What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

I want to throw this question out to everyone including Robert and get your feedback. Masculinity is something that I've struggled with feeling especially with growing up around some very abusive men in my environment. As I've been working through the trauma they caused me I am integrating into my life a sense of masculinity but feel challenged because of the steriotypes of society of what a man is supposed to be along with the very destructive role models I've had. So, if you're up to sharing your story, your thoughts and feelings on this please do… oh, and anyone's input is invaluable… male and female.

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Great to meet you at the Practicum, Michael, and I look forward to doing further work with you.  I'll send your question in to Robert next week, and I'll have something to say about it myself at some point (a little swamped right now). 

For now, here are some threads that have some relevance to this topic:

• MEN’S WORK: GUTS, HEART, PRESENCE
• Gifts of “Feminine” and “Masculine”
• Fight Club (Reviewed by Robert Augustus Masters)

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

As a child I didn't have great male role models in my life. My father was a great guy in some ways, and I love him; and when I was growing up he drank too much, tended to be loud and aggressive, had outbursts of anger, and on rare but memorable occasions beat me on my bare ass with a belt. I felt afraid of him.  I didn't gravitate to the things he was into – hunting, fishing, all that traditional “guy” stuff; unfortunately, as a result he and I didn't bond very well; at that time he just didn't know how to relate to me as I was (for the most part; I did really get into his interest in weird topics like UFO's and the supernatural, which lead me in some interesting directions.) I also remember being shamed for feeling “tender” emotions (in other words, being “unmanly); e.g. once as a teenager I had an argument with him, and when I started to tear up he said angrily, his voice dripping with contempt, “Go ahead, cry,” as he left the room in disgust.

I was extremely shy and introverted as a child, and generally didn't get along well with my male peers at school, tending to be ostracized, mocked, and sometimes beaten up. I tended to have only one or a few friends at any given time. There was one uncle I liked a lot, even to the point of hero worship for a while, but he didn't model strength and presence; he was more of a shy, sensitive, intellectual type (like me). At family parties the group would sometimes divide into men in one room, women in another, and as a child and teenager I would often spend most of my time in the room with the women.

When I was young it felt easier and safer to feel anger than other emotions; generally, though, I wished at that point to feel no emotions whatsoever, to be cold and logical. At that point in my life I despised myself for feeling vulnerable or needing other people. Although it seemed “easier” to feel anger and even hatred, anger seemed to be a dangerous, hard to control force, especially in men (and very much so in myself).

As I grew up I came to loathe men and masculinity, and associate being male with anger, aggression and domination. I sometimes hated being a man, and wished that I had been born a woman instead. (I wasn't a transsexual, however; I didn't believe I was, in actuality, a woman born into the wrong body.) As I got older I tended to form friendships with and/or develop crushes on women who disliked or even hated men, a position I substantially agreed with at that time. I tried to be more like women, as I perceived them to be – sensitive, caring, nurturing, good listeners etc. Women loved me as a friend but didn't want to be more intimate with me (and who can blame them?) I learned a lot about women through these close friendships.

Through my childhood, my teens and twenties I strongly overdeveloped one aspect of my self while repressing another. Somewhere along the line, probably sometime in my twenties, and picking up steam as I got older, I began to appreciate that being a man is not intrinsically a bad thing, that women are not superior to men (interestingly, I still feel some resistance even now to making such a statement; something inside me says are you sure about that? and I feel strongly compelled to qualify it, as in, “…women are not necessarily superior to men…”

I feel this post has gone on long enough, but it gives some idea of what my experience of growing up male was like; perhaps later at some point I'll write a bit about the journey of learning to be OK with and eventually even start to enjoy being a man in the world.

I haven't read any of the responses to this thread yet, preferring to sit with my own feelings around this topic.  I may do so for a while longer, but eventually I'll read through everyone else's responses.

spiral out,

Arthur

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Hey Arthur!

Thank-you SO much for your post.

I resonate with some of the things you say, like feeling vulnerable or needing other people was simply the worst thing I could experience and the most shameful thing I could be.

In my early teens I wanted to be a soldier and pretty much everything I did in my life became influenced by that. I read that the guys in the regiment I wanted to join and read about all the time, the infamous SAS, only did exercises in a minimum of 50 reps. So guess what? Everything became 50 reps, at least. I read thye didn't wear any clothes while sleeping, so of course I didn't do that either!  I asked my biology teacher in the middle of class if it was safe to drink urine becase, I thought, one day I could be in the desert and have no water. The list goes on!

Anger and aggression for me was often the only way to express myself other than my private creative work like poetry and painting/drawing. I was a bully, I was desperately sad, lonely, confused, frustrated, scared and without a male role model. I didn't really respect my step-father much at all.

However I did find a role model when I was 16 and consider him in some very real way my first, and so far only, guru. I say “guru” because I very did idolize him and have gone through, and am going through, a period of digestion over the 8 years since meeting his work and him.  We've recently had some amount of relational choppy waters (which is great) and it's lovely for me to feel the “stabilizers” being taken away and finding that my legs are strong and flexible.

Without sayign more about “masculinity” (whatever that is) I find I have a lot of “feminine” qualities and I really really LOVE them. I like music penetrating into me, I like my teachers mind opening me, I love being responsive in many interwoven ways with my lover, I love music and food, paying very close attention to how a room feels and my orchid.

I also don't have a “point” to this post other than to share and learn through dialogue, which could be seen as very “feminine.”

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Hi Michael,

Great question!

I really feel gender, sexuality, biological sex etc. is a really important reality for us all to understand. 

For me something that has come up relatively recently is “how can I be informed about wider gender issues and contexts that inform my own gender without at the same time falling into some sort of 'blame game'?” 

Sometimes gender study seems to fall into the “who has it harder?” mode and it quickly gets some tires stuck in the mud.

However at the same time both David Deida and Warren Farrell have recently said that “women are currently more evolved than men.”

Why is that? I think surely one reason is that, as you say, we have some crappy ideas about what it means to “be a man.” If a male is crying and someone says to him “be a man,” what do they mean? They mean repress your emotions and return to being a producer.

Of course when we look at perspectives such as Roberts' one possible reply to that could well be “I'm crying because I'm in touch with who I am and it actually makes me stronger in my purpose, clairty, trustability and heart. I AM being a man.”

I am of the opinion that we all need to learn to be men and women beyond discrimination while also honouring whatever genuine different expressions each person wants to express through being a gendered being.

I think it *could* be possible that at the moment more people are learning to be women than learning to be men. Maybe.

