On the Shame and Joy of Being a Male
"Though it cost all you have, get understanding." -Proverbs 4:7
I've spent the last couple of months trying to get to the heart of who I really am. This is a difficult journey for anyone. In this relatively short (albeit intense) period of time, I've come to a simple truth. The cornerstone of my own psychopathology is this: I'm ashamed to be a male. This has caused difficulty in my relationships.
It's eloquent in its simplicity. I'm a man. I want a woman. Men always hurt women. If I get a woman, I will hurt her. I don't want to hurt anyone. This is the source of my own inner conflict. It's a logical fallacy for many reasons, and intellectually, I can accept that now. But admitting this out loud isn't enough. This is a feeling of truth that I've internalized deep inside of my heart and my head, and I learned it when I was very young. It's going to take me a lot of time and effort to truly unlearn it. (How I came to learn this is a long, complicated, and pretty boring story, so I'll skip those details.)
I carried this with me into my adolescence, and while I longed to be close with a girl, I never could quite bridge the gap completely. I remember being in high school and going after a couple of girls. More often, they chose to pursue me. The end was always the same: when the critical moment came for me to make a decision, to be the guy and make a move, I simply froze. I couldn't bring myself to move forward. The deep seated feeling, at my core, was that if I moved any closer, I'd end up hurting the girl.
Is this actually true about myself? Would I actually hurt every girl I try to get close to? Of course not. I'm not an evil person with evil intentions. I was merely applying black and white thinking to a simple fact of life: that getting close to anyone will eventually result in some pain for both people. But in life, while pain inevitably goes with the territory of any relationship, this pain is always overshadowed by the benefits of the relationship itself. Intimacy with another human being, romantic or otherwise, does cause suffering, but we accept this because we value the other aspects of the relationship much more.
I see clearly now that this has determined how things have played out between me and every girl who's ever been willing to try and get close to me. In those moments of shared vulnerability, it always struck me that not only could I be hurt, but more importantly, that I possessed the terrible capacity to hurt her. I saw the latter as the only possible end in every one of these situations. In response to recognizing this, I've always turned and fled before things could go any further.
I remember being at a dance at the start of 10th grade, and a girl I knew approached me, wanting to dance. We talked and joked around for a while, and we danced to the upbeat songs. At the end of the night, when the slow dance was closing things down, we stood there staring at each other. As my friends danced in pairs around me, I stood petrified. I couldn't bring myself to reach out to her. At the end of the night, we left the venue in silence, and she simply went her way and I went mine.
One might think that I just trying to avoid getting hurt myself; this is only a partial truth, at best. Much more, I always feared the guilt that would result from inevitably result from me hurting them. But avoidance of being hurt, and avoiding the potential guilt of hurting someone else, both stem from the self-interest of avoiding some kind of pain. So perhaps the difference is negligible.
In my case, I know that it's possible for a person to feel something so strongly and so deeply that self-interest leads to self-sacrifice.
It's incorrect to believe that any incidence of pain in a relationship nullifies the value of the entire relationship, but it's also diminutive of me to have believed that I always needed to be the one protecting the girl. I've always felt I had to run away, to fall on my sword, in order to to prevent me causing her any hurt. In my naiveté, I've consistently failed to see the girl as a person capable of managing her own feelings, taking her own risks, and letting her decide for herself when she needed protecting. My hamartia is indeed pride.
The most horrifying thing is that this has invariably been a self-fulfilling prophecy. In letting things build to the point where we're both vulnerable, and then fleeing before a relationship could be established, I really did end up hurting the girl. In every situation, that ended up being the extent of what was shared. We'd draw close together, and I'd offer only rejection. In trying to avoid doing what I feared I would do, it ended up being the only thing that I ever managed to do.
All of this dawned on me slowly a few days ago. I drove to the mountains and introspected to see if there was any truth in this. The tears came slowly, but when they did, I wept bitterly, and I recognized them to be those tears that only accompany truth. The seemingly haphazard actions I've taken in my life, the hazy motivations that have driven them, and all the events that have resulted, could suddenly be tied together by this one common thread.
