by Simone de Beauvoir
The above quote has a meaningful meaning and I will give my best and explain it with a few simple example base on my opinion..
If you look at the nature of a man, you will understand that the way a man is programmed to express love and emotions is quite different from that of a woman.
From the context of the quote above, I understand that a man and a woman have different ways of expressing their love and if there is no understand between them in this aspect of expressing love to each other, there's going to be a misunderstanding. The definition of love by men is not the same as to how women will define love for you, and this difference is what is leading to some misunderstanding in relationships today. Unless there is a mutual understand between two partners perspective in a relationship, there will always be a misunderstood that can lead to division.
Majority of men today often think that when expressing love to women, all what women wants is for them to provide for their needs. Men most times shows that they love women by providing every the woman wants, lavishing her with so much gifts, spending money on her, protect her from other men but in real sense, with all these things, the money, gifts and everything, what a woman is expecting from a man is to show that the man love her not just by spending on her or lavishing her with gifts, but loving her through affection and giving her attention.
Could it be that this affection, attention and the emotional connection that is lacking among men is one of the reasons today for many broken relationships.
Women can be with a man for the money and fame, and gifts, but their hearts might belong to another person who gives them the attention they need. Someone who has time to listen to them. What I'm trying to say is that men expresses their love through their actions of provision, protection and doing things while women feel love through affection and giving them attention.
Most often men neglect simple compliment to their partners. For women (most) to know that their partners truthly love them he has to show that through his compliment on them as often as possible. Sweet romantic words like I love you, babe you are looking beautiful, your dress look very nice, compliment them publicly around your friends and hers are some of the little things that makes a woman believes that you love her as a man, but men most times don't understand these things. Men often believe in expressing their love through actions, buying gifts, spending on a woman, just doing things and this is one of the reasons for having misunderstanding that cause division in relationships.
A man might feel that if he is doing everything for you as a woman, then he love's her and there is no need to say it with his words all the time. But women on the other hand want to feel loved mostly through those words that men often neglect. They prefer the words of affirmation.
One thing I would also like to say regarding this is that a man always feel he is the boss, he is the head and as the head he should be respected and his words, and decisions are always right and final and women feels that they should have a say, they should have an opinion which should be heard as well! They should be understood by the men. In this kind of situation, if a man always feels he is the boss and the head, and the woman want her opinion to be heard, there is going to be a serious misunderstanding. Men will want you as a woman to show that you love him by respecting him and his decision and the woman will want you to as a man to show that you love her when you understand her and her opinions.
Well this is just my opinion regarding this.
There are many difference between a man and a woman when it comes to expressing their love. The good thing is for both gender to understand each others perspective and have a mutual understanding of each others way of expressing love.