If that is the case then it *could* be because of a crucial main theme of Feminism, that history is defined by unconsciously male narratives. The interesting spin that I would put on this in addition to “therefore we need conscious female narratives” is that “therefore we need conscious MALE narratives as well!”

Where are they?  For me I am looking for mine in my own life, in my own meditation, work, love(r) and sense of smell.

Something personal for me to share is that I am noticing the way in which I have been so heavily conditioned that to feel like “a man” I have to be muscularly bulky. It is very refreshing for me to see video of David Deida and how potent his energy feels while also seeing him being small framed (which doesn't mean physically weak).

Well, ok, enough excited typing from me.

Rich

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Hello Rich,

Thank you for your insights. Sounds like you've been doing a lot of reflecting on masculinity too. I agree that there seems to be more out there assisting women on becoming more themselves, but when it comes to men we seem really stuck as a society. I find that as men we lack language around so many things such as our emotional experiences and that trying to describe them can seem strange because it isn't modeled much around us.

I've found at times that as I'm sharing something deep with a male friend I can struggle with the words to describe the abstract world within and that it can be awkward for them to enter into the dialogue. It's as if we as men don't have this mutual language that women seem to have cultivated more.

I'm currently in the process of expanding my friendship base to develop more friendships with men who are more willing and able to go deeper though, who are willing to struggle in finding language for the abstract world within. Some of my more longterm male relationships, many of whom would see themselves as very masculine, are not as fulfilling for me and I'm not spending as much time with them, although we can still have fun together but not really connect on a deeper level. They seem so stuck in the steriotype of a masculinity that is unfeeling, except for anger… or passion with sports. Some of them have journeyed with me and have become closer friends but some of them just look at me as if I'm from another planet.

One of the fears seems to be that only women or gay men are allowed to talk about emotion or deep things. Just look at the sitcoms on TV. Why can't a straight male also be able to cry without people getting uncomfortable? If a young girl falls off her bike and cries as she's trying to learn to ride it she will more readily get a hug and be gently coaxed to get back on, but if a boy does the same he's more often told to stop crying, to be a man and get back on with no help. How did we get to think that being a man has to be so one-sided? I realize that the world can be a tough place to be and we can't just coddle children as they grow but aren't we just human beings first with all the multiplicity and spectrum of the same emotions? Where did it become so unsafe for men to share the same emotional space that women share?

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts.

Michael

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Hey Michael

I feel moved by your post, your search.  I remember when I started searching for what it means to be and feel feminine…I felt I had abandoned something vital in me, and I had to find it again…and now I realise that it is a search of endless depth, but I do feel more comfortable than I did in the past so progress in our 3-d world is possible…:)

I remember going throuhg quite an extreme phase, where I let go of some brittle assumptions and let myself explore a more crazy, extreme femininity…figuring going through that wound was needed…purging and manifesting hidden mad assumptions about men and women, manifesting these crazy beliefs in my life in my love life work life etc and I remember walking or stumbling back to the middle at some point but it felt different - like I knew something about the extremes and could go further into them if I needed to, it made me feel more solid in the middle like it wasnt a middle that was mush and grey and suppressing so much.

I dont know what a good answer to your question would be….swhat comes up first,…when I feel a man who is holding a lot of his masculinity comfortably I feel some kind of desire to make a change in the world that finds its bloodline back to a desire in his heart and soul - some thing he wants to give to the world that he admits and is focusing on putting out there. 

That sort of inner dynamic marshalls a lot of “masculine” qualities to its aid - anger, fierceness, calm, clairty of thinking, strategic thinking, focus, goal orientation, protectiveness, leadership…

(women have these qualities too).

G

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

I believe that the main obstacle on a global, political level to men finding their authentic voices (which are predominantly masculine voices) is the feminist movement. I know that this is not a popular claim, but it is nevertheless what I believe and know to be true deep inside of me. I've witnessed firsthand in Sweden what happens when feminism is implemented in a whole society, and the result is nothing short of a war on boys and a war on men, which leads to spineless men with crippled self-esteem that aren't in touch with their masculinity at all. Ultimately it leads to very disappointed women too, because women don't want that kind of man when they look for a partner.

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

As much as I love this thread, It hurts me.
My sense is that there needs to be a sensitive masculine movement, but not at the cost of bringing down the feminine movement. the two need to co-exist.
Women have been brought up in a man's world and so have men.

Through connecting with men on groups and sites such as this, I have been delighted with the powerful, feeling men I have encountered that I only dreamed existed…. it makes such a difference to my world… thankyou.

Sha

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Pelle, I don't know whether you are off topic or not, but I am intrigued.  What exactly is it about the women's movement that is so obstacle-ish for you?  And what do you think the movement is doing that is so deeply affecting men's authentic voices?  I just finished the 99th Monkey, and was reminded of Elieser's experience of the large woman that sat on him so that he could work out his pent up anger regarding his suffocating mother?  How have you been suffocated and disenfranchised from voice?  What have women been doing? 

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Jane: What have women been doing?

Hi Jane, I think the answer to your question is that women have been doing many diverse things, as many as men thereabouts, sometimes more, sometimes less, and always depending on context, and in ways only partially comparable.  Like men, women have alot of work to do on ye ole power shadow.

I claim equality.  In a couples fight, I rarely see only one person fighting!  Women have very strong fighting tools, and they use them.

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Tom, Pelle, and Albert, 

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Hi Jane, your framing the issue as “done by men” imo overpersonalizes the matter—imputes an express or implied ill-will that I do not think explains gender role differentiation of the last many centuries.  Women opted out of heavy labour work (8000 B.C. to 1900 thereabouts) for very good reasons of family-line and species survival.  By so doing, women lost power in the public sphere while increasing their power and presence in private and social (including relational and educational) spheres.  Women did not lose their voice in these latter—a crucial human and relational voice, including skills that voice implies.  The voice which you say women lost I think regards largely the public sphere only, which is an important, but limited, life sphere.  That word “limited” is essential to broaching a balanced understanding.

This historico-biological contextualization is rarely brought to bear on discussions of gender roles.  Its absence, imo, gives rise to unneeded personal friction, upset, anger and blame.

