Veils to the Soul
Season 2 ... Masculinity and Spirituality. An exploration into the current state of the Masculine in Therapy and Spirituality.
Season 1 ... Birthing Spirit in the Modern World. An exploration of what's between us and our Souls' birth, and how the Modern World resists that birth, but needs it - if it's to survive and thrive!
Veils to the Soul
6. Connection
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Gary and Oliver look at what creates connection, particularly conscious connection. The Importance of Curiosity and Courage ... basically lots of C's.
Thanks for listening!
Find out more:
For Oliver's Psycho-Spiritual work with Individuals, Couples and Groups, please visit www.oliverbaum.co.uk.
For more information on Gary's work www.thewrightmedium.co.uk
Veils to the Soul Masculinity and Spirituality with Oliver Baume and Gary Wright. And today we're going to be talking about connection and sort of the different ways we can connect both with each other and I suppose spiritually as well. That may come into the conversation. But as I was sort of gearing up for this, I was out for a walk today and with a dog and just noticing sort of the different levels and layers of connection with people as I was sort of wandering around. And so sort of, I was, I noticed I was quite high up in my chest. And there was a sort of excitement and an anxiety about this topic for some reason that was there. There was also then mirrored in the conversations that I was having with people, they were which were quite sort of, I suppose gossipy almost and um a bit fluttery, should we say, not very grounded. That would be the best way of putting it. And then on the way back, I was uh got talking to a chap who who I normally see on his on his bicycle, but he was walking. So I asked him about that. And then we started talking, he he had some uh prostate problems and things like that. So it then dropped right back down and was very uh I suppose more earthy in some ways. Um and and there's something I I don't know, there's just something where we connect with each other, whether you think of it in terms of the centres or or chakras, and how we I mean, certainly when I work with couples, I do work on, you know, quite often someone might come from the heart, but then the response is from the head. Um and so that that jars. Um, but yeah, I don't I don't know. I just I just thought I'd throw that open, see, see what you think of that, Gary.
SPEAKER_02Very interesting, isn't it? Because um I was talking to two people yesterday, a couple yesterday actually, just not professionally, we were just talking um, because they were I'd I I bumped into them literally in the street, and they're an extraordinary kind of couple, um, to two women. Um, and they're lovely, they really are lovely, but one is very romantic and very idealist, and is very painter, so it's all very beautiful and everything's lovely, and nothing is there's no nothing, no dark clouds ever enter her world, you would feel. But she's not uh what I would say very present in you know in her wherever she is, she's somewhere else. But she's charming, you know, and that's and she creates amazing art. Um her partner is absolutely practical to a level of of almost it's almost shocking. She is so she's she's not empathetic, she's not unfeeling, she's actually quite a feeling person, but everything is always seen on a practicality first, right? Well, have you bought that? Well, we haven't got that. No, we haven't got that, we've got to do that. So everything is about keeping the world, and they're a good couple because you've got one that's actually quite interesting and quite creative, and the other one it really creates spaces for them to do that. And I actually thought they can they do connect, but they connect from totally different places and totally different centres. And when I'm teaching, I often see you could call it the chakras, you could call it, you could call it where people feel things, if you didn't want to put that word in, which is where they come from a feeling place. And sometimes people will what they can really ground in themselves is a kind of energy in themselves. But sometimes people find grounding at the heart quite a challenge, so they'll get overwhelmed or get over-emotional when they're working psychically with somebody else, and they have to then ground that energy into the lower part of the body so it doesn't go all kind of swirly and chaotic and they don't lose what they're saying. So we really do have to connect, and we connect into different situations and different people from different places all through the day. I I shudder to think how many times we just move from a different center. You can do you can do that with one person in a complete in an hour's conversation, let alone how many times we probably move from a different place energetically all day.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's mind-boggling that, isn't it? Um and and and it is interesting what you say about that couple, because you're right, you they don't have to be the same. And actually, sometimes sameness can lead to a form of disconnection or a lack of depth of connection.
SPEAKER_02Totally.
SPEAKER_00You know, what encourages connection, what encourages communication, and obviously it's not just verbal as well. I mean, it it happens in all you know, I think communication, what is it, only 11% is is is actually verbal, the rest is all non-verbal. So it's happening in all kinds of ways at any given moment. So yeah, uh yeah, well, I mean, for me, words like vulnerability, um compassion, humility, things like that come in when I think about what does help bring connection. But I just wondered, you know, what else?
SPEAKER_02Well, not wanting to create a groan from the listeners here, but I'm like I'm likely to say, well, the first point of connection has to be with yourself and it has to be in a grounded place. There's a big thing of know thyself, isn't there? I mean, it's that old wishy it comes up with those old wishy phrases and those those old, you know, all those what's that old films, those modern films on on interesting things where people are working with energy and you know, and people say, Well, it's but what do you feel? And um, if you don't know where you start and finish, it's a really true valuable connection is actually quite hard to create because you can then get buffeted around and let you know what's yours and what's not. You know, we're in a world that's really heavily marketed, and we've got we're in a you know, really in the last I think five to seven years, we've become much more kind of opinionated as a as a group of people, I feel. You know, we're what do we, you know, feel. I'm I'm gonna say something. Um I blame I blame reality TV purely for this, actually. Because we always had to decide what side we're on, we're on, who we're voting off at the end, who's good enough, who's who do we like more. So we've gone back really to the I think we've gone back to the Coliseum in many ways, you know. Yay, boo, kill them. You know, we've gone back to a very kind of it's one person or the other. And so we've we've l we've come into what we like and what appeals rather than what we connect to. And so you have to kind of know what you like, but from that point have to sit there and think, well, why am I struggling to connect with that person? Or are they, you know, and sometimes the somebody is just not your person, you know, as a friend, as a colleague, you know, you just have to find a way of getting on if you're thrown together. But really, connecting to yourself is the prime point. Because then what do you even offer in connection and relationships if you don't know you're who you are?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's interesting, isn't it? And and there's something about the balance of giving and receiving within that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Because quite quite often you can have have someone who loves giving.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_00Gives and gives and gives and gives, but shuts off as soon as the other person tries to give them, give to them, which you know, that might be a power play, it might be all kinds of things, or or just a you know, blind spot or whatever it might be. Um but that jars connection quite spectacularly. Um it's not just about so it is about our ability to connect with ourselves, but it's also about that self-awareness. I d I I'm just sort of thinking into the the relationships where I I feel the most settled in in the communication. It's the most I mean gentle might be the word, but it's I don't mean that in a sort of passive way. Is when there's very little ego and there's there's quite a high level of self-awareness.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00So so the the connection isn't based on an outcome or anything like that. It's just okay, this is us just together connected.
