The Sacred Masculine: prompt
The Man Who Taught Me the Meaning of Sacred Masculinity
He healed my heart, changed my life, and made me see men in a whole new way
I met him in early 2015. When my partner left me, I decided to dive into radical change in every way. After more than a decade in education, I left my teaching job and started working in a nonprofit.
I was hired to run a huge youth program that covered three counties, employing nearly 100 teenagers and 25 adult staff members. As my new boss began reading from the three-page list of my job duties (which was 2 ½ pages longer than the one that had been attached to the job announcement), she must have noticed my jaw dropping further and further open in shock.
“Don’t worry,” she said, interrupting herself. “I know it’s a lot, but you’ll be working closely with a partner from our sister agency. He’ll help you get up to speed and will work with you to get all this done.”
At the end of our meeting, she gave me his contact information. “His name is Peter,” she said. “Contact him right away and set up a meeting so you two can get to know each other.”
I nodded and started out the door, but she called me back.
“Start off on a strong foot with him,” she advised, pointing to me, expectantly. “Always come into a male-female partnership strong. Otherwise, the power dynamic will always be off.”
I considered her words and found myself nervous to be in another close partnership with man at work. I’d never experienced one that had felt equal — especially during my years in education, an industry that notoriously undervalues and takes advantage of female employees.
I was genuinely nervous that first time I sat down with Peter.
Looking back now, it makes me laugh to think of that. Peter is the most evolved man I’ve ever known, the very definition of the Sacred Masculine. Our partnership was one of the most healing relationships I’ve ever had — professionally and personally.
I had nothing to worry about.
Our first successful season together garnered us a shower of praise.
“I can’t take the credit for this,” I demurred, as I always do. I was taught that a humble woman does that — takes no credit. But also…I genuinely felt like Peter and I were one person and I could not have accomplished what I accomplished without him and his particular genius.
I was shocked, however, when he immediately spoke up and said, “No. This was all Yael. She is an amazing woman and she deserves all the credit.”
I have never in my life worked with a man who stepped back and tried to give me all the credit. I was stunned.
For the duration of our four years together, he did it again and again, mostly without prompting. At every meeting we attended, he found ways to publicly sing my praises and diminish his own contributions. He was constantly elevating me, centering me, putting the spotlight on me.
Of course, I pushed back — as was appropriate. Because it was a team effort. Period. Neither of us could have done what we did without the other.
But Peter is a deeply generous man who I think genuinely has no ego. All he wants is to see other people excel. And instead of passively hoping that might happen, he made it happen. He actively participated in the elevation of people who were more marginalized than he was.
“I’m coming over,” Peter said, when he texted me on a Saturday to ask me to email an urgent work document and discovered that I was at the office, finishing the tasks I couldn’t complete over the course of the week.
I argued with him that first year — I felt like a strong woman wasn’t supposed to ask for or accept help. But he insisted.
“This isn’t about you or your competence or your efficiency,” he said, once. “This is about our program. All that matters is that the program is successful. And that means we both put our sweat into this — whatever it takes. We are in this together.”
So we worked together on countless Saturdays. And Sundays. And evenings. And holidays.
He always made himself available for the sake of the program, as I did, and through that, we developed a deep trust in one another. We knew we could count on each other.
“I got your back, kiddo,” he always used to say.
Peter doled out apologies as often as “thank yous.” This stunned me.
When it comes to apologies and men, I’ve rarely heard a good one. In fact, I rarely hear them, at all. My last partner occasionally copped to his bad behavior and gave very sincere apologies. But mostly, my romantic partners have only apologized when I made an issue out of something and then only when simultaneously pointing out what they thought I had done wrong.
And I have never, ever had a male coworker apologize to me.
But Peter… Peter apologized all the time. If he moved something on my desk. If he called me on a Saturday. If he needed something when he knew I was busy. If he felt he might have been a little grumpy the last time we talked.
