Men’s Emotional Blind Spots #142

The fastest way to stay stuck is to assume your struggle is unique. Tamara sits down with Michael Reed, host of Adaptive Men, to unpack why so many men repeat the same relationship patterns and then blame themselves when it falls apart. We get specific about attachment theory, how childhood conditioning shows up in adult dating, and why “you deserve better” can feel like a replay of every breakup you’ve had.

We also go deep on men’s emotional health without drifting into vague advice. Michael explains alexithymia (the trouble many men have naming feelings in real time) and why somatic work can be a practical doorway back into emotional awareness.  From there, we connect the dots to emotional self-regulation so feelings don’t get stuffed, stacked, and leaked out as irritability, shutdown, or a short fuse.

From people pleasing and nice guy syndrome to self-worth and self-forgiveness, we keep coming back to the same idea: a lot of “bad habits” are old programming, not a life sentence. We also discuss men’s groups, why community helps men heal, and how porn addiction and sexual insecurity can distort intimacy and communication even in loving relationships.

If you want actionable insight on men’s mental health, attachment theory, emotional regulation, and healthier relationships, this one is for you. Subscribe, share it with a friend who needs it, and leave a review so more people can find the show.

Transcript

Welcome And Guest Introduction

Tamara 0:00

Hello. Tamara here. Welcome to the show. Today's guest is Michael Reed. He has a podcast called Adaptive Men with the goal of educating and supporting men. Thanks for joining me, Michael.

Michael Reed 0:11

Thank you for having me. I appreciate it.

Tamara 0:12

Yes, I I like to focus on men. I have a lot of male listeners, so it's always good to educate. And just I know the world seems to be against men nowadays. So hopefully it doesn't feel too bad for people. But yeah, just anything we can do to support men. I'm all about it.

Michael Reed 0:30

Absolutely. Absolutely.

Breakups That Repeat And Attachment Theory

Tamara 0:32

All right. So how what do you want to talk about? How you got into this space? Because I know from reading your stuff that I know, but how about you tell the listeners now?

Michael Reed 0:43

So yeah, I got into the uh the men's work about uh two years ago. I had a relationship that had been going on for about a year and a year or so. And it ended uh it ended in very similar ways to past relationships. So much so that when like when the problem started hitting the fan, it was like I remember having this moment of like, am I having deja vu right now? Like this is so this is so like she's saying the same things I remember past girlfriends saying, then I'm saying the same things, and then like what is going on right now? And it was it was her saying, like, you know, I don't, you know, you deserve better. I can't give you what you need. You'd be happier with somebody else. I'm not good for dating right now. Even though we had a fantastic, amazing first year together. And I was just like, what this feels like, Dave Shavu. This has happened before, what is happening? And so I I went to Google, started digging the research and realizing, like, oh, this is what the whole thing called attachment theory is, you know, past behavior, childhood development, you know, how much your your early years, really formative years really affect you, past traumatic experiences, all this stuff. And it just started, it just explained like everything. Like my entire life was like literally written in these books by people I'd never heard before from books I didn't even know existed. It's been around for like 50, 60, 70 years. And I was just like, holy moly, it's all here. And I've been doing massage therapy for close to 10 years now, and have a lot of experience just like talking to people and letting they just letting them pour out their hearts, their they come in saying my back is hurting, and then as soon as the door closed, they're like, Let me tell you about my my family and my my job and my kids. Oh my god, and I just tell you everything. And so I've come to really enjoy just working with people, and in particular men, to um help them understand what's going on in the relationships, what's why these patterns keep repeating, why you keep finding the same woman over and over again. Like what what is it in you, what is it in them that you see, and where is the science behind it, and how can we go about trying to fix it, address it, change it ideally. Yeah.

Tamara 2:42

Yeah. Yeah. That uh attachment theory is one of my first episodes because I had the same. Like definitely anxious attachment and all the hallmarks of that has definitely been an issue in the past. So yeah, I'm trying finally getting a handle on it, but yeah, it's definitely a lot of work.

