Interview with Faisal Khokhar

Okay, if you're a frequent listener of the Dad Starting Over podcast and you find yourself saying, "Yeah, that sounds like me," well, you don't need another podcast episode. What you need is support. The Help for Men Brotherhood is where men go when they're done pretending that they got it all handled. You know, your dead bedrooms, your divorce, your loneliness, your rebuilding life. We have private forums, frequent live Zoom meetings, one-on-one coaching, courses, all my books at no additional charge. And yes, we get together in person. Real men and real conversations. So stop doing this alone and join the Help for Men Brotherhood today at help4men.com/join. I look forward to seeing you in the next member meeting. All right folks, DSO here, and welcome back to another episode of the Dad Starting Over podcast. And with me today, all the way from sunny London, England, is Mr. Faisal Kulkar. Faisal, welcome.

Hey buddy, thank you for having me.

Yes, absolutely, my pleasure, my pleasure. Now how in the world Did you and I connect? I think you reached out to me like 2 years ago or more via Facebook, right?

Yeah, I saw your group. It was Dad Starting Over Again, and I was very curious. I thought, you know, I'm a dad and I've been through a journey of starting over again. And so I was just, you know, reached out to see, you know, what you're doing. And also as a life coach and a speaker, you know, I'm very curious about what other guys are creating as well. So yeah, it was really interesting, and, uh, I'm glad we connected. You've got some real awesome content that you put out there.

Well, thank you, especially a book as well.

I really like your book.

Thank you, thank you. And so tell us about yourself. And, uh, you know, I love to hear the, what I call the superhero origin story of how a guy got to this point, because the Faisal that we're seeing now, this wasn't the Faisal as of what, a short 5 years ago?

Well, yeah, that's nearly 8 years ago.

8 years ago.

I was a very different, different man. And so my background was, you know, I was a techie. I grew up since the age of 7 from in London and West London. And before that, I was in Pakistan. And so I came here and I became a tech nerd. So it was easier to talk to technology than it was to talk to human beings. And I just developed all my social skills with a computer, you know, data skills. That's what I developed. And after developing that, when it came to interacting with people, I— that was a real struggle, you know. And then you throw the mix of women into it, you know, throw it, you know, you've got a tech guy and then you've got social skills which are not actually developed, and then you're— then you want to, you know, be in a relationship, be with someone, it just becomes a huge challenge. I mean, I did, I did okay. I did okay. I mean, apart from my first relationship, which was a huge challenge, and then my— then that was a very toxic relationship. I landed— got myself into a toxic relationship, and then afterwards came out and then had got married And after getting married, I didn't see it coming. I got a divorce. Divorce hit me, and that was my, what I call my rebirth, my, you know, awakening. That was awakening the unit, as to say, you know, the universe has shaken you to awaken you. And that's, that's what happened to me.

That's what I call the holy shit moment. And, uh, you, you're in good company because, as I often say, Every great man that I know has had some or a series of holy shit moments. We all have to go through that, and that's how you learn, and that's how you go. The great ones say, time to change things up. You know, hey, universe, I get the idea. I'm loud and clear. It's time to change things. So what was the— divorce is obviously a very traumatic thing for anyone, no matter what the circumstances. It sounds like it was a surprise to you. So, wow. What was the flip? What was the switch flip to say it's time to go to Faisal 2.0?

Yeah, I mean, the real strange thing was I remember when she told me. I remember when she told me, and it was a real— it was a shock. The shock wasn't because I'm ending the— the marriage was ending. I think there was some telltale signs there, but I kind of ignored them, put them under the rug. Can I just ignore them? But what was challenging for me was, you know, my, you know, I have two boys, two sons, and they were 2 and 5 at that time. And what was devastating was I wasn't gonna be with them anymore and not see them grow up. That was a real painful moment. That was a real struggle for me. And I found that very difficult. And I remember when she told me at that moment, I kind of fell to my knees And then I had this, uh, karamna, insight. Do I go right and then, you know, take full responsibility, or do I go left and then start blaming, getting angry? And in that split second, I said, right, I'm gonna go right, and I'm just gonna take 100% responsibility of what's happening to me right now. And further on. And that was it. I just took full responsibility and I didn't blame, I didn't do anything. I went through just this huge awakening.

Very good.

From there, and from there I had some, I thought, okay, cool, it can only get better, right? That's what I thought. Okay, I hit this low point, but actually no, there was more low points to come. It's when you start to confront your dark side, when you start to confront the things that you don't want to see. You're confronting the side of you that led you to that moment. And it's only then, it's only then when I started realizing that, okay, wow, I have some traits and behaviors that led to that breakup, that led to that dysfunctional relationship, that led to some of my challenges in my life. And that's what I've got to overcome. That's what I've got to start working on. And it wasn't a nice thing to look at. You know, there's parts of my dark side I was like, "Oh, that's ugly, that's horrible." You know, it's painful. So there was a painful journey for about 2 years. And I went through a phase where I was like, "Ah, you know, I don't want to be here." And I thought, you know, I see my— I was in pain, and the worst thing was I saw my kids in pain, and that was really tough for me. And I remember I remember at one point my son came up to me and he said, "Daddy, Daddy, when are we coming back home? When are we coming back home?" And then I just looked at him and I said, "You know, your new home is with mom in this place." And he kind of just was confused and he looked at me and he said, "Daddy, do you not want us? Do you not love us?" And, and that was hard. I mean, that was really, really hard. I mean, how do you explain to a 5-year-old— yeah, you know, all what's happening right now? So that was a real tough moment. And, uh, yeah, that's when I just, you know, I had this crazy rational thinking. Well, if I'm not here, then the problem's gone, the situation's gone, that, you know, they'll get over it, they'll be okay. But, you know, there was something inside of me that didn't take that route. Now, I'm glad I didn't take that route because, you know, when you're going through the tunnel of darkness, you know, you don't think it's gonna ever end. You know, but what I realized later on, you know, the bad times don't last. So, like, good times don't last either. So, you know, we can get attached to either of them. So Yeah.

And how are the children doing now?

They're good, they're good. I mean, my oldest son struggled. He struggled, um, he went through some challenges and, uh, he found that separation really difficult.

Yeah.

