The Problem Isn’t Suffering, It’s Your Relationship to It w/ Tim Desmond

Being a man today often means shouldering heavy pressure without the words to name it. We're still expected to show strength and provide stability. Yet many of us were never taught to navigate our inner world. We were told to push through it instead. This creates a culture of silent strain, bottled-up emotions, and burnout dressed up as toughness.

In this episode, host Timothy chats with therapist, author, and veteran mindfulness teacher Tim Desmond. They explore how to ease suffering while holding onto real responsibility. Drawing from decades of Buddhist practice, therapy, and leadership coaching, Tim shares a practical take on masculinity. This is built on awareness, compassion, and emotional steadiness, not just grit or performance.

They unpack how men are taught to grit through discomfort and why burying feelings often passes for strength. Furthermore, they talk about how mindfulness builds the capacity to face pressure head-on without shutting down or drifting off. Tim opens up about his own path from political activism to deep meditation retreats. He explains how it reshaped his views on fear, choice, and duty.

This talk isn't about encouraging retreat or weakness. It's about mindfulness as a sharp tool for smarter decisions, stronger leadership, and resilience that lasts. They cover emotional regulation, the body's stress responses, and the key difference between toughing it out and unknowingly making it worse.

You'll hear them break it down:

• Suffering vs. strength: Ignoring pain doesn't build toughness. Awareness does, by boosting true endurance. 
• Mindfulness beyond calm: Real practice keeps you present in the heat of pressure, not escaping it.
• The body as anchor: Emotional control starts with feeling sensations. It's not about thoughts. It's about how bodily awareness stabilizes the nervous system.
• “I’ll be happy when…” mindset: Chasing the future quietly feeds burnout and discontent.
• Compassion as discipline: It's not weakness. It's a skill for staying steady through tough spots.
• Power with ease: Carry responsibility without endless tension, control, or self-denial.
• From reaction to response: Pause and sit with discomfort. Act from your values, not knee-jerk impulses.

Tim stresses that less suffering isn't about dodging hardship. It's about facing it with clarity and kindness. When men meet discomfort this way, they unlock a deeper strength. This fuels better leadership, closer relationships, and lasting purpose.

This conversation bridges discipline and compassion, presence and duty, effort and ease. It's not about getting softer or more "spiritual". It's about showing up more effectively, more grounded, and more fully human.

The American Masculinity Podcast™ is hosted by Timothy Wienecke — licensed psychotherapist, Air Force veteran, and men’s advocate.
Real conversations about masculinity, mental health, growth, and how men can show up better — as partners, leaders, and friends.
We focus on grounded tools, not yelling or clichés. If you have questions or want a tool for something you're wrestling with, leave a comment or send a message — your feedback shapes what we build next.
Note: While this doesn’t replace therapy, it might help you notice something worth exploring. 

Transcript

Tim Desmond: 0:00

If what you're trying to do is create a world with less suffering, one thing that you absolutely need to do is learn how to suffer less.

Tim Wienecke: 0:05

The way that you're framing it. That's not often what I hear when I talk to Buddhist thought philosophies. But tell me more about how you impact the world

AI Voiceover: 0:13

Today. We have Tim Desmond, whose journey runs from political activism to Buddhist retreat centers to the therapy room.

Tim Desmond: 0:21

The very first teaching that Buddhist ever gave. Number one, everybody suffers. Number two, suffering has causes. Number three, liberation is possible.

Tim Wienecke: 0:30

One of the things that always turned me off at Buddhism is the idea of self-acceptance. As this very settling into where you are, version of accepting your situation,

Tim Desmond: 0:41

your mind has evolved to always be like, this isn't what I want. I want that. The idea of self-acceptance ultimately comes down to recognizing your mind's gonna do it, but not letting that convince you that. Happiness and freedom are not available to you in this moment.

Tim Wienecke: 0:58

My understanding is that is not a complete or even beginning to really understand the self-acceptance that Buddhist tend to bring to the table.

Tim Desmond: 1:06

For me, with Buddhism, whatever teaching you're looking at, it's like why? Like why do you care? It's connecting with the need. Just answer yourself. Are you doing it 'cause you have to, or are you a free person making your choice?

Tim Wienecke: 1:19

One tool that you wish more people had, what would that tool be?

Tim Desmond: 1:23

Uh, I mean just,

Tim Wienecke: 1:30

Hey Tim, man, thanks so much for coming on.

Tim Desmond: 1:32

Yeah, no problem. Happy to be here. I.

Tim Wienecke: 1:34

So I was excited by our conversation and the pre-interview and a little bit before this to talk about different ways that mindfulness practice comes in for people. What uniquely qualifies you to have that conversation? For our listeners that don't know you,

Tim Desmond: 1:45

I guess I, I could tell sort of like a bigger story. I, I got introduced to Buddhist practices, um, and undergrad. I was really interested in social change, um, and like kind of trying to understand, um, as much as I could about that. And I was introduced to the teachings of Han the Vietnamese and master. By in a political science class on peace studies,

Tim Wienecke: 2:12

that is a unique way to come to Buddhism.

Tim Desmond: 2:14

Yeah, so when I, when I read, when I read the book, when I read Tek Han's writings, what I found was a perspective that I wasn't getting anywhere else, which was Bo. Most of the people that I knew that were trying to make the world better, were doing it very much from a perspective of sacrifice. That was kind of the idea of like, we're, we're trying to make the world better so we're given, so we're sort of like giving up what's good for ourselves to be of service to the world. And Han was like, if what you're trying to do is create a world with less suffering, one thing that you absolutely need to do is learn how to suffer less. If you want a, a world with more happiness and more freedom, then you need to understand how to be happy and free. And that just clicked for me in a fuck, in a deep, deep way. And I, as 19 year olds do sometimes with that, that get really, um, that, you know, find something that makes sense to them. I just dove in and I spent. Really up until Tek Nhan had his stroke, um, a handful of years ago in, um, I guess like 2015. Um, spent as much time as I could, so on retreat with him or traveling with him going from place to place. I would actually often spend, uh, a couple months on retreat. Han and then from there go to whatever sort of political organizing kind of stuff I was doing. And then when that was over, I would go back

Tim Wienecke: 3:47

and I didn't realize about the, the political connection. So when did you make the jump from doing act, the more activist things to therapist?