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Tom, I am okay with all that you say…. I don't disagree with how it all transpired regarding women's voice or even that the voice was perhaps lost in one sphere, while still resonant in another.  I hear what you are saying regarding the 'ill-will implied'…. but it is not intended.  If I were born male, I would have a particular context that would largely define me, just as I have by being born female, so it is curious to consider what that context is for men?…. I am interested in the male thing here…. What happened and moreover is happening with the authentic male voice because of the 'women's movement'? Jane

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

I am appreciating Janes sober persistence in asking this question; “What IS happening to the authentic male voice because of the women's movement?” I really want to know. A list, a list of facts that does not employ emotion or decision may be a good way to inform us, women. It seems to be an evocative subject/question and I also sense strong feelings/anger from Pelle and Tom. (and would have been too afraid to persue this question with them/you because of my own fear of angry men- as I wrote in my post here. Another thankyou to Jane for demonstrating strength where I feel weak.)

I zoom in on Marc's comment (and great post) where he say's
 ” I think we need to root out our victimhood from, and beyond to realise that really, we CAN be men in today's world.”

and I zoom in on Albert's comment;
 “It's up to men's cultures to empower and reflect and initiate new perspectives and self understanding.”

Steve mentions that Pelle is talking about men being like women in Sweden? is it? or Denmark?.. a scandinavian country. Is this more of a cultural problem over there?… why is there such strong feeling, Pelle?

Sharon

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Hi Sharon, I'm not feeling angry.  I'm simply being direct in my descriptive language, perhaps more a masculine quality.  The questions raised by Jane's first response, and the imputation of male repressing will and intention as primary sources of the dynamics in question, are important enough to me to merit a response.  When the root source of gender role diversification is factored into one's understanding—that root being survival necessity—then one is forced to take a more functional, less personal, less emotional stance.

Thus if human goods are divided 50/50 between men and women, and if focussing in one direction leaves other directions compromised, then men's specializing in public functioning can be hypothesized to have:

• left men undeveloped in areas to where

• women would naturally gravitate and claim as their own.

Something like that would have constituted the bargain struck in necessitous circumstances.  You men do that and we women will do this.

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Hi Tom,

So, instead of Jane's initial question being,

“What have women been doing?'
 
Do you think it would be more appropriate for her and myself to ask,

“How has the feminine movement affected authentic masculine voice?”

Would that warrant a direct answer?

Sharon

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

And Tom, aside from the root cause of why things unfolded as they have, doing the same old thing that was once warranted for survival but now is not, is very problematic.   We have been stuck in the middle ages in many ways and the challenges of moving through this are upon us. 

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

I am feeling sad that some of the men on here have not felt moved to share more of their direct experience and instead have played from a position of Sociology/Philosophy. 

This is not because I am anti-intellectual, I have a 1st Class BA in a Socio-Cultural study of Criminality and Psychology and post-graduate education under Sean Hargens and JFKU in Integral Theory, to name but 2 achievements in that area.

However the thread is entitled “what does it mean to be and feel masculine?”

While it is important to include technological, political, cultural, economic etc. dimensions nevertheless these dimensions need to be grounded squarely in one's bones, blood and flesh to really fit the tone of the question initially inquired into by Michael.

My feeling is that there have been both useful and hurtful dimensions to the beautiful growth of Women and Womanhood.

Feminism came forth with the correct observation, and command for change, that much of history was “unconsciously male.” This then led, very rightly, to a movement to find accurate and empowered female narratives, be they straight/queer, able-bodied or not, black/white/red/brown etc., and so forth.

For me however that was only one part of the equation. The other half is saying “yes, history has often been unconsciously male, which is to say, Male-ness has been forged UNCONSCIOUSLY.” 

So now is the time to create conscious male experience as well and that has not received its deserved attention because the feeling has been “men have got what they wanted throughout history, now it's our turn.”

However this is not true, men have also been coerced into conforming to a system of identity that doesn't serve them.

Many men feel afraid to express the juice of their maleness because it has been so thoroughly pathologized by unhealthy, loud, voices in the Feminist movement.  It has become very acceptable for women to undermine men and men then feel unable to express their hurt because to do so would be “unmanly.” 

An example of a friend of mine speaks to this.  He was asking his now ex girlfriend, because he cares about her, why she seemed upset after seeing him during the night in a pub they were both at. Her reply was that it was because he was being an “obnoxious cunt.”

Now instead of being able to meet that experience directly, the experience of opening himself to dialogue and inquiry and then being called a “cunt,” and express the pain, vulnerability and anger of that he retreated into anger, thinly veiled by logic and openness. 

However other men fall victim to the flip side of that, which is only being able to be “sensitive,” “open,” “caring” etc. These are all excellent things to be but their actual expression becomes very lop-sided when corralled by an overly female-oriented view from women and also internalised by men. Examples of this would be that “caring” would always have to take the form of being soft, listening, not threatening etc.

*phew* I'm exhausted, I feel there is SO much here and so many nuances that I can't really write anything about it at all. I'm going to eat!

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Hey Rich,

Thankyou for using an expressive-feeling word like “sad” and for observing the sociological and philosophical positions that have been played from here by some men. I have struggled to stay present because I am not so intellectual… but still wanted to show a sensitivity to the men showing up here, on this valuable thread.

It is true that men do not feel safe to express their hurt if and when they feel shouted down by women (they go one way or the other),….. and I feel it's important for women to acknowledge there is a beautiful growth unfolding in the hearts, souls, bellies and minds of men and to not react when they see men saying immature, narrow “things” if it is still in the context of wanting growth and awareness. At the same time and on the same note ,women in this mutual, self-work and growth arena feel it, know it and have got to say it.
I can understand why you feel Liz  trashed the men on the Garrison video that Marc put out on this thread…..  My feeling was of compassion for the men (as I think Liz also expressed in her addendum) and at the same time (or infact BECAUSE of) seeing some blindspots in them and immaturity as Liz and Diane said. There was also a part me retracting thinking “oh god, guys, please don't pat youselves on the back too much.” I'm not sure that they did, but feel there is a danger of that! They haven't arrived yet and neither have I.

Sha

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Sharon and Jane, I don't really know what Pelle was referring to in asking his question.  I also don't share his understanding that feminism did whatever it did re men's voices, as Rich also states.  I hear a certain victim cry there, to which I don't ascribe. 

In dialoguing about these matters, I personally think it important to define what voices are being spoken of.  I didn't like Jane's putting things the way she did as, for among the reason I mentioned above, it glosses over the considerable human goods women developed in other than the public sphere, which goods are a source of very real power in life, regardless if they did not for many years confer the right to vote.

