Why men who do their ‘inner work’ are irresistible?
And why doing that inner work is terrifying
Dear men,
In case you did not notice it yet, a fundamental cultural shift has happened in the last decades.
We, men, have been busy chasing the traditional cultural symbols of success: house, family, job, career, stability, safety, comfort.
Meanwhile, women were doing their inner work and shifting their role in society….
We, men, have been busy playing war and politics over territory, ideologies and resources.
Meanwhile, women were doing their inner work and calling out rape and dominance culture….
We, men, have been comfortably profiting from our patriarchal privileges, assuming that the world (and women) owed us something.
Meanwhile, women were doing their inner work, healing from the emotions of having been used, abused, and disempowered by men...
Welcome to today
Whether you like it or not, whether it is already fully visible or not, the cultural paradigm has shifted.
Women are the majority gender on this planet and outnumber men in higher education, both in enrolment as well as in completion. More women are active in the workplace and financially independent than ever before in human history.
And women have a simple agenda:
They want equal representation at the leadership table, in the communities and in the family systems.
They do not want to be looked at as second-class citizens, whose voices and contributions mean less.
And what does that mean in relationships with men?
They want to be met and treated as equals to men, in practical, everyday terms.
It’s pretty simple really
Women are no longer willing to tolerate the comfortable and blissfully ignorant, self-serving, not to say ‘entitled’, behaviour of ignorant, privileged men, with the excuse of ‘boys will be boys’.
Neither the ‘little-boy’ attitude, nor the macho attitude, is good enough anymore.
Women want awake, conscious men.
Men who are committed to taking the journey to wholeness.
Men who do their inner work.
I hate to say it, but most ‘modern men’ have not kept up with the times
We enjoy living in the moment, strive to optimize our life, maximize our pleasures, and satisfy our needs.
And then, in our intimate relationships, we suddenly face some struggles. We don’t seem to be able to connect deeply. We sometimes hurt the women we are supposed to love, inadvertently, due to our own inner pains, due to our pride, or our ego.
In reality, we haven’t taken the time yet to do the work to meet our own internal shadows and release the cultural stereotypes that hold us back.
We haven’t done our inner healing work.
Okay.
What exactly is the “inner work”?
Inner work is the psychological and spiritual practice of diving deep into your inner self for the purposes of self-exploration, self-understanding, healing, and spiritual transformation
It involves becoming familiar with every corner of your psyche — the conscious, the unconscious, and the sub-conscious — and accepting and approving of its state.
That does not sound that bad, does it?
Well, think again.
Doing the inner work is terrifying
When you look within and start doing the inner work, you could:
· meet the parts of yourself that are hard to love
· meet your selfishness, your greed, your sadness, your anger, your fear
· face a needy, entitled, scared inner little child
· find parts of yourself that have been rejected, forgotten, judged or dismissed
· encounter old painful memories, limiting beliefs, ugly scars and wounds
Yes, there are some shady shadows and scary monsters in there.
It can be a gut-wrenching, heart-breaking, mind-paralyzing journey.
Yes, we men fear what will come up with the inner work.
We love to stay on the surface because it’s much easier to stay there.
There’s plenty of light here.
Let’s ignore the deeper work, not look within, pretend we do not need this, distract ourselves with busyness and argue that things have moved on.
But what if there was a positive way to look at inner work?
· What if doing the inner work would provide you access to authentic power?
· What if doing the inner work was the doorway to real freedom?
· What if doing the inner work would make you a better leader?
· What if doing the inner work was a path to ecstatic intimacy?
· What if doing the inner work was your ultimate competitive advantage?
Power, freedom, leadership, erotic ecstasy, competitive advantage?
Those are things that we men can appreciate, no?
OK, enough of the sales talk 😊
Let’s take a simple look at the benefits of inner work
1. Self-awareness
By doing inner work, we are bringing awareness to what is happening inside of us, our inner processes and mental habits. We are starting to recognize our own behaviour patterns.
While some people may naturally be more self-aware than others, self-awareness is a lifelong pursuit, to be cultivated. There are simple practices we can all take to improve our self-awareness. This can happen through self-inquiry, mindfulness practices, yoga, energy work, or psychotherapy.
Ultimately, the goal is to no longer be at the whim of preconditioned mental habits in perceiving the world.
