043: Stefanos Sifandos | What If Your Success Is Just Survival | The Matt King Show

Summary

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The Matt King Show | Episode 043

Guest: Stefanos Sifandos

Title: What If Your Success Is Just Survival

Release Date: January 20, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this probing, deeply introspective conversation, Matt King sits down with relationship coach and author Stefanos Sifandos to explore the hidden drivers behind high achievement—trauma, inadequacy, and the ways in which unprocessed pain can masquerade as "success." Together, they unpack the psychological underpinnings of ambition, how trauma imprints behaviors and relationships, and what true healing, presence, and intimacy really demand. Stefanos brings honest personal stories and actionable insights about parenting, partnership, and self-mastery, offering listeners a new lens on fulfillment and transformation.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Success and Survival: The Trauma Connection

• High achievement isn’t always about fulfillment; it’s often about compensating for internal wounds.
  • "They label it success, but what if it's just survival with better packaging?" — Matt King (00:44)
  • Stefanos suggests that, for many, outward success serves as a balm for deep-seated pain and inadequacy, often originating in early childhood.
• Trauma as the driver:
  • Trauma is less about the event, more about the meanings we attach to it and how those stories evolve over time.
  • "It imprints on our nervous systems and imprints in our psychology. And then…the trauma or the experience is less about the actual event, but more so what we make it mean…" — Stefanos (01:44)
• Unprocessed trauma leads to seeking external validation, which ultimately remains unsatisfying.

2. Parenting, Reparenting & Breaking Generational Cycles

• Parenting begins with self-parenting:
  • Stefanos advocates for “reparenting” oneself—learning to comfort and accept your inner child—to become emotionally present for your actual children.
  • Emotional presence is a daily practice, cultivated through self-awareness.
• Personal anecdote:
  • Stefanos recounts his daughter’s meltdown and his instinctual anger, shaped by his own upbringing with a violent father.
    • “For like a couple of seconds I had this thought, picked her up…But when I grew up, my dad would do far worse than that to me." (09:09)
    • After the incident, he ruminates on the thought rather than his healthy response—highlighting how self-criticism and generational shame often linger.
• Breaking the cycle:
  • The act of not repeating harmful behavior, even when the impulse arises, is generational healing in action.

3. Rejection, Worthiness & Social Conditioning

• The roots of inadequacy:
  • Rejection is felt from a young age; much of our adult pain is rooted in early perceived slights or abandonments.
  • Matt shares that even young children interpret rejection as “I’m not good enough,” despite ongoing affirmations from loving parents. (11:32)
• Is rejection real, or is it a story?
  • Stefanos questions the very notion of rejection, suggesting it's more about historical and personal associations than objective reality.
  • "Does rejection actually exist? Obviously if we're experiencing it, it exists. But…do we give it way more weight?... we're self referential and that carries on into our adult lives." (12:25)

4. Intimacy Defined: Beyond Physical Connection

• Intimacy as presence:
  • True intimacy demands the courage to be fully seen, without fear of judgment or rejection.
    • “Intimacy is actually being able to be ourselves and not being fearful of what the response may be from the outside world.” — Stefanos (18:00)
• Restlessness and codependency:
  • Restlessness and codependency undermine closeness; unresolved pain pushes us toward validation-seeking or avoidance.
  • To experience real intimacy, we must be present through discomfort, not just pleasure.
• Sex ≠ Intimacy:
  • Society conflates sex and intimacy; Stefanos draws the distinction, highlighting emotional and relational layers that go far deeper than orgasms (20:26).

5. Sitting In Discomfort: How to Build Resilience & Regulation

• Staying with hard feelings:
  • True growth and intimacy only happen when we resist the urge to avoid, numb, or escape discomfort—personally and relationally.
  • “Stay in the fight. Literally just stay in it and feel what's happening for each other.” (18:24)
• Practical tools for resilience:
  • Engage in manageable, consistent challenges (journaling, meditation, exercise).
  • Learn to self-regulate: breathwork, grounding, and other nervous-system-calming practices.
  • “The elite are elite because they've mastered the basics...” — Matt King (28:38)
• Mastering the basics applies to all areas—parenting, marriage, health, money. (28:38)

6. Key Questions for Self-Awareness and Relationships

• "What is my nature?" "Who am I?"
  • Regularly inquiring about one’s true nature is the foundation for growth, authenticity, and healing old wounds (30:16).
• "What do you need?"
  • The most transformative question for partners.
    • “What do you need in this moment? … It’s a moment-to-moment thing, man.” — Stefanos (32:58)
  • Matt explores how acting on unasked-for service often misses the mark; true service begins with curiosity and direct inquiry.
• Move beyond awareness:
  • Awareness is only the starting point; transformation demands action.
    • “Most people confuse awareness with healing or wholeness… We have to move beyond it... to elicit real, meaningful action.” — Stefanos (33:29)

7. Consistency & Willingness in Relationships and Growth

• Consistency beats one-off efforts:
  • Whether it’s business, love, or personal growth, “Consistency is everything” (35:19).
  • Real change comes from relentless willingness to sit in discomfort, not a single moment of courage or kindness.
• Complementary needs in relationships:
  • Stefanos explains how requests from a partner (e.g., for more compassion) often serve both people, enabling mutual healing, if we’re willing to sit with discomfort. (39:55)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

"They label it success, but what if it's just survival with better packaging?"
— Matt King (00:44)

“Most men, especially that are successful, are compensating for an inadequacy. And you're attempting to soothe your restlessness with accolades, with validation from the external world. But it's empty…”
— Stefanos Sifandos (00:30)

