Why Great Relationships Aren’t Conflict-Free (and How to Thrive in Them) | Jack Longbottom - Part 1

In this deeply honest conversation, James and guest Jack explore the truth about conflict in relationships — why it’s not a sign of weakness, but a natural and even necessary part of building something lasting. Together, they unpack the myths around “perfect” partnerships, share personal stories of being conflict-avoidant “nice guys,” and reveal how real growth comes from leaning in rather than running away.

Jack shares the powerful mantra his partner uses during tough moments: “It’s you and me versus the challenge, not you versus me.” From this, they explore practical tools for moving from knee-jerk reactions to thoughtful responses, including the importance of taking a pause, naming what you’re feeling, and agreeing on a repair process that goes deeper than quick fixes or sweeping issues under the rug.

The conversation digs into the deeper layers of why conflict feels so threatening — from childhood conditioning to unhealed relational patterns — and how our partners often mirror the shadows we most need to face. They discuss the role of acceptance, boundaries, and radical ownership in creating a space where both people can be fully seen, even in their most uncomfortable truths.

You’ll hear stories about men’s work, shadow work, and how formative experiences shape the way we connect. Jack reflects on the pivotal role of his relationship in his personal growth and shares his definition of ownership as “authorship” — the choice to create the future you want, even after difficult or unfair experiences.

Whether you’re navigating romantic conflict, family dynamics, or friendships, this episode offers a roadmap for turning disagreements into deeper connection, replacing blame with curiosity, and building relationships rooted in care, respect, and resilience.

About Jack:

Jack is a qualified relationship coach who helps couples using a blend of practical tools, emotional insight and a hardline of removing restricting/untrue beliefs to support lasting change. Jack believes that much of our relational behaviour is shaped by the baggage we carry — often unconsciously — from past experiences. By helping clients understand how their nervous system responses & relational strategies impact connection, safety, and reactivity; He empowers them to build more consciously connected and authetic relationships through both individual ownership and collaboration with others.

Transcript

0:00

In today's episode, myself and Jack talk about how conflict is a natural part of healthy relationships. We look at practical tools for conflict navigation. And commitment and ownership are the keys to a long and healthy relationship. Welcome to Man: A Quest to Find Meaning, where we help men navigate modern life, find their true purpose, and redefine manhood. I'm your host, James, and each week, inspiring guests share their journeys of overcoming fear Embracing vulnerability and finding success. From experts to everyday heroes. Get practical advice and powerful insights. Struggling with career, relationships or personal growth? We've got you covered. Join us on Man Quest to Find Meaning. Now, let's dive in.

James: 0:54

Are not measured by a lack of conflict, but by the capacity for care they can access when dealing with it. Good afternoon, Jack. Hi James. Can you explain more?

Jack: 1:05

Yeah. I feel like there's a big fantasy or yeah, fantasy in the world that like really strong relationships just don't have conflict. You know that everything's fine all the time and you get along so well that conflict just doesn't exist. And yeah, I really don't ascribe to that. I feel like the challenge of relationships of getting two individuals who decide to commit to each other and share their lives is one of the most difficult, and at the same time rewarding things that you can do and that comes with conflict as you try and meld. These two individuals together with everything that they bring as an individual. And it's all fair, but it's all fair. It's all warranted. It all has to be there. But I do think it's unrealistic to think that's just gonna emerge no matter how much you're in love with someone you know, seamlessly. Part of what I think makes love and relationships so amazing is the ability to have this connection, have disagreements and come back. And when I say like the capacity for care is it goes two ways. It's like, how much can I care for what I want whilst also considering this person in front of me and where they've come from and what they want, and how do we find this space in the middle that is like the beauty?

James: 2:28

You've got two separate individuals. Both have different boundaries, both for different people. Somewhere along the line you're gonna have comfort. Yeah. And as we're gonna chat about in a minute, it's how we deal with the conflict that matters. And because I used to be what you call a Mr. Nice guy. To what, whatever I could do to avoid conflict, I would do it. And I remember in one relationship, she would get angry at me and I would almost cower down, get anxiety and just say yes. Obviously the relationship broke down. And that was luckily from, for me, that's where my proper journey began. After the breakup. Breakup. But it was more, there's always gonna be a bit of conflict and it's how we deal with it.

Jack: 3:26

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I can resonate with that. I was also Mr. Nice guy conflict avoidant. Do anything to just quell the intensity of it, if that meant I had to say yes when I meant no or no. When I meant yes, then that was, it was a higher priority for me in the past to not be in conflict than it was to gain something from it. So I really resonate with that, and I think that's shared by a lot of people. I think that's a human, it's a human experience, that a lot of people share.

James: 4:01

Where in your life have you been in a conflict with a partner, but have come out the other side having Rowan A lot?