SPEAKER_02Yes. And does that require the other person to be conscious and less egotistic, or do you think it just requires you to be like that?
SPEAKER_00I d yeah, I d I I think it could i it would be too one-sided. I think if it was just a person. I mean it has the potential then to open the other person up and to give them you know, I'm just I I suppose with a therapeutic relationship, you could argue there's a mis potential for a mismatch there. Um but I'm thinking more just friends and intimate relationships. I do think it needs two people or or however many people to be willing to engage in that space. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02I I agree. Um, but it's an interesting one, isn't it? That if one person does it, at least there's one grounded, conscious person that maybe can show the way a little bit. Um often you, you know, uh it's it's great if you find you watch two people who are completely unconscious and completely ungrounded and completely, you know, self-absorbed ever try and have a conversation because um nobody knows where they're going. Because the other because normally what happens in there is everybody's trying to hold on to their bit and not listening in at all. And it's actually quite funny to watch. I think it's probably quite awful to be in the middle of or to be part of, but sometimes as an observer, you think, how's this gonna work? Because it requires one person to be able to listen, really. And the point of real connection is about listening, isn't it? To oneself and to the other.
SPEAKER_00And probably even deeper than that, it's about hearing. Yeah. Yeah. Again, that's the groundedness, it's like womph. There's something very solid about hearing rather than just listening. Um, you see, uh see, I d I used to notice this when I had got an office in town, um, and I go to restaurants for lunch quite regularly, and there would often be couples two people having lunch together, and one would be talking almost incessantly, and the other one would be listening. Um, and it was rare when there was a you know, two people sat at a table where there was sort of equal airtime.
SPEAKER_02Yes, the art of conversation is interesting. I was teaching somebody the other day, and I said why w what I I it was very interesting. I said, What what's going on here? And I it took us all the three of us a little bit of time. He said, I know. I said, I he said, I don't know what's the matter with me, and he sort of barked orders at everybody, and he didn't hadn't spotted it, and he's working for a development of AI. So what he's doing is trying to catch AI out with all its limits, and so his working day for sort of eight to twelve hours is to try and catch out this machine and then hold it accountable and go, yes, but that you changed that, and I never asked you to change that. You know, you're working for me, you're not doing you're not meant to have a you know, you're not meant to be leading the way. And so he'd realised and he said, Oh, thank he was really grateful. He said, Thank you so much. He said, Because I'm having terrible problems with my girlfriend, because it's quite a new job. He's been in it about four months, but literally all day he just sits and plays with AI and comes up with some interesting things and said, Well, tell me about this, show me about that, create an image here. So he's very in command of his communication space to a machine, or you know, sorry, those people who work in AI that have just called it a tool or a machine, but he brought that into his so he'd actually stopped listening. So his his responses were having to be he was sort of waiting to read them and then see how he felt. And it was frighteningly, he said it's really frightening how much that changed him to stop listening with any depth.
SPEAKER_00Wow, yeah. He's very high up on the list after the robot uprising, isn't he? If he's doing that for a living.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I yeah, I we did say that he said I'll be the first. He said they take over, he said I'm the first one to be killed. I said you're probably behind me. Um you know, where because you know he's he's being encouraged to go into that relationship to say, no, that's not what I asked for, no, that's not what I think. So he's gone into this very much totally empowered place so that he'd lost the art of negotiation very quickly. Wow. So he was deeply grateful. Fortunately, he'd put himself in a psychic class because he knew something was going wrong and he was trying to work out how to feel, but it had taken that feeling space away from him straight away.
SPEAKER_00So how's and I mean that's that's fascinating and and so true. And and if you think sort of sort of everybody scrolling and social media and all the rest of it, and the attention spans getting less and less and less, and our ability to really stay present with anything being challenged, I suppose, by technology. Um and also the polarization that you've you sort of spoke of earlier, you know, our capacity to stay with someone with and be present with somebody who has a an opinion we might not agree with. It's getting less and less and less and less. And what does that do to connection more generally? You know, there is a safety in security, maybe in some you know, you know, there's things like AI girlfriends and whatever keeps um and and stuff like that, and it's kind of I suppose there's a safety in that connection. Um, not that it's necessarily a real connection.
SPEAKER_02Well, I mean, that's just me, I I've it's a very interesting question, but what's coming to me really is that if you're in those connections, it's about if you're in those connections that don't challenge, you're permanently in control of who you connect with. You know, who do you follow on social media, who do you kind of like, who can you block without having a conversation and saying, Well, this, you know, this is not you know, this is not for me, this upset me, this you don't have to explain anything, everything is an immediate kind of response to you. So, you know, you can block or you can follow or you can like or you kind of think it's it is about how you feel, but it's not about how you feel in relationship to what just happens to you, you know. But sometimes you find people who really shouldn't get on. I have a friendship on paper, and there's somebody I talk to most weeks, I probably sometimes interact with daily. On paper, we should not get on. We are the polar opposites of each other. I mean, this is a friend of mine who once said to me, Well, when I did my first PhD, I was like, You got two? You know, I've got a couple of, you know, I've got a couple of O levels. But um, you know, I've done quite well. But, you know, I mean, intellectually we're different, value systems, things, faith and belief system is different, experience, we're from different continents. None of it should work. But actually, we get on incredibly well. I'm terribly, terribly fond of it.
SPEAKER_00And what is that, do you think? Yeah, what is that that brings the two of you together?
