BECOMING A MAN: THE BIG GIG // secret men's business - manhood: the big gig (john marsden)

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8. Recognise Your Feelings
This is a big problem for a lot of males. Their failure to understand their feelings means they don't develop to their potential as human beings. In particular; they fail in relationships and they fail as fathers.
You certainly know men who are unable to confront or acknowledge their feelings.
A few years ago a Queensland politician said: 'In Queensland all males have their tear ducts surgically removed at birth.'
Sure, it's a funny line. But like most comedy, if you look at it from a different angle it's tragic. This guy has a big problem. When you deny your feelings, when you bottle them up, when you put them away, they don't disappear. They go deep inside you and they fester. It's like a dog burying a dead rabbit. It doesn't disappear. It sits there under the ground, getting rotten and mouldy.
As well as recognising your feelings you have to be able to express them, and express them in appropriate ways. If you're feeling angry it's not appropriate to hot someone. If you're frustrated it's not appropriate to destroy something. If you're depressed it's not appropriate to take drugs.
It can take a lot of courage to confront and explore your feelings in a meaningful way.
The novel and film Ordinary People explore the life of a teenage boy who feels guilty about the death of his older brother in a boating accident. Conrad, who was a good swimmer, survived, but his brother drowned. As if that wasn't enough, Conrad is also struggling to cope with his parents, who are difficult people. Their relationship is in trouble, partly as a result of the drowning.
Conrad goes to a counselor, who encourages him to express his feelings, not to bottle them up. One day he does so. Frustrated with his parents and grandparents during a family photo session he yells angrily at them.
They are shocked. He's never spoken to them like this before. They're very upset.
Conrad goes back to the counsellor. 'You told me to express my feelings,' he complains, 'and look what happened. They're all angry with me.'
The counsellor leans forward and sys quietly: 'Don't expect it always to tickle.'
Conrad is a young man of great courage. At least one of his other friends, a girl he met in hospital, is unable to fin as much courage. Rather than face up to her feelings she commits suicide.
Happiness, pride, love, they tickle. Anger, guilt, sorrow, they're a bit tougher to handle.
But how painful can feelings be, that people kill themselves rather than face them? How difficult is the truth? I keep thinking of a newspaper interview with an Anglican woman priest, who was trying to persuade some builders' labourers to go to church. One of them said: 'I'd rather stick a pin through my dick than go to church.' She thought: 'Goodness me, how painful can it be to go to church?'
Feelings can be extremely painful. But nothing's as painful as suicide. I'd rather go through the pain of confronting my feelings, no matter how much courage it takes, than throw my life away.

9. Experience Success
If you can't point to a number of major successes you've had in your life already, you need to do something about it.
This is quite urgent. There's nothing wrong with failing. Failures can be great. you can learn heaps from them, you can become stronger, you can bounce back next time.
To fail time and time again, however, is a very different matter. It is a serious problem that needs to de addressed. It is very bad for you to fail over and over. There is nothing to be gained from it.
I once took over as coach of a tennis team that had been losing every game by big margins for years. I said to the man who appointed me: 'If after one year of hard work the team are still the easybeats of the competition, I will come to you and tell you that we must withdraw. We must find different teams to play against, teams who are closer to our level.'
As it happened the team did improve steadily, and although they did not win a match that season they were no longer easybeats. And they own their first match of the following season.
That's irrelevant though; the point I want to make is that the choices for a person or a team in their situation were very easy. Improve or get out.
If you are failing badly in a music course, a relationship, the job market, a sport, a school subject, school generally, then that is your choice: improve or get out. It is dangerously easy to drift along for month after month, year after year. It's often more comfortable to do that, to stay in your unhappy hole, than to risk breaking new ground. It takes energy to break new ground, and people who have been failing for a long time lose energy.
A battery that keeps being drained becomes flat. It needs to be recharged. If you're feeling like that battery, drained by failure after failure, ver getting the recharge of a success, you need to take charge of the situation.
Supposing we're talking about a school subject for instance. If you've been failing in Maths or Japanese for months or years, you're doing yourself damage. Work out a programme for the next four weeks that you think you can manage. It might involve getting help from your parents, another student, a teacher, a computer programme or a different book. Don't aim to reach an A or make up all the ground you've lost. Just give yourself targets you can attain.
