Sovereign Love w/ Dené Logan

Sovereign Love w/ Dené Logan

July 17, 2024

Across all cultures spiritual and philosophical texts talk about the importance of uniting the internal masculine and feminine energies. An awaken person has access to the multitude of their humanity rather than being confined into an emotional box. Our guest, Dené Logan, comes on the show to ground this spiritual concept and provide step-by-step direction on how to access the entirety of your being.

Episode Transcript:

0:24

welcome to the show I’m your host Mark azoulay and I’m here with dene Logan she’s an author of sovereign love um a book

0:31

that is really really blowing up in Colorado at least one of my supervises was just talking about it um the other

0:36

day I was talking about that before the show um she’s also a a marriage and family therapist um and a spiritual

0:41

Retreat facilitator so D I’m really excited to have this conversation with you welcome to the show oh mark thank

0:47

you so much for having me I’m so excited to sit down with you so what’s great about this book is that it talks about

0:52

masculine and feminine energies um so before we go much further i’ love for you to Define that for our audience what

0:58

do you mean by the masculine feminine Energies within each of us yeah so I come from a background in

1:05

depth psychology and I always say and pronunciate pronunciate a little clearly depth because people always think I’m

1:11

saying death psychology but depth psychology is um a lot of times known as

1:16

the psychology of the Soul it’s sort of the exploration of our Collective unconscious and um themes that have run

1:23

throughout history and um different periods of time and cultures and um it’s

1:29

really the things that are like if we zoom out on our life and look at the big picture what’s happening for us within

1:36

um the human psyche right um Beyond like what’s on the surface level and a lot of

1:41

depth psychology is really rooted in yungi and psychology Carl Young was sort of the first person in terms of the

1:47

psychology world to really name that all of us have both masculine and feminine energetics within us um young sort of

1:55

spoke to them in a little bit of a binary way more than we might now in that um you know young called the Ana

2:03

the female elements within a man and the Animus the masculine um elements within

2:09

a woman um we’ve since come to understand that they’re a little bit more nuanced but where I believe Yung

2:15

absolutely got it correct is that all of us have both masculine and feminine energetics within us um but what we’ve

2:22

lived in from my perspective for centuries now has been um in a patriarchal culture really a sort of

2:28

wounded mascul Paradigm um and you know both masculine and feminine energetics are unbelievably

2:36

beautiful and unbelievably necessary for us all to embody and um experience

2:42

within ourselves but our society has sort of really glorified some of the more like distorted versions of

2:49

masculinity certainly in terms of like what we hold as cultural values but also we’re a culture that has really sort of

2:55

dismissed and not had any really sort of healthy relationship with the femin and energetic within all of us from my

3:02

perspective I I completely agree I think there’s like a ton of Oppression right I think there’s like a ton of like you

3:07

said wounded a lot of lost guys out there you know that don’t know what the masculine actually is or they have this

3:13

kind of Twisted view the kind of you know tough guy Macho jerk view um versus a more embodied masculine and and we’ll

3:19

certainly get into that in the interview and I want to start with you so what what got you started on this work um I

3:25

guess what was your journey with your femininity and your inner masculinity how did you how do all this you know

3:31

yeah well I love that and I love that you said um you know what you said about

3:37

masculinity I think there are so many ways that everything about this culture

3:43

really teaches us to not understand one another and sort of like defend

3:48

ourselves and that was certainly the case within my relationship with my own masculine and feminine energetic and in

3:55

my relationships with men I think I I was raised as so many of us as women were

4:00

um that what it means to be a good feminist is to really have an idea about

4:05

what masculinity is that is like really you know um masculinity is toxic and you

4:11

can’t trust men and always have your guard up and so there’s so many ways that as I entered into a marriage and I

4:17

was married for 12 years I realized that so much of my conditioning caused me to really embody a really wounded masculine

4:24

armor in my relationship um I was really defended against softening and allowing

4:31

myself to be intimate in you know in all of these ways of like when I think of intimacy I think of like really in me

4:38

see intimacy like really letting someone see me and feeling safe allowing myself to be you know my really human messy

4:47

feminine self which we all have within us but you know when my marriage ended

4:53

it was sort of an interesting time because I realized that I really had um

4:58

you know just like a strength in working with couples as a therapist it sort of was like my jam from the beginning for

5:04

whatever reason I just like really had an affinity for it and loved it and as my marriage was um I like to say

5:10

changing form more than coming to an end because I have a child with my kid’s father he’s still one of my best friends

5:17

on the planet I love him so much and we both realized that our relationship needed to change form but as that um

5:25

shift was occurring in our relationship I was sort of like oof like how did we get here like what happened and I really

5:32

started to be like an anthropologist when it came to love like I was fascinated by really understanding what

5:39

was unfolding with the couples that I was working with first of all but then also in my relationships that was really

5:45

making it so difficult for us to find an authentic sense of fulfillment and um

5:51

just really trust one another in a way that I could see so clearly all of us were struggling to do yeah do you have a

5:57

sense of what was going wrong you you know as as you talk it’s a story I’m making up I’m sure you’re familiar with

6:02

with David daa and some of his work around this he talks about like depolarization which I think many

6:08

couples are in right where the masculine and feminine are not balanced it kind of goes towards the middle and there’s this

6:14

kind of like deadness that I know so many of my clients experience right sexuality is destroyed right there’s no

