 Well, hello and welcome to Understand Men Now. I'm Jonathan Asley of johnathanasley.com. I'm so excited to be shooting this short video for you today. Our topic, how to bring strong, strong manly men back into your life. Okay, really quickly before we get started, if you've been interested in seeking help when it comes to men trying to understand men and maybe you're in a relationship with a guy and you're like, I just want some perspective, check out the link below for a free discovery call. Or even if you're single and looking for love and you want some assistance because my information resonates with you, click this free discovery call, the schedule call to see if working with a coach might be right for you. Okay, how to bring those strong manly men into your life. Look at that, I've got some muscles now. I've been working out. I didn't think of it when I wore this shirt. So this particular share actually comes from, I'm gonna share a little story with you. This relates to something that happened to me about three years ago. And three years ago, I did something called the Hoffman process. And if you're not familiar with it, here's the book, The Hoffman Process. But what's interesting about this experience, it's an inner child workshop where you heal your childhood wounds and traumas. It was done at a facility in Northern California, actually up in Napa. There were 40 people. There it was 20 men and 20 women. I don't think that was by design. It just happened to be 20 men and 20 women. And the experience was very much individual. You're doing your own work, your own healing. But it's very introspective. You are interacting with people, but not a lot. And not that that's overly important, but one of the things is, is you're not allowed to tell people what you do for a living until the end. So why this is so important that I'm sharing this with you is I scan the room of men and women and I see them doing their work. I was just very impressed with everybody that was doing the heroic work of working on themselves. They were really investing in themselves. And I remember the second to the last night, oh, and by the way, coincidentally, this happened to be the weekend of my birthday, which this video is coming out, the week of my birthday. So there's some coincidence here. But there was this great ceremony that we did. And it was like, it was a birthday ceremony. It was like being wrapped in a blanket of self-love. And hence why I wrote a book called What the Heck Is Self-Love Anyway? But it just, it gave you that impression of what it feels like to be wrapped in a blanket of self-love. And some of this may sound very feminine. Some of it may sound very soft and compassionate and sensitive and everything. So it doesn't sound very manly or strong, but I can tell you the strongest thing you can do, for yourself, whether man or woman, is to do deep introspective work. Because a man's masculinity isn't based on how much he can lift or how chivalrous he is. It's actually his masculinity or his strength. A strong man is one that can go inward and faces inner demons. That's what a strong man does. That's what a strong manly man does, is faces inner demons. It's not about going out into war. Well, no disrespect for our warriors out there and our soldiers who protect us and our cops that protect us and our firemen that do all that. And every individual that protects children and whatnot, it's certainly a sense of strength. But I'm here to go to another layer of strength and that's to go inward because there is nothing more powerful than to face your demons with a level of strength. And these men, these 20 men and 20 women did that. Okay, so now this is where the important part of the story comes in. So the last evening, we get to share with everybody what we do. And people went around the room and what was interesting, there was this one guy who looked like an ultimate fighting champion and had tattoos up and down his arms and he looked like the Marlboro man, right? And when he got up to share what he did, he's a professor at Stanford of microbiology. I mean, such a contrast to the way he looked. And we had a supermodel in the group. We had an actor in the group. We had attorneys, we had all housewives, all different kinds of people. And I shared, I'm a dating relationship coach. Okay, fast forward to that evening. When we all hung out at the jacuzzi because this was kind of a retreat center, all the women flocked to me, all the women flocked to me because they heard I was a dating relationship coach and all the guys were getting pissed. That was kind of funny. But one of them took me aside afterwards and she said, Jonathan, I wanna share something with you. I had a profound, profound experience here relating to men. And a huge shift in perspective. And she said, when I got here, I scanned the room of guys and there were two guys I was attracted to. Now she mentioned the Marlboro man. I can't remember his name, but she mentioned him. And she mentioned me. She said, you seem like the strongest, most masculine men here. And I was highly attracted to you guys when I got here. I go, well, thank you. I really appreciate you sharing that. And she goes, why I'm telling you this is because I looked at the other 18 guys and I wouldn't have given them the time of day from a dating perspective. But after going through this experience and recognizing the humanity of all of us in this room, particularly the brave men and women, the brave men, she said, these other 18 guys who leaned into their demons, who leaned into their sovereignty, that leaned into their personal development and self-help work. She said, I would date any one of these guys because I saw their heart. Wow, she saw their heart. She saw the strength within them because it came from the men's hearts. And if I had to share with you ladies what the greatest challenge is today is that we don't get to see people's hearts because it's all armored up with the illusion in the mask we wear. And all it takes is an invitation, a little bit of curiosity, because she said to me, she felt so bad for actually judging all these men based on looks and not based on their heart. So how do you bring strong, manly men into your life? You shift your perspective on men and recognize that we are all human beings, that we have flaws and we're trying to work through our stuff at the best we can. And some people don't work on their stuff. Most people do on some level. I'm here to invite a deeper level through personal development, self-help, and spiritual work. That's why I wrote my book, What the Heck is Self-Love Anyway, as that invitation. You see me talking about a variety of books. But I'm here to say, you know, being open and receptive to men and also shifting your perspective on men will help you see them as being strong, manly men. Yeah, just a shift in perspective. And look, ladies, I get the frustration. There are a lot of jerks, assholes and very self-absorbed, selfish men. The dating process is riddled with men who are very selfish and myopic, okay? I get it. And ladies, you guys are no different. You ladies are no different. If you can point the finger at men, you can point the finger at women. And as I always say, most men are good guys. They're just bad daters. So how do we get to see their heart? This is the hard part in dating because it requires compassion. And that's my invitation for you. So if you have a bad experience, just chalk it up to, hey, he's just having a bad day. Have some compassion for him. But if you want to see men as strong, manly men, then start to shift your perspective and start visualizing every man is strong and manly from a perspective on dating apps. I tell my clients, when you're on a dating app and you're swiping and you see a guy you're not attracted to, just send, and say, if you're gonna swipe left, send them love. Just say, thank you, I love you, thank you, I love you. Just shift your perspective by simply saying that, even though you may not be attracted to him because if you're judging the way he looks, you are never going to see strong, manly men because then you're waiting for the Marlboro man or me who's six foot two, full head of hair, decent shape for a man over 50. But I'm the rarity, I'm in the top 2% of height. But there are so many amazing men, all it takes is taking the blinders off to see and it starts with compassion. So my invitation for you is to lean into compassion. None of this leaning back stuff, you know how I hate leaning back. I'm here to suggest leaning into compassion for yourself and for men because when you do that, you'll begin to see men for who they are as beautiful human beings. It's not about strong or weak, it's about the beauty within each soul and that's my invitation for you. Wow, shared a lot. Speaking of men, that's my dad and my mom, there's my dad right there, speaking of men, my two best buddies, you know, because there are great men out there, big and small, you know, thin and fat, that's thin and large, excuse the fat. There are great men, just like there's great women. And my invitation is to shift your perspective to compassion and you'll start seeing strong, manly men. All right, you got the gist of where I'm going. Hey listen, if you found value in this, please check out the links below. Scheduled discovery call with me, check out my book, What the Heck Is Self Love Any, check out my podcast, What Would Love Do and check out my free gift. And again, if you want some help and can't afford it, check out my VIP group called Midlife Love Mastery. All right, I'm gonna wrap up this video as I always do first off, giving myself a big gigantic hug of self love, I'm gonna give you a hug of love, I'm gonna ask you to turn to someone and give them a hug because hugs are a great source of love and we can all use more love in our lives. Thanks so much and wishing you a super-duper wonderful day, bye-bye now.