July 30, 2025 • 19 mins
Hey, Friend!
Mansplaining is patronizing and condescending. When a man mansplains to a woman he automatically assumes she has no knowledge or experience with the subject. Women can be guilty of this to, although the term womansplaining hasn’t really caught on.
In today’s episode, I share some ways a man can avoid mansplaining, by focusing on being a good listener, being humble in his communication, paying attention to non-verbal cues, and being open to feedback.
If you are guilty of mansplaining or womansplaining, or you have been on the receiving end, this episode is for you.
I pray this blesses you,
Becky
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Mansplaining.
(00:02):
That's a term used to describe a situation in which a man explains something to a woman
in a condescending, patronizing, or overly simplistic way.
Often in a context where the woman may already have knowledge or expertise on the subject.
And the key aspect of Mansplaining is not just the act of explaining something, but doing
(00:26):
so in a way that dismisses or undermines a one's ability to understand or to contribute
to the conversation typically assuming that she knows less.
Today's episode is how to avoid man's Blaining in ministry.
Want to know more?
(00:47):
Let's dive in to today's episode.
Hey friend, are you a people-pleasing conflict-avoiding leader?
Is your secret relationship with fear affecting your leadership decisions?
Do you want to learn how to build credibility and confidence or to navigate difficult conversations?
(01:07):
Do you long to manage your time without sacrificing your family or self-care?
Welcome to leadership becomes her.
I'm Becky Burroughs, your host and a minister and life and leadership coach with over 50 years
experience in leadership.
I firmly believe God has given you everything you need to lead well.
(01:29):
You have the toolbox.
You just need to learn how to use the tools.
So get comfy or start a mindless task.
You know how to pause or rewind if you need to.
Let's get started.
So I want to begin by sharing some of the key characteristics of Mansplaining.
(01:51):
First of all, using a patronizing tone.
If the man speaks as if the woman is unaware or inexperienced, often regardless of her actual
expertise.
Now very often in many churches, men are in, I'll call them higher levels of ministry positions,
(02:13):
maybe there are more men who are pastors over an entire church and more women tend to
be over-poticular ministries.
However, and so there are some experiences and there are some things that men experience
and know how to do that.
She's not, let's say the woman she's talking to has never been a pastor over an entire church
(02:36):
but she is the pastor over her ministry.
So it's very similar only on a smaller scale.
You also see this with generalists.
You've got a specialist, a man in ministry who has perhaps multiple degrees in some form
of ministry or theology and you've got a woman coming in as a generalist who has multiple
(02:56):
degrees but they're in something else.
And so the assumption is that, well I've got to simplify this, I've got to talk down to
her because well she doesn't have my ministry experience.
Now when I first came to ministry, I had multiple degrees in something else.
I'm very much a generalist and one of the first things I noted was that in our staff meetings
(03:19):
the men with the multiple degrees in theology would use theological terms that didn't have
any meaning for me.
Not necessarily biblical terms, just theology based, such as at that particular time 18 years
ago we would get any staff meetings and the men would, you know, softly debate if we were
(03:42):
going to be a missional church or an attractional church.
If you have not worked in a church you don't necessarily know what those terms mean.
I had to learn what those terms mean or what they meant.
And I remember thinking, well we could be 100% missional if we didn't have a building.
So we've got a building.
Why are we having this debate?
(04:03):
Seems like we got to figure out how to be both or get rid of the building.
It seemed logical to me but nobody asked me.
Another thing they would talk about is they would use, they would throw around the term organic.
We want to do this organically.
And I'm sitting here thinking, I know what the word organic means.
I was afraid to ask for fear that they would mansplain.
(04:25):
So I'd go look it up because I didn't want to be talked to, talked down to because I was
trying to learn inner language, inside language that somebody from the outside coming in doesn't
necessarily understand.
And ministers, men or women have to be careful about this when it comes to their church.
I see ministers get up to the pulpit and the preachers do this, some preachers do this,
(04:50):
but anybody can get up there and they'll use terms that means something to ministry, but
they don't mean anything to just the general population.
