Shownotes
Tanner Guzy is a men's style coach and author of The Appearance of Power, helping high-achieving men align their external appearance with internal identity. As a single father of seven running a seven-figure business for eight years, Tanner has completed a half Ironman, earned Jiu-Jitsu medals, and conquered Spartan races. In this conversation marking five years since his first appearance on the show, Tanner discusses sovereignty, the collapse of the manosphere, and why most men's approach to style undermines their masculinity.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
- Most men wear a "uniform of apathy" that signals lack of sovereignty over their lives
- The manosphere failed because it worshiped autonomy instead of healthy interdependence
- "Extegrity" means aligning who you are externally with who you are internally
- Growth gluttons pursue progress at expense of presence and meaningful relationships
- Romance maxing creates fulfilling life experiences instead of waiting for circumstances to change
- True masculinity holds tension between competing values rather than choosing extremes
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The Appearance of Power: https://a.co/d/eBl3Oph
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Transcripts
Foreign.
Speaker B:Hello and welcome to the Will Spencer Podcast.
Speaker B:This is a weekly interview show where I sit down and talk with authors, thought leaders and influencers who help us understand our changing world.
Speaker B:New episodes release every week.
Speaker B:My guest this week is Tanner Guzzi.
Speaker B:Tanner is a men's style coach and the author of the Appearance of Power, a book helping high achieving men align their external appearance with their internal identity.
Speaker B:As a single father of seven, Tanner has successfully run his own seven figure business for eight years while building an impressive list of physical accomplishments, including completing a half ironman, earning multiple Jiu Jitsu tournament medals, and conquering Spartan races.
Speaker B:Over the past decade, Tanner has worked thousands of men, me included, helping them reinforce, helping, helping them develop a personal style that reinforces their virtues and builds genuine confidence.
Speaker B:His approach moves beyond traditional fashion advice and focuses on three key pillars.
Speaker B:Aesthetics, articulation, and authenticity.
Speaker B:Tanner was also my first guest ever on the podcast five years ago almost to the day, and this is the first time he's been on the show since then.
Speaker B:Tanner, to kick off my month long celebration of five years of the show.
Speaker B:Welcome to the Will Spencer podcast.
Speaker A:Dude, you make me sound real good, Will.
Speaker A:I appreciate that intro.
Speaker B:You're welcome.
Speaker B:I just pulled a bunch of stuff from masculinestyle.com and put it into a bio for you.
Speaker A:Well, I appreciate it, dude.
Speaker A:It's always fun to get to chat and hang out with you.
Speaker A:I'm glad to be back and how rad that it's.
Speaker A:Man, five years, that's a good chunk of time.
Speaker A:So I'm glad to be back and hanging out.
Speaker B:It's crazy, man.
Speaker B:Does it feel like five years?
Speaker B:It kind of does and it doesn't.
Speaker B:We live in a very different world today than I think we did just five years ago.
Speaker A:It, I mean, my world is certainly different than it was and it is, it is.
Speaker A:It's one of those where it's like, has it only been that long?
Speaker A:And I can't believe it's been that long, you know, kind of the, the both ends of it.
Speaker B:Yeah, it was like 20, 20, 21 and 22 were such, they were such odd years, just in a historical sense with COVID and coming out of that and then 23 and 24, that's kind of like the lights came on a little bit and now here we are in 25 and it kind of feels like that whole Covid thing that happened.
Speaker B:Remember we shut down the world for a couple years.
Speaker B:Remember that?
Speaker B:Like, don't just forget about all that.
Speaker B:And now we're on this yeah.
Speaker B:Now we're on Trump 47, and it feels like this is completely new.
Speaker B:Horizons have.
Speaker B:Have opened up in the.
Speaker B:In the world and for men.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:It's.
Speaker A:It's been.
Speaker A:We live in interesting times, for sure.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:So.
Speaker B:So five years on, I remember we did a.
Speaker B:You did a style coaching for me, and that was probably one of the most transformative, if not the most trans of personal coaching that I've ever done.
Speaker B:And I'm still wearing batch shirts, and I've kind of.
Speaker B:I've kind of made them nicer with a.
Speaker B:With a T shirt now instead of keeping them all buttoned up.
Speaker B:But I still wear these shirts.
Speaker B:I still wear mott and bow jeans, and I still feel confidence when I go shopping for clothes.
Speaker B:And you, to date, are still the only guy that I know who's talking about this stuff, which is awesome.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:I mean, I guess it's nice for me because I don't have to compete with anybody.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:And it's a.
Speaker A:It's a fun niche to get to be in, for sure.
Speaker A:Especially because a lot of guys still have a tendency to kind of undervalue the importance of their own appearance when it comes to.
Speaker A:I think a lot of guys will begrudgingly recognize it when it comes to how it works in dating or maybe from a career perspective, but they.
Speaker A:They don't see the strong correlations as far as how it affects their own sense of self and kind of like how they show up with their own internal relationship and.
Speaker A:And how they view themselves fitting into the world that they either have created for them or they choose to create for.
Speaker A:And it's fun to get to work with guys and help them see it's a really pretty potent tool if you know how to use it the right way.
Speaker B:Well, why don't you take a moment, just kind of break down the work that you do with men, the value of it, the things that you lead them through.
Speaker B:Of course, I mentioned your book the Appearance of Power, which is still very good.
Speaker B:Congratulations, by the way.
Speaker B:So maybe just break that down, because I think that there's a possibility to discover a whole new generation of men that are beginning to think about these things.
Speaker A:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker A:So I think the best way to really kind of like, break it down to its brass tacks is what I do is I help men create extegrity, and that's kind of a term that I've created and played with, but it's the idea of who you are on the outside actually aligning with and reflecting.
Speaker A:Honestly and accurately who you are on the inside.
Speaker A:And a lot of guys, especially good men, do a ton of the inner work, and that's way more important than any of the stuff that I do.
Speaker A:When you do the.
Speaker A:The inner work, as far as your spirituality or healthy relationships or having, like, a good emotional range, good emotional control, all of those things are absolute crucial.
Speaker A:And we're not just internal beings.
Speaker A:We're not just intellectual beings, but we are social beings.
Speaker A:We have physical bodies, and we have our own sense of sight and smell and sound and all of these other things.
Speaker A:And when who we are externally can align with and reinforce who we are internally, it creates something that's very powerful, and it creates this really cool synergy.
Speaker A:And our identities become stronger.
Speaker A:We become more powerful.
Speaker A:And what's fun about it, it's unique for everybody.
Speaker A:You and I are different men.
Speaker A:Internally.
Speaker A:We share a lot of values, but we inhabit the world differently.
Speaker A:You know, our family situations are different.
Speaker A:Our careers are different.
Speaker A:Our hopes and dreams and aspirations, our hangups and our sins and everything are all a little bit different.
Speaker A:And so how we present externally should also be a little bit different.
Speaker A:And so what I get to do is help men cultivate that for themselves so that it is very congruent and authentic, but it's also authentic to better, higher versions of who they are, as opposed to just, you know, kind of like the.
Speaker A:The postmodern, secular version of authenticity, which is just an excuse to, you know, indulge in your baser instincts.
Speaker A:It's not that kind of authenticity.
Speaker A:It's a more noble version of it.
Speaker B:Yeah, it was just.
Speaker B:Strangely enough, I was.
Speaker B:I was a guest on a podcast yesterday, and we were talking about this very issue.
Speaker B:In fact, I was telling them about.
Speaker B:About the coaching that you do just.
Speaker B:Just by how it works out and being able to talk about things in terms of a man's, like, you know, the way that a man should dress and present himself will be very different.
Speaker B:For if he's got.
Speaker B:If his buddies are hunters versus if his buddies are chess players.
Speaker B:And it's not a better or worse thing.
Speaker B:It's just two different ways of being.
Speaker B:And so you as a man.
Speaker B:Yeah, so you as a man, have to know how to dress in a way that suits you, but also.
Speaker B:And your budget, and that also suits the communities that you're a part of.
Speaker B:And I don't think I learned that from you, and I don't think anyone really ever breaks that down.
Speaker B:For men, we always have to be kind of shoehorned into whatever image we're seeing on the media or, you know, on the red carpet.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Or sadly, what a lot of us tend to do is just play it safe and dress to something that's so neutral that it never really identifies us with or against anything in particular.
Speaker A:And there's.
Speaker A:There's certainly times and places where you need to lean further in or further out of particular tribal identities or things like that.
Speaker A:But neutrality should be done from a place of intention as opposed to from a place of fear or a lack of awareness or a lack of skill set or anything else.
Speaker B:Yes.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:It should be an expression of who you are as a man rather than sort of desperately trying to fit in.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Or even desperately trying to just not.
Speaker A:There's a difference between fitting in and just not getting noticed.
Speaker A:And I think a lot of guys have a tendency to go that route where it's.
Speaker A:I will just dress in a way where I don't even show up.
Speaker A:I don't attract any positive or any negative attention.
Speaker A:I just.
Speaker A:I just don't register at all.
Speaker A:And that is more often done from a place of fear or incompetence.
Speaker A:And this sounds like I'm getting on these guys.
Speaker A:Like it's.
Speaker A:It's not anybody's fault.
Speaker A:Most of us didn't grow up learning how to navigate any of this stuff.
Speaker A:We weren't taught this by our dads.
Speaker A:This isn't stuff we were taught in school.
Speaker A:But it is.
Speaker A:It's usually done from a place of fear or incompetence or some other level of lack that if you just learn how to be able to visually assert yourself a little bit more, and it's done in a way that it feels congruent, then you have a little bit more courage to do it, and everything just gets better for you when you do it the right way.
Speaker B:Maybe this relates to a classic meme of yours that I don't see quite as often, at least not as much as I used to.
Speaker B:Real men don't care what they look like.
Speaker B:So talk about that, because that was like.
Speaker B:That was like your thing forever.
Speaker A:It was.
Speaker A:And I still.
Speaker A:I still get to pop it up every once in a while.
Speaker A:So I've been doing this for 15 years, and as you can imagine, a lot of the resistance that I get given what I do, you know, And a lot of your listeners may even be experiencing this as they listen to us talk is like, why does this matter?
Speaker A:Like, a real man shouldn't even care what he looks like.
Speaker A:He shouldn't care about how his clothing communicates to other people or anything else.
Speaker A:Like, just be a good man and just dress in XYZ basic clothing and that's all that matters.
Speaker A:And that's historically inaccurate and not the.
Speaker A:When you zoom out from our little like 20th century Western culture bubble.
Speaker A:20th, you know, 21st.
Speaker A:And you look at any other culture at any other point in history, men have always used their appearance and have always cared deeply about appearance.
Speaker A:And even within sub classifications within their different groups, you've got the warrior class that dresses very differently from the priest class, which dresses.
Speaker A:Dresses very differently from bureaucrats or whatever else.
Speaker A:And appearance, and an intelligent use of appearance has always been part of masculinity in the way that men relate to each other, the way that we relate to women, and the way that we relate to children.
Speaker A:And so I love using that meme whenever pictures or photos or paintings or whatever else pops up of all of these different historical examples of men very deeply caring about their appearance.
Speaker A:It's just, it's a little bit of a dig of like, now you think that they don't care, but we care and we've always cared about it.
Speaker B:Is there, is that the total why men don't care?
Speaker B:They think who I am inside as a good person is enough.
Speaker B:Even if that's not true, like, or is there, I think there's sometimes like a component of they want to be invisible.
Speaker B:You know, when you start, when you start dressing in an intentional way, you get noticed and it's just easier to kind of coast through life and hide.
Speaker A:Yeah, there's pressure and expectations and everything that come from being noticed.
Speaker A:And life is a lot easier and a lot smoother and a lot more comfortable.
