Forging Resilience

S3 Ep78 Craig White: Redefining Male Leadership

• Aaron Hill • Season 3 • Episode 78

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What if the strongest thing you can bring to the room isn’t control, but connection? We sit down with leadership mentor and former elite high-performance coach Craig White to chart the shift from head to heart, and from managing outcomes to mastering attention. Craig takes us behind the scenes of life at the top of rugby and into the inner practices that changed everything: breathwork as the master regulator, nature as a nervous-system reset, and relational presence as the true measure of leadership.

Craig opens up about a month in a tantric yoga school that split his career into a before and after—two weeks of restlessness followed by deep stillness, heart-opening states, and a flood of long-buried fear, anger, and grief. He explains why he reframes “soft skills” as attention skills, how he learned to share spirit and non-linear movement with hard-edged teams, and the rule that guides his work: never ask a client to do what you haven’t done yourself. We explore the often-hidden topic of male sexual energy as creative fuel, and how redirecting it through breath cultivates vitality, clarity, and steadiness under pressure.

For high achievers who’ve built success on control, Craig lays out first steps toward safer relationships and better leadership: recognise dysregulation, recentre through the senses, and blend anger with love when setting boundaries. He shares a practical 20-question safety inventory couples can use, a redefined barometer of success—daily joy and staying open while activated—and seven pillars of self-leadership spanning self-understanding, radical accountability, emotional mastery, mission, vision, energy, and love. We finish with transitions as natural upgrades and the invitation to embody the body’s wisdom so you can meet life, and the people you love, with a clear spine and a soft front.

If this conversation sparked something in you, follow and share the show, leave a review to help others find it, and tell us: what practice will you try this week to come back to centre?

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SPEAKER_00:

Welcome to Forge and Resilience, real conversations for high performers facing transition. I'm Erin Hill, and join me as I talk with people about challenge change and the adversity they faced in life so we can learn from their experiences, insights, and stories. Today we have sat with us Craig White. Craig's a leadership mentor and former elite high performance coach with 30 plus years experience in top-level sport. After coaching at the highest tiers of rugby, including British and Irish lines and football, he now mentors leaders and teams through programmes, retreats, focused on embodied leadership, culture, and connection. So Craig, welcome to the show, mate.

SPEAKER_01:

Nice to see you, Harry. It was a while ago that uh we spoke for the first time, and uh I know we've been trying to make it happen, and then you're busy, I'm busy, and uh yeah, it's good to uh finally make it happen.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, today today the day was the day it was meant to happen. Uh a quick like curveball just to kick us off, Craig. Why why would anybody listening today want to stick around for the fill interview? What would we might mean we talk about that make it valuable for them?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, the work I do and the book I've just finished writing is all about the redefinition of male leadership. So um, you know, we look in history at the ups and downs of male leadership. You know, men have been at the forefront of making decisions for thousands of years, and there's been good some some good stuff, but you know, the the old model of leadership isn't sitting very well at the moment, you know, conquer and divide and control, and uh we're being called into the relational space more than ever before as men, but we don't know how to do it. So uh we'll be talking a bit about uh the redefinition of of leadership in today's world, which is much needed.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, I love it. Let's go straight there then, mate. What what what brought you to start looking inward um in terms of self-leadership to be able to write those books uh or to write that book and and to do that the work that you do, Craig?

SPEAKER_01:

Um so as as kids, as small babies, we we're curious. It's just uh an expression of of being a baby, of being a child. You know, we're curious, we're we're we wanna we wanna know, we wanna we wanna experience magic, we want to experience all of this world with full expression, and then life gets in the way, and we realise that certain parts of our expression are not accepted by our king and queen, our mum and dad, and teachers, and you know, we grow up with this kind of split identity, really. You know, we show a persona because that's what led to safety and love, and then everything else gets relegated, and that curiosity that is there as a small child in me it was was really kind of squashed down. Um but I remember going on a trip to Thailand when I was in my 20s and going to all the Buddhist monasteries, and then I started to read about about Buddhism a lot, but I didn't tell anybody, and that started to bring my curiosity online. Um I also remember it wasn't I I don't define it as the start of my personal journey back to self, but I also remember in my 20s clubbing a lot and taking ecstasy and how that kind of opened me up to this expansive feeling of love that I had never felt before, but there was a knowing of a feeling of home and a feeling of well, this is how we should be feeling as human beings. And and so during my 20s I was seeking a lot but I didn't tell anybody, I was reading a lot, but I didn't tell anybody. Um, you know, I remember working for London Wasps rugby team in London, and I would go to meditation centres and I would go to Kabbalah centres and not tell anybody but have this intrigue around what what what is out there and what is what's beyond the person I know and the way I show up in the world. And and I remember working for Leicester Tigers and I used to sometimes at the weekend drop into the Hare Krishna Centre, and I would never tell anybody about that because my mum told me that those people are dangerous and just fascinated by the way they connect and sing and meditate and chant, and so I was all this curiosity started to build, and then and then I got married in my 30s, and then um about 16, 15, 16 years ago, my my wife at the time, Marta, we went on an intensive yoga retreat to Thailand, and at the time I was working for the Welsh rugby team. I was at the top of my game, I'd been on a lions tour, uh, I'd been on two lions tours actually, and um I was performance manager for the Welsh rugby team, coach, and um and then I went to Thailand on this yoga retreat. To this tantric yoga school, and um it was the most significant month of my life, um, and it really kind of took me on an intense journey of self-discovery. What I realized looking back is that for the first two weeks of that retreat I couldn't keep still, you know, because yoga is a practice that creates stillness and it turns our attention in inwards, but it was really uncomfortable. Like I didn't want to turn my attention inwards, I want to be I wanted to be in my head and and my body couldn't keep still and I was itching and I was conveniently leaving for a piss every two minutes. But then after about two weeks, like I I brought my drive and I thought, you know what? Come on, just see what happens. So I I went and I learned to detach from my thoughts, and and then I started to experience feelings that uh would were new to me, you know, expansiveness, out of body, like heart opening, um jo uh intense joy, bliss, kind of subtle orgasmic states, even so that was one side of if you like the opening, but on the other side, um other stuff was coming up for me, you know, uh like fear, anxiety, rage, memories around childhood, like why did I have this shitty relationship with my brother? Why wasn't I closer to my dad? Why did I think my mum was amazing? But really, there's aspects of what she taught me that didn't serve me. Why was I hypermasculine and why was I repressing my feminine side? And it just brought up a shitload of questions, and that really 15 years ago was almost the end of my full-time career in rugby, the first 15 years of my professional life, and the start of my next 15 years of professional life, which was deep inquiry, laws and laws of self-development, and also learning different tools that I could bring back into my world of coaching. So that's when it all started for me, really, that deep, deep self-discovery, introspection, self-inquiry, realizing that I hadn't chosen the rules of my life, and I wanted to create my own rules and I wanted to be the architect of my own future. But that required a lot of deep soul searching and and and work on myself.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, and I and I guess as you alluded to, the pendulum swings, isn't it? When there is more bliss, then there's there's more darkness that comes up with it, and having the tools to be able to step into that. I I I guess from what when I hear you speak, and what resonates for me and so many other people as well is that sometimes when we do things that are not um well, we fit we we sit in a fear of judgment. What will uh what will they think if they know that I'm meditating or going to a Buddhist sentence? And it's interesting to see how these things start to come up slightly more mainstream. Would you say that is the case in terms of performance, that they're they're leaning harder, well leaning more into these soft skills and and exploratory.

SPEAKER_01:

100%. And I mean I don't know if I'd I don't know if I'd call them soft skills, but what what what what these kind of practices that we're seeing these days, you know, breath work meditation, movement practices. Um what's really happening is is the the I would call them attention skills, you know, because we live in the head, we're lost in the head, we're we're lost in a story book of rules that we didn't choose, we've got a set of beliefs and our attention's here, our attention's plugged into the world, the world is trying to kidnap our attention, and really these practices are are bringing the attention back into self, whether that is the body, the breath, your heart, um, stillness, spirit. But really, it's that there's a need in society to redact redact redirect our attention to what's really real within. So that's that kind of shift from outer work to inner work.

SPEAKER_00:

Have you now taken that that work and held that in in spaces in terms of rugby and performance then, Greg?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, with all my clients, really, whether I'm working with the CEO or whether I'm working with a rugby player or whether I'm in a corporate day event or and then leading that, or whether I'm with a professional team or a head coach, yeah, it's um it's in my toolbox. But there was a time, Aaron, where I was shit scared. I was shit scared of using the word, I was shit scared of using the word spirit, I was scared of um asking guys to move the body in non-linear ways, I was scared of what they thought of me, and 100% with 100% accuracy, my experience is that as all those parts started to integrate inside of me and I wasn't so split and I and I wasn't so much wearing a mask because I I was worried what other people thought of me, it then becomes easier to share all that stuff in the outside world. But but I had to try it all myself as well because a rule of life that I'll probably have until the day I die as a coach is I'll never ask a client to do something that I've never done. So I had to dive into everything myself, you know, breath work, meditation, silence, darkness, fasting, coaching, therapy, shadow work, psychedelics. I I had to try it or nature. I had to try it all myself.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, definitely. For for you, what's what's the just switching because you've mentioned uh quite a few practices, what's the what's the most regular practice that you go to, Craig, regardless of whether you're on the high of life or or or struggling a bit, mate? Well, sure, go to the case.