Tim Desmond: 3:54

Yeah, so, um, it was actually while I was on retreat with Take Mahan. Um, I was living at Deer Park Monastery, uh, which is a monastery it outside San Diego, California. Um, Han was there giving a three month retreat and basically I decided I didn't want to become a monk, um, that I thought about the rest of my life and that I wanted to have a family. So I'm like, okay, so what am I gonna do if to make money if I'm not gonna become a monk and decided I could get involved in like nonprofit kind of work. I could get involved in political organizing, but that's going to eat my whole life. Um, I could also get involved in mental health, which was like, it felt like an extension of my Buddhist practice, and I could probably have a more balanced life that way and I could stay involved. In political organizing and, and, and sort of social change stuff. Wow. But, but have like a more balanced life. So I, I went to graduate school, got my, uh, degree in clinical psych and kind of took it from there. But definitely I think most people that I know that. Are interested in the sort of mindfulness and psychology realm. They get a degree in psychology and then they get introduced to meditation that way. For me, it was very much the reverse. It was just like living and breathing Buddhist practice. And then I'm like, well, what's the closest thing to a job that, um, that would allow me to mainly just be focused on my practice or sharing my practice?

Tim Wienecke: 5:29

Yeah. I've only got one other colleague that was like a yogi before. Becoming a therapist and it, it was lovely coming up with her because of the perspective pushing on some of the Western therapy ideas. It was nice to have some friction with. Right. Just to learn, you know, if you can't compare, you can't. Consider yourself good at something. And you've now been doing both of these things for a few decades, if I'm remembering right.

Tim Desmond: 5:56

I didn't realize, but I started seeing clients about 20 years ago. Um,

Tim Wienecke: 6:01

so just settling in, you know, getting,

Tim Desmond: 6:03

yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, which, you know, it's funny because the empirical, the data that we have is the therapists. Often their, um, efficacy can go down the longer you're in the field. And so I'm hoping that's not, uh, true for me. But I guess it's the, a lot of people talk about it in terms of enthusiasm that the longer we're in the field, the more we kind of feel like we've seen everything. And, and it's like, like a harder to feel like. Genuinely interested in like this specific person and their specific story. And so I feel like that's, um, yeah, that I, I find that interesting and, and, and definitely like a challenge and definitely sort of like a way of, of, um, it's not true for everybody, but I definitely want to be like, one of the ones that isn't burned out is, continues to be interested in people. Because for me, all the different ways that a human mind can show up, it kind of fascinating.

Tim Wienecke: 6:55

Yeah. The ones that I see. Do well later in their career.'cause I got exposed pretty early Colorado, changed some licensing stuff and all of a sudden these 20 year clinicians had to go back and get credentialed for addictions work. And at the time I was teaching the addictions classes. And so I got to see the length and breadth of like, you know, 20 or 30 different 20 year clinicians and their thoughts and how they showed up. And what I find is those of us who teach tend to hold our edge a little bit better. And there's also just a. You can kind of tell when you're talking to somebody if it's still something they still wanna get better at. I like that you also come from that political activist background. That was mine as well. When I was through college, I thought I was gonna be a senator for some reason, and that was the goal. Until, you know, I realized I didn't have the strength of character to do that and be a good human being.

Tim Desmond: 7:41

Yeah. Well, I mean, I'm, who does?

Tim Wienecke: 7:45

Uh, very rare individuals.

Tim Desmond: 7:46

Yeah. Yeah.

Tim Wienecke: 7:48

And so it's nice to, I, I don't hear that background very often with other clinicians, man. Sure. I didn't know we had some nice pieces in common, man, that's a lot of fun. Sure. Well, so I guess we should jump into things for the listeners as opposed to just my curiosity about your career.

Tim Desmond: 8:00

Sure, sure. Yeah.

Tim Wienecke: 8:02

So, uh, one of the things that always turned me off when I was younger of Buddhism before I met that, that colleague that I got to do training with to like push on this, is the idea of self-acceptance as this very passive. Very kind of like settling into where you are version of accepting your situation. And my understanding is that is not a complete or even beginning to really understand the self-acceptance that Buddhists tend to bring to the table.

Tim Desmond: 8:32

Okay, so here's what it comes down to. So the like, um, any idea in Buddhism comes down to. I think it's helpful to contextualize within the noble truths, within the sort of core, like the, the very first teaching that Buddha ever gave, and by some accounts, the also the last, right before he, he died, were the teachings on the four Noble truths. They're translated in in different ways. My teacher translates 'em as number one, everybody suffers. Number two, suffering has causes. Number three, liberation is possible. Number four, liberation also has causes. So whatever you're doing, like for me with Buddhism, what it comes down to is whatever teaching you're looking at, it's like, why? Like, why do you care? Like why would this help anybody? And if there's no answer that you have or like, how it, how does this pertain to my life? Then forget about it. It's not for you. Um, and ultimately one of the things that the Buddha would often respond when people asked him academic questions is, how does this relate to the problem of your suffering? And so, um, basically, and sometimes he would give these like stories about like, somebody whose house is on fire and they say, well, before I put the, before I put this fire out, I need to know who started it. Who are their ancestors, why they started it, what were they using? Where did they come from? Um, and then by the time they get all of their answers, their house is burned down. And so for me, what Yeah, what it comes down. So the, the idea of self-acceptance comes down to what is your suffering? Like, what is, what is stopping you? From feeling light and free and from loving the people that you want to love in a way that to them, they experience as being loved. And often the ways that we look at our experience and just saying, no. The Buddhist term for this is aversion. When we, when you look at anything and you're just sort of like, I, I, I can't deal with that aversion and, and the other side of aversion of, of craving or clinging, you know, grasping at things. Those are necessary qualities of the mind. Your, your mind has evolved to always be like, this isn't what I want. I want that, that's not what I want. I want this. The, the idea of self-acceptance or the idea of acceptance ultimately comes down to not getting caught by those things. Recognizing your mind's gonna do it, but not letting that convince you that happiness and freedom are not available to you in this moment, because that, that's ultimately when, whenever we're not accepting. Implicit in that can be the idea that I can't feel okay. I can't be okay. I can't be free until something is different.

