How To Be Evolve Beyond Traditional Masculinity

The Man Box is a Condemned Building—Time to Burn It Down

Alright, let’s talk about the mess that is modern masculinity. According to a recent FiveThirtyEight poll, a whopping 60% of men say society pressures them to act in ways that are straight-up unhealthy. And the stats don’t stop there—men make up 80% of suicides in the U.S., and nearly 1 in 3 has battled depression.  So yeah, we’ve got a problem.

Enter Ed Adams and Ed Frauenheim, two guys who have had enough of the outdated, 300-film-version of masculinity they call Confined Masculinity—a pair of handcuffs that forces men into rigid roles, fuels selfishness and misogyny, and leaves a trail of damage in its wake. Their solution? Liberating Masculinity—a fresh, evolved take that lets men be strong AND compassionate, protect AND nurture, lead AND collaborate.

 What’s Unpacked In This Lunchbox Of An Episode?
🔥 A new definition of masculinity that actually works—for men AND women
🔥 How to show up as a better man without selling your soul
🔥 What great leaders have in common (hint: it’s not an anger issue)
🔥 The future of masculinity—where it’s headed and how you can get ahead of the curve
🔥 Surviving boyhood and coming out intact in a culture that tells guys to “man up”
🔥 Breaking out of the Man Box before it suffocates you

Meet Ed Frauenheim—The Man Who Broke Free
Ed Frauenheim has spent 4 decades wrestling with what it actually means to be a man. He’s been on both sides—stuck in the toxic “win-at-all-costs” culture and leading the charge toward something better. He’s written for *Fortune, Inc.,* and *Wired*, coauthored three books, and helped shape the conversation around workplace culture and masculinity. TL;DR: He knows his stuff.

He used to be haunted by the old-school male obsessions—domination, brute strength, and climbing to the top of the corporate ladder. But through self-reflection, mindfulness, and a whole lot of growth, he’s ditched the BS and embraced traits like emotional intelligence, camaraderie, and joy—you know, the stuff that actually makes life worth living.

Ready to Ditch the Old-School Masculinity Trap?
This episode is a wake-up call—and a roadmap—to something better. Tune in and start redefining what it means to be a man *on your own terms.*

🚀 Listen Now & Liberate Your Masculinity! 🚀

To listen to this liberating episode at Podomatic (where all our evolved intellectual convos are housed) click here.

To watch the video, click below.

 

To read through the transcript, put on those readers and read on MacDuff…

The Man Box Is A Tenement—Time to Tear It Down w/ Author, Ed Frauenheim – Transcript 

Dr. John Schinnerer:  Hey everybody, this is Dr. John back with the latest episode of the Evolved Caveman and the author from the book Reinventing Masculinity. In a recent 538 poll, 60 percent of men surveyed said society puts pressure on men to behave in a way that is unhealthy or bad. Men account for 80 percent of suicides in the U. S. and three in 10 American men have suffered from depression. Ed Adams and Ed Frauenheim say a big part of the problem is a model of masculinity that’s become outmoded and even dangerous to both men and women. The conventional notion of what it means to be a man, what Adams and Frauenheim called confined masculinity, traps men in an emotional straitjacket, steers them towards selfishness, misogyny, and violence, and severely limits their possibilities.

As an antidote, they propose a new paradigm, liberating masculinity, building on traditional masculine roles like the protector and provider, expanding men’s options to include caring, collaboration, emotional expressivity, and inclusive spirit and environmental stewardship. So today I’m thrilled to have with me Ed Frauenheim.

Ed was Senior Director of Content at Great Place to Work, the research organization behind Fortune 100 or Fortune’s 100 Best Companies to Work For list, and he has written or co written articles for Fortune. Inc and Wired and is the coauthor of three books. Ed, how are you doing? I’m thrilled to have you here.

Ed Frauenheim: I’m doing well, John. Thanks very much for having me.

Dr. John Schinnerer: Yeah, we met recently. And for those of you listening, I professed my love to Ed quite quickly for me, within minutes. It’s very odd and liberating. So Ed, tell me, tell us your story. Like, how did you get to the point of writing a book on reinventing masculinity?

Ed Frauenheim: Sure, John. My [00:02:00] story is one of struggling to be a guy in a lot of ways. And I need to put that caveat on these days, which I want to put on it. I had it in a lot of ways, pretty easy growing up. I was a middle class white guy, cisgender heterosexual growing up in a suburb outside of Buffalo, New York.

Ed Frauenheim: And. Still faced all these pressures that a lot of us guys had growing up. I’m 55 now to be, great at sports, super strong ladies, man win in different areas of life. And also to be, that tough guy, super stoic. I was skinny, I was sensitive, insecure, and I was thwarted with all my sports championship games.

Ed Frauenheim: I tied in a hockey game when I was 12 and I felt like I was the one who, cost the team a win. I didn’t win my college intramural championships in hockey or in ultimate Frisbee. And then my teams were losing like crazy. The Buffalo Bills lost four Super Bowls in a row, John. And the Knicks couldn’t get [00:03:00] past the Bulls.

Ed Frauenheim: All that, it sounds trivial, but it all weighed on me, and I know that there’s been some other writing about people and these adolescent moments that can be really powerful. That was powerful for me. And as I got into the career stage, I did fine. I’m a writer, a lot of books, as you mentioned, made a middle class living, but I never managed anyone from, I managed one person for one day.

Ed Frauenheim: I may have the smallest management career in history, and I never got, to the poll surprise level of articles and that sort of thing as a journalist. And all that to say, I found a way to feel more whole, as I reflected on these masculine pressures we hate we face that ultimately you know through personal writing and then also seeing that in the workplace where I studied work issues and leadership I saw men are called to show up differently.

