114: Raising Kids with Fearless Sexuality | Teaching Sexual Wholeness Without Shame in a Porn-Filled World (with Taylor Chambers)

As a parent, one of the hardest questions you’ll ever face is this: How do I teach my kids about sex in a porn-filled world—without using fear, shame, or silence?

In this episode, I sit down with Taylor Chambers, a licensed marriage and family therapist and the founder of The Good and The Free, to talk about what it really means to raise porn-resilient kids and model fearless sexuality—not just for them, but for ourselves as men.

We explore what it looks like to move beyond fear-based parenting and into sexual wholeness, integrity, and self-leadership. Taylor shares his deeply human story of moving from religious shame and willpower-based recovery into an approach grounded in acceptance, integration, and emotional honesty—the same work that helped him build his Porn Resilient Summit and framework for helping families heal from shame and secrecy around sexuality.

In this episode, we dive deep into:

• How fear and shame around sexuality create disconnection and secrecy
• Why porn addiction recovery starts with your own sexual integration
• The psychology of how kids internalize sexual shame—and what to do instead
• The neuroscience of fear, desire, and emotional regulation
• How to talk with your kids about sex and pornography in ways that build trust, confidence, and self-respect
• The true meaning of integrity and why it’s impossible to be “whole” while rejecting parts of yourself
• How to raise kids who are resilient, not just “protected,” in a digital world
• Why fearless sexuality doesn’t mean indulgence—it means freedom from control, repression, and fear

You’ll learn how to reframe sexuality as a relationship rather than a problem to eliminate, and why healing your own sexual shame directly impacts your children’s freedom and confidence.

We talk about the inner work every man must do to align his psychology, spirituality, and masculinity—so you can live with the kind of integrity your kids can actually feel.

If you’ve ever felt torn between wanting to protect your kids and wanting to raise them to be strong, wise, and connected—you need this conversation.

Featuring: Taylor Chambers, LMFT — The Good and The Free

Taylor is a leading voice in porn addiction recovery, healthy sexuality, and shame-free living. He’s a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, creator of the Porn Resilient Model, and founder of The Good and The Free, where he teaches men, parents, and couples how to build sexual wholeness rooted in honesty, integrity, and freedom.

Follow Taylor at wearethegoodandthefree.com
or on Instagram @thegoodandthefree

Don’t miss the Porn Resilient Online Summit (Oct 13–16, 2025), where I’ll share The RAIL Method™—a step-by-step system to turn cravings into fuel for recovery. You can watch my interview and 20 other experts free, or grab the All-Access Implementation Bundle for lifetime access to all recorded interviews + courses and resources (including my RAIL Method™ online course)—just $87 if purchased by October 12th.

Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07.63)
We face an immense challenge. Previous to 30 years ago, just didn't really face when it comes to sexuality. Our kids have instant access pretty much everywhere they go to whatever sexual material they could ever imagine and things they can't imagine.

We have a relationship with sexuality. Questions aren't how do we eliminate it. In a relationship, if you're trying to eliminate the other person, that's called murder. What we're trying to arrive at in a relationship is partnership. How do we figure this thing out between the two of us?

When we look at fear and shame, they're key drivers of disinhibited kinds of sexual outlets and behaviors. If I don't have that root of fear and shame, and I really clear that out and I fill it with love and acceptance and compassion towards these parts of me, there's not so much the reason for the disinhibiting, impulsive hypersexuality.

Speaker 1 (01:19.936)
Hey guys, Jay Castleman here with No More Desire. I wanna start today's episode a little non-traditionally by telling you guys some meaningful news in my personal life. My wife and I just had our second child, a son, and we are celebrating his new life, this new member of our family. It has been quite incredible, you know, having him and

He's been in the NICU for a few days, nothing serious, just needed some help breathing, but inviting this new life into the world, a new person for me to provide for and look after and be responsible for, and then also just this new joy of a developing personality and someone to get to know and to understand. So with that news, it's fitting that my episode today is on parenting.

And I have a special guest, so being a parent today feels like walking on a tightrope in a lot of ways. On one side, we want our children to grow up curious, confident, emotionally whole. And on the other side, we face a world that's saturated with sexual messaging, pornography at our kids' fingertips, filters that only do so much when it comes to tech and you're wondering.

How do I protect my kids? But how do I also raise them without this fear or shame or an unhealthy relationship with sexuality? If you've wrestled with guilt, with confusion, or even outright fear about how to talk to your kids about sexuality or how to model healthy sexuality in your own life, you're far from alone. It's one of the hardest roles a parent

ever steps into. And it's going to be one that I will need to step into with my children. So in today's episode, I'm very privileged to have Taylor Chambers on, he and I tackle these topics. We explore how parents can teach fearless sexuality, as he terms it, term that I love, by cultivating sexual wholeness, relational integrity,

Speaker 1 (03:46.284)
and open dialogue, even in a porn-filled world. We dig into how your own recovery journey and inner work become the foundation for raising resilient kids. We also pull back the curtain on Taylor's Porn Resilience Summit, that is October 13th, and how you can attend for free and what's inside the premium implementation bundle for those who take it further.

Taylor Chambers is a licensed marriage and family therapist, author and coach who has spent over a decade helping men and families heal from unwanted pornography use and reclaim sexual integrity. He's the creator of the porn resilient model, leads the porn resilient parenting program and founded the Good and the Free, an organization devoted to guiding men and families toward sexual wholeness without shame.

Taylor has helped men move beyond willpower-based recovery and parents move beyond fear-based teachings to values-led shame-free healing. He brings deep wisdom from IFS integration in spiritual psychology. He also has valuable firsthand experiences into the challenges of being a parent himself devoted to faith and religion in today's culture and landscape.

striking the balance between sexual integrity and sexual wholeness, sexual expression. I'm honored to have him on the show. Now, for those of you tuning in who want real structured help, not just theory, Taylor is hosting the Porn Resilience Summit. It is launching, it's an online summit, an online event. It's launching October 13th through October 16th is when it finishes.

days, you'll hear from over 21 experts in the porn and sex addiction recovery fields. You'll get free access to live interviews of each of these experts. And in addition to this free ticket, if you decide to purchase the implementation bundle, you get all the recordings from the entire event, all over 20 experts, bonus assets, worksheets,

Speaker 1 (06:14.178)
deeper training materials and support tools to actually apply what you learn. This isn't just information, it's applied practices for daily living. Included in this bundle is the RAIL method, my brand new course that helps men face cravings with confidence and turn them into fuel for recovery. You get all of this for an absolutely unbeatable price. It's incredible. I cannot believe the deal that he is giving on a

package like this. It's a no-brainer. So to attend this porn resilient online event or to purchase that implementation bundle, the links are in the show notes. And with that, we'll dive in to the episode. Taylor Chambers, welcome to the show, man. It's so good to have you here.

Thanks so much, I'm glad we could make this connection.

Yeah, this is great. The event coming up soon, I'm super excited about it. We'll be sure to talk more about it today, but everything you're putting together there and everyone you have involved, it's beautiful to me to just bring everyone together for this cause and helping people out. So thank you for your efforts there, for the good of others. It's awesome.

Yeah, yeah, it's a cool event for me just because I get to connect with so many people and, you know, I feel like new friendships get forged. I think that's kind of what we're, what we're doing here today. And, and then, you know, for a lot of these people, I've been following their work or, you know, very familiar. And so it's cool to connect with them just at a person to person level. And so, yeah, it's a really amazing event just in terms of my own gratification. So.

Speaker 1 (07:54.69)
Yeah. Well, and that's, it's very apparent in what you do, man, just your value of human beings and people and relationships. So it shows, it shines forth, man. And I actually want to start the episode by asking you about that before you launched the Good and the Free, right? You had a journey that shaped how you approach this work. And I just want you to kind of share some about that journey, including maybe kind of a key turning point in your personal and professional story.

that led you to shift from kind of the traditional addiction rhetoric, right, into your resilience-based model, stepping out of fear of sexuality into something that's much more powerful, I think. So kind of what that journey has been like for you and what led you here.

