Order of Man - September 16, 2022


Do You Have Men in Your Corner？ ｜ FRIDAY FIELD NOTES


Episode Stats

Length

24 minutes

Words per Minute

193.19664

Word Count

4,642

Sentence Count

289

Misogynist Sentences

2

Hate Speech Sentences

1


Summary

Do you have men in your corner? How important is it to have other men around you when things don't go your way? Do you feel like you don't have a safe place to turn to when things aren't going well?


Transcript

00:00:00.000 You're a man of action. You live life to the fullest. Embrace your fears and boldly charge
00:00:04.960 your own path. When life knocks you down, you get back up one more time. Every time.
00:00:10.380 You are not easily deterred or defeated. Rugged. Resilient. Strong. This is your life. This is who
00:00:17.060 you are. This is who you will become. At the end of the day, and after all is said and done,
00:00:22.580 you can call yourself a man. Gentlemen, what is going on today? My name is Brian Michler.
00:00:27.420 I'm the host and the founder of the Order of Man podcast and movement. Welcome here and welcome
00:00:32.260 back. Today is your Friday Field Notes. I'm going to share some thoughts with you that have been
00:00:36.860 bouncing around in my brain over the past little while. That's what I do on these Friday Field
00:00:40.620 Notes. But if you're not yet subscribed, make sure you are because we also have interviews with
00:00:45.400 very, very successful individuals. Guys like Ed Milet and Tim Tebow and Dan Crenshaw and Ben Shapiro
00:00:53.200 and Dave Ramsey, Jocko Willink, David Goggins. The men that we've had on this podcast are some
00:00:59.840 phenomenally successful individuals in all walks of life. And I want to give that information to you
00:01:06.160 as I learn from them, as I extract some of their wisdom and try to become a better man myself.
00:01:10.980 We also have our Wednesday show, which is our Ask Me Anything, where we field questions from our
00:01:16.220 exclusive Brotherhood, The Iron Council, or from our Facebook group over at facebook.com
00:01:20.840 slash groups slash order of man. All right, guys, as you can see, I got to say this first,
00:01:27.640 I've got, uh, it's starting to get a little cold here. I'm cold right now. It's a little cold here
00:01:31.420 in Maine today and I'm feeling fall in the air. So I've got my, uh, well, it's, it's almost like a
00:01:37.200 Mr. Rogers sweater with a little, with a little style. It's got the camo on there, but, uh, yeah,
00:01:43.140 I'm getting cold. I'm starting to cool off. So that's why I got the sweater on today. I'm not ready
00:01:47.860 to turn that heat on because once I do, it doesn't go off. So I'm not, I'm not messing with
00:01:51.520 that yet. Um, but I wanted to talk with you about, uh, having men in your corner and the
00:01:57.220 importance of that. Now, let me throw this disclaimer out here. This is, could be perceived
00:02:02.080 as a little self-serving because our exclusive Brotherhood, The Iron Council just opened up.
00:02:08.500 And if you don't know what that is, uh, it's a group of men who are all working together
00:02:13.820 on improving ourselves, uh, trying to hold ourselves to the highest standard possible,
00:02:19.580 learning what those standards are, having, having metrics and systems and accountabilities
00:02:24.600 and processes for improving ourselves and helping other men improve in their lives.
00:02:30.460 So that has opened up, which is the reason that I wanted to talk with you about this today,
00:02:35.220 but whether or not you want to join the Iron Council, I've got about five points here,
00:02:39.360 uh, maybe six, five or six points here, uh, that makes sense, whether it's in the Iron
00:02:46.060 Council or whether you're wanting to band with men, uh, outside of the Iron Council in
00:02:51.900 your area, wherever that may be. So if you're not interested in joining, no worries, there's
00:02:55.580 still a lot of value for you here. If you are interested in joining, this is going to give
00:02:59.640 you some insight into what we do. And of course you can check it out at order of man.com
00:03:04.160 slash iron council. So let's talk about this. Do you have men in your corner? The first
00:03:08.580 thing we need to understand is that this is actually important and it really isn't, or it
00:03:14.620 doesn't seem important until it hits the fan and things go South. Uh, you have a problem
00:03:22.840 with business. You have a health scare, you have a challenge in your relationship. Uh, you
00:03:28.860 have financial troubles. There's so many different things that could come up and having other men
00:03:34.940 in your corner doesn't seem like a priority when other things, when everything's going
