Episode #1207
Most marriages do not end in a fight. They end in a slow drift that both people can feel and neither one names. The husband tells himself it will get better after the next quarter, the next vacation, the next Christmas. The wife takes on more, says less, and slowly stops expecting anything. On paper they are still married. In the house, they are roommates.
In this episode of The Powerful Man Show, Doug Holt is joined by his wife Erin Holt, a women's coach who regularly brings a woman's perspective into TPM's groups. Together they map both sides of the same breakdown: what a man is doing when he doubles down on work, what a woman is doing when she goes quiet, and why each one is waiting for the other to move first. Doug calls the male version hopium, the habit of surviving on the hope that tomorrow will be different. Erin calls the female version self-abandonment. Same ending, different route.
The discussion covers:
- Why men wait too long: the pattern Doug hears from almost every man who comes through TPM, and what happens when a wife stops being angry and closes the door on reconciliation entirely.
- What a gray marriage actually is: Erin's term for a couple who are technically married and no longer connected emotionally, intimately or sexually, and why so many couples live there for years.
- Why somebody has to go first: the leadership argument at the center of the episode, and why a man who leads his business and his family still waits to be led at home.
- The five minute reset: the simplest practice Erin starts every client with, how to use it to slow a nervous system down, and how a husband can create the space for his wife without trying to fix her.
If the drift in this episode sounds like your house, the next two conversations go deeper. The Two-Year Warning: Women's Journey Before Divorce walks through the timeline a wife moves along before she leaves, and Sex and Intimacy: What Men Need to Know covers what happens to the physical side of a marriage while the emotional side is quietly going cold. Doug's closing instruction in this episode is the whole point: in the moment of insight, take massive action.
Timestamp Chapters
00:00 - Introduction: What Would You Do If Today Was Your Last Day Alive?
01:31 - Shifting Priorities: Family Connection Over Business Distractions
02:19 - What Authentic Presence Looks Like Without Digital Distractions
03:31 - Why Happiness Rises as People Age: Running Out of Time to Care
04:30 - Doug Holt Mid-Roll: A Man’s Guide on How to Save Your Marriage
05:33 - Seeking Connection in the Wrong Places: Phones vs. Real World
06:51 - How Finite Timelines Eliminate Fear of Vulnerability
08:05 - Putting Trivial Stories and Daily BS Into Perspective
09:28 - Kicking the Can Down the Road: The Trap of Complacency
11:06 - What True Presence Looks Like at Home Without Grandiose Gestures
12:40 - Applying the “Last Day” Frame to Daily Morning Habits
14:39 - Self-Imposed Urgency vs. Waiting for Divorce Papers or Illness
17:23 - Breaking Out of the Discomfort Zone of Performing Only Under Pressure
19:38 - Cutting Through Noise to Focus on What Truly Matters
21:47 - Expressing Love and Owning Your Side of the Street
24:04 - Using Urgency to Eliminate Procrastination and Rock the Boat
26:41 - What If You Had 24 Hours to Save Your Marriage or Business?
28:27 - Leaving It All on the Field and Closing Remarks
RELATED EPISODES
- The Two-Year Warning: Women's Journey Before Divorce
- Sex and Intimacy: What Men Need to Know
- Making the Holidays Magical: Strengthening Marriages
Frequently Asked Questions
What is a gray marriage?
Erin Holt describes it in this episode as a marriage where you are technically still married but not really. You are not connected emotionally, intimately or sexually. You are together on paper. Nobody is fighting, nobody has left, and nothing is being said. That quiet is the problem, not the proof that things are fine.
Why do men wait so long to fix their marriage?
Doug calls it hopium. A man sees what is happening, decides to put his head down and grind, and tells himself it will get better after the next deadline, the next vacation, after Christmas, when the kids are older. Meanwhile he is getting admiration and significance at work that he is not getting at home, so his energy naturally follows what is feeding him. The waiting feels like patience. It is avoidance.
My wife has gone completely cold. What does that mean?
In the episode Doug describes wives who have almost left the marriage without leaving the marriage. He says some women put out feelers or try to blow it up, and that TPM calls those safety tests. He also warns about the version that costs men everything: when she has not only made up her mind but has closed the door on the possibility of reconciliation. The distance is information, and it has a clock on it.
How can I reconnect with my wife without having a big conversation about it?
