Cultivating The Masculine Warrior -Part 3

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"As children we are scared of the dark, as adults we must marinate in it."

As a coach for such a lengthy period of time, I often get asked what is the main problem with modern man and their biggest pain. 

It’s a great question and the answer is often suprising. 

It has nothing to do with navigating the modern world, relationships or the peripheral parts of his life, for these are determined by the understanding a man has of himself. 

The main issue is that he has rejected parts of himself that he deems wrong or uncomfortable about, due to guilt, shame or conditioned beliefs from those who raised him. 

It is the rejection of the dark side that keeps men less than they are. 

The light and dark side of man has been described as the shadow by psychoanalyst Carl Jung, the light and dark wolf by the Cherokee Indians, the serpent and the dove in Christian teachings and Winston Churchill’s saying of “Be kind but be fierce.’

They are also demonstrated in the Chinese symbol of Yin and Yang and its description of the dark and light energies. 

What appears to be two opposing forces are in reality two aspects of the same thing, as in darkness cannot exist without light and good without evil. 

These all describe how the unification of the light and dark, create not just a complete man but a highly courageous one. 

This is the  main angst of man and the reason he becomes sick of living his life according to the whims of others. 

The fragments and disconnected pieces of the man he lives by, are felt not just in quiet moments but even in the company of others. 

The denial of himself has denied him the life he wants and the man he is meant to be. 

The forced niceness he had been sold for an easy life, end up being his greatest pain. 

Remove the inner protector and a man will always be a victim. 

This victim is not not just to the outside world but to himself as he indulges addictions to numb the pain of the incompleteness he feels within himself. 

Yet despite this pain, it remains just an unidentified form of despair. 

Even the despair is not identified. 

Soren Kierkegaard once wrote: 

“The specific character of despair is precisely this: it is unaware of being despair.”

It is the denial of our capacity for chaos and cruelty that result in indulging the very traits we deny. 

As a young man, the pain of my own incompleteness was unbearable and when I had no where else to hide and could not distract myself any further, I turned towards it. 

I went into martial arts to become familiar with the very monster I was denying and this wasn’t to become a great fighter but to give conviction behind my words, my beliefs and my actions. 

Once I acknowledged I had a real capacity for chaos, I could control it’s many masks that were disrupting my life and steer it towards a protective force for good in my ambitions and in my environment. 

Next week I will share my favourite story of the light and dark wolf of the Cherokee Indians which beautifully describes these energies and how they form a complete man.