Masculinity and the Power of Community | the ACT OUT podcast

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): Welcome to the act out podcast, and I'm your host, Adam Tomlin. Today's guest is Jason Lange. He is a men's group coordinator and also the leader of Evolutionary Men. Let's roll the tape. Hey, Jason. How's it going, man?

Jason Lange: I'm so excited to be here. Thanks for having me.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): It is definitely my pleasure. Whenever. Whenever I saw your bio, I was like, oh, this guy's got a very easy job.

Jason Lange: That's right.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): How long have you been working with, like, men's groups?

Jason Lange: Sure. Yeah. So I've personally been involved just in terms of my own journey since about 2006 is when I got involved in my mid-20s, and then it's been about eight, nine years since I kind of took a professional turn in terms of. Okay, I really want to actively step into supporting men around this. And so some. Some sense. I've been going a long time. In some sense, I feel like I'm just getting started.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): So, like, whenever you. Whenever you first started out, like, was there in 2006. So I'm trying to, like, think of, like, what the, like, mental health situation was back then.

Jason Lange: Yeah.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): From my perspective, like, I was. I was in college then, and the. The idea of, like, feelings and emotions, the only thing I knew were that they were something that had to be conquered. And if you could. If you could suppress them as much as you can, or if you could figure out a way to, like, numb yourself or dissociate, that's all you needed to do, and you're fine. That was pretty much my concept of mental health back then.

Jason Lange: Yeah. Yeah, totally. It's changed so much.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): Right.

Jason Lange: Just even concepts of, like, meditation and mindfulness, you know, that was way kind of out there back then, and now it's much more part of the culture and yoga and wellness and, you know, when I got started, you said if you said the word men's group back then, most people would have associated it either with an aa, a recovery group, or some kind of church group, like a Bible study group. And those still exist. But the types of men's groups we're seeing kind of roll out in the culture now, you know, are a lot more focused on, okay, just wellness, you know, in a sense. And it is changing, and it is changing fast. And I think it's changing partly because there is a crisis. Right. Men have been struggling for a long time, and a lot of the places we've been vulnerable around mental health, I think, are just those places are getting more extreme where culture and technology is taking us in. That I mean, right back in 2006, you know, Amazon was still selling books, nothing else. Now you can live from your apartment, right. Literally click, and have everything shipped to your house and never even have to leave if you work from home. And that's a very different world than men were even living in back then. And it creates a lot of issues that I see showing up for a lot of men these days.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): It's really interesting that you said that men have been struggling for a really long time because I think that there's kind of a perception among some where actually men are just now like talking about struggling. There weren't any problems before. People were just fine back in 2006 and 1996, 1986. Men are just weak now. What do you say to that?

Jason Lange: Yeah, I think, I mean, part of the trajectory is the ways men used to cope have changed. And meaning, you know, back in the day, you were a so called successful man and family man if you provided. Right, right. That was actually the equation, like, are you bringing in money to provide for the family? And that was the deal. And that was enough. And some men found some success in that. A lot of men were drinking, depressed, overworking, cheating. Oh, there's, there's plenty of stuff under the surface there. And even if they weren't like, you know, technically in some kind of depressive state, it doesn't mean men were thriving back then because there was a very narrow range of where you were allowed to be as a man that definitely catches up with guys. So I think one of the shifts we've seen is, and one of the challenges is men are expected to be more these days. Right. I mean, there was, there's a crazy stat I saw, right. I got two kids, 1982, about 43% of fathers had reported they had never changed a diaper. By 2000, that had dropped to 3%. So you could, you can see the roles and the expectations were changing, right? Our parents generation, some previous generations. Yeah. You know, like all the kids stuff was in the realm of the mother. That's changed so much. We're expected to be a lot more involved as fathers now. And myself, many men I work with, we were raised by the fathers who weren't super involved and were just working all the time. And maybe it looked okay on the outside, but there was a lot of suffering on the inside. So as the roles and expectations for us men have changed, that's where a lot of men are coming to me. Like, I don't know how to win this game anymore. Like, I need to be making money, but my wife makes more money than me. I'm supposed to be emotionally present in the relationship. I don't even know what a feeling is. I could barely have any time to build friendships anymore. There's this sense that things have shifted, and men haven't been given a whole lot of examples of what healthy masculinity looks like right now. And, you know, you and I were talking a little bit before this, and in the vacuum of that, it's left space for all kinds of regressive masculinity to kind of try to reassert itself. No, let's just go back to the 40s and 50s and, you know, it sounds like a sweet deal, but it doesn't work. There's no going back. There's just no going back. And anyone who's trying to sell you that is literally just trying to sell you something. And we're being asked, you know, at as men to change and evolve and grow, man.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): So you. You hit it on a lot of things. But at the. At the very end, what you said, the. At, you know, talking about the kind of that. That manosphere and like, the product they're selling, it essentially boils down to, hey, you're human. I've got the cure for that. And it is. It is a trick as old as time that is so fascinating to me that these, like, regressive ideas are rooted so much in insecurity.

Jason Lange: Totally.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): And it's almost as if they're trying to harken back to a time that never existed in the first place.

