Andrew Horn: How Men Find Success and Fulfillment Through Personal Integrity and Relational Leadership | #153

Speaker A: I'm never going to regret any time investing into the relationships that matter. I can trust integrity as a pathway to living a, uh, fulfilling, successful life. And simply being myself is an act of service that helps other people to do the same thing.

Speaker B: Welcome to the Wild show with your hosts, Will Chang, Li Chang and Andrew Hsu. Hi. Uh, this is Will Chang and today we have our friend Andrew Horn with us. Andrew is a serial entrepreneur turned coach and master facilitator. Andrew helps ambitious founders and CEOs like those at Toms Shoes, Hinge and Casper master the inner game of leadership to maximize their impact and build low drama, high performance teams. Most recently, he was also the co founder and CEO of Tribute. For the last eight years, Andrew has been running Junto, a uh, men's leadership retreat for guys who are curious about men's work and serious about personal growth. I recently participated in Andrew's Junto in Austin a couple weeks ago and had an incredible time. Welcome Andrew.

Speaker A: Thanks so much for having me. Will. Excited to be here.

Speaker B: So I had such a great time with you over the last couple of weekends that I ended up asking you to become my coach. Over those three days I spent with you, I could definitely feel that you live by what you preach and your life feels so full because of it. Can you tell us a little bit about Junto and and what inspired you to create it?

Speaker A: I think it's the amalgamation of so many experiences. But if I were to synthesize it all into one thing, I would say that there was a um, moment that I experienced when I was 27 that I really wanted to share with other men. And so quick backstory here is. I grew up in Hawaii and experienced a lot of racial discrimination growing up. Which is odd thing for a middle class white kid to experience, but in Hawai, not uncommon. And I felt really lonely and ostracized. And I had an opportunity to move to just outside of Washington D.C. when I was 13. And my mom happens to be a world class communicator, speaker, author, she's published 13 books in the realm of interpersonal dynamics and public speaking. And it was around this time that I started to at seriously 13, 8th grade reading books on communication by folks like Jack Canfield and Robert Cialdini, you name it. And because I so deeply wanted to belong, I wanted to be able to woo a girl I was interested in. I wanted to be able to belong to the popular group. I wanted friends, I wanted community, I wanted to be liked. And I thought that if I studied these tools of communication and connection, then I'd be able to do that. So that's where my journey with relational dynamics really began. And then I went through high school and college, and I mastered a lot of these tools and techniques. And I became a cool kid, and I had the girlfriends. And after college, I was able to start my first organization, a nonprofit when I was 21 and had raised millions of dollars by the time I was 24. Gave a TEDx talk when I was 23. But something was true under the service that no one really knew, which was, even though I was achieving externally and things looked good, I was constantly experiencing this dissonance of insecurity, anxiety, this deep clenching in my belly when I was a room of my friends, Cottonmouth, when I was giving up to give a talk about subject matter that I was passionate about. And everything changed. When I was 27, I got invited to a workshop on something called Gestalt Communication. So Gestalt is this kind of now unpopular therapeutic modality, not widely used, but it's ultimately all about full presence and transparency. And to help you understand what that means, I get to this workshop in Cleveland, Ohio, and the facilitator kicks everything off, and he says, okay, I'm going to invite you to practice these three pillars of authenticity, curiosity, and presence while you're here this weekend. So authenticity means anything you're thinking and feeling is real, valid, deserving of voice. Curiosity means trust your curiosity to its end. If you have a question, ask it and be fully present, which means come out of any sort of story from the past or prediction of what the future holds. Just be fully here. And he says, if you do that, you're going to have a novel experience. And I'm kind of an astronaut when I go to these personal development workshops. So I'm like, okay, let's try that on for size and see what happens. And so one of the first exercises is this contact improv thing where we're walking around the room and he invites us to then stop. And he's like, whoever you're standing next to go and face that person, look into their eyes and stand toe to toe. And so it's a man who's probably 10, 15 years older than I am. He has glasses on. And they say, okay, whoever has, uh, longer hair, which is me, I want you to share with that person exactly what you're thinking right now. And the first thing I was thinking was, this feels homoerotic. And I don't allow myself to get this close to other men because they'll think that I'm gay. And that was exactly what I was feeling in that moment. I've never said anything like that in my entire life. And the man across from me, he hits his chest twice with his fist. And that means, oh, uh, me too. I feel that way. That's something that they taught us there. And then I go back to my seat and I notice that I have this electricity. I can still feel it in my body right now, but it's coursing through my body. And I was like, man, if this is what telling the truth feels like, I never feel this way. I never feel this way, right? And so now I'm in this curiosity, mindset. I mean, what's going on here? And there's this second instance where kind of the illusion of reality as I was living it truly came crumbling down. And there was a woman there named Megan. I have her permission to tell the story. Megan, super successful media entrepreneur. We were two of the only people in our 20s in this workshop. Everyone else was basically a 40, 50 year old entrepreneur CEO. I was trying to connect with her, but I just noticed that in all my conversations I had that response where she's looking around the room. She's not really giving it back to me or asking questions. And so I start to pull away and withdraw and I'm noticing this in me. And then Megan is coming over to the coffee machine during our first break and I'm already standing there, I'm filling up a cup and I was like, okay, authenticity. Anything you're thinking and feeling is real valid and deserving of a voice. So I stop her and say, hey, Megan, can I share something with you? And she says, yeah, of course. And I was like, so I just want to let you know I love everything you've built. It's super impressive. And I also wanted to share that I've been trying to connect with you and ask questions, but I haven't really felt you reciprocating or asking me any back. And that's all good, but I just want to let you know that I'm going to stop and if you ever do want to chat, just let me know and I'd be happy to connect. And you know the story because I told it to you at Junto. But basically what happens is she pauses for three seconds and then she essentially starts crying. And my first thought is, oh man, this authenticity stuff is bullshit. Like, this is not working at all the way I want it to. But then she opens up and she says, andrew, she's like my boyfriend. And I are breaking up. She's like, I'm not sure that I'm gonna, like, get the fundraising I need to keep this company afloat. This is the last place on the planet that I want to be right now. And it was like the end of Matrix 1 when Neo kind of sees all the code and Agent Smith is trying to shoot him with the gun. He's just like, no. But he sees the nature of his reality. And it was in that moment that I saw the nature of my reality, which is I wasn't actually responding to Megan. The insecurity that I experienced around her was the product of my story about her not thinking I was smart or successful. And that's what created that anxiety in me. And I realized that I wasn't just doing that in this conversation with Megan. I was doing it in every relationship in my life. I was doing it with my wife. I was doing it with my mom. I was doing it with my co founder. And so I sat back in the room at the end of the break, and then there was another element that just stamped the importance of what was happening, which was Megan sat down and the facilitator says, does anyone have anything that they want to share before we get going? And Megan says, yeah, I do. I don't want to be here. And the facilitator kind of laughs, and he says, great, thanks so much for sharing. And then someone else raises his hand. He's a banker. He's, uh, a New York guy. And he says, you know, I get what you're trying to do here, but also, I'm an I banker. Like, this type of fluffy, emotional language like, this isn't going to fly with the people I work with. And he's like, hey, great, thanks so much for doing that. One other person raises their hand. And it was in that moment where what I witnessed was I just shared what was real for me with Megan. And then Megan just shared what was real for her that she likely wouldn't have shared otherwise, which then empowered another person to share the thing that they were holding onto that they likely wouldn't have shared. And I realized that when I did it intentionally, my authenticity could be an act of service that made it easier for other people to share the hard things that they're holding onto. And in that moment, I realized that I'm a nerd for communication and relational dynamics. And if it's hard for me, my mind could immediately make the stretch to say that, well, if it's hard for me, maybe it's hard for everybody. And so the next thing that I sought to do was create a men's group, where historically, men's groups are these places where men would come together and they would speak honestly about the totality of their lives and their challenges and their struggles. And so I reached out to, uh, 12 of my friends, and I said, hey, guys, I want to start a men's group. We're just going to come together every single week for two hours, and we're going to talk about our feelings, and we're going to explore what it means to be a man. And after the first meeting, I reached out to 12 of these friends. Each one of them said yes. Every single friend said yes. We. Once again, my mind is like, maybe you're onto something here. I remember that at the end of the first meeting, one of my friends, Neil, he's a really successful entrepreneur, and he just kind of pauses. We're all getting up to leave, and he just looks at everyone and he says, I feel so much less alone. And I get goosebumps when I say that, but it's like. And everyone said, yeah, me too. These are my best friends. I love these guys. They love the shit out of me. But it was having a space where we could truly go to that next layer of depth that was so special. And a year later, you know, my interest in this space of men's work was confounded because we were also in the midst of the MeToo movement. And so there was this profound questioning that was happening about what it means to be a man, and also what is some of the harm that perhaps we have brought unto others unconsciously? And so there was this collective questioning. So it was a, uh, perfect storm of me having this awakening of realizing that techniques and tools are great for connecting with people, for speaking with authority, doing the things you want. But I realized what people really want is the experience of being themselves, of being honest. And I started to ask myself the question of how can we do that in a way that is constructive? How can we be honest and tell the truth in a way that engineers connection that allows us to lead effectively and have the impact that we'd like to in the world? And so went out on a whim and invited probably 50 guys to a retreat in October of 2018. And 20 said yes, and the rest is history. And now we just set out our invite for our 25th retreat.

