Mastering Your Marriage in 2025 with Mark Collins (Ep 107)

Episode 107 • 27th March 2025 • My Ministry Mission • Jason McConnell

Introduction and Guest Welcome

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on my podcast back in July of: 2024

about mastering your life in: 2025

So that legacy can be passed down to their children. Just as a reminder, his website is freedom for life. net and his program is life mastery. I have links in the show notes to his website, along with his Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube. He's also got a book out there, Life Mastery, Life by Design. You can find it on Amazon and I'll put links to that in the show notes as well, so go check those out.

Guys, I don't know about you, but I am eager to learn more about what Mark has been up to.

Welcoming Mark

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Jason: So Mark, welcome back. I was super excited to hear from you. I'm very excited to have you back. I want to thank you for returning and gifting us with your wisdom and experience that God has blessed you with.

Mark: You're too kind, Jason. I'm excited for the conversation. I'm glad to be here

Jason: Great. I'm equally excited.

Mark Collins' Recent Achievements

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Jason: Um, we've been, you've been doing a lot in the last six or seven months. I mean, we'll get into that in a bit, but on a personal level, how have you been? How are things going?

Mark: doing well, keeping really busy. It's I believe this is a pivotal year for what we're doing and the work that we're doing with men and and personally, you know, there's a lot, there's a lot going on family health stuff, not myself or my wife, but, you know, folks that we're close to. So a lot of navigation that's happening.

Of course, when you have the biggest dream, sometimes, you're You have also the biggest challenges to walk through, but that's okay.

video, huge announcement for: 2025

Life Mastery and Personal Growth

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Mark: Yeah, you know, part of that life mastery journey for me and trying to make up for a father. I didn't feel like a measure up to part of that was athletics. And at least for me, it was self defense. You know, my wife, my dad was, uh, you'd look at him as a, you know, pretty nuts and bolts, tough kind of guy, tough as nails, as they would say back in the day.

And so for me, it was, uh, really trying to. Learn through martial arts, how to become a person who was confident in who I was and and honestly being able to, you know, like in the movies, be able to take on the bad guys and do that. I was doing that for quite a long time. Got my black belt and was, you know, training and all of that.

And even into my mid thirties, having wife and kids. And then I had this epiphany one day. I was like, you know, I'm training. I don't go to bars or clubs or places where the crazy things happen. And so. Cool. At some point, I said, you know, I'm training for a fight. I'm probably never going to get into. Do I really want to put all of my time into this?

It's not that it doesn't have value and worth, and they certainly do. But for me, it was a change and a pivot in understanding that maybe I don't need to be that guy anymore. So, yeah, I did get it and it was exciting and happy to have the achievement, but, you know, everything has a season, I guess. Right, Jason?

Jason: absolutely. Absolutely. We've learned that from Lise Estes for sure. So I wish I had more time to go through more of your videos. I did enjoy watching the one. It was never make a mistake again.

Overcoming Mistakes and Self-Doubt

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Jason: Video, uh, seems to me that you were saying that if you put intention behind decisions and actions. You have one of two things, you have a favorable outcome or we learn a lesson and it avoids becoming a mistake, quote, unquote, mistake.

But either way it goes, it's an opportunity to growth. I mean, hoping I got that right.

Mark: no, I think that's perfect. You're, you're right. And, you know, I'm so impressed with you remembering and actually watching the videos with intention. Um, yeah, I think a lot of it comes down to sometimes we really beat ourselves up for the things that we do. And, and, and the, the life that we've walked through, so you.

You have some decisions, you have some directions you make, and on the other side of it, it didn't work out the way you wanted. And I don't know about you, Jason, but for me, 1 of my biggest challenges was. It wasn't just having the error, the issue, the mistake, the challenge, the failure, whatever the word is you want to use for it.

It was that it started to become a weaponized as something I would beat myself up. You know, nobody else would remind me, but I'd remind myself. Oh, remember when that happened? Or, you know, you're not even saying it verbally, but in the inside of your head, you just you're, you know, thrashing yourself for some sort of issue or challenge something that you did in your life.

