16 min read
Episode #987
What if the key to stronger connection isn’t about trying harder—but simply remembering who you are?
Fresh off The Rising, Tim Matthews sits down with Mark and Chris —aka “The Love Power”—to unpack some of the biggest personal breakthroughs that came from shutting out the noise and tuning in to what really matters.
They dive into the messy, beautiful process of self-discovery, and what happens when you finally stop running from your own patterns. You’ll hear how something as simple as saying “I love you” can completely shift a relationship—even in the middle of a heated disagreement.
In this episode, they talk about how knowing yourself can expose hidden triggers, like emotional eating, and how those subtle shifts can create massive change. They reflect on why real connection often gets lost in the day-to-day grind—and how men can reclaim it by owning their truth and leading from love.
This is one of those conversations that reminds you: the work isn’t about being perfect—it’s about being honest. With yourself first. Then with the people who matter most.
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Transcription
Chris 0:00 You’ve been present for a number of my realizations, and you’ve saved me quite a few times. The energy in that laugh is just so pure and joyous. When it comes, I’m just reminded of the fact that, yeah, I did the best I knew how at the time. But now I know better, and I can do better. And that’s exciting, right? Because it’s all forgiveness for myself for the past, acceptance of where I am, love for where I am, and such excitement for what comes next.
Tim Matthews 0:35 Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of The Powerful Man Show. I’m your host, Tim Matthews, with Mr. Mark Smith and the incredible Mr. Chris Cameron, aka—
Chris 1:00 The love power.
Tim Matthews 1:01 The love power. I love that. This is going to be a fun conversation. So we’re just off the back of the Rising. We are. How’d you find it?
Chris 1:15 Unbelievably enlightening on so many levels. It was challenging, but in the healthiest and most incredible ways. Yeah, just incredible.
Tim Matthews 1:29 You say in the most exciting, healthiest of ways. What do you mean?
Chris 1:34 It was scary, but it was only scary because I was letting go of the day-to-day comforts. And halfway through day one, the noise on the outside was turned down so much that—well, the way you put it—the noise on the inside got turned up. And I just learned a lot about myself, which was the enlightening part, right? Diving into stories, noticing things about my body, noticing things about the way I think, noticing things about the way I feel. Learning about myself. Studying myself. What an incredible journey to take—to study oneself.
Tim Matthews 2:25 It reminds me of that quote by—I think Seneca or Socrates—“Know thyself.” It’s so simple, but also so profound, right? It’s not a new saying. We’ve heard it for decades. How many people actually know thyself?
Mark 2:43 Yeah, that’s the journey that I’ve been on for many years, specifically with that focus. Tell me more? Oh, we can go metaphysical with this. So I was diagnosed—quick anecdote—I was diagnosed when I was in my early 20s with astigmatism. So I’d wear spectacles. And I read a book by Louise Hay called You Can Heal Your Life. And when I looked into astigmatism, it was called “eye trouble”—this fear of really seeing the self. I went, okay, so I’m going to dive into really seeing myself. And that has come to me in so many different ways, in so many profound ways. And the result is that I no longer wear spectacles because my eyesight has improved and my astigmatism has gone much, much—
Chris 3:37 I love that. Wow, that’s wild. Yeah.
Tim Matthews 3:47 So this journey of “know thyself” is a great topic for this, right? As we either venture through the Rising or venture through life, I’m wondering how, right now, we could convey the power and importance of knowing thyself. I think about guys who are listening to this right now. It could be guys that have been in the movement for a while and are on the journey of knowing thyself, or some may think they already know thyself. And then there’s going to be people on the outside who honestly have probably heard the idea of “know thyself” but haven’t even begun the journey of knowing thyself. So let’s dive into it a little bit and see if we can dissect it in some ways and add some value to that conversation. So on this journey during the Rising over the past few days, and this theme of “know thyself,” what are some of the key insights you’ve uncovered about yourself?
