Franklin: [00:00:00] Right now, the world needs great men who will stand up and lead with honor, serve with purpose, and courageously fulfill their God given roles and responsibilities as husbands, fathers, leaders, and men. It's time we see more men thrive, marriages filled with passion, and families that flourish. So whether you're a man struggling to figure it all out, or an awesome husband and dad looking for the next level, you've come to the right place.
We're your hosts, Franklin Swan and Tanner Hayes, bringing you practical, applicable tools and strategies you can use every day to build yourself into the man God is calling you to be. This is The World Needs Men. Let's go. Welcome back to the World Needs Men podcast. I'm your host Franklin [00:01:00] Swan today and really excited to introduce today's guest on the show, Bill Winchester.
I first heard Bill on, uh, on another podcast and reached out to him and made a connection. He's married and has Uh, two sons and a daughter lives outside of Bend, Oregon, has a construction company. But the reason we're talking today is because he is the founder of a program, an organization called Dangerously Good Men, and, uh, basically takes fathers and sons on rites of passage experiences and, and really just initiates them into what is the journey from boyhood to manhood in a very intentional way.
And so. Bill, thank you for taking the time to come on today. Really excited to talk. There's, there's so much I'd love to get into and just welcome to the show.
Bill: Hey, thanks, Franklin. I really appreciate the invitation. It's, it's a blessing to be here and I'm excited about sharing
Franklin: message of what we're trying to get done.
Well, once you. [00:02:00] define real quick, just so that we can kind of create a frame for, for the conversation. When you say dangerously good men, what do you mean by that?
Bill: Yeah,
Franklin: that's a great
Bill: question. It's one that actually I've been working on defining for a couple of years. We did, uh, the first initiation where I brought other men into the picture, you know, so post having initiated my own sons, did that first one without, without a name for what this is or what it was going to be.
But then coming out of that first one where we ran to two fathers and their sons through our three day program that we developed dangerously good men was just. It kind of organically came out of that and over the couple of years since then, as I've been trying to define that more, you know, cause it's something that I say and it immediately resonates with most men and actually most women.
Like it's funny, we were at a church event the other night and my son and I actually both happened to be wearing the same shirts and my daughter was there with us. And, and it was so funny, her friend that was standing beside her said that, [00:03:00] you know, you should have one of those shirts too, but it should just say looking for a dangerously good man, because.
like my daughters, my wife, they are looking for the same thing. So what I've come over the last couple of years to define it as is, you know, we are as men made for danger. It's, it's in our DNA. We're, we're looking for it. It starts at, you know, the toddler level, when the little boy starts, you know, building a tower out of blocks and then has the inclination to immediately break it down.
You know, there's a power in that they're not afraid of the edge of the deck or the stairs. You know, they just, they want to go over there in a way that little girls don't always tend to be as inclined to pursue that. Right. So we're made for danger. And then the other side of that is that we're built.
For hard, I talk about my job as, as being a journey from being a builder of spaces where I remodeled homes to a builder of men, where I helped men guide their sons into manhood. And, and it really is, we start in [00:04:00] a place where we're made for danger and we, we end up building into the hard things. And I believe it's those hard lessons and that hard training that takes the power that's within every man.
and guides it towards the good things, the selfless things where we use our strength in the service of others, as opposed to the selfish ways where we use our power to control others for selfish needs. So a dangerously good man takes that power that's inherent in everybody, uh, steps into the dangerous things.
builds through hard circumstances, a strength that he can serve others with, as opposed to a power that he can control.
Franklin: You know, it's interesting. You talk about directing and guiding in that being an inherent part of the makeup of, of a man, but. It has to be guided and directed. And so as you take a father and son groups through this rite of passage experience, talk a little bit about kind of the intentionality behind that.
And then really what the big vision is and the purpose behind [00:05:00] having something like this to begin with. And, you know, I think another important point to make too, and to dive into is the fact that this just is such a rare thing that. in our modern culture that has been lost does not exist. I know I didn't experience any kind of a rite of passage growing up, you know, boys who grew up maybe in the Boy Scouts or, or doing some stuff like that might have experienced a little bit of that.
But I think there's just so little. That men are equipped with to to walk their sons through the adolescent phase of going from a boy to a man. And so just kind of take that where you want to and kind of really unfold what that looks like. And then the intentionality behind taking a young boy. And through a process and through a sequence of events over a period of time, building him into that dangerously good man.
Bill: So there's really kind of two questions there. I'm going to start with the first one. Like, what, what is our main goal at the, uh, [00:06:00] initiation events that we do? And we call them an initiation specifically because. You know, rites of passage are something that, um, you know, there's not just one or two that that should happen in our lives.
They're, they're very distinct things that, you know, they can be, be defined as like the seasons mark out the phases of the year, rites of passage and rituals that go with them mark out the phases of our lives. And so we really have developed, you know, we have an initiation rite of passage and that's what we've been doing for you know, You know, dozens of men in the last couple of years, and that's a thing where we help fathers lead their sons out of boyhood and into this process of becoming a man, because it really is.
It's a process. And then we have completion ceremonies that we can help facilitate as well, or we can just help the fathers. Bring those together. And then in between those two is that, that journey and demand hood. You know, when you look at the Latin word for threshold, it's, it's liminal is the word. [00:07:00] And it speaks of a thin space.
And this is something that, you know, in times past other societies prior to, you know, the last 70 years of Western culture, they all understood that there was a process where You left boyhood behind and you moved into manhood and in between those two phases of life, there was this space where you were neither.
Um, you look at some of the, the, especially the African communities, the boys were, were shunned and rejected. The mothers would turn their backs. You know, the, the young men would ceremoniously walk out of the village as a nobody, and they could not come back until they had accomplished something, whether it be, you know, kill a lion or make a track of some kind, whatever it was.
And while we don't go to those extremes, we do recognize that the process of moving into manhood is a process. And it's, it's an intentional process that if it gets skipped, leaves us with what we have today, which is an abundance of [00:08:00] Grown males that are not operating as men in this world, and they continue to bring those, those childhood qualities into grownup life.