Women have not had much of a public voice for what looks like many centuries.  They have had, from what I have seen and can infer, a voice (and more voice than men) in more personal, relational and educational realms, in socializing realms, in realms that speak from inner places.  These matters have been part of womens' history moreso than mens', which Rich's characterization overlooks.

These realms in which women developed over recent history are realms in which men find themselves, in some broadly applicable average, playing catch-up.  The Garrison video, which I haven't watched, is probably a case in point.  Most men probably feel this at least implicitly in their relations with women, if not more directly as feelings of inferiority, shame in some regards, perhaps confusion and maybe defensiveness being less adept in navigating those so-important human relations.  I personally see these differences between men and women daily: men in many ways look like boys to me, and I assume they are in regards to relating maturely at the level at which women prefer to, and can and do, relate.

Jane, I share your observation about reshuffling the balance between men and women.  Certain structures and patterns served what look to be older purposes, and have by now outlived probably most of their usefulness.  I can understand feeling angry, looking inside oneself and seeing: where in me is that which I see in men (women)?  Why am I compromised in my human capability because I'm female (male).

I also suppose that the anger voiced particularly by feminism performed a certain function in helping gender role differentiation lessen.  Anger can play that other-moving role.  But for my part, I prefer understanding to expressing feelings, and important to that understanding is trying, so far as gender relations are concerned, to see a functional thread in the way things went.

I also find that that understanding has lessened anger and other feelings I have felt as a man, helps me relate with greater openness to others finding their way in these matters, and more generally might quell a bit of warring.

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Hi Tom,

I would agree with you that many men feel scared of entering into the relational space with women, who by and large have had more “schooling” than men in this regard. I feel often men feel (a)shamed that they can't access or express their emotions in such a way as women often can; well, some women anyway.

I feel that many men have become “sensitive” (e.g. defined by women or overly-centred with what women think of them to a point where they loose their core) in a bid to be Good Men. 

There are still so many insensitive dickheads out there that the world really needs men in touch with their heart. However insensitive guys won't listen to men with no potency. So, yes, the world does need more sensitive men but if it just stops there the process is really incomplete, as I feel you are also saying.

For me I have had to go into pretty hard physical confrontational training to get an embodied sense of my strength and solidity, which was often very painful, very scary, very taxing and something I was often discouraged to do by others.

Rich

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Pelle,

d`accord! I am seconding you without a nanosecond of hesitation.

To develop and embody authentic masucline perspectives for 21st century is quintessential. No matter where the starting points are.

I am definitely contradicting Deida and others when say women in toto are more developed.

I was in groups with women since I my 6th year. The form of their consciousness is very attractive and of course really advanced.

I know personally from lots of these ladies they are yearning for a new masculinity. its up to the mens cultures to empower, reflect and initiate new perspectives and self understanding.

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

I just want to highlight Rich's point..

“So now is the time to create conscious male experience aswell and that has not received it's deserved attention because the feeling has been “men have got what they wanted throughout history, now it's our turn.
However, this is not true, men have also been coerced into conforming to a system of identity that doesn't serve them.”

It's true, as a woman I do feel like it's “my turn” and if I feel that ,other women do. I feel women need to start letting go of “now it's my turn,” to let the magic happen for both genders…. we have much to gain.

Thanks Rich- you are brilliant (IMHO)

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Pelle: I believe that the main obstacle on a global, political level to men finding their authentic voices (which are predominantly masculine voices) is the feminist movement. I know that this is not a popular claim, but it is nevertheless what I believe and know to be true deep inside of me. I've witnessed firsthand in Sweden what happens when feminism is implemented in a whole society, and the result is nothing short of a war on boys and a war on men, which leads to spineless men with crippled self-esteem that aren't in touch with their masculinity at all. Ultimately it leads to very disappointed women too, because women don't want that kind of man when they look for a partner.

~

When I think of feminism I think of

”The theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes.”

and

”The view, articulated in the 19th century, that women are inherently equal to men and deserve equal rights and opportunities.”


When I hear you say, “when feminism is implemented in a whole society, and the result is nothing short of a war on boys and a war on men…” I think, whoah, is that really feminism?   Not in the way that I understand that term!

Similarly, I have come to value and appreciate healthy versions of conservatism, and see a lot of what the neocons have done in America in recent history as a complete perversion of that, as not really being conservatism at all.  Unfortunately, there is a tendency among some progressives to say, “See!  This proves that conservatism is a failed, toxic doctrine which must be rejected completely!”

What we need, in my opinion, is not to reject feminism, but to embrace what is good, true, and beautiful about it as we continue to evolve individually and culturally – and if we see a perversion of feminism we can and should point that out. 

But if we reject feminism based on aspects of the movement (arguably) having been hijacked by extremists, then we are just perpetuating a culture war that we really have find a way to move beyond.

The evolution of feminism, what “feminism” even means, how it has played out and is playing out in different times and places – this is a rich topic for exploration in itself and at this point would probably justify it's own thread if people want to explore those aspects more deeply. 

…meanwhile…

“What does it mean to be and feel masculine?”


spiral out,
Arthur

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Pelle,

I don't doubt that there are reactionary factions, I've been around separatist feminists in my day.  However I did hear Gloria Steinem talk a few years back and her message was and is very much like the solutions I hear from conscious fathers.

I also feel this…

“Feminism is good at tearing down old structures that no longer serve us, but it's crap at rebuilding something new that actually works.”

begs the question…is it up to women (yes I know there are male feminists & I find them sexy) to come up with a workable solution for boys?  Who better to teach them how to be men of consciousness than men of consciousness?

~leela

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

   

What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

I always think the answers to these type of questions can be so simple and so complex.

The simple answer (if you are a man) is “Like this”.

I imagine a kid going “whats it like to be a kid or how can i be a kid” the answer is just - you are a kid so thats what it feels like :)

For the more complex perspectives in the gross body i can resonate with Deidas “Cartoon” descriptions of 3 stages of the Masculine

First Stage - Macho Jerk - All spine and no Heart

Second Stage - New Age Wimp all Heart no Spine (Pelles description of Sweden where women are women and so are the men )

Third Stage - Superior Man - Spine and Heart in balance giving his deepest gifts in every moment to his death knowing deeply that in the face of the infinite all of it will count for nothing

I also resonate with the Tantric description of the masculine and feminine - the Masculine being the Causal Witness or Ground of Being out which the big SHE of all physical form arises so the Masculine and Feminine just become energies which we (male or female) can identify with and make a choice as to which pole we play.

