Your shadow has its own intelligence. The shadow is the psychological energy that's working against you to shut off the pathways towards your goals, aims, and the changes and the love that you want. We need to invite in the intelligence to work with us, to build a relationship with it so it's not working against us but with us. And when we start to do that, we start to expand consciously and create sovereignty internally. - Connor Beaton

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Wellness + Wisdom Episode 509

Connor Beaton, the founder of ManTalks and author of Men's Work, a self-help book from men, for men and about men, joins Josh Trent on Wellness + Wisdom Podcast to discuss how to integrate and embrace your shadows in order to heal and become your true self.

Are you ready to discover how shadow work can help you achieve loving relationships with others and remove your triggers and addictions?

This episode will teach you how our limiting beliefs govern our lives, what you can do to reclaim your darkness and step out of your father's shadow, why separation is a myth, and how porn can destroy intimacy in your relationship.

Listen To Episode 509 As Connor Beaton Uncovers: [1:30] Ending Self-Sabotage

Connor Beaton
ManTalks
Men's Work: A Practical Guide to Face Your Darkness, End Self-Sabotage, and Find Freedom by Connor Beaton
Facing self-sabotage and allowing parts of yourself to die.
What happened after Connor's publisher told him that men don't read self-help books.
What women can learn from Men's Work even though the book is from men, for men, and about men.
The struggle of juggling a newborn son, running a business, and writing books with his wife Vienna.
Vienna Pharaon
Vienna Pharaon Podcast - Two Books & A Baby: Surviving Hard Times In Your Relationship

[08:40] Letting Go Of Limiting Beliefs

[13:00] The Magic Of Stepping Out Of Your Father's Shadow

Josh Trent with Aubrey Marcus: Becoming Fit For Fatherhood
Why we demonize our fathers and get stuck in their shadows.
The importance of realizing that we bring down or pedestal our fathers, and starting to see them for who they truly are.
Connor's father wound: How his dad left and started a family with another woman.
Why he couldn't communicate the pain he felt about his parent's divorce.
Why there were verbal and physical conflicts with his mom's new partner.
How he felt about losing his father to another family and having him replaced with another man.
Uncovering how he was trying to get close to his dad and why the more he tried, the more frustrated he became.
How stepping outside of the shadow of his two father figures gave him the opportunity to finally be the man he was capable of becoming.

[18:55] Reclaim Your Darkness

490 SOLOCAST | Hypervigilance: The Subconscious Strategy of Survival That Slowly Kills
The merit of knowing your own darkness: Your darkness is still who you are.
Why understanding and reclaiming your darkness is an act of strengthening.
What it means that your pain has its own intelligence and how your shadow works against you.
How accepting the parts of us that we've been rejecting creates internal sovereignty and we stop making other people responsible for how we feel.

[23:44] How To Gain Sovereignty From Shadow Work

Why sovereignty is connected to peace according to Josh and how our partners test the foundation of our sovereignty.
How women reveal who you are as a man and how men disempower themselves by projecting their journey onto women.
Why men become more attractive when they reclaim their darkness.
Vienna's and Connor's childhood: Growing up in a high-conflict environment vs growing up with zero conflict.
The end of the honeymoon phase in their relationship and having to face conflicts.
Why you need to be present to be able to move through trauma.
How your triggers and reactions to them point out your shadows.
Realizing his reactions were trauma-based and being able to set clear boundaries in conflicts.
Why you need a partner who you want to do a conflict with.
The reality of human experience.

[37:40] The Art Of Choosing The Right Partner

Why respect is important in relationships and helps you handle conflicts easier.
Why you need to pay attention to what a woman reveals about who you are as a man.
How men are taught to be independent and have it all figured out.
Learning who you are by paying attention to the darkness that is brought up in a relationship.
Why you can't know who you want to be with if you don't know who you are.
Secure attachment: Enduring difficult situations together.
The importance of being with a partner that challenges you to reach your full potential.
The difference between someone who's trying to change you VS someone who pushes you to step into your true self.

[44:20] Thy Myth Of Separation + Male Suppression

The role of self-regulation in a relationship.
What the myth of separation is and why hiding from what you think might make you look won't make you stronger.
How we live separate from the things we feel that make us weak.
Why people believe there is strength in the suppression of men.
Unpacking why the act of admission is the pathway toward strength.
How Connor suppressed his own emotions, problems, and addictions in the past.

