WEBVTT 00:00:03.760 --> 00:00:12.160 Welcome to Follow Me to the MROP, a podcast dedicated to the journey of the masculine soul and the transformative power of initiation. 00:00:11.400 --> 00:00:12.840 My name is Brian Mueller. 00:00:12.840 --> 00:00:18.200 I live in suburban Dayton, Ohio, and I made my rites at Pilgrim Park in Illinois in twenty fourteen. 00:00:18.200 --> 00:00:24.840 I'm your host, and in each episode of our show I'll sit down with one man who has made his rites, and I'll invite him to tell his story. 00:00:24.360 --> 00:00:33.800 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. 00:00:33.260 --> 00:00:43.019 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 Illuman community. 00:00:42.360 --> 00:00:49.240 If this show resonates with you, please take a moment to rate, review, and share it on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen. 00:00:49.240 --> 00:00:52.680 You can find all of those links at mroptalk dot 00:00:52.920 --> 00:00:53.080 com 00:00:53.200 --> 00:00:57.520 To support my work, you can explore my published poetry volumes at BrianMueller dot 00:00:57.600 --> 00:00:58.160 com. 00:00:58.160 --> 00:01:03.120 I also work closely with men and Illuman to share and teach the practice of presence. 00:01:02.360 --> 00:01:04.920 You can learn more about that at choosingpresence dot 00:01:05.000 --> 00:01:05.320 org. 00:01:05.320 --> 00:01:15.640 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. 00:01:14.960 --> 00:01:17.520 On this show we just don't talk about the rites in theory. 00:01:17.520 --> 00:01:19.600 We talk to the men who have walked a path. 00:01:19.600 --> 00:01:23.120 Today I'm joined by a man who has made us rites, and we're going to hear 00:01:23.140 --> 00:01:25.700 Exactly what that journey looked like for him. 00:01:32.860 --> 00:01:34.539 My guest today is Matthew Burch. 00:01:34.539 --> 00:01:35.740 Brother, I'm really glad you're here. 00:01:35.740 --> 00:01:38.619 Thanks for making the time and for being willing to share your story. 00:01:38.619 --> 00:01:40.060 Oh, Brian, thanks for having me. 00:01:40.060 --> 00:01:41.659 Glad to be here. 00:01:41.340 --> 00:01:44.380 Matthew, tell us where you're from and how you spend your time these days. 00:01:44.380 --> 00:01:45.340 Oh, let's see. 00:01:45.580 --> 00:01:49.740 Right now I live in Oklahoma City and have for some time. 00:01:49.740 --> 00:01:51.180 I'm a small business owner. 00:01:51.180 --> 00:01:55.900 I've got a company called Urban Agrarian that I started out in my garage in 2008. 00:01:55.900 --> 00:02:03.180 Although the past few years, particularly after getting involved with the contemplative work, I've spent less time there on a day-to-day basis. 00:02:02.740 --> 00:02:08.420 I've been driving as an Uber driver, and they're going to pay for me to resume school here in just the next few weeks. 00:02:08.420 --> 00:02:15.220 So I'm picking up a bachelor's degree that I set down in the year, oh, probably two zero two or 200 three. 00:02:15.220 --> 00:02:17.220 I'm a college sophomore. 00:02:16.560 --> 00:02:18.959 Now let's dive in and talk about the men's rites of passage. 00:02:18.959 --> 00:02:20.799 The MRLP is a unique experience. 00:02:20.799 --> 00:02:22.560 It's not a retreat or a workshop. 00:02:22.560 --> 00:02:23.599 It's an initiation. 00:02:23.599 --> 00:02:27.760 Many men arrive at the rites at a crossroads in their lives, looking for something they can't quite name. 00:02:27.760 --> 00:02:31.120 Before we dive into the why and the how, let's start at the very beginning. 00:02:30.560 --> 00:02:33.760 Matt, when and where did you make your rites? 00:02:33.760 --> 00:02:39.360 I made my rites in DeRoche, British Columbia in 2024. 00:02:38.940 --> 00:02:41.900 And do you recall who the Weaver was and about how many men were there? 00:02:42.220 --> 00:02:44.700 Ned Abenroth was the Weaver. 00:02:44.700 --> 00:02:47.500 Karim was our ritual elder. 00:02:47.500 --> 00:02:51.819 And if I remember right, we were nearly seventy initiates. 00:02:51.160 --> 00:02:54.200 With a pretty large initiator program as well. 00:02:54.200 --> 00:02:56.520 In the sacred space, there were over 100 men. 00:02:56.520 --> 00:03:02.520 Now, when you think back to that weekend, what's the first image or even feeling that comes forth for you? 00:03:02.220 --> 00:03:07.900 think for me the beauty of the area where those rites were held. 00:03:07.900 --> 00:03:10.540 I'd never been to the Pacific Northwest. 00:03:10.240 --> 00:03:16.320 So I'm in this mountainous rainforest, lush, beautiful space. 00:03:16.320 --> 00:03:23.760 I mean, that struck me right off the bat, and it's probably the first image that I remember when I go back to it. 00:03:23.440 --> 00:03:25.440 I've heard another man describe it. 00:03:25.440 --> 00:03:27.840 I think Brody Fulk was at your rites of passage. 00:03:27.840 --> 00:03:29.200 He was in my council group. 00:03:29.200 --> 00:03:29.840 Oh, great. 