The Men Haunted by Loneliness
"Love takes off the masks we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within”
– James Baldwin
Male Loneliness
More and more men are struggling to feel understood while they often complain that their vulnerabilities are dismissed. They worry that their words will be overly policed and that their efforts will be under-appreciated. And with so many evolving rules related to relationships and romance in modern love, many of them feel unfairly judged and confused about what’s expected of them. But masculine energy, the energy defined by doing rather than being, is oriented toward having a mission, setting goals, and moving forward with direct intention. It provides structural safety and focus, often complementing receptive feminine energy. So, when men can’t trust their masculine direction, what happens to their self-esteem?
Thankfully, a growing number of people with public platforms are beginning to openly discuss men’s mental health and bring awareness to the significance of male vulnerability. Unfortunately, these men have already spent generations pushing down their emotions because many of them have noticed that many partners tend to want a man who is emotionally available, but they don’t want an emotional man. Whether this is due to their fear of his weakness or their own inability to better support his emotional expression, they're likely not ready for long-term partnership with a man if they're not okay with witnessing his sensitivity. After all, who is expected to protect and take care of his heart if not the primary person in his life?
But many women are also disenchanted by repeated negative experiences in dating. They complain about men's arrogance and inconsistent behaviors that lead to breadcrumbing dynamics and accusations about men who want to be chased like a woman. More and more men call women hypergamous and fear being used for their financial resources or choosing an emotionally unavailable partner, or a partner who'll weaponize his vulnerability. Not to mention, there are many men who are intimidated by competing with a woman’s success or ambition, or a woman with her own spending power.
We spent the early 2000s celebrating and glorifying women's independence, but now, her success is harshly judged and resented. And in some instances, these women also fear being used for their financial resources, with the added bonus fear of being used for what's between her legs. Many relationship gurus will caution men to steer clear of these women. But if a woman prioritizes her own success, she clearly thinks intelligently about her future, so what would make a man assume that she wouldn't include him in that if she loves him? That’s the thing, at some level of consciousness, they’re questioning whether or not they’re lovable.
Think about a man's unique upbringing and how that relates to his family and cultural conditioning. Similar to women, men struggle with feeling lovable and crave to feel seen, understood, and appreciated. Consider the percentage of men who report having no close friendships. Loneliness and social isolation were officially declared a national public health epidemic in the United States in May 2023 by the U.S. Surgeon General. During the pandemic, many of us were quite isolated and desperately turned to the internet and social media to seek answers… and connection. It was during that time when we started to see so many of these internet “experts” spouting advice about self-improvement while promoting destructive male versus female narratives.
Men who lead these conversations tend to have shiny toys, but oftentimes, don't have partners or families of their own. Purportedly, women control access to sex, and men control access to commitment, but for some reason, many of these men don't have spouses. So, once you peek under their proverbial hood, you see the perverseness of their anti-woman rhetoric. A number of them are just grifting, and others, due to inexperience, are sincerely deluded about the true gifts of a healthy woman. Many couldn't care less about pleasing a woman or how to keep her happy. But the bottomline is that there are few women who are willing to trust them to lead because true leadership isn’t about control or competition. It’s about empathy and empowerment.
So what happens when they bring these primitive, disempowered ideas outside of their internet algorithm into reality? They quickly feel scrutinized, ridiculed, and ultimately, enraged. And because men are instinctively, highly attuned to their own sense of adequacy or inadequacy, it makes them feel even more lonely, further eroding their mental health, crystallizing these ideologies, and making them even less desirable to potential partners. They feel disgruntled, angry, and resentful. Some start to hide these programmed belief systems because they sense the impending rejection. But if they're hiding their ideological views because they think their dates can't accept it, what does that really say about how they think?
And in an alarming number of instances, lonely men who are just looking for answers about dating or getting healthier or getting fit, end up getting sucked down an insidious algorithm of anti-woman rhetoric, or worse, White Supremacy, and don't even know it. While they struggle to get appropriate support, women complain about not wanting to date these men and are giving up on men and dating altogether. Not to mention, none of the harsh criticisms and devaluing underlying beliefs about women are helping them to take charge or feel confident in healthy ways. Many women appreciate confident men who can take charge, as opposed to overly permissive boundaries, but what would make them think anyone wants a bully in the house?
Wounded Masculine Energy and Displaced Anger
Wounded masculine energy manifests as excessive control, aggression, hyper-independence, and proving worth solely through achievement. These men have ways of hiding or pushing down their trauma, so they can be quite explosive with their anger. And if they're self-medicating, the substance or substances are likely amplifying their volatility and emotional reactivity. But if there's no self-exploration, then there's no personal evolution, so there can be no healing. With that said, children and partners learn to walk on eggshells around these kinds of men because they are unpredictable and scary. It’s not enough to only acknowledge a PTSD diagnosis, and think it’s okay to keep giving your loved ones hell.
