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Overcoming the Divide: Nonpartisan Politics
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Overcoming the Divide: Nonpartisan Politics
Empowering Boys and Young Men with Warren McCrickard
Today's episode features Warren McCrickard, Executive Director of the Boys To Men Mentoring Network in Virginia. Our conversation covers a number of hot topics including: the crisis in boys and men, the significance of mentors, showing up for yourself, how emotional integrity is an asset and not a liability and much more.
Warren's work is truly inspirational and provides a space for boys and young men who are looking for community and a place to feel safe. I hope you enjoy the following.
You can support the mission of Boys To Men Mentoring Network in Virginia by following their Facebook page here and donating at their website here.
Music: Coma-Media (intro)
WinkingFoxMusic (outro)
Recorded: 9/16/23
Hello everyone, thank you for tuning in today. In today's episode, get ready to hear a nuanced discussion on lifting up boys and young men, the barriers to this, the support needed and much more. This conversation is with Warren McCrickard. He is the Executive Director of Boys to Men Mentoring Network of Virginia. Warren is a native of Richmond and a graduate of Hermitage High.
Speaker 1:Warren has spent most of his career in sales and marketing. He spent seven years in Los Angeles working at Paramount, DreamWorks and Summit, now Lionsgate. He spent another seven years in Chattanooga, Tennessee, working in the recreational marine industry. In two years in Atlanta, Georgia, working for his wife's health tech startup, Motivo. He's excited to be home and to apply his 15 years plus of corporate experience to the nonprofit sector, while learning and growing in this role for boys to men. In his two years at Boys to Men, he has helped the organization grow from three school districts to now eight, while also growing their participants from around 200 to over 500 young men. Warren resides in Richmond, VA, with his wife, Rachel, and their Boston Terrier named Lucy. If you enjoy this conversation, all I ask is that you share it with a friend. Thank you. What is Boys to Men, Warren? What sparked that pursuit of the organization and where are you guys currently located?
Speaker 2:Boys to Men started about 26 years ago in San Diego. A father and a son went on a trip called the Mankind Project, where men go into the woods and search for their own emotional integrity. When they came back from that trip they realized that the young men in their community would benefit from something like this. They launched the first Boys to Men out in San Diego. In Virginia, our chapter founder, who's still our program manager, steve Martin, had been a part of the DC chapter. He started about 17 years ago here in Virginia. We're located in Central Virginia, so Richmond, the surrounding counties and the Tri-Cities area which is around Petersburg and Hopewell. We have been doing the work for about 17 years unofficially and then 11 years as an official nonprofit.
Speaker 1:Interesting. I want to get into that more down the line what it sounds like from that experience that the founder went on and that emotional integrity and that emotional search. Can you speak more to that, what that maybe looked like and why is that important?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think, as men, what we, I come to believe, is I'll speak for me.
Speaker 2:I was raised in an environment where it wasn't necessarily encouraged for me to speak about my emotions.
Speaker 2:I could show my emotions, but there was a lot of just phrasing, toughen up, man up, just words, that in examples of why it may not be good for me to talk about my feelings or my emotions. The reality is, I still had feelings, I still had the emotions and I still figured out ways to show them or act them out, but it was probably in very unhealthy ways. It wasn't unhealthy ways. So when the Mankind Project which isn't affiliated with Boys Demand, but a lot of men or mentors that are a part of our organization have been through that process, it just gave men an opportunity to look at themselves in a more authentic fashion. It's important because when we're authentic, when we understand our truth, when we're able to vocalize emotions, it doesn't make us soft, it allows us to hold ourselves into integrity and it allows us to, as men, be more clear. Our communication can be more responsive and less reactive and we can likely get more accomplished, or at least that's what we've seen 81% of Americans believe that everyone's life has an ultimate purpose.
Speaker 1:25% of Americans have said they've found a clear meaning, of a clear sense of what makes their life meaningful. What do you believe the ultimate purpose? Or how do you believe someone finds their ultimate purpose and how does that affect someone's development? And, say, the coming of man from a trend going up from boy? How does that all play out?
Speaker 2:I mean, my belief is that life is a journey. It's not about the destination, it's about the discovery along that road. So I think can be temporary and there can be larger purposes. Well, from my own life, I worked in California in the film industry for seven years and I loved it, but I always felt like I was chasing something. I couldn't necessarily find clear purpose and the day I could, maybe for that day I could accomplish, but I didn't really necessarily know what was there. But I was in my 20s. So the journey of me finding purpose is still ongoing.
