Latest / Masculine Containment / 54 - From Constant Terror to Peace: David Binns' Brotherhood Story

Transcript

54 - From Constant Terror to Peace: David Binns' Brotherhood Story · Masculine Containment

• 0:00
  Welcome to another interview of the Masculine Containment Podcast.
• 0:03
  I feel honored today to be interviewing one of the members from our third container, David Binns.
• 0:10
  David has a long history in personal development and personal work and was a very active member of our third container.
• 0:18
  And I'm excited for you to hear his story, hear the transformation he's gone through, and...
• 0:24
  I think you'll find a lot of what he's been through relatable and where he ended up inspirational.
• 0:30
  David, thank you so much for being on the podcast, brother.
• 0:33
  Thanks for having me, brother.
• 0:34
  Yeah, no, it's good to have you, man.
• 0:36
  So let's jump in.
• 0:38
  Let's jump in.
• 0:39
  Let's start with what was going on for you before you came to the brotherhood.
• 0:44
  What was life like for you?
• 0:49
  That's a really loaded question, you know, by way of, by way of background, similar to yourself, I was raised by women and then thrown out into the world and said, go be a man.
• 1:03
  And yeah, I'm ripped 45 years old, great shape, tough as nails.
• 1:07
  Sure.
• 1:08
  You look at, but internally there are a lot of different things that I needed to learn along the way.
• 1:14
  And I have, but yeah.
• 1:18
  coming into our marriage and you're there to, you know, lead your wife, lead the family, lead my wife, lead the family.
• 1:25
  Like I, this sounds people who grew up with their father, they can't understand, but I had no clue what I was doing.
• 1:36
  No clue.
• 1:37
  I had my mom, my stepmom, my two stepsisters and my biological sister surrounded by women.
• 1:43
  And I
• 1:45
  Then fast forward to more recently over the last few years, um, my wife and I went through
• 1:54
  a wildly insane situation for the better part of four years as a result of her ex where our lives were being threatened.
• 2:02
  Um, for those of you who are Canadian that are listening, the Canadian secret intelligence agency or pardon me, Canadian secret intelligence service was involved, which is the equivalent of the CIA in the United States.
• 2:16
  Uh, we had private security.
• 2:17
  I had the guns and gangs unit on call, uh,
• 2:21
  It was mental.
• 2:24
  Mental.
• 2:26
  And as a result of that, I had near adrenal failure in 2023 into 2024 in PTSD.
• 2:36
  Like a full body breakdown, right, David?
• 2:38
  Brother, I couldn't work for 18 months.
• 2:40
  Yeah.
• 2:41
  I worked with, like, I had some clients to get by, literally get by, but...
• 2:49
  I was working maybe an hour a day.
• 2:51
  I, I had very, very limited cognitive function.
• 2:55
  I was destroyed.
• 2:57
  And as a big part of that, you know, I haven't really been too descriptive publicly about it, but let's just put it this way.
• 3:07
  I didn't, at that time, I didn't want to be here anymore.
• 3:14
  I would drive by home Depot.
• 3:17
  every day, wondering if I should go buy a rope.
• 3:20
  I was in a dark, dark place.
• 3:26
  But what made it, there's two things that made it exceptionally difficult in my own circumstance.
• 3:34
  Number one is I have 16 years of formal training in personal transformation.
• 3:40
  I didn't go to an ayahuasca retreat and suddenly I'm a prophet.
• 3:43
  I'm not about spiritual entertainment.
• 3:45
  I've been formally trained.
• 3:48
  For decades.
• 3:49
  So you think I would have the tools to be able to manage a situation like that?
• 3:54
  Well, clearly not.
• 3:57
  Then I have a family.
• 3:59
  My wife has emotions.
• 4:01
  Her nervous system was just as fried as mine was.
• 4:05
  So you want to talk about a dumpster fire of a marriage?
• 4:11
  I don't wish that level of arguing on anybody.
• 4:18
  And arguing is putting it lightly.
• 4:19
  We were both fried.
• 4:24
  And I don't know where you want me to go with this.
• 4:26
  I could keep describing the story.
• 4:28
  Tell us, like, what does that look like day to day in the actual relationship?
• 4:32
  You know, like, what was it like for you and your wife?
• 4:37
  It was constant terror.
• 4:40
  That's such a strong word, David.
• 4:41
  Tell us, like, take us inside that.
• 4:44
  I mean, by the way, I'm not downplaying the word.
• 4:46
  It's just such a strong word.
• 4:47
  I understand.
• 4:48
  And I know you, so I know it's real.
• 4:52
  But for the people who are listening, like, tell us what, what, what do you mean by it was constant terror?
• 4:58
  So there's two pieces to that.
• 4:59
  There was what was happening externally with the individual that created the situation.
• 5:03
  Well, understandable that that, that raised a tremendous amount of pressure, but you're saying terror in the relationship.
• 5:09
  And that was my second point.
• 5:10
  So there's that piece that created terror.
• 5:12
  Right.
• 5:13
  Then internally at home, it created terror because we had to have private security.
• 5:21
  Right.
• 5:22
  I had to put new security cameras in our home.
• 5:24
  We delete relocate three times on the advice of the police.
• 5:28
  Uh, my wife is running her own business.
• 5:33
  I'm trying to run my own business.
• 5:38
  Her, her upbringing trained her to be able to financially thrive in chaos.
• 5:48
  My childhood did not.
• 5:51
  So her business at the time was taking off like a rocket and mine was plummeting into dust.
• 5:59
  So my self-worth was down in the bottom of the ocean.
• 6:06
  Then I would see my wife go do a $500,000 launch, but then she would be stressed.
• 6:14
  But my self-worth is in the tank.
• 6:17
  It was just this perpetual constant turbine of stress.
• 6:24
  I would say something.
