In the debut episode of Crying Is Manly, host Tyler shares a bit about his experience with mental health issues such as anxiety, depression, and low self-esteem, and how these have intersected with societal expectations of masculinity. Tyler discusses the pressure men face to suppress emotions deemed "unmanly", like crying, and asks that we consider redefining what it means to be masculine by embracing vulnerability, authenticity and emotional openness. He also touches on his struggles with procrastination and the life-changing impact of finally taking action to start the podcast. Join Tyler as he briefly explores all of these themes, encouraging listeners to confront their fears and take meaningful action.
In the debut episode of Crying Is Manly, host Tyler shares a bit about his experience with mental health issues such as anxiety, depression, and low self-esteem, and how these have intersected with societal expectations of masculinity. Tyler discusses the pressure men face to suppress emotions deemed "unmanly", like crying, and asks that we consider redefining what it means to be masculine by embracing vulnerability, authenticity and emotional openness. He also touches on his struggles with procrastination and the life-changing impact of finally taking action to start the podcast. Join Tyler as he briefly explores all of these themes, encouraging listeners to confront their fears and take meaningful action.
In the meantime, just remember: crying is manly. 💪😠#cryingismanly
P.S. You can drop me a voice message at: https://fanlist.com/cryingismanly or send an email to: podcast@cryingismanly.com
Tyler:
Hello and welcome to the first episode of Crying is Manly. Before we get started, I just need to say that I am not a medical professional and I am not a mental health professional, all right, so my name is Tyler, I am 39 years old and throughout my life, even when I was a kid, I've struggled in one way or another with mental health, specifically anxiety and depression, but also low self-esteem, chronic procrastination, addictive and compulsive behavior, and it was all accompanied by this overall feeling that I'm weak or cowardly or just generally not enough. Speaking of anxiety, right now, I'm getting a lot of that even just recording this, like I'm literally shaking. So apologies if the audio comes out weird, but yeah, I just I think it's important to be upfront and honest about that sort of stuff. So this is terrifying, but let's go ahead and continue on. So as far as the weak or cowardly bit, I do think that's true-ish, because I've spent so much time knowing what I should do or that I wanted to do a certain thing, but then just not doing it because I'm scared or anxious, or you know, I make up some excuse. Sometimes this is with large life decisions, but even more often it's honestly just the small instances throughout each day, and this has gone on for almost 40 years now, which is, yeah, not great.
Tyler:
One of the main things I've struggled with, as someone who has a pervasive avoidance of fear and discomfort, was that I wasn't masculine enough, that I basically was the opposite of manly, whatever manly means. And at a very young age it was clear that I was a sensitive kid. You may have heard the phrase highly sensitive person or highly sensitive child. I was one of those, and you know so. I was very affected by the world. For example, I would cry easily and I was bullied pretty frequently for that, among various other things.
Tyler:
While there is variation between cultures, countries and demographics, I think a lot of us know that many times we as men and boys feel this near constant pressure to not show certain emotions, to not say or do anything that is perceived as weak or feminine or unmanly. Crying in particular is targeted as being something essentially taboo for men and boys in many groups, in many areas. So part of what I want to do with this podcast is kind of flip the usual conversation on that whole mess. The title Crying is Manly gets at the heart of that aspect of what I want to essentially put out into the world this idea that no, crying does not make you a girl or weak or unmasculine. Instead, what if crying itself were manly? What if having the courage to be vulnerable, the courage to break down in front of people, the courage to open yourself up, the courage to record something, even if you're shaking in fear, is in fact very masculine and shows a strong individual who is worthy of admiration and respect? I don't know if all of that is true, and the podcast recording bit is a little bit tongue-in-cheek, but I do love the idea of thinking about it all from that angle. I also love the idea of some people having very strong or even visceral reactions maybe, to reading the phrase crying is manly. I kind of think about that sometimes, kind of what people will think and feel when they see that. So I don't know what kind of reactions we'll get, but I think it'll be fascinating and I'm actually really excited to see that happen.
Tyler:
No-transcript about this idea that finding our calling is something where you know when we do that it won't feel like work. Or if you find your purpose, everything else will just sort of fall into place. I've never known exactly what my purpose was. I sort of drifted around. I've done a lot of call center jobs and just sort of you know, popped into whatever job was next or something to pay the bills and that sort of thing. But once I decided concretely to actually start this podcast and begun taking real measurable action to start it, I began feeling like this might be my purpose somehow, which I don't know. I know that might sound kind of strange to someone listening, especially if they've known me a long time, but you know the sense is, maybe even this might like evolve into the thing which is my purpose. It's very difficult to articulate and it's not really an experience I've had before, but it's fascinating and I'm interested to see where it will go.
