269: What women truly crave from men | Dear Men

Melanie Curtin: Kind of cleansing experience that I've seen a lot of our guys go through. Like, oh, yeah. Like I, I can feel that part of me now. Like I'm, I'm in touch with it. Like it's part of me and I don't have to be afraid of it. Hi, everyone. Welcome back to another episode. Always love having you, Jason, on the podcast. Thanks for being here.

Jason Lange: Excited to be back.

Jason Lange: Yeah. Often there is a lot of confidence with these men. Often, particularly with women, there's a lot of drive, there's a lot of, you know, a sense kind of going for what they want, knowing what they want, moving towards what they want. Can often be a lot of action taking as well. Oftentimes don't have problems. Yeah. Attracting mates, having sex. It's everything that happens after that that is often more the struggle for, for these guys in terms of the relational space and feeling heart seen and heart connected and whatnot. But there's a lot of go. Energy a lot of times in these guys. Right. There is a lot of like drive go for it. Not all men like this, but for certainly a population of these men, there's a lot more emphasis than on. On I, than you or we. And that can again, that can be. Cause a lot of great things in their life, but can sometimes make it harder in relationships.

Melanie Curtin: That's a great way of putting it. I like that. Yeah. Something that I've noticed about this type is there's often also this, this type of man has often had a lot of success early on in let's say school. So middle school, high school, sometimes this guy was an athlete or he sort of fit into the man box in many ways. And so there was a certain level of ease that he had not always in family life. I'm not talking about that. But just fitting in, you know, social sort of situations. I think perhaps conventionally attractive. Yeah. Often sort of more in his body. So yeah. Sports or just things that got him in his body more and, and, and we're going to go through sort of pros and cons. I think there, there are advantages to that because it's a lot better than getting bullied. Right. It's like 100 times better than getting bullied. And there's a sort of way of. There is a box, right. The man box is called a box for a reason. And you are constrained and there. And it is quite lonely. So I think I just wanted to name that. I do think that that is a pattern that I have seen where there are limitations to that kind of ease early on because it doesn't necessarily help you get to depth. Basically. That's the short version. Parents. So parents of this guy. And this, this is. This was hard. When I was prepping for this episode, just thinking about our clients and patterns and types. There are A lot of men, you know, in general who were raised by a dad that they didn't want to be like. They were like, okay, I didn't like that. I don't want to be like dad. Like, whatever I do, I'm not going to be like dad. But within that, people respond to different upbringings in different ways. So basically both of these are relevant for both types. But one thing I've noticed is closed off dad. So this, this was like a disconnected dad, sometimes quite authoritarian or disciplinarian, sometimes really, really strict dad. That could be a religious dad, it could be a military dad, but some kind of strict authoritarianism in the house, whether it's dad or mom. But I'm sort of focusing on dad because that tends to be one of your primary masculine role models as a man. And then, yeah, I would love to hear anything that you've noticed just in terms of patterns of this, this type dad or parents.

Jason Lange: Yeah, I think sometimes also just having very achievement oriented father or parents, which isn't, it's not always necessarily a bad thing, but there's just a, oh, we're a successful family and we do successful stuff. So there's this kind of like, you know, build fast and launch a lot of success kind of energy that some of these guys get launched with, which can be really powerful and also comes with pressure. Right? Comes with some pressure to achieve, whether that's in sports or academics or in their career. There's, there can be, there's a bit of like a push energy coming from the parents sometimes. Right. Like it's not okay to just be where you're at. You got to, you got to move past that. And oftentimes I think that connects to another pattern I've seen as one of the ways to ensure that in that push is emotions often get left behind. So there's the basic. Bro often is maybe raised in a household where there's not a lot of emotional literacy or emotions aren't valued. So there's a, you know, stop crying, get it done kind of energy sometimes or just no one has the fluency to even kind of know what, what's going on there. So some of these guys that we've certainly worked with, I think there can be not a whole lot of emotional range there. There's kind of just like go succeed or I kind of feel really down and you know, I'm failing. But there's not like even a lot of interoception or the ability to kind of oh, what is happening in my body right now. What am I feeling emotionally? And I think that does often kind of come from the parents because there is this kind of push, push, push, go, go, go, energy that the cost often is emotions.

Melanie Curtin: That's a really good point. That's a very good point. That pressure I think is a common, a common experience. And that's again, this isn't only about this archetype. Right. Nice guys also have that pressure or have come from those homes too. But there are certain correlations. I think just patterns emerge as we've worked with lots of men, okay, so we're going to move on to advantages and problems now. So I think we've gone over some of these advantages already. But this type of doesn't tend to struggle in terms of actually getting sex or yeah, getting dates, getting sex, moving things along sexually. Often they feel sort of, you know, in control or empowered in some way in that space. Problems. This is interesting. One of my very first clients, years and years and years and years ago fell into this category. And his main problem, I think one of the reasons that he came to us was he said basically I've never had a relationship longer than three months. I don't know why, like I can't, I can't. It's a mystery to me. Like I can't figure out why. And because he wasn't very good at making himself vulnerable, we had to sort of read between the lines. But essentially what he was saying was I can't keep a woman engaged, right? I can, I can attract her. I can, you know, I go to the club, I don't have a problem bringing women home, but then I can't, can't keep them engaged. And so one of the big problems is that often these types will get left by high self esteem women. So the, the type of woman they want to be with won't, won't stay. And so they'll, they'll get laid but they won't get committed to. So that's a big, that's a big problem. And both of these types in, and I think men overall in our culture experience profound loneliness and they're different flavor of loneliness. But that's one of the, one of the flavors here for this type is sort of I'm want, I'm wanting that connection, I'm wanting that depth. I don't know how to get it, I don't know how to lead it. I don't know how to engage with her in that way. And so for me as a woman moving around in the world, I can say I meet and interact with these types. And there's a certain level of attraction, right? There's a certain level of like, oh, like he's, you know, I can feel the zing, I can feel the heat. I'm like, oh yeah. I feel like this, this man would be able to, to take me, but I do not trust that he'd be able to hold my heart. I do not trust that he'd be able to hold my heart. And so for me, as, as a fairly developed woman who has, you know, a lot going on, I'm not even going to engage with that guy in the first place. I'm not. Or, or I'll engage with him, but I'll engage with him as a fling, I'll engage with him as a boy toy, right? I'll engage certain way, but I'm not going to take him seriously as a long term committed partner because I can feel that he hasn't gone to certain depths, emotional depths in himself. And so I don't trust that he's going to be able to hold me in my depths. And I want that, I want that, that level of depth and holding.

