Why Nice Guys Never Get What They Want (And What Respected Men Do Instead) l EP. 44 l

This is the brutal truth most high-performing men refuse to admit...

You're successful in business. You’re respected at work.
But at home? You're either being ignored, resented… or silently losing your wife’s trust — one “nice guy” moment at a time.

In this episode, I break down:

The hidden trait that keeps "nice guys" stuck in resentment and rejection

Why your covert contracts always backfire — especially in relationships

How your inability to regulate your nervous system is silently destroying intimacy, respect, and polarity

The difference between a man she can feel… and one she shuts down from

If you’ve ever felt like you’re doing everything “right” — being supportive, working hard, holding it together — but still can’t seem to win her back…
This is the wake-up call you’ve been avoiding.

Join the 90 sec email club HERE

Or if you want more personalised help to step out of the nice guy & into the masculine leader you're capable of faster,

Book a call HERE 

Join the free Skool community for the free 7 Day Nervous System Reset HERE

Transcript

Harrison Orr (00:00.863)
This is the real reason nice guys never what they want and the true trait that separates nice guys from respected men.

Harrison Orr (00:12.905)
Welcome back to another episode of the Be Better podcast. I'm your host, Harrison Orr, and I've coached almost 500 men to have more presence, more energy, and ultimately more intimacy without burning out, without playing the nice guy so that they can be better husbands, fathers, business owners, and leaders of their own life. And what we're going to talk about today is how nice guys go about getting what they want because to the nice guy, and I will say to the nice guy, but everything

I talk about comes from first-person experience. When nice guys seek out to get something, whether it's to create more trust, to create more intimacy, to persuade someone or to get their way in some way, or form, it's always through these covert contracts. It's always through what do I need to do to get an IOU? What do I need to do to get this person to do what I want without me saying what they want?

And the problem with this is not just the lack of communication of this desire of this trade off, but what it breeds in the nice guy. It breeds this frustration and this resentment, but also reinforces the I'm not enough belief. Because most men in general have this subconscious belief of I'm not enough the way I am.

That's why we go out and build massive businesses. go chasing massive salaries or massive amounts of income, finances, the house, the vacations, the toys, whatever else, know, trophy wife, even for some guys, whatever else it is that you deem as when I have this thing or I achieve this level of status of finance of success, then I will be enough. The problem with that is it never is because we're always trying to be enough.

to somebody else. Like the amount of business owners that I've worked with that had the belief that if I make six figures, then if I make seven figures, if I grow the business to this level, then I'll have more time. Then the relationship will grab the intimacy, the connection, the sex, the everything that I want again. And everything is predicated on achieving that thing. I will fulfilled and be more present when this happens. I will be able to be a better dad.

Harrison Orr (02:38.451)
when this happens. I'll be able to take my wife on more dates and we'll be able to have more sex and connection when this happens.

but it never does. And what we sacrifice along the way is our presence, our energy, our time. And the version of us along the way in the pursuit of that is often reactive, tired, stressed, because we're not where we wanna be. And we put all this trust in or expectation

in other people changing the way they treat us when we achieve this. Instead of seeing that as a reflection of how we are showing up, what we are providing. Because a man's role isn't to provide, isn't just to provide financially. Sure, that's one element of it. But what many guys, myself included, forget is we're also there to provide masculine leadership, masculine.

presence and energy, which no amount of money can replace, which is why there's that disconnect. There's no polarity in relationship. unless we address that, unless we start showing up as that man and take ownership of ourself, of our traits, then nothing else will change. No amount of success, no amount of money can replace that leadership, replace that masculine presence and energy.

And a lot of guys get short, get triggered with their kids, with their wife, saying that they just don't understand. Maybe even calling them ungrateful. But what I challenge you to do if that hits home is ask yourself, where is that true? Where is that trigger true? And what is it there to teach you? Because a trigger will not, something will not trigger you.

