Healing Vets – the Welcome Home Project – 2011update
by Boysen Hodgson
In February of 2010, I met Bill McMillan in CA when he won the Ron Hering Mission of service award for his work with his wife, Kim Shelton, on a documentary film called “The Welcome Home Project” featuring Michael Meade and 23 combat veterans and those close to them.
Read the original article by Bill McMillan here: http://mankindprojectjournal.org/search/welcome+home
The Welcome Home Project is still going! Screenings are being hosted across the US and overseas for small groups and large groups, in churches and in living rooms.
Welcome Home Project helps veterans heal by sharing war burdens with the community
(Warning:Video clip contains explicit and graphic language.)
by Bill McMillan
Feeling frustration over the lack of connection we felt with millions of returning veterans, my wife, Kim Shelton, and I had the crazy idea of creating a program called The Welcome Home Project. We wanted to become more involved with veterans and to offer a way for the larger civilian community to actively participate in the return of our soldiers.
Welcome to the Journal
Welcome to the home of The Mankind Project Journal. We hope you become a regular reader in the years ahead.
The Journal aims to serve “new warriors” and the general public. The quarterly web magazine will feature articles, essays and other works exploring diverse men’s issues. Other reports will cover MKP activities worldwide.
I AM AN EARTHFOLK
by Francis X. Kroncke
To understand my claim and its message about masculinity and spirituality, some background about the 1970s anti-war trials of the “Minnesota 8″ draft board raiders is required.
“…five years in a federal penitentiary.” I was indicted on “sabotage of the national defense.” Convicted of a crime of violence, I remain a felon for destroying government property-the 1-A files of draftees. At trial it was decreed, “You gentlemen are worse than the average criminal who attacks the taxpayer’s pocketbook, you strike at the foundation of government itself!” After eight days of testimony by historians, theologians, ecologists, Vietnam veterans, anti-war activists, the jury was instructed, “Everything you have heard here for the last eight days is irrelevant and immaterial.”
‘New Warrior’ men make good fathers
by Steve Norcross
Once again, the third Sunday in June is Father’s Day. Greeting card publishers, clothing manufacturers, distilleries, and long-distance phone operators are hoping to realize a profit from the once-a-year obligation many feel to honor their dads. I hope my own kids, at least, call and wish me well, tell me that they love me.
I’m put in mind, this time of year, to recall and honor my fathers and grandfathers. I hope to be so honored by my descendents.
The Screaming Nice Guy
by Matthew Alexander Sloane
I took part in a workshop recently: about 18 women and 12 men played in a very interactive, energetic inquiry as to the nature of sexuality and how it lives or does not live in each of us.
In one moment, our brilliant facilitator noticed that there was a “men vs. women” dynamic showing up in the conversation, so she invited us to make it more real and play it out. All the men stood on one side of the room and all the women on the other. “Let out all the judgments you have about the other sex — say it to the people across from you now!”
Set Them Up For Success
by Alain Hunkins
What do good leaders do?
Help their followers succeed.
Simple enough to remember.
Not so easy to execute.
As a leader, what do you put in place so your people succeed?
Do you provide them tools so that they can swim?
If they start to flounder, do you help them?
Or do you criticize and blame them while they gasp for their last lungfuls of air?
Poetry: My Sons
by Kit Lueder
Sometimes my sons are Children of the Sun,
Intense and radiant,
Excited and streaming with energy.
Sometimes my sons are Children of the Stars,
Steady and ever-present,
Independent and limitless.
Sometimes my sons are Children of the Moon,
Cool and distant,
Not avoiding but not reaching out.
Sometimes my sons are Children of Venus,
Affectionate and loving,
Close and considerate.
Sometimes my sons are Children of Mars,
Defiant and challenging,
Determined and strong-willed.
Ending a “Dads” Stereotype
Category: Fatherhood, Men and Parenting, Men and Relationship, Men and Work, Opinion
by Ravenspen
Stereotypes abound. They’re a convenient way for me to pigeon-hole people when I don’t want to take the time to put myself in their shoes. Stereotyping makes me feel smug, superior and part of the “in” group. We (I) often express stereotypes in jokes, as if that excuses them. The problem with stereotyping is that we (I) can slip, without noticing it, into believing our own stereotypes, enforcing prejudices we need to examine … and probably abandon.
