 My name is Socrates. I'm a former guest speaker at the 21 convention and I currently run a blog on Relationship and Relationship skills specifically for men at manningupsmart.com my biggest Draw for myself education has been without a doubt the phenomenal success of the World Wide Web It is the end in the internet in particular is that it is a plethora. It is like multitudes of library communities Outreach programs that you're able to go to draw upon at your leisure Literally at your fingertips and it is a resource tool that I've been able to manipulate and utilize on a regular basis for any number of educational themes ideas processes whether it's my professional development personal development social development Anything I could think of personal interests entertainment, whatever the internet has been a phenomenal resource When I was younger that wasn't around so I can remember a time period when that resource wasn't available You had things to do like for example to go to a library Physically go to a library and then you were subject to the quality of that library The internet you have access to God knows the number of resources that that that has content available Some of it's good. Some of it's bad. You have to stream through you have to filter You have to hunt pack search, but the information is available and if it's not available there I then can find other resources that may direct me and again the net can help point the way So without a shot of a doubt then the internet has been the the single largest tool that I've been able to utilize Effectively for myself education the personal drivers have always been my my typically my mistakes My failures any time I've had a personal calamity I tend to learn through pain and it's not that I am not necessarily aware of the information Sometimes I may know something in advance, but it doesn't become real to me until I can actually feel it and You know relationships are no different in particular relationship development skills were always spurned by those failures and To self-educate was one of the things I did to help the healing process to better my life and to better myself As far as a direct response as to an initiator for education or a leading thought or philosophy I think my personal experience has been it's been very very diverse I can point to a number of role models that that I've either modeled followed respected valued and I would have directed myself towards those pursuits utilize them as as Figures that I would you know typically aspire to or guide my life Some of them are authors some of them are well-known authors and ran for example, you know An object of ism is something that I found compelling may not have by bought into a hook line and sinker But I was inspired by a lot of the thinking of individualism the rights of individual and so forth and it created awareness On a more human level. I can sit down and say friends my father the men in my life That that have been direct roles that that you have a personal connection with that have influenced you friends peer groups In interestingly enough, you know, I can sit down and say it's not necessarily someone always older in many cases And in Anthony and you in particular you're younger than I am but it's been an inspiration watching you take The 21 convention and mount that forward and it by your example It motivates you to do similar things and we figure out failed to recognize often that our own example is a very very powerful Motivator for change in the world And I know I've always looked directly to others to find different elements to find inspiration to find a measure of a Connection and to be inspired by that and so I look any number ways I joke that I'm a professional thief that I constantly try to steal everything I can from everywhere But you try to make it your own And not just mimic but in many cases if you can follow in somebody else's footsteps It's a lot easier than trailblazing and it even when you are trailblazing you can use others by direct example What did they do? How were they inspired and you get to understand them in a manner? You probably wouldn't recognized and that's been kind of an interesting story when I view my early childhood development with my father My idealized version of him and then when I as a teenager start recognizing him as a man his personal failings and the failings between him and I and the growing issues that happen and of course I'm trying to self-identify and develop my own sense of identity in my own my own life and then to recognize that in a Very real way he was a man and he was trying and that he may not have known But I was also realized the humanity that is in Invented with the individual and that has been a tremendous learning experience And then this also brought me closer to him to understand truly the man That is my father and not just this idealized self and that's that's been an immense motivator and and and something I can utilize as a touchdown for my own personal growth and It's I've always tended to use personal examples and along those ways My influences on heroes and looking up to somebody have always been fairly normal And I think people do it and it's it's very common whether we idealize them We model after them everything else But the problem when we do that is what we also come into start contrast is that they're human and in many cases that these Individuals and heroes and ideal idealized figures will have very mortal human failings And you can be home and feel very betrayed by it and it's not that What they represented was a failure that the failure was was on on them But the internal betrayal that you feel is because you hinge something and pinned it to them when it wasn't meant to be and You need to seek the ideal behind the individual and not idealize the individual and that is completely different concept And I've had a number of issues where I idealized an individual and felt very very betrayed by their their human failings And it diminished Their message to me and it took a very long time for me to kind of process some of it and realize No, there really was value in it and that the failure for myself was the idealization of the individual Not the concept of what they're representing so if we're going to idealize Someone is to clearly distinguish the difference between what they're representing and Themselves and to clearly have that notion in mind when we do such and in that regard we can take and draw upon any number of Resources individuals experienced both past present and and you know and in today, you know and can come from Peers it can be from elders. It can be from people from the past And we can draw upon those but the the danger is to idealize the individual not the symbol The concept of thieving is something I developed and stole literally When in architecture school, we had a guest lecture come in and it was a highlight of a lecture series The final final lecture was the surprise lecture and was supposed to be the grand finale and it was in a very very highly Trumpeted lecture series and to our surprise Having seen a number of fairly famous Recognizable and influential architects presenting we were at really at odds with the notion of Gregory Hines being the Celebrated speaker and we're walking. What is this celebrated American jazz dancer gonna teach architecture