For some men I’ve worked with this means focusing the Warrior by training in martial arts. For others it means adopting a very focused attitude to business. For others it means finding a cause, a set of values, or a purpose which is personally important and which can be embraced with whole-heartedness.
For some it means protecting the family and doing everything necessary to ensure the family’s well-being. For others it is about fighting for justice. For many men, it is about forging a path of their own choosing through life. But whatever it means for you, there’s no question that your powerful Warrior needs to be carefully managed and harnessed in the service of your Sovereign rather than allowed to rampage around on his own account. This is explained more fully in the chapter on the Sovereign.
Anger, Fear and Weakness
From time to time I work in an organization which runs weekend workshops designed to bring men to a fuller, closer relationship with their mature masculinity and maleness. One of the objectives we have is to help them embody their Warrior archetype in a healthy way. When men arrive for their weekend on Friday evening, I see a lot of fear.
Yet when I talk to men who were doing this work 20 years ago, they tell me that most of the men in those days arrived with a lot of anger. This seeming shift from anger towards fear might be a reflection of society’s fear of masculine warrior energy. This has probably not been helped by a feminist movement against male authoritarianism and the power of the patriarchy.
I believe some men have internalized this energy as self-hatred or fear of their own masculinity. Now they simply don’t have access to clean male energy. Rather, they look like the “new men” of our time – incomplete, eager to please, emotionally immature, living in fear of the feminine and fearing their own male power.
Yet this is not their fault. Not really. After all, who is there in society to teach young men how to become powerful adult men with easy access to their warrior energy?
Traditionally this would have been the job of the Elders and adult men in the village, who would put the boy through a series of more or less terrifying initiation rituals which might result in his death. This process was designed to transform his fear into warrior power so that he could fully live his destiny as a Warrior.
Nowadays, although we need warrior energy just as much to survive the demands and rigours of our modern technological society and all its challenges, most men are not introduced to their Warrior archetype in any meaningful way. In fact for many men warrior energy is completely repressed into the shadow unconscious.
And even in shadow this warrior energy (which you can call male energy, assertiveness, the energy of action in the world, anger, aggressiveness and no doubt many other names) retains its power. It will emerge sooner or later as the Warrior’s shadows – uncontrolled and destructive.
The Emotional Wound In The Warrior Quarter
We think of the Warrior archetype as the source of the masculine energy responsible for getting things done in the world. And so it is, but underlying this is a deeper need in all of us to make an impact on the world.
To make an impact you must be sure at the heart of your being that your very existence is right and proper. You must know you have a right to exist, a right to occupy the space you’re in. And an unconditional right at that.
And to know that, you must know where your physical and emotional boundaries lie. You must have a clear sense of your own identity. Only then will you be able to build the foundations of true adult male power and presence, and have the ability to make an impact on others.
In an ideal world these qualities emerge naturally as a child grows and develops. When a baby is born there is no separation in the baby’s mind between baby and mother. That separation develops over the first year of life as the child gradually comes to realize that he or she is a separate being with the ability to impact the world and get his or her needs met. This is part of the child’s identity formation and individuation.
At the same time as he starts to develop an awareness of his psychological boundaries, he also naturally begins to experience the boundaries of his body. These represent the physical boundaries of his existence in the world.
If all goes well with this process a child will develop a clear sense of separation from his parents. As he does so, he gradually realizes he can make demands of the world and comes to understand he can refuse to cooperate with the demands made of him. He realizes he has a will of his own and that he can say “No!” And so he comes to understand he has power in the world.
Very often a child’s “No” is more about learning to set boundaries than saying “I don’t want that!” In reality the child is exploring the difference, the separation, between himself and his parents. At the same time he is experimenting with his newly discovered sense of power and potency in the world.
If his parents are strong enough, mature enough, and wise enough to hold this energy in a loving way and to accept their child’s “No!” as a sign of his individuality and growth, then he can develop a strong sense of self-identity and come to know he has power in the world.
This is a healthy process which leads a child to the unconscious certainty that he is indeed his own person and that he has a right to exist in the world in his own image. And then he can naturally embrace many of the qualities of the balanced Warrior.
Unfortunately ours is not an ideal world.
A lot of men in my men’s emotional healing workshops tell me how their mothers, fathers, siblings, friends and other adults invaded their boundaries when they were children.
In fact I think almost every child experiences adults infringing their boundaries in one way or another. That can range from a lack of respect for their privacy or personal space all the way through to deliberate emotional, physical or sexual abuse.
But whether minor or major, any kind of boundary incursion, repeated often enough, inevitably has some impact on a child’s developing identity, sense of self and warrior energy. And each time it happens the response inside the child is likely to be anger. That’s because anger is not only the energy which drives boundary setting; it is also the natural response to the infringement of our boundaries.
