Brian Mueller: Welcome to Follow Me to the MROP, a podcast dedicated to the journey of the masculine soul.
Brian Mueller: and the transformative power of initiation.
Brian Mueller: My name is Brian Mueller.
Brian Mueller: I live in suburban Dayton, Ohio, and I made my rites at Pilgrim Park in Illinois in twenty fourteen.
Brian Mueller: I'm your host, and in each episode of our show I'll sit down with one man who has made his rites
Brian Mueller: and I'll invite him to tell his story.
Brian Mueller: This won't be an abstract explanation or a theological lecture, just a real conversation about what it was like to cross that threshold at the rites and what changed afterwards.
Brian Mueller: This podcast is truly a labor of love, inspired by my own transformative experience at the men's rites of passage and my ongoing commitment to the men of the Illuman Community.
Brian Mueller: If this show resonates with you
Brian Mueller: Please take a moment to rate, review, and share it on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen.
Brian Mueller: You can find all of those links at M-R-O-P Talk dot
Brian Mueller: com.
Brian Mueller: To support my work, you can explore my published poetry volumes at Brian Mueller dot
Brian Mueller: com.
Brian Mueller: I also work closely with Men and Illuman to share and teach the practice of presence.
Brian Mueller: You can learn more about that at choosing presence dot
Brian Mueller: org.
Brian Mueller: Before we go any further, I want you to know that this is an encore episode.
Brian Mueller: The week of August 10th I'll be in Illinois at the men's rites of passage, standing with the men who are crossing that threshold this year, and I'll be away through the seventeenth.
Brian Mueller: Rather than let the feet go quiet, I wanted to bring back two conversations that mean a great deal to me, and both of them are with men who are giving themselves to these very rites.
Brian Mueller: Today you'll hear Episode 4, my conversation with Bob Colaresi.
Brian Mueller: Bob is the founder emeritus of these rites, and this year he serves as the Weaver for the Returning Initiated Men.
Brian Mueller: Last Monday I re-released Episode 1 with Chester Trocha.
Brian Mueller: the very first man to sit down with me on this show, and the MROP coordinator for the Illinois rites this year.
Brian Mueller: If you missed that one, go back a week in the feed and give it a listen.
Brian Mueller: These two men are dear to me, and I respect them deeply.
Brian Mueller: Each of them has given themself, over many years, to walking alongside other men on the spiritual journey.
Brian Mueller: and to building real community within Illuman.
Brian Mueller: If you heard these conversations before, list again.
Brian Mueller: I think you'll hear something you missed the first time.
Brian Mueller: And if they're new to you, you're in for a gift.
Brian Mueller: New episodes return on Monday, august twenty fourth, and there is good work ahead.
Brian Mueller: Conversations coming with Joe Grilliot from Ohio, Matthew Burch from Oklahoma.
Brian Mueller: and Byron Macmillan from New Mexico.
Brian Mueller: Now the Men's Rites of Passage, or MROP, is an experience designed to help men move from the first half of life into the second, shifting from a focus on ego and achievement to a life of meaning and soul.
Brian Mueller: On this show, we don't just talk about the rites in theory, we talk to the men who have walked the path.
Brian Mueller: Today I'm joined by a man who's made his rites, and we're going to hear exactly what that journey looked like for him.
Brian Mueller: My guest today is Bob Colaresi.
Brian Mueller: Brother, I'm really glad you're here.
Brian Mueller: Thanks for making the time and for being willing to share your story.
Brian Mueller: I'm honored that you want to hear me.
Brian Mueller: Bob, tell us where you're from and how you spend your time these days.
Bob Colaresi: Well, I'm a native of Connecticut.
Bob Colaresi: I grew up in Connecticut Yankee and in a very Italian community.
Bob Colaresi: Italian ghetto.
Bob Colaresi: And then I joined the Carmelites and I've been a Carmelite priest for fifty-eight years.
Bob Colaresi: And I've, you know, been a Carmelite for about sixty-six years.
Bob Colaresi: So joined religious life and it's been an interesting life and I've done a lot of things you know in my life.
Bob Colaresi: I did a lot of education and been a lot of development and stuff and retreat work.
Bob Colaresi: So that's kind of what I do.
Bob Colaresi: mostly, you know, in different parts of my life, you know, that I've been challenged.
Bob Colaresi: And Carmelites had a way of tapping into some of my organizational skills.
Bob Colaresi: And I ended up being the administrator of a lot of things as I look back on life.
Bob Colaresi: And it's hard to let go of it these days.
Bob Colaresi: Well, I also know you've been really involved with the men's work of Illuman.
Bob Colaresi: Very much so.
Bob Colaresi: It's been one of the joys of my life.
Bob Colaresi: I wish I had done it all earlier.
Bob Colaresi: But uh yeah, no, it uh Lumen has been a real blessing in my life.
Bob Colaresi: I've lived with the male communities, but sometimes uh we don't always share well.
Bob Colaresi: And I think place where a lot of the my good friends and people I've trusted more have been my Illuman brothers, you know, here, especially in Illinois, but even around the world, because somehow we
Bob Colaresi: We know that life's more than sports and overeating today and, you know, and the politics and stuff.
Brian Mueller: Well, great.
Brian Mueller: Thank you.
Brian Mueller: Let's go ahead and dive in and talk about the men's rites of passage.
