Latest / Masculine Containment / 48 - From Dead Bedroom Roommate to Connection, Passion, & Intimacy: How Mac McKey Saved His Marriage

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48 - From Dead Bedroom Roommate to Connection, Passion, & Intimacy: How Mac McKey Saved His Marriage · Masculine Containment

• 0:00
  Welcome to another episode of Masculine Containment.
• 0:02
  Today, I am honored and privileged and honestly excited to be speaking with Mac McKay.
• 0:09
  He was a member of our third Brotherhood Container and experienced a truly radical transformation that has taken him from, well, I'll let him explain.
• 0:19
  It's taken him from a place of some challenges to really an entirely new place in his life.
• 0:24
  And I've been excited for this interview because...
• 0:27
  Mac is somebody who teaches self-protection.
• 0:29
  He has been in bodyguard work, martial arts, a man with tremendous discipline and has really put the work of the brotherhood in place in his life, in place in his relationship, his business.
• 0:42
  And I'm excited for you to hear from him.
• 0:43
  Mac, thank you so much for joining me, brother.
• 0:45
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 0:47
  It's a pleasure to be here.
• 0:49
  So let's not go all the way to what I just talked about.
• 0:52
  We'll get there in a minute.
• 0:54
  Where I want to start is what was going on for you before you joined the brotherhood.
• 0:59
  Tell us what your life was like.
• 1:01
  I tried to block all that out.
• 1:05
  You're not the only one, brother.
• 1:06
  Yeah.
• 1:07
  No, I mean, so I've been married 31 years and...
• 1:13
  Things start off really good.
• 1:14
  We have three children, three daughters.
• 1:16
  They're all grown.
• 1:17
  I've got three grandkids.
• 1:18
  So I'm in that really cool phase of life right now.
• 1:22
  But prior to this, prior to what was going on in my world is we became, I'm going to make this simple.
• 1:32
  We were roommates.
• 1:35
  I mentioned that word to my wife.
• 1:37
  She did not like that word.
• 1:40
  And but I think she after we've talked realized that's pretty much where we were at.
• 1:47
  So we weren't physical really much anymore.
• 1:54
  If we were, then two days later, we were not for five months after that.
• 1:59
  And that was a continual circle for.
• 2:01
  A good.
• 2:02
  20, 15, 20 years, long time.
• 2:10
  So, um, I, I had basically, you know, moved out of teaching martial arts and I felt like I lost a big piece of myself.
• 2:20
  I think I took that out on a lot of people when I had to go corporate and I went corporate because my business was suffering at the time and, um, I needed to find a way to support my family.
• 2:32
  So I think when that happened, I just, I was angry.
• 2:37
  Yeah.
• 2:39
  Took a lot of things out on my wife and I think my kids too, in a way.
• 2:44
  We're all grown now, but there's some trauma there that I'm sad that I caused.
• 2:51
  So it was roommates, Alex.
• 2:55
  We were getting along, but every third week, every second week, arguments that just caused
• 3:06
  Issues for at least two or three weeks.
• 3:10
  Then we would repair and then another week would go by and it would be another rupture that would last either three to four weeks or however long it would be that we just didn't connect.
• 3:24
  And that was going on for 10 to 15 years back?
• 3:27
  Yeah, that went on a really long time and I don't give up.
• 3:31
  So I didn't I didn't leave.
• 3:33
  She didn't leave.
• 3:34
  Thank God.
• 3:36
  We both believed in, you know, finding answers.
• 3:40
  My wife is a student of mine.
• 3:42
  She's a third degree black belt under me and we both are fighters.
• 3:45
  So we, we believe, yeah, we believe there was something out there.
• 3:53
  And I'm going to tell you that it's been that long to find, to find where I'm at now.
• 4:03
  Did you try other solutions or did you look at other things during that time?
• 4:06
  I sure did.
• 4:07
  We went to therapy.
• 4:09
  Mm-hmm.
• 4:10
  And that, bless his heart, I mean, the guy was trying.
• 4:15
  Yeah.
• 4:17
  But it was really a waste of time.
• 4:19
  It was a waste of time.
• 4:20
  It was a waste of funds.
• 4:22
  There was no action steps.
• 4:24
  There were not a lot of practices.
• 4:26
  There wasn't anything that we had to so-called change.
• 4:30
  There was a lot of negotiation that we were supposed to be doing.
• 4:35
  And that stuff just was not where it's at.
• 4:40
  It is not.
• 4:41
  I'm going to tell everybody that's listening to this, that is not where it's at.
• 4:46
  Maybe partially, but that was the big crux of it.
• 4:49
  So books, I'm an Audible fan.
• 4:51
  I have 82 books in my Audible library and 43% of those are self-help, whether they be business or relationship or marketing or communication.
• 5:04
  I've read them all and bits and pieces, but
• 5:11
  I just want to get to that really fun stuff and tell people how great this is because I'm just being honest with you.
• 5:20
  I've listened to a good 30-something books or more, and I say listen because that's all the time I got.
• 5:28
  Yeah.
• 5:30
  And we went to therapy and… Still didn't work.
• 5:35
  Zero.
• 5:37
  I don't even think we made progress, to be honest with you.
• 5:40
  Yeah, you know, Katie, I don't know about you, Katie and I tried therapy, and we would often go into a therapy appointment in a pretty good place and leave in rupture.
• 5:50
  Did that ever happen to you?
• 5:52
  Yes, it did, because we would talk a little bit more about what he wanted us to expose, and then feelings got hit, and there was blowups on her side, and then I just started defending myself, and...
• 6:09
  You know, so it, yeah, it, it, it, it started, it would start good and then we, I got to where I didn't look, I wasn't even looking forward to it.
• 6:21
  Mac, when you're in that place, and I know there's a lot of men out there, like a lot of men in our container, the one that you were in, were in that place of roommates and disconnection and kind of tiptoeing around each other, trying not to cause another rupture and just hoping everything would be okay.
• 6:36
  Can you share when you're in that place, like what does that do to the rest of your life?