Jack: 4:11

Okay. So I'm I'm in a relationship at the moment. We with a wonderful woman called Erica. We've been together for seven years and we've had plenty of conflicts. I came in to the relationship off the back a few years previously, off the back of a bad breakup, and I was like, completely shut down emotionally, which I had actually been for many years, but that's a realization that came later. But I was like really protecting myself, only thinking about myself. And then, we slowly start forming this relationship and she's so switched on. She definitely started her journey, if you wanna call it that, a few years before me. So she was always a couple steps ahead and could recognize in me the things that I was still denying to myself. And yeah, plenty of times where she had to set boundaries by which I mean, Hey Jack here's what I want. Here's what I'm willing to put, here's what I'm willing to make room for, which is uncomfortable for me because I see in you that you how you are. And here's the stuff that I'm. Not willing to put up with this is what I'll if we continue down this path and I'm afraid I'm out. And I would say things, I think my the best, I'm glad I can look back on this and laugh now, but one of my excuses I came out with once in the heat of an argument, I said, do you know what Erica, you may have all this work to do on yourself, but some of us are just okay. And I look back and I'm glad I can laugh about it now, I was just like so adverse to it, recognizing in myself anything that was, anything that I was doing that was holding anything back because that's how my Mr. Nice guy thing fed into it. It was like I'm not gonna cause the trouble. I'm not gonna make the waves. I'm gonna make sure everyone's always happy. Obviously my idea of happy there was just not in conflict, which is not now an nowadays why define as a mark of happiness and, i've lost my train of thought. Yeah, it was a lot. It was a lot of back and forth. I got my hackers up a lot. I went super defensive and I would when I got pushed to the point where I wasn't gonna be able to avoid the conflict, I would come back just deny. And yeah, we've done that a few times over the years, more than a few times. When these things crop up we realize, oh, this probably isn't feeding into the future that we keep on talking about building together. And yeah taking own, like my part of that is like taking ownership over the things that I'm doing. And that was really difficult because I wanted to view myself as a person who never put anything negative out there, who never was holding anyone else back. And that's thing I always othered. I'm always, I'm holding Erica back. I'm holding this person back. I'm holding that person back and never would shine. Turn the mirror around on me and say, oh, actually I'm the one who's suffering. The people around me suffering are symptoms of my suffering and my refusal to just go deeper within myself. So a lot of the conflicts that we've had have been around that. And obviously we've had what you would call mundane or silly conflicts, oh, I forgot to do that thing that I said that I would do for you. Or, the sort of humdrum, everyday disconnections, which happen as well, which are just as common, just as important to deal with in the correct way. Because there is always a core to that. It may be, oh, I forgot to pick up the thing that I said, but deep down how is that, what impact is that really having? It's probably been making my partner feel uncared for not listened to, not heard. So it isn't the fact that I forgot to pick this thing up. It's are you listening? Do I, do you value me enough? That's what my partner was. Was saying on some level, do you value me enough to actually commit to the things that you say you're going to do to me or for me, or whichever way it would be? Yeah. Does that answer the question? I feel like I've rambled.

James: 7:59

Yeah. Yeah. It's all right. Is that so That's powerful because,'cause within a relationship, there's, what I've come to learn is that every person is going to shine on you. What you perhaps don't see in yourself. Whether that's shadows, whether that's gold. And I've had to learn that the last couple of years the last probably three or four years, and working with the shadow and how the shadow will come up to be seen. But quite often we don't see it because we aren't looking for it or we're running away. And so there's this avenue that in order for us to grow, we've gotta be willing to ourselves first and foremost. And everybody else around us is going to reflect that.

Jack: 8:49

Yeah. Yeah, I couldn't agree more. There's like a, like the big trap is like othering, isn't it? It's like all the problems in my life are coming externally. None of them are coming from in here. It is not my reaction to the circumstances I'm receiving. It's the circumstances fault. And it's so easy to, that's such a safe, comfortable line of thought because you, if you can ascribe to that, then you never have to look inside. And that's easy, very easy. So I don't hold it, if I hold it against anyone else, I would have to hold it against myself.'cause I've certainly chosen the easy path many times. But it always leads back to the same place, unfortunately.

James: 9:27

Yeah, but I think we all chose the et path over the hard path.'cause the hard path, as we said, is hard. And I tend to do after relationships is I would tend to have two or three years between my next one because I understand, I've had to start to understand over the last eight to 10 years that there's a level of work that we need to do. And I fully believe that there is one person out there who is perfect for you, but in order to get to that person who's absolutely perfect, you've gotta go through I think quite a few relationships and do the work on yourself. And then eventually you get to that point where that one person who is meant for you will appear.

Jack: 10:15

Yeah. Yeah. I can, I couldn't agree more. I dunno if I fully feel into the soul. Seeing, that one person, I don't know. That's not strong opinion either way. I don't know about that. But I do really believe in all of these relationships through your life. Not E, not just the romantic ones. It's fa, those ones that taught you how to do relationships, family relationships, or whoever raised you. We are learning to do relationships from the moment we can talk from the moment we're interacting, even from the moment we're born. We're learning to do relationships even if we can't communicate. And I think that is a process, and I totally agree. It's not every people, I get mixed reactions when I say this, but it's not every relationship is meant to last forever. I don't think that makes them any less special. It doesn't make them any less beautiful. They're all teaching us something, how to be better lovers, how to be better partners, how to be better brothers, fathers, sons, whatever it is that if we can go with intention and a bit of reflection, all of that feeds back into this me into us as individuals. And then I think that is the beauty that allows you to find that soulmate, that one but I do think it takes the effort as well, because you can find the one and completely, flush it down the toilet through not, acting with intention.

James: 11:41

Yeah, totally agree. What are some of, obviously yourself and people that you work with what are some of the common mistakes that people make within conflict?

Jack: 11:52

Okay. There are many things. I'm gonna start off on the second part of conflict, which is repair. And I feel like, yeah, there are mistakes you can make in conflicts, but then by definition, I think conflict is messy. Conflict is by donation. When you are triggered and you're probably not centered, you're not gonna be your most collaborative self. And so I do allow some space and conflict for people to get it wrong. That's that's human. And then that's where the capacity for care comes in. How much can I care for this person who's really not serving themselves or the relationship right now? Obviously there are agreements that you can come to when outside of conflict of how we're going to deal with it. The next time we get triggered, what are we going to do? And you put a plan in place. And then also having the grace to. I understand that may go wrong sometimes, and maybe you won't be able to act out the perfect scenario that you wanted to. And being able to come back to that again and review it and say, okay, what went wrong? Not, oh, you didn't do this thing that you said you were going to. It's okay, what happened there? And that that's like the, that's the repair part. And that's what people I think, struggle so much with. I feel like one thing I see a lot of people's version of repair is either waiting long enough for the feelings to become subdued enough for them to just carry on. So you just waiting for the stress levels to come down, maybe give it a couple days. You may ply, say sorry, and then a month later, two months later, however long later, you're having the same argument again. Or even if it's not the same argument, you are going through the same patterns whilst carrying out conflict. So there's this these states of repair that come back to like homeostasis, to like calmness, but really you haven't actually repaired anything and that is a bit more water under the bridge. Or you go and buy them a gift and Oh, lovely on flowers. You bought me flowers in so long, or Oh yeah, I really needed that thing. Whatever. I, okay. They, oh, happy feelings again. Let's just, cover up tho those bad ones or, oh, we'll go on holiday and we'll have a really great time together and when we come back we'll have forgotten about it all. But, and I was such a big believer in the body keeping score and every time we experience conflict in a negative way, it's not only, we're not only affected cerebrally, in the, in what we can express, but it's our body, our nervous system. Remembers what that feels like. Which is why I think we carry so much from our early childhoods, from our early relationships, those patterns, especially around conflict into later ones because it's, we're not actually acting out of choice. A lot of it is okay, here comes stress. This is how I react, for, let's say for maybe that's a different subject. You're asking me mistakes with conflict, so I will stick on that. I feel the biggest one to statement it is get a repair process in place. Have an agreement that you can have disagreements, you can have disconnection, but you both commit to coming back afterwards if you can't resolve it there and there. If you both to activate it, then what's the plan? Do you leave it 12 hours? Do you leave it 24 hours? Like when is the date, when you're gonna come back to it, when you can both come centered and have a conversation again about what's gone on? Because it is co-created, conflict is co-created, and it's. It's the impact of others' actions and our reactions, our triggers to the others. It's not their fault, but it is, we are impacted by each other. And I'm really just viewing it as that, whilst caring to the other person, what did my impact what was my impact on you? What was your impact on me? Not you did this to me. When you do this, you are in the wrong, because I don't like feeling this, it's like all of this blame he said, she said, and that just gets you nowhere. It just keeps you stuck. You can, I have in the past spent hours revolving around a conversation where you just arguing about, oh no, but you said it like this, so you must have meant that. And they said, oh no, I actually said it like this. So really what I meant was that, and and then you're just stuck arguing over a sentence and where's that gonna lead? Lead you nowhere. Certainly not to repair. That lasts a long time.

James: 16:18

Yeah. There's some key things you mentioned there. Coming back to center. And as you mentioned, being centered the first thing that came to my mind was breathing. Was'cause we're, I think as human beings, we're programmed to, to go. We want to get to places, we want to achieve things, but we forget to slow down and to actually breathe. And I think that's a key thing because grieving allows us to become centered, which allows us to relax emotions. Because I think those in an argument and the conflict, your emotions are high. But as soon as you become center, as soon as you start to breathe, you can start to allow and relax. Yeah. And then I think that's when you, that's when the repair can happen, when you are calm and relaxed. And another thing that came to mind, so I started. I'm starting to look at relationship. I think it's relationship relating authentic relating, sorry, authentic relating. That's the one. And one of the key things I mentioned in the five, top five principles, do we have authentic relating is assumptions. You beings we're based on assumptions because assumptions have kept us safe over the last, probably two or three centuries and probably the rest of the time, but are our assumptions of what's going on right or wrong? And I'll give you a per example, and I've had to rethink about whole, my whole aspect of this. There's a friend of mine who I occasionally feel like I'm treading on eggshells around and I don't wanna be like that because I want to be me and obviously. As you in beans, you might say something and it might annoy somebody. I don't wanna feel like I'm treading on eggshells around anybody. And so there's this idea that, am I making an assumption that every time I see him, am I gonna be tread on eggshells? So I need to almost allow myself just to go and speak my truth, saying, is this, right? I have to be careful what I say around you, or is that an assumption I'm making?

