Making Decisions as a Man, Fault Versus Responsibility, and Casting Visions When All is Dark ｜ ASK ME ANYTHING
Episode Stats
Length
1 hour and 8 minutes
Words per Minute
186.27141
Summary
In this episode, the brother and sister duo of the sit down with their good friend, Kip, and talk about life, love, and what it means to be a man in this day and age.
Transcript
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You're a man of action. You live life to the fullest. Embrace your fears and boldly chart your own path.
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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.
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This is your life. This is who you are. This is who you will become.
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At the end of the day, and after all is said and done, you can call yourself a man.
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Kip, what's up, man? Great to see you today. Looks like you got a new, uh, fresh new haircut there.
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And a beard trim. You're looking sharp. Yeah. Yeah. Clean up. Although it was funny.
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Literally within a day, someone's like, Kip needs to grow a beard. I'm like, oh my gosh.
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I think that what you have on your face right there is, is my, you know, two o'clock shadow.
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Hold on. Hold on. You're getting some, I think you're getting some weird feedback again. Is it?
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Picking up the wrong mic? Nope. I got the right mic.
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Okay. There it goes. Yeah. No, you're good. You're good.
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Okay. It just, it was rough there for a second. I almost blew out my eardrum. So
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That's what it is. That's exactly. All right. Proceed. You were about to say something
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Well, it wasn't actually, I was just saying that as much as I, I don't know, I'm not as hairy as
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some guys. And as I get older, I'm like, I'm actually grateful because I am too lazy to have
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to manage a lot of hair growth all the time. So I've accepted my lot of thinner facial hair and
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I'm grateful for it. So thank you, mom. Yeah. I'm one of those hairy guys that just has always had
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to deal with it. So it is what it is. Yeah. Eighth grade. You're shaven. Yeah. That's right.
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Yeah. I mean, even my son, my oldest, he's got like hair on his armpits and a little happy trail
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going on. I'm like, Holy cow. He's a little mustache in the, in the, in the right light on
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his upper lip. I'm like, dang, this guy's killing it. Not kid anymore. Holy cow.
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Yeah. Well, yeah. I was just going to say, I love how shaving is like a little bit of a rites of
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passage. Do you remember doing like shaving prematurely as a kid where you're like, I don't
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really shave anyway. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. I didn't have my, my dad wasn't around to teach me. So I
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remember my mom showing me how to shave my face. So that was kind of even now, I mean, it was like,
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she had to do what she had to do, but even now I'm like, Oh man, that's something that would have
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been really cool. So I've already had that lesson with Brecken just cause he's pretty close to me.
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He doesn't really need to, but he's pretty close actually. So, yeah. And it's pretty nasty when they
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get like random gross hairs, you know what I mean? Yeah. And they think it's cool. That's the funny
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thing. They think it's cool. It's like, look at my mustache. I'm like, don't brag about that.
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Like shave that off. Trust me. You don't want that right now. So yeah. Good tip. I got to tell
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you, I'm nursing a, um, a knee issue, by the way, similar to what you were nursing several months ago.
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There's a little bit of happiness that entered my soul when you're like, I hurt my knee. I'm like,
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good. I know. Yeah. I, um, it hurt. It popped. Yeah. Knee bar hill hook or no, I was inside
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control. I don't know why he did it. Bless his heart. Um, and pulled his, pulled your ankle
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towards him, but like, didn't do it. Like, like jerked it. I'm like, really? Why? And just jerked
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on his pop. And I'm like, Oh, just rolled over in agony and laid there for about two minutes. And I'm
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like, all right, I think it's okay. Let's keep training. He's like, you sure? I'm like, yeah,
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let's keep training. So I kept training and it felt pretty good, but that was the adrenaline
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and everything else going. And then I got done. Yeah. And I felt it from my calf all the way up
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into my ass. And I'm like, Oh, this is a problem. Like if it was just isolated, I would have thought,
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okay, it's just a little sore, but I felt it in my entire leg. I'm like, Oh, this is a problem,
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but I don't know. We'll see. I'm going to training tonight. We'll see how, we'll see how it goes.
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Did you at least smash him or anything during that? Uh, Hey, let's keep, that's the way you wanted
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to keep going. You're like, let's keep going. I choked him out. I knee barred him and did it
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right back to him. No, I heel hooked him. No, I didn't do that. Um, no, I don't know. We just,
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we just kept training. It was fine. It is. I, that brace I'm telling you, the one I sent you
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check that out. That thing's pretty, I mean, it's expensive, but, um, I've been wearing that and I
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don't feel any pain in my knee. You wear it when you train or what? Yeah. Yeah. But it has like
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metal brackets down the sides, but it keeps them covered in padding. So you're not, you know what
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I mean? Driving a metal rod into someone's face or hip or whatever. That's what I want. I want like
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spikes on it, but, uh, it works pretty good. Prevents me from moving my, my turning my knee sideways.
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Yeah. Right. So yeah. Well, other than that, all is good, man. Book's almost done. Uh,
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saw that. Yeah. Things are good. Podcast downloads are numb are up. So it's all good.
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Well, let's get into some questions, man. Yeah, for sure. So we're founding, we're, uh,
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fielding questions from the foundry, uh, which is the platform that the iron council uses our
00:05:32.260
exclusive brotherhood to learn more about the iron council, go to order of man.com
00:05:35.620
slash iron council. You can sign up for a newsletter, but just so you guys know,
00:05:40.060
not currently opening and we'll have probably an opening later March, mid March, possibly.
00:05:47.300
Yeah. Beginning or middle of March, it'll open back up. So make sure you're getting notified on
00:05:51.320
that. Cause those will go quick. Those spots will go quick. Yeah. They went really fast this last time.
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So, all right. Cordell Neely, I'm 26 year old. I am planning on taking action in 2022 and finally
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moved to a new state by myself. Can you elaborate on any experiences you might have had moving from Utah
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to Maine in regards to preparing and dealing with family members or friends unsupportive of the move
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multiple States away? Um, I don't, I don't look, that's an easy one. That's an easy one to answer.
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It's that it's your life. Like this is a weird thing. I feel like generally a lot of people believe
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that they need to be supported in order to move forward with something, or they need the praises
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and the accolades and the approval in order to progress down their own personal path. And although
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it would be nice to have, you definitely want people who are supportive of what you're doing.
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It isn't a prerequisite for moving forward in what you think it is effective way. So as a 26 year old
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man, come on now, like people, there's going to be people are supportive. There's going to be people
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who are not, there's going to be others who are indifferent. And so what, what they think of
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what you're doing is irrelevant. The only people it matters to is you and anybody that you've
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committed to. So your wife, for example, your children, you know, I would definitely take my
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wife's approval into consideration as I consider moving her across the country. You know, that might
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be something you'd want to do because you've made that commitment, but I haven't made a commitment
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to my mother for her to approve everything I do. I haven't made a commitment to my friends to just
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perpetually just be there forever. So they're comfortable with the way I choose to live my
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life. So the best thing you can do is get over it and live your life, do what you know, you need
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to be doing, look for the good work hard and that's it. And then you just let the chips fall where they
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may. What other people think of what I'm doing is largely irrelevant with the caveat. Again, I say
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this caveat, the people that are impacted by the decisions I'm making. Yeah. Because I'm not the
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zero Fs kind of mentality where it's like, I don't care what any, I've never been that. There are
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people I care about what they think, even mentors who I'm like, okay, well, what do you think? And I
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would take what they say into consideration, but no, I don't need people's approval to make my own
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decisions as a man. Copy. Drew Lewis, Ryan, if you were asked what three key elements and experiences
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are most effective and consistent in the transformational development from the state of
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immature, masculine to the mature, masculine, what would they be?
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Uh, I would say personal responsibility, just, just owning your own decisions and your own choices.
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Like even that last question lacked a little bit of personal responsibility when you're worried about
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what other people think, because what you're doing essentially is you're pinning it on somebody else.
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You're saying, well, you know, the reason I'm, I really hesitated about moving is because somebody
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else didn't like it. Okay. But it's not their responsibility. It's your responsibility.
