If somebody's tuning in and they're like, "Well, I feel like I'm definitely avoidant," probably a lot of leaders, what, what are, what are they supposed to do about it?

Learning to be more personal in the context that you share with others is realistically the key target here, and that's...

That sounds like a big ask.

Let me be clear.

First you have to learn who is trustworthy and who is not.

The research on Kohlberg's morality scale says about 10 to 12% of people are fundamentally driven by doing right for the sake of right, even if they're punished for it.

So your window's about 10 to 12% of people.

That's scary.

Is there any equivalent for men?

There is.

Yes.

Okay.

Here's what it mostly is.

I'm trying to frame it.

People don't usually ask that.

it that you taught me about the role of vasopressin for men during sex?

And it's a failure of using your own theory of mind.

You're very right.

It's also, I've been studying a lot into mirroring neurons, especially when we're little children.

So when we're born, we have the amygdala and then we have a lot of mirroring neurons.

It's two of the only structures that are really fully formed at birth.

And our mirroring neurons, we're supposed to have mom.

Mom is supposed to be paying attention to us and, and, Looking at us and mirroring our expression to her so that we we feel interesting to people just by existing.

And again, you know, a lot of this could come from parenting problems too.

Husbands who complain about having zero sex have no idea how the female sex drive actually works, and the complaining makes it much worse

[laughs] My favorite thing is when couples come in and they haven't had sex in a year, and I ask why, and she looks at him and says, "'Cause he hasn't asked." And he says, "Well, I kinda hinted, and you just never seemed interested." And she says, "Well, when was the last time you spent time with me?" "Well, why would I spend time with you if you're not having sex with me?" And that right there is exactly the spiral.

Women, after one year, their sex drive switches from g- bonding with you mode to long-term stability and mate retention.

If you have given her the adequate emotional bonding, and if she has decent enough, secure enough attachment to receive that bonding, her sex drive will go way up, 'cause her brain says, "Keep this man around and have as many of his babies as I can.

We must have 15 babies in the next week." That's what her brain will say.

And I've seen couples, I've worked with couples in their 60s who come in, and sorry for this mental image, but they come in having very little sex, and they leave after a few sessions having sex three or four or five times a week in their 60s, because they improve their actual emotional intimacy, which leads to better non-sexual physical intimacy, which then leads overwhelmingly to sexual physical intimacy.

It should begin in your emotional bonding and connection.

What was, what was it that you taught me about the role of vasopressin for men during sex?

Is there any equivalent for men?

There is.

Yes.

Okay.

Here's what it mostly is.

I'm trying to frame it.

People don't usually ask that.

it that you taught me about the role of vasopressin for men during sex?

What are maybe a few things that they can do to increase that capacity for emotional regulation? I'm curious maybe what your clients have found like the most helpful tips that they can maybe use today.

I walk my clients through a three-prong approach.

First, we start using the physical body techniques, mental techniques, imagining yourself in a happy little meadow.

That does not work, right? Meditation doesn't work.

Affirmations don't work.

Prayer, I love prayer.

But at a certain level, it is difficult to even remember to pray or form a prayer.

I feel like we don't talk about this enough.

Why might they be this way?

So quiet disorganized.

What I often see is either a childhood upbringing with significant pieces of trauma that they don't identify as trauma at first.

A lot of abuse, a lot of screaming, yelling, family absolutely broken, sexual abuse.

That can be one piece.

It can be a family that is so overly stressed out that they are absolutely silenced and they have no idea how to predict what people want from them.

Some of them have Marine fathers and their fathers got out of the Marines, very traumatized, stressed, never knew when dad would explode and start screaming, but dad would never hit them.

Do you feel like these four steps of a healing and attachment disorder and creating secure attachment can be done within a month? Like how, what's the shortest time span that you've seen someone successfully restore secure

"Husbands who complain about having zero sex have no idea how the female sex drive actually works, and the complaining makes it much worse."

[laughs] My favorite thing is when couples come in and they haven't had sex in a year, and I ask why, and she looks at him and says, "Because he hasn't asked." And he says, "Well, I kinda hinted, and you just never seemed interested." And she says, "Well, when was the last time you spent time with me?" "Well, why would I spend time with you if you're not having sex with me?" And that right there is exactly the spiral.

Women, after one year, their sex drive switches from g- bonding with you mode to long-term stability and mate retention.

If you have given her the adequate emotional bonding, and if she has decent enough, secure enough attachment to receive that bonding, her sex drive will go way up, 'cause her brain says, "Keep this man around and have as many of his babies as I can.

We must have 15 babies in the next week." That's what her brain will say.

And I've seen couples, I've worked with couples in their 60s who come in, and sorry for this mental image, but they come in having very little sex, and they leave after a few sessions having sex three or four or five times a week in their 60s, because they improve their actual emotional intimacy, which leads to better non-sexual physical intimacy, which then leads overwhelmingly to sexual physical intimacy.