[48:40] What Is Truly Behind Porn Addiction?

Josh's porn addiction and how an honest relationship helped him heal from it.
How Connor struggled to give porn up.
The realization that he always felt something he didn't want to feel right before watching porn.
How porn was helping him regulate his nervous system and ease anxiety.
Learning to stop, breathe, and sit with his feelings before watching porn.
Why porn is risk-free compared to other addictions.
The first time Connor got caught watching pornography: Realizing the disconnection he felt with his partner because of porn.
How he turned healing from porn addiction into a practice to regulate his nervous system.
Your Brain on Porn: Internet Pornography and the Emerging Science of Addiction by Gary Wilson
The connection between money and porn: How Josh's revenue tripled after he got rid of porn addiction.

[56:00] Porn VS Intimacy

Why Connor wants to be transparent about his addiction with his son and talk about creating healthy intimacy.
How his stepped dad found porn in Connor's browser history when he was a child.
Why searching for alternatives and reasons why you should stop doing something that's bad for you can be helpful.
How porn conditions us to expect an extraordinary experience.
The effects of watching porn on intimacy with your partner and why it can lead to sexual dysfunctions.
Unconscious incompetence: You don't know what you don't know.
Admission and confession: The bridge you have to cross in order to create a change in you.
How we don't know how to be with our pain and why we need to turn towards it to understand and accept it.
How porn is ritualized and why it's important to identify the ritual and the feeling before it in order to start healing.

[01:06:55] The Collective Shadow + Loving Stubbornness

Why the feminine is the collective shadow according to Connor.
What creates a negative internal dialogue: Disconnection from the feminine energy.
How the ability to interact with the feminine is related to the internal interaction with the feminine.
How external validation can be a sign of negative internal dialogue.
The reason he wrote a letter to his son before he was born and the poem of two stubborn hearts he wrote to his wife.
Why stubbornness is perceived as bad in our culture but it can be a good thing.
What it means to love and show up stubbornly and how it can help us get through our shadows.

[01:16:10] The Lie About The Rational Mind

The power of breath: Grounding VS action.
How the ability to switch between the light and the dark comes through the breath and the nervous system.
Why the rational mind that can solve all problems is a lie sold to men.
Ken Wilber
Eckhart Tolle
Wim Hof
Why recording the audiobook was a highlight for Connor.
ManTalks Podcast
How his podcast allows him to expand his own curiosity and the more he learns, the more people get out of it.

Power Quotes From The Show The Shadow Of The Father Wound

"We often get caught demonizing our father and get stuck in his shadow. We become a judge of our father and we sit in a righteous seat when we're hurt and say "this is how my dad should have parented me." As if we have any context for his life and what he was going through." - Connor Beaton

Understanding Your Own Darkness

"There's merit in understanding your own darkness because your darkness is still you, a part of who you are. When you start to turn towards your fears, your insecurities, and your doubts, there's a chance you'll be able to not only understand those parts of you but also welcome them back in your kingdom." - Connor Beaton

Move Through Conflict With Your Partner

"If you can find somebody that's along for the ride with you that you respect enough to move through conflict with, you're much more likely to show up in a respectful way to prioritize figuring out what's happening within you as a man. And subsequently, become somebody who's willing to move through conflict themselves." - Connor Beaton

Links From Today's Show

About Connor Beaton

Connor Beaton, the founder of ManTalks. He was raised to believe that being a man meant you had to follow certain rules. The most notable one is like the first rule of Fight Club: don't talk about it. For most of his life, he believed all men had the same rule. Shut up and deal with it. Man up.

Over the next few years, he learned to take his trauma, shame, and denial—all the shadowy parts of himself—and integrate them. He spent thousands of hours learning and training. He consulted psychologists, historians, neurologists, and authors. Connor trained for years under mentors and leaders in Jungian psychology, somatic therapy, and holotropic breathwork. He even apprenticed under a disciple of Carl Jung himself.

In 2014, Connor founded ManTalks as a grassroots movement to further the cause: giving men the tools and training to create a truly self-led life.

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