• 6:25
  She would analyze it.
• 6:27
  I would bark back.
• 6:30
  I would do something.
• 6:31
  She would correct me.
• 6:32
  I would bark back.
• 6:35
  And slowly over time, it just started to divide us to this
• 6:43
  degree where I went to bed for the better part of two years, just wanting to flee.
• 6:50
  I got tied up in this chaotic situation and I led like a boss through that whole thing, but there was a huge cost to it.
• 7:00
  Then my wife was incredibly upset and fried.
• 7:03
  I'm incredibly upset and fried.
• 7:06
  Then we would argue, fight, fight,
• 7:11
  yell at each other.
• 7:12
  It was, it was, it was horrible.
• 7:14
  You know, I don't want to get too, too, too deep into those details, but I hope I'm beginning to really paint, paint the picture of, of what that was actually like.
• 7:27
  Yeah, I mean, it sounds like two nervous systems teetering on the edge constantly and then triggering each other.
• 7:36
  Massively.
• 7:37
  Yeah, into what sounds like a lot of that pattern we talked about, trigger, escalation, rupture, withdraw, and then some attempt at repair.
• 7:45
  But when you have that level of outside pressure, it feels like repair would be near impossible.
• 7:53
  It would happen, but it would take longer.
• 7:56
  Yeah.
• 7:57
  And it would take longer on the tail end of that pattern because the way in which Adele would respond to the pattern and the way in which I would respond to the pattern was different.
• 8:09
  So when the pattern played out, at the end of it, the way in which repair would occur was predictable every single time.
• 8:19
  Yeah.
• 8:22
  I would avoid because my nervous system was fried.
• 8:26
  It would take me three to four days to get over an argument.
• 8:29
  Not like because I'm negotiating, she said this, my nervous system.
• 8:33
  I just need it back to baseline.
• 8:35
  A hundred percent.
• 8:36
  Yeah.
• 8:36
  And even then at that time, you know, on a scale from one to 10, let's say eight being really healthy for a baseline, my baseline was two.
• 8:48
  And my doctor said to me, because I was telling you before we started recording the podcast, I got flown out on an emergency flight from Toronto to Vancouver because of the neuroadrenal failure.
• 9:02
  He says, if you didn't meet me in the next month, you would have been hospitalized.
• 9:08
  My cortisol levels, and I think we measure them differently, Canada versus the United States, mine was at a four.
• 9:16
  Healthy is 20.
• 9:18
  If you go to one, you're hospitalized.
• 9:20
  You go to zero, you're dead.
• 9:24
  So there was this, yeah, like there's this constant level of internal terror, but also terror in the marriage.
• 9:34
  And it's obvious why the circumstance that we navigated.
• 9:38
  Yeah.
• 9:39
  But at the end of the pattern in the picture that you paint, right at the end of
• 9:48
  Adele would want to repair quickly and I would avoid.
• 9:53
  So it's like the inner, the inner child would get activated at the end of the pattern.
• 9:58
  Well, it's activated throughout the whole thing, but the way in which we would respond to repair was directly correlated to my inner child and her inner child.
• 10:08
  And that made it even worse because I needed space rightfully.
• 10:11
  So, because I was so fried because my baseline was at a two.
• 10:15
  Yeah.
• 10:17
  And then Adele would come and repair and then would want to repair.
• 10:20
  But the way in which we repaired that whole pattern, I could literally write out exactly what happened.
• 10:26
  And we probably cycled through that 150 to 200 times a year.
• 10:31
  What's that like, David?
• 10:33
  Like you call it terror, but as like trying, like if you had to.
• 10:38
  It's such a unique situation.
• 10:39
  You know, I've done a lot of these interviews and every man's situation is unique, but yours is like truly unique.
• 10:43
  You had all this outside pressure.
• 10:45
  You have the medical stuff going on.
• 10:47
  And then you have this dynamic where your wife has conditioning that makes her want to repair immediately.
• 10:54
  You are in a place where due to your conditioning, your life, and then your actual like energetic capacity, you can't.
• 11:05
  What are the thoughts that come up for you as a man when you're going through that?
• 11:09
  I don't want to be here.
• 11:11
  Yeah.
• 11:12
  God, it's hard to say that.
• 11:15
  What's the point?
• 11:17
  Yeah.
• 11:18
  I mean, it's hard to hear that.
• 11:21
  Yeah.
• 11:24
  How often was it like that for you?
• 11:27
  Three years, every day.
• 11:30
  Jeez, David.
• 11:30
  Every day.
• 11:34
  Every day.
• 11:39
  Yeah, I think it doesn't get talked about enough, but I don't know a lot of men who haven't encountered suicidal ideation.
• 11:48
  And it's come up on more than one podcast with members.
• 11:51
  Because when you're in that place where you're stuck in that dynamic, hope starts to exit the picture, doesn't it?
• 12:03
  In the moment, you don't even understand what hope is.
• 12:06
  Pardon me.
• 12:06
  Let me be responsible.
• 12:08
  I didn't understand what hope was in the moment.
• 12:11
  Yeah.
• 12:13
  Because it was, you know, it was, it was, it was like, it was, I always describe it like this.
• 12:20
  It's like a, it was like a capsule of terror.
• 12:23
  I couldn't see anything beyond the terror.
• 12:26
  I couldn't, but this is in my situation where it got particularly nasty, I
• 12:32
  Is this situation that we went through was, was it's not anymore incredibly public.
• 12:42
  Like I I'm talking national and international public.
• 12:47
  Okay.
• 12:48
  So the, the, the level of crippling shame that I experienced was,
• 12:58
  What does, I wonder if this person knows, what do they think about me?
• 13:00
  I haven't heard from them in a while, isolating from friendships.
• 13:04
  It hasn't been up until really the last 18 months that I've really started to get back out into life.