And, um, then he had some other challenges with, um, his new father-in-law. I mean, again, that was another level to deal with. You know, you're, you're dealing with a separation, then you deal with the person, you're partner, ex-wife, then she gets into another relationship, and then you've got stepdad, and you've got all of those things that you never think about. You never think about when you get into a— when you're young, you get into a relationship like, these are the kind of hurdles that will come on my way. You know, you think, you know, you sold that dream, aren't you? You sold that, you know, you grow up, get, uh, you get a job, you get, you know, financially stable, you You find a girl, you get married, and live happily ever after. Fuck, what a, what a, what a half a story, right?

Exactly, exactly. And I love the idea of— you illustrated with, I could go right or left here. And oh boy, how many men do we know just by, you know, virtue of looking at the internet and comments and so forth, they took the left turn. And that is just this endless road of distain, regret, resentment, anger towards the opposite sex, towards the world in general. And a lot of these men hearing your story are just nodding and getting angrier. It's like, here's yet another good man that's just been— had his neck stomped on and the world has spit on him. And you're here to say, yeah, but I didn't continue down that road. That was very, very simple. I could have done that and been down that road. But instead, I made the the right turn instead. And I'm telling you guys out there, and I'm speaking for you and for myself, it gets better. And it does you no good to lash out at the world. And it's, it's the world against me, woe is me, gets you absolutely nowhere. But it's perfectly natural to have those feelings, especially early on in the process.

Absolutely. Absolutely.

We all go through it.

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it doesn't mean that I don't feel— I don't have all the emotions regardless of which way I went. I still feel all the emotion of envy, jealousy, hate, resentment, guilt, shame. You know, no matter how developed you are, it's healthy and normal for you to feel those, but it's— the difference is the way I process them.

Yeah.

Okay, so, you know, I love the quote, is either you'll get better or you'll get bitter, you know. So the right was better, or the left was bitter. So I took, you know what, I just instinctively took, hey, let's try this route. You know, you've done the other route. You know, I lived very— I look back at my life and I was like complaining, moaning, being ungrateful, not being in the moment, all these things which I thought, you know what, I just had to do the basic stuff, protect, provide, that's enough. There was no emotional intelligence. And, you know, I was like, what, emotional intelligence? There is such a thing as that? So I, I, I, it was like day zero for me, like really learning. And, you know, I just looked around the world and I'm like, okay, cool, this is new, this is new, this is new. And some of my friends are going, what's wrong with you? Like I said, I don't know, have you been in The Matrix or something? Probably. So I'm like just looking at the world, just reliving the world from a new lens. Lens, you know, not from the old lens. And sometimes my old lens does come back. Hey, I'm just, just a human too, you know. I make mistakes, I screw them up plenty of times too.

So, so interesting how our stories parallel so much and how— and you've talked to many men and how you're just like shaking your head and smiling, saying, yeah, been there, done that. I hear your story, brother. They're all the same. They're all the same. The only difference is that right-left turn decision. And guys, if you're going to take anything from this podcast episode, it's that it's never too late to make that turn. It's not like you said, it's, I'm 10 years down the road of resentment, awfulness. I can never go back. Yes, you can. One of the things I tell men, and it sounds very clichéd and Pollyannish, if you will, but it's, you can be whoever in the hell you want to be. And I think you're a perfect illustration of that. You were a self-professed computer geek who had very little in terms of social intelligence or emotional intelligence, as you put it, and so for charm, charisma, whatever you want to call it. And then finally one day you just said, I don't want to be that guy anymore. I'm going to be Faisal 2.0 and watch me, world. And it wasn't easy. And if I remember from your story, one day you took the leap of public speaking and gave that a shot, if I remember, if it was in a small group setting. Am I right?

Yeah, yeah. I mean, oh, public speaking. I mean, so when I started going on this journey of growth and, and, you know, introspection and, and just evolving, um, I learned a lot. I read, uh, you know, like hours and hours a day, you know, and, uh, I, I was reading, I was listening I've never read, I think I've read about maybe 3 or 4 books in my life. And I remember reading a book called To Kill a Mockingbird. It's 400 pages and took me 4 years to complete. But now I was going through books, several books in weeks and just learning and growing. I remember I learned a lot and discovered about relationships. I wanted to find out Where the hell did I go wrong? Because I wanted to fix this. You know, I had my fix-it hat on. So I wanted to find out where I went wrong. And I discovered things like masculine and feminine. I was like, wow, there is such a thing as this. And I learned this, and my friend, she said to me, you know, Faizal, I want you to come and speak. And she was just starting up in speaking as, you know, as a coach. And I'm like, I'm not a speaker, I'm an ex-geek. I don't do public events. And she said, please just come down, you have some great knowledge on, lot of stuff about relationships. I just want you to come and speak. And I said, okay. And I pushed myself. I had this like 80-20% rule. 80% of the time when I get nervous, when I get anxious about something, I will do it. 20% of the time I'll give myself some leeway. And that fell in the 80%. I was like, ah, crikey, okay, I gotta do this. So I said, okay, what am I talking about? Toxic shame. Great, I'm experiencing an enormous amount of toxic shame talking about toxic shame. Eventually turned up and I had one of my friends, he was a public speaker, and I remember having some couple of drinks before, making some notes. I turned up, I was so robotic, I was so nervous, and there's only about like 10-15 people there, and I went to every single one of them and I said, "This is my first time speaking, so please be nice to me. This is my first time speaking. Hi, I'm Faizal. This is my first time speaking, please be nice to me." So I kind of like made sure that everyone was on my side, spoke for 5 minutes, and done. I was like, "Never doing that again." And then my friend said to me, "Okay, see you in 2 weeks' time. We're doing a 3-hour talk together." And I went, "Okay." I just went right again. I went, "Okay." And that was it. That was the start of my public speaking career, from a tech guy to public speaking, completely facing my fears.

I love it. I love it. And so many stories are the same. You have to take that initial leap, leap of faith. Yeah. And, you know, again, sounds clichéd, but whatever it is that you're facing that gives you that anxiety of, well, I don't know, probably 9 times out of 10, you need to go do it.

Yeah.

