#241 The art of masculinity and how to be consistent with who you truly are as a man, with Johnny Elsasser.

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EPISODE TRANSCRIPTION

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Please note that while an effort is made to provide an accurate transcription, errors and omissions may be present. No part of this transcription can be referenced or reproduced without permission.

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Johnny Elsasser  0:00  
When you look at the definition of masculinity, it is very vague and what you can see from that definition, it's not conceptually transferred from society to society. So when people want to say a man is this or a man is that you're being very subjective, in your view of what masculinity is.

Agi Keramidas  0:28  
You are listening to personal development mastery podcast where you will find inspirational conversations and actionable takeaways to master yourself and improve your life. I'm your host Agi Keramidas and my mission is to inspire you to grow, stand out and take action towards a purposeful and fulfilling life. In this podcast, I invite myself inside the minds of successful entrepreneurs, authors, spiritual teachers, thought leaders, people who share their journey, milestones and failures for you to be inspired to grow. In each episode, you will find actionable takeaways that you can implement right now, so make sure you follow the podcast to get them as soon as they are released. I remind my regular listeners here that for a short while the podcast will have one episode a week rather than two.

Agi Keramidas  1:29  
Today's episode is about masculinity. Many of us have built in expectation in our mind as to what a man is. But what is the real art of masculinity? Let's dive right in. In today's show, I am delighted to speak with Johnny Elsasser. Johnny, you are a former Special Operation US Army Ranger who turned men's development and leadership coach After embarking on the journey of your own development and working through your own shadows. You are the host of The Art of masculinity podcast and you are on a mission to help men reconnect with their authentic masculinity and be consistent with who they truly are. Not what society expects them to be. Johnny, welcome to Personal Development master what a joy it is to have you with me today.

Johnny Elsasser  2:30  
Yeah, this has been I've been looking forward to this year. And I've had a great couple like brief conversations. And I've just been so excited to get back on here with you and, and chat for a bit. So appreciate you having I'm having me on the show. And I appreciate what you're doing putting out into the world to really help people have their own identification with personal development. So thank you.

Agi Keramidas  2:53  
Likewise, because you are a fellow podcaster, and also with lots of interesting content out there. And you know, I'm very excited about this particular conversation because I'm at 230 Plus episodes. So when we're recording this, and I haven't specifically discussed masculinity I have, you know, gone in sight that I want to wait but not directly have this as a topic. So I think it was a longer video. So it's great to discuss this today. Before we go there, the art of masculinity, as you say, which is really what I'm going to focus this conversation on, I would like to ask you to give us a little bit of, you know, some background to set the tone for this conversation. So you have a military background, I don't know, I will let you you know, maybe share whatever you feel it's relevant to the realising what masculinity truly is. And this, but I will leave it to you.