And it takes skill to talk about things that you've been talking about in your ministers
meeting using theological terms and then you get to the church and you've got to use everyday
(05:12):
language, every man language so that everyone can understand what you're saying because
you're not impressing anyone with your unique language that they don't get, that you don't
look that smart.
You know, if you think about it, have you ever gone to the doctor and you say, okay, doctor,
you run all these tests, what is it?
And all he can do is use scientific terminology.
(05:33):
Now, I want to hear the scientific terms, but then I want you to tell me what that means
because I haven't been to your school.
I don't know what you know and it honestly takes some of the most intelligent people to
take complex terms and put them in simple language.
And that's what we have to do and we have to learn how to do that without talking down
(05:55):
to.
We want to get on the same level in explaining something because if we talk down to,
it's patronizing and that's the issue with mansplaining.
If a man speaks to a woman who's asking a logical question, she's asking a question that
anybody might ask and she's talking down to her, it's obvious rather than saying, oh, I'm
(06:19):
sorry, I should have put that differently and worded in a different way or maybe mansplaining
can be unsolicited explanation like the man just automatically explains something, assuming
she doesn't get it.
For example, it could be about teaching a class.
No, maybe she's never taught a class in church, but she does come from a background in education.
(06:44):
She's been teaching her whole life.
So you don't have to teach her how to teach.
Maybe you need to suggest some ways in which it's different for her to be thinking about.
For example, when you teach in a school, there's going to be tests somewhat you taught.
You're going to expect people taking notes.
You're going to expect they've read the chapter ahead of time.
(07:05):
These are all expectations you can't have in a church.
And so just suggesting, hey, let me tell you some ways in which it's different so that
you'll be prepared.
That's not mansplaining.
That's preparing a teacher.
Or if you make assumptions based on gender, assuming that a woman is not going to know
or understand simply because she's a woman rather than based on her actual knowledge or
(07:28):
experience.
I've got to say this.
As I was thinking about this episode, I posed the question to my search engine, what is
the female equivalent of mansplaining?
And the search engine did not have one.
So it doesn't mean it doesn't happen.
(07:49):
Women do this too.
We talk down to men or some women do about things that we assume they don't know anything
about.
And we're taking care of kids.
In other generations, the woman took care of the kids and the man brought home the bacon
so to speak.
Now, those are shared responsibilities.
(08:11):
And many, many, many, I would say most young fathers know about as much about taking care
of their kids as the wife does.
And so to talk down to a man, assuming that because he's a man, he doesn't understand things
like things that were traditionally women's roles in other generations like caring for
the house, like taking care of the kids or buying the groceries or whatever it is is the
(08:36):
same thing as mansplaining.
I just don't have a term for it yet.
But because we do have a term for mansplaining, that's why I'm talking about it today.
And here's why this is problematic.
Mansplaining highlights power dynamics and gender inequality where men may inadvertently
(08:59):
or sometimes deliberately assert dominance in a conversation.
It can make women feel dismissed or undervalued or ignored and reinforce the stereotype that
women are less competent or knowledgeable.
I will say in this generation in this time, I don't experience mansplaining as much as I
did maybe 10, 20 years ago.
(09:21):
But one thing that I do, I still experience and there's, I don't have a term for it, specific
to men.
But sometimes there are different ways in which men and women communicate.
The men that I work with want the facts, just the facts.
And the women tend to want details.
(09:41):
They tend to want to picture what happened.
So let me give you some very specific examples.
When I first came into ministry, I was working very closely with another, with a male minister.
He was training me in my role.
And we would meet once a week.
And so I would, I would say notes for things that I wanted to talk about.
(10:02):
But occasionally I couldn't wait a week and so I would send him an email.
And I wanted him to have all the details he needed so I would write this long email.
And I would send it to him.
And when he, when I got his response, I'm opening the email and it said concur.
And I'm like, okay, I just wrote you three paragraphs and all I get is concur.
(10:25):
So glad you agree with me.
Need more detail.
I need to know, are there any points that I need to improve?
What did you like the best?
Etc.
Etc.
And I learned because of our different communication styles to shorten my emails, hoping that would
encourage him to lengthen his.
Didn't always happen, but I did learn to write, type your emails.
