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41 - The Lie I Didn't Know I Was Telling · Masculine Containment

• 0:00
  If you watched any of my work or you've followed me for any period of time, you know that I'm obsessed with central nervous system regulation.
• 0:06
  See, I see this equation for me, and I think it's the same for others, that the more regulated our central nervous system is, the less capacity we're burning around fight or flight and anxiety and dysregulation, the more capacity we have and the more we can get done.
• 0:24
  The more we can hear intuition and inspiration, the more...
• 0:27
  We can actually see what we want out of our lives and make the decisions that benefit us.
• 0:32
  And I think when we are dysregulated, the opposite happens.
• 0:35
  When we're dysregulated, we get to a place where just survival instincts tell us, like science tells us, survival instincts make it so that we see less options.
• 0:44
  We see less of a future.
• 0:45
  We're making decisions for right now, not for what could be.
• 0:48
  And we're kind of in a place where we're making decisions out of urgency rather than a place where we're making decisions out of what we really want.
• 0:56
  And I think so many of us, I know me for a long time in my life, I know I was making decisions from a place of urgency most of the time.
• 1:07
  And what would happen in my life, this may be relatable to you, what would happen in my life is I'd get to a point in my life, look up, and say, how did I get here?
• 1:17
  Why am I here?
• 1:18
  You know, why am I in this place where I'm not comfortable with what I'm doing or I'm not comfortable with who I'm around or I'm not comfortable with how I'm behaving or I'm not comfortable with what I'm doing in my life?
• 1:27
  And I would be out of integrity, but I wouldn't have realized I was there.
• 1:31
  I wasn't realizing on the way there that it was the day-to-day decision-making that I did that got me there.
• 1:39
  And so today I want to talk about integrity and being in integrity and how much it is just this life changing discipline.
• 1:48
  And I want to talk about a few of the places where men in the brotherhood are out of integrity, where I was out of integrity.
• 1:54
  And then I also want to share this is uncomfortable to bring up.
• 1:59
  I wanna share a place where I recently realized I was out of integrity in what I felt was a dramatic way.
• 2:05
  When I shared it with my wife, she didn't think it was as dramatic, but I really felt like it was dramatic, and so I'm gonna leave that for the end and share with you transparently.
• 2:14
  Part of the reason I'm doing this podcast is to share exactly what I'm talking about and get it out in the open, get it out of my body, and share it with you guys.
• 2:24
  And so first, let's start with
• 2:28
  what it means to be out of integrity in your nervous system, and what it means to be out of integrity in your life, and just some of the common places that men in the brotherhood are out of integrity, and it's interesting.
• 2:39
  For the men in the brotherhood, so often, it's exactly what I went through.
• 2:42
  And so let's talk about one of the biggest ones for men.
• 2:45
  One of the biggest places we're out of integrity is if we're in the habit of using pornography or objectification, both of these things,
• 2:55
  drain our capacity like crazy if you go back and listen to the podcast that i did with aaron bartell he talks in detail about how much capacity he was losing through objectification through porn um and this is a place where i was losing massive massive capacity for so much of my life
• 3:13
  You know, I've talked before about having the behavior of porn addiction.
• 3:18
  Like whenever things got slow for me, whenever I didn't feel like I was in momentum, whenever I didn't feel like I was moving forward, oftentimes my pressure release valve would be to go pull up a website and use porn.
• 3:30
  And what I didn't know was the massive effects that it was having on me.
• 3:35
  And, you know, I've now spoken with dozens of men, now hundreds of men in the brotherhood, and...
• 3:43
  They all agree that pornography and objectification, like using porn actually leads to the objectification of women.
• 3:49
  And when we're objectifying women, we're often in a place where we are disassociating, where we're uncomfortable, where we're not on mission.
• 3:58
  That's the conclusion that I came to in my life was I was using pornography and objectification as a way to numb myself, as a way to...
• 4:07
  stimulate myself as a way to change my state as a way to make things feel different and it was because I wasn't on mission I wasn't excited about what I was doing when I finally figured this out you know I had a friend of mine ask me what's the gift of pornography addiction and I was so frustrated with the question but when I finally figured this out that pornography was a signal that I wasn't on mission everything in my life changed you know I've been I haven't used porn in now years
• 4:39
  and I haven't had slips on objectification in well over a year, and I think it's even longer than that.
• 4:44
  It's probably, I think in February next year, it'll be two years of no slips, no going out in public and looking at a woman and objectifying, and no disruption in my nervous system now.