00:03:29.840 --> 00:03:34.400 Yeah, he was very yeah, he really liked the scenery of it as well. 00:03:34.060 --> 00:03:40.379 Yeah, I was gonna ask so if someone came up to you on the street and said, Hey, Matthew, you've been to a rites of passage, what was that like? 00:03:40.379 --> 00:03:43.819 What would you just you know, what would you give as a casual answer? 00:03:43.340 --> 00:03:49.820 Well, I told them that it was an initiatory experience with a group of regenerative men. 00:03:51.020 --> 00:03:56.860 A really beautiful experience that I would say shorthand helps you become more yourself. 00:03:56.440 --> 00:03:58.200 helped me become more myself. 00:03:58.599 --> 00:04:08.440 Now without sharing anything that's too personal for you or would betray some confidence from your time and council or anything like that, was there an interaction that you had with another man there that stands out to you? 00:04:08.440 --> 00:04:11.160 Or was there some event or something that was really memorable? 00:04:11.420 --> 00:04:12.540 Oh, so many. 00:04:12.540 --> 00:04:13.100 So many. 00:04:13.100 --> 00:04:14.300 Five days. 00:04:14.300 --> 00:04:21.740 The strongest experience I had of the various activities and rituals there was the day of 00:04:22.420 --> 00:04:24.340 Fasted nature solo. 00:04:24.340 --> 00:04:25.860 That was the most resonant. 00:04:25.860 --> 00:04:33.620 I mean, I've got a lot of journal notes and I've had a lot of reflection on many points of that, of those rites. 00:04:33.560 --> 00:04:46.440 The PNW also takes what's usually called the archetype room in most chapters, and they've expanded that into something that they called the nest. 00:04:46.120 --> 00:04:49.080 which had a an amazing soundtrack. 00:04:49.080 --> 00:04:58.599 It had copies of everything from old sign-in logs of initiations, mrops that happened at Ghost Ranch. 00:04:58.300 --> 00:05:03.660 Two copies of the Koran and the Bible, other holy texts, books of poetry. 00:05:03.900 --> 00:05:08.460 But there was sage burning and palo-santo and incense. 00:05:07.800 --> 00:05:18.600 and meditation cushions and beautiful tapestry rugs and of course the the beautiful archetype posters that that I believe Richard Rohr originally put together. 00:05:18.380 --> 00:05:23.020 This room, yeah, the nest was otherworldly. 00:05:23.020 --> 00:05:23.900 Yeah, thank you for that. 00:05:23.900 --> 00:05:26.940 That's the first I've ever heard the nest described, and you know 00:05:27.460 --> 00:05:31.780 I keep thinking to myself, I've got to get out to the Pacific Northwest and see these rites sometime. 00:05:32.020 --> 00:05:33.220 It really sounds amazing. 00:05:33.540 --> 00:05:39.139 What were the circumstances that were going on in your life at the time that you decided to participate in the rites? 00:05:39.220 --> 00:05:40.979 What led you to do this? 00:05:40.620 --> 00:05:55.020 Well, my first engagement with Illuman work of any type was my mother in law sat on the board of another organization with an Illuman man and heard tale of the youth rites of passage in South Fork, Colorado. 00:05:55.139 --> 00:05:58.100 that had been going on for about fifteen years. 00:05:58.100 --> 00:06:05.780 My son was fifteen at the time, and she suggested that I maybe take my son Cohen to these rites. 00:06:05.139 --> 00:06:07.780 The coordinator was Andrew Rice. 00:06:07.780 --> 00:06:09.860 That's the first man that I spoke to. 00:06:09.860 --> 00:06:17.699 And I got a sense of what would be going on at these youth rites: contemplative prayer, some hiking, some council practice. 00:06:17.420 --> 00:06:23.740 Time by the fire, some drumming, communal meals, and not much technology. 00:06:23.740 --> 00:06:27.260 All butted right up against the Rio Grande River. 00:06:27.260 --> 00:06:28.940 So that sounded good enough for me. 00:06:28.940 --> 00:06:31.180 I hadn't been on a vacation. 00:06:30.400 --> 00:06:33.600 From my job, my small business that I started in ‘08. 00:06:33.600 --> 00:06:38.080 I hadn't been on a vacation anything serious in probably almost a decade. 00:06:38.080 --> 00:06:40.000 And I took my son to these rites. 00:06:40.000 --> 00:06:43.199 I was introduced to the five hard truths. 00:06:42.820 --> 00:06:46.420 At that youth rites, I was introduced to council practice. 00:06:46.420 --> 00:06:49.140 I'd never heard the name Richard Rohr before. 00:06:49.140 --> 00:06:52.420 There was a lot of talk of Junior concepts and 00:06:52.920 --> 00:06:59.560 the history of Christianity, various schools of thought inside of the history of Christian thought. 00:06:59.560 --> 00:07:03.880 Just these amazing conversations, these new names, this new information to jump into. 00:07:03.880 --> 00:07:07.000 And I left those rites with my son. 00:07:06.940 --> 00:07:18.540 after anointing him as a you know as a as a beloved son of of the universe I I left there crying tears of joy and in a way that I never have in my life 00:07:19.320 --> 00:07:25.000 for probably four coming up on four hours driving all the way to Denver. 00:07:25.000 --> 00:07:30.440 So it was undeniable that I had just experienced something that I could not explain. 00:07:30.199 --> 00:07:37.240 I had a lot of curiosity and I wanted to, I wanted to be involved with whatever kind of work these men were doing. 