Jason Lange: Yeah, totally.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): Yeah.

Jason Lange: Yeah. It's. It's. It's a bit of a. You know, it's all kind of made up. And just what I mean is, it is selling that kind of energy. It's actually quite fragile. Right. It's a fragility. It's a very fragile masculinity that has to be seen and experienced in a very certain way. And if not, you're not a man. And that's just frankly, fragile. Like, those guys don't have necessarily a lot of depth of fluidity or flexibility. You know, what I will say is, oftentimes the challenge with this kind of stuff is, you know, a cultural movement like that, there's often something at the root of it. And what I would say is maybe the positive at the root is we've kind of swung to a space where, for a lot of men, they don't feel like it's okay to feel pride in being a man. Hey, I'm a Man, I'm proud of being a man. I do manly things. Like, that's okay. There was a. There was a time where that kind of wasn't okay. And it was culturally, in a sense, necessary. Right. Men were kind of. The patriarchy is a real thing. We were kind of running the world in a lot of ways. And we have countless endless examples of what happens when men who are disconnected from their hearts, what they can do to the world, to the planet, to women, to children. We have, we've seen all that now. That's. That that's still being uncovered in our culture. And the thing is, that doesn't mean all masculinity is bad. It's just what we're addressing. There is a specific type of pathology in masculinity. So the, the good part, I think, is saying, hey, men, it's okay, right? It's okay to be proud of yourself as a man as long as you're showing up and as long as you're connected to your heart, as long as you care. You know, I tell a lot of people at this day and age, you know, the honest truth is we need more healthy men and masculinity. We don't need less. We just need men who know how to show up in their bodies, control their emotions, and aren't fragile.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): You can do every masculine thing in the book and be proud of it, that there's nothing wrong with that. Like, whenever there's. Like whenever you have a problem, it's if you think like, I do these things, therefore I'm better than, or doing these things makes me superior to another, to another person or another gender, whatever it is, that's not it at all. Like, you can be proud of doing what you're doing, but it doesn't mean that you're better or that that thing is better than anything else.

Jason Lange: Yeah, exactly. And so, you know, it's a movement, and it's a movement. You know, I think men have to be careful about right now because we are in the midst of a pretty, I think, significant moment in the challenges men are going to experience, because we do have generations of men who were raised, even though things have changed, who were still raised with this frame of your value as a man is in your capacity to provide. Right. Being a man means providing, and we are in the midst of a cultural economic shift that nobody knows where it's about to go. AI, automation, providing is not going to mean the same thing ten years from now it did back then. And if we don't, if we don't get men ready for this identity shift, it's only gonna get worse. And that's what these kind of manosphere people prey on is, hey, your identity is being taken away from you and you need to reassert it, you know, kind of posture aggressively versus what does it mean to be a meaningful masculine presence if the one thing you're supposed to be known for providing money isn't the thing anymore? Who are you? What do you want to create in the world? What do you wanna bring? How do you wanna relate? Those are deep questions and you can't answer them, you know, in little Instagram video, so to speak. You have to get, get in there and do the work, which is the kind of stuff I get inspired by.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): So where do you, do you think that the, that the idea of the measure of a man is how much he can provide? Where do you think that came from? And where do you see that idea is now, like, evolving to.

Jason Lange: Yeah, I mean, you know, some of it's cultural, some of it's biological in terms of just, you know, even caregiving a newborn. You know, those first couple of years, mom has to do more, right? The baby has to be closer to mom. And dad's job is to kind of set the stage so mom could be fully present with the kid, right? To kind of create the little environment that, that nurture.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): I nicknamed myself Useless Nips.

Jason Lange: Yeah, exactly, right. And that's all changed. You know, that's part of all this cultural change is bottle feeding. You know, there's way more ways we can be involved now that, you know, you couldn't back in the day. But a lot of that kind of comes from there. And this idea that this goes to some deeper stuff. And by no means is this a. This is more kind of a population level thing. Every individual is going to be different, but culturally and kind of worldwide to some extent, one of the big differences, right, in terms of male and female is reproduction. So. Right. Where's the bottleneck in reproduction? Woman can only carry one child at a time. A man can father literally as many children as he possibly could in a given moment. What this does biologically is it puts the scarcity on the female, right? And so traditionally, male bodies have been more disposable, right, in a sense, because if we have war or famine or something, right? We want to protect the women and children because just a couple of men is all it takes, right, to repopulate. But you lose all the women, you're, you're, you're having a hard time, right? That's, that, that's almost the end of everything. And that has bubbled up in all kinds of ways in the sense of, you know, it's definitely changed a lot. But traditionally, kind of war was the place of men going out and exploring was the place of men even today. Right. Mike Rowe, the dirty jobs guy, was, you know, kind of a big proponent to this. A lot of the most physically dangerous and demanding jobs tend to be held by men. And there's this general cultural sense that male bodies are just a little more disposable. Yeah, go work 80 hours a week. Like we're fed this stuff still today, right? Oh yeah, Elon's so great. He works 80 hours a week and he sleeps under his desk. Like, oh, that's something we want to aspire to. Like, what are you talking about? No, that comes at the cost of physical, emotional and mental well being. And so there's all of these cultural pressures, I think, that really push this providership narrative for men that if you're not providing, you're not useful. And it's a real impulse in men. You know, every man I know wants to be of some kind of service. He wants to know he has something to offer his community and world. And so it's not all bad. It just starts to put men in this narrow box which we talk about in this. Right in the world of men's work as the man box, right. To be a man, there's a certain box you have to exist in. And if you don't check all the little boxes inside there, you're not a man and you're considered less of. And that comes at us from culture, it comes at us from religion, it comes at us from other men. Sometimes it comes at us from women too. And so our work as men these days is starting to expand that and say, hey, is that actually all we are? Isn't it? Okay, we, we can be more, not be solely focused on providership. Or maybe, yeah, maybe the thing I want the most is not to be providing. Maybe I do want to be a stay at home dad and just be totally in there with my kids all day long every day. That is a new reality possible to men. That wasn't possible, you know, 40, 50, 60 years ago. It just wasn't in the culture in the same way. So we have more choice in a sense. But that choice can get confusing in a lot of ways where they start to feel lost. So, you know, this stuff still comes at us. And to some extent, I think what I'm starting To see is okay, maybe we can't quite fight the provider narrative, but what we can start to do is expand it that providing doesn't just mean bringing money. The thing you can actually provide that's genuinely the most valuable more than anything else is just your presence.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): Yes.