Chris 4:45 One of the first ones was the fewer distractions I had, the less hungry I was, which was incredibly eye-opening to me. And even just talking to you about it, learning that there’s probably some really interesting triggers in my life that cause me to go and grab snacks or go and get hungry or fill the void. And that’s a really interesting thing for me to take back and play around with and just take a step back and watch myself on a day-to-day basis and see, okay, well, this situation has caused a craving for something. What was it about the situation that did that? It’s almost like a different level of accountability, right? Like understanding why I’m doing some of the things I do that may be on autopilot, which are things that all of us do on and off throughout the day, on and off throughout life. But to take a step back and watch it for a bit—to even think to watch it—is an incredibly exciting step to be able to take.
Tim Matthews 6:08 Yeah, just the power in that as well. There are levels to this game of personal growth, right? And I really want to emphasize the power of that. Because as you rise up—no pun intended—but as you’ve done the work on yourself over the past few years, you come into the movement, you go through the Reset. And really, The Alpha Reset is designed to reset, right? I think it does a good job of helping you reset. Great. And then as the months and years go by and you continue to implement what you’ve realized and shift—I mean, you’ve gone through so many transitions of identity over the past few years. It’s wild. I can think of three without even trying. Yeah, right? Your growth has just been incredible. It’s been fun. So to get to the point of recognizing, oh, there’s a tiny little leak here and a leak there with the triggers with food—sure, right? Yeah. The level that you perform at—by you becoming aware of that, unplugging that leak, that tiny leak—could give you exponential results. Yeah, absolutely. Because of the level you operate at. It’s often the tiny tweaks, the 1% little optimizations. When you were at your starting point a few years ago, it was less about the 1% shifts because you needed bigger shifts. Right now, it’s those 1% little tweaks that provide exponential results.
Chris 7:44 There was, in one of my former lives when I worked in retail, an executive who used to play for the Mets. His name was Doug Mizzy, and one of his sayings that he would bring out at the annual conferences, or one of his questions would be, “Does anybody know the difference between hot water and boiling water?” And it’s quite literally one degree, one degree Fahrenheit. And I think that ties in beautifully with what you’re saying around those 1% changes, those 1% differences. Even becoming aware of the potential of that is exciting.
Tim Matthews 8:24 Oh, for sure. And this is why somebody coming into the movement, they’re not ready for a Rising. It’s nothing against them. Sure. They’ve got to do the groundwork first through, be it The Activation Method, the Reset, whatever it may be, to enable them to build up the temperature, essentially, so they can get to the point of that one degree making all the difference. Yeah, I love that, that one degree shift.
Mark 8:51 The air is thinner, isn’t it, as you rise? So the nuances are there, and that can make it more challenging, right? Because it’s not so obvious to see what those changes are that need to be made. And yet, speaking exponentially, once that shift happens, it can create a massive tectonic plate shift underneath.
Chris 9:16 Absolutely. Yeah.
Mark 9:18 So what was your biggest shift this past week?
Chris 9:20 Recognizing the power of love.
Tim Matthews 9:26 That was a wonderful thing this week. I love that.
Chris 9:31 Yeah, it really was such an incredibly empowering and simple realization to come to. But just to understand on a visceral level the power of “I love you” and what that can do in life, in disagreements, in repairing relationships and maintaining relationships, was just unbelievably enlightening and also exciting to learn and understand and see from a higher level, from a top-down view. It was such an incredible moment of enlightenment that I had to stop and start laughing. You’ve been present for a number of my realizations, and you’ve saved me quite a few times. The energy in that laugh is just so pure and joyous. When it comes, I’m just reminded of the fact that I did the best I knew how at the time. Now I know better, and I can do better. And that’s exciting, right? Because it’s all forgiveness for myself for the past, acceptance of where I am, love for where I am, and such excitement for what comes next.
Mark 11:05 Can I add something? So the “I love you” was looking out. If you were to look in and say, “I am love,” how would that land for you?
Chris 11:17 “I am love.” Yeah, the smile comes over. Right? That energy, it feels right. It feels good. Yeah. Yeah, it does.
