SPEAKER_01: 0:04

Are you ready to break free from hesitation, self-doubt, and isolation? Do you want to lead with confidence, build powerful connections, and live boldly? I'm Corey Baum, and I'm here to share the most impactful strategies and mindsets that I've learned through coaching, leadership, and real-world experience. Together we'll forge unshakable confidence, master social dynamics, and create a life rooted in purpose, brotherhood, and bold action. Inside, you'll get the tools and insights to become the strongest, most connected version of yourself. Let's dive in. Today I'm joined by someone who sits at the crossroads of men's work, psychology, leadership, and storytelling in a way that very few men do. Jesse Johnson's path has taken him from a Buddhist-based graduate psychology program to coaching Division I and future Olympic athletes, to working with horses to teach non-predatory leadership to corporate teams. His masculinity has shifted, shifted shapes over the years, moving across strength, sensitivity, power, and humility, all while deepening his understanding of what grounded, responsible manhood actually looks like. So today, Jesse and I explore the evolution of masculinity, the role of sensitivity in masculine leadership, and how men can develop the relational and social intelligence required for a world that's changing fast. So let's dive in. Hey, welcome, Jesse. Glad to have you on the show.

SPEAKER_04: 2:11

Yeah, Corey, thank you so much. It's an honor to be here. Yeah. I just want to say even noticing my body in response to that beautiful summary. I don't know how you constructed that summary of my life, but I was feeling like the last 25 years of my existence come through me in that not in a way to to focus on the externals that you wrote, but to say, oh my gosh, like that's that's a lot to live up to and to soak in and just noticing how I, you know, it's it's sometimes hard to receive ourselves in our full power. So I appreciate you. Appreciate you reading that introduction for your listeners, but also, wow, what an experience. Do you do that with clients ever? Like read them their resume.

SPEAKER_01: 2:58

You know, it's to your point, it's it's really interesting to interpret that from somebody else and then reflect that back to them. And it can be really hard to man, did I really do all of those things? Is that me? Am I living up to that? And so congratulations, man. I mean, it it sounds like you've had a a pretty impressive resume, especially and particularly within the men's space.

SPEAKER_04: 3:22

Yeah. I mean and what does it even mean, right? We can say these things and then what do they mean about me and and what are they? Are they really impressive? It as I hear the sort of like accolade version of them, I'm really interested in my integrity about what all those words that you said mean. So I think it's a really cool starting point for this kind of conversation. Even in what we were talking about before we started, just in terms of both of us feeling that responsibility of modeling and mentorship with our sons. And one thing I wanted to say about that might kind of dovetail here is that we I think in our culture, we often limit what we see as modeling to, you know, direct action or words or words of direction. And in what you were saying about your boys, there's so much to model about how we live our lives. And I think kids especially pick up a lot more about that than than we sometimes give them credit for. And they may not be able to say that explicitly to us. Like, hey, dad, I really noticed that, you know, you're living with integrity with your with your with your intimacy boundaries, with, you know, mom or whoever, or your boss. But they but they'll feel it and they pick up that programming in a real cellular way. So just it really helps me to kind of bridge that gap of like, what do all those bullet points on a resume actually mean in terms of the way I'm embodying my power, the way I'm embodying my integrity, the way that I'm directing my leadership and my my mentorship.

SPEAKER_01: 5:08

Absolutely. And I think that to your point, there's there's a there's an entire difference between, you know, ink on a piece of paper and the way that we're actually embodying it and living it out and and acting it. And and I think on the flip side of that, we don't necessarily have to have the bullet points in life in order to live with integrity and and these sort of things. So, you know, it's something I just wanted to add here, kind of to your point of how people pick that up, and not just necessarily kids, but I think really any anybody and that sort of energy that you put out into the world. And this example in particular was with my kids, but a number of years ago, as I was going through, you know, really, really trying to shift the way it was that I interacted with them and acknowledged them, was kind of present with them, right? It was one of the things was was shifting my my the way that I asked questions to be more like inquisitive and curious, right? So instead of being like, hey man, how was your day? You know, you get you get yes or no, right? It was like, oh, it was good, or you know, and generally I don't know that anybody ever says it's bad. But so shifting that, so many of my questions to, hey man, tell me something that was really interesting about your day today, or what went really well. And over a period of time of seeing that, of them listening to that change, I started, it was first I noticed it in my oldest, he's now 11. I started noticing him ask his questions in a similar way. Dad, what was something that went really good for you today? What was something that was exciting? And so, to your point, he doesn't know what I'm doing. He doesn't know that I had a, you know, that there was things that I was testing and tuning and trying out. But he was starting to model that sort of thing. So as we kind of continue our discussion today, I think just over and over again, how important it is for us a lot of times to do the work, to make these changes in our lives, not so much for, you know, the I guess making a big splash sort of thing, that that energy and that essence just reverberates out into the world. And we may not even notice it and how it changes or affects the rest of the world, but it it happens nonetheless.

SPEAKER_04: 7:32

Yeah, right. To trust that it's happening, even if we don't get that explicit reflection of like, dad, I noticed this, and now I'm thinking and self-reflecting on my and you said doing the work and also living the work. And I think that's one of the biggest shifts that I've made since you know, I I first delved into what I would call kind of the American or Western coaching scene back in, you know, maybe 10, 12 years ago. I I got really swept up and it and inspired by this whole movement of impact. And there's a lot of coaches out there and just people who are equating their value through like the number of lives that they can feed and the number of kids that they can build a school for, and the amount of water they can provide to you know, such and such African nation. And I think that's amazing. The people who are doing that, keep going, you're awesome. But I think a lot of folks, especially men, feel like, what if I'm not in a position to make that sort of doing the work impact on that level? Because if that becomes the metric for impact, it can leave people feeling really hollow and discouraged. And I know I've been through my version of that where I just wanted to have this mega epic impact on transforming the whole globe's consciousness, right? Like so many of us probably think about every day. And what I had to go through in writing this book that you mentioned was a real deep sense of despair for my own purpose, for my own ability to impact positively all the pain and suffering that that I'm seeing in the world and is evident to probably everybody these days. And what I had to come through it with is the idea that like living the work, as you're saying, is enough. And of course, we can still strive to create wells in Africa and schools and all that. And if I can be compassionate in a moment where I'm tired with my son, or if I can look for an opportunity to support a neighbor who just is going through something difficult or, you know, needs some eggs, these things are not insignificant. And they actually create, you know, what some people call morphic resonance. You know, you can you can think about just like a rippling effect. I think I think this is valuable. And 20 years ago, version of me would have dismissed that and said, like, no, I've got to actually be able to see and touch and feel the change I'm making. I've got to be able to donate a million dollars here, or I've got to be able to, you know, see this school open up over here or whatever, like these big projects that people work on, I'm sure you're familiar with. Maybe you're even doing one. And that's been huge because I'm saying this for people who are listening, for the for the man who might be listening, who's like working 60 hours a week just to try to make mortgage or rent and you know, keep their kids' food on the table and give them any sort of path and direction in life that creates opportunity. And it's feeling like, what the hell am I supposed to do? I'm just stuck in the system and trying to survive. And survivalism is like the death of you know prosperity in in the ways that we're talking about, in those inner ways.