Jason Lange: Yeah, I'm actually here with my kid, with my spouse, with my family. I'm here. And that's a thing so many of us generationally just didn't have absent fathers barely around, get home at the end of the day, fall asleep watching tv. That's, that's a real wound that many men I know carry and that are inspired to find another way to do.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): Dude, you made too many good points. You blew my mind. I did not think of men being like so like more disposable and like worn stuff because of like how easily it would be for a man to be replaced like genetically and further, you know, like furthering along at that blew my mind. And, and yeah, I, I, I, I think that you're also correct whenever we're talking about this, as masculine as what, what it means to be a man kind of evolves over time to not to fight the provider narrative, but to yes. And it, you know, like, yes, it is more than, it is more than fine to, to want to be a provider. But thinking about it in just economic terms is where things take a no stuff. Whenever you focus so solely on one thing, you leave so many other things completely ignored. And ironically, whenever you ignore all those other things, you're not going to be able to do as well on the one thing that you're trying to do.

Jason Lange: Yeah, it's so true. Yeah. And I mean, I think this is part of the shifting sands of culture right now. And let me just be clear, it's not just men, right? Things have changed for women too. They're expected to be a lot more and do a lot more. So both sides are trying to figure out how do we, how do we win? How do we thrive in this new environment? And we're asked, you know, we're being called to be more, to be more fluid, to be more emotionally present, to be more involved in our kids lives, to yes, have a thriving career or something we can throw our energy into, but one that doesn't come at the expense of our families. Right. I mean this is a tale as old as time. I, I still see, right, that kind of providership narrative that men get sucked into. Okay, I graduate high school, maybe I get a trade degree, maybe I go to college and get a degree. I come out of that. Okay. What I'm supposed to do is find a partner, get married, have kids, and grind away in my career, make as much money as I can so that when I retire, they can be okay. I can be okay. And what happens in that career gap is all the energy goes into the career. Kids hit teenage years, man hits middle age, maybe exit middle age. Kids no longer need them, leave the house. Spouse is like, hey, you and I haven't had an actual relationship for 20 years. I'm not in love with you anymore. I can't do this. I don't even know who you are. You haven't been here. And she leaves, and the man's left. Like, wait, what? I thought I was doing my part. Like, I was told this is what I had to do. I'm confused. I'm hurt, I'm mad. And that's. You know, I. I work with a lot of guys coming. Coming to me at that period of like, wow, I didn't know. I didn't know. And it turns out my partner was suffering the whole time, or my kids were suffering the whole time. And now I have to, like, try to go salvage a relationship with them because I thought I was doing the right thing, you know, taking the job, always upgrading, doing that thing. But it turns out they missed me, and I didn't actually put in the time on that relationship. And learning to mend that is, you know, it's a big deal. And it's not all a man's fault, because we're taught, you know, this is what you're supposed to do, and we're just having to rewrite that narrative now that. That's part of what you're supposed to do, but there's other things that are just as important for you to do.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): And.

Jason Lange: And that's where men need a lot of training, because we are just not taught how to be in our bodies, how to be relational, how to communicate all the things that we've kind of been pointing towards under the surface.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): I think in a lot of ways, it kind of. It feels like you're. You're in a. Like, someone just kind of threw you in a boat and like, okay, good luck. And they didn't tell you, like, hey, if you look down, there is an oar, and if you place that oar into the water, you can actually change the direction of the. Of the way that you're going, you know, and you. You. All of a sudden, there's. There's cells as well. So if. If something happens, you can pull These up. It's like you're just kind of thrown in the middle of something and expected to, to pick it up. It's. It's unrealistic. So I guess that's where you come in.

