Getting Your Needs Met

Hello? Hello. Hello everybody. So welcome to another episode of gay men going deeper, a podcast series by the gay men’s brotherhood, where we talk about all things, personal development, sexuality, and mental health. Your host today are Matt, Michael and myself Callan. And today we are going to be talking about getting your needs met. Yes. I freaking love this topic.

I’m so excited to dive into it. Okay. So some of the questions that we’re going to be answering are what self-care practices do you have in place to make sure that you are meeting your own personal needs on a regular basis? How do you know when you’re stepping out of alignment with your own needs and you’re no longer being authentic and what advice or best tips do you have that helped you along the way to figuring out how to meet your own needs and how could someone implement it for themselves?

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All right. So jumping into today, getting your needs met. My goodness. First question is what self-care practices do you have to T in place to make sure that you’re meeting your own personal needs on a regular basis? Well, let me start off by saying my, my own personal needs are so huge to me. I used to always do everything all the time,

because I was an overachiever, as we all talked about this, we’re all overachievers as well. People pleasers, we were all like intensely, like hypersensitive about that perfectionism and all that jazz. We’ve already done episodes on all of that. So for myself, I really had to take a look at, especially when I became an entrepreneur, I really had to take a look at how I did things and how I showed up.

And one of the things that I had to do was like really set very clear boundaries around how I do anything. So what that looked like is like, I was only going to allow myself to work Monday through Friday. I had to absolutely take the weekends off. I turn off all my apps and notifications. I don’t have any notifications on my phone unless it’s a direct text message,

a direct phone call or something like that. I have no, all the apps like Facebook messenger and all that kind of stuff. I have them all turned off because I know myself and I’ll get easily distracted if I can see a Bing or something in sounds absolutely not. So for me to protect that for myself, I need to make sure that I’m setting myself up for success case in point,

I just had a Buddha voodoo go off on my computer, which is like very rare, but it was like an update. So yeah, so setting myself up like that Monday through Friday, weekends are completely off and making sure you’re taking care of that self time, because if I’m not taking care of me, I can’t take care of other people. And that’s how I look at things.

I can’t take care of my clients. I can’t take care of the things that we do here on the gay men, going deeper podcast. If I’m not in a healthy mental state. And that starts with me taking time for myself. So evenings and weekends are completely off case in point, I went away this weekend and I completely turned myself off from Thursday to Sunday.

I’m a bit of a mess today because we’re recording this on a Monday, but Hey, that time for me was just so rejuvenating to be out in nature and just like relaxing and not thinking about things. And I think that that’s really important for us as individuals to make sure that those needs are getting met. Because if you’re rundown, if you’re tired,

if you are sick, you’re not going to be able to help other people and show up in the way that you want to show up. So that’s what I’m going to say for right now. And I’m going to pass things off to Michael and kind of get your 2 cents on, on getting your needs met. And I also love this topic. Thank you for starting us off Callan quickly.

I want to say actually, you know, you brought up a really good point about notifications. I didn’t even think about that, but that’s definitely something I do, especially with Facebook or any kind of I’m in a few group chats. And those sometimes for me, tend to go like off the hook, which really annoys me. So that is another really good one,

but, okay. So the question was what self-care practices do you, do you have in place to make sure that you are meeting your own personal needs on a regular basis? Yes. Okay. I would say, I think the first thing for me is about knowing what those needs are. Sometimes I’m so out of touch with what my needs even are,

because I’m so into the hustle of it all. And you brought up a really good point at the beginning of their calendar about the entrepreneurial side of things. And I think for all of the, all of the lessons I learned before becoming an entrepreneur, I feel like I’ve had to relearn all the same lessons again in the space of now becoming an entrepreneur.

And so sometimes not even being aware that I have needs that aren’t being met. So I would say for me, my needs change hour by hour, day by day, it’s all really depends. So the first thing I’d like to do, and I’m very strict about this is having mornings to myself, for me to check in with myself. So lately I think over the last couple of months,

I’ve set an intention of getting out of bed before or getting awake or getting up by seven 30 and getting out of the house pretty much amongst the first things I do. Like, you know, brush my teeth, do all that stuff and then get out of the house either, go for a walk or do something as the weather changes out. I’m not sure how that’s going to last,

but during that alone time, I really check in with myself, like, how am I feeling? We know before I get to the, what do we need to do today? Which is usually how I start my day. Like I wake up like, okay, what’s my to-do list. I try to create a space before I get there and make sure I’m checking in pay.

What do I need today? For me, solitude is, is one of my deep, deep needs. Like I really need to be alone. And this is not a disrespect to anyone in my life. Any of my family, my partner has nothing to do with that. It’s just, I really actually have come to learn to enjoy my own company.

And when I’m alone with my thoughts and my emotions, that can really do a lot of really good work there. And, and, you know, as you said, once, I can figure my own shit out. Maybe not figure it out, but once I can get a grasp on where I am mentally, emotionally, spiritually, then I’m like,

okay, I can now go forth with my day kind of with that check-in piece. So yeah, I think that’s, that’s a big piece of it getting outside of having that alone time. Another thing that I talked about a lot here is journaling writing in general, but for me, I really enjoy journaling. It allows me to, to ensure that my needs,

I guess my need for checking in with myself is being met because, you know, as coaches, we spend a lot of time supporting other people. I think it’s really important that we have to, we check in to support ourselves soon for me while I do have my own coach. I also like to journal and that helps me a lot because I can kind of see where I’m at and let myself express myself very authentically,

very freely because no one else reads my reads my work. And so one of the things is moving my body. That’s, that’s another thing I like to do. So again, going for that walk again in the summer, when I can moving my body, getting out there, breathing in fresh air for me, these are all things that I really like.

