This is the Fourth article in a series on Upgrading Men and Women. Click on Articles by Jose Stevens on the menu to the right to see the other three articles.
In this article we could get into some volatile territory that people have strong feelings about so I we will go very slowly here. Remember that I am just the messenger or the bearer of information that is supported by what science thinks is true thus far.
There is no question that we have mammal bodies and that mammal bodies biologically respond similarly across species. Of course there are significant exceptions. The fact that there are exceptions means that more typically they follow certain similar patterns or in other words, the exception proves the rule.
For the most part, in nature, males chase females and females play hard to get for a very good reason. For the survival of the species the females want the best genes to win out in the mating process. Therefore females reward the more persistent and stronger males by allowing them to mate more often. During the mating ritual of many mammals the males are required to perform in various ways. They have to do mating dances that are complex and take perseverance. They have to build stronger more attractive nests to lure the females. They have to have more colorful plumage to attract the females. They have to have a better stronger song or call that attracts the females and so on. You get the idea. So while mammals are attracting mates, the females are very discriminating and rejecting or ignoring of the males that don’t quite add up. If they are not colorful enough, not strong enough, not handsome enough, don’t sing and dance well enough, don’t build a good enough nest, and so on then no cigar. The males that don’t make the grade get pretty beaten up and often don’t get to mate at all. They have to hang out with the straggler males on the periphery and work on getting bigger and stronger for next season’s mating rituals.
For many animals, once the female has chosen her mate, she drops all the discriminating behavior and she and her new mate work side by side together, gathering food, developing a den, raising the young and so on. However for many human females for various reasons their approach to this cooperative phase is quite different. Often the discriminating, judging, criticizing, testing, and ignoring, never ends. The females unconsciously may continue to intensively test the male on an ongoing basis to see if he is good enough to continue to be her mate. Naturally for the men dominance, strength, power, and aggression are handy traits to have in order to meet many of these tests. However he also has to be sensitive, vulnerable, emotional, (but not too much so) and a host of exactly opposite traits. Most male humans fail miserably on this or that test along the way. They just can’t do it all. They are expected to be strong, decisive, leader-like, but good at consensus and of course sufficiently obedient, good at making money, but also able to spend plenty of time at home being available to listen to and be understanding, while being ready at all times to fix anything that breaks or anything that needs upgrading and on and on.
Most men know deep in their hearts that they are failing their spouse’s deepest wishes somehow, someway. Somehow they just can’t quite do it all right. They feel like failures and grow disenchanted, frustrated, and deeply resentful. They start tuning the nagging spouse out and they begin to pursue those things that they know makes them feel better, working more, watching pornography, drinking, watching football, and a host of other things.
Perhaps this extended testing phase began when women found out they had become property, around the time when humans shifted from hunter-gatherers to farming, something we discussed in the first article. The systematic dismantling of their self-esteem began then so it is small wonder that they would take revenge on men by testing them without time limits. Interestingly this has led to a stereotype of the incompetent male head of household that we see over and over in comics, on television and movies. There is little respect for the father or husband. He is a lazy napper who watches football, can’t do anything right, and drinks beer all day.
Now there is no question that men have their unrealistic expectations as well. They of course have a fantasy that their spouse is always going to be beautiful, highly attractive, and of course be sexy but totally faithful, while at the same time she should not be perfectly predictable or she will be boring. She has to provide a good home environment, should bring in a good salary at work, should not nag or be disgruntled, and has to build up his self esteem on a regular basis. She has to be a good mother to him but not ever accuse him of being a child or of needing too much building up. She must avoid bringing up the incest taboo by not complaining about being his mother all the time. So the kiss of death happens. She denies him sex out of resentment or disenchantment or denies him any enthusiasm over his sexual advancements. She just lies there, goes through the motions, or falls asleep etc. He is furious but feels helpless. He accuses her of freezing him out. He doesn’t know how to warm her up anymore. His interest wanders. This of course leads her to become contemptuous of him, very disappointed that she has been able to castrate him because she was hoping she would not succeed at it. He was supposed to pass this test by somehow overcoming her resistance to him without of course being overly aggressive or dominating her too much.
