By now you’ve certainly heard or read that Procter & Gamble’s Gillette brand group has launched an ad (or perhaps a campaign) urging men to “Shave their toxic masculinity.” If you believe all publicity is good publicity, this would look like a victory for Gillette. However, if your purpose is to attract more loyal customers, it’s hard to see how this ad will make that happen.

Half a cheer for taking a stand

Let’s give Gillette credit for purchasing expensive air time to promote their corporate point of view. And let’s concede that the abuses of masculine strength they call out are genuinely wrong. I’ve taught my own sons and published this blog to reinforce the purpose and appropriate use of masculine strength.

Where the blade slips

Here’s the problem: Gillette blames all men for the misuse of masculine strength. Cultural Marxist feminism has sought to destroy men by diminishing and vilifying them simply for being men. This is the same cohort that attempted to define the marriage bed — that transcendent one-flesh union that is a glorious gift of God — as rape. That’s right: they call sexual relations between a husband and his wife rape.

Whether they mean to or not Gillette tars all men with the broad brush of “toxic masculinity” — a term of art used to smear any masculine expression that doesn’t conform to current-year pieties. It’s purposely vague and obviously intended to exert control over men and their behavior, particularly men who are more traditionally masculine.

In my view, this is not just bad business, but Procter & Gamble have allowed a political -ism to hijack its brand and in doing so, alienate its loyal customers.

Piling on

Coincidentally, the American Psychiatric Association issued a report just a few days before the Gillette ad saying that traditional masculinity was harmful. And there it is! To be a man is to be bad. We have a lot to look forward to as the implications of this study take root.

Bleeding out

I’ve read several articles on the Gillette ad, and I have particularly enjoyed reading the comment sections following each. While I didn’t find any commenters acting as champions for sexual harassment, bullying, or sexual violence, I did see men and women rejecting the slander and declaring their intention not to buy Procter & Gamble products going forward. It’s a free country, and free men and women get to spend their own money where they will.

Several of the commenters made the point that if you want men to take the lead, don’t berate them in front of the ones who are supposed to follow them. This is correct.

That’s why we want to encourage and affirm at this blog, rather than shame or scold. The other thing I’ve learned is, where men are concerned if you’re talking to everybody, you’re not talking to anybody.

More freedom

Since I practice my freedom of speech here, I support and endorse Procter & Gamble’s right to waste their shareholders’ money on preachy and ineffective ads. I also support and endorse those consumers who choose to take their business elsewhere. Live and let live.

My family and I don’t want to reward a business that seeks to enhance its reputation by slandering men, so we will be shopping more carefully.

About that crisis

Before I close this post, I want to say that there is a crisis in masculinity. But that crisis is spiritual in nature — and it isn’t going to resolve by buying one brand of razor blade or another. And that’s the worst of Gillette’s blunder: call out a social problem with a spiritual root, and present your product as the magic solution. Or worse, position yourself as judge and scold. “Forgive us, O Gillette, for we have sinned — every one!”

But spiritual problems don’t get better simply by trying harder. My friends in recovery understand this better than most. This is why 12-step programs such as Alcoholics Anonymous encourage participants to acknowledge their powerlessness to overcome addiction on their own, and to engage the help of a “higher power.” Around here, we know His name. And as we grow in our love for Him, He transforms us. Then obedience, reformation, and restoration take the place of the unhealthy compulsions that so often result in the abuse of masculine strength with all those unhappy consequences.

So, I’m keeping my beard, changing my razor, and seeking to walk closer with Jesus. I won’t look different, but over time, I want to be more like Him.

So how about you? What’s your take on the Gillette ad and the APA statement? Add your comments below.

PS Not so long ago, Gillette ran an inspirational ad depicting Seattle Seahawks rookie player Shaquem Griffin from his childhood to the NFL. The scene with his father teaching him and his brother to shave was on-brand and affirming. This shows how truly wretched the new anti-masculinity ad is. Maybe Gillette figures that the greater surface area of women’s legs will offset the loss of blade sales for men’s faces.

“Turn my eyes from looking at worthless things; and give me life in your ways.” – Psalm 119:37

We have spent the last several weeks considering the importance of the psychological and emotional needs Identity, Stimulation, and Security. In this post, I’d like to discuss the consequences of the misplaced or unmoderated need for stimulation.

Knowing how to distinguish real from counterfeit is valuable

Is stimulation bad?

Let’s address this up front: stimulation is vital. Babies need visual and auditory stimuli to develop normally. And sociologist Robert Ardrey who enumerated these needs maintained that we need stimulation throughout our lives to be emotionally healthy. We need to encounter new ideas, new people, new locations, new songs, new works of art to feel and be truly alive. If you’re creative at all, you know that it’s nearly impossible to create out of a sense of boredom.

But let’s also agree that stimulation, like many other beneficial things, is subject to misuse. We can seek sensation and experiences as a substitute for a healthy sense of identity and or security. We can use cheap imitations of genuine accomplishments to avoid potential pain or loss. We all have our favorite mindless entertainments, and we use them to get a quick hit when we’re procrastinating. I can find no shortage of articles to read when I should be writing, for example. But why do we do this?

Paging Dr. Zimbardo

In his TED Talk titled The Demise of Guys, Dr. Philip Zimbardo explains that westerners, men in particular, have essentially re-wired their brains through consumption of visual media. He says that excessive screen time — particularly web surfing, porn and video games — has created what he calls arousal addiction. This type of addiction creates a powerful craving for novelty — that is, for more and different stimulation. He contrasts this with drug addictions, where the desire is for increased quantities of the same substance.