Doug's answer is that somebody has to go first, and in this case it is the man taking the leadership role. That can be an apology. It can be changing how you show up before she changes anything. He points out that most men want to be the leader of their business and their family, and that a leader goes first rather than waiting for the other person to move.
How do I help my wife slow down when she is overwhelmed?
Erin's answer is to support it rather than manage it. She starts her own clients with five or ten minutes of scheduled space where you deliberately do not fill it. No phone, no task, no meditation required. She says men already understand transition time after work, and the move is to recognise that she needs the same thing and to make room for it instead of asking her to power through.
What should a husband do if his wife says she is done?
Erin reframes "I'm done" as a usable starting point rather than an ending. She asks clients what the sacred third is, because all or nothing thinking hides what you actually want. Then she has them name which parts of themselves they have abandoned and start reactivating those. Doug's parallel instruction for men is to stop waiting, look at your own side of the street, and take action on what you have full authority over.
Stop waiting for the right time.
Every man Doug talks to says the same thing on the other side: I wish I had done it sooner. The antidote to the waiting is action, and action does not have to be dramatic. It can be one conversation with someone who has seen this exact pattern a few thousand times.
If this conversation sounded like your house, claim a free copy of A Man's Guide on How to Save Your Marriage Without Talking About It. Doug covers the book, you cover the shipping. It is an action plan you can start using today.
And if you want a straight answer on whether TPM is a fit for your situation, book a call with an advisor. No pitch, no pressure. Just a conversation about where your marriage actually is.
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Transcription
Doug Holt 00:00
It'll be better. The kids will be a little bit older. Then we can reconnect.
Erin Holt 00:04
I want so much more.
Doug Holt 00:06
Most of the guys go, "Okay, I see what's happening. I'm going to wait a little longer."
Erin Holt 00:11
I cannot live like this anymore.
Doug Holt 00:12
If you're in that state of resentment, that's hard because you think you're the victim.
Erin Holt 00:16
Beyond exhausting, lonely, and depressing.
Doug Holt 00:20
Sometimes, unfortunately, we get guys that have waited too long.
Erin Holt 00:23
Once you deepen with yourself, you can deepen with your partner. Period.
Doug Holt 00:27
The antidote to the hopium addiction is action.
Do you ever wonder why some people just want to blow it all up and start from scratch? Well, that's exactly what we're going to talk about today on the TPM Show, and we have our special guest, my wife, Erin Holt. Babe, thanks for being here.
Erin Holt 00:54
Hello, everybody. Thanks for having me again.
Doug Holt 00:56
Yeah, I'm excited about this topic. You gave a little bit of insight before we hit record. Without further ado, tell me what your thoughts were.
Erin Holt 01:05
I was just thinking about the coaching clients that I talk to, and also having experienced this in my own life and with girlfriends, when specifically marriage isn't going as well as once thought, or you're in a very dark phase of it, and the sense of, "Is this all there is?"
We're usually somewhere around 30s, 40s-ish, midlife. It's a stage of life where it's like, "Is this it? This is the dream we all were reaching for?" And feeling a level of scared that this is all it is, disappointment that this is the "it."
And being like, "Wow, I want so much more." For women, to language what they want: more depth, more connection, more fun, more freedom, more play, more ease, more peace. All of those things, usually when they come to me, feel very far away.
There's also a fear of, "I really love my people, and this isn't enough. Do I have to blow my whole life up to get these things?" It's a theme that I see a lot.
Doug Holt 02:21
I can totally see that too. Guys have something similar but different, and I think we have a defense mechanism, though, that stops us from going there as quickly.
Erin Holt 02:30
Tell me more.
Doug Holt 02:32
Okay, I want to dive into more of yours too.
Well, I think what guys do is we naturally bury our head in the sand and survive off hopium. "Is this all there is to it? Okay, I'm going to grind it out more. It's going to get better. I'm going to put my head down and focus on what I can do," which will be double down on work for a business owner, especially. They're going to double down on work.
In fact, I was just talking to one of my one-on-one clients before we got here. He was talking about his business. He's trying to scale his company. He's got a large company already, and his marriage isn't working out the way he wants it to ideally, and certainly not the way his wife wants it to be working out.
