Without your permission, society has signed you up for a set of expectations.
Really, society has set you up because no one can achieve it… that is, unless you happen to be Clark Kent.
Being a healthy man means owning your responsibilities. But first, you have to understand what society will tell you that you are all about (adapted from “5 Things Society Unfairly Expects of Men” as featured on Alternet):
- Making Money
- Being competitive and winning
- Having muscles and being strong
- Fixing everything that you get your hands on
- Being a sex machine
Society has it dead wrong. If you follow the path that society has for you, you will chase an elusive goal. You will never be truly happy. Your true responsibilities are much deeper.
If you want to throw off the expectations, you have ask yourself question
As a counselor, I am usually the one who asks the questions. In fact, I often joke with people that I get paid for each question that I ask… so that’s why I ask so many good questions.
Recently I was asked a question by a client that I had no answer for.
Being a modern man begins when we question the messages that we hear all of the time.
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It’s a perplexingly simple question.
My client said to me that she believes her family is “dysfunctional.” We then talked about the word dysfunctional and how it is one of those words that feels like a psycho babble cuss-word. As in, when you are mad at someone, you call them dysfunctional. The word has come to mean many things in our culture:
- Unable to handle life
- Poor at relationships and intimacy
- Being an emotional mess
- Not normal
- Not like the rest of us
As a therapist, I confront this concept every time it comes up in conversation. It is a word that creates a wasteland of comparison, judgment, shame and the conclusion that we are a messed up and abnormal person.
My client is only 15, but she is wise beyond her years.
So here is the question…
“What is a functioning member of society, anyway?”
I told her that it was a good question. Then I changed the subject.
Over time, we explored how no one is normal and how THAT is normal. I supported to think about her life, her substance use and her family relationships and what she can do to become more of the person that she wants to be.
How responsibility will set you free
Life is about learning to function better in our relationships and our work-lives. It is about learning to be a better human being. Sigmund Freud is known for a lot of things, but one thing he did was try to simplify what it means to be a functioning human. He boiled it down to the core:
Love and work are the cornerstone of our humanness.
You are responsible for yourself, for how you love and for your work. That’s pretty simple. Being functional should be about learning to be free to be who you are. Taking time to identify what you are responsible for can set you free. That may sound counter intuitive in our commitment-averse culture. Sometimes we get the message that freedom is cutting loose and having few responsibilities.
Happiness is never found in a bottle, a pill bottle or at the end of a needle. We find our way back to happiness when we reach the point that we admit that doing whatever we want is not enough.
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In my practice as an Addiction Therapist, I often see the wreckage that results from throwing off all of our limits and following our impulses. Happiness is never found in a bottle, a pill bottle or at the end of a needle. We find our way back to happiness when we reach the point that we admit that doing whatever we want is not enough.
Take a moment and consider a question: What are each of us responsible for… things that lead to our happiness, our ability to love and find our way through the world?
You may have your own ideas, you might make it simple like Freud or you may have a few more items to add to the list. Here is what I have come up with:
1. I alone am responsible to breathe. No one else can breathe for me. Breathing is how I slow my heart rate and my thinking. Breathing is one way that I slow my mind and connect with my spirit.
2. I alone am responsible for my mental health. My well being is my responsibility. My mental health, physical health, relationships and my emotions.
3. I alone am responsible for my own happiness: Not my family, not my spouse or my partner, not my family, not my work and not my dreams. Being “Liked” on Facebook and Twitter won’t make me happy. If I can’t be happy right here and right now, I will never be happy. And only I can decide to be happy.
4. I alone am responsible to understand myself. In understanding and being intimate with myself, only then can I be intimate with those I care about. I am not perfect and accepting myself means that I accept that I have both weaknesses AND strengths.
5. I alone am responsible for my attitude during both successful times and more importantly when life is hard and everything feels like it is a challenge. I am responsible for how I respond to my circumstances.
6. I alone am responsible to learn from the past, but not let it dominate my thinking. I cannot change the past, but I can use the past to change me.
