Order of Man - Handle Adversity Like a Man

00:00:00.000 You're a man of action. You live life to the fullest. Embrace your fears and boldly chart

00:00:04.980 your own path. When life knocks you down, you get back up one more time. Every time.

00:00:10.460 You are not easily deterred or defeated. Rugged. Resilient. Strong. This is your life. This is who

00:00:17.200 you are. This is who you will become. At the end of the day, and after all is said and done,

00:00:22.780 you can call yourself a man. Gentlemen, what is going on today? My name is Ryan Michler.

00:00:27.680 I'm your host and the founder of this, the Order of Man podcast and movement. Welcome to 2024.

00:00:34.320 Ready or not, here it is. And I hope that it's starting off on the right foot. I hope that

00:00:39.580 things are going well for you. And I hope that this year we can provide you with the tools,

00:00:43.820 conversations, resources, everything that you might need to be able to thrive as a man. That's

00:00:49.380 what we're doing. For almost nine years now, we've been working to reclaim and restore masculinity to

00:00:54.640 its rightful place, a place of respect, a place of service. As it says, over my shoulder,

00:01:01.080 protect, provide, preside. It's our opportunity to serve other people, serve our family members,

00:01:07.480 our communities, the people that we have a responsibility for, the people that we have

00:01:11.620 an obligation to serve. So if I can give you what you need to be able to do that more effectively,

00:01:15.820 then I figure that's a mission accomplished. And I'm really glad that you're tuning in.

00:01:20.000 Uh, we're going to get into a very important discussion today because 2024 is likely not

00:01:26.060 even likely, I would say guaranteed to present you with, uh, some challenging situations, whether

00:01:31.460 they're self-inflicted, uh, or whether they're completely outside of your control, you are

00:01:36.980 going to be confronted as you are every single year with challenge, heartache, heartbreak,

00:01:42.740 adversity, struggle, and your ability to overcome these things will spell the difference between

00:01:49.960 success for you and yours and utter and complete failure. As many of us have done in the past,

00:01:56.100 I don't want you to fail. Uh, I don't want you to struggle unnecessarily granted. We're all going to

00:02:00.940 fail. We're all going to struggle. I don't want that to be unnecessary. And I don't want the people

00:02:05.320 that are impacted by the decisions that we're making and the way that we're leading to be negatively

00:02:11.820 affected by our inability to handle adversity. Like a man, what might that adversity be?

00:02:20.280 Loss of a job, medical diagnosis, losing a loved one, going through a divorce, filing bankruptcy,

00:02:27.560 going through a lawsuit, any number of things that you and I have dealt with or will deal with

00:02:33.920 in our life. And it could even be much more simple than that. Maybe there's a fire to put out at work.

00:02:39.140 Maybe a client is bothered with you and upset about the way that you handled a situation. Maybe your

00:02:45.240 boss is frustrated because you failed to meet a project deadline or didn't complete it to the

00:02:52.100 standard. These are things that can be addressed, but if we lose our mind and we lose our cool and we

00:02:57.160 blow up and we let our emotions rule and dictate the way that we handle these situations, not only do we

00:03:03.100 take a project that maybe wasn't done to par, but we compound it and we end up losing our job.

00:03:11.100 Or you have that discussion with your significant other, your wife, and instead of handling it like

00:03:17.520 a man would handle it with some class and grace and maturity, you blow up, lose your cool and

00:03:24.000 erode and undermine to the detriment of your marriage. We can make it worse or we can make it better

00:03:31.320 the way that we show up. Now, I'm going to share with you today five mindsets that you can

00:03:35.300 hopefully consider, ponder on, chew on a little bit that might help you handle whatever adversity

00:03:39.660 you may be going through right now. And I've gone through my fair share of adversity.

00:03:43.740 2023 was in a lot of ways a very good year, a growing year for me. And in a lot of ways,

00:03:49.880 it was riddled with adversity. And I feel like if I was dropped into the same situation

00:03:56.200 situation in the future, that I would handle it very much the same way that I handled

00:04:01.300 my situation in 2023, which means that I passed the test. Now, I don't know that it's a test

00:04:08.260 necessarily. It might be, and we'll talk a little bit more about that. But I feel like I did what a

00:04:14.860 man would do given the circumstances that I found myself in. And also, to be honest, the circumstances

00:04:21.400 that I created for myself. So five mindsets that you can incorporate that are going to help you be

00:04:27.860 more manly as it relates to dealing with hardship and struggle and adversity and challenge. Now,

00:04:33.300 inevitably, when I say be more manly or become a man, you have a sub group of people who will say,