Brian Mueller: The MROP is a unique experience.
Brian Mueller: It's not a retreat or a workshop.
Brian Mueller: It's an initiation.
Brian Mueller: Many men arrive at the rites at a crossroads in their lives looking for something they can't quite name.
Brian Mueller: Before we dive into the why and the how, let's start at the very beginning.
Brian Mueller: Bob, where and when did you make your rites?
Bob Colaresi: Well, I made my rites in August, the first week of August 2005.
Bob Colaresi: I had heard of Richard Rohr.
Bob Colaresi: I mean, I do a lot of talks and I work at Retreat House.
Bob Colaresi: I had heard of him for a long time and you know, and I've heard about the men's rites and I didn't get real excited for a while, you know, but I was doing more of his biblical stuff, but he was really speaking to something in me.
Bob Colaresi: And but then I did finally decide to go.
Bob Colaresi: Although it was f funny as we were planning and I wanted someone else to go and there was a guy I was working with and he was interested, so we were gonna go.
Bob Colaresi: But I made the mistake this is a funny thing about me.
Bob Colaresi: I made the mis I read Adam's Return and you know what?
Bob Colaresi: That got me nervous.
Bob Colaresi: Because I said, you know what?
Bob Colaresi: I'm going to be somehow up there in Minnesota being eaten alive by mosquitoes.
Bob Colaresi: You know, that was really hit me.
Bob Colaresi: And they almost backed out.
Bob Colaresi: It was really funny.
Bob Colaresi: But I had a wonderful spiritual director.
Bob Colaresi: She was a woman that's been really was a real big part of my life.
Bob Colaresi: And what happened was and she had encouraged me, but she I didn't do it for her.
Bob Colaresi: But she was very happy when I told her I was doing it, 'cause she was aware of Richard Rohr and the more mystical approach to religion.
Bob Colaresi: And what was really funny.
Bob Colaresi: Well, so I had pretty well decided not to go.
Bob Colaresi: About two months before, I said, What the hell?
Bob Colaresi: I can, you know, see if I get my money back.
Bob Colaresi: Well, she arrives with a beautiful
Bob Colaresi: drum o with uh whatever animal skin it was.
Bob Colaresi: She had spent five weeks making this drum and I didn't have the heart to tell her I wasn't using it.
Bob Colaresi: It wasn't going.
Bob Colaresi: Well, that got me first there.
Bob Colaresi: And of course, then the same thing was.
Bob Colaresi: And then, well, I can't look there.
Bob Colaresi: But then if I had to go, and then it wasn't going to fit in my bag.
Bob Colaresi: You know, you don't bring a lot of stuff.
Bob Colaresi: And I said, She'll never know.
Bob Colaresi: And I said, Oh, she'll know.
Bob Colaresi: So I took it.
Bob Colaresi: Well, it blew me away.
Bob Colaresi: I'll tell you.
Bob Colaresi: I was glad it was in Minnesota.
Bob Colaresi: There were 80 of us guys there.
Bob Colaresi: And the drumming that first day just got you know, it gets the rhythm inside you.
Bob Colaresi: There was something going on there, just the drumming.
Bob Colaresi: And I didn't wasn't a big drummer kind of thing.
Bob Colaresi: And I even asked some one of our drummers in our parish.
Bob Colaresi: I said, What's this drumming about?
Bob Colaresi: And he said, Oh, it's about you just getting inside yourself.
Bob Colaresi: And I said, What does that mean?
Bob Colaresi: You know.
Bob Colaresi: But anyway, but it worked and it was really incredible.
Bob Colaresi: But it also was very threatening.
Bob Colaresi: I was just going to say this
Bob Colaresi: I'll tell you after I said after a day and a half, they were sending me into areas that I didn't want to look at in my life.
Bob Colaresi: It's the reason I went.
Bob Colaresi: And I'll tell you the reason I went because when they asked you, What are you about
Bob Colaresi: It dawned on me.
Bob Colaresi: I've been s I've been very successful.
Bob Colaresi: The Carmelites have put me in places and I made things work.
Bob Colaresi: I'm an Enneagram three and I
Bob Colaresi: I'm a doer, I get things done, and I want them to look right.
Bob Colaresi: That doesn't mean they're always correct, but I make them look good.
Bob Colaresi: You know, and so that was all part of it.
Bob Colaresi: But you know what?
Bob Colaresi: The point was at that point in my life
Bob Colaresi: I was getting into my 50s and I just there was something empty inside.
Bob Colaresi: Everybody said, well, you got a golden everything.
Bob Colaresi: And I said, but down deep, and one of a few of my friends and my spirit director, I felt empty.
Bob Colaresi: There was something restlessly empty inside.
Bob Colaresi: And so that's what kind of drew me to the whole thing.
Bob Colaresi: And then, even though I was panicking, because I didn't really
Bob Colaresi: I wanted to know what was causing it, but I didn't.
Bob Colaresi: I thought it would just go away if I just worked harder.
Bob Colaresi: It was all about me.
Bob Colaresi: So that that was kind of one of the issues of this restless emptiness.
Bob Colaresi: And uh but it became
Bob Colaresi: No, it uh you can ask more questions, but it just became I'm glad I stayed.
Bob Colaresi: If I had been too close, I would have gotten in the car and come home.
Bob Colaresi: Right.
