How to heal the wounded men: trauma, numbness & masculinity (transcript)

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Episode Transcript:

Lian (00:00)

What happens when a man finally faces the darkness he's been trained to numb and hide? Hello, my beautiful souls and a huge one welcome back. In this episode, I'm joined by Hugh Newton, a men's mentor whose life began in the midst of war in Zimbabwe, then known as Rhodesia. Growing up in such harsh conditions meant that he had to face and overcome the trauma of being trained as a child to defend his family.

30 years into his own healing journey, Hugh now dedicates his life to helping men step into their fullest, most loving selves while supporting the strength and renewal of the African continent he so deeply loves.

In this conversation, Hugh and I explore men, trauma, and the long road back to wholeness.

We talk about his childhood on a Rhodesian farm, the day a nine-year-old was armed to protect his mother and sister, the years of numbness that followed and the moment he named the predator within and chose to meet it.

we turn to what creates healing, men's work that faces danger with love, simple daily honesty instead of performance and the kind of steady boundaries that make intimacy possible.

So listen if you are or love a man who can't feel. If you've ever wondered why good men go numb or wanted to understand how even the deepest, darkest wounds in men can become strength. And before we jump into all of that good stuff, first it's time for your weekly omen from the algorithmic oracles.

Hades speaks from the shadows, skip subscribe and your feed fills with ghosts of empty chatter. Subscribe and each week real depth rises from the underworld of wisdom. So hit subscribe and cross the threshold. And if you're struggling with the challenges of walking your soul path in this crazy modern world and would benefit from guidance, kinship and support, come join us in Unio, the community for wild, sovereign souls.

UNIO is the living home for the wild sovereign soul path where together we reclaim our wildness, actualise our sovereignty and awaken our souls.

We meet twice each month in our community guidance circle in which Jonathan and I meet you exactly where you are and with whatever challenges you're experiencing. And that can be really anything from health to relationships to business to matters of spirituality, parenting, you name it. And this is in essence, in order to guide you To meet the material for liberation your soul is calling you to, so that you may become truly free, living the life your heart longs for. You can discover more and walk with us by hopping over to BeMythical.com/unio or click the link in the description. And now back to this week's episode. Let's dive in.

Lian (03:05)

Hello Hugh, a huge welcome to the show.

Hugh Newton (03:08)

Thank you, Lian. It's lovely to be here. Thanks for having me here.

Lian (03:13)

⁓ my pleasure entirely. as I was saying to you before we started recording, I haven't been too well. I'm just recovering from COVID. But the fact that I knew we had such ⁓ an important but also kind of juicy conversation to be had, I was like, I'm going to make sure that I get myself well enough for this conversation. So I'm really looking forward to it.

Hugh Newton (03:37)

Great, lovely.

Lian (03:39)

So let's start at the beginning. I know that you've got kind of an interesting and unusual start to your story in terms of your childhood, where you lived. I'd love to know how did your origin story, as it were, inform how you've ended up doing the work you do today?

Hugh Newton (04:01)

Thank you. Yes, I grew up in Rhodesia ⁓ before it became Zimbabwe and Rhodesia was a British colony. And at some stage in the early 60s, ⁓ Britain wanted to hand back the colonies to the original inhabitants. And ⁓ in Rhodesia, the Europeans decided they didn't want to hand the country over.

And so what happened was the local inhabitants fought a civil war against the Europeans who were running the country. And I was born into the country and lived on an isolated farm ⁓ way out in the bush. And when the war arrived in our area, I was nine. And what was happening is the Africans who were disenfranchised from their country would go into other African countries and train as soldiers and come back into Rhodesia with the aim of killing the white Europeans who lived out on the farms. And that was myself and my family. So at the age of nine, my father trained me and my brother ⁓ and armed us to protect our family.

And I lived in that war in an incredibly dangerous situation for the next six years ⁓ until I was 15 when we left the country and came over here to the UK. So I lived ⁓ in profound danger, both for myself and my family for many years in my childhood. And so I know violence and I know trauma.