Speaker 2:I love the work that I do with Boys DeVin. I feel like I am inspiring young men and holding them accountable and they're holding me accountable and we're building great relationships, but they're still a part of me that feels like maybe my full purpose hasn't been realized, but I feel like that's part of the journey. Our program founder, steve, talks a lot about how the work that we do is his passion, he's found his purpose and for him, a lot of it is the community that is there and so, yeah, I mean I think it's just part of the journey. I don't know if there's an absolute purpose for everyone, but I do think that, if there is a willingness to just kind of take where you are and live it to its best potential, that you're becoming more and more aligned with, maybe the core of who you are.
Speaker 1:You mentioned something about holding each other accountable. Could you dig deeper there and what that may look like?
Speaker 2:Yeah, at Poistomane most of our circles are in schools. We also have community-based circles. The community-based circles are in the evening and we do a four-part process. Throughout a circle we do a check-in where everyone says their name, they say a feeling happy, sad, mad, fear, shame or something creative. We believe at Poistomane, virginia, that happy, mad, sad and fear you were born with and shame was something that was taught. And then we go into a round where youth can kind of talk about what's going on in their lives. We may go a little bit deeper with particular youth in round three or maybe do a game to shift the energy, and then we always do a check-out to see how the energy has changed from when we started to when we ended One of the first weeks of circle.
Speaker 2:We always do a guideline, so each young man, as well as any mentor that's sitting in the space, gets to say one thing that they need to feel safe. They may have multiple things, but we ask for everybody to say one thing and that's a way for us to hold everyone accountable. So instead of being called out in a circle, if there's disruption, the young man can be called in based on those guidelines. So holding each other accountable, and the reason and the way that we can kind of work on that is by week by week, creating that safe and consistent space where the guidelines have been agreed to and being able to then allow the youth to come to their own realization.
Speaker 2:We believe that the youth have their own answers. They know everything, Probably in their head. They just might not know how to vote plus, so if they're upset with the teacher or mad at home, instead of looking at where the issue may be with someone else, the questions that we do are trying to help them come to the realization that they have some things in their control. So how do they own those pieces? And then how do they acknowledge that some things are out of their control and they can release them and not feel controlled by them?
Speaker 1:It sounds like a majority of your work, or a good portion of your work, deals with expressing oneself how they feel about certain things. And you mentioned that people were taught this. Why do you think that is? Why do you think men, maybe in particular, were taught this?
Speaker 2:Well, when we talk about emotions happy, sad, mad and fear we believe born with shame is what we believe is taught. Again, I'll give an example from my life as a youth. My dad was a minister, my mother was a music school teacher and things like lying. We didn't have long conversations about what a lot might be. But I might feel shame. I might go into a space and feel bad and there can be some positive shame. But shame sometimes is you should not, you should not, you should not.
Speaker 2:And so I took that on as a lot of things that I couldn't do and that shame sometimes gets at least for me, was kind of repressed and when I felt shame I felt like I wasn't my true, authentic self. So in circles with youth we work with them. When they say you know I should do something, you know, we just kind of identify that as that you know that could be some shame talk. So instead of what you should do, what can you do? So we put it more into an active and engaging fashion so that these boys can take away from maybe that place of I didn't do something, that I'm bad, or that belief that they may have, and instead say you know, I know I own that I could have made a different decision, and the decision I can make now is this. So again, it's just kind of retouching, maybe a way that they have been told, versus what is within their control of what they can do.
Speaker 1:So not maybe not invaliding them. I think what you're saying is born here not invaliding the emotion, but also not justifying an uncontrolled response to it, but rather exploring and dissecting why you feel that emotion and what you can do. That would be an appropriate response to it and a better course of action down the line.
Speaker 2:Absolutely Track, and I'll say, all feelings are valid and we're going to meet the young man where he is. So if in that day he's living in a space of shame, then let's look at it. Let's just talk about what that is. Let's own that it's shame and let's talk about you know, what is within the control to go on from here, so that we don't live in a space where we're constantly sharing ourselves.
Speaker 2:I as a man, I warren, have toxic shame. I believe one of the mechanisms that I use out of protection for myself is that I will walk into a space and talk about my weight or my look or my height or whatever I need to, so that you can't say it against me and I'm a man doing this. So part of our work with youth is hopefully breaking some of those kind of cycles by allowing them to just kind of accept where they are for that day. So if they come in and say today I'm feeling fat, okay, thank you, thanks for for sharing that. But we don't necessarily have to over empowered or over indulge it. We can continue to move into other processes or look at it further if they need to, and find ways that they might be able to own something different from just feeling that, that bad feeling.
