The tendency of moderns to seek out exaggerated characteristics is, I think, a direct reaction to the androgynizing currents of the contemporary age. We react to sexual depolarization with extreme polarization, as a way of swimming against the riptide trying to drag us under.
On the biology question, interesting to note that human neurophysiology is specifically designed to enable us to overcome our biological instincts. That's one of the core functions of the neocortex. So, we need biology to overcome biology; and to be true to our biology, we must overcome our biology. Humans are strange animals.
Yes for the biology, but this leads to circular reasoning in a sense until we ask the question: what the hell is using the frontal cortex to overcome biology, and how?
This reminds me of the book "Brain Over Binge." The conception of the "low brain" used in that book to outline what is really going on in eating disorders is a highly informative and generally applicable model for the relationship between this "low brain" and the neocortex.
"But not only that: since completely overcoming biology (if it were possible) would require massive amounts of hard self-work and, indeed, an extremist spiritual path of total asceticism and dedication to an all-out war on the usual biological reactions, something they are not willing to commit themselves to, these people simply have declared that biology doesn’t exist, that there is nothing mechanical about human beings."
I think another way to put this would be "surrender." Surrender to the flesh. Surrender to blind mechanism, in the unmanliest (or unwomanliest) ways. To wrestle with limitation is part of what defines humanity. But as you say, the flesh is not merely another opponent to be completely overcome or ignored, but a specialized tool that we must learn to wield well, if we're to attain the higher order. The masculine and feminine tools are shaped for different purposes in that quest, and to blur the lines between them is to dull their edges and render them less useful (and perhaps ultimately useless).
Yes, surrender is more like it, although the funny thing is that these people actually delude themselves into thinking they have overcome it and achieved enlightenment, even while they are more and more ensnared in the flesh. Classic trick of the devil.
Oh one more thing about the fight between flesh and spirit, consciousness and biology: it isn't really a matter of "switching off" biology or "move out" of the flesh, per se, but of transcending it. After all, it is through biology that we interact with the world. So for example, emotions can be irrational, but they can also give us lots of information. Desire can be just predatory sex drive, or it can lead to a meaningful encounter and long-term growth. Discernment is key, and we can only achieve by a lifelong practice of not merely reacting mechanically, but integrating mind, body, emotions under a wider definition of Reason. This literally can remake our internal make-up and connect us with subtleties in creation, including subtle perceptions and sensations, that we didn't even know existed.
Your ‘wider definition of Reason’ might correspond to what CS Lewis calls the chest 🤔
🗨 It is the ‘chest’ (or the heart) that – with the aid of the mind’s reason and the guts’ natural instincts – serves as the metaphorical organ capable of intuiting, resonating with, understanding, and adhering to the Tao.
🗨 It may even be said that it is by this middle element that man is man: for by his intellect he is mere spirit and by his appetite mere animal.
For a long time every time I heard about toxic masculinity I reminded myself about sacred masculinity. Lately I have been using magic as a technology for accessing "higher realms," while embracing my masculinity. Many years ago I went through a training set up like an initiation into manhood, put on by The Mankind Project, which started back in the 80"s based on the work of the poet Robert Bly and the psychologist Robert Moore. The focus there on the archetypes of King, Warrior, Magician and Lover was beneficial to me (as far as I know the organization went woke in recent years.)
I am very glad to hear so many substackers I admire writing about tonic masculinity.
First and foremost, we need to get in touch with our souls…
That’s an interesting ideal, but it’s very difficult to do in practice. People need a simple and well-defined path. Otherwise, they will do nothing.
In my experience, it’s best to start with the body (barbell training, killing processed food, vitamin D, hormone optimization, etc.) and slowly expand out from there. If people realize that *they* (not Big Medicine) have control over their physical existences, then it's not too big a leap to realize that they have control over many other things as well. The hardest part is getting people to take that first step.
I think that's very sound advice. If we are not even at the level of a well-oiled machine, we have little hope of transcending it!
However, I think it depends on the individual - some people might need less physical exercise than others, and oftentimes it's good to tackle it from all fronts simultaneously: body, mind, emotions, spirit/soul... This can lead to mutual enforcement and positive feedback loops.
Reading this brought to mind CS Lewis' reflections on describing the angels of Mars and Venus in Perelandra:
"What Ransom saw at that moment was the real meaning of gender. Everyone must sometimes have wondered why in nearly all tongues certain inanimate objects are masculine and others feminine. What is masculine about a mountain or feminine about certain trees? Ransom has cured me of believing that this is a purely morphological phenomenon, depending on the form of the word. Still less is gender an imaginative extension of sex. Our ancestors did not make mountains masculine because they projected male characteristics into them. The real process is the reverse. Gender is a reality, and a more fundamental reality than sex. Sex is, in fact, merely the organic adaptation to organic life of a fundamental polarity which divides all created beings. Female sex is simply one of the things that have feminine gender; there are many others, and Masculine and Feminine meet us on planes of reality where male and female would be simply meaningless. Masculine is not attenuated male, nor feminine attenuated female. On the contrary, the male and female of organic creatures are rather faint and blurred reflections of masculine and feminine. Their reproductive functions, their differences in strength and size, partly exhibit, but partly also confuse and misrepresent, the real polarity.”