Your brain on stimulation

So what happens when our brains are stimulated in this way? The arousal response results in production of the neurotransmitter dopamine. It’s powerful stuff. Dopamine lights up the brain’s pleasure/reward center and it is part of the neurochemical mechanism of motivation. When you’re producing dopamine you are receiving a naturally occurring positive reinforcement that will cause you to repeat the behavior that created the reward. If you’re generating product or creating something positive, this can be an engine of prosperity. But what if you’re reinforcing the pursuit of pleasure for its own sake?

When a man exposes his brain to excessive stimulation — via junk food, gambling, porn, or video games — dopamine production increases radically. The producers of this stuff know it. In the same way water flowing downhill creates a gouge, then a gully, excessive dopamine creates its own pleasure pathway — a landing pad that demands more traffic. As Zimbardo explains, the desire is for greater variety, not just more of the same. The recipe for loneliness then is: Indulge, rewire your brain, and isolate yourself.

Nothing new under the sun

Man’s tendency to seek too much of a good thing didn’t start with the advent of the internet, any more than his tendency toward violence began with the invention of machine guns. However, the ability to create large-scale impacts in a very short period of time is a product of technological progress. Men have always been fascinated by sex, but the anonymity of the internet has provided access to far more images far more frequently. Zimbardo claims the average man views 50 pornographic video clips per week. If so, the effects of arousal addiction are likely to be more widespread and more profound

But let’s go back to the root of all this: we need stimulation, and we are biochemically wired to reward ourselves for it. The feeling of accomplishment when you achieve a goal, complete a project, take a trophy buck, or ask that cute girl for her number — that’s all proper and a result of dopamine doing its job. This is natural and beneficial in its proper place and proportion.

I submit to you that the problem is seeking that dopamine rush without doing the difficult work that leads to legitimate rewards. Each of us has a mission, and we need to be at our respective posts. Faithfulness brings a good reward. Shirking your duty to chase shiny objects leads to all kinds of calamity. Let’s look at an example from ancient history.

Oh look — a squirrel

In chapter 11 of 2 Samuel, there’s a famous story of a king seeking stimulation in the wrong places. It goes like this:

In the spring of the year, the time when kings go out to battle, David sent Joab, and his servants with him, and all Israel. And they ravaged the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah. But David remained at Jerusalem.

It happened, late one afternoon, when David arose from his couch and was walking on the roof of the king’s house, that he saw from the roof a woman bathing; and the woman was very beautiful. And David sent and inquired about the woman. And one said, “Is not this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?” So David sent messengers and took her, and she came to him, and he lay with her. (Now she had been purifying herself from her uncleanness.) Then she returned to her house.  And the woman conceived, and she sent and told David, “I am pregnant.”

So David sent word to Joab, “Send me Uriah the Hittite.” And Joab sent Uriah to David. When Uriah came to him, David asked how Joab was doing and how the people were doing and how the war was going. Then David said to Uriah, “Go down to your house and wash your feet.” And Uriah went out of the king’s house, and there followed him a present from the king. But Uriah slept at the door of the king’s house with all the servants of his lord, and did not go down to his house. When they told David, “Uriah did not go down to his house,” David said to Uriah, “Have you not come from a journey? Why did you not go down to your house?” Uriah said to David, “The ark and Israel and Judah dwell in booths, and my lord Joab and the servants of my lord are camping in the open field. Shall I then go to my house, to eat and to drink and to lie with my wife? As you live, and as your soul lives, I will not do this thing.” Then David said to Uriah, “Remain here today also, and tomorrow I will send you back.” So Uriah remained in Jerusalem that day and the next. And David invited him, and he ate in his presence and drank, so that he made him drunk. And in the evening he went out to lie on his couch with the servants of his lord, but he did not go down to his house.

In the morning David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it by the hand of Uriah. In the letter he wrote, “Set Uriah in the forefront of the hardest fighting, and then draw back from him, that he may be struck down, and die.” And as Joab was besieging the city, he assigned Uriah to the place where he knew there were valiant men. And the men of the city came out and fought with Joab, and some of the servants of David among the people fell. Uriah the Hittite also died. Then Joab sent and told David all the news about the fighting. And he instructed the messenger, “When you have finished telling all the news about the fighting to the king, then, if the king’s anger rises, and if he says to you, ‘Why did you go so near the city to fight? Did you not know that they would shoot from the wall? Who killed Abimelech the son of Jerubbesheth? Did not a woman cast an upper millstone on him from the wall, so that he died at Thebez? Why did you go so near the wall?’ then you shall say, ‘Your servant Uriah the Hittite is dead also.’”

So the messenger went and came and told David all that Joab had sent him to tell. The messenger said to David, “The men gained an advantage over us and came out against us in the field, but we drove them back to the entrance of the gate. Then the archers shot at your servants from the wall. Some of the king’s servants are dead, and your servant Uriah the Hittite is dead also.” David said to the messenger, “Thus shall you say to Joab, ‘Do not let this matter displease you, for the sword devours now one and now another. Strengthen your attack against the city and overthrow it.’ And encourage him.”

When the wife of Uriah heard that Uriah her husband was dead, she lamented over her husband. And when the mourning was over, David sent and brought her to his house, and she became his wife and bore him a son. But the thing that David had done displeased the Lord.”

Go to school on David, or learn your own painful lessons

It almost looks like the plot of a Hollywood thriller, doesn’t it? Voyeurism, lust, adultery, conspiracy, murder, corruption, and a cover-up. None of it necessary.

Notice first that King David was at home when he should have been on the battlefield with his army. Maybe he had been too successful too soon, or maybe he had gotten bored with winning. No matter the reason he was casting about on his roof, spying on his neighbor’s wife as she bathed. Maybe she was bored, too, and wanted the excitement of an affair with the powerful king next door. Perhaps. But if he had been faithful to his mission, his men, and his God, he wouldn’t have been there in the first place.