students about architecture? And the reality is he didn't teach us about architecture He taught us about creativity and inspirations of creativity and his notion was this is that he would intentionally go to amateur and Local theater to find and watch dancers move How they celebrated the art form and he would intentionally go to seek inspiration and he related that he was he would leave Disappointed if he couldn't pull something out of the performance that to have that moment of inspiration Take that one moment and then transform it and own it, you know to you know In essence a friend of mine refers to it as swagger jacking, you know to take someone's swagger and jacket But it's not just mimicking and copying it's when you take ownership and you make it originally yours and that is an immense difference So when I say stealing it's it's to find inspiration in things and in modeling in Ideas whether it's a turn of a phrase or a concept or an idea and to make it originally yours And to be constantly on the lookout very much like a thief to harvest these sort of things You know and to pick the low-hanging fruit and to make new discoveries and to have inspiration and creativity in your life And that was one way in which I walk and go through and experience the world the concept of community and specifically the men's community or the the Manisphere is a kind of an evolving element. There's multi faceted. It's multi collective and it's not narrowly defined And there's a number of ways in which we can view the the idea of it But ideally it's where men are coming together to talk discuss learn develop share ideas trade ideas train utilizations cross-experiencing and To report back kind of some of the things that they're experiencing and understanding and it's a greater Worldwide kind of collective that what just really wasn't available prior before it was individual interpersonal Relationships where you might be discussed between you and your friends and that was it in this this particular notion It is a vastly greater audience of men coming together and talking about these ideas concepts and the world in which we live in My discovery the man's community was something that occurred when I was directly looking for It it was during a course of period of time that I was looking at self-discovery Reinventing myself or rediscovering myself and I wanted to go back to some of the hallmarks for my earlier life Areas in which I had been successful at things that I knew that I had done to excel And I looked at those time periods in my life in which I experienced that and I asked myself what was taking place What was the makeup of that and in part? It was guys that were very much interested in a common idea or a theme or an idea Whether it's sports in high school when I was competitive swimming or when I was in the army And we're training together those sort of events when I was in architecture school pursuing an architecture degree That sort of sense of community when we had a common Objective in mind. We had a common relative goal There was there was a camaraderie there and at that particular time in my life. I was completely devoid of that I was in a relatively in a new city New new experiences and the cultural Exchange was very different from what I was going to use to and so I literally went out looking for like-minded men In part I was looking for guys that were looking to self-develop to self-educate in relationships They're lives to improve and I ended up just you know literally back in my way via the internet to the Manisphere in a number of ways through chat rooms communities groups and so forth and ended up meeting some amazing people learning developing Becoming part of different organizations and ultimately it led me to the 21 convention. I got to see its birth It's origination conception if you will and and and its evolution to this point and and Interestingly enough I've actually asked to be a speaker, which was you know a really unique opportunity for me to be a part of that I met Anthony when he was a young punk. It was it was amazing. It was a stellar Individually just he was going to stand out amongst hundred guys here. You have a very very young guy Just incredibly sure of himself direct and even when he wasn't sure there was this just this Flair to him that that wasn't to be denied and and it wasn't going to be denied And but it wasn't just that cockiness and self-suredness that that resonated he he aspired He he literally dreamed and that's where I think I've always liked that real election of as far as avatar And the name was dream is because it really did represent him and it was a reflection of him Is that he aspired for more and he was going to achieve it and you knew this was someone to watch One way or the other whether to stay out of his way to watch from the sidelines or be a part of it This one was when it was somebody to watch so I met Anthony when he was young punk And I've got to see him develop and it's been a pleasure. I found out about the 21 convention when it was Early early in the conceptual form I it was when he was batting ideas around on a Forum with the community and he was really kind of self-generating this idea and a concept and initially it was an under 2021 convention and I had absolutely no interest in it I was an older guy pushing 40 and it was geared really to the young Turks and without question Unabashedly unashamedly, but it it was fascinating to watch To see that process evolve and what Anthony has done with it And so that's when I first it so it was a really unique experience of I remember when this was absolutely a pipe dream You know, it was simply a wild hair of Anthony's ass and he took it and he ran with it Never did I expect to actually get swept up into it and be a member and active participant in it and to see how it's Affected my life as well, but he has that way my experience direct experience on the 21 convention was very much the way in which I felt about the pickup community when it was at probably its zenith when We talked about intergame you have a group of people Being brought together for a similar idea and in goal to transform their lives to empower themselves to be better men to Define who and what they want to be all in one place and there was truly an energy involved And it was amazing to not only just hear the speakers But then to literally hear the discussions to be a part of the dialogue and the narrative After and in between both the events and I found it to be an immense immense experience Period where I saw it from the very very beginning it from a conceptual idea from something that I absolutely would have shunned and did And didn't want any part of wasn't going to be a part of the kind of this young Turk movement Had really no interest in something that was completely framed for to one that it's evolved into a vastly more mature open Dialogue and in direction one in which that not only did it encompass many of my own ideas and fascinations Hobbies and interests but something that I can actually be a part of and actually I'm very proud to be a part of And it's it's interesting when you really look at the questions being posed by young men in a knowledge-based service Economy and what we expect of it's answering the fun You know helping to answer the fundamental question is what do I want to