Ed Frauenheim: It doesn’t, it’s not successful to be that barking boss, that kind of cold me first guy anymore. And that’s how when I, Ed and I talk about [00:04:00] two heads being better than one, and he brought the psychological perspective, which I know you have, John, and then I brought the workplace perspective and we both had these personal stories.

Ed Frauenheim: And that’s what led us to our book remitting masculinity. And it’s but neat to see that it’s making some kind of an impact on folks and giving guys permission to think more broadly about how to be a guy.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Yeah. And I love those of us out there that are giving men permission to be full spectrum to embrace their full spectrum humanity.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: I think I like the idea that we’re human before we’re male and like we feel things. Even though we don’t want to do exactly. So let me, God, there’s a bunch of ways I can go with this. So one of the things I wanted to touch on was your time at great places to work. And what did you see in terms of, cause you mentioned what I consider command and control style leadership, the traditional style leadership, it’s paramilitary, it’s hierarchical, it’s fear driven, intimidation driven.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: What did you see in terms of great places to work and any correlation to that type of leadership? [00:05:00]

Ed Frauenheim: We saw that the opposite almost type of leadership is what’s succeeding today. We did a study a couple of years ago, looking at 75, 000 employees and 10, 000 managers. And we found that the most productive and inclusive leaders were what we called ended up calling for all leaders.

Ed Frauenheim: And that was a reference to the fact that almost everyone on their teams had a great experience. They also had the highest levels of innovation productivity retention, all these kind of markers for what you want on business results. And what these folks looked like were qualities that do not show up in that kind of old style leadership command and control stuff.

Ed Frauenheim: Instead, these are folks that build bonds of trust. They were really great relationship developers. They were purpose oriented. By that the big picture purpose, not necessarily the quarterly results, but what is the highest mission of our organization. They also were humble. They tended to make space for their [00:06:00] people to show up and get the attention and to not take credit for the accomplishments of their teams.

Ed Frauenheim: And so when we put, I love, we created an icon for this, John, that I loved. It was a woman, so it was a woman sitting down. With her hand holding a rainbow and it was like the exact opposite of that take charge guy was barking an order. Like the rainbow was reflecting the idea of what’s the purpose are, are the gold we’re seeing at the end of the rainbow.

Ed Frauenheim: And in fact, they did get the gold because that’s what people are drawn to now is that kind of warm leader, the psychologically safe oriented leader, the leader that’s going to be about purpose.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: We know that from the Google study, that psychological safety is the number one driver of effective teams.

Ed Frauenheim: Exactly. Yeah. And that court we had very similar findings. We separately, we found that the most the small businesses that had a caring community outpaced the revenue of their peers. And at first I had to fight to get that research published on because it great place to work. We weren’t sure we [00:07:00] could say that because it sounded so soft.

Ed Frauenheim: And but this is what the numbers showed. Like we’re dealing with hundreds of companies and data points. And that was the most significant driver of revenue outperformance was whether people felt like they were in a caring community.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: When I think, at some level, we all want to be seen, heard and validated, and we all want to feel safe.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: And, if you think of psychological safety, driving productivity, what’s the number one thing that undermines safety, psychological safety, I would say it’s negative emotions, primarily anger. Yeah.

Ed Frauenheim: I, yeah I, one, a line that I, we use in our book, I think was caring rather than scaring produces the best results today.

Ed Frauenheim: And that is, that requires guys to show up differently. We, whereas before, even if they weren’t scaring people, still guys tended to have kind of their armor up, and not going to be vulnerable and not going to, you never can cry. But if you’re going to create psychological safety as a leader, you’ve got to go first.

Ed Frauenheim: You’ve got to be the one who said, I’m actually struggling today because [00:08:00] I had a big tax surprise, and I’m worried about permission. You got to get permission. You got to model that. Exactly. And so if guys are showing up that older way, they come across as rigid, cold and isolated in a world that’s really now calling for flexibility, warmth, and connection.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Men’s Counselor: Yeah. Yeah. And I think it’s one of my biggest struggles as a coach is some of these old CEOs that. For any number of reasons, just can’t seem to see the damage they’re creating in their workforce.

Ed Frauenheim: What do you think is behind that? I, that’s a fascinating observation. There’s blindness.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Men’s Counselor: I think I think lack of self awareness is the foundation.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Top Mens Counselor: I, I’m a big fan of Tasha Eurek’s work that says 95 percent of us will self report being highly self aware and the actual number seems to be somewhere between 10 and 15%.

Ed Frauenheim: Wow. All right. I didn’t know that statistic. And

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: I think I’m gonna check my

Ed Frauenheim: own reference points there to it.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Okay, call myself self

Ed Frauenheim: aware.

Ed Frauenheim: I’m probably

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: I might not be in that [00:09:00] category. Yeah then you you hear that and you’re like, Oh, shit, where am I? Which one? And, it doesn’t really matter where you start. It just matters that you become aware and start working on it to get better at it. And I think, one of the big problems is that whole man box socialization process where I would argue we’re left with only three things that we can publicly display without fear of humiliation, which are less stress and the big one, anger.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: And so all of our emotions almost get funneled through that anger lens. And I would say a big part of these CEOs that’s motivating them is abject fear and terror, but it comes out as anger and irritability. They’re so scared of not achieving or not living up to what they think they should be doing or letting people down or letting the investors down, whatever it is.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Letting their dads down. Dad was an owner before them. And it just comes out as this Awful irritability and anger where they’re just barking at people and creating psychological terror, intimidation, fear, anxiety, stress, stifling [00:10:00] creativity and innovation. .

Ed Frauenheim: Yeah. I think you’re really onto it when you talk about the, those three sanctioned expressions or emotions and all the ones that aren’t.

