I always think it's much harder for men in recovery to get in touch with their real feelings due to the misplaced conditions on us through society. I was always lead to believe that a man was not supposed to show his emotions. I learned that through my own father who was not one to show his feelings in front of his children. I don't blame him for my own situation it's just probably the way he was brought up and so on and so forth. Children were also expected to be "seen and not heard" in my family and that meant emotionally as well for me.
As a child I found it very difficult to show my own feelings in front of people yet I was overly sensitive and felt the need to cry due to how I was feeling at times. This usually meant isolation, where I would have to deal with my emotions away from other people, usually my bedroom. Hence, why I have probably sought that isolation through the latter and more damaging years of my drinking due to the intensity of the shame and fear that had been suppressed over the years
We have given ourselves as men such a hard task of keeping up the appearances of what it is supposed to be, to be a man. Ego is the biggest culprit in this facade. It's only through deflating ones ego that we can allow ourselves to stop trying to define who we are supposed to be in the eyes of the rest of the world as not only men but people. Only then can we see ourselves for what we truly are and that we are no different in essence from women.
I have tried so many ways to try and define who I am as a person (and a man) under this guise of many masks, even through my sexuality. I feel love for both men and women today but I do not 'lust' after men in the way that I would women. Sex, Love and intimacy were very warped notions in my head at one time and the boundaries were almost non existent. As a man having the usual lustful thoughts held no taboos in my eyes during my active years in addiction where I considered myself to be a hedonistic bisexual.
It is only through my recovery and my awareness of myself that today I have stopped trying to define myself with putting a label on me. I have a greater understanding of me as a person today and I don't have to define myself by ANY man made label. I am who I am and even my name is just another label. Father, Son, Brother, Friend, Lover...etc etc ALL just labels.
Recovery for me is not just about putting down the drink and drugs. It's about getting in touch with who I am with all my 'glorious' defects too so that I can become all that I can be!! I can't possibly live my life without defects of character to be honest, because it's a part of our human nature I believe to have what I would call "The Seven Deadly Sins!" lol. They keep us in check and show us when we are in need of balance in our lives. The yin and yang if you like.
I'll leave you with this thought from Eckhart Tolle
"Give up defining yourself - to yourself or to others. You won't die. You will come to life. And don't be concerned with how others define you. When they define you, they are limiting themselves, so it's their problem. Whenever you interact with people, don't be there primarily as a function or a role, but as the field of conscious Presence. You can only lose something that you have, but you cannot lose something that you are."
Love and Light
Phil
xx
As a child I found it very difficult to show my own feelings in front of people yet I was overly sensitive and felt the need to cry due to how I was feeling at times. This usually meant isolation, where I would have to deal with my emotions away from other people, usually my bedroom. Hence, why I have probably sought that isolation through the latter and more damaging years of my drinking due to the intensity of the shame and fear that had been suppressed over the years
We have given ourselves as men such a hard task of keeping up the appearances of what it is supposed to be, to be a man. Ego is the biggest culprit in this facade. It's only through deflating ones ego that we can allow ourselves to stop trying to define who we are supposed to be in the eyes of the rest of the world as not only men but people. Only then can we see ourselves for what we truly are and that we are no different in essence from women.
I have tried so many ways to try and define who I am as a person (and a man) under this guise of many masks, even through my sexuality. I feel love for both men and women today but I do not 'lust' after men in the way that I would women. Sex, Love and intimacy were very warped notions in my head at one time and the boundaries were almost non existent. As a man having the usual lustful thoughts held no taboos in my eyes during my active years in addiction where I considered myself to be a hedonistic bisexual.
It is only through my recovery and my awareness of myself that today I have stopped trying to define myself with putting a label on me. I have a greater understanding of me as a person today and I don't have to define myself by ANY man made label. I am who I am and even my name is just another label. Father, Son, Brother, Friend, Lover...etc etc ALL just labels.
Recovery for me is not just about putting down the drink and drugs. It's about getting in touch with who I am with all my 'glorious' defects too so that I can become all that I can be!! I can't possibly live my life without defects of character to be honest, because it's a part of our human nature I believe to have what I would call "The Seven Deadly Sins!" lol. They keep us in check and show us when we are in need of balance in our lives. The yin and yang if you like.
I'll leave you with this thought from Eckhart Tolle
"Give up defining yourself - to yourself or to others. You won't die. You will come to life. And don't be concerned with how others define you. When they define you, they are limiting themselves, so it's their problem. Whenever you interact with people, don't be there primarily as a function or a role, but as the field of conscious Presence. You can only lose something that you have, but you cannot lose something that you are."
Love and Light
Phil
xx
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