Transcript
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Speaker: Hello and welcome to Fit For My Age, the health and well-being podcast from Abysida, on which we don't tell you what to think, but we do hope to make you think.
Speaker: I am Michael Millward. Today, I am discussing the conflicts between me and us, or us and me, with Joshua Rodriguez, who is a kink coach and accountability coach from the Kink Collective in New York City.
Speaker: I have been to New York, but I've never actually been to Manhattan. It's one of my claims to fame. But if I ever get to go back to New York, I will make all of my travel arrangements with the Ultimate Travel Club, because as a member of the Ultimate Travel Club, I have access to trade prices on all sorts of travel-related purchases.
Speaker: So I'll be able to afford a hotel in Manhattan. You can also have access to those trade prices on travel by becoming a member of the Ultimate Travel Club. And to make that easy, I have put a link in the description with a built-in discount on membership fees. So just like me, you can travel at trade prices.
Speaker: Now that I have paid some bills, it is time to make an episode of Fit for My Age that will be well worth listening to, liking, downloading, and subscribing to, and probably also one that you will want to tell your friends, family, and work colleagues about.
Speaker: Now, it's time to say hello, Joshua. Hello. Hello, Michael. Thank you so much for having me on. I'm really excited to be here. Thank you very much. I am also intrigued and excited about our discussion and the sort of work that you do. So could we start off, please, by you explaining a little bit about the work that you do at the moment? Absolutely. So I'm a kink coach and an accountability coach here based in New York City. And how I got here was through professional domination for the last 15 years.
Speaker: Professional domination, essentially what I did was help People, primarily men in the beginning, helped rebuild their relationship with masculinity, what it means to be a man and what it means to be sexual. Over time, holding space for so many people, men and women alike, I've gotten a deep look into a lot of what plagues people when it comes to relationship, relationship with themselves and relationship with partners.
Speaker: the fear or the shame or the guilt that keeps their voice quiet. And the accountability part comes in this by having these deep conversations around how am I showing up in my life?
Speaker: And then more importantly, where am I not showing up in my life? Why not? And without judgment, how can we break that down? Interesting. Are you suggesting then that the need for domination in the kink collective is would be someone who's looking to fill a gap in their life, something isn't isn't right, or that they're interested in a particular type of activity, but they have a negative impression of their desire for that, and you're helping them turn that into something that is positive? That's one in one degree, yes. I think primarily the people who come to the King Collective are people who are, they're educated, they're well informed, they're successful in everything that society was expecting from them on paper. They got the job, they got the family, they got the home, they got the 2.4 kids and the cat and the dog.
Speaker: But the relationship with themselves, they've erased themselves by not best representing themselves, talking about, and it doesn't even have to mean bedroom desires, but just intimate desires, how they want to be seen in relationship and how they want to show up in a relationship versus what's expected of them.
Speaker: So erasing themselves in that capacity where they've been in a marriage for 20 years and it really wasn't them, but they thought that's just what they were supposed to be doing and how they showed up in relationship.
Speaker: So we help a person dive further in to really unpack this stuff of Who am I and why am I not the same person I was 20 years ago? And what does that mean?
Speaker: And myself, I just turned 48 on Sunday. It's like having had to walk this journey myself around who am I versus who do people expect me to be brought a lot of conflict into my life.
Speaker: I had no one to sit and process it with because culturally here in the States, to be a man means to have all the answers. And then Imagine once you're 18, you're a man, so you're supposed to have all the answers from 18, and that puts a lot of pressure on people, and that affects the way they show up in intimate relationships.
Speaker: And again, it doesn't even have to be sexual, but any type of relationship with vulnerability is present or desired. Really it's about what's, we live our lives, I suppose, or unless we're very lucky, we live our lives to fulfill societal expectations of how we are supposed to live rather than how we really want to live. So you have potentially lots of unhappy people trying to be something that they're not in order to fit into a society that deep down they don't really want to be part of. Yes, and it's a double-edged sword as well, right? Because I believe in social constructs, meaning if I say I'm a man, society is expecting me to show up with certain behaviors as a man, responsible, dependable, accountable, consistent, truthful, loyal. And I understand that these aren't characteristics that a lot that a lot of people portray, period, in general.