Speaker A:It's a whole lot less fulfilling and a whole lot less noble when you fly under the radar.
Speaker A:But I certainly get the, the siren song of that.
Speaker A:And I think another thing of it too, in this kind of almost like ironic meta sense, is that a lot of us grew up in a culture where the only appropriate, appropriately masculine relationship with appearance is indifference to it.
Speaker A:But it has to be the right level of indifference.
Speaker A:You can't be indifferent enough that you're wearing a dress or garbage bags or something else.
Speaker A:You have to be indifferent to the same like, T shirt, cargo shorts and old sneakers version that everybody else is.
Speaker A:And so we, most guys will wear the same uniform, but we just live in a culture that the uniform is one of apathy or indifference as opposed to a uniform of dignity or nobility or aspiration or self respect or whatever.
Speaker A:Many other cultures would make their uniform Instead, I remember.
Speaker B:I remember the cargo shorts.
Speaker B:The special enemy, the nemesis of Tanner.
Speaker A:Ghazi, which is funny because even now I see guys that wear them and wear them great.
Speaker A:And you can do it in a way that works very well.
Speaker A:And it's funny because even that is.
Speaker A:That's not the same uniform of apathy that we would have seen now.
Speaker A:It's like guys that are in their shiny golf polos and their Lululemon ABC pants and.
Speaker A:And they're like hybrid work sneakers.
Speaker A:That.
Speaker A:That's kind of like the new.
Speaker A:The.
Speaker A:The new uniform of indifference, that that's what most guys just wear without wanting to look like.
Speaker A:They think too hard, but they're not too outdated on anything either.
Speaker A:So the uniform changes, but it's still this idea of you have to look like you don't care.
Speaker B:You have to study indifference.
Speaker B:I have to look precise.
Speaker B:I have to wear the uniform of not caring.
Speaker A:Exactly.
Speaker A:Exactly.
Speaker B:Interesting.
Speaker B:I've never thought of it that way before, but, you know, as, sorry, I'm just getting over being sick.
Speaker B:But as I look around the world, you see it.
Speaker B:You can tell the difference between men who are trying and men who are trying too hard and the men who are not trying at all, Right?
Speaker A:And a lot of guys justifiably are afraid of what happens when they try too hard, because there's a big risk when you try too hard and you make a fool of yourself or you wear something that looks like it's too much of a costume or you feel like a complete fake and a liar when you put it on.
Speaker A:Like, these are all justifiable fears is too strong of a word, but, like, you're justifiably reticent when you think about those potential pitfalls.
Speaker A:But it's not impossible to learn to dress better and navigate all of those things without falling into those pitfalls.
Speaker A:It's very doable for anybody.
Speaker B:And on the other side, we have, I love another one of your terms, the gentle dork.
Speaker B:Now, so talk about what that is, then I'll give a little story about that.
Speaker A:Okay, great.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:And I feel like I always have to give this caveat because I rail on these guys.
Speaker A:And part of it is because I was a gentle dork myself for a while too.
Speaker A:And these are the guys who really don't have any other masculine capital.
Speaker A:They're not, you know, they're not strong.
Speaker A:They're not courageous.
Speaker A:They're not assertive.
Speaker A:They're not really masculine in any traditional sense.
Speaker A: n also dressing like it's the: Speaker A:And so they don't look like Cary Grant.
Speaker A:They look like this dorky, cosplaying version of Cary Grant.
Speaker A:And what made Steve McQueen Cary Grant, you know, Clint Eastwood, all of these great kind of, like, aspirational figures that a lot of these guys try to dress up as from the 20th century.
Speaker A:It wasn't the clothing that made them.
Speaker A:It was the combination of the clothing and then just their overall masculine presence.
Speaker A:And without one, then the other ends up looking like a costume.
Speaker B:Yeah, there was a.
Speaker B:There was a guy at a church.
Speaker B:We'll say which church?
Speaker B:But.
Speaker B:And he was.
Speaker B:As soon as I saw him, he went for several weeks that.
Speaker B:While I was there.
Speaker B:And he was the classic gentle dork.
Speaker B:Not a particularly masculine man.
Speaker B:Very socially awkward in his speech.
Speaker B:Incredible at picking out combinations of colors for his suits and his ties.
Speaker B:Like, obviously had a really good sense of color and fit and texture.
Speaker B:Like, he.
Speaker B:Like, from.
Speaker B:From the neck down, it's like, you know, he looks really good.
Speaker B:It's just that from the neck up, it was like, it wasn't making up the gap in terms of his ability to relate to the world, so that it actually made him unapproachable to see the way that he was overdressing.
Speaker A:Yep.
Speaker A:Yep.
Speaker A:And a lot of guys will use it as a.
Speaker A:Like, as a bludgeon or as a club when your style should be something that is just a natural extension of who you are, as opposed to a compensation for where you lack.
Speaker B:Say more about that.
Speaker A:Yeah, well.
Speaker A:And this is one of the things that I really focus on when I work with my guys.
Speaker A:A lot of guys come in and they think that working with me is all about, like, here's the colors that work for you, or, here's how we should do things based on what your build is, or here's what the latest trends are, or here's kind of how people in your industry dress.
Speaker A:And all of those things are very relevant.
Speaker A:And we do tackle all of it, but it's not the foundation.
Speaker A:The foundation is, who are you?
Speaker A:What are you bringing to the table?
Speaker A:What is your North Star as far as, like, what's the man you're building yourself into?
Speaker A:And if we Know that then it's very easy to develop a sense of style that does factor in all of those variables, but it brings it in a way that it just becomes okay.
Speaker A:One of the best ways that I hear this is when I work with married men, I will have their wives tell me, finally, Will looks like the man that I was the only one who ever saw.
Speaker A:Like, he now looks like the man that I know, right?
Speaker A:Where these people who know these men on an intimate level get to see the entirety of who they are.
Speaker A:And then when you dress the right way, that now becomes something that's presented to everybody and reinforced back to you, as opposed to it being kept compartmentalized.
Speaker A:And what you're presenting is this just muted down version of yourself or this caricatured, lying version of yourself that a lot of guys overdo it with as well.
Speaker B:What's interesting, I don't know that when we had this conversation a few years ago, if we talked so much about the influence of wives over the process, probably because I wasn't married at the time, wasn't on my mind.
Speaker B:But I imagine that that can be very helpful, but also potentially introduce a lot of friction in some ways as well.
Speaker B:If, you know, she sees him one way, he identifies another way.
Speaker B:Potentially you see him a third way.
Speaker B:I mean, how do you navigate those tensions?
Speaker A:So I do my best as far as my third way of seeing that as removing that entirely.
Speaker A:My job is to teach them how to be able to do it themselves.
Speaker A:And when it comes to helping them navigate that tension in there, sadly, a lot of times it really depends.
Speaker A:It kind of shines a flashlight on where the relationship is strong and where it's weak.
Speaker A:Because I've seen and worked with clients where when this becomes a very visual representation of the fact that they're working on themselves and they're bettering themselves, and sometimes they have a spouse that's not interested in that, she'll try to drag him back in.
Speaker A:Or maybe it's a way of him trying to kind of like reclaim his individuality and his identity.
Speaker A:And in the past, his wife was the one who chose his clothing for him.
Speaker A:And so she resents that he's no longer her mannequin and she can't assert her vision of who she wants him to be onto him, but he's actually asserting his vision of himself onto him, onto himself.
Speaker A:And so sadly, in.
Speaker A:In tense relationships, it can be a way of.
Speaker A:Of not exacerbating it, but maybe highlighting in a way that they don't see it, but in really, really healthy relationships.
Speaker A:The feedback that I get from wives is always so fun and so good to see because these are women who love their husbands.
Speaker A:They love that they're men that are interested in being the best they can be.
Speaker A:And when they see new avenue for that to present itself, they love it.
Speaker A:And then what's even better is that they.
Speaker A:When they see how that affects them as fathers and how they show up differently as fathers, how they become more aspirational for their kids, or their kids get to learn this new level of expression, or it becomes another way for these dads to be mentors and teachers and be involved with their kids.
Speaker A:Most of the wives just eat it up and love it because it's just another realm of excellence that they get to see their husbands show up in.
Speaker B:And that's the part that I really want to highlight for the listeners, is that this outward style coaching is not just outward coaching.
Speaker B:This is not just how to dress.
Speaker B:It's actually something much, much deeper.
Speaker A:Yeah, Yeah.
Speaker A:I can't call it this because I don't have any sort of degree or anything that would relate to it, but essentially what it is is appearance psychology.
Speaker A:It's really being able to understand how you think, how you interact with people, understanding how the world works, but doing it through a visual lens, as opposed through talk therapy or an emotional lens or something else.
Speaker A:It's the visual approach to it.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Just to give an example, do you still do the three style archetypes?
Speaker B:Rinkish, rugged, refined.
Speaker B:Okay.
Speaker B: this would have been back in: Speaker B:And then in taking the quiz, it was like, actually, no, you're more rakish with refined.
Speaker B:And that was not rugged at all.
Speaker B:And I was very surprised by that.
Speaker B:And then when you and I sat down to talk, you know, it was as if you had analyzed my psychology through this brief quiz, and you pointed out something that had stuck with me to this day, which is that it's refined clothing, but with really subtle detail, so that if you pay attention, you notice there's more going on than just refined.
Speaker B:And that has really stuck with me since then.
Speaker B:And that's sort of become like a nor.
Speaker B:It's because it's true, not just because I like it, because it's true.
Speaker B:And so I really.
Speaker B:When I.
Speaker B:When I do go shopping for clothing, I do try to pick out things that have those little details, like, no, it's not enough that it just looks nice.
Speaker B:There has to be something about it that makes it special.
Speaker B:Even if I'm the only guy who notices.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:And that's.
Speaker A:Oh, I love that.
Speaker A:I love that.
Speaker A:It's about.
Speaker A:Even if you're the only one who notices, because then it's not you putting on a presentation for somebody else.
Speaker A:It's you integrating by putting on something that's representative of you and you feel different and you interact.
Speaker A:Okay, I'll give you.
Speaker A:I'll give you an example of this.
Speaker A:I was just talking with a client yesterday who was at a networking event in Denver, and we had worked very specifically.
Speaker A:He's a relatively new client.
Speaker A:So this was one of his first events after we had worked together.
Speaker A:And the stuff that we had arrived at for him to wear was different than what he had worn before.
Speaker A:And what he noticed was that a ton more people approached him and wanted to interact with him than what he had had before.
Speaker A:And part of it was that, yes, he dressed in a way that subtly stood out and made him kind of easily recognizable, but a big part of it was that he was way more comfortable and at ease at this event.
Speaker A:And so his posture and his body language and even just kind of like, I don't believe in, like, the woo woo energy stuff, but even just like his energy, it felt different.
Speaker A:And so because he was more calmly confident and sure of himself, it made him more approachable.
Speaker A:And so it wasn't that people necessarily related entirely to the clothing, but they related to the clothing plus how he related to his clothing.
Speaker A:And that's what the combination was.
Speaker B:Can we take a diversion off the highway for a second?
Speaker B:Because I want to get your.
Speaker B:I want to get.
Speaker B:Okay, do you remember, I think it was like, three months ago, there was a whole big controversy on X about this man who kind of had, like, the dad bod.
Speaker B:And then he got, like, super lean.
Speaker B:Okay.
Speaker B:And all the guys were like, the dude on the right looks amazing.
Speaker B:And all the women were saying, no, the guy on the left, the pre.
Speaker B:The before looked amazing.
Speaker B:And we think the guy on the right is gay or whatever is what they were saying.
Speaker B:And that was just this entire firestorm.