Jack: 18:32

Yeah, I love that. And I'll tell you what, one, one thing, one really simple like stem that I love using when addressing assumptions or judgments or anything like that, it's just I'll start off with, I have a story. Which allows me to, own the fact that I'm not accusing them. It's not Hey, I have to walk on eggshells around you. It's Hey bro, I have a story that I have to do this. This is what I'm telling myself in my head. Is that true? And then suddenly you've opened, you've seen, you've been seen in what you are actually going through, and you offer the other person this option to be like, oh, it's not like that. Oh, it is like that. Oh, you no way. I feel like that as well. Or whatever it is. Yeah. Assumptions assumptions and judgment as well. I. It just exactly what you said, they've kept us safe for so long. Back in, if you want to take it that far back when tribalism hunting, wherever it is, you have to make snap decisions. Is that animal going to kill me? Or even more modern days, if I walk down that dark alleyway, is something bad gonna happen to me? If I get into that car that doesn't have seat belts and looks like it's falling apart? Am I gonna have a car crash? We make these snap judgements every day to keep ourselves safe. And they do. Unfortunately, maybe a bit, they just do bleed into our social lives as well, yeah. And it's, yeah, easy to fall victim to assumptions.

James: 19:56

Oh, it's very easy to fall victim. I noticed it several times. Only noticed it the other day when I shot into one of my friends. I jumped to an assumption. But anyway. What's your, what's, what do you feel the difference is between, because obviously in a conflict we have a choice. We either react or we respond. What is the subtle difference between reacting and responding?

Jack: 20:18

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Reaction. Reaction is powerless. Okay. Where, this is my views. When we react to something, it is paramount in my head, or tantamount to saying, I have no choice. A plus B, equal C. You raise your voice, I raise my voice. That's the equation, and I'm done because I have learnt over the years that's what keeps me safe. I've had experiences in the past that say if I shout louder than the person shouting in front of me, that person goes away and I can return to homeostasis and calm and de-stress. And reacting for me is it's choiceless. It's, it does serve, it is self-serving in a good way. We are trying to serve ourselves, we're trying to get back to a place of calmness and reduce the cortisol, reduce the adrenaline. And the problem is that a lot of these patterns are formed in our formative years, don't actually have the legs or the foresight to see what we need in the future. Although maybe 10 year olds is served by just like getting danger out of their space as quickly as possible, whereas a 25-year-old, or 35 45, however old, someone who is like in an adult committed relationship, or even still with family members, close friends, wherever it is. Suddenly you have an or you may have extra value in wanting to care for that relationship and actually seeing your hopes for that relationship come to fruition. So like React, I think is just like animalistic, get me safe. Doesn't matter the impact, doesn't matter the consequences. The only thing that matters in the reaction is how do I keep myself safe or get what I need out of this situation? Whereas responding is like, holds that in honor. Okay, this is where I want to be. Don't really wanna be in conflict. Would love to be more in a collaborate, collaborative space right now. And I also realize that what's happening in front of me is not conducive for me accessing my compassion, my curiosity, or my ability to collaborate. So how do I respond in a way that is going to. Get me what I want big picture wise, and that's where the, as we were talking about earlier, the big mistakes between, or the things the mistakes people make around conflict. So that's why those conversations, when you are calm and I was gonna use the word sober, but I suppose it is kinda like that, no adrenaline, no cortisol, just like everyday me. And I make those agreements, those that's the response. It's okay, next time I feel like I'm getting super stressed. It could be as simple as I'm gonna name it. Instead of shouting back, I'm gonna choose to say, Hey I'm struggling right now. Hey, I feel really angry right now. And I feel like I'm wanting to just shout back at you or what, it can be as simple as just naming it. Rather than being it, we can feel anger and not have to express raw anger at the same time. It doesn't mean that one has to not exist. In fact, that's, I think, crippling that's the opposite of what we want. It's not about denying that the anger is out in the first place or whatever the whatever's coming up for you. It's like, how do I hold that name it and move through this, either with the person in front of me or even, another one, another great one for response that just Hey, can I come back to you with this in an hour in six hours? Can I, can we talk about this evening? I just need to go and actually process this. Think about it. Whatever works for you. But it's like putting in those steps and standing up for what you've said when you're not triggered is how you wanna. Be in those moments. Does that make sense?

James: 24:33

Yeah. And I've got a sneeze coming. I'll cut this out,

Jack: 24:38

Rob. Probably not.

James: 24:39

And how, obviously we have reacting. And we have responding. Yeah. But how can, so somebody listening here wants to know how to identify and to move from reacting to responding. How can they do that?