I can say this: these kinds of revelations are never as dramatic as we might like them to be. We hope that clarity will come into our lives like a grandiose Hollywood production. We imagine theatrical singing and dancing, and all manner of explosions. Somehow we think that getting to the heart of the matters that matter most will upset every fiber of our being. But it's more like sitting outside, in tranquility, and a small sparrow lands on your leg. It sits there and watches you in silence for a time, then it offers you a short birdsong. Once it feels that you've gotten its message, it flies off. You watch it fly out of your sight, and then go back to the undisturbed tranquility. A little while later, you notice that it has crapped on you.
I was in a 12 year relationship with a girl that ended in the middle of last year. She told me simply: I want children. Knowing I didn't really want children, she knew this would put me to a decision. What she was really saying is that she needed a commitment from me. In a situation where I care about the other person, especially as much as I cared about her, the whole thing scared me. Commitment, marriage, all of that, it only translated to one thing for me. To me it could only mean I'm going to hurt someone. This was a long relationship, so I know that we cared about each other, and I know that we loved each other. Despite that, fearing inevitable destruction, I preemptively destroyed. Fundamentally, I felt I had to eliminate the relationship before children came into it; I couldn't spare either of us the pain of separating, but I had to spare them the pain that would come with our union.
Then I decided to pursue another girl...one with whom I felt I shared more common ground. The manner in which I did it was well-intentioned but ignorant, and as a result of my mistakes, she not only rejected me, but sent me a clear message that roughly said, I am afraid of you. Get out of my life forever and never return. Now I understand that this outcome hurt me as badly as it did not because I'm incapable of handling rejection, but because it tore open my deepest wound. It confirmed my worst fear: try and get close to a girl, and you'll only hurt her.
Why am I sharing this? Because if this is true for me, then someone else out there is feeling it too. I always hope that what I write reaches someone else who needs to read it. I'm not alone, and if what I'm writing about myself here resonates with you, then neither are you. I hope I can articulate in words what someone else is struggling to express about themselves. I owe almost everything that I know to other people who have put what they know into words, and who have had the courage to share them. If you can, avoid my mistakes.
My experiences have made me into who I am; the experiences of no two people are the same. What we see, feel, and learn shapes our perspectives. We all get molded into a completely unique person, and this makes us capable of accomplishing something that no one else can. The only pertinent question for me now is how I move forward. If the rule that I followed has led me down this path, where am I meant to go next?
I've spent the last couple of months trying to get to the heart of who I really am. This is a difficult journey for anyone. In this relatively short (albeit intense) period of time, I've come to a simple truth. The cornerstone of my own psychopathology is this: I'm ashamed to be a male. This has caused difficulty in my relationships.
It's eloquent in its simplicity. I'm a man. I want a woman. Men always hurt women. If I get a woman, I will hurt her. I don't want to hurt anyone. This is the source of my own inner conflict. It's a logical fallacy for many reasons, and intellectually, I can accept that now. But admitting this out loud isn't enough. This is a feeling of truth that I've internalized deep inside of my heart and my head, and I learned it when I was very young. It's going to take me a lot of time and effort to truly unlearn it. (How I came to learn this is a long, complicated, and pretty boring story, so I'll skip those details.)
I carried this with me into my adolescence, and while I longed to be close with a girl, I never could quite bridge the gap completely. I remember being in high school and going after a couple of girls. More often, they chose to pursue me. The end was always the same: when the critical moment came for me to make a decision, to be the guy and make a move, I simply froze. I couldn't bring myself to move forward. The deep seated feeling, at my core, was that if I moved any closer, I'd end up hurting the girl.
Is this actually true about myself? Would I actually hurt every girl I try to get close to? Of course not. I'm not an evil person with evil intentions. I was merely applying black and white thinking to a simple fact of life: that getting close to anyone will eventually result in some pain for both people. But in life, while pain inevitably goes with the territory of any relationship, this pain is always overshadowed by the benefits of the relationship itself. Intimacy with another human being, romantic or otherwise, does cause suffering, but we accept this because we value the other aspects of the relationship much more.
I see clearly now that this has determined how things have played out between me and every girl who's ever been willing to try and get close to me. In those moments of shared vulnerability, it always struck me that not only could I be hurt, but more importantly, that I possessed the terrible capacity to hurt her. I saw the latter as the only possible end in every one of these situations. In response to recognizing this, I've always turned and fled before things could go any further.