Speaker B: One of the things that really resonated with me during the retreat that you said was that depression is not expressing yourself or something along the lines. And maybe you can repeat back to me exactly what you said, but it resonated with me a lot because there was a point in time where I didn't share. And because I didn't share, I fell into like a deep depression. And it wasn't until I had broken up with my ex fiance that I started to share. And I realized that there was this connection that was missing. And I felt like when we went into the retreat, there was a lot of guys that were kind of holding onto something that you were teaching them how to vocalize or how do you share? Could you just repeat back to me what you said to us and then maybe we could explore that a little bit more?

Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. And this is, in my experience as a coach is anytime I've been working with someone who is experiencing depression, it is typically one of two reasons is number one, they are unwilling or incapable of feeling what they're feeling or they're unwilling to share what they're feeling. So they're unwilling to feel what they're truly feeling or they're unwilling to share the thing that they're feeling. And I will very rarely if ever use the word healing because to me, feeling is the gateway to wholeness. Where we can just accept all parts of ourself, where we can enact a process that allows us to take the wisdom that's available in our emotions and identify the noise and untruths that that oftentimes they try and send towards our mind. So depression is often not feeling and not sharing.

Speaker B: I've run very small men's groups before, maybe six to eight people. And when I see you run a, uh, three day long weekend with 20 guys, like the capacity that you have to basically hold all these guys and to make them feel safe is an incredible skill is watching like a master at work. Right? So could you kind of just explain to me or help me understand how do you create the environment for a bunch of guys that don't know each other to come into a weekend and to be able to start figuring out how to feel their feelings and uh, actually share their feelings?

Speaker A: I will say this, I love experience. Design is one of my great passions. And it is, as much as any other, the art form that I have committed my life to mastering and exploring and activating. That just comes from an experience where when I proposed to my ex wife, Mickey, I brought together 30 people. I got everyone dressed in whites and got them on two buses and brought them to a surprise venue in Hudson and had them waiting in the woods making like a tunnel with Flowers as she took off a blindfold and was like, where am I? And friends cooking in the woods. And threw a rave until 7am in the morning on the Hudson River. And I woke up the next morning and I was like, that's the best thing I've ever done. And I realized, what is that? It was like, oh, it's because I'm creating this experience, which is in and of itself, art. Uh, I'm bringing together my favorite people, we're having fun, and it's deeply connected. And I was like, that feels like the best use of my energy. So the way that I keep that energy so high and connected is first and foremost because I love what I do. And I met a guy at Esalen last year over New Year's, and he said, if you want to inspire others, be inspired. And I love that concept. And so, so much of what I do is really sharing the things that I have either experienced or learned or created that have been most meaningful in my life. And so I don't need to fake or pretend at all when I'm actually in that space, facilitating, because it's so alive for me. Right? So that's what I would say there. It's like, that's what allows me to maintain that type of energetic presence for three days straight. And then there's so much that I could say about how to create a great container. But as much as anything tactile I could offer you is the way to create a strong container is clear agreements. And, um, so this is true for transformational retreat. This is true for building culture, but having really clear and explicit agreements and intentions about how people are expected to behave while they're there. And so at a weekend like ours, I can share exactly what ours, our agreements are. So first and foremost, it's confidentiality. It's people knowing that they are safe to share whatever it is that they'd like to share, knowing that it will stay there. So that's incredibly empowering if you want to create space where people feel safe sharing things they don't typically share. Second is we talk about accountability. We say it's, hey, everyone here is going to be on time. One of the things I see, especially with men, is that if you see people who are putting a lot of energy into an experience and other people are not showing up on time or as present, the next step of what will happen is people will typically start to withdraw because they don't want to be in this kind of imbalance of power that they're putting energy forward and Someone else isn't matching that. So accountability. Everyone shows up on time while they're there. Our events are sober, so no one's imbibing any sort of mind altering substances while they're there. So those are all agreements. And the difference between an agreement and intention is essential. And it's one word, objectivity. An agreement is something that is measurable. Right? It's a, uh, yes, no, binary. You did it or you didn't. Whereas an intention is subjective and an intention is beautiful and it's directional, but it's not objective or measurable. Right. So some of the intentions that we have at our retreats would be something like full responsibility. Everyone here is responsible for getting what they need out of this weekend. If you're unclear about something, ask that question. If you're not happy about something, if someone said something that upsets you, it's your responsibility to speak up and address that directly. There's not a way that we can address. Everyone is taking full responsibility objectively but directionally. We want you to embody that. Right. We want people to be curious, meaning like any question you have of yourself and other people ask that. Once again, it's a beautiful intention, but it's not objective. We can't measure that. And so intentions and agreements are foundational for how you create these types of spaces. And then there's just a multitude of other things I've learned over the years about what you can do to create really electric group spaces. Probably one of the simplest ones that has a lot of crossover into business and work and culture building is what I would call being a conversation catalyst. And so being a conversation catalyst means that as a leader, you are being a stand for creating and supporting deeper conversations with your group or your team. And so if you have people that are coming together, I just talked to One of my CEO clients, he has a 150 person team. He's coming together for their holiday parties. Like, I want to make it a little bit more intentional, more deep this year. How do I do that? Easy. Here's a list of 10 questions that you can put out in the beginning of that event which says we only get so much time together. Instead of asking like, how are you? What's going on? What are you doing for New Year's? Let's be a stamper saying, ask each other these types of questions. What was the highlight of your year? What was the biggest challenge you went through? What was the lesson that you learned from it? What's your dream for 2026? That's so simple. But if you can transform the depth of the conversations that people are having at your event in your space, you're going to transform the connection that they experience there. So as much as anything else, simply being a stand for prompts and questions that take the conversation to a deeper level is how you can create much more engaging spaces. And you know this from Junto, but one of the things I do is we don't talk about work. We talk about work all the time. It's one of the first places that men especially will go. And so we actually ban that conversation. We say, hey, From Friday at 3 until Sunday at 5, we're not talking about work. There's so much else that you can talk about. And we give people some of those initial prompts and different areas of life that they can talk about and explore. They don't have to do with the title or what they do for work.

