Men Talking Mindfulness

David Meyer was one of the first Americans ever to earn a black belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. He’s an eleven-time world champion, he holds the Coral belt, and he turns 64 this month — and still trains seven seven-minute rounds against men half his age. He’s also the co-founder and former CEO of Adopt-a-Pet.com, and now runs Food System Innovations. When Will asks what keeps him going, the answer has nothing in it to buy: hydrate, protect your sleep, cycle what you train so something is always recovering. His line on discipline reframes the whole thing — it’s easy for him to train today because he trained yesterday.

Then Jon asks about ego, and David draws a distinction worth the whole hour: ego isn’t something to get rid of, because it’s your identity. It’s something to tame. He covers the deathbed test, the paradox that the only way to improve is to train against people who beat you, and what he tells himself when he gets wound up — the mountains are laughing. And when Jon describes being introduced at parties as “my friend the Navy SEAL” rather than as Jon, David doesn’t tell him to let it go. He tells him to expand it.

IN THIS EPISODE, YOU WILL LEARN:
1. Why longevity has no cheat code, and what gets built instead by an ordinary day repeated
2. How David trains and recovers at 64 — cycling muscle groups, protecting sleep, and giving stiffness the time it now needs
3. Why ego is not the enemy, and what taming it looks like in the moment — including the deathbed test and “the mountains are laughing”
4. The paradox of competition: the way to get better is to train with people who beat you, and the way to win more is to care less about winning
5. What happens to a man when the title goes — and why expanding an identity beats letting one go

CONNECT WITH DAVID MEYER
•  The Ageless Warrior Lab Podcast - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-ageless-warrior-lab/id1840239491
•  Food System Innovations: https://www.fsi.org
•  His bio and background: https://www.fsi.org/david-meyer
• Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/agelesswarriorlab/

STAY CONNECTED WITH MTM
•  Join the MTM community — text MTM to 33777
•  Website: mentalkingmindfulness.com
•  Take our Free Assessment - https://focusnowtraining.com/assessment-page
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•  Focus Now Training: focusnowtraining.com
•  Work with us / speaking inquiries: focusnowtraining.com/contact

Produced by Robert Lopez: https://cratesaudio.com

Most men who eat when they are already full have decided the problem is willpower. Dr. Jason Linder spends this episode taking that explanation apart and handing back something more useful.

Jason is a bilingual trauma and relationship therapist in San Diego, an EMDR Certified clinician and EMDRIA-Approved Consultant, and an adjunct professor at Alliant International University. In his clinical experience, almost every addictive pattern he has treated — substance or process — sits on top of two things: not enough high-quality human connection, and unresolved past experience that still has a pull on the present. The quantity of relationships is beside the point. One person can bring grief, vulnerability and overwhelm to change the picture.

IN THIS EPISODE, YOU WILL LEARN:

1. Why compulsive eating sits on top of connection and unresolved experience rather than a lack of discipline
2. The three things most men were never given permission to bring to anyone — grief, vulnerability and overwhelm — and what it costs to carry them alone
3. How short sleep raises hunger signalling, and why evening cravings tilt toward sugar, salt and fat
4. How to tell nutritional hunger from emotional hunger, and what the emotional kind is actually asking for
5. What urge surfing is, plus four small mechanics that change a meal: chew fully, set the utensil down, no screens, stop earlier in the evening

CONNECT WITH DR. JASON LINDER
•  Alliant International University faculty page: https://www.alliant.edu/faculty/jason-linder
•  Writing at Psychotherapy.net: https://psychotherapy.net/blog/author/jason-linder-lmft
•  Therapy practice — San Diego, California clients only: https://dr-jason-n-linder.clientsecure.me
•  Instagram — @drjasonnlinder
•  Linkedin — https://www.linkedin.com/in/jason-n-linder-psyd-8871a68b/

Take our FREE 5-minute Assessment
https://focusnowtraining.com/assessment-page 

STAY CONNECTED WITH MTM
•  Join the MTM community — text MTM to 33777
•  Website: mentalkingmindfulness.com
•  Focus Now Training: focusnowtraining.com
•  Awareness to Action program: focusnowtraining.com/a2a
•  Work with us / speaking inquiries: focusnowtraining.com/contact

Produced by Robert Lopez: https://cratesaudio.com

You do not have to have kicked in a door overseas for this conversation to land. Training alone carries a heavy physiological burden and the injuries it leaves behind have a name.

