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"A man rediscovers and fine-tunes his purpose in the company of other men who won’t settle for his bullshit." -D.Deida
Format:
50% Goals & Achievement
50% Tension & Emotional Intelligence
To get the most out of the meeting, we agreed on the following rules:
1. Feelings and Action. The primary objective of the Group is for men to improve their everyday lives outside the Group, including aspects of career, relationships, money, sex, and life purpose. It is not a place for endless watery discussions about abstract ideas.
2. Courage & Truth. The Group strives for honesty, courage, and truth, which can be, at times, uncomfortable. Zero bullshit tolerance, no Nice Guy pleasing.
3. Confidentiality. This creates a safe space for men to share openly and be vulnerable. What is said in the Group stays in the Group.
4. No advice-giving, unless asked. Giving unsolicited advice very often comes from a place of pride, not a genuine understanding and caring for the fellow man.
5. Commitment & Accountability. Each member of the Group has a unique background, experience, and perspective of the world. The Group thrives the most when all its members are engaged and present regularly. Men hold each other accountable for the goals and commitments they made during the meetings.
Integrated Men's Groups are a powerful way to grow your masculine traits, improve your relationship to yourself and other men and grow as a powerful & integrated man in the world.
David Deida on Men's Group (from the book The Way of the Superior Man)
"You should sit down with your closest men friends and discuss what you are doing in your life and what you are afraid of doing. The conversation should be short and simple. You should state where you are at. Your close men friends can provide the stark light of love—uncompromised by a fearful Mr. Nice act—by which you can see the direction you really want to go.
Your close men friends should be willing to challenge your mediocrity by suggesting a concrete action you can perform that will pop you out of your rut, one way or the other. And you must be willing to offer them your brutal honesty, in the same way, if you are all to grow.
Good friends should not tolerate mediocrity in one another. If you are at your edge, your men friends should respect that, but not let you off the hook. They should honor your fears, and, in love, continue to goad you beyond them, without pushing you.
Choose men friends who themselves are living at their edge, facing their fears and living just beyond them. Men of this kind can love you without protecting you from the necessary confrontation with reality that your life involves.
A man’s capacity to receive another man’s direct criticism is a measure of his capacity to receive masculine energy. If he doesn’t have a good relationship with masculine energy (e.g., his father), then he will be hurt or defensive rather than make use of other men’s criticism.
You should be able to trust that these friends will tell you about your life as they see it, offer you a specific action which will shed light on your own position, and give you the support necessary to live in the freedom just beyond your edge, which is not always, or even usually, comfortable.”