• 4:57
  When I say that, like every once in a while, I'll look and I'll have a thought, and it's not that same objectification thought, it's like the precursor to it, and here's how I stopped doing this.
• 5:08
  Here's how I got out of the whole porn addiction and objectification.
• 5:12
  I've shared this before.
• 5:14
  When I first realized what an issue this was in my life,
• 5:17
  I came up with a process that every time it happened, every time I had the thought to objectify, the thought to use porn, I had to slow myself down.
• 5:24
  You know, for us as, if you're listening to this podcast, you're probably a lot like me.
• 5:29
  You're type A personality.
• 5:30
  You want to get everything done all at once and right away.
• 5:33
  You live for momentum, for making things happen, for moving forward.
• 5:39
  Well, sometimes that urgency, that continued push forward, that making decisions from a place of urgency keeps us in these loops, right?
• 5:46
  And so what I did to get out of this was when I had that urge to objectify, when I felt it coming up, I would stop, put a hand on my heart, hand on my stomach, and I would breathe.
• 6:00
  And I would say, I'm here and I'm safe.
• 6:02
  And I'd send that person love and I'd return the love to myself.
• 6:06
  And then I'd go back to what I was doing.
• 6:08
  And that pattern interrupt, that slowing down pattern interrupt over and over again, got it to the point where I rewired my nervous system.
• 6:16
  Objectification, porn, those are things that are conditioned.
• 6:20
  Those are things that we have wired into our nervous systems a lot of the time.
• 6:24
  Those are things that over time have become part of our lives.
• 6:29
  And it doesn't have to be that way.
• 6:31
  Sometimes people tell me like objectification is natural.
• 6:34
  Appreciation is natural.
• 6:35
  Objectification is turning another person into an object.
• 6:38
  which if you really think about, that's a form of energetic violence.
• 6:41
  That's not natural.
• 6:43
  That is what we're conditioned.
• 6:44
  That's what we're told is natural.
• 6:46
  That's what we're told is okay.
• 6:48
  That's what we're told we should continue doing.
• 6:50
  So when we finally realize that it isn't something we have to do and it's something that we can actually stop and it's something that we can actually work on and break the pattern and get the capacity back, it changes everything.
• 7:02
  And again, I'm obsessed with capacity.
• 7:04
  I'm obsessed with getting things done.
• 7:06
  That's a lot of the reason why I'm doing the work that I'm doing today.
• 7:10
  Now, another place where a lot of men in the brotherhood are out of integrity is in disassociating and numbing.
• 7:19
  Now, porn and objectification, definitely a way to do that.
• 7:23
  But when it comes to disassociation and numbing, a lot of times we use things to avoid what's really going on for us.
• 7:29
  We use things so that we don't feel what's really happening.
• 7:33
  We don't feel what's going on in our bodies.
• 7:35
  We don't feel what's going on for us.
• 7:37
  And when I say disassociation and numbing, like one of the common ones is work, just working all the time, just throwing yourself into work, not really slowing things down.
• 7:45
  that's a big one.
• 7:47
  But the ones that come up a lot of the time in the brotherhood are two.
• 7:49
  It's alcohol and THC or, or cannabis.
• 7:54
  And, and,
• 7:55
  Here's what's interesting.
• 7:56
  You know, when men get into the brotherhood, one of the suggestions I make is that they avoid substances and numbing for the duration of the containers, usually 10 to 12 weeks.
• 8:06
  And it's a choice.
• 8:08
  Not everybody has to do it.
• 8:09
  Not everybody does it.
• 8:11
  But here's what happens over and over again in the discussions that we have in the brotherhood.
• 8:17
  We're learning the martial art of masculine containment.
• 8:20
  We're learning how to stay present and in the moment and grounded and aware.
• 8:24
  And the training ground for most of the men in the brotherhood, not all, but for a lot of them, is their relationship, their marriage, their relationship with their partner if they're not married, the woman that they're with.
• 8:35
  And when I say that's the training ground, the reason why I feel like that is such an effective place to learn is that it's emotionally charged.
• 8:44
  Um, you know, a lot of men say things like I can stay contained at work.
• 8:47
  I can stay contained when I'm doing errands and stuff.
• 8:49
  I can stay contained in most of my life.
• 8:51
  The place where I lose it is with my partner.
• 8:54
  And then the second place is usually with their kids.
• 8:58
  And I believe the reason we lose it with our partner or with our kids and we can stay contained in most everywhere else is that.
• 9:07
  our relationship is a mirror of what we learned growing up.
• 9:12
  And our relationship brings up all of our childhood shadows.
