Another 4 way chat with my Men's Mastermind - comprising 4 of Australia's top men's coaches.
Man Pants is our metaphor for getting into our "Man role"
Here's the transcript of my share:
For me, getting my Man Pants on was it was a real defining moment. And it came out of a relationship.
It wasn't a particularly long relationship – however it was relationship which I'd just handed over my balls.
I was trying to do all things you’re mean to do, trying to play, just trying to make it out. And it became really clear it wasn't working. I needed to be out of it. It was toxic. It was abusive. There was a whole bunch of shit going on.
And I was kind of still wanting to do it, but got really clear that this wasn't it.
What I did differently, stepping out of that relationship - I've never done before - is I got really, really real with exactly what it was I was doing. With exactly what was happening.
I fully owned what I was doing. And it was the first relationship that I wasn't beating myself up with ending – exactly because I was taking responsibility rather than blaming myself or her.
I spent literally 5 months going really deep into detail in exactly what I was doing. The patterns I was living out. The ways I was just not having my man pants on, basically.
And then spent another 5 months after just getting really clear on what I then want to do differently, how I wanted to live differently. But from that place of really acknowledging what I was actually doing. What I actually did.
The other person, other people in my life had their stuff. But what exactly was it that I was doing - that I could own, that I could understand? And in that sense, take action on.
And for me, in terms of that day to day keeping my man pants on - that's still the essential bit of it for me. Being real with exactly what I'm doing.
When I notice that I've left them in a corner somewhere, it's essentially that. There's something that I haven't gotten really real with.
There's some part of my life that I've kind of gone like, "Oh I can't do that, I'm too small” or “it's somebody else's fault." Or "That work's too hard, I'm not meant to do that kind of thing." When I see that, I go: "Nuh, put them on. Okay, I'm in this situation. This is what I've got. This is how I feel, this is exactly what is for me."
And man pants just crawl up out of the corner, come up my legs, and strap themselves back on. And off I go actually doing something useful about the situation.
ALEX: Nice one, thanks for taking the metaphor for a good ride there. I really actually enjoyed that point. Sort of, you wake up in the morning, and you can decide what to put on. Sometimes you may not want to put the man pants on, depending on what you've got in play.
Yeah. Sometimes it's important to hide in a corner for a day or 2 or even a week. To not have the man pants on, 'cause that shift back to having them on can be part of the power of "Oh yeah, THIS."