So when I talk about and go into the marriage component of the call, he's less interested. He's more interested in, "Hey, Doug, here are my business problems. Let's solve those," which I can do. I mean, I was a business coach for a very long time, so we do both of those things.
A lot of guys will go, "Okay, I'll just double down on work." Another guy that is in the Inner Circle, talked to yesterday, very similar. It's because women do it in their own way, but men are getting significance and the things they're not getting at home from work.
Subconsciously, as a man, if I'm not getting admiration, or I don't feel like I'm getting admiration or respect at home, if I feel like I'm walking on eggshells, maybe I'm not leading the way I should or don't feel I can lead the way I should because something's going to blow up, and I'm getting all of those needs met at work, subconsciously I'm going to naturally focus my energy and attention on what's feeding me, what's giving.
I mean, same reason people have affairs. That goes where someone's giving them attention, someone's getting the stuff they're not getting at home.
So men survive on what I call hopium, right? They're hoping it's going to get better tomorrow. "I put my head down. We just get this done. We get past the vacation. We do this. We do that. We'll get to the other side of this. After Christmas, it'll be better. The kids will be a little bit older. Then we can reconnect."
They just kind of think for that future and settle into really just ordinary and average at best, and allow things just to play out the way they're going to play out.
Erin Holt 04:58
There's so many different angles. Let's talk about that.
Doug Holt 05:01
No, there are.
I've been leading a company for the last 10 years with TPM alone, and as you know, coached men and women before that. I talk to so many of these guys, and we've had tens of thousands of men going through either phone calls or programs and just talking to our advisors.
When I talk to the advisors, most of the guys come in, regardless if divorce is on the table, an affair has happened, lying, cheating, or they've just grown apart. Most of the guys go, "Okay, I see what's happening. I'm going to wait a little longer."
That's the thing. That's why sometimes, unfortunately, we get guys that have waited too long, and the wife's not only made up her decision and made up her mind, but she has totally closed the door to the possibility of reconciliation. It's because they waited too long. They didn't take action.
I also hear from guys all the time, like at an event, they're like, "Man, best thing I've ever done. I was listening to the podcast for three years. Wish I would have done it sooner."
"I wish I would have done it sooner" is the number one thing I hear from every guy that goes through our program. Every single guy. "I wish I could go back and shake the crap out—" They don't say crap, though. "Wish I could go back and shake the shit out of myself three, four years ago and got myself to do it."
And their wives are saying the same thing.
So for women, though, because a lot of guys experience this, she's either blowing it up or attempting to blow it up or putting out feelers, is what it feels like to me. We call them safety tests.
Some of the guys will say, "Wow, my wife, she's become completely ice cold. She's doing her own thing. She's almost left the marriage without leaving the marriage."
Erin Holt 06:48
Yeah, I think there's a term for that these days. It's a hot button. It's called a gray marriage.
Doug Holt 06:52
Never heard that before. A good gray marriage?
Erin Holt 06:54
No, just a gray marriage. You're technically still married, but you're definitely not really. You're not connected emotionally, intimately, sexually, and you're very much together on paper.
The woman's version of that is similar but different in the way that we're so trained to be easy and just go with the flow. We end up being people pleasers and putting ourselves last.
"Okay, I'll just take on more, and it will make things better at home," or, "Our marriage will be better if I just don't bring up that topic again, even though it's really between us, but I don't want to make things worse, so I'll just act like everything's fine for a while," or I'll try doing—
Doug Holt 07:41
I want to buy you a gift.
Look, if your marriage is struggling, and let's be real, every marriage struggles at some point, but yours is struggling where you've lost that love, admiration, respect, I want to help you.
I want to buy you a copy of the book that I wrote, A Man's Guide on How to Save Your Marriage Without Talking About It. In here, I've distilled over eight years of programs that we've developed at TPM to help men just like you save their marriages without talking about it.
There's no fluff, no BS. It's an action plan that you can start using today to actually save your marriage and bring that love and respect back into your family, back into your house. You deserve it.
Look, all I ask is you pay the postage, you pay the shipping. I'll buy the book for you. That way, you can take massive action today.
Click the link or find it in the bio and get your copy now.
Erin Holt 08:34
More other things at home so he's not so stressed out, or maybe he'll be in a better mood if I take on more of the kids, or if I work less, or work more, or bring in money, or X, Y, Z.