Tim Matthews 11:34 Let’s break this piece down a bit, right? Because I can imagine guys are listening, and the idea of “I am love” or “I love you,” I’ve got to imagine some guys may resist it or think it sounds a bit fluffy or weak or brush over it, whatever it may be. But just explain a little bit, Chris, about why that realization is so powerful for you.
Chris 12:03 So for me, the realization was so powerful because I had set out on a bit of a journey to find something. And my intention in finding this thing was so pure. It was to help somebody. But my expectation was it was going to take a lot of effort to find it. And it quite literally took me three steps to find this thing. And when I realized instantly that it was three steps, I realized that those three steps were “I love you.” And what I had been really diving into was some familial relationships and how can I reconcile those? How can I move forward with those? And I hadn’t been caught in analysis paralysis, but I felt I was starting to get there. And as soon as I realized the three steps that I had taken and what they meant—“I love you” to me—I realized that that’s all it takes in those relationships. I also realized that that’s all it takes. I’ve historically been one of those guys that doesn’t say “I love you” very often. It’s not my go-to. Now it is.
Tim Matthews 13:41 This might come from—
Chris 13:49 I’ve been blessed to be able to come to this ranch for a number of events. And a couple of— I think it was two years ago—I had some deep realizations for myself around the difference between intention and expectation. And this exercise also just really reinforced for me how important intention is. And if your intention comes from love, they can’t land anywhere but in a good way. And it’s so hard to hold a grudge or truly be upset with somebody if they’ve shared with you in a genuine way that they love you.
Doug Holt 14:37 Hey guys, I just want to share something with you. I’m sure we can both agree that in order to fix something, you need to know what’s broken. And not only do you need to know what’s broken, but you need a step-by-step methodology on how you can fix it. That’s the easiest way to do it, right? Otherwise, you’re going to be toiling with things. That’s why I created a free training—a training that not only shows you how you got to where you are, where your relationship is missing that love, respect, admiration, and even intimacy that it used to have—but how you get it back. How do you retain that, where your wife’s looking at you the same way she used to look at you when she said, “I do”? You know, I don’t know about you, but for me, when my wife looks at me like I’m her man, that feels like I can conquer the world. And I want that for you. Simply go over to https://thepowerfulman.com/scales. That’s thepowerfulman.com/scales, and I have a free video training for you. You can just click play and see if this resonates for you. Now, back to the podcast.
Chris 15:41 It disarms, right? You guys know that I started singing that song, “The Power of Love,” by Huey Lewis and the News, right? It’s so powerful. Yeah, right? It’s a completely different understanding for me of that timeless phrase, “Love conquers all.” And whether it’s romantic love or brotherly love or family love—maternal, paternal love—it’s love. And it’s such a high vibrational state. I think it might be the highest, or one of—
Tim Matthews 16:23 It’s one of the top three.
Chris 16:25 Yeah. What a place to come from.