SPEAKER_01: 11:00

Yeah. No, and that's that's a really good point that you bring up. That it sounds like if I was to put like a wrapper around kind of all of that sort of stuff, is that sometimes just doing the work on ourselves is is what really changes the way it's like in and of the process of doing it is what can be enough. And and and I've seen that time and time again to your point of like saying hi to somebody at the grocery store. Right, or whatever, you know, stopping at the crosswalk to let somebody go by, or telling somebody like, hey, I I really like your dress or your shoes or whatever it might be, but that that's enough at some times to switch that person's perspective of that day or whatever it is. Like, man, the world isn't such a bad place.

SPEAKER_04: 11:46

Yeah, I mean, what a change in worldview that would be, right? Yeah. And I think as I said, just want to clarify, it doesn't mean not to keep striving. Like, I still have these grand visions of, you know, it's part of the reason why I want to be on your show and others, is I still think there's so much potential. And I and I am not shy about wanting to make big impact. I think what's really shifted for me is to allow whatever's accessible to fill me because I was getting, I was in a really dark, despairing place, feeling like I don't know how I'm gonna get there to that mega epic place. So, you know, what's what's even the bother, you know?

SPEAKER_03: 12:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 12:26

And I think a lot of men feel some version of that. Why don't you have you have you seen this? Yeah, have you seen this with your with your work and your clients? Just the sort of existential despair of purpose and things like this.

SPEAKER_01: 12:40

Yeah. Well, I I think with a lot of things when we look at there's so far to go, right? That it's kind of like that eating the elephant sort of thing of like, you know what, I I've been this way my entire life, right? I can't possibly change, so why even bother? Why even start? Right. It's gonna be so much for me to necessarily overcome that I'm yeah, it's not possible. I'm not going to do it. And so yeah, to your point, that really that it it is great to have those grandiose, and I think it's super important, right? To have those, maybe even at times those sort of things that if we were to really be a hundred percent realistic, or like that's pretty far out there, right? But that's important to have as well, right? To to have that sense of like dream and and and not even vision, bigger than vision, right? But to have this thing that seems so far-fetched, right? Because I I think as I think about that for myself, that if I allow myself to step away from that, I'm just like taking away the opportunity of that ever being a possibility. So yeah, you know, it's it's way out there. And I may never get to that, but it's kind of like acting in essence of that every day.

SPEAKER_04: 14:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 14:01

Right.

SPEAKER_04: 14:01

And it keeps and it keeps your system engaged. It keeps, it keeps the response to the world online. And I sorry, excuse me. Corey, as you're saying that, it makes me wonder if the world, especially of men, is sort of going through an existential crisis of collapse. And by collapse, what I mean is in terms of like the fundamental sort of fight, flight, freeze, fawn, play dead, sort of survivalism response that the brain has. And I wonder if like metaphorically, there's this sort of like collapse to power because it's like I don't know how to express my power in this new emerging world productively. Maybe I've even been told it's not welcome in this way. And maybe some of that's really good, and I and I can reflect on how I've been expressing myself in the world, and that's great work. And one way I like to, and this comes from the horsework, actually, if you want to get into that at all. There's there's this idea that the fight response in a human is only that in which we describe, like it's an actual confrontation or a battle. And if we expand that a little bit, I like to use the idea that the fight response is like moving toward. So if we change the languaging around this, we can say fight being like moving toward, flight being moving away. And like conflict is like dominance is like moving against. And so there's a real important discernment between moving toward and moving against, and then collapse. And I feel like there's a crisis right now in our world around the collapse of this really important vitality that everybody has. But specifically, socially, men are trying to reconcile. Does that make any sense?

SPEAKER_01: 16:08

Yeah, yeah, more than more than you probably know. So I something that I've really been trying to wrap my head around lately, and and I say wrap my head around as if I'm going to come to a solution or an answer around it, but and and just to make sure we're on the same wavelength here, like I've I've looked at and and a part of my story as well in this is when I look at the the the timeline of masculinity, at least as far as I know, and not going too far back into the past sort of thing, but you know, I see it as like a in most recent history of kind of like a toxic masculinity, a lot of people would say, right? That there's a lot of a lot of like stoicism, boys don't cry, men don't have emotions, right? We work 80 hours a week, you know, we probably there's a lot of alcoholism, a lot of these, and I don't need to put it all on that, but like it's a very there's there's an image, right? And there's an image that I think a lot of people, you know, between the women's movements and things like that, that really have like sought out against that sort of persona or that image or that archetype or whatever it sort of is to the extent at which that I feel like it's uh it's killed so much of who that person is. And so I feel like as, and just to I I guess wrap things up to a certain extent, to go from I think we've gone from like a hyper masculine to the the the pendulum has swung all the way to the other side of things where we're like we're scared to be men, right? And this is a conversation that I have often that now and where I'm hoping to go, and it sounds like a lot of the work that you're doing as well, is like we need both we need all we need a lot of all of this, right? We there's aspects of that past that we need. And there is there's great things that we've learned since kind of in that swing of the pendulum. But now how do we bring those two worlds together?

SPEAKER_04: 18:21

Yeah, and it might be some measure of integration, right? Like it's not how do we how do we get to bring our abusive past into the present, but it's like how do we get to integrate the seed of what was really organic into this new version in a healthier, integrated way? And and in your the way you're laying it out, it's really helping me make sense of this whole analogy here. You describe the alcoholism and the stoicism and the that's like sort of the freeze response, right? So, men, it's been it's been like we could say, just speaking in broad generalities, that it's been conditioned that we sort of have a freeze or we move against. And that's been the power over sort of abuse dynamic where we know how to assert our dominance because we have the backing of all the systems that have been created by ourselves, or we know how to freeze and just sort of weather the storm and take it until we get in a position where we can move against. And I think to my point, and and maybe yours as well, is I think what's emerging is this opportunity to learn how to move toward, you know, like a healthy fight response in a way. Because when we're when we're in a fight response, and this is really cool to see with with relationships, is that at least in a fight response, and anybody who's been in a long-term monogamy knows this, at least like thing you can grab hold of something. It might be messy and it might be really sloppy, but there's something there to mold together. And then, you know, what we make out of that is determined by what we bring to that moment, right? Can we be compassionate? Can we listen? Can we understand and See each other, et cetera. And I think as a in this cultural conversation about sort of the consciousness that masculinity is going through, I think we're trying to evoke this ability to move toward things that are tough. And moving toward engaging means looking at our stuff, means like unearthing some of those old ways that were really harmful and will not serve the greater good moving forward, even though they may have played some role at some point. And my fear is simply that we will, for a variety of reasons beyond the scope of our conversation, but all of which you and I feel every day that we will collapse because we're just like, I mean, where do I even move in this world? I don't even know, right? Like I'm totally shut down. And there are external, you know, reasons that are that are encouraging shutdown, and then there are the internal capacities that are enabling shutdown. All of it is to say, I'm really inspired, and I think you're inspired, and men we know are inspired to help help us all kind of like come to this place where we can engage again and we can say, all right, like I'm stepping into this thing. I don't know what it's becoming. I've got all this conditioning from the past. And, you know, I can either give up and just say it's too much, and I'm just gonna, you know, sort of wallow, or I can say, let's look at it, right? Let me let me step into the fire. Yeah. And that's that's what I'm like trying the path I'm trying to walk, you know, in my marriage as a dad, with my clients, with with my writing. It's to step into the honesty of all of all which I represent, including my past conditioning, and to really challenge that and to look at an integrated version moving forward. Not that it's ever going to be without harm, but that there's a way I can become less harmful and more hopefully life-serving just by existing and as you said, doing and living the work.