And so what I understand for myself and with the men that I work with, you know, maybe you as well. Nope. We make the best decision we can on the other side of that isn't success all the time. It isn't, you know, perfect. Yay, I made it. Um, and I made the right choice again. You could still learn from it. And your definition for the mistakes, the error is the things that don't work out successfully will determine not just the things you're willing to work on, the things you're willing to reach for, but really the, the, the piece that you can have in it, the joy that you can have from it and the grace that you can give yourself.

The more you give yourself grace, The more you'll be able to have big dreams, have big visions and take big swings of life and and to me, that's what matters more.

Jason: Absolutely. I mean, yeah, I, I, I still do it from time to time. I mean, even things that happened years ago, you know, maybe I raised my voice at my daughter when I shouldn't have and, and stuff like that haunts you. And you, you gotta, you do have to give yourself grace because God does.

Mark: Yeah, absolutely.

Refining Focus on Relationships

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Jason: So, um, you, you're going through what you described, I think you described as a refinement process and you're focusing in on providing more information, coaching and life mastery tools for relationships, specifically men and how to be the hero in their household.

Um, and just. To clarify this new focus builds on the back of your life mastery program. We're not taking anything away. The old stuff is still relevant, right?

Mark: Yeah, absolutely. And it's, it's, it's not a rebranding. It's not a reinvention, but so life mastery, the, the tools that I have, the tools and strategies of unpacking and you're understanding your identity of. Walking in the tools of transformational tools of mastering your thoughts, words, and actions. Those are all still there.

The five areas of life mastery, spiritual, relational, vocational, physical, financial. Those are all still there. The four pillars of life master is still there. Either living from your identity or living from experiences, creating meanings and having emotions. And so those 4 pillars are there, right? Here's the interesting thing.

The tools and the strategies and the things I do with life mastery work in every area of life. And so my focus was, you know, 1 of the areas where I wanted to grow myself. In the past, and that was vocationally for me, it was entrepreneurship. It was really creating my own thing. It could have been spiritually, you know, your relationship with God.

It could have been relationally your relationship with your wife. It could have been the physical or financial, right? So it works in all of these areas. My intention and my direction was more in the entrepreneur space, really believing that. You know, for those guys, when they stretch out for more, and a lot of times that's the entrepreneurial journey, you, you stretch out for more in your life.

All of a sudden, you start to see the holes, the issues, the negative thoughts you have, and all of those things that go along with it. And so I was really focused more in that 1 area, but the interesting thing happened, Jason, I would have conversations with entrepreneurs with guys who are in jobs or businesses, or you know, high level job, mid level job, whatever the thing you have, I would have these conversations with him.

And these conversations would always start to turn towards relationship. You know, I have this job or I have this business, but you know, how do I get better as a husband? How do I, how do I show up more intentionally as a father? How do I, how do I, you know, the things I'm doing at work, I'm not doing at home.

I don't know that intentionally, but what I'm seeing is. I feel like I'm, you know, achieving my goals there, but at home, maybe I'm a bystander. Maybe I'm somebody who's kind of emotionally irrelevant or I'm not engaging in conversation. So all of the conversations were starting to move towards the relationship sphere.

And so I was talking to somebody who I try and learn from as a mentor and he said, well, if all the conversations are going that way, maybe that's the area and the issue, the challenge that the men are telling you that they want to work on. So rather than seeing, you know, okay, well it works for everything, but I want it to work for this.

What if I was to refine what I'm doing and really focus on what the feedback is telling me. The conversations are telling me the relationship is the thing where I need to grow. I could be great at my job, or I could have a promotion, or I could be doing well in my position, but if my marriage isn't right, if I'm not right in the household, then what does it really matter if one is great and the other one's a failure or one's a disaster?

That makes everything a bit of a disaster. And so for me, it was really refining the focus towards the things that the guys that I was talking to were telling me that this one matters the most right now. And so that's where that refinement came from. All the tools work and they work in all of the areas, but sometimes you need to be laser focused on where the real questions are, where the real conversations are happening.

Jason: Yeah, that makes total sense. And that brings up the big question.

Challenges in Marriage and Personal Growth

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Jason: Why is marriage so difficult,

Mark: Yeah. Well, this guy has this joke. He says marriage would be easy, except for there's people in it.

Jason: right?

