The Thriving Man Podcast

We had a mix-up on the first release, here is the right version.

Gratitude is something people talk about, but putting it into practice is difficult. Plus, many people talk about it in a “touchy-feely” way, which throws us off as men. The reality of gratitude is something we need in our lives if we want to thrive.

In this week’s show, we discuss gratitude, what it is, and some of the pitfalls that keep us from developing a grateful attitude in our lives.

• Psalm 104 God sustains all aspects of creation
• We get used to things and expect them to stay the same
• Gratitude is a mentality that comes with practice - new neuro pathways in the brain
• Gratitude is a choice of where we put our mind

Entitlement

• When things are going good, we get used to it, and when things go bad, we notice it.
• Things “should be good” God Owes Me
• Biblical view: the only reason the world doesn’t fall apart right now is because God is holding back the chaos.
• The natural setting of this world isn’t life, but death. But God gives life.

Victim mentality

• James Clear Quote on Focus
• "If you look for evidence that people are conspiring to hold you back and the world is working against you, then it will take you no time at all to find precisely that. If you expect to encounter helpful people and experience a world that is working with you, then you find plenty of evidence to support that view as well. The raw material for a sweet life or a bitter life is always there. The story you emphasize is the one you notice."
• Writer and Nobel Prize winner Gabriel García Márquez on what matters in life:
• "What matters in life is not what happens to you but what you remember and how you remember it."

• At the end of each day, think about one thing you are grateful for

RESOURCES TO HELP YOU THRIVE AS A MAN

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Thriving Man Coaching Resources

4D MODEL FREE PDF

Learn about the 4 fundamentals of a Successful Life

Discover OUR SPEAKING AND HOW WE HAVE EMPOWERED THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE ACROSS THE WORLD

What motivates you in life? What helps you have the energy and perseverance each day to keep going?

We all have different motivations. Some are selfish, and some are altruistic, but they often come down to our values. What we value will ultimately motivate us in our lives.

We want to do the work to recognize our values so we can focus on them and let them empower us to live a thriving life.

On today’s show, we discuss how values direct our lives and keep us from getting distracted or off course.

• Values are like a bridge between the wisdom of God and our everyday lives
• Values give a specificity to eternal principles and allow you to connect with them.
• Jim Dobson “I believe it [the midlife crisis] is more a phenomenon of a wrong value system than it is the age group in which it occurs. All of a sudden you realize that the ladder you've been climbing is leaning against the wrong wall.”

• Values inform your decisions and responses to life.
• If you do not choose, someone else will choose for you.
• “Your values are tested daily by those who do not embrace them.” John Maxwell

• Values force you to face reality every day: the difference between how you want to live and how you are living.
• You have to discover what’s important to you if you want to make progress.
• Your value score isn’t about the outcome of the day, but the input of that day.
• It’s not about how the day went, it’s about how you went through the day.
• It empowers you because it’s not about what’s outside your control, but what is in your control.

Get your free Values Starter Kit

RESOURCES TO HELP YOU THRIVE AS A MAN

========================

Thriving Man Coaching Resources

4D MODEL FREE PDF

• Learn about the 4 fundamentals of a Successful Life

Discover OUR SPEAKING AND HOW WE HAVE EMPOWERED THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE ACROSS THE WORLD

What good are values? How do they help us in the everyday chaos of life?

That is what we are talking about on the show today. We will discuss how values are essential for us as we navigate life. Just like a compass helps sailors arrive at their destination, values guide us to live empowered lives. This means each day can be rich and full of meaning no matter what you do for a job or how many tasks you have to accomplish.

• Values can act as a compass and bring focus amidst the chaos.
• Values give us direction on what action to take.
• Values help us cut out the unnecessary or unimportant in our lives.

• Without values, we aren’t aiming our lives in any specific direction
• Values force us to choose.
• If we don’t choose a direction for our lives, someone or something else will choose for us.
• The current of life draws us towards the easy and the urgent. The easy and the urgent are rarely the important.
• Not choosing is a choice.

• A million different voices are screaming at us that we NEED to do their thing. (Buy their product, take their course, follow their advice, etc.)
• There is a dangerous assumption in our world that we can do everything.
• You CANNOT do it all. “Teach us to number our days, that we might gain a heart of wisdom.”(Psalm 90:12)
• We don’t need to do everything. We just need to do the right things
• The difference between a light and a laser is the focus.
• The difference between surviving and thriving is the focus.

