56 ~ Men and Emotions with Ean Wood

Join us as we welcome our first male guest.  Ean Wood is a commercial fisherman, professional snowboarder, published writer, coach, and TEDx speaker, who shares his transformative journey of self-love with us. From childhood gatherings with his father and other men discussing their innermost feelings, to his extensive travels, Ean offers a compelling challenge to the rigid narratives of masculinity.

We reflect on our previous discussions with women about self-love, transitioning with Ean into the often overlooked male experience. We discuss how societal expectations push men towards relentless self-improvement and competition, often overshadowing the need for self-compassion.

Through personal stories and wise insights, we navigate the journey of self-love for men, including overcoming past struggles with addiction and self-abandonment. Ean sheds light on powerful practices like mirror work and Internal Family Systems (IFS) to foster self-acceptance and inner peace.

Our discussion explores the importance of self-love practices, the challenges of navigating gender dynamics in relationships, and the deep-seated fear of emotions many men face. We discuss the impact of validation on self-worth and the aspiration to cultivate a profound self-love.

Ean’s open and curious nature enriches our exploration, making this episode a must-listen for anyone interested in the intricate and dynamic journey of self-love, both masculine and universal.

Connect with Ean:
Instagram @seedingmasculinity 
Linkedin @eanwood
Website www.eanwood.com 

Chapters

• 0:08 Exploring Self-Love With Ean Wood
• 4:20 Understanding Men's Relationship With Self-Love
• 22:28 The Journey to Self-Love
• 29:02 Morning Self-Love Practice
• 32:47 Navigating Gender Dynamics in Relationships
• 37:57 Exploring Men's Fear of Emotions
• 53:03 Empowering Men Through Self-Love
• 59:39 Embracing Self-Love and Wisdom

Transcript

Catherine: 0:08

Welcome to Desire is Medicine. We are two very different women living a life led by desire, inviting you into our world.

Catherine: 0:16

I'm Brenda. I'm a devoted practitioner to being my fully expressed true self in my daily life. Motherhood relationships and my business Desire has taken me on quite a ride and every day I practice listening to and following the voice within. I'm a middle school teacher turned coach and guide of the feminine.

Catherine: 0:36

And I'm Catherine, devoted to living my life as the truest and hopefully the highest version of me. I don't have children, I've never been married. I've spent equal parts of my life in corporate as in some down and low shady spaces. I was the epitome of tired and wired and my path led me to explore desire. I'm a coach, guide, energy worker and a forever student, even after decades of inner work.

Catherine: 1:00

We are humble beginners on the mat, still exploring, always curious. We believe that listening to and following the nudge of desire is a deep spiritual practice that helps us grow.

Brenda: 1:12

On the Desires Medicine podcast. We talk to each other, we interview people we know and love about the practice of desire, bringing in a very important piece that is often overlooked being responsible for our desire. Welcome back everyone, hello. Hello. Today we have an amazing guest. In addition to our guests, we have Brenda, as usual. Hey, brenda.

Brenda: 1:35

Hey, Catherine, welcome everybody to Desires Medicine, Season 2. Season 2, baby, Season 2. So today we have with us our first male, our first man on the podcast. His name is Ian Wood. Ean is a commercial fisherman in Alaska. He's been one for over a decade. A professional snowboarder, a published writer in three different languages amongst five countries, a coach, a teacher, head of management at a large cannabis operations, a TEDx speaker. He's been many things in this life so far.

Brenda: 2:14

From the time that Ean was a little boy, he would gather with his father in groups of men that were talking about what was going on inside of them, their feelings, their thoughts, their emotions. Ean has been all over the world sitting with groups of men listening to their deepest, darkest secrets. So Ian and I were part of a community. We had the same mentor, and that's how I know Ean. No, I was not sitting in the same circles with the groups of men. That was all Ian, not the two of us.

Brenda: 2:43

And when I thought about this series that we've been on the self-love series, contemplating well, what does self-love look like for men? I thought of Ean. Ean has this particular quality to him where it's almost like he is a human sponge full of curiosity when I would speak to him. His eyes, his whole body somewhat vibrates and he's just so happy to receive and reflect. It's a really gorgeous quality to human, a really gorgeous quality to human to be, to any human really, and I was like how amazing would it be to have the perception or hear a man talk about what it's like to love yourself as a man, from a man that I know interacts with the world in such an open way, know, interacts with the world in such an open way?

Brenda: 3:47

Usually, when we think of men, we think of them being very rigid and structured and like it has to look like X or it has to look like Y and, who knows, we have some other men lined up that may be the case for them, I don't know, but I thought it was. What a great way to start talking to men Like Ean is the great opener.

Ean: 4:06

A great way to start talking to men Like Ian is the great opener, Ean welcome. Thank you so much for having me. What a pleasure. I had so many things percolating in my brain already, so I'm looking forward to where this conversation goes.

Catherine: 4:20

Well, let me kind of give you a little bit of a recap to where we've been and everybody listening to.