Jack: 24:56

I think it, it comes back. So how do you, so this is outta the conflict, genuinely. How do you feel about your relationships? Okay. Let's say it's a, particularly, you've got one person in mind. How do you genuinely feel about how that's going? How do you want it to be? What's your plan for the future? What's the. How do you want to experience that in the day-to-day and when you, and then why do you wanna feel that way? Why do you want to be that way with this particular person? Like really understanding what you as an individual bringing to the table and what you want to experience, how you want it to turn out. Then you make those agreements or boundaries either on an individual level or if you are in a relationship or it's family, someone who you're gonna have to or are just in this long-term thing with. Do you feel the same things happening over and over? So let's say, oh, there's a one person who every time we have a difficult conversation, it ends with up with them shouting at me. That's how it always ends. They flip the handle, then I collapse and I end it. And I never really get a heard in the thing that I want. If you can come to that realization, then I suppose you're left with two options. After that, you either hope there's an option that works and an option that doesn't work. You can hope that things are gonna change with no effort. Oh, they'll change after this period of their job's really stressful at the moment. They'll be fine after that, or the house is being renovated or after the kids leave, or a million things, which is never gonna happen. Hope springs eternal and it's fantastic, but it doesn't affect change. You can leave the relationship. That is always an option. You can turn your back in and say, no, I don't want this. Which sometimes you have the option to do. I would say it's probably, I think, and this is personal opinion, but I feel like that's all personal opinion. A lot of people refuse that option of leaving, or of redefining it in a way that works for them with such a hard boundary line. Or the option is like, how do I wanna do this differently? And we have to maybe within that own the fact that, okay, if this person in front of me is always, I'm always getting the same reaction out of them. How can I communicate differently with this person to try and get a different, a different response to be heard? Or what am I not hearing in them that they're screaming about wanting to be seen in that? Actually, I'm so obsessed with being seen over here. I'm not just taking a pause and seeing what's going on in front of me. So I think the way we know how our boundaries are being crossed is getting really clear out of conflict about what our boundaries are. It's not so much. We're always allowed to get triggered. I don't feel like there's a level of enlightenment for anyone who is this is it. I'm now so at peace for myself that nothing anyone can ever say will affect me. Because for that to be true, that means you'd have to stop valuing things. The, we protect what we value, and sometimes those things, those values come under threat. We get triggered conflict. So I think it is just being a bit more intentional about how we want things to pan out, and which may sound like maybe a bit too diluted, but it is harder than it sounds. It is harder than it sounds to, to really decide and commit to a plan moving forward. Because a lot of the time conflict, I would hope that. If you're in a relationship that you want to go the distance that you aren't in regular conflict, I don't wanna be mis misconstrued and'cause there are those high conflict couples who maybe have a massive blowout every single weekend. They go out, they have a drink or whatever it is, have a massive blowout by the next day. They're sweeping it under the rug and, oh, that's just how we are. And then every week of these huge, massive shouting arguments and it's I don't think that's definitely not healthy. That's not the sort of conflict I'm talking about. I feel like in, in relationships, you're probably only gonna get a chance very sporadically to truly practice in that moment when your full trigger to be like, okay, this is my opportunity to do the thing that I said I was going to do and I. Maybe you'll succeed, maybe you won't. Maybe some of it'll go right, some of it'll go wrong. And again, that's why it's so important to be able to have come back afterwards and have that communication and talk about what went right and what went wrong. There's like a sentence that my partner Erica embodies so well, and always reminds me, I say always is great at reminding me when I forget and will be in conflict. And you say, Jack, remember it's you and me versus the challenge, not you versus me. And it's okay, deep breath. Here's the obstacle. And the obstacle includes your trigger, my trigger, the circumstance, the thing that we're trying to achieve. All of that. And here we are as a team addressing that. It's not this thing that's in between us. And we're both coming in from either end crushing this thing in the middle till the pressure is just gonna explode. And

James: 30:43

yeah.

Jack: 30:44

Yeah. I feel like that's, it's just like a single sentence I keep in my head that helps me really come back to collaboration after

James: 30:55

there's one of the other things mentioned in authentic relating is to accept everything. So whether that's yourself, the other person, the circumstance, the challenge. And is almost like seeing every person, yourself, every challenge, every opportunity as an opportunity to look deep into that and to accept stuff that's good that you enjoy, that's good for you, but also about accepting things which you find resistance against. Yeah. And I think that's, I've only been reading it a couple of days and it's already got the hold on me. So like in, in this moment, there's a sense of acknowledging and welcoming nervousness ability to acknowledge and welcome sadness and overwhelm and all kinds of different things. But also regards to the challenge of the podcast, there could be the acknowledgement and welcoming better communication as an option.

