Order of Man - The Case for Intelligent Disobedience

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

00:00:05.000 your own path. When life knocks you down, you get back up one more time. Every time.

00:00:10.500 You are not easily deterred or defeated. Rugged. Resilient. Strong. This is your life. This is who

00:00:17.240 you are. This is who you will become. At the end of the day, and after all is said and done,

00:00:22.800 you can call yourself a man. Gentlemen, what is going on today? My name is Ryan Michler.

00:00:27.640 I'm the host and the founder of this Order of Man podcast and movement. If you don't know what

00:00:31.700 we're all about, my goal is to give you great conversations, tools, resources, access to

00:00:37.960 information, brotherhood, camaraderie, frameworks, whatever it is that you need to thrive and become

00:00:43.140 a more capable, proficient, strong, assertive, bold, courageous man. That's what we're doing here.

00:00:49.940 Now, I will say, got to throw this disclaimer out here. I don't have everything figured out. Never

00:00:53.980 once have I said that I do. And it's evident in my own life personally. And you guys can see my

00:00:59.580 own failures as well. I don't have this thing figured out, but I'm on a path. I'm on a path

00:01:04.120 to making myself a better man. And hopefully along the way, I can teach you some things that have

00:01:07.520 worked for me and you can use that. We can bring in great guys on this podcast. We've interviewed

00:01:12.600 close to, I believe, 450 incredible men like Jocko Willink and Terry Crews and Tim Tebow and Matthew

00:01:19.780 McConaughey and David Goggins, all of these guys coming on to impart some of their hard-earned

00:01:25.260 wisdom. And hopefully again, that'll make us better men. Now today, I want to talk with

00:01:30.260 you about a point that I had made in our Brotherhood, the Iron Council. And I was talking about why

00:01:37.860 it's important to break the rules occasionally. I believe that any man worth his weight knows

00:01:43.220 when to break the rules, has the courage to do so, and the capacity and capability of making

00:01:47.960 sure that if he's going to break the rules, that he's going to be successful. So I wanted to talk

00:01:52.240 with you about the concept that I heard as I made this post, and then also explain with you or to you

00:01:58.100 seven ways or seven factors that you can consider when trying to decide whether or not to bend and

00:02:04.240 break the rules a little bit. Let me share with you my post first and foremost. Here's what I said.

00:02:09.080 One underrated skill that all of us can work on developing is knowing when to follow the rules

00:02:15.120 and when to break them. If your boss, supervisor, and or lead asks you to do something specific,

00:02:21.400 there's probably a reason for it. As a general guideline, it's best to follow the rules in

00:02:26.640 these scenarios. If you have general instructions and know the intent or desired outcome of the

00:02:34.000 process, it's safer to break a few rules, not laws, in order to achieve the desired outcome.

00:02:40.380 A disclaimer here is morality and legality are factors to highly consider. Be smart,

00:02:46.740 be innovative, exercise discernment, accomplish the mission at hand, but don't make life harder

00:02:53.280 for your command. Then I asked and solicited some feedback by asking what factors do you consider

00:02:58.760 when following the rules versus breaking them? Drop them in the comments. I had a lot of good

00:03:03.740 comments from our guys here in the Iron Council. One came from Josh Fryer. Let me see if

00:03:10.360 I can find this. I had it pulled up and ready to go. Here it is. From Josh Fryer, he says,

00:03:17.380 and I'm not going to get into the full comment, but he shared a concept called intelligent

00:03:21.320 disobedience. This is really what I wanted to focus on today. As I said a minute ago,

00:03:28.160 I believe a man, if he's worth his weight, knows when to break the rules, knows when to follow the

00:03:33.540 rules, knows when to produce the desired outcome and result. He's willing and able to do that because men

00:03:38.940 generally are more prone and maybe not capable, but more prone of taking risks for the betterment

00:03:46.920 of themselves, their families, their communities, the people they're trying to lead. If we can't do

00:03:51.240 that by putting ourselves in harm's way at times, by putting ourselves in situations where there's

00:03:58.280 consequences to varying degrees, then what use is it in having us around? We need to understand when

00:04:04.120 to exercise intelligent disobedience. I say intelligent, or Josh mentioned this, because