That was a big growth moment for me, where it's the same thing. I wasn't the most social creature in the world. Considering my relationship prior to divorce was a relationship of 20 years, that was all my young adulthood. So I didn't have the experience of going to clubs and whatever it may be, and— excuse me— and trying to meet women and so forth. And so, wouldn't it be nice to be that guy? Well, I just dove into the deep end of the pool and did it. And it's, uh, a lot of guys report the same thing. You surprise yourself. Wow, public speaking, I'll be darned, I'm kind of good at it. Who would have thought? Or wow, flirting with women, I'm kind of good at it. Who would have thought? You don't know until you try.

Absolutely. You know, a lot of, a lot of us wait for you know, the feeling of confidence, and then when I get the feeling of that, and then I will do it. Well, actually what we need to do is that we need to have that, you know, I realized that what I was practicing was my courage muscle. When I, you know, went into courage, which was being vulnerable, being exposed, there might be people who might like it, not like it, I might get shot down, get rejected, whatever it was. And then I love what Dr. Steve Harris says, you know, he says, the feeling of confidence comes after the act of confidence. So when you've repeatedly done the, the action of confidence, right, then the, the feeling will catch up then. So it was, it was just doing repetition, and, you know, I really believe in that.

Things don't get easier, you just get stronger.

It's absolutely— and I just, I just put up an Instagram story Yesterday about, you know, I have cold showers. I finish my showers with cold showers.

Oh, do you?

So it's freezing cold in the UK right now, okay? And it's not— it is sunny, which is, which is cool, which, uh, right now. And, uh, so I finished off my showers with the cold showers. I've been doing this for 3 years. Is it easier? No, it's still tough. It's still like, oh my God, you know, I'm gonna turn it on and I'm gonna be, you know, under the shower for, you know, 30 seconds, a minute, to whatever it is, or even 5 seconds. What— and it doesn't get easier, but I— my, my resistance towards it, I'm fighting that resistance, is constant. I've got to fight that resistance. That's where the results and success lies, is beyond what I feel. It's not what I feel, it's what I need to act upon. Yeah, I'm training my mind. It's not what I feel. Feeling doesn't equate to the truth. It's just an emotion. When I go past my emotion, what I'm feeling— because I could be feeling hesitant, nervous, or anxious, or fearful, and that will then trigger thoughts. So the thoughts aren't real, they're triggered by the emotion. So now I'm thinking, okay, so how do I go beyond my emotion to get the result? Some days It's easy. Some days it's not, you know. Some days they win, and that's okay. You know, I, I— again, it's not getting here perfectly every time, right?

You got it exactly right. Exactly right. So you take that step— I'm going through the journey of Faisal here to Faisal 2.0— and you discover your skill in the public speaking. People want to hear you more. They love what you have to say. How does that go from that to the Faisal that we see today? And I want to hear more about your business too.

Yeah, so when I— the best way to learn something is teach it. So I started teaching something that I was, you know, not the strongest at. So relationship skills is definitely one. Public speaking is the other one. You know, and communicating. These weren't my skills. My skills were building a machine system, programming that, you know, give me that, I can solve it, do this. So teaching that allowed me to reverse engineer it, understand its mechanics of it. So when you're a student, you kind of like take in, you understand how it works, but you don't understand the full mechanics of it. That's where teaching really comes in, is you kind of reverse engineer it and then you got to understand its path. And that really helped me to understand, ah, okay, this is what I need to do. When it comes to relationships, you know, I mean, my Achilles heel was what a lot of guys is, is attracting the girl that you desire. It's that's the one. See, I speak to men and they're like, yeah, I have no problem with attraction. Okay, cool, that's great. But what about the girl that you really desire? You really fancy the one that, you know, just, paralyzes you? Oh yeah, shit, that's a difficult one. Ah, okay. So, you know, when we are not attracted, when we write, ah, it's not, it's not a challenge. So where is your challenge? So my challenge was, you know, the, the girl that I wanted, I desired, attracting, having a conversation, connecting, uh, at any level was a challenge for me.

I see. And so over the years you've built up the skills obviously via teaching others and how to do this. And I would assume it hasn't been all wine and roses for all of these years. You've had your ups and downs.

Oh, a lot, a lot. So what I did was I, I spent 2 years before I actually fully started, uh, speaking and coaching, but I spent 2 years going out 3, 4 times a night. I would go out and then connect. I would connect with men, women, you know, go out to different types of events. You know, there's an awesome app, like Meetup app. I would just go out to wine tasting or go out to theater or go, or kind of like different kind of environments where I have to interact and network with people. And that's all I wanted to do was just develop my skills. And I said, "Oh, I want to develop it with everyone." So for 3, 4 nights, bars, nightclubs, networking events, conferences, everything. And I would push myself out there. And some days I would have incredible success, some days not. And it was, it took time. It took time. It wasn't like you just walked in and that was it. Hey, Mr. Charisma. It wasn't like that. It was like a lot of, um, I'll come back tomorrow. Yeah, I'll come back tomorrow. You know, a few weeks, a few weeks and a few months, I'm like, I'm just in the corner. And most of the time I'd be in the corner with a drink hoping someone would come and interact with me, you know. And, uh, I'd be like, oh, please, please, please, please, please, can you be the person who talks a lot? Because sometimes I'm socially awkward right now. I don't know what to say, so I'm just gonna be quiet. So please, I hope you're a talkative person. But then when you've got another person who's socially awkward, it's like this awkward silence, and you're just sitting there going, okay, thanks, and then just move on. So yeah, a lot of, a lot of time of, you know, 2 years of just going out in field.

You know, what you're describing is social anxiety, or for psychological terms, neuroticism. People that are low in neuroticism hear that and say, what are you so afraid of? And really, it's rejection. Rejection in any form is, oof, that's really tough, especially for men. For whatever reason, we just do not take rejection very well. It really hits to the core of something, doesn't it?

Yeah, I mean, rejection is a big thing, you know, for like, for guys and for me, you know, that, that fragile ego that we have, you know, she's gonna— or, you know, it's, it's such a measurement as well. So we really measure ourselves like that attractive girl gives us attention, gives us her, you know, time, and, you know, gives us a phone number. Cool, I'm a worthy man. So we put so much worthiness on the other person.

Yeah.

Then our actual own character. And, you know, I did that a lot before, but, you know, very different story now.

