Intensity

"He can't handle the intensity of her emotions."

This one makes me roll my eyes every time.

Our culture does not reliably produce adults who offer others the pure intensity of their emotions.

The adults in our culture who are capable of such a thing have trained that skill, usually paying another adult to teach them.

The trouble is, there are some adults in our culture who want to be capable of offering the pure intensity of their emotions, and they pay another adult to teach them, and that person shows them how to offer a bunch of garbage along with the intensity of the emotion.

Many high profile teachers teach us to speak intrusive thoughts, unkind projections, and harmful narratives we have about a person right to their face.

This is what it means to express unpalatably, and in my experience, THIS is the only thing "he" can't handle.

Rightfully so.

These processes are meant to occur within us and with friends we can trust to love everyone involved. We are all meant to clean our own projection equipment and show up curious about the other. We are all meant to resource each other in cleaning up projections and returning to love.

I have never known a man to shy away from the actual pure intensity of my emotions.

I have known a slew of men who will run away from narrative garbage flying at them with all of the intensity of my emotion.

Let me tell you this--they are wiser and worthier than the ones willing to stay.

The way GOOD men have moved out of the line of fire when I offered them garbage I *thought* (and was taught) was the "intensity of my emotion" has been of deep service to me.

Their refusal to be with me while I have offered them harm disguised as authenticity has led me to learn palatable expression of intense emotion.

When I see this idea bouncing around that "men aren't ready for the intensity of her emotion," my understanding is that someone has dropped the ball on their personal responsibility, taking refuge in blaming others. This is the way such a statement creates the reality—I decide men can't handle it, never considering I'm not really doing "it," then I never really offer "it," and then I never experience that men can handle "it."

If others are walking away from your "emotional intensity," consider that they might be wise. Double down on whatever had you perceive that they were worthy in the first place. If a worthy person is walking away from me, what might I have to learn from that?

Whatever you are saying to the other person, the words, the style, would you want someone to say exactly that to you? Whatever you want them to learn, how would you like to be taught?

He can handle the pure intensity of your emotion. Can YOU handle the full responsibility to clean up the garbage around it before bringing it to him?