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Uh, I know plenty of grown males. They're not acting like men who constantly blame other people
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for their circumstances and their scenarios and their lack of opportunity and their lack of results
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and their life, man, just start owning that stuff. Even to a, even to a fault. I would say that's bet
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owning it to a fault is better than fault. The fault of not owning anything and making excuses for
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everything in your life. So I w I would say personal responsibility.
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That's it. I know he's asking for two or three. That's it. You know, when you own and then outside
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of that, it's your ability. Here's one thing I would say is learning to become a producer rather
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than a consumer. Yeah. And let me make sure I put this little caveat in here as well. All of us consume.
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There's nothing wrong with being a consumer. Like I, I buy things. I, I require food for energy. Like I
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consume we're consumptive creatures. That's not the problem. The problem is when you consume more than
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you produce, that's what I mean by being a consumer and a producer is somebody who produces more than he
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consumes. So when you think about children, young, young boys, young girls there, and I'm not talking
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about the emotional worth for, for a parent or even their worth as a human being, but primarily
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they're consumers, right? They, they require time, energy, attention, food, money. You got to put food
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on the table, roof over their head. They got to go to sports. You got to drive them around. They're not,
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they're not adding income to the house. They're not participating in the bills. They might have some
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chores and things like that, but they're largely consumers. And we expect that because we're teaching
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them how to be producers, but there comes a point in time where that, that scale needs to shift from
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primarily consumption to primarily production. And I think that's a maturity conversation because I know
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young men, my, my oldest is one of them. And of course I'm biased, but he is a young man who really
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understands this concept and he tries to add maximum value where he can, he gets it even in some cases
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more than a lot of grown males get it. So I think when you're talking about immaturity, it's about
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personal responsibility and then moving from a consumer to a producer.
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Zach Underhill, expecting our second child next month. From your experience, what are the biggest
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challenges that present themselves when adding another child to the family? And how did you
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navigate these challenges? I think for us, the biggest challenge was making sure that the previous
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kids still get the time and attention they need from me and mom. I think that's really, really important
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because it's easy to place all of your time and energy and attention and emphasis on, you know,
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the newborn and to a degree it's needed, it's required. You know, they need physically more
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resources talking about consuming versus producing. They need more of your resources than an older
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child might. Um, so, so I would say depending on, did he say how old his first was? You didn't.
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I would say depending on, on the age, of course, but let's just say maybe what three to five, I would
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say on average, if I had to guess, I'd probably say kids three to five, like still take time
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individually. Hey, we're going to go out and we're going to go to dairy queen and get a blizzard
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or we're just, you and I, just you and me, like mom's going to hang out here and take a nap with
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the baby, but you and me, we're going to go to the park and hang out. And by the way,
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sometimes that's actually all you can do. It's good for the kid, but you know who else it's good for
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mom, right? Because you can't breastfeed the baby contrary to popular belief. Like you can't do all
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the things that the baby needs, but what you can do is take little Timmy or little Susie out,
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spend some good quality time with them. So mom can really rest and get some, some time with the
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newborn, which is I think going to be really helpful for her as well. But yeah, the best thing
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you can do is just give, give your first the time and attention that they're naturally going to lose
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when you bring a new baby into the house. For sure. I was, I was talking with some friends last
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week and I don't know, I was getting on the topic of the importance of consistency and structure for
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children. And it was really, and I was suggesting that I think it's critical for kids to have
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consistent structure because for them, the unknown, their unknowns are different than our adult unknowns,
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right? And, and as adults, the unknown, the unplanned ends up becoming, those are adult
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versions of stress, right? And for a kid, it's the same thing, but their unknowns are slightly
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different. And I, and I think bringing a new child into the family is an unknown. And so I think there's
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some probably proactive approach that you can take about how this is going to go and, and what's your,
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your existing child's relationship and what role does he play or she play in the new baby? And
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like really set a precedent ahead of time. So then that way they can have some comfort and stability
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around what this means to have this baby join the family. You might be clear in your head,
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but it's probably completely unclear to them. And, and you're shaking up the status quo,
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right? By introducing a new kid. So I think there's some prep that you could do to really help in that
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process too. Yeah. I like that. I agree. I think there's some, some exceptions to that. I'll explain what
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I mean in a minute. But one thing you also led me to think was including your first child in the
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process with the baby. Like, for example, I don't know whether your newborn is going to breastfeed
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or not, but let's just say hypothetically that he or she is not, well, you can have your four-year-old
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help mom feed the baby. Yeah. Right. If she's on a bottle or he's on a bottle and, and that gives
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her an opportunity or help tuck the baby in, or, you know, like big brothers, big sisters,
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they love that stuff until they get to like eight or nine years old and then they hate it.
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Yeah. So you might as well take advantage of it right now, but if you can get big brother,
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big sister involved in the process, they're going to feel more included and welcomed and an important
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part. And they are an important part of the family. But what I was going to say with the exception to
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consistency and structure is that I've seen a lot of parents who go overboard with it and they turn
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into helicopter parenting parents and, and they coddle and they bubble wrap and they, and they
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don't let their kids have any sort of challenge or adversity or hardship. Uh, I've, I've seen parents
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who, you know, maybe all of us are spending time together for the week or the weekend, uh, or maybe at
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the park for a day and then they leave. And it's like, well, why are you guys leaving? Oh, well,
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the baby needs to take a nap. Like, I think the baby could take a nap an hour and a half later.
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Like you're here spending time with all of us. And, and it's just, it's, it gets a little bit
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overbearing at, at points. So yeah, structure and stability, but also kids are resilient and they
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need hardship and they need to be introduced within reason to some discomfort. So make sure you're not
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stripping all of that away from them. And I don't think you're suggesting that, but let's know it
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is, it does happen. It does happen. Yeah. And well, and, and right in your example, it's like,
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it's the, uh, it's for me, it always seems like it's the first time parents they're, they're the
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ones that are like, yeah, well, Timmy has a schedule. And then by the time, like two, three,
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four comes along, they're just like, yeah, he's outside in the car, you know, everyone relax. I'm just
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joking, but you know what I mean? It's like, you get so hands off by the time you have a couple
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more down the pipe. Or I think like in that example, you are playing at the park. If you
00:17:04.180
have your fourth kid, you're like, I'm not, I'm not leaving to give him a nap. You look over and
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he like fell asleep in, in the swing or something or in the dirt, you know, he's drooling in the dirt.
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You're like, see, he's taking a nap on his own now. He's good. I remember with our, with,
00:17:20.760
with our first, you know, he, he had this really strange habit of eating rocks. Like he'd put rocks
00:17:26.460
in his mouth and, or he'd be on the carpet and he would see like, I don't know, cockroach or
00:17:32.480
something and like eat it. And, you know, as a first time parent, you're like, oh, and you're
00:17:36.920
like freaked out. And by the time you have, cause we have four, you know, he eats a cockroach. I'm
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like, eh, it's protein. It's good for him. Like you just don't, or he's eating rocks. He'll poop them
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out. Like it's fine. It's good. And it just does. It just matters less. Cause you realize,
00:17:56.220
you know, of course, within reason, they're pretty resilient little creatures.
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Koa, he's our sixth, right? He's three right now for the last year, he eats the dog's food
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all the time. And we're totally like, Bubby, that's gross. And that's it. Then he's like,
00:18:11.580
I like it. He's like, I like it. And we're like, all right, fine. Have at it. You're okay.
00:18:17.840
Yeah. He's down there all hands, all fours, like a dog. I'm like, nah, he's okay.
00:18:22.660
I think that's why it seems to me. The last child is always like the biggest handful. And I'm not
00:18:29.780
totally sure why that is. Maybe God like saves the ones that are a handful for the last because
00:18:35.540
he doesn't have to trick you. Well, no, I think he just knows he doesn't have to trick you into
00:18:39.560
having any more. You've already said you're done. So he's like, cool. I'll give you the, I'll give you
00:18:43.780
a hole on the last one. You're like, thanks. You give me the little angel, you know, on the first
00:18:49.160
one. So I have more. And then you give me the, the, the devil on the last one. Yeah. Or I don't
00:18:55.060
know, maybe it just has something to do with like, Hey, you're on your own pal, you know? And so they
00:18:59.480
just, they just like build this level of just disdain and resentment and resilience and like this
00:19:06.080
independence that the other kids weren't required to have.
