A lot of men find it challenging to feel fully alive when in a long-term committed intimate relationship. Some men, who perhaps enjoyed being single, who felt lively & dynamic without the responsibilities a relationship brings, may struggle to maintain that vitality while settling into long-term relationship. Being in a two-person system (relationship) requires different … Read more
The great crises of our time for countless men: a persistent incapacity to fully feel our aliveness, and no elder guidance to show us another way.
♦◊♦ There’s a reason the people who just stormed our nation’s capital, who now take public pride in sowing terror in our community, call themselves “proud boys” and not proud Men: They haven’t yet learned to take responsibility, as Men do, for how their behavior affects other people, the whole community. For as Men, we … Read more
“The more fragile a man feels internally, the more likely he is to try building an outer shell to hide this fragility.” ~ Guy Corneau (Absent Fathers Lost Sons) ♦◊♦ Throughout my life I have been plagued by the enduring fear that I’m never quite successful enough, whatever my actual successes. Which has been at … Read more
♦◊♦ More and more I’m convinced the success of intimate relationship strongly depends on … timing. I don’t mean perfect accidental timing, like where you just happen to be at the post office on the exact day, at the precise hour, minute, second that The One needs stamps. I don’t mean bad circumstantial timing, like … Read more
♦◊♦ A few years ago, I was shocked to discover I’d spent a lifetime (unknowingly) allowing one especially critical boundary to be violated by the women I loved, over and over. Naturally, I routinely violated this same boundary for them, too. Had I been aware (and able to stand for this boundary) I’m convinced! I … Read more
I never understood why the women I loved were so often angry at me. Until one day, in the painful midst of another lover-spat going nowhere, I finally got it …
In a coaching session with a couple, I told a confused man whose wife was on the brink of leaving: “She will follow you anywhere … if you just stop trying to solve the ‘problems of her’ and instead practice connecting with her.”
We men are Angry. Furious. Enraged. Which has nothing to do with Republicans, or Democrats, or the unfair accusations our intimate makes in her (his) moments of upset. No. We’re angry because our fathers left us alone to find our own way.
No matter what you’re saying or what you did even 5 minutes ago, if you don’t FEEL SAFE to her right now, she won’t trust you, nor should she.