Speaker 1:Speaking that accountability, though could there be some contrast in that and maybe some dichotomy there? For example, if someone let's not use a fat example, let's use the angry example, I'm feeling angry today, I'm feeling angry yesterday, my feel angry tomorrow, my emotions like a valid, and you maybe discuss that, but do you kind of deploy mechanisms to address those like and I think you do, by one here maybe how address those behavioral issues? Because I think it's not, it's not difficult to say that we're all flawed, we're not born perfection and we'll never reach it, but we could strive to be better. So how do you go with kind of calling out maybe some of those flaws and some of those things that don't make us perfect, but we have the capability and the agency to own it and be better from it, taking a sort of course of action?
Speaker 2:Yeah, again, I think it's meaning the youth where they are. So if a youth comes in angry, yeah, part of the group mentoring process that we do is you know it's not one to one so we can look around the room and gain some validation of anger. Right, you know, we can ask other men who are sitting in that circle. I have there been times that you are angry, yeah, okay Cool, what did you do with that anger? How did you respond? And the man may be really honest. So I responded really bad Punch someone, okay, cool. Where there consequences to it? Yeah, so when I walked on that we may ask other peers you know of the youth have you ever been angry?
Speaker 2:Yeah, sometimes it's just the relation of it can take away some of strips, some of the power, in the sense that when we go through emotions, or when I go through emotions, sometimes I feel like I'm kind of all on my own and, yes, they are my emotions, but I might feel like I'm just by myself in this feeling of anger. So in the group mentoring process we're able to shine a light on others in the space that may also have anger. We may ask some follow up questions to others to understand how they handled their anger or what are the things that make them angry and allow the person who kind of spoke about being angry. Maybe that day is a day where they talk about their anger, maybe today where they hear how others felt anger and what they did with it. So yeah, owning the emotion, yes, and they may still be angry the next day. That's okay.
Speaker 2:In our circles. We're dealing with where they are, right there, and our hope is that if they are angry, even if they remain angry, they at least come out 30 to 45 minutes later feeling a little bit better themselves. So, even if they're still angry within them, they either have tools to address that anger or they at least feel a little bit better because they were at least able to speak it. They were able to just say I'm angry in a space that was safe enough that they didn't get penalized or punished for saying it. They were validated and acknowledged for just being real.
Speaker 1:I think that's important. It's important to feel safe, to find a place where your fears feel safe, to discuss what you're feeling. I am curious so like, and not as a push to your work or a critique, because I'm largely ignorant besides this 50 minute conversation. But does that address the recall slash? Is that sustainable? I'm assuming there's the age limit on these boys who, young men, who are coming here. They may not always have that space is my point. And my other point is that does that dig deep enough to actually see where the angle may come from so they can address in their lives and become better people and better men?
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's a great question. We are as an organization. One spoke in a wheel.
Speaker 1:Yeah, maybe exactly.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so we are not the end all be all. Most of our facilitators, as well as mentors, are not licensed therapists. We come in as volunteers, as a group or a peer mentor support in that sense. So we recognize that deeper, sustaining, long term issues may be present and will last in a circle or potentially even in a year of circles. The extenuating circumstances by which the young man lives may continually put him in a place where he's unsafe or he's in danger, or he's just angry, unsettled, whatever that is. So we're not there to fix everything.
Speaker 2:Our goal again is, as they walk in, they're safe, they have a chance to speak about it and they have the belief that we're going to show up the next week and give them that same space.
Speaker 2:So someone who has long term anger validated, most likely hopefully they'll come back the next week and if they're still in that space they can speak about it and they still continue to feel safe. To your point of will it change or not, it's hard to tell. We can't predict the future and we definitely can't go back and bend the past. So we just try to do our best that we can at the time that we have, and we have mechanisms with the schools, especially when we work with youth in school, that we have a liaison within the school that we can go to. So if a youth has something that is deeper than what we can solve or deeper than what we can really get into, we're okay to go speak with the youth and say, hey, is this something that you're comfortable with us sharing, or this feels like something you may want to bring up? And we can engage the liaison so that there's additional support outside of what we do.
Speaker 1:Boys want to grow up to be like their role models, and boys who grow up in homes with abs and fathers search the hardest to figure out what means to be male. More than one in four fathers don't live with their children. Only 24% of teachers are male. Only 5% of psychologists under the age of 30 are male. Where do boys go to find guidance, encouragement and comfort in today's society?