Harrison Orr (04:44.453)
if you don't believe it's true. If there's something that you haven't owned, if there's something that you believe about yourself, that's why it sets you off. Cause you haven't owned it. And it's an incongruency with who you believe you are versus what someone else is saying. Often our kids are our wife, right? Cause they know the full spectrum of us. They know us in our entirety. So they know who we like to portray we are, who we like to say we are.

versus who we are even in our most lazy and incongruent moments. The problem with that is when we are reactive, a lot of nice guys, actually I should pre-frame this, a lot of nice guys may not always be reactive to that trigger.

externally, but the way they respond to it might be to shut down. So nice guys often will only snap a couple of times a year, but it'll be this big explosion and then an apology and then shrinking back down. And then every time there's that trigger, they'll suppress it, won't feel their emotions and just go back inward. And that's why she can't feel you. Cause you can't feel you, right? You suppress those emotions, say it's bad to feel anger, it's bad to feel all these things, suppress them, push them down, you know,

Good guys don't show those emotions. You don't show vulnerability because that makes you weak, makes you a threat, makes you whatever story you've been indoctrinated in or been fed.

But then when we snap, she sees a boy, not a man. She sees someone who can't control his emotions, who can't healthily express and articulate his emotions. Because what that shows is you are dangerous and not in a good way. You are a threat because you can't control it. It's the difference between having a trained sniper and giving a kid a machine gun. One.

Harrison Orr (06:45.949)
knows exactly how to line it up, how to use it, when to use it, who to use it on and the context of everything. The other is completely emotional and as soon as you set him off, we'll just spray the entire school down. Not a great time, right? So we get to choose, but you can only really choose to be the trained sniper once you've regulated your nervous system. Once you've owned those triggers, owned those traits and then put yourself in a position where

You can regulate yourself, ground yourself, be present enough.

to sit there when those triggers happen. When these conversations, these events or these situations present themselves, that you can still be present without reacting, without disconnecting, but staying present and guiding yourself and your partner or whoever you're communicating with through this conflict, through this situation. And to be clear, if this is really triggering,

and it's evoking that aggression, that anger, there is nothing wrong with excusing yourself to go and regulate yourself, whatever that looks like. And then coming back, I promise you, if you can go and do that and express that in a controlled and healthy way and come back, she will trust you so much more because she will know that you have the capacity for that emotion, but it's under control. You have the capacity for anger.

for aggression because you're a human being, you're a masculine human being, but you keep it sheathed and under control and only use it when you need to. It's not going to spill out against her or against the kids or unnecessarily, it's saved for when someone is threatening you or your family. Only in those circumstances does it come out to defend and protect, but never against the ones you love. That kind of trust.

Harrison Orr (08:48.583)
is only built through that healthy expression. Because pretending that we don't have these emotions that we never feel them is wrong, right? Like you've ever been around someone that's just always happy, eventually you get a little bit sus, right? Because you're like, you're human, you have emotions. what do you, what facade are you kind of putting on? Because it limits relatability, right? Think about it from a nice guy perspective.

If they always say yes, they always go above and beyond. They always do everything that you want to because they think that's what you want of them. They always tell you what you want to hear or what they think you want to hear. Eventually you lose trust in them, right? You won't ask them for an opinion because you know you won't get an honest opinion. You just get what they think you want to hear. You're like, well, fuck, if I wanted to, if I just wanted to hear what I want to hear.

I would just ask the mirror. I'm asking another human being because I want a different perspective. I want an outside opinion or source of information to tell me maybe what I can't see, what I'm not looking at, a different perspective to help me get better at this. But how can I get better? How can I grow if I'm just, someone's just parroting what I already know back to me? It won't work. And to some men that strokes their ego and that's great. But if you want to change,

if you want to be challenged to grow and to be in your highest potential and like around men, but then in terms of your partner, if you want to create that trust, there needs to be that ability to regulate yourself and communicate that. And there are going to be times where you say something which is not what she wants to hear, right? And she might get upset in the short term, but then the frame on that is like, but yeah babe, but now like you...

You can trust when I'm saying how amazing you look, how much I love this outfit on you, how much I love this meal or whatever the thing is. You can trust that I mean what I say because I don't just say that every single time. I don't just say like, yeah, baby, you look amazing. You're so beautiful. my God. I'm so lucky. Wow. Go me. Right. It's just, it's boring. It's monotonous. There's no feeling behind it. And she's not going to trust that. And so when we're in these situations of

Harrison Orr (11:17.651)
being triggered of having to speak our truth. Real regulation is being calm under pressure, is being present in that pressure, is not disconnecting, is not suppressing, but holding the frame, not throwing it back saying, I don't care, fine, whatever you want, know, just agreeing or, you know, giving it back to her, but being able to hold the frame.

still lead the conversation, lead it into a constructive space of understanding of what the other person is trying to communicate and then get to a point of, okay, this is, am I understanding this right in blah, blah? know, repeat what the person has said. Most guys will get that wrong the first time, but going through that enough times until you get to the point where she says like, yes, that's what I'm communicating. That's what I'm feeling or whatever the thing is, because most guys, that's where they get it wrong.

she said she was upset because I didn't clean the garage and I cleaned the garage and she was still upset. Or I said I would do it later, but she's still upset. Yeah, because it's got nothing to do with the garage. It's because you said you would do this three weeks ago and she's had to nag you every weekend and you still haven't fucking done it. It's not about the garage. It's the fact that she can't trust your word. And the fact that she can't trust your word means she can't trust you. And that hurts her deeply.

That really sucks that she wants to trust you, she wants to respect you, she wants to love you with all of her heart, but she can't respect you or trust you because you can't keep your word, because you don't trust you. And that's what hurts her.

Harrison Orr (13:00.521)
but coming back to the regulation, how we can start working on this, start with your nervous system, start regulating your nervous system. Look at the things that put you in a dysregulated state, which for most people is excess cheap dopamine. So sugar, porn, social media, all the cheap fixes, gambling, drugs, alcohol, overstimulation from those sources, but also from caffeine, pre-workouts, stimulants, all the things.

removing as many of those as possible, bring them down to, or either get rid of them completely or remove them down to a point of just one or two. Okay, I have one coffee in the day because I like the taste of it, but I don't get to the point where I haven't eaten, I'm running off nothing but caffeine and nicotine and I'm jittery and anxious all the time. That's gonna make you super reactive and not help this. Being calm but focused comes from regulated nervous system, comes from removing those stimulants.

comes from time in the sun, getting your quality sleep, like all the boring work that no one wants to do. Being present with your breath. I can't tell you how amazing, simply taking five minutes at the start of your day to have no influx of information. So no phone, no music, no anything, just sit there in silence, closing your eyes, tuning into your breath.

just being completely regulated and calm and present with your breath and then planning out your day. Being intentional with your day, what you do, why you're doing it and being present in it will not only help you to be productive, not just busy, so that you're now focusing on the highest ROI task, not just the shit that keeps you busy. When you are doing the task or you're with your partner, you are solely present, which means you will be so much more connected.

You'll get to such a deeper level of conversation and understanding that an hour of surface level small talk couldn't penetrate to. So again, it's the intensity and the potency of your energy and of your essence that comes from that presence, no matter what you're doing. Productivity wise, you get so much done in more time because you're not distracted because you're present. Connections, you're so much deeper. You get to intimacy and connection and love and all the fun things so much faster because

Harrison Orr (15:29.385)
and it's not a race, but you get there better because you're solely present. You're half texting, half thinking about work and all the things.

If you haven't tried it already as a side note to this, if you want to go deeper into this in our school community, there's a free seven day nervous system reset, which will walk you through one action item each day on how to regulate your nervous system and bring it back to a baseline so that you can start being more present, creating more intimacy and just being more productive in life. So go check that out if you haven't already. This is going to massively help your wife in feeling you, feeling your presence.

It'll help you understand her needs and your kids needs deeper than the words that they say, so much more. And so when you start to rewire your nervous system, you can now lead yourself much better, which makes you ultimately a person that is worth following. Because if you can't lead yourself, why would anyone else trust you to lead them? It makes no sense.

So you start with your nervous system, then you can lead yourself from a place of ground and presence, not reactivity, and then you become someone worth following.

And so if you haven't checked out the seven day nervous system reset, go check that out. If you want a quick action item to go and do like right now, give yourself five minutes, find some silence. If you've got earplugs or noise canceling headphones, even better, plug those in, sit and breathe for just five minutes. Four seconds in, six seconds out. In through the nose, expanding your diaphragm, your belly, out through the mouth.

Harrison Orr (17:16.543)
for five minutes, just be present, what's alive in your body, what's alive in your mind, and then take that into your next meeting, into your conversation when you get home with your wife or with your kids and see what you feel, see what you notice in that interaction. See if you get anything different back from them by being that present and see how it feels for you. If that interaction feels much better, if you feel calmer, less reactive, more connected.

And if you do, me a message on Instagram, let me know how you go, because I'd love to hear what impact that has on your day, your productivity, your intimacy, your relationship. Because I know personally that's had a huge effect on my life. One of the big reasons that I'm doing what I do today. So with that, you've got the lesson. Don't be sorry, be better. I see you guys in the next episode.