“You broke a massive generational pattern by not being your father, by not being physically abusive, by not actually screaming at her… but all you're focusing on is that two-second thought you had.”
— Stefanos' teacher, about self-criticism in parenting (10:23)

“Intimacy is actually being able to be ourselves and not being fearful of what the response may be from the outside world.”
— Stefanos (18:00)

“The elite are elite because they've mastered the basics.”
— Matt King (28:38)

“What is my nature?”
— Stefanos (30:16)

“What do you need?”
— Stefanos (32:58)

“Most people confuse awareness with healing… We have to move beyond it... to elicit real, meaningful action.”
— Stefanos (33:29)

“Consistency is everything.”
— Both (35:19; 35:17)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• [00:44] — The trauma-rooted drive behind success
• [01:44] — Trauma’s psychological impact; childhood wounds
• [07:28] — Emotional presence in parenting; breaking the generational cycle
• [09:09] — Personal story of handling daughter's meltdown—reflection on inherited behaviors
• [12:25] — The concept of rejection and its origins
• [16:06] — The importance of touch and connection, post-Covid insights
• [17:02] — Barriers to intimacy: restlessness, codependency
• [18:00] — Re-defining intimacy
• [21:52] — Example: managing a child’s distress, avoidance vs. presence
• [25:41] — Regulation and resilience: practical practices
• [28:38] — “Elite are elite because they've mastered the basics.”—applying to all of life
• [30:16] — The question: “What is my nature?”
• [32:58] — The question to ask partners: “What do you need?”
• [33:29] — Moving beyond awareness to action in growth & healing
• [35:19] — “Consistency is everything.”
• [39:55] — Relationship requests—complementarity and discomfort
• [42:11] — Stefanos introduces his new book and where to connect

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Takeaways

• Outward success often camouflages inner survival mechanisms unless individuals choose to confront and heal their core wounding.
• Presence—with oneself, with partners, with children—is the antidote to generational patterns of pain and avoidance.
• Intimacy and growth demand resilience, regulation, and, above all, a willingness to consistently engage with discomfort.
• The most transformative questions are simple but profound—about one's nature, about the needs of loved ones, and about cultivating real action from awareness.

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Further Resources & Contact

• Pre-order Stefanos’ new book: Tuned In and Turned On (releases February 3, 2026) at tunedinandturnedonbook.com
• Work with Stefanos: coachwithsteph.com
• Follow: @StefanosSifandos on social media

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This summary covers the heart of the conversation, distilling Stefanos’ wisdom and Matt’s honest inquiry into an actionable roadmap for listeners ready to move from survival into authentic, connected, and fulfilled living.

Transcript

[A]

You don't remember the moment that broke you. Not exactly, but you feel it. You feel it in the restlessness, the shame, the drive to prove you're enough each and every day.

[B]

So now we're stuck with this thing that we think we've forgotten about, but it really lives in our body. And so unconsciously, it's dictating all of our lives. And we're so complex, right? It's dictating our behaviors, the things that we like and dislike, what we're attracted to, what we push away.

[A]

So you work harder, you try to achieve more, you build the life you thought you always wanted. And still something in you feels hollow.

[B]

But most men, especially that are successful, are compensating for an inadequacy. And you're attempting to soothe your restlessness with accolades, with validation from the external world. But it's empty because you're not addressing.

[A]

The thing that actually really hurts the world. They label it success, but what if it's just survival with better packaging?

[B]

And then the trauma or the experience, it's less about the actual event, but more so what we make it mean.

[A]

This is a conversation about trauma, the kind that hides an achievement and the kind that finds ends when someone chooses to feel it.

[B]

So when you couple resilience practices and challenging practices with regulation practices from that place that you can start to sit with other people's discomfort because you're laying the foundations for sitting with your own discomfort.

[A]

This is Stefanos. Stefanos. Recently that most extremely successful people as society define success, let's be clear, like billionaires, which is not necessarily successful, but that's what society calls success. That most of them are driven or fueled by extreme traumas. Do you think that's true or untrue?

[B]

I would say that's truer than it is untrue. Right. And. And we should probably. Just briefly. There's many ways to define trauma. Let's define in a couple of ways that are really simple. So firstly, it's an intense experience that we have as humans that imprints upon us in a really big way. Right. So what does that. What does that mean? It imprints on our nervous systems and imprints in our psychology. And then the trauma or the experience is less about the actual event, but more so what we make it mean and the psychological meaning that we give it. And to your point, earlier, around time and the compound of time, our memories become skewed. Our relationship to that thing either intensifies, it changes, it gets bigger, it gets smaller, and it distorts over time. Right. And unless we're able to actually address it and be with it and physiologically close the trauma loop somatically in the body and then psychologically close it, it festers because we're suppressing and repressing it. That's the strategy. Because often trauma is too much, too soon, too fast on the human body, on the nervous system and the psychology. And so we don't know what to do with it. Instead of actually processing it in real time like an animal would, right. If they experience an adrenaline dump, for example, in the wild, we suppress and repress it. That's the tools of the two, tools of psychology, of our own minds. So now we're stuck with this thing that we think we've forgotten about, but it really lives in our body. And so unconsciously it's dictating all of our, all of our lives. And we're so complex, it's dictating our behaviors, the things that we like and dislike, what we're attracted to, what we push away. And so if, let's just say you experience as a child and by the way, during our formative years, we're most impressionable. So anything that imprints upon us and we're self referential, meaning that everything's about us. So if something happens like my father leaves and it's abrupt and my mum and dad divorce, right, I'll make that mean if I'm 5 years old or 4 years old, I'll make that mean that's my fault. And so now I'm living with that. And now that, that, that thought compounds over and over for years and years and years. So I may make that mean that I'm worthless, that I'm going to hurt people. So I'm going to now keep people away. But there's a part of me that wants to still be in intimacy, in relationship, because fundamentally, as humans, we want to be seen, we want to be heard, we want to be loved, want to be accepted, appreciated, respected, especially men. So now we've got all this stuff happening and we don't know what to do with it. So when it comes to trauma, we just continue to live with it. So the greater the pain, the greater the pleasure required to mitigate the pain. So when you look at the case of a successful person, externally, they're living with so much, not always, but the vast majority of time, they're living with so much pain that they need to create pleasure in their lives. It's compensation. So what will I do? I will look for the places that I'm Most validated, where I don't believe in myself, I will look for the world where the world can validate me. Well, if I'm a billionaire, if I run a successful company, if I do really good things, then people are going to love me. If I'm an athlete, I'm winning gold medals, people are going to love me. And that will feel okay for a small period of time. But because you're not addressing the root cause, it's going to keep coming up, right? You're still going to feel uneasy and restless, and you're attempting to soothe your restlessness with accolades, with validation from the external world. But it's empty because you're not addressing the thing that actually really hurts. Because at that time of. Of trauma, another sort of definition of it is trauma is disempowering. And so unless we learn to empower ourselves from the inside out, not from the outside in, validation from the outside in, it just keeps looping. That's the. That's the closed loop that we have to close.