Yeah, absolutely. so my story, like, you know, a lot of coaches will have kind of like the, struggled, I figured it out, you know, and now you can too. And I've struggled to like put my story into that kind of a, formula just cause I'm, I'm a little more messy than that. And I've, I've come to be really okay with that, but you know, it is kind of hard to, to know quite how to present it. So what I'll say, like there, there've been

you know, like different eras, know, Taylor Swift is singing country music and then pop and now she's whatever. And do you, yeah, I don't know where she's at these days, right? And I kind of like, yeah, yeah, exactly. So I'm, I'm in, I don't even know what era I'm in now and kind of what's coming down the pipeline. I'm curious to see the back half of life and see, see what goes down there. but early on, you know, I think, my primary

I like the analogy.

Speaker 2 (09:40.942)
In terms of sexual development, my primary lens was religious, I think, prototypical LDS upbringing and the sexuality framing was through church doctrine and the cultural upbringing that I had around that.

And we might want to clarify, many of my listeners probably know I'm LDS, but just to clarify, right, LDS is members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, right? So we are Christian, but it's a specific approach to that Christianity. It's unique, especially for this area in Utah, where I'm at.

Yeah, exactly. And I would say, like, if you're more familiar with a more broad or different form of Christianity, it would probably map on pretty well in terms of, like, purity culture and things like that. You know, so you can probably find a lot of yourself in that if this resonates. So, you know, I think what that did is what it provided is a lot of, the

I guess you could say correct answers or kind of like the kind of like aspirations that I actually still hold. I want sexual discretion in my life. I'm happy to be like with one woman till the end of our days. I think that there are a lot of pitfalls that were warned against in my upbringing.

that I see as legitimate pitfalls that require caution. But I soaked in a lot of the fear and the shame that can often come with that kind of upbringing. And so I warded off pornography until I was 15. And I think that's later than most people encounter pornography. And some of that was like,

Speaker 2 (11:47.278)
I was pretty sheltered, I didn't come across things. And then later on, I certainly had the opportunities. People around me were trying to convince me to view porn and just kind of really resisted in a way that felt righteous, I guess. Like, okay, no, I'm not going to do that.

The willpower kind of approach.

But you know, but really the the seed of curiosity was planted I was like Why does this seem to like be such a thing for people and just my own natural development of like, you know my own natural curiosity my attraction and all of those things and so Anyway, you know long story short That curiosity led to encounters with pornography, but because of the shame, you know It felt like it needed to be secret and like I didn't

I didn't know what normal sexual development was like. I didn't know that these were feelings that were kind of built into all humans, particularly through adolescence. like, so it like, you know, something was broken. so, you know, that led eventually to, you know, I devastated my mom. I remember her crying on the bed at one point, you know, discovering my pornography use.

I was really devastated, I've been found out this is so bad and dove into some 12-step work. And again, it was a new way of seeing my sexual experience and development and a lot of gift to it. There are still some principles and values that are like, cool, I'm really glad that I learned a lot of those things.

Speaker 2 (13:32.312)
But the 12-step stuff didn't necessarily result in behavioral change over the years. And so there was still this lingering shame. At a certain point, my wife, when we were dating, dumped me. We were having open conversations about pornography. And it just wasn't shifting. And she was like, this isn't working. And so at that point, I kind of took on maybe a third lens, you might say, with.

some of the sex addiction therapy work that was available at the time. I was living in Japan and so I actually sought out like an online program and back in whenever that was, 2010 plus or minus. That was still kind of developing and kind of a new thing that was like cutting edge. So anyway, I got involved in that.

and found a ton of success using the addiction rhetoric, using the addiction model. And that really, again, added to a lot of the things that I had been building up through spirituality, through some of the 12-step approaches to addiction. And this kind of took things to the next level. And I was able to really pull together.

Like I was able to win at that game and I got, you know, five years of sobriety, no porn, no masturbation, you know, things like that. and then. Yeah. Like this was like, felt like I had arrived and this is also aligning with like, okay, this is where I brought my career into it. I, know, I wanted to help other people in on the journey. And so I got training as a porn addiction and sex addiction therapist. like kind of made this, made this my thing and it felt, felt good. It felt really solid.

It's amazing,

Speaker 2 (15:25.708)
and stuff like that. I think looking back, I can see that there were still some inherent challenges that hadn't been fully confronted. All of this was still relying on a lot of fear and a lot of shame. And like when I say I was winning at the game, I was able to avoid the things that would stir up the fear. So I was performing well, therefore I got to feel worthy and I got to feel good, right? And- Yeah.

So eventually I actually, long story short, there was a huge pile up, this perfect storm for a year and then kind of a cluster, right? And in a particular moment and it just wore through my defenses and I did the horrifying thing of viewing pornography again. Yeah.

That was after over five years. That's devastating feeling.

Yeah. Well, and you like your, your reaction right there is, like, you know, you can, you can feel it. And even when I look back at my store, I'm like, man, that kind of sucks. Yeah. Yeah. It was kind of like, my, in my high school years, you know, academics was something that I was, you know, decent enough at. I, you know, I had that 4.0, until I got my first B and it like losing that streak was like grief.

Yes.

Speaker 2 (16:51.534)
to me, you know what I mean? And I was like, all of a sudden I won't be able to graduate valedictorian. I won't be able to like say that I got the 4.0, that kind of thing.

Well, and I think, you know, I want to just interject on that because so many of us can get this really confused and this is the best understanding I've come to, which I think is an understanding of love and acceptance, which is that's a high achieving mentality, right? And that's really good. Like it's really good to aim for high standards and to like perfect ourselves and to, you know, do really well. But obviously.

the dark end of that is it can render itself to massive shame and fear and, you know, learning to relate to that high achieving stuff and to see like, I want to, I want to accomplish great things, but then also how do I handle failure? Like how do I work through it? Cause that's a part of life too.

Yeah, exactly. And, know, I didn't really have the training or the tolerance for that side of like humanity, right? And so, yeah, I mean, so I had the opportunity of like, okay, like, you know, I broke the streak, you know, I can't undo that, you know, and so like, had to figure out what, you know, what do I do? And, you know, naturally I was like, okay, let's get back on the wagon, you know.

the second best option will be like, okay, let's get another five years, know, coming outside the other side of that. And it was interesting just because like, I think there was something in me that really had shifted and it felt really hard to keep playing that game. when I say game, I don't want to like illegitimize that. think there's a, you know, I think that there's a way of engaging with that that's very appropriate. But for me, it was like,

Speaker 2 (18:48.014)
Do I just do the same thing over again? You know what I mean? And so, you know, this was a gradual process, but, know, I really kind of started to step into maybe a more, for me, a more thorough examination of like, what's going on with this whole thing, you know? And it like, is my life really going to be about avoiding mistakes? And, you know, am I like,

I'm still really insecure and fearful sexually. Like, it going to always be that way? You know, and so I started to get really interested in things along the lines of acceptance, know, kind of radical acceptance as things as they are. You know, some really important Buddhist psychology stuff and mindfulness and things, you know, really started to come in and again, just offer more lenses.

So that I was kind of piling up these different ways of understanding my sexual experience. And I don't know that I've chucked any of them out entirely, right? But it's not like I, for me, it's never been about, I had one lens, I found that it was flawed, so I gotta chuck that out the window and insert another. It was just like, hey, maybe all of these are saying important things. so, yeah.

I started to look a lot more toward what I call now sexual integration of just like learning to inhabit my sexuality, kind of see the humanity in my sexuality, get a broader understanding of sex positivity and the human sexual response system and kind of even going back through kind of some anthropology around like how have humans done sex and sexuality throughout, you know, the eons and.