00:04:10.020 disobedience in and of itself isn't virtuous. It's not virtuous. If there's something behind

00:04:17.240 the disobedience, like there's a motive for doing so that's going to produce more favorable results,

00:04:22.640 then I would say, sure. Or if the rule or the law is immoral in and of itself, then you have the

00:04:29.460 moral requirement and responsibility to disobey that law or that rule. But just for the sake of being

00:04:36.220 a rebel, that's not virtuous. So we need to make sure that we're exercising discernment here. So

00:04:42.180 let me share with you, again, seven tips that I believe are going to help us exercise intelligent

00:04:50.660 disobedience a little bit more effectively. And also, I think it's important that we understand that

00:04:55.280 for the most part, we need to operate life in the spirit of the law versus the letter of the law.

00:05:02.040 If we take the spirit of the law and we exercise discernment, which honestly seems to be on the

00:05:07.420 decline. And I think social media has a big part to play in that. People aren't willing to look at

00:05:13.140 what somebody's actually saying. They're using the exact precise word and they're making new definitions

00:05:19.380 of what that might mean and they're straw man arguments because we just love to hear ourselves

00:05:25.880 talk and chatter and yap when maybe we know all along we're wrong, but we just don't want to admit

00:05:31.260 that. There are benefits and pros of following the rules. And part of that is that there might be a

00:05:38.520 reason for doing it. Maybe you're learning from somebody who has a system in place that keeps the

00:05:43.580 ball rolling. Maybe they've tried a bunch of different things. And by following these rules or these

00:05:47.860 systems, it creates a more favorable outcome. But sometimes, again, disobedience is important

00:05:53.100 because there might be a better way of doing it or there might be some sort of moral override to that

00:05:59.620 rule or that law and that we're required to override what the rule is in order to be moral, virtuous men.

00:06:07.700 Let's break this down. Number one is I think it's really, really important that you articulate and

00:06:14.740 understand what your motive is for disobedience. Okay. There's a large, there's a growing trend

00:06:21.260 in society today that says, just be an asshole, be who you want to be, to hell with everybody else.

00:06:29.160 Doesn't matter what anybody else thinks. I'm going to buck the system just because I can. I'm going to be

00:06:34.260 a dick just because I want to. I'm not really going to worry about how this impacts or affects other

00:06:39.780 people. I want to prove that I'm smart by disagreeing, even though I don't really have any

00:06:44.560 motive or reason for doing so just so I can look better. My ego gets in the way. And by the way,

00:06:50.300 these are all things I'm guilty of at times in my life. But if you're just disobeying to be a dick,

00:06:55.860 that's not going to serve you or anybody else. Well, you might feel good. You might build up that

00:07:01.260 bravado. You might, might prop yourself up at the expense of other people. But once they find out who

00:07:08.480 you really are, which is not a rebel, not an innovator, not somebody who is willing to take

00:07:15.700 powerful risks for the betterment of other people, but that you're more worried about yourself

00:07:19.940 and propping yourself up and flattering your own ego. Once they realize that you're done.

00:07:26.420 So the motive of rebelliousness or disobedience purely for the sake of being disobedient is just

00:07:34.740 not going to play to your favor. It might today because you'll feel really good about

00:07:38.640 clap backing at somebody, but over the long haul, you're going to, you're going to disenfranchise

00:07:44.360 people. They're not going to want to be around you. They're not going to work with you. They're

00:07:47.700 not going to be influenced by you and you're going to repel people. And that's not the point,

00:07:51.540 not to mention if you're just doing it just because you can, you might actually take on unnecessary

00:07:58.120 risks that drive your own success and the success of the team that you're working in into the ground,

00:08:03.340 which clearly isn't what you want. But if you're pure, if your pure motive is, I just want to be

00:08:09.880 right. I just want to be smart. I just want people to know how good I am. You're going to destroy

00:08:15.060 whatever project and tech credibility you once had. Number two, I think this is a no brainer,

00:08:21.020 but we need to look at the ethical nature, the moral nature and the legal nature of the rules and the,

00:08:28.280 and, and the codes and all of this that we're following or deciding to bend or break a little

00:08:33.200 bit. You know, if there's, if there's something in place and there's a moral reason or an ethical

00:08:39.740 reason or even a legal reason as to why that's in place, then I think you ought to look at your

