Building Discipline w/ Peter Taylor

Building Discipline w/ Peter Taylor

September 15, 2023

In this week’s episode our Guest Peter Taylor – trainer, business owner, and mentor – talks about building discipline. We discuss how men need challenge to grow and how important it is to do difficult things.

Episode Transcript:

Intro: [00:00:00] Mark Azulay is an industry leader in psychotherapy and men’s mental health. He’s helped countless guys get back on their feet, deepen their relationships, and excel in their lives. Now, he’s taken all that he has learned and is sharing it with you. In each episode, Mark will interview an expert in the field of masculinity and men’s work.

We’ll cover topics such as emotional intelligence, masculine identity. Anger management, financial health, trauma recovery, marriage, and divorce ethics and spirituality. Tune in and become a better man. 

Mark: Welcome back to the men’s therapy podcast. I’m your host, Mark Azulay, and I’m here with Pete Taylor. He’s a co founder of the awakened man project, a father and ex pro athlete, a leader of thousands of men.

I’m really excited to have this conversation with you because as I’ve been digging into Thank you for joining us. You know, what male communities are out there. I love what you guys are putting together. It seems like an [00:01:00] incredible blend of coaching, teaching, mentoring events. I mean, you got it all. So I’m really happy to learn more about you and your program.

Welcome to the 

Peter Taylor: show. So I am, uh, I’m excited to talk about it. It’s, um, this is the thing that I needed years ago, still, still need now. Like I frequently say to the guys on the calls, it’s like this work that we’re doing together, like I need it just as much as, as, as you guys are receiving it. 

Mark: Yeah. Yeah. So let’s just dig in with your personal story.

Tell us a little about yourself, Pete, like what was your relationship with masculinity growing up and how’d you get into doing men’s work? 

Peter Taylor: If you’d said the words, uh, men’s work to me, even two years ago, I’d have had no idea what you were talking about and not, I wouldn’t have had a clue what you were talking about the just two years ago, I was in a bricks and mortar business that I had built.

Uh, a team of 20 people, I was very much in the architectural world, I was doing architecture, interiors, construction, [00:02:00] completely different world to what I’m in now. But, like, where my journey of masculinity started, if I go back to, like, when I was 13, 14 years old, back then, my bone and muscle density was 3 years below what it should have been.

Um, I was later, you know, doctors prescribed me with all sorts, but what that meant when I was a young boy was that a 13 year old looking like a 10 year old, a 16 year old looking like a 13 year old, and I very quickly got the nickname Little Pete, very quickly was bullied. Um, not just by the boys, physically by the boys, verbally by the girls, right?

And so from a young age, and like when you’re a teenage boy, it’s hard anyway, like there’s loads of stuff going on, right? So this adage of being little Pete, um, but that led me to go into the gym [00:03:00] really, really early, led me like 15, 16, starting to go to the gym, starting to train. And I learned quickly that it was well within my power.

To change not just physically the, but going to the gym made me feel good and gave me more confidence. And then it was, I think there was no coincidence that not long after that, like the bullying stopped and, um, and I, and I started to change as a, as a young boy coming into coming into a young man. 

Mark: Yeah, I’m curious about that time.

Did you talk to other like millennials, right? Or elder millennials, where I feel like we didn’t really question or think about gender in the same way that the younger generations do now. But I wonder what the bullying, did you ever wonder about that? Maybe not, you know, if you are a man or not, but if you could fit in with other guys.

Or if you were strong enough, like, did any of those feelings come up for you? 

Peter Taylor: Uh, the biggest, like, I [00:04:00] absolutely wanted the cool kids to like me. That was a big thing. I wanted the cool kids to like me and I wanted the girls to like me. And that was, uh, that was also a big thing. And like, when I was coming up for my, like mid teens, 15, 16, all my buddies having girlfriends, I’m not right.

And there was a, it was a real problem for me. It’s like, what’s, what’s wrong with me? And I’m like, why am I so small? Um, you know, this is, this is definitely the reason that I’m not getting the girls. Um, so, I don’t know whether I, it wasn’t like I was questioning, um, whether, I think I wasn’t really thinking about that.

I was just like, I want to get the girls and I want the boys to like me. It was only like much, much later on, um, when I started doing like this, like deeper work into my past and like how my brain works and how my makeup is, it’s like, ah, I start to learn a lot about like the impact of my parents divorcing when I was 13.

[00:05:00] Um, and, and like, and me then like my mother bringing me up and my father moving away. When I was probably 15, he moved to a different country, so I then started to learn, like, the impacts that had on my masculinity, which was probably, which was not, yeah, probably as important of a role as the bullying did and as the little Pete did.

Oh, 

Mark: 100%, right? I mean, growing up with an absent father and going through that. You want to share a little bit more about what that divorce was like and how it impacted 

Peter Taylor: you? Yeah, the divorce. Um, I literally, we spoke, I spoke about this a couple of weeks ago. I was over in Dubai, uh, with, with some, with a couple of friends.