Speaker: But I think there's a social expectation of it. When I say people not showing up as who they really are, it's it's more around expression. It's more around taste and desires versus characteristics.
Speaker: I think characteristics, there are people who show up that bring value to society. And then there's people who take from society because they're not showing up with respect or compassion or truthfulness or intention that isn't self-sufficient.
Speaker: self-serving Yes. this sounds um yeah this is This is really making me think, Joshua, because there are characteristics that society places on us because there are labels that we that we have. So you're a man, you're a woman. You're straight, you're gay, you're a a pastor, you're a police officer.
Speaker: These labels come in all sorts of forms. And once you say that you have a particular job, people expect a certain type of behavior from you. yes They expect you to dress in a certain way. And that's one part of what makes us an individual, our personality, so to speak.
Speaker: But then you also talk about the expression, the expression, i think, if I'm understanding you correctly, the characteristics are placed upon us in some cases forced upon us, yeah but the expression comes from inside ourselves.
Speaker: Yes. And that's the part I think that gets beaten down. For example, I wear high heels, I wear dresses, I have a feminine expression. Sometimes I like to get dressed up. And the reason why I don't do it more often is because it takes a lot of work to get dressed up like that. And I have a high regard for anyone who has a feminine expression and puts in the investment to be seen that way in society for anyone who does it.
Speaker: I understand what you mean, because I can also sort of say like, yeah, for a woman to put the effort into fulfilling what society says a woman should look like. Yes. Takes a hell of a lot of work and it's very expensive. Yes. Time, money, energy, a lot.
Speaker: Now, with with that being said, I personally deeply desire that if a woman any woman wanted to dress however she wanted, run with it. And just in the same with a man. as long as And this is for me personally. As long as I know you're going to show up responsibly and accountably, I don't care what you do.
Speaker: The hard side about authenticity is that it comes out of pricing. Not everyone's going to operate the same way operate. Authenticity comes at a price and that price affects how people show up too, because a lot of people aren't willing to pay that price. Understandably so.
Speaker: I don't think you're talking about money when you talk about price though. No, I'm talking about judgment and criticism and rejection and shaming and in some cases violence and death.
Speaker: Yeah, we've done programs around that sort of thing as well. But this is where it gets to the sort of point of the courage to be yourself in lots of situations can put you into a situation where you're in direct conflict yes with the society and the culture that you live in because of the characteristics, the behaviors that society expects of you because it attributes a label to you, which is a label that you are saying, actually, that's not me.
Speaker: And society doesn't seem to like that. Exactly. exactly I spent a lot of time with conflicting labels. And if you see if you saw me, I'm a very light-skinned individual.
Speaker: I'm Puerto Rican, Mexican, and Cuban, and I grew up in a black neighborhood. I've always been in conflict with how people received me. And so that's why my identity has played such a big role in my life, because I've had so much conflict around not fitting anywhere I went.
Speaker: Opposites can attract in some situations, but also you need to feel that the environment that you're in is accepting of you. It's like that expression, you have to see yourself in other people to know what is you are capable of doing, what what life could look like for you.
Speaker: ooh i've never I've never considered that, never heard that, and that makes a lot of sense because I felt like I spent my whole life trying to figure out my next step. You're very welcome. It just came off the top of my tongue because I'm just thinking, so thank you for listening to what you're saying and all of the different cultures that you've encountered in your upbringing and your your history, lots of people would say that's a great melting pot and you can draw on all sorts of resources. There's a positive side to it, but there's also the negative side is like, you can feel very, very alone when you feel very different.
Speaker: And that's the sort of the conflict between me and as in everyone else. And it can be that you need to find your, your right community. You need to go beyond where you are to find the people who are going to accept you for you.
Speaker: Yes. I've built that over time here in New York City through the Kink Collective. What I realized is that the people I connect with don't look like me, but there's an awareness of existence that changes how we socialize with the people around us.
Speaker: And the characteristics come into the ah into what the community is more so than the way we look oh well i think what you mean is like society places importance on the external the characteristics which make it easy for society to label us in one way or another and that makes it easy for society to say yeah you're part of our gang you're part of that other gang you could be part of ours but hey you know we'll take it or leave you What you're saying is once you've found that group of people, that collective, who who are like you on the inside, the external doesn't matter.