• 13:12
  And it's look, there's still energy from that experience that's exiting me.
• 13:15
  Like that's not gonna go away in six months, right?
• 13:18
  No, it's like, it's a process and I'm doing those, doing that work, but.
• 13:23
  It was, if there's a word beyond isolating, it was that.
• 13:29
  Hmm.
• 13:32
  Such a unique situation.
• 13:33
  It sounds, you say isolating, it sounds crippling.
• 13:36
  Like, it just shuts everything down.
• 13:38
  Like, you literally, like, feels like there's no options.
• 13:43
  Correct.
• 13:44
  And the other thing that made it so difficult is...
• 13:52
  I have 16 years in the transformation space, like leading programs, transformational programs to hundreds of people at a time, holding that, leading them, dealing with really, really complex, heavy things.
• 14:08
  And they go out and produce a new future and breakthrough like extraordinary stuff.
• 14:13
  But then this thing literally just crippled me.
• 14:17
  And now I know why, but it completely crippled me.
• 14:22
  And I just, I crumbled in the whole thing.
• 14:25
  God, the juxtaposition of, of like knowing you can go out and help other people and then being in this place where you feel stuck, it like 16 years in the transformational space becomes a judgment.
• 14:36
  100%.
• 14:39
  So intense.
• 14:44
  So tell us, how did you find the brother?
• 14:47
  Like, that's the next question I normally ask people, but I, I want to bring you to the experience and, and like, let's get into that.
• 14:53
  How'd you, how'd you encounter this work?
• 14:55
  Well, you and I initially met back in 2016, I think it was in Pasadena or San Diego.
• 15:02
  One of those, one of those events.
• 15:04
  Yeah.
• 15:05
  Okay.
• 15:06
  And, um.
• 15:08
  You and I went and recorded a podcast and it was really funny because I always remember this.
• 15:13
  Your message was very much like scaling and it's just like, that doesn't resonate.
• 15:20
  So I didn't really pay much attention.
• 15:23
  And then I'd always think about, I wonder what she's up to, Chris Smith and just name, what are all the guys up to?
• 15:30
  Check in once in a while.
• 15:32
  And then Kylie was working with Adele.
• 15:36
  Kylie Ryan.
• 15:36
  Yeah.
• 15:37
  Yeah.
• 15:38
  She was working with Adele and she goes, and she was helping Adele with some stuff around what we're talking about.
• 15:45
  And he should totally check out Alex Sharfman.
• 15:49
  And Alex, Adele was like, babe, do you know Alex Sharfman?
• 15:52
  I'm like, Sharfman.
• 15:53
  I'm like, of course I do.
• 15:55
  I'm like, why?
• 15:56
  And she goes, just check him out.
• 15:58
  And then I read a post and I was like, hmm.
• 16:03
  read another post and I was like, and oh, you know, it's really funny.
• 16:06
  This is a little asterisk.
• 16:09
  Um, there's always the asterisk on the tail end of that situation.
• 16:14
  I led leadership programs for men, that whole situation that we went through.
• 16:19
  And then I actually had to stop and we don't need to get into why, but I had to, well, because of what the men were dealing with.
• 16:25
  And then it was getting all over me.
• 16:26
  That's a whole other episode, but so like, I'm not new to the men's space.
• 16:31
  Yeah.
• 16:32
  And then I see your content and I was like, no one's talking about that.
• 16:38
  And I'm not, I don't just mean masculine containment.
• 16:41
  I just mean the messaging.
• 16:42
  And I was like, interesting.
• 16:45
  And then I read another one and then I sent you a message.
• 16:48
  And then you posted, hey, I'm opening up the next container.
• 16:52
  And I was like, send me the link.
• 16:53
  And you're like, there's no link.
• 16:55
  This is going to be the last container that it's free.
• 16:57
  And I was like, I'm in.
• 16:58
  I was like, let's go.
• 17:00
  It was back when I was testing.
• 17:03
  Exactly.
• 17:04
  Second container.
• 17:05
  I introduced you as third container.
• 17:06
  That's okay.
• 17:07
  Second container.
• 17:07
  Sorry about that, David.
• 17:08
  That's fine.
• 17:09
  Well, I was in the third.
• 17:10
  I was in second and third.
• 17:11
  You were in the third, too.
• 17:12
  Yeah, you did it twice.
• 17:13
  Bit of a lifer.
• 17:16
  And so what was it, you come from the transformation space, you've done men's work, what was it about the messaging that stood out to you?
• 17:31
  What stood out to me the most was the pattern that you describe.
• 17:41
  And I sat with that and I was like, son of a bitch.
• 17:44
  That's exactly what happens around here.
• 17:47
  Hmm.
• 17:48
  That's totally what happens.
• 17:51
  And then as you began to share more and more about the impact of that, it really, really resonated.
• 18:01
  But the other piece of it too, was your authenticity and your own journey with Katie, because I knew, you know, obviously aren't best friends, but I knew who you were and what you were up to.
• 18:14
  And I was like, he shut his whole business down and went and invested obviously a ton of dough in his own marriage and his development.
• 18:21
  I was like, wow.
• 18:24
  But those were really the two things, the pattern and the way in which you described that, and I totally identified myself within that.
• 18:32
  And that is exactly what happens.
• 18:34
  And you're talking about that main pattern, the trigger escalation.
• 18:37
  Trigger escalation.
• 18:38
  Exactly.
• 18:38
  Yeah, exactly.
• 18:40
  Yeah.
• 18:42
  So you reached out, you asked me for a link.
• 18:46
  You came into the second container.
• 18:48
  Did you have any hesitations coming in?
• 18:50
  Zero.
• 18:51
  See, I'm an anomaly in that way.
