Mental Health

                Whatever your political beliefs or where you live in the world, if you’re willing to open your eyes, heart and mind, you know that humanity is not doing well. We are in serious danger unless we change our way of being on planet Earth and need all the help we can get. Kelly Wendorf may be just the person who can give it to us. I first learned about Kelly’s work from my friend and colleague Chip Conley who is the founder of The Modern Elder Academy, the world’s first midlife wisdom school.

                Chip and his team were offering a program at their Santa Fe Center titled Applying Ancient Wisdom for Personal Transformation, with guest faculty Kelly Wendorf. The description was intriguing.

“In this Owning Wisdom workshop co-facilitated with EQUUS founder, coach, author, and ‘CEO whisperer’ Kelly Wendorf, you will be invited to enter through Nature’s doorway into a deeper, more profound relationship with yourself and the world around you.”

                I immediately purchased Kelly’s book with the mysterious title, Flying Lead Change: 56 Million Years of Wisdom for Leading and Living. I recently had the great pleasure of having a free-ranging discussion with Kelly about her fascinating life, what she has learned from indigenous elders she has met in her travels around the world, and her love and connection with the wisdom of horses. You can engage with our fascinating discussion here.

                As the founder of EQUUS, her mission is to liberate the leadership capacities of the conscientious, empathetic, accountable, and kind individuals who are most qualified to guide humanity into a future where we live in greater communion and connection to nature and to ourselves. 

                When I read her book, I was impressed by the range of experiences and wisdom she has acquired over the years, including expertise in the field of neuropsychology. She quotes one of the leaders in the field, Dr. Mario Martinez, author of The MindBody Code. Dr. Martinez says,

“All cultures, East and West, have their own unique ways of punishing those whose ideas and behaviors run contrary to established beliefs. These forms of punishment cause emotional damage that surfaces in the form of three archetypal wounds: abandonment, shame, and betrayal.”

                Dr. Martinez goes on to say,

“I discovered something profound. There is a healing field for each of the three wounds. Commitment heals abandonment, honor heals shame, and loyalty heals betrayal.”

                When I interviewed Kelly she described an experience she had with the group of Native American healthcare practitioners and community leaders from the Four Corners region of Utah, Colorado, Arizona, and New Mexico. Kelly said,

“When they all entered the arena to meet the horses, the horses responded in a bizarre fashion. Normally when people enter the herd, our horses are curious, or may show off, be agitated, or take turns meeting each person. In this case, not one horse acknowledged any person in the entire group. It was as if the people weren’t there.”

                From long experience Kelly knows that the wisdom tunes into deep truths about the humans who visit.

“What were the horses reflecting?” she asked the participants. “If we assume that the horses have a gift of teaching, what might that be?”

                It took a while working with the group but she discovered that every member of the group held shame for simply being alive, brought about by their collective historical trauma as displaced indigenous people. Drawing on the wisdom from Dr. Martinez, she and her horses were able to help the group reclaim their honor, loyalty, and commitment to life.

                In many ways we are all wounded by our collective historical trauma that goes back more than 6,000 years and we all have much to learn from elders who have been successful here on Earth for 56 million years. Interviewing Kelly and reading her book gave me a profound insight into what all humanity could learn. Imagine being in the presence of wise elders who recognize our individual woundedness and disconnection, who can see through our defensive shields, give us honest feedback about the state of our dis-ease, and guide our healing.

                Kelly asks in her book,

“What if you had a source of wisdom, a teacher, a mentor, who had been around for a really long time and who had mastered the big challenges that we are trying to figure out about how to live here on Earth?”

The answer is that we do and we all have access to it if we are willing to live and learn.

The Five Pillars and Two Superpowers That Kelly Wendorf Offers the World

                Kelly says,

“Based on my observation of multiple herds, wild and domestic, and a lifetime of working with horses, it is my experience that equine culture is organized around five pillars: Safety, Connection, Peace, Freedom, and Joy.”

                Take a moment to breathe and imagine a world where humanity was organized around these five pillars. What kind of leadership would it take to support our safety, connection, peace, freedom, and joy? Clearly, not the kind of leaders that dominate the headlines in the news today. Kelly observes.