Speaker B:And like, my take on it was like, okay, you can say that, but I guarantee you the guy who shows up being super lean and ripped is going to move through his life with so much more confidence that will be so much more attractive than just the surface appearance might be for some women.
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker A:And that was one of the things that I noticed, is that there was a lot of Evaluation not necessarily of the appearance itself, but what it represented.
Speaker A:Because a lot of women were saying, well, I like the guy who he was before because the guy on the right is going to be too focused on his macros and he's not going to be able to be present as a dad or it's not going to be.
Speaker A:And so we do this subconsciously is we assign motivations and morals and attributes and all of these other things onto not only our appearance, but what it takes in order to be able to get to that appearance.
Speaker A:And a lot of times we do it in a negative way.
Speaker A:But you're absolutely right, because somebody who not only looks that way, but has the sovereignty of knowing.
Speaker A:I took myself from point A to point B, you show up differently because of the confidence that comes from that.
Speaker A:And that's just a visual manifestation of what all of that is.
Speaker A:That's the funny thing about all of this appearance stuff is it doesn't happen in a bubble.
Speaker A:It does not happen unrelated to the social cues or our own psychological aspects or how much work we had to or didn't have to put into it or anything else like that.
Speaker B:Man, I just gotta say, it is so refreshing to talk to you because you used a word, used the word sovereignty.
Speaker B:And I remember back in the manosphere days like that was one of the words that I thought had some real truth to it.
Speaker B:Now I do want to get into the manosphere and what's happened, you know, since then, but like, it's.
Speaker B:It's good to be going through the wreckage of what's sitting at the bottom of the ocean and kind of harvesting.
Speaker B:Like this was actually a really useful idea of men acting with a sense of sovereignty over their own lives, being able to make independent decisions from the collective thinking around them.
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker A:And it's a word I still stand by and totally believe in.
Speaker A:I don't think I was one that particularly leaned heavily on it, but I do think that it's, it's.
Speaker A:You have to.
Speaker A:You have to start from a position of sovereignty and then choose how much you're willing to cede that for the people who matter and for the consequences that you want.
Speaker A:We all seed sovereignty when it comes to, you know, we live in a society.
Speaker A:But like, you know, that's true.
Speaker A:Or when you're married and a father, you seed certain levels of sovereignty for the betterment of your family.
Speaker A:If you believe in God, you cede certain levels of sovereignty in order to be able to submit to his will in a way that, that is appropriate and what's cool is when you take it from the perspective of sovereignty, then I feel like very rarely is it actually a.
Speaker A:What's the word I want?
Speaker B:Ceding.
Speaker A:Cessation.
Speaker A:I don't know what the word is.
Speaker A:But you're not actually seeding it.
Speaker B:Concession.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Okay, thank you.
Speaker A:But you're investing it because family life pays out massively, even when you go through terrible circumstances.
Speaker A:I mean, I ceded a lot of sovereignty to my marriage, and my marriage blew up, but I've got wonderful kids that it was worth seeding that sovereignty to, and I cede a lot of it to them.
Speaker A:But it's not.
Speaker A:Not a victim.
Speaker A:I'm not trapped.
Speaker A:I'm still sovereign.
Speaker B:You know, this is great.
Speaker B:I want to dig into this because I talk to a lot of men who are single and who want to be married, and I take them at their word.
Speaker B:But one of the things that I've noticed in myself and that I spent a long time consciously preparing for, as in, I met my wife in the woman who would become my wife.
Speaker B: We met in August of: Speaker B:It had become clear by December, January, that this had marriage potential.
Speaker B:We were engaged by.
Speaker B:I think it was April.
Speaker B:And married and married in June.
Speaker B:Married in July.
Speaker B:Sorry.
Speaker B:So engaged in May.
Speaker B:Yeah, engaged in April, married in July.
Speaker B:Cool.
Speaker B:And I was a single guy, and I'd been single for a long time.
Speaker B:But I started preparing myself mentally about six months before the wedding, before we were even engaged, to know that, okay, what is my day going to look like if my wife is here walking around, if my kids are here walking around?
Speaker B:I cannot be the same guy that I am just in private and just, you know, not that I'm walking around in sin all day, but I'll give you a good example.
Speaker B:Like when I would, you know, eat by myself and make myself dinner, I would sit and I would watch videos of chess breakdowns.
Speaker B:Like channels that, like, analyze chess games.
Speaker B:That's what I'd watch while I would eat.
Speaker B:You know what I mean?
Speaker B:It's absolutely.
Speaker B:It's not mindless, amoral.
Speaker B:It's completely amoral.
Speaker B:Exactly.
Speaker B:It's fun.
Speaker B:It's entertaining.
Speaker B:Exactly.
Speaker B:Now I'm probably not going to be able to sit and watch chess videos anymore.
Speaker B:I'm not going to have time and so thinking about those things.
Speaker B:So let's talk about the process of men who don't want to be single, they want to be married, getting ready to give up that sovereignty.
Speaker B:Because I don't know that enough men think about that.
Speaker A:It's interesting that you're asking me this because I am finding myself from the complete opposite direction.
Speaker B:Yes.
Speaker A:Where, you know, I was married for 13 years, and we have a lot of kids, and I feel like I had been able to carve out a really, really good balance of, like, I work for myself.
Speaker A:And so I had a lot of autonomy and a lot of sovereignty in that regard.
Speaker A:And I was able to kind of control my schedule and work out when I wanted to and work when I wanted to.
Speaker A:And I had great friends.
Speaker A:Like, I feel like I had a really good balance in a lot of that.
Speaker A:And now I find myself in a position where I. I don't know what it's like to be single.
Speaker A:I'm two years in, and I'm still learning what it's like to have what, like, my own.
Speaker A:My own.
Speaker A:It's so weird because it sounds so funny saying it, but, like, everything that I did wasn't.
Speaker A:I was not.
Speaker A:I did not have a life that was built around, like, happy wife, happy life, or, like, this immediate.
Speaker A:But everything was built around family and legacy and building and all of that.
Speaker A:And even the way that I was able to turn my hobbies and my friendships and my connections into things that either made money, or I felt like they made me a better father, or they were things that I could connect with my kids on or things like that.
Speaker A:And I still have a lot of need for that and a lot of drive for that.
Speaker A:And at the same time, I have a lot of time that I can.
Speaker A:If I want to, I can sit in here and I can play video games for eight hours straight and just numb myself and distract myself, you know, and so I don't know if I'm the right guy to ask that question, because I've always been so.
Speaker A:I'm so much more capable of finding the balance of what?
Speaker A:Balancing, converting, investing, leveraging, maybe all of those words, my sovereignty, into a family dynamic that I'm, in a lot of ways, incredibly lost when I don't have that.
Speaker A:That direction to channel it into 100% of the time.
Speaker B:Well, that's.
Speaker B:That's just as valuable, because I'm sure there are plenty of men that have that same feeling.
Speaker B:Like, I know plenty of men who are looking for the opportunity to have the yoke placed around their neck.
Speaker B:And then there are some men that reach a stage in their life through no fault of their own, where suddenly that yoke has taken off.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:You know, and they're like, I don't know who I am without this weight.
Speaker B:That's Sort of that I use to anchor myself.
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And I found that for me, one of the interesting things in the last two years has been I've just been in this kind of like, limbo of, you know, and a lot of guys, certainly a lot of manuscript guys would tell me I'm an idiot because I've lived out in what a lot of ways are like Reddit horror stories.
Speaker A:It's the stuff that a lot of, a lot of you guys read.
Speaker A:And sometimes you go, there's no way this could be real.
Speaker A:And sadly, my experience is a lot of it is real.
Speaker A:I want to get married again.
Speaker A:Like, I want to be partnered with somebody forever.
Speaker A:Like, I have no interest in hedonistically playing the field and racking up notch counts.
Speaker A:Like, I just, I want to.
Speaker A:I want to be married and build a deep, connective, mutually beneficial relationship in life with somebody.
Speaker A:And one of the things that's been a challenge is realizing how subconsciously I've been just in this kind of like limbo or purgatory or waiting period of like, you know, when I find somebody that I can click with and we can build that in, then I can get back on track to where I want to be.
Speaker A:And so one of the things that I'm actively trying to do right now, I actually just did a sub stack on this is I still love.
Speaker A:I still love all the.
Speaker A:The X jargon and everything else is I'm romance maxing.
Speaker A:And not from like a dating perspective or anything else like that, but I'm trying to make my life with what it is as enjoyable and romantic and kind of like aspirational as it can be.
Speaker A:So, like, a great example is I do the same thing as you, except I just mindlessly scroll TikTok when I eat dinner.
Speaker A:And now it's like, no, I'm gonna put on, like, good music and I'm gonna sit down at my dinner table and I will have taken some time to like, actually cook dinner as opposed to just like nuking a quesadilla in the microwave or whatever else as a way to just, like, live my life as what it is right now, as opposed to waiting for my circumstances to change and then feeling like I can get back to living the life that I, that I had and that I loved so much.
Speaker B:Sort of not really taking a step off the path of who you used to be and just continuing on in that vein of living.
Speaker B:I don't know what we say it's not a dignified life, but it's like leading a Put together life, leading a life of respect of your time and respect of yourself, and not letting the sudden shift in circumstances sort of jar you into being some lesser version.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:And I think part of it too is that for me, even when things were really good, I always had a hard time being present.
Speaker A:I think that's a trap that a lot of us that are very self development minded fall into is.
Speaker A:It's always like, what's the next goal, what's the next milestone, what's the next PR or whatever else.
Speaker A:And I certainly got on that treadmill.
Speaker A:And that was part of how I contributed to the detriment of my marriage was that things were just never good enough.
Speaker A:What I did wasn't good enough, what she did wasn't good enough, what my kids did wasn't good enough.
Speaker A:And it wasn't because they weren't good things, but I was just like, okay, that PR is now the new baseline and we have to get to something else.
Speaker A:And so it was this kind of like, it's almost like gluttony for growth, you know, And I don't think that we need to stop being growth minded.
Speaker A:And for me, being present that term never really did a lot.
Speaker A:But if I can make my life feel more cinematic, more romantic, more just kind of like immersive as opposed to it always having to be progressive or distractive, then that's where I'm finding I'm reclaiming a lot of my individual sovereignty right now.
Speaker B:You're building a life and life rhythms that feel the way that you want it to feel that isn't always focused on the next hill.
Speaker B:It's like, well, I've actually.
Speaker B:You've arrived at a pretty decent hill where you're at right now.
Speaker B:Right, right.
Speaker B:And always being focused on the next hill.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:There's a way that we should do that as men.
Speaker B:We should be looking towards the next horizon, but not at the expense of missing what's right and in front of us.
Speaker B:And you can do that as a unexpectedly single man at this stage of life.
Speaker A:Right, yeah.
Speaker A:Learning to getting better at it.
Speaker B:Right, right.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And yeah, because I, you know, of course I met you when you were married and you've shared some stories about things that have gone on.
Speaker B:And so, you know, over the past couple years, we were talking about like seeing you rebuild from that, like knowing, knowing the life that you had built, the man you were, you know, and what you had, and then to see it just all kind of blow up in its own way.
Speaker B:And then to see you kind of rebuild in this new guy.
Speaker B:Like, it makes sense why you're like, okay, well who am I now?
Speaker B:I get to choose.
Speaker B:This is who I am.
Speaker B:And I like being this guy in the hope that this is the road that will take you where you're going.
Speaker B:It seems like it is.
Speaker A:And even if it doesn't, or even if it takes a lot longer, because I think that's another one of the things that's happened, and I've done this my whole life is I've always just waited.
Speaker A:I've always wanted to be at the next stage in my life.
Speaker A:And I think that's part of the reason why my particular life blow up was so hard, because I.