Bob Colaresi: You know, it's it got a little too dangerous.
Bob Colaresi: But I couldn't.
Bob Colaresi: And so I did.
Bob Colaresi: And I'll tell you, it blew me away.
Bob Colaresi: I mean, I still look at it as one of the one, two or one or two most powerful transformative experiences of my life.
Brian Mueller: That's great to hear.
Brian Mueller: Now let's go back a little bit to the moment that you kind of arrived in Minnesota for the Writes.
Brian Mueller: What was the first thing that comes to your mind when you as you entered the Writes?
Brian Mueller: I don't know.
Bob Colaresi: Well, uh, suddenly we were in this little cabin up there, and oh my god, I'm sleeping in a room with a bunch of other guys, you know, and I haven't done that for a long time.
Bob Colaresi: you know, and uh it it really hit me and the woods looked good.
Bob Colaresi: I mean, I always of life life nature, but there was something about what did I get into and I was sitting there and uh
Bob Colaresi: So it just, I don't know what it was, but it was a certain fear.
Bob Colaresi: Like I told you, probably by the second day, I might have just gotten in a car and disappeared without telling anybody, you know, because somehow I knew.
Bob Colaresi: It was doing probably what I was looking for, but didn't want to go there.
Bob Colaresi: You know, that kind of, that's something I wrestle with in my own self.
Bob Colaresi: So that's what it was.
Bob Colaresi: But it seemed good.
Bob Colaresi: And we had that first mic, and we were going around and I was really impressed with the guys were saying.
Bob Colaresi: I said, well, okay, they're all safe, seem like safe people.
Bob Colaresi: and good people, but you know so it it they invited me into it.
Bob Colaresi: I will will say that, you know, it's great.
Bob Colaresi: Even though it was a guy above me in the bunk and he was almost falling through on me at the time.
Bob Colaresi: And I'm going, what you, what are we doing in bunks out here?
Brian Mueller: Can we find a hotel?
Brian Mueller: You've already said there was maybe about 80 guys at your rites.
Brian Mueller: Who was the Weaver?
Brian Mueller: The Weaver was Richard Rohr.
Brian Mueller: Richard was still on.
Bob Colaresi: Steve Picha was the elder, you know, the ritual elder.
Bob Colaresi: And
Bob Colaresi: It was great to me, right?
Bob Colaresi: Heard Richard before, and it was great to be with them, and it was just some wonderful stuff.
Bob Colaresi: There's a lot of things I could talk about, but you know, those rituals had a way of
Bob Colaresi: grabbing your heart and grabbing your attention.
Bob Colaresi: They were something they still are, even when I when I worked on them so many other times before.
Bob Colaresi: There's still something that those opening rituals and right that first day and a half, that's probably what mesmerized me the most.
Bob Colaresi: Like, it wasn't the talks, but it was just that
Bob Colaresi: And Richard was all over the place in those days.
Bob Colaresi: I mean, he wasn't consistent, but I knew that part of him, you know.
Bob Colaresi: Yeah.
Brian Mueller: Yeah.
Brian Mueller: So, was there a particular ritual or a particular moment without getting anything that's too confidential or personal, but was there something in particular that really stood out to you during the
Brian Mueller: rites.
Bob Colaresi: They all grabbed me, but probably there is one day of a grief ritual that kind of grabbed me more than any other time.
Bob Colaresi: And in the middle of it, because we were, you know, if you spend time in nature and some of the things they were doing.
Bob Colaresi: I really got in touch with myself of what was going on in me because I was really looking for this empty restlessness inside me.
Bob Colaresi: What's going on here?
Bob Colaresi: I mean, I could count, you know, so many things.
Bob Colaresi: But it wasn't filling me.
Bob Colaresi: But the grief ritual, and I'll tell you what really happened to me there without revealing a lot of everything.
Bob Colaresi: But in the middle of it, we were invited, if you want, in our small group or the big group to say something, what was your mind?
Bob Colaresi: And I said,
Bob Colaresi: Inadequate son.
Bob Colaresi: What were you grieving?
Bob Colaresi: Inadequate son.
Bob Colaresi: And I s put my hand over my mouth.
Bob Colaresi: I said, I'm not inadequate.
Bob Colaresi: I'm the most competent man in the world
Bob Colaresi: But see, it came out.
Bob Colaresi: It just came out.
Bob Colaresi: Once it was there.
Bob Colaresi: And so when we had that day alone in the woods, it was incredible.
Bob Colaresi: And two things happened, I just want to say.
Bob Colaresi: One is we were lining up to go out there for the day we had been fasting for, you know, about a day before, and somebody came out and there were two of us.
Bob Colaresi: I blame blame, don't be there.
Bob Colaresi: He said, come here, and they pulled us out of line.
Bob Colaresi: I'm thinking, What did I do wrong?
Bob Colaresi: You know, and well, the guy said, hey, you're you're the diabetics, I don't want I want so.
Bob Colaresi: Come here.
Bob Colaresi: He took me to the kitchen.
Bob Colaresi: And he gave me an apple and a peanut butter sandwich.
Bob Colaresi: He said, I don't want something to happen to you out there, you know, 'cause the long hours are going to be out there.
Bob Colaresi: Well, then I looked and I said, God
Bob Colaresi: Three years ago today, I buried my father.
Bob Colaresi: He had died.
