Dating & Relationships

Dr. Doug Weiss – Porn And Sex Addiction Are More Complex Than You Think

Talking points: addiction, sex, porn, narcissism, relationships, therapy

I’ve yet to meet a man who hasn’t struggled at some point in his life with porn addiction. I was one of them. But is sex addiction any different, and is it more or less complex? I sat down with Dr. Doug Weiss, himself a recovered sex addict (37 years and counting!) to get some insight.

This is an ep to listen to if you’re looking for more insight on a pervasive problem for many, many people. One that can heavily impact relationships, work ethic, and even overall success.

[00:01:11] – Dougs defining moment
[00:03:27] – Defining sexual addiction
[00:19:41] – What is intimacy anorexia, and what’s contributing to it?
[00:30:37] – Reinforcing yours AND your partner’s experiences, and matching types of expression in sex
[00:39:28] – Partner betrayal trauma
[00:44:08] – What makes intimate relationships unique
[00:46:19] – More on sex and porn addiction
[00:50:45] – Sex addiction and ADHD
[00:54:11] – Can you be addicted to validation? 
[00:57:58] – Can sex addiction escalate into something darker?
[01:00:51] – On narcissism

Dr. Doug Weiss is the Executive Director of Heart to Heart Counseling Center and has been helping couples and individuals for over thirty years. He is the President of the American Association for Sexual Addiction Therapy where his treatment model for sex addiction, partner betrayal trauma, and intimacy anorexia is used in counseling practices all over the world. 

His direct and charismatic approach to handling tough issues has made him sought after for professional appearances on television shows such as The Oprah Winfrey show, Dr. Phil, Good Morning America, 20/20, The Doctors, Daystar, FoxNews, CNN, Montel, and more.

Dr. Doug Weiss has written and filmed over 40 books and therapeutic teachings that directly address specific issues in relationships regarding intimacy, sex, partner betrayal trauma, sex addiction, parenting, and more. He has had more than one Lifetime movie made about his counseling practice (Heart to Heart Counseling Center) in Colorado Springs. 

Connect with Doug

-Website: https://www.drdougweiss.com/

-Intimacy Anorexia: https://intimacyanorexia.com/

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drdougweiss

-Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/drdougweiss

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/drdougweiss


Pick up my brand-new book, Men’s Work: A Practical Guide To Face Your Darkness, End Self-Sabotage, And Find Freedom: https://mantalks.com/mens-work-book/

Check out some free resources: How To Quit Porn | Anger Meditation | How To Lead In Your Relationship

Build brotherhood with a powerful group of like-minded men from around the world. Check out The Alliance and join me today. 

Enjoy the podcast? If so, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or Podchaser. It helps us get into the ears of new listeners, expand the ManTalks Community, and help others find the tools and training they’re looking for. And don’t forget to subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts  | Spotify

For more episodes, visit us at ManTalks.com | Facebook | Instagram | Twitter

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Maintaining Relationship Through Disagreement

It’s not easy. It’s not simple. It’s not comfortable. It’s definitely not fun. But it’s good for you, and in times like these may be one of the most important skills to cultivate.

Transcript

All right, team. Welcome back to the ManTalks Show. Connor Beaton here, and today we’re gonna be talking about one of the most important skills that you should develop – just as a human being. This is an incredibly important skill far too few people have been able to develop in their life. And I’m gonna share with you why I’m talking about this.

So recently, I have had a couple guests on my show that are a little bit more controversial, and it has been very fascinating to watch, observe, receive the responses of having those guests on my show. Everything from, “I can’t believe that you would platform this person, and how could you believe what they believe,” making wild assumptions, to questioning why I had them on the show, to thanking me for having them on the show to saying that they were somebody’s favorite guests on the show. So this massive gamut, having these controversial guests on the show.

But one of the interesting things that really stood out to me was how many people threatened to unfollow me, or threatened to never tune into my show again, or made some type of threat saying: “Oh, you’re going off the rails by having this person on your show, or having these people on your show,” and never throughout any of that questioning whether or not I agreed with them, whether or not my belief system and my value system is the same as theirs. Never inquiring as to why I actually had these people on the show.

And so I’m going to give you what I think every single man especially needs to develop in our modern time. This very skill, I think, is incredibly important, and I’m just gonna tie it in, and this will be probably pretty brief, but one of the biggest skills I think that we can develop as a man is the capacity to be relational with people that we disagree with.

I’m gonna say that again: be relational with people that we disagree with.

I have been running my podcast for seven years. I’ve had hundreds of people on the show, and I haven’t always agreed with them. I wouldn’t always agree with their perspective. I haven’t always agreed with their religion. I haven’t always agreed with their politics. But the point of me being a good moderator and host isn’t to always agree with everybody that I’m communicating with. That’s not the point.

The point is: can I better understand their worldview?

Can I be curious enough and inquisitive enough and impartial enough to understand their perspective that maybe has value to a large subset of people? Even if those people are different in their belief structures and systems than me?

I remember working at Apple for a number of years, and I tell you why this is so important, both within your intimate relationships and out in the world.

I worked at Apple for a number of years, and eventually, one of my roles, one of my positions was a market leader for the company. And part of my role within that company was to deal with some of the most unsavory, disgruntled customers that had come into the ecosystem, right? They were pissed off, they were entitled. They thought that they deserve something that was just nonsensical sometimes. They’re super angry, they’re super upset with you, and so automatically, there’s a massive disagreement, right? They want something. They believe they’re entitled to something that is just false. It’s just not possible.

So there’s automatically this discrepancy of agreement between you and this person. That’s how the conversation is starting. And over the years of doing this job, I got very good at being able to de-escalate people, at being able to understand their perspective, at being able to set more realistic expectations, and at being able to maintain, and this is the important part, a relationship with somebody who was coming in armed to the teeth right, ready to destroy, pissed off with the company who I happen to represent in that moment.

And the reason why this is so important is that when you look at our culture today, when you look at the political landscape, when you look at the media landscape, it is awash in the just dumbfounding incapacity of people who are able to maintain some type of relational conversation with other human beings that they happen to disagree with.

You can go online, and as soon as people, as soon as you see people disagree with one another, the communication and the conversation and the relationship dissolves instantaneously. It evaporates. And the problem with this is that this has turned people into very fragile, very psychologically weak people who can’t have proper disagreements.