Catherine: 4:27

We've talked to a few different women about self-love. Katie Hendricks we talked to her about, like, body dating and what it feels like to be a woman getting older during a time when, well, let's be honest, youth is the thing that's pedestalized, right, and so a woman posts menopause. It's like, well, do you even have a space at the table and what does that space look like? We spoke to Madison, who talked about self-love from the perspective of she does portraits of women and what it's like for those women to go through that portal of loving themselves and seeing themselves on a canvas. And we also spoke with Clara, who talked about self-love coming from a place of nourishment. Like how do you, as a woman, fuel yourself so that you can actually show up to go after the things that you want? So, Ean, when do you ever even have the thought like, oh, this guy should love himself more, or any version of that, like, does that ever even cross your mind?

Ean: 5:43

All the time. And I think it's a beautiful place to start, because if we look not only at humans, if we look all over in the natural world, it's very unnatural for a male to promote self-love. And I say to look outside of humans, because what do we see so much for males? It's about battling to be the strongest or the best, to look at different species where the best is the one who gets to mate, different species where the best is the one who gets to mate, and that is very much deeply, deeply ingrained in men. And I think why say it's unnatural?

Ean: 6:39

Men, the biggest thing that I see is how hard they are on themselves and I think this is natural for all humans in a certain way. But I see it in a different flavor. That is this unconscious mechanism to become greater, that is, looking at faults and where it's not good enough, and especially in the world today, that's that's shaped men to be rewarded for being hyper analytical. They're, in their mind, even more disconnected from their bodies and feelings of deeper things, and the mind is like this is what I face the most with the men that I interact with is just not good enough in so many different ways. And what is the mechanism?

Ean: 7:28

The mechanism usually isn't self-love. It's getting better at things, making more money, getting better at the hobbies they play, whatever they're passionate about. It's this constant hunger to be the best in different ways. So obviously that's a generalization, but when you were introing the podcast and we were talking about it, that was the wording that came to mind. For me, what I see is it's very unnatural for men to have self-love I'll stop there and it weaves in many different directions.

Catherine: 8:08

Thank you for boiling it down to a place where, oh, wow, yes, men walk through the world with this constant hunger of being the best. There was something I heard in what you said that I don't know if I've seen that lens quite just in that way, so I'm going to see if I can repeat it. Hopefully I can. It's not just a fleeting thought. You spoke about how the top 10% of males in the wild mate, something around mating, and I thought, thought, oh, yes, that's true.

Catherine: 8:47

Normally, you know, even amongst humans, usually the top 10 percent of men are the ones statistically and we are speaking in generalizations are the ones that have the most opportunity to mate. And if mating is what makes you a man or like, then you would want to do a lot of it so you could be best at it, or the one with the most notches on your belt and I guess to be the bottom 90%. Well, it's not that cool, but I hadn't thought about it from that perspective of oh, there's an even bigger drive. It's not just procreation, it's like how do I make my stance and show that I'm the best? Well, this is one of the ways of doing that. Would you concur, or would you edify it in some way, incur or speak, or would you edify it in some way?

Ean: 9:43

Yeah, what I want to say is it's very unconscious, it's it's it's that deep animalistic nature, that animal brain. And there's another, there's a. An addition I want to say is there's a split in men, there's a divide in men, and this can be a deep conversation as well. Some men are on the softer side, or some of the language is the feminine side, and some men are on the harder side, which is like the classic you know, hard up masculine man we see in the world. Classic, you know, hard up masculine man we see in the world.

Ean: 10:28

And the way that those two versions of men react to this deep animal drive to be at the top is different. Some of them will fight for it and the other side will like collapse and in their mind they may say I'm not going to play this game or whatever. That's like. You know. They may not. I'm not going to play this game or whatever. That's like. You know. They may not play the game of being the hard. They may go into the arts, they may go into these other things, these other forms of expression, but that deep animal woven into the dna over thousands of years is still in there.

Ean: 11:05

It's still in there of this drive that manipulates, in my perspective, the mind and the loving of self, because you know, this is all about self-love and it's like this distortion in different ways becomes the mind that is hard on self.

Ean: 11:27

And also, if we look at the roles of you know that if we look in general once again, in general there's like the roles of the father is a lot about judgment and discipline, like creating this child through mind and structure, and so that also shows up, I think, in the way that men are really hard on themselves and why I say it's very. What I see is it's very unnatural for men to love themselves and I think it's easier for men that are on the softer side. I would put myself on the softer side and I can explain in my experience what I grew up with that was different, that put me on the softer side that those are the ones that are easier to connect to self-love and the ones that went on the harder route. The men on the harder route that you know want to be the best or are tough, those are the ones that really struggle with making their way to self-love.

Catherine: 12:34

Thanks so much for that. Brenda, is something coming up for you? Wow, this is such incredible information.