Speaker B: A lot of what we went through is around relational leadership. Could you describe what that is?

Speaker A: So relational leadership, for me, I think of it as the most rewarding path to success and fulfillment. And I think that so much of leadership just comes down to people and managing relationships. And so relational leadership is this idea that if I were to create a list of all the most important relationships in my life across every area, from personal to professional to family, and I just rated myself on a scale of 1 to 10, how healthy, connected, alive, and am I in this relationship. That if all of Your relationships are 9 to 10 above, that your life will take care of itself. If your relationship with your co founder is a 9 out of 10, your relationship with your wife is 9 out of 10 or above, kids, the rest is probably taking care of itself. And so it's this orientation of saying, I am fundamentally going to make sure that the most important relationships in my life are operating efficiently, enjoyably, and doing what they need to do for me. And once you commit to that, there's a series of skills that we teach people so that they can do that, because most people are not going to oscillate at a 9 or above in all of their relationships all the time. And so we have a process that we've created. It's called I. I can't is the acronym you can remember. And so it's based off of introspection, intentionality, curiosity, authenticity with objectivity. Very important distinction we'll probably talk about. And now for presence. And these are the five skills of relational leadership that fundamentally help any individual to take their true and honest experience and turn it into communication that Engineers connection, the type of impact we'd like to have. So that's how I think of relational leadership. And those are the foundational skills that someone can master to really walk on that path.

Speaker B: You mentioned authenticity with objectivity. Could you describe what that meant?

Speaker A: Yeah. So I have this saying that authenticity is not, ah, a virtue. Authenticity with objectivity and positive intent is a virtue because as we've all experienced, something has happened in the past. Let's say, like your wife is late for a meeting or doesn't do something she said that she was going to do. And in that moment, maybe your mind is thinking you're an asshole. And that would be authentic. That would be honest of you to say that, because that's your perspective in that moment. But that's likely not going to do anything positive for the relationship. Right. And so authenticity with objectivity and positive intent adds a layer of discernment onto our, uh, authentic expression. So objectivity. I, uh, utilize the frame of nonviolent communication, which is an incredible communication modality created by a man named Marshall Rosenberg. And so basically, it is based around these four pillars of awareness, observations, feelings, needs, and requests. And if anyone wanted to transform their communication for the better, I would say that this is probably the most foundational one. In many ways, I think it's a, uh, spiritual experience. Because what we start to do is notice how much of our time we spend in subjective judgment about other people and the world itself. And what objectivity does, is, invites us to connect with not just our truth, but the truth, the literal, objective truth of what is. And as we start to do that, we find that people are much more open, empathetic, and accepting of what it is that we have to say, even when that thing might be challenging or confronting. So let's work through it real quick. It's a terrible acronym, but helpful to remember this, which is oftener. Observation, feeling, need, request. And so let's use that example again of our wife forgot to do something that we really need. So you really need your wife to send a return for this $2,000 rug that you just bought, and she missed a deadline, so now you're out $2,000. So it's like, oh, my God, you're so inconsiderate. I asked you to do that twice. I can't believe you did that. You're always like, such a stress to me, and I have so much going on right now. All that is authentic to share in the moment. But here's what that statement sounds like through the lens of, of observation. Hey, I asked you to bring the rug back twice by the 15th and you didn't do it. It's like I'm feeling really angry that that didn't happen. It's like I needed you to do what it is that you say you're going to do, because it's really hard to trust you when you don't do what you say you're going to do. And my request is right now, it would be meaningful if you would apologize for not keeping your word here and just recommit that next time you say you're going to do something, you really do it. So that's a sequential process where what I just did there is rather than oscillating hyperbolic judgment of the person and their identity. I'm speaking to the objective actions of what had happened. And then I'm taking it internal. Um, I'm helping the person to see that their objective action has an impact on my emotional state. So right there, we are becoming more empathizable. People are able to see this. And then we look at one of the core frames of relational leadership, is that we take full responsibility for the quality of our relationships in our life. And anytime we're experiencing judgment of another person, I can guarantee you that you're having that experience because you have a need that's not being met. And what relational leaders do is look at, okay, if I'm feeling triggered in any relationship, let me get curious about what need I have of this person that's not being met. Because when I come out of that hyperbolic criticism and judgment of the other, and I opt to instead question what my need is that's not being met, I'm much more capable of sharing that with the person so that it actually gets addressed and doesn't happen again in the future. So I'm taking responsibility for looking at the behavior that I need to stop or start from the other person so I can share it with them. And then I move into that request. And I created a really helpful frame of how to get our needs met in relationship. And this is all about making masterful requests. We had just talked about the difference between an intention and an agreement. And again, what's helpful about the five A's, as I call them, is it helps us to bring our request to people into the realm of objectivity versus subjective intentions. I need you to be more on top of things next time. What does that mean? That, um, might mean one thing to you, might mean another thing to your wife. Right. But here's how we look at the five A's, it would start with just acknowledgement, which is sometimes, and we've all been there, someone does something and it triggers you a little bit, you're upset, but it's not a big thing and you don't want to mess with the equilibrium. Everything's fine, it's just a little thing. So I'm not going to talk about it. But what happens is that if you go a long time, a bunch of those little things build up and then someone does a little thing and then you blow up. And so acknowledgement is the first A, which is just, hey, you did this thing. I want to let you know it impacted me in this way and I just wanted to share it so you know how it made me feel. So you can be conscious of that next time you do that. That's acknowledgement. The second one would be ask a question. So a lot of times someone does something and we're just like, hey, did you intend to do this on time? I'm curious how you managed to not get it back. What was going on in your head? Ask a question to understand. She could say, I was going to get it there on time. And then my mom got sick and I got totally lost in this thing that was happening with her. I'm so sorry. Right? So I can ask a question, understand what's going on through their perspective. Sometimes I can ask for an apology. I can ask this person, hey, this really hurt my feelings. Honestly, it would just be meaningful if you'd apologize for the money that I'm going to lose here, the impact that it had, and I'll feel clear. And then we get into some of the more proactive steps of action and agreement. Action is a one time thing which says, hey, since you caused this, it'd be meaningful if you covered half of the cost of this that we're not going to recoup. Now that's a one time action. Agreement is something that you could institute. That's an ongoing commitment that you've both opted into which says, hey, this is a pattern that I've witnessed where I've asked you to do things, you've said yes, and then you've forgotten. Can we have some sort of positive repercussion where if you do this again, you have to pay me $100 no matter what it is. Right. And that's just a, uh, fun example where I have couples and founders who have these types of commitments to themselves. If they say, I'm going to do this thing and they don't do it I have coaching clients who often pay me money or I have them donating to causes because they want the accountability to do the thing that they say they're going to do. So that is how you start to orient yourself towards objectivity. And this is where people start to find out that I truly can be myself. Because you're doing it with objectivity and positive intent. And it's not just authenticity. It needs that secondary layer of objectivity and positive intent for it to not just liberate ourselves, but to liberate others to share their truth and to connect us in relationship.