00:04:39.380 who are you to decide? It isn't me. It's an objective standard. Now, sometimes I have a bias or an

00:04:44.600 opinion about what a man ought to do and how he ought to show up. But I'm sure that you'd be willing to

00:04:51.360 agree, especially because you're listening to this podcast, that the standard of the way that we show

00:04:55.580 up with a level of maturity and grace and class and empathy and our ability to help other people

00:05:01.900 successfully navigate hardship is a hallmark of masculinity. Not my opinion. It's something that

00:05:09.660 thousands and thousands of years of human history and evolution have taught us as to why and how we

00:05:15.780 show up as men. Before I get into that, I do want to mention that one way that you could put not only

00:05:20.160 the results of becoming a better man on hyperdrive, but your results on improving what it is you want

00:05:25.960 to accomplish in 2024 is by joining our exclusive brotherhood, the Iron Council, where we are all

00:05:31.960 in a brotherhood. We're all standing shoulder to shoulder. We're all working side by side.

00:05:38.380 We're going through our battle plans. We're helping us each other hone and refine and fine tune these

00:05:45.180 battle plans and then ultimately leading that to action so that we can improve our circumstances

00:05:50.920 and the circumstances of the people that are following us, whether it's your children or your

00:05:56.420 wife or your colleagues or your coworkers, your neighbors or whoever it might be. If you are

00:06:01.180 interested in learning a little bit more, we're open until January 7th. You're listening to this on

00:06:06.040 January 5th, Friday, January 5th, which means that you only have a couple of days before we shut it

00:06:12.280 down and we don't open up again for another two or three months. If you are interested in knowing

00:06:16.080 what we do and how it might benefit you, then you can go to theironcouncil.com, theironcouncil.com,

00:06:22.900 or you can go to orderofman.com slash ironcouncil. Either one of those will take you to some

00:06:27.040 information in a video that you can watch and learn more about what we're doing. Again,

00:06:30.780 orderofman.com slash ironcouncil. All right, man, let's get into the five bullet points that I had

00:06:36.140 created today and thought about with regards to handling adversity like a man. Number one

00:06:41.700 is we need to realize that our energy is infectious. Our energy is infectious. In fact,

00:06:48.680 I pulled this up because I thought this was really important as I took some notes and considered what

00:06:53.080 I wanted to share with you today. I was reminded of the poem, If by Rudyard Kipling and the very

00:06:58.580 first sentence of that poem. And most of you guys know about this poem. If you don't go, please read

00:07:04.340 it because it's crucial for your development as a man. But the very first line is this. If you can

00:07:12.000 keep your head when all about you are losing theirs and blaming it on you. Let me say that again. If you

00:07:21.200 can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs and blaming it on you. Guys, energy is

00:07:29.460 infectious. I'll give you a little bit of a physics lesson here. Energy cannot be created nor destroyed.

00:07:35.340 It cannot be created nor destroyed. Energy can only be transferred. It's either static or kinetic,

00:07:41.580 meaning it's just sitting there as potential energy or it's in motion. And that would be kinetic energy.

00:07:47.440 Guys, we have energy, the way that we show up for our significant other, the way that you show up for

00:07:53.720 your kids, the way you show up to work, the way you listen to this podcast. People are observing you.

00:07:58.780 People are watching you. If you're dealt with a challenging situation at work and you're frantic

00:08:04.380 and chaotic and out of control and emotionally volatile, do you think that the transfer of energy

00:08:11.940 is going to be one of peace and calmness and stillness and clarity towards what needs to be done in order

00:08:18.900 to address the situation at hand? If as a first responder or a law enforcement officer, you go into a

00:08:26.020 situation when somebody is dealing with potentially one of the most horrific experiences of their life.

00:08:32.380 Maybe that's a fire or a natural disaster, active shooter situation, violent crime, domestic abuse.

00:08:39.560 And you go into this environment, they're already upset. They're already freaking out. They're already

00:08:44.520 losing their mind because they're not trained. And we'll talk a little bit more about that here in a

00:08:47.620 minute. And you go into that environment with the same franticness of what they're dealing with.

00:08:54.840 Do you think that's going to subdue the situation? Or do you think that's going to escalate the

00:09:00.620 situation? Well, intuitively, we know it's going to escalate the situation and it's going to make a bad

00:09:06.880 situation worse. Your energy level is crucial. If you're sporadic, if you're chaotic, if you're frustrated,

00:09:16.340 if you're volatile, if you're prone to emotional outbursts, you're making the situation worse.