SPEAKER_01: 22:00

Yeah, I love that. You know, there's to your to your point that it's uh I see it as almost a like being in a room with walls that are almost right in front of you in every direction that you go, right? I can't go this way, I can't turn that way. And it, you know, it's it's almost like at a certain point realizing that maybe looking up, right? And there's still like yet maybe a more creative kind of way out, just as I think about it off the top of my head, because it is very, I think for myself looking back on the journey that I've been through and a lot of the men that I've worked with, that you know, that there's been this stereotype from maybe their fathers or social media or whatever it is, that being starting to step into this vulnerability and exploring your emotions and your feelings and sometimes I think just your thoughts around these sort of things, like actually, like, hey man, what do you think about this? As gets this stigma or gets this label as being femin feminine, right? And that yeah, it's just a really I think at the same time, you know, as much as I want to say that it's a really challenging time, I think it's a really exciting time as well, because it's it's an opportunity for us to really, really propel and step into to what you said essentially, to step back into some of the greatest things about that part of masculinity, but then also recognize where it wasn't serving us.

SPEAKER_03: 23:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 23:48

And then also looking at, you know, maybe where parts of where we've swung into lately are not serving us as well, and trying to bring those two back together. So, you know, a lot of times, guys that I work with, it's so difficult to break into that to start to kind of open things, you know, that open things up, but one of the things that we talk about often is really seeing that from a powerful perspective. I I had a woman the other day on the show, and one of the things that we talked about, she helps with somatic coaching. And one of the things that she said that I thought was really interesting, just having not really looked at it from what the way that she said it, in that perspective, was that times she will work with high-profile businessmen to in like keeping their that things like keeping their composure is you know about evaluating, it's like in kind of the boardroom or in negotiations or things like that, that being able to keep their their calmness right is a sense of power.

unknown: 25:06

Right.

SPEAKER_01: 25:06

So instead of like maybe at times it'd be like blowing up or exploding would be that's the only way to be powerful, to actually like take a step back and to just listen and not be the one to I don't want to say explode, but really the point that I'm getting at here is that this vulnerability is really a power, right? That these sort of things are, I think, is what's going to really create that next generation of us or evolution of us.

SPEAKER_04: 25:40

Yeah, it's almost like space holding is sort of the new warriorship.

SPEAKER_00: 25:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 25:44

Yeah. Rather than dominance, it's like there's a there's a there's a power in being able to hold steady and to hold things. And that, you know, certain cultures have archetypes around family where the the sort of male role is like the the larger I'm I'm holding for for the for the non-video version of this, I'm holding my arms around something like the the man is holding, the woman is holding the child, that whole archetype. I think like some of the deep masculine health is around being able to hold composure and support. Like we are supportive, nurturing beings in that way. Yeah. So that could be part of what comes sort of like come, it's always been here and it's coming back into find its new purpose. Yeah. I really like, I just want to go back to, I really love that room, that room analogy is really cool. It's an awesome thing.

SPEAKER_01: 26:44

I feel like I didn't do it justice. It it wasn't, but she was talking about it. It was, you know, I want to say it was Chinese men or something like that. She's like, I often meet with them to show them how that like that peace and that serenity is really the power when it comes in the boardroom to negotiations, to things like that. And I was like, man, I love, I love that just that picture. I guess that for me.

SPEAKER_04: 27:08

That, but I was actually also just referencing your your simple imagery of just being sort of in a cell and feeling like you're locked in on all sides, and you just haven't realized that you could look up and that there might be, you know, you can take the take the imagery wherever it's useful. But there could be a cathedral, there could be an open air space. Like this is this is the representation of what we're sort of dreaming about. That there's that there's a whole other dimensionality to this process that we're trying to invite in.

SPEAKER_01: 27:43

So I'm I'm curious that, you know, one of the things that really surprised me is the work that you do with horses. Tell us a little bit about that. And how how did you get into it?

SPEAKER_04: 27:54

Like Yeah, well, the work I do with horses is experiential. So I I bring clients and it's usually groups. I've I've led corporate groups and private groups who want to explore their relational dynamics, especially as it pertains to power and leadership, which I absolutely just love because I I because of all the reasons that you and I are discussing, seems so, so critical in humanity's sort of trajectory right now. And so horses, as I've uh discovered and had the had the fortune to be sort of like trained in, horses have an incredible relational ability in that, especially the horses I work with largely rehabbed Western Mustangs. And so for people who don't know about the United States, Western, Western United States, like a lot of Mustangs ended up here because of the Spanish wars in the 1500s. And after folks left, the horses were sort of left in the wild. And they just lived in wild herds, and there still are several out here in the American West. I'm in Central Oregon, like a little over half the population in our country lives in Nevada. So there are these like BLM, you know, Bureau of Land Management governed areas of Mustang herds. And the reason why that context is important is because when we're working with them and people, those horses have lived a portion of their lives in their sort of quote unquote natural wild state. And so their social intelligence is really, really raw and fresh. Like they're not these domesticated, you know, thoroughbreds that you might think about when you talk about horses. You might think about horse racing. And these horses have come from living amongst themselves. And so they're grounded in this sort of herd social intelligence that we're now starting to learn about as humans and utilize as a way of discovering maybe unintegrated parts of ourselves or pieces that can come forth to be more integrated versions of our own leadership, of our own, you know, just our own people. We don't have to make it that fancy. It's just like, how do I harness the social intelligence that I'm working with, with this relationship, with this horse or these horses? And what if these pieces are alive in me in the human way? Because I think they very much can be. And so I got into this, you know, I've worked as a somatic therapist for going on 17 years now, and I've always loved horses. I grew up, you know, with the occasional opportunity to engage or ride horses. Did not grow up with horses, but about 10 years ago, a colleague of mine introduced me to somebody that was doing equine coaching. And that started me down a path of pursuing various trainings. And I ended up doing a certification with Linda Kohanoff, who's a pretty well-known global author, and sort of like, yeah, she's she's almost like one of the innovators of this field in a way. And all of it I've just kind of integrated into all my background, you know, working with like Division I athletes and high school athletes and clients. And, you know, I spent three years working with men who were in the court system because of domestic violence. And like I've just seen and be able to integrate different pieces. But the Equine work is especially powerful because the relationship with the horse is so sensitive that their feedback mechanism is one that will show you an honest reflection of yourself, whether you're ready for it or not, in a much usually cleaner and more efficient way than we can get from each other, because they just don't have the same like ability to lie to themselves that we do. They're not going to play nice, they're not going to be, they're not going to take things personally. They feel and they're very sensitive, but they're very honest because they are, they are prey animals. They have this incredibly attuned nervous system and sensitivity to their environment. And we are in a in the hierarchy of the animal kingdom, we are predators. And so to have a relationship with a predator in that situation takes an immense amount of sensitivity. And yeah, so that's kind of the the intro to that. I'll stop there in case there's taken a different direction.