Speaker 2:One place that we see that is very organized and also knows how to meet the basic needs of youth or young men are the streets, gangs or street affiliations. I do a really good job of giving young men food, clothing, shoes, shelter what looks like support, what looks like friendship. There's a lot there. So unfortunately, that's a really clear path that a lot of young men take is that kind of idea. The other thing that happens with a lot of young men is that they're kind of parented or raised at times by other young men their age, by their peers. What's going on around them? So, yeah, it can be troubling. With that said, I think there is a lot of organizations like ours. I know that there are a lot of organizations like ours, as well as foundations that support us and many other organizations, corporate entities, that are always looking for alternatives. You have programs like Boys and Girls Club and YMCA that are strong and profound and a lot of smaller nonprofits that are always looking for giving alternatives.
Speaker 2:One of our great partners here in this area, daniel, is organization through Hopewell, the city of Hopewell Public Schools. Their superintendent, dr Hackney, set up a community space called the Well. That is in the school board office. They took the third floor during COVID and turned it into a game room. It has a chef station, it has a workout room, it has a study room, it has a movie room. The idea was to give middle and high school youth especially a space to come so that if they do not have role models or mentors within their community or within their home, they can come to that space and feel safe and get that from those.
Speaker 1:So yeah.
Speaker 2:I hope that answers.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and then quote I started out with came from an American educator and social activist. Jeffrey Kanana Is his name. Not sure if he ever popped up in your guys space before, but he kind of works.
Speaker 2:I've heard that name yeah.
Speaker 1:That was a quote directly from him which I found would be quite interesting and you know, pondered on it for quite some time. A research study assessing the views of 4,000 men, conducted by the Center for Male Psychology, I believe, down that 85% respondents thought the term toxic masculinity is insulting and probably harmful to boys. What is your relationship with that term?
Speaker 2:I mean to be honest, I don't, I don't. I guess I don't put power to it. Often I don't really speak that much about toxic masculinity. I don't lift it up In our organization. Can we model something different? And can we? And do we have to name it? Our goal is is to help young boys or boys to become young men. So how do we just model what a man looks like, and how do we model when we are feeling dishonest with ourselves, when we're feeling off of that? So do I think it's real? Yes, so I think that there are men out there that are making money and making clout off of the term toxic masculinity and modeling it. Yes, the best that we can do is take the power out of the words and hopefully model something different that looks even more attractive.
Speaker 1:Interesting. Yeah, I don't find that quote or that term, excuse me to be too helpful, and I often find the proponents of using that term whether they are trying to capitalize on their own gains or say, or just involve in the political space not to have, not to be the best faith faith actors out there and Adam Lane Smith, I believe, is he's a family therapist, a couple's therapist licensed was recently on the Chris Williamson podcast, modern wisdom. Modern wisdom, which I listen to quite often, and discussing this term, he asked about the host that is about this and he responded with it's not like toxic masculinity or whatever other buzzword, but just rather a lack of, and I think I buy more into that. I'm curious to get your thoughts on it too, because when someone is quote, like, say, toxic, they're not exactly, they're not inhibiting mass traits of masculine that would be desirable or appealing, or should be I a license in any regard?
Speaker 1:And when you think of someone who goes and this is example I've all recently too is when, say, someone opens up a charity and they're just doing it for self gain reasons no, just for the self gain, the gain, popularity, or for tax reasons perhaps you'll go oh, that's toxic charity, that's just to being toxic. Toxic, a charitable, you know, oh, that's, you know, self absorbed. They're deceptive, they're this or they're that. And when I hear toxic masculine from the people who use it the most, I usually hear from people who I think, more or less have a bone to pick with masculinity rather than maybe some undesirable elements that have been exhibited by some men in the past.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean it's again. It's an interesting term, I think, like I used earlier toxic with Shane you know, I think that emotions I can.
Speaker 2:I can carry an emotion to a level by which it's unhealthy. So when I say toxic, I might need to help better define it that I have an unhealthy amount of shame when I say toxic, shame. Language is important. It's, it's one of the key ways that we communicate is through, through words.
Speaker 2:I think, potentially the term toxic, master masculinity maybe came from a healthy place, or you know those who are just trying to put language. You know, in our culture those things can, can be elevated, they can be sound bites, they can take on a life of their own. So, you know, again, I would, I would much rather work with men and with young men about kind of the emotions that they're holding in that moment and what that makes them feel and how they want to deal with those and look for solutions. If they're looking for it, then to talk about masculinity in a negative form. Masculinity, I think, and you know, can also be narrowly defined and I think part of what we're doing as a culture and society is trying to better understand what that language, what that term means and how we want to define it and work, work with that as well.