• 6:41
  How does it affect your work, your yourself, your self image?
• 6:44
  Like,
• 6:45
  I know you're in a different place now, but can you think back to what that felt like?
• 6:48
  Yeah, I can.
• 6:49
  It's still fresh.
• 6:50
  The hierarchy that you talk about in the program was all out of whack.
• 6:55
  I'm not going to go through all that because these boys that are thinking about doing this training, that's for you to do.
• 7:02
  But I can tell you the hierarchy was all out of whack.
• 7:05
  Mission was number one.
• 7:06
  I wanted to just be working all the time.
• 7:09
  It was where I was knowledgeable.
• 7:12
  It was where I was in charge.
• 7:13
  Yeah.
• 7:15
  It's where I called the shots.
• 7:17
  It's where I made a difference.
• 7:19
  It's where I, people respected my opinion.
• 7:23
  There was no, you know, backlash or anything like that for what I was doing.
• 7:30
  And so, but because of that, then I'm not present at a movie night with my family and my kids.
• 7:38
  I'm not hanging out.
• 7:44
  At all.
• 7:45
  We're not going out to dinner.
• 7:47
  We're not.
• 7:50
  None of that stuff was happening.
• 7:51
  It all disappeared.
• 7:54
  All the things that cause.
• 7:57
  Or help a relationship.
• 7:59
  Bloom and grow.
• 8:01
  Disappeared.
• 8:02
  It was like a garden.
• 8:03
  And then it was all of a sudden like a desert.
• 8:08
  And it was bad.
• 8:10
  I was.
• 8:11
  I hated myself for it.
• 8:13
  As well.
• 8:15
  I hated that I couldn't control myself.
• 8:17
  I've come as a background as a fighter.
• 8:21
  Supposedly, I'm teaching everybody discipline.
• 8:23
  And at the same time, here I am just, you know, battling it out verbally and defending myself and doing everything backwards.
• 8:32
  Just really backwards.
• 8:35
  It was bad.
• 8:36
  I want to share the hierarchy just so that there's not like a question in the air, you know, in the world, a lot of times what gets shared is for men, it's mission first and then everything else, you know, and what we teach in the, in the brotherhood is there's a hierarchy.
• 8:51
  It's you and your relationship with your higher power, God, then you and your relationship with yourself, then you and your relationship with your wife, then your family, then everything else, and then mission and everything else.
• 9:03
  And the reason I teach it that way is because for 20 years I was a coach, and when I saw men put mission first, their life became a shambles, and the mission suffered.
• 9:12
  Did your mission suffer?
• 9:15
  I had issues at work.
• 9:20
  I had positions that I moved in and out of because it was just, I couldn't seem to get along with people.
• 9:27
  I just, I, I,
• 9:31
  I got frustrated a little too easy.
• 9:33
  I didn't, there was no containment.
• 9:35
  It was zero.
• 9:37
  It was professional, but I'm not one of those that's really good at hiding things on my face.
• 9:44
  So.
• 9:46
  I've been accused of being told the same thing.
• 9:50
  The very first boss that hired me, I was in banking and she said she hired me and then she talked to me later and she was like, I don't even know why I hired you.
• 9:58
  You didn't smile at all during that interview.
• 10:00
  She says, I don't know what, but fix that.
• 10:02
  And I was like, wow.
• 10:04
  Nobody's ever been that honest.
• 10:06
  So.
• 10:08
  It really does affect everything when.
• 10:10
  Everything.
• 10:11
  When you don't have like that piece, that connection.
• 10:13
  Yeah.
• 10:15
  So tell us a little bit about like, what was it like for you in that roommate phase?
• 10:21
  You know, for some men, it's like tipping around, walking on eggshells.
• 10:24
  For some men, it's like just trying not to like be present.
• 10:28
  Like, what was it like for you?
• 10:30
  I think men who are in that place feel like they're the only ones.
• 10:34
  Right.
• 10:34
  And you're letting them know that they're not.
• 10:36
  Absolutely.
• 10:38
  I think the eggshell scenario that you'd mentioned is...
• 10:42
  very appropriate.
• 10:44
  I felt like I didn't want to say, cause my girls are, I got three and we raised them strong, real strong.
• 10:52
  Uh, my oldest daughter is also a black belt student of mine.
• 10:57
  My middle daughter is a student of my, that fighters shoot guns can fight with knives.
• 11:03
  I mean, we're just, and then also just the cutest things in the whole world at the same time.
• 11:10
  And, um, um,
• 11:12
  They called me out several times, expressed disappointment, which is a parent's worst nightmare, that your kids are disappointed with you.
• 11:26
  I'm afraid to say anything to them.
• 11:28
  I'm afraid to say anything to my wife because I felt like every time I mentioned something, I said it wrong, I did it wrong, and then that argument was going to last for three weeks.
• 11:42
  And it may not be that we're bickering for three weeks.
• 11:46
  It may be we're just disconnected for three weeks, literally.
• 11:52
  I mean, we're doing typical roommate stuff, laundry, eating, cleaning the house, cleaning whatever.
• 12:01
  But it ruined that relationship.
• 12:05
  My kids could see how I was not connected to their mother, my wife.
• 12:12
  And that was painful for them.
• 12:14
  They've come out since and told me all of that, that it was a real, real bad problem.
• 12:22
  I was very angry.
• 12:23
  My wife says, you seem like you're mad.
• 12:25
  I said, honey, I'm mad every day.
• 12:29
  I'm mad all day, every day.
• 12:33
  I'm just not letting it out.
• 12:36
  Yeah.
• 12:37
  Yeah.
• 12:37
  It's like suppressing and pushing it down and holding on to it all the time.
• 12:41
  Yes.
• 12:44
  You know, just for you, I just want you to know, like if your daughters have been able to come to you and express disappointment and communicate that to you, you probably already know this.
• 12:53
  But I just want you to know, like me reflecting it to you, that means you've built trust with them.
• 12:58
  And that means that at least they trust you.
• 13:00
  They trust their relationship with you, which a lot of men do not have with their daughters.