Tim Wienecke: 11:56

I'll be happy when

Tim Desmond: 11:57

I'll be happy, when I'll be free when, and if you get caught by that idea, then you'll never be free.'cause there'll always be a win that is very different. Then the kind of like looking at something and wanting to make it better. Um, like looking at a situation and wanting to intervene and make it better from a place of freedom. Like I recognize that I'm free now. I recognize this, the, the world is how it is right now. I also recognize that there's something that I can do about it. Like there's something that I can do in the world to make it better, and there's no conflict there.

Tim Wienecke: 12:37

It's interesting the way that you're framing it, because that's not often what I hear when I talk to kind of more Buddhist thought philosophies in that you're connecting it to other people. Most of the time when I talk to Buddhist folks, it's very like internal locus self-acceptance. Kind of deeper and deeper. Deeper into yourself. But tell me more about the, like how you love other people and how you impact the world,

Tim Desmond: 13:02

honestly. So it depends on where your suffering is, right? So for me. Uh, so, uh, I grew up with a single mom. I wanted to be able to, like, one thing that was true for me, so my mom, my, my father left before I was born. And one thing that was true for me is like, I want to be a good father. Like, that was like one thing that's been clear to me since I was young. Um, I also want to be a good partner and in many ways, like that is part of what drive what, especially early on in, in my, um. In my relationship to, to Buddhism. But I would say still, like I have a 12-year-old, a lot of what's driving me is like, I wanna be a good parent. Um, I want to be like a good partner. I wanna feel free in myself, but not only for my own enjoyment, like as a, as an extension, as like a model, as like a way to. Contribute to like freedom in the world. And so Te Han would, one of the things that Te Han would often say is like when we talk about, um, compassion for ourselves or compassion for other people, he would say that's discrimination. Compassion is compassion. Compassion is a way of responding to suffering in a way that relieves suffering.

Tim Wienecke: 14:25

That lines up with a lot of Western thought on empathy too, where if you can't have external empathy, you can't. Have it for yourself.

Tim Desmond: 14:32

Exactly. So the, the idea is like if you, if you respond to suffering, if you know how to respond, he would say the more, more technically, um, compassion is the intention and the capacity to be able to be of benefit to suffering or to be able to transform suffering. And that can be suffering in you and in other people. And if you only care about suffering in yourself. I am not gonna put anybody down for this. It likely what it is, is that you're in that moment. You are so overwhelmed with your own suffering that the idea of being helpful to somebody else is just not on the table. But as soon as you are. Stable enough that there are other people that you could benefit, then that starts to become obvious that like you're practicing for yourself and for others.

Tim Wienecke: 15:23

I really, I really appreciate the, the, and that you're bringing into that. Like, one of the things that tends to annoy me pretty heavily, and I, I tend to call it hippie shit, is the folks that are so lackadaisical in the world to like ease their suffering. Right. The folks that are like, oh, well this came up for me and I'm just gonna cancel on you. Oh, you know, like that nine to five is just, oh, that's just too, that's too much. And what I'm hearing from you is there will always be some suffering. So which suffering are you picking? How are you resolving it?

Tim Desmond: 15:59

Yeah. In Buddhist philosophy, there's a term called the Near enemy. And so what we do, uh, anytime we define a thing. We define it often by its far enemies and its near enemies. So, uh, compassion, the far enemy of compassion is cruelty, right? So it is just the opposite, you know, like the, the, the, the far enemy is just the opposite. The near enemy is something that can be mistaken for the quality, but is actually very different. So one near enemy of compassion is pity. So pity is an example of like, I, I see that you're suffering and I care, but in a way that very put, very much, puts myself above you. It's sort of like a condescending compassion where I'm just sort of like, well, glad I'm not you. Um, I have pity on you. Well, and I

Tim Wienecke: 16:54

couldn't be you, you know, which

Tim Desmond: 16:55

is, yeah. And I couldn't be you. And so like, compassion is like, I can see myself in you and I can see like, your suffering is not different than my suffering. Like, we both suffer and we suffer in different ways. But, uh, one of the things that you're talking about there is sort of like a, it's like a, a narcissistic. Near enemy of self-compassion, like, which, which is basically sort of like, um, the, the type of, the type of self-compassion that is, is maybe like self-centeredness, more than self-compassion. It's this idea of my suffering matters and only mine, and that is missing the point. In terms of what's actually going to liberate you, like what's actually gonna create the experience of being genuinely free and alive

Tim Wienecke: 17:39

and, and I think that's a big critique I have on our field as clinicians is too many of our colleagues don't encourage that outward connection and mirror to make the work stick and be worthwhile. And it makes some sense from. From a clinical standpoint, right? We're, we're infinitely curious about the person's thought and experience. That's what we do for the job and it's fantastic. And so I think it makes sense that we get lost there, but I think the kind of TikTok version of therapy has led people down this really destructive, isolated, selfish path.

Tim Desmond: 18:12

Yeah, I think that, um, I mean the other thing is. Um, a, a lot of people in the psychology field are not very empirically driven, and we know that like the quality of our relationships is one of the biggest predictors of the quality of our wellbeing. There's like that, you know, 70 year Harvard study, which is just like, you know, positive affect, you know, happiness. Happiness is largely driven by the depth and breadth of our relationships, um, at more than, pretty much anything else you can find. Uh, so yeah, it's, it's, um. Because of how we're set up with the doors closed. It's easy to get, you know, kind of myopic and, you know, naval gazing, but it's, uh, I ideally we can remember what actually matters.

