We are here on this earth because of our parents: a mother and father. As we celebrate the Father’s Day holiday, it’s a great opportunity to reflect on what fatherhood means – and what we can learn from it.
Maybe you’re a father yourself, but even if you aren’t raising your own children, the role of the father is familiar to you. Your own father is a part of your life, regardless of the relationship you have with them, and by existing in the world as a creator and leader, you have experience “fathering” those around you through guidance and wisdom.
In this light, we can see three pathways to understanding fatherhood: the fathering you receive, the fathering you provide directly, and the fatherly qualities you exude by offering leadership to those around you. These are all worthy of reflection and deeper understanding, and each is a gift in its own right.
Before we do a deep dive in the audio presentation below, let’s take a moment to meditate on a beautiful poem by John O’Donanue titled “For a Father.”
The longer we live,
The more of your presence
We find, laid down,
Weave upon weave
Within our own lives.
The quiet constancy of your gentleness
Drew no attention to itself,
Yet filled our home
With a climate of kindness
Where each mind felt free
To seek its own direction.
As the fields of distance
Opened inside childhood,
Your presence was a sheltering tree
Where our fledgling hearts could rest.
The earth seemed to trust your hands
As they tilled the soil, put in the seed,
Gathered together the lonely stones.
Something in you loved to inquire
In the neighborhood of air,
Searching its transparent rooms
For the fallen glances of God.
The warmth and wonder of your prayer
Opened our eyes to glimpse
The subtle ones who
Are eternally there.
Whenever silently, in off moments,
The beauty of the whole thing overcame you,
The look from your eyes
Like a kiss alighting on skin.
There are many things
We could have said,
But words never wanted
To name them;
And perhaps a world
That is quietly sensed
Across the air
In another’s heart
Becomes the inner companion
To one’s own unknown.
O’Donahue is reflecting on the ways his father imbues is own life, the lessons learned, the model of interacting with the world he gained through quiet observation and reverence… But he’s also talking about something much more difficult to absorb: the beauty and power of embracing the unknown. You see, our collective relationship with fatherhood is complex. On one hand, the conventional role of the father is one of guidance, protection, leadership, power, and wisdom. We expect these qualities from our fathers and father figures, and expect to provide them for others in our own “fatherly” roles.
On the other hand, the ideas surrounding fathers and those relationships can also be a source of pain, a wound that needs healing. For some people, this is because of damaged or abusive relationships, for others it might be the pain of absence or loss, and for still others it’s a less defined sense of disappointment – either because they didn’t live up to their father’s expectations, or because their father didn’t live up to theirs…
All of these relationship dynamics are unique, but have something essential in common – and it’s right there in plain sight in O’Donahue’s poem: the unknown. All of this baggage, hurt, or disappointment that we associate with fathers comes from expectation – and expectation comes from imposing our own rules on the world instead accepting it as it is.
We have to understand that everyone is making it up as they go along. This is true of your father, of you as a father, and of you in any of the fatherly wisdom you provide for others. You can provide guidance and be a source of wisdom, but you’ll never have all the answers, and neither will anyone else. More than understanding or recognizing, we have to OWN that fact, and carry it with us throughout our daily lives.
But our concept of fatherhood puts a strain on that way of seeing the world. We were taught, time and again, that our fathers are supposed to have all the answers and experience disappointment when they fall short of that unrealistic expectation. Similarly, we experience self-doubt and feelings of inadequacy when we don’t have all the answers for the people we’re fathering.
All of this is a reminder to meet reality AS IT IS, not how we expect it to be. When we accept the unknown and move through the present with open hearts and open minds, we shed the expectations we have for ourselves and others, and become free enough to learn and grow.
In fact, we can use fatherly relationships to help cultivate this mindset of presence and wonder. You can turn to your children (actual or figurative) as reminders of joyous exploration, and as a child yourself, you can help the fathers and father figures in your life reconnect with youthful curiosity. We can help each other let go of the NEED TO KNOW, and instead approach each day with openness and presence.
We tend to think of fathers as holding power, but perhaps the truest form of fatherhood is one who knows how to hold power without being preoccupied with it. And where does that power come from? The ability to remain present, to learn and grow, to accept reality as it is, and create the future based on what is, not what we expect to be.
On this Father’s Day holiday, cherish the present moment and release the expectations you have for yourself, the expectations you hold/held for your father, and the perceived expectations you see in those you’re fathering. Cherish the space we have to become ourselves by moving confidently through the unknown, and allow this perspective to let you see the encompassing ideas about fatherhood in a new light. There’s far more to see than what you think you know.