Speaker A: nd I would say that the years: Speaker A:And so for me, that was like the only time in my life that I wasn't waiting for something else to happen.
Speaker A:I had finally gotten to a point where, yeah, it was like, you know, how do I work on this PR for at the gym?
Speaker A:Or how do I set this next goal for this accomplishment?
Speaker A:Or how do I scale the business?
Speaker A:But it wasn't that things were so far from where I wanted them to be that I was always just like, well, maybe when I do this, then I'll be happy.
Speaker A:And then now to have so much of that stripped away.
Speaker A:I've wasted a lot of the last two years going back into this mindset of if I can change my circumstances and if I'm patient enough, then I can be happy again.
Speaker A:And it's more learning that I may be in this for a while.
Speaker A:I may not, I may not find a good relationship for another, you know, two years, 10 years, 20 years.
Speaker A:Who knows how long it's going to be?
Speaker A:And I don't want to waste the entirety of that time waiting to be happy and waiting for my circumstances to change.
Speaker A:Whether I'm waiting passively or actively, it's still waiting.
Speaker B:You want to know something funny?
Speaker A:Please.
Speaker B:You and I have like completely changed positions due to our change in circumstances.
Speaker B:Because I am, I am not generally like a hyper goal oriented guy.
Speaker B:I focus very much on presence.
Speaker B:Presence is something that I have in spades.
Speaker B:But now here I am married and everyone listening gets to, gets to hear the story.
Speaker B:Like my wife is pregnant and we went for our ultrasound yesterday and so got the photos and, and the baby's nine weeks old and got to see the heartbeat on the ultrasound.
Speaker B:And I got real emotional looking at that.
Speaker A:Oh, dude, I love it.
Speaker A:So stoked for you.
Speaker B:Me too.
Speaker B:And presence is great.
Speaker B:And presence is absolutely something that I can and should and do bring to my wife and to my daughter and to my family in the evenings when I'm there.
Speaker B:And, you know, presence isn't going to help feed and clothe a growing number of kids.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:And don't sacrifice presence to do those things, like just throw it out the window.
Speaker B:That has meaning.
Speaker B:But I need to bring out more parts of myself.
Speaker B:So I'm learning to be more goal oriented and goal driven.
Speaker B:And meanwhile, here's you on the other side being like, I was super goal oriented.
Speaker B:Now I'm going more towards presence, which is.
Speaker B:That's kind of wonderful, actually.
Speaker A:Well, I think that's the beauty of these different circumstances, you know, And I have always talked about how, for me, marriage and fatherhood were rocket fuel.
Speaker A:I was not necessarily super ambitious.
Speaker A:I wasn't necessarily super present.
Speaker A:I was just really good at distracting myself, if I'm being honest, you know, up until I grew up.
Speaker A:And for me, marriage and family did that.
Speaker A:And it really turned on a lot of that ambition that I don't think it would have otherwise.
Speaker A:And I'm grateful for the unique circumstances that that brought in there.
Speaker A:And I'm also really grateful for the unique circumstances that I'm in right now because I think about how, you know, if.
Speaker A:If my world wouldn't have blown up, what would I be doing right now?
Speaker A:And it still would have been on that progress treadmill of like, what's the next big thing?
Speaker A:What's the next big step?
Speaker A:And I still don't think I wouldn't have been.
Speaker A:I wouldn't have been able to be as fulfilled and as joyful as I wanted to be.
Speaker A:I wouldn't have been able to be as present with my kids and as good of a dad as I want to be.
Speaker A:I wouldn't have been able to be as good of a husband as I want to be.
Speaker A:And in a lot of ways it feels like, you know, obviously agency comes into play and God has more and there's.
Speaker A:There's a whole lot more to it.
Speaker A:But I think one of the blessings from this is God is giving me an opportunity to embrace presence and romance, Max.
Speaker A:As opposed to just be a continued.
Speaker A:I haven't thought of this term before I just said it, but I. I'm going to use this.
Speaker A:Growth glutton.
Speaker B:Yeah, man, you're so good at coming up with these things.
Speaker B:I remember the first time that I ever heard your.
Speaker B:Your name, I think it was.
Speaker B: Would have been in: Speaker B:I think it was LARPing.
Speaker B:Personal development.
Speaker A:That was.
Speaker B:That was like your first meme that really hit, I think.
Speaker B:Was that it?
Speaker A:Probably that.
Speaker A:That one's mine.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:These ideas, like, you read all the personal development books, but you, like, implement anything they say.
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:So my Audible account shows a very different man than who I am.
Speaker B:Right, Exactly.
Speaker B:So now another one is growth glutton.
Speaker B:You got to be writing these down, man.
Speaker B:These are all stories.
Speaker B:No, and I.
Speaker B:And I think that there's a way in which we have to learn to be responsive in this way.
Speaker B:Like, mindfully responsive to our circumstances.
Speaker B:Like, you could.
Speaker B:You could rage against your circumstances, and you could say, you know what I'm going to do?
Speaker B:I'm going to kick it into sixth gear because I don't want to wait.
Speaker B:And then you could.
Speaker B:Without the constraints, you could run yourself, you know, right off the cliff or into the ground or burn yourself out.
Speaker B:But it's like, no, I'm going to mindfully slow down and make my life into something that I feel comfortable in right now.
Speaker B:Rather than, you know, you have a big semi truck that's pulling a load, then you decouple it from the load.
Speaker B:What happens?
Speaker B:Like, does this truck fishtail out?
Speaker B:Like, you don't want that to happen.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:And I think that that's another one of the blessings for me of this weird kind of like, bipolar nature of what my life is, because I do have seven young kids when they're here.
Speaker A:You know, My oldest is 13 and my youngest is 16 months.
Speaker A:And so when I have the kids here, work is incredibly difficult to get done.
Speaker A:You know, you don't say it's.
Speaker A:Yeah, right.
Speaker A:It's interactions with clients.
Speaker A:And if I'm lucky, I can sneak out a daily email and, like, that's the extent of it.
Speaker A:And then when they're not here, I can go days because I work from home.
Speaker A:I can go days without coming up for air of just, like, working and grinding and trying to figure things out and trying to get more business or other things.
Speaker A:And I think in a way, it is such a blessing to not have the ability to go all in on either one of those.
Speaker A:There's been some guardrails on the road as a result of that.
Speaker B:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker B:In a similar way, for me, I have to get much more efficient with my time.
Speaker B:And also now that I'm in the circumstances, wife and kids, the things that I want for Them is very different than the things that I want for myself as a single man.
Speaker B:It's like, yeah, I'm good with what I've got.
Speaker B:It works.
Speaker B:Maybe I want marginal increases here and there.
Speaker B:Maybe splurge on a big nice thing, like a big, nice car or something.
Speaker B:But single guys are usually like that.
Speaker B:But I can look at my wife and say, there are all these things, things that I want to give her, and that inspires me to want to work harder, to be able to provide.
Speaker B:And so that's a mindful response to my life circumstances.
Speaker B:Instead of being like, oh, my gosh, it's overwhelming, or instead of being status conscious, like, well, how can I respond to this?
Speaker B:It sounds like you're doing the same, trying.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:So I guess I want to talk a little bit about the manosphere in relation to all this, because I think the reason.
Speaker B:Well, there are many reasons, but the big reason why the manosphere failed is that it didn't have a healthy vision of kids and family.
Speaker B:You know, it couldn't think of itself beyond the, you know, beyond the casual sex, build muscles, big money mindset.
Speaker B:And think about men giving themselves, giving their lives to women, to a woman, for life and children.
Speaker B:Like, there wasn't room for that.
Speaker B:And so I think as men reached a certain age, like, cool.
Speaker B:I've mastered a lot of these lessons, or I certainly understand them.
Speaker B:And now I want to do the natural thing that men do, which is get married and settle down.
Speaker B:And all the manosphere had to say was like, all women are like that.
Speaker A:It's risk.
Speaker A:It's all risk and no reward.
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:And I think, you know, I think about some of my experience and some of the guys, you know, I think about guys like Ed Latimore or Alexander Cortez or guys like, you know, who really have kind of, like, leaned into and embraced new roles of marriage and fatherhood.
Speaker A:Like, I love seeing Alexander leaning into, like, buying land and all these other things, or how much Ed loves being a dad and stuff like that.
Speaker A:I think that, you know, and maybe this is a good thing.
Speaker A:I haven't actually thought about a lot of this, so I'm just going to think out loud.
Speaker A:And I probably will disagree with a lot of this in a week, but.
Speaker B:We'Ll just think out loud.
Speaker A:We'll just talk out loud.
Speaker A:I think a lot of the manosphere was very much the opposite side of the coin of feminism.
Speaker A:And I'm not the first one to say that, but it was a very reactionary, you know, kind of like meeting place and mindset and ethos and everything else.
Speaker A:And when you get enough people that are able to get out of a state where they have to be reactive and can get into a state where they're.
Speaker A:Are proactive and they've.
Speaker A:They've got these accomplishments and they've successfully built these things, then you don't need the old scaffolding anymore, you know, and so maybe.
Speaker A:Maybe what a lot of it was, and I think we can even see that from like, a macro perspective, was a lot of it was scaffolding for the right guys.
Speaker A:I think a lot of it was.
Speaker A:There were certainly, like, purity spirals and a lot of drama and everything else like that.
Speaker A:We had a lot of guys that.
Speaker A:And I'm sure that there are guys who would say this about me as a result of what happened with.
Speaker A:With my marriage, but you had a lot of guys that there was a duplicity or duplicitousness about how they presented themselves versus who they really showed up to be.
Speaker A:And I think that that is one of the hard things about it is.
Speaker A:And you can see this in my own content, and I've written about this a lot because I know that I am a public figure and I'm tied to this space.
Speaker A:How do I present in a way that is equal parts aspirational and humble?
Speaker A:And a lot of guys missed the humility aspect of it.
Speaker A:And it was.
Speaker A:And I don't even think it was always necessarily malice.
Speaker A:I think a lot of times guys would post stuff as a way to kind of like.
Speaker A:Like, just reinforce that this is who I'm trying to become or this is what I want to be.
Speaker A:It's not like, you know, I'm just putting on this face to show.
Speaker A:But then the problem is, is when you have all aspiration and no humility, then eventually when the flaws that we all have bear fruit and you see the results of that come into the spotlight, then you get knocked off of the pedestal that you never should have been on in the first place.
Speaker A:And I think a healthy dose of humility is what keeps us from putting ourselves or from having other people put us up on pedestals.
Speaker A:And most of the manosphere lacked any humility.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And then.
Speaker B:And then sort of the four years of Biden came along.
Speaker B:And, you know, when Trump was president, that was sort of gave air cover for a lot of men as it is now, to begin thinking and speaking about these things.
Speaker B: And then from: Speaker B:Andrew Tate decided that he was going to eat the whole buffet and kind of did, you know.
Speaker B:And so I think there's a component of it where there was never anything solid built there kind of.
Speaker B:To begin with.
Speaker B:The duplicity was a part of it as well.
Speaker B:And again, there was this lack of humility.
Speaker B:There was a siloed thinking.
Speaker B:The interpersonal drama was, of course, a big thing.
Speaker B:And I think you're right that it was ultimately, it was feminism for men.
Speaker B:And I think there was a way in which it was productive for a lot of guys.
Speaker B:But, yeah, it's a vehicle that was meant to be left behind.
Speaker B:It drove you a certain distance.
Speaker B:Now you have to get out and you either build your own car or walk on foot or however you think about the metaphor.
Speaker B:But, like, it was never meant.
Speaker B:You never met men, were never meant to set up camp and live there.
Speaker A:No.
Speaker A:And it.
Speaker A:Yeah, no.
Speaker A:And I think that what's hard is that for a lot of people, you.