And so if you are somebody who is so wildly susceptible to getting so reactive with somebody that you disagree with online or you tune into a podcast, or your favorite show, or news station, and they have somebody on the show that you disagree with, and your immediate response is, “I’m never tuning into this show again,” that is going to filter in to your life. That’s gonna filter into how you have conflict with your wife or your girlfriend. That’s gonna filter in to how you show up at work. It’s gonna filter into how you raise your kids. It’s gonna filter into how you deal with your friends. And this notion that we should just ban people and exile people from our lives because we disagree with them, or because they maybe believe something that’s different from us is a very damaging notion – both on a community and social level, but also on an individual level.

Because here’s the thing about human beings: we thrive off of a sense of resiliency and being robust. And the more that you are able to be in relationship with people, and again, I’m not saying surround yourself with people that you just disagree with and hang out with them constantly and go out to the bar and do that kind of stuff.

But the more that you’re actually able to converse and be around people that you disagree with and have meaningful conversations with them and say, “I don’t think I agree with you, but that doesn’t make you a bad person. I don’t think I agree with what you belief is around this political thing, or whatever it might be. But I can see your point. I can see why you believe that, because I’ve done the legwork to understand why you came to that belief, why you came to that value, why you came to that decision.”

And when we lack that capacity, we actually begin to operate in such a way in our relationships, not even in society or culture or in the world, but in our relationships, we begin to operate in a very fragile way that says, “you can’t disagree with me because otherwise I can’t be in relationship with you. You can’t disagree with what I’m saying or my beliefs or what I want or what I desire, or what I want things to look like. Otherwise, I won’t be in relationship with you.”

And so this impending and background threat of I’m going to unperson you, I’m going to cancel you out of my life in some capacity becomes the sort of guillotine that we use to get people to conform to what we want. And this does not create psychologically, emotionally, physically, spiritually, robust and resilient human beings.

And so one of the best things that you can do, and I wish I had done this sooner, I wish that somebody told me in my twenties, “look, If you really want to be a resilient man, go and talk to people that you just fundamentally disagree with. Go and have some type of relational conversation with them where you’re not attacking their character.”

You’re not trying to dismantle them. You’re not, trying to take them down a peg or change their mind. You’re actually just being in a relational conversation with them where you’re saying, “I don’t understand your perspective. I don’t get your opinion. I actually don’t understand your belief. Tell me more. Why do you believe that? Tell me how you came to this conclusion. Give me some information about your worldview and what formed that.”

I’ll just wrap this up with one final piece, which is, I just interviewed this gentleman named Sterling Cooper, who is a former porn star, and I got some heat for having him on the show because of some of his beliefs and some of his views; but one of the things that I found very interesting was I asked him very openly: what got you into this in the first place? What was your defining moment?

And he opened up and told me about a story that I don’t think he’s told on any other show, about losing his mother, about his mom. I think she had some form of cancer and then she passed away and it dramatically altered his life in a way where he began to question – life is short, and so what do I want to do? What do I wanna experience? How do I want to live?

Now you might not agree with what he came up with in terms of the life that he’s chosen and the life that he’s built, but it’s wildly fascinating to see how somebody losing a parent, how that’s going to alter their life, because I’ve interviewed a number of guests where that has been the case and it’s pushed them into all kinds of trajectories, all kinds of decisions, all kinds of experiences and adventures.

And so take the time in your life to develop some type of capacity to have deeper conversations with people that you disagree with. Listen to perspectives that you disagree with. Engage with people that you disagree with.

Stay grounded, stay rooted, stay curious, ask better questions. Try and see if you can build some type of understanding of what led them to that decision, to that choice, to that perspective in the first place. And probably what you’ll find is one that will help you maintain the relationship, which is an incredibly valuable skill in trade.

If you are a man who can maintain relationship through disagreement, you are going to have a kind of superpower at work and at home that is just invaluable because so many men do not know how to be in disagreement with somebody and maintain the relationship because we move into this “I gotta be right. I gotta prove you that you’re wrong. I gotta fix this problem. I gotta solve this solution.”

And the relationship goes out the window and then everything breaks down. So if you are a man who can be in disagreement with somebody and maintain the relationship, you have developed something so foundationally important, not just to us as human beings, not just to maybe your marriage or your relationship, not just to your work and your colleagues and your friends, but to culture and humanity itself, because when you look at out the world right now, when I look out at the world right now, what I see are a whole bunch of people that cannot disagree with somebody and still maintain a relational, ethical, and moral way of interacting with that other person. And that, to me is wildly dangerous. It’s brutally terrifying because I think it’s going to lead to a lot of tremendous – a lot of horrible stuff. It already is, right? The way that we interact and treat with – treat each other online is despicable. Often, it’s really not a moral thing. It’s not a moral way that we’re interacting with one another.

Let me know what you thought about this. Do you agree? Do you disagree? What would you add to it?

Please don’t forget to Man It Forward. Share this. This is how we’ve grown. We’ve never done any marketing. I’ve never marketed this show. This is all through word of mouth, so share it, Man It Forward, and until next week, this is Connor Beaton signing off.


Pick up my brand-new book, Men’s Work: A Practical Guide To Face Your Darkness, End Self-Sabotage, And Find Freedom: https://mantalks.com/mens-work-book/

Check out some free resources: How To Quit Porn | Anger Meditation | How To Lead In Your Relationship

Build brotherhood with a powerful group of like-minded men from around the world. Check out The Alliance and join me today.

Enjoy the podcast? If so, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or Podchaser. It helps us get into the ears of new listeners, expand the ManTalks Community, and help others find the tools and training they’re looking for. And don’t forget to subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts  | Spotify

For more episodes, visit us at ManTalks.com | Facebook | Instagram | Twitter

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Christine Hassler – Anger, The Feminine, And Successful Relationships

Talking points: anger, relationships, finances, birth, mental health, masculine/feminine dynamics

Delighted to have the frank yet eloquent honesty of Christine Hassler on the show. This episode is a top choice to listen to with your partner if you’re looking for some relationship advice that combines practicality, spirituality, and much more.

[01:02] – Christine’s defining moment.

[07:59] – Christine on women and anger

[12:23] – How Connor and Christine define ego.

[15:25] – Women and anger.

[28:14] – How can men effectively address a woman’s anger?

[36:57] – How modern relationships have changed for men and women.

[48:59] – What conversations should people be having about money?