SPEAKER_01: 32:38

Yeah, that's that's really interesting as I think about it. And I I don't know that I would say that I I I did grow up with horse, horses, you know, cleaning stalls, doing the things, and we used them. Nice. Uh I don't want to say that I'm a horse person because I I wouldn't, I don't know that I would go that far, but I was around them often, you know, usually from like a labor sort of perspective. But we did, I always found that it to be really interesting. The time that I worked with them the most, we would pack in and out of a hunting camp, elk camp. Right? And so they would pack in, at times they would pack in throughout the summer, but really the weeks leading up to hunting season, packing things in and then working, you know, throughout the season if we had killed an animal and then packing things out. And, you know, outside of that whole hunting perspective, it was not, and I grew up, I guess, more intimately or more connected to like a motorcycle background, right? Like it had a throttle and a brake, like I could really understand it, but it always really struck me during that time that that sort of a relationship, right? And and that, like what even in that time that we were out there, there was a real, there was a connection that happened, right? Because at times there was a lot of fresh snow, right? Like everybody's cold, the packs are heavy, all of these things, and it goes from being a tool to a connection, right? Like, hey, I need you, man. You know, like I know that we haven't been on the best of terms in the past, but like I really want an opportunity here to connect with you as more than as more than a tool, as a friend, as a compadre, as kind of whatever it is. And I really like the point that you made around there's not like these other sort of filters that it sounds like they're they're going to let you know right away how it is that they feel about in response to the way that you're treating them or acting or however it is.

SPEAKER_04: 34:56

Yeah. And and what an amazing practice at the in this stage of humanity. And I can I'll bring this back down to what you're saying, I promise. But something you said really struck me that for you, you saw the horse go from a tool to a connection. And I think one of the one of the awakenings we're having as our species is to understand the role we've played in sort of like putting ourselves above and separate from the rest of the living things on earth. And so it doesn't have to be horses, but one way that I've really healed, and and for me it's through dogs as well, is to consider the relationship as an as an equal source of mutual respect. And that's one of the exercises we can do with horses is to explore what it's like to be in mutual respect. And that might seem like kind of an obvious concept, but in fact, it illuminates how asymmetrical our respect relationships have been and continue to be with animals, with our pets, with our trees, with our natural resources. The way we treat this planet is largely through a dominant sort of destructive lens. And it's leading us towards, you know, toxic decline. And eventually, you know, what we what we do to the other, we do to ourselves. It just might take a little while to come back to us, right? Excuse me. But I think whether you whether you're talking about the specific horsework I'm doing, or if you have a dog in your house, you could go, you could kind of like turn to them and just ask yourself, do I see this being in the same value that I hold myself? And just be curious. Not it's not a point of indicting yourself. It's just a a curiosity about the way you're relating to the world. And I think the horses have helped open that up in me. And back to sort of the grounded in this conversation is well, horses almost like it's a cliche how easily they draw women, the fascination of women. So they the horses themselves have become almost synonymous with like this like feminine power, which again in itself is awesome and and totally rad. And what I've noticed in my trainings is that I'm normally almost always the only man. And everything that comes up for me in those, in my own experience, in my own training, and my own work has felt so relevant to the masculine development of myself. Not that it, you know, again, we're speaking archetypally, right? So all beings have whatever energies they have, and that can include whatever terms you want to use, right? So we're just using these for shorthand. But in my maleness, I see so much potential for horses to help teach us how to integrate our power. And so when we talk, you mentioned the term non-predatory power. I think you mentioned elephants. I would say elephants' horses. Let's not go down that rabbit hole right now. But there are other species that have such intelligent non-predatory power. And actually, Linda, one of my main teachers, hold on, I'm gonna let my dog out.

SPEAKER_01: 38:28

Speaking of, your dog has needs to.

SPEAKER_04: 38:33

I know. And that there it is. I wanna I wanna respect that. So actually, what okay. So the reason why we say non-predatory power is because to put to put an animal as a prey animal, quote unquote, is to sort of deny it the power that it has. And herbivores, especially large herbivores, tend to be far more community-driven. So the social intelligence of a horse herd is to share leadership roles and they become very fluid. And that's something that humans don't tend to do. We sort of have this rigid linear hierarchy. And I don't say hierarchy with connotation because I actually think hierarchy exists naturally and it's really important. It's a word that I think we need to like take back and really improve and use better. So horses have hierarchy as well, but the way they utilize it is generally with a sort of more of a collectivist social intelligence. And so oftentimes I'll have leaders in groups who are trying to be leaders just actually observe her dynamics. Like if we let six or eight horses into a space, they're gonna sort things out. As you would see if you have a dog, you know, and you go to a dog park and you introduce your dog and there's 20 dogs. Like, watch their behavior and watch how they're like if we don't get too helicopter ish in our in our human, you know. Dog's companionship, dogs sort of figure things out. And horses have the same, I mean, in a different way, but they have that same sort of intelligence. And so all that is to say is that there's an opportunity in that relationship for us to understand ourselves better and to utilize some of the teaching that they have. I think there just is an immense amount of wisdom in all the species on the planet that we could be benefiting from. And so horses have been one that I've been fortunate enough to engage with and learn a lot about. But I think it is very masculine in a way that's like not commonly represented, right? In media, you know, in the world, it's often like horses are very like feminine in that way. So I'm here to say that there's actually a huge opportunity for the men that are wanting to step into that work. You come face off against, you know, against, see, there it is. There's my conditioning. You come into a small space with a 1200-pound animal that has a hundred percent presence on you and your relationship. And like you can even feel that, right? Like that sounds like a men's group, right? Yeah. And and that is gonna show you who you are. And then it's up to you to be in integrity because they won't, they won't mess around if if they don't trust you. They're gonna protect themselves or they're gonna just stay away. It's not really gonna be as dramatic as the movies like to say. Most of the time, they'll just they're not like they're not aggressive, you know, like they'll mostly just sort of avoid you. And then it's can be like, whoa, what is happening here? Oh my gosh, am I not worthy? Am I not trustworthy? Yes, I'm not. I'm doing this with this business person or I'm doing this with this colleague. And then let me feel that. And then, oh my gosh, now as I'm admitting that, the horse is coming over to me. Oh my goodness, this is overwhelming. Holy cow, I never knew there was this reserve of gratitude and humility. Let me be with that. And now I'm and now I'm walking around with this horse. Like, so all these almost like you can appreciate it having been around them, but it's not gonna be that dramatic in a cinematic sense. But everything that you're feeling inside of you is gonna feel dramatic in that way. Yeah, it's powerful.