• 9:16
  So do our kids.
• 9:17
  Depending on what age the kids are, you're going to start seeing the shadows and the challenges that you had around that age when you were a kid.
• 9:23
  I know my kids are 16 and 19 and...
• 9:27
  Fortunately, I have had that experience with them.
• 9:30
  And unfortunately, I have had that experience with them because I didn't always understand what I know now.
• 9:34
  And there's been so many times where with my kids, I'm blowing up over something that's really mine, not theirs.
• 9:41
  And I shouldn't be like, there's no excuse to blow up at your kids.
• 9:43
  There's no reason for it.
• 9:45
  uh staying contained staying present staying aware staying in the conversation with them is how you really cause change and how you communicate and so i'm certainly not excusing anytime that i did that and with katie far too often in our relationship something would come up and i'd react as though there was danger in the moment and there really isn't it's from another time in my life and so here's what would happen in the brotherhood and what's happened a bunch of times like not once or twice
• 10:12
  I give everybody the suggestion to avoid substances.
• 10:17
  And some men are like, hey, you know, my wife and I go out once a week or we like to go and do dancing or something where we drink.
• 10:27
  And they're like, what do you think about me doing that?
• 10:28
  I'm like, hey, my suggestion is you don't.
• 10:30
  But like, this isn't a cult.
• 10:32
  You can do whatever you want.
• 10:34
  You know, this is up to you.
• 10:35
  These are your choices.
• 10:37
  And so many times what ends up happening is a guy will come into the platform that we use to communicate with all the members and they all communicate with each other.
• 10:46
  And it's super active when we're in a container, like very active, like posts every day.
• 10:52
  And like rarely is there a day that goes by where there's not posts or comments.
• 10:57
  I think this last one, I don't know that there was a day and there might've been a couple.
• 11:02
  Um,
• 11:04
  And what ends up happening, and this is recurring, is that a man will come in and say, I lost it last night.
• 11:12
  It's week four or five, or this is a composite of stories, not an exact replica or not exact retelling of a story, but let's just say it's week four or five, and somebody will come in and say, I've been crushing it up until now.
• 11:24
  Every time I've been triggered, I've been able to breathe to slow things down, just like I talked about at the beginning, slowing things down, hand on heart, hand on stomach.
• 11:32
  I've been able to really understand my feelings, to feel my feelings, and I didn't explode.
• 11:38
  I didn't implode.
• 11:39
  I didn't bring too much energy to the situation.
• 11:41
  I didn't withdraw my energy to the situation.
• 11:43
  Too much energy creates a feeling of panic on the other side and a feeling of being under attack and withdrawing your energy creates a feeling of abandonment and also a feeling of panic on the other side.
• 11:54
  And so if we stay present and in our bodies and in the moment, that's how we create communication.
• 12:00
  That's how we create emotional safety and security.
• 12:02
  And then we'll come in and say, I lost it.
• 12:05
  And then in them sharing, they'll say, we went out for a couple of drinks.
• 12:11
  And more than once men have said things like, if I'm honest, the alcohol didn't help.
• 12:16
  Or another guy said something like, I think this is because I was partially off from drinking and I'm going to give up alcohol for the rest of the container.
• 12:27
  And so often, like I said, not every man does it, but men have the reflection of having this, being in this intense experience of learning masculine containment, of learning this martial art,
• 12:39
  And then they're going along great.
• 12:40
  They have a couple of drinks and that's where things fall apart.
• 12:44
  And so that's another place.
• 12:45
  Whereas men, we're out of integrity.
• 12:46
  If we're numbing, if we're reaching for alcohol, you know, one of the things that we now know about alcohol is that there is no positive medical benefit.
• 12:54
  A while ago, there was this thing about red wine and how it was good for you.
• 12:58
  Resveratrol that's in red wine, you can take it as a supplement.
• 13:01
  And the alcohol far outweighs any benefit from it.
• 13:04
  Now, I don't drink at all.
• 13:07
  But if you're somebody who drinks occasionally, okay.
• 13:12
  It's something that you do occasionally.
• 13:15
  But there's no medical benefits for it.
• 13:16
  There's no health benefit for it.
• 13:18
  There's no central nervous system benefit for it.
• 13:20
  It throws off your sleep.
• 13:21
  It throws off your digestion.
• 13:22
  It does so much things.
• 13:23
  It's literally poison.
• 13:24
  And so that's a, and, and same with, you know, cannabis, if cannabis is used ceremoniously every once in a while, um, in a way that like helps you see the truth and helps you understand what's really going on in your life, then maybe that's a, that can have positive benefits.
