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137. The Power of Vulnerability: Unlocking True Strength for Men
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In this episode of the Spiritual Fitness podcast, host Eric Bigger explores the Power of Vulnerability for men, emphasizing why embracing this quality is crucial for personal growth, stronger relationships, and authentic living. Eric highlights how vulnerability fosters emotional intimacy, trust-building, and deeper connections, especially for men who are challenged by societal stereotypes of masculinity. He demonstrates how vulnerability can serve as a superpower in life and relationships, breaking through the "tough-guy" mentality that often prevents emotional openness. Through practical insights on communication, trust, and self-awareness, Eric invites listeners to redefine masculine strength and integrate spirituality with emotional awareness for a more fulfilling, expressive life.
Also in this episode:
- Vulnerability as Strength: Embracing vulnerability can enhance trust, improve communication, and serve as a guide to authentic living.
- Breaking Stereotypes: Challenging traditional masculine ideals by adopting emotional openness can empower men, serving as a testament to true strength
- Personal Growth: Developing an intimate understanding of one's emotional landscape can lead to personal transformation and deeper self-awareness.
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Transcript
Introduction to Spiritual Fitness
00:00:06
Speaker
Welcome to the Spiritual Fitness Podcast. I'm your host, Eric Bigger, and each week we will explore powerful practices, inspiring stories, and expert insights to guide you on your path to holistic health. By blending spirituality and physical wellness, we support you in strengthening your body and soul. Whether you're a seasoned spiritual seeker or just beginning your journey, the Spiritual Fitness Podcast is here to help you unlock your inner potential and live your most vibrant, purposeful life.
00:00:35
Speaker
It's Miracle Season.
00:00:40
Speaker
Spiritual Fitness, Spiritual Fitness podcast. I'm your host, Eric Bigger, and I'm back again with another episode. And today, today is going to be great because I get to help my men out. I get to help the fellas out.
Why Should Men Be Vulnerable?
00:00:54
Speaker
Today's episode, it's about why men should be vulnerable. Before we get started,
00:01:02
Speaker
I'm going to have a toast to you, everyone out there listening, watching. and Sparkling Rose, Elia, all the way from Spain. It's really good. It's really smooth. 20% off when you use my promo code EB20 for all orders up to $100. Promo code is EB20. Check the details in the show notes and look them up. Elia. It's really great. Sparkling Rose.
Eric's Personal Journey with Vulnerability
00:01:31
Speaker
So why men should be vulnerable in a relationship?
00:01:35
Speaker
I have the privilege to some of you don't know, you might know, I had the privilege to really coach a lot of high-end, independent, successful women. In the course of this year, I've helped three of them get through divorces, 17 years, 15 years, 21 years. Most of my clients are women, 40 and older, of kids married or previous married, they're very independent.
00:02:00
Speaker
I've been collecting a lot of data on like, what do women really want? Was lacking in a man from a woman's perspective, but I also know being a man had a whole space for these type of women, just women in general. But I'll just start with myself. First of all, vulnerability is a superpower and it's the gateway to authenticity. And our most vulnerable self, usually when it comes from a man's perspective or paradigm, is very fearful. It lacks confidence.
00:02:29
Speaker
It lacks faith. It lacks trust. A space where we don't maneuver, we don't move, we don't really tap into because the stereotypes that will put on us as men in society. You gotta to be a man, you gotta be strong, you gotta hold it down. You know all the cliches. Don't ever let them see you sweat.
00:02:49
Speaker
Men don't cry, boys do. You know, the list go on and on, a tough guy. You got to be the man of the house. My dad would always say, take care of your sisters and be the man of the house. Right. I'm 13, 14. Okay, pops, be the man of the house. Whatever that means. And I remember I didn't cry until the age of 25. I was standing strong my whole life because coming up in Baltimore, growing up in a tough environment.
00:03:15
Speaker
You don't show them emotions. You don't dance. You don't even smile. I was always just suppressed. I was suppressed in my emotions. I was suppressed in my feelings. All I did was like, oh, I played basketball. I went to school. I did well. I was a leader.