Ed Frauenheim: ’cause I was going to, I posit something similar to what you said about why aren’t these guys seeing the impact? And I was thinking it has something to do with not. Knowing what those feelings are themselves, right? Because they don’t let themselves feel, Oh my God, I feel like a little bit empty, or I feel sad that I’m not making a big, a better difference in the world, say, or frustrated that something isn’t working, or even joy.

Ed Frauenheim: The other side of like the beauty of stuff or the beauty of teamwork. I’ve been playing around with a little phrase of I want to help guys feel, reveal and heal because I think there’s so much that Is not felt. And I’m still working on this, even though I, I know what the medicine is supposed to be, but it’s still hard to let the guard down.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: I think it’s still scary at times. It [00:11:00] is for me. I’m still working on it. I’ve been working on it for 30 plus years. But I think, with that anger, I think we’re really addicted to anger as men in positions of power in particular. And the problem with anger is. I externalize all blame onto you when I’m really angry at you.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: And so if I’m doing that, I have no accountability. I have nothing I need to look at it myself. If you would just stop being such a lazy sack of whatever, I wouldn’t be so angry. Then I’d be okay.

Ed Frauenheim: Yeah.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Instead of what’s my part in this drama? What am I doing to contribute? What is this? What’s it’s a co creation.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: What’s my responsibility?

Ed Frauenheim: I love that, John. And I’ll cop to, I went to an anger management class, maybe five, seven years ago. It’s because I was trying to get my daughter to go to an anger management class. She’s dad, you have a bad temper. You should go. I’m like, okay, fine. I will go. I was trying to like, role model that.

Ed Frauenheim: And I actually learned so much. I think we should all go to one. I was in, in this class at Kaiser Permanente are my healthcare system with [00:12:00] really diverse group of people. Some folks that are dealing with jail issues, and You, I think I heard you talk about this with Alex on one of your other podcasts, like anger as a cover for either sadness or fear.

Ed Frauenheim: Maybe there’s other stuff in there too, but shame, yeah. Embarrassment that, what I really took away is so often for me, at least anger was about fearing for the safety of my kids or it was that I was just sad, and I couldn’t register that emotion

Dr. John Schinnerer, Top Mens Counselor: really well. Yeah. And so I think, to your question of why do they do that?

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: I think that’s part of it. I think there’s other little things around the edges, but I think to me, that’s some of the biggest explanation.

Ed Frauenheim: Yeah.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: So let me ask you this going back to great places to work. One of the things you spoke of when we spoke earlier in our first conversation is this idea of different sort of colored levels being applied to human consciousness, a la Ken Wilber, but then you guys applied those to organizations.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Can you go into that a little bit? Because that was fascinating to me.

Ed Frauenheim: Yeah,

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: thanks for that invitation. Because I can’t even, I can’t even [00:13:00] understand Ken Wilber.

Ed Frauenheim: Yeah I have not made it through a ton of his stuff, but I do appreciate some of the overall theories. And then the fellow, the author that really moved me and applied a lot of Wilber’s theories is named Frederick LaLue.

Ed Frauenheim: And he wrote a book called Reinventing Organizations. And he talked about how We’re at this next stage of human consciousness called teal consciousness, and organizations are taking this form. So we talk about teal organizations and that teal is a color that comes after a progression of colors that correspond to human levels of basically awareness, starting with red, which is a very kind of angry gangland gang type warfare stuff.

Ed Frauenheim: And then see, there you go. Red anger at the bottom. There you go. It almost fits your colors from inside out, John. Amber is like more authoritarian, like a church or a university that’s very structured and rigid. Then comes orange, which is a more kind of capitalistic or focused on performance and achievement.

Ed Frauenheim: Innovation. [00:14:00] Green is the DEI world of, okay let’s actually include more voices. But the teal one is shaped by Kind of an acceptance of all the other levels for one thing, and it’s a, you really could call it leading to soulful organizations where we’re allowed to bring our whole person and to see the world in a more holistic connection.

Ed Frauenheim: They also are. Characterized by democracy and much more shared decision making and an evolving sense of purpose so that you’re listening to the spirit of the organization. So it can sound a little woo, but I found that I was really drawn to this and in part, because Lalu talks about the need to unite the feminine and masculine energies and archetypes.

Ed Frauenheim: And that we for 10, 000 years, maybe since the dawn of agriculture have leaned on a hyper masculine side of things where we’re ignoring the connectivity, the compassion, the receptivity, the, just the being, as opposed to the doing and the the kind of aggressive [00:15:00] and purposefulness of masculinity, which can be fine in balance, but we’ve been out of balance.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Top Men’s Counselor: Yeah. I love that explanation because I, it’s one of the things I argue for is the Of masculine and feminine energies. And, to me, it’s really about cause I get guys push back on that. And they’re like I don’t want to be feminine. Like I want to be, I want to be a man, and the fear comes up and I get that and I’m like, and I actually had someone asked me in an interview it seems to me like you’re arguing for the justification of men.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Like you haven’t been listening because what I’m arguing for is to give men full access to their complete humanity. Whether it’s masculine or feminine. If we can just throw those labels out, that’d be great. And just let them be human and then bring the best parts of themselves to whatever the context is that they’re in.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: So different context, different needs. If you’re playing rugby versus going out on date night with your partner versus, helping a child with a skinned knee.

Ed Frauenheim: Love that, John. Yeah. One way that I’ve [00:16:00] come to think about this, and I’ve got a partner who thought up this with me, Jim Young, we came up with this idea of the arrow and circle man, which I think gets to what you’re saying it’s harmonizing the feminine and the masculine, and it’s right there in the masculine bathroom symbol, the symbol of Mars with the arrow pointing up.

Ed Frauenheim: To the right circle. And we’ve been only about the arrow for thousands of years, and we ignore this other part of our humanity, as you’re pointing out, like the need to be caring and to connect. And the, when you talk about the Russification of men, like it takes real courage to talk about emotions and when, and to be vulnerable.