A gender neutral Sun is even stranger than a feminine Sun tbh. Russians are weird.
Then again I'm a native speaker of one of only three Indo-European languages that don't assign gender to inaninmate objects, so who's really the WEIRDo.
I prefer the tradition where the Sun is male, the moon and Venus are female and the rest of the planets are male, and all of them are gods with their own character.
I love the framing here of working within biological constraints. The modern world presents many temptations that appeal to our biology, a high degree of self-awareness and discipline is needed in order to forego this temptations that often serve to lure us off the path that leads to achieving our highest purpose, which as you note, is self-defined. Perhaps the word "tonic" can be used in a wider capacity to describe this phenomenon in relation to any aspect of one's identity that is of central importance to the individual in question. At there very least, it could be equally useful to describe a tonic femininity as well. The individual that can resist and overcome perverse incentives to achieve their purpose can be said to be tonic. The Tonic Man. The Tonic Woman. The Tonic Soldier. The Tonic Professional. The Tonic American. For many, their biological sex isn't central to their identity. They might scoff at the idea. That is fine, but everyone has some kind of identity that is important to them, and this conception of the tension between various incentives is probably useful to consider in all those circumstances.
I started reading a book that you may or may not find interesting (it's from the academic philosophy world, with all that this entails, although it's well-written and readable): Self-Constitution: Agency, Identity, and Integrity by Christine Korsegaard. She argues from a Kantian perspective but with a twist: she says that the identities we create and adopt for ourselves are actually the source for our ethics. Reminded me of your take.
Thanks, this is very helpful. I think considering identity is very useful. While we're all ultimately unique, McConkey has me convinced that considering things from the perspective of deracinated individualism tends to leave us prone to abuse from bad actors. Also, it takes a lot of intimate knowledge to wrap your head around an individual, identity meanwhile is something that is shared and there are fewer of them to consider. We've found a positive use for intersectionality I think.
Jan 25, 2023·edited Jan 25, 2023Liked by L.P. Koch
Nice piece.
Biology can be a prison, and spirituality a mirage. Because masculine and feminine are distinct, we can help each other to avoid them. Men can see feminine traps and illusions more clearly than women, as they can clearly see masculine ones.
It takes real strength to tell a woman that her feelings are an illusion. I've been married to the same one for 38 years and have had to do this on a few occasions. And she has told me some of my dreams were not going to work.
But by the same token, we can help each other to see the possibilities of our biology and spirituality. I left a cushy government job I had been at for ten years to start my own business. I had no work lined up, no safety net, and worst of all, no experience in the field. We had 5 children at the time. But my wife supported me and said, "Go for it." And I've been in business for over 25 years. So now I trust her when she says, "No." and she trusts me when I say, "Yes."
In a good male/female relationship you will laugh at each other's foibles, challenge weaknesses, and bolster strengths, egging each other on to higher use of both the biological and spiritual. It is definitely not weak to love a woman. It's the hardest damn thing I've ever done, but well worth it.
“Biology can be a prison, and spirituality a mirage. Because masculine and feminine are distinct, we can help each other to avoid them. Men can see feminine traps and illusions more clearly than women, as they can clearly see masculine ones.”
It’s getting crowded within the fray, exceedingly fast 😉
Inspired & inspiring writing 👌 Yet not without kinda utopian sheen: if only humans were a bit more virtuous, a bit more aligned with archetypal dimensions... It might be helpful to go a level up on abstraction scale, beyond rational actors striving individually for connection/manifestation with/of the higher realm.
Of course, frameworks ‘emselves are models: none exhaustive, some useful. Superorganism is yet another: apes playing ant games (h/t BJ, https://hwfo.substack.com/p/we-are-all-apes-behaving-like-ants). Nested programs (biological and cultural alike), nested networks, nested frameworks 🙂
🗨 From the viewpoint of an extrasolar alien anthropologist, observing the Earth from a hidden moon base to collect information for their impending invasion plan, the implication is extremely clear. Humans are primates acting like ants.
Yes, there are different useful models. How about: maybe we can think of the higher realm not as a separate space, but how reality actually looks like if we add another billion years of evolution of consciousness? Perhaps evolution can speed up dramatically at certain junctures? Or time isn't really what we think it is?
All of this of course relates back to our baby/toddler/infant childhood brain-and-nervous-system emotional patterning or imprinting. This important topic has been the life time work of Joseph Chilton Pearce beginning with his seminal 1973 book Magical Child, which I came across back then.
This reference provides a list of his books most of which are devoted to understanding what he called The Monstrous Mis-Understanding the description of which is featured on the page of his website.
His last and best book The Heart-Mind Matrix How the Heart Can Teach the Mind New Ways to Think (and I must add feel) is superb. Among other things he refers to the work of Candace Pert in her book The Molecules of Emotion which describes how our emotions have a profound effect on our brain and nervous system, especially in the formative childhood years.
He also refers to the very important work of the Heart-Math Institute, and features telling examples of their work and findings.
At the end of the book he refers to these two related websites
Some of the people who link into this site are probably aware of the writings of Charles Eisenstein. Pearce's website features an interview with Charles
All of which is to say that before one can fruitfully access any "higher order" or awaken ones soul, one has to do the very hard yakka of getting ones life-level biology in order which is extremely difficult.