(10:47):
Another example is I went on sabbatical last year.
I missed an entire month of meetings and communication.
I had no idea what was going on in church.
And when I came back, here's what I knew, to do and what I knew not to do.
I knew not to go to any of the men and say, so what did I miss in last week's meeting?
(11:09):
I know y'all were going to discuss what to do Easter, what did I miss?
Because if I asked any of the men, they would say something like, we decided not to have
a breakfast on Easter morning and here's why.
I knew to make an appointment with the women.
And so there was one of the women who literally before I had a chance to make an appointment
(11:32):
with her, she contacted me and said, hey, let's go to lunch next week.
I've been keeping notes this month about everything you missed and I want to go over them with
you.
That was music to my ears.
She as a fellow woman and someone who knew me well, I'm not saying all women are like
this, but she knew me knew that I wanted to experience the meetings as if I had been
(11:55):
there.
I wanted to know.
So instead of saying, and then when we got to Easter, we decided to have not to have a breakfast,
she would say, you know, we talked about having a breakfast.
And this one thought this and this one thought that and this one thought this and that and
we decided we just wouldn't have one because she knew that would have been one of my first
questions.
(12:15):
Why are we not having a breakfast for?
We always do an Easter breakfast.
She knew that about me.
So she came prepared.
So not every instance of a man explaining something to a woman is mansplaining.
This term specifically refers to situations where the explanation is delivered in a condescending
(12:35):
or dismissive way based on assumptions about gender.
And by the way, I just remembered that when I asked social, not social media, when I asked
my search engine, if there was a female equivalent, it said, well, one potential equivalent
could be woman-splaining.
But it's not a term that has been established nor is it widely used and it doesn't carry
(12:59):
the cultural weight and the gender implications that mansplaining does.
And the concept of mansplaining is deeply tied to historical and social power dynamics where
men traditionally had more authority, more visibility and control, including in communication
(13:21):
and knowledge sharing.
But it specifically addresses the dynamic where men and often it's unintentional talk down
to women.
And again, I don't see that now near as much as I saw it in the past.
And it's important to know that women are capable of this as well, that over-explaining
(13:44):
something or talking down.
So while we're talking about it, I'm going to give some tips.
If that's you, if you're a man listening to this podcast and you know you are guilty of mansplaining,
if you're a woman and you know that you woman's playing, here are some tips.
Listen actively.
Before you offer an explanation, make sure you're fully listening to the other person, pay
(14:07):
attention to their perspective and ensure they're not already knowledgeable about the topic.
And then engage their ideas by asking, clarifying questions.
This shows that you value their input and you don't assume that they don't know what they're
talking about.
Assess the need for an explanation.
Ask yourself if an explanation is necessary, are they asking for help?
(14:30):
Or are they simply being a part of the conversation?
And try to avoid the urge to explain something unless it's clear that the other person is asking
for information.
So before you speak, pause.
Ask the situation and if the other person is contributing meaningfully, meaningfully likely
they don't need you to educate them.
(14:52):
Recognize when someone has expertise or experience in the area being
discussed, go back to my example of teaching.
You've got a lifelong educator who's now working in a church teaching a adult class, Bible
class for the first time.
And then engage her expertise in teaching, her experience, avoid assuming she need your
(15:15):
input.
And when you do make a suggestion, say, hey, just so you know, just so you're prepared, this
is different.
Think about all the adult Bible classes you've been in, you know, as you know, acknowledging
her expertise, her experience in attending a class.
As you know, there's no tests, there's no requirement, there's no this, there's no that.
(15:37):
And so it is a little bit different.
And so if you're tempted to mansplain or woman's playing, be humble, be self aware, recognize
you don't have all the answers, be open to learning from others, approach the conversation
with humility, and avoid assuming that you know more than the other person.
(15:57):
And if you're unsure about something or you feel you might be over explaining, check in.
Say, does that make sense?
I don't want to overwhelm you with information if you're already familiar with this.
Pay attention to nonverbal cues.
Be aware of their body language.
If they look disinterested, are they interrupt you or try to?
Are they give short answers?
It might be a sign they understand more than you know, and they don't need further explanation.