There’s more to the story, and I urge you to read on in 2 Samuel. You can start here. But I want to encourage you — and me — to get solid on your identity and your purpose, and avoid the cheap buzz that fake stimulation creates.

Be a producer, not a consumer

If you are in the grip of one of the fake stimuli, I challenge you to quit being a consumer and to begin to produce, to create. You know your gifts, spend your time seeking the rewards of genuine accomplishment by making something that others can enjoy or from which they can benefit. Create sculptures, paint pictures, plant gardens, paint houses, tell stories, write songs, stage plays, serve others. And learn to enjoy the satisfaction of real rewards.

So how about you? How are you experiencing accomplishment and avoiding arousal addiction? Add your comments below.

 “Crazy is like glitter. It sticks to everything, gets everywhere, and you never get rid of it.”  – Anonymous (or perhaps I said it first)

In this post, I want to explore the relationship between Identity and Stimulation.

Insert Personality Here

Crazy

Gen X Angst

Haiku writing youth

I’m a pierced nonconformist

Just like all my friends

                  -George E. Booth

Two facets

 About glitter

What makes crazy so crazy?

But why do they do it?

I’m so glad you asked! Part of the reason I’ve emphasized identity followed by Truth is to make this next point clearer. People do crazy things because, having abandoned Truth, they do not know who they are or why they are here. This leads to a good deal of experimentation. Since I’m feeling generous, I’ll call it questing.

The quest is to overcome the boredom that a rootless, purposeless life will produce. Think about the worst stereotype of American middle-class consumerism. Glassy-eyed, stoop-shouldered, and paunchy, homo economicus americanus  gets up every morning to earn enough money to keep a roof over his head, so he can get up every morning…

This is where the synthetic stimulants enter. These range from television to fantasy sports, to video games, to gambling, to intoxicants, to gossip, to stirring up conflicts among people, to living vicariously through celebrities or even one’s own children. (And yes, porn would be included in this grouping, too.) Not all of these would appeal to every man, but a bored man will be attracted to one or more of them. The goal is to fill the emptiness with experiences, with feelings — even if they aren’t rooted in reality.

I want to be fair and add that leisure time is a blessing, and a measure of our comparative affluence. And Story is an important part of being human. So please understand that I am for wholesome pastimes, just not at the expense of Living and being truly alive.

Contrast fake stimulation with a life of purpose and consequence where every day is vitally important, and the fruit of one’s labor is enhanced by the satisfaction of the tasks completed and delight at the work ahead.

Initiation: getting your question answered

Love, Dad

• Don’t date or marry crazy – She won’t change. But for God, people don’t change.
• Don’t co-sign crazy – It’s bad financial practice, and you’re only enabling more jackassery.
• Don’t make your living from crazy – It’s immoral to sell people the tools of their enslavement
• Avoid other people’s drama – Recognize it for trap it is — especially the classic “Let’s You and Him Fight”
• Don’t try to fix other people’s crazy – Love everyone and live your life. Pray for the crazy ones you know, but unless you’re a trained counselor, leave that to the pros.
• Let God initiate you into manhood – If you didn’t get it from your dad, God wants to do this for you.
• Get some sane friends – encourage each other in your respective missions.

So how about you – In what ways are you giving crazy a wide berth? Add your comments below.

“There is a me you would not recognize…” – Over the Rhine from Latter Days

In my previous post on identity, I warned against the rise of the impostor, also known as the false self. If you’re like me and most of the men I’ve met, you have either overcome the false self, or you are living the life of the false self.

What is this False Self you speak of?

Different teachers have called it different names — the False Self, the Impostor, the Poser — but it’s all the same thing. A wounded man — and let’s face it, we’re all wounded to some degree — seeks to cover his vulnerability by building on his natural abilities. He seeks out opportunities to excel where his giftedness won’t betray him, and avoids environments where he fears he might be exposed. It’s a way of rigging the game, of stacking his schedule with less-than-challenging opponents.

The result can be quite convincing for a while. Casual acquaintances may never catch on. But inside the man is miserable and increasingly angry — and unfortunately, he spreads his misery to his wife and children. I know, because I lived it.

My False Self – a not-very-cool origin story

I’ve written and spoken before of how I was named for my paternal grandfather and how he taught me so many good things. As I child, I idolized him. There was nothing he couldn’t do. I wanted to be like him, and his approval was everything.

There is a me you would not recognize…

After my parents separated when I was ten, we moved back to my parents’ hometown — an hour away from my dad. My grandfather became that much more important to me, in his influence and proximity. I spent many Saturdays at his elbow, working in the yard, repairing things around the house — learning a lot of the very useful things men learned from their fathers and grandfathers.

On many of these occasions, my grandfather would send me to his shop or his storage shed to bring a tool, a fastener, or some other needed part to him. He would explain what it looked like, and where to look for it. He would always ask if I understood. If I said I didn’t, we’d go through it again. Most of the time, I found the item and brought it back straightaway. Other times I’d get distracted and come back without it. Sometimes it wouldn’t be where he said it would be. But sometimes, I lied and said I knew what he was talking about so he’d think well of me.

On one of those latter occasions, I returned without the thing he sent me to get. Exasperated, he look at me disgustedly and said, “You haven’t got the sense God gave a goose.” I didn’t cry. I didn’t complain. But I was devastated. In some ways that one remark was a greater wound than the one dealt by the death of my parents’ marriage. This was because I knew that my parents’ impending divorce was not my doing. Even though it was like a wildfire wrapped in a tornado in an earthquake, I knew it wasn’t my fault. By contrast, my grandfather’s disapproval and his harsh words — directed at me  — delivered a blow to my heart.