And so we have three main goals that happen that we achieve at the initiation rite of passage, which is deep connection. We're looking to get the fathers and sons deeply connected. Most of them already have some kind of connection. You know, this isn't a triage unit. We don't. We don't want guys coming in here, you know, trying to throw the Hail Mary to save their relationship with their son.
Just before he graduates, this is something where we're wanting to help guys intentionally connect deeper with their son, but we get deep connection very, very quickly and find that surprisingly a lot of that happens on the journey that most of these men take just to get to us. You know, they show up at the lodge and they're already talking about how incredible some of the conversations they've had, whether they've been, you know, on a couple of flights to come across the entire country, or they took a seven hour drive to come [00:09:00] down, you know, from Northern Washington, that time that spent just one on one for a lot of these guys, that's the first time they've done.
Anything more than a trip to the hardware store where it's just dad and son and the two of them intentionally spending time together. So deep connection. And then over the course of the three days, we have a number of sessions and activities that are are intentionally designed to create a shared vision of the future.
Where are we wanting to go as a father and a son? What is, what is the son's vision of, you know, what graduation at 18 looks like and maybe what ideas they have for the future after that, what is the father's vision of that? And then we help them bring that together. Okay. Where are we? Pointing where are we headed?
And then we, we work to give them a framework, both inside of the sessions at the event, but then especially afterwards, we give them a framework where we encourage the men. In fact, we, we commission them, we give them papers and we give both father and son, some, [00:10:00] some tokens that are visual and intangible reminders for them of where they're going and encourage the men to bring other, um, men of significance.
into this process with them. And it's, it's going to be a couple of years. It's going to be, you know, three to five years, depending on how old their son is, that they're going to intentionally take these core values that we share with them and instill those into their son. So that when they reach graduation age, you know, and the son is going into a job or moving out on his own, or, you know, for some of them, maybe going to college, there's not this worry about, have I prepared them?
The men are confident that they have prepared their sons. They've equipped them and these young men are moving into this next phase of life. Having gone through a completion ceremony where dad and five other men have affirmed them, have encouraged them and have committed that they are in their corner.
And so we're sending young men out. With a band of brothers behind them and beside them, instead of sending our [00:11:00] young man out, hoping that they don't get swallowed up by some other group that that they step into on a college campus or in a
Franklin: workplace, I think it's really an important thing to note. That this is a starting point, not an ending point, you know, before, you know, listening to you and really thinking through it, I would have, I would have told you a rite of passage was, was the finish line, right?
It's like, okay, you've, you've accomplished the challenge or you've, you've completed the test or whatever the case. And you're you're done now congratulations, but but really it's it's the opposite of that it's saying Okay, you are now stepping into the journey and this is just marking the beginning The gun's going off and the race is starting and now the work begins in order to begin moving towards and I love the idea of a shared vision like There's what the father sees and hopes for his son and then there's helping the son understand what's going on That he even needs to create a vision.
You know, how many boys are not even given that these days [00:12:00] is something that needs to be an important element in their life and then merging those two together so that they have a common goal that they can work towards. I think that's just such an important element and an understanding of yeah. the responsibility that's on a father's shoulders with a son in that 11, 12, 13 year old, maybe, or maybe even older, but that, that age range of, of what he's got ahead of him.
Bill: Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you've, you've touched on a couple of things there. One is that, you know, every beginning, and this is something I just picked up a book that I came across and I've been loving it. I'm almost done with it. It's called the disappearance of rituals. And it talks about a lot of these, these things that we used to have.
In our lives as human beings that would remind us of the need for these things. And one of the things that struck me most was this discussion about the fact that every birth requires a death and it struck me, it was something I thought about for a while and it really did start to resonate, like we have, you know, these markers that [00:13:00] on day two, we're, we're at the, we take everybody on a climb and we ended up at the, at a peak and with.
You know, with good weather here in central Oregon, we're looking at seven mountaintops in the distance that we can see. So while we're up there, we give the young men these markers. And this is a point of beginning marker that in, um, navigating in geo mapping areas and gritting out parcels of land, that is a marker that is used to say, okay, you start here.
And then from that point, a surveyor can lay out, you go this far at this bearing, And to this point, and then you turn and you go this way and you know, those pointed beginnings are used to map out a parcel of land or direction for a course to navigate. And in the same way, we're telling the young men, this is your point of beginning.
And we very clearly defined that boyhood is dead. That young man that you were. That's gone that or that boy rather we make a point of saying the boy is gone, but you are not yet a man You are [00:14:00] going to go through this intentional process. This is a point of beginning We're going to equip your dad with some some tools We're going to encourage you to work with him and over the course of the next few years you will move into manhood And that will be another kind of ritual marking.
And we tell him very clearly that one is the final point of beginning because manhood and developing in that doesn't end till we're dead. You know, the really intentional man understands that I'm going to be growing till the day I die. And the day that I stopped growing is the day that I die. And sadly, we've got a lot of men that are walking around kind of in that zombie like existence, you know, they're not growing any longer.
And so by marking these things out and by, by putting clear visuals with the rituals that we tie them to, it's really, it's, it's great to remind men. What am I doing with my days, you know, to remind young men, what am I doing with my days while I'm still here with the parents? So, yeah, we rely heavily on some of those things and [00:15:00] really like to delineate where we're at and where are we going?
Franklin: I love that idea of this is a starting point and boyhood is now dead. You know, I mean, that just is such a, it's just such a profound statement that really jumps out to me how, how many boys need to hear that, you know, I needed to hear that at some point you needed to hear that, but, you know, maybe we were told that or not, but just hearing like boyhood is dead and now you're on a, there's a new expectation placed upon you moving forward and you're going to have to prove yourself in order to step into the next phase, which is another starting point.
You know, there's not really an ending point, as you said, until we. But, you know, you're, you're going to go through this season, then once you initiate into manhood, well, that's just another starting line into another journey that you're preparing for. Now, you mentioned a minute ago that you, you really focus in on some core value.
I would love for you to kind of dive into that and. And unpack what those look like and kind of [00:16:00] what you help teach and instill in the father son groups that come to work with y'all.
Bill: Yeah, absolutely. Before I go there, the one thing I want to say, you know, one of the things that we do at the events, we start in our first session and, and, you know, there's grace in all of this stuff.