00:07:37.240 --> 00:07:37.560 So 00:07:37.860 --> 00:07:39.700 I lived in Oklahoma City at the time. 00:07:39.700 --> 00:07:43.220 Those youth rites were an extension of Illuman of Texas. 00:07:43.220 --> 00:07:49.860 Oklahoma was an emerging chapter that was really getting most of its support from Illuman of Texas. 00:07:49.860 --> 00:07:50.900 Guidance and 00:07:51.920 --> 00:07:57.280 And know-how, and laying out the path on how Oklahoma would eventually become a chapter. 00:07:57.280 --> 00:08:00.720 At that time in Oklahoma, all we had was a Zoom council. 00:08:00.720 --> 00:08:04.320 So when I was returned home from those youth rites 00:08:04.740 --> 00:08:11.460 Within about a month, I'm jumping on my first Zoom council for Illuman of, Oklahoma, this emerging chapter. 00:08:11.460 --> 00:08:16.260 And I log in, and the first face that I see is a man named John Day. 00:08:15.740 --> 00:08:22.140 John Day and Andrew Rice are two of the want two of the men that helped get this emerging chapter off the ground. 00:08:22.140 --> 00:08:30.220 And John Day just so happened to be my first landlord at the small business I started in Oklahoma City, Urban Agrarian. 00:08:30.039 --> 00:08:32.360 So it was like one of those spiritual breadcrumbs. 00:08:32.360 --> 00:08:44.519 This man, John Day, was always very kind to me, always checking in on me, well before either of us knew that we would be together in council and the Illuman context. 00:08:43.940 --> 00:08:53.620 So that was just one of those synchronicities, one of those breadcrumbs, a part of that thread that I came to understand that I was trying to follow. 00:08:53.060 --> 00:09:01.940 So yeah, the youth rites into into Zoom councils in Oklahoma, into in-person councils in Oklahoma, and then 00:09:02.640 --> 00:09:06.880 Through that process, this all happened in 2023. 00:09:06.880 --> 00:09:11.680 And by, I believe, I took my rites in May of 24. 00:09:11.440 --> 00:09:21.840 Within less than a year of having that experience at the youth rites, I found myself at my own initiation in DeRoche, BC, having attended basically every monthly 00:09:22.160 --> 00:09:26.720 council that that my local emerging chapter chapter had to offer. 00:09:26.720 --> 00:09:31.280 That was a context for me entering DeRoche twenty four, was I was the person that did. 00:09:30.759 --> 00:09:37.639 Come to this work through taking his son to be initiated and had experienced some amazing breakthroughs in council. 00:09:37.639 --> 00:09:43.720 I found myself at those youth rites, you know, weeping on the side of a mountain with men that were strangers. 00:09:43.040 --> 00:09:48.320 To me just hours or days before, and I didn't even know I had tears to cry. 00:09:48.320 --> 00:09:53.680 I didn't know that I was repressing some of my own despair, sadness, fear. 00:09:53.640 --> 00:09:56.120 I really had hidden that from myself well. 00:09:56.120 --> 00:10:01.960 I also had an experience of telling a group in council a story. 00:10:01.540 --> 00:10:09.140 from my past that you know the best phrase I can think is it is that it was potentially something like a repressed memory. 00:10:09.140 --> 00:10:13.779 I was saying out loud a difficult experience that I had had. 00:10:13.640 --> 00:10:15.480 That I hadn't even rehearsed in my head. 00:10:15.480 --> 00:10:17.880 I hadn't thought about since I was younger. 00:10:17.880 --> 00:10:24.600 And it's not something that I had that I had knowingly, consciously sort of repressed or put aside. 00:10:24.060 --> 00:10:27.260 It was just a difficult time that I had never considered. 00:10:27.260 --> 00:10:34.540 And I find myself just in real time involuntarily describing this scene to some people that I had just met days before. 00:10:34.540 --> 00:10:36.380 I didn't know I had any of that in me. 00:10:36.380 --> 00:10:37.980 I really did not. 00:10:38.140 --> 00:10:51.260 It was a big surprise to me what how I behaved and what I found in myself, even just in a five-day initiation rite, that was not even for me. 00:10:50.920 --> 00:10:55.800 You know, I was there helping build a container for my own son's initiation. 00:10:55.800 --> 00:10:56.199 Right. 00:10:56.199 --> 00:10:59.560 So I knew that I needed to seek that out for myself. 00:10:58.860 --> 00:10:59.820 Man, that's beautiful. 00:10:59.820 --> 00:11:01.020 That's an awesome story. 00:11:01.020 --> 00:11:06.860 And I must say that that's the first time I've kind of heard one of the men that I've talked to 00:11:07.920 --> 00:11:12.720 engage in a rites of passage after going to a youth rites of passage for their son. 00:11:13.040 --> 00:11:13.759 That's new to me. 00:11:13.759 --> 00:11:16.639 But I love the fact, too, that you're making the connection there. 00:11:16.639 --> 00:11:19.920 You made that connection and that fathers and sons can definitely do this work together. 00:11:19.920 --> 00:11:22.319 I think that's beautiful. 00:11:21.500 --> 00:11:22.540 So you make the decision. 00:11:22.540 --> 00:11:24.300 You register for the rites of passage. 