Christine Hassler is a master coach, spiritual psychologist, facilitator, and speaker with 20 years of experience. She is the best-selling author of three books, most recently Expectation Hangover: Free Yourself From Your Past, Change Your Present and Get What you Really Want and is the host of top-rated podcast “Over it and On With It” where she coaches people live on the show. Christine is the co-founder of Elementum Coaching Institute, a premier coaching certification program. She also holds in-person retreats and teaches online courses on relationships, calling in love, healing your inner child, and personal mastery.

Connect with Christine

-Website: https://christinehassler.com/

-Podcast: https://christinehassler.com/podcast/

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/christinehassler/

-Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/christinehasslerpage/

-Twitter: https://twitter.com/ChristinHassler

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/christinehassler


Pick up my brand-new book, Men’s Work: A Practical Guide To Face Your Darkness, End Self-Sabotage, And Find Freedom: https://mantalks.com/mens-work-book/

Check out some free resources: How To Quit Porn | Anger Meditation | How To Lead In Your Relationship

Build brotherhood with a powerful group of like-minded men from around the world. Check out The Alliance and join me today. 

Enjoy the podcast? If so, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or Podchaser. It helps us get into the ears of new listeners, expand the ManTalks Community, and help others find the tools and training they’re looking for. And don’t forget to subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts  | Spotify

For more episodes, visit us at ManTalks.com | Facebook | Instagram | Twitter

 

 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Don’t Fall Into This Relationship Trap

There are a LOT of relationship tips and tricks on social media. Lots of traps too, and this one is possibly the worst. Dig in, dear listener.

What’s your take? Would love to hear your thoughts on Instagram (or check the YouTube video)!

Transcript

So today, we’re gonna be talking about one hypocritical thing that you should never allow in your relationship. Doesn’t matter what type of dynamic you’re in.

There is this notion that circulates online that I see a lot within certain relationship circles and content that essentially says that it’s okay for a woman to leave a man if she’s not getting her emotional needs met. It’s okay for a woman to be very upset with a man if he’s not doing his part in understanding the emotional landscape, in prioritizing what she needs emotionally, in making that front and center.

But it’s somehow not okay for a man to leave the relationship if he’s not getting his sexual needs met. And it’s not okay for a man to be very upset in a relationship if a woman isn’t prioritizing or putting the effort in to maintain sexual connection.

So there’s this hypercritical sense, and I think one of the rules that I’ve generally had within the context of relationships is my partners don’t get to decide if and when I’m celibate.

My partners don’t get to decide if and when I’m celibate.

I think what happens – and this doesn’t mean that they, in the past or in the present, that my partners have had to have sex with me or any of those things. It’s just more of an agreement between you and your partner that sex isn’t going to be a power tool.

It’s not going to become a bargaining chip. It’s not gonna become something that’s I’m gonna take this off the table if you’re not giving me what I want. If you’re not acting the way that I want, if you’re not checking with me emotionally, that’s gonna be the thing that I take away from you.

That is a recipe for disaster. And I think one of the things that has become interesting in a lot of the conversations in modern-day relationships is that has almost become an okay standard within relationships. That it’s almost – it’s completely unacceptable for a man to not have emotional intelligence, for a man to not be prioritizing emotional connection.

There’s a lot of women that would say it’s not okay, it would not be okay if a man was relegating emotional connection to 30 minutes a week, right? It would not be okay for a man to be relegating any type of emotional connection to a certain time of the week, or relegating emotional connection dependent on certain criteria, right? “I’ll give you emotional connection, if you X, Y, and Z.” That man would be called a narcissist. That man would be called unhealthy, toxic, et cetera, et cetera. And the woman in that situation would be told, “you should leave him immediately.”

And yet, if we replace emotional connection with sexual intimacy, it has almost become the norm for sex to be a bargaining chip within a relationship for sex to be something that a woman gives and a man is lucky to receive. That a woman gives and a man has to jump through all these hoops and do all the checklists and all these things have to be prioritized first and take precedence before any type of sexual connection happens.

And one of the things that I have found in relationships is that is a recipe for disaster. Especially if one person in the relationship really has sexual intimacy as a top priority, or really has emotional intimacy as a top priority.

If two people aren’t willing to give equal weight and equal prioritization to these elements and these aspects of the relationship, to seek to understand. What does it look like for sexual prioritization to happen? How? What do you need in order to feel sexually prioritized? What do you need in order to feel emotionally prioritized?

These things go hand in hand. And for a lot of people, for a lot of women, there’s a lot of data and a lot of research out there that says that, I think it’s something like 70% of women have what’s called responsive desire. And so they respond to their partners sexual advances, and they respond to their partner’s emotional openness and connection and intimacy being present beforehand.

All of those things are true, but the problem happens when sex is deprioritized in the relationship to a degree where emotional intimacy is this maze that you have to traverse before sexual intimacy is even possible. And what I really want to drive home is that sexual intimacy is not the dog treat or the reward at the end of the emotional maze. That’s set up within a relationship is destined to fail. That setup in a relationship is destined to fail because what happens is that one partner, traditionally the man, will then have to go through a whole maze of things that his partner thinks that he should do or say, or experience, or prioritize in order for sexual intimacy to be possible.

When that’s the case, what generally is going to happen is one of the people or both, likely both, are going to become resentful because the emotional intimacy and the sexual intimacy are not on the same playing field. They’re not given equal weight within the relationship. And I think this is the really important piece. It’s not that sex and emotional intimacy are the same, that they’re equal in that way. They’re very different pieces of a relationship, but they should have equal weight within the relationship. So being able to have a discussion as a couple to say, “look, we’re not going to do this. We’re not going to…let’s create an agreement where sex is not something that we only prioritize after this laundry list of emotional connection and emotional relating has happened.”

Yes, of course those things are important. Yes, of course those things matter. But we also have to give equal weight to sex and intimacy and make it a priority because what do we know about relationships? Within two years of being in an intimate relationship, 30% of couples will be in a sexless relationship.

30%. Why? Why?

Because for a lot of couples, sex is the thing that gets deprioritized the quickest. It’s the thing that gets deprioritized when you have kids, when life gets busy, when you’re having to work that second job to try and pay off the mortgage, when your family’s visiting, when you’re on vacation, and people get sick, and whatever happens, right? Life happens. Sex is usually the thing that gets deprioritized within a lot of people’s relationships. And the expectation that a lot of people have that’s very much pushed into the modern narrative of Instagram and TikTok and all these social media accounts, is that you have to maintain emotional intimacy a hundred percent. It’s unacceptable to not have that be prioritized, but it’s okay to let sexual intimacy wane.