• 13:04
  So congratulations on at least them being able to talk to you and being able to express to you.
• 13:11
  That means you did a lot right, Mac.
• 13:13
  Yeah, I appreciate that.
• 13:15
  That's hard to believe sometimes, so I appreciate it.
• 13:19
  Yeah, no, for sure.
• 13:20
  I know it's hard to believe.
• 13:21
  I always share with men, you know, self-awareness can be such a bitch because when you realize what trauma is and where it's caused and what trauma you have as a man, you start realizing how much trauma you've actually created.
• 13:34
  Yes.
• 13:36
  And it's sad for me because being a self-defense person
• 13:43
  minded person well an expert it's trying to like resolve crises and problems and de-escalate and and to see that almost hypocrisy in a relationship where i felt like like two different people it was jekyll and hyde and it just it didn't seem it it i knew it wasn't right i just didn't know how to fix it
• 14:11
  So, Mac, I know you want to get to the good stuff now.
• 14:14
  So let's talk about how you found the brotherhood.
• 14:17
  What brought you to us?
• 14:19
  That's my wife.
• 14:22
  You and so many other men.
• 14:25
  Yeah.
• 14:26
  She's about as sick of it as I was.
• 14:29
  I'm just going down the audible book path and, you know, things like that to find things.
• 14:35
  Got a best man.
• 14:38
  He was the best man at my wedding.
• 14:39
  And he, you know, was sharing some things with me.
• 14:41
  And he's a marriage counselor and all that.
• 14:45
  So I had some of that, too.
• 14:46
  I said, that's more therapy that I got.
• 14:50
  Um, even some of that just seemed to, I mean, it was, it was good advice because it's a very smart man.
• 14:58
  Um, I don't think it hit the nail on the head at the time that I, what I needed.
• 15:02
  Um, so my wife.
• 15:04
  Um.
• 15:06
  is an avid researcher just like I am.
• 15:08
  And she bumped across your podcast.
• 15:13
  I believe you were doing it with, it was some wellness podcast, Tom something or another maybe?
• 15:18
  Josh Trent.
• 15:19
  Josh Trent, there we go.
• 15:20
  Yeah.
• 15:21
  There we go, thank you for helping me with that.
• 15:22
  And that's where she saw you there.
• 15:24
  And the key word that you used was that you had realized that you had not created a safe space.
• 15:35
  And that's the first time I had ever heard that because in my world, safe space means physical.
• 15:43
  Yeah.
• 15:44
  Offensive.
• 15:46
  I know what a safe spot is.
• 15:48
  I know what safe distance is.
• 15:50
  I know all of that.
• 15:51
  But when I heard safe space for your spouse, man, that was the one podcast that turned me.
• 15:59
  That one thing turned me around completely.
• 16:02
  Yeah.
• 16:03
  I made a 180 in like one day after that.
• 16:07
  And my wife was floored.
• 16:09
  And I told her more about the brotherhood and that it's coming up.
• 16:13
  And she's like, when are you going to join?
• 16:17
  And I'm like, hey, if one podcast is going to make that much of a difference off of YouTube, he doesn't even know I'm watching it and it's making this difference.
• 16:27
  Yeah.
• 16:29
  This brotherhood thing has got to be something that I need to be a part of.
• 16:34
  curious, Max.
• 16:35
  So you listened to the Josh Trent podcast, which we'll link in the comments.
• 16:41
  What was it that you started doing differently after just listening to the podcast?
• 16:45
  Because that's intense.
• 16:46
  But it doesn't surprise me because you're someone who sensory acuity, like training, discipline, none of that's new to you.
• 16:54
  But what was it in the podcast?
• 16:55
  What did you start doing differently?
• 16:57
  The newest thing in the podcast was is me realizing how afraid
• 17:06
  And that was a big wake up call.
• 17:08
  My wife is.
• 17:11
  Every guy is going to say this.
• 17:12
  I hope they do.
• 17:13
  My wife is beautiful beyond belief.
• 17:15
  Like I'm I'm way I married way up, like not a little.
• 17:21
  It was way up.
• 17:22
  And my wife gets a lot of attention.
• 17:25
  And I'm when I'm walking with her, I'm eyeballing every person because I can see them looking up and down and I eyeball them enough to where they understand that kind of safe space.
• 17:37
  But when I realized after talking to my wife that she's afraid to go to the gas station by herself, she doesn't even like going to the grocery store by herself.
• 17:47
  She doesn't like to go even to our own business and walk in here off of the square here by herself because she's just afraid all the time.
• 17:57
  And once I realized that.
• 18:00
  I was adding to it, to that fear, because I understand fear, and I never understood that she didn't have a safe space and that there was a lot of fear that I was creating for her.
• 18:14
  That broke me beyond anything that I have ever, that's the hardest punch, kick, anything I've ever had was that moment.
• 18:26
  And that was the moment that I realized safe space isn't just physical.
• 18:31
  There is a mental space where women need to feel safe with the person that they've chosen as a partner.
• 18:39
  And I could not believe that I had been adding to her fear for all this time.
• 18:46
  I couldn't, I don't know why I never grasped that.
• 18:49
  I don't know.
• 18:52
  You're not alone, Mac.
• 18:53
  You know, I,
• 18:55
  I'm like feeling what you're saying in my chest because I remember the day that I figured out the power imbalance between men and women and just how vulnerable women feel and how every time I raised my voice, every time I changed my tone, every time I brought too much energy to the situation or withdrew, I was scaring my wife.
• 19:13
  You know, I'm six foot two, 200 pounds and my wife's five foot four, you know?
• 19:18
  And so, well, really five, three and a half, she jokes.
• 19:21
  Um,
• 19:23
  But it's interesting because your wife's a third-degree black belt, and she still feels the same level of vulnerability and fear.
• 19:28
  Yes.
• 19:29
  Yeah.
• 19:29
  So it's like, you know.
• 19:30
  Every day.
• 19:31
  So do my daughters.
• 19:32
  Yeah.
• 19:33
  I've talked to them since.