Indeed, and I remember how reading Candace Pert was quite shocking. It really brings home the point that we have much less control than we think.
I would also say though that it's not necessarily a matter of "first this, then this", but rather we need to work on all fronts simultaneously: cleaning up body, emotions, mind, spirit - to create sort of a positive feedback loop.
In my view we are in a descending culture, and it is marked by the role sex plays in society. This is the Frame of our current times. Sex in entertainment, advertising, education, sexualization of children like the movie “Cuties”, child sexual abuse, sexual trafficking of all human beings are all indicative of corruption in civilization. Sexual pleasure is the “supreme value” that is placed at the pinnacle of desire. This reduces the role of sexual energy to a function like eating. It objectifies it. Since sexual pleasure is the pinnacle, then sexual gender, family, choice are not important. The result is “free” sex, sexual perversion like sadism, treating other human beings as objects without compassion, child sexual abuse, satanic sexual abuse, pornography, etc. No one is completely free of this programming in the West.
What are man and woman? In Plato’s philosophy, they are 2 halves seeking to be 1 whole. In the Bible, woman is created from man as a complementary partner. In these views, man and woman are fundamentally different, but by uniting they create a complementary whole, oneness. Then the idea expressed in the Gospel of Thomas indicates the same thing, “when you make the 2 into one” in one human being you become conscious. What does it mean?
This is an exploration. How are man and woman different beyond the biological? Historically and culturally they form a family with different roles. Man is the provider, the hunter, the protector, the warrior, the builder, the doer. Woman is the nurturer, the giver, the healer, the compassionator, the home maker and home ruler. They each have differences in psychology and behavior. When they talk with each other, the masculine wants to hear what needs to be accomplished so it can proceed to action, the doer. The feminine wants to develop relationship that defines connection and meaning. In Gurdjieff’s enneagram, because of different types, there are elements of masculinity and femininity that are exhibited by either man or woman.
To make the 2 into one, I would suggest it means the masculine is the truth seeker and the feminine is the love creator, and therefore love and truth are the unifying principles. In the makeup of the human being they each have an intellectual mind to pursue truth, and an emotional mind to pursue love in its highest form. From this point of view, the dis-ease of the current time is the materialist dominance of the left brain leading to transgenderism, sexual abuse, artificial intelligence, transhumanism, eugenics, and no family. This ignorance of the feminine role regarding emotional intelligence and therefore values of compassion and intuition is the spiritual problem facing humanity and each human being.
This is really excellent, and I feel guilty I didn't finish reading it till just now. My apologies for not doing so and giving credit earlier when it was due!
I have a rough time as well keeping up even with just a few stacks. It's just too much if you also want to read a book, not to mention keeping up with chores. It is what it is!
I have a rough time as well keeping up even with just a few stacks. It's just too much if you also want to read a book, not to mention keeping up with chores. It is what it is!
I really enjoyed reading this piece, it really made me think. The thing I notice now is that after becoming a father, living up to his values of being a good provider to his family, and growing and maturing into his multiple new roles and responsibilities that forced much personal growth in trying to live up to his ideals and now with age… my husband is a much better person than he used to be. Personal growth seems to occur when you cease to be the most important person in your life anymore. Having a child definitely helps with personal growth as for the first time in your life you put yourself second so it’s pretty humbling. In today’s world I think you just have to march to your own drum and go with and be the type of man you want to be as obviously with maturity you gain a much better understanding and insight into who you are. I find it happens around the age of 30 maturity should be happening and then you begin to address your flaws, accept your flaws, and begin on the inner work to deal with your inner demons in order to become a better person and in so doing you experience much personal growth and if you have kids you are also striving to be a good role model as you know all of their perceptions of both men and women are formed by you. I really hate the term toxic masculinity as before they changed the meaning of words you only associated the word toxic with poison most certainly not synonymous with masculinity. Tonic masculinity is a good thing and there is nothing wrong with a man being masculine so please don’t let their negativity get to you, just strive to be the best man you can be and all who know you will like and respect you for it. Only the people that matter are important, you younger people may not remember the old song which goes “ You can’t please everybody so you gotta please yourself.” Just as true now as they ever were maybe even more so.
"...mystic G.I. Gurdjieff went so far as to call man a 'machine'..."
The idea that human beings are machines dates back at least to the mechanism (as a form of materialism) to Thomas Hobbes in _Leviathan_ in 1651:
" ...life is but a motion of Limbs, the begining whereof is in some principall part within; why may we not say, that all Automata (Engines that move themselves by springs and wheeles as doth a watch) have an artificiall life? For what is the Heart, but a Spring; and the Nerves, but so many Strings; and the Joynts, but so many Wheeles, giving motion to the whole Body..."
The project of Leftists has always been to dehumanize humanity and make each of a part in the machine of the state. Emasculating men is just one more part of that project.
Yes, the idea of mechanical man is old. However, Gurdjieff wasn't a materialist/determinist, but a mysticist. He thought that mankind is enslaved via a "mind job" that has programmed it to behave mechanically in predictable ways.
Not sure what Hobbes would have said about Gurdjieff's idea that mankind, unless awakened, is just a mass producer of psychic energy that feeds the moon :)
“Our biology has a massive influence on our behavior and the way we think, and it severely limits our self-expression. Hormones affect our mood, anxiety designed to protect the body runs our mind, and occasionally, bloodlust emerges from a perception of danger, real or imagined.”