• 13:38
  But when it becomes an everyday or several times a week thing, that's just numbing and disassociating.
• 13:43
  And men have talked about both.
• 13:45
  And so that's another place where, as men, we can step into integrity.
• 13:49
  Give up the numbing.
• 13:51
  Give up the, like, literally disassociating on purpose.
• 13:54
  Now, the first one, porn objectification, kind of a big one, disassociating numbing.
• 13:59
  Now, this doesn't sound like a big one, but it is such a big one.
• 14:04
  This next one is not following through on things and leaving open loops in your life.
• 14:09
  I've been working at this for a long time.
• 14:11
  You know, when I look back at my career as a business coach, when I look back at my career as an entrepreneur, one of the things that I used to talk about all the time was lowering pressure and noise in your life.
• 14:21
  It's like literally, I've been working on containment since before I understood what I was doing.
• 14:26
  And one of the posts that I used to make on social media was your body will show your lack of transparency.
• 14:33
  And transparency is like, your body will show your lack of integrity is what I probably should have said.
• 14:38
  And what I meant by that was every time we step out of integrity, porn and objectification, step out of integrity, numbing ourselves, step out of integrity, not following through on something or leaving open loops, our body actually feels that.
• 14:53
  Like it feels the stress of it, that we dysregulate our nervous system.
• 14:57
  We dysregulate how we're feeling.
• 15:00
  And when a nervous system is dysregulated, there's this cascade of things that happen.
• 15:04
  It's interesting.
• 15:05
  If you look at medical science around central nervous system dysregulation, you would think medical science would focus on regulating the nervous system, but it doesn't at all.
• 15:16
  Most doctors will give you a pharmaceutical without asking what your environment is, without asking what your habits are, without really understanding what's going on with you.
• 15:25
  They don't really look at are we dealing with a human with a regulated central nervous system?
• 15:30
  Because when you're in dysregulation, five-flight, fauna freeze, what happens is this cascade of things.
• 15:36
  Like you are using too many hormones.
• 15:39
  You're using the wrong chemicals.
• 15:41
  digestion slows down your breathing actually gets shallow and upper higher in your chest you take on less oxygen you have less thirst instinct you have less hunger instinct or way too much hunger instinct to kind of rockets back and forth for a lot of people and so when you're in in this place of this dysregulation it causes massive symptoms
• 16:03
  You know, I now really, truly believe that maybe not all diseases caused by central nervous system dysregulation, but I absolutely believe all diseases made worse by central nervous system dysregulation.
• 16:16
  Here's one of the things that I know why.
• 16:18
  Oftentimes, and, you know, if you don't know my history, I'll just share with you that I was a business coach for a few decades, like first in real estate and then with entrepreneurs and really big in the ClickFunnels community and worked with some really extraordinary entrepreneurs that did amazing things.
• 16:35
  They built in, you know, a lot of seven-figure businesses, eight-figure businesses, in some cases, nine-figure businesses, in some cases, businesses that are doing more than that now.
• 16:43
  And...
• 16:45
  Not many, a few.
• 16:46
  And one of the things that we would do with people is show them how to follow through and close open loops.
• 16:54
  And we'd show them how to follow through, like, hey, anything you say you're gonna do, write it down, make sure you're getting it done.
• 16:59
  Don't make promises to your team, don't make promises to yourself, don't make promises to your partner, to your spouse, to your kids that you don't actually follow through on.
• 17:06
  And I would use the example, like if your wife says, hey, will you take out the trash and you say yes, just do it.
• 17:12
  Just do it because you don't want an hour and a half later, it's still in the back of your mind.
• 17:15
  It's gonna be rattling around whether you know it or not.
• 17:18
  And so do the things that you can immediately, write down the things that you can't do immediately and like do not leave open loops in your life and follow through on what you say you're going to do.
• 17:27
  And here's how I know how dramatic a difference this is.
• 17:32
  Not once, not twice, but tons of times.
• 17:36
  Like over and over again, people would join our program
• 17:41
  Some sort of medical issue that had been following them around a lot of the time for years.
• 17:48
  People joined our program that had autoimmune issues.
• 17:50
  They had IBS.
• 17:51
  They had Crohn's, colitis.
• 17:53
  They had...
• 17:56
  eye twitches, double vision, chronic headaches, chronic migraines, really, really brutal chronic migraines.
• 18:05
  So many other things like asthma issues.
• 18:08
  I'm trying to think of just like the ones that come up off the top of my head.
