Breaking Bad Habits, Renewing the Mind, and Dealing with Narcissists ｜ ASK ME ANYTHING
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Summary
In this episode of the Ask Me Anything podcast, we answer questions from our fraternal organization, The Iron Council, and answer some questions from the open FB group "The Order of Man" and answer your questions!
Transcript
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You're a man of action. You live life to the fullest. Embrace your fears and boldly charge
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your own path. When life knocks you down, you get back up one more time. Every time.
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You are not easily deterred or defeated. Rugged. Resilient. Strong. This is your life. This is who
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you are. This is who you will become. At the end of the day, and after all is said and done,
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you can call yourself a man. Gentlemen, what is going on today? My name is Ryan Michler.
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I'm your host and the founder of the Order of Man podcasting movement. I'm glad that you're here.
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If you've been with us for almost eight years now, welcome back and thank you for being a loyal
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listener and a plier of this information. That's the most important thing is, yeah,
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we can listen and we can read books and we can hear from all these guys that we have on the podcast.
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But at the end of the day, if you're not applying this stuff, what does it matter? I mean,
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it's just a waste of time. So if you're applying the information and you're becoming a better father,
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husband, business owner, community leader, man in general, congratulations. And I am appreciative
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of you. If you're new to what we're doing here, you joined us on a Wednesday show, which is our
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Ask Me Anything. And we're fielding questions from our exclusive fraternal organization called
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the Iron Council. We're also going to be fielding some questions from our open Facebook group at
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facebook.com slash groups slash order of man. Normally I'm joined by my good friend and co-host Kip
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Sorensen. He was having some technical difficulties today. So we'll excuse him today. We're not going
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to excuse him next week, but we will excuse him today. And you're just going to hear from me.
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We've got a lot of questions that came from our Iron Council brothers, and we got a lot of good
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questions that came from our Facebook group as well. So we'll just jump right into it. Actually,
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hold on. Before I do that, let me tell you about our battle ready program. This is a free course
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available. It's 17 emails you're going to receive over 30 days. So if you want to do some work,
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you want to figure out how to set goals, you want to figure out how to achieve goals and make
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something different of your life than currently is, then sign up for our free course, orderofman.com
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slash battle ready. All right, guys, let's jump into the questions. The first one comes from Stefan
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Serrata. He says, when breaking a bad habit or an addiction, what is better to concentrate on no bad
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habit slash addiction or on a positive formulation that excludes the bad habit? So the question ultimately is,
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what is better? Is it better to just say, hey, I'm not going to do this anymore? Or is it better to
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replace it with something that's more productive? This is a false dichotomy. Classic example of a
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false dichotomy. It's not an either or. It's really not. And I know maybe in the spirit of the question,
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no, we're not going to do the spirit of the question thing on this one. You don't need to choose.
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You can do both and you should do both. You should look at what works for you based on past
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experience. Does it drive you to say, hey, I'm not going to do this because I know where it leads me
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and that stick, if you will, is enough? Or do you need a carrot? I'm going to instead replace it with
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something else that's going to help me live a better life. I don't know what's best for you,
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but you don't need to have either or. You should be able to look at a situation and say,
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I know that doesn't serve me. I know that's destructive to my mental, emotional, or physical
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health. And therefore, I'm going to resist the urge to smoke or to drink or to engage in pornography
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or to engage in womanizing or to engage in biting my nails or eating like garbage. And that should be
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enough because you have a future vision for what you want your life to be and the kind of man that
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you want to be in that future life. That's an important tool, right? You have another tool,
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which is instead of drinking alcohol, I'm going to drink seltzer water. When I stopped drinking
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alcohol, for me, it was drinking a Red Bull. And I know that's not the bad schedule. Oh, you shouldn't
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drink those. That's better than alcohol, bro. So if that helps me get to a place where I can get rid
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of that altogether, then by all means, I'm going to take advantage of that. If smoking is your thing
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and you want to quit smoking, then okay, what are you going to replace it with? Maybe you bring some
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Tootsie Rolls. I don't know. Smoking is not a thing I've ever dealt with, but maybe you bring
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some Tootsie Rolls. And instead of putting that cigarette in your mouth, you decided you want a
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Tootsie Roll or a piece of gum or whatever it might be to eliminate that temptation. So let's not get
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into false dichotomies. Let's look at all of the tools that we have and use all of the tools that we
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can to achieve our desired result. Can you imagine a carpenter saying, you know, I don't know what's
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better. Should I use a hammer or a screwdriver? I don't know. It depends on if you have a nail or a
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screw. And why can't you have both in your tool belt? You should have both. Our job as men is to
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build out our repertoire, if you will, our toolkit with as many tools as possible so that we could
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use the right tool for the right job. And in this case, I would suggest that you need both.
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Tony Luzny, he's a fireteam leader over on Team Valiant. He says,
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what are a few of the best objectives and tactics that you've seen that make a huge difference in
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someone's life? So good that perhaps everyone should do them at least once. Well, if you're
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not familiar with what a tactic is, a tactic is a daily strategy. It's a daily action item. It's
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something that you can do every single day to achieve your objective. The beauty of tactics is
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that when you do these small little things on a daily basis, they compound and they add up.
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And over time, they're going to produce drastic results in your life. You're going to build
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relationships. You're going to start businesses. You're going to lose weight. You're going to get
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more clear about who you are as a man. You're going to be able to identify goals and objectives and
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dreams and hopes and desires, but it takes time. So that's what a tactic is. The problem with tactics
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is that they take time. And so you might get up today and you might go work out or you might drink
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today, a hundred ounces of water, or you might decide to show some level of appreciation for
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your wife. And you decide to send her a text or write her a letter, write a little note on the mirror
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or drop some flowers off or have some flowers delivered to her office. Well, guys, that's not
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going to make a huge difference today if you've been an asshole for the past 12 months. But if you do
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that enough over and over and over and over again, then she's going to see that you're serious.