Such are the complex relationship games of human beings. They don’t always follow this pattern. This is just a popular one. Sometimes they are reversed in certain ways and they are made infinitely more complicated by all the other dysfunctions going on and the many other variables at play. And I should add here that these games are not restricted to heterosexual couples only.
The other mammals have it easier in the respect that while their mating rituals may be complex, they follow a predictable pattern and certain actions produce successful results or not. The human patterns are varied and hard to understand for everyone involved. No one seems to consciously know what they are doing. Humans hopefully may be able to see they are repeating a similar pattern with different mates. Are these physical patterns, emotional patterns, psychological patterns, genetic patterns, past life patterns or what? And how does one go about fixing them?
All this dysfunction is carried into the workplace. The men are fed up, angry, tuned out, and just want some gratification. They are thinking, “Come on now, play your role and act attracted to me, spread your legs and give me what I want and then don’t bother me with all your nagging and bitchiness. I worked hard for this and deserve my rewards for having big power, lots of money, and knowing what I want.”
The women are in some ways trained to want some of the things that the successful males are demonstrating, money, power, dominance, and directness. According to the male, the women’s part of this game is that they are supposed to be alluring, beautiful, sexy, and willing to get the success they are seeking by playing along. The females are actually mostly horrified that they have to play their part of a game of dominance-submission that they hadn’t consciously planned on. They are thinking, “You asshole. Who do you think you are? I thought this was a professional relationship and you are turning it into greedy, selfish, self-gratification at my expense. F___ you. I am not even attracted to you. You are disgusting. I am going to get you back, even if it takes me years.”
Remote Healing
Each month, around the new and full moons, Jose, Lena or Anna leads a remote shamanic healing session. These approximately 30 minute sessions are designed to be experienced in a quiet, safe place free from distraction. Even if you cannot join live they can be very powerful, and always include a good clearing and beautiful icaros. Recording access is included for a short time afterwards. See the product description for dates and times.
The vast majority of women hate this game and many men don’t enjoy it either because of its lack of intimacy. However, the truth be told, some hard core, ambitious, and sociopathic women enjoy the game and are perfectly willing to play it and it is these women that some men can point to and say, “See, women love it.” This then gives them justification to try to play the game with every woman they can and they leave a trail of carnage in their wakes.
There are as many variations of this game as there are men who want to play it and women who have to confront it to get ahead, yet in the end it is all more or less the same.
So let’s ask some hard questions here. How many men are actually having deeply satisfying egalitarian emotional relationships with women? How many men are having a deeply satisfying, fulfilling, and enduring sexual relationship with a woman? We can ask the same question of women regarding their relationships with men. The problem with surveys is that people do not always report the truth because they don’t really want the world to know how disappointed they actually are. Failure is not an acceptable option for men and many women. All we have to do is look around at the many substitutes people have for intimacy and fulfillment. There are practically all the addictions for example: Alcohol, opioids, prescription drugs, cannabis, inhalents, gambling, food, shopping and on and on. There is the unbearable loneliness of isolation either by choice or inability to connect. There are those who simply work interminable hours to fill the time. These dysfunctions are highly prevalent in the United States but not exclusive to the States alone.
In extensive surveys on sexual satisfaction of men and women around the world the numbers are not very impressive tending to hover around between 45% and 55% on average with more men being satisfied than women. Those that expressed dissatisfaction tended to feel similarly about the state of their relationships. The numbers are not very inspiring considering that most people tend to respond idealistically rather than realistically. Why is this so?
