This training is over, a first edition has happened on the 27th of October 2024.
However, we’re planning on bringing this work to more events and people.
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How this training came to be
Some of you may know and some of you may not know that I spent the last two years studying in Portland, Oregon on the rugged west coast of the United States. A two year deep dive into a paradigm called ‘Processwork’ and into a culture that looks the same as mine on the surface, but seems to be far different up close.
In the last year of my study I materialized a long lasting dream of mine and launched a series of local in-person men’s groups. Little did I know it would turn out to be one of the most satisfying and gratifying projects I have ever done. Men were excited about the work we did and kept coming back week after week. At the end of the series they wanted more.
One of the regular participants, Peter Mortola, offered his support and together we created a new, more intensive series with a closed group of 8 men. As a professor at the local Lewis & Clark College, Peter has long had a specific interest in working with and writing about boys and men. Our differences in age, background and approach and our similarities in being a man and a Gestalt practitioners were a great fit. We had so much fun and learned so much working with this group of men.
My U.S. visa expires this September, so I’m coming back to Belgium and luck has it that Peter will be coming to Europe in October to teach as well.
We are excited to bring our collaboration to my local community and are offering a day-long training on working with men on the 27th of October in Brussels. We’ll be modeling some of the work we did with the men and link it to theory, research and Peter’s academic writing.
Scroll down to the bottom of this page for a short video example of how some of the men experienced the work we did with them.
A summary of our ideas about men’s work:
There is a subtle but significant difference in the ways that many men engage with the world compared to most women. This difference in relational style is based in biology and shaped by society. This difference is not cast in stone, nor does it apply to all males, and it shows up in degrees, not polarities.
We believe that men often have work to do on their social and relational skills.
We also believe that many of us have work to do to better understand and work effectively with men. We can become more effective in working with men when we can see differences, not deficits, in the way that many men make contact. We believe we can help men make better contact by making better contact with them.
Read more in depth about our ideas in our newsletter and/or
click below if you have missed some of our prior emails:
– 12th of September ’23: Support & Challenge
– 22th of September ’23: Direct & Indirect approaches
– 3rd of October ’23: Affiliation & Status
– 12th of October ’23: Gas pedal & Brakes
– 19th of October ’23: Empathy for people and Empathy for things
About the training ‘Working with men’
(this training will happen entirely in English)
When might this training be something for you?
You are a man or a woman who supports men in their personal growth journeys and notice they can get stuck easily. You’ve been trained to help people to go deeper, but it’s not any deeper. You know about the social impact on men, how patriarchy has built up strong obstacles for them to be vulnerable and how their privileges reinforce that impact, but that knowledge doesn’t always get you where you’d want to be with the men you’re supporting. You’re there to be on their side in their growth journey, but when they get stuck like that you notice how they feel lonely, guarded, inadequate or embarrassed and how they might get less excited about pursuing the growth they’re seeking. You’d like more skills and understanding on how to approach men in these difficult moments and are excited about a training that addresses specifically that.
What can you expect on this daylong training?
Through working with men, Peter and I have seen how a lot of the difficulty in supporting men is indeed what has been learned through socialization. Men benefit from patriarchy and yet it also puts them in a box created by a lot of shoulds and shouldn’ts. But, in addition to the social impact there is also a biological impact that needs to be acknowledged. Men engage differently in social interactions in part because they are different biologically. Research shows fascinating proof of this difference. Our experience is that working with men means holding that balance between supporting them to learn what they’ve not learned socially and approaching them in a way that honors and respects their difference.
In this training, we will engage in practical exercises and experiences we have used in our own work, as well as discuss the theory and research that supports our approach. As a participant, you’ll learn both practical approaches as well as a new theoretical underpinning for your work.
What is it not?