For my own personal journey through the masculine with 4 years of involvement with Mens work and Mens groups i think it is extremely important and valuable for Men to learn and experience their identity through spending time with other Men - this is where they claim their own identity through ritual,challenge and authentic heart felt feedback.
I have travelled to some incredible deep open spaces with Men in groups and highly recommend Men joining or forming mens groups to explore and deepen their own connection to that energy.

There is a whole generation of men who have found their identity through relationship with Women as many Fathers have been “absent” either literally or just through lack of knowing how to provide their full presence in the family and seem totally lost as to who they are or what they are supposed to do.

So for me the deepest vision i can see for the masculine is an open hearted loving Man deeply present,in touch with the sacred, clearly on purpose,quiet mind,relaxed open body,full of humour, giving his individual gifts to the world,present and intimate with his intimate partner unafraid of her anger and able to stand in the face of it and deeply feel into her and open her heart to the infinite,providing love,direction, clarity and boundaries to his family,constantly feeding the “Third Being” of their relationship through his speech and actions using his fierceness to fight for the freedom of consciousness to fully express itself ultimately through all forms and to use his fighting ability not for power over others but for the health and growth of the planet and all beings.

Steve

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This is very meaningful to me, to feel different men feeling and yearning and knowing what they want to get in touch with….
I am moved to tears by your sharing, Arthur…. I experience you as a sentient BEING in this description of your experience. In that sense, as a being myself, I can say that I was subject  to alot of physical abuse from men as a child (hair pulling, leg slapping, hit with stick, general anger and aggression and perhaps the men that meant most to me in relationships were those who were emotionally illiterate and afraid of intimacy, to reflect that in myself.)

To be a small girl (or boy, no doubt) at the wrath of grown men's anger makes an over whelming, incredible impact…. and whilst I am able to have compassion for those men/teachers (who, as children, must have gone through exactly what they did to me) it nourishes and heals me to experience how it actually feels to resonate with the hearts of men here….. It's nurturing… how marvellous that I can now equate “nurturing” with men..  :o)

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Hi Steve,

I often enjoy seeing you show up here. I enjoyed spending time with you and thank-you for the support you're giving to men's groups.

I'd love to meet up some time.

On a little bit of a “view” point I feel it is impotant to distinguish between non-theistic and theistic Tantra. 

Hindu tantra does pose a Shiva/Shakti dynamic and this informs Daivd Deida's work, with an underlying theistic basis, with a subtle or not-so-subtle (depending on manner of interpretation and practice) external deity.

Buddhist tantra however rejects external deity in all ways and instead, at its deepest, allows the practitioner to fully wean themselves away from anything other than the nature of direct experience.  When we read Trungpa in Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism he gives the view of Vajrayana Tantra as going beyong the Mahayana Realization and proclaimation of “form is emptiness, emptiness is form” to things simply being “osel,” or self-luminous, things being liberated from their own side, without any need for funny business.

Why is this important?  Because otherwise things are still operating from a duality, as Deida's work does. Because of this we can become fixated and create ground and identities where they don't truly exist.

From a different perspective Buddhist tantra also “switches” the masculine and feminine characteristics, the Feminine being the Wisdom aspect (a woman always knows!) and the Masculine being the Compassion aspect (a man busy doing, doing, doing).

This is all ment only to give a different and well-informed perspective, simply to keep things lively and not tense up around “masculine” and “feminine.”  Deida has also asked “if a mans' anus cannot be penetrated, how can he be penetrated by God?”

This is not in any way a criticism about you or your work, both of which I value and feel tocuhed by.  I also do not assume that you disagree with anthing I've said and that therefore I am “informing” you or letting you “know the score.”

Rich

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Arthus thank you for your vulnerable and honest and trusting sharing here…It makes me feel more centred just to wtiness it and be with it.

G

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I'm incredibly lazy in going through all the posts. I've skimmed. But I wanted to add my two dollars and 50 cents to this argument…

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I listened to the entire half-hour. It seems like these guys are at least trying to grow. But I gotta say, it doesn't do anything for me, the open relationship baloney. 

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Several threads are relevant to the last couple of posts:

• Is Mature Polyamory Possible?
• Mature Monogamy
• The Evolution of Intimate Relationship
• THE ETHICS OF PROMISCUITY PRE-DHARMA SURRENDER - Stuart Davis

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Thanks for you thoughts on it, Liz! I do appreciate them.

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Marc wrote: “I was in East London last night in a restaurant and there was this absolutely beautiful waitress serving me who I was really enjoying the presence of. And seriously, ALL I wanted to do was take her home and have her up all night. Why am I sharing that? I'm sharing that for a reason. Does that evoke reaction in anyone? This is what I wanted. It may not be what I get and I think if I'm pushy about it, I'm moving away from where I want to be. AND, if something else happened if I'd have tried to solicit that in any way, I'd be open for that. But can I state “This is what I want, is this what you want?””

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Hey, Marc-

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Hi, running out the door, so no time to write more except THANK YOU LIZ for writing with such clarity and exposing the immaturity and pretentiousness of those two “men”.

Diane

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addendum: this is not to completely discount the fact that these guys are owning who they are, which is great. Pretending to want what women want is not the path to real masculine strength and presence. However, neither is pandering to one's baser impulses in the name of “integrity.”

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The video was interesting for me as I have been in conversation with Bryan of AMP around me contributing to their blog. My vision of my contribution would be opening up my blog, featured on Integral-Life, to their audience. 

I do have certain reservations about AMP, some of which are highlighted in a post I wrote abour Marc Gafni on the Integral Pod, largely around people cultivating “Presence” in order to be more attractive to women. I feel that practice is a “translation down” from teachers such as Deida and run the risk of being poorly informed of genuine contemplative roots, leading to quite crude spiritual materialism.

However I would also mention that the man in the video *is* in touch with the energetics of his heart, *is* actively engaged in genuine and challenging dialogue for both him and his partner, *is* figuring out ways to be met in his totality while also deeply caring about how his female partner is experiencing things *and* the place in her that she is coming from that informs those experiences. 

Yes, they still have work to do, and acknowledge that!, but please don't simply trash them, which is in part what has happened.

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Marc, I really appreciate your post.  I watched the video too.

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Interesting (Long) Article written by Joseph Serra



Inner Marriage, The Men’s Movement
and The Feminine


Within himself he has opened to the daunting freedom and creative potency of the masculine, and the overwhelming mystery and wisdom of the feminine. The masculine in him energises his feminine. The feminine in him grounds his masculine. These universal energies are erotically united inside him. This is Inner Marriage.