00:03:30
Speaker
But I never understood feelings, emotions, and when it came to relationships, at least in my mind and in my life, because I didn't have that affection and nurturing from my mom the way I needed to want it, I was so afraid of love.
00:03:47
Speaker
I didn't grow up in a family where we hugged or we told each other we love you or I love you or we talked about our feelings or emotions. We just did what we had to do. You know, food was on the table, clothes was on our back. We went to school. I played sports. That was it. Growing up as a young man, I mean, that's my norm. That's all I know. So when it comes to affections, when it comes to feelings and emotions, like that's like so foreign. I don't talk about that.
00:04:15
Speaker
What I realized was that even though I had this strong exterior and I was driven and I was motivated, I was so afraid to be weak, right? And I was so afraid to be vulnerable and I was so afraid to be my true self. So most of my life from a young man up until adulthood, I was just afraid to be who I needed to be. I just kind of like was quiet about my feelings. I didn't say much and I just kept it going. The first time my parents or my family ever heard me talk about emotions and or love when I was 29 on a Bachelorette. And so of course they was our it was all shattered and they were like, what? You felt that way? You felt like we didn't love you? You felt like we didn't care about you, right? Oh,
00:05:02
Speaker
And that was the first time when I think about it now that I felt comfortable or I felt safe to be vulnerable about my feelings. I didn't know that I didn't speak about my feelings. I never brought a girl home at the time. No one ever knew who I was dating or who I was seeing and no one asked me either. Like emotions and affection was rare. So as I've dated women over the years,
00:05:24
Speaker
I was never vocal about how I felt. If I really liked someone, I would show them. My love language is active service and quality time. Words don't really do much for me, but they do today because I understand them more. I'm saying all this to say because I want to get into the importance of why men should be vulnerable.
Benefits of Embracing Vulnerability
00:05:44
Speaker
So rule number one.
00:05:47
Speaker
There's four tips of why men should be vulnerable in life and in relationship. Emotional intimacy, it builds trust, it improves communication, and you break down the stereotype of the tough guy. So for me, it actually tapped into conversation with family members and people close to me. Where I was having conversation with my sisters about the type of woman I should date and What's their background? And I was like, sis, you never asked me about the woman that I dated. You never gave me feedback or game. So it improved the communication. You know, I was able to have deep conversations with my mom and my dad apologized to me because I was vulnerable. My dad was vulnerable. He apologized to me on national TV. Right. And then so the conversation improved. So men.
00:06:31
Speaker
Rule number one, conversation rules the nation. So when you're vulnerable, you not only improve the conversation with people around you, but you improve the conversation within yourself. Because the number one relationship and the best relationship you should have is with yourself.
00:06:49
Speaker
So if you're not speaking to yourself or opening up to yourself, it's not going to be easy for people to open up to you or for you to open up to others. So you have to build that, improve the communication with themselves. So being vulnerable improves communication overall. It's very important. and You need to know that. It improves vulnerability, improves communication.
00:07:10
Speaker
Second, it builds trust. So let me give you a story. So the old me who wasn't vulnerable, and I was asking to grow out, I'll give you a scenario. And I say, Hey, you know, if you're free on Friday, if you want to hang out, you should go to the movies with me around seven. Let me know if you free. Is that vulnerable? Think about it. The second one is.
00:07:36
Speaker
Listen, there's a movie that comes out Friday. It's a Christmas movie called Rid One. It's at 7 p.m. at the Grove, and I would love to take you to the movies and spend time with you.
00:07:49
Speaker
let me know if you can go. What's the difference in that conversation and those words? So the first half is I'm building up the conversation not to be rejected because I'm saying, hey, if you open on Friday, I'll let it take you to the movies. Let me know if you free or not. If she's not free, I see that's no, but the second one is like, look, I want to take you to the movies. I want to be around you. 7 p.m. or everyone. Let's go watch Christmas movies.
