The Gift of Brotherhood
Being a man in a default-separated world
Last week, I had the honor to volunteer fives days of my life to a cause I deeply believe in. I spent those days in the forests of my youth with the next generation of boys and men—those from ages 12-16 who are on their journeys into masculine initiation.
The program—Sacred Fire—was passed down to some uncles of mine from a Native American man named Paul. It’s a young men’s rite of passage, to help the boy crawl and climb into masculine embodiment.
Each year—of three years total—is a different journey. In year one, there is a 24-hour solo in the forest. In year two, peers tend a central fire and learn humility for four days. In year three, the group holds space for the first years and learns what it is to be a leader.
Finally, after graduating, we are welcome to return and offer our time and our hearts to the younger men, to help guide and initiate them.
I worked as the “Kitchunk,” or Kitchen-Uncle. It was a challenging role. I woke up at 5:45 to prep coffee for my fellow uncles and older men. I went to sleep at 11 after hours of cooking, cleaning, and organizing.
And through it all, there was an unrelenting force rising from within me, empowering me to serve. I discovered what is undeniably a bottomless well of energy within me that can always be tapped into, when it comes to serving the world, and living into my purpose.
As I sit with the experience in the snatches of time I get amongst the chaos of my life, I find myself most of all grateful for brotherhood—for the band of men I am lucky enough to have in my life—which is truly a foundation for all my security and stability. I know that at the end of my line, at rock bottom, no matter what happens, I’ll have men in my life who will stand by me, behind me, and for me. And the biggest gift is that the love is unconditional.
There is a capacity for masculine love which is unconditional, and yet bounded. There is codependent love, which is primarily an act of “if you’re okay, I’m okay,” and “you will save me/I will save you.” I’ve experienced both in my life. And these brothers don’t give that. There’s a primal separation of selves, because of what is an indivisible wholeness in each self that allows for Truth to live between men, and not be repelled by unconscious walls of self-preservation.
This is, certainly, what the world needs more of.
We need more unconditionally loving men whose capacity to hold themselves and others is vast, deep, and broad. We need men who can contain their energy and equally who can empower those around them to take ownership.
Our role as men is not to caretake for the world, but to pour our limitless love into ourselves and each other, so that we can empower the world to take care of itself. We are the stewards, not the healers. We are not here to fix anything, because fundamentally, nothing is broken. We are here to contain, and subsequently focus our ceaseless desire, and to honor the wellbeing which is primally apparent already.
The grief of a brother is the call to action.
The tears and wails of a brother in pain is the calling.
Our men are hurting. We are feeling the ache of generations of longing for wholeness, for self-honoring, for health and wellbeing in our relationships. We are needing a world where men are valued not for their capacity to win, but for their capacity to hold with love. There is honor in ourselves that we are not valuing. There is honor in the masculine, and in men that the patriarchy has killed.
We are human before we are man. And to be human is to be in relationship, to be a communal being. We are fundamentally wired for connection, for love, for mutuality and support, for reciprocity. We are ecological outpourings of the Divine web of life, which is unconditionally supportive to the fruitful continuation of existence. Does that mean we are always well? No. Does it mean that we will all survive? No. Does it mean that we should pour ourselves out until we are empty? No.
What it does mean is that in any moment, we are able to choose our own reality, to see ourselves in a caring world, in a world where we are held up not only by our own boot straps, but by the fundamental capacity of True and Unconditional Love.
And for the majority of the world, this is a scary proposal. For the many men who have never experienced the life I have, where I have been held in my deepest sobbing, heaving, heartbroken moments not only by mother/woman/lover, but by brother/father/uncle, this brings fear. But I say it anyways:
Let down your walls. Trust that there is love worth letting your guard down for. Trust that the world is not out to get you. Trust that there is life beyond the death of ego and self-separation. Trust that there is fundamental wholeness that requires literally no effort to sustain. Trust that in the deepest and most core parts of Reality, you/we/I are already safe.
There is nothing in the world that is broken. There is no rattling of curses or demons. There is no Evil. There are only those hurt little boys who are running away from the recieval of unconditional love, who are out to prove that they’re enough so that they can finally feel safe.
But it doesn’t work that way. Safety is not an end goal. It is an internal choice. It is the foundational groundwork for all else. If we want love, we must feel safe inside ourselves. If we want money, we must hold a space of love internally so that money has a place to land. Safety is an internal shift, more than an external reality change.
If there is one external thing that is necessary, though, for a man’s internal safety, that thing is Brotherhood.
We must cultivate and create the conditions in our world for men to feel safe to be held and loved by other men. We must build a world where men can feel open in their emotional expression, where we can love each other as our most real and honest expressions of self. Only then will the world be ready to welcome in a new generation of what Life could be life.
Only then will the world be truly safe; when Men hold each other, and when we feel safe in ourselves.
With love and blessings,
Faolan
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