6:19

fun anymore like everyone it’s all about fairness but fairness as a straight 50/50 I think doesn’t work although you

6:26

know my generation the millenni generation was raised that way um like all these kind of traditional

6:31

roles fall apart and in a depolarized relationship it just um kind of becomes like a goall so I don’t know if that

6:38

happened to you but I’m curious like what happened in your relationship um around these energies and their

6:44

expression you know it’s twofold I have two ways that I’ve come to understand it and there’s like a larger historical

6:50

context to what I think is happening and then I think there’s a way that we are conditioned especially like within the

6:56

realm of couples therapy to hold some of these attachment based models of partnership so if we start with sort of

7:02

the historical context when I went back and I started to really research and look at the history of patriarchy there

7:08

were so many things about what was done to the feminine collective in order to

7:14

create a dominance space structure of a society and in so many ways women were

7:19

um you know seen as property and sort of like you got a plot of land and you got a wife and you know we were in many ways

7:26

harmed by the masculine Collective not protected we were burned alive sometimes while men stood by and watched and that

7:32

is multi-generational pain that has really been left un um you know we

7:39

haven’t had a Reckoning with it we haven’t really sort of been in relationship with what was passed down

7:44

by our mothers from their mothers around how to interact keeping yourself safe from men but also there’s a lot about a

7:52

patriarchal culture that teaches men to really suppress their healthy masculinity and their Inner Warrior and

7:59

their sense of self there used to be a time in collectivist societies when men would really have um a period of

8:06

initiation into manhood I think we’ve lost a lot of that in our culture I think men sort of you know a lot of

8:12

times are living with what I call like a fatherless Society of men and even if there are fathers in the house a lot of

8:18

times those fathers are not really connected to their emotional landscape they’re not able to be present with

8:24

their sons and teach them about what it is to be an integrated man and so it’s like we have the historical context of

8:30

what patriarchy does to all of us um but then the other aspect of it from my perspective is there’s so much about

8:38

what I love to call an ownership template of marriage and partnership that really you know teaches us to

8:44

believe once you have your person they are yours they are your property but like that we almost stop seeing one

8:50

another it’s like think about all the objects you own like you’re really excited about them in the beginning and then over time you’re like yeah they’re

8:56

they’re they’re whatever but that’s sort of how we start to feel about our relationships and what I noticed with

9:02

couples is like the number one thing that I think comes up is like entitlement like I’m entitled to you I’m

9:08

entitled to getting my quote needs met by you and there’s a lot of complacency that comes up um and so much of the the

9:18

like therapy orientations around couples work really support this in focusing

9:23

more on attachment which for me is like the stability the structure the masculine aspects of our relationships

9:30

and not the aliveness the EOS the life force the feminine aspects of our relationships right and when we do that

9:36

that doesn’t come without a cost because there’s this thing of like we can have a ton of stability and know you’re not

9:43

going anywhere but that doesn’t leave to or excuse me lead to a lot of aliveness and without the aliveness over time

9:49

there starts to be a real deadening in our relationship we’re just like nobody wants to have physical intimacy anymore

9:55

which is probably like the number one thing couples come to see me about and it’s because we’re almost like in roommate situations cuz we’re just

10:02

taught like the attachment is all that should matter you know yeah I’ve never thought of it that way but that’s really

10:07

insightful that attachment is based on that stability and structure and masculine you know foundational stuff

10:13

but yeah there’s no fun there’s no play there’s no fluidity there’s none of those great feminine aspects it’s it’s

10:19

not a relationship I mean it’s not romantic at the very least right it it is purely like logistical as far as that

10:25

goes so absolutely what was it like for you to start start to deprogram some of these patriarchal you know beliefs and

10:33

and unconscious kind of oppressive forces in your life how did you start on this journey for

10:38

yourself yeah so you know as I was doing this work and sort of unpacking what I

10:43

was seeing with couples I found that it was really sort of coinciding with the work that I was doing to reclaim my own

10:50

inner feminine and what that meant for me was really like going back and doing

10:55

some inner child work with my own little girl and getting in touch with like what was the messaging that she got about who

11:01

she needed to be in society to be acceptable to be enough um when did she

11:07

you know when did I first abandon her when did she first feel like she was sort of left behind by me um and as I

11:14

reclaimed her and really started to get in touch with what she loved the music she loved the way she liked to play um

11:22

all of these aspects of myself that I had sort of lost touch with I found that

11:27

I was able to see what was is happening with couples through a different lens and a lot less of like the societal

11:34

structure of what a relationship should be but really approaching relationships as what if they were a co-creation

11:41

between the two people and you know every day we’re sort of in relationship with the relationship it’s like the

11:48

third entity so there’s you and me and then there’s our relationship and that’s what we’re really working on you know

11:53

honing and creating and um holding with a deep sense of reverence around what it

11:59

is um and so yeah it just it became like a different way that I started to work

12:06

with couples I realized that so much of what we’re taught about relationships is actually really codependent um right

12:13

like from the beginning when we look at our fairy tales there’s a lot that’s like super like once I find my person

12:19

then I’ll be like happily ever after and I think of course we’re like deeply disappointed when we get in a real

12:25

relationship and it doesn’t feel that way you know yeah love songs or super gross if you look at them as a therapist

12:31

right like I list to them like oh my God what are they saying you know this is this is insane right I yeah but you’re