00:11:24.300 --> 00:11:25.820 You tell your wife, I assume. 00:11:25.820 --> 00:11:27.660 You tell other people you know, your mother-in-law. 00:11:27.660 --> 00:11:29.820 Maybe you tell a spiritual director or other people. 00:11:29.820 --> 00:11:32.380 What was their reaction when you told them, Yeah, I'm going to do this too. 00:11:32.380 --> 00:11:34.620 I'm going to go to rites of passage. 00:11:34.880 --> 00:11:35.840 I was supported. 00:11:35.840 --> 00:11:37.200 I was supported all around me. 00:11:37.200 --> 00:11:40.720 Even people that didn't understand exactly what this work was. 00:11:40.720 --> 00:11:42.160 I think of like my mother. 00:11:42.160 --> 00:11:44.640 She also she didn't know Richard Rohr. 00:11:44.720 --> 00:11:45.840 She hadn't read much about 00:11:46.420 --> 00:11:54.740 maybe the need for initiation in our society or the historic depth, the role that they've played in human development. 00:11:54.339 --> 00:12:02.339 But she knew that I had a strong enough experience and I came back with a certain light in my eyes and fire in my chest that, yeah, I was supported. 00:12:02.339 --> 00:12:04.660 All around me, I was supported. 00:12:03.940 --> 00:12:09.220 So you go to you get on a plane, you go to Vancouver, you go to British Columbia. 00:12:09.220 --> 00:12:16.180 So as you kind of get to the location where the rites are being held, what was the first feeling that you encounter? 00:12:16.040 --> 00:12:23.480 As we approached, I mean, for one, you're going from Vancouver, which I'd never been to, which was just utterly brilliant and beautiful in its own right. 00:12:23.480 --> 00:12:29.880 But as we traveled east out of Vancouver toward DeRoche, which is where the rites were held. 00:12:29.540 --> 00:12:32.820 I mean, I've just never seen scenery quite that beautiful. 00:12:32.820 --> 00:12:37.540 The lushness of the Pacific Northwest, the size of some of the plants. 00:12:37.860 --> 00:12:41.140 There were perennial plants and things that I was familiar with. 00:12:40.839 --> 00:12:47.560 That were just like mega-scale, like Tyrannosaurus Rex scale annals, for instance, or something like that. 00:12:47.560 --> 00:12:50.279 And the blooms, it was just all so beautiful. 00:12:50.279 --> 00:12:54.360 So that setting was very attractive for the rites. 00:12:54.040 --> 00:13:03.720 And when we arrived, just immediately they came and asked for the keys to our rental from the driver. 00:13:03.160 --> 00:13:16.120 and asked us to step out and we within minutes of of our wheels hitting the turf of the of the grounds where the rites were held we were invited toward toward the welcome gauntlet which was in some fairly dense forest 00:13:16.480 --> 00:13:19.440 And, you know, it was just sort of bewildering. 00:13:19.440 --> 00:13:24.880 I'd done the youth rites of passage, and so I had some sense of like the five hard truths. 00:13:24.880 --> 00:13:30.080 But but we one thing that was not used in the youth rites was the concept of the core wound. 00:13:29.720 --> 00:13:41.880 So within maybe the second, third, or fourth person that I approach or reach on this welcome gauntlet, I'm asked if I'm going to be willing to name and honor my core wound. 00:13:41.640 --> 00:13:44.600 I've never even heard that phrase before. 00:13:44.600 --> 00:13:50.680 You know, it was disorienting in a lot of really great ways and certainly set the stage 00:13:50.940 --> 00:13:54.140 Kind of created maybe a portion of that container. 00:13:54.140 --> 00:14:01.580 I certainly felt contained after arriving, being immediately invited into that welcome gauntlet, going through that, and then basically 00:14:02.020 --> 00:14:07.380 than you know, re reuniting with my belongings and getting set up in my cabin. 00:14:07.380 --> 00:14:11.940 I mean, just that little process that we began with there. 00:14:11.740 --> 00:14:13.260 Set the stage well. 00:14:13.500 --> 00:14:14.700 That's exciting to hear. 00:14:14.940 --> 00:14:20.060 I just, you know, the whole welcome gauntlet experience in the natural scenery of DeRoche. 00:14:20.060 --> 00:14:21.100 I love it. 00:14:20.560 --> 00:14:24.240 As the rites began, was there something that you were hoping for? 00:14:24.240 --> 00:14:26.960 Was there something that you were wanting to be initiated into? 00:14:27.280 --> 00:14:30.000 You know, so many things. 00:14:30.000 --> 00:14:32.560 I found as I did 00:14:33.220 --> 00:14:37.060 try to look inside and name and honor that core wound. 00:14:37.060 --> 00:14:43.780 The finest point I could put on it at that time, and I and I haven't improved on this since, but I just hold in my mind that 00:14:43.740 --> 00:14:47.660 the verbiage or the language around this core wound could could potentially shift. 00:14:47.660 --> 00:14:53.740 There could be some depth to it that I've not yet been able to access, but the way that it was verbalized and I still use 00:14:54.020 --> 00:14:57.220 Is a core wound of just feeling like I'm not enough. 00:14:57.220 --> 00:15:01.780 I very much wanted to be initiated into 00:15:02.440 --> 00:15:09.320 into into a situation where where that voice where I could have um a salve for that wound, for that voice. 