Episode Summary

(1:00:00 - 1:01:09) Are you stressed? Oh no, heck no. I'm just busy. I'm just busy getting my A's. I'm just busy being perfect. If my life wasn't so busy being perfect, I might have a language for how much that was becoming an overload. There is a point where we hit peak performance though, and anything beyond that peak performance, it kind of curves back down into what we call distress. It's like having only one gas pedal and no brake, and we really need to be able to have a gas pedal, a brake, a steering wheel, maybe some nice music, you know, some ways to enjoy the ride and modulate in a little bit more rounded way. You're not broken. You're a high performance vehicle that's been running at full throttle for years without scheduled maintenance. The question is not whether you need it. The question is whether you are willing to pull over before the engine tell you it's not optional. Dr. Ken Martz wrote that to open unshakable, he's got 20 years on me in the field, and today he takes us past the analogy and the warning lights and the pit stop tactics that let you keep the speed without letting fear decide when you stop. Ken, man, I'm so glad you're here. So glad to be here. Appreciate you having me and looking forward to the conversation. (1:01:11 - 1:01:38) I really like how you framed things out. So I want to jump right in for the guys. What does high functioning anxiety look like when a guy still hits every target in his life? Sure. You know, it's like as guys, we get trained in up front that we only have two feelings. It's angry and fine. And so when we start building up, we start getting more work, and one more thing gets out of the plate, one more thing gets out of the plate. (1:01:38 - 1:02:14) It's like we don't have a label for that. So we're just, when in doubt, perform more, do more. Getting everything done before the wheels are about to fall off, because I don't have a warning sign saying, wait a minute, I'm getting a little frustrated here. I'm getting a little overloaded. Without those spaces, and to have a blow off some steam and really maintain for a marathon, not a sprint. You know, that high pressure is fine for a sprint, but it's not good for staying. (1:02:15 - 1:02:39) Anything worth doing should have a push, but you can't live in the push. Right, right. And if we don't have a way to identify and articulate the emotions, what starts to happen is the one solution is work harder. Got another feeling? Work harder. Do more. And it's like having only one, a gas pedal and no brake. (1:02:40 - 1:03:11) And we really need to be able to have a gas pedal, a brake, a steering wheel, maybe some nice music, you know, some ways to enjoy the ride and modulate in a little bit more rounded way. Yeah, this comes up a lot for a lot of guys that come on, and it's certainly been true for me in my life where it would always be these big spikes of effort until you hit a wall and crash. And so my thing is always trying to build in the sine wave instead of the big spikes. (1:03:12 - 1:04:52) Yes, exactly. Exactly. We're going in it for a marathon. And so how do we begin to think about that? And most of the time we think about it as like, well, I'm just not going to do the last thing or I'm not going to overload. But it's really a little more complex than that. Some of it is about avoiding a stressor if we can recognize it to be able to do that. But some of it's about building up our resiliency such that I've got the skills to be able to handle more. You know, I've got the nuance to be able to handle more. When I make it to the gym, I have more energy. So when I have more energy, I can do more during the day before I get fatigued. You know, when I eat right, I have a little more energy during the day so I can do more before I get to the fatigue. So it's kind of both and how to increase our skills, abilities and competency, the level of nuance I can do over the years, I can do more things with more ease than I used to be able to do because it's more practiced, you know, as well as know when I'm going to need to take a break. It's like when I'm at it for a while and pounding it, it's like, ah, I can feel this in myself now. I know it's time for vacation. So it's that paying attention instead of overfunctioning. Yeah. Yeah. The thing that's kind of running through my mind as you talk about that is most guys that are listening to this podcast are looking for ways to kind of dial in and get more effective. Right. That's most people listen to podcasts. They're looking for something to do. (1:04:52 - 1:10:44) And the guys plugging into this are the guys that do that really well already. Right. They know how to optimize. Yeah. So what's the difference between a guy who's looking for the way to cram more work in and the guy who's building a functional life? Right. So at the risk of doing an over overused word, but that work life balance element, when you think about like the me myself as a whole person, you know, I just give the health example, you know, health, health is not a not a end goal. You know, you got to start there. If I don't start with my energy levels, I don't have the energy to push. And the other one we tend to skip over is the downtime, which leisure fun. That's kind of why we're doing all that. So it's not necessarily an end goal, either, that we get to. We only get to have fun after we work hard. You know, it's got to be built in and even structurally into the practice, you know, time away on a weekly basis, time for a weekend trip on a quarterly basis, vacation on an annual basis. You know, for example, such that. You know. It may not even be obvious to others, but some of those downtimes have been my actually my most productive times. So some of my clients don't see it, but I've got times blocked out where I'm like, this is a couple hours blocked out. I'm going off to the woods and going for a long walk, long hike that that morning before I come back for the afternoon. It's like doing nothing is actually often a time where I'm like, oh, that's what what I need to do. An insightful time that actually moves the business or my life forward because I've got space to be able to see the bigger picture rather than just doing the piece that's right in front of me. Yeah. And I mean, those are the things that I think once guys look into this content a while, that's what they find they should be doing. What are the things they should be looking for that tell them they're not doing it well enough? Like, what are the kind of signs that lets you know they're wired in, but like not feeling the way they should not being in the life that they want? So a lot of places that that could show up, you know, personally, it could be fatigue, an extra cup of coffee, not sleeping as well, that waking up at 2 a.m. If I'm, if I can't rest, that's already telling me that my central nervous system is on high alert already, which is fine during the day. But if I can't calm that down at night, I'm not getting recharged. So I'm not going to be able to sustain it. You know, in, in relationships, it