Johnny Elsasser  4:03  
Yeah, no, I appreciate it. And I think there's there's a dual concept here between person personal development and masculinity, Right. but predominantly, because you know, obviously your show being personal development, mastery. Personal Development has a connotation that really kind of lends towards more of the feminine side of things, right and more women are in the personal development space than men. But part of that was the block of from masculinity. Even for myself, I, you know, former Special Operations I used to protect the US ambassador to Iraq, I spent about 10 years in and out of the Middle East. And I was in a very alpha male environment. And not only that, I held myself to a very high standard being part of an elite group in the US forces. And so having those concepts really underlying for who I was as demand because it was really a lot of my formative years. As a young man, I got into the military at 17 years old. A lot of that so a lot of My foundation was predicated off these very Alpha environments. And to that concept, there's a lot of positive things that came out of that in confidence and establishing who I was and who I knew I was at those times. But then there's a lot of negative things that impacted that. And that's the judgement of others. That was the expectation that people weren't at my level, which, you know, blocked me from having friends and getting close to the family and things like that, if it was, if it wasn't my brothers from the same community, I wouldn't really have an easy time, you know, connecting with people, even though I'm a very social person. So a lot of those concepts really, you know, kind of contradict one another. And I saw from that environment, not only that, but when, you know, men would go home, my brothers would go home, they'd have a really hard time interacting and integrating back with their family members. And in that concept, they didn't have the ability to really adjust even with their children. So when I started to think back a lot of conversations I had, and then I started to think to myself, when I was transitioning to the real world, I was like, Wow, I'm having a hard time, I didn't know my purpose, I didn't know who I was showing up as as a man in the world, because I was holding on to a past version of me, that no longer really had a place fully, he didn't fully have a place in the transition to the quote, unquote, real world. A lot of the hyper vigilance created negativity created a lot of bad habits in the sense of putting myself in positions where I would speak negatively about, you know, situations that could flourish into really positive situations, I was putting expectations on things that didn't necessarily need to be there. So I struggled with that for a while. And it hit me about six months after I got into the states. And shortly after that, I ended up in a divorce because of just a negative relationship predicated off the fact that I didn't know who I was, as well. So we had a divorce. And in that I kind of hit my rock bottom where I was drinking way too much. I was still working out all the time, because I was part of who I was, which really helped me. And I think that kept me afloat. But I started to go down a negative, you know, road of my own version of masculinity because I could no longer find out who he was. And so as I went through that divorce, and I started to talk to a friend who's now my beautiful wife, at the time, she was a good friend of mine, and she was helping me out kind of, you know, passing me off self development books and things like that, and saying, Hey, listen to this podcast, or watch this documentary. And I was like, you know, as a guy, especially from an alpha background, I was like, I'm not gonna listen to these guys. Like, who are these guys to tell me who I'm supposed to be as a man right? Like, complete judgement immediately. And this is where I think that that alpha masculinity intertwines with personal development, because a lot of men, even though they could use the assistance in realising you know, their own shortcomings, they don't want to step foot into that, because they're like, Who is this person to say anything to me, they don't know my life. But at the end of it, that person has something to give them that could be a tool, it could be a concept, it could be something that changes them forever, just even a switch in their perception. But I blocked that for a long time. And I didn't listen to those people. And I didn't read the books. I wasn't, you know, on here listening to you, Aggie or anybody else I was I was like, no, these guys don't know what they're talking about. Well, I finally grabbed one book, and it was Dr. Wayne Dyer's books, excuses be gone. And the way Dr. Wayne Dyer writes is he was a very educated man, but he was a very, you know,

Johnny Elsasser  8:45  
you know, just face forward man, he would speak directly in the way that he wrote. And it was the punch in the stomach that I needed, I was making excuses of why I didn't want to be in personal development, or why I didn't want to look to these tools and concepts that were being passed off. And I had to come to a realisation that, wow, I was actually a lot weaker mentally than I thought I was. And even though I had been through so much in my life, I was very weak because I couldn't deal with my own darkness. I couldn't deal with my own shadows in the sense of being able to confront them and ask questions. And so when I finally started to do that, it just opened the floodgates, I was like, I need more, I need more, I need to I need to read this, I need to do that. And so I started to do that and understand more and more about what could really help us moving forward as individuals and especially as men because I knew the blocks I was that guy. I was the guy that you know, I'm trying to get through even in my own show, I'm trying to get through to him because I know that on the other side for him his greatness, and that's what I see. And, and so, you know, that took me on a path that is self development, leadership to me Having the podcast being on here with great individuals like yourself. So that all took me in that route. And that's where I, that's where I ended up now really trying to help men discover themselves through the ability to really question themselves.

Agi Keramidas  10:15  
Wow. Okay. That's amazing. Thanks, Johnny, for this answer, I will, there is one thing that I want to clarify with you, because you mentioned it a few times, and maybe some people listening to this right now might relate even more if, if it was a bit more clear, you mentioned quite a few times the term alpha male, and you also talked about expectations as a result. So can you give some maybe brief description of what kind of expectations were there involved in this alpha male that prevented you, you know, from doing personal development, or from having friends that were outside of your, you know, your circle, as you were saying?