Speaker B: The weekend was really helpful because when I was going into it, I felt a deep resentment. So I'm the chairman of this fraternity, and there was some, like, relationship stuff that I was holding onto that I didn't think was a big deal. But going into the weekend, as we were working through kind of our contentious relationships, I found a way to communicate through everything that you've given me of a way to communicate to this person what I needed and what I was feeling. And not only that, because of all the positive relationships that you made us think about in terms of how grateful we are about them and expressing them to, in real time to the people in our lives. Like, it made me completely. Almost like it changed my state, uh, completely in my relationship with this organization, because it made me feel lighter and it made me want to be engaged again and want to need to lead again. And so just wanted to let you know that that whole process transformed my relationship with that organization, with ff.

Speaker A: Yeah, I'll say a big part of where that comes from is one aspect of these retreats is I like to take it out of the. The theoretical of, uh, hey, here's information that's on a page and into the experiential, where people are actively having the experience of sharing things with other people, whether that's through the lens of conflict or in this case, appreciation. I ran this company for 10 years called Tribute, and we help people to create millions of group video montages of people telling the ones that they love what they love about them. And we have this mantra that is a bridge off of the famous saying, if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say it at all. And I realized that if you take out two of the don'ts, it becomes, if you have anything nice to say, say it all. And when it comes to building meaningful relationships, simply committing to sharing all the appreciation that we have for the people in our lives is one of the easiest and most effective strategies that we can deploy. I think that meaningful relationships have these four core ingredients. I think the meaningful relationship is vast. It's vulnerable, it's appreciative, it's supporting, and it's trustful. And that appreciation is one of the core pillars of meaningful relationship. And so if you have people in your life whom you're grateful for, there's no good reason for keeping it inside. And so it's a simple practice that someone can commit to. It's if they want to build more meaningful relationships. And I think that, you know, I'm not sure when this podcast is going to come out, but we just went through Thanksgiving and you have the end of the year coming up. And these are these built in milestones every single year, the holiday of gratitude and the end of the year where we're encouraged to look back at, um, the things that went right, what didn't. And I'd invite people to look back at the people that went right that showed up for us fully, and to make the most of that by just sending them a note, whether it's a voice, text or an email, just saying, not just I appreciate you, but here's what I appreciate you for. Here's how you impacted me. There's, uh, a lens on this. I really appreciate Robert Cialdini, who wrote the book Influence. He says it's not our sentiment of, uh, affection that impacts the recipient, it's our explanation of it. So it's not thank you. It's thank you for doing this. It really saved me some time that I got to then go and spend with my family. It's, hey, I love you for always pushing me to be the best version of myself. It doesn't mean that I love you and thank you aren't powerful, meaningful statements. But what it does mean is that if you want the recipient to feel the depth of that statement more deeply, add an explanation to it, and it will be more impactful in the way that you probably intend it to be.

Speaker B: This isn't, uh, something that you're just saying. It's like I've witnessed you actually live it. Right. And I've witnessed you not only living it, but the impacts of your relationships and your network because of it. And so maybe you could describe what you do personally around this and then maybe, like, in terms of, like, how do you think about relationships and building relationships with other people?

Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. Uh, we'll pause for a moment to say it feels nice to receive the reflection there of the alignment that you see in me. And so I just Want to say thanks for speaking to it, man. It's, uh, I appreciate the reflection. And how do I build relationships? The one word that comes to mind is intentionally. And one of the best things that I would invite people to do who want to build more meaningful relationships is to start by getting clear about who those people are that they seek deeper, more meaningful relationships with. If you were just to make a list of the friends, family members, co workers that you would consider to be meaningful relationships in your life, and you just said, like, on a scale of 1 to 10, how fully actualized is this relationship? It's like, okay, you got some sevens in there, Maybe you got a couple of fours. Like, okay, now you have a roadmap of where you can invest some energy. And Harvey Waldinger, uh, ran the longest study ever on happiness at Harvard. 75 participants over 75 years. At the end of it, he gets up, he gives a TED Talk, he says, more than anything else, one thing is true from this study. Great relationships keep us happy and healthy. Like he said it again, great relationships keep us happy and healthy. So investing into the relationships that matter to us is an investment that you will never regret and that will pay dividends, unlike, um, any other investment over the long run. And so get clear, who are the people that I want to invest in that I want to build better relationships with? And one of the things that I learned early on in my 20s, was we typically have these options that we're given when we're young, of, uh, you're an introvert or you're an extrovert. And then 10 years ago, they're like, oh, you can be an ambivert. You can be one or the other. I realized that I am a fourth option that I created. I call it being a univert, which is I love people. I love people so much. I'm, um, genuinely curious, and I want to understand them. And also, being in group dynamics for me can be draining. It's like, unconsciously, I feel like I need to manage energy. Things get cut off, my attention is going places, and so oftentimes my energy ends up being drained, even if the experience is enjoyable for me. But what I realized when I was probably 25 in New York was, wow, I'm going to all these incredible events with people I never thought I'd be able to hang out with. And I get to these events, and there's always, like, a couple of people that I just lock in with, and I'm like, that's someone I really want to be friends with. And for me, I really focused on. I just always had a desire to have really strong male relationships. And I had this idea, I was like, uh, well, why don't I just. Instead of going to a party on Friday, I was in New York and there's this famous bath house called the Russian Turkish Bath in New York. And I would just reach out to the guys that I want to be friends with. And I was like, hey, do you want to go get a sauna and then we'll go get some noodles afterwards? And so I would take these guys, like methodically, like every other week, once a month. Sometimes the guys that I really wanted to be friends with, I'd take them to the bathhouse. We go in sauna for an hour and then we go get ramen down the street in Lower east side of Manhattan. And those guys, in that uninterrupted two and a half hour, three hour period of time, we would go so deep and we would feel so connected. And I would go home at 10 o' clock at night, I'd feel amazing because I just had a social experience, right. And I feel connected, which is what I wanted. I don't want to be with people. I want to feel connected. And for me, that's how I achieve that. And I can do that same thing if I'm going to dinner with a couple and it's the four of us. That's just my ideal. That's where I'm really filled up. And so I'd really embrace the power of the one on one of choosing people and being intentional about creating those types of one on one experiences or small group experiences, because that's typically where true connection is built rapidly. I would offer that the intentional about who you want to build relationships with. And then the third thing I would invite in is to look at rituals. So. Priya Parker is the author of the Art of Gathering, like one of the preeminent resources on meaningful gathering and group events and things like that. She's an amazing follow on social media and I interviewed her for my podcast and she said the difference between ritual and routine comes down to one word, intention. So routine is something you do all the time. Ritual is something you do, like in a consistent cadence, on purpose, with intention. And what I invite people to do is, once you've identified those relationships, what's the ritual that you want to put in place to actually stay connected? Right. It's as we get older, we don't live in the same place as so many of the people. We want to spend time with so with my core best friends, oftentimes if I'm not feeling connected to them, I will put a ritual in place, right? And it's like, hey, you want to like do a rosebud, uh, thorn every quarter? Maybe it's an annual check in one ski trip a year. But get intentional about, if I'm not feeling connected in this relationship, I need to change something about it. And I'm always really clear about this because I'm a freedom maximalist at heart. And so what I say is minimum structure for maximum enjoyment and efficiency. And so if you're feeling connected to one of your best friends and you love the shit out of them and they love the shit out of you, and you're 9 to 10 out of 10 and how like actualized and healthy that relationship is, then just let it be great. But if you have a relationship that's at a 5 and you don't feel connected, then be intentional about the cadence in which you want to connect with that person. Hey, like, if we just got on like every quarter we scheduled a call, you put that in the calendar. Stephen Covey says, don't prioritize your schedule, schedule your priorities. And I love that idea. So those are three of the things that I would say about really building meaningful relationships. And I think one of the things that's been really true for me over the years as well, it's. I've been really fortunate to build, you might call it like a high status network. And when I was younger, I think that that really mattered to me as I wanted to validate myself by being around people who were really successful. And what I found was that as I started to give myself to these practices of radical authenticity, the type of people who I wanted to connect with when I was in my early 20s, I find so much more ease connecting with them and so much more, I would say, call it magnetism towards those types of people because have the same experience that Megan have, which is that they can just be themselves, which I think is so much of the experience that people want. And so it is this idea that so many people tell us this time and time again, just be yourself. And my response to that for the longest time was, well, how the fuck do I do that? How does one be themselves? And that's as much as any, like, when I think about the practice of integrity, which for me is integrity is a practice of being yourself. And that is so much of what my work has come down to is, oh, yeah, like, how do you be yourself? Because that feels Like a pretty simple and powerful way to live your life. And I wanted to make that more tangible and operational for people who had that same question of, like, I get it, but how do I do that?

