Softening
The paths of becoming, 5
The paths of becoming series so far:
‘When I was young, I admired clever people. Now that I am old, I admire kind people.’
—Abraham Joshua Heschel
In the midst of all this awakening, dissolving, healing and deepening, one of the things that life will try to teach you is to soften.
You stop clenching your fists so much; you don’t have a point to prove. You can lean back in your chair and breathe. You can wait, and wait, and smile as you do so. You don’t try and fight the sadness. You don’t put on any face except your own; you learn to love the lines that life has given it. Among your watchwords are compassion, and slowness. You’re awake to your senses; you’re mindful – a beholder.
To some people, this comes easily, naturally. The childlike has not been ripped out of them, and so they move through their days steadily, gently; a mildness infusing their interactions. For the rest of us, we have to keep learning it, and keep learning it, for the culture that we live in is unrelentingly forcing the opposite message upon us: that it’s a cruel world, and therefore we must harden; that it’s a dog-eat-dog world, and therefore we must bite and strive; that it’s a isolated world, and therefore we must look out chiefly for ourselves.
But the way of soul and wisdom – these paths of becoming we’re opening ourselves to – reveals these for what they are. Lies.
An important caveat: softness does not preclude fierceness. We are not one-or-the-other people; we are myriad. Iridescent. There is protecting those we love; there is defending the vulnerable; there is the bright-eyed pursuit of justice and standing up unflinchingly for what is good and right. And you can do all those with a softness of being.
I need to take a brief detour into the discourse around masculinity here. There are some who would rail against this devotion to softness as an unwanted ‘feminisation’ – bemoaning a supposed movement away from ‘traditional’ masculinity. When a man is called ‘soft’, what is usually meant is that he is not tough, and, by inference, is less of a man.
For me, this simply indicates a colossal insecurity. Those crooning within the Manosphere about being manly men aren’t men at all. They’re boys. Lost, misguided, wounded and exploited boys.
You can be as soft as a rose petal while still being tough as old boots. As Rumi put it, ‘The rain that refreshes the parched pastures is soft and gentle, yet it can bring down a mountain.’
A man who is sure of himself doesn’t need to preen, boast, or display dominance over others. He knows who he is, and is satisfied with the fact. He can weep, and love, and be tender with, and smile easily, and dance, and be flowerful, while still being a protector, a provider, someone who will unflinchingly put themselves in harm’s way to defend others.
A better definition of strength is a willingness to put others first. A manly man is one who serves.
Softness is for the mighty of soul. A quickness to venom and a hardness of heart betray a lack of spinal fortitude. Softness shows far greater courage and grit than throwing up a wall that you can hurl rocks from.
Gentleness can be masculine. Just as steeliness can be feminine. Aggression and dominance won’t transform the world in the way it needs to be transformed; nor will it ever satisfy. Someone once said that the meek will inherit the Earth; someone who was soft enough to give up their life for others. A real man, and a real woman, is someone who is zealously kind; mild yet unyielding in their belief in justice and grace; someone who softly, yet definitively, overcomes evil with good.
Poem: Slain by something wonderful
No more grasping at it now;
no more bite for glamour;
no more strong surge, and jostle.
I want to be slain by something wonderful;
let beauty defeat me; surrender
to the gentling immensity.
No more quick-breathed lengthening of stride;
no more rasp of clever purpose.
Lay it down. Fall
out of those grand ambitions.
God sits among the vanquished, not the vanquishers.
May we grow small and soft in the broken paths, and rest
until the moss covers our toes. May we remember
that the finish line has nothing to teach us
except a bad joke.
May we sink beneath the moon-weight,
look for what haunts the lostness,
be transformed by a song
too slow to be consumed.
No more praise for the roar and rush now;
may we be quiet
and patient enough
to see the flowers
grow from our wounds.
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It’s possible I love this one the most. Thank you.
Good words. Thank you.