Most boys these days are not initiated into manhood. You may not have been either. This can cause pain that is challenging to recover from but today’s guest has a path to find the hero you actually are, but may have forgotten.
Show notes
In many cultures around the world, boys around age 8-10 are taken into nature and guided in a ritual by the older men.
This serves to support boys to step into their manhood, to find their courage and strength, to understand the responsibilities of becoming a grown up.
Were you ever explicitly guided from boyhood to manhood?
Were you taught what it takes to care for yourself and others, in the midst of a changing and challenging world?
If you were, I am deeply grateful.
Most men in our modern culture have not been guided. And thus have lost part of their strength, grit and well-being.
Jeffrey Erkelens is the author of The Hero in You. It is a powerful book written for boys, as well as for men who struggle to feel their place in the world and their sense of being a hero on their own journey.
In this conversation we discussed:
- The initiation boys need to become men who are not only successful but fulfilled
- An evolved conception of manhood
- The deadly “dragons” that take you from your unique path onto one of following expectations and shoulds
- The ways in which men ARE needed in the modern world
- The life forces a man needs so he can accomplish his goals and contribute to a cause of his choosing
Jeffrey references an African proverb: “If we don’t initiate the young they will burn down the village to feel the heat.”
Are there situations or relationships you have “burned down” in your life, perhaps feeling unguided or misled, or maybe out of a desire to feel your own aliveness in a world that feels deadened?
If so, check out Jeffrey’s stories here and then visit his Facebook page to get a copy of his book.
Links:
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Bio:
From Jeffery:
So far in my life, I’ve been a warehouse picker, a commodities trader, a plantation owner, an investment banker, Chairman, Manager, mortgage banker, venture capitalist, entrepreneur, telemarketer, door-to-door salesman, and non-profit manager. I have counseled Presidents and bribed Vice-Presidents. I have skirted near the extremes of affluence and poverty, and struggled in the in-between. I have dined in the most expensive restaurants and dumpster-dived for scallops and Jimmy Dean sausage.
On my 55th birthday:
- I realized I no longer enjoyed, nor believed in the story I was in, so I decided to write my own.
- I left my job, and walked away from a promise of a generous lifetime pension in exchange for my freedom.
- I surrendered my possessions to rid myself of distractions.
- I embarked on a journey return to childhood dream, align life with who he knew he was but had not had courage to respond to.
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As the oldest immigrant son out of 6 children born to hardworking immigrant parents, I learned the immigrant work ethic at the age 6 or 7 years old. I would go out with my father in the cold, dark of winter to feed the cows and the hogs before I walked to catch the bus to school.
I could only carry half a 5 gallon pail of feed back when walking back then. As my industrious, hard working father’s farm grew, so did my responsibilities, my direct ” hands on” experience, my work load, my confidence, my skill sets etc.
My father could never afford brand new equipment, so he bought older, second hand equipment which we fixed up, enhanced, and made work very well. He only had a grade 7 formal education but he was raised on a farm him self and was very very handy even being very creative with his work arounds and his solutions etc.
As an example of my personal growth, I was maintaining, repairing, installing and rewiring over 100 different electric motors used on the farm when I was 16 years old. We operated, maintained, repaired and eyes even enhanced very large, heavy off road machinery used on the farm. Over 45 years ago, my father, my 3 brother and I would build 25′ tall, 16′ by 16′ square, wooded hopper bottom grain bins; we build about 15 in total. These days farmers buy the same size in round steel bins for $8000 and up with bigger bins.
When I went off to college at 18, I was able to run with 6 pails of feed and had I already learned how to work 7 days a week with livestock chores, field work, carpentry work in building all manner of buildings; including concrete footings, floors etc. mechanical and electrical work and still get great grades in school.
I am the only sibling to have inherited my father’s “creativity gene” as my sister calls it. I have gone on to write business plans, write patents, work in almost all the various states and be self employed to be my own boss in life. If I had not learned all those seemingly very simple, myriad of various skills sets from the farm along with the immigrant work ethic, I would never have become the MAN I AM TODAY! I never realized this until I was in my late 40’s early 50’s. Just like John Denver used to sing in his one of his songs; “Thank God I am country boy!