Since 2020 the Book “Sex, Masculinity and God” came out, I have been involved in men´s work and the topic masculinity.
It has been an interesting ride since then!
This weekend I will be presenting with my brilliant co-authors Cadell Last and Kevin Orosz at the Mann-Sein Konferenz 11th+12th of June in Berlin, organized by the magnificent John Aigner. You are very welcome to join.
The last weekend I have been at the Männerfestival, very well organized by Franz Josef Neuwirt-Wildberger in Austria and the weekend before I joined a leadership summit of the European Men´s Gathering in Denmark. I actually did not expect doing such things in my life, but since the written and spoken reflection with my co-authors the infinite scope of this topic opened up.
Good friends have argued with me and were worried if I have rejections on feminism because of talking and doing workshops for masculinity. I found their impulsive rejection of masculinity, actually, more interesting.
I came from a pretty social deconstructive academic past and found myself lost in mental categories. I don´t mean that categories and politics of common agreements are less important and in the same manner gender equality, but when interacting personally, I could find better answers for behavior in psychoanalytic traditions and in Tibetan Buddhism, both uncovering the unconscious drive towards our consciousness.
Since I have been studying and organizing institutions and events around consciousness, the turn towards the unconscious was inevitable, not only because of personal traumas but also because of curiosity. The shadow of our consciousness are our chains of determination, our autopilot. Most of it plays out in our intimate relationship: Our relationship to our mother and father, as well as any other deep relationship, but also our relationship to ourselves.
I believe that if we dig deep and look inside we can have much better friends, partners, and family members. We are processing a hard time with lock-downs, covered faces, and a war in our neighborhood. Emotional distancing and anxiety are around every corner.
I see this time as a chance to make this a better world and for now I see so much potential, if we work from the inside out. That means acknowledge yourself, fix your intimate relationships and move from there. Not everything is 100% fine, but we work through it, and we don’t hide behind the screen or in the delirium of alcohol, drugs, and porn.
I am very thankful for people that taught me how to fight for truth even when it hurts, relationships that taught me to love myself and the other equally and mentors that also taught me how to teach.
Life takes very funny turns, but I am happy to represent a cultural edge (again) that is so alive: A masculinity that can hold difference among each other and from each other, work on sexual awareness and deep dives into bio-energetics and shadows of our contemporary collective.
See you in Berlin!