And the courtship is hell! After all ~ why are we not already rested in the full nobility of the masculine?  Why are we not already surrendered to the full splendour of the feminine? Whatever our reasons ~ they are what need to burn. The First Man in us says ‘no’. The Second Man in us says ‘yes’ because he ought to. The emerging Third Man says ‘yes’ because he is already committed to facing being alive.


In the 1990’s the Men’s Movement seemed to be gathering quite some momentum. Iron John was a bestseller, men’s groups were popping up everywhere, and men were enquiring into the essence of manhood. Since then there has been some integration of this enquiry into mainstream culture, but the enquiry itself seems to have lost its erection, so to speak. The main thrust of menswork today seems to be the Men’s Rights Movement, which has its pros and cons, but certainly isn’t pursuing the enquiry into the essence of what it means to be a man.

This is a vast generalisation of course, and some menswork has continued (some of it quite vigorously), but I retreated from menswork for some time because I came to feel that we could only go so far without the women. And my sense is that most of the menswork that continues, although completely worthwhile, will eventually come to the dead end we came to…

In the 1990’s I started lots of men’s groups, camps and workshops, but then I took a break. I even left a men’s group I’d been in for many years. To caricature things (but also be brutally honest) it looked a bit like this:

I meet a male friend, Bob.
Me: How’s it going with your partner, Jenny?
Bob: Yeah, fine. You know, ups and downs.

Later that day I meet Jenny.
Me: How’s it going with Bob?
Jenny: Well, we’re in crisis. I think we might be splitting up.

There was so much emotional disconnection in the men. The sharing, and even the catharsis, that was happening in our men’s groups wasn’t carrying over into our lives. There was a chronic, ingrained resistance to the feminine - and whether we were gay or hetero, our feminine partners were freaking out.

The masculine wasn’t in deep, intimate connection with the feminine. We were cultivating our masculine together, and our feminine - but in everyday life things just weren’t coming together. We weren’t showing up in ways that won the respect our masculine so much wanted, and our feminine was just under-developed. We felt criticised, unsupported and undermined by our feminine partners, and they were feeling unprotected, unheard and unloved. The more they expressed their discomfort, the more defensive we’d become. When, inevitably, they expressed their discomfort in unreasonable and unfair ways, we’d latch onto the unfairness – in order to avoid the point: that we were shrivelled and contracted and defensive, and that they were deeply disillusioned with the men to whom they’d given themselves. Disillusioned, and sometimes desperate.

I am not only talking about ‘others’ here. I too was defended from my wife’s pain. I too felt blamed. Like so many men, I didn’t know how to expand into the fullness of my masculinity – I didn’t even know what it was. I was caught inside my own smallness, my own little ego. And fighting for its survival felt like life or death. Because of all this, my personal enquiry into manhood, once I had withdrawn from the men’s movement, had two concerns, (1) the freedom and genuine empowerment that allows the masculine to be open to the feminine, and (2) the deepening of my seeing into the heartful essence of the feminine.

Gradually I came to see and understand the choice I had: to identify either as a lone male ego, or as a participant in the collective evolution of the genders. I came to appreciate the fundamental natures of the masculine and feminine: how the masculine pulls in one direction – upwards, to the stars, to aloneness, to power, to purpose, to achievement, to freedom; and how the feminine pulls in the other – downwards, to the earth, to the senses, into connectedness, authentic relationship, towards pleasure and pain, and love. And I felt how this pulling in different directions is the erotic charge between them.

The problem is when these two charges get too far apart, or too close. The First Man stays too far away. He’s in his masculinity but, frankly, because he’s not connected to the feminine, he’s a bastard. He’s the patriarchal part of us who’s responsible for the environmental and social fragmentation we’re now in. But the new-agey Second Man gets too close. He gets so close he gets feminised. And there’s a big difference between being in-connection with the feminine (while rooted in the masculine), and being feminised. But either way, whether too far away or too close, there’s no erotic charge - and this erotic charge is not just sexual, it’s the excitement and creativity that enlivens our lives.

The problem for the masculine is individuation. In other words, while he still  fears being reabsorbed into mother, while he’s not separated-out and secure, and identified with the masculine, then he can’t maintain an openness towards the feminine. He has to be too far away or, in guilt and disempowerment, too close.

Full individuation is a profound journey into our aloneness, and into the unknown. It eventually opens out into peace, presentness and oneness – but it’s intense, and it requires not-less-than-everything. It’s a letting-go, a falling, and it requires great intellectual and spiritual skill. But it’s the hero’s journey the masculine has to make. It’s the homecoming of the masculine to itself.

From here the masculine can allow itself to be grounded and kept in-connection by the feminine – without feeling criticised or disrespected. Which is where the women, and feminine-dominant men, come in. At this point the masculine is finally able to receive them. At home in itself, the masculine is now able to receive the attunement the feminine offers – without flying off into spirit, or into some mental idealism, or just into numbness or disassociation.

Gradually the masculine becomes capable of maintaining continuous connection with the feminine. Not too close, not too distant. The Third Man. Open to himself, open to her. And through openness to her, opening to his own femininity. Opening to his own masculinity, opening to his own femininity. Power, Feeling. Eternity, time-and-space. Exquisite balance. Inner Marriage.

As we stabilise in The Third Man, The First Man and The Second Man are still there too – always ready to make their disempowering and disempowered contributions. The guidance of the feminine remains essential. And in humility, whenever we lose touch with ourselves (and therefore resist her), we just have to pick ourselves up, and forgive ourselves. In practice, rather than holding the idea of ‘becoming The Third Man’ as a destination to be reached, it is probably more nourishing to think in terms of the First, Second And Third Men each rising and falling within us, continuously – and accepting that, without abandoning our destination.

As we become committed to the journey of The Third Man we become more and more comfortable in the exquisite beauty of the unknown ‘now’, and from this place can honour the truth of the reflection our personalities receive from the feminine. But to sustain this commitment we need the support of other men, other men who are equally committed. We need their community. When my commitment is strong it sustains them, and when my commitment is weak their strength sustains me.

In this way, lacking the ‘vertical’ support that men once received from their fathers, their grandfathers and the elders of the culture, we receive the ‘horizontal’ support system of a brotherhood committed to a shared context: the path of The Third Man – a male community committed to honouring both the masculine and the feminine.  

