Order of Man - A Man Only Has Five Types of Friends ｜ FRIDAY FIELD NOTES

00:00:00.040 So if I ask 100 friends, what's your biggest fear?

00:00:03.500 80% of them, 80 in this case, say,

00:00:06.040 I'm afraid of snakes, I'm afraid of spiders,

00:00:08.580 I'm afraid of heights.

00:00:09.840 Cool, you're in the 80%.

00:00:11.900 Now, if I ask the same amount of people

00:00:14.140 and 20% or 20 of them said,

00:00:16.620 I'm really afraid of not being meaningful and significant.

00:00:22.020 I'm really afraid of failing my children. 0.89

00:00:26.000 You know when you're being a coward. 1.00

00:00:27.340 you know when you're being weak and soft and pathetic and there are 20 percent of men who 0.99

00:00:32.500 know that about you too men you've got five types of friends in your life 0.98

00:00:38.400 maybe you'd call it 10 or 20 or 100 or whatever uh maybe on the opposite end of the spectrum

00:00:46.660 you'd say you don't really have any friends at all but if you actually sat down and mapped it

00:00:53.400 all out. Every guy you text, every man that you might grab a beer with, every man whose name comes

00:01:03.680 up when somebody asks who are your guys or on your phone when you get a text, he'd likely fall

00:01:12.900 into one of five categories. And here's the part that I think might sting a little if you spend

00:01:20.800 some time thinking about it none of them on their own is a real friend actually that's not true

00:01:27.020 there is one there is one who's a real friend and i'll hit that on friend number five um and it's

00:01:34.200 not because these guys are bad it's not because they're malicious or they want the worst for you

00:01:39.700 it's because these five guys are are substitutes the four guys are a substitute for the thing that

00:01:48.680 you actually need and most men go their entire lives running on substitutes without ever noticing

00:02:01.060 that their tank was never full that they never had the depth that they were looking for

00:02:08.540 so i want to start with the one that you've got the most of it's the most covered it's it's called

00:02:17.500 the convenient guy okay this is the guy uh at the gym the guy in your group chat the guy from

00:02:26.100 the the the neighbor that lives next to you it's your wife's friend's husband it's the guy that you

00:02:35.820 went to high school with and played baseball with maybe if it's an it's the guy that you played

00:02:42.680 what his son played baseball with with your your kids and he's around because logistics put him

00:02:53.180 around you know he's in the same building he's in the same neighborhood he's at the same sports

00:02:58.140 complex he's that he's at the same business events he he's running the same errands as you

00:03:05.500 and when those logistics change he's gone not because of falling out not because you guys had

00:03:13.740 a difference of opinion be big but because there was never really any glue that was holding anything

00:03:20.620 together except just proximity and proximity is fine i mean you'll meet some great people

00:03:26.700 but the difference is intentionality but that convenient man so that's number one it's the

00:03:33.420 convenient he shows up when it's when it's good for him when it's easy plans when it's easy timing

00:03:40.880 when it's low stakes you know he's going to ask you for something that costs him nothing but cost

00:03:50.320 you time energy money attention because he's not willing to invest in his own well-being

00:03:58.180 to the extent that it's all about him.

00:04:02.580 And I've often talked about a man is a man

00:04:06.620 when he becomes capable of producing more than he consumes.

00:04:10.540 So the convenient is the guy who's like,

00:04:13.920 I just want to take from this relationship.

00:04:19.400 So when you say, hey, man, let's go out and do this thing.

00:04:21.920 He's like, yeah, anytime, let's go do it.

00:04:23.200 It just becomes silence.

00:04:24.920 and most men mistake the volume of the convenience that they have in their life

00:04:30.460 you know you might have 40 guys in your phone contact or 100 guys or 200 guys or 5 000 guys

00:04:37.300 in your facebook group or your facebook page or whatever um and not one of them would help you

00:04:45.580 get off the couch not one of them would help you overcome addiction not one of them would step up

00:04:52.140 and help you move. Not one of them would help you when you're dealing with some marital spouts.