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Or if it comes to losing weight, then your body's going to start reflecting the changes that you're
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making. So it isn't a one and done type thing, which is frustrating because you might wake up today
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and say, well, I really want to change. And so you do all the right things today and you see zero results
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from the changes. So to Tom's question here, what are a few of the best objectives and tactics?
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I think it's more important that you realize that consistency is key. Okay. We all know what's right.
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We all know how to eat correctly. I mean, it's amazing to see some of these fitness accounts and
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they have millions of followers. I'm like, why? Everybody knows what to do. Why do I have a business?
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Why is the order of man a movement? Because everybody knows what to do. Why do I have this
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business? Why do fitness people exist? Why do life coaches exist? Because even though we know what to
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do, we struggle when it comes to application. So guys, the most important thing is not necessarily
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what you're doing. You already know what to do. It's that you can do it consistently day in and day out
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forever. We have a 90 day battle plan. So guys think, well, if I can do this for 90 days, I win.
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Or you look at programs like 75 hard. If I do this for 75 days, I win. What happens on day 76?
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What happens on day 91? And that's not to diminish what we've created or what Andy Frisilla with 75
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hard has created, but what happens on the very next day? I've talked with hundreds of people,
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if not thousands of people at this point who have gone through 75 hard and guess what they do on day 76?
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They go out and they get shit faced or they go out and they eat like a freaking pig.
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Okay. Well, congratulations on the past 75 days. Now what? Now you just go back to the slob and the pig
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that you were being before? I'm not interested in that. I'm interested in lifelong improvement.
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And I'm not taking away again from any of these programs. They're a kickstart. But if that's the
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end of your self-development, that's a problem. It should be the beginning of your journey.
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So yeah, I mean, I could tell you like journaling has been valuable for me. Reading has been valuable
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for me. Daily exercise has been valuable for me. Eating correctly has been productive for me.
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All the things you already know how to do. I wish I could give you a better answer and say,
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these three magical things that nobody's ever heard of or talked about before,
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but that isn't the reality. Just go do the things that you know you should be doing forever.
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All right. Derek Gordon, without giving away any trade secrets, what in the way of innovation is
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going on in the Order of Man Iron Council? What are things that are no longer serving us that we are
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getting rid of and what things are going to change in order to improve and what new things are going to
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be tested to move towards the next season? I mean, Derek, look, you're part of it. You know,
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last week, we opened up the Iron Council for the very first time to the public. And so we had,
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I think, close to 150 visitors on that call. And that's something. We're introducing new courses
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and programs that are available. We've got a... In fact, I've got it pulled up here. We've got a
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marriage course. We've got an overcoming pornography addiction. We're putting a nutrition course in
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right now. So the courses are going to be big. The way we onboard new members, most programs like
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the things that I've seen or the things that we're doing, basically, they just get you to sign up and
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then you're supposed to follow one guy and worship him and pretend he's God. And it's all centered
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around this false idol. We don't do that in the Iron Council. What we do is enlist other men who have
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things to share above and beyond what me, Ryan Mickler, might be able to share. And so we do that
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through courses and programs and topical channels with moderators that aren't me. We have other
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people coming in to discuss ideas and topics and strategy. I mean, we're so far ahead of the curve.
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It's unreal. I mean, it really is. You're going to pay a bunch of money and you're going to go
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listen to some guy yap at you for an hour a day. And then you're supposed to talk with each other
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with no structure or system in place. And the things that we're doing are structured.
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One other thing that we're going to be doing is not only exclusively for the Iron Council,
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but for Order of Man is next year, we're going to do a men's summit, right? There's all sorts of
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men's events and things like that. We're going to do this thing right. I did one last year and it
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was a good start to what I want to do, but we're taking this thing to the next level. I'm talking
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about 500, 600, 700, 800, 900 guys all together over one weekend with powerful speakers, powerful
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instruction, powerful activities to get us to work and get us learning how we can apply this information.
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So we're always looking at ways to innovate, ways to improve. I'm not the center of the universe.
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I'm not the center of this movement. I'm here to facilitate. And that's the difference in what
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you're going to find between what we're doing and what all these other men's guys are doing.
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They want to be the center of it. Like, look at me, look how wonderful, look how great I am,
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like follow me, do what I do, and you're going to figure it all out. I just don't believe that's
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the case. I can help facilitate. I can help lead. I have a vision for what we're doing here.
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I'm fairly organized and structured and can see things in a way that a lot of people can't. But
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at the end of the day, I don't have all the answers. And my job is to help bring the right
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guys in, put them into the right places so that I can serve you. Good question, Derek.
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George Sykes, do you have a daily mind renewal practice? I got to stop right there. Like these are
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buzzwords. I don't know what a mind renewal practice means. So let's go on. Maybe there's
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an answer here. Oh, Casey does clarify. As the Bible talks about in Romans 12.2, if so, what is it?
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I don't know what Romans 12.2 is. Let's see. Oh, he put a link. George, look at you. Romans 12.2,
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and this is in the NIV version. I don't even know what that stands for. Oh, new international version.
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It's not what I use. King James version is typically what I use. Do not conform to the patterns of this
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world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve
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what God's will is, his good, pleasing, and perfect will. Again, it doesn't really give me a whole lot
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of information. Maybe there's some context there that I need to look at. But again, the question is,
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pull it up here. Do I have a daily mind renewal practice? Let me go on and see what he says here.
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I recently heard of a great and simple practice from Mark Driscoll of real faith and in beginning to
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incorporate that into my daily life. He says to take a sheet of paper and put two columns on it.