Jason Lange: Yeah, I think this is also a type I want to name, kind of related to emotions. Certainly some of the men I've worked with and experienced like this in my life. There can also be high levels of reactivity here. This can be a very reactive type. Quick to anger, quick to frustrate kind of more. That type of. Maybe that's the only, that's about the only emotion maybe allowed oftentimes for the, the basic bro is, is kind of anger or, you know, is push or react or fight or there's a lot of that that can come through, but there's not much room for anything else that's really allowed usually often in themselves or in their culture, in their family system. So kind of everything else has to get stuffed other than that, like it's okay to get explosively angry to get what you need at work or something like that, but everything else kind of gets pushed down. And you know, these are the kind of guys that, you know, if someone gets up in their space, they'll get up right back up in someone's space, right? They'll step right in. And there's a lot of power in that actually. And that can be a powerful thing. But again, it comes at a cost in that I think this type is particularly. They fit into the man box, right, which is where a certain sense of early belonging can come from. And like a feeling of like, oh, I'm good at this. Right. So oftentimes there is that early success, but the problem is they're also confined even more than other types to that same box. Then that, oh, I'm not allowed to ask for help or show vulnerability or not want to fuck a woman just because I don't feel like it. Right. Like they have to deal with all those pressures which the nice guys don't. They'll have different things we'll talk about that they often have to deal with.

Melanie Curtin: Yes. And we're not saying that these are the only guys in the man box because our culture does try to apply that to everyone and it's. It fucks up everyone. So we're not saying it doesn't. But I do think that there's. There's an experience. I think that we. There's a. There's a pattern that I've seen in you and me, in the work that we've done, in the men that have arrived where they kind of make it through their 20s and part of their 30s and everything's sort of fine. And they sort of thought this part of their life would just kind of work out. And it's not working out. So they're. They've either gone through a big breakup, right. A woman that they valued left them, or they can't seem to sustain relationships or bring them to the depth they're really wanting. So the central question for both of these types is why am I lonely? What? Like, why isn't this working? Or why am I lonely? And I think that's. That's an experience that I've. I've seen repeatedly. And I remember that first client years ago, just at one point, really feeling his experience of isolation and just really understanding his world around, like, wow, he feels really isolated because there's a way he doesn't show himself truly to anyone, including close friends. Right. He's surface level. There's a certain level of surface. Surface ness about this type that it hasn't been safe for them to go deeper than that or reveal their true. Their true feelings, their true hurts, their true vulnerabilities. And if you go through life not revealing those things, it's fucking lonely. It's really isolating and lonely. So that's. That's a primary, primary thing. So that's the sort of description and the profile. And then the path for that type is to open his heart. That's his spiritual path. That's his journey. That's where he's going in order to become the integrated man. His primary path is to open his heart. And for what it's worth, I think think it's true. And we've done episodes on this, but many of us are working through lineage stuff. So it's not just, it's not just you. It's not just like your heart is closed and you need to learn to open it. It's like you probably come from a lineage of closed off people, men or women, you know, it depends. But it's very likely that this is work that's needed to happen in your family system for a long time. And this is, this is your. This is your path, this is your gauntlet. This is what it will take for you to grow deeply and for you to have a deeply fulfill, filling, nourishing, loving, healthy relationship.

Jason Lange: Yeah. And what we mean by open the heart, you know, is getting into your emotional body, not just your physical body. So becoming aware of the emotions inside your heart, being able to name them and being able to share them in a relational space. Right. That's often the vulnerability thing. And it's also allowing yourself to be seen when you don't feel like you have it all together. I think that's another big thing. It's in some sense, it's allowing yourself to be seen when you feel weak or not in your power that is often the key to really opening your heart and letting people in. As we often hear, you got to let me in. I don't know how to get in there. That's often what that's pointing to is, oh, I need to know what else is going on there. When you have it all together or you just stay stoic, it can be really hard to connect.

Melanie Curtin: Yeah, I think that's a great point. And I think that's why it can be, I think, confusing sometimes for this type because the feedback that they'll get from women is like, I can't really feel you. Right. Or like, where are you? Or like, I never know what you're thinking or you just seem kind of remote or distant or, you know, I. I'm trying to. Yeah. Get in. And I don't feel like you're letting me in. And I think when, yeah, when this guy hasn't learned how to do that yet, it feels mysterious. It's like, well, I don't know. I don't know what you want me to do. Like, I don't really get it. I don't really know what that means. And so it's really hard to fix or solve. And so the how of both of these paths, which we'll Go into more detail later is basically, you gotta find the right guides. You gotta find the right guides to help you with these paths. So in terms of opening your heart, you can't just do it yourself. Like, you gotta have some help on both sides. And that whole trying to do it yourself, trying to power through it alone is part of the. Of the man box. It's part of the problem is like, well, just fix it myself. I'll solve it myself. Like, no, that's not really how it works. And that's not really how spiritual growth has worked anywhere in any lineage ever. Yes, there are vision quests. There are parts of the journey that are so done solo. And big parts of the journey are done with others and with trustful guides and elders and those who are holding space and showing you the way, showing you the path, those that have walked it before you. So that's. That's part of the. The how. If you're wondering about how to do this. So let's move on to the nice guy archetype. Again, we're going to go through a little bit of a profile here. Do you want to start with just sort of like the overall profile of this. This guy?