And actually when I left the country, I knew nothing about trauma. For me, a lot of my childhood was normal. I'd lived in it so long. But when I came to the UK, I was extremely traumatised and had a lot of ⁓ behaviours around the trauma that was inside of me. And what I did was what most of us men do in those situations, I buried it.

I buried it, I hid it, I tried to look normal and behave normally and it wasn't until I was in my mid-30s where I was having profound difficulties with what was going on inside me that I decided I would try and turn and face it instead of running away from it and hiding it and I would attend to the trauma that was very much alive inside me. So I started my healing journey.

Lian (06:45)

my goodness it was really landing in me how for so many of us and this is not at all to dismiss let's say the kind of like more quiet types of trauma and not so obvious not so necessarily played out there but I there was something about the way you described there was this trauma happening externally not just within your family but in the the country you were living in in your community which then of course was also happening within your family and then within yourself. That's not common. ⁓ And there's something about that that was really, what I was noticing as you were talking was, and this again is true for all of us with all kinds of trauma, but I don't think it's as obvious usually because again, it's sort of quieter themes. What was occurring to me is You know how when we've experienced trauma as children, we kind of adjust our being around that. We sort of adapt ourselves for that to, I guess, make sense. And then we reach adulthood and it kind of doesn't no longer make sense. However, it's become the norm for us to be that way in life. And I was thinking your experience was so much more extreme than that because it literally was maladaptive. You were trained.

you as you said, you were literally trained to be a certain way that made sense in your environment, which didn't make sense once you arrived in this country. There's something to me that's so profound about that. It's like, it's no wonder you've ended up doing the work you've done. mean, talk about the medicine in the wound. But there is something about that that was really striking me as such a such a symbol for

Hugh Newton (08:30)

Hmm.

Lian (08:37)

this work, the path for all of us that it just yeah it has me kind of awestruck actually.

Hugh Newton (08:44)

Yeah, I was trained as a child to kill people, to protect my family. and... ⁓

When I first started this work, I couldn't talk about it, about my childhood without breaking down. It's taken me a lot, a real lot to be able to talk about it openly and in clarity without too much emotion coming over me. But I was conditioned by violence and threat and ⁓ by trying to stay alive. And I had a double barrel difficulty is I was afraid for my own safety as a child, but I was so orientated particularly to protect my mother and my sister. So I had a double fear. Will I be able to, if we are attacked, will I be able to be brave and strong enough to protect my my sister and my mum? And it played on me a lot. Yeah, it really did. So.

Lian (09:47)

Mmm.

Hugh Newton (09:50)

Whilst, yes, I have ⁓ really obvious trauma and obvious difficulties grown up, actually with my work with men, I have found that the degree doesn't make all that much difference and that trauma can be big and blindingly obvious or it can be much more subtle and ⁓ enduring and undermining. And however it goes, what that pushes us men into is

Lian (10:02)

Mmm.

Hugh Newton (10:18)

quite a similar place of ⁓ living round ⁓ distinct pain and adopting a number of behaviours to cope with that and to prevent the pain happening again and ⁓ then finally turning towards healing to be able to sort it out. But whether the trauma is big or small, I find it affects us in a similar way.

Lian (10:42)

Mm, I completely agree. It's, I've noticed in the work that I do with people, sometimes it's the, the trauma that is kind of the water we swim in, which is true, actually, to some extent with all trauma, but you know, so, so subtle is actually hard to name. Sometimes that can be the hardest to make conscious and to heal. Not that it's impossible, but that you're completely right, is actually that kind of big extreme trauma isn't necessarily, doesn't necessarily have a bigger impact than seemingly smaller, more subtle kinds of trauma. And something that really struck me as you were talking, and this links to something that I experienced when we were talking before we started recording that I'm going to share in a moment, is you mentioned that

What you were really present to back in childhood was this need to protect your mother and sister. And so this wasn't violence for its own sake. This was violence as a means to protect and protect your own lives, obviously, but as you say, to protect the women in your family.

