Episode #639
Do you believe that your wife will never leave you?
It’s common for men to have a firm belief that their wives will never leave them and get lazy within the relationship, only to wake up one day to her walking out the door.
Even if you feel things are great within your relationship, it’s important to focus on the growth of your marriage and consistently showing up for her.
In this episode, we will learn the purpose of coaching in the relationship and what you can do to lead yourself out in the darkness so you can improve your marriage.
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TRANSCRIPTION
Doug Holt 00:01
Hey guys, welcome to The Powerful Man Show where we help married businessmen save their marriages without having to talk about it, get unstuck and gain clarity in their lives. As I like to say, life is too short for average. I’m your host, Doug Holt with my co-host, Tim, The Powerful Man, Matthews. Now let’s get this started.
Swallow my pride and get some help from an expert. So, I do this, and within 20 minutes, I’m going down the slope like it’s nothing. Why? Because the expert can see things that I’m doing that I can’t see. I can’t see that I’m turning, I can’t see that I’m leaning back rather than forward. I can see if I’m sitting on my heels, just my toes, I can feel these things. I’m thinking about them, but an expert can see that.
Hey, guys, welcome back to another episode of The Powerful Man Show. Great to have you guys here with us. Tim, great to have you back in the saddle as well, my friend. How are you doing today?
Tim Matthews 00:59
Well, I’m great. I’ve just gone ahead and gone to Alpha, well, thepowerfulman.com/rise and seen Arthur’s picture on there and found it incredibly hilarious. So, I’m doing very well.
Doug Holt 01:13
We do have some old pictures. That picture of me I’m not sure when that was taken, but it was a little while ago, guys, and we’ll get some new headshots up there.
Tim Matthews 01:21
I’m going to give a free coaching session to anyone that emails in and guesses Arthur’s nationality correctly from his picture. I can’t imagine anyone will get it wrong.
Doug Holt 01:32
All right. There you go. It’s Tim@thepowerfulman.com if you want to reach Tim directly with that contest, a free coaching session with Tim Matthews himself. There’s only tens of thousands of men that listen to this podcast that can pretty much look at Arthur’s last name and figure out his nationality, let alone by his picture. You’re going to be busy my friend.
Tim Matthews 01:53
You guys in the IC, if you want a good laugh, head over to the powerful man.com/rise. You can see off his picture. It’s amazing.
Doug Holt 02:03
Yeah. So, guys, we do have for this month, we are giving away the Alpha Rise and Shine cheat sheet, and that’s what Tim is actually commenting on. Tim asked hey, what are we doing? I was talking about the podcast and I said, hey, look, I love to give the guys the Alpha Rise and Shine. We have so many guys going through this program as we’re transitioning out of winter into spring. You know, guys just, you need to shake it up. It’s time to get — dust the cobwebs off, get back in shape, really spring clean your life, your marriage, your business and everything else. And that always, always starts with the foundation, which is the Alpha Rise and Shine.
So, you can get that, Tim left, let the cat out of the bag so to speak. You can go over to thepowerfulman.com/rise. That’s R-I-S-E and go ahead and download that. That is our gift to you. But that’s not what we’re talking about today. We’re not talking about the fact that we have so much going on with coaching that we forget to update our headshots. We’re normal people too. We can do that pretty quickly. But we’ve got a lot going on. And part of that is coaching. That’s what we do. It’s what you and I both love to do, Tim, is coach men. And right now we are talking about coaching men from the darkness, the darkness of a marriage that’s failing and not working to a healthy one. What is the role in your opinion, Tim, in coaching to help men get there?
Tim Matthews 03:26
Wow. It’s a great question. I think, yeah, Kudos to Darcy, for writing such a good question. I think for me, one of the first steps is for the guy to really take ownership of his part in where the marriage is. We give the men to try to connection, which forms, you’ve got love is a king system at the base of it, hidden motives on the left hand side and clean slate on the right hand side and all of those sides, if you will, work together, but they’re all held up by the love is a King system. This is where the guy gets to put certain things in place in his life, that means that he becomes consistent. And a big part of that is him recognizing the role that he played in having the marriage end up in the dark side.
And this could be his wife that’s having an emotional affair, it could be he who’s had an affair, it could be all sorts of different darkness and dysfunction that takes place. But a lot of lightness begins to creep in when the guy begins to get some clarity and some awareness and perspective too on why he is where he is. That’s when the darkness begins to lift because it’s like anything, right? I like to use the analogy of Google Maps or whatever satellite navigation you use. You type in the destination of where you want to go, and then what does it do? It calculates where you are. In order to get to where you’re going, you’ve got to know where you are.