may be numb, just ignoring someone much less may be a little more progressed, getting irritable or just not caring. And so it gets a little bit cold or lonely. Not that we ever had those feelings, but you know, those types of things could start to happen. Well, the, the two things that click for me on a personal level is that extra cup of coffee. Like I'm pretty regimented about my caffeine intake for good reasons, right? It's anxiety juice when it's like overused. Oh yeah. Yeah. But every now and then, right. And it's that clue that something's off. And then that, that numbness in the quiet where like for my anxious guys, they get so exhausted that they just kind of dissociate from it when they're resting. And the, the irritability comes because someone pokes them while they're trying to like, they think they're relaxing, but they're really just kind of checked out in a reset. Right. Yeah. And, and the day gets even more and more pronounced at that point. Well, I'm working till 10 o'clock at night and then I need three hours to unwind. And so then the things that I'm doing at 10 a.m. 10 p.m. may be things that are not as healthy. Yeah. You know, so it's not actually unwinding, it's not actually recharging, it's not actually scratching that itch to recharge, you know, in the same ways that I really need it. Yeah. Well, and it's the, for me, it's the connective tissue of a life that starts getting lost. Like when a guy can come in and just go through the checklist of all the things he does and just wanting to do more of them. Yeah. I think the danger, when we talk to those guys, when we start listing all these things, it's like, okay, cool. I'm giving you a list of more things to do on an already overcrowded list. Exactly. Exactly. And, and so, oh, we, now I got to go to the gym too. And now I've got to do this and now I've got to do this other thing to relax. And, you know, and that can be part of the task as well, how to be more efficient rather than how to do more. You know, so one of the ways I sometimes think about this from the, from the work side is really reviewing once in a while where the business is at and where I'm at in life and what can be delegated, what can be automated and what can I just say, throw this the heck out. It's no longer serving. I'm not going to do it anymore. It can be eliminated, you know? And so there's a lot of ways to smooth. And each one of those three are all about time saving, being more efficient, being more effective rather than doing more. And as I get more time saving, I can actually then have space to do more as I continue to level and grow. (1:10:47 - 1:11:18) Yeah, I think the hardest thing I see with those guys that come in is the acceptance that you have to have trash time. Like that's how Scott Galloway puts it when he talks about him and his kids. He's like all the best conversations I've had with my sons hasn't been on the vacation, hasn't been when we set time aside, it's driving them to the thing they're going to. It's being present at a moment when the moment can happen. And so much of our life gets locked in on a calendar. If it's not on a calendar, it doesn't happen in my life at this point. (1:11:20 - 1:11:40) And I think that's another thing that I noticed with these guys. If every moment of your day that isn't on your calendar is a point where nothing exists, it's probably like our work isn't going to be giving you more shit to do. It's probably going to be helping you pick some things. (1:11:40 - 1:12:02) Yeah. You can't be so overloaded that there's no space because that's one of the functions of being effective is having a little bit of emergency space. I sometimes call that lunchtime. (1:12:02 - 1:12:56) Whereas if something came up, I've got buffer space. I don't eat always eat now or have lunch. Yeah. But there's space in there to do that, whether that's something that comes up as an emergency or if it's a quick walk because it's a nice day or it's make a quick phone call. Having that buffer time is critical to not overload. So what is that difference then for that overload? That's when I start to think of anxiety, I start to think of overload. Can you break down the difference for the guys listening, the difference between that stress and when it tips over into anxiety and vice versa? Sure. So I'm a visual person. So think about a line going up as I'm describing this. (1:12:57 - 1:13:48) So I joke about it that it's like we need our stress. And I know some people disagree with this kind of thing, but hear it for a second first. We need our stress. If I was like seven o'clock this morning and the alarm goes off and I say, it's nice, it's cozy in here. I want to stay, snooze. You know, I'm comfy staying here for an extra minute. This feels good. I miss it. I need it. By eight o'clock comes around, by nine o'clock comes around, by 10 o'clock comes around. I'm getting Nancy laying in the bed. Mm-hmm. By the way, I'm starting to get hungry. So I'm going to get my butt up. I'm going to go down the kitchen, open the refrigerator, make some food so I can eat so I don't die. (1:13:49 - 1:16:29) Because stress is about a fight or flight response, right? I open the refrigerator, I say, shh, there's no food in here. I guess I better get myself down in the grocery store so I can get some food so I can eat so I don't die. I get to the grocery store and I open up my wallet and I say, oh shoot, I guess I better go get a job so I can get some money so I can get some food so I can eat. So there's a certain amount of activation that gets us up and going into life, you know, into movement. And the technical term for that is eustress. So that's the amount of stress, that activation that keeps us going up and up and up. There is a point where we hit peak performance though. And anything beyond that peak performance, it kind of curves back down into what we call distress, which is all the stuff that we think of when we call anxiety in general terms. That stuff that's like heart attack and high blood pressure and indigestion and relationship problems and irritable and, you know, all those types of things are all the symptoms, all the markers of I'm already on overload. And so I usually work with folks about how to keep my activation up but not so much that I go over the peak levels. And even up or down just a little bit. Yeah, because like you can't, like you can't, it always really bothers me and I think this is where therapy talk loses a lot of guys is it's this soft, like you just need to relax, you need self-care, you need like most guys need something to do. Most of us, just as human beings, like having something that is needed to do. It's when it trips over to that overwhelm where we've now taken on enough that all these things are needed and I'm past capacity. And I think that's one of the places that by the time folks are coming into counseling, they often are getting to that point of being on overload. And so it gets a messaging that we need to come and chill back. But it's not just that, you know, it's moving some things and sometimes