Catherine: 12:41

I mean just hearing you talk about this. This is wow. Like I know a lot about women and I talk to women, but it's so great to hear from you, ian, and have you explain this. It just all feels so clear and I would love to hear you said you would talk about what had you, what were your experiences growing up that had you maybe lean more towards the softer side.

Ean: 13:03

Yeah, I think this is a huge piece.

Ean: 13:14

It's a huge piece and it has to do with generations, and particularly for me. If you look at two generations above me, so my grandfather, that was the generation of the Great Depression and war and more traditional style of living where it was like man was provider and protector and so, like my grandpa's generation was like very on the hard side. And then my father's generation was the first generation you know, recently that went, could go to the soft side in the way that it did the more emotional side and what we see in the generation above me is so I'm 39, I'll just put that for the listeners. The generation above me, my father's, like 65. That was the generation when there was this growing, you know, this growing absence of fathers, this growing absence of fathers in the home and a lot of mothers raising the children in a new style of living. And so that's where this great divide and a big piece of where the great divide came from, is like mothers raising all the boys, them not having a lot of connection to the fathers.

Ean: 14:28

And I went softer side because, in my opinion, from my experience and there's a lot of depth to this but my dad was very emotional, my mother was very rigid. My mother was the disciplinarian. My mother much more held the masculine frame of structure and predictability. She very much held the masculine role and my father was an example for me was what I saw a man was was very emotional.

Ean: 15:03

So when I learned what a man was, I saw emotions and so for me personally, I didn't grow up like on the hard up side because my mom was presenting that rigidness to me and I rebelled against it. I was like, no, I'm not living like that, I'm living the life I want to live. I kind of went away from structure, want to live. I kind of went away from structure and my dad was deep in the menswear community. I was in that community since I was 13 years old. So to me I was around a bunch of men talking about their emotions and crying and getting angry and expressing, and so I was connected to those emotions early on and I'm actually now starting to really focus on shaping that rigidity and strength and structure on the other side of the pendulum. But that's what my personal experience was and I think a lot of men on the soft side come from a father being absent and then also, you know, some people went the hard path as well, with absent fathers.

Catherine: 16:06

I was going to let you piggyback, as you had opened up this line of conversation. I would actually go back. So I appreciate you talking about the softer side of men and I hadn't really thought about that from the perspective of absent fathers, right, especially because, yes, that's true, there's an absent father and the mother could take either role either strengthen her masculine pole right and show this boy this is how you have to grow up to show up as a man, how to be a provider, a protector boy. This is how you have to grow up to show up as a man, how to be a provider, a protector, how to show up for your wife and your family. Or you could potentially go the other route, which is like tell mommy what you're feeling, right, like let's talk about your sensations. You don't have to punch the boy in the schoolyard. No, that's not how we fight. We can have a conversation.

Catherine: 17:03

Everything doesn't have to be war, I guess. Right, if we're thinking about men who are in the constant hunger to be the best, and violence is oftentimes one of those ways right to show your dominance against another male, especially in the primal ages, when I think of a young man growing and absorbing the world. Our brains aren't fully developed until we're like 30. So in that frame I would assume you know using your fists is one of the options. But you said something around the drive that is unconscious that manipulates the mind. So the drive that is unconscious that manipulates the mind, that mind is the mind that's hard on self right, and that mind predominantly I guess a few generations back, not that many generations back was all about judgment, discipline, structure. How does then a man find his way to being more loving?

Ean: 18:21

Or what does that even look like, to take that step, knowing that there's there's a, there's a crack that has to open in some way for men, and sometimes that's from rock bottom and for the most part that's where most men crack open. Or that crack opens to allow them to love themselves is when things just get so bad. They're so focused on business and that's it, because life showed them that that's how they can, you know, be loved or whatever, and they find that it's fruitless, that it's not actually the gold that was at the end of the rainbow, that they were told, or they've become just so hardened that they can't feel, they can't connect to their partner. Most men that crack opens through rock bottom or hardship to say, okay, I need to do something different here. And that's why I say it's a little bit easier on the softer side is because there's the arts, there's those types of communities like you're more in touch with your emotions, so it's easy to get connected to self love. But so much you know, so much of the energy in the world that I see still, you know still in young men today is like it's so interesting because it's it's, it's so similar to other different animals.

Ean: 19:56

Let me collect the most resources, let me get the strongest. I have the biggest antlers. I, you know, I battle the strongest. Making money is just the same People making a bunch of money, collecting a bunch of resources. In my head I see a squirrel collecting a bunch of acorns and putting them in their little hole in the tree and they're like look at all the acorns I have. It's no different. We make it think it's like this some advanced thing as human beings, but it's the same thing. We're collecting resources to like feel good about ourselves and that's like what's projected to men. They see it in the movies James Bond, all these wealthy men that are good looking and that's you know. That's why I think that crack has to that crack. When I see men come into the men's communities, something, probably they're facing that rock bottom or something and that crack opens up and they're like I have to change, something has to change.

Brenda: 21:05

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense and I think it's very similar for women.