And for most guys, they often don’t know that they’re in the darkness. They know the marriage isn’t working quite as well as they would like it to work. But they also have a lot of faulty assumptions, right? She will never leave me. When I fix this issue in my business, then I’ll turn my attention to my marriage. There’s all sorts of faulty assumptions that go on. She should do the work before I do. Why does it always have to start with me? There’s a lot of pride and ego that gets in the way. Yet, when they actually begin to do the work on themselves and take ownership for their side in the darkness, like I said, that’s when the lightness begins to creep in. And it’s amazing to see when that first ray of light makes its way into the man and then into the relationship.
Doug Holt 05:52
Yeah, it is great to see. And we think about transitions when we think about coaching, what comes up to me, Tim, is this idea — skiing. So, I was snowboarding previously, now I’m going to be skiing because my kids are getting older. My wife can’t snowboard because of fears, right, of her knees. So, she wants to ski. So, anyway, I go out in the slopes, and I try to do it myself. Not a pretty picture, right? I’m all over the place. I’m falling. You know, skis have changed since the last time I skied — [crosstalk]
Tim Matthews 06:22
Was it videoed?
Doug Holt 06:22
— which is decades ago. No. And sadly, it’s not because it would be hilarious. So, the next time I decide, all right. I’m actually going to take a lesson, right? I’m just going to take a lesson, swallow my pride and get some help from an expert. So, I do this, and within 20 minutes, I’m going down the slope like it’s nothing.
Why? Because the expert can see things that I’m doing that I can’t see. I can’t see that I’m turning, I can’t see that I’m leaning back rather than forward. I can see if I’m sitting on my heels, just my toes, I can feel these things. I’m thinking about them, but an expert can see that. They can also see me — ski in front of me, watch me come down the hill or wait, ski behind me, watch when I’m turning from behind or ski next to me. They have a vantage point that I just simply can’t have. Also, the ski instructor knows mountains more than I do, no pun intended. They know so much more about skiing than I’ll ever know. Let alone they’re giving me the basics, the basics on which to build upon.
Now fast forward, I’ve taken several ski lessons. I’m out in the blues with my wife, her friends who’ve been skiing most of their whole lives. I’m out there, and it’s challenging. So, the big blues are still challenging for me. I’m new to this. But I can do it. I can hang out, I can have conversations. A hot toddy at the lodge, with the whole group rather than me being on the bunny slope. Months later, still trying to figure it out on my own, struggling, frustrated, meeting them in the lodge, eventually with snow all over me just pissed off and angry, and not having a good time. We’ve all been there, whether it be golfing, skiing, anything that we’ve done.
For a lot of us, it’s been in our marriage, it was for me. My marriage, there’s not a lot of places you can go and learn the skills as a man, a real man in a modern day world to actually have the skill sets on how to regain the strength and leadership in your marriage. There just isn’t. And so that’s where the activation method comes in. And with the activation method, which is our proven eight-week course that we take men through is led by a coach, a coach that guides men through this process. And it’s a proven process.
I think that’s really important. If I hired a ski instructor who’s never helped anybody get down the mountain, that’s an issue. But our coaches have helped hundreds and hundreds of men get down their mountain safely, efficiently. Some of the guys are freaking doing backflips off the moguls. Like, I mean, they have the skill sets to help anybody, even amputees. Like in other words, marriages that are so far gone on the brink of divorce guys are bringing it back. Point is coaching allows you to have that visibility to move and move quickly.
Sure, if you haven’t skied like me, maybe by the end of the season, you could pick it up and you’d be on the greens pretty good. Blues, probably not. Maybe you could, maybe. But you’ve lost the whole ski season, you’ve lost the money invested in the ski rentals, everything else, the time that you’ve missed with friends and family laughing in the lodge, the time that you’ve missed enjoying the experience; those are opportunity costs you cannot get back. And Tim, that’s where I think coaching really fits into this transitionary period.
Tim Matthews 09:45
Yes. Remember before I invested in my first coach a long, long time ago, I was into personal development. And I was kind of like the — What does Tony Robbins call it? Turning your car into a university, into a college everywhere.
Doug Holt 10:04
Automobile University, Jim Rohn, actually.
Tim Matthews 10:06
Yeah.