SPEAKER_01:

The most regular practice that I do every day, and literally after I open my eyes and I prop my pillows up in bed, and sometimes I do a standing. The most regular practice is breath work, you know, but I use different aspects of breath work. You know, I'm a trained yoga teacher, I'm a trained Friday Army teacher, I've done a shitload of breath work, I've done some advanced training online, and um but um but that is for me the root of self-regulation, bringing me back to my centre, just reminding me that actually this is my centre, my intention to come wonder but keep coming back to my centre where problems don't exist, perspective exists, love exists. Um so it it's it's breath work, and I like to use a combination of breath work, stuff from yoga, stuff from Wim Hoff, Jordy Spencer, Tantra. You know, as an older man of 53 years of age, I don't wanna I'm at that stage where I don't want to waste my sexual energy. So a lot of my breath work is connecting with my sexual energy and moving it up and kind of re-directing that energy and using it um for creativity. But I think it's often ignored. And men don't realise the power of our sexual energy, the power of the energy in our balls sounds a little bit freaky, doesn't it? But we know we have a lot of power, we just need to know how to harness it.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, well, that's really interesting, mate. We'll come on to that in a sec. Um I I I'm I know it's been true for me um in the past as well, where that that self-exploratory and then the wanting to know and understand can often sometimes impede action. And we can it's it's not the excuse, but it's a reason to keep on to keep on going. How do you balance or harmonize that need to understand yourself and keep leaning into that curiosity without taking away from from the action, from serving yourself, from serving clients?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, it's been a journey for me. If I look back, I guess if you like, my intense personal journey started 15 years ago at the end of that yoga retreat, at the start of that yoga retreat, and it's been a journey for me. You know, there was there was some years where I was on the wheel of self-development, I was going from retreat to retreat, I was sometimes using meditation to hide, but it was a phase I needed to go through. I needed to do a shitload of stuff. I needed to, you know, maybe I was a materialist for a while in terms of a junkie, but I needed to go through that and and until I came out the other end, and now I realize more than ever before that, and I'll use a metaphor of of sports for this, it's like, you know, my breath work, my silence, nature, the odd retreat, topping myself up, yoga, my yoga practice. That is the training field. But the arena is intimate relationship, whether that's with a partner, with with young kids, with my mum and with my mum, with my brother, with my relatives, with my best friends, with my clients, with people that trigger me. You know, that that is that is the arena. And I guess the biggest shift for me, and I'm 53 now, is uh the realization that this stuff's still important, Craig, because it keeps you grounded and centred, but really it's just getting you ready for the the the arena of life where your shit's gonna come up. So I I have a I have a an integrated relationship now between more kind of formal practice and this spontaneous, uncontrollable aspect of relating.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. Let's go back to our bulls then, mate, and sexual energy. Uh talk talk to me more about that.

SPEAKER_01:

Um it's just something that I've been exposed to over the years. You know, I was exposed to it when the yoga school in Thailand was a tantric yoga school, and for anybody that doesn't know what tantra means, there's so many ways to define it. But my interpretation of it is it's just the practice of deepening connection. You know, we we can we can practice tantra with a person, we can practice tantra with art, we can look at we can connect with the cosmos, we can connect with nature, you know, the tantra of fatherhood, the tantra of parenthood, the tantra of sexuality. There's it's not just sexuality, it's really deepening connection and attunement with an aspect of nature, with life in its all all its richness. So um I remember attending lectures in that yoga school, you know, Taoist lectures, uh, Indian tantric lectures, lectures around uh Chinese medicine, and hearing this concept that a man has enough energy within his balls, you know, within his sex, if you like, to create life, to create life itself. But unfortunately, you know, we we we we live in a world where we're so distracted and we're so dysregulated and we don't know what to do with this energy that most men waste it. You know, we masturbate, we masturbate again, we masturbate again. I remember growing up in my teens and as as a 20-odd-year-old thinking that fucking hell, I'm really horny. I want to wank all the time, but really I wasn't, I was just distracted, and it was a way to distract from my feelings. It wasn't that I was horny, it's that when my feelings came up and they wanted to be felt, I couldn't feel them, so you just ejaculate instead or you just switch porn on. And it's funny as as I get older that that I'm reading again, because I read them all years ago, and I'm actually currently reading reading all the Taoist books again around cultivating male sexual energy, that I'm starting to feel, wow, yeah, I'm 53. But when I kind of connect with this energy in my lower centres and I move it up on a m every single morning on a daily basis, and I'm regulating it through my body through deep intensive breathing practices, that I actually don't feel 53. You know, I feel youthful, I feel energized. Um, and more than ever, I feel at 53 years of age how debilitating it is to my nervous system and my the story in my head and how I feel about myself when I ejaculate a lot. So it's a practice that is not often not spoken about, but it's it's it's kind of finding its way into the mainstream a little bit more.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, my coach always used to refer to it as procrastination. Um, but yeah, like you say, in in in avoidance, yeah, the brain seeks seeks pleasure, and uh why not? Um it's it's the easy one to lean into, as you say, it keeps us away from dealing or having to look at what's really going on underneath the the the frustration or the fear. You you talked there about we're so dysregulated then. So how how might somebody that is potentially listening to this in terms of becoming slightly more connected or or regulating themselves? What's a few of the things that you that you teach specifically like high performers, business leaders, sports women in terms of regulation?

SPEAKER_01:

I mean, we can't be regulated all the time. The first thing is to just have an appreciation of when we're dysregulated, you know, when we're not present, when we're agitated, when our uh hands are shaking, when our feet are shaking, when we're kind of uncomfortable, when we the unfortunately the the world or a lot of the world has normalized low-level fight or flight. You know, it's it's actually become normal. You know, I've done I've worked with clients in the past, and if they're the if they've been on fight or flight for years, and then I take them on a deep meditation and they enter regulation, sometimes it's so weird that feeling of being centered and at home and at peace that they don't like it in the beginning. It's like, whoa, what just happened? But over time they learn to experience it as as actually the new norm, that the the regulated state, where really they should be living most of the time. Um, so it's important to be aware of that in in one's body and and and have practices. I mean, sometimes the word regulation it confuses people. I prefer to just say center. You know, I did a session this morning with a client, and it was like reclaim your attention, bring it inside, bring it towards you, and find that place that feels like your center. And over with practice, oh yeah, I get it. Now let's kind of anchor that and just feel what it's like. How's your body when you're in your centre? How do you breathe when you're in your centre? What how do you sit? How's your state of energy when you're in that centre? So I help clients to kind of find that center, if you like, and then give them tools to kind of come back to that center. Nature's one, nature's the big one, but the best one, we walk in nature for hours, we regulate. Nature is just full of wisdom. Um, breath work, any anything involving the senses really can dysregulate us or regulate us. If we look at a murder scene, it dysregulates us. If we look at the sunset and the beautiful light shining through the trees, it regulates us. If we listen to A C D C over and over again for hours, it'll probably dysregulate us. Or if we listen to beautiful piano music, it'll regulate our nervous system. If we talk unkind things to ourselves, consciously or unconsciously, it dysregulates us. If we learn to talk to ourselves in a kind way, it regulates us. One of the things I get my clients to do is write love letters to themselves because it's it's really important. That that self-authoring is a key practice, actually, to regulate one's nervous system. The way we sit regulates our nervous system. If I sit like that all day, I'm dysregulated, and I take that home from the office. But if I can move occasionally and I shake shake off the tension and I and I'm froffed and I'm grounded, I'm regulated, you know, the way we walk, the way we move, it it is all uh related to regulation or not. The way we touch ourselves, if I'm itching all day long because I really don't like myself on the inside and it gets regulated. But if I learn to stop and I and I touch myself and myself and I send the energy through my touch, I breathe that energy through and regulate it. And the ultimate regulator is the breath. You know, the breath is the only aspect of our physiology that we have any control over, so it affects everything. So learning to kind of regulate the breath and become best friends with our breath is is really the the the master uh regulator. But also in you know, also within relationships as well, you can't always say, hang on a minute, I don't want to go into that conflict, let me just regulate. But even even little kind of tools like catching yourself in the morning, in in sorry, in the moment. And one of the things I do, especially if I'm triggered or if I'm about to express disappointment or anger, I put my hand on my chest. It's just become second nature now. So if I have to say some bad news to you, I'll I'll I'll ground, I'll stay connected to you, and I'll put my hand on my chest. So I'll I'll I'll bring love into the expression of disappointment or saying no or or setting a boundary. That's one of that's one of my key motives that you'll probably if you spent time with me, you'd see me do that a lot. Because I used to be an angry fucker and I needed to learn through work with one of my former therapists, Dr. Robert Masters, that love could be fused with anger.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, fascinating. And I was just gonna take take you back there to what's one of the biggest things that you've had to unlearn in terms of performance coming from such a disciplined structured, uh, outward-focused world like high performance and sport to to the the world that you don't mention.