And that's something to recognise. These things, men having these darker aspects, have a purpose. They're not just, let's say, things that have gone wrong. There is a primal basis for these things that is, I think, important to recognise and honour as part of this work that we're talking about.

I also noticed that before we started recording and we were talking about this theme, the darkness in men, and you said something like, you were saying, I am a dangerous man. And then you went on to explain how you've worked with that. And I noticed when you said those words, I am a dangerous man, I noticed the somatic impact on me as you said them. I noticed how those words landed in my body. And it was a really interesting experience because

there was a kind of, there was a real charge I felt in me where it was a kind of both a yes, that's actually, I could feel the response to me as a woman was partly that's actually what we need and want in a man. And yet of course, it is also, it can also bring harm. It can also be something to be ⁓ scared of. And so, I really want to, weave that into the conversation as we go, because of course, anytime we talk about men, we're also talking about women. The things as far as I can, know, those, that way, the dance between us is something that we can't really ignore. And again, I think this is so interesting that you brought that up, like the purpose of you being trained in that way was actually to protect.

And yet we can make those instincts in men wrong and we shame them, which is part of the reason they get pushed into these dark places. So I've said a lot there, but it was just there's so much was coming alive for me that I just wanted to share. So I'd love to hear your thoughts on that, kind of how these things get so, so repressed, so hidden, they can be hard to actually sort of bring out and make conscious.

Hugh Newton (14:21)

Thank you. yeah, the first thing that occurs to me is ⁓ there a single one of my male ancestors that I know of, all the way back to my great grandparents who have not been involved in wars.

Lian (14:37)

Gosh.

Hugh Newton (14:38)

Yeah, I'm the most recent, my father in the Rhodesian Civil War, both my grandparents in the Second World War, both my great grandparents in the First World War, and so on backwards. ⁓ we, as part of Sovereign's Journey, we explore what our ancestors have been doing. And whilst most men haven't been involved in a war themselves or their fathers, Nearly all of the men ⁓ have had grandfathers and great grandfathers in the two world wars that have gone before us. And if we look around the world now, there's so much war about. And this is a common thing for men. This is a common thing. It's really, really recent that men have known that they're not necessarily going to be called on to go and defend their country.

Lian (15:12)

Mmm.

Mm-hmm.

Hugh Newton (15:36)

defend their society, defend women. It is such a common thing and yet as you say there's a lot of doubt about men these days, ⁓ considerable doubt about men being safe and I'm not surprised it has an effect when I say I'm a dangerous man because ⁓

The reason I know that is because I've looked very, very carefully into the aspects of me that are dangerous. I know them inside out and I know that there is no certain way of me not being dangerous for the world except by completely knowing these aspects of myself and loving them and holding them in my heart and getting ⁓making agreement with these parts of myself that are dangerous, that they will not act out unless I give them permission.

Lian (16:40)

Hmm... Yeah.

Hugh Newton (16:43)

I have found there's no way for a man to be safe when he has danger inside him other than doing his own personal work to make himself safe. I originally tried a route where I would hide the darker aspects of myself and try and keep them out of view and out of sight. And actually, it doesn't work. It just doesn't work. ⁓ We cannot help if we are traumatised. We cannot.

Lian (16:52)

Hmm.

Mmm.

Hugh Newton (17:13)

help ourselves and stop ourselves acting out of that trauma unless we turn and face it and deal with it. And that's the only way we know how to make ourselves safe and what I can see I don't know another way.

Lian (17:22)

Hmm.

I quite agree. How do you see, and perhaps let's talk about some of the ways that I guess are harder to sometimes to talk about because of the shame they bring, but I would love to look at some of the ways that those traumas do play out when a man hasn't yet been able to turn inwards and ⁓ really meet those dark parts.

How might they be showing up in a man's life?

Hugh Newton (18:03)

Yeah, thanks. Okay, so now we're getting to the nitty gritty. If ⁓ we've suffered trauma in our childhood, we're most likely to live in a place of survival in life.

Lian (18:18)

Mm-hmm.