do with my life? Who do I want to become and it's serving as a platform and a springboard to help an individual formulate the ideas Concepts and awareness and to be able to project that and make that decision for that individual and we typically don't see that anywhere else So I've seen it evolve from within the community I've seen it take the best of the community and I'm seeing it evolve in a manner in which the community refuses to do and For that I think it's been absolutely stellar and I applaud Anthony and his his efforts and the success of the 21 convention My ideas of the 21 convention going global was kind of a surprise I Didn't anticipate it one for it to succeed not that I was rooting for it not to succeed But you kind of take this wild idea notion most ideas kind of fizzle this didn't and I don't know Maybe that was my self-limiting belief is that I didn't expect it to go beyond just a local event to all of a sudden become An a dominant us event let alone it going global But that's a reflection of Anthony my future projections for this is not really it going global I thoroughly expect at some time in the future when we have space tourism one of the first companies that will be doing this We will have an event of the 21 convention in space I have no doubt because no one's done it Anthony's gonna go there I have that is now my firm believe having witnesses from the very conception and if you ask me where's this gonna go I think is gonna take it beyond this plane the 21 convention being idealistic is one that it gives Direction and also a kind of an end end goal as far as what it's trying to aspire to be in a very quick sound bike You know, it's a calling card. It's a label It's something to reference immediately and the notion of becoming an idealized man or idealized self is one that Addresses kind of a fundamental question of this age for men that are actually developing in a knowledge-based service economy You know where you have this delayed adult Onset taking place because of you know, you have to require skills You have to require the experience that goes with those skills And it's not as simple as what my grandfather faced of picking up a drill and marching into a mine You know, you have to become aware you have to become a developed and as we become more knowledgeable The demands are placed are higher on us and the in that plays out And so when you have this idea of what do I want to do with my life? What do I want to become who do I want to be the 21 convention can address some of that it becomes a platform It's telling you very clearly and succinctly what it wants to become and this notion to motivate to aspire To become the best individual art the idealized self the idealized man is one That's immensely noble because it's not about being a superior individual to an at someone else It's about being a superior to your former self and that is the essence of a noble ideal and to be a noble Individual and it's one in which you can to aspire to be and to seek to be a better person The relationship you have with yourself is going to be a critical one because it's going to be at the foundation for which You project everything in your life You know, it will literally determine your expectations for yourself for your life the people in them The relationships you have whether it's work whether it's interpersonal whether it's familiar It's all gonna be rejected, you know projected based on your concept of yourself and how you treat yourself And the healthier you are with your yourself the higher probability of you entering into a healthy relationship that the the Important element is this is that a healthy person will actually avoid an unhealthy one an Unhealthy one is gonna not going to avoid an unhealthy relationship And they will actually try to find and replicate an unhealthy one as it's a historical pattern We see in psychological studies again and again which socialization where people meet their expectations And if you have low expectations for yourself, you're not going to achieve greatness one of the most fascinating concepts with observing the transformation of the pickup community or the men's community and the Manisphere is that these these notions of idea waves as they come across into the community and they generate out and One of the most important ones that I've always felt was this idea of intergame this this this notion of your relationship with yourself and how Important it is to start and establish that and when the the community had really first started to embrace that and That upswell and that knowledge and awareness was cross-ended to a number of individuals very rapidly I think is when the community was absolutely at its at its healthiest and it was probably one of the its finer moments in time Unfortunately that idea faded out as something else came along because sex cells, you know Whether it was the idea of going direct or this idea of the claw or cave manning or any of these other things You know the the quick idea and the quick sell of sex Upsurp this this long drawn-out idea of Self-discovery self-improvement and this notion of developing a relationship with yourself But for me the highlight of the community was when the the notion of intergame was a paramount and a singular focus within the community And it was a large proponent of why I stayed in and the healthiest part for me for the community the thing that I pulled out of it my discovery of sales type tactics within the community As related to relationships was not necessarily really a sales thing. That was more of a pickup thing You know you make the sale by pulling the trigger in in the pickup community You know there's kind of a well-worn Axiom that if you can't pull the trigger and execute you're an entertainer, you know and women don't fuck clowns And in its sad but true and that doesn't play out in relationships You have to close the deal you have to get the girl first off But once you get the girl, you know having a sales mentality constantly in a relationship isn't going to work You know she's already bought into the goods It's more of establishing marketing and branding type elements as a notion and I've really learned to foster and develop that sort Of awareness as it pertains to relationships rather than a sales type thing Establishing your sense and identity as a man, you know equivalent of a brand What is that brand and at every point of contact or sales? You know when you have decisions being made choices are being made What are you consistently projecting and are you establishing a baseline set of behaviors that she can rely on that other people can rely on? And you do that within relationships, you know, what's your relationship as a friend, you know What are you bringing to the table and when we talk about marketing? You know, how are you marketing yourself? How are you setting that out into the sexual marketplace and it is a marketplace? It's essentially a commodities marketplace, you know How are you taking yourself and this notion of you as both a product and a service provider and putting that in the dating world? You know, do you know how to properly market yourself? Are you going to the right environments? You know, for example, I think finding a you know, a nice stable relationship, you know Maybe she's a church going girl. You're probably not going to find her in a strip club You know, are you marketing the right areas? You know, are you going to pickup bars? Are you going to cocktail places trying to find somebody who's going to be a home body? You know the the area in the market in which you choose to to look for somebody will, you know Effect your results, you know, do you know how to properly do that or are you doing what's popular by other people? You have to know yourself You have to know what you're looking for to be able to market and to find what you want and if you don't have those skills You're you know, you're you're subject to, you know Serendipity and that's typically not a successful strategy My personal belief in the sales closing element of pickup and my philosophy of Relationships is that the sales pickup is just a small portion of an overall process You know the closing sales part is just to get in action to to get the girl to start the relationship But and that's typically where the pickup community completely stops They don't carry it forward and matter of fact They'll actually promote the notion of not doing so of washing rinsing and repeating in in my approach You you develop those skills you utilize those skills and you implement the skills but then you deal with the branding marketing and customer relationship process of Continuing that relationship to continue to make additional sales with the same buyer You're essentially developing customer relationships and in ultimately it is a relationship you have access to greater resources It the sales become easier. You're able to replicate develop And it becomes the established sales funnel is it's easiest to to to win the client again And it's vastly easier, but it's a different challenge and there are different elements to that and you need to have Relationship skills if you're going to have a relationship whether it's an interpersonal relationship whether it's a customer relationship winning the client again is Proven to be more beneficial than to continually to wash rinse and repeat on closing a simple sale My perspective of seeing the Manisphere evolve has been a fairly unique one. I've been able to witness it directly from when it was very much an underground hidden Facility for men to come together to share ideas and develop themselves their skills the relationships Any any of these elements together in the community or went on the net in particular From a very shamed type based Idea to something that has evolved to become something more mainstream that you see not only in mainstream media in stories and reports and interviews and books and so forth But you're actually seeing it evolve into higher education facilities and education itself Which I find to be very very beneficial and in a very positive set forward From the standpoint that it is a travesty that male issues Male culture and education is not being paired Gendered equitably with women ten years ago You would never find a male center at a university even though you find a complete department on women's studies Today, that's not true. You now start to see male centers on campus not necessarily full-on Departments for study, but you also start to see classes being taught on theories of masculinity and Other type courses and so that there's this emerging idea of the necessity to teach the idea of male culture male gender studies and and to promote the idea of healthy fostered Relationships because when we don't we see these things played out in a number of ways The most predominantly is the number of failed marriages on the high percentage of failed Devour a high high percentage of divorce rates and the fallout from that Whether it's the failed marriage failed families broken relationships broken family structures and that plays out and that gets passed on generationally into the children So I will see hopefully see the day or at least my grandchildren will see the day that we will actually be able to have Gendered studies equally taught at universities that being a man will be accepted as part something that would be healthy Role of relationships and integral part to marriage currently. I don't think we live in that world The idea of self-awareness and self-development outside of the pickup community is is one that gets attention But I think it's also when it gets negative attention For example when we talk about a young man developing or a young boy developing into a man You know that the notion is you know, for example is your is your son to being too much of a little boy Medicaid him, you know and these notions of developing a Healthy sense of what it is to be a man to develop is not necessarily reflected positively in our society And it's an unhealthy one and it there are consequences when we don't develop Healthy men in our societies in many instances, for example, we diminish and we Devalue the notion of masculinity when in fact it is essential to a healthy bond to essential to a healthy Relationship and when we ignore one gender we all are affected My observation of how the man is evolving to meet the challenges of feminism And the out the the the childbirth social programs that that become it is that as a decent guy You no longer can be the white knight and play the nice guy role because what we realize is if you want a particular woman You can't be doing it. She's not responding to that And when you watch you sit down and say if I aspire to a particular woman one of the first things You're gonna do it is observe is who's the guy she's dating who's the guy she's choosing and guess what? It's gonna be the alpha cock. It is gonna be the really aggressive dominant male Okay, the guy who's gonna dump you know pumper and dump her and leave her and what you learn is that's the guy She's choosing it's not necessarily who she ultimately wants but that's what she's choosing and so the the pickup community The the the manuscript in many ways are responding directly to the field environment And that's terribly unhealthy and when we talk about sexual freedom. We're really not talking about freedom We're talking about anarchy, you know, you don't know what the dating world's like anymore The rules of the road have been it you know for all practical purposes thrown out You know and you have a wide variety of activity dating is no longer an ends to a means you don't know what it means You don't know what the rules of behavior of cultural acceptability are and and I'm seeing the man is fear play that out And as we evolve women literally are getting the men that they are choosing and that's not really a healthy thing It's not what they want. I find it very interesting that feminism and girl power are Literally failing to get what they want, you know, and it's providing them everything that they they're they're not expecting It's they're creating it But at the same time it's not giving them the men that they need that and ultimately what they desire is a man To be able to hold them and they're not promoting them a particular note that I have concerned about is is not the perception that feminism is good or bad What I have a problem with is that the third-generational wave of feminism is something I very much I'm opposed to in many ways the first wave of Women's suffrage for example I think was very beneficial brought many things forward the second wave of feminism the one