Speaker A:You couldn't.
Speaker A:I mean, you make a.
Speaker A:You make a good income and you have status and clout and all these other things.
Speaker A:And it's addictive to be on that side of things.
Speaker A:And especially because you can come up with very real and very moral justifications of, we're helping men and they're in these hard places and we're helping them navigate this, and it's self development and all of that.
Speaker A:And it's just so tricky because you have to be very.
Speaker A:Again, I think humble is the right word.
Speaker A:I think you have to be very humble to be able to parse out when are you actually doing this to help, or are you using help as a justification to just serve your own ends and your own needs?
Speaker A:And I think the guys that have been able to still move themselves into different spaces, like, okay, Jack Donovan, he and I, you know, on, like, theological levels, are about as antithetical and as opposite.
Speaker A:Opposite as it gets.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And I've been right, and I've been friends with Jack for years, and he's one who.
Speaker A:I still just really love and appreciate his sincerity.
Speaker A:And I think that he does a good job with his guys and he's built a.
Speaker A:A good club with the Order of Fire, where those guys feel like they have a space, you know, And I.
Speaker A:And again, I have.
Speaker A:I have my theological differences with what the end goal is or things like that, but I don't see Jack as somebody who's this grifter or somebody who is trying to leverage.
Speaker A:I. I I just.
Speaker A:I just see a lot of sincerity from him, and I don't necessarily see it from other people.
Speaker A:And there are certainly other people, you know, and I don't.
Speaker A:I don't want to get into name games, but I can see good examples and poor examples from.
Speaker A:From all sides as far as, like, those of us that used to make up kind of the core of what the manosphere was.
Speaker B:Yeah, I. I agree with you.
Speaker B:I agree with you.
Speaker B:I. I think Jack is.
Speaker B:He is sincere, and he.
Speaker B:He has tried to offer something.
Speaker B:He and I haven't spoken in over three years at this point.
Speaker B:So, you know, so I don't really know.
Speaker B:I don't know where he's at.
Speaker B:He also blocked me on X, like, whatever.
Speaker B:But I will say that the.
Speaker B:The man that I knew back then, he was genuinely trying, and it was from a sincere heart.
Speaker B:And there are others out there for sure, who.
Speaker B:Maybe some of them still around, maybe some of them are not, who were not doing it from a sincere heart.
Speaker B:And that creates a very different feeling.
Speaker B:And the sincerity is.
Speaker B:What I always found appealing, is that there was a realization, maybe not consciously expressed, but that certainly had been around since the 90s, that for whatever reason, men don't know what it means to be a man anymore.
Speaker B:This is a generational problem.
Speaker B:It crosses all boundaries of age, race, class.
Speaker B:They just don't know.
Speaker B:And some men, out of a spirit of.
Speaker B:Maybe they learn for themselves, maybe they had a good father who taught them, they wanted to offer something to other men.
Speaker B:And it was flavored with, well, yeah, I got to make a living doing it, and I think that's okay.
Speaker B:But was flavored with, no, I do this because I genuinely care, as opposed to seeing it as a market to exploit.
Speaker B:Because you could see it both ways.
Speaker B:You can look at it and say, like, that guy over there is hurting.
Speaker B:If I poke at his wound and he cries out, I can sell him the medicine, too.
Speaker B:And you can do it that way.
Speaker A:And there were plenty of guys who did.
Speaker B:There were tons who did that.
Speaker B:Absolutely.
Speaker B:But I think the men who really wanted to offer something where it's like, don't stick around, grow up and leave home.
Speaker B:Don't live here.
Speaker B:Like, if you want to stay here in the club or whatever, cool.
Speaker B:But, like, the goal is that you become your own man, which is that you say, go ahead.
Speaker A:That.
Speaker A:Well, sorry I interrupted you, but that's like, that's the ultimate in masculine mentorship.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Is.
Speaker A:It's that I don't need you to be my protege in Order for me to feel.
Speaker A:In order for me to maintain my identity as a mentor, I legitimately want you to leave and be able to be on your own.
Speaker B:Yeah, exactly.
Speaker B:Exactly.
Speaker B:This is the tricky part, because when you start getting into monthly recurring revenue models, there's a disincentive.
Speaker B:There's nothing wrong with that, but you have to, within yourself as an individual man, release that and trust that God will bring more men to you and not to try and squeeze out every dollar you can from the guys who come to you.
Speaker A:You.
Speaker A:Yeah, And I think that that's one of the ways that I was.
Speaker A:I haven't thought about this, but that's kind of a blessing for me, actually, because I knew that what I do with style coaching, one was not a big enough, like, hair on fire problem that there was real pain to exploit.
Speaker A:So the temptation wasn't even there.
Speaker A:It was more of this kind of, like, you're good.
Speaker A:How do we take you up to an even higher level as opposed to, like, your life is miserable.
Speaker A:How do we dig you out of it?
Speaker B:It.
Speaker A:And then also that because it was so little of a, like, hair on fire problem, there really was no monthly recurring revenue model that worked.
Speaker A:And so very early in, I leaned on this idea of my job is to get you to not need me anymore, you know, and that would.
Speaker A:That.
Speaker A:That's been my marketing for 10 years, and I never really thought about this, but, you know, because these different mindsets and ethos don't exist in a bubble or in a vacuum.
Speaker A:I think that that's part of why I never really got trapped into a lot of these same pitfalls that a lot of other guys did, because I never.
Speaker A:There was never a conflict between my goals for my clients and what I could find worked for my business.
Speaker A:I didn't have to navigate that like a lot of guys did.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And then that's a.
Speaker B:And that's a blessing if you.
Speaker B:If you proceed with that.
Speaker B:With that mindset, as opposed to, like, sort of.
Speaker B:And I think Andrew Tate played into a lot of this.
Speaker B:I've described him as the apex predator of the manosphere.
Speaker B:He's the guy who did all the things that other guys only talked about.
Speaker B:You want to talk about, you know, being fit.
Speaker B:Well, dude fights.
Speaker B:Professional MMA fights.
Speaker B:You have professional.
Speaker B:Not maybe not with ufc, but MMA for sure.
Speaker B:You want to talk about making money.
Speaker B:The dude's a multi hundred millionaire.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:With Cam girl Empire, but the money don't know where it come from.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:And then you want to talk about, you know, you want to talk about success with women.
Speaker B:The dude's basically a digital pimp.
Speaker B:You know what I mean?
Speaker B:So he's the guy and he drives a Bugatti and wears an iced out watch and stuff.
Speaker B:So he's the guy that did everything that a lot of guys were only speculating about.
Speaker B:He wasn't a virtuous man, but he still did them.
Speaker B:And when you come from an anti moral Nietzschean philosophy, which is kind of what the manosphere was, there's no grounds to say that what he's doing is wrong.
Speaker B:So he just comes and he just eats everybody's lunch.
Speaker B:Joined the war room, becomes the most searched name on the Internet.
Speaker B: I think it was summer: Speaker B:And so suddenly this giant core of the market goes to the bigger fish in town, and then what's left?
Speaker B:You have a lot of guys scrambling to hold on to something where the sand has been eaten out from beneath them.
Speaker A:I never thought about it from that perspective, but you're spot on because he did.
Speaker A:He walked the walk in not just one way, but in all these different ways.
Speaker A:And when you come at it from that amoral as opposed to pro moral perspective on things.
Speaker A:And I think, you know, and again, this is where Jack talks about.
Speaker A:And I appreciate the distinction between being good at being a man versus being a good man.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And I think that we're, we're called to be both.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:Just.
Speaker A:And, and.
Speaker A:But the problem is, is when you have good people that are not good at being men, then it's really easy to lose your lunch to people who are good at being men but aren't necessarily good people.
Speaker B:That's right.
Speaker B:Oh, absolutely.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And the problem was always in the choice that you had to be good at being a man or be a good man.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker B:And what does it mean to be both?
Speaker B:And the answer for me ultimately came from Christianity.
Speaker B:This surprised me.
Speaker B:Like I went into the manosphere.
Speaker B: I found the men's Movement in: Speaker B: I found the Manosphere in: Speaker B: You and I met in: Speaker B:I spoke at the 21 Convention.
Speaker B:2021.
Speaker B: By: Speaker B:But that led me deeper into the Christian faith.
Speaker B:And I realized that that's the picture that actually harmonizes being good at being a man in some of the highest and greatest ways, particularly around self sacrifice and also being a good man.
Speaker B:And it's like, oh, well, finally.
Speaker B:And everything that I was looking for in the place that literally the last place I would ever think to, look.
Speaker A:There'S a home for all of this.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And I think to some extent, I think the manosphere failed to respond to that challenge.
Speaker B:Is that, okay, cool, you got hundreds of thousands of men around the world, they're talking about what it means to be a man, and then you have the rival of God, the Father and the Son, Jesus Christ, back into the dialogue.
Speaker B:They never went anywhere but back into the dialogue.
Speaker B:And how do you respond to that picture?
Speaker B:And do you reject it?
Speaker B:Or do you say, wow, maybe this actually has something to teach me?
Speaker B:And I think a lot of men rejected it.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Especially because I think one of the things that happens is that.
Speaker A:And this is one of the paradoxes or the contraries of Christianity that I think a lot of people struggle with, and I love those contraries, is that for a lot of guys that have been victimized their entire lives, or at least felt like they've been victimized their entire lives, and then they finally find a space that not only gives them permission, but also gives them a roadmap to reclaim some measure of sovereignty.
Speaker A:And then they're told that, yeah, but you actually have to willingly cede some of that back in order to be moral.
Speaker A:Like, it's not that the best person is the one who accumulates the most autonomy, but there's actually a give and take relationship with autonomy.
Speaker A:And in order to reach the measure of your creation and the highest level of fulfillment, you have to willingly give some of that back.
Speaker A:And that's the stuff that we've already talked about.
Speaker A:I think a lot of guys, they were.
Speaker A:They just were so happy to finally have it that they clung to it desperately, and it was too hard to let go of it in the healthy ways that were necessary to get them to the next level.
Speaker B:That makes sense.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:For the first time in your life, you have a little bit of independence, a little bit of sovereignty, you've learned to reclaim some autonomy.
Speaker B:And the idea that now you as a man are going to join a church and you as a man have to be in submission to a man who you might not 100% agree with, let's just say it's a healthy church and it's not run by women, so you still have to give up some of your autonomy.
Speaker B:And maybe your pastor, maybe the elders don't agree with all of your political takes or whatever, you still have to give that up if you want to be part of this.
Speaker B:And that ask was too much for men, That's a really good way of looking at It.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Or you think about all of the anti marriage, anti family rhetoric, and it's all a risk of losing autonomy is really what it is.
Speaker B:Say more about that.
Speaker A:Yeah, I mean, you think about, you know, she takes half your stuff, or you don't get to see your kids, or you lose all your time, or you don't get to go out with your friends even if you are married.
Speaker A:You know, you don't.
Speaker A:You don't get this level of autonomy that you had before.
Speaker A:It's ultimately all predicated on the assumption that the happiest man or the best man or the most fulfilled man is the one who has consolidated the most autonomy.
Speaker A:And any risk to that is not worth taking.
Speaker A:And, you know, I think it's almost like what Aesop's fable of, like, the miser that has the gold buried in the ground.
Speaker A:And there's a guy that comes along and he ends up saying, well, you know, if you're not going to do anything with it, why not just put a stone in there and paint it gold?
Speaker A:And I think a lot of men have done that with our sovereignty and our autonomy is.
Speaker A:It's like, if you're not going to spend it on something, what's the point of having it?
Speaker A:And I do.
Speaker A:I think that we, a lot of us have become misers of our power.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Say more about that.
Speaker B:Keep going with this.