If after four weeks you haven't made any progress it might be that this subject just isn't your scene. Your skills may lie elsewhere. Quit.
But it's not enough to put an end to a long run of failures. You've got to achieve some success. Real success too: you on your own, without cheating, without having your hand held. Choose something that you're really keen to do, work out how you're going to do it, discipline yourself to achieve it.
Avoid that very common mistake of taking on too much.
You might decide that you're going to achieve success by getting a job, by putting out a class yearbook, by designing and selling a range of T-shirts, by getting your coaching certificate in soccer or your umpire's accreditation in cricket, by reaching Grade Six in saxophone, by making a movie, by saving enough money for something you want, by building a sleep-out, by swimming a sub-minute 100 metre freestyle, by quitting smoking, by taking over the cooking for your family at weekends, by reading a book a fortnight for the next year...
'Nothing succeeds like success' says the old proverb. Success is good for humans and other living creatures!

10. Explore your Feelings About Death
A person who has no understanding of death, never grappled with it, never thought about it, is not yet an adult.
A generation or two ago children saw life at close quarters. In some societies they still do - but not in our urbanised, industrialised, contemporary Australia. Beatrix Potter, author of Peter Rabbit, in a letter to a newspaper in 1911 described how as a child she had helped scrape the bristles off her grandmother's slaughtered pig. She complained, 'The present generation is being reared upon tea - and slops.
Maxim Gorky, in his classic account of pre-Revolutionary Russia, My Childhood, wrote with vivid detail of his first-hand encounters with suffering, depravity, happiness, life - and death:
Nanny took his cap off, and the back of his head hit the floor with a dull thud. Then it rolled over to one side, and the blood flowed more abundantly, but only from one corner of his mouth now. It flowed for a horribly long time. At first I expected Tsiganok to test a little, sit up, spit something out and say:
'Whew! It's hot in here!'
He always used to say this on Sundays, when he woke up from his after-supper nap. Now he didn't get up, but he just lay there, his life ebbing away.
The sun had already moved away from him and the bright strips of light had shortened and fell on the window sills. Tsiganok had gone black all over, his fingers didn't move any more, and the foam had dried from his lips. Around his head burnt three candles, their flickering golden spears lighting up his disheveled, blue-black hair, his blood-stained teeth and the tip of his sharp nose, throwing quivering yellow patches on his swarthy cheeks.
Nanna, who was kneeling by him and weeping, whispered: 'My angel, light of my life.'
It was cold in the room and I his under the table in terror. Then my Grandfather, in his raccoon-fur coat, burst into the kitchen, followed by Grandmother, who was wearing her cloak with the little tails hanging on the corridor, Uncle Mikhail, and a lot of strangers.
Grandfather flung his coat on the floor and roared 'Bastards! Feel satisfied now you've killed him? He would have been worth his weight in gold in give years' time!'
(pp. 58-59)

In our antiseptic, terrified society, where avoiding the experience of death for ourselves and for others has become a national obsession, will we ever again find anyone who can write with such intimate, loving knowledge of the mysteries of human existence?
I once taught a class of Year 10 students. We were reading a book called Bless the Beasts and Children in which the young characters suddenly come across buffalo being slaughtered. My Year 10 students yawned their way through this chapter of the book, showing no interest in the scene, no understanding of the feelings involved.
I thought 'Stuff this, I'll show them what it's like to unexpectedly come across animals being killed.'
I drove to the local abattoir and got permission to bring my class there the next day. When the students arrived at the classroom I loaded them in a bus and we drove straight to the abattoir. Not until we were at the gates did the students realise where we were going.
The trip had a dramatic effect on them. Only three were able to complete the tour; the rest ended up sitting outside under trees with their heads on their knees, trying to quell their nausea. Four became vegetarians on the spot.
For many years these students had happily helped buy meat in neat Gladwrapped packets in the supermarket. They had happily helped cook it, and they had happily eaten it. Now, for the first time, they were confronted with the reality of where the meat had come from. They understood in a real (not an abstract) way that the animals had to be killed before they could be eaten, and they started to understand what those deaths involved.
It's morbid to be obsessed with death. But it's equally unhealthy to avoid thinking about it. As part of your Science or Religion or English course you might be able to do a unit on death. This could involve a visit to an undertaking business or a crematorium, discussion with a doctor, a visit to an abattoir.