Tim Wienecke: 18:57

The way I like to frame it is like going into the naval gazing to come back out better for your folks is, is kind of the goal, right? That in

Tim Desmond: 19:03

total. Totally, yeah. Good, good exploration. What I would say is the, the way that I like to think about it is like you bring your, it it like, so sometimes you'll have a client who's like, well, why do I need to do all this introspection? Um, why do we need to go through all this stuff? And I'm like, okay, so imagine you brought your car into a mechanic and he is like, okay, I'm gonna need to go through and kind of like open it up and look at it and see what's actually not working. And you're like, that's a waste of my time. Just fix it. It's like, well, I, I don't know how to fix it until I look at it and see what isn't working.

Tim Wienecke: 19:34

So when I got turned onto mindfulness, it was through like dialectic behavior therapy and that's. The whole lever of it is just know where you're at, know what's happening, and then, right. And that we tend to skip that first part for the folks listening that are, you know, maybe more performance driven, you know, they've, they've got their goals, they wanna keep their edge. What would you say to them around. That kind of in and out of that suffering and acceptance and impact,

Tim Desmond: 20:05

be very clear about why you care about your performance, and I would assume that if you are honest with yourself, you wanna perform optimally because you believe that that will create more happiness, more freedom, less suffering in you and the people that you love. And I want to say that probably optimum performance is part of. What can create a better life for you and the people you love, but it will not be the entirety of your path. Being entirely focused on optimizing yourself, being entirely focused on, you know, maximizing your performance will still leave a big hole, will still leave like a, a sense of unease in your life, and it is possible. To perform at a high level, um, with a high level of ease. And one of the things that I often, I, I often look at, um, in the, in, in Daoism, in traditional Chinese, uh, philosophy that we look, we talk about understanding water as a metaphor for power without effort. When you watch a wave crash. Shore, I mean, depending on where you live, or you can watch a river carve through a mountain, every drop of water is exerting no effort, and yet it's incredibly powerful. And so you can allow yourself, you can find ways to be powerful without striving, without the, the sort of like gritting your teeth. And you can often find a greater degree of power that comes. So Teon actually wrote a book called Power. Um, that's, you know, that, that's about these teachings, but it's like this idea of being able to have power with ease, which can be a, um, another way of deepening.

Tim Wienecke: 22:07

The thing that comes to my mind fairly immediately when you talk about that power with ease is the distinction of mastery at a thing. And where I think a lot of people get it messed up is it's not that you're just so good that you're not trying, it's that you're so good, you learning. Isn't difficult anymore, like you're still engaged and you're kind of at that, that edge where you're cruising through things really well. For me anyway, I always feel like I visit that it's not anywhere I get to live.

Tim Desmond: 22:37

I think like on top of the other thing that I would say is as you spend more time understanding yourself, as you kind of understand the nature of your mind and understand like, okay, so why do you care? Why do you want mastery? Why? Like why? Why do you want efficiency? Why? Why are you looking for power? The more that you can see the drive as sort of like the conditioning of your mind, and the more you can from a place of freedom, go with it or not based in an understanding of like what actually, what's what serves me in the people that I love. You can step out of habit. You can create a freer place of engagement, and when you're engaging from a place of freedom, then. There's like, there's just more energy. To engage.

Tim Wienecke: 23:29

Can't remember which instructor talked about it first, but it was why I like motivational interviewing so much is that the minute that you are targeted at your efficacy and your choices, that freedom of choice, no matter how crappy the choices you have in front of you are immediately provides healing.

Tim Desmond: 23:47

Yeah. And I think, yeah, in terms of motivational interviewing, the, the way that we. Talk about it in Buddhism is, um, for example, it's like when in the, um, discourse on, um, uh, dwelling happily in the present moment. We talk about when thinking about the past, you are not caught in thoughts about the past. When thinking about the future, you are not caught by thoughts about the future when thinking about the present. You are not caught by your thoughts about the present and that there's like a sense of freedom. And what I mean by not caught is like this idea of like, I recognize when I'm thinking about the future, it's just like realizing I'm not in it, like feeling kind of overwhelmed by like, what am I gonna do? It's like I'm here thinking about a thing that may or may not happen and I can engage with the same kind of planning, I can engage with the same kind of strategizing without. Like feeling stressed about it.'cause I recognize that it's just like a, a thing that may or may not ever happen.

Tim Wienecke: 24:49

I, I think that transitions pretty well into the, the other aspect of mindfulness that I'm really excited to talk to you, but I feel like I could go into catching Western thought comparisons with Buddhism to get, get the understanding out there. But I wanna make sure that we leave people with some broader practice on how to get to that kind of acceptance place. And like we were talking about before, with. Within like clinical mental health, right? And DBT mindfulness. What I hear from most guys is they try it the way that like my DBT manual teaches it, right? Like do some square breathing, kinda count your thoughts, do chain analysis, et cetera. And what I find is, and it's certainly true for me a lot of the time where it just doesn't work. I get stuck in the future thinking, I get stuck in the past thinking, I get stuck thinking about thinking and. That's even more true for my patients that are a DD where they just don't, they, they don't have that, that mind. What ways do you give those folks to, to do that mindfulness practice