Try and do it from that angle and just ease everything for everybody else while she's drowning. She gets to a place where she's twisted and contorted herself so much that she doesn't even know who she is and does not exist.
Then they get to a point where it's just like, "I cannot live like this anymore." It's beyond exhausting, lonely, and depressing.
Doug Holt 09:12
Yeah, it's funny when I listen to you talk about women. It's like when I hear the guys talk about men. We don't consider the other side of that.
I'm not saying you're not doing that, but it's like, "Well, as women, we contort ourselves. We're giving everything, and then we're done."
Erin Holt 09:30
It just looks different.
Doug Holt 09:32
It looks different, but the men are feeling the same way.
What comes up for me for that is resentment. "I'm doing all these things, and the other person's not." So therefore, I resent them for me giving up myself.
From a man's point of view, it would be working harder, bringing in more money, doing all these things, sacrificing myself, my wants and my needs, so that she can go do what she wants to do, or whatever it may be.
Meanwhile, they're not communicating about it. So that resentment just builds and builds and builds until his story is, "She's cold. She's manipulative." He loves her but doesn't want to be with her.
They get to that point, and that's obviously not a recipe for a great marriage or a great life.
Erin Holt 10:24
No, not at all. It's a really hard, dark, lonely place to be for both people.
Her story is similar but different. It's just like, "I can't give up any more of myself, or just pretend I don't exist to try and make this marriage work, or be the only one that's carrying this marriage and this household emotionally and psychologically and spiritually, and sometimes financially too."
Different families have different makeups. Underneath all the anger and the fear, just feel so sad and be like, "There has to be more than this."
Doug Holt 11:00
Well, and there is, right? That's the thing. There definitely is, and you and I have been on the other side of this.
I did a podcast interview with another woman's coach, and one of the things that came out of that is a question we get asked all the time. The title of the book I wrote is How to Save Your Marriage Without Talking About It. "Well, how can you do that?"
The way you do that is, for the man—the woman could do it too, but in this case, the man—taking the leadership role. Somebody has to go first. It could be an apology. Someone has to go first. It could be switching the marriage around.
What happens so often is each person's waiting for the other person to do their change. Kind of a, "Well, when you change and start seeing all the things I'm doing, I'll start seeing the things you're doing," or you get what I'm saying.
Or, "I'll break down and say, 'Hey, we need to talk,' sit down and have a conversation, and do it in a way that's receptive for you, not receptive for me."
If you're in that state of resentment, that's hard because you think you're the victim. That's where it takes, for the men that we work with, they have to step up and take the first step.
That's what leadership is anyway, right? Most all men want to think of themselves as the leader of their business, the leader of their family, the coach of their kids' sports teams, or whatever it may be. But a leader goes first.
When you think about all the men our advisors talk to, they're like, "I'm just going to wait a little bit longer," or, "Maybe it's not the right time. Now we're going into Q4 right now, so I'm going to wait till 2027 when Christmas is over."
That's not leadership. Leadership is going, "Okay, there's a problem here. Maybe she's not doing what she needs to do, and I'm going to go anyway and go first."
Erin Holt 12:54
Yeah, I agree.
I had a call inside of the business with an Inner Circle crew the other day, and a lot of the topic we talked about was similar things about this.
It's reminding me, one of the things that we were talking about and just saying, when you can really take the leadership role, male or female, take full responsibility that you play a role in creating the dynamics that are here.
Just know that when you start to really get to know yourself better, heal parts of yourself, look at your shadows that we all have, and realize that actually once you heal those, you free yourself up so much more, and you have a better relationship with yourself, so you're able to have a better relationship with your partner.
I love that. It just works. There's no "if, and, or but" about it. Once you deepen with yourself, you can deepen with your partner. Period. Always, every single time.
Doug Holt 13:49
Love it. Love that on so many different levels.
The guys love it when you do. For those listening, Erin periodically will go into one of our groups, like our Inner Circle group, which is one of our highest-level, one-year mastermind groups, and provide a woman's perspective, which is so great because hearing it from you is much different than hearing it from me, and you can give more insight than I can give from a woman's perspective.
What you may not know is I've been doing a six-module shadow work session with that particular group you're talking about. So for you to talk to them about their shadows, and that's exactly the deep, deep work we're doing with them right now, is perfect.