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On the left, put lies and list all of the twisted crap that comes from our minds and hearts under
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that. And on the right, put truth and list quotes from the word of God that combats the lies and
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meditate on those. Yeah, that sounds good. I like that. I just journal. And that's one thing I've
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started to do. I've got my journal right here, my little red journal. And every day I'm going in there
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and writing the things that I believe and writing the things that I've heard and writing the lessons
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that I've learned and evaluating my day and figuring out where I can improve. That's been valuable.
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Another thing, and I don't know if this would fall under mind renewal practice necessarily,
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but another thing that I do is I consult with good, successful men in different areas of life.
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Family men, businessmen, entrepreneurs, marketers, sales guys, athletes, scholars,
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warriors, New York times, bestselling authors. I'm fortunate in that I have the best people on
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the planet talking with me about what they're doing on a daily basis. And I'm telling you journaling
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reflection, reading from some of the greatest minds the worlds have ever known. These are all
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practices that I do on a daily basis, writing and reading the Bible sometimes, or we just released a
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podcast with John Deloney, the books over there. We've got another podcast coming out with Michael
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Easter on the scarcity brain. So guys, it's, it's all there. Um, and you know what I do? I read,
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I journal, I reflect, um, we do the after action review. I do my battle plan and I'm pretty religious
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about all of those things. And so I'm not sure George, if that falls into daily mind renewal
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practice, but I do like what Mark Driscoll says, which I've reached out to Mark and hopefully we can
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get a podcast going about the lies and truth. I like that. James Knox Jr. He's brand new to the
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iron council. He says, if you had a physically crippling condition, how would you continue to
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contribute to those around you? And how would your leadership be affected? Well, my leadership would
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definitely be affected because I do, I'm trying to be very honest on this question. Um, I do pride
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myself on being a man of value. I do pride myself on being physically fit and strong and capable of
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doing things. Fortunately, knock on wood. I've never had to deal with a physically crippling
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condition. Now I have had some minor injuries. I've had a surgery on my pec and had to deal with
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that for about three months and felt pretty useless, but there were still things that I could
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do. Um, but I will say this, James, if the physical component of a man's contribution to society's all
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that he offers, that's bad news because you could very easily get injured, hung up, hurt, die.
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I, our physical bodies are the weakest part of who we are, or at least it should be because your mind
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should be the strongest. And what are you doing to provide emotional, mental, physical, or excuse me,
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not physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual support to the people that you care about.
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You know, if you're dealing with a physically crippling condition and people see that your
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mind is strong and that you're working through your condition and you're trying to improve and get
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better and add value, then that's a valuable part of life. That's a value that they can see
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and improve. If you're giving guidance and direction and instruction, if you're teaching
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people how to overcome hardship and heartache and adversity because of what you might be dealing
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with from a physical perspective, that's a value add. Guys, there's so much more to add to this world
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than our paycheck or what we can do physically. It's mental, it's emotional, it's spiritual.
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Your kids are looking, for example, for guidance, direction, instruction, discipline. You can still
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offer those if you have a physically crippling condition. In fact, you might be even a better
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example because they're going to see that dad in this case is really struggling physically and yet
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he's still up every morning. He's still reading books. He still joins us for dinner. He's still
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having conversations with us. He's still going around and living his life and pursuing his dreams
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and desires and ambitions. That's powerful. You take a healthy man that's doing that, that's powerful.
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You take a guy who's physically unhealthy or unwell and he's still doing that, that's even more
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powerful. So when you ask a question like this, all I can help but think is you're limiting yourself
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and your value to what you physically add to your environment. That is a component. I don't want to
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make any qualms about it. That is a component, but it's not the only component. And there's other ways
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to add value in your life. Al Petroni, what is the most pivotal moment in moving on from the divorce?
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Any advice to shake the lingering regret asking for a friend? Don't ever say that, by the way.
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It's one of my least favorite phrases. I'm asking for a friend. I know it's a joke,
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but let's own it. I'm asking for me. I know, again, I know it's a joke. I know it's meant to
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be lighthearted, but that's one of the, that's a pet peeve of mine. I'm asking for a friend.
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Ask for yourself. That's what men need to do. We need to ask more questions. We need to
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be curious. We need to turn to other people who might have ideas. And that's what you're doing,
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Al. So I'm glad you're here, but I just want to throw that out there. That is one of my pet
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pees. I'm asking for a friend. The other one, and I hear this a lot is I lost all my guns in
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a boating accident. You didn't lose shit in a boating accident. Stop saying that. All right.
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As men, we're going to be assertive. And the language that we use is important. I know we're
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joking, but also if you're joking about it, then there might be some element of truth to it, which
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is like, I'm a little hesitant and scared of asking this question, or I don't want people to know I
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have guns. Like guys, we're men. We need to exert ourselves more. If I don't know how to do
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something, I'm not embarrassed to ask. Like if there's a new activity or hobby or interest or
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book or whatever, and I don't know anything about it, I'm going to ask, like, how do you do this?
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I have a, I have a, um, a neighbor. His name is Bo. It's a great guy, very successful, good family,
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man, just a good human being in general. And, uh, we're doing some landscaping out in my front yard.
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And, uh, we were doing some landscaping this weekend. And he said, uh, he's like,
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why don't you hop up in the loader? And this is a big loader. Okay. I don't, I don't know
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exactly what it is. Cause I'm not privy to all of that stuff. Cause I didn't really have an
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experience with it growing up. And he's like, why don't you hop in the loader and, uh, go move
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this gravel. I don't, I don't know what to do with that. Now, look, here's the problem. A lot of guys
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would be like, well, you don't know how to draw it. Some of you guys are saying it right now. You don't
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know how to drive a load. No, I don't because I've never done it before. See, that's the problem
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with men. In fact, is that like, we don't know how to do something. And so you go out and you,
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you're, you're honest and you're humble about it. Like, Hey, I don't know how to do that.