• 18:54
  When I find someone or something with credibility and there's immediate trust in my gut about it, as you saw in the second container, I do not hold back.
• 19:06
  I lead from the front and I'm just all in.
• 19:09
  So I am very unique in that situation.
• 19:12
  I appreciate, you know, men tend to be a little bit more trepidatious and skittish around that level of commitment.
• 19:19
  But, you know, you have this ability to create a very healthy and clean and trustworthy space, which you could just, I could see with the other guys, like men literally just unzipping themselves and say, here I am.
• 19:37
  I'm here to learn.
• 19:38
  And that is a, that is a skill and it's a beautiful thing because there's way too much spiritual entertainment out there where people are in the men's space.
• 19:46
  Um, meanwhile, behind the scenes, their life is a dumpster fire.
• 19:50
  And I, I knew that wouldn't be the case with you.
• 19:53
  You call it spiritual entertainment.
• 19:54
  I call it spiritual tourism.
• 19:56
  Yeah.
• 19:57
  Performative, performative spirituality is another term I use all the time.
• 20:01
  Yeah.
• 20:02
  Yeah.
• 20:02
  It's like, um,
• 20:05
  Yeah.
• 20:06
  Yeah.
• 20:07
  It's a, it's, it's kind of an epidemic.
• 20:10
  Um, so tell us about coming into the brotherhood and, and, you know, getting into the container, getting on the calls, what started shifting for you, David?
• 20:17
  I mean, I, I remember vividly, but I want you to tell the story.
• 20:22
  It's so wild.
• 20:23
  Cause that, when did we start that in December of 2025?
• 20:27
  I think, I think it was, it was, um,
• 20:33
  I went, you, you gave me instruction on, I think it was the ninth call to go back and look at the first call.
• 20:38
  And I was literally unrecognizable.
• 20:40
  Even to this day, I'm unrecognizable.
• 20:43
  Um, man, you know, one of the other curses, I guess you could say, and I, and I mean that with love towards myself of being at such a high level in this industry is that
• 21:00
  as I shared on that call, and I'll get to what that was in a moment, but I was trained at the Navy SEAL's level of integrity.
• 21:08
  Like a level of integrity that people can't handle.
• 21:14
  But it has been the biggest struggle for me my entire life.
• 21:21
  And we were on a call.
• 21:23
  It was around, and the conversation was around integrity.
• 21:25
  And fortunately, I'm able to suspend any kind of preconceived knowing and allow you to fully contribute, which you did.
• 21:34
  And we went into a breakout room.
• 21:37
  And I just, you know, shared openly and said, this is something I really struggle with and yada, yada, yada.
• 21:42
  And I got a lot of shame around it because of how I was trained and I have a higher expectation of myself, but I can't break through this.
• 21:47
  And then I brought that back into the open room and share that with you.
• 21:50
  And you asked me one question.
• 21:54
  And it wasn't a question of like, what do you get out of not keeping your word to yourself?
• 21:59
  Like, what's the, you know, it wasn't something like that.
• 22:02
  You said, who didn't keep their promises to you as a child?
• 22:09
  And I broke down for the better part of five minutes and you did not rush that call at all.
• 22:17
  You know, and I would in full transparency, as always, it's something that I'm, I'm still integrating, but there's a whole new space because I've got 40 years
• 22:28
  of training of not keeping my word to myself to you.
• 22:31
  It is absolutely not a problem.
• 22:33
  Yeah.
• 22:33
  To whoever my son's baseball team, whatever it is, but to myself, it has always been a challenge, but since then I have made huge leaps, but I've, I've stripped away the shame of it because that's what it does when we don't keep our word to ourselves, what that activates is shame and guilt.
• 22:59
  And I stripped that away and have replaced that with love, compassion, and forgiveness.
• 23:05
  And that in and of itself is a massive victory.
• 23:09
  And I'm making huge leaps in that area of my life.
• 23:13
  Huge.
• 23:14
  David, for the guy who's listening, who hasn't done the same level of work that you have, can you help me make it tactical for him?
• 23:22
  When you say you weren't keeping your word to yourself, like what was it?
• 23:25
  How did that show up in your life?
• 23:27
  Yeah.
• 23:34
  I run ultra marathons.
• 23:37
  I would say that I'm going to go running on Saturday.
• 23:42
  At 7am.
• 23:46
  It would be raining, so I wouldn't go.
• 23:49
  I've got all the gear.
• 23:50
  I've got more gear than I've got all the gear.
• 23:52
  I can go and I wouldn't go.
• 23:55
  Or...
• 23:57
  I would say that I'm going to meet this certain objective in my business and then create a plan.
• 24:04
  Well, I'd, and I'd follow it for two weeks, then I wouldn't follow it.
• 24:10
  Or I said I was going to pay this particular bill on Tuesday.
• 24:14
  It's in my calendar for 9am.
• 24:16
  And then I'm suddenly like completely not suddenly, but then I'd be oblivious to my calendar.
• 24:22
  Oblivious.
• 24:23
  I'd get caught in a project.
• 24:25
  Or it would be a rather substantial bill.
• 24:30
  And then I would reason and justify to delay paying that.
• 24:38
  Does that give you a greater context?
• 24:40
  It does.
• 24:41
  I can keep going.
• 24:42
  No, I mean, it does.
• 24:43
  The reason I ask you to do that, David, is because I think what you're talking about is this really common experience for men that we know what we want to do.
• 24:56
  we know what we should do, we make commitments to ourselves, and then there's this part of us that gets in the way of fulfilling the commitment to us.
• 25:04
  And like you said, we often fulfill commitments to everyone around us but ourselves.
• 25:09
  Yeah.
• 25:10
  And what I shared with them, what I shared with you on that call and why I asked you that question is because so often,
• 25:16
  That is us repeating the patterns of our childhood, us repeating the patterns and conditioning of the adults around us that we're doing the same thing to us.
