Peter Elfred Freuchen was a Danish explorer and war time resistance fighter who rode a dogsled across the Greenland ice cap, killed a wolf with his bare hands and escaped from the clutches of the Nazis at the height of the Third Reich.
In 1926 during one of his Arctic expeditions, Freuchen was caught in a blizzard, so he took cover beneath a dog sled. But the snow and ice overtook him and he was left trapped for days.
The shelter became a cocoon of ice so tightly packed around him that he could barely move, a situation made worse by the fact his breath began to condense into ice. Using his own frozen faeces as a chisel he carved his way out to escape his freezing shelter.
Once outside, he realized one of his legs was no longer working so he crawled for three hours back to base camp. On his arrival he discovered that gangrene had set into his toes so he amputated them with a pair of pliers and no anesthetic.
It’s an epic tale of derring do but we shouldn’t confuse it with resilience. Resilience is not some sort of death or glory, ‘rather die than quit’, hell and back, journey to success or oblivion.
Instead it’s the ability to adapt to challenging circumstances.
It’s bouncing back after we’ve struggled, faltered, or blown it completely. It’s about reminding ourselves what our best looks like even when we feel at our worst. It’s recognising that it’s OK to get mad when it all goes wrong but that it’s not OK let it deflect us.
In short, resilience is NOT about being ready to go down with the ship.
If we want to cultivate resilience then we need to seek out not only the sort of learning and growth opportunities that allow us to draw out useful experience and memories, and to do so in an environment that is both physically and mentally stimulating - the outdoors. It’s going to be an immensely powerful combination.
But we’re not going to simply create adversity so we can cheerfully and positively bounce back from it. If we wanted to do that there are numerous self sabotage opportunities out there.
No, in the outdoors you are totally responsible for your situation and how you deal with what happens to you. What is more, there will almost always be something you can do to improve it. You can put up a shelter to keep the rain off, you can light a fire to keep you warm. You can gather resources to sustain it, to insulate the ground underneath you, make various items of camp equipment or navigate yourself to a more favourable location.
Just through the simple act of finding shelter you have demonstrated your own ability to dramatically improve your circumstances in a way that is hard to replicate anywhere else. But there’s more.
1 Making fire
As a species its our most game changing discovery and perhaps that’s why, when a fire we’ve laboured to build comes to life, it’s like we do too. It takes time, effort, knowledge and patience to gather the the resources, process them, then ignite and maintain the fire, particularly in winter, but when we get it right we feel the benefit almost immediately. So does everyone else around us.
2 Shedding excess baggage
The natural environment has a way of steering us down the path of what we actually need to do in order to stay healthy and productive or to achieve our objectives.
Amazingly you can meet all your needs with what’s in your rucksack, even for an extended stay in the wilderness and perhaps even more surprisingly you can sometimes be happier and more fulfilled as a result.
So get brutal. What elements of your life bring you joy and get you closer to your objectives? Which ones don’t? Can you unload any of them?
3 Gratitude
The practice of gratitude is one of the most time-tested and proven methods for enhancing resilience. Gratitude helps people feel more positive emotions, relish good experiences, improve their health, deal with adversity, and build strong relationships. That being the case it’s a wonder we make so little conscious effort to experience it.
If there is a better way to appreciate having a roof over my head than spending time in nature I haven’t found it yet. The more wild and inhospitable it gets the more I appreciate my couch and TV when I get back to them.
The outdoors has a way of staying beautiful through the worst of wild wind and weather. If you’ve ever watched a storm roll in over the city of Glasgow from the heights Cathkin Braes or experienced fifty mile an hour winds on the footway of the Erskine Bridge you’ll know what I mean.
Besides, if you do find yourself on the couch, chin on chest, watching the TV when you get home, well, you’ve had the best of it and you have much to be grateful for!
4 Journalling
Writing is a physical act that engages body and mind it also builds self-awareness, encourages learning, and opens the door to adaptability.
Naturalist John Muir was a prolific writer and kept a journal with him at all times on the trail to record his observations and make sketches. Of course, he had no other way to do it, something that was brought home to me last winter when I left my phone behind when setting out for an overnighter in the forest.
Instead of taking pictures of my campfire, shelter etc for social media upload I was able to use a notebook and candle lantern to jot down my thoughts as they came and in so doing I was able to capture the events and experiences of the day in objective language, and take note of my own reactions to them. Most importantly it was a chance to reflect on what lessons I could take away.
I’ve done it many times since and my ‘Overnighter Journal’ is both a record of the technicalities of wild camping in Scotland and of my uninterrupted reflections of progress towards in my goals in other areas of my life.
I was reminded of all the adventurers, travellers, soldiers and explorers of fact and fiction that I’d read about since I was a kid.
5 Bringing it home
Resilience is not being awesome all the time but it does have a lot to do with remembering who we are on our best day. Sometimes we lose sight of that and it can be useful to have something with which to remind ourselves.