We're not, we're not, you know, mean spirited about any of this, but we try to make it really, really clear. There's no more boys here. And, you know, that's something that is really empowering to the young men. They want to step into that. When you take a young boy, 11, 12, 13 years old and say, okay, you're not a boy anymore.
We're calling you into manhood. So we are not going to call you boys anymore. They tend to want to rise up to that. Most of them, especially if their father's invested the amount of time and money it takes to come out here, we've had a couple of calls. I've talked with them. They're excited about stepping into this new phase of life.
Most young men want to do that, but what's really interesting is it's a challenge for the dads to stop calling their son boys, you know, they, they want to refer to it, the boys. Okay. Someone go get the [00:17:00] boys or bring the boys in. There's a lot of power in the words that we speak and the words that we use.
And if we want these young men to start behaving as young men, we have to quit calling them boys. And obviously, like I said, You know, even as men, we'll talk about having our boys that we go and do stuff with, you know, and they're grown men, they could be 50 year old, but it's, it's a matter of being real intentional at the beginning, that setting an intention, we're leaving those child ways behind and you're stepping into a new era of responsibility.
And so part of how we lay that out, we use a model that was developed by Dr. Michael Gurian, who's a brain scientist out of Spokane that I had the privilege of meeting. Gosh, 18 or so years ago at a conference, uh, when my boys were, you know, two and three years old and my wife and I went up there to, to learn about this.
And as I've read some of his books and gone through some things, we came across the heroic model for manhood that he has in his book, the purpose of boys. And so we, we do take [00:18:00] time in one of our sessions to lay out this heroic model and, and it's an acronym that stands for honorable, enterprising, responsible.
Original, intimate, and creative. And, you know, I spent some time for a while thinking, okay, is there something else that I can do? So I'm not, you know, borrowing Dr. Gurian's model. Is there another word? And I started, I invested a fair amount of time and realized, you know, This is pretty good. You know, we want men to be heroic.
The young men of today are especially when I say young men, I mean, we've got 40 year olds that are buying superhero action figures and setting them up on their shelves. There's something within men. We want to be heroic. So why fix something? If it isn't broken, we have developed short mantras that, that we use for each of those words.
But what we really do is we empower the men at the event to take some time. Fathers and sons go aside, start thinking about. What do these words mean to you? How do you want to develop them into what you're going to use? Because [00:19:00] for the next few years, you know, really we're looking at these guys bringing other men of significance in, you know, from my sons, it was, you know, both my dad and my wife's dad.
So they had their two grandfathers there. They had their youth pastor and they had an FCA coach and an uncle, you know, at, at their events. And these men were each. Tasked with grabbing one of these core values and spending some intentional time with my sons talking about these core values, talking about how these values showed up in their life as either a blessing, you know, ways they helped them through difficult times, or maybe some of the consequences of not living into those core values.
So my son's got to hear from just more than dad. Why these things are important. And they got to learn some practical, real examples of men that they know who struggled with or succeeded through the application of these core values. And then, you know, one of the other things that we do is the fathers get a fistful of arrows.
We, we, I love the idea of [00:20:00] arrows as the visual that we use for these core values. These are things that point the way, you know, when you are honorable. The mantra that we have with that is do the right thing, no matter what. And that arrow will point the direction when you come to these These, um, choices in your life, which way do I go here?
So we're not, we're not trying to give them the exact answer for every situation in life. We're not trying to help them learn in the way that our modern teaching system is, you know, how to just get the right answer. We're trying to teach them a way of living and a value in their life that will give them the right answer in everything they encounter.
And they can quickly know. What do I do here? You know, enterprising. We talk about find a way to keep moving forward. You know, we want young men that aren't stopped easily by challenges that come, but rather see them as an opportunity to grow. Responsible is one of the ones that, honestly, most of the men end up going into that one first, because Like I said, when you, when you [00:21:00] make that connection, you tell a young man, you are not a boy anymore.
We're calling you into manhood. We're expecting you to start growing into this. They want to rise up to that. They want to answer that. And they will immediately start seeing stuff. These guys call me up and they tell me their wives are like, what happened to my son? You know, he's, he's taking the garbage out and I'm not having to tell him he's, he's making his bed.
He's being nice to his sister. There's these things
Franklin: that, that change. I think there would probably be like listing out those things. Make your bed, take out the trash, be nice to your sister. I think there are plenty of, uh, mothers who would, who would probably hear that right now and say, wow, I'll sign them up for this.
Bill: You know what's surprising? One of the, one of the guys at our last event, he didn't tell me this, you know, we, We had a call, I probably talked with him for 45 minutes to an hour on a zoom call. And then we had our pre event call where all the fathers and sons are on together. And in both of those circumstances, he never mentioned this and he actually never told me directly.
I heard it from our chef. We have a, we have a chef that comes up to our events and cook some unbelievably good food for [00:22:00] us. You know, one of the evenings, most of the fathers and sons have gone off to bed. I get very little sleep on these things. I sit up talking with the guys that help facilitate. And, um, Andreas, our chef was sharing with me that this particular guy said that his wife heard a podcast, signed him and his son up and presented him with the receipt and said, you're going to this, you know, and it was incredible to watch the transformation that happened in these guys and they, Kind of came somewhat begrudgingly, I think, but that's not the model we're going for.
We're looking for guys that are heavily invested and clearly this guy was for, you know, maybe just different reasons, but the transformation was, was unbelievable. And, you know, it's something that I'm excited about. Cause a lot of, a lot of times what we run into is we have young men that don't move into manhood properly because mom's not wanting to let go of her little boy.
You know, and it's, it's scary to think about that process, but when we can help moms understand, we're going to give you back a man that you're going to be proud to have as your son, you know, it doesn't erase all the challenges at all. It just [00:23:00] gives a meaningful path forward through those challenges. It helps you encounter them with expectation that these are going to be there and we're going to go through them in an intentional way together.
Rather than, you know, the son encountering challenges and, and not knowing where to go with them. The dad may be trying to anticipate them or keep his eye out for him, but also being distracted with what he's got going on in his life. We're trying to be really proactive about the way fathers and sons move through this
Franklin: process of adolescence.