They just inspire me. And it just helps me to get outside and breathe in some pressure, even as it’s just for a few minutes. So yeah, that’s it checking in with myself, being with myself and asking myself, what, what do I need to today? What do I need right now? Right. Cause my day can go from very low to very high,

quickly, or very high to very low, quickly. I don’t know if it’s a Gemini thing, but it’s just what I do. So that’s what I’ll start off with. How about you, Matt? I know you can resonate with a little bit of that last part. Yeah. There were so similar. Michael, it’s funny. I giggle, I always giggle inside because where I,

when I hear you talk, I’m like, oh, we’re so similar. Okay. So for me, this is a very alive area in my life right now about needs. Calvin said it from the top people, pleaser, codependent, lacked boundaries, perfectionist, all the things. Okay. All the things I’ve heard. I’ve talked about it many times in all the episodes,

I won’t go into too much detail, but I’m now really, really getting in alignment with my most authentic self. And it feels fucking fantastic. But with that comes really learning about what my authentic needs are. So the first, before I was able to really identify what my authentic needs are, I have to look at what is my authenticity, who is this new sense of self that’s emerging that I’m allowing to be fully embraced?

And there’s things that about me that I need to make sure that I’m getting my needs met, right? Being demisexual is one of them being empathic is another one being highly sensitive is another one being a gay man is another one. So I have all these little niches of who I am as we all do. And I had to get really clear on what it is each one of those,

you know, compartments of me needs in order to feel good about himself. And this has been really beautiful work, but also really like there’s a lot of worthiness that’s required to get, get to that place. It’s like, okay, do I feel worthy to meet my needs? Do I feel strong enough and vulnerable enough to share my needs with other people?

So what I’ve done now is like looking at like, you know, how can I practice these self care practices? I’m in alignment with what both of you guys has said, all those things are very much in alignment with me too, but I break it down into four categories. Like you have your mental while you’re having your physical, mental, emotional,

and spiritual. And within each domain, there is needs that I need to have met. And I would say in the physical, one of the most important needs for me is going to be nutrition. Like what I put in my body is probably like one of the most important things in my life, because there’s a lot of things that I just can’t put in my body.

I’m very sensitive to chemicals. I’m very sensitive to pharmaceuticals. I’m very sensitive to things like sugar and alcohol and caffeine. So one of the needs that I have is to not betray my body because for so long, I didn’t want to be different. I didn’t want to be outcasted and I wanted to do whatever one else was doing. So for everyone who was out at the bar drinking,

I would drink, even though I knew it was horrible for my body. So now one of my needs is to just be, self-possessed just do what is good for my body. Doesn’t matter what anybody else is doing. Just really honor. What’s good for my body. So I think, you know, in the domain of physical, it would for sure Lee be,

you know, making sure I’m taking care of my body in the way that feels good for me, mental, this is a big one. I would say an area within like I’ll categorize mental as like, like intellectual. And I think for me, a very important thing for me is connection and communication, right? I’m very stimulated on a cerebral level and I need this.

This is very important in an intimate relationship for me. Like it’s probably sits at the top, like maybe top three, things that I require in a relationship would be someone who loves talking, loves communicating is stimulating because like when I’m stimulated intellectually, I’m stimulated sexually. And so they go hand in hand for me. So that would be one in kind of the mental domain.

So just making sure that I am obviously practicing what I preach, right. And, and, you know, being a good communicator, constantly looking for ways to evolve my communication skills, which authentic relating has helped me tremendously in developing my communication skills. So my relationships have improved a great deal. Since I started doing that, moving on to emotional, what would be an emotional need for me?

I would say it ties into communication, but feeling heard, feeling heard is a big one feeling heard, seen and understood because like I have had the experience most of my life of being different. I think as all gay men can relate to, we all have that. We’re different. There’s been other things that I’ve had to navigate in my life that have also really highlighted the fact that I’m different than other people.

And I feel have felt misunderstood. It’s been a very common theme in my life feeling misunderstood. And so when I feel heard and, and valued and, and understood, I tend to feel safe and I feel like I can trust. And then I’m getting those needs met for me. So, and I think those things happen for me over time and slowing down my connections.

Right. I can allow people to get to know me. I can get to know people. So I think a need that’s really tied into that need would be slowing down, just allowing myself to really take my time, getting to know people. This is really, really important in my intimate relationships right now is really taking things slow and getting to know somebody.

So I can really truly learn who they actually are instead of just buying into the story that my mind wants to create them into. That’s been a big learning for me. And then spiritually, this is a really big one for me too. I have a very, this is a big part of who I am my spirituality, and it kind of encompasses it all.

Really. Spirituality is a very encompassing term for me, but the, the one that I, that feels in most alignment with this would be nature because that really is the embodiment of everything. It’s, it’s the creation of everything. It’s I can remove myself from, from the confines of my mind or my day-to-day life, my work, all these things that they are me,

but they’re not me. You know what I mean? Like I’m, I’m so much more than those things. And when I get into nature to something happens, I just feel like I can just let go and I can breathe and I can connect to my innate, my innateness, just that, that energy of who I am. Not the stories, not the mind,

not the ego. It’s just, it’s just the me, the most me that I can be is when I’m in nature. And so I have a strong need to be in nature a lot. That’s where I go and recharge. And I always do a lot of work with empaths and highly sensitive people. And I always say like, empaths are people.