And we were talking about, um, because I’m actually going through divorce now, right? Um, and we’re talking about me going through divorce and the guy I was with, he was also had been through a divorce a couple of years ago. And we were talking about that and I was like, you know what? I can remember when I was 13 years old.

I was standing at the top of the hallway, um, in [00:06:00] the house that my family used to live in and my dad telling me that, Him and mum are getting divorced and he cried and it was the first time I’d seen my dad ever show really any emotion let alone like real like bawling tears and I was just I just I remember I remember all the feelings I can feel my goosebumps going up now like it was and it was a real like pivotal moment like in me starting to grow up as a like a very young boy was like seeing my dad who is like very you know He’s, he was like a very traditional man, um, back then, right?

And so, seeing him like that was, um, it shocked me, it absolutely shocked me. And then, and then actually, and then going off from that, although he tried to be there when my parents divorced, I think it was, I think he struggled with it a lot. 

Mark: Yeah, I’m making it to get back with the older men and [00:07:00] emotions thing, right?

Because, you know, I’m a therapist in the therapy field. It’s like, hey, we need to see older men have emotions, normalize it, et cetera, et cetera. But I have a similar story of seeing my dad cry when his dad died, right? At my grandfather’s funeral. And it was the most disturbing thing. It disturbed me on such a core level because similar sounds like to your father.

He’s very stoic. He’s very, he’s, he’s happy and jokey, but there’s no, um, sadness or grief there. And when I saw that, it wasn’t this like liberating moment. It was terror. I felt real terror seeing my dad cry. I’d never seen him in a state like that ever. 

Peter Taylor: Yeah, yeah, for sure. It’s, um. Yeah, when you’ve not seen it, it’s a shock because you look like he’s, he’s, he’s the man like men don’t like it.

And even, even, even at that age, like at 13, I like I, it was instilled into me the men don’t cry, right? 

Mark: Right. And if, and if dad’s crying, if the man is crying, something’s really wrong. Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. Something’s really wrong. Um, so yeah, so let’s keep moving through your story, right? So you go from bullying, [00:08:00] you go through the divorce.

Where do you go from 

Peter Taylor: there? Yeah. Like, um, so coming into my like later teams, I’m taking the gym really seriously, taking the gym really seriously. Um, I’m also taking money pretty seriously as well. Like I just want to earn money. Started only like started doing the paper round when I was 13 started. So do you remember like Pokemon cards?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I started selling the Pokemon cards on the playground. Um, so like there was like. I wanted to earn money and I started work when I was 17, got straight into, into like, into the corporate world, they took me to university, I continued with the gym, I was very, very, I was becoming obsessed with that, I was trying every diet, trying every sort of routine, and in my early 20s, as I started to climb the corporate ladder, I also started to compete, um, in the gym world, so like in the bodybuilding, like fitness modeling world, so getting up on stage, um, which is, and like, From going, from being bullied, um, [00:09:00] about really the way I looked.

Yeah. To going to be on stage. Now I look back at that now and I’m like, Fuckin hell, I had some balls, right? To be on stage, really, to be judged. On the way I look, that’s the only way you win those comments that you’re being judged on the way you look down to like the finest detail, right? To like single muscle definition and all that.

Absolutely. Yeah, it’s all got to be symmetrical. It’s like the way, the way you present yourself on stage, the way you hold your confidence on stage, the way you move on stage, like it’s like it’s um, it requires an awful lot of confidence and it requires an awful lot of discipline, um, to be able to get yourself into that sort of physique and an awful lot of sacrifice.

Yes. Um, so I continued that bodybuilding sort of fitness modeling. It wasn’t a career. It was like it was a hobby. Um, and in the end, I won a number of competitions and I got my pro card and I competed in the London O2 arena and thousands of people. And, and, and that was a very interesting time for me because it [00:10:00] taught me how to be disciplined.

It taught me that if I really, really want it because I wanted to win. It’s like, if I really, really wanted something, and I put my mind to it, and I put everything into it, then I had a good chance of doing that. Um, and then that discipline that I learned from really just all that sacrifice, just doing that, doing the hard shit I didn’t want to do, getting up at five in the morning to go and train when it’s raining and cold in England, right?

And then, and then having to go back to the gym in the evening to do the same, to train and, and, and just like the religious eating, you’re only eating your chicken and rice and potatoes and that’s what the food was. So, um, but learning that taught me great skills and behavioral traits for then going off to build my business.

Which is then what I did in my late twenties. 

Mark: Yeah. Yeah. I think about this idea of male initiation, right? And I think you’re talking about two of the [00:11:00] main ways that guys do it, right? It’s like fitness and business, right? Entrepreneurship. It sounds like you really went hard on both, which is incredible.

You know, this idea of, like you said, having to show up, practice, discipline, push yourself. Um, kind of get out of some of the more boyhood ideas, like procrastination, right? Or laziness or, you know, um, self destructive behavior. It sounds like you really had to do that. Do you feel like you were initiated during that time?

Like, was that your kind of boy to man transition? 