Speaker 1:In the average school district, high school district, the top 10% of GPA scores. Two thirds of those are girls. At the bottom of that pool, the lowest GPA scores scores. That is, two thirds of those are boys. Why do you believe boys are falling behind in education and do you see that in your work and Lancy? Why is there such a little talk about it around this issue?
Speaker 2:We do see it in our work.
Speaker 2:We understand that a great deal of young men in our school systems have lower grades and have a hard time maybe catching up than than females.
Speaker 2:In our work we do offer tutoring services if it's requested. We have seen in other spaces middle sex, high school and middle sex sorry, middle sex middle school, which is a different area of Virginia, launched a peer mentoring piece for young men in their school and we saw that that worked and so you know we've worked with them a little bit on some of the social emotional pieces and we've said to them this model that you have is incredible and are trying it in a few schools this year. So I would say, how do you? One way that we're trying to maybe address it is through peer to peer support. So how can some that are academically more fit be able to engage with other men, young men in the school that maybe don't have as good a grades, and how do we help them work together still be a part of the process but empower these young men to work together academically and see if that's an approach that would work.
Speaker 1:And we spoke to earlier, the different resources that are for boys who are growing up, say, without role miles, and there's different resources. However, interesting reporting from a number of outlets shown that 9 million men prime working age that is 25 to 54, have exited the workforce. I know your organization, your work, doesn't specifically cater to that demographic but I am wondering and curious on why do you, what do you think is happening there, given the fact that you're dealing with boys who are coming from, say, unstable homes, broken homes, unstable lives, why do you think maybe this problem is not being addressed and then kind of expanding the point where 9 million working age men have exited the workforce?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I have a couple thoughts here. I hope I can keep them together. My mind's moving away, no worries.
Speaker 2:One thing I will say is we did in partnership with the city of Petersburg Bureau of Police and through some funding that they allocated to us. We did launch a community circle for 18 to 25 year olds and we have a lot since. We've been around 17 years unofficially 11, as a nonprofit. We have a lot of young men who are now in that age range that have aged out of our 12 to 17 year old circles, but we love to keep them connected. So we do have a circle that engages that and in that circle we try to bring in resources like Virginia CareerWorks here will pay for certificates and pay for schooling and help young men and young women but help any young person that's 18 to 25 find certain work. You know welding and truck driving and cosmetology, all kinds of things. So part of it is.
Speaker 2:I think part of the issue is understanding what resources are available and making sure that those resources. As adults we all tend to know about them. But how do we get that knowledge into the kids hands, into the young men's hands and let them know that those opportunities exist? I think a large issue is transportation. When I was 15 and a half I had my learners and at 16, I was driving. A lot of our young men we see are not driving at 16, they're driving later. A lot don't have really good transportation and not all communities have good public transportation. So you can put all types of effort into workforce but if there's not transportation that's reliable to get there, it's going to make it harder.
Speaker 2:I think it's also a misleading statistic a little bit, in the sense that a lot of young men especially that I have seen that are of minority will do a lot of startup. They do a lot of their own business. Part of it is maybe even trust in big corporations. Or they've been burned by big business or they've been immature. Maybe in their first job that was a bigger corporation and how it was handled. They don't trust anymore, so they try on their own to make their own money. So are they out of the workforce. Maybe are they trying a different method by which to make money and become self-sustaining. I would say that that's probably more accurate but maybe less reported.
Speaker 1:Interesting. Now, speaking of the corporate world, which you have quite extensive experience, and why pursue this? I may have touched on that earlier, but what really brought you to this and switching your pursuit?
Speaker 2:I have led a very privileged life. I'm very fortunate. I have held a job from the time I was 15 until now I'm 41. I have never had a problem finding a job and every job that I took, my parents instilled in me make the most of it, be the best at it and take on any role that's possible. So I honestly believe that my corporate experience led me to the space that I'm in and nonprofit now. I think that part of the conversation with purpose earlier I think that there were times where I was in my 20s and in my 30s looking for maybe more beneficial work but at the same time trying to take all of the positions that I had at that time and learn as much as I can, soak up as much as I can and then apply it to the next job I would do so.