And this, of course, brings us back to men’s groups, or at least to male community. Whether or not it is a statistical fact that The Men’s Movement has gone into a bit of a lull, I am convinced that as men we can only go so far alone, and that our next evolutionary step is to honour the superior emotional knowing of the feminine, and to bow to her guidance – which is, of course, really, really tough for our egos. 

It’s up to each of us. We can take this evolutionary invitation, or not. The choice is: to go on our personal journeys of aloneness, freedom and empowerment, open to the feminine and let go into the bliss of wholeness; or remain stuck up egoic little pricks, caught in our minds, bickering tooth and nail, defending by attacking (or defending by grovelling), and perpetuating the chaos of a disintegrating patriarchy.

As I see it, for the Men’s Movement to have an evolutionary future, there will need to be enough men with enough determination and humility to take up the invitation to masculine empowerment AND feminine empowerment. We need context, and we need commitment. This will create an atmosphere of solidarity that will strengthen us enough to be able to fall to our knees – again and again. Which, paradoxically, and heart-breakingly, is where true masculine power is honed for use in the world.

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

wow, I really like this article by Joseph Serra. I don't see women talking about themselves in such evolutionary conscientiousness. Men are onto something and it feels good to me.
Thanks for posting, Steve.

I like it all, but especially,

“It's a letting go- a falling and requires great intellectual and spiritual skill. But it's the hero's journey the masculine has to make. It's the homecoming to the masculine itself.”


Amen :o)

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Hi Sharon,

Yes, I was saying “Well said, Joseph, well said…” after reading the article (thanks for posting it, Steve).

He and his wife Elizabeth have co-created, and run together, their Culture of Honouring Project. I know them both very well, and whereas Joseph may be the more prolific writer of the two, I can vouch for the power, penatriveness and forward thinking of Elizabeth's communication.

She's written an essay “The way of the feminine woman” which you can access via a link on their website's homepage here.

Lol

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Thanks for that great link Lol.  I can't open the article you mention, but article The Row of Our Times certainly nails the situation!  

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Thanks Lol,

I really appreciate that…. loving the energy of that site and looked at Elizabeth's essay. It feels good and feminine to me. Thankyou so, another dimension to my life.

Hey! by going through the masculine, I got to the feminine!

Sha :o)

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Steve and Lol, Thanks for sharing the work of Elisabeth and Mark Joesphs-Serra. I'd never heard of them and spent a good bit of time yesterday reading some of their work (as well as this thread.) Very compelling! I posted Elisabeth's article on my blog here if people want a direct link.

Have either of you taken workshops with them? Would you recommend working with them in person?

Wonderful thread everyone!!
Deep appreciation to you all…

Love,
Lauren

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Hi Lauren,

I haven't taken workshops with them, so on that basis, without having such experience, I wouldn't be able to recommend working with them in person.

However, I was in from the beginning of a men's group Joseph started  in '94 (I think). It was the second group he started, the first of which he got going, then remained in as a member until it eventually expired in its then form. The group I started in was facilitated by Joseph, for its first six months, in co-creating its vision and structure of process, after which he bowed out and left us to continue co-creating (and co-facilitating) our own process.

This group continued for a few years, eventually running out of juice, by which time some members of the first group, including Joseph, had reformed. I joined that group after a few months, and continued with it until it too kind of ran out of juice 2-3 years ago, suffering as it did from a fragmentation of creative energy/directional purpose, and 'ceased to be' (cue here for Monty Python's Dead Parrot sketch.) Anyhoo… long story short story, I got to know Joseph well, and can attest to his honesty, integrity, heart, and the passion and honourable nature of his vision, and I admire/respect him for how he embodies the feminine in balance with the deep masculine.

Elizabeth I got to know over a number of years, most powerfully when (mostly) the second men's group I was part of met up with (mostly) members of a women's group (comprised largely but not solely of partners of guys in 'my' group) to work with, over a period of time, male/female and masc./fem. “issues”. Hence, as I said in my other post, I can vouch for the power, penatriveness and forward thinking of her communication, and honour her for embodying the masculine in balance with the deep feminine.

Hope this helps… and btw, are you thinking of coming over to these fair shores? : )

Love,

Lol

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Thanks for this, Lol.

No, no plans in immediate future to visit Britain, but I'm always interested in knowing who and where good mentors and teachers are, inquiring into whether I feel a call to work with this person or that person…

Much appreciate your deep sharing on this thread.

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Love this article, Steve. This part, especially, feels truly integral to me, and dead-on (italics mine):

As we stabilise in The Third Man, The First Man and The Second Man are still there too – always ready to make their disempowering and disempowered contributions. The guidance of the feminine remains essential. And in humility, whenever we lose touch with ourselves (and therefore resist her), we just have to pick ourselves up, and forgive ourselves. In practice, rather than holding the idea of ‘becoming The Third Man’ as a destination to be reached, it is probably more nourishing to think in terms of the First, Second And Third Men each rising and falling within us, continuously – and accepting that, without abandoning our destination.

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Hello All!

Great thread…. I really appreciate the contributions, the sharings, the continued questioning :)

I would like to preface my post, with the sharing that I am writing, with intention to post from my higher self, however I am surfing many converging cycles and feel quite grizzly, prickly, agitated because of my personal interior crashing… so while I try to zero in, be centered in this post… there may still be a lot of static (not in relationship to this topic ;)

What I'd like to share here… is that it is my deepest desire to see children being raised where both masculine and feminine in themselves is honored, up front, from the onset.  For both sexes to have freedom to feel emotion (for boys that may mean “softer” expression like sadness, for girls that may mean “harder” expression like anger) and yet at the same time be guided through them… to develop discernment and practice of what action to take, to start creating a healthy internal dialog (through first modeling externalized dialog and healthy being/doingness).

To begin with “third stage” in mind.  Or as Rich put it, we are already One yet also recognizing that the two dualities (masc/fem) dance within us.

My personal story is to be born with a feminine essence (with a twin brother which adds some interesting sidenotes ;) that became dissed, in preference of the masculine (shell) then to have to reclaim my feminine self (intensely catalyzed thru pregnancy/motherhood) and… my NOW is from this excavated and rebirthed feminine, to re-claim my masculine (and figure out what i view/be as healthy masc).  So in many many ways… we are all in the same boat, to different degrees, various timelines, certainly!!