It should begin in your emotional bonding and connection.

What was, what was it that you taught me about the role of vasopressin for men during sex?

What does each part actually look like in daily life? Maybe we can apply one of the scenarios we've been talking about using this equation.

It's very simple.

Ownership means I control how I feel, which means I must control how I feel.

Many people don't understand that their nervous system is a physical, tangible piece of them, and that, yes, your logical brain diminishes in functioning and your emotional brain escalates, but your hindbrain, everything back there, the physical processes, that can decrease the agitation on your emotional brain if you use physical processes to manage your nervous system.

Most people try to think their way out of how they feel, and that's why it doesn't work.

You can't meditate, think, or any of that way out of how you feel.

When you use physical processes, tensing and releasing muscles, vagus nerve stimulation and vagus breathing, intense cardio, when you use these pieces, that's how you manage your nervous system, and you bring it down from 9 out of 10 agitation to 2 out of 10.

Of course.

Mm

... or losing him.

Women who actually have clear expectations and explain why, women who are building something like a legacy with him, women who are very clear that they want commitment and why.

The why, the context, all of that.

Women who can be transparent and have accountability, loving and kind, but firm and exact.

Clear, measurable communication as if you are in business.

That's what men need, and when they have that, they're shocked because you explain context the way no one else ever has.

What do you feel about that?

... yourself? Yeah.

Num- number one is learning that this exists, 'cause most people, your nervous system's in a state that says, "Love and loyalty don't exist, so I have to earn their, those things temporarily from other people by performing, and then I have to protect myself from other people leaving me or betraying me or abandoning me, so I have to be hypervigilant all the time." And this creates what we call attachment fatigue.

It creates ongoing constant exhaustion and burnout in the person 'cause they can never, ever relax.

Now, if you think that you are worthless on the inside, you believe you are not a good person and that you don't deserve love, and you have to earn your connection from other people endlessly by performing forever, and you fear abandonment in particular, that's anxious attachment.

Nice guy syndrome, like you correctly intuited there.

That's anxious attachment.

Now, that doesn't mean you have anxiety.

And I, yeah, why do we want it so badly?

When you look at the top 1% of mother-child relationships where they have the strongest, most connected, most healthy relationship, what is it about the top 1% of mother-child relationships that make them so strong?

Three things.

One is she has, that woman has looked at her own relationship with her own mother first.

Most women are coming from their relationships with their mom.

And the messaging was, I hate motherhood.

It's hell.

It's awful.

Out of everything I'm describing, how would you design, if you think you can, the ideal situation that women should strive for?

Mm.

His wife says, "Why don't you ever talk to me?" And he says, "I don't know what you're asking me for." He, he doesn't know what she's even asking.

He looks like an irritable tyrant in the house, and he looks like he's holding out on everyone, but he has no idea what they're even asking of him.

It, it looks like the wife who's sitting there w- crying herself to sleep at night after her husband's fallen asleep because she feels completely unseen, uncared for, and she thinks it's her fault 'cause she's not trying hard enough.

She hasn't said the right words.

She's overperforming, and she's been burned out for five years.

She takes care of the kids.

I mean, these are the two primary relationships in our lives, right, that, that are so formative.

And now tell us how we can build up and get out of that.

Yeah, I hear that loud and clear.

That's usually where they come to me.

Sometimes he's just had an affair or he's come very close to one.

Someone has tried to have an affair with him and he's pushed it back.

He is depressed, but he would never use that word.

He feels meaningless and joyless in his life.

okay the

For somebody who may not know, what are those four levels of safety? And can you give one little thing for each of them so that people can start to look

for it? Oh, absolutely.

Physical safety is mandatory, right? In the old days, it was protect me from saber-toothed tigers.

Now it's protect me from the world, from existential stress and threats, from STDs.

Don't bring those home.

But if we're out in public, keep your head on a swivel so I don't have to.

If there's a bump in the night, you get up and you go take care of it so I don't have to, right? Physical safety is still there.

And it's like when men haven't been taught the safety and the women haven't been taught the boundaries, when you come into contact with a manipulative man, no wonder you end up becoming a victim of that.

... you end up becoming a victim of that.

And we all have to learn that, right? I've got, so I've gotAn older son and, and then my daughter's right below him, the two oldest, and I've raised him to be a leader, and I've raised her to also be a leader in her own way.

But he's the oldest, so I say, "If he ever..." Like if, if he ever does like kids do, they fight and they bicker and they're, they're mean to each other, I pull him aside while she's standing there and I go, "Buddy, when you're bigger, when you're older, do you want her to listen to you as the older brother?" He goes, "Yeah." I said, "Do you wanna be able to protect her and she'll listen to you and, and..." "Yeah." And I say, "Well, look, stop and look at your sister right now.