Dr. Chris Frueh is a clinical psychologist and professor of psychology at the University of Hawaii–Hilo with more than 30 years working alongside combat veterans, special operators, contractors, and first responders. He was lead author on the 2020 medical paper that coined the term “operator syndrome,” and his book of the same name is written for operators and their families rather than for clinicians. Dr. Mark Gordon introduced him to Jon, and this episode pick s up exactly where the Gordon conversation left off. Chris explains what operator syndrome actually is and how it differs from PTSD, gives the fullest public account we’ve heard of what Secretary Hegseth’s July 15 announcement and follow-up memo actually said, and lays out a genuinely hopeful recovery path — starting with tests almost anyone can get. As he puts it: this is not a life sentence of horrible misery.

IN THIS EPISODE, YOU WILL LEARN:
1.  What operator syndrome is — and why PTSD is only one possible piece of it
2.  How the same symptoms get called depression when the real driver may be hormones, sleep, or inflammation
3.  What the Hegseth July 15 announcement and one-page memo actually said — including the context most coverage missed
4.  The first moves in a recovery plan: hormone and cardiometabolic panels, a sleep study, and lowering inflammation
5.  Why bringing your partner into the process changes the outcome — and how to start that conversation

More about Dr. Chris Frueh:
1.  Website: https://www.chrisfrueh.com
2.  Book: Operator Syndrome (Ballast Books) — available on Amazon and via his website
3.  The original 2020 Operator Syndrome paper is free to download from chrisfrueh.com
4.  Instagram: @drchrisfrueh

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Produced by Robert Lopez https://www.cratesaudio.com/

Out of every punctuation mark in every language, Vaisesika Dasa argues the question mark is the most powerful.  Why, because a question is a hook that pulls the answers already around you closer.

Vaisesika Dasa left an ordinary path at 15 to become a monk, chasing questions most people never stop to ask. He has spent his life studying a traditional line of Vedic teaching and translating the Bhagavad Gita into something genuinely usable for professionals and seekers in the modern world. His book, The Four Questions: A Pathway to Inner Peace, distills it into four questions anyone can carry: Where am I investing my attention right now? What is the lesson? What is my purpose? And how can I be of service? In this conversation with Jon and Will, he makes the case that attention is our only real asset, that life is a schoolhouse rather than a bed, and that the fastest way to feel connected to your own life is to serve something beyond it.

IN THIS EPISODE, YOU WILL LEARN:
1.  Why your attention is your most valuable asset — and how to get a real return on it
2.  The one-question practice that pulls you back into the moment when you drift
3.  How to turn setbacks into lessons by changing the question you ask
4.  A simple exercise for getting clear on your purpose and writing your own personal constitution
5.  The hierarchy of service — and why serving out of love outperforms serving out of fear or gain

More about Vaisesika Dasa:
1.  Book: The Four Questions: A Pathway to Inner Peace — https://www.thefourquestionsbook.com
2.  Website: https://www.vaisesikadasa.com
3.  Published by the Bhaktivedanta Book Trust — also available on Amazon

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Does your company need help, or would you like to reduce safety incidents??
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Produced by Robert Lopez https://www.cratesaudio.com/

Howard Behar helped grow Starbucks from 28 stores to more than 15,000 and at 80, he found himself in a treatment center for depression.

Howard is the former president of Starbucks North America and the founding president of Starbucks International, a longtime advocate of servant leadership, and the author of It’s Not About the Coffee and The Magic Cup. He returns to Men Talking Mindfulness for one of the most candid conversations we’ve had: what depression actually felt like in his body, why acknowledging it was the hardest and most important step, what treatment really looked like (including the setback when he thought he was ready to go home), and what keeps him well now. His message is direct and hopeful. 

Depression is a sickness, not a weakness, nobody is beyond its reach, and people around you genuinely want to help if you let them. If you or someone you know is struggling, call or text 988.