7. I alone am responsible to love. In loving, I find happiness. It’s that simple. I am also responsible to be loved. Opening up to be loved can change me.
8. I am responsible for my possessions. I may share my home, my vehicles and the contents of my home… my finances and my future investments. But I am responsible to earn money, spend it wisely and take care of what I own. I am responsible to ensure that what I own does not own me.
Definitely Freud’s idea is easier to remember in our sound-bite culture. However you define it, knowing what you alone are responsible for can set you free.
Society has one thing right: Being a man means that you own your responsibilities
Society places heavy burdens on men, on women and on our future generations. Being a modern man begins when we question the messages that we hear all of the time. It is difficult to own your true responsibilities, but it will lead to lasting happiness and show you the way to living the life that you want to live.
Life is about learning to function better in our relationships and our work-lives. It is about learning to be a better human being.
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Being a healthy human being is not about fitting in or being like everyone else. It is more about accepting yourself for who you are and striving to love yourself and other people anyways. It is about working and making a contribution whether or not your work is fulfilling or your ‘calling.’
One way that you can re-write your future is to answer the question for yourself: What are you alone responsible for? No one else can answer the question for you. I am curious how you would answer the question. I would love to hear from you in the comments.
If you enjoyed this article, you may enjoy some of my other work:
Why is Emotional Healing So Much More Difficult for Men?
The Risks of Being a Rational, Sensible and Distant Man
Your Feeling of Unworthiness is Undermining Your Happiness
I write articles about wellness, leadership, parenting and personal growth. My hope is to deliver the best content I can to inspire, to inform and to entertain. Sign up for my blog if you want to receive the latest and best of my writing. If you like what I have to say, please share my work with your friends.
Lastly, if you like my writing, you can click here to vote for my page on Psych Central’s list of mental health blogs.
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Photo by Thomas Leuthard
I think the five-item list confuses society with media. The media view is a caricature, or even a counterfeit, of what society expects.
Society’s actual expectations for men (based on your list) are honorable:
1. Providing for yourself and your family
2. Putting forth honest effort
3. Being physically capable of defending yourself and your loved ones
4. Being willing to try fixing something before discarding it
5. Building a loving relationship with one woman through physical passion, emotional intimacy, and lifelong commitment
These five tenets of masculinity are why society can rest on a man’s shoulders.
Jason, In my view, society is part of media and media is part of society. They are linked and intimately connected.
I like your list, it is well said. Thanks for taking the time to comment!
I think that respect yourself is more important than happiness. I would rather a person respect me than like me.
Linda, Well said. I hope to have both in life, but if I have to choose one self-respect is a better path. Thank you for taking the time to respond!
Each of your five pressures are indeed expectations placed on men. Every time and man attempts to break out of them he is shamed as “not a real man.” Every time he speaks out about the stress and anxiety about this he tends to get one of these responses.
“We women have it worse.”
“Boohoo, check your privilege.”
“Be a man.”
Yes, we are all responsible for ourselves but this is social. This is ingrained. It doesn’t just require men to change. It requires women to fundamentally change their expectations of men too.
C-Bob, Thanks for taking time to read and respond to my piece. Indeed, there are pressures on ALL of us. Unexamined expectations become stigma. Society can perpetuate stigma and expectations about women and men, gender and sexuality, religion, and mental health. It is important that we create dialogue rather than opposing camps to try to prove whom is disadvantaged.
Men are also part of perpetuating stigma about our own gender. We need to create a conversation that men, ourselves, will participate in that can create a better future for us all.
We need to create a conversation that men, ourselves, will participate in that can create a better future for us all. Im all for that conversation as long as it doesn’t lead to the usual conclusion that women have problems, men are problems, and if men did right by women everything would be fine. And frankly that’s what puts me off of most gender conversations. They define men in relation to women, label men as a danger to women, that we only suffer harm because of some innate (or early learned) desire to harm and subjugate women, and seek to… Read more »