Mark: so, so I think for a lot of us, so. Here's the solution to a great marriage is me being a great me. And so those tools that we've talked about identity, right? Understanding who you're created to be and not where your life has told you.

Hey, we've talked about it with the martial arts with me, right? Trying to get a black belt to prove I was as tough as my dad was. Trying to measure up to a version of what it looked like to be a man that, that I felt I needed to well, our life has a way of talking to us in relationships as well, whether it's your parents, and maybe not receiving the love that you have, or maybe having an absentee parent or being in relationships in the past.

And they didn't work out. And all of a sudden, there's this feeling of, you know, I'm not a person of value. I'm not somebody worthy of being loved. Those kind of things that are happening in your life, right? Or in the case where I was growing up with a mom who had some challenges in her past. So, when I was a young person, she was.

You know, committed to a hospital because she had a nervous breakdown. There's these things that we go through in relationship and life that tell us a story of who we are and if we're loving, worth having a relationship, worth having health and value, well, then you grow up, you become an adult and all of those voices have a voice in what your marriage looks like in your relationship looks like.

And by the way, Jason, it's not just me. It's the spouse as well. It's my wife, my fiancée, and my girlfriend who has a life as well. Exactly. So why is marriage challenging? Because if I'm showing up with my past telling me more than the identity of who God made me to be and she's doing the same, well, what's the outcome?

I tell people I was at a marriage conference last summer speaking there and I told people, I said, two unhealthy people can't have a healthy marriage. Two dysfunctional individuals, two people living from their pain can't have a healthy Relationship together until you walk through some of those things.

So it's, you know, for me, my best ability to grow our marriage and to make it the marriage it was supposed to be is working on my own life mastery journey. So I show up as who I'm supposed to be.

Jason: Yeah. So you're improving yourself, but the, the by product. Is you become a better husband?

Mark: Yeah. And from a spiritual sense, I'm supposed to take a leadership role. I know it could be controversial in some circles, but as a husband, I should lead the way, not just in decisions and directions and how we spend our money, what we'll do to raise our kids. Frankly, for me and my wife, it's a team effort and all that we do.

But I have a responsibility as a husband to lead the way, to lead with integrity, to lead with honesty, to lead with vulnerability, to lead with authenticity. So those areas where I'm leading, if I can lead from that place of being who I'm created to be, of having. A voice that's, you know, a voice of reason and care and comfort and kindness because I'm caught up in who I am now.

All of a sudden, it creates an atmosphere where we both can and the relationship can't help but grow.

Jason: That's good. No. And we know that communication is a big part of it. Communication is challenging in relationships.

The Role of Vulnerability and Honesty

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Jason: And, you know, I guess my question is what, what are the roadblocks that men have that get in the way of them being able to communicate effectively or healthy communication in a marriage?

Yeah,

Mark: You know, I think there's a couple of well, I mean, there's probably several, but there's 2 that really come to mind. 1 is. That fear of vulnerability, you know, for, for many of us, myself included, you well, let's just be honest. Many times. I think that men feel like they have to be perfect. I can't have fear, worry, anger, anxiousness. I can't have emotions that maybe are anything but. You know, those powerful, amazing emotions, and it doesn't mean we can't have the powerful ones as well. But vulnerability isn't something many guys raise their hands and say, I'm going to be that guy. And the other side of vulnerability is honesty and saying, Hey, this is going on, or this is what's happening.

And so being in a relationship where have permission to show up, maybe not having it all together, maybe not having every answer, maybe not being perfect every time. Is something that's scary because we, I believe we think that it's what we're supposed to be doing. And I think that the other part of that, I mean, if I could give you the other side of the coin is, is, is the challenge with a lot of people.

What I tell people, Jason, is the guys that I work with are some of the bravest people I know. Because in order for me to get better and not have my life tell me who I am, I need to acknowledge the things that it's saying I need to acknowledge, like with my mom and her challenges she walked through, I could have ignored it and just go through life and act like, well, that didn't hurt that didn't, you know, bring some dis, you know, some instability as a child that didn't have an effect on me.

Man, I just need to move past it. And it would have affected every relationship in my life. But the guys that that really have transformation are the ones that really do the bravest thing of saying that. If that's holding me back from what I'm supposed to be and how I'm supposed to engage in what I really want to have as a marriage and a life and relationship, then I'm going to address it.