I would say that is a losing strategy and that the winning strategy for any relationship is that emotional and sexual intimacy have equal prioritization within the relationship and that part of your work.

As an individual in the couple, and part of your work as a couple, is to talk about what it looks like to have sex and emotional intimacy be equally prioritized. How are you going to do that? What would it look like? What would each of you need? What do you need in order to feel emotionally prioritized? What do you need in order to feel sexually prioritized? And to have that conversation happen, because what will happen, I guarantee you, if that is not discussed or agreed on, is that at some point in the relationship, the emotional connection will take priority. And this is what I see a lot in couples work, in couples therapy, is that people go into some type of couples work or couples therapy because, generally speaking, there’s some emotional disconnect that’s happened. But the sexual disconnect has happened far before that. Usually what’s happened is that there’s been sexual disconnection and then over time emotional disconnection has grown and grown and grown. Now, maybe the emotional disconnection has contributed to the sexual disconnection, for sure.

But do not fall into this trap. Do not fall into it. Talk to your partner about it if you’re in it right now and your relationship is okay, I would say that the majority of relationships fall into this trap of deprioritizing sexual connection and sexual intimacy, which is a huge – hugely important part of an intimate relationship because it’s one of the primary things that creates a demarcation between a regular relationship, a regular friendship, and an intimate relationship.

Sex, and then the depth of emotional connection, the depth of transparency, the depth of belonging, the depth of understanding, are also the important pieces. So have a conversation with your partner. Ask them and ask yourself, do I feel like sex and 📍 emotional intimacy have equal prioritization, equal weight in our relationship?

And if not, what might it look like for us to create that?

And until next week, this is Connor Beaton signing off.


Pick up my brand-new book, Men’s Work: A Practical Guide To Face Your Darkness, End Self-Sabotage, And Find Freedom: https://mantalks.com/mens-work-book/

Check out some free resources: How To Quit Porn | Anger Meditation | How To Lead In Your Relationship

Build brotherhood with a powerful group of like-minded men from around the world. Check out The Alliance and join me today.

Enjoy the podcast? If so, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or Podchaser. It helps us get into the ears of new listeners, expand the ManTalks Community, and help others find the tools and training they’re looking for. And don’t forget to subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts  | Spotify

For more episodes, visit us at ManTalks.com | Facebook | Instagram | Twitter

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Nick Solaczek – How To Make Your Partner Feel Seen

Talking points: relationships, IMAGO therapy, emotional intelligence, social media, attachment theory, conflict, sex, intimacy, artificial intelligence

Deeply grateful to have sat down with Nick last week to chat about all things relationships. Nick is, frankly, one of the best in the biz, and his compassionate yet no-nonsense approach has helped a great many people.

If you’re interested AT ALL in levelling up your intimate relationships, this is an episode to listen to. Strongly recommend you listen alongside your partner—or at least share it with them later.

[00:01:04] – Nick’s defining moment
[00:09:48] – What made you choose IMAGO certification?
[00:12:15] – Where do you see modern relationships breaking down most often?
[00:15:57] – How would you say social media has affect modern relationships?
[00:21:08] – What does it mean when your partner says “I’m not feeling seen”?
[00:25:50] – What other ways can we support our partner in being heard?
[00:28:52] – So what is IMAGO therapy based on? What tools does it deploy?
[00:44:49] – What are some of main challenges couples face in the realm is sex and intimacy?
[00:59:11] – Do you think AI is going to impact the future of intimate relationships?
[01:07:33] – We ultimately want to bump up against each other at a deeper level
[01:10:25] – What’s your definition of a conscious relationship?

Nick Solaczek Certified IMAGO Relationship Coach, working with individuals and couples to boost their emotional intelligence and success in romantic relationships. He emphasizes safe conversation techniques, mindfulness, authenticity, and boundary setting.

Nick is based in Vancouver, Canada, and has coached Hollywood celebrities, CEO’s, secret agents, high-profile lawyers, therapists, doctors, fresh partners and lifelong marriages. He’s also been privileged to assist Dr. Harville Hendrix and Dr. Helen LaKelly Hunt (founders of IMAGO and authors of the bestseller Getting the Love You Want) in their online training for couples.

Connect with Nick

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nicksolaczek/
-Couples Course – Romatic Relationship Reset: https://nicksolaczek.com/connor/
-Website: www.nicksolaczek.com

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Men’s Work Session – Healing The Relationship To Anger

Talking points: anger, inner critic, passive aggressiveness, shame

Haven’t done one of these in a while! Every so often I’ll have an anonymous guest on the show to give listeners a glimpse into what men’s work at ManTalks is actually like. This time, my guest is already familiar with what we do, so I dive right in.

If you’re the kind of person who has difficulty standing up for themselves, or can’t seem to control negative self-talk, this may be a helpful episode to dig into. We talk a lot about something I call “implosive anger”, aka when instead of having a healthy relationship with the anger you feel, you suppress and direct it back at yourself.


Pick up my brand-new book, Men’s Work: A Practical Guide To Face Your Darkness, End Self-Sabotage, And Find Freedom: https://mantalks.com/mens-work-book/

Check out some free resources: How To Quit Porn | Anger Meditation | How To Lead In Your Relationship

Build brotherhood with a powerful group of like-minded men from around the world. Check out The Alliance and join me today. 

Enjoy the podcast? If so, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or Podchaser. It helps us get into the ears of new listeners, expand the ManTalks Community, and help others find the tools and training they’re looking for. And don’t forget to subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts  | Spotify

For more episodes, visit us at ManTalks.com | Facebook | Instagram | Twitter

See omny.fm/listener for privacy information.

Do Not Compromise On This

Having a bit of give and take? Good. Being flexible within reason? Great. But in my opinion, there’s one area of your life where you should never, ever compromise. Listen in.


Pick up my brand-new book, Men’s Work: A Practical Guide To Face Your Darkness, End Self-Sabotage, And Find Freedom: https://mantalks.com/mens-work-book/

Check out some free resources: How To Quit Porn | Anger Meditation | How To Lead In Your Relationship

Build brotherhood with a powerful group of like-minded men from around the world. Check out The Alliance and join me today. 

Enjoy the podcast? If so, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or Podchaser. It helps us get into the ears of new listeners, expand the ManTalks Community, and help others find the tools and training they’re looking for. And don’t forget to subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts  | Spotify

For more episodes, visit us at ManTalks.com | Facebook | Instagram | Twitter

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Stirling Cooper – Porn, Attraction, Dominance, And What Women Want

Talking points: porn, sex, psychology, sexual technique, sexual health

Note: there were some technical troubles on this one, so forgive the rougher audio! I polled my followers on Instagram for a lot of the questiosn Stirling and I covered this episode, so expect a great combo of thoughtful “why” answers and actionable advice on everything sex, arousal, attraction, and more.