00:19:10.140
When you learn as parent, like, I think the big thing is you learn to choose your battles
00:19:14.700
and, and your first kid, everything was the battle. Now it's like, yeah, no, I'll pick and
00:19:21.500
choose what I'm going to get mad about. That's true. That's true. Yeah. All right. What else?
00:19:27.160
All right. Justin, uh, gelsma, uh, what are you, what are you men currently listening to on podcasts
00:19:34.560
and or books that you're reading? We only listen to this podcast. So yeah. Is there,
00:19:40.400
is there other podcasts? I thought this was the only one that existed. Yeah. Yeah. Me too.
00:19:44.720
You know, actually I started listening to, I've been so consumed with writing the book. I haven't
00:19:50.160
read a whole lot admittedly, but I did start listening to, uh, 1984 the other day and that's
00:19:56.960
some crazy, crazy stuff. It is crazy. It's not that far-fetched either. That's the amazing,
00:20:02.180
not that far-fetched. It's not even amazing. It's quite disturbing. Yeah. The 1984, uh, you know,
00:20:09.740
as far as podcasts go, probably the same that you guys listened to. I listened to, um, I, I actually
00:20:15.740
listened to a lot of Rogan. Um, and I listened to Rogan because he's so good at what he does.
00:20:21.740
And, and I don't think people fully realize or appreciate it. Like they like his podcast
00:20:26.580
and they like his guests, but I don't appreciate his role. Yeah. Which is fine. I get it. Why would
00:20:34.080
they, you know, you're rooting out when you're, when you're listening. Yeah. It's like somebody
00:20:38.900
who watches UFC for the first time or MMA of any form. And they're like, this is stupid because
00:20:43.440
they're just rolling on the ground. Yeah. They're just like wrestling. You're like, no,
00:20:48.020
they're trying to hurt each other's technique. Yeah. Yeah. They want to see what they want to see is
00:20:53.060
they want to see them stand up and engage in kickboxing or Muay Thai. Like that's what they're
00:20:57.260
really looking for. And they get in the clinch or they get on the ground. They're like, this is
00:21:01.140
stupid. But somebody who knows it is like, what do you, this is the best fight of all time. What
00:21:06.540
are you talking about? You know? Totally. Totally. Um, so I listened to Rogan a lot because I'm not with
00:21:14.180
a, a crit, I was gonna say critical, not critical, analytical with an analytical ear. Like, oh,
00:21:19.660
how did he transition into that? How did he close out the interview? How did he start the
00:21:22.960
interview? How did he get somebody back on track that maybe it was DV deviated a little bit?
00:21:27.540
So that's pretty good. Um, you know, I listened to more like political commentary. So I listened to
00:21:34.440
a lot of Matt Walsh, Ben, Ben Shapiro. Uh, they have a podcast called morning wire, which is a nice
00:21:40.140
little intro to the day talks about three or five political or culturally charged issues. And it gives
00:21:46.140
a little report on them over 15 minutes. I listened to that one pretty much every day.
00:21:49.660
That's your news. Yeah. I mean, the same things you guys listen to, I'm sure.
00:21:55.560
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I, I won't even mention any podcasts. I think in the iron council,
00:22:00.480
we were wrapping up the confidence gap. So that's a recent book. Yep. Um, Robert green's book,
00:22:05.920
the laws of human nature. Um, my son read it first and he's like, dad, you got to read this book,
00:22:11.480
you know, and we all know Robert green. So, but that's actually a really good book. I've been really,
00:22:15.680
and then culture code is another book I just recently wrapped up. So I don't know. There
00:22:21.860
you go. Cool. Yep. All right. Brett Godfrey. How do you know that it's the right time to start dating
00:22:29.880
after a divorce? Yeah. I don't think you will know. How do you know?
00:22:35.580
Start before you get divorced, bro. If your marriage is easy, start now. Yeah. Might as
00:22:44.060
well see if there's anything better out there before you decide to throw in the towel on what
00:22:47.620
you have. Oh my gosh. We're all joking. We're joking. I know. Yeah. Almost have to say that
00:22:55.040
anymore. It seems like, uh, so here's what I would say is, I mean, you're asking the question,
00:22:59.700
maybe it's time to start dating, you know, but, but here's what I would be cautious of is try to
00:23:05.560
lower. I wouldn't say your standard of women. That's not what I'm saying, but try to lower
00:23:11.460
the expectation of where it would lead to. So don't lower your standards. That's not what I'm
00:23:17.600
saying, but lower the expectation of like the next woman you go on a date with, she's probably not
00:23:23.320
going to be your next wife and it's okay. Yeah. Yeah. Like just go have fun, enjoy the company of a
00:23:30.300
woman. Like I enjoy women's company, you know, not, not romantically, but you know,
00:23:35.520
there's something women bring to the table and that's nice. What and big and go back to dating,
00:23:40.520
which was what do you like, what you don't like, you know, and, and get back on that path of
00:23:46.140
determining what that is. Don't try to backfill the position of wife. Right. And I don't even know
00:23:54.780
if I would like really measure them against, okay, is this somebody I can marry? I think maybe just
00:24:01.380
enjoy a woman's company. And that's like the goal right now. Yeah. But, but I will say this,
00:24:07.760
don't neglect yourself. All right. Like if you're talking about dating women, I would say it should
00:24:13.660
be 95% attention on yourself right now. And 5% attention on another woman, like get your finances in
00:24:21.500
order, get your mind, right. Make sure your health is in check. Make sure work is going well. You're
00:24:27.840
doing your diet. You're doing your exercise. You're doing your, your meditation and your visualization.
00:24:32.700
You're planning for the future. Like get like all of that, get all of that locked in. And I think the
00:24:39.400
need or the desire, the wonder about when to start dating, I think that probably starts to resolve itself
00:24:46.180
as you start to get better with yourself, because I've never been through a divorce. I went through
00:24:52.440
that separation with my wife early in our marriage. Um, man, that was a hard time. And it was a, it was a,
00:24:58.840
it was the darkest time of my life. Uh, and so I had to get a lot of things right before I was ready for
00:25:05.060
like anything else dating. Like I didn't date women cause we were still married, but, um,
00:25:10.580
like work was struggling. My health was like, there was so much that was going wrong at the time.
00:25:16.940
And I just focused on those things I could control. Fortunately, my wife and I were able to reconcile.
00:25:22.760
I know that doesn't always work out of course, but you'll be better off if you do it that way.
00:25:27.960
Yeah. Would it work for me? That bitch. So, so Brett, Brett, here's the deal. You, you ready?
00:25:36.620
And you may not like this answer. So first your divorce is your fault.
00:25:42.760
And if you don't feel that way, figure out how it was and then fix whatever that was.
00:25:49.600
And, and then I say, you're, you're in a better position to be dating. I'm not, I don't think you
00:25:55.340
need to be perfect to start dating, but like, I literally had this conversation with a friend
00:26:00.020
last week and they're like, Oh, you know, they're asking like when they should get, when they should
00:26:04.780
start dating again, I'm like, well, has he like grown and evolved into a, like a better man?
00:26:10.080
Because he's already like in another relationship. Right. And they're like, Oh no, like he's the same
00:26:15.900
guy. And, and, and sometimes when we do that, we're like, Oh, so he thinks that this next woman,
00:26:22.060
it's going to magically just work out. And that nothing that he's bringing to the table
00:26:26.700
contributed to his first divorce. So I'm going to lean on more on the negative side is like,
00:26:31.880
are you the same man? And if you are, that's probably not going to work out well for you
00:26:36.680
because guess what? It didn't work out and you played a big part in it. So figure out what part
00:26:41.140
you played, sure that up and make sure that you're not falling into a committed relationship and putting
00:26:46.920
that on that other individual that like, Oh, because she's the right one. It's going to work
00:26:50.920
this time. Like you gotta, you gotta get clear on where you went wrong. Yeah. I think that's well said.