00:05:00.040 Not a single one of them. It's all about them. It's very selfish. It's self-serving. And you

00:05:07.880 know it. You know it when you see it. All right. So that's number one, the convenient. Number two,

00:05:13.060 and this kind of ties into the convenient a little bit. This is the default. This is that guy,

00:05:17.640 like the apartment complex the neighbor the kid you went to high school with the the guy that you

00:05:23.900 sit next to in the cubicle with the guy that happens to be on your softball team like you

00:05:28.640 didn't choose that guy life just kind of you know handed him to you again it's it's the husband of

00:05:36.820 of your wife's friend or or the guy at work who just happens to be next to you not because you

00:05:44.460 chose it but because it is what it is it's that high school buddy that you haven't really thought

00:05:50.200 about whether or not it's serving you and your life and your goals but he's been around for 20

00:05:56.840 years and so it is just what it is but you've never actively ended that relationship

00:06:04.660 it's it's the default it's the relationship that just runs in perpetuity on

00:06:14.500 loyalty i mean i and i can respect that a relationship that runs on loyalty i mean that

00:06:21.920 that actually sounds pretty good right like you want a person who's loyal to you but if that's

00:06:26.480 all it is it doesn't really make for the kind of man that you want to have in your life it's

00:06:31.400 inherited. It's not really built. It's by default. And the idea of inheritance is a really strange

00:06:41.820 thing to build a friendship on. Loyalty is a very strange thing to build a friendship on.

00:06:48.760 Loyalty is a virtue, by the way, but it's not going to serve you well because you never had

00:06:55.200 to decide. You never had to actively engage whether or not this relationship was worth it.

00:07:00.260 he was just kind of there and so the friendship never got tested and never got pushed and never

00:07:08.400 got oppressed upon um never got proven and here's the trap of that is that the default guys

00:07:14.960 they feel like old friends they feel like it's earned because they've just been around for a

00:07:21.220 very long ass time it's the it's the quality over quantity conundrum it's actually a good

00:07:31.520 way to say it i should coin that quality over quantity conundrum maybe somebody else has

00:07:37.860 already said it but time isn't really the same thing as connection right you know i can i can

00:07:47.140 spend 20 years I can log 20 years next to a guy who says he's a friend and actually know less

00:07:53.940 about what actually what is actually going on inside of him then you might actually learn from

00:08:01.220 a stranger in one very simple quick honest conversation we want depth and I'm going to

00:08:09.200 talk about that in number four number five type friends but let's get to number three okay so 0.98

00:08:14.900 number three is the clown okay every single one of you guys have a clown maybe you're the clown 0.87

00:08:21.160 i don't know but every single one of you have a clown in the group it's the guy who makes 1.00

00:08:25.760 that group chat like fun and interesting and you open it up and he's telling a stupid joke or 0.98

00:08:32.860 you know telling him about his latest escapades or whatever it's the one who can you know take a 0.98

00:08:39.020 take a boring or lame party or Tuesday evening or a poker night or whatever and turn it into

00:08:46.100 something awesome. Just a really great night. And I want to be clear, this is not a knock on the

00:08:52.280 clown. None of this is a knock on any of these individuals. I just want you to start thinking

00:08:57.100 about the five types of friends that you have because that clown is valuable. Laughter and 0.93

00:09:03.980 lightness and enjoyment, that's medicine in some ways to a man's soul. A man who can make you laugh

00:09:11.080 when you're carrying something heavy or you've got a burden weighing yourself down is somebody

00:09:16.880 that I think is doing some legitimate work, whether he knows it or not. But here's where

00:09:23.660 I think it breaks down. Try to bring the clown into something heavy. Try to have a real conversation 0.78

00:09:32.180 about your marriage or a real conversation about your financial situation or a real conversation

00:09:39.160 about your goals and dreams and desires and ambitions and failures and fears and setbacks.

