Men and Relationship

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Larry Pesavento is a member of the TMC Advisory Council,
a therapist, an author and the Founder of CHRISTOS - A Center for Men located in Covington, KY.

"In 1993 I started a men's center to help initiate a dialogue about how a man in this confusing, elderless world can find a sense of identity, place and pride. I had been counseling men for close to 25 years and learned a lot from their struggles as well as my own. I then decided to write a book about the internal journey that a man must take in order to find a sense of peace and generativity. I felt called to write a book to share what I learned as part of my own journey and struggle with manhood. I will be publishing chapters from this book monthly, along with thoughts that pop up during the month. Thoughts may come from my practice, from the chapter of the book highlighted that month, from my own life, or maybe from the lives of readers that e-mail me."

For more info about Larry Pesavento, visit his web-site, http://www
.christoscenter
.com/
E-mail:

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"I can be me, You can be you, We can be us.
I can grow, You can grow, We can grow."
Janet Woititz

Men and Relationship
January 2001

I want to share something that is not particularly politically correct. This will be an overgeneralization, but not a hasty one. This is a realization that has grown over many, many years. I reveal it only because it may be a helpful one to know, especially for men. Take it for what it's worth to you.

When it comes to healthy, hetero relationships, women are as much in the dark as men. Yes, women are not the last word in love.

I say this in the interest of healthy, hetero relationships. It is not meant to put down women. It is meant to give men some hope and motivation. It is meant to create an atmosphere where something good can take place between men and women.

Men need help with relationships. In the present milieu, women are considered the experts in relationship. Men believe this. Women believe this. The thought gives women a certain confidence. sometimes arrogance, in relationships. However, this stereotypical myth only demoralizes many men, destroying confidence. It causes men to prematurely withdraw from authentic relationship, defeated by a self-fulfilling prophecy. This cultural myth does not help either men or women.

The myth of male relational incompetence is as bad as the Victorian myth of female hysteria. Depersonalizing by these kind of stereotypes becomes an excuse for both to quit trying. For a woman, the alibi of her partner's inability is an honorable way to not look at her own inabilities. For a man, the assumption of his ineptitude eats away at any motivation that would get him through the rough spots. It also makes it easier for him to fall back on the macho Victorian alibi and label his partner an emotional child.

As in all stereotypes, there is a shaky foundation of truth in the idea of female relational competence. Woman seem to be much more aware of their feelings, and are able to swim happily in this ocean. There is a line from a recent movie that says it all. An amazed young man describes a young woman who "when feelings come up, she actually feels them."

Women also seem to yearn for an emotionally intimate relationship more than men. Women want to know their man's feelings, as a way to get closer. Emotional rapport is a valued state. Being on the same page emotionally is an important goal.

It is probably true that women are the experts at romantic love. At least women have a stronger interest in perpetuating this form of love. This highly volatile sense of union seems to fit the personality of most women more than men. And I must admit that I, along with other men, really enjoy this extended infatuation time. The sexual high is wonderful. The banished feeling of loneliness is very comforting.

But does this form of love cover the whole field of love between a man and a woman?

It is really tempting to see this infatuative high as the substance of relationship, as Robert Johnson points out in his book, We. He points out that romantic love has become the only love in town between a man and a woman. And this cultural form of love has become the standard for men and women to measure any capacity for intimacy and partnership. However, Johnson points out, this idea of love, being 'in love', can be an obstacle for men and women, an obstacle in finding real happiness in relationship.

I think that men are so attracted to this form of love because it allows men to come in contact with a passionate, intense feeling life. Since men are taught to numb themselves, there are precious few opportunities for men to feel. As William Pollack says, men have feeling in a range limited to anger, lust, and triumph. To someone who hasn't felt much success lately, lust, combined with romantic love, can be that desperately sought oasis in the desolation of an emotional desert.

