“In no traditional society was the training of young boys left in the hands of the fathers alone. The entire male community participated in this important work. Our fathers didn’t have these connections either - He was as lost as we are.”

By adopting the six stages of boyhood to manhood transformation, we provide lost men simple yet effective steps to find their own light at the end of the tunnel. The course involves the ingredients of meditation and relaxation techniques (such as yoga, massage, gardening, drawing, painting, writing and wrestling), and lessons on mindfulness and right livelihood.

Adopting the six stages to manhood course is one method to witness the difference between a healthy childhood and an unhealthy one. For many men, this is the first time that they are confronted with what should have been. Prisons and mental health institutions are filled with men who suffered abusive childhoods.

All pre-capitalist cultures had initiation rites for adolescent boys. They were trained to live as functioning, hardworking, independent, humble and respectable adults by the time the boys reached the age of sixteen (Iron John,
Robert Bly).
Boyhood to manhood transformation involves confronting the pain of our childhoods by taking responsibility for our lives. As M. Scott Peck said,

“Emotional illness is avoiding reality at any cost; mental health is accepting reality at any cost”
(The Road Less Travelled)

Mothers can initiate their sons by throwing them out of the house permanently, at the appropriate time, just like every other mammal. This initiation is an incentive for the young adult male to take responsibility for his own life, rather than leaving this to his own mother or mother-substitute(s).

• “In centuries gone by, becoming a man was a long, planned process. It required ritual and effort and the deliberate active intervention of older men. This ritual and effort, although very diverse in its forms around the planet, was universally practised in every society ... it had a name. "Initiation" ” (Manhood, Steve Biddulph).
• 75% of adult men aged 16-35 arrested for drug and/or alcohol convictions, still lived with their mum (interviewed by an arrest referral worker on behalf of ARCH Initiatives, during 2006-2007, at the Wirral Custody police station, www.archinitiatives.org.uk).
• The average age when they began to become class A drug and alcohol dependent was fourteen years old (see above).
• Britain has the highest teenage pregnancy rate in Europe.
• The biggest killer of teenagers today is traffic. On average around 50 are fatally wounded each week (cinema commercial).
• Planet Earth, animals, insects, plants and trees are our teachers; their lessons are non-verbal.
• We have forgotten how to live with dignity, because we have forgotten how to die with dignity.