Jason Lange: Yeah, that's right. Yeah. Learn it. Learning, you know, I mean, it's one of the great. On that same story of kind of I grind away for 20 years. You know, oftentimes I'll get to men who have kind of hit the career success and then they've never actually stopped to ask themselves though, what do I want? Like, where's it all going? So, oh my God, okay, I've made this amount of money or I finally got the position and it actually requires me to be away from home or be working all the time. And I never actually thought about what's, what's the actual lifestyle I want to live. And then they finally get there and they wonder why they're miserable. So a lot of what I do with men is like, hey, let's figure out where you want to get. Like, literally how do you want to be living your day? And then we'll reverse engineer from there. What kind of career choices, health choices, relationship choices do you need to make to get you there? And a lot of guys just never stop to actually figure that out or simultaneously they just fall prey to the probably the greatest masculine myth there is. Of course, once I X, then I'll feel y. Once I get the raise, then I'll feel financially safe. Once I finally get the woman, then I'll feel like it's enough. Once I da da da. Once I retire, then I'll actually have time to enjoy my life. And it just doesn't play out that way, man.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): I wish you would have told me that like five years ago. That would have saved me so much money in therapy, man. But that, that has been that that was the story of my life. Like I always assumed, like if, if, if I can do this, then this is going to happen. And I am set. And it was expecting things to like, give me a sense of identity that was never going to come from the outside world.

Jason Lange: There you go. That's it exactly. And so that's part of what we're just being asked to. Yeah. Get the ore in the water and actually make some conscious choice about where we want to go. That includes more of our humanity as men. So we're not just productivity machines grinding away in a, in a system that ultimately doesn't care about our well being, you know.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): Right.

Jason Lange: Wants to extract and you know, that's just how it is. But we have a lot of responsibility we can take for, okay, well, how do I want to participate and what kind of life do I want to create?

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): So the like your average, your, your average client. How many like men do you have in a, in a group at a time?

Jason Lange: Yeah, it depends on the different programs I run. Some I keep pretty tight. It's just like 10 minute ones. Some it's 15 to 20. I got private clients, I got people in the community. So, you know, I've worked with, you know, 5, 600 people over the years at this point. And men's groups, when I lead those, those tend to be 6 to 12 people. That's like the real 6 to 12 of where, where men can really drop in and feel connected to each other.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): Now, like in your experience, do, do guys need to be around the same age, like in order to have a, have a good group or is it nice to have a mix of like having, you know, some of us old folk in there as well as, you know, some of the younger guys as well?

Jason Lange: There's, there's real pros to both. So it's one of those both and situations where there's something great about just feeling people in a similar life stage and kind of moving through that together and the shared reality of culture and history and all that kind of stu. So that does. That is meaningful. But what I will say is that, yeah, the most potent place is when it's a bit of a mix. Because I think one of the big shifts and losses we've experienced in our culture, particularly the younger generations, is they don't get to spend time around older, more mature men. Right. Just the way communities and society have shifted, there's often just not that presence where if you're a young kid, like somebody who's 60 years, why would I ever talk to that person? Right. Like they, they have nothing to do with my life in the way that old men's clubs or church groups or just even the old kind of trade system. Right. This is Robert Bly, who's kind of one of the pioneers of the men's movements in the 90s. He writes about this in Iron John. And one of the big shifts that really impacted boys, men and masculinity was, you know, back in the day, right around 8, 9 years old, in a lot of traditional cultures, boys are kind of taken by the men to go learn a trade or learn some way to be of service in their community. And what happens then is they spend all day in the shop with dad or uncle or the guy down the street, and they're learning from him, right? And they're not just learning the trade, they're learning, ooh, I. How does he handle stress? How does he handle relationships with other people in the town or whatever that might be? And there's, there's like a transmission of wisdom there to guide the young boy into manhood. That all, you know, and again, I'm talking kind of population level stuff here. But that really changed once the industrial revolution hit. And what started to happen was, well, actually, dad doesn't work at home anymore. He doesn't work in the local shop. Instead he goes away to the factory all day and you get sent to school. And school, you know, it's been a mix, but traditionally has been more led by women. So boys were spending more and more time with women for a longer portion of time. And then maybe we'd get into some kind of sporting or coaching thing. But there's a real gap, I would say, in our culture of boys, young men, adults, older men getting to connect. And just the wisdom of that. And the cool thing is, yeah, from the elder populations down, there's just all kinds of wisdom in relaxation that gets transmitted of like, oh, yeah, I've been there. I messed up like that. I totally got it. I, I've been, you know, it kind of makes it okay that, yeah, it's, it's okay to mess up like you're going to get through it. I've had kids. I did the thing, da da, da, da. And then through the other direction, actually, there's a lot of vitality that gets transmitted from the young up to the old. A certain verve for life, a plugged inness to the culture that kind of wakes up the older people. And it's like, oh, yeah, cool. It's like, it's so fun to feel that energy, that zest again. So it can be such a great gift to each other. But outside of, you know, men's work, in men's circles, you just don't see those types of connections forming nearly as much anymore. You know, even in terms of careers, you know, one of the big changes generationally is like, you know, our parents, they like get into a job. You'd work at the same place, like 20, 30 years and kind of work your way up the rank, right. Start in the mail room, get all the way to the top. That doesn't happen anymore. People like the whole career trajectory, people are floating around all the time. There's a lot more contract work. You have Less opportunities for that kind of mentorship to begin with. And that's where I think a lot of young boys and younger men do get lost because they're like, I need help, but I don't even know who to talk to to get help. Right.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): Yeah, no, I, absolutely. I, it's so, it's so interesting me, as you were, as you were saying that I was thinking of like, as we grow up how like little we kind of invest into children. Like if you think about like, so in the, if you're going to play like in a professional sports league, you're going to have a, like a good coach is going to be with you, very good portion of your career. You know, you're going to, you're going to be with that person for, for a very long time. Like, think about like whenever we're in school, teachers are going to be around for a year and then you're going to see, see another one the next year, another one the next year. And as, as now we are in like the kind of the socio or the economic society that you're talking about, where we are moving around from contract to contract, place to place. There is absolutely no opportunity. You know, there's. Not only is there, there's not an opportunity like realistically, but I don't even think guys consider, like, hey, I'm missing something here. Like I, I don't even think that a lot of people even realize they're missing something to begin with.

