The Problem With How Most Guys Relate to Each Other

All right, and welcome back. So today we're going to talk about the problem with how most guys relate.

And it actually starts with that key word at the end, relate, in that most men don't actually relate. In mainstream culture that a lot of us are raised in, most men connect via triangulation. So instead of me facing you and having a conversation about what it's like to be you, what's going on in your life, etc.

Etc. Most masculine culture focuses on relating via a third thing. So instead of me looking at you and talking about my life, we are focused on some third thing, and that's our experience of connection. So that third thing could be a big one for a lot of guys.

Sports, could be women, could be money, could be some kind of activity like working on cars or fixing things, collecting things, talking about movies, whatever that might be. For most men, that is the type of connection they have available to them with other men. We can talk, but the focus and our orientation has to often be on this third thing.

And you'll see this physically a lot of times, right? It'll actually show up in the structure of where men are facing with each other. And in a lot of popular places, they're not facing each other, right? They're facing out for that third thing. Now, there's nothing wrong with relating via triangulation, relating via external things. The problem with it is it leaves most men desperate and thirsty for real connection.

Seen this time and time again with men I've worked with in men's groups or coaching, they're not used to actually relating to other men, facing other men, having conversations with other men about what's happening in their lives and what's happening for them in the moment with each other, that type of connection, incredibly nourishing for all human beings.

We're wired for it. The trick is, as I've talked about before, the way a lot of mainstream masculine culture has played out, we don't get that nutrient from other men, which means for a lot of nice guys, they mainly get that from women, from the feminine. They get women who can look at them, talk to them, have a conversation about how they're feeling and what's going on in their lives.

That person, for a lot of guys, then is also the person they're dating or married to or in relationship with. Again, it doesn't mean there's anything inherently wrong with that. But that becomes a problem when it's your sole space for getting actual relational connection. Puts a lot of pressure on that relationship. If we think of it as a circuit, it's all running right there.

So something goes wrong with that one. It can be really hard for guys having the experience of being able to drop in and connect deeply with other men and actually talk about life. Right? What are my hopes? What are my fears? What's been really hard? What am I celebrating? What's my edge? Where do I feel like I'm failing? All of that stuff can come out when we're actually relating with other men face to face.

Now. It's one of the things I love right about sitting in circle with other men. There's an actual orientation to our bodies of facing in towards each other. Or these days, with a lot of the virtual groups, I run and many run, we're facing our screens but facing each other. We're looking at each other. We can actually see each other all at the same time. It's one of the powerful things about the virtual arena versus sometimes even sitting in a circle.

You can't see the people right next to you. Having the ability to talk to other men and having the experience, not having to keep our armor up with other men is a game changer for guys. Now, a lot of men are resistant to it or don't believe it's possible or even afraid of it because of how messed up most mainstream masculine culture is, right?

Particularly when we're growing up, there's a shaming of showing weakness, emotions, or feeling. Right? Don't be a pussy. These awful words, right? That feelings were somehow less than masculine. It's bullshit. It's totally bullshit. Of course, I've referred to this in other episodes, But a real man has the capacity to be with all of his feelings, not become overwhelmed by them, not react against them.

A lot of guys that make fun of feeling are afraid of them. They're afraid of touching and experiencing their own feelings, so they deride and push it away in others to make themselves feel better. Now, it takes practice to actually slow down and learn how to relate face to face, heart to heart, soul to soul with other men.

For a lot of men I've worked with, just that experience alone can be incredibly healing. Wow, these are guys that aren't attacking me, aren't judging me. Doesn't mean they might not have strong Feedback for me and the way I'm showing up in the world. But they're not tearing me down because I'm sharing something real about my life. They're actually supporting me, getting even deeper into it so I can move forward in the ways I want to move forward in my life.

Now, particularly for men that have had any kind of actual trauma with bullying or siblings or sports culture, all the different things were kind of hammered into us as guys that you're not allowed to do, right? You have to be in a certain spectrum, tough, stiff upper lip, don't show any weakness. Now coming out of that, for a lot of guys, that's where some of that hesitancy comes. You know, I've tried talking to other men.

They either can't meet me in it, aren't interested, or in the worst case scenario, a lot of men have experienced, you know, they attack me for it, they shame me for it, they make fun of me for it. So I learn I don't do that with other men. Well, that's an important thing that we're working hard to rewire and redo in our culture right now. Because it's amazing as guys to be able to connect to women whether you're sexually attracted to them or not, right?