00:26:56.540
The only thing I would, I would change with what you said is I don't know that I would use the word
00:27:01.260
your fault. And instead I would use the word responsibility. Now look, it could maybe be your
00:27:07.920
fault. Like that, that actually could be true. Yeah. And so I'm not discounting that, but it
00:27:13.280
doesn't inherently mean it was your fault and it isn't 100% your fault, but it is 100% your
00:27:20.680
responsibility. Correct. So now, so I think fault kind of puts a period on the end of the thought,
00:27:29.320
like, Oh, that was my fault. It sucked. I messed up. And responsibility is a comma like that. Okay.
00:27:35.240
It didn't work out, but it is my responsibility. And so I'm going to do these things moving forward.
00:27:40.900
Yeah. And it might just be semantics. So use whatever word you want, but the point remains like
00:27:46.940
don't wallow in it, fix it. And that's what you said is you said, okay, now figure out how you can
00:27:53.140
become a better man so that you can improve yourself enough that when the next relationship takes place,
00:27:58.340
that it's going to be a different circumstance than it was this one.
00:28:03.080
Yeah, for sure. I'm hesitant to say this just because I feel that book feels, seems so
00:28:08.820
controversial. I'm interested in your thoughts on it, but I, what enters my mind when I read this
00:28:13.600
question, my bread is like, cause you probably read rational mail at the same time, but what's your take?
00:28:19.420
I mean, yeah, I look, I think having information is great. Um, but when you take one bit of information
00:28:28.660
and you turn it into doctrine, the Bible. Yeah. Yeah. Like, like the cannon, you know,
00:28:35.660
canonized word, it, it, it becomes a problem. Uh, and, and especially in the red pill and manosphere space,
00:28:45.540
because a lot of that comes from immaturity and a lot of it comes from hurt men who haven't learned
00:28:53.720
to deal with the pain they've encountered in a healthy way. So what I will say is that you're
00:29:01.340
going to find some good information in the rational mail and other books like that, but don't allow it
00:29:07.580
to become your soul doctrine. And I would say the same thing about anything that I've written almost
00:29:14.000
every book. Yeah. Right. I mean, sovereignty is, is the book, you know, and like I, you could take
00:29:19.960
that to the extreme and it can really create some real problems for you. So just, just be careful,
00:29:27.320
like read good stuff, get good information and take it all with a grain of salt and all within the
00:29:33.740
context of what you personally are dealing with. And then round it out with other practical advice and
00:29:39.680
timeless information that's available. Yeah. Matt Testerman with over 1000 members in the iron
00:29:49.760
council, where there come a time when inactive members will be asked to leave to make room for new
00:29:54.720
members, whether it be changes in membership requirements, participation requirements, physical
00:29:59.840
standards, and et cetera. I don't know that I would ask what, what was the word he used? Non, what did
00:30:07.520
he say about non-participating members or something? What was the word?
00:30:11.660
Or inactive. Would inactive members have membership requirements around participation
00:30:17.580
and physical standards, et cetera? No, probably not. And I'll tell you why
00:30:22.380
is because we have a lot of guys in the iron council who participate to varying degrees. So you might be
00:30:29.920
hyper engaged with a very powerful team of men. You're all working together. You're holding each
00:30:36.280
other accountable. But I'll tell you from experience that there's other men in the iron council that for
00:30:41.460
whatever the reason, they either can't be on a team or aren't interested in being on a team for a
00:30:46.540
myriad of reasons. And yet they're still engaged. You know, they'll show up on the Friday call.
00:30:51.120
They're still doing their battle plans, but they're not as engaged as you might be. And so do you call that
00:30:56.920
an inactive member or do you just call it somebody who's participating to a different degree than you are?
00:31:02.280
Yeah. So, I mean, you and I are good examples of that per se, right? Theoretically. Well,
00:31:09.460
we're on the leadership team, but it's not the same as what a standard member is on a battle team,
00:31:15.880
but it's not like we're not doing our battle plans. We're not actively participating in other ways.
00:31:20.460
Yeah. Right. Yeah. So I probably not, you know, as far as participation requirements,
00:31:26.120
I leave that to the teams, you know, each team has their own culture and their own standard.
00:31:29.760
And, and we work closely with our battle team leaders to ensure that they are doing what they
00:31:35.700
need to do individually. And also that they are capable of leading other men to improve the quality
00:31:43.560
of their lives. So that's a team thing. Now I have thought about elevated experiences, we'll call it,
00:31:51.440
where there are some requirements for not only participation, but your, your metrics, when it
00:31:59.520
comes to health, your metrics, when it comes to financial success. And we're, we're going to take
00:32:06.660
the cream of the crop and yes, there'll be other softer metrics that we'll have to weigh as we interview
00:32:14.080
specific people. And we start creating more of an elite unit of men who have proven that they're high
00:32:21.320
caliber, uh, and they're capable of leading themselves and others as well. So stay tuned for
00:32:27.180
that. I've been thinking about that over the past several months. I don't know why, but that stuff's
00:32:30.680
just, it's interesting. That stuff like gets me excited. Well, because you're a high caliber guy.
00:32:37.540
Yeah. When I think about it, like no, no one here, body fat needs to be a percentage. You know what
00:32:42.960
I mean? It's like, right. Cause you're a high caliber person. And so you want to be around high
00:32:47.760
caliber people and look, body fat. Isn't the only metric wealth isn't the only metric, but they're
00:32:54.180
pretty, they're indicators that you should pay attention to. And, and look, and we'll have guys
00:33:00.300
be like, well, that's not fair. I want to be part of that. Cool. Then get your stuff in check and you
00:33:04.920
can be part of it. And this is a thing in society. Like you're not supposed to exclude anybody.
00:33:11.660
You're not supposed to make anybody feel unwelcome or inferior or any of that stuff. And look, if we
00:33:18.600
put something like this together, it's not to exclude people. That's not the reason. Now it will
00:33:24.880
be exclusionary by design because it has to, because if it's inclusive to everybody, then it means
00:33:31.880
nothing. So it's the same thing with woman, you know, Matt Walsh, he's, he's, he's going viral
00:33:37.880
right now. Cause it's Dr. Phil thing. And he has a, he has a great point. He's like, what does woman
00:33:41.580
mean? And nobody can define it? No, like no, every, I can define it. Rational people can define what
00:33:49.840
woman means. Cause we all know it's a female. Uh, and, but the, but some people on the left just can't
00:33:56.840
define it or they won't, that's probably more accurate. Yeah. They won't define it. Well, okay.
00:34:01.480
If woman means nothing, then it, then it's open to everybody and it's subject to interpretation.
00:34:09.060
And it means nothing. If you can't define it, it means nothing. And then therefore, why are you
00:34:15.280
worried about, why would a man be worried about being a woman? You can't even define what it is.
00:34:20.380
Yeah. Well, yeah, but clothes, you know, clothes, those are, those are, uh, just social or, uh,
00:34:26.080
what do they call them? Social constructs. Okay. Then why are you so concerned with wearing
00:34:30.160
what we would call women's clothing? If they're just social constructs and you're trying to break
00:34:34.180
down traditional gender norms, why are you wearing girls' clothes to prove a point?
00:34:40.820
Yeah. If, if wearing clothes doesn't matter. Yeah. Or what the clothes you wear don't matter.
00:34:44.700
Or, or address. If you, if you're telling me, for example, that address is just a social construct,
00:34:50.240
which I actually can get behind. Sure. Because if, if you're, you know, in Scotland,
00:34:55.440
400 years ago, you were wearing a kilt. Yeah. Tonga. Exactly. You're wearing,
00:35:00.840
I don't know what they call it in Tonga, but you're wearing what, what we would call a skirt.
00:35:04.880
Lava lava. Okay. So yes, it is cultural. A hundred percent. It is like, I'm not disagreeing
00:35:10.620
with that, but what I'm saying is that if you think it's so irrelevant as to what we wear,
00:35:17.240
then why are you a man wearing a dress to prove that you're a woman, which is something that you
00:35:25.020
can't even define. That's where I get hung up. Yeah. Who knows how we got onto that tangent?
