Men are not born. Men are not born

Psychologies: Simone de Beauvoir’s phrase “Women are not born, but become” at one time turned upside down ideas about femininity. The writer and philosopher decisively stated that biology does not determine everything. Can the same be said about men?

I.P.: Partly possible. Although it would be more accurate to say that both women and men are not only born, but also become. Moreover, this process continues throughout life. In infancy, biological mechanisms play a decisive role. And the older a person is, the more important psychological, social and spiritual mechanisms become. The main thing is to understand that the initial biological properties are not final, not final and not fatal. You can compare this to sports. Let's imagine two boys: one has excellent abilities in some sport, the other has quite average abilities. Could it be that in 10 years, someone with less ability will achieve higher results? Of course, it can: due to well-organized training, volitional efforts and many other factors. The same can be said about the formation of qualities that define a man.

How are these qualities “trained”?

I.P.: It all depends on which of them are considered decisive. For example, until recently it was common to say that the army turns boys into men. And the young people who served were indeed distinguished by their independence, physical strength, one might say, greater masculinity compared to their peers who did not serve. The reasons are very simple: separation from the usual environment, lack of influence from the immediate environment, constant physical activity, a new circle in which it is necessary to assert oneself - and primarily by force. So much for the training.

Your answer implies a very specific set of qualities that define a man.

I.P.: Not at all, I clarified that everyone is free to determine these qualities themselves. I believe that today's men are lucky: they live in a time when there is no need to assert themselves only through physical strength. They can find their place in life and gain self-confidence in a variety of ways - through intelligence, social skills...

However, you must agree that in recent decades, much more social opportunities have opened up for women. Doesn't this mean a narrowing of opportunities for men?

I.P.: You are right that women have been given more opportunities. But there is no need to talk about any narrowing of men's domains. At the most, about increased competition. But this should just be useful for men! Competitive behavior is one of the traits that comes with being male.

I.P.: This is perhaps the most important topic in the conversation about masculinity. There are so-called androgenetic qualities, initially caused by the production of androgens - male sex hormones. They can manifest themselves at various levels and in any area of ​​life. And the more masculine a man is by nature, the more actively these hormones are produced in him, the more strongly the corresponding qualities will manifest themselves. Competitive behavior applies specifically to them.

“They say a man is afraid of his wife’s energy or success. No! He involuntarily perceives her as another man."

I.P.: There are about twenty of them. For example, hierarchical behavior. If you look at all purely male communities - from the army to monastic orders - then everywhere you will find a very rigid hierarchical structure. These same qualities include territorial behavior - the need for one’s own space, free from the encroachments of other males...

Male animals solve this problem by marking their territory. What is the territorial behavior of modern men?

I.P.: Well, for example, in the fact that they hang out in the garage or workshop for hours without any reason understandable to a woman. They may not do anything there at all; it is important for them to feel that they are on their own territory. And there are also ways to “mark” territory: shirts, T-shirts and other toiletries scattered throughout the house are just a typical manifestation of territorial behavior. And a consequence of the initially high level of male sex hormones.

In this case, the woman who invariably puts all those shirts and T-shirts in the closet...

I.P.: It throws off a man’s program, absolutely right. The same thing happens in a more classic situation. After all, the very relationship between a man and a woman is initially, from a male point of view, a relationship between hunter and prey. He pursues, she runs away, this is also an androgenetic program. Now imagine what happens when the game suddenly turns around and rushes towards the hunter with open arms. Firstly, he will be taken aback by surprise. And secondly, he will almost certainly refuse such “prey.”

And there is no moral assessment of a woman’s behavior in this?

I.P.: No. A man can come up with them in hindsight. But initially this is precisely a failure of the androgenetic program. And by the way, returning to the situation of competition. It is quite possible between men and women. But when entering it, it is important for women to understand the following. Competing with a woman, a man from a certain moment ceases to distinguish her as a woman. And he acts the same way he would act if he competed with men. At the level of business relationships, this is normal rigidity. But if competitors also turn out to be spouses or just partners, everything becomes more complicated. Men very often react with a decrease in potency. In such situations, it is customary to say that the man was afraid of his wife’s energy or success. Yes, he was not afraid of anything, he rather unconsciously began to perceive her as another man! It's biology and it's hard to do anything about it.

Our expert - psychotherapist Boris Suvorov.

Where's the initiation?

If a woman who has become a mother is usually considered accomplished by society, then from time immemorial it has placed much higher demands on men. A man, in order to be considered such, needs to prove that he can be responsible for himself and for the people who depend on him. But modern society, alas, does not prepare boys for this.