As a result, I became the competent one. I was going to have an answer — the answer — and I was never going to be unprepared or feel that humiliated again. I threw myself into striving. I sought approval everywhere. School was easy, and it provided ready feedback. I’ve always been good with words, so verbal jousting and bantering was an easy way to establish my place in the pack. I was active in scouting, so again it was  easy to tick off requirements and earn badges. Ultimately, the false self made me an addict — and approval was my drug of choice.

Years later, when I became a follower of Jesus, I concealed the pain that had shaped me. I was able to pick up the dialect and the false self let me hide in the context of the church. I appeared to be a capable leader

I was nearly 40 years old by the time I understood what had happened and why I was trapped in a prison of rules (conformity), approval — and my “favorite,” the fear of failure. looking back it is easy to see. But I was young at the time and badly hurt. And the ones who should have helped me overcome this woundedness to help me see my true identity on the other side of this — were the two men who wounded me.

Ultimately, my story had a happy ending, as I admitted to God and myself that I was damaged, and He began healing me. Part of the way my pain was redeemed was the process of masculine initiation I undertook with each of my sons. Part of it was committing to honoring the vows I made to my wife. Part of it was realizing that my grandfather and my father were wounded themselves and forgiving them. And part of it is in writing this blog to help those of you with a similar story find the joy and freedom of your true identity.

Those gifts you’re leaning on are good gifts. Your mistake is thinking they define who you are. They were meant to emanate from your identity, not take its place.

The Unbearable Lightness of Being

When you live according to external appearances — and you stake your identity on what you have and or what you do, you are falling into the trap of ontological lightness. It sounds paradoxical to say that the way through pain is to admit how bad it hurts, but I know it to be true because that is the path I took. Even though my healing came over 15 years ago, there are still times when I am tempted to fall back on the false self, the all-capable one. Then I remember.

As I hope you see, living according to the false self  is exhausting. You can never let down your guard or else someone — the dreaded and ubiquitous “they” — will see you’re a poser. It’s like the doofus on the beach trying to appear more muscular by sucking in his gut. Eventually, he has to let it out. Based on my experience, it’s better to surrender your mask than to have it stripped from you. And that is what God, our Father, wants to do for you, His sons.

I am healed and I am free, and I want you to have the same freedom to live from your redeemed heart. If I can do it, you know it can be done.

So how about you? In what ways have you grown tired of the false self? You can add your comments below (anonymously, if you’d like).

“Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral. Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said, ‘Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.’” – Hebrews 13:4-5 (NIV)

Hugh Hefner, the founder and publisher of Playboy Magazine died last week at the age of 91. If you wonder how our culture became tolerant of pornography of increasing explicitness and ubiquity, you can thank Mr. Hefner for his significant contributions.

Sign of the times — thanks, Hef.

Following Hefner’s death, it seemed nearly every news organization published a gushing tribute to the man and his legacy. If you want to read them, there’s this thing called the Internet and I’m sure you can find them. But in scanning the headlines that reported Hugh Hefner’s death, one headline caught my eye. It said, “Hugh Hefner’s first wife CHEATED on him — a betrayal which gave birth to his Playboy lifestyle.”

The article reports that Hefner and his fiancée had been saving themselves for marriage, but that while he was serving in the army during World War II, she confessed to him she’d had sex with another man. They married in spite of this, but their marriage ended in divorce four years later. About the infidelity, he said,”That was the most devastating moment in my life.”

Why are we talking about this?

If you’re a regular reader here (thank you!) you know I always have a reason. Hefner said his then-fiancée’s being with another man cast a shadow over his marriage. “After that, I always felt in a sense that the other guy was in bed with us, too.” And although his wife, guilt-ridden, encouraged/allowed him to sleep with other women, ultimately, Hugh Hefner became an enemy of sexual morality.

He started Playboy magazine in 1953 and sought to make eroticism socially acceptable by publishing photos of nude women alongside interviews, music reviews, essays, and short stories.  In addition to the magazine, Hefner promoted what he called the Playboy philosophy, which as you’d imagine took a dim view of monogamy.

So here we have a man whose woman was unfaithful, whose marriage didn’t last, and whose life’s work discouraged others from being faithful in marriage.

The wound and its interpretation

Brent Curtis and John Eldredge’s book The Sacred Romance, and Eldredge’s later book Wild at Heart discuss in some detail what they refer to as “the message of the arrows.”  Each of us, they say, receives a wound, and that wound pierces us in a vulnerable part of our heart and soul. We try to make sense of it, and we get a lot of “help” from the world, the flesh, and the devil. Most of us regard the wound as something shameful, and we internalize it and never take it to our Heavenly Father to let Him heal it. Instead we make a vow to never let ourselves get hurt that way again. And this gives way to the false self.

A man’s question

More from Wild at Heart: Eldredge explains that every boy longs to receive the masculine blessing — to know that he is a man and that he has what it takes. That blessing should come from a boy’s own father, or perhaps his grandfather, uncle, or godfather. It is the conferring of manhood, so it should come from men. But bad things happen when a man seeks to validate his masculinity in the arms of a woman, or women. To quote Eldredge verbatim:

“When a man takes his question to the woman what happens is either addiction or emasculation. Usually both.”

Back to Hefner

Do you see this pattern playing out in the life of Hugh Hefner? Clearly, he wanted his wife to validate him as a man. Her sleeping with another man created a wound in that most vulnerable part of him. The false self that became his identity was that of the Lothario, the playboy, the stud — able to get any woman he wanted. This turned out to be partially true. He could get all the women he could bribe with plastic surgery. And he could keep all the ones who were willing to put out in exchange for an “allowance.” But ultimately, this wounded man sought to medicate himself with women’s bodies and Viagra. Pretty sad.

