Are You Hiding Out?

Episode #722

Have you ever wondered why some men seem to hide out in their lives, avoiding facing their true selves and responsibilities?

What happens when a man’s desire for avoidance overtakes his ability to be authentic and present in his relationships and endeavors?

Men often hide out in various aspects of their lives, from immersing themselves in work to seeking solace in their man caves, all in an attempt to avoid confronting the uncomfortable truths they face. They may use excuses like a lack of clarity or feeling stuck to justify their actions. However, this evasion often leads to a sense of being trapped and unfulfilled, both for the men themselves and their loved ones who see their untapped potential.

The key to breaking free from this pattern lies in getting real with oneself and seeking help when needed. Recognizing that you’re hiding out is the first step toward positive change. Whether it’s through professional guidance or personal reflection, addressing this behavior can lead to a more authentic and fulfilling life, benefiting not only the individual but also their relationships and overall well-being.

In this episode, you’ll learn the impact of “hiding out” on your relationships and personal growth, and how to recognize and address this behavior.

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TRANSCRIPTION

Doug Holt  00:22

Hey, guys. Welcome back to another episode of the Powerful Man Show. Today we’re going to talk about hiding out. This is a situation a lot of men find themselves in. Now, most men aren’t going to think that they’re hiding out, right? It’s something that just occurs. So what I’m going to encourage you to do is listen to the beginning part of this so you can self-identify and as Tim and I are chatting about this, see ways in which you may be hiding out in your life and ways to get around it. So, Tim, when you think about the word hiding out or this idea that men hide out, what comes to mind for you?

Tim Matthews  00:54

Living a lie is one thing that comes to mind.

Doug Holt  00:58

Tell me more.

Tim Matthews  01:00

I think a lot of guys know it when they’re hiding out. They’re not stupid. Think about the guys that just been here at the reset. One of the guys knew he was going into the garage every night, having a beer R2 or R3, watching football, knowing that he wasn’t getting anything done. Now, he wasn’t willing to face that reality for a while until the pain got so great, whatever that situation may be. Right? But he knew all along he was hiding out. Right?

And you see it in different places where the guys choose to hide out in the business instead of going home, work longer, because that’s where they get more their significance and connection and all that stuff from. So, yeah, living a lie. I think the guys living a lie, but I also think a lot of times they know it. They just don’t have anyone around them that’s willing to call them out on it and be honest with them and tell them the truth.

Now, the wife might, but they don’t always receive it from the wife because it can be received as criticism, right? Or clouded in, whatever it may be clouded in. But for everybody else in their life, usually these guys are the top of the tree and nobody else is willing to tell them the truth. But whenever we tell them the truth, I think about be it a call with the advisors or calls we’ve had with one on one clients, and we share with them the truth, and that first they know. As soon as you say it, they know you’re right. They know it. And I think a lot of guys are dying to be called out on it, and when they called out on it, they’ll shift it. But yeah, that’s the thing that comes to mind for me, living a lie.

Doug Holt  02:37

Yeah. The guy you mentioned, what he was saying specifically about watching football, he was saying, we have a thing here in the States called Monday Night Football. And Monday Night Football is a big deal. Happens after work. A lot of guys will go to the bar, but you know, married guys don’t go to the bar, so a lot of them will go into their man cave, which for this guy was the garage.

And so what he was saying is he knew he was doing it, but also didn’t. Right? You make up all these excuses of why you’re doing it’s Monday Night Football, but it gave him the opportunity of being alone and not having to face things, not having to face the hard truths that were happening in his life.

Tim Matthews  03:15

Yeah. The thing for him as well, that Monday night turned to Tuesday night to Wednesday night. It literally became every night, right, over a short period of time. I think you’re right. That idea of not facing things 100%, because that’s what he said as well. Right? I think he hit the nail on the head.

Doug Holt  03:31

Why do you think men hide out?

Tim Matthews  03:33

They’re afraid.

Doug Holt  03:35

Afraid of what?

Tim Matthews  03:36

The truth.

Doug Holt  03:37

The truth of what?