12:38

right I we’re conditioned for that all the time and I want to bring you back to this point around like the obligatory

12:44

default relationship you know we had a guest on before that was talking a little bit about uh Dei and diversity

12:50

and how you know America is such a blending pot right in a mixing bowl of all this but in that our culture has

12:56

been like reduced to the bare minimum in many ways like all the different diversity from all these different

13:02

cultures has been just kind of whitewashed into this like base level where we don’t have things like you’re talking about like we don’t have

13:08

initiation rituals right we don’t have you know spiritual guidance we don’t have you know coming of age or even like

13:16

the the wedding ceremony is often like more about Instagram more about the picture and less about the actual

13:21

commitment and the and the ceremonial bonding so I I love what you said about you know Breaking Free from that mold

13:27

and having your relationship be something that has a creative artistic expression free from all those

13:32

constraints you know so I’m wondering this is maybe more practical what are some things that you have added into

13:38

your relationship or how do you make that work to not feel bogged down by the kind of whitewashing that American

13:44

culture often does to deeper ways of relating yeah you know when I think

13:49

about interdependence which is really what I you know I tend to work with

13:55

couples on attempting to cultivate a more differentiated model of relationship meaning um that the purpose

14:02

of relationships is a little bit different from what we’re conditioned to think it is which is you are the person

14:09

that sort of saves me from all of my existential angst and anytime I’m feeling scared or uncomfortable you make

14:15

it go away because that’s your job right um whereas I believe we have the ability to see our relationships as the most

14:22

sacred mirror showing me to me showing me my pain points showing me my fears so that I can get into right relationship

14:28

with them and so an interdependent model of relationship sort of moving away from that codependency is I can’t fix it but

14:37

I can go through it with you I’m right here right that it’s not our job to sort of like fix these things for one another

14:43

um but that we are sort of one another’s mirror and one another’s you know co-pilot in this thing of moving through

14:50

life together but I think in terms of like the tangible work of what that looks like it’s like that I am much more

14:56

responsible for filling up my own cup than I ever thought um yeah was another

15:02

person’s responsibility and if each of us are doing that it becomes like I fill up my cup for you you fill up your cup

15:08

for me and then we pour into one another from the Overflow but it’s not your job to fill my cup that’s my job and

15:14

especially once we sort of have like kids and responsibilities and all of the other things coming into the picture

15:20

it’s really important that we take responsibility for doing that for ourselves or we start to feel a lot of

15:25

resentment and you know depletion and things that just like do not serve the relationship you know absolutely yeah

15:31

and I see that so calm with my clients and I’m sure you do too this like mind reading thing you know back to that

15:37

point that you said I think the traditional relationship is is yeah it’s like either this person gets rid of the bad feelings and gives me the good

15:43

feelings you know it’s just about that and it’s almost like a very preverbal way of being in a relationship of they

15:49

should know they should know that I’m upset they should know what I need in this moment and I think it leads to a

15:54

lot of miscommunication a lot of hurt and resentment like you’re saying so yeah transparity is critical right absolutely

16:03

and I don’t know if you have kids but what I realized once I had a child was there’s so much about what we’re doing

16:08

in relationships that is like sort of we’re parenting each other or like what my child expects from me that it’s like

16:14

this actually doesn’t lead to again a lot of EOS and romantic love between us you know yeah it’s it just it’s

16:20

caretaking right yeah yeah which isn’t that sexy

16:26

you know it’s necessary but not that sexy yeah absolutely yeah as we’re

16:32

moving towards a commercial break I’m I’m curious like how would you define Heros you know I’m familiar with that

16:38

word but for our listeners so they have something to hold on to what is that like yeah I think of I like even get a

16:44

little like as I think of what OS is it’s sort of like that Greek way of expressing love that is like you know

16:50

the life force love the sensual love the like longing love the like the love that

16:55

is aliveness right like I think that it’s all of the elements of the feminine

17:01

are what I think of when I think of os it’s so much of like where the life in our love is and we can have safety and

17:09

we can have like the aliveness um existing but we’ve we’ve really sort of thought like safety is what we need to

17:16

put an emphasis on over the Heros I know we’re such like a fear-based culture and we’re such Like a Warrior fight kill

17:24

culture that there’s no there’s often not room for lover energy that’s right we’re going to move to our first

17:29

commercial break when we come back I want to talk more about the difference between the two energies from your

17:34

perspective um as well as some you know tips and tricks or practices that people or listeners can do to help to cultivate

17:41

and come in contact with these because I agree with you completely I think they’re very powerful but they’re often

17:46

really blocked and repressed within people so you know listeners you do yourself good to hang on in there and

17:51

we’ll see on the other side as you um learn how to unlock these for

17:57

yourself

18:27

e

18:57

e

19:27

e e

20:25

welcome back to the show I’m your host Mark aay I’m here with da Logan and we’re talking about masculine and feminine energies so in the center part

20:32

we’re kind of in like the meat of the podcast I’d be curious today just want to give you the platform to Define what those energies are um where they come

20:40

from their roots are and what they you know feel like both internally and externally so big tall order but I know you can handle it I love that yeah so

20:48

you know when we think about these energies it’s really I think important to state that like they are energetics

20:55

and there are ways that we sort of describe what these energ itics are and feel like and I talk about in the book

21:01

like what you might consider qualities of healthy masculine or wounded

21:06

masculine healthy feminine wounded feminine um but they’re not fixed and all of us have all of these energetics