• 19:34
  Yeah.
• 19:35
  And they have the exact same feeling.
• 19:37
  We have a 16 and 19 year old, same thing.
• 19:40
  I think if a man's listening, like really understanding how much different it is to live as a woman than a man.
• 19:48
  And, you know, the world tries to convince us we're the same.
• 19:50
  And there's nothing like nothing further from the truth.
• 19:54
  Women exist with a level of vulnerability we simply don't understand.
• 19:59
  Yeah, I remember the day I figured it out.
• 20:01
  I ended up laying down on my office floor and just like having to process because I felt so much shame and so much pain around how much I hurt my wife.
• 20:12
  I will beat myself up.
• 20:14
  I am the worst opponent to myself.
• 20:19
  I will beat myself to a blood pressure.
• 20:25
  I can't even talk to people.
• 20:26
  I get so angry with some of the things I've done.
• 20:30
  And I would and I couldn't let it go.
• 20:33
  And me not letting it go also caused that pullback.
• 20:38
  So now I don't want to talk to anybody.
• 20:39
  Now I want to be next.
• 20:41
  I don't trust myself.
• 20:42
  I can't say the right thing.
• 20:44
  I won't say the right thing, even if I want to.
• 20:47
  But I'd beat myself up so much that it was also another problem for my kids and my family.
• 20:52
  I'm not there.
• 20:53
  I'm not present.
• 20:54
  I'm not doing all the dad stuff anymore or the husband job.
• 21:00
  It's just not there.
• 21:01
  I'm just existing.
• 21:03
  Yeah.
• 21:04
  Yeah.
• 21:05
  So, so you listened to the podcast and, um, what was it?
• 21:09
  What made you, that made you decide to join.
• 21:11
  So tell us, was there any hesitations you had?
• 21:13
  Did anything almost stop you or was it just full steam ahead?
• 21:17
  Um, I think, I think I've trained so long with,
• 21:22
  some of the top instructors in martial arts.
• 21:26
  I don't, I mean, some of the names that I could throw out, you would be, as a martial artist, you would know exactly who that is.
• 21:36
  And I've always gone to what I thought was the best of the best and a place where I was not going to waste my time.
• 21:47
  Um, so I, once I saw the podcast, heard the verbiage, it sounded just like me.
• 21:55
  I had never found that in any book, in any video, in anything.
• 22:02
  It was gung ho full speed ahead.
• 22:04
  I really, I really had heard and seen all I needed to know.
• 22:10
  Awesome.
• 22:11
  So tell us what it was like.
• 22:12
  So you jumped in, you were in the container.
• 22:16
  And I'm actually really curious to hear this.
• 22:18
  As a martial artist who's had a lot of instruction and a lot of mentoring, a lot of coaching, what was it like being in the Brotherhood container for you?
• 22:26
  So I can't tell you how much I enjoy being a white belt, Alex.
• 22:32
  It's a new experience, but it's a good one, isn't it?
• 22:35
  Yeah, I can't tell you how much I enjoy...
• 22:39
  that experience of like getting into, cause I've always told my students, if you feel uncomfortable, it's good because it means you're, it's, it means something to you.
• 22:51
  Anytime you feel comfortable or nervous about doing something, that means it's important.
• 22:56
  So I came into this a little, very uncomfortable.
• 22:59
  I came into it nervous.
• 23:00
  I'm like, what am I going to say?
• 23:02
  I don't think I have much to contribute.
• 23:04
  I just know I'm here to get something to change my whole world.
• 23:08
  And once I got in there and started seeing all the boys there that were dealing with the same, I could not believe how many same stories I was hearing.
• 23:20
  Because you do think when you don't connect with brothers, you will think, I'm going to say me.
• 23:28
  I thought there was nobody else going through this.
• 23:33
  I had social media syndrome where it looked like everybody's life was perfect and dolled up.
• 23:39
  Everybody's going on the vacation of their life and nobody's frustrated and whatever.
• 23:44
  But when I got in there and I started hearing the stories that came out and they were exactly like my story, I cannot tell you what a relief that was to know that there's not.
• 23:55
  I wasn't relieved that they were going through stress.
• 23:58
  I was relieved to know that I wasn't the only one.
• 24:02
  Which meant there's knowledge here because everybody who was going through that had a way of processing it.
• 24:09
  And I'm like, as a somebody who likes a technique, I'm like, I've got opportunity for a lot of techniques here.
• 24:18
  And I'm very excited about that.
• 24:21
  So getting in there and hearing those stories and then hearing your backstory.
• 24:26
  And my wife said the same thing.
• 24:27
  She's like, I don't know about this guy, but he sure does sound.
• 24:30
  He and his wife sound exactly like what we've been going through.
• 24:34
  And I'm like, yep, it does.
• 24:35
  So that was that was.
• 24:40
  That was unbelievably amazing for me to be that connected to those guys and, and talk with them and share and, and pick their brain and get, get technique, things I never even thought of.
• 24:54
  They were like, I was able to discover.
• 24:59
  Wonderful.
• 25:00
  So, Mac, I want your qualified opinion.
• 25:02
  You know, I refer to masculine containment as a martial art, you know, as a discipline.
• 25:09
  As a lifelong martial artist, would you say that this is like similar to or another martial art you've adopted?
• 25:15
  Yeah, I'm going to give you why.
• 25:16
  Because I've really thought about this, too.
• 25:19
  And I and I and I.
• 25:22
  I think I hit on something in this process that I don't think we talked about it like in the scenarios that we were in, but my brain processing ceremonies as a training tool that makes you ready for a spur-of-the-moment rupture.
• 25:49
  So I, if I hadn't had, if I hadn't have taken ceremony so seriously, and I did, I
• 25:57
  because everything you mentioned to me was a technique tapping.
• 26:00
  I did the whole thing.
• 26:01
  I did forgiveness.
• 26:02
  I did the whole thing.
• 26:03
  I did all of those very regularly walking, not a problem.
• 26:09
  Sometimes it was hitting a bag.
• 26:11
  Maybe I changed it a little bit.