00:09:23.100 Now, the beautiful thing about this is we get to decide how we show up. You get to decide today,

00:09:27.900 how do I show up? When confronted with a challenging circumstance, do you lose your mind and slip into

00:09:34.120 this lizard brain where we're just thinking about the fight or flight? We're not even thinking about it,

00:09:39.220 frankly. We're just operating from a fight or flight, pure survival position. Or do you actually

00:09:45.760 realize that you're a human being who has evolved into this incredible problem-solving, evolving

00:09:54.760 machine, which is what we are as humans? Which one of those do you become? The first is reacting.

00:10:02.660 And when you're reacting, you're playing defense. You're behind the eight ball. And when you're behind

00:10:07.440 the eight ball, you're really struggling because there's a lot of fear. We're going to talk more about

00:10:11.940 that too. There's a lot of fear that's driving your response or your reaction. If on the other hand,

00:10:18.840 you stay out ahead of it and you realize that you're going to be intentional, maybe that's taking

00:10:23.960 a breath. Maybe that's being well-trained so you can deal with adversity. And you're going to be

00:10:28.740 intentional about how you respond because you know that the energy you bring to the equation is going

00:10:33.920 to be transferred, to go back to our physical lesson, to the other person that you're dealing

00:10:38.960 with. If your wife is upset with you and yelling at you for whatever reason, and you come and get

00:10:44.900 defensive and decide to yell back, is that going to escalate the situation or defuse the situation?

00:10:51.000 Your goal is to defuse the situation so that you can move forward towards a resolution,

00:10:55.380 a healthy resolution that helps both parties win. If you are angry and upset and emotional and yelling

00:11:04.840 and name-calling and getting personal and getting ugly, you're making the problem worse. And you're

00:11:10.760 not handling the adversity like a man, you're handling it like a boy. What does a boy do when he

00:11:16.520 does not get what he wants? If he's young enough and immature enough, he literally may thrust himself

00:11:21.760 onto the ground, bang his fist on the ground and kick his feet and cry because he's not getting

00:11:29.340 what he wants. Now, most of us chalk that up to being a toddler, not getting the cereal that he wants

00:11:36.440 at the grocery store. But I've seen grown men engage in very similar behavior, at least deep down.

00:11:43.960 It may not, the physical manifestation, not be thrust themselves onto the ground and throw a temper tantrum,

00:11:48.040 but they might get passive aggressive. They might even get aggressive. They might even get violent

00:11:53.200 in some cases. And it's the same thing as the two-year-old throwing himself on the ground because

00:11:58.320 he got fruity pebbles instead of lucky charms. Guys, we can do better than that by taking a breath,

00:12:04.180 realizing what we're dealing with. I'm going to talk a little bit more about some other things I

00:12:07.260 think will help us do that. And then approaching the adversity with a level of calmness and clarity

00:12:13.120 so that we can move towards resolution. Number two, we must realize that adversity comes

00:12:20.280 and adversity goes. Whatever you're dealing with, barring terminal illness, is something that will

00:12:27.760 pass. It may not feel like it. I went through a divorce in 2023. I went through a situation where I

00:12:34.500 had to explain that divorce to a degree and explain my alcohol abuse in a very public way. It was hard for

00:12:42.760 me in that moment to realize that this is just a moment in time. This isn't the end. But fortunately,

00:12:47.960 I had enough wits about me that I realized that even though other people were going to mock me,

00:12:54.280 belittle me, put me down, call me names, get personal, that this was just a moment in time.

00:13:00.660 And that the way that I responded moving forward was going to spell the difference between success in

00:13:04.740 this current venture and potential failure. I knew even in the depths of despair that this was going to

00:13:12.060 pass. Very hard circumstances and situations. And I knew that it was going to pass. And you know

00:13:18.340 what else I know? I know that even though that adversity has passed for the most part, there's

00:13:23.260 going to be new adversity that I'm going to deal with. And because I'm aware of that, I can make sure

00:13:27.920 that I plan ahead. I can make sure that I remain humble. I can make sure that I remain in a constant

00:13:35.400 state of learning, growing, self-evaluation and awareness and improvement. So when these

00:13:40.840 situations inevitably rise, I'm more capable of dealing with those things. There's challenges and

00:13:46.520 hardships that I've gone through at 42 years old that I could not handle, literally could not handle

00:13:51.840 at age 18. And I would like to say that at age 60, I'll be able to handle circumstances that I could

00:13:58.080 not possibly handle when I was 42. Guys, adversity comes. It's a natural part of life. If we spend our