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And then you get mocked and ridiculed for asking like this stupid. If a guy's asking you about
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something, like instead of making them feel like a fool, like teach them how to do it.
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So I told Bo, I said, I would love to do that, but I don't, I don't know how to do that. Can you teach
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me? I said, yeah, sure. So we jumped up in the loader. He's like, all right, here's this button.
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Here's this, here's how to turn it on. Here's how to put in gear. Here's how to lower the bucket.
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Here's how to raise it up. And like, cool. So I went and did it and learned something new and
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tried something different. And we had a good time and I didn't kill anybody or run into anything.
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So, you know, it went well, but guys like enough, like let's just exert ourselves. Hey, I don't know
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how to do that. Can you tell me? Or I have this question. I'm not asking for a friend. I'm asking for
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me. Like I have this question because it's a concern of mine. So anyways, maybe I blew that out of the
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water. But anyways, just wanted to throw that out there. What was the biggest, or excuse me,
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what was the most pivotal moment in moving on from the divorce? It was when I said it was over.
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Let me reword that. It was when I acknowledged that it was over. I didn't say it was over. In fact,
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I didn't want to get divorced. That was not my idea. And I spent a very long time pouring everything
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that I possibly could into the marriage in hopes of salvaging the damaged relationship.
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And no matter what I did, it just, it wasn't, it wasn't happening. So the most pivotal moment for me
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was coming to the conclusion and realization that it was time to close that chapter of the book.
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I didn't want to, I resisted for a long time. I hesitated. I felt like a failure. I felt a lot
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of guilt and shame. And I still feel those things occasionally, not nearly as much as I did a year
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ago, but I still feel those things occasionally. But you know what? Life is pretty good. I'm developing
00:21:04.200
and building a better relationship with my kids. I'm reevaluating what I'm looking for in a woman.
00:21:08.820
I'm reevaluating what my life is going to look like and how I envision my life to go.
00:21:16.200
I'm journaling. Like I mentioned earlier, I'm reading good books. I'm getting back to the basis.
00:21:21.440
I stopped drinking. Like there's a lot of things that I did that, that have just made life better.
00:21:28.500
And for me, it was just putting a period on the end of the sentence of marriage and realizing this is
00:21:34.480
done. I don't want it to be this way. I wish it wasn't this way, but it is an operating in reality
00:21:41.260
and started to move on, started to date, started to build my life. Like I'm in a different home and
00:21:48.420
started to rebuild the podcast and the movement and started to have different discussions. There's a lot
00:21:52.620
more empathy and kindness and compassion in my voice. I think hopefully you guys can hear that
00:21:58.860
because I've been humbled. I can see things in a new way, but for me, you know, there's only so
00:22:05.360
much a guy can do. And I came to the realization that as much as I wanted to control the inevitable
00:22:11.620
outcome of what we were doing, it wasn't within my control. And with regards to my divorce, I can
00:22:19.580
walk away now. And I have walked away because I've closed that chapter of the book with a clean
00:22:26.300
conscious. I did everything I could to salvage the marriage. I did everything I possibly knew
00:22:32.340
what to do. I did everything that I could and it wasn't enough, but that's not on me.
00:22:41.000
The part that's on me is doing everything that I could. So I can hold my head up high. And especially
00:22:45.780
as I date, you know, women ask me like, why'd you go through, why'd you, what happened when you're
00:22:49.500
divorced and why that happened and how did you handle it? And I can have an honest discussion about it
00:22:54.360
because I did what needed to be done and I did it right. And I treated my ex-wife with a level of
00:23:00.960
respect that I think she deserves, a baseline level of respect that she deserves, but that wasn't my
00:23:06.520
decision. So that's what moved the needle most for me. Also dating, you know, dating helped. And look,
00:23:14.200
it's easy to sedate ourselves. I'm not saying go out there and get laid and chase a bunch of women
00:23:18.440
around, but, you know, realizing that there's other women out there, realizing that there's incredibly
00:23:23.860
beautiful and amazing women that you can be involved with. That helped. And then just getting
00:23:30.440
busy with my own personal development. I think those were the three pivotal moments, closing the
00:23:34.760
chapter, dating other women, and then just focusing on my own personal development for myself, not for
00:23:42.260
her, not for the kids, not for anybody else, but for me, that's what I needed to do. All right, Al,
00:23:47.440
I hope that helps, man. Sounds like maybe you're, you're dealing with that. And I, and if that's the
00:23:51.320
case, I'm sorry, I know how hard it can be. Jarrett Silverback Storrell says, how would you work with a
00:23:57.740
narcissist? They don't believe that any of the problems they've created are theirs and they don't
00:24:03.120
want to take responsibility for them. What tactics would you use to helping them see the issues?
00:24:10.220
I would try to help them not necessarily overcome their narcissism because that's what we have a
00:24:15.000
tendency to do. And I think that actually might be a little narcissistic in itself. Like I can be the
00:24:20.120
savior. I can be the white knight in my latest book, the masculinity manifesto. I talked about why we help
00:24:26.440
people. And too often it's not for the inherent good of helping others. It's, it's not altruistic. It's
00:24:32.940
for our own benefit. Like I will feel good. I'll feel like the white knight. I will have rescued the
00:24:38.860
damsel in distress. So it had nothing to do with the damsel in distress and more to do with us being the
00:24:43.720
hero of the story. I'm not saying that's necessarily wrong, but let's get our motives right. And that's
00:24:49.160
typically what it is. So it might be a little bit narcissistic to actually think that you can
00:24:56.360
change a narcissist. What makes you think you're going to be the one to do it? This person's 40
00:25:02.260
years old or slightly younger, slightly older, but they've been around on the planet for decades.
00:25:06.960
What makes you think you're going to be the one to change this person? Probably not going to happen.
00:25:13.060
So we need to take a different approach. And what is that approach? Service. One of service.