Think about what does rejection mean from a woman to a man. In very primal terms, it means, "You are not worthy of my time and attention, man, because upon first glance, upon first interaction, I have determined that you're never ever going to be a person I ever want to—" Well, basically, let's take it even to the most primal level. "I will never ever procreate with you based upon my first 5 seconds of meeting you. So why bother? Get out of my face." Oh my gosh, I can't think of a more hurtful thing for a man to— and that is what we, in a blink of an eye, that is basically what that interaction means. Hello, I'm Ralph Brewer. How are you? Very nice to meet you. Wide-eyed stare, turn around and goes the other way. Oh, that's, you know, there's nothing more hurtful than that. And to you, if you're a highly neurotic person, that means, well, I'm just going to go hide in my apartment for the next year. And maybe at some point, I'll come out and For the low neurotics, it's a laugh, and you just go, strike one, no biggie. You look at the club and you go, yeah, there's about 50 other women here that I could potentially talk to. What's the big deal? Um, that sounds simple to me. This new version of me is a lot less neurotic than what I used to be. Um, but for some men, that seems like an insurmountable obstacle to overcome, that fear of rejection. Any tips on overcoming that other than just go out and do it and just get the drinks thrown in your face, get the women turning around.

Well, I've not had any drinks thrown in my face. That's good. I did, uh, I remember when I was, um, 18 and we just finished college. So me and my friend, we just finished college. It was a Friday afternoon, it was sunny, and we thought, you know what, let's just, uh, get ready and go out, uh, go and, you know, go into central London, let's hit the town. And you know, we were about 18 years old at that time and we didn't really, you know, I didn't really go out much. So we went out and we went to the nightclub. I remember turning up at the nightclub, we were so early, there's only about 12 people in there. And we're like, I'm sure this is supposed to be busy. Yeah, probably not at 8 o'clock in the evening. And so we turned up and we got a couple of drinks and we saw these two girls, they were sitting down facing each other by a balcony. And so my friend nudged me and he said, "You know, let's go up and talk to them." I went, "Okay, cool." "What are you going to say?" "I don't know." "What are you going to say?" I said, "I don't know." So anyway, let's just go and say something to them. So we just turned up and I've got a drink in my hand, kind of robotically walk over and they both turn around and there's this awkward silence. Then I said, would you like a drink? And she just looks at me up and down. She went, uh, no. And I just did a 180, and I'm like, I'm never talking to women again.

That's about as bad as it gets. Ooh, no. Yeah.

And then it's down my drink, and that was— I like— and never talking to women again. And so we, you know, when we get burned like that, you know, it kind of like that burn just stays with us. Maybe happened in childhood, you know, that's what resembling. But that, that was— I remember that I was like, oh my God, girls are horrible. How can you be so cruel? Why can't you just say, hey, no thank you, rather than having this real strong, you know, expression on your face that says I'm completely disgusting?

And the answer to that is she's a human, and some humans are assholes. Done. Yeah. And it's, it's funny how, um, and you can probably attest to this that, hey, she's human and some humans are assholes, is kind of a light bulb moment for some men. Because a lot of men put women very much on a pedestal of, no, they're softer, they're the more empathetic sex, they're not capable of such evil like us awful men are. And so when they see that, oh, that is doubly, triply, extra super duper terrible. Wow, I must be really bad. If one of those superior women rejects me. Oh my goodness, how awful that is. Do you have a defining moment where it kind of clicked with you? And that moment became a laugh it off versus a down your drink and stare at your shoes for the next hour? I have such a moment myself that I could share. I don't know what the mechanism there was. But I wasn't really hitting on a girl other than just striking up a conversation. And she was obviously very attractive. And she just looked at me and said something to the effect of, "Sweetheart, you're a little too old and you're a little too bald." Then I just laughed and I just said, uh, "Well, the good news is that there's a lot of younger guys here with a lot of hair. So best of luck to you," and shook her hand and she laughed and that was the end of that. And I don't know, that just clicked for me. Like what she said, I could have taken as, wow. What a bitch. But instead I just laughed at it as kind of the half-hearted joke that whether or not that was her intention to hurt me or not, I took it as, that's kind of funny. And that was my click moment. And from then on, it was just like, what they say, feel, whatever, doesn't really have that much impact on me anymore. It doesn't, it doesn't sting. It's not the kick in the groin that it used to be. Old me would have just said, geez, I'll be heading back home now. Wow. What am I thinking? What am I doing? And the spiral, it would just spiral out of control. But that was just a funny little moment that I can laugh about to this day. Do you have such a moment yourself or anything similar?

I like, I like how you handled that. Uh, no, I don't have, um, there was a moment of like, aha, you know. I think it was just gradual grind work, you know, just keep grinding at this, keep working at this. So there wasn't, there wasn't any moments like that. But yeah, I mean I have realized when you have rejection like that, just laugh it off. Or what I like to do is I like to play with them. You know, you got too many grays. Hey, have you got any grays? Let me see. Oh, I can see a gray. You know, just play with them. And I'm like, I haven't got any grays. Oh, I can see them. You're just hiding them. That's what it is. You've just been pulling them out and they just come out this evening. So it's just being playful with it. And I guess one of the things is I'm not so outcome dependent. You know, if I get their contact details, get their number, okay, cool. If I don't, you know what, I can still have fun regardless of what happens in the evening, whether I get a number or not. And a lot of that shows to me that when a guy is so dependent on what's going to happen at night, that just shows codependency. Yes. You know, it's codependency because your whole system is based on what is going to happen rather than what you're going to create. Yeah. And it took some time for me to merge into that, you know, like that, the codependency, trying decoupling away from codependency and, you know, and measurement work. It took some time from that. And that's when you start really coming in your power. When, when I started coming into my power was Actually, it's the inside. When I brought the world from the outside world, like my emotional center became internal center and my validation became more internal rather than external, that's when I saw some results. That was when I was, turn up, I'm comfortable in my skin, whether you like it or not, it's okay. And it doesn't mean I'm 100% bulletproof. You know, it doesn't mean, you know, some days I do feel the emotion of rejection or I do feel the emotion of, you know, not liked. I get it, but that's my, again, that's my emotion coming in, and I gotta go beyond my emotion. So I just gotta keep exercising, keep reminding, the repetition of, okay, I gotta go beyond my emotion, I'm just feeling it, it's okay to feel it. Process it, sometimes do what you need to do in order to process that in a healthy way, and then find out some strategies to overcome this.

