Speaker 2: [00:00:00] In 2017, me Too started a conversation. Most of us weren't ready for. Most guys supported what the movement was trying to do, but were scared on how to engage without messing up. I'm Tim [00:00:10] Winneke. I spent three years in the Air Force and three years on college campus as an advocate against sexual assault, and I spent the last 10 years as a licensed clinician helping men, veterans, and first responders.

Speaker 2: In our last episode, [00:00:20] we talked about what to do if you were accused as a guy today, how to support me too in 2025 as a man without guilt, without performance, and without walking on eggshells. [00:00:30] To do that, we're gonna break it into three parts. What to do for yourself, what to do for your people, and then what to do for your community because you can't share what you haven't built.[00:00:40]

Speaker 2: Let's get into it.

Speaker 2: If you're not a [00:00:50] survivor yourself, you know some one in four men. Half of women and a substantially larger amount of non-binary and trans people have experienced some kind of sexual [00:01:00] misconduct in their lifetime. People that you love, people that you care about, people that you feel protective of have gone through this, and if they haven't told you about it, it's [00:01:10] because of a few factors.

Speaker 2: They don't wanna hurt you. They don't wanna put you in a position where you respond in a way that's going to hurt you. They don't trust you to hold it with [00:01:20] them instead of at them. The responses that we have when people that we love and care about tell us their stories are primal. There's a rage, a [00:01:30] fear, and a shame that comes forward in anybody who feels some kind of protectiveness over their loved ones when these things occur, and for men, we're [00:01:40] socialized for violence in these instances.

Speaker 2: Now, this is really important. I'm not anti-violence. I work with police officers. I'm an Air Force veteran. I work with veterans. There [00:01:50] is a time and a place for protective violence, and I will never advocate for a world where I think that's not true. It's important to remember that this isn't that time.[00:02:00]

Speaker 2: What's happened has happened. You taking vengeance does nothing, but put yourself at risk, and the worry of your desire for vengeance is [00:02:10] part of why your loved ones haven't told you. The next one that we tend to do is in that rage, in that fear, we start to try to pick apart details. We're trying to ground with our logic, the big volatility of our [00:02:20] emotions.

Speaker 2: And when we start to do that and we start to try to break down all the details of what happened with the survivor, what it looks like and what it sounds like is we're blaming them for their assault. [00:02:30] Even if they were in the wrong place, even if they were with the wrong person, it's never their fault.

Speaker 2: They didn't choose to have someone hurt them. They maybe [00:02:40] put themselves at risk to be hurt. But if your immediate response is to start to pick apart what they did and blame them, you're gonna do significant harm to your relationship with them. [00:02:50] And you're gonna have the opposite impact of what it is that you want to do, which is be there and be a support for your loved one.

Speaker 2: So before you sit down to talk to people about this and to try to [00:03:00] get them to open up about these things, I want you to go in clear on what your role is in the moment that you do this. Your role is not to protect them from the world in this moment. [00:03:10] There's nothing you're gonna do now that's gonna take away what's happened to them.

Speaker 2: Instead, your role is to provide safety, stability, and a calm presence to be there with them [00:03:20] while they go through the turbulence of telling you about what happened to them. Think about the visceral response that you're gonna have in hearing it. It happened to them. It's [00:03:30] worse for them. It just feels worse for you right now because it's fresh.

Speaker 2: So you've gotta learn how to be ready for that. You've gotta be ready to hold the answer to a question before you ask the [00:03:40] question. So a few ways to do that. Don't respond immediately when someone starts to tell you their story. Do not [00:03:50] say the first or second thing that comes to your mind. It's probably gonna be emotionally driven and unhelpful.

Speaker 2: You wanna take a breath, you wanna take a minute [00:04:00] and you wanna repeat back what it is they've told you. And if it's helpful to you, name the feeling you're experience. I'm feeling so angry this happened to [00:04:10] you. I'm feeling really protective of you. I'm so sorry this happened to you. I feel like I should have been there for you.

Speaker 2: I feel like I should have done more. It's okay to name those things, [00:04:20] but then when you follow up with, I'm glad I'm here for you now. I'm glad you're telling me these things so you're not alone with it. I wanna be here for you while you heal from this. [00:04:30] It sounds. Impossible for some guys. I'm tearing up thinking about a few of my people that it was really hard to have this conversation with.[00:04:40]

Speaker 2: It's hard. If it takes help for you, if you need to go to do some counseling, if you need to go do some work on your own emotional regulation, you need to figure out how to [00:04:50] hold heavy things without dissociating from them, ignoring them, stuffing them, or blowing up about them. Go do that before you have these conversations, but go [00:05:00] do your work.

Speaker 2: Do not use the fact that you haven't done your work to not be the man you wanna be for the people in your life. Go do the work to be the man that you [00:05:10] wanna be in your life. That's how we move the ball in this. That's how we make things better. We stop falling into this trap that violent protection is the only thing we owe the people in our [00:05:20] life.

Speaker 2: We want to provide more than that. We wanna provide that stability, we wanna provide that safety, and we want our people to know that they can depend on us. [00:05:30] And the hard times. So go do your work to be able to be the guy that can do that. The last thing we're gonna talk about in this video about what you're gonna have to do for yourself before you do [00:05:40] anything else is that if you're a man in America, you've likely made some mistakes at a minimum.

Speaker 2: I don't know, a guy who wasn't some kind of [00:05:50] creepy in adolescence while he figured out how to handle the urges and the ways to engage with the sexuality of yourself, with who you're feeling it towards. At a minimum, we all [00:06:00] had those moments where we didn't behave the way that we wanted to because we didn't know how.