We were constantly empathing for people and helping them move their emotions and their energy and mother nature is my empath. She empaths for me. Right. So I get out into nature to recharge myself, to fill my bucket. So then I can show up in my highest self to be able to help people with, with my empathic abilities. So yeah, I think that’s,

that feels complete for me. I love that. I love all of it. I love what you guys all like, what you both just said. I love how you’re getting out early in the morning. I feel like just doing you in the morning. I think I could afford to implement a little bit more of that. I think I’m too trigger,

happy on like, you know, I’m that person, the first thing I do is roll over and grab my phone and kind of look at things. But I also, I don’t necessarily go and read all the emails and look at all the messages. I just see, okay, what’s going on, go, okay. I got some stuff going on over there.

And usually it go to my to-do list. Like my Assana like by my daily, like what do I have on today’s schedule? Cause then I can kind of judge, okay, how fast do I have to move today? Or how slow am I allowed to move today? Cause if there’s a lot going on, then I’m like, okay, got to get out of it.

I gotta get out of bed a little quicker, make my tea a little faster and kind of like get myself together at work. Can I do it a little bit more loungy and kind of like most of your rounds? Oh, I love that you get up and give yourself that time. And Matt, there was something that you said that really resonated loudly with me was taking time and taking things slowly,

especially when it comes to other people in order to not make up the stories about who you want them to be in your head and really getting to know them for who they are. And like, that is a huge thing. I think that’s going to be well for me, but also for our listeners is that I know I tend to kind of make up stories of like,

if I see somebody like somebody, you make up a whole story about who they are and all these other things, even if you’ve just met them once or twice, you’re like, oh, they’re all these things. But remember when we meet people, we’re usually putting our best foot forward. Not saying we’re terrible, but usually you’re kind of trying to put your best foot forward.

So like of course you’re going to be showing all those good things. So it’s like allowing yourself to take that time and kind of go at things slower, allows you to see more of their true, authentic self. And yeah, there’s going to be messy bits in there, but that doesn’t mean they’re going to be necessarily bad. It’s just those, aren’t the polished bits that they’ve been showing you.

Right. So I really love what you said about that. That’s that’s huge. So thanks for those. Thanks. Yeah. Let’s jump into the next thing we’re going to be exploring today, which is how do you know when you’re stepping out of alignment with your own needs and you’re no longer being authentic. So I think I want to hear your guys’s first and then I’m going to do mine after.

So Michael start us off. Yeah. Okay. The first tip for me is how I feel. I trust my emotions and for me, they are pretty much the roadmap for everything else. So, you know, again, it goes back to the check-in like, how do I feel right now? It’s so easy to, to go through your day as it used to be very easy for me to go through my day,

going through all these moods and emotions and never really checking in to ask myself why, what where’s this coming from? What’s happening. So first of all, the check-in from what I said before, but I’ll give you an example, stress when I’m feeling stressed like that, like tense, like shoulders, my hunch, my shoulders, I kind of shallow breaths or I feel stress that usually for me is an indication that I’m putting too much pressure on myself because 99% of the time,

the stress I’m feeling is from myself. So I think the way I feel it helps me realize that. And so I’ll check it with myself, like, okay, wait a minute. I’m feeling stressed. What’s going on? Why where’s this coming from? Usually it’s because I’ve put myself in some kind of rush to get something done. I’m in, I’m back in my rat race mentality,

which has been something that I’ve had to have for, you know, been a high-achiever kind of person my whole life. And so I think that there’s this, this rush to get things done, I have to get everything done. That kind of proves my, my worth. And I realize, okay, the stress is coming from that story. And I need to check myself.

So it tells me that my need therefore, is to slow down. I’m feeling stress. I can usually equated to a need that I need to slow down. And then the question, the hard part of course is actually doing it right. Recognizing it number one. And then the second piece is, okay, am I going to actually allow myself to slow down?

Am I going to tell myself, Hey, I don’t have to get this done today. Or am I going to give myself a break? Whatever that might look like in the moment. Another example, actually that shows up for me with how I feel is when I’m feeling resentment. I know for sure for the work that I’ve done through my, my people pleasing is resentment is a sign that I’m somehow people-pleasing somewhere,

some along, somewhere along the way it is assigned for me that I’ve said yes to too many things. If I’m starting to feel resentment towards somebody or something, again, check in with myself, okay, where is this coming from? My goal, where’s this resentment. And then I can usually trace it back to that. I’ve said yes, to too many things or,

or at the end of the day, I guess the need is I’m not taking enough me time. And there is a need for me to do more things that I want to do so less about everybody else more about what does Michael want, which sounds very selfish, but it’s not sometimes that, that is how you get back into sort of that authenticity is I no longer be being authentic because now I’ve given my time and my life to be saying yes to these events or doing too much work or whatever it is.

And I’m not being authentic to what I need. What if I just need an app? What if I just need to go for a walk? What if I just need to do nothing or my own projects sometimes. Right. So I think that’s for me is, is, is the answer is, is how I feel and asking myself the question, how do I feel?