Speaker B:This is.
Speaker B:I love this way of thinking about it.
Speaker A:I'm trying to think about how that even.
Speaker A:And this is all just me again, thinking out loud.
Speaker B:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:And trying to.
Speaker A:Trying to think about this.
Speaker A:But really, like, if I circle back to conversations that I've been a part of and the way that I've seen things happen, from marriage, from religion, from having children, and this is not.
Speaker A:This is.
Speaker A:I think this is the sad irony is that this is not unique to men or to the manosphere.
Speaker A:But this is the ultimate goal of.
Speaker A:This is what feminism has done for women or anything else is it's taught us that anything that tells us that we will be better by sacrificing power is oppressive and is a lie.
Speaker B:Anything that tells us.
Speaker B:So this is the message of the manosphere.
Speaker B:Anything that tells us that we'll be better by sacrificing power.
Speaker B:The thing that's telling us that is lying is a lie.
Speaker A:Churches are lying to us, society is lying to us.
Speaker A:Women are lying to.
Speaker A:And it's the same thing again.
Speaker A:It's the same thing that women are being.
Speaker A:And, dude, this is the thing that is so fascinating about being back in the dating world.
Speaker B:Oh, man.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:I mean, for me, it's so fascinating to be in here because I, you know, the last time I was in the dating world was I was in my early 20s.
Speaker A:And you learn how terrified people are when they're in their 30s or their 40s to cede any power to anybody.
Speaker A:Or how quickly we label, like, healthy interdependence as codependence, or like a desire for co regulation as, like, you know, and there's all these, like, therapy terms that are thrown about and bandied about for everything.
Speaker A:And we've pathologized a healthy, mutual relationship into a threat to everybody's autonomy and everybody's power.
Speaker B:That's.
Speaker B:That makes a lot of sense because from two different angles.
Speaker B:One angle is you have the people who were in situations where the autonomy that they had given up, that interdependence was abused, where it was taken advantage of.
Speaker B:You have those situations, but you also have a general cultural thrust right now that's about expressive individualism in a hyper expressive, individualistic kind of way.
Speaker B:Nothing, no tradition, no set of.
Speaker B:Not even set of laws, not even physical, biological reality can be said to have a claim over me.
Speaker B:If I tell you that I'm a woman in a man's body, even my own genetics have no control.
Speaker B:So I think those two factors tend to collide where it's like, okay, is this not feminism and is this not feminism for men?
Speaker B:The two factors collide, and they say, you know, anything that constrains your autonomy is a lie.
Speaker B:And those who constrain your autonomy who have authority over you, they're abusive.
Speaker B:And so the only response has to be to throw both off.
Speaker A:Yes, absolutely.
Speaker A:And ultimately, what it sadly has done is it has convinced us that we are all little gods.
Speaker A:I am a God unto myself, and anybody that demands that I be subjected to anything bigger than myself is oppressive.
Speaker A:And anybody who doesn't respect my truth and worship at my altars the way that they should is also somebody that needs to be cut out of my life.
Speaker B:You know, it's funny.
Speaker B:I was just at the National Conservatism Conference, natcon, about a month ago.
Speaker B:And so National Conservatism is a.
Speaker B:A political movement with a very heavy Christian element to it.
Speaker B:Judeo Christian, especially.
Speaker B:The founder, Yoram Hazoni, is an Israeli Jew.
Speaker B:And there are lots of Christians of all denominations speaking there.
Speaker B:And so their entire, I guess, perspective is to push back on the individualistic approach of the Enlightenment.
Speaker B:Everything since the Enlightenment has been hyper individualistic.
Speaker B:And so now you have national conservatism that's pushing back on that from a biblical standpoint, is that we aren't just individuals who are sovereignly dropped onto the world.
Speaker B:Man is free, Ed.
Speaker B:Everywhere is born in chains.
Speaker B:I think that's Rousseau.
Speaker B:Instead, we are born into families, tribes, nations that have claims over our behavior and our beliefs.
Speaker B:And, and so I listened to everything they said, I read the books, and it's like, okay, I can actually get down with this.
Speaker B:And to find that there are elements on the right that can't stand it, it's like, okay, the friction there is between the people who want to continue to say, you know what?
Speaker B:No, I am an individual sovereign.
Speaker B:You have no claim over me besides that of the law.
Speaker B:Because we live in a nation of laws, but no tradition, family, nation, these things have no claim over me.
Speaker B:It goes really, really far.
Speaker A:Yeah, it goes really, really far.
Speaker A:And I think that for me, this is why I love the imagery of the Straight and Narrow Path.
Speaker A:Because one of the things that we see such a good example of is that we have, whether it's individual sin or societal downfall or these big major issues that we get so scared of that we, we push ourselves so far away from it that we end up falling into, you know, it's the horseshoe theory or it's Aristotle's like virtues and vices and things like that.
Speaker A:It's the same thing.
Speaker A:But I think that we've done that where we are right to fear so many of the downfalls of collectivism or communism or oppressive or oppression or all of these other things.
Speaker A:But when you bastardize it to the point where you become, you can become evil in the other direction or you can become fallen in and, yeah, downfallen in the other direction.
Speaker A:And I think this is where a lot of us have gone and we've made, we've made autonomy into a false God and we worship really readily at.
Speaker B:That altar, just like others have made sort of collectivism into a false God.
Speaker B:A lack of autonomy.
Speaker B:Like, yeah, you can have super oppressive regimes, you know, that, that are materially oppressive.
Speaker B:Meaning like they've got guns and jackboots and they keep everyone, like everyone in line, you know, like the dystopian science fiction, you know, but you can go just as far in the other direction of saying, no, my individual liberty means that I can just kind of do whatever I want, and I will be equally oppressive to you in preventing you from constraining my behavior at all.
Speaker B:Everything must be permitted for everyone is equally oppressive ultimately.
Speaker A:Well, and I think what makes it even trickier and harder is that the solution is not.
Speaker A:You can use this as kind of like.
Speaker A:Like libertarianism versus communism is kind of like the political extremes of that.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker A:And the problem is not.
Speaker A:Or the solution is not necessarily this, like, milquetoast, moderate, middle of the road type of thing, but it's being able to recognize when elements of one attitude are predominant and appropriate and when elements of another attitude are what's most appropriate.
Speaker A:And it's.
Speaker A:It's being ironically sovereign enough to be able to hold the tension between these.
Speaker A:These contraries, to be able to say, I'm going to lean this way on this and I'm going to lean that way on that, as opposed to, I have to always be in this camp where I have to always be on that camp and let that do the thinking and the decision making for me.
Speaker B:That's.
Speaker B:I'm so glad you went back to the word sovereign, because one of the things that I've observed and.
Speaker B:And that a battle that I've been fighting is I think a lot of men are afraid to stand up against their bros when their bros are getting into bad ideas.
Speaker B:And there's a lot of that online right now.
Speaker B:It's growing like wildfire, sadly.
Speaker B:And so I encourage them.
Speaker B:You have to take a stand against your bros.
Speaker B:I know it's the most unnatural thing to do.
Speaker B:It may seem disloyal, but if you believe and you are loyal to a higher moral law, then you have to say something to your friends.
Speaker B:And it's unloving to say otherwise.
Speaker B:That's the position I've taken.
Speaker B:And I found that appeal that doesn't always land.
Speaker B:But I think the idea of saying, can you be sovereign even over the influence of your friends, I think that is a powerful way of framing it.
Speaker B:Both are true.
Speaker B:Not something one is.
Speaker B:It's just a different way of skinning the cat.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:And I think that that kind of stuff, we can even tie this back into what I do.
Speaker A:As far as from a style perspective.
Speaker A:It's not always like, what you do matters, but how you do it matters.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:And so I think about this, like, I spent years trying to figure out how to be present, and it didn't work.
Speaker A:And then as soon as I.
Speaker A:As soon as the idea of, like, romance maxing and making my life feel more romantic and more cinematic, it's the same thing, but it's just phrased in a way that actually clicks with me.
Speaker A:And so it's the same thing with sovereignty, where it's like yeah, you're.
Speaker A:You have this moral obligation which you do to, if you really love your friends, you're going to stop them, do everything you can to stop them from going down bad paths.
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker A:And that may click for some people, but for some people, if you phrase it from a sovereignty perspective, it may click a little bit differently as well.
Speaker A:So, yes, what we do matters, but how we do it matters just as much.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And it's the same for me with goals.
Speaker B:Like if the number, if the goal for me is just racking up another zero, that doesn't necessarily have appeal for me.
Speaker B: rt of thing like, Yeah, I can: Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:I suppose that for some men are motivated by that and that's completely fine, but that doesn't click with me.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:And I think this is the beauty, and maybe this is another reason why growth as a man, especially now, is so interesting, is that we get the chance to learn this stuff kind of on the fly.
Speaker B:It's like there's like a pioneering spirit.
Speaker B:In a way.
Speaker B:There is.
Speaker A:And I think that we, more of us need to kind of take that, that approach to it.
Speaker A:And again, that comes down to this level of sovereignty because it's a lot easier to be an acolyte than it is to be a pioneer and.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:And so when you have your gurus that are the pioneers and you buy into the programs and you just follow what they say on their sub stacks and stuff like that, then you don't have to carry the burden of responsibility for the outcome of it.
Speaker A:And if, if it fails, you get all the upside if it works.
Speaker A:But you don't have to care, you don't have to take any of the risk if it doesn't work because acolytes get to blame the leader on it.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:Whereas if you think about it more from the, from the lens of being a pioneer, there's more self experimentation, there's more sovereignty, there's more self responsibility, there's more of that masculine mantle and weightiness that comes in with it.
Speaker A:But that really is the attitude that we need because we're in like, the old world is dead.
Speaker A:We're in like the world, the 20th century bureaucratic Western world is, is dead.
Speaker A:We're seeing it sartorially, we're seeing it culturally, we're seeing it spiritually.
Speaker A:And it doesn't mean God is dead, it doesn't mean civilization is dead, it doesn't mean any of that.
Speaker A:But it means that the ways that all of those things existed don't exist anymore.
Speaker A:But we're not in the new phase yet.
Speaker A:We're in the transition, which is the hardest position to be in.
Speaker A:And you have to have pioneers in those transition phases.
Speaker B:This is fantastic because I think one of the things that so many men are feeling, understandably so, is that, and this also explains a lot of the enthusiasm for SpaceX and Elon Musk is that we've covered the world, we've covered the planet.
Speaker B:There is no go west, young man.
Speaker B:There is no Western expansion.
Speaker B:We expanded all the way to the west of California and now people are bouncing off, heading back to the east, you know, the bottoms of the ocean, like who wants to go there?
Speaker B:The deserts, everything has been mapped.
Speaker B:And so men who have a pioneering spirit.
Speaker B:What are we pioneering towards?
Speaker B:And so you look at Elon Musk, who wants to go to Mars, Cool, fine, talk about that separately.
Speaker B:But I think not every man's going to be Elon Musk and not every man's going to go to Mars.
Speaker B:So how can we have this pioneering spirit, the sense of adventure in our own lives in a way that's fulfilling to us as men that doesn't necessarily involve something with like going out and conquering some physical plot of dirt.
Speaker A:That's such a good question.
Speaker A:And I think one of the other things that makes it even trickier to navigate is that we can have that pioneer spirit subverted by consuming pioneering as opposed to participating in it.
Speaker A:So we do it in video games, we do it in shows, we do it in.
Speaker A:Again, that LARPing personal development is, you know, if I listen to all the Audible books and I'm pioneering but I'm not actually doing things, or if I'm just like a Musk fanboy, I think a lot of guys that get really involved in like, you know, they're.
Speaker A:And again, there's nothing wrong with any of these things, with being really into tech and like being excited about the latest stuff and.