Speaker B: Can you tell us about the integrity effect?

Speaker A: Yeah. So we had just talked about being yourself, and again, there's that trite statement that we've all heard throughout our lives of, oh, you want to connect with other people, just be yourself, you'll be okay. Well, how do we do that? And so as I continued on my journey of coaching and facilitation and connecting more deeply to my values, I really started to land on this one as what I perceive to be the most important skill for cultivating success and fulfillment. Because who wants success without fulfillment? And that skill was integrity. And I wanted to make that much more objective and clear than everyone has their own interpretation of what is integrity? Being true to yourself, whatever that might be. And I started to see integrity as this three leg stool. So to me, it's this process of, number one, knowing yourself, knowing who you truly are. The second step is being yourself, which is, once you know who you are, how do you communicate in a way that is authentic and effective? And then the third step is all about keeping your agreements, is once you know who you are and you have the tools to communicate authentically, how do you align your action with your values and the truth of who you are? And so the integrity effect is what happens when you shift your orientation from trying to control and impact external variables and instead shift your motivation onto intrinsic motivation of, I'm going to do the work to understand who I am. And to make that more clear, what are some of the ways that we can answer the question who am I More constructively? You'd start by understanding. It's like, okay, in this moment, I am my emotions. An emotion is the state of being that I contain in this very moment. And to establish a fluid sense of self, we have to be able to feel, recognize and articulate what our emotional state is. So you would start all the way there. It's an emotional intelligence. Then you can move up into something like the values. Your values are your core way of being that you must be to be you. While you're here, you can move all the way into purpose. What am I committed to that is bigger than myself? And I am my purpose. You could talk about legacy. You would talk also about relational identities, right? It's because being a father, being a son, each of these relational identities mean something to us. It's like, oh, I'm a father, so I must be this. I'm a son, so I should be this. And understanding what we have made those relational identities mean. And also it's unlocking and, um, discovering the conditioned parts of our identity, right? What are the characteristics, behaviors, and traits that we've simply adopted from society or from our father, our mother, from our friend group when we were younger that aren't actually us? There's just momentum to be a certain way. And so we are, but it's not actually connected to the truth of who we are. We can look at our shame, right? Shame are the stories about how we are fundamentally broken or not enough and tells us all the things that we're not, what we're incapable of. And so as we start to articulate the empowered sense of self, and we start to decondition the unconscious and disempowering self, we're much more capable of aligning our actions with what we truly want and who we truly are. So we start in that realm of identity, of knowing who we are. And then the second step of being yourself is really just putting all of the relational leadership tools into action. It is understanding how to come out of reactive patterns and into the full response. So no matter what, I know how to welcome in my thoughts and my feelings. I know how to act with intention and clear purpose. I know how to ask questions and not make assumptions. I know how to speak authentically, but with objectivity and positive intent. And I know how to be fully present and not lost in stories. And as I master those skills, I understand that I can be myself in any given moment. And then this last piece about keeping my agreements is all about aligning our actions with who we need to be. It's becoming explicitly clear within ourself, but also in our relationships with friends, family members, co workers. What are the explicit things that I must do to be myself? Right, as we have, uh, expectations for ourselves of, well, how do I need to eat to actually be a healthy person? How many times do I need to work out? How many times do I need to have dinner with my family? What about the business that I'm building? How much time do I need to put in here? What are the structures that I need to have in place with my team so that people feel recognized? And there's, uh, a pathway of becoming really explicit about everything that I must do to be myself? And as we start to get explicitly clear about those, then we can establish those norms and put ourselves kind of on autopilot, and we naturally just start to do the things that we need to do to feel great and have our greatest impact. And so those are the three steps of integrity. I think about it as a life practice and the way that I often frame it for people is that if you were to go through your life and you committed to this practice of fundamentally knowing the truth of who you truly are, you committed to speaking the truth objectively and with positive intent and aligning, uh, your actions with what it is that you know you need to do, creating the habits that are most important for yourself as well as the people who depend on you, you will get to the end of your life and you will know that I did my best. I did what I could. And what happens when we shift our orientation from seeking to control other people, seeking to control outcomes and focus purely on what it is that we control that we have a direct impact on. So much of the stress, worry, anxiety drifts away and in the process we become much more effective. The process is so much more enjoyable. Right. And we enjoy it so much more. And so that's the integrity effect is where we start to shift our attention away from the external validation and impact that we don't control. Focus on the intrinsic motivation that we'll always be able to impact. And we allow that to be the thing that drives us towards true success, fulfillment and meaningful relationships.

Speaker B: I feel like you've had almost a head start on all of us because of your mother. And I'm not going to go into your mother right now because I feel like there's so much more to ask you about. But basically you mentioned her before and a lot of the things that we experienced in Junto I think came from just your experience at a young age. For most of us when we experience hardship, we don't have the tools to move forward and there's a lot of suffering. Right. And I'm curious about your story because you had a child in a marriage and you divorced. Right. And so I was wondering coming into it, having these tools, how you thought about it or what was it like for you and what happened in all that?