SPEAKER_01:

I wouldn't say I've unlearned it because it can still rear its head, but one of the one of the things to unlearn for most men is is defense whenever we're triggered. You know, we get triggered and we start to defend an identity or or we defend what we said or we flip it. We we what we don't realize is that defence is really a form of attack. So learning to regulate, be comfortable with yourself, not take things personal so that you can drop your defences and just go into that, hey, I'm here now, my defences are not up, let's talk about this. Because I was super defensive, because my dad was super defensive, my mum was super defensive, my brother was super defensive. I came from a family that repressed all the emotions. Um, so learning to drop my defence is the most important practice of my life, and it still is, and it still will be because I've just entered into a new intimate relationship with someone.

SPEAKER_00:

Good for you, mate, good for you. And and and I guess it's part of what makes us us. Um, we've probably got success in the background in in the past because of it, and it's like you've said, it's something that it just have to hold and question and and notice to to recognise is it serving us?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, because it's Yeah, for sure. I mean, even the word success, it's very different to me now as a 50-year-old man than when I was 25. And and I would say for me, the two barometers of success for me now are number one, how much joy I feel in my body on a daily basis, and number two, how I'm able to stay grounded, centred, connected, and loving when I'm on when I'm being activated in a relationship instead of fighting or checking out, which I which I used to do.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, no, me too, mate. So in in in terms of what you've just said there, Craig, I I know I I I feel that I res that resonates with me, and I can understand I I practice those things myself. But for somebody who's just new to that journey and very skeptical of whether that actually how that fits into their business, their relationship, or their sport, how how do we guide them towards the first step of just being open to the other way?

SPEAKER_01:

There needs to be a recognition um and and and self-ownership, like radical ownership um before one can change. So if we're talking about these triggers within intimate relationship, one of the things I do with my clients in the beginning is I created a 20-question inventory that assesses how safe they are in a relationship. So it's got and they have to rate themselves and they get a score. So it's got questions like um, how true is the following statement, not to ten. I never criticize, shame, or blame my partner. I'm always listening with full presence. Um, I never tell lies and so on. And there's 20 of these questions. So that's a powerful practice in the beginning with clients because it with most of them, it's like, fuck. I didn't realise that that's a red flag, that's a red flag, that's a red flag. So those are the areas where she doesn't feel safe when I'm like that. Wow, I didn't realise that. Let's remove blame and let's point the finger this way, and let's let's then start to do something about that. Okay, uh, are you aware this happens? Let's identify some common examples, let's get you into some kind of simple, formal, regulated relation practice, have a chat with your wife, ask for her support and track, you know, track what's going on in the real uh arena of relationships. But the recognition and the like the realization that you're not as safe as you think is a tough one to swallow, but an important one. Uh and and again, look, guys watching this, they could just go to Chat TPT, type into Chat TPT. Um, I want to assess how safe I am in relationship in terms of what I do and what I don't do and how present I am. Give me a 20 question quiz so that I can access um I can assess where I'm actually at.

SPEAKER_00:

And and I guess it comes down to some sort of personal desire to change as well, doesn't it? Um willing to step into that.

SPEAKER_01:

Well the willingness the willingness always comes from some kind of painful experience, doesn't it? It's like me in Thailand where I realise, fuck it now, you're angry as fuck, you're not, you're not the squeaky clean guy you used to think you were, you're a bit of a people pleaser, you're a bit of a bully, um, fuck. There has to be a felt sense, whether it's an injury, an illness, an ultimatum from your wife, divorce, uh losing your kids, your dad dying, your mum dying, or maybe you've just been on a retreat and it's just opened your eyes. But there has to be some there has to be some kind of struggle or painful realisation. It's the only way.