Bob Colaresi: That was his funeral, August 5th.
Bob Colaresi: I'll never forget it.
Bob Colaresi: Well, that triggered something.
Bob Colaresi: I mean, my dad was in the middle of it, but that triggered me off on what became probably the most significant thing was
Bob Colaresi: That and I just want to talk about.
Bob Colaresi: But when I went out there and we had some things to read and stuff, but I just wanted to be there in that confined space out in the woods, and it was incredible.
Bob Colaresi: I love being out there.
Bob Colaresi: And I was hanging from trees playing Tarzan sometimes.
Bob Colaresi: You can't leave the you know, the six feet thing, and watching who came and the animals and stuff.
Bob Colaresi: It was just incredible.
Bob Colaresi: But at one point, what really surfaced as I was kind of hanging there thinking I was Tarzan, you know, was, Dad, was I ever good enough?
Bob Colaresi: And what really happened to me was, and suddenly my dad smiled.
Bob Colaresi: I mean, I was very aware.
Bob Colaresi: The funeral, and his funeral and his death
Bob Colaresi: And then what happened to me was I remembered something I'd forgotten.
Bob Colaresi: Three years about three years before that, he had had a stroke and I was went back to Connecticut several times.
Bob Colaresi: But the last time I went to see him, because my dad, I'm going to say this.
Bob Colaresi: My dad had a sixth-grade education.
Bob Colaresi: They were Italian immigrants.
Bob Colaresi: He could fix anything, but he was passed over at the job because he in the 50s, you know, he ran this company.
Bob Colaresi: He was with Stanley Works, and he was.
Bob Colaresi: He was very, very good and he ran this whole area about 200 men and then they were going to make a superintendency out of it.
Bob Colaresi: And everybody thought he was going to get it, but he didn't get it because at that time the companies were professionally.
Bob Colaresi: He had to have a BS degree.
Bob Colaresi: He was passed over.
Bob Colaresi: And and what he did what the result was me, I'm the oldest boy of the family, I'm the second child, but oldest boy.
Bob Colaresi: So he suddenly realized education is everything in this country.
Bob Colaresi: So he'd always say to me, when I came home with four A's and a B, and I was a good student, he'd all he ever said was, Why'd you get a B?
Bob Colaresi: And he said it often enough that I began to because I trusted my dad.
Bob Colaresi: He was the one training me in how to be a man.
Bob Colaresi: And he was a wonderful, kind guy, but I wasn't good enough.
Bob Colaresi: And so I really the this the the false self that I developed over the years was
Bob Colaresi: That I was inadequate.
Bob Colaresi: I was never good enough.
Bob Colaresi: And I kept trying harder.
Bob Colaresi: Well, that makes me messianic.
Bob Colaresi: My personality is, well, I'll prove to you
Bob Colaresi: Everybody became a project to fix or improve, or you know, that's why I was so good at administration.
Bob Colaresi: I was getting things done, I could mobilize people.
Bob Colaresi: But and so Sedley was there.
Bob Colaresi: But the last thing what happened was the last day of Psalm before I 'cause when I left I was leaving.
Bob Colaresi: I had been there for a couple of days
Bob Colaresi: I went and I'd he was always either sitting or talking, but I went to his room 'cause I was going back to Darien and I just said, Dad, I was talking and suddenly he wasn't in the room.
Bob Colaresi: So I said, Where is he?
Bob Colaresi: So always probably in the community room.
Bob Colaresi: You know your dad.
Bob Colaresi: So I go in there and he's in a wheelchair with all these people around.
Bob Colaresi: And this nurse comes up and she says, sir, only family in here.
Bob Colaresi: And I said, My Bob, I'm Quinto's oldest son.
Bob Colaresi: Oh, she said, well, I haven't been here.
Bob Colaresi: You're okay
Bob Colaresi: And he looked up from that chair and he said, That's Father Bob, my son.
Bob Colaresi: He screamed.
Bob Colaresi: Well, you know what?
Bob Colaresi: Typical me being poor, I said, God, I'm so much like my dad.
Bob Colaresi: Am I going to end up in a wheelchair?
Bob Colaresi: Which is what's happening now.
Bob Colaresi: That's a different thing.
Bob Colaresi: But you know, but I walked away, driving to the airport, I'm thinking, God, am I going to end up in a wheelchair?
Bob Colaresi: Well, I forgot it, but I'm sitting there hanging from the stand where I've, and I remembered what he said.
Bob Colaresi: He called the whole damn world.
Bob Colaresi: That's what I said with the biggest smile ever.
Bob Colaresi: What I've been li waiting for all my life.
Bob Colaresi: I mean, he wasn't the kind that said, I love you and that stuff.
Bob Colaresi: He worked his butt off for us.
Bob Colaresi: He gave himself, emptied himself totally in a lot of ways.
Bob Colaresi: And so Sunday that and then I, you know, I was s sitting there and I was so overwhelmed.
Bob Colaresi: It's like heaven smiled.
Bob Colaresi: And then, you know, the other piece of that, which is so hard, I couldn't talk about it for years because but the universe opened up and I became one with the universe hanging there.
Bob Colaresi: At that point, I had stripped my clothes down.
Bob Colaresi: I wanted to be totally naked before God.
Bob Colaresi: And it was amazing.
Bob Colaresi: And something ripped through me.