To be clear on the nuance we’re trying to bring to this often-polarized debate, I’d like to quote Peter in his soon-to-be-published chapter on how to help men to make better contact with themselves:
“I find it difficult at times to advocate for this population that causes so much harm in the world – from mass shootings to sexual abuse to broken windows at the Capitol. It’s therefore important to state what my advocacy is not: It is not meant to reinforce patriarchy or white male supremacy. It is not an attempt to “make our gender great again” by working to reinstate outmoded forms of masculinity. It is also not an attempt to reinforce a rigid gender binary: I believe there are many expressions of gender and many ways to be male. Put simply, in advocating for men, I think it is important to acknowledge the obvious social influences on gender development — for example, the all to pervasive message, “big boys don’t cry” — while at the same time acknowledging the influence our biology may have on our development — for example, the evidence that testosterone may inhibit tear production (Bylsma LM, et al, 2019). By being willing to be informed about both social and biological influences on male development, we may see the male client before us who is struggling to express his emotions differently: Instead of seeing him from a deficit perspective (“This client has an inability to express emotions”), we may be able to see him from a perspective of difference (“I may have to change my expectations of what emotional expression looks like and adjust my practice to be more accomodating”). To be clear, I think there are many things our male clients need to practice and learn (for example, expressing vulnerability, using words not fists, etc), but, equally, I think there are many things we as practitioners need to learn as well (for example, how to both recognize and not pathologize male differences, how to adjust our practices accordingly, etc.)“
Content of the training
Below a brief overview of the content of the day, just to give you an idea of how we’ll build up the training. If you’d like to get a better sense of the different pieces, please signup for the newsletter with the button below, so you’ll get updates and more in depth details about the specific content in your mailbox.
| Time | What we’ll do |
| 9:30-11:00 | – Opening, welcome and overview of logistics and content – Introductory exercise ‘Pick a card’ – Linking practice and theory: ‘Support & Challenge’ as a dialecticel framework to create group atmosphere, set up group structure, design exercises and pace the work |
| 11:00-12:30 | – Exercise ‘Talking Hands’ to facilitate intimate conversations and contact – Linking practice and theory: navigating the dialectic tension between “Direct & Indirect” contact or how men will often say more about themselves if they are not talking directly about themselves. |
| 12:30-13:30 | lunch |
| 13:30-15:00 | – Exercise ‘Snowball Activity’: bringing the difficult topic of male competition and comparison into the conversation with men – Linking practice and theory: using the dialectic of ‘Affiliation & Status’ to support your facilitation and engage men with each other |
| 15:00-16:30 | – Reading Peter’s short illustrated book ‘The bear inside’, written for children and useful in working with men – Exercise ‘Draw your Bear’ – Linking practice and theory: the ‘Gas Pedal & Brakes’ as an important metaphor and descriptor of many of the issues men tend to struggle with (e.g. aggression, attention, sexuality, externalizing behaviors, etc.). |
| 16:30-17:30 | – Theory: the dialectical tension between ‘Empathy for Things’ and empathy for people and how ‘being bilingual’ makes us more fluent – Exercise ‘Closing Card Activity’: learnings and take aways |
Practicalities and price
- Be aware this training will happen entirely in English
- The training will happen on Friday the 27th of October from 9:30 to 17:30
- Location will be in the south of Brussels at GC Pianofabriek, close to train station and public transport.
- Bring you own lunch, have lunch at Café Alcantara at the Pianofabriek or grab something in the neighborhood.
- Coffee, tea and water will be provided
- Cost of the day-long training is 175€ vat excl.
- Peter and I are in the process of writing a book about this work. At the beginning of the day you’ll receive a copy of the manuscript in progress, so you can follow the theory, make your own notes, read and deepen your understanding after the workshop.
If you’re excited about this and are sure you don’t want to miss it, click on the button below to pay your fee and secure your seat.
Here’s the little bonus to end with, a short video we made with some of the men from our ‘Mendays’ weekly group meetings in Portland. They give their own thoughts on why they joined a men’s group and what they got from it. Enjoy!