Peter Taylor: Um, kind of. I like my boy to man transition was probably was in my actually in my early 30s. Um, There was never, I don’t think there was ever really a defining, like, Oh, I’ve crossed the border now. Like, I’ve, I’ve, I’ve had that, like, I’ve, I’ve sacrificed the lamb.

I don’t, like, I don’t think there was ever that, that, that defining moment. Like, I absolutely do remember being in my early 30s and thinking, I am fucking just still a boy in a man’s body. There’s so many, there’s still so many, like, boyish [00:12:00] tendencies. And there was so much for me to learn. And, and, and I, I didn’t, and being really honest, it was probably.

Only a couple of years ago where I really made a big, like impactful change, which was when, so just to backtrack a little bit to my very late twenties, I set up a business and I set that up with a business partner and we grew that business from living room to three story building in London and we won loads of awards and we had a big team and we did really well, but I had a business breakdown.

So on year six I had a fuck it moment and I left my own business. I’d, I’d, I’d had enough and now I look back at that and now I can, I can like assess how I acted and like, I had no boundaries. I didn’t even know, like we did architecture, right? So a boundary to me was a fence, right? I had, I didn’t, I didn’t, I didn’t know what the word was.

I just, I had no idea, [00:13:00] right? I, there was, I had, there was no, no signs of me showing any, any signs of like being assertive. Right, there was, there was, I had plenty of very strong, like, masculine traits in that I could work my fucking ass off and I could, and I could work all hours and I was very, very hungry and I would, and I’d go out and I’d go, and I’d, it’d be like, warrior esque, very, very warrior, right?

But I was lacking many, many masculine traits at the same time. And You know, I had no idea how to have a hard conversation and how to maintain a hard conversation and, and to, and to push through when I needed to push through. And that, and ultimately that, that led to me leaving my business, my own business.

All right, which was for the best because it led to me setting up the awakened man because it was absolutely what I needed. I was in, I was in search for something and I’ve been in like my personal development journey started when I went [00:14:00] to start going to the gym. I started reading books on like how to be confident and then that was it.

I was a, I was a bookworm and I was a, I was a gym goer and I was a personal development addict ever since then. So leaving actually the business breakdown helped me to. Step into being more of a man, and it also put me on a journey of, of, of finding, like, my own masculinity. Which then led me to setting up The Awakened Man, because I couldn’t find it.

I couldn’t find anywhere to teach me. Yeah, and so it’s like, well, if I can’t find it, it’s going to create it and I’m going to bring the experts in. And then I’m going to surround myself with other great guys. And then before we know it, but 2 years in, and there’s, yeah, and it’s, you know, we’ve got thousands of guys that are in our communities.

Mark: I love that. Yeah, it is painful how hard it is to find some of these places, you know, and to find places where men can be open and honest and encourage each other to grow. So I’m happy you’re out there. Doing that work, um, you know, I took commercial break, but when we get back, I want to ask you a couple questions.

Um. [00:15:00] 1 thing that you talked about was kind of this breakdown moment, right? And I’m really interested. And if you think men need that, like, do we need that rock bottom moment? Do we need to motivate it through pain? Right? Or through our patterns being destroyed? Is that the catalyst that it takes for a guy to go to the next level?

So, um, we’ll talk about that when we get back. If you’re listening, hang on in there and we’ll see you on the other side of the commercial break.

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Intro: You are listening to the Men’s Therapy Podcast [00:17:00] with Mark Ale. To reach the show today, please call 1-888-346-NINE 1 4 1. That’s 1 8 8 8 3 4 6 91 41, or send an email through podcast at men’s therapy.online or visit www dot men’s therapy podcast.com. Now back to the men’s therapy podcast,

Mark: welcome back to the men’s therapy podcast. I’m sitting here with Peter Taylor. He’s the co founder of the AwakendMan project. And I pitched him a question at the end of the last segment where I talked about, you know, do you think that men need that rock bottom suffering moment where everything falls apart?

You know, for you, you talked about where you pushed yourself way too far, right. And you had to really just have a fuck it moment to walk away from your business. Right. Like it got you up to a point, right. The warrior hustle mentality. But at some point it’s just like, Holy shit, you know, this is unsustainable.

Um, so I’m curious. 

Peter Taylor: Yeah. Do you think men need pain? Yeah, a hundred percent. I think it’s, um, [00:18:00] sometimes it’s a little bit sad that us guys sometimes need that fucking awful moment to, to, to turn our lives around. And, uh, and I, so in my mid twenties, I lost my best friend in a car accident. So he was. 25, I was just about to turn 25 and, um, and up until then, I’d never really had anything bad happened to me.

I actually remember fucking thinking, like, prior, prior to that car accident, I’ve never really had much to, I’ve never actually had anything bad happen to me. I’ve had a pretty easy ride, like, no one around me’s died and I’ve just, I’ve been all, I had to, you know, I had to bully him back then, but I was way, way over that now and I, I, I’d already seen it was helping me.

And, um. And when Danny, um, died in a car accident, that fucking turned my world upside down. It was, you know what I mean? We used to talk every day. It was one of those relationships, every day. And back in the [00:19:00] day, he was the cool kid. He was the guy that, like, I really, like, I admired. And then we became best friends.

