The Mythic Masculine

My guest today is Jasper Sircus - a longtime friend, musician, and father of two, whose background spans community building, cultural anthropology, and mental health work with youth. He is currently completing a master’s in Counselling Psychology. I’ve known Jasper for years, from our shared time in the Vancouver culture scene, to living on land together in the Cowichan Valley.His path began in suburban Los Angeles, where his father was a senior architect for Disneyland. Jasper was raised partly inside ‘the happiest place on Earth’ which taught him that imagined worlds can be made real, and later, became disillusioned when he realized the magic was owned by a corporation.A secular materialist through his early twenties until a psychedelic experience in a forest cracked his worldview open, he was called to the path of yoga, Vedic philosophy, and a passion for cross-cultural cosmology. Then, at twenty-three, came the news that he was to become a father. It shattered him - because he realized he was still a boy, not a man. And that he had no village.That realization launched a ten-year search across Costa Rica, Hawaii, Bali, and Mexico - touring eco-villages for the promise of paradise., but discovered that the real-life reality told a different story. He and his family eventually committed to a community project on Vancouver Island, which they co-stewarded for 5 years, until they decided it was time for a new chapter and hit the road for adventure.In our conversation today, we spend much of the time exploring the rite of passage Jasper crafted for his son at the age of seven and what such rituals actually do: how they forge identity, bind a community together, and give the village a reason to appear.Would love to hear your comments on this conversation. Post your thoughts below.LINKS* Revillager - GuidebookHeads up, if you are a man seeking to explore the mythopoetic path, you are invited to check out The Archetypal Compass. This mini-guide is designed to help you navigate the internal archetypes of the soul, providing a map for those ready to move beyond personal inquiry and toward a more conscious stewardship of their lives and the world.RELATED EPISODESSHOW NOTES5:30 — Raised at Disneyland: Son of a senior Disney architect; the park taught him magic is buildable - and what it costs when a corporation owns it.8:00 — The Raggers Program: A hidden rite of passage at YMCA camp: a chosen mentor, a self-built challenge, a mountain ritual - the seed of everything to come.10:30 — The Egg Crack Moment: A first mushroom journey in a forest cracks his materialist worldview open, leading to yoga and Vedic philosophy.13:00 — The Light Switch: An unexpected pregnancy at 23 launches ten years of searching for village.14:00 — The Search: Costa Rica, a free-birth in the jungle, and eco-villages where the branding outshines the structure - including an elder’s warning: it is harder than you think.18:00 — The Tamera Lens: Ian on ten years researching Tamera: communities ride an edge, thriving one year and falling apart the next.20:30 — Paradise and the Million Dollars: A buy-in on Vancouver Island within six months; five years building a community of thirty on fifteen acres - then leaving it behind.29:30 — Why Seven? Empathy circuits coming online; Bali’s built-in rites at six months, three years, and seven years.32:30 — Crafting the Ritual: The hero’s journey as template; ritual power comes from intention, not cultural origin - make your own rather than borrow another’s.37:30 — The Departure: Call, refusal, and the mentor in a mask; at the wooden gate, a guardian asks: are you ready? A yes that cannot be refused is not a yes.43:30 — The Innermost Cave: Jasper as the angry deaf-blind giant, pressing his seven-year-old son: are you willing?45:30 — The Toolbox: Uncles circling with words of wisdom; every tool given with its meaning; the pillars of character, carried forward from the Raggers Program.53:30 — It Is Not About You: Jasper, long against marriage, is stopped cold: the couple face outward, toward the circle the marriage is actually for.61:30 — The Cost of Not Doing This: Psychological adolescents masquerading as adults; rites regenerated across a whole life - just do something. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit themythicmasculine.substack.com/subscribe