00:14:06.580 entire lives avoiding, running away from, hiding from the adversity, number one, we're not going to

00:14:13.940 grow. Number two, it's going to find you anyways. And you're going to find yourself unprepared to deal

00:14:19.500 with whatever life has to thrust at you. Also, it will pass. Nothing is permanent. I know that whatever

00:14:25.880 you're dealing with, divorce, bankruptcy, medical issues, lawsuits, somebody calling you a mean name,

00:14:34.660 it's going to pass. And what I would like to do in my own life is to be able to look back and say,

00:14:43.200 you know what? You handled that situation like a man. It wasn't a great situation. It was unfortunate

00:14:50.760 that it was either thrust upon you or you did it to yourself, but it is what it is. And in the given

00:14:55.560 set of circumstances, you handled yourself well. I would love to look back and I cannot say this is

00:15:02.060 true, but I would love to look back in my life and say, every obstacle I dealt with, I handled like a

00:15:08.200 man. That hasn't always been the case, but I'm forward thinking. And so as I'm presented with

00:15:14.160 challenges, I'm willing to project myself out into a future date and even ask, how would the guy that I

00:15:19.600 want to be handle this circumstance? How would the guy who I want to be handle a divorce or a bankruptcy

00:15:27.340 or a lawsuit or a medical diagnosis? What would that guy do? And then become that guy because you

00:15:35.140 know what? Life's going to get better and you want to be able to look back at yourself and the people

00:15:40.100 around you with some pride and some dignity. Maintain your dignity. I've seen grown men stumble,

00:15:46.760 inevitable and completely self-destruct. Man, have some self-respect, have some dignity. Things don't

00:15:54.660 always work out. You may suffer the consequences of your poor decisions as I have, but have some class,

00:16:01.220 have some dignity, stand up, dust yourself off, improve, get better so that when the challenge

00:16:08.680 passes and it will, at least you have your honor and your respect intact. Number three,

00:16:15.940 adversity is opportunity. Adversity is opportunity. You know what I actually like is I in a way like

00:16:25.060 that not everybody can deal with adversity the same way I can. You know why? Because it presents

00:16:31.080 opportunities afforded to me that not everybody else will get to capitalize on. For example, if a client

00:16:36.900 is potentially working with me as a financial advisor, I use that example because I was a financial

00:16:42.040 advisor in another life and they're working and meeting with me, but they're also meeting with

00:16:47.460 another financial advisor, I love when that individual brings up challenges. I love when they

00:16:52.720 bring up objections or concerns they may have because it provides me an opportunity to educate them

00:17:00.260 on why they don't need to worry about that or how we're going to hedge against that or how we're going

00:17:05.280 to improve their circumstances in light of that information. But you know what? Not everybody will do

00:17:10.600 that. And the cream rises to the crop, cream rises to the top, excuse me, which means that as adversity

00:17:17.040 presents itself, everybody else is going to throw in the towel. Podcasting is a great example. How

00:17:22.880 many people started podcasts? Maybe you're one of them and it got hard or it got boring or you didn't

00:17:28.780 have a guest or you couldn't make any money doing it. And so you threw in the towel. Good.

00:17:33.280 Now, because I'm trying to serve you as a man, like I don't want that to happen,

00:17:36.840 but that presents an opportunity to me who is willing to stay in the game, who's willing to

00:17:42.300 deal with not as many people listening as I'd like, who's willing to overcome the fact that

00:17:47.040 maybe they couldn't get a guest for a specific week and making something work. Those are opportunities.

00:17:52.800 The other thing I'd have you consider is that sometimes people believe that their external

00:17:56.200 circumstances will change their current reality. For example, if only I had enough money,

00:18:03.400 then my life would be better. If only my wife acted this way, then our relationship would be

00:18:09.480 great. If only my boss wasn't such a dickhead, then I would be happy with my employment. Guys,

00:18:15.320 it doesn't work like that. I call it God. It is God. But if you want to call it the universe or

00:18:20.480 karma or Jiminy Cricket for all I care, there's going to be opportunity presented to you in the form

00:18:26.820 of adversity to prove that you're ready for the next chapter, the next level. You don't get to

00:18:33.220 elevate yourself to the next level until you pass the previous level. It's like a game.

