Order of Man - November 24, 2020


The Battle for Masculinity | NICKY BILLOU


Episode Stats

Length

1 hour and 1 minute

Words per Minute

210.79453

Word Count

13,016

Sentence Count

915

Misogynist Sentences

46

Hate Speech Sentences

28


Summary

Masculinity is on the decline, not just anecdotally but also statistically. In this episode, Ryan and Nicky discuss the reasons for this, and how to reclaim and restore masculinity. This episode is brought to you by Origin Maine, and the Order of Men Podcast and Movement.


Transcript

00:00:00.260 Masculinity is on the decline. I say that not just anecdotally, but also statistically.
00:00:05.120 If you look at testosterone levels, degrees of strength, and our increasing inability to delay
00:00:11.540 gratification for the betterment of ourselves and others, I think it's painfully obvious that men
00:00:16.100 generally aren't what we once were. And there's a myriad of reasons for this. And my guest today,
00:00:22.100 Nikki Billu, and I talk about what those reasons are from the changes that we see in society,
00:00:27.800 both positive and negative. The increasing lack of fatherless homes. We talk about
00:00:32.600 taking fault versus assuming responsibility. The third entity of the relationship with our wife,
00:00:40.440 we go through that concept. Also the undermining of the family unit and the man as the head of his
00:00:47.080 household. We talk about so much more, but ultimately we talk about this battle for masculinity.
00:00:52.700 You're a man of action. You live life to the fullest. Embrace your fears and boldly charge
00:00:57.400 your own path. When life knocks you down, you get back up one more time. Every time. You are not
00:01:03.240 easily deterred or defeated. Rugged. Resilient. Strong. This is your life. This is who you are.
00:01:10.420 This is who you will become at the end of the day. And after all is said and done,
00:01:15.180 you can call yourself a man. Gentlemen, what is going on today? My name is Ryan Mickler,
00:01:20.540 and I am the host and the founder of the Order of Men podcast and movement. Welcome here. Welcome back.
00:01:25.300 If you're a man, this is the right place. If you want to be a better man, you want to improve your
00:01:30.220 ability to communicate effectively with the people you care about. You want to make more money. You
00:01:34.020 want to get strong. You want to get fit. You want to be capable, all things worthy of your endeavors
00:01:38.120 and pursuits. Then this podcast and this movement is designed to help you do exactly that. Guys,
00:01:43.960 we've had, I want to say close, probably even more at this point, over 300 interviews with some
00:01:49.920 absolutely phenomenal men, guys like Jocko Willink and David Goggins and Grant Cardone and Andy
00:01:55.400 Priscilla and Tim Kennedy. And we've got a very powerful lineup of guests coming up. So please make
00:02:02.620 sure you subscribe, leave a rating and review. I don't want you to miss anything that we're doing
00:02:07.060 here. And I want you, please, if you would, to share this show with other men who need to hear the
00:02:11.260 message of reclaiming and restoring masculinity. Now I've got a great one for you today with a good
00:02:15.660 friend of mine. But before we get into that, I just wanted to mention my friends over at Origin
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00:03:06.260 All right, guys, let me introduce you to my guest. His name is Nicky blue. He and I have been friends
00:03:11.400 for years. We've been trying to work on doing this podcast. He's been busy. I've been busy,
00:03:15.140 but we made it happen. We made it happen. I'm inspired by this guy's ability to speak
00:03:19.520 exactly what's on his mind. He cuts through all the clutter, the nonsense, the noise,
00:03:24.220 the BS that permeates much of our culture today. He's the author of finish line thinking how to think
00:03:31.060 and win like a champion. He's a highly sought after public speaker. He's a corporate trainer.
00:03:35.860 He's the host of the podcast, the thought leader revolution guys. You're going to hear exactly why
00:03:41.020 I think so highly of Nicky in this podcast today. And I know, I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that
00:03:45.900 you're going to walk away with a ton of insight, a lot of clarity that you may not have had going
00:03:51.020 into this conversation. So enjoy my conversation with Nicky, Nicky. What's up, my man. It's been a
00:03:57.800 long time in the works, but I'm glad to have you on the order of man podcast, Ryan, man. It's a total
00:04:03.700 honor to be here with your brother. Thanks for having me on. Of course. I've enjoyed our
00:04:07.860 conversations about men and masculinity and I think you've got some powerful insight. And so I know the
00:04:12.440 guys will really resonate with what you have to share. Tell me a little bit about your thoughts
00:04:17.920 just in general, because we've had these conversations about the state of affairs for
00:04:24.120 men in society today. I know that's very broad, but I think that will allow us to go down some
00:04:29.140 different paths and different veins for this conversation. Absolutely. Thanks for asking the
00:04:34.880 question. So Ryan, we live in a curious time in history, you know, throughout history, men have
00:04:42.480 been, as you put it, providers, protectors and presiders, right? It has been our traditional role
00:04:47.700 yet in the last 50, 60 years, at least in large parts of the Western world, that whole paradigm seems
00:04:54.760 to have been turned upside down. And men today, frankly, are lost. A lot of men don't know how to
00:05:00.920 be. The women's live movement happened in the 60s. And while I think a lot of the impulses behind it
00:05:07.620 were good impulses, they wanted to have legal equality for women, give women opportunities to
00:05:11.820 get into the workforce and so forth, there have definitely been some unintended consequences.
00:05:16.320 And one of the things is that the whole concept of a man being a masculine man, a powerful man,
00:05:21.900 who's their first family, who's their first society in his community has been turned upside
00:05:26.860 down. And there's this horrible, sexist phrase called toxic masculinity that whenever I hear it
00:05:32.800 makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up, that really, to me, is indicative of how society has
00:05:40.400 lost its way in terms of how it sees men, and really what the proper role of men ought to be in
00:05:46.520 society. You know what I'm saying?
00:05:47.960 You know, I'm curious what you think. I've got my own thoughts, but you know, some of the guys want
00:05:52.980 to hear my thoughts and some don't. So I'm curious what your thoughts are about specifically
00:05:59.640 the term toxic masculinity. Again, I have my own thoughts. Most people know what it is who are
00:06:05.480 listening to this podcast, but I'd really be really curious to hear it.
00:06:07.860 It's an anti-man sexist term, brother. It's an anti-man sexist term, and it needs to be banished.
00:06:12.160 Period. Full stop.
00:06:13.480 But let me say this, but is it though? I mean, look, maybe I'm playing a little bit of devil's
00:06:19.140 advocate here though, because I think what a lot of people say is they think to themselves,
00:06:24.940 well, you know, some of the atrocities that have been committed throughout history have been
00:06:33.020 perpetuated by men. And so I think what they're saying is that masculinity is, if it's used
00:06:40.360 incorrectly, can produce inferior results. Now, I don't happen to like the term either,
00:06:45.320 but I'm trying to see both sides of it to the best of my ability.
00:06:49.160 I totally understand. My thoughts on it are as follows, okay? If you're going to be fair to the
00:06:56.220 goose, you need to be fair to the gander. You know what I'm saying? If we don't want to use
00:07:00.840 pejorative terms about women and femininity, which I absolutely believe we don't, and I think it's
00:07:06.180 wrong to do so, we don't want to be using pejorative terms about men and masculinity.
00:07:11.640 That very term makes a lot of men feel less than that. There's something wrong with them,
00:07:16.540 even before they have an opportunity to demonstrate who they are through their character. And yeah,
00:07:21.120 for sure, men have done some terrible things throughout history, but let's face it, you know,
00:07:24.880 men aren't the only ones who've done terrible things throughout history.
00:07:27.180 Women have done some terrible things throughout history too, and it's,
00:07:30.840 it's not about putting people down. You know what, you want to uplift women and girls,
00:07:34.880 I'm a hundred percent for that, but you also need to uplift men and boys, right? You got to do the
00:07:40.120 same, because if you don't, you're going to leave one gender feeling less than, and I got to be honest
00:07:44.760 with you, if enough men start feeling that the world doesn't value them, there is a part of men
00:07:49.900 that will fight back, and you're going to see that. A lot of men are going down this whole crazy
00:07:54.640 MGTOW movement. You're familiar with the MGTOW movement? I don't think that's a good thing for our
00:07:58.980 society to have men going down that way. And then there's, there's young men who without the proper