00:25:19.580
All right. You need to earn trust with this person. And by the way, let me just throw this out here.
00:25:24.540
I'm not really going to work with a narcissist unless I have to, like, I'm not going to bring
00:25:28.600
narcissistic women, for example, into my life. Like this is not something I'm going to do.
00:25:33.200
I'm not going to business, become a business partner with somebody who's narcissistic. This is
00:25:37.560
not something I'm going to do. I'm not going to be a friend or engage in hobbies or activities
00:25:41.600
with a narcissist. I'm just not going to do it. But there are circumstances where you got to work
00:25:47.500
with an a-hole. So what do you do? Serve. Guys, that is the foundation of the value that we add
00:25:56.080
and the fulfillment that we enjoy is our ability to add value to people's lives, whether they're
00:26:01.620
a narcissist or not, whether they deserve it or don't deserve it. What matters is that you're adding
00:26:06.500
value. So what does a narcissist want? To feel important, to feel special, to feel valued.
00:26:13.100
Just like all of us, by the way, I want to feel important. I want to feel special. I want to feel
00:26:18.040
valued. Am I narcissistic in my approach to it? I hope not. But that doesn't mean that my approach
00:26:24.300
is flawless. So a narcissist is actually after the same things that you are. And sometimes we can feed
00:26:30.400
into that in a healthy way. I say healthy because I'm not telling you to get trampled on.
00:26:34.840
I'm not telling you to take one for the team. I'm not telling you to be abused emotionally,
00:26:42.540
mentally, spiritually, physically, verbally at the hands of somebody, a narcissist. I'm not saying
00:26:47.340
any of that. I'm just saying, you know what that person's after. Serve them and help them because
00:26:52.260
what that's ultimately going to do is it's going to build trust between you two. And the more that
00:26:58.260
you serve and the more you help and the more you advocate for this person's redeeming qualities,
00:27:04.100
the more they're going to look at you and think, man, in this case, Jarrett, this Jarrett guy,
00:27:09.780
he's different. He's been helpful. He's been courteous. He's been supportive. And then maybe
00:27:16.000
when you build that trust and you break down some of those walls, or at least take the bricks down,
00:27:20.440
some of the bricks off of the wall, maybe then will that person listen? Because they know you've put
00:27:27.000
enough emotional deposits into the friendship or the relationship bank account. And so maybe at that
00:27:32.780
point, it's time for a withdrawal, which is, Hey, Jarrett, you know, man, I really want to see
00:27:37.420
you succeed and win. I hope that, I hope that my, my help and assistance is, has moved you towards
00:27:42.840
those goals. Um, I found, I came across something that I thought would be interesting to you. Maybe
00:27:47.740
it's an article, or maybe it's this podcast, or, you know, maybe it's a message, or maybe it's a text
00:27:52.360
or a quote and you just pass it to him. Like, I just found this to be interesting. And, uh, a great book
00:27:57.640
is extreme ownership. Hey, I found this book to be interesting. I was having a hard time taking extreme
00:28:02.780
and this book really helped me. You might be interested in this because this is a really
00:28:05.760
powerful book, but you can do that once you've built trust. If you don't, the walls are up and
00:28:10.900
they're just going to look at it and think that you're trying to undermine them or take advantage
00:28:14.320
of them because they're hurt, right? Narcissists are hurt. They're hurt from past experiences and
00:28:19.400
other people taking advantages of them. So what do they do? They build up walls and they look after
00:28:23.380
themselves. I'm going to get mine. I'm going to worry about me and everybody else can deal with their
00:28:28.540
own. That, that sounds like a hurt person. That's what a narcissist would say.
00:28:31.840
Okay. All right. Let's go to Richard Ray for zero zero eight. So another new member of the iron
00:28:37.160
council, he says, I'm coming up on a year since my dad passed and I'm still working through the red
00:28:41.880
tape of the estate stuff, but nearing the end of that, that's going to feel good. It feels like it
00:28:47.100
has stunted my grief process through it. And I've kind of been given the patriarch, a patriarch baton,
00:28:53.680
which I'm honored by that role. My question is, as you and Kip have both experienced this loss as
00:29:00.260
well, what did you do find helpful in processing through the grief? Uh, I know that everyone has
00:29:06.040
a different relationship with their dad and that can affect a lot of how a person deals with it,
00:29:10.180
but just looking for some input, by the way, I had a great relationship with him
00:29:13.780
and it was healthy beyond words. Thank you guys. Look, Richard, I'm glad you guys had a great
00:29:18.300
relationship. I had a very strained relationship with my father. So I don't, I don't know that my
00:29:24.720
advice is going to help you. But for me, the best thing I could do is to compartmentalize his death,
00:29:29.880
his life, and our relationship. His death, it was his death. It's just, it's part of life. Um,
00:29:35.840
I don't, I don't feel like because somebody dies, I need to grieve unnecessarily. Um, I don't feel like
00:29:42.500
I need to hang onto that forever. Uh, I don't feel like that I can't live and enjoy my life because
00:29:48.620
somebody else's life is gone. Like that isn't something that I'm, I'm going to do now. Granted,
00:29:55.080
I haven't dealt with a lot of death in my life. I've had some friends die and I've had my father
00:29:59.780
die, but you know, not a lot to be honest. And I'm grateful for that. And at some point that will
00:30:04.720
come, but I know I'm going to die. You're going to die. Everybody's going to die. And if their death
00:30:12.840
is what pushes me over the edge into despair and depression or not being able to grieve correctly,
00:30:18.960
I probably gave that person too much weight. And that might be interesting to hear, especially
00:30:24.300
because you had a great relationship with your father. It sounds like I didn't. So I, I can say
00:30:28.640
that because his life didn't really impact my life as much as maybe your father's has for you. Um,
00:30:37.800
one thing I did is I, I began to take my father off the pedestal that I had placed him on. And that
00:30:42.600
was actually a very gracious thing for me to do. It was hard for me to do, but it was,
00:30:48.020
it was a good thing because then I started to recognize and see him for the human that he was
00:30:52.460
the flaws and the, the, the, the tainted issues and the little tarnish on there. I started to see
00:30:58.580
that maybe he wasn't a horrible person as I maybe thought at some points in my life that he was just
00:31:04.340
a human. And as I go through my own personal experiences and some I do really well, and some I
00:31:09.560
absolutely flop on, I'm starting to find some more empathy for my father who's passed away
00:31:15.820
and realize, you know what, he was dealing with his stuff too. So that's one element, another element
00:31:21.320
of it. And I really liked this framing because it's only just framing, right? We have experiences,
00:31:26.200
which are objective. The experience is the experience. And then we have our perspective
00:31:32.320
of it. So an example might be that you're driving down the road and the speed limit 65,
00:31:35.980
and you're going 75 miles an hour. And the police officer pulls you over and he says,
00:31:41.120
sir, do you know why I pulled you over? And you said, yeah, yeah, I don't know. Or yeah,
00:31:44.440
I know I was going a little bit over the speed limit. Now his story is, Hey, I'm trying to serve
00:31:48.600
and protect, right? I'm trying to keep the road safe so that nobody gets hurt. That's his story.