(16:23):
You know, you could try seeking permission before mansplaining.
If you feel the need to explain something, ask if they would like your input.
This shows respect for their autonomy and it voids the assumption they need your help.
You could say, "Would you need me to explain this further?"
Or, "Do you feel like you've got a good handle on it?"
And this gives them the chance to guide the conversation and helps you ensure that you
(16:46):
are not overstepping.
And be open to feedback.
If someone tells you that your explanation was unnecessary or even patronizing, listen
to them and adjust your behavior in the future.
Being open to feedback is absolutely key to improving your communication.
And avoid being defensive if they point out to you that you're mansplaining.
(17:10):
Don't be defensive, express understanding and gratitude for the feedback and make a conscious
effort to adjust next time.
And respect their boundaries.
Be aware of how much you're talking and whether you are dominating the conversation.
If you find yourself speaking too much, give the other person space to share their thoughts
and opinions.
(17:31):
And as you're talking, say, "What do you think?"
Or, "I'd love to hear your thoughts and invite their collaboration so that you can ensure
the conversation is balanced."
And it wouldn't be a bad idea to educate yourself on gender dynamics.
You know, mansplaining is rooted in this, in historical power imbalances between gender.
So educate yourself about these dynamics.
(17:53):
And this will help you avoid inadvertently falling into these patterns.
So if you want to avoid mansplaining or even woman's planning, focus on being a good listener,
recognize the expertise of others and be humble in your communication.
By asking someone if they need an explanation, by paying attention to nonverbal cues and
(18:14):
being open to feedback, you can engage in more respectful and collaborative conversation.
Because ultimately, the goal is to treat others with the same respect and consideration
that you would want for yourself without assuming that you always have the answers.
Hey, I hope this has been helpful to you.
(18:35):
Let's do this again next week.
It is my prayer that this podcast inspired you, blessed you, or made you think.
If so, please share it with a friend, subscribe, and please leave a review.
Hey, I want to connect with you.
Follow me on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn.
Send me a DM or email me at hello@beckyburroughs.com.
(18:59):
If you are a Christian woman who leads and you are interested in one of my Leadership Boot
camps for Women in Ministry, this is a four week workshop.
Or becoming part of a Kairos Cohort, year-long group coaching.
Send me a DM or an email for more information.
We'll talk soon.
[MUSIC]
(19:26):
(upbeat music)
Mansplaining.
(00:02):
That's a term used to describe a situation in which a man explains something to a woman
in a condescending, patronizing, or overly simplistic way.
Often in a context where the woman may already have knowledge or expertise on the subject.
And the key aspect of Mansplaining is not just the act of explaining something, but doing
(00:26):
so in a way that dismisses or undermines a one's ability to understand or to contribute
to the conversation typically assuming that she knows less.
Today's episode is how to avoid man's Blaining in ministry.
Want to know more?
(00:47):
Let's dive in to today's episode.
Hey friend, are you a people-pleasing conflict-avoiding leader?
Is your secret relationship with fear affecting your leadership decisions?
Do you want to learn how to build credibility and confidence or to navigate difficult conversations?
(01:07):
Do you long to manage your time without sacrificing your family or self-care?
Welcome to leadership becomes her.
I'm Becky Burroughs, your host and a minister and life and leadership coach with over 50 years
experience in leadership.
I firmly believe God has given you everything you need to lead well.
(01:29):
You have the toolbox.
You just need to learn how to use the tools.
So get comfy or start a mindless task.
You know how to pause or rewind if you need to.
Let's get started.
So I want to begin by sharing some of the key characteristics of Mansplaining.
(01:51):
First of all, using a patronizing tone.
If the man speaks as if the woman is unaware or inexperienced, often regardless of her actual
expertise.
Now very often in many churches, men are in, I'll call them higher levels of ministry positions,
(02:13):
maybe there are more men who are pastors over an entire church and more women tend to
be over-poticular ministries.
However, and so there are some experiences and there are some things that men experience
and know how to do that.
She's not, let's say the woman she's talking to has never been a pastor over an entire church
(02:36):
but she is the pastor over her ministry.
So it's very similar only on a smaller scale.