00:08:16
Speaker
When we get vulnerable and we speak like that, we build trust in when people are like, Oh, so now she knows, Oh, this guy wants to take me out. She's more clear. I want to take you out on Friday. This is the day I'll come pick you up. You start to allow her to open up to build some type of trust or rapport with you, right? Building trust because I'm telling you how I'm feeling. I'm telling you, I want to take you out.
00:08:41
Speaker
I remember a moment when I was younger that was dating this young woman named Natalie. We were probably talking and dating for like six months. And I was like, what's wrong with you? Why are you acting like that? We were outside and she's like...
00:08:53
Speaker
I don't know, I don't feel like you like me. I'm like, what do you mean? And I'm like, what? We hang out, we spend time, I want you to come over. She's like, yeah, but you never tell me how you feel. And I was like, oh. So I'm over here, fellas, we do this. We'll spend money, we'll spend time. We might compliment them on their attire or their hair or their features. We might even have fun in the bedroom.
00:09:20
Speaker
But we won't really express those emotions. It's funny. I had a client tell me, she said, Eric, I don't understand men. How is it that men put all their faces in all places all over your body and do all these things?
00:09:34
Speaker
But they can't even express their feelings to you or how they feel about you. They won't say the words, I love you. It's so weird. And I was like, that is so odd that we'll do all the physical things. But when it comes to that vulnerability in our communication about our feelings, we shy away from it.
00:09:52
Speaker
So ladies, what that means is that he's afraid to express themselves because he's afraid that if he expressed himself, he's going to lose his power. So ladies, write that down. Most men are afraid to express their true feelings when they're in love or when they love someone, if they're dating, because they're afraid they're going to lose their power and you're going to take advantage of their feelings, right? Because there are women out there that have took advantage of vulnerable men.
00:10:18
Speaker
So that is the thing. And men, we don't know how to deal with heartbreak the way women do. We don't know how to talk about it or deal with it. When you allow yourself to be.
00:10:29
Speaker
intimate with a woman you love and you're into, you actually alchemize the power within your vessel to get more out of life. See, we looking at what we getting out of the relationship, what we getting out of her, but you get more out of life because there's no stagnation in the love department. There's no stagnation in the communication department. There's no stagnation in your vulnerability and your emotions and your feelings. You're truly embodied in the emotions and in the joy an expression of love with no fear, right? But the challenge is for us as men, the reason we can't get emotionally vulnerable or intimate is because we don't have the emotional, vulnerable, and intimate relationship with self.
Emotional Connection for Deeper Relationships
00:11:10
Speaker
We've been programmed in a society as men to provide, to protect, to be the leader, to be the man of the house. Those are all masculine traits.
00:11:21
Speaker
No one tells you to be spiritual. No one tells you to allow. No one tells you to trust. It's all protect, provide, lead. That's it. Security, right? And a woman feels safe when you're providing, you're protecting, and you're leading, right? And you're making a decision.
00:11:40
Speaker
But there's another component where she's missing out and that's that vulnerability and that's emotional intimacy. Shouts out to all the men that's doing the best they can. We don't know what we don't know. This is why I'm doing this podcast. And I want to give information and insight deeper into how you can add these little tidbits to what you're ever doing. So if you're a man and you're providing, you're protecting, you're leading. There's two other things that might be missing in this package.
00:12:08
Speaker
And number one is you mentally connect with your woman. You emotionally intimate with your woman. Like, do she feel safe coming to you with her problems or her fears or her emotions without you running or getting afraid?