That's challenging to be willing to do, but it's the most brave thing I've ever seen men do. And I'm so proud of them in that I work with that they're willing to tackle everything, not just, you know, the outside challenges and being the big man in the household, which of course we're supposed to be a protector and a guide and strength and all of that.

But also saying, hey, if it's these things that are standing in the way, then I'm going to address those also.

Jason: Yeah. I've been, I've been trying to coordinate a group, uh, we'll call it a ministry for lack of a better term of dads, you know, fathers in our church. And it's, it's kind of based on the similar premise that, um, you know, guys are expected to know how to parent. They're no, they're expected to know. And we put those expectations on ourselves.

You know, it's not, you know, the world tells us this, but we, we essentially put it on ourselves. Um, but the truth is we don't know what we're doing, you know, we're just doing the best with what information we have and, and being able to be vulnerable is such a blessing in this group. I mean, I've, I've got some great dads in there.

We're building this thing up. We've had some amazing conversations, um, but they come from being vulnerable and it gives them a place to do it with other guys who get it. And that's, I mean, tremendous transformation can happen in that environment.

Mark: Yeah. And if I could give another word for it to be totally honest, the other word for vulnerability is honesty

Jason: Yes, yeah, no, I

Mark: of the day. You know, we, we hate the word vulnerability, but the truth of the matter is, it's just another word for honesty. And what's not honest is us showing up and acting like everything's okay.

I know people in my life and you do probably as well who are. Yeah. They're on the verge of divorce or, or they're having challenges in their marriage, or there's something going on, maybe even drug abuse or pornography or what have you, right? They have these struggles that they're walking through and they're walking through them alone because they, they, they don't want to do the scary thing of being honest and saying, Hey, I don't have it all together, or we, me and my wife aren't, you know, in a great place right now, it's such a tragedy in my life as, because I am a pastor as well, to, to be able to engage in people's life after the house is on fire.

After everything has gone wrong, because it's only when it becomes a last resort and sometimes guys raise their hand. So, you know, any guy who's, you know, shrinking back from vulnerability. I get it. I don't want to be that guy anyway, but if the other side of honesty. Is the marriage that you're wanting, and if you can be honest, like, you're doing with your group and kudos to that, that's amazing.

When you can be honest, when you can be willing to be honest and have an atmosphere to do it, whether it's in my life mastery or with the group that you have, the other side of that is the marriage that you're looking for.

Jason: Yeah. And the, I mean, the family that you're looking for,

Mark: Yeah,

Jason: even beyond that.

Being the Hero in Your Household

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Jason: But you, so you mentioned this idea of being the hero of your household and I'm, I'm silly me. I'm, I'm hoping hero is an acronym, but what is hero and what does it mean to be men who are heroes?

Mark: no, no, Jason, they're always literally that.

Jason: Excellent.

Mark: this, I think there's this desire on the inside of every man. To show up as that hero, right? The person I believe I can be not necessarily always the guy that shows up the one that can show up with understanding, can show up with strength and show up with confidence and assurance and can show up with, you know, vulnerability, honesty, openness, who can show up as the man that you're created to be.

We know who that guy is sometimes. And most of the time, but we don't always show up as that man. But what the whole understanding is, again, walking through that journey of divorce proofing your marriage and showing up as a hero in your household is really me showing up as who I was created to be. The truth of the matter, if you're a person of faith and I am, I believe that God made me exactly the person I'm supposed to be for my wife and her for me. And so when I show up authentically as that person I'm created to be, right. Living from identity, living out that life mastery journey. As I show up as that guy, I believe that's the exact representation of who God wanted to invest in my wife's life. And, and again, her in my life as well. So that hero that you want to be, I believe is who God made you to be.

And so as you, again, start walking through those tools, mastering your thoughts, words and actions, living from identity, you'll start to show up as that guy, the hero that you believe you can be, you believe that you're supposed to be, you believe that you're created to be, he'll start to show up.

Jason: That's awesome. Um, I mean, and I mean, you touched on something here and we, you know, we kind of get into back and forth. And I think I had this on my list of topics anyways, but God has specific intentions for marriages. For, for, for who the husband is, who the wife is, how they interact. I mean, where do we begin with, with understanding that

Mark: Yeah.

