I have been a student of relationships for as long as I can remember. My deepest desire has always been to share loving connections with the people around me. That desire, though, was shaped by trauma. Because the models of family, friendship, and romance I witnessed early in life were toxic and dysfunctional, I grew up searching for answers: How do people form meaningful bonds? How do they sustain them over time?
Decades of therapy and inner work have helped me grow, but relationships remain a passion subject of study. Along the way, I realized I wasn’t alone. So many of us are asking the same questions: How do we find people to truly connect with, and how do we hold onto those connections in healthy ways?
This reflection is part of my attempt to answer those questions—not with “final solutions,” but with observations of patterns I’ve noticed in the past, where I see us now, and where I think we might be headed. At the heart of it is my conviction that we are living through an adjustment period in how men and women relate to one another. Both are struggling to find their footing in a world that looks nothing like the one our primal instincts were shaped for.
What I offer here are not prescriptions, but possibilities—ideas about how we might begin to maneuver differently if we want different results. Because underneath all the noise, I still believe this: most people want to love and be loved. If we can keep that intention in focus, I believe there’s a way forward.
Primitive Origins
Let’s strip it back to the beginning. In the creation story, Adam comes first. Alone, he learns survival—how to find food, where to take shelter, how to protect himself against animals stronger than him. He begins to make sense of the world by naming what he sees. Identity is forged in solitude before there is ever companionship.
When woman enters the picture, everything changes. Their complementary parts spark desire, intimacy, and the instinct to bond. But Adam’s first relational impulse is not noble. It is possession: “This is mine.” From there, protection and provision grow—not from pure selflessness, but from a selfish root. Over time, this selfishness was repackaged as a noble duty: men as providers and protectors, women as nurturers and caretakers.
The Feminine Constant
While men wrestled with survival and then possession, women’s primal entry point has always been relationship. She multiplies connection through children, through community, through sustaining bonds. Her form of provision has never been submissive or secondary—it has been the constant flow of life itself.
The Break in the Bargain
In early relational “contracts,” men were expected to provide and protect while women sustained the home and community. But the bargain broke down. Men became absent, abusive, neglectful, or unfaithful. Women adapted because they had to.
They pursued education, secured jobs, bought homes, raised children alone, and became financially independent. Women’s role expanded out of necessity. It was never about rebellion—it was about survival.
Masculine Stagnation
Many men resisted change, clinging to the provider/protector role without actually embodying it. Unlike the original Adam who forged his identity in solitude, modern men were born straight into community. Without rites of passage, rituals, or solitude to shape them, their identity remained weak and reactive.
This stagnation has produced contradictions: men demanding submission while simultaneously expecting women to pay half the bills, stay home, and remain eternally feminine. It has fueled anger, confusion, and in some corners, entire movements built around blaming women.
The Current Crisis
This is why we see so many strained dynamics today. Men want the benefits of Adam-with-Eve but have skipped the necessary foundation of Adam-alone. Without initiation, many lack clarity about who they are. The result? High rates of despair, rising suicide among men, and online communities venting their confusion and resentment toward women.
Meanwhile, women—who want companionship—look at men’s immaturity and conclude that submission to a man-child is unsafe and foolish. Leadership is not automatic; it is earned. A man who proves trustworthy, consistent, and loving will find submission natural, even easy. But no woman should submit to a man who hasn’t earned her trust.
Wasted Masculine Energy
What makes this worse is how men often use their natural drive. Testosterone and aggression are powerful energies meant to build, protect, and create. But too often that energy is wasted online, tearing women down.
Here’s the truth: if your sense of masculinity depends on a woman validating you, that’s not manhood—that’s immaturity. Masculinity isn’t something women bestow. It’s something men must discover within themselves, through their own wilderness.
The Blame Game
From Eden to today, blame-shifting has been the oldest trick in the book. Adam said, “It was the woman you gave me.” Modern men echo the same: “She tempted me, she disrespected me, she made me cheat.”