Hugh Newton (18:19)

Being in a place of survival means that... ⁓

Being in a place of survival has meant for me, I can't talk to everyone, for me, first of all, that I have been relatively numb around emotions. The only emotion I showed before doing my own personal work was anger. And I would suppress any feelings of sadness, any feelings of fear, any tenderer or more... ⁓

Lian (18:36)

Mm-hmm.

Hugh Newton (18:54)

gentle feelings, I would suppress all those because being in a place of survival, I did not feel that I could be vulnerable or that I could show any form of vulnerability to the world. So what that means is that the part of me that fights for myself and fights for survival and to stay safe in the world is exaggerated. So ⁓ a man in this place might be looked at as being a bit of a bully in some ways, always fighting for himself ⁓ quite hard, pushing endlessly, trying to get his own way and being hard to reach in a gentler, more loving way. That's, that's, yeah, I've got a few if you don't mind for a second. Yeah.

Lian (19:38)

Thank you.

Can I just name something that just, it was funny because you know how you can hear similar things said over and over and over again, and then suddenly you hear something and I don't know if I'm going to be able to quite do justice to this in words, but there's something about the way you said that about being numb that just like it brought tears to my eyes hearing you say it. And I don't know why I heard something different in the way you said it. What came to mind was, how it's a really common refrain I hear from women these days where they'll talk about and I think this is a kind of coming into consciousness for women about what they want in a man, what they want in a relationship and I hear over and over again this notion of a man not being emotionally available and wanting more of that in quote marks from a man.

Hugh Newton (20:34)

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Lian (20:41)

And there was something about the way you spoke about that numbness. And I just felt the, ⁓ gosh, know, like, of course that's not going to feel safe for a man. And that numbness is going to be the armor he wears. And then that's going to be made wrong because he's not going to feel emotionally available to the woman he's in relationship with. So I just wanted to share that while it was fresh because I felt that in a way that I haven't in the past.

Hugh Newton (21:07)

Yeah, thank you. I really appreciate that. And I want to say my numbness was not just a result of a lot of trauma in my childhood. My numbness was even more a result of growing up in a very patriarchal, hard, masculine world. And in the hard masculine world I lived in, boys could not show sadness and could not show fear, couldn't show softness not even gentleness really. And if we did, it would entail ⁓ heavy duty bullying ⁓ and ⁓ a lot of difficulty surviving ⁓ in our boyhood. So a lot of men from my generation had to, for survival reasons, even if there wasn't a lot of trauma around, harden up and ⁓ not be sad, ⁓ not be emotional, not let tears show.

Lian (21:35)

Mmm.

Hugh Newton (22:03)

ever. Never show fear in the face of bullying or other men and that meant that often for a lot of us anger was the only thing we could show and I know for myself instead of fear I showed anger instead of sadness I showed anger and I really was not really available in relationship because I was truly numb and the

Lian (22:04)

Bye bye.

Hugh Newton (22:29)

parts of me that are needed in relationship were not available to me and not available to my partner and so I wasn't really present in relationships and I know to a degree that is a common thing for a lot of men who try to be there in relationship but if they haven't done their personal work to rescue their emotions and bring them back to life or to be able to feel fear again, or even to be able to feel joy and love again, without having done their work to bring those back to life, ⁓ we can end up seeming to be somewhat unavailable and a bit half dead in relationship and even a bit half dead in life.

Lian (23:02)

Mmm.

Hmm. So I'm aware I interrupted you. You're about to, I think, give some examples. Would you like to return to that?

Hugh Newton (23:25)

Hmm. So, so what survival means is I end up ⁓ fighting far too heavily for myself in an exaggerated way. And so that can mean I try and make the whole of my life for myself. I'm a bit self-obsessed, a bit narcissistic, pushing way too hard for what I need. ⁓ Looking after myself as number one, not truly caring for the people around me, not really feeling empathy for them.

perhaps using people a bit to get my needs met, to advance in life. ⁓ If we look around us, there's a lot of ⁓ resurgence of that sort of masculinity, self-orientated, ⁓ using the world to get what I want to climb to the top of the pile just for me. There's a lot of that in the world and there's a lot of trauma behind that sort of behaviour.

