E-motion is necessary for ACTION

All right, welcome back. And on today's episode, we're going to be continuing something we're going to explore a lot on this podcast, and that's the relationship between the masculine and feelings.

And for a lot of us men, a lot of men that come to this work, feelings are new territory. We live in a modern culture that does not really support or encourage men to be in their feeling bodies, right? Particularly growing up, we're often shamed for crying. We're often shamed for being angry or having a lot of energy. We're often shamed for not sitting still. And any kind of weakness we show, particularly to other men while growing up.

And, yeah, even in as adults, is often attacked as being something shameful and something we need to outgrow. And we just got to put on a tough outer skin and get through it. But there's a huge problem with that. So feelings are another word for emotions. And you've maybe heard this before, but I think it's just a really simple but beautiful concept of.

Emotions are energy in motion, energy in motion. So feelings are just energy that moves through our body. It's energy that moves through our system, our awareness, in our physical body and our heart. They're meant to come and go, right? Like I talked about in episode one, they're meant to be felt.

Now as men, like I said, our culture rarely supports us in learning to be in touch and process our own feelings. Right? We're not really kids, given many times and places and skill sets to learn to be in touch with the actual feelings in our body, to let them move through us. So two things happen. One, we clamp down and totally disconnect from them, right?

We often see this a lot in men. And then those unprocessed feelings, like I talked about, kind of build, build up as inner kinks or inner shadows that sometimes then come out explosively in times where it's not necessarily warranted. Right? Someone cuts us off on the way to the ATM while we're parking, and we explode in rage. It's not really about the atm. It's about all the other moments of unfelt anger and grief in our lives that just bubbles, oil over the top that we had been disconnected from.

So that's one strategy we clamp down and pretend like it's not there. And usually that results in us either walking around completely numb or with an extraordinary amount of anxiety or tension in our bodies. Literally. You can see men locked up in their bodies, see this a lot. When I work with guys in person, shoulders tense, hunched forward, breath super shallow. I've been there, I know what it's like. Number two, the other way a lot of us men deal with emotions is we try to out feel them with something else.

What does that mean? Well, we call this numbing or unhealthy self soothing. So, so we got all these feelings going on. We don't necessarily know how to get in touch with them and be with them. And so we turn to alcohol to change our state, or we turn to marijuana or video games or a big part of my personal history, pornography or food.

And for some people, even sexual, right? We do something to change our state so we don't have to feel the actual emotions, the energy that wants to move through our body, in our bodies. So this is one of the big ones for so many of us men. We all tend to have some kind of crutch to help us regulate, which basically means kind of get a wrangle on our emotions.

Now the natural way would be to feel those, but when we don't have a toolkit for doing that, we reach for other things to change our state without actually expressing that energy underneath. So it helps for a while, but then eventually that substance that show that whatever wears off and we're right back in that same spot again and we got to turn to that thing again. Now there's a problem with this, particularly this. Whether it's the first one cutting yourself off or the second one avoiding the feelings by turning to some kind of substances or external things to change your state.

The problem is we're not touching the feeling underneath. And I have seen this time and time again that this creates a really tough pattern, right? We have all these feelings unprocessed inside of us. We turn to some kind of substance to help us avoid feeling that feeling. That kind of cuts us off, that kind of numbs us off a little bit and it prevents us from taking action.

So it actually keeps us in the same place. When we're not feeling that energy in motion, we're not getting into motion. Motion and action are closely related. So there's this kind of stuck in neutral feeling or experience that a lot of us men can get into where because we're avoiding our feelings, it's almost like we're just treading water or running in the hamster wheel.

Our minds, our really powerful masculine minds can double down on this tendency as well. So our minds, you can kind of think of them as like pinball machines, right? What do I mean by that? Well, the ball is a thought. And as long as it's bouncing around, AKA having different thoughts, stuck in thought loops, thinking, anxiety, ruminating, going back and forth, that ball isn't falling down into the actual system.

So to run with this metaphor, the system would be our body, our feelings. So oftentimes we'll just like we would turn to booze or just like we turn to other things, we habitually get lost in thought, lost in our heads, running in circles, ruminating. It can be totally exhausting. I'm sure a lot of you guys know. But what that does is is it prevents us from dropping down into our feelings. Now, in addition to not having the skill set for being in our feeling body and knowing how to deal with this energy in motion, a lot of us are just scared to.

Because like I said, what I found is that energy in motion is the grounds for action. So feelings, emotion is necessary for action. It demands action. Feelings demand action when we're really in them. When we finally drop down out of our heads, when we finally cut off all the numbing agents and we get into our body and we let that energy, we let that emotion run its course through our system, so actually move through us.