00:35:33.040
Oh, what was the, but yes, maybe stay tuned elite version. Oh yeah. Holy cow.
00:35:39.840
Way off track. No dresses allowed. Yeah. Unless you're Scottish or Tongan. Yeah. There might be
00:35:48.400
some other cultures in there. Travis Froome. How do you determine what your future vision looks like
00:35:54.400
while going through a separation? Seems to be difficult to figure out how to do so personally
00:36:00.220
when things are so uncertain with relationships with my wife and that having such a big role to play in it.
00:36:06.560
Just, just make, it's just a little better than what it is today. Yeah. That's it. Like for you to,
00:36:15.200
at the stage that you're going through in your life right now, for you to imagine, let's just throw
00:36:21.680
some concepts out there for you to imagine that you're happily married with another woman and you
00:36:28.760
guys are connected and you're intimate and you love each other and business is going well.
00:36:36.240
And you're making money hand over fist and you're going on experiences. And if you have kids through
00:36:42.900
this existing marriage, you have a deeply, deeply connected relationship with all of your kids.
00:36:48.880
I got to be honest, even from where I sit, that seems to me a pretty hard sell.
00:36:57.300
Like, I'm not sure how you sell yourself on that vision when you are where you are right now.
00:37:02.740
And that's hard. And now you see, you want to, but you can't, and I get why you can't.
00:37:10.540
And then you start to feel down on yourself because you know, you're not doing it right.
00:37:14.020
Quote unquote, doing it right. Just cast a little bit out into the future. Hey, you know what?
00:37:20.960
I'm going to get through this and it's hard right now, but I know over the coming months
00:37:27.280
in the next 12 months or so that I'm going to come to terms with this. I'm going to try to be
00:37:33.900
amicable in this. I'm going to be as connected with my kids as possible. And so you just cast
00:37:40.240
to where you can see a little bit further than, than where you're comfortable or where you're at
00:37:45.960
right now. And then when you get to that point, you cast a little further and a little further and a
00:37:50.240
little further. And as your life starts to change and improve and get better. And now maybe
00:37:54.980
you're interested in another woman, you know, you cast that vision further because you're more
00:37:59.940
capable of, of mentally and emotionally doing it. You just can't do it right now. So don't get hung
00:38:05.760
up on like, I need to cast my vision of the perfect life. No, just be a little better than today,
00:38:11.500
that tomorrow you're going to have maybe some new strategies for coping with the reality of your
00:38:18.140
situation. And so maybe you pick up jujitsu, maybe you go weight train, maybe you decide to put
00:38:25.020
together a group of men who meets every Saturday morning for you know, an F3 or whatever. I don't
00:38:33.280
know, whatever your thing is golf, golf, hit the driving range or hit the links. And you just cast
00:38:38.320
it a little further than where it is now, knowing that it will improve down the road.
00:38:43.040
Yeah. I mean, obviously run, you can relate to this. I mean, Travis, super tough scenario,
00:38:51.120
right? I remember when, uh, my ex-wife and I, when we, when she first moved out, had an apartment
00:38:58.760
and we're in this separation, this limbo state of not knowing what we're doing and, or not knowing
00:39:04.560
how she might react. I think the key thing, you know, at least a thought that comes to mind that I
00:39:10.060
think is critical is Dylan reality. And the reality of it is you're separated. So what are you going
00:39:15.460
to do with what you got and put a vision around that? Not around like, well, I need to know if
00:39:21.960
she's in or out before I can execute. You're not going to know that you got to execute on what you
00:39:28.440
got in the moment. Right. And so if you're a hundred percent on board of like, Hey, I'm going to
00:39:32.940
improve myself and I'm going to show up still in a very powerful way in my relationship with her,
00:39:38.720
then to your point, cast that out. And that's your focus. And until that changes, you know,
00:39:45.540
keep, keep your course. Um, because I do feel like, and I was the same way. I really felt uneasy
00:39:51.340
with the uncertainty of it. And I felt like I couldn't, I couldn't progress without knowing
00:39:56.460
what we were, what was going to happen. And unfortunately that might take a while and you
00:40:02.400
don't want to be in that kind of limbo state where you're not progressing in a positive way and showing
00:40:06.160
up in a positive way and putting that back on her. Right. You decide how are you going to show up in
00:40:11.440
spite of the circumstances? What kind of man are you going to be focused on that? Yeah. Yeah. I mean,
00:40:18.220
I, I look at it, imagine this, you're, you're in a, in a dark forest and it's pitch black out. You know,
00:40:24.980
the clouds are covering up the moon and you can't see the stars and it's just dark. Right. But you've
00:40:31.100
got a flashlight. And so you turn that flashlight on, you look around, you get your bearings,
00:40:36.320
you find the trail and you cast that flashlight out. That flashlight is only going to go so far.
00:40:43.180
Right. And so you cast it out there and you, you see it. And so you start walking, you know, okay,
00:40:47.940
well, there's a path. I don't know where it leads. I don't know what it entirely, it looks like, but
00:40:51.800
that's the path. And you start walking. Okay. There's going to be a bend in the trail that you can't
00:40:56.980
see from where you are right now. But when you get to that bend in the trail and you've got your
00:41:01.060
flashlight and you turn that corner, you're going to see more than you saw today, but you only get to
00:41:07.840
see more if you're willing to take the next step. And the beautiful thing about it is that as you're
00:41:13.380
walking with your flashlight, every step you take your flashlight goes a step further. So the vision
00:41:21.460
gets further. You never catch up with your vision. So that, that might bring you some solace too.
00:41:26.620
Like the, the, I could be at the pinnacle of my achievement today and I will never catch up with
00:41:35.040
the vision I have for my future. So you look around and you see these guys who are hyper,
00:41:40.780
hyper successful. And even them, they haven't realized their ultimate vision because it's still
00:41:48.360
out there. You're never going to catch up with it, but you got to cast it and you got to be willing
00:41:52.680
to take the next few steps and then the next one and the next one and the next one.
00:41:56.620
Yeah. I like that. Bruce Lee. I recently came across a quote by Epic Epictetus about wintering
00:42:05.600
ourselves. We must, we must undergo a hard winter training and not rush into things for which we
00:42:10.900
have, we haven't prepared referring to Greek warriors, continuing to train in harsh winter
00:42:15.740
conditions to better prepare battles in spring, putting ourselves intentionally uncomfortable
00:42:20.720
situations in order to better prepare for harder times outside of jujitsu and cold water immersion.
00:42:27.700
Have you come across any other techniques that work for you?
00:42:30.700
Generally, I would say no. Generally. For me, it's physically related. It has to be physically
00:42:45.960
related for me. So yeah, jujitsu is part of that. You said outside of jujitsu, generally no, but yeah,
00:42:53.520
there's a thousand other things you can do other than jujitsu. You can do strength training.
00:42:57.700
What's uncomfortable. Yeah. Yeah. So again, strength training, um, you know, maybe running
00:43:04.600
a marathon, uh, or just learning to run in general. Maybe it's, uh, some sort of a relay
00:43:10.980
race or learning to bike or swim, like the things that I know you've done, uh, or you want
00:43:16.640
to hike, uh, a certain peak in your area of where you live. Like to me, it's gotta be physically
00:43:22.360
related. Cause I think for men generally, maybe more so our physical growth and our mental and
00:43:28.440
emotional growth are inextricably connected. Like they are, they are so deeply connected that
00:43:35.520
our physical suffering can trigger mental and emotional development. And so I find it through
00:43:45.720
jujitsu, but you could find it on the mountain. You could find it hiking. You could find it in
00:43:49.080
isolation, but yeah, physically I think is the best way for men. I wish I had a better
00:43:53.660
answer for you, but that's it. Yeah. I mean, even if you think about public speaking, Ryan,
00:43:59.640
it's kind of a physical element too, even with that, like if, if I was afraid of public speaking
00:44:04.520
and I signed up to present something in front of a bunch of people, like I could do that in
00:44:09.160
my mind, but that's a different story than walking up on that stage and going, okay, I'm,
00:44:15.180
I'm confronting something that, that causes a lot of uncomfort here. Right. And so I, I, I mean,
00:44:21.480
maybe Bruce, one of the ways you do this is what are those areas that you're uncomfortable,
00:44:25.100
right? You're uncomfortable getting punched in the face. Sign up for martial art. See what that
00:44:31.120
feels like. Yeah. If it's public speaking, go to Toastmasters, like figure out where you're
00:44:37.620
uncomfortable, what you're avoiding and maybe perhaps go after it with reason.