21:12

alive within us all the time because it’s just an aspect of our Humanity um but what when we think about what

21:18

wounded masculine or distorted masculine energy might be or look like I really think of so much of as we were talking

21:25

about before what our cultural values have been like really sort of like pull yourself up by your bootstraps that John

21:31

Wayne like I got this I’m alone like um really like fear of failure um

21:37

competition um like that isolation energy like I don’t need anybody sometimes that avoidant energy if we

21:44

think about it in terms of attachment style energy that can be some of the Wounded masculine um energetic or

21:50

archetype um it’s certainly that energy that like seeks external validation and

21:56

sort of like um like cares about how things look from the outside versus like the actual feeling of how it feels for

22:03

me right um and then when we think about like the distortions that we’ve held or the wounded feminine energetic that is

22:10

sort of like that anxious energy that like um attempting to cling people pleasing defining Myself by you know who

22:18

is choosing me who wants me like that type of thing right and so it’s like

22:23

that energy of like the anxious attachment style is often what we think of as like the like more wounded

22:29

feminine energetic and what’s interesting societally is that when we think of masculine energy or feminine

22:35

energy a lot of times what comes to mind for people first are what are the more distorted versions of these energetics

22:42

um and I realized as I was starting to like really dig into these energetics and learn about them that we don’t have

22:49

a ton of models certainly as we were talking about of what healthy masculinity looks like um but also not a

22:57

lot of permission to be in our healthy feminine um and so to me the healthy

23:03

masculine energetic is the energetic that um is humble and knows itself well

23:10

is confident um is really like Mission driven knows death and has sort of faced

23:15

some of my existential fears and is in relationship with them um and is able to

23:20

hold space and be like that steady aspect of myself right um and then the

23:26

feminine is the essence of like the Soul Space within us it’s like the space of deeper meaning the play the allowing the

23:34

part of us that manifests life the sensuality the life force the Raja as I

23:40

like to say a lot of times it’s all of these beautiful elements of ourselves but it’s also like our emotional space

23:45

and a lot of times like the constantly shifting ever flowing world of our

23:51

emotional Landscapes so a lot of times because it can’t be named or contained or put in a box we really struggle with

23:58

our feminine we shame ourselves for our feminine because we want to keep that contained and under control you know what I mean yeah I I want to dive into

24:04

that issue because there are and actually prob i’ pick your brain after this for resources on the feminine but

24:10

I’m I’m but so resources on the masculine right all it very masculine to like put things into boxes and

24:16

categorize and like have all these different metaphors and all these different like you know charts and

24:21

everything right like a common one is like king warrior magician lover it’s like the union archetypes for the men right and there’s like graphs in or

24:28

whatever right that’s great um but the feminine is is like you said it’s ephemeral so I’ve always found it

24:33

difficult to even put words like even the question I asked you is a masculine question of like hey describe it list it

24:39

out what are its features what are it like like pull the spreadsheet you know like describe the feminine but you’re right it is a very like

24:46

ephemeral fluid thing um so I’m curious I just want to dig into that more like

24:52

how do you talk about the feminine with your clients or or invoke it in your

24:57

sessions yeah what I think is so interesting and I love what you just said about holding that this is the

25:04

difference in these energetics and we do need both because we need something that is clear and structured that we can feel

25:10

Tethered to in this experience of being in our bodies but also a big part of

25:15

what we have um struggled with around our feminine is that is the unknown the

25:21

feminine is the space of a lot of times why it gets into that distorted energy of anxiety is it’s like you know the

25:28

anxious energy is the like the fear of the future and what’s going to happen that I can’t know right and so we’ve

25:34

been in a really sort of you know unhealthy relationship with our feminine for so long I think because it it feels

25:42

wild and untameable and you know um there’s so many aspects of life that like as much as we can have science and

25:49

we can have all of this technology there are some things that are just beyond our human comprehension and that can feel D

25:55

stabilizing or or maybe and um it can also feel exciting because that’s the

26:01

space of like the imaginal space and possibility if we’re willing to see it that way so so often I find with clients

26:09

just naming these energetics and naming these as things that we have been conditioned to be in relationship with

26:15

in a certain way that even can feel really containing and like oh I’m not there’s nothing wrong with me that this

26:22

is something I struggle with it’s like no these are things that all of us struggle with it’s it’s our human you know yeah and everybody has it in them

26:29

and I think diving into that unknown is where the magic can happen you know one of my spiritual teachers defined the

26:35

feminine as embracing of the mystery the mysteries of life and and really just you know beholding the mysteries of life

26:41

without trying to fix it or solve it which as a man as a masculine oriented man I’m like what do you mean like I

26:46

solve Mysteries Sherlock Holmes over here you know like like that’s that’s like my whole brain just wants to solve the mystery or you know even more primly

26:53

like kill the mystery right cuz you you mentioned masculine has this like kind of like Predator Hunter aspect right we

26:59

want to like destroy the unknown and bring in order and structure so that’s

27:05

you just said a mouthful though mark because that’s important to me like I love that you said that because I think

27:12

and I don’t know if you experienced this but so often what happens when we fall in love with someone is we fall in love

27:18

with someone who’s sort of like the complimentary energy to us right it’s that yin and yang energy and so if you

27:25

are like that core masculine man that’s super structured super likes you know order and this is the way I do things