Speaker A: Yeah, I was very fortunate. I married an incredible woman named Mickey Agarwal. She's a uh, industry changing social entrepreneur, feminist and powerhouse. And we had this really incredible relationship for 11 years. And we have an 8 year old son named Hero, named after hero protagonist from Snow Crash for you sci fi nerds. And as I started to practice so much of uh, the same techniques we've been talking about here, you know, one of the things that is central to this Process is taking full responsibility for the quality of our relationship. And one of the things that I realized in my own relationship, my pattern was that I was very codependent. I needed the people around me to be okay, to feel like I was okay. And my pattern was also in sacrificing a lot of my own needs, not speaking clearly to what those things are. And as I started to learn some of these tools, especially things like nonviolent communication, I got really clear about asking for things that I was afraid to speak up about in my relationship. Initially, mostly ways of communicating, resolving conflict that were own first person communication, absent criticism, shame based language. And over time, as I continued to ask for what I wanted objectively, it became clear that my partner was not available to relate in the way that I wanted to. And it didn't mean in any way that she was wrong for how she showed up. But what I often say is that a healthy relationship is just my needs, your needs, and where they meet up. And so because I was able to evaluate it objectively, by the time that we had gone through a separation and we were making a decision about whether or not to, uh, divorce, like, I was very clear that this was not the relationship I was supposed to be in. And when we were nearing the time of separation and divorce and it was clear that that was a path that we were likely on, I actually sat in a sound ceremony with psilocybin and mdma. And in the midst of that ceremony, before we even got into the depths of it, I was just doing breath work and I just started weeping. And it was this clarity that my relationship was complete. And I didn't, you know, come out of that ceremony and go and communicate this to her. You never want to be the guy who goes to a sound ceremony and breaks up with his wife in the middle of it. That's not a good look. Don't ever do that. But I did have this profound vision that I connected to which said, huh, huh, this can be for the best, that this can be a separation, a shift in our relational dynamic where there's truly more love for Hero. Because the truth of our romantic relationship is that it was no longer a fit and we're moving away from that part of the dynamic. But I had this connection to a vision that we can do this in such a way that it is affording more love to everyone, not just Hero inside of the dynamic, but that it really is better for everyone and that it can be a beacon of hope for other people who are experiencing divorce. Because I myself Am a child of a, uh, highly contentious divorce. I know what that was like. It was not fun. And so I was connected to this vision of creating a, uh, co parenting dynamic that I was inspired by and that allowed my son to grow up in an environment that he could truly flourish in. And not that it has not been hard or turbulent at times, it certainly has. But also the time that I invest into these little practices, which is my son's eight now. And one of my favorite practices, I was just, um, on with a coaching client before and I said the same thing. It's what's so brilliant about when kids come online in this way and they have the access to abstract thought, is that you can ask them what they need. And one of the things I try and do as a dad is really celebrate when he tells me what he needs. Because I have a six month old son with my new partner. But being able to really create space every single week where I'd be like, hey, how you feeling this week? Is there anything I can do for you to help you feel more loved, feel safer, more connected? And whenever he tells me, I make such an effort to do it because I want to show him that expressing his needs objectively and constructively is hard to do. And that when he does that, things change, right? He can get what he wants. And so one of the things that he had shared when I asked him this question was I want to do more things as a, uh, family. And I was like, great. And he's like. And even phone calls. And I was like, oh, cool, that's a new thing. And one of the things that I do with my son is we have these different card decks. And so whether that's an Osho Tarot deck or my, uh, friend John has a card deck called Candid or Esther Perez. Where should we begin? That's probably a little edgier for an eight year old. But we have these card decks and at night we pull cards and Hiro pulls cards for everybody. And then whatever card we pull, well, depending on time, we'll either all answer the same card or we'll all get our individual card and we'll go around and it just leads to much better conversation, much deeper. And so the tradition that we have now, we've been doing that in our house, but now every single night he pulls a card for Mickey. And so Mickey's not here, she's on the phone. We go back and forth on weeks. And so it's a way where every single night she's in the tradition Right. So we're not in the same house, but we're doing that. And as much as anything I do, innovating there is the most important for sure. And now I get to share it with someone like you. And maybe someone else hears that who has a co, uh, parenting dynamic that they're navigating. And so that's how I think about the divorce and how these tools were not only helpful in allowing me to clarify the relationship that was no longer really a fit, and then now how to take that new dynamic because we'll be in relationship for the rest of our lives. And how can I look at everything that I can do to make that the most loving, healthiest version of what it is? That's just true.

Speaker B: During the, uh, separation, there must have been a lot of emotions and messiness. Right. I think it's easy when it's like you're doing what you're teaching us when things are okay. Right. But when things are really bad, how do you think about actually doing the things that you talk about?

Speaker A: Yeah. The vast majority of people that I work with are people who are coming to me because things are not okay. Right. The vast majority of the entrepreneurs and CEOs and founders that come to me, they're coming to me because their co founder and themselves are on the brink and they're about to blow up the whole business. You have a couple that's like heading into separation. You have brothers who are never going to talk to each other again. So I would say as much as anything, that's where I spend time and where I think these tools are so valuable and where we oftentimes need structure around how we communicate is for these times which are inevitable, where we find ourselves in trigger where there's some tension in relationship. And so what's really helpful about orienting to objectivity is that as we start to practice it ourselves, we can also start to command it of other people. Right. And we can see when I own, hey, here are the things that are happening that are impacting me. Here are the objective requests that I have for you and how I would like you to amend your behavior, your communication in a specific measurable way, we're more likely that that's going to be welcomed in. But also if you are locked into a, uh, relationship or a dynamic with someone else who is coming at you with a lot of hyperbolic criticism and judgment or shame based communication about how you never do this and how you'll never be X, Y and Z, you also have a tool to help them to see how their communication is hyperbolic, subjective. So if someone is coming at me and this could be a, uh, business partner or an ex wife and they're telling me that you are X and they're saying something critical about me, right? You're never present. I can say, hey, I hear your criticism. Is there something you needed me to do that I didn't do? Right. We can embrace it. Anytime someone has a judgment of us, it's because they have a need that was not met. And so if someone continues to come at me with hyperbolic criticism and judgment, I can say to that person, hey, when you come at me with this kind of subjective criticism, it's really hard for me to stay present. My assumption is that there's something you needed me to do that I didn't do. If you're not able to share that at this time, I'm going to ask that we pause and you just let me know when you're able to communicate more objectively here.

Speaker B: Right?