You also see this with generalists.
You've got a specialist, a man in ministry who has perhaps multiple degrees in some form
of ministry or theology and you've got a woman coming in as a generalist who has multiple
(02:56):
degrees but they're in something else.
And so the assumption is that, well I've got to simplify this, I've got to talk down to
her because well she doesn't have my ministry experience.
Now when I first came to ministry, I had multiple degrees in something else.
I'm very much a generalist and one of the first things I noted was that in our staff meetings
(03:19):
the men with the multiple degrees in theology would use theological terms that didn't have
any meaning for me.
Not necessarily biblical terms, just theology based, such as at that particular time 18 years
ago we would get any staff meetings and the men would, you know, softly debate if we were
(03:42):
going to be a missional church or an attractional church.
If you have not worked in a church you don't necessarily know what those terms mean.
I had to learn what those terms mean or what they meant.
And I remember thinking, well we could be 100% missional if we didn't have a building.
So we've got a building.
Why are we having this debate?
(04:03):
Seems like we got to figure out how to be both or get rid of the building.
It seemed logical to me but nobody asked me.
Another thing they would talk about is they would use, they would throw around the term organic.
We want to do this organically.
And I'm sitting here thinking, I know what the word organic means.
I was afraid to ask for fear that they would mansplain.
(04:25):
So I'd go look it up because I didn't want to be talked to, talked down to because I was
trying to learn inner language, inside language that somebody from the outside coming in doesn't
necessarily understand.
And ministers, men or women have to be careful about this when it comes to their church.
I see ministers get up to the pulpit and the preachers do this, some preachers do this,
(04:50):
but anybody can get up there and they'll use terms that means something to ministry, but
they don't mean anything to just the general population.
And it takes skill to talk about things that you've been talking about in your ministers
meeting using theological terms and then you get to the church and you've got to use everyday
(05:12):
language, every man language so that everyone can understand what you're saying because
you're not impressing anyone with your unique language that they don't get, that you don't
look that smart.
You know, if you think about it, have you ever gone to the doctor and you say, okay, doctor,
you run all these tests, what is it?
And all he can do is use scientific terminology.
(05:33):
Now, I want to hear the scientific terms, but then I want you to tell me what that means
because I haven't been to your school.
I don't know what you know and it honestly takes some of the most intelligent people to
take complex terms and put them in simple language.
And that's what we have to do and we have to learn how to do that without talking down
(05:55):
to.
We want to get on the same level in explaining something because if we talk down to,
it's patronizing and that's the issue with mansplaining.
If a man speaks to a woman who's asking a logical question, she's asking a question that
anybody might ask and she's talking down to her, it's obvious rather than saying, oh, I'm
(06:19):
sorry, I should have put that differently and worded in a different way or maybe mansplaining
can be unsolicited explanation like the man just automatically explains something, assuming
she doesn't get it.
For example, it could be about teaching a class.
No, maybe she's never taught a class in church, but she does come from a background in education.
(06:44):
She's been teaching her whole life.
So you don't have to teach her how to teach.
Maybe you need to suggest some ways in which it's different for her to be thinking about.
For example, when you teach in a school, there's going to be tests somewhat you taught.
You're going to expect people taking notes.
You're going to expect they've read the chapter ahead of time.
(07:05):
These are all expectations you can't have in a church.
And so just suggesting, hey, let me tell you some ways in which it's different so that
you'll be prepared.
That's not mansplaining.
That's preparing a teacher.
Or if you make assumptions based on gender, assuming that a woman is not going to know
or understand simply because she's a woman rather than based on her actual knowledge or
(07:28):
experience.
I've got to say this.
As I was thinking about this episode, I posed the question to my search engine, what is
the female equivalent of mansplaining?
And the search engine did not have one.
So it doesn't mean it doesn't happen.
(07:49):
Women do this too.
We talk down to men or some women do about things that we assume they don't know anything
about.
And we're taking care of kids.
In other generations, the woman took care of the kids and the man brought home the bacon
so to speak.
Now, those are shared responsibilities.
(08:11):
And many, many, many, I would say most young fathers know about as much about taking care
of their kids as the wife does.