Just in time for the weekend, a conversation from the vault (actually recorded 2 years ago, but freshly published now).My guest today is Jayson Gaddis, founder of The Relationship School, which he co-teaches with his wife. He is the author of “Getting to Zero: How to Work Through Conflict in Your High-Stakes Relationships” and has trained over two hundred coaches across eleven countries.I’d been aware of Jayson for a few years, though what drew to me reach out was discovering a paper he wrote back in 2005 called The Deep Masculine, while researching my own program by the same name, and realized we had been walking parallel trails for a long time.His path took him through the college fraternity system, where hazing and sexual conquest offered a distorted version of the belonging every young man actually needs. He took on an advocacy role that led him through seventy-five college campuses in thirty-five states, until disillusionment called him into the wilderness. He took young men on seven-day backpacking trips to see what might happen if initiation was replaced by solitude and sweat instead of alcohol and shame.The trail finally bent toward relationship, after a breakup in a Whole Foods parking lot at age twenty-nine made him ask a terrifying question: maybe I’m the problem.In our conversation today, we explore his perspective on ‘the deep masculine’ and what it actually takes for a man to stop defending, start feeling, and learn the single most important relationship skill there is: repair.Jayson reminds us that most men don’t come to this work through inspiration. They come through pain. And the path back to connection runs through the body, the present moment, and the art of intimacy.LINKS: * Jayson Gaddis’ Relationship School* Getting to Zero - book Would love to hear your comments on this conversation. Post your thoughts below. Heads up, if you are a man seeking to explore the mythopoetic path, you are invited to join The Deep Masculine - my 3 month online quest to repattern your relationship to sex, soul and purpose. Developed with my colleague Deus Fortier, it draws from embodied somatics and the mythopoetic lineage. Robert Bly’s Iron John. The archetypal map of King, Warrior, Magician and a special emphasis on the Lover.We work with four pillars. Mythopoetic maps. Somatic skills. Ritual rhythm. And brotherhood. Ongoing connection with men around the world who are walking the same terrain.If you’re not quite ready for the deep dive, check out The Archetypal Compass. This mini-guide is designed to help you navigate the internal archetypes of the soul, providing a map for those ready to move beyond personal inquiry and toward a more conscious stewardship of their lives and the world.SHOW NOTES0:07 — Fraternity Culture: Ian asks Jayson to unpack what the system promised, delivered, and took from the young men inside it.0:09 — Broken Initiation: Jayson on hazing as a distorted rite of passage, where alcohol and peer pressure replace traditional thresholds into adulthood.0:12 — Sex and the Mask: The conquest culture inside fraternities, where bravado hides the private shame of sensitive, lost young men.0:16 — Wilderness Initiation: Jayson proposes seven-day backpacking trips for fraternity men, and the breakthroughs that came from solitude and physical exertion.0:18 — The Parking Lot Epiphany: At age twenty-nine, breaking up with a woman at Whole Foods, Jayson faces the possibility that he is the problem.0:27 — The Deathbed Offering: Ian shares the night his grandfather was dying, when he told his own father he was glad to be his son, and what melted in the aftermath.0:29 — Father Repair: Jayson describes doing similar work with his dad, accepting that the man did the best with the values he had.0:32 — Learning to Feel: Jayson recalls six months of therapy where the only words he could find were I don’t know, then numb, then anger, and eventually something more nuanced.0:36 — The Defensive Man: On the wound of not getting it right, the shame underneath, and how to approach it as a team rather than a battlefield.0:38 — It’s Not About That: Ian tells the story of watching another couple at a festival fall into the blame-defend loop, and whispering to a friend that the argument was not really about the surface conflict.0:39 — The Repair Template: Jayson offers a simple practice of owning what you did and imagining its impact on your partner, and why repair is the most important relationship skill.0:46 — Present, Body, Heart: Jayson revisits his three invitations from the 2005 paper and translates them into practical entry points for men who are scared to feel. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit themythicmasculine.substack.com/subscribe

Can you feel it? Already the summer heat is ebbing. Walking the trail near my house, I see the first leaves curling at the edges, turning toward brown and gold. I am not ready for the season to change, and yet I know it must.With the shift toward autumn comes the next invitation for the Deep Masculine, my three-month online quest.This invitation is for the men who have been listening. Absorbing. Contemplating. I know you are there...Perhaps you’ve listened to a few episodes or many. You have felt the spark when the conversation lands. You have recognized a calling towards this mythic terrain and a longing for who you might become.Then you close the laptop or finish the episode, and go back to the life that is not quite “wrong” enough to force you out of it.I