I once overheard our male staff members criticizing him for this. “What’s with all the fucking I’m sorrys?” one of them whispered. “It’s so weak.”
No. It’s not weak, at all. It’s a sign of immense strength of character and emotional maturity. It’s the sign of a man who respects other people and understands that the way he looks at the world isn’t necessarily the way other people look at the world.
It’s the sign of a person who cares about other people more than he cares about how others perceive his identity as a man.
I’ll admit, I completely fell in love with Peter. Who wouldn’t?
But it wasn’t his humbleness. It wasn’t his ability to admit when he was wrong (or might be wrong). It wasn’t his sense of commitment.
It was his emotional intelligence.
Peter is a deeply intuitive man. He pays attention to people, watches their expressions, and reads their body language. And being in touch with his own emotions, he can sense other people’s emotions, as well.
I learned this the first summer we worked together, when my boss and I had an upsetting disagreement right before I had to meet with Peter. I still didn’t know him very well and had no plans of confiding in him about what had happened.
I got out of the car, walked across the lot to him and gave him my most convincing fake smile.
He didn’t buy it for a second, immediately opening his arms and I surprised myself by diving right into his bear hug.
“What’s wrong, kid?” he asked.
So I told him everything.
From that moment on, we seemed to be connected by a strange thread. He could literally tell I was upset even when we hadn’t talked all day, even when we were working in separate offices. Out of the blue, he would text me and say, “Kiddo, you okay? I’m worried about you.” How did he know?
I learned, over time, that he knew because he paid attention. He knew my fake smiles. He recognized my anxiety when I stiffly crossed my arms over my chest. We could have a conversation across a crowded table just with expressions, nods, and head shakes — no words.
He never shied away from talking about feelings — his own or others’. And he made it his business to clear the space around people who were hurting or scared. He would walk the perimeter, offering his support and keeping other people away until the person in question was okay.
And yes, Peter was a white knight. He didn’t have much of a temper, nor any apparent aggression to spend. A person could thoroughly screw him over and though he would grumble about it later, he never escalated the conflict or made a stink about it. He’d just accept it and move on.
But if someone hurt someone he loved…he leapt on his steed and galloped in to save the day.
“I’m sorry we didn’t cite your work in that brochure we published,” a colleague called to tell me one day early in my partnership with Peter. “That was a terrible oversight.”
I was shocked by the call. Like Peter, I rarely made an issue when it came to standing up for myself and was surprised to get an apology from someone I had assumed didn’t know I was upset in the first place.
“Peter called and told me it was wrong that we did that. And he’s right. I’m sorry.”
Oh, I thought. That’s why they called.
Needless to say, this happened time and time again. People mysteriously called me to apologize and later, I’d discover my white knight had defended my ideas, advocated for my advancement, and called out people who had treated me badly or failed to respect me or my work.
“You know that as a woman, it’s imperative for me to learn to speak up for myself,” I once told him. “I don’t want people to think that I can’t take care of myself without my partner to back me up.”
“I know,” he conceded. “But people will listen to me without question. And shouldn’t I take advantage of that on other people’s behalf?”
I knew what he meant — he is a white man in a position of power in a huge, well-respected organization. And he wanted to use that power to help those who didn’t get a share in that power.
To me, Peter will always be the epitome of Sacred Masculinity.
Despite the fact that he is a cisgender, heterosexual male, our culture would define him as weak, based on his behavior. I saw our young male employees size him up as such many times, as I mentioned above.
But I see the strongest, most masculine man I have ever known in Peter.
Though we never got together (he is very happily married), Peter is my dream man. He is kind of partner I want — not just in work, but in all things.
Peter is a good and strong man because he doesn’t pin his entire identity on his gender. Peter sees himself as a person, above all else — an equal who doesn’t need to demonstrate power or aggression. He wants what is best for everyone.
© Yael Wolfe 2020
This was written for Jean Carfantan’s prompt about the Sacred Masculine.
More about my friend, Peter:
