I called an audible this week and decided to change the direction of the podcast. One big problem I had was the audio quality was seriously lacking so I dropped my earbuds mic for just the microphone on my phone. This has increased my sound quality a lot and the sound will improve down the road when I get a digital recorder for the show. The other reason I changed some stuff in this show already is that I got called back to why I was doing my blog and now this podcast. The reason is that we are losing men left and right to suicides. Last year around this time I lost my good dear friend Cory Hicks. Then this year on the 18th of November I lost my best friend from high school. Jake McDowell was his name. When you hear me talk about going to my friend’s house and we would camp out on the circle or out in the pasture. This was the guy I was talking about. I called an audible this week and decided to change the direction of the podcast. One big problem I had was the audio quality was seriously lacking so I dropped my earbuds mic for just the microphone on my phone. This has increased my sound quality a lot and the sound will improve down the road when I get a digital recorder for the show. The other reason I changed some stuff in this show already is that I got called back to why I was doing my blog and now this podcast. The reason is that we are losing men left and right to suicides. Last year around this time I lost my good dear friend Cory Hicks. Then this year on the 18th of November I lost my best friend from high school. Jake McDowell was his name. When you hear me talk about going to my friend’s house and we would camp out on the circle or out in the pasture. This was the guy I was talking about. He had a tent so we would go on grand adventures. If it were too cold to sleep outside we would sleep in the barn. Sometimes there would be horses in the stalls under us. I actually think this is one of the reasons I like the smell of hay and tack so much now. Yet I wonder why. Of course, all the survivors wonder why our loved ones take their lives. Sometimes it is evident while others are not so much. Jake is later, we don’t know why. We only have assumptions that are wrong. Yet this decade seems to have increased in the number of suicides. I have my theories as to why. I talk about Jake often and now that he is gone, I will talk about him so that his memory stays alive. Jake loved to tell jokes and superstitions. He would cough up a joke at a moment notice and you didn’t know if it was going to be an off-color joke or one you could tell you, mom. But you laughed at them. Yet, through the years I lost contact with Jake and I remember the joy of finding him on Facebook. I was able to connect and I would talk to him from time to time. I even went to where he lived and ate catfish with him. It was an incredible time to see my dear friend again. I would still touch base but again I lost the majority of the connection with Jake. The Connection This is what the Relaxed Male is about. I want to help me reconnect. Not only with their friends and family, but with the one person that means the most to them. Men need to reconnect with themselves. We often don’t consider our own interests until everybody else is taken care of. Sadly, that is to our detriment. Men these days lie to ourselves and say we are too busy to connect with other men. We are losing the coffee shop gatherings. This allows us to have the needed senses of belonging that keep us content and balanced. Yeah getting outdoors provides some of these benefits but talking to our peers is also very important. That is why one of the pillars of Relaxed Male is Family/Community. Yet the younger men don’t want to have to go through the troubles of answering a phone. Some won’t even answer a phone call, but they will answer a text. Sadly there are nuances that are found in speech that are lost in a text. Yeah, you can sort of make up for it with an emoji but it really doesn’t cut the mustard. We have used technology to try to make ourselves more comfortable and in doing so we have become unbearably lost. Todays you see men who are talking about not having any friends. If you confront them on it they make the excuse of I don’t think I really need friends. Well, they don’t realize they just cried out for help. These young men want friends but don’t want to get uncomfortable. Without that discomfort, they don’t grow. That lack of growth causes you to be stunted as a man. You lose needed skills so that you can be as helpful to the community as you possibly can. So this week go out and talk to someone. Make a connection hone that connection so that it is noticeable when you haven’t been in contact with that other man in a couple of days. You will be happier for it. Jake McDowell was his name. When you hear me talk about going to my friend’s house and we would camp out on the circle or out in the pasture. This was the guy I was talking about.
Read more at: https://www.relaxedmale.com/we-are-missing-the-connection/
The concept of Growth mindset and it’s counterpart Fixed mindset comes from Stanford Professor Carol Dweck Ph.D. in her book Mindset. In this book, she talks in detail about what each mindset is and give example after examples of people who display both sides. From Dorothy Delay the violin teacher from The Juilliard School of Music to Jack Welch, the man who saved General Electric. Carol talks about key points that exemplify why a growth mindset is needed if you want to succeed and why the fixed mindset often causes you to have a meltdown like Bobby Night on a losing streak. What is a growth mindset A growth mindset is a mindset that you are more about the ability to get better than having something of natural talent. It is interesting to think we are born with a growth mindset and then we slowly settle into a Fixed mindset. You see babies who keep trying to learn how to walk and we celebrate when they are able to start wobbling around. You even see a child who finally figures out that...
his week talking about the opposite of the abundant mindset in Episode 14. That is a scarcity mindset and the problems it can cause in your efforts of being successful. We all have problems with negative thinking. Those negative thoughts are normal and have a purpose but they don’t serve us as they did in the caveman days. We use to not have enough and we had to fight for all that we had. Today that is still somewhat true but now scarcity is an element that holds us back. It keeps us safe and when being safe we are never growing emotionally or in knowledge. What is scarcity mindset? The scarcity mindset is seeing the world and your resources as being a zero-sum game. You are only allotted a certain amount and then when you are out it is gone. Stephen Covey talks about this in the “7 Habits of Highly effective people” and says this, Most people are deeply scripted in what I call the Scarcity Mentality. They see life as having only so much, as though there were only one pie out ...
What is an abundant mindset? People with an abundant mindset feel freer to give and share because they don’t see that the resources in their life are in scarce supply. They have the motto of There is more where that came from. Often people who aim for and achieve big goals are people who have an abundance-oriented mindset. Because they aren’t worried about what they don’t have, abundant mindset folks are generally happier and easier to get along with they like to take people on their journeys and include more people in their success because they are not limited in what they can do. More control If you have an abundant mindset you aren’t worried about how it is out of your hands. They will take what they have and use it to the fullest extent possible. They approach jobs with more gusto and enthusiasm because they are eager to see the results of their endeavor and don’t worry as much about what won’t happen. When they do fail, they take responsibility for their actions instead ...
For today’s #TuesdayThought is centered around how much we show the world how much we don’t knit by starting what we do know.
This weeks #TuesdayThought is centered around understanding. So often we want others to understand outside before we even have the whole story. We pontificate our views and any other view is irrelevant.
If you want someone to understand your view why not listen first to their side. We do have two ears and one mouth. Which tells me we need to hear twice as much as we speak.