Tim Matthews 16:32 Yeah. I think the one thing we all want—I know there are apparently six human needs, right? Certainty, uncertainty, significance, growth, contribution, and love and connection. Anyway, point being is, for me, if I reflect on this event, this conversation, and the thousands of men that we’ve worked with, the number one thing that I think we all crave is connection, above and beyond everything. Significance is a gateway to connection. I want to be significant—why? So I can be accepted and have connection. I want to contribute—why? So I can connect. And I think life would be so much easier if we all realized that the number one thing we’re actually chasing is connection. And it’s so easy, as you go through life, to get into a situation where you have a disagreement with someone you love and you forget that you both want the same thing, which is to be seen and heard and to connect. But in that moment, that’s forgotten, and it becomes about you versus them or them versus you. And in my experience, what I’ve found to be really powerful is, in those moments of disagreement, for me to remind the person, “Hey, I love you. You’re important to me. This relationship’s important to me. And that’s why I’m saying this, because I want to be closer to you.” Yeah. Even you use Doug and I in our relationship over the eight years, right? You know we’ve got—well, it’s like having a work wife, is what everyone says about me. The point being is communication is the number one thing. And a big thing with him and I over the years is we’re disagreeing—two strong personalities, right? So you disagree and clash. There’s all sorts. And I think the thing that’s seen us through a lot of the ups and downs has been the communication. But in particular, within the communication, something we always say to one another is, “Hey, look, Doug, I love you. I never want any mud on the glass between us. Our relationship’s super important to me, so I just want to share this thing.” Yeah. And we have a philosophy that there’s never going to be any mud on the glass between us. And it comes back to that thing of love, right? Above and beyond everything else, we come from love and respect for one another, for each other’s families. Yeah. And it’s the same with anyone. It could be Amelia—we’re in a disagreement—and I might have to remind her, “Hey, I love you. I want to be in a relationship with you.” Yeah. And that’s where I’m coming from with this. Yeah. But like I say, it’s very easy for that to get lost and forgotten when we’re triggered or when we’re not getting our own way, or somebody says something and we take it personally and fall into DEER mode or whatever it is. And to your point, Chris, just remembering the power of love and the fact that we all want the same thing—connection. Yeah. It sounds cliché, but it can cure so many things.
Mark 20:11 Yeah. There are so many songs that have been written about the power of love, “Love conquers all,” right? And there is a reason. And to what you were saying, it really occurs to me that a lot of us don’t necessarily think it through as deeply as we can. The relationship I’ve got, for example, with my daughter—I met her at the age of eight—we have an exceptionally honest relationship. And I said from the get-go, “I’m not your father, I’m not your friend, I’m Mark. And I’m in your life to love you and provide for you,” and so on and so forth. And she just tells me straight what she thinks of everything that I say or do to this day. And we even work closely together. And it’s such a gift. It’s such an incredible thing, and I value it so much that there’s such honesty in the relationship. And that’s what is created here amongst the men as well because of the love that we have for each other and the fact that we are warriors doing the work, and we don’t allow mud to be on the glass as much as we possibly can. Clear it. Clear it up. It doesn’t always get cleared up as quickly as it could. That tells me that love isn’t soft and fluffy. It’s just an incredible gift and a privilege. And it’s not always easy. And yet, there’s huge value behind that clarity of love.
Tim Matthews 21:44 You know, I think about attachment types. And the guys here are able to be so honest with one another because they love one another. And in doing so, it creates this secure attachment type, right? Which, within a secure attachment type in any relationship—be it intimate or otherwise—enables honesty because you know the person isn’t going to close down or leave or abandon you or whatever it is. And I know it’s an idealistic kind of point of view right now, but I just wonder what might be possible in the world if people really did leverage the power of love—what that might do to all this dysfunction in relationships because of the attachment types that get created because of a lack of love. Yeah, exactly. And therefore a lack of honesty because people worry about someone leaving them or shutting down or stonewalling them or whatever it may be—revenge. Yeah, right? But instead, if everyone was able to just remember the power of love and even “know thyself”—if you feel really true, if you’re really real with yourself, yeah, and you can examine your needs and come to realize that connection is the most important thing to me, which for most people it is—yeah—then if that’s true, how might you then be able to leverage the power of love?
Mark 23:19 There’s another word that came up for me when you were speaking, which was, you know, love myself. And as a result of loving myself, I completely accept myself exactly as I am, with my flaws and, you know, warts and all. I think that’s really important, because then that provides the opportunity for another to accept themselves and therefore love themselves.
Chris 23:43 Absolutely. Accepting yourself is a journey, right? But embracing love and spending time looking at what you love about yourself, even seeking feedback from people close to you who you love—what they love about you or what greatness they see in you—yeah, what a gift. Yeah, what a gift. You know, one of the other things that really helped this week was breaking down the stories, like just the power of love and what it can do to break down those stories that we tell ourselves or those stories that subconsciously are planted, or even generationally planted. Yeah, it’s truly an incredibly powerful thing to know thyself and to go on the journey of knowing myself and to love thyself.