• 18:12
  And here's what would happen over and over again.
• 18:15
  Like I'm remembering some specific examples where somebody would come in and part of what was making their lives so hard was this medical issue.
• 18:24
  And then we would show them how to follow through and close open loops and stop disassociating, stop numbing.
• 18:29
  I mean, we were a business coaching company that taught hardcore business principles, but we had to show this to the entrepreneur in order for things to work.
• 18:38
  And we had to show the entrepreneur how to regulate themselves.
• 18:40
  Like when I first started coaching business, I just showed him how to grow the business.
• 18:43
  And man, it was a disaster.
• 18:44
  I mean, I knew how to grow businesses, especially operationally.
• 18:48
  And so we'd have people come in, put some systems in place.
• 18:51
  Their business would go from 300,000 to 2 million.
• 18:53
  It'd go from 1 million to 4 million.
• 18:54
  It'd go from 2 million to 10 million.
• 18:56
  And so we'd have people come in, put some systems in place.
• 18:58
  And it was a disaster.
• 19:00
  They would become so dysregulated that they'd actually sabotage the business, sabotage themselves, and a lot of cases have way more serious medical issues.
• 19:08
  So I saw that over and over again, and I'm like, man, we need to protect the entrepreneur here.
• 19:11
  We need to protect the person running the business.
• 19:14
  And so by showing them how to follow through and close open loops, here's what started happening.
• 19:18
  By showing them how to regulate their nervous system, there was more that we did, but this was really crucially important.
• 19:25
  when we got them to stop disassociating, to follow through, a lot of the times business would grow and the medical conditions would become dormant or go away.
• 19:37
  Like this is intense.
• 19:39
  And it wasn't once or twice.
• 19:40
  Like I've got so much recorded video of somebody sharing in one of our business conferences
• 19:46
  We used to do them quarterly, but we would have people come in and share, hey, I put the system in place, and I closed open loops, and I'm not overwhelmed anymore, and I feel more regulated, and my Crohn's disease has disappeared.
• 19:58
  Like, I know it's still there because I've got the diagnosis, but it's not there as much.
• 20:03
  People would say things like, you know, I used to be so ADHD and I couldn't focus on anything.
• 20:07
  And now I can focus and I can sit down and I can write longhand and I can do all kinds of stuff that I wasn't able to do before.
• 20:13
  Or they'd say, you know, my sleep has regulated completely.
• 20:17
  Like, I thought I had insomnia.
• 20:19
  And now that I've like slowed things down and regulated myself, the insomnia has gone away.
• 20:24
  So over and over again, I saw this massive change in people of regulating their nervous system.
• 20:29
  And one of the big things was following through and not leaving open loops.
• 20:33
  The more open loops you have in your mind, the more you're draining your capacity, the more your subconscious and conscious minds in some combination are focusing on the things you haven't done yet.
• 20:45
  So write it down.
• 20:47
  If you can do it immediately, do it immediately.
• 20:48
  Try not to leave things undone.
• 20:51
  And now the last place, and this is a big one, especially for us as entrepreneurs, and I'll personalize this.
• 21:01
  What I realized for myself over time was that when I would lie or exaggerate, even a white lie, when I would like, when somebody would say, hey, is this okay with you?
• 21:13
  And I would say, yeah, it's great.
• 21:14
  And it wasn't great.
• 21:16
  I would actually, I started feeling that in my body.
• 21:18
  Now, I want to make this clear.
• 21:20
  When I was younger, I didn't feel it at all.
• 21:23
  When I was younger, I wasn't in a place of regulation.
• 21:25
  I was in a place of living in fight or flight, living in reactivity.
• 21:30
  I was using porn and objectifying.
• 21:32
  I was disassociating and numbing on a daily basis.
• 21:34
  I drank and drank all the time.
• 21:38
  I didn't follow through on things all the time.
• 21:40
  I had open loops all over the place.
• 21:42
  I mean, I was running a multimillion dollar business in my 20s and doing all of this,
• 21:45
  I barely survived.
• 21:47
  When I started my company in my 20s, I was in really good shape in California before I moved out to Florida.
• 21:53
  I actually did some runway modeling and some physique modeling.
• 21:57
  And by the time I was 30, I was almost 300 pounds.
• 22:00
  My waist was huge.
• 22:02
  My body fat percentage was off the charts.
• 22:04
  I was weak and taking prescription drugs to keep myself alive.
• 22:09
  Like I was on blood pressure medication and
• 22:12
  sleeping medication, I can't remember what else, not psychiatric drugs, but I was on drugs and cholesterol medication.