Speaker 2: Yet the older you are, the more likely that you have done worse, [00:06:10] and it's because of the culture we were raised in. But it doesn't excuse it. It means we have to take that on and we have to be able to look at it within ourselves and deal with what happened. [00:06:20] I was a kid of the nineties. My favorite movie in high school was something about Mary.

Speaker 2: It hasn't aged Well. It's essentially an entire movie about how the least creepy stalker [00:06:30] gets the girl and every decade back. The rape culture in Hollywood is worse. That frames how we dated it, frames how we pursued women, and it framed how women [00:06:40] wanted to be pursued by us. As you explore these things, you're gonna have these moments where someone tells you that someone hurt them, and you're immediately gonna start to think of [00:06:50] things that you may or may not have done in your history in your past.

Speaker 2: You need to be able to face those down, and you need to be able to talk to them within yourselves and process them before you go [00:07:00] and engage other people, because then you're gonna be defensive. You're not gonna be present with them because you're gonna be too lost in yourself. And that's gonna be key for the next part.

Speaker 2: The next part, we're gonna talk about how [00:07:10] to do this with your people and how to develop out your people. You can't take those things on alone, but you need to start by naming them within yourself. So as you take that accounting, as [00:07:20] you start to look into these things, as you start to look at these stories.

Speaker 2: And you start to see your own history. Who are you gonna talk to? Let's talk about that in part two.[00:07:30]

Speaker 2: You are not gonna be able to do this alone, and you shouldn't. This isn't something for any one man to hold. This is something that's hurt [00:07:40] so many people and it's in your life. This is personal. You know, people who have been this like we talked about, and you're gonna need to be. In a space [00:07:50] where you can process for and with them, and you're gonna need spaces that are unique to what you're gonna struggle with as a man Coming at this, there's a few ways that you're gonna be able [00:08:00] to do this, like we talked about in part one.

Speaker 2: The first one is learning how to hold boundaries within yourself. How to hold complex emotions and process them and get them to where [00:08:10] they're driving effective action instead of destructive action. So before anything else happens, regulate yourself. Once you've got that, once [00:08:20] you've got those skills lined up, now you're gonna find so much more traction in building out your people.

Speaker 2: You're gonna need more than one person in your life for this. [00:08:30] Sometimes it's a therapist. A lot of times it's a therapist. I see it every week in my practice. There isn't many men that I work with that we don't talk about some of this stuff with [00:08:40] as they think about the women and people that they love in their life.

Speaker 2: So as we just discussed, this is going to be personal for you. Either as a survivor or for the [00:08:50] survivors in your life. And remember with those statistics, we know they exist and it's gonna start with that self-regulation, that pause, that thoughtfulness within yourself to be able to show up on the way you wanna [00:09:00] do.

Speaker 2: But you're gonna need more than that. You're not gonna be able to do this on your own. First thing we wanna talk about is what you're gonna hold. You're gonna hear these stories from people that you care about, [00:09:10] and some of them are gonna be testing you. Some of them don't feel safe with this. Some of them are gonna push on you.

Speaker 2: And you're gonna have to hold that for a moment, not forever. [00:09:20] Doesn't mean you've gotta take it in the teeth for things that you weren't involved in, but you do need to hold that a man likely hurt them. Most of the time these things are done by men, most of these times [00:09:30] are done by men that look like me.

Speaker 2: And that's probably true for you in some instances. So you're gonna have to hold that. And so as you ride that out, [00:09:40] what I want you to remember is this phrase, if you don't know what else to say. Say this. I'm so sorry that happened to you. [00:09:50] Thank you for trusting me. You don't have to agree with everything they say.

Speaker 2: You don't have to validate every part of their story, but you can validate and be thankful [00:10:00] that they're trusting you with the love and affection required to sit with them through this. So if you freeze up and you can't think of anything else, remember [00:10:10] I'm so sorry that happened to you. Thank you so much for telling me.

Speaker 2: And if you can't do more than that in that moment, that's okay. You can even tell them that [00:10:20] I know you're hurt. I'm overwhelmed by this too, and I'm still so thankful that you told me and I'm so sorry it happened, but I, I need a minute with [00:10:30] this too. That's okay. It's better to save that then get flooded and say, and act in a way that's gonna be ineffective and destructive to your relationship.

Speaker 2: So there's another core thing you can do, [00:10:40] but what happens after that? Now that you've got this story and you're just holding this pain, where do you go with it? You've taken on yourself, you've looked in the mirror, and you've saw the ways that [00:10:50] you've behaved in the world, that you regret, that you feel bad about, that you feel shame about.

Speaker 2: You've heard people talk about what men do, and part of you goes, but am I part of that problem? I don't know what to do with this. [00:11:00] I'm holding all of this. You need people to share this with. You cannot do this by yourself. When I first got my start, I was generally the only man walking into these [00:11:10] spaces.

Speaker 2: And it made it incredibly difficult to process this. There were wonderful women in my life, uh, a director or two of [00:11:20] two sinners that helped me and taught me and not having other men to talk to about this. Not having other men to process this with was brutal, and it slowed down [00:11:30] my personal work, and it made it hard for me to do some of the work that I really wanted to do well, and I got there.