[A]

So can we achieve success without pain?

[B]

Great question. I actually don't know. And I. So the answers. I believe the answer is yes, but I also believe that the. Where we are at, the collective consciousness of humanity, the answer is probably no right now because it's evident like we see it. You see most success stories. Oh, well, I experienced this growing up, and it was really hurtful, or I was sexually abused, or we moved around a lot, or I was bullied a lot, or I was told I wouldn't amount to anything. They're the majority of the stories we hear. Very few stories. Very few. They exist. This is why I'm saying they exist is I had a really great upbringing. My parents were really supportive. I went to a great school. I lived in a great. I love my life. I did whatever I wanted. And now they have massive success. Very few.

[A]

So then how do we parent our children?

[B]

We're gonna learn to reparent ourselves first, right? I mean, and that's a really great question, a big question. And it's also one of those things. It's like, who am I to tell you how to parent your children? Who might have told you how to be a man? Who might have told you how to do. I can't tell anyone how to parent their children. But the immediate answer I gave you was learn to parent yourself in a child healing. And in some of those, you know, psycho emotional modalities, those relational modalities of healing, we learn to parent ourselves like we learn to be with ourselves. To love ourselves in really meaningful ways, to accept ourselves, to respect ourselves. And then naturally from there we have greater clarity and creativity in how to do things that are really important to us, such as build business or create amazing products and services in the world, or parent our children. Right. Because we're clearer within ourselves. Like we're, we're less obsessed, or rather I should say less occupied unconsciously with dealing with our own trauma that then builds frustration or anger or despondency or shutting down and, and then passing that on to our children.

[A]

Well, and what I hear you saying is really the way you're trying to parent your children is with emotional presence, not only for yourself, but you're probably trying to give your child emotional presence as well. So is that something that is true? And if so, have you been working on it for how long?

[B]

Yes, and yes. And I've been working on it for many years because I've been attempting to cultivate, to cultivate that presence within myself. And so part of what that looks like tangibly is not just embracing and accepting the convenient parts of myself. So the parts that I don't know that would be appealing to the world, like the healthy part of me, the joy that I bring, you know, the. Maybe I make someone laugh. My sense of the. Here in America, in Australia, no one gives a fuck. But yeah, here in America it's different. Like, you go to Australia, people are going to love you. Um, but you know, it's that. And so as we work on ourselves more, we're able to be more of that for others as well. And may I say that for me, having a child, my daughter's turning 4 in March has been the greatest heart opener and the most confronting thing in my life, man. And look, I probably arrogantly thought same when I got married to my, when I met my wife, we thought, oh, we've done lots of work. This is going to be great, man. Three weeks in and we're in. We are in it. You know, we're still together, obviously nearly eight years later. But, but we were in it and it was like, well, you know, these new beautiful, meaningful experiences will activate old wounds or activate new, you know, older ways of seeing yourself, but you've got to learn to see yourself in new ways. And so being emotionally present and just being present to my, my daughter and being a really available father, that's not living from generation. And I'll give you a real example in a moment that's not living from generational pain is a constant daily practice. The other day she Was in a. She woke up a little different.

[A]

Wrong side of the bed, wrong side of the bed.

[B]

We call it sometimes sunny side, cloudy side. She was definitely cloudy. And mama was putting some things in her. She wanted like 300 knots right in her hair. And her mom says, I can't put any more in, there's no more space. And she just lost her shit. So she went into the corner of the toilet and just stood there and just protesting. I came in and I was. It was, it was a. She didn't sleep well that night. It was a difficult. Anyway, so I was looking at her, she was screaming and crying, carrying on. And in my mind I felt like I just wanted to shake her, physically shake her, right? And I didn't do that, of course, I shouldn't say of course, but I didn't. Definitely didn't do that. And I was really calm and regulated and I was genuinely regulated, right? But for like a couple of seconds I had this thought, picked her up, she put, she put her hands out. She goes, okay, daddy, I'll come. Picked her up, gave her to mama, she calmed down, we helped her. And when I grew up, my dad would do far worse than that to me. I can smash my head into the wall. Very physically violent, right? And in those moments like that couple of hours after that, I was berating myself for the thought I had. Not for the thing that I did, which was really healthy, but for the thought that I had in that split.

[A]

Second that nobody else knew about, that.