• 25:24
  And like we're repeating those patterns because it's familiar, not because it's healthy, not because it feels good, but it's familiar.
• 25:30
  And I think, you know, for so many men, that's an unlock.
• 25:34
  It's like, Oh wait, I'm treating myself the way I didn't want to be treated when I was younger.
• 25:38
  Yeah, exactly.
• 25:44
  Exactly.
• 25:46
  So tell us, go ahead.
• 25:47
  Oh, sorry.
• 25:48
  No, you go ahead.
• 25:48
  I didn't mean to cut you ahead.
• 25:49
  And it's like, you know, given the, you know, in my particular circumstance, I never had a male figure to grab me by the back of the neck and said, son, that's not how we operate.
• 26:07
  We just don't do it that way.
• 26:08
  This, I'm going to show you how we do life.
• 26:11
  I never had that.
• 26:13
  I literally, literally would be, I had the freedom to do whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted, wherever I wanted as a kid.
• 26:22
  And I don't mean flying off or whatever, like spending money.
• 26:25
  I just, my mom was always working.
• 26:27
  She had to, she was a single mother.
• 26:31
  So that, that my environment combined with my childhood conditioning, it was a recipe
• 26:42
  You know, it's amazing that I've gotten this far to do all these great things.
• 26:46
  But like, you know, what men really want to understand, anything is possible when we keep our word to ourself and start small.
• 26:59
  Look, I know this topic down to the studs.
• 27:04
  It's starting small.
• 27:05
  It's literally one thing a day.
• 27:07
  I don't care if it's drink one glass of water a day.
• 27:11
  Out of this particular cup, go do that.
• 27:15
  And then add one more thing and one more thing.
• 27:22
  Like we say in the Brotherhood, progress over perfection and slow is fast and fast is slow.
• 27:26
  It's really just one thing at a time.
• 27:28
  Totally.
• 27:29
  So, David, you had a unique experience because...
• 27:33
  You were on that call earlier in the Brotherhood where there was a breakdown, like a moment of intervention where we stopped the call and you and I really spent some time together.
• 27:44
  And then there was the call towards the end of the container where I said, you were sharing or something.
• 27:48
  I stopped and I don't, I think I remember you sharing or asking a question.
• 27:51
  I answered your question.
• 27:52
  I said, David, just one more thing, man.
• 27:54
  I think you need to go watch the recording.
• 27:56
  Right?
• 27:57
  from the earlier call.
• 27:59
  And you said, why?
• 28:00
  And I said, you know, I think you need to go like, I would really highly recommend you go see how much different you are now.
• 28:07
  I think you're going to go watch that call and maybe have trouble recognizing the person on the call.
• 28:12
  So you did that.
• 28:13
  Can you share that experience with us?
• 28:16
  I'm covered in goosebumps as you asked that question.
• 28:18
  Cause I remember.
• 28:18
  I've got chills going on too.
• 28:20
  And when I came on the first call, I was so skittish.
• 28:25
  I was scared.
• 28:27
  I was stressed.
• 28:30
  I was contracted.
• 28:34
  Like I was restricted.
• 28:35
  I was like contorted.
• 28:37
  Like I literally, I could see the tension in my body and.
• 28:46
  It was jaw dropping at the same time to witness.
• 28:50
  It's very rare that we ever witness our own transformation because very hard to, because we are the transformation, but going back and actually seeing it was like, holy cow.
• 29:04
  And, you know, I can go back and look at photos of when I was 230 pounds.
• 29:09
  Okay, fine.
• 29:10
  That was like 15 years ago, 12 years ago, whatever.
• 29:12
  It's not the same impact.
• 29:14
  The fact that that was four months, three months, uh,
• 29:22
  Yeah, I think it was eight weeks.
• 29:23
  Yeah, there you go.
• 29:24
  No, the first one was 10.
• 29:25
  The first one was 10.
• 29:26
  Oh, yeah, the first one was 10.
• 29:27
  The first one was 10 weeks.
• 29:28
  But I think the call I asked you to watch was the second one.
• 29:31
  Yeah.
• 29:32
  And I asked you to in the ninth week.
• 29:35
  So, yeah, maybe something like that, seven or eight weeks.
• 29:39
  To see that level of distinction in who I was being was remarkable.
• 29:50
  Truly remarkable.
• 29:52
  So you were in the container, you made this massive transformation, you were able to witness it in yourself.
• 29:58
  Give us the highlights, what did you start doing differently as a result of the brotherhood?
• 30:07
  I stopped reacting to Adele.
• 30:11
  And I would feel the reaction, but I would breathe into the reaction, just hold space.
• 30:16
  Mm-hmm.
• 30:17
  Because, you know, we had five years of not being kind.
• 30:21
  Let's just say that to each other.
• 30:22
  Mm-hmm.
• 30:23
  I really took a leadership stance in that way to really lead my nervous system.
• 30:30
  And my nervous system still has a ways to go, which is fine.
• 30:34
  But you can even see it in my demeanor.
• 30:35
  Like, I'm very calm and present.
• 30:38
  But I took it upon myself to stop intellectualizing all
• 30:43
  All of this, all of these things that I've learned to try and bolt them on to our marriage.
• 30:49
  It's like, bro, that ain't, that ain't gonna work.
• 30:51
  A man's nervous system brings the weather.
• 30:55
  He brings the weather in the home.
• 30:57
  It's either gonna be a thunderstorm or it's gonna be flowers and beautiful sunshine.
• 31:02
  And the more that I calmed down, the more the light came back.
• 31:07
  So.
• 31:09
  I took it upon myself to use the practices and I was not perfect.
• 31:14
  None of us are.
• 31:15
  Right.
• 31:16
  And I did them to the best of my ability and just noticed myself being significantly softer with Adele.