Michael Reed 2:58

So absolutely.

Science-Based Emotional Language For Men

Tamara 3:00

What do you want to talk about what you learned about yourself or more like how you've helped what the kinds of things you help people with?

Michael Reed 3:08

I what I try to do is work with men to essentially give them the tools, the vocabulary, and the understanding of what is actually going on. Like a lot of guys have an allergy to emotions. They're just like that, it's a very it's not masculine, it's not manly, only girls cry, all that stuff. But I I me personally, I found a very powerful pull towards it when I was able to like unpack the science behind it. Because it's like it's me, I'm I'm nerdy, I love science, I'm all about like problem solving. And it's like you should if someone comes to me, came to me and said, like, you should let yourself cry because your inner child is wounded. I'd be like, that that's some astrology crystal woo. That that sounds ridiculous. Versus saying you have some undigested emotional experiences from past events that your body didn't get to go through in a proper manner. And sometimes crying might be the physiological process in which your body metabolizes those feelings to get the feeling off your system. Like that, okay. That's okay, that makes more sense to me now.

Tamara 4:13

Yeah.

Michael Reed 4:14

Same thing, different words.

Tamara 4:15

Yeah, more analytical in the male mind. Like the logical making sense thing. Yeah, and I I'm just I'm reading a couple books right now about that stuff, like somatic stuff. So is that do you talk about that or just being a massage therapist?

Michael Reed 4:29

When you touch certain areas, I'm guessing people potentially react to, or sometimes the somatic stuff you're talking about is very potent because it's one of the easiest ways to start tapping into plugged up emotions for some guys. And that a lot of men, we're we we say like a lot of men are decapitated from the neck down. Like they just they can't feel their own bodies. And what this is in a more technical scientific term is something called lexothymia. It's basically an inability to identify what emotions you're feeling as you're feeling them. Because you can still be having an emotional response, but you can actually not be able to tell that it's happening. But it's it's almost like you're like you caught yourself, you can't feel the cut. You burned yourself, you literally can't feel the burn. And so when when you start working with men, sometimes it's a matter of it could be doing breath work, could be doing journaling, it could be slowing, like trying to find ways to figure out what their patterns are and what their patterns of coping, their patterns of suppressing, repressing are. And very commonly what we see with it, myself included, like I like to talk fast. I'm a quick talker, I like to just think very fast, talk fast. That's that partly is what I'll do sometimes to like kind of like push a feeling down. And one of the best ways to get me to like stop and feel the feeling is to start talking slower because it's a it's a pattern interrupt. Some guys talk fast, some guys talk slow, some guys, you know, they bounce in their chair, some guys, you know, don't move at all. Uh, and figuring out like what is your pattern and then disrupting it. And usually in the process of disrupting it is when they'll immediately feel something. Like, like I want, like, are you bouncing your chair? I want you to just sit still for a second, like, oh, I have like a knot in my stomach. Like that was probably there the entire time, but you didn't notice it because you were using the bouncing to actually ignore it. What does it not feel like? Oh, it feels like it's in my stomach. All right, well, then we'll go through a whole somatic experience where I want you to like close your eyes, take a deep breath, and just like tell me what it describe it, tell me what it feels like. Tell me what you're feeling. And sometimes you'll have guys that just like that just feels like a burning, feels like an empty, feels like a void, feels like this, feels like that, and we'll start to try to work with like, all right, sometimes if it's in your stomach, it could be shame. It might be if it's in your chest, it might be anger. If it's like sadness, it might be in your throat. And this is sometimes where you got like the whole chakra thing too, which a lot of guys are like, it's all mystical woo-woo. But your body does kind of have certain spaces to hold certain emotions in certain ways. It's not like it's physically in there, like I could take a needle and in like you know, with pull, like stick a needle in your abdomen and be like, oh, I'm gonna pull some shame out of there. It's just that when you're feeling embarrassed, for example, or you're feeling shame or guilt, very frequently a lot of men will feel it in certain areas. Like it's very commonly, like usually in your gut. If you feel like you want to cry, you feel like there's like this lump in your throat. Like if you're emotional, it's like sadness or anger, or like deeper down, you're feeling horny. Maybe you feel things when you're groin, whatever it may be. And then getting guys to draw the connection to those and realize, like, oh, that's what grief feels like. That's what sadness feels like, that's what shame feels like, that's what guilt feels like, that's what joy feels like, that's what my anger feels like, and whatever it may be, trying to work with them to reconnect. And then next step is give them space to actually like move through the feeling itself. A lot of guys have a very, very hard time letting their guard down enough to let their body, it's almost like the way I say is like a lot of guys are emotionally constipated. It's like if you eat food and you don't pass it, it's not good for your body. If you feel a feeling and you don't let it finish its whole process, it's not good for your body. Emotions can literally get like stuck in your subconscious, in your system, and you can just hold on to them for years. And over a long enough period of time, you start getting autoimmune conditions, you get aches and pains, you get you become irritable, you become like you know, you withdraw, things like that. There's a million different things that could be it could be. But it's it's your brain is spending a disproportionate amount of energy trying to maintain something that shouldn't be there in the first place. It should have just like something made you angry, let yourself feel angry. And then once you're through it, cool, you've it's gone now. Something made you sad, let yourself feel sad. Once you move through it, it's gone now. Versus like it starts stacking and it just stacks higher and higher and higher until finally it's too much and you can't feel anything.