It, it's funny that, um, that rejection— you, you nailed it with the codependency thing. And for a lot of men, that codependency can kind of morph itself into a state of real toxic behavior, especially towards the opposite sex. In terms of, let's say you're at a club and a— what you consider— and yes, men are this shallow— an average gal and you go up and talk to her and she in turn turns to you and says, "Ew, yuck, go away. You're not wealthy enough. Look at your pants," whatever it may be. A lot of men take that as, "Who does she think she is? Look at her," and the anger. In other words, "She rejected me, therefore her standards are just way too high. Look at her, she's 20 pounds overweight," and it keeps going and going and going. And eventually it becomes this, "All women are terrible, all women are awful.". And a lot of men say, well, send me screenshots of online dating. And there'll be an obviously woman who's a little heavyset saying, if you don't make six figures and you're under 6 foot 3 inches tall, don't bother. And then the men will say, you know, like, who does this woman think she is? And my interpretation of that is, or my reaction to that has always been, good for her. I hope it works out for, you know, if she's a heavyset gal, and she's able to land a wealthy tall, dark, and handsome, more power to her. The end. I don't see the advantage of how dare she. It really, it speaks to the man's low sense of self-worth, how he takes that rejection. Yeah, how dare, how dare she reject me? Doesn't she realize her low value compared to my high value? What a horrible toxic area to get into. Or mindset to get into, by my estimation. And I see a lot of men very easily slipping into that. But when they take that time to do that introspection and that self-worth work, they realize that it really is all me. And it really is my interpretation of these events. And how I react to these moments says everything about me and my mindset at the moment. I could take this as a, hey, high five, girl, more power to you, best of luck to you, I'll see you around. Or I could, um, paint her as this villain that is just part of the world that is out to get me. And it doesn't do those men any good.

Absolutely not. I mean, you know, when you see that reaction, and, you know, I'm not saying that I don't— you know, I've not acted like that in the past. I have, you know, like, who the hell does she think she is? You know, I mean, she's like that. So I'm going to complete judgment and critical mode. You know, I've gone on to lashing out, attacking, and that is— that is— I'm so attached to something, and because it's triggered a lot in me, that's what I'm doing. And I get it, I get it. And now it's like, now I see that, and like, you know, the reaction you just had, Ralph Brewer, was like, oh, good to her, because you're, you're not attaching so many to the outside world. You're like, cool, that's her business. Yeah, you just brush it off and you focus back, you're back on your internal leadership, higher self. And, you know, and I get it, it's not always easy for guys to do that. You know, I've been that guy. You know, I'm not saying 100%, sometimes I don't get judgmental, critical. Yeah, sometimes my brain kind of takes over if I'm not in a good place. It happens. But now I'm like, okay, cool, you know, if that's what they want to do, great. So the thing is I think guys are, you know, we're all men and women, we're always looking for a fight, you know, we're always looking for that fight, you know, they're in us, you know. All women are like this, all men are like this, you know. I think we've reached, um, gender equality because now we're equally battling each other, equally putting each other down, you know. And there is, there's, there's enough of, enough, uh, on social media and you can see that equal amount of fight there is amongst And all that kind of— I had a realization about this, and it was my own internal realization. We don't actually hate people. We don't have the capacity to hate other people. We only have the capacity to connect to our hate, and the other people just bring that out. And why is it that, for example, sometimes talks on feminism and You know, misogyny and misandry, all that stuff gets everyone heated. So there's always a fight we're looking for, whether it's gender, whether it's war, whether it's money, finances, rich, poor. Whenever there's polarity, there's a divide, we'll always find something, you know, for us to fight because we feel like, I don't, you know, I felt like I don't have any control here or strong struggling here, so I'll take it on this.

Yeah, I can't tell you how many men— it's very, very easy to go down the road of, um, there's a lot of very, uh, feminism this, feminism that, um, the misandry in, in society today, etc., etc. And men will send me stuff about, can you believe this feminist person's posted this on Twitter, anti-male stuff and whatever it may be. And my reaction to that is simply, I don't care. Let her say what she wants to say, whatever. That's so outside of my, my periphery. It's just, it's not in my wheelhouse, and I don't allow that into my space. And yes, there are a lot of crazies out there, and I could spend 24 hours a day, 365 days a year finding the crazies and stuff that will anger me. Yeah, so what? Yeah, absolutely.

And you'll get that in every single aspect of it. Whether it's business, whether it's religion, whether it's money, war, health, anything, you'll find, you know, if your monkey brain wants to find a fight, it'll find a fight. You know, and whatever you're gonna put your energy and focus on, it'll find that. You know, if you focus on, you know, like a lot of the work I do is around dating and attraction, confidence around this. And if you're gonna find some excuses, you're gonna find some excuses. You know, and you know, I sometimes, I, you know, I fall into that trap. There is, it's a trap, and I fall into the trap. And you know, just today we were talking about when the emotions take up, when emotions take over, and it does, you know, we kind of lose our rational mind. And that's why, you know, a great thing is to have a, you know, group like, you know, like you're running, or, or a coach or something that comes in and helps you, you know, takes that rational brain of yours and takes away the hijacking of it from your emotions, you know. And that's what, you know, starts to help you give you clarity. Yeah, understanding. A lot—

a different perspective, a different outside perspective on your situation, where sometimes it's as simple as, I don't understand, why are you doing that? To which the person stops for a moment, said, why am I doing— it doesn't make any sense. Absolutely.