And so to talk down to a man, assuming that because he's a man, he doesn't understand things
like things that were traditionally women's roles in other generations like caring for
the house, like taking care of the kids or buying the groceries or whatever it is is the
(08:36):
same thing as mansplaining.
I just don't have a term for it yet.
But because we do have a term for mansplaining, that's why I'm talking about it today.
And here's why this is problematic.
Mansplaining highlights power dynamics and gender inequality where men may inadvertently
(08:59):
or sometimes deliberately assert dominance in a conversation.
It can make women feel dismissed or undervalued or ignored and reinforce the stereotype that
women are less competent or knowledgeable.
I will say in this generation in this time, I don't experience mansplaining as much as I
did maybe 10, 20 years ago.
(09:21):
But one thing that I do, I still experience and there's, I don't have a term for it, specific
to men.
But sometimes there are different ways in which men and women communicate.
The men that I work with want the facts, just the facts.
And the women tend to want details.
(09:41):
They tend to want to picture what happened.
So let me give you some very specific examples.
When I first came into ministry, I was working very closely with another, with a male minister.
He was training me in my role.
And we would meet once a week.
And so I would, I would say notes for things that I wanted to talk about.
(10:02):
But occasionally I couldn't wait a week and so I would send him an email.
And I wanted him to have all the details he needed so I would write this long email.
And I would send it to him.
And when he, when I got his response, I'm opening the email and it said concur.
And I'm like, okay, I just wrote you three paragraphs and all I get is concur.
(10:25):
So glad you agree with me.
Need more detail.
I need to know, are there any points that I need to improve?
What did you like the best?
Etc.
Etc.
And I learned because of our different communication styles to shorten my emails, hoping that would
encourage him to lengthen his.
Didn't always happen, but I did learn to write, type your emails.
(10:47):
Another example is I went on sabbatical last year.
I missed an entire month of meetings and communication.
I had no idea what was going on in church.
And when I came back, here's what I knew, to do and what I knew not to do.
I knew not to go to any of the men and say, so what did I miss in last week's meeting?
(11:09):
I know y'all were going to discuss what to do Easter, what did I miss?
Because if I asked any of the men, they would say something like, we decided not to have
a breakfast on Easter morning and here's why.
I knew to make an appointment with the women.
And so there was one of the women who literally before I had a chance to make an appointment
(11:32):
with her, she contacted me and said, hey, let's go to lunch next week.
I've been keeping notes this month about everything you missed and I want to go over them with
you.
That was music to my ears.
She as a fellow woman and someone who knew me well, I'm not saying all women are like
this, but she knew me knew that I wanted to experience the meetings as if I had been
(11:55):
there.
I wanted to know.
So instead of saying, and then when we got to Easter, we decided to have not to have a breakfast,
she would say, you know, we talked about having a breakfast.
And this one thought this and this one thought that and this one thought this and that and
we decided we just wouldn't have one because she knew that would have been one of my first
questions.
(12:15):
Why are we not having a breakfast for?
We always do an Easter breakfast.
She knew that about me.
So she came prepared.
So not every instance of a man explaining something to a woman is mansplaining.
This term specifically refers to situations where the explanation is delivered in a condescending
(12:35):
or dismissive way based on assumptions about gender.
And by the way, I just remembered that when I asked social, not social media, when I asked
my search engine, if there was a female equivalent, it said, well, one potential equivalent
could be woman-splaining.
But it's not a term that has been established nor is it widely used and it doesn't carry
(12:59):
the cultural weight and the gender implications that mansplaining does.
And the concept of mansplaining is deeply tied to historical and social power dynamics where
men traditionally had more authority, more visibility and control, including in communication
(13:21):
and knowledge sharing.
But it specifically addresses the dynamic where men and often it's unintentional talk down
to women.
And again, I don't see that now near as much as I saw it in the past.
And it's important to know that women are capable of this as well, that over-explaining
(13:44):
something or talking down.
So while we're talking about it, I'm going to give some tips.
If that's you, if you're a man listening to this podcast and you know you are guilty of mansplaining,
if you're a woman and you know that you woman's playing, here are some tips.
Listen actively.