• 31:28
  Not like I would have like an edge that just took that away.
• 31:34
  And yeah.
• 31:36
  I would say using the practices on a daily basis made the biggest difference.
• 31:42
  The other difference was being a part at the time.
• 31:45
  Cause you don't do this now was the telegram group.
• 31:48
  Like all of us just like, man, we're like the band of brothers.
• 31:52
  Yeah.
• 31:52
  It's incredible.
• 31:53
  Right.
• 31:54
  And just a place to be seen into like, you know, to, as I like to say, like drain the tank.
• 32:01
  Like she did this, just let it rip.
• 32:03
  Just say whatever you want to say and need to say.
• 32:05
  And just like, it was like a garbage can, just like, leave it here.
• 32:09
  And the guys are going to love you for it.
• 32:12
  And we did that with each other.
• 32:13
  And like having that consistent outlet to be seen, loved and heard by strangers for the most part.
• 32:21
  made a huge difference because most of us as men, we just, we walk around with anger, rage, resentment, undelivered communications, and all of that compounds.
• 32:34
  And eventually the top blows off.
• 32:36
  And in our situation, when both of us had fried nervous system, that lid would pop off very easily.
• 32:42
  It would just take a light breeze for that to pop off.
• 32:45
  So the more that I had an outlet, the,
• 32:49
  It made a huge difference.
• 32:51
  And then I would say the final piece, which is particularly intricate for men is, was the forgiveness practice.
• 33:00
  Often a forgiveness practice is like a, a white male or a North American male, I should say, learning Cantonese.
• 33:09
  They're like, what, huh?
• 33:11
  I can't, I can't understand that.
• 33:12
  What does that even mean?
• 33:13
  Yeah.
• 33:14
  But when we begin and you do such a wonderful job of this.
• 33:18
  And, you know, like I've said, I'm not new to this stuff.
• 33:25
  Self-forgiveness was something that I genuinely just didn't really ever grasp or understand.
• 33:33
  And after that call, I took it upon myself to go study the way that I study and look at the definition and read through it and think through it and ponder it and reflect and meditate.
• 33:45
  And I finally started to get it.
• 33:49
  there was like this massive release just off my shoulders.
• 33:53
  I didn't ball my eyes out or anything like that.
• 33:55
  We already did that on the integrity call.
• 34:01
  So, um, it was just this, and I hope you can hear this, like this sense of relief, this weight that just lifted.
• 34:16
  And the forgiveness practice was,
• 34:19
  It really does have the ability, it's very simple, but to bring us back to life.
• 34:25
  Now you got me rolling.
• 34:27
  Now the fourth one, and I'll stop here, that I have found particularly powerful that I haven't been in contact with for a number of years was the cord cutting practice.
• 34:39
  The cord cutting practice,
• 34:46
  Man, that is real.
• 34:48
  That is frickin' real.
• 34:51
  And, you know, we're very similar where you and I have the ability to take what could be perceived as something for the feminine or very esoteric, and you and I bring it down to the nuts and bolts and make it practical and relatable.
• 35:11
  And you did that really well with the cord cutting.
• 35:16
  And what's very important about that, and now I'm starting to remember a lot more because so much went on.
• 35:24
  As a result of that situation that we referred to at the beginning of this episode, this individual had in total over multiple accounts, over 60,000 organic social media followers where he was shaming us every day.
• 35:39
  So I turned into literally an intelligence officer during this.
• 35:44
  Okay.
• 35:46
  And I was collecting evidence every day for the lawyers, all of these different things.
• 35:51
  So much so that I knew that he was living in Mexico while nobody knew that he was in Mexico.
• 35:58
  And after the situation completed through the courts on March 5th, 2025, four, 2024,
• 36:16
  through that whole situation, I developed an addiction of Jeff and his social media every day.
• 36:22
  It would be like looking at the, it was, it's incredibly demonic content, incredibly demonic and dark.
• 36:31
  And the first person that came up during the court fighting exercise with you was him.
• 36:40
  I didn't, and I would check his social media 10 times a day.
• 36:44
  And there was no need to the court, like this is done.
• 36:46
  The guy doesn't live in North America.
• 36:47
  Like total addiction, total addiction.
• 36:50
  And from that day forward, which would have been January ish of this year.
• 36:57
  Yeah.
• 36:58
  I did not look at his social media content once.
• 37:04
  I have since just to check and, but it's not the same reaction now.
• 37:08
  Cause I cleared all that out.
• 37:10
  Not the same compulsion.
• 37:11
  Oh God.
• 37:12
  No, I, I don't know.
• 37:13
  I checked it last week.
• 37:14
  Cause Adele and I were curious, like, just want to make sure he's still living here.
• 37:18
  Yeah.
• 37:19
  Still living there.
• 37:20
  How does he look?
• 37:20
  Terrible.
• 37:21
  Okay.
• 37:21
  Done.
• 37:22
  Right.
• 37:23
  Um, there is zero energetic draw whatsoever to that man.
• 37:37
  that was such a part of the internal terrorism that got created.
• 37:42
  Okay.
• 37:43
  You're almost terrorizing yourself.
• 37:45
  A hundred percent.
• 37:46
  I was a hundred percent.
• 37:47
  It was just, it was just, it was self-shaming.
• 37:49
  That's what it was.
• 37:51
  And I never did anything wrong.
• 37:53
  Um, I also use the cord cutting exercise with my father.
• 37:56
  Okay.
• 38:00
  uh, probably about two months after that integrity conversation that we had.
• 38:06
  And that has made a huge difference.
• 38:08
  That will be a tool that frankly, all of the tools will be something I have it all printed out right here on my desk in a minder.