00:12:26
Speaker
Are you comfortable being vulnerable and crying or allowing your true self to be seen when you're not your best? So the biggest thing that I learned from women, I tell guys all the time, I say, listen, brother, you can provide and you can protect her and you can lead her. But if you're not emotionally and spiritually connected to her, you're going to lose her because she wants to feel your masculinity from an intimate, emotional,
00:12:52
Speaker
space. She wants to feel that in her body. She wants to feel like y'all reading on the same page that you're gazing in her eyes and she can feel what you feel. And you love her the way she loves you. And y'all won. But a lot of times We might be there in the bedroom. We might be there when it comes to paying the bills. So the most important thing I think in 2024, moving into 2025, is that men, we got to communicate emotionally. We got to become vulnerable. We got to build trust within ourselves. We got to improve the communication within ourselves. But the most important thing that I know from coaching very high-end, independent, successful women,
00:13:34
Speaker
is emotionally, spiritually, and mentally connecting to them for them to open up so they can be in their feminine. Because there is a thing where the roles are switching, at least the energies are changing. And it's not that it's bad. A woman can still be in her mask and be independent because she wants more and you still conserve her, make her feel safe. Some women just want more money and want to provide and have their own. They don't need your money.
00:13:58
Speaker
but they want your emotional depth. They want to feel at home in your presence. They want to feel safe in your presence. They want to be able to lay on your chest and tell you the world that person they looked up to when they needed a shoulder to lean on. Coaching so many women, I haven't had women on Zoom, in my workouts, crying, emotional. There is moments where they are a little hesitant when I'm like, no, no, no, it's okay.
00:14:23
Speaker
Why they cold? You're safe here. And then they go. Why didn't they cry more? I just listen. I'm patient. I'm holding space. And then they wipe their tears off and then they're fine again. But sometimes we want to have a solution for their tears. We want to have a solution for their problems. Instead of just listening, holding space, trusting what's coming through them, they don't need the answer. They have the answer. They're connected to divine more than we are because they're independent or they're emotional, invulnerable. And then they feel 10 times better.
00:14:53
Speaker
That's all they want, brother. That's all they want from you. But you gotta learn how to connect with your own emotions and to your own vulnerability. Listen, no one's gonna have it all figured out. No one's gonna be perfect. I don't want you to be perfect, but I want you to get in the space of being vulnerable. I'm pretty sure if you have a great relationship with your mom and you tell your mom every day, that's the first woman you fall in love with is your mom. So you're probably vulnerable with her. You probably tell her everything. But why can't you tell the woman of your dreams or your partner or the lover of your life the same thing?
00:15:24
Speaker
So the collective is changing. It's very important as men for us to tap into our supernatural powers of our femininity, our emotional vulnerability, our emotional intimacy to tap into our supernatural power to take on life with joy, with love, and with abundance.
Vulnerability as a Superpower
00:15:46
Speaker
I just want you to know that the most important thing with any woman in your life that you love and care about You have to emotionally, mentally, and spiritually connect to them. In order to do that, you have to mentally, emotionally, and spiritually connect to yourself. And that's why you should be vulnerable. Because vulnerability, like I said in the beginning, is a superpower and it's a pathway to authenticity. And last but not least, why men should be vulnerable? We got to break this tough guy stereotype. Actually, the guy who is the most vulnerable is actually the strongest.
00:16:21
Speaker
If you're a guy and you stand in front of me and you've got it all together and you're strong and but you're not vulnerable and you're not tapped into your emotional side, your EQ, your emotional intelligence and you're not hyper aware or super intuitive and I can read through your BS and I can see the holes within your vessel. Not because it's bad, not because I'm better.
00:16:45
Speaker
It's just because I'm more aware of myself because I've done the work. And here's the thing. I'm not perfect. I make mistakes. I was super hypercritical in relationships. I was a perfectionist. I was a people police. I did all these things because I didn't get love growing up from my mom. So I put women on a pedestal and I over gave and overdid where I didn't have boundaries. I wasn't strong. You know, I didn't know how to say no. So I wasn't perfect. I learned, right? And I went through a lot.
00:17:14
Speaker
going through that, but I understand now that I know how to say no. I know how to hold you accountable. I know how to put my needs first when it matters to my mission or my career. There's a book, by the way, fellas, that you should read. It's called The Way to the Superior Man. And in that book, he said, if a man doesn't have a mission, he doesn't have a wife.
00:17:34
Speaker
If you think about the word submission, a woman will only submit to a man who has a mission. Some fellas, if you're out here looking good and you acting cool but you don't have no mission, she not gonna submit to you.