Ed Frauenheim: Which Brené Brown has spoken so well of it takes a lot of courage to be willing to opt out of some of the domination games that men play and they’ll stand up for. The least powerful around and getting, stop a bully say as opposed to just go along with this idea, we’re going to be, king of the castle and make fun of those who haven’t gotten [00:17:00] to the top.

Ed Frauenheim: Yeah, I think there’s a lot. Of kind of simplistic thinking around this question of how do we evolve as men and I like the way you’re talking about, can we access our full humanity, because there’s so much richness there john like it. When you don’t just have the arrow. You often don’t have an interior life.

Ed Frauenheim: You often are also going to be disconnected from people. You don’t have as many friends that we now know with growing amounts of research that relationships are the key issue, the key factor for a healthy and happy life. So you’re going to be a non wussy man and be a dead man and an unhappy man.

Ed Frauenheim: You’re going to choose that because you’re afraid of being a wuss.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Yeah. The masculine code ensures your misery.

Ed Frauenheim: That’s well, that’s brilliant right there.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Truly, I think, and then that’s the thing that it pisses me off about this honestly because I see so many men that are fucking miserable, and they have it all.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: But they have no friends [00:18:00] they can’t communicate with their wife their teenage kids are resentful and angry at them because all their time and attention is spent at work.

Ed Frauenheim: Yeah,

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: but they’re worth 400 million dollars. Wow.

Ed Frauenheim: I think that frustrates me. Do you see change and hope? And I love to I get my thought on too But i’m curious when you look out of the culture john or especially with younger men I what do you see?

Dr. John Schinnerer, Best Mens Counselor: I see a reason for hope I see the younger generation in High schools and colleges. I think it’s split right? I can argue it either way, but the part I like to focus on is there’s a large group of young men that are more and more or increasingly comfortable with everything that they feel. They understand that the importance of having friendships and a healthy relationship with a partner.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: They’re comfortable telling each other male friends, I love you, giving them hugs. And then I see. It’s funny because it’s spotty, right? Like I remember a few years ago. I had a teenager telling me that. Yeah, I was trying to be [00:19:00] vulnerable in front of my girlfriend and I started crying because it was heavy and she looks at me and she goes.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Dude, stop being such a pussy. And so I think just that awareness of it’s not just the men policing the men, right? It’s women are raised in this environment too. And they buy into it as well.

Ed Frauenheim: For sure. Yeah. That’s a a huge issue. And I, we try to, in our book, I think it’s important to acknowledge that this is men’s responsibility to change, but women can play a huge role in facilitating it or preventing it.

Ed Frauenheim: If not preventing it, hindering it, let’s say.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: When I like the idea that I like the idea that it’s not our fault that we came up through the man box that just happens. We don’t ask for it. We never chose it, but it is our responsibility to evolve beyond it. I think one of the things that we can do and women can do.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Kind of generalizing here for heterosexual relationships. So I apologize. Is I think we can both realize that women are inherently better in most cases in [00:20:00] relationship than we are because we are not socialized in that direction at all growing up. In fact, I would argue that we’re mocked and humiliated most of the time for dipping our toe in those waters and women are socialized in the direction of relationship connection.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: And so I think oftentimes, like when I’m doing couples counseling, I’m giving more weight to what the female saying and her perception of reality. Because I know that typically the man is locked in anger and is externalizing most of the blame.

Ed Frauenheim: And

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: isn’t as evolved in those soft skills that she is.

Ed Frauenheim: Yeah.

Ed Frauenheim: And if I apply that to the workplace realm, which I know better than that, the personal realm where you have such expertise as my coauthor does, that’s what you just described helps explain why women are thriving as leaders when they do get to be leaders, because they they have that wider range.

Ed Frauenheim: They’ve had to learn the game of being the hyper masculine boss and be [00:21:00] tough, but they also don’t. tend to still have those relationship skills or often do still. And they’re able to work in this world that’s more flatter, faster and more fairness focused is another way I’ve thought about where things are going.

Ed Frauenheim: And that often requires a little bit of vulnerability. It requires a emotional intelligence to be able to read emotions and know how to respond. And If guys want to thrive in the world, it’s taking shape. They do need to get those soft skills. And maybe we can reframe them as success skills. My, my coauthors wife, Marilee Adams, helped us coin that little term, but because that’s really what’s called for these days.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: And I think we need this, we need to consider marketing, in the use of phrases, right? Like maybe we call those skills, rock hard cock skills. I’m just trying to think of how do you appeal.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: To the man box, man. I’m half kidding. Where was I going with that shit? Oh, I think you’re right that I think women are better suited to be leaders at this point because they have a, they have more access to a [00:22:00] broader suite of skills. And I think they. There’s a distinction I make between gender and sex where gender is masculine to feminine and that spectrum and sex is male to female and that spectrum.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: So what that means is, especially for a lot of women in business, they’ve learned to be more masculine because they need that to survive. They need those skills, but then they also have access to the feminine. And so you can have a masculine woman or a feminine man or anywhere in between. But I think that’s an important distinction.

Ed Frauenheim: Yeah I that’s, I think that’s a good point. Yeah, it seems to me that we are starting to realize more and more people I think are realizing that, this is going back to that hope question and I see it in some of the best workplace leaders that I, got to write about and interview and connect with, like the head of Cisco, for example, is Chuck Robbins.

Ed Frauenheim: And, he just embraced some of these things that we would consider more. Feminine. When he took over [00:23:00] as the CEO role several years ago, he had a dream that he was in a homelessness camp in, in San Jose near Silicon Valley headquarters of Cisco, the big tech company. And he, in the camp, he saw in the dream is the face of his father and his pastor.

