Connor Beaton argues that men who chronically suppress pain, grief, and anger create a psychological shadow that sabotages their goals, relationships, and health. The more they push emotions down, the more power this shadow gains to work against them. Awareness of this trap is the first step toward processing emotions differently.
For men, suppression is this kryptonite. It's a kind of poison that when you suppress too much, long enough, hard enough, what ends up happening is the psychological and emotional material that you end up pushing down and suppressing becomes the energy that sabotages your life. It forms your shadow. It forms the part of your psyche, the part of your identity, the part of your personality that actually acts against you. Against your goals, your aims, the man you want to be, the type of intimacy and sex you want to have, the type of relationship you want, the type of body that you want. It works against all of that. So the more that you suppress, the more that you suppress your pain, the more you suppress your grief, your anger, the more that you suppress those things, the more fuel, the more energy that it produces to work against you.
How to Raise Strong, Unshakable Boys in Today's Culture, with Dr. Shefali Tsabary
