Raising a happy, well-adjusted, emotionally secure son is getting tougher all the time. Parents are up against influences that did not exist even one decade ago. Social media and cyber bullying are real, often incredibly cruel influencers on a tween. Boys are given false images of masculinity from video games, porn (studies state that 50% of boys in middle school have watched porn), film, and their peers. These influences portray women falsely, often as inferior beings who are dominated by men (in porn) in cruel and callous ways.
Your son emerges from a barrage of negative imagery confused and often angry about women and manliness – his perception of how he matches up to the inverse portrayals that abound and are easily available.
Boys often start retreating from their parents around age nine, when puberty starts. This is the time to start conversations with sons, if not sooner. Conversations that may have seemed too adult for nine year olds a decade ago, need to start sooner. The floodgate of disinformation is open, whether parents like it or not.
In my books, Women, Meditation, and Power and The Power of the Loving Man, I point out that the essential and highest quality of a person who has a male body is love and loving kindness. For millennia, men were raised to believe that they were controller, dominant, born to lead. Women were subservient, weak, not leaders. Because this is not true, your son’s exposure to any of these beliefs will harm and coarsen him.
Both men and women have energy bodies that surround their physical bodies. They look and behave differently. A woman’s energy body is more fluid. It vibrates rapidly and extends beyond her physical body like a butterfly’s wings. Her energy body is an expression of power as we see it in nature – fluid and capable of vast change. A man’s physical body is more constrained, it is grid-like and held closer to the physical body. It resembles a honeycomb. It is a perfect container for love.
When you observe, you can see the differences between male and female energy bodies starting to emerge around age nine.
Teaching a young son about the innate, fluid power of women will help him understand the big changes his female peers are going through and help him understand himself. This is the time to encourage him to grow love that extends to his friends, his activities, his family, life as a whole. He has made space in his heart for love without fear of derision or bullying.
He can watch his female peers blossom and gain their innate power without feeling threatened or holding them back through thoughts of domination and control. With love in his heart, he can step back and withstand the pressure to be something he is not.
He has role models. Jay-Z talks about love that is not just romance. So does John Legend. Surfers talk about their love for the sea. Athletes talk about the importance of heart. Your son should understand that the loving kindness in men has been repressed for millennia, just as the power of women has been deeply repressed and is only now starting to emerge.
Teaching your son meditation and mindfulness will help him for the rest of his life. In meditation (stopping thought), he will gain a core, compassionate sense of stillness that will anchor his loving kindness. There are many sources for learning to meditate and I teach several ways in the books. Simple mindfulness techniques will allow him to feel calm and balanced in the midst of outer turmoil.
The Power of the Loving Man shares numerous techniques for rekindling love. Remember, loving kindness is your son’s (and all male’s) true nature.
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