FWTW S3E05 | Why Most Men Are Emotionally Stuck—and What It Really Takes to Heal: Mighty Brad - From Wounds to Wisdom (Previously the Mental-Hell Podcast)

Episode Transcript
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SPEAKER_01 (00:02):
At 13, he was diagnosed with depression.
At 16, he was dismissed bytherapist.
And by 18, he was coaching menin their 40s through their
darkest chapters.
Today on From Wounds to Wisdom,meet the young man who's
redefining masculinity one soulat a time.
Let's dive in.

SPEAKER_00 (00:20):
And that started my coaching practice about a year
and a half ago, and it's been ablessing so far.
I've worked with over 80 guys tohelp them transform their lives.
But those small wins andactually showing yourself that
you're making progress andfeeling like you're doing it as
well is one of the mostimportant pieces to creating the
life for yourself that youdesire.

(01:08):
Thank you so much for hostingme.
I'm super excited to have thisconversation.

SPEAKER_01 (01:11):
Likewise, likewise.
Thank you for coming on.
So, Mighty, tell me about that.

SPEAKER_00 (01:17):
Oh, that was uh just the I actually came up with that
when I first started my YouTubechannel when I was 18.
Um, and that was actually thefirst name that came to mind.
And I thought to myself, maybeit sounds a little bit cringy,
maybe it's weird.
Yeah, it's really the brand namemost people call me, Brad.

SPEAKER_01 (01:32):
Very nice.
Well, I know that um through ourprevious conversations that you
generally target a maleaudience.
Is that accurate?

SPEAKER_00 (01:38):
Yes.

SPEAKER_01 (01:39):
Okay.
Tell me, I know that we talkedabout you had insecurities, but
kind of give us a summary oflike your story and what made
you start doing the work thatyou're doing today.

SPEAKER_00 (01:47):
When I was 13, I was diagnosed with depression
clinically.
They put me on medication for alittle while, just dealt with
that for about three yearsstraight.
And then when I was 16, stumbledon a few general
self-development YouTube videosof yeah, you should start making
your life better, get in thegym, focus on your mental
health.
So I stumbled upon a few ofthose when in the midst of me
just going to school, cominghome, playing video games, going

(02:08):
to sleep, doing it all over andagain, uh, really remaining in
that depressed cycle.
Just a few components and ideasfrom those videos made me think
to myself, I should probablyincorporate some of this.
Maybe it'll help me finally findsome direction and purpose in my
life.
And so it didn't matter if I,someone in my class when I was
16 asked me, Hey, what'd you geton the on the test?
And I said, I got an A plus.
And they go, Oh, I got a B.
Like that's so good that you gotthat.

(02:29):
I would feel nothing.
Right?
It's like there's no sense ofaccomplishment.
So I had always feltdisconnected, and that also I
think contributed to me kind ofviewing the world a little bit
deeper when I was younger.
The work itself got obsessedwith psychology, philosophy,
spirituality, studying all thesedifferent practices and then
experimenting with them for thelast six, seven years of just
continued that.
And then when I was 18, decidedto start my YouTube channel and

(02:52):
start really posting on socialmedia, and then started my
coaching practice about a yearand a half ago.
And uh, it's been a blessing sofar.
I've worked with over 80 guys tohelp them transform their lives,
whether it's guys in theirthey're were a little bit
younger than me, 18, justfeeling a little bit lost in
life, to guys in their 40s whoare going through a divorce,
struggling with uh jobtransition, whatever it is.

(03:12):
So we'll kind of dive into everycomponent of life, and uh it's
been an absolute blessing so farto be able to uh do the work
that I do and to have itresonate with people and me
being myself such a young guydoing it.

SPEAKER_01 (03:22):
So let's go into the age thing.
I I hear you talking, and then Ithink to myself, well, that's
not a normal teenager, right?
Um, most teenagers are notreflecting on their spiritual
development and looking for waysto get out of depression through
personal development.
Generally, they're they wouldturn to drugs or alcohol or

(03:43):
being disobedient or whateverthe case may be.
What do you think made youdifferent?