SPEAKER_01: 42:19

Even as you're saying it, it's really landing with me, you know, and the thought of these aren't like domesticated, you know, a family and a lineage of this is what I've always done, this is what I grew up in, you know, my my pack horses, things like that, where yeah, I know how to be around, I know how to be in the human world and do what they need to do. Yeah, and but yours, like it's it's one or the other. So the point that it sounded like you were making that if the if the two, you know, the three of you were in a field, like you and a client and a horse, that they'll just run off.

SPEAKER_04: 42:53

You know, um I tell you a quick anecdote about this that I think could resonate with a lot of men, and if it doesn't, you can cut it out. Yeah. So in my in my training, we were we were working on this higher level kind of exercise, higher level in that like it takes a lot of understanding on how to communicate with horses to do it. And my teacher put me in with this incredibly dominant horse. And when people hear dominant, they probably think aggressive or they probably think mean. But if you're thinking of it in just more fundamental terms, dominant is like a commitment to like somebody's integrity, almost like a stubbornness could be a it's a bit reductive still, but that could help us for the point of this conversation. And so this little horse who was like the smallest in the herd, and his name was Spirit, and my goal, my goal was to use so we're using like ropes to just as an extension of our energy. They're just communication devices. I had to raise my energy enough to ask spirit to ask spirit to move from behind. So the driver of a horse is from behind. If you're facing like 30 feet away and you're kind of at a 45 degree angle, they're backside, let's say, just for people to ill to vision that. And so I've got this rope, and all it is is I'm he's reading my energy. And if I'm not owning it, a really dominant horse, and you can think of this in the people you know, they're just so committed to their integrity that you can't move them from their spot unless unless you're in your integrity. It's beautiful, right? As frustrating as it can be, it's it's amazing. And so I sat there for 20 minutes trying to find this part in me. And he just sat over there completely still, didn't pay me any mind, couldn't care less, right? To the point where my teacher was like, you have to raise your power dial so high that it's gonna feel violent to you. And so I'm screaming and thrashing this rope and trying to find that as a source of power, not anger. It's gonna be easy to imagine that as violence. And that's so, as an example of the work, I couldn't, I couldn't ask, he he wouldn't receive my request because I couldn't get in my integrity with that level of ask. I didn't feel comfortable. I was worried I was being violent. I was doing all this codependent stuff, right? And so he was just sitting there. He was just like, dude, I don't like I don't think you, you know. It's like if we're in a men's group and you and you're working with somebody and you're just like, man, like, no, you know, but this isn't like you're not you're not getting to the heart of it, right? And so it's a great example because it had nothing to do with technique. He didn't care how loud I shouted or what words I said. It was reading my integrity. And he was just like, nope, I don't believe it. And so that's a great example of like, no matter what you do, you cannot cheat that relationship because I had to find the place in myself where and then my teacher went in and she didn't have to do any of that theatric. She just went in and owned her power, and they had the trust in their relationship that she could just casually look, it would look to the outside that she's just casually rotating the the lunge line. But she was accessing a power center that the horse trusted and could read. Incredibly humbling.

SPEAKER_01: 46:34

Yeah. That's a really good point that you make. That I got this vision of you, you know, whipping the rope sort of thing, up and down, like move, you know, doing all of the sort of things that, you know, kind of like you said, this somebody from the outside would be like, man, he's super angry, all of these sort of things that would probably be interpreted as a sense of dominance, right? But knowing that, you know, it's kind of like what we can do on the external versus what we can do internally and at our core. And kind of going back to I feel like a lot of what we've been saying in this, that it's really that like groundedness at the at the heart and the center of it, and living in that integrity that we can do all of these sort of things. Something I often say is kind of around uh be do have, right? We can do all of these sort of things. You can whip the line and act a certain way, but unless you actually are becoming that or embodying that, it doesn't necessarily land or resonate.

SPEAKER_04: 47:40

100%. And parents of strong-willed children, you know, of which I have one, a strong-willed 11-year-old boy. And I've learned from working with the horses that healthy dominance is not about raising the volume all the time. Like a really high integrity, dominant person. And we can just move that to strong-willed if that's easier in human terms. They actually don't require much. It's much more around do you do you really respect their level of intelligence? Like with my son, if I go too intense, he'll push back because it's so shaming in a way. And and if I do the slightest little thing at the with the right attunement and the right spirit of like, hey, I've got you and I see, and I'm not trying to embarrass you or get you to control you or anything. That's when he responds. And so, you know, basically that example I just shared about spirit and the healthy dominance was spirit was a great teacher for me to realize how far I have to go in integrating like my leadership. Because it's not about how big or loud or brash or you know, some modality or technique or this new leadership skill or that book. It's like, no, like, are you in your power in your body right now? Can you feel your feet on the ground and believe that you believe that the being across from you deserves to be here as much as you do? And can you make an ask with a lot of respect, right? Can you make an ask and just make it clear and respectful and loving?

SPEAKER_01: 49:20

So fascinating. I'm so curious. But you know, and and I because at the end of the day, that horse, you know, 1200 pounds or whatever it is, like he doesn't have to do anything that you would like him to do, you know, and you can keep ratcheting up the crazy scale, right? And at some point he may or may not give in, but they don't have to.

SPEAKER_04: 49:44

There's no more in them, and we don't want giving in. That's the whole point. Like, that's you know, I know you're using that just, but that language is important because that that would be like what that horse did for me was to say, Jesse, if I give in, I'm doing so out of submission. And submission is not relationship. Submission is is force. That's that's an old power paradigm. And it may have a place in certain relationships, but it's not the way I'm gonna do that with you. And that is the gift of high integrity.

unknown: 50:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 50:19

I'm sure I'm sure if you're listening to this, you have an experience of this in your life where someone might drive you nuts with their principles and their reflect on yourself, right? Because that's a moment where somebody's like asking you to challenge your own integrity. Yeah. So it's important. I I don't mean to cut you off, but I think what you accidentally or maybe unconsciously magically hit on here is that that is the conditioning, is like we're we're having a battle of wills, and I need one of us is gonna give in. And that's not mutual respect. That's not true connected relationship. It's certainly not the type of leadership that you and you and I are practicing and envisioning, but that's the conditioning that I went into that round pen with spirit with. I figured the only way to ratchet it up is to get him to, you know, submit. And and good for him. He's not putting up with that shit. He's like, he's like, no, I'm strong enough. You're you're a joke to me. Like, get it together, dude.

