How do you learn to love, when you’ve been raised to show no emotions?

Let me back up to the beginning. I was born and raised in the south, near Atlanta, Ga. In a culture where men are men, they show no emotions, they drink heavily and they know how to handle themselves in a fight. As a boy my father constantly made sure to remind me and my brother, “boys don’t cry”, “toughen up”, “act like a man”.

How do you eventually grow up and share yourself with anyone, when you are told your whole life that emotions are a bad thing? A woman’s thing. I can’t tell you the last time my Dad told me he loves me. Its not that I don’t think he does, I know that he loves me, but it’s just that inability for either of us to say it.

Now that I’m a 32 year old “man” I feel like that lesson to always be the alpha male has really hindered me in finding a real relationship. No grown woman wants the guy who has to out drink everyone, take every dare and be the first person to jump up and fight someone. They especially don’t want the man who never lets them in, never opens up and never lets his guard down. You know what woman finds that attractive?

A 16 year old little girl.

Maybe it’s just me, my younger brother is married with a small child and loves them both. I cant help but feel like I’m not alone in this though, that men are conditioned to close themselves off from women emotionally and even from each other. I can count on one hand the male friends that I can actually sit down and have a conversation about something that’s really bothering me. Of that handful, only one that I feel I can tell anything to without any judgment.

Even as I type this I’m contemplating whether or not to post this article to my Facebook wall in fear of what my friends would think of my sensitivity. I guess I’ll post it, you have to start somewhere right?

So, men, lets tear down these walls. Let’s take a chance and share our feelings with the women and men in our life. Let’s realize that the tougher and ultimately manlier thing to do, is to show those emotions.

Hopefully, I’ll eventually learn to love.