SPEAKER_00 (03:48):
So I was definitely disobedient.
Um, I always had a problem withauthority.
I hated the school system, Ihated having teachers and I
hated being tell told what todo.
But where it started for me wason a foundational basis for my
parents.
My dad is the most honest personI've ever met in my entire life.
Um, a lot of us say that wedon't lie and we're honest
people.
My dad is almost incapable ofdoing such things.

(04:08):
So I kind of got that from himand uh the the honesty piece,
which is kind of I think alittle bit of that when I was
depressed for a few years, likeit kind of clicked in my brain
of something's wrong, somethingneeds to be fixed, and I need to
look at the reality of thesituation, that nothing was
gonna change if I didn't changeanything.
Like when I was 16, and then itwas that that video by a creator
named Elijah Long that stillmakes videos to this day, just

(04:30):
talking about the realities oflife, what most people are
struggling with, the risk peoplearen't willing to take, and
that's why we're all somiserable.
Um, and I was realizing I'm nottaking any risks, I feel very
stuck.
I've the awareness was therethat something always felt
wrong.
That was all I knew.
And I didn't ever believe thatthere was something that was
right.
I didn't know how to get out ofit, I didn't know how to
transcend things, and it wasjust like I gotta try some of

(04:52):
the stuff.
And then once I tried a fewthings, I was hooked.

SPEAKER_01 (04:55):
Do you get pushback because of your age with older
people?

SPEAKER_00 (04:57):
People who are not interested in self-growth, yes.
People are interested inself-growth, doesn't matter to
them.
In terms of people in mypersonal life, when I started my
coaching practice, it was yourhow could you be a life coach?
How could you tell people, youknow, guide people you haven't
experienced any of this stuff?
Shifted me to actually when Istarted my coaching practice,
I'm only gonna work with guyswho are like 18 to like 24.
It's like come in my comfortableball field.

(05:18):
Then as I started my practice, Iwould find myself getting a call
booked in with somebody who was30 or in their late 20s or in
their 40s and 50s, and guys intheir 40s and 50s were having
open conversations with me.
I have found a way to tap intosuch a creative part of my brain
that I've met in that mostpeople, no matter what age, have
not tapped into.
There's so many of us that we'venever fully soaked into what we

(05:42):
actually want to create forourselves.
The client I'm actually workingwith that's in his 50s is now
rediscovering, building up hisuh practice for physical, like
gym and yoga, spin classes,stuff going back to school to
become a teacher, per se, right?
And he worked as uh in a job for25, 30 years that he didn't
enjoy.
And now I'm helping him makethat transition out of that and
tap into the more creativespirit is just helping him see

(06:05):
components of himself that haveexisted ever since he was five,
ten, fifteen years old.
He just lost track of.
All of us are emotional beings.
Guys and girls in their 30s,40s, and 50s are still having
these emotional experiences andletting them overtake them.
How much of like lack ofself-control, lack of awareness
of yourself and of other peopledo you need to not have to get
to the point where you've livedfor 50 years and you're still

(06:26):
completely disconnected fromthese things?
What I've noticed specificallyfor men is that we've never been
taught how to manage ouremotions.
We've never been taught how tointeract with them in any sort
of way.
We're told to be men, to man up,and as a result of that, we
disconnect ourselves from ouremotional experiences.
We tell ourselves we can't cry,we can't integrate anger in a
healthy manner.
And so what is what happens?
This comes out in for some menvery ugly ways, uh, within

(06:50):
self-inflecting things onthemselves, as well as in the
darker sides of like romanticrelationships, where it actually
turns into something like abuse,or even if it's not to that,
like severe neglect of somebodyelse.
And it only makes sense becauseif you've unconsciously
neglected yourself for yourentire life, how could you ever
hold the space for a woman orsomebody in romantic partnership
to have to hold space for themif you've never done it for you?

(07:10):
Well, essentially a part of thework that I do is helping us
rediscover ourselves to start tointeract with these things that
we've been ignoring for so long.

SPEAKER_01 (07:17):
Do you find that a lot of them repeat patterns from
their past, from their fromtheir parents?
And how do you work with them onthat?
If that's a case.