And that's And that's the hate energy. See, that resentment, hate, bitterness, that kills your charisma. If there's one thing that's going to kill your confidence, your charisma, your attraction ability, is that energy that you hold. Because, you know, women can sniff that from a mile off. As soon as you walk into the room and the guy's got hang-ups about X, Y, and Z, Okay, she can feel that. You know, women feel a lot more than guys do, you know. Oh yeah, I think their mirror neurons are like 2.5 times more than ours, which means that they can pick up, you know, what our body is doing, our reaction doing, a lot more than, you know, we can. That's their superpower. Yeah, you know, that, that's one of the superpowers that they have. And so when you walk into a room and you've got these hang-ups, these stories in your head, without even opening a word they've already signaled and communicated that to her. Yeah, okay. And there's some guys who have extreme power, poise, energy about them. That's like a real masculine spine, you know, the masculine spine and a gentle heart, but a masculine spine. And they walk into a room, they command attention. Yep. And it doesn't have to be like, oh my God, this James Bond or something, or The Rock. But it's like a feeling of like, oh, I feel this presence, you know. And you are— ask any woman this, right? Ask any woman this, you know, have you ever been in a room and you can feel the presence of a strong masculine man without actually even seeing him, right? And most feminine women I've spoken to, actually all the feminine women, I've said that, yeah, I can feel him as he's entered into the room without actually visually even seeing him.

Yeah. It's funny, the more you study human behavior, how much our nonverbal cues that we give off set a tone where, like, if you assemble a group of men together, invariably one or two of those men will stand out as the— it's an overused term— the alpha male of the group, or the leader, or the emotionally dominant person in the group at the time. And no one has to say a word. You just look. And you're just like, that's the dude, that's the one. And it's how he's standing, how others are interacting with him. And you're right, as soon as that guy walks into a room and commands the room, so to speak, a lot of the times it's that he's the charismatic one, the outgoing one, the one that walks in the room and everybody turns and says, John! You know, the room says, he doesn't have to say a word, the room does it for him.

They just smile. Goddamn John.

All he has to do is walk into a room, flash a smile, and everything else is fine.

I know, I'm like, I was like, damn. And when I was young, I was like, I want to be that guy. And I would hear all the women say, oh my God, the guy's so charismatic when he walks through. I'm like, what the hell is he doing? What's his secret? What's— how does he walk into a room? And, um, so yeah, that was an incredible journey, like walking into a room and commanding, you know, uh, attention, commanding respect, and I was talking to one of my friends and I said, you know how women get attractive female privileges? And he was like, what's that? I said, you know, like when you're attractive female, not when you're attractive, I mean, but attractive females get, you know, they get into nightclubs for free, they get VIP tables on all of these kind of privileges, holidays. I know girls have had incredible like lifestyles, free cars, handbags, everything, being flown on a jet. And I said, you know, we don't experience that. But that's until I started to do a lot of the charisma work. I started to get a lot of freebies, entrances, VIP invitations. I'm like, wow. So it's not just for, you know, attractive female privileges, but actually guys who are charismatic, charisma opens up incredible doors. You know, it really opens up doors, you know, opportunities show up because people want to be around you. You have this free energy. And you know, when we feel confined and we see someone else free and confident, we were like, oh, what's up with that? Give me— package it, give it to me. So it's incredible when we, when we take that right turn, when we go and say, okay, I need to leave all this bitterness, all this hate, because there's nothing that kills your charisma than that.

There's a flip side too that's not necessarily resentment and hate But it can also be a lot of men that I talk to are fresh out of long-term relationships, marriages, and they're dating far too soon. And the energy that they are exuding when they enter a room, so to speak, is one of neediness, codependency, nerves, and just really, I need, I need, I need, gimme, gimme, gimme, and looking for the next Mrs. Right. And that energy that they put out, for whatever reason, attracts all the wrong people. Um, because you talk about women having that intuition, if we want to call it that, that are able to sniff out those signals. They sniff out, here's a needy man who will give me whatever the hell it is I want. And you are not attracting the most mentally stable, grounded individuals with that energy. And those are the men that say, what is with women these days? Because it's just been one after the other after the other of toxicity, toxicity, toxicity. And I said, you just never did the hard work of that introspection and taking a timeout from dating and doing all that, like the work you did to become your new self. That's— we all need some version of that before opening ourselves up to the world and saying, here I am looking for a romantic relationship. That's far down the line from a guy who just had his heart broken and found out his wife has cheated on him 4 or 5 times. The last thing he needs to do is the next week go out and try to find Mrs. Right again.

Doesn't work. Happens. I mean, I see, I see this a lot with guys I work with. With as well. It's— they, um, they break up, they're in this huge void. This vacuum sucks them into wanting attention, validation, and, and that company again, because they're in this void, this, this vacuum. There's nothing there, and, and they're scared, and, and they gotta fill this in. And I remember when I, when I went through my breakup, my divorce, I had 2 years of just me time. Perfect. And that was like growth time. This is it. I don't need to jump into any kind of relationship. I don't need this right now. Actually, what I need is to do something I haven't done before, which is work on myself, you know, be by myself, work on myself, and not, you know, get rid of that neediness. I mean, that neediness is a like number one turn-off. Yeah, absolutely. For men— for, for women on men, it's not, it's not a deal breaker for, you know If she's hot and she's attractive and she's needy, it's not a deal breaker. You know, other way around, you know, it is a deal breaker. Absolutely. I mean, if she's hot, I listen, I'm gonna get some sex, and she's hot, she's needy, okay, who cares, right? I just want to get laid by a hot girl. That's what's— that's our primal part, you know? Yeah.

And, and once that's done, yeah, you got it. Okay, so perfect segue. A man is listening to all of this and says, "Yeah, the charisma thing has kind of eluded me all these years. I would love to be that John that walks into the room and gets the attention. I'm having difficulty finding the right woman. The women I do meet are all very toxic. I recognize I have these neuroticisms and social anxieties and so forth. I need some help with all of this." Enter Faisal. So tell us more about your business and how you can help these gentlemen.

