We men have many masks inside, and of course a face behind the mask, and not displaying all of them can cause us to feel angry, anxious, depressed and addicted to outlets where those other masks can live and breathe. Movies, sports, video games, the news, reality shows, books, are big business in part due to the forum they provide for us to vicariously remove one mask and try another. - Ben Ringler
The Masks of Masculinity
by Ben Ringler, Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist
Wearing masks can be quite
fun. You can pretend you are someone
else, play a character, take on a persona, exaggerate, be menacing, afraid,
goofy. Then, when you’ve had enough, you
can take off the mask, and return to you, perhaps a little sweaty and satisfied
with the encounter.
Imagine if you couldn’t take off
the mask? (For all of you Twilight Zone
fans, there’s a great episode dedicated to that nightmarish scenario). Perhaps the people around you expect you to
keep it on, or maybe you just forget that it is on and go to work, business as
usual.
Well, this is how it is for many
men. We have been given, and have worn,
our masks for so long that we’ve forgotten that they are on. We may even have a sense, but are too afraid
to take them off, that we will be abandoned or attacked for doing so. Or, just as awful, we are afraid to take off
the mask to find that there is no longer a face behind it. That the mask now keeps us in one piece and
we might fall apart if removed.
These masks are caricatures (or
aspects) of masculinity (strong/silent, aggressive, non-emotional,
intellectual, sexual prowess, to name a few); they are not drawn from thin
air, but are quite often over-emphasized when we were little boys. They most likely represent a true aspect of
us, but not nearly the whole picture. That’s
what is so confusing. They are the masks
that quite often comforted those around us in our early years, and/or fit well
in our families so we made (unconscious) pacts to keep them on, to
over-emphasize these qualities, to deny the face behind the mask.
We men have many masks inside, and
of course a face behind the mask, and not displaying all of them can cause us
to feel angry, anxious, depressed and addicted to outlets where those other
masks can live and breathe. Movies,
sports, video games, the news, reality shows, books, are big business in part
due to the forum they provide for us to vicariously remove one mask and try
another. For example, if the mask one
wears is of the wimp, watching football may allow one to be infused with the
mask of physical strength. When that
game is over, however, the deflation may return quite quickly.
This predicament is serious. There are major shifts occurring around men’s
role in our society, and this can be quite unsettling. Given these trends, if we men wear one mask
too long, this can be quite anxiety provoking and we can even approach
breakdown territory (i.e. the proverbial mid-life crisis). We must start to work with this, develop our
awareness of what unconscious agreements we have made and start to broker new
deals for ourselves. Here are some ways
to start to work with your masks:
TRY THIS
Start relating to all the masks
inside you; take some time and ask yourself:
What mask do I most tend to wear
and where did I get this particular mask?
How is this mask serving and
limiting me?
What other masks am I drawn
to? Where do I show these masks?
Feel free to share with me what
you’ve come up with at ben.s.ringler@gmail.com.
With you in mind and heart,
Ben Ringler
Besides my general practices in Berkeley and San Francisco where
I see adult men and women, couples and families, I help men find inner strength as
they balance evolving visions of being a man, provider and father. By helping men find a more proper
alignment, I address such out-of-balance symptoms as depression, anxiety,
anger, and addiction. 510-848-8899 or www.benringler.com
Labels: Ben Ringler, False Self, Masculinity, masks