00:15:09.640 --> 00:15:13.080 Where did - uh fear show up for you within the rites? 00:15:13.080 --> 00:15:14.360 Oof. 00:15:14.220 --> 00:15:16.780 Fear in opening up in council. 00:15:16.780 --> 00:15:25.740 You know, I mean, I can think of several places, but I sit down in council, and once again, it's men who are strangers to me. 00:15:25.500 --> 00:15:33.180 And I make certain assumptions about who's who, who I think naturally will like me, who I think I might need to 00:15:33.800 --> 00:15:44.120 Navigate in a certain way, you know, almost just like the pieces of man, like which parts of myself might these various characters, you know, I'm establishing some theory of mind and 00:15:44.339 --> 00:15:52.500 So, I think that there was fear in really opening up and trying to show my true integrated self inside of council. 00:15:52.300 --> 00:16:02.140 There were times in some of the rituals that I had too much of um too much of a self-consciousness, too much of like an 00:16:02.540 --> 00:16:10.860 A thought that others could be watching me as I participated in these rites and that it just felt awkward. 00:16:10.680 --> 00:16:11.720 Blessings. 00:16:11.720 --> 00:16:14.520 We went to every meal in a line. 00:16:14.520 --> 00:16:17.880 We had a beautiful team of volunteers that fed us every day. 00:16:17.880 --> 00:16:20.440 And before we would fill our plates, 00:16:20.220 --> 00:16:27.020 we would receive a blessing from the man in front of us, and we would in turn give a blessing to the man behind us. 00:16:27.020 --> 00:16:34.300 And for whatever reason, I had a lot of anxiety and fear around what blessing to give. 00:16:34.460 --> 00:16:37.580 Something around my own inner perfectionism. 00:16:37.580 --> 00:16:41.420 You know, I wanted to be giving very good blessings. 00:16:41.420 --> 00:16:43.180 And if I'm in line and 00:16:43.520 --> 00:16:46.720 Nothing particularly profound is coming to my mind. 00:16:46.720 --> 00:16:51.040 Yeah, something akin to fear would well up in me that I just wasn't quite 00:16:51.320 --> 00:17:04.439 Ready for this, that I wasn't enough, that I wasn't ready for this, that I didn't have good blessings, that I didn't really know what I was doing, that I was LARPing something in a way, almost a fake it till you make it kind of thing. 00:17:04.439 --> 00:17:04.760 And 00:17:05.220 --> 00:17:16.100 That certainly subsided as I dove in and just allowed myself similarly to how you would do in council to just speak from the heart and be spontaneous. 00:17:15.720 --> 00:17:23.240 I could tell that there were times that I would give a blessing that I didn't find particularly profound, but the receiver on the other end certainly did. 00:17:23.240 --> 00:17:27.400 You know, it came to them like a you know, like a little spiritual bread crumb or something. 00:17:27.400 --> 00:17:29.480 And so I tried to let go of 00:17:29.900 --> 00:17:35.420 My understanding of what made for a really particularly profound blessing or not. 00:17:35.420 --> 00:17:38.460 But that was unusual to me. 00:17:37.940 --> 00:17:41.380 I had not done anything quite like that in my life. 00:17:41.700 --> 00:17:49.539 Even praying, saying grace, things like that were which were a part of my childhood growing up in a Nazarene context. 00:17:49.340 --> 00:17:59.020 But blessing each other in that way, that personal, intimate action, was not really part of anything that I was familiar with. 00:17:58.600 --> 00:17:59.559 I really appreciate that. 00:17:59.559 --> 00:18:00.279 Thank you. 00:18:00.279 --> 00:18:03.559 And appreciate your volume vulnerability in that response as well. 00:18:03.559 --> 00:18:05.000 So you get through the rites, right? 00:18:05.000 --> 00:18:05.559 So it's 00:18:05.960 --> 00:18:09.720 I don't mean to glaze over the entire rites, but you know, that's not really what I want to go into. 00:18:09.960 --> 00:18:11.640 I want to hear more about your broad experience. 00:18:11.640 --> 00:18:19.080 And we certainly want men who encounter the rites to have some sort of novelty as they come in and not know all the details of the rites. 00:18:19.080 --> 00:18:20.520 But you make it through the weekend. 00:18:20.820 --> 00:18:24.980 uh all the ritual events, uh the time in nature as you you mentioned earlier. 00:18:24.980 --> 00:18:30.580 And uh the rites are over and you're you're leaving DeRoche, you're heading back to Vancouver to fly out. 00:18:30.580 --> 00:18:31.460 How did you feel? 00:18:31.460 --> 00:18:33.540 And what were you feeling right in that moment? 00:18:33.540 --> 00:18:35.220 Wonder, awe, 00:18:36.260 --> 00:18:47.140 I was rolling over various synchronicities that had happened over the course of those days, very at home in my own skin. 00:18:47.440 --> 00:18:56.400 Voices of sort of shame and fear and were much more muffled. 00:18:56.220 --> 00:18:58.140 Yeah, I felt at home in my own skin. 00:18:58.140 --> 00:18:59.900 I felt at home in the world. 