Jack: 32:07

Yeah. Yeah. I love the word acceptance and I think that goes what that's bringing up in me as well is this word reality, it's two people can come in, two people can have exactly the same, can be in the same place and experience the exact same event and come away with completely different realities about what has just transpired. And I think that acceptance really bleeds into that as well. It's can I accept that the person in front of me thought I was shouting at them, even though I am convinced that I didn't raise my voice, that I didn't use an aggressive tone to my measure of what angry is. I was a three, I was nowhere near the top of the scale, but it the impact it's had. That person felt like I was shouting. That person felt like I was furious. Can I sit here and accept that's their reality? And it's true. My reality is also true. No one is right or wrong. It's, you are both right. You've both had your experiences. Can you accept the other person's experience and then work from what, from that point? Because again, that's, I mentioned slightly earlier. I feel like that's that's one of the easiest places to get stuck. And he said, she said, you did raise your voice. No, I didn't raise my voice. No, I did. No you didn't. No, I didn't. Where are we going with this? So yeah. I love that on acceptance. Like you say everything except everything in you as an individual and accepts what's in, in front of you as well. One of the most powerful things Erica ever said to me was basically, and this is gonna sound bad, but it was beautiful. She listed all the ways that she saw. This is a fair bit into our relationship that I wasn't serving myself. And this isn't like her judgments comes externally. This is, she's reflecting back things that I've said. She's reflecting back what she sees in my actions and all of this. And she lists out and then at the end goes, and I still love you and I'm still here for you. Even though you know the, when you do this, it has this impact on me. It has this impact on our lives. It has this impact on you. I still love you for all of that, and I'm here with you. It as and if and when you choose to work through this. And it's like that level of acceptance is, that's like pinnacle, I think. But again, you have to have your boundaries in that. It's not just oh, here are all the things that aren't gonna serve us in the future or serve you. And I'm willing to take all of it. It's just in this moment I see that I love you. I accept you. I if you, and just use my personal experience, it was like the end of that sentence was, and if you are, if you're willing to do the work that you say you're going to do, if you're genuinely motivated to work on yourself in the ways that you say you want to, then I'm here for that. But if you're not, I'll leave. And a lot of people might find that like threatening, but it wasn't a threat. It wasn't like sort yourself out or leave you. It was like, because the things that she would tell about me were big points of shame for me. I was being harder on myself than she was to me. So it's like all of those things that you hate about yourself, all of those patterns that you still do, that you can't figure out why you do them and you know are holding you back. I love even those parts of you, the parts that you hate about yourself. I love you for that. And it's whoa, I personally had to hear someone else say that for me to be able to be like. Okay. I can have all these great attributes and also restrictive patterns, and they're not separate mes, it's all me. It's all the whole, without one, I wouldn't have the other. And and that's just such more of a firm grounding to start from when it comes to making individual change. So acceptance is again, an easy word to say. An easy word to, like talk about, but hard in practice.

James: 36:18

Six couple of years back, I did the Mankind Project. And I did the Warrior training weekend. And after the Warrior Weekend you come back into groups and you do, I think it's eight weeks to step in. So then you can go into the men's groups. Now one thing we did, which are very. Male based thing, because I think for men we're quite blunt and to the point. Quite often, I think sometimes women they do it, they do a same similar version, but I think from what I've gathered, they do it a little bit softer around the edges. And the ex exercise was I see in you and you'll tell the man what in them. So basically you are looking at perhaps to start off with something you don't like about the man. But then that man is your mirror. So you might say something like, I don't like how you treat that person, or I don't like how you shame him. But then. The other person has a kind of a shield. And you allow yourself then to see that shame and then go through a process of owning that yourself. And I've seen this in such and such circumstance. Now the other person has the option then at the end of that exercise to accept that in themselves or not. But the whole process is about the person speaking and about him owning his own shadows. And I think we find it quite hard to own our own shadows because our own shadows show the part of us that we don't like about ourselves. Whether that's shaming people, or it could be you find you might be evil to a certain person and I feel like we're owning our own evil. And there's that level of bravery to actually step into that. And to be able to own them parts takes, takes a lot. But then it is about loving those parts because we have everything with insiders, I believe.