Tim Matthews  03:38

That they’re not as good as everyone thinks they are.

Doug Holt  03:42

Okay. So when you say men are hiding out in their business, give me a scenario.

Tim Matthews  03:50

Scenario would be either working later than they need to work. They’re avoiding going home. It could be they are taking control over things they don’t need to take control over, just so they remain busy. Right? And just using their business as a way for them to avoid facing what they know they need to face, whatever that may be.

Doug Holt  04:17

And so if they’re hiding out in this scenario of the business, what does it look like from the family’s perspective?

Tim Matthews  04:25

Abandonment. Like the family don’t matter. They’re just an afterthought. Oftentimes for the wife, she feels as though she’s left to raise a family, and she has to give up her hopes and dreams and her identity, and she just becomes a mother, and she feels guilty for thinking that way. Right? Yeah. The family then ended up getting the rest of the guy instead of the best of the guy.

Doug Holt  04:58

Interesting. Yeah. When I see it, for a lot of these guys, they feel stuck. They feel stuck and unclear. That’s how you can kind of know you’re hiding out. Men, we use this excuse of not having clarity or excuse of being stuck in some area as a way to hide out. And that’s an indicator. Right? So you have the symptom. The symptom is feeling stuck. It’s how you know you’re not being authentic and you’re hiding out somewhere. So you put on a front of pretending to be somebody else, pretending that everything’s great on the outside.

We’re this power couple. I have this amazing family. I’m checking all the boxes, and I’m doing all this, but in reality, you know, as a man that something’s missing, you know, that things aren’t okay. And the problem, in my opinion, and I want to hear your take on this, is most men think that if they just wait it out, it’ll get better.

Tim Matthews  04:55

Yeah, for sure. Or they can outwork it. If I work harder and I make more money, then it’ll go away.

Doug Holt  06:07

If I buy her the lake house, if I take the family on that trip and vacation, then everybody will be happy.

Tim Matthews  06:13

Yes.

Doug Holt  06:14

And then what happens then?

Tim Matthews  06:15

Gets worse because they have more of the things that they thought were going to be the answer, realizing that they’re not. And then that void in that hole gets bigger. Right? And also they become trapped because then they have a burn rate that’s so high because they’ve brought all these things into their life, and it could be possessions, it could be people, because they try and save everybody else because they’re not saving themselves. It’s easier to save everybody else, to try and feel as though and I am making progress, and they often can fall into a habit of judging people, and it’s kind of like the armchair quarterback. Right? And then they end up with this burn rate, like I was saying a moment ago, that’s so high that they almost have to work harder because they’ve created this trap for themselves.

Doug Holt  07:07

Yeah. It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy. Right? I think a lot of these guys do it subconsciously on purpose. Right? Because then, now I have to go to work, aka hideout. I have to work longer. Therefore, I don’t have to be near my wife, my marriage that’s not working out, or my kids who don’t want to be around me. There may have been an infidelity on either side. There may be something else that’s going on that’s contradicting their values, things of that nature.

So we have a lot of men, a large proportion of the men that join our program are Christian men, and a lot of times they’ll use the excuse of, well, I don’t know, is this going to conflict with my values as an excuse to continue to hide out? It doesn’t. We have all these men that go through the program go, oh, no, it actually accentuates my values. Not that, but they’ll use that as an excuse to continue to hide out and not get help, not get into a methodology that actually allows them to hit the reset button. Right?

And that’s a lot of times you find yourself hiding out. You have to take a massive change. You have to hit the reset button and take a massive step in a different direction and almost go to extremes, right? Almost go to extremes to reset it and do something different.

Tim Matthews  08:20

Got to rip the bandit off. It’s got to be ripped off fast.

Doug Holt  08:23

Yes.

Tim Matthews  08:24

Because it’s in that process of ripping it up fast that they actually make a change if it’s too slow, ain’t going to come off.

Doug Holt  08:30

No.

Tim Matthews  08:31

It’s got to be ripped off fast.