00:08:03.660 type of guidance on what the right kind of masculinity is, lose their shit and go do some
00:08:09.140 really crazy, heinous things out in the world. They go shoot people, you know, they get involved in,
00:08:14.120 in other crimes, and that's not a good thing. And I, I think it's really important for us
00:08:18.980 to understand that, yeah, the world has changed, no question about it. We're not going to go back to
00:08:23.080 how things were 60, 70, 80, a hundred years ago, but we can go forward, bring in the best of what
00:08:29.860 being masculine is all about to men and boys and to society. And if we do that and we honor men the
00:08:35.220 same way we honor women and girls, it's going to be a beautiful thing for the world. And it's going
00:08:39.420 to be a beautiful thing for the relationships between the genders.
00:08:42.700 I, I, I agree in that, uh, men and boys and women and, and young women need to be edified and uplifted
00:08:49.080 and honored for who they are specifically and uniquely. You know, one thing you said is that
00:08:54.820 we don't want to go back to 60, 70, 80 years ago. What do you see as being the problem with
00:08:59.980 reverting back to that form of masculinity, if that's the right term?
00:09:05.860 I don't think there's anything wrong with the form of masculinity that we had back then.
00:09:09.800 Absolutely not. But I think in terms of societal norms, I think in terms of the role that women play,
00:09:15.160 a lot of women today are not going to be happy going back to saying, look, all I want to do is
00:09:18.900 go be in the home. As much as I think it's important for, for, for men and women to make
00:09:24.360 their own choices. And there are women who are going to want to choose to be home. And I think
00:09:27.380 that's the great thing. Like when I was married and my wife and I had babies for a while, she stayed
00:09:31.720 at home with the kids and I'm so grateful that she was able to do that. But for a lot of folks,
00:09:36.180 you know what? The world has changed. They want to go be able to make their own way in the world.
00:09:40.040 And if women want to do that and they're all empowered in doing that more power to them.
00:09:43.620 But the form of masculinity that we had back then in terms of, you know,
00:09:47.380 men understanding their role as men in terms of men honoring their families, in terms of men
00:09:53.160 honoring women a certain way and being gentlemen, I think those parts of masculinity, we should go
00:09:58.220 back to and make them the new future. I just don't think we're going to go back to a world where a
00:10:02.400 woman stayed at home and men went out to work. I don't think that's ever coming back.
00:10:06.020 I agree. But at the same time, I actually, it's a little disappointing to me from my perspective.
00:10:12.720 My wife, for example, is a homemaker. And you know, what's funny is when you use the term
00:10:18.680 homemaker, I think everybody's kind of like, should I use that term? Like, does it have a
00:10:24.020 negative connotation? And I say it proudly. My wife turns this house into a home. She raises our
00:10:30.020 four children. She provides dinner. She has bees that she keeps. She cans food. She makes dinner for us.
00:10:38.560 Like I say that proudly. And I get so frustrated when I hear just societally, and I'm generally
00:10:45.040 speaking here, I'm using broad general terms here. It seems to me that society has diminished the role
00:10:50.740 of a woman in the home. And I think that's just as honorable, if not more so than a woman who goes
00:10:57.600 out into the workforce. And it's very discouraging and disheartening when I see collectively society
00:11:03.180 say that a woman needs to be a man in order to be valuable. And that's the furthest thing from the
00:11:09.680 truth. It's very frustrating to me, especially with a wife who stays at home and does a wonderful job.
00:11:15.120 I agree with you 100%. Kudos to your wife for what she does and for honoring that role of woman, wife,
00:11:20.960 and mother. And I think that's a great thing. Honestly, though, for a lot of people, that's not
00:11:25.500 really an option anymore. You know, there's a lot of folks today. Our world has changed. And that's a
00:11:30.260 really big conversation to have. But it's society's not teaching us to say, hey, you know what,
00:11:36.500 family formation is the right way to go. In fact, one of the things that society teaches us is,
00:11:41.220 you know what, you can get together with somebody, you can have kids with them. But if it doesn't
00:11:44.400 work out, just leave. It's all good. I think that's horrible. I think that's horrible. I'm a man who's
00:11:50.220 gone through divorce. I'm telling you, I don't recommend it. I absolutely don't recommend it. I have a
00:11:54.800 fantastic relationship with my ex-wife. I have a new lady in my life. You know, I get along with my
00:11:59.620 ex-wife. In fact, prior to all this COVID nonsense, my lady and I went on vacation with my ex-wife and
00:12:05.340 my kids together. And really? Yeah. Twice. Twice we've done that. It's pretty amazing. I know.
00:12:11.500 Interesting. But did she bring her, does she have a new husband? Did she bring him along?
00:12:16.460 She has a new husband. She didn't. He was welcome to come, but he's a musician and he had gigs. So
00:12:21.300 he couldn't make it. I'm just curious how this works. I mean, this is an interesting thing for me. So
00:12:25.580 I'm curious how that dynamic works. Yeah, no, for sure, man. He's a good dude. And I'm glad she found
00:12:31.940 somebody good to put into her life for herself. I'll tell you what, though, and I say this, you know,
00:12:38.120 I say this very clearly. I wish we would have been able to find a way to keep our family together and
00:12:43.400 to keep our marriage together. I think that would have been best for the kids. And I think that that
00:12:47.500 would have been, frankly, in the long term, best for us. And I say this as someone who's in love with
00:12:52.120 someone else, loves the relationship I have now. I'm really happy for my ex-wife. But I think
00:12:57.140 the best thing is for a family unit to be able to stay together. The reasons we broke up on the
00:13:03.060 surface of it, society today would say, oh, yeah, those are good reasons to break up. But honestly,
00:13:07.500 40, 50, 60 years ago, a lot of folks would have found a way to not break up over those reasons.
00:13:12.180 They'd have had some tough times, but they'd have had their community rally around them and help them
00:13:16.860 stay together. But it is what it is. It happens a lot these days. It's one of the reasons I'm a
00:13:22.860 champion for men. It's one of the reasons I like to participate in men's groups. You know,
00:13:28.620 I've got a men's group here in Toronto that I run. It's just a small group of a few men and I that
00:13:33.080 are together. I've done men's work. I've done Justin Sterling's Sterling Men's Weekend. I'm sure
00:13:39.260 you've heard of Justin and his work. He's been around doing this kind of thing since the late 80s for men.
00:13:44.000 Men need this work. Men really, really need to be around other men. That's why I'm so excited to be
00:13:51.040 here with you because, man, you are the biggest champion I know of men being with men, iron
00:13:56.800 sharpening iron. You know, the order of man allows men to do that. And you run a lot of fantastic
00:14:03.440 circles for men and you're at the forefront of making this happen. I just want to see the order
00:14:08.400 of men and other groups spontaneously around the world like this blow up in size so that every man,
00:14:15.120 every man on the planet has men that he can count on. He's got his men, men that he can call if he's
00:14:21.160 stuck at 3 a.m. in a Mexican jail. You know, because that sounds like you're talking from personal
00:14:26.500 experience there. No comment. But I'll tell you what, you need to have those kind of men in your
00:14:34.300 life. And those kind of men are the kind of men that you can talk to about anything. And if you
00:14:40.300 don't have those kind of men in your life, if you just got men that you sit around and shoot the breeze
00:14:44.340 and talk about the ballgame or how hot that woman looks or, you know, how funny that dude looks when
00:14:49.560 he's trying to approach that woman and she turns him down, that's not the kind of man that's going to
00:14:54.680 help you become a better man, that's going to help you become more successful in life,
00:14:58.200 in business, that's going to help you stop drinking too much, stop eating so much, get yourself in
00:15:03.660 shape. Not going to be the kind of man who's going to push you and say, hey, man, you're not protecting,
00:15:08.480 presiding, and providing the way you ought to be for the people that you care about.
00:15:11.980 You need the kind of men that are going to push you to be better than you currently are.
00:15:17.440 I want to talk about this idea of banding with other men. I think it's very important,
00:15:22.700 but I want to go back because I don't want to gloss over this. And I certainly don't want to
00:15:26.340 pry where my nose doesn't belong, but I think it'd be really helpful for the guys. You said
00:15:29.900 something interesting. You said, you know, the problems that you and your wife, your ex-wife
00:15:35.700 at this time had, you know, 60 years ago, maybe you've been able to work through those. Would you