The feminine women, they're incredible at relating often more naturally than a lot of men who haven't yet received training or been in the types of experiences to learn how. But there's something different about it, right? There's something unique about being met by other men who get it, who get what the experience is like of being a man in this day and age, being a father or a husband or divorcee, whatever that might be, other guys get it, just get it instinctively, intrinsically.

And when we can actually start talking about those things which most of us have been trained and taught to hide from other men. When we can cross that threshold into revealing what's really true for us, what's vulnerable for us, what's not working for us, what we think is shameful in our life, or what we think is broken about us in our life and no one else when we can bring that up, hey, I'm really hurting.

I'm struggling right now. My life's were not where I wanted to be or I just don't know how to make my relationship work. I can't seem to move forward. And my job, my to do list just seems like it grows and never, never shrinks. I just don't have enough money, you know, whatever it is, I've heard it all men who have open hearts and can connect in this way, they'll get it.

And the feeling of being met by another man like that, who sees it, hears it, feels it, understands it, and gets it relaxes something in the masculine nervous system. Part of us actually relaxes. You mean I don't have to put on all that bravado or show or pretend like I have it all together?

Nobody has it all together. Everybody has wins, everybody has losses in their life. Everybody has things they're working at, growing at. There's something about being met by other men in that that becomes deeply healing and deeply nurturing for us. And for a lot of guys, these types of group experiences are one on one experiences. With men who know how to connect in depth, they can be life changing experiences.

There's something about being able to relax into the presence of other men who have us in that moment, understand us in that moment, and don't need us to pretend to be anything else than we are exactly as we are in that moment. That's when I see just pounds of stress melt away from men's nervous systems. Wow.

I've never said that to anyone or no one's ever heard that story. I've heard that many times in different groups I've led. You can actually see men get lighter when they're able to share these parts of themselves and be met by others while doing that. The stuff has changed my life. Helped me navigate moving to a new city, helped me navigate leaving a relationship that was comfortable but ultimately I knew was not in service of me or her.

Helped me navigate the first years of my marriage as I was learning what the fuck I was doing and how to actually show up in my life with my wife. And it's helped me navigate the challenges of becoming a father and having unexpected twists and turns in the birth of my daughter and knowing that there's actually a place I can go where I can step in front of other men and let go and be held and just melt.

Done that many times with trusted men in my life since I started doing this work where literally just get through the door and boom, it all drops out all the feelings, all the emotions. I don't have to do anything. Nothing has to change yet. The guys are just with me, with me in that oftentimes they get it in their own ways. And then after, and only after they've been with me, they can help me make a plan.

Sometimes I've been so disoriented or so crushed, I don't know what the fuck to do next. To move forward, to heal, to help a situation. That's where masculine support really comes in. Hey, brother, I feel you. I hear you. That sounds really tough. What do you think needs to happen? And it's pretty profound.

What a wise counsel of men can offer us in exchange can offer us back. When we bring the truth of our heart and our experience fully to them. They can help us get clear so we can make the next best right move. Might not be the ultimate move, but it's just the next best right move with the information we have. And if it doesn't work, they got our backs. And the cool thing about this style of relating is actually relating to each other about our lives and the things we're feeling.

What we're wanting to create is it stays with us, stays with us outside of those actual containers. After the group ends, there's a feeling I hope every man gets to experience at some point in his life. And a big part of why I do what I do. And it's just the feeling of other men having your back, right? Can actually feel the army of men, so to speak, of allies, of support and sometimes loving ass kickers who I have at my back and at my side that help me, okay, I can do this because I know I have all that behind me and around me and all those others.

I can actually feel it. Like the manifestation of men just putting their hands on your back in between your shoulder blades as if they're just standing right there with you. I've worked with men who have never had that experience once in their life, have always had to do it alone, were never able to trust other men. And something shifts when we feel that support at our back.

Fuck. I don't have to do this all alone. And you know what? I don't have to do it perfectly because I got guys who can help me process the grief or the anger or the disappointment when things don't work or are challenging. And you can celebrate the hell out of me when I have a win and a success and can encourage me to move towards the things that actually bring me energy and life.

And it creates an amazing Circuitry as you get involved with other men. Because what you find is that unlike a lot of masculine culture, a lot of that triangulation culture where men are competition, I gotta do better than him. And this type of powerful relating in the container of men's groups and men's work, those guys in your field, those men at your back, their wins become your wins.