So I have a, I have a group that I set up a couple of years ago, and it's a very small, tight masculine group. And what it was, I set it up and I said to the 3 other guys, there's 4 of us, and I set it up and I said, I want to, I want to have lasting change. You know, I've done Tony Robbins events, I've I've led teams for Tony Robbins. I've been part of one of his teams to lead teams for him. So, and Les Brown, all of these, some big names. I've been in the circuit for quite a while. And I said, I want everlasting change. I'm fed up of just a bit of, you know, you go on a weekend seminar, you might have a couple of coaching sessions and that's it. There's no results. So I set up a men's group. It's a very small group. And what we do is we work on the principle of mastery. Really mastering our craft, really getting the results we want. And I said, if you still have the boy psychology, okay, this is a great place to go from boy to man. But remember, the boy is gonna clash because the boy in us wants instant results. I want instant results. I want instant gratification. That's where, you know, I see my children. That's what they are like. I don't want to commit. I don't work hard. And I want the result. How do I do it? What course do I need to get this? So, and that's something that I wanted to move away from. So I created this group, it's called the Masculine Charisma Mastery, and what we do is we work on a principle of mastery so you can finally develop a character that can attract. It attracts opportunities and attracts women. So you don't have to look, learn 1,000 pickup lines. You don't have to learn about everything about body language. What she says, what she doesn't say. So guys get really consumed about, give me all the tools, give me all the engineering work on how she works, and I can work it out. But the thing is, when you have all of that, your bandwidth is just killed. You kill your bandwidth, and you're not being present, and all the insecurities come out. So work— so what I do is I work on character. We work on the foundation. We develop a strong, solid character on that. So I have a group on that, it's called the Masculine Charisma Mastery. So if you go to www.masculine.co, straight, simple, and then you'll be able to sign up from there. And it's application-based. And if guys say, hey Faisal, I need, I want some more help with dating, I want some more help with, you know, fine-tuning my charisma, getting more confident, being out there, when I show up, I want her to say, Oh my God, she's bragging about you to her friends. You know, I want to have that courage when I go and I'm in a coffee shop and I see a cute girl. Hey, let me just strike up a conversation. Coffee shop, train station, wherever. I can do these things most of the time easily. Okay, I say most of the time, and that's my truth, you know. You don't want to be 100% boom, done., but you are gonna be in a much stronger place than ever before.

Wonderful. Wonderful. And I'm sure a lot of guys are hearing this saying, that sounds like my cup of tea. So masculine.co. Yeah, you did. That's a, that's a good domain. You lucked out there.

Got a good one. I, you know what? I was so chuffed. I was like, it's even shorter than .com. It was like the masculine, straight to the point.

Boom. That it is. Very good. So, and, uh, are you going to be seen in any seminars around? You've done a lot of public speaking. I know with the COVID and everything it makes things difficult, but, uh, any other avenues to interact with Faisal?

Yeah, I mean, so what I want to do some more, um, kind of webinars, more online training. So I have plenty of online stuff on my social media as well. So check out my social media. I do want to do some online seminars in London, and I want to do some retreats as well. So I'm planning a couple of treats, um, you know, for like 2022. So maybe in the end of that year, you know, take some guys, uh, on an awesome all-inclusive by the beach, somewhere nice and warm and hot, because, you know, we don't get it a lot in London, and it's dry. And then have everything that's, you know, looked after so we can work on your mindset, your psychology, your confidence exercises, and also, you know, comfortable around other men, you know, build that as well. And also, I believe that we could have a lot more fun and adventure. That's what's missing in our life, and especially in the personal development and growth world as well. There is so much about, oh my God, codependency, wounds, dark side, shadow side, all of this side. It gets too much sometimes. I'm like, I just want to go have some fun. Yeah, okay. I just want to— hey guys, let's just go out, have some fun. Let's go out, music, live band or something. So I'm just— I want to take guys out more on adventures. This is what's missing in us.

It's funny you mentioned how you got into this, uh, when you had your awakening, so to speak, and you started reading incessantly about the topic of masculine, feminine, and life and self-improvement. I hear that a lot from so many men. Um, I've read 12 books this, this, uh, this year. I'm looking for number 13, guys. Give me a You can overdo it really quickly. Um, it just floods your brain with all this stuff. And if you're a highly neurotic person, that just adds fuel to the fire. It's just more to become neurotic about, more to ruminate on at night. Yeah, yeah. Am I being the— so many guys fall into this trap of, is it alpha male for me to do this? Is it beta male for me to do that? That alone gets men in a tailspin. How am I standing? How— what does my shirt look like? How am I I said this to the ex-wife the other day. Was that the alpha male thing to say and so forth? It's just timeout. And you just nailed it on the head with, when's the last time you had fun? When's the last time you just stopped and did something goofy? And just for the sake of being goofy and fun. And a lot of guys just miss out on that part of life. And I've been, I've been posting more about that here in recent in our groups is that just don't don't overlook the importance of just having fun and being goofy with your kids, with your partner, whatever it may be, with yourself. And there's this constant influx of, I have to fix me, I have to fix me, I have to fix me. I get it. We've all been in that. But there's this big movement lately with self-care. Everyone talking about taking care of yourself. I personally love it. I think we need more of that. Especially in this— we're inundated right now with just so much data and stimuli via social media, via online work, work, work, work, work. COVID just ramped that up for so many people that if you're neurotic and then COVID hit, oh my goodness, that just sent people into a tailspin. Oh my goodness. So yeah, take a timeout, just have fun. And you also hit on another point of being comfortable interacting with other men. That seems to be— boy, take a timeout from women. I love that you took 2 years to yourself. My goodness, that's rare. I always tell men to take a year off after divorce. Just forget women. They're not going anywhere. Just leave them aside for now. You took 2 years. Great. But during that year, interact with other men. Form a tribe, whatever you want to call it, your little social group that you get together often and talk and so forth. That seems to solve a lot of problems for a lot of men.

Oh, it does, it does.

Just that, just that's that release, that anxiety release of talking to other men. And a lot of guys that I talk to surprisingly do not have, um, any kind of men that they talk to, period. And they put a lot of their mental health on the shoulders of women in their life.

And that's a problem as well. And you see that very much I mean, I was one of those guys who didn't have a lot of strong male friends or male friends. And, you know, I was very uncomfortable around men. Yeah. And, you know, like feminized men, you know, as that part, we can be very uncomfortable around strong masculine energy because it, you know, it kind of like, wow, it kind of highlights, I feel a bit weak here and I feel inferior here. What's going on here? So, I don't want to feel that again. So what I'll do is I'll go to the bosom of a soft female, you know, I'll hide under there. That's where I'll be safe, I'll be okay, and I'll be mothered, you know. And that's what a lot of guys are, you know, looking for that. And I was one of those guys as well. And, uh, and here's the thing, you know, guys, you know, women cannot teach you how to be a man, you know. And, and another thing, do not— I mean, this is my personal opinion they are not a great source to understand attraction, okay? Because they again struggle with attraction themselves, and attraction is one— relationship skills, yes, possibly, but when it comes to attraction, attraction skills and relationship skills are polar opposites, you know. They, they can be very polar opposites. What causes someone to be attracted has got nothing to do with your character. Whether you're nice or, or an asshole, if you're confident asshole or confident nice person, you know, it's 90% of it right there.