“The leader is the one who is not the mightiest or the most domineering but who cares the most—a true definition of a servant leader.”

                She goes on to say,

“The leader, or the head of the family, is chosen based on their ability to maintain these pillars within the herd system. How exactly does a lead horse govern and keep those five pillars intact? Through two superpowers: care and presence.

                Kelly concludes saying,

“Care is that genuine desire to attend to the needs of others. Synonymous with love, care is unconditional love with responsibility. Presence is the ability to be wholly here in this present moment, in this limitless sense of totality here and how. Presence enables care to be acutely responsive to the moment, in each moment. Without presence, care can be inaccurate or ill-timed. Without care, presence can remain aloof.”

What Equus Offers

                I invite you to check out Kelly’s work at Equusinspired.com if you answer “yes” to any of these questions:

• Do you sense something more is possible for your life?
• Are you called to something deeper?
• Do you long to be challenged and inspired?
• Are you ready to really move the needle in your life?

“Welcome to a powerful approach to self-discovery and personal and professional development,” says Kelly. “Our evidence-based experiential processes leave you changed, meaningfully impacted, and clear about your next steps forward. Our work sits at the nexus of science, ancient wisdom and social innovation, and is designed to create measurable results through the following:”

• Coaching

“Coaching is one of our most popular offerings and sessions are both in-person and remotely by phone or zoom.”

• Courses

“We offer online courses throughout the year on varied topics based on the mission and values of ancient nature-based wisdom, neuroscience, contemplative wisdom, innovative leadership, and life-long learning.”

• The EQUUS Experience

“The Equus Experience is our award-winning personal and leadership development process that changes organizations, and transforms individuals, families, leaders, and teams.”

• The Wisdom Circle

“A mastermind and group coaching platform and innovative approach for navigating transition, developing leadership, and developing self-mastery developed by Kelly Wendorf, Founder and CEO, and ICF Master Certified Coach.”

“If you feel inspired, come visit EQUUS in beautiful Santa Fe, New Mexico, we welcome you,” says Kelly. “O’ghe P’oghe (White Shell Water Place), the original Tewa name for Santa Fe, is located on unceded territorial lands of the Tewa and Tanos people. We acknowledge the Traditional and Ancestral Carers, past, present, and future, of this land.”

To connect on-line, you may do so here: https://www.equusinspired.com/

If this article was helpful, please share it with others. If you would like to read more articles and connect with me and my work, you can visit me at https://menalive.com/. You can subscribe to my free weekly newsletter here: https://menalive.com/email-newsletter/

The post Why Humanity’s Future May Depend on Our Connection to Our 56-Million-Year-Old Elders appeared first on MenAlive.

In Part 1, I discussed the origin of my own search for masculinity growing up with an absent father. I also introduced you to Michael Gurian and Sean Kullman and their book, Boys, A Rescue Plan: Moving Beyond the Politics of Masculinity to Health Male Development. In Part 2, I expanded the discussion to draw on the work of other colleagues who are recognizing that healthy masculinity, like healthy femininity, are opposite sides of the same coin and must be created supported together for the good of all.

Jungian psychologist Robert Moore and mythologist Douglas Gillette wrote a powerful and mind-expanding book, King, Warrior, Magician, and Lover: Rediscovering The Archetypes of the Mature Masculine. They also understand the importance of Rites of Passage to assist males in developing into healthy mature adult men.

“In the present crisis in masculinity we do not need, as some feminists are saying less masculine power,” say Moore and Gillette. “We need more. But we need more of the mature masculine.”

They go on to say,

“There is too much slandering and wounding of both the masculine and feminine in patriarchy, as well as the feminist reaction against patriarchy. The feminist critique, when it is not wise enough, actually further wounds an already besieged authentic masculinity.”

I met Robert Moore and Doug Gillette shortly after the publication of their book. We three had a connection with Robert Bly. I had met Bly several years previously and shared a cabin with him at a men’s gathering in California. He gifted me a copy of his book, The Rag and Bone Shop of the Heart, co-written with James Hillman and Michael Meade. Robert wrote:

“To Jed with love and in the mood of brothers.”