Men’s Resources
Category:
Please use the links below to connect with diverse resources for men.
MKP Links | MKP Members’ Programs | Men’s Publications | Men’s Info Resources
ManKind Project Links
- The ManKind Project – Presenting the New Warrior Training Adventure.
- New Warrior Circle – Resources for NWTA graduates.
- New Warrior Journal – NWJ archives from 2003 to 2008.
- MKP Elders – Awakening and nurturing elders for teaching and mentoring.
- The ManKind Foundation – Creating a culture of generosity.
What am I waiting for?
by Chris Gilwee
Perhaps a gift. Something given, not earned.
Maybe an option that is less scary. Easy.
Someone who can magically take me back in time and change the way that I was treated; and a blessing from God Himself, so that I may decipher the hidden meaning in my Mother’s words. “I love you so much that I can’t bare to see you fail; so I verbally abuse you to make you tough for this world”.
Fathering in the 21st Century
VoiceMale Magazine Summer 2010
By Donald N.S. Unger – Reprinted with Permission from VoiceMale Magazine [http://voicemalemagazine.org]
When we examine change, we often look as well at why things often don’t change. I am particularly interested in the not uncommon resistance to the notion that the quantity and the quality of the time American fathers spend with their children have changed meaningfully. Ironically, I see this resistance coming from both the right and the left.
Gender Differences: Women love by sentiment. Men love by action.
by Steve Norcross
Women give and receive love as sentiment. Men give and receive love as action.
Already I’m in trouble. I have made a sweeping generalization with many exceptions. In this time of discovering that men and women are more alike than different, and in this day of a blurring of the lines that formerly defined the gender roles, I may be politically incorrect to describe inherent differences between the sexes.
Elder Blessing in the Family
Category: Boys to Men, Fatherhood, Men and Initiation, Men as Elders
by Terry Jones
When my oldest son reached the age of 18 years, I felt a need to release him. I had been aware only at an intellectual level that I would need to let him go someday. It felt like he was ready not so much to be an adult but rather to be honored as a boy who was ready to consider adulthood. My wife and I planned a ceremony that would bless our son and show our respect for his individuality.
tired of being a bullet; a poem
Take the hill
by Johnny Fontaine
A flushed heat of anger bruised my cheeks and stallions of fear galloped in my heart. School had let out for the day. I was walking home alone down the snow covered sidewalk of Sunset Boulevard in the sleepy hamlet of Coxsackie, where the family moved after my childhood in New York City.
Game On
by Kip de Moll
A troubling fear in the days before my surgery was that much of this ordeal provided a convenient excuse to avoid the more serious crisis of how to live the rest of my life. As long as surgery loomed and the catheter was an impediment, I could sit here quietly and always plead my health.
A tribute to Bill Boal: Reframe your fear
Bill Boal
Editor’s Note: MKP elder Bill Boal of New York City has died at age 80. In his honor, we reprint below the article he contributed to the September 2009 edition of the Journal, based on his latest ebook, Getting Free From Fear.
Bill was always creating new ideas. For instance, he’d begun visiting senior and assisted living homes in NY to conduct “sharing circles” among the residents. Last November he attended the World Elder Gathering in London where he promoted “Elders mentoring Seniors,” gaining commitments from a dozen men to implement the program in their communities.
Dancing in the Breath; a poem
Philos 100
Dancing in their Breath
( that youth we knew…)
by Loren Ruh Smith
He was dancing upon the precipice
Glib of tongue with laughing metaphors
Blessed of health and being hazard’s child
Seeing danger not as paradox but as prayer
Someone called after him, saying “Take care!”
His laughter echoing in the dark abyss
His humor seeming contagious, awing
Sweeping all their fears, all alarms away
Poetry: A knowing heart
by Eric Diamond
Be thankful for the grief in autumn,
rust on weathervanes, sour plums, and
soothing words for the sad, four-leav’d heart.
I let bygones be bygones, then
went after bigger fish to fry.
Try my speckled perch with artichoke heart.
Numbed by news, dark grey overcoats
of despair huddle in doorways
in the city they call Broken Heart.
Owls track scurrying field mice, while
hawks cast shadows on wounded squirrels.
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