00:03:39.020 well, but when there's something that's off, something that messes with us in our lives,
00:03:44.320 we realize very, very quickly that for most of us, we haven't done a great job of bringing
00:03:51.040 men around us. And I know that I've done that. I know that there's hundreds, thousands, probably
00:03:56.440 millions of men, uh, who haven't done that. And they face some real world consequences of
00:04:03.080 not having these guys in their corner. And that could be depression, even leading to suicidal
00:04:07.980 thoughts or actions. Uh, it could be that there's just a whole lot of anxiety or even confusion
00:04:15.440 about what they might be able to do and their situation and what they're dealing with. But man,
00:04:20.280 there's just a lot of support that comes from having men in your corner. And it's just something
00:04:25.480 that society doesn't really address all that often. I think if we were to look at women,
00:04:30.980 uh, they generally do a better job at this. They're more relational, I think by nature,
00:04:36.940 and men can be relational too, but we don't focus on our, each other. We usually focus outward.
00:04:42.680 That's why teams, for example, relational, we're all working together, but we're trying to beat
00:04:47.680 that other team or in the military. Yes, we're all working together and cooperating and communicating,
00:04:52.520 but it's so we can defeat the enemy. Whereas women turn inwards, it's like the relationship
00:04:58.060 for the sake of the relationship. And what I found for me is especially over the past several months,
00:05:06.200 as I've had things that I've been working through personally, where I do have men who I can
00:05:12.860 communicate with and men that I can talk with and men that I can bend their ear and get their advice
00:05:18.500 and get their input. And it's been extremely valuable. In fact, it's been invaluable for me
00:05:25.300 as I've struggled with some of these challenges. So really take an inventory. Do you have men in
00:05:32.140 your life that you communicate with frequently that you can hold their feet to the fire? They can hold
00:05:38.680 their, your feet to the fire, um, that you can lean on each other if needed, that you can support each
00:05:44.480 other and uplift and edify that you can be honest with. They can be honest with you. And if you don't
00:05:49.880 have that, then I would encourage you to get that. Even if you don't think you need it. It's like that
00:05:55.800 old adage of when is the best time to plant a tree? It's before you need the shade. So I don't want you
00:06:02.480 to get into a shady situation and not have planted the tree of masculine relationships. So do that now,
00:06:10.080 regardless of where you are, but let's talk about some qualifying factors that you should look into when
00:06:15.060 it comes to building your band of brothers or at a minimum identifying people, men who you would like
00:06:20.760 to have in your corner and you would like to be in their corner. Number one is they should be
00:06:25.440 successful. Now, when I say successful, I'm talking about success in the areas of life in which you want
00:06:32.020 to be successful. They don't need to all make a million dollars a year. They don't need to drive a
00:06:37.860 certain car or live in a certain neighborhood or, or, or wear a certain watch. And that's not what I'm
00:06:43.140 talking about. I'm talking about that they should be successful in the area that you want to be
00:06:49.200 successful in. So if you want to be a great husband and a great father, then you really need to be
00:06:54.740 looking for men who identify or not identify, who exhibit those characteristics, you know, who are
00:07:01.880 great fathers, who are engaged husbands, who are married, who have worked through problems in their
00:07:07.800 marriage. If you want to be successful in business, then you need to find guys who
00:07:12.380 own businesses, guys who have started businesses. And look, even guys who have lost businesses
00:07:17.960 because they, they can teach you what didn't work guys that have lost and rebuilt. And there's,
00:07:24.440 you just need to be selective, you know, discriminates a bad word and culture today,
00:07:29.320 but you do need to discriminate to a degree without the negative connotation, of course,
00:07:34.680 but you do need to discriminate based on who you want to have in your corner.
00:07:38.160 Like, this is just not an open invite. This is not anybody comes. No, it's, I'm going to be,
00:07:43.740 I'm going to be clear. I'm going to be concise. I'm going to write down what kind of men I want to