And seeing how I fit in with all of that. And so for me now, what that's led to is kind of my work will still involve, you know, I feel like spirituality matters so much. feel like reinterpreting Bill W's journey and the 12 steps, I feel like there's something extremely profound there. Like this is not something like I'm like done and over it, right? You know, I'm...

Speaker 2 (21:11.392)
I don't choose to participate in 12 step groups right now, but I think there's really something profound there. I think the addiction stuff really helps to organize and structure our efforts. And I think there's something really important about all of that. And so I use a lot of those techniques in my coaching with other men and then all of this kind of acceptance and integration stuff. And so I've kind of like drawn from those and kind of put together my...

my, my proprietary kind of cocktail of different approaches and, you know, trying to, to be really customized to kind of where each individual is at. But, you know, seeing the value of all these options and then like, okay, let's use, you know, whatever one might be really important for this stage of development. So anyway, that was a really long response to your question, but hopefully that kind of.

My hope, you my story is not necessarily one I would recommend to people. But maybe, again, it's not about replicating what Taylor did, but just seeing that, Taylor was engaging with things as they came up, era by era. And that's kind of my invitation. If my story's doing anything, it might be inviting you to like, whatever's showing up here, what's my wisest way of dealing with this phase of my development?

I love everything you said, Taylor. And I also love that there's a part of you that ends that with, sorry, that was so long winded because I am so much, like I can relate to that so much personally where I'm just like, I just, can't believe I, there's so much in your mind, right? To say in so much passion that you have for this work and this field and just so much to share in that, that resonates. It's beautiful. So everything that you're sharing is valuable. And I actually,

really resonated as well with this journey. You know, get five years into sobriety, you relapse. And for me, I got a year into sobriety and relapsed then another year and relapsed. And I still didn't learn the lessons then. It took me eight years after that to start to finally learn some lessons that are similar in ways to what you're talking about, which was.

Speaker 1 (23:31.886)
I had set up my life in kind of this like fear-based type of approach to recovery, like you're saying. And that's a little black and white to say it that way, because there were a lot of good things about what I was doing. And I had obviously, I mean, I had been sober for, I guess it wasn't quite eight years, it about seven and a half. And that was right when I started my previous business, Become a Good Man. And I was all about structure.

and systems and staying busy and daily routines, right? And daily, you know, spiritual, mental, physical wellbeing. So many good things that are still a part of my recovery, right? They're still very important. But again, seven and a half years into sobriety, I had to, I hit what I call my real rock bottom where

I really realized that I still had an addictive mindset. I was addicted to work. was addicted to product, you know, hyper productivity. I was just filling every second with something and very much what I ended up understanding is, similar to what you're saying, which is to approach recovery instead from a place of self-acceptance.

self-compassion and really a, like a love for all parts of me. And IFS, that was shortly thereafter is when I discovered IFS and that just changed everything in my life by far. that's the interview that we do for the porn resilient event you put on. That's the rail method is what I developed through my discoveries in IFS and how to integrate it into addiction recovery and this, you know,

daily practice that's structured, but also very kind of fluid in the way you can, can approach parts of you. Right. And so I, I so much just, just resonate with that of this. can get years into sobriety doing things one way and then realize how have I been so blind or, know, maybe this isn't working as well for me as I thought it was. Right. And so you can carry all that stuff with you and then integrate some new, some new things.

Speaker 1 (26:01.142)
Right. I would love to talk more about that sexual integration inhabiting your sexuality, sex positivity. I'm looking down here, by the way, because I'm writing little notes and things that helps me concentrate and remember, but so I am paying attention to you. to clarify.

thought you

Just paying bills. I don't even auto pay. I write them. I write them.

Yeah, the old, like, my mom, you know, in the paper checkbooks, right?

Exactly, yes. So I want to dig into that, but I do want to take this opportunity to just talk about the Porn Resilient event with the Good and the Free. And, you know, again, I'm really excited to be a part of that. We've done that interview, you know, it's now recorded and we'll be launching by the time this comes out in two, basically a little less than two weeks from when it comes out. So October 13th is when the event launches.

Speaker 1 (26:58.606)
Can you share what people can kind of expect from this event and why you believe it's so needed right now or kind of what benefits you see for people?

Yeah, absolutely. Well, uh, yeah, four day event, uh, kicking off October 13th, uh, 2005 here. Um, I always listened to podcasts like from their early episodes on if I've ever, really, so I've often listened to things. I'm like, what year are you talking about? Cause you clarified the year. Yeah, I like that. Anyway, for, nerds like me. So, um, but yeah, October 13th here, uh, again, four day event. so.

The core of it is just a huge expert interview series. I was able to connect with 21 different experts, including some of them are couples. And so, you know, that adds up to 23, 24 people really giving input on topics around pornography. And so we're talking about sometimes the mechanisms of how we go about changing.

how to handle relationships in the process, repairing, rebuilding trust and things like that. And then a lot of the kind of bigger picture questions of like, why does this matter? What is this all for? What does freedom and liberation look like? it's kind of like my way of, again, I think somebody signing up and participating in the event, it's just going to be this like scatter shot of different points of view.

I actually interview experts who are very traditional and experts who are very progressive and anywhere in between. I often joke that we probably wouldn't get along if we were all in the same room. But I'm that weird person that can get along with nearly everyone. can step into a lot of different viewpoints.

Speaker 1 (28:57.602)
I like that.

I think the value in that again is like, think you're going to run into some gold, right? Like the rail method, you know, if people aren't even familiar with that yet, you've got to check out Jake's interview. Like there's just direct value there. And then the overall experience of kind of absorbing from so many different people, you start to gain these common threads, you know, what you prefer, what you don't prefer, you know, what sometimes people say things you're like, I think that's...

just not how I see it, you know, and so like it can really help solidify your convictions. so yeah, some direct benefit and then, you know, the event gets to kind of shape you in that way. So, four day event. and so yeah, jump in, get started. it is offered for free, if you want temporary access. And so there's, that's where the, those four days come in. if you're a completionist and you want to like, you know, watch every single interview.

More power to you. That's kind how I like to do things. And so you've got the option to purchase recordings, comes with additional things with it. I'll spare you the details, but you know, as you kind of step toward the event, you'll see that there's a lot going on if you want to take it to the next level as well. So.

Yeah. And so you get, you get all the interviews, but if they do choose to purchase the implementation bundle, they have all that recorded in addition to all the assets that both myself and 20 other experts are giving. is a very, an extremely generous offer. will say I, you know, when I saw what you're, what you're giving, it's wonderful. So it's really good, Well, let's, let's talk about this concept of sexual integration.

Speaker 1 (30:41.102)
because here we're gonna be discussing things about parents and how to, what they can do in the home and things. But this really does play into that with just this fearless sexuality, I think is how you put it, right? So inhabiting my sexuality, sex positivity, these kinds of things. I'd love to understand more about that and kind of your approach. What a couple of the truths that you've come to.

how we relate to sexuality, maybe in ways that are well intended and we think we're doing the right thing, and that could be in reference to how we parent, right, and how we refer to this with our kids, versus what you found is actually helpful for people. Yeah.

Absolutely. Okay, well, though, let me just highlight, you kind of said it right there, like how we relate to this sexuality or the pornography or whatever other aspects. I think viewing porn as a problem sets us up to find solutions. That's great, that's a good approach. But I think there's something even...

more potent about setting it up as a relationship instead of as a problem. All of us have a relationship to pornography. For some people, that's a of a non-existent relationship if they've never viewed porn or a very distant relationship. Just like that one uncle, never like, you hear weird things happen where he's at, but you don't have like a very direct relationship, but you're related in some way.

Yeah, for many of us, know, we're like, you know, cohabiting with pornography. like, you know, an active part of our daily lives and things like that. but when you look at it as a problem, then it needs to be solved or, you know, like, and what that often looks like is elimination. And so it becomes so easy to accidentally see like, okay, pornography is a problem. can't view porn anymore.