Bob Colaresi: I don't know whether it happened for five seconds.
Bob Colaresi: five minutes or five hours.
Bob Colaresi: But it just poured through me this this false self I've had created and I was living from, making me messianic to get everything done.
Bob Colaresi: It was all about me, but it was suddenly I was beloved of God.
Bob Colaresi: They just, oh, it was so hard.
Bob Colaresi: And for years that kept up.
Bob Colaresi: You know, this part of the hemorrhaging.
Bob Colaresi: But I had to get over my identity, that what I was living from, what Merton would call the false self, was that I was inadequate.
Bob Colaresi: And it was the driving force of my life.
Bob Colaresi: And suddenly, no, I was the beloved.
Bob Colaresi: I was beloved of God and my dad.
Bob Colaresi: You know, and it began to I stopped hemorrhaging a bit.
Bob Colaresi: It didn't totally go away.
Bob Colaresi: There's still an inadequacy inside me.
Bob Colaresi: The wrong things to get me, but it was just one of those experiences.
Bob Colaresi: I'll never forget it.
Bob Colaresi: Part of it early on in that experience, I don't know how long I was out there, hours.
Bob Colaresi: And I was hanging there at one point I kid, this is dumb.
Bob Colaresi: This felt dumb.
Bob Colaresi: It wasn't it was threatening.
Bob Colaresi: And there was no wind, but this branch came and slapped me across the face.
Bob Colaresi: I'm like, what the hell?
Bob Colaresi: And about 15 minutes later, it did it again, twice.
Bob Colaresi: So when I went back before I was leaving, I cut a piece of that branch because it was trying to awaken me.
Bob Colaresi: You know, nature was very active in my experience hanging there.
Bob Colaresi: And I've never forgotten it.
Bob Colaresi: And I still go back to it.
Bob Colaresi: I mean, sometimes
Bob Colaresi: It was an experience that transformed my life.
Bob Colaresi: And now I have to watch it that you're not a project that I'm supposed to fix.
Bob Colaresi: Your brother I'm supposed to know and love and all and I think and I would that's a big thing and it still struggles.
Bob Colaresi: There's a piece of me inside that messianic thing that's so well known to me
Bob Colaresi: that I want to turn everybody into an you know an object of what I can do to fix them or improve them.
Bob Colaresi: Right.
Bob Colaresi: You know, and so it you know, but that kind of thing.
Bob Colaresi: And that was that was life changing.
Brian Mueller: For me, Bob, it really is exciting for me to hear about your experience and just the wonderful things that happened and that you went through on the rites.
Brian Mueller: I want to keep in mind that some of the guys that are going to be listening to this are not going to have any familiarity with the rites.
Brian Mueller: And so first I want to say, you know, we're talking a little bit about your experiences at the Writes.
Brian Mueller: And just kind of funnily, you know, not everybody's going to be taking off their clothes, but or.
Bob Colaresi: Swinging from the menu.
Bob Colaresi: And I didn't know.
Bob Colaresi: I just, nobody told me to.
Bob Colaresi: I just had that herd.
Bob Colaresi: That was me.
Bob Colaresi: That's me, Bob Colaresi.
Brian Mueller: And there is time at the rites that men will be.
Brian Mueller: Able to spend some time alone in nature.
Brian Mueller: And so that's where some of that comes from.
Bob Colaresi: Go ahead.
Bob Colaresi: Well, I was going to say, no, it's huge.
Bob Colaresi: I think, you know, a couple of things.
Bob Colaresi: There were the rituals we had, there were those short talks.
Bob Colaresi: The small group stuff sharing was incredible.
Bob Colaresi: I was an incredible group.
Bob Colaresi: But that time in nature out there, there was something, I think I always liked it, but somehow it became more alive to me to go out there.
Bob Colaresi: Then they teach you how to be.
Bob Colaresi: Be who you truly are.
Bob Colaresi: And they were very participant, even the tree slapping me twice.
Bob Colaresi: I mean, I just couldn't believe it.
Bob Colaresi: But yeah, no, and I think those were the huge pieces of when I look back that time alone.
Bob Colaresi: Out there was not just those times, but the other times we went out and quiet and listened to, you know, to what was going on inside me, you know, be still and know that I'm God.
Bob Colaresi: And somehow nature has a way of silencing us.
Bob Colaresi: Making us open to listen instead of what am I doing to do to fix this or strangely soon.
Brian Mueller: I really love the enthusiasm you have for sharing your story.
Brian Mueller: I do want to talk a little bit about expectations.
Brian Mueller: One
Brian Mueller: your own.
Brian Mueller: And then other guys, if they're hearing you and having this expectation that they're going to have the same sort of transformative experience that you had, or what would you just say about that, about your expectations?
Brian Mueller: And
Brian Mueller: advising other on theirs or heading into the rites.
Bob Colaresi: I I didn't know what I was looking for.
Bob Colaresi: I know why I went, which was this restless emptiness inside me.
Bob Colaresi: I didn't even name it the inadequacy until it came out of my mouth.
Bob Colaresi: But somehow through the whole process of
Bob Colaresi: the guys being there, the drumming, the talks, the rituals, the time in nature.
Bob Colaresi: That came out of something beyond me.
Bob Colaresi: It wasn't from me, because I would never say I was in Etika, but I knew it.
Bob Colaresi: That it became a revelation, an awakening.
