Images of man.
Many years ago, Gurdjieff used to ask his students, “How many people are there in the world?” Almost all of them would juggle the best known statistics of the day and try to come up with the closest approximation of people living on The Earth. Of course, no matter how close they were, they were all wrong. After their futile calculations, Gurdjieff would calmly answer; “Nine, the rest are just reflections.” Of course what he was referring to was the nine personality types of The Enneagram.
Two Matching Particles Collide In Space
The other night, I sat across from my reflection, a recent version of myself in the guise of a physicist from Texas. We exchanged small talk, we exchanged pictures of kids. His son is a purple belt, mine is a yellow belt. Both are very athletic. He flashed a picture of his daughter. We talked about being dads, interspersed with about thirty minutes of hardcore football talk, some beer, some wine and then things got pretty interesting. As we began to shift our talk to women, he confided to me that he had not had sex with his wife for one year, four months and three weeks. It was that specific. Then a troubled look came over his face and he wondered if he and his wife would ever achieve a level of intimacy again. He was invested in it, because he wanted to keep his family together, stay with his kids. etc.
The reflection got clearer.
He confided to me that his parents split when he was four. I separated from wife just after my son turned five and there he was, on the precipice of pondering the very same realities in his own life. I asked him if he wanted to, “have sex again with his wife and save his marriage?” He said, “yes.” I then told him that when he returns to Texas, to take his wife aside and tell her from the bottom of his heart that, “her and the family are the most important thing in his life and that from that moment forward, he would place them front and center.” I could tell that he got it, understood and didn’t really like it. We then plunged into a deep discussion around male/female dynamics and what’s important to men and women and how we don’t understand this from either perspective.
A Fallible God
By the end of the night as we said goodbye, I could tell that he was re-thinking his stance and wondering how committing in such a way would change her and their life for the better. Wasn’t he already doing enough? He is the bread winner, a corporate physicist flying around the country, inspecting high volume petroleum equipment from a mathematical perspective, gauging output, stress, etc. “Wasn’t this enough he wondered aloud, even if I was Jesus, she’d find fault with me.” I could see the clouds of doubt move across his mind. I told him, “You have not given her your heart and she knows this and doesn’t trust you.” Again, I could see truth inch closer and closer in his awareness. I continued, “You have one foot out the door already and she knows this as well.” I could see him solemnly agree. I knew this, not because I am psychic, but because I was that guy a year ago.
Saturn In Libra Addresses Longing And Grief In Equal Measure
While the statistics I quoted in the last piece point to an overall trend of unhappiness for women, mens grief and isolation might even be more pronounced. My reflection is a physicist, he spoke glowingly of Richard Feynman as a cultural and personal light. He wondered aloud about why it’s important for him to understand the nature of material existence while for his wife, it seemed a rare luxury in the day in and day out exercise of life. He is a quester, a pathfinder, a pioneer, a seeker. These are qualities that are not necessarily socially acceptable in the framework of a marriage and nuclear family, where the goal is not “questing,” but “nesting.” Herein lies the rub between men and women in our modern era. Our bio-sensors are fundamentally different. We seek different types of meaning and the modern world and all of it’s supposed sophistication cannot take away from the fact that we have ancient roots in our DNA, strands that return us to the formation of civilization, tribal life and survival. The codec of the species is hard wired into the sexes; survive and ultimately find higher and higher levels of meaning for our existence, our raison detre’
This is not confined to “men are the seekers and women are the nurturers” model as there are many exceptions to any rule. I want to preface this by saying this is not a one size fits all blueprint for being, I’m just trying to untangle some knots of relating according to a particular aspect and my take on it.
The physicist was at a crossroads, trying to go deeper, find his purpose, re-claim his meaning in the midst of a domestic laboratory. He wants out, she wants in. But his out is a misdirected out. He is confusing his quest to find meaning in string theories and quantum fields with his unconscious desire to leave the marriage. She knows this and as a result loses more trust, creates less intimacy and further polarization.
Is this a solvable equation?
Can we find the golden mean of intimacy and relating?
Can we reconcile the desire to move out and in simultaneously?
Are men simply trapped in a loop of prolonged adolescence, naively searching for meaning through a myriad of distractions?
Is a woman’s need to nurture, grow and love been obscenely simplified by the outward quest for material gain, comfort and luxury?
During Saturn in Libra we will have ample opportunity to explore these themes.