Speaker A:But it needs to be something that we are participating in rather than just consuming.
Speaker A:And how you do that in your own life is going to be very different and very challenging.
Speaker A:But I think that that's this, this is a really Good call to action for me of like.
Speaker A:And I think that.
Speaker A:That this even fits into, like, what the romance maxing is.
Speaker A:Is, like, what are the things that are worth pioneering and experimenting that I either need to start doing or I'm already doing.
Speaker A:But I can come at it with new vigor and vitality if I think about it from that perspective, as opposed to I'm tired.
Speaker A:You know what I mean?
Speaker B:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker B:Like, the pioneer spirit is.
Speaker B:There's a way in which a pioneer spirit.
Speaker B:My pastor talks about things in terms of pioneer faith that we see all throughout the New Testament and the Gospels.
Speaker B:You see the stories of people who had pioneer faith.
Speaker B:Like the hemorrhaging woman, you know, she says, if I just touch the hem of his cloak, I'll be healed.
Speaker B:My pastor says that's pioneer faith, where it's like, she doesn't know entirely what's going on.
Speaker B:She's willing to take a risk if I just touch him.
Speaker B:That's how powerful that what's going on is.
Speaker B:And then she confesses the whole story.
Speaker B:That's pioneer faith.
Speaker B:And so there's a way in which being pioneering draws us towards something that's beyond where we're currently at while also maintaining a healthy tie to what was.
Speaker B:Like, we're not pioneering just for ourselves.
Speaker B:We're not going to be a recluse.
Speaker B:There's something we're trying to do on behalf of others.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:And I think.
Speaker A:I mean, really what you're just describing actually is active faith, because you can't have faith if you are unwilling to put yourself in risky situations.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:Because if everything is known and you've got a pretty good understanding of what the likelihood, you know, like, my turning on a light is not an act of faith.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker A:It's not.
Speaker A:When Edison was trying to figure out how to make light bulbs work, that was an act of faith.
Speaker B:Faith.
Speaker A:Because at the time it was unknown.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:And.
Speaker A:And so, yeah, I do.
Speaker A:I think that what we're missing that's so interesting, do we consume other people's faith or do we, like, pro.
Speaker A:Like, do we commodify it in our.
Speaker A:Like in our.
Speaker A:In what we watch or what we play or the music that we listen to versus actually living it actively.
Speaker A:And so it's almost this, like, bait and switch into thinking that we're being faithful, but it's not actually yielding any results.
Speaker A:And so we have to go get our faith fix by doing it again in something that is a simulation as opposed to actually being real.
Speaker A:Man, that's really interesting.
Speaker A:That's really interesting.
Speaker B:And I think that's the appeal of the conspiracy stuff that's so popular right now.
Speaker B:Like Ian Carroll, whatever.
Speaker B:I'm going to have pine.
Speaker B:I'm going to be the pioneer on behalf of all of you and I'm going to investigate all of these things and I'm going to tell you what's going on so you don't have to go find out because you can't do it yourself.
Speaker B:So I'm going to be pioneering for you.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Which is not to say that we need to like eschew the idea of scouts, you know, And I think about pioneering obviously with my heritage, with my people were the actual like American pioneers that got pushed out west and everything else.
Speaker A:You know, I have a very close relationship with that word.
Speaker A:And that doesn't mean that there weren't scouts, there weren't people that didn't go out ahead.
Speaker A:But you still, there were still plenty of people that took a lot of risk moving out west in handcarts and ox drawn wagons and things like that.
Speaker A:And it is a little too easy in our very live in our brain screen based, intellectualized, philosophized, non physical world to turn our scouts into what are prophets or gurus and not actually have to follow suit.
Speaker B:I think of it in terms of yes, Scouts is a real thing.
Speaker B:I think of it as in an era that starved for fathers into that vacuum step a whole bunch of older brothers, like Lord of the Flies, you know what I mean?
Speaker A:Like all the fathers culture or whatever else.
Speaker B:Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Speaker B:And so an older brother, brother comes in, older brother has sort of like a bullying mentality.
Speaker B:I'll fight for you, but I'm going to bully you a little bit as well because kind of the relationship between older brothers and that's a very different, that's a very different feeling than the one who wants to guide or is exploring because he likes to explore.
Speaker B:It's I'm going to do this for you, but I want something from you in exchange as opposed to this is my calling to go explore this and I'm happiest when I'm doing that.
Speaker B:There's a very different feeling there.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:And I think sadly so many of these men resonate with that older brother approach because, well, my, my attitude on this is that the, the physical casualties of the two great wars were absolute atrocities.
Speaker A:But the worst thing that came out of it were the spiritual and emotional casualties that just wiped out an entire generation of healthy men.
Speaker A:Men.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Oh yeah, right.
Speaker A:And those men did the best they Could.
Speaker A:That is by no means throwing shade or casting aspersions on these men who were broken psychologically in some of the worst ways imaginable.
Speaker A:And it manifested in there not being a lot of good paternal energy or approaches.
Speaker A:For now, multiple generations, and we're left with this older brother attacked or just the complete abandonment of masculinity in general.
Speaker B:This is literally what I was talking about on the podcast I was a guest on yesterday, the same one we talked about your style coaching.
Speaker B:It's like, look.
Speaker B:Look back up.
Speaker B: d from the position of, like,: Speaker B:You're looking at World War I, which they called at the time the war to end our wars.
Speaker A:Right, right.
Speaker B:We don't know much about World War I today, but that's.
Speaker B:I mean, it was horrible on a scale like gas and trenches.
Speaker A:Insane, Insane.
Speaker B:Crazy, right?
Speaker B:And then on the heels of that, you have the Great Depression, people living in shanty towns in New York City, you have the Dust bowl, people starving to death.
Speaker B:And then you have World War II, the atomic bomb, and all the horrors of World War II.
Speaker B: rom the perspective of, like,: Speaker B:Yeah, well, yeah, a generation of men who are becoming fathers, who, in their living memory, they remember World War II because they fought in it.
Speaker B:They remember the Great Depression because they.
Speaker A:Lived through it, grew up in it.
Speaker B:Yeah, they grew up, and their fathers probably fought in World War I.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker B:So, like.
Speaker B:So, yeah, they're not going to have a whole lot of fatherly presence available because they're struggling with their own.
Speaker B:Their own demons, the things that they're haunted with, with the things that they saw.
Speaker B:And so, yeah, they're not going to be able to be available for a baby boomer generation.
Speaker B:You know, that.
Speaker B:That is more comfortable and more coddled than any generation in human history.
Speaker B:And so the baby boomers grow up hating their John Wayne dads.
Speaker B:Like, your John Wayne dad was doing the best that he could.
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker A:Well, and especially because I wonder how much of it was that they almost felt like, look, I'm doing okay because of this material abundance that I've created.
Speaker A:And so it was a way to kind of focus on that and to not have to continue to do.
Speaker A:To dig deeper and reflect on more of the pain and everything else.
Speaker A:Because I wonder how much of it was almost a shadow of, like, if we can pull out of all of these awful decades from a material perspective, then that is indicative of the fact that we also pulled out of them from a Spiritual or an emotional or a societal or a psychological perspective as well.
Speaker A:Which almost makes me wonder if that's why people get so hyper focused on, you know, well, the world is better than it's ever been because of xyz, technological or economic marker.
Speaker A:And we so quickly just focus on, well, TVs are cheaper than they've ever been.
Speaker A:And so the world is better than it was 80 years ago.
Speaker A:And it's like, well, no, there are more ways to measure the health of a society than just technologies and economies.
Speaker A:But those are a lot scarier to have to confront because Green line doesn't always go up.
Speaker B:That's right.
Speaker B:That's right.
Speaker B:I'm thinking about.
Speaker B: would be like, okay, so it's: Speaker B:I've got a comfortable office job, you know, we've got the suburban house, you know, and.
Speaker B:And everything's happy, world's at peace.
Speaker B:You know, maybe the Korean war is kind of happening, but like, things are good.
Speaker B:We made it.
Speaker A:You did it.
Speaker A:You arrived like you did it.
Speaker B:But no focus on spiritual health at all.
Speaker B: Because it was during the: Speaker B:That was all planted in the 50s.
Speaker B:And that all took root quite heavily, which is why we don't look at it much today.
Speaker B:But.
Speaker B:But like, yeah, there was a lack of focus on spiritual health because there was an overt focus on material health.
Speaker B:And so now you have an older generation that still thinks that way.
Speaker B:It's like, look, I got.
Speaker B:We got all this stuff.
Speaker B:It's like, well, you can see that inside there's a rotting going on.
Speaker B:So maybe that has been passed down as well.
Speaker A:I think so.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Where it is, it's just as long as I have more stuff, then society's doing okay.
Speaker A:Because it's a lot scarier to look at the alternative.
Speaker B:The alternative that have a society where I would have less stuff.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Or even that a society may have a lot of stuff, but it's not a good, healthy society.
Speaker B:That's right.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:People get into that to talk about, like, illegal immigration.
Speaker B:Like, okay, if you round up and kicked out all the illegal immigrants and you started paying, you know, regular American wages, what would that do to the price of everything?
Speaker B:The bitcoin guys talk a lot about that.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:And it's like, yeah, I mean, that's.
Speaker A:That's real.
Speaker A:And there are real prices to that.
Speaker A:And it doesn't mean that it's not worth doing.
Speaker A:You know, absolutely.
Speaker A:If you could go back to.
Speaker A:This is a conversation I have with my friends all the time where it's like, if you had to go back to the technological levels or even, like, medicinal levels or things like that of a particular point in history, but you also go back.
Speaker A:Got to go back to the level of, like, social cohesion or social trust, where would you go?
Speaker A:Would you do the 90s?
Speaker A:Would you do the 80s?
Speaker A: Would you do the: Speaker A:Like, where's the trade off as far as, like, how much physical, economic, technological progress you're willing to seed?
Speaker A:And, you know, obviously the assumption is that those two are.
Speaker A:You know, there's an inverse relationship, and that's obviously not the case.
Speaker A:But it's an interesting thought experiment, and I think what underlies it is that a lot of people are willing to tackle it because we see kind of an inverse correlation between how abundant in resources we are, but how starved for spiritual and emotional and social, like, societal health we are.
Speaker A:At the same time, I like how.
Speaker B:You said social cohesion, because I think that that explains why people look at the 80s.
Speaker B:They're like, look, this was a time of material prosperity.
Speaker B:It was like the explosion of Chinese junk in the American economy, whatever.
Speaker B:And there was very socially cohesive, even though it wasn't that at all.
Speaker B:And you can easily run down that path.
Speaker B:You're like, well, you know, who had high material prosperity and high social cohesion?
Speaker B:Nazi Germany.
Speaker B:You know, the Roman Empire.
Speaker B:And that explains.
Speaker B:Those were, excuse me, huge themes of the manosphere.
Speaker B:Not necessarily Nazi Germany, but like the Roman Empire return.
Speaker B:Remember that?
Speaker B:Return with the V?
Speaker A:Yep, absolutely.
Speaker B:And that's what they were hoping for is sort of material prosperity and social cohesion.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:And I don't think that they are.
Speaker A:I don't think either of those in and of themselves are problems.
Speaker A:Not at all.
Speaker A:But I think that what happens is, you know, and I use this one a lot too, where X is a false God, not like X the site.
Speaker A:But, you know, that's another one of the memes of mine.
Speaker A:But we.
Speaker A:I think the problem that most of us fall into is that.
Speaker A:That it's not that we have.
Speaker A:We have, like, our hierarchy of the things that we value the most.
Speaker A:And the problem is not that things don't belong in the hierarchy, because material prosperity deserves a place in the hierarchy and social cohesion deserves a place in the hierarchy.