27:31

and this is what I know for sure you will often fall in love with a core feminine woman because she is radiant

27:37

and flowing and sensual and all of these things but then what happens when we get into partnership is I want to kill that

27:44

energy within her like it makes me uncomfortable it feels unsafe to me

27:50

because it’s not the way I process the world and so so much of what I do with couples is sort of like how do we get

27:55

into that space of remembrance like no we chose this person because they were such a beautiful compliment to our

28:01

energy our work is to like really feel like I am enriched by that versus like it’s a threat to who I am yeah let’s dig

28:08

into that because I see that a ton both in individual work and in couples work is that men are afraid of emotions and

28:15

what most guys say when you dig into that is they’re afraid of being consumed and afraid of being merged with them

28:21

which is a kind of we talk about toxic feminine it is kind of that right it’s like being totally enveloped and smothered and like losing a sense of

28:28

self which on the one hand can be a spiritual you know egolessness experience the other hand it can feel

28:33

like death for a guy so a lot of us are really afraid of these emotions and again we don’t we don’t like processing

28:39

our emotions we like killing our emotions right it’s like I am sad I do not want to be sad sad needs to die I

28:44

need to go back to happy versus I think the feminine has so much more emotional tolerance endurance I don’t know Majesty

28:53

right love that like I’ve seen feminine individuals really Bond over what a would call negative emotion right like

29:00

women being sad together brings them closer right whereas men being sad together we get all freaked out and we

29:05

don’t want anyone to see us be sad um at all so yeah I’m curious about the barriers that I think that get in the

29:11

way of accessing the feminine you know just like my heart as you’re talking I

29:17

think a little bit we were talking about why it’s so important for men and women to come back into sitting in circles and

29:22

that’s an aspect that I think we’ve lost in you know moving away from collectivist ways of being because even

29:29

as you were saying that I started to get a felt sense of something that I forget or I’m not maybe conscious of in terms

29:36

of what the felt experience for men is because I don’t process the world that way like I don’t think of emotions as

29:42

something that are going to overtake me and as you say it that makes so much sense because it’s like the waves it’s

29:49

like a lot of times like it feels like you’re drowning and how big her emotions are and how like out of control they are

29:56

and it’s like I need to contain this and this feels too big to contain I don’t even know what to do with that um and

30:02

that’s not the way that the the feminine is experiencing her emotions you know in

30:07

maybe her healthier space like now we’ve certainly been conditioned to hold contempt for the messiness of our emotions but I think that there’s so

30:15

much power in like reclaiming the thing of like being able to ride these waves and be

30:21

really curious about them as information that is sort of like tuning me into some

30:26

aspect of self that I meant to be curious about but also there’s just something in the understanding of what

30:33

you’re saying about shutting it down because that’s sort of where I land in the book is that like the reason the

30:39

work of integrating our own inner masculine and feminine um becomes so important is because I can only meet

30:45

another person to the extent that I’ve met myself and so if I’m really rejecting of my own feminine and my own

30:51

emotional waves feel big and scary and I shame myself for them I am certainly going to do that with my partner right

30:58

um but a lot of times we just have to understand this is why this feels so scary and even just now as you were

31:04

saying that that gave me an understanding of like the felt visceral experience of what that feels like within a man you know yeah I I was want

31:11

to underline what you said and to the you know male listeners out there what I heard D say is like the best way to show

31:16

up for the women in your life is to show up for yourself and understand your own emotions so that you aren’t you know shaming her often unconsciously right

31:23

you don’t mean to but it results in that right shaming or or being afraid of her

31:28

or pushing her away um the best thing to do is kind of dive into your own inner work so that you can hold it and I think

31:34

you know for a lot of guys and I’m CU your thoughts on this toight like our emotions can be really violent and I

31:40

think and like literally violent right like suicide violent or domestic violence violent you know or abuse

31:47

violent you know I I think a lot of men especially you know look at the millennial generation we saw the

31:53

violence of the generations above us and I think a lot of modern men are really afraid you you know um that’s why I hope

31:59

that there’s an update to some this masculine talk because I think a lot of the books and stuff I read talk about masculine being this like you know

32:06

football player jock stereotype big tough guy but what I see with our generation and younger is the opposite

32:13

it’s often like a depolarized male a guy who is afraid of his own power a guy who

32:18

is a nice guy who is a people pleaser who you know often isolates maybe spends a lot of time online doesn’t take care

32:24

of his body his mind and his Spirit you know it it’s still complete push away from the masculine versus this like

32:31

stereotype of the over embracing of it so yeah I guess to to order the conversation one I’m curious if you see

32:37

that and two how how you work with that in in your practice Yeah I love where we’re going with this because this is

32:43

really important from my perspective and you’re right Mark there’s so many ways that what our culture conditions men to

32:50

believe is that the only time men you know being a man feels emotions or is

32:57

able to be in his emotional world is either when he’s angry or when he’s having sex like that’s when you get to

33:03

access those emotions right like without feeling some sort of Shame about it um certainly not true of little boys if you

33:10

watch little boys when they’re with their buddies they’re just like so tender and loving and holding hands and

33:16

all of the emotions that are you know very natural and necessary for men to

33:22

feel um but they are shamed out of very young now why this matters and you’re

33:29

absolutely spoton what I started to notice with men was that again what the

33:35

feminist movement as grateful as we all are let me be clear for the feminist movement really taught all of us was