00:07:48.180 attract in my corner, what their level of success is in their family, in their business, in their
00:07:54.540 community, in their wealth, in their health, every facet of their lives. And then, and only then
00:08:00.180 can you begin to identify who it is that you want to have in your corner.
00:08:02.980 So make sure that you're not just inviting your neighbor, Bob, uh, over to, to, you know,
00:08:10.620 dump all your problems on Bob because he's convenient. He happens to live next door to
00:08:15.880 you. If Bob's not on the same page and Bob isn't successful and Bob might not even be interested in
00:08:20.600 what you're interested in, then that's probably not, not going to be a good fit. So many of us men
00:08:26.000 live our lives by default, where if we want to have a friend or a buddy or a band of brothers,
00:08:32.420 uh, it's just, it's Bob, right? He lives right next door. It's easy. It's convenient. I don't
00:08:37.740 have to work any harder or Steve at the office. Okay. That could work, but not by default. We need
00:08:45.000 to be more deliberate and intentional about it. So make sure you're evaluating them again. It's not
00:08:49.800 that everything in their life is perfect. It's that they have a measure of success or they have a level
00:08:55.420 of experience where they're credible to talk with you about the things that you want to talk about,
00:09:00.320 the things that are important to you. Number two, uh, I'm actually going to change this a little
00:09:05.860 bit. I'm going to change the order. So number one, and these aren't in any order, but I want to save
00:09:09.680 this one for last. Cause it's something that I'm learning is very, very important. Uh, but number
00:09:13.880 two, in addition to being successful is that they need to have some sort of shared, uh, value or belief
00:09:22.280 system. Now they don't need to believe everything that you do. Okay. They don't need to be, uh,
00:09:27.300 believe even in the same God as you, uh, or, or be the same denomination of Christian or whatever it
00:09:33.540 might be as you, uh, they don't need to work in the same field as you, but there has to be some
00:09:38.600 shared values, some shared belief system. Imagine trying to, uh, work with a, with a company that's
00:09:47.280 going to send a man to Mars. Okay. There's going to be different systems we need to focus on.
00:09:54.460 There's propulsion, there's guidance, there's, I don't know, entering the, the, the atmosphere of
00:10:00.380 Mars, there's landing, there's, uh, how do we take care of oxygen? And there's so many different
00:10:06.380 systems when it comes to putting a man on Mars, right? So everybody's going to come at it with
00:10:13.500 their own unique perspective. Propulsion is going to look at it different than how are we going to drive
00:10:18.760 on the surface of Mars? They're going to look at different things, but I'll tell you what,
00:10:22.160 one thing they all have in common is they all know math and they all agree on the math.
00:10:28.340 That's the belief system, right? They all know that two plus two equals four,
00:10:32.460 because if they didn't believe that, that two plus two equals four,
00:10:36.960 then nothing else would matter. And that's what I'm saying when it comes to having these,
00:10:42.680 these men in your corner, this band of brothers, if you will, is that, yeah, you can see things
00:10:48.460 differently. You can come from different walks of life. You can have even some different goals,
00:10:53.160 but at the fundamental root level of who you guys are, you should all agree that two plus two equals
00:10:59.420 four. So what could that possibly be? Well, there's a higher power that might be a shared belief system
00:11:06.140 or at a minimum that there's some sort of moral compass that we all agree on, which is,
00:11:12.680 which is right and moral in the way that we are ethical in the way that we should be behaving
00:11:17.000 or the way that we want to show up as righteous protectors, providers, presiders. And if somebody
00:11:24.820 sees that completely different, I mean, nothing else really matters. So if you start to get a hint
00:11:30.940 from these guys that they have not a different perspective or not they're from a different
00:11:35.320 socioeconomic status or a different geographical area, or their skin pigmentation is darker or lighter,
00:11:41.740 no. Okay. That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about their shared belief system.
00:11:47.880 This is like that whole concept of diversity. Diversity is strength. No, diversity is diversity.
00:11:53.700 It's neither strength nor weakness. Okay. If we're talking about people coming from different walks of