00:08:45.400 decision as to whether to obey or disobey with a little bit more scrutiny because you can't just

00:08:51.500 break rules just because you want to break them. You can't break rules just because you don't like

00:08:56.200 them. I guess you can, but I think it's really important to consider the moral nature,

00:09:00.760 the ethical nature and the legal nature. Now that's not to say, especially as regards to legal

00:09:06.400 and I'll explain this a little bit more. That's not to say just because there's a legal

00:09:10.460 barrier to what you're about to do that you shouldn't do it. I'm not going to tell you

00:09:15.580 when that would be. You have to decide that for yourself using some of the other factors that I'm

00:09:19.300 going to share with you, but there might be some reasons why you would do that. To take an extreme

00:09:24.560 example, if you're taking your wife into the hospital because her water broke or there's a

00:09:30.840 medical emergency, I think we'd all agree that we're probably going to break the law as it relates

00:09:35.420 to the speed limit. Did you do the right thing or the wrong thing? I would argue you did the right

00:09:39.680 thing and it required you to break the legal law in order to do the right thing. So you can see that

00:09:45.140 there are scenarios. This is where the discernment comes in, but we really should ask ourselves,

00:09:50.460 is what I'm about to do moral? Is what I'm about to do ethical? And is what I'm about to do legal?

00:09:57.340 If it is, I think you're more likely to say yes, or at least you can feel better about maybe being

00:10:02.620 a little bit disobedient. If not, you need to scrutinize that a little bit more.

00:10:07.440 Number three, we should always be asking, why is this rule in place? This happens a lot in the

00:10:12.740 business sphere. Your employer, your team leader, somebody might ask you to do something a certain way

00:10:18.980 and you don't like it. You don't like it because maybe it takes too long or you don't like it

00:10:23.940 because it adds to your plate or you think there's a better way of doing it. And all of that might be

00:10:28.540 true, but we have to ask ourselves, why is this rule in place? Maybe it's there for a reason.

00:10:35.160 And maybe you're making decisions to disobey based on faulty, inaccurate, or incomplete

00:10:41.280 information. And if you're doing that, you're going to create problems for yourself. You're going to

00:10:45.780 create problems for your team and you're going to create problems for your employer. I'm talking

00:10:49.980 about it specifically in the context of a business. If there's a rule in place and you do it your own

00:10:54.620 way without taking into consideration that that's already been thought of, that we've already gone

00:11:00.320 through that, and that they want you to do it this particular way for a reason, you're going to

00:11:05.560 ostracize yourself and you're going to get yourself into trouble. That one actually came from Mitch

00:11:10.260 Jamieson. When I asked for feedback, he said he always considers why a rule is in place

00:11:14.780 before considering bending or breaking that rule. Number four, we should always be looking at

00:11:21.380 commander's intent. And what I mean, if you're not familiar with that term, it's a military term,

00:11:26.500 what is the commander's intent? What is the outcome? So if you're working in a business environment

00:11:31.160 and your boss wants you to get a project done, then getting the project done is the primary

00:11:37.220 driver. It's the primary motivator. How you do that might vary on a case-to-case basis.

00:11:43.180 So if, and this gets into point number five, if you have a specific set of instructions as to why

00:11:49.880 you should do or how you should do a certain thing, it's safe to assume that specific instructions as

00:11:55.440 a general rule should be followed. They should be followed. But if you're given general guidelines

00:12:02.500 or general rules, but you understand what the commander's intent and the mission is,

00:12:08.340 then you have some wiggle room and it's going to be safer for you to bend the rules a little bit

00:12:13.380 to innovate, to speed up the process, to reduce cost in that decision-making process or that task.

00:12:22.680 And you might become the hero because you understood number three, what, or excuse me,

00:12:28.260 four, what the commander's intent was. And number five, you knew that you got general guidelines,

00:12:33.180 not specific rigid tactics or strategies for accomplishing that goal at hand.

00:12:40.140 And by the way, another pro of breaking the rules is that you become an innovator.

