John Eldridge: the Most important question for men

The challenge of our lives

"A few years ago, one warm August night, I and my sons were climbing in a place called "garden of the gods" not far from our house. We all like to climb mountains, and for this our love is more than just a love of adventure. The confrontation between the stone slab, consent to answer the challenge that it brings, allows you to check yourself and make sure of their manhood. Besides the boys at every opportunity ready to climb on any high object — the refrigerator, the banister, the neighbor's vineyard, so it is better if the subject is outside the home.





That night Sam had to go first, and after he secured himself to the belay rope, he began to climb. He pretty well until then, until he reached the small ledge.

In this place, despite the rope, Sam felt unprotected and vulnerable. He could not manage to overcome the ledge, and the more he hung out there, the more I started to panic and was ready to cry. Therefore, little to cheer him, I told him he better go down, because we don't have to climb this rock today, and I know another rock climbing which would be a lot more interesting. "'No,' he replied, ' I want to climb on this rock."

I figured it out. In life there are moments when we just need to respond to the challenge of our lives, and to stop walking backwards. So I helped him to overcome this ledge, and he quickly and confidently began to move up. "Come On, Sam! You're looking good. So... now pull to the right... good, now push down on this prop... a good step.“





Please note, how important are such encouragement replica in any men's sport. In this way men casually expressed appreciation to each other. We rarely openly praise each other as women do.

Men praise, noting the achievements and successes of each other: "Wow, well-aimed shot, Ted. Today you've got a killer scope“.

Ten or fifteen minutes, and I already forgot about what happened with Sam. And he's not. While I ran the ascent of his brother, Sam somehow silently approached me and asked quietly, "Dad... did you really think I behaved like a real man?"

If you do not pay attention to such moments, we may forever lose the boy's heart. This is not an ordinary question is the most important issue for boys and men. Will I be able to cope with difficulties? If I'm strong?

Until a man is confident in his masculinity, he will always try to prove that it is entitled to be called a real man, at the same time trying to avoid anything that might prove otherwise. Most men live lives trying to answer this question, or suffering from the response that they received.

Where's the source of masculinity?

To understand how a man's heart, you receive a wound, you must understand the basic truth on the way of turning a boy into a man: masculinity does not come by itself, it is given (or piped). A boy learns who he is and what he's capable of from a man or group of men. He can't learn about it in some other way. He can't learn about it from the other boys don't know he does in the female environment. The father is the first man in a boy's life and forever remains the most important man in his life. Moreover, the father must answer the most important question of his son, and give it a name. Throughout the history of mankind recorded in the Bible, the father blesses the sons and thus gives them names.

Mother and sons

A boy comes into this world thanks to my mom and she is the center of his universe in the first months and years of his life. She breastfeeds, educates, protects, she sings him songs, reading books, caring for them, as they say, '"as a hen". It often gives him the names, delicate names like "my little lamb" or "mother's joy", or even "my little friend". But the boy can't grow up with these names, and there comes a time of change, when he begins to seek love and attention of his father. He wants to play ball with him, wrestle with him, to spend time with him in nature or in his Studio.

If the father works outside the home like most men, his return home in the evening becomes for the boy the most important event of the day.This is a very difficult period in the life of the mother when the father replaces her and becomes the most important person in the eyes of her son.

Mother rarely agrees with this and even more rarely responds correctly to these changes. Many women ask their sons to fill the emptiness in my soul that leaves their husband. But the boys have a question to answer, and they can't get it from her mother. Woman will never be able to give my son something that will make him a real man. Mom often called me "sweetie" and daddy called me "tiger". What do you think image is for a boy attractive? He will continue to resort to mom for comfort (e.g. when you break a knee), but he goes to the father in quest of adventure, to be able to show their strength and, above all, to get the answer to the main question of his life.