In the old days, there was a concept of “initiation” - initiation, when boys and girls, having undergone special training, were accepted by adults of their sex into a male or female community. Now this custom has been preserved only in tribes far from civilization. There, boys at the beginning of puberty are taken from their mothers and given to men to raise.

In modern society, children are unfortunately deprived of such thoughtful preparation and are often forced to cope with growing up alone. Without a model of mature male behavior nearby, boys begin to draw examples from the Internet, men's magazines and movies. This is how a purely teenage misconception of masculinity as a kind of “cool” spreads. It means aggressive behavior, a love of extreme sports, owning a lot of money, driving expensive cars, and a promiscuous sex life - all that actually has nothing to do with real masculinity.

Every boy strives to become a man, but without the help of close adults he cannot understand how to do this. If adults do not create the opportunity for him to make this important transition in safe conditions, there is a risk that the transition will occur in a much less harmless way - for example, the young man may end up in a criminal group.

General "fatherlessness"

For normal development, a boy needs constant communication with at least one adult man - a truly adult, that is, psychologically mature (it happens that a person has already grown old, but has not matured).

But current Russian society is not at all concerned about this issue. At the same time, the problem with masculinity in our country is particularly acute due to such a phenomenon as widespread “fatherlessness” - and this often happens when fathers are alive and well.

For example, in France there are no fewer divorces than here, but there it is customary for the father to participate in the lives of the children, regardless of the relationship with their mother. In our country, after a divorce, many fathers simply disappear from the sight of their children, not considering it necessary to communicate with them. And it happens that their mother interferes with their communication.

But, even if the parents are together, the father often withdraws himself, the children spend all their time with their mother, who is sometimes quite happy with this state of affairs. It happens that a father somehow communicates with his son, but this communication turns out to be formal, because there is no main thing in it - the desire for mutual understanding and the transfer of personal experience. In a word, almost no one in our country realizes the importance and value of fatherhood.

Outside the family, the situation does not change: both in kindergarten and at school, the boy’s adult environment consists mostly of women. Communicating among the male representatives only with the same immature boys, after graduating from school he will remain so. For him, a woman will usually be the main adult who leads and makes decisions, and in relation to her he will be a rebellious or obedient, but in any case an irresponsible teenager. Agree, a rather bleak prospect.

No woman can raise a man, our expert believes.

• Encourage and encourage communication between the boy and his father, even if you are divorced.
• If communication with the father is not possible, be sure to find someone who could provide an adult male presence in the child's life. Let it be a grandfather, uncle, older cousin, or at least the head of the sports section.
• Allow your child to show natural boyish activity and aggressiveness.
• Under no circumstances should you give up on your personal life after a divorce and devote yourself entirely to your son.
• Focusing on a child as the only man is the worst thing a mother can do for him.
• Treat even a preschool-age boy like a man. Maintain personal boundaries and show respect - both to him and to his father.
• If a boy over 5-6 years old finds himself in an unpleasant situation that requires the intervention of an adult, provide protection to a man - his father or someone else. As an adult woman, you, of course, will also cope with this, but you will not be able to give your son an example of a man’s way of resolving conflicts, and you will also unwittingly humiliate him.
• A single mother of a boy definitely needs to undergo a course of personal psychotherapy. The fact is that when a woman raises her son alone and she has to be in charge, she unconsciously tends to suppress his male energy. Psychotherapy will help track and neutralize these unconscious impulses. If the boy has already reached adolescence, it would also be useful for him to have his own psychotherapist - of course, a man.

On February 23, it is usually customary to congratulate everyone whose gender is designated as “male” in official documents. Moreover, regardless of age. However, the holiday is passing, and those who just recently toasted “our beloved men,” “little men,” etc., are increasingly complaining that meeting a real man in our time is problematic. We would like to talk about the causes of this problem today, especially since parents, and especially mothers, are directly related to it.

First of all, we need to figure out who a “real man” is. In order not to get confused in vague psychological and philosophical definitions, let’s turn to the original source – the word itself.

The fact is that the word and language as a whole are not a tool for describing the world or a means of communication. The word does not describe reality, but creates it. It programs certain life processes. Depending on how a word is organized, the semantic fields of its elements (letters) form various semantic possibilities that control human behavior. In other words, a word is a code for a particular phenomenon. It conveys its essence, therefore, depending on what symbols the phenomenon is described with, it expresses itself in this world and functions in one way or another. From these positions, we propose to consider the concept of “man”, or more precisely “husband”, since “man-rank” is a phrase denoting a person who has the rank of husband. What meaning and what reality are formed by the images that make up its letters?