Finding Meaning And Purpose In A Jobless Society
Men will have to undergo a radical shift in purpose and meaning, especially in the light of a failing economy. With less jobs and less opportunities for many men to self-actualize in the work place, the threat to their self-esteem and well being is ominous. Already displaced in a society that moves further and further away from organic values and closer and closer to some sort of trans-humanist synthesis, the ancient call to provide, protect and explore within the cells of men will be further and further distant memories. As this occurs getting close to the heart of the matter will be more and more difficult. Already teetering on the edge of existential doubt, large numbers of unemployed men, could be incredibly demoralized by the lack of opportunity in the work world with little opportunity to redeem their dignity and pride through providing. Rebalancing the sexes during a time of imminent economic decline could prove to be one of our greatest challenges ever and yet, if we enter into it consciously, without guilt, without shame, with a sense of commitment, we can actually use the crisis to our advantage.
Naming The Invisible Threat And It’s Consquences
One of the things that we did as a species as we roamed across the great plains of the planet, hunting mastodons, protecting ourselves against the sabre-tooth tiger, etc, was that we formed and cultivated a highly responsive, fight or flight mechanism. The individual as well as the tribe’s survival depended on it. In this instance, the sex roles were clearly defined. Men hunted and protected the tribe. Women attended to more domestic affairs, like picking out wall paper for the cave. This continued for a while, even up through the feudal Europe. A village had to look after itself. Be it’s own sentries, etc. By the time the wild west came to pass, law and order as a carer path began to open up. It signaled a movement away from self-policing in terms of family, home, hearth and tribe and professionals were conscripted to safeguard our well being, property, etc. Armies were raised by tax dollars. The industrial revolution brought with the beginnings of a police state. When I say, “police state” I do not necessarily mean it in it’s most Orwellian definition, but rather the rise of police forces to enforce “law and order.” The burden of security was theoretically no longer placed at the foot of the individual, in most cases, the male. Men, were now “freed up” to pursue commerce, empire building and benefit from the fruits of capitalism. In addition to the rise of the police state, we also experience a rise in larger levels of government, special interests and ultimately the psychopathic rise of corporate culture. During this paradigm shift, the threat to our safety and security became more and more abstract. It wasn’t giant bears that we had to defend ourselves against, but the invisible hand of corruption, greed, cunning, and machination–hands that pulled levers on social programs–hands that unleashed memes into the culture that would redirect our thinking–hands that would inevitably walk off with trillions of dollars from pension funds and 401Ks. The predatory threat was no longer a lumbering beast, but a stealthy planner, a shrewd shape shifter and a social engineer.
The Narcolepsy Of Materialism
While we were all out trying to get one up on “The Jones’ ” wallowing in some form of temporary luxury, the forces that accrue power and wealth were not standing still, they were not complacent with their position, no matter how much they had accrued. In earlier times, people safe guarded their and the tribes well being, these types of mostly “physical” threats were exposed, but as we got fat on consumerism, we let them roam freely in the psychic and social landscapes of our lives, as we mainlined consumption to assiduously to cover the wounds of a traumatized culture.
Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell
Now we’re talking about security here and it becomes a slippery slope. Women, by and large and this is my personal experience, don’t like to hear about “conspiracy” or how fucked things are. It is antithetical to their nature. It’s an assault on the sanctity of life and it has no place in the paradigm of continuity. So as a result, men have been discouraged to go down these paths. It’s much easier to bury and sublimate the findings, fears and instincts and take out the trash, worry about your 401K and plan the next years trip to Disney so that he can still have some semblance of love and intimacy. In essence, he does not want to go too far down that path because it might alienate the woman in his life, who ultimately wants her and her family to feel safe. From a most intimate place within the family unit, men have been subtly discouraged to rock the boat.
Saturn In Libra Equals True Liberation
If we are going to get through Saturn in Libra, the scales of justice will have to prevail. We’re going to have to look at how things are, not how they used to be, or would like them to be. Men are going to have stand up for what’s right and women will need to have a willing spirit. The continuity of the old world; marriage, kids, home. vacation, college, retirement is over. Done with. Getting over it sooner than later would be the best course of action. Once that is done, we can then go about the task of creating new solutions (as I type, Patti Smith has just hit my iTunes, “People Have The Power”). In ending this installment, part of the balancing that needs to occur between the sexes is for men to become men again, to protect, to serve, to commit, to love and to quest in the name of the sanctity of life itself. If we can do this successfully, I know very few women who would not respond in kind with their own sacred devotion and begin to yield the mysteries of love and creation which resides eternally within them. How cool would that be?
16 thoughts on “Saturn In Libra Preview — The Reclamation Of A New Masculinity — Reconnecting To Protecting The Sanctity Of The Tribe”
As usual, I appreciate your insights, but this time I really appreciate your candor. If we are to survive this shift, it is paramount to restore and repair the growing schism between men and women. I have had this conversation many times with friends.