Bob Colaresi: And I'd say anybody, go with no that's why I didn't know what I wanted.
Bob Colaresi: I just knew why I was there.
Bob Colaresi: And but but it was a revelation to me and to everybody else, you know, that like, wow
Bob Colaresi: And so I think as go, just trusting just trusting the experience and trusting the people that are there and trusting nature.
Bob Colaresi: Nature is the first revelation of God.
Bob Colaresi: And somehow that that God is going to help reveal our truer self if you just learn to be still, our expectations get away and they become a vehicle of disappointment a lot of times.
Brian Mueller: Well, it sounds like too you had to trust that initial calling, that initial urge inside you to sign up at the very beginning.
Bob Colaresi: It did.
Bob Colaresi: And it was, you know, and it was only, I remember reading something about that, but about this emptiness.
Bob Colaresi: I had to acknowledge it.
Bob Colaresi: I had been doing that within therapy and stuff and spiritual direction before, but suddenly.
Bob Colaresi: It was there.
Bob Colaresi: I had to acknowledge something.
Bob Colaresi: Most people would say, there's one of the complex old we said, Bob, you know, the reason we gave you all those jobs, you're too damn proud to fail.
Bob Colaresi: Thank you.
Bob Colaresi: Well, it's true.
Bob Colaresi: And suddenly I had to get through that.
Bob Colaresi: And so, and that, those five days were incredibly instrumental for me.
Bob Colaresi: I still think back on them.
Bob Colaresi: I've even gone back and read my notes at some things I wrote after and I've been journaling ever since then, but it's back to what was happening and but it was an awakening
Bob Colaresi: To what was already present within me.
Bob Colaresi: And I've told other people that I know when I was trying to get some of the men at the Paris go, and one of these women, she, well, I don't know, he's going to come back because he went to one of those, you know, whatever thing.
Bob Colaresi: Thinking, you know, a man's in charge and I said, No, he's going to come back.
Bob Colaresi: More of the man you love.
Bob Colaresi: He's going to be more alive into his own truth.
Bob Colaresi: You know, and later she said, Yeah, why was I afraid?
Bob Colaresi: Yeah.
Bob Colaresi: No, I believe that.
Bob Colaresi: You know, I think sometimes we're all afraid of our own truth.
Bob Colaresi: It's so powerful, and yet that's what it's called to be.
Bob Colaresi: We're here to be what God knows us to be.
Bob Colaresi: And I I we have to learn to trust that.
Bob Colaresi: And even when I
Bob Colaresi: Fall back and detour, and let there other stuff that demonic kind of stuff inside me.
Brian Mueller: I just say, come on, get back.
Brian Mueller: And before you
Brian Mueller: Before you decided, before you came, when you first signed up for the men's rites of passage, you told your spiritual director, Susan, and she made you this wonderful drum and everything.
Brian Mueller: But did you tell anyone else?
Brian Mueller: Or was this something you kind of held close?
Bob Colaresi: I held it close.
Bob Colaresi: I told people I was going on a kind of
Bob Colaresi: Retreat vacation.
Bob Colaresi: In fact, the tip the problem was when I came back, because you know, when I came out of it, and I did fly back with my friend in a plane, we had to be there, and he at least started talking.
Bob Colaresi: I don't know what his experience was, but he started looking at me, and I just started tears streaming down my face.
Bob Colaresi: And I said, Oh, God, what's going on?
Bob Colaresi: And so when I came home, you know
Bob Colaresi: That night there was electricity was off in the area of my own house, but I tried to go to the office the next morning, which was Monday, and I just they'd say, Hey, how was your time in the woods?
Bob Colaresi: And I just started crying.
Bob Colaresi: I just teared up.
Bob Colaresi: For two days, I teared up.
Bob Colaresi: I was just embarrassed to see what was happening, but I'm saying, Lord, what's going on?
Bob Colaresi: You know, what's going on?
Bob Colaresi: But it was, um it's hard to go back.
Bob Colaresi: I look back, it feels so silly now.
Bob Colaresi: And uh What was your conversation like with Susan afterwards?
Bob Colaresi: Well, it was weird.
Bob Colaresi: Let me this is a funny piece of it.
Bob Colaresi: One of the things that was on my home phone was that a lady I knew, her son had just died while I was gone.
Bob Colaresi: And I'd known her, and he was always used to druggie.
Bob Colaresi: He was trouble.
Bob Colaresi: He actually overdressed.
Bob Colaresi: So there was a thing about that.
Bob Colaresi: Monday and Tuesday was her the wake and funeral.
Bob Colaresi: So I said, Well, I better get I can't I knew I Tuesday had something.
Bob Colaresi: So I said, I'm gonna go.
Bob Colaresi: So I went over to the church to go to the wake, and she was there, and I was talking.
Bob Colaresi: But I
Bob Colaresi: What I noticed was, I wasn't looking at people.
Bob Colaresi: I knew them all.
Bob Colaresi: I'd been that parish for 20 years at the time.
Bob Colaresi: And it was really funny
Bob Colaresi: And so I went over to Pat for a while and talked with her and then I figured so I'm driving home and I said, Well, there's Susan's house.
Bob Colaresi: She's going to wander off.
Bob Colaresi: So I wanted to tell her that that drum was very significant.
Bob Colaresi: So I go to the door in her house and she says, What do you got?