00:44:42.340
Yeah. I think that's a good, I think that's a good point. That's a good indicator is if it's
00:44:45.520
and look, I'm not saying that anything that is uncomfortable, you should do. Cause if it has
00:44:51.100
no meaning for you, then like, why I'm not telling you to go like, go, go beat yourself up for no
00:44:57.720
reason. That's silly. But if there's something that sounds meaningful and important to you,
00:45:04.080
then yeah, I think being uncomfortable or having some discomfort over it is a good enough reason to
00:45:12.340
Yeah. Jeff fluid. I have someone in my life whose actions are not always consistent with what he
00:45:19.980
says he values when with a smaller, more familiar group, he holds true to his values when interacting
00:45:27.440
with a wider group. He does not. Do I just accept this is who he is or do I try to help him course
00:45:40.780
Like he's a friend. Is it a friend or a family member? Did he say?
00:45:45.520
Someone in his life. So I would assume that, but yeah, it's a, it's a friend or a family member.
00:45:49.920
If it's not, I mean, maybe you're going to, it's less important that you do, but if it's a friend,
00:45:53.960
like, why wouldn't you do that now there's a way to do it and there's a way not to do it,
00:46:00.020
but if it's a friend, absolutely you should. And so one, one thing is obviously be an example.
00:46:05.860
That's kind of the, the primary answer, you know, being at being an example, but let's just say you
00:46:10.660
have that checked off. You are already being an example. I think you probably should talk to him
00:46:15.620
depending again, this depends on your relationship with this person, but I don't, I don't think it's
00:46:22.020
too much of a stretch for you to go say, Hey, you know, Kip, um, I I've, I've noticed a few things
00:46:27.580
and man, I love you and I want you to win and I want you to thrive and succeed. And I feel, I feel
00:46:32.500
compelled to give you a little bit of feedback that I think might help you. Are you, are you open to
00:46:38.400
that? If I sense any sort of hesitancy, I probably wouldn't share it. Like if you're like, um, you know,
00:46:45.400
but if you said, yeah, I'm open to that, I'd be like, okay. And I would, I would try to be as
00:46:49.340
tactful as possible, but yeah, I think if you're a friend, you have a responsibility to, to friend
00:46:55.120
somebody, which means that you're going to have to do some things that aren't always comfortable
00:46:59.100
and aren't always safe. And part of that means that if a friend's struggling, then you need to
00:47:04.220
bring it up. Now, if, if you bring it up and he continues to do it, okay, well, like you've done
00:47:11.440
what you can do and then you got to let it ride from there. You don't need to keep beating it up.
00:47:15.400
You don't need to keep bringing it up over and over again. And at that point I would say, okay,
00:47:19.100
well, this is just the way it is. And until he asked for my help, um, or he's struggling,
00:47:24.500
like really struggling thing, I'm just not going to step in. And, but I think the first course of
00:47:30.120
action is to address it. Yeah. A hundred percent. Wouldn't you say?
00:47:35.680
Totally. And I do think, let me ask you this, Ryan.
00:47:39.480
If I were, I think it's different if I was annoyed by you. So, so if you were showing up a
00:47:49.320
certain way and it's pissing me off, that's different. That's a different strategy than if
00:47:55.840
I'm like, man, you know, I, Ryan, I see the potential man, but you're shooting yourself in
00:48:00.260
the heel. You know what I mean? And I want to help you that has more genuine to it. The other one might
00:48:05.240
just be, you're being a victim and you're being easily triggered by someone else. And you want to
00:48:09.500
make them wrong for the way they're showing up. That's different. And I want to be really clear
00:48:14.360
on that. Right. But if it's coming from a position of like, you know, I had a conversation with someone
00:48:20.120
last week about, I had a really difficult conversation for an hour and a half with someone
00:48:23.900
literally last week about this very kind of this thing, like, dude, you're, you're doing okay.
00:48:29.200
Right. I'm not criticizing you, but your potential is over here. And I think you're kind of shooting
00:48:36.200
yourself in the foot because you're not keeping up with your commitments. Right. And, and how can I
00:48:41.320
help? Like, it was really from a genuine place of like, how do I help you level up so you could take
00:48:46.800
advantage of more opportunities and growth, but it wasn't from a, from a position of me being frustrated
00:48:53.460
or annoyed. And those are two different things. Yeah. I think, I think that's well said. You,
00:48:59.260
you really do have to evaluate your motives. If you're just frustrated, deal with it or move along
00:49:05.540
or don't spend time with that person. But if you care about somebody, then there's an, there's,
00:49:11.160
there's, I was just writing on this idea in the book. If you care about somebody, then that means
00:49:17.160
you want to serve that person. And in order to serve another person, there has to be an element
00:49:24.300
of sacrifice. You can't serve. If there's no sacrifice, it's not service. Yeah. If you're
00:49:30.400
not sacrificing something. So in this case, if you care about somebody enough that you want to serve
00:49:35.720
them, then the sacrifice is your own discomfort. And that's probably really why you'd even question
00:49:43.420
whether or not to have the conversation, you know, the guy needs it. You know, it'd really help if
00:49:48.600
he implemented your advice. Okay. He, you know, he's going to be uncomfortable to check. We already
00:49:54.020
got that, but are you more worried about your own sense of security than you are about his wellbeing?
00:50:01.060
Because if you are, you won't do it. Right. Like, ah, and we say, here's what we say. We say like,
00:50:07.520
I don't want to put like that person in uncomfortable position. No, I don't think so. I think you don't
00:50:12.280
want you to be in an uncomfortable situation by him being uncomfortable. Yeah. Or him being pissed
00:50:20.760
or upset or whatever. So the motive is you. So again, if you're really wanting to serve somebody,
00:50:27.900
there's a sacrifice, there's a price to be paid. And this case it's discomfort or the sacrifice is
00:50:34.840
your own comfort. Yeah. And the risk of losing a friend. Like that's another thing that could happen
00:50:41.840
actually. You know, and I've seen that like a friend goes and approaches somebody and he's like,
00:50:46.700
Hey man, I really care about you. And I just got to put this out there and they've lost friendships.
00:50:52.320
That's a real risk, but that's the price that needs to be paid. If you really are a friend,
00:50:58.220
if not just be an acquaintance and that's good enough, but a friend is something deeper.
00:51:02.120
And what's fun about this or related to this, and it's kind of a fun conversation I was having with
00:51:09.120
one of my employees last week about having difficult conversations and coming across wrong.
00:51:15.420
And, and I suggested to them that when you get the mindset, right, you'll come across correctly.
00:51:23.380
In most cases, it's usually like, you know, when most people come across like arrogant or overly
00:51:31.580
critical, it's because they're probably arrogant, overly critical. So like you want to do a really
00:51:36.780
good job at helping someone get clear in your head first. And, and why are you truly wanting to help
00:51:43.780
them? And, and it gets a hell of a lot easier to approach it tactically and carefully because you
00:51:51.400
have the right mindset and it's going to come across genuine, your body language and everything.
00:51:57.160
That's a really good point. I mean, I've, I, here's how, you know, somebody is not as they'll
00:52:01.480
say these, well, I'm just telling the truth. I'm just calling it. Like I see it. Okay. That has
00:52:05.480
nothing to do with you wanting to help somebody. It has to do with you liking the sound of your own
00:52:11.320
voice, or you want to jack yourself off enough to feel good about what you're doing.