Tamara 8:53

Yeah, and I was gonna say too, they say that the feelings you generally last no longer than 90 seconds. So it's quick.

Michael Reed 9:00

Yeah, yeah, very frequently. It's different if you have people who have been through it's different if you've been have people who have been through depending on the person, everyone's a little bit different. It depends on how intense whatever it was may have happened to you. Yeah, some people who've had traumatic experiences might have a lot of bent-up emotion in there, and even the process of digesting and working through that can take a lot a lot longer. But yeah, in the moment, it's like if it happens in the moment, it's

Somatic Clues And Pattern Interrupts

Michael Reed 9:30

a healthy person ideally would have around you know 90 seconds to a two minutes or so before they calm down. If you haven't had, for lack of better words, adequate training growing up around emotional self-regulation, it'll take longer. And that's usually what the practice is, is to get yourself to return to baseline in a quicker manner without ignoring what you're feeling.

Tamara 9:55

Yeah, I just I read a book that says 90 seconds, but I think she said waves as well. So it's not like it's over over, but like you're that wave is 90 seconds, and then there's some other stuff you do for to help men understand what's going on.

Michael Reed 10:09

Emotional self-regulation can be a big one, giving them space to digest, you know, penned up emotions and feelings. Working with guys who are uh people pleasers, nice guys, as opposed to common one. Understanding it and not demonizing it because it happened. People pleasing is very commonly ultimately what it is, it's it's a man who at some point in his life learned I'm it's not okay for me to make mistakes. It's not okay for me to like be myself. I have to be somebody else, or I just cannot make mistakes because I can't bear like rejection or scrutiny from other people, or I can't just admit that I like you know. It's not that they don't they don't want to admit it, it's it's more like growing up, you weren't like you know, you you made a m- you were five years old, you made a mistake, and your parents like brutalized you. And you just learn from that day on where it's like never F up ever. Even though you're human, you're gonna script like crazy. And so like the nice guy behavior, people pleasing, it's a matter of getting them to practice in those moments when you very when you very quickly will find yourself like something bad happens, like, oh, I'm so sorry, I'm and it's like it's like you dropped a glass of water, it's not the end of the world. But it feels like it's the end of the world, those emotions flare up really heavily. Yeah, getting yourself to like work through it's somewhat so somatic work, depending on how it pops up from guy to guy. But getting them to let go of that shame, let go of that guilt, getting a better sense of self-worth, learning to say, like, I'm okay, I'm I'm a good person and I'm gonna screw up once in a while, and that's okay. Versus I screw up, therefore I'm a bad person, therefore people are judging me and should judge me, and I'm a bad person. Yeah, I've had I've had a guy I worked with who's a friend of mine, it was very funny. At some point working with he's married, he's two kids, and he he was he wasn't really where he wanted to be in life based on where he felt like he could have been had he actually taken his younger years more seriously. And I remember I asked him something to the effect of like, what would it feel like for you to like forgive yourself? Like, just what does the word forgiveness sound like to you? And he's like, dude, I want to throw up when you say that. Like, that doesn't sound that sounds terrible. I could never forgive myself. I'm like, okay, what we know where to start then. Because, like, all things considered, like, you whatever happened in your childhood and some mess-up stuff that happened, like, you didn't ask for