Where’s this coming from and tracing it back to some unmet need? How about you, Matt? Yeah, mine. Mine’s going to be very similar to that. I think, you know, you look at the word authenticity and it’s like, what is the most authentic aspect of our nature? Right? Like our soul. And then on a human level,

we have our emotions, right? Our humanness is our emotional worlds. That’s always pointing us in the direction of what we need and what we don’t need. And I think so if you look at emotions, they’re, they’re messengers of need. They’re constantly communicating to us what need is going unmet and what need is going met. Right? If we have joy,

we’re, we’re meeting a need. If we have anger, we’re not meeting a need. So we, when we’re not in touch with our emotional world, we’re not in touch with our inner compass. And I think that is a take home message that I want the listener and viewer to really resonate with. It’s like, we need to feel if we want to connect to our authenticity,

right? Whenever I do like assessments with people before coaching and we’re doing authenticity coaching, it’s always, how embodied are you? How good are you at feeling your emotions? Because if you’re not good at feeling your emotions, you’re not likely going to be good at getting your needs met. And this has been a big learning for me. So looking at my,

and you know, within the emotional world, we have, we have primary and we have secondary emotions as well. And secondary emotions are still not going to point you to the need, right? So if you’re looking at something like anger, right sitting on the top, it’s like the anger iceberg rate sits at the top. You have anger, but below it is all the stuff that’s going on.

If you’re only connecting to the anger, you’re likely not going to be connecting to the unmet need because you’re going to root into anger, which this is my pattern, by the way, route into anger, deflect, project deny all that stuff. Anger is full of blame. And then we still don’t take responsibility for our unmet needs. So when I look at,

for myself, what is, how do I know when I’m stepping out of alignment is likely anger. Anger is the first thing that I’m going to notice because I will be like, fuck you world, fuck you. This person, like, I just send fuck yous to everybody. And then I’m like, oh, okay, wait, maybe there’s an unmet need that I need to tend to.

And what I’m really learning about myself as below the fuck use is the sad, hurt, little Matt that like wants his needs met. And like, he’s not feeling heard. He’s not feeling understood. He’s not feeling seen. So he’s like sending up middle fingers to everybody and he’s defiant, right? And that I’m, I’m really learning to love this little person in me because he is just trying his best to get his needs met.

But big Matt has not been feeling his feelings very much in his life. So he’s really learning this skillset. And this has been a really big part of me, you know, stepping into my authenticity is learning how to feel. I second, what Michael said around resentment too, because like, as being a people pleaser most of my life, which is really a denial of your own emotional world,

right. Please, everybody else co-dependence focused on everybody else. So they don’t have to feel their own stuff. So I noticed for me, when I have that kind of visceral feeling of resentment taking course in my body, it tells me that I’m well, two things I’m not getting my needs met, or I’m not setting up a boundary, which is going to help me get my needs met.

So lack of boundaries, always for me, leads to resentment or anger or irritation because people start to infringe on me. And I feel like, you know, whoa, like back up. So resentment and anger will tell me that another one that I’m very, very familiar with is putting a lot of pressure on myself. You know, I’ve worked on perfectionism for the last probably five years,

very, very deeply. And it’s still part of me. I think it’s just so deep inside of me that it’s, it’s always going to kind of be there to a certain degree and I just need to keep it in check. And when I am putting a lot of pressure on myself, it is very, it, it, I just find that I get really overwhelmed.

I feel like I start to compare myself to others. It just leads me down a path that I do not want to go. So I have the same rule as Michael in the morning. I always wake up two hours before I have any commitment so I can move slow. I like to move like a turtle in the mornings. And I like to,

you know, not touch my phone first thing. So I usually will get up and do some sort of meditation or movement or something where I get connected to my body. And then I do my mantras. I work with my stones. Like I need to re into myself in an embodied way before I can move into my day. And especially days where I have heavy,

like a lot of clients or something like that. It’s really important for me to be embodied in, in my practice. So yeah, and that, that, that will only, you know, that’s only really known to me when I feel the energy of I’m starting to put too much pressure on myself. It means that I need to take more time to surrender,

to connect to my feminine, to not be in this, do, do, do energy because I love me a good to do list. And I also need to like root into the energy of like, okay, nothingness, nothingness, like you can still accomplish in being-ness right. That’s a big, a big lesson that I’ve learned in the last few years is the divine feminine is just as much valuable to accomplishment as the divine masculine.

And I think that’s been a really important lesson for me. So yeah. I love this topic. I love talking about needs because it’s so new and exciting for me right now. Those are both great guys. And I think I’m probably gonna, I’m probably gonna say a lot of the same stuff when you’re talking mine. Definitely the two that came to my mind is anger and judgment.

Cause I don’t get very angry. Like I’m not, I might get a little ExecEd exasperated at times, but I don’t usually go to like anger, anger. And so when I’m in anger, anger, that’s a big sign to me. I’m like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Like what is going on? And it’s very rare that that happens.

But that’s when I know, okay. Something is very out of alignment here because this is not who am. And usually that’s, if I’m letting somebody push me and push my boundaries and I’ve not held on to them or they’ve jumped over those boundaries, regardless of how upfront I was about those boundaries, that really gets me. And that goes into like the whole,

you know, consent conversation of, you know, just personal boundaries of like, you know, if you’re out and about and somebody like grabs your ass or like touches you. And you’re like, don’t touch me. And like has been clear. And then they try and go again. And you’re just like, oh my goodness. Like I literally just said that like,

that kind of stuff gets me angry, but it’s because somebody else is like, you know, crossing my boundaries. But just in everyday life, if I’ve set up a boundary for myself and it continuously keeps getting pushed aside, that’s when I that’s, when I start to get angry, I’m like, okay, I needed to be firmer with my boundaries because I know that those help keep me in alignment and help keep me happy.

So I definitely resonate with you on the, on the boundaries front mat. And another one that I know that I’m out of alignment is judgment. If I’m judging other people, because then that means I’m playing like a comparison game or like I’m a better than the out game. Like, and that is not in alignment with my authentic self. So when I start judging other people or doing things like that,

I’m like, why does it matter if this person is doing that thing over there? Is it affecting me? Is it affecting my life? No. And that’s why I need to take a step back and I’m, and I have to think, okay, have I gotten wrapped up in the, you know, getting along with everybody and everybody else has kind of been a bit of a judgy mood and this is how we’re communicating today.