know the feeling. I have been that man. I harvested wisdom to feel like I was changing…without risking anything.But the core patterns of stuckness remained.I think deep down, most men want the same thing: richer relationships, meaningful work, and a deeper sense of being alive.But here’s the truth: real change takes work. It takes commitment. And it takes the willingness to give up the part of you that keeps you stuck.It’s understandable to feel that it hasn’t been the right time yet.You’ve needed more money. More clarity. More space.That you will begin the work when the kids are older or the job is less stressful. This is the same lie that has kept good men in comfortable paralysis for their entire lives.You already know enough. Another conversation or instagram reel or well-written book will not free you.The question is whether you will let your ache turn into action.So here is the invitation:The Deep Masculine is my 3 month online quest to repattern your relationship to sex, soul and purpose. Developed with my colleague Deus Fortier, it draws from embodied somatics and the mythopoetic lineage. Robert Bly’s Iron John. The archetypal map of King, Warrior, Magician and a special emphasis on the Lover.We work with four pillars. Mythopoetic maps. Somatic skills. Ritual rhythm. And brotherhood. Ongoing connection with men around the world who are walking the same terrain.We track the Wild Man, with the hard distinction that Bly himself made. Wild is not savage. The wild man is deeply attuned to the natural order, moving with his own sense of rightness. This in stark contrast to the ‘savage man’ - one who is disconnected from that order. He is dangerous. The world has seen enough savagery dressed up as masculinity. We are after something far older and more disciplined than that.We also center the Lover, because most men’s work chases the King and the Warrior while neglecting the one archetype that keeps all the others humane. In the words of Robert Moore and Douglas Gillette, the Lover keeps the other masculine energies loving and related. Without him, men default to numbness or anger. We are doing the work of resensitizing, of coming back into right relationship with the living world.And we go into the shadow, the parts of you that were punished into exile did not die. They just found distorted ways to express themselves. Integration is how you reclaim that vitality and wield it consciously rather than letting it leak out in addiction, manipulation, or self-sabotage.This is the end of our third year running the Deep Masculine, gathering men from all over the world, including Australia, the UK, and across North America.Ultimately, what we’ve found is the deepest wound is disconnection. The medicine is walking the path with other men.And so, the next Fellowship is gathering.We begin the week of September 21st.Book your intake call on the calendar before September 1st, and get a 30% early-bird discount on the investment. (The call itself can happen after the 1st. What matters is that you reserved your spot before the deadline). This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit themythicmasculine.substack.com/subscribe

Fresh off the first Cascadia Men’s Conference, I’m pleased to share my first long-form podcast episode in some months. Right now, Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey is storming around the world, a $1.3 billion phenomenon that has returned one of humanity’s oldest stories to the center of our cultural conversation.My guest today is a man who has been steeping in this epic for years. Phil Cousineau is the author of newly published ‘The Wisdom of the Odyssey: Twenty-four Life Lessons from Homer’s Epic’ and more than forty other books, including the bestselling The Art of Pilgrimage and The Hero’s Journey: Joseph Campbell on His Life and Work. He is a writer, teacher, and storyteller who has consulted on myth and story for Warner Brothers, Pixar, and Lucasfilm, led mythology travel programs to Greece for more than three decades, and hosted the PBS television series Global Spirit.In our conversation, Phil invites us to look at why The Odyssey has risen once again. He suggests the epic poem is Western culture’s first articulated case of PTSD and the consequence of war and conquest. We speak of the women who guide Odysseus back to himself, the terror of crossing your own threshold after twenty years away, and what it means when love rather than fame becomes the gravity that pulls a man home.Phil reminds us that the Odyssey is everybody’s story, and the courage required to bend down and kiss the earth in gratitude for the chance to begin again.Here in full is the Rumi poem I reference (translated by Haleh Liza Gafori)LOVE, YOUR waters, your melodieswhirl me and whirl me.I'm the wheel in a mill.Whirl me forever.When my heart is troubled,when my heart has fled,keep me close.No branch, no leaf, no piece of straw drawn