00:52:18.440
I'm just being honest. Okay. That's not what we do when we help people. It's not about being
00:52:26.000
honest. It's about delivering a message in a way that will resonate. Yes. You want to be truthful
00:52:32.960
about it. Of course, but that's not the motive. The motive is not to be honest. The motive is I want
00:52:39.440
to serve this person and I'm going to use honesty to help that. Or I'm going to use a certain language
00:52:48.420
and I'm not going to use other language. And I'm going to worry about the inflection of my voice
00:52:53.520
and the tone and the volume, because I really want this message to land. Cause I think it'll
00:52:59.140
help somebody. And somebody that comes with the attitude of like, what's your problem, bro? I'm
00:53:03.240
just being truthful. I'm just calling it like it is. If you can't handle it, that has nothing to do
00:53:08.420
with the other person you say you're trying to serve. Yeah. Yeah. Colton Briner.
00:53:14.540
How do I control feeling like I'm better than almost everyone? You know what? We're going to
00:53:19.840
skip this question. Ryan's not going to be able to help you. Are you serious? Is that really?
00:53:24.620
No, I'm just joking. No, it is a legit question. I'm just playing. All right. Let me read it again.
00:53:31.520
How do I control feeling like I'm better than almost everyone I come in contact with? I'm currently
00:53:37.000
doing phase two, a live hard program and knocking out almost every quadrant on my battle plan. And I feel
00:53:43.540
myself pushing myself and growing towards my vision and goals. But when it comes to having
00:53:47.920
mundane conversations about sports on TV or how many beers to drink, I can't help, but feel like
00:53:54.440
why I even wasted my time talking to that person. I still have compassion and I want to see others
00:54:00.960
improve, but the ones that have shown no interest in, in it, I can't see the reason to even carry on a
00:54:08.000
worthless conversation. Thanks for all you guys do. You know what? We can't relate Colton. We can't
00:54:13.460
relate. I'm sure. Yeah. I mean, that's a ballsy question. Like I do, I do appreciate the honesty
00:54:20.800
about it for sure. Oh, and let's be honest. You feel the same way, Ryan. I mean, if you were totally
00:54:26.660
relate, if you didn't meet up and all the guys were like talking about the sports game about how,
00:54:32.280
you know, so-and-so got plastered the night before you'd be like, why am I hanging around
00:54:37.200
these idiots? Right. So, but I don't jump to like, I'm better than them when I hear that,
00:54:45.220
like that, like, so like if a guy is like, they're on a different path. Right. And I don't,
00:54:50.740
and I'm not interested in walking on that path. And so I don't think I'm better than them. I'm just
00:54:56.080
not interested in that path. Like it just, it's never crossed my mind that I'm like, these guys are
00:55:01.820
losers. Cause they talking about the Superbowl. I'm like, I don't care about, I don't even know
00:55:07.420
who's in this. I don't even know who's winning the Superbowl or who's in it. Or I don't even know
00:55:12.060
when it is like, cause I don't care about that. But like other guys, like, I think there's more
00:55:17.560
important things to worry about, but if a guy's like, yeah, I'm really worried about this particular
00:55:21.660
team that made it to the Superbowl, all the power to you, bro. I hope whatever you are looking
00:55:26.620
for in life is yours. And I genuinely mean that. Like, I hope you get what you want,
00:55:30.260
but I'm, I'm not better than them. So I think we need to be careful of casting our own
00:55:37.120
desires and ambitions on other people. I think this is kind of a stoic philosophy too, is like,
00:55:43.020
who am I to say that my path is your path? And people will tell me that all the time.
00:55:47.520
Ryan, you, somebody the other day is like, you're getting a little preachy on the blah, blah, blah,
00:55:52.180
on my Instagram or whatever. And I'm like preachy. Like, that's my job. My job is to tell you my
00:55:57.800
opinion. That's why you, that's why you follow me because I'm preachy. Yeah.
00:56:02.760
And if you don't like what I'm saying, then find somebody else who you like, what I'm saying.
00:56:07.540
It's, I just don't understand why we think that we need to project ourselves onto other people.
00:56:12.980
And this, I think requires a level of maturity to the point where you're like, I really don't care
00:56:19.540
at this point, what people do. I'm going to try to do everything I can to help them win and to give
00:56:27.380
them the tools and resources that I think will help to give them information, to bring guests on
00:56:31.860
the podcast. But I got to wash my hands after that. Like I can't, I can't wrap up my success in what you
00:56:41.040
do or you don't do. And it's arrogant to believe, to start to think like that anyways. Yeah. Like
00:56:47.960
just you get on the path that you want to get on, find other people who are already on that path.
00:56:54.080
And by the way, they could be ahead of you or behind you on the path. And there's value to both.
00:56:58.120
Like there's guys that I have in my circle who are further ahead of me on the path. And there's guys
00:57:03.340
who aren't as far as along as me on the path, but they're still my brothers because we're all on the
00:57:08.440
same path and I'm going to help them. And I'm going to have them help me. And it's just better
00:57:15.180
that way. Now, if somebody else is not on the path, I'm, I'm going to shake their hand. I'm going to
00:57:19.640
look them right in the eye. And I'm going to say, I wish you really well on the path. Here's where I'll
00:57:24.140
be. If you ever feel like you want to walk this path with me, let me know you are welcome anytime
00:57:31.280
and then be done. And that's okay. But there's, there's a little bitterness in this question.
00:57:37.160
Um, and I think maybe it's because I'm not trying to project here, but I think maybe it's because
00:57:44.220
you don't have the caliber of men in your corner that, that you should, and you're just hoping
00:57:49.760
all these other guys will, will become that. And they just might not, and they're not meeting your
00:57:56.300
expectation, right? It's like, no, you shouldn't be this way. And one thing I've always loved,
00:58:01.420
and I know it's a play on words and a thought process, but, but it's helped me deal with
00:58:06.660
difficult relationships of my life is that if I were Ryan and I was raised the right,
00:58:13.540
the way that Ryan was raised, I would make the same decisions he makes. And so there's some power
00:58:19.460
in just having some empathy, you know, it's like, you know what, I, everyone's on a different place
00:58:24.100
and, and they're on that place because a whole lot of different circumstances and who am I to
00:58:29.640
back to what you're saying? Who am I to say they should be any different right at this time in their
00:58:34.140
life and then be okay with where people are, you know? And, and what does that have to do with you
00:58:39.760
anyways? Like, so the, so the guy wants to talk, wants to drink beer and, you know, talk about the
00:58:46.300
weather or sports. What does that have to do with me? That doesn't impact my life. Like now, okay.
00:58:52.740
Now, if I had somebody in my life that I was relying on, like my wife wasn't elevating her life.
00:58:59.760
Okay. Those would be conversations we need to be having. And it's affecting you. Yeah. Yes. Yeah.
00:59:04.600
But if some guy is like not on the same playing field as me or whatever, it's like, okay.
00:59:11.740
Yeah. Like that's it. Like, okay. I bet you're right, Ryan. And we're, we're projecting on you a
00:59:17.420
little bit. Um, it was Colton, but you know, maybe he doesn't have those guys in his life.
00:59:23.600
Right. And he's, he's got to get tired. You know, it's like, I get that. I can definitely
00:59:27.700
understand that people that's on the same path as me and it's getting old. Um, you just need to find
00:59:33.140
those guys. So, so that way it's, you won't project on these guys as much. You're be as annoyed by
00:59:38.560
these other guys. Once you get, I mean, that's why I started the iron council. Yeah. Like I told you
00:59:43.880
guys, the reason I started because of what, of this question, like all the guys that I knew were
00:59:49.400
more interested in the parties and the, you know, hanging out on the weekend or where they're going
00:59:54.800
to Mexico or Lake power, whatever. They were so concerned with that. And they weren't concerned
01:00:00.740
with the things I was concerned with. And it was frustrating. That's a frustrating thing. So then I
01:00:05.880
started to make relationships with people who were on a different path and that became less
01:00:10.600
important to me, what other people did or how they spent their time. In fact, some of those,
01:00:15.820
some of those people are still my friends because they've, they've changed their life and they've
01:00:21.120
gotten on another path, you know, might've taken a different route than it took me, but they're on
01:00:25.880
that path now. And, you know, we still spend time together. We still talk and have conversations,
01:00:30.840
but like, I don't, you, you got to find those people and you got to become that kind of man and you
01:00:35.960
got to go where those guys are. And then you got to add a value into their lives. And that's how you
01:00:39.680
become friends with these types of people. Totally. Yeah. And if you want your mind really
01:00:43.940
blown, just realize that Ryan wanted friends because he had none and somehow got a thousand
01:00:50.820
friends willing to pay him to be his, to be my friend. Who pulls that shit off? Right? Like
01:00:56.300
that's awesome. That's hilarious. I haven't thought about it like that, but that's actually really
01:01:01.780
paid friend membership for the guy who had no friends, you know, that's right.
