Back before I knew a thing or two about women, I made a lot of stupid and selfish mistakes.

One of which was breaking up with my girlfriend and then sleeping with her coworker a couple days later.

When she found out, she was furious (and rightly so).

I tried calling her to apologize but she had blocked my number. I tried talking to her in person, but she wouldn’t have any of it. Each time I approached she’d yell “go away!” and ignore me.

One day, at our college campus, I followed her to her car pleading the whole way there for her to just hear me out. Not only did she not but she went as far as calling campus security on me and said I was stalking her.

This drama went on for a month before she finally conceded and agreed to meet me in the middle of a crowded mall.

As I walked into the mall, I noticed my heart pounding and my breath shallow. I took a detour and bolted into the public restroom. There, I splashed water on my face, took a few deep breaths, and stared at myself in the mirror as a wave of nausea passed through me.

“What am I doing here?” I thought, “What am I trying to achieve?”

I didn’t want to get back together with her, I knew an apology wouldn’t do any good, and I was absolutely sure that she was going to eat me alive. It felt like I was purposely walking into a giant black widow’s cave.

But I couldn’t just live my life as if nothing had happened, I knew I had to face her and apologize even if nothing came out of it. It was something I was doing more for myself than for her. I wanted to prove to myself that I could face my fears and own the consequences of my actions instead of scurrying away with my tail between my legs.

I stood up tall, took one final breath, and forced my wobbly legs to take one step in front of the other until I was standing in front of her at our agreed upon location in the mall.

There was no greeting or acknowledgment from her, only a cold, bitter glare as I sat down and made sure there was enough distance between us to avoid risking another assault charge.

Despite the background chatter of shoppers, there was a deafening silence I knew I was expected to fill.

I started off by thanking her for agreeing to meet me and for giving me the time of day. But I was quickly interrupted by a sharp and impatient “what do you want?”

I gulped and told her that I only wanted to apologize, and that I knew it wasn’t going to take away her pain or right the wrong I had committed.

“Damn right it’s not,” she spat, “you’re the biggest fucking asshole I know.”

I nodded in agreement, but remained quiet. This only made her angrier as I watched the thin thread of composure she was holding onto snap before my eyes. The damn shattered and all hell broke loose.

For the next 45 minutes, I didn’t say a word as she drilled into me. I merely listened and nodded in agreement as she tore me a new one. It was a bloodbath.

I was tempted to retort a few times when I felt she’d crossed the line, but I didn’t. I simply bit my tongue and took it. I didn’t know what else to do or if it would ever end, but I knew I was in no position to get angry. I was the one who had slept with her coworker and I was the one who had asked for this meeting. Nevertheless, there’s only so much a man can take, and I was approaching my limits.

But just when I was about to get up and leave, the bombardment stopped. She had finally spoken her piece and gotten everything off of her chest. Her icy exterior melted and for the first time in months I saw a warm smile on her face. She softened and we began catching up like old friends about things that had nothing to do with our relationship.

Eventually, it was time to go, and we got up and walked together towards the exit. I said my farewell but resisted the temptation to hug her; I knew it would have been inappropriate. But to my surprise, she lunged at me, gave me a hug, and then turned around and walked away without a word.

I got in my car and sat there in silence for a few minutes savoring the warm glow filling my heart. I didn’t fully understand the significance of what had just happened, but I was proud of myself and drove away with a modest smile.

Containment

I often think back on that moment with pride as it was one of the first times I had truly practiced containment.

Containment is the ability to provide the right conditions for a woman to feel safe and secure in. When you do this, she will soften into her feminine essence, open her heart, and be her fullest and wildest self.

It’s like the process of tending to a rose. You must make sure it has the proper nutrient dense soil, the right amount of water and sunlight, and the adequate time to blossom.

Similarly, a woman’s physical and emotional needs need to be tended to for her to be able to blossom both her heart and legs for a man.

There is no way to provide proper containment by faking it, you must have a woman’s best interest in mind. This means listening to what she needs, not just with your ears but with your heart and soul. In fact, sometimes she will tell you one thing and really mean another. It’s up to you to see past her words and know her better than she knows herself.