that, it wasn't your fault. And as a result, you then got into some bad behaviors, which led you to a bad path earlier in life. You since of course corrected, you're doing pretty well now, but learning to give yourself grace and space to screw up, a lot of guys have a very hard time doing that because again, early on, it was not okay to make mistakes. And so, yeah, working with guys to just have a better sense of self-worth, better relationship to themselves. And when I say relationship to themselves, people think like it sounds a little bit like weird spiritual boo-woo, but it's it's more this idea of your impulses, your subconscious, your animalistic behaviors. They're kind of separate from your conscious, rational mind, but they're also very powerful. And once in a while, they're just gonna win. And you're gonna say something really stupid, you're gonna do something really stupid, but it doesn't mean you're a bad person. It just means it's just autopilot that hasn't been programmed properly from way back when. And part of the healing process is doing something stupid, standing up saying, My bad, I apologize. That was a mistake, but it's okay, I'll figure it out, and I'll also I'm a good person. Things like that. Yeah.

Tamara 13:49

You talk about helping people letting go of past traumas. Like, obviously, that was an example of the people pleaser. Is there or is that pretty much what you just said? Getting them to see it.

Michael Reed 13:59

Yeah, along the same time, it's like yeah, trauma gets a bad rap nowadays, but it it is a lot of guys, especially guys more so than women, mainly because a lot of what's going on, like I said in the beginning of the podcast, a lot of a lot of guys are not very well received nowadays. Men are not really in good men are not good in good standing in like the very aggressive public discourse of social media, but in like more private settings, a lot of people are like actually, like I feel bad for guys. I feel like I don't know why they're getting their ass kicked so bad, like right now. So I think there's more sympathy than is perceived. It's just kind of hiding, and it's not as easy to find because the angry stuff tends to pop to the top of the algorithms very quickly. Um, but the traumatic trauma thing is a matter of like a lot of guys are just holding on to some kind of experience from way back when, or some kind of event that happened to them. Could be something severely traumatic, could be like, you know, consistent over a long period of time, could be heartbreak from high school, could be the loss of a parent, a heavy divorce. And rather than really feel let themselves feel like that sucked. Like that really sucked, and there's nothing to do other than just the fact that you need to just sit there and let yourself feel the fact that that sucked. Because your body is going through a natural biological emotional digestion process. It's like emotion comes up, your body, you feel tears, you get mad, you want to yell and scream. 90 seconds later, like you said, calms back down. If it comes up, you just go, nope, back down. We're not talking about that right now. Like it's still there, it's still sitting in the back of your system, and you start you notice you start getting more reactive, you have a short temper, you you're shut down, you don't want to engage in conflict, you're having trouble with the relationship, and it ends up just like compounding until things kind of blow up in your face, and then is it's a matter of just like spending the time to find the right space and the right person to work with. It could be a coach, it could be a therapist, could be a men's group. Men's groups are fantastic about this. I'm a huge fan of them. I'm part of a couple of them myself. That you can let your let that feeling out without the shame involved. Because a lot of it is a lot of guys have this sense of like you've heard it, maybe you've heard it before, like, if you knew who I really was, then you wouldn't love me.