• 22:21
  And a lot of that was because I was so dysregulated, I couldn't even feel my body to know what food to put in my mouth to make myself feel good.
• 22:29
  Today at 53, I am in infinitely better shape than I was when I was 30.
• 22:35
  And so,
• 22:37
  When I was younger, I didn't feel when I lied.
• 22:39
  I didn't feel when I exaggerated.
• 22:40
  I didn't feel when somebody, when I told a white lie or when somebody asked me a question and I gave them like a partial truth.
• 22:46
  But these days, man, I feel it.
• 22:49
  I feel it.
• 22:50
  Like sometimes I'll fall into an old habit and somebody will say like, hey, is this okay with you?
• 22:55
  And I'll go to say, sure, yeah.
• 22:56
  And then I have to like correct myself and say, honestly, no, you know, I really don't want to do that right now.
• 23:02
  Or is, what do you think of this?
• 23:05
  Oh, it's great.
• 23:06
  No, you know what?
• 23:07
  I don't think it's that good.
• 23:08
  I don't think that, I don't like it.
• 23:11
  And I'm way, way more cautious these days about any type of exaggeration, any type of fabrication, because what I know for me, and you can try this on for size.
• 23:25
  And what I believe is for everybody else, but this is up to you to try this on for size, to think about, does this feel this way for you?
• 23:32
  What I know for me is every time I say something without integrity, I'm carrying that with me.
• 23:40
  Every time I exaggerate or don't tell the truth, or let's be honest, tell a lie, I'm not saying that.
• 23:46
  I feel it, I'm carrying it with me.
• 23:48
  And what I now understand is that sometimes I'm doing that without even knowing it because it's so historical that I've done it over and over and over again.
• 23:56
  I'm gonna share a quick story with you and get something off of my chest and oh my gosh, as I start to talk about this, it's so uncomfortable.
• 24:04
  Because for years, for years, my goal has been to live at the highest level of integrity possible.
• 24:10
  And in 2024, when Katie and I closed down our company and went on sabbatical, like part of that sabbatical was studying sex, intimacy, and relationships.
• 24:19
  When another part of that sabbatical was like, I'm going to get to the highest level of integrity with myself I've ever had.
• 24:25
  I'm going to stop the bad habits once and for all.
• 24:27
  I'm going to stop pretending like it's okay to have these in my life.
• 24:30
  I'm going to stop with the pornography, with objectification.
• 24:32
  I'm going to stop with everything.
• 24:35
  And this week I was on a podcast with Brett Kaufman.
• 24:42
  The podcast is called the inner space.
• 24:44
  And it was basically a conversation just about my life and how I got to where I am today.
• 24:50
  And I shared with him a story that I've shared far too many times.
• 24:56
  And it was a story that's kind of like one of the stories from my childhood that I tell.
• 25:01
  Now,
• 25:02
  don't feel like there was any benefit in telling this story.
• 25:04
  It was just like my recollection was that I was 10 or 11 years old and I was at a garage sale and I was with my mom and there was a guy selling this box of CDs, this box of audio cassettes and books.
• 25:18
  And I was begging my mom to buy it.
• 25:20
  Like I wanted it so bad.
• 25:21
  Um,
• 25:24
  And the punchline of the story is that like, the guy who was in the garage sale was watching me walk around 10 or 11 years old, and by the time my mom and I were leaving, he went and picked up the box of cassettes and books and handed it to me and said, hey kid, you need this more than anybody else.
• 25:41
  And when I told that story, and I've told it before, but when I told that story this time, with Brett,
• 25:47
  He was like, I think he asked, how old were you when you started your personal development journey?
• 25:51
  And I said, well, let me tell you a story.
• 25:52
  And as soon as I started telling it, I got this weird signal in my body that something was off.
• 25:57
  And then when I was done telling it, Brett said something like, well, you're ahead of me.
• 26:01
  I was 14 or 15.
• 26:02
  You were 10 or 11.
• 26:04
  And I got another signal in my body that something was off.
• 26:07
  And.
• 26:09
  I didn't react to it immediately.
• 26:11
  It was one of those things where I'm like, oh, that was weird.
• 26:13
  And I kept kind of going through my day, but then it kept coming up for me day two, day three.
• 26:19
  And I finally, last week, a couple of days after that recording, I'm like, I need to figure out what's going on in my body with this.
• 26:25
  Like, what is going on with this story that...
• 26:29
  By the way, I mean, I'm pretty sure I told that story when my mom was alive and she validated it.