That really. Is very meaningful to me thinking through that kind of sideline conversation on this, like, because it, it can vary, I would assume it can feel like the mother may feel left out of this, this whole thing that's going on. This is a father son thing. It's about them. I don't have a part, but, but kind of what you're bringing to light that there is a very meaningful and important role that the mother plays in this in supporting and maybe [00:24:00] even being an initiator, if necessary.
in this whole thing and, and even stepping into the really difficult process of letting go. And allowing this to happen or, or being on board with it happening. And so I don't, for some reason that's coming up in my heart is just something that's really important to recognize. This isn't, this is a father son thing, but, but the mother plays a very significant role in this as well.
Absolutely. Yeah.
Bill: Yeah. You know, we've, we've had a number of men reach out. And so we're in the process of developing something for fathers and daughters too, because we believe absolutely that this isn't just a father son thing, dangerously good men. You know, really the vision is that we would be developing men who go back to wherever they're from.
They intentionally leave their son through this process. And as they're doing that, the men around them, whether it's the men of significance that they invite in to do this process with them, or it's just the fathers on their son's football team or baseball team that start to notice how he's behaving so [00:25:00] much differently and ask that dad what's going on.
And they get to share that. This is how a man not only You know, transforms his family, but then starts to impact his community, whether that be his faith community or sports in the area, the broader neighborhood. And, and we really start to see a transformation in the world by building men that are dangerously good, that are living in an intentional way through these core values that elevate the society and serve those around them, rather than looking for what can this world give me, you know, When, when it comes to the mothering thing, though, you know, I have, you know, the image that I share that's so clear in my mind is we were dropping our oldest son off at college and driving away and my wife's, you know, tearing up in the passenger seat, the confidence that I had knowing that the first thing my son wanted to unpack into his dorm room was this quiver with the arrows and the letters from these men was really, really powerful.
Because I knew no matter what he encounters, if he couldn't or wouldn't feel comfortable calling me for some reason, [00:26:00] he's got five other men that he knows without a doubt would come running to his aid. And I'm fully confident. And, and they have a hundred percent authority for me. If Jake ever calls you, you know, and you can't get ahold of me, whatever you feel is right.
Do it because I trust you and we've spent time together investing in my son's life together and it's the same way, you know, some of them have sons that I'm doing the same for them, but on the, on the other side of that, you know, we actually just last night had a really powerful experience. It was neat.
My wife and I got to talk about. And I think I can say this. I don't know what your lead time is before these things go out, but my son is blessed with a wonderful girlfriend that he's excited about getting ready to propose to. And so as he's been thinking about that, he's been bouncing some questions off of me.
He's been sharing some of these thoughts and he sent over this, this note. You know, a PDF of, of kind of his notes and this timeline of what he thinks things will look like and, [00:27:00] and the why behind his love for this gal. And as my wife was reading through it, she was just so impressed by the level of detail and the level of thought.
And as was I, I was blown away by it. You know, and, and, and told him, you know, this is, this is far beyond what I did when I was preparing to ask your mom to marry me. Not that I wasn't intentional about it, but it was just, you know, a different way of approaching it. And what's funny is my wife's response to his text thread after looking at some of the stuff that he sent was, I would marry you.
And, and that's exactly what we want is we want to raise young men that our wives, you know, they, they get to a point where they say, that is a man that I would have married. That is a man worthy of someone saying yes to. Right. And, and there's a gap though. Your little baby boy is not ever going to be the man that is worthy of getting a yes to that proposal question unless he goes through this process.
And so [00:28:00] for me, that was really neat. I mean, I've, I've known, and my wife's been on board with this process for a while, but just seeing that text response while I was out working out in the gym, it just clarified and brought to a point the fact that, you know, we are making men we're building
Franklin: men. Yeah. I mean, I am like, just The thought inside of your son being going from being a boy to a man of character, it's such a depth that you're that his mom or your wife like looks at him and goes, man, you're the kind of man I would have married like that.
I've never heard anything put that way in terms of how a mother could look at a son, but just for him to be able to develop into that kind of a man that gets that kind of response, man, that is just so powerful.
Bill: Yeah, yeah. I mean, you know, for her to say that what that was one thing I was like, son, I don't think you're going to have any problem going to her family with this and saying this is what I would like to do.
Do I have your blessing, [00:29:00] you know, for for him to have put the thought into it that he has, you know, I They've got challenges that'll be in front of them. Like every young couple, you know, the growing and, and building a family. I mean, he had details in there well beyond just, I want to get married. Right.
But also like we've had the conversations we've had conversations, you know, those other core values we've talked very explicitly about intimacy and the importance of it and how much that goes beyond sex, but getting back to the initiation stuff, like, you know, Sex is something that needs to be talked about between fathers and sons, and it's an awkward thing that we make an intentional time where myself and some of the other facilitators, we bring up the awkward things we bring up those things, and then we provide time for father and son to go to a different place separately, and the dad can say, Hey, That weird thing that was kind of weird, right?
That bill brought up. Is that something that's come up? Is that something that's come up at school? Is, has anybody shown you something on their phone? You know, there's, there's just a way [00:30:00] that we do this that creates an opportunity for fathers to engage their sons in difficult conversations in a way that is, is transformational and not so scary, I
Franklin: guess.
Well, your son's going to have questions, and it's critical that I think fathers are a safe place for them to go to get those answers, and if you don't lean in, then that awkwardness keeps you separated, and it, I mean, it takes some courage and some guts to just step into those things because they're not comfortable for either, for anyone, but the, you know, long term, like when he's 15, 16, 17, 18 years old, and he's got questions.
Like who does he feel comfortable coming to and getting good answers and getting in hearing truth from is it going to be his buddies who don't know anything? Or is it going to be you? And it takes some intentionality to create that safe space for him to come in and do that.
Bill: Yeah, yeah, it does. And that's part of what is so great about the event itself is that we, we, Create that deep connection, [00:31:00] but then, you know, what's really been fundamentally a part of helping my sons grow and what I see the most successful men who implement this after the fact they go and they very quickly find those other men of significance.
And we do that across the spectrum, you know, so my sons, they've got me. They've got their grandfathers who are 20, 30 years older than me. They've got a youth pastor who's maybe somewhere between their age and my age. They've got an uncle that's, you know, a little bit younger. So they're seeing men at different phases of life with different experience, but with aligned core values, able to answer their questions, you know, from, from multiple perspectives, which not only lends it a credibility because it's not just dad saying it, you know, it could be very easy.