00:09:46.500 You know, try telling him that your marriage is on the rocks. Try telling him that you got this

00:09:51.840 crazy medical diagnosis and it wasn't good. You know, try calling him at midnight and see if he's

00:10:01.500 going to answer the call. I think when the clown gets presented with that kind of reality, he 0.97

00:10:12.300 flinches. He's going to deflect. He's going to make it silly. He's going to make a joke. He's 0.98

00:10:18.040 not going to address the real situations. He's going to self-deprecate or he's going to mock

00:10:24.560 you and tease you and poke at you a little bit, which is fine within reason, but he's going to

00:10:29.600 go a little harder than he thought because the joke like the joke that he has is it would be

00:10:40.080 like a carpenter who only has a set of crescent wrenches in his toolbox if you need a crescent

00:10:48.040 wrench great call that guy but if you need 99.9999% of what you actually need in your life 0.80

00:10:56.000 probably don't call the guy who only has a crescent wrench and that's what the clown is good for

00:11:01.240 he's good for laughs he's good for lightheartedness he's good for just breaking down tension and

00:11:07.860 enjoying and having fun he's not going to go deep he's all that guy is always absent of weight

00:11:15.020 and a guy who only shows up for the light stuff who was never actually walking with you with the

00:11:22.540 deep stuff. He was never walking next to you. He's never carrying your bag. That's fine. But

00:11:30.800 you need to compartmentalize. That's not a man who is going to be in your corner when you need

00:11:37.140 him the most. Which kind of leads me into the fourth and the fifth. And this is where I want

00:11:43.020 you guys to start thinking about moving your relationships from one, two, and three to four

00:11:49.520 and five so the fourth friend that a man has is is the casual okay this this is a little deceptive

00:11:59.220 it's a little bit sneaky because it looks like a real relationship from the outside it's good

00:12:06.540 conversations it's genuine laughs you know you like this guy he likes you you'd call him a friend

00:12:13.040 without hesitation it's the guy that you talk with at the gym every couple of days or weeks it's the

00:12:18.400 guy who maybe even in your, your office, who you spend some time with, or maybe you crack a beer

00:12:24.380 with. It's, it's, it, it has a, it has a purpose. And I don't want to say that it doesn't, but it

00:12:33.360 does. It does have a purpose. And the purpose for this individual is to be there, to be present,

00:12:43.060 to, you know, have the type of conversations that you might want to have.

00:12:49.460 It has some depth to it, but if you strip it all down, what's actually there?

00:12:55.240 Some good times, a little bit of laughter, a little bit of depth.

00:12:59.300 You know his job, but you don't maybe know what he's fearful of.

00:13:02.980 You don't know his goals.

00:13:03.780 You know what he does for work, but you don't know what he actually does.

00:13:06.340 you know what opinions he has on sports and politics and the weather and all the small

00:13:12.700 talk that we talked about last week but not what he's actually afraid of at 40 years old or 50

00:13:18.940 years old or 60 years old that casual friendship that you have and this is where a lot of men

00:13:27.780 reside you have a lot of guys in this category and you are this guy in a lot of men's categories

00:13:34.640 he's pleasant right you go to church with him he's your he's your wife's husband or your wife's

00:13:41.500 friend's husband or whatever and you enjoy him well enough but just being pleasant and being

00:13:50.440 kind of on the fringes requires nothing from you it requires neither of you to do any difficult

00:13:59.100 things. It's, there's no friction involved. It's free a little bit, but I think probably by design

00:14:07.080 subconsciously or consciously, it's like, oh, this is a good friend of mine, but man,

00:14:12.160 if the rubber meet the road, met the road, you would not, this isn't a guy that you'd rely on.

00:14:18.880 And I don't think men really grow in what I would call friction-free spaces.

00:14:28.780 Men grow when something or maybe even someone pushes back.

00:14:33.940 I mean, I had a heated argument with two of my closest confidants and allies and friends in this movement earlier today.

00:14:43.480 and not one of us, I mean, we might've been offended with each other, but not one of us

00:14:48.560 decided like, well, this is not worth a friendship because it required hardship.

00:14:52.380 It required me saying you're wrong and them saying, no, you're wrong. And we had a really

00:14:57.680 spirited discussion and I loved it. I loved it. Okay. You can have a casual friend for 30 years

00:15:04.320 and never once tell them that, that you're wrong. Okay. That's not friendship. That's just

00:15:11.500 company or companionship, I don't really think that's friendship.

00:15:19.180 Now, there's a fifth, and this is what I want you to be moving towards.