Speaker 2: But it took [00:11:40] way longer because I didn't have other men to process it with later in life. As these things got more normalized and more guys were talking about it, I had the gift of talking with a friend about some things that we had done [00:11:50] in college. We used to throw these massive parties where a lot of alcohol was served, and in college we had the story that we were all these good guys that were like these paladins of virtue, that no one [00:12:00] ever got hurt.

Speaker 2: These parties had over a hundred people with them, and we went through a epic amount of alcohol and. We were drunk most of the time. There is [00:12:10] no way that years of doing that didn't leave. Some people hurt and even scarier that I might've hurt people while intoxicated. [00:12:20] And it was wonderful to have a buddy that shared my values, that went through that with me, that was in this space with it now, so that we could process it so that we had somebody who [00:12:30] understood what we were holding without going to the women in our life and the people that have been victimized in our life to try to get absolution from them.

Speaker 2: You need other men around if you don't have them [00:12:40] and you need to find them. We've got a video on how to build a men's group. It's more simple than you think. I'm not saying it's easy, but there's tools and ways to do it. So look at that so that you can build your [00:12:50] people and you can get a group of guys together.

Speaker 2: They're gonna help you be the men you wanna be in the world and help share some of this load and this grief that you're carrying as you learn these things, as you take them on for your [00:13:00] loved ones. In addition to getting men in your life that are gonna be doing this. You need women in your life and non-binary folks that see you.

Speaker 2: People that know you as a [00:13:10] good man, people that see you for your values. It's been so healing for me to be able to go to some important women in my life and talk about the various things that have happened to the various things I've done, [00:13:20] and talk about who I am now and them be okay holding that with me.

Speaker 2: It's really important. This doesn't happen when someone's telling you [00:13:30] about their pain. These are two separate sit downs. This is a mutual care relationship, but when you have a good woman in your life or good women in your life [00:13:40] that can hear you taking on where you've been and where you're going, it's gonna help you be accountable and it's gonna help you remember that you're driving to be the men that you wanna be, [00:13:50] not the man you were.

Speaker 2: And that's even more true if you're a guy who's done something terrible. If you're a guy who's really hurt somebody in a profound way that [00:14:00] you've been holding, you need people in your life that you can bring that shame to, that'll help you wash it, that'll help you be the men that you wanna be. This is [00:14:10] also where faith communities come up.

Speaker 2: If it's not gonna be a men's group, and it's not gonna be some of the women in your life. There are a lot of really good religious organizations that are doing good work around this, that [00:14:20] aren't blaming women or excusing men, but are helping build accountability. Find those spaces, find those communities so that you're not by yourself here, and then find a few people [00:14:30] within those communities to bring into yourself.

Speaker 2: These are your people. These are your core people. These are the people that know your values, can hear you, and that you can [00:14:40] go and say, I didn't live to my values here. Here's what I'm trying to do. That's a rare group, but it's so important for your healing. If you can't find anybody else, get to [00:14:50] therapy.

Speaker 2: Find a educated therapist, somebody who ideally specializes in men so that they can help you take on these things. But somebody that's gonna give you the room to process these things so that you [00:15:00] can bring it back to your people. Sometimes we can't just jump in and build it, but go to therapy. Get those skills like we talked about.

Speaker 2: Do your work so that you can circle back and talk about these things and [00:15:10] build on who you are. 'cause remember. The way we fix this isn't by saying that men are good. It's by showing that men are good. It's by being the men we wanna see in the world. [00:15:20] This is how we do it. You can't do it by yourself.

Speaker 2: You've gotta do it with your people. One more thing about having your people and knowing what happened to them that you're gonna have to accept as you [00:15:30] go into this. There's very little justice for survivors. I did six years of work as direct advocate, and I've done 10 years of clinical work, and I've only ever seen one [00:15:40] instance.

Speaker 2: Where someone came out on the other end of court with some justice. It's not because our court system is terrible. A lot of people talk about it like that and it's got its problems. [00:15:50] It's because interpersonal violence is usually between two people, usually two people alone, and in a court system where innocent and PR until proven guilty is a key component [00:16:00] in our justice system, it makes these things incredibly hard to prosecute.

Speaker 2: So if you're a guy that has faith in the system, please understand. That as good as the people that [00:16:10] often work in these systems are as good as the police office that are trying to prosecute. These things are, it's incredibly difficult and might not happen for your survivor or you. Each survivor [00:16:20] has to take on whether they wanna involve justice system or not, and it's not for anybody else to decide.

Speaker 2: Remember that as you talk to people about these things, part of you is gonna want that punishment. Part of you is gonna want that moral [00:16:30] punishment, right? Getting into court, getting into something where the world says, this person hurt this person. It's not gonna be for you to say. It's gonna be for you to support whatever they decide [00:16:40] and to live within your values and what you can do.

Speaker 2: So now that we've talked about how to hold the pain of others, and we've talked about how to help you hold the pain, it's time to [00:16:50] talk about how to get you engaged with accountability. So to do that, there's a tool that I really like to use to give some perspective on these things for, it's called The [00:17:00] Continuum of Harm.

Speaker 2: And essentially it goes like this. Making a sexist and inappropriate joke in the workplace does not make you a rapist. Doing an inappropriate internet search or [00:17:10] watching porn at work, school, or other public venues does not make you a rapist. Inappropriately touching someone does not make you a rapist. A [00:17:20] rapist does all of these things.