Tim Desmond: 25:53

in the discourse on, on, um, the foundations of mindfulness, the sort of like the core discourse. When the Buddha sort of taught the practice of mindfulness, there were like the four foundations of mindfulness. Uh, mindfulness of the body, of the feelings of thoughts and of sort of like dharmas or, or, um, uh, sort of objects of mind. The, we start with the body and one thing that is important to recognize is that when somebody is in distress, we always start with whatever is the easiest object of mindfulness. When you're feeling relatively peaceful, the breath can be a helpful object to be paying attention to. When you're in distress, it's the wrong choice. When someone is anxious, stressed, angry, sad, we focus on the sensations in the body and the sensations in like the physical sensations in the body that, um, so, so, uh. One thing that, that is like a, one of those common overlaps between Buddhism and neuroscience is in Buddhism, uh, a feeling sadika is made up of a bodily state and a tendency to think certain types of thoughts. So all when, when you say you're fearful. When you say, when we talk about, you know, uh, I, I'm experiencing fear, what fear is is a physiological response in your body combined with a tendency to think fearful thoughts. If you take away those two things, there's nothing there. There are no other parts of fear. So what we do is we distinguish between the physiological process. Increased heart rate, blood pressure, you know, like sensations in my chest and in my stomach, um, from the fearful thoughts. And what I say is, keep your attention as much as you can on the sensations in your body. So when you're feeling stressed out, when you're feeling anxious, um, even with like a DHD kinds of things, A DHD is like a, it's, it's a. The fidgetiness, the sort of like agitation that's there, come back to the body and when you come back and you just pay attention as much as you can to the sensations in your body, it's fine If thoughts come and go, um, just don't lose track of your body. Try to keep at least half of your attention on the sensations in your bo as much as you can, at least half. So right now I'm paying attention to like tightness in my chest and in my throat. Right now I'm paying attention to sort of like tension in my face. And I just wanna, and the, the acceptance part here is we start with, the way that I like to teach mindfulness is we, um, especially when, when we're doing mindfulness of distress, it goes from tolerance. Mere tolerance. Can you tolerate that uncomfortable feeling in your body? Can you just be like, ah, this sucks, but I'm going to feel it anyway. And then from tolerance into acceptance, which is like, this is an unpleasant feeling. But I am, it's, but it's okay to have unpleasant feelings sometimes. Like life will have continue to have unpleasant feelings from now until you die. Like you'll have pleasant, unpleasant, and neutral feelings every single day for the rest of your life. If you go into a panic when an unpleasant feeling comes, or you feel like you need to distract yourself or you feel like you can't tolerate it, then you're gonna spend a lot of your life running. So we learn how to tolerate an unpleasant feeling. We learn how to accept an unpleasant feeling, and then we move into compassion. And so what I mean by compassion in this sense is you are a mammal, and mammals are set up physiologically to respond to certain kinds of attention. In a way that feels like it soothes distress, right? So every single mammal has, so, uh, the neuroscientist yak Ponzi, he's, uh, one of my favorite, uh, neuroscientists. He studied emotion. He talks about the sort of core affective, like emotional circuits that every mammal shares. And one of them is that he calls the care circuit. And it lights up. It's something that's not a particular region of the brain. It comes through, uh, various regions of the brain. But every time a mammal from a mouse monkey person is either giving or receiving care, that part of your brain lights up. It releases oxytocin, it releases natural opiates to kind of give you that warm, fuzzy feeling. And according to concept, and this makes a lot of sense from the perspective of Buddhist psychology, it is one of the our most basic tools for regulating distress, for relieving distress when a baby is in distress, being held with compassion. Just that that sort of caring affect is soothing and it's soothing for us too. And what it feels like is this idea of like, it's okay that I'm suffering in this moment. And there's like a sense of care of like, hey, of feeling cared for or feeling care. And I think that the, that for me, um, just recognizing that what you're doing is you're activating a part of your brain that's going to relieve your distress. You know, you're just getting in touch in, in Buddhist psychology, we say the energy of compassion. Is what relieves suffering in a neuroscience, we say activating the care circuit. You know, relieves distress and the sort of the markers of distress. It's the same thing.

Tim Wienecke: 32:27

It's really interesting. My mind is immediately going to, um, internal family systems work, which has been, uh, a big part of my own personal work for the last year or so, and. A big part of that was my grandmother was the, the kind of nurturer in my life early and my kind of pre memories of being cared for by her. I got to witness happen to my baby brother, and so a lot of that distress and sitting with it and being able to go through the various things that I needed to involved. A lot of this is happening. I, I see this hurting. I see why it's hurting, and either this is how we're gonna take care of ourselves now and tend to it, or, Hey, now isn't the time for that tending, but you, it will be tended. This will come, this compassion will come.

Tim Desmond: 33:12

Yeah. I, I think that's the missing part one, one thing that I think is really unfortunate, and I think this actually there's like a, an interesting history here where, uh, John Katzen, um, basically took some teachings about Buddhism and wanted to make them, like in, in the seventies and early eighties, he wanted to make them more palatable. For conservatively trained doctors, so he got rid of a lot of important aspects of how these things are taught traditionally so that conservatively trained doctors would be able to relate to it as more of a clinical intervention and not something that made them feel uncomfortable. Mindfulness. As it's defined in Buddhist philosophy and, and the abi Dharma is like one of the sort of core, uh, collections of Buddhist philosophy in terms are defined. Uh, uh, I think mindfulness has 18 necessary and sufficient conditions, um, in order to be mindfulness. And one of them is compassion. And so if there is no care, if there is no love. Then it's not mindfulness. It might be a a, a precursor. You might be try, you might be like in the, you know, I'm trying to orient toward mindfulness, but you're not successfully practicing it if there's no love.

Tim Wienecke: 34:33

Just thinking about, uh, I had to go get a trainer because I'm not, uh, as self-motivated in the gym as I would like. And of course, the guy's a maniac, right? Like he's the guy running like the 50 mile Ironmans and everything. And one of the things that really drew me to him is. Will be going through whatever, and he's demoing something and he's like, oh, I can't do that very hard. It'll gimme a big smile. It's my rest day. And there's this, I wouldn't think he would frame it this way, but it's that like self-compassion that has to happen that he's enjoying so he can go do the next type two fun thing tomorrow.

Tim Desmond: 35:06

Yeah, I mean, the thing is like whatever you're motivated by, right? I mean, okay, so ultimately all biological things. Are motivated to suffer less and to thrive in whatever way they frame thriving. Right. Is it to rep, is it to replicate? Is it to have wellbeing? Is it to, um, you know what? Whatever your understanding of thriving is, every amoeba tries to move away from dangers and move toward. Um, you know, these drives that we have, so understanding what's driving me this, this idea of like, of freedom, of happiness, of joy, of ease. Like what are the, what are the, the of fulfillment, of self-realization, like whatever these drivers are, and looking for people that we, that can mentor us. In to that, to, to learn these different kinds of qualities and kind of recognize like, just in the same way that I can work on myself in the gym, I can work on that. Um, when someone, you know, like when, when someone asks me about, uh, doing like that, that smile of like, it's my recipe. Okay. Like that. Having that kind of natural and easeful smile is a quality we can, we can train in as well for more like specifics of what we were asking for. Somebody dealing with a DHD for someone who's whose stress agitation, what we wanna do is come back to the body. We wanna tolerate an unpleasant sensation, we wanna move into acceptance, and we wanna move into compassion. And then what that allows us to do. Is to be able to be more easeful as pleasant, unpleasant, you know, sensations move through us, it's not a problem. Right? And then we don't get stuck. We don't get caught in any of it,

Tim Wienecke: 37:04

and we're not gonna add to the suffering by giving it a spin in our mind. So if there was a like one tool that you wish more people had. That like DBT and the kind of western pilfering of these things, uh, doesn't cover, but that would really help most guys. What would that tool be?

