A boy, however, must at some point pull away from the security of his mother to seek out his male identity. He must confront challenges and dangers, and then learn to nurture in a masculine way by shedding sweat and blood to protect and provide for his mate and children. Becoming a man requires the young boy to die to his old, mother-sheltered self and be born as a new person. He is forced to leave a warm place to find his natural role. Without a guide on this difficult path a man can easily lose his bearings, fall into the abyss, and even become an evil which threatens the community, rather than a front-line defender of the community.
Most boys learn what it is to be a man from their father.
A father knows that becoming a good man requires transcending one's self, and he knows how difficult that is, and that even he has only partially succeeded. He knows that good men must be taught and trained up that way, and that the body of male tradition and ritual is a very important tool for achieving this. A man must be educated into connecting himself to his children, and fathering them. He must have the traditions of previous fathers passed down to him. Staying through long years with the woman he has impregnated and the resulting child is a challenge to a man, who is urged by biology to seek younger women and work only to support himself.