The Solution to Patriarchy: Give men more power.

“It’s a very scary time for young men in America.”

D. Trump speaks the truth.

Put away your pitchforks and hear me out.

If we could only slow down and try and listen to the confession inside of this…

It holds the key to our collective liberation.

Patriarchy is the product of terrified men.

Men terrified of being powerless and unimportant so they create false power and false importance through domination and control.

That is the masculine shadow. When men go deep into the hidden parts of the psyche they find the devastating truth that they are not woman.

Men are not life-bearers. Men are not the body that brings forth life. Every man comes into this world through a woman. And after birth man is dependent on woman for nourishment and sustenance for years.

Sit with that for a moment. Men, notice what that touches. Women, can you even imagine? Please try.

There is a deep existential terror here that we must take deadly seriously if we want to understand and disrupt the patriarchy that is destroying the Earth.

The solution is counter-intuitive. Instead of taking power away from men we actually need to address the shadow of powerlessness that creates the systems of false power.

We need to initiate men into their true power so they don’t wield shadow power in an attempt to medicate their terror and inferiority.

What does this look like? This looks like giving men, especially young men, the opportunities to discover who they are and how beautiful and useful and appreciated they are for their gifts.

Men need to understand how important they are so they don’t go about creating false importance.

This looks like giving young men the opportunity to test themselves, to endure pain and failure, to celebrate their desire to build and create new things, transcend challenges, discover their deeply sensitive heart and powerful sex.

Young men need to understand that they have the power to destroy life or to serve life.

They need to learn to wield that power responsibly but the only way to teach this is to give a young man the opportunity to fail at it without shame and punishment.

Young men need to learn to wield their power and need appropriate environments where they can test and receive natural feedback as they grow this capacity.

We need to give young men more real power, more real responsibility, more real opportunities to find his own worth and value so he does not grow to burn the world down in search of it.

And, yes, ideally fathers would be leading this charge and taking this responsibility on. There is a movement. It is doing great work. But it is small and a drop in the bucket right now.

Men: Get involved in the movement. Find out how. Google “male initiation” and begin your journey. Find men who you admire and ask them about their journey. Start looking at your shadow of powerlessness and rage. Go in search of your importance.

And to all you mothers and wives out there – all the women who are rising up and taking a stand and are no longer going to be silent – Please remember this: It is the power you support your sons and husbands to discover in themselves that will set us free.

They need you to encourage them to find themselves. They need to differentiate from you. They need to learn to do it their way.

How? That is a hard question. We don’t collectively know the answer but it begins with inquiring about what true and deep and essential masculine power really is.

It begins with telling new stories about what men are and how important they are.

It begins with acknowledging the deep fear a man has of not being woman and holding that knowing as we relate to our children and the men in our life.

Women, your sons and husbands need you to believe in masculine power. If you can’t right now then find a way. Ask questions. Talk about it. Let’s create the conversation.

Your men need you to have such deep faith that they have a unique and important contribution as men in this world.

Deep down men know that women can do all that men can. We know that you are as smart and capable as any of us at just about anything. So what is our real contribution? It is not obvious to us. I promise you this is true.

Men need you to celebrate the ways they think and act and choose differently. They need you to understand that their sex penetrates and their heart is penetrated. Men need you to hold space to discover who they are beyond their fear.

Do you owe us that? Probably not. But do you need to so that our grandchildren will have an Earth to live on? Probably.

And, men, if you are reading this and nodding along then go out and start this conversation yourselves. Talk to your sons, brothers, nephews and cousins. Go find your own shadow of terror and impotence and start talking about the pain and powerlessness so it can get out of the shadows. Own it and name it so it no longer runs you from behind the scenes.

We must reclaim a deep and enduring narrative of true masculine power before the scared young men do the only thing that makes any sense to them and destroy us all in search of it.

Yes, the young men are scared. They have every reason to be. To be a man is to be born into fear of impotence.

Patriarchy is a failure of masculine power rather than a triumph of it and we have to take this seriously if we are going to transform our experience of being alive.

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