Boys are pulling away. Here's what structured connection can do about it.

A recent TIME article laid out the harsh reality many of us already feel in our work: one in four young men in America reports feeling deeply lonely on any given day. Two-thirds of them believe no one cares whether they're okay. Boys are less likely than girls to be diagnosed with depression, but more likely to die by suicide. 

Those statements may not be surprising if you work with boys. What the article clearly lays out, though, is why these stats are true: boys are taught that toughness is valuable and vulnerability is a weakness, so they don't ask for help when things get hard. Instead, they pull away. 

"By the time a boy becomes a young man, he's likely absorbed a pretty clear set of rules about what he's allowed to feel — rules that often leave little room for the kind of connection and support young people need." 

The Council for Boys and Young Men was developed to counter this very issue, not through therapy or crisis management, but through something boys don’t get to experience enough: a group of peers where their full selves are welcome, they can express their feelings and emotions, have fun engaging in relevant group activities, and where a trained adult facilitator models what it looks like to be a well-rounded and healthy adult. 

The TIME article cites mentorship as the solution, and we agree, but effective mentorship requires training in creating safe spaces, asking thought-provoking questions, and meeting boys where they arewithout inadvertently reinforcing the same norms and behaviors that shut them down in the first place. We have to do the internal work as adult mentors, and that’s exactly what One Circle Foundation trains people to do, while also providing a structured program model for it.  

The loneliness crisis boys are facing won’t be solved by awareness alone. It takes individuals like you and organizations like yours to show up for young people every day, to develop skills, examine your own triggers and behaviors, and then step up to bring this kind of programming to the boys in your community. 

Become a certified facilitator of The Council for Boys and Young Men by attending a training. Ready to build broader capacity in your community? We'd love to talk with you about booking trainingfor 10 or more staff.