Yes! True. This is why I wonder if, due to biology/genetics (and nurture) we humans genuinely have free will or not. Are we honestly making ‘choices’ each day? Or are we simply reacting to stimuli around us, and, with our highly developed cerebral cortex, simply convincing ourselves of our cognitive autonomy?
All authors need to Frame the context of the discussion. We have had questions in posts of what is woman, Wokeism, transgenderism, and toxic masculinity. So the context is the current times, and how these words are being used to define sexual identity, gender and its meaning as something different from biology or spiritually. They are being used and defined contrary to any cultural, traditional, historical or spiritual values. They are being used to attack religious, family and community values. They are being used to divide and conquer. One line of efforts to oppose this is to define terms, like tonic masculinity, that affirm life and values. In my view, we don’t need new phrases unless the old ones have become subverted and cannot be rejuvenated. Indeed, the search for new phrases may become a distraction as the words become more important than actions.
As noted by Luc, Gurdjieff described man as a machine, and worse a lying machine. To take this in the right way is to first understand that the human body, heart and mind are a vessel that contains your soul. However, we use the word “I” indiscriminately to mean everything and nothing, this is what Gurdjieff means by lying. The easiest way to see it is simply make the aim to record the use of the word “I am” or “I love” or “I hate”. The one we all use is “I forgot”. Who is that? Otherwise we are in a prison as Luk notes because we are stimulus driven. I am hungry, must eat. I hate french fries. I am tired, must rest. I am the pain in my head, need aspirin. Someone yells at me, I am angry. My friend is talking to my girlfriend, I am jealous. Then there is even, my thought, my idea, and someone opposing it is an enemy. We are a multitude trying to pretend to be one, instead of taking actions that lead to oneness.
Gurdjieff called the Fourth Way, esoteric Christianity. It is the inner meaning and method of Christianity. What is an example? Gurdjieff said that for someone to start this work they had to have a “magnetic center”. If they didn’t have a “magnetic center” they would not be attracted to the work, and furthermore they would not have the desire to make effort in the work. What does it remind you of? It is the parable of the sower and the seed. The seed is the teaching. It is sown by the teacher, some of it falls in the rocks and it is choked off or eaten by birds, some of falls in unprepared soil and starts to grow then withers and dies, some of it falls in prepared soil, the magnetic center, and grows and gives fruit, consciousness. What does it mean? Many people are not interested in work or change. They are happy as they are with their material lives. The times we are in will make it difficult on such people, as the times turn dark. This means they will begin to see differently, some will begin to grow a “magnetic center”.
This is one Frame of the discussion. What you begin to see, is that we each start from where we each are, the context of our reality, our beliefs. We cannot start from where we hope to be, or sit around blaming parents or circumstances as a victim. Then you become aware that to even begin you must have some direction, some aim, so that you can observe and evaluate results. Ouspensky said you start with a near aim, not some grandiose aim of Christ consciousness. What is important is to remember what you observe for the most part is the vessel, not the Self or Soul. This can be disheartening as you discover what tries to do the work is the vessel, your individual mind, heart and body. The work is work. Your Self is a process in becoming.
I'm often amazed at how many male actors of the past seem to have such weak arms, almost weak sausages. But that's because we are so used to seeing body builder actors with bleached teeth all the time. To be fair though, ideas about masculinity can change somewhat depending on context and needs of a given society, IMO
A friend of mine was once puzzled why the aborigines in National Geographic weren't ripped. I was like, take your ripped boys and set them down in the jungle and see what happens.
Maybe I just read too deeply into things, but I brought up the deadlift example to try to show that strength = size (hypertrophy). You can't have one without the other.
By the way, it's perfectly fine to shit on body building. They don't have a very likeable culture.
The tendency of moderns to seek out exaggerated characteristics is, I think, a direct reaction to the androgynizing currents of the contemporary age. We react to sexual depolarization with extreme polarization, as a way of swimming against the riptide trying to drag us under.
On the biology question, interesting to note that human neurophysiology is specifically designed to enable us to overcome our biological instincts. That's one of the core functions of the neocortex. So, we need biology to overcome biology; and to be true to our biology, we must overcome our biology. Humans are strange animals.
Yes for the biology, but this leads to circular reasoning in a sense until we ask the question: what the hell is using the frontal cortex to overcome biology, and how?
Aye there's the nub. Or the key, depending.
Magic
That's it! That's the million-dollar question!
Maybe he did and it's called the Universe.
This reminds me of the book "Brain Over Binge." The conception of the "low brain" used in that book to outline what is really going on in eating disorders is a highly informative and generally applicable model for the relationship between this "low brain" and the neocortex.
Exactly.
My favorite metaphor is the gom jabbar. A human can overcome himself and master his animal instincts. An animal by definition cannot.
That would be the goal of the Western magical tradition, first embrace the body, to learn to let it go.
Excellent work as usual, Luc.
"But not only that: since completely overcoming biology (if it were possible) would require massive amounts of hard self-work and, indeed, an extremist spiritual path of total asceticism and dedication to an all-out war on the usual biological reactions, something they are not willing to commit themselves to, these people simply have declared that biology doesn’t exist, that there is nothing mechanical about human beings."