Recently I read a story about a woman in a divorce from her husband, who was furious when her ex-husband wanted to take his son hunting with him. She tried to get an official document according to which the father would be forbidden to tell his son about how to handle a gun. One young man shared with me: "We live on the East coast, near the theme Park. There is an old fishing boat, wooden, but my mom would never allow me to climb on him." It is also a deprivation of masculinity, and in this situation absolutely requires active intervention of the father or of another man.





From strength to strength

It's hard to say what is masculinity, but each boy it is necessary just as food and water. This is something that is exchanged between men. "The traditional method of education of sons, noted by Robert bly, which was used for thousands and thousands of years, which was very important for fathers and sons living in close — murderously close — proximity, was to teach the father of the son of his profession: it could be farming, or carpentry, blacksmithing, or tailoring".

My father taught me to fish. We often spent long days on the river in a boat trying to catch fish. I never will forget how happy he was for me when I was able to catch something. But the fish itself had never imagined for us special value. The greatest value was the joy, companionship, a sense of belonging to the male. "Well done, a real tiger! Come on, bring it! So... Well done!"

Listen men, when they fondly talk about their fathers and you'll hear something like: "My father taught me how to repair the tractor... do the trick (Approx. in sport: a deceptive move, feint)... hunting quail". And if you do not go into the details, the most important thing that fathers give their sons male blessing.

"In most primitive tribes, the fathers and the sons show a remarkable tolerance with respect to each other, says blye. — Sons have a lot to learn, so fathers and sons spend hours together, trying to make arrowheads, or repair a spear, or to drive a wild animal.

When father and son spend so much time together, what some fathers and sons, we can say that some substance needed almost as much as the food is passed from the older Junior."

"In primitive society people believed that a boy becomes a man only because a special ritual is performed and applied some effort, only through the active involvement of more Mature men," reminds us of bly. The father or another man must actively intervene in the process of education, and the mother needs to let go of his son.

Bly describes the ritual performed in one of the tribes, which assumes, like all such rituals, men take the boy for the rite of initiation. But in this case when they are returned, the boy's mother pretends not to know him. She requested her "young man". This is a great example of how a mother can help her son become a part of the world of his father. If it does not, in the future, the son may face big trouble, especially when getting married. Between mother and son established an emotional connection, which can be called emotional incest.

Married, he tries to remain faithful to two women. That's why the Scripture says: "Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife..." (Gen. 2:24; emphasis added. — J. C.).

Sometimes when the mother does not want to let go of his son, he is desperately trying to break away from her. This usually happens during adolescence and often takes ugly forms; sometimes a young man begins to speak of his mother horrible things. The mother feels rejected, the son feels guilty, but he knows he just needs to put it down. So it was in my case, and my relationship with my mother since I entered into puberty, it was impossible to call it good.

I found that many, many adult men dissatisfied with their mothers, but find it difficult to name the reason for his discontent. They just feel that close communication between them impossible.

My friend Dave said, "I hate to call my mother. She always says something like "I'm so glad to hear your sweet little voice". I'm twenty-five years old, and she still likes to call me his little lamb". Somehow he feels that a close relationship with the mother can adversely affect the process of maturation that he can back to his childhood. It is an unconscious fear, but he shows that in his life you have missed two important points: the mother did not allow him to break away from himself, and the father took it away from her.





The wounds inflicted by father

Dave remembers the day when he inflicted the wound. His parents were arguing in the kitchen, father had heckled the mother. Dave stood up for her, and my father exploded. "I don't remember all the words that he said, but I remember his last words. "You're just a sissy!" he yelled. He then walked out of the kitchen".

Perhaps if overall Dave was a good and close relationship with his father, such a wound could be delayed, could be healed with words of love. But this blow was struck after years of mutual alienation. Father Dave was often gone at work from early morning until late evening, so rarely spent time with his son. Furthermore, Dave felt that his father has long been disappointed in him. He was a talented athlete, which would like to see his father. He felt a strong spiritual hunger and often attended the Church that my dad was absolutely useless occupation. So those words were for Dave's final blow, a death sentence.