Um, and then, and then that was it. One day, done, boom. And, of course, I went through an incredible amount of pain, incredible amount of trauma. And it was about probably 18 months after that, when I started to pick myself back up, is when I really, that’s when I started my business, right, I had a fuck it moment in my corporate career, and I was like, fuck this, I’m out, I’m done, started the business.

Um, and then later on, I had the same fuck it moment in my own, in my own business when I, when I left, left my business, kind of a bit of a breakdown because I put myself through so much pain, but like all this pain and like, I can look back at like Danny’s death and, you know, I’d love it if he was sat with me here now, but he’s not, [00:20:00] um, and I absolutely grew from that.

I like, I absolutely became a better man from that. I like. So, uh, yeah, I, I agree. Like, I do think all men need pain. I think that men need to do hard shit. I think in today’s society, men don’t do enough hard shit. And it’s very, uh, and it’s very, very easy for guys just to fucking get away with it. Um, it’s extremely easy for guys just to sit at home and play the PlayStation and just mull around and watch porn and go on social media and then watch a little bit more porn and then just feel sedated.

And it’s, it’s There’s, and there’s, there’s no one, there’s no one really there, like, to fucking keep them accountable, or pick them back up, or say, what the fuck are you doing? They haven’t got that, so then it’s It’s easy. 

Mark: I agree. Yeah. There’s like a big pull down into this kind of lethargy, depression thing that I see a lot of guys in right.

And they, yeah, they just, they’re lost. There’s no male role models. There’s really no [00:21:00] reason in a lot of ways, right? Like a lot of guys, you know, can get by, right? Whether it be because of our privilege or because of our families or because of, you know, we can like live a mediocre life. Very easily, and there’s not the same kind of suffering that I imagine there was historically, right?

Like, you don’t have to go out there and hunt the elk, right? Or, you know, keep watch on the walls or do any of that stuff. Right? So I think it does take action, right? It takes guys putting themselves into situations in which they will suffer on purpose. And I think for a lot of people, a lot of men will stick with guys like it’s that’s like, not palatable.

They don’t want to do that. You know, they don’t want to suffer on purpose. They’re like, why would I do that? Um, so I’m curious for you, like, how would you, how would you talk to somebody about that? How do you, you know, motivate a man to, like, suffer on purpose or to bring challenge into their lives? Um, 

Peter Taylor: I put a fucking mirror in front of his face.

Yeah, there you go. Like, I also had this on today’s Awaken Man call. And, um, I lost my shit at, [00:22:00] uh, a couple of the guys and I could see their faces because I don’t always lose, I don’t, I don’t, I am, I don’t always lose my shit with the guys. They, um, they like it that I have high standards and they like, and they go, well, I like to listen to what Pete’s going to say because he’s got high standards of what he does.

And we see that he actually, he does what he says he’s going to do. I think guys get a lot from that. But every so often I think guys need to kick up the ass. I need a punch in the gut. And, and then there’s, there’s a bit too much of the, let’s talk openly and we’ll put an arm around you and give you a cuddle.

Um, and I, I think there’s a place for, there’s absolutely a place for just like getting some shit off your chest. It’s like, get some, get some stuff off your chest. Now let’s move forward. But if you’re not moving forward, then I think it needs a, well, I’m just going to shine a mirror up at what’s going on.

And here’s the reality of it, because no one else is telling you. No one else is telling you that [00:23:00] you’re fat and. You look like shit and you could do something about it because it’s because it’s because you’ve done something about it before but you haven’t done anything about it now and you’ve got and you’ve got kids and you’ve got a wife and you’re being lazy, right?

So that’s one thing and then your business isn’t performing. Why isn’t your business performing? Because you’re not doing, you’re not just, you’re just not doing the actions you need to do. You’re being lazy again. You’re getting easily distracted by a phone. Um, the, you’re looking on Instagram and then, and then you, you’re looking on the highlight reel of some, because it’s ladies on there, it’s just constant ladies with their, in their bikinis and their tops off and all, and all this and, and now you’ve got an urge in the middle of the day to go and jerk off.

Right. And ’cause no one’s around you go and do it. Right. And now and, and now and now you feel tired and then you’ve just neglected all the stuff you need to do in your business and then it repeats and then you don’t look after your health. And, [00:24:00] and, and a lot of the time it’s ’cause they don’t wanna do hard, they don’t wanna do hard stuff.

’cause it’s easy not to do hard stuff. I, I get up really. I get up at four in the morning. It’s hard. And I, I get up at that time because I like a, it’s hard. And I like doing hard stuff. I can train earlier, and I can also get a good amount of work done. I go to bed earlier. I go to bed earlier. I make sure I get my sleep.

But it’s so easy for a guy not to get up early. I’m not saying you need to get up at four in the morning. It doesn’t matter what time you get up. But it’s very, very easy for a guy to say to himself, Do you know what? I’m gonna get up at six. But I get up an hour earlier than I normally do and I’m going to go and train, I’m going to go and do something hard, I’m going to go and move my body.