00:15:41.480 mind disclosing what some of those issues were? Because I think that'd be helpful for the guys.
00:15:45.540 A hundred percent, brother. So back in, I have two sons and one was born in 2006, the other one in
00:15:55.940 2008. The one that was born in 2008, he was born with a condition called subglottic tracheal stenosis.
00:16:01.720 In English, that means his windpipe is too narrow. For you and me, it's not a big deal to have a
00:16:06.520 windpipe that's a bit too narrow. For a newborn, it's almost a death sentence. Not quite, but it can be.
00:16:14.080 Wow. So my son went to the hospital because he had a hard time breathing. When he was two months
00:16:20.160 old, he was in there for two weeks. We really got freaked out. And then again, at a year and a half,
00:16:24.660 it happened again. And this time, the doctor that originally looked after our son was on vacation.
00:16:30.780 So one of his colleagues took over and he was an alarmist and he freaked my wife out. And I mean,
00:16:35.360 freaked her out. This kid could die. We need to have this surgery. Now the surgery they wanted to have
00:16:39.840 involved sticking a tube down his throat, knocking him out,
00:16:44.080 opening up his trachea, making it bigger and adding some foreign material in there to permanently
00:16:49.400 make it bigger, leaving that tube down his throat for six weeks while he's knocked out.
00:16:54.700 Keep in mind, he's a year and a half old. And the chances of success are decent, 80%. But there's
00:17:01.320 a 20% chance of failure. And failure does not mean he goes back to where he was. Failure means he is
00:17:07.240 permanently damaged. He will have to have a hole in his throat for the rest of his life. He won't be
00:17:12.040 able to participate in sports or do normal things. To me, that was unacceptable. Now at the time,
00:17:17.940 my understanding and conception of how to be a man in a relationship as a marriage was not as
00:17:23.200 advanced as it is now. I felt that I had to be tough and strong. And I just was rough on my wife
00:17:32.080 verbally. I mean, not physically, but verbally. And I got angry with her. What I should have done is put
00:17:37.280 my arm around her and say, honey, I love you. This is our boy. I'm with you. We're going to get through
00:17:42.260 this together and guided her through that. What I did instead is I got into an argument and a fight
00:17:46.640 with her. And there were people around her. And unfortunately, this is something that a lot of men
00:17:50.320 are going to deal with. If you are married to someone and you've got a good relationship, sadly,
00:17:55.860 there are the kind of people that will come around her, both men and women, who want to break up your
00:18:00.200 happiness. And that's a fact. There's men who are going to want to try and take her away from you
00:18:05.280 and have an affair with her. And there's women who just are going to, they're going to hate to
00:18:10.120 see her happiness. And they're going to try and find a way to break it up. And they're going to
00:18:13.900 constantly be saying negative stuff in her ear. And I did not know this was going on. If I had,
00:18:20.360 I would have found a way to say, listen, these people are not pro-family. You need to not be
00:18:25.440 friends with them. Ryan, you know what I'm talking about? And she had these people around them.
00:18:29.540 And when we got into these fights, what they were saying to her, which had never really impacted her
00:18:34.160 before, fell on fertile soil. And she said, yeah, maybe you're right. Maybe this is guy. And I'm
00:18:38.780 from Iran. I'm from the Middle East. We're passionate, hot-blooded people. You know, never
00:18:42.760 raise my hand to a woman and I never will, but we definitely raise our voices and that can be equally
00:18:47.400 as bad, maybe even worse. And her friend said, this is not a good guy. You don't need to put up with
00:18:52.400 this, blah, blah, blah. And this other guy who wanted to frankly get into her pants, there's no better
00:18:59.120 way of putting it than that. He also got in and started putting little thoughts in her ear and
00:19:04.340 she just got to a space for like, nope, I'm not putting up with this. You're putting my son's
00:19:08.720 life at risk. You're from the Middle East. She went to the courts and said, hey, I'm worried you
00:19:13.500 might be taking the kids and not letting me do this. The surgery is necessary. It was rough stuff.
00:19:20.500 Initially, the courts all sided with her, you know, the story that she told him. And I don't blame her
00:19:26.980 because she was a mama bear trying to take care of her kids. And she, she had come to a space where
00:19:31.500 she thought at the time I was a threat. I absolutely was not. And I was going to do the
00:19:34.420 right thing for my sons, but that's how it came across. And I had to fight my way through that
00:19:39.460 to get my rights. Cause initially I wasn't allowed to see my kids. I had one of them, man. It was
00:19:44.480 awful for 41 days, brother. I could not see, speak or in any way contact with them. I wanted to crawl
00:19:49.640 into a hole and die. Not that I was going to kill myself. How did you not have, and maybe you did
00:19:55.580 initially, but any sort of animosity and contention towards her? I had tons brother. I had tons. I
00:20:02.980 hated her. I hated her. I went through horrible head spaces around all this, man. But guess what?
00:20:11.400 A friend of mine, a woman said, you need to join a men's group. Join a men's group. Why would I
00:20:16.200 join a men's group? No, no, no. You need to join a men's group. And there's this one man who works
00:20:19.580 with men who are in relationship distress. His name is Owen Williams. And Owen's an incredible man,
00:20:24.720 you know, um, it's, it's amazing how they say the best rapper in the world at the time was Eminem.
00:20:31.600 He's a white guy. The best golfer in the world at the time was Tiger Woods, a black guy. And the
00:20:35.380 best heterosexual relationship guy in the world was a gay guy named Owen Williams. So just hilarious.
00:20:41.880 And Owen, Owen ran a group for men. I joined that group. I was in that group for several years.
00:20:46.780 Owen saved my life. Owen helped me take responsibility. Owen helped me see that it wasn't
00:20:51.180 all her doing. He helped me. He helped me see that, Hey, yeah, she may have done some things
00:20:55.720 that weren't, you know, the best things from my perspective, but the only way I was going to get
00:20:59.540 out of this was to take a hundred percent responsibility. And it took me a while to get
00:21:02.860 to that space, but I did. And I remember I was in a, in a, in a circle of men and a group of men where
00:21:08.580 I was still angry with her. And one guy who I couldn't stand, Ryan, you know what I'm saying?
00:21:11.960 I couldn't stand this guy. And, and, and to this day at home, a great debt, but he's not the easiest guy
00:21:16.620 to be around. He just got up in front of me and he was just needling me, needling me. And I wanted
00:21:20.280 to deck him. I was so ticked off. I wanted to deck him, you know, and four guys got in the way
00:21:26.120 because I was going to do it. And then he looked at me and he just said, Hey man, when are you going
00:21:30.200 to stop blaming her? When are you going to man up and be a man and start seeing what you did to
00:21:34.580 contribute to this? When are you going to be a man? And he looked me in the eye again, as I was trying
00:21:39.540 to punch him and I just, I dropped my hands and I started to ball, man. I bawled and I bawled for like 15
00:21:45.620 minutes straight and all these men are watching me and they put their arms around me. And, and,
00:21:49.660 and, and, and the guy said, you done blaming her and Ryan in that moment, man, that was five years
00:21:55.760 later. After five years of dealing with this, all the venom left me, all of it, that instant,
00:22:01.660 we had a break because we were in a workshop with men and I, my phone had been turned off. I turned it
00:22:07.700 on. There's a call from her. She hadn't called me in months. And so I called her back and she started
00:22:14.280 to cry and she said, I'm so sorry. I've been trying to make you suffer and this is wrong and
00:22:20.060 you're a good man. And I know it didn't work out between us, but I am done making you suffer. I'm
00:22:25.060 going to sign the divorce papers because you know, she'd been pushing for the divorce. Then she
00:22:28.160 wouldn't sign him, even though I gave her everything she wanted. She signed him that day. The moment I,
00:22:33.020 I energetically let go of the venom, it hit her man. And that's when she did all that. And since then,
00:22:38.700 honestly, she's the easiest person in my life to deal with the easiest, easier than my kids,
00:22:44.480 easier than my current lady, easier than my mom. Well, look, a little contention is a good thing.
00:22:49.980 If it was easy, it wouldn't be fun. You know, that that's how I look at it. Like my wife and I,
00:22:54.880 she's hardheaded. She's stubborn. I'm hardheaded. I'm stubborn. And I like it because it's challenging.
00:23:00.600 It's fun. If it was easy and she was passive, I'd be like, Oh, this is boring. Like how boring and
00:23:06.520 lame would that be? So I like the contention. You know, one thing though, I'm interested in is