[B]

Nobody else knew about. Later, like two, three hours later, I was speaking to my, my teacher and I told, I shared with him a story. He said, steph, isn't it interesting that you broke a massive generational pattern by not being your father, by not being physically abusive, by not actually screaming at her or telling whatever, right? And you did. But all you're focusing on is that two second thought you had, one second thought you had. And my bet is man, most men, because we're speaking to a larger audience of men here, right? But most men that especially that are successful are compensating for an inadequacy. Like I went to the inadequacy, I went to the low self worth. And I genuinely do care for myself and love myself. Not in like an egoic, arrogant way, but I just care for my constitution. Like I'm deeply grateful I get to have this existence and experience. But in that moment I went right back to, I'm a piece of shit, what should I even be a father? Like, those are the thoughts I was Having. I'm not a good father. How can I even think about that? Yeah, and I would bet that most successful humans are having thoughts like that that they're either avoiding or having and then just shoving down more and more.

[A]

Yeah, I think it's most humans, I mean even, even our children. Right. I have a six year old daughter and we have those same meltdowns over the same level of, of issues. We're like, oh my gosh, really? Oh, it's, I mean it is, it is intense and it's hard to stay calm and I'm not perfect and I wish I did. I asked for a lot of do overs and you know, I'm trying to get better. But it's, it's interesting because when I really dig into her after the fact. How are you feeling? What was going on? It's a sense of inadequacy. You guys don't love me, my friends don't like me, the teacher doesn't like. It's, it's always about this like feeling inside. And I think my wife and I do a good job of affirming to her that she's seen affirming to her that she's loved, helping her recognize how great she is. But still society gives this imprint of like, you suck, you're bad, you're not good enough. The second that we're met with rejection.

[B]

I think the second that we're born, man, and you're right, the rejection amplifies it. Or is it. And here's another thing I have a different take on, I have a. Not a take, it's more of a curiosity. Does rejection actually exist? Obviously if we're experiencing it, it exists. But what I mean by that is do we give it way more weight? And we, and I believe we do because again, we're as children, we're self referential and that carries on into our adult lives. But rejection really is. If you ask someone something, you make a request and they say no, or someone pushes you away, right? And says, oh, get away from me, I don't like you. And they have no real reason as to why not. Like that is their own unconscious selves. Maybe you, you're wearing a fragrance or a color that reminds them of a trauma that happened to them that was really unsafe and they don't know how to verbalize that, but they'll just push you away. But then we feel rejected. So my point is that when, you know, in, even in dating and intimacy, right. When we're rejected in dating, it's really that person Saying no to a set of values that holds a historical meaning to them and a historical content. It's got nothing to actually do with you more often than not. And so it's, I think about that because I, I, my daughter's 4, so it's hard to sort of convey that to her. But how do we convey that in, in say, non verbal ways and in, in that situation, like when we're trying to soothe our, our loved ones. And I think it's our presence to what you spoke to earlier, emotional compassion and our curiosity. And when we come to the table to any relationship with that, what we do is we're stopping trauma from continuing. Like your reactivity. My reactive. If we're in an argument, I'm going to be reactive now. You're going to be reactive now. And, but if I, or you say, hey, I hear you, tell me more about what you're feeling and do you think you could do it in a way that is maybe calmer?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And that's an invitation now I don't have to keep perpetuating my trauma. Right. And you don't either. That's how we start breaking cycles. And so the foundation of that part of that is presence. Yeah.

[A]

And, and it's interesting because when you talk about relationship, I think most often what people fear is rejection. And so they'll find different escapes. Right. Until they find the love of their life or the person they love. And even in those moments, there's still people that struggle. But yeah, they chase, you know, if it's men, they chase women, if it's girls, they chase men, or porn or whatever the addiction is. Right. Because there's no rejection there.

[B]

It's harder to be rejected by an inanimate object. Right. So it's like the ultimate pornography is the ultimate pleasure, so to speak. Right. You can choose whatever you like or you can fantasize about the experience and have it there in this, in this. Men are very visual, most people are actually. And then have that. And you're not going to be told that you're too fat or you're not doing it right, or you look at, it's just, it's. Everything's there. So that becomes addictive as well. But you know, the root, I think the root cause of addiction is a disconnection. We're craving connection. What I said earlier, craving to be seen, loved, heard in non judgmental ways. That's the key. Like being accepted as we are.

[A]

Well, and the connection piece is fascinating, especially when you look at Covid. I mean this time in life that we're hopefully out of or coming out of or on the other side of, but, you know, families were connecting over zoom to play card games because they missed connecting. And the government was saying, you can't connect with people. You can't leave your house. You have to wear a mask. And so we as humans kind of felt isolated. And I think more than ever, men especially felt isolated. And we realized the connection we actually need and desire with people. Our tribe, our community, peers. Whether it's for rejection or for acceptance, we, we just need to be around people.

[B]

We need human touch, man. Like, it's, it's, it's fundamental to our nervous systems. It's the way we, we move through the world. It's the way we understand the world and we understand each other. It's the way we make sense of the world and the way we make sense of ourselves is through human touch that hasn't left us for millions of years as hominoids. I'm not going to say it's the most important thing, but entry level fundamental foundations. It really is. We have to, we have to be in each other's nervous systems. We've got to touch. We're going to know that we're safe. Yeah, yeah. And that we also matter. And it's through, through another. Because we're relational beings, it's through another that we're able to experience that.

[A]

So you touched on relationship earlier, then you touched on, on physical connection or physical interaction. So it leads me to wonder, what common patterns have you seen that stop couples or people in general from experiencing true intimacy? And further, what is the definition of intimacy?