A lot of guys get frustrated with this because they don’t understand the nature of the feminine energy or how to deal with emotions. This is because they lack the proper connection to their own feminine energy and emotions and thus don’t know how to navigate a woman’s. 

(If you want to learn more about emotions check out my past letter titled Emotional Alchemy here.)

Feminine energy cannot be boxed in, labeled, categorized, dissected, analyzed, rationalized, or understood. Feminine energy must first and foremost be felt.

But most guys are too emotionally stunted to know what that means. They cannot feel what a woman is truly desiring so they are forced to take her words at face value and then blame her for contradicting herself later.

But it’s not that a woman is lying or intentionally trying to contradict herself, it’s that she is expressing her fullest ever changing truth spontaneously in the moment. And what her soul is secretly longing for is for your grounded masculine discernment to pierce through her emotional storm and get to the heart of what she needs. Every time you do this, you prove to her that you can contain her, and she feels safe and secure to be herself around you.

On Testing

When a woman tests you, consciously or unconsciously, she is gauging your integrity and your capacity to contain her. You do this by not getting sucked into her emotions, by remaining centered, and by feeling into what she needs, and then giving it to her. Here’s an example that will hopefully drive this point home. 

We all know children throw temper tantrums. In those tantrums, it’s not uncommon to hear a child shout spiteful things to her parents like, “I hate you!” or “I wish you weren’t my dad!” or “I wish I was never born!”

Imagine if a father took his daughter’s words at face value: he would be crushed and hurt, or even become defensive and angry saying things like, “You ungrateful little brat! See how long you survive on the street without me!”

Although it’s understandable why a father would react this way, it’s not helpful and comes from an emotionally immature place. A grounded, centered, mature father providing masculine containment for his daughter would see her spiteful comments as nothing more than an emotional outburst, a smokescreen of sorts that he wouldn’t take personally.

Instead, he would know that his daughter is feeling unsafe, and that what she needs in that moment more than anything else is his unconditional and unwavering presence and love. And he would give it to her, telling her, “I understand you’re upset sweetie and you’re allowed to feel that way. I still love you and I’ll wait here until you’re ready to talk calmly.” And this helps her trust her father and calm down quicker than if he would have gotten emotional and defensive.

Now, because women are not children, they must be held to a higher standard. It’s not acceptable for a woman to be saying nasty, hurtful things to you all the time, but it is ok for her to be angry, distressed, confused, worried, scared, doubtful, or fearful towards you. That just means that she’s not feeling safe and that there’s an opportunity for you to step up to the plate  and contain her emotions. Get to the source of what she needs and give it to her.

When you learn how to do this, women flock to you because you are giving them the very life-giving energy they have been craving all their lives and that so few men are capable of delivering.

This is exactly what happened with my ex girlfriend when I was able to own my shit and remain grounded in the face of her fiery wrath. If I would have gotten sucked into it then she would not have been able to trust me and the mall scenario would have ended quite differently.

Likewise, if I would have been overrun by shame and remorse, and begged her to forgive me, then she equally would not have trusted me because I would have been overtaken by my own emotions, and she would not have softened.

It’s only because I was able to simultaneously empathize with her and stay centered in my power that she felt both seen and secure.

If I hadn’t been able to endure her 45 minutes of fury, then she would have known that I was full of shit, that I hadn’t actually owned up to my mistake, and that I wasn’t actually the man I was claiming to be.

But fortunately, without knowing what I was doing, I was somehow able to strike the right balance and conjure the necessary containment for her to go from cold and wanting to stab me, to warm and wanting to hug me.

This taught me a powerful lesson about the interplay between masculine and feminine energy and gave me my first taste into being a mature masculine man who can provide adequate containment for a woman.

Hope this short story helps my friend.

If you want help with any of this, shoot me a DM on Instagram and let’s chat. ‘Till then.

Breath deep, face fear, become whole,

Danny