Speaker 2 (32:49.422)
Now let's go upstream. Okay. What are my triggers? Great. You know, I shouldn't have those things anymore. You know, some of those early feelings of sexual desire or lust or whatever it might be. You know, I probably like those set me up to view pornography. So I want to like move upstream and clear those out as well. And what can accidentally happen is that we're kind of just engaged in a battle with our sexuality and

So when we transition it to like, have a relationship with sexuality, then the questions aren't how do we eliminate it? Because like in a relationship, if you're trying to eliminate the other person, you know, that's called murder. You're not supposed to do that. You know what I mean? Yeah. What we have to do instead is like, what we're trying to arrive at in a relationship is partnership. Like, how do we figure this thing out between the two of us?

Yeah, that's, that's good.

Speaker 2 (33:45.324)
Now, you don't have to engage with pornography long-term. I'm not saying you need to partner with it and make it an act of presence in your life. But I would argue sexuality, when we zoom out to like not just the one expression of sexuality, or more often, pornography is even about like emotional regulation, not even sexuality itself, right? But when we look at sexuality, if we are relating to it with aggression,

If we're relating to it through avoidance or dismissal, if we're relating to it through like control and manipulation, like those are all ways of like building toxic relationships. And so good relationship with sexuality does certainly involve having boundaries. It involves you bringing your values into the relationship.

And it allows you to, or a good relationship will have some openness for the other side of it, right? For, you know, what is the input of this other person or in this case, this other force or this experience. And so sexual integration is kind of a bold move of like, well, what if I allowed the wilderness, the kind of mercurial nature of sexuality?

to actually have some influence, to give some input. Now, again, that's very different than having sexuality take over, which most of us oscillate when we're in this compulsive pattern between control release, right? Like I'm dominating and then they get their turn and they dominate and then this back and forth. That's not really what we're talking about here. We're talking about maybe a mutual influence of like, for me, again, I was trying to be so straight-laced that something as

unmanageable as like our sexual passions, you know, that felt disinhibited. It felt, you know, naked and bare. It felt, highly, arousing rather than like, you know, methodical and rational and controlled. And so, you know, that bringing more eroticism into my life has allowed me to kind of find some balance to my personality. It's, it's allowed me to

Speaker 2 (36:11.118)
find ways of experiencing and expressing my humanity in ways that I couldn't do if I was continuing to play the perfectionist game of like, you know, kind of over-regulate every sexual impulse that comes my way. So that's kind of the big picture of it. Like I'm looking for how can I relate to this aspect of myself and even involve it in part of the whole of me.

Again, keeping in mind that that keeps me still as leader in IFS terms. If your listeners are familiar with your work there, you know, I'm still retaining self leadership. You know, my values are the determiner of how I conduct my life, not the impulses of my sexuality or my striving, you know, controlling part. Like those all get to be influences, but not the final say. so that's kind of this idea here of fearless sexuality.

I love that man and I love that you bring it around background IFS because both of you and I are very passionate for that. You know how passionate I am. And it's that discovery that I could actually relate to the parts of me that are involved in that sexual expression that I could relate to them in a very healthy, loving, know, kind, accepting way. It's completely revolutionary for me. When I started to hear that in IFS,

My immediate reaction was, that's insane. You're crazy. Like, why would I ever invite that part of me? I can't stand that part of me. And what IFS teaches is if you exile that part, if you cast them out, you are casting out so many great gifts and values that you have, right? Really positive traits. And for me, what I came to understand is

two of my primary parts, call it the adventurer and the peacemaker, were the parts involved in my addiction to pornography, specifically. So this adventurer part, right, which is about, you know, excitement, pleasure, being in the moment, being present, just like sensuality of the moment, and that spontaneity, right?

Speaker 1 (38:35.938)
You're talking about so many great gifts that I have inside. Again, like this can be put through what seems like a really negative lens, but if we pay attention to spontaneity, fun, know, enjoying the moment, being present, these are all such good things. And so when I with...

what I call my organizer and my achiever parts, which is very masculine, this approach to life that's all about accomplishments and checking boxes and keeping things organized and morals and values and doing everything right. I took those parts and I suppress my adventure part. I suppress that peacemaker part that tried to bring me comfort through the use of pornography or through food and other methods as well. But I suppress those parts. So then I lose.

so much of my ability for fun, right? And for presence, lose so much of my ability for bringing peace and comfort and soothing both to myself and to others, right? These are parts we can use for the blessing of other people in all sorts of ways. One cannot be exiled without exiling the whole thing. And so when you talk about wholeness, right? I really think of that it's inviting and bringing in all those parts. And so I have to get to know.

that addictive quote unquote part. It's found itself in an addictive role or these few parts have found themselves in an addictive role. That's not who that part is. And that's transformed everything for me.

Right. Yeah, exactly. I think that my fear around sexuality and various emotions that got managed through things like pornography, it's not that the expression and the way that that came out is like the truth of myself or my nature or sexuality generally. It's that it's a response to how I had been relating to it. You know what I mean?

Speaker 2 (40:38.956)
When my wife and I are picking on each other, we get to see the like the downside of each person's personality. Right. And it's like, well, I'm kind of, you know, I'm kind of feeding into the loop that circles back around to me. know what I mean? And, that's not her, right? That's her out of balance. And that's me out of balance. And when we get into better relationship where we're relating based on values, love.

We're each kind of differentiated and have our own individuality and yet we extend ourselves into the cooperation of companionship. Then all of a sudden we get versions of each other that feel more authentic, that feel more sustainable, that feel more...

real to who we are, I guess, right? And so again, with sexuality, when we get in good relationship with it, it's really unlikely that it would continue to show up in compulsive out of control, know, objectification or like, know, secret keeping. It's just like, that's a response when we're like, that, you know, the secrecy is like, that's what we do when we're dominated. A controlling parent might get good behavior from a child.

And then that child is going to have to like express themselves in secret ways that couldn't be known because otherwise they'll be punished. So, so yeah, the kind of trusting this process of like, Hey, if I get on good terms with my sexuality, I think for most people that starts to really align with, you know, this fearless, fearless sexuality, which I attribute like three elements to there's intention behind it. So again, we have a vision of where this is going.

how sexuality can foster goodness in our lives and this sense of the values that are undergirding our life and our sexual life in particular. There's integrity, which I'll come back to because I want to unpack that one. And then there's intimacy. And there's this fear of like, if I'm not on top of my sexuality and controlling it, I'm just going to turn into this reprobate and I'm just going to like,

Speaker 2 (42:54.378)
and end up creeping people out or I'm going to get out of control or whatever it is. When we let loose the reins a little bit, there might be a little bit of exploration. There might be what we have deemed sexual mistakes from time to time, but they're usually in a much more narrow range than we worry about. I've yet to encounter someone who was like,

taking these ideas and then all of sudden going off and really harming people.

Yep. And that's, to me, it's so much, you know, when we look at fear and shame, they're key drivers of disinhibited kinds of sexual outlets and behaviors. You know, if I don't have that root of fear and shame and I really clear that out and I fill it with love and acceptance and compassion towards these parts of me, there's not so much the reason for the

disinhibiting, impulsive, know, hypersexuality. Would you agree with that?

totally agree. Well, it's like, you know, I think most people who are like, you know, robbing other people or like, you know, stealing from students. A lot of times, you know, that's like, they're pretty limited in their options, right? They might feel like this is the one way to either. I mean, for some people, it's not about the material benefit. For some, is like the, it can be its own version of pornography of like the emotional impact of it.

Speaker 1 (44:29.336)
The thrill. thrill. chase the...

And so, yeah, but when you give a lot of people options, most people are gonna work in earnest and honest living. It's just like, that's what most of us do. When you give people sexual options, most people tend to gravitate toward the kinds of sexual experiences that tend to feel good and sustainable and long-term rewarding.

And they honor every part of you, right? Because you were talking about the value-based parts of me versus those that are more kind of erotic or expressive or creative, making choices that honor all those parts. Yeah.

