The Meaning of Modern-Day Manhood
It goes beyond embracing our “sensitive side”
I just read Robert Bly’s book, Iron John. It’s about modern man’s need to embrace his inner “wild man.” Here’s what I learned in a single sentence:
Embodying the wild man means leaving overly nourishing parental energy to escape into the “wilds” of life with all its treachery, hard lessons, inner battles, and eventually, ascension.
To invoke the words of James Russell Lowell (words I’ve seen innumerable times on herbal tea labels): “One thorn of experience is worth a whole wilderness of warning.”
Embracing the Wild
Iron John is a large hairy man who guides a young boy away from his parents straight into the woods. The tale of Iron John was originally penned by the Brothers Grimm, a couple of 19th-century folklorists.
In his retelling, Bly takes a mythopoetic approach by unpacking the short tale over a period of 250 pages. He therein recites various archetypal initiation experiences occurring throughout the mythological canon. He places great emphasis on embracing the wild rather than “savage” man. Savage men exploit the earth, devalue women, obsess over warfare, and contain unexamined wounds. “The Wild Man,” Bly writes, “who has examined his wound, resembles a Zen priest, a shaman, or a woodsman more than a savage.”
Then, we learn that while it was excellent to see many men grasp their “sensitive side” post-1950s, the work shouldn’t end there. Many men have fallen into the trap of becoming the “soft male.” This man, Bly states, “was able to say, ‘I can feel your pain, and I consider your life as important as mine, and I will take care of you and comfort you.’ But he could not say what he wanted, and stick by it. . .Development of the feminine side has been an immensely valuable journey, but more travel lies ahead.”
Thus we must embrace the wild. We must turn our savagery that has destroyed and conquered for millennia into wildness flooded with resolve and life-preserving power.
Lacking the Father
Earlier in my sum-up of what I learned, I mentioned the importance of escaping over-bearing parents. A lot of men’s despair, however, is actually rooted in the remoteness (or complete absence) of their fathers. This led Bly to title an entire chapter “The Hunger for the King in a Time with No Father.” In my notes for the chapter, I wrote this single line:
“Lack of father energy = loss of inner and Holy king”
The levels of kingship are trifold. There’s political kingship, inner kingship, and holy kingship. Inner kingship is the embodiment of our decisiveness, our ability to strive for what we want out of life. Holy kingship (and queenship) exists in the mythological realm where resides figures like Kali, Buddha, the Virgin Mary, Thor, Zeus, Allah, and Artemis. Political kingship, well, lacks plenty of inner and Holy kingship these days.
Lacking a father figure empties our reserves of inner and Holy kingship. This is why we’re seeing many men “leaving it all behind,” heading to India, and finding and living with a guru. Others think a couple of Ahyuascha trips will fix their hangups.
These men crave spiritual bypassing disguised as spiritual flight.
Embracing our inner Wild Man actually requires that we come in deep touch with the dark dirtiness of the earth. Bly calls this “The Road of Ashes.” The Greeks called it katabasis. It’s where we’re completely humbled by the seemingly unfair turmoil inherent in life. Katabasis is where we find our strength, our ground, our capacity to face the deepest of wounds.
While further prepping for this piece, I listened to an episode of the Art of Manliness Podcast. Therein, a successful psychologist explained that his journey to knowledge really began when he was working part-time as a 26-year-old under the management of a 16-year-old. Imagine that. Humbling.
Finding our ground, one could argue, is essential for our initiation into manhood.
Embracing Initiation
I had a “Road of Ashes” experience only a few months ago. I was on a farm in England building a campervan. For the vanlife-uninitiated, such a project seems fun from the outside looking in. And it was at times!—but the weather was cruel and freezing. Endless rain and snow and wind battered my skin and spirit. I struggled to learn woodworking, metalwork, and how to lay vinyl flooring in the storm-swept moorlands. . .
Yet the psychological growth I acquired from this experience is pure and true. It’s a strength I can feel and carry with me forever. The 4 months of building in the dead of winter felt like an initiation.
Where have rites of passages gone in our modern culture? Today, if we’re lucky, our fathers will teach us camping and fishing. But that’s it. Where have the ancient ways gone? Where is our Iron John?
This is an important question Bly addresses in his book:
“The ancient societies believed that a boy becomes a man only through ritual and effort—only through the ‘active intervention of the older men.’ It’s becoming clear to us that manhood doesn’t happen by itself. It doesn’t happen just because we eat Wheaties. The active intervention of the older men means that older men welcome the younger man into the ancient, mythologized instinctive male world.”
Familial connection and initiatory experiences left culture when men were told success lies in factory work and business endeavors.
Perhaps the meaning of modern-day manhood, at least partially, lies in our ability to guide our sons into the physical and psychological wild. Maybe then our sons will help and not harm the earth and its daughters.