Ed Frauenheim: And the next morning he woke up and said I just have to do something about this. And he made, he called, the city officials in charge of homelessness issues and said how can we help. And so he immediately made philanthropy a key part of his leadership, which is typically been more, we’re just tell us about the bottom line, you know that.

Ed Frauenheim: All that do gooder stuff, not part of the, real performance. Plus he was leaning into the intuitive, the dreams, and for him to take that seriously and to be public about it, it ignited a firestorm of philanthropy. And throughout the company so that the entire company, all the employees started doing more and they, their efforts just kept like a like a flywheel of effective, [00:24:00] of feeling better about themselves and as a company, they rose in the great place to work rankings in the course of this work.

Ed Frauenheim: So there aren’t leaders doing that. And another example is the head of PwC, the consulting firm and accounting firm. He took a call during the COVID time frame in his daughter’s bedroom. A lot of leaders were having to lean into their humanity, but he’s okay, I’m on a zoom call.

Ed Frauenheim: I’m in my daughter’s bedroom. And during the call, he acknowledged that mental health challenges had touched his family. And for this leader of one of 55, 000 employee or something like this, company in charge of money issues to acknowledge vulnerability in his own household around mental health, that just.

Ed Frauenheim: is speaking volumes of the way that guys are cracking open or breaking out of that man box. We call it confined masculinity and acknowledging the fuller humanity.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Best Men’s Counselor: Yeah. It was interesting. I was just doing an interview this morning, actually with Dr. Elise Cortez, who does meaning she brings meaning purpose into [00:25:00] corporations.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: And she was saying that. In leaders, she’s looking at intelligence, emotional intelligence, pretty standard. And then she also has added spiritual intelligence. And she said, a lot of these high performing innovative companies, the leaders have really embraced these spiritual elements. And to me, that makes sense, right?

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: That CEOs or leaders are always operating in an imperfect vacuum of information. Like you can’t get enough. You don’t have perfect information in order to make a decision. You’re always trying to gather as much information as you can and then make a calculated risk decision. And okay, so you’re gonna check an astrological reading or you’re gonna check a dream.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: I think there’s it’s whatever Avenue you can use to get another little nugget of information that might apply. And I thought that was interesting.

Ed Frauenheim: I love that. Yeah, I think that’s a growing area and it’s, and that’s one of the reasons I would, I’ve been drawn to this teal stuff and to be clear like the teal world is a little separate from the great place to work world.

Ed Frauenheim: A lot of my research that when I was there was heading in that direction but great place to work is not quite, Embracing this teal [00:26:00] stuff. I think it’s a step away, you might say, but that’s actually why I did leave great place to work. It was a great place to work, but it wasn’t quite ready to embrace this stuff.

Ed Frauenheim: Partly, I think of that fear of the woo maybe, but also I think it’s more a little more comfortable with some of the traditional reporting structures whereas teal is really interested in shared decision making and distributed power. Really challenging these traditional hierarchies. But going back to your point about the spiritual knowledge piece.

Ed Frauenheim: I think you’re right. And I think there’s, the latest science suggests that like when we achieve states like meditation, like you were getting at earlier, John We have access to understandings and insights that we wouldn’t otherwise have. So why wouldn’t we tap that world and that, that element of ourselves and then the deeper connections we have to the collective unconscious as I, as Jung might put it, or, other intelligence

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: or however you want to.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Yeah.

Ed Frauenheim: Exactly. It’s there, we don’t, we may not understand it fully, but, [00:27:00] including with all the research on psychedelics and their ways of people accessing deep, like firm beliefs that we’ve seen the deeper connections there’s something going on there that we can tap.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: And I’ve lived long enough. I’m a big fan of the scientific paradigm. And I also have lived long enough to know that it can’t explain everything. It’s one paradigm.

Ed Frauenheim: Yeah.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: And I’m always going back to that. That’s my foundation, but I’ve also lived long enough to realize that there’s more going on in this world and there’s other paradigms to explore that might address other phenomenon a little bit better.

Ed Frauenheim: For sure. I think that the more we Step into these practices of contemplation of meditation explore explorations with some of the psychedelics and how they can be therapeutic. Besides expansive I’m reading Michael Pollan’s book how to change your mind right now and I know some friends that have gone on some of these medicine trips.

Ed Frauenheim: And they’ve been incredibly super powerful in terms of transforming [00:28:00] lifelong anxiety and giving people a lot more hope. I’m considering doing some of this work as well, and taking some of these medicinal trips, both for anxiety that I’ve wrestled with, but also because I’m drawn to that spiritual access that I, and this is another thing that men, Historically wall themselves off from John.

Ed Frauenheim: The research shows men are a lot less interested in spirituality or so at least somewhat less interested in spirituality than women are. And so what what an impoverished life that is. If you are going to just pooh that and focus on the material your entire life.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Yeah. There’s definitely more going on in this world than what I can sense with my five senses.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: That’s for damn sure. In fact, my eyes don’t even work that well anymore, so I’m maybe down to four and a half cents.

Ed Frauenheim: Oh no, all I’m sorry to hear that. And maybe, the intuitive or the other kinds of senses may take off.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Exactly. That’s, my thought is, okay, what am I not seeing or what am I supposed to see differently?[00:29:00]

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: So that’s how I’m trying to make meaning of it. But so turning to masculinity, so I want to get to your book a little bit as well. So how do you talk about traditional masculinity? Cause that’s a perilous phrase in this day and age. Yeah. And I sure as hell don’t want to go to toxic masculinity because I don’t think that helps any of us.

Ed Frauenheim: We had the same idea, John, we were trying to understand how to yeah, what are the like, what’s the terminology we’re going to use as we think about the shift underway. And we did see it, try to keep things simple and the notion of the conventional traditional masculinity. We ended up calling it confined masculinity, which is similar to that box idea.