00:18:59.900 --> 00:19:08.700 And I felt like I had found some work that I could continue to grow deeper into. 00:19:08.720 --> 00:19:10.320 Tons of brotherly love. 00:19:10.320 --> 00:19:11.760 Tons of brotherly love. 00:19:12.000 --> 00:19:18.480 The men in my council that, like I said early on, I thought, oh, maybe I won't get along with this guy so well, or maybe 00:19:18.919 --> 00:19:33.000 through that initiatory process and through the various councils that happened throughout, by the end of it, not only was I seeing myself in a different light and finding a lot of really loving sort of 00:19:33.500 --> 00:19:38.620 Pro-social attitudes toward myself, but I was finding it for all the men around me. 00:19:38.620 --> 00:19:46.860 I mean, I couldn't believe how beautiful they all were when they really bore themselves, sometimes beautiful in their own suffering. 00:19:46.919 --> 00:19:52.600 sometimes beautiful in their in their own sort of skill or unique gifts. 00:19:52.600 --> 00:19:56.120 But but I just I I found it all so beautiful. 00:19:56.120 --> 00:19:58.440 And I was amazed at how 00:20:00.140 --> 00:20:09.340 I want to say similar, we all felt, but the universality, there was something just very, very universal about the existence of all these men. 00:20:09.120 --> 00:20:13.280 you know, that that was contained in me, but was also contained in them. 00:20:13.280 --> 00:20:18.400 And it just seemed to me that that almost, you know, I kind of had a 00:20:19.200 --> 00:20:32.240 A vision that just almost any human with the right little bit of polish and effort on their own behalf mostly, but also in the eye of the beholder. 00:20:31.660 --> 00:20:39.260 that you could just find this brilliant radiant beauty inside of any anyone 00:20:40.860 --> 00:20:46.140 And I saw it profoundly in the men I was in council with and the men I was initiated with. 00:20:46.140 --> 00:20:49.740 But it just gave me a sense that literally any of us 00:20:50.720 --> 00:20:52.480 Has this inside of us. 00:20:53.440 --> 00:20:58.560 A beautiful story to beheld 00:20:58.940 --> 00:21:03.019 And, like I said, beautiful sufferings along the way. 00:21:03.019 --> 00:21:07.019 And just yeah, just something really gorgeous about the totality of it all. 00:21:07.419 --> 00:21:10.860 What did you bring back with you from the rites for your son? 00:21:12.059 --> 00:21:17.260 Meaning those youth rites, or what did I bring back from my own MROP for my son? 00:21:17.580 --> 00:21:21.260 Yeah, you know, he went through an initiatory, you know, ritual. 00:21:20.740 --> 00:21:21.940 First, and then you did it. 00:21:21.940 --> 00:21:28.340 And I'm just wondering what you could bring back from the men's rites to share with your son who had already been through a rites experience of his own. 00:21:28.440 --> 00:21:34.279 Oh, another layer and round of just deep appreciation and love. 00:21:34.279 --> 00:21:41.320 I mean, any time that I come back from an Illuman event to see my family for the first time, and in particular my sons. 00:21:41.200 --> 00:21:48.720 My access to just really deep, profound love for them is always very, very present. 00:21:48.720 --> 00:21:50.960 You know, raising young boys, there can be a lot of 00:21:51.740 --> 00:22:01.100 little bits of conflict or things that I'm trying to guide them toward that they're stubbornly not doing, or just things inside of the household, things at school, things 00:22:02.179 --> 00:22:14.820 You know, that sometimes can cause some static just in day-to-day life, but that all falls away and fell away for me after my men's rites. 00:22:14.800 --> 00:22:22.720 And just there was a really there's a place of spaciousness and and just I guess that 00:22:23.720 --> 00:22:28.760 That feeling of being able to get a really strong sense of other people's wholeness. 00:22:28.760 --> 00:22:36.600 People at the rites, people at the airport afterward, getting a sense of that and just musing and imagining about it, and then engaging with my own sons. 00:22:36.600 --> 00:22:37.640 And. 00:22:37.720 --> 00:22:47.960 Just, yeah, being able to have a much clearer perception of their wholeness and belonging in this time and place in the world. 00:22:47.820 --> 00:22:51.260 I just want to accentuate what you said there, a sense of other people's wholeness. 00:22:51.980 --> 00:22:53.260 That's really lovely. 00:22:53.260 --> 00:23:01.580 So what has changed in your life since making the rites of passage and thinking spiritually, relationally, maybe even practically? 00:23:01.519 --> 00:23:03.039 Man, a lot. 00:23:03.039 --> 00:23:04.000 A lot. 00:23:04.000 --> 00:23:10.799 I bet if we could quiz my wife on this, she would say that I'm much less angry. 00:23:10.820 --> 00:23:19.780 You know, I had a fair amount of repressed anger that through this process I've been able to engage with more directly and understand its source. 00:23:19.419 --> 00:23:23.100 and grieve the things that that are related to it. 00:23:23.260 --> 00:23:26.780 I'm also putting a ton less pressure on myself to 00:23:27.600 --> 00:23:33.039 You know, come to find out, I was sort of trying to justify my own existence through my projects in the world. 