00:23:11.700 as you're talking about this, like taking ownership, taking responsibility for your
00:23:17.800 part to play in your relationship struggles. There's a lot of calloused men out there who I
00:23:23.900 know, I know of the hundreds of thousands of men who are listening are saying, well, yeah, but you
00:23:29.740 know, women are bitches and she did this and she was vindictive. And so she had a part to play in that.
00:23:36.520 Which I actually agree with, you know, it's a, it's a, it takes two to tango.
00:23:41.700 So what do you say to the calloused men who are like, yeah, but yeah, but my wife did this
00:23:47.700 and my wife did that. And, and, and it's not a hundred percent my fault. What do you say
00:23:53.740 to that guy?
00:23:55.040 Nothing's a hundred percent anybody's fault and fault and responsibility are distinct
00:23:58.940 and separate from each other. And I think it's really important. If you go into fault,
00:24:02.880 you're going to blame somebody else. You're going to blame yourself. I don't want you
00:24:05.840 to blame yourself. I don't want you to blame somebody else. Responsibility is you're able
00:24:10.540 to respond. Responsibility is a position of power. Taking a hundred percent responsibility
00:24:14.740 for anything, regardless of what somebody else did means that you have the ability and the power
00:24:20.880 to change the way you respond to that situation and make it different. Well, if you blame anybody
00:24:26.920 else, if you blame your ex-wife, if you blame the client who won't pay you, if you, and that's,
00:24:32.240 that's happened to me by the way, many, many times, including someone I'm dealing with right
00:24:35.480 now, if you, of course, yeah. And if you blame other people and you say, oh, it's their fault,
00:24:40.340 then there's no power there for you to be able to turn the situation around and make it better
00:24:45.100 and make it different. While if you take a hundred percent responsibility, then all the powers with
00:24:50.300 you, which means that you have the ability to reframe things in such a way that they can work better
00:24:56.700 for you. And that's what I have to say to those men. So number one, being a man, being a masculine
00:25:01.160 man is about being a hundred percent responsible. If you're the kind of man who doesn't take
00:25:05.960 responsibility, then I'm sorry, man, you're a soy boy. You're a beta male. You're not an alpha male.
00:25:10.560 You'll never be an alpha male. You're never going to live the kind of life you want to live
00:25:13.560 because you're always going to be at the effect of other people. Real men are not at the effect
00:25:17.920 of others. Real men are the ones who create effects for other people. You know, uh, mad dog
00:25:24.200 Mattis, when he was secretary of state under president Trump, one reporter asked him one day,
00:25:27.780 what keeps you up at night? He looked at her and he said, nothing keeps me up at night. I keep other
00:25:33.260 people up at night. I love that. And I just like, I'm like, God damn, that's me, man. I keep other
00:25:39.360 people up at night. I don't stay up at night. I sleep soundly. And that's the way it needs to be.
00:25:43.960 And I say this to men. Hey, listen, you know what? If you want to go and say women are bitches,
00:25:48.080 women are this, you know what? Women say men are bastards, men are pricks. So who's right. Who's wrong.
00:25:53.060 I mean, yeah, I've got, I've got a sweetheart in me and I've got a bastard in me and it's up to me
00:25:58.940 to regulate what those are. And you know what? The, the thing you need to understand about a
00:26:03.460 woman is hell hath no fury, uh, like a woman scorned or a woman that's that, that that's lost
00:26:09.300 faith and belief in you. And if that woman's being a bitch to you right now, there's at least a part of
00:26:14.420 that that you're responsible for. She fell in love with you because she fell in love with your
00:26:19.040 potential. She fell in love with the way you were behaving and treating her. Owen Williams taught me
00:26:22.960 this. Owen Williams is a genius. You ought to have him on your show sometime. That guy is
00:26:26.400 the most brilliant man when it comes to a relationship that I've ever met by far, bar
00:26:30.940 none. And he said, and she'll fall out of love with you based on your behavior. So if you married her
00:26:37.360 and then you decided, Hey, she won the lottery. I don't have to do anything else. I don't have to
00:26:41.820 court her anymore. I can just relax. You're wrong. You need to court her every day. You need to remind
00:26:47.820 her why she made a good decision in picking you because whether you, you believe it or not,
00:26:52.360 she did pick you. She may have made you feel like you picked her, but it was her that picked you that
00:26:56.820 allowed you to pick her in the first place. So make sure this woman feels on a day-to-day basis
00:27:02.380 that you are the right guy, that she did good. And I messed this up with my ex-wife. I should
00:27:09.200 have kept courting her. I should have kept making her feel she was special every single day. I should
00:27:14.660 have made her believe in me and continue to believe in me by my behavior and not just say that and sit
00:27:20.280 back like so many dudes do. So many men do this and go, she won the lottery. She got me. I'm married
00:27:26.840 to her. I don't need to do anything. I can sit on the couch, drink beer, get fat and not really work
00:27:31.880 too hard. And when she says, honey, will you, will you clean out the garage or take out the garbage?
00:27:36.620 I'll just grumble rather than say, yes, ma'am. Absolutely. Cause you're my princess and it's my
00:27:41.260 privilege to make my princess happy.
00:27:42.860 Men, as I do every week, I got to hit the pause button real quick. We're approaching the end of
00:27:48.920 the year. You know, that we're very close now. Many of you are looking for ways to make this new
00:27:54.320 year, 2021, the best year that you've ever had, especially on the back of one of the most
00:27:58.480 interesting that you've ever had, I guess would be the word interesting to put it mildly.
00:28:04.540 But the best place to start your new year on the right track is with our free battle ready program
00:28:10.140 over the course of the next 30 days. When you sign up, we're going to walk you through the exact
00:28:14.980 steps and strategies and tools. And we're going to give you a bunch of resources that you need to
00:28:19.940 reach maximum performance in every area and every facet of your life. I'm not going to beat a dead
00:28:27.120 horse here. If you want to improve your life, you want to get better and you want a system for making
00:28:31.420 that a reality. Then our 30 day battle ready program is the place that you need to get started.
00:28:37.640 And if you start today, here's the best part, because as of the release of this podcast, it's
00:28:42.740 the end of November, I want to say maybe the 25th. I don't know what I have to look,
00:28:47.660 but somewhere around there. Anyways, we're at the end of November. So if you start today,
00:28:52.000 you're going to be in a prime position at the end of December, going into 2021 to absolutely crush that
00:28:58.020 year. Unlike you have any other year. So get signed up for the battle ready program. You can do that
00:29:03.100 at order of man.com slash battle ready again, order of man.com slash battle ready. Do that right
00:29:10.040 after the show. Right now, I'm going to get back to it with Nikki. What's the difference though,
00:29:15.180 between doing these types of activities, you talk about being fat. So the antithesis of that is
00:29:19.940 continuing to train and work out and get strong and fit and everything else. What's the difference
00:29:25.120 in your mind between doing that for another individual, even if it happens to be your wife
00:29:30.020 and doing it for yourself? Honestly, it should be done for yourself. 100%. It should be because
00:29:36.820 that's who you are. And that's who you want to be as a man and as a human being in the world.
00:29:41.280 But the beauty, the beauty of it is that if you do do that, if you continue to try hard,
00:29:46.220 as it were in life, that's probably the type of behavior you were exhibiting when you were
00:29:50.820 courting her that had to be interested in you in the first place. While if you are a lazy slug,
00:29:56.300 women don't like lazy slugs, man. Women like men who are ambitious. And ambition doesn't mean you
00:30:01.620 want to be a billionaire necessarily. You know, you could be a guy who's got a job for the city,
00:30:06.020 but if you're ambitious to be the best father you can be, if you're ambitious to be the best
00:30:10.760 member of the community you can be, if you're ambitious to frankly build the best model cars
00:30:16.200 in the whole neighborhood, she's going to look at that and say, this man's got it going on.
00:30:20.720 He's sharp. I'm glad I'm with a man like this rather than Jenny's husband who just sits on the
00:30:26.980 couch, drinks beer, watches a football game, and never ever does anything to make her feel like she
00:30:34.140 is a woman who's lucky to be married to him. Nicky, one of the things that I appreciate you
00:30:39.540 and we've known each other for years now is I appreciate your enthusiasm and your excitement and
00:30:44.820 your assertiveness. How does the new woman in your life, maybe not new, I don't know how long you