00:15:24.020 So maybe there is a little bit of hierarchy in this. And this is what I call the 2 a.m. friend.

00:15:31.280 Okay, it's the guy who, if I call, and I have a handful of them, I've got about four, maybe five

00:15:37.480 men who i would call if i needed to at 2 a.m in the morning and i would say and i have and i'm

00:15:46.340 not joking i would say i need you here in the morning and they would hear be here the next

00:15:51.580 morning before noon these are guys who are on the opposite end of the country of me

00:15:55.740 it doesn't matter the hour it doesn't matter the ask it's like that uh oh um ben afflack and i

00:16:05.300 can't remember the hawk's name the actor who plays the hawk or hawkeye not the hawk hawkeye you can 0.72

00:16:12.100 see how much i know about marvel or dc characters i don't give a shit but uh hawkeye i think you 0.56

00:16:19.160 guys know who i'm talking about and ben affleck's character comes to him and says hey i need you to 0.71

00:16:25.660 and i'm paraphrasing i need you to come with me you can't ask questions you can't uh ask what

00:16:31.760 we're doing or what the consequences are and he and the guy says hawkeye says whose car are we

00:16:38.200 taking that's the 2 a.m friend i could call about four or five guys and i could say hey i need you

00:16:44.940 here by 7 a.m and four or five of them would respond i'll be there and by the way there's

00:16:52.480 four or five guys in my life who said hey i need you here at 8 a.m i would say i'll be there any

00:16:58.920 hints nope doesn't matter i'll be there you know if it's if it's bail money if it's if it's body in

00:17:07.980 the trunk i'm there and he's there no questions no hesitation you know i'm planning a trip i'm

00:17:17.680 going in august i'm going to uh train with vortex in wisconsin uh and then i'm going straight to

00:17:25.800 maine and train with the origin guys for jiu-jitsu and i told my buddy this and he's like don't you

00:17:31.780 have a scout in maine you need to pick up like yeah i do he's like cool go pick it up we'll do

00:17:36.780 a cross-country road trip you and me like hell yeah that's a 2 a.m friend he's the closest of

00:17:45.000 the five to something real because he's proven under pressure it's not it's not convenient it's

00:17:54.540 not expedient. It's not something that is easy. It's something that is difficult and

00:18:00.640 crisis and challenge. This is one of the first men that I called when I was going through

00:18:06.140 my divorce. And through character, mine and his, he's shown what he's capable of. He's

00:18:12.560 shown that he wants to be in my corner. And I want to be in his corner. If he had things

00:18:19.840 going on I'd be in his corner too but even this one has a bit of a ceiling right it has a it has

00:18:29.300 it has a limitation it has a cap a lot of a lot of those 2 a.m friends exist only in the crisis

00:18:38.440 so drive four hours to help you or to bury that body like I was talking about and then go another

00:18:44.260 eight months without a single real conversation about how he's actually doing. And that's not on

00:18:49.680 him. That's on you. See, he's built for emergency, but he was not built for the everyday. Or at least

00:18:57.320 he wasn't trained for the everyday. And that's on you. And I would suggest to you that every

00:19:03.240 conversation about all of the five friends that you have are predicated on your ability to create

00:19:10.500 those and you might say well i don't have any friends well how friendly are you well i don't

00:19:17.380 have anybody i can call it 2 a.m does anybody have in their rolodex because i'm an old man

00:19:23.340 have you listed as their top five contacts if no then what right do you think you have

00:19:29.840 to be on theirs okay your life is never going to know

00:19:36.260 who the ordinary ones are, who the convenient ones are,

00:19:41.280 who the clowns are, you actually have to go out and do something.

00:19:45.340 And if there's something that underlies all that we talk about, 0.94

00:19:48.340 it's the responsibility that you have to do something.

00:19:51.880 And I hear it all the time.

00:19:53.260 Guys are like, well, she's this.

00:19:54.780 My boss is this.

00:19:55.780 The economy, that.