SPEAKER_00 (07:24):
I think our relationship with our parents
affects our relationship withourselves, with friends, and
very specifically with romanticpartners.
I work with a lot of guys whothey had a very poor
relationship with their dad ortheir mom, or maybe they didn't
even have one of the parents.
And we can see how these littlethings show up in our
relationships, and even aconscious recognition of a lack

(07:44):
of love we receive from somebodyseems to keep showing up in our
relationships when we pretendit's love.
For example, one of my clientsthat I work with uh had gotten
divorced after being married forquite a few years, his wife at
the time was very encompassingof the poor relationship he had
with his parents, and all of theneglect that his parents gave
him showed up there.
She showed him care, affection,provision.

(08:04):
And because there's a componentunconsciously in his mind that
thinks that because this is theway his parents treated him,
there's a component of love likethat that must exist.
Even if consciously he says tome, which he has many times,
like, I know like I don'tdeserve this, right?
It's like consciously you do,but your subconscious does not.
If you're you have a really goodrelationship with your mom or a
really good relationship withyour dad, you'll find that in

(08:26):
your romantic relationships,there's certain components of
them that you really liked thatjust seem to naturally show up
in your partner.
When you brought up were broughtup with decent to good parents,
you're already unconsciouslyconnected to those things.
So in your romanticrelationships and dating
experiences, you areautomatically attracted to those
types of people.
And also, especially with thepeople who haven't had a good
relationship with their parents,they find themselves very much

(08:47):
attracted to people who treatthem very badly.
There's like, of course, thehealing process around that with
recognizing this consciously andsetting certain boundaries
internally for yourself.
I'm gonna challenge them on it,tell them why I think it's wrong
and how I feel about it, and seeif they can hold the space for
me.
If they can't, goodbye, nextperson.
Because if I'm gonna build alife with somebody, there needs
to be something real that'sinteractive here.

(09:08):
But of course, a lot of guysdon't know how to interact with
that because they neverexperience anything real with
somebody else or withinthemselves.
If the inner work isn't done,like most people never find
their person, or they findsomebody who they think is their
person and it ends in divorce,as we know from the statistical
standpoint of the United States,most over 50% of people get
divorced.
So these are things we have torecognize in order to start to

(09:29):
interact with these things andgain a deeper connection with
themselves to even understandlike what does that entail?
What is what does the work workrequire that I have to do and
kind of soaking into thatreality?

SPEAKER_01 (09:37):
So you embody what you teach.

SPEAKER_00 (09:39):
100%.

SPEAKER_01 (09:40):
Where do you bring fun in with your clients?
How do you teach them about funand what do you do for fun?
Because it can't always be likeall of this, right?
Like it can't always beself-improvement, it can't
always be it's gotta be yougotta have fun in life.

SPEAKER_00 (09:53):
Playing the drums.

SPEAKER_01 (09:54):
I'd love to follow up with you with after you have
children.

SPEAKER_00 (09:58):
Oh man.

SPEAKER_01 (10:00):
It's like you see the world in a very different
way in that aspect, and youlearn a lot.
Um, so that's not something wecan really talk about yet
because you don't have children.
But tell us, give us a tool.
Just a tool that people can takewith them.

SPEAKER_00 (10:11):
Start with one component at a time, start with
the smallest step possible.
Before one of my clients, hecame to me and he came to me,
he's like, How do I get uptomorrow and go walk?
And I'm like, Whoa, whoa, we'renot there yet.
Like, let's just get it downlike an hour and a half, right?
It's like, and like what's alsoplaguing there?
Like, why can't you get up?
Like deep diving into the deepmechanisms.
Where's the disconnection?
Where's the fire?
So I think when that thatinitial reflection process,

(10:32):
famous businessman online has agreat quote that I love, which
is you've already achieved goalsuh that you thought would make
you happy.
It's great to strive.
It's but when you're so obsessedwith the goal itself and nothing
everyone talks about it's thatyou're about the journey, not
the destination.
It's about both.
Uh, but those small wins andactually showing yourself that
you're making progress andfeeling like you're doing it as
well is one of the mostimportant pieces to creating the

(10:54):
life for yourself that youdesire.