to amberwill move without a breeze.Unless desire stirs it, nothing in this world will dance.Every element, every particle of every elementis a whirling lover, drunk on union.The generous host lays out a feast.Animals graze the sweet grass.Didn't the ants tell secrets to Solomon?Didn't the mountains singwhen David sang his songs of praise?The sky is your lover.Lay your head on its peaceful chest.The sun is your lover. Drink its light.Love moves through every mountain and field.How else would green grow from earth's dark body?LINKS * Phil Cousineau - Official Website* The Wisdom of the Odyessy - BookHeads up, if you are a man seeking to explore the mythopoetic path, you are invited to check out The Archetypal Compass. This mini-guide is designed to help you navigate the internal archetypes of the soul, providing a map for those ready to move beyond personal inquiry and toward a more conscious stewardship of their lives and the world.Also, the next cohort of The Deep Masculine, my 3 month online journey for men begins Sept 20th. Join a mythic brotherhood aimed at re-patterning your relationship to sex, soul and purpose.SHOW NOTES00:04 — Quebec and Detroit Roots: Phil traces his ancestry to Jean Baptiste Cousineau, one of the nine founding families of Montreal, and his mythic upbringing in Detroit.00:06 — A Family of Readers: Growing up reading Homer, Grimm, and Canadian folk tales aloud together, and the inherited practice of read, pilgrimage, and the Long Conversation.00:10 — The Odyssey Sketched: A whirlwind through the enchantment at Olympus, the judgment of Paris, Helen, and the 1,156 ships sailing for Troy.00:16 — The First Documented PTSD: Why Odysseus is arguably history's first case of post-traumatic stress, and why a soldier cannot go straight home from war.00:22 — The Bard Scene: On the island of Phaeacia, when Odysseus hears his story sung, takes it back, and the healing begins.00:25 — Why Myths Rise Again: James Baldwin on reading as the antidote to unprecedented pain, and why myths that never happened are always happening.00:33 — The Masculine Arc: From the hunger for kleos (glory) to being pulled home by eros (love), and the grief of men who have achieved everything yet feel lost.00:39 — Polytropos: What it means that Odysseus is "many-turning" — the colossal, radical act of a man capable of changing his mind.00:42 — The Six Women: How Athena, Calypso, Circe, Nausicaa, Eurycleia, and Penelope guide Odysseus home, making the epic the world's first romance.00:46 — Achilles in the Underworld: The axis mundi where glory confronts the choice for one more day of sunshine over eternal fame.00:52 — Gratitude and Kissing the Earth: On Rumi, Coleman Barks, and Odysseus bending down to kiss the beach as literature's first grateful male hero.00:56 — The Beggar's Return: Odysseus comes home not in triumph but humbled, bent, and listening — a diminishment that is actually a deepening.01:06 — Nolan's Ending vs. the Greek Original: Why sailing away into the sunset is American Western mythology, not a Greek ending, and what the film sacrifices.01:10 — Talking Until Dawn: Penelope's fierce "My heart can take it" and the moment husband and wife talk and listen to each other until dawn.01:13 — The Wisdom of the Odyssey: Phil's new book, recommended translations by Lattimore and Emily Wilson, and upcoming mythology tours to Greece. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit themythicmasculine.substack.com/subscribe

A few years back, I hosted Dougie Mackay at my home on Vancouver Island for some pizza and a televised hockey game. I’d just caught his show in town and was struck by how he illuminated the wingspan of a story - the way it could carry an audience across centuries and landscapes with each sentence.Raised in the Scottish Highlands where storytelling is still in the water, Dougie has sold out shows at the Edinburgh Fringe and the Scottish International Storytelling Festival. He even holds a Guinness World Record as part of the longest continuous storytelling session (74 hours, set in the central square of Marrakesh, where storytelling is also heritage). He describes his own work as firing on the edge of the wild.In this episode of The Crow’s Nest, Dougie joins me to explore the medicine of story for these times - and for men in particular. We speak in support of the upcoming Cascadia Men’s Conference, happening August 6-9 in the Squamish Valley just north of Vancouver. The conference draws its DNA from the Minnesota Men’s Conference, now forty years strong, and we’re gathering elders and younger men alike to light a fire we hope will burn yearly.Dougie won’t be with us in person this August (he’ll be at the Edinburgh Fringe with his show A Wolf Shall Devour the Sun), but his spirit is woven into what we’re building. At the heart of our conversation, he tells the old Gaelic tale of Finn McCool and the Salmon of Wisdom - a story from the