If you use social media you might have noticed that certain people love to share quotes from famous/ worthy/ wealthy/ beautiful people. Often they are accompanied by images from nature; people on mountain tops, people on beaches at sunset, desert highways and forest trails.
They are a pleasing juxtaposition of stirring words and an inspiring picture and they are almost always correct (in as much as trying harder is a good idea, getting angry is a bad idea and being successful is, well, nice). So why do so few people ever tell you how a quote changed their life?
My theory: Somebody else’s wisdom, however neatly packaged, will never carry as much weight as a discovery or moment of self validation that we arrive at by our own efforts.
That, and the fact that if were truly inspired but what we’d just read we wouldnt keep scrolling but we almost always do.
If you go into the outdoors and it makes you feel great then how big of a leap would it be to take a picture of yourself? Better yet, with your own words underneath. Even if you’re not perched atop a lofty summit it will be a picture of you looking joyful, strong and resilient and reminding yourself why that is. It might be you sitting beside the fire you made, or in the downpour you decided to go out in, or with a dramatic sunset behind you. It might also be you at the end of a really bad week, at the end of a relationship, at the start of a time of uncertainty.
You on your best day, you overcoming, battling through, you being resilient. These are your meme moments. Don’t wait for that next Tony Robbins/ Gandhi/ Steve Jobs/ quote to float up in your timeline. Get out there.
Scrolling social media feeds and timelines, especially when we’re feeling low or anxious, can make us believe that everyone else is coping better, having more fun and generally being more wonderful than we are.
Constant showcases of self-improvement, happy holiday snaps, dinner in nice restaurants, people working out in the gym or doing yoga in their spotless living rooms (when they’re not cooking something amazing in their lovely kitchens)...
If this sounds familiar you’ll know something of the effect that other people’s need for approval can have on us.
We’re going to look at
The psychology of ‘likes’.
How we can maintain meaningful social media usage without needlessly comparing our lives to others.
Why self confidence and approval are not the same.
Self confidence vs approval of others.
They are both fragile and they both make us feel good when they work but they are not the same.
Self confidence is a state of mind achieved through recognition of our own abilities and successes. It gives us the wherewithal to act without reference to others or the need for reassurance. It can be dented though and we only truly find out how much we have when we need to use it but it can also be ‘banked’ in the form of memories we can draw upon when necessary.
Approval is someone else letting you know they like what you are doing. It gives us a nice feeling but tends to be a more fleeting experience than the feeling we get from achieving something significant. Approval works in the short term to give us a lift when we’re feeling low but in order to be effective we need to actively keep seeking it, like a shark that has to keep swimming. Approval, not self confidence, is what we get from social media.
Some questions
Is someone else thinking you are Ok more important to you than actually being Ok?
How do YOU show up on social media? Describe yourself as seen in this format.
Before you post something on social media ask yourself what you are hoping to get from the experience.
Will sharing it provide a missing element to the experience?
The psychology of ‘likes’.
Dopamine is the brain’s ‘pleasure chemical’. We get a shot of it every time we taste something nice, see something beautiful, get paid, buy something we like.
Like many other things that make us feel good, the effect can be short-lived which leads us to seek more of it. Trouble is we can’t always buy a new pair of shoes or get thanked for doing something awesome every time we feel unhappy.
Fortunately social media is available 24/7 to give us almost instant reaction and gratification; well done, you look great, nice shoes, you have a lovel;y home/ baby/ car/ holiday/ cat… ‘Likes’ are a microshot of dopamine that fades almost as oon as it registers, a sprinkle of sugar on an otherwise monotonous routine.
Of course wanting others to value our achivements is nothing new but the instantaneous gratification we get from social media makes us impatient with the non digital world which takes forever to recognise our achievements. Worse still it makes us less willing to start something that will not receive instant recognition; the potato patch, cleaning the car, learning to rollerblade, getting fit.
Likes and other social media notifications make us feel good. The brain makes what are known as neuro associations with them. The trouble is our brains quickly become desensitiesd and we need more, like any other addiction.
Some questions
How do you recognise the validity of the experience without social media?
What woould it be like not post it on social media?
What have you been putting off because it will take too long?
How we can maintain meaningful social media usage without needlessly comparing our lives to others.
To do this there are some things we need to recognise.
Firstly the highlight reel. This is our life as seen on social media, or our timeline; its all the selected, crafted , edited, filtered and posed content that we allow our followers to see. Deep down we all know it is not representative of our lives but we post it because it looks like the one we should be living.
There are two problems with this:
(1) Knowing this is not a true representation of our lives does not, bizarrely, prevent us from believing that other people’s timelines, filled with laughter happiness and productivity ARE representative of their lives and it leads to anxiety and depression.
(2) The need to capture these experiences in order to share them not only divides our attention in the moment but it causes us to view experiences and important occasions in terms of their suitability for upload to social media.
The next thing we should consider is the concept of ‘Social Currency’.
Social Currency leads us to quantify our self worth by what others think of us.
Of course, if we do something awesome and share it on social media likes can be the icing on the cake. It validates what we did by adding a numerical value to it.