SPEAKER_00:

Catalyst, yeah. Yeah, it's interesting you say that. My my catalyst though was through being gifted a coaching session, thinking, nah, I don't need this, but I'll I'll yeah, I'll run with it. I'm curious. And then yeah, getting to look in the mirror for the first time, it's like, oh fuck, that was quite painful. Um, but yeah, incredibly insightful and like you say, life-changing. What's some of the common patterns that you see um coming from the world that you have, Craig, uh, and the the clients that you work with now in terms of high-achiev men and leaders?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, the the the journey of the guys that I seem to attract, and and these guys are kind of 40s and 50s, is exactly the same. You know, they've they've lived a world of control, they've lived a world of micromanagement, they've lived a world of provision, protection, and intense, insane drive and the quest for financial success. And because they've micromanaged everything, they've actually been relatively successful in that domain. You know, they've got big companies, they've earned a lot of money, they've got a lot of investments, they've got big houses, but it comes at an expense because to kind of live that life, you you've got to live in your head, you've got to live in the head, you're constantly thinking, thinking, overthinking, planning, assessing, measuring, rationalizing, and it's at the expense of the body. You know, we we we we we check out of the body, and and it could there comes a moment in the guy's life, 40s or 50s, where he realizes, hang on a minute, I keep achieving the goal, and the next one, and the next one, and I've got more money and then more money, and I've got a house, and I go on six holidays, and I've got a bigger car, and I can't financially free, but I feel like I've never lived, like I've not lived life. I'm drinking shitloads of alcohol, and so and again, sometimes a painful thing can happen which turns them inward, and then and then they might come to me. And really, it's it's it's the the the search inwards, and a simple way of saying what I help guys to do, you know, and I wouldn't really share this in social media because it might scare people off, is I help guys to take that journey from the head into the heart, from the head into the body, from logic into feelings. Because it's only through the intelligence and the wisdom of our body that we can feel the love in the world, and we can feel our life force, and we're and and we and we feel connected to the world in in new ways. We can't connect through logic and reason, we can only build and control and and and gather things, we can only really feel and connect with this amazing magical world that we live in through the intelligence of our body. So there has to be a shift and of attention back into the body. So that's really the essence of what I do through all these different practices. We're training the attention to come back into the space where we thought was unsafe growing up.

SPEAKER_00:

And I'm curious to know some of the results then of once some of the the men have lent into that and and done this work, being clarity, I'm sure, is is is one of them. But what's a few other things that people get to walk away with when they turn inward?

SPEAKER_01:

The gr the greatest ones which which are which touch me more than any others are reconnection with wife, reconnection with your father, uh telling your dad that you love him because he didn't know how to do it, reconnecting with the brother that you thought you'd lost, reconnecting with your kids, modelling something different to your kids, uh inspiring your sex life again, you know, all all all The juice of life, really. Uh prioritizing connection in with your senior leadership team instead of just trying to tell them what to do. More playfulness, more joy, more capacity to be goofy with your kids and not worry what other people think. More energy. Yeah. Capacity to breathe better.

SPEAKER_00:

And I guess that takes courage to, as as you as you say, and I see on your social media as well, like daring to be different.

SPEAKER_01:

It takes yeah, it takes courage to feel, isn't it? It takes courage to feel. Um, and there's a lot on the inside that that we need to feel as men. You know, we need to feel our grief. Every man, for me, every man needs a good cry, and I know it's not easy. Sometimes in my past, I've had to use things like psychedelics to kind of bring that out of me because I couldn't cry. So I've had to take ayahuasca, I've had to take mushrooms because that's really released the grief and opened opened up centres in me that were repressed and soften my body to be able to let go of tears and soften my jaw to be able to let it out and soften my eyes. And um, because it's not easy when you're blocked up so much, and you you're taught by the world that it's fearful to cry, and you had a mother like I did that called you a crybaby if you tried to cry. So, you know, a lot of men need to cry, and a lot of men need to get in touch with their anger and love it instead of run away from it and repress it. And a lot of men need to have a relationship with the fear instead of wishing it didn't exist, and a lot of men need to ultimately feel the shame that lives in all of us and and and the the deep-seated childhood belief that's underneath that of I'm not good enough, I'm not worthy, I'm not lovable. It it's I mean, it's dark to say things like that, but it it is a necessary part of um evolution if we want to be free in the world and experience the juice of life and the fullness of life. I remember the philosophy of one of my therapists, he doesn't practice anymore, he's late in his late 70s, Dr. Robert Masters, who wrote a lot about men's work and emotions, and like his philosophy was we've got to feel it all, be intimate with all of it. He wrote a great book called Emotional Intimacy, which is about being intimate with every single feeling that arises in the body, so it can move through us, it can move through us and and and set us free, and we can become more of our authentic relating self.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, and yeah, and I love that. And it because for me, what I'm hearing there for myself on a personal level is because if we don't answer those questions, we assume they're true. So if I'm not worthy until I do this, or I'm only lovable when, um, or am I even lovable, if that doesn't get answered, most of the time it's because there's a default of no, um, we'll run with it. Um, yeah, so it's to bring it out into the light and answer it.