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8. Recognise Your Feelings This is a big problem for a lot of males. Their failure to understand their feelings means they don't develop to their potential as human beings. In particular; they fail in relationships and they fail as fathers. You certainly know men who are unable to confront or acknowledge their feelings. A few years ago a Queensland politician said: 'In Queensland all males have their tear ducts surgically removed at birth.' Sure, it's a funny line. But like most comedy, if you look at it from a different angle it's tragic. This guy has a big problem. When you deny your feelings, when you bottle them up, when you put them away, they don't disappear. They go deep inside you and they fester. It's like a dog burying a dead rabbit. It doesn't disappear. It sits there under the ground, getting rotten and mouldy. As well as recognising your feelings you have to be able to express them, and express them in appropriate ways. If you're feeling angry it's not appropriate to hot someone. If you're frustrated it's not appropriate to destroy something. If you're depressed it's not appropriate to take drugs. It can take a lot of courage to confront and explore your feelings in a meaningful way. The novel and film Ordinary People explore the life of a teenage boy who feels guilty about the death of his older brother in a boating accident. Conrad, who was a good swimmer, survived, but his brother drowned. As if that wasn't enough, Conrad is also struggling to cope with his parents, who are difficult people. Their relationship is in trouble, partly as a result of the drowning. Conrad goes to a counselor, who encourages him to express his feelings, not to bottle them up. One day he does so. Frustrated with his parents and grandparents during a family photo session he yells angrily at them. They are shocked. He's never spoken to them like this before. They're very upset. Conrad goes back to the counsellor. 'You told me to express my feelings,' he complains, 'and look what happened. They're all angry with me.' The counsellor leans forward and sys quietly: 'Don't expect it always to tickle.' Conrad is a young man of great courage. At least one of his other friends, a girl he met in hospital, is unable to fin as much courage. Rather than face up to her feelings she commits suicide. Happiness, pride, love, they tickle. Anger, guilt, sorrow, they're a bit tougher to handle. But how painful can feelings be, that people kill themselves rather than face them? How difficult is the truth? I keep thinking of a newspaper interview with an Anglican woman priest, who was trying to persuade some builders' labourers to go to church. One of them said: 'I'd rather stick a pin through my dick than go to church.' She thought: 'Goodness me, how painful can it be to go to church?' Feelings can be extremely painful. But nothing's as painful as suicide. I'd rather go through the pain of confronting my feelings, no matter how much courage it takes, than throw my life away.
9. Experience Success If you can't point to a number of major successes you've had in your life already, you need to do something about it. This is quite urgent. There's nothing wrong with failing. Failures can be great. you can learn heaps from them, you can become stronger, you can bounce back next time. To fail time and time again, however, is a very different matter. It is a serious problem that needs to de addressed. It is very bad for you to fail over and over. There is nothing to be gained from it. I once took over as coach of a tennis team that had been losing every game by big margins for years. I said to the man who appointed me: 'If after one year of hard work the team are still the easybeats of the competition, I will come to you and tell you that we must withdraw. We must find different teams to play against, teams who are closer to our level.' As it happened the team did improve steadily, and although they did not win a match that season they were no longer easybeats. And they own their first match of the following season. That's irrelevant though; the point I want to make is that the choices for a person or a team in their situation were very easy. Improve or get out. If you are failing badly in a music course, a relationship, the job market, a sport, a school subject, school generally, then that is your choice: improve or get out. It is dangerously easy to drift along for month after month, year after year. It's often more comfortable to do that, to stay in your unhappy hole, than to risk breaking new ground. It takes energy to break new ground, and people who have been failing for a long time lose energy. A battery that keeps being drained becomes flat. It needs to be recharged. If you're feeling like that battery, drained by failure after failure, ver getting the recharge of a success, you need to take charge of the situation. Supposing we're talking about a school subject for instance. If you've been failing in Maths or Japanese for months or years, you're doing yourself damage. Work out a programme for the next four weeks that you think you can manage. It might involve getting help from your parents, another student, a teacher, a computer programme or a different book. Don't aim to reach an A or make up all the ground you've lost. Just give yourself targets you can attain. If after four weeks you haven't made any progress it might be that this subject just isn't your scene. Your skills may lie elsewhere. Quit. But it's not enough to put an end to a long run of failures. You've got to achieve some success. Real success too: you on your own, without cheating, without having your hand held. Choose something that you're really keen to do, work out how you're going to do it, discipline yourself to achieve it. Avoid that very common mistake of taking on too much. You might decide that you're going to achieve success by getting a job, by putting out a class yearbook, by designing and selling a range of T-shirts, by getting your coaching certificate in soccer or your umpire's accreditation in cricket, by reaching Grade Six in saxophone, by making a movie, by saving enough money for something you want, by building a sleep-out, by swimming a sub-minute 100 metre freestyle, by quitting smoking, by taking over the cooking for your family at weekends, by reading a book a fortnight for the next year... 'Nothing succeeds like success' says the old proverb. Success is good for humans and other living creatures!