00:19:57.060 My so-called friends are this. 1.00

00:20:00.200 My kids are jerks. 1.00

00:20:01.440 Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. 1.00

00:20:03.100 I don't really care about most of that. 1.00

00:20:06.260 can your kids be jerks yeah so can mine can your boss be an asshole yeah so can mine I don't really 1.00

00:20:15.700 have a boss but when I did can your wife be just a pile of crap to you yeah and my ex-wife was to 1.00

00:20:26.700 me sometimes and i was the same to her can the economy be shitty yeah again can your can your 0.99

00:20:37.220 job go bankrupt regardless of the good that you've done to build that company yeah it can

00:20:45.000 but there is something that you have control on of it's your effort it's your attitude it's the

00:20:53.320 way that you engage with the world and so here's the here's the truth about this when it comes to

00:20:59.300 the five friends whether again it's the convenient or it's the default or it's the clown or it's the

00:21:05.760 casual or it's the 2 a.m the five friends that you have they all kind of can serve a purpose

00:21:13.340 but here's the reality is that it requires you to put forth effort and what i want you to do as a

00:21:20.000 man, is I want you to move from the types of friends that we've been talking about,

00:21:26.480 the five friendships that we've been covering. And I want you to move over to

00:21:31.280 number four and number five, the casual, okay, and the 2am friend. But that requires not them,

00:21:39.840 but you. Can you set boundaries? Can you communicate effectively? Can you dive a little

00:21:45.220 deeper? Can you have real conversations? And you'll find out quickly. If I asked

00:21:50.780 my friends, all of my so-called friends, if I asked them, hey, what's your biggest fear?

00:21:58.680 It's called the Pareto principle. 20% of them would answer with a genuine response.

00:22:06.720 The other 80% would be spiders and snakes. It's fine. I don't need to convince you

00:22:15.180 to be one way or the other, but you're part of the 80.

00:22:18.840 What I'm looking for is the 20.

00:22:21.320 So if I ask 100 friends, what's your biggest fear?

00:22:24.460 And 80% of them, 80 in this case, say,

00:22:27.760 I'm afraid of snakes, I'm afraid of spiders,

00:22:30.320 I'm afraid of heights.

00:22:32.420 Cool, you're in the 80%.

00:22:34.620 Now, if I ask the same amount of people

00:22:36.840 and 20% or 20 of them said,

00:22:39.380 I'm really afraid of not being meaningful

00:22:44.340 and significant in the world i'm really afraid of of failing my children i'm really afraid of

00:22:53.840 the financial hardship regarding getting ahead in society and culture that we live in those are the

00:23:02.080 20 when i listen to that i'm like boom you're in this category you afraid of spiders are in that

00:23:08.380 court category look i don't like spiders or snakes either but if you ask me what i'm afraid of i'm

00:23:14.220 not going to tell you spiders or snakes i'll just squash them what i'm afraid of is not being

00:23:19.420 significant what i'm afraid of is not giving my kids the tools they need what i'm afraid of is 1.00

00:23:27.640 trying this business this movement and everybody saying you shouldn't do that it's stupid it's dumb 0.99

00:23:33.680 and then it flopping and floundering around that's what i'm really afraid of and the guys who are 0.99

00:23:39.260 afraid of that are the guys like you and all it takes is you asking that question you have to ask

00:23:46.520 those questions yourself you have to take risk you have to put yourself in awkward conversations

00:23:51.720 because the reality is is you'll say hey what are you afraid of i'm afraid of failure and some guys 0.99

00:23:56.540 will be like oh failure is stupid you should be afraid of spiders that's not your guy that is not 1.00

00:24:03.800 your guy. He can be afraid of spiders. That's fine. But he 1.00

00:24:07.800 ain't going to be with you. You know what you're afraid of.

00:24:13.160 You know what you've seen in your life

00:24:15.860 that has been a failure.

00:24:19.420 Where you maybe didn't flinch, but you just kept going. You know.