Fianna cycle about a boy raised by wild aunties in the forest, who must learn not just to hunt and fight, but to see truly.What emerges is a conversation about masculine leadership, the necessary relationship between youth and elders, and what it means to be mentored by both the feminine and the wild. "I think there's lots of people seeking belonging, and the salmon has something to say about that."Dougie offers a particular tonic: the idea that in our broken culture, many of us in midlife and beyond may find ourselves in the role of Finnegus - the old poet who sits by the pool for seven years, preparing the ground so that someone younger might receive the gift we never will.If you’re drawn to the work, you can find Dougie writing on Substack at Rekindling the Hearth. He’s also launching a nine-month storytelling mentorship cohort called The Storyteller’s Journey this September.The Cascadia Men’s Conference runs August 6-9. Details and tickets at cascadiamensconference.com This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit themythicmasculine.substack.com/subscribe

We’re just under 30 days out from my upcoming Cascadia Men’s Conference, a first-of-its-kind mythopoetic gathering happening August 6-9 in the Squamish Valley, north of Vancouver. In the lead up, I’ve been hosting live conversations with our presenters - previous episodes have included men’s author Matt Sturm, indigenous poet Cliff Taylor, and later this week Scottish storyteller Dougie Mackay.Yesterday I connected with Satyen Raja.Satyen is the founder of Warrior Sage, a master martial artist, and one of the keynote presenters at the conference. He’s been showing up in FB with what I can only describe as fiery transmissions - dispatches on men, presence, and the particular weight of this moment in history. “Without a deep purpose - a purpose of depth that comes from the soul - we flounder. We gravitate toward the superficial. We can enjoy it, but we can’t live there. It will never touch the deepest core of our being.”We talk about distraction as a slow theft of life force, about what brotherhood actually offers that no amount of solo self-improvement can replace, and about the three pillars Satyen will be bringing to the gathering: presence, claim, and penetration.Men, if you’re stirred by what you hear, consider this your summons. "We just need to do it for the freaking hell of it. That's it. Just that - for the joy of being with men together in a good way, not just in a competitive beat each other up way, but in a way that we bring the fullness of our human spirit."The conference is August 6-9. Details and tickets at cascadiamensconference.com This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit themythicmasculine.substack.com/subscribe

Two decades ago, I graduated university.I took a job writing copy for a small online business that rented holiday properties, and my role was to add content for the search engines to bring in traffic.It was a 9-to-5 kind of thing.I liked my employer and coworkers. And the job itself, I voraciously learned as much as I could and pumped out all the work that was assigned to me.Pretty soon, I was able to finish my output by lunchtime. And when I asked for more, my employer offered it. And this went on for a few months.Eventually, there came a time when my employer told me, “we don’t have more to assign today.”My response was, “Okay… well can I go home?” which seemed reasonable enough. I wasn’t even asking to be paid for the hours.Her response: “No, you can’t go home. You have to remain at your desk.”I couldn’t believe it. A part of me rebelled. I couldn’t imagine sitting at a desk for hours every afternoon, needing to ‘make up work’ that was unncessary, rather than having the freedom to do my own thing.A quiet voice spoke to me. This isn’t for you. You are meant for more.I tried to stuff it down, reminding myself of the practical, real-world responsibilities I had at the time. Paying rent. Buying groceries. Saving for a mortgage. But still, the quiet voice wouldn’t relent.A fire burned deeper than my practical fears. This was the First Fire of my soul. And I couldn’t put it out.Well, I didn’t last much longer at the job before striking out on my own. I began publishing an online magazine called Brave New Traveler, which featured my own writings alongside guest authors, that spoke to the magic and mystery of travelling off the beaten path.From there, I was noticed and invited to join a larger travel publishing network with a global reach. Somewhere in there, I also became a documentary filmmaker - recognizing the power of the medium to change the world and shift consciousness en masse in a short period of time.And so I followed the calling of my soul. I produced films like Sacred Economics and Occupy Love.I loved the collaboration, the storytelling, and the impact. But behind the scenes, there was heartbreak. In the middle of that