In the introduction to King, Warrior, Magician, and Lover, Moore and Gillette say,

“During Bill Moyers’s recent interview with the poet Robert Bly, ‘A Gathering of Men,’ a young man asked the question, ‘Where are the initiated men of power today?’ We have written this book in order to answer this question, which is on the minds of both men and women.”

Decoding the Male Psyche–The Four Archetypes of Mature Masculinity

                “The four major forms of mature masculine energies that we have identified are the King, the Warrior, the Magician, and the Lover,” say Moore and Gillette. “They all overlap and, ideally, enrich one another. A good King is always also a Warrior, a Magician, and a Lover. And the same holds true for the other three.”

                In my book, Long Live Men! The Moonshot Mission to Heal Men, Close the Lifespan Gap, and Offer Hope to Humanity, I detail what I’ve learned from Robert Moore and Doug Gillette. Here is a short description of the four archetypes:

• King—The energy of just and creative ordering.
• Warrior—The energy of aggressive but nonviolent action.
• Magician—The energy of initiation and transformation.
• Lover—The energy that connects one to others and the world.

Moore and Gillette believe that the problems we see with men today—violence, shiftlessness, aloofness—are a result of modern men not adequately exploring or being in touch with the primal, masculine archetypes that reside within them. Like the great psychoanalyst Carl Jung, they believe that men and women possess both feminine and masculine archetypal patterns—this is the anima (feminine) and animus (masculine).

Each of the archetypal energy potentials in the male psyche has a three-part structure. Think of a triangle. At the top of the triangle is the archetype in its fullness. At the bottom of the triangle are twin dysfunctional aspects, either having too much (+) or too little (-) of the quality.

The King in his fullness at the top is powerful and nurturing.

At the bottom, the dysfunctional

Tyrant (+)           and            Weakling (-)

                The Warrior in his fullness is forceful and peaceful. The dysfunctional pairs are the

                                                Sadist (+) and the Masochist (-).

                The Magician in his fullness initiates and transforms.  His dysfunctional pairs are the   

                      Detached Manipulator (+) and the Denying “Innocent” One (-).

                The Lover in his fullness is connects and protects.  The dysfunctional lover are the

                                             Addicted Lover (+) or Impotent Lover (-).

                I believe we all recognize many of the dysfunctional aspects in men, including male leaders. 

Healing the Father Wound

                In order to move from a world of where we have men who express their mature and healthy King, Warrior, Magician, and Lover energies, we must heal our father wounds and experiencing healthy Rites of Passage. In my book, 12 Rules for Good Men, I have a chapter titled, Heal Your Father Wound and Become the Father You Were Meant to Be.

                I work with many men whose father wound has interfered with their success in love and marriage, limited their career success, and kept them from being the man they most want to be. I have also developed an on-line course for healing: “Healing the Family Father Wound.”

                Do you suffer from a family father wound? According to Roland Warren, former head of the National Fatherhood Initiative,

“Kids have a hole in their soul in the shape of their dad. And if a father is unwilling or unable to fill that hole, it can leave a wound that is not easily healed.”

For millions of men and women, the father wound influences our health and well-being, but we are not aware that it exists.

Here’s The Father-Wound Quiz I use in my counseling practice to help people assess whether they may have been impacted by an absent father. Please check off each statement that is true for you.

1. My father died when I was still a child (  ).
2. My parents divorced or were separated when I was young (  ).
3. My father was physically present, but emotionally distant (  ).
4. Growing up, my father worked a lot and he didn’t have enough time to be with me (  ).
5. My father was very critical of me (  ).
6. I never felt I could please my father (  ).
7. My father rarely said, “I love you, I’m proud of you, I believe in you” (  ).
8. One or both of my parents had mental health problems (  ).
9. One or both of my parents had drinking or drug problems (  ).
10. I sought out father-figures to help compensate for my father’s absence (  ).
11. During adolescence I often got angry and sometimes got into fights (  ).
12. During adolescence I was eager to fall in love or had early sexual experiences (  ).
13. Having a best friend was extremely important to me (  ).
14. I felt lonely and depressed growing up, even though I covered it well (  ).
15. As an adult I have had difficulty finding and keeping a healthy relationship (  ).
16. I’ve been married and divorced at least once (  ).
17. I have difficulty committing to a relationship (  ).
18. I sometimes pick partners who aren’t good for me in the long run (  ).
19. “Looking for love in all the wrong places” may have been written for me (  ).
20. With my own children, I worry about whether I’m being a good parent (  ).
21. I’ve vowed to be a different kind of father than my father was for me (  ).
22. I have been very successful at work, but less than successful in my love life (  ).
23. With my spouse or partner I often feel like a critical parent or a demanding child (  ).
24. I haven’t made as much money as I’m worth or become as successful as I want (  ).