Bob Colaresi: Your collar?
Bob Colaresi: I said, Well, Pat's a son.
Bob Colaresi: I wanted to go to the wake.
Bob Colaresi: I can't believe you're So she's looking at me and then, you know, she's looking and I said, I just want to talk, how was it?
Bob Colaresi: And I said
Bob Colaresi: I said, it was incredible.
Bob Colaresi: I don't have the words to explain it.
Bob Colaresi: You know, I'm very wordy usually.
Bob Colaresi: And she said, why aren't you looking at me?
Bob Colaresi: And I said, it's okay.
Bob Colaresi: No, it's great.
Bob Colaresi: You know what?
Bob Colaresi: That drumming thing was incredible.
Bob Colaresi: I mean, thank you for that drum.
Bob Colaresi: It was really a gift.
Bob Colaresi: Why aren't you looking at me?
Bob Colaresi: I said, Susan, I'm not, I don't know.
Bob Colaresi: The words are going to shrink this experience.
Bob Colaresi: So I can't, I don't have anything to say about it.
Bob Colaresi: And this went on for like about 10, 15 minutes.
Bob Colaresi: And I said, Susan, I got to go.
Bob Colaresi: I got to go.
Bob Colaresi: I go.
Bob Colaresi: And she said, Don't, don't do darn leave until she's looking at me.
Bob Colaresi: I was, I stayed outside her door.
Bob Colaresi: She's standing at the door.
Bob Colaresi: And so she said, Bob, please look at me.
Bob Colaresi: I don't know what's going on with you But I do look at people when I'm talking to them.
Bob Colaresi: And I looked up at her and she flew back against her where her door was, there was a stairway and she w flew into that wall.
Bob Colaresi: I just got in my car and went home.
Bob Colaresi: I almost drove what's going on here.
Bob Colaresi: So, this was an important piece of it.
Bob Colaresi: And so, about eight o'clock that night,
Bob Colaresi: I get a phone call.
Bob Colaresi: You know, we didn't have cell phones.
Bob Colaresi: You know who was calling.
Bob Colaresi: So I pick it up.
Bob Colaresi: Yeah.
Bob Colaresi: Bob is the Seuss.
Bob Colaresi: Yeah, I said.
Bob Colaresi: And I said, Susan, I'm sorry.
Bob Colaresi: I don't know what's going on.
Bob Colaresi: She said, Just listen to me.
Bob Colaresi: I know why Moses veiled his eyes after he saw God.
Bob Colaresi: And I said, What?
Bob Colaresi: Jim, when you looked at me, I looked right into the heart of your soul.
Bob Colaresi: Well, I said, Oh, my God
Bob Colaresi: But I'll never forget that.
Bob Colaresi: You know, she always and then later, you know, for she died two or three years later, but I remember she said, You never told me about it.
Bob Colaresi: I said, I can't talk.
Bob Colaresi: Words don't explain it.
Bob Colaresi: Yeah.
Bob Colaresi: You know what it was.
Bob Colaresi: And I said, but you helped me understand that somehow something had happened deep within me.
Bob Colaresi: And own it because she was.
Bob Colaresi: It was very important, you know.
Bob Colaresi: And one of the last things she said before she died at her funeral that remember that point, when she said, You never told me about what really happened on the M-ROP.
Bob Colaresi: And I said
Bob Colaresi: You saw the result of it, okay?
Brian Mueller: Bob, that's a wonderful story.
Brian Mueller: I mean, it also illustrates for us the importance of needing some time after the event to kind of
Brian Mueller: And wake up to what's really and what's changed now since you've made your rites, and it's been you know 20 years since you've done that, yeah.
Brian Mueller: You know, what are the substantive changes, the transformation that you feel like took place maybe because of or since those, right?
Brian Mueller: Since that experience?
Bob Colaresi: Well, mostly for me.
Bob Colaresi: I think I'm much more aware when I'm doing things so people will like me or I'm trying to fix them.
Bob Colaresi: You know, instead of out of a genuine love, an empty, self-emptying love.
Bob Colaresi: I think I become more generative, but I get the type because there's a piece of me, I practiced that for 40, 50 years.
Bob Colaresi: It doesn't go away.
Bob Colaresi: I think I'm much more aware when I try to fix things or try to figure out what's wrong with you or what I'm supposed to be doing about it.
Bob Colaresi: No, it's just to listen to you.
Bob Colaresi: I think I listen more to people now.
Bob Colaresi: And know that God is working in them as well as in me.
Bob Colaresi: And I like that.
Bob Colaresi: So I think I'm much more personal.
Bob Colaresi: I mean, people in the office even said that because I had a quick temper and, you know, things.
Bob Colaresi: And
Bob Colaresi: Something happened.
Bob Colaresi: So, and it does, I think when I start looking at people as people and instead of a project that I got to work on, see, that whole thing of reducing you to an object.
Bob Colaresi: As opposed to being with you.
Bob Colaresi: That's that whole thing.
Bob Colaresi: And I think it's in great with the men we work with here and our mid-person councils and stuff.
Bob Colaresi: I think it opened
Bob Colaresi: A side of me that I didn't know well, because I was operating out of my need to prove myself.
Bob Colaresi: My inadequacy was the driving force.
Bob Colaresi: And now I really believe it's the Divine.