00:30:50.800 guys have been together. Nine years, man. Nine years. So not new. Okay. So how, how does the woman
00:30:55.640 in your life deal with this level of assertiveness? Does she like it? Is it difficult for her? What are
00:31:02.160 the challenges or contentions that you guys have in your current relationship? You know, that's a very
00:31:07.220 good question. So, um, she would probably say she both likes it. She hates it. Yeah. She likes the
00:31:14.480 ambition in me. She likes the fact that I want to make a difference for people. We work together
00:31:18.340 inside my company. You know, she, she's, I know it's crazy. So I don't think my wife and I could do
00:31:24.120 that, brother. I don't think it's possible. Yeah. This is our logo that we got here for the company.
00:31:29.820 And she and I, we wear these, we, we, we, we work together. We love to, we, we love to work together.
00:31:35.580 And she's also, she set three Guinness world records for running 12 hours on a treadmill
00:31:40.000 brother. So she's a, she's, she's a, she's like a, she's like a girly David Goggins, man. She likes
00:31:44.660 this extreme stuff. It's pretty crazy stuff. Um, she loves doing that sort of thing. She's into it
00:31:51.860 and she likes that. I like that sort of thing. But part of me that she doesn't like is when I'm
00:31:56.560 in business mode, sometimes I forget she's my lady and I talk to her like she's a guy, which is not.
00:32:00.780 You know what? Look, I know what that's like. My wife has said, my wife has said in the past,
00:32:05.140 she says, you know, you're, you're, are you talking to me right now? Or are you talking
00:32:10.200 to your guys? Like, do I need to turn the camera on and hit record? Or are you trying to have
00:32:14.340 a conversation with me? I'm sure you relate to that.
00:32:17.300 A hundred percent, man. So this morning when I was talking to her, she called, I called her
00:32:21.600 about something for work. And I said, okay. She says, can you give me five minutes? 15 minutes
00:32:26.140 later, I'm looking, I'm going to listen, honey, I got to go. I got stuff to do. And she's like,
00:32:29.480 but wait a minute, this is important. And I'm like, I'm getting impatient. And I'm going,
00:32:33.040 I got stuff to do. I, you said five minutes. It's been 15 right now. I got to go. That's
00:32:38.120 the wrong thing to say to your lady. It's been 15. Really? The truth is the truth. Look,
00:32:44.080 the truth is the truth. That doesn't mean we can't be tactful about it, but the truth is
00:32:47.820 the truth. She hung up the phone on me. She was passed. She hung up the phone on me. I'm
00:32:52.760 like, okay, I did what I had to do. Cause I really did have to get some stuff done. I called her
00:32:56.740 back and I apologized and said, honey, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have done that. I just, you
00:33:00.440 know, I just need to get some stuff done. I know sometimes I treat you like one of the guys. I
00:33:04.860 apologize. And she says, no, no, no, it's good. You're great. I love you too. I'm sorry too. I
00:33:09.720 was just, you know, I wasn't mindful that you had to do stuff. So it worked out, but like in the
00:33:13.520 moment it can get pretty rough. You know, one of our friends, I don't know if I should say this,
00:33:18.860 but one of our, one of our friends, one of our friends said, you two are Leo's. This is the crazy
00:33:23.720 thing. We're both born on the same day, August 12th. That's insane. Really? Wow. Oh yeah. Yeah. It's crazy.
00:33:28.900 And my friends said, you know what? You two, your energy is like, you guys are going to either F or
00:33:34.320 you're going to fight. I'll let you figure out what the F is. So you guys need to do,
00:33:37.960 need to figure out. Hey, both are fun though, right? Both are fun.
00:33:42.780 So, all right, let me go back to the relationship with you, with your ex-wife.
00:33:48.200 You said she had some people in her life that, that were, you know, planting these little seeds
00:33:52.740 of contention and discontent in her, in her mind. Yes. How do you inoculate
00:33:59.020 a woman against that sort of thing? And look, I want to say this with a disclaimer. I'm not saying
00:34:07.200 that she needs to be protected or bubble wrapped or coddled or anything like that. It's not what I'm
00:34:12.600 getting at, but how do you ensure that these little seeds of discontent that other people would love to
00:34:18.620 so don't take root and that you're actually leading the relationship effectively?
00:34:24.320 What a great question. I'll tell you. So, and having been someone who didn't do a good job of
00:34:30.460 that in the past, I've given this a lot of thought and I've talked it over with a bunch of men.
00:34:36.680 And here's the best answer I've come up with. First of all, I think you both need to have a
00:34:42.300 conversation that there are people in your periphery and both of your peripheries who are not
00:34:47.560 going to be pro your family and pro your relationship. That's just the way it is.
00:34:51.220 And that you both need to keep a sharp lookout for them. And that if you notice that there's
00:34:55.780 someone who's not pro family and they're, they're just around you, but they're always making comments
00:35:00.660 and they're always inviting you to things that are not family oriented. I've got, I've had guys who've
00:35:06.080 said, Hey, you want to come out to the strip club with me? And I'm like, no, man, I'm in a long-term
00:35:09.600 committed relationship. I don't go to strip clubs. You know what I mean? But I like that guy cannot be
00:35:15.760 one of my regular friends. He cannot be one of my regular friends. Like, listen, we can talk once
00:35:19.940 in a while if he's part of a bigger gathering and I'm there. But if I hang out with them,
00:35:23.840 you, you become who you hang around with. And that's really important for you to understand.
00:35:27.280 And it's important for her to understand as well. So I don't hang around those types of people.
00:35:31.580 And I want her not to hang around the type of person who again is doing things to weaken the
00:35:37.840 relationship and weaken her bonds with me. And we both have had this conversation together. My current lady
00:35:43.580 and I have, and we both have an agreement that we're not going to be hanging around certain types
00:35:48.160 of people. She's a very beautiful woman. I mean, she's stunning, stunningly gorgeous. My lady,
00:35:53.240 right. She's like, she looks like a bloody movie star, you know? And, um, the truth of the matter
00:35:58.000 is because she looks like a, like a movie star, a lot of guys are into it. And a lot of guys show
00:36:02.700 that they're into it. Right. So, you know, I, when that happens, right. And she tells me that this guy's
00:36:08.520 doing this, I go, honey, what are you doing to hang around with this guy? She goes, I don't know.
00:36:11.980 I get it. I'm not hanging around with this guy. You know, I'm just letting you know this,
00:36:15.220 this, the kind of thing that happens. And it's, it's, it's an agreement that we've made
00:36:19.660 that if someone is showing interest, sexual interest, relational interest in the other
00:36:24.840 person, no matter how good a friendship we have with that person, we're going to get that person
00:36:28.420 out of our life because there's just too much of, I don't want to say a temptation, but too much
00:36:34.840 of a possibility of being around that kind of energy eroding, eroding the energy that you have
00:36:40.440 that, that keeps you solid and strong. You need to, you need to make sure that your environment,
00:36:45.020 I think is so strong that these types of, of seeds, if you will, can never fall on fallow
00:36:52.740 ground because it's possible for you and your wife to have arguments. It's possible for her to
00:36:56.880 be feeling bad about you a hundred percent. And you don't want to set the deck against yourself and
00:37:01.520 your family. Well, okay. So I'm going to piss a lot of people off, especially our female listeners,
00:37:06.680 as I say this, but you know what it needs to be said. And I'd say it to my wife too. And I've
00:37:10.100 had said it to my wife. Women tend to be in my experience, a little bit naive about sexual
00:37:16.880 interest from other men. They totally are. A hundred percent. It's just friends. Oh no,
00:37:22.120 he's not interested. They don't understand either. They don't understand or they don't acknowledge
00:37:26.220 it or they're, they're, they're, they're, they refuse to acknowledge it. I don't know what it is,
00:37:29.960 but women tend to be a little bit ignorant about that. I say that with all the love of my heart
00:37:33.940 for my women in my life. So when you have an attractive woman, like you say, your wife is,
00:37:40.480 or, or your, do you, what, what is it? Your girlfriend? Is it your, your partner? Like
00:37:44.600 that's her. Take a look. Beyonce. Okay. There she is an attractive woman. Okay. So you've got
00:37:49.560 your fiance. She's an attractive woman. She probably doesn't see advances from men the same way that you
00:37:56.540 see them. So I'm wondering if she feels like you're being, uh, overbearing or irrational when
00:38:06.100 it comes to these kinds of requests from you. Look, you're a hundred percent correct. Women tend
00:38:12.300 to give men the benefit of the doubt, maybe when they shouldn't certain men. And, um, they like to