SPEAKER_01 (10:55):
And with that guy that you were talking about who
takes three to four hours to getup in the morning, I would say,
what are you avoiding?

SPEAKER_00 (11:00):
In what capacity would you mean?

SPEAKER_01 (11:01):
Because if it's taking you that long to get up,
you're avoiding something.
There's literally no way thatyou would take that long to get
up unless you're trying to avoidyour day, you're avoiding your
life, you're avoiding what youhave to do, you're avoiding
work, you're avoiding, you know,just yourself in general, right?
But to take that long to get upmeans that you're trying to push
something off, you're trying toavoid something.
So even just looking at like,you know, something like that,

(11:22):
like asking myself, watching TV,what part of my life am I trying
to avoid?

SPEAKER_00 (11:26):
Depends on you as an individual, how you're feeling.
And of course, asking yourselfthose initial questions, which
you beautifully highlighted,which is like, yeah, if I'm
watching TV, it's like, where amI disconnected from myself?
Where what am I avoiding?
And it's just for myself, it'slike when I pick up my phone and
start scrolling, what am Iavoiding?
Oh, I'm avoiding that, right?
Because you don't just pick upyour phone to scroll to do it,
right?
It's because you're avoidingsomething, um, because you're
procrastinating.
And then you have to question.

(11:47):
Or you're trying to that's whatI did with video games when I
was younger, is like uh realityfeels so dull that this is the
only way I can feel like I'mleveling up.
This is the only way I can feelsomething.
Um, and so social media and ourphones do a great job at making
us feel something, but theydon't ever do an even decent job
at making us feel connected.
The group that I run and thecoaching practice that I do,

(12:09):
it's I have some in-personclients, but it's mainly online.
I've got Guy in New Zealand andCanada, all of the US.
Like it's like we wouldn't havebeen able to connect if the
internet if this online stuffdidn't exist.
So that's of course, is likewhere's the consumption
disconnect and where can I startto consume more things that uh
are genuinely serving me?

SPEAKER_01 (12:28):
So, where can people find your information so they
can consume it?

SPEAKER_00 (12:32):
Oh, absolutely.
So, YouTube, YouTube is a lot ofthe longer form stuff.
Uh, it's gonna be Mighty Brad.
Uh, there's some podcasts onthere, and I've been doing a lot
more sit-down 20, 25 minute uhsessions of me just having a
conversation about whateverconcepts coming to my mind.
Occasionally some snippets thatI actually take from some of the
work in my coaching practice,uh, usually blurring out the
actual uh words from my clients,but just some thing, the concept

(12:55):
that I'm talking about.
And then Instagram is would bethe best way to reach me.
Shorter form content or just askme a question personally about
something you're going through,would love to just give you some
quick tips about anything thatyou're looking for.
Um, and that's gonna be MightyBrad official.
And then, of course, I'm on theother platforms like Snapchat,
Twitter, Mighty Brad to reach methere as well.

SPEAKER_01 (13:14):
Beautiful.
Well, thank you for coming onthe show and giving us um all of
the great intellect that youhave.
And most people don't fascinateme, you fascinate me, so that
was cool.

SPEAKER_00 (13:24):
I appreciate that.

SPEAKER_01 (13:25):
Yeah, we appreciate you, and I will put all of your
contact information in our umdescription, and hopefully
people connected with you willreach out.

SPEAKER_00 (13:34):
Awesome.
Thank you so much.
You asked some brilliantquestions, and I I had so much
fun having this conversation.

SPEAKER_01 (13:39):
Like I think you're gonna be able to do it.
If this story spoke to you,let's keep the healing going.
Visit BarbieMoreno.com for myonline course, Awakening Your
Worth in Healing EnergySessions, one-on-one coaching,
and your free healing guide.
Your next step is waiting.

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FWTW S3E05 | Why Most Men Are Emotionally Stuck—and What It Really Takes to Heal: Mighty Brad

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