IN THIS EPISODE, YOU WILL LEARN:
1.  Why depression is a physical illness as much as a mental one — and what it felt like in his chest
2.  Why acknowledging it was the hardest step, and what changed the moment he did
3.  What treatment actually looked like, including the setback that taught him he wasn’t done yet
4.  The two-week marker: when ongoing symptoms are a signal to reach out rather than wait it out
5.  What keeps him well now — ongoing counseling, real routine, and letting people in

More about Howard Behar:
1.  Website: http://howardbehar.com/
2.  Books: It’s Not About the Coffee and The Magic Cup — available on Amazon
3.  LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/howard-behar-24ba274/
4.  YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@Hpbehar
5.  If you or someone you know is in crisis, call or text 988 (Suicide & Crisis Lifeline)

Take our Awareness to Action COURSE (A2A)
12 modules structured curriculum on attention, presence, practices & performance — plus an inspiring community built in for connection.
https://focusnowtraining.com/a2a-course

GET MORE FROM MTM:
Join our free weekly Substack newsletter → Click HERECheck out our MTM Website to see what else we are up too! https://mentalkingmindfulness.com/

GET FOCUSED!!
Does your company need help, or would you like to reduce safety incidents??
Head over to https://focusnowtraining.com/ - we have you covered!

Produced by Robert Lopez https://www.cratesaudio.com/

The average man today is walking around with meaningfully less testosterone than his grandfather had at the same age — and the fix the military is reaching for may be aimed at the wrong target.

Dr. Mark Gordon returns to Men Talking Mindfulness for his third appearance to unpack the quiet war on male hormones. He’s a pioneer of hormone-and-brain medicine, Medical Director of the Warrior Angel Foundation, and featured in the documentary Quiet Explosions. This episode centers on a live policy moment: a Pentagon directive associated with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth that would screen service members over 30 for low testosterone and offer TRT, with the goal of a more capable, resilient force. Dr. Gordon shares the good news underneath the headline — the goal is right, and the biology is fixable — while making a clinical case that simply injecting testosterone is the wrong target, because it shuts down the body’s own ability to produce it. Jon and Will dig into what actually drives low T, why everyday ibuprofen may be quietly part of the problem, and the root-cause path that restores a man’s own hormone engine.

IN THIS EPISODE, YOU WILL LEARN:
1.  Why the average man today carries far lower testosterone than his grandfather did — and what’s driving the decline
2.  The Pentagon’s proposed directive (tied to Secretary Hegseth) to screen service members over 30 for low T and offer TRT — and Dr. Gordon’s clinical case for a smarter target
3.  How everyday NSAIDs like ibuprofen (“vitamin M”) can quietly interrupt the brain’s signal to make testosterone — and how to work around it
4.  Why blast and TBI exposure can leave blood testosterone looking “normal” while brain hormone production is devastated — and why an injection can’t reach that
5.  The root-cause approach that restores your own production — pulsed clomiphene, calming inflammation and cortisol — instead of shutting your system down

More about Dr. Mark Gordon:
1.  Educational site: https://www.tbihelpnow.org
2.  Store (10% first-time discount, funds veteran treatment): https://www.millenniumhealthstore.com
3.  Neurosteroid hormone paper — available on his website and Instagram
4.  Documentary: Quiet Explosions: Healing the Brain — featuring Dr. Gordon and the Warrior Angel Foundation
5.  Book: Peptides for Health — available via millenniumhealthstore.com

• (00:00) - Cold open

Check out our Awareness-to-action Self Mastery COURSE & COMMUNITY:

12 modules on attention, presence & performance. Work at your own pace plus a community built for Inspiration and connection.

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JOIN US IN PERSON — Future Events and Retreats.

1.  Live in-person event: Warrior Defined.
We will be in Charlotte, NC, September 25, 2026 more info HERE: 

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Produced by Robert Lopez | https://www.cratesaudio.com/

The parts of you that feel most alive — the vigor, the wonder, the real friendship — aren’t gone. They’re just waiting for you to make a little room for them again.

Ed Hinman is a U.S. Naval Academy graduate, an eight-year Marine Corps veteran, and an executive protection specialist at Gavin de Becker & Associates — who left a paved path to chase what he loved, earned a master’s in history, and turned his writing into a career. His book, The Barbarian in You, is built on three pillars every man can reclaim: vigor (physical effort and aliveness), wonder (awe, imagination, meaning), and fellowship (real male connection). In this episode, Ed joins Jon and Will to make a genuinely hopeful case: living well doesn’t take a blown-up life or heroic willpower — it takes intention, a willingness to be the fool, and the courage to trust your own heart. Just showing up, he reminds us, is ninety percent of it.