33:41

that you know there’s a lot about masculinity that is toxic but also I

33:46

always think about like as we were becoming more empowered as women nobody really taught

33:53

men how to hold space for that and so we have like a generation of men that were sitting at the table next to their

33:59

sisters while their mothers were saying men are trash and they’re toxic and they were like okay I don’t want to be that

34:04

so I’m going to try to suppress all of my masculinity and what it ends up being is it’s like a beach ball that you’re

34:10

holding underwater it’s like if I’m suppressing some aspect of my Humanity when it comes to the surface it’s like

34:16

and it feels big and scary and out of control so a lot of men end up being really afraid of their healthy emotions

34:24

but also of their anger like you know anger is in information it’s not necessarily a bad thing um I think when

34:32

I understand how to titrate my anger and be in relationship with my anger it’s actually useful when I’ve been

34:37

suppressing it because I think it makes me a bad person to be angry or to have like the full range of emotions then my

34:44

emotions feel out of control right so I think what you’re saying is so important because from my perspective our society

34:52

doesn’t suffer from a lack of masculinity our suffer our society is suffering from

34:58

wait let me back up our society from my perspective is actually suffering more

35:03

because we don’t have masculinity like I believe the the root to like solving so

35:09

many of these problems is bringing back in healthy masculinity and that men have

35:14

a sense of self and know themselves well and go through some of these initiatory processes because there’s just so much

35:21

pain in the masculine Collective that is impacting all of us like we can’t pretend it’s not the majority of you

35:27

know violent crimes are committed by men white CIS hetero men are the population Dying by Suicide at rates that are far

35:34

beyond any other part of the population men are hurting and we all should care because they are half of the population

35:40

you know what I mean absolutely yeah and to extend your beastball metaphor like you push it down too much and it pops

35:46

and that’s a suicide attempt right or that’s an abuse you know um absolutely and when I say to to a lot of my guys is

35:52

when I look at healthy masculinity I have to go back into the past I don’t see it around me you know but when I

35:57

look at you know I watch speeches from great speakers like Martin Luther King right or Teddy Roosevelt um or you know

36:03

wison Churchill or recently actually onest forzar or the rock which are very like masculine presenting dudes but

36:09

they’re able to speak very emotionally you know I I think when guys think about getting touched with their emotions I think about crying alone on their couch

36:16

in the dark you know they don’t think about leveraging their emotions to be a leader or to inspire people or to really

36:23

Express masculine values like protection and love and compassion and like you know strength and I think like we don’t

36:30

have those types of leaders or those mentors anymore just for what you’re saying I think there is this like Lost

36:36

Generation of guys that have just been really silenced and really shamed absolutely couldn’t agree with you

36:44

more yeah but yeah I think and that’s you

36:50

know I’m so moved by the men that are really demonstrating what it looks like to embody some of that healthy

36:58

feminine within themselves and allow to be a full functioning emotional human

37:04

being and you know I think more than anything what I’m so passionate about is men need Community men need other men

37:10

that hold space for some of these things for them because I think you know there’s all these ways that they see

37:15

like in Partnerships when a woman dies before the man he does not do well if a

37:21

woman or if a man dies before the woman she’s okay because she has an entire community of people to support her

37:27

that’s a problem you know yeah I think men definitely need other men right join men’s groups go to Retreats do all that

37:33

stuff I I think it’s really critical to just see that to see the strength and to feel the strength in male emotionality

37:40

and if we don’t have a guide or someone that can point the way we’re we’re not going to know where to go um so

37:45

conversation is going really well we’re going to move to our final commercial break when we come back I want to talk about some kind of practical tips or

37:51

exercises or or things that people can consider to start to you know encounter these energies within themselves so

37:57

listeners thank you for tuning in and we’ll see you on the other

38:26

side

38:56

e

39:26

e e

40:26

welcome back to the show I’m here with D Logan and she’s talking about internal masculine and femininity um so D I’m

40:32

curious if somebody wants to get started on this path if they’re listening to this conversation and they’re inspired

40:38

how should they start what should be step number one I’m like well first go get my book then by the book love my

40:45

book I I do think that there’s a lot of ways that I attempt to make some of this tangible with examples in terms of the

40:52

couples that I work with and all of that but beyond that I think you know

40:57

certainly starting to do some of the work of what we’ve been talking about right like what is some of the messaging

41:04

I got about what it means to be a man or like who I need to be to be enough as a

41:09

woman right like whatever these narratives have been around gender and the ways that we’ve been socialized

41:16

like how do we start to challenge that some of the work that I was talking about where like just going back to like

41:22

really being in a relationship with what you loved as a child I believe we are a

41:27

society that is really sort of suffering from a lack of Wonder you know like we’re all just and to me the Wonder is

41:34

the feminine right so there’s just all of these ways that we’re just like I got

41:40

to get through life I got to like you know we all have these responsibilities and all of that is real but at the end

41:46

of the day if we’re not enjoying our lives that doesn’t come without a cost that um really does sort of like

41:52

cultivate these stressors that you know create sickness and all of these things that are just not in service to any of

41:59

us but also um I believe we are shifting to a time where Community is going to be

42:05

the answer to so many things um I think you know what was interesting in 2020 as

42:11

a therapist was I was sort of watching how my clients would tell me about how

42:16

they would be really struggling with work and they came up with the solution of I have to work this neighbor that