replacing them with things that are a little more aligned and recharging. You know, something that I love doing that gets me up out of bed in the morning, gives some meaning to all that churn. Rather than just believing that life has to be hard. Yeah, like life should be hard. Life shouldn't be daunting. (1:16:30 - 1:16:44) Yes. You know, enough to be a challenge, enough to be a, I want to overcome that. I want to be able to get the accomplishments, the pleasure of being successful. (1:16:46 - 1:19:01) Yeah. Yeah. One of my training sergeants loved throwing the word lackadaisical around when I was in the Air Force. That was just like an insult. And it's always stuck with me. And it's when I would hear in programs and different people talk about anxiety, stress, and self-care, I'm like, you're just describing a lackadaisical life where like I'm skipping through flowers, like nothing's going on. No one that I like relates to that. No. Yeah. Like nobody I want to spend time with. Like I've got some friends that can get there and it's lovely when we find our silly space, but like none of them live there. Yeah. No. Yeah. It's a nice, that's a vacation space. That's not, if we can get a vacation space, it's not the day-to-day. It's not the, this is what's causing the struggle. Yeah. You know? And so when it clicks over into that struggle, you do a really good job at the beginning of the book, kind of listing some of these check engine lights. Can you name a few of them off for the guys? Sure. Sure. Some of them I already started with the, just being a bit self-aware because usually when I'm so busy, I'm not paying attention to check about where I'm at. You know? So for example, what's going on in my body? Am I starting to get tension? Am I starting to get sleep disruption? Am I starting to get that amped up and I can't wind down racing thoughts, waking up in the middle of the night or not falling asleep? Sleep is a big one. Or eating. You know? I'm just going to eat because I'm like, not hungry, but I'm just trying to make up for the fact that I didn't sleep. Yeah, exactly. Trying to regulate. I often say, it's like, you know, people underestimate in our culture a bit, the diet and all that. It's like, if I put maple syrup in my car's gas tank, I guarantee you it will run differently than if I put premium gasoline in the gas tank. You know, I may enjoy a pancake with some maple syrup someday, but I will run differently if I've got some balance of good fuel. (1:19:01 - 1:19:05) The pancake coma. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. (1:19:07 - 1:19:21) Well, and so the one that struck me when I was reading through is, you know, the panic attack in the car or in the bathroom before the big work meeting. That's usually when guys that are willing to come, come through the door the first time. Sure. (1:19:22 - 1:19:41) If they have their first panic attack and that wakes them up a little, they come in and there's still a lot of time to catch some things. When guys run past that one and now this is just like, yep, this is what stress feels like. As opposed to like, no man, you're in fight or flight. (1:19:41 - 1:20:28) That's not stress anymore. Yeah. Not at all. And it feels so bad that's enough to wake people up sometimes. But not always, you know, so it's like, um, that I sometimes tell the story, you know, back when I was in school, uh, I, uh, I was the guy who got shit done. And so, you know, we finished through and I remember social psychology and my gosh, we finished the exam the next day and we're reviewing it and I'm sitting in the back row and I say, excuse me, on question number 24, you said the answer was this, but it should have been this. (1:20:28 - 1:20:45) I was of course, right. You know, because naturally, you know, that's the way it was. And so we just, we, we debated this in front of the class for, for a few minutes before he suddenly looks at me and he says, Ken, didn't you get a 99 on this exam? And I said, yes, I did. (1:20:45 - 1:22:15) That's why I want this last point. You know, you know, drive and drive and drive feels really good. Like I'm going to get accomplished. Like I'm going to learn all this stuff. Like I'm going to get the a, I'm going to get the, this and that and the other thing, which feels really good until, you know, I turn around, I'm standing in the line in the post office, um, of all places. And all of a sudden the, my ears start pounding and my heart starts racing and the room's spinning. I don't know what the frick is going on until you wake up like a few minutes later in the hospital gown that kind of doesn't fit to cover anything that's important. And they're trying to figure out why this healthy, high-performing person should have a heart condition, you know, much less, are you stressed? Oh no, heck no. I'm just busy. I'm just busy. I'm just busy getting my A's, you know, I'm just busy being perfect. If my life wasn't so busy being perfect, I might have a language for how much that was becoming an overload, you know, much less a panic attack, much less a heart condition, much less any of these, which are so miserable, you don't want to get it. (1:22:16 - 1:23:22) No, but you learn how to live with it. Yeah. So that's one of my missions is like to begin to have the conversation where it's okay to have these conversations before it gets to that point. You know, I'm really good with working with panic. I'm really good with working folks post-heart attack, but I'd much rather work with you a little earlier on, you know, where it's prevention rather than post-intervention. Yeah, because once the, after a heart attack, it's a very different recovery. Yeah. Like I, there's a reason why you and I get along. When I was in grad school, I was doing pretty consistently 60 to 70 hour weeks because I was also working on campus, building out programs, doing, you know, doing all the things because I was in my thirties. The one thing, it wasn't enough in grad school. I'm way late to this party. I got to catch up. Right. And my father, I watched him have a heart attack in his late thirties. Now my dad had a heart attack in his late thirties because he was in the eighties as an adult and cocaine is awesome. (1:23:25 - 1:25:37) But for me, that scared me. Yeah. And so I go to the medical center on campus where I've got coverage and I'm like, Hey, you know, I just want to run all the tests. You know, my dad had an early heart attack. My grandfather had an early heart attack. I'm only in my thirties, but you know, better to get ahead of this stuff. And when it came back fine and he's like, yeah, have you, talk to a counselor. Yeah. It's like, I, I'm, I'm going to be one. Like, what do you, what do you, what do you mean? And it was wild to hear all of the symptoms of a heart attack that you would notice start with when you're consistently in that fight or flight before you've done damage. And so if it wasn't for my father and witnessing that, I might've ran it into the ground and then, you know, maybe I would've made it into my forties or fifties, but I