Jason Lange: Nice guys. There it is right there. They're very nice, often very pleasant to be around, good at conversation make. One of their superpowers is helping people feel safe. So not being too much and just really honoring people where they're at can often have a hard time setting boundaries, sticking up for themselves, going for what they want as opposed to what other people wants or what their culture wants. They can oftentimes be a little dissociated or disconnected from their sexuality and maybe feel a little bit of shame around it. And can sometimes try to get things without asking for it. As our friend Dr. Glover talks about a covert contract. So there's a way, like, oh, there's something I want, but rather than asking for it, I'll just try to really be nice to someone. You know, the sense is if I prove to someone I have a really good heart and I'm safe enough, you know, particularly in relationship, a woman's going to want to fuck me, right? And it doesn't often work that way. They want to be your friend. They want to call you when they're having emotional problems or not feeling well, but they don't necessarily feel that connection. And a lot of us nice guys kind of get. Get stuck in that. Right? Just the friend zone is kind of the home base oftentimes for the nice guy as well as some Sometimes in their own way, just not feeling seen. Right. Kind of always feeling a little bit overlooked or that people, you know, women are checking out other guys, not that guy. So there can be that sense. And, you know, in my experience, you know, I certainly live this and I think a lot of nice guys did. It's a little different. It's. We were never in the traditional successful man box of, you know, another way to put the basic. Bro might be the kind of, you know, high school quarterback. Right. He's like good athletics. You know, sometimes they are good and smart. They're getting women from an early age and they're like the prom king. Right. Oh, I'm not that I didn't have that. And so there's that kind of outsider feeling. I think a lot of times nice guys have as well, in my experience.

Melanie Curtin: Yes. And I. I wanted to underline what you said about safe safety. I think that, yeah, there is a sense of not wanting to rock the boat. That's. That's an overwhelming pattern that I see in this type is. Yeah. Avoiding confrontation, not wanting to rock the boat, kind of wanting everyone to get along. Sometimes they were the peacemaker in their home. And we'll get to sort of home life after this. But there's a lot of. Yeah. Wanting to keep the peace, wanting things to be okay, wanting to make sure people like me, that no one's mad at me. And there's a. There's. There tends to be a lot of patterns around waiting. So waiting for permission. Waiting for permission to do things or say things or. One of the things we hear a lot is waiting. I was waiting for her to give me a sign that she liked me or I was waiting for her to give me a sign that it would be okay for me to kiss her. Or was waiting for an invitation. I was waiting. I was waiting. I was waiting. So that word waiting, sometimes it's. Yeah. A bit more passive a lot of times that this. This type of man is not going to bring up a difficult emotional topic in a relationship. He's going to hope it goes away or. Yeah. Avoid avoiding it a lot of the time. Definitely challenges with boundaries. So not always standing up for oneself or.

Jason Lange: Yeah.

Melanie Curtin: Just able to hold tension. Right. It's like. It's like I can't stand tension. Tension is overwhelming to my system. I don't. I don't want to deal with tension. Tension is not. Doesn't feel safe and it's not okay. So I'm going to do whatever I can to avoid it. And my strategy like you said, is to be really, really nice to people and then they'll give me what I want. So I'm sort of giving to get, but I don't identify that way. So I think a lot of nice guys don't realize that they're running covert contracts. So they don't. They, they're just being nice, but really they do want something back and they are expecting something in return. And there can be a lot of resentment or rage that builds up in nice guys about doing, doing, doing for others and then feeling deeply taken advantage of. So one of the. Yeah, well, I guess we'll go in order. But that's, that's something that I've seen, seen a lot.

Melanie Curtin: That's a great point. So background, family background, parents, a lot of what we've seen, I think there's sort of two categories. One is passive dad or absent dad. A lot of times there wasn't really a masculine role model around or there wasn't a trustable masculine role model. Because I've sort of seen it two ways. I've seen these guys being, you know, raised by men that were like them. I've also seen these men raised by a volatile dad, right? An angry abusive dad, alcoholic dad. And, and from a very young age, a big part of them said, I'm never gonna be that. I'm never gonna be that. I'm never gonna be like that. And there's a very big push away rejection like shoving, like I will not be that. Which is. What's the word? Comes from a really good place, right? There's a lot of advantages to that of. I, I swear to God, I, I think there's a sacrifice that happens that we'll, we'll get to around that. But I've seen it both ways where sometimes it's a Push away. And sometimes it's a. I didn't really have a lot of role models or and as we've covered in other podcasts, sometimes this can also be. I was primarily raised by women, my mom and other other women and told like don't be like your father type thing. So sometimes it was. Yeah, sometimes that was going on.

Jason Lange: Yeah. I think emotionally caretaking a mother is a big one we see here. Or sometimes just emotionally kind of caretaking the family unit in that kind of having to grow up too fast. I think sometimes is where the nice guy gets bored too because there is no room oftentimes for some of the guys we've worked with as kids to like be kids and explore and have their own emotions. It's just like I gotta like keep this household running. So again they're learning to prioritize other before self oftentimes from an early age in their family system.

Melanie Curtin: Yes, a lot of self sacrifice and.

Jason Lange: That'S.

Melanie Curtin: I think what's encouraging about this and I think what's encouraging overall is how much we have witnessed men grow and grow up and grow out of these patterns. And it's really there are so many advantages to this type. There's so many. There's so many positives. Right. So many pros to being in this category. There's so much of yeah there's just a lot of the skills that this man already has map very well to relationship. So there are certain missing ones and there are certain big things and big areas in which he needs to grow. But he actually is set up quite well for romantic relationship and for being a great partner. So that's.