SPEAKER_02Because well, actually, it is the point of connection because my world is not like his world, and his world is not like my world. And I think if I'm gonna make a judgment on it, I hadn't really thought about it. I think fundamentally we're both quite nosy. So we like other people's lives. We're interested in something I'm never gonna be in any of those fields. I don't want to be, and I'm not suitable for them, and I don't have the aptitude to be in any of these sorts. But that doesn't make me uninterested about how they roll and how they are. So generally, I'm generally one, I care. Well, initially, I I say now I care, but initially when I met him, I was just very interested in who he was and what he did and what his opinions were about things, and that's moved into a kind of care and could say love and you know, compassion and all of those things. So, but it started just from a point of curiosity. And I wonder if we're losing the point of curiosity and favoring over the point of the connection that we just think will work. No, we're moving into the tribe, but without no real connection to the individual. So, who do we follow on social media? I think if we look at who we follow, probably there's a similar kind of thing. Because those are the things we get offered, don't we? You know, follow a lot of people who are interested in mediumship and spirituality. You get more, oh, you might want to connect with this person, but it's not really bringing us into a mixed bag of life, you know, as we would do if we were if we were living in villages, you know. We might not have got got on with the the the major, but we might have got on better well with the woman who ran the post office. But we would have been polite because that's was village life, but we've become more sort of urban even in the countryside and more and more in control of who we connect with. It's less likely to happen, it's more controlled.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that point of curiosity, because that is essential, and and it goes, you know, know thyself as well as uh sort of having a so an inner curiosity, but also a curiosity for the outer. I'm just sort of rem remembering a wedding I went to donkeys years ago, and and the guy I think that the people who were were getting married were bankers or something, so there was a lot of people there, and there was a guy I was talking to who who I could feel he was he was feeling quite insecure about himself generally, and he said, I'm a carpenter, and he'd put himself in a place of sort of less than and and quite dismissed it. But then it turned out with a bit of curiosity and a sort of gentle question, you know, he's doing all these oak frame buildings, and that was absolutely fascinating. Um what he did, it was amazing. Um, and yeah, I did I there is yeah, that that sense of oh well you're wrong. If if you know if someone disagrees, you're wrong, I'm right. Bang, that's the end of the conversation. And and it, yeah, there is a harshness and a coldness to that. And it just I mean, it just it leads ultimately, is my feel of it, is to to isolation.
SPEAKER_02It does, because there's no point of travel, is there? There's no point of going, well, why do you feel like that? We're not thrown together in so many ways to just see where it fits, you know, and it's only really if we consciously put ourselves in in groups or spiritual development spaces that we're gonna necessarily come up against people that we might not find so easy, and what's that about? So we've got to consciously connect now. We think we're more connected, but we're not because it's got to be done more consciously, uh you know, to be surprised by it, to be, oh, this is a really interesting thing. Oh, well, you're this, and oh, I'm not like you know, um, and to and to find those genuine friendships that are nice. Um and surprising rather than the ones that we think should work because the algorithms say they do.
SPEAKER_00Is it even yeah. But yeah, even if you take the computer element out of it, the algorithms of sort of social structures and social hierarchies.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00I don't remember like parents' evenings and things like that, and the dads are, you know, in the early days, it's like, what do you do, what do you do, what do you do? And everybody is trying to sort of sort of put themselves in a you know, get a sense of um where everybody is in some kind of imaginary hierarchy, pecking order kind of thing. And again, that that jars um and doesn't.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. I fortunately never had to do a parent team.
SPEAKER_00My my youngest actually banned me from going to the the parent teacher once because he said I put my therapist voice on. I wasn't that upset about not going again, but anyway, but yeah, the the the sort. Parents the parents get togethers were always quite interesting for that. Um and and again it just it doesn't enhance any depth of connection.
SPEAKER_02No, it's an interesting point. You know, I've got yeah, I've got a friend who who who doesn't do social media, doesn't do kind of mm computers, doesn't do the tele, doesn't do um doesn't do any of that kind of stuff, rarely buys the paper. She knows what's going on in the world, she finds that out, but she doesn't do any of the things. Boy she does she have some interesting parties because she's sitting there you're sitting next to somebody who's Lady Tiddly Pommer somewhere, and then the tramp that she met in the park walks in, and you think this is interesting, who's tried to scrub up and you know, she's probably taken him to the charity shop and bought him a couple of things because she's kind. But everybody gets on because the point of the point of connection is we all love her.
SPEAKER_00Oh, that's lovely.
