Eisenhans

Some of you may be aware that I am involved in a spiritual director's formation program - held at Queen's House of Retreats one weekend a month for the next two years. Well, 1/2 a year has already passed. It has been a marvelous experience thus far. We are learning much about how to connect with the journeys of others as they find their way. And I am learning even more about myself and my own journey. My eyes have been opened to so many things that have up until now, remained dormant, unseen, lying in shadow.

This last month, we explored the issue of sexuality and spirituality - and it was refreshing to hear and affirm that sexual energy and spiritual energy come from the same place - from the very depths and core of our identity as humans. Part of the discussion about sexuality and spirituality was centered around the topic of gender, and how our journeys in life reflect our sexual identity (that seems obvious, eh?). Much of the discussion hit very close to home and I saw many things I had never seen before. One small area that I heard that relates to the male spiritual journey is the old fairy tale by the Brothers Grimm called "Iron John" or "Eisenhans" in the original German. An American poet by the name of Robert Bly has picked up on that fairy tale as a deep metaphor for the journey of a man through this world and has written a very intriguing and engaging book.

Bly argues that men have lost much of what makes them men in the current age. There has been a push (the author states) to make men more "new agey". As such, he claims that men have learned to become passive, numb and naive. Passive because they ask their wife or girlfriend or children to do their loving for them. He believes that men must learn to keep the thread of intimacy unbroken by learning that "Talking is not everything, but it is a part of loving, as are buying gifts, getting to 'completion' in a conversation, praising the other person..." (p62). Men have become numb because (and this may be controversial) they have been pushed to adopt the emotions of females - most specifically their mothers. Fathers have remained emotionally distant so boys have looked to their mothers for emotional protection. But, boys are men, not women and so have found themselves in a women's emotional world which, as good as it is, is foreign to men. So, many men have therefore, chosen to feel nothing.

The third criticism Bly has of the modern man is that they have become naive. Men have learned to accept the attacks of others as sick way of loving the other. Men will be proud to pick up the pain of others, particularly women's pain. To this, Bly writes, "I think each gender drops its own pain when it tries to carry the pain of the other gender. I don't mean men shouldn't listen. But hearing a woman's pain and carrying it are two different things. Women have tried for centuries to carry men's pain, and it hasn't worked well" (p64).

Bly continues by stating that, because of naivete, men have not learned to state what it is that hurts them, to set boundaries, and use their strength as men should. "The naive man often...lets things go on too long. At the start of a relationship, a few harsh words of truth would have been helpful. Instead he waits and waits, and then a major wounding happens farther down the line. His timing is off. We notice that there will often be a missing beat a second or so after he takes a blow, verbal or physical. He will go directly from the pain of receiving the blow to an empathetic grasp of the reason why it came, skipping over the anger entirely. Misusing Jesus' remark, he turns the missing cheek" (p66-7).

Bly refreshingly states that there is a gender difference - a very politically incorrect comment in the modern day. He calls for men to accept their maleness - to learn to be active, alive and aware as opposed to passive, numb and naive. There most certainly is something that is different between the genders (thank God!). Openness to discussion about this topic would be very welcome. As would a growing respect from each gender to the other. How often have we heard, when men get together, the common language of running down the female gender? I believe that it would be incredibly wonderful to hear language expressing ourselves for who we are rather than for who we are not - and all the while celebrate what makes us human, male and female, in the image of God.