00:18:38.040 If you're playing a game, you don't get to improve your character until you prove yourself competent

00:18:44.840 in a certain set of skills on that game console. It's the same thing in life. You guys say you want

00:18:50.940 more money, but you're not willing to do what you need to do to make more money. You say you want a

00:18:55.020 better relationship and you just wish that God came down, touched you on the forehead with his

00:18:59.020 finger and bestowed it upon you. Be great. But you're not worthy of it yet. And I'm not talking

00:19:05.100 about human worth. I'm not talking about your worth as a human being. We're discerning here. I'm

00:19:10.140 talking about your worth or worthiness of getting the pay raise or having that relationship or

00:19:18.420 completing that marathon or fill in the blank with whatever your objective is. You're not worthy of

00:19:24.580 that result yet. And if by some miracle you achieve that, it's not sustainable. Give you an

00:19:34.420 example of that. Lottery winners. Go back and look at the statistics, the data. And I don't have that

00:19:41.120 pulled up in front of me, but I've seen statistics that show that lottery winners will go broke within

00:19:47.320 a matter of a few short years of winning millions and millions of dollars and not only broke in many

00:19:54.300 cases worse off, owing more money than they did before they had that landfall. Why? Because they

00:20:01.280 weren't worthy of the $10 million they won. They were operating from a $30,000 a year mindset. And now

00:20:13.220 of a sudden they're given $10 million. Do you think that they automatically have all the financial

00:20:20.800 acumen that comes with somebody who earns $10 million? Of course not. So they fall into their

00:20:25.120 old patterns, their old ways. And this is why, by the way, if you were to take all the money in the

00:20:29.820 world, and we're talking about income distribution right now, all the money in the world and distribute

00:20:36.000 it evenly between the, what is it? 9 billion people on the planet right now. I'd be willing to bet that

00:20:41.760 within a few short years, the majority of the money would trickle back into the hands of the

00:20:46.740 people who have it now. Oftentimes people like to reference the elite. They're manipulating people.

00:20:52.820 They're taking advantage of people. They're not paying their fair share. No, the elite, no. And I'm

00:20:57.720 talking about financially elite. I'm not saying again, worth as a human being. I don't subscribe to

00:21:02.720 that, but their financial acumen, they know things that you don't know. If you knew what those things

00:21:08.880 were and you implemented them, you would be in that club, but you're not. And I'm not either

00:21:12.900 because I'm not doing what they're doing. So the best thing that you can do if you want something

00:21:17.440 is to make yourself worthy of having that thing. If you're in a marriage and you want that to be a

00:21:22.500 thriving marriage, then you have to do today what people in thriving marriages and relationships do.

00:21:29.000 And then the result will come. If you want to make a million dollars this year, then you don't

00:21:34.660 make the million dollars first. You do what the million dollar annual income earners do.

00:21:40.180 And then the inevitable outcome is the million dollars a year. If you want to run a marathon,

00:21:44.420 you don't just get up off the couch after being out of the game for 10 years and go run a marathon.

00:21:48.880 You might actually die doing that. So you have to do what marathon runners do. They train,

00:21:54.480 they eat right, they sleep, they recover, they hire coaches. And then you're deemed worthy

00:22:01.120 of being able to be a quote unquote marathon runner. If you want to write a book this year,

00:22:08.300 you have to do what authors do. And then you will experience the result. The thing that you need to

00:22:14.960 know is that anybody that you've ever heard on my podcast, and I've interviewed over 450 incredibly

00:22:20.640 successful men in their own right and different avenues and facets of life. Some people tend to

00:22:26.720 believe that these are individuals who are free of adversity from their life. Oh man,

00:22:30.520 if I was that guy, then my life would be easy. Yeah. I'd be a millionaire too. Yeah. I'd have a

00:22:36.780 successful business too. Yeah. I'd be an ultra athlete too. Yeah. I'd be a scholar too. No,

00:22:41.700 you wouldn't. Because if you had the skillset of those individuals, you would be what those

00:22:48.060 individuals are. You, you aren't those individuals, which means you don't do what they do.

00:22:53.620 And I'm not casting stones. I'm in the same boat. If there's somebody I aspire to be like,

00:22:58.200 then I don't get to just be like that person. I have to do what that person does in order to

00:23:03.720 manifest and yield that result. Number four, let's realize our triggers and where they come

00:23:09.340 from. And I wrote a couple of different things here. Number one, awareness. This is about self

00:23:13.160 awareness. If you feel yourself getting heated and bothered about something, I think it's a good

00:23:17.480 idea to ask yourself, why do I feel this way? If a client calls you up and says, Hey, I don't want to

00:23:22.920 work with you anymore. I want to work with the guy down the road at the other financial planning firm.

