Duncan Alldridge is the blogger behind
Our Masculine Heart (UK) a cool blog "
talking about men and masculinity." Nice title. I am not sure how I found his blog, but it's good stuff, although I wish he posted more often. This is the current post from back in November (2012).
I’m
heading down a darkening, wintry M3, returning home from an intense
weekend in a Wiltshire forest. I’m sleepless, tender, and inspired by
the healing power of a group of men. During the past few weekends I’ve
attended various events and workshops with men: in Brighton, in London
and here, near Salisbury. I want to write about how it feels being in
the presence of men.
Men Together
There’s nothing more grounding for me than being in the company of my
own sex: no distractions, straight talking, the sense of humour, men
together getting things done. I feel at home, as if I’ve come
home, and even though I’m meeting many of these men for the first time,
everyone here understands me in a way no woman ever can.
Do I allow this to happen enough in my life?
I look deeply into his eyes, beyond the mysteries of his
childhood, and held within a deep, beautiful vulnerability, lies the
heart of this man. I feel his tenderness, longing and pain. I see myself
reflected as his father, his brother, his son, and sense his spirit,
lightly, flickering, slowly meeting mine. I am beyond my body now, in
the places where God moves, and something holy here dances between us.
When I strip away the societal conditioning of how I am expected to
be as a man – me against the world, just surviving, defined by my work
and in a world where I’m taught that repressing my feelings is the only
way to get on – and then step into a held space with other men, it’s as
if the whole world tilts. I find I can speak what’s on my heart without
fear of judgement, I feel I am not alone and that other men are similar
to me – they too have been hounded by addictions: pornography, computer
games, sex, alcohol and drugs, they too are wounded by the world, they
too know what it’s like to be truly alone.
Shared Suffering
As I grew up I was conditioned into thinking that being ‘emotional’
was weak and that it was something best avoided or overridden rather
than experienced. Vulnerability was what women ‘did’ and so for me to
really feel was something to be ashamed of and therefore
something that I learned to hold back. It’s okay for a girl to cry at
school, in fact she’s not a girl unless she can do this, but it’s
absolutely not okay for a boy. So, like many of us, I spent years and
years storing up my pain.
A circle of 30 men define a woodland space. ‘Any man who
has lost a loved one or partner – step forward. Men, you share a special
bond.’ Damp leaves carpet the wet earth. As men step forward I feel
time expand and the space around me ripe with the fruit of our shared
past, our history; the circles of men that have stood for thousands of
years.
As the circle shifts, I feel one man’s pain, then
another. As if we are one body we stand; and as the inner circle of men
sharing their grief shifts, I feel the presence of an ancestry only
rarely recalled. I feel an overbearing sense of grief; and as the men’s
tears moisten their cheeks and fall, we are lifted up into a unity and
togetherness that I yearn for all men to share.
I’m crying again. A deep, deep sense of grief. I cry. I cry for us
all, for those men before me, and those to come; for everything I’ve
ever lost: my childhood, my friends, the women I’ve met and will never
meet, for love undiscovered; for her, for you, for life, for God.
For me, they are the tears of deep healing, the years of stored male
grief; all of our shared tears. And they are the same tears that invite
me to fully live the next beautiful, sunlit morning.
After I cried I felt relieved… and happy and grateful,
and maybe not fully healed, but helped in a huge way by expressing my
feelings… (Thomas G Fiffer – Boys Do Cry, and Men Do, Too)
Taking It To The Men
No woman wants to be her man’s mother. It’s the last thing she desires or needs. It’s a complete turn off. It’s just a big NO.
So why is it I so often fall back into doing it?
How many times have I taken my needs to my women? Just how many? I
don’t know about you but it makes me squirm. Let’s just say too many.
I’ll only set her free by taking it to the men.
I feel the circle around me, the men’s faces, their
presence. I move them both around the space, the two women in my life.
And as I stand apart from them both, fully seen in my need, I know that I
am a man, my father’s son. I leave them both to their paths and step
back into the circle, more determined and resolved – to keep on taking
it to the men.
Validation
Is there anything more powerful than being validated by another man –
where a man actually comes to you, meets you fully in the eyes and
gives you positive affirmation? I don’t mean being told I’m a clever guy
who’s funny, but have you ever heard a man speak fully of his
experience of you? Until my early 40s the nearest I’d got to this was a
few drunk ‘I love yous’ in a pub, or some throw away comments that never
landed and fit only for the wind. I was too scared to make myself
vulnerable. It’s my conditioning. Maybe I still wanted to be one up; I
loved him, but I wouldn’t trust him with my heart.
As men, we need each other’s validation. The validation we maybe
didn’t get from our fathers. The validation that, over the years, has
been replaced by individualism, narcissism and competition. My father
gave me strong positive affirmation many times, but if he were unable to
meet me in this way, it’s possible that I’d never get this validation
anywhere else.
As the men’s words sink in I feel my heartbeat, the
visceral pumping blood of history, the man inside me preparing to rule, a
benevolent king ready to serve. I feel an inner strength within me,
shining, and I feel something of the boy in me die. My spirit quickens, I
sense God’s gentle power and feel ready to stand in the world.
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