There is work that traces a spatial/visual difference between men and women in the limbic system. I am writing about this in my book, The A-Limbic System. Deep in the old/reptilian brain is fight/flight. The question in part is: When did the battle of the sexes get stirred up? Who stirred up this fight/flight pattern while embedding the onstar system within us? Why have men become more afraid of women, so much so that they don’t want to give their hearts fully? Could it be the seeming lure of options? Why is it we are afraid of each other rather than the more ominous and threatening Black Hand on society and our world? The dark Lord is a wise one. He squares the deep Plutonian ashes and we wonder how and if the goat will rule them all. This from a triple Libra.
Gloria,
Really looking forward to seeing your work come to fruition. Please let me know if you need any help publishing it.
Robert, I respect you but one need not look far to discover that woman’s instinctual drives are to “tame” beastial men. Women are NOT attracted to safe providers. She may love a providerbut that is not attraction. This results in the most sociopathic men in our society having thousands of willing females, and the nerds, providers, and empathic creative men left with the option of holdingout for the RARE evolved female or getting hitched with a female who’s looking to settle. Robert, please STOP spreading the falsehood that women want men with even a shred of emotional awareness.
gods bless.
You’re missing the context of my post, almost entirely. I am not promoting men to be safe providers. On the contrary, I am promoting men as risk takers as it relates to seeing the world and what’s taking place and to take a stand.
This is not the safe and secure model at all.
I used the older model of tribal survival versus the more abstract and less visible threats to our sanctity and how this is NOT a popular mode of awareness in a culture where relationships have de-evolved into mostly futile exercises in security and material consumption. That’s why we are in a bind. We have been asleep at the wheel and out current models of relating have promoted the trance.
Great post Robert. This subject has been on my mind for a while now.
I love, adore, respect and desire men with emotional awareness. Infact I ‘insist’ upon it 🙂 Maybe I am in the minority??? maybe not.
The word ‘conspiracy’ is part of my everyday life now and I know how fucked things really are:-) maybe I am part of a ‘new breed of woman’ here upon Terra.We are meta morphing as a race into something ‘absolutely awesome’ at a rate never seen before.Change is upon us.The ‘Reclamation’ Of A New Masculinity sounds like a good idea to me.
Here is a link to a great post from Lisa Renee of Energetic Synthesis on the subject of the ‘Masculine Revelation’. It really compliments all you say Robert.
http://energeticsynthesis.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1151&Itemid=336
Enjoy.
Hey Robert,
Always a pleasure to read you but this time around, I need a little help as some stuff in here is a little too abstract, even for me. 🙂 Are you saying that generally, men want to go out and seek truths and quests, and that women prevent them from doing so because they want them home?
Anyhoo, I have a little prayer that Saturn in Libra will help men reclaim their masculinity…I have always found the demasculinization of our society a very big problem that people are turning a blind eye to because it’s not PC. :S
Hey Katrina,
I think that after re-reading this post and some of the comments, I actually should have broken it down into two entries.
My main premise is, is that since we have moved from a tribal/agricultural society into an industrial and post-industrial society, that the natural responses that we developed as men and women were altered and had almost no place to be expressed in the so-called modern world.
Men were usurped by hired guns, literally to perform a function that they had performed for years, which was not just protecting the home, but the well being of the tribe itself. As we moved more towards a culture of luxury and convenience, the threats that were once visible now became more abstract and the need to build on security and continuity became paramount. As a result, we ultimately traded in our rights to be free, to be theoretically safe and comfortable. It is my contention that men have been discouraged to pursue these paths because it is unnerving and “un-safe.” Tell a mother with a three-year-old about the horrors of chemtrails and what that child is breathing and I doubt that you’ll have an extended conversation with them. I know this through my own experience. In order to have this dialog, we have to completely re-think society and culture. We have to reevaluate our values and come closer towards the organic expression of our sexes, versus the synthetic and modified versions that the last 100 years of social programming and indoctrination have heaped upon us.
I have been really fascinated by the work of Arthur and Fiona Cristian, who have a wonderful site called “Love For Life.” To me, Arthur exemplifies some of these qualities that I am referring to. He is not entrenched in some form of an adolescent quest for freedom, but a mature, wise and focused intention to embody principles of freedom for all.
In his work, he is involved in what is called “no harm communities” that go by the name of “kindoms.” While the vision of the kindom is one that is gentle and peaceful, Arthur is a fierce warrior in the service love and truth. But in order for there to be a copacetic relationship in his relationship with his wife, they needed to remove themselves from the system and create something wholly different and new. I believe that ultimately this type of exodus from consensus reality will lead us back to our organic expression and allow us to embody our natural selves as men and women.
Check out their site.
http://loveforlife.com.au/
I think what I’ll do is try to tie these things together in the next post.
Thanks for reading, paying attention and asking questions.