wouldn't have known to, to pause and look for it. Right. Right. And, and it seems like clear for those people, but when you're in the day to day, it just feels normal. This is just, this is just life. Yeah. You know, isn't everybody going to school and working and, and, and, and having a relationship and, and, and, or maybe getting into a relationship later. Those are my favorite guys. Yeah. Once, once I get all this done, then there'll be room. Yeah. For, you know, what life is actually for. Right. Right. Yeah. And you can't always wait until later for that. No, you know, and no, it's been a run actually the last, this last six months I've started four guys, all of whom have crushed their career. Like they are, you know, five to 10 years ahead on their career progression to their peers. And all of them were doing it to get to where they could find like the life for a spouse. Like I need financial security before I can do any of that. (1:25:37 - 1:28:02) Right. I'm going to go get that and put my head down and only do that. Right. And that's a, that's a shitty way to live. Yeah. Yeah. It, it, it, it portrays a story that it's not possible to have it all. It's not possible to have both, you know? And the irony of it is very often aside from just being hungry for it, when we've got that, that's part of the motivation that lets me push through the harder days, you know, part, because I know I got somebody that's got my back part because I care. And frankly, caring is a lot higher frequency, a lot higher energy than, you know, fighting on stress. Well, and I think like the thing that's kind of going through my mind as you talk about that is that frame that you started with where guys get fine and angry as their emotional language and what that denies them. Yeah. And so you put together this really wonderful five emotion frame in your book that I really liked. Yeah. What are some of the range that the guys listening might be able to look for to kind of catch some of these moments before they're just like always running from a failure instead of towards a success? Sure. Absolutely. First to start is that there are more than two emotions, you know, and we need all of them despite having it trained out of us for years. We need our fear. We need our grief. We need our passion. You know, fear is there to protect us from danger. You know, despite this, the hats and t-shirts, it's like no fear, you know, which sound really cool for a short term. If I have no fear, I'm going to walk out in the street and get, get hit by a car. I'm going to die. If I have two, no one likes that guy. No, no. If I have too much fear, I'm going to be a deer in the headlights and frozen, and I'm going to get hit by a car and die. We need all of these things in some measure. (1:28:05 - 1:29:43) So I usually talk about Goldilocks and kind of finding that balance. And that's why I talk about managing emotions, just like I talked about managing stress a moment ago that I want not too much, not too little. I need to know that alert system that's saying, wait a minute, I'm getting in danger here. Because when we turn off that alert system that says, the stress level is getting too high, you should be watching out here. It's like turning off the warning panels on your dashboard. It's like, why would you do that? Then danger is going to hit you without you knowing it. We need our fears. We're not going to live there, but they're warning there to protect us and keep us safe and healthy. Same thing with grief, although nobody wants to be grieving, but grief is in direct proportion to the love. Every time I risk caring about somebody and being vulnerable and being real and the passion that brings, it's temporary. And so it comes to the point where it's going to stop at some point. And either I'm going home or they're going away, or it could end, or one of us could pass away. And it hurts, but that is the anchor that brings the preciousness of joy, which is in the day to day, in the present moment. So it's like you don't bake a cake with one emotion. It makes it taste better, much better life to be a little more rounded. (1:29:45 - 1:30:46) Yeah. I think the, when I think of anxiety kind of sucking the color out of the world, it's, you're so worried about either not getting too happy or losing happy that you never get to be some kind of happy. Exactly. And so if you're not willing to accept the grief, that's going to come when something doesn't go through, if you're not willing to accept the frustration that comes from somebody not doing anything, you don't get to have the other end of it. When we have those moments where things go well, when we have those achievements that we earn. We can't have happy without the concurrent risks associated, which is also true in business. My business success is in proportion to the risks that I take. If I make little tiny itty bitty risks, I'm going to make little tiny itty bitty gains, which are still progressive gains, which is fine. And I'm not talking about going crazy and being, you know. (1:30:47 - 1:32:19) Like putting your house up for mortgage to start a business and no research. Yes, of course. Comma, I've got to take a few risks here and there, even if some of them don't pan out exactly the way that I want, you know, within my re within whatever my means and reason are, you know, which the same thing with the, I can live in my armor, in my walls and it's safe and it's lonely and it's boring. It's cold. Yeah. And why, you know, you know, it's nice to be safe, but well, I think this is where like some of the stoic thinking on emotions really helps, right there. The goal is not to not have the emotion. The goal is to have an effective and metered response with an emotion. Right. And this goes back to that distinction between stress and anxiety, like having juice to get up and go get something is great. I wouldn't take that from anybody. I don't like people that don't have any. It's weird. That's depression. Like if you don't have any stress that you feel, that's depression. Yeah. Right. But for me, where it jumps is like worry is a healthy thing. Right. Like a, I think a lot about my public speaking. If I'm not worried going into it and I've been doing it for 20 plus 30 years now, if I'm not a little worried walking into a presentation, that means I didn't prep every big mistake I've ever made is because I was cocky and thought I just didn't need to do anything to get ready. Right. Right. Every time. (1:32:20 - 1:32:52) Makes sense. You know, and as I progress in my career, as any of us continue to grow, you know, every time we grow, we're going into something new. So if we're not on occasion running into that imposter syndrome thing, we're not doing our growing. And if we're stagnant, we're not in a path we want to be in because the world's going to grow up around us. We're that bit of worry. Let's just know what we're on our growth path. (1:32:53 - 1:34:39) We just re-released an episode with a clinician I care for deeply, Kara, and she studies and specializes in suicidality. And one of the