SPEAKER_02And but she doesn't do any of the kind of you've got to be somebody's, you know, and because of that, she walks, you know, she walks down the street with her or stepped on a tube with her. Everybody's totally charmed because everybody to her is an open book that she may or may find to dip into. And I sat on a tube with her at once, and there was four very rowdy teenage boys gone, you know, quite, you know, and the energy of sometimes groups of teenage boys can be sometimes, even if they're quite charming, quite threatening, because they come through with a kind of force, really. Not that I felt threatened necessarily by that, but you could see the carriage went, oh, okay. Well, she had them all completely charmed. She never said anything, they were just like, excuse me, you look really interesting. She was like, Oh, yeah. She was chatting about what she did and all sorts of things, and they all kind of settled because she's available for connection always. You know, she's really interesting. She's one of the only people I've ever met that's like that. She ever you can she might decide to go now or or step out, or she it might just not work, but she is available for you to connect in with her. There is no restriction. Wow. It's it's it's remarkable. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's incredible. My aim is to be more like that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Yeah, I I mean I suppose that raises, you know, boundaries is one of the words that are thrown around left, right, and centre at the moment. Um what's your view on that boundaries and connection? And then she sounds as if I mean she could say no if she wanted to. She had that uh the wherewith all about her for that. But at the same time, there was just there's just uh there's a lovely openness to her that you said, you know, it's available all the time.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, she has presence and a boundary, but she has presence, so you people have to, you know, people don't always approach her. But but she's available to it. Um well, boundaries and me. I mean, if you ask anybody who knows me well about, you know, Gary's boundaries, they'll find um they'll find that I know where they are very, very quickly and can pick them up. Um partly it's because of my job, partly it's because of working with different energies and spirit. You have to be quite boundaried that side of my world. I could say I have to be quite, because you know, bearing in mind most of the spirits I talk to do not have a body, so they do not need to sleep, and I do. So, you know, I'm very boundaried on that, but I've always been quite boundried. Um, which has not always been the best bit of me, because being very boundary means you always know how to step out, and I I know in my it's not uh something I'm particularly proud of, but I have wonderful access to being remote. I can find my remote button really easily, and I can look remote, and then I I look grand, and then people just think, oh, I can't bother with him. But quite often I'm just with myself. But boundaries and connection, I think one has to really, and I've had to really work on my this on myself, and I can't say I I would say I'm completely completely kind of clear on it in myself totally. But can there's the point of wanting a connection with somebody, something, some point, and there's the point of knowing the boundary, and I know the boundary often before I know what I would like that connection to be. And when I say what I you know, I like that connection to be, you know, I do have to, because I'm so busy, I do have to sit there and think, well, have I got time to make a few more friends? Or am I just gonna there is only one of me, or is it just gonna be depleted? So quite often I think you've got to be really clear in yourself what you need, what you want, what you'd like to experience if you want more connection. And you have to, or I have had to look at where my boundaries are on that. And sometimes there are enforced boundaries from external time, energy levels, money, distance involved. You know, there are those ones, and sometimes there are the ones that are kind of more internal where you just think, actually, I'm not clear on what I'm offering or what I'm requiring. What's this need in me to make another connection? And can I really subbeat, you know, I hate this another word that gets banded around, showing up, you know, and that gets banded around the men's movement quite a lot. Or what are you showing up with? And and but it's it's not a bad thing to think about, you know. What are you bringing to the situation? And if it's nothing, can I just want to take, then that's not going to be a connection that's gonna have any lasting energy behind it, is it?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I mean, even just as you say it, it's kind of yeah, you can feel the air, it's like a balloon being emptied of air. Without the funny noise. But um anyway. Um this this I mean this for me anyway, what's what's kind of popped up is is about uh going back to that idea of being able to hold your own heart. Sort of knowing. Yeah, knowing where you sort of you begin and end, and then actually that allowing the connection or not, you know, depending on what might be appropriate for the two people. Um I'm I'm glad you brought the sort of men's movement back in as well, because obviously we've been talking a bit more generally about this. But uh with men, um I mean the stereotype would be sort of, I don't know, talking about football or or you know, whatever it is, just very uh sort of that surface level of connection, which I I think is a bit unfair. Um but do you think there's something different in the way men connect when they do it well?
SPEAKER_02Yes. Yes. I think from what I I often see of men's movements and men's groups and men's retreats, it's all about, you know, it's often about showing up for your brother or showing up for your your tribe or something. It becomes very tribal. And but it in many ways it can become quite unrealistic that you can be you're available to all those men on lots of areas, you know. There are gonna be, especially if it's in a group or a very short period of time, people who gravitate towards people, and that always happens, and that should be championed, really. But I do feel that when men really kind of can connect in well as friends, they have to do quite a lot of work. Now, sometimes that's unconscious, sometimes it's quite conscious, but they really have to go past the point of what it's gonna be like, what everybody else is gonna see, and protect that relationship quite strongly. It's a good question I I feel, and and the the good male friendships I have are about actually nobody really kind of yeah, we get on and people kind of say well, they get on, and there's a kind of uh kind of an ease in there, but you have to drop into finding that ease, I think, with another man, and to be sensitive and tender with that. And I'm not sure always that as men we're very good at being tender, we tend to try and be practical. So, what have we got to do? What what would we like to do? You know, it's gotta have an event around it and it's gotta have an end goal. And the really good friendships and the friendships I see men foster do not have an end goal, they're about discovery and allowing somebody to be who they are rather than think I've got to do this or I've got to do that, or to this, it's gotta be like that, or to have a retreat, it's got to, they've got to leave with this. And you and me both hold groups, and we know that we have to work on what people leave with, but you have to be careful not to bring that into a friendship. So if people meet in groups and movements and those kind of things, they have to it often gets very goal-driven rather than just the point of a connection of well, actually, do I want to get on? But you've got to risk see, there's a big risk in that because you could be wasting your time. So often when I've been in men's retreats and men's groups, people are trying to pick people off of who they think will work, and you know, you see people get disappointed, and somebody says, Oh, I'm from Sweden, you think, Well, I'm not gonna see you very much, and then they kind of walk away. But maybe, you know, from Sweden doesn't mean I live in Sweden, it's a mishearing. And I watched somebody walk away and they went, Oh, I thought I'd get on really well with him, we had a lot in common, but he lives in Sweden. I said, He never said that. He said, I'm from Sweden. He said, No, he lived in Sweden. I said, No, he never said that. And actually, the person lived up the road, and I kind of pointed out, and they did get on very well, and they are still friends to this day, but on that simple wording, and the risk of, oh, I'm not gonna find a connection, it could have gone really wrong. It was fortunate I was sitting there, and the you know, the old theatre director in me what does tend to watch a bit, you know. I've always got one eye on that's interesting, and I just heard the word, and but but I saw one just just just absolutely totally disconnect, and the other one go, I don't know what's just happened. And it was on a a mishearing or a or a lack of curiosity, really. I mean, you did say I live in Sweden, but the curiosity, I'm from Sweden. The curiosity should have just on that one word, it shifted the whole dynamic. But they sorted it out, but but they had to discover that, and and sometimes you have to go through the point of thinking, well, is this not gonna work? This is not the friend I want.