Well, Dad wants this for me. So that's why he's answering this way, but it's, it's the ability for them to see, you know, people in different stages of life and places saying the same thing.
Franklin: is fathers are beginning this journey. It, it seems to me that one of the, uh, [00:32:00] important things is that men not only teach this, but more importantly, actually live it out themselves.
So how can fathers not just take this framework and this, you know, the, these values and go, well, I'm going to teach these to my sons, but, or my son, but how can I begin by embracing them myself and living these values out? Because. You can even go on a, you know, on a really powerful experience over the weekend and do all this.
But if you, if you don't live that out in the day to day life between when you initiate him in that event, and when he goes off to college or out into the world, you know, it's going to lose its impact, and so to me it's. It's not just what we're speaking and saying in to them. It's it's what are we showing and modeling for them?
And so what would you say to men, uh in terms of how they would approach this to take a look at Look at how they show up and and try to embrace and embody these values themselves [00:33:00] Yeah, so one one of the
Bill: things that immediately comes to mind. I know I don't know who said it It's probably been said by many different people, but you know if you really want to learn something well You Teach it, right?
You know, when you understand a concept and this is something, you know, being in construction and having guys work for me, I realized as I was trying to teach them the way to do something properly, if I started to prepare to actually just teach this as a lesson, if I was going to put the process down on paper, you know, All of a sudden, I started realizing all these things that there were just kind of automatic decisions I would make.
But as I try to communicate that to somebody else, I start understanding more about the why behind some of the things I would do. And I would even change some of how I would do things based on that process. And so it is something that as you are teaching your son, you're going to find that you're challenged in a lot of these things.
And so part of what we do, you know, we recognize. You know, we have a very intense time. We build free time into the event, but it's still very intense. You know, I, my wife tells me [00:34:00] I need a week to recover every time we do these. And I imagine it's probably similar for the men that go through the event.
Cause it's a lot and it, it changes men. But to continue that process, what we've done. Is included in their registration. We give them a year of support after the fact. So we've got monthly zoom meetings that they can get on connect with the guys, not only from their group, but you know, other guys that have maybe gone through at different times.
And we'll focus on one of those core values each month, share some ideas, some activities, some discussion points that they can use. To go over those things with their own son, but then also create a space where these men can share some of the struggles that they're encountering, some of the successes that they've had, things that have worked for them.
And then we, we get this broad expanse of wisdom, you know, cause my, my youngest is 19. Now I don't have a 13 year old, uh, to know what exactly they're dealing with right now. The beauty of that is that these core values are really, uh, broad and [00:35:00] applicable without knowing the specific circumstance, but having the men that are right there in that phase of life share some of how they're applying it is really powerful too.
So we, we provide that support. And, and then the other thing that we do is we have what we call benchmark adventures. Cause a lot of these guys, you know, the young men I'll find out on the way home. You know, one of their number one questions is, are we doing this again next year? You know, and, and, you know, you don't need to be initiated into this process again, but they love that time with dad, just one on one, they love the challenge that they went through and that experience.
And so we talk about a lot about raising the baseline. You know, we, we have a discussion on the, on the mountain top where we give them their point of beginning marker that, you know, all those distant peaks out in the distance that you can see. If you want to go there, you know, it's the same as the goals and the vision that you have for your life.
This place you want to get to by the time you turn 18 to go from where you are right now to there. Like the first thing you got to do is you got to start going downhill. [00:36:00] There are valleys in this life. As we go through the journey, there are going to be moments where you're not as high as you are right now.
And there's going to be times when it feels like you're climbing straight uphill. And so, In between there, you know, in between the peaks and valleys is this baseline of life and we want that trajectory going up, but it's going to be a lot of modulation up and down, up and down. And so we try to support them in the process of that by giving them some opportunities to get back to some of these peak moments with their son.
We've got a, an event coming up in July where we're going to be doing some, some flight fishing on the world renowned, the shoots river. And then we're going to go do some really cool, extreme off roading up in the Cascade mountains. And in some of these men are bringing their sons back and they're going to go on this adventure with them.
And it's going to create a great opportunity for them to, to deepen some connection and have some good discussions. And it's also an opportunity where they're going to, Be able to possibly do one of their arrow ceremonies, you know, so we were real intentional about as you transfer those arrows one at a time from your hand into your son's [00:37:00] quiver, be intentional about that.
There's a letter that gets written that accompanies that and there's, there's a process and we want it to be significant. And so we, we try to create an opportunity at all of our events for one of the men that have gone through before to do one of those arrow ceremonies with their son, if they'd like, and usually that's, you know, a lot of these guys, they'll transfer that respect.
Arrow to their son, um, which works out really well because we invite them to come back and they, they serve the other man at the event. They help with things there and, and that goes right to our core value mantra for respect that is responsible, rather not respectful, you know, responsible men are a master of themselves so that they can better serve others, you know, and so we're just.
Trying to create as many opportunities as we can to help fathers instill these values deep in their sons so that when they, they go out into the world, it's not something that they just carry because mom and dad said, this is how you should live. It's something they actually have internalized themselves.
And it's not going to fall off at the first opportunity to change their mind about [00:38:00] things.
Franklin: looking at that model of masculinity. I just want to make sure that we don't miss any of these points. So you went through and it's the heroic model. So you have honorable, enterprising, responsible. I think we missed the O and the C because we and we had intimate.
Bill: Yeah. So original, we talk about being comfortable around others, but not a copy of others. We want them to be who they were made to be intimate is in life, in love, in friendships. We want to be men of depth. So we talk about really being deeply connected to people and, and not just talking on the surface level.
We want to go through the challenge of things. It's not just sex, but sex is a big part of it. And, and before, These young men get to that point with their wives. We want them to be able to connect on other things, too. And that starts at 13, 14, 15 years of age, being able to talk about the things that are, you know, below the surface and then creative.
We don't want young men that are just consumers of content and entertainment. We want them to always be creating, looking [00:39:00] to develop new things that they could share and serve others with. Uh, I think we hit all six of them there. And like I said, those mantras are what we've used and what have served us really well.