Brenda: 21:09

You know, we do have some kind of a crack where, or a bottom where you're like something absolutely needs to change, because I can't go on in this particular way anymore, and very often we do have to hit bottom in order to experience that.

Brenda: 21:25

So I'm assuming that, like what you've said, you grew up with this work. You grew up sitting around as a 13 year old boy through your teenage years and now you teach this work with men. So you grew up with this. So I'm kind of assuming and we'll get to that later and also we invited you here because you're a first man on this podcast and we're very excited about that and we felt into you and we know you, that you're someone who was willing to have this conversation of what does self-love even look like for a man, and so I do want to hear what your practices for that are. But I'm also curious, since you said about a rock bottom and a crack and changing if, even though you did grow up in that way, was there a moment for you where you had that crack yourself and you were like, oh, something's got to change and you were able to let more love in for yourself.

Ean: 22:24

Beautiful, thank you. Thank you for that. Yeah, I mean, here's the crazy thing. I grew up around all this. I I suffered, like the rest, I was uh, I mean, you probably could have considered me an alcoholic. I drank and partied so much. I was addicted to pain pills like doing a bunch of pain pills. I had my rock bottom moments where it was.

Ean: 22:54

You know, the thing that has continually brought me back to my own journey with self-love is relationally.

Ean: 23:09

Relationships have been my thing, where and this is something that I continually face is putting all of my energy into relating with someone or something and, in that relationship, abandoning myself.

Ean: 23:30

So it's like I'm still facing this. I still go through different cracks where it's like in my last relationship that I recently got out of putting so, I had this huge epiphany. This huge epiphany that was, I would allow myself to feel a level of love for my partner that I wouldn't feel anywhere else, especially a love for myself, and that was like my latest great epiphany was okay, why will I love, why will I let myself feel this amount of love for another person and not allow myself to feel this level of love for myself? And so, once again, another crack that has me going deeper, expanding more into my self-love practices. How do I get this back on the rails and growing into my next iteration of self-love so that I don't keep losing myself in relationship and putting all that love to another and continue to love myself in that process and expand in the amount of love that I allow myself to feel towards myself?

Brenda: 24:59

Thank you for sharing that. I think that's really relatable and we've even talked about that on this podcast feeling more love and giving more love for other people than you would, than you actually give to yourself. So I'm so glad to hear you say that and that you were able to see it and get curious about it and I know curiosity is one of your superpowers as well, and that is really a superpower, um so so what does self-love look like for then, like on a daily basis, or when you, when you came across this insight, what shifted, and what does self love look like for you?

Ean: 25:37

Yeah, I want to start with what I, what I see at the very entry point that was there for myself and is to this day of a man's journey to self-love. I think all humans but I'm focusing on men specifically is like the inner narrative is the first thing you know this is mostly for the listeners is like the inner narrative. How do I talk to myself? Some of the most impactful work has and it's talked about in many different circles, but it's mirror work. How do I? When I look in the mirror, what do I think? Do I like what I see? Do I? Do I just continually point at what needs to be better for men aging? It's like they're looking at their you know you talked about age earlier. It's like is my hairline receding? Do I still look strong? You know what is the narrative in the mirror? I think that is a great barometer for men to see where they're at on the journey of self-love and then starting to unwind that, unpack that when I started saying I love you to myself, just looking in the mirror and doing that work. I still do it to this day, but that was a huge one at the beginning of my journey Like I love you and really feeling it and meaning it, not just being words, but really I love you and going into what I felt in that experience. So I think that that's a huge doorway for men and their self-love journey and once again to see where they are.

Ean: 27:14

For me personally, where I'm at today is is it's through a certain lens and you can let me know how far you want to go into this subject, or we may go in different directions, but the path that I'm on is internal family systems or parts work. I go into my imagination, I connect with different parts of myself, I relate with them and ultimately actually writing a book on this right now For Men, which is this path of being there for yourself, no matter what comes up, to stop abandoning ourselves, because this is a huge thing that we do is things happen and we abandon ourselves to go deal with them. So I I make time, I mean one of my things that I do for myself love. Right now, the first thing I do is I wake up, I write down on the top of this paper that says here we go, Webster, from a session I did in parts work in my imagination. I start here we go, webster. And then I write for 15 minutes about the thing that I'm most passionate about right now.

Ean: 28:54

That's my newest piece of self-work self-love work I also do. The first thing I do in the morning is a huge self-love piece is I don't turn my phone on for a while and I stay with myself. I give myself love and attention. That is the hugest practice for me is giving myself love and intention, instead of immediately going to what is on my to-do list. What work do I need to do? Who do I need to talk to? What do I need to take care of? It's like I start my morning with me, in silence and connecting to self, and that can show up in a lot of different varieties, but I know I said a lot there.

Brenda: 29:44

That was amazing. Thank you so much for that. I just have a question who's Webster?