[00:01:08] – Stirling’s defining moment

[00:05:23] – How it shifted Stirling’s perspective

[00:12:57] – How DID you end up in porn, and what is it really like?

[00:21:22] – Why OnlyFans took off

[00:28:39] – What porn can do to a guy’s sexual psychology

[00:38:03] – How would you talk to your son about porn?

[00:46:44] – How do you map out male dominance in the bedroom in today’s society?

[00:55:41] – How do you get your partner in the mood?

[01:01:56] – How do we bridge the gap between women who want a more dominant man in the bedroom and men who are worried about being so?

[01:18:14] – How to get better erections and last longer

Stirling Cooper is an Award Winning Australian Pornographic Actor. Born in rural Western Australia, Stirling started off his Porn career in 2017 shooting for smaller studios based in Melbourne. He then moved to the United Kingdom and used his experience and connections to get his foot in the door in the British Porn industry, shooting for numerous studios throughout 2017 such as the notorious Fake Taxi, Dorcel, and many more. His career started to really kick into gear in the beginning of 2018 when he shot his first scene for Brazzers in 2018 and after that was flown out to Budapest, Hungary to shoot for other MindGeek brands like Babes. He stayed in Europe for several months working between Budapest, Hungary, and Prague, Czech Republic building a lot of momentum and gaining tremendous experience after being cast by big names like Rocco Siffredi and the FakeHub Network.

Stirling now uses his wealth of experience as a professional sex machine to teach men how to improve their own sex lives and through his Youtube channel he also helps enlighten men on the virtues of living an unapologetically masculine life.

Connect with Stirling

-Website: https://www.stirlingcooper.com/

-Twitter: https://twitter.com/stirlingwisdom

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0YIbCZJoYV1BeZ5qHDIJyQ

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cooperstirling/


Pick up my brand-new book, Men’s Work: A Practical Guide To Face Your Darkness, End Self-Sabotage, And Find Freedom: https://mantalks.com/mens-work-book/

Check out some free resources: How To Quit Porn | Anger Meditation | How To Lead In Your Relationship

Build brotherhood with a powerful group of like-minded men from around the world. Check out The Alliance and join me today. 

Enjoy the podcast? If so, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or Podchaser. It helps us get into the ears of new listeners, expand the ManTalks Community, and help others find the tools and training they’re looking for. And don’t forget to subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts  | Spotify

For more episodes, visit us at ManTalks.com | Facebook | Instagram | Twitter

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

What Pornhub Data Says About Men

Talking points: porn, stress, hentai, isolation

Every year, Pornhub releases a bunch of stats detailing how long people are watching, top search terms, when people are watching, and more. This data is from Dec 2022, so it’s a bit old, but I wanted to share some thoughts on what some of these stats might be implying, particularly for men.

This is an episode for anyone curious about porn’s implications outside of just “sexual entertainment”. I go into how it might be affecting (or a be a response to) other parts of our lives, and offer up some thoughts on what to do.


This podcast is brought to you by Organifi! Plant-based nutrition that’s science-backed, high quality, and something I use literally every day. Hit up the link for 20% off your next purchase here: https://www.organifi.com/mantalks

Pick up my brand-new book, Men’s Work: A Practical Guide To Face Your Darkness, End Self-Sabotage, And Find Freedom: https://mantalks.com/mens-work-book/

Enjoy the podcast? If so, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or Podchaser. It helps us get into the ears of new listeners, expand the ManTalks Community, and help others find the tools and training they’re looking for. And don’t forget to subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts  | Spotify

Looking to build brotherhood with a powerful group of like-minded men from around the world? Check out The Alliance and join me today. 

Lastly, check some more free resources: How To Quit Porn | Anger Meditation | How To Lead In Your Relationship

For more episodes, visit us at ManTalks.com | Facebook | Instagram | Twitter

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Why Bother Getting Married?

Talking points: marriage, relationships

With marriage rates seemingly at an all-time low, and most of the old reasons for marriage largely defunct, it’s a question many men are asking. It was something I wrestled with too. So…why bother with marriage? And why did I get married?

[00:00] – Statistics on marriage and some of the reasons we used to get married

[06:56] – Why I chose marriage

Transcript

What’s going on, Team?

Why are marriage rates in decline? There seems to be a disproportionate amount of people that are not only checking out from dating, but are just checking out from marriage altogether. There was some recent data that came out from the United States Congress, the Joint Economic Commission. Marriage is now between 6.5% and 6.9% marriages per thousand people. That is down significantly from the 1980s, the 1990s, and the early 2000s. What seems to be fascinating is that as we reach this all-time low within marriages, there seems to be a couple things driving this.

So I wanted to talk about why did we get married in the first place? Is marriage really even worth it? Why might you do it? So I’m gonna share a little bit about my personal story towards the end. But one of the things that I found fascinating is when I was doing research for this was that trends that are being set right now are showing that people are just opting out of dating and marriage altogether.

There’s men between 18 and 29, 66% of men in that age bracket are single, and of that age range, 50% of men say that they’re not even looking for a partner or a relationship. Then you have women, who projections are showing that by 2040, 45% of women between the age of 25 and 45 are going to be childless and single. So not in a marriage and without children. And that’s the highest that’ll ever have been, period. Not only that, and this is a different topic, and maybe I’ll talk about this in a different video, of those women who don’t have children post-menopause, the women who get out of the window that they can have children, 8 out of 10 of those women say that it was non-intentional, meaning that most of them wanted to have children, but the timing wasn’t right, or whatever the reason was that it just didn’t work out. So it’s not that they weren’t able to reproduce, it’s that it just never happened for them. There is a tremendous amount of grief coming up for a lot of women around this topic.

But let’s talk about marriage specifically. So as marriage rates decline, I think one of the things that is important to talk about is why did we get married in the first place? So I’m gonna bucket this into a couple [three] very clear and simple things. Then we’ll talk about some ideas around why this is happening.