Erin Holt 14:25
Yeah, and I do this with my clients too, in a simple way. It's just healing the younger parts of yourself that you've actually outgrown. That's why it feels so uncomfortable.
If you're in that state, a pretty common stage of life where you're just like, "This doesn't feel good anymore, but I'm in the in-between. I'm not at my next. What's the next? I'm in the middle. I'm in the messy middle, but I know I'm ready for more," fill in the blank, or X, Y, Z. Or, "I want this to feel better. I want to feel more," fill in the blank.
When you really start to heal the shadow parts or younger parts of yourself that you've outgrown and learn how to operate from, honestly, just a more mature place, your life starts to feel and look really different.
Your inner world matches what is out-picturing back to you. So if you don't like it, as hard as it is sometimes, it's like, "What's going on inside of me that is creating this?"
Doug Holt 15:17
Well, yeah, it's feedback, right? The things around you, the way your wife's behaving, your kids are behaving, your coworkers, your business is performing. These are all feedback loops for you.
There's also a version of perception. We have a family member right now that's going through some mental health challenges, and when that individual doesn't sleep, the world's very dark for him. If you see him the next day and he got a great night's sleep, the world's beautiful and rosy again.
Same world, different perception of the world, and that can happen a lot too for men and women.
We're talking about this idea of blowing it all up. When things are dark, that's when you want to blow it all up because you don't have another solution. That's kind of the last-ditch effort.
I know some people blow up the relationship subconsciously. They're too scared to have that conversation. I've talked to a lot of guys that are too scared to talk to their wife about what they need in the bedroom, so they go have an affair, which sometimes ends the relationship, which is the direction they were going.
Which is so odd to me because you're like, if you're going to do this thing, it's probably going to cause a divorce if it gets found out. But you're not willing to have a conversation about a subject.
That's such an interesting thing in the psychology of humans, this idea of blowing it up. Are you doing this to sabotage? Are you doing this because you really want to have an affair, or are you doing this subconsciously because you want to self-sabotage?
Because a lot of the times when I'm talking to these guys, they have nothing but regret.
Erin Holt 16:56
Yep. Same for women.
Doug Holt 16:57
Yeah. I wonder at a subconscious level, that kind of, "Hey, let's blow it up because therefore I have to start over. Therefore it forces my hand to do so."
Erin Holt 17:08
Yeah, and with the women too. I know you do the men.
A lot of times, if they're in a marriage that isn't working, we'll talk about it and we'll talk about differences between men and women, which are insanely huge. Obviously, we focus on them.
Then it's just like, once they can pull their energy back into them and really realize, "Okay, this part of me is activating this part in our relationship, and I can take responsibility for that," and just be like, "I'm really ready to lay that part of me down. It's not working. It actually doesn't even feel good. I don't like who I become when X, Y, and Z happens between my husband and I."
It's a really common theme for women to be acting from a younger place and being like, "He should know what I need without me telling him," or, "You should be able to read my mind," or, if things aren't working out that way, "He doesn't care about me. He doesn't love me," and just go down this spiral of really young, kind of princessy thinking.
After working with them and kind of growing them up into a more mature version of themselves that matches with what they actually want and need and dream of and desire, even if it's in secret, if they don't say it out loud, they're capable energetically now of matching what they actually want and not sabotaging it if they start to expand and pull more into their life through themselves first.
I just fully believe that women and men—I know you believe this too—that are more connected to themselves, love themselves more, are more happy and harmonious within themselves, create that in their family and their home, and then it just goes out into the world.
I do have women come to me thinking they're at their last straw. "I think I have to blow this thing up. I can't do this anymore."
It's like, "All right, all right. Let's just pause for a minute and slow down."
It's a big thing for women. Just slow down. In our fast-paced world, I know for a fact, for women, we're so disconnected from ourselves. That is not the pace that we can tune in and be connected to our highest and best selves.
So slowing women down, as annoying as that sounds, is actually one of the most powerful things that we can do.
Doug Holt 19:28
So how can a husband slow his wife down during this stage? I mean, they're not in a great space. What can he do?
Erin Holt 19:38
I know it's a really hard pattern to break, and I can speak to this because I had to learn this skill.
We live in a country where faster, bigger, stronger, go, go, go, nonstop, no matter what, is always better. Or if you're not doing something productive, this is a worthless waste of time.