01:01:06.340
That's quite impressive. That's funny, man. That's really funny. All right. What else we
01:01:13.660
got? Let's take a couple more. Okay. One more. I got a jet after this one, if that's okay. So John,
01:01:19.580
John, he's like, he even gave me the pronunciation. I saw that pronunciation of the Jenkinson. All right.
01:01:27.140
John Jenkinson. The area I struggle with is building meaningful, intentional relationship
01:01:33.480
and friendships with other people in my community. My observations are that there, that they, that there
01:01:38.900
are stages we experience as we get older, where there are friendships we develop due to, uh, due to
01:01:46.540
when our kids were younger with other adults, as they get into their teens and we lose those
01:01:52.320
connections. It doesn't help that I've been a loner most of my life and cautious of making new friends
01:01:58.200
relationships as I have inherent, uh, skepticism or, uh, of others due to underlying issues that I
01:02:05.660
left a mark on me. Sorry. I'm slaughtering this, John. The question is, how do I overcome this? I'm
01:02:10.620
51. I feel confident in who I am as a husband and a man, though. I feel I set in my own, in my ways in
01:02:17.240
many aspects. How do I overcome what, how do I overcome? He said he's a loner. He's the skepticism
01:02:25.740
of other people. Yeah. And maybe like, well, what it sounds like is we have friendships. Our kids
01:02:32.420
were like teenagers together. Then we lose those friendships because they don't have the common
01:02:37.240
kid thing anymore. He's older and he he's overly, um, cautious. It sounds like with establishing
01:02:44.920
relationships. How does he, how did I think really, how do I move on or generate better relationships as
01:02:52.200
he's older? Well, I, I, what I'm hearing when you say that is, do you even feel like you need these
01:02:57.480
relationships? It's true. Right. Because to me, the way I'm hearing this question is like, I'm good.
01:03:04.500
I'm, I'm sad. I'm comfortable. I'm, I'm, I got things dialed in. And so like, I almost to me sounds
01:03:11.940
like there's some sort of external belief that you're supposed to have these friends, but you really
01:03:18.060
don't quite believe it in your own heart and mind. So if that is an accurate read, then yeah,
01:03:24.520
of course you're going to struggle making friends. Of course, you're going to have skepticism. You don't
01:03:28.600
even know the reason why you would want to have friends. So I would start there. Like, is it,
01:03:34.580
is it that you can't make friends or that people can't be friendly with you? Or is it that you don't
01:03:39.260
see the value in it? And, and that actually goes back a little bit to the last question of like,
01:03:44.220
and if all your friendships are just kind of trivial and nonsensical and unimportant,
01:03:49.620
then why would you be optimistic towards, right? Why would you be optimistic towards that? So what I,
01:03:54.820
what I would do and suggest if, if I'm reading this correctly, maybe I'm completely off base
01:03:59.440
is start thinking about why this would be good for you in the first place.
01:04:05.780
And is it something you actually need? Now I think it is, but I'm not going to answer that for you.
01:04:10.640
You, you're going to have to determine if having a couple of guys in your corner,
01:04:15.120
high caliber men in your corner are worth the risk. This goes back to your skepticism,
01:04:20.500
worth the risk of engaging in a relationship with. And again, it's a give and take it's service.
01:04:26.680
So there's an element of risk. You have to determine whether or not it's worth it.
01:04:31.560
I think it is. I think you're going to be more fulfilled. I think you're going to have somebody to
01:04:35.680
talk with. I think somebody is going to help you be more accountable to what you want to accomplish.
01:04:41.080
I think they're going to challenge you in ways that maybe your wife can't because she's a woman
01:04:45.640
and she's your wife, not to diminish her role at all. And so I think it's valuable. And if it is,
01:04:52.700
then you need to risk the, the, the, the, whatever it is you're afraid of. I don't know what you're
01:04:59.720
afraid of, but you, you need to risk that in order to go out and get what it is that you want and why
01:05:06.380
it will serve you. So Ryan, once he comes to that conclusion, recommendations of, okay, you know,
01:05:13.060
it's worth the risk. Now what? Yeah. Go where those guys go, where they congregate, you know,
01:05:18.500
successful people are involved in business. If you're a little bit older, let's say you're retired
01:05:23.200
and I don't know, John, if you are or not, but let's say you're on the tail end of your career.
01:05:27.100
Um, you know, that might be at, at golfing or a country club or something like that.
01:05:33.240
Um, also another great place is charitable organizations within your community. Like I
01:05:39.440
know a lot of ultra successful businessmen who are involved in lions club and rotary and these sorts of
01:05:46.480
things. And, you know, maybe they've retired or they're on the tail end of their career. And so
01:05:52.100
they're looking for ways to give back and still be involved in the community and still feel like they
01:05:56.120
want to be active and contribute. And those are great places and they would love to have,
01:06:00.620
they're always looking for more members. So go, go visit rotary, go visit lions club. Um,
01:06:07.020
you know, maybe it's, uh, uh, VFW or American Legion and go to, go to the, I don't know if you're in the
01:06:15.000
military, but go to those places and put yourself in their environments and then try to add value and
01:06:21.500
serve. And you're going to find high caliber men in those places for sure.
01:06:25.520
So we, we mentioned a couple of things, uh, reminder, if you're interested in perhaps
01:06:30.000
join the iron council, when we open that up, uh, go to the website, subscribe to the newsletter or
01:06:35.860
follow Mr. Mickler on the social media, uh, to learn more about the IC, go to order of man.com
01:06:41.780
slash iron council. And to follow Ryan on Instagram and Twitter, that's at Ryan Mickler.
01:06:49.060
Or anything else you would ask, sir, maybe ratings and reviews, I think was something
01:06:53.660
that's always helpful. Yeah. Ratings, reviews, just take 30 seconds. Like we want this to be
01:06:57.820
a two way street, you know, like we're, we're trying to add value. We're trying to get good
01:07:02.780
information to you. And you know, we're doing that. I can confidently say we're doing that because we
01:07:07.500
have a very successful podcast and we've been doing this for seven years in exchange. We would ask
01:07:12.940
that you just take 30 seconds, 60 seconds, jump in there, leave a rating review on Spotify or
01:07:18.500
iTunes or wherever you're listening. And, uh, it goes a long way. If tens of thousands of you do
01:07:23.820
that, we bump that visibility up. We, we get this information to more men and frankly, society becomes
01:07:30.480
better. I get so many messages from people who are like, what can I do? What can I, how do I get
01:07:35.580
involved? What can I do? What can I leave a rating review? Oh no, something else. Okay. Well, like I'm
01:07:41.140
giving you things that you can do. This is a very small and simple thing that you can do. And then
01:07:45.420
we'll build from there. There's other things too. That's not the only thing, but it is a thing.
01:07:48.880
So we would ask for that. That's all I got. Excellent. Okay, cool. All right, you guys. Well,
01:07:53.920
we will be back on Friday. Uh, go listen to yesterday's podcast with Brian Callen. I think
01:07:58.160
you guys will really enjoy that one. It was a very entertaining, informative conversation for me.
01:08:02.560
That's for sure. Uh, and then we'll see you on Friday until then go out there, take action
01:08:06.900
and become the man you are meant to be. Thank you for listening to the order of man podcast.
01:08:11.700
You're ready to take charge of your life and be more of the man you were meant to be.
01:08:16.060
We invite you to join the order at order of man.com.