Robert,
As I was reading your reply, I had an epiphany…I had just turned 21 when I starting dating my fiance. He had always been into “spirituality” (honestly, I don’t know how to use that word anymore) and I was really attracted to this new world I always new existed. Throughout the years I have been looking for a teacher. (They say the teacher appears when the student is ready, so I guess I still have some growing up to do, at 27.) I went from circle to circle to only feel disappointment, disenchantment, and betrayal. I was wondering what spirituality was supposed to be. I even learned Reiki, but didn’t see the point in doing all the hand motions…it seemed like pretty fluff to me. (If you want to heal someone, just do it. Incantations and hand motions are unnecessary.) What I am getting to at this point is that all these circles and teachers I was seeking were women. After three years of reading prescribed bullshit and assisting to bullshit circles of light and whatnot, I gave up a little. All the spiritual women I met were all the same. I could tell that they had deep hurts that they were trying to heal through spirituality. Everything was all “life is beautiful” and fluffy effin’ clouds. But I was born with a sense of urgency. Their way of expressing their spirituality did not make me feel free. I felt like, even though what they were doing was great and still spreading light and hope on the earth, they didn’t really get it. And many of them didn’t know how to show humility. I was sometimes even ridiculed. I think these women were all seeking empowerment and not enlightenment.
Through time, I have only ever been truly compelled by male teachers, and your post makes me understand why. They seek what I seek. Truth and freedom. The only female guide I have ever encountered and loved was an Olympic athlete and very male in nature. She said “I am not a Shaman, but am on the shamanic path.” I was hooked the instant she said that because it showed humility and that she would forever be a seeker. A few years ago, a man actually came to one of those “circles” (never showed up again, and I don’t blame him!) and spoke of freemasonry and all these dangerous secrets that were important. For me it was a “blue pill vs. red pill” moment. Since then I have been down the rabbit hole. Perhaps I should blame that in my chart, Mars is perched in Scorpio (0 degrees, so I don’t know what that means) in the 9th house.
But I’m still a wanderer, which is difficult because I need structure and guidance. But I know I need to wander some more, leave my mind and enter my heart. Maybe then, my long awaited teacher will come. Either way, the world is in desperate need of warriors. I hear from everywhere that this age belongs to women and that they will reclaim the earth to save it… Well, this worries me! If there is any hope, they need to “man up”! So many of these women wear veils of illusion…
Thank you for the link, I will check it out for sure!
Katrina
PS: When you say “100 years of social programming” it makes me realize how unbalanced we have become to live unconsciously in the mind to the great detriment of our instincts.
Hi Robert,
I have read your post a handful of times. I have been very moved by this post, because it clearly came from your heart and I feel like I’m right there in the bar session between you and newfound friend, the Texas physicist.
A couple of thoughts came to mind:
– Your physicist friend is on his own journey, and (unfortunately), he’s going to have to figure out things for himself. Your advice/perspective may sway him in a direction that he might have already contemplated, but he ultimately will have to figure his situation out on his own (sadly).
– I too have wondered (and still wonder) why men and women, for the most part, don’t seem to “get” each other at fundamental levels. I am still puzzled by why it isn’t easier for men and women, especially on an intimate, committed relationship basis, to “get” each other. But maybe this is just specific to me and my experiences/relationships.
I don’t have much more to add than this except that I think the interaction between couples is very complex, and I sense you’re trying to make sense of your own past interactions. I hope you can come to terms with it all for yourself, and I thank you for putting yourself out there — way out there — it’s really brave and inspirational to me that you’ve done this. I really appreciate your writing and perspective — it gives me a lot to think through.
-Marvelous
Another excellent read Robert …
As spirit beings having a human experience we learn and evolve quicker through the highs and heartaches of many situations…and so it goes…..
Katrina Rocks!
Well thanks Abra! Though I’m not sure why you think it so…lol 🙂
Wow, I really understand what Katrina is saying here. It dismays me that most women tend to be conformist and safe. (Not saying it’s bad necessarily, just that it dismays me.) I notice this in myself too. A more masculine style of spirituality seems important right now. I think the growing popularity of the religious right has something to do with the craving for the masculine virtues in society.
Robert, great read and food for thought.
I re-read Katrina’s post and was blown away by the honesty and to use a word that she invoked, “urgency.” After re-reading the post, I also realized that my Mars at 0 degrees Cancer is in an exact trine with Katrina’s Mars at 0 degrees Scorpio.
Thanks for dropping by Beth.
Beth! I totally agree with your “maculine virtues” bit! It’s a great way to put it.
Oh Robert, as a newbie, I wish I could understand your astro talk 🙂 A trine is a good thing right? 😀
BTW, for anyone interested in using astrology to further your spirituality, I recommend to read Henrik Gullfoss’s “The Complete Book of Spiritual Astrology”. This is not astrology that seeks to serve the ego, but the soul. Gullfoss is Norwegian. Now when I think of Calleman who is Swedish, I wonder what other pearls Scandinavia has for us.