[B]

Yeah, so restlessness. So we, we experience this restlessness and even. And codependency. Let me start with these two terms. Restlessness and codependency. Right. So codependency is this need for us to feel okay only when certain things in our lives are a particular way or are okay. So in other words, I need you to be okay for me to be okay as a form of codependency. Right. I'm going to rely on something happening. So me winning the lotto or me getting this job, which, by the way.

[A]

Right now would be a good time to win the lotto.

[B]

Oh, so what is it?

[A]

It's like 1.6 billion or something in.

[B]

Texas or in the, in the Federal.

[A]

I have no idea.

[B]

1.6.

[A]

I didn't buy a ticket, but I was like, that's a lot of.

[B]

That is crazy. So there's that codependency, right? So we move through life feeling quite restless, not feeling ourselves because we have unresolved, unprocessed wounds and stuff that's happened in our lives that we haven't really resolved and reconciled.

[A]

Right.

[B]

So we're always finding pain, pleasure, paradox. We're always finding ways to feel better, but they're just moments. Right. Because we're not really addressing the thing. And so intimacy, we don't experience actual like real closeness, we don't experience real vulnerability. We don't experience. Intimacy is actually being able to be ourselves and not being fearful of what the response may be from the outside world.

[A]

Right.

[B]

So there's two parts that though A, there's that part inside and then being met by another in non judgmental ways. So you're not being critiqued, you're not being criticized, you're not being, as a result of that, rejected. They're not rejecting you. They may not align, but they're, they're able to communicate in a very conscious, mature way. But we as a collective and most humans lack that. We don't know how to communicate. Communicate. We communicate from our wounds and our pain. Like I don't want that. It's making me feel a particular way. Therefore, now I'm going to attack you or I'm going to run away, or I'm going to do the thing that makes me feel better as opposed to actually staying in it. Intimacy, Another definition of intimacy is, for lack of a better term, stay in the fight. Literally just stay in it and feel what's happening for each other. And can you still communicate to each other with compassion, curiosity and non judgment? That there is extremely helpful. But to get to that place, we have to work on our own selves. We have to be familiar with our own patterns. So traumas are traumas. Sure. But what are the patterns that develop from the intense experiences that we have that continue to push people away or push or pull us away from closeness?

[A]

Right.

[B]

From not addressing the issue. Like you may say to me, hey, I don't like the way you spoke to me. And instead of me saying, oh man, tell me more, and even just being able to take ownership of that, my nervous system starts to rattle. I've done something wrong. Whatever my wound is, I'm feeling rejected. I may say f you. Yep. Or I may just run away from that and ignore it and not even address it. That's not intimacy, that's running away. So intimacy, another definition is embracing all of the person and all of yourself. Not just the convenient parts, not just the parts that feel Good. But the parts that feel sticky, you may say, I don't like the way that we had that conversation and here's what I made it mean and here's how it relates to me, and here's what I think. You can do better. No one wants to be told they can do better.

[A]

So what I hear you saying is sex and intimacy are very different, but the world kind of meshes them and blends them all for sure.

[B]

Because. Because we confuse the orgasmic experience, because it's such a heightened, pleasurable experience with intimacy. And it is a form of intimacy. Absolutely. I'm taking that away right there. But there are deeper layers of intimacy and connection and that's where it's relational and emotional. That's where you know when you can be with your wife and see that little girl that was hurt when she was 7 and still love that part of her when she comes out and maybe is reactive to you or she's having a moment. It's actually got nothing to do with you. And you can actually, in that moment, you can see that little girl or you can see that part of her that's just, that's unsure. And instead of you getting angry and upset and elevating, you know, your emotions, you ground you, hold you. You're present for her, you're there for. You may even ask her, hey, what do you need right now? I'm sorry you're feeling that way. You're empathetic with her. You're actively really listening. Like if we can, all we do is seek to understand our partners or the people in our lives that are really important to us. And, and we hope that that's also reciprocated. I mean, that's enlightenment, man.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. And, and what I hear you say is like, in order to experience intimacy, true intimacy, we can't be avoidant. Oh, we have to sit there.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

In the fight.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And just feel.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Be present.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So how do we start? Yeah, how does somebody start that? Because I know, you know me, for instance, like I can go back to yesterday. I had the six year old, the four year old wife's at home with the one year old and we're out here at the ranch and we're working cows.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And my 4 year old son's like freaking out because it's cold now. Now granted it was cold, but this is Texas cold. So it's like 55 degrees. And he's screaming and he's crying and like I'm trying to stay calm. I'm trying to Stay calm. Like, hey, buddy, I hear that. Do you want to go in the car? Hey, buddy, I hear that. Do you want to go in the house? Hey, buddy, I hear that. You want a jacket. Hey, buddy, I reminded you to bring your jacket, right? And then after about 15 minutes, I'm like, dude, the whining isn't going to stop the cold from coming. And so, like, that was me avoiding the discomfort of sitting in. The whining, the complaining that him feeling his feelings. And ultimately, if I look back on that after we are just having this conversation, really what he was wanting from me probably more than anything, was just to hold him and hug him and quote, unquote, warm him up, right? So how do I go from the avoidant guy who's like, dude, stop whining. Like, wanting to say shut up, or like, going back, like, shaking, I'm gonna be like, stop. Which I didn't obviously do. But how do I go from that to actually sitting with it and being present?

[B]

It's a beautiful question, man. And I feel it's a very personal question to you as well. So I really. I just really appreciate your openness with it, you know, and I have very similar questions. So why I say stay in the fight and most people leave too early to actually learn and grow from the experience and they just take the same version of themselves into the next relationship is because most of the world avoids, even in like, an anxious attachment style or an insecure attachment style, where they sort of. They appear to be leaning in, but they're only leaning in to get to the goodness really quick. They're still avoiding. They're still avoiding the discomfort of the conflict or the tension that is revealing something about themselves. So I just want to be really clear. That's why I say stay in the fight. Because most of the world, most of the time, we're just in avoidance.