Does she look like she feels safe with you?" And he looks at her, she's, like, crying.

And I go, "Does she look like she feels safe with you?" And he goes, "Well, I guess not." And I say, "Okay.

Well, do you think that when it matters she's gonna listen to you or trust you?" And he's like, his, his face just, he goes like...

And it hits him, like, "I don't know." And I go, "Well, let's ask her.

Mm-hmm.

Okay, so you say, number one, one day you will look at your partner and feel nothing.

Yes.

Explain.

Inevitably, this day comes.

I'll never forget.

There was a day where my wife and I had, we had two kids already.

And she was having really tough postpartum depression.

Where can people find you, your YouTube, your events, sign up for all the stuff you've got?

So we've got number one: we think intimacy is a single event.

I will say this, most women think that being intimate with a man is one big flash in the pan, but intimacy is not just one event.

Intimacy is a cluster of everything.

Sex should be the culmination of all the love and care that you have.

I teach the oxytocin pipeline, the bonding hormone.

It begins with safety, and that opens the wheel for oxytocin.

And then there's emotional intimacy, sharing and talking and laughing and feeling that connection, leading into non-sexual touch of hugs and kisses and fun and, and all of that.

No.

So we've got number one, the space test.

Yes, he'll begin taking space.

This is usually when he's stressed.

Ethical avoidant men don't take space because they don't like you or to punish you.

Manipulative avoidant men take space to punish you and hurt you because you asked for something.

Ethical avoidant men, they're with you, they're talking and they're sharing and connecting.

But remember, closeness is danger.

Now moving on to the autonomy test.

Give me an example.

Absolutely.

Most women will wait 30 years before saying anything and then file for divorce, and the husband will say, "You never said anything was wrong." And she says, "I hinted for 30 years." Most women don't have the guts to create consequences because they think the relationship is nothing but feelings, and part of this is not their fault.

They don't feel safe, and the man has failed to provide the four levels of safety that are mandatory.

So there's a problem there.

But consequences would be if your husband is looking at pornography and you've made an agreement not to, and it bothers you and you've told him this, and he says, "I won't," and then you find it and he has, you don't pretend it hasn't happened or say, "Hey, this thing upset me," and then go have sex with him the next day.

You don't do that.

How did that become our base, though?

Yeah.

Great.

So when we have insecure attachment, what tends to happen is that we are low on several bonding hormones and neurotransmitters.

There's an important bonding hormone that makes us feel loved and safe and a sense of belonging.

It's called oxytocin.

Oxytocin releases when a mother gives birth, when she breastfeeds, when you hold your, your spouse's hand.

It's what compels us to kiss our child on the forehead, to want to hold somebody, to want to snuggle with them, and it releases when we feel loved and safe.

Yeah.

Say more.

It exposes all of the weaknesses in the couple.

He's already emotionally starved and gets no touch.

She's now through pregnancy, probably not touched him that much, and now has a new baby that she's fully invested into.

He feels tremendous pressure to perform and take care of everybody, but he feels more alone than he's ever felt.

And everyone in the world yells at him if he ever says, I feel lonely.

How dare you? Shut up.

And he said, but if you didn't respect me, I could never be with you.

Say more.

It exposes all of the weaknesses in the couple.

He's already emotionally starved and gets no touch.

She's now through pregnancy, probably not touched him that much and now has a new baby that she's fully invested into.

He feels tremendous pressure to perform and take care of everybody, but he feels more alone than he's ever felt.

And everyone in the world yells at him.

If he ever says, I feel lonely.

And he said, but if you didn't respect me, I could never be with you.

How do you know the difference between someone being truly romantic and just using those tactics as a way to manipulate you?

A lot of women are listening right now asking the same question.

How do I know? You need to cooperate with other human beings.

You're not going to know in yourself alone for at least a year.

His novelty dopamine will fall off a cliff at about seven months, but he's going to continue to play nice till 12 months.

You won't know.

And if you sleep with them, you're going to get drunk on an oxytocin and connections.

So what's the difference between someone who gets anxious and so they control things to lower their anxiety versus someone who is manipulative and they're using that control element as a way to make sure that they trap you?

So how do you know the difference between someone being truly romantic and just using those tactics as a way to manipulate you?

A lot of women are listening right now asking the same question.

How do I know? You need to cooperate with other human beings.

You're not going to know in yourself alone for at least a year.

His novelty dopamine will fall off a cliff at about seven months, but he's gonna continue to play nice till 12 months.

You won't know.

And if you sleep with him, you're gonna get drunk on an oxytocin and connections.

So what's the difference between someone who gets anxious and so they control things to lower their anxiety versus someone who is manipulative and they're using that control element as a way to make sure that they trap you?