Tyler:
If you've read self-help books or listened to self-improvement podcasts or you know struggle with being undisciplined, you've probably heard people say something like whatever you're delaying, whatever thing you're scared about, start right now, just do it. Do it now. You know the time will never be just right. You'll never feel confident. Just start it. Do it right now, because it's always going to suck at the beginning. You're always going to be basically terrible at the beginning, uh, but you've got to start, man, you've got to take action or at best, you'll never reach your potential. At worst, you'll live a life of shame and regret, just you know, kicking yourself for never having done all the things that you could have, should have, would have done. I've spent a lot of my a lot of my life in that place of shame, regret and knowing that I wanted to be doing more, wanted to become more. So, believe me, I can definitely relate if you're feeling that or, you know, feeling sort of called out by the last few things I said. That's definitely not my intention.
Tyler:
Specifically, with the podcast, I've been wanting to do one since at least 2022. And I had been thinking about it off and on, brainstorming off and on between then and now, but otherwise didn't really do a whole lot of work on it. You know I would jot down ideas of episode titles periodically. I even bought a microphone in October of 2022, which I didn't use for quite some time and you know, just a little bits and pieces of effort here and there, but nothing that was like major, nothing that really moved the needle, and I was just thinking to myself oh, I'll get to that. I'll get to it when I have a good setup. I'll get to it when I feel confident I'll get to it when it's going to go well. Basically, just excuses rooted in fear and apprehension.
Tyler:
Thankfully, I was listening to some entrepreneur question and answer interview type podcasts a few weeks before my birthday, which was last month, and, for whatever reason, the message about starting right now it finally got through. So I am doing the thing. The episode might be terrible, I have no idea. Am doing the thing. The episode might be terrible, I have no idea, but we, we have to be okay with that. Um, that's you know. Again, when you start a thing, you're going to suck Not always, but, but usually, almost by definition, you're going to be garbage at it, but you got to do it. So I am doing the thing. I am taking action. I started slash, am starting the podcast, which is the most important part. That's what this episode is all about. So we're doing the thing.
Tyler:
So, after finally starting taking those real actions, that concrete progress on the podcast last month, in the period of about a month, not only did I make more progress than I'd made in about a year and a half, but honestly I couldn't. I couldn't believe the amount of things that happened very quickly. It was just, it was just wild. I had people telling me the kinds of things they'd like to see discussed on a podcast about men's mental health. I got to speak at length with a professional podcast producer I think he gave me something like four hours of his time who introduced me to some great podcasts just a wealth of suggestions and ideas and wisdom and told me about some men's mental health events and an organization that does podcast conventions. I did not know that even existed, so good to know.
Tyler:
But, yeah, I decided it was basically a few days from when it was going to happen, maybe a couple weeks, and I decided to attend the convention as a birthday present to myself. So, of course, I ran into all kinds of interesting things and interesting people there and all of that wouldn't have happened unless I had taken that concrete action. You know, yeah, we can say maybe it would have happened unless I had taken that concrete action. Um, you know, yeah, we can say maybe it would have happened at some point. But you know, all other things being equal, all that stuff dominoed out of finally to making the decision to all, right, you know what I'm going to start it today, which is just just wild, so I could probably talk for like 10 minutes straight about all that, as far as how many unexpected things have developed from finally taking action. But I, you know, I think I've sufficiently made the point. So, yeah, it's wild and it's hard to believe.
Tyler:
So, whatever you know deep down you want to do or whatever you think you're meant to do, whatever you've been putting off, just do it. Just do it, man. Do it now. Just do the damn thing. Take action. Even if the results are awful, even if you hate it, you will absolutely benefit and grow from the experience. I promise you it will be worth it in some way or another. If you know again, if for no other reason than you can say, hey, I did the thing, I'm proud of myself, nice, and you won't have that nagging feeling anymore that you're choosing a path of fear or avoidance when the option is available to do something, to be something more.
Tyler:
So the next time you take action on a thing you've been avoiding due to fear or anxiety, please do let me know. I'd love to hear your story. You can find links in this episode description where you can send me an email, leave me a voicemail or connect with me on any of my social accounts. I specifically, would love to hear from you on voicemails. I think that's just such an awesome way to connect, since we're already on a medium that's audio based. All right, everyone. So that is it for this episode, and I will see you in the next one. For now, just remember, crying is manly.