00:38:18.960 see the best in people. I'd see the best in men. That's probably why they fell for you.
00:38:22.320 Yeah. Because if she had to fall in love with who I was, that would be a miserable proposition.
00:38:29.620 She fell in love with who I could potentially be your potential. That's it. Well, then fall in love
00:38:33.760 with a man's potential. Owen Williams taught me that too. So I, I totally get that, but they need
00:38:38.980 to understand that men, you know, when it comes to relationships and, and, and, and, and sexual
00:38:44.360 interests are really predators. They're the ones who go after, um, what they want. And sometimes,
00:38:50.740 uh, they're not above or below or beneath playing a role, pretending to be your friend when that's
00:38:57.620 not at all what they want. I've had this discussion. Yeah. I've had this discussion with my lady and
00:39:03.600 she, she, uh, she has not always seen things my way at the beginning, but I, I just, I sat with her
00:39:10.480 and I said, look, how would you feel if there was a woman who was interested in me that I hung around
00:39:15.960 with and went running with and had phone call and text conversations with, I asked her, how would
00:39:20.700 you feel? She took one look at me and she said, okay, I got it. It's done guys out. And just like
00:39:26.940 that, she did it because there have been some women who've shown an interest in me. I'm not as good
00:39:32.140 looking as she has to women as she is to men, but, but she has seen it. She's come to me really upset
00:39:39.240 and said, Hey, that girl wants you. And I've said, really? Cause sometimes I haven't noticed
00:39:44.840 that I've been pretty clueless about these things sometimes myself. Uh, but she said,
00:39:48.900 yep, a hundred percent. And I'm like, she's out, she's done. And, uh, some of these, you know,
00:39:54.600 some of these women have texted me and called me and said, Hey, you want to get together? And I said,
00:39:58.140 you know what, honestly, you know, I'm in a long-term committed relationship and I totally
00:40:02.080 appreciate that. That's maybe not your, even an interest on your end to try and explore anything
00:40:06.420 else. But my lady's uncomfortable. You're, you know, you're an intelligent, vivacious,
00:40:10.180 attractive woman. And out of respect for my lady, I can't hang out with you. And that's that. I say
00:40:15.180 that to women. And if it upsets them, it upsets them too bad. You know, that's how I feel about
00:40:20.400 it. I want my woman to feel good about me and how I comport myself when it comes to the respect that I
00:40:26.900 show her in our relationship. It's very important. Yeah. And I can appreciate that. I mean, if,
00:40:31.040 you know, if you're, if you're telling her, she needs to behave or, or act a certain way,
00:40:34.940 and yet you're not willing to uphold yourself to the same standard, then obviously you're going
00:40:38.640 to lose influence and credibility. And isn't that what being the man of the relationship is about,
00:40:44.560 is about credibility, authority, influence, but it's all voluntary. It's not like you're,
00:40:50.360 you're demanding that, or you're, you're seizing that you're requesting that. And then she can decide
00:40:55.960 whether or not she wants to voluntarily follow you or not. But the idea is that you can, I hate to say
00:41:03.160 it this way. It doesn't sound right, but that you can get her to follow you without having to
00:41:08.400 manipulate, coerce, or force her to. Listen, in a relationship, you both need to lead each other at
00:41:16.560 times. You know, uh, the, I'm a man. I like to say that I really don't have any relationship skills
00:41:23.160 compared to her. She's a relationship pro. I'm a relationship amateur. And there's a lot of things
00:41:28.020 that she knows about how to make a relationship run that I, that I just don't know, or don't have
00:41:32.520 the same skillset as her. And I follow her lead on a lot of things, but there are certain things
00:41:36.620 that I, you know, she needs to follow my lead on. And that's, that's the give and take of a
00:41:40.520 relationship. I really strongly believe that you need to show respect to each other, but there's the
00:41:45.980 third entity. Um, this Owen Williams calls a relationship, the third entity. So there's you,
00:41:51.680 there's her, and there's the third entity, the relationship, and all of them need to be nurtured
00:41:56.260 and respected. And you can't have a relationship last. If you know, the basic rules of how to keep
00:42:04.100 a relationship solid are not followed. And one of the basic rules is you don't let people in there
00:42:09.020 who are not pro the relationship. If there's people who are trying to damage the relationship,
00:42:13.460 those people got to go. That's like having a bad apple as an employee, somebody who's sowing
00:42:18.100 dissension in the ranks. You got to get rid of that person as soon as possible, because if you don't,
00:42:22.220 they're going to destroy all the good morale you have in your company and destroy it for you.
00:42:27.160 I agree. I agree. I think sometimes there's obviously resistance to that from one party
00:42:33.360 or the other, or sometimes a little bit of a voluntary blindfolding. Like I don't want to
00:42:39.800 acknowledge that this is what is happening. And so we don't deal with it. And then we say,
00:42:43.560 Oh, I was blindsided. Were you, or did you just refuse to acknowledge what was actually happening?
00:42:49.860 Right. I think that happens a lot of the times.
00:42:51.660 I felt blindsided too. That's what I said when, when my wife left me back in 2009. And in retrospect,
00:42:58.280 I shouldn't have been blindsided. I, I was messing up. I was messing up pretty badly in my
00:43:03.060 relationship. And if I had my eyes open, then I wouldn't have messed up and I'd have been able to
00:43:07.380 turn it around. Men need to understand. That's one of the reasons it's so important, Ryan, to be
00:43:11.820 part of a group of men, group of men who have your back because you can bring these kinds of issues to
00:43:16.400 them. And you can, you can nip it in the bud. You know, Owen said to me that by the time a woman
00:43:21.920 tells you she's thinking of leaving the relationship, she's been thinking about it without sharing it
00:43:27.180 with you for two years. That long. Wow. Interesting. So by the time she tells you she's 98% made up her
00:43:36.740 mind that it's over. And once she's fully made up her mind and closed her heart to you, your chances
00:43:41.780 of getting her back are nil. You don't want to wait for her to say, I think we've having problems
00:43:47.220 in our relationship. You need to pick up on those cues well beforehand. If you have any commitment
00:43:52.720 to keeping your relationship strong. One of the reasons I'm in a group with men right now is
00:43:57.740 because I buy, I tend to buy my own bullshit. I'm a man, you know, I weave a load of good bullshit out
00:44:03.900 in the world. It's part of how I'm successful in the world. And, and, and it's dangerous when you
00:44:09.340 start buying your own bullshit. Cause when you buy your own bullshit, you're done, you're done.
00:44:14.080 And having a group of men around me means I don't get to buy my own bullshit because these men are
00:44:19.240 going to call me out and they're not going to be gentle about it either. Not that they're going to
00:44:23.660 deliberately try and hammer me, but you know, if I'm, if I'm around the group and I'm saying some
00:44:29.320 crap about my lady, one of the men's going to go there and say, Baloo, that's the biggest load of
00:44:33.560 crap I ever heard in my life. Can you even listen to yourself? You listen to how you sound.
00:44:37.820 And then at first I get ticked off and I go, man, what the hell are you talking about?
00:44:41.940 Then I sit back and I go, yeah, wait a minute. He's right. He's completely right. I'm buying my
00:44:46.560 own crap. No, it's important to have men like that. Cause if they sugarcoated everything,
00:44:51.940 and this is actually one of the problems I see in society generally is I see a lot of women trying
00:44:56.380 to raise boys. And I know this anecdotally through the own, my own emails I receive from women. And if
00:45:02.520 you're listening and you're raising boys on your own, I'm telling you, you, you, you likely do the
00:45:07.600 best job that you can, but you're a woman. That doesn't mean you're inferior. It means that
00:45:11.820 there's something that's missing. You're not a man and you cannot raise a boy to be a man
00:45:18.560 any more than I could raise on my own, a young girl to be a woman. I don't know what it's like
00:45:24.600 to be a woman. A woman doesn't know what it's like to, to deal with the issues that boys have
00:45:29.600 and how to become men. And so you might raise a good and decent human being, but a woman cannot
00:45:34.700 raise a man. So ladies, if you're listening, and I know there's a lot of you, if you're listening,
00:45:39.180 you've got to get your boys around other men who can say the things that need to be said
00:45:45.860 and do the things that need to be done. I watch, for example, my last year, my, my son was playing
00:45:52.420 football and I watched that coach get right in his face and do the old knife blade right at him,
