The recent Guardian article on “mankeeping” touches a nerve. Many women in heterosexual relationships are tired — tired of carrying the emotional weight, tired of being the only person their partner turns to, or of feeling the distance when their partner doesn’t open up. Tired of waiting for men to catch up emotionally.
It’s true: men are, in many ways, playing catch-up when it comes to emotional and relational growth. And yes, it’s crucial for men to gather with other men to do this work. But the idea that men only need other men to grow emotionally — or that engaging emotionally with men is inherently exhausting for women — isn’t the whole truth.
When we learn to relate consciously, it doesn’t have to be an exhausting burden.
One essential part of the path is for men to do their inner work with other men — in honest, supportive spaces where emotional intelligence is cultivated and shame dissolves. But on its own, that’s not enough.
For the past two decades, I’ve supported men as a coach — not by coddling or mothering them, as some assume, but by respectfully challenging and guiding them.
I help men learn what many were never taught: how to be emotionally connected, relationally attuned, grounded, confident in their full humanity, and capable of true relational leadership.
Women don’t need to be “mankeepers.” We don’t need to carry more labor. But we also don’t need to buy into the story that a man’s emotions are a burden.
When I led my first women’s workshop nearly 20 years ago — after facilitating many for men — I thought it would be a breeze. I assumed women would open up easily. But that wasn’t the case.
Many women struggle just as much to open emotionally. And many don’t know how to receive a man’s vulnerability — unintentionally shutting him down when he finally opens up.
I get it. It can feel scary — like you’re going to lose your rock, your sense of safety, like he might never return from the abyss of fear or darkness. But what I’ve found — in my own relationships and with clients over the years — is that when we hold space for a man to touch his vulnerability, he emerges stronger, more grounded, more connected… and more able to attune to us.
We all need support structures outside of our romantic relationships. And we can create partnerships where fear, stress, and emotional needs are met with presence, care, and humility.
As men do more of their inner work, and women transmute bitterness and resentment, a new kind of relationship becomes possible — one that moves beyond codependence or hyper-independence and into something far more powerful: conscious interdependence.
In these next-level relationships, both partners show up fully and supportively.
Emotional growth is shared.
Love becomes a path of mutual evolution and awakening.
In these relationships, partners meet each other with honesty, curiosity, and compassion. They don’t avoid discomfort — they grow through it. They evolve together in ways that bring more satisfaction, aliveness, and fulfillment than either could reach alone.
This tends to support heterosexual couples to grow together:
- Each person does some healing with like-gendered groups
- Each person learns from skilled relational guides who honor and challenge them, supporting their growth as relational leaders
- Each person deepens their capacity to honor themselves — without hardening, demanding, or closing their hearts
- Each person releases the role of emotional caretaker and steps into a loving interdependence that sees fears and needs not as weakness, but as humanity
- Couples learn to connect and communicate in honest, open, and vulnerable ways
This isn’t a fantasy.
It’s a new paradigm of love — conscious love.
And it’s absolutely possible.
It’s the work I’ve devoted my life to.
If you’re ready to grow — not because you’re broken, but because you long for deeper love, clarity, and connection — I’d be honored to support you.
And if you’re in a relationship and both of you feel the desire for more intimacy, truth, and mutual evolution, I work with couples to build exactly that.
This is a doorway to the kind of intimacy many people long for but have never experienced.
If you want support, reply here and tell me about your situation.