Even those with healthy, involved fathers will check off a few of these statements. However, if you checked six or more, you may be suffering from the effects of an absent father. The more items you checked, the deeper the wound is likely to be.

Experiencing Healthy Rites of Passage

Bill Kauth is the co-founder of the ManKind Project. It offers one of the most powerful rites of passage programs I’ve ever experienced. I first met Bill Kauth in 1980 at a conference that had emerged from the consciousness of the women’s movement. I immediately felt I had found a kindred spirit. We were both impressed with the positive energy of women coming together to break out of the old restrictions that society had placed on them. It felt good to support women, but we also recognized that men needed to find their own support and break free from their own restrictions.

I still remember my own introduction to the New Warrior weekend (Now called The Mankind Project’s  New Warrior Training Adventure) . It was 1991, twelve years after my men’s group began. We joked that we felt like “an old married couple.” We knew each other well, felt safe and comfortable, enjoyed ourselves immensely, but were growing a bit bored hearing the same stories. We decided to attend the New Warrior weekend. Although it’s impossible to describe any kind of ritual initiation because the real value is in the experience, here are some of the things I learned:

• Being with other men in this well-crafted weekend experience was transformative. I felt a host of feelings: Anxiety, confusion, exhilaration, joy, and true brotherly love. By the end, I felt more myself, more deeply connected to others, and with tools that I could use to be more successful in life.

• I broke through my “Mr. Nice Guy” image to share a lot of my woundedness and anger. I found that my anger didn’t destroy people. In fact, it was appreciated, and there was a group of supportive men to help me guide my anger and who taught me ways of expressing it that would help, rather than harm, myself and others.

• Most of my life I felt like the Lone Ranger figuring things out on my own, doing what needed to be done by myself, solving my own problems. I thought being stoic, independent, and self-sufficient was what it meant to be a man. During the weekend, I learned to be part of a team, to work together in support of shared goals, and found that success was sweeter and more lasting when achieved together.

Being part of a men’s group that has been meeting for forty-six years has been a great gift that I recommend to all men. In my book, 12 Rules for Good Men, I talked about the long history of men’s groups.

“Looking back on our heritage as men to our lives as hunter-gathers over the last two million years, one of the things that stands out to me is that men spent considerable time in small groups with other men.”

I concluded,

“Bottom line—Being in a men’s group combats loneliness and keeps you alive and well.”

If you’d like more information about my work and upcoming opportunities, please visit me at https://menalive.com/.

If you are not already receiving my weekly articles and newsletter, you may do so here: https://menalive.com/email-newsletter/.

The post In Search of Mature Masculinity in a World of Wounded BoyMen: Part 3 appeared first on MenAlive.

In Part 1, I discussed the origin of my own search for masculinity growing up with an absent father. I also introduced you to Michael Gurian and Sean Kullman and their book, Boys, A Rescue Plan: Moving Beyond the Politics of Masculinity to Health Male Development.

                Another colleague I had the pleasure of interviewing is Gary Barker, founder and CEO of Equimundo: Center for Masculinities and Social Justice. In a recent article, What is a ‘masculine’ workplace, anyway? Barker says,

“In his recent appearance on Joe Rogan, Mark Zuckerberg said that workplaces need more ‘masculine energy’ and that the workplace had been ‘neutered.’ I began to ask myself, what about workplaces exactly have been neutered? And what masculine energy is Zuckerberg trying to bring back?”

                We are living at a time where a regressive kind of masculinity is coming to power throughout the world. We see it with the election of Donald Trump, who once again has ascended to the U.S. Presidency. We are also hearing more about a certain kind of masculinity represented by media personalities Joe Rogan and tech billionaires, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, and Elon Musk.

                Gary Barker says,

“The bottom line: a restrictive old-school version of masculinity is generally not good for men ourselves, for the people in our lives, nor for businesses. Nor for the world.”