• 26:34
  She died in 2019, but I've been telling that story for a long time.
• 26:38
  And she totally remembered being at a garage sale and having a guy give me a free box of cassettes and books.
• 26:45
  And, you know, it's something that I've told over and over again.
• 26:49
  But then this week, I got the signal again a couple days later, and I looked up the publish date of some of the audio cassettes, and they weren't published until I was like 13 or 14.
• 27:02
  I think one of them was maybe 14 or 15.
• 27:05
  And I'm like, holy crap, my life is a lie.
• 27:10
  That was really my first thought was my life is a lie.
• 27:13
  It was very dramatic.
• 27:16
  But then I realized something like, hey, you know,
• 27:19
  I've gotten to the place where I've been practicing masculine, masculine containment since December 23rd, 2024.
• 27:26
  And in some form I was practicing it before then.
• 27:29
  And I've spent a career regulating my nervous system and getting into the present moment and really turning my body into, into like a, a,
• 27:40
  a tool that I can use, an instrument to tell me which direction I need to go in my life and to tell me when I'm out of integrity.
• 27:46
  And this boiled up this week.
• 27:49
  And I'm like, holy crap.
• 27:52
  And when I, when I read it and I had that thought, like I really did have the dramatic thought, my life is a lie.
• 27:58
  I'm like, okay, chill out.
• 27:59
  But man, I felt it in my body.
• 28:01
  I felt like this activation.
• 28:03
  I felt like a vibration go over all the skin of my body.
• 28:06
  And I'm like, man, this is a lot.
• 28:08
  Like, I'm really feeling this.
• 28:09
  I'm like, I'm gonna have to talk to Katie about it.
• 28:12
  And I didn't get to talk to her right away, but I talked to her a couple hours later and I'm like, hey, I need to tell you something.
• 28:16
  And I shared with her, you know, that story that I tell and I've told it for years.
• 28:20
  Well, I just looked up the published dates of some of the stuff in that box and I had to have been, you know, 14 or 15, maybe, you know, 15.
• 28:27
  at least 14 or 15 for that to have been able to happen.
• 28:31
  And so I remember myself as 10, but I was really 14 or 15.
• 28:34
  And it kind of changes like how I've felt about that period of my childhood.
• 28:38
  And now I'm like, oh, okay.
• 28:39
  So I was in high school when I started listening to that stuff.
• 28:42
  It wasn't when I was younger.
• 28:43
  Part of the reason I used to tell this story was I was so weird when I was in grade school.
• 28:48
  And I like...
• 28:50
  had so many weird reflections for teachers that I really thought a lot of that was motivated by the personal development stuff that I listened to and read when I was younger.
• 28:57
  But I think a lot of it was just that I was weird and I was really, really different than the other kids.
• 29:03
  And it was intense.
• 29:04
  I mean, it's been intense.
• 29:06
  And I thought about it and I'm like, I need to do a podcast and come clean on this because that story is recorded on so many people's podcasts and so many events and so many different places where I've retold that story.
• 29:18
  And I'm like, man, I need a correction out in the public to show people I wasn't trying to lie.
• 29:23
  I wasn't trying to make it up.
• 29:25
  And honestly, like when I first started talking about this just a few minutes ago, it felt really uncomfortable in my body.
• 29:32
  But here's what I want you to feel like.
• 29:37
  Feel with me.
• 29:39
  Now that I've said this and I know I'm going to put this out as a podcast.
• 29:46
  My shoulders actually feel lighter.
• 29:49
  I actually feel more of my body.
• 29:51
  It feels less activated.
• 29:53
  I actually feel more comfortable in my skin right now.
• 29:56
  Like, feel it.
• 29:57
  Don't just listen to my words.
• 29:58
  Like, see if you can feel what I'm feeling.
• 30:00
  Like, feel your body and see if you can pick up the resonance of mine.
• 30:04
  Because, oh, man.
• 30:09
  The last few days I've been really like activated by this, by the fact that, you know, I've told this untruth.
• 30:14
  I don't believe it was purposeful.
• 30:16
  I don't believe it was even intentional, but I've done it over and over again.
• 30:20
  And so right now in this moment, I can't tell you how much more comfortable I feel.
• 30:27
  And right now in this moment, I understand so clearly why.
• 30:33
  exaggerating or telling kind of sort of truths or not really being completely honest with somebody without weaponizing it you know in a kind and compassionate and empathetic way is so crucially important for me because it keeps me bright here like bright now I feel better than I have in a couple of days I know that sounds probably crazy to some of you
• 30:57
  But I feel more grounded, I feel more in my body, I feel like this sense of relief, like holy crap, I'm surprised by how dysregulating this has been since I figured it out a couple days ago.