SPEAKER_00And again, I mean, there's bravery in that, but uh the the word boldness springs to mind. And that uh having the courage to actually really lean in and also face potential rejection. Um but it's not a it's not a from a courage point of view, it's not like sort of drawing your sword and and really going all guns blazing into the woods kind of thing, which I th I think the the warrior energy would encourage. It as you said, it's much more tender, it's much more soft. I suppose if you I mean to use the archetypes, it's just sort of more of a lover energy, or maybe even a magical energy.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And are we really as men very good at holding the lover energy with another man? Or does that bring up all weird things of internalized homophobia, or is it just too soft, or that's the thing I say for when I'm with a woman, or or is your gay with another man, that's a different kind of relationship. You know, it's got it's got all that jarring, or can I just be with somebody in a loving space that and see where that goes? But is that too risky? Because it's not known in society. I mean, we don't tend to come together in groups of men very easily. I had a very interesting um conversation with somebody years ago, and they and these two friends uh were they were very good friends and they were both best men together, and they both uh were godfathers to each other's children, and and um it was a really, really deep and close kind of connection. And I went to the wedding and I didn't I never knew where they met. I just assumed I kind of had done that awful thing of assuming they met at university and or did something like that. And um they actually met, um, and this is gonna it's gonna sound very funny, and this was how it was put over the uh the and the best man speech, which are kind of often a bit riotous, as we know. And he said, Well, I suppose you're wondering where we met. And uh everybody, nobody had really, nobody kind of knew. I think their wives knew about him. And he said, Well, I'd booked a squash court, and my mate didn't turn up, and he never spoke to me again. And on the next door squash court, somebody's car had broken down, and so he was on his own. So they met on a squash court. They were both good at squash, both fiercely competitive over this. One eventually beat the other one eventually, and he said, then we had this thing of, oh, well, he said, then I ended up in a shower with somebody who I'd only just met, and those name I didn't know. And then we thought, well, we're better have a cup of tea, because uh we've all gone past the point of intimacy in some weird kind of way. And he said, We played squash together ever since, and that they still do, and they were had a great friendship. But they've been thrown together on the fact that two people hadn't turned up, and the next thing they knew, they'd gone into fierce competitiveness, competitiveness where they had to get they got it all out of the way. That's interesting. And then they realized, then they realized that actually they've gone past the point of, you know, most people don't take their clothes off with somebody they've only met like an hour ago. You know, even if it's practical, even if practically to do that, they'd gone past some really big hurdles within the first sort of six hours of meeting each other. And then they had to work out if they had anything in common, which they on paper they don't really, completely different jobs, completely different backgrounds, but they had gone past something very quickly and had been there as one would describe the other one as this had been there to rescue him from being disappointed that he didn't play a game that day. And they but but they had a point of connection through the sport, they were both kind of very good at squash, so they had a reason to continue meeting. That was kind of clear, and they are kind of slightly, you know, they are of the two people I know that uh have a solid male friendship, which is really admired by everybody, it's those two. And yes, I did ask their permission to at some point tell this story, so I've got it in there in these podcasts, but because I I just I spoke to them and I said, Do you mind me telling it? And they went, No, because they said it helps. It's great, but they're very conscious, both of them, and they have no problem with showing a real external love. And I remember one of the brides saying, I've probably lost him, he'll be with his best friend. And she didn't see him at the wedding because they just sort of hung out, hung out more because they had been through this period of time of being the best man. Um and that's an interesting kind of that's an interesting point, but they they were thrown together through the risk and it survived.
SPEAKER_00It's interesting, isn't it? Because there is that that uh the I for want of a better word, shenanigans bit, period, until people settle in to to be able to relate at a deeper period period of time, and particularly between men. I remember I remember when I was training as a couples therapist and and one of the modules was on working with same-sex couples and um and I and it was family conservation, so there was a lot of representing and embodying people. So I was representing loads of people and loads of experiences that that I'd never had before, and it was so freeing. But I also became really, really, really aware of sort of my internalized homophobia and all the other cultural bits and bulbs that were in the mix of it. So it was a real gift that weekend, but that's not something many people have the opportunity to do.
SPEAKER_02No, you'd you'd have to I think we'd have to seek that out. And quite often when you go into the men's retreats and workshops and movements, it is about showing up and being fierce. And lots of men are kind of falling to the people-pleasing energy and uh the sort of the dog's body, you know, and we're put up with it, and they do need to find that in themselves. I'm not saying that that is not a valuable piece of work, but rarely is it showing up with the fact of can I actually hold another man's experience in a gentle, tender way? And what do I need to go through? That's not often the case, or it's fitted in, it's fitted into a bit of a retreat, or it's fitted into a bit of a thing, and then it's dropped. Where because it's so new and out of most people's experiences, it needs to be raised and be tender more and nurtured. It's a bit like a sort of not very well plant. You know, it needs a lot of care, you know, it needs to be grown, it doesn't naturally just grow, grow naturally, you know, lack of connection and competitiveness and and kind of shaming is a things that men find quite easy to do to each other. I mean, that's a bit like some sort of rare, you know, great weed growing in a garden, you know. But there's the rarity of the kind of the small kind of connections and love that need raising. Um and protecting from a wider societal gaze until that's established, really. And then I think that brings up lots of kind of issues in men, you know, you all new relationships always have to be protected by it from the outside world sometimes because other people get involved. And yeah, can you say more about that? Because yeah. Well, I've got a female friend at the moment, and she's she's going out with somebody, and um it's it's great, and it will work and it'll be a thing, and they adore each other, and I'm thrilled for both of them. Um, but you know, she's got a couple of people around her that may not may find that her being really happy a bit of a challenge to them. So I said to her, So we've just got to protect you with this new relationship, you know, you've got this amazing connection, but on another level, you don't know each other so well, you know, got that's got to be raised and grown. Um and so you have to kind of protect things from from other people where they get a lot of protection. People try to get involved, you know, and suddenly get very into your new couple relationship. And if you're gonna, you know, that's that's an intimate kind of you know, relationship that will go towards a marriage or something at some point. But if you're meeting even with a friend, you've got to get to know each other and understand where one starts and finishes for that friendship to really survive. So you've got to really protect it and let it grow and let it nurture. New things have always got to be nurtured, and a new friendship has got to be nurtured. So you've got to make time for that new male friend or that new mate in your life. You've got to make time, you've got to. It's it's obvious when you're meeting somebody you kind of fancy because you go on dates and you do all that, you know. It's that period has to be traveled through of getting to know what you like. I'm not going to that film, I think it's not my kind of thing I like. Oh, well, let we'll go to this, you know. You've got to do all that working out, but you've got to do that working out in friendships sometimes for them to really survive. And so it that becomes a kind of intimacy quite quickly. And I think that's probably for a lot of men actually a very, very challenging space because it requires a vulnerability and it requires a kind. Intimacy tenderness. And maybe some people or or it goes through people's heads of I'm not quite sure what this is, and I'm not quite sure where I am, and that need to be in control of situations comes up very quickly. So I think often men either keep a very surface level with each other or they come away from something just don't bother, just don't bother continuing it. And it's about sharing and about connections and being vulnerable and holding your heart and saying, Well, actually, I quite like our friendships. Could could it be expanded more? Could I like to see more of you? And saying I'd like to see more of you is something we say to a partner or somebody want to get married. We rarely say it to a friend. Yeah, it's interesting. I think women are better at saying that. Women are saying this is an important friendship for me with another woman. I'd like it, I'd like to, you know, I'd like to see you more, or they're more practical. You know, what can we do together if you want to come to this? Do you want to come to that? Um, it's hard. And I actually ran into it yesterday with somebody I kind of knew. And I thought, well, I'm going to go and do this. And I thought I knew they'd like it. And well, fortunately, um and I thought, well, I'd have to say it. I thought, well, you could come to this actually, it'd be quite nice. And um, anyway, when I looked it, it all sold out. So I couldn't, I was I was rescued, but I was pleased I didn't have to say it. And I thought, hang on, I should be disappointed that actually that's not something we could share. And I was pleased that I didn't have to put myself through the fancy doing this. And this is somebody I've met a couple of times, and this is not a romantic situation or anything like that. I'm very clear, you know, it's it's not that. So it is about a friendship, but it's how you go across that bridge. And I thought it was very interesting that that happened to me yesterday as I was going to be speaking to you today about this.