Unfortunately anger is an emotion which can be difficult for parents to accept in their child. Some parents have their own issues with anger. Maybe it scares them. Maybe they can’t hold it safely for their child while he learns to hold it safely for himself. Maybe they just don’t want an angry child in the family.
Whatever the reason, a child may have to repress his anger if he is to be accepted as a full member of the family unit. This is a direct assault on the child’s right to express his feelings freely. It’s also an assault on his right to an independent, individuated existence.
The message which the child picks up is some variation of “You can’t exist as a separate person in your own right.” More simply, we could express the message as “Don’t exist as you are.”
Of course the Warrior wound doesn’t have to be as extreme as an overt or covert injunction which says “Don’t exist.” Often the message a child picks up is something more like “You can’t be yourself.” “You can’t exist as who you are.” “You are only wanted here if you become what we want you to be.” And so on.
These are messages which tell the child his existence in the world will always be conditional on him being a certain way, or on getting somebody else’s approval. And that can be just as harmful to a child’s sense of self as the simpler and more direct message “Don’t exist.”
So the Warrior wound is an emotional wound about existence and identity. Somehow a child comes to understand that his identity, the way he is, perhaps even his very existence, simply isn’t acceptable in its natural form. Somehow he comes to know that his right to assert himself, his natural self-confidence, his assertiveness, and even the anger which arises when his boundaries are infringed cannot be freely expressed. Instead it must be put into shadow. This is an emotional wounding which can have devastati
ng consequences.
There are many variations of this wounding which can continue throughout boyhood and adolescence. For example, if a boy’s tears are unacceptable to his family, the message the child receives may be something like: “We don’t want your sadness around here. Take it somewhere else. If you want to be a part of this family, don’t show your sadness to us.”
When faced with this ultimatum, whether it’s spoken or implicit, a boy will repress his tears because he wants to remain a part of the family group both physically and emotionally. He may start to cover his tears and sadness by hiding them behind anger. (I’ve met many men in the course of my work who weren’t allowed to express their anger during childhood and put it into shadow to please their parents. I’ve met many more who did not have the freedom to show their grief and so put their sadness and tears into shadow.)
Whatever the exact nature of his wounding, if a boy learns to hide, repress and deny the anger which naturally arises in him when his boundaries are violated, he will develop a relationship with anger which definitely won’t serve him later in life.
He may not be able to assert himself. He may not know what is acceptable to him and what isn’t. He may not be able to say “No!” He may become a pussy, a walk-over. In the extreme he may become a boundary-less individual who is open to invasion from everyone who wants to step over his boundaries, deliberately or accidentally. He may become passive-aggressive, showing indirect resistance to the demands of others and an avoidance of direct confrontation.
There can be more subtle consequences as well. If a boy doesn’t develop an appropriate level of self-confidence, assertiveness and warrior energy, and the well-defined sense of self that goes with it, as an adult he may simply not know what he stands for. One minute he’ll agree with one person, one point of view, and the next he’ll agree with somebody else taking precisely the opposite point of view.
In short, the more a boy represses his anger the less likely he is to become a man able to defend his boundaries, stand up for himself, speak his mind forcefully, take appropriate action, be powerful and decisive, and generally make a mark in the world.
Of course the energy of anger repressed into shadow does not go away. Often it builds up bit by bit until it reaches cyclone-like force. Then, perhaps in response to the slightest trigger, this energy may erupt as emotional or physical violence all over anyone or anything unfortunate enough to be near the man. In the opposite extreme, the suppressed anger is turned against the self and becomes some kind of reactive depression.
But whether his anger inflates (intensifies) or deflates (becomes less obvious), its energy is alive and well inside the man’s shadow unconscious, from where it will constantly leak out in various ways. The Warrior’s shadows can indeed be frightening. Let’s look at them in more detail.
The Warrior’s Shadows
When you think about the explosions of rage and the cruelty and brutality which men and women can display, you might wonder how human beings can be capable of such depravity and lack of feeling. The answer lies in the almost unimaginable power of the Shadow Warrior.
Every archetypal shadow has two opposing poles known as the inflated and the deflated form. The Warrior’s shadow can manifest in the inflated form of the Sadist or Bully, and in the deflated form of the Masochist, victim, or coward.
The Inflated Shadow: The Bully, Sadist or Perpetrator
Once warrior energy goes into shadow, it may inflate – in other words grow. Robert Moore and Douglas Gillette called the inflated Shadow Warrior the “Sadist”. Another word is “Bully”. It’s an energy which takes many forms.
Inflation of shadow warrior anger can produce a man who is volatile, unpredictable, and who oozes aggression out of every pore. This is the man around whom no-one feels safe. He looks like he might explode at any moment.
And indeed he might, most commonly in outbursts of rage provoked by something quite trivial. Road rage is a well known example of this. This kind of male shadow anger is often directed against other people, which is why it can be so dangerous. Women in particular know this.
