Is Being A Nice Guy Enough With Troy DaRonco

Being a nice guy is indeed an admirable way of life, but what if it actually leads to your self-sabotage rather than a fulfilling self? Daniel Weinberg sits down with relationship and life coach Troy DaRonco, who delves into the common issues that bring men into this practice that ultimately make them feel stuck, shameful, and furious. They discuss practical tips on how men can vastly improve their romantic relationships, putting an end to miscommunication and a dead bedroom. Troy also shares his personal daily practices for self-improvement, as well as the right way to deal with partners during conflicts and misunderstandings. Do not wait until your relationship is broken to start the work and turn your nice guy attitude into the key to creating a balanced partnership.

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Is Being A Nice Guy Enough With Troy DaRonco

On this episode, we have Troy DaRonco where we discuss the hidden costs of being a nice guy.

Troy, welcome to the show.

Thank you very much, Daniel. It’s so good to be here.

It’s good to have you here. We’re going to dig in hard here, Troy. You are a relationship coach and life coach. For this episode, I want to focus on what a relationship coach does. I want to hear what is happening to men when it comes to relationships that requires them to come and see a relationship coach in in my time. You may be would have gone to a therapist at most.

I’ve obviously made a lot of mistakes in my life. I’ve got two failed marriages with five amazing kids, but I’m sure a relationship coach would have done me a lot of good in both those relationships and in life in general, with friendships and in business relationships. I’ve had some very difficult business relationships as well, which failed and caused a lot of suffering and stress in one’s life.

Having unhealthy, toxic or very challenging relationships can’t be physically healthy for the for the body either. I’m curious as to how you see the state of relationships that men are having and why there are enough problems or issues out there that would require someone like you to jump in and help guide them to have healthier and less toxic relationships.

Thank you for that. It’s both overt and covert with what men are dealing with now. For me, so much of this work comes down to being there for another guy as he’s working through growing. I talked to a man who said, “I just feel weak.” I said, “Brother, you’re not weak. You lack education.” We didn’t get it.

When he said weak, is it because he doesn’t have the courage to speak his mind or weak because he knows he’s in a toxic relationship and he doesn’t know how to manage it or deal with it?

He feels like he where stronger, he would know what to do. He grew up with this idea that men handle their own shit. Yet he told me he couldn’t beat his way up a paper bag. He’s just stuck. He doesn’t know the next step. He’s been married for twenty years. He’s been out of a while and she just said, “I’m done.” He is nowhere near done. Where does men go then, if not to a relationship coach? As you said, maybe a therapist.

We create a group for men so that men have a peer group to go and sit with other guys. Instead of feeling like, “I’m the only one going through this.” It’s like, “There’s a lot of other guys going through this too with me.” The same relationship and challenges. The same bullshit story in their head. As I said, Daniel, there’s so many subtleties and there’s so many things that are just overt. Are as I scroll through social, for instance. The amount of messages, meaning, “Do this, it’ll save your marriage.” “No, do this, it’ll save your marriage.”

It’s like, “They’re different. What am I even doing?” They’re stuck before they start. There’s so much misinformation and many gurus. I’m not a guru. I’m just a dude who had a bunch of messed up relationships who realized what the problem was and did a bunch of homework. I started putting it into practice. I am my own guinea pig in very many ways. I’ve been in my relationship for many years.

You’re in the same relationships. You’ve survived many years, is what you saying.

That’s right.

You’re hitting like the unicorn status.

I’m catching my stride. Daniel, the first relationships in my 20s and early 30s was no good. It very much mirrored my parents’ relationship, which didn’t work. They didn’t know how to make it work. My dad is often my avatar. When I write something or I create something like a course, my dad’s the dude that I keep front and center in my brain. It’s like, “Dad, how much better would your life have been?” If he just had a few tools and a few strategies. I watched that man suffer a lot and I watch cancer take him at 63.

In part because he felt like he’d done the iterating that he could through his life. Nothing ever changed because he refused to set goals. God knows he didn’t have any support. He was a farm dude from Northern Wisconsin. When he got with his buddies, they talked about sports or hunting or work, or the weather. That’s it.

Maybe when things got messy, he had one buddy he could confide him because they both were in relationships that were working. Even then, you have the blind leading the blind. It didn’t work. When I was 33, I ended a relationship or it ended badly. I committed for the next year to only work on me, my relationships and my business. No dating. No hooking up. Nothing. I got to the end of that year and still saw the same behaviors with my friends, conflict, avoidant, and punishing with silence what.

What Keeps Men From Building Healthy Relationships

Let’s do that now. What do you see as the key challenges that men in particular have informing healthy relationships? I want to focus on healthy romantic relationships now. Let’s move away from business and friendships, but having healthy, solid, romantic relationships where you turn up as a great partner and your partner feels like they see you and appreciate you like, “You’re a great partner. You’re so different to the rest.”

I want to know what are the things that men struggle with or a challenge by, then you’re going to tell us a walk us through and help the readers understand what are the things you can do to counter those things. My experience thus far in being exposed to this whole space of men, let’s say. There is common denominators. I started this whole process with, we’re all making the same mistakes. I’m going to bet that the issues that you see are only a few of them that you’ve highlighted that are common across the board.

The story sounds a little bit different. There’s different characters in the play but you’re walking into these sessions almost with your eyes closed and hands tied behind your back. You know exactly what you going to do because there’s nothing new here. It’s just a different story. I’d love to hear what you see is that the key common denominators and the tools that one can use to overcome each of those things. There’s a lot of shame involved in feeling a weakness that we’re all going through, but let’s kick off in here about what you deem to be the key features of women suffer or struggle.