But the worst thing was that this man’s false self contaminated our culture and created massive stumbling blocks for generations of men. Each one of us is responsible for his own choices and actions, but notice how personal choices affect others. How many of our grandfathers, fathers, brothers — and how many of us — have given in to the temptation offered by Hugh Hefner and his imitators? How many of us grew up with absent dads imbued with the Playboy philosophy?  How many of us are in the chains of sexual addiction through promiscuity, pornography, or both?

May God grant us the grace to overcome the sorry legacy of Hugh Hefner and walk free in the glorious light of Christ Jesus. May we seek and find our identity in Him. And may we pass on a better legacy to our sons and daughters. If we truly believe God is for us and will never leave us, we can find contentment whether married or single.

So how about you? How have you gotten your question answered? Do you need a reboot? Share your story or add your comments below.

“Turn my eyes from looking at worthless things; and give me life in your ways.” – Psalm 119:37

We have spent the last several weeks considering the importance of the psychological and emotional needs Identity, Stimulation, and Security. In this post, I’d like to discuss the consequences of the misplaced or unmoderated need for stimulation.

Knowing how to distinguish real from counterfeit is valuable

Is stimulation bad?

Let’s address this up front: stimulation is vital. Babies need visual and auditory stimuli to develop normally. And sociologist Robert Ardrey who enumerated these needs maintained that we need stimulation throughout our lives to be emotionally healthy. We need to encounter new ideas, new people, new locations, new songs, new works of art to feel and be truly alive. If you’re creative at all, you know that it’s nearly impossible to create out of a sense of boredom.

But let’s also agree that stimulation, like many other beneficial things, is subject to misuse. We can seek sensation and experiences as a substitute for a healthy sense of identity and or security. We can use cheap imitations of genuine accomplishments to avoid potential pain or loss. We all have our favorite mindless entertainments, and we use them to get a quick hit when we’re procrastinating. I can find no shortage of articles to read when I should be writing, for example. But why do we do this?

Paging Dr. Zimbardo

In his TED Talk titled The Demise of Guys, Dr. Philip Zimbardo explains that westerners, men in particular, have essentially re-wired their brains through consumption of visual media. He says that excessive screen time — particularly web surfing, porn and video games — has created what he calls arousal addiction. This type of addiction creates a powerful craving for novelty — that is, for more and different stimulation. He contrasts this with drug addictions, where the desire is for increased quantities of the same substance.

Your brain on stimulation

So what happens when our brains are stimulated in this way? The arousal response results in production of the neurotransmitter dopamine. It’s powerful stuff. Dopamine lights up the brain’s pleasure/reward center and it is part of the neurochemical mechanism of motivation. When you’re producing dopamine you are receiving a naturally occurring positive reinforcement that will cause you to repeat the behavior that created the reward. If you’re generating product or creating something positive, this can be an engine of prosperity. But what if you’re reinforcing the pursuit of pleasure for its own sake?

When a man exposes his brain to excessive stimulation — via junk food, gambling, porn, or video games — dopamine production increases radically. The producers of this stuff know it. In the same way water flowing downhill creates a gouge, then a gully, excessive dopamine creates its own pleasure pathway — a landing pad that demands more traffic. As Zimbardo explains, the desire is for greater variety, not just more of the same. The recipe for loneliness then is: Indulge, rewire your brain, and isolate yourself.

Nothing new under the sun

Man’s tendency to seek too much of a good thing didn’t start with the advent of the internet, any more than his tendency toward violence began with the invention of machine guns. However, the ability to create large-scale impacts in a very short period of time is a product of technological progress. Men have always been fascinated by sex, but the anonymity of the internet has provided access to far more images far more frequently. Zimbardo claims the average man views 50 pornographic video clips per week. If so, the effects of arousal addiction are likely to be more widespread and more profound

But let’s go back to the root of all this: we need stimulation, and we are biochemically wired to reward ourselves for it. The feeling of accomplishment when you achieve a goal, complete a project, take a trophy buck, or ask that cute girl for her number — that’s all proper and a result of dopamine doing its job. This is natural and beneficial in its proper place and proportion.

I submit to you that the problem is seeking that dopamine rush without doing the difficult work that leads to legitimate rewards. Each of us has a mission, and we need to be at our respective posts. Faithfulness brings a good reward. Shirking your duty to chase shiny objects leads to all kinds of calamity. Let’s look at an example from ancient history.

Oh look — a squirrel

In chapter 11 of 2 Samuel, there’s a famous story of a king seeking stimulation in the wrong places. It goes like this:

In the spring of the year, the time when kings go out to battle, David sent Joab, and his servants with him, and all Israel. And they ravaged the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah. But David remained at Jerusalem.

It happened, late one afternoon, when David arose from his couch and was walking on the roof of the king’s house, that he saw from the roof a woman bathing; and the woman was very beautiful. And David sent and inquired about the woman. And one said, “Is not this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?” So David sent messengers and took her, and she came to him, and he lay with her. (Now she had been purifying herself from her uncleanness.) Then she returned to her house.  And the woman conceived, and she sent and told David, “I am pregnant.”

So David sent word to Joab, “Send me Uriah the Hittite.” And Joab sent Uriah to David. When Uriah came to him, David asked how Joab was doing and how the people were doing and how the war was going. Then David said to Uriah, “Go down to your house and wash your feet.” And Uriah went out of the king’s house, and there followed him a present from the king. But Uriah slept at the door of the king’s house with all the servants of his lord, and did not go down to his house. When they told David, “Uriah did not go down to his house,” David said to Uriah, “Have you not come from a journey? Why did you not go down to your house?” Uriah said to David, “The ark and Israel and Judah dwell in booths, and my lord Joab and the servants of my lord are camping in the open field. Shall I then go to my house, to eat and to drink and to lie with my wife? As you live, and as your soul lives, I will not do this thing.” Then David said to Uriah, “Remain here today also, and tomorrow I will send you back.” So Uriah remained in Jerusalem that day and the next. And David invited him, and he ate in his presence and drank, so that he made him drunk. And in the evening he went out to lie on his couch with the servants of his lord, but he did not go down to his house.