They drive your wins. Holy shit. So and so is kicking ass. It's so inspiring to actually see a man leave his job or make a change in his relationship or get fitter than he's ever been before. It ignites something in us when we're celebrating that man's win and he's celebrating ours. We're not in competition. We're in support of each other, building the best lives we can.

And as we see other people getting there who have our backs, creates this beautiful network and cycle of uplifting the whole group. Now, for a lot of men, they don't have access to this. They don't have access to other men they can actually relate to. They often just have access to men who. Who can only relate via triangulation. And when you can only relate via triangulation, it's hard to get real about life.

It's hard to get nourished, and it's hard to make change because you can't actually talk about the things that are happening. You can bitch and moan a little bit, ah, you know, I'm a crazy girl. But then it just becomes point of view. She's so crazy. Women are crazy versus. Yeah. What's really going on? What needs to happen in your relationship for it to get better? Where are you hitting the mark? Where are you not? What do you need more of from her or him?

What kind of plan can you make? That's the power of having a group. And that's where we can get this missing nutrient that so many men don't have. If we're lucky, we get it in sports or school or in the military with just a few guys. Late nights or maybe we're drunk or an alarm, long car ride.

And suddenly something breaks and something true comes through. And I'm like, oh, my God, I can actually talk. And we're talking. Talking just that little bit can juice men up for days, weeks, or months. Because so many guys are just desperate for real connection, desperate for real relating, for the physical experience of relating man to man, eye to eye, heart to heart.

When we're in that orientation and when we see each other, we can also see what each other can become. We can see the standard, and we can hold that standard for each other. I know you can do this. I know you're better than this. So many men don't have that. So many men have never had the experience of that. Instead. How's it going?

Okay. Work kind of sucks. Who won the game? Oh, yeah. So and so won the game. And our pleasure and our pain in life gets routed through these external things. And we're standing next to someone talking about or doing some kind of activity where the focus is on that rather than the pain and struggle we both might actually be going through in that exact moment in life. Standing right next to you and being totally missed.

Who do you have in your life that's a man you can relate to. What men do you have in your life you can really get real with? Who can push you when you need to be pushed and hold you when you need to be held and help clear you when you're totally stuck and unsure what to do next.

My hope is if you don't already, you can find men like that in your life. When you have that group, your life will change. To reiterate another episode, lone wolfing. It doesn't work. It's not Navy SEAL. It's Navy SEALs. The unit, the collective can do something far more than the individual can do alone.

It's a more resourced network. Being able to actually relate to each other as men will free something in you. It will free you from having to hold it all and pretend, keep it all together. It will free you from having to turn to things to deal with those feelings.

So many guys I work with, and I've been on this journey myself, because we don't have the medicine of other masculine presence, we turn to substances to help us regulate. Food, Netflix, video games, sex, porn and masturbation, gambling, sports, whatever it might be. Oftentimes we have to turn to those medicines because we don't know what else to do.

Nobody in most mainstream culture these days is giving men many examples of other things that are possible. That's what the power of this work is all about. That's what getting into a men's group is all about. To learn that there's different ways to deal with life and that men grow when in connection with other men.

It'll change your life when you have the experience of being related to and relating with another man, with the masculine, with a men's group, once you feel what's possible. So like so many guys I've worked with, the old stuff just doesn't cut it anymore. The old friends may fade away.

Even some will probably love to come along and be like, oh, my God, thank you. Thank you for leading this. Thank you for creating this. Thank you for getting real. But some won't. Some aren't there yet. Some are afraid to go there. But once you've tasted real connection, real relating to other men, the triangulation isn't enough.

It's just not sufficient. And the great news is all that stuff we do, all that triangulation we do as men, becomes even more fun when we're doing it with men who we have this connection with underneath. Going to a game, going to a concert, having a party, going hiking, whatever.

Because that depth, that realness of connection infuses all of that. Those bonds, they kind of drive the power of those things even more because those things then become an expression of the connection we have underneath. They're not the only connection. So if you're ready to have the experience of actual relating to other men, it's time to make a change.

You can join me for one of my drop in men's groups at Evolutionary Men events, or you can join my intensive dating and relationship group coaching men's group by watching my free training at Evolutionary Men webinar. Until next time.