                Richard V. Reeves, Founder of the American Institute for Boys and Men and author of Of Boys and Men: Why The Modern Male is Struggling, Why It Matters, and What to Do About It, offers timely wisdom about the importance of paying attention to the problems of boys and men and the dangers of our failure to do so. Reeves was recently interviewed on John Stewart’s The Daily Show by comedian and actress Desi Lydic.

                “Politicians on both left and right have failed to engage constructively with the problems of boys and men,” says Reeves. “Views on what it means to be a man in the twenty-first century have hardened along partisan lines, but people can hold two thoughts in our head at once. We can be passionate about women’s rights and compassionate toward vulnerable boys and men.”

                In these polarized times with conflict between the left and the right, too often one side blames the other. Some believe that If women are not doing well, it must be men’s fault or if boys and men are not doing well, women must be to blame. But Reeves recognizes that men’s and women’s issues are opposite sides of the same coin and must be solved together or not at all. Says Reeves,

“Too often, there is the belief that men don’t have problems. Men are the problem. And if we continue to just see men as problems rather than having problems, then it’s going to be a very, very, difficult time for us over the next few years.”

                Ruth Whippman is a feminist mother with three boys who was confronted with these conflicting views of masculinity. I interviewed her and wrote an article, BoyMoms and BoyDads: What We Can Learn From Ruth Whippman & Richard Reeves About Sex, Power, and Parenting. In her book, BoyMom: Reimaging Boyhood in the Age of Impossible Masculinity, Whippman says,

“While the left branded masculinity as toxic, the right sold it as the answer to all our problems, with both politicians and online influencers peddling a new brand of wounded, furious manhood, drawn from a combination of superhero fantasies and defensive rage.”

                Whippman goes on to say,

“Everywhere I turned inside my own brain I found contradiction and hypocrisy. In the fevered, absolutist climate of #MeToo, it is hard not to start to see men as the enemy… Disoriented, I veered wildly between disgust and defensiveness. While the feminist part of me yelled ‘Smash the patriarchy!’ the mother part of me wanted to wrap the patriarchy up in its blankie and read it a story.”

                Failure to recognize and take seriously the problems of boys and men lays the foundation for the rise of authoritarian leaders that we are seeing in the U.S. and around the world. Internationally acclaimed historian, Ruth Ben-Ghiat has been studying and writing about men like these for many years. In her book, StrongMen: Mussolini to the Present she describes leaders from the past like Benito Mussolini and Adolph Hitler along with contemporary leaders like Vladamir Putin and Donald Trump. She says,

“For ours is the age of authoritarian rulers: self-proclaimed saviors of the nation who evade accountability while robbing their people of truth treasure, and the protections of democracy.” She goes on to say, “They use masculinity as a symbol of strength and a political weapon. Taking what you want and getting away with it, becomes proof of male authority.”

                Like all authoritarian rulers, they are really not “strong.” I believe they are actually very wounded men who feel frightened and and are forever looking for “more”—more validation, more love, more recognition—to fill an inner void that they are reluctant to address. Rather than being healthy, mature men, they are “boymen” who have never truly grown up.

                Prior to Donald Trump’s November 2016 election, I wrote an article, “The Real Reason Donald Trump Will Be Our Next President,” that was posted on my website on May 7, 2016. This was written at a time when few people, including Donald Trump himself, believed that he would be the next President of the United States. In the article I said,

“Our presidential candidates reflect the view we hold of ourselves. Donald Trump is a wounded man and has suffered abuse, neglect, and abandonment as a child. Many of us resonate with his rage.”

                My clinical experience working with men in the U.S. and around the world, convinced me that though males occupied positions of power, too many felt wounded and disempowered and would vote for “strongmen” rather than “healthymen” if given a choice. Clearly in the recent Presidential election the majority voted for the Donald Trump and Republicans rather than Kamala Harris and the Democrats, including many men and women who had previously voted Democratic.

From Artificial Intelligence to Evolutionary Intelligence—From Boy Psychology to Man Psychology

                In my book, 12 Rules For Good Men, Rule #4 is “Embrace Your Billion Year History of Maleness.” With all the talk these days about “artificial intelligence,” it is good to remember that human intelligence has been evolving on planet Earth for three to four-million years. In researching the book I wondered when did “males” and “females” first evolve in evolutionary history.