Yeah, exactly right. I wrote in my book The Dead Bedroom Fix, um, go to a woman and say, hey, what makes an attractive man? Um, it's not going to be as fruitful as if you go to a man who has a lot of luck with women and sit him down for a drink and just say What do you think? Look at me, you know me, what do you think? And he'll give you the straight scoop on what's going on. And he'll tell you what he thinks. And the analogy I use in the book is, if you want to learn how to become a good deer hunter, you go to the guy that has a lot of deer heads on his wall. Right? Yeah. And he'll tell you, he said, yeah, you shoot them from close range with a shotgun. That seems to do the trick. If you ask the deer, how do I hunt you? He's going to say, well, you want to get a slingshot and you want to stand way far back. And yeah, it's like they're not going to give you the truth. Yeah. So I agree wholeheartedly. Find a mission in life, find a purpose, something to strive for. Have a good tribe of men around you, which I realize these days is very difficult. But thanks to the internet, look, I'm speaking to a man across the ocean, for goodness sakes, in real time. This is amazing. You really have no excuse not to go out and make those connections. And my group and in your group, the DSO fraternity, masculine.co. The avenues are there, man. You just need to set aside your ego and get it done. Yeah, absolutely.

And sometimes, you know, I do have a lot of guys who are on the fence, and, you know, again, you know, they say, how do I attract women? How do we become stronger and, and, uh, you know, powerful and charismatic? And I'm like, first thing is get off the fence, because if you're indecisive, you're like umming and ahhing, and I'm like you've already killed attraction. That's it, it's gone instantly. All right, you killed the charisma, you killed your attraction, and you've just killed the value that you could have, you know, brought to the table. That's it, done. Get off the fence, make a decision. Yes or no, I'm going to make a decision. And this, you know, there's a lot of training out there which is quite reasonable, you know, quite reasonable. You probably spend more on going out on a night out and waste money You know, and you can spend that on some training that will support you, guide you. And I mean, mine, the training cost of mine is just a night out, like a meal and a few drinks. And if you're on the fence on that, and hey, listen, that's okay. Maybe there's some anxiety going on, maybe there's something going on. But remember, if you want to create attraction, you cannot be sitting on the fence. Strong masculine men make quick decisions when they have like a lot of the information that they need.

And, and they may get rejected, whether it's a quick decision in terms of going to a woman, going to a man, and a business, whatever it may be. They may get rejected, but that man has a sense of abundance and low, low anxiety in the situation, and he says, not a big deal, there's more than one fish in the sea. This is, this is not a life-changing event.

Absolutely. I totally— you know, and, and the thing is, you know, she'd rather you make a decision and get it wrong than you sitting there umming and ahhing. That's more frustrating to the feminine. And she's going, oh for heavens, just make a decision. Yeah. You know, whether you get it right or wrong, it doesn't matter, but at least you had the courage, the balls to act. A lot of women— that is super attractive.

A lot of women say that, uh, it sometimes feels that the earth is unsteady under their feet. There's uncertainty, there's anxiety, whatever you want to call it. And wouldn't it be nice to go to someone, the masculine, the man in the relationship, and he presents that stoic certainty? He's the level ground that she can go to and say, ah, everything's right over here. When she goes to that and says, are you my stable ground? And he goes, no, I'm more of that neurotic energy that you really are uncomfortable with. She's like, oh shit. Wonderful. Now look at— and she'll quickly look elsewhere. And you're exactly right. And she could pick up on that in about a split second if you have that energy or not.

So, and, and, you know, also, um, I found that as a dad, as a dad, being that grounded masculine man, you know, is so important for my kids. Because I, I mean, the last year and a half has been, you know, through COVID, through my son, some of my son's challenges is when I've shown up ungrounded, when I've been, you know, panicking myself. I'm sure— I mean, I go through these things too, and, and I can see how it impacts my kids. So when you're really strong and you're grounded in yourself and you're— you have a place where you respond rather than react, you— I see my kids really responding, really, the behavior is incredible. And you think, wow, who are these kids? So they are much more reflective on how you show up. Yeah, exactly right. You know, they're that, you know, emotional energy, feminine energy too. So it's not just the work for, you know, dating and attraction, but, you know, if you, you know, as, you know, your dads and future dads, when you become that grounded, It's more like a parent, you know, when you're more like a parent. Otherwise, I was saying this to my client this morning, it'll be like a child parenting another child. And that's— and I've been that, you know, in that space. But now I'm more of an adult because I can parent myself a lot more than I could ever before. Therefore, I have more discipline, more boundaries, more structure. More standards. These are imperative for a masculine man. You know, I work on discipline every single day. That's what our group is based on. Our group is based on every single day we have our daily routines, and then every Tuesday, you know, we go and report our routines. We have an accountability. We see, we have a measurement in percentage of our integrity. What's our integrity?

And that's a foundation for a strong masculine man. Yeah, amen, brother. Perfect. Very well said. Faisal Kokkar, thank you so much. I appreciate you coming on. I appreciate this. Yes, thank you for having me. Masculine.co, and, uh, you can find the links to all of your social media accounts on that website, I assume? You will, yeah, absolutely. And any of those in particular that we should focus on? Instagram? Is that your Instagram?

Instagram is good. Yeah, I enjoyed Instagram. So there's plenty of Instagram stories and Instagram messages. And, you know, my tips are like 7, uh, one of my popular ones at the moment is, uh, you know, 7 ways that, you know, James Bond is so charismatic and irresistible to women as well.

So I use the James Bond as an example quite a bit too. The perfect, the perfect stoic, uh, attractive man who could, uh, have anyone in the room if he wanted to. 007. Yeah, you got Faisal, thank you so much, buddy. I appreciate it. Ralph, thank you for having me, brother. All righty, have a wonderful day.

You too, my man.