• 38:17
  Um, so I, I can keep, you know, you're starting to unlock a lot of pieces because the two containers kind of got blended for me, but, um, um,
• 38:27
  Yeah, that forgiveness and cord cutting exercise, like man, oh man, oh man.
• 38:32
  So simple, yet wildly powerful.
• 38:36
  I think it's, I mean, I so appreciate you sharing that, David, especially those two practices, because
• 38:44
  The self-forgiveness exercise or ritual or somatic practice that we do in the container takes about 15 minutes.
• 38:52
  And the cord cutting is, I think, 15 or 18 minutes.
• 38:57
  And, you know, what I've learned in my life is that...
• 39:03
  It's not the amount of time you give something.
• 39:05
  It's the intention, the presence, and the process.
• 39:08
  And so many men have reflected that that 15-minute self-forgiveness or the 15-18-minute cord cutting has completely shifted something major in their lives.
• 39:19
  Like in that time period, that was the time period that the work was done, and it was done, and it was over.
• 39:25
  Correct.
• 39:25
  And I think so much of the time, especially for people like you and I have done a ton of personal development work, it's like, oh, I've got this thing going on.
• 39:31
  It's going to take forever.
• 39:33
  But when you're in an energetic container like the Brotherhood and you're sharing that space with literally dozens of men from around the world and you're all doing the same thing in the same way with the same energy,
• 39:47
  it really can shift from like, there's a before and after to a phone call.
• 39:51
  I mean, sorry, to a Zoom call.
• 39:53
  It's like, here's where I was before and here's where I'm after.
• 39:56
  And there's like, what sounded like for you, a permanent shift.
• 40:00
  Without a doubt.
• 40:01
  In that 15 minutes, from that moment forward, there was maybe a day or two where there was a slight urge to check his social media.
• 40:12
  Then after that, it literally vanished from my mind.
• 40:15
  And that was a severe, now it was appropriate during the time of everything going on.
• 40:22
  Yeah.
• 40:23
  But I was doing it a year and a half after.
• 40:25
  Yeah, you didn't have to keep doing it.
• 40:27
  And I kept doing it because it was self-punishment.
• 40:30
  And then I stopped.
• 40:33
  So the moment we stopped giving something so much significance, like stop making this one thing or deal with such a big deal.
• 40:41
  It is a big deal, but stop making it a big deal.
• 40:45
  And just go do one of these practices.
• 40:47
  Stop making it so significant.
• 40:49
  And bring the commitment and the intention.
• 40:53
  You can transform something in 10 minutes, 15 minutes.
• 40:57
  So how, you know, we, we touched on it earlier and I just want to make sure before we wrap up, how is your relationship now with Adele?
• 41:04
  How are things going between the two of you?
• 41:06
  Cause I know that was a big part of why you came into the container.
• 41:09
  Huge.
• 41:10
  It was, it was the reason I came into the container.
• 41:12
  It was, yeah, it was, it was the primary reason.
• 41:14
  It was the motivation.
• 41:15
  Yeah.
• 41:16
  Yeah.
• 41:16
  Thank you.
• 41:16
  The motivation.
• 41:18
  Um, yeah.
• 41:22
  our home is way more peaceful, like way more peaceful.
• 41:29
  There's way more joy.
• 41:31
  There's more love connection.
• 41:33
  I have more space.
• 41:34
  You know, when you're in that level of terror, you feel like you live in a prison.
• 41:38
  Yeah.
• 41:39
  And I, I'm, I'm as every week passes, you know, cause as, as we said, like a situation like that takes a while to get the energy out.
• 41:48
  I'm just feeling more free.
• 41:49
  Like my wings are spreading even more and more.
• 41:52
  And the love and affinity that continues to get restored between the two of us, given the totality of we dealt with is truly monumental because how it didn't tear us apart.
• 42:10
  I don't know.
• 42:12
  I genuinely don't know.
• 42:14
  It could have been trauma bonding, who knows, whatever, it doesn't matter.
• 42:18
  We're still together and, uh, we're thriving and we're healing and we're growing and this home is, is completely different since the first day that I started in the brotherhood.
• 42:36
  Now there's still work to do.
• 42:39
  Like I'm not here and I never will paint a picture of perfection.
• 42:43
  But it's the commitment and the intention that I know I will continue to bring to the practices and through my own things to continue to make that work.
• 42:54
  Okay, so just a couple more questions.
• 42:57
  And thanks so much for sharing all this, David.
• 42:59
  It's been awesome.
• 43:02
  If there's a guy out there who is considering joining the Brotherhood and is experiencing tension in his relationship, is having challenges in a place where he doesn't feel like
• 43:13
  you know, things were worth it, or maybe that that feeling of worth is slipping away from him, what would you tell him about joining?
• 43:25
  Join.
• 43:28
  That, that it's, it's, you know, I'm looking just at, you know, my own experience and I know myself, I am bred to never give up.
• 43:41
  You know, and I know I bring a level of intensity and commitment to my own development and evolution and evolution and growth.
• 43:49
  And that's not normal.
• 43:50
  I get it.
• 43:52
  But if you're in that place of where there's medium to high tension in the marriage, you can literally feel it in your body.
• 44:02
  You can feel the stress in your brain secretly.
• 44:11
  You want to flee, you want to go somewhere else.
• 44:14
  You don't want to be there.
• 44:15
  The place is, is the brotherhood.
• 44:19
  That is the place to go.
• 44:21
  And it's not the be all and end all because that does not exist.
• 44:25
  But what does exist is a possibility inside of that container for you to radically transform yourself, which will alter the paradigm in your household.
• 44:35
  I'm living proof of it.
• 44:36
  And I can, there's tons of guys, Jaron, Cal, like you name it, all the guys in there, like tons.
• 44:42
  I literally watched it, but the thing that always has to be there is your willingness and your commitment.
• 44:53
  And my recommendation is just get in.