things that we talked about is as you progress through life as a guy, your status is dependent on further achievement. And most of the time. And it's why like the money that looked so good at 25 looks terrible at 45. Right. Right. Yeah. And, and so some of it's an acceptance that you do want things in life and the more you build, the more you want, because you see the next thing to reach for. But that means the fear of like what you've already built collapsing underneath you gets bigger and bigger and bigger. Right. At least in my experience. Well, and you have more skills in your belt to be able to reach for those types of things. You've done the reps to be able to, and develop the skills to have those next layers, you know, and sustain them. But we need also the operating system along the way, because if we don't have all the lights on our, on our dashboard, letting us know, Hey, the oil's getting low. This has gone a little bit, you know, this is overheating a little bit. This is, this is a little bit off. Those are the skillset that lets us stay on our, on our marathon rather than running too hot and needing to crash. And then, and we're the tortoise and the hare story of, you know, where I ran and then I just ended up being further behind than others because I didn't have that emotional regulation to sustain, you know, and that is a skill that can be taught. (1:34:39 - 1:36:22) It is a skill that can be practiced and evolved and you can get better at, you know, there was a, and sometimes you start to get at it and you don't even realize I had a client I was working with one day was telling a story and, and all of a sudden he turns to me and says, says, how do you do that? What did I do? You sit there and I'm talking through the, these painful stories and you get all glassy, but you never cry. So my first thought was, oh, of course. Oh shit. He caught me. Okay. All right. I thought I was just staying right at that, you know, but that's a bit on purpose of in my world and see what you're feeling. I want to, I want to sense where you're at. I'm walking this journey with you closely and deeply, but I've got to maintain my regulation so that I don't fall into the pit with you because then it becomes all about me rather than all about you and finding that balance again. Well, that's the complaint that comes out of the first response committee with those guys I work with. Like they come to me and they'll have gone to a, like a non-trauma trained clinician and then they go tell a painful story from their job. Usually a kid call and the counselor like starts crying and then they have to tend to the counselor in this moment that they were supposed to have a container. (1:36:25 - 1:41:28) And I think about that a lot when it comes to being your own container. Yeah. Like if you, if you can't see the emotion that you're having, acknowledge it and then move towards the need that it's pulling towards instead of just ignoring it to get to the need you've named. Right. Eventually something's going to break. Right. Right. Inevitably might be this week. It might be in 10 years, but something's going to go and it's going to be big and it's not going to be when you pick. No. Well, and the trauma example is another great example of that. It's like, I sometimes talk about it as surfing. Cause it's like, I'm not resisting the wave. I've got to be able to ride the waves as they come up and as the emotions build and fall, you know, and so I'm not going to get just smacked down, you know? So, and that will vary from day to day how to ride that wave. So. Well, you gave, I mean, in the, in the end of the book, man, the appendix is great with the three kind of clinical tools that you hand guys. And what I love about it is it's only asking them for like 10 minutes. Yeah. I mean, it's 10 minutes spread through your day for these different things that are going to help you do this a little bit better. What are like one, two or three of those things that a guy listening in his truck right now could make his day a little bit better tomorrow with? Yeah. One of the fastest ways to do this and easiest to teach in like a couple of seconds is called the sigh breath. It kind of triggers one of the physiologic responses and it's very simple. It's just take a deep breath, inhaling, then take a little tiny bit more. Cause sometimes we act a little bit more through the, in through the nose, exhaling through the mouth, like a gentle sigh, you know, you know, when you have a long day and you hit that side, it's just like all of a sudden everything melts. The body knows how to respond there. You can do this for two, three, four, do it a couple of minutes and see how quickly just that quick inhalation, a little bit of extra oxygen, a little bit of oxygen equals energy. And that sigh, anything time the exhalation is a little longer than the inhalation, it physiologically activates the parasympathetic nervous system, the one that tells us to slow down. So inhale, inhale a little more and then sigh, just slow exhale. What I found interesting is the first time, cause like you said, man, it's the bread and butter where we start a lot of times and it's great. There's a reason why bread and butter is delicious. It goes with every meal. But what's funny is my athletes and veterans pick that up faster because if you've ever done any distance running or distance biking, you know how to do that because your body will convince you that you're out of gas when you're at 60% and start making you breathe like a bellows. And if you can catch that and control your breathing, it reminds your body that you're, you're good for a while yet. Yeah, exactly. Using the systems that are already there rather than fighting against it. It's the same thing with abdominal breath. It just takes a little longer to teach it, but it's already trained, pre-trained, particularly in speakers or musicians that they know how to use that particular muscle group that we otherwise forget about. But it's very effective and it's very effective for retraining the whole system so that I'm consistently breathing that manner, which is about depth and consciousness rather than in my shallow stress breathing. So it's a little longer to teach, but again, different paths up the mountain. So I'm a toolbox kind of guy. It's like if tool A doesn't work, we go to tool B, we'll go to tool C. I'm going to get you there. It's not a question that we're not going to get to the resolution, but sometimes we need to find the right match that's just right for you. Yeah, I think that's the trick, right? I think a lot of guys, when they call, a lot of therapists frame it as like, you're going to have space to talk and you're going to feel better. And sure. And I have degrees. This isn't just you're coming in and venting for an hour and that makes your life better. No. It's you venting and then me guiding you through what to do while you vent, how to take what you're doing home better. And a bit of breathing goes a long way. Right. And a bit of awareness. When I can step back from the problem and