SPEAKER_01: 51:18

You you and the hundred guys before you, man. I've seen it. Yeah, totally.

SPEAKER_04: 51:21

Yeah, and a weaker, a weaker horse, I could do that with, right? Just like in our relationships with people. So think about a relationship that you might have that, you know, you can push someone around, or someone who's pushing you around. You know, where can you find your integrity? Yeah. Sorry. Go ahead.

SPEAKER_01: 51:42

No, that it's so fascinating. And I'm I really appreciate that you made that clarification around that, because that's not the relationship that we want to have with people to be walking around and be the one to concede sort of thing. And that's not what we want to imprint on people, sort of thing. That hey, this is a this is a relationship, right? That that we're both here out of our own free will, right? And you know, I can put out kind of to what you're saying, like I can put out into that container, you know, or through the rope, or however it is that we communicate that, like my intentions, what it would like, what I would like, like who it is that I am. But at the end of that, spirit making the choice to to kind of interpret what it is that you're putting out for him and making the decision for himself that that's something that he wants to do. Now, whether that's because he feels like it's contributing to the relationship, right? Or whatever it might might be.

SPEAKER_04: 52:51

Yeah. And in that case, if he's not interested in having a connection with me, that is his choice. He is not here to serve me. And so that's the conditioning also that I want to continue to work on, you know, and and honoring that, as you said beautifully, honoring the choice. And I think what we're running into in 2025 and beyond here is that our systems don't necessarily have built-in agreements, social agreements, or you know, financial flexibility sometimes to allow for those higher levels of creative energy. Like I would say a lot of the world historically has been built upon dynamics of compliance and submission. You know, every once in a while we get to cooperation. Maybe higher still, we go to collaboration. And I feel like one of the highest generative states is co-creation. And so what we're doing in relationship with the horses is we're practicing a co-creative relationship. And I think people have this with each other too. When we have moments where you can feel it, where it's like, this is so awesome. I feel so expansive because you know, I'm honoring all of who you are, and you're somehow honoring all of who I am. And there's energy in that, right? And I'm I'm speaking culturally, I think that's that's the crisis we're in right now is trying to find a generative place that moves on from some of the compliance, submissive force paradigms. So that's been really healing for me. But just to kind of put a period on the end of the horse sentence. There's so you know, please, if you're listening to this, think of like the example of the equine coaching. It's simply like an example of something that's available to us in various forms. It's it's representative of a place that I think we can play with, regardless of whether you have the specific coach or this horse or whatever. These are places to consider in ourselves. And obviously, coaching and other modalities can help us have a have framework or a place to do that or somebody to even facilitate that, which is wonderful. But it's available to you. We've all got these pieces in us that are that are so have so much potential, I think.

SPEAKER_01: 55:12

Yeah, that's that's fascinating. I mean, it I'm gonna be left pondering this for quite a while, but I love it. And you know, with that, and my relationship with animal, just people in general, right?

SPEAKER_04: 55:26

And it sounds like kind of to your point that this doesn't have to be just it's how it's how we kind of be and operate or take up space in the world of could go on for metaphors, but there's a lot of rabbit, like there's a lot of rabbit holes that like we said at the beginning of this, you know, we could we could travel down, yeah. Yeah, but whatever you're coming away with, just maybe yeah, let it exist in you and be curious. Yeah. So I'm curious if you're gonna be able to do that. Or at least that's what I'll that's what I'll try to do for myself.

unknown: 56:01

Okay.

SPEAKER_01: 56:02

One of the things just to to kind of circle back to a topic that we were talking about earlier around kids and masculinity and and kind of the direction that things are going, right? Or at least maybe even the state at which they're at right now. What do you feel like and I've got a lot of thoughts about this, not that we need to go into them, but what do you think that young men are are starving for right now that older men haven't modeled well?

SPEAKER_04: 56:42

I wanna I wanna start with you on this because I feel like I I could shoot from the hip, but I think you have a more grounded response, and I promise I'll I'll add to it.

SPEAKER_01: 56:52

Okay, all right. Well, and and I don't know that I have a fully baked idea, but something that I've really been putting a lot of thought into lately is really like what does what does being and I might mess up the terminology, but being an elder sort of thing, like this whole thought and this bringing that back into the life of it, right? And and I think that there's so much richness and experience for better or worse sometimes, that that is being it's kind of like all of the information from the past, right? Is not being handed off, passed down to, and yeah, that as we've talked about, there's some things that that we're in transition right now that we're learning from some of these sort of things, and we've got some new developments in the way that we're finding are maybe more effective, you know. But I for the most part, I think that we're hard pressed to find these days. And and I feel like personally a lot of the work, the direction that I'm heading in, and is in the sense of bringing men back into communities and bringing men back into the forefront of young men's lives, right? I as an example, I mean, I I've gone back to coaching my kids' wrestling team, right? To being a part of the PTA, right? Doing things within the classroom, volunteering and stuff, but to to bring that presence back and that masculinity to a sense to say, like, hey man, you're you could be doing this differently. And I just think that that's it's gone. You know, it's almost like it's almost like all the elders are dead, sort of thing. And that and and on that, one of the things that we talk about is that we're not we're not asking, we're not even we're not asking them to fill that role anymore. Right? It's it's almost as if it's something that's not important to us, and and there's a part of me that's really afraid of what's gonna happen when that's gone.

SPEAKER_04: 59:16

I think you're hitting on Yeah, you're hitting on just a huge, huge piece of it. And I'm not sure that we need to, you know, have too many words for it, because I think we could put it in a number of terms, but you're really hitting on such an important essence of it. And the word that the one word that comes to mind for me that might help kind of be a catch-all is the sense of responsibility in all the ways, you know, not just you know, doing your laundry, but like taking responsibility for who we are and what kind of effect we have in our. Selves and our family and our neighborhood and our city and beyond responsibility for spiritual growth and connection. Like talk about being lost and disconnected. You know, a lot of elder communities, it seems to me like they used to hold that's like source sort of seed, you know? Whatever that is. What is it when you say that you're worried about the lack of being able to bring sort of generational wisdom along? Is there one thing that represents that that would be so critical to hold on to in your mind?

SPEAKER_02: 1:00:57

I don't know if I can put my finger on one thing.

SPEAKER_01: 1:01:08

But when I think about it, I think that it's the diversity and perspective of a generation of experiences. But I've had kind of a I've had a challenging relationship with my father. Really as of lately, right? But as I think about that, you know, and and I've had to navigate how I wanted this to play out, but to but to think about the possibility of like having gotten to the end of our time and not have had an opportunity to talk to somebody face to face about what their experience and kind of going back, I I feel like a part of this maybe ties back to your ex experiences with animals and such, of being able to like look somebody in the eye, not read a book. Don't get me wrong, books are great. But but to look somebody in the eye and ask them, you know, and share that moment with them about what their experience of life was like. You know, and so you know, being able to to see the the mannerisms, right? The how they like it stops them for a moment and they catch their breath, or how they smile, right, about these sort of times and and how important different things were to them in that sort of time that there's just there's there's only certain things that you can you can only acquire them with time and age and repetitions. Right? And if we get to a generation generation, generations where we just haven't had those experiences and we haven't had those reps, you know. And I I think that there is a real I I think as a society that we have gotten away from giving that responsibility to things from creating an opportunity for our elders, right, or whatever we want to call that, to be in that role. And I think that they have maybe as a result of that or not, have also not stepped into that role.