Speaker 2:I don't know if I was ready to be in a nonprofit space before 40 years old. I think I had some real SH work to do on myself to get through to maybe come to this point. So maybe from a physical standpoint I was ready. Maybe from a mental or professional standpoint I was ready, but from an emotional place I don't think I was there and my life brought about challenges in my 30s where I had to own a lot of my own actions, and my own actions came with consequences, and from that I think I got to a space where I was ready to lean into something like this type of work and make sure that I was there. So I think it was just again maybe a part of my purpose, but a part of my journey, to get here.
Speaker 1:And then, speaking to the organization, right now, I'm curious on values that you would try to maybe instill or that you believe are important at the minimum, and this organization, when speaking to the boys you seek to help on a daily basis it's been expressing your emotions, and being honest with yourself and feeling safe with people around you is a one that comes that significance. Are there other ones you try to maybe hit on as well or hold?
Speaker 2:dear, yeah, value of self accountability, authenticity, truth, trust, loyalty, self actualization, maybe a little bit of how to believe in yourself, to be kind of what you want to be, yeah, safety. I think those are all, all key values that we try to live by.
Speaker 1:Good. No, and I want to get a little more specific to it. With the boys that you say help on a daily basis, where are they generally coming from? I know you're based in Virginia, but is it from all walks of life or their commonalities? What do you really try to, without obviously getting specific or too specific, but what do you really see, maybe in the trends and things to be aware of when thinking about this issue?
Speaker 2:Yeah, high level, yeah, high level. I would say around 51% of our youth would have no male mentor in the home or male figure in the home. So those that lack that would would be a natural draw to this program. Behavioral and academic issue youth may also be a draw within the schools. We allow the school to kind of make the recommendation of youth, but it's a buy in process. So we may have a circle where their youth that have behavioral issues, academic issues or no male male in their life consistently that will be suggested, but the youth themselves have to buy in to stay.
Speaker 2:What we find by the middle of the year of a school year, so around January, february, is word of mouth catches on. So those youth who are getting value out of the Boys Dement Circle will tell some of their closest friends hey, I think you need to be involved in this too, which is really awesome that it becomes word of mouth. I will say that some of our youth, though, are just social. They just want the social connection. We have some some great young men in our program that have loving families, they have everybody connected together, but they just they want friends and they look at Boys Dement and say, well, this is an easy way for me to make friends.
Speaker 1:You see that the rate of quote loneliness is increasing, particularly in young males. Believe 12% more likely to the women that is to go to family about an issue than a friend. So I think that kind of plays into your point too. Just when that social camaraderie and going to the values that you spoke on, self-actualization, believing yourself, I think there's almost like a lack of encouragement that that's happening maybe in society to make up for historical errors for men and not like for men in regards to there are a lack of maybe encouragement, motivation or just any source of any source of belief to pull from, when you don't have that male role model, you don't have that person telling you that you can do great things and you can do what you believe is capable of your power and the power of yourself and being able to achieve these awesome things.
Speaker 2:Which leads us to another value that we have that I didn't mention, which is honoring. We're huge on honoring young men, huge on it. At the end of a circle, every time when we do a checkout, there is an invitation to honor. That can be a peer to peer, that can be a mentor to a youth, that can be a youth to a mentor. It doesn't matter. But we, as men from the beginning of the school year, model what honoring looks like.
Speaker 2:Daniel, I honor you for your passion and your commitment to these podcasts, for your willingness to find interesting people to talk to and ask interesting questions to help educate us all. That's the type of thing that we do. We want to say their name, we want to honor them. It can be small or big, because to a young man who's 13 years old, who has no place where they feel safe enough to say that they're sad or lonely or angry, just to say I see you and I thank you for giving us that opportunity to hear about you is huge. If you're not getting it other places, at Boys DeMene, it's super important for young men to feel validated and to know that they're seen and honored. Thank you for mentioning that, because that is a huge value for us.
Speaker 1:I'll give you an example, not to completely monopolize that point by any means, because it's a great point. I'm actually glad to hear you do that because I see resources and encouragement for most groups out there. I believe that's necessary, that's warranted and that's right. I just don't see it for young men whatsoever, for example. Yesterday I published an article and that would be what September 20th it was.