• 26:13
  I might hit a bag every once in a while too, Mac.
• 26:15
  There you go.
• 26:15
  Yes, sir.
• 26:17
  So everything became an exercise and without those mental skills, you know,
• 26:24
  which I relate to a martial art because I'm a, when we're in training with our buddies, we're laughing about being choked out.
• 26:31
  Well, you're not going to be laughing out on the street.
• 26:33
  That's not going to happen.
• 26:35
  So in my world, when I started doing ceremony with my wife, that was a place where I knew I had rules and,
• 26:43
  which, you know, be it whatever they may be in my world, I had rules where I wasn't going to get mad, defend myself, talk back, say this, try to stop her, try to fix it.
• 26:55
  I wasn't trying to do I I had never gone into a conversation where I had set up a bunch of rules before we started talking because everything was always spur of the moment.
• 27:05
  And then I just would react.
• 27:08
  That part of it as a martial artist, like training a technique that was so valuable to me that I got so good at ceremony with my wife because I invented a bunch of other stuff.
• 27:21
  I brought in bowls and candles and we lit them together and we blew out the flames together.
• 27:27
  I came up with a bunch of stuff that was just like.
• 27:29
  You turned it into a ritual.
• 27:30
  I did.
• 27:31
  It was a big ritual.
• 27:33
  My wife could not wait to do it because she's the diehard for those kinds of those things.
• 27:39
  And I'm just going to tell you that if I hadn't done ceremony as many times as I did and when we were in the brotherhood, I did ceremony every day, just about every day.
• 27:49
  And I talked to a lot of guys that were in that those groups and a lot of them were like, well, I've never even done it.
• 27:55
  And it's we're on week eight.
• 27:57
  And I'm thinking.
• 27:58
  Yeah.
• 27:59
  And I would share my ceremony story and they would say, I'm doing that.
• 28:03
  I can see that value.
• 28:04
  But that technique of setting up a bunch of rules where you can't do X, Y and Z and you're just there for her made it so that when a spontaneous rupture happened.
• 28:18
  I had a mental mindset from ceremony that I now was like, why aren't I upset?
• 28:25
  I would normally lost my crackers on that one.
• 28:30
  Why am I not losing it?
• 28:34
  Training.
• 28:35
  So it's training.
• 28:36
  It's skill technique.
• 28:37
  It's mental jujitsu, kickbox, whatever you want to call it.
• 28:45
  That's how I relate it.
• 28:46
  I want to share with everyone.
• 28:47
  So the concept of ceremony is a technique.
• 28:51
  It's a tool we train in the brotherhood.
• 28:53
  And it's really like the most important thing you do every day, I think.
• 28:57
  And it's sitting down with your partner, especially at the beginning of this process, and allowing her to share what's going on for her, how your relationship's been, whatever she needs to offload so that you can hear it.
• 29:09
  And here's what happens.
• 29:10
  She feels seen and heard.
• 29:13
  But then as the man in that situation, like Mac just described, what we do is we teach ourselves that emotions are safe and that we don't have to react and we don't have to blow up.
• 29:22
  And Mac, the way you just described it was so brilliant because what I tell men is when you get into ceremony, you're training around not being triggered.
• 29:31
  You're conditioning yourself to being able to be with emotions because as men, we have such a hard time with being with emotions.
• 29:37
  Even as a lifelong martial artist for me, even as someone who's like, I'm a dangerous guy.
• 29:41
  Like people can't, you know, there's, there's a very small percentage of men who are a threat to me and I would think the same for you.
• 29:48
  But even so, when a trigger was present or emotions came up, I would react as though violence was present.
• 29:54
  You know, like I'm defending something like with my life.
• 29:58
  And so the way you just described ceremony was so eloquent because you train in ceremony.
• 30:03
  And then what happens is in the rest of your life, it just starts working.
• 30:09
  Couldn't say it any better than that.
• 30:11
  That's exactly what was happening.
• 30:14
  And it was so organic.
• 30:17
  And just the fact that I started ceremony telling my wife, this is a safe place for you to tell me anything and feel whatever you want to feel.
• 30:30
  She cried when I said that.
• 30:33
  She never heard that.
• 30:35
  In her life.
• 30:36
  Not from me.
• 30:37
  Yeah.
• 30:38
  And that's who she needed to hear it from.
• 30:40
  And because that's the way we still do it, I still do the candles.
• 30:46
  We light them together.
• 30:47
  We blow it out together.
• 30:49
  My wife sometimes is like, can we just leave the candle burning?
• 30:51
  I just like how it looks and feels.
• 30:54
  And I'm like, honey, you can do, we can do whatever you want.
• 30:57
  We'll leave that thing burning until it burns out.
• 30:59
  There's nothing wrong with that.
• 31:01
  I'm laughing because Katie does that sometimes.
• 31:04
  She'll say, hey, can we just leave the candle on for tonight?
• 31:06
  I think we need the energy.
• 31:07
  I love it.
• 31:09
  That's right.
• 31:10
  I thought we were the only ones.
• 31:13
  So Mac, you know, here's something that I have a lot of guys either say to me or send me a direct message or, you know, they say ceremony sounds like you're just sitting there and getting abused, you know, and you're just sitting there and taking it, like you're teaching men to just get abused.
• 31:30
  What would you say to those guys?
• 31:31
  Like, how is it different for you?
• 31:34
  If you were a martial artist, you could say the same thing.
• 31:38
  In training?
• 31:39
  If you were weak, you could have that same philosophy, even in a martial arts environment, where you come in as a white belt, and I knock you around for 30 minutes, and then you come back, and you pay me, and I knock you around for another 30 minutes three or four times a week.
• 32:01
  Why is it we don't look at that as abusive?
• 32:07
  Not that I'm taking out teeth or anything, but, you know, we know what it is.
• 32:12
  You're getting choked.
• 32:13
  You're getting armbarred.
• 32:14
  You're getting popped.
• 32:15
  You're getting.
• 32:17
  So the mentality of it is it's I say you get what you look for.