Ed Frauenheim: And it really stemmed from. Some psychological theories that came out of a Japanese psychologist who talked about the confined and the expanded self. We and I’m not going to get the psychologist’s name right at the moment, but it was an unhealthy, the confined self was an unhealthy version of the self.

Ed Frauenheim: And the expanded one had much more vitality and it [00:30:00] was a fuller life. We didn’t want to have expanded masculinity because we felt it sounded too much like an erection. So we went for liberating masculinity. We were heading down that path pretty long, John. We went with liberating masculinity to signal that it’s about a freeing of yourself.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: To jump in there though, in terms of confined or restrictive masculinity. I like those phrases and it makes me think of, if you take a piece of paper and you fold it many times has, it has that feeling to it, like a confined definition of self. And it’s in each of those folds in which the shadow, the shame, the guilt, the fear, the anger.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: I

Ed Frauenheim: love that. Did you just come up with that just now, the folded paper? I did. All right. I’m going to, I’m taking the first paper. There it is. Here we are. That’s a brilliant analogy. And then our book in some ways came out of the APA new guidelines on healthy masculinity.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: That created a huge firestorm.

Ed Frauenheim: Big [00:31:00] firestorm. And Adam is my coauthor was on the front lines of that. He was on the U S he was on today. What are some of the morning shows with Michael Strahan, for example, and Laura Ingraham on Fox because the findings of those were like, if men adhere rigidly to those traditional guidelines of stoicism, competitiveness, aggression, self reliance, they become, they live unhealthy lives.

Ed Frauenheim: They have higher rates of the problems, like the medical problems and shorter lifespans. Suicide, addiction, loneliness. All that stuff. And so it shouldn’t be in some ways controversial, right? But, we got that big backlash, but that’s where we were. That was a big genesis for our book was to say, let’s, how can we get to a healthier place?

Ed Frauenheim: And it’s not just the realm of our own health, but I, we tie things to the planet. If we don’t have a more enlightened version of masculinity that sees the interdependence of the world, we are going to burn ourselves up or blow ourselves up.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: When you can argue that traditional masculinity looks at women just as they [00:32:00] do the planet.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: You dominate, you take what you want. You don’t worry about the consequences.

Ed Frauenheim: That is really well put. Yeah, exactly. And then, that is actually a road into, I think a better version of masculinity too, is to point out can you, do you really want to have your wife or your daughter or your mother treated in that way?

Ed Frauenheim: And then there can be a defense of the traditional thing. I’m going to protect her and so forth. But if you push a little bit further, they’re like, do you really want to treat them like they’re infants? As opposed to adults like you and me, like, why should they have less power? How powerful they are, they’re probably more powerful than you in some ways, so I think there is a, there’s an avenue there. But I think a big part of it is helping guys see that traditional masculinity. And just asking them, how is it serving you? You talked with Alex the other day, with a beautiful conversation about men talking about the pressures they felt, what was hardest about being a man.

Ed Frauenheim: And Alex talked about a hike where they were saying, it’s just so hard to be a provider and to be a successful guy. And I think if we raise more of these [00:33:00] conversations, I’ve been having them with my friends and, wider circles as well. And so often men don’t really. Understand what they are called to do individually with those pressures of how we’re supposed to show up as that money guy and the strong man and the ladies man, that really gets in the way of us being who we would be otherwise naturally or organically or in terms of what our spirit is called to be.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Yeah, I think it hamstrings us on a number of levels. And, the biggest ones I concerned I’m concerned about is happiness and relational satisfaction. Because we seem to be doing okay and you know the workplace like we can make money, again We don’t find a whole lot of meaning in it usually and we lack self awareness.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: So we don’t really know what we feel

Ed Frauenheim: Yeah. And I want to challenge that a little bit, John, because yes, we’ve guys have done better than women overall in the workplace, but most people at work, including most men are not [00:34:00] satisfied or they’re disengaged, right? And they are. Yeah,

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: that’s definitely true.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Like the Gallup. Yes, the galloping on

Ed Frauenheim: disengagement. And what what you find is that those workplaces are structured according to a hyper masculine culture. There is we’ve been talking about the command and control stuff there’s no room for emotion or intuition or spirit. And that kind of infantilization of those in the lower rungs of the organization, which is most guys, most people is very toxic to the point where it shaves lives off years off our lives.

Ed Frauenheim: Jeff Pfeffer of Stanford has done this. Amazing research on how we have 100, 000, 120, 000 extra deaths a year because of this kind of management where people are, they don’t have any control over their jobs at work. They have insecurity over their jobs at work with this kind of ruthless kind of layoffs that at You know at the slightest drop of trouble and so just like slightest sign of trouble will lay people off and so all this contributes to a pretty unhealthy experience at work for most guys, [00:35:00] even though to your point maybe you were getting at this idea that We can earn a living and we can maybe do better than women have it’s not it’s far from ideal

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Yeah, I think you nailed it with your first statement of we’re doing better than women was my thought and obviously that’s true with the gender the pay gap and So yeah, where do you see us evolving?

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: You touched on that. Where specifically, how, and I know it’s hard to be prescriptive, but what are the general trends,

Ed Frauenheim: I think that the role, for one thing, we think about roles and relationships that are sanctioned under the two, under that confined masculinity, and I think where we’re going with this liberating masculinity or this Erwin circle masculinity, I think men are seeing that they can be caregivers.

Ed Frauenheim: In addition, in some of the roles that can be our caregivers, they can, that can mean raising kids more actively. And there’s really neat research that men during the pandemic who were staying at home more have identified more fully as dads, when they are dads and they don’t want to go back, they’ve really fused that into their identity there [00:36:00] who wouldn’t, they’re their kids and they’re coming to realize, I love you, and it’s challenging but there is a change in identity that’s happened during the pandemic because of.