42:23

I’ve never talked to also has to work we both have kids so maybe we could figure out how to split the day or get someone

42:29

to watch the kids outside while we’re working and I was like it’s fascinating to me how like we have this innate

42:35

knowing within us of how to do this thing of building Community when we have no choice we’ve really been conditioned

42:42

by this nuclear family structure that we’ve been living in that like you just get in this bunker with your nuclear

42:48

family and that’s all you should need and you’ll be fine and it’s just really not working for any of us so I think

42:54

certainly um our work is first like the feminine is the going Inward and doing the work to know ourselves well and you

43:01

know as therapists we’re certainly going to encourage you to be in relationship with your inner landscape and start to

43:06

build that relationship with yourself but then from there I think that we need to learn to be real with one another and

43:14

a little bit more vulnerable in the space of community and um allowing ourselves to be seen as scary as it is

43:20

but seeing how much healing comes from that you know I think it’s critical you know and to add a couple examples on

43:26

those ideas from my own life cuz I I followed some of this path for some of our listeners to make it tangible um one

43:31

of a spiritual Retreats I had a nature-based vision quest I remember as a kid I used to love waiting through

43:37

muddy rivers just like and feeling like the mud on my toes and like not being

43:42

worried about being dirty or anything right or like what was down there but just like enjoying the like raw sensual

43:47

pleasure of like moving through mud in a in a river and just like touching the rocks and the seaweed and whatever and I

43:54

was like maybe five when I had this memory right so took a while because I I had all this like resistance to doing it

44:00

but when I was able to do that and actually just feel it not think about it feel it it it was enlivening you know

44:06

like you said going back to those things we enjoyed as a kid so for our listeners out there it’s like I think the Gateway

44:13

is feeling you know feel the sun on your skin I think a lot of guys just like you said they feel it in sex maybe I’d I’d

44:19

add the gym or sports to that right I would add drugs to that like I think men are so hungry for feeling for actual

44:25

sensation even even though it’s accessible all the time so for those guys out there try to tap into raw

44:32

sensation whether it’s something in nature or something like a massage or you know certainly a workout or something like that but like be alive I

44:40

guess I would say you know try to like feel the power of being alive um love that and I think what you’re speaking to

44:46

Mark is is really mindfulness work like can I be in my body in relationship to the sensations I’m feeling and to your

44:54

point that can look like so many things that can look like getting a a massage and really being in touch with what it feels like to connect with that feeling

45:02

of you know someone touching your skin in that way and all of those things that I think we’ve just we’ve been such an

45:08

autopilot Society we’re on these little like machines and computers all the time we’re just checked out and I I think

45:15

you’re absolutely right a lot of this is coming into the mindfulness work of knowing how to be in our bodies again

45:21

yeah we’re so disembodied I agree completely and we’re so self-sufficient you know you most people can have a work

45:27

from home job order everything they want from Amazon including food get driven around in an Uber you know and just not

45:33

have to really depend on each other you know so I’m curious your thoughts on

45:38

this I’ll tell a quick story right or just a idea so you know I moved to World Colorado we’re talking about a little bit before and I mentioned we had a 4ot

45:45

snowstorm and I needed my neighbors right I tried to plow my driveway my

45:50

truck like slid down the driveway hit a tree and was pinned and it took a bunch of neighbors we all came over we dug get

45:57

out you know recovered the truck and then we took that truck and I plowed all their driveways you know so it was a

46:02

great just like Mountain Community story right and like that was a unexpected

46:08

benefit of living where I’m at being in a hostile environment that I do know my neighbors in a way that I didn’t when I

46:13

was in Boulder because Boulder Colorado is just a very cushy privileged area and

46:18

it’s a very techy area now so it you don’t need to like know anybody you don’t need it um so I’m curious for you

46:25

what do you think like about intentional Community like one is it possible and and how do you create Community without

46:32

survival need because so much of human Community has been based on survival needs right that’s why we needed each

46:37

other was so we don’t die in the harsh environments that we decide to live yeah

46:43

you know I think we’re living through a moment of Reckoning where we’re really being asked to be in this inquiry for

46:51

ourselves like who do we want to be as humans we are like AI is here I was about to say like we’re on the brink of

46:57

AI but like AI has arrived like it’s here it’s not really going anywhere but I think what we are going to see very

47:04

shortly is the necessity of human connection and that our humanity is the only thing that sort of separates us

47:12

from all of this technology and if we continue to put all of the emphasis on

47:17

technology and not on the human aspects of who we are I think that life is going to continue you know either harshly or

47:25

maybe a little bit more gently hopefully but show us what is um challenging about

47:31

that and it’s so funny Mark there are ways that like there were prophecies that spoke about this time in history

47:37

during the Aquarian age that began in 2023 saying that this was going to be the rise of the feminine Consciousness

47:43

and it was going to be a gradual thing that you know all of a sudden we were going to remember like the necessity of

47:50

making meaning and being in this experience of human connection and

47:55

collaboration in a really um presence centered intentional way and I think we

48:01

are you know we’re just like right at the start of it but I believe that all of this is sort of unfolding in the same

48:07

way that your truck sort of slid down with the universe being like all right Mark we’re going to get to know our neighbors

48:14

call that’s it like I have no choice and I think that’s going to be a little bit

48:19

um the way that things unfold to show us why we need each other so much so

48:25

hopefully we’ll get there without it being too catastrophic but I do believe that we are remembering ourselves more