And then there's a third place, ⁓ which is really dark inside men, where we have a part of us that holds our darkness and inner violence. And in a way, if we're so used to it and have been around it for a lot of our childhood, this part of us remains alive inside us in adulthood. And in my sort of work, I call this part the predator.

And it's the part of me that wants to hurt the world, hurt others, that wants to rise to violence just like that, that sees others being predatorial or dark or violent, even if they're not necessarily. It's like an inner part of me got attuned to violence and danger. it's that being affected by that as a child is a bit like being bitten by a vampire, where it gets inside of us and it becomes strong and part of that is wanting to act that out onto the world as well. And it's a very dangerous part of us and a lot of my, in my work with men, all the men I work with, we seek to identify this part inside of us that wants to punish or hurt or ⁓ abuse the world and we get to know this part.

Lian (25:34)

Hmm.

Hugh Newton (25:52)

of ourselves very carefully and bring this part to light and to our heart so that we can hold this part of us and stop this part of us acting out on the world. And then the last bit is a bit like, ⁓ because we can get too numb, we can only access and start to open up maybe through drink, through drugs or things like that. And so

Lian (26:08)

Mmm.

Hugh Newton (26:22)

with a lot of trauma inside us, are vulnerable to addictions, to ⁓ booze, to alcohol, just a lot of men in this place can only really feel something in partnership through sex rather than through feelings. And so we can be vulnerable to addiction and to messing up our life by being far too orientated towards drink and drugs and things like that in order to try and feel alive.

Lian (27:00)

Talking about, ⁓ you mentioned both that predator aspect and then also sex. ⁓

What do you see, I mean, speaking as a woman, and I'd say most women would have their own stories of this kind where we've experienced sexual violence from men. Would you just talk a little bit about that feels like a sort of particular aspect of the predator that's a little bit different to the way that you spoke about it? you share a little bit about that more, yeah, like sort of sexual predator aspect of a man?

Hugh Newton (27:39)

If men can't really feel then ⁓ they might be entering relationship to get exactly what they need. If they can't really feel they might be entering relationship without having much love and empathy for the person who they are trying to get into relationship with and they might be... the thing about Predator is it's very disguised and very hidden and doesn't really show itself but it has powerful ⁓ and single-minded focus on its target and so for instance being finding a man, find someone who they think they like and they really focus in hard love bombing ⁓

⁓ Trying to get this person to come alongside even when they're not ready. ⁓ Pushing hard for sex when the person isn't ready. Engaging in sex in a way that feels ⁓ as it's without much connection or without much feeling. ⁓ Hiding their true aspects until ⁓ they feel safe enough or they feel there's some love in the relationship before they reveal what's really going on inside them and who they really are. ⁓ Starting to reveal themselves after that beautiful, blissful first six months window is starting to pass and they find that they can't hide ⁓ the darker aspects of themselves. And for women it's when a woman gets a sniff or feeling that the person approaching is not safe.

⁓ is not showing their true colours, ⁓ that there's hidden aspects of this person, there's hidden aspects of everyone of course, and we gradually reveal ourselves in relationship, but ⁓ it's when a woman's getting an instinct, a really strong instinct that something's not right and that the person who's in front of them is not being authentic and not showing who they really are.

Lian (29:39)

Hmm.

Hugh Newton (29:59)

and then it starts to come across in ways that ⁓ maybe the man is too forceful or coercive or he shows hints of ⁓ violence or anger and when women start to feel that and start to see glimpses of something going wrong or something not right that's most likely to be quite a predatorial instinct that a man is following and It's good for women to be really aware of that and to take action and lay boundaries and get it out into the open pretty quickly if these sort of things start to happen. And just to check that if a man has these sort of things inside them that they're prepared to work on it and look inside and bring some healing to it.