SPEAKER_00I mean, just the idea of nurturing relationships and friendships, which is because we do, particularly, I think, in the early days, just well, maybe I say we, I, I'll own this, um, kind of almost assume that if it's meant to be, it will be easy. And actually, you know, okay, you don't want things to be disjointed and and diff and like difficult, difficult people being difficult, but it if there's that sense of yes, actually I'd really like to get to know this person more or be around in whatever circumstances are, it does need nurturing, it does need people to put the time and the effort in. Yeah. To be able to, you know, not just sort of oh I'll squeeze you in here or squeeze you in there kind of thing. Um it is, yeah, I'd like to spend time with you, I'd like to, you know, in whatever context, and I will carve out the time for that.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And the interesting thing about going back to my on paper we shouldn't get on friendship, um, because they they live in America and I live here, um, when they're in when they're in um England, it's often I see them, you know, three, four, five times in quite a short period of time, you know, sometimes in a week, sometimes in a month, sometimes in coffee, sometimes, or I'm flying in and I'm I'm here for 12 hours. Have you got time? It's it's very, you know, and they they're very good at saying, you know, I'll be there in two months' time. So I'm very good at making time for that. Interesting. I've only just thought about that, but there is a lot of time given it, given to that friendship. Um, which I am really happy to give because it's a really lovely plus to my life, but it's had that intensity of time, which is probably why it works.
SPEAKER_00I mean, it's interesting. One of the one of my my favorite people to connect with, and we we we have a Zoom call every week, um, lives in Florida, and we met via a spiritual online spiritual group kind of thing. And we've never met in person. Um, and it's really I mean, we quite often observe how that is kind of weird that we can connect. I mean, we would never have met without Zoom, as it were. Um so there's a sort of gratitude to that, but there's also a sort of an acknowledgement that you know there's something missing as well.
SPEAKER_02Yes, it's an interesting one, but I suppose the world is smaller, and we can do that, and we can become very, very connected to people in that way. But it's but also not wanting to take away from your experience, I think, but putting it into a you know, a connection of going back to men, maybe that also means there's a safety there for between it wouldn't mean that there's a kind of you know, going out for a meal with somebody and going to the theatre or going to the cinema with them is kind of an intimate thing to do, we kind of think if it's just one-to-one. So sometimes on a Zoom thing, you haven't got to go through that challenge. That doesn't mean that it's not valuable, doesn't bring enhance our lives in the most incredible way, but it does mean that sometimes we can still put things in a place, and it'd be interesting to see how many men would challenge them, want to challenge themselves to meet beyond something else. I I don't often find if I'm on a retreat, might be because they don't like me, but if I'm on a retreat or I'm on a group of men's group or something, but many people want to spend time with me outside that space, might be also that they say, Oh, just I'm too busy, might be that I'm too challenging, whatever is. But that has to be nurtured. But I also don't make foster that either. So there's an interesting point of how can we can we challenge ourselves to go beyond ourselves to make sure this connection really works.
SPEAKER_00And it's interesting the assumptions we make, oh, they must be busy, they won't have time.
SPEAKER_02They don't like me.
SPEAKER_00Um, which, if we're honest with ourselves, is more about probably protecting ourselves than the reality of the situation. But it does, it does take that moving through that discomfort to go, okay, well that might be the case, but I want to try and do this anyway.