This can poison it too. An insufficient level of appreciation can lead you to question the level of your your achievement.
Nobody liked the pics of your cat pawing at the window? Maybe it wasnt that funny. Only five views of that selfie you just posted? Maybe you look lonely and sad. Just six likes of your new shoes after three days? Maybe all the people in your network aren’t your friends afterall.
Thirdly FOMO or Fear of Missing Out. This is the reason most people cite for not shutting down social media accounts even when they bring no joy.
Fomo, like many other forms of isolation, opriginates in early humans. As pack animals, being separated from the herd could mean death. Social media isolation, the knowledge that others in your network are interacting without you, can have the same effect and triggers stress and anxiety.
It can develop into a vicious cycle of feeling left out, checking social media and, through law of attraction, finding evidence that we are still being left out.
The feeling that somewhere something amazing is happening and that they are being deprived of something they should have based on social norms.
Some questions
Authentic self presentation on social media has been proven to reduce FOMO, so does looking inwards, journalling, being in the present moment. What changes can you make to achieve this?
.
What do I want to achive? What do I want my life to be like?
Is someone else thinking you are Ok more important to you than actually being Ok?
How do YOU show up on social media? Describe yourself as seen in this format.
Before you post something on social media ask yourself what you are hoping to get from the experience.
Will sharing it provide a missing element to the experience?
Top tips
Our brains only process information in silence. But we become overwhelemed when we’re online. Don’t bring the devices to places where you get silence.
Self confidence is doing something awesome and NOT posting it. It’s living the experience fully. It’s knowing that it didn’t need to be validated by anyone who wasn’t there. It’s recognising and celebrating it.
80% of scial media uploads are about the person who posts them.
Don’t follow, don’t stalk, don’t obsess.
The addiction is not to the phone, it's to the dopamine hit we get when there’s something on there.
Beware the passive aggressive status war.
Resist the temptation to constantly check your phone by transfering your social media accounts to the computer and scrub them from your phone.
Professional success is dependant on focus and concentration. Soc media fragments your attention. If you spend large portions of your day being distracted it can permenantly deplete your capacity to sustain concentration.
The Pursuit of Happyness is a true story about Chris Gardner, a homeless salesman with dreams of being a Stockbroker.
In the movie Gardner, played by Will Smith, has every obstacle thrown in his path and endures great hardship before he ultimately triumphs.
The idea that anyone can do it if they try hard enough might be appealing but it never gets us very far. If it did we’d all achieve everything we ever wanted. But we don’t.
That might be because real life has no stirring background music or it might be because we realise afterwards that we’re not as handsome and cool as Will Smith.
Another possible reason is people who never give up have a reason to never give up and it goes beyond wanting to have a better life or a better job or a bigger house. Chris Gardner had to hit absolute rock bottom before he found out what he was capable of.
We can’t borrow that experience without blowing up our lives but there’s a lot more going on here than one man’s refusal to quit, most notably in terms of Chris’s other traits and characteristics, things we CAN borrow and learn from.
So what are they?
He listened to people.
Chris Gardner drew his inspiration from the world around him. He listened to people and remembered what they said.
He had a cruel and abusive stepfather who repeatedly reminded him he didnt have a daddy. This led the young Chris to promise himself he would always be there when he became a father himself.
His mother who told him he would never be Myles Davis but he could make a million dollars.
His three year old son who, when Chris felt he couldnt go on any longer told him ‘Poppa, you’re a good Poppa.
These words had infinitely more power than motivational memes, movies and quotes from people he’d never met.
He’s completely honest.
There is a scene in the film where Chris arrives for a big interview at the Investment House in a vest and jeans. There is a look of shock on the faces of the panel and its the worst possible start.
He’d been arrested the night before - while decorating his apartment - for a huge pile of unpaid parking tickets and had been released just in time to sprint all the way to the interview. He’s clearly anxious but decides not to make excuses and simply tells the truth, backing it up with assurances as to his commitment.
Can I say something? I’m the type of person that if you ask me a question and I don’t know the answer I’m gonna tell you that I don’t know, but I bet you what - I know how to find the answer and I WILL find the answer.’
He’s genuine
Let’s not forget, we’re not trying to borrow Chris’s motivation, we’re trying to borrow one or two of the attributes that contribute to his success and the way he presents himself is crucial.
The real Chris was not a New Yorker, he was from the deep south and if you watch even a bit of the interview that I’ve shared at the bottom you’ll see that he does not sound like the traditional top flight fund manager. Instead he listens with great care and intensity to everyone he meets and speaks respectfully and with conviction.
This helped just enough of the right people to trust him when it mattered most. In real life the Bear Stearns fund manager who eventually hired him did so because he knew that while Chris didnt have a PHD he had a PSD (poor, smart and determined) and he’d heard him make a great many cold sales calls.
He’s inquisitive.
