The sad thing is that most people take emotional dishonesty for granted and are unaware that anything else is possible.
Virginia Satir
Until we are willing to question many of the specifics of the male sex role, including most of the seven norms and stereotypes the psychologists Robert Levant names in a listing of its chief constituents ― “avoiding femininity, restrictive emotionality, seeking achievement and status, self-reliance, aggression, homophobia, and non-relational attitudes towards sexuality” ― we are going to deny men their full humanity. Feminist masculinity would have as its chief constituents; integrity, self-love, emotional awareness, assertiveness, and relational skill, including the capacity to be empathic, autonomous, and connected.
Olga Silverstein, The Courage to Raise Good Men
Our job is to love others without stopping to inquire whether or not they are worthy. That is not our business, and, in fact, it is nobody’s business. What we are asked to do is to love, and this love itself will render both ourselves and our neighbours worthy.
Thomas Merton
When men are asked how they are, the standard reply often used is, “I’m fine”. (Frazzled, Insecure, Neurotic, Exhausted! Perhaps…)
Often, we are trying to deflect, to keep under wraps how we are really feeling or, even more concerning, the fact that we haven’t a clue what we are feeling. We sometimes have just a subtle foreboding that we are not feeling safe right now. When I reply in this fashion, those able to consciously tune into body language will recognise that my words and my nervous system are not in alignment.
Perhaps the jaw has tightened, the breathing pattern changed, the tone shifted, or eye contact has abruptly ceased. She is asking: “What’s wrong?” because my body is communicating something different to my words.
And if she (or he) has lived through childhood adversity, trauma, betrayal, addiction, or emotional inconsistency, it certainly isn’t the case that she is “too sensitive.” She has learned to read subtle shifts because, at one point, it was crucial to her survival.
When she asks, “What’s wrong? ” and gets the reply, “Nothing” while experiencing something different, uncertainty is created. Then calling her anxious or telling her she’s overthinking are attempts to entice her to distrust what she’s accurately noticing.
Eventually, she’ll stop asking. Don’t mistake that silence for peace. It may be emotional self-protection. You may be in for a long, drawn-out cold war.
In such a scenario, emotional maturity, otherwise known as Emotional Sobriety, can be manifested in one sentence: “You’re reading the signals correctly. Something is off. It’s work (or any one of several topics). It’s not you. Give me an hour and then you’ll have my full attention.”
It’s that simple. You have taken responsibility for your own ― perhaps nebulous or confusing ― feelings, validated what she has noticed, removed the oblique blame, and joined up all the dots.
And partners: not every shift in her/his energy is about you.
Ask, but if someone repeatedly attempts to induce you to ignore what you can clearly see and feel, that’s not healthy communication. Healthy relationships do not automatically grow in the absence of stress. They’re built when words, behaviours, and actions tell the same story. It’s an example of expansive emotionality characterised by what is called congruence.
Let’s take a closer look at Robert Levant’s work on the cultural inculcation of sex role norms, specifically for boys. In a 2021 interview on the topic of: “Men, Masculinity, and Mental Health,” with the “Speaking of Psychology” Podcast ― the flagship podcast of the American Psychological Association that examines the links between psychological science and everyday life ― Levant stated:
One of the things that I ran up against is … a lot of men have a lot of trouble identifying and describing how they’re feeling, they cannot give a good account of their emotional life. Sometimes, if you ask them how they’re feeling, they’ll tell you what they’re thinking, or they’ll tell you what they’re going to do. And there’s a word for this, I hope it won’t turn off your listeners, it’s alexithymia, A-L-E-X-I-T-H-Y-M-I-A. It’s a Greco-Roman root which means “without words for emotions”.
And in my research, I found that there was evidence that as a result of gender role socialization, that boys between infancy and six were socialized to restrict the expression of emotions.
It may be of interest to you that as neonates, boys are more emotionally expressive than girls. But what do neonates do? They cry or they sleep. But this difference holds up until at least one year of age, boys, and they do a lot more at one year of age than they do hours after birth. But the difference starts to reverse itself by two, where girls are more verbally, emotionally expressive than boys.