Johnny Elsasser  11:03  
It's a great question. And it for me, it's pretty simple. People were the people that I was starting to interact with, when I came back from overseas born at my standard, because they've never gone through elite training, they've never understood what it was like to be pushed to the limits physically and mentally. And so therefore, I already felt like I was pretty much better than them. Because I had been to this elite standard. And that's where a lot of the expectations of, okay, if you and I went out to go have a beer, and we were just meeting if you said anything like, Oh, I've done this in my life, I'd be like, Yeah, whatever man, like, okay, whatever, you haven't done anything compared to so there was that level of expectation that other men just weren't at my standard unless they were in the same field as me unless they were, they were actually Special Operations, guys. So that's where that came in, and the alpha male. For people, it's just, it's really a term that's given to men who are kind of the dominant force in majority of scenarios, and people look to them to lead, that's typically an alpha male, now there's different, there's different subsections of that alpha male, and there's like the false alpha that I see a lot today with men. And they can be perceived by people who aren't leaders as alphas, but really, they're not alphas in and of themselves. But that's kind of the concept of alpha male, somebody who's typically in a role that's perceived as a leader controlling the the environment, or the conversation has kind of this, you know, maybe even an energetic pole to themselves, a room with other people. So that's what I would say an alpha is for anybody that's kind of like trying to understand that concept.

Agi Keramidas  12:48  
Sure. That's great. Thank you for this explanation, I think he's very useful the way to say it. So let's talk then about the art of masculinity. Because it is intriguing very much both in the two terms. So in the masculinity and the art, I mean, I will start with the masculinity. And you know what, again, I'm going to give like a little preface to this, because it's sometimes many words or terms have been used without, and many people have misconceptions about them. And I suppose you will agree with me that masculinity is one of those terms that not everyone understands what, what it really is. So I just looked it up, I will read you what masculinity is. So and then tell me what it is for you then. So the dictionary says that masculinity is a set of attributes, behaviours and roles associated with men. That's a simple version of it. So tell me the journey about masculinity for years and with your realisations.

Johnny Elsasser  14:00  
Well, I love that you actually brought up the definition of it because I'm, you know, I'm in the works of writing a book. And in that I actually go into the definition of masculinity. And the beautiful thing about masculinity, or the beautiful thing about understanding etymology, which is the foundation of words is that when you look at the definition of masculinity, it is very vague, because and what you can see from that definition, it's not conceptually transferred from society to society. So when people want to say a man is this or a man is that you're being very subjective, in your view of what masculinity is. That's, that's the concept of why I love the name of my podcast, the art of masculinity and why I love diving into this, because of the fact that when we look at masculinity in and of itself, it doesn't transfer from society to society, society, and it doesn't even really transfer regionally within the US. United States, like if you look at somebody from from New York, and you pluck them out of New York City, and you put them down in Alabama, a definition of a man in Alabama is going to be very different from a definition of and vice versa, if I'm plug somebody from Alabama and put them in New York City, so in reality, masculinity doesn't even transfer regionally, let alone cross culturally. So for us to try to create a standardised version of this and then hold all men to the standardised version, it is a is a very misconstrued concept that is causing, in my opinion, which is causing the massive influx in depression and sadness and suicides in men worldwide. And that's why I believe that we have to really understand when it comes to masculinity, that it does become an art, it becomes a canvas for us to paint you really who we decide to be and are owning authentically within society, and showing that to be a positive influence on the younger generations in the form of what a man can do, and what he's capable of. And so that's why for me, it was very important that you lay down the groundwork of putting the definition out there. Because when people hear that, if you ask them, hey, you know, what do you think about that? They're like, wow, that it's very interesting, because it doesn't have any roots in standardisation. And it doesn't.