First and foremost was economic reasons. Men and women got together, there were very clear roles – not saying that’s good or bad, but it’s just the way it was. The men would go out and work, the women would raise the children, and so there was an economic incentive for women to be with a man. There was this economic force of…okay, if I’m gonna have a child, it’s probably better to do that with somebody who can provide a certain lifestyle. Buy us a house. We can have a car or before that, a horse. But that was the structure. So for a very long time, for the most part, men went out into the workforce of the world. They tilled the farms, they built the buildings, they built the cities, the infrastructure, the pipes, the whole thing. And women were making sure that the family was being tended to at home. So there was this economic structure that was in place.

The second big one was religion. You were getting married for religious purposes, showcasing that your relationship was permitted by God and that you were following certain orthodoxies and certain ideologies, and you were abiding by certain rules that were laid out by your religion and et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So it was all underneath this religious umbrella.

Then lastly, it gave people a very clear sense of function or purpose or role. So as I was talking about before, for a lot of men, this was your function. You were the provider. You, for better or for worse, were expected to go out and work and make a living to make sure that your family [was] provided [for].

I think in some ways, we structured our family systems like that for a very long time because we’ve generally built our social structures to coincide with how we’ve evolved – with evolutionary processes. We’ve gone out, historically, men have gone out around the world and been the hunters. They’ve been the ones that have gone out, and if you were in North America a thousand years ago, braved not getting eaten by a grizzly bear or a cougar or whatever it was, and in other parts of the world it was going out to hunt for antelope and make sure that you weren’t gonna get eaten by a lion, or a jaguar, or something like that.

So our social structures have, generally speaking, coincided with our evolutionary structures. But we’ve reached this place where that’s not necessary anymore. The economic incentives have basically dissolved because 42% of American households have women outearning the men. The economic structure that was in place before, that’s gone. So a lot of women, they’re not marrying for security or financial incentive.

The religious piece is very quickly dissolving. There’s less people going to church than ever before. Something like 40% of Americans identify as spiritual, but not religious. So they’re not getting married for religious purposes.

The role in the function part has started to dissolve, as well. As women have become more fiercely financially independent, more men are hearing things like, I don’t need a man. I don’t need a man to provide for me. Those types of things. So where a man used to be…okay, my why I would get married as a man is…because I’m going to provide, I’m going to protect. My role in this relationship has a very specific purpose and function, and that can give me a sense of purpose in life. And there’s many benefits to that for a number of reasons, which I’m not gonna get into. There’s also obviously some constraints that we could talk about, but I think the biggest thing that I’ve come to is why would anybody get married now?

If you’re a man, because like 95% of you watching my channel and on the podcast, there’s more women that tune in for sure, but if you’re on YouTube, it’s 95% dudes. If you’re watching this or you’re listening to this and you’re a guy, you’re probably thinking like, why would I bother getting married? And I gotta tell you, I asked this question for myself for a very long time, I make good money, I’m tall, I’m attractive. I like traveling the world. I have a really good social circle within my male friend group. So there really wasn’t a lot of incentive.

I wasn’t getting married for economic purposes. I wasn’t getting married for a sense of purpose or function. I wasn’t getting married for religion. And so I grappled with this notion of why would I get married? What’s the purpose of doing that? Because really, I think one of the other things is that marriage, still to this day, from a judicial and legal system, is still predicated on this notion that men are the providers. You can very clearly look at the data and see that historically, within the last sort of 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 years, but especially still today, where 42% of American households, women are outearning men, men get the short end of the stick when divorce happens.

And the big challenge is that something like 75% of divorces are initiated by women. You hear a lot of guys of like, why the hell would I get married? There’s no role or function for me. I’m not getting married for religion. I’m not getting married toprovide for my family. My wife is making good money, or my girlfriend’s making good money. Like, why would I go do that? Especially knowing that the chances are if this doesn’t work out, she’s going to be ending the marriage. She’s gonna be the love one leaving, and if we have kids or financial assets, I’m probably going to get the short end of the stick on that. I’m probably gonna get shafted in some way, shape, or form.

There’s of course, exceptions to the rules, but statistically, men are going to go through that divorce and they’re gonna have to pay more in alimony. They’re gonna have to pay more in child support. They’re gonna lose more of their financial assets. That’s just the way that our court system still operates.

So I thought about all of this data for a very long time, and I thought about why would I want to get married? Cause when I met my now-wife, and we’ve been married for four years, we just celebrated our four year anniversary. I thought about this for a while, and I really came to the place of I’m not getting married for any of those reasons. We’re gonna keep our financial assets separate, and we’re gonna have agreements around our finances, and my wealth, and her money. I got to the place where I decided that I wanted to get married because I saw it not as a religious thing or any of those things, but actually as matrimony, as a commitment to the relationship itself.

I think one of the things that I’ve noticed within our modern culture is that relationships are paper thin, and the excuses and the reasons that people have for bouncing out of a relationship is so high. I see all these stories online of all these “oh, I’m, I broke up with him because I want to go and live my best life and I just, I wanna be free and I want to express my most authentic self,” and [men] are like, I broke up with her because, she wanted too much from me and she was asking too much and da-da-da-da-da.”

So I think what I see is that when things get hard in relationships, which of course they’re going to get hard, the tendency of people is to peace out, is to not push through the challenge; and the beauty of a powerful relationship is that it’s going to help you. Carl Jung said that ” the fastest racehorse in the race of individuation is marriage,” aka relationship.

So the real, underlying principle that I came to around is that you are making a declaration not just to that other person, and not necessarily to yourself, but to the structure of relationship itself, to the relationship itself between you and this person. And you’re saying, “I’m going to commit to taking care of, protecting and providing for this third entity that exists between us, and that in doing so, I’m going to learn something fundamental about being human, about tending to this earth, about tending to this culture and society that we live in that’s so chaotic, and that so many people, as soon as things get challenging and hard, they peace out.”

Now, I’m not saying that you should get married and if abuse starts to happen that you stay in it, or if it’s super unhealthy that you stay in it, but I’m saying that you make a commitment to something that is bigger than the context of – “oh, we’re dating.” “Oh, we just live together. We’re in this relationship.” Maybe you don’t need to get married to do that. Maybe there’s a different way for you to go about it. But for me, matrimony was the recognition that I was making a commitment to something that was beyond just a relationship, that was beyond just living together; and dedicating myself as a man to this third body of the relationship and saying, “I’m going to commit to tending to this aspect of life.” When things get hard, I know I’ve also found a woman who’s going to do the same thing. You know that’s very important for her, that we’re both dedicated to almost like tending to a child – if you have a child together, you both parent it. When you get married, the whole purpose of it, again, if you strip away all of the religious and whatever, is to learn to take care of something else that’s bigger than you, and your relationship is bigger than you. And it’s bigger than just the other person, right?