Before you offer an explanation, make sure you're fully listening to the other person, pay
(14:07):
attention to their perspective and ensure they're not already knowledgeable about the topic.
And then engage their ideas by asking, clarifying questions.
This shows that you value their input and you don't assume that they don't know what they're
talking about.
Assess the need for an explanation.
Ask yourself if an explanation is necessary, are they asking for help?
(14:30):
Or are they simply being a part of the conversation?
And try to avoid the urge to explain something unless it's clear that the other person is asking
for information.
So before you speak, pause.
Ask the situation and if the other person is contributing meaningfully, meaningfully likely
they don't need you to educate them.
(14:52):
Recognize when someone has expertise or experience in the area being
discussed, go back to my example of teaching.
You've got a lifelong educator who's now working in a church teaching a adult class, Bible
class for the first time.
And then engage her expertise in teaching, her experience, avoid assuming she need your
(15:15):
input.
And when you do make a suggestion, say, hey, just so you know, just so you're prepared, this
is different.
Think about all the adult Bible classes you've been in, you know, as you know, acknowledging
her expertise, her experience in attending a class.
As you know, there's no tests, there's no requirement, there's no this, there's no that.
(15:37):
And so it is a little bit different.
And so if you're tempted to mansplain or woman's playing, be humble, be self aware, recognize
you don't have all the answers, be open to learning from others, approach the conversation
with humility, and avoid assuming that you know more than the other person.
(15:57):
And if you're unsure about something or you feel you might be over explaining, check in.
Say, does that make sense?
I don't want to overwhelm you with information if you're already familiar with this.
Pay attention to nonverbal cues.
Be aware of their body language.
If they look disinterested, are they interrupt you or try to?
Are they give short answers?
It might be a sign they understand more than you know, and they don't need further explanation.
(16:23):
You know, you could try seeking permission before mansplaining.
If you feel the need to explain something, ask if they would like your input.
This shows respect for their autonomy and it voids the assumption they need your help.
You could say, "Would you need me to explain this further?"
Or, "Do you feel like you've got a good handle on it?"
And this gives them the chance to guide the conversation and helps you ensure that you
(16:46):
are not overstepping.
And be open to feedback.
If someone tells you that your explanation was unnecessary or even patronizing, listen
to them and adjust your behavior in the future.
Being open to feedback is absolutely key to improving your communication.
And avoid being defensive if they point out to you that you're mansplaining.
(17:10):
Don't be defensive, express understanding and gratitude for the feedback and make a conscious
effort to adjust next time.
And respect their boundaries.
Be aware of how much you're talking and whether you are dominating the conversation.
If you find yourself speaking too much, give the other person space to share their thoughts
and opinions.
(17:31):
And as you're talking, say, "What do you think?"
Or, "I'd love to hear your thoughts and invite their collaboration so that you can ensure
the conversation is balanced."
And it wouldn't be a bad idea to educate yourself on gender dynamics.
You know, mansplaining is rooted in this, in historical power imbalances between gender.
So educate yourself about these dynamics.
(17:53):
And this will help you avoid inadvertently falling into these patterns.
So if you want to avoid mansplaining or even woman's planning, focus on being a good listener,
recognize the expertise of others and be humble in your communication.
By asking someone if they need an explanation, by paying attention to nonverbal cues and
(18:14):
being open to feedback, you can engage in more respectful and collaborative conversation.
Because ultimately, the goal is to treat others with the same respect and consideration
that you would want for yourself without assuming that you always have the answers.
Hey, I hope this has been helpful to you.
(18:35):
Let's do this again next week.
It is my prayer that this podcast inspired you, blessed you, or made you think.
If so, please share it with a friend, subscribe, and please leave a review.
Hey, I want to connect with you.
Follow me on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn.
Send me a DM or email me at hello@beckyburroughs.com.
(18:59):
If you are a Christian woman who leads and you are interested in one of my Leadership Boot
camps for Women in Ministry, this is a four week workshop.
Or becoming part of a Kairos Cohort, year-long group coaching.
Send me a DM or an email for more information.
We'll talk soon.
[MUSIC]
(19:26):
(upbeat music)
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