Speaker A: But I would never tell anyone to stay in the midst of a conversation or dialogue where someone's on the receiving end of shame, criticism and judgment because that's going to be destructive for the quality of that connection long term. And what I say is no one's going to get it right. No one's going to communicate perfectly, perfectly objectively, always with positive intent. But it is important that you have people that are willing to take ownership and say, hey, I didn't share that perfectly. I, uh, apologize, I wish I had said it this way. And so what's really helpful, and I have a very simple blog, I can share it with you after this. But it's here are the essential frameworks that I would invite any team. I uh, typically offer this to teams, but you could truly do it in a romantic partnership. And they're the simple tools that any team can implement for more clear, conscious and kind communication. And fundamentally it is the drama triangle to notice where we are oscillating and reactivity where we're putting ourself into seat of the victim, not taking responsibility for asking for what we need. It is nonviolent, objective communication, oftener being willing to get clear about what's happened, what our needs are, clear requests of the other person. It is taking responsibility, taking ownership. So it's all about being willing to take radical ownership for the things that I've done that were out of integrity. So even if it's something small, where it's like, oh, I showed up five minutes late to dinner that night, I'm going to own that fully apologize when my actions are out of alignment. If you were to look at those three things, those are measurable frameworks, they're objective. You could put those into place. You could ask someone if they're truly doing those in any given moment. And it's going to give you some of these tools which you can utilize to take the charge out of those conversations that are really difficult to be in. So as much as anything, I think that these tools are really helpful when the conversation's already tense or blowing up or when you're in a less charged situation but where there's resistance to sharing something. Right. Where you had talked about resentment earlier for someone that you're in an organization with. And so again it's anytime we are in relationship and holding on to resentment for the other, the issue is not with the other person, it's with you. Because if you are holding resentment for another person, you are poisoning the well of that relationship no matter what they've done. If you're holding onto resentment and you are not willing to share it, in my perspective, and I'm kind of extreme on it, you are the one who's poisoning the well there. You need to be willing to communicate that for the sake of the relationship. So that's how I think about these tools and where they're really valuable in those heightened situations.

Speaker B: It's awesome because I get to relive my weekend with you at Junto and just being around you, I can feel like the vibration that you have or the energy that you have, I can feel it. And everything that you're saying is true because you're living it. I wanted to just maybe give you a chance to tell your story because Junto really is a almost like a expression of your entire story. And so maybe you. We don't have that much time. We have maybe like 20 minutes. But I would love for you to just talk about from growing up with your mom to your nonprofit to tribute to executive coaching. Could you just talk us a little bit about how you got to where you are today?

Speaker A: Yeah, you mentioned my mom a couple of times and I'd be remiss not to talk about the influence that she had on me and my track. And so I was fortunate. I had two entrepreneurial parents. My dad was a pilot and he started a tourism company with gliders. But my mom, I would say I m much more like. And so she is a 13 time published author and started a writer's conference in Hawaii when I was probably 8 years old and so when I was 9 and 10, I was the errand boy at a writers conference for people like Jack Canfield and Mitch Albom and John Gray. And so at a very young age, before I'm rationally thinking about this as a career option, I'm around it. I see people who are multimillionaires, who are helping people by creating art or putting books and movies into the world. And so as I started to come of age, I can't neglect the impact that that would have on my worldview. The idea that, oh, that's actually possible, you can do that, and I have direct access to someone who's doing it. And so my entrepreneurial journey really started when I went to Virginia Tech and I was getting ready to graduate. And so much of my early life was defined by trying to be cool again. I had so much insecurity and loneliness from my early adolescence in Hawaii that I just wanted to belong. I wanted to fit in. I wanted to have like a full social life. And I succeeded and I did that. And I was having so much fun. And when I got to the end of my college career, I just didn't really have any jobs that I was excited about. I thought I was going to go into nightclubs and nightlife because I was promoting clubs and our social chair of our fraternity. And I had this conversation when I was a senior. It was a guy who was a career consultant at uh, Babson College in Boston. And we were sitting at this dinner table and it was actually we were sitting at this dinner table because I saw him give a talk earlier in the day. And there was this event called Renaissance Weekend. And Renaissance brings together all sorts of thought leaders and entrepreneurs and athletes and artists. And then they just do these panel conversations for the entirety of the weekend. So people just talk about different ideas and political policies and it's really fascinating. And one of the panels was what is a life well lived? And this is a very common question in academic philosophy is what is a life well lived? Is how you would phrase this question of, um, yeah, what is the meaning of life? What should we do while we're here? And all these people got up, there was a pro basketball player and he's talking about work ethic. And then there was a Tennessee senator and he was talking about ethics and values. And it was things that I had heard before that just occurred to me and my 21 year old brain as trite and uninspiring. And then this guy, Steve Robbins stood up and he said, some of you will wake up Tomorrow. And you will ask yourself, have I lived a, uh, life well lived? And you will either like your answer or you won't. And you'll have an opportunity to change something. He said, some of you will wake up 10 years from now and ask yourself the question, have I lived a, uh, life well lived? And you'll like the answer or you won't, and you'll have an opportunity to change something. He said, which one would you rather be? He said, living a life well lived is simply asking yourself the question and liking your answer. And I realized that I did not like my answer. I was having fun, but I was totally unfulfilled and unactualized and, and at the time I was reading the book into the wild by Christopher McCandless by Jon Krakauer. Christopher McCandless is the main character of the book about this kid who graduates from Emerson and he hitchhikes across the country and all these adventures trying to find himself. And in the absence of any other idea of what I wanted to do with my life, I was inspired by this conversation I had with Stever after that talk where he asked me, what am I passionate about? And I said, making money, women, partying. And he like laughed at me. He was like, yeah, sure you are. And he said, do you know the difference between happiness and pleasure? He said, pleasure feels good, but happiness is long lasting. Like when you, something really brings you happiness, the good feelings stay around long after the experience of the event is over. He said, what makes you happy? And I realized that I didn't have a lot of happiness in my life. I had a lot of pleasure. And I, uh, was in this question of really having no idea of what brought me happiness, like what it was that I was committed to. And then this book, into the Wild, inspired me to say, well, in the absence of a really good answer, why don't just go figure it out and spend time doing that? And my dad happened to be moving to Alaska at the time. And so we went on this grand road trip for two months from Washington D.C. to Alaska. And on that trip there was a moment that, that oriented me towards a path of service which was he was in the military. I was asking him questions about that and he was talking about 27 years he spent flying, flying off aircraft carriers and super inspiring stuff. And I remember looking at him and saying, wow, sounds like you're really proud of what you did there. And he said, yeah, I was. And then he looked at me and he said, what's the last thing you've done? That you're proud of. And I paused for a second and I just, I didn't really have anything. I didn't respond. And he didn't ask another follow up question. He just let me sit in the not knowing. And probably about 15 minutes later I had an answer. I said, you know, I do have an answer. When I was a junior in college, I was volunteering for this nonprofit called Dreams for Kids. And I was raising tens of thousands of dollars for kids to play baseball with the White Sox and adaptive water skiing clinics. And I was working my ass off. I was flyerbombing north beach and staying late after work and volunteering on the weekends. And I looked at that and I was like, wow, I'm really proud of that time. I really had an impact and changed some kids lives in a positive way. And my dad in his simple wisdom looks back at me and he says, well, why don't you do more of that? And I sat for a moment and allowed it to sink in. But there's something beautiful about not having many options because I just didn't know anything about what I wanted to do. But there was this one thing that I had done that brought me a sense of purpose. And so I just resolved to do more of that. How do I help kids to play sports who might have disabilities? And a year later I got back to Washington D.C. and I set off on the path to start my first nonprofit. I literally just applied online and three months later I get this certificate that I'm the founder of Dreams for Kids DC and just started making it up while working as an executive recruiter. But again, I had a 9 to 6 executive recruiting job. But I would go in, I got free office space at the first collaborative workspace in DC. I would go in from 6:00 clock to 2:00am you know, unfortunately jacked up on Adderall that I prescribed because who works 6 to 2am and I started this company and I raised our first couple hundred thousand dollars and I had intern teams of like 16 people in the summer. And we were the nonprofit on the real world and all this stuff that was just coming from this place of real purpose. And I felt what it was like to energize myself through the commitment of something bigger than me. And that's what got me out of my rut, was committing to something that was bigger than me. And time and time again I just come back to that place, whether I'm writing, whether I'm facilitating that, that has been such a consistent center of gravity for me of Just truly grounding myself into service and coming back to how is this benefiting someone else? And when I anchor into that energy, I feel more grounded, I feel more loving, more centered, more confident. That was my first company, which then there's so much else that has happened since then, but really it's all grounded in service and contributing to something that's bigger than the self. And now I would say that my real mission in life is to, I call it creating art that reminds me how I want to live. And so I'm just deeply listening and present to life. And when things happen to me, when I have experiences, when ideas come that improve my quality of life in some meaningful way, I'm constantly looking at how I can take my personal experience and how can I synthesize that into some format that other people can then benefit from it. And that could be something as simple as creating a podcast and sharing stories in a way where I'm doing justice to what I've taken in and making it easy for other people to implement that in their lives. Or writing a book on integrity, which I'm doing right now, to building a new business right now called Easy360, which makes it easy for people to get collaborative feedback from their entire community about how they can most effectively grow. I'm, um, building things that by creating them, I'm reinforcing the very ideas that have helped me to live a, ah, full, integrous life. And so it's this beautiful upward cycle where they say, if you want to learn something, teach it, right? And for me, that's like creating art or anything or building. So I'm just, if I have something meaningful, I want to turn it in. I want to create art with it and share it in such a way that it helps other people to do the thing, which then reinforces my own ability to do the thing that makes my life better. And so I just feel locked in this spiral and new things keep happening. But also I feel pretty locked into some of the fundamental truths and orienting forces of my life that make it amazing. I'm never going to regret any time investing into the relationships that matter. I can trust integrity as a pathway to living a fulfilling, uh, successful life. And simply being myself is an act of service that helps other people to do the same thing.