00:11:58.620 life and diversity could be utilized to shore up weaknesses, to look for threats, to improve ourselves,
00:12:05.780 to increase our odds of identifying what could potentially go wrong or looking for
00:12:11.540 opportunities that we can capitalize on. Okay. But again, if we don't believe that two plus two
00:12:17.760 equals four, okay, well, there's not much more to talk about. So make sure that the guys in your
00:12:22.960 corner and the guys that you're looking at have some sort of shared values and or belief systems.
00:12:28.680 Number three is they're open to discussing these ideas, to discussing improvement in your
00:12:36.460 relationship, in your business. We're all in different places in our lives. And some guys are
00:12:42.460 very guarded. Some guys are very close. Some guys don't want to be open to your influence or your
00:12:50.960 thoughts, or maybe you don't want to be open to somebody else's influence or thoughts. And if the
00:12:55.200 guys that you're looking at are not open, I mean, maybe they'll make a great golf buddy or a lake buddy,
00:12:59.960 but they're probably not going to be this band of brothers kind of guy.
00:13:02.960 They're just not because they're not open in a way that you need them to be open with.
00:13:07.880 And I'm going to talk a little bit more about what they should be open with. But again, if they're
00:13:11.840 not open and receptive to learning, to growing, to be more than just your weekend beer and barbecue
00:13:17.660 buddy or the golf group, that's fine. But those are just friends. These are not band of brothers.
00:13:25.300 Look for somebody who's open. And how do you do this? Well, you talk about it.
00:13:28.860 Hey man, like here's, here's what I'm looking for. Even this, here's what I'm struggling with
00:13:33.840 right now. Have you ever struggled with that? If they're like, Oh no, I don't struggle with that.
00:13:38.160 Okay. That's an indicator that maybe they're not open to having these types of discussions.
00:13:42.400 If on the other hand, you say, Hey man, I'm really struggling with addiction right now,
00:13:46.980 or I'm struggling in my relationship, or I'm struggling in my business, or I'm struggling
00:13:52.200 with self-confidence or being accepted or whatever. And, and you ask, have you ever dealt
00:13:59.760 with that? And I'm like, Oh yeah, you know, I've, I really deal with, in fact, I'm dealing
00:14:02.740 with this right now. And this is what I've been doing. And this is how I've been trying
00:14:05.540 to work on it. What are you doing? Okay. Now you have somebody who's like, cool, this is
00:14:10.660 good. Like this is moving in the right direction. This is somebody who's open and receptive to
00:14:14.160 the idea of talking through these issues, being a sounding board, helping us unpack and
00:14:20.140 discover the things that we need, but they gotta be open. Okay. So again, number one,
00:14:25.160 they've gotta be successful in an area that you want to be successful in. Not that they've
00:14:29.260 never had failures, but that they've risen from the ashes and they are a success to some
00:14:33.660 degree. Okay. Number two is that they have to have some shared values and, or belief system.
00:14:40.280 Number three is they have to be open to this, this relationship. If they're not to the type
00:14:48.280 of relationship you want, then that's just not going to work. Uh, number four is there
00:14:53.000 has to be some sort of process or system in place. Cause what I'm not talking about is
00:14:59.000 having casual friends. There's nothing wrong with casual friends. Okay. But I'm not talking
00:15:03.900 about your fantasy football league. Now, some of the guys might be more in your inner circle
00:15:10.240 and I'm not talking about your beer and barbecue buddy on the weekend. And I'm not talking about
00:15:14.240 the golf guy. I'm talking about somebody who's it's deeper. It's, it's committed. There's
00:15:21.360 accountability. And like I said, a second ago, there's a process or a system in place to ensure
00:15:28.260 that you guys are doing what needs to be done. Um, I've got a friend who I meet with just about for
00:15:35.240 the past, I would say four to five weeks. I meet with just about every week. Uh, we go to breakfast
00:15:41.440 together and we talk about what we're struggling with and we talk about, uh, the gospel and we talk
00:15:47.340 about spirituality and faith and relationships and the things that we're dealing with, with our
00:15:51.960 spouses and the things that we're dealing with, with our kids. Okay. That's a process. Now it's
00:15:55.900 not a formalized structured, but it's just a process that we're using. It's very informal