10. Explore your Feelings About Death A person who has no understanding of death, never grappled with it, never thought about it, is not yet an adult. A generation or two ago children saw life at close quarters. In some societies they still do - but not in our urbanised, industrialised, contemporary Australia. Beatrix Potter, author of Peter Rabbit, in a letter to a newspaper in 1911 described how as a child she had helped scrape the bristles off her grandmother's slaughtered pig. She complained, 'The present generation is being reared upon tea - and slops. Maxim Gorky, in his classic account of pre-Revolutionary Russia, My Childhood, wrote with vivid detail of his first-hand encounters with suffering, depravity, happiness, life - and death: Nanny took his cap off, and the back of his head hit the floor with a dull thud. Then it rolled over to one side, and the blood flowed more abundantly, but only from one corner of his mouth now. It flowed for a horribly long time. At first I expected Tsiganok to test a little, sit up, spit something out and say: 'Whew! It's hot in here!' He always used to say this on Sundays, when he woke up from his after-supper nap. Now he didn't get up, but he just lay there, his life ebbing away. The sun had already moved away from him and the bright strips of light had shortened and fell on the window sills. Tsiganok had gone black all over, his fingers didn't move any more, and the foam had dried from his lips. Around his head burnt three candles, their flickering golden spears lighting up his disheveled, blue-black hair, his blood-stained teeth and the tip of his sharp nose, throwing quivering yellow patches on his swarthy cheeks. Nanna, who was kneeling by him and weeping, whispered: 'My angel, light of my life.' It was cold in the room and I his under the table in terror. Then my Grandfather, in his raccoon-fur coat, burst into the kitchen, followed by Grandmother, who was wearing her cloak with the little tails hanging on the corridor, Uncle Mikhail, and a lot of strangers. Grandfather flung his coat on the floor and roared 'Bastards! Feel satisfied now you've killed him? He would have been worth his weight in gold in give years' time!' (pp. 58-59) In our antiseptic, terrified society, where avoiding the experience of death for ourselves and for others has become a national obsession, will we ever again find anyone who can write with such intimate, loving knowledge of the mysteries of human existence? I once taught a class of Year 10 students. We were reading a book called Bless the Beasts and Children in which the young characters suddenly come across buffalo being slaughtered. My Year 10 students yawned their way through this chapter of the book, showing no interest in the scene, no understanding of the feelings involved. I thought 'Stuff this, I'll show them what it's like to unexpectedly come across animals being killed.' I drove to the local abattoir and got permission to bring my class there the next day. When the students arrived at the classroom I loaded them in a bus and we drove straight to the abattoir. Not until we were at the gates did the students realise where we were going. The trip had a dramatic effect on them. Only three were able to complete the tour; the rest ended up sitting outside under trees with their heads on their knees, trying to quell their nausea. Four became vegetarians on the spot. For many years these students had happily helped buy meat in neat Gladwrapped packets in the supermarket. They had happily helped cook it, and they had happily eaten it. Now, for the first time, they were confronted with the reality of where the meat had come from. They understood in a real (not an abstract) way that the animals had to be killed before they could be eaten, and they started to understand what those deaths involved. It's morbid to be obsessed with death. But it's equally unhealthy to avoid thinking about it. As part of your Science or Religion or English course you might be able to do a unit on death. This could involve a visit to an undertaking business or a crematorium, discussion with a doctor, a visit to an abattoir.
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