Tim Desmond: 37:25

I would say ultimately like, recognize when you're suffering, like recognize when suffering is present and really, like a lot of men don't pay close enough attention to themselves to realize when they're suffering. If you are not feeling free, if you're not feeling joyful. If you're not feeling like light and loving, then there's suffering in you. Like it's suffering that is getting in the way of you feeling joyful, of you feeling loving. Pay attention to that suffering and then recognize that that suffering that is in you is in need of compassion. And I, I feel like that that orientation is like kind of the core of what I got from gna.

Tim Wienecke: 38:06

That's really interesting. The. The kind of way that we learned that as men. I, I tend to go back to, uh, the boy crisis and some stories that he told when he looked at how men modeled for us. And the thing that boomer men tended to do well was suffer without bothering anybody. Boomers and Xers were like, that's, that's their jam. Like a man gets it done, he shows up and that's fine. And what. I found really moving is when I started to look into these stories and, and was inspired by that book was when children ask their fathers and grandfathers what their dreams were and it's almost never their work. It's almost never the thing that they gave their entire life to for them. And I think there's something, there's definitely something admirable, right, about going through hard things to improve the world, improve things for your family. But I think by doing it in silence, it robbed the gift of it in a lot of ways.

Tim Desmond: 39:07

Well, and I think that's the thing. It's like if, from a place of freedom, so I don't like flicking out on plans, like just, you know, you brought up, you brought that up earlier. I certainly don't like flicking out on my loved ones. Like I, I'm someone who takes my responsibilities very seriously, but from a place of freedom. And the recognition is that you can show up. With that kind of solidity and consistency without having to ignore your suffering. And honestly, you can show up a lot better because when you do show up, you're not a fucking buzzkill. Like, I probably, I dunno if I can swear here, but like, but, but like, basically it's like a lot, the thing that a lot of boomer men, uh, we're good at is showing up and making everybody else feel uncomfortable. Um, and, and, and, you know, kind of like. Like they had to walk on eggshells. And so what I wanna say is like, you can show up with that kind of consistency, but with an open heart. But like, being the kind of person that people wanna connect with, who like wanna listen to, like, wanna um, wanna be like, and you do that by recognizing the suffering that you're carrying around. And you don't need to let. The transformation of your own suffering dominate you and, and sort of be like, it, it precludes me from being productive. Like, no, that's, that's again, missing the point. Like, we're transforming our suffering to show up. And so the, the idea is like, these are not, these are not ideas that, that need to be in conflict. You know, like my wellbeing and other people's wellbeing, they're the same thing.

Tim Wienecke: 40:52

Yeah. I, I immediately kind of go to. I, I wish I could figure out where I quoted this from because I, I know it's not mine, but pain without Purpose is suffering. And there's this exce when you have some pain that you're choosing, like, I'm gonna be uncomfortable here. I'm gonna go do this thing. I'm going to, I'm gonna go make my buddy's thing, even though I'm, I'm really tired and don't wanna go, and I'm gonna go and I'm gonna have a good time. It's the. By picking the why.

Tim Desmond: 41:19

Yeah, it's connecting with the need. Like what's drive like, like before you go, just answer yourself. Like, are you doing it 'cause you have to, or are you a fucking, are you a free person making a choice And so long it's like, be a free person and, and then show up for your buddy.

Tim Wienecke: 41:36

Yeah. I think the. The frame that I often use for it that lines up pretty well is make the choice that moves you closer to who you wanna be, and if you're moving closer to who you wanna be, whatever it costs you, it's mitigated. Like the cost is mitigated by the acceptance of it.

Tim Desmond: 41:51

There's a lot in Buddhism that's, that's really about it, kind of existential freedom.

Tim Wienecke: 41:55

Well, and you covered a lot of kind of high-end language and uh, like Buddhist concepts that we had to kind of let go by. Right? We've only got the 45 minutes if. Someone was gonna read a primer. That was a really wonderful introduction to a Western thinker, to Buddhist ideas and philosophies. What's a book or two that you would throw at them?

Tim Desmond: 42:19

Well, the first thing that I would do is I would say, why do you care? Because if you don't know why you care and you're just wanna learn some terms. Then why you care is that you wanna impress people and maybe like, sit with that a little bit and just kind of like, why do I care about impressing people with my terms? So just like, just, I wanna say again, like, so

Tim Wienecke: 42:38

before you look at any of this show up Humble,

Tim Desmond: 42:40

but Yeah. Sh yeah. Before you look at any of this, like do it, like, the first thing is, what does this have to do with the problem of your suffering? And so be clear about that. The, the reason that I, that I say that is. Um, the, you know, the top line book that I would say is the Heart of the Buddhist Teaching by Tek Mahan. It's a, a great overview of, of, um, sort of Buddhist philosophy and psychology. I have actually three books coming out over the next year. Um, Buddhist practices for. Overcoming depression, Buddhist practices for healing, uh, trauma, um, Buddhist practice for, for calming anxiety. Um, that kind of go into a little bit more technical sort of Buddhist philosophy specifically around. Something that you might be trying to deal with in general, just like showing up and being curious if, if you want to go, go deeper, the, um, insight Meditation Society and the Barry Center for Buddhist Studies. Barry is B-A-R-R-E, are, are also great places to kind of, to learn more.