SPEAKER_02They um when I was um I was in a theatre, I was directing, I was in a theatre uh piece, which was very, very, very distressing. It was all about um the fuguinos killing, you know, killing people in France. I mean, everybody was, I mean, nobody was I I think there was one character still alive at the end. But yeah, I mean everybody went in somewhere, they're all die, being killed off. Um, and so you had to get, you know, the actors had to be very vulnerable and got to know each other very well, and then it was on tour, so people had to share dressing rooms and then dressing rooms and then accommodation. And so this was a group of people that were either going to get on very well things, and the tall matinee, idle, gorgeous, uh, buffed, ripped kind of uh actor who everybody wanted to be, and um and he's a charming man as well. Um they ended up being really good friends with a sort of sort of short, strange, slightly quirky, um, slightly overweight uh gay guy who was in the group as well. And and and the gay guy would say, I never thought anybody who looked like him would ever be my friend. And the other one would kept going, why? You're the biggest laugh in the company. But they became very, very good friends. But but on pay again on paper, in their or on their mind, they were two people who sh didn't think they would get on. But it was all to do with a wounding in in one of them, of oh, he won't be my friend. And he judged, he judged him. And it was the the the tall Adonis kind of Matanayada one who went, oh god, no, we've got to share, I've got to share with you because because I can't, I've just you know they got on, but it was really nurtured by um one of them, and the other one had quite a lot of inner resistance because he thought he was being played for something. He thought, no, he won't ever want to talk to me. Came from a very wounded place, and he's through it now. But it was a very beautiful relationship to watch develop, a friendship develops, and they're still very good friends now, with one of them saying, Stop doing that to yourself. I actually I really get I I really find you really, really enjoyable company. But it took some the other one to be that brave and and just not give not give in.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02It was it's lovely and continues to be lovely, and they've written together a play and all sorts of things, but they were very much in one of them's mind, in very much not a good fit. But it did require one to sort of take the lead and and go stop, and the other one got though, you know, they they helped each other technically on acting and things, and one the other one got more work because of the support and the friendship, which continues to happen. Um but but it it took one of them to be really brave, really brave, and beat through the door, really, beat through the restrictions and not not you know get wounded when one of them would fly out the rehearsal at the end of the day and not ask him how he was or or where he was traveling to. But you know, they got on, they just one of them just saw something in the other one that they knew, and and I said, Well, what what I because we were talking about it, I said, Well, what what happened? He said, I knew there was something in him that I could love. Oh wow. And I said, Oh, and that was how he framed it, you know. There was something in him I could love, and that's what he that's what it did. Isn't extraordinary?
SPEAKER_00I mean, that's incredibly yeah, that's incredible.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, an extraordinary spiritual kind of interesting man anyway. But he knew something, he said, I knew something that was still him I could love. And I just I said, Were you looking for a new best friend? He went, no, got loads of friends. But he said, I just looked and I just he said there was a connection there, and he knew exactly what it was in him and for him, and went for it. Went for that connection as a as a friendship, you know. Uh it was it was great, you know, like you'd see somebody, he said, Well, he's somebody who also sees relationship and friendships very much cut from the same cloth. He said, you know, you have to be, if you're gonna get married to somebody, you have to be their friend, as well as their husband, he's now he's now a husband, he wasn't when they met. He's now a husband, and you know, he said, you become other things, you become other archetypes, you know, going back to those archetypes. But uh initially, he he doesn't see friendship and relationships differently. He said one's in uh sexually intimate and one is not, but equally they were both require love to survive. So he's always goes at that. So he went for this friendship, like he would do his, he said, I said, Well, it was a bit like you. We ever we all thought you were in love, and that you know, we were thinking, Oh, I need to really pursue this person. He said, I know what you thought. He said, I didn't care. That was somebody I thought that's gonna be a really good friend for me, and they'll have my back and they'll be there for me. Um, and that's what he did, and it was incredible.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that is I mean, that is amazing. And treating all connections in the way you might do a romantic relationship again, because I mean I suppose it's acceptable to pursue with reason anyway, um, romantic relationships, but it's not necessarily something people would do with friendships. And just but I I don't know the way you you described that's lovely.
SPEAKER_02And it was incredible to watch. And I we all we all sat there in the rehearsal room saying there's a play here. There's actually a really good story here, and maybe you should write it. And and they decided, and they do write together, and they've written some quite interesting stuff. Um, and and and I said, Were you not thinking? and they said, No, we that's that's our friendship, and we decided that we weren't gonna put that on on the stage. So even in that point, they decided that they were gonna protect it, very protective over their friendship together, um, and very thing, and people really misread it and get into all sorts of, you know, they get all sorts of judgments around it, and people and they don't don't care. But it did take one to really decide that that was gonna be important. And the other one to, in a way, you had to surrender to this person wants to be your friend. It was very difficult, you know. Very difficult. And in in and you know, one who describes himself as gay said, I had to sit there and go, can I be friends with a straight man? They had both had to do a lot of work. Yeah. Both had to do a lot of work on themselves, but it it became it, it mattered very quickly, so they were happy to do it. But it wasn't easy, I don't think. I don't initially, I mean they never said it, but it wasn't. I don't think initially, from my sense, that it was easy. But what it did show me about friendship is they have to have time and effort. They don't just happen.
SPEAKER_00So I'm wondering how I mean because that's that's such a different way of looking at at friendships, you know, the way those two connect it. So I'm just wondering with with say men's groups, men's retreats, uh not just so not just the sort of relational side. And it it sounds like they've got a a spiritual bond as well as everything else. Um but there's something from that that can feed in to a very different way of of being in in men's groups. And again, it does come back to words like tenderness and and uh all the rest. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02I I mean uh it's it's I this is gonna sound very judgmental and it's not meant to be, but if you're a very conscious man and you understand yourself and you understand you've had challenges, maybe you need to be challenged to kind of be more kind of aggressive and sort of more dark masculine, more penetrating, and more kind of aggressive in the world. But maybe you also what really needs to be developed and nurtured in groups and men's groups and talked about more is a sense of love, um, and a sense of care and a sense of nurturing. Because often it gets put into a sort of brotherly shape, and then that puts a lot of family weight on stuff, or it or you get sort of father-son dynamics happen if you've got a wider range group, and often it people talk about oh, we're all family, but actually we and people talk about chosen family quite a lot now. So chosen family is a word that gets used and a phrase that gets used quite a lot, but it does require, you know, do we talk in men's groups about friendship as much and and developing male friendship and what that looks like? Or do we talk about, you know, we've got to go into the world and make our mark, you know, in a big way. And often it's sometimes seen as a big thing that we have to do, where we've got to kind of help 40 men, you know, and that's gotta be the aim. Where maybe, you know, a men's group is four men who meet regularly, or three men who meet regularly. I always think a group is three. Um, for three something's not an easy way to have a group, but you know, it doesn't all have to be kind of in the, you know, don't always have to be in, you know, mega amounts of people. But can the love and the tenderness be brought through and the gentleness? And can people sit with that? And quite often I go to men's retreats or groups or things where I'm asked to work in things, or I'm dealing with I'm talking to men, you know, in my in other work. They don't, or it's not always talked about. And going through that uncomfortableness isn't always talked about. Um, I'm not somebody who likes shouting at a wall or pounding a cushion particularly. I can find other ways of getting released in my inner anger that doesn't require that. I can do it if I'm if I'm asked to. But you know, those moments where I'm actually asked to be quite vulnerable at the heart, um I haven't there's they haven't been asked to do that in lots of men's groups actually. Give somebody a compliment, I'll do that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah. I mean it's interesting, isn't it? There's there's I mean, you talked about the sort of familial role, so it's a brotherhood or it's uh or it's all we're family, or maybe we're a tribe, or whatever. But there's immediately there's rules in that, or whether that's spoken or not. And there's a security I mean, maybe there is something about sort of sex is taken out of the equation in some ways with that. Um or that's not quite the right, it's it's more sort of the roles are a bit more certain, let's put it that way.