The pain points are difficult with men because we don’t want to admit it. I talked earlier about this idea of being stuck and not knowing what to do. You’re right, when you name shame and embarrassment. A lot of times that shows up as anger or withdraw.

The cycle is they feel shame. What are they generally feeling shame about?

Not knowing what to do next, not getting their needs met, and not knowing how to meet hers. She pops off and she stress tests. Some would call it shit testing. Instead of holding space for her, masculine frame, they add. They pile on and they make it so much worse.

Give us an example. Talk us through a typical scenario where men just fuck up.

The wife gets home from work and she had a rough day. Instead of standing in the kitchen with her, for instance, and just listening. He listens for a few minutes and then he takes it personally like she’s taking a dig at him. Instead of him saying, “Not mine. This all gets to be her stuff. I’m going to be here. If I ask a question, it’s one of two questions.” The first question, “Babe, do you want me to be here with you and listen or do you want me to be here, listen and help you fix it?” Those are the only two questions I tell men to ask when his wife is being a storm.

Also, can I help you or how can I help you?

Potentially. Find your own wording, but the essence of it is there. Listen or listen and help. What I want to do as a man is I want to rush in and fix it. What she wants is me to shut up and listen. She can vent, externally process, marry the logic and emotion that she’s dealing with together, but she needs somebody, which me, to hold space for that. Can I do it?

That’s the tool. What do men typically do in that situation?

They shut down because they take it personally. They aren’t listening or they get pissed because she’s pissed. She is often a man’s wife or partner is often his emotional caretaker or barometer. If she’s up, he’s up. If she’s down, he’s down. They don’t have any emotional agency.

Is that the same when you flip that situation around? Does the woman also use the man’s emotional state as her barometer?

Yes, but to me, that’s appropriate at times. One of the analogies I give is this idea of the first Jurassic Park movie. It’s about halfway through the movie. The dinosaurs are testing the fences. You see it on the screen and parts of the fences are lighting up as their testing. To me, women do exactly the same thing. They test our fences. Except unlike the dinosaurs who are trying to get out, the women want to make sure that those fences will hold and keep them safe.

We aren’t very good at that typically. We just open the fence and let them through and they’re like, “I knew I couldn’t trust you. I knew I couldn’t trust you with my emotional safety, my mental wellbeing and sometimes my physical safety.” What we get to bring as men is presents. They don’t need us for making babies. They don’t need us for making money. Any of that. We get to bring our presence. That anchoring effect but we have to do that for us to first.

That takes time to learn how to be emotionally regulated and emotionally set stable. I’m not popping off all the time. Only because I don’t know how to handle my frustration or my anger or my sadness. This is where a number of the books behind me are on stoicism. When I first started learning about stoicism, they were talking about shutting down your emotion. I thought, “That doesn’t seem right.” The further I dug, it’s about mastery.

I could get pissed off, but I don’t have to. I could get sad, but I don’t have to. I know that emotion so well that I can choose to go there or not. That’s what our women depend on us for. It’s that levelness so that they can be that storm and I get to be granted. That storm can wash over me. I don’t have to move from it. It’s a choice, but certainly not run from it. Certainly not, as I said, pile on a bunch of crap and make her feel worse. Pretty soon, what could have been a four-minute talk from her turns into a 40-minute argument and shut down for the rest of the night.

That resonates. When you say the man fucks up, is he doesn’t listen, so he takes a personally. I can relate to that. I take it personally, then you go off topic after a couple minutes and it’s like, “I told you what a shit experience I had. Why are we talking about you? You don’t even listen to what I’m saying.” That’s the pushback you’re going to get and then now you’re in the ring. You’re like, “Here we go. How do I unwind this situation?” What do you do?

I’ve got a fresh example of this. I started with a client. I hear this so often. His wife said, “That’s it. I’m done. I want a to divorce.” He’s thinking, “I don’t want to divorce one.” She doesn’t want her taking half of everything they build. He doesn’t want another dude parenting his kids. There’s a lot of reasons to want to stay. Plus, he still in love with her, first and foremost. What are we going to do? I gave him the tool that I shared with you, “Do you want me to be here and listen or be here, listen and help?”

He tried it. She bitched for four solid minutes. He said, “She just went. It was like she took a breath, cleared it out and said, ‘Do you want to see what I bought shopping?’ What in the hell was that?” I said, “You gave her space to work through her emotions. You didn’t need to fix it. She just needed to talk it out.” We make shit so hard. As men, we make shit so complicated. Part of my job at least is to help it be helped to make it simpler.

Let’s go through it. Tell us the key things that men struggle with. Something like not holding space.

The inability to not make her stuff yours or mine. Be there. We get caught up in our own story about what something means like, “If she’s complaining about that, that means I don’t make enough money or we don’t live in a big enough house.” Be careful with your story. Whatever meaning you give to the conversation is going to shape how you react to the conversation. I worked to be careful and mindful about the story I’m telling myself.

I’ll even tell myself while my wife is talking. The story I’m telling myself is she’s judging me or I’m not good enough. I can then bring that up like, “Babe, the story I’m telling myself is you don’t think I’m good enough.” She said, “This wasn’t about you.” Dave, what’s the story you’re telling yourself about what’s going on? I love that tool.

You asked her what’s the story you’re telling yourself when you’re complaining about the fact that we don’t have a big enough house.

