Gender, Grief, and Gentleness

The older I get and the more I learn about health and wellness, the more I’ve come to understand wellness as a form of intimacy with yourself. The ability to companion yourself well throughout your life, and relate to yourself with kindness, compassion, clarity of intention, and execution and follow through of that intention.

I think that these elements of health can’t really be separated from each other without sacrificing something essential. I observe a lot of men at the various gyms where I work who seem to have the last two qualities in abundance: clarity of intention and follow through. They have a well-planned workout and commit to it day after day. But while executing their plan, they seem angry. They slam weights loudly, stomp their way around the gym, and sometimes audibly berate themselves. To me, this doesn’t seem healthy.

I also see other people who seem to make endless excuses for themselves for not following through on their plan - who have some kind of emotional resistance to moving their body in a focused way, but never address that resistance and so never follow through on a plan. There may be endless self-compassion and gentleness, but no structure.

Because I am a male-leaning, socialized male person, I feel drawn to working with men who struggle to be gentle with themselves. Men or other male-leaning folks who have a hard time softening inwardly when experiencing emotional distress, and so tend to spiral up and away from intimacy with themselves, spiraling into distraction and stimulation, numbing or checking out, or maybe spiraling down into depression and shame. Or perhaps spiraling out into aggressive, angry behaviors - all due to a lack of skill and capacity to have a more supportive, intimate relationship with themselves.

There’s much more I could say about this, but I’ll simply give one clear, vivid example of how this male socialization plays out, and then describe one way that I’m trying to make a difference.

There is, of course, a long and ongoing debate about the potential dangers of pornography. I don’t know that I have any stance on whether or not pornography is inherently dangerous or not, but I have come to believe that the way that most young men (or boys, in some cases) are exposed to and are engaging with pornography is problematic because it results in them having a less intimate relationship with themselves. For many young men, moments of viewing pornography are clandestine, overstimulating, sometimes even guilt-ridden or shameful. Rarely, as far as I know, is pornography being engaged with in a way that moves young men closer towards the nuances and subtleties of their own bodies and sexuality, or expands their capacity to connect with themselves emotionally. Instead, it’s almost always stimulation at the cost of self connection.

This might seem like an extreme example, but I think this theme holds true for many of the visible and invisible ways that male-bodied people are socialized. Being taught that winning fights is better than shedding tears, that rushing towards danger and sacrificing yourself to save others is better than being afraid, or that having big muscles and being an athlete is better than being skinny and a caretaker.

Depending on what messages were reinforced by family and loved ones, I think it can be very difficult for many men to find their way through this mess and arrive into a deeply rooted, well established capacity to companion themselves well throughout their lives - most especially during moments of stress, hardship, and emotional pain. To that end, I’m very excited to be collaborating with a dear friend to offer a workshop for men called “Gender, Grief, and Gentleness.” It will be a 6 hour exploration or unlearning some of the ways we’ve turned away from ourselves, as well as playing with new ways of relating to both ourselves and each other. You can find more information here: https://sites.google.com/view/gender-grief-gentleness/home …and registration can be found here: https://bale.as.me/?appointmentType=85138001

Thanks for reading, feel free to comment and share thoughts. Take care.