00:12:44.120 If you do this right, if you do this wrong, you're going to be ostracized. You're not going to be

00:12:48.380 looked at favorably. If you take these factors into consideration and you bend the rules, but you

00:12:52.620 accomplish the task at hand, you're going to be acknowledged and recognized as somebody who's

00:12:56.980 willing to take risks, somebody who's willing to try new things, somebody who's willing to adapt and

00:13:01.760 improvise and overcome obstacles that other people weren't able to overcome. And you make yourself

00:13:06.760 more valuable by being able to bend and break rules as necessary within the confines of what we're

00:13:12.540 talking about here. Number six, are you willing to deal with the consequences? Because sometimes

00:13:18.160 there's a rule in place. Maybe it's a law, like I talked about earlier. You're driving your wife to

00:13:22.220 the hospital because her water broke and you're going 20 miles over the speed limit. You might get

00:13:26.760 pulled over. You might get yourself a ticket. Are you willing to deal with the consequences?

00:13:31.240 If you're not, then you need to be more cautious about breaking rules. And that would be something

00:13:35.720 to consider when you're deciding and weighing whether or not you should keep the rules or break

00:13:40.260 the rules. Are you willing to deal with the consequences? And by the way, this is just a

00:13:44.380 great practice in life is that you play out the decision-making process. Too many of us make

00:13:50.040 decisions on instinct and our gut and we just say, go. And we don't think about the ramifications of it,

00:13:55.240 positive or negative, and we just go with it. And then all of a sudden we find ourselves shocked that it

00:13:59.280 didn't work out or it played out in a different way than we thought it would. Consider how your

00:14:04.620 decisions are going to play out and what type of results they're going to produce, favorable or

00:14:10.080 unfavorable. And whatever they are, if you're confident in knowing that I made the right decision,

00:14:15.760 but I may have to deal with the consequences, then you might be more prone to taking those risks

00:14:21.460 and trying new things, but don't do it in ignorance. Do it with knowing what the consequences

00:14:28.180 are, what the results are, and asking yourselves whether or not you're willing to face up like a

00:14:33.680 man and take the result, the consequences, your reactions like a man. Number seven, we also want

00:14:40.800 to consider the fallout. So this is not just the consequences for you. This is the consequence for

00:14:45.340 the people around you. Guys, we don't make decisions in a vacuum. We don't operate in this

00:14:50.440 environment where the decisions we make are completely independent from how it's going to

00:14:55.060 impact and affect other people. If you show up in powerful and positive ways, that's going to impact

00:15:00.300 people powerfully and positively. If you show up in dangerous and destructive ways, then that puts

00:15:06.260 people, your people, your family, your friends, your colleagues, your coworkers, your neighbors at

00:15:10.660 unnecessary risk. And is that what you want? Is that really what you're after? Of course not.

00:15:16.080 You're listening to this podcast. So you want to protect, you want to provide, you want to preside,

00:15:20.700 you want to lead, you want to be a good leader as a man. And if you're willing to do that,

00:15:25.200 then you need to understand that the decisions you make impact other people. I know, again,

00:15:30.140 this is to go back to what we said earlier, that we operate in this life, this world where

00:15:34.120 people do whatever they want and don't worry about the consequences and what other people think

00:15:39.960 and how they react and how they respond is their problem, not yours. I don't buy into that.

00:15:44.460 I don't buy into that. There's certain elements of it I do, but there's certain elements that I

00:15:48.600 don't buy into. We need to be able to serve other people. And that means we need to be considerate

00:15:54.760 of how our decisions impact other people positively or negatively. And even if you decide to do something

00:16:01.900 that goes against somebody else's wishes or somebody else's own wellbeing, we can still do that

00:16:07.500 with class intact. We can still do that with a level of empathy. Let's say, for example,

00:16:12.360 you're dating somebody and you're in the process of wanting to break up with this person. You don't

00:16:17.180 need to be an a-hole to her. I mean, you can do that in a respectful way. So it might be a decision

00:16:23.120 you feel is necessary to make, but you don't need to blow up the island on the way out.

00:16:27.440 Same thing with your business. You might really hate your boss. You might despise your boss.

00:16:31.800 You might despise everything about that organization and what it means. And what do you do? Do you blow

00:16:37.900 everything up on the way out? Or do you gracefully bow out, explain your position, do it with class,

00:16:46.220 move on in your life, and let that business bury itself? And if it's as bad as you think it is,

00:16:52.220 trust me, it will bury itself without your help. You don't need to help it unless there's some

00:16:58.580 ethical or legal things that would protect you and make sure it protects other people.