00:31:53.760
And my story, if I get pulled over might be, Hey, uh, you know, I'm really trying to get to work.
00:31:59.380
I'm running late and there's a deadline. And so I got to be there. Okay. Same exact situation.
00:32:05.820
75 and a 65. Those are the facts, but the interpretation of those facts is different
00:32:10.700
based on which lens it's being viewed through. I'm justified in my own mind. Cause I'm late for
00:32:14.980
work. I got to get there on time. He's justified in his mind of pulling you over and potentially
00:32:19.160
writing you a ticket because he's trying to keep the road safe. So who's wrong? Who's right? Well,
00:32:23.520
it's just an interpretation of the facts. So if we look at the example with your father,
00:32:30.060
uh, you know, the facts are that in this case, it sounds like he was there and he was present and
00:32:35.260
he was available and he was good to you. And the interpretation of that is that you should be that,
00:32:41.140
or that he should do certain things or should behave a certain way because you placed him on this
00:32:47.800
elevated pedestal. And once I took my father off the pedestal, I realized he does have flaws. He
00:32:53.440
does have weaknesses and it's okay. It doesn't make them less than, but the other thing, and I like
00:32:58.620
this framing, this is what, at the point I was making and getting to is that you can honor his
00:33:04.580
life and his dedication and commitment to you. If you take his lessons and you apply those in your
00:33:11.780
life, he is still within you. I love that line of, uh, lion King where, uh, Simba, the baboon tells
00:33:21.340
him to go look because Mufasa is still alive and he tells him to go look in the pond and he looks
00:33:26.300
and Simba says, Oh, that's just my reflection. He's like, no, look again, look harder. And he looks
00:33:30.500
again and he sees his father. He's like, right. Your father lives in you. So you can keep your
00:33:36.520
father's legacy alive. You can keep the relationship alive. Even though your father is dead, you can keep
00:33:44.200
it alive by being the kind of man he wanted you to become. And by the way, we don't want to do it for
00:33:49.960
our father. That's not a good motive. You want to do it for you. He gifted that to you. He sacrificed
00:33:57.540
for you. He made concessions for you and his life. And so we need to want to take that and then to
00:34:06.380
carry it and move it forward and then pass it on to the generations from here. So I realize you're
00:34:11.020
dealing with some estate shit and the, and the red tape and all the bullshit. And it is, I mean, I'm,
00:34:15.860
I'm, I'm trying to be a little bit better about my swearing, but that is, that stuff's all bullshit.
00:34:21.040
I know because I was in the financial planning business for nearly a decade. I know how horrible
00:34:24.660
it can be. So you'll get that stuff taken care of. But in the meantime, honor his legacy by living
00:34:30.280
his life, but also acknowledge that he wasn't perfect and he had flaws and he did the best that
00:34:35.100
he can do. And now it's your turn to do the same. Brett Huber. How do I advise a friend who's
00:34:40.260
struggling? His relationships are being harmed due to his use of alcohol. He doesn't want to attend AA
00:34:46.420
or other addiction problems. He doesn't see the value in getting together with others to
00:34:50.920
commiserate their addiction. It seems like that would be an important first step, but I don't have
00:34:56.280
experience in this to draw from your perspective and advice are appreciated. Stop, right? Just stop.
00:35:03.560
This is different advice than I'd give you in the past. Your job is not to rescue your friend.
00:35:08.460
In fact, he doesn't want to be rescued. He doesn't even think there's a problem
00:35:11.620
based on this quick two paragraphs you wrote. So if he doesn't acknowledge there's a problem,
00:35:16.900
what are you possibly going to say? And also consider this, if he doesn't believe there's
00:35:20.840
a problem and every time you guys get together and you start poking at him and pointing out problems,
00:35:25.300
how enjoyable is that for him? How much longer will he want to have conversations with you?
00:35:30.500
Because now it just feels like nagging. He doesn't see the problem. What are you going to do
00:35:36.080
if he doesn't see the problem? Now I know we as men want to ward off and we want to protect and we
00:35:41.600
want to serve and we want to add value in people's lives. You know how you do that? You just be a good
00:35:46.240
friend to him regardless of the substance abuse. Now you should bring it up. And I've talked about
00:35:51.580
this in the past. So if his name is Bob, Bob, look, brother, I love you. I really do. And man,
00:35:59.220
I care about you. And we've been friends for a long time and you're, you're screwing up. Like I
00:36:04.480
see you, I see you drinking. I see, I see what's going on and your family's not happy. You don't
00:36:11.320
look great physically. You look, you look bad. Your business is suffering. How's your finances?