And I have to take a step back and go, okay, well, I don’t want to communicate like that today. So how can I reroute back into myself and get back into alignment with myself and like shift the conversation or drop the judgmental talk that’s going on in my head? Cause it just, I don’t like judging people, but it’s something that’s so deeply rooted in our society and in our consciousness that like so many people,

that’s how they get along. Like, that’s how they, I think Michael, you’ve talked about this quite often about your friend who you’re like, oh, we did together was like, you know, bitch and judge and like gab about other people, but in like a not so nice way. And so you had to really make a conscious effort to be like,

okay, if we’re going to continue being friends and have a friendship, we need to have conversations in this direction. Of course, that takes time and it’s a journey, but like that’s, that’s the kind of shit that goes on in my mind that I’m like, you out of alignment? And that’s also how I know that’s also how I know if I am truly around people who are my people or if I’m around people who are just filling a void of space.

So it’s like if you’re hanging out with people and like your energy is going into kind of like that catty, sassy, judgemental, like sassy could be fun where, you know, the gay community, you can have a bit of like some shade and some sass, but there’s a difference between SAS and shade when it’s like good hearted, well natured. And like everybody’s in on the joke and it’s not every day.

It’s not all the time. It’s just like fun here and there. And then there’s a difference when it’s like coming from that judgmental or that like mean-spirited energy. And like, you can tell the difference when that goes on. Cause people are like, Ooh, that was that actually. Wasn’t nice. So when I’m with a group of people specifically, and I,

and I feel like that judgment is coming out, that’s when I go, oh, are these really? My people are, you know, are these people that I’m just going to like, maybe keep at an arm’s length or keep it acquaintance length. And that also can come back to me because I go, okay, if I’m rooted in my authenticity and I’m rooted in myself,

even if those people are doing that, I still have the power to contribute to the conversation steer at a different direction. So maybe I then need to take it upon myself and steer it in a different direction. And if they follow and they do migrate to a more positive kind of like way of speaking in that then, okay. Maybe they just needed to learn that this is a safe space for us to talk like that because you know,

everybody’s default is like to poke, to make fun of, to be sassy, to be judgemental because that’s how people communicate. And if they don’t follow then, okay girl, I mean, you’re not from me. Have a good one. And then that’s how I know that my people are really my peoples because like we never go in like us three,

never go into the, I mean, I never say never, but very, very rarely do we have judgmental talk or kind of that kind of talk come up amongst us. Like, it’s always, like, I always feel fulfilled. I always feel I’m seen and heard, like you were talking about Matt. I always feel seen and heard and appreciated.

And that’s how I know. I’m like, okay, well this is like, this is the space where, you know, keep cultivating more of this into your life. And I think the more we do this work, the more that that does naturally come to us, just look at our, you know, our Facebook group that came in brotherhood. That’s what we’re cultivating in that group.

We’re cultivating that energy of like bring your authentic self kind of, you know, it’s going to have some vulnerability in there, but the more people see it from others. I’ve seen so many posts lately of people coming around and being like, oh, I’ve been in this group for a month, but I’ve never introduced myself. But now they’ve seen the proof of other people coming in,

like the support that you get. And you know, you’re only gonna learn how to do that. If you put yourself into that environment to kind of expose yourself to it and learn and grow. And I’ve even seen people who were a bit, maybe sassier, more judgmental at the beginning, kind of drop that BS, drop that mask and go, okay,

that’s not the energy for here and start learning how to communicate in those different ways. So, yeah. So I know I’m stepping out of my alignment and, and meeting my needs when I drop into anger and judgment. That’s that’s for sure. All right. Let’s jump into the next one. And the last one we’re going to be exploring here. I’ll just make a comment I want to make.

Cause I think it’s Important. There’s, there’s so much cattiness and judgment in the gay community. I’m going to bring voice to that right now. I’ve been around it. I participated in, in my early twenties and I made a commitment to myself probably when I was like in my late twenties, after reading Don Ruelle, Don Ruiz, the four agreements,

and one of them is be impeccable with your word. And I had a real, a revelation in, in, in one of those moments when I was reading that book that, you know, people who are willing to talk shit with you about somebody else are likely willing to talk shit about you, to other people. And it’s really important to note that because you know,

when we do our healing work and we become integrated in closer to our authentic self, we don’t, we don’t need to talk shit about other people because we’re happy with ourselves. And usually people who are talking poorly behind people’s backs are people that aren’t happy with themselves and they’re treating others the way that they’re treating themselves. And they’re just externalizing their own inner dialogue,

right. With other people. So just be really mindful of that. Like for people that are listening right now, like be mindful and pay attention to people that are willing to go in those dark nasty places with you and in talking behind other people’s backs, they’re likely to throw you under that same bus in a, in a different conversation. So don’t be that person.

Nobody wants to be around people like that. Yeah. Thanks. Thanks for putting that out there because yeah, I agree. And I think even Bernie brown, I can’t remember what book cause I’ve listened to all of them. Pardon me? But she talks about this, the fault, the fault. Oh yeah. Braving. I think it’s braving. And so she talks about it in braving.