00:17:02.840 You don't need to help bury that other business. Just let the business fall. It will. But you worry

00:17:09.740 about your stuff and not get yourself into unnecessary trouble. And that's it. Those are the seven. I went

00:17:17.840 through that list fairly quick. So let's reiterate here. Let's rehash these. Number one is knowing what

00:17:25.020 your motive is. Okay. If your motive is to prop yourself up, probably not a good reason to break

00:17:29.960 rules. Okay. That's, that's not going to serve you well. If your motive is to accomplish the task

00:17:35.520 at hand more effectively and efficiently, that might be a better reason. Number two, what's the moral,

00:17:40.920 the moral, ethical, and legal implications of what you're about to do. Number three, why is the rule in

00:17:47.640 place? You may not understand all of it. So don't be ignorant because that's going to get you and other

00:17:52.700 people into trouble. Figure out if there's a reason this rule is in place. And then, and only

00:17:57.380 then should you consider breaking it. Number four, what is the commander's intent? If your wife asks

00:18:03.140 you to get something done around the house and you want to help out around the house, what is her

00:18:06.540 intent? If you know her intent and you know what the mission is, then you have some leniency and

00:18:11.940 leeway in how you complete it. I think I mentioned it last week. I don't believe the ends justify the

00:18:17.620 means. The way we do things is important. The outcome is important. Sure. But the way that we

00:18:23.100 accomplish it is. So I'm not saying that the ends justify the means, but I am saying that there might

00:18:28.800 be reasons those rules are in place and we need to know what they are. We also need to know what the

00:18:34.360 intent of the person asking us to do a task, a project, whatever it might be is. Number five, do you

00:18:42.340 have a specific set of instructions? If you do generally, you're going to want to follow that.

00:18:45.940 Or do you have general guidelines and counsel? In that case, it's safer to break rules. Number six,

00:18:51.340 are you willing to deal with the consequences of your decision? And number seven, what is the

00:18:56.140 fallout? Not just for you, but for other people around you. Guys, these are all good decisions to

00:19:01.240 make. And I would tell you that the best decisions that I've made in my life, the ones that have paid

00:19:05.880 off time and time again, are the ones where I've bent the rules or I've even broken the rules,

00:19:11.140 that I've done things differently, that I've done things that weren't the status quo,

00:19:15.100 the things that I wasn't quote unquote supposed to do. Those great risks that I have taken are

00:19:21.020 where the great opportunities lie, but we don't want to be dumb about it. And we don't want to

00:19:25.820 put ourselves into dangerous situations. We certainly don't want to negatively impact other

00:19:29.580 people. So if we follow these seven steps and these guidelines here, I think that's going to help

00:19:34.660 us exercise intelligent disobedience a little bit more effectively and make good decisions for

00:19:41.620 ourselves and other people. Guys, on a parting note, if you want to know more about what we're

00:19:46.120 doing inside of our exclusive brotherhood, the iron council, including conversations like this,

00:19:50.720 this is a direct result of a conversation that we're having in our brotherhood. You can go to

00:19:54.900 order a man.com slash iron council. Now, bad news is we're closed right now. We're going to be opening

00:20:01.280 up in two or about three months. So if you go to order a man.com slash iron council, you can watch a

00:20:07.260 quick video about what we do, what's included features, benefits, all that kind of stuff and

00:20:12.140 get yourself signed up to be notified when we open up in the fall. All right, guys, that's all I've got

00:20:17.700 for you today. We'll be back with a great conversation with a very, very successful entrepreneur and

00:20:24.980 business owner. His name is Vic Keller. That's on Tuesday. So make sure you subscribe. And like I

00:20:30.480 said, we'll be back then. Until then, go out there, take action, exercise intelligent disobedience,

00:20:37.460 and let's all become a man we are meant to be. Thank you for listening to the Order of Man podcast.

00:20:42.700 You're ready to take charge of your life and be more of the man you were meant to be.

00:20:46.740 We invite you to join the order at orderofman.com.

Order of Man - July 14, 2023

The Case for Intelligent Disobedience ｜ FRIDAY FIELD NOTES

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