• The Values Starter Kit

RESOURCES TO HELP YOU THRIVE AS A MAN

========================

Thriving Man Coaching Resources

Discover OUR SPEAKING AND HOW WE HAVE EMPOWERED THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE ACROSS THE WORLD

Samwise Gamgee was an iconic character in the Lord of the Rings series. He was an everyday gardener who was put into some unbelievable situations. The amazing thing about Sam was that he didn’t let the good or bad situations change him. He had a strong identity and stuck to it no matter the situation.

Many men today are facing an identity crisis. This is due to their lack of foundational values. When a man has strong values, he will often have a strong identity. He can stand up in hard situations and is less likely to back down in the pressure cooker of life.

Today’s show discusses how our values help shape our identity.

“You have to be great and world-changing!”

All the unrealistic men on TV and social media.

Who am I? Do I need to be like them?

How we often look to accomplishments to validate ourselves.

They help you become more confident in who you are

They give you a pathway on how you should live

Values guide us and keep us focused on what we can control

Values are meant to guide your personal behavior, not define your circumstances.

Values guide how we live more than how we feel, where we are at in life, or how others respond.

Download and go through the Values Starter Kit PDF at www.thrivingman.com

Core strength often involves our abs and whether we are exercising. However, we want to discuss a different type of core strength in this week’s show: Inner Core Strength.

This has nothing to do with abs but has everything to do with your Values. When a man has values and seeks to live by them, he is stronger in every area of his life. When a man ignores his values, he will live a weak life of following others. Join us as we focus on values and why they are so important to men today.

Weak men lack purpose and wander through their lives

Weak men selfishly focus on themselves

A weak man’s world is easily wrecked by circumstances

Weak men will often seek escape from hard choices

The answer isn’t just to try harder

The answer is to build your core strength

Core strength in men is their values

Some values are universal and some are personal

They will become slaves to other people’s opinions and their appetites

RESOURCES TO HELP YOU THRIVE AS A MAN

========================

Thriving Man Coaching Resources

4D MODEL FREE PDF

Learn about the 4 fundamentals of a Successful Life

Discover OUR SPEAKING AND HOW WE HAVE EMPOWERED THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE ACROSS THE WORLD

As men, we tend to go to extremes in different areas of our lives. This can be a good thing when applied appropriately, but many of us struggle with different types of extremism in our everyday lives.

On today’s show, we discuss some of the common extremisms many guys struggle with. These are simple attitudes that can hurt us as we try to build a thriving life.

We also give a simple attitude adjustment near the end of the show to help you fight against extremism in your life.

Many men use this to justify not trying

This attitude can ignore the learning process

This attitude is seen in the blaze of glory mentality

We focus on going big in every area of our lives

The problem is we often look at regular everyday life as not “enough”

We use this attitude to justify sacrificing the important areas of our lives to reach a “pinnacle” of success

There are certain areas this attitude applies, but it can’t be in every area

Some men use this attitude to brag about the grind so they feel better about themselves

In the end, we often pick the wrong area to give everything we’ve got and ignore the important areas of our lives: Relationships, health, growth, financial wisdom

Momentum is what builds lasting success and we build momentum with small daily decisions

We want to build the daily habits of success that will give us a solid foundation for success

Once we build the habits, they become ingrained into our lives and a part of who we are as men

What are your top habits that pour into your long-term success?

What habits are you building that you can carry on your journey?

Your legacy is how you lived your life, not the reputation that follows you after you die

RESOURCES TO HELP YOU THRIVE AS A MAN

========================

Thriving Man Coaching Resources

4D MODEL FREE PDF

• Learn about the 4 fundamentals of a Successful Life

Discover OUR SPEAKING AND HOW WE HAVE EMPOWERED THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE ACROSS THE WORLD

Discouragement is easy to fall into in our society today. With the rise of social media and worldwide connectedness, we often find examples of guys who do things better than us. This means we have to fight against it actively. If we aren’t careful, we can fall into a place of discouragement where we stay busy but don’t live purposefully.