It’s just like, okay, well, if you come and tell me something that you shouldn’t be telling me, then I now have to put you in this category of like, okay, well, I can’t tell you things because I can’t trust you to be a vault for the things that we share. So the things that are like, this is just for you and I,

I need to be able to trust you with that. And you look at you see those people around you and you notice you go, okay, well, this person has never said anything about other people to me. I feel like I can trust them. And you build that relationship. But then if you have friends who constantly tell you other people’s business,

and then you tell them a secret and they go tell somebody else, and then you get mad about it. We’ll like, what did you expect? Like you were part of the conversation of talking shit about somebody else. And then you’re surprised when they go and tell somebody your secrets. Like, I mean, actions speak louder than words. So I’m really glad that you brought that up.

Cause it’s, it’s very true. And I mean, none of us are perfect. You know? You say, I, I don’t talk shit about people. I will make observations and things known to specific people be like, oh, this, this other person, who’s not my people. And it’s because of, you know, you know, maybe one thing or the other,

but it’s not talking shit. It’s just like, yeah, they’re not my person. And then that’s the end of the conversation. It’s not like a deep dive of like back and forth falling kind of a thing. So that I do even try and limit that. Cause that’s still, again goes in judgments like, oh yeah, they’re not my people,

not my thing. So thanks for that. All right. Diving into the last bit here we are going to be talking about what advice or best tips do you have that have helped you along the way to figuring out how to meet your own needs and how could someone implement it for themselves? So advice or best tips to help someone along figuring out their own needs.

So I’m going to trace this back to something. I think you said earlier about, I don’t know if you use this wording, but like the mother, Teresa, like giving of yourself, taking care of everybody. So like focusing on everybody else. But to me, I always look at a lot of those people and I go, okay, have you done the inside work?

And you’re doing that out of kindness or you have even not done the inside work. You’re doing that out of avoidance. So my first, my first tip would be, even though it can be scary, give yourself the time to get to know yourself, sit with yourself, figure out what your needs are, figure out what you need in your life in order to be able to express these things.

Because if you don’t know what you need, you can’t communicate that effectively to other people. Other people aren’t mind readers. They’re not, they don’t know what’s going on in your head. You’re the only person who’s spending 100% of the time up in here. Right? So you can’t assume other people know what you need from them. And this drives me crazy,

especially when I see it in relationships where people are while the OSHA just know, like usually just know I’m like, what do you mean? I just know, like you can’t assume somebody knows something. If you’ve not properly communicated it. And I like to use this in specifically relationships like romantic relationships. It can be in all, but like in romantic relationship where,

where you’re starting things off fresh and new, a lot of that building happens at the beginning. And if you don’t know what your needs are and if you can’t communicate those things properly, you can’t assume the other, person’s just going to know because your, your journey of growing up is different than everybody else’s. And so your assumptions that you’re making are going to be completely different than somebody else’s assumptions.

Growing up, me growing up very like middle, low class in Vancouver. And how I was raised is going to be different than somebody who’s raised in Europe with like maybe more family values and European lifestyle. Like it’s going to be very different. And like, I’ll take a, I’ll take an example of a friend who grew up in a very Italian household,

you know? And they, I don’t want to say aggressive, but they’re very passionate with their communicating. And so his way of communicating is very animated, very passionate and can come across as aggressive and sometimes angry. And that’s just because that’s the environment that they were raised in. And that makes me want to run away because I’m like, this is too aggressive for me.

This is too much because I grew up in that different situation. But in order to have that communication, I need to know myself enough to go, okay, I know how I want to communicate. I’m going to bring my best self to the table. These are my needs. And if I need to say, Hey, I love that. You’re so passionate.

But like the voice is like way up here. And it’s like, given me kind of like these angry, aggressive Vives, can we just bring it down to like a normal level? And that’s not rude. It’s not being a shady bitch. It’s just communicating what you need. And if they can’t do that, okay, well, I know that I can’t hang out with you as much,

but in relationships you can’t just assume like, oh, well this person does that. Or, or you’re supposed to do that because no, unless you’ve told me this and communicated this to me, I don’t know me and myself. I’m a very straightforward person. You want me to do something? Ask you, need something, ask you. You want me to know something?

Tell me. And I, it drives me crazy when somebody pulls out that well, you should just know, or the best part is like, well, don’t you remember? I told you that one thing in passing and did not actually like sit down with you and communicate it properly. I just frivolously threw it out there and expect you to know that that’s a giant key point of me.

It’s like, no, if something’s really honest, the key thing to you, you need to give time and energy to that conversation and sit down and go, okay, let me communicate something that’s really important to me. And for me, that would be, Hey, I really want to get to know you. I really enjoy being around you. I need to communicate to you that I also very much need my own space and I value my own space.

And it does not mean I’m not interested in you. It does not mean I’m ignoring you. It does not mean that I’m not interested in. You does not mean that I’m not falling for you. It just means that to be a happy, authentic, caring individual that I am. And to give you the energy that I do, I need to take care of myself first.

And I need to just have some of that. So maybe that means I only see you once or twice a week instead of every single day. But that’s like an actual conversation. You sit down and you have, so that would probably be my, my advice and tips is like, just spend time getting to know what your needs are first. And then that way you can properly communicate them later.

But if you don’t do that first bit, if you don’t actually figure out what that is, then how is anybody else going to know either, right? Which just going to be running through life, waving your hands and be like, I don’t know. So that’s me. What about, what about you? Let’s go to Matt. Go to me.

Okay. I wasn’t expecting that mottoes. I wrote down three things here that I, that I think are important. So the first one is going to be to feel, feel my feel. You’re not feeling you’re not healing. You’re not understanding yourself. There’s so much being missed out if you’re not feeling your emotions and that, that there’s so many different ways to explore that.