Jason Lange: Yeah, it's so, it's so, so true. And it's one, it's something I see in the work I lead in men's groups. I lead when men finally have the experience of getting connected to other guys and feeling support and community and instead of the kind of normal lone wolf, I gotta do it all myself. Men are competition. It's like realizing there's this fuel source they didn't even know was available to them and they get plugged into it and they're like, whoa, I was running on fumes. Like, I can't believe how little I was working with there. And now that I have like a safe, supporting, loving community of men who will, yes, also call me out of my bullshit when I'm veering off course.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): Wow.

Jason Lange: Turns out I can do a lot more in my life. I feel much more. You know, this is the thing a lot of guys I work with kind of get wrong is they, they, they set these goals and then they don't get them and then they feel bad about themselves and they oh, I just gotta Work harder, da da da da. And oftentimes the part of us that wants to be bold, take risks, go for it, try new things, that actually comes online much more powerfully. When we feel safe, it's very simple. Like when there's a net underneath us to catch us, then making mistakes doesn't feel like a big deal. The, the, the young guys who don't have that support around them, who don't have mentorship, who don't have peers. This is how I lived. You know, in my early 20s. I was so afraid of messing up. I went ahead, like, I got to do it all perfectly. So my, my nervous system felt like this. Okay, I gotta research this one little step. Gotta research this one little step. And I didn't have a lot of success, you know, because of it, in a sense. And what I've seen in men's group is there's this space of, oh, hey man, we got you, we got your back. It's okay to go out and make mistakes and mess things up in that kind of love and connection. Turns out it's really good for our nervous systems. It helps relax us in. A relaxed, well regulated nervous system can get so much more done.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): But when, whenever you were, whenever you were talking about being so afraid of, of making the mistake that you kind of over, like, would overwhelm yourself, I was like, so afraid of making a mistake that I couldn't even start. Like, I, I wouldn't even be able to.

Jason Lange: There you go.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): Because I was, I was like, if, if it's not perfect, I'm not going to be able to do it. And it did not, it didn't work that way.

Jason Lange: And I was like, so my case too? Yeah, I just, I resonate with that.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): And looking back, I think that at the time I was obsessed with being disciplined. I've got to have discipline. And I looked, I think I looked at discipline as the ability to overcome yourself. You know, like, if I could just overcome all of these bad things, then I, I, I, I, I've got it. I now see discipline is being able to consistently work with myself. And whenever, whenever I had that switch, man, all of a sudden I can do so much more stuff. Like, yeah, I can start a podcast. I'm all of a sudden not afraid to get behind a microphone and make a jackass of myself every once in a while. Like, it's, it's very liberating.

Jason Lange: I love that it's such a shift. And you know, again, it's part of that identity shift from paradoxically, the less I'm only as worthy. I'm only worth as much as I do or create turns to create. Right. It doesn't create a psychology of I want to try stuff, I want to get out there. And instead, as we relax, to, okay, my job is just to kind of follow my curiosity, work with myself. I'm going to have updates, I'm going to have bad days. It creates so much more room to move. Right? And, you know, I've seen this kind of socioeconomically in the sense of,