momentum, after a decade together, my marriage crumbled.It wasn’t just a legal separation - it was the total dismantling of the world I had known for my entire adulthood. I was cast out of the home and the life we had shared, once again adrift. The stability I had built, the shared vision of our future had turned to ash. I was awash in the wreckage of a life I thought was certain, navigating a depth of grief I wasn’t prepared for.In the wake of that collapse, I threw myself even deeper into the craft. I produced films like Amplify Her, Lost Nation Road, and The Village of Lovers. Filmmaking became the outlet of my creative soul and my search for meaning.I met a new partner & became a father.But then, about 5 years ago… I remember feeling that small voice inside again… clear, grounded, and directive.It’s time to shift. You have achieved what you intended with your films. You have said what you wanted to say.It was the closing of this chapter, this first fire. And the beginning of the next.It was few years before this that I encountered ‘men’s work.’ At the Tamera research village in Portugal, I sat in my first intergenerational men’s circle. Young men and old men, wrestling with masculinity and how to show up powerful and in service to life. A frequency I had never experienced before was transmitted. And I was changed.I returned home and attended the New Warrior Training Adventure with the Mankind Project. I was taken on a descent and return, and I rediscovered a core trust in men that I didn’t know I had lost.A few years after, I began publishing The Mythic Masculine podcast, to explore the mythopoetic lineage and the role of archetypes, ritual, and culture work in the modern world. Somewhere in there, my film career began to fall away.The Second Fire of my life was kindled, and is now ablaze.For the last two years, alongside in-person and online transformational containers, I’ve been working 1:1 with men, usually between the ages of 30 and 60.Many of them come because of a specific challenge or pattern that I find intimately familiar to my own story.What I offer them is what I’ve had to learn myself: Archetypal maps to name what’s happening beneath the surface. Somatic practices to move it through the body. Ritual practices to mark the death of the old identity and authorize the new one.Here’s what I’ve come to realize: None of these challenges are isolated. Underneath, they are all connected by a deeper shift.It would be easy to call it a “midlife crisis.” That’s what this culture tends to do. But none of that addresses the deeper stirring of the soul, which is what these breakdowns actually represent.James Hollis calls it the Midlife Passage. It’s an opportunity to ask the sometimes frightening, always liberating, question: “Who am I apart from my history and the roles I have played?”When we discover that we have been living what constitutes a “false self,” that we have been enacting a “provisional adulthood,” then we open the possibility for the second adulthood—our true personhood.Maybe you’re in your 30s, 40s, or 50s. On paper, your life is “fine.” But beneath the noise of your responsibilities, there is that voice.Maybe it’s whispering: “There has to be more than this.”Today I’m announcing a new 1:1 mentorship container for men, designed for this threshold.It’s called The Second Fire.It’s not about optimizing your productivity, or biohacking your body. It’s about apprenticing yourself to your soul.Men, if you’re stirred by this invitation, and feel at the beginning (or in the midst) of this passage, then this invitation is for you. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit themythicmasculine.substack.com/subscribe

We have reached the final episode of the series:”Trans Men: In Their Own Words”.This conversation began with Episode #1, looking at the collective cultural moment with The Seed and the Soil. We explored how trans folk represent a trickster figure, troubling the psychic architecture of the binary many of us were raised with. We talked about the urge to ‘monster’ the other, but we also looked at the history of how gender has been used as a tool of social control.In Episode #2, we moved past the intellect and into Stories of Transition. My guests shared the intimate vulnerability of their own journeys - the grief, joy and reckonings that bind us all in the search for a place in the Book of Life.And now in this final episode, Emmanuel, Kanoa, Lev, and Aliko move beyond individual stories to examine the architecture of men’s work. We address the faultline currently trembling modern men’s spaces: the tension between a masculinity fixed in biological certainty and one defined by collective stewardship.