00:36:16.580
Your finances might be suffering. Like you should bring these things up. Okay. That's your job as a
00:36:20.980
man is to bring that up. And because you care about him more than you care about the relationship,
00:36:24.280
like you care about that person more than you actually care about your potential relationship
00:36:28.740
with him. Cause you're putting it at risk when you say something like that, but it sounds like
00:36:32.380
Brett, you've already done that. You've already brought it up to him. And if you haven't, I would
00:36:35.940
now he knows where you stand and you may drop it periodically, but outside of that, man, invite him,
00:36:42.300
invite him, invite him to a barbecue where there's no alcohol, invite him to the game where you don't
00:36:48.160
drink, invite him into your life. Fellowship him, as I would say, get him around other good people
00:36:55.620
who don't drink, who do engage in good behavior, behavior that's going to serve them over the long
00:37:02.160
run. I'm not saying drinking is bad necessarily, but for him, for me, it was, you know, it got out
00:37:06.660
of hand and it sounds like it is for him as well. So what I would do is I would just support him.
00:37:10.860
I would be there. I'd be available. I'd make, I'd make some comments and that's it. And occasionally
00:37:15.740
I would drop something in. I'd never do it passively, aggressively. Like, oh man, if you
00:37:19.220
wouldn't drink, you wouldn't have this problem. I'd never do anything like that. Cause that's
00:37:22.680
nagging. That's nitpicking, nagging behavior. That's not behavior that men engage in. We address
00:37:28.020
it. Hey, Bob, I love you, but man, you got to stop drinking. You're a real asshole to be around.
00:37:32.740
I love you. I want to be around you, but I'm not going to be around you. If you're going to be a
00:37:35.400
dickhead all the time. Okay. That's how men engage. Women are more likely to say, oh, well, you know,
00:37:40.520
if you wouldn't drink, then you wouldn't have such a temperament. Okay. That's not a,
00:37:43.940
that's not a great way to approach another man because it's passive. It's weak. Instead. It's
00:37:50.440
like, Bob, let me sit down, man. I love you. I care about you. I want you to win. I want you to
00:37:56.260
succeed. You've got a beautiful wife. You've got three kids. You've got all these things going on
00:37:59.420
and you're drinking and you turn into a real dickhead. Your wife doesn't want to be around
00:38:03.360
you. Your kids can't stand you. And I don't enjoy our time together. Now I love you and I care about
00:38:07.920
you. I want to spend time with you, man. You need to hear the truth and then fellowship him.
00:38:14.220
Be a brother, care about him, love him, support him. That's how I would do it. It's hard when you
00:38:19.780
see somebody you care about struggling and you, you just want to like bang them over the head with
00:38:24.100
a frying pan or something. You know, they just, they just don't get it, but it's their life.
00:38:29.020
All right, let's go to Adam Lewis. He says in the theme with the power of moments, which happens to be
00:38:34.140
the monthly topic we're talking about for the month of October. He says, what are your defining moments
00:38:39.040
of your BJJ journey or my jujitsu journey? We have, and can, oh, excuse me, what have,
00:38:44.200
or can you do to recreate that power in other moments of your life? Um, so my defining moments
00:38:49.320
in jujitsu or when I started, that's a defining moment. Uh, when I got my blue belt was a defining
00:38:54.260
moment because I realized I was progressing and getting better. And then also when I got injured,
00:38:58.240
that was a defining moment because it changed its trajectory of my jujitsu training. Um, all right.
00:39:04.880
So what can I learn from those experiences in other aspects of my life? Let's take the first one,
00:39:10.260
starting something. How many of us want to start a business? How many of us want to ask a woman on a
00:39:15.260
date? How many of us want to ask for a woman's hand in marriage? How many of us want to get that
00:39:19.320
new client? How many of us want to try a new skill, hobby, or whatever it may be? Just start.
00:39:24.560
You're going to look foolish. You're going to look dumb. You're going to feel awkward. You're going to
00:39:27.660
feel out of place. You're going to mess up. You're going to have a lot of, uh, screw ups along the
00:39:31.800
way. So what just start, we put too much weight on it. Oh, well, what if I don't? Yeah. What if you
00:39:37.600
don't, then you just go back to the guy that you were before. That's easy. That's your default.
00:39:41.660
You can always slip back to that. What if you do, what if it does get better? What if it does improve?
00:39:46.800
What if life gets better because you're engaged in this new thing? Uh, the blue belt, that was the next
00:39:51.240
moment I talked about. Well, in that moment, it's about celebrating the wins. It's about looking at your
00:39:55.480
growth and your progress. You get that new client. You start that new business. You hurt, hit your
00:39:59.220
first six figure year or month. Uh, you ask that woman on a date and she says, yes, you ask for a
00:40:04.960
hand in marriage. And she says, yes, you have a kid. Um, you, you coach your kid through a difficult
00:40:09.100
and challenging circumstance. You coach your kid at football. These are all little moments that we
00:40:13.940
should celebrate. We, we often don't, because if you're like me, we move on to the next thing so quick.
00:40:18.400
It's like, what's next? What's next? What's next? What's next? What's next? That's good for
00:40:21.760
ambitious men, but also like, it's good to look back and think, you know what? I did good.