As many of you know, I am a single mom with two daughters.  So I am presented with abundant opportunities to truly exercise both masculine and feminine expressions (I read somewhere that parenting is actually a fairly masculine endeavor)…  as healthily as possible (often times under stress and fatigue)… and I try to nurture, guide, honor my daughters' uniqueness of masc/feminine as their development unfolds.  I treat them as princesspirates…. (or pirateprincesses, some days ;)… I want them to have access to both, by choice, as a continuum, all while staying attunded to where their 'center' may be…  Right now they are in a phase of wanting to NOT be girlie, to be tomboys.  So in their effort to “dis” girly stuff and wanting to reject it… I create discussion/ experiments/ play to keep girly on the table, to have some vibrancy, however miniscule.  For now, they just are choosing to be boyish Ninjas (except girlie sneaks in as they paint cool black markings on their face like cat eyes :)

And when I relate with my young nephews, I offer them the same as well.

That's all  (I feel like I've lost my train of thought, Im distracted so I'm dropping out for now ;)

Engaged, heartfully,
~Stacy

ps.  About 8 months ago, my daughters and I came across a mini-poster that said “tough guys wear pink”… we laughed. How great is this!  So i bought it.  And then we went on a mini-spree and bought pink shirts for all ages of boys/guys/men/grandmen that we know/love and gave them a copy of the note and shirt!!  we had so much fun… kept the discussion alive for about 2 months.  And the reactions!  =)

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I want to comment on two things. The replies to my own post above, as well as the Authentic Man Program (AMP).

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Shannon,

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Pelle,

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Hey,

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I appologize for this long reply, but this issue is close to me…

I tried to read the whole thread, but I might have skipped a few…

It seems to me that there is one aspect that wasn't covered at all…what if masculinity is not based on gender?  I am not talking about  lesbianism…

I believe that we are living very exciting times where the primordial roles of man and women are questioned…I had the exact opposite experience that most of the man on this threat talk about…I was forced by circumstances to become the head of the family, from an early age into a society where women are not considered the head of the family and the correspondence or any serious dealings are not addressed to them. My intelligence was above the average, but the best compliment I would get was…well you're smart for a girl…I had very close encounters with women in this type of society and it wasn't the men that wanted to keep them in this bondship, it was the women… They had developed some kind of jealousy, where a young girl wouldn't be allowed to have more than they did, because that would prove their lives as being  demeaning…

They tend to have the last word, because they know how to manipulate man in feeling guilty for their inequalities along the centuries…I am not sympathetic to any cause that uses history to explain their shortcomings. The time is here and now…if there is something to prove or to win…here's your chance…

Yes, I believe that feminism was needed then and there are still countries out there that need a good dose of that…But, the feminism as it was intended in the beginning, not in the current format.

I don't believe that there are fast recipes for the roles of humans in the society….There are men who are better caregivers than women, does that make those man less masculine?? I personally don't think so…There are women who are less emotional than a lot of other men…are they masculine?

I believe that in order to grow as a society, we need to understand that there is more to any of us, than the labels and the fast rules…it doesn't mean that I agree with a lot of the things that are allowed out there now, under the liberalism label….

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Appreciate your post, Oris.  : )

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Beautiful, Pelle!  aaaaaaaaah I can chillax now! man with feeling- was kind of waiting for that.

Thanks!

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Pelle…  I look forward to learning more about Scandinavia… thanks.

Everyone:
 I read this book about 5 yrs ago… and found it valuable, in greater understanding of the male experience, more importantly those of the boys/men in my life.

http://www.amazon.com/Dont-Want-Talk-About-Overcoming/dp/0684835398/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1227473848&sr=8-2

I Don't Want to Talk About It: Overcoming the Secret Legacy of Male Depression (Paperback) by Terrence Real

~S

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I'd like to know why what I said was “trashing.” I can see both the honest integrity and the bullshit in one person. Why is it either/or? I'm sure everyone here is more capable of holding “both/and” than that, without making me the bad guy.

Liz

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Liz, do you mean bad girl?  : )

I think your comment was characterized as “trashing” because you exposed a certain immaturity in what you viewed and someone felt hurt and defensive.  Men are terrified by being seen as less relationally mature than women.

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Liz,

You're not the bad guy, you're a very sharp woman.

I feel I am part responsible for mentioning your name a few times in empathy to Rich's expression of what he felt was men being dismissed for their efforts and “trashed.” Also, I felt Diane re-enforced your statements by thanking you for highlighting the immaturity of those men… yes she had to run out of the door and didn't have time to write more and could probably see the honest integrity of the men as well as the bullshit, but Diane chose to focus on one side, the bullshit…. So we are all responding accordingly, I feel. That's not to make Diane the bad guy either…. it's just the energy of sharp women here, is being digested by sensitive men…. and instead of being defiant, they are expressing that Sense of theirs.

Respect (and a little scared)

Sha

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Hey Liz,

I'm sorry if I seemed to be trying to make you the bad guy. My intention was to protect Marc's offering, as I felt he was getting swamped.

I was not being “either/or” as I used the words “this is in part” what had happened; I did not say this is all that you had said.

My reply had an edge to it because the overall feel to me of your and Diane's posts were largely disrespectful and dismissive of the video Marc presented. 

For me the AMP work seems to present some pretty interesting material at the level of relating that Robert would term “co-independent.” 

As has been said elsewhere we all flux between these different levels of relating, with a probability to where we will show up from most of the time based on our maturation. 

These guys are seeming to do work around releasing their own lack-based motivations and at times come from a place that is certainly moving towards Being-oriented, with Garrison, for example, inquiring into what would be best for her even though the outcome might devastate him and having a basic sense of trust that his devastation has an ok-ness to it, it's not something to be got rid of but something that will mature him.

Rich

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Rich, I don't think you read everything I wrote, or the latter parts didn't make much of an impression. There was an evolution to what I said. I went back a couple of times and reread what I said. There is an edge to it for sure, but I think in light of all that I wrote, I'd still stand by it. Honestly? I don't think those guys have anything to teach you, from what I've seen of you.

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Hey LIz,

I hear you  :  )

I am open to and feeling that there is indeed a progress in your posts. I also like that you say there was also an edge in your posts, as well as mine. Thank-you for being open.

I think my edge is on the “woah, wait a minute, there's something here” and your edge is on the “woah, wait a minute, there's something lacking here” 

I really agree with you that there are strong elements lacking here and I am genuinely happy that you get a sense of me from what you've seen of me.

I'm excited for you about the practicum, I really value the work.

Rich

Re: What does it mean to be and feel masculine?

Just want to add a short entry from Blog of William Harryman:

Dr. Helen Smith: Where have all the Vikings Gone?

Its a view from a woman.

And a special discussion between women from all over the world would be most interesting.