Jason Lange: I used to talk about this with some of my friends of or guys I even worked with of like oh my God, it's so clear you're going to be great in relationship but you're kind of terrible at dating. This is often where I see it because they don't have that initial drive or like pull to which I think is the opposite of the basic pro where they're often great at dating, the short term flings, the excitement. It's when it gets into like actual part life partner territory that it can get a lot harder for them. But that that is a. A great asset the nice guys often have is if you can kind of get through some of that initial stuff you are really set up to be an incredible partner.

Melanie Curtin: And I think it's worth noting that I would say more and more in our practice we're working with men that are in relationship and a lot of Them are married. And so all of these dynamics map to marriage as well. It's not that we're just talking about dating. And I think that the nice guy, the married nice guy, you know, there is. All of these things are present, right? The self sacrifice, the waiting for permission. And I think one of my favorite sort of success stories is a man who was married and came in and sort of transformed through the. For, through the program and really started leading in his marriage. And the sex got better. And it wasn't necessarily something that he had come in for. That wasn't a huge reason that he'd come in, but it was a byproduct. And he also started seeing more success at work because of this whole journey around owning your power. This tends to map to other areas of your life. And so he actually started earning more money and just. Just feeling more free. Feeling more free. I think there's a way that waiting for permission, constantly waiting for permission is a little bit like you're sort of always waiting for the other shoe to drop. Like, what if I say the wrong thing? What if I do the wrong thing? What if I try this and she doesn't like it? What if, you know, when there's that attachment to what the other person will think? There's a lot of loss of freedom. And I think one of the big things that we saw him grow into was just feeling generally more free. Like. Like, yeah, I want to do this. I'm going to do it. And, you know, he had enough trust and rapport already built with his wife that he knew some of the things that she liked and he was able to lead and feel comfortable and. And he'd already talked to her about things and she. She wanted more of that from him. So there was. There was just a lot more ease in the way that he could be and lead than he had before. And it felt like just freedom.

Jason Lange: I think that's a. A beautiful story. And I just highlights another piece. I think nice guys tend to often hold a lot of fear. So there's a lot of fear that prevents action that can kind of keep them not moving forward on a lot of things or not taking a lot of risks where the basic bro. I think sometimes it's not that they don't have fear. It's A, they often just will push through it or B, they'll have it, but they'll numb out from it, right? So they just won't feel it. They'll just disconnect from it and kind of move forward no matter. Oh, you know that didn't work. And then they'll just kind of drink their way out of it or forget it or numb out to it if they got rejected from a woman. Whereas the nice guy is more likely to just never approach to start with because it may not work.

Melanie Curtin: I think that's a great point and I would, I would, I would say similarly, I have noticed that substances. I've noticed substances more in the basic bro category than the nice guy category. I mean, substances are everywhere in our culture. But yeah, specifically alcohol, marijuana, mostly alcohol and marijuana. I think pornography is also used as a coping mechanism for both of these types. But yeah, particularly alcohol and pot to numb and to kind of. I mean, alcohol is such a socially acceptable numbing strategy in our culture. It's just like. It's just. Yeah. Ubiquitous. I think we've seen a lot of our clients stop using alcohol or stop using substances as they're growing because it just doesn't. It doesn't work. And a lot more consciousness and power coming online. Authentic grounded power in. In doing the work underneath it to not. To not need substances anymore to regulate, but having actual strategies. So back to. Yeah, the profile of the nice guy and parents and kind of upbringing. Something I wrote down that I've noticed is a lot of these guys tend to come from a background of emotional neglect. So not necessarily physical neglect in the home. Like they may have had enough, had food security, had housing security, but just they weren't attuned to. Right. There was no one really being getting on their level, asking them how they were teaching them how to feel. Just having them feel seen, having them feel seen that their needs mattered, that their interests mattered. And so there's almost an atrophying effect of I guess I don't really matter. Like, I guess I don't matter. There's some. There's something around that that I feel like I've seen repeatedly that may the parents were around, but they weren't actually attuning to their son. Can you say a little more about that?

Jason Lange: Yeah. Neglect, I think, is a big one here. Certainly one that I experienced in a sense of I don't matter. I'm not important. Right. If no one's kind of attuning to me. And I think that's often the feeling a lot of times nice guys have is. And why it can then be a challenge for them to. To step into taking some attention because they're often just not used to actually having people attuned to them and kind of come in. It's. It can be almost reflexive to put the attention on other people. And I, I do think that often happens kind of in households where again there's just, there's no space for them to have emotions sometimes. And it's not even always, you know, nefarious per se. It's just parents aren't skilled, they don't have that capacity themselves and yet their basic needs are met. So there, this is, can kind of be the paradox sometimes to the nice guys, like my basic needs are met so there's not like a certain type of pain causing a drive to like take action where again not all basic bros, but some guys, whether it's pressure to succeed or they're really coming from a family where like, you know, they weren't eating, like there was no food on the table so they had to go out and get work. And there's like a, I have to take it for myself because no one's going to give it to me. I think the, the place nice guys can sometimes get stuck around this kind of emotional thing is everything is being met for them to some extent other than the emotional resonance that actually tuning into them as an individual. And so that can be a really uncomfortable place for them that they're just not used to. They're really good at creating that space for other people, but they're not great at asking for it or receiving it themselves.