And then when the time comes, and the alarm goes off, and then you go, I’ll do it tomorrow. I’ll snooze for 10 minutes, it’s warm in bed. It’s just the easy decision. It’s so, so easy to make that decision not to [00:25:00] ultimately step up into the discomfort and into the uncomfort, and you just stay safe. And. And I think this is the thing that a lot of guys don’t get.

I think a lot of guys get away with it, because they A, think they’re never gonna die. They think they’re invincible. And they got, and they think they got years and years and years left. It’ll be alright, I’ll do it next week, I’ll do it next year. I’ll sort myself out then. So they think they’re never gonna die.

But I can tell you from my fucking experience, people die. Just like that. Just like my mate Danny did. They die. The next thing is, The thing that no one’s looking at them, and because no one’s watching them, there’s no one to keep them account. So, there’s not, yeah, my wife’s here, but she’s not saying anything, so I’m just going to continue.

But there’s no one there to really keep them account, there’s no one looking at them, so they think they can get away with it. But here’s the thing, there is someone looking at them. It’s their soul, and their [00:26:00] psyche, whatever you want to call it, that is looking at them. And every time they make a decision that goes against progression, or goes against growth, The easy decision every time they break their own word, it will just leave a little dent on their soul over and over and over and over again.

And you do that over a number of years and that’s where you see very, very lazy man who’s not, who’s not, who’s not going to go anywhere in life because he’s repeated that. It just becomes habitual and then it’s literally imprinted on the soul. Yeah, I 

Mark: love what you’re saying that, right? There’s like some psychology research of gender differences between men and women, right?

And women really care about self esteem, right? Which is essentially like, what do other people think about me? Or what do I think about myself? Do I like myself? Whereas men connect with self efficacy. Which is, can I do a thing right? Just like you said, can I keep my own word? Can I do a hard thing? Am I able to run that mile?

I’m able to lift that heavy thing. Am I able to fix the [00:27:00] thing in my house? Right? Like, am I effective in my life? And I see it just the same in my therapy practice. Exactly. We were talking about man of, like, those ongoing broken promises to the self, you know, um, my story, you know, I’m sober. I was a drug addict for a while, right?

That was kind of my rock bottom moment. And I had to learn that about myself, right? I had to, like, keep the promise of sobriety because every time I would. Break that every time I would drink every time I would smoke it, you know, in like a echo chamber. Wasn’t that bad? Right? Like I was fine. I can still function.

But like you said, I was denting my soul. I was destroying my self advocacy. I was destroying my view of myself. Um, so yeah, I think learning to keep your promise to yourself is a huge thing that I wish I wish guys talked about 

Peter Taylor: more, you know? Yeah, absolutely. And this is the next thing on just like keeping your promises is keeping your standards high.

Yeah. It’s have, it’s like it’s, it is like having very, very, very high standards for yourself. I was speaking to a guy today. [00:28:00] Good man, he just joined the program, and I’m, and I’m, and I’m proud of him from, from, because it was a, it was a ballsy move for him, he was extremely nervous, and he’s not done something like this before, but he was talking to me about his drinking, and he doesn’t, he goes, I don’t have a drinking problem, um, I might have like four or five pints, um, a couple times a week, like, and he said, but I just feel like crap every time after, and he goes, I can have, I can have a pint, I’ll, I’ll be okay, but I’ll have three more, and he goes, I feel like crap the next day.

And um, but prior to him telling me that, he told me that he put on a load of weight over the last two years, which he hadn’t taken, which he hadn’t been able to get off, and his business wasn’t doing as well as he wanted to. It was just doing okay, and it had been ticking along for two years. Um, and I was like, Dude, like, the alcohol is a vice.

The alcohol is not serving you. Yeah, fine, go out and have a pint, but those extra three, [00:29:00] what’s it doing to you? It’s not doing you any favors for your health, and then you literally just said to me your business has been ticking along for two years, yet probably two days of the week, maybe three days of the week, you’re not feeling on top form because you’re feeling hungover.

There’s a problem, right? I was like, yeah, you might get an additional hour of laughter down the pub with the guys having an extra three pints. But is that hour of laughter worth then the sacrifice that you make and all the stuff that you’re not getting? No, it’s not, right? So just cap it. Get rid of it.

Hold your standard higher. It’s like you’ve got a daughter, it’s like you’ve got a daughter and you’ve got a wife, they’re looking at you. The daughter especially, she’s very, very young, she’s like a year old. I was like, dude, in a year’s time, she’ll be looking at everything that you’re doing, everything that you’re doing.

She’ll copy you, she won’t, she won’t care about what you say, she’ll care about what you do. And that’s the reality of it. [00:30:00] 

Mark: Absolutely. Yeah. So that’s that kind of tells the question I wanted to ask you, which is around like a level deeper of motivation, right? Like what gets guys going to that next level?

You know, you talked about warrior during the first segment and when I was my warrior mode, I was like, angry, right? Anger was the motivation, spite proving people wrong, like acquiring power and resources, right? Which is effective. I think guys have to go through that, right? No shame on doing that. I think we need to do that, but I’m curious, what is like the next fuel?

