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What is it about Sturgis, South Dakota, that draws 4 to 5 hundred thousand bikers, mostly men, to gather for a week of partying and hanging out together every summer?
What is it that draws 10,000 men to Gull Lake in northern Minnesota to sit with fishing poles around holes in the ice in sub-zero temperatures?
What is it about being in a deer stand, quietly staring into the woods for endless hours waiting for a deer to show up?
What is it that draws men who have served in Iraq or Afghanistan want to return so they can be with the men they served with?
The men in each of these situations are in some way, without knowing it, satisfying deep, primal spiritual hungers. All men have spiritual hungers but very often don’t call them that.
Whether a man considers himself ‘religious’, that is, church going or not, all men (all humans), in the broadest definition of the word, have a ‘spirituality’. Pretty much everything we do and are every day, in some way impacts our ‘spirits’ in positive or negative ways. Religious affiliation is NOT the primary goal of the male journey. Spirituality is!
- Two-thirds of U.S. adults (65%) describe themselves as religious (either in addition to being spiritual or not). Nearly one-in-five say they are spiritual but not religious (18%), and about one-in-six say they are neither religious nor spiritual (15%).
- Over 70% of the boys who are being raised in church will abandon it during their teens and twenties. Many of these boys will never return.
- More than 90% of American men believe in God, and five out of six call themselves Christians. But only one out of six attend church on a given Sunday. The average man accepts the reality of Jesus Christ, but fails to see any value in going to church. Clearly, organized religion is just one of an endless list of experiences that can shape a man’s spirit.
Why Wild and Wise? The male journey is filled with endless experiences that call for a healthy interplay between wild and wisdom energy. When wild energy dominates, then the possibility for extreme risk taking, self-destructive behavior and danger takes over. When wisdom energy dominates, then there is a tendency to over protect, play it safe and avoid adventure.
We have many great examples of men who, in spite of their self-doubt and missteps, were able to hold the tension between wild and wise energy in balance and changed the world for the good. Jesus, Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King, Oscar Romeo all brought about great spiritual and social change by resisting the urges to choose violence or extreme passivity. These men are powerful examples of what healthy, spiritually alive men look like.
This journal contains 38 meditations that reflect on the challenges and choices that shape a man’s spiritual life and the legacy he leaves behind. How he uses wild and wisdom energy determines the kind of impact he has on his world and to what degree he is aware of his ‘true self’, his Godself.
Too often men are distracted or addicted and do not have the awareness and words to name the spiritual realities that are embedded in everyday life. This legacy journal is designed to wake men up to the great mysteries and spiritual adventures that offer a deep and transforming life.
