In my years of working with men to overcome challenges such as chronic stress, or the bottling up of distress and pain, there are a few things of which I am certain of. Men are far more likely to end their distress in unhealthy and sometimes fatal ways because they will not be the ones to scream the loudest about the challenges that life has presented to them. Many of my clients have bottled up stress, frustration, and anger for years upon years, only to find that their marriage has imploded and their relationships with their children have become non existent.
So much of this could have been prevented had the weary traveling man been given the tools to traverse each bump, hill, and mountain, that he came upon. Hence he becomes the man who lives in quiet desperation. Each measure of density, each added stone that weighs down the bag of this weary traveling man, takes away an equal portion of his levity, joy, happiness, and freedom. Feeling, in the life of a human being is a single coin with two sides to it, one side is suffering, one side is happiness. As the weary traveling man slowly numbs away his suffering, so he also numbs away his happiness.
We know that we are composed of little atoms of energy. In your imagination visualize a wide rushing river, moving over boulders, effortlessly. Then imagine a small stagnant dam of water, stuck and confined only to become cloudy and odorous over time. As the weary man suppresses and ignores his suffering he creates dark dams of stuck atomic energy throughout his body, leaving them to fester and increase his level of suffering and ultimately, his weariness with life.
With simple tools, bravery, and through the use of his breath and focus, this traveling man can slowly remove each stone from his heavy sack. Overtime, our weary traveling man now feels joyful, at peace, free, and suddenly finds himself laughing deeply and smiling again. A client of mine once described his transition as moving from existing to living. Our weary traveling man must pause in his journey and ask himself, do I want to exist through life until I meet my end? Or do I want to spend my life living and truly smiling until I meet my end?
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This post is republished on Medium.
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