[A]

Why?

[B]

Because we don't. We haven't embraced discomfort. We haven't embraced that yet. So to your other question, like, how do I begin that process of sitting with discomfort is. Well, we learn to become more resilient in the. In the world we live in. In the technologically aided world we live in, the world of convenience. Resilience is getting further and further away. Resilience is one of those core human characteristics and traits that actually got us to where we are today, that helped us survive very harsh environments again hundreds of thousands, millions of years ago. And it's a trait that, psychologically, emotionally, it's. It's leaving us get on a dating app you have the illusion of all the fish in the sea, but there's no, there's no resilience. You're hiding behind a screen, you know, swiping, saying things, but you're not feeling the person. We're not meeting each other. You have their examples, right? It's really convenient for you to be. Or me. Well, I've got work to do. I'm really busy. I can't address that conflict right now. The thing that I really want to say to you, that I'm just holding back and saying I'm just going to go bury myself in work and get validated through that. So we begin to become more resilient. Well, okay, well, how do we do that? Well, as men particularly, it's important, well, humans, full stop. That we start to experience challenge. So at some level, you've got to take agency and you've got to take self accountability and responsibility for the changes that you want to experience in your life. You may say, I'm probably going to have to do some hard stuff. Now. Part of that is looking at myself. My constitution, my patterns, my personal, my relational patterns. Like what do I do in argument? Do I get angry and big? Do I pull away? Do I really actively listen? Do I listen just to respond? Like, start observing your patterns. You've got to get curious about yourself. Then make sure that you're actually challenging yourself in life. Not things that you're accustomed to that most people would say, oh. Other people say, oh, that's really challenging that you do that. That's awesome. Well, it's easy to use and it's not a challenge. So something that could be challenging to you is journaling five minutes every day. Something that could be challenging to you is making sure that you're going to the gym three times a week.

[A]

Meditating. I'm terrible at meditating. Whatever.

[B]

It means sitting in stillness and silence. When you live in a beautiful place here, there's so many, I would imagine, so many spots on the land where you could just sit in stillness and just hear the wind. That's challenging for you. Do more of that. So the more we do something that challenges us and start small and build, the more resilient we become, the more resilient we become. This laser foundation coupled with one thing I'm going to say in a moment for regulation. Why is regulation important? Regulation is the place where change occurs. You can't make change from a dysregulated place. If you're restless, if you're, if you're feeling really pressured, Inside your mind. If you've got a lot of stuff going on and you're just running this sympathetic nervous system constantly, you can't really elicit meaningful change from that place. So when you couple resilience practices and challenging practices with regulation practices, such as, I'm going to walk barefoot on the land a few times a day, I'm going to pause every hour and just breathe really slow, five seconds in, five seconds out for two minutes. I might do that two times a day. Whatever you're practicing, you're exposing yourself to more, a more regulated nervous system. You know, I'm going to lay down with a weighted blanket, I'm going to do some breath work, I'm going to do some meditation, whatever it may be, right? I want to drink some, some warm cacao, and I'm going to go through a process. Whatever your regulation practices are, and there's plenty of them, jump in the ocean, go for a hike. When you couple that with resilience practices and you get more exposure and you clock more time in the consciousness of regulation, it's from that place that you can start to sit with other people's discomfort because you're laying the foundations for sitting with your own discomfort right now. That lays foundation for you being active and doing inner work. I'm going to work with a coach, I'm going to work with a therapist. I'm going to be more prone to read certain books and do deeper practices because you develop, right? Like when you learn to play basketball as an example or boxing, whatever. The first thing that you learn in boxing is. I'm going to learn how to jab and twist my. What I'm giving you example. I'm going to learn how to place my feet in a particular way. You're not learning how to do the fancy shit that triple G does, right? He learns that the elite are elite because they've mastered the basics. Being challenged, learning to regulate your nervous system gives you foundations, their basics, right? Practice them over and over again, no matter how elite you are. From there, you can deep dive into yourself to learn about why you can't hold discomfort or your child's discomfort. I'm the same man. I lose my mind sometimes when my daughter's whining. But why should I be getting so upset by that? I'm being triggered because the little boy inside of me, the psychology, the psychology, the layers of psychology that live within me are being triggered because it's reminding me of stuff that happened when I was younger. I don't know how to be with that and I want to fix it, so I want to make it better. So I've got to learn in those moments to self soothe and not make it about me, but make it about me, paradoxically, and then be available to her. But I can't do that if I don't have an experience of what does it feel like to be regulated in this moment constantly, over and over again?

[A]

Well, and I love what you said, that the elite are the elite because they master the basics. And a lot of people only talk about that in business and in sports, in the military. Yeah, that's it. They're, they're the elite because they've mastered the basics. Let's focus on Michael Jordan, let's focus on Tiger. Like let's focus on the best of the best. But if you actually think about that concept in everyday life, if you want to be an elite husband, master the basics. If you want to be an elite parent, master the basics. If you want to be elite with your health, master the basics. And even with money, how much you spend, how much comes in, master the basics. Right. So it's, it's powerful to actually think through that concept even though it sounds so complex and simple all at the same time. Because all you have to do is master the basics, get 1% better each and every day.

[B]

Even less than that even. Yeah, you're like, no, but you're right. The concept of 1% better, but even less even if you cannot measure it, but you have a sense of. And by the way, just having a sense of is having you connect back to your body, which by default is supporting you with moving through trauma. Because most trauma again is a disembodied experience. Part of the psychological coping strategy is let me disembody disassociate from the pain that's happening to me. But you're still experiencing it from a sensory level. Yeah, everywhere. Everywhere. And, and so just that like let me sense that I'm getting a little bit better. Great.