SPEAKER_01:

I mean, it's tough, it's a big realization when when when when we realise that fucking hell, you know, I think I'm this tough guy, but really there is a small part in me, a young part in me, that is fucking really scared and sometimes feels like he could lose love so he doesn't show up because he thinks like people are gonna leave him. And so when we s when we tend to that self, call it what you want in a child work or just radical love for self, when we tend to that self and have a dialogue with that self and connection with that self and communicate through our body with that self and and keep tending to that part of us, um, things do start to change and our relationships change because when we meet the needs of that part and we validate that part ourselves, we're not looking to the external world to validate us in every moment, so we become less needy.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Love it. It's it's interesting you say that because this weekend, as I just said as I got into this, I had a crash on my mountain bike straight over the bars on a big drop, and I landed full on my shoulder. Um, and what was interesting is is exactly that. What came up was sadness, a lot of pain. And the tears that I allowed when I got home, it wasn't pain, it was sadness. And it was really interesting because uh yeah, because I could just hold that for long enough just to ask it, what what what is under that? And it is really a sense of isolation and and humiliation because I crashed in front of people and and they did nothing, which is which is another thing. I'm not judging them for that. I did initially, in fact, me I did. It was all their fault, and this is this is why I'm upset. But yeah, because I could hold it, it's actually it's not so in bringing those questions up, can I answer them as an adult, not the the the young lad who sat in fear and as as the man um and and say no, you're okay, let it go, and and tomorrow's a new day, and we go again. Um what what does what is how how do you live by dare to be different?

SPEAKER_01:

Um how do I live by dare to be different? Number one, by I created my own, I mean they're not my own, but it works for me. I created my own uh pillars of self-leadership, and really that's how I live. The first one is um self-understanding. So I'm constantly, constantly trying to understand myself even more. I've got a document on my computer, it's pretty detailed, it's got everything on there from my family patterns, information from my therapist, um, relational family therapy stuff, dysfunctional patterns, functional patterns, all sorts of stuff. Gratitude. And um, so I'm constantly, constantly digging into like what shapes me, who I am now, where am I heading towards, what are my talents, what are my gifts, what are my superpowers. I'm constantly trying to understand myself more or give meaning to who I am and what I do in the world. And the next pillar is radical accountability. I'm constantly, you know, I l I live a comfortable life, but I'm always looking for an edge because that's where growth is. And um, I'll never point the finger to someone else. I'll never blame someone else for my own suffering, never. So maybe I'm hard on myself sometimes, but I always point the finger this way. It's always I always follow that radical accountability. The third pillar is emotional mastery, that's been a challenge for me, but it's one that I'm stepping into more and more and more. Um, and I've done a lot of work in that area, and I'm leaning into my next relationship now, which is gonna bring it up even more. The fourth pillar is um personal mission. I know I'm I'm on this planet, I'm on this planet to help blokes unravel the uniqueness of who they are, and I'm on this planet to help blokes to redefine how they lead as a man in today's world. And the fifth pillar is personal vision. You know, I I have a seed of of what's coming in my life. And the sixth pillar is energy. Energy is everything to me, absolutely everything. I prioritize my energy. Um, sleep is a non-negotiable clean food, exercise, regulation. Um, I don't allow anything into me that that is gonna really kind of bring negativity. I don't watch the news, I'm hardly on social media, even though it looks I'm on there the whole time. And the last pillar is uh is love, really, is just keep opening my heart, even though I want to close it. You know, I've I've recently fell in love with someone and my heart's open and I'm shit scared. I'm shit scared of getting hurt, but I've I've just got to keep it open.

SPEAKER_00:

Powerful stuff. In terms of uh some of the things to talk about in and on this podcast and forging resilience, is uh that I've identified identified through my listeners is is the the challenges through to transition when we leave one identity and start to to move towards another, whether that's forced or not, by the way. Um be that an exit, be that an injury, through that whatever it might be, is is there anything that you could speak to specific about transition and and the unknown for our listeners?