I think another way to put this would be "surrender." Surrender to the flesh. Surrender to blind mechanism, in the unmanliest (or unwomanliest) ways. To wrestle with limitation is part of what defines humanity. But as you say, the flesh is not merely another opponent to be completely overcome or ignored, but a specialized tool that we must learn to wield well, if we're to attain the higher order. The masculine and feminine tools are shaped for different purposes in that quest, and to blur the lines between them is to dull their edges and render them less useful (and perhaps ultimately useless).
Yes, surrender is more like it, although the funny thing is that these people actually delude themselves into thinking they have overcome it and achieved enlightenment, even while they are more and more ensnared in the flesh. Classic trick of the devil.
Oh one more thing about the fight between flesh and spirit, consciousness and biology: it isn't really a matter of "switching off" biology or "move out" of the flesh, per se, but of transcending it. After all, it is through biology that we interact with the world. So for example, emotions can be irrational, but they can also give us lots of information. Desire can be just predatory sex drive, or it can lead to a meaningful encounter and long-term growth. Discernment is key, and we can only achieve by a lifelong practice of not merely reacting mechanically, but integrating mind, body, emotions under a wider definition of Reason. This literally can remake our internal make-up and connect us with subtleties in creation, including subtle perceptions and sensations, that we didn't even know existed.
Your ‘wider definition of Reason’ might correspond to what CS Lewis calls the chest 🤔
🗨 It is the ‘chest’ (or the heart) that – with the aid of the mind’s reason and the guts’ natural instincts – serves as the metaphorical organ capable of intuiting, resonating with, understanding, and adhering to the Tao.
🗨 It may even be said that it is by this middle element that man is man: for by his intellect he is mere spirit and by his appetite mere animal.
Tools, however you slice it—or with 'em 😉—BJ again --> https://hwfo.substack.com/p/the-human-tool.
“To wrestle with limitation is part of what defines humanity.”
Love this. Beautifully stated. And incredibly true.
Inspired by John Carter and Jay Rollins I wrote this:
https://williamhunterduncan.substack.com/p/sacred-masculine
For a long time every time I heard about toxic masculinity I reminded myself about sacred masculinity. Lately I have been using magic as a technology for accessing "higher realms," while embracing my masculinity. Many years ago I went through a training set up like an initiation into manhood, put on by The Mankind Project, which started back in the 80"s based on the work of the poet Robert Bly and the psychologist Robert Moore. The focus there on the archetypes of King, Warrior, Magician and Lover was beneficial to me (as far as I know the organization went woke in recent years.)
I am very glad to hear so many substackers I admire writing about tonic masculinity.
❤️❤️👍
First and foremost, we need to get in touch with our souls…
That’s an interesting ideal, but it’s very difficult to do in practice. People need a simple and well-defined path. Otherwise, they will do nothing.
In my experience, it’s best to start with the body (barbell training, killing processed food, vitamin D, hormone optimization, etc.) and slowly expand out from there. If people realize that *they* (not Big Medicine) have control over their physical existences, then it's not too big a leap to realize that they have control over many other things as well. The hardest part is getting people to take that first step.
I think that's very sound advice. If we are not even at the level of a well-oiled machine, we have little hope of transcending it!
However, I think it depends on the individual - some people might need less physical exercise than others, and oftentimes it's good to tackle it from all fronts simultaneously: body, mind, emotions, spirit/soul... This can lead to mutual enforcement and positive feedback loops.
I understand, but I worry that by trying to do everything all at once we will end up doing nothing. Focus is important.
That's a good first step!
🔥🔥🤘
Reading this brought to mind CS Lewis' reflections on describing the angels of Mars and Venus in Perelandra:
"What Ransom saw at that moment was the real meaning of gender. Everyone must sometimes have wondered why in nearly all tongues certain inanimate objects are masculine and others feminine. What is masculine about a mountain or feminine about certain trees? Ransom has cured me of believing that this is a purely morphological phenomenon, depending on the form of the word. Still less is gender an imaginative extension of sex. Our ancestors did not make mountains masculine because they projected male characteristics into them. The real process is the reverse. Gender is a reality, and a more fundamental reality than sex. Sex is, in fact, merely the organic adaptation to organic life of a fundamental polarity which divides all created beings. Female sex is simply one of the things that have feminine gender; there are many others, and Masculine and Feminine meet us on planes of reality where male and female would be simply meaningless. Masculine is not attenuated male, nor feminine attenuated female. On the contrary, the male and female of organic creatures are rather faint and blurred reflections of masculine and feminine. Their reproductive functions, their differences in strength and size, partly exhibit, but partly also confuse and misrepresent, the real polarity.”
Great quote, he's coming at it from the other direction so zo speak.
Funny also how he uses the word gender correctly, unlike today's ideologues: the grammatical form. He then extrapolates to the higher realm.
BUT. Languages are funny. German: moon and stars are masculine, sun is feminine. French: moon and stars are feminine, sun is masculine.
French: nice things are feminine, less nice things are masculine.
German: opposite
Explains a lot really
Russian: moon & stars side with French, while sun is bowling alone (on neither team) 🤔
A gender neutral Sun is even stranger than a feminine Sun tbh. Russians are weird.