Speaker: Yes, 100%. And and that that hasn't just been on my social level, but that's also been in my intimate and relation relational romantic level too. It changed how I was connecting with people when I realized that that beauty is only skin deep, and I've met some very, very ugly people.
Speaker: Present company accepted. Except beauty accept you. and Thank you. right but We all look good in our own way, think, is one of the things.
Speaker: How do you go about finding that group of people who are like you? I had to go through a lot of ups and downs in my in my journey. I think the one that really...
Speaker: it's It's a very complex process that happened over the last eight years. And I'm going to throw in some broad brushes and by no means I trying to shortchange the experience.
Speaker: I was canceled eight years ago when the Me Too movement happened. Right after all the bad actors went, it became weaponized and they started to focus the Me Too movement on bad relationships.
Speaker: I wasn't showing up responsibly in a relationship because I didn't have the courage to speak about what I needed. And so what I did is I kept it quiet and then I would cheat. And it made me into my inability to be honorable and have courage turned me into a person I didn't want to be, so I cheated.
Speaker: Upon the breakup, i I was made to be this big villain. And I didn't quite grasp it until five years after, five years into the cancellation, when a friend of mine, a former mentee of my ex and I became friends, she told me something that really changed my view on the anger that was projected onto me.
Speaker: Essentially, she told me that my ex was humiliated. She felt humiliated by the amount of cheating I did. Because it was with all women that she knew in one capacity or another. And when my friend told me this, it finally made me realize i wasn't just cheating, but I humiliated and dis disrespected her.
Speaker: That was a lens I couldn't see because I was so caught up in my feelings of what I didn't have the courage enough to say. And when that was said, I realized one, how bad that was. And I dropped all of my anger.
Speaker: all of my frustration around the circumstance because that was disgusting that what I did. But then I also took that lens and I applied it to every relationship before. And I realized I had been in relationship acting on fear for almost two decades because of what happened to me in my first relationship.
Speaker: And it was like, wow, I needed i needed a catalyst of change to change how I was showing up in relationship because Aside from my romantic partners, I was the person I wanted to be honorably, truthful, transparent, respectful to everybody else in my life.
Speaker: It was just with the person closest to me that I was afraid. I was afraid of getting hurt, so I would hurt first. And so in that process of being cut out and being canceled by community, by the circles I was in, and none of them had any of the information. and They all projected whatever they were going to whatever stories and blanks they were filling in because no one ever really came and got the story.
Speaker: But all of that aside, I realized that the people that mattered to me were the ones that were actually going to come and hold me accountable, but also ask me and process with me.
Speaker: And it was like, there are people out there who want who want to resolve and work through things versus throwing stones and wounding banding bad bandaging wounds up and then continuing to go at it. It's like,
Speaker: I needed an example that people were different, that I didn't have to be afraid of everybody. And once I saw that, it really changed who I connected with. And I connect with people who are curious and who aren't judgmental. And that really changed my direction with how I build community.
Speaker: You've almost described a thing there, that that concept of the frenemy, someone who's a friend but also an enemy. And you never really know which one you're going to get until they actually start behaving.
Speaker: And they will feed off you, but generally always negative because you don't... We all need consistency in our lives. And we know we need to know how the people that we...
Speaker: are trying to be friends with the people that we care about are likely to react when we give them information or know consistency helps to build that relationship with people and and the trust and it sounds as if what you've experienced is a period of where you couldn't trust other people and then you couldn't trust yourself and you've had to rebuild that trust with yourself before you can rebuild the trust with other people yeah yeah and unfortunately as i experienced it it came at the cost of other people's safety and emotional safety it was my fear
Speaker: my fear from a relationship from when I was 18 with my oldest daughter's mom and the way that turned out. I do men's work as well. I've been doing men's work for the last few years.