SPEAKER_04: 1:03:44

That's why I was pausing for a moment after you after you first shared, because I think community hits on so much of it. This is bigger than a male-female thing. This is a globe, this is a Western, this is a modernity thing, this is like nuclearization of families thing. Like we have, yeah, we have come dangerously close to like creating an extinct eldership.

SPEAKER_01: 1:04:12

Yeah, and I and it feels like as you know, as we talk about community or the the the lack of that and and how everybody is just falling farther and farther away from that like center of mass sort of thing, and and everybody is silently and suffer is suffering silently alone in their own little cages, right? I mean, as I talk to, as I talk to my my father in this, you know, I mean, part of the he's like, you mean you mean I can actually like we can have conversations and I can tell you like how I feel about things? You know, he's suffering in his own way, yeah, I'm suffering in my own way. I've got people that, you know, and I tell the story at times, like it's like with guys sitting across from the table, you know, that it's like, hey man, how's things going? Oh, I'm good. How you doing? I'm good. How's the family? Oh, we're good. But in reality, like they could both be struggling with the same exact circumstances, and nobody is it's like fight to the death. Nobody's gonna be the one to to to break that seal. And so you know, I guess kind of the direction for this to go, sort of thing, is how do we get back to, you know, as we the the question I initially asked was what do you think it is that those young men are are starving for that the older generation haven't really m modeled?

SPEAKER_04: 1:05:42

Yeah, or have tried to model, but we're not able to listen or whatever it is, it's just a disconnect, right? I which is why again, why I love that you you position that within community, because I think community in all its forms is a real medicine for a lot of what we're talking about. And community simply, like I just formed this peer men's group with a neighbor and another friend of mine who lives in town. And we're all facilitators of certain kinds, but we all recognize like all the limitations that we're pointing out, and we said, like, screw this, we have to try to, we have to prioritize this. So we get together like twice a month and try to get deeper into the layers of our of our struggle and our striving than are commonly made space for in male relationships. And it could be just going out and playing, it could be just knowing your neighbors. I think one of the problems with modern nuclearization and economics is like we don't need each other in the way that we did in pre-industrial times or in different cultural times. We we have like I look down, I live in a in a fairly high SES town, and you could look around my neighborhood, and there's like 18 basketball hoops on a block, you know, like the outdoor hoops that sit in a driveway. Like, what how would community be different if we could only afford one? And we had to put it at the end and all the kids played together and they knew each other, or they got in conflicts and parents had to come in and parents had to meet other parents, and we had to work through that. And, you know, everybody's got their own lawnmower and their own this and that, and it's keeps us isolated. And I'm using that, you know, as a symbol. So, community, as you hit on, I think is an antidote here, and I think it's something that can be practiced in so many easy ways, and I'm I'm guilty of all this nuclearization as well, and I'm sort of checking myself out every day. Like, how can I become more intertwined and interdependent with my with my neighborhood as a starting point because that's the accessibility. Instead of thinking, like, well, how can I create a school, you know, in South America? I'm like, well, how can I like get to know my neighbor down the street who's off? Yeah, the guy next door to me has like PTSD and he doesn't like loud noises, and my kids out there shooting hoops and banging the ball against the backboard. And like we had this whole conflict last year, and he was he was really struggling to find an assertive place to represent his needs, you know. And I was trying to help him out, and I was getting pretty activated because he's he's asked for quite a bit. And finally I got to this place with him where I was like, I won't use his name just to respect his because you never know. Some people don't want to be on the internet. But I said, I said, hey, you can he started to get really down on himself. And he was like, no, I should just move, you know. Like it was kind of this like, I'm a bad kid routine. I could see it. Like he kind of shrunk, you know, he's in his 70s and he's like this little boy all of a sudden. And and I was like, no, dude, please, you can, I want to be, I want to be, you know, as supportive a neighbor as I can be. And I said, you can ask for anything you want as long as it's okay if I say no. And that was such a liberating statement for me because I had in me like this sort of codependence of like, oh, but I'm gonna have to give up what's good for me and like it's gonna be a win-lose thing again, you know? And that feels terrible. Because I actually, in this case, we didn't have a solution. And so I just said, please keep coming to us. Like it's okay, like your needs are safe with us. I just may not always be able to acquiesce, but I will work really hard to try to find a solution. And I just mentioned that because that accessed in me something that felt powerful where I was like, oh crap, that's what I've been wrestling with. That's all the that would come out as passive aggressive behavior 30 years ago or avoidance or, you know, resentment or something. And now I'm like, you know, he and I are good. You know, we don't, we're not buddy buddy, but like there's a safety and a respect. And so that's community. Yeah. I and and I'm not I'm not at all trying to suggest that like I have something figured out. I'm just simply drawing on something I can be be accountable for, you know. Like I'm sure there's viewers that have taken this, you know, listeners that have taken this much further. And, you know, feel free to share those stories when you can and keep doing what you're doing. I want to learn from from people who do it really well. Because I feel like I'm just kind of awakening to the possibility of like everything's right here in front of us that we can practice if we choose to see it that way.

SPEAKER_01: 1:10:55

Yeah. That's such a beautiful story, and it really, really highlights that community isn't always like, come over and have Thanksgiving dinner, you know, or that I want to spend all of all my time with you, or that you're gonna get everything that you want. So that's a really great example that hey, we can still be like, hey man, you don't have to move. We can still be in community here. You have you know needs, wants, desires, I do as well. And and I loved how how you kind of wrapped that up that like you can ask for absolutely anything, and I'll answer the door every time. Yeah. And just know that you know, I may, I always have the opportunity to say yes or no, you know, as do you. You know, totally we can we can continue doing this, and that's that's such a different dynamic that I think so many guys and there's such vulnerability in doing that. You pausing and stopping, right, and assessing all the things that are flying by at a hundred miles an hour in your mind, I imagine, right? That you're like, you know, if I just told this guy to shove off, this would all be over with, and he could take me to court, and I know he wouldn't, whatever that long lived. But there was such strength in you for like, let me see this guy, right? And what it is that may you know, I imagine there's a part of you though putting yourself in his shoes at being 70 years old with PTSD and these sort of things. And so I think as men that a lot of times we have this like, I just have to crush whatever is out there, regardless of the impact that it has in the world. But there can be this other where it is, it's it's seen, I I see it, I guess, as leadership as this I I try not to say this higher sort of self, or it's like this additional level, right? Of kind of like, hey, leveling up though, you were able to take a situation that in the past may have been very, I don't know, not worked out very well for everybody, and to be able to level up, basically. So right.