Speaker B: This is something that I maybe recently learned. And it's amazing to watch you live it. And that before it was like, okay, conceptually, what do you think I want? And then from external validation, how do you chase it? Right? And what you're describing is like how do you feel the thing and then how do you basically continue to walking to continue feeling it? Right. Yeah. So incredible. And I just maybe start out with. For people that are interested in junto, what are the types of people that are you're welcoming to come in and then what do they expect to come out of it for or with?

Speaker A: I would say that the right guy for junto is any man who is called to a path of leadership. And typically the makeup of the groups that come are really entrepreneur and executive heavy. And I find that the junto is not just a three day experience, but we also have these reintegration men's groups and then one year union retreats. So it's not just state change. We really try and focus on long term behavior change for our guys. And by really anchoring into this experience of leadership and bringing together men who have a desire to lead both personally and professionally, I find that the relationships that are forged at the junto are much stronger and long lasting. And so that's the typical makeup of demographic of the people who end up at these places. And we have synthesized an experience that brings together the best aspects of emotional inquiry. Being able to fully feel your feelings, integrate them consciously. Personal integrity, understanding who you truly are, how to be yourself, how to align action with your intention through relational leadership. Understanding how to communicate in a way that is authentic and effective in the world and to get out of the classroom and start living it while you're actually there. And on top of that it's just connecting with the brotherhood of men who are willing to look at themselves, want to stretch and live a big life, but deeply committed to doing their own work. So those are some of the things that someone coming to junto could take away from it.

Speaker B: And where do they go if they want to sign up for junto?

Speaker A: So best place to sign up is go to wejunto. J-U N T O.com I think if you google junto, we're right at the top. If you google my name, Andrew Horn, I'll be right at the top. So easy to find. And so we do these junto retreats every quarter typically. And then I also do a uh, webinar every six months which is called the intro to relational leadership. So that one is targeted for professionals who want to establish more constructive way of communicating at work. And so a lot of those things that we talked about here, like nonviolent communication, taking full ownership, the drama triangle, taking full responsibility. How do you operationalize that for your team is what we focus on there really in a business context. And so that's also really fun. Those are some of the really easy ways to dive in and see if you connect with me and my approach and our kind of way of thinking about life and how to live it.

Speaker B: And then you mentioned your podcast. Can you just talk about your podcast a little bit and how to find you, uh, on your podcast?

Speaker A: Yeah. The podcast is called what's a Big Idea? I started it probably eight years ago as an excuse to talk to the people who I find to be the most fascinating on the planet. And so very wide ranging over the past eight years. But now most of the people that I bring on are who I would consider to be world class teachers in the realm of personal development and leadership. And so I'll have everyone on from the top BDSM expert talking about power dynamics to Sam Altman's executive coach. And those are the types of people who. Because that's where my interest and field of study is most active right now. So it's fun and I get to do probably like one of those a month with people that I'm really inspired by. And it's another fun project that I have going on.

Speaker B: And then you talked about writing a book. Can you just tell us real quick about the book that you're writing?

Speaker A: Totally. So I have a book that's coming out in the middle of next year called the Integrity Effect. And again, I think that if there was one skill that you could master for success, fulfillment and meaningful relationships, it is integrity. And so what we've done is distilled it into a practical process of knowing yourself, being yourself, keeping your agreements. And so that's something I'm really excited about. And for folks who want to get more deeply involved, I'm actually writing this in public and I have a community of people and a little brain trust. So if you want to dive deeper into the subject of integrity, there's a way where you can ask questions about a lot of the tools and the techniques and get access to me in a way that you typically wouldn't be able to. So that's a fun thing that I have going on right now.

Speaker B: And then finally, if people are interested in your coaching, where do they go?

Speaker A: Yeah, it's andrewhorn.com so at any given time, I have, uh, around 25 mostly CEO and founder clients who are working with me in a variety of ways. But I say that my approach to coaching is grounded in a lot of the techniques that we've talked about here. But fundamentally Taking full responsibility for the quality of every relationship and outcome in your life, and learning how to operate with full integrity and relational mastery, and having a clear system of how you show up in the situations that really deserve all of you. And that's the foundation of the coaching practice.

Speaker B: Andrew, I had such a great time. Thank you so much for helping me relive June to again. So thank you so much.

Speaker A: Yeah, man. Well, I can't wait to work, uh, together. And from the moment that we chatted, I just felt your heart. And not just that, but just some innate skill that make me think that you are probably already very good at this, but that you can be really world class and someone I'm excited to invest into. And I also just saw that you have this James Turrell poster behind you who's one of my favorites.

Speaker B: So I definitely want to be world class. So I'm so excited.

Speaker A: Well, there you go. Like, one of the things it's like, it's to be inspired is how you inspire others. And I feel you pursuing your dharma here of the thing that lights you up and so excited to accelerate that path from where we are today to feeling world class and excited to stay connected until you look at me and you're like, you know, I really feel world class. I'm looking forward to that day.

Speaker B: I'm looking forward to it, too. Thank you. Of course.

Speaker A: Thanks, Will.

Speaker B: Thank you so much for listening until the end. If you've enjoyed this episode, please leave us a review on Spotify or Apple Podcasts. It'll help more people like you find us. You can find more about us on Wild show wld sh o w. Please subscribe to our newsletter or DM us on Twitter. We'd love to get to know you.