“There is a larger paradigm shift in men’s work: the realization that men’s circles aren’t just for healing and brotherhood. These circles are now impacting our greater world in this time of transformation. The call is to show up in the world with the skills and the willingness to grapple that we develop in these spaces.From an eco-political-spiritual perspective, [men’s work] is being asked to move beyond the internal process into an external one that serves the entire collective. This is why conversations around transness and color are surfacing. We have to ask: what are we doing as men with our healed bodies in a world under great collapse?It is not enough to just sit in a circle and heal myself; I need to know how to move my authentic self into this collapsing world. This is the overarching transition putting men’s spaces at the edge of so many vital conversations.”- Emmanuel H BrownFor men’s work facilitators, this conversation serves as a guide for understanding how and why to consider including trans men, as well as the broader transition of men’s work itself. We are tasked with moving from a narrow focus on ‘personal wellness’ toward the regeneration of culture - calling forth a masculinity that is aware, regulated, and in service to thriving life.You can find the full guest bios & links to their work on the Series Page.I’d love to hear your comments & reflections below. Heads up, if you are a man seeking to explore the mythopoetic path, you are invited to check out The Archetypal Compass. This mini-guide is designed to help you navigate the internal archetypes of the soul, providing a map for those ready to move beyond personal inquiry and toward a more conscious stewardship of their lives and the world.Also, the next cohort of The Deep Masculine, my 3 month online journey for men begins May 19th. Join a mythic brotherhood aimed at repatterning your relationship to sex, soul and purpose.SHOW NOTES: 02:43 - The Faultline at the Mankind Project: Ian addresses the recent friction at the MKP 40th anniversary and how it exposed the tension between biological essentialism and the evolution of modern men’s spaces.06:46 - The Code of Testosterone: Aliko challenges the definition of manhood, shifting the inquiry from physical genitalia to the codes and blueprints of masculine presence that trans men share with cis men.11:23 - The Shadow of the Phallus: Exploring how the presence of trans men acts as an accountability mirror for cis men, forcing a reckoning with the historical harm done to the feminine that many circles try to escape.13:50 - Restoring the Sacred Tapestry: Emmanuel discusses the eco-spiritual paradigm of men’s work, moving beyond a one-size-fits-all manhood box into the authentic restoration of a sacred and divine masculinity.18:48 - The Responsibility of the Elder: A call to ensure that the wisdom, initiation, and depth of practice found in legacy spaces are made accessible across the entire masculine spectrum.21:42 - The Unique Messenger: Kanoa explains why the message of accountability lands differently when it comes from a man who has navigated the world perceived as a woman and survived the violence of the patriarchy.23:12 - Purity Myths and White Supremacy: How the hyper-focus on purity in affinity spaces mirrors white supremacist structures and why intersex folks are vital to breaking the patriarchal archetype.27:17 - Investigating the Fear: Lev reflects on the assumption of difference and invites cis men to look at where their fear of losing their masculinity actually originates.32:36 - Detaching from Biological Essentialism: A deep dive into the question of safety, identifying that patriarchy-not transness-is the root of violence in both men’s and women’s spaces.37:19 - The Seed and the Sword: Addressing the mythic dimension of anatomy and the responsibility of stewards to ask how they are using their sword to protect or to manipulate.46:36 - Activation in the Great Collapse: Emmanuel pivots from internal healing to the external harvest, asking what masculinity is called to bring to a world currently undergoing ecological and social breakdown.50:31 - The Facilitator’s Tactical Guide: Emmanuel and Aliko offer a framework for conveners on self-inquiry, group reconciliation, and how to issue a transparent, sovereign invitation to trans men.55:46 - Relaxing into Enoughness: How decoupling biology from gender allows all men to step out of the rigid expectations of patriarchy and recognize their inherent value.1:06:48 - Reporting the Patriarchal Crime: Invoking bell hooks’ vision from The Will to Change to reconsider male desire and heal the mental illness of patriarchal violence.1:13:46 - Embracing the Chaos: Final reflections on opening the circle to meet the collapsing structures of our time with a more diverse, loving, and whole masculinity. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit themythicmasculine.substack.com/subscribe