Tamara 16:18

Yeah.

Michael Reed 16:19

It's like you'd be surprised how many people are okay with how you are, even if you screwed up. But you are not convinced of that. The only way to convince yourself of that is to actually go to somebody else who you feel you're comfortable, is not gonna judge you or shame you, and just let it let it rip in front of them. And it literally neurologically retrains your brain to say, Oh, I was convinced I

People Pleasing Shame And Self-Forgiveness

Michael Reed 16:40

was a bad person, but now I'm gonna surround I'm surrounded by people who heard what I just said and they're not judging me. So now I have to change this narrative.

Tamara 16:50

Yeah. Do you excuse me, are do you run a group or are you in some? And are there any that you recommend? Or I know I had someone else on that talked about men's groups as well.

Michael Reed 16:59

Yeah, yeah. I'm in the process of trying to build out a group online. It's probably gonna be like a like a free one. Um, but I'm part of a couple different groups. One group I'm a part of is the uh men's alliance, Connor Beaton Mantox. I'm also part of the Iron Council. But if you Google like men's groups, there's tons and tons of them. I'm gonna be like I said, I'm gonna be starting my own soon enough. Um they can just people just can keep track of my my social media content. I try to post on Facebook and you I do a podcast myself. If it pops up there, it'll be publicly available as well. But yeah, some of the there's it's one of the best ways for men to start unpacking their problems, getting moved through their pain, um, getting getting healthy. Like support doesn't mean there's something wrong with you. We're we're hyper-social creatures. We are extremely we're animals. And for whatever reason, in modern day, we seem to have forgotten that. And part of being hyper-social creatures means like we get a lot of health and wellness and a sense of safety and how to do things properly and move through things in proximity to other people, especially people we trust. So men's groups is one of like the best ways you can go about trying to just get yourself in a better space psychologically, mentally, letting go of old pains, letting go of old traumas, finding direction and purpose in life, holding yourself accountable to things you're struggling with. Beyond, beyond amazing.

Tamara 18:23

Yeah. And you mentioned social medias earlier. Do you want to talk about that? And you can talk a little bit about the podcast itself if you want to.

Michael Reed 18:30

Sure. Yeah, yeah. So the podcast I'm running is called Adaptive Men. You can find it on YouTube and Spotify. Um, the goal of the podcast essentially is to try to, like I said here, give men as much information, mixture of science and things like that. I have an interview a lot of guests myself to get them to have a less science, less spiritual, less woo-woo, a little bit more science-based where possible. Because that's what would help me tremendously is understand, like like recently put out a video podcast called uh about like porn addiction. And really understanding, like what I see a lot on social media is I'll I'll sometimes the algorithm will float things to me that's like women getting really mad at their partners for having engaged in pornography use in the first place. And they take it very personally. Yeah, like he must not love me because he's doing this. Where, but if you really dig into like the neuroscience of it, it's actually like like loving somebody and having an addiction is like two different things, two different parts of the brain. An addiction is a very different type of pathway, it goes on in the inside inside of a man's brain. And it it can be easy to demonize people who are going through that kind of stuff. I think when you really understand, even if you feel like the feeling is gonna be the failure, it's gonna you're not gonna be able to change it. Like if she feels betrayed, she's gonna feel betrayed. Yeah. But I think there's there's still opportunity within a relationship to essentially say, like, I know you feel that way, but here's actually what's going on, and here's how to try to work through it in terms of overcoming addictions, overcoming certain shames and getting better communication. There's a whole litany of science and research out there talking about how to actually move through these things. But I think I personally think like when you understand it better, it gives you a little bit more grace to let the per let yourself and the people in your life screw up rather than just taking it so personally.

Tamara 20:24

Yeah. Well, I had an ex-boyfriend who admitted after the fact that he had been addicted to porn the entire time we were together, and it was seven years like off and on. And he was he I found out like he would live m I would fall asleep, and then he would get porn out and and I would have glad they had more sex with him. So after the fact, I was definitely like not happy to hear that he had done that. I'm like, I would have, you know, I would I wanted more. And I'm gonna find out that he was doing that you know after I fell asleep or whatever.