SPEAKER_01:

The only thing I would say about transition is that um I do believe it's a natural evolutionary process in life. Um because we a lot of people live with with the desire to control every aspect of life, it can become really tough when a transition's happened to let go of the old and step into the new, it's tough. Um so the first thing I would say is that these transitions are natural evolutionary shifts in our consciousness. Um so if we realise that, and if we also realise that at the start of transitions, there might be a bit of clunkiness, a bit of confusion. But after a while, if we if we open up and we we surrender to what's take what's happening in that transition, for me, what happens is we look, we we we step into that transition and we look over our shoulder and we realise that what we were scared about was actually an illusion. So for me, every time I transition, I realise that um everything that went before me, and especially around my fears, we're an illusion and I step into a newness. Um, we need supporting transitions for sure. Um, but having said that, sometimes a transition might mean spending time on your own for an extended period. Sometimes a transition might be being in the arms of your loved one or your family or your mates. Um but these transitions are just some are just natural to the evolution of consciousness. And every time we transition, for me, every time I've transitioned, I get an upgrade. An upgrade in terms of less fear in my life, an upgrade in terms of not worried what other people think, be more authentic in myself, but also an upgrade in terms of my my construct, my thinking construct and my model of the world and and my belief systems. Um I was speaking recently to an old friend of mine who's a professor of um thinking, he's created his own developmental model of evolutionary thinking, and what he says is at the low levels of the construct we believe we have no choice. You know, for example, the homeless person on the street is life-shaping in a way that we think away, he has a model of the world and he doesn't have a choice, it just is the way it is. But as we allow evolution to take place at the higher developmental models of thinking, we have more awareness and choice. And when we have more awareness and choice, we can step into receiving more job.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, love that, mate. Great, mate, as as we start to to wrap up, is there a uh a thought or or something you'd like to speak to before before we start to leave?

SPEAKER_01:

Um, yeah, it's just it's this concept of relational presence. And I first heard the term from a fellow mentor coach in the US, a guy called Traver Traver Bo um Traver Bohem, I think his surname is. Um and it's the essence of um my first ever book. I've just finished writing the first draft of a book and I'm just going through every single chapter, and it's about the redefinition of male leadership. But when I look through it, what I realise is the essence of it is as men stepping and learning the tools of relational presence because we're not taught that. Women have been naturally relating with presence for thousands of years, and we've not, we've been providing, protecting, you know, out there in the world, hunting, building, and for me growing up, this relational presence was the domain of women, and I was a man, so I didn't do that. But for me, the world is calling more and more and more now for us to step up as relators, as intimate relators. But the irony is we can't be deeply intimate in relationship with others and the world if we're not deeply and intimately in relationship with ourselves. And the only reference point we've got for who we are is our body. So men have to come back to the body, we have to reclaim and inhabit our body. There's so much life in the body, there's so much in the body that needs to be expressed and integrated and felt. So we we've really got to turn the gaze inwards and be incredibly intimate with everything that our body is speaking to us before we can do the same in the outside world. If we're not if we're unkind to our body and our feelings, we'll be unkind to others. If we have a shitty dialogue with our own body, we'll have a shitty dialogue with others. If we get frustrated with our body at times, we'll get frustrated with others. So it's this reclamation of of the body's intelligence so that we can turn up in this relational space.

SPEAKER_00:

Love it, mate. Craig, where might people um get in touch with you if they're interested in in working with you or finding a bit more about you or even getting your book?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, people can go to my website, craigwhite mentoring.com, uh, YouTube channel, um, podcast Craig White Dirt to Be Different on YouTube and all the audio channels, um, Spotify, Apple Music, uh, what else? LinkedIn, Craig White, uh, Instagram, Craig White Mentoring. And if you go to my website, you can sign up to my community and receive a weekly email with uh really informative stuff around male leadership.

SPEAKER_00:

Awesome. Greg, thanks so much for your time today, mate. Thanks for adding in the the the soundtrack of the rain in the background there as well, mate. No worries, mate.

SPEAKER_01:

I don't know if you can hear the cat. I'm gonna have to let the cat in in a minute.

SPEAKER_00:

Nah, no worries. No, I couldn't. Um, but yeah, it's been great to chat to you, mate. You've got some really interesting reflections and experience there, and uh yeah, I appreciate both your your presence here today, mate, and and and the man you're being for other men as well.

SPEAKER_01:

No worries. Thanks, mate. It was good to reconnect, and uh I I love the interview. Thanks a lot.