She might be frustrated about money in that moment but in my head, I blow it up. It’s like, “She’s complaining about money because we talked about a bigger house and we still don’t have one. Now, if you feel like a failure.” That’s not what she said. She just said she wanted to buy something and felt stressed about it. I made this whole story up and now my wife’s going, “Is this Dr. Jekyll or Mr. Hyde that just showed up in the kitchen with me?” That’s when she’ll say, “Dude, not about you. I was just venting because I was frustrated.” “Oh, shit. Okay. Sorry.” Over time, they get story having to explain.

It’s like, “Babe, what’s the story you’re telling yourself when you’re upset? When you’re upset about that, what does that mean to you?”

Well said. That dovetails perfectly. What is the meaning I give to anything? It’s going to shape how I act or react to something. I’d much rather act than react. Especially as a mature man. I want to not just look like I’ve got my shit together, but to have done enough work that it’s like I love her and I’m not going anywhere. No matter what I’m staying. I’m going to keep working on me and us. That’s the meaning that I give to my relationship.

Are there days when I think, “It would be so much easier to be single?” Yes, then I remind myself, “This is why I’m here. My next partner would never know my parents. They’re both gone. It’s a twenty-year gap. Plus, I have many years of investment in us. I want to keep doing that.” Not knowing what to do is one of the first things, to answer your question, Daniel. The other thing is who is the person or people who you’re going to bounce stuff off of? Versus just books or YouTube videos.

You need an actual person. By the way, it’s not AI. AI is going to give you a couple of tools. Maybe they’ll work, but there’s no back and forth and there’s nothing personal about that. I use AI a lot, but when it comes to actual human interactions in the subtleties. This is where we need real people. The more AI becomes a part of our lives, the more we’re going to see analog conversation just like this one becoming more important.

Navigating The Messy Process Of “Uncoupling”

Tell me what stage do the men tend to come to you? Do they come to you and there are already like, “I had a conversation with a famous divorce lawyer and he said to me, ‘I know when they come into my office it’s already too late.’” When they’re coming in, it’s done. I want to ask you, at what point in your experience are men coming to you for relationship guidance? At what point in the relationship are they? Is it too late or in your experience, do they catch it just in time?

A lot of times, they catch it just in time. Especially if she’s still living under his roof or their roof. That’s a big one. Even if they’re separated. I’m working with a man and they’re separated and living apart, but they talk a lot. He said they talk more. Sometimes that can help. I will disagree with the attorney. I can tell you maybe with some pride. If I was in the office with him, there’s a good chance that if nothing else, I’d put both of them on a 90-day challenge and say, “Unless you are absolutely 100% unequivocally certain. Let’s give this 90-days where you’re both in.”

I give them the guidelines of what those 90-days look like so that if it ends at the end of those 90-days and neither one will ever look back and say, “I wish I had just. I wish I had tried. I wish I had been a little more patient.” We do it in those 90-days. If I talk to that divorce attorney and say, “Of the relationships that he’s worked people through, how many of them regret it afterwards?” I know from my own work a lot.

That’s such a very good question. How many regret it? That’s a good one.

We get so hurt. We get so stuck in our hurt that we can’t almost problem solve our way out of it. The more we can help them problem solve, the more we can give them strategies and tools that they’re taking action instead of just rinsing and repeat the same thing for twenty years.

What I’m hearing and I want to clarify is that these are men who are trying to save their relationships. They’re not coming to you with, “My relationship is fucked. I want to exit. Help me exit this relationship.”

I do that, too.

You do that as well?

I do that, too. I call it uncoupling. Uncoupling is different than divorce. A lot of the men that I work with have children and like you, Daniel. You’re still co-parenting, unless your children are grown. You’re still in a relationship with her to some degree. Can we make it as peaceful and amicable as possible and show up as much as we can like two grown ass adults?

I’ve seen relationships where their children are young teens and are in many ways more emotionally mature than the parents at that point because the parents have accumulated so much hurt. The 90-days does that piece well of, if nothing else, each gets to see the others actual side, the other person’s actual vulnerabilities. I get to hold that space for them so when shit goes off the rails because it inevitably does get them back on track.

You’re saying, when you do the uncoupling situation, you do them together. You are managing them both. You’re doing them as a couple.

If she’s willing. A lot of times, it’s amazing how willing they are.

In general, if the men is wanting to improve and/or save their relationship, do you tend to mostly focus on the man only or as a couple?

Mostly, the man only at least for the first month or two. I will encourage them if their wife or partner is willing to come to a conversation to have her come. As I said, it’s amazing how often she says yes. It’s amazing how often I end up working with those women one-on-one. Now they’re not just seeing his shortcomings. They’re willing to say, “Help me. Help me help us.” I call it the D Card or the Divorce Card.

Whoever pulls it first is typically the one who is truly out of what to do next. They don’t know what else to do. They just pull the ripcord. It’s like, “Peace out. I’m done. I’m out of tools and strategies. We’re good to go.” When somebody comes in with some tools and strategies, they’re like, “This feels different now.” A month or two with just the dude and then bring in the partner.

These dudes that come in, what are you doing with them? Are you getting them to describe their interactions? I’m just curious what are the men generally struggling with. Are they disconnected emotionally? Is their physical relationship died? What do you see is the common struggle for men?

Dead bedroom a lot of times. The intimacy or the passion has faded. They don’t know how to get it back. Sex was the way very often that many of us received love or interpret love, that she loves me. If I can, as a man, penetrate my woman mentally emotionally and physically, means I’m enough. It means that she’ll stay. That comes off the table or when women aren’t willing to open up anymore.

It might be the man as well who shuts down libido-wise.

The Hidden Cost Of Being A Nice Guy

It certainly can be. That’s not typically my experience. They want that connection. I suppose it’s the men that I attract from marketing or from referrals. I attract a lot of nice guys. Dr. Robert Glover wrote a book called No More Mr. Nice Guy. He frames it beautifully as conflict avoidant.