So I think that’s the main reason why I got married, is that it was a dedication and a commitment. To provide for and to protect something that was bigger than me, that was bigger than my partner. And it was a declaration of something more meaningful than just where we’ve lived together for seven years.

So comment below if you’re watching this on YouTube. I see that there’s a bunch of you that are listening to my podcast, that are tuning into my YouTube channel that are not subscribed, and so please go and do that. Don’t forget to man it forward. Share this with somebody else you know will enjoy it or enjoy the conversation. Until next week, this Connor Beaton signing off.


This podcast is brought to you by Organifi! Plant-based nutrition that’s science-backed, high quality, and something I use literally every day. Hit up the link for 20% off your next purchase here: https://www.organifi.com/mantalks

Pick up my brand-new book, Men’s Work: A Practical Guide To Face Your Darkness, End Self-Sabotage, And Find Freedom: https://mantalks.com/mens-work-book/

Enjoy the podcast? If so, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or Podchaser. It helps us get into the ears of new listeners, expand the ManTalks Community, and help others find the tools and training they’re looking for. And don’t forget to subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts  | Spotify

Looking to build brotherhood with a powerful group of like-minded men from around the world? Check out The Alliance and join me today.

Lastly, check some more free resources: How To Quit Porn | Anger Meditation | How To Lead In Your Relationship

For more episodes, visit us at ManTalks.com | Facebook | Instagram | Twitter

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Danica Patrick – Where Achievement And Spirituality Meet

Talking points: masculinity, femininity, achievement, dating, psychedelics, competition, culture, truth, what men and women want (and what they get wrong)

Wow. Danica and I covered a LOT of territory in this conversation. Like, top 3 widest-ranging conversations I’ve had on the podcast. Listen in for everything from masculine/feminine dynamics, to the nature of truth, to sharing psychedelic stories, to what men get wrong about women (and vice versa).

This is a brilliant episode to dig into if you’re looking less for answers and more for wonder. Much of what we discussed is better served by not forcing solutions, but simply wondering about viewpoints. Plus, you get a little of everything in this one!

 

[00:03:54] – Danica’s defining moment

[00:11:41] – Women and the masculine

[00:17:49] – How did masculine energy show up in Danica’s career?

[00:23:47] – How does it feel to be told, as a woman, “You’re more masculine than I am”?

[00:37:17] – The intersection of achievement and spirituality

[00:44:52] – Psychedelic experiences

[00:54:24] – How has your imagination and curiosity shaped your life?

[01:08:28] – How do you view the masculine and feminine culturally?

[01:30:18] – What do women get wrong about men, and vice versa?

 

About Danica Patrick

At just 10 years old, Danica’s racing career began after her parents bought her a go-kart. After winning numerous regional and national go-kart titles, Danica left the Midwest at 16 years old to compete in the cutthroat world of European road racing.

As a racecar driver, Danica Patrick broke barriers and set records with her on-track performance. With her racing career behind her, Danica looks to her next chapter as she focuses on her passions: good food, great wine, fitness and helping others achieve their goals.

Moving into her next chapter, retired from racing, Danica’s focus has shifted to her role as an entrepreneur and business owner. Danica has launched the clothing line – Warrior by Danica Patrick, authored a book Pretty Intense, and is the sole proprietor of Somnium, a vineyard in Napa Valley, California. In addition to these passion projects, Danica also continues to do inspirational speaking engagements and she plans to build upon these initiatives in the coming years.

Connect with Danica

-Website: https://www.danicapatrick.com/

-Podcast: https://www.danicapatrick.com/podcasts

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/danicapatrick/

-Twitter: https://twitter.com/danicapatrick


This podcast is brought to you by Organifi! Plant-based nutrition that’s science-backed, high quality, and something I use literally every day. Hit up the link for 20% off your next purchase here: https://www.organifi.com/mantalks

Pick up my brand-new book, Men’s Work: A Practical Guide To Face Your Darkness, End Self-Sabotage, And Find Freedom: https://mantalks.com/mens-work-book/

Enjoy the podcast? If so, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or Podchaser. It helps us get into the ears of new listeners, expand the ManTalks Community, and help others find the tools and training they’re looking for. And don’t forget to subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts  | Spotify

Looking to build brotherhood with a powerful group of like-minded men from around the world? Check out The Alliance and join me today. 

Lastly, check some more free resources: How To Quit Porn | Anger Meditation | How To Lead In Your Relationship

For more episodes, visit us at ManTalks.com | Facebook | Instagram | Twitter

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Big Misunderstanding About What Women Are Attracted To

Shorter episode today, but something I’d love to get your thoughts on. This came from a recent conversation between Lex Friedman and Aella, a sex researcher, writer, and sex worker.

She surveyed her followers on what men and women actually want in the bedroom, and noticed an interesting discrepancy. I polled my own followers and found something similar. Listen in!

Check out Aella’s work here: https://knowingless.com/

Transcript below!


This podcast is brought to you by Organifi! Plant-based nutrition that’s science-backed, high quality, and something I use literally every day. Hit up the link for 20% off your next purchase here: https://www.organifi.com/mantalks

Pick up my brand-new book, Men’s Work: A Practical Guide To Face Your Darkness, End Self-Sabotage, And Find Freedom: https://mantalks.com/mens-work-book/

Enjoy the podcast? If so, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or Podchaser. It helps us get into the ears of new listeners, expand the ManTalks Community, and help others find the tools and training they’re looking for. And don’t forget to subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts  | Spotify

Looking to build brotherhood with a powerful group of like-minded men from around the world? Check out The Alliance and join me today.

Lastly, check some more free resources: How To Quit Porn | Anger Meditation | How To Lead In Your Relationship

Transcript

What’s going on, team? We’re gonna have a short little episode here today; but we’re gonna be talking about the biggest misunderstanding about a woman’s attraction. I found this to be very interesting because it came out of – this whole conversation came out of some research that I stumbled across.

I think I was listening to Lex Friedman podcast, and he was interviewing this woman named Aella. I don’t know if I’m saying that right: A-E-L-L-A. She was a former OnlyFans star and escort, et cetera, turned relationship data scientist. And so she uses her platform to study relationships. She had talked about this poll that I went and checked out where she started to see that there was this big discrepancy between what men thought women wanted and what women actually wanted sexually within the bedroom. And so she put out a poll and said, “Women, how many of you want a man to be sexually dominant in the bedroom? How many of you want a dominant man sexually?”