00:16:02.420 to make sure that we're actually talking about things that are meaningful rather than just, you know,
00:16:06.960 how's the weather or how's, how's your day? Like that stuff's important, I guess. Sure.
00:16:14.060 But again, this is something deeper and more meaningful. And so when you're looking for guys
00:16:19.940 to be in this band of brothers with you, like I would, I would suggest to them, Hey,
00:16:25.580 what if we got on a call every Wednesday and just kind of hashed out some things that we were dealing
00:16:29.520 with throughout the week? Or, or what if we, uh, what if we went to the gym every Thursday morning,
00:16:36.060 Tuesday and Thursday morning and on the drive over, um, we could hold each other accountable.
00:16:40.400 Like I could ask about your goals. You could ask about mine. You see what I'm saying? Like there's
00:16:45.020 actually, there's, there's thought in intent behind it rather than just, Hey bud, what's up?
00:16:50.340 I'm not into that. I'm not looking for that. I need somebody who I can really do this, this life
00:16:55.420 thing with. It'd be like a, like a soldier, like a warrior, you know, a hundred, 200, 500, a thousand
00:17:01.180 years ago. And it's like, Hey, you want to hang out? It's like, no, I don't want to hang out.
00:17:05.200 I want to train so that we can make sure we can defend our village and defend our families.
00:17:10.260 And, and, and in order to do that, we're going to, we're going to work offense. We're going to work
00:17:14.640 military tactics. We're going to work whatever it is, but there's a system in place. That's what
00:17:19.940 I'm saying. There's intent behind it. So we've got success. Uh, we've got shared values and or
00:17:26.220 belief system. We've got, they've got to be open to the idea. We've got to have a process or a system
00:17:29.900 in place. And this is the one that I shifted around. This is one of the things that's very,
00:17:34.880 very important that myself and so many other people overlook. You need to have somebody who's
00:17:42.020 willing to be honest and bold with you. And that's one that a lot of us struggle with.
00:17:50.220 And it's not only something that we struggle with finding and other guys, it's something that we
00:17:55.280 struggle in doing for other people. And when you're honest and bold with other people you care
00:18:00.940 about, you actually are doing them a service. So many of us don't want to do it because we're
00:18:06.120 uncomfortable with it. So if you notice a guy who's in your corner or you're in his corner and
00:18:11.640 something's off or something's wrong, or you notice behavior in him that isn't really like him
00:18:18.120 or he's doing something that, you know, he shouldn't be engaged in. Then you need to be the
00:18:24.460 guy that says, Hey buddy, you're doing this thing. I've known you for three years and you're going on
00:18:29.340 this path and you should not be on this path. What can we do to get you off this path?
00:18:34.600 That's what's missing. That right there is missing in so many men's lives, myself included.
00:18:42.640 And if I'm looking at it fairly and accurately, I've done a pretty good job building up friends,
00:18:49.320 battle brothers, band of brothers, whatever you want to look at it as. And of course, we've got the
00:18:54.660 iron council and men who listen to the podcast, but I don't have a lot of guys and I'm not putting
00:19:00.960 this on them. I'm actually putting it on me. I don't have a lot of guys who are willing to be
00:19:06.920 honest and bold and really get in my face in a caring way in my corner. And that's what I need.
00:19:16.760 And I'm imagining because that's what I need, that that's what other men need too is somebody
00:19:22.740 who can check you. I had that in sports. You know, if you were, if you were slacking off or you weren't
00:19:28.400 doing what you needed to be doing, I had buddies were like, bro, what's up? Like your head's not
00:19:32.760 here today. You're better than that. What's going on with you? Had it in the military for sure. There
00:19:37.880 was this level of accountability. And then you get out of those things and you just don't have that
00:19:42.140 and you need it. And you need to be that for somebody else, honest, bold, and a level of care,
00:19:49.940 more care for the individual than your own feelings. Because isn't that why we don't share
00:19:54.120 things that are uncomfortable? It's not because we want to salvage or spare that person from the pain.
00:19:58.820 It's we don't want to be in an uncomfortable and awkward position. Oh man, I can really talk to him
00:20:03.440 about the way that he's treating his kids, but I don't want to talk to talk about that. I don't want