Ean: 30:05

internal family systems, but especially in relationship. But in the world at large, when something happens, the mind instantly goes to how do I fix this thing? How do I fix this external thing so that I don't feel this internally? So if a relationship thing happens, I go how do I fix this? Do I need to set a boundary? Do I need to do this? How do I adjust? How do I address the external world With this new perspective? It's like how do I take care of the parts of me that are upset right now, because that's what a trigger is. Some part of me is upset, not all of me. I'm sure I could find parts of me that don't care or aren't upset, but it's going and taking care of the inner world.

Ean: 30:48

So Webster was from a parts work session that I did. And what did it start out as? Because it transformed, it started out. It started out as a different character and I and I I went in, I related with it, my eyes were closed, I was just working with my imagination and eventually that part turned into webster and it was a part of me that wanted more self-expression. So in my imagination there was this, this part of me that transformed into this spider and it was like doing art in the spider web. And so it wanted more self-expression and it wanted more passion. And so that's why I wake up in the morning and I say that phrase to cue that part of me, and then I go into actually expressing what I'm passionate about for no reason. Expressing what I'm passionate about for no reason. For no reason. There's nothing I'm trying to get from it except this part of me that wants to express itself.

Ean: 31:47

So there's a lot in that practice that this may confuse some of the listeners, because there's not a whole lot of background, but that's how I met Webster and why it says here we go, webster, but that's how I met Webster and why it says here we go, webster, thank you, I had a feeling it was something like that, but I really wanted to know, because I've learned with this podcast, if I'm curious about this, somebody out there is curious about it as well, and I think that's one of the most empowering questions that we can ever ask ourselves. Something that you said which was how, what do I need so I can be okay over here without changing anything externally? What a beautiful practice to just come back to yourself in that way, and I love everything that you've said. It's been so. It's so informative. And this practice of waking up and writing for some, for 15 minutes, on something that you're passionate about. I already want to do this practice.

Ean: 32:47

It's interesting because, especially as men you know, I love watching men, I love interacting with men, I love being a man and I have so much compassion and curiosity still and men love solving problems, they love teaching I just crack up when I see I mean in this you can see this too toxic ends, where it's like mansplaining. You know it can go that way, but underneath is just this passion to solve problems and to explain things. It's a very manly, masculine mind thing and what? How that becomes a problem and how I saw this in my own journey is you, every when a man does that, he abandons himself instantly. When he goes to solve the problem in the external world, he is not there for himself anymore. His attention is in the outside world. It's not what's going on inside of me that needs me.

Ean: 33:58

I've thought about this like how does a man mature?

Ean: 34:01

How does he mature when he's there for the immature parts of himself that the external world wasn't able to mature for him?

Ean: 34:10

That's when a man matures, is when he can be there for the parts that get triggered, that get afraid, that get sad in the external world, and he's actually there for himself instead of going out into the world and trying to fix the outside world so that those parts of himself are no longer activated that actually just stuffs them away even further. So this has been a huge practice for me, and even a ton of my last relationship is when things happen that in my mind I actually put my focused attention in my heart and in my mind I say I'm here, We've got this like it's gonna, it's, I've got this. Like I step into a confident place like I got this, got this. Whatever happens, even like when a like catastrophic thing is right in front of me, I don't abandon myself first to go take care of it in the external world. I go inward and, like with with the thought in my head and with my focused attention in my body, I don't abandon myself and then I take care of the external world after that.

Brenda: 35:25

That's just absolute gold Staying with yourself, taking care of yourself, instead of it's so easy to just go out and try to fix and do and this is true for women as well. I mean, I've absolutely had this pattern where it's just so much easier to put my attention out and go out and try to fix everything than to actually just sit with myself and feel my feelings or feel my triggers or feel what's coming up for me and sit with myself in the discomfort of that. And I think that takes so much self-love, so much willingness to be with all the parts of yourself, the parts of yourself that are confusing or not as pretty, you know, or angry, whatever it is, and I really appreciate your description here of being with yourself in that way. I'm going to switch over to Catherine, because I see her wheels turning over there.

Brenda: 36:22

My wheels are turning, predominantly because a lot of what we've been talking about thus far, as far as how men, it's a few different things. I'll start with when we were talking about men who, when we think about the pendulum of the spectrum, we have men who are on the softer side, men who are on the harder side, and we sort of moved on the continuum around softer men potentially coming from fatherless homes, right, or men were homes where men weren't as present to then instill in their boys. This is how. This is how men behave in the world. But as Ian was talking about abandoning himself and these other pieces, I'm like, oh, okay, so now we're talking about codependence, we're talking about inner narrative. We're talking about oh, I feel discomfort in this relationship or in this interaction or with this other thing of the world. I need to feel safer. I need to eliminate this discomfort, whether that's me harvesting my acorns as a squirrel or catching more money, having my resources or pouring more love onto my partner. That's something that women do as well. I'm feeling and looking at this from the side of oh, these are just relationship mechanisms. This isn't we're not really talking about. I don't really see the gender gap. I guess I wanna say in this dynamic, in the pieces that we've talked about, but if I did wanna bring the gender gap in a little more, I would like to sort of turn the ship a little bit.