breathe for a second, I can start to be able to articulate what the problem is. Because if the issue is grief, there's different tools in my toolbox for grief than there are for fear than there are for anger. So you can find the right tool and the right solution if you do a right diagnostic upfront. (1:41:30 - 1:44:26) And I can just start there, but it's good. Well, yeah. And it's a, you know, it's why like dialectic behavior therapy is so wonderful with the mindfulness aspect of it, right? Like if you don't, just like anything that you've ever done, that's hard. If you don't accept and see where you're starting in the skill, you will not get better. You will just keep flailing in the same ways. Right. Yeah. And so we've got the breathing and I like in the book, I pulled it up just to make sure that I got it in front of me is that's a great way to start before the phone. Yes. Right. Rather than waking up and jumping into like a sprint, even if it's just a minute while you're making your coffee. Yes, exactly. Right. Now, what is the like a midday thing that you like? So a couple of things, breathing is one that works, works well all the way throughout. You can redo that at multiple times and it kind of seasons thing by midday. We've already been active a little bit and maybe been sitting in our chair for far too long. So midday, I particularly like a little bit of movement. If you can get outside and get some sun, you know, that's awesome. If not, even just some very, very simple stretches, something to wake up to, to undo all the movement that we're sitting in our chair for so long, stand, walk, twist, stretch. I also teach yoga. So there's more complex ways you could do that, but it can start with just a simple forward bend, back bend. Yeah. You know? One, I think that's useful because it, there's a somatic component of like what your body's doing when you feel an emotion. And so many of us as guys are kind of trained to not notice that just by starting to pay attention to that body, it starts to go better. Like I said, my athletes and my veterans, once they accept the emotionality as a skill and something that they can do with that body awareness really builds up for them. For my cognitive guys, what I like is the checklist, the midday checklist. Because just like you and me were talking about earlier, if we're blowing by all our achievements and all our completions, we never get to have a sigh. We never have to get an internal sigh of like, good, that's done. Right. Good. That's done. Yeah. Instead it's, this isn't, this isn't, this isn't, this isn't. Yeah. So, and there's the, that's not just midday. They can also do a checklist as a, as a work product. You know, I had these goals take two minutes at the front end of the day, what's on my to-do list and check them off. The checking things off lets me feel accomplished, lets me know I'm on track and lets me get the top priorities done before I get to the end of the day and like, oh shoot, now I got to be extra stressed because I didn't do the important one. Oh shoot, I forgot that one was due. (1:44:28 - 1:45:16) Yeah. And I, what's interesting to me is I think it's because we're not built for having multiple tasks going on. Yeah. And so we need cognitive frames for it. Like the guys that I work with that, you know, find themselves kind of checked out with their kids or find themselves waking up at two in the morning with those spinning thoughts about the next work report. Right. I'd say half of them, just by starting the day with the checklist they made at the close of the last day, having a lunch check-in on where their work is at. Yeah. And then stopping working 10 minutes before it's time to leave and noting where things are at and where they're picking them up the next day. Yeah. It makes the lift of changing gears and being home and not being in your work possible. Like not easy, doesn't always work, but it makes it possible. (1:45:16 - 1:45:28) Yeah. And that transition time becomes very important as well. You know, when we were all going out to work and then coming home, there was also a little, usually a bit of a drive time. (1:45:28 - 1:45:33) There was a little bit of decompression time. Oh yeah. A lot of folks are working from home now. (1:45:34 - 1:45:52) So it's like, I finish, I close the laptop and I walk into the room and all of a sudden. I'm supposed to be dad. I'm supposed to be husband. I'm supposed to be whatever immediately. Everything. Yeah. And there's not a transition time. There's not a moment to decompress, to mentally close the book. Not just as, which is not as fast as closing the laptop. (1:45:53 - 1:51:53) Yeah. When I was still with my ex-wife through COVID, I would like pop up from the desk after the last client and walk into the living room and she was just, you know, we're both lonely. Like we're both in lockdown. So she's like, Hey, tell me about it. I'm like, this is, I need a minute. And so I had to literally start not opening my door for five or 10 minutes, just to kind of like gear shift before, which felt, you know, it feels really, for me, I always felt guilty that I needed a break to get ready for this person that I care for this person that I want to be there for. But it's just, we're not designed to be able to task switch like a light switch. Right. And that's one of the things that happens with stress levels is we're trying to manage a dozen different things and keep track of work and life and home and bills and everything else under the sun. And we can still only, even when you're spinning plates, you're still spinning one at a time, which is how we're designed. Well, so what I'm going to do for the guys listening is I'm going to take the appendix out of your book and I'm going to turn it into an HTML worksheet for them. Great. And so guys, if you're listening to this and any of these things sound like something you want to try, there's going to be some extra guidance for you. You can also just buy his book. It's pretty good for this stuff, right? Yeah. But I find having it in a quick reference on my phone helps me do the simple things, give them a shot. And the other thing I would tell you is that when you try these simple things, if they work a little bit, go get help. Like I think what happens with a lot of folks listening, right? Either they just take any information and they don't do anything with it, which please don't do that. I know it feels like you're doing something when you listen to things like this, but if you don't go do any of the stuff that we talk about, nothing changes for you. And then if you, you're a bright, effective guy, if you're listening to this, it's because you're a high functioning guy with anxiety, which means you're going to do the thing and it's going to get a little better. But imagine what it would look like if you sat across from somebody who knew what they were doing. So try some things that work. If they work wonderfully and you don't need anything else, great. High five. Dr. Marr, it's me. We helped you out. Don't have to pay a bunch of money, go