Understanding Yourself as a Husband

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Mark: I think the more I understand of who I am as a man, the more I understand who I can be as a husband. Yeah, I actually, um, I, I obviously thank you so much for plugging it. I have a YouTube channel and I actually recorded a session. Um, today and it was, it was understanding, um, who my wife is. So if you see it in a few weeks, it'll be, um, she's the 10 and it came from a conversation.

Rating Your Spouse Beyond Physical Appearance

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Mark: Somebody was on a podcast and they were going back and forth on rating your spouse, rating your significant other, right? Is he a 10? Is she a 10? And they were talking back and forth and and really what they were talking about was your physical appearance, right? When we talk about, hey, she or she's a 10, it's it's a physical appearance.

So what I said with that, in fact, I'll I'll give you the prop I used. I used a dice. And what I said was my wife's physical appearances. This side of the dice. But this part is her compassion and how she cares for other people. And this part is how she takes care of me as a husband and father. And this part is how she likes to give gifts and love and care for people.

And so if I was to rate her as to what, whether she was a 10, a nine, an eight, a seven, whatever, I couldn't just do it with one aspect of the dice because there's so much more to her. How do you get to a place of seeing that in your wife? I can't see that in her if I don't see that in me.

The Importance of Confidence in Marriage

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Mark: And so for me to become a good husband, I need to understand and have confidence in who I am.

The more I am assured and confidence in men, I know who I am. I know the impact I'm having on my life, my wife, and the world. And I know that I am a person of value and worth of significance and impact. When I can live from that place now, all of a sudden, my wife doesn't have to make up the difference. We have to be perfect and and you have to, you know, always be patting me on the back and our home has to be full of peace and never having disagreement.

Right? I put expectations on the relationship when I'm not confident in who I am. But when I show up as that man that I'm created to be confident of worth and value. Now, all of a sudden, I innately can start to see it in her. I can start because I don't need to draw from you things that are overcoming my insecurity now.

All of a sudden, I can honestly see from God's perspective of who you are as a wife, as a woman, as a mother, as a friend, and in that place, our marriage gets better. And I get better as a husband simply because I'm confident as a man.

Jason: so that kind of rang a bell in my head.

Healthy Conflict in Relationships

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Jason: Uh, I mean, I think relationships should have, and you can tell me if you agree or not, should have a healthy level of conflict, uh, not an unhealthy level, not fighting all the time, but there should be disagreements because that is that honesty coming out. That's a vulnerability coming out, being able to disagree with your spouse, that can be scary.

For some people, but being able to do it and then have a conversation about it and then come to a resolution on it. I mean, that's, that's gotta be important.

Mark: yeah, I think that's good. That's a great point. I tell people this.

Leadership Lessons Applied to Marriage

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Mark: So in, so in a leadership aspect, so I've, I've dealt in business and entrepreneurship and jobs and leading people and all of that, you know, leadership role. Here's, here's what I tell people. I tell people, if I'm leading people, here's what you need to understand.

If you and I both. Have the same opinion. One of us is unnecessary.

Jason: That's true. Yeah.

Mark: or yes women to tell me that I'm always right with everything I talk about because that doesn't make us better. Well, if you take that philosophy and you bring it into a marriage, I don't need my wife to be a yes woman in my life all of the time.

Certainly we want to we want to agree on the big things, right? The family things, the relationship things, the value things, the uh, The goal things and all of that, but in our life, if everything I believe she believes also, if everything I have is an opinion of the direction she does also, I, we limit. Our ability to grow as a couple and our ability to experience things.

I love the things that my wife and I have in common that brings us a unity and the things that we can have joy in. But I value the ways that we're different because my wife, she makes me better in her difference from me, not be in her likeness to me. And so in that place of conflict and, you know, walking through disagreement and different ideas.

There's health in that because that means that we're not the exact same purpose.

The Role of Authenticity in Marriage

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Mark: And, and to be totally honest, no two people are alike. So if you're agreeing all the time, Oh, my wife and I, we never fight is one thing, but if you never disagree, if you never have contrary opinions, then somebody is not showing up authentically.