Yeah, sexuality, we're talking about an integration where it plays well with all the other aspects of ourselves. So again, very different than like it just does what it wants and we have to deal with it. the integrity piece I wanted to come back to because integrity is, it is alignment with our values. It's like having the discipline or the follow through or the, courage to do what is right by our value system.

So that's integrity that we often talk about. And I think there's plenty of dialogue already around like, we want to be men of integrity or finding sexual integrity. And I think that's good, but the second definition there of integrity does imply kind of this integration, right? It's built into the word like, we want the various parts of this thing to come together in the whole.

Speaker 2 (46:07.938)
And so if we're striving for an integrity that cuts out a section of our humanity, like our sexuality, it's a distorted version of integrity because it's not integrating, right? It's disintegrating, right? Or fragmenting. And so integrity here is kind of the challenge of like, how can I treat all of these aspects of myself well?

Let me kind of throw kind of um, a story in there to kind of share what I mean a little bit. You know, I tend to toward the logo, so we'll throw a little pathos in here. I, so years ago, you know, after one of my encounters with pornography, I, you know, I still kind of running through, um, this was, know, after the, the five years and then things started to.

There was intermittent experiences with pornography. In this case, there was still a shame-based reaction and a feeling that, damn it, I screwed up again, that kind of emotion. Well, and that's a minor version. It was actually quite emotional and frustrating, a lot of anger and shame in quite intense ways.

And so I went on a walk and I did what I always do. I'm just like, okay, I made the mistake. I despaired for a little while. And then this was the point at which it was like,

Time to get things up and going again, right? So I went on a walk and I still remember, like could probably go to the exact block where this happened, but I was on the walk kind of churning through my mind. What are the limits I need to impose on myself, which by the way, I still believe are an important element of my life. What are the practices that I need to engage in, which again, those are active and alive parts of my life.

Speaker 2 (48:17.518)
Um, and I was just figuring out like, what am I going to do to solve this? Right. And so then from an IFS point of view, like I was kind of just struck by this vision. It was like, as if this girl approached me on the sidewalk while I was walking. It was all in my mind's eye, just in my imagination, but it was quite vivid. And like, she was, uh, you know, I guess you could say, I don't know, cute or attractive, but she was like really disheveled and, know, um, and.

kind of like the, prostitute where there is this sexuality to her, but also this like pitiful, aspect to it. at least in, in, some representations of prostitution or sex work. And like she was crying, you know, the, running mascara again, my mind is quite imagined. So it laid out quite the scene for me. And like, she just came up and like grabbed my shirt and was like, please.

please don't put me away again, right? And it was this moment of like, man, like this is it. Like I'm using all of the quote unquote good aspects of myself to subjugate this person. And this was, she was afraid. Like she was like clearly not like on her own two feet, but like there was this sense though that like,

I kind of started to feel a bit more responsible, like just like for our fellow human beings, like it's like, let's help each other out, right? And so there was this sense toward this part who was representing my sexuality and kind of like a figure, like some of the, you know, the subjects in these photos that I'd recently viewed, it was like, they can kind of step off the screen and say like, hey, there's a little bit more going on with this story, right?

I'm here, like, is there some way that I could, like, be allowed to exist? And so that was a pretty powerful moment for me. And it kind of really checked my tendency to just correct, to just fix. And it reawoken, it reawakened me to some of these principles that were already in me of like acceptance and integration. These were theories. And this kind of called me into like, you're supposed to live these things out, man.

Speaker 2 (50:45.14)
And so it was taking a look at like, okay, let me slow down on the porn elimination efforts and let me try and tune in with some of the, like, what's going on for me? What's, what, does my sexuality have to say in this difficult moment? and I just slowed things down and went more into a listening mode rather than a, you know, an inadvertent, like subjugation mode.

And I think that can be a really powerful illustration of what we're talking about here with fearless sexuality. Like I had to get over the fear of this aspect of myself so I could start listening and relating and integrating this part into the overall whole of the system of Taylor, if that makes sense.

such a powerful, like imaginative representation. And for me, the, especially when you get into IFS work, it's, to me, it's such a, it's such a spiritual matter, you know, it's psychological, it's emotional. You know, I've started referring to our mental mind versus our emotional mind as really

Two kind of separate things where the emotional mind is highly spiritual. The way it works and functions is not according to like what we mentally would think logically. Emotions are so fascinating and so strange. But this part of your mind really is very real to you coming to you and saying, please don't cut me out again. You know,

It's easy for us to face certain thoughts or desires or emotions and inclinations that come up and to say, to fight them and say, get the hence Satan, you know, stop, go away, you know, and, and, and thinking I'm doing this because I'm trying to be righteous and I'm trying to be a good person. And we miss the boat on the fact that that is not like for Christian.

Speaker 1 (53:02.254)
That's not how Christ would approach someone who is in sin. He would move toward them as Jenna Ramirez says in her book, move toward these emotions, move toward these people, spend time with them, be with them, right? Integrate them. I love how you have connected integrity and integration. I've never heard anybody put it that way. And when you say that, it's like, my gosh, they're the same root.

Word, you know? Yeah, we have to seek for this more whole approach.

Well, I love that you brought up kind of the image of Christ, right? Like we've got the Pharisees who are like super upset with him. Why? Because he's like, he's drinking with harlots, you know, like he's like, he's hanging out and like eating with, you know, with the people who are not following the letter of the law. And, know, evidently Jesus was completely unafraid of people who are in the midst of their sexuality, even

you know, immature, unhealthy, toxic versions perhaps, right? I mean, for a lot of sex workers, it's just like they're kind of railroaded into that experience. And so it's not even like a, yeah, I hold so many of them blameless. know, they can certainly do their harm, but.

There's almost no choice.

Speaker 2 (54:36.256)
Yeah. And in at least some cases or many cases, but, you know, Christ was apparently like not worried that their presence, their company, their conversation would affect his like purity, to speak. Like he wasn't, he wasn't, he wasn't someone like the, the mega church pastors who are like,

You know, who have a rule of like, will never be in the same room with a woman alone because I have to be, you know, above suspicion. Jesus was kind of like, yeah, sure. Yeah, we can drink together. That's fine. He's just like, like such a different way of relating to that because for him, you know, I, what this might represent is just like, you know, this is, you know, an issue between me and God and God isn't worried about

how things look, that's what the Pharisees are worried about. God is worried about how I treat people. so, you know, apparently he was thinking along these same lines. I don't know if he probably didn't use the phrase fearless sexuality, but he seems to have had it. You know what I mean?

I love it man. Well, I want to move into kind of the next topic of our talked about fearless sexuality and the sexual integration and sex positivity. And I want to really move in now Tyler or Taylor, I called you Tyler, Taylor into this when it comes to parent being a parent specifically, right? And how we can help our kids the best, right? Cause this is really

really challenging, like just to preface this, for those parents who are listening, we face an immense challenge now that we, I mean, previous to 30 years ago, just didn't really face when it comes to sexuality, where our kids have instant access pretty much everywhere they go to whatever sexual material they could ever imagine and things they can't imagine at any given moment. And so,

Speaker 1 (56:51.202)
our responsibility as individuals, as parents, to approach sexuality in a way that's far more mature, far more whole and integrated is greater than ever. Like we could kind of get away with in the past, like using shame as a pretty effective tool to, you know, to prevent sexual promiscuity. Right. That not the best way, obviously, but it was easy.

to do that in a lot of ways. And so when it comes to this default, we kind of get into, well, I want to say this as well. Now with what's coming for those who aren't aware, and I'm sure you're aware of this Taylor, but we have AI chat bots now, right? And many of them can be highly sexualized. Those are fully available. Some of them totally free.

We have humanoid robots that are on the way, right? Those are being developed right now by multiple massive companies. And in the next decade, it will, who knows how available it will be or how expensive it will be or if it takes a few decades or what have you, but there will like very likely be people who have sexual relationships with humanoid robots that have AI personalities.