00:17:46
Speaker
Because you don't have no mission. You don't have no purpose. You're just existing because you can. And you got to look, or you look good, or you got a mouthpiece and you know how to talk to women. Eventually, she's not going to stay because you're not holding space in a way that is trustworthy long end. Now, maybe you got somebody 10 years, younger, five years, younger, and you can control it because you have more information in life. I want men to be whole. I want them to be complete. I want them to be in a divine masculine, in a divine feminine, a divine union.
00:18:14
Speaker
So fellas, we got to break this tough guy. You ain't got to be tough to be in love. You ain't got to be tough to speak your truth. You ain't got to be tough to tell your woman, and baby, I love you. Fellas, sometimes we become a ashamed around our feelings and our emotions. I couldn't wait to see my girlfriend and cuddle and become one and just connect and just be in her energy.
00:18:38
Speaker
It felt good and when I saw a ooh baby, it was magical. So fellas, don't be afraid to be vulnerable. Let's break this tough guy stereotype. And look, I know some of you are suffering in silence. I know some of you acting like you got it all together because look, I've been that way. I'm that way in some spiritual there. I'm still learning how to be vulnerable in certain capacities in my life. That's it. I ain't got it all together. My biggest challenge is asking for help or receiving help.
00:19:03
Speaker
But I've gotten better. So it's always a work in progress. We always got to be willing to grow and learn. But I'm here to tell you that emotional intimacy, improving your communication with yourself, building trust within yourself and connecting to your higher self and your purpose and having some spiritual foundation will help you become vulnerable.
Coaching for Self-Understanding and Relationship Improvement
00:19:21
Speaker
So if you're listening and you think this resonates, share this episode.
00:19:26
Speaker
and sign up for one on one coaching. Let's get on a tension call and I can show you as a man what you probably need to look at because you have the answers. I'm just open up the space so you can see what you can't see. I'm just the other side. I'm your mirror.
00:19:42
Speaker
And to women out there, if you're looking for a man and you can't find your king, I know what it is. It's like this. You don't feel safe being in your feminine. You don't feel safe speaking the truth. You're afraid to lose a man you're dating, so you walk on eggshells.
00:19:58
Speaker
because you don't want him to leave you. Maybe you're at the age where you're like, well, what I'm going to do, I'm getting old. So this is the only guy that's giving me attention. No, no, no, no, no. That's a choice. That's a thought. That's not true. So sign up for 101 coaching. Work with me. The link will be all in the show notes. A shout out to Simplified Impact.
00:20:17
Speaker
It does all my marketing for YouTube and social media. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And don't forget to get you some miracle season merch promo code M season for 50% off. And if you're a guy or you're a girl and you just want to have a quick sidebar conversation, DM me on Instagram at Eric bigger. And like I said, share this episode of your resonates. Give me some feedback. Let me know if you have any questions. Let's connect with fellas. Let's be vulnerable.
00:20:45
Speaker
Why you should be vulnerable in a relationship? Because it improves your communication. It builds trust. It builds confidence. You tap into your emotional intimacy and that's the best intimacy you can have, especially what you want because the love is 10 times better. You're not just loving because you can. It's more unconditional and not conditional. And you break the stereotype of being a tough guy. Nobody wants to be tough, man. Stop all the tough guy and the cool guy stuff. Be a real guy, real man.
00:21:09
Speaker
and stand in your truth, be a nurturing man, be a wholesome man, be a trustworthy, authentic, a man of integrity by being vulnerable. So that's all, that's it. And don't forget to get you ah bottle a bottle of Elia. EB20 is a promo code for orders up to $100, 20% off. You guys, I'm out. Spiritual Fittest podcast.
00:21:34
Speaker
Thank you for joining us on the Spiritual Fitness Podcast. We hope today's episode has inspired you and provided valuable insights for your holistic health journey. By blending spirituality and physical wellness, you can strengthen your body, mind, and soul. If you enjoyed today's episode, please subscribe, rate, and leave a review. Until next time, stay strong, stay inspired, and remember, it's miracle season.