Lian (30:49)

Hmm well that segues really nicely to what I was about to bring us to which is of course, if a man's just not ready to do that work, chances are he's not even going to be listening to this episode. So recognise that anyone listening, and especially men listening, is because there was already some readiness, or maybe, you know, there may already be quite a long way along this path. But I would love to know, speaking more generally, how might...

Hugh Newton (31:08)

Mm-hmm.

Lian (31:28)

a man recognise that there is something shifting, he may have lived a lifetime where those patterns that you've spoken about have just become normal, they're not even something that he's aware of, particularly they're just kind of how he is, how life is. What might indicate a readiness to change, a readiness to heal? And I guess we could look at that both from a perspective of what's going on in a man's inner world but also what we might look at if we were looking at the man from outside to recognise there is something shifting and a readiness for that.

Hugh Newton (32:06)

Yeah, thanks. It's a good question. The parts I've highlighted are the active parts or the overblown parts that normally are seen in the world. And there's another whole range of behaviours that inactive, withdraw from the world, hide, ⁓ try and keep safe, ⁓ not managing to bring a beautiful life to ourselves because...

Yeah, because we're hidden from the world. Actually, what I find is that by the time men reach 40s, they're often incredibly tired of living in a way that's really not working, living in a way that causes pain for ourselves or causes pain for the people who come in touch with us, or living in a way where we simply can't bring love and joy and ease and connection into our lives. A lot of men are really lonely, we know this by the statistics and there comes a time where men get truly exhausted and depressed with living our childhood conditioning and where a man chooses ⁓ to step forward and create a life that's aligned with our heart, aligned with love, aligned with connection and aligned with joy. And when our old work, our old world is not working anymore, and we are losing relationships, we're losing touch with our children, we're stuck in an unhappy career which is not fulfilling us and not really working. Men start to see signs that it's going to either be like this for the rest of my life unless I do something about it or I turn towards myself, find out what is truly going on inside of me, find the part of me that feels love and joy and steadiness and wholeness and wants to serve the world and men get to know that it's time in the end to make a change and not just keep on going in the same old painful, unfulfilling, sad, lonely, fearful, depressed ways. And there is a time to make a stand for ourselves where we can reconstruct ourselves in the image of our heart and in the image of love.

in the image of a good, strong, beautiful man. And all of that's available to us, but it takes a decision and it takes courage and strength where a man decides and says, okay, I'm going to dig into all of who I am and I'm going to make peace with what doesn't work and I'm going to build the best of myself so I'm happy and joyful in life.

Lian (35:02)

Hmm as I was listening to you talk I was present to how can I name this? The men, the men I know or maybe know of who kind of where you're describing but aren't choosing to do that work and in some ways you could say well that's actually the majority isn't it like we the conversation we're in is talking sadly about the minority of men and I don't personally think that's because men can't be bothered or men are you know arrogant or any of those things

Hugh Newton (35:38)

Mm-hmm.

Lian (35:51)

There is a there's a real reason at the heart of why more men aren't choosing to do the work you just described. What's your sense of that?

Hugh Newton (36:02)

Well, my sense is that it's a hundred and eighty degree turn for a man, where it means going against all our conditioning, ⁓ against all advice, just suck it up, be tough, hide what's hurting, ⁓ don't be a baby, ⁓ be a man. Most of us have been... ⁓

Lian (36:12)

Mmm.

Hugh Newton (36:29)

encouraged into that for years and years for the whole of our childhood to turn in completely the opposite direction and go well my tenderness is important, my feelings are important, my ability to love wholeheartedly is important. Being tough isn't the only thing in my life, actually what I realize is being tough and being in survival leaves me half human.

And it's like a shield against love. It's a shield against true life. And it's a it's a shield against joy and happiness. And most of us men are deeply happy and we're used to it. And we've been in it forever. It's like comfortable old pain. We know we can keep our nose just above water in this place. Yeah, it's not fulfilling, but we can manage and we're used to and were conditioned into it in the first place. To take a 180 degree turn and face into our numbness, our inner ⁓ predatory nature, into our inner violence, ⁓ our inner narcissism, it's painful work. It takes a brave man, it really does. And it takes a brave man to bring the love in his heart alive. And so, I'm not surprised not all men are going for it. It's not an easy task. I do notice that men my my son's age actually are much less numb, I judge, and much more open. And so there's a lot of hope that the younger generation are going to be able to enter this world a lot more easily than we men are. But it takes a lot for a man to do 180 degree turn.