Agi Keramidas  16:36  
Let's talk about this standardisation or this expectations that there exist about men that they have to be a certain way or behave a certain way which you gave a very good example with the two different regions. It's very different what is expected of a man. But if we were to talk about this idea that many men mistakenly have created, how can one start to recognise that, you know, maybe there is something different, there is something that is not right here, it is not. The fact that it is expected of me doesn't mean that I must do it, because I imagine.

Johnny Elsasser  17:25  
Yeah, I mean, the first thing is, is I ask people, you know, we have to start with awareness, what feels good to us and what doesn't feel good. If I find a lot of anxiety or pressure and trying to show up a certain way, I can start to, you know, relatively assume that that is not in alignment with the the deep person inside of me, the man that is inside of me. And if I'm trying to conform to that, and I still don't enjoy it in any way, shape or form, then I have to consider the fact that that may not be something that is part of my personality trait as a man. And so it may not be in my toolbox. And so when you're trying, it's the old adage of putting a square peg into a round hole. If you feel that way in your life, you can start to safely assume that that may not be in alignment with the man in your heart or the man in your soul. And so okay, then the evaluation gets to come. Well, what does that man look like? Or what are the features of that man? And that's the start of the building blocks of finding the foundational masculinity within you, if you write down the traits of what he looks like, and what feels good to you as that man and showing up like, because this is the question I give the men I coach, this is the question that I give to a lot of men out there in general when I talked to them, and that is asking them well, does that serve you or does it not? And when you leave a situation currently, as the man that you show up, as are there times that you feel shame, regret, guilt, embarrassment, because majority of men where they're going to feel that way when they show up the way that they are right now if they haven't currently done the evaluation of truly what is in alignment with them. And so that's the start is getting the awareness of what is serving you and what is not serving you and what is allowing you to exit not just enter but exit any situation, looking back saying you know what, I'm really happy with the man that showed up there. He was great. I love that guy. And I have no shame or regret in the what he said how he acted how people perceived him. I feel really embodied in that masculine figure and I feel great about how he showed up. And so that is where the power comes. is into, okay, that evaluation has to be that awareness and evaluation has to coincide with one another. And that's where we can truly start in seeing that

Agi Keramidas  20:11  
like very logical, you presented it with awareness and evaluation. And you also said just now to start with implies that it is something ongoing. It is askew linearity, like growth or like personal development, it is ongoing process. It's not like now why masculine it's done in the next day or so. Tell me, what are the main challenges the main struggles you see your clients having in terms of or as a result of the the idea of masculinity that they should have?

Johnny Elsasser  20:52  
I would say this is probably the biggest one I find guys struggling with. But it's, it's really interesting, because it's so broad, but it's confidence, and confidence. It's like, I can't hand you confidence, I can hand you the tools to have awareness and evaluation, but I can't hand you confidence it takes you to do that process to really establish it. So that's one of the biggest ones. And then the other one is them identifying that they have triggers that resemble maybe some male figure in their life, because it's not always our father's you know, when we look back, you know, Dr. Bruce Lipton talks about this when we go over epigenetics, but typically from what happens is from ages two to eight, we're in with what's called theta Brainwave. And in theta Brainwave. That's where hypnosis takes place. That's where we're incredibly subjective and malleable. And so from two to eight, if we think about that, well, a lot of our predispositions as boys, young boys, which is going to develop into how we act as men, it's imprinted on us by who we look up to. Now I say, who we look up to, because then if we go further into social sciences, or psycho psychological science, and we talk about Bandura, social learning theory, it's not necessarily our fathers, it could be any male figure that we look up to, or even female figure. So and that is because and I say this, and I love Bandura social learning theory, because of the fact that at a young age, we don't understand words, we only understand movements, tones, we understand facial features, and body language, we don't understand words. So what's imprinted on us is what we see. And we don't understand who's the important figures in our lives other than food, right? Like, that's the one thing like, how do you how do we get food, but we don't understand the important figures. So we associate that at certain points in our lives. And when we do that, that helps us to develop our no go and go zones of who to be and how to act. And that is from that two to eight. Now, obviously, we're still impressionable, after eight years old, it doesn't mean that it stops. But that's when we're at our most malleable state, that's when we're at our most impressionable state, because we're having a coding system written within our brains. That is not of our own design or cognitive ability, it's subconsciously being written. And that's where we have to dive into when we're talking about finding this awareness, and then creating the evaluation, we have to understand a lot of our foundation was written for us, not by us. And that's where we, as men have to say, Okay, so now that I understand that, what is actually serving me and what's not serving me, if I got handed something from my father, or my uncle or somebody else that I was, you know, very, that was very impressionable to me when I was young, if that was given to me, but I don't really like that now. Like, I'm an adult, or I'm, I'm a, you know, an adolescent, and that does just doesn't feel good to me, well, then that can be thrown out. But we have to give ourselves permission to really become aware of that and then evaluate it.

