Marilyn Rodriguez is a masterful coach, and I am graced with her help birthing my first book. She recently asked me to write a brain-dump for why I was writing this book. This is the raw, mostly unedited response I wrote to her:
I want men to have a book that they can pick up and have lots of “Oh, yeah, I can see that” or “OMG, I’ve always felt that I was the only one” moments. I want them to pick it up and re-read sections around communication, intimacy, up-leveling their behaviors. I want it to be a true guidebook on how to live life happily in the 21st century.
I want the book to be a wake-up call for guys. I want them to see that they are not going to make it resting on their laurels. The game of them being kings just because they are born male are OVER. Game over, and they need to gear up and get back to the mat to learn the basic skills of being nice, real, vulnerable and communicate.
I want them to learn how to LISTEN and to enjoy LISTENING. I want them to show the women in their lives that they can be told the truth and want to be educated on how to best love them.
I want to reiterate the power and value of the #METOO experience for the healing of the genders. YES, it will be tender for a while as all wounds are, but healing can happen faster than most think if handled deliberately and carefully. The genders can see eye to eye.
Men NEED to truly look at how they have co-created this situation of inequality and the negative repercussions of that concept.
Even the nice guys have in ways they are not privy to. They co-created it by allowing their brothers to abuse women. They need to put down their egoic shields, open their hearts, pull the wax from their ears, and LISTEN.
They need to walk in a woman’s shoes down the streets of NYC or in the boardroom or their father’s house and really understand the subtle ways that abuse of the feminine has occurred and continues to occur. It’s not okay for men to say “it’s not me” because, even if you’ve never catcalled a woman or coerced a woman into a sexual situation, we’ve all participated in bad behavior around them.
I want men to have permission to explore their emotions in all avenues of life. I want to give them the gift of fear, sadness, anger, and desire. I want them to know that “THEIR EMOTIONS are RIGHT!” I want them to be able to fully explore them, ask questions about them, and talk to their intimate friends about them.
I want men to not have to wear masks in order to survive and thrive in today’s world.
I want men not to rely on formulas for success. I want them to have the mastery to use both logic and intuition, historical info and moment by moment stimuli, right and left brain to guide them in all aspects of their lives. When something doesn’t FEEL right, I want them to not shun it. I want them to embrace their feminine not as a curse but as an opportunity. I want them to truly feel their infinite powerful nature. In my upcoming book, I show them how to do this.
For those confused by men, I want them to understand the intense challenges men are facing but won’t reveal. I want them to know that they are good men underneath their facades and even if they act like boys, they truly just want to love. I want them to understand that there is a lot of FORGIVENESS that must happen for the genders to heal the rift.
And, I want the book to be a success. I want people to talk about it, share it, sneak it on their partner’s nightstands, go, “Oh you should read unHIDDEN”. I want all the best talk shows to call me and say “come on the show” or their stage. I want the podcasts to ask me to come on and talk about it. I want it viral. I want it everywhere. AND, most importantly, I want to get that email from that lonely guy in Iowa or Belgium or Japan saying, “Thanks. I needed that.”
My book, unHIDDEN, will release this fall and you can pre-order your copy. All pre-orders will be personally signed by me and recipients will receive a special unHIDDEN gift.