One of you is in showing up as the person that you're supposed to be. And in that place, your marriage loses because if she can't feel like she can be everything she's supposed to be. Then I'm missing out as a husband and vice versa.

Jason: Yeah. No, that's, I've heard people say that, Oh, we never, we never have disagreements. We never fight. Well, that's a problem. Maybe you should.

Mark: Yeah. And you don't have to fight. I mean, you know, you can use the terms you want, but if you don't have contrary opinions to each other, then I worry about the authenticity of the relationship.

Jason: Yeah. One of the, one of the sermons series that our pastor did was on, on marriage and relationship. And one of the things that he said, Um, and I'm paraphrasing here, but basically your spouse is a person. Who knows every way to hurt you and chooses not to do that.

Mark: Yeah. That is definitely a good aspect of the marriage for sure.

Jason: I'm going back to your announcement video for a second. You, you made a interesting point in there. I want to make sure I touch on that.

Checklist Christianity vs. Authentic Faith

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Jason: Sometimes we follow the quote unquote Christian way using air quotes, uh, reading scripture, praying, going to church, whatever, but there's still something missing and, and I was curious, where do you think that disconnect?

Comes into play where you think that disconnect is,

Mark: Yeah. I think so growing in relationship and husband and wife in marriage, um, a lot of times is the same as us trying to grow as Christian men and, and the, and the challenges. And again, I'm speaking from experience and what I've seen in other guys as well. My challenge in that was, I thought the checklist was the thing.

If I, if I finished my checklist of Christianity, right? I, I went to church, I, I prayed every day, I read my scriptures. And again, there's value in each of those. But the value is in how they open up the relationship with God. They're not the end point. They're not the goal. And so in that place, I can't grow as a Christian if all I'm doing is living from a checklist.

It's the transformational journey of me understanding relationship with God, changing to become the person I'm created to be and using those, um, relational aspects that he's given me the word and community and opportunity to speak to him, um, that I'm able to do that. And it's the same in marriage where a lot of times.

Well, just to be totally honest, Jason, and it's no harm or foul to anybody, but sometimes we just throw cliches at marriages and relationships. We teach our spouses in these marriage ministries sometimes. Just have us to follow and so if I'm doing great at my habits, and you're doing great at your habits But neither one of us understands authentically who were created to be then our marriage won't get better And then there's it's not because of any ministry or any person's issue, but there's a reason why Marriages in the Christian Church are getting divorced as quickly as those that are not I think it's because we're using a checklist marriage opportunity versus Really kind of delving into, hey, who's the person really showing up?

Are you showing up is who you are? Are you walking through those things? Are you superficially using activities? To mask an inner issue that you should really be working on

Jason: that's a good point. Um, and then brings up another point.

Tools and Techniques for a Strong Marriage

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Jason: What tools and techniques do you use today? Like in your marriage and your life that you would have wished you had known about in your twenties.

Mark: Yeah What the first and foremost is is life mastery is really starting to as we had in our previous talked about in a previous Conversation is unpacking who I'm who you're created to be of living from identity not from your past

Jason: Right,

Mark: The challenge is apart from living from my identity, who I'm created to be, our relationship is always going to be influenced by my past and by yours as my spouse.

And so I would say that it's that, um, because when I start to live from who I am, I start to be secure in who I am and I start to become open to walking through, um, challenging things, walking through uncomfortable things. With my spouse, I'm not defending myself. I'm not defending my position. I'm not controlling things or keeping you at a distance because I can't really trust that you won't hurt me when I can be authentic when I can be the person living from that life master journey of who I'm created to be. Don't need you to make up the difference. And because of that, I can be vulnerable without being fearful. And so for me, it's that communication, knowing what good communication looks like. You know, we, I've never been taught by my parents when they were alive. I didn't see it growing up, but, you know, there's a, there's a way of communicating where I honor our relationship 1st.

So, our relationships bigger than the thing that we're disagreeing about and so good communication looks like me. Speaking about the issue, but not blaming you for it and creating an atmosphere where we can be honest and open, where I'll be who I am speaking towards the issue, but not blaming you for what you did and in that place, give you permission to do the same.