Speaker 2: Most of the time guys who do these things all the way from the jokes to upward, [00:17:30] they're doing it 'cause they think it's funny. A lot of times they're doing it 'cause they're trying to ball bust and maybe rib somebody out, or they just think they're entitled to it, that it [00:17:40] shouldn't bother anybody. Why it's important to check those behaviors is because somebody in your life might be doing the one that you're not comfortable with, might be moving up that [00:17:50] scale in a way that's not effective.

Speaker 2: But when they see you laugh at the lower one, they think you agree with what they've done. So when a rapist is at work and he tells a [00:18:00] joke. And the guys around him laugh. He thinks he's just doing what he's supposed to be doing as a man. That's why it's important to check the behaviors. So how do you do that?

Speaker 2: [00:18:10] What are you gonna do in your world and what do you have to ask people to do for you when you mess up? Because you're gonna, you're human, you're gonna mess up. You need [00:18:20] people around you that hold you accountable too. So let's talk about that accountability. Now we know why. In addition to it just not being okay for the people around it, we might be validating someone's [00:18:30] choices to hurt people by being anywhere on that scale.

Speaker 2: So there's a few things that you wanna take on. You wanna correct actions, not [00:18:40] thoughts or morals. This is a great tool across the board. We cannot police other people's thinking and we cannot judge what their values are, even if they tell us we're [00:18:50] not there to change them. We're there to contain the behavior, to give them an opportunity to see a different way to be.

Speaker 2: And if they move it to their personhood, if they move it to them being a good, bad person, a sexist [00:19:00] person or whatever, all of a sudden we lose the thread. There's gonna be somebody that tells them they're not those things. There's gonna be somebody that tells them they're okay. We wanna keep it to the behavior.

Speaker 2: Hey, [00:19:10] don't talk like that here. Well, why blah, blah, blah. No, no. You're not talking like that here. That's not okay. If there's somebody you know and trust, you can be softer, but you need to [00:19:20] correct it and keep it on the behavior. Correct those and not the thoughts. Because if we try to get into thought policing, nothing good happens.

Speaker 2: Everybody's got weird whacked out thoughts. Well, [00:19:30] maybe not everybody, but who I talk to is a therapist. Judging how people think is just one, it's not useful. And two, everybody thinks some pretty messed up things in the course of their lifetime. In my [00:19:40] experience. Maybe it's just 'cause I'm a therapist and everybody shares with me their dark thoughts.

Speaker 2: But coming at people for how they think just isn't worth the time. It's how they behave and how they act, because then you can keep it to the behavior. They can't [00:19:50] wiggle out of it. The next thing is, is you wanna maintain your calm as much as you can. You wanna give feedback clearly, calmly, and specifically.

Speaker 2: [00:20:00] This joke isn't okay here because don't do that around me. Shouldn't do it anywhere, but don't do it around me. Hey man, I know you. I know you and I know you're [00:20:10] better than this. Don't do that. And then do for them what you will want to have done for you. When somebody calls you out, give them space to [00:20:20] repair.

Speaker 2: If they stop the behavior, if they acknowledge the behavior is wrong and they have that shame and guilt moment where they're being checked and they're gonna do something different, [00:20:30] let them give them a minute and then bring them back into the extent that's appropriate. Just like you would want somebody to do for you if you mistepped, [00:20:40] give a little grace.

Speaker 2: Once somebody's respecting the boundary. And for you when you're being corrected, remember the smartest thing most people can say is, I don't know, and I was [00:20:50] wrong. If we get too invested in the good guy story, but I'm a good guy. Nothing positive happens within our behavior. Be patient with yourself and be kind to yourself [00:21:00] as you take those corrections so that way you can do that for others as well.

Speaker 2: This isn't a one way street. If it's helpful. And it's within your core group of who we're [00:21:10] talking about. You have a lot of power. And so processing what was going on for them when they took the action that you're checking might be a really powerful [00:21:20] way for you both to process and heal and repair the relationship.

Speaker 2: Understanding where someone's coming from and helping them see where they're at can be really, really powerful for [00:21:30] your growth in relationship and as individuals. So take that on for yourself. Be the person willing to admit when you're wrong. Be the person to be willing. Admit that you don't know, and be the person willing to [00:21:40] call out the things that you don't wanna see in the world.

Speaker 2: It's gonna go a lot better for you. So how do we do that? What are the exact ways to have a boundary? This is really useful [00:21:50] just in life generally. You're gonna have people in your life that push on your boundaries because that's what happens. That's how we negotiate boundaries. And you as a grownup need to know how to [00:22:00] hold boundaries, right?

Speaker 2: The best way that I've found on how to have these boundaries is by having a 10 scale of what an appropriate response is gonna be. [00:22:10] Everything from there really isn't a boundary. You were just a little bit uncomfortable for a moment, but nothing's really going on to physically enforcing your boundary up to and including violence when appropriate.[00:22:20]

Speaker 2: That's a 10. The reason why it's important to acknowledge there's this huge scale isn't because it's prescriptive on, this is how you start everywhere you go, it's to [00:22:30] give you the options and latitude to do so artfully. My greatest example of this is just cultural. If you ask for directions in New York City like you would [00:22:40] need to in Iowa farm country, people are going to be angry at you for wasting their time because you're not being direct and fast enough in what you need.

Speaker 2: If you try to ask for directions in [00:22:50] Iowa farm country like you would in New York, people are gonna be so appalled that you're rude, that you might get punched in the face. Neither are incorrect in their scope of where they are, and it's important to [00:23:00] know that you can do the range when needed, but where and how are you gonna be most effective?