IN THIS EPISODE, YOU WILL LEARN:
1.  The three pillars of a life that flourishes — vigor, wonder, and fellowship — and how to build more of each
2.  How to make real friendships as a grown man (Ed started a book club that’s thrived for 13 years)
3.  How to tell a genuine calling from ego — and the simple litmus test that reveals it
4.  Why filling your own cup lets you give from the overflow, not the reservoir
5.  How to move through dark seasons — reach for your people, and remember you don’t have to go alone

More about Ed Hinman:
1.  Website and Book - https://www.barbarianinyou.com/
2. Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/ed_hinman/
3. Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/@edwardhinmanbarbarian 

Check out our Awareness-to-action Self Mastery COURSE & COMMUNITY:

12 modules on attention, presence & performance. Work at your own pace plus a community built for Inspiration and connection.

1.  www.focusnowtraining.com/a2a-Course

JOIN US IN PERSON — Future Events and Retreats.

1.  Live in-person event: Warrior Defined.
We will be in Charlotte, NC, September 25, 2026 more info HERE: 

Or mentalkingmindfulness.com

GET MORE FROM MTM:

Text MTM to 33777 — free weekly newsletter

1.  Subscribe: mentalkingmindfulness.com

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1.  focusnowtraining.com/contact

Produced by Robert Lopez | https://www.cratesaudio.com/

In 1998, Alexander Love’s father was murdered. Years later, he sat down — on Zoom — with the man who did it. And what he found there was not what anyone expected.

Alexander Love is an acupuncturist, developmental coach, and senior faculty at the Newfield Network, where he created the Lumina Process — an integrative approach to shadow work weaving together Eastern wisdom, Integral theory, parts work, and polarity work. His TEDx talk is titled “How Embracing Pain Creates a Legacy of Love,” and his forthcoming book, the Evolutionary Gestures Trilogy, opens with the story of his father’s murder and the restorative justice dialogue he pursued with the man convicted of it. In this solo conversation with Will (Jon was away), Alexander makes a radical, gentle case: pain is not something to escape but a doorway to walk through — and the courage to turn toward it is what actually makes a good man.

IN THIS EPISODE YOU WILL LEARN:

1.  Why pain is a doorway, not a problem to eliminate — and what opens when you turn toward it
2.  The restorative justice dialogue: forgiveness, and why “hero and villain” falls apart on contact with a real human
3.  The belief that human beings are fundamentally good — even the man who took his father
4.  The three-step practice: turn toward, locate the sensation in the body, and lovingly embrace it
5.  Why the cultural story that “real men feel no pain” is a marketing myth — and being a good man takes the opposite

More about Alexander Love:
1.  Website: alexanderlove.org
3.  TEDx talk: “How Embracing Pain Creates a Legacy of Love” — search on YouTube
4.  Newfield Network (9-month coach & personal transformation training): https://www.newfieldnetwork.com

Check out our Awareness-to-action Self Mastery COURSE & COMMUNITY:

12 modules on attention, presence & performance. Work at your own pace plus a community built for Inspiration and connection.

1.  www.focusnowtraining.com/a2a-Course

JOIN US IN PERSON — Future Events and Retreats.

1.  Live in-person event: Warrior Defined.
We will be in Charlotte, NC, September 25, 2026 more info HERE: 

Or mentalkingmindfulness.com

GET MORE FROM MTM:

Text MTM to 33777 — free weekly newsletter

1.  Subscribe: mentalkingmindfulness.com

2.  FNT: focusnowtraining.com

BRING FNT TO YOUR TEAM:

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Produced by Robert Lopez | https://www.cratesaudio.com/

The crisis almost never arrives all at once. It builds — quietly, gradually — and then one day, people break.

Dr. Adjoa Smalls-Mantey has stood in two of the most extreme places a human can be. As an emergency psychiatrist in New York City, she sits with people at the absolute edge of crisis. Off the clock, she looks for her own edge on the sides of mountains —. A physician-scientist trained at Oxford and Columbia with a PhD in HIV immunology, an award-winning author, and a national mental health policy voice, she joins Jon and Will to talk about what actually brings people into the ER, why economic stress is now hitting the middle class and young adults, and the single lesson the mountains taught her that changes everything: ask for help early.