Doug Holt  08:33

Agreed. Ripped off fast and ripped off in such a way that you can’t go back.

Tim Matthews  08:39

Yeah, big time.

Doug Holt  08:40

You can’t go back at all. So what advice would you give to a guy listening to this right now that finds himself like, crap, I’m not in my garage per se, but I’m either at work or I’m in my man cave or whatever else it is. They’re hiding out in social media or some kind of project. Another guys do this a lot. They’ll pick projects and they’ll get them to 70% completion. They won’t finish them, and then they’re hiding out by starting another project.

Tim Matthews  09:07

I think the first thing is to get real. If this is resonating with you, you know that you’re hiding out and the people around you know it as well. And what frustrates your wife the most is she sees the man that you’re capable of being. She sees it, and it frustrates her that she’s married this guy. Kind of like the bait and switch, right? She’s married this guy and was promised a certain life, and you’re not delivering it, quite frankly, and it’s frustrating. She feels trapped.

So just get real. Get real with yourself. This is resonating with you. Get real with the fact that you are hiding out. We’ve all been there no shame in it. There’s only shame in you choosing not to change it once you become aware of the fact that you are doing it. And also at the same time, look, we all need help. We can’t see our own blind spots. The guys that we work with, they’re intelligent men. Therefore they also tell intelligent stories to themselves, which are very believable. But they can’t see their own blind spots, and they have no one else around them in their circle or their world willing to be straight with them, willing to hold a mirror up to them and tell them the truth. Because instead everyone’s more concerned about putting them on the pedestal because they control the paycheck or whatever it may be.

And that can be family members as well sometimes, because a lot of the guys have put the family on the payroll as a way to save them and to that hero complex of feeling good, right? Because they know internally they’re not facing the things they need to face in themselves.

So at the end of the day, get rid of yourself. But also if you haven’t fixed it by this point and you got to rip that Band Aid off fast, you’ve got to get some help. You just do get some support from somebody who has been through the process, who understands the process and can help you to rip that Band Aid off faster.

Honestly, I’m not bothered whether it’s us or not. I mean, I’d love it to be us because I love the work that we do. I mean, that Alpha Reset was just magical. Every one of them is magical. It’s why almost half of the team at TPM used to be men that were in the movement, having their own businesses and the movements create such an impact on their life, they’ve given up their businesses to come and join us and impact men in the way that we do. It’s incredibly special.

And yeah, of course, if the listeners are resonating and I’d love to be us, that helps guide them on that path. We often say we’re not here to be liked. I’m not bothered about the guys liking me. I’d much more support the guys to get the result that they need and they dislike me, but they’ve got the result than them like me and me not have been honest and real with them. So they’re intelligent men can’t see your own blind spot. Get some support. It’s not with us. Just get it with somebody, because if you keep doing what you’re doing, you’re going to keep on getting what you’ve got.

Doug Holt  12:17

There you go, gentlemen. In the moment of insight, take massive action. We’ll see you next time on The Powerful Man Show.

All right, guys, that’s a wrap for this episode. But as I always say in the moment of insight, take massive action. You see, there are two types of men that listen to a podcast like this, those that go on from one podcast or show to another just hoping things are going to change and realizing that they’re going to be in the same place month after month, year after year.

You see, I was this guy so I completely get it. You may just not be ready. But there’s also a second man, a second man that listens to a show just like this. And this is a guy who takes massive action so they can shorten the learning curve, compress time, and get RESULTS to be the WOLF. See, WOLF is an acronym for Wise, Open, Loving, and Fierce.

Now ask yourself, which one am I? And just be honest with yourself there. And there’s no judgment on my end. But if you’re ready to move from deactivated DEER mode, which is Defend, Excuse, Explain, and React to activated WOLF, Wise, Open, Loving and Fierce, then go over to thepowerfulman.com/grow. And go there now. In fact, I’ll make it super easy for you. I will even put the link right in the description here so you can just click it and go over there now to learn more. Guys, in the moment of insight, take massive action. Go from deactivated to activated, because like I said, life is too short for average and I’ll see you on the next episode!