00:23:29.660 That might be upsetting to you. And I think that'd be upsetting to anybody, but certain men are going

00:23:34.380 to handle that with class and grace and say, Hey, man, hate to hear that you're leaving. Do you mind

00:23:38.960 explaining why? So I might be able to improve my practice for other people moving forward. That's a

00:23:43.240 mature way to handle that. By the way, an immature boy, child, prepubescent, at least emotionally

00:23:50.140 might say, well, that guy's an idiot. I can't believe you do that. And man, you're not going

00:23:55.880 to be loyal. You've been working with me. And now all of a sudden you're just going to jump ship

00:23:58.900 because of dot, dot, dot, dot, dot, dot. That's immaturity. That's a trigger. There's something

00:24:03.040 going on. Why are you so upset? In the past, I've been like that. And the reason I was upset in this

00:24:09.980 particular instance or this set of circumstances is because I wasn't doing enough marketing to have

00:24:14.320 other clients. If at this stage, somebody messages me and says, Hey, I'm not going to be in the

00:24:18.440 Iron Council anymore. I'm not personally offended by that because I'm doing a good enough job

00:24:22.460 marketing and value proposition and creating value in men's lives that one person leaving

00:24:27.780 for whatever reason, isn't going to cripple our business. A hundred people leaving isn't

00:24:32.860 going to cripple my business because I'm doing the work required. Same with you. If you have one

00:24:37.160 client leave, if you're upset about that, it's because you're not doing the work. If somebody

00:24:41.160 says something to you and belittles you or mocks you or undermines you or makes a passive

00:24:46.140 aggressive comment or criticize you and you become emotionally vested in what that individual

00:24:51.620 is saying, there's something deeper there that you have to figure out. Why is this an

00:24:55.780 issue for me? It could be that your abusive father used to treat you that way. And so it

00:25:00.800 represents him and you hate and despise him as a man. And so everybody else who says that

00:25:07.860 thing or talks to you that way triggers this thought of your father who you despise, that

00:25:16.320 would be important to know because then you can say, all right, well, this person isn't

00:25:19.480 my father. That was an isolated experience. And so maybe they don't even mean what they're

00:25:23.540 saying the way that I'm interpreting it. And I can have a further conversation to clarify.

00:25:29.020 And usually we find that they didn't mean to be offensive at all. It's just, they're filtering

00:25:33.680 their response through their own baggage and bullshit throughout life. Be aware of why you're

00:25:40.260 feeling the way you're feeling. Another issue might be integrity. If somebody calls you fat

00:25:45.800 or you're a slob and you get offended by that, if somebody called me fat and said, I'm a slob,

00:25:51.360 I wouldn't be offended by that because it's not accurate. And I know it's not accurate.

00:25:56.940 If somebody says, you're a liar, you're a cheat, you're a scam. And people say that all the time.

00:26:00.380 I'm not offended by that because I know I'm not. Every single week, people say, oh, Ryan,

00:26:05.400 you're just scamming guys who are hurting out of their money. As if that's supposed to be offensive

00:26:09.600 to me. It's not offensive because that's not what I'm doing. And I know that. I'm so grounded in that.

00:26:16.480 What we do as a business is we provide a valuable service that certain people are interested in.

00:26:24.640 And we enter into an exchange of value. I give them what they're after. And then in return,

00:26:32.640 they pay me. It's the nature of business and capitalism and exchange of value.

00:26:36.980 I'm not offended when somebody says you're scamming people because we don't. I would not

00:26:40.760 be offended if somebody called me a lazy piece of crap because I'm not. But if you are scamming,

00:26:45.980 or if you are a lazy piece of crap and somebody calls you that and you're upset about that,

00:26:50.560 that's an integrity gap. Because you know somewhere deep and down inside, there's a tinge of truth to

00:26:55.260 what they're saying. And that might be offensive. So what is the integrity gap? Where can you improve?

00:27:00.700 Where can you incorporate more integrity in your life? The only other thing that I wrote here is

00:27:05.420 that we're driven. And I talked about this a little bit earlier, the lizard brain. This is the less

00:27:09.520 evolved. This is the fight or flight response of our brain. It's driven from emotion, fear, and greed.

00:27:16.440 I dealt with this all the time in the financial planning industry. When the market was doing

00:27:21.000 really well, people would put a ton of money into the market. When's the last time you went into a

00:27:25.540 retail store? Let's say you needed a new pair of pants. You went into a retail store and the

00:27:29.920 associate said, hey, normally these pants are $100, but today we're going to charge $150. And he said,

00:27:35.740 oh, that sounds good. I'll go ahead and do that. You would never do that. But you do it in the stock

00:27:41.040 market. The stock market's up. The stock was $10. Now it's $13. You're like, that sounds like a pretty

00:27:47.380 good deal. No, it's not a good deal. Why are you making that decision? Because you're greedy or

00:27:52.660 you're ignorant. And so you think that, hey, the stock market is good. I'm going to buy it at a

00:27:56.980 premium. Don't buy stuff at a premium. That's when you sell it. If everybody else is buying it for

00:28:03.020 the jeans for $130, you sell your $100 jeans for $130 so you can realize the $30 gain.