Ed Frauenheim: The work at home. So caregiving. But also things like spiritual seeker, like we were getting at a little bit earlier can you make space for exploring the matters of spirit and soul? Potentially also the new kinds of relationships that we can get into so that we can be relating to each other as.

Ed Frauenheim: From a place of emotional vulnerability and face to face male friends, as opposed to shoulder so that we can actually look at each other in the eye as really understand how we’re doing and be honest about that stuff, including, warts at all. So I, and that’s, that includes a closer relationship to ourselves who am I, what am I really feeling the self awareness piece that you’re getting.

Ed Frauenheim: So I think if we, one way to think about is this. We have more roles that we can play and we have new ways that we can relate to each other that are going to be, and one other part of that relationship stuff is to be collaborative besides competitive. We grew up so much [00:37:00] in a sea where we’re swimming in competition, John, but we don’t have to always be fighting.

Ed Frauenheim: We can be seeing each other as brothers and collaborators besides competitors.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Yeah, beautifully put. And I love that you brought in that shoulder to shoulder versus face to face that change in dynamic because my, the work I do typically. is and was face to face. Men struggle with that. And so for some of my more difficult clients, usually, like teenagers back in the day, I would actually take them out to a park and do something with them side by side.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: So they wouldn’t have to make eye contact.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Yeah. So yeah. And I think, when we were hunting back in tribes, that’s how we were with shoulder to shoulder.

Ed Frauenheim: I’m glad you mentioned the tribe stuff because that’s a piece of this puzzle that really animates me, John, and I’m not sure if you and if you explore that with Alex and the other conversation I heard but the idea that most of our time as human beings was as hunter gatherers.

Ed Frauenheim: So like our DNA is really our natural makeup [00:38:00] is shaped by hundred thousand years roughly of being foragers and those communities. were shaped by three attitudes or three, three kind of central attitudes, according to the research I’ve looked into on this gratitude gratitude, autonomy, and egalitarianism.

Ed Frauenheim: And when men are in, were in those communities and when they were, when Anthropologists have studied some of those tribes that have not been touched much by civilization, as we know it, the men tend not to be super aggressive or dominating, they are much more living according to those things we don’t boss each other around that we have autonomy.

Ed Frauenheim: We aren’t having extreme differences in wealth and status. And there’s a sense of abundance, like the earth did give enough. Back then, in some ways it still does, but we have, with the rise of agriculture, you started having scarcity, you had the more dominating folks came to the top. In some ways, that’s a simplistic view but we can see [00:39:00] there was a Garden of Eden back then for male and female relationships and for men is in general to be.

Ed Frauenheim: It brutish and short life. Back then, the research has busted that myth.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Oh, so let me ask you this, just on a personal level, on a vulnerability level. So how is your, I’m sorry, I don’t

Ed Frauenheim: do that stuff. John ,

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: I think. I think you meant to say shit. I don’t do that shit. I know that shit. . So how has your personal evolution of masculinity gone and where have you

Ed Frauenheim: stumbled?

Ed Frauenheim: Yeah, bumpy way, I would say. Hey, would you, we’re gonna say something more there. Just where you, where have you stumbled? I stumbled on tax day this week, John. I did my taxes. With H& R Block, I’ve done for 20 years, 80 percent of the time, 90 percent of the time I’ve had a refund. I’ve been pretty conservative.

Ed Frauenheim: This year I was a little more risky, and I have a 15, 000 tax bill, which is at least 10, 000 more than I [00:40:00] expected. And it really it’s, it hurts. And it’s in, it hurts at these psychic levels too, about being a man who’s a failure, a financial failure. Like how can my, how come I’m not in control of my, of our family finances as the main guy doing this stuff.

Ed Frauenheim: And for a day or two, I just was like, ah, really hit by at that masculinity shame level. But Thankfully, I’ve, learned enough about this stuff, written about it to climb out of that spiral sharing it with people, including my wife and realizing, okay, there’s it’s not totally my control.

Ed Frauenheim: Like my son started college a week later than he should have. If he had started college a week earlier, he would have been a dependent. Maybe that would have given a big tax break. His school started in September as opposed to August, which some do my youngest. Turn 17 and I didn’t realize that cost you a 2, 000 child tax credit.

Ed Frauenheim: So there’s this, these things that are just a little. They’re calm. It’s complicated. It’s complex. And and if I [00:41:00] looked at the bigger picture, we are in a society where my wife and her profession as an artist isn’t recognized, isn’t valued, but I don’t subscribe to those values. Like we would be in much better shape financially if she was compensated a VC, or investment banker or somebody, and look at down the street, the guys at Silicon Valley bank just lost billions of dollars.

Ed Frauenheim: And I actually feel bad about a 15, 000 tax payment. So I’m. I’m working on writing about this too, from that perspective, which is also cathartic for me. So I would say I’m making progress and I still stumble regularly, in terms of navigating these old holes to feel the man box pressures.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: And thank you for sharing that. And it fascinates me because I think one of the man box rules is we’re only as. Masculine is our latest achievement. So as soon as we fall down, as soon as we get fired, as soon as we have a huge tax bill, as soon as we, there’s a bunch of ways you can go get it.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Someone breaks up with you. All of a sudden it gets related back in our minds to our masculinity. And I [00:42:00] like I remember after I got divorced, I got a vasectomy and I wanted it. Like I didn’t want any more kids.

Ed Frauenheim: Yeah.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: And there was like 12 to 24 hours afterwards where I had this, these thoughts in my head of, am I less of a man right now?

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: I can’t have babies. Yeah. Even though I didn’t want any babies. I’m, in my mind, I was too old for babies, but the thought still comes. And so I make the distinction between first voice, second voice, where the first voice is just that primitive amygdala, emotional kind of troll fucked up part of your mind, which is always there.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: And you can’t stop that. You can’t stop that bastard from talking, but you, I would argue the more true you, the core self is that second voice. And so to recognize that as, Oh, that’s the first voice, just talking shit to me. And then you come up with the second voice and say, you know what, John, relax.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: You’re okay. You’re still a man. You don’t need that sperm anyway. You don’t even want it.

