{"id":14663,"date":"2022-09-17T18:19:07","date_gmt":"2022-09-17T18:19:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/actionresearchplus.com\/?p=14663"},"modified":"2022-09-17T18:19:08","modified_gmt":"2022-09-17T18:19:08","slug":"love-in-the-spirit-of-inquiry-co-reflecting-about-good-men-silvie-lemuzic-for-yes-and-podcast-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/actionresearchplus.com\/love-in-the-spirit-of-inquiry-co-reflecting-about-good-men-silvie-lemuzic-for-yes-and-podcast-3\/","title":{"rendered":"Love in the Spirit of Inquiry: co-reflecting about good men. Silvie LeMuzic for Yes\/And Podcast #3"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Blog by Silvie LeMuzic<\/p>\n

A group of women doctoral candidates, at various stages of our action research journeys, read Hilary Bradbury and William Torbert\u00b4s book Eros\/Power – Love in the Spirit of Inquiry<\/a> together as part of our book club. We see our action research as inspiring efforts to transform what no longer works into what does. Reading Eros\/Power helped propel us further.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Two of us,\u00a0 Louise McCulloch and Silvie LeMuzic then invited Hilary Bradbury to a Zoom-co-reflection.\u00a0 We share the recording and discussion with you, so you too feel invited to speak your own truths into being on matters of gender and power.<\/p>\n

First, then, we are grateful to Hilary and Bill for being fiercely courageous in writing about their mentorship relationship and how it helped shine light on their work. We saw this as a book for women, and for men, if they are willing to go out on a limb in sharing about (gender) privileges and problems. Witnessing their relationship makes it a little easier for us as readers to muster up our courage to speak about what needs to change in our own relationship to power and gender.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In hosting the conversation, Louise and I entered with a rendition of a Celtic mythical story called \u00b4What Do Women Want?` – this version written by Dr. Sharon Blackie from her 2019 book “If Women Rose Rooted – A life-changing journey to authenticity and belonging.\u2028\u2028”<\/p>\n

It poses an all important question!\u00b4What Do Women Want?!\u00b4 Hint: Women want sovereignty! Hilary wondered about our choice to start with this myth.<\/p>\n

The mythic story provided a way to articulate something transformative in reading Eros\/Power, namely that it indeed takes two to tango. Both partners in dance must know the steps well and surrender to each other and the music for the dance to flow. The Eros\/Power book cover does show a woman and a man deeply connected in a tango, albeit with the woman leading (not typical of tango). Is this a symbol of sovereign people in practice? But we wondered, how do men and women see through their cultural conditioning to be sovereign?\u00a0 \u00a0How do we dance a new dance having only learned old steps?<\/p>\n

In Blackie’s mythic story a good knight, Gawain, the nephew of the king, must marry a ‘difficult’ woman. He does not, however, resort to domination and control over the Lady. This despite her not appearing as a normal woman. In fact she looks like a monster with wild animal attributes.\u00a0 Remarkably Gawain has compassion towards and displays signs of honoring her regardless. She gets to make her own choices; she gets to follow the path that is best for her. Gawain feels no need to impose his choices. In this way, we have a happy ending.\u00a0 Gawain frees them both from what (spoiler alert) was an evil spell by the dark knight.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Blackie elaborates: \u00ab\u2026The story shows the feminine principle of Sovereignty being honored; it also shows the \u00b4good masculine\u00b4 in practice. The \u00b4good masculine\u00b4 is essential to the functioning of a healthy, balanced world. In decrying the repression of the feminine in our culture, it can be all too easy not only to blame men for the mess the world is in, but to set ourselves against them. Men – our brothers, fathers, lovers, friends – are not always the enemy, and to think of them as such would be like placing ourselves against half of nature, half of our own souls. Men too have cultural expectations foisted upon them, and, increasingly they are speaking up about all of the ways in which Western rationalism has distorted their image of themselves.\u00bb (Ibid p. 244).\u2028\u2028<\/p>\n

Yet in truth we continue to live in a male minded, a male storied world.\u00a0 I deeply resonated with Hilary’s amazing willingness to share her truth, vulnerability, and courage with the reader. Equally, I reacted to a what seemed to me the WASP (White Anglo-Saxon Protestant) influences that privilege but also blind males.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Was Bill merely dipping his toes in reflexivity-waters? While also\u00a0 boldly courageous in his willingness to \u00abtell all\u00bb, to me his reflexivity seems unable to see – nor receive – the truth of Hilary’s lived experience in a patriarchal academic setting. All the more reason to underscore Blackie’s point: In decrying the repression of the feminine in our culture, it can be all too easy not only to blame men for the mess the world is in, but to set ourselves against them. My own coming to see how deeply washed we are in patriarchy is part of my reaction which became a major lens through which I read the book for me. Now I can imagine more transformative dance moves.<\/p>\n

You may view\/ listen to the recording of our conversation as part of the Yes\/And podcast series, also available at soundcloud.<\/strong><\/p>\n