that we recognize from the 1960s in many ways has vastly changed our world for the better the notion that you could actually take a job Because you want to enjoy it you find it fulfilling has actually enabled not only women to succeed But for men to be able to choose a course other than the one that they typically would be assigned by a gender role I think that's been a very beneficial Positive set for I would also sit down and say that there have been some negatives that have fallen out of it hook-up culture Is is one of them the whole notion of the Catharsis to this is is a pickup culture is spawning off directly because of the relation with the second wave of feminism Third wave of feminism is more about supplicating men's desires to the feminine nature And it is something that is no longer about just equal rights and equal status It is about superiority and it's being pushed And I find number of issues along those lines to be terribly unhealthy for not only an individual But for society at a whole I mentioned earlier this idea of third wave of feminism and when we look at it feminism Isn't just one continuous idea notion being brought forward through society There have been three typically distinct and separable ideas and time frames in which they have existed The first phase was simply women's suffrage when women literally were trying to actively get the same rights as Citizens period and it's something that we typically take for face value, so we don't even recognize it today Then the second wave typically occurred during the early 60s transformed through the 70s in which we actually start to see equal rights Equal pay for equal work so forth and that is again something that had brought massive changes within our society both Pro and con the third wave is something very distinct It's it's coming from a multiple different directions and really typically has been taking a typical Form but it's generated by the phrase, you know, for example girl power or female empowerment But it's not just empowering women. It's empowering women beyond Gender equality. It's now about supplanting male supremacy. It's about rectifying past Wrongs through through further wrongs and what we have is a complete alienation of men the complete alienation of Masculinity within relationship structures, you know, it's not enough that men are just disposable at this point We're actually at a point in time in which men aren't even necessary We're at a point in which science can actually create out of a stem cell sperm A man's not even needed even for the act of procreation and sperm generation You no longer even have to be the sperm donor sperm can be created and Thus men are completely irrelevant from the question Unfortunately feminism and girl power hasn't been able to they've gotten what they've wanted and and they've created a world in which I think that they've gone very much astray and it still hasn't answered the real question of being able to have the types of men The types of relationships that they clearly honestly want and feminism isn't answering it It's leading many women astray. It's leading men astray and We're seeing it in and rising and rising divorce rates and the catastrophic results that we see across our nation On a very basic level when you sit down and say as your child develops when they don't have a two Parent household or family nuclear family You don't have the role models from the very beginning that Relationships are stable and they will last because your reality is they don't and that starts to play off you also have this this father avoidance element that men are are They're they're simply not needed. They're inconsequential and I think there are immense dangers in society when we tell one gender You're inconsequential It might might take on the rise of the divorce rates and the failures of marriage and how that plays out in the travesty of You know, it's the the the ugliness and the damage that's done to lives families children and how that gets you know Rippled out throughout throughout the future It came about in a number of ways, you know, the running joke is that it's the four horsemen of the apocalypse You know, we can sit down and say it was the ease of of contraception and availability of contraception allowed women to respond to the hypergamious impulses the desire to sexually marry up or to better themselves to seek the bigger and better deal and in a very real way it freed them to do that sexually and in it allowed a freedom to take place that it becomes very sexually driven and to not have necessarily the ramifications of a poor choice in a past time The second is the massive transformation of the family law structure Is that quite frankly you're you're equal in marriage until divorce, you know And then the laws change that are so feminine weighted that it's not even funny It destroys the incentives for men to actually enter into marriage. So you're stripping the incentives The third one is going to be kind of also another unique one is that you talk about the knowledge and service-based economy That you know, we talk about culture is one that's devaluing Making men basically irrelevant to the equation and and society and culture or drive in this, you know We can't just reflect, you know to sit down and say Take it as it is, you know and man up, you know, it's a phrase I absolutely loathe and it's one of the things that I had responded to in naming of my blog Is to do it smartly because it wasn't something I sit down and say the objective isn't what I find offensive It's the manner in which they're telling men to do it So I see a lot of these things as being major social structural elements that have changed The incentive has changed the structure and has changed the course of men making responsible decisions and being, you know Being driven towards marriage and they're not healthy When we talk about family law and its impact on marriage It's it's it's one of the prime drivers for the incentive for men to enter relationships And when you strip the incentives away, you know, for example when your rights are stripped out of a marriage, you know That that women typically initiate divorce 70% of the time. It's completely Disproportionate and it feels incentive for divorce because what happens is that women have immediate rights to the child You know because of this this notion of the the feminine supreme being as being the holistic of the mother But no rights given to the father, you know that that you're equal in marriage, but unequal in divorce You know and when we talk specifics about family law, they're immense because there are many different facets we can take You know when we talk alimony, you know, men cannot necessarily be seen as taking alimony as as appropriate and very few men do But consequently typically most women are actually supported and enabled by society for doing it and the the notion of gender Inequality in family law is immense And if you're going to change and preserve the institution of marriage and celebrate it and hold it in regard I think you really have to address this notion of gender equality within family law You know, for example, if you want to get away from this notion of alimony and have equality is make women pay for it You know, we we we for example in this nation We imprison and incarcerate 58,000 men in prisons