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): you

Jason Lange: know, guys I've worked with who come from families who have financial resource, right. Sometimes by the time they're 25, they've launched and failed five, six, seven businesses, right? I mean, just like, I tried it, but I messed up, but it was okay because we actually had the resource. And so then by the time they're 30, they've launched something and it looks super successful. And in the outside, they look like some kind of prodigy, and. But you just never see that. Oh, actually, what they had was the safety to make mistakes and learn, and it was okay. And when we don't have that safety, like you said, it gets a lot more paralyzing. And this, I think, ties into one of the things I teach around, you know, the uniqueness of men's work, men's groups, and what I would say is, you know, masculine compassion and love. And I kind of tie it to father energy, right? And I don't mean it just in terms of biological father energy, but if I could kind of sum up the father energy at its greatest gifts and where we all need it the most, it's just this very simple thing, and it's a presence that gets in there with you and says, let's figure it out together. You made a mistake there. Okay, that's cool. Let's. Let's figure it out. What. What went well? What didn't go well? Oh, yeah, you try this. That didn't work. Oh, you failed here. Oh, she rejected you. That's okay. It's okay to make mistakes. It's okay to mess up. Let's. Let's figure it out together. And it's that feeling of someone with you who helps you sort through the mistakes and find the path forward. And so many guys, myself included, just didn't really have that. And so that's where that kind of fear of making mistakes comes in. But as we get that. And part of what I teach is, you know, you can get that through a men's group, through a community. Turns out it's like, oh, okay, Cool. I don't have to do everything perfectly. I'm allowed to go out there and explore and experiment and try stuff. And whatever happens, that is the learning, right? That is where I actually learn something valuable that helps me take it forward in a meaningful way. And that's an energy. Men, women, you know, anyone in between, I think we all need that, that safety of, okay, someone's here to guide me and just help me figure it out, and it's not a big deal.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): I, I, I can't believe I'm, I'm about to share this. So, literally yesterday I, I was kind of doing, doing like, a meditation, just checking in, seeing what was going on with me. And I was feeling, I was feeling a, like a sense of anxiety. Whenever I, like, kind of feel a sense of anxiety, I'm like, hey, man, like, what, what do you want to say? What, what, what, what do you got for me? And, like, you know, as, like, as it was going, it was essentially like, you know, like, I, I'm afraid you're not going to be there, you know, like, and, and it was like, so, you know, like, what then? And, like, just the, the thought came to me. It's like, if I'm not there, then I'll be there to help you fix it. And saying that meant, like, I started crying. Like, I, like the, like, but it was crying. There was, like, chills. Like, it was a, it was a very, like, very, very cathartic feeling. And all it was was just being curious and compassionate with myself. That was all it took. Wasn't being a drill sergeant.

Jason Lange: Yeah. I think that's one of the major shifts for men that I'm seeing play out. And, I mean, it's just a simple thing that, you know, shame does not work as a motivator or teacher. We like to think it does, but it just doesn't. Right. Because then we're always acting out of the fear or the not enough. You know, I see it with my kids. I see it with, in the parenting world, I see it with men I work with. And it's like, what was so beautiful about that moment is that's the exact moment that what your nervous system needed was not shame or to put yourself down. It was just compassion. Right? Like, oh, yeah, man. Yeah, totally. I get it. You're afraid. Your nervous system feels heard in that. And it's like, great, cool. Put me back in coach. Right? Like that. That's the beauty of that. And it's a, it's just a very different way to relate. That is Changing, I think, thankfully, in how we relate to boys, men, and each other. But, you know, it takes time. And you're a great example of, you know, it starts with us. It just starts with individually, like, okay, can I be compassionate with myself first? Because the more I can do that, the easier it's going to be to bring that to other people as well.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): Shame is. Shame's a tricky one because you think that it's working for you because shame works incredibly well until it doesn't. What would happen with me? I would. Like, something would happen. Like, nope, I will never do that again. Like, I come down on myself so hard and I was like, the goal is whatever it is, I would be such a Spartan towards that goal for a bit. You know, like, I could do it for a while, but then whenever I would mess up, I would just start a cycle of shame and it would just be a rinse and repeat thing that I would just go in a circle over and over again.

Jason Lange: Yeah, it's so brutal. I think it's just overused in a lot of ways. For men, you know, there's a time and place for healthy shame. Right. Which is just the recognition. Oh, I made a choice. I'm not so happy with that choice. It got reflected to me. But, you know, Brene Brown's really good at this. She, you know, really teases apart. There's a difference between shaming the behavior and shaming the person. And where I think a lot of men go wrong is it's not, oh, what I did wasn't optimal. It's, I'm a piece of shit.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): Yep.

Jason Lange: Which is a totally different equation. Right. And when we do it at that identity level, it's just poisonous. That's word gets used a lot. But it's toxic. That's the toxic version versus just, oh, hey, I made a choice there that in retrospect, I would like to do differently next time. So I'm just going to get curious about, why did I make that choice? And lo and behold, a lot of times it goes back to our nervous system, our childhoods, what we learned, how we learn to protect ourselves, what we think will get us what we want. And we just have to start to see that clearly and bring compassionate compassion to that part of ourself.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): And it shows another, like, pitfall or a danger of putting your identity in external things. Because whenever that happens, it is very easy to attribute, like, a mistake to, well, no, it wasn't that I'm a piece of shit. It's not, you know, that thing Went wrong. I'm bad. So that's it. Man, this. This conversation's been so much fun.

Jason Lange: Yeah, it's great.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): So whenever. I think you said you started in 2006, right, with men's groups. Yeah.

Jason Lange: That's when I got in my first group.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): How have you seen kind of the type of men that come in change over time?