Speaker 2: The key is you wanna start at the lowest volume [00:23:10] that you're likely to be heard at, because it's always possible to turn up the volume on the scale. But it's very rarely possible to turn it back down [00:23:20] effectively. So we wanna start at the lowest level that we're likely to be heard. So remember, one, nothing's going on.

Speaker 2: Maybe you felt a little twinge of something uncomfortable, but nothing happened and it's [00:23:30] not really even worth expressing. Two is expressing the discomfort. And this isn't always verbal necessarily, but it's allowing the impact to be seen. This is the, the frown, the the little [00:23:40] mean mug, the like pulling back a little bit, the getting quiet, letting the world know a little bit that you're uncomfortable while you figure out what you wanna say.

Speaker 2: If you wanna say anything at all. So three is [00:23:50] expressing discomfort. That doesn't necessarily saying what's going on, but it's showing the people around you a little bit, that you're uncomfortable. This is where maybe you get quiet [00:24:00] and thoughtful. Maybe you're not ready to speak to it, but you're also not ready to just be in the group and let it pass.

Speaker 2: This is where you might even just say, I'm uncomfortable. You're not even saying that it had anything to do with them. [00:24:10] You're not asking them to stop anything. You're just like, Hey, I'm uncomfortable. That's not okay. Like, or, Hey, I'm uncomfortable with that. I don't like that. But you see how you didn't say stop.

Speaker 2: You see how you didn't put [00:24:20] the action at their feet Yet, that starts at four. Four is where we start to talk to the person directly about the boundary that's been violated. And so [00:24:30] at four, this is where we're still doing it with kindness and softness. We're assuming good intentions and a desire to not harm.[00:24:40]

Speaker 2: Hey, I know you're a great person and I know you would never try to hurt anybody. That really isn't okay. Like that hurts people. I know you're, I know you're not a person that would [00:24:50] ever wanna hurt anybody. That hurts though. Hey, I know you're a person that really loves making people feel welcome. And when you said that like, I feel unwelcome, it's, it's really uncomfortable for me.

Speaker 2: And I know that's not who you wanna be [00:25:00] in the world. This is where you're calling out their behavior. But you're mostly focused on this is how it's impacting the world. And I know that's not how you wanna impact the world. What's up from there? If these are people [00:25:10] that you're close enough to correct with, they're probably people you share values with.

Speaker 2: And this is where you're gonna leverage that knowledge. Hey, we both value x. Y doesn't go with that. [00:25:20] Don't do that. Hey, we're both good Christians. Good Christians aren't gonna hurt people this way. Let's not do that. You're gonna use your shared identity, your shared [00:25:30] values, the shared place of where you are, to let them hear about how they're not achieving being the person that they likely wanna be in the world.

Speaker 2: But also that you're not gonna [00:25:40] let them be that person around you in the world, at least not without calling it out. The sixth one is more about a personal boundary. Okay? This is [00:25:50] moving away from it being a community thing of an US thing about who we wanna be in the world to an I thing that crosses my boundary.

Speaker 2: Regardless of who you wanna be, [00:26:00] it goes against what I wanna do. Don't say that around me. Please don't say that around me. Please don't do that around me. It's about you. Now, if they're past the point where having a mutual connection and shared [00:26:10] values is gonna add to their ability to do something, or it's gonna be, uh, not heard because it's so soft that they're gonna argue the value with you, you just escalate a little bit.

Speaker 2: Hey, whatever. [00:26:20] I'm not comfortable with it, don't, don't do it around me now. It's about you holding your boundary more than it is about you all holding a boundary that you share. That's six. That's still pretty soft, right? [00:26:30] Seven. This is kind of military speak. Okay. This is literally just a direct statement of don't do that again.

Speaker 2: In the military, we value respect, and we value [00:26:40] clear communication and in complicated situations, saying directly what you want to have happen and not happen, or directly. What you need without explanation is the expectation, and [00:26:50] this is the time for that. You're done explaining. This person doesn't hear your explanations.

Speaker 2: You just tell 'em to stop. Don't do that. Don't do that around me. You're not [00:27:00] escalating, you're not pushing, you're not speaking to their intentions. You're not making threats, but you're telling them, don't do that. That's a seven. Now we're getting into that [00:27:10] forceful place where we're not only like trying to hold the boundary, we realizing we have to push to get it.

Speaker 2: And this is where it's important to know where your boundary goes from here. [00:27:20] Okay, violence. Even protective violence without violence being projected at you is probably not the right move. [00:27:30] However, there are ways that you can physically enforce your boundaries. You can escalate to an authority figure of some kind.

Speaker 2: So if you're at work, right, go to a boss, go to hr. [00:27:40] If you're on a college campus, go to the professor. Go to somebody who has some power to enforce some shared boundaries, or at a minimum, you can physically remove [00:27:50] yourself from what's happening. Right, and why it's important by the time you're an eight to understand where the 10 is, is because you're gonna start telling them that the ten's [00:28:00] there and it's coming.

Speaker 2: So what's an eight? Then? Seven is just that direct, right? Seven is direct. Don't do that. Eight is [00:28:10] if you don't stop, X, Y, Z will happen. If you don't stop, I'm going to hr. If you don't stop, I'm going to the boss. If you don't stop, I'm going to the professor. If you don't stop, [00:28:20] I'm leaving. If you don't stop, we are gonna have a bigger problem than you want to handle.

Speaker 2: Whatever it is, make sure it's appropriate for what [00:28:30] you can do in this situation, okay? Do not pop off to violence. If violence isn't on the table, it's not gonna go well for you. You'll just get arrested and it's not handy. That doesn't [00:28:40] mean though, that you can't physically enforce it. It doesn't mean you can't use a resource to enforce it.