Agi Keramidas  24:06  
That's great. How important do you think it is to work with that period of your life between two and eight, you know, to do some kinds of therapy or practices to, you know, work with that shadow part. Do you think that is very important?

Johnny Elsasser  24:25  
I think, you know, there's, there's, and I know, you know, this but and you probably tell your community this but there's very different layers to trauma, and there's very different layers to how that's imprinted within our psyche. And so I would say from a prefrontal cortex or tax or a con, conscious level, I would say that it's very important to go into those years and understand what you remember from that to then address maybe why you get triggered with your kids or why you get triggered with your spouse or what Certain situations trigger you to react a certain way. Because consciously we can identify those moments in a lot of ways of trauma. And then there's obviously with the different layers of trauma. There's the subconscious. And then there's the middle brain level, which even hits before the subconscious, you know, brain. And so when we have those, those are different structures to go into. But I would say yes, first consciously going into some form of therapy, in some way, shape, or form, or, or even even if you're open to working with hypnosis, those are really beautiful tools to help you kind of start to peel back the onion, discover more about yourself and then see what you do want to rewrite.

Agi Keramidas  25:44  
That's great. It is you gave me exactly the answer I was looking for, because I was about to ask you, any in practice, but you you also already we talked about the hypnosis, and also the first consciously to recall and work with that, which is the as simple as it is, I wonder how many people have actually done it, as you know, to think about it and write some things down. Johnny, I want also to discuss with you something that the emotional side of masculinity, because I suppose this is also one of the things that many men have trouble with expressing their emotions. Because again, and maybe it is related to what you were saying earlier, it is expected from a masculine man not to show certain emotions. So do you want to give me your your thoughts on this the emotion, the masculine, the emotional side of masculinity?