Explain the nice guy. What’s the nice guy?

Nice guy is conflict avoidant. Nice guy is not being willing to declare his needs or even think that he has any. If he can just give all the time, he can be safe or feel safe in his relationship. Back to that idea, if she’s emotionally unregulated, so is he. If she’s happy, he’s happy. If she’s sad, he’s usually goes with her and digs in. No emotional balance of his own.

What I’m hearing there with nice guy is not very connected with himself. He’s more like he is more driven or emotionally affected as you said by his partner. Basically, he’s barometer is his partner’s barometer.

It goes beyond that. It’s friendships, bosses and co-workers. Whatever they’re feeling, he’s often feeling. He then becomes potentially resentful that he doesn’t get to have his own feelings. That’s one of the things he’ll tell himself like, “I don’t get to have my own feelings.” He’s the same dude typically who will walk into a room of people and be able to take a pulse on that room but he can’t take a pulse on himself of what his emotional state is, but he can engage everybody else’s.

Most of us grew up with that. Who are nice guys? I’m a former nice guy. I’m completely conflict avoidant. I shut down instead of talk. It’s brutal. Silent treatment, waiting for our partners to come and get us instead of us go and get them. We go hide because if she comes and gets me, it means she wants me. For a woman that’s exhausting. It doesn’t take long for that to unwind.

You’re boggling my mind here. I want you to repeat that last bit about the hiding.

You’re hiding because it’s not safe to be seen in our relationship. If I’m seen, I’m showing my soft underbelly, I’m terrified that whatever I share will be used against me. I’ll keep giving her what she needs. I’ll keep thinking, “I don’t have any,” until one day I can’t take it anymore. I become so resentful that I’ll probably blow up the relationship. That hiding, I remember doing that.

I remember one particular evening having a dust up with my partner, going and sitting on the couch in the other room. It’s a room we rarely used. I sat there for a couple of hours waiting for her to come and get me, give me attention and let me know that I was okay. That is not her job. I completely flipped the roles with her, and we did that for a while. Again, I was just waiting.

What did you mean? You did what for a while?

She was in the masculine role and me more in the feminine of her being my emotional stability. She was leading our relationship in many ways. My mom did that. My mom did not let my dad lead. He didn’t create enough safety for her. I always thought, “My mom is just a strong woman.” She wore the pants in the family. Now looking back, every time my dad tried to lead and tried to say, “This is what I want. This is what I want to do. This is where we should go,” she’d cut him off at the nuts. It’s like, “You don’t have enough of a plan. I don’t trust you enough.” Whatever her story was.

What is he need to do? You said earlier on, “I know if my dad had the tools things would be different.” Took me through your mom did there and tell me what your dad would have done differently in your eyes if he had the right tools to change that balance.

It’s a good question and I will try and be as granular as I can while being efficient with time.

You described, “I would observe that a lot,” with the other and I would say that was me in my earlier version of myself. No doubt.

First and second relationship, Daniel?

Definitely first and maybe second, without realizing it. All the things you’re talking about now around expressing your needs. That can only come when you become deeply connected with yourself. It’s maybe a little bit more challenging in the earlier stages of your life and development to truly be connected with yourself because you’re just in discovery phase. What happens in that discovery phase is you can be understanding and a bit more conscious and proactive around, “I need to work out what I want to,” and be conscious about that process.

I speaking for myself. Ordinarily, what happens is I was completely unconscious when it comes to that and I slipped into the role as you described earlier on. I’m that guy. I sat on the couch waiting for my partner to come to me and ask me how am I doing because I was pissed off about something or I was upset or whatever. I sat there waiting to see, are you going to notice me and see me now or are you just going to have your head up your ass?

The resentment is coming in and it’s like, “You don’t even fucking see me. You don’t care. All the stories you’re telling you bang on.” The thing is, I’m not that guy now on the contrary. I have a partner now where we have lived a lot more of a life where we’re each individually so much more connected with ourselves. We know what we want. We’re very clear about it. We’re not like working it out. We call it what it is and it’s an extremely healthy, very rich, deeply connected relationship because it is completely like that.

She’s not waiting for me to check on her and see if she is alright. We’re very expressive and have the tools now. We do the things you’re talking about without having to think about, “I should listen and pay attention.” Once the penny drops and you see the effectiveness. You also don’t need to solve everyone’s problems. Be like what you’re talking about before hearing the problem being told.

I don’t believe my partner or a woman is coming to tell you the problems so you can just go into solution mode. It’s exactly the way you described. The reason why I saw this plot doing what the work I’m doing is, how do you fucking know? You don’t know. How did you know? You saw your parents act like that, which is quite typical. I’m in my 50s and that peer group. I see that same shit. I see the same stuff, like resenting the wife and can’t even better look at them anymore. It’s all the stories you’ve told like the frustrations, the way that things are being dealt with. Some of those situations get to a point where it’s like unrepairable.

You get to a point where it’s spoiled and the word spoiled meaning it cannot be reversed. Sometimes, you can’t unsee things that have passed as much as I want to save every relationship. Early on in my life, I believe in forever like getting married, being in love and living the rest of your life out forever. My parents are married for 50 plus years. They’ve been through their own challenges but they got through it. I believed in them, but I learned to also believe that there is also the reality of some relationships just run their course.

They just run the course. If you’ve invested twenty years of your life into a relationship, just like anything. Whatever you invest twenty years of your life into can be anything. You’re not in general like human nature. You’re not going to give that up to easily. You might not know what to do anymore. I completely appreciate that I want to say this. I’ve invested so much this. I just don’t know how, which is your sweet spot and what you’re talking about.