00:28:10.220 That's a rational approach, but you're driven by fear. You're driven by greed.

00:28:15.960 Same thing with the stock market. When the bottom falls out and that $10 stock turns into $3,

00:28:21.120 you're like, oh, I got to sell this. I got to get rid of this. Fear, fear. Oh, I'm scared. Fear,

00:28:24.980 get rid of it. No, that's not when you sell. If you go into the store and that's that $100 pair of

00:28:30.440 jeans and because it's Christmas time, they say, hey, this is normally $100, but today it's $30

00:28:34.000 and you need a new pair of jeans, that's when you buy the jeans. It's on sale. Buy it now. Don't sell.

00:28:40.180 Buy it now. When I say it that way, everybody's like, oh yeah, that makes sense. Yeah, because

00:28:44.720 you're rational right now. When fear creeps in and greed creeps in, you make dumb decisions.

00:28:53.160 The uncertainty of 2024 could cause you to make dumb decisions. The uncertainty of your wife telling

00:28:59.740 you that she no longer wants to be married triggers you, right? Abandonment, failure, loser.

00:29:06.440 And so you make dumb decisions. We're not going to make dumb decisions. We're going to make rational,

00:29:13.540 clear-headed decisions, knowing that this adversity, whatever it might be, too, shall pass.

00:29:18.220 The last point I want to make here is I want to talk a little bit about emotions.

00:29:22.620 There's a lot of misconception, especially in this men's space that say, oh, don't let emotions rule

00:29:29.360 you. I agree with that. But I think it's taken to the extreme as in like you're never supposed to

00:29:35.620 experience emotions. Guys, emotions are amoral. Please understand that. There's no such thing as a

00:29:41.820 negative emotion. People will tell you there is. Oh, you shouldn't be angry. Oh, you shouldn't be sad.

00:29:46.960 Don't be sad. Oh, life's hard. Don't be sad. Don't be sad. Don't be sad. It's okay. If something

00:29:52.540 unfortunate is happening in your life, it's okay to be sad. If somebody's taking advantage of you,

00:29:57.860 it's okay to be angry. Now, the way that we respond to those emotion matters, those emotions,

00:30:03.820 excuse me, matter, but it's okay to experience and feel what you're feeling. Emotions are amoral.

00:30:08.660 They're neither good nor bad. The response to our emotions is not. If I say, for example,

00:30:14.240 I'm angry about something that happened at work today and I decided to go punch a hole in the wall

00:30:19.480 or worse, punch somebody else for no reason, I think all of us would say that that's an unhealthy

00:30:25.100 expression of emotion. The emotion wasn't the problem. The expression of the emotion was.

00:30:32.460 So guys, let's stop burying our emotion. You can be sad.

00:30:36.100 You can be angry. You can be happy. You can, you can be loving. You can be empathetic.

00:30:46.540 If you're feeling those things, feel those things. Let's not over index them. And what I mean by that

00:30:52.440 is put too much weight in those things. Well, I'm happy because you know, whatever. And so

00:30:55.960 you make dumb decisions because that happiness is just like driving and steering all of your

00:31:01.320 otherwise rational decision-making process. It's just a factor. It's feedback.

00:31:07.540 When you're driving down the road and you have your dashboard there in front of you,

00:31:10.700 you're looking at gauges. You're looking at the temperature of the car. You're looking at the

00:31:13.780 oil pressure. You're looking at your speedometer. You're looking at your mileage. You're looking

00:31:17.260 at your fuel gauge. When the fuel gauge drops from half down to zero and the little light comes on

00:31:22.460 and says, get fuel now, do you get pissed off and slam your car off the road and wrap your truck

00:31:28.140 around the next telephone pole you see because you're mad that the indicator light came on?

00:31:32.960 No. You find the next exit, go to the gas station, turn the car off, put the pump in the tank,

00:31:40.980 turn it on, put your credit card in there, fill up, close the cap, put the pump away,

00:31:45.120 drive back onto the freeway and get on about your day. Same thing with emotions.

00:31:48.580 When you're angry that the client called you and left you, you don't blow up the business.