Speaker: v if If when I was 18 or 19, I a mentor or I had a big brother, but he wasn't there and him and I have spoken about that in recent years, I just i wish I had someone to talk to because I was flying this shit blind and expecting I thought everyone else knew what was going on except me. yeah After I realized, one, everyone's winging it, no one knows what's going on, but two, I had to find the forgiveness in myself to say, you know what, I wasn't afforded the opportunity for mentorship, but I've touched enough irons and I see what I did and I've stopped it.
Speaker: And i thank I thank God every day for it, for the the ability to see through see through the choices I've made and come out on the other side with some clarity so I can change and then I can step to the younger person, younger version of me and say, you ah have a seat with me let me. Let me ask you a question. What you what do you have going on?
Speaker: yes And just really being curious about a younger version so that they can feel seen and heard because that's what I didn't have. And I'm thankful that I have the opportunity now for the last few years to be able to sit with men from all ages and and just check in with them as one human being to another. Hey brother, where are you?
Speaker: Yeah. Earlier on in the conversation towards the start, you mentioned, know, a boy turns 18 and people say, okay, you're a man. And what you just described there is this situation that the world says you're a man because the chronological clock has ticked around to a certain point. Yes.
Speaker: But an awful lot of boys do not know how to be men because there is no role model. There is no mentor figure in their life that is demonstrating to them this is how a man behaves. Yeah, exactly.
Speaker: Exactly. and and and and i hate And I hate to be the person, but also the fear of defining a man. Here in the States around gender and gender ideology and expression and all that, it's like everyone's- I was sitting in ah at a hookah lounge a few months ago with my partner, and we were talking about what is the definition of a man.
Speaker: And her and I were going back and forth. She's ah years a few years years younger than I am. And so I spoke to, there was another gentleman sitting in the space outside with us and I go over to him, I go, hey brother, hey, can i ask you a question? he said yes and I asked him how old he was. He said he was 22.
Speaker: And I said, can i can I ask you, how do you define what a man is? Can you define a man? And he froze. At first he was afraid. I said, listen, I don't care what you say. I'm not gonna be offended either way. I'm just curious your relationship with the word.
Speaker: And so he spent about a minute or two trying to get it and he couldn't come up with one. And so he asked me, And that was my first time being asked by someone as opposed to me trying to process it myself. And so he called me on the carpet, coat so to speak.
Speaker: And in that moment, I realized a man is a social expectation, a social contract, a social obligation. If I'm going to say I'm a man, I'm expected to show up with these characteristics I stated previously, respect, honor, dependability, consistency.
Speaker: ah transparency, truth, right? And not only that, but to hit those more often than not regularly, knowing that I'm also only human and I'm going to drop the ball from time to time. And my job is to pick that ball up and repair what I did, take accountability and keep moving. Unless I'm doing that, then I'm not a man. Then I'm just a guy.
Speaker: yeah Yeah, I can see what you mean. But it also is this conflict that exists between what society says are the characteristics of a man. And I don't disagree with any of the ones that you've listed. I think they're the ones of chivalry, the ones of being a gentleman, as well as being a man.
Speaker: And then the things that are more individual where feminine side of our personalities can conflict with what society says a man should be like or how a man should behave. Yeah, 100%. That coming together where the two can live alongside each other.
Speaker: yeah I was thinking the other day that Boy George, singer with Culture Club, has um released a new single. He's gotten a lot of hits about it because it's about Israel. He says it's a peace song and there's all sorts of controversy which we won't go into now. The reason why I mention him is because back in the 80s, the early 80s, so this is like more than 40 years ago, he was this man in his early 20s.
Speaker: ah know I've never seen him live, but I understand that he's like six foot tall and a trained boxer and all this sort stuff. But essentially, you know he was a drag queen, yeah but he's a man. Very fun man. Yeah, and I thought to myself, you know, the fact that men today wear aftershave and we'll have conversations about the aftershave that they wear or the hair gel that they're using or the differences between shampoos, hair care, all sorts of different things, the clothes that we wear are because people in the eighty s
Speaker: all sorts of people from you know Boy George, Marilyn, Steve Strange, Duran Duran, all sorts of people pushed the boundaries of what it meant to be a man and were in yeah conflict but with society. But at the same time, you know Boy George, in many ways, was a ah direct confrontation with society, but was still the sort of person that your grandmother would want to have a cup of tea with. 100%. And you'll catch me like that any given day. yeah i I have a wide range of expression. The thing that we're missing is emotional maturity.