HUSBAND = M (mother, matter) + U (establishment, way of life, law) + F (life, vitality). Combining these meanings into one, we get the following meaning: “life according to the law of the mother.” That is, the answer to the question that interests us will look like this: a man is one who lives according to the law of his mother. More specifically, a child. Despite this unexpected definition, which is very different from “a brave, intelligent, taciturn provider and protector,” few readers would argue that in reality everything is exactly like this: most modern men are infantile, dependent on the opinions of their mothers or wives, whom they choose according to maternal type and are concerned only with material well-being.

It turns out that women who dream of meeting a “real man” simply came up with some unrealistic image? Apparently not. After all, there are other men - independent, mature, masters of their lives, true creators, strong in spirit. Today there are only a few of them, but the deeper into the centuries we go in our research, the more examples of true masculinity we will encounter. What's the matter? The answer will be given to us by the same word “husband”, or rather its ancient spelling - mdzh.

МДжЪ = M (spiritual intelligence) + D (spiritual heritage received from ancestors, culture, tradition, knowledge that is passed on from generation to generation) + F (life force) + B (creation on Earth). The overall meaning is as follows: “one who creates the world, focusing on spiritual knowledge, culture, tradition and the laws of the universe.” In short, he is a creator.

As you can see, the meaning of the word in the ancient spelling is radically different from the modern one. The difference between a “creator” and a “mother’s son” is obvious, and it is quite understandable that most mothers (on a conscious level) want their sons to become creators. But those, as a rule, continue to hold on to their skirt until old age. Of course, the question arises here: is “not a boy, but a husband” possible today, if in modern language, which has undergone several devastating reforms, there is no such word?

Many years of research practice in the field of applied nameology allow us to confidently say yes. But for this, at a minimum, it is necessary that the boy be named with a male name. Masculine not in terms of grammar, but in its internal semantic structure, which corresponds to the codes of the solar paradigm. In other words, a man's name contains images of the solar myth and solar cult, in accordance with which the basic attitudes of the worldview of its bearer are formed, his motivation and actions are determined. The names of the solar paradigm are really funny. They carry such meanings as the predominance of the creative, bright, immortal principle; belonging to the world of the Father; service to law, order, truth; solar heroism based on strict adherence to the warrior code; obligatory initiatory overcoming of darkness.

There is a problem with these meanings in modern names. Today's male names are mostly “male” only in form, but “female” in content. Their figurative structure corresponds not to the solar, but to the lunar paradigm. Such names are characterized by all manifestations of the lunar cult: the predominance of the feminine, absorbing, dark principle; unconditional freedom of instinct; absence of boundaries and prohibitions; illusory; desire to gain the upper hand at any cost; obligatory opposition to everything masculine and sunny; admiration for mother.

Need I say that “lunar” names are represented most strongly today? Why is a separate question, the consideration of which deserves an entire book. But in short, it’s all about changing eras and paradigms. According to the heritage of traditional Slavic culture, 1620 years ago, the Age of the Fox, Mary, or, as it was called in other traditions, the era of the “Dark Mother” (Kali Yuga) began.

The era of Mara became the time of the dominance of lunar cults and the heyday of matriarchy, a period of dominance of the feminine-maternal or feminoid principle. The male solar principle was banned here, weakened, devalued and suppressed. From the point of view of matriarchy, “the ideal man is a woman” and everyone who does not meet the ideal is subject to elimination.

It was lunar mythology that formed the basis of the lunar paradigm, in which cunning, resourcefulness and deception predominated. Where the main value was personal gain, and the goal was survival at any cost, searching for and capturing sources of resources. Where life is a struggle, competition for a place in the mother's womb.

“Lunar” male names, to one degree or another, precisely corresponded to the meanings of the Lunar Epoch. At the same time, the truth was that the lives of their carriers, who initially had a masculine, bright beginning, were crippled, but such were the times and customs... However, the situation is already beginning to change.

According to the ancient Slavic calendar, the autumn equinox of 2012 became the starting point of a new era - the Age of the Wolf (Veles). This event means not just the beginning of a new astronomical cycle, but a global paradigm shift, a change in the meanings and the very reality of our world.

The paradigm of the Age of the Wolf is based on solar mythology, which is filled with such meanings as justice and order, Law, service to the highest Truth, rejection of lies and deceit. This is the era of the Word, where the greatest value is Knowledge and the opportunity to follow your Destiny. This is the solar era of the Father, in which the names of the matriarchal lunar list will gradually disappear, and “solar” names will begin to come to the fore - and are already coming out - truly male (and, of course, truly female).