Speaker 1:I published an article and I wanted to get a fact check, spelling and grammar check. I was like why don't I try chat GBT to make sure everything is spelled correctly and there's no grammatical errors? Probably better than Google Docs. I put in and said can you please perform a spelling and grammar check? It did rather well. At the end of it it said this is a well-written article. It communicates your points effectively. Good luck on the writing. That little thing right there. I'm not going to go dramaticize and say it made my entire week, but definitely made my day. It's weird that's coming from AI. I understand how crazy that is. It made me realize that point. There's definitely a lack of encouragement and it's not to a pity party, but it's more so to magnify Because I'm just a microcosm of a larger issue going on. I'm happy to hear that you guys do laugh. It's a great example.
Speaker 2:I think we all seek validation because we seek connection. We want to be connected. At the end of the day, these circles are connecting young men to other young men. Yes, in a safe space, yes, a consistent space, yes, with all these things, but it's connection. What we know is when youth are disconnected, bad things can happen. When they feel no connection. There's a lot of things you can put out there that they may choose to do. If we can give them connection, if we can model it and we can harness it and we can put that container together, then they know.
Speaker 2:I had a young man in one of our towns tell me I show up every week to school. I might miss other days, I don't miss this day because this is the place where I get to talk about this stuff. We know that what he's saying is I don't feel connected other places, but here I get connection, here I get something. Chatgpt could tell me that they love me and I would probably cry because there's a part of me that the little boy, the little Warren, is still screaming please connect and make me whole. It's still screaming those words. When we get that validation, that connection, it softens us and it allows us to feel just a little bit better.
Speaker 1:Where do you think that issue really just comes from? Why is there such a lack of acknowledging it, like just in general, like this entire issue in general? I feel I did for the podcast too. It was called Five Controversial Takes in Society and one of them takes were and I think I sent you this too that there's a crisis among young men and boys that's being actively ignored.
Speaker 1:And the whole point of me doing that series wasn't to intentionally be inflammatory or just irritate people, but rather spark a dialogue on issues I believe are important and I believe have more than one just opinion on it, one more than one just appropriate opinion on the matter.
Speaker 1:And when I started off, I was like I feel that most of people out there they just don't believe like this is an issue you don't have to believe like this is the most important issue or this is like number one on your list when going to the polls or when thinking about life. But there's almost a denial in this issue. And when I spoke to a friend of mine who is a woman about this before, like a year ago and we were out at bars, it wasn't the best place to do it, but I just made the mention of like I believe like young men need more encouragement society, and she was like baffled at the notion of that. What Really? And that kind of took me back personally because like there's such a denial that this issue exists whatsoever and it's frustrating. So I'm curious if you have seen that over the course of your life and maybe that's pushed you in this direction as well. But I want to hear a little more about that if you care to share.
Speaker 2:First great article that you wrote. It was very my appreciated. You send it to me and passed it on the staff, and the staff really enjoyed reading it as well. Yeah yeah.
Speaker 2:Maybe it's just consciousness, right, like, if we're not conscious or aware of it, you know we're likely not doing it. So how do we? How do we help show? How do we bring it to other people's consciousness? My belief is we model it. So if you see me on the road, I'm failing it when I'm speaking here. So my, my, my actions and my words will fall apart if you see me driving, because I wouldn't say I'm the kindest driver, but what? What I'll say is if model, model what you want to be seen.
Speaker 2:So if men, if young men, are not being supported or validated or acknowledged, acknowledge them. You know, if you're listening to this and you know you see a young man do anything, pick up a piece of trash, whatever, just acknowledging it. You know, if we continue to model it in our lives, little and big, then you know the course of history will change itself. But if we are not conscious to it, we're not aware of it, or we make conscious choices to just kind of focus on what we need for the day. If I'm in Walmart or if I'm in a local store supporting local business, either way, and I'm so focused on what I need that I don't take the time to validate someone else or to acknowledge them, then I've missed an opportunity to change that by modeling it, by bringing it to someone else is conscious. You know doing others as you to have done unto you. So maybe it's that, maybe, since we're not conscious to it and it's not a sexy narrative, so we're not necessarily leaning as hard into it, but those who know it can model it.
Speaker 1:Don't talk about being a good person. Be one, that's. You know, that's right, from like Marcus or really is. I'm not sure if you're ever read meditations or familiar with that work, but it's preaches in the stoicism to a degree and I feel like that could be maybe seen at odds with your organization or just expressing your emotions in general. But following Ryan holiday, who runs a daily Stoke account on Instagram quite popular, he kind of elaborates on that point of like stoicism versus maybe expressing your emotions and what the conclusion basically is that there's there's a time for both. But stoicism I think maybe gets misinterpreted as not showing your emotions, whereas it's not. Laying your emotions dictate your behavior and laying your values dictate your behavior. And I really enjoy what you said actually wrote down, so probably you know keep that around, which is model. What you want to be seen goes right, goes right into it.