00:23:33.039 --> 00:23:39.679 And I had a lot of there were there were false securities that I was cloaking myself in. 00:23:40.080 --> 00:23:46.720 not quite realizing that I was more insecure and anxious than I would have wanted to admit publicly. 00:23:46.720 --> 00:23:49.840 So yeah, being able to peel back some of these layers 00:23:50.120 --> 00:23:57.240 see some of these false securities, see some of these resentments that I was holding so dearly and indulging in. 00:23:57.560 --> 00:23:59.000 I found a lot more patience. 00:23:59.000 --> 00:24:01.080 I found less reactivity. 00:24:01.080 --> 00:24:02.280 I found more 00:24:03.100 --> 00:24:10.779 Routine around my meditative practice, more routine around my journaling practice, more inquisitiveness into some of my own reactions. 00:24:10.779 --> 00:24:11.980 It's not that I'm 00:24:12.220 --> 00:24:16.140 This is Guan Yin, the bodhisattva of mercy, sitting behind me. 00:24:16.140 --> 00:24:22.140 It's not that I become a bodhisattva or someone, you know, some great wise master in these moments, but I. 00:24:22.700 --> 00:24:31.260 Certainly, I have a confidence that I might be on a path towards something that I could call elderhood later in life. 00:24:31.240 --> 00:24:38.919 And more accepting curiosity around the things that happen in my own experiential 00:24:39.600 --> 00:24:42.320 consciousness, you know, as things come up. 00:24:42.320 --> 00:24:45.519 I'm less judgmental toward myself and others. 00:24:45.519 --> 00:24:48.799 And I just have more patience. 00:24:48.900 --> 00:24:57.860 And honestly, I wouldn't have understood before you know, some years ago, I wouldn't have understood even what a phrase like heart wisdom meant or sort of love wisdom or 00:24:58.740 --> 00:25:08.980 This feeling from the heart, this heart intelligence and love wisdom, these concepts, now they're experiential. 00:25:09.000 --> 00:25:10.760 Inside of myself. 00:25:10.760 --> 00:25:22.760 And so even if I don't feel that I'm always living directly out of the core of that place, I know what it feels like to be getting farther from it and being more judgmental and cold and 00:25:23.320 --> 00:25:26.520 scabbing toward toward the world and myself. 00:25:26.520 --> 00:25:30.840 And I know what it feels like to be in something more like this place of 00:25:31.519 --> 00:25:32.960 heart wisdom. 00:25:32.960 --> 00:25:38.320 Yeah, just that that feeling component, that emotional component, I'm much more in touch with. 00:25:38.559 --> 00:25:41.440 My emotional intelligence. 00:25:41.600 --> 00:25:47.600 I don't know how I might test or show it, but it certainly increased in me. 00:25:48.480 --> 00:25:52.320 Experientially, I feel its increase in me. 00:25:52.140 --> 00:26:01.260 You made a comment earlier that if I was to ask your wife or someone was to ask your wife about how the rites changed you, she would probably say something about you being less angry. 00:26:01.260 --> 00:26:02.860 And I got to admit, I can relate to that. 00:26:02.860 --> 00:26:04.540 And so I'm going to ask you about your 00:26:05.179 --> 00:26:07.980 How the rites impacted your relationship with your wife? 00:26:08.380 --> 00:26:12.539 It's a little it's a little she has a little bit of fun with me, I'll admit. 00:26:13.820 --> 00:26:20.220 She has jokingly and lovingly told some of our friends before that I've joined a cult. 00:26:20.700 --> 00:26:22.860 She's just teasing. 00:26:23.260 --> 00:26:26.940 She's actually sat in council with me some since then, but 00:26:27.419 --> 00:26:37.980 But because these words, ritual, initiation, rites of passage, they're not necessarily everyday parlance. 00:26:37.720 --> 00:26:46.040 And so she doesn't always know how to describe these things in shorthand when someone's asking what I'm up to. 00:26:46.040 --> 00:26:51.480 So some of her shorthand has been this sort of joking Matt's joining a cult thing. 00:26:51.380 --> 00:26:55.620 And then she lets me she lets me describe the experiences. 00:26:55.620 --> 00:27:00.500 But she's been yeah, how has it affected my relationship with my wife? 00:27:00.500 --> 00:27:00.820 Well 00:27:02.840 --> 00:27:09.720 She's amongst the people that really kind of helped set me off in this direction toward these contemplative practices. 00:27:09.720 --> 00:27:12.280 She's encouraged me along the way. 00:27:12.400 --> 00:27:22.560 A lot of the ways that we have conflict in our lives are still there, but they're not nearly as knotted and tangled, and the brambles don't have nearly as many thorns. 00:27:21.820 --> 00:27:34.940 I know, especially when there are things that she finds in me that she finds distasteful or counterproductive to something in our lives, I'm much more able to listen to that. 00:27:35.280 --> 00:27:37.600 these days, and it's not as reactive. 00:27:37.600 --> 00:27:39.760 I'm not as defensive. 