SPEAKER_02I thought uh yeah, maybe sex isn't uh It's not the right word, but it's maybe maybe intimacy intimacy is taken out. Yeah, emotional intimacy is taken out if you're but if you're you know, because i I I'm a single child, so I don't have anything about things. So directly some people start talking about family and brotherhood and things like that to me. I don't have those siblings. So for me, that rough and tumble that you have in big families where everybody fights and then two minutes later everybody sits around a table and has dinner together, I find quite difficult. You know, if I have a bit of a conflict with somebody, it's it's I'm quite a slow healer because I'm not used to having just to get on and move on quickly, as you often find people do in bigger families. You know, that you know, we've had a fight, but now we're all eating dinner. I just think we've had a fight and then want to see if we've got 12 hours, maximum, minimum or maximum, you know, depending on how I feel. So that we've moved it into a kind of structure, as you say, but it doesn't always have so much at risk intimacy. And I think it's a risk that at risk intimacy is the thing that people have to walk through. Yeah. Or men have to walk through.
SPEAKER_00And it yeah, I mean the image I get as you say that it it's literally like a threshold. You walk through the threshold. And then if something's meant to be, it'll be there the other side. Um but it takes that action of of and the risk, I suppose, of walking through in the first place.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And takes that desire. Talking about the the two actors, what one had was his desire to make it work.
SPEAKER_00And I I mean, um the way you told that, he also had a vision. I mean, he clearly saw something.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I mean, he approaches all of his life like that. I mean, he is a very successful man. He has a vision and goes on going for it. And um, you could say he swept the other one along, and you could you could make all those judgments, and all those judgments have been made around them. Oh, well, everybody's gonna want to be friends with a good-looking, successful one if you're not, if you don't fit that kind of category. No, these two are really really love each other, they really matter to each other, and that's what they've created. It goes beyond all the kind of, oh, you know, we all want to be good, we always want to, we all want to be with a friend with a good, you know, of the successful man. Everybody who's a successful man, you know, we want to be their friend. It's gone, but it goes beyond that. But that desire to that things matter is really what what what made it survive. It it was it mattered to him, and he was very honest that it mattered. But it was to do with laughter, it's to do with fun. And often initially, and often what is missing, I think, from sometimes men's groups and men's work is a sense of fun, is a sense of ridiculousness, is a sense of laughter. I'm somebody who quite likes a laugh and a joke. I I was brought up in a A family. I was what my dad was a very funny man. So I find that going into something where you know seven days of being very earnest maybe doesn't um doesn't necessarily work for me. And last fortunately, the last men's retreat I was on, I found I found the other funny person, thank goodness. And we uh we we spent the whole time being very naughty and laughing. But actually I needed that. I don't know if I would have got through it without him because it because that earnest level for me needs a release around fun. But yeah, um yeah.
SPEAKER_00No, it's just uh because because the and actually I've I've made this assumption that idea, say, of of two men sat opposite each other and and and tenderness coming between the space, immediately it feels quite serious. Well, that's my uh you know, I'm putting that on top of it. And and there is the potential for earnestness, and obviously we have to be talking about difficult things and and whatever. Whereas you're right, the lightness and the fun element of it is often what opens the hearts between two people.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and you can't create I think I think the the the cult jester again is an archetype, and the court jester could say to the king things that anybody else would have had their head chopped off for, in a sense of fun, and I can have a I can I have marvellous access to my court jester, and I can get away with saying things that other people wouldn't. But the laughter and that fun has to be that it comes up because of trust, um, and a shared connection somewhere. It all those seriousness and that seriousness and all those things you think about that you've just talked about do matter and they do have to be travelled through. But but if you feel safe with somebody, you can say you can be a bit more fun. Somebody asked me a question the other day, it was a really complicated question all about reincarnation and past lives. And I said, I don't know. And they were quite shocked because it was quite a serious thing, but I genuinely didn't know. I said, I'll find out. I said, I'm gonna have to go and sit and meditate and ask and talk to a couple of people, but it's not available today. But actually, because I was quite honest and I said it in a funny way, it kind of moved something forward. Um, that was a very conscious decision in me to deal with it like that. But yeah, I think sometimes with the world we need to laugh more, and I think as men with each other, we need to find a sense of fun and the ridiculous, you know. It's not all about doing an assault course, which can be fun and ridiculous in a way. But you know, if you're me, the chances of getting injured, I just I just won't bother. Fair enough. I've got enough old dancers' injuries to last me a lifetime, thank you. No need any more.
SPEAKER_00I didn't I don't I think the word the word that I'm with right now, um that I'm aware we're sort of coming towards the end time-wise, but is willingness and that will really put ourselves in in those potentially awkward um situations.
SPEAKER_02And I've got commitment, you see. What what's interesting I see when people have men, women, anything, anybody actually have uh truly very good relationships with friends, siblings, partners, children. It's because they are really committed to making that work. And commitment is a kind of we we often think of commitment being a time thing, but actually it's a condition of the heart.
SPEAKER_00You have been listening to Veils to the Soul, Masculinity and Spirituality with Gary Wright and Oliver Baum. For more information on the work of Gary Wright, please visit www.therightmedium.co.uk and for Oliver www.oliverbaum.co.uk produced and edited by Oliver Baum with additional editing and music by Felix. Thank you for listening.