Speaker 2:Thank you, yeah, I mean it's. I welcome all kinds of thought. We have plenty of of mentors that show up in our circles that have various beliefs outside of circle. Inside of circle, our focus is on what. What can we do for the youth and how best can we do it? And how best can we can we leverage ourselves on our own experience to do that. So I love when there are points of view that maybe sound different, maybe look a little bit different, but are still kind of getting to the core of either self respect or respecting others in ways to show it 100%.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I hear you're respecting others quite often that's important, like being kind is important, should be a priority, but respecting yourself is is something that you don't really hear too often. And I don't know how you feel about the man, jordan Pearson, but I don't agree with everything you said, but I've taken a lot of his work, taking a lot of value in his work, specifically his first book, 12 rules for life. I would honestly recommend to anyone, not just young men, women, as well as any person looking for self improvement, and one of the rules in that book is treat yourself as if you are someone responsible for taking care of. And the interesting point to that is that when someone has a dog and they need prescriptions, oh, I believe the stat is 90% they're likely for that dog to take the prescription. When it comes to humans, it's lower. I would say it's maybe around like 70% or 80%. And the other point being is make yourself your, make yourself a priority.
Speaker 2:Not have selfishness, but have how you, being the best version of you, allows you to be the best version of yourself or other people to be the best version of yourself, and there are a lot of quotes, kind of on this and I think athletes are speaking out more and more on this too, on this idea that you know, in recovery, communities are really strong on this as well.
Speaker 2:I mean, the priority has to be taking care of yourself, because you can't take care of others or others won't be around if you don't take care of yourself. So, yeah, so self respect can be a challenge and, again, a gift of group mentoring, a gift of being in a circle, is I may not have a lot of it that someone else may validate something in me and I may walk out of that space and respect myself more. So, again, connection and community. So, if there's, if there's a time or a place in our life where we aren't respecting ourselves, if we can find a safe and consistent space around others who are uplifting themselves or uplifting each other, my belief is that there's a better chance of us. Then, you know, feeling connected and maybe finding a now the ability to connect to ourselves.
Speaker 1:There was one takeaway from this conversation that some could walk away with. What would you want that to be?
Speaker 2:If they walked away with one thing, I would hope that they walk away with willingness to model what they want, seen, just a willingness to model it. If in their day, someone who is listening feels sad and wants to feel happy, model, model kindness to someone, give it away as a gift. If you can't give it to yourself, give it away as a gift. Model that you know, find that connection and who knows, it can be a gift that someone else then gives to you to help you kind of heal to that place where you can feel it. So yeah, that's it.
Speaker 1:And how can people support your work and your organization's mission?
Speaker 2:That's very kind of you to ask. Our website is BTM vaorg. So boys to me be as a boy I'm a man. Va is in Virginia dot org. There's a donate button and they can absolutely donate if they have the financial means and willingness. If they are in the central Virginia area and are interested in mentoring or learning more about the circle, there's a contact us and they can speak about that. Or if there are young men Near or far, we offer some virtual support as well. So be it if they're young men or local or not, it would be great just for them to reach out and let us, let us know their story about the young man 12 to 17 years old, or if they're 18 to 25, same Let us know. We'd love to connect.
Speaker 1:Are there social media channels at all that people can keep up with? Your work is to, as well as Facebook.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we have Facebook. It's boys demand VA on Facebook. That's, that's about all that we have. Some of our staff is on LinkedIn, so they and some of our board members are on LinkedIn, but we mainly focus on attraction of a promotion, so those that are drawn to find us, we believe we'll find us and we'll be able to connect.
Speaker 1:I like. That goes against much of social media marketing, but I like it. I like it. I think it speaks true. And then one last thing, which kind of plays off that, which is is there a question that you wished? I asked? You asked you that didn't that you would like to know, have the opportunity now to speak on any point that you like to make as a closing one.
Speaker 2:I think you did a great job in this, asking questions that I didn't even know were coming and challenging, challenging my mind, stretching me. So, no, I'm really grateful for the opportunity to speak with you and, daniel, I just appreciate the work that you do. Podcasts are a consistent commitment there. It's a mountain, and I'm sure there are days that you might not want to do it, so I just appreciate your willingness to give a gift to the rest of us.
Speaker 1:Thank you. Thank you one, it's been an absolute pleasure.
Speaker 2:Same.
Speaker 1:See you guys.