Ed Frauenheim: Yeah. I love it. If you, do you know about that work of Phil Stutz [00:43:00] and his tools, Phil Stutz, the psychologist. Oh yeah. On the,

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: He had the Netflix special.

Ed Frauenheim: The Netflix special. Yeah. With Jonah Hill. Great stuff.

Ed Frauenheim: Jonah Hill’s guy. I just was reading some Stutz’s book and he’s got this cool thing about shadow, which reminds me of what you’re saying here, John, that if we can. He has this idea that if you can move your shadow out in front of you and have it look like a person, like what is, what are the features of that shadow?

Ed Frauenheim: And then can you connect with it and speak out to the world with it? And I did that in the wake of this financial thing and I was like, okay, I, that shadow looks like a naive disorganized, skinny guy, weave in the strength piece in there. And there was, when I was able to embrace that in the positive scene of it, it was like, there’s something wise about the naivete I would have was just to say I don’t care that much about money.

Ed Frauenheim: And I don’t believe in this capital, the system we have in the ways it values certain professions way more than others that I consider more meaningful. [00:44:00] So you’re supposed to connect with the shadow and turn to. Some other audiences say, listen and there’s something strong and powerful about doing that.

Ed Frauenheim: Or I found that. And I’m wondering if there’s a way to take some of those first voice impulses, even, or maybe it’s not the same as what you’re saying, but something about the thing that we are ashamed of and incorporating it into us that can make us healthier.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: When I think that’s Largely what internal family systems is about where, you take I could also say that voice that’s saying, Oh, you’re less of a man is my inner critic.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: And so I can say, that’s a piece of me or a part of me. And I can have conversations with that part of me in an attempt to come to terms with it, make friends with it, have it be heard, and then ultimately have it switch roles because that’s a role it doesn’t really want and never really asked for, but it took on in order to protect the whole of you.

Ed Frauenheim: Interesting. I just want to thank you for doing Inside Out, dude. What a killer movie. Can we have the little [00:45:00] boys version next? Because in some ways that would be a really interesting segue there. Have you thought about that?

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: I just had a small part in it. I just consulted and gave them information on anger and anger management and how the brain works in relation to it.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: But I did go back and do a little bit of work with Paul Ekman, who’s the world’s leading expert on emotion. And We were trying to get his atlas of emotions, which is an amazing tool that he developed for the Dalai

Ed Frauenheim: Lama

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: into some of these, there’s a few efforts going on to create social, emotional and ethical curriculum for everyone in the world.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: And I remember I talked to, I think it was Tulane and they were super excited to have the tool and bring it in. But the whole conversation got scuttled. Because someone who is involved, their emotions came up, ironically, and I think they needed some more control which I was confused by. That does sound very ironic.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: But we were going to use those inside out characters in that curriculum, and I was like, [00:46:00] brilliant. It’s, because that movie’s given a whole generation of people a new vocabulary and a new awareness in terms of what’s going on inside their head and their heart.

Ed Frauenheim: For sure. Yeah. I know. I’m just, I’m thinking aloud.

Ed Frauenheim: It just, it would be interesting to, to show young men and older men what operates within us because I think it’s a brilliant idea. It’s like a black box otherwise. And we don’t want to look at it in it, but the movie was such an invitation to explore this stuff.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: I think, honestly, I think most of us men are scared shitless.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: To go inside. And I think that’s one of the biggest hurdles. Because what

Ed Frauenheim: you start seeing is stuff that we’re told is shameful, right? Like fear and sadness, concerns were weak, or sadness. I know I had a heart attack about two years ago, John. And one of the interesting things in the week after I talked to a counselor for a while was like grieving part of my childhood.

Ed Frauenheim: And realizing that my dad’s really bad [00:47:00] temper was, had scared me pretty badly and had probably set the stage for some anxiety. And I just. She said, you might have to grieve your childhood. And it hit me like a ton of bricks. It’s holy crap. I have been walling off this sadness and shame around God.

Ed Frauenheim: Cause you don’t want to be, you don’t want to identify yourself as a scared kid. Cause who wants, what guy wants to acknowledge that he was scared?

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: I didn’t want to identify as an anxious adult, but I went on the radio and did that ultimately. I was like, part of my makeup’s depression, part of it’s anxiety.

Ed Frauenheim: Kudos for doing that. Because we still. And that stuff makes gives permission every time one of us does that I think to open the door open a little bit more.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: And I think that’s part of what gives me hope is that there’s more and more people out there that are giving other men permission to feel.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Whatever it is, they’re feeling. I love it. So let me ask you this. I got to wrap up, but where can people get ahold of you if they want to know more? Where can people get ahold of the book?

Ed Frauenheim: [00:48:00] You can find me on LinkedIn Ed Fraunheim. You can also go to edfraunheim. com. My website, it’s got some services there and more ways to connect and find the book on Amazon, Barnes Noble.

Ed Frauenheim: Happy to give talks, workshops on some of these topics. And yeah I am really, this is a mission of mine to help guys free themselves and live fuller, healthier lives. And then that usually means everyone around them has healthier, fuller lives as well.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Absolutely. And I love you and I really appreciate the hell out of the work you’re doing.

Ed Frauenheim: So love you back, man. Looking right in your face. Thank you so much.

Dr. John Schinnerer, Mens Counselor: Look into my good eye. So anyway, so that is it for this episode of the Evolved Caveman. If you liked this episode, please be sure to rate, review, and share. If you didn’t like it, you don’t have to do a damn thing. Thanks so much. I’ll see you next time.