Bob Colaresi: Abba or Father, it's the way I pray to God that Abba is working in and through me.
Bob Colaresi: And that changes everything about the way I look at you, deal with you, listen to you.
Bob Colaresi: Instead of reducing you to something that I want can control by fixing you.
Bob Colaresi: See, that that's a subtle it's very subtle, but it's very powerful in a personality like mine.
Brian Mueller: Yeah, and you said that before the rites.
Brian Mueller: I mean, of course, you were familiar with the concept of male initiation and you had read Adam's Return of the United States.
Brian Mueller: Now that you experienced it, not only that, but you've given so much of yourself over the past 20 years to creating that experience for men in Illinois and the surrounding areas and regions.
Brian Mueller: You know, what would you say?
Brian Mueller: How is your understanding of masculinity initiation?
Brian Mueller: How have those changed over time?
Bob Colaresi: Well, I think it's been great having like around here Illinois males.
Bob Colaresi: We've been we used to be Illinois males, we're now the women of Illinois, the name changing.
Bob Colaresi: But there are guys who are sincere, and there are guys who challenge you, love you, listen to you.
Bob Colaresi: I mean, it's really great having a brotherhood.
Bob Colaresi: And I live in the male communities all these years.
Bob Colaresi: And one of them one day said, You're so involved with those guys.
Bob Colaresi: I said
Bob Colaresi: we talk at a different level.
Bob Colaresi: We don't just talk about sports and the weather politics, you know.
Bob Colaresi: And it was really interesting.
Bob Colaresi: And I believe that.
Bob Colaresi: And it's just been a real support in my life.
Bob Colaresi: I think I joined the Carmelites.
Bob Colaresi: I didn't become a Dasin priest.
Bob Colaresi: Because of the loneliness factor, I joined to have community.
Bob Colaresi: And I've had some wonderful communities.
Bob Colaresi: But lately, we've gotten so individualized, there seems to be
Bob Colaresi: If you don't have some close friends, you're alone.
Bob Colaresi: And so I think it's helped that a lot.
Bob Colaresi: Illuman of Illinois all these years.
Bob Colaresi: I was even convener at it for a long time.
Bob Colaresi: I've just met guys that you can share your life with.
Bob Colaresi: And listen, and I share their life.
Bob Colaresi: And it's and I'm interested in them.
Bob Colaresi: And it makes me bigger than who I think I am because I well, it was the center of the damn universe.
Bob Colaresi: You think you're God when you're messianic.
Brian Mueller: Right.
Brian Mueller: That's a wonderful endorsement and very much a reason to advise men to participate in the men's rites.
Brian Mueller: And so finally, I'll just put a point on it.
Brian Mueller: What counsel would you invite would you offer to men considering participating in the rites?
Bob Colaresi: Listen to your heart and go for it and step through any fears.
Bob Colaresi: There's that wonderful song we just sang at Mass: Come back to me with all your heart, don't let fear keep us apart.
Bob Colaresi: I was afraid that I was nothing.
Bob Colaresi: I believe that.
Bob Colaresi: And that's all I do.
Bob Colaresi: And I've tried to convince a number of people to go, and some have had a great time.
Bob Colaresi: Some aren't sure what they got, what they got into.
Bob Colaresi: Other people are afraid of it, you know, because I talk too much about it sometimes, maybe.
Bob Colaresi: But, you know, I did.
Bob Colaresi: But I think, take the risk.
Bob Colaresi: I took the risk at it, even though at that point I had terrible doubts about it.
Bob Colaresi: Right.
Bob Colaresi: Because my fear got in the way.
Bob Colaresi: I'm going to be eaten alive by mosquitoes out of the woods.
Brian Mueller: Well, Bob, thank you so much, brother.
Brian Mueller: Really, I love you, Andrew.
Brian Mueller: I appreciate your honesty and your courage for giving us a window into your experience of the MROP.
Brian Mueller: Thank you.
Bob Colaresi: Thanks for asking, and thank you for the work here.
Bob Colaresi: We need to spread the word.
Bob Colaresi: I think a lot of guys deserve to go on an MREP.
Brian Mueller: Amen.
Brian Mueller: For those listening who are now feeling a tug in their own soul and are curious to learn more, allow me to share a bit about the history of these rites.
Brian Mueller: The Men's rites of Passage was originally developed by Father Richard Rohr, and was first offered at Ghost Ranch, New Mexico, in nineteen ninety six.
Brian Mueller: While it was imported for many years by the Center for Action and Contemplation, since twenty twelve a Lumin has been the steward of this work.
Brian Mueller: Preserving and adapting the rites for men all over the world.
Brian Mueller: To learn more about the history and the theology behind this work, I highly recommend reading Adam's Return by Richard Rohr.
Brian Mueller: If you are ready to make your rites, you can find details and registration information at Illuman dot
Brian Mueller: org
Brian Mueller: Slash MROP or Illuman dot
Brian Mueller: org slash events.
Brian Mueller: Finally, if you enjoyed this podcast, don't forget to share it with a friend.
Brian Mueller: You can find all our episodes and subscribe in your favorite podcast app at m-r-o-p talk dot com, and you can visit me at Brian's Poems dot com or Brian Mueller dot com.
Brian Mueller: Thank you for listening to follow me to the MROP.
Brian Mueller: Until next time, brothers, stay present.