00:24:25.240 You know when you're being a coward. You know 0.97

00:24:27.840 when you're being weak and soft and pathetic. 1.00

00:24:29.840 you know that 1.00

00:24:32.240 and there are 20% of men who know that about you too

00:24:36.100 and if you can't name who that is

00:24:38.980 if you don't have that problem

00:24:41.620 then I would say you have a depth problem

00:24:44.940 and it's not going to fix itself by adding a sixth guy into the group chat

00:24:49.880 another guy on your hunt

00:24:51.520 another guy who you went to high school with

00:24:53.880 that ain't it

00:24:55.540 it's building the kind of friendship

00:24:58.400 that just does not happen by accident

00:25:00.580 every one of them

00:25:02.860 the five men I just described to you

00:25:04.640 three of them are just a product of circumstance

00:25:11.460 but two of them are real

00:25:14.580 those are the real ones

00:25:16.040 those are the kind that you can build on purpose

00:25:23.140 the casual, lower tier

00:25:25.220 the 2 a.m higher tier and that means going first guys that means saying something true and honest

00:25:32.600 and frustrating and challenging and scary and embarrassing maybe even to show that you're in

00:25:39.920 this before that guy even does it it's showing up in his ordinary tuesday not just a crisis

00:25:46.280 it's letting him see that before you're sure it's it's even safe to be sane or safe to be

00:25:55.060 viewed safe, to be

00:25:58.580 challenged, that you're willing to go first.

00:26:04.240 That's the whole game. That's the whole game of friendship.

00:26:08.020 You've got to stop counting Facebook friends.

00:26:12.840 You've got to stop counting the guys you went to high school with.

00:26:15.980 Those guys don't count unless it's been intentional.

00:26:20.020 You've got to stop counting the people that you work with.

00:26:22.640 somebody else set that up for you. You didn't set that up. Somebody else did that.

00:26:26.680 Real friendships are one that you set up. And by the way, proximity is not bad. This is what

00:26:32.220 I was saying. None of these friendships that you have are inherently bad. I'm not saying that at

00:26:38.300 all. I'm just saying that if you don't take it a step further, then you'll never know if these

00:26:42.240 are real individuals who can be part of your team. Are these the guys who are actually going

00:26:50.520 carry the weight again it's the convenient it's the default it's the clown it's the casual 0.75

00:26:57.340 and then it's that 2 a.m

00:26:59.440 just somebody willing to go first

00:27:03.720 so guys if you want to connect with more of what we're doing if you want to find friendships

00:27:10.640 and connections that might turn into 2 a.m friends and go from

00:27:14.980 either the casual or the default and move then into the 2am friends join us in the iron council

00:27:23.800 i mean we've got thousand a thousand plus guys in the iron council right now and we've had over

00:27:28.840 10 000 men go through the program and i'll tell you that these guys understand what a 2am friend

00:27:36.620 is they understand how to turn the default into the standard the expectation and we can show you

00:27:46.360 how to do that so if you're lacking in your friendships be a little bit more intentional

00:27:50.140 and part of that starts with our exclusive brotherhood the iron council head to order

00:27:54.900 of man.com iron council you can learn a little bit more and then on august 12th we're actually

00:28:01.220 doing a preview call where we talk about these concepts and more in depth. And I want you to be

00:28:07.400 there for that. So check it out, order of man.com slash iron council. Or if you want to jump on the

00:28:13.980 preview call, head to the iron council.com slash preview, and we'll get you all synced up. But guys,

00:28:20.400 again, there's, there's five types of friends. There's the convenient only after himself. There's

00:28:28.400 the default, the guy you went to high school with. There's the clown. He jokes around and messes 0.99

00:28:33.500 around, no depth. There's the casual. You can have good conversations, but it doesn't go deep.

00:28:38.820 And there's the 2 a.m. friend who you could call any hour, any day, any time, and they would be

00:28:45.080 there for you in a heartbeat. I want more of that for you. I want more of that for myself.

00:28:51.340 And if you found any value in this, then go to orderofman.com, share it far and wide,

00:28:56.940 Take a screenshot on your phone right now, share that as well, and we'll continue to put out what I hope is good information that serves you well.

00:29:08.500 All right, guys, we'll be back next week for our interview.

00:29:11.920 Until then, go out there, take action, and become the man you are meant to be.

00:29:17.840 Thank you for listening to the Order of Man podcast.

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Order of Man - July 24, 2026

A Man Only Has Five Types of Friends ｜ FRIDAY FIELD NOTES

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