Brenda: 37:57

Just recently I was listening to a podcast with Dr Orion and Steve you know the Diary of a CEO and Dr Orion was saying men would rather take something apart than sit down and talk about their feelings. I'm sure he's talking about the men that come from the harder side, like what men really want is a solution. They want to be able to go out and do something I had not thought of. I had not thought of, I had not made the connection until we're having this conversation right now of oh, it must feel so good to take something off the to-do list or the solution list. As a man, right, if that, ultimately, is one of the unconscious driving factors of I'm at the best at that, I'm the best at this. Well, I'm the best at checking things off the to do list. There was a problem I solved, like I've got all these problems that I've solved. I'm amazing, I'm the shit Like I solve all these problems. I wouldn't necessarily say that as a woman. I feel like I'm the shit I solved all these problems Like that. That wouldn't be something that I'm looking at Normally.

Brenda: 39:06

If we're talking about gender gaps, what I see, I haven't seen or been around a lot of men like you discuss, ian, where they're really willing to be with their feelings and talk about them with each other. I haven't seen that many men's group and I honestly don't know that many men that fall in that category. I do know a lot of men that want to just solve problems. For sure that that I see. I do also see a lot of women who like to talk and process with one another.

Brenda: 39:34

It's something that has us feel like something moved or changed, even though nothing changed. You just talked about the thing for an hour or two hours. Nothing changed. Same shit, different day, but you feel a little better. You know what I mean. You're like oh, I feel so much better now that I got that off my chest. Is anything different? Do you understand something different? Nope, but I feel better. I got it out. I don't necessarily feel or see men behaving in that way. Is that because most of my access has been with men that are on the harder side, or would you say yes, please speak to that. Do you see men feeling like let me process this out loud and now I feel like I solved something, even though nothing really got solved? Yeah, how do you see that continuum? How do you? See that continuum. Yeah, you know.

Ean: 40:22

I am definitely in. I know that I'm in a different reality of what I see because I, you know, I go to these experiences. I go to these places, I attend these events where there's so much space for emoting, for going in. That's what it's about. I was cracking up so much. Yeah, the love of signing off that talks about relationship a lot like you're talking about. It's actually a trait I've seen in myself where I'm like I it's. It's something I kind of want to change in myself because I see myself just talking about relationship and I see it in my father.

Ean: 41:31

A ton like we're just talking about this thing. Now what I, what I personally see in groups of men, is that's not the case, it's not the case to talk about, because it's that whole metaphor of this treasure chest that's been shut for so long and if you open it up, all these scary things are going to fly out. So I think what I experience the most part with men and this is a ton, and you can see this a ton in this, in the area of sexuality is to keep things surface level, to say the things that you think other men want to hear, and not really open that box up and speak to the truth of emotions. There's, there's a ton of that energy that I feel is keep that, keep that closed, because we don't know if we can handle the opening of that.

Catherine: 42:36

This is super interesting because now my where I've gone is okay. So it's sort of like Pandora's box you don't want to touch it because you don't know, when you open it, what kind of genie or magic bottle what comes out of there. And if men have this propensity to be the best at something, subconsciously right, like I want to have the most acorns, I love that one. So that's the phrase that I'm using for our podcast today I want to have the most acorns. I want to have the most things ticked off my checklist. I'm going to be the best out of all the things.

Catherine: 43:16

So I feel like you're saying, hypothetically speaking, that it's possible that most men don't talk to process because of the fear of the Pandora's box. It's not that men don't talk to process because they just see the world differently. You're like, oh, they're not seeing or experiencing the world differently, they are just emoting differently because this is what's socially acceptable or this is what, like, the fear has that box closed, almost like all right, we're only going to talk this much, find a solution and move on, because if we continue to dig and dig and dig, we don't know what we're going to touch down there, like the boogeyman's in there. Is that what you're saying?

Ean: 44:05

What the world has allowed men to feel is anger, and anger also shows up as productivity and frustration. You know there's all these different words for anger, but what men are terrified of is mostly sadness and grief. Those are the two I experienced the most. That men are the most afraid of are sadness and grief. Fear is in there as well, because they want to be perceived as strong and maybe don't want to touch into their own fears. So, men, you know they will go to anger and underneath is the other emotions that they, for the most part, are trying to avoid but never go into. Yeah, because it's like the Pandora's box of wow.

Ean: 45:03

I didn't feel the grief of when I lost this when I was five years old. I didn't feel the grief of when I lost this when I was 10. I didn't feel the grief of when my partner left me when I was 15. I didn't feel the grief of this, of this, of this, like there's a mountain of grief in there. That I, you know, for men, the sadness one is is, I think, one of their greatest fears. Where, you know, talking about genders, I see women so much more easily going to sadness or expressing that or sharing that, whereas in. You know, when I see a man crack into his sadness or grief, there is a there's a feeling that's pretty wild.

