Who’s the man?
PRINT PAGE
Who’s the man?
What is a True Man? Does such a being exist, and would we even know what it looked like if it did?
Recently I posed a similar question to a number of men and what soon became apparent from each man’s response was that although each of them expressed what they felt were their own personal views, they had all aligned to what society has dictated a man to be.
After discussing the topic further, each of them came to the realisation that what they actually felt and knew inside to be true was different to what they'd been expressing in their answers. The other revealing factor that became apparent was that they had been living their lives in alignment to their initial responses and not to the truths that had been uncovered. This made me ponder – why are we accepting what society is dictating without feeling if it is true for us.
By not living our truth, how is this affecting the way we live our life and what impact does it have on us personally and those around us?
When we as men come together, why are we afraid of really expressing ourselves and having true relationships? Why do we tend to only touch on a small number of topics or change the subject if more than the superficial is addressed? As long as we discuss work, sport, current affairs or how busy life is, everything is okay and we dare not deviate. Is this because we don’t have to look too far for the answers or that our answers can be easily influenced/justified by what others around us may also think? Or is it we believe if we start to explore more than the superficial we will be ridiculed or somehow ex-communicated from our friends, or that the lifestyle bubble (Serge Benhayon, 2005) we have worked so hard to create may pop?
Why are we afraid to go deeper in these conversations?
Why do men use ingrained behaviours?
Is it possible men use ingrained behaviours to avoid being their full potential because they fear rejection?
Whilst we are living our lives this way, keeping others at a distance and not forming true relationships, it gives us room and opportunity to set up distractions. We may over-exercise, hardening our bodies to protect ourselves from the world. We may drink alcohol so that we don’t have to go deeper when we're around our friends and family. We may overeat foods that dull us or make us feel sluggish, stopping us from really engaging with people. We may watch and partake in various sports to avoid real conversations. All these things are exactly that – distractions to keep us pre-occupied from something… but what?
Are these distractions just giving us something to talk about when we do come together, to stop us from feeling and understanding more about ourselves and really connecting with each other on a deeper level? Do they form a layer of protection that shields us or even prevents dialog from being directed towards us that could ultimately expose our vulnerability?
Or are they all just a mask for the real issue and if we were to dig a little deeper, would we find that this real issue is actually a fear of our true sensitive nature being rejected? By not living who we truly are or expressing what we truly feel we are dishonouring our true being, the being inside us we know intimately and very seldom share with anyone, thinking we need to protect it.
So, how do we build or strengthen ourselves to not need to hide or protect from the world knowing our true sensitivity?
It could all start with caring for ourselves more. Looking at what we eat, drink, watch or listen to, how we exercise or even by the way we prepare ourselves for bed each night. Let’s face it, all these things ultimately affect the way we feel about ourselves physically and mentally – and contribute to our building those hardened layers of protection versus the openness to be and connect with others.
If we don’t put the right fuel in our car, wash it regularly, garage it every night and take it out on regular drives it will soon deteriorate. Now consider the same for your body. Without healthy food, a good night’s sleep and regular gentle exercise our body is going to suffer, with the effects becoming very noticeable to those around us, however not always to ourselves.
"Be the man you know you are and not the man society has told you to be."
Serge Benhayon Esoteric Teachings and Revelations Volume 1, ed 1, p 553
What if we made a choice today to start to honour our bodies and make loving choices that benefit us without worrying what anyone else around us may think? If we start to take responsibility with our daily choices and start making decisions that will benefit us instead of hindering us, our world may begin to open up and we would be able to connect with our families, partners and friends in a deeper way than we could have ever imagined. If we make our relationships about substance and truth rather than superficiality, perhaps we may feel better within ourselves than we have ever felt before. By aligning to what we feel to be true inside, we would then have no pull, desire, cause or room to align to the falsities projected at us from society, as well as generate a core steadiness for living our life in a way that does deeply honour who we really are.
These choices can’t be left for others to make for us, we have to start looking within, questioning the world around us. We need to know and understand our bodies just as well if not better than we know how to perform our daily tasks at work. By taking care of ourselves we innately start to feel better about ourselves. This builds a strength and understanding within us to be able to handle most situations, and we will get to know our inner-selves intimately and from there nothing thrown at us from the outside world can harm or hurt us.
Just because something is accepted by society doesn’t make it right for us. We need to stand up and take responsibility for our choices and the way we care for ourselves.
Filed under
Awareness, Communication, Confidence, Healthy living, Self-empowerment, Self-worth