Self-awareness doesn't mean you've developed solid coping strategies. Therapy or seeking professional support helps build what self-awareness alone can't heal.
These men are popularly called toxic, but it is likely that they may feel wounded and unlovable, as well as indignant in response to how they've been treated, what they've witnessed in relationships around them, or what they've been programmed to believe about women. But unhealthy or wounded men are not violent or innately dangerous. They are isolated in some shape, way, or form, and deeply disconnected from the depth of their inner world. There's so much suppressed emotion and emotional pain, or even struggles to move past trauma, that there's become a growing trend of them thinking they don't need love. Only transactions. All for the sake of loneliness masquerading as peace. But the struggles of wounded masculine energy aren't unique to men.
Wounded feminine energy manifests as insecurity, poor self-worth, overly permissive boundaries, preoccupation with performance or achievements, and women who are takers as opposed to receivers. Women also close themselves off after feeling frustrated, and then make global generalizations based on what's been experienced around them. Unproductive girlfriend chatter will oftentimes result in the same effect that red pill and Manosphere spaces have on society… man versus woman narratives. If you're consuming information on the internet that reeks of man versus woman narratives, abort! It might be keeping you single and bitter, as it doesn't promote gestures of love, but of negativity and transactional relationships. And how can anyone begin to confront their fears if we're all too busy resenting one another?
A wounded or unhealthy man may rigidly avoid seeking support, while a healthy man may seek guidance so that he can better acknowledge his inner world and take ownership of how he thinks, feels, and behaves. Stagnated growth or healing in isolation is not accountability or responsibility, and being an explosive bully is certainly not masculine. Toxic masculinity is not strength. It is strength without responsibility. And men who are considered nice guys, are likely to exhibit responsibility without strength because they likely struggle with healthy boundaries. Healthy masculinity is the integration of both. Men have to learn to stop trying to handle their emotional turmoil alone. It only makes the emotional pain stronger and more dangerous.
What makes you feel angry? Your emotions deserve to be heard.
Anger needs a structured outlet for justice and healthy creative expression. It doesn't need chaos or anyone forcing subjugation. It needs structure and discipline, as well as activities that feel grounding as opposed to anything that magnifies insecurities, emotional wounds, or anger. To better manage anger, it's crucial they learn to improve their emotional vocabulary. Just being able to verbally articulate feeling angry without censorship can be so healing. We all get angry, but that doesn't give anyone an excuse to pick up a chair and throw it across the room. When any of us can learn to better articulate underlying needs and expectations to our partners, we plant crucial seeds for healing in love because it supports repair ruptures in connections.
Healthy Masculine Energy and Connection
When men learn to embrace their vulnerability, they can begin to shift from emotional suppression to emotional expression. In order to be more emotionally expressive, the inner work becomes cultivating self-awareness, practicing self-love, and healing inner child or familial or societal wounds. It’s necessary to reconnect with their own feminine energy so that they can create more balance and healthy interdependence in long-term love relationships, as opposed to codependence. What happens when a man who is grounded in and guided by his heart as opposed to his sexual energy? They tend to attract more potential partners who are grounded in and appropriately connected to their sensuality and sexuality. Afterall, the heart and sacral chakras are intimately connected and complimentary in sacred sexual wisdom.
Both women and men need connection, but they connect in different ways. Men tend to report talk while women tend to rapport talk, allowing their moments of connection to feel deeper and more intimate than discussing facts and numbers. So men who understand this deeper need for intimacy tend to seek out women for romantic or platonic intimacy because there’s a softness they can’t usually feel with other men. The danger happens when a platonic connection gets sexualized, because for men, sexual connection is often necessary to feel safe enough for emotional vulnerability. And men in our society are usually taught that it's safer to reach for sex over over tenderness. However, a man’s power center is his heart chakra.
A man’s partner may be his emotional anchor who loves him deeply, but his partner is not his therapist, punching bag, emotional regulator, rehab center, or there to absorb his unhealed trauma. His partner requires his responsibility. Partners can be compassionate and still call for his authenticity and accountability, supporting his growth without enabling destruction. This is where the concerted effort for deeper intimacy and friendships come into play. Do their friendships contain depth and how often do they connect? How often have you seen men overly rely on their romantic partners for connection or their social activities? It’s imperative that they seek out professional support or create a community of men with whom they can share their vulnerability.
Men need opportunities for pleasure, a sense of purpose or meaning, connection, and surrender. They have Love Bucket needs, as well. When you encounter a man who has learned discipline to control his sexual urges, whose presence offers safety and helps his partner feel calm and emotionally regulated, who protects and provides for their loved ones, and who takes responsibility for their actions, then trust that you are experiencing a powerfully masculine man. He shows that he is a healthy man, not a “nice guy.” So, it's important to do whatever work is necessary on your own journey to be ready for him so that you can wholeheartedly offer him the appreciation, validation, sensuality, and unconditional respect that he deserves… and has earned.
And until then, he is better left single.
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