That is not true because I would just argue that any person, male or female, that's running around ragged, adrenal fatigued, living off of whatever caffeine and sugar to keep going, that's not actually productive. That's waiting for a health decline and misery on the inside, even if your business is thriving. But that's a whole other story.
The way I start with my clients, and the way I really started myself, it sounds so simple. I literally started, I think, with five or 10 minutes of just scheduling space time, connection time. You do not fill it. Literally, do not fill it.
You can sit there, drink some tea. It's literally growing your capacity to be with yourself, is what it really is, to be still.
When you first start sitting there, you're going to start, "Oh my God, I need to do this. I need to do that. I need to call that person." Everything that you need to do is going to fill your brain. Just pay attention to it.
It honestly was really challenging for me in the beginning, and it's challenging for all my clients in the beginning. Then it becomes a breath of fresh air because you actually have a minute to connect to yourself before everybody else, quote unquote, needs you and the entire world needs you to respond to them, so that you can come in a little bit more resourced into your days.
Then I add in other things, but that is the most simple step. You don't have to meditate. If you want to meditate, you can.
The whole point is a sacred sit. You can do it outside. I love to do it outside. You can do it inside. I prefer it in the morning. If your mornings don't work, you can schedule it in your day and just learn how to be with yourself without filling it with so much noise.
Here's an example. I do this, and it's kind of funny, but if I'm driving somewhere and the music is up, and I'm following directions somewhere I don't know, as I get closer, I turn the music down. It's too much noise in our brain.
I've been driving at that level for whatever, 15 miles, but as I get closer to the destination where I really need to follow the directions to get to this house, turn the music down. I think a lot of people do this. It's because I need to focus more. I need to tune in to make sure I don't make a mistake or mess up.
Our world is, we're pounded with things and bings and updates and notifications and all the things, and our marriage isn't working on top of it. The stress is so crazy from that. I mean, it's wild what that does to our systems.
I know men's too, but it really takes a toll on our nervous system.
Go back to why you turn that music down. There's too much noise. When you literally can sit with yourself for five minutes without filling it, it was the first step I started with some of my clients, and I did it myself years ago.
Doug Holt 22:49
Yeah. So the question of how can a man help his wife?
I'm going to take all the stuff you said as advice for a woman, but a man could create that space for her or try to lead her into that space by doing the same things.
Erin Holt 23:02
Yeah, and do the best you can to support her, knowing that it's okay if she takes time.
On the call that I did with the guys the other day, I talked about tune-out time or whatever. You guys have transition time after work, and it's really supporting her that she also needs time to tune out and transition and slow her brain down so she can connect to herself.
Otherwise, are we capable of crushing it and going on to the next thing and powering through it? Yeah.
Do we feel our best? No.
Are you going to get the best friend of it? No, definitely not.
Doug Holt 23:36
Anything else you want to impart to the guys listening? I know a lot of the wives listen too. We have a much larger viewership of women on YouTube than we thought.
Erin Holt 23:45
I love that. I didn't know that.
Doug Holt 23:47
Well, I'm noticing more and more that couples are sitting down, especially the podcasts with you, and watching them right on YouTube. Throw them on their smart TV, put up YouTube, and they'll have conversations. Pause. "Okay, what'd you think about what Erin said or what Doug said?"
But any parting words? There's a woman out there right now. There's definitely a lot of guys out there thinking, "Oh crap, my wife's doing this. She's getting ready to blow it up or just blew it up."
But for the women listening, what's one piece of advice? And you've given a lot. If you were to have them walk away with one nugget, what would it be? And I'll give one for the men.
Erin Holt 24:25
If you're in this place, I know how lonely and sad it feels, and also angry, full of rage, right?
Things I ask my clients all the time is, "Okay, what's the sacred third?" Because when you get stuck in the "there's only this or that," you lose perspective of probably what you really want.
Just take a minute. You're probably at a threshold of, "I'm done," and that's great. That's actually a really good place to be. "I'm done with the way this is going." Declare that.
Then also declare, what parts of you are you done with, nothing to do with the marriage? Then start there.
What parts of you are you missing and really maybe have, in some way, abandoned, self-abandoned? Really tune into those parts of you.
"I really miss the part of me that was more social," or, "I miss the part of me that read." What did you used to like to do before we got so busy?