Then again I'm a native speaker of one of only three Indo-European languages that don't assign gender to inaninmate objects, so who's really the WEIRDo.
Then again I'm a native speaker of a language that assigns moon to masculine and pairs sun with stars on feminine camp. WEIRDo, granted 🤸
I prefer the tradition where the Sun is male, the moon and Venus are female and the rest of the planets are male, and all of them are gods with their own character.
I lean towards the animist view that it isn't only the planets that possess their own native spirits.
Tbh I flirt with the notion that all the universe is alive with consciousness of a kind.
I love the framing here of working within biological constraints. The modern world presents many temptations that appeal to our biology, a high degree of self-awareness and discipline is needed in order to forego this temptations that often serve to lure us off the path that leads to achieving our highest purpose, which as you note, is self-defined. Perhaps the word "tonic" can be used in a wider capacity to describe this phenomenon in relation to any aspect of one's identity that is of central importance to the individual in question. At there very least, it could be equally useful to describe a tonic femininity as well. The individual that can resist and overcome perverse incentives to achieve their purpose can be said to be tonic. The Tonic Man. The Tonic Woman. The Tonic Soldier. The Tonic Professional. The Tonic American. For many, their biological sex isn't central to their identity. They might scoff at the idea. That is fine, but everyone has some kind of identity that is important to them, and this conception of the tension between various incentives is probably useful to consider in all those circumstances.
I started reading a book that you may or may not find interesting (it's from the academic philosophy world, with all that this entails, although it's well-written and readable): Self-Constitution: Agency, Identity, and Integrity by Christine Korsegaard. She argues from a Kantian perspective but with a twist: she says that the identities we create and adopt for ourselves are actually the source for our ethics. Reminded me of your take.
Thanks, this is very helpful. I think considering identity is very useful. While we're all ultimately unique, McConkey has me convinced that considering things from the perspective of deracinated individualism tends to leave us prone to abuse from bad actors. Also, it takes a lot of intimate knowledge to wrap your head around an individual, identity meanwhile is something that is shared and there are fewer of them to consider. We've found a positive use for intersectionality I think.
❤️❤️🤘
Nice piece.
Biology can be a prison, and spirituality a mirage. Because masculine and feminine are distinct, we can help each other to avoid them. Men can see feminine traps and illusions more clearly than women, as they can clearly see masculine ones.
It takes real strength to tell a woman that her feelings are an illusion. I've been married to the same one for 38 years and have had to do this on a few occasions. And she has told me some of my dreams were not going to work.
But by the same token, we can help each other to see the possibilities of our biology and spirituality. I left a cushy government job I had been at for ten years to start my own business. I had no work lined up, no safety net, and worst of all, no experience in the field. We had 5 children at the time. But my wife supported me and said, "Go for it." And I've been in business for over 25 years. So now I trust her when she says, "No." and she trusts me when I say, "Yes."
In a good male/female relationship you will laugh at each other's foibles, challenge weaknesses, and bolster strengths, egging each other on to higher use of both the biological and spiritual. It is definitely not weak to love a woman. It's the hardest damn thing I've ever done, but well worth it.
That was lovely, thank you. And yes, yes, yes to the last sentence. So many people have no idea how much hard work love is, and how worth it is.
“Biology can be a prison, and spirituality a mirage. Because masculine and feminine are distinct, we can help each other to avoid them. Men can see feminine traps and illusions more clearly than women, as they can clearly see masculine ones.”
Beautiful.
It’s getting crowded within the fray, exceedingly fast 😉
Inspired & inspiring writing 👌 Yet not without kinda utopian sheen: if only humans were a bit more virtuous, a bit more aligned with archetypal dimensions... It might be helpful to go a level up on abstraction scale, beyond rational actors striving individually for connection/manifestation with/of the higher realm.
Of course, frameworks ‘emselves are models: none exhaustive, some useful. Superorganism is yet another: apes playing ant games (h/t BJ, https://hwfo.substack.com/p/we-are-all-apes-behaving-like-ants). Nested programs (biological and cultural alike), nested networks, nested frameworks 🙂
🗨 From the viewpoint of an extrasolar alien anthropologist, observing the Earth from a hidden moon base to collect information for their impending invasion plan, the implication is extremely clear. Humans are primates acting like ants.
Yes, there are different useful models. How about: maybe we can think of the higher realm not as a separate space, but how reality actually looks like if we add another billion years of evolution of consciousness? Perhaps evolution can speed up dramatically at certain junctures? Or time isn't really what we think it is?
A potential for gainful application lurks here as well 🙂
As in alone together 😝
🗨 I will cast abominable filth upon you, make you vile, and make you a spectacle.
Doesn't even sound remotely like a compliment 😭
Wtf, stuck with me fast. Care to elaborate? I'm dying to know how I come across 😊
All of this of course relates back to our baby/toddler/infant childhood brain-and-nervous-system emotional patterning or imprinting. This important topic has been the life time work of Joseph Chilton Pearce beginning with his seminal 1973 book Magical Child, which I came across back then.