Lian (37:55)

Hmm.

Hugh Newton (38:22)

step away from his conditioning and bring himself into love and life in a profound way and it's a long journey because we've spent so long on the other side.

Lian (38:34)

Gosh, again, it's really striking me how the way you're saying things is landing for me in a way that it's bringing the man's experience to life in ways that's just activating things in me differently. I'm really appreciating that about this conversation. It strikes me that this is something that

Hugh Newton (38:48)

Mm-hmm.

Lian (39:04)

as women, it would be really helpful for us to know and bear in mind because there is, and I think you mentioned it before we started recording, that refrain of where are all the good men? And there is in the kind of spiritual, personal development, self-help world, there is this cliche, but there is a truth to it, that it's women doing all the work. It's always women who go to the courses and the retreats and the therapists.

And it's so easy to be like, why the hell are men not doing that? And what you've just said there, I think is so helpful for us to recognise the conditioning that women and men have had largely is very different. And so it's not to mean that it's easier for women to do the work, but I think it is easier to choose into it in the first place. I think that's something that's really helpful to bear in mind.

Hugh Newton (40:05)

Yeah, I totally agree. ⁓ What us men see women doing is naturally coming together, naturally sharing depth and personal arenas of your life. And honestly, it's not natural for us men to do it. And we're heavily conditioned out of. And what I want to let women know is that there's a real quiet revolution going on. And I know a lot of men doing their personal work.

Lian (40:38)

Me too, me too. It's very, very hopeful to see that.

Hugh Newton (40:39)

Yeah, and it's a quiet revolution. We're not the guys standing up at the top of the country going, do this and do that. The people who feel the effects of it are our children, our partners, our friends. It's local, but we are bringing our hearts alive and we are ⁓ undoing this heavy duty patriarchal conditioning that has kept us in this half life.

for much of our life and it's a slow process, it takes a while. I feel that a lot of it needs to be done amongst men for starters because there's a lot of darkness in us men and those of us who are a little bit ahead on our own personal work, we hold that space for the other men who are coming after us. It takes a lot of strength to hold men's darkness and

Lian (41:27)

Mmm. ⁓

Hugh Newton (41:34)

to be with it in a loving way and help men come to terms with it and break out of it and live in love and live in feelings and wholeness. But there's so many of us getting on with it and it is changing our world, but it's quiet and it's heartfelt and it's not shouty. And I just want women to know that lots of us are here and we're doing our personal work so that we don't go blind and numb into relationships. so that we can truly bring our hearts forward in relationship and love well and love securely and not run at the slightest difficulty and be truly present in love in our relationships.

Lian (42:15)

Coming to what you just said there about ⁓ much of that work needs to be done with other men and I very much agree with that and conversely the same for women with other women. And I think there absolutely is a place for men and women to do some kinds of healing work together and that we have a role as women in men's lives and whether that be

Hugh Newton (42:23)

Hmm.

Lian (42:44)

⁓ as wives, partners, or in a kind of more therapeutic way. How do you see that women can support men more, can be a positive influence in men choosing to do this work? What would that look like? If you could...

Hugh Newton (42:50)

Mm-hmm.

Lian (43:13)

have it all your way and say to women, if you were to do this, it would mean more men could choose into doing the work. What would that be? What would women be doing?

Hugh Newton (43:26)

Well, a big part of my journey, the first part of my journey has been with men, and then a big part of the second part of my journey has been with women. And I attended something called Noble Man, which is run by a women's organisation called Celebration of Being, where ⁓

Lian (43:46)

I've had them on the show quite a few years ago.