00:20:09.920 to bring that up. Yeah. Because it's uncomfortable for you. So in that situation,
00:20:14.380 what are we more concerned with that person or our own feelings? And I would submit to you that
00:20:20.840 more often than not, at least in my case, that I've been more interested in my feelings
00:20:25.420 and the way I feel that I do my level of care for that individual I could otherwise serve.
00:20:32.800 So if you have somebody in your corner, who's, I won't say a liar necessarily, but isn't willing to be
00:20:38.920 honest or bold or courageous when it comes to confronting you, maybe they're not strong enough
00:20:44.760 or confident enough, then that's probably not going to be your band of brothers guy.
00:20:50.680 Could be a friend, could be a family member, could have some good interactions with them,
00:20:54.460 could play some great golf with them or go bowl or whatever it is you do,
00:20:57.480 but that's probably not a band of brothers guy. You need somebody. And that's, but that's the hard part
00:21:03.080 is when you find that you're uncomfortable with it too, because they're going to tell you things
00:21:07.820 that are true that you don't want to hear. I've had some guys in my life over the past couple of
00:21:11.960 months, tell me some things. And I'm like, you're an a-hole. I didn't say that to him, but in my mind,
00:21:16.860 I'm thinking this guy is a real jerk for saying that. And then I sit on it for a minute. I'm like,
00:21:22.920 Oh no, he's actually right. He's not a jerk. He actually cares about me. And so he's saying
00:21:28.360 something that's truthful so that I can improve and get better in my life and be in a better
00:21:33.340 position. And it's been really uncomfortable, but it's also been really helpful. So I hope that gives
00:21:41.780 you some ideas. Again, I don't care. It's not that I don't care. I do care. I would love for you to
00:21:47.720 join the iron council. Again, that's our exclusive brotherhood where we've got guys from quite
00:21:53.820 literally all over the world working together and trying to improve in each of these areas,
00:21:58.420 becoming successful. We have shared values and belief systems. They wouldn't join if that weren't
00:22:03.220 the case. Many of them have been listening to the Order of Man podcast for years and years and years
00:22:07.040 that they're open to the idea of growth and progress. Of course, they wouldn't be in it.
00:22:12.800 Number four, there's a process and a system in place. Of course, we've built that over the past seven
00:22:17.000 years. And then the last, again, being honest and bold, being willing to confront,
00:22:22.060 willing to get into your face, proverbial face, not literally, I guess, maybe literally as well,
00:22:28.040 but definitely metaphorically and say and do what needs to be said and done to get your butt back on
00:22:34.400 track. If you can find that on your own, do that on your own. And there are guys that do that.
00:22:40.020 If you can find that in your office or maybe through some sort of civic organization or business
00:22:44.100 meeting or other organization, by all means, if you feel like you want some help with it, then join us
00:22:48.960 in the Iron Council. We're open right now and we'll be open for another 14 days and that's it.
00:22:53.740 And then we're closing down until the end of the year. So your next time to get in won't be until
00:22:57.920 January, 2023. I'd love to see you inside. I'd love to have you be part of it to be with us.
00:23:04.840 But you can make those decisions for yourself. Regardless, I hope that these key factors
00:23:09.980 serve you in some way and that you'll be diligent in finding these kinds of men and also becoming this
00:23:17.020 kind of men for yourself and for other people. I hope that helps gentlemen, go to the Iron Council
00:23:22.360 signup page and learn more about what we're doing at order of man.com slash iron council,
00:23:26.920 or hit me up on Instagram. Very active there. I've been less active on the posting, but if you hit me
00:23:32.660 in the DMS, I'm still pretty active there. We'd love to connect with you guys. That's it guys.
00:23:37.900 That's all I've got. We'll be back next week. Ed Milet is on the podcast. So next week,
00:23:42.780 make sure you subscribe, leave that rating review, check out the Iron Council, and we'll see you
00:23:47.480 next week. Go out there, take action and become the man you are meant to be. Thank you for listening
00:23:52.500 to the order of man podcast. You're ready to take charge of your life and be more of the man you
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