• 31:09
  And man, I'm glad I recorded this podcast and I'm glad it's going out soon.
• 31:15
  So that this story can be out in the open and
• 31:18
  um and i have a place to point people if they ever bring it up honestly that that like made me uncomfortable that somebody could listen to the story and say wait he's 53 do the math go back and look at publish dates and be like he's making this up he's probably making everything up and let me tell you why why is it so critically crucially important to me it's because
• 31:41
  At this point in my life, I am so on mission.
• 31:46
  I feel like I'm doing the work I'm meant to do in my life.
• 31:50
  I feel like I'm doing the work I've always been called to do.
• 31:52
  I'm in this place.
• 31:53
  When I look back at my life and I look at the challenges I've had and the frustrations I've had and the businesses I've run, the lessons I've learned, the practices that I have, the routine, the rituals, the structure, everything that I've done, I'm
• 32:08
  I feel like I've been moving towards this place where I can become the man that teaches and shares and learns along with my members this martial art of masculine containment.
• 32:20
  And it is so important to me.
• 32:22
  In just the past few weeks, I've done interviews with multiple members where they say things like, you know, this changed everything in my life.
• 32:30
  And this showed me that I wasn't safe and showed me how to become safe.
• 32:33
  It showed me self-forgiveness.
• 32:35
  You know, being in the brotherhood has completely changed their lives.
• 32:38
  And it's so crucially important to me.
• 32:41
  right now to be in integrity everywhere in my life because I'll share just one last one of my beliefs with you is that the higher you are in the level of integrity you live with the more magnetic you become and the more you can manifest and the more you can bring what you want to your life and so I literally obsess over being in integrity because I want the brotherhood to grow
• 33:06
  I want to help as many men as possible understand what I now know and go through the journey that I went to understand containment and improve their relationships with themselves first.
• 33:16
  Like it's so crucially important to forgive themselves, to understand themselves, to see themselves for who they really are.
• 33:23
  I want more men to be able to improve their relationships with their wife, their partner, to see them for who they really are and to provide emotional safety and security in a way that gives us so much capacity as men.
• 33:36
  I want men to be able to have better relationships with their kids.
• 33:39
  And like so many men in the brotherhood have talked about, I want their businesses to be easier and less stressful and more with ease.
• 33:47
  And I want them to grow and have the life that they really want.
• 33:50
  And so-
• 33:52
  Having this out there where I had this glaring inconsistency, this untruth that anybody could find, really made me feel like it was challenging my mission.
• 34:00
  And that's so much a part of the reason why I recorded this podcast today.
• 34:05
  And so...
• 34:07
  Thank you for being here and thank you for witnessing me and for seeing and hearing me and for allowing me to have this transmutation and this release.
• 34:16
  It actually feels freaking awesome.
• 34:21
  And if you're a man who might have some challenges in your relationship and might have some issues in how you're treating your kids or judging yourself or...
• 34:31
  knows that you need help, do not try and do all of this on your own.
• 34:35
  You don't need to.
• 34:36
  Go to thebrotherhoodsociety.com.
• 34:38
  It would be my honor to walk this path with you.
• 34:41
  When this podcast releases, we are in a open interview period right now where you can jump on a call with me and other men.
• 34:48
  and hear what the Brotherhood Society has to offer, understand masculine containment at a much deeper level, and get any questions you have answered.
• 34:56
  All you have to do is navigate to thebrotherhoodsociety.com and jump into an interview.
• 35:01
  There's a schedule there.
• 35:02
  There's tons of calls throughout the month of August, 2026, and I'd be honored to meet you in person.
• 35:09
  Thanks again for being here with me today.
• 35:10
  I appreciate you.
• 35:11
  I appreciate you being a podcast listener.
• 35:14
  And before I leave,
• 35:16
  I'll just make one request.
• 35:18
  If you know a man who needs to hear this podcast, do me a favor, share it with them right now.
• 35:22
  If you know a person who needs to hear this podcast or who would benefit from hearing this podcast, take a moment and share it with them right now.
• 35:28
  I don't wanna put ads on this podcast.
• 35:30
  I wanna keep it completely pressure and noise free, but recommendations and referrals are how the Brotherhood Society has grown from the beginning, and I would appreciate you sending this to somebody you love.
• 35:40
  Thanks for being here again.
• 35:42
  TheBrotherhoodSociety.com.