The stats were quite high. She also asked men, “How sexually dominant do you want to be or think you should be in the bedroom?” And that was quite a bit lower. And so she started to see this discrepancy emerging that more women want a sexually dominant man than men want to be sexually dominant in the bedroom.

Now, I thought that this was fascinating. I would not have guessed that if somebody had asked me that initially; and so I actually repeated the same poll, the same kind of survey on my platform on Instagram. And if you’re not following me, it’s @mantalks. But I repeated this poll, and I said, “Men, how many of you want to be sexually dominant in the bedroom and to what degree?” So I said, ‘zero to three, three to six, six to eight, eight to 10.’

Then I asked women, “How many of you want a man to be sexually dominant in the bedroom? With the same scale.” And what was fascinating, to my surprise, was that the data matched up with what this woman, Aella, had found, which is that more women wanted men to be sexually dominant in the bedroom than men wanted to be sexually dominant in the bedroom.

It got me to thinking: why is that? How has this come about that less men want to be sexually dominant? So I followed up with the men and I said, “Is it that you don’t want to be sexually dominant, or is it that you think that you shouldn’t be?”

Now, this is where it gets really interesting. A lot of the men responded by saying that their perspective of womens’ desires, and I asked them to DM me, message, and whatnot. A lot of the men who responded said, “I think most women don’t want sexually dominant men. I don’t think that women want a man to be that directional or take charge in the bedroom, right?”

So there’s this growing stereotype that a man who wants to be, and I think this has been in our culture for a number of years, that a man who wants to be sexually dominant is dangerous. That a man who wants to be sexually dominant is somehow toxic, and that a man who wants to be sexually dominant is actually not what women want, which is counter to a good amount of polling and data and evidence. I think I had about 2,500 men and 2,500 women respond to the polling in the survey. And I think Aella had like tens of thousands of people respond to the survey. So of course this is a smaller subset of data and we can talk about the data itself and the efficacy of it, based on the polling in the survey, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

But the truth still stands that there’s a bit of a discrepancy there. And so I think what has started to transpire is two things: number one, I think that over the years there’s been this very negative connotation around our sexual desires as men. I think that, for the most part, when you look out at the modern narrative, when you look at the mainstream narrative, and anytime that it talks about men and sex, it’s generally not a good narrative. It’s not like, “yeah, men’s sexual appetites and energy is positive. It’s great.” it’s like, “no, men are responsible for domestic violence and all these things.” And so what really gets highlighted is the dangers of male sexuality. So I think that that’s part one, is that the quote unquote “dangers of male sexuality” have become so prominent within the modern narrative that a lot of men are afraid to even go near any kind of sexual dominance, right? Being able to express or explore what maybe is truly what they desire.

Number two: I think is a discrepancy and a complete misunderstanding of what women. And what I’ve noticed guys get caught by is that they go online and they maybe follow a female dating coach, or they follow guys who are talking about relationship advice, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, and they ask the question, “what does a woman really want?” And the more that you listen to, and I’ll just speak from my personal experience, but the more that I listen to a woman, describe what she wants, and I’ve spent a lot of time doing this. I’ve been on a ton of women’s podcasts talking to them: what do you want? What do you desire? The more that you’ll hear a woman talk about what she’s attracted to, not what she’s aroused by. And I think that this is the biggest discrepancy that when you listen to a woman, describe what she actually wants, what she’s attracted to, what she’s attracted to relationally, she’ll often talk about things that indicate a kind of physical or emotional safety, right?

So maybe she’ll talk about status, right? She’ll say, “I want a guy who’s over six feet tall, and I want a guy who has got a good job for himself. He’s making so much money. He’s emotionally intelligent. He cares about me, he’s compassionate, et cetera.” And so all of those things that she’s saying are things that she’s attracted to relationally, but not necessarily things that equal sexual arousal. And you hear this all the time with women who was like, “oh, he was such a great guy, but I just wasn’t attracted to him.”

What she’s really saying is, “he’s a really great guy. I was attracted to him relationally, but I wasn’t aroused by him. I wasn’t turned on by him. He sort of met the criteria of the checklist of what I wanted, or what I thought I wanted, right? He had a good job. He had a good family. He’s very nice. He’s very compassionate, very kind. But there was no element of spark and so I wasn’t aroused.”

So I think the biggest misunderstanding that a lot of men are operating on that I would really encourage us to challenge is this misunderstanding between what a woman is attracted to and what a woman is aroused by. I think if you’re a young man out there, or if you’re an old man out there, it doesn’t matter what your age is, and you’re single and dating or you’re in a relationship, there’s merit in being able to distinguish between what the woman that you’re with or dating or et cetera, what she’s attracted to and then what she’s by. Because those two things are often very, very different, right? You can see this again in female literature, right? If you read, if you read any sexy romance novel, if you look at a lot of the data and the research that’s out there, what women are often aroused by and what they want sexually – it’s not that it’s counter to what they’re attracted to and want in a relationship – it’s simply that it’s often the parts of men that we have in modern culture very much demonized and villainized in the last few decades, right?

So again, in this data, what I really got from it, in this polling, in this survey that I found fascinating, and again – I’m not speaking about absolutely every single woman, I’m not talking about every single man, I’m talking about a kind of general population – is that there are more women who are wanting sexually dominant men. But I think that the number of men who are willing to be sexually dominant, who know how to be sexually dominant in a healthy way – I don’t know if that’s lessened. I don’t know if more men are afraid of going down that path. I know for myself, I’ve talked to a lot of men who are like one wrong move and you get canceled. Or, you say the one wrong thing or you’re walking on eggshells. And so a lot of men are – I don’t know wanna say the word afraid, but they’re very cautious of really getting into a relationship and expressing this part of themself or exploring it with their partner.

So I’d be curious to hear your thoughts. I’m not gonna give necessarily any here’s what we should be doing about it or anything like that. I just want to hear what are your thoughts on this matter, on this discrepancy between attraction and arousal, and the volume of women that are out there that maybe want sexually dominant men; and the decrease or the smaller population of men who are willing or wanting to be sexually dominant?

Man It Forward. Share it with somebody that you know is gonna enjoy the conversation. That’s gonna enjoy getting into the comments section and digging in on this one because the dating market is interesting right now, and this conversation seems to be a hot topic. So I look forward to hearing your comments. And until next week, it’s Connor Beaton signing off.

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