00:31:53.360 You don't call your thousand other clients and say, I'm out of here. You guys all suck

00:31:58.380 and I'm not doing this anymore. And you can go shove it. That would be ridiculous. You chalk it up.

00:32:05.100 You realize, Hey, is there something I can learn from this experience? Maybe there's a way for me

00:32:10.140 to better retain clients, or maybe I wasn't adding as much value as that person liked, or maybe I wasn't

00:32:15.400 fulfilling my commitments. I'm not mad about it. I'm a little upset. I'm a little maybe hurt.

00:32:19.860 I feel maybe a little bit of betrayal. And so that's an indicator that something's off. And then

00:32:25.340 we figure out what's off so that we can improve and not have to deal with it again. Your emotions

00:32:29.540 aren't bad. Even the so-called negative ones. If you're angry, you can be angry. If you're sad,

00:32:34.480 you can be sad. If you're loving, you'd be loving. If you're empathetic, you'd be empathetic. If you

00:32:38.600 want to be nurturing, you can be nurturing. You can be any of those things as a factor for your

00:32:44.280 decision-making process. And then there's other factors. Feedback from qualified sources,

00:32:49.000 rational level-headed approach, long-term thinking, this sort of thing. So those are my

00:32:54.980 five tips for handling adversity like a man. Now we didn't get real tactical and I could,

00:33:00.660 but there's an infinite number of circumstances that you're going to be presented with. And so

00:33:04.900 you'll have to figure out how to tactically address those circumstances. And we can talk a

00:33:09.440 little bit more about a tactical approach in a future podcast. But for now, I think if we get the

00:33:13.380 mindsets right, then the tactical approach becomes better. So for example, if a client calls you

00:33:18.580 and says, Hey, I'm leaving. And your mindset is, Hey, my energy is infectious. So I'm not going to

00:33:24.640 blow up at my client. I'm going to maintain calm, rational communication and dialogue. I'm going to

00:33:32.340 realize that, Hey, this is unfortunate. I'm losing a really good client. I like my relationship. I like

00:33:36.420 the income that came from that client, but this will pass and I'll have another client. If you look

00:33:40.940 for opportunities. So for example, you, you might ask a client, Hey, is, is there anything that I'm

00:33:46.120 unaware of that, that I could be aware of that will help me in my business as I work with other

00:33:52.120 clients? And they may tell you, Hey, you just didn't communicate with me real well. Okay, good.

00:33:56.600 That's good information to have. Realize that, Hey, if you're triggered by one client leaving,

00:34:01.180 like if one client blows up your business, there's probably a deeper issue at hand,

00:34:05.140 meaning you need to get some more clients instead of having one or three, maybe have 30 or 300.

00:34:10.760 So one client isn't going to spell the difference between success and failure.

00:34:13.880 And then number five, if you're angry again, realizing that emotions are a factor, not the

00:34:18.780 only factor, but you're upset and angry about that. Okay. That's the little indicator. That's

00:34:23.760 the little fuel light on the dashboard. Hey, you're angry about this. Why let's figure it out

00:34:28.560 so that we can make better decisions moving forward. All right, man. I hope that serves you.

00:34:32.680 I would love to see more of us. And I'm working on this to be more level-headed, be more rational,

00:34:38.380 handle adversity. Like a man, I mean, people are relying on us. Not only are you going to have a

00:34:42.380 better experience throughout life, but your wife is relying on you. Your children are relying on you,

00:34:46.720 your colleagues and coworkers and clients and neighbors, they're relying on you. Don't show

00:34:51.100 up as an inferior version of yourself. Show up as the best possible version by incorporating these

00:34:56.460 five things. Again, learning and knowing that energy is infectious. Number two, knowing that adversity

00:35:02.300 comes and it goes. Number three, adversity is opportunity. Number four, realize your triggers.

00:35:08.760 And number five, emotions are a factor, not the only factor. Now, a couple of marching orders

00:35:14.040 as we wrap up today. Number one, go read If by Roger Kipling. I think you guys are going to really

00:35:18.880 enjoy that poem if you don't already know of it. And then number two, check out The Iron Council

00:35:23.940 at orderofman.com slash ironcouncil. All right, guys. We'll be back next week. Until then,

00:35:30.200 go out there, take action, handle adversity like a man, and become the man you are meant to be.

00:35:35.880 Thank you for listening to the Order of Man podcast. If you're ready to take charge of your life and be

00:35:41.500 more of the man you were meant to be, we invite you to join the order at orderofman.com.

Order of Man - January 05, 2024

Handle Adversity Like a Man ｜ FRIDAY FIELD NOTES

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