Tim Wienecke: 43:40

For me, I do wanna impress people. I'm status motivated enough, that's a thing why I look into this stuff. But the frame that always goes best for me is just trying to be a good neighbor. I'm 30 minutes from Boulder, Colorado and I got a lot of neighbors up there that I'd like to be nice to and be able to like communicate with. Well,

Tim Desmond: 43:56

that makes sense. Again, it's just sort of like, yeah, I want to be a good neighbor. I wanna have something to give. And the service motivat motivation, that'll get you far. I wanna be of service. I wanna have something to give. And then that, yeah, that's a, that's a great place to be coming from.

Tim Wienecke: 44:10

Well, kinda strangely, the place I picked up the idea of being a good neighbor was I moved down to Utah for college and I'm not Mormon. And back then I very much didn't look Mormon. I had like hair down to the middle of my back. I wore combat boots, had a poor kid uniform. I stood out walking around campus. And the conversations that were the most meaningful to me from those two years were with Mormon guys and student government, where I just got to be curious about what I was seeing with some kindness, right? Like, Hey man, what's the deal with the underwear? Like, help me understand this, right? And man, the laughter and the joy of just how weird some beliefs are and how they impact people, made it wonderful. All of a sudden I wasn't resenting it.

Tim Desmond: 44:57

And the more we dig into our suffering, the more we realize we all have weird beliefs.

Tim Wienecke: 45:01

Yeah. A hundred percent

Tim Desmond: 45:01

What, so much of what paralyzes us in relationships and, and family and whatever our, our own version of Mormon underwear.

Tim Wienecke: 45:08

One of the first things I built when I started making this kinda content for folks was the idea of not like accepting that they're normal is not your normal. And if you start there, it's gonna go a lot better. Yeah. Everybody's got something weird that. Where depending on where you go, you're very strange. Yeah, man, I'm really impressed by the three books in one year. How did you manage to do three books in one year?

Tim Desmond: 45:37

It's something that I, and there ideas that I think a lot about. And so, you know, they're, they're smaller books. They're only about, you know, 80, a hundred pages each.

Tim Wienecke: 45:46

It seems to be about the right length anymore.

Tim Desmond: 45:48

What it came down to is like the first few books that I wrote, so I wrote, um, uh, Self-Compassion in Psychotherapy. It's more of like a psychotherapy textbook. It's my favorite book that I've written. But you have to sit there like you want to. Sit down and read a 300 page, uh, text, you know, psychology textbook, like, then I have a, then you've impressed me. Uh, there's a self-compassion workbook and then sort of a general book called How to Stay Human in a Fucked Up World. But I think at that point I was starting to look at how the people around me like to read books is just have them around and pick up and like, you know, just like two pages here or three pages there. And I'm like, okay, well what if I, I wanna give. I wanna make something available for people that's meant to be consumed in that way. And so that's kind of where I came from.

Tim Wienecke: 46:37

One of the things I just heard that's giving me a little bit more self-compassion about my lack of ability to write that well, and that often is that you've been doing it a while and have published some other things, so maybe there's some mastery on there. Right.

Tim Desmond: 46:49

My first book took a, took a, it was like. Probably a year and a half of giving the same presentation.

Tim Wienecke: 46:56

That's exactly where I'm starting that. That's so hopeful for me. Thank you. Thank you so much. For the listeners, we've got an affiliate link for bookstore.org. I just wanna remind everybody about that, and since we're talking about these books, we'll certainly have in the show notes, links to your website, where to get them. But bookstore.org guys is a great nonprofit site to connect you with your local bookstore. And if you're ordering books online, it's like a buck or two more than you'd probably pay on Amazon, but you're keeping a local bookstore open. And if you go to our link, you're helping me keep the bills. So thanks for that. Sorry, I just, I got a lot of hard time for my producer for not plugging more about where we're doing things. Right.

Tim Desmond: 47:36

Gotta do it.

Tim Wienecke: 47:37

So I think, uh, it's time to kind of get in and spin down into you a little bit. And these questions, the reason we're asking them of everybody is we wanna normalize just the humanity of masculinity for guys and the different ways that's shown up in people's lives. For you, what's a truth about masculinity? You learned before you were 12, that's remained true through your life.

Tim Desmond: 47:59

I mentioned, uh, earlier, I grew up without a dad. So when I think about before I was 12. I don't think that there was a, like my role models were like all people on tv and I think that pretty much everything I learned about masculinity at that point, um, hasn't stuck. And I think that that maybe that, what I wanna say there is like, um, radical change is possible and whatever we learn early on. Um, if, if you're lucky enough to have good men in your life when you're young, then that's great. And if you're not, then I would say that, uh, in high school I just basically was just like, masculinity is misogyny and that's, so therefore that's what I need to explore. And I went, you know, tried it out, tried it on for size. Did ultimately not a fan,

Tim Wienecke: 48:57

no

Tim Desmond: 48:57

shocking. Yeah. And so, uh, and then learned, uh, and, and then I would say like in college, it was really when I started to spend time wanting to learn about Gary Snyder, the beat poet, wanting to learn about Woody Guthrie, the folk singer, and kind of looking at, you know, uh, clearly masculine figures that I felt like I could kind of get behind their values and, and lived well

Tim Wienecke: 49:23

to me, maybe to get there. A little bit is if you look at the general ways that masculinity is presented, it's so thin it's not gonna serve yours. That you need to find good examples. You need to find some depth and some good men to be around.

Tim Desmond: 49:40

I hadn't found that by the time I was 12. I'm grateful that I did later.

Tim Wienecke: 49:44

No, I mean, I think it was hard for guys our age that were raised without followers 'cause we're also the latchkey generation. Like we weren't. Out in the community to go see anything. So it was, you know, He-Man, at least for me, He-Man was awesome. So the, the next one I, I think it sounds like high school's got some good opportunities for this one. Tell us about a time where pursuit of masculinity hurt you.