Melanie Curtin: And it feels like I, you know, I'm thinking of a couple of, of archetypes, a couple of men that we've worked with, our friends that I have where you know, emotional neglect includes like no one was guiding them, no one was saying how's it going at school? Do you like anyone? How's that going? You know, what's, you know, what's just what's going on for you? Tracking what's going on for them on a day to day level and giving them some advice like oh, here's something that you could say to her or let's practice asking her out to a dance or you know, there was no real like interaction in that way. Whether the parents were busy just trying to survive. Right. Just like maybe they worked late. There were things going on. They were doing their very best to just provide for the family or they just didn't feel equipped right. There were just, I mean there's countless, yeah, just stories of well yeah, dad was sort of around but he wasn't, he didn't interact. There was no emotional depth. There was no, he wasn't going to guide them on topics around emotion or risk or, you know, it's just there wasn't guidance. And so, again, that's just a really important piece. Another thing I wanted to just name in terms of patterns is I've seen a lot of the men that we work with are survivors of bullying. We've done one episode. If you are a survivor of bullying, I would recommend. Definitely recommend listening to that episode. It's pretty old now. It's from a while back, but I think that's a very common. A common experience and one that just can stay for a long time. And we've seen a ton of growth in our men who have had that as a background. So it doesn't need to stay with you forever. But I just wanted to say that's definitely a pattern that I've seen.

Jason Lange: And this doesn't apply to all nice guys we work with, but again, some of them, I think, pointing to the bullying can sometimes be more comfortable with women than men, and so actually don't necessarily feel safe and sometimes feel a little scared to come into a men's group or come into a men's space where they're used to being ostracized or, you know, punished for who they are versus the types of places we create, try to create around safety and welcoming. But there can be a kind of a gravitation to that more relational, feminine space than feeling safe around guys.

Melanie Curtin: Because I do think that's something that I've been touched by repeatedly, is how many men have come in to our programs and said, this is. This is the first time I've ever told anyone this. Or this is a safe space. Like, I've never been in a group that's felt safe, genuinely safe before. And some of these guys are in their 30s and 40s. Like, that blows my mind. And I think is another. Just really makes me sad about the culture that we live in because it's so isolating to go through your life and not feel safe or secure. Because if. If you are a man who has sex with women and you're not able to share your. What's on your heart or your problems or your real feelings about it with other men who have sex with them. Right? With other men in the same kind of place as you, that's really lonely. Like, you just. You feel alone and you feel like, yeah, these problems are unique to you. Whereas when you share and you're heard and you hear other men's problems, you. You know in your cells that you're not alone. And that can change everything. Even if your situation isn't isn't different and how it feels different when you know you're not so. Okay. And so pros and cons. I think we've pretty much gone over a lot of these. I think pros are really around connection and the ability to connect, the ability to converse and feel again, like a lot of these guys do have people feel safe around them. They are. They are easy to be around. That. That's, I think, a good way of putting it, is a lot of times easy to be around. And there's a lot of. There's just a lot of ease there. And sometimes emotional skill. Not always, but sometimes just emotional skill, like comfort and emotion, emotional skill facility. And then problems. The problems that this guy tends to have. Not getting enough sex or the kind of sex that he wants. So whether you're in relationship or not, just that feeling of I'm not really getting what I want and. And not feeling. Feeling stuck. Like, not really feeling empowered about that. Right. Like, just like wanting and not knowing how to go after it and just again, like waiting, like doing things. Waiting and then being disappointed. The nagging feeling that more is possible. Just like I feel like more could be possible here, especially in a relationship, and then feeling taken advantage of. This is. This is a big one. I think a pattern that we see in a lot of. Of our clients, particularly coming in, is that feeling of being taken advantage of, that I'm. I'm giving and giving and giving and never getting back. This isn't true for all guys in this category, but it's a pattern that I've definitely witnessed. And. And then the. That. Yeah, that feeling of resentment of I'm giving and giving and not getting my needs met. And again, I feel kind of helpless or hopeless about that. Like, I don't. I don't really know what to do about it. So I feel stuck.

Jason Lange: Yeah. This is the type that we love to help. You know, for one, that it's a journey I've. I've certainly walked. And again, there's. There's a lot of pros there. And then, as I like to say with both types, really, but it's often just they're missing some training. There's just, like, a few things they haven't been led through. And, you know, for the. For the. The basic pro, you can often think, you know, part of the job, and I didn't come up with these terms, but is waking up into our hearts. And oftentimes for the nice guy, it's waking down into our balls, into our power, into what we want to. Connecting to our impulses in a moment to moment. Like, oh, I want this. Or even the sense of it's okay for me to take this, like, I deserve this, you know, obviously in a consensual way. But that, that can be a big edgy energy to bring back online for the nice guys a lot of times.

Jason Lange: And you just. That reminded me of one other key thing I think we see with a lot of nice guys related to this is nice guys are often the type of guys that'll end up in a relationship because a woman approached them. So they'll. They'll kind of like settle into something that maybe wasn't what they actually wanted, but it was because the woman took some initiative that they kind of just go along with it versus that, oh yeah, I really went after the woman I want. That's often not the case for nice guys. They'll kind of go after the woman next to the woman they want if they do go after a woman. Or they'll just wait for a woman to approach them. And there's. Well, if I don't stay in this, I'm afraid I'll be alone, so I better stay in this. And they can get into some pretty. Pretty messed up relationships sometimes that really aren't healthy because of that dynamic and this feeling or bad belief, though it's not really true that, well, I can't do any better, so I better accept this or take this.