to therapy or go to a coach or whatever. But if they help a little bit, that's like duct tape, right? Duct taping a hose in the car, right? It'll work for a while, but you really want to go replace the hose. Absolutely. I often say, you know, there's a lot of things that I can do. It doesn't necessarily mean I should do. When that certain thing breaks in the house, I can make the five trips to Home Depot and spend two weeks on it with a whole bunch of extra expense and extra mess. Or I can ask for help and get that done quick and easy and move it along. Yeah. I give myself two trips. If it goes past two trips, I'm done. The validating thing is every time that's happened, the repair guy has had to go on to the shop or something for an extra thing. I'm like, okay, cool. It's not just, I'm not an asshole. Nope. This is just tricky. Yeah. Yeah, it is. And these skills to be taught and practiced. So let everybody help each other. Well, and just to kind of give them something on the other end of it, right? Like the guys that you work with and that I work with that come in like this and they start to do some skills and they find the right ones for them and it starts to get traction. What changes? Sure. Like why would they want this? Sure. Well, easy example to kind of see is that I'll sometimes work with folks who were coming in with multiple panic attacks in a week, which is brutal. It's brutal. It's absolutely brutal. And so even within a couple of weeks, I can pretty much get you moving into the point where we start counting days without a rescue medicine. Within a month, we're talking about weeks without a rescue medicine. And I'm still in that mindset of how to not have panic, how to not have problems. I'm avoiding a problem. Yeah. And so the mind starts to continue to shift when all of a sudden I can relax and I'm not worried about the next panic attack. All of a sudden now I'm free to like my shoulders start to drop. Oh, I didn't even realize my shoulders were up here all day long. And then in a couple of months, it's like, oh, that's why I always did that. Yeah. And in a couple of months, it's like, oh, I'm not even talking about how not to have stress in my life anymore. It's like, how do I take all this new energy and build a new life and start transitioning almost into a business coaching life development process? So life continues to change. And when we get our emotional world on straight, we've got room to sprint again. I really love how you frame that because it's a pretty big cautionary tale for a lot of guys. Guys that are productivity hounds, that are anxious and effective. They listen to the stuff, they do the tools and they're like, great, I got more bandwidth. I'll take on another project. Yeah. Yeah. No, man. Like just five minutes. Yeah. Five minutes to think about like, what do you want? Yeah. Not what the next achievement is. Right. Like, what do you want? What do your kids want? What does your wife want? What does it look like of maybe finally getting a girlfriend or a boyfriend? Right. Yeah. Like if you don't know where the goals are, you're going to keep going through very, very short term goals. Any good business plan, it's going to have a five year, three year, one year plan along with those action steps. My to do list is typically my action steps from today. (1:51:54 - 1:54:32) But if I don't have a context with that, what about what's it all about? Where am I headed? Why am I doing this? How am I using these action steps today to build towards something bigger so that next year it's going to be even easier or more productive, more productive, more financially lucrative, more passion, more play, more fun. Yeah. Where I'm surfing instead of swimming. Yeah. Yeah. It was funny. I, so I've been rehabbing a hurt shoulder that I've had since I was 20 and the rehab now is it's been hurt for so long that I sit wrong with it Yeah. Out of fear of the pain of it. Yeah. And a lot of the work now is just like relaxing it. And what's interesting is, is my therapist was the one who pointed out like, you know, I'm a few years out of my divorce and it's now like my, my regulation is starting to come back pretty well. And the highlight of like, if you're older, you've got some things that hurt. Yeah. Like you'd no one gets through their thirties with no, nothing being busted up, even if it's just from sitting still too much. And that anxiety tension makes that happen faster and worse and makes it harder to get anything done with. Right. Yep. And so the, so the other thing is if you're a guy that's listened to this and you're a high achiever guys like Ken and I, we want you to be a high achiever. We want, we like being able to say, I've got clients that go and do X thing. Right. But I want you to be able to do it into your seventies. And if you keep, if you're in your twenties, thirties or forties, and you're doing it like this, you won't. You know, that's such a critical piece because of the repetition element, you know, that I often say in one of my deeper assessments, taking a look at very specific physical, physical symptoms, which is more in depth in this conversation. But for example, some of us, we clench at our jaw. Some of us clench at our shoulders. Some of us, we clench at our belly, which is good to be aware, which is a step one. But what happens when I clench my jaw all day for years, for decades, would it be surprised if I start getting chronic migraines? Would it be surprised when I start wearing down the, the, uh, enamel on my teeth and I lose my teeth, you know? So what works for a sprint does not work for a chronic strain stress. (1:54:33 - 1:58:41) You know, it's more than just a heart attack. It's the whole body. Well, it's that burnout recovery, right? There's a difference between recovering from a push and recovering from years. Yeah. It takes more and it takes more intention. Yeah. So I'm going to make the worksheets up out of the back of your book, man. I think I, I, I love the frames. I like the nuance that you bring to it. And I think the language in them is really going to resonate with the guys listening and guys, they're free for anybody who needs them. And if you've got like five bucks to throw for a worksheet, cause you want to help us do this for more guys. Great. But if you're listening and you just need something to try, please, that's what all those worksheets are for. They're there to help. Um, is there anything that you want the guys listening to know before we get into your story a little bit here at the close key pieces to remember that we don't need to be doing alone. You know, there's this, one of these myths about the lone wolf as if it's a priority and we are social animals and wolves are to, you know, you need connections cause we each have different skills. And so we actually get further, stronger, easier when we collaborate, when we take the time to build those relationships and invest in our future that way. There's never been a point in the human experience where an isolated person was the way to live. Like at best you've got cultures