In the morning David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it by the hand of Uriah. In the letter he wrote, “Set Uriah in the forefront of the hardest fighting, and then draw back from him, that he may be struck down, and die.” And as Joab was besieging the city, he assigned Uriah to the place where he knew there were valiant men. And the men of the city came out and fought with Joab, and some of the servants of David among the people fell. Uriah the Hittite also died. Then Joab sent and told David all the news about the fighting. And he instructed the messenger, “When you have finished telling all the news about the fighting to the king, then, if the king’s anger rises, and if he says to you, ‘Why did you go so near the city to fight? Did you not know that they would shoot from the wall? Who killed Abimelech the son of Jerubbesheth? Did not a woman cast an upper millstone on him from the wall, so that he died at Thebez? Why did you go so near the wall?’ then you shall say, ‘Your servant Uriah the Hittite is dead also.’”

So the messenger went and came and told David all that Joab had sent him to tell. The messenger said to David, “The men gained an advantage over us and came out against us in the field, but we drove them back to the entrance of the gate. Then the archers shot at your servants from the wall. Some of the king’s servants are dead, and your servant Uriah the Hittite is dead also.” David said to the messenger, “Thus shall you say to Joab, ‘Do not let this matter displease you, for the sword devours now one and now another. Strengthen your attack against the city and overthrow it.’ And encourage him.”

When the wife of Uriah heard that Uriah her husband was dead, she lamented over her husband. And when the mourning was over, David sent and brought her to his house, and she became his wife and bore him a son. But the thing that David had done displeased the Lord.”

Go to school on David, or learn your own painful lessons

It almost looks like the plot of a Hollywood thriller, doesn’t it? Voyeurism, lust, adultery, conspiracy, murder, corruption, and a cover-up. None of it necessary.

Notice first that King David was at home when he should have been on the battlefield with his army. Maybe he had been too successful too soon, or maybe he had gotten bored with winning. No matter the he was casting about on his roof, spying on his neighbor’s wife as she bathed. Maybe she was bored, too, and wanted the excitement of an affair with the powerful king next door. Perhaps. But if he had been faithful to his mission, his men, and his God, he wouldn’t have been there in the first place.

There’s more to the story, and I urge you to read on in 2 Samuel. You can start here. But I want to encourage you — and me — to get solid on your identity and your purpose, and avoid the cheap buzz that fake stimulation creates.

Be a producer, not a consumer

If you are in the grip of one of the fake stimuli, I challenge you to quit being a consumer and to begin to produce, to create. You know your gifts, spend your time seeking the rewards of genuine accomplishment by making something that others can enjoy or from which they can benefit. Create sculptures, paint pictures, plant gardens, paint houses, tell stories, write songs, stage plays, serve others. And learn to enjoy the satisfaction of real rewards.

So how about you? How are you experiencing accomplishment and avoiding arousal addiction? Add your comments below.

 “Crazy is like glitter. It sticks to everything, gets everywhere, and you never get rid of it.”  – Anonymous (or perhaps I said it first)

In this post, I want to explore the relationship between Identity and Stimulation.

Insert Personality Here

Crazy

Gen X Angst

Haiku writing youth

I’m a pierced nonconformist

Just like all my friends

                  -George E. Booth

Two facets

 About glitter

What makes crazy so crazy?

But why do they do it?

I’m so glad you asked! Part of the reason I’ve emphasized identity followed by Truth is to make this next point clearer. People do crazy things because, having abandoned Truth, they do not know who they are or why they are here. This leads to a good deal of experimentation. Since I’m feeling generous, I’ll call it questing.

The quest is to overcome the boredom that a rootless, purposeless life will produce. Think about the worst stereotype of American middle-class consumerism. Glassy-eyed, stoop-shouldered, and paunchy, homo economicus americanus  gets up every morning to earn enough money to keep a roof over his head, so he can get up every morning…

This is where the synthetic stimulants enter. These range from television to fantasy sports, to video games, to gambling, to intoxicants, to gossip, to stirring up conflicts among people, to living vicariously through celebrities or even one’s own children. (And yes, porn would be included in this grouping, too.) Not all of these would appeal to every man, but a bored man will be attracted to one or more of them. The goal is to fill the emptiness with experiences, with feelings — even if they aren’t rooted in reality.

I want to be fair and add that leisure time is a blessing, and a measure of our comparative affluence. And Story is an important part of being human. So please understand that I am for wholesome pastimes, just not at the expense of Living and being truly alive.

Contrast fake stimulation with a life of purpose and consequence where every day is vitally important, and the fruit of one’s labor is enhanced by the satisfaction of the tasks completed and delight at the work ahead.

Initiation: getting your question answered

Love, Dad

• Don’t date or marry crazy – She won’t change. But for God, people don’t change.
• Don’t co-sign crazy – It’s bad financial practice, and you’re only enabling more jackassery.
• Don’t make your living from crazy – It’s immoral to sell people the tools of their enslavement
• Avoid other people’s drama – Recognize it for trap it is — especially the classic “Let’s You and Him Fight”
• Don’t try to fix other people’s crazy – Love everyone and live your life. Pray for the crazy ones you know, but unless you’re a trained counselor, leave that to the pros.
• Let God initiate you into manhood – If you didn’t get it from your dad, God wants to do this for you.
• Get some sane friends – encourage each other in your respective missions.

So how about you – In what ways are you giving crazy a wide berth? Add your comments below.

What is an idol?