Tim Matthews 24:52 One of the things that’s really transformed my relationship with Amelia more recently, actually, in hindsight, has been the power of love. It’s been my commitment to remain open to her even when I’ve wanted to close down. Because historically, what I would have done is I would have closed down and stopped doing the things that I would do when I was open. So, for example, that might be acts of service without being asked, which essentially is me being attuned to her needs and understanding where she’s at and taking things off her plate to make her life easier. Whether it’s making her a drink, whether it’s seeing that the dishwasher needs doing and doing it, whether it’s whatever it may be. And historically, if we would have been in a disagreement and I would have been triggered, I would have known that the dishwasher needed doing, but I would have not done it. Yeah, “What is my glass? Her thing to do.” Yeah, because in terms of roles and responsibilities and agreements we’ve made and blah, blah, blah, for the most part, that’s her thing to do, right? But the power of love and the commitment I have had to it means I do it even when I don’t want to, even when I don’t feel like it. But I’ve remained committed to the power of love. And thus, even in the disagreement, I’m still able to see what it is she needs in the moment, and I’m still providing that to her. Yeah. And what that has done for her and her levels of safety and our levels of connection, they’ve been exponential.
Chris 26:33 That’s awesome. Yeah.
Tim Matthews 26:34 Well done, I believe. Yeah, thank you. It’s a journey. It’s tough, right? It’s tough.
Mark 26:40 To be committed when our inner child has been triggered from the wound, to then show up from a mature, masculine point of view and, as you said, do what I don’t feel like doing and still stay committed to being the love of that person’s life. Yeah.
Tim Matthews 27:01 Power of love. I’ve got a question for you, actually. Yeah, fire away. So we’ve got a guy listening to this. He’s been through the Reset. He is kind of thinking, “I don’t need to go to the Rising. It’s just another Reset, really. I’ve been there, done that.” What advice would you give him?
Chris 27:24 I would really encourage him to take an honest look at himself and ask himself if he were to rate himself on a one to 10 for growth before The Alpha Reset and after the Reset, figure out what that number is. I would imagine it’s a 10 because most of us aren’t awake when we go into the Reset, and we come out awake. And remember that feeling when you came to whatever your realization was during the Reset. Now take that feeling, connect back into it, and amplify that feeling by a factor of 100. You should do the Rising, but you’ve got to be ready and willing to believe in yourself and to know that the work doesn’t end. It doesn’t finish. There isn’t a finish line. If you think there’s a finish line, you’re wrong. I love you, but you’re wrong. If you think that it might be for you, remember that feeling— that feeling when you came to your realization—and know that, should you choose to do the Rising and should you be up to the challenge, should you stick with it, should you do the work, you’ll be rewarded with a whole new level of awareness and growth from within that you didn’t know was there, but will give you a whole new respect for that saying that the destination is the journey. Because the journey doesn’t end. The onion—you haven’t reached the center of the onion. There’s no way to.
Tim Matthews 29:43 I want to commend you, brother, because you’re doing the work. And that’s rare. As we’ve spoken about the past few days, there are tens of thousands of people that download this podcast every week. I love you, and lots of them won’t be doing the work. It’s just a reality. Yeah, it’s just the way it goes. I would love for them all to be doing the work, because imagine the kind of world we’d have. Yeah, that’s the dream, isn’t it? That’s the dream. Yeah, it’d be incredible. Well, men like you, Chris, are incredibly rare. The way that you have chosen to take time out of your life to come and voluntarily go through a process that you now have a clue what you’re going to go through because you understand that you are the number one asset in your life—and the man that you are and the person you are—and going back home for your girls, for your partner, for the people in your life. Yeah, it’s incredible. We need more men like you. I mean that.
Chris 30:55 Thank you. Thank you. I receive that.
Mark 31:01 I'm complete. Thank you.
Tim Matthews 31:06 So, guys, as we say, in the moment of insight, take massive action. We'll see you next time on The Powerful Man Show.