Speaker 2: So eight is don't do it or X nine is, this is your [00:28:50] last chance. If you don't stop, X happens. 10 is following through on the hardest thing that you can [00:29:00] do to hold that boundary that's appropriate for the situation involved. So you see how these work, right? We start within ourselves. We start with our own discomfort.

Speaker 2: We move [00:29:10] into our shared values with people, we remind them of who they wanna be and how this isn't part of that. If neither of those work, then we are just allowed to hold a personal boundary where we start telling them, [00:29:20] you're not doing this around me. I don't like this. Don't do it all the way up to physically enforcing the boundary, leaving engaging some kind of authority, or [00:29:30] in very rare cases, depending on the action happening, violence.

Speaker 2: It's important to have these things listed in your mind, though. That way, you know what happens next. It's a [00:29:40] lot more comfortable to take on the discomfort of a boundary, understanding where you're at on a scale and where you can go if you need to. There's a lot of [00:29:50] confidence in telling someone kindly when you know how to tell them unkindly if you need to.

Speaker 2: It's a lot easier to be soft with people when you have faith in yourself that you can be [00:30:00] hard, should you need to. So remember this 10 scale, one to 10, the volume knob. When people around you are doing things that need containment, how do you [00:30:10] contain it effectively? And how do you communicate appropriately for the environment you're in?

Speaker 2: Please use this skill. It's one of my favorites. It comes up on my practice all the time. Most people coming in for [00:30:20] mental health work are struggling with boundaries in some way, shape, or form. I can't tell you how many people this helps navigate these complex and hard conversations [00:30:30] and. Be ready to have these boundaries thrown back at you a little bit.

Speaker 2: You're accidentally or not so accidentally gonna cross boundaries of people that you care about in your life. And it's gonna be important that you [00:30:40] recognize the volume that they're at so you can meet them and hear them early so they don't have to escalate, just like you wouldn't wanna have to escalate for them.

Speaker 2: So that's the 10 scale. I know that was [00:30:50] a bit long, a bit, probably the longest part of this video, but everybody needs help with boundaries, so hopefully that helps. So for a recap, [00:31:00] you got yourself in part one sorted out. Now you've developed out your community, you've learned how to hold things. You've accepted that these things are happening.

Speaker 2: You've accepted and talked about them happening, [00:31:10] and you found different people and different avenues to process with a tight group of people that you share values with and that see you as the man that you're trying [00:31:20] to be and wanna help you get there. Men, women, and others. And as you explore these things, you better understand how to hold boundaries effectively.

Speaker 2: You're gonna remember that 10 scale, and [00:31:30] you're going to engage with people at the appropriate volume level for where you're at and what's happening. Now that you have all that, it's time to start going into the greater community. [00:31:40] Now that you've got your core managed, you've got your core support ready, now what do you do out in the world with that?

Speaker 2: How do you bring what you've built into the world effectively and powerfully? [00:31:50] Let's talk about that in the next part.

Speaker 2: All right, so you've done the work to get yourself together and you've done the work to get your [00:32:00] people together. I wanna just take a minute here and say, thank you. You've done the hardest part of all this, and you've done more work than [00:32:10] most men have gotten to. So whatever else happens from here, be proud of yourself for this.

Speaker 2: If you get to this part. You've done real work and you're a better person for it. [00:32:20] It's important to know that because you're gonna need it. Once you go out into the world outside of your people, the folks you're gonna come across will not see a good guy. [00:32:30] They just see a guy. And when you're moving in spaces with survivors, that means that they're seeing somebody who might have hurt them.

Speaker 2: This is what hurt most people [00:32:40] look like. I work with clinicians, I educate clinicians. I have to cope with the fact that every time I walk into a room to teach and I get into the front of a room, that more than half the [00:32:50] people in that room are probably triggered just by looking at me, especially with the topics I talk about, I talk about these things.

Speaker 2: I educate on clinical work, which means that you need to [00:33:00] learn how to hold some kindness, but also hold your own boundaries. Just because someone sees you as a thing doesn't mean you are a thing. But it's worth being there and knowing that going in [00:33:10] it's hard and that's why you need to be able to fall back on yourself and you need to be able to fall back on the people that know you and your community.

Speaker 2: They're gonna help you survive and like do well in these places [00:33:20] without losing who you are or forgetting the good guy that you're becoming instead of the defense of, I'm a good guy, we're always striving to be better. One of the [00:33:30] first things to acknowledge is that these things aren't really done online.

Speaker 2: Internet outrage is powerful. It feels really good. It [00:33:40] gives you the adrenal hit like you just did something, but for most of the time, you're just burning energy in an echo chamber, in a place where you have no [00:33:50] influence, leadership, repair, or power to change anything you're just piling on If you are spending your energy on trying to [00:34:00] correct people that aren't in your world.

Speaker 2: That you don't have any influence over, that you have no idea what actually happened wherever they were. Why? [00:34:10] Nothing good happens there, but you burning up your energy and it's destructive. It's not just an effective, it's destructive. It just feeds more outrage and more anger and more [00:34:20] vitriol when what we need is presence and movement.

Speaker 2: You need to take the energy that you want to do on your social media and hate post for like an hour [00:34:30] out into the world. Show up to the march show up to the center that's looking for phone volunteers. Go make sure that you're doing things in the places that you have influence, [00:34:40] that your presence and your words have impact on.