Tim Desmond: 50:05

Probably like. Eighth, ninth grade. So my, my, I grew, I was raised by a mother who was like a, like a, um, radical feminist, like some, she was like the state secretary of now, like the National Organization for Women in Massachusetts in the seventies. Um, she's like, like very strong feminist, you know, raised me as a single mom, raised me and my sister, and so then as I was trying to figure out like, what did it mean to be a man? It was like, okay, so I'm just, how about, how about I just be the opposite of her in every way? Then I see men doing that, like young men doing that right now with the idea of like, so what, what if you're trying to figure out what it is to be masculine, look at what women call femininity and just try to be the opposite of it. Which, and the, the, the fucked up thing there is like, they're claiming a lot of good values, like kindness, like caring, like, you know, being, being loving. Like if, uh, like do not allow that to be something that is like polarized and only available to some of us. Like, that is not the world we wanna live in and it's not necessary. So I think the idea of just like seeing, um, women who are like. Excited about their own gender and being like, okay, I'm just gonna be the opposite of them.

Tim Wienecke: 51:24

It doesn't go well. I I love that you're speaking to that'cause it's one that hasn't come up in this discussion and it's so pivotal in so many of the guys I work with, where as they're trying to identify masculinity and they don't, we didn't have good frames. We just didn't, that the only thing available to them was that opposite. As though the shadow of femininity is masculinity as opposed to the light of masculinity being its own thing.

Tim Desmond: 51:48

Totally. Yeah. Yeah, and I think that's the thing. Uh, yeah, there's a, there's a term for it in anthropology. It's called schizo agenesis, where it's basically, I, I, my identity is formed out of just. Um, I'm the opposite of you and it's Yeah, it's very codependent.

Tim Wienecke: 52:04

Yeah. The, the fuck you dad identity. Yeah,

Tim Desmond: 52:07

exactly. Yeah. Totally.

Tim Wienecke: 52:09

Alright man, well, we like to take folks out on a high note. What's a time where pursuit of your masculinity empowered you?

Tim Desmond: 52:15

I think really with my son, I, I think it's, it's just kind of like, um, he is like a very masculine boy. He's very like, uh. Has an easy time identifying with his gender, uh, as a boy. And so for me it's like finding ways in myself to show up in ways that are like strong and self-confident and like comfortable in being a man. And at the same time are like things that I'm like that, that I want him to take after, that I feel like are of service to the world and of benefit to the people that will be in his life. And so I feel like that's like just the, the, the experience of raising a boy. And I think that the thing that I wanna say there is like, when we look at like what it is, what does it mean to be masculine? It's like we can't claim sole ownership. Sole ownership of any virtue. I, I, I think the, I think the, the terrible thing is, and when we start talk about what's masculine and what's feminine, if you try to say that these are masculine virtues and those are feminine virtues, you're, you're gonna end up with a messed up, um, conversation because everybody can develop every virtue. And so the idea is. Masculinity is like this, this ability to like, um, to frame myself as a man and my culture, um, and to sort of like have these identifiers that like my, my culture associates with, with manliness and with masculinity. But it doesn't mean to have virtues that women aren't allowed to have or to avoid virtues that women are supposed to exhibit.

Tim Wienecke: 53:57

Yeah. That's one of the, the kind of key concepts. So Richard Reeve's work is what inspired. Me to finally have something to say on these things in a way that was cogent and masculine. The, the best way I've heard it framed is it's descriptive, not prescriptive. Meaning that we can name something that many men have and acknowledge that that's masculine and figure out what to do with our culture with that, without saying that women can't have it or men must have it. I'm really glad you're in the world doing the work you're doing, men. Yeah. Thanks. I, I really love. Talking to competent people from the perspective that makes me uncomfortable.

Tim Desmond: 54:34

Oh, cool.

Tim Wienecke: 54:35

And you've done a fantastic job of that today, so I really appreciate you.

Tim Desmond: 54:40

Thanks, man. It's, and great, great to talk to you. Great to meet you. Um, thanks so much for the work that you're doing and for this podcast. Yeah, I look forward to staying connected.

Tim Wienecke: 54:48

Awesome, man. If people were looking for you, where should they find you?

Tim Desmond: 54:52

So, I hide, I, I, I'm, I'm boycotting social media, but I have a website. You can read my writings of, you know, finding me on, on your bookshop. You can, um, find like, you know, interviews and videos that I've done and podcasts that I've done. Um, you know, and then Tim desmond.net is like a place that, you know, puts a, that I have a handful of interviews and things like that.

Tim Wienecke: 55:16

And that's where they'd find you to connect for coaching as well?

Tim Desmond: 55:18

Yeah. Yeah. If they wanted to find me, uh, in private practice. Yeah.

Tim Wienecke: 55:21

Great. All right, man. Thanks for coming on.

Tim Desmond: 55:23

Yeah, thanks. Bye.

Tim Wienecke: 55:25

And that's our conversation with Tim Desmond, I hope you got as much out of it as I did. If you did, do me a favor and subscribe. We're really close to getting some numbers that are really gonna start helping guys find us. So please take a moment and do that. As always, we like to fact check around here and in this episode, there were only a few things that need clarification. The first one is suffering less. We didn't mean it like pretending there wasn't any suffering going on or eliminating all suffering. It's about reducing how much unprocessed suffering drives your behavior. The mechanism is an avoidance. It's understanding and integration. The second one is discussions around fear. It was broadly accurate, but there's some nuance here. Fear isn't only body sensation and fearful thoughts. Those two systems are central, but they produce downstream behaviors like freezing avoidance or flight, and levels of conscious awareness. Those behaviors don't exist separately from the physiological and cognition, but they're part of fear and how it shows up in your life. The third one is when we were talking about compassion. It's worth clarifying that compassion isn't sympathy both psychology and ethics. Compassion implies a motivation to act or relieve suffering. It's not just noticing pain, it's responding skillfully to it. And the last one is, when we refer to the four foundations of mindfulness, language is informal. Apparently the accurate framework is. Mindfulness of body, feelings, mind, and mental phenomena. Those are sometimes called dharmas or objects of mind. The conversation was correct and the structure was correct, but the wording was a little bit more casual than maybe some people would be comfortable with. So all in, Tim's been doing this a long time, and so there wasn't anything terribly, terribly wrong. I just wanted to make sure that we got you the clarifications so that way in case there was any chance of misunderstanding that we had it for you. As always, this is Tim Winkie with American Masculinity, thanking you for being the guy that's trying to be better, and we'll see you next time.