Last week, I released Part One (you can listen here). This series grew from a seed - a conversation with Emmanuel H. Brown. Emmanuel has been navigating his own journey, seeking out the places where manhood and masculinity might be expanded to hold the lived experience of trans men.As someone rooted in the mythopoetic lineage, I recognize that these voices have often been missing from our circles. This series is an invitation to a broader framework - one that is mutually supportive for the soul of every man.In our first episode, The Seed and the Soil, we explored the trans man as a trickster figure - one who troubles the binary architecture many of us have been raised with. We looked at the history of gender as social control and the tension between biological certainty and the expansive human spirit. We asked how we might hold space for genuine curiosity and reckon with real violence against trans folk without losing our humanity to the polarized scripts of our time.Subscribe to get the full series in your inbox.If the first conversation was about the why of this series, this one is about the who.In this episode, Stories of Transition, we move from the intellect to the heart. By sharing their personal stories of transition - the specific griefs, private triumphs, and quiet moments of reckoning - Lev, Emmanuel, Kanoa, and Aliko disarm the listener with a rare and honest vulnerability.We touch the visceral edges of their paths: mapping the territory where their unique stories cross and diverge, showing that they are all bound by the longing for place in the Book of Life.Overall, the intention is simple: to widen our capacity to remain human to one another. It’s about dissolving the outdated programs of society to find the infinity of the breath underneath. You’re welcome to leave your respectful & nuanced thoughts in the comments below. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit themythicmasculine.substack.com/subscribe

To brood is to wander through a grovewhere one sheep straysand a hundred wolves follow.Why did I make brooding my vocationwhen AWE was an option?Thought spinner, mull the wine of wonder.- RUMIThree years ago, my colleague Deus and I joined forces to craft an experiment. We invited 12 men out to the forest. He brought his years of training in breathwork, transformational art, and psychedelic facilitation. I wove my love of archetypes, fairy tales, and the lineage of mythopoetics.The result: a cauldron of mystery that we named AWE - Awakening the Wild Erotic. Since that time, we’ve ran the 3 day weekend over 7 times, supporting over 90 men through the journey. Deus and I still have a difficult time describing what happens during these ritual gatherings. What feels most true: it is the rite of passage that most men never received as we entered into our erotic birthright. It is the beginning of coming into right relationship with sexual energy, responsibility, and self leadership. Plus, it’s a lot of fun. Here’s what some of the men have said: "I really got to know men in this time—more so in three days than in the 49 years I've been alive. And through that, I got to know so much more of me. I feel more open to vitality, to passion, to pleasure and joy... to the juice of life... the nectar of the Gods.""I arrived at the retreat seeking to heal shame carried in my body... What I discovered was an inner fire. Beyond healing, I left the weekend ablaze with energy and purpose, ready to fully embody my life as a father, a son, a husband, a brother, and a friend.""Upon returning home from AWE, my wife said to me: ‘The pilot light of our love was going out. You came back with the flame to relight us.’ If feeling what it means to be alive, to love and be loved, to breathe in the air of erotic life-force resonates within, you owe it to yourself to work with these men."The terrain of sex, eros, and intimacy is edgy territory.Especially these days, when the shadow of men is running rampant, as we’re confronted with the Epstein files, endless wars and abuses of power. On the personal front, there’s the continual seduction of numbing out with substances, pornography and now AI “girlfriends” that promise pseudo intimacy without any real-world risk or rejection, or reward of being truly seen.In the face of all that, over and over, I’m astounded by the men who choose to attend AWE. These are men who want to access a deeper vitality in their being, who wish to connect with the current of life, and show up as more grounded, integrated and passionate lovers.UPCOMING WEEKEND - APRIL 24-26Once again, we return to Black Creek on Vancouver Island. This is likely to be the only AWE we are offering in the region this year.If you feel the pull - or if you know a man who needs this kind of medicine - you can find the application and full details below.We have 4 spots left. Begin the Descent - Apply for the April 24-26 AWE ImmersionP.S. For those of you who can’t make it to the island, the next cohort of our 12-week online journey, The Deep Masculine, begins in mid-May. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit themythicmasculine.substack.com/subscribe