Johnny Elsasser  26:50  
Yeah, and this is a great topic. I love this topic, because I come at it from a way that might be very different from other people. But let's go with the most mainstream, we'll start with that. And the first is obviously, majority of men, at least in Western culture are taught to shove down emotion like that it's you suppressing emotion becomes normal because of the fact that men aren't supposed to have those things. Because they're, they're perceived as being the rock or the protector. And if that protector shows emotion, well, then they become emasculated either to the enemy, or they become emasculated to the people that love them, who then lose trust and faith in who they are, and how they're going to keep them safe. So that's the simplest concept of where that happens with men shoving down emotion. But the other one that not so many people talk about is the you know, how are you and I conversing right now? Well, we expand over our vocabulary, we expand our knowledge around subjects, well, how many people have actually expanded their vocabulary around emotions? I think there's a there was a study, and I'll get the numbers, I'll get the numbers incorrect. But there's studies that have been done on the personal vocabulary between men and women on emotions. And actually women didn't score terribly higher, but men scored very low. I mean, I think it was like, the average dude has like a vocabulary of like, four emotions are five emotions, like they can only list that off. And then women were somewhere around like, eight or 10. But you know, how many, you know how many words are actually associated with emotions? It's like over 250 words, and we know a friend, not even really a fraction of that. And so how do we really convey emotion when we don't understand the vocabulary, the expansive vocabulary and how to convey those things. If I only know four ways to express my emotions, it's going to be very hard for me to convey to you what's going on and for you to understand what's going on in me, and then we're going to get it wrong. And then it's going to be all jacked up, we're going to get both infuriated and frustrated, and then it's going to we're going to turn away from each other, right? And this is what happens and, and so when when men can't really discuss emotion part of it. And I think this is for people in general, is that because our vocab we're almost emotionally illiterate? You know? And how much do we really expand on that? And so I tell people is like, well, you know, let's go in to diving into to expanding on emotions, let's go into the vocabulary on him and associate those words with feelings because then you get no real truly, that's when you get no emotional intelligence or EQ. You know, when you can do that. You can understand where you're coming from when certain situations arise, which allows you to get more into awareness. But then I can also have empathy. And empathy is very important for me to really connect with people and to allow them to see my emotional side. So that's where the real conversation happens. But we can't get to empathy when we don't even understand the emotions that are going on in us, because we can't understand what's going on and other people.

Agi Keramidas  30:04  
That's a fantastic topic. And I have recently been doing one practice as part of my morning journaling, which I do every day, I have a so called Emotional vocabulary. So it's a sheet of paper that has, I don't remember how many they are maybe around 100. So in different categories, and every day, I look through the list and pick two that represents how I'm feeling that moment. So it is a great practice, because it's great to talk about, you know, expanding our emotional vocabulary from four or eight, which is, it's terrible. If you if you think about it, it's really terrible. What, yeah, maybe a tool like that might be helpful for someone to actually expand it. Otherwise, it might be difficult to figure out how I can add more, you know, words in that vocabulary.

Johnny Elsasser  31:05  
So yeah, I mean, that's, that's why kids cry, because kids can't express their desires or their needs. That's why babies do that. And even toddlers, right? And so essentially, we're all toddlers in an adult body, and we're sitting here, and we can't understand the emotion. So we can't understand how to connect and we can't understand how to release. And so that becomes that becomes a big part of the conversation that people leave out when they talk about emotions. And yeah, it's okay for men to have emotions, we all understand that and everybody wants big men can cry, we get that we understand that. But that's the simplest version. Like that's a very rudimentary thing. What we're talking about is the fact that not only are you entitled to emotions, which we all are, but you're entitled to actually know what they are and to be able to convey them. And that's where the expansion happens in my in my personal opinion.

Agi Keramidas  31:55  
That's one that's the Thank you. I was just writing this down this what you just said about understanding the emotions really understanding and to give them a name, that's what I came to, it came to my mind when you fill in something, name it, what is it or maybe position it in the body as well, because they come, they don't just appear if you really look carefully, it has a place in the body and there are characteristics so being that that awareness that you said earlier, and the valuation that I believe is one of the most important things one can do regardless of you know, whether he's a man horses a woman, it is understanding how our emotional state is, in the present moment. Very important.

Johnny Elsasser  32:46  
Yeah, and it's a lot of it too is like an emotion is sparked in this is what people don't necessarily understand either, is emotion is typically sparked by a thought that you have that you've associated with potentially a past situation in your life. And so what happens is you're actually putting an inference on somebody else's intentions, which means that then it's provoking or a situations intention, intentions external to you. And then you're actually associating that which is then creating an emotional response within your body. And if you can name the emotion, well, I'm feeling very melancholy today. Why am I feeling melancholy? Oh, man, I didn't do my evening routine last night, I woke up a little later than normal. And now my brains kind of operating differently. So you know, maybe I need to think about how I can get myself back out of this state before I maybe speak to my spouse, and then that turns into a very dreary conversation, whatever it is. But when you go through that process, you're able to challenge first here, because as you know, everything starts here. But you're able to challenge yourself first before you start challenging the external world.