There is a wonderful scene (which actually happened in real life) where Chris sees a Stockbroker arrive at the investment house in a magnificent red Ferrari. At this time he didnt have five dollars in his pocket but without hesitation he walks right up to him and says ‘I got two questions:
‘What do you do and how do you do it?’
He’s not apologetic or humble, neither is he pushy or aggressive and instantly the Stockbroker warms to him and tells him all he needs is to be good with numbers and good with people - two things he could do beautifully.
The reality was not much different but in both cases we see a man who is neither bitter at his position in life or jealous of others. Crucially, he’s also not afraid to ask and this repeatedly opens up opportunities for him.
He believes in himself and he works from here
There is an oft quoted line; Tomorrow is the first day of the rest of your life. Chris lives and breathes this idea. He makes some terrible decisions including quitting his job and investing in products that nobody wants. He carries the memory with him but not the idea that he is doomed to failure. When he speaks to people he sees opportunity not, not the spectre of all his past failures.
A big part of this was knowing that despite everything that blew up in his face he was still holding a few good cards, in particular his gift with numbers and his way with people. We’re all holding a few good cards but its easy to forget sometimes. We’re also all allowed to have a past, it doesnt have to define our future.
He gets mad.
Oh hell yes! Who wouldnt in his circumstances? He lets his anger and frustration have it’s moment then he carries on. He doesn’t opt for a Yogi like state of serene mindfulness.
He’s projects confidence.
Throughout the film we see Chris under enormous pressure but in every scene where we see him with people he stands up straight, he looks them in the eye, shakes hands firmly and smiles and laughs alot.
Harvard professor Amy Cuddy has done some fascinating work on the relationship between our physical posture and our emotional state, most notably in terms of confidence. Have a look at her work on the ‘power stance’. Whether you buy it or not Chris, as portrayed by Will Smith, and the real Chris, have great posture; alert and upright but not threatening.
He’s decent
There is another popular adage that says ‘Nice guys finish last’. In the film Chris never talks down to anyone or speaks unpleasantly. Not to the other candidates in the competitive internship, not even his bitter and spiteful wife.
If this doesnt always make him successful then at least he had the satisfaction of knowing that when he came through this terrible ordeal his soul was still intact. He was still Chris Gardner and still a good man.
Don’t waste your time studying the top ten characteristics of successful / rich / powerful people.
Instead understand your goal and the characteristics needed to achieve it.
What sort of person will it take to pull this off?
How will they appear to others?
What will they say to themselves when it gets tough?
What experiences and achievements do YOU have that can be drawn on when it matters most?
I can't help you become Chris Gardner - you don't need to be him anyway. I CAN help you nail down the qualities you need and make them habits and I can keep you accountable and help you stay the course when it gets rough. This is what I do and I'm good at it. My contact details are at the bottom the page and our first session is always free.
Some years ago while working in Aberfoyle I was lucky enough to meet a former member of the Timber Corps.
The Timber Corps was a branch of the Women’s Land Army and during WW2 they took on the job of managing and maintaining Britain’s commercial forests in order to supply the vast amounts of timber needed for the war effort.
Jenny, who was in her 90’s and on her best day would have been 5ft 2, explained that after the trees had been felled (by hand with axes) they would have to snedded (limbs trimmed off) and then carried or dragged to to the logging trail where they would be cut to length using huge crosscut saws that required two people to use. Then they would have to be lifted by hand onto trucks or wagons.
It was tough, physically demanding work in all weathers. It required something more than biceps like coconuts and washboard abs, it required functional strength.
To swing a 5lb axe with a 36 inch handle - all day - means powerful grip, forearms that can maintain correct angle of stroke for long periods, core strength to maintain good safe posture and to act as the driving force behind the swing.
To use a 6ft crosscut saw takes a combination of coordination, stamina, core and shoulder strength. It also requires flexibility.
To drag, and then lift, a felled trunk takes all of the above plus that explosive, plyometric strength to get it past obstacles on the ground and then to lift it to full arms reach above your head.
The work of the Timber Corps is the best example of functional strength I can think of. It’s not about having a beach body or being able to take better selfies in the gym, it’s about being able to meet the physical challenges life throws at us effectively and safely.
Functional Strength training focuses on exercises that target muscles in the hands and forearms, abdomen and lower back. It stengthens the core to perform daily tasks safely. Lifting squatting, reaching, and pulling will all be made easier with a functional exercise routine.
Do you want to be able to hoist your toddler onto your shoulders and finish the walk without stopping (while singing at the same time)?
Lift your heavy shopping out the back of the car without a twinge?
Shunt the new washing machine back into place without having to ask for help?
Get up from tying your shoes in one powerful movement without having to grab something for support?
Perhaps you’d like to be able to carry a double armful of wood to where you’re having the fire then saw it and split it with an axe (we’ll come back to that!)
To acquire Functional Fitness doesn’t mean working long hours in the forest nor does it have to involve signing up to an expensive course or buying a whole load of shiny new kit.
A rucksack filled something compact but weighty. Take a look at my post on Ruck Marching for more detail on this.