So what we're looking at from an addiction perspective is something on a grander scale than we've ever encountered. Now that looks really bleak and terrifying because it kind of is terrifying. But more so I want to bring hope that there's also so much movement on the opposite end to educate people and for us to develop, I think, a beautiful relationship to sexuality and to human integrity and to relationships as a whole.

We've just never been called to do that before, really, because we haven't had to meet these challenges. So, all that to say, a lot of parents kind of default to the fear and filter type of approach when it comes to their kids and pornography. In your view, and we've already talked about this kind of why that isn't enough, but what does a truly porn-resilient approach

Speaker 1 (59:10.902)
look like? How can they empower their kids? That's a really broad question, I'm sure. But yeah, let's talk about that.

Yeah, mean, yeah, certainly I've got a framework that maybe I can briefly kind of throw out and kind of maybe provide a bit of structure for people to be thinking about these things. And it's, you know, if you kind of imagine like a step pyramid with four different layers, you know, I think there are some foundational things that, and then things that build on that in that second layer and then the third and then ultimately the fourth layer. And

you know, maybe I'll initially I'll talk about like, if, we're starting early with our kids and things are going well, you know what this looks like. And then of course this needs some, personalized adaptation for where maybe the more listeners who are like really curious about like, yeah, what do I do about this is probably because things have already gotten messy, with, you know, one kid or another. And so, you know, yeah, full recognition that this isn't going to be a neat and tidy process here.

So, so we've got the four layers, right. And, and then I, there's kind of a zero layer, like the ground layer. And what, what I view as that layer is the parental sexual piece. So similar to like this, this notion of fearless sexuality. Again, if you are square with your sexuality and the sexuality of humanity, that is such a strong position to raise a healthy.

sexual child, right? And if you are still figuring that out, that's okay. I mean, I'm still figuring it out, right? Like I don't represent like the full embodiment of all of my theories and ideals here, right? I'm, you know, I still have my insecurities and shortcomings and things, but you know, it's weird.

Speaker 1 (01:01:06.328)
Taylor, thought we had to be perfect to teach other people things.

That was my other era, I'm in this like, mistakes are okay era. Yeah. So we'll see where I go next. Yeah. So, yeah, but, you know, again, that's kind what we had been talking about. So that's, that's great context to raise a kid in is that if, if you imagine like, Hey, they've got a mom and a dad who are square with sexuality. Okay.

that's right. Part of the point, I guess.

Speaker 2 (01:01:36.622)
Cool, like that's a really ideal starting place. What I would say too about like what you'd mentioned, like yeah, in some ways, know, sexuality and AI and things like that, it certainly is kind of freaky, you know, where things are going and, you know, how it's developing. I guess I would also say too though, like it's just different ways of doing the same thing that has always been around in humanity.

You know what I mean? And so like, yes, there are, there are new and additional methods of sexual expression. most of which will probably lend themselves to self focused, non-intimate interactions and stuff like that. you know, I'd be interested to see, you know, which Gen Z, you know, kid grows up, you know, marries a sex robot and then.

gets a divorce so that they can marry a real human. What I'm saying there is, I think that there are still opportunities abound for moving through immature expressions and on into more mature expressions, even though there are new opportunities. Now, many of these do have addictive qualities and make it easy to kind of fall into a compulsive pattern with.

There certainly is that element and perhaps again, that's always been there in various forms as well, right? So.

She said the zero layer is parental sexuality and did I miss the other four layers, Taylor?

Speaker 2 (01:03:18.318)
No, just kind of like I just let everybody know there is a pyramid and then didn't

okay. You don't have to. You don't have to.

No, no, my intention was, and I can be brief here, let's kind of go through those. So we've got the parental sexual piece. The foundational layer of raising a porn resilient child is to cultivate the relationship. From there, we would go on into preparing your child. I'll kind of explain what I mean by that. Then we get into how do we go about managing media and then how do we navigate exposure or kind of the incidents that are naturally going to arise in this.

in this development process.

The very surface layer, that fourth layer, is what we traditionally kind of think of as the solution.

Speaker 2 (01:04:03.724)
Yeah, exactly. A lot of times we don't really think much in terms of sexual development or raising our kids in their sexual nature until something has come up and we're like, well, it wasn't supposed to go that way. It's like, well, turn your phone in, sir.

Why didn't you control this better? How does this not go exactly according to my system?

Yeah, I thought you'd made zero mistakes if I didn't give you any instructions. now, and to be fair, you know, we're a generation that didn't have this modeled. Our parents didn't have it modeled for them. I think our generation is really constructively trying to step into this space, but it's almost like we're trying to kind of craft it as we go. so, you know, so full compassion for parents who have.

have done the like, whoops, you I guess maybe you should have known some things before I handed you the smartphone.

Yeah, it's all new. I think sometimes I get into, haven't we figured this out? And why isn't it better? And it's like, this just happened. It's just the last three decades. It's so new.

Speaker 2 (01:05:14.958)
all of us. yeah. Can feel like a long time for us in our lives, but a very short time in kind of the generational course of humanity here.

Yeah. that's good. No, that's really good. So I want to kind of ask, how can parents teach their kids to engage with sexuality in a way that is both value centered and shame free? I think where I want to speak to one of the primary fears that I would assume you run into, which is this

If I tell my kids that sexuality is okay and it's welcome and it's normal, it's natural, or like it's positive, then they'll be like, great, then I guess I can just give into all these whims and these desires, et cetera. If you could kind of, I don't want to put too much pressure on you, but model a conversation, right? And kind of what that would look like with a kid as to how a parent could approach that with their

with their child when it comes to, yeah.

Yeah, absolutely. Well, we kind of recently had a conversation with my nine-year-old daughter around alcohol. And I think it maps on and, you know, this might, maybe this will be a good example in the sense that we can maybe more easily imagine having this conversation with alcohol because while it might be equally or arguably even more destructive than pornography in terms of the consequential impact on humankind, it is also

Speaker 2 (01:06:56.458)
Not nearly as taboo. and so it gets a little easier to explore or talk about or things like that. and, so, you know, I can't recall what came up. think it was something through either a song or a show or something like that. but this idea of drinking, you know, kind of came up and she was asking, you know, what is that? And so we kind of like, you know, we, don't drink and so we, we.

I kind of had this conversation with her. And so first of all, we kind of laid out the basics. She's like, what, what is this thing? Well, it's, it's a drink, right? And it contains something called alcohol and, and alcohol is something that has a pretty powerful effect on our bodies. Right. And so, you know, what we're starting with are some of the foundational informational bits and some of like the, just like the knowledge base.

to work from, And so she's curious. She's a kid. And because we didn't get weird or like, you know, we'll talk about alcohol when you're older or something like that. She, you know, we kind of followed her lead of curiosity. Some kids aren't, you know, going to ask all these questions, right? And so you can find other opportunities to kind of bring up these conversations in gentle ways, but. But.

And how old is she again? Nine. Yeah.

Uh, and by the way, I mean, she's equally curious about, uh, bodies and sexuality. And so we're having similar conversations there. Uh, there's a funny thing that happened last week about that, but anyway, so with the alcohol, you're going to, you're going to just believe us. Use your imagination. Um, so, um, so, you know, knowledge base, awesome. Right. Uh, responding to questions. So she's like,

Speaker 2 (01:08:52.139)
So we started talking about some of the ways in which this affects people because she could tell in the context like this makes people weird, you so what's going on? Okay, you know, it inhibits judgment and people can get, you know, lose their sense of balance and they don't think as clearly. And, know, we kind of layered those things on it. And she's like, well, why do people... Yeah, kind of like, you know, our erotic nature. Yeah. So, so she's like, well, why do people do this? And so, you know...

Kinda like sexuality.

