It’s taken me a long time to understand how to take responsibility for myself, to be a true man in the true sense. Looking back, I was – choice by choice – numbing, selling out and destroying myself in the process of ‘living’ from boy to ‘man’.
As a boy going into my teens it was all about the constant harassing of girls to get them to kiss us. A gang of twelve year olds would bully the females in our year group to give us attention. The pack, which I was too afraid to stand up to, tormented girls who were attractive and those who were not – the attractive girls were harassed sexually, those less attractive were humiliated, bullied and persecuted because of looks, clothes. These devastating behaviours were considered normal for us as boys: it was just what we did.
DRUNK, DRUGS & DISORDERLY
Mid–teens, it became about getting so drunk at a ‘day party’ while my parents were at work that I vomited all over their bed, whilst the other rooms in the house were filled with school-aged peers getting drunk and disorderly in the name of fun and cool ‘adult behaviour’. This was perfectly acceptable to those on the adult threshold. This is how we grew up. It was ‘normal’.
By my late teens I was subscribing to the lie that drugs were less harmful than alcohol, yet I was using both. I was once taken to hospital because the images that I was seeing, after abusing pints of lager and numerous bongs, were so fear-inducing I could not handle the space I was occupying. Known as ‘a big night’ that went off track, it was perfectly acceptable to my college peers and we all joked and laughed about it for days afterwards until someone else’s night went off track… letting me off the proverbial ‘piss-taking’ hook.
My twenties were all about music and ecstasy: a Class A drug that took you completely away from reality. It was perfectly acceptable to work all week and then go out on the weekend and ‘lose it’ in the name of music and hedonism… everything was accepted as long as the experience was ‘far out, man’.
SELF ANNIHILATING
By my thirties it had shifted again and with more money came ‘seemingly’ more power. Large amounts of cash earned ended up in fine wine, restaurants, the cocaine dealer’s hands and while the scenery had shifted, the activity was the same. In the end I felt trapped. Responsibility was calling and the question was how much longer was I going to avoid it? There was no joy in that struggle, no love, no care for me or for others, just a self-annihilating existence that grew bleaker and bleaker.
How is it possible that the natural, tender, beautiful boy I was born, turned into anything but that?
Screaming at the world through behaviour that was effectively saying: “I do not want any part in feeling this world”, devastated at being told by the world every step of the way: you cannot stay that joyful, loving, deeply caring boy – you have to choose/exist ‘this’ way.
RESPONSIBILITY & TRUE FREEDOM
I discovered there was another, gentler way to be a man, and that I could make lasting changes to my life simply by making different choices. I struggled with self-doubt and it took me a long time to overcome my resistance to making choices that would support (not destroy) me – I could feel this self-worth stuff coming up. Over time, I began taking true responsibility in what I chose for myself through:
- absolutely claiming that the relationship I had with me was loveless,
- making the choice to take care of myself in gentleness,
- knowing that I deserved more, that I deserved love.
Although there were many times when I just wanted someone else to do it for me – someone to pick me up and dust me off when the momentum of my self-harming choices would come crashing in and tear everything apart – I kept taking responsibility.
Now, the old days of living a life that seemed ‘free’ have been well and truly surpassed by a truly free life, where my only responsibility as a man is simply about living lovingly in my day with me.
My relationships feel warmer and more honest: no roles to play, no job to ‘wear’ and no lies to ‘live’ in.
From the choice to BE all of me, without perfection or critique, my way of life has become responsible and this is where freedom truly lies. Now, it is a joy to be me – the true man I am.
By Lee Green, Awesome Man, Perth
566 Comments
We as a society have just about everything upside down, were our standards of what is ‘normal’ is the absolute antithesis of what is truly natural for us, and what is worse is that we champion this and encourage our children to walk this unnatural way so as to not accept the responsibility of what we have left behind and as such avoiding the fact that this is what we live in hurt of. Our behaviours in general reflect that which are abusive, to ourselves and to others, and the only way this can change is to live in connection to love, to that which we naturally are within, and that which is what we all seek to freely live.
The fact that we have arrived at a place in the time where the scenarios you have shared are considered to be normal, is quite shocking and very sad at the same time. To me, the sort of behaviour you describe is simply one long cry for help from young men, and often young women, who do not know who they are, have never been supported to honour themselves and who have very little sense of choice and the subsequent consequences. But as you have discovered there is another way to live, one that is based on love for self and others and self-responsibility.
I was talking with some colleagues the other day and we were discussing how life had changed for us and what we value now was quite different to 10 years earlier. Previously, our lives reflected a recklessness and irresponsibility but now there was a greater settlement and responsibility.
Many of the behaviours that society deems ‘normal’ are anything but. We humans are a strange species, hell bent on causing damage to our own bodies if it allows us to escape a reality that we ourselves have created. Your experience shows that we can live a life that is true if we choose.
Reconnecting with our true worth is an important part of naturally being motivated to take greater care of ourself. It certainly helps to recognise the impact this has on everyone else as well.
It’s so important for us as Men to reflect and appreciate how far we have come, as you do here Lee. With this foundation of knowing how God has touched our life how can we go back to a mundane view of ourselves and of life? We are multi-dimensional beings of Love first, before any job, title, role or gender.
We all have so many ways to avoid our own love, drugs are just one of many things we use to dull our light so not to shine bright in a world where most others have also dulled theirs.