[A]

So what do you think the one question is that everybody should be asking themselves more frequently in relation training, specifically just in life.

[B]

That's a really good question, man. What is my nature? What is my nature? I think when people start to ask that question, they really, really sit with that question. What is my nature? You know, it's another form of maybe who am I? I mean there's, there's a, there's an old Vedic practitioner. The, the, the only teaching he gave was to tell his students to constantly ask themselves who they are. Like who am I. That was his teaching. That's it. Go figure out who you are. Yeah, who am I? And there's a lot of. There's a lot of power in understanding your nature. Because what happens is, if you're very sincere about that inquiry, you start to come face to face with all versions of yourself. And you then become empowered to choose what versions you want to bring forward. But you'll also start to notice some of those versions that live below the surface that you've maybe been avoiding. And the only way we can actually really move through our trauma outside of certain processes and so forth, is to embrace the whole of who we are. That's also one of the reasons why we can't embrace the whole of other people, including our children, when they're having a tantrum. And it's not because we're lacking boundaries. That's a separate conversation. If we're getting activated and triggered by something that's happening that isn't threatening our lives. Right. It's telling us something about us. And so when we inquire about our nature, we're curious about why is that thing happening and what really is it? What's it revealing about me?

[A]

Yeah, it's fascinating because I spent some time with Ricky Williams, the Heisman winning trophy running back. Most people know him as, you know, the pothead who failed the NFL because he got lost. And one of the lessons he taught me was that most humans are missing the most powerful part of life, which is live in curiosity, to seek awareness, to provide you the opportunity to make a choice, to then get more awareness. And so I've tried to sit in curiosity much more in my life. Everything I try to do is three questions. Three questions, three questions. Because the mind, I have found, wants to answer the first thing quickly, like, how can I escape the discomfort of the curiosity? And then once we find that answer, okay, cool, close that box. Never look at it again. But I've found for me personally, if I can go three questions deep, that's usually where the awareness sits that I need to actually pay attention to, that actually is going to empower the next choice. And so that leads me to the next question. So that's an amazing question for us to ask ourselves, but what's the one question we should be asking our partner or our significant other?

[B]

What do you need?

[A]

What do you need?

[B]

What do you need? What do you need in this moment? And it's a moment to moment thing, man. And, you know, I'll say something about awareness. I don't think this applies to you too much, because just of what I know of you, you have a tenacity and a curiosity. And I. I see you again, this is my story. You tell me if this is inaccurate about you. But I see you as someone that wants to also move well beyond awareness, into action, into change. Right. Would that be fairly accurate?

[A]

Absolutely.

[B]

I would posit that most people don't. And most people confuse awareness with healing or wholeness or. I've done the thing now because I have an intellectual or cognitive awareness of it. Yeah. We have to move beyond the awareness, the first step. And it's crucial and critical. We have to move beyond it. Yeah. To elicit real, meaningful action. That's why, you know, talk therapy is. Is actually very useful and plays a very important role or that that structure can play a very important role in transformation and change and healing. But it's not an end point, and it's actually not even a start point to some degree. But when we ask someone, what do you need right now? How can I help you? How can I support you? You know, you can frame it however you want. But it's that question what that. Because we're relational beings. I said that earlier. What that also does is it gives you an opportunity to show up, to. To maybe bring a version of you that you. You're unfamiliar with. So there's more revealing taking place. There's more awareness and more potential for new action to take place in ways that you never thought was possible as well. But we're often so scared of prioritizing other people because we feel that, I don't know, maybe our energy will be zapped or we've got other important things.

[A]

Or we'll be rejected.

[B]

Or we'll be rejected in that we.

[A]

Prioritize them in a way that we think is serving them.

[B]

Yep.

[A]

They respond because that wasn't what service looked like to them. And then we shut down and go, I'm not going to prioritize you anymore.

[B]

And what's the opportunity right there? To not shut down, not shut down or even maybe to shut down, but to go into your own shutdown. Right, But. And this is the dance. This is a constant dance. There isn't ever any one thing or three things or one and done. It's. It's consistent, man. Like, if you just do one nice thing for your wife, Right. And then the next three years, you either do nothing or you're an asshole. Like, negates the one thing.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

We have to. Consistency is everything.

[A]

Consistency, everything.

[B]

Every bit. Building a business. How can you how can you just show up five hours a week in a business and it's going to be okay? Maybe after 30 years of, you know, 20 hours a day, I don't know, whatever. You get what I'm saying. But consistency is key.

[A]

Yeah. Because even after that example, right. You build this business, it blows up 30 years later. You still have to be consistent with checking the metrics or hiring, of course, or managing talent or letting go. Most people don't recognize that actually letting go is the best way to allow your business to thrive and grow.

[B]

100. But either way, whatever you're choosing to do deliberately and with intentionality, it needs to be consistent for that thing to be quote, unquote successful or for it to come to fruition the way you envision it to. Consistency is everything people will say to me, oh, if my partner ignores me, does that mean it's the end of the relationship? I'm giving you an example, right? No, it's not the end of the relationship. I mean, it could be, yeah, but if he or she is consistently doing that, it's a pretty good indicator of something. But it's also, it's not just the isolated incident like my partner cheats on me is at the end of the relationship. Maybe, but maybe not now. If they're consistently doing that and that goes against your values, then yeah, should be the end of the relationship because you're compromising yourself. But consistency is key in everything, both ways.