Speaker 2: It's not always gonna be our words. Sometimes just being there for a lot of these things. [00:34:50] Survivors just need guys there. There are great groups doing it. There's a wonderful nonprofit out here that are bikers against child abuse where all these bikers get leathered up and [00:35:00] ride to the courthouse with the kids making their reports and hang out outside the kids' window at night so they feel safe while they're going through the trial.

Speaker 2: And these are burly, nasty biker guys. It's awesome. There's a [00:35:10] lot of different groups like that. Rather than burning up all that energy online, find groups like those guys. Go do things in your community that actually impact. I'm not saying never be on social media. I'm [00:35:20] not ignorant and I'm not stupid, but use your social media to get to where you have influence instead of just thinking you're doing something by posting.

Speaker 2: Most of us [00:35:30] are not. It's important. Note here that for social media, if it's not being used as like the public square coming at people, but place to find empathy, find people to connect with, find [00:35:40] local organizations, that's the effective way to use it. I know I got really vitriolic just there for a minute, but I get so tired of people just spewing venom into the world.

Speaker 2: There's a lot of good ways [00:35:50] to use social media, and if you can be disciplined and proactive in how you do it, that's great. Do that. Go be on those Discord servers where people are helping and talking about their story. Go find those social media [00:36:00] groups and Reddit forums with guys trying to do good work.

Speaker 2: Just don't pile on or get sucked into the outrage machine. It's really hard to do because it's designed for [00:36:10] outrage more than it is care. Lean into the care that's there if you're gonna use it at all. Now that you've found those spaces though, you gotta figure out how to walk into 'em. Most spaces leading on interpersonal violence are led [00:36:20] by women, and that's intentional.

Speaker 2: Women have gotten ran over by this forever, and so you're gonna need to learn how to be in those spaces [00:36:30] and how to take up the right amount of space with your presence. When you're starting out and as you're getting educated on this, you're gonna be showing up and listening to leaders that are [00:36:40] educating you and telling you what's happening in the world around these things.

Speaker 2: You're gonna find dedicated, educated, and passionate people to go learn from. And just by being there [00:36:50] and just by hearing those stories and just by being present in that space. You are gonna learn a lot and you're gonna be of support and you're gonna show the people around that there are men that can [00:37:00] be there and handle it and be there to support it just by being there.

Speaker 2: So don't always worry about having to say anything and it certainly isn't the center yourself and be the center of attention, [00:37:10] especially not when you're starting out. Do not try to lead in the greater community unless you're like operating a men's group or something. Without learning and getting mentorship from somebody who's in [00:37:20] that space.

Speaker 2: There's a lot of really good leadership almost anywhere you look for these topics. Go learn before you try to lead. It's important. So many [00:37:30] guys messed this up because we're raised to think that we should jump in and lead. We're raised to be in a space where people defer to us. That's not your fault.

Speaker 2: It's just the way the world is right now, and it's [00:37:40] probably the world. The world's gonna be for a while. I know people don't like hearing that, but here we are. Just fight that urge in yourself a little bit to show up at the presence that you need to be there. If you're worried about it, if you're [00:37:50] scared of it, look up some gods on how to show up in spaces that don't belong to you.

Speaker 2: We've got one here. I'll link it here. It's a guide that's gonna help you walk into spaces that don't belong to you. [00:38:00] It's important to go in with some confidence, and the way to do that is by watching videos like this and educating yourself on how to do so well. Also understanding that [00:38:10] you're going to make mistakes that while you're out in that world, you might get a little triggered, you might say the wrong thing, you might put the foot in the wrong place socially, it's gonna happen.[00:38:20]

Speaker 2: And you're gonna need some space to recover. That's why you did all that work, to build on yourself and to build your people before you go out into community. 'cause it's gonna give you that place to go and heal and get [00:38:30] better and you're gonna be okay. You can take a little bit of a hit as you learn how to do these things.

Speaker 2: I promise you, you're tougher than you think you are. If I can do [00:38:40] it, you can do it. I was emotionally volatile in my twenties. I was a mess and I was still able to show up in these places and do more good than I did harm. You can [00:38:50] too. Have some faith in yourself and show up even when it's uncomfortable.

Speaker 2: But do so in an informed way. Get what you need. Observe, listen, earn, [00:39:00] trust, and then serve. How asked when the leaders ask you to be places when the leaders ask you to do things, when the leaders say, we need people on the phones, we need people on the phone bank [00:39:10] on these shifts or train you, show up and do 'em.

Speaker 2: It's gonna feel really wonderful. To serve for these things and it's gonna be really healing for you, your loved [00:39:20] ones, and our community. The big thing here is that you're showing up with calm, collected presence. Not hostility. Not vitriol, and not violence. In these [00:39:30] instances, courage for men is just being in that room, not necessarily speaking in that room.

Speaker 2: So let's talk about what happens as you build that competency. Big thing with a movement, [00:39:40] one in four guys, one in four guys are survivors. It's gonna be important that if that's you and you've done the work to leverage your story and to [00:39:50] heal with your story and bring it forward to share, I'm really proud of you and this beautiful thing.

Speaker 2: I'm tearing up just thinking about a few of the guys that I know that have done. It's [00:40:00] powerful. And if you go to these places and you learn from those mentors and you learn from the leaders. It's okay to start taking up a little bit more space. It's okay to start stepping [00:40:10] into leadership roles once you're competent to do so.