00:45:57.140 right in his face, man, just getting after him. Cause he missed his assignment. And I could see
00:46:01.340 my wife just like mama bear, just like, kind of like tussled up. And she's like,
00:46:06.820 I'm like, just take him out. She's going to take him out. Relax. Just sit there and be quiet
00:46:12.320 and let the boy learn from a man. And sure enough, he picked up his assignments. The coach came over
00:46:19.380 later, put his arm around him. I didn't hear what they said. I talked to my son after he said, yeah,
00:46:23.620 he just told me I missed my block. He gave me some instruction and gave me some coaching and all was
00:46:29.040 good. That's going to be hard for a woman to deal with, but men need to learn from other men how to
00:46:36.200 be men. It's, it's not going to happen any other way. You know, that's so true. And again, when I
00:46:42.040 was, when I was working with Owen back when my marriage first broke up, he, he made a very powerful
00:46:48.320 point. And this guy is just so brilliant, man. He said that between the ages of nine and 14,
00:46:53.960 uh, a boy needs a man around a boy needs a man around. Those are formative, powerful years for
00:46:59.680 him. And if he doesn't have good, solid, uh, men around role models who can teach him and set them
00:47:07.040 straight, he is, he's in for a rough ride. And those are the, those are the years in which single
00:47:12.560 mothers who don't have good men around their boys are going to have a rough time. You know, a couple
00:47:17.200 years back, I was talking to, uh, Warren, uh, Farrell, who I believe you've had on your show as well.
00:47:22.040 Yeah. The boy crisis. Yeah. Yeah. So he and I were talking about kicking around the idea of
00:47:27.340 putting a course together for single women, uh, single moms who had boys to, to help them with
00:47:33.880 this stage of a boy's life, to how to raise good men, men who would be able to go out in the world
00:47:39.000 and win. And I still think it's a good idea to do something like that because there's so many good
00:47:44.500 women out there who are single women and have, have boys who just at some stage don't get it.
00:47:50.560 Don't understand how, how to do what they need to do in order to help that boy navigate
00:47:55.160 that very precocious and difficult and challenging time where he transitions from being a boy to being
00:48:01.560 a man. Yeah. Well, you know, look, boy Scouts used to be that boy Scouts has lost its way.
00:48:07.920 Uh, competitive sports used to be that, but in the wake of this COVID, you know, agenda here,
00:48:13.240 uh, that that's been pushed by the wayside, all these institutions that, you know, first the
00:48:19.960 father was replaced and then everything that was replacing the father is now being replaced. And
00:48:23.920 it's a real travesty to our young men. It's very frustrating. And the things that Dr. Farrell talked
00:48:28.720 about the thing that Dr. Uh, Leonard Sachs talks about in his books, boys at drift and why gender
00:48:33.800 matters. These are all things that are only getting worse, which is why what you're doing and what
00:48:40.700 we're doing is so crucial, not only to men, but the boys who will be eventually become men.
00:48:46.520 Amen, man. Amen. A hundred percent agree. And you, you know, you, you, you talk about this a lot,
00:48:52.120 Ryan, you talk about holding the line and we need to hold the line and we need to make sure that we
00:48:57.560 raise the next generation of boys and men to be the kind of men that really the world has seen
00:49:03.440 throughout its history. The kind of men that, that go out there and, and protect the people that
00:49:08.600 come out of them, that provide for their families and that preside and help raise those families and
00:49:14.160 raise the children so that they can be productive, great members of society. We got to do that.
00:49:19.500 Um, I'm a big believer that, you know, maybe this didn't happen by accident. You know, there's a
00:49:24.860 fellow that I, that I come across, uh, I actually interviewed him not on this topic, but, uh, his name's
00:49:30.020 Kent Clisby. He wrote a book called willing accomplices. It's a really powerful book. And in it,
00:49:35.460 he talks about how when the Soviet union came into being in 1917, uh, Vladimir Lenin saw, uh, the
00:49:44.980 biggest obstacle to the goal for worldwide revolution, which was what communism was all
00:49:49.260 about back then was the United States. He called the United States the main adversary. So he had one
00:49:54.560 of his chief lieutenants, a guy named William Unsenberg, who was a German communist come to the
00:49:58.880 United States with a cadre of committed communists and say, look, we're never going to defeat the United
00:50:03.860 States from without, but we can defeat it from within. You need to go and destabilize its
00:50:08.880 institutions. This is going to be a decades long process, but you need to destabilize, uh, its, um,
00:50:14.820 school system, destabilize the media and destabilize Hollywood because Hollywood was just coming into
00:50:20.280 its own back in those days. And William Unsenberg did exactly that. And in that book, if you read that
00:50:26.040 book, you'll see that was planned. They had a plan to come in and change all the norms that have turned
00:50:34.720 America into a great solid society. And over a period of 50, 60 years, we're left with political
00:50:40.980 correctness, political correctness being the norm. We're left with schools being a place, not to
00:50:46.720 celebrate America and celebrate the virtues of masculinity and manliness that made America great,
00:50:51.500 quite frankly. And, and now deriding America and deriding masculinity and Hollywood has used to be
00:50:59.220 a fabulous place that made incredible movies that, that told the American story in such a beautiful
00:51:04.240 way and told the story of men, men that created and did great things inside the world. And now it's
00:51:09.420 turned into something that, that crops all over that. And the less I say about the media, the better,
00:51:15.360 because I think the media right now is just a dumpster fire of epic proportions. And it's very
00:51:21.140 important for people to understand that these types of things don't happen in a vacuum. Other
00:51:25.940 folks have had a role to play in this. And if we want to change the world, if we want to create a
00:51:32.180 world where masculinity is celebrated, we're going to need to understand that we've got to go step by
00:51:38.380 step through the institutions, retake them and start having people like Ryan Mickler stand up and talk
00:51:45.380 about masculinity to the largest possible audience possible. And then to also help other men be
00:51:52.520 inspired by what you're doing. So there's not just one Ryan Mickler, but there's 10 million Ryan
00:51:56.660 Micklers around the world doing what you do. That's, what's going to change our world and put it on the
00:52:01.020 right path. I think you're spot on, which is why I think we resonate so well and, and, and, and agree
00:52:08.120 on a lot of these issues. I made a post on Instagram the other day about the undermining of religious
00:52:12.380 institutions, the family unit and small business, because those represent the greatest threat to the,
00:52:17.880 the, the powers that would be. And, you know, a lot of people agreed, certainly a lot of people,
00:52:22.600 tons of people agreed, thousands and thousands of people agreed. Uh, but there was an overwhelming,
00:52:27.060 uh, percentage of people who, you know, didn't agree or were, were, were refused to acknowledge
00:52:33.960 this or saw it different. And I just thought, man, what a shame that we can't recognize that
00:52:39.720 I'm hesitant to use the word attack on masculinity. Again, I think vernacular vocabulary is very
00:52:46.700 important, but there's certainly an undermining of it. Certainly an undermining of it because we as
00:52:52.060 men and the boys that we will raise to become men represent the first and last line of defense
00:52:57.820 against those powers that would be in, in 1917 and on, like you had talked about, maybe it was communism.
00:53:03.480 And, and I think that has made a significant resurgence in the form of, uh, democratic socialism,
00:53:09.700 which is socialism, which is Marxism, which is communism, all blanketed and veiled under this,
00:53:15.360 this, this, uh, these, these words that we try to disguise the agenda in. I'm careful of talking
00:53:21.980 about that because I, I, I have a lot of people say, well, that's conspiracy theory. It's really not.
00:53:27.200 I mean, we know that men are being undermined at every turn from the family unit to our religious
00:53:32.400 institutions, to boys, uh, being stripped of their, their rights, uh, to be around their fathers,
00:53:38.960 uh, to them primarily being raised by single mothers and being taught by female school teachers.
00:53:46.100 It's really actually right there in front of us.
00:53:49.580 A hundred percent, man, 100%, you're a hundred percent bang on, which is why the work you do is
00:53:54.740 so important. And the fact that you get to reach so many men is so important. Honestly, I have a vision
00:54:00.840 for you, man, where you reach a hundred times as many people, a thousand times as many people.
00:54:04.940 And that honestly, there are literally millions and millions of people who are inspired by what
