Why men are secretly afraid of women (especially their anger)

When I first started dating, I was attracted to a certain type of girl: sweet and lovely. The first girl I loved was sweet and lovely. We went out for waffles and chatted about The Simpsons. It was a good, calf love.

In my early 20s, I had a relationship with an older woman who was separating from her husband. For a young man of that age, Miri really was a blessing. Her gentle nature, her hunger for sacred intimacy, and her failing marriage, meant that she approached it with an unmatched sweetness. Grateful for a distraction from her impending divorce, she supported my journey of self-discovery without judgement.

Even if it meant spending time apart.

“There’s something missing”, I said. “I’ve only known sweet, warm, loving women. I’m sensing that when I’m with a strong, powerful woman, I won’t know what to do.”

“Then,” she replied, “you should find a strong, powerful woman, and see what happens.”

About a month later, I met a school teacher at a tantra workshop. She was fierce, intelligent and outspoken. It was a 4-week-long disaster.

This was mostly on me. Picture this: an deep, fiery woman looks at me with her green eyes, tells me that her body is ready. She is pining, aching, raging to be a mother. I was 24 and a fool. Her body spoke and I was deaf. Hell hath no fury.

What’s more, I froze. As I suspected, when the feminine was strong, I did not know what to do. My immobility that day enraged her further. A few days later I called Miri and told her the story. She laughed with sympathy.

“Find out what happened, and learn”, she said.
“I will.”

The first girl I loved. She reminded me of my mother.
Miri, she embraced me with maternal instincts.
Sweet, lovely, and ethereal. That is how I would describe my mother.

Even at that age, I was beginning to see the pattern and how much my love life reminded me of her. It was a strange, surreal realisation.

On the other hand, a part of me craved intimacy with the powerful, the mesmerising, the ravishing. And yet, I knew that I lacked the emotional capacity to hold it. To be present with it.

In his book Mothers, Sons & Lovers, Michael Gurian described the emotions that I was feeling but could not put words to. That there was a hidden, constant fear of the feminine, that it could somehow destroy me, that I was powerless to confront.

That there was a dread of the feminine, akin to death, that a woman’s power could disintegrate me. That’s what happened to me when I froze.

Transformation was the only solution.

My first calf-love. She blew me away.
Miri amazed me beyond words.
And the school teacher with green eyes. Fuck me. I now know, even in her rage, that this was an expression of love… or at least the pain of its void.

But above all, beyond all of them combined, there lies the mother. So it is for many men.

For us men, the image of the feminine comes from the mother. Freud knew this. Men change when they talk about their mothers.

The inner boy still exists in the heart of all men. And within that heart is the image of his mother. Of her, he holds awe, and fear. In his mother lies the feminine and in the feminine lies the mother, and in her presence, his body speaks.

Many men will seek out reunion with his mother reflected in another woman. He will feel safe.
Many men will learn sexual gratification through pornography, absent of complications.
Some men will freeze amidst conflict with a woman or avoid conflict altogether.
Some men will seek sexual conquests to prove that the fear has no power over them.
Some men will fuck silicone dolls.

The fear men feel is of disintegration. That the love of a woman, her passion, her expression, will overwhelm him and his capacity to hold it. Love is the eternal aether of the feminine. It will be too much. He will die.

It is the equal and opposite to the pervasive fear of abandonment in the feminine.

Nobody survives without inner transformation.

To be continued.