where they have monks, where they have like hermits, people that go off on their own. But the purpose of that is to bring wisdom back to the group. Even those folks aren't just doing it for themselves and by themselves. Absolutely. So for you, I'm really excited to see where this goes after 30 years, listen to other guys describe these answers. What's the truth about masculinity that you learned before you were 12 that's remained true through your life? Yeah, there was a old wall and quote from a Henry David Thoreau that I'm going to butcher probably, but I've I'll be pretty close. You know, I went to the woods because I wished to live to deliberately to put to rot all that was not life and not when I came to live, not when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. You know, I picked up really early about these messages about being successful and really growing. And that's really precious. And I say it's really important to know what our particular gifts are so that we can share them as best as possible without getting all lost in our side quests and our distractions and our things we didn't know so that we can be as successful as possible, whatever that means in light of our gift, you know, and that's a life practice. It's not a once and done. So find that meaning. Well, I think that for me, the big thing I've noticed in these conversations is, you know, if a woman is a woman after her period, in a lot of cases, we have ritual and we have things that welcome in different cultures, women to, from being a girl to being a woman and for men, it comes through competence. Like when you're a young man, it's your privileges. It's the things that you hold in the world that maybe you didn't earn. But the older we get, the more it's about what you know how to do. And so if you can't name your gifts and you can't find space for them in your world, it hurts. It just hurts to be a guy that's not doing that. (1:58:41 - 2:04:02) Right. Well, and I'm going to add to that a little bit because sometimes it's about what I do and sometimes it's about how I be, you know, because my identity is not just what I do. My value doesn't come from my labor. My value and my identity, my emotions come from me. Yeah. And they're expressed through my labor, but keeping that distinction about I'm more than just what I do. Man, this is one of those moments where those who can't do teach, like you are absolutely 100% correct. And yeah, we all need, this is life practice. We all need people around us that remind us that like, they like us for our stupid laugh. They like us for the little things. And then some work with some purpose goes a long way. Yeah. Good catch, man. Thanks for that. Absolutely. What's a time that pursuit of manhood hurt you? Not simple, but an important one. I already talked about the, the, you know, growing up, I bought in a bit to the let go of the feelings, just charge, just be productive and identify that stuff and run with that stuff because that's our metric is getting good grades, getting a salary, getting a external metrics. And that doesn't serve us. They're valuable, but it's a piece, not an end goal and how to kind of gearshift back from that a little bit. So the mission is a little bit more inclusive than just that. I think that that overshoot. Yeah. Yeah. It always hurts. Yeah. So what's a time where pursuit of manhood empowered you? You know, it didn't stop at my first, I didn't learn the day after the first panic attack, you know, and that pursuit is a journey, not a once and done either. But the places in life where I've learned to recognize and drop the masks and be a little more real and be, you know, not to wallow, but have a space to be honest and real with my guy friends, with my wife, with my kids, with my family members, with my clients in certain ways. Those are the places where it's really precious. And so really being able to lean into that as an ongoing practice, it's not a once and done, you know, I'm going to continue, I'm sure, you know, cause I've grown up, found more new things. I'm going to continue to grow until I'm, but those are the places that there's some juice where it feels good. And it's like, ah, I want to be here. Yeah. That, that feeling of wanting to be here was a profound shift for me. And it didn't, it's one that I should have learned. Cause I've like heard, yeah. You know, dozens and dozens of clients talk about that shift. And then it's weird when you come do it yourself. Yeah. Yeah. And sometimes it's really valuable to have a mentor or somebody around to say, Whoa, stop. Just take this in a second. Yeah. You know, cause sometimes we're rushing. So we don't stop to do that, but yeah, stop. Well, I've got more to do. Would you just like, let me go about one? Yes. Take a breath, take this in first and then carry it in and then you'll do better next time. Yeah. Well, uh, come in. Thanks so much for putting all this work into the world. And if you're wondering if he's an overachiever, how many books have you written? 16. So the 16th book, he's got 30 years of practice. So I know these things sound simple that we, he and I are talking about, but there's a reason why you need simple things to do hard shit. So take it from him and take it from me. Go get the things you need. Ken, thank you so much for being here, man. Thank you. Appreciate you. I always appreciate our conversations and, and, and the work that you're doing because there's so much need out there and it's easier together. It's easier with more hands and we need that kind of a growing movement and a permission structure amongst guys to be able to grow in that way. That's our conversation with Dr. Ken Mards. To help you put into practice, we built out some worksheets. There's links in the show notes to them. They're free for anybody who needs them. As always, we fact check the episode to make sure that we're getting you the best information possible. This one had no major corrections. (2:04:02 - 2:04:56) There's one bit of nuance that's worth naming though. Dr. Mards and I use these tools in our practice regularly to help people, but don't mistake diet, exercise, and breathing as a cure-all that everyone. It helps almost everyone, but it's often not enough for most. Don't mistake someone with anxiety and depression as someone who isn't willing to put in the work. Sometimes these things get complicated and that's why he and I have a job. On a housekeeping note, you may have noticed that we missed a few weeks of releases. I was in a motorcycle accident, so it was laid up for a bit and I'm going to be okay. Everything should heal fine, but I'm going to be in recovery for the next few months. Between that and trying to finish my book, we're going to have to scale back the podcast a bit going from weekly releases to bi-weekly releases. I would rather take the time to make sure we're giving you the best we can than trying to rush them with me at half speed. So thanks for the support. Thanks for listening. This has been Tim Wieneke with American Masculinity episode 65. We'll see you next time.