In fact, romantic love may be one of the very few ways a modern man can access his inner life, in a relatively healthy way. Otherwise, he is thrown back on addiction as the main way to experience a feeling life. Men have a debt to women in this area. With the goal of romantic love, women continually call men to experience their inner life. Women also call men to a relatedness, through this love. This relatedness is a needed antidote to men's cultural isolation.

The problem here, again generalizing, is that neither men nor women know what to do with that inner life, brought on by romantic love, once they experience it. There are no guidelines in our culture. A woman has a history of feelings without a manual. A man has neither history nor a manual.

Once into a relationship, women seem to feel that the goal has been reached. Romance is the answer. Men, after a while, find that the romance is not enough. So men tend to end the stage of romantic love long before a woman would, often replacing it with lust if there is no movement toward maturity.

Why this seemingly premature ending of romantic love? A psychodynamic psychologist may argue that men are really just afraid of engulfment. Commitment is problematic because it takes away an adolescent, or even childish, freedom. This is a valid explanation for some men's withdrawal. An evolutionary psychologist might say that men are biologically programmed to spread seed among many women. Monogamy is counterproductive in an evolutionary sense. Withdrawal, especially to another female, is a biological imperative. This is a very lame explanation. Or maybe it's just a lame excuse.

There is also a more positive explanation, I believe, that is hopeful for us all.

Men tend to want something more from feelings than a relationship. Men tend to want to hold on to something of themselves, outside of relationship, more than women. There is an inner force that says you can't get lost in all this. There is often a need for more direction, more purpose beyond the relationship, or maybe for the relationship. Men are hardwired to use feelings to find life direction, as much as to find feeling in relationship. And this is what they can give to this experiment in healthy relationship.

I believe that a man has to give witness to that sense of the individuality, and the individual journey, within relationship. Men symbolize the twoness in relationship, while women symbolize the oneness. Men symbolize the direction of the community of two, especially toward the outside world. Women symbolize the goodness and relatedness within the community of two, something like you and me against the world.

Robert Johnson points out that romantic love has replaced the individual religious journey in our Western culture. As a feeling, romantic love has taken over the yearning that men and women once had, as a culture, for the spiritual. Following up on this thought, I believe that for men, romantic love has replaced the male's need for initiation, an archetype of the spiritual journey for men. Men have embraced the feminine goal of romantic love as they have embraced women. Romantic love has therefore become the dead end road to manhood. I believe that there is a lesson for men and women in this realization.

Women need to realize that the man they are looking for can't be created through romantic love. They can't love a man into manhood. Love can bring feelings, but not direction. Men need a direction that is found in a journey alone, or with other men. Women must go against their instincts for relatedness and let them go. When men return, their capacity for relationship will be as much as any woman can handle.

Men, obviously, cannot look to women to give them feeling or direction. Yet, most unconsciously do. This is not woman's fault. He is looking in the wrong places, and must learn that. She is witnessing to an important half of relationship. He must find his half.

Men and women each need the natural gifts of the other to make a whole relationship. Then a mysterious thing happens. If there is authentic relating and mingling, each partner finds the other's gift within. Especially at midlife, men and women will cross over. Women will find themselves looking more for personal direction. Men will find themselves looking more for the community of relationship. Both will become more whole within themselves. Both will have found the means and goal of the spiritual journey. Both will have used romantic love for its proper purpose.

I know I have paraded a long line of generalizations here. Take them at a symbolic, archetypal, or literal level. You might not want to take them at all. They're just thoughts.

My purpose is to show the real gifts that men bring to a relationship. Most men become psychologically initiated through the challenge of a relationship with a woman. A woman opens them up. Men owe women for that. That is a woman's gift. Once opened, a man has to take it from there. His gift to relationship, then, is the fruits of his initiation. His gift is the wholeness he possesses and the ideal of wholeness that he nurtures in others. His gift may also be the return of a more spiritual dimension to the idea of romantic love.

E-mail: Web-site: http://www.christoscenter.com CHRISTOS - A Center for Men
9 EAST 12TH STREET
COVINGTON, KY 41011

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