This reference provides a list of his books most of which are devoted to understanding what he called The Monstrous Mis-Understanding the description of which is featured on the page of his website.
http://josephchiltonpearce.org/books
His last and best book The Heart-Mind Matrix How the Heart Can Teach the Mind New Ways to Think (and I must add feel) is superb. Among other things he refers to the work of Candace Pert in her book The Molecules of Emotion which describes how our emotions have a profound effect on our brain and nervous system, especially in the formative childhood years.
He also refers to the very important work of the Heart-Math Institute, and features telling examples of their work and findings.
At the end of the book he refers to these two related websites
http://violence.de/index.html
http://www.wombecology.org and provides a 27 point list of some of Michael Odent's findings.
This reference features a 1998 interview with Joseph
http://ratical.org/many_worlds/JCP98.html
Some of the people who link into this site are probably aware of the writings of Charles Eisenstein. Pearce's website features an interview with Charles
All of which is to say that before one can fruitfully access any "higher order" or awaken ones soul, one has to do the very hard yakka of getting ones life-level biology in order which is extremely difficult.
Indeed, and I remember how reading Candace Pert was quite shocking. It really brings home the point that we have much less control than we think.
I would also say though that it's not necessarily a matter of "first this, then this", but rather we need to work on all fronts simultaneously: cleaning up body, emotions, mind, spirit - to create sort of a positive feedback loop.
❤️
In my view we are in a descending culture, and it is marked by the role sex plays in society. This is the Frame of our current times. Sex in entertainment, advertising, education, sexualization of children like the movie “Cuties”, child sexual abuse, sexual trafficking of all human beings are all indicative of corruption in civilization. Sexual pleasure is the “supreme value” that is placed at the pinnacle of desire. This reduces the role of sexual energy to a function like eating. It objectifies it. Since sexual pleasure is the pinnacle, then sexual gender, family, choice are not important. The result is “free” sex, sexual perversion like sadism, treating other human beings as objects without compassion, child sexual abuse, satanic sexual abuse, pornography, etc. No one is completely free of this programming in the West.
What are man and woman? In Plato’s philosophy, they are 2 halves seeking to be 1 whole. In the Bible, woman is created from man as a complementary partner. In these views, man and woman are fundamentally different, but by uniting they create a complementary whole, oneness. Then the idea expressed in the Gospel of Thomas indicates the same thing, “when you make the 2 into one” in one human being you become conscious. What does it mean?
This is an exploration. How are man and woman different beyond the biological? Historically and culturally they form a family with different roles. Man is the provider, the hunter, the protector, the warrior, the builder, the doer. Woman is the nurturer, the giver, the healer, the compassionator, the home maker and home ruler. They each have differences in psychology and behavior. When they talk with each other, the masculine wants to hear what needs to be accomplished so it can proceed to action, the doer. The feminine wants to develop relationship that defines connection and meaning. In Gurdjieff’s enneagram, because of different types, there are elements of masculinity and femininity that are exhibited by either man or woman.
To make the 2 into one, I would suggest it means the masculine is the truth seeker and the feminine is the love creator, and therefore love and truth are the unifying principles. In the makeup of the human being they each have an intellectual mind to pursue truth, and an emotional mind to pursue love in its highest form. From this point of view, the dis-ease of the current time is the materialist dominance of the left brain leading to transgenderism, sexual abuse, artificial intelligence, transhumanism, eugenics, and no family. This ignorance of the feminine role regarding emotional intelligence and therefore values of compassion and intuition is the spiritual problem facing humanity and each human being.
Whew, a whole essay with so many good points. Thanks.
This is really excellent, and I feel guilty I didn't finish reading it till just now. My apologies for not doing so and giving credit earlier when it was due!
Thank you, doc!
I have a rough time as well keeping up even with just a few stacks. It's just too much if you also want to read a book, not to mention keeping up with chores. It is what it is!
Very true!!!
Thank you, doc!
I have a rough time as well keeping up even with just a few stacks. It's just too much if you also want to read a book, not to mention keeping up with chores. It is what it is!
I really enjoyed reading this piece, it really made me think. The thing I notice now is that after becoming a father, living up to his values of being a good provider to his family, and growing and maturing into his multiple new roles and responsibilities that forced much personal growth in trying to live up to his ideals and now with age… my husband is a much better person than he used to be. Personal growth seems to occur when you cease to be the most important person in your life anymore. Having a child definitely helps with personal growth as for the first time in your life you put yourself second so it’s pretty humbling. In today’s world I think you just have to march to your own drum and go with and be the type of man you want to be as obviously with maturity you gain a much better understanding and insight into who you are. I find it happens around the age of 30 maturity should be happening and then you begin to address your flaws, accept your flaws, and begin on the inner work to deal with your inner demons in order to become a better person and in so doing you experience much personal growth and if you have kids you are also striving to be a good role model as you know all of their perceptions of both men and women are formed by you. I really hate the term toxic masculinity as before they changed the meaning of words you only associated the word toxic with poison most certainly not synonymous with masculinity. Tonic masculinity is a good thing and there is nothing wrong with a man being masculine so please don’t let their negativity get to you, just strive to be the best man you can be and all who know you will like and respect you for it. Only the people that matter are important, you younger people may not remember the old song which goes “ You can’t please everybody so you gotta please yourself.” Just as true now as they ever were maybe even more so.