Melanie Curtin: That's a great point. I'm actually, yeah, recalling another client who I think God got into a relationship in college, right. So Maybe he was 20 years old and got married. Like they did the whole thing. They got married. And I think that he was in his mid-30s, I think was like 15 years or something of sort of the dynamic you described of like, well, I guess this is what we're doing. Like, I guess. Guess this is what we're supposed to do and. But not really. Yeah, none of that zing, that passion. It was basically a sexless marriage. And he was really. Yeah. Like, scared to bring it up. So he didn't, he didn't bring up sex in the relationship. He would do things like make the bed in a certain way, hoping that that would be help somehow that, like, that that's what would have her be open to sex or, you know, these circuitous things that we're talking about instead of actually driving a conversation or, you know, taking action. And so it amazes me sometimes. Yeah. Like, how many people, how many men we work with who. Who have just kind of like, waited for a woman or stayed in a relationship that they knew wasn't the best or wasn't deeply nourishing because they were really afraid of being alone and not sure. Yeah. Just not feeling empowered, not feeling like, yeah, I can, I can attract. I can make things happen. I can. You know, there are other options available to me. It's more like, well, this is what, this is what I've been given. And I think I want to bring a lot of compassion and empathy to the subject in general. And part of why we are talking about the where did you come from? Aspect. Who were you raised by? If you were raised with emotional neglect, if you were raised with volatile parents, if you were raised by a woman who had a personality disorder, for example, you really were less equipped. You really didn't. There is a reason that you went into freeze or go into freeze. This isn't out of a vacuum. Right. It's. It's trauma. We're talking about trauma. This is how that person shows up in relationship. That is a trauma survivor. And I think that, you know, there's a number of ways to work with that. And I think that that's just something that I. Yeah, I just want to bring a lot of love to because I don't want this to feel shaming. This is not, it's not shaming. And there's nothing wrong with you if this has been how you've done relationship. And there's nothing wrong with those, those men who've been in 15 to 20 to 25 year relationships with women and then looked back and thought, man, I really wish I'd done this work sooner because I would have figured this out sooner. And Might not have spent so many years suffering in the way that I did. So I just want to say we see you like that is real. Your experience is real and the suffering is real. So, okay, so we're gonna start to go into the path for the. The nice guy type, which is own to own his power. And the how of this path is actually the same as the other path, which is find the right guides. Find the right guides and the right guidance. This is important because again, I think, I think I feel particularly protective of this type because I do think that you want to find the right guides that are going to be empathetic and bring a lot of love to the process because there are parts of you that are in freeze and are. That have gotten to the way that they are for a reason. And you don't want to be with guides that are going to shame you or reinforce old stuff. So you don't want to get bullied again, I think is my point. There's a way to work with these dynamics that are straightforward, where you are growing and you are held accountable with love, with a lot of empathy, with a lot of compassion. Because I think a big. Yeah, just a big part of the whole process for both types is actually learning about self love. What does it mean to love myself as I am and grow? What does it mean to love myself as I am and grow? It's not that I'm bad. It's not. There's nothing wrong with me. You can grow and also love yourself as you are now. And that's actually critical to the growth process. So you want to make sure that you stretch and you don't tear. So when you're looking for finding your way, you want to be, you know, cultivating guides that you. That you feel are trustable, that you can. That you can rely on and who know what they're talking about. Right. Who have walked that particular path for either of these that you feel like are trustable. Anything else on that?

Jason Lange: Yeah. Owning your power is often coming deeper into your body. And I think for a lot of nice guys, reclaiming your anger. So being able to get in touch with that and own that in a healthy way and learning to move that and learning that it's okay, like it's okay to be angry, it's okay to have boundaries and that with, with both of these paths. Yeah. The idea is it's pretty hard to lead ourselves any deeper than if we've ever been ourselves. And so that's where the power of guides can really help because they can kind of help walk us to somewhere we've never been before. And so we get to stretch, but in a safe way. And we often get to see. Right. As I've talked about before, there's a transmission of when we see it. Oh, that's what it looks like to have healthy anger, or that's what it looks like to be vulnerable. Right. Sometimes guys have never seen this before, and I've led hundreds of meds groups at this point. Sometimes the guy will come in and be like, I didn't even know that was possible. Like, to. For a man to cry and not seem like week or something like that. But to get that transmission of, wow, that guy really put all of his cards on the table. And I trust him more. I feel like he's more powerful than when I met him before. And there's that rewiring that happens when we just get to see it and be around it.

Melanie Curtin: Yeah. Thank you for speaking to that. It reminds me of a. A moment I was. We. We had a family crisis in my family years ago. And one of the things I. I love about my dad is that he is in touch with his emotions, and he was. He was supporting his brother, and I was supporting him, supporting his brother. And we were at my uncle's house, and, yeah, my dad just broke down one morning. I was crying for, like, at least 10 minutes, and we were just there with him. And he didn't apologize for it, and he didn't collapse into it. It was like, this is really stressful and sad, and I'm upset and I'm crying. And it felt. I felt really proud of him. And I remember my uncle. You know, I can't remember how this happened, but somehow he. My dad left the room or something happened, and my uncle said, that's one of the strongest men I know about my dad. And it felt deeply honoring. And I remember also feeling like, wow, there's a certain level of stuckness. Like, this event was happening to him, but he couldn't cry. Like, he hadn't cried yet. And so it was almost like not my dad was crying for him, but there was a certain level of, like, the stress just got to be too much. And I remember feeling for my uncle, like, I want that for you too. I want you to be able to access that grief. And I think it's worth. Yeah, just naming that. Grief and anger are two of the most basic fundamental human emotions, and they are, I think, quite misunderstood. And. And. And our culture has gotten really weird about them with respect to men. So I. I wanted to also come back to that thing about anger. And what I've seen repeatedly in a lot of nice guys is, oh, I'm not angry. And whenever I hear that, I feel a little scared, like, I feel intimidated. I feel like this is, that's dangerous because every human being has anger. Every human being can access that part of them. But if you do, but if you've disowned it, if you put it over here, I'm not an angry person. I'm not. I don't get angry. No, I know. I'm really, really chill. What I hear in that is I am a suppressed person. I am a repressed person. I have parts of me that I don't want to look at and I don't to want, you know, And I'm sure that that comes from something. Right. I think a lot of those people, men and women, have had an angry person in their life that has caused a lot of destruction or someone who wasn't responsible with it. But that identity around. I'm not an angry person, or I don't get angry, or I don't. I don't get upset, or that there, there is. I have seen certain nice guys with a certain like, attachment to an identity around it. Like, I am a nice guy. I don't get angry. And to me, I feel actually less safe with him where I think he's trying to make me feel more safe. And I actually feel less safe. And I don't even feel safe to kind of say, like, wow, that doesn't make me feel safe because I feel like I'm just gonna get pushed back. There's not, like, there's not gonna be a lot of room there. Right. But I think that's something that, something encouraging I've seen in, in the growth of some of our men is particularly in in person work is really reclaiming that part of themselves and getting in touch with their anger or their rage in a safe way, meaning in a contained way with other people that are holding that with them that are really like, yeah, this is okay. This is an okay part of you. We want this with. From you, with you. You know, this is okay. And I think that a lot of men that I've been with personally have been scared of that part of themselves because they don't want to hurt someone. So they're afraid if I really go into it, if I really let myself go there, I'll hurt someone. And that's, you know, yeah, it can happen for sure. But if you're, if you're moving it responsibly. Right. If you're doing it at a workshop or you're doing it at a rage room, or you're, you know, working with a coach or a therapist, or, you know, you've got a wiffle bat and a, and a pillow or, you know, there's tons of ways to move the energy, but you can't move the energy if you haven't even claimed it. If you're, if you disowned it, you don't even have a shot at working with it. So I think that that's a really encouraging and kind of cleansing. It's a weird word to use, but a kind of cleansing experience that I've seen a lot of our guys go through of like, oh, yeah, like I, I can feel that part of me now. Like I'm, I'm in touch with it. Like, it's part of me and I don't have to be afraid of it or. Yeah, I'm just, I'm curious if you can touch on. Because I would say that you, you've lived this archetype. What has been your experience around reclaiming or owning or what was your world like when you were like, I'm a nice guy. Like, I don't get angry to, to moving past that.