for failure to pay alimony or child support doesn't matter because if they have an inability to it But we have no jails holding women for the same account And yet we know they tend to be a greater offender in failure to pay child support That is not something politically correct You would be shamed in even bringing the subject up in effect It's debtor prison for men. We're incapable of providing for their children, but we don't hold another the other gender accountable The reality is that we're not probably not going to affect Case law. We're not going to affect civil law as far as regard regarding marriage But what we can do is start promoting marriage We can start promoting the values conditions and terms in which we engage in these relationships and specifically for example Women are have been well celebrated for being gatekeepers of sex And they failed miserably. They've developed a pump and dump culture. They've developed hookup culture as men Our role is commitment. We control the commitment women control sex men can control commitment We need to start recognizing that we are gatekeepers for this. We are the gatekeepers for marriage We are gatekeepers for these long-term investments of our children as such We need to be making better decisions more informed decisions and taking action and addressing these issues openly when you see Misandandric behavior. Misundry is the the antithesis of misogyny It's when women act aggressively in a negative tone towards your gender inappropriately You need to voice it. We need to become active. We cannot be passive players in this world stage You have to address it and when you see a quality woman respect that woman demand these things out of them You get the woman you sleep with or let me rephrase it in a different way women get the men they sleep with Men get the woman they commit to The notion of a psychological mirror is a concept that kind of goes back to the beginnings of the founding fathers of Psychology Carl Young and Freud and they were the first ones kind of to start the notion and branch out in a number of ways And when we look at the notion of utilizing a psychological mirror in relation to a relationship Is that we're trying to choose a way in which we can view ourselves? And we can see it based on our the decisions we make and because they're value-based you you're having to make a choice And when we look at our partners We can discover a number of things that we value the choice of our partners who she is why she is What type of person she is why am I attracted to it? What are the things that I'm getting out of the relationship? What are my needs that are being fulfilled by having this relationship if I look and Analyze these I can start to understand myself in a much greater way a lot of cases. It's dependency needs You know, what do I need things that I have to you know, whether it's this sense of security warmth being loved so forth And for example a lot of guys go out and try to get laid because they need a sense of validation Understanding what's driving that behavior can actually help the individual grow because clearly You know, we don't want to be using relationships just to fulfill these dependency needs and because it's it's an addiction You know, and it's an unhealthy one and it's why we have these you know You know for example serial monogamy is an outreach of these we have People that have dependency needs that are trying to find and discover themselves and grow by utilizing the safety and security of a Relationship to discover it and people get hurt people get damaged by this and and done a number of times it becomes your personal narrative We can also look at relationships to find out what our developmental tasks are You know, what are the next what's the next thing I need to learn in life to progress and obviously in in when you look at Failing relationships. It's a note. It's a conflict point, but it's an area where you're not adequate You know, your skills your development aren't adequate to overcome this and it's in jeopardy And we can either choose to look at these moments in time and learn from them and to direct our energies to modify that behavior Or that condition or to prevent those from ever occurring and learn But if you're cognizant of it We can slowly look at our lives and the choices and decisions we make and to see ourselves Better in many cases we can actually see what our next developmental task is before we even come come across it And that is probably the most proactive thing we can do is to Anticipate what our developmental tasks are work at them so they don't ever become an issue and that is the importance of actually learning Relationship develop relationship skills is that they teach a lot of these things They avoid these common pitfalls that mankind has made through millennia, you know, these aren't necessarily new Obviously societies change people change you have different influences But the common pitfalls typically are always there and we can learn to avoid them. That's we can improve the qualities of our lives My concept of relationships as being investments I guess might take on it is not necessarily an investment because clearly it is but I think it's more than that A relationship is a partnership in life You're taking someone on to be literally a partner in your life objectives Whatever they need to be you know or want to be and hopefully they're parallel And and that you have the same life objectives if you don't there's gonna be something wrong And and the the relationship is not gonna work out because you don't have necessarily the same Objectives in life and that's a that's something you should be screening and filtering directly for but I see it as a partnership Not just a partnership But one in which you're bound to because you want to be it's a choice and I think people choose marriage and Relationships in a very frivolous careless manner typically based on attraction An emotional dependency need maybe a developmental task that they have this notion that there's something wrong that they need to be fulfilled by Jerry McGuire kind of coined it you know the popular notion of you complete me would be a sign if somebody has a developmental Task or a dependency need that's not fulfilled And then you look for somebody else to fulfill that and they invest in this individual and they become wrapped up into that That's not gonna be a healthy relationship But the the notion of being able to carry that forward choosing the right partner is absolutely an investment into your life and The success happiness fulfillment of your life will be directly related to the quality of choices You may can clearly the choice of a relationship and the quality of that relationship will determine the quality of your life one of the core Relationship elements that you have to have and it'll be it'll be primarily to And it doesn't matter what relationship we talk about Whether it's an interpersonal relationship with a friend with a lover and and I'll leave I'll even say with yourself Fundamentally if you're gonna have a friendship or or any sort of relationship You're gonna have to have trust and respect if you don't have those two things You really don't have a healthy relationship and it starts with you if you don't have the ability to trust and to Respect yourself no matter what