Integrating his Anima and conquering the Mother Complex is one of man’s most important inner work
Bernhard Guenther, James Bartley, Eve Lorgen, and Mary Anne Fisher are having a deep-dive discussion of this critical cross-cultural, generational, and incarnation-spanning issue. Together, they unpack the topic of toxic masculine programming holistically, addressing the physical, psychological/emotional, metaphysical, and spiritual layers of being. They examine a variety of ways it affects areas of our lives and sharing key approaches to an array of action steps you can take to heal yourself and step into your embodied masculinity.
It is the prerequisite for being grounded in healthy and creative masculinity, for walking and fulfilling his higher purpose, for engaging in healthy relationships with a woman, and for being an embodied role model for his children.
Anima and the Mother complex (not to be confused with his physical mother) are two different feminine energies within a man.
If these inner feminine qualities are unconscious, undifferentiated, and unintegrated, he projects them on women, institutions, government, religions, material things, and even his own children to the detriment of himself and whoever are the targets of his positive & negative projections.
These inner feminine qualities are present in unhealthy unconscious ways in what people call beta males and alpha males, both representing the unintegrated boy-man—two sides of the same coin.
The former is overtaken by his Anima and his feeling nature, over-sensitive and moody, daydreaming about life rather than pursuing it; the latter has rejected his Anima, is shut off from his deeper feeling nature, and overcompensates with “manliness” and force, taking pride in his “stoicism” and worldly accomplishments.
You see the unintegrated Anima and Mother complex on the left, the right, liberals, conservatives, anarchists, trad movement, truth movement, religious folks, new age, crypto community, etc., in all social classes and races.
The manosphere and dogmatic religious conservatism are good examples of rejection of the Anima.
It shows itself, for example, by projecting their rejected feminine shadow (and sexual shadow) on OnlyFans girls, condemning them from their high horse while virtue signaling about family and marriage. Unconsciously they are deeply attracted to the “whore” archetype.
At the same time, mother-complex possessed boy-men revel in sexual fantasies and sign up for OnlyFans porn.
Both male opposites act out their unintegrated feminine Anima and mother complex. Both are disconnected from their embodied masculinity.
Healthy masculinity is the result of a man’s internal battle to integrate his inner feminine parts, not an outward battle of “performance,” moralizing, virtue signaling, or career accomplishments. It is also not just about marrying and having kids.
The popular polarity movement, which focuses on specific roles and behaviors between a man and a woman (leading man, surrendering woman), also misses the mark and addresses superficial symptoms for the most part.
These symptoms are most often based on anima and animus projections and externalize a process that needs to happen within.
For a man, that means anima integration [and slaying the “dragon” of his mother complex]; for a woman, it implies animus integration [her male opposite within.]
It is a deep inner psycho-spiritual alchemical process that cannot be achieved only by external role behavior play.
A woman looking for a leading manly alpha man mostly projects her unintegrated animus on him, while a man looking for a feminine woman/wife/mother tends to project his anima on her.
It’s about inner marriage in both, resulting in attracting the right person to an equal partnership with integrated healthy masculine and feminine energies. It’s the “holy grail” of a relationship.
Doing this work in partnership is very powerful if both partners are aware of the anima/animus dynamics within themselves and how they play out in the relationship.
But for the man, this inner work is more challenging due to his mother complex.
Due to a lack of a conscious psycho-spiritual rite of passage in our modern society that would initiate a boy into a man, most men have an unintegrated Anima and act out the mother complex unconsciously.
It also relates to healing the mother/father wound, which we all have to varying degrees.
Listen to our podcasts about the mother & father wound here. We all talk about anima integration for men and animus integration for women:
The Mother Wound: A PsychoSpiritual Healing Guide | TCM #136
The Father Wound: A PsychoSpiritual Healing Guide | TCM #137
Godspeed.
Bernhard Guenther
“Almost all of a man’s sense of value, worth, safety, joy, contentment, belongingness, and happiness derive from his inner feminine nature.Men, in their arrogance, generally think it is their strength, possessions, and dominations that bring them happiness. But it is not so. Happiness is feminine in a man, a feeling quality, and generally mysterious to him.Without good masculinity, a man is weak, ineffective, and useless, but it is his [inner] femininity that inspires his strength, meaning, and value.The more a man is in harmony with his inner feminine nature, the easier it will be to be on good terms with the exterior women in his life.The bravado and bantam-rooster behavior of any young male is a product of his fright at the impending dragon battle that faces him. If he thinks the battle is “out there,” he will make the most ridiculously blustering attempts at settling it “out there.”He has to have “in here” settled before he can make the slightest progress “out there.”Most young men saddle their psychological horses, make a brave foray “out there,” fail (because they did not have the dragon settled inside), and then have to face that awful moment inside when the balance scale of life or death tips back and forth.It is the mother complex that is the death-dealing element in life. This is the true dragon battle and it is here, on this level, that any youth makes or breaks the first half of his life.He thinks he wins his maleness by great accomplishments “out there,” but the real dragon battle is a totally interior one.When that battle is won, he can accomplish “out there” and have something to show the world and prove his value.But no amount of “out there” accomplishment can settle the dragon battle, and there are many men of all ages who have accomplished great things and amassed great fortunes but who are still vulnerable to the inner dragon or mother complex.Far too many modern men make a hue and cry over maleness in outer form while they are quietly losing their inner dragon battles by default.Tons of sporting equipment and fleets of fast cars are sold to bolster the male image, but these are a sad substitute for that wonderful-terrible moment when a young man slays his dragon and is free from his longing to return to the dependence of boyhood and be taken care of by a mother.A young man’s insistence on dangerous adventures is a thin disguise for his mother complex. To risk being killed on a motorcycle or to hang precariously on a cliff signals the intrusion of the mother complex masquerading as ultimate maleness.The [conscious or unconscious] wish to fail or to die is so strong in a man with a mother complex that he has to expose himself to these regressive experiences frequently to win his battle over them.Suicide is the ultimate defeat by the mother complex. When one kills himself he consents to the great regressive force of the mother complex; she wins the battle, and death prevails.The first task in approaching the mother complex is to understand that it is not one’s actual mother. It is not anyone “out there” who is making the trouble is to be prepared for the real battle, always inward.Most dark moods in a man are his mother complex coming to the surface.Not to recognize this portion of one’s feminine heritage is to be locked in bravado and the ceaseless battle of proving one’s value. Masculinity “out there” is not difficult to achieve when one has fought the dragon battle.That terrible inner battle is totally feminine and is such a baffling struggle for a male. Just to define it is to begin one’s freedom.Fighting with a feminine element is like fighting with a fog bank. Rough masculinity is completely ineffective; consciousness and clarity are the effective tools.A particularly touching example of the mother complex is found in the Grail myth, that great Western repository of instruction on becoming a man.In western mythology, the mother complex is represented by the dragon that every hero has to face and conquer. The fair maiden [his inner Anima] awaits him only after the dragon or mother complex has been conquered.”– Robert Johnson, “Lying With The Heavenly Woman”