Parents need to know about this point. The change of eras is always accompanied by a change of the name field. It is no coincidence that our wise ancestors said: “By name and life.” The name truly determines the fate of its bearer. His meanings shape the reality in which he lives. And what is a people if not a community or a system of name bearers? In this case, if the individual fate of a person is determined by the meanings arising from the combination of the letters of his name, then the fate of a people depends on the meanings arising from the relationships of the constituent names. That is, a change in the nominal field precisely leads to a fateful paradigmatic shift, as a result of which the aggregate property of the entire society changes in one direction or another.

Now the dominance of “lunar” names is ending. Their time has passed, and they will no longer receive support as before. The most favored nation regime for them is ending, so it will become increasingly difficult for their carriers to achieve success. Moreover, the further they go, the more they will begin to come into conflict with the era and time. If parents do not take this into account, they risk dooming their children, and therefore their family, to a very difficult life and even extinction. After all, when a change in the name field occurs, accompanying a paradigm shift, the individual, generic and collective unconscious is rewritten. That is, the internal mental structure changes. And if you continue, out of “habit,” to throw “lunar” names into the name field, then a very serious conflict will occur between the new solar time and those who live in the “lunar” past. For them, the new era will be a disaster.

So, parents who decide today what to name their child have a huge responsibility. It is especially important for mothers to understand this. As consulting practice shows, it is they who prefer to give their sons “lunar” names, thus tying them to themselves. This happens also because today’s mothers themselves were born in the Age of the Fox. That is, their thinking in this sense is inert. Therefore, it is quite natural that they like the names of the past more. They're just familiar. But the names “solar” seem strange and even alien to the ear of an adult (although our ancestors simply did not know other names a thousand years ago). But we must not forget that we are not talking about the category “like it or not,” but about the future of children who will have to live in a new era, where completely different laws and principles apply. Therefore, if parents do not accept solar names, it means that they have not yet accepted the energies of the new time. In this case, they simply need to rebuild. And the sooner this happens, the better it will be for their children.

The more parents begin to approach the choice of a destiny for their children seriously, realizing that in this way they are writing the future, the more intensively the names of the solar list will appear in everyday life, that is, the truly noble characters of creators, bearers of light and defenders of the Fatherland.

What does it mean to be a man? This is an important question for me. Inside each of us there lives a desire to find out who we really are. We strive to discover what it means to truly be yourself. What makes men develop and succeed? What does masculinity mean to us?

It’s easy for me to name things that have nothing to do with masculinity:

• Drink more than your neighbor.
• Establish yourself through property: a big house or a fast car.
• Lift more weight than the other guy in the gym.
• Be the loudest voice or most valuable opinion in the meeting.
• Carry a weapon with you.
• Use force against another person.
• Fix broken things.
• Gender and sexual characteristics.

Most of us turn to examples from our immediate environment to get our first idea of ​​what it means to be a man. For example, for my father, masculinity was manifested in the fact that he constantly drank and hid a lot of things. He was angry and depressed. He didn't know how to talk about important things. As a result, I grew up hating alcohol. For me, he has become a demon that captures people.

I also had uncles who discovered masculinity through pornography. Pornography has taught them that women are a means to obtain pleasure. When a man begins to view a woman as a thing, it changes him forever. The effect created by violent and humiliating porn is very difficult to erase later.

Others taught me that masculinity is about getting out of the city and learning to live in the wild. I became a Boy Scout as a teenager and spent many days with a backpack on my back. But even in the Boy Scouts, older guys expressed their masculinity by bringing alcohol and porn into our group. All these examples only confused me.

Finding an answer to the question “What does it mean to be a man?” not a requirement for survival. This is a voluntary decision. Many men abandon deep self-knowledge and accept primitive definitions of masculinity: alcohol abuse, anger, misogyny, pornography and power over other people.

But some of us are ready to go beyond these superficial ideas and dive into the depths of our own Self. In the process of internal search, I realized that true masculinity has much more to do with knowing oneself than with external manifestations.

Examples from others may be useful pointers, but they are just guidelines. We need to find a way to pass through the narrow gate of our own consciousness and soul. When I looked within myself for answers, I found dark caves and sources of light. One of my “caves” is clinical depression and anxiety. I need to learn to live with this. Of course, women are also susceptible to these diseases, but they have a special impact on men.

Society expects men to be strong and self-confident. But depression undermines our self-confidence

At least that's what happened to me. I'm still not completely healed. I will most likely have to fight this for the rest of my life.

But there are also rays of light within us. To be a man, it is important to know yourself and your strengths. Being a man means first of all being honest with yourself. To be a man means to be a full-fledged person.