But part of what we do with all of this stuff is we, we create some very specific opportunities. There's some other stuff we do at the event for the fathers and sons to, to internalize and own this, to make it what they're going to use going forward and find that that goes a long way to helping them stay engaged in this, when, when the vision is something that they've developed.
You know, with a little bit of assistance, then they're excited about pursuing it. If I tell them what they should be going towards, it's really easy to, you know, discount that as just Bill's vision and, and dream and not
Franklin: ours. So my son's 11 right now and just, just coming into this season where this is, is just the perfect timing to begin this journey and sitting where I am right now.
And I would think a lot of men would resonate with this. It's, it's a, it's a daunting. [00:40:00] Idea of gosh, how do I walk through this with my son? I don't want to mess it up. So speak to what you see for fathers who show up and then leave specifically as it relates to their confidence and how they're going to navigate the years ahead based on what they, how they're equipped after Uh, going through this, this event.
Bill: Yeah. So we, like I said, by offering them that support in the first year to help them, we, we, and we've given them a very clear framework. We've given them some very basic things that if they will engage with them on a consistent basis, we'll kind of build success on success. We're, we're continuing to develop more content because a lot of these guys, they're hungry for something.
And so we put out articles, we put out little adventures they can do at home with their sons to help. Continue this process, but really, you know, it goes back to what I mentioned before. If you wanna learn something, well teach it. [00:41:00] The biggest thing is start telling other people about 'em. You know, we get these men to share what they've done with others to, to bring somebody alongside and tell 'em about what they went through.
There's an immediacy. Uh, they want to hear more. And as you tell them more, you know, the ideas start flowing and you build. Further connection. So, you know, there is a sense of urgency and an importance about it. That can feel very overwhelming, but you know, my response to most of those guys is that, you know, just, just start, you know, get engaged now, the sooner, the better, because, you know, the time goes by so very, very quickly and we can't get it back.
And, and to be sitting there with an 18 year old son about to graduate, trying to figure out how do I cram everything he needs to know into, you know, the next couple of months. That's, that's a scary place to be. We combine physical activities and fun games into our sessions in a way that, you know, a lot of that comes out of who I am, but also my [00:42:00] experience as a youth pastor, you know, trying to engage middle schoolers and get them to To grasp these concepts that are challenging to take hold of one of them.
We have this game called pounders that we'll use. It's our third session of the day. These guys are just kind of met each other. They'd been around each other for a couple hours and we, we send them out. We've got a big stuff and a bunch of hammers and nails and we've. It's got this game that we play and without going into the game too much, one of the things that was most surprising the first time we did this was how many of these men within the first couple of minutes came up to me and said, Oh my gosh, I just realized I've never even taught my son how to swing a hammer, you know, so they, they have this revelation and we had, we had 11 year olds, 13 year olds, we had a 15 year old at this event and all of these young men, like they'd never even swung a hammer.
And, and that was a real wake up call for these men and they realized there's so much in my life that I've been doing that I could have just invited my son to be a part of it. [00:43:00] And, and learning to do things that you don't know exactly how to do it and being okay with your son being there while you don't know how to do it.
That's a really powerful thing. For both father and son to step into stuff that you're not exactly sure how it's going to go and figure it out together that bonds you deeply, you learn better, you know, because you're both going to have different perspectives. You're going to be able to share that. And you know, what I want going forward and what I'm confident I have going forward is sons and a daughter.
That are going to continue to want to be friends and be a part of our family because we're connected deeply. We have these experiences that we've shared and we've developed a way of relating to each other where we, we love each other even when we suck at things, even when we're not very good, even when we're frustrating or challenging with one another because of how we've done it together.
Franklin: I'm really curious. Have you seen, since you started this, a difference in the [00:44:00] boys and the fathers who show up over the years or when they show up, does it seem kind of like the same story each time or has then, has there been any shift? That you've seen just through COVID through just increased social media I'm curious like could there be this outside shell?
Like i'm just curious if there's a shift but at the same time is there this core Like that all these boys ultimately like are still looking for that same thing Even though society and culture may be influencing them in different ways and they may be a little bit different now I'm, just I have no idea.
I'm just throwing that out there as a curiosity
Bill: Yeah, I, you know, I don't think that it's been a couple of years that I've been doing this for other men, you know, facilitating for them. It's been six years now, eight years since I started this process with my own sons. And in that course of time, I mean, there's been a lot of stuff, you know, COVID being a big one, but I don't really see where fundamentally, Any of that has made a shift in that [00:45:00] timeline, because the one thing that's consistent is the phones and the distractions of media and screens, and that's something that we get rid of as soon as they show up.
And so what's really interesting is I had the very first one of these we did. I had an experience where a gentleman that I'd been a part of a group for a while. So I'd known him for a while, a good year. I met his son at the airport. You know, we picked him up at the airport to bring him back. And when I met his son, his son was, you know, head down on his device.
His dad's introducing him and like hitting him on the shoulder. Hey. Look up, look at him. I'm introducing you, you know, kind of a thing. And his son just was glued into that device. We stopped and you know, it was one of our first events. It wasn't as many people there. So we stopped and got them lunch on the way in.
They'd had a long flight and all through lunch, he's kind of, you know, on his device. And then we get up to the lodge and I don't share the wifi password. You know, it's a, it's a satellite to get wifi. We're out remote and I don't give them the password. And I let them know, [00:46:00] you know, we're not doing the phones thing.
We're here for a reason. We, we were very intentional. There's a lot of investment that's gone into you getting here. We're going to make the most of this time. And one of the first conversations I had with that dad post them returning home was about how his son didn't even look at his phone on the, on the flight home.
You know, they got out of, out of my truck at the airport, got on the plane, and they were talking to each other the whole time. And he said it wasn't until halfway home, you know, the drive from the airport to the house, that the dad pulled out his phone just to check, because I think maybe his wife had texted him or something.
And then his son remembered, oh yeah, I have a phone. And took it out, you know, so the the transformation there was was huge in just a matter of a couple of days, you know that that connection and so when we can start to build that connection, this this device that we all carry in our pocket that's supposed to connect us, but really doesn't.