Lynn Payne said that when the relationship between a father and son add up correctly, "spreading and gives the shelter the tree of masculinity and power, growing in the father, protects and nourishes the delicate beginnings of manhood, soaking in the son."

His father Dave took an axe and dealt a crushing blow to a young sapling. How I wish that this case was an exception, but I regret to say that he had heard many stories similar to this.

In cases where fathers have short temper, their response that get their sons to your most important question, is having a devastating effect. "If I'm strong enough to cope with a difficult situation? If I look like a real man, daddy?" No, you're a sissy, idiot, Homo.

Here are the sentences that determine the future of man. These wounds resemble the wounds of a gunshot. They can cause unbearable pain, especially if the insults are accompanied by physical or sexual violence from which the child suffers. But there is one thing in common, typical for wounds inflicted by the charges: they are obvious.Hidden wounds are quite different, they are harmful, like cancer. Because of their stealth, these wounds often are not detected and therefore heal poorly.

As bly said, "if you do not receive any blessing from his father, it causes you injury -- If you, as a child, I see your father never spend time with him, if you do not have a relationship with him if he is missing, lost at work, it also causes you injury".

The father of my friend Alex died when his son was four years old. For Alex the sun set and never rose above the horizon. How could a little boy to understand this? Every evening Alex stood at the window and waited for his father to come back home. It lasted about a year. I have many patients whose fathers had just left, and never came back.

Some fathers inflict upon their sons wound just by their silence; they seem to be close, but in reality they do not exist. Such silence is able to stun. I remember that in my childhood I wanted my father died, and felt unbearable guilt for this desire. Now I understand that actually wanted someone confirmed that I'm hurt. My father was absent, though physically he was nearby. So I lived with a wound that no one could see and understand where it came from. If a boy is silent, passive, or forever absent father, then the son's question remains unanswered."Will I be able to cope with a difficult situation? If I look like a real man, daddy?" Behind the silence of the father lies the following response: "I don't know... I Doubt it... You'll have to figure it out... Maybe not."

The consequences of injury

Every man has a wound. I have never met a man who was not once wounded. No matter how you happy with your life, you are living in an imperfect world full of imperfect people. Your mother or father may just be great parents, but they can't be perfect.And every wound, whether explicit or hidden, carries a message. This message is for us real and effective, absolutely effective, because it has great power. How we react to it affects the formation of our personality in a definite manner.

Hence our tendency to put on a mask. Most men that you know, I live under cover of this mask, take a position that is directly related to their wound. Allow me to clarify this issue.

I already wrote that for many years was a very demanding, intolerant, and painful valuing their independence man, a perfectionist. Our society encourages such behavior; most of the successful men reading this book behave in the same way. But my behavior did unhappy people around me — people I've hurt or abandoned, including my father.

I was close to destroy your marriage and, of course, to lose your heart. Because in order to live the life that I chose, I had to literally bury your heart or to drive him into a corner. I couldn't admit that you need something, I'm weak. That's what happens when you put on the mask. If you ask my wife whether our relationship is warm and friendly first ten years of marriage, she might respond positively. But if you asked her, what was missing from our marriage, if she felt that our boat was leaking, she would have answered you without hesitation: "I did not need the John."You see, that was my motto: I don't need anyone. My wound was deep and unhealed, and the message which she is carrying, seemed unchanged: in this life I itself.

There are two basic reactions to pain which causes inflicted wound. Men are either trying somehow to numb the pain and become bitter, or trying to suck it up to pain to get used to it and become passive.

These stories are innumerable. The child receives the wound, and with it a message. Since then, the boy makes a vow, chooses a lifestyle that leads to the creation of a false image, a mask that he wears. At the heart of all these events lies a deep insecurity. A man ceases to live in accordance with the desires of your heart. Often he feels at an impasse: either he is paralyzed and unable to move or unable to stop the movement." published

 

@ John Eldredge, "Wild heart "

P. S. And remember, just changing your mind — together we change the world! ©

Source: //adalin.mospsy.ru/r_03_00/r_03_03y.shtml

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