Michael Reed 20:53

I wonder then, yeah, I've heard this story before with guys, and it a lot of women think like, oh, they're just they're just guys just infinitely horny. All they want is just sex for the sake of sex. But a lot of there's a lot of men out there who may be struggling with libido and whatnot towards a partner because it's because the act of intimacy in itself is something of like there's something behind it for them, it's like I fear being vulnerable, I fear of being, I don't I don't feel like I'm good enough for you. I feel like you know my my dick's not big enough, I feel like I'm not good enough in bed, I feel like whatever it may be. And it's just like rather than work through that and understand it to figure out where it's coming from and why it's happening and letting go of those whole shames and behaviors, the it's so easy to just pull out your phone and just be like, I'll just deal with this by myself quietly off in the corner. No one's gonna notice. And then it uh if if anything, it becomes a uh challenge in the relationship because essentially saying like it's too difficult to communicate my needs and understand what's going on. Like the like for the Porn does a lot of things that's very problematic, but like a big one, pun intended, is that it gives a lot of guys a misinterpretation of how how much you actually need. And I've had guys I've talked to who are just like, yeah, well, you know, my junk is, you know, it's and I'll just stop them and be like, okay, a couple things. One, like the first, I think it's two to three inches of the vaginal canals where majority of the nerve endings are. Beyond that, does not really matter. So if you got like, if you got two inches, you actually can do a lot, you'd be surprised. Number two, I tell guys, is like, listen, if a baby can go through there, but she still wants to sleep with you, then your junk size is fine. It's like it's not like you don't need to be an elephant.

Tamara 22:46

Yeah. And if to me, if you ever look at the actual porn stars, I would that would be like I just was like, I can imagine the pain. Like I would never I would never want to.

Michael Reed 22:56

That's uh I've heard women, I had women back in college I used to talk to you about this, and

Men’s Groups Porn And Relearning Intimacy

Michael Reed 23:00

like they're just like it's not fun getting punched in the cervix. Yeah. Like you think it sounds good on paper, but it's just like, no, that like guys, you know what it's like to get kicked in the balls. It's like that's kind of similar and it's not pleasant.

Tamara 23:11

Yeah.

Michael Reed 23:12

But but they but their interpretation of what intimacy should look like gets heavily drawn from pornography, and they don't have the skill set to stay emotionally grounded while taking like my when I was younger. I remember this. Like I had one of my first girlfriends, like I was ultra insecure, ultra sexually insecure. And I just did not believe her when she said she was happy with the sex. Like I didn't, I could not, I was just was like, I I don't I don't believe you. I'm sorry, I just like I know you're saying it and you're smiling, you're telling me you love me, and I was like, I just still feel I don't know. I feel like I'm not doing it, and I just could not let go of it. Years later, you know, did my own inner work and therapies and whatnot, but like a lot of it, I think for me came from because I got it to porn very young, like to like 11, 12 years old. Found it like in the pay-per-view box in the basement. And a lot of guys have had similar stories of finding though like back in the day, a porno magazine, you know, Playboy, it's just a photo. Yeah. But now it's like you're literally seeing everything of the graphic to act. Not to mention you have infinite varieties, you have an infinite number of ways to compare yourself to somebody that's that that is not even doing like what actual real intimacy, what looks and feels like.

Tamara 24:30

Yeah. Do they do men know about the other sites like OMGS and then there's Make Love Not Porn, different stuff like that, just so it's like real couples on Make Love Not Porn. I shouldn't know. OMGS is actually a like a tutorial. They have videos and tutorials on how to please women, basically.