48:31

and more I think there are conversations we’re having about spirituality and about making meaning I

48:37

think we’re just at a point where we’re we’re starting to feel a little bit you know like I’m tired of this thing of

48:42

constantly like numbing on my phone and and we’re looking for more experiences and I I’m sure you see this as someone

48:49

who does Retreats that it’s like the in-person things people are really hungry for that and there’s just like

48:55

such a deep sale of the healing that comes when we see one another and when we come together at a healing community

49:02

so it’s like we remember how to do it and I think we’re just starting to like feel that pull to come back to it yeah

49:08

it’s it’s the are funny because it’s I’ve experienced so much resistance to it I’ve doing them for four years and

49:15

they’re just now starting to take off but the people that go love it and keep coming back and I think that really just

49:21

speaks to what you’re talking about what’s going on in the culture is like we think we don’t need it or maybe on some level where deeply afraid of it but

49:28

once we feel it it’s like oh my God where has this been my whole life and really it’s like we’re not doing

49:33

anything that crazy we’re like talking to each other in circles for the most part doing group therapy in the woods but it it is really powerful for people

49:40

and you know for women I am I I kind of like the the Trad movement to some extent because what they’re bringing

49:46

back is some traditional feminine spaces like sewing circles and like you know Pottery things where like women would

49:52

connect in circles right and like share the oral history of you know their

49:58

themselves and their families or you know the what’s going on in the village and the town and like all those things got destroyed too like there’s no places

50:05

where that are feminine spaces where women gather and just talk with one another like what happened you know it’s

50:13

all G well you know my theory of what is returning in terms of the feminine is like there’s going to be a a Reclamation

50:19

of our witch and I think that that is a big part of what it’s going to look like for the feminine to just be back in

50:27

nature and really connecting to all of the intelligence of the herbs and the

50:32

natural resources that we were really in tune with in terms of our ability to

50:37

heal ourselves and ability to be in nature um that patriarchy really stripped us of right so I

50:44

think I sort of you know I think that there’s going to be a balance and there’s going to be a way that we

50:51

understand how to hold one another as valuable regardless of how we identify

50:57

in terms of gender but to me the biggest gift is that I believe we’re all going to Define for ourselves what looks like

51:04

a beautiful co-created life that we want to be living versus this external Authority is telling me what a good life

51:11

looks like and what my fiveyear plan should be and all of these things that I think we’re just starting to see like a

51:16

little bit you know behind the curtain and The Wizard of Oz doesn’t really hold as much um you know weight as we might

51:24

have thought oh 100% yeah I don’t want to get too political towards the end the show but like you look at the upcoming

51:29

election and it’s like if these are the men we’re putting out we need some witches you know we need we need

51:34

something else yeah we need something else and and like yeah we talked you know in the show about the um the male

51:41

and the Predator Hunter mentality but I think you’re speaking to is the gatherer mentality of the feminine which is like

51:47

go out and explore and like look at the plans and pick up the rocks and just see what’s in our close environment instead

51:54

of living in these very linear ways of like get in the car drive to work drive to grocery store drive home right like a

52:00

more kind of expansive way of living and you know I’m a huge fan of nature-based connection and ritual and all that and

52:06

and that’s I think women need that they need to just like know what’s around them and and not just know but like that

52:12

that’s masculine but like be in a relationship like you’re saying be in a relationship with what’s around them and what’s growing and What needs help and

52:18

caregiving and tending and just really like owning their space yeah and we need

52:23

to do so little I find to heal as you were saying saying about the it’s like we’re almost scared of our own power and

52:30

like I’m sure you’ve experienced this as a therapist that so long we’re just like in the anxiety and like the fear and

52:37

like whatever the stuckness is because we imagine whatever the emotion is if we go there it will kill us and then we

52:43

finally go there and we’re like oh this was so easy right but I think that’s the same as us as humans and like just

52:49

getting a nature I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had a client who’s having like a panic attack and I’ve been like do me a favor take your shoes off

52:56

go outside walk around in your backyard for a little bit and then text me and tell me how you feel and they’re like I

53:02

feel better and it’s like yeah we know how to do this thing of returning to Our Roots and allowing the Earth to heal us

53:09

but we’ve just been conditioned to forget yeah we’ve been kind of forced to live in boxes and and have interaction

53:15

mediated through screens it’s just not natural right it’s like I said it’s very robotic so we can keep going there’s a

53:22

huge conversation here uh but we are nearing the end of our show um can’t wait to have you for a future episode

53:27

tonight there’s a ton of stuff to talk about and I know our listeners found this valuable so where can people learn

53:32

more about you online again touch with some of your work thank you Mark um i’ I’ve really enjoyed this conversation

53:39

with you um you can find me online at D logan.com and then I’m on all the social

53:46

media socials at d. Logan de ne. l o an um

53:53

yeah great and all that stuff is in the show notes as well as a link to the book book Sovereign Love pick it up um it’s a

53:58

phenomenal read and I think it’s really pushing the conversation forward in a meaningful way so buy the book support

54:04

da um check out her stuff she’s got a lot of really good messages out there um so da thanks again for being on the

54:11

show and listeners such a pleasure really great to meet you listen thank

54:16

you so much for tuning in and we’ll see you next week another episode of the men’s therapy

54:25

podcast