IN THIS EPISODE YOU’LL LEARN:

1. What gets in the way when we need to ask for help?   
2. The most common crises that bring people to the psychiatric ER — and how the demographics are shifting
3. Why economic stress is now breaking middle-class professionals and young adults who can’t find work
4. Crises build gradually, then people break — and why to call 988 and ask for help early
5. What mountaineering taught her about asking for help: inexperience delays it, and delay costs the whole team
6. Put your own mask on first, ask the right person, and keep the ask time-limited

More about Dr. Adjoa Smalls-Mantey:

1.  Instagram & Youtube: doctoradjoa

2.  Children’s book: Anjali the Brave (All About Vaccines) — on Amazon

3.  New York Mental Health Foundation — launching soon 

4.  New York County Psychiatric Society (branch of the American Psychiatric Association) — Dr. Smalls-Mantey is immediate past president

5.  If you or someone you know is in crisis, call or text 988 (Suicide & Crisis Lifeline)

Check out our Awareness-to-action Self Mastery COURSE & COMMUNITY:

12 modules on attention, presence & performance. Work at your own pace plus a community built for Inspiration and connection.

1.  www.focusnowtraining.com/a2a-Course

JOIN US IN PERSON — Future Events and Retreats.

1.  Live in-person event: Warrior Defined.
We will be in Charlotte, NC, September 25, 2026 more info HERE: 

Or mentalkingmindfulness.com

GET MORE FROM MTM:

Text MTM to 33777 — free weekly newsletter

1.  Subscribe: mentalkingmindfulness.com

2.  FNT: focusnowtraining.com

BRING FNT TO YOUR TEAM:

1.  focusnowtraining.com/contact

Produced by Robert Lopez | https://www.cratesaudio.com/

One of the biggest reasons why many men are suffering with loneliness is their lack of emotional intelligence and emotional literacy. 

Dr. J.J. Kelly, the Punk Rock Doc, is a clinical psychologist who runs a practice called The Unorthodox. She is the author of the Holy Shit book series and recently wrote a piece for Vice on why men are so damn lonely. 

In this returning appearance, she joins Jon and Will to make a blunt, funny, and genuinely useful case: the male loneliness epidemic is about emotional illiteracy. The good news is that emotional intelligence is a set of skills anyone can learn if they are willing to do the work. This common challenge stems from limited opportunities to develop these vital skills earlier in life. 

Fortunately, emotional intelligence and emotional literacy are abilities anyone can strengthen through consistent practice. Men who cultivate these capacities gain the tools to identify their feelings, communicate with honesty, and form authentic connections. This growth supports men's mental health and creates space for deeper friendships and brotherhood. Mindfulness and emotional awareness practices further enhance resilience and a sense of belonging, leading to richer relationships, greater purpose, and happier, healthier lives.

IN THIS EPISODE YOU WILL LEARN:
1.  Why emotional illiteracy — not circumstance — is the root of male loneliness
2.  Insight is not a skill: why reading every book changes nothing until you practice
3.  Name it to tame it: validation and acceptance before change (the backbone of DBT)
4.  The values exercise: behaving according to your values even when you’re activated
5.  Eating your shit sandwich with dignity, and why courage rarely backfires

More about Dr. J.J. Kelly:
1.  Website: https://www.drjjkelly.com
2.  TikTok: large free-content library — search “Dr. J.J. Kelly”
3.  Get Real Self-Study: 8-week emotional intelligence course — via drjjkelly.com
4.  Books: the Holy Shit series (incl. the loneliness book with the “note to men,” and the forthcoming Holy Shit I Think I’m In Love) — on Amazon
5.  Gifted Misfits: her program in book form (most affordable entry point) — via drjjkelly.com
6.  Vice article on male loneliness — https://www.vice.com/en/article/a-psychologist-has-a-blunt-theory-about-whats-really-driving-the-male-loneliness-epidemic/

Check out our Awareness-to-action Self Mastery COURSE & COMMUNITY:

12 modules on attention, presence & performance. Work at your own pace plus a community built for Inspiration and connection.

1.  www.focusnowtraining.com/a2a-Course

JOIN US IN PERSON — Future Events and Retreats.

1.  Live in-person event: Warrior Defined.
We will be in Charlotte, NC, September 25, 2026 more info HERE: 

Or mentalkingmindfulness.com

GET MORE FROM MTM:

Text MTM to 33777 — free weekly newsletter

1.  Subscribe: mentalkingmindfulness.com

2.  FNT: focusnowtraining.com

BRING FNT TO YOUR TEAM:

1.  focusnowtraining.com/contact

Produced by Robert Lopez | https://www.cratesaudio.com/