[A]

GoBundance is a community of over 800 high performers, entrepreneurs and investors with a combined net worth of over $5.7 billion. But look, it's not just about the money. We're about building lives of abundance. If you're ready for a tribe that challenges you to achieve a higher standard for yourself, visit gobundance.com tribe that's G-O B U N-A-N-C-E.com T R I B E to apply today. And what I also heard you say is, you know, asking your partner, what do you need? Allows you to show up for them in a way that they feel they need. Whereas I feel like, you know, I'll talk about my relationship. For instance, I like to serve others. I have always said that service is the trojan horse to knowledge. But if you take that a step further, service is the Trojan horse to whatever you want. If you serve people, ultimately you will find the way or make the way to. To receive whatever you're looking for. And so I serve, but without asking. And so here my story is, I'm serving I'm giving, I'm helping. I'm serving. I'm giving, I'm helping. But her story could be, he's hurting. He's making it worse. Like, because I don't pause and say, hey, what do you need? So I'm making up my own labels of what she needs, which in reality might be the opposite of what she truly needs. Then we start to have conflict. Then we both experience our traumas in our own way. I shut down, she shuts down. And now it's like, okay, cool. Like, I'm not gonna help with the dishes anymore, because every time I do, I do it wrong.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And then she's like, now you never help with the dishes. And, you know, so it's just like really big circular reference that can be stopped with one simple question. What do you need?

[B]

Yeah. And even. Even if we even move beyond words and we just hold each other's hands for a moment, and we look into each other's eyes. Yeah. And we just give each other a hug, and we may even not even ask questions, just say, I got you. Yeah. You know, or I see you, or thank you, you know, or hopon upon her, which is thank you. I'm sorry. Please forgive me. I love you.

[A]

Okay, what was it?

[B]

Thank you?

[A]

No, no, the actual.

[B]

It's. It's an old Hawaiian healing mantra. Please forgive me, I'm sorry. Thank you. I love you. You can say in a few different ways. Yeah, it's for those first statements, right?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But, you know, something you just said a moment ago was. Was deeply intriguing. And in the 25 or so years I've been working with people, individuals and couples, one of the things that I've noticed in terms of relational patterns, almost never. Almost never. I'll say never. In my anecdotal experience have I ever seen an example where a partner has a need of someone else, and that need doesn't actually serve the person that the need is of example. Right. My wife. And this is a real life example, my wife will say to me, let me actually go back a bit. I have. Part of my personality and my expression and my defensive protective structures in the world is I will. I can. I can be abrasive and impatient and aggressive and big in my energy. My dad was like that. I'm not making excuse. I'm just sort of like. As I've taken on these traits. So if I get frustrated or if I feel I'm being rejected in the moment instead of shutting down, which I sort of do both because I have a Disorganized attachment. Had a disorganized attachment style. I will shut down and get big at the same time. Right. Like I shut down my vulnerability and I get big at the same time. So a request that Christine will have of me is, hey, it's really important to me. It really means a lot to me when I'm bringing an issue to you, even if it's about you or not, that you can just meet me with compassion and just and. And curiosity.

[A]

Right.

[B]

And not blame and not shame me and not get angry. Now the thing she's asking me is actually really good for me because I don't want to live with the. That it's not a fire, it's a fury that lives in me, you know, sometimes. And I don't want to live with that. And so by me practicing being in touch with that, A and B, being kind, but practicing kindness, I'm rewiring and re reframing my entire internal constitution over time. Consistency. But the thing she's asking of me is really, really good for me. That's an example of that complementary need. Right, Right. It's of service to us.

[A]

But you also have to be willing to sit in the discomfort request. Right. Because even that request could cause that trigger massively.

[B]

What are you saying? That I'm not calm? I am calm. Willingness, what you just said then. Yeah. Is everything. Yeah, that's the, the thing I said at the beginning about self responsibility and self accountability. You've got to be willing to go to those places within yourself to actually sit in that request or the fire of that and what it brings up for you.

[A]

Well, and going back to what you said about consistency is everything. You can't just be willing once. You have to be willing every single minute of every single day because you're going to get tested. The old lady's going to cut you off, the kid's going to have a meltdown. The spouse is going to say something that triggers you. The business deal is going to fall apart at all moments, all the time. You have to be willing to consistently sit in it. So people are listening to this, are like, man, I love what this guy stands for. I want to learn more about him. I know you wrote one book. I know you've been working on another book. Tell the listeners how they can find you, how they can follow you, and what they should look for in the next book.

[B]

Yeah. Thank you. Appreciate that, man. So to order the book, it releases February 3rd, 2026. Tuned in and turned on book dot com.

[A]

Tuned in and turned on Book dot com.

[B]

Yeah, tuned in and turned on is the title of the book. What you can expect from the book, right? Oh, you can find me also at Stefanos Defenders on my social media coachwithsteph.com if you want to work in a one on one capacity as well or with couples. But what you can expect from the book. The book is a grouping of my life experiences. Some of the patterns that have developed from that that can be very relatable to so many people. A stack of client examples over the years, a real life, tangible, very relatable examples of how people have presented certain issues and challenges in their lives and then how they've moved through them. How we've supported that in a container, but how they've moved through that essentially. But the fundamentals of the book really focus on, hey, most of us, most of us, if not all of us, have experienced some intensity in life. We've made that mean certain things. And as a result of that, we've developed patterns in our adult lives, many that we're not really quite liking about ourselves but we're not sure how to shift. Helps you identify that stack of tools and practices to help you shift it. That's the first part of the book. It really highlights the importance of our formative years. Inner child work, other modalities to really help you shift into a more elevated, regulated place. The second half of the book goes a little deeper. The claim I make or it makes is that doing that inner work helps every area of your life actually be successful. Success being defined by fulfillment and meaning. Right? Not compensation coming from wounds and unprocessed trauma, but from a place of