Speaker A:But when we place them in the wrong position and we place them too high up is when things become false gods.
Speaker A:And that's when they become problems, it's when we're too willing to sacrifice other things that should be maintained or actually deserve a higher position in that hierarchy, that that's where we run into issues.
Speaker A:And so this is what we've seen is, you know, you saw.
Speaker A:You've seen with both the manosphere and feminism, we saw connection and humility placed lower than autonomy.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:Or we've seen this with a lot of just Western culture in the 20th century as we saw, you know, economic and technological growth at the expense of social cohesion or spiritual growth.
Speaker A:And again, none of these things are wrong or problems in and of themselves, but it's when we just.
Speaker A:We prioritize the wrong things in the wrong places and we sacrifice the wrong things for the other things.
Speaker B:I think that's a really good way of looking at it, because I think.
Speaker B:Think we can understand this moment as what are the idols that people are worshiping?
Speaker B:Unchecked economic growth was the idol of the second half of the 20th century.
Speaker B:There are many.
Speaker B:There's a book called Idols for Destruction that I read last year that was excellent.
Speaker B:That's like, wow, we are a crazy, idolatrous nation.
Speaker B:Totally.
Speaker B:But unchecked economic growth, and now it's almost like there's another idol.
Speaker B:It's almost like social cohesion is probably a good way of phrasing it.
Speaker B:I want a society that hangs together that I feel like I can be a part of, that's become an idol in and of itself, where it's like, okay, I'm even willing to sacrifice my civil liberties, or I'm willing to sacrifice people's lives to create that sense of social cohesion, but that also will not deliver satisfaction.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:And I think the other thing that makes it really scary is that we get these idols that are pitted against each other and that what.
Speaker A:And that can create this kind of fever pitch of, you have to choose one or the other, because we do have this one idol of social cohesion.
Speaker A:But then on the other side, we have this, like, hyper individualism.
Speaker A:And those can contradict each other in very real ways.
Speaker A:And so if you're not willing to, you know, I'm totally pro social cohesion, or I'm totally pro hyper individualism, or I'm totally moderate and trying, like, it's just.
Speaker A:It requires so much ability to hold tension to be able to say no.
Speaker A:There are elements of social cohesion that are worth sacrificing for, and there are elements of individualism that are worth sacrificing for, and we need to find A way to hold on to the best of both of these things, as opposed to just like, you know, it's Solomon splitting the baby in half.
Speaker A:That's not the solution.
Speaker A:It's being able to.
Speaker A:To find what's worth holding on to in both of those and putting them in the right places in the hierarchy.
Speaker B:And that's what I always thought was the best about the conversation, about masculinity at its.
Speaker B:At its best moments, men would reach points.
Speaker B:This where you recognize.
Speaker B:No, it's not about either or like, somehow we have to find a way to chart a path through the middle and maybe the middle towards one side or towards the other, but there still is a middle ground.
Speaker B:And we know when we've crossed the line and become more extreme because we're willing to sacrifice too much.
Speaker B:And that was what always appealed to me about the conversation, because it highlighted what a challenge being a man is and has always been.
Speaker B:And are we up for that challenge versus no.
Speaker B:I'm going to take the path of my flesh and I'm going to go what's most satisfying in terms of a perspective that gives voice to my anger, gives vent to my bitterness, as opposed to.
Speaker B:No, like, being a man is a higher calling than that.
Speaker A:It is.
Speaker A:And again, you know, because you and I are who we are and who your audience is, we can talk about this.
Speaker A:In a way, I love the beauty of Christ in that, because Christ is the alpha and the Omega.
Speaker A:He's not M or whatever the middle letter in the Alphabet is, but he's not just Alpha or just omega.
Speaker A:And he's perfect justice and he's perfect mercy.
Speaker A:And it's the ability to embody all of it, as opposed to just go one extreme to the exclusion of the other, or vice versa, or just play it safe in the middle of the road.
Speaker A:And I feel like those are kind of these three alternatives that we're presented with is you have to be this extreme, that extreme, or extremely milquetoast.
Speaker A:And the real trick of masculinity is being able to embody as much of the full spectrum as you can see.
Speaker A:And that's why I love so much of what the manosphere was, because it embraced so many good things that were left out of the conversation of what masculinity was and should be.
Speaker A:That's why I had no problem going into a lot of the spaces that a lot of the manosphere resents, where I would go into a lot of this more kind of like therapy or some of these other kind of like, softer, more Self development spaces.
Speaker A:And there are, certainly there are problems in both sides, but there are strengths in both sides.
Speaker A:And so I love that, that idea of those contraries and, and to truly emulate Christ is to be as.
Speaker A:Even if we can't embody alpha and Omega, to recognize that he can perfectly embody alpha and Omega, and to not think that we always have to choose one or the other or choose nothing at all.
Speaker B:That's right.
Speaker B:And, and the constant reminder like, you ain't the guy.
Speaker B:Oh no, that's the humility part.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker B:It's like, hey, however cool that you think you are, you ain't Jesus.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker B:You know, you're probably not going to start something as big as Abraham.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:You're probably not going to lead as many people as Moses.
Speaker B:You're probably not going to be as wise as Solomon or King like David.
Speaker B:Like, see yourself reflected in the stories of these, of these great men.
Speaker B:And like, and have some humility and have some gratitude to be part of the story instead of thinking that you, you are the, the Ubermensch, you know, you are the end of history, man.
Speaker B:Like from Nietzsche.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:And yeah, and I love even again, that beauty of like, there's, there's sovereign humility because you do want to be the Ubermensch in your own story.
Speaker A:You want to be the main character in your own story, but you want to have, have the humility to recognize that it's your story, you're not the main character in anybody else's story.
Speaker B:Yes, yes, that's right.
Speaker B:And you should be the main character in your story.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:Maybe Jesus should be the main character in your story, in a manner of speaking.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:But in terms of your life, you are the main character of your story.
Speaker B:Not that there aren't really important other supporting characters, not that you don't have co stars in your story, but to understand that there is a degree of sovereignty that we're called to exercise over our lives, over our circumstances, on behalf of our families, in the perspective of humility.
Speaker B:And that's okay.
Speaker B:And you can do that without going crazy in one direction or the other.
Speaker A:Exactly.
Speaker A:And then still have the humility to grant people sovereignty in their own lives.
Speaker B:Amen.
Speaker B:Amen.
Speaker B:So I want to bring this back around again to how this ties into men's style.
Speaker B:No, but honestly, I do think it matters because it's great to talk about, about these big philosophical concepts and we should and men should.
Speaker B:And there is still a point where it's like, hey, we have to land this in our lives.
Speaker B:And the first way that this land, there are many ways that it lands in our lives, but in terms of other people's interactions with us, the first way that we land for them is always our physical appearance.
Speaker B:They don't see us as disembodied spirits, as good people.
Speaker B:They see who we are on the outside.
Speaker B:And in a sense, the way that we dress, the way that we present ourselves is a way of expressing sovereignty or not.
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker B:It could choose the course of our lives in some circumstances.
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker A:And that's, you know, I do think this is a great way to tie everything back in because, you know, we talked before about the uniform of apathy or the uniform of indifference.
Speaker A:And it is an anti sovereign uniform.
Speaker A:It is one that is basically saying that I have so little sovereignty in my own life, so little responsibility for my own life, that I would rather blend in and not even register than be willing to take the risks and the responsibilities and the rewards that come from actually just manifest.
Speaker A:And that's, that's one of the best things.
Speaker A:And you get this now because you've worked with me on a different level, that when you put on clothes every day, most guys, when they put on clothes every day, it's as automatic as brushing your teeth.
Speaker A:You don't think about it, you just know that you have to do it.
Speaker B:It.
Speaker A:When you get dressed every day, you are putting on your sovereignty every day.
Speaker A:And it's either something that reinforces that or it's something that undermines that.
Speaker B:And it's something that I can grow and develop in as well.
Speaker B:Like, I don't dress the same way that I did a few years ago.
Speaker B:I make changes because it is a way for me to assert, like I'm on camera, you know, so the way that I dress matters.
Speaker B:Like, how am I going to present myself when I'm talking to you know, really professionally politically accomplished, you know, people that have made impacts in the world versus how am I talking to someone who works on a smaller scale?
Speaker B:Well, how do I put myself together in a way that is able to meet both of those as I chart my own course, you know, through YouTube, in a sense.
Speaker A:Absolutely, absolutely.
Speaker B:Excellent, man.
Speaker B:Well, I'm, I'm, I continue to be grateful.
Speaker B:Oh, before I forget, I have to, I have to say thank you because as a result of the style coaching that we did, I got to get dressed for my wedding.
Speaker A:Yeah, dude, isn't that so fun?
Speaker B:And that was amazing because I got to say, the kind of suit that I wanted, the colors that I wanted, the Cut and all of that.
Speaker B:And I got to look exactly the way that I wanted to look on my wedding, such that people complimented me all throughout the day, which was an amazing feeling.
Speaker B:So there's nothing wrong.
Speaker A:Tell me it didn't just help you feel more confident, more present, more like celebratory.
Speaker A:There's no self consciousness about was this the right thing or like you just got to be fully immersed in the experience as a result of that.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker B:That's right.
Speaker B:Oh, yeah.
Speaker B:I got to pick a color suit.
Speaker B:I went with a mid blue suit with a rust colored tie.
Speaker B:And what really did it was like I looked at it, I was like, okay.
Speaker B:And it went to suit supply.
Speaker B:Also the tie came from, I think tie bar online, I think is where.
Speaker B:No, no.
Speaker B:I went to a men's store here that had.
Speaker B:I wanted to see it in person, but I felt that the suit itself wasn't enough.
Speaker B:So I went and I got a vest and I got a vest that was just slightly, like slightly darker than the suit itself.
Speaker B:And the whole thing just like came together so well.
Speaker B:And so it's like I got to feel comfortable all day knowing that I looked good and that like I looked good standing next to my bride, who looked incredible.
Speaker A:Yes, dude, I love it.
Speaker B:Good.
Speaker A:I'm so glad that that worked out that way.
Speaker A:That's fantastic.
Speaker B:Very much so.
Speaker B:So thank you for all that you've given me over the years to make that possible.
Speaker A:You're welcome.
Speaker B:All right, well, if men want to create similar transformations for themselves, where can they go to find out more about what you do?
Speaker A:Okay, so the best places to interact with me are on X and Instagram and it's annerguzzi, which is T, A N N E, R, G U, Z, Y.
Speaker A:You can learn more about my coaching and my approach to stuff if you go to masculine-style.com and then if you want really like a good 50,000 foot view on kind of what the.
Speaker A:The ethos and then go check out the Appearance of Power.
Speaker A:It's on Amazon, it's on Audible.
Speaker A:You can get it really kind of anywhere at this point.
Speaker A:So.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Are you going to do a second edition to the book?
Speaker A:I don't think I need to.
Speaker A:Which is actually kind of fun.
Speaker A:I'm coming up on.
Speaker A:I'm eight years in.
Speaker A:I may do an updated version that inserts another couple of chapters.
Speaker A:I know I've got another book in me, but it's not necessarily style related.
Speaker A:But we'll see what that ends up being in the future.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:All right.
Speaker B:I look forward to it.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:All right, brother.
Speaker B:Well, it's great to reconnect with you again after five years.
Speaker B:Thanks for starting the journey.
Speaker B:And I think in this conversation, everyone will understand.
Speaker B:And what a blessing it's been to talk with you and.
Speaker B:And why you were the perfect guest to start off my podcast.
Speaker B:So thank you.
Speaker A:Thanks, Will.
Speaker A:Such a pleasure, man.
Speaker A:Sa.