Jason Lange: Yeah, for me, it wasn't so much like, I don't get angry. It was, what's the point? So I was raised in a house where, particularly as I kind of got into my teenage years, a lot of anger did move through. My dad in particular, a lot of shouting and yelling and fights with my mom, but it didn't translate to any kind of action. So it was like all of this energy and turmoil and then nothing would happen. So part of what I kind of internalized, and it wasn't just from that, it was from my types of neglect, was like, well, what's the point? Who cares? Why even. Why bother? It's not going to change anything is what I had internalized. And it was as I started doing this work, you know, and it still surprises me sometimes. People love it when I get angry. Like legitimately. They, they, they, they like when I get angry. They feel me more, they feel more conn. They trust me more. You know, this is totally different from aggression. It's not like I'm taking it out on people, but they, my wife likes it. Men in my men's groups like it that they connect to me more and believe in me more and I believe in myself more now, having that on tap when I can Move that and knowing, you know, I think there's a. There's also a thing, a direct correlation I often find, between our access to anger and self honoring that if we don't have access to anger, it can be really hard to honor self as well. And so there's a certain amount of dignity that came back for me and comes back for men as, as we bring that back online, right? That ability to be like, no, you know, I was just working with a guy on this stuff yesterday in a group. And the vitality that comes back online and feeling like, okay, this is. This is actually something, you know, and this is kind of is. This is going to be maybe a little controversial for some nice guys, but this is actually something the world needs more of from men. Healthy forward, facing righteous anger. Not, not anger about getting back at people, but anger about, this isn't okay, right? Like, what's happening to our planet, what's happening to our children, what's happening all over the place. Women are in a large way holding that torch right now. And I don't think there's enough men who, who are, who are taking up that mantle with healthy anger saying, this isn't okay. And we need more of that, you know, good anger. The type of anger we're talking about here that you can cultivate as a nice guy, it creates safety in the world, right? It's. It's a bit of a paradox, but it creates more safety. And the real safety, I'm not talking about the fake safety that we sometimes get caught up in as nice guys. If I can't step on anyone's toes or make someone uncomfortable, but it's that ability to really go to the truth of the moment and speak to when something's not aligned or something's not okay for myself or absolutely for others as well. Right. You know, what woman, what human being doesn't want to know that if they were in a moment of need, their partner could step in and create safety for them, right? Hey, this isn't okay. Back off, right? Or stop that. Get away from him. Get away from her. Whatever that is. That. That's a powerful thing when we feel that. So this, obviously, this is one I'm. I'm still on a journey on myself as I've learned to reclaim it from my lineage in a healthy way. But there's a lot of power there. And I do see men come alive. They really. They just legitimately come alive when they can start to tap into this power, which is often connected again to this sense of anger. Or caring. One of my teachers often put it.