• 32:24
  If you're looking at it as an abuse session, it is maybe.
• 32:28
  Maybe.
• 32:30
  Mentally, I didn't look at it as an abuse session.
• 32:36
  And I set boundaries.
• 32:38
  There was no cursing.
• 32:40
  There was no, not that we do that anyway, but there's no, you know,
• 32:47
  trying to demean each other.
• 32:48
  I said, that's not going to make the conversation any better.
• 32:53
  So we had boundaries, and we both agreed to those boundaries.
• 32:57
  And then ceremony would start.
• 33:00
  And she unloaded on me some ugly, ugly stuff.
• 33:07
  And all I could think of as a martial artist is punch to the nose, punch to the chin, choke out.
• 33:16
  crack my my my my ankle was you know popped pretty bad during a jujitsu all i'm thinking is that's all this is these are these are training these are training tools not you have a good word for it i'll throw this out and feminine testing where i believe that was okay so if it's a test i understand test belt rank belt rank belt rank belt rank belt rank belt rank
• 33:43
  Sorry, these are all Mr. Miyagi stories, but it's all I can relate to.
• 33:47
  I love the analogies to martial arts because that's how I talk about containment, and I think it's relatable.
• 33:52
  If it's a test, then I need to pass.
• 33:56
  I understand a test now.
• 33:57
  You call it feminine test?
• 33:58
  It's the first time I ever heard that word.
• 34:00
  I'm like, oh, my goodness.
• 34:02
  So this is just a test.
• 34:03
  Now, my wife will flip it all around, and she'll say, I'm just trying on dresses when I say stuff to you.
• 34:11
  That's her.
• 34:12
  That's the way she sees it.
• 34:14
  She's like, don't get too mad at me because I'm just trying on a dress and I probably won't even like it.
• 34:20
  So don't get mad right away.
• 34:24
  And this whole discussion happened after we got to a good place again, because that conversation really never happened.
• 34:30
  Maybe if I'd have known that a while back, I wouldn't have been such a jerk.
• 34:34
  Yeah.
• 34:36
  Yeah.
• 34:36
  So, you know, one of the things I share with men, and I'd love to get your perspective on it, is that.
• 34:41
  when you are in ceremony and you let your wife unload, you know, what she's actually doing is getting trauma out of her body.
• 34:49
  Absolutely.
• 34:49
  She's letting go of pain, she's letting go of fatigue, she's letting go of suppression and repression and maybe even depression, and she's getting trauma out of her body.
• 35:00
  And what I share with men is like, if you do this and you remain curious and you hold the space and you're there and you hold containment,
• 35:09
  You'll actually see a shift in your partner.
• 35:11
  Did you see that shift?
• 35:13
  I absolutely saw the shift.
• 35:15
  And I'll I'm going to add to ceremony a little bit.
• 35:18
  We do the breathing exercise together before the ceremony starts.
• 35:23
  I started asking her, where does she feel those emotions?
• 35:27
  And she's like, what are you talking about?
• 35:30
  And because you shared that with us, that was a very big tool.
• 35:33
  Identifying your emotions in your body, yeah.
• 35:36
  Very big tool.
• 35:37
  She didn't even understand the question.
• 35:39
  I said, honey, just tell me, where do you feel all of that?
• 35:44
  And as soon as she started identifying those things, she would say, I feel it in my throat.
• 35:51
  And as soon as she said that, she would start crying.
• 35:55
  Because she had never allowed herself to feel much of anything.
• 36:00
  She was feeling just as bad about everything that was going on as I was, and she was just suppressing it all and crushing it all down and not allowing herself to feel it because she felt like she had to do all the things I wasn't doing.
• 36:14
  Which is very common for women to pick up masculine traits when the man pulls back.
• 36:21
  And my wife was doing that.
• 36:23
  So as that started to happen, she became great.
• 36:29
  Yeah, was it hard?
• 36:30
  I had to watch 10 ugly dresses before she put the one on that actually fit what she really thought about me.
• 36:37
  And that dress, she was thankful, grateful, tearful, thoughtful, precious, vulnerable.
• 36:51
  That all happened.
• 36:52
  But it was 10 ugly dresses and or seven choke outs.
• 36:58
  However you want to look at it.
• 36:59
  It's not a session where we're getting beat up.
• 37:02
  It's a session where we're allowing our wives to do something they've never been able to do.
• 37:07
  I'm going to say me.
• 37:08
  I'm not going to say everybody.
• 37:09
  I allowed my wife to do something she had never been able to do, and that is to talk to me and tell me genuinely how she feels without me losing it, defending myself, fixing it, making excuses, trying to compete.
• 37:22
  Maybe I want to win the conversation more than I want to listen.
• 37:26
  And I just, once I shut all of that down and she just told me flat out after one of our sessions, she says, the best thing you've ever done is just let me get it all out.
• 37:38
  Even if it's not true, even if I don't think you're a, you know, whatever it was, whatever so-and-so, I really didn't mean that.
• 37:47
  And I only realized that with you allowing me to get it all out.
• 37:54
  So beautiful, Mac.
• 37:56
  That's amazing.
• 37:58
  Yeah, it's life-changing.
• 37:59
  I mean, and it's made me a totally different person.
• 38:01
  It's affected me in every area of my life.
• 38:04
  You brought up something earlier that I just wanted to come back to.
• 38:06
  You know, you said...
• 38:09
  that you are your, and I've related to this so deeply, that you are your own worst opponent.
• 38:14
  Like the person in the world who can choke me out better than anybody in the world is me.
• 38:18
  And I can hold that choke for months.
• 38:21
  Yep.
• 38:22
  I can.
• 38:22
  You know, and one of the things we work on in the brotherhood is self-forgiveness, which used to be such a foreign concept to me.
• 38:30
  Did you experience self-forgiveness in the brotherhood?
• 38:33
  I did.
• 38:33
  I went through the forgiveness ceremony that you run us through and showed and taught to us.
• 38:40
  I ran through that multiple times, actually, because it was it was.