Yeah. Like just really connecting more with your body, right? Oftentimes I think when we experience as gay men, like I said, this, I say this all the time, but we have a lot of shame. We have a lot of trauma that we experienced growing up and a common reaction to that in most human beings is dissociation. We cut off our ability to feel,

and we live up here up in our minds. And I think we, then we, what we try and do is we try and intellectualize our feelings. We try and think our feelings and that doesn’t work, right. Feelings need to be felt and discharged through the body. So embodiment practices, connecting to your body, dancing anything. And that’s why I’m so big on the divine feminine.

And it’s not about gender. It’s about connecting to that. More slowed down version of you, that in the body can go. It can be so beneficial. So I would say find ways to connect to your body and start practicing feeling. That’s one of them. And actually, I will say yoga nidra, yoga nidra has been one of the most effective things that I’ve done that has helped me connect back to my felt sense in my body.

So definitely check out yoga nidra if you’ve never done that before. And then there’s two questions that I really, I always get clients to explore these two questions, which is what are, what unmet needs did I have as a child? And how am I getting these needs met now? Or are these needs still going unmet now? Because I think you look at,

you know, development. And the first 10 years of our lives is really record. And then the next, whatever 60 years of our lives is playback, we’re always playing back the same tapes, the same messages, the same things that we experienced in the first 10 years of our development. And when you can understand, you know, what were maybe some core fundamental needs that went unmet in your early developmental years,

you’re really going to understand yourself now because we are repeating the same things. And for me, I said it was, you know, not feeling heard and understood. So, you know, if I’m in a relationship or I’m in a setting where I’m not feeling heard, I immediately resort back to wounded inner child, Matt, that wants just wants to have his needs met.

Right? So I think that’s a, those two questions will really help you explore that. And then the other one would be communication, right? You need to find ways to communicate because how can we get our needs met if we’re not communicating? So that looks like being vulnerable and setting boundaries, right? There are two essential things when it comes to getting needs met and two essential things when it comes to living your most authentic life is like being vulnerable and showing up,

practicing, authentic self self-disclosure and, and feeling worthy enough to get your, to get your needs met through, through boundary setting. Right? So, and this is, this is like life work. Like I may, I’m, I’m talking about it as if it’s like, just do it, but I get that this is life work. I’ve been working on these things for years,

a beautiful container to do this is to come and join the gaming, going deeper membership community, because this is where we teach all this stuff, right? And this is the central point where you can come and you can learn everything that we’re talking about. We released coaching videos each week and we have zoom Hangouts where we can come and into, into community and connection with other gay men.

And we can work on developing these skills, right. This is why we created the membership. So I just think it’s important to, if you’re looking for a place to kind of do a one-stop shop to do all this work, the gaming going deeper membership is going to be that place. For sure. Yeah. What about you, Monica? Yeah.

You guys have shared so many awesome things as always. I want to echo, because I think it’s worth repeating, listening to yourself and, you know, listening to your emotions or at least, you know, feeling them and, and, and realizing that they are the roadmap. You know, I think for me, that’s not even a skill I knew was a skill until,

til I kind of had to figure it out the hard way. But beyond that, I would say, I think as you guys are talking, I’m thinking about my own experience. And I sort of started on this journey of meeting my own needs probably in my late twenties, after a very bad breakup that I took very, very poorly. And it kind of threw me into a tailspin emotionally,

mentally, and F from the ashes, so to speak. I really asked myself some really tough questions. I did some therapy, which really helped a lot. Put me, kind of got me out of my own head a bit. And then from there, it just, I just took off because the Results I saw after very quickly or were making a lot of impacted my work life,

love life, social life, everything. So I would say the first thing that happened though, is self-worth like, you’re, you’re not gonna listen to your own needs. You’re not going to listen to yourself when it comes to your emotions. If you don’t believe you’re worthy of that. I think that is for me, at least that was the turning point.

Once I realized was sorry, I said it realized, but it’s not a realization that just kind of happens. Listen, it wasn’t for me. But as I began to develop my own sense of self my own self-worth for myself by myself, that is when I was like, Hey, wait a minute. I like I’m worth listening to myself. I’m worth feeling whatever I’m feeling.

I’m worth, I’m worth this. Like I’m worth spending time by myself. So I would say for me, that’s, that was my turning point is developing that sense of self sense of self worth from within, because before that I would delegate responsibility for this to a lot of other people, family, friends, looking for that validation for me, my thing was sex and dating that the more,

the more people I could attract, the more guys I could have sex with, the more hookups I could have that for me was filling up my self worth, but cup, but guess what? Didn’t work. Right? I would fill it up for the moment for the evening. And then lo and behold, an hour later, there was again, feeling lonely and feeling insecure.

I wouldn’t call it insecure at the time. I, I think now looking back, I can call it insecure, but I felt lonely and I’m like, I need something to fill that up. So, you know, what happened for me was eventually that I realized, okay, this is just a numbing. It’s not really doing anything. It’s just numbing,

numbing the pain of loneliness. And I didn’t want to feel the feels of loneliness, sadness. I missed my ex. I read, you know, all these things. I was trying to get over it for myself. And I did that in the ways by again, delegating that responsibility to be like, oh, Hey, you guy on Grindr or Hey you guy at the gym or Hey friend or whoever,

it was just make me essentially saying to them, like, make me feel worthy. And that’s not fair to them. It’s not fair to me. And it also doesn’t work well because it’s ephemeral. It’s not going to last once I turned within and I’ll tell you how I did that. I, for me, in that particular case, I made a commitment to myself.