Michael Reed 24:49

That's interesting. Yeah, yeah, there's a lot of coaches out there as well that do similar things, but uh in yeah, of trying to really educate people of like this isn't like the movie is not real life. This is the Marvel movie, that's fantasy, that's not how real life works. And it's okay that you're not like that. It's okay that you don't have a 17-foot penis and like all this ridiculous stuff, like and a lot of it comes down to like guys trusting that they are enough as they are, yeah that they have enough to give, pun intended, as well as emotionally, that that alone is like you the and trusting that their partner when they say like they're happy with the way things are, then they are. But if they're if if you're if you're a guy out there and you find like you know, she keeps saying she's happy, but I don't believe her. I don't know, I just don't believe it. Like that's usually a telltale sign of like something's got like shame, guilt, traumatic experience, something's still echoing because it's not letting you just trust the person you're with. Yeah, and then that's usually what leads to pornography and infidelity and things like that.

Tamara 25:52

Yeah. And I was gonna say, not that this is needed at all, like you're saying, but there is there are now like um I had I interviewed someone that I can't remember how they do it, but they enlarge penises basically. Oh, they can and they can add material like almost like lip fillers. It's like kind of like that for men now. Not that, like I said, anyone needs it for sure.

Michael Reed 26:15

Yeah, most like 99% of guys don't. Yeah, definitely.

Tamara 26:19

Yeah, and I was just saying I interviewed people that have um the different sizes of of condoms, and the the largest, the highest selling one every time is the smallest size, but they're like you know, very varying sizes, like 42 different sizes. Wow. So there's a lot of variety out there.

Michael Reed 26:37

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Tamara 26:38

And it's a lot more common to be average. But we all know this. Are we uh the two of us know this? Um, is there anything you want or do you want to say you didn't mention your socials yet? I know you talked about your podcast. Do you want to talk about are they the same for your socials?

Michael Reed 26:53

Same thing, yeah. My podcast is Adaptive Men, Social Media, Facebook. I haven't been posting much on Facebook, but um, I try to post on my Facebook, uh, YouTube, Spotify. I have a website, adaptivemen.com, but anyone's interested in finding out more information about what I do and how I can help. Coaching, one-on-one, things like that. Absolutely. My my goal here is to try to connect with as many men as possible and start to help them go work through the things that I work through myself. Like people pleasing behavior, nice guy, terrible relationships, porn addiction, I had video game addiction, finding a sense of self-worth and self-love, being able to like be okay with yourself, things like that. But working at it from a different angle that traditional therapy doesn't really go about. Because traditional therapy, depending on if you find a good therapist, it's gonna be good. But like traditional therapy can fall a little bit short sometimes because talking about it from with men is not the same as doing the things that need to get done and giving them a kind of like a solid step-by-step guidepost to follow.

Tamara 27:50

Yeah, yeah, I can definitely see that. All right, well, it sounds like kind of your final thoughts, closing comments. But if there's anything else to add, otherwise we can call it good there. But yeah.

Michael Reed 28:02

Um, yeah, last thought would just be like if you're a man listening to this, like odds are your story is not unique. And it's not a slight against you. It's just that it's very common for men to isolate when they have problems. But the complete opposite is actually true. Really, you should be finding other men in your life to talk to, guys you trust, guys you can connect with, find a men's group if you need one, find a good coach if you if you feel like you're struggling with accountability or certain like you know, addictions or just self-worth, things like that. And then it is very addressable. Relationship issues, addiction issues, nice guy behavior, relations like all that stuff is very it's all essentially just poor programming that was not your fault. That you it is on your responsibility and your your goal is to be the one to try to actually like address it, fix it, and reprogram it. It's doable.

Tamara 28:58

Yes. Awesome stuff. Yeah, thank you very much.

Michael Reed 29:01

Thank you for having me.

Tamara 29:02

Yes, and if you love this episode, be sure to tell your friends about it and rate it as well. All right, thanks again, Michael.

Michael Reed 29:09

Thank you, thank you.

Tamara 29:10

Alrighty, and thank you, everyone. Alrighty,

Practical Next Steps And Closing

Tamara 29:13

bye.