"...mystic G.I. Gurdjieff went so far as to call man a 'machine'..."
The idea that human beings are machines dates back at least to the mechanism (as a form of materialism) to Thomas Hobbes in _Leviathan_ in 1651:
" ...life is but a motion of Limbs, the begining whereof is in some principall part within; why may we not say, that all Automata (Engines that move themselves by springs and wheeles as doth a watch) have an artificiall life? For what is the Heart, but a Spring; and the Nerves, but so many Strings; and the Joynts, but so many Wheeles, giving motion to the whole Body..."
The project of Leftists has always been to dehumanize humanity and make each of a part in the machine of the state. Emasculating men is just one more part of that project.
Yes, the idea of mechanical man is old. However, Gurdjieff wasn't a materialist/determinist, but a mysticist. He thought that mankind is enslaved via a "mind job" that has programmed it to behave mechanically in predictable ways.
Not sure what Hobbes would have said about Gurdjieff's idea that mankind, unless awakened, is just a mass producer of psychic energy that feeds the moon :)
Yes. True.
“Our biology has a massive influence on our behavior and the way we think, and it severely limits our self-expression. Hormones affect our mood, anxiety designed to protect the body runs our mind, and occasionally, bloodlust emerges from a perception of danger, real or imagined.”
Yes! True. This is why I wonder if, due to biology/genetics (and nurture) we humans genuinely have free will or not. Are we honestly making ‘choices’ each day? Or are we simply reacting to stimuli around us, and, with our highly developed cerebral cortex, simply convincing ourselves of our cognitive autonomy?
^^^
Michael Mohr
‘Sincere American Writing’
https://michaelmohr.substack.com/
All authors need to Frame the context of the discussion. We have had questions in posts of what is woman, Wokeism, transgenderism, and toxic masculinity. So the context is the current times, and how these words are being used to define sexual identity, gender and its meaning as something different from biology or spiritually. They are being used and defined contrary to any cultural, traditional, historical or spiritual values. They are being used to attack religious, family and community values. They are being used to divide and conquer. One line of efforts to oppose this is to define terms, like tonic masculinity, that affirm life and values. In my view, we don’t need new phrases unless the old ones have become subverted and cannot be rejuvenated. Indeed, the search for new phrases may become a distraction as the words become more important than actions.
As noted by Luc, Gurdjieff described man as a machine, and worse a lying machine. To take this in the right way is to first understand that the human body, heart and mind are a vessel that contains your soul. However, we use the word “I” indiscriminately to mean everything and nothing, this is what Gurdjieff means by lying. The easiest way to see it is simply make the aim to record the use of the word “I am” or “I love” or “I hate”. The one we all use is “I forgot”. Who is that? Otherwise we are in a prison as Luk notes because we are stimulus driven. I am hungry, must eat. I hate french fries. I am tired, must rest. I am the pain in my head, need aspirin. Someone yells at me, I am angry. My friend is talking to my girlfriend, I am jealous. Then there is even, my thought, my idea, and someone opposing it is an enemy. We are a multitude trying to pretend to be one, instead of taking actions that lead to oneness.
Gurdjieff called the Fourth Way, esoteric Christianity. It is the inner meaning and method of Christianity. What is an example? Gurdjieff said that for someone to start this work they had to have a “magnetic center”. If they didn’t have a “magnetic center” they would not be attracted to the work, and furthermore they would not have the desire to make effort in the work. What does it remind you of? It is the parable of the sower and the seed. The seed is the teaching. It is sown by the teacher, some of it falls in the rocks and it is choked off or eaten by birds, some of falls in unprepared soil and starts to grow then withers and dies, some of it falls in prepared soil, the magnetic center, and grows and gives fruit, consciousness. What does it mean? Many people are not interested in work or change. They are happy as they are with their material lives. The times we are in will make it difficult on such people, as the times turn dark. This means they will begin to see differently, some will begin to grow a “magnetic center”.
This is one Frame of the discussion. What you begin to see, is that we each start from where we each are, the context of our reality, our beliefs. We cannot start from where we hope to be, or sit around blaming parents or circumstances as a victim. Then you become aware that to even begin you must have some direction, some aim, so that you can observe and evaluate results. Ouspensky said you start with a near aim, not some grandiose aim of Christ consciousness. What is important is to remember what you observe for the most part is the vessel, not the Self or Soul. This can be disheartening as you discover what tries to do the work is the vessel, your individual mind, heart and body. The work is work. Your Self is a process in becoming.
I'm often amazed at how many male actors of the past seem to have such weak arms, almost weak sausages. But that's because we are so used to seeing body builder actors with bleached teeth all the time. To be fair though, ideas about masculinity can change somewhat depending on context and needs of a given society, IMO
A friend of mine was once puzzled why the aborigines in National Geographic weren't ripped. I was like, take your ripped boys and set them down in the jungle and see what happens.
They weren't weak. They just weren't hypertrophied.
Who's bigger? The man who can deadlift 185 x 5 or the man who can deadlift 405 x 5? How do you separate strength from hypertrophy?
Maybe I just read too deeply into things, but I brought up the deadlift example to try to show that strength = size (hypertrophy). You can't have one without the other.
By the way, it's perfectly fine to shit on body building. They don't have a very likeable culture.
🔥🔥🔥❤️