Generations were taught to excuse men with phrases like “that’s just a man’s nature.” This narrative let men avoid accountability while still claiming authority. The irony is that men created and sold this messaging to themselves. Women weren’t the enemy—men’s avoidance of responsibility was.
Women’s Adaptation
On the other hand, women have consistently evolved. They saw the patterns, adjusted, and kept moving forward. Even under patriarchy, which kept them constrained, women reached for relationship and community.
Every complaint men now make about women—too independent, too masculine, too distrustful—points back to men’s actions. Independence came from men’s failures to provide. Distrust came from abuse and betrayal. Survival forced women into “masculine” roles, not ambition.
The Gamble of Letting Down Walls
Still, there is a cost. The survival roles women stepped into are heavy, and not always natural. Many would gladly set them down—but doing so feels like a gamble. Even when a good man shows up, self-aware and ready for partnership, letting down walls built for survival is terrifying. Vulnerability after trauma doesn’t feel natural; it feels dangerous.
This is where modern relationships get tangled. A man may genuinely want to relate, but a woman is still protecting. He interprets her guard as rejection. She interprets his frustration as pressure. Both feel “out of order.”
The Adjustment Period
This is why American relationships feel so strained right now. We are in an adjustment. Women are unwinding trauma. Men are trying to prove they’re not the men of the past. Both are sincere, but both are impatient with each other.
Women feel rushed. Men feel delayed. She says: “Give me time to heal.” He says: “Don’t punish me for what he did.” Both are right. Both are exhausted.
Seeds of the Solution
- For Men: Stop demanding submission. Earn it with trustworthiness, consistency, and integrity. Learn to be patient. Patience is not weakness—it’s strength.
- For Women: Survival mode was necessary, but it cannot remain permanent. When a safe man proves himself, practice small releases of control. Healing doesn’t mean forgetting the past, but letting the present show up differently.
- For Both: Companionship is not built on pressure. It is built on time. Stop demanding instant transformation and learn to trust the process.
Return to Old-Fashioned Courting
One practical way forward is to revive a simpler approach: dating without expectation. Not rushing to define every interaction, not pushing to secure commitment in the second month. Just practicing the art of being with people again.
Go to group activities—bowling, meetups, community events. Pay your own way, drive yourself, and show up independently. Let the focus be on practicing social skills, flirting, conversation, and fun. Without pressure, genuine connection has room to grow.
If you’ll be alive five years from now, what’s the rush? In five years, you could either be married to someone you’ve truly gotten to know—or still cycling through disappointment because you never slowed down long enough to let anything real take root.
Closing Thoughts
The primal truth hasn’t changed: people want companionship. But selfish roots and survival distortions have left us out of balance. Moving forward requires accountability from men, discernment from women, and patience from both.
When men stand up and take their rightful place in society—not from ego or entitlement, but from love and a true desire to protect—they create stability that everyone can feel. Women, children, and other men begin to trust, and the whole community grows steadier. Unstable men put entire communities on edge, but strong and loving men anchor them.
It is my firm belief that men are meant to lead. Time and again, history shows that when good men take the wheel, they have the power to shift the trajectory. Women can lead, and often have when necessary, but we still live in a society built on masculine power structures. Collectively, we have not yet learned how to trust men and women equally at the wheel. It is simply where we are.
That means the shift must begin with men. When men get real with themselves, hold themselves accountable, and hold each other accountable, the ground beneath us changes. And as that happens, women who long for companionship will, over time, learn to set down their armor. They will rediscover the freedom to flow in their natural space of nurture, companionship, and community.
The balance we’re reaching for isn’t about going backward or denying how far women have come. It’s about men and women stepping into the fullness of their roles, not distorted by selfishness or fear, but refined by accountability and love. If we can move toward that, then the relationships we build will not just serve individuals, but restore stability to the entire community.
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