A sandbag. These are an awesome training tool for functional fitness. Have a look at this video I made on sand bags.
Resistance bands. Cheap and highly portable, these are great for improving functional strength. Check out this great video on how to use them.
In situations where we anticipate a high level of stress and anxiety and a low level of personal gain there is a tendency to measure success by 'just getting through it' or 'surviving'. This was my approach to going with the family into the city or to the shopping centre, cinema complex or supermarket at the weekend - when it was busiest. As someone who has had anger issues and a long-standing dread of crowded noisy places, I could see potentially stressful outcomes and conflict everywhere I looked.
Even after separating from my wife I realised I was still going to have to take my boys into the city anyway because they’d still want to go and showing up for them and sharing quality time with them was going to be more important now than ever. But I was dreading it.
Enter: Situational Awareness, a concept I had dabbled with the year before and which now became a possible means to deal with the very real anxiety, fear and anger that I experienced during these outings.
Situational awareness is a structured, goal driven way of thinking that creates a constantly evolving picture of the state of the environment. It has its origins in aviation and is widely used by law enforcement, military and emergency services. It’s main purpose is to allow the individual to use current environmental factors combined with relevant experience to create likely future projections. Dr Mica Endsley describes it as ‘flying ahead of the aeroplane’. I realised that if I could use this form of deliberate attention to spot possible sources of stress and conflict early enough I'd be able to avoid them or deal with them more effectively.
Situational Awareness works best with a goal which the individual can constantly check in with and measure current state and progress against since goal driven information processing is the most efficient.
My ex wife and kids had clearly defined goals when we went into the city. These involved what they wanted to see, where they wanted to eat, what they were hoping to buy and how they hoped to feel. This made it easy for them to assess not only whether the outing was going well but enabled them to spot visual cues in the environment that would improve their chances of success.
By contrast I had only one goal which was to get through the trip as quickly as possible without completely freaking out. Unfortunately this made me quite situationally unaware since, with time as my only metric for measuring progress to completion, all my available choices and attention were automatically geared to getting everyone home again as soon as possible.
Our competing goals obviously led to diminished chances of success for both myself and the family. What’s more this conflict quickly became an expectation for both parties, serving to reinforce lower expectations for future repetitions. Put more simply this meant that Dad being an asshole just made everything crap for everybody.
Clearly job number one for me would be to set realistic goals and and number two would be to assess likely factors that would compromise them.
I set a number of linear (rather than fixed end point) goals. These were: sharing quality time with my boys, maintaining a constant calm mood state and above all noticing (and avoiding) things that made me anxious.
In the absence of facts, the brain has a natural tendency to “fill-in” the missing information with assumed information. This is especially true when you are under stress. My assumptions around going into the city at the weekend were largely the product of me telling myself I had always hated the entire experience and couldn’t cope with it.
Actually, when I thought about it, It was only certain elements I had a problem with and most of my anxiety focussed around two things: 1, feeling physically hemmed in and not being able to move freely (being stuck in traffic, searching for non existent parking spaces, dense slow moving crowds)
And 2, getting into confrontations with other people (idiots who bumped into my kids while text walking or jumped the queue I was in, people cycling on the pavement and shop assistants who talked to each other about football while serving me).
In Situational Awareness terms, making a decision to actively notice certain elements of the environment, be they hazards or opportunities is crucial. Doing so allows the brain’s Reticular Activating System (RAS) to scan for and acknowledge those things when it encounters them. Think of looking for a friend in a crowded railway station. That’s your RAS at work.
Bringing Situational Awareness to these outings and the construction of a constantly evolving picture was easier than I thought. It didn't make it wonderful but at least now people who stopped right in front of me to check their phone (one of my pet hates) showed themselves at a comfortable distance as their pace slowed or they delved into pockets. Groups of people who blocked up the aisles and concourses became visible in plenty of time to find another way round and textwalkers coming blindly towards me, heads lowered, were easy to spot and just as easy to sidestep as the slow moving elderly people who always used to get right under my feet.
Situational Awareness even helped with another source of stress for me - looking for a parking spot. My experience centred around circling the packed out car park with a mounting sense of rage while listening to constant updates from my wife and from the back seat;
‘There’s one! No, you’ve missed it.’ or ‘There’s a space Dad! Oh, there’s a Smart car in it.’
Now I not only actively scanned for spaces, I looked at the other moving cars too. Drivers who'd vacated a space were driving slightly quicker and were not looking left and right quite as much. They might also have shopping bags on the back seat and often a parking ticket still in the window. There was almost always a space in the row they were leaving. I felt calm and in control again and it was great.
Even with my newly found awareness of the physical environment, my dark, angry thoughts were still just beneath the surface. They were so familiar and their associations with crowded public places so deeply ingrained that it was going to take a supreme effort to correct them if I was going to maintain a calm mood state.
Unless of course it was possible to repurpose the core concepts of Situational Awareness to provide a similarly useful and fluid picture of the state of my own mind. One which allowed recognition and interception of negative and anxiety inducing thought patterns.