• 44:55
  It's that simple.
• 44:58
  I want to give you an opportunity, David.
• 45:00
  Is there anything that I missed?
• 45:01
  Anything else you want to share?
• 45:04
  Yeah.
• 45:04
  The only other thing that I would share is one of the beautiful byproducts of participating is the career growth.
• 45:12
  I didn't ask you about that.
• 45:15
  No.
• 45:15
  Yeah.
• 45:15
  How has it affected your business and your career?
• 45:18
  Yeah.
• 45:20
  It's been very good.
• 45:22
  It's been very productive.
• 45:24
  And I find when you participate in something like this, there's a ripple effect to other areas of our life.
• 45:36
  container number two, during container number two that I was a part of, which was the first one that I was in, I signed the largest consulting contract that I've ever signed in my business.
• 45:47
  It was a six-figure contract.
• 45:53
  I have a division of my business that I do not talk about publicly, where I work with ultra high net wealth people.
• 46:01
  And
• 46:03
  It's so fascinating because a previous version of David would be like, how am I going to script this guy into working with me?
• 46:10
  I need this.
• 46:10
  Like there would be this panic.
• 46:12
  And I'm talking, and I mentioned it to you on the last call of the last container that there's something I wanted to share with you.
• 46:19
  And I'm not ready to even share it yet because it hasn't happened yet.
• 46:23
  And I will, but there are some massive, massive players who are circling my pond and,
• 46:31
  And I know the more that I bring masculine containment, the more that I bring containment, the more that I'm in touch with my vision, which you cover in the program, like that's happening.
• 46:40
  And I also know my work doesn't operate in the predictable.
• 46:45
  It doesn't operate with systems and structures and, and, uh, um, you know, scripts and funnels.
• 46:51
  It's not, that's not it.
• 46:53
  And.
• 46:56
  I know the future that I'm creating is one thing we can all create, but being up, being, being able to contain it is a whole other ballgame.
• 47:11
  My finances, I cleaned up all of my finances because something that I took away from masculine containment is a phrase I came up with was financial containment, bringing those practices to my finances.
• 47:23
  Yeah.
• 47:25
  So I know that this is just the beginning.
• 47:28
  And as I continue to embody the practices and embody the work and embody the vision, my ability to contain the future that I'm committed to, like it's cooking, it's happening.
• 47:40
  It's so awesome.
• 47:41
  Yeah.
• 47:41
  It's so funny that you brought that up on the last question, David, because
• 47:45
  I'm like sitting here reflecting as a former business coach who used to focus almost exclusively on revenue and growth and scale and all the stuff that you said.
• 47:54
  It doesn't even cross my mind anymore.
• 47:55
  Now it's like, what happened personally?
• 47:57
  How's your relationship?
• 47:59
  Tell me how you changed in your life.
• 48:01
  Totally.
• 48:02
  What's so fascinating is you and so many other men, either during the container or after the container, we now use school, so we don't have Telegram anymore, but so often-
• 48:14
  We see these reflections of like kind of a little bit like shocked, like, guys, I'm doing this work and it's getting easier and my relationship's getting better.
• 48:24
  But I just signed.
• 48:25
  I mean, I think in the third container, a guy signed two contracts worth a million dollars to his company.
• 48:30
  And he's like, I've never done that before in a week.
• 48:31
  It's never happened.
• 48:33
  And so many men, even even I can't remember who it was.
• 48:37
  But even a guy who's not an entrepreneur, just worked a job, was like, hey, you know, I left my job and I can't remember the exact story, but it was something like left one job, didn't really want to be there anymore, and then got hired to do something where he was getting paid more and really what he wanted to do.
• 48:50
  And so it's so interesting how...
• 48:54
  It's so interesting how I don't focus exclusively on that anymore, but also how often that reflection has come back that you do this work and your finances change and your perspective shifts so much that it changes your ability to attract wealth and success.
• 49:10
  Totally.
• 49:11
  And it's so beautiful because, you know, I'll finish with this point.
• 49:15
  Like, you know, my impact in finance has got completely, or pardon me, my business in finance has got demolished during all that stress.
• 49:23
  Yeah.
• 49:24
  And the, the performer in me was like, no, we gotta go do it now.
• 49:31
  Like, it's like Dave, but your work, that's not your work.
• 49:35
  That's not what I teach.
• 49:37
  So it's allowed me to expand my capacity inside of the future that I'm creating.
• 49:42
  And it's building month after month after month, which is a completely different place to operate from.
• 49:49
  And that wouldn't have, that wouldn't have come across.
• 49:52
  I shouldn't say it wouldn't.
• 49:54
  A huge part of that was being inside of the brotherhood and masculine containment.
• 49:59
  Huge role.
• 50:01
  Thank you, David.
• 50:02
  You're welcome.
• 50:03
  Man, what a pleasure.
• 50:04
  Thank you for sharing this with us today and for being so vulnerable and so transparent in such a unique situation.
• 50:12
  I think it's interesting how unique your situation is, yet I found so much of what you said and how you felt and what was going on in your body and for you relatable.
• 50:22
  And so if you're a man listening and you're going through a tough time, you have maybe in a space where things don't feel like you want them to feel, and you don't feel like you're making progress or feel like you want to make a lot of progress in a short period of time, I'd be honored to walk this path with you and welcome you into the Brotherhood.
• 50:40
  You can go to thebrotherhoodsociety.com and register for either our interview or a wait list and get into the next container.
• 50:48
  And I'd love to meet you in person.
• 50:50
  And David, thanks again.
• 50:52
  And for everybody else, go to thebrotherhoodsociety.com.
• 50:55
  Please leave a comment.
• 50:57
  We read every one of them.
• 50:59
  And take a moment and consider who can you share this with.
• 51:01
  I appreciate you all.