Catherine: 45:52

What does that mean? There's a feeling that's pretty wild. What does that mean? There's a feeling that's pretty wild.

Ean: 45:57

I honestly feel like their journey has finally begun, that the masks they've been wearing can finally shift, the walls that they've been building can finally transition in some way, because, let's face it, boys are very emotional. They're very emotional. And then these emotional, you know, I think about myself. I had I went. I didn't discover until I was my mid-30s how much grief I had that my parents split up when I was five years old and I tapped into that. It was some of the biggest pain I'd never felt, that when I was five years old, the thing that I loved so much broke apart. And so I think this is, you know, talking about self-love.

Ean: 46:53

Men aren't taught that feeling their emotions is a form of self-love For a lot of them. Even if you look at stoicism or masculinity, a lot of it's about your emotions are weak, they're not valuable and move beyond them, go into action. Like this is taught and presented in so many ways, and I actually understand some of those teachings. But until a man goes in and feels the emotions that he hasn't felt from those early years when his personality was forming, he can't go to that stoic or strong place. His, his foundation's too wobbly, and so men don't see, a lot of men don't see emoting or emotions as as strong or as self-love.

Catherine: 47:46

I want to say that I identify with that way of living. I lived that way for most of my life. I want to say that I identify with that way of living. I lived that way for most of my life. So it's interesting to hear you talk about it, because the thing like if we were to end the conversation right here, right now, my walkaway point would be oh, wow, I don't know if our world is comfortable in the middle yet Not the softer side, not the hardened side, somewhere where you're in the center and you're able to emote and feel, and allow yourself to feel from a place of non-fear, like, oh, this is okay, this is just an emotion that nobody's going to die. And I get to feel this and still live my life. Because as I hear you speak, Ean, I'm like oh, I know exactly what that hard side looks like. I lived it.

Catherine: 48:34

I didn't really feel my emotions until I was about 35. It was very limited. I knew how to feel anger. I knew how to feel sad. I knew how to feel happy. It was very, but anything in between there I was kind of like pretty checked out. It had to kind of have a particular flavor for me to say, oh yeah, this is one of the okay ones and that's okay.

Catherine: 48:56

I had shut down very, very young and definitely, when that box opened, there was a lot to unravel. So I know that we invited you on today, ian, so that we could talk about how men do self-love, and I, honestly, am seeing this less gendered and more like. Were you on the softer side growing up? Were you on the harder side growing up? And therefore, if you continued on that continuum and you haven't seen the other side, than in actuality, what we're talking about is more balance, like you said. Oh, I see myself talking about relationship, not necessarily resolution focused or checkbox focused. How do I get a little bit more there? Right, and potentially, for somebody who's resolution focus, acorn focus, how do they get to a place where they're not so afraid of the Pandora's box of emotion? Yeah, how does that landing for you with what I'm sharing here?

Ean: 50:08

Yeah, I think you, I think you nailed it and that's what I see is you know, and I think of the middle path where it's like and for me, as I said, is is I grew up with seeing the a man being soft. My father was emotional, very emotional, and I grew up around men emoting, and so I actually me finding my middle ground is going into in a healthy way, the more quote-unquote hard side, which is like not letting emotions take me over, not letting that chemistry override my mind and what it is that I'm focused on Now, wherever a man is in any part of the spectrum, like, yeah, I'd love to finish on really focusing on the self-love Honestly self-love for a man, and I love that you're saying maybe there isn't as much difference as we think there is, but it's that for men, the time that they give themselves to take care of themselves, that's not based upon some end goal. You know, even if we think about what men love to do, to quote, unquote self-care take care of themselves, like to play sports or to watch the game with your friends, friends or go on a vacation, or whatever is to find time to value and discover oneself. For men and once again, this probably bridges the gap is like a huge thing that comes up is around value. A huge thing that comes up is around value, feeling valued, really feeling valued, and what most men are taught by example is to go whatever it takes to value yourself for who you are in this exact moment and spend time with yourself, doing less and feeling value for yourself, not based upon what you do. That's the great like, that's the greatest journey to self-love. Because if we look at little boys and once again this bridges the gap. But it's just like this teaching of do better at this, do better at this, do better at this.

Ean: 53:03

I mean I look at my childhood. I was so rewarded for good grades, I was so rewarded when I scored a bunch of goals. I was so rewarded by what I did. It was amplified and what it taught my subconscious mind was when I do things, I get rewarded and people love me more. And as men we've taken that on unconsciously and we have to find that journey back towards.

Ean: 53:29

Do I value myself for who I am right now, in this moment, and what I've already achieved? If I say no to that, I don't love myself. I still need to. There's a deep journey there for me to find love for myself, because I don't accept who I am and what I've already achieved. These are things that I cannot change in any way. And what I've already achieved, these are things that I cannot change in any way. And there's distortion within me that exists from other people, other experiences, that needs my attention and that's how I love myself. To commit that time to finding it, to discovering it, to excavating what's in the way of me accepting and loving myself in this exact moment.