Part of the problem is of course the dismal state of education about how to manage relationships in general. Even highly educated people don’t know much about how to have satisfying relationships. Psychologists and therapists are some of the worst examples of having successful relationships. The interest is enormous considering the massive number of magazine articles that provide self-help solutions to relationship problems. However it’s too little too late.
Education of course comes from watching our parents relate to each other or perhaps not relate very well. Education also comes from how we are taught to view our bodies and sex in general. Religion has a lot to say about what is or what is not acceptable (mostly what is not acceptable) and of course teaches most people to not talk about sex at all.
There are no simple solutions. One solution is just to wait for the people who perpetrate bad relationship to die off but this will take too long since there are always up and coming generations ready to take on the mantle. So here lets introduce the subject of soul age, yet again.
Infant souls do not relate. People are objects to them. They are sociopathic by nature without conscience. Don’t hook up with an infant soul if you want to be treated decently. Don’t worry, they are currently only 5% of the population and mostly in jail.
Baby souls are very frightened and stick with what they are taught to get by. They are very rigid. Their relationships are completely based on the formulas laid out by religion and strict social norms. They never question authority or how things have always been done; They dictate rules to everyone but aren’t capable of following them. They are the poster children of hypocrisy but this is often not their fault as they mostly don’t even know what hypocrisy is. They are 20% of the world population. Whatever the culture teaches about men and women they uphold, never questioning the status quo. In the United States this largely follows a traditional Christian notion of stay at home wives, working husbands, and a rule that a wife must obey her husband.
Young souls are children emotionally and hell bent on getting away with as much as possible through pure bravisimo, bald face lies, self-aggrandizement, and recklessness. When receiving discipline they are already thinking of their next manipulation. Their idea of a relationship is to be with eye candy. Sound familiar? They are good at forming loyal bands that fight and conquer together but intimacy does not really exist for them. There is no honor among thieves. In their current paradigm, women are chattel, expensive property to be shown off publicly but largely ignored privately. Some young soul women become powerfully successful but most must become a man to do it.
Mature or adolescent souls are relationship oriented. They are hypnotized by relationships and focus on them obsessively. Everything is about the relationship, good ones and bad ones. They suffer and they struggle and they love passionately. Eventually they learn to enjoy them. Men and women explore a wide variety of sexual identities and everyone seems to be confused or struggling with something. These are the people who rally behind causes and rebel against the status quo, often to their own detriment.
Philosophically oriented or older souls greatly value relationship but they also take them in stride. They are fairly practical about them. They are very generous and kind but also don’t take crap from anybody. If it doesn’t work out they don’t take it personally. They are fairly unattached to gender roles and are quite relaxed about them. They tend not to be too zealous, understanding that everything works out in the long run over many lifetimes. They are compassionate, kind, responsible, and tend to mind their own business preferring to find some way to enjoy themselves no matter what.
Perhaps for now, this guideline is your best bet for managing your relationship life. It will still be a while before the majority of souls have grown up and are at the most mature levels. Meanwhile, the games will be played, the karma will roll. May the lessons be learned.
Next article: More on the personality and the soul ages and how they influence relationships.
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José Stevens
José Luis Stevens, PhD is the president and co-founder (with wife Lena) of Power Path Seminars, an international school and consulting firm dedicated to the study and application of shamanism and indigenous wisdom to business and everyday life. José completed a ten-year apprenticeship with a Huichol (Wixarika) Maracame (Huichol shaman) in the Sierras of Central Mexico. In addition, he is studying with Shipibo shamans in the Peruvian Amazon and with Paqos (shamans) in the Andes in Peru. In 1983 he completed his doctoral dissertation at the California Institute of Integral Studies focusing on the interface between shamanism and western psychological counseling. Since then, he has studied cross-cultural shamanism around the world to distill the core elements of shamanic healing and practice. He is the author of twenty books and numerous articles including Encounters With Power, Awaken The Inner Shaman, The Power Path, Secrets of Shamanism, Transforming Your Dragons and How To Pray The Shaman’s Way.
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