                At the beginning of the chapter describing Rule #4, I quoted the cultural historian Thomas Berry who said,

“The natural world is the largest sacred community to which belong. To be alienated from this community is to become destitute in all that makes us human. To damage this community is to diminish our own existence.”

I believe that it is clear to anyone who is willing to see the truth than our disconnection from the natural world has produced a kind of destructive and artificial intelligence that is undermining our life-support system that is necessary for our survival.

                Our modern confusions and conflicts about “masculinity” and “femininity” keeps us from recognizing and appreciating the evolutionary history of “male” and “female.” In his book, The Hidden Spirituality of Men: Ten Metaphors to Awaken the Sacred Masculine, Matthew Fox says,

“The universe invented sex and sexuality one billion years ago.”

                According to mathematical cosmologist, Dr. Brian Swimme and historian Dr. Thomas Berry, in their book, The Universe Story, they say,

“Life first evolved on Earth about four billion years ago. Prior to the evolution of sexual reproduction, cells divided into individual sister cells.”

Swimme and Berry call this living organism Sappho.

“But one billion years ago, a momentous change occurred. The first male organism, Tristan, and the first female organism, Iseult, were cast into the ancient oceans.”

                This was the first love affair and, as the story goes, the rest is evolutionary history.

                In their book, Boys, A Rescue Plan, Michael Gurian and Sean Kullman go into great depth in helping explain the confusion about sex and gender and conclude,

“Human beings are sexually dimorphic. Our chromosomes set us up that way in utero. We develop during our lifespan as male and female in body and brain, even as particular brain characteristics in a male or female lean toward extremes or middles.”

                They go on to say,

“Dimorphic doesn’t mean stereotyping. It doesn’t mean one boy-type, one girl-type, with no variety. Sexual dimorphism creates averages and means for male and female on the brain sex spectrum.”  

They backup their findings with data from a host of scientists.

According to David C. Page, M.D. professor of biology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and director of the Whitehead Institute, where he has a laboratory devoted to the study of the Y-chromosome,

“There are 10 trillion cells in the human body and every one of them is sex specific. We’ve had a unisex vision of the human genome. Men and women are not equal in our genome and men and women are not equal in the face of disease.”

Marianne J. Legato M.D, is founder of the Foundation for Gender-Specific Medicine and author of numerous books on sex, gender, and science, including, Eve’s Rib:  The New Science of Gender-Specific Medicine. She says,

“Everywhere we look, the two sexes are startlingly and unexpectedly different not only in their internal function but in the way they experience illness.”

Just as there are biological and evolutionary differences between male and females there are differences between man psychology and boy psychology. In their book, King, Warrior, Magician, Lover: Rediscovering the Archetypes of the Mature Masculine, Robert Moore and Douglas Gillette, say,

“In their radical critique of patriarchy, some feminists conclude that masculinity in its roots is essentially abuse, and that connection with ‘eros’—with love, relatedness, and gentleness—comes only from the feminine side of the human equation.”

They go on to say,

“Patriarchy is the expression of immature masculinity. It is the expression of Boy psychology, and, in part, the shadow—or crazy—side of masculinity. It expresses the stunted masculine, fixated at immature levels. Patriarchy, in our view, is an attack on masculinity in its fullness as well as femininity in its fullness.”

For most of human history, there were Rites of Passage where boys were initiated and supported in moving from boyhood to manhood. But now, as Moore and Gillette point out, men are fragmented—various parts of their personality are split off from each other leading to often independent and chaotic lives.

“A man who cannot get it together is a man who has probably not had the opportunity to undergo ritual initiation into the deep structures of manhood. He remains a boy—not because he wants to, but because no one has shown him the way to transform his boy energies into man energies. No one has led him into direct healing experiences of the inner world of masculine potential.”

I was fortunate to have experienced several initiations throughout my life and now help guide others. You can learn more about what we do by visiting us at MenAlive.com and MoonshotforMankind.org.

The post In Search of Mature Masculinity in a World of Wounded BoyMen: Part 2 appeared first on MenAlive.