And between four and six, little boys lose their facial expressivity. Now, what’s happening to boys between four and six? They’re in preschool or elementary school, and they’re getting policed by other boys. Basically, other boys are shaming them for expressing emotions, they’re enforcing the masculine code.
In the introduction to his wonderful book “The Myth of Normal”, Dr Gabor Maté states that when we grow bacteria in a Petri dish, the substance in which the bacteria are placed is called “the culture”. If the experiment does not work out as anticipated, we do not blame the bacteria or fault it for bad behaviour.
We look to the culture for clues as to why the experiment produced unexpected results and, for the next research increment, modify it accordingly.
Well, when it comes to the unwritten rules of masculinity ― “The Man Rules” is the term used by Dan Griffin in his excellent: “A Man’s Way through Relationships” ― we need to look at the culture we have created. It certainly needs to be adapted to get the results to which we aspire.
At SoberOasis, we aspire to learning to lead a life of Emotional Sobriety. For us men, therefore, there can be no place for any of the seven norms and stereotypes of the male sex role, as defined by Levant, i.e.: “avoiding femininity, restrictive emotionality, seeking achievement and status, self-reliance, aggression, homophobia, and non-relational attitudes towards sexuality”.
We need to shift from the patriarchal paradigm of dominance and subjugation to the life-affirming, love-propelled paradigm of mutual compassion and cooperation. Masculinity in this latter paradigm would be characterised by integrity, self-love, emotional awareness, assertiveness, and relational skill, including the capacity to be empathic, autonomous, and connected.
Where to start?
I believe the starting point for us men must be to learn to reconnect with our emotions. This is the main focus of the 7-day Men’s Emotional Sobriety Retreats which have been rolled out this year. While the next retreat in October (in Ireland) is also dedicated to men, our future offering with include both men’s retreats and mixed gatherings.
Self-actualization invariably involves becoming aware of what happened to us in our earliest years, embracing then transcending the woundedness of childhood, learning to self-regulate and co-regulate, and cultivating new patterns of thinking, feeling, and behavior which truly serve us as we contribute, through our own recovery, to the sustained recovery and thriving of creation at this perilous juncture of human civilization.
The word “cultivate” is key. We humans tend to be forgetful and slip back into our default mode very quickly in the absence of a daily practice of the new, upgraded modus operandi. This means we need to practice every day, bringing to each new dawn a “beginner’s mind”.
In this respect, Mental Fitness is no different to physical fitness. We know what happens when we take a break from going to the gym or exercising daily. To remain fit, we need to train often and regularly for the rest of our lives, one day at a time.
The culture that enables me to cultivate Emotional Sobriety is a combination of Twelve Step Recovery, PQ Mental Fitness, regular (somatic-based, trauma-informed) psychotherapy, and a regimen of self-care covering diverse areas such as sleep, exercise, nutrition, daily meditation, soul food, and engaging in an array of creative interests (writing, photography, dancing, drumming, etc.).
For those of us dedicated to this challenge, learning how to feel and to clearly express what we are feeling are essential skills, just as the skill of listening to the feelings of others and bringing compassion (for self, others, and circumstances) to each encounter.
Initiating and maintaining a loving inner dialogue with the many facets of our Inner Child is also crucial, as emphasized in the ACA Twelve Step programme, designed for those who wish to recover from growing up in dysfunction and chaos.
The words of Thomas Merton take on new power in this context.
What we are asked to do is to love, and this love itself will render both ourselves and our neighbours worthy, is what he writes with respect to interactions with others.
This is also true of our inner dialogue. Both the adult Patrick and the three-year-old child within are rendered worthy. This realisation of our worthiness is the seed bed for further healing and growth.
We can then lead by example, in our own families, communities, places of work, social settings, and recovery fellowships.
The task is not trivial. The culture in which we live is so ingrained with Man Rules that we may not spot them at first glance. The fabric of the 24/7 media onslaught is shot through with obvious and subliminal messaging about both gender roles. The same applies to much of the knowledge discovered and decimated throughout the world over the past 7,000 years. Discernment is required as we go through each new day.
Life in the 21st century is a great opportunity, our opportunity to shift the consciousness of humankind such that men and women will learn to work together to ensure the survival of our species and to thrive in peace, joy, and creativity for the many millennia to come.