On today’s show, we discuss the cycles of discouragement and why we get to this place. As we recognize the mindset, we can begin to fight against it.

Many men get to a place of frustration and declare, “I’m going to CHANGE!”

Then they come up with some crazy plan which often ends in failure

This puts them right back to the start but with more frustration

They eventually develop a lack of belief in their ability to change

Our discouragement grows when we take everything in a hyper-personal way

“I’m fat because I’m a failure” “I’m poor because I’m lazy”

There is a place for taking personal responsibility, but does everything have to be personal?

We have to learn to separate who we are as men from what we do as men

Our sense of failure often derives from our Unrealistic expectations

We battle this by learning to approach setbacks differently

Defining the problem

Trading condemnation for curiosity: Curiosity asks, “Why I fail?”; Condemnation assumes it’s all our fault

Get help

Quit trying to fix multiple things to get better in

Pick one thing to get better at and focus your energy on that

Get curious about past failures and seek to learn from them instead of ignoring them

Quit trying to lone-wolf fix things in your life

RESOURCES TO HELP YOU THRIVE AS A MAN

========================

Thriving Man Coaching Resources

4D MODEL FREE PDF

• Learn about the 4 fundamentals of a Successful Life

Discover OUR SPEAKING AND HOW WE HAVE EMPOWERED THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE ACROSS THE WORLD

The lone wolf man is a persona that isn’t real. When you look at most movies about lone wolf men, they have a pretty sad life. Sure, they could kill people and win the day, but at what cost? There is also the reality that none of them became great warriors alone. The movies will often show a backstory where they had a guide train them for their adventures.

Too many men think they have to battle everything in their lives alone. They see it as a sign of weakness to ask for help. We want to show how this attitude hurts us and how we can overcome it and build strong resilient lives.

Pride

We idolize heroes of the past

The quest for glory and other people’s respect

We get weird by ourselves

We try to do too much

We get an attitude of everyone against me

We don’t trust

Our capacity won’t grow, by ourselves

Others can call us higher and push us

Serve Others

Avoid building a Loner Life

Seek to have real relationships and not just virtual ones

Quit buying the lie of doing it by yourself!

RESOURCES TO HELP YOU THRIVE AS A MAN

========================

Thriving Man Coaching Resources

4D MODEL FREE PDF

• Learn about the 4 fundamentals of a Successful Life

Discover OUR SPEAKING AND HOW WE HAVE EMPOWERED THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE ACROSS THE WORLD

On today’s show, we are talking about the reality of fatherlessness. Many men grew up without a father in the home, in a stepdad situation, or in a bad example of a father to follow. The men who grew up like this often don’t realize what they are missing because it wasn’t there.

We discuss the reality of fatherlessness and how it affects men, their families, and society. This discussion can help men discover what they can do to build up the barren areas of their lives that fatherlessness causes.

Many men grew up without a dad

This isn’t an excuse it’s a reality

2 extremes have come out of these “distortions”

The effemination of men

The extreme Alpha male

This reality has hurt families and society

Recognition is the 1st step

Too many men think it didn’t bother them but they have nothing to compare it to

Fight the common male appetites that drive so many men today

Don’t follow fads

Build your core values as a man

Develop a strong positive worldview

We all need to be a part of a team in our lives

Look for men who have the same values as you and build friendships with them

”Defense wins championships,” is a saying we often hear in football, but what about life? Should we live on defense or should we have an effective defense?

Today’s show discusses defense and how there is a good side and a bad side to defense. As men, we should have a good defense but not live on defense. Society encourages men to live on defense today and too many are doing it.

Let’s dive into what it means by looking at an Active Defense vs a Passive Defense.

• Intentional
• Guard your hearty
• Healthy living and choices
• Know your strengths and weaknesses
• Protect Priorities and Values
• Protect Relationships

• Path of least resistance
• Passenger seat of life
• Escapism
• Survivor Mode
• Lack of Priorities

RESOURCES TO HELP YOU THRIVE AS A MAN

========================

Thriving Man Coaching Resources

4D MODEL FREE PDF

Learn about the 4 fundamentals of a Successful Life

Discover OUR SPEAKING AND HOW WE HAVE EMPOWERED THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE ACROSS THE WORLD