Speaker: That's a part of that. And the ability for the man, because the man is going to have to take the hits. I have to show up regardless of what people think about me. I still have to show up. i still The man doesn't erase themselves. The man works through it. I was at a sexual health alliance conference this weekend with all mental health professionals and there's 95% women and it's like, and the men that were there, they're all fucked.
Speaker: I'm not, not to judge them. They are, they, they seem to have softened themselves in order to, to be comfortable in those spaces. And that's something I'm not willing to do myself.
Speaker: I'll prove to you that I'm a safe person because I understand that your relationship with men and masculinity can be, can be a skewed through your own lived experience. give me an opportunity to show you i'm not one of them and that's where emotional maturity enters the room it's like look i'm going to come in with my biases and judgments and i'm going to give you an opportunity for equal space so i can learn who you are and work through that society doesn't have that in them anymore and i good bad or indifferent is just a circumstance the other thing that we're missing is practicing of belief systems it's like
Speaker: There's a lot of people out there that call themselves Christians, Catholics, Jews, and everything else, but they act like assholes. And it's like, yeah do your behaviors match your principles or are your principles just preferences?
Speaker: That is such a powerful thing. That's almost a podcast in itself, Joshua. but Yeah, dude. there's That is one of those sort of things. if we yeah I could talk to you for hours on that sort of thing. and i And I have this feeling that when we stop the recording, my mind is going to go into overdrive and think about all sorts of other things. that connected with this, because even that thing where you've said you were at a conference, most of the audience, most of participants were women. The few men that were there were noticeably changing their behavior in order to fit in with the women.
Speaker: And you're saying you tried not to do that because you want to be authentic to the man that you are. I think that and is in as many ways is also very interesting because it can be ah very conflicting for a man to used to working, living in an environment that is mainly other men and then to move into an environment that is mainly other women. it You have to change how you think. you have to change how you operate.
Speaker: It's funny. my My environments are primarily queer men. Right. and not gay men, but queer men. There is a difference, isn't there? Yeah. Oh, big time. Big time. What I noticed over the weekend is that because they had another conference there that in the hotel that was predominantly men and the energy of heterosexual men and queer men and gay men, those are three different areas that are embodied and expressed very differently.
Speaker: i I don't fit in any of them because I'm too straight for the gay, I'm too gay for the straights. It's like, I've had to create my own groove because it's that's just the way it is right now.
Speaker: And that's the key thing, isn't it? What we're talking about here as we zigzag around this topic is people need to think about what their own groove is and work towards being in their own groove and having been like bamboo, being flexible with it, but knowing where your groove is and spending the majority of your time in your own groove.
Speaker: Yes, sir. That's been absolutely fascinating, Joshua. Really very interesting. And you've certainly made me think. Thank you very much for your time today. It's been great. Thank you so much, Michael. I look forward to chatting again.
Speaker: So do I. I am Michael Millward, the Managing Director of Abbasida, and in this episode of Fit for My Age, I have been having a conversation with Joshua Rodriguez, a kink coach and accountability coach from the Kink Collective in New York City.
Speaker: At Fit for My Age, our aim is proactive positive aging. Knowing the risks early is an important part of maintaining good health. That is why we recommend health assessments from a York Test, especially the annual health test.
Speaker: Performed annually by an experienced phlebotomist who will complete a full blood draw at your home or workplace, the annual health test provides an assessment of 39 different health markers.
Speaker: After hospital standard tests are carried out, you will be able to access your easy to understand results and guidance to help you make effective lifestyle changes anytime, anywhere via your secure Personal Wellness Hub account. There is a link and as you would expect, a discount code in the description.
Speaker: I'm sure you will have enjoyed listening to this episode of Fit for My Age as much as Joshua and I have enjoyed making it. Please give it a like and download it so you can listen anytime, anywhere. To make sure you don't miss out on future episodes, please subscribe.
Speaker: Remember, the aim of all the podcasts produced by Abbasida is not to tell you what to think, but we do hope to have made you think. Until the next episode of Fit for My Age, thank you for listening and goodbye.
