The Remedy for Men
What is the remedy for men to deal with the lack of clarity or the demons within?
Therapy can benefit some, but as I shared before, I don't think the isolation, feelings-based model which most of the therapeutic model depends upon is right. It doesn't fit Christianity, and it runs counter to men.
The irony is that the answers can be found in the Scriptural model of how men healed and were repaired against the hardest things.
The first is confronting God in their own desert.
The second is bringing those revelations into well-constructed sharpening with other men.
Today, I'm going to focus on the second, because it is sorely missing and can be easily repaired.
What do I mean by well-constructed sharpening?
It is where men come to each other, ideally in a small group, and their issues are clarified and the path to repair and restoration is brought forth.
However, most men, both due to their own fallen nature and to poor doctrine of the church, not only fail to do this, but hurt each other.
IF you are able to be in a group of well-constructed sharpeners, you are 50% of the way towards addressing your primary issues across your life.
What are examples of bad construction?
The first is men's instincts, when they hear a problem or concern, to jump in a provide a solution.
Sorry men, I know that is what every man wants to do, which is to jump in an solve the problem.
But think hard for a second from reason: when you first hear a problem, how much do you really understand the problem?
Framing the problem is 50% of getting to the right answer.
In my work, I often see men who are engineers proposing elegant or complex solutions.
But I'm often wrestling with them to pull back and ask, "What is the actual problem we are solving and for whom?"
After a while, eventually they concede that they haven't formulated it; but the struggle to make things up to answer the question is real.
Why do they do this?
Because it's more fun to come up with solutions.
But the proper rigor is to think more in terms of identifying the real problem. Who is the real enemy? What is the actual territory?
Men like to act and solve, but to their detriment.
No man wants to present a problem and hear an answer which misses the point!
This is one reason why men can't find restoration amongst themselves: the men they are seeking help from fail to really hone in on the nature of the problem.
The second reason: men judge.
Who likes feeling judged?
But men who are misconstructed may say things like, "But you shouldn't have done that." "Just do X, it's easy." "Why haven't you X?" "What were you thinking?!"
None of these things are helpful.
The reason why men do this is because, deep down, they are still falling for their need for "one-upmanship." Saying these things help them feel better.
The masculine energy that has failed, that has not found restoration before Jesus, is still seeking small false wins to cover their large real losses.
Have you ever done this when a guy comes for advice?
I have had my share of these, and it makes me never want to go to confide in someone.
Is that who you want to be?
The third reason men don't go before other men is a difficult problem, even if rationally solved, is very emotional; men aren't comfortable with the flooding, biologically there is some evidence that the flooding of emotions has been badly socialized.
The flooding makes them uncomfortable, but they don't know how to operate in this.
This falls on both sides of the equation: the man with the problem needs a path forward to deal with flooding; and the guys on the other side need a way to enable the fallen soldier to be restored to a state of calm and reason.
Telling someone to just "stop feeling" their emotion isn't the answer. This will create harm.
But it isn't to be a therapist and let someone just go through all of their pain and emotion in an endless cycle. The only one who can perform such deep heart surgery is Jesus.
But men can help land men in the right place and offer a steady hand.
These are the three big buckets of poorly constructed brothers-in-arms: jumping in with solutions; dismissing the problem; mismanaging the flooding.
The source is a combination of pride and incompetence.
Some men have a still deeply-rooted sense of pride, which causes them to be ineffective and hurtful.
Those who have contained this pride can be incompetent -- they don't know what to do.
They are like a soldier on the battleground who have never been taught basic medical procedures. This invokes helplessness and prideful shame.
So, do you want to be a part of a small group of men who are capable of helping you to overcome your hurdles, restore brokenness, and redeem your life wherever you may be?
It starts by you, first, learning how to do so and finding others who have committed to being that person.
Think about it for a moment.
If you are going to battle, there are a few things you'd likely want in your squad.
One, you have a shared understanding of the objective, the enemy, and who is on your side (the worst case is to be shot because an incompetent soldier mistakens you for the enemy).
The second is competence: has this person demonstrated training, how to deal with hardships, how to defend themselves and others, how to read the terrain with intelligence?
The third is serve and rescue: would you rather be in a group where the mantra is "leave no man behind" or "everyone for themselves?"
Sadly, most of the world has trained men to be the latter.
And they can't tie a tourniquet. They can't extract a bullet. They can't tie a splint. They can't carry you on their back.
This is the case of most men groups, even the well-intended.
What's the point?
What to look for should be what you can offer
This may feel hard, and unfortunately, it may be one of the most important quests for you to take: how to find your fellow brother-in-arms.
Today, it often takes place by joining the right company at the right time. Perhaps there can be a zeitgeist which draws people together, such as how the PayPal mafia brought together some of the smartest and now wealthiest men in Silicon Valley.
Guess what....the well-intentioned man just may not know how, because he's been misguided.
Who else is teaching how men should be able to form groups that support each other?
Jesus illustrates how we should be to each other.
And we're going to learn this. Our relationship with Jesus isn't just vertical -- he is King.
While this is important, He walked the earth to establish a relationship with humans. He did so in a way that most men don't appreciate or know, because it's not taught. Why the church fails to teach this is another topic.
But I'm here to instruct you now.
Let's go through each one.
Jumping into the solution
Here, you need to reframe it without being one-up manship.
How I do it with real world problems is to be honest and open to understand. The goal is to literally be in that person's shoes. Not to pretend (that's sympathy).
You want to first understand as if in their shoes. That's empathy.
The compassion, of feeling a desire to help them, comes later. But you must first understand the lay of the land.
EVEN if you don't understand it, you must get to a place to articulate what the person is thinking such that the person feels understood, and that you understand it.
Because, once you do that, you can begin to apply clear reason, to not be suspicious or doubtful of the person, but to ask questions to reframe it.
This is where I have experienced men fail.
They are skeptical of the person's conclusions. That feels horrible. They judge, because they presume the right way to do something or to think, and when the person doesn't agree to this, then they expression dissatisfaction.
It doesn't feel good when someone does this, even when they are well intended.
The right way to do this is to look at the underlying framing and assumption and ask for the person to help you to understand the why.
See, when asking someone to help you understand, not to defend themselves, they must begin to reconstruct their own reason. For women, this often doesn't work; and they will get angry.
But for a man, as long as it's not challenging them, but asking for the man to solve your problem with the framing, their reasoning and problem-solving will kick in.
Your goal is to help them man re-regulate by framing the problem and getting them to solve things.
The first thing is always, "What do you want? Where do you want to go?"
Men are "goal seeking" -- they often get very focused on the goal.
But this is being more of a coach and friend to understand, what is their goal? How did they get this? How does this fit with their larger picture (when in doubt, zoom out).
But this is what my cousin would do and it's an example of what not to do:
"Why are you complaining? Look at what you have!"
Right, it's dismissal. Set the goal by zooming out.
"Alright, let's zoom out and what you want to do and where do you want to go. Tell me about this. (wait for answer). How big is this situation, really, in terms of impacting you?"
Now, depending on the situation, it may in fact be big. It may be catastrophic.
But you have to help to frame this.
Even if it is serious, then you know the solution must be serious. But the point is focusing the mind on where they want to go, not only the fact that the problem is big.
What is the goal? How can they name the race, and the prize?
Your job is not to name it for them? It's to nudge them back with the right level, but get them focused on the solution and get them focused.
The second is your own pride and judgment.
One of the best ways to deflate this is to imagine this: is the person in a hole and are you looking down at them telling them they made a mistake for jumping into the hole?
This is very common response.
What men want are to get into the