This is from the end of “Iron John” by Robert Bly;
A dear friend told me a story. This man’s father fled the family in shame when the son was five, and the son felt for years shamed himself through this abandonment. In his twenties the son went to Japan and spent ten years studying the martial arts with a strong mentor. It was only after learning the art that he was able to return to his own family and take his rightful place there. To be without a supportive father is for a man an alternative phrase for “to be in shame.” His support, as the boy’s in our story, came from a substitute father – in his story, a martial mentor, in our story Iron John. Only when a man’s interior warriors are strong enough can he go into the joy of display.
With this strength he can also enter into the delight of form. Shapeless clothing, verse that is sloppy, chaotic furnishings; all are linked in secret ways to shame. The Universe is not ashamed, and delights in form. The sun rising over the ocean and setting in the ocean, the moon’s lonely shining and hidings, the leaves unfolding and falling are its displays.
Poetry is a form of display. The poet bird repeats vowels and consonants in order to widen its tail. Meter and counted syllables make up a peacock tail. The poem is a dance fro some being in another world.
The delight of form, then, moves one away from the old duality of hero and enemy, right and wrong, male adversary and female adversary. When a man or a woman enters ritual space, each takes actions meant to be seen, and the joy of display helps pull energy away that would otherwise be invested in conflict.
This section of the book explained how a boy that didn’t get the support from his father, needs a strong mentor in order for him to ‘display’ himself.
I take that he is unable to stand tall in his own power. And that all his energy is then invested in conflict, a struggle to make himself right, he has to make another wrong.
It has to be the same for women. In picking up a relationship that is broken between my sister and I, I can feel the conflict arising.
How our energy gets invested in conflict, instead of being invested in self- power.
What I want most is for her to test the truth of my words in her reality.
What I want least is a battle between right and wrong, but somehow that is what seems to happen. I see two wounded girls she may only see one.
What I want most is for us to be able to display ourselves with all our wounds, to stand up and say our truths, for the truth will set you free.
It is the courage to accept, that you find the courage to heal.
We truly need to display our wounded ness in order to display our joy.
Hiding in the darkness we are lost, it is only when we take our darkness into the light, do we find our wholeness there.
As we stand in the Light, displaying our brokenness, we see that our imperfections are perfectly perfect.
We see and say, “I M Perfect.”