Doug Holt 10:07
Yeah, he might’ve taken it from Jim — [crosstalk]
Tim Matthews 10:08
Yeah, Jim Rohn. But that’s what it was like for me back then, right, listening to audiobooks everywhere I went using the CD rather, the audio CD. Loved it, didn’t know anybody else in personal development back then. I did my best to apply the lessons, did my best to apply it to my life. However, I lacked perspective. I lacked insight from somebody that was a step or two ahead of me that could hold a mirror up, really, and help me to see my own blind spots, because I couldn’t see them. I thought I knew what the holes in my game were.
But from somebody that’s walked the path, that understands the challenges that you’re going to face, they’re going to see my — the holes in my game very differently to me. You know, it’s difference between an amateur and an expert. They’re going to have two very different perspectives on the same situation. And one is also going to be able to get to the result a lot faster, a lot less effort than the other. And I think you’re right, coaching for me, at least, it’s been that perspective that you get offered by somebody. It could even just come in the form of a question they ask you. It could open up so much for you when you asked the right question. And it’s very rare that in my experience, I’ve never asked myself a question as powerful as I’ve been asked by somebody else.
Questions can open up so much, but like you said, it all comes from coaching. And it’s interesting, because so often we, there’s a culture of encouraging your kids to go to college, right? Why is that? Well, it’s so they can learn from experts, so they can get a proven way of doing things so that they can actually then learn something they can take with them for a lifetime. So, if it’s good enough for your kids, for you to set money aside to invest in their own growth and development, why would it then not be good enough for you, for you to invest in your own growth and development in your marriage?
Doug Holt 12:23
That’s funny you mentioned it. Last night, my wife was — she’s taking a coaching class, a class that’s kind of advanced communication skills. And she’s in a room going through it. My daughter who’s three goes, “Well, where’s Mommy?” I said, “Well, mommy’s in school right now.” “Mommy goes to school?” Like, “Sweetie, we all grow and learn.” That’s how you keep growing. Your whole life is about growth.
Growth and enlightenment and development, really. And my daughter just lit up. And she thought that was the coolest thing that mommy was in school. Because my wife is patterning for my daughter, a way of being. School is good, school is okay. My daughter goes to school, she went to school today. Today she went happily. Usually it’s a little bit of a struggle. But the fact that she saw that mom goes to school, dad goes to school, we’re continually developing ourselves through coaches, that makes it more acceptable. So, to your point.
And when you’re going through, I know for me, Tim, when I was in the darkness of my marriage, what happened for me is I was just pissed. I was pissed, I had a lot of resentment against my wife, and vice versa, right, my wife did with me. And during that time, it’s hard to see a transition out of that frame, without somebody else helping you get out of it. Because you’re angry, you’re upset, you’re hurt, you’re sad, you’re confused. You have all these emotions that we don’t explore as men and you don’t know which way is up. Okay, what do I do? Give me the playbook. And nobody has a playbook.
So, a coach can look at your individual situation, and give you perspective on what’s going on, what might be happening behind the scenes, things you can’t see, and also helps you transition from this dark period, this winter, if you will, and helps you see the sun rising. And when you see that transition, that sunrise, that’s when things really shift for men. It’s also why a lot of guys who joined the program will say within two weeks things have dramatically turned around in their marriage. That’s not hyperbole, you can go in and look at our channel and our community, look at the testimonials. If you go over to powerfulman.com/ I think it’s testimonials. But you go to the website, essentially, you can see results. And there’s literally hundreds upon hundreds of men who are sharing their results they’ve got through the program.
We cover up their faces or their names most often unless they’ve given us approval. But you can see they’re real guys because they’re posts, that they’re sharing this with, they’re communications. And you’ll see that these guys, just like you listening to this, they had dark seasons. And it’s the coach that typically allows them to see what needs to be done. The coach doesn’t do the work for you. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not like you sign up for a program and instantly everything’s fixed. That’s not the way it works. But it’s not like doing your Alpha Rise and Shine, right? Doing those kinds of things that are taught through the activation method and having your coach tweak those for you, individually, that’s what gets you exponential results.
If you don’t get a coach, it’s akin to me going on YouTube and looking up how to ski, which is what I did. Okay. It’s what I did originally before I hired someone to help me out. It’s good. It’s better than not doing it. It teaches you how to put your skis on a little bit as you’re getting them on. It does not help you with your turns, it does not help you with getting down the mountain. Otherwise, it’s going to be a garage sale. You’re going to clean out and you’re going to be stumbling down that mountain. You’re going to be the guy that people are sitting in the lodge watching you tumble and fail as you go down the mountain. And the only thing attacked will be the pride that you didn’t reach out for help. You didn’t hire an instructor.