Situational Awareness practitioners regularly talk about the need to ask questions in order to bring thoughts to a conscious level. If I asked myself the right questions could I become conscious enough to see my negative mood states coming? With a lifetime’s experience of being angry to draw on it was easy to isolate the symptoms; angry self talk, assumptions of conflict combined with tension in my shoulders, hunched posture, feeling myself becoming more withdrawn.
Here are some of the ones I use
How do I appear to other people when I’m struggling?
How do I appear to other people right now?
How are you showing up for your kids right now?
How would you like to appear to them?
How is my current mood state influence my current goal?
What, if any, are the possible sources of anxiety in my immediate environment?
Questions like these forced me to improve my posture, to smile, to critically evaluate how I was meeting my goals, change the tone of my self talk, pay attention to my boys and trust myself to see any potential sources of anxiety coming rather than waiting for them in a perpetual state of fear.
It’s a work in progress. Busy crowded places will never be my comfort zone but at least now I can feel at ease in them and most importantly, share them with my boys.
WOMEN AND CHILDREN FIRST
Some years back we travelled as a family to Belgium, taking the ferry from Newcastle for an overnight crossing, my boys were five and seven at the time.
On the way the grisly subject of the boat sinking came up. My youngest, Nicholas had recently done a school project on the Titanic and the story had captivated him, its a fascinating one afterall.
As a family we had watched the epic movie but myself and my boys had also watched a number of documentaries on the subject and done a deal of online research.
We discussed the bravery of the ship’s engineers who tried to buy the ship a few more precious minutes and the decision to close the watertight bulkheads which sealed many of them below decks.
We talked about Captain E J Smith who went down with the ship in accordance with regulations, the officers who supervised the evacuation, knowing that they were dead men and we discussed the courage of the ship’s musicians who played on long after it became clear that the ship was doomed.
We also talked about the policy of women and children first, and here we differed. I told them that as a man it would have been expected that I would wait until all the women and children had been evacuated before trying to save myself. ‘It’s the rules of the sea’ I told them nobly, but to be honest I agreed entirely with this idea.
As someone raised on stories of bravery and heroism I found myself hoping that if heaven forbid, I was in a similar position I would hold my nerve and do whatever I could to help.
Beneath this though was the more selfish question of how I would live with myself if I did not. How could I hold my head up as a man knowing that someone else’s children had died so that I could get a place on a lifeboat? How could I continue to set an example of strength and resilience to my boys? How would I answer the enevitable questions that would be asked about my own survival?
In our cabin that night he subject came up again and I tried to stave it off by telling the boys that nothing would go wrong. The ship was well equipped with life boats and we would all be fine, but the questions persisted.
‘So you’d come with us?’ asked Jack.
I told them that if the ship were to be evacuated - which it wouldn’t - I would make absolutely certain that they were on a lifeboat but that it would also be expected of me that I would help other people who were struggling or elderly, or disabled. The boys became very upset and Nicholas told me that he’d stay too in that case and in the end I told them that I was certain they’d be very useful and that together we would do we whatever we could to help before making our escape. It wasn’t the best night’s sleep I’ve ever had.
If you’ve read any of my previous posts on modern vs traditional masculinity you’ll know that the last eighteen months have been something of a turning point for me and I’ve given a good deal of thought to the subject and started my own coaching practise built around this issue.
I’m asking myself again as a modern man, in the final analysis am I absolved of my unwritten duty to ‘women and children first’? For that matter, do modern women actually need to be saved by men?
Is rationalising the need to preserve my life for my children really any more authentic than my belief in risking it for someone else’s?
Close to the centre of all these thoughts is my Grandfather Rodney Gold, who was was killed at the battle of Anzio in 1944. He had been on the army staff and based in Whitehall at the start of WW2. He had applied numerous times for frontline duty and was granted it in 1942. My Grandmother, who died aged 100, confessed in the last weeks of her life that he had been the love of her life but she had never forgiven him for this decision. Perhaps he is just the personification of all the things I was brought up to believe in as a boy but he has always been my biggest hero.
The question I’ve never asked, and really need to, is what does my Dad think about what he did.
I’m coming around to the view that the traditional tenets of manliness that I was raised on and have embraced my whole life are bit like a teddybear that I just can’t seem to put it aside with all the other things I’ve grown out of like Father Christmas, the tooth fairy and comic books.
From the first time my dad told me to be a brave soldier and not cry to holding back my tears at my mum’s funeral last year I’ve always thought that projecting outward strength, even when you have none left inside, will get you through, Like a teddy who keeps you safe from things that lurk in the darkness.
The trouble is telling yourself to man up, screw your balls on, dig deep and tough it out just isn’t enough. I can hear some of you giving me an ironic handclap right now but stay with me.
Back in February I had an accident a work which involved gashing my knee with a draw knife. It was in the middle of a session I was running and straight away I could see that it was a bad one. I got it stitched up later that day and went home feeling like a bit of a twit.