I remember being at a dance at the start of 10th grade, and a girl I knew approached me, wanting to dance. We talked and joked around for a while, and we danced to the upbeat songs. At the end of the night, when the slow dance was closing things down, we stood there staring at each other. As my friends danced in pairs around me, I stood petrified. I couldn't bring myself to reach out to her. At the end of the night, we left the venue in silence, and she simply went her way and I went mine.
One might think that I just trying to avoid getting hurt myself; this is only a partial truth, at best. Much more, I always feared the guilt that would result from inevitably result from me hurting them. But avoidance of being hurt, and avoiding the potential guilt of hurting someone else, both stem from the self-interest of avoiding some kind of pain. So perhaps the difference is negligible.
In my case, I know that it's possible for a person to feel something so strongly and so deeply that self-interest leads to self-sacrifice.
It's incorrect to believe that any incidence of pain in a relationship nullifies the value of the entire relationship, but it's also diminutive of me to have believed that I always needed to be the one protecting the girl. I've always felt I had to run away, to fall on my sword, in order to to prevent me causing her any hurt. In my naiveté, I've consistently failed to see the girl as a person capable of managing her own feelings, taking her own risks, and letting her decide for herself when she needed protecting. My hamartia is indeed pride.
The most horrifying thing is that this has invariably been a self-fulfilling prophecy. In letting things build to the point where we're both vulnerable, and then fleeing before a relationship could be established, I really did end up hurting the girl. In every situation, that ended up being the extent of what was shared. We'd draw close together, and I'd offer only rejection. In trying to avoid doing what I feared I would do, it ended up being the only thing that I ever managed to do.
All of this dawned on me slowly a few days ago. I drove to the mountains and introspected to see if there was any truth in this. The tears came slowly, but when they did, I wept bitterly, and I recognized them to be those tears that only accompany truth. The seemingly haphazard actions I've taken in my life, the hazy motivations that have driven them, and all the events that have resulted, could suddenly be tied together by this one common thread.
I can say this: these kinds of revelations are never as dramatic as we might like them to be. We hope that clarity will come into our lives like a grandiose Hollywood production. We imagine theatrical singing and dancing, and all manner of explosions. Somehow we think that getting to the heart of the matters that matter most will upset every fiber of our being. But it's more like sitting outside, in tranquility, and a small sparrow lands on your leg. It sits there and watches you in silence for a time, then it offers you a short birdsong. Once it feels that you've gotten its message, it flies off. You watch it fly out of your sight, and then go back to the undisturbed tranquility. A little while later, you notice that it has crapped on you.
I was in a 12 year relationship with a girl that ended in the middle of last year. She told me simply: I want children. Knowing I didn't really want children, she knew this would put me to a decision. What she was really saying is that she needed a commitment from me. In a situation where I care about the other person, especially as much as I cared about her, the whole thing scared me. Commitment, marriage, all of that, it only translated to one thing for me. To me it could only mean I'm going to hurt someone. This was a long relationship, so I know that we cared about each other, and I know that we loved each other. Despite that, fearing inevitable destruction, I preemptively destroyed. Fundamentally, I felt I had to eliminate the relationship before children came into it; I couldn't spare either of us the pain of separating, but I had to spare them the pain that would come with our union.
Then I decided to pursue another girl...one with whom I felt I shared more common ground. The manner in which I did it was well-intentioned but ignorant, and as a result of my mistakes, she not only rejected me, but sent me a clear message that roughly said, I am afraid of you. Get out of my life forever and never return. Now I understand that this outcome hurt me as badly as it did not because I'm incapable of handling rejection, but because it tore open my deepest wound. It confirmed my worst fear: try and get close to a girl, and you'll only hurt her.
Why am I sharing this? Because if this is true for me, then someone else out there is feeling it too. I always hope that what I write reaches someone else who needs to read it. I'm not alone, and if what I'm writing about myself here resonates with you, then neither are you. I hope I can articulate in words what someone else is struggling to express about themselves. I owe almost everything that I know to other people who have put what they know into words, and who have had the courage to share them. If you can, avoid my mistakes.
My experiences have made me into who I am; the experiences of no two people are the same. What we see, feel, and learn shapes our perspectives. We all get molded into a completely unique person, and this makes us capable of accomplishing something that no one else can. The only pertinent question for me now is how I move forward. If the rule that I followed has led me down this path, where am I meant to go next?