Agi Keramidas  34:01  
That's one of the mistake. Johnny mobile is very keen on giving to the listener, something actionable. And we've already talked about quite a few, I believe, but if you were to give to the listener right now, one actionable item, something they can implement right now, tomorrow morning, what would you say?

Johnny Elsasser  34:26  
Man, I have I have so many and I want to give and I know that you've you've already probably hammered into them journaling and how important that is for people. So I want to I want to deviate from that because they already hearing that. So I would say the importance of giving yourself 10 to 15 minutes of silence every morning and allow now you know people obviously we refer to that as meditation. Meditation can take many forms. But if you can give yourself 10 to 15 minutes of silence so your phone is away. From you, you're not dealing with kids, you're not dealing with a spouse, you're not on the computer for work. And I say the morning because of the fact that that's the calibration for how our day is going to go. So if we can allow ourselves 15 minutes of silence, where were we just might be sitting outside with a coffee, drinking coffee and staring out at something that's beautiful out there. But give yourself that moment of not talking, and not listening. But listening to what's going on here in your head and in your heart and in your body. And give that to yourself. Because those that actionable tool, if you can actually put that into, into practice, every day is going to calibrate you to yourself, to start doing awareness to start feeling grounded, and to proceed with your day, having an equilibrium within yourself and who you are showing up that morning, when we get into chaos every morning, we are never settled. And that's what causes a lot of dysfunction and disorientation throughout the day. But if we give ourselves those moments of just like I said, 10 minutes, 15 minutes of just silence, nothing, nothing that you're involved in, nobody's involved with you. And give yourself that I can guarantee everybody it is going to change their day. And it causes a disruption in a normal pattern. And then in then it becomes a pattern for your brain to calibrate every morning. So when you start this, you're actually going to see a lot of cool things happen in your day, if you pay attention. And then as you create this as a habit, you're going to start to see a balance to yourself, where you actually can be very in tune at the start of your day, or even throughout your day, if you take 10 minutes of silence, say in the late afternoon, you're going to feel yourself go back to that calibration and help yourself reset, because you've already trained your mind and your body to respond to that in a certain way. So it has a very profound effect. And it sounds so simple. But I question everybody, how many of you actually do this right? And, and that's the big question. But that would be my biggest actionable tool on top of what you you already hammer in obviously some great tools on the show. So

Agi Keramidas  37:21  
this is fantastic. And I also loved how you described it as silence rather than meditation even it could be the same old note. But I like very much because it is a more. It doesn't have any other implications. Also, people don't think about in a certain way. So fantastic. And it is, I will second that that is an awesome piece of advice. And also what you said in the end towards maybe in the middle of the day or later on. It is not just for the morning, it is very amazingly powerful and simple. So absolutely. Absolutely. Johnny journey. This has been a truly fascinating conversation. I have some quickfire questions, which I will ask you in a moment. But before we go there, where do you want to direct people who want to find out more about you? Who is it that you work with? And also, if you want to share a word about your podcast, because it is it always fascinates me, you know, when I speak with your fellow podcasters