But at the end of the day, understanding that the unity of who we are matters more than whatever we're disagreeing about. That wasn't something that I understood as a young person as a young person seeing in my family in general. It was just. Who could win the argument and winning means my side, one, my opinion, one, my idea, one, and which means yours has to lose.

That's, that's never a great way to have a healthy marriage. Um, but if I can, again, start from unity. Start from this relationship matters more than what we're disagreeing about, and I'm not going to blame you for it, but I'm going to speak about how, you know, whatever was said affected me. Whatever was done affected me just to allow you into who I am and me to hear that from you as well.

When you can do that, you can actually have healthy resolution. And at the end of the day, the big thing wins, which means our marriage matters more.

Jason: Yeah. And I, I've, I can't remember where I've heard it from, but, uh, it was if, if both people are more concerned about being right, then they both lose. Because, you know, you may win the conversation, you may win the battle, um, but you've hurt your relationship in the process and that's not okay.

Mark: yeah, absolutely.

Jason: So give you a little, uh, little insight into my background.

I mean, most people know this, I'm not shy about it, but I, I've, I've been on this faith journey for going on five years now.

Overcoming Past Mistakes

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Jason: Um, as you can imagine, I didn't always make the best decisions in the first 42 years of my life, nor the most godly decisions. You know, I'm currently in a situation where, you know, I've got an ex, we were never married, we have a child together.

And sometimes I look back and I feel like I've really stumbled and sometimes I feel like those bad decisions impact my daughter. You know, when I was thinking about preparing for this, I was wondering, what would you say to a guy like me in, in this situation?

Mark: Yeah, that's a great question. I appreciate you sharing, by the way, than being honest about where you're at. Um, I think a lot of times we walk into what we're trying to do in this journey, not from a place of being perfect ahead of time. I haven't met a guy yet who has been perfect, and I haven't met a guy yet who's had it all together.

Maybe it's like you, a person who's, you know, has has had a relationship and has children. Maybe it's a guy who's. Who is in the process of getting a divorce? I thought, you know, we're, we're in church and we're doing this stuff and I thought it was going to work out and it didn't. And at the end of the day, you know, again, there's a, I apologize for keep plugging my YouTube channel, but there's another video that I have that, that I talk about.

Um, are you, is it a teardown or is it an update in homes? There's a teardown and or an update, right? So that I, I watched home videos. I love seeing those crazy, amazing videos. Um, but what I talked about was, you know, Sometimes we want to update the home. So we want to clean it up a little. We want to refresh it a little, do some things and make it look good.

And, and other times it's a total tear down, which means I'm tearing it all the way down to the studs, taking all the stuff out. And I'm recreating that a lot of times as men, we think that we're a tear down, not an update that I'm, I'm, I'm damaged. I'm messed up. I totally screwed up. And, and God, you know, our prayers, our prayers of God, you know, I'm horrible.

You change me, do something in me. I can't do this on my own kind of thing. And, and it doesn't mean you don't have a place of humility and vulnerability with God. But the challenge is that a lot of times we think we're broken when we're not. We think we're damaged when we're not. We think that we've made those huge mistakes that we can never get over, get past, move on from, and that's not the truth.

A lot of times we're praying, tear down prayers, God, make me somebody different when we don't realize that he already created you as the person you're supposed to be. It's your life experiences and past that are lying to you and telling you you're not. And I would say that for somebody that would be in your shoes or somebody who's, you know, been divorced, gotten divorced, had some huge mistakes in their life that they continue to beat themselves up for.

That they don't want to tell other people because they feel like they'll be looked at differently, or they want to, it's not part of conversations because they don't want to be that honest because in that place, they may be judged. I think for those guys, the thing I would tell them is that first thing, you're, you're not damaged.

You're not a mistake. You haven't messed up so much that you should be ashamed. If shame is a part of what's happening, if regret is a part of what's happening, then I think you're being lied to that. There's, there's, there's more for where you're at. Here's the truth of the matter. I so. Many times in my life, I'd be in my life master journey, you know, doing, making good decisions, making right decisions, understanding who I'm created to be.

And then I would look back at who I was 10 years ago, five years ago, 20 years ago, and, and, and know something that I did with that was just horrible. It was bad. It was a, it hurt somebody else or it hurt me. And I would punish myself now because, Oh, well, you know, look at what I did back then. And what I tell people in the training that I do is.

