Good for your little brother. Growing in masculinity is so important for boys/men. It's not popular at all but it's important.
I used to attend a church with a female pastor who was a Jezebel. Her husband was extremely passive and was Norwegian, so she would say that Norwegian men are very passive to explain away why her husband was so passive. Her husband was simply 'an Ahab'. One day, I was playing football with two boys (10 and 11 years old) in front of her home. Both boys were from single-mother homes and unfortunately this pastor had befriended their moms. Let's call the 10-year-old Tom and the 11-year-old Andy so I don't have to keep writing their ages.
Andy was a compliant child and Tom was an assertive child. (These are the two basic types of children.) We played catch for a while and I would throw the football to each of them. Tom caught about 18 of 20 passes; but Andy only caught about 5 of 20 passes. I assess people, things, and situations
really quickly (because I don't like wasting time), so when I saw that no matter how softly I threw or lobbed the ball to Andy, he just couldn't catch it, I
recognized the dynamics at play and called him over to me. I remembered that Andy was living with a single mom and that meant he was living a whole lore more "Nos" and "Don'ts" than "Yeses" and "You can do its". On top of that, he was a compliant child which made it worse (because Tom was also living under 'single mother rules' but could catch a football). Andy's mom needed him to be 'weak' so she could feel safe... but agreeing to be weak, Andy's weakness translated to
ineptitude: "I have to be weak and inept so my mom can feel safe that she will never lose me and I'll never leave her." His ineptitude grew like vines into his physical abilities. That was why he couldn't catch simple and easy football passes. So, I put my hand on his shoulder, looked him in the eye, and told him, "There is nothing wrong with being strong. It's okay to be strong. There is nothing wrong with being strong." I then sent him back to where Tom was standing and threw each of them the ball twenty times each.
This time, both Tom and Andy were catching about 18 of 20 passes. They were evenly tied because "a stronger" had come along and 'loosed' Andy by giving him the permission to be free and be himself.
The 'law' from mom to those two boys was "Please don't be [too] strong." This law didn't affect Tom like it affected Andy because everyone is different. I had to come and speak a contradicting 'law' ("It is
good to be strong!") in order to supersede or neutralize the 'law' from his mom ("It is
bad to be strong"). Of course, he would have to return home to his mom, so he would have to acquiesce and slide back under the law she put on him. (The Jezebel pastor also worked on Tom to weaken him. She plainly saw Andy was already quick to yield to feminine wiles, so she didn't bother him. But she would needle and poke and prod and try to drain and bring Tom under her control. He was a resistant kid. He needs a father figure in his life to learn to manage his masculinity because he (both of them) started out compromised.) So, it's a good thing you're with your mom and around your brother as a mitigating force against
'reaching tentacles' and 'smoky tendrils' of emasculation and domination.
Your dad sounds like the everyday Californian. I lived in Cali for a while. The people there have reached possibly the highest level in human coldness (the closest to robots I've seen in any country), worse than NYC. There will be revivals in Cali but they'll be like rains of fire (similar to the Azusa Street revival which began in Los Angeles) whereas revivals in NYC will be like hurricanes (water) from the coast.
You're not going to find those posts I made about 'principalities and powers'. I wrote three of them last night and then when I saw they weren't allowed to post re-wrote all three this morning. The new three have also been banned from posting. They were 'moderated and found wanting'. Here are links to the three new posts I re-wrote today:
1.) 'Thrones and Dominions', Pt. 1:
https://christianchat.com/bible-discussion-forum/thrones-and-dominions.217243/.
2.) Part 2:
https://christianchat.com/bible-discussion-forum/thrones-and-dominions-ii.217244/.
3.) Part 3:
https://christianchat.com/bible-discussion-forum/thrones-and-dominions-iii.217245/.
I'll have to write on the topic within one of the threads I already started-- maybe this one. It's only a matter of time before I'm banned from this site, so we'll see.