Problems facing boys and young men in the United States—technological change, immigration, growing socioeconomic inequality, and increasing detachment from civic, familial, and social life—mirror challenges from the 1900s while contemporary responses fall short of past collective efforts. A renewed call for men to respond to the boy crisis is urged. Tyler Schueffner is a trauma-informed, existentially grounded therapist with twenty years of experience working with at-risk youth and men in Madison, WI. Narrative therapy and therapeutic storytelling are emphasized because men often connect with stories more naturally than direct emotional speech, and stories can provide emotionally safe exposure that helps access emotions and strengthen adaptive neural pathways for confronting trauma.
"Boy Crisis of 2025, Meet the 'Boy Problem' of the 1900s," the social theorists Robert D. Putnam and Richard V. Reeves described how the problems boys and young men in the United States face today-technological change, immigration, growing socioeconomic inequality, and increasing detachment from civic, familiar, and social life -mirror those of the 1900s, yet how our response today is not matching how society rallied to address these issues then.
In my experience, men connect with stories more naturally than speaking directly to their feelings. In a sense, myth, folktales, poems, and music provide an access point to the emotions that often remain stuck below the surface. In another way, stories may function as "exposure" with a measure of emotional safety. We may be able to listen to someone else's story, draw parallels to our own, and strengthen the adaptive neural networks that eventually guide us as we confront the wounds we live with.
#boys-mental-health #mens-mental-health #narrative-therapy #trauma-informed-care #socioeconomic-inequality
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