Mindfulness is for men too!

If you are a man interested in meditation practice, then you might want to read this blog piece. As a male mindfulness teacher and practitioner, it seems that I am in the minority. When I was studying my Masters in Mindfulness Teaching at Bangor University, there were only a handful of males taking the course. And as I teach and lead groups in meditation, there are always more females than males taking part. But mindfulness is for men too! Just like with yoga practice in the western world, men seem to gravitate away from committing themselves to group sessions. Meditation, of course, doesn’t favour any of the sexes. I’ve done many one-to-one classes with men who have been honest and open and, yes, showed their vulnerabilities, to me when we practiced together. But as a teacher, what I’ve found is that we men shy away from joining in when it’s a mixed group. Why is this? As a male teacher, it is something that I’ve asked myself many times. Is it a macho thing? Partly. Many men seem to think of meditation as something “soft” and not something that a man needs to do. Better off going sea fishing and catch a big predator off the shore of Mozambique here, or watch a rugby match, than to come and sit on our veranda when I host a free monthly session. But it’s more than that. The macho mentality is part of our overall conditioning as men. Most of us have grown up with the view that men only “do” certain things. Meditating wasn’t something on my radar screen growing up in Ireland. As distinct from drinking pints of Guinness, for example (nothing wrong with that, but you know what I mean!) But the biggest thing we men don’t do is to show our feelings. Especially in the presence of the opposite sex. Everything, as we say in Ireland, is “grand”. And even though we might be breaking apart inside, we have an external mask that we never let down to reveal what is really going on behind it. These feelings are often supressed and lead to us turning to maladaptive distractions which never solve the fact that we are neglecting all this stuff inside of us. We overdrink, overeat, binge watch, take out our anger or aggression on others, and so on. Being afraid to show our feelings is what really stops men for showing up for a mindfulness session. We are afraid that we will have to talk about them, reveal them and, most of all, face them. We certainly won’t do all of this in front of a bunch of women. Oh, no. And it doesn’t matter how much I say this to men. For many of us, this is one of the biggest fears of our lives – revealing who we really are. Even to ourselves. That’s why I created Men Behaving Mindfully, an online safe space to gather as a group of men and just to practice together and share how we see our lives. How we find it hard to face the changes that life brings – changes such as aging, changing jobs, separating from our partners, loss, upcoming retirement and many more. And, yes, how we can learn to reach out to those feelings we may have locked inside us and learn to be with them with a kind and tender heart. There’s nothing really macho about being kind to yourself. So if this piques your interest why don’t you get in touch. You can also book a free 30-minute introductory call to chat with me. There’s a place waiting for you where you don’t have to be anyone except yourself. With no masks.