You know, disassociates us, it can fall by the wayside, but it's an intentional [00:47:00] practice that we have to do, you know? So as far as other things that I've seen, you know, I, not in the time that I've been doing it, the, the one thing that I have seen is, you know, the earlier, the better, you know, when we can engage these young men, we've had 11 year olds come and, you know, some 11 year olds won't quite be ready for it maybe, but that's, that's pretty.
Easy to determine in a conversation with dad pretty quickly. Teen is we've had 15 year olds and. The one thing I'll say is they're just, they're at a different spot. It was amazing to watch how, when we had a group of eight young men and some of them were 11 and we had 15 year old in there and a bunch in the middle, that 15 year old, like almost assumed a leadership role immediately and was setting an example and it was, it was powerful to see how just a couple of years older, these younger men were immediately looking to that older one as an example, and they were, they were making the connection in their head.
Oh, if I do these things, then when I get to this [00:48:00] point, I will have already accomplished X, Y, and Z, you know, so as we've tried to spread this message more and more and get men engaged in the activity of intentionally raising their sons, I've become more and more just open. I'll give all this away. I'll tell you everything, all the secrets.
But the big thing is, you know, a lot of guys want a little bit of help. Doing this because it is, it's, it's overwhelming. I've had a lot of guys that have read books that by the time they get done with the book, they're just like, I don't have enough time for my life the way it is. How do I add this in?
You know, and I've got, I've got three sons and a daughter. How do I do this four times? So, you know, part of what we do is we make it really, really easy. To do to get started. And once you've started, I mean, it's like so many things you get started, that's the biggest hump to get over. And then, you know, maintaining that momentum is so much easier.
But then the other thing that's been really powerful is to see the impact of bringing people outside of their comfort zones. You know, so a little over a month ago, we did our first [00:49:00] event where instead of everybody coming to bend, we went together. To them kind of, and I say kind of, because the guy that facility, you know, set all this up, he had attended an event in band with his son gone through the process and was so fired up about it that he wanted to take it back to his community.
But I told him we can't do it in your community. You have to put them in a position where they got to travel. And it's for two reasons. One, we found that trip, that father son trip is so valuable as a starting point for this journey. And, uh, I encouraged them heavily. Don't let them carpool. Don't let them do that.
Make them, you know, most of these dads on this last event, they had a six and a half, seven hour drive. Just them and their son. In the car, and, um, that's really powerful, valuable experience. And then the other thing is when you get around other men that you maybe don't know very well, if at all, but you know that you're all invested deeply in this process of transformation, being [00:50:00] away from your normal environment and being in a setting where you know that you're safe because the other men there are intentional to.
Stuff will come out that won't come out at home stuff will come out that won't come out at church or youth group or, you know, on a, a conversation as you're driving home from practice, it just won't. But in this environment where you see other men stepping into discomfort, you get emboldened by their courage, even if you don't know them.
And so there's a power in having these groups of men do this together. And, and, and there's a reason why, you know, that's how it always was done. It wasn't, you know, in days gone by fathers, initiating sons by themselves. We have a long history, you know, prior to world war two of, of, of young men going into the same trades or occupations of their fathers.
And, and John, who helps me facilitate these events, he, he coined a phrase that, that I love. And I talk about it as being murderously close. You know, when young men, when we were in a time in this country where they went into the trade of their [00:51:00] father, if the father was a blacksmith or a farmer or whatever, they started very, very early as soon as they were capable, learning that trade alongside their father.
And it was murderously close sometimes because as a father, you know, that sometimes you just want to smack them when they won't pay attention, when they're not getting it. But in that process, we develop deep bonds. And then as fathers, you know, we, we don't just, it doesn't stop there. The apprenticeship program, if you look at how that used to be, there was a council, there was a group of masters that would approve this young man as an apprentice and say, okay, you've moved beyond that stage and you are a journeyman.
And. I don't want to get into all the problems I have with the current education system, pointing so many young men and women just blindly into, you need a degree and you need to, you know, go, you know, be behind a keyboard, but the whole process of removing kind of these barriers and these levels of mastery and this group approval and bringing it down to just a piece of paper now, kind of that you can [00:52:00] go and essentially buy.
Okay. Has really taken a lot of the pride of self development and service out of this. And so when we bring a group together and we can, we can start instilling some of that value. And then through the course of three to five years, depending on how old the son is, they go through a process and other men are affirming them and other men are challenging them.
That's not something that dad by himself can do.
Franklin: And it's all about that intentionality, as you say, and just being wherever you are just starting and not delaying this, especially if, if you have a son in that 12 to 15 year old age range, just knowing that, like, the clock is ticking and start be intentional and just, you know, Yeah.
Bill: Yeah. I mean, I don't think there's a man out there who would say that he hasn't learned from his failures. And, you know, so if I [00:53:00] could encourage them in anything, you know, if they took just one thing away from this is share those with your son. You know, we don't want to drag them into our failures, but we need to let them know what we've learned from our failures, and we need to let them learn from our failures, knowing that they're going to need to make their own.
But when we present ourselves as perfect, when we are never wrong in the eyes of our children, what we are teaching them is it's not okay to be wrong. It's not okay to fail. It's not okay to struggle. And that's, that's unrealistic they're going to. And so when they do, if they don't feel comfortable bringing that to us, what we are asking them to do is go and do what so many of the young men of today are doing, which is self initiate.
And that happens through drugs. It happens through sex. It happens through, you know, finding these, these groups, you know, you could call them gangs, you could just call them bad friend groups that will, uh, That will welcome them in and challenge them in these ways that, you know, as fathers, we wouldn't want them to be engaging in those activities, but that's where they're going to go if they don't feel comfortable to [00:54:00] struggle and fail and grow alongside us.
Franklin: Yeah, I think that's very important for fathers listening to this to understand and the mothers to like there's an inherent, like, I think God instilled desire. For men to go through this and to be able to prove themselves and to be able to be, you know, show that they show their worth, right? Like I am worthy of stepping into manhood and if, if we don't create those conditions for them, they will either just, you know, talking about that movie failure to launch, they'll either just spend their life in boyhood or they will self initiate based on what culture and society presents to them, which is, you know, Almost never going to be positive or productive in any way and so like that's like there is going to be something's going to happen regardless and so the only question is are we being intentional and and mindful enough to to create what [00:55:00] we want it to be rather than just allowing them to just find it on their own
Bill: now.