00:54:10.260 you do to want to do that themselves inside other communities of men, men that maybe otherwise
00:54:14.480 wouldn't be able to hear of you and the work that you do. I think it's so, so important. And you know
00:54:19.340 what I do for a living is I'm a champion for entrepreneurs and free enterprise, right? I believe
00:54:24.640 free enterprise is the most moral system of economics and governance the world has ever seen in the
00:54:30.160 United States of America as the avatar of that system. It has created so much abundance, so much
00:54:36.000 prosperity and brought more people out of poverty and into abundance than everything else combined
00:54:41.120 throughout history has done. And that's why I'm so passionate about serving entrepreneurs,
00:54:47.180 helping them win because governments today aren't doing that. And the powers that be, as you say,
00:54:51.520 aren't doing that. In fact, they're actively undermining them. That's why they need champions
00:54:55.620 like myself to be able to stand up and say, hey, free enterprise matters, freedom matters.
00:55:01.420 And to me, the United States of America is the one indispensable nation. It is the single greatest
00:55:06.700 nation in the history of the world. Twice in the last century, twice. The so-called civilized nations
00:55:15.160 of the world in Europe and Asia dragged the world to war in flames. And who had to come and save
00:55:21.460 their butts and restore peace and prosperity? But the corn huskers from Iowa and Nebraska,
00:55:27.140 the garment workers from New York, the surfers from California, the cotton pickers from Alabama
00:55:32.300 and Georgia, and the auto workers from Detroit, Michigan, where would the world be without the
00:55:37.360 United States and freedom loving people, freedom loving men like you? It would be in a hell in a
00:55:42.960 handbasket under the Nazi jackboot and the Soviet hammer and sickle. And right now, this generation,
00:55:49.800 once again, is being called upon to stand tall and stand strong against the forces that call
00:55:55.220 themselves tolerant, but are anything but the forces of so-called democratic socialism.
00:56:00.340 The only difference between democratic socialism and Marxist socialism is one of them uses unfree
00:56:05.560 elections to get their way, then the other one doesn't bother with that and just uses guns and
00:56:10.120 weapons. America's great. America's wonderful. We need to stand up for who she is. And we need to
00:56:15.760 make sure that men understand that men, men are the ones who need to stand up for these things.
00:56:21.060 We got to stop taking a backseat and stop pretending this is no longer our role. This is our role now
00:56:25.840 more than ever. Amen. Look, there's, there's no question I can ask and no point, no finer point
00:56:35.780 that I can make than what you just said. So I think we'll end it right there because that's a powerful
00:56:40.460 note to end on brother. It really is, man. I appreciate you. I knew this pat, this conversation
00:56:45.380 would be powerful. It's been a long time in the works. Nicky, tell me how the guys can get ahold of
00:56:50.040 you. Some guys are going to resonate. A lot of the guys, obviously you're going to resonate with
00:56:53.240 what you're doing and they're going to want to know more about your work and how to connect.
00:56:58.060 A hundred percent brother. Um, so listen, there's a, there's a, there's a couple of things people can
00:57:02.560 do. I I've got a podcast as well. It's called the thought leader revolution. Uh, you've been a guest
00:57:08.360 on that show a couple of times. Probably going to have you back on because we got to have you
00:57:13.300 talking about the book again some more. Cause I think that the book's really fantastic. And I
00:57:17.680 actually think I'd love to maybe even have you on once a quarter to talk about like a quarter of the
00:57:22.180 book and what we do. Let me tell you this, Nicky, there is a new book that will be coming out very,
00:57:27.960 very soon. So let me tell you that as well. We'll have these conversations. No doubt. Okay. So we'll
00:57:32.380 definitely do that. I think that's great. I think that's important. So the podcast,
00:57:35.560 the thought leader revolution, which is on all the podcast platforms and also the thought
00:57:39.860 leader revolution.com. That's one way people can get ahold of me, but I'm going to make an offer to
00:57:43.320 you. And this is a bit of a crazy offer. You're going to think I'm crazy for making it, but I'm
00:57:46.360 very sincere in wanting to make it. If you want to have a conversation with me and you're a man and
00:57:53.280 you, you are having issues in marriage and you just want to have a conversation, or if you're a
00:57:58.200 business owner and you're thinking, man, this crazy cat, maybe he's got some things I want to,
00:58:01.660 I want to, I want to find out about, I am going to offer this. I will give 45 minutes of my time
00:58:08.960 for free to any man who wants to do it. And the way for them to do that is they can go to,
00:58:13.660 to one of my company website, East circle academy.com. There's a button that's there that says book a
00:58:18.820 call. All they got to do is click on that button and say, I listened to it. I listened to the order
00:58:22.860 man podcast and I'm claiming my free call with you and fill in the rest of the information.
00:58:27.260 I will get on the phone with you. We'll have a conversation and I will give you all my heart
00:58:32.120 and soul to help you. If you're dealing with a relationship issue, or if you just want to talk
00:58:35.620 about business or just talk about freedom and how great America is, whatever the reason is,
00:58:39.480 take advantage of that. My friends, tell me the website again. Sure. It's E circle academy,
00:58:46.560 E circle academy. You know what? Let me, let me show you the spelling of it. Just so
00:58:51.960 here we go. It looks, it looks like this. There you go. E circle academy. Yeah. And there's a
00:58:58.800 button in the, there's a button on the homepage. It says book a call. Just click on the button.
00:59:03.060 Right on, man. We'll sync it all up. Nikki, I appreciate our friendship and,
00:59:06.480 and, uh, your continued guidance and your insight. It's been invaluable for me. And I know it's going
00:59:11.020 to be invaluable for the men who are listening to this podcast. Thanks for joining us, brother.
00:59:15.820 Thank you for having me, man. It's totally been an honor. I had a blast.
00:59:18.720 Gentlemen, there you go. My conversation with Nikki blue. I hope that you enjoyed that one.
00:59:24.460 We had a very candid conversation. We agreed on some things and not that we disagreed, but
00:59:29.340 I think we challenged each other well and talked about some things from some different points of
00:59:33.880 view that maybe we haven't in the past. And these are all conversations that need to be had. And it's
00:59:38.820 my goal in these podcasts to make it feel like you're actually part of the conversation because
00:59:42.380 what you have to say and your input is valuable as, as is ours. So please make sure you connect with
00:59:48.280 Nikki. He gave you a tremendous offer to, uh, do the coaching, the free consult and coaching.
00:59:53.140 Uh, you can do that at e circle academy.com. And he's also got, and he failed to mention this on
00:59:58.260 the podcast. Cause I failed to ask, uh, he's got an event. It's a, it's a digital event coming up.
01:00:04.580 It's called winning 2021. It's November 28th. And he said that if you go to
01:00:10.160 ecircleacademy.com and book an appointment with him, the way that he gave on those instructions
01:00:17.400 on that call to action button, uh, then you can ask about the, uh, the winning 2021 event. Again,
01:00:23.500 that's on November 28th, go to ecircleacademy.com to check it out. All right, guys, that's all I've
01:00:29.480 got for you again, connect with Nikki, let them know what you thought. Oh, by the way,
01:00:33.720 I was going to tell you guys, the conversation I had with tank last week on the podcast did
01:00:38.560 phenomenally well. In fact, it was our highest single daily download to date, which means that
01:00:45.760 the conversation we shared between tank and I really, really resonated with you. So go back and
01:00:50.640 listen. If you haven't make sure you share it because men need to hear the message that tank shared.
01:00:55.600 Uh, and then tank also said that you guys bombarded his inbox, which I asked you to do.
01:01:00.660 So I appreciate you doing that. I don't know if tank appreciates it. I know he does. He does
01:01:05.520 appreciate it because he sent me messages that you guys sent to him. Uh, and it was clear that that,
01:01:10.280 uh, really opened up some great conversations and some great thoughts for you guys. So I'm glad to
01:01:16.240 know that make sure you keep sharing the show because more men need to hear what we're doing.
01:01:19.300 All right. That's all I've got for you. We will be back tomorrow for the ask me anything,
01:01:23.760 but until then go out there, take action and become the man you are meant to be.
01:01:28.540 Thank you for listening to the order of man podcast. You're ready to take charge of your life
01:01:33.000 and be more of the man you were meant to be. We invite you to join the order at order of man.com.
01:01:38.500 Thank you.
01:01:43.960 Thank you.