I’m also accepting of, I know I’ve invested twenty years of this but it’s run its course. It’s done. It’s dead. It’s like Kodak camera. It ran its course. It’s like, “It was amazing,” and then we don’t need you anymore. That can happen. My process was learning to accept that because I I didn’t believe in that but I do believe in it now. I’m a bit more open. Sometimes, it’s not just that you’re a bad person or whatever. It’s also like what you’re indicating before in the relationship. It’s 50/50. It’s a combination. It’s not just you.

In that combination that you describing, in your twenty-year relationship, I would suggest to you as well, that the Troy that was there many years ago is a different Troy now in many ways. I’m going to presume that not everyone does. In general, most people evolved as humans because of the experiences that they had, having and also, they shared those experienced with someone else. They’ve also had their own individual experiences and they’re evolving.

Your partner is a very different person. I could not be happy of where I am with my partner, but I believe that we will evolve amazingly together. I also know in twenty years’ time that she will be a different person from now than she is now and so will I. I’m hoping that Daniel version age 70, and my partner at that stage are still going to be madly in love with each other and still think, “You’re amazing.” It’s not unrealistic that people change as well.

How Grow With Your Partner

Some of its intent is our intent to grow together. Are we doing things that are going to keep us connected? Do we craft a vision for our life every year? At the beginning of the year, that’s what my wife and I do. What are the goals?

Talk us through that as an activity. That’s interesting. When you say you sit down with your wife and you got to the beach and say, “Let’s talk about 2026. What are you wanting for 2026?” What categories you are talking about when you talk about those goals?

Every category such as finance, home, travel, relationship, growth development, adventure and friend.

She goes, “This is my wish list for 2026. What’s your wish list? How are we going to this together?”

When we talk about traveling, it’s largely together. Not always. Time apart is important, because knowing who we are as in individuals is key. It keeps us interdependent. Not co-dependent.

That’s forced upon me. I’ve got kids that live in other countries. My partner and I travel a lot with each other and spend a lot of time with each other. When I’m traveling to go see kids, I get that time apart. That cycle can be frustrating at times as well because you’re a part. We don’t love to not be together. We enjoy being with each other but there’s a very healthy component of that. I don’t think most couples get that because that’s a luxury.

The luxury is you want to go away with them. Maybe either by yourself or usually with one or two other friends or do something like that just to have a different type of experience. You’ve got your male friends that you want to have a bonding experience with. In today’s world, that is becoming more of a luxury. Although, it’s a very healthy ingredient to a relationship. Each of you get to experience individually. The relationship is basically you, the union and your partner. It’s three different based factors here. You want to make sure that they are all healthy units overall. There’s me telling the relationship coach what he thinks.

All good. If you and your partner, every year craft a plan together that unifies you, it will keep you together 20 years from now or 40 years from now because you’re growing in the same direction.

I’m sure you’re talking on a daily regular basis about lots of things. You’re saying, “I want you to literally take some time out and think out loud on the subject of what do we want for 2026 as an exercise.” I like that look.

Dream together. I’ve been saying it for a long time and it’s oddly cliché, but a couple that dreams together, stays together. The reason for that is very practical. That is, many of the couples that I work with, many of the men that I work with are pretty set in life. Work is okay. Money is okay. Life’s just okay. If we don’t have a problem to solve or a quality problem to solve, our mind will make one and it’s almost always the relationship because she is an easy target for anything that I find dissatisfying in my relationship. What my wife and I do is we create quality problems together. Things that we have to solve together, so that we don’t end up in conflict.

Give an example.

Going to the beach and deciding where we’re traveling. A trip coming up in February, in April, and in October. Now, we get to figure out how to save money. We get to make the plans around plane tickets and whatever the details are. We have something to look forward to together. Usually, it’s in alignment with our values of being physically fit and active. We have to keep up with our daily routines because it’s going to play into that. We go out to dinner and I say, “I want the loaded nachos.” She says, “We can do that. Does that get us to where we want to go?” “Thanks. Good catch.”

You’re like, “I wanted the Tiramisu,” and she’s like, “Is that going to get us to one of our goals?” You’d be like, “Yes.”

No shaming. She’s just keeping me on track and I do the same for her.

You don’t take it personal.

Never. There’s no reason to because we agreed ahead of time that we are going to help support each other and keep each other accountable to what our goals are. If my partner isn’t helping to remind me when I’m tired or when I’m over hungry overstimulated of, “You can do that. It’s totally fine but I’m wondering does it feel right to you or is it alignment with what you want?”

Sometimes you say, “I know, but I’m sting for staying for the loaded nachos.” You can do it still and you should.

I call it a good case of the fuck it. It’s like, “Fuck it. I’m doing it anyway.” I’m so going to enjoy it no shame because it’s intentional. You’ll hear that from me a lot. What is your intention?

A good case of the fuck it.

If you’re going to do it, for God’s sake, do it. Enjoy it. Eat the nachos. Devour them. The tiramisu, for God’s sake, take your time. Make it last fifteen minutes. Take it outside. Sit and watch the sunset. I don’t know what that is for you. We just tend to move from one thing to the other. There’s no transitions. We don’t appreciate things.

Bringing The Spark Back To Your Dead Bedroom

The final one we’ll talk about which you touched on was on the physical, the dead bedroom. Sometimes it’s a difficult one to reverse because again, two people are involved here. You’re coaching the man like, “This is what you need to do. I know you want it and you want to have a healthy, physical relationship. Whatever. I can try and help you get there.” Isn’t it often the time that the man’s partner is just not interested?

