He: Understanding Masculine Psychology

After gaining personal insights that I had never seen articulated so well, I gave HE to all my sons -5 - one of whom told me "that HE was a book which should be made mandatory reading for every boy in high school. HE helps put the forces which drive male psycholgy in perspective and balance incredibly well.

This small book actually began with 10 lectures given by Robert Johnson at an Episcopal Church. Thus they are concise and do not offer a broad array of examples. I found the book to be excellent and found it much more to the point that Emma Jung's long study of the Holy Grail myth in all it permutations. Of course, as a Jungian, Johnson sees mythology as reflecting underlying psychological and spiritual processes that take place in the human psyche. These myths are spontaneous images from the unconscious and contain both psychological and spiritual truths. Myths allow the interaction of archetypes, which are patterns of life that are universally true for humans. Myths are to mankind as dreams are to an individual. Therefore a dream shows the dreamer a truth about themselves whereas the myth shows mankind a truth that applies to all of us. Individuation is a process that Jung describes as a life long movement toward wholeness and completion. It involves the life long expansion of consciousness and the ability of the conscious ego or personality to reflect the total self. One interpretation of Jesus Christ is that of a man who has been able to allow the unconscious to fill up the self and be always present in the personality. Because God the Father moves through and emerges in the world through the human unconsious, Christ may say that he and the Father are one. A primary first step in the individuation process is the confrontation with the Shadow. Actually the confrontation with various aspects of the Shadow continue throughout a lifetime, but the first encounter is usually of great psychological power. The negative repressed side of the personality, that longs for acceptance and integration, continually follows the ego until the strength is mustered to face the shadow, accept the shadow, and then integrate the shadow into the personality which increases the energy and strength of the personality/psyche because energy is no longer used to suppress the shadow. After the shadow is integrated, many people then may develop to the point where they can integrate the anima/animus, which is the characteristics of the opposite sex into their more complete psyche. It is here that Johnson points out the Parsifal and quest for the Holy Grail is in fact a myth of the male reconciliatoin with the anima who becomes a guide and leads him to the Grail. Here Emma Jung and Robert Johnson would have slightly different interpretations of the Holy Grail myth. Whereas both see the anima as being essential to reaching the Grail, Johnson believes the integration of the feminine, the Anima, is a major and tricky task for young men. Also, whereas Emma Jung saw the grail as serving mankind as an expanded consciousness through which much psychic material may now flow; Johnson sees that the grail serves mankind through and expanded consciousness but also serves God because it is through this expanded consciousness that God flows into human interactions and becomes real

He, by Robert A. JohnsonA fascinating discussion of the male maturation process, using the story of Parsifal and Jungian concepts. The author relates the myth of the famous Arthurian knight to a masculine lifeline. Why use a medieval story to illustrate the psyche of modern man? As the author explains, "Often, when a new era begins in history, a myth for that era springs up...One can say that the winds of the twelfth century have become the whirlwinds of the twentieth century." Short and concise like its title, He is nevertheless a profound study, and serves as a guide to the every man's own life. Major questions are asked, addressed in Jungian thought and in the myth, and then handed to the reader, who can apply it to his own experience. The real start of Parsifal's and every man's journey comes when Parsifal enters the Grail Castle. He is offered the Grail (the cup out of which Jesus Christ drank at the Last Supper) but fails to ask the question that would have brought happiness to the kingdom. That question is "Whom does the Grail serve?" We spend the rest of book discovering why the naïve teenager said nothing, and how he could redeem himself, as well as the readers.The Grail moment, as explained by Mr. Johnson, is that time in the life of all young men when they stumble onto the Divine, "a magic hour sometime in their youth when the whole world glowed and showed a beauty not easily described." Parsifal's inability to ask the question, according to the author, is because "no youth can cope with this opening of the Heavens for him and most set it aside but do not forget it." Men, once touched by this overwhelming joy, spend the rest of their lives seeking it. Their journey, if thoughtful, will bring them to the castle again, usually in middle age, when they are more able to ask the question.Although this book is not really a fable, still, I will not "give away" the ending because I think the author wants the reader to explore along with the hero, Parsifal, at least on first reading. However, here are some points of interest in the journey that shed light into the process of "becoming a man."- When Parsifal leaves home, his mother gives him a homespun undershirt. He wears this under his armor, and it is partly this that keeps him from asking the fateful question. Mr. Johnson explains that Parsifal had not reconciled his mother complex, that he was still boyishly clinging to the idea of mother as protector. - When he returns home to visit his mother after the grail castle, he finds her dead from a broken heart, because he had left home. This is important, says the author, because we must become independent even if it brings pain. - When Parsifal kills the evil Red Dragon, this is coming to terms with our manly power, our primal rage. We must learn that we have power, as people and men, but also must learn to use it wisely and temper it.- Mr. Johnson points out that chastity in knightly mythology has to do with seduction of the feminine side

Robert Johnson is a life changer. I have read everything he has done several times. HE and SHE should be a required read for everyone. I recommend you read the book on your own sex first so that you become familiar with Johnson's style before prying into the opposite sex's mind. :) If you find some of the other self help books too trite and not very thought provoking, Robert Johnson is for you!

In "HE", Robert Johnson, relates the myth of the Fisher King, and explains the age-old psychology of masculinity in both men and women. His insights into human consciousness and the meaning of myth are invaluable to any man trying to understand and free himself, and any woman trying to understand a man