Right, like kind of once you’ve established a beachhead, and now you just want to get better, what, what keeps you going? What do you see keeps you guys going? 

Peter Taylor: Yeah, um, I love angry emotion. I think it’s like, it’s good for like interim. It’s not sustainable long term. Right. It’s like a booster mode, right?

Like you just boost forward with it. If you are able to control the anger, anger is a fantastic emotion. Um, and the thing is, this is the next [00:31:00] thing, like guys will want motivation and go, Oh, I’m not motivated. I’m not motivated to get up, I’m not motivated to go and build the business, I’m not motivated to get up before in the morning, but I use discipline to do that, like motivation is, it’s finite, you know, it comes and goes, you can’t rely on that shit, but what you can rely on is like, your structures and your discipline to do the hard stuff when you don’t want to do the hard stuff, so like, I would absolutely be having like, structures, protocols around, here’s a routine, I’m going to do this, whether it’s sunny, rainy, or there’s a rainbow with a unicorn jumping over it, I’m still going to do it.

Okay, and we can talk about purpose and passion, and it’s a quite, we’ll probably be here for quite some time talking about that, and I think that’s hard to find, and I think you need to, you need to be able to find it, you have to go on a big journey, and you have to do the work, you’re not going to find purpose or passion sat on your sofa watching TV or sat on [00:32:00] your bed, you have to, in my opinion, you got route A and you got route B, route A is the safe route, the route that, Society wants you to take, or that maybe like, maybe your parents want you to take the safe route, get the corporate job or whatever that looks like.

Route B is a scary route that you know sometimes you should probably take and you’re scared to do it. I’d be taking route B because that’s where you’re likely going to find paths that are going to lead onto some form of purpose, some form of passion, and that will give you a further drive in life. 

Mark: Yeah.

Peter Taylor: I like 

Mark: what you’re saying that discipline, that willpower kind of, and yeah, building atomic habits, right? Like habits and structures that will not fail. Um, and it takes time, right? It takes time and creativity. Um, so we’re going to move to an extra virtual break when you get back. I want to have you speak direct listeners about how they might build discipline, how they might.

Get that willpower in their life, how they might hold themselves to a higher standard. So some real practical tips. Um, so if you’re listening, hang on in there. We’ll see you on the [00:33:00] other side of the commercial break.

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Intro: You were listening to the men’s therapy podcast with Mark Azulay to reach the show today, please call 1 888 346 9141 that’s 1 888 346 9141. Or send an email to podcast that men’s therapy. online or visit www. menstherapypodcast. com. Now back to the men’s therapy podcast. Welcome [00:35:00] 

Mark: to the final segment. In this segment.

When we talk directly to you, the listener and present some tactical and strategic ways to do some of the stuff we’ve been discussing during this episode. So Pete, I just want to give you the mic talking about discipline and willpower and really how to kick your life to that next level. What would you recommend guys do and where should they start?

Peter Taylor: Yeah. Okay. First thing, let’s start with awareness. Right, so, and we’ll talk about discipline. I think it’s imperative that every man knows how to utilize discipline to its fullest capabilities. These are the three types of discipline that I like to work with. Number one is structural discipline. These are your routines, your protocols, your habits.

Number two is reactive discipline. This is how you react in any given moment. So in any given moment, there’s a stimulus and a response. Okay. And in the middle of the stimulus and response, there is a, there is a, there’s a gap where you can react. I like to respond. Okay. And the, and [00:36:00] the, and the first like tactical part I’m going to give you here is if there are particular moments or scenarios in your life where you know that you react, you know, that you get triggered or you react, there might be two or three that you can think of.

Less. Just work on them and then my line go right. Okay. I know that I get triggered in those moments. I know that I get angry or I get upset or I go quiet. I go into victim mode, whatever that looks like. So that all I want you to be is just be aware of when that happens and then you can choose. Your response.

Okay. So the next time it happens, choose your response. So that’s reactive discipline. The next, the third type of discipline is expansive discipline. Expansive discipline is the hardest to, um, to handle. This is the, the moment to moment, but being able to think bigger. Okay. It’s being able to like have a big, big goal over in the [00:37:00] future, but be able to bring that all the way back to now.

And then, moment to moment, when you react, you’re able to think about and respond in a way that pushes you further forward towards your goal. Okay, so the three types of discipline. The easiest to master is the first one, structural. Okay, um, and the first thing I think about doing is, how can you make your life harder?

How can you, we put you through some pain. Like the pain, the pain will set you through free. Absolutely will. So I, I’d absolutely be looking at how can I get up earlier? Just like, can, can I get up 30 minutes earlier? Can I get up an hour earlier? Can I get up an hour and a half earlier? Because when you do that, A, it’s hard.

And when it’s cold, we wanna do it. When it’s cold, we wanna do it all year round, including the weekends. Okay, so the, so the bedtime and the wake up time is exactly the [00:38:00] same when we get up, it’s, and then we go and do something productive. First thing I would suggest working out, I’d suggest going to a gym or or doing a home workout, do some form of movement, do something else hard, right?