A self-aware man is one who can appreciate himself enough to know what he’s good at and what he is not and take neither for granted. He doesn’t judge his worth by it, he just utilizes that knowledge to estimate what he is capable of.
The best leaders demonstrate high levels of self-awareness.
2. Emotional intelligence
By doing the inner work, we are befriending our emotions. As men, this is a fundamental part of our growth journey, to become mature and whole human beings.
Sorry to break the spell, but the archetype of the stoic manhood is outdated.
Once you open yourself up and dare to look behind your armoured self, you will discover that reclaiming your emotions is incredibly liberating and opens a depth, intensity and richness in life that is wonderful.
By welcoming all your emotions, integrating your suppressed or hidden parts, and bringing them back together, you are able to move past fears and limitations, wounds, trauma, and the feelings of emptiness and loneliness that sometimes tend to paralyze us.
Believe me, when you can authentically and truthfully feel forgiveness, gratitude and love, you will discover they are actually incredible superpowers!
An emotionally intelligent man is a man who appreciates the importance of emotions to its fullest, recognizes its purpose and effects and uses that knowledge to regulate his emotions, evaluate the mental state of himself and others to determine what he must do. He can think clearly and respond to external triggers appropriately, share his feelings and communicate calmly with people, instead of letting his emotions spiral out of control.
This is a core skill necessary for performing under pressure and it is a well-documented fact that emotionally intelligent leaders are better leaders.
3. Power with purpose
By doing the inner work, we are rediscovering our authentic leadership power.
Inner work brings healing, healing brings strength, and strength brings power.
Inner work turns power into purpose.
Yes, I know, we men like power and thinking big and pointing lasers to the moon. Bigger, bolder, faster, higher in external accomplishments.
But I hope you realize that leadership today means that people and the planet matter more than profit.
The new definition of power is ‘power with purpose’; the new currency of leadership is positive impact on people and planet.
Actually, all the great social movements change leaders were highly contemplative and tapped into their inner sources of power to transform institutions and societies.
The difference between an awakened leader who has done a lot of inner work and a leader who hasn’t? It’s the difference between a highly trained sniper and someone randomly firing shots in the dark.
Yes, the inner work of men can have powerful consequences in the larger world.
4. Erotic connection
By doing the inner work, we are reconnecting with our innate Eros.
Our interiority is literally the gateway to our aliveness and erotic living.
When we are living from the inside, we are operating from our soul, living naturally, in the flow of our own life.
As our relationship with ourselves grows deeper and stronger, so will our relationships with others, and with women particularly.
The unconscious man comes to conquer women, there is a demand, a greed, a need to possess, to own, to dominate — it becomes a power game, a game of separation.
The conscious man comes to merge with women, so the women love them and lift them up — it becomes a game of union.
To merge is to become one with the experience of life. Living life intensely, fully, is deeply sensual, is intimate, is erotic. It is not an experience of the mind, it is an experience of the body, the heart, the soul, the guts.
It is primal, it is vulnerable.
When you become an insider to the mystery that is Eros or Love, you live from an open heart, your are fully open, receptive, welcoming, vulnerable.
Love and intimacy become a state of being.
And that is sexy as hell.
So, are you ready for the inner work?
The journey to wholeness means that you are indeed becoming a kinder, gentler man in touch with your feelings AND at the same time you can still “man up” and take care of business. It’s an evolutionary tale, the standard continues to raise, your human potential continues to grow.
But please, watch out not to fall for the narcissistic, navel-gazing pitfalls.
Whining, over-sharing, falling too much in the yin, isn’t sexy.
If you worry about becoming ‘emasculated’ when doing your inner work, then you are not secure in your masculinity in the first place.
Okay, brothers, I hope you get my point by now.
We need to do our inner work to evolve our relationship with women in line with the cultural paradigm shift.
The male as protector and provider of financial stability is outdated.
It is time for a new relational narrative.
For the contemporary man, the deepest satisfaction and healing will come from stepping into his role as a guardian of the womb and honouring the feminine in her journey back to wholeness.
When a man supports a woman on her journey back to wholeness, his healing will also be ensured. The reason why women are still struggling is that men still selfishly seek their needs through her womb and sex rather than support her healing journey.
Somehow, we have to find our way back to participatory reverence.
We are charged with a huge task.
How to become fully human again.