Johnny Elsasser  38:29  
ya know, i Great, thank you for giving me the platform, Aggie and I appreciate again being on here and having this conversation with you. Such a lovely person and you have such a great, great attitude about you. So I just love this conversation very much I appreciate that. You guys can really find me on Instagram is where I hang out the most which is just Johnny dot L. Sasser and l SAS or E L S A S S E R and then you can head over to my website, John L sasser.com. That's where he got all the information of upcoming events, the podcast, any any things that are coming up as far as programmes or anything you can dive into in the ecosystem. And as far as the podcast goes, the art of masculinity is it's a passion of mine. I love it. Because I love the fact that we have a lot of men on there who are very and we have some women on there but they typically every is everything centralised around masculinity. So typically, it's women who have worked with men in some professional capacity or been in an alpha environment. So they get on there and kind of discuss that element to themselves. And so, with the podcast, though, it's really opening the door of what it looks like to be truly an embodied and aware man. And a lot of these men who have been professional athletes and business moguls and former Special Operations really go into the struggle Was that they've had, and it gives men permission to understand that that is okay to have that. And it's okay to talk about it. And it's okay to be vulnerable and say, Yeah, like that was something that I really struggled with. And it was very hard to get through. And here's how I progressed through that. And I still work on those things. It's the podcast really is an open A, it gives an opening to men to understand that they're not alone in their problems, because most men are not almost like and I say this to guys, even the deepest, darkest thing that you don't think any man is struggling with out there, I can pretty much promise you, there are a lot of men who have that same deepest, darkest struggle. And I'm telling you, I've heard this, I've heard these things. And I was like, it was even shocked me when I first started coaching, I was like, Holy crap, like, you guys have the same problem. And it's a pretty, like, deep problem that I wouldn't think would be that common, but it is. And so it's just under it gives men the permission to understand that they're not alone as well. So that's really the podcast, and then who I work with is predominantly men. So I work with men in coaching, as far as one on one coaching, I have group courses for them. And then I host events for men. Because I truly believe that, you know, building a tribe for men is very important. And when they can allow themselves to get into communities, whether in person, or online. And they're surrounded by like minded individuals who are trying to better themselves, it really raises the vibration of the men together and allows them to see something different in themselves and say, Wow, I have brothers out there that I can come to and be vulnerable with an open with. So that's kind of the spiel across the board.

Agi Keramidas  41:53  
That's fantastic journey. Thank you very much. Let me ask you some quickfire questions or so to wrap things up. So my first one is What does personal development mean to you?

Johnny Elsasser  42:07  
Well, I mean, I like I said, I'm a big person of Etymology and personal development, I look at the foundation. And it just it's it's talking about your own personal development, what is important to you, and how you're improving every day, because there's no comparison between URI. What personal development is, to me is that I'm 1% better tomorrow than I was the day before. And that is personal development is a continuous process that's never ending. And it should be fun. It should be fun, because you're learning yourself. You're you're developing yourself, you're making conscious awareness around who you are, and who you show up as in this world, and the perceptions that you carry. And to me, that's personal development.

Agi Keramidas  42:53  
There was some Yeah, and hypothetical question. If you could go back in time and meet your 18 year old self, what's one piece of advice you would give him?

Johnny Elsasser  43:04  
Man, he would be a hard one to talk to you at this point. There is, I would tell him that it's okay to lower your guard. I think that's something that we don't do enough of, especially as men, which causes a lot of friction, and animosity towards one another and comparison itis towards one another. And I think if he knew that it was okay to do that, and to support other people from a place of love, he probably would have had a lot easier time, you know, creating deeper relationships with his brothers in the military and just in life. So yeah.

Agi Keramidas  43:47  
So Tony, I want to thank you very much for this really fascinating conversation. I enjoyed it, I learned many things. And I believe that, you know, we have inspired hopefully, some awareness to the especially the men listening, but also for the ladies that might have found something relevant to maybe the men in their life. So I want to wish you all the best with this magnificent mission that you have to empower and awaken Amen. Any last parting words?

Johnny Elsasser  44:24  
Just just that as a man, you know, really diving into awareness and how we interact with the world to create a different and better calibre of man because the world deserves that. And the next generation deserves that. So as us men evaluating how we show up, how we can find authenticity with ourselves, and then present a better calibre of man, that's what I asked guys to do.

Agi Keramidas  44:55  
I hope you enjoyed listening and that you got a huge amount of value from today's episode. If you have please share this episode with someone who you think will benefit from it. If you want to know more about me and what I do, visit my website AGIKERAMIDAS.COM

Agi Keramidas  45:19  
And until next time, stand out don't fit in!