The question is, Daniel, why not? What’s not happening for her that she can’t literally open to tell what’s happening?

You tell me.

He doesn’t feel safe. First and foremost, that’s what I’ll tell you. She does not feel safe.

Do you think the key driver of why the woman in a relationship turns off is because they don’t feel safe?

That’s right. It’s certainty, safety and security. At the end its safety. I don’t think most men realize what it must be like to allow someone literally into your body when you don’t feel safe.

I’m saying wow. Knowing that, when you convey the message package like that, I’m putting myself now in the man’s shoe. That would feel pretty devastating for the man to know that he hasn’t been able to provide his partner that sense of safety. That’s that must be very challenging.

He doesn’t know that’s what it is though, Daniel. He doesn’t know that.

What I’m saying is, when you tell the man, when he describes the relationship like from experience of being in relationships. The physical was on a extremely low frequency. That’s very difficult to handle as a man because there’s a feeling of rejection. There’s a feeling of, “Am I not attractive to you? What’s wrong with me?” You start telling the stories in your head. You would feel pretty bad about it and when you frame it to the man and you tell them that it is because you don’t fundamentally make your partner feel safe. That’s a pretty hard pill to swallow, I would say. How do you reverse that?

Skill him up. Get him to stop asking questions about himself, and get him to start asking questions about her and her needs. When we’re struggling, all of the focus becomes internal with us men. You said it, Daniel. What did I do wrong? Am I not attractive? I instead of her. What does she need? What would make her feel safe enough to open to me? What is her wants and needs in this relationship? I feel like I’m giving a lot but clearly, it’s not what she needs. I need to take a step back.

That last piece you just said is interesting. I’m going to speak from experience as well. In my failed relationships, I would say when I was in those, I reflect very differently on it now. When you’re in those relationships, you feel like, “I’m giving so much here.” It’s not about how much you’re giving. It’s, if you’re not satisfying the others’ needs or you’re giving things that’s not being added to their relationship, then it doesn’t count, does it? You don’t know.

That’s right. It’s trying to listening with the new set of ears to what’s being said. It’s using the skills of observation. There’s a reason why women often now accuse us of being narcissists. It’s because to them, it’s what it sounds like. It’s what it feels like. They feel manipulated.

Are you saying the woman feels manipulated?

By the man. Let’s go back to sex, Daniel. She knows that the things that he’s doing is to earn her body. Not her, but her body.

You’re saying that’s the currency.

The things that he’s doing like providing and giving, the subtext she’s getting is it’s so that he has access to her body like sex. It’s not for her. That’s the story I hear a lot from women.

That explicit? The women in general think that whatever men are doing ultimately is just so they can get them into bed for physical experience. Not for a deeply connected experience.

That’s right. It’s interesting. I’ve worked with women who say that sex is uncomfortable if it hurts. It’s interesting how that can change some at least when they feel more connected and safer to him. There’s a reason her body is rejecting being penetrated goes. It’s terrifying. Nobody wants their body to be a commodity. That’s not loved, by the way. That’s lust.

Tell me how you reverse it. I’m talking about relationships where they literally having sex five times a year. Maybe on the birthdays and anniversary.

It’s expected sex.

How do you reverse that?

I’m being redundant. Help her to feel safe. Our time together is too short. I can go into that in detail. If somebody wants to spend time with me, there are number of ways of doing that. Helping her feel safe is first and foremost. Learn her love language. I know it’s everywhere and her top two. I’m working on something called Appreciation Language. Love is one thing, but how does your wife receive appreciation? How do you receive appreciation?

Some of the same tools apply but love and appreciation are different. What does she need from you that only you can give that you might be blind to? It can be prompts like, “Babe, what you’re looking for is this or it feels like what you’re looking for is this. Am I close? I feel like we’re not quite connecting or almost there. I feel like you’re withholding a little bit and I want to make sure that I can create enough safe space that you feel like you can share it with me because there’s something here.”

She’ll usually look down or away because you hit something. Pay attention. Most the time, we are not looking at them. We’re looking through them. We’re looking around, then we’re looking at our phone. Look at her. Look into her eyes. Feel your feet on the floor or your butt in your seat if you’re sitting down, but ground yourself. Men hear that from me a lot. Embodiment practices are everywhere. They’re all over social and YouTube for a reason.

Most of us are from here up. We don’t belly breathe. We’re ungrounded. When our woman comes along and tries to knock us off our feet, figuratively speaking. She’s able to because were not centered in ourselves. You brought up something beautiful earlier, by the way, and that is time alone. Do I know myself? A lot of nice guys that I work with don’t. They don’t want to spend time with themselves. They don’t like what’s going on between their ears. They will do anything to avoid it.

What happens is, and again, speaking from my experience, is sometimes you get lost in what you’re describing before. Which is you get lost into falling into following the barometer your partner and then your moods again to be determined by what is going on there to the point where you wake up one day and you realize you don’t even know what you want any more.

Mid-life reckoning.

I see that play out time and time again. One requires a reset. Let’s get you back on the path and it’s a bit like, let’s go back to first principles or scratch here. What do you like? Ask yourself. What do get passionate about? What makes you feel good? What doesn’t make you feel good? Be honest with yourself about it. That needs to be at the core before you can have a positive healthy relationship. It’s you until you do that work, you’re not going to be out as effective, as happy, or as healthy as you could have been in any relationship. Not just as a partner but as a father. Rather a friend, business partner or whatever. You need to start with yourself.

