Ken Solin

Women have on average, six friends, while men have none or one. That disparity says everything about how men view each other.  The reasons for the huge gap are simple, and the solutions are equally simple. It would appear that trust between men is nowhere to be found, and since trust is a major building block in relationships, men are relegated to being loners.

Men’s trust issues date back to their boyhoods when they competed against each other in sports, for girls, and for the leadership role with other boys. As men, they compete for jobs, women, and to appear the most manly. It is the latter that separates men from each other and creates a lack of trust. Men don’t want to look foolish or unmanly and prefer a lone wolf existence that doesn’t expose who they are, or who they think they are, to other men.

This isolation creates more fear and mistrust and encourages men to remain loners permanently. So what’s so bad about being a loner? Everything.

There’s an absolute absence of experiential input from other men that can prove enormously beneficial, particularly in contrast to standing in front of a mirror and second guessing yourself every time you face an important decision. It isn’t gratuitous advice that men need, but the intimate, personal, experiential feedback instead.

A man going through a divorce doesn’t need advice unless it’s from his lawyer. What he needs is someone who is willing to share what worked for him and what didn’t when he was going through the same turmoil, someone willing to talk about how he felt in his heart. It’s that type of sharing that makes friendships between men solid. A man struggling with raising his children needs to hear from other men who’ve struggled similarly and succeeded. A man who has worked on his relationship with his wife or girlfriend benefits from listening to men who overcame their issues and made their relationships stronger and more intimate.

Where can a man find such wizened friends? Where can a man feel safe sharing his deepest, most personal issues? In a men’s group with other like-minded men, that’s where. Men who meet together regularly keep their issues on the front burner where they belong, and where they can be examined until they are resolved.

I have seen nearly miraculous changes occur in the lives of men who share their problems and work towards overcoming them. I moved from a place of mistrusting all women for decades, to getting married a few years ago. I’ve seen men leave their relationship anxiety behind them and move forward to build enduring, trusting, intimate relationships with women.

If you are a lone wolf, you live your life in an emotional vacuum. You are slowly but surely suffocating emotionally and will likely end up alone and without the comfort of men who care about your welfare.

Join with the minions of men who have made the leap of faith regarding trusting other men. Live your life as fully as you always dreamed you would.

Act like a man!

My wife and I are genuine best friends. We married three years ago after being single for many years. I never trusted women enough to consider one a friend until I met Sheri. I had trust issues that I hadn’t worked out. For me, trust means that if I ask Sheri a question that pertains to my life, I know her answer will be what’s best for me, even if it doesn’t necessarily work for her. That’s a best friend wife, and it has helped create a marriage I could never have imagined a scant few years ago.

But our friendship lacks the male perspective that I frequently need, and that’s where men friends come in. Sadly, it’s also where most men fall apart because few have authentic men friends. When I am struggling with issues that men typically find difficult, relationships, intimacy, and trust, it’s my men friends who have helped me find the appropriate path. I don’t want to get into the right brained, left brained dialogue because that’s just too heady. Suffice to say though that a man who is struggling in a relationship can find the specific help he requires from other men.

For a man to have the ability to unload his problems with other men and then hear how they experienced similar issues in the past, is invaluable. This isn’t gratuitous advice, but experiential sharing, and the difference is wide enough to drive a truck through. Any time I’m talking with a man and he begins his sentence with, “you should”, I immediately tune him out. You know the expression that suggests the similarity between opinions and a certain posterior organ. Men don’t need other men’s opinions, they need other men’s experiences in similar situations.

When I first married and was hell-bent on getting it right, it was my best friends who I meet with twice a month, my men’s group, who helped me find and stay on the appropriate path based on their experiences. Unfortunately, that male perspective is widely available, but rarely sought out. It isn’t unmanly for men to talk about their emotional issues. It’s unmanly not to, because the suffering caused by fear of other men and their input contributes to the problem, not the solution.

Having best friends is a blessing, and my goal in writing about men friends is to help other men find theirs. The mental prison men create around being open with other men is detrimental to their well-being. The walls they erect are pointless and prevent them from enjoying the authentic male perspective.

No matter how good your relationship is with women, the male perspective is missing. Find a small group of guys you feel you can trust, and begin sitting down together a few times a month to talk about your lives. I offer a guaranty to any man who makes this leap of faith with other men.Your life will have more meaning, you will find your center in your relationship, and you will have friends you can call when your life falls apart.

There is no substitute for male friendship. Act like a man!

My best friend is moving to Hawaii in a few weeks. We’ve been hanging out together and talking about our lives without filtering or judgment for over twenty-five years. We took motorcycle trips together, hiked together, and invited each other for dinners with our girlfriends and wives. This kind of relationship can’t be duplicated. At sixty-five, I’m past wanting to start a new friendship that could rival ours.

When my youngest son Jesse died nearly ten years ago at only twenty-nine, Tony was the first guy I called. I was between relationships and didn’t have a woman in my life. He lived half an hour away and that’s how long it took him to show up at my home. He hadn’t stopped to pack any clothing or even a toothbrush. He spent the next few days sleeping on my couch and watching out for me. He comforted me and allowed me to talk about Jesse without interruption. He didn’t offer any bromides or false hopes for a rapid recovery. He just listened and when I fell apart from time to time, held me while I cried. He told me years later that he’d never heard anyone wail like I had in my grief, and I understood how difficult it must have been for him to hold up while I fell apart. But he never balked.

I had spent much of my young adult life as a lone wolf and was accustomed to dealing with problems on my own. But I never really felt good about living on my lonely planet. I had always wanted to have a friend or friends who cared about me. I have several close friends now, but Tony is my best friend. It took some effort. I had to invest time and energy into creating and maintaining our friendship, and he had to do the same. Years later, we’re like brothers. We share all of our joys and disappointments. We support each other unconditionally.

I’ll miss Tony. We plan to Skype often, and I’ll visit him in Hawaii. Our bond can never be broken and we will remain best friends no matter where we’re living. I’m beginning to realize that our friendship extends beyond physical boundaries. It’s in our hearts and is not subject to geography.

A best friend is forever.