So then immediately straight off the bat, you’re doing two things that are difficult to do, but they are a giving you more time. Right? To go and do something productive. And B, it’s elevating your state. Like, I honestly don’t believe there is anything else in this world that can elevate your state, that’s literally within your reach.

There’s nothing else other than working out. Right. It releases so many great hormones and, and, and, and so on. And it’s, it’s been, there’s been loads and loads of science around how great training is for a man’s mental health. Right. So that’s the first thing I do. The next thing I think about is your food, [00:39:00] follow a diet and track it.

Get someone to figure out what your macros are and what you should be eating. And then like, whether you want to lose weight or whether you want to gain some gain, some muscle, figure out what that is. And then track it. Okay? And there’s a reason behind this, because, hey, it’s hard. Right? So follow, try and follow a clean diet.

And then track that diet. So, hit your macros. It’s difficult to do that. But it will teach you a skill set, in learning what to eat, and how to eat. And it’ll also teach you another skill set, in being able to track, and staying disciplined, and this is what I’m going to eat. Right, and then when you reach for the cookie jar, because you’re feeling hungry, it’s like, uh, there’s a moment, I can either choose a moment of weakness here, or I could be strong.

What am I going to choose? And I can assure you, that happens ten times over the course of a day. Like, and you [00:40:00] don’t give in to the weakness of the cookie jar, or the, whatever it is you’re going to eat, the chocolate bar, or the bit of pizza. You build strength. You build mental strength and you do that over and over and over again.

I’m telling you guys in time, you fucking back yourself. You know, I’ve, I’ve been pretty good with this. I’ve been getting up early. I’ve been training religiously. Now I’ve been tracking my diet. I’m looking good. I’m feeling good. My wife is winking at me, right? Think this is, you know, this is, I feel good now.

And I know that I can stick to something. I’m going to back myself now and doing something a little bit bigger. The next thing I would do, this is number four, get rid of your vices, whatever your vices are, whether that’s substance abuse, whether that’s drugs, whether that’s alcohol. Um, if there’s a, if there’s a porn, it doesn’t have to be an addiction, but if it’s there, remove it.

It does us no favors as men, [00:41:00] trust me, social media. Do you scroll too much on social media? Do you find yourself that you’re just there numbing, just scrolling, scrolling, clicking, clicking? Or TV, maybe there’s too much TV going on, you might find yourself, you’ve watched way too much TV. When you could either be asleep, or you could be doing something productive.

So remove devices. Those four things are hard. All of them are very, very hard to do, but guess what? You, you, you do all those things, do you think your life’s gonna exponentially improve? I can tell you it will do. I get all my guys to go and do stuff, do these things. We get them to do other things, but these, these are, they’re, they’re core.

And you’ll absolutely improve your life. You’ll feel better. You’ll look better. You get mentally resilient. You back yourself. Your wife would be happy, or your partner would be happy, right? Your kids will look at you in a different way. Literally, like, I train every morning, and my [00:42:00] son, who’s two and a half years old, Leo, who stays with me, he joins me in the gym.

He knows to get out of his cot, and he knows well, because he gets out of his cot well. I dunno what the time he gets out about 6 37, depending on what time and if I’m still in the gym, he’ll, he’ll come in the gym and he sees me in there and I like just, it will just instill great habits and rituals into your own children.

Mark: Yeah, 

Peter Taylor: he, he’s picking up on that, which is really great. It was a great role model. 

Mark: Um, I, I want to bring you back around ’cause I think what you said was incredible right? It’s not just the outcome you get from changing these things in your life, right? It’s the skills that it’s going to teach you in order to make that happen.

So I just want to zoom in on that a little bit, right? Because it’s, it’s about, it’s about the journey too, right? So what are some skills that people develop by doing things like, you know, training and controlling their diet and cutting out their devices? What, what do they have to learn? 

Peter Taylor: Yeah, I did a talk on this [00:43:00] in London at the start of the year, that three, three levels for a man to exponentially grow his life is, is increasing his skill sets, is increasing, is working on his belief system.

And then working on his character traits, his behaviors, skill sets is the easiest one, typically, we can go out and acquire skills, it’s very like we can go out and we can do a course on Facebook marketing, or we can go do a course on like how to talk or leadership, it’s like very easy to acquire skills, um, doing those sorts of habits, doing those four sorts of like disciplines, one of the best skills that you will learn there is focus, because we live in a world now, Where everyone is trying to capture our attention.

It is relentless. It is everywhere. There’s the, there’s the next podcast, there’s the next YouTube, there’s the next course, there’s the next program, there’s the next speaker, there’s the next thing on social media. There’s just, it’s, [00:44:00] there’s the next advert. It’s freaking everywhere. And, and what these people, what this, like, society is doing and so on, and, and, hey, listen, like, I’m part of that, like, I’m part of breeding that, I have programs and so on, right?

But it fractures our attention, and when our attention is fractured, like, it’s hard for us to really focus. And when we lose focus, we can lose sight of really where we’re going, um, and we can become stuck, and we can become, we can feel overwhelmed, we can feel lost. What these habits will also teach you is how to focus.