I've seen this time and time again in myself and with the hundreds of men I've worked with in men's groups and coaching. Suddenly it's time for a change. That feeling demands some kind of action. I can no longer live like this. I have to do something different. I have to end this relationship. I have to get off my ass and get into the gym. I have to change my job. It's the feelings that drive the action energy in motion. And so if we're cut off from our feelings, it's really easy to just not move anywhere for long periods of time.

And that can be really painful. That can start to feed into the pain that then makes us turn to either cutting off ourselves from our emotions completely or turning to numbing agents of any kind to help us not have to drop into our bodies, to not actually have to feel that feeling. Because part of us intuitively knows if I go there, if I allow that energy to move through my body, something is going to change. I'm going to have to take action. Action is vulnerable.

Action leads to uncertainty, unknowing Right. We don't know how things will go if we leave our marriage. We don't know how things will go if we leave our job. We don't know how things will go if we put that piece of art out there that we've always wanted to do. And not knowing is a deep thing we have to learn to practice, to be with, to breathe, to stay present, and to be okay not knowing and trust that we're going to be okay on the other side.

Learning to let that energy be in motion through our bodies is one of the most important things you can take responsibility for as a man right here and now. To take responsibility for your feelings, for your feeling body, to take responsibility for safely finding ways to express and honor everything that's going on in you.

All that energy that needs to be in motion from your modern life right here and now, and also taking responsibility for everything that came before. Oftentimes when you were young or when you were a kid or when you had traumatic events, there's energy in your body that stuck. It wasn't allowed to move to come to completion. A huge part of men's work is bringing that to completion and in the company of other loving, trusting men. And here's the deal, it's so much easier to do in company of other trusting men.

Like I talked about in a previous episode, relationship is the context with which a lot of this emotion gets stuck, right? Something happens and it's not safe for that energy, that energy and motion to come to completion in our system. So it gets cut off or we pause it. Being in relationship with a therapist, a coach, a lover, a men's group that you can safely process this stuff with from your past is going to make that a lot easier. And a lot of us are afraid to feel these things because we've never done it before.

And maybe we'll eventually break down and have some tears. And there's just this feeling that, oh, if I go there, it's never going to stop, right? It's like a tidal wave of feeling we're just holding at bay. I've heard this firsthand from men. And so we do everything we can to hold it, to push it back, to cut ourselves off, to put in numbing agents. And then we're kind of stuck in this perpetual place where all that energy that wants to move through our body is instead being used to resist what's actually there.

And it leads to that neutrality, that going nowhere feeling. But when we can relax that and process that in the company of others, it's so much easier. And it will pass. It may take weeks or months, but it will pass. One of the biggest transitions in my life when I left a relationship that wasn't right for me. And I knew that in my body, but I had been avoiding for two and a half years. Finally, I dropped into my body one night and I felt it. I really felt it.

How much hurt I was causing her, how much hurt I was causing myself, how selfish I was being. And within two hours, I had the conversation and we broke up. It's one of the hardest things I ever did. And over the next six months, I was going to the gym almost every day. I'd work out and tears would come. Tears would come. I'd be sitting there in the gym, pumping weights and crying, crying, crying, listening to my tunes, letting that energy move through my body.

That was a lot of unfelt grief and feelings from that relationship. And even before that, from all the relationships I hadn't had and other painful experiences. I just had to let it move its way through my body. And then I had men to hold me and support me in that through my life. Some feelings are not meant to be felt alone. I'm going to say that again. Some feelings are not meant to be felt alone. It's one of the many reasons to get into a men's group.

To find yourself held while you allow this energy to come to completion in your system, to move while being in resonance with other human beings. That can help hold some of that energy with you. It's kind of cheesy, but if you've ever seen Guardians of the Galaxy, right, they have the big scene at the end where no single person can handle the energy of the Infinity Stone, but when they link up together, their system is strong enough.

That happens in real life, too. You can go to the depths of despair or anger or grief, frustration, disgust, whatever it might be, shame. And it's so much easier when you're being held in trusted company. And it will start to move the energy. It will free up energy that was being used to resist to now move into action. Okay, I always see more space in men on the other side of feeling these things.

And I always see action result. So do what it takes. Learn to get into your feeling body. Emotion is necessary for action. If you're at a place where you need to take action in your life, one of the most immediate things you can do is take responsibility for feeling. If you want help with that, reach out to me. I host a virtual drop in men's group every month.

Here at Evolutionary Mens. And if you want to go the extra mile and completely change your life when it comes to dating and relationships and purpose, get in touch with me by going to Evolutionary Men webinar and watching my free training. And at the end of that will be all the information you need to book a call with me. And if it's a good fit, you can join an intensive men's group coaching program I have that's all about getting into your body, learning to process your feelings, and learning how to lead the feminine in relationships, in yourself, in life.

Until next time.