Melanie Curtin: Yeah, I love that I'm. I can hear what you're saying about, you know, I feel you more like, I. There's. There is a sort of balancing effect, right. Of the explosive anger or the anger that doesn't actually. I'm going to give an example when we're talking about healthy anger versus unhealthy anger. Unhealthy anger is like, well, why did you do that? That. Why would you even think to do that? That's not healthy anger. That's not what we're talking about. What we're talking about is I'm angry that you went there without me. I felt out of control that I wasn't there to protect you. I'm angry about this. We need to talk. That's very direct. And then passive aggression is you don't tell the person that you're upset, but you're slamming dishes in the kitchen and they have to come to you. They have to come seek it out from you, and it's still hard for you to be direct about. Yeah, I'm angry. I felt left out, and I feel like I shouldn't feel angry, but there it is. That's the truth. And then moving the conversation from there. So healthy anger often sounds like, I'm upset about this. I'm angry about this. And I think that's, again, one of the reasons why it's important to find guides. It's important to find trustful people to help you figure out how to do this. Because we don't teach it in schools. We don't teach people how to relate. We don't teach them how to relate with one another. It's the most important thing we'll ever do in. In our lives. And it's not covered in school at all, which is pretty counterintuitive. But there you go. That's. That's where we are. There's something else I wanted to say about path. Oh, yeah. I think another thing that is important in the. The Nice Guy sort of journey is embodiment and really getting into the body instead of the head. So we have. We worked with a lot of guys who have just been in their head a lot, like, for a lot of their lives. Just a lot of being in their head. And what does that mean to come into your body? I can't tell you how many clients we've had where they're like, I still don't really know what that means. What does that mean? And I think the journey that we go on one of their transformations is around learning what that means, practicing what that means, actually getting in touch with their body. And one of the advantages that I've seen of that is to go back to that. That client who started attracting different kinds of women was because he was more in his body. He felt his attraction, he felt his draw. And he was. Because of the work that he was done, he felt the draw and he was able to go after it. It was like before, I think maybe he would have felt the draw but not felt empowered to go after it or to pursue himself. So he was just sort of taking whatever came towards him. But after that, he was embodied, could feel the drive and then go towards it. And it's the same in relationship. We've had a of nice guys in relationship, married nice guys who as they've gotten into their body, they've been able to lead their wives, they've been able to lead whether it's in sex or something else, but just like, yeah, I feel the impulse, and I'm able to do the impulse. I feel the impulse. I can do the impulse. And that I just want to say, as a woman, that's really what I want. I want your power. I want your direction. I want your impulse, I want to follow, I want, want, and I want it to be trustable. Right? Meaning I don't want it to just come from your head. I want to feel your balls. I want to feel you leading us from your authority, from your. From your hips. Right, from your grounded nature. I don't want, like, just your head calculating this. I want your power. I want your intuition. I want you to lead from there. And that's a trustable lead. That feels trustable. So we're going to start to move into. Yeah, the integrated man. What. What is that? What does that look like? You know, this is really what we're craving, what women are craving on a deep level and yearning for, because I think that's what I just talked about is one of the major hallmarks is an integrated man provides a trustable lead. He's trustable in his lead, and it doesn't mean that he always knows the answers. So, for example, I think you've spoken about this on the podcast before, but there. There was a period in your relationship where you said, I thought I could lead us through this part, and I can't. So I'm bringing someone in. Like, we're gonna get some help here, because I thought I could do this, and I can't. And to me, that is an integrated man move. That Is an integrated move. It's not. I'll fix it. I'll do it all myself. Like, I don't want to tell anyone. I can't. You know, we gotta hide it. We gotta make sure no one knows. No, it's. I thought I could handle this. I can't. I'm bringing someone in. I'm taking an action. We are taking an action for our relationship, for our family, because that's important. And that's more important than whether I look good or whether I have figured it out or whether, you know, whether I'm still in the man box. And I think that's a misunderstanding of. I guess it's just. It's really easy for us to map all these concepts in still a man boxy way. So I want to make it clear. The integrated man is. Is open to life. He is open to life, including help from outside sources for himself, for his partner, for his relationship, for his children, for his family. There's a certain openness, almost like porous. Right. It's like things can come in, things can flow out. There's an ease. There's an ease around. It's not. I do it all myself. It is not. We are interdependent and I am part of this.

Jason Lange: And it's. It. This integration we're talking about, you know, it's not a box. Because what it's about is actually being at choice. It's having the ability to go where needs to be gone in any given moment. I can go into vulnerability if I need to go into vulnerability. I can go into power and protection or. Or lustful taking if I need to. I don't have to in any given moment. There's no way I have to be. But I have the ability me to go there, and I'm that choice, and I'm free in that. And the limitation often of the basic bro or the nice guy is they don't have that ability yet. The basic pro doesn't know how to go to vulnerability when he needs to. The nice guy doesn't know how to go to. Now's the time to make the move and take it. Right? You've read the signs now. Trust your body. They haven't developed that capacity yet. So what we're talking about here is it's not about constriction into these things. It's about more freedom. It's more freedom to bring into the moment, into all your relationships in terms of what you can give and what you can receive.

Melanie Curtin: I think that's really well said. And I think that's when we're talking about finding the right guides. I think that, yeah, we're talking about therapists, coaches, plant medicine guides sometimes. So again, just the guides. Having people and elders and mentors that know the way and can show you the path and who can be with you as you walk, it is really what you're wanting. And again, men's groups are another place where you're with trustable people that are also showing up to grow, grow who you can grow with and who are learning the same things. Like, they are also learning how, okay, how do I, how do I be vulnerable and also masculine, right? How do I not lose myself? How do I show up for myself? How do I express anger without being an. Like, what the hell is that? And those are really the deeper questions that you want to be asking and engaging with if you want deeply powerful, intimate, healthy, passionate relationship. You know, it really does take, take this. And like you said, you can't fake it, so you have to be doing it to receive it. And I think what's been really encouraging in the clients we've worked with is that we've seen significant shifts in men that both that are dating, that are single and dating as well as in relationship. Right. But there's. Yeah, there's just a lot of possibility for growth in both of those areas. This. It's exciting. It's exciting. So as we start to wrap up here, if you are interested in working with us, you can go to evolutionary men. And right now I think this is gonna. This is. This episode will drop August 11th. So you still have time. Also, if you want to dive in the deep end, we would love to have you at our in person workshop that's coming up. And Jason, maybe you can tell them a little bit about where they can find that. That.

Jason Lange: Yeah. If you go to Evolutionary Men Retreat, you'll see all the info. It's from Thursday, August 31st through Monday, September 4th, Labor Day. And Mel and I will both be there along with about two dozen other men. We only got three slots left so if you're interested I would pull the trigger sooner than later. We have ride shares going on so if you're not in the state you can fly in and grab a ride up with someone and if you're in state you can just drive up there. But this is going to be one of the most powerful ways to make some big breakthroughs fast and actually get the experience of what it means to be around power, what it means to be around vulnerability and what it means to access. Access those inside yourself.

Melanie Curtin: Yes. And that will be in Northern California. We would love to see you there. It. Da da da da da da da da da da da da.