Hugh Newton (43:50)

Lovely, okay. Well, there I went to address my own feminine side and to, with the holding and love of women to bring the relational loving ⁓ safe part of me alive in relationship. That was a huge step for me. And what I would encourage women to do is, see if you can get to know your man and the things that are troubling him inside, like a ⁓ feeling that he is safe for being numb or that he shouldn't show his feelings and really encourage him in as good a way as you possibly can. Really encourage men to show their feelings and show them that they are safe being vulnerable, safe showing their tears, safe being deeply loving.

And I believe women want us to be strong and to hold space for them. And women can also profoundly hold space for men as they go through this difficult journey into their softness and into their gentleness. so women can really confirm that they love this in men without trying to force them or push them, without saying, ⁓ you haven't got feelings. I want more feelings from you. but in a gentle and loving way, really responding where they do show their feelings and loving them for that and showing them that they're safe to be able to do that and they can continue to unfold.

Lian (45:26)

Gosh, there's so many other places that I would love to go in this conversation, but we are coming up on time. Is there anything that we haven't, I mean, there's probably a million things that we haven't come to, but there's anything that you really feel is important that we do touch on before we close?

Hugh Newton (45:37)

Yeah.

yeah, just to say to men that if you have trauma inside of you and if you have trauma that's conditioned and deeply affected how you've lived your life, it doesn't have to stay that way. It is possible to change. I don't live in my trauma. I still have parts of me that want to act out and I notice them and I love them and hold them back in so they don't have to. There is healing, there is joy, there is… movement out of loneliness, there is joining in with the rest of the world with love, there is peace. I never believed I could have peace in my heart and I have profound peace and love in my heart. So there is hope for us men even if we had a really painful start to life.

Lian (46:38)

thank you so much. And where can listeners find out more about you and the wonderful work you do?

Hugh Newton (46:46)

I run a program called The Sovereign's Journey. So that's the sovereignsjourney.co.uk and ⁓ myself and other men who love this work, we take a small group of 15 men through a 10 month journey to build their sovereign and to support their sovereign to bring to love and peace all aspects of themselves, especially the most difficult aspects.

so that their joy can bubble from within them and so that men can lead the life that their heart knows that they long for. It's a very beautiful journey for men, so if men are interested in that, they can get in touch with me and find out about that journey.

Lian (47:22)

Hmm.

Thank you so much, Hugh I really appreciate you and the work you do. I've been so touched during this conversation and feel as though.

Again, I'm struggling for words because I feel like I've felt things at a depth that I almost don't want to try to name and speak out too soon, but it's been profoundly impactful for me personally. So thank you so much for that.

Hugh Newton (48:00)

Yeah, thank you. Thank you for your love and care for men and that you are bringing this sort of work to the surface. Us men need it. We really need it. I'm very grateful for you that you are bringing this forward.

Lian (48:14)

Well, that is true. I do very much love men and this has been just such a delight and pleasure to have a chance to have this conversation with you. Thank you so much, Hugh

Hugh Newton (48:25)

Thank you.

Lian (48:27)

What a wonderful and much needed conversation. Here were the parts that I hope stay with you. Men's childhood survival strategies often harden to adult numbness, yet those same defenses can begin to soften through awareness and care. Naming and meeting the predator within can change everything. It transforms behaviour, reshapes desire and restores trust in relationships.

When women can meet men's early imperfect vulnerability with steadiness and warmth, it speeds the healing of the masculine hearts in ways that words alone never could. If you'd like to hop on over to the show notes for the links, they're at BeMythical.com/podcast/525 And as you heard me say earlier, if you're struggling with the challenges of walking your soul path in this crazy modern world, and would benefit from guidance, kinship and support. Come join us in Unio, the community for wild, sovereign souls. You can discover more and join us by hopping over to BeMythical.com/unio now. Let's walk the path home together. And if you don't want to miss out on next week's episode, head on over to your podcasting app or platform of choice, including YouTube and hit that subscribe or follow button.

That way you'll get each episode delivered straight to your device, auto-magically, as soon as it comes out. Thank you so much for listening. You've been wonderful. I'm sending you all my love. I'll catch you again next week. And until then, go be mythical.

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