I had that story. It’s embarrassing to admit, but I was like, ugh, the guy in his 40s with a ski instructor on the blue or the greens and all these things. And as soon as that was done, like I said, now I’m on the blues, because I tossed that story. I reached out for help, got a coach, a ski instructor. And again, I’m on the blues hanging out with my wife, her friends, our mutual friends and having a great time.
Tim Matthews 16:30
Yeah, I’m just looking at the results page here. So, it’s thepowerfulman.com/results. And yeah, it’s crazy, it’s wild. Just getting back from Cuba as well having spent a week or so with the men recounting the stories that they’ve shared of how past, well, the coaching, right, be it over the past few weeks, the past few years, we’ve got guys that have been with us for varying degrees of time. But the impact the coaching has had on their lives and how it’s changed their lives and by no means is this glorifying what we do, because it’s not. These guys have had to put in the work. They faced challenges. It’s been tough at times, but they’ve continued to do the work. They’ve been consistent.
And it’s through having the coaching to be able to provide the insight and perspective and the ability to be given tools as well and encouragement. You know, a coach plays various roles in somebody’s life. They’ve been able to achieve the results I’ve achieved, guys who prior to the Alpha Reset, were convinced they were going to get divorced because they were the ones that wanted to get divorced. Or the guys in the movement saying, “Hey, don’t do it. Just wait until you’ve been to the reset and then make your mind up.” Comes out of the reset and he’s now a few weeks later, says Hercules, a few weeks later, having gone to Cuba is now going to be reviewing his vows with his wife. I mean — [crosstalk]
Doug Holt 18:06
Yeah, what a great guy.
Tim Matthews 18:07
— the role of coaching, right? And imagine if he wouldn’t have had coaching, where would that leave his family today? Where would that leave his kids today? Where would that then leave his wife today? It’s huge.
Doug Holt 18:25
Yeah, and I know some of the naysayers out there, Tim are saying, “Oh, yeah. Well, you guys are saying that because you offer coaching services.” And that’s partially true. The whole truth of that is we often say if you go back to the podcast, don’t go through The Powerful Man if you don’t want to, but do something, do something. Now we are biased, we do think the activation method is the single best program for married businessmen to go through to save their marriage, to turn things around. It’s the best because we tweak it every single session and make it better every time. And we make it better based on feedback from the men, feedback from the coaches. I think we have almost a five out of five star review from all the program’s men that go through.
Every once in a while guys, like, “Hey, I didn’t get an email,” so he gives a 4.9 or whatever. It’s pretty frigging close. And it’s because we work diligently on it. We don’t work diligently on our headshots on the website, but we work diligently on the program and the coaching. And so again, hey, if this isn’t for you, if what we’re talking about is not resonating with you, that’s great. No worries. But do something. Do something that’s going to move you further down the path, whether it be in your business, your marriage, your relationship, whatever it is, do something to go through. Tim, any final comments for the men as we go through this and the role of coaching and helping guys get out of the darkness and into the light?
Tim Matthews 19:49
It’s going to be uncomfortable, right? You always like to say choose your heart. Choose your heart. It’s going to be uncomfortable working with a coach because they’re going to challenge you to face things that you’ve probably been avoiding, but you know you need to face. It’s going to be tough. At the same time, continuing to struggle in the darkness on your own without a roadmap to find your way out without an inclination of when the light is going to shine, that’s also hard. And your family, the people who work for you, no doubt people in your community, they are looking to you to lead; to be the beacon of light, to be the beacon of hope.
So, you have a duty, in my opinion, you have a duty to lead yourself out of the darkness. And clearly what you have been doing hasn’t been working. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have ended up in the darkness in the first place. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing and expecting a different result. So, do something, whether it’s with us or not, I’m not bothered, quite frankly. I’d love to work with you and if you choose us, great. If not, just choose somebody. Just do something. Just don’t continue to drift in the darkness.
Doug Holt 21:09
Yeah, guys. As I was telling one guy I was talking to I said, “Look, you join the activation method, doesn’t change what I eat for dinner.” I don’t go from Top Ramen to eating steaks. Does not change my life in one bit or other, but it will change yours. It will change yours. So, gentlemen, as we always say, in the moment of insight, take massive action. We’ll see you next time on The Powerful Man Show.