you do how hard you try you're gonna have an unhealthy relationship But you because ultimately you yourself are unhealthy You know with your own notion of yourself, and if you can't trust and respect yourself. You don't have anything the least of the relationship the specifics when we talk about trust and respect Transcend friendship boundaries to interpersonal, you know intimate relationships because In a number of significant ways because they they truly are more intimate. They're vastly more personal you share You're exposing you're having to open yourself up more fully to those relationships They're gonna be more of where who you really are deep down and that's gonna be reflected and seen and projected out into the Relationship and when we talk about these sort of things one of the key is gonna be boundary issues You know if you don't have proper boundaries or established boundaries if you have collapsed boundaries Or you don't even are even aware of what those are you're gonna have a lot of problems And in any relationship there are gonna be certain amount of boundaries respecting them establishing them respecting other people's boundaries Realizing other people have them and these transcend obviously when you're dealing with somebody on a more intimate level They're gonna be vastly more acute and any problems you have are going to be again vastly more acute Both positive and negatively and the notion of a relationship is that you're open yourself up It is a partnership. You're bringing someone in to your life, you know and opening up if you don't it's gonna be unhealthy It's not it's it's gonna be foreign and you're gonna be treating and regarding each other in that regard You know, it's just not gonna be healthy The notion of self-investment. I think it's an incredible one If you don't do it, you're not gonna grow if you don't put value back into yourself primarily You're not gonna grow you're not gonna experience the things and grow from them You're gonna be a set product. You're gonna be stagnant and I think it's it's probably not just an unhealthy Element not to do. I think it's highly toxic Is that if you don't do this you're gonna be not only You're you're emotionally stunted you're developmentally stunted And we know you have a particular life trajectory You know as a man I can project certain elements are gonna happen in my life over a certain span I will age my body will do things differently And I have a finite time to improve myself to be where I want to be at a particular time Investing in any sort anything whether it's a business a trade or anything Getting the tools and resources available to do the job necessarily help you out And if it's personal development, you know in your life the most important thing that's gonna ever exist will be you You know for it for yourself Investing wholly into that is an idealized self, you know And how do you achieve that and it's gonna be one of the wonder questions of this age? What do you do with your life? You know and we have we don't we've we're living in an age when you can actually ask yourself that question You know at no other time in human history have men been able to ask themselves that fundamental question What do you want to do with your life and then have the resources at hand to be able to have that life to pursue that life? And have the liberty to do it It's it's incredibly mind-boggling and it's it's a it's a heady question I think it reflects of one of the things of our days in our age that we live in is that young men are Having to discover that for themselves in this kind of knowledge-based service Economy that we have and it it delays this idea of onset, you know becoming an adult and It's it's fascinating to me that we have these opportunities And we know that we're gonna be responsible for leading Relationships and leading our lives, but we're not giving men the opportunity to learn and to develop and to foster these skills I see the role of honesty being Within relationships being a linchpin to trust and respect because without it you can't develop that those two elements You you can't be honest where you fear to offend And you can't respect an individual that actually deceives you on a regular basis You know and that's just a founding element and if you don't have these elements You don't have a relationship But the same time in a relationship you have to have that measured response of care and consideration And that is something it's it's not necessarily a Blanket policy issue of initially for me to sit down and say you have to be absolutely honest But it needs to be discussed it needs to be communicated and that is another you know vital absolutely vital communication skill is is that blew the answer but the the Notion of communication being an essential relationship skill is you need to be able to communicate these things within a relationship And that also fosters a degree of trust honesty and respect is that when you can be honest and be truthful And yet still be respectful in and consider the individual and how you care and hold that Individual went in the manner in which they're regarded is you know really truly the underpinnings of a relationship The idea of honesty in an intimate relationship is obviously it is going to be a more intimate raw Exposed you know a completely naked Vulnerable element of your psyche your awareness your sense of self will be exposed You know you can put up a social front publicly, but in a relationship that that Public facade is stripped away. They're gonna get to know you and there will be this raw Vulnerability that that you expose yourself in a healthy relationship and you can tell when a relationship Starting not to be in a healthy level when it's starting to be an inflection point into an unhealthy nature is when that honesty is Evaporating when that honesty has been transgressed when there's been a violation of trust Respect and you don't have that open dialogue that sense of communication no matter what form it takes is is stripped away My concept of the screaming narrative is the personal story that one projects out into life It's it's what can be seen and derived from watching and observing somebody It's their body body behaviors the body communications how they regard themselves the choices of clothing the style of clothing All these things start to tell a story and these stories are self-projected the individuals choosing these sort of elements Because this idea of self-identity self-created they themselves have created a manner in which they are living to project themselves And it is that story In most cases when I talk about interpersonal relationships I talk about and I warn men about a woman's screaming narrative and in many instances a woman who projects herself as a Wild and crazy woman is doing this intentionally. She's setting things up to develop a life and life expectations of you for her and you can't expect a woman who's going wild and crazy and living sort of that life to all of a sudden be in a home body and a quality relationship and so men typically are Responding to women based on attraction triggers. They're not watching the story. She's projecting Is this an individual for a viable healthy relationship? In most cases, she's not a likely candidate don't be investing your life your energy and in Resources into, you