You do. I want to add to that. For the men who just heard you, it is something they can do while they’re in a relationship. The richest men would have heard you say, “You need to be single to do it.”

I’m just talking about you got to work on you. Don’t do what I did and wait till everything falls to fucking pieces and then realize, “I’ve got to get back to me.” You certainly should be checking in with yourself all the time and being true to yourself. When you talk about the safety, that’s when you are very clear in what you stand for, what’s important to you, and what’s not what acting as pack leader.

Begin to express and clearly define who you are so it’s very clear and not confusing. Be content and satisfied with who you are. Be willing to work on making yourself better. Coming back to what you suggested as one of the key issues. It’s the ability to provide safety. When you can be that, the woman should feel safe with someone who is very clear with who they are as individuals. Your partner can then decide whether she wants to invest and spend the next decade with that person who is very clear or not.

At least they can make an educated decision instead of being reactive.

 We could ramble on for a long time.

One quick thing, Daniel. Folks, if you’re working on yourself, try and to do one thing at a time. Don’t lose weight. Work on your relationship. Get a better job. Make more money. Please, slow down. One thing at a time because you’re going to overcome yourself and get even more stuck. This isn’t school. You’re not taking multiple lessons. You’re growing. Growth takes time. Slow down. Decide what you want to focus on. Go learn it. Whether it’s about women or health. I don’t care, but please try and do one thing at a time.

It’s a marathon.

As we know. You and I are both now more than half a century on the planet. It is a marathon and sometimes it gets freaking tiring then it’s time to rest.

It’s ongoing. You cannot forget the process of checking in with yourself. When things are not feeling good, it’s not about ignoring them, suppressing and putting it down or whatever. It’s constantly knowing yourself.

I ask myself, “Am I coasting towards growth or am I coasting towards death?”

Daily Practices To Improve Yourself

Finally, any daily practices that you do that you find helpful for you? I do my journaling. I exercise most days. I find that it doesn’t matter what any of the practices you put in place. As long as you’re doing it in a discipline where it becomes a part of you because a lot of the time, it’s almost the act of the discipline, which is in itself is the grounding of you. When you say doing meditation between men, it doesn’t matter how good the meditation session is exactly where the fact that you’re committing to that thing for 20 minute every day. To me, it’s the gold in the process. It can be anything. What are your daily practices?

You touched on a few of them already. Movement has to happen every day. In fact, through my workday, movement happens. I take myself for at least three walks during my workday for 15 minutes. It’s not a huge time commitment but get the blood moving. Get some fresh air and sunlight in my eyeballs. Ritualized bedtime wake time is huge for our circadian rhythm.

I’m struggling with that now. That’s very interesting, but that is bang on.

However, I can ritualize some things so I have less to think about. My body knows what’s happening next and what’s going on. I need things that I can depend on because life is changing often. What are the things that are reliable for me consistent? I get up in the morning. Wake time for me is right around 5:00. A while ago, it was 3:30. I was up and I did my routine from there. I don’t just wait till 5:00. I get up and grab some water. I get the tea water heating and I go and sit. The first thing I do in my spot is I contemplate.

I have a 5X8 notebook and I just brain dump. You came up. It’s like, “I’ve got the show with Daniel.” Sometimes I’ll put a feeling after it. After that, I put excitement. I forgot to return that call. I was excited about this event with my wife. I just write down thoughts. A lot of times, it’s worries or stress or regret like things I messed up on or things I missed yesterday or a week ago. It’s like, “Oh shit,” but contemplation 3 to 5 minutes. From there, I moved to meditation for 30 minutes. That’s the thing that contemplation has been the biggest benefit from me with meditation.

You do the brain dump before you get into meditation. Your mind doesn’t wonder out there anymore.

If I’m 10 minutes in and this thing keeps popping up in my meditation. I will open my eyes, write it in my notebook, and I’ll go back to meditation. My brain is like, “It’s handled. I can leave them alone now.” Sometimes that’ll happen 5 or 6 times in a 30-minute meditation because I keep thinking of things. I’m so relieved that I do.

I love that I’m conscientious about it. If I don’t do that, it wakes me at night or won’t let me go to sleep if I don’t do the brain dump in the morning. It’s going to demand my attention at some point. I might as well give it to it willingly. It’s get up. I do three-and-a-half-mile walk. I live in San Diego. It’s very hilly where I live. Some pretty good grade, so I can get a good pump going. I come back from a 30-minute workout, shower, and I come to my office. I journal once I get there and start my day.

How about in the evening?

I do groups. For some evenings, it’s not so ritualized but having dinner with my wife and having that time together. Sometimes, it’s in front of the TV. We both have had a day and she’s in her chair and I’m in mine. We might eat in front of the TV. I prefer when we’re at the table and we can talk. I try and bring questions to that meal so it’s not just, “How was your day? How is this going?” It becomes nauseating to me after a while. I get bored pretty soon. I find myself staring at my plate. Bring questions, folks. There’s tons of them.

I did 32 questions that I created for couples. They’re designed to help couples go deep. Again, not just, how was the day or are you still dealing with that pain in the ass co-worker or whatever. What’s the intention this use of time together? We’re spending time. That’s something I’ve been meditating on a lot lately.

I’m in my 50s, spend time. I don’t get it back. How am I spending it? What’s its quality? The only thing that gives life meaning and finally realizing, “That’s true.” I used to call bullshit when I was young. Reading is key. I love to read. I did a ton of work around my house listening to shows but also taking mental breaks like siestas from learning and growing. If we’re not careful, we can get into something I call wound worship. Where we’re always chasing what’s not working, what doesn’t feel right or I must be broken. Sometimes we need a break from ourselves.