00:40:27.560
When's the last time you felt good about yourself, man? We beat ourselves to death. We beat ourselves
00:40:34.360
to death. I didn't get this project done. I didn't hit this deadline. My wife is mad at me. My kids
00:40:40.860
hate me. My boss is upset with me. I lost this client. I don't look good in the mirror. I've added a
00:40:46.940
few more pounds. My bank account isn't where I want it to be. My business isn't growing as fast as
00:40:51.700
I think it should. My house doesn't look the way it should. I'm not as good as my friend. Like
00:40:56.220
we do that every day. When's the last time you said, you know what? Damn, I did pretty good right
00:41:03.720
there. I did pretty good. Today was a good day. I got four new clients. I paid off a thousand dollars
00:41:11.480
of debt today. I went to the gym and I'm down two pounds this week. I drank a bunch of water. I didn't
00:41:18.720
drink any alcohol. I took my wife on a date and we had a great time and we were able to have sex
00:41:24.500
and be connected and intimate afterwards. Celebrate that stuff. Celebrate that stuff because we're just
00:41:30.320
not doing it enough. And then the last moment that I said is when I got injured. Guys, I got injured
00:41:35.440
bad. I had a pectoral rupture. The tendons ruptured completely off the bone and I had to get surgery and
00:41:40.400
I was out and hung up for months and months and months. But that's life. You're going to get kicked
00:41:45.440
in the dick from, from time to time. What do you do? Like, do you use it to, as an excuse to throw
00:41:50.900
in the towel, to not do anything, to just live your life the way it always has been or the way that it
00:41:55.040
is now? Or do you say, you know what? Yeah, this was a, this was a real kick in the pants, but I'm
00:42:00.600
going to do something different. I'm going to adapt. I'm going to grow. I'm going to get better. I'm not
00:42:04.520
going to be deterred from this. I'm going to keep working out. When I got hurt with jujitsu, I actually
00:42:08.920
still went to class. You can talk to the guys that I trained with. I was there every night that I
00:42:14.300
trained. I was there and I wasn't training, but I was in the corner and I was doing body weight
00:42:19.080
movements. I was doing air squats and sit-ups and lunges and ab things. And like, I was doing all
00:42:25.420
the things that I could in spite of the injury that I had. I would listen, I would sit and I'd watch.
00:42:30.920
And then when I came back to jujitsu, I started training again and I felt really good. And the
00:42:35.020
guys are like, man, it feels like you haven't even skipped a beat. Yeah. I didn't skip a beat.
00:42:38.820
I stayed in shape. I stayed in the game. I did it differently, but I stayed in the game. I watched,
00:42:44.080
I studied, I researched, I looked, I asked questions and I kept myself in the game.
00:42:49.180
When I went through my divorce earlier this year, I kept myself in the game. Guys have asked,
00:42:53.760
oh man, it seems like you bounced back really quick. Of course I did. Of course I bounced back
00:42:58.140
really quick because I kept my head in the game. In fact, I would say it differently. I got my head
00:43:02.900
back in the game. I've got the tools. They're all right here. Journaling, battle plan. I've got all the
00:43:09.540
tools. You've got all the tools. And yet when something bad happens, we're like, oh, well,
00:43:14.000
you know, life's over. Life's no, it's not over. It just sucks for a minute. So we can wallow in it
00:43:20.060
and we can cry and we complain and we can bitch and moan about how it's not fair and why it shouldn't
00:43:24.080
happen to you and why, you know, you wish life was different, but it's not. And so instead it's like,
00:43:29.260
okay, let's use the tools that I have. Damn, that sucked. What can I do? Well, I can get in shape.
00:43:35.540
Stop drinking so much alcohol. Start having better conversations. I can start journaling my
00:43:39.980
thoughts. I can go to AA. I can get a therapist. I can join the iron council. I can get, join a gym.
00:43:45.360
I can start reading better books. I can call up my friends. I can go on vacations. I can go on
00:43:49.740
hunts. I can develop new hobbies, but you don't need to be halted just because some unforeseen,
00:43:57.100
unexpected, horrible event happens in your life. You just move on. Just keep going and it'll get
00:44:02.860
better. I have some bad days with the demise of my marriage. Like I have some really bad days
00:44:08.320
with the struggle between the kids. I have the relationship. I have my kids. I have some bad
00:44:11.780
days. I really do, but there are fewer and far farther between. And I'm able to recover quicker
00:44:18.340
than I was a year ago because I'm doing all the right things. At least I think I am. And it feels
00:44:23.160
like I am. All right. Last question of the day. This one comes from Alan McMichael. He says,
00:44:28.000
what is the best book that you've read this far read this year so far? Um, three books come to mind.
00:44:34.360
They're all podcast guests. That tends to be what I read the most as I'm preparing for guests, uh,
00:44:39.060
scarcity brain by Michael Easter. He's going to be coming on in the next week or two, uh, building a
00:44:45.020
non-anxious life by Dr. John Deloney. That podcast came out yesterday as a little release of this
00:44:50.480
podcast. And then a couple of weeks ago, I had Gary John Bishop, who's one of my favorite authors,
00:44:55.400
uh, to talk about our role as parents and how to heal our own personal traumas so that we can parent
00:45:00.660
better. And that one's called grow up. And I think the subtitle of that one is become don't
00:45:04.620
quote me on this becoming the parent your kids deserve, I believe. So those three are very,
00:45:10.520
very good books. And I would highly recommend all three of those. Okay. All right, guys,
00:45:15.280
we got through all of the iron council questions. I hope I gave you some good answers or at least some
00:45:19.480
things to consider. Please keep the questions coming. Consider joining our battle ready program
00:45:23.920
at order of men.com slash battle ready. That's a free program available to anybody who wants to sign up.
00:45:29.160
Uh, and yeah, that's it. So let's keep getting after it. We've got a lot of work to do. Um,
00:45:37.200
I like these questions a lot today and I really appreciate you being engaged in this question.
00:45:41.060
Guys, we'll be back on Friday until then go out there, take action and become a man. You are meant
00:45:46.060
to be. Thank you for listening to the order of man podcast. You're ready to take charge of your life
00:45:51.020
and be more of the man you were meant to be. We invite you to join the order at order of man.com.