Jack: 38:29

Yeah. Can't agree more. And like the shadow. Oh, shadow, it's like, it's there to teach us, isn't it? And it is in my opinion, it's also leftovers from, I'm gonna talk like, specifically relational shadow.'cause it's, shadow isn't all encompassing words, but I'm a big believer in, in a lot of what I would consider relational shadows actually being the strategies and the patterns that we developed to maintain connection as a child, for instance, I use a really simple one. Let's say you have parents who say, oh, good boys, don't cry. If you want my approval, if you want my connection as your primary caregiver you won't cry. Which by extension is the parent saying, I'm not comfortable with you crying. It is too uncomfortable for me to see you cry. So that's why I don't want you to, it's not because it's not good for you, it's because it's not good for me. Regardless. That's their shadow playing out. And even though that's a super simple example, like we'd latch onto that, onto those patterns that have maintained connection in our early years, whether that be good boys work really hard always, don't answer back. If you, if I'm angry at you, you stay silent and you don't say anything. That's a big part of my people pleasing my dad was incredibly tyrannical. And so it was like really hard for me to find my own voices I grew up. And those shadows are like the remnants of those patterns that we developed to keep connection with our parents and keep our, yeah, our connection with those people who are so important to us, whoever it is who raised you. And and I also believe that it's in relationship that those shadows are healed. We can go and we can do the individual work and you can go to all the retreats and the meditations and treat yourself the best way you possibly can, but you are never gonna know. Until how you've healed or how you can act differently until you are back in a high stakes relationship, whether that be romantic or not. But it, it has to be a relationship that matters, a relationship that you truly value. Because without value, you're not gonna get triggered. You're not gonna care enough for those shadows to get activated. You're not gonna care enough about the connection with that other person to really put that to the test and say, can I show up in this new way? This way? That gives me genuine connection, not someone else telling me, oh, don't answer back. It's someone saying, Hey, I want to hear what you have to say. That's the relationship I'm want right now. So yeah, shadow is. It's there to show us so much. And like you say, there's there's this mirroring thing, like as you were mentioning in that exercise, it's can I hold up that mirror and show myself my own shadow? But yeah, I just truly believe that it's like it's in relationship and with other people that those get healed. And actually going back to your soulmate sort of comment, that one comment, the one comment you made earlier, I suppose I do actually believe that we actually seek the specific people who are gonna help us heal the specific wounds that we have grown up with. For instance, people who maybe have come from a super aggressive relational background are probably going to find themselves with partners who are aggressive. Again, they, and they are being treated the same way. We all know these people are like, oh, I dunno what's wrong with me. Like the last five partners I've had have all been like these psychos and they always just fly off the hand or is everyone out? There're like that. It's no, those are the people that you are attracting. Those are the people you are going to find because those are the situations you are used to. Doesn't mean it's good for you. Doesn't mean you like, it doesn't mean it's serving, it means it's familiar and comfortable. And even, and comfortable is like a bit of a trick word in that I love the word familiar, but it's if we are used to having high levels of stress in all our relationships, then we will be com we will become comfortable and familiar with always having high levels of stress to the point where we're just numb to it. And I think for we carry these things for as long as we don't address them. Yeah. I think that's why I get in, that's why I'm a relationship coach. That's why I love it so much because I, it's my true belief that we all come with that. There's no such, there's no such thing as just having the perfect upbringing. And nor should there be, because we have to be, at some point, we have to learn the resilience to address our shadow and yeah, it's just so important and beautiful. I love that about relationships and that's why I love conflict and repair because it's all part of it. It's all healing. We're teaching our nervous system that it's, it is okay.'cause a child can't do that. A can't, a child can't teach their nervous system that it's okay. And we, that's our responsibility as we get older. Yeah.

James: 44:01

So it's taken us quite a while, but can you tell us your story?

Jack: 44:05

Yeah. Where it's like hard born where to begin. Okay. So yeah, as I mentioned, my dad was, my dad growing up was alcoholic. In fact, I forgot a big history of substance abuse throughout the family. That was completely, I was completely unaware until I like went counseling for the first time, which was just after COVID, which I had like my biggest dip That was on my, one of my lowest points just after COVID and pointed out that, in fact, essentially my entire family deals with their problems through substances, mostly alcohol. Mine was weed, there was alcohol, but my, yeah, I've had multiple family members die from the ramifications of being alcoholics. And so yes, my dad dealing with his own trauma never had the opportunity to, was like super tyrannical and just a bit of a broken man growing up and. That led me into big people plea. I was super sensitive, emotional growing up, as I later realized my father was as he was a child, but his dad fucked it messed him up. And anyway, that's how it bleeds down. And he really did try his best. Anyway. This isn't becoming about my dad's about me. It took me, what I'm trying to say is it took me a long time to reconnect with my sensitivity after having it very much squashed in my formative years. And then it was around, no, it was a maybe a year or two before COVID. I went at my first men's retreat, which blew my mind. I had never experienced anything like that before. Being like 30 guys of all walks of life, everything I could imagine dealing, coming to deal with all walks of obstacle. Whether that be relationships or self-exploration or drugs or what, whatever. I could imagine. And then just this air of doing the work, like we are there to do the work, but zero expectation of how you show up. You could be 100% authentic and you'll be welcomed in. You wanna do the workshop? Do the workshop, don't wanna do the workshop, don't do the workshop. By turning up. We've all made our commitment here to try and do the work, but if it's really too intense for you, that's fine. And everyone did all the workshops and no one ever backed out of anything. And I got to the end of that week and we're in our closing circle and we're all making our commitments to, what's the next step? What's our accountability step? And it was in that moment that I just I. Need to work with people. I have to work with people. This has just blown I've never felt so fulfilled in my entire life and I wasn't even facilitating hosting anything. I was just there as a as a member of the participants. But just having connected with the other brothers and just seeing the power it had on them and feeling the power it had on me, I was like, wow, okay. This is definitely something that I'm gonna pursue. I dunno, didn't know what it looked like then. And this many years later, maybe six years on I'm, I really only feel like now that I'm have started fulfilling that, that promise to myself then, but, these things take time and it's been a wonderful journey. And I would say also, apart from the individual men's work, my partner Erica, has just been pivotal in. In my ability to explore. One thing that has become very apparent to me over the last years, last however many years as I've been training and helping people is I'm only able to help others as much as I'm able to help myself. And it's been such a real motivator, and it's so true. If I'm in denial about X, Y, or Z, how on earth am I gonna go help someone else who's in denial of X, Y, and Z? How on earth am I gonna speak from a place of authenticity to help that person move through this particular obstacle? So yeah. And again, that bleeds back into the relationship part of it. Erica has been just there aren't enough nice, powerful words to describe how lucky I feel in one sense, almost. Now, maybe that's a part of, it's still a part of my worthiness that I need to work on. It's like I almost feel like this is luck, like it's been given to me from the universe or whatever, but I've put in plenty of effort to make this work and to work on myself. So it isn't all given, it's never all given. Nothing is given. But I would say those two things are like the main factors of how I, or three things, my upbringing, finding men's work and finding a relationship that's really motivating me to improve myself yeah. How I found myself

James: 49:08

here

Jack: 49:09

right now. Talking to you. Yeah.