I agree Ingrid this website Esoteric Women’s Health and the Women in Livingness websites are extremely supportive and it is just wonderful that we can share, open up and express how we are finding it and how it feels living as women and then share the process.
Being really honest as to who we are and what we are choosing can be at times really hard to do. We don’t want to take the responsibility that we totally have the power to make different choices. Lee what a great sharing as to how you found the process and that it is a forever learning and allowing process.
Resisting the love that we are can be very hard on the body and our overall well-being. It puts us in a constant fight against ourself. To liberate ourself from this constant bombardment of self-depreciation and abuse is to eventually accept who we truly are and live in the joy of being a true reflection of this love for all to see.
When we’re in the flow of being disregarding and disrespectful of ourselves it is hard not to see that it does neither work nor serve us or anyone for that matter. To call out the loveless patterns and to be honest to why we are turning to them is a place of returning to who we truly are.
Wow thank you for sharing so graphically about the lack of joy when we are living irresponsibly and the true joy to be found in returning to our gentle selves when we can be released from the many self harming behaviours we have taken on to suppress our ever present ability to feel everything.
I remember those days of being free which meant we could do whatever we wanted, be as careless and loveless as we liked and it didn’t matter. This is not freedom it is imprisoning and it is not true because all we really wanted was to love and be loved yet we were not willing to feel love, nourish and nurture love in ourselves first. The New Age talked about loving yourself but in my experience it was mostly as a concept from the head and the love had emotional undertones, it was not a matter of connecting to our innermost and living from there on a daily basis.
It is actually that simple. It shows us that allowing ourselves to be real and loving is actually way more easy than resisting our natural power to love.
We can redefine these words with such writing…Responsibility here takes on a whole new meaning. Rather than an onerous word that is weighty and full of burden, it is an opportunity of lightening our load and indeed our whole existence.
I love that there is a simple responsibility in taking care of yourself, it’s simple maths – how we take care of ourselves effects everyone around us, it’s part of what we contribute to the world and what kind of world we would like to live in.
Hey and awesome man indeed you are Lee. I love this . . . “My relationships feel warmer and more honest: no roles to play, no job to ‘wear’ and no lies to ‘live’ in.” Wow you are now free to be yourself! This is so worth breaking down our walls of protection for as they never worked as protection only as a prison of our own making.
You are obviously an amazing example Lee to others. We all seem to feel pressured into following the “normal” so called right of passage in our youth but how wonderful to know we can step out of that by loving responsibility to ourselves.
It is quite a tale, the depths we go to before we find our way back to recognising that all those self-abusive behaviours are not us, they are not solving anything, or making us feel any more settled in our lives or our bodies.
Yes indeed and that there is another way to live that is available to us.
It is fascinating to read such an honest account of the path that you have walked, from one acceptable form of self-destruction to the next, with each step gaining you more and more recognition as well as engaging with even deeper the ever persuasive pull of increasingly sophisticated ‘good-times’ which actually meant that your drugs or alcohol of choice simply became more intense and expensive.
Lee I love how you highlight with such clarity and simplicity that our true purpose and only responsibility in life is to be ourselves and to live lovingly.
That is a miracle Lee Green. It is so simple as it is in your conclusion – be yourself and be responsible for living lovingly for that amazing life – I’m learning more and more if I want an amazing life then I must give it to myself.
You are a gorgeous man Lee, it is inspiring to meet men who allow their tenderness out and to be expressed with others.
One of the most beautiful gifts we can give to ourselves is the gift of freeing ourselves from those old paradigms that we have taken on from childhood that have defined who we are, and in that freedom feeling who we truly, as Lee so beautifully writes, are.
It is a very typical lifestyle you describe from the past, glossed up with a degree of sophistication that rationalized it all to be ok – even desirable. When we make these choices we can’t be feeling with our hearts and bodies the potential devastation. It is truly worth while considering: what would have us do harmful things to ourselves and others when inside we know this isn’t what feels true or loving?
Beautiful Lee and I appreciate your honesty in that with discovering this gentler way to be a man and change your life by making different choices, there was also a struggle as there was, the momentum of how you’ve lived irresponsible, facing self worth issues, resistance to supportive choices etc. We have to go through this phase and truly claim we deserve love in every way and take responsibility for what has not been true although it is called ‘normal’ in our society so we don’t have to look at how we are living with ourselves and each other in the first place.
Yes, it requires lots of honesty and purpose to change a self-destructive trend like that, but we always deserve it.
When I think back to my teenage years and feel the amount of energy and time spent on getting ‘wasted’ I see how detrimental and irresponsible it was.
We are all in truth super tender and sensitive yet we can find a myriad of ways to disguise this.
It is great that you found your way through this strong momentum of abusing and numbing yourself so strongly. It asks a lot of loving discipline to get there. The teachings, workshops and healing modalities of Universal Medicine are from great support in those big changes in life.
The school ground can be a vicious and nasty introduction to set up and reinforce our patterns in life. You gave an ideal example of this Lee with what is considered normal behaviour by boys and the torment that ‘the attractive girls were harassed sexually, those less attractive were humiliated, bullied and persecuted because of looks, clothes’. No wonder as adults we have issues today for these playground incidents if not worked through and let go of shadow our adulthood and continue to play out like malicious game after game after game.
Well said Suse, it is the same pattern of behaviour that is founded in our childhood that perpetuates through our adult and working life. The same pack mentality till one of the pack says no…