Over the weekend the cut was giving me a lot of pain and and there was swelling round my knee. I put this down to the fact it had been a bad cut and waited for it to get better but it didnt. By monday my leg was too swollen to get my jeans on and I felt feverish and weak. My appetite had dropped off completely and despite drinking copious amounts of water I was struggling to pass it.
I put it all down to an infection that was sure to pass and reluctantly made an appointment to see the Doctor that afternoon figuring I just needed some antibiotics and I’d be fine. He prescribed them and took a blood sample and offered to make me a hospital appointment. I declined. I’ve never been in hospital since the day I was born. I’m hardly ever ill, I push weights in my garage four times a week, I’m fit and I can carry a heavy rucksack twenty miles and still have the energy to fell and split wood for a campfire. More importantly I’m also a man.
On the tuesday night the hospital called. They’d seen my blood results and they were extremely bad. Blood toxicity is measured as CRP and for a healthy person this is usually between 5 and 7, mine was 560. ‘You need to come in now,’ the Doctor told me, ‘We can send an ambulance.’
In the end I asked my ex wife, who lives in the next village to take me because in my book ambulances are for people who are dying, not strong men with a swollen knee who are feeling a bit poorly.
It was sepsis, something I'm ashamed to say I had never heard of. I spent three weeks in hospital, the first ten days of which I don’t remember very well. I had a catheter inserted and drips in both arms I’d also been told in no uncertain terms that I was lucky to be alive. My right leg was enormous by now and an ugly shade of purple and as if to compensate I had lost a tremendous amount of weight. I looked terrible.
When my boys came to visit my tears came uncontrollably. They had never seen me cry and I felt weak and utterly pathetic. I had also nearly deprived them of their father owing to a longstanding misconception that my chromosome count is a superpower.
It took three months to get back to full health including a long spell on crutches, physio and boxes and boxes of tablets that made me feel nauseous and brain-dead. There was also much time to reflect.
It wasn't as simple as deciding to be more emotionally coherent, in fact it was a bit like discovering that common courtesy, something else I was raised on, was now no longer of any value, but I’m working on it.
Part of this involves showing up for other men. That hasn’t been easy either and for anyone who persists in the belief that men are uncomplicated creatures whose needs are few and simple you’ve only got to look at the number of us who kill ourselves each year, often without ever once reaching out for help to know that this is just another metaphorical teddybear that we cling to. Another way to rationalise not asking for help.
I'd love to hear some of your 'man up’ stories and if
you're interested in issues of traditional vs modern masculinity you might be interested in joining Beyond the Mancave. There is a Facebook Group Facebook group and more importantly a Meetup Meetup group. No rituals, no role play, no 'deep work' and no pressure. We're just going to light a fire, hang the kettle and talk.
Lastly, sepsis kills thousands of people each year, if you think you might have an infected cut be a man and get it checked out at the earliest opportunity.
Back in 2004 a friend of mine took his own life. he was one of a great many British men to do so that year. He was in the age bracket of men most likely commit suicide and was statistically 4 times more likely to suffer this fate than a woman of the same age. These deaths, while tragic, are part of a steady trend and something we're becoming more used to hearing about.
The way he chose to take his life however was not.
Alister's hobby was skydiving and during a jump from 15,000 feet, he deliberately removed his parachute shortly after leaving the plane, striking the ground a minute or so later at 'terminal velocity', about 120mph. His body was found the following day in a cornfield.
I always imagined him lying peacefully, one hand across his chest looking dignified and noble in death but deep down I know this was not the case.
He was a long time friend of my partner and had recently separated from his wife. In the weeks leading up to his death he had been staying with us while he figured out his next moves.
I liked him from the start. He was a man's man in the traditional sense; quiet, stoical, handsome, tough and generous to a fault. You never got his advice without asking and even then it would be brief but it was always worth listening to.
Skydiving, like most minority interests, is close community and his death had a terrible effect on those of us who knew him, not least of all because it came with absolutely no warning but also because he was universally liked and respected. For those closest to him, and I knew many of them, his death also prompted a great deal of self recrimination and anger. How was it he could not share his pain? Why, when surrounded as he was by people who would have done anything for him did he not reach out?
A week later we gathered at the drop zone and after many drinks one of the company quietly admitted that if you have to go then surely there was no braver or more noble - and indeed, manly - way to do so. He had died like a man. I and a good few others concurred whole heartedly. It felt like the one small thing that could be salvaged from among the wreckage he had left behind, and there was wreckage, as a father of two and a well known and popular man there was no shortage of it.
The truly disgusting behaviour of the tabloid press in the immediate aftermath and Alister's reasons for taking his own life are another story but as a traditionally raised man myself I still struggle to reconcile the admiration I have for his courage that day with the pain it caused and what I know now.
For me personally its about recognising that so much of what I was brought up to believe about masculinity and manliness is obsolete. Its hard though, 'manning up' is a like a comfort blanket left over from my infancy; when things get tough the simple tenets of traditional manliness are always there to fall back on - keep your feelings hidden, tell everyone you're fine, stay strong and above all never shed a tear. Its so much easier than admitting you can't cope or asking for help or allowing your grief to have its moment. I'm working on it though.