Although Elrond here looks saintly, I wouldn’t pray to him. (Photo by Gabriela Brandão/Facebook)

How it all works

Idols? In the current year?

A recent revelation

So how can a man keep his heart from idols?

Make God — the ultimate reality — your hiding place.

So how about you? What idols have crept into your life? How do you plan to combat them? Add your comments below.

This is part of an ongoing series about Identity, Stimulation, and Security. You can read the earlier posts here, here, and here.

In my previous post on identity, I warned against the rise of the impostor, also known as the false self. If you’re like me and most of the men I’ve met, you have either overcome the false self, or you are living the life of the false self.

What is this False Self you speak of?

Different teachers have called it different names — the False Self, the Impostor, the Poser — but it’s all the same thing. A wounded man — and let’s face it, we’re all wounded to some degree — seeks to cover his vulnerability by building on his natural abilities. He seeks out opportunities to excel where his giftedness won’t betray him, and avoids environments where he fears he might be exposed. It’s a way of rigging the game, of stacking his schedule with less-than-challenging opponents.

The result can be quite convincing for a while. Casual acquaintances may never catch on. But inside the man is miserable and increasingly angry — and unfortunately, he spreads his misery to his wife and children. I know, because I lived it.

My False Self – a not-very-cool origin story

I’ve written and spoken before of how I was named for my paternal grandfather and how he taught me so many good things. As I child, I idolized him. There was nothing he couldn’t do. I wanted to be like him, and his approval was everything.

There is a me you would not recognize…

After my parents separated when I was ten, we moved back to my parents’ hometown — an hour away from my dad. My grandfather became that much more important to me, in his influence and proximity. I spent many Saturdays at his elbow, working in the yard, repairing things around the house — learning a lot of the very useful things men learned from their fathers and grandfathers.

On many of these occasions, my grandfather would send me to his shop or his storage shed to bring a tool, a fastener, or some other needed part to him. He would explain what it looked like, and where to look for it. He would always ask if I understood. If I said I didn’t, we’d go through it again. Most of the time, I found the item and brought it back straightaway. Other times I’d get distracted and come back without it. Sometimes it wouldn’t be where he said it would be. But sometimes, I lied and said I knew what he was talking about so he’d think well of me.

On one of those latter occasions, I returned without the thing he sent me to get. Exasperated, he look at me disgustedly and said, “You haven’t got the sense God gave a goose.” I didn’t cry. I didn’t complain. But I was devastated. In some ways that one remark was a greater wound than the one dealt by the death of my parents’ marriage. This was because I knew that my parents’ impending divorce was not my doing. Even though it was like a wildfire wrapped in a tornado in an earthquake, I knew it wasn’t my fault. By contrast, my grandfather’s disapproval and his harsh words — directed at me  — delivered a blow to my heart.

As a result, I became the competent one. I was going to have an answer — the answer — and I was never going to be unprepared or feel that humiliated again. I threw myself into striving. I sought approval everywhere. School was easy, and it provided ready feedback. I’ve always been good with words, so verbal jousting and bantering was an easy way to establish my place in the pack. I was active in scouting, so again it was  easy to tick off requirements and earn badges. Ultimately, the false self made me an addict — and approval was my drug of choice.

Years later, when I became a follower of Jesus, I concealed the pain that had shaped me. I was able to pick up the dialect and the false self let me hide in the context of the church. I appeared to be a capable leader

I was nearly 40 years old by the time I understood what had happened and why I was trapped in a prison of rules (conformity), approval — and my “favorite,” the fear of failure. looking back it is easy to see. But I was young at the time and badly hurt. And the ones who should have helped me overcome this woundedness to help me see my true identity on the other side of this — were the two men who wounded me.

Ultimately, my story had a happy ending, as I admitted to God and myself that I was damaged, and He began healing me. Part of the way my pain was redeemed was the process of masculine initiation I undertook with each of my sons. Part of it was committing to honoring the vows I made to my wife. Part of it was realizing that my grandfather and my father were wounded themselves and forgiving them. And part of it is in writing this blog to help those of you with a similar story find the joy and freedom of your true identity.

Those gifts you’re leaning on are good gifts. Your mistake is thinking they define who you are. They were meant to emanate from your identity, not take its place.

The Unbearable Lightness of Being

When you live according to external appearances — and you stake your identity on what you have and or what you do, you are falling into the trap of ontological lightness. It sounds paradoxical to say that the way through pain is to admit how bad it hurts, but I know it to be true because that is the path I took. Even though my healing came over 15 years ago, there are still times when I am tempted to fall back on the false self, the all-capable one. Then I remember.

As I hope you see, living according to the false self  is exhausting. You can never let down your guard or else someone — the dreaded and ubiquitous “they” — will see you’re a poser. It’s like the doofus on the beach trying to appear more muscular by sucking in his gut. Eventually, he has to let it out. Based on my experience, it’s better to surrender your mask than to have it stripped from you. And that is what God, our Father, wants to do for you, His sons.

I am healed and I am free, and I want you to have the same freedom to live from your redeemed heart. If I can do it, you know it can be done.

So how about you? In what ways have you grown tired of the false self? You can add your comments below (anonymously, if you’d like).

This is the way of an adulteress: she eats and wipes her mouth and says, “I have done no wrong.” – Proverbs 30:20 (ESV)

I was simultaneously heartened and disheartened late last week as I read an op-ed in Thursday’s Wall Street Journal. In a piece titled Take the Pledge: No More Indulging Porn, Rabbi Shmuley Boteach and actress and “ahem” model Pamela Anderson co-authored a commendable appeal for “an honest dialogue on the dangers of pornography” and for voluntary rejection of and abstinence from its use.

A summary of the argument

If you have a subscription to the Wall Street Journal, you can read the article here. If not, I’ll summarize the duo’s main points.