Speaker 2: It's important even when you're competent to do so, even when you've done the work to show up, there're gonna be people [00:40:20] that think you don't belong there. And there are spaces we don't belong. Women need groups too. Women need spaces without men where they can process just like we need spaces with men without women, where we can [00:40:30] process just like non-binary people need places away from CIS folks so they can process.

Speaker 2: It's okay that we're not in every space, but the movement is large and [00:40:40] complex. And I promise you there's spaces that you can go be in men against. Interpersonal violence is a growing movement. After you're done these things, after you've shown up in these [00:40:50] spaces, you've listened, you've learned, you've observed.

Speaker 2: Don't be afraid to show up with that calm presence in a leadership role. The big thing here [00:41:00] is being vitriolic and being big and fiery isn't gonna be what's gonna be helpful as a man in this space. I used to do it. [00:41:10] A lot. Early on I was very white nighty. I would show up, I'd get loud, I'd get angry at people.

Speaker 2: I'd take up all this room, and that's how I hurt people showing up in [00:41:20] these spaces. That's how I made the biggest mistakes and learning lessons that I made to bring this to you, to bring that guide on how to walk into places and show up, learn from me. [00:41:30] Don't try to lead like that. Lead from that quiet competence, that consistent presence, that person that shows up when they say they will and shows up consistently.[00:41:40]

Speaker 2: Be that guy. Find other like-minded men's. Start your men's groups. Show up for the groups of men that are doing great work in these topics, and when appropriate [00:41:50] step into those leadership roles. It's okay. It's not about owning the movement, it's not about owning the space. It's about inspiring and teaching others to move through the space.

Speaker 2: Well, as [00:42:00] you move through the space, well, you're gonna feel better about the world. If you get offline and you get away from the hate and the vitriol that we see, probably some of the comments that I'm gonna have [00:42:10] to moderate here, and you get into the world and you see a survivor feel safe, you see someone that you know has been hurt, [00:42:20] show up where they were afraid to show up and speak.

Speaker 2: You help a young guy do better. You help a good man, you know, be the good man he is trying to be [00:42:30] instead of the one hurting people. Your world is gonna get better. You're gonna get better and it's gonna be hard. All of this is hard. All of this hurts. There's not a point in [00:42:40] any of these three that don't involve getting on the other side of some pain and some discomfort, but you can do that.

Speaker 2: That's what we're supposed to do. Life isn't supposed to be just skipping through the [00:42:50] breeze. Life is for overcoming challenges and enjoying the successes, and then having some ice cream, right? We can have little joys, but that's not where we feel whole. [00:43:00] We need the productive impact that took our learning and our struggle to get better at.

Speaker 2: You can do that with these. Best frame for allyship that I like for this as [00:43:10] a big guy is if it's an event that's not for me. If I go to a march, if I go to a thing that's not for my needs, my role is to be a step back into the left. [00:43:20] I wanna leave the room for the people taking their power and supporting it.

Speaker 2: I wanna brace them, not try to jump over them, not try to save them. And then over [00:43:30] time, if appropriate, if it's your movement, if it's something that you need to speak to in your world for your healing, you get good. You get [00:43:40] mentorship, you get invited, and then you start showing up. Your world's gonna get better, and you're gonna feel better for it.

Speaker 2: It's important through all of this. [00:43:50] To remember that this isn't about fixing men. It's not about fixing women or anybody else. It's about strengthening our community as a whole. It's about all of us being better in [00:44:00] the world. If you go in thinking that you're a broken man who needs fixing, you're not gonna come out whole.

Speaker 2: You need to go in as a man who's being better in [00:44:10] the world than he was yesterday and making his community better just by being in it. This is one of those moments in time. And where the most powerful thing you can do with your masculinity and your presence [00:44:20] is show up, be calm, and be there for people.

Speaker 2: And be effective, not vitriolic, not violent, not jumping over people to protect them, [00:44:30] but by joining where appropriate to make our world better if you made it this far in this episode. Thank you so much. I'm [00:44:40] so happy you're here. It's been so wonderful in the last few years to see more men showing up for these things.

Speaker 2: And it's been wonderful to see young guys doing better than I did. [00:44:50] Man, when I got my start, it was so bad. It was all white, knighting, it was a mess, and people were patient with me because I was the only one showing up. Now you show up like I did, [00:45:00] kicked out. It doesn't work good on you guys. For the older guys that are showing up to this party now.

Speaker 2: Welcome. It's not easy. [00:45:10] But your world's gonna get better. You're gonna be there for your loved ones, and you're gonna be of service to your community in new and powerful ways. And I'm so proud to share this with you. I'm so proud to share [00:45:20] this movement with you. Thank you for being here. In our next episode, it's the last part of the Me Too episodes that we're gonna do for 2025.

Speaker 2: A meeting with another advocate who's got a [00:45:30] history as long as mine, and we have a really wonderful discussion on patriarchy, on the cultural moments, on the ways that we as men can take these things on [00:45:40] broadly. I think it'll be a nice wrap to these practical episodes, and I hope you find as much use for it as you found here.

Speaker 2: Please take a moment in the comments. Let me know what support you [00:45:50] need and let me know what resources you need, share what you're doing out in the world and in the community to do better here, we wanna make sure that guys know they're not alone and that they're finding new [00:46:00] ways to be appropriately supportive.

Speaker 2: Here, I'm gonna need you. I'm fairly positive that I'm gonna get a lot of hate for this episode, so help me balance it out with some positivity and some [00:46:10] good work. We'll see you next [00:46:20] time.