Jason Lange: Yeah, yeah. I would say there's just a lot more of it, you know, I think is the thing that's happening right now where back then, you know, most, you know, I was in Boulder, Colorado, at the time, which was a little bit more kind of hippie growth edge, you know, common to have men's groups, but outside of that, they weren't really that present. Now you can kind of go to any major town or city, and there's something happening in the men's work world. So it's really just expanding in a really meaningful way. And I think we're just starting to see this shift that, you know, even if we just keep it in the realm of effectiveness, you know, most men want to be effective. They want to be able to have a goal, move towards it, create the things they want. And it turns out you can be a lot more effective when you're also including your physical, emotional, and mental wellbeing. And so I think a lot more guys are waking up to that. And so I see just a much more expanded population of men, both young and old, kind of coming into the fold of, you know what I tried. The lone wolf thing kind of sucks. I don't. I'm a little scared to try something else, but here I am. I'll try it. Right. I'm ready for anything at this point. So I do see it really changing in just that I think it's much more part of the culture. I think we're much more aware. You know, it's rarely a month goes by, someone doesn't send me an article from a magazine or a newspaper about the boys crisis, the men's crisis, the mental health crisis. So it's. It's percolating like we're recognizing, okay, we need to do something different here as men. And I think men's groups are one of the best solutions to that because it fulfills so many deep needs for us. So I see more and more guys showing up across all generations that it's just like, hey, I want to do something different here. I want. You know, I need community. Just that simple. I need community. I want good men in my life, because my life gets better when I have Good men in my life.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): First of all, Boulder is an incredible town. Like, I love that place.

Jason Lange: Yeah, yeah, yeah, totally.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): Oh, man. I started thinking about Deion Sanders, and I distracted myself. So with these. With these groups and kind of like, as they've. As it's gotten more and more popular, I think one of the biggest shifts. Shifts, and it's kind of like something that I saw in the sketch, like in 2000, you know, hey, Adam's in therapy. They're like, what in the world is wrong with that guy? And then now in 2026, it's like, wait, Adam's not in therapy? Like, what. What's wrong with that guy?

Jason Lange: Yeah, totally.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): I.

Jason Lange: And I think that's a really positive shift, right? I tell guys all the time, you know, again, some of the masculine culture, I think, still makes it generally a little more comfortable for guys to go to something like coaching. I think even if it's just the word coaching, first in therapy still has a little bit more of a stigma, but it is changing. And I, you know, I ding the bell on so many guys. I'm like, dude, do you only go to the gym when you've had an injury and are recovering? They're like, no, I go to, you know, get stronger. Same thing. You don't go to therapy just when you're broken. You go to maintain and grow your edge, right? It's. It's just the gym for your. Your heart and your mind in a. In a big sense. And it has massive payoffs, right? Getting into a good therapeutic relationship, learning a little bit about your history, freeing yourself from some of that stuff, again, it can just make you more effective. So I love seeing that it's getting normalized in the culture, because I think every man should have a coach, a therapist in a men's group. If, man, if that happened, world would change so fast. So fast, and we would all be doing a lot better.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): What do you think is, like, the biggest misconception that you see from guys whenever they, like, start working with you?

Jason Lange: Yeah, I was just talking about this one recently because I still see it all the time. It's that so many men think they're so called negative emotions, which in the work I do, I don't even. We don't even call positive or negative. There's just. There's. There's light notes on the spectrum. There's dark notes on the spectrum. Right. It's just like a scale on a piano. One's not better than the other, but for the. The more challenging things. Grief, fear, Shame, sometimes even anger. So many men have this story that me sharing that would be a burden to you. And if I tell you how sad I am, it's going to make you sad, and that's going to be a burden. And I don't want to be a burden. This is a thing I see so many guys go through. And then here's the experience they'll have. Another guy in circle will do some deep work, step into their grief or their anger, their fear, their shame, do it in, you know, a fully present, not collapsed, not posturing way, and just get in there and face it and deal with it. And the guy does that. And they're like, oh, my God, thank you so much for doing that. So inspiring to see you. Like, you're so strong. Right? I can't believe, like, I don't know if I could do that.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): And.

Jason Lange: And they actually get lit up. They get lit up by seeing another man deepened into his experience. And then here's the moment where I'm like, well, you realize that's how other men experience you. When you do the same thing, it's not a burden. It's actually a gift. And in the same way, you got inspired by that man and are like, well, I wasn't going to share that until I saw Adam. You know, he. He bravely talked about that tender moment. And then I was like, man, I can do that, too. That's exactly what happens for you. And it just. It's like a matrix moment for guys where they're like, wait, me bringing myself forward isn't a burden to you guys. You guys can handle it. And let me know if it is. Like, you'll just be like, hey, man, I just don't have the capacity today. No problem. Right? And it's just like, blows their minds. And suddenly it becomes this different kind of leadership in a group where a man realizes, when I bring myself forward, it's not just selfish. It actually serves the other men in my group because it creates more of an invitation for them to do the same. And when every man is doing that, it becomes this incredible vehicle of connection and transformation.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): And every time that you get to do that, your brain is making the connection. Whenever I'm vulnerable, whenever I step up and I do something courageous, something good can happen. And creating. Allowing your brain to create that reality is freaking powerful.