I’ve learned the end of what’s called Dolce far niente, which means the sweetness of doing nothing. That’s a handful. I was always feeling my time with what you just described, business schedule. If I’m doing nothing, it’s like, I’m wasting time where the art of learning to enjoy, having what I call palm peace of mind to quiet. Nothingness is a pretty blissful state to be in.

I grew up on a farm, so I spent a lot of time on a tractor and headphones were forbidden. We would destroy our ears but you couldn’t hear if something went wrong with the machinery. I would spend 8 hours, 10 hours 12 hours, or 14 hours on a tractor alone with my own mind. You get to learn to be friends with your own mind when you’re essentially in solitary confinement for hours and hours. It’s the way our ancestors evolved. They were bored a lot. Folks, go get bored. I’m serious. I’m not playing.

I tell my kids that.

If you want to be creative or if you want to know what’s going on in your relationship, go get bored so your mind can come in and go, “This is the problem.” If you fill it with this thing, good luck. It’ll tell you what’s wrong with somebody else but it probably won’t speak exactly to your problem.

Answering Rapid-Fire Questions

That’s exactly right. We got to wrap it up. I want to ask you five questions that I asked all my guests. I’m just looking for a Troy response. Who would you like to say sorry to given the chance?

This is going to sound weird, folks, but I this I woke with this at 3:30. My mom passed years ago. She died of cancer. I was holding her when she passed.

Both of your parents died of cancer.

The same cancer.

Which one?

The non-small cell lung cancer. Probably from radon in their home in retrospect, which is a gas that comes from the ground. We had a basement in our home. In Northern Wisconsin in the US, it’s very cool. Winter is 6 and 7 months. The house is closed up, so the gas concentrates. That’s the theory. Within 30 minutes of my mom’s passing, she did everything she could to open her eyes. I don’t know what I was thinking, but I closed her eyes. It has bothered me, hurt me, and hurt my heart. I wanted to say sorry to her. Potent but it’s what came to mind when you asked that question. She deserved to have her own agency without me interrupting her leaving journey.

What are you proud of being or doing in your life?

This with you. Being able to help and support men because sometimes we need to suffer. We also get to say, “I’ve suffered enough and I’m ready for something different.” This is what I want to be doing, Daniel. I believe this is why I was put here. I help men make sense of things that don’t feel like it makes sense to them. I’m very proud of that.

You must get a lot of satisfaction.

I do. I don’t know that I’ve ever felt much joy in my life, truthfully, but this brings it.

Amazing work. When did you receive kindness while needing it most and expecting it the least?

It’s amazing how fresh some of this is. I have three business partners in Groups For Men. They came together to Rally around me when I was in a low spot. They are all twenty plus years younger than myself. We’re doing a lot of growing now. I am in Tech fatigue. I am the face of the business and I can learn it but I don’t like it. I want to be here doing this with you. I want to be talking to men. I don’t want to be behind a computer alone. It’s not good for me.

They rallied around me to recognized what was going on because I wasn’t willing. I felt like I was fucking old and it wasn’t going to admit to that. They saw it and said, “We’re going to pull this off of your plate.” I did not expect that but it is a true kindness. I feel like a new man. I feel seen, valued, heard, respected and loved. Amazing.

Have you told them?

I’m very effusive. I am very demonstrative. Gratitude is pouring out of me probably daily to the point they’re like, “Wish we hadn’t done this because this dude won’t shut up.” Gratitude is huge.

What did your mother or father teach you that you frequently remind yourself of?

It’s a daily practice. I started us with my dad and I’m going to take us home with my dad. We camped as a kid because being farmers, we didn’t have much. Camping was our vacation. When we would arrive at the campsite, my dad and I would clean it before anything came out of the vehicle. The shovel and the rake came out. We emptied out the fire pit and we raked out the ground. It was ready for us. Guess what? When we left, we did exactly the same thing. My dad would say every time, “You leave it better than you found it.” That’s what I work to do here. I want to leave you better than I found you.

That’s amazing. I love that. Finally, what is your superpower?

It’s being able to know what someone needs before they know they need it.

That’s stiff.

I did hospice work for a number of years. That was important because when someone can’t talk and yet when I see the relief on their face from the warm washcloth, the massage, the touch, knowing what they need before they know they need it or when they can articulate it. That’s mine.

Discussion Wrap-up And Closing Words

That’s amazing Troy, what a pleasure. It was a very deep conversation. I’m walking away with a lot for myself to ponder on because you frame things that extremely resonated a lot with me and I’m sure with a lot with most men who’d be reading to what you had to say about relationships, what men need to be accountable and responsible for in creating a healthy, happy and balanced particularly romantic relationship, and to think about it in a completely different mindset. It’s not about what your partner’s doing. It’s what are you doing that’s created this situation that you currently in and what do you need to do to make that a whole lot better. For that, thank you. You’re doing incredible work and I hope we get to have another conversation.

I will look forward to that. Daniel, thank you so much for your time and playing with me this way and for the invitation to be here.

I appreciate it.

Thank you.

Important Links

• Troy DaRonco
• Troy DaRonco on LinkedIn
• No More Mr. Nice Guy
• Groups For Men

About Troy DaRonco

Troy DaRonco is the co-founder of Groups for Men and a specialist in Human Needs Psychology with over 15 years of experience in the men’s self-improvement space. After a total life collapse at age 33, Troy realized that “being a nice guy” was actually a form of dishonesty that was destroying his relationships. This wake-up call led him to master Strategic Intervention, Conflict Resolution, and Somatic Awareness to help other men avoid the same trap.