SPEAKER_04: 1:12:58

And as you're saying that, this might be a really nice way to bring us to a close, too. That I think the essence of what we're talking about, whenever we're talking about levels or growth or, you know, moving toward, as we mentioned in the horse example, is things that allow the relationship to persist make so much more possible. They make co-creativity possible. When the relationship is severed, we don't get access to these incredible moments of community and generative possibility, as you said in the beginning. And I think the aha moment for me with my neighbor, which yes, I failed hundreds of times in similar moments in my life. Like, this is why this is such a big anecdote for me, because it was a real turning point after so many years of like getting into, you know, convince and convict conversations where we're trying to persuade each other. And I sort of dropped that and was able to tap into like my inner Alan Watts and just be like, I don't have to explain myself to you. I hear what you want, I really want to make it happen. And I and and what would get us the closest to that? Because I really want you to be well as a neighbor, like just to stay with that. And what was allowed to persist in the way that we came through it is the relationship. And so now other things become possible. And so if we amplify that throughout, you know, 10, 20, 100x relationships in our lives, just imagine, you know, we're only scratching the surface on what we can generate together as a household, as a as a neighborhood, as a school community, as a city, as a world. And I think that's that's the vibrational sort of shift that, as you said, is makes this like one of the most horrific times to be alive. But if we choose to see it this way, one of the most incredibly potential, exciting times to be alive. And that's that's where I'd like to leave it today, is just like really appreciating the relationship that you and I have been able to create in this hour and a half together, and for all the work you're doing with your own coaching and as a dad and with men. And it's just a real honor to take time with someone who cares. I mean, I'm really truly noticing that in my time with you, and I have this with others, as I'm sure you do. I want to really acknowledge when I'm when I'm in a space with someone who shares that sort of like intent for my best well-being. And I can feel that from you. And and you you clearly have an intent for, you know, all living beings to and their well-being. So thank you.

SPEAKER_01: 1:15:38

Thank you. I appreciate that. Well, hey, we didn't get to spend as much time on it as I'd like, but tell us a little bit about the the book that you've written.

SPEAKER_04: 1:15:47

Oh, yeah, thanks. You know, I would say transcendence is a place, like I said, where I was able to sort of process and integrate all the diverse feelings that I had. Starting, I started it six years ago. So it was like 2019, and I was just having this vision of humanity and extinction and was reading just a lot of extinction science and you know, philosophy, and like embracing the idea that I was a father of a five-year-old, you know, in in the midst of human conscious extinction. Like, has there ever been a species that was conscious of its own demise the way that we are today? And the book sort of came to me through some, you know, I don't know, collective unconscious or whatever, as a way to really wrestle with the near-term future of what humanity's going through. So it's a, it's a, it's a, you know, it's a pretty intense speculative sci-fi kind of story. It's going to be a series. So I'm, I'm working on the second one right now. And and and if you read it, what you'll come to realize after listening to this conversation is what's different about it is my attempt to find like new resolutions in in these old power paradigms that we're discussing. And so I don't know how successful I've been, but that's where I put a lot of energy in. I just really appreciate writing as an art form. It's helped me get through that place. Uh, when I mentioned collapse, I was very much kind of headed toward that collapse, like give up, screw it. It's it's all over. Like, what are we trying for, you know? And I was able to work my way through that, through these characters and this world that I created into a place where, gosh, I mean, like, we still may not make it another 10, 20, 50 years, but I'm facing that in such a different, more hopeful light. And I have the book to thank, to thank me for it. So yeah, sure, I'd be honored if if you're drawn to, you know, folks that are listening, you'd be drawn to find it. You can find it on Amazon or at my author website, which is just jessickjonson.com. I don't know if you'll have that in the notes, Corey, but there's a 299 ebook version and uh a beautiful paperback version. And I'm working on creating the audiobook for release, you know, probably to mid-2026. And it's part of you know how I'm supporting my next my family and my next venture, which is, you know, we want to eventually have some sort of land share where we can do some regenerative farming practices and potential animal conservation, maybe even some Mustangs. If you know, the funny the funny thing about regenerative practices is uh the little that I know is that horses are like the most work and sort of the least helpful. And so like we wouldn't necessarily start with horses, even though I'd really love to live with some, but we are hoping to just try to try community in a different way and create a conservation space where people can come make art, contribute to food growth, and do community gatherings, events, festivals, things like that. So, you know, supporting the book really helps that vision get closer. And yeah, it's just been it's been an honor to be able to have the support from my family to do that. And I would say just one step further that in the context of what we're sharing about growth and men, like engaging in an artistic discipline is just an underused tool. So highly recommend men pursue some sort of creative discipline. It doesn't have to be that you end up with a product that you share with the world, but you can just engage with your creative self. So powerful. And it just helps keep some of those like freeze conditioning responses from getting too stuffed down at the very least. Yeah. Just as a side note, I think art is potentially the most culturally transformative force that we have. So go out and make things, make beautiful things.

SPEAKER_01: 1:19:56

I love it. So it's and and not only the The book also, but is is Jesse K. Johnson also your coaching webpage?

SPEAKER_04: 1:20:06

No, that's that's uh supergivers.com is my my equine stuff. Yeah, and I'm sort of like maybe it's ADD. I just have a lot of drivers in the world, and so I I I do have this creative outlet, which is my substack. You can also support that. The Substack is the same content, whether you sign up for free or donate. And then Supergivers is the Equine coaching. Yeah, you're welcome to find me there if you I I really only do like custom workshops. So I work with you know groups that want to create a specific off-site for their company or for their group, and we just build it wherever you are. I have partnerships, you know, at various places. I can't necessarily come anywhere, but I have different options opportunities in different parts of the US. And we yeah, we we create what it is that that you need in order to explore what you need to explore. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 1:21:00

Love it. Well, hey Jesse, so much of this conversation was so good. And I can I can tell from having this conversation with you and getting to know you and connecting with you that you're just a very kind and thoughtful as well as well as very knowledgeable person. And so yeah, I appreciate the time and look forward to chatting again in the future.

SPEAKER_04: 1:21:20

Thank you, Corey. It's an honor to be part of your podcast, and I hope it's yeah, it's been helpful for someone.

SPEAKER_01: 1:21:26

Yeah. All right, have a good one. Hey, before you go, this podcast is just the surface. The real work happens inside the Evolve Men Brotherhood. This is our private community of men committed to leading themselves boldly, building confidence, and sharpening one another in the fire. Registration officially opens December 1st, and we kick off our Brotherhood calls together beginning in January 2026. But you can get on the list today and be the first to claim your spot. If you're tired of going to life alone and you're ready for true accountability, support, and connection with men who get it, head to Evolvmen Project.comslash Brotherhood. Don't just listen, step into the Brotherhood. I'll see you inside.