Here's the truth of the matter. I can't use who I am today to beat myself up for who I used to be because at the end of the day, if that guy, that Jason or that mark of five years ago was where I was at now for me in that life master journey, understanding who I am, then he would have made different decisions.

Then he would have had different actions and he would have done or said differently. But I didn't know back then. And so of course I did the best I could for where I was at.

Jason: And I, I mean, I've resigned to a lot of that and it's, it's good to have that affirmation. I did, I do.

Asking God for Wisdom

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Jason: So I've been recently reading through first Kings, um, you know, in chapter three is when Solomon asks, you know, God, Offers him anything he wants and he asked for wisdom

Mark: Yeah,

Jason: and they got me thinking like in our prayers and our everyday prayers How often do we actually ask for the wisdom we ask god?

Will you take this away god? Will you help with this? But when when do we ask god will you give me the wisdom? to handle this or even the wisdom to know what to do and you know you you kind of touched on that and the way you answered that and I think You know, it just, it brought this to light and I thought it was important to, to kind of throw it out there that we, we should be asking for more wisdom because God will give it.

Mark: absolutely. Absolutely. And sometimes we're asking for the things that he's already given us.

Jason: It's true.

Mark: A lot of times I tell people this, it's sometimes our biggest challenge isn't that we're, we can trust God, whether we can or not. It's believing that God actually trusts us. Because we know our history, we know our past, but so does God.

So at the end of the day, maybe we're asking for stuff that he's already given. So if I was to ask him, God, would you show me the wisdom that you've given me? Would you show me the strength that's inside of me? Would you show me the person that you've created me to be for this thing, whatever that is you're doing?

I wonder if he would just show up and show you those things. Here's what I see in the Bible, Jason. I never see God equipping people after they're in the middle of their thing. Whether it's a battle or war, a decision, a direction, a prophecy that they need to give, or a people that they need to lead. What I see is that God reminds them who they are and tells them what their assignment is, because they're already equipped to walk it out. Many times we want Him to add to us, when really what He wants to do is reveal us to us.

Jason: that is so true. And I've, I've made that, I've had that similar thought. You know, I trust God. Do I trust myself to interpret what he's saying? Do I trust myself to believe that I'm understanding him? And that's, you know, that's, we just, sometimes it's a walk of faith.

Mark: Yeah,

Jason: and it goes back to that being intentional about your decisions and your actions and either going to get it right.

You're going to learn something, right?

Mark: And that's part of that past, right? By looking back at your past and saying what good came of that, what value did I bring out of that? What thing did I learn from that? How did I change and transform so that it actually drove me towards who I was supposed to be versus who I used to be?

Jason: Absolutely. Mark.

Final Thoughts and Conclusion

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Jason: As always, it is a pleasure to speak with you. I think I'm going to go ahead and wrap this up. Do you have any, any final words before we finish up?

Mark: What I would say is you're planted in the place where you're at for a reason. Whether you're a husband or a father or you're that person who sees that in the future or you want to be that now. That God's actually equipped you more for where you're at than you believe. And that if you walk in that life master journey, you're living through that transformational journey.

That hero that you believe you can be that hero that maybe sometimes you don't know if you can be, but you really are hoping for that guy can show up. You have it on the inside of you on my job. And my journey isn't to give guys extra tools and things that they're missing, but to reveal with them. Who they are, and in that place, they get to live it out so they could be the hero.

They're called to be keeping that journey. I am proud of you for even being willing to listen and even imagine that it's possible. And I believe it's just around the corner for you

Jason: Thank you, Mark. It's great advice. Again, his website is freedom 4 life. net. His program is Life Mastery. I will have links in the show notes to his website, uh, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, all the good stuff, and his book. I encourage you to visit his website and social media. He's got a lot of great content on those platforms.

We already talked about some of the great videos. Uh, and again, his book is life mastery, uh, life by design. Thank you, Mark. I appreciate you and God bless

Mark: always a joy. Jason. Thank you.

Jason: as for the rest of you until next time. Keep loving your neighbors, dive into God's word daily, and may the Lord bless you and keep you and fill you with his peace.

Take care. God bless. And I'll see you in the next episode.

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