know, a low probability payout situation, you know, it's strictly foolish men Don't do that. They don't stop and ask themselves these questions And that's when I talk about the screaming narrative. What's the personal story that this individual projecting? We don't even listen to the one that's screaming in the room, you know, let alone the subtle one You know and the when you get into Interpersonal intimate relationship, you'll actually get to know the subtle stories, but often we even ignore that the screaming From a personal perspective, I can relate a particular story when I talk about not seeing the part in a screaming narrative There was a woman I chose Relationship developed a tight bond with her projected my life. Our lives got tied up together Literally the house in which we're filming in is a part of that and in there were devastating Consequences for that failed relationship and and I was immensely hurt There were financial damages and it just it's the Travis that the full-on calamity But there was a time period when I was out with a friend and we came across her at a bar And she presents herself and she's wearing a little halter top express intersexuality thrown it completely out there and What was interesting was that she actually had on the embossed on her halter top a logo of a bad kitty and this is the notion that she was actually projecting that and My partner turned me and kind of in a very sincere way But in a very direct way sat and said by the way, there's your sign, you know and in many ways I Had refused to see her screaming narrative, you know that idea that she's a wild child and there was no tame in her Okay, I refused to listen to what she was telling the world and the results that stemmed from that was I didn't listen and Everything else was a consequence of it and men need to pick up on similar things that women are projecting If she constantly sits on as an admirable trait that she says I'm sarcastic These are not necessarily things that you want to partner yourself up with, you know When was the last time you tried to have a serious conversation with somebody that was constantly being sarcastic, you know Are these traits there something is she looking for in the similar is is you know, is it fair to be on the other side? You know does she look for somebody who's a sarcastic, you know and a pain in the ass in a challenge, you know These are things that are being projected men need to listen to these things They need to start looking for them because they're going to play out in your life my particular take on a healthy Relationship as far as it when we talk about the notion of a mature or an immature Relationship and especially when it deals with age is one when which we talk about development How much awareness how much experience? How many differing focusing of different ideas is someone aware and are they able to implement that awareness that experience and knowledge appropriately to fulfill a better healthy life to develop a To further relationship along in their life objectives And are they able to maintain that with another individual and that is a very very complex notion and set of skills to develop Knowledge-based to become aware of and to not only just comprehend but to kind of relatively master and get right And it's very difficult when you're younger when you're it being inundated from any number of directions about ideas of life concept of self Relationship patterns in the in your just sheer lack of experience. And so I would take the notion that Typically that you're gonna have a vastly more mature life and in relationship much further on in life than you will early on It'll be fairly rare to find a mature developed relationship Fairly early on but it's going to be essential to actually have those skills in place to develop one healthily My belief on relationships is that they're not static that they evolve and they have the potential to evolve in any direction and in any shape you can take an unhealthy relationship and it could evolve into a healthy one with care consideration direction leadership any any number of Skills and attribute, but it's gonna have to be compatible with two parties The same can be true for example also with a healthy relationship that can deteriorate into an unhealthy one So I don't necessarily would sit down and view somebody that's unhealthy as always having an unhealthy relationship But the notion is is that they're probably likely for success will be determined based on their state of health and the relationship with themselves Then the relationship with their partner the healthier what it is the more beneficial and the higher probability of success and happiness Obviously would be would befall that When I spoke about the hallmark of suffering being resistant reality is that reality Existing can't typically be changed and you can struggle against it. You can fight against it But you're taking on a feudal effort. It's it's a fool's errand But it's one that's going to be fraught with anxiety Frustrations pain and it's not going to affect a change And that's when I talk about you know it being a hallmark of suffering is that you're choosing to actually Do this knowingly when you fight reality the the more appropriate thing to do is to recognize reality and let it in Because that's simply all we can do we can't necessarily change reality It's going to exist and often we struggle against reality when it's easier and more appropriate to make room for it And now there are skills that you need to do to develop that Methodologies and so forth and practices and philosophies for doing it, but the easiest solution is to make room for it The future 21 convention that I'll be speaking I to be really honest I have not formulated the actual talk or speech But you know when we talk about this idea of becoming an idealized self in my particular interest and focus has been Relationships and will continue as being why I'm being asked to speak We'll probably center around those two concept of becoming not only just an idealized individual But an idealized relationship and becoming an idealized candidate for the idealized Relationship and and it can take on any number of forms that you decide you determine And that's probably the direction in which I'll be taking that that speech and we'll be directing come come August if there was one thing I would express to an individual watching this or hearing my voice and For them to talk and or to take away from would be the notion is that your your life is finite You know and live accordingly You know make up your mind look do the research find out who you want to be direct your life towards those goals Don't waste your life. Just floating along. Don't don't let this time and opportunity pass you by Reach out for those resources reach out for like-minded individuals share those ideas become an act of participant in your life and act on it live life Hey guys, thanks for watching really enjoyed the interview I hope you come see me at the 21 convention and please when you do come see me Tell me about your stories tell me about your experiences and definitely bring your questions I'd love to be able to elaborate and continue this conversation directly with you You can find me there or you can address me and it and contact me through my blog at manningupsmart.com Take care