James: 49:13

There we are. So you mentioned a couple of things, and then earlier on you mentioned about commitment. I remember after my first breakup. First major breakup, which led me onto the path I believe the path, the journey, whatever you wanna call it. The fur, the main thing that I did after that was to commit to never being in that same place of my lowest point ever again. And I feel such a commitment is such a strong word.'cause we have this idea of we have to commit to doing some things, though. We have to commit to a job. We have to commit to making, paying off our house to commit to having looking after kids, that kind of stuff. But there's something deeper with the word commitment. And I think with regards to commitment, there's a level of you, you've said a few times ownership, and I think you were mentioning about. You don't, in order to do, in order to progress, you've got to be at a level, a place of taking ownership of yourself, which is such a key thing. And so what is what is your definition? And take ownership.

Jack: 50:29

Okay. I'm actually gonna, I'm gonna steal, I'm gonna steal, have you heard of a guy called Jason Gaddis?

James: 50:36

No.

Jack: 50:37

He's a wonderful relationship coach and psychotherapist, a mentor, and I actually did two years of training under him. And I love, I, I now associate the word ownership with the word authorship. He has, he's talking, reference is, he talks about victimhood and authorship. But it is all, it's all in one. And I feel like we really have to trust. That we are in control. We do have a choice going forward. And there are events which we are victim of. So it's like someone cheats on us, someone hits us, someone, those truly like bad things, which we are victims of. It's hard to take ownership over the those bad events where we are true victims. But the author side of that, the ownership, the authorship of that is, okay, I find myself in this situation. What do I want to do next? And that for me, like that one question is ownership. It is authorship. It's here are all the things that I've experienced. Here are all the impacts I have. Here's what I'm carrying. The good and the bad. Dunno those words, the comfortable and the uncomfortable. What do I wanna do next? And that's as simple as it is for me in ownership as a statement piece. What do I want to do next? Do I need to turn around and make amends for maybe some of the things in the past? Is that holding me back? Do I have these thoughts going, I really wish I hadn't done this, really wish I hadn't done that. Or whatever. If it, if is it something in the future? I never want to experience a relationship like that again. I never want to be abused like this again. I never wanna be used like that again. I want to create this. So it's like this ownership is really realizing that we have the power to build our future. And I always try and wanna, I wanna avoid being super cliche when I say that. It's not oh, anything is possible. Every, the world is yours. But it's like on some level. Yeah, actually anything is possible. You don't want to, you don't wanna have bad relationships anymore. You can make that happen. You want to be more financially comfortable. You can make that happen. You want to live in a different country. You can make that happen. You wanna make amends. You can make that happen to a point. It depends what your idea of making amends is. If your idea of making amends is this person has to forgive me, then you that's something you don't control. You don't control other people. But you can. But you can go and admit to the impact of your actions and then leave it in their hands. And if they wanna forgive you, they can forgive you or so on and so forth. So I think, yeah, as simple as it is, ownership is about choice and reintroducing choice and it's the react re respond thing we were talking about earlier, reaction. There's no ownership in reaction. You can own that. You've had a reaction, but react is like victim, victims react, oh, this thing's happening to me. Bam, I'm gonna react this way. And authors respond. It's oh, this, I'm receiving this thing.

James: 53:56

How do

Jack: 53:56

I want to respond to this? And also, both are, again, I wanna say both are fine. We will all feel victims of things sometimes, even if we're, even if at a later date when we really think about it. It's oh, actually I did have a part to play in that here. This is a ridiculous example, but this is the one that, that Jason used to say, and I always used to love this because it's a completely out there example, but it really illustrates the point. It's let's say one of your car gets stolen. How do you take ownership over your car being stolen? It's not your fault. Someone else has come into your life and done this really horrible thing. And he was just like I could have got a steering lock for the wheel. Actually, I got two cars. Probably didn't actually need a second car. I probably didn't actually have to have it, could I next time buy a car that has a better security system? Could I put a tracker in my next car? So if it did get stolen, I would know where it is. It's instead of just sitting there being like, I'm the victim of a crime, it's been like, okay, retrospectively could have made these decisions. And even if that wouldn't have helped in the future, I can make this dec these decisions to make sure it never happens again. So there's the ownership piece. It's not oh, I hope no one ever steals my car again. Oh, I feel so bad because I didn't deserve this. It's what can I do in the future? And it is like very hyperbole that. Example, but it example, I love it.'cause I do think it illustrates just choice, just reintroducing choice. And I love that. And it's not always fun. Sometimes it really isn't fun, but it's so important.

55:36

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