Because they will, they'll seek it out. I mean, what are they talking about? Nature hates a vacuum. Something's always going to rush in and fill that empty space. And, and so if we don't give them a process, if we don't challenge them, they will go looking for that challenge, you know, and, and it's different for a lot of young men, different ways that will express it.
But the universal is that if it's not channeled in a positive direction, a negative will fill that void. And, and that's, you know, Not something we want to be looking back on and seeing an opportunity that we missed to give them, you know, some things that will point them in the right direction.
Franklin: Well, Bill, as we start winding this down, what would be a last thought you would like to leave for the fathers, the mothers listening to this as we wrap this up?
Bill: You know, one of the, one of the things that we do as we're, we're coming down the mountain in our events is we, we move into a time, um, [00:56:00] of thinking forward to the future. And so for the fathers in particular, but it's a great thing for the mothers to think about too, you know, think forward to, you know, whether it's three years, five years, 10 years in the future, depending on the age of your son, when they turn eight, you know, here in the U S I mean, that's a, uh, usually a pretty big celebration of some kind of graduation, but Regardless of what's on the other side of it, we're celebrating something typically.
And, and when we think about what we're celebrating there, what we want to be excited about, one of the things that I talk about a lot is I, we define this dangerously good man, we're looking for directions. Not destinations, but having a vision for where you're wanting to go is, is a really good thing. And it helps you develop those directions to get there.
So, you know, we're, we're inspiring, you know, or specific enough to be inspiring, but not so rigid that we can't make any changes. Get a vision for what you want. See in the future. What do you want to be celebrating? What do you want to see in your son at 18 years of age and then start working backwards from that?
What do you need to do [00:57:00] between now and then? Because like you said, you know, some guys put marbles in a jar for each week that they have left. Other guys will print out a big calendar and they'll mark off the weeks as it goes by. It goes way quicker than you think. But at the same time, those little things that we can do consistently on a day by day basis add up.
Mhm. And grow way quicker than you would think. So it's the choice is yours. You know what you want to do to invest in that, that future payoff, that graduation day celebration, where you want to be. So, you know, if you take a little time, another thing we talk about is the power of the pan, you know, write it down.
Don't just let this be an exercise that you think about for the next five minutes after this podcast is over and then it's gone. Take some time, get out a sheet of paper, write it down. Who's there, what are you doing and what did it take to get there? And, and when we develop that kind of a vision, it gives us the strength to do the difficult things now that will get us there.
Franklin: That's so good, Bill. This has just been a really exciting conversation [00:58:00] for anyone listening to this right now. Here would be my challenge, send this podcast and Bill's message to some father that, you know, who. would benefit from hearing this. And then also like reach out to Bill, check out his website, like find a way, especially if you're a father in this season right now, or maybe you're a grandfather, or maybe you're years ahead, but start planning today, like take some sort of action because we need more of this.
Of our boys who we build into dangerously good men. That is what this world is lacking. That is what this world needs is our next generation of boys. And, you know, there's a lot of complaining about gender like kids, you know, or examples of boys who are 30 living in their parents basement and playing video games.
Well, here's the deal. Whose fault is that? It is the parents. It is not the child's fault that they're sitting in the in the basement if they [00:59:00] had been led by a father through a process of becoming a dangerously good man that would never happen to begin with so Men, we have to take action. We can't just listen to podcasts.
We can't just read books We have to do something about it. So send this to someone who would be benefited by it reach out to bill Check out his website and start to put together a plan for how you're going to build your son into a dangerously good man. Bill, this has been an honor. Where can listeners reach you, find you, and, uh, and learn more about what you do?
Bill: Yeah, so we're in the process of a website rebuild, but we do have a website up right now, DangerouslyGoodMen. com. You're welcome to go check out some of the information there. See, we've got a couple of videos about the first one is about our mission and why we're doing it. The second one is, is a great little time lapse of, uh, an event.
You can kind of see what the summertime event looks like. Uh, if you were to come out to one of our right of passages, so you can email me bill at dangerously good men. [01:00:00] com. And then we also have a sub stack where I've been posting articles and we'll continue to post more regularly. Uh, and that's at dangerously good man, sub stack.
And, you know, I'm always excited to talk to folks that are. intentional about raising their, their children. You know, like I said, we're working on content for, for daughters as well, but specifically these young men, because, you know, all the challenges that we're seeing in our society right now are coming from the fact that we have men that aren't engaged in living intentional lives of service and to their families and their communities.
Really passionate and excited about helping make that change happen and I would love to talk to these folks got some resources that we share out for dads whose sons aren't quite ready for something like this. You know, maybe they've got 7, 8, 9 year olds and they're, they're wanting to start being intentional about some of these adventures and I'm happy to share those out and then just, yeah, any kind of advice, stuff like that, that people are looking for.
I'm always happy to.
Franklin: to
Bill: share what I've
Franklin: learned and,
Bill: and
Franklin: learn from them as well. [01:01:00] Bill, thank you so much. That's just, I really appreciate your time. I know you're, you've got a lot on your plate and, uh, plenty pulling at you. And so taking the time to spend it, spend it with us has been, uh, uh, been an honor.
And so thank you for also what you're doing to help men be leaders in their homes, because that's just, that is so needed and we need more of it. So thank you for coming on the show today.
Bill: Well, thank you so very much. You know, what you've started here is something that is desperately needed, you know, and, and the title of your podcast is very fitting.
And I hope you see, you know, just lots and lots of people, you know, getting this message and what you're spreading. So we'll be praying that you just see tons and tons of success in this.
Franklin: Appreciate that. All right. That is it for today. Thanks, sir.
Tanner: We ask that if you found value in this, that you subscribe to the podcast and share with someone that you think would find value in this as well.
Franklin: If there's a man that you know who would benefit from this, please share it with them. We want to [01:02:00] get these messages and these tools and resources out to as many men as we can so that marriages can be thriving, families can heal. So kids have great dads so that wives have great husbands and one man at a time in this world we can make a difference.