• 38:51
  When you understand technique, like let's say you're even a baseball player or football, it doesn't matter if you're a musician, it doesn't matter.
• 39:01
  There's technique that has to go in.
• 39:03
  The first time you do it, it's, eh, maybe it's terrible.
• 39:08
  Second time, better, third time, and so forth.
• 39:10
  So that self-forgiveness practice I did genuinely multiple times before I actually felt like I could forgive myself.
• 39:21
  And I was in the hierarchy that you discussed, God, yourself, your spouse.
• 39:28
  I had that all wrong because I could never forgive myself.
• 39:32
  And a man who hates himself cannot.
• 39:35
  I'm going to speak for myself.
• 39:37
  In my eyes, a man who hates himself cannot give anything to anybody.
• 39:45
  They can't give their best.
• 39:46
  They can't give their they can't give.
• 39:50
  I could not give because I didn't even care about me.
• 39:54
  I didn't even care about me.
• 39:56
  So if I don't care about me, you think I care about you?
• 39:58
  I had a problem with that.
• 40:01
  That was a huge issue for me.
• 40:04
  So to forgive myself and let it go was, it's life-changing.
• 40:11
  And I hadn't found anything that allowed me to do that until that exercise, which I did multiple times.
• 40:21
  Yeah.
• 40:21
  You know, I still do it now.
• 40:22
  I think when we were in container three, I did it and I go report to the men just like everybody else does.
• 40:29
  Because I think, you know, we have to, we all do this.
• 40:31
  Like I will have a rough day, a rough week and sit down and go through that ritual.
• 40:36
  And it really does it.
• 40:38
  And like you said, once you've done it a bunch of times, you do it and it's so much more poignant, so much more powerful.
• 40:44
  It means more.
• 40:46
  The more the deeper it went and the more I did all of the exercises, the more I understood them.
• 40:53
  And then I would look up tapping and I'm like, I'm going to look this up and figure out why it's working.
• 40:57
  Like, why is this working?
• 40:59
  Like, I'm the I'm a big on the with my students.
• 41:02
  It was never just do this because I say it's like do this.
• 41:07
  And here's like nine reasons why you would want to know that you and I are so similar.
• 41:13
  So as soon as you would explain something and I'm like, well, I don't understand this tapping stuff.
• 41:17
  I'm not sure why that's working.
• 41:19
  Well, I did enough research on it to go.
• 41:21
  Oh.
• 41:22
  Oh.
• 41:23
  So now the more I'm doing it, it just means the more you want it.
• 41:30
  We're back to you get what you look for.
• 41:32
  The more I wanted to figure all of this out, the better it all got.
• 41:37
  And I feel sorry for guys that come in and just kind of half-heartedly go through it.
• 41:42
  I hope there's enough seeds planted there to where they just explode one day and figure out that all these exercises are the key.
• 41:51
  In my world, they were the key.
• 41:53
  I'm not, maybe I don't want, I try not to speak for everybody else, but in my world, every exercise was, they're too important to not do.
• 42:06
  So I know you've wanted to get to this part since before we even hit record, Mac.
• 42:12
  So tell us, how's your relationship now?
• 42:14
  You went from roommates and kind of bumping into each other and no intimacy, no connection.
• 42:19
  Where is it now?
• 42:21
  Well, let's just say intimacy is pretty much off the charts.
• 42:27
  Congratulations, man.
• 42:29
  I'm a good church going.
• 42:30
  I'm laughing, like joyfully laughing.
• 42:32
  This is like my life.
• 42:34
  This is what I want men to experience.
• 42:35
  Yes, sir.
• 42:36
  Because that's what happened for me.
• 42:38
  So I can tell you that my wife, in all those 10 to 15 years, never initiated anything with me.
• 42:49
  Mm-hmm.
• 42:51
  If we got intimate, it was because I think just because I bugged her too much.
• 42:58
  And then it would be five to six to eight months of nothing.
• 43:03
  I can tell you now, though, four to five times a week for us together is very common.
• 43:12
  I can tell you that she is.
• 43:16
  loves when I take her out on a date now.
• 43:19
  My wife used to, and I'm going to circle back a little bit.
• 43:22
  My wife used to, I used to let her make a bunch of decisions because I didn't want to pick something that was wrong or say something wrong.
• 43:30
  And what I was doing is I was handing over that responsibility that a man should have about taking his girl out to eat or where she, you
• 43:41
  Yeah, I'm going to take you to this great restaurant.
• 43:42
  You didn't even know where we were going.
• 43:44
  She goes, where are we going?
• 43:46
  I used to never I used to do that way back and I found it again.
• 43:50
  So the dating is great.
• 43:52
  She looks forward to me asking her out on dates.
• 43:54
  We go out on two or three dates a week now.
• 43:57
  My daughters, I think this is probably the biggest part of it.
• 44:00
  My daughters have come to my wife and my oldest daughter has written me on Father's Day of the best day in the world.
• 44:10
  Wrote me a note and she was just like, I can see that, you know, things have changed.
• 44:15
  It's very emotional right now.
• 44:18
  That really got me.
• 44:22
  She was able to write that down and say that she could see that things were.
• 44:28
  like they needed to be better.
• 44:31
  Everything was back to normal again.
• 44:33
  Everything was great.
• 44:35
  She didn't have to work.
• 44:36
  My girls used to worry about my wife just spending time with me because who knows when I would go off to wherever I'd go.
• 44:46
  And now they, they told my, my, my daughter told my, my wife that she's like, I don't,
• 44:53
  You're with dad, so you're okay now.
• 44:55
  I don't worry about you anymore.
• 44:57
  So that's what's made the difference.
• 45:01
  My wife and I are like teenagers all over again.
• 45:04
  We're making out in the car and all these great things, and we're laughing, and we're talking deeper.
• 45:13
  We're really talking deep now.
• 45:16
  And that never used to happen.
• 45:17
  I used to keep it superficial because anything, I was afraid I'd say something stupid, so I wouldn't say anything.
• 45:23
  Conversations are better.
• 45:25
  Dates are better.
• 45:26
  Relationships better.