00:27:40.080 --> 00:27:45.520 Not that I never am, and I certainly don't have all this stuff down pat or perfect, but 00:27:45.660 --> 00:27:57.020 I think it's helped us to deepen our understanding of each other and directly say things to each other that sometimes can be difficult or hard, finding sort of the courage to say 00:27:57.620 --> 00:28:07.380 say things to each other that um before might have been we might have been working, you know, I I might have used much more clandestine 00:28:08.300 --> 00:28:09.100 Processes. 00:28:09.100 --> 00:28:12.940 You know, I wouldn't say directly what I wanted or needed or what I was feeling. 00:28:12.940 --> 00:28:16.380 I would use some other substitute and mask the whole thing. 00:28:17.120 --> 00:28:20.560 Some second third person ordeal. 00:28:20.560 --> 00:28:24.480 So I guess I'm saying all that to say that direct communication 00:28:24.740 --> 00:28:35.700 and less reactivity are both sort of hallmarks to ways that that my relationship with my wife has changed since I got into Illuman and contemplative work. 00:28:35.600 --> 00:28:37.120 I love it. 00:28:37.120 --> 00:28:48.639 So I'm going to take it for granted that the rites, both the youth rites and the men's rites that you experienced, shifted your perspectives on masculinity, initiation and even the male journey. 00:28:47.900 --> 00:28:50.380 But I want to ask you how how did they change those things? 00:28:50.380 --> 00:28:51.740 How you view those things now? 00:28:52.060 --> 00:28:58.460 I think before I started any of this work, I think I was very much in a warrior archetype. 00:28:57.919 --> 00:29:08.480 And being reminded of the fact that there are other modes of existence for men, you know, the lover, the king, the sort of sacred fool or jester. 00:29:08.820 --> 00:29:15.700 Those were all components of myself that I recognized over the course of my life, but I had gotten into a mode where I just was 00:29:16.800 --> 00:29:30.480 Where I thought that my primary role was to sort of fight in the world, fight for what I thought was good and true and right, but always with the fighting and always with the armor and always with the weapons. 00:29:30.140 --> 00:29:32.300 and always with the conflict. 00:29:32.300 --> 00:29:37.260 So I think that that's a big I think that's been a big shift for me. 00:29:37.260 --> 00:29:41.100 There's, of course, a place for that warrior archetype. 00:29:40.700 --> 00:29:46.060 you know, as men, for us to embody and embrace in ourselves. 00:29:46.380 --> 00:29:53.420 But I do think that myself and a lot of men that I know get get sort of 00:29:54.400 --> 00:30:00.720 It seems like maybe our culture really overemphasizes that particular component of the male psyche. 00:30:00.720 --> 00:30:01.919 And that's where I was. 00:30:01.919 --> 00:30:06.400 And it felt so freeing to be able to engage other parts of my 00:30:07.980 --> 00:30:13.100 Being as opposed to just always being in this warrior zone. 00:30:13.419 --> 00:30:20.539 The the the tenderness and the openness and the um you know, I didn't know that men could be this vulnerable 00:30:20.919 --> 00:30:25.400 And just how beautiful that had a capacity to be. 00:30:25.400 --> 00:30:28.600 Loving towards each other, vulnerable 00:30:28.820 --> 00:30:43.220 And supportive, patient, understanding, teaching, just all these things that I would have nurturing, all these things that I would have associated more with women in my life, with my mother and with female relationships. 00:30:43.140 --> 00:30:52.500 To know that there are parts of me that can be nurtured and tended to and supported through a masculine lens 00:30:52.460 --> 00:30:53.980 That was all new to me. 00:30:53.980 --> 00:30:55.740 That was all new to me. 00:30:55.740 --> 00:30:58.700 I did not have a good relationship with my father growing up. 00:30:58.700 --> 00:31:02.220 I met my biological father when I was 24 years old. 00:31:01.940 --> 00:31:05.779 I had a fairly fraught relationship with a stepfather. 00:31:05.779 --> 00:31:09.940 And so, through most of my developmental years, 00:31:09.840 --> 00:31:16.000 I had significant trust issues, in particular around men, in particular around men in authority. 00:31:16.000 --> 00:31:20.799 And I acted out through my late teenage and into my early twenty years. 00:31:20.900 --> 00:31:28.740 I acted out against that authority in ways that were not particularly healthy or helpful to me. 00:31:28.700 --> 00:31:41.100 Yeah, to be able to rekindle a trusting relationship with men, you know, in a one-on-one basis helped me to heal some of my sort of global 00:31:42.060 --> 00:31:46.780 you know, mental attitudes toward men, masculinity, authority. 00:31:46.780 --> 00:31:49.740 Yeah, that that all of that was very significant for me. 00:31:49.740 --> 00:31:52.060 And it's still a work in progress. 00:31:52.000 --> 00:31:59.600 You know, over my years of involvement with Illuman, I'm coming to realize more and more that there's a lot of guys out there that are probably interested in this work. 00:31:59.600 --> 00:32:03.440 They may have heard of Illuman, they know Richard Rohr, they may even know the Mankind Project. 00:32:03.440 --> 00:32:05.120 They realize that there are some of these 00:32:05.440 --> 00:32:09.440 ritual rites experiences out there that are available to them. 00:32:09.440 --> 00:32:18.639