• Porn is dangerous and addictive, and we don’t yet know all the consequences and effects resulting from its near-unlimited availability to adults and children. The known statistics suggest that consumption of pornography occurs among men and women, with rates of dependency (i.e., trying and failing to quit using) similar to that among users of marijuana.
• The authors suggest that we can’t yet tell how these rates will change because the current cohort of children raised in the current sex-saturated, media-enabled environment haven’t reached adulthood. They predict that the desensitization likely to result from such early and constant exposure will inure them to genuine intimacy, and lead them to crave increased stimulation — if it can be found.
• Using the case of disgraced former congressman Anthony Weiner as an example, Boteach and Anderson opine that porn use and related acting out belie a crisis in masculinity. They state that Western men, made comfortable by material prosperity and liberal/secular values, are bored and entitled. Even the love of a wife or girlfriend doesn’t alleviate the sense of listlessness, so they choose pornography for the jolt it provides.
• Given the changes in societal morés — especially with regard to sexuality — and the advance of technology that makes consumption of pornography practically anonymous, the authors express doubt that laws would curtail consumption, if they could be passed at all.
• Instead, they recommend that individuals pledge to reject pornography out of self-interest. And they issue a call for what they call the “sensual revolution,” which would emphasize the bond between sexual expression and love in the context of relationships.

They end by encouraging parents to internalize and teach their children that “porn is for losers.”

“Keep your way far from her,and do not go near the door of her house, lest you give your honor to others and your years to the merciless, lest strangers take their fill of your strength,and your labors go to the house of a foreigner.” – Proverbs 5:8-10 (ESV)

Two cheers

At the risk of sounding like a curmudgeon, let me offer a hearty two cheers for this article. I agree with the central argument, and if you haven’t heard me say you should steer clear of porn in all its forms, you just did. And I think the Rabbi is on safe ground presenting his message to an audience who may not share his theological assumptions.

At the same time, it’s a bit thin to hear a woman whose fame and income derived in no small part to the release of two(!) sex tapes and the most appearances on the cover of Playboy magazine say that “porn is for losers.” In other words, all you suckers who spent your time and money while she cashed in her beauty are losers. And only now that she is nearly 50, and her opportunities to continue to do so are diminishing does she see fit to say so. Does that seem hollow on her part — or gratuitous on mine? If so, I’d add that I’d like to know what brought her to this new view.

Let me unpack what they get right

I agree with Boteach and Anderson that porn use is more about the user than his relationships. Men living in a culture that emasculates and dis-values men will always be susceptible to artificial agents that promise to relieve the boredom through stimulation or comfort. And any man who has cultivated the habit of medicating himself will, as the authors point out, not break the habit even when he is loved. If between 50 and 99% of men consume porn on a regular basis, those aren’t all bachelors.

It’s not simply a matter of the eyes. When we engage with a text (And by the way, thanks for reading!), an image, or a video, we are introducing thoughts. We’ve already covered the link between thoughts and feelings, between feelings and actions. Pilots train in flight simulators. Musicians and athletes visualize optimized performances. If a man intends to be the best version of himself, he should not put himself through simulation training to violate himself and others.

Addiction is principally about the heart, and about what one loves. If you love your fix — in whatever form — more than you love God (or for my unaffiliated friends, more than you love being clean or sober), you will remain stuck. My pastor says it this way: “Jesus is not obligated to deliver you from your friends.”

And porn use is not simply a “safe” alternative to acting out sexually. And it’s certainly not a “victimless” activity — not when men and women are trafficked and exploited sexually, some ending up on porn sites. Now you know.

What’s missing?

But here’s where I differ with them: substituting a Sensual Revolution for the expression of sexuality within the bonds of covenant marriage is, to borrow from Mark Twain, “like the difference between lightning and lightning bugs.” Re-establishing the expression of human sexuality in the context of loving, non-exploitative relationships is significantly better, but failing to reserve sex for the matrimonial context is like reattaching a severed limb without re-establishing its blood supply. I’ll say it again: sex was made for its fullest realization within marriage. I’ve been married (to the same woman) for a long time, so if it weren’t true and possible, I would tell you so.

Zombie sexuality

Let’s revisit the statistics for a moment. The Census Bureau says that as of 2012, there were approximately 120 million males age 15 or over living in the US. If half of them consume pornography on a regular basis, and 9% of them become dependent, that’s 5.4 million men. And that’s the lower end of the range.

But even if you’re not hooked, feeding your mind and spirit this consumerist, disembodied, soulless  approach to sex — zombie sexuality — it will affect the way you regard others, and it will burden your marriage with unfair expectations as you compare your wife to the endless buffet of imaginary partners. You will wound her — and not lightly.

Bringing it home

Let me end by saying that I agree with Boteach and Anderson that more laws against pornography are unlikely to be passed, and even less likely to cut demand. What will reduce porn consumption is to have what Dallas Willard calls a “Renovation of the Heart” — a spiritual transformation that directs one toward generosity. It isn’t magic — for most of us, it takes time.

Using a dietary example, if you used to gorge yourself on donuts, you likely won’t lose the craving for them overnight, just because you decided to follow a low-carb diet. In some ways the sex drive is a more potent appetite than the one for food, and more difficult to corral. Where one’s sexual appetite is concerned there simply isn’t a substitute — porn is not a “low-carb” version of sex. But by desiring a genuine, deep, and authentic marriage, and by seeking the emotional and spiritual well-being of your wife and children (even if you don’t have them yet), you will cultivate the necessary self-discipline and generosity that will, by God’s grace, result in the full enjoyment of guilt-free sex.

So how about you? How do you intend to live free of the bondage of pornography? What have you found helpful? Add your comments below.