• 45:28
  My children are better.
• 45:29
  My grandkids are the beneficiary of all of this stuff that's going on now.
• 45:34
  They've got to, you know, their pawpaw is a fun guy, and that's somebody they want to be around.
• 45:46
  I couldn't have paid more in any other way than what I got out of everything that you gave to us.
• 45:56
  I got my life back.
• 45:58
  Man, thank you, brother.
• 46:00
  I got a little emotional listening to you, honestly.
• 46:04
  Just because that's why I do this work.
• 46:06
  Because I think every man is capable of this.
• 46:09
  If there's a guy out there who is considering joining the brotherhood, what would you tell him?
• 46:16
  Um, if you don't have the money, borrow, steal it.
• 46:23
  Oh, I'm just kidding on that, but kind of, I'm kind of kidding.
• 46:26
  Not really.
• 46:28
  Um, this is a, the best investment we can make in our, in our, in, in anything is that investment in our lifelong partner.
• 46:38
  That's the person who's going to give you the energy to make the business that you've always wanted to have go nuclear.
• 46:43
  Yeah.
• 46:44
  That's going to be the person that's going to make you the best dad.
• 46:47
  That's the person that's going to make you shine as a grandfather.
• 46:51
  That's the person that's going to lift you up when you beat yourself up like I do.
• 46:55
  Now my wife doesn't join in the beating.
• 46:59
  When I'm beating myself up, it used to be she'd join in.
• 47:03
  Now she sees that I'm beating myself up and she takes the time to lift me up out of that space.
• 47:10
  That wasn't happening.
• 47:12
  So the beatings just went on and on and on.
• 47:15
  Now my wife is the one that rescues me.
• 47:18
  But my wife also now has admitted that she now can be as feminine as she's always wanted to be.
• 47:29
  She doesn't have to make all the decisions because now I'm doing that again with confidence.
• 47:38
  She doesn't have to get between...
• 47:41
  You know, if there's an issue with two people, she can lean on me.
• 47:46
  You know, my kids are grown, but they're still, you know, sisters.
• 47:50
  They still argue every so often.
• 47:52
  And my wife now feels like she can lean on me.
• 47:56
  Our business, which I'm at right now, when it gets to be stressful and I showed up, it used to be twice as stressful for her.
• 48:05
  Now, she says when she sees me walk in the door, she she almost has a big sigh of relief.
• 48:10
  Like, this is so bad.
• 48:11
  I'm glad he's here.
• 48:15
  That is worth.
• 48:19
  That's not it.
• 48:20
  There's no money on that.
• 48:22
  I can't even.
• 48:23
  I think you're still charging too cheap.
• 48:25
  This thing needs to be like a million bucks.
• 48:29
  I wouldn't be able to go to it, but.
• 48:31
  I sure would start saving.
• 48:36
  Brother, is there anything I didn't ask you anything else you want to share?
• 48:41
  No, no.
• 48:41
  I felt like we discussed some things that I thought were really valuable.
• 48:47
  You know, I don't want to.
• 48:48
  I'm not trying to give all the goodies out to everybody because it wouldn't be justice to give that small snack.
• 48:58
  I mean, it's good to give little pieces of what you do.
• 49:02
  But I think everything that needed to be covered is covered because a man's value is – it's not always how we see ourselves.
• 49:12
  It's how that most important person –
• 49:15
  sees us and the most important people in our life can see us and take with us.
• 49:19
  I don't want to go, I don't want to die and have everybody, you know, not, not, not remember the, the help I gave them, the, the joy I gave them, the, the, so it's those things that I'm, I feel like I've got it all back.
• 49:34
  I got a new life, man.
• 49:35
  I'm,
• 49:37
  I'm getting started all over.
• 49:38
  It's like being a teenager with me and my wife.
• 49:40
  We're starting all over again and it's good.
• 49:46
  I love that, Mac.
• 49:48
  Every once in a while, my kids are 16 and 19, and my wife will say something like, you know, I used to wonder what we were going to do as an empty nesters.
• 49:54
  I don't wonder anymore.
• 49:55
  I'm good.
• 49:56
  No, it's real good.
• 49:59
  Well, Mac, thank you, brother.
• 50:02
  I just want to reflect something to you before I do a quick close for everybody listening.
• 50:07
  You know, the reason you had this massive transformation, you know this, I just want you to hear from me, is that you did the work, brother.
• 50:14
  You know, the work in the brotherhood's not easy.
• 50:17
  And holding ceremony space is not easy.
• 50:19
  These are not, they're relatively simple processes.
• 50:23
  They are difficult in execution and it takes a lot of courage.
• 50:27
  A lot of strength, summoning up stamina and belief in yourself.
• 50:31
  And you did all those things, man.
• 50:33
  And so I just want to reflect to you that the results you got were in part due to what the Brotherhood offers.
• 50:38
  But your transformation is so extraordinary because of the effort you put in, the time you put in, and the commitment you made to yourself.
• 50:45
  And so this podcast has been truly inspirational for me and for what I do.
• 50:53
  And I can't thank you enough for taking the time, man.
• 50:55
  It's been my absolute pleasure.
• 50:57
  Thank you for the opportunity.
• 50:58
  Yeah, thank you, brother.
• 51:00
  If you're a man listening to this podcast and you can relate to that picture of Mac's life before he found the brotherhood and maybe you've been to therapy, you've read the books, you've listened to the books, you've tried all the things and it hasn't worked, I would be truly honored to walk this path with you.
• 51:15
  The work we do in the brotherhood changes men's lives.
• 51:18
  It changes families.
• 51:19
  I think it changes generations of families, and I would love for you to experience it with us.
• 51:25
  And so you can go to thebrotherhoodsociety.com, sign up for the next container or sign up for our wait list.
• 51:32
  Make sure you're getting our emails, and we will keep you updated and keep you informed, and we'd love to do this work with you.
• 51:38
  Mac, thanks again for being here.
• 51:40
  For everybody else, go to thebrotherhoodsociety.com, and I look forward to meeting you in person.