There's a lot of juice in there and gold in there. How can you reactivate parts of yourself that are dormant and you've abandoned on some level?
That's a really good place to start because then you can start to bring yourself back alive.
Doug Holt 25:45
And you have control over that, right?
I love that because so many people play the victim card. "When you do this, then I'll do that," right? That's really just saying, "I'm the victim of your circumstances."
When you can look inside and go, "Okay, what parts of me that I have full authority, autonomy of can I change?" Why not just start there? Because I want to change that anyway.
So instead of waiting till the marriage blows up, I'll just change that now. And if the marriage doesn't work out, well, at least I've got those things changed.
Erin Holt 26:15
Correct.
Doug Holt 26:16
One, that does great for guys too, by the way. I know you know that. So guys, you could double down there.
But I'll give you something different to run into: stop surviving off hopium. You're an addict. You're a hopium addict, and I say that lovingly. But I'm saying that as a friend or advisor speaking right to you.
I talk to so many men, and I hear all the time, "I wish I would have done it sooner. I wish I would have done it sooner. I waited too long."
Now, a lot of the guys who waited too long were able to pull things back, right? Some guys aren't. Now their parents are divorced, and kids are in different homes. There's all kinds of issues with that.
The antidote to the hopium addiction is action. The antidote to the hopium addiction is action.
Whatever that action looks like, if Erin and I, the conversation we're having right now, resonates with you—we've done thousands of podcasts—if that resonates with you, get on a call with an advisor and just see if it's a good fit. Just see if TPM is a good fit for you, and jump in two feet first.
That way you can do exactly what Erin's talking about, which is you get to work on your side of the street and cleaning it up.
Like I've talked to so many other professionals, the way you save your marriage without having to rely on the other person is by you changing your behavior, the way you show up, raising the bar for yourself first and foremost, because everybody's watching.
People forget, and the men we work with—and not all the listeners are going to fall into this—but the men we work with are natural leaders. They may not have all the leadership skills yet, but skills are learned. Riding a bike, playing basketball, reading a P&L. These are skills.
One thing that I was never taught was the skill of relationship, right? That was one I had to learn. Unfortunately, I had to pay a really heavy price in our marriage, but that's what got me to learn the skills, and I wouldn't change it for anything.
Well, I can think if I could implant those skills in me beforehand, that would be good. But the result was worth it.
Getting those skills, and where you and I are, Erin, right now in our marriage, is a very rich place. Not perfect, but you're working on it.
I say that tongue in cheek.
Obviously, awesome, babe. I really appreciate all you do. The guys in the Inner Circle reached out to me right after that call, just saying how professional you are, how prepared you were, and blew their socks off just having the opportunity, from a man's point of view, of working with a high-level woman's coach like yourself.
So thanks for giving back to the community at TPM. We're on a mission to save families by saving their fathers first, and you do that same thing by helping us with that mission, and then also with your own business coaching women and saving their families.
Erin Holt 29:17
Yeah, I have so much fun going into the groups, and it's really, really fun to get to know these men over time and see their growth.
Also, just know they ask really insightful questions, and that they are into their own growth for the purpose of what you just said, evolving their family and their kids and their marriage.
With my own clients, it's just such meaningful work to do.
Doug Holt 29:42
I love it.
As I often say, "In the moment of insight, take massive action." And in this case, it's getting off the hopium. Stop sucking on hopium and start doing the work. It's the work that matters. It's the work that you want to do.
I can tell you right now that we have very prominent business leaders, politicians, athletes coming through our programs, and one thing that they find out often is that they're playing the victim card.
These are strong men, but they're playing the victim card deep down. My job is just to be honest, hold up a mirror as a reflection to you.
Nobody likes hearing that. I certainly didn't like hearing that and realizing that I was playing the victim card when my marriage wasn't working out the way I wanted to because it was obviously all Erin's fault, until I did just what Erin said and looked at my side of the street.
I knew I could take care of that part of the marriage, and that's where I started. I was lucky to have Erin be on the same journey. Neither of us knew that at the time, but that's worked out.
Even if your wife's not on that journey, at least as far as you know, because I didn't know Erin was on that journey, you can take action and turn things around.
But it only happens if you take action, and either way, you come out a better man on the other side.
We'll see you next time on the TPM Show.
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