Catherine: 54:12

It's really lovely. Thank you so much for sharing that, Ian Brenda.

Brenda: 54:17

Best advice ever, absolutely gorgeous. Thank you so much. I want to know what would you say to women who are listening. Our listeners are mostly women. We do have a couple of men and who are listening to this saying oh my God, I need my man to feel more. I need my son or my father or the men in my life to feel more. That might not go so great for women to take that on, and so what would you say to a woman listening?

Brenda: 54:50

Well for women to take that on. And so what would you say to a woman listening? Well, well, that's a whole other podcast for sure, but I'll, I'll give the fun answer and then I'll give, like, a more short answer, and then I'll give a more short answer.

Ean: 55:17

I believe women are so powerful in what they draw out of the men in their lives, and so I would say whatever you're facing, you're the one you've been waiting for.

Ean: 55:28

Go inward, find your parts, love them and the men in your life will show up differently as one piece. Two, know that your man most likely struggles with valuing himself and loving himself. The men in your life most likely don't love themselves. The men in your life most likely don't value themselves. They most likely don't think they've done enough, that they've achieved enough that their legacy is going to be anything great enough. And that's one of the curses, I believe, hardships, challenges, lessons, textures of being a man is this struggle to feel value outside of action, and I don't know what it is for you to do with that. I don't know what it is that you want your love for yourself and work in your inner world and become that magnet that attracts the world around you, and you can see the struggle in men. I think that that's a great place to start. I think that that's a great place to start.

Ean: 56:48

That it's like for the most part in the world today. It's a bunch of boys in old people's bodies. They're not mature. They're like little boys in bigger bodies that have bigger fists and bigger energy and their voice is louder. But that's a five-year-old, that's a seven-year-old in there, that is, in a 40, 50, 60, 30, whatever year old body. That's what you're coming up against is the younger parts of themselves that they haven't integrated, that they haven't learned to love. So you're in this journey. We're all in this journey together. They haven't learned to love. So you're in this journey. We're all in this journey together. That's why I love this. This perspective is I'm here to clean up my inner world and love myself.

Brenda: 57:40

You're on that journey and then that's how we create something beautiful together. One thing that I know for sure is that anytime I want anyone to act different or do anything different, because I have that idea in my mind I just use that as a mirror and I just do that thing with myself and by shifting in myself, learning to love myself more or clear anything that's inside of me, that's stuck. It's amazing the people in my life, my relationships just change automatically and the other person didn't do one thing. So that's amazing advice that you're saying to women. It's gold. I have another question for you. Since this is the Desires Medicine podcast, I love to ask this question of our guests what is a desire that you have, ian, for yourself?

Ean: 58:35

Wow, I wasn't expecting that. What is a desire that I have for myself? You know I have a desire to continually strengthen the love that I feel for myself. To stay on the theme of this podcast is that it's like there can be someone I'm attracted to that walks up to me and says something terrible to me and I have so much love for myself that I have the space to be compassionate for them. Or I want an opportunity to come my way, like I have a call after this for a big speaking opportunity and I want to show up authentically as myself. And you know it could come that they're like, yeah, you're not good enough or whatever.

Ean: 59:31

And I am just solid in my love for myself and I'm like it doesn't even sway me, I just keep on my path. So in the theme of this deep desire is just like I want to love so deep for myself that the external world can't even rattle it, can't even shake it, because I'm just like I'm in my knowing, I'm in my love, I'm in my connection to something higher and I just like have the wisdom that sees through all the things that happen in the external world and I just go to myself, I go to that heart space I go into my mind. I'm like I got this Life loves me. There's more love to be felt and found and I want to feel love for myself in the same level that I feel love for the women in my intimate relationships.

Brenda: 1:00:30

Well, so it is, and so shall it be be, and maybe even better than you could possibly even imagine. It's a beautiful desire, thank you and as we close out.

Brenda: 1:00:42

I just want I do want to paint a picture for our listeners of ian right now, because it's so enjoyable to look at. He's in this white hoodie. He has like a scruffy beard with his AirPods, looking super handsome, and he's wearing this black baseball cap that says holy shit, we're alive and it's just such a joy to see you and hear you. It's been really enlightening to hear your wisdom and I'm really grateful for it and thank you. Enlightening to hear your wisdom and I'm really grateful for it and thank you.

Ean: 1:01:11

I really appreciate the opportunity and what you two are doing and this. I think there's some beautiful weaving happening in the world between the masculine, feminine worlds and you're a part of that and I'm honored to be on the show and I look forward to hearing other men on the show and I look forward to hearing other men on the show.

Brenda: 1:01:38

Thank you for joining us on the Desire is Medicine podcast.

Catherine: 1:01:42

Desire invites us to be honest, loving and deeply intimate with ourselves and others. You can find our handles in the show notes. We'd love to hear from you.