If you're interested in issues of traditional vs modern masculinity you might be interested in joining Beyond the Mancave. There is a Facebook Group Facebook group and more importantly a Meetup Meetup group. We're getting together for the first time in October. No rituals, no role play, no 'deep work' and no pressure. We're just going to light a fire, hang the kettle and talk.
1 Fire!
Only one moment of manly epicness can be greater than effortlessly lighting a fire in the outdoors, and that is doing it when people are depending on you. With a few easily mastered skills you too can bask in the metaphorical — and literal — glow of this achievement.
Have you ever seen a collie dog meeting sheep for the first time? They know, deep down, that there is something tremendously important that they are supposed to do. They’re just not quite sure how to go about it.
A lot of the men I meet and work with in the outdoors are the same. They seem united by a need to claim a specific piece of ground, gather natural resources and use a variety of tools on them and then to make fire — with varying degrees of success.
But even when they’ve worked their way through all their matches and newspaper and are considering how to siphon petrol from the car, and even when their wives/ girlfriends/ kids are clearly becoming very impatient and bored they are never going to ask for help. It’s a guy thing.
7 WAYS TO HIT YOUR ‘RESET’ BUTTON
Worrying about what people will think, re-visiting conflicts and arguments we’ve had, anticipating that ‘everything will go wrong’ or just being harsh with ourselves. They are all habitual ways of thinking that we can devote a tremendous amount of time and effort to.
One solution is an activity or set of actions that we consciously choose in order to re-route negative or unproductive thought processes. Of course, that first entails being aware of them and not simply ‘riding the dark train’ until an external event does the job for us.
It also requires a bit more than angrily telling yourself to ‘snap out of it’, ‘get a grip’ or ‘let it go’ but go right ahead and try all three next time you realise you’ve been dwelling on the same negative thoughts for the last half an hour!
To hit the reset button involves re-focussing our mental energy onto or into something and to be most effective it has to be something we can do right there and then when we feel ourselves going down that familiar path of habitual thinking.
YOUR FAVOURITE MOVIE CLIP.
We don’t watch movies to remind ourselves of all things we have to do this week or all the things that are worrying us. We watch them to escape. Try downloading a few of your favourite clips to your phone or creating shortcuts to them in your browser. It might be something that makes you laugh, it might be something that makes you feel brave or it might be something that reminds you to be grateful. Here are some of mine:
The pre battle speech in Braveheart
The opening scene of Dances with Wolves
Andy Dufrain’s escape in the Shawshank Redemption
The oil strike from There will be Blood
VISUAL CUES
Gill Hasson in her book ‘Mindfulness, Be Mindful, be in the Moment’ suggests using strategically placed post it notes to remind yourself to breathe or to check in with your state. Personally I find that they quickly become part of a familiar landscape that I am no longer paying full attention to. But that’s Ok because there are reminders everywhere you look - you just have to decide what they are. I like to use the traffic lights on the way to work. Red says stop, breathe, check in. Green says move on leaving the negativity and angst behind.
AWARENESS.
Mindfulness is viewing the world with gentleness and without prejudice, existing only in the moment but to be honest I find existing in the moment to be a bit like riding a unicycle, sure, its pretty cool when it works but a momentary lapse in concentration and its gone. I prefer to exist in the moment by asking myself questions about my surroundings because I’ve found that it totally refocusses all my attention and is easier to maintain.
What was it startled the pigeons just then? Why is there a bend in the road here? Is it because there was once something built there? Does that guy up ahead come this way often? Why is this building different from all the others in the street. Asking the questions makes it possible for us to gently move on from our habitual thinking.
YOU, BUT ON A REALLY GOOD DAY.
Recollecting moments of success and the feelings that went with them when you are having a really bad day can remind you just how awesome you can be. You don’t need to have scored the winning goal in extra time or won the lottery. In fact it might be something as simple as striking a line through the last item on your to do list and realising there was still time to go for a pint. Or it might be executing a nifty little manouver to snag that parking spot right next to the restaurant and looking like a boss. Whatever it is, if it made you feel good you can use it again to reset. Photos, or a screen saver on your phone that commemorate these little moments of everyday greatness can be a powerful reset button.
AFFIRMATION.
Have you ever looked at one of those motivational posters or memes about finding happiness/ inspiration/ love, and thought 'That's absolutely right!' and then forgotten it completely at the next setback? One of the main reasons for this is the fact that it wasn't you who came up with it. But if it was it would be entirely specific to you and your goals, it would remind you exactly why you’re here, trying so hard and it would contain reasons - ones that you couldn’t possibly argue with - to keep going and not give up. This is a personal affirmation and when things get difficult it can serve as a fixed point of reference and a place to come back to once you’ve taken a deep breath! Here’s mine which I also use as a screen saver.