I was hooking up like daily sometimes multiple times a day at the time and Fridays were the worst because all my friends had partners or they all had plans on Friday nights. And I didn’t, and that was the time I really missed my partner, my ex partner. Cause we had date nights on Friday. So Fridays I committed. Okay, I’m going to spend time by myself on Fridays and I’m not going to,

I’m just going to have a date night by myself. And again, at the time I really want to reiterate to this to listeners. I didn’t have all the languages that I have today. I didn’t have language about self-worth and getting needs met. I didn’t know what was going on. I was just, okay, I’m going to just do this by myself because the way I was doing it before was not working for me.

So yeah. I thought, okay, what do I really want to do? What are the things I love to do by myself? And it was like watching at the time I was watching fab. I was watching reruns of golden girls, which I still do by the way, reading books at the time I was, I was a big Snapchat user.

So I was playing with like doing lip syncs on Snapchat. I guess these days it’s ticked off, but I’m like playing with that. And while that still is a little bit of numbing, in some sense, if I did it by myself and I made sure I am not going to delegate responsibility for my own entertainment, like I’m, I can entertain myself on a Friday night and I can learn to be by myself and look what I like,

look at the difference. Right? At the beginning, I said, I love solitude. And I need solitude where at the time it was the worst thing you could do. If you had to say it has been a Friday night alone, I would be terrified. Like, no, no, I can’t spend Friday night alone. Like, what are people gonna think?

Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Like don’t I gotta do something. I gotta, I gotta fill it out. I gotta find somebody. So yeah, I think, I think that’s, that’s a big piece for me is, is as I began to spend time with myself, I’m like, Hey, this is a fun Friday night.

I’m just gonna order a pizza. We’ll watch whatever I want to watch, you know, whatever I want to do and just do it and let myself do it and resist that urge to want to turn on my grinder and invite thought hot neighbor over, even though he’s just two doors away or, or resist the urge to go do whatever it is, other things I could do.

So it, it decreased my reliance on others at the same time, as it increased my reliance on myself. And as that happened, my confidence began to grow. My self-worth began to grow and I just kind of kept doing that. And it, my people pleasing eventually went away, not went away, sorry, decreased, because I didn’t need to perform to have people that meet my needs.

I could just toss that all away and say, oh, okay. I could just be more authentically me. And you know, this was, this was a long time though, like this didn’t just happen overnight. I really want to reiterate this. This is a very long tumultuous process and it was not linear. It was ups and downs and mistakes and things along the way.

And luckily I did have some support through therapy. And then later I met people who I could be myself with, that I could share this stuff with. And they understood. Right. Kind of like were saying your, your, your vibe attracts your tribe. As they say, as I became more authentic and Isaiah to your guys’ points communicated that the people who didn’t want to participate,

they didn’t participate and that’s okay. Have, have a nice time. But the people who did those were the people that I wanted to nurture more deep relationships with. And some of the ones from that era stayed, some of them left. And the great thing is a bunch of new ones showed up. But I first had to make that commitment to myself for myself.

So I think that’s just a long way of saying, developing your self worth and spending time, spending time learning to spend time with yourself. And, and you know, if you have, if you have to listen to yourself and then listen to your emotions for me, I like, it’s hard for me to do that when I’m with other people. Cause I guess I’m just too involved with them when I’m by myself,

I can really check in and do that work. So that’s, that’s my tip. My advice. I love that. I love it. You guys pull us such good stuff. Wow. I think we’re kind of gearing up and getting close to the end here. Does anybody have anything else that they’d want to end on the last little bit? Yeah,

actually I do Calan as the resident, Italian of our threesome, I could totally reiterate. I’ve had people come to my, come to my family dinners and be like, why is your family yelling at each other? Like, are they mad? And I’m like, no, that’s just, that’s just how we talk. So yeah, a hundred percent I get that.

We, we are, we are a passionate people and sometimes speaking softly is not in our, in our genes sometimes. Yeah, Yeah. Yeah. I love that. Yeah. Oh, so good. Thanks for, thanks for sharing that, Michael. Well today’s conversation has been absolutely amazing. I love talking about this. Getting your needs met. It’s so important to meet your own needs.

If I always say, fill your own cup first, before try helping filling other people’s cup. Cause if your cup is half full and you’re giving that water to other people, you’re going to empty yourself up real quick. I like to fill my own cup and then all the extra that keeps coming out. That’s when I start giving it to others. But that’s the only way you’re going to feel fulfilled and still be able to serve others because otherwise you’re just going to feel drained.

I call it the mother Theresa syndrome, like you’re going out and you’re doing all this good stuff for everybody else, but it’s going to, if it’s continuously draining you, you need to reanalyze and look at yourself and go, okay, what’s working here. What’s not working here. God take care of you in order to take care of everybody else. I also always think of it as like,

okay, well I can change the world now and you know, struggle more. Or if I make a lot more money, I can help a lot more people. That’s what I always think. And that’s something I had to switch my mind about. Like in order to help people, I was like, I didn’t want to make a lot of money.

Cause it’s like no bad, but now I’m like, oh my goodness, I could help so many more people cause I can donate so much more money to the causes. I want to see change. But yeah, those are just some little lines that shifts. All right. So to wrap things up here, I want to let everybody know that you can go and join our free Facebook group.

The gay men’s brotherhood. The link is in the show notes. Matt also mentioned our gay men going deeper coaching membership, which the doors are going to be opening very shortly here. So if you’re interested in that and coming and joining us and working on some of the stuff that we talk about in the podcast, you can do that. The link is also in the show notes to get on the waitlist,

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if you leave us a comment or none on an overview, we’re going to do our best to try and read them out before every single episode that we all do together. So I think that that is it for today. I hope everybody goes out there and has the best day ever. Peace love rainbows. And we will catch you next time, everybody.