Right, because if we start getting rid of our vices, we’re actually off TV, so we’re not seeing as many habits, we’re not, we’re spending nowhere near as much time as we used to on social media, so you’re not, you’re not being pulled into all these things, and because you’re, because you’re feeling better.

Like, um, not just physically, but like emotionally and mentally, like you will feel better from doing this, [00:45:00] you’ll be able to think clearer and like, it’s, you won’t, um, you won’t feel the need to just be like drawn into something because you’re, you’ll have clarity of mind, right? And here’s the next thing is like, if you, if you quit advice, such as porn, because I know it’s a big problem for guys, it was a problem for me.

I know it’s a problem for guys. I have hundreds of guys. That tell me it’s a problem. Or don’t tell me it’s a problem. That’s, oh yeah, I use that. As though it’s not a problem. But, I can tell you, you, you, you eliminate something like that, and your sex life will get better. And, and you’ll have more energy.

And you’ll, you’ll feel better. So I think actually one of the key skills there is focus, that’s what you will acquire from that, and you, you got focus, you got discipline, you’re feeling better, you’re looking better, like, [00:46:00] that’s a, you’re now, you’re now in the 1%. You’re now well, well, well above average. Do you know how easy it is to be, to be above average?

It’s so easy, but it’s just a little bit hard. 

Mark: Right. Yeah. Well, that’s the thing I think we talked about previously, I think the standard for men have just plummeted. So, to get in that top 50 percent is not that. Yeah, I mean, it’s hard because I think it’s hard for people to make the shift, but like you said, it’s not that, like, challenging, I guess, or, like, the bar isn’t as high as you would think.

Um, because, yeah, I think a lot of guys are in that, like, you said the porn cycle drinking too much. Not doing anything very lethargic, right? Like no emotional depth or intelligence, right? Just kind of like existing. Yeah. But this is going to bring guys out of that, right? We want to like throw them a life preserver.

Peter Taylor: We do. I want to bring as many guys out of that as possible. 

Mark: Yeah. 

Peter Taylor: But that there will always be winners and there will always be losers. 

Ad: [00:47:00] And 

Peter Taylor: I’m happy to continue the winning streak. It’s whether the guys, the guys that are listening to this, whether you want to go, do you know what? Right. Well, good night.

I’m going to make a change now, now’s the time, because like I said earlier, like you could die tomorrow, you’d get run over by a bus, you’d have a hernia, anything can happen. Can’t take it for granted. 

Mark: Yeah. Right. And it’s like, as far as we know, we only have one life. So let’s try to live the best life possible.

Um, you know, like I said, even for your partners, for your wife, for your kid, and for the world, right? I think a lot of guys have a lot of incredible gifts that are behind these, these walls of laziness and lethargy and. Shut down. 

Peter Taylor: Yeah, one of the biggest things, one of my fears is getting to my deathbed and, and thinking why the, why did I not play that power move?

What, like, why did I not go full out? Why did I have those, those, that number of years where I just, I knew I [00:48:00] was playing at like 70 percent and I could have played at 100 percent or could have played at 90%. That’s a, that’s a huge fear. 

Mark: Right. I think that’s why you hold yourself back. 

Peter Taylor: Right. Yeah, absolutely.

Like I have to catch myself. Like even today, there was a, there was a moment today and I’m like, Oh, that’s a fricking power move that is, and I have to catch myself and I’m like, well, Hey, if I don’t make that move in a couple of years or 10 years, will I, will I look back and go, you idiot, come on, man, just, just make the move.

What’s the worst that can happen? Just step 

Mark: up to the plate and do it, you know? Just step 

Peter Taylor: up to the plate, yeah. 

Mark: Well, on that note, we gotta start to wrap up, but I’m curious, Pete, where can people learn more about you online? 

Peter Taylor: I am very active on Instagram. My handle is Pete underscore Taylor. I’m extremely active on that.

Um, the second place is heroicman. com [00:49:00] That’s where we’re at. That’s gonna, that’s actually our new website. We’re just moving over to heroic man. com. Great. Yeah. Check it 

Mark: out. Great programs. If you need that, like a little kick in your ass, feature guy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. With pleasure. So thanks again for joining me on the show.

Um, listener, thanks for tuning in. You feel like a guy needs to hear this, share it, right? Send it to him, you know, Listen to an hour, I think it’d be really helpful to get a guy who’s like, stuck in a rut, listen to what Pete’s saying and just kind of get it because that’s moving for lack of a better term, you know, um, so yeah, like it.

Do all that stuff, share it, and we’ll see you next week. Another episode of the Men’s Therapy Podcast.

Intro: Thank you for joining your host Mark Ale on the Men’s Therapy Podcast. Be sure to tune in again live next Friday at 2:00 PM Eastern Time and 11:00 AM Pacific Time on the Voice America Empowerment channel and anywhere podcaster found To support the show, leave a review on your favorite podcast platform.

For more information or [00:50:00] to apply to be a guest, visit www.menstherapypodcast.com