Jason Lange: Exactly.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): I think a lot of times people don't realize the extent to which you can mold your reality. This is so fascinating to me.

Jason Lange: Yeah. Yeah. And it's. It's. I think one of the real, somewhat related, but one of the real powers I see in a group to kind of maybe even tie it back to some of the stuff we were talking about in the beginning is one of the challenges these days is when we don't have a lot of connection in our life as men. We're, we are for better or worse, gonna try to find approval out in the world somewhere and we're gonna care what does so and so. Think about it. If I post on social media or say whatever, da da da da. One of the cool things I see about a group is that shifts. And what I mean by that is, you know, I, I'm part of a, a long standing group. I'm part of a couple groups, but those are the men whose opinions I give a shit about because they know me. They actually know me. Warts and all the things I'm struggling with, the things I'm good at, what I want in my life, they're the ones whose feedback I actually really listen to. Don't find myself nearly as concerned with what everyone else is thinking these days because they don't actually know me. Right. They're judging some expectation or image on me and the, the freedom I've found in that is so amazing. Right. To again then allow me to go out, speak my voice, take risks, try things, be myself in the world to some extent. Because I'm like, okay, cool, I got some people tracking me and if I get off course they're going to let me know or if I'm not showing up in the ways I say I want to be showing up, they are going to let me know. So that relaxes my nervous system so much because it means I don't have to be quite as vigilant as I used to be.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): Dude, you have blown my mind twice today. First was with the, with the war. And then the second, I did not quite connect until you talked about it. Whenever I feel like a less of a sense of connection and then how that correlates to trying to seek approval.

Jason Lange: Yeah.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): As you were talking about that, that I'm definitely guilty of that. Yes. Okay. That, thank you so much.

Jason Lange: Yeah, yeah, it's, well, it's hardware and one wisdom in my, in my own life. And you know, once I saw it then I was like, oh this, this is worth teaching people. Like I, I, you know, it's, it's, it's kind of like a good group inoculates us against manipulation in a sense because you know, the, the red pill that the, you know, so much in the world right now wants to take advantage of our pain and so we can be manipulated, you know, oh, your pain, that's not your fault. That's these people's fault. Right. And once you get someone into that, you, you can use them in all kinds of way. When I, when I'm in a group and my pain's my responsibility and I'm getting my approval from them, I'm like, what are you talking about? This is what matters, not that. And it, it creates a level of freedom that I think is really empowering.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): I would be weary of anyone who tries to sell you a cure that is like outside of working on yourself.

Jason Lange: Yeah, exactly. That's a great way to put it. It's a great way to put it. I, that's. Yeah, I love that.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): If your problems are because of a woman or someone that looks different than you. No, that's not it, big guy. Whenever, whenever I think about that, you know, there were, there were definitely moments whenever, like I would see someone, one that was like secure and strong in themselves and that made me viscerally uncomfortable. I would get like, I would not like that at all. And my, whenever I think about it, it's sad because whenever that moment happened and I saw someone that was strong and secure and I realized, hey, there's a power hang here. I'm not as strong as that person. My inclination wasn't I should get stronger, it was that person needs to get weaker. Yeah, that bumps me out.

Jason Lange: I love that. Yeah, yeah. That's such a great insight. And yeah, Terry Real teaches about this I think in a brilliant way and now I see it everywhere of just. He calls it one up, one down. That rather than relating to people as equals, our default is often posturing grandiosity. I'm better than or for a lot of guys I work with. Right. I work, I consider myself work with a lot of so called nice guys that the posture is one down. Oh, wait, wait, wait. I'm so sorry. Like I didn't mean to do that. I don't want to hurt you. I don't want to make you uncomfortable. And there's this constant kind of putting down when the real work is to just come into balance and be like, hey, neither of us are perfect. I have some gifts, you have some gifts. I have some weaknesses, you have some weaknesses. How can we actually relate to each other? And that's actually a far more vulnerable place to be because it's less about controlling and it's more about relating.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): Dang man. Like dude, you have like Way too many insights, man. This is. How can folks get in contact with you?

Jason Lange: Yeah, absolutely.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): People want to join a men's group.

Jason Lange: Totally. Yeah. If you like kind of what I'm. I'm spouting here, you can check me out at Evolutionary Men. So not dot com, but dot Men. And on there, I've got my own podcast, writings, programs, information about men's groups, free quiz guys can take all kinds of fun stuff coming down the loop. And, you know, and there's a contact form, so if you're like, okay, I hear you. My bell is rung. How do I find a men's group? You don't even need to work with me. Literally. Just where are you in the country? What are you looking for? I'm so well connected to this point, I'll try to route you to something that's meaningful for you.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): Oh, man, that's actually a great idea. And I'm going to contact you as well. I'd like to kind of to get into that loop. As you know, I've got the podcast and, you know, I think it'd be good to try to get this going. Yeah.

Jason Lange: Love it. Awesome.

Host (the ACT OUT podcast): Yeah. Well, Jason, this has been an absolute pleasure, man. Thank you so much for acting out with me, bud.

Jason Lange: Yeah, thanks so much for having me, Adam. It's been brilliant.