Sometimes the Warrior wound can lead to failure to form a clear self-identity, so men with a strong Shadow Warrior may try to affirm some kind of identity for themselves by joining a particular group and labelling themselves with the identity of the group. We see that in the case of gangs, religious institutions, members of the military, and so on.
Another aspect of this weak identity is the way some men seek to “big” themselves up by wearing “big name brands” and buying products with so-called designer labels. This feels phony and has the air of someone desperately shouting “Look who I am! I am someone of significance!”
Another sign of the inflation of warrior energy is seen in the man who constantly asserts himself, trying to be bigger than he really is, threatening others, taking offence at the slightest hint of an insult, and generally “looking for trouble”.
Another common example of the inflated Warrior is to be found in the increasingly recognized experience of workplace bullying.
Most often shadow anger manifests in the form of the sadistic Warrior or bully. If a man allows this Shadow Warrior to outwardly express his desire for destruction and cruelty, he may feel some kind of satisfaction and perhaps even pleasure as he torments his victims.
This sadism, bullying, taunting and victimization can sit alongside a hatred of those whom the Shadow Warrior perceives as weak and on whom he perpetrates his violence. (Of course, this behaviour is all about denying the fact that the man himself is a weak Warrior.)
The Shadow Warrior is insecure, adolescent in outlook, and violently emotional. These qualities mirror aspects of the Hero archetype, the boyhood form of the Warrior archetype.
Robert Moore and Douglas Gillette saw the Hero as an energetic archetype which provides an adolescent boy with the energy to break free from the feminine, both internally and externally, so he can identify with, and join, the world of the masculine. In their view, men under the control of the Shadow Warrior who behave like sadists are unsure of their legitimate male power. In fact they suggested that an inflated Warrior, like an adolescent boy, might still be waging war against the power of his inner feminine or “Anima”. It’s certainly possible. Either way, we’ll look more closely at the energy of the Hero in a moment.
The more you look around our society, the more you can spot the inflated Shadow Warrior in one form or another. He manifests as the wife-beater, the teenage bully, the abusive father, the unreasonable, harassing boss or bullying co-worker, even the rapist, and so on.
One thing which can really activate the Sadist or Bully is the sight of weakness. When a man’s Shadow Warrior sees weakness – whether that is part of a man’s own psyche or something in the world around him – he may charge out of hiding and start wielding his sword with ridiculous violence and power, metaphorically chopping off the heads of everyone within reach.
In other words, the sadistic Shadow Warrior’s victim can just as easily be the man in whom he resides as anyone else. When he turns against his host, some form of self-harming behaviour pattern is a common result. One common expression of this may be the self-driven workaholic who seems to have no time for himself.
This is the energy we see in managers who stay on at work after everyone else has gone home. We see it in therapists, social workers, doctors and nurses who endlessly try to meet the needs of other people’s emotional well-being, even at the expense of their own.
In short, these are people who don’t care for themselves. They act out the drive of the Shadow Warrior under the guise of helping others or saving the world, while simultaneously harming themselves and perhaps their families as well. Although subtler and more refined than the energy of the outright bully, this still seems to be the energy of the Shadow Warrior, this time turned against the self.
In reality, if a man doesn’t have an internal psychological structure strong enough to withstand the force of his Shadow Warrior, any
situation which puts a great deal of pressure on him can empower the Shadow Warrior to take control.
I saw this in a young father in his twenties who attended one of my workshops. He was having trouble with his anger – well, rage really – towards his young children.
As a child he had suffered at the hands of his own violent father. Unsurprisingly, he had internalized his father’s rage and abusiveness. Now under relentless pressure as family breadwinner and father of three young boys he could not control his anger, particularly during the stressful periods in his life.
He found himself overtaken in an instant by the energy of his Shadow Warrior, who raged abusively and violently, unexpectedly and uncontrollably. No matter how much he wanted to do things differently, he seemed unable to change his behaviour.
By allowing him to express this part of himself fully and without restriction, in symbolic form and in a safe setting, we were able to get the anger out of shadow and more integrated into his conscious awareness. This gave him much greater control over his rage and allowed him to start responding, rather than instantly reacting, to situations which had previously triggered his Shadow Warrior.
The Deflated Shadow: The Masochist, Coward or Victim
The deflated Shadow Warrior, the one who tends not to show any anger, may be a masochist, coward, weakling or victim. Repressed anger directed against the self can also manifest as a form of chronic depression or lack of motivation.
The masochist is a doormat, a mummy’s boy, a wimp. It’s the quality which can evoke the abusive insult “Don’t be such a pussy!” These words refer to the passivity and lack of power or presence in this expression of the Warrior’s shadow.
And just like the Sadist, this shadow originates in some kind of alienation from healthy, balanced warrior energy.
Warrior, Magician, Lover, King Page 4