Speaker 2 (01:09:20.192)
We, you know, and I, I admit there was like a, no reason, you know, like, let's just ignore the pros of, of beer or whatever. Cause you know, let's just kind of nudge you toward the negatives. But you know, we, we, we acknowledge like, well, you know, a lot of people find that this helps them feel really good. or that, they can kind of relax with, you know, with alcohol or things like that. Again, she could pick that up from the context already.

So we were clarifying what she was already absorbing from society. this will happen with sexuality as well. Like they're, they're already getting the tone or the idea that there's something going on here. So us hiding or imbalancing and, know, stepping out of objective descriptions can be, can leave them going to other sources like pornography to learn more. So from the knowledge base, then she's kind of like.

Okay, why do people do this? then, and then from there, we had the opportunity to kind of just like ask, what do you think about that? She was like, I don't know, that seems kind of silly, right? Um, and you know, like, you know, what would that ever be interesting for you? You know, and again, feels like a risky question, but wouldn't it be good as a parent for me to know if she had some propensity toward that? You know, my older daughter, probably not my younger daughter. We'll see. Cause she's, she's a little bit more of a wild card, right?

So for her, you know, she was like, well, no, I mean, it sounds like it's not healthy, you know, and health is kind of this new value that she's kind of formulating. She's trying to understand physical fitness. She's trying to understand nutrition and kind of rudimentary ways. And again, it's not us proselytizing toward her that she's got to eat right and, you know, stay active. She's just noticing that we kind of care about those things. And so she's soaking some of that in from us. Anyway, so we talk.

What I'm pointing out here is again, knowledge base and then active dialogue. If we can be talking about this, that is their way of taking the raw material of information from society, from a particular media source, from our family values and trying to craft something with that. Right? So having sexual dialogue means they might initially have some

Speaker 2 (01:11:38.87)
some ideas might not immediately snap into a mature vision of sexuality. They're not going to get it, obviously. But the dialogue is the process of shaping that into something with a bit of intention. Again, the intention based on our values. Now, each of our kids will have a unique value system that is different than ours, just like we each get to have a different value system than our parents.

That's really good. helps us remain adaptive generation by generation. And so, like, we have to kind of let go of imprinting our values on our kids and instead help them cultivate their version of values. Again, that feels really risky, but if we're supporting them in that process, the vast majority of human beings who get that kind of nurturance and guidance

are going to really create something that holds together, something that functions well in society, right? It might look different in the details with you or their sibling, but it's going to be something that can be quite functional and support them in kind of an ever-growing maturation process, if that makes sense. So eliciting those values more than imprinting those values.

Yeah, it does. it's a less, you know, again, I run it through an IFS lens and it's the kind of the manager perspective on sexuality, which is all about controlling and inhibiting. So if I can just tell my kid that they need to control these feelings and make sure they don't get out of hand. And when they come up,

If they'll just kind of just, you know, get busy with other things or not think about that, you know, because then when you're married and you're older, right, for those of us who are kind of in that conservative space and that traditional kind of culture, then you can have sex and you can explore all that. But until then, just don't, just, just don't really think about it. Just stay busy with all these other things. And that then teaches them, I guess that this part of me is bad. It's unwelcome.

Speaker 1 (01:13:56.544)
I shouldn't give it any space to breathe. that then, you were saying this earlier and this is, the truth behind this is so profound. Like that part of you will show up somehow. that part of you that's involved in your sexuality is gonna show up somehow. And if I try to repress it and stuff it down, it's going to show up destructively.

If I teach it it's bad and filthy and nasty and I don't want it around, then it will likely show up in ways that make me feel bad and nasty and unwelcome, right? And so that was my experience when I was 13. I was scared of sexuality. It was unknown to me. I didn't understand it. What I did understand is that I shouldn't feel those things. And so then,

I kept it secret and I kept isolated and I went off in in secrecy and isolation viewed porn, right? Kept it to myself and developing that relationship from one that's when it's really broken like that, that takes a lot of time and effort. And so if we, as parents can have that ongoing dialogue with our kid from really young ages to like, for me, my son is two and a half and just, just

calling the part of his body a penis, right? And helping him understand that girls have vaginas, right? Like just that basic kind of stuff. This is a part of your body. And like he touches himself and things like that. Cause that's what we do. Cause like, yeah, like it feels good. It feels interesting. That's okay. I don't need to call a bunch of attention to that or stop doing that. You know, it's just, this is a part of being human. It's sexuality. You know what I mean? And we can get so worried like,

It's gonna ruin them. It's gonna take them over. I need to make them stop doing that. But I think for some of us too, and I'm curious what you have to say, Taylor. What's the balance in that as well? Because we also don't want our kids to be taken by sexuality, right? How do I have that conversation? Let's say my son's five years old and he's doing that frequently, maybe, stimulating himself. How do I approach that conversation?

Speaker 1 (01:16:18.7)
with him in a way that's going to most likely lead to something positive for him in the long run.

Absolutely. Now again, yeah, if we're starting early and kind of working the ideal process, which might not be most of us here, then it looks like that, again, that dialogue is the process, right? And so you might think of it this way of like, okay, it's not like, do I make sure, how do I prevent bad sexual things from happening to my child all the way until they launch? You might think instead of like,

How refined and sophisticated do I want my child's sexuality to be by the time they launch? And you can break that down, right? Like, hey, by the time they enter high school, how familiar and to what depth do I want to have them thinking about sexuality? For me, you know, don't know, the deeper the better, right? Like if they can kind of like be really familiar with the fundamentals, if they can be really familiar with kind of

how to go about talking about how sexuality can can convey certain values and how those bump into perhaps competing values and how do we reconcile these things, right? Like I want my daughters, so I don't, don't, I don't have a son. And so in some ways sons get the, you know, the extra dose of fear, right? Although historically women have, have been really shut down in their sexuality. And so.

Part of where I'm at is like, want my daughters to end up with powerful, passionate, enjoyable sex lives. Like that's what I want. And there are a lot of pitfalls toward that end that I'm going to support them in avoiding, right? So I will have boundaries. I will verbalize cautions, right? But again, I'm really trying to lean into a trust that

Speaker 2 (01:18:19.458)
to the extent that they know their bodies, to the extent that they understand sex and the context, like the bigger ecosystem that sex takes place in, relationships, healthy versus unhealthy relationships and so forth. I can trust that if we're talking a lot about these things, and I don't mean sit down with a weekly conversation. I just mean, when they ask questions, that's our opening, right? When we watch media, which might be the more common form,

When we listen to things, hey, what did you think about that? Hey, did you notice this happened between the two characters? You know, what did you notice? Those are all opportunities. And so for you kind of raising your son with some of these sexual values, I do, again, I might hold maybe a more optimistic and positive space than what many listeners feel. And that's okay. I don't know that I have the full right of it. You know what? I'll probably land in somewhere.

North or South of total balance, right? But I want to really retain that kind of optimistic viewpoint. Now, having said that, I think what my approach is is kind of a gradual expansion of freedom for my kids in terms of opportunities around media. So we're actually pretty...

Uh, like we don't watch a lot of things that, uh, you know, think, how do I want to put it? I think we're, maybe more conservative in our media than, the average family in America. You know what I mean? Yeah. Um, and, for some of that, like my daughters don't like scary stuff. And so when we talk scary stuff, we're talking about like the lava monster in Moana is too much. okay. You we're, we're going to skip that part, right? Yeah.

And so, you know, we're pretty thoughtful there, but there's going to be this expansion. I think what we often see is that there's a lack of good guardrails. so innocence is prematurely kind of removed. I'm just trying to remember that I'm not trying to retain innocence until they launch, right? Innocence meaning, you know, good choices. Sure. Yeah. I want to preserve that, you know, if that's possible, but innocence meaning

Speaker 2 (01:20:43.534)
I don't understand what's around me, like the naive side of innocence. Kids are sexually innocent because they don't get it. It's not that they don't experience pleasure or that they don't fool around in the playground or whatever, but they don't understand what this signifies or how it relates to the broader aspects of life. for us, when we're looking at devices, we're very thoughtful about, okay,

first device is not going to be an unlocked smartphone. Let's take it stepwise into here's a device that we've got a dumb phone that I use for myself just because I prefer digital minimalism. It keeps me focused in my values, sexual and otherwise. We let her borrow that and use that from time to time.

We're looking to get her like a Chromebook and our plan is like, okay, let's let it do nothing except the tools that we want it to do. But we know that that's going to change year by year and evolve. There will be this gradual expansion of freedom. And what we're hoping to do is mask that with a gradual increase in her responsibility. So to the extent that our kid is responsible, that's the extent to which they can handle freedom. We want those to align.

And so, you know, maybe a practical step for some parents might be here. If something's feeling off, you know, you might, you might kind of like talk about what, how overall responsible your child is with them. Like high, medium, low, like where are we at here? You know, zero to 100, we're at 33, you know, responsibility points. Great. Well, okay. So let's reorganize any boundaries necessary or access.

so that it aligns with 33 points of freedom, right? And then, you know, if our kid is wanting more, like if they're like, hey, I want, you know, whatever, smartwatch or something like that. And you're like, okay, there's some risks there though. So if you want, you know, that would be like a, I don't use these arbitrary numbers, but maybe for illustration they're useful here. Like 42 points of freedom, great.

Speaker 2 (01:23:04.482)
So you need to increase by what, nine points in responsibility. How are you going to do that? Once you do that, once we kind of see a sustained like level of responsibility there, I have no problem. And if that's earlier than your sibling got it in their life, or if that's later, that's fine. We just want that to relate to responsibility. And so kind of negotiating with your kids of like, how much freedom do you want and how much responsibility do you want? And let's see if we can align those. And if one of them has to change, which are you going to change? Are you going to?

You know, I had a colleague whose son was like, you know, like, does my sister get a phone? And he kind of mentioned like, because she's super on top of all of her schoolwork and she, she can take care of it while handling the phone. It's not interfering with her basics. And he's like, so do you want to start doing your homework more proactively like her? And he's like, no, I'll just do without the phone. But he's like, okay, that's totally fine. He gave him the choice, but it kept it aligned. You know what I'm saying?

I had other parents who went through a poor and resilient parenting workshop. did like a four week kind of in-person workshop. And by the end of it, they're like, we're actually shocked. We're realizing that we need to give our oldest daughter a phone now. we're losing time in training by not giving it to her because she's actually highly responsible and we've been withholding it. So if we can give it to her earlier on, we get more time with her in our home.

where we can train and iron out the challenges and the missteps and the mistakes that come along with it.

That's so cool, Taylor. It's a totally different perspective than I think quite a bit that's out there. And yeah, a very whole perspective. Love it. Thank you for sharing that, Matt. And is there any other messages, whether around fearless sexuality or around, know, parenting kids to have this fearless sexuality and these open dialogues, et cetera, anything you want to leave people with?

Speaker 2 (01:25:09.16)
I think I've kind of, yeah, covered quite a bit of ground. So hopefully that leaves people a lot to chew on. The one thing I will say is that, I, I do want to acknowledge those situations in which things are really messy. And some of these, these perspectives can feel much more limited in those scenarios. There can be some legitimacy to, like really leaning into.

really tough boundaries with a spouse or with a child. There are certainly situations in which there's unacceptable expressions of sexuality that must be confronted. You know, there are, I think that, I think people could use some of the ideas from today's discussion and justify bad behavior and kind of use some of these notions

to step out of integrity. And so, you know, for all listeners, just being really thoughtful about, I'm bringing in a lens, you get to use this with your life experience and your own good judgment to what extent you incorporate these ideas. So, yeah, having said that, yes, you know, that we do need to be careful, sexuality can be a very destructive force in our lives. And I think for most listeners,

I would say, you know, this is hopefully a stretch, like taking kind of where you stand and just trying out a perspective that is a bit of a stretch toward more self-acceptance and I don't even know if maybe optimism isn't the right word, but kind of trust that, you know, hey, we're okay. You know, things are okay. Everything's okay.

And I think it's, again, with IFS, we all have this, I term it higher self, but in IFS, it's just termed self with a capital S. We all have that. What I would say is that truth and that love, that guiding force inside of us. And when we can empower our kids to bring that out more like you are an agent, you can make your decisions. I'm here to help you and assist you, support you, give you all the resources I can.

Speaker 1 (01:27:27.84)
I don't make your decisions for you. And when they're really little, obviously there's all sorts of misdecisions I'm making for them, right? But that increases, as you're saying, this responsibility in the agency. And the more I can empower, you know, my own kids to do that, the more chance they have of really navigating life in a way that's successful and that leads to peace and joy for them and those around them. And that's so important rather than just trying to manage them all the time. So it's really good. Taylor, if

people want to get in contact with you, work with you, come to one of your workshops, whatever that might be, where do they go and what should they check out?

Uh, yeah, absolutely. So I accidentally chose a really long URL. so, um, um, so my, organization is, uh, the good and the free, and then the, website, the good and the free, um, just, you know, wasn't, uh, directly available or I think it was like premium pricing. Cause it was like, I don't know some buzzwords in there. was like, um, you know, anyway, you chose, you chose.

to save on the cash a bit. Yeah, right. Understandably.

And unfortunately, my keywords are good, free, and porn. So I don't know if I really thought that out super well. my gosh.

Speaker 1 (01:28:44.622)
That is too funny. my god.

Anyway, so, you know, I've made my life choices here. So, yeah, if you want to catch me online, we are the good and the free is the full URL. So have fun time typing that in. And then at the good and the free on Instagram as well. And Instagram, you'll stay up to date on things. I also do a newsletter. Writing is one of my favorite aspects of.

offering support and ideas to people. So, I really encourage you to check out the email list as well. And so you'll find that at the site, wearethegoodandthefree.com.

And I will say that your writing style and your voice and everything, it's kind of, it's fun, it's creative, it's human. so anybody would be privileged to be on that newsletter. And I think it provides, you provide knowledge and wisdom while also keeping it very human and kind of expressive. So it's awesome. Yeah. Yeah. Thanks for coming on, man. Such a privilege to have you. Thank you for all the wisdom you're offering to people. And I'm sure it's made a...

Cool. Yeah, I'd love to hear it. Yeah, thank you.

Speaker 1 (01:29:56.406)
made a difference for a lot of people today, so.

Yeah, awesome. I'm glad we could chat and thanks for the great questions. I love the approach that you're taking and the good that you're doing with your people.

A reminder to go to the links in the show notes to register for the Porn Resilient Online Event taking place between October 13th to October 16th of 2025. You can get a free ticket to attend the online event as well as purchase the implementation bundle to get 20 online courses and other resources from experts in the porn and sex addiction recovery fields. Those links to get

both the free ticket or the implementation bundle are entitled Porn Resilient Online Event and All Access Implementation Bundle. Please use those specific links in the show notes as a favor to support this show. Thank you and God bless.

Speaker 1 (01:30:56.706)
Thanks for listening to No More Desire. It's a genuine blessing for me to do the work that I do and I wouldn't be able to do it without you, my listeners, so thank you. If you've enjoyed today's episode, do me a favor. Follow this podcast, hit the notification bell and shoot me a rating. The more people who do this, the more men this podcast will reach. So take a few minutes of your time and hit those buttons. If you want to take your sobriety to the next level, check out my free workshop, The Eight Keys to Lose Your Desire for Corn.

or my free ebook, The 10 Tools to Conquer Cravings. These are specialized pieces of content that will give you practical exercises and applied solutions to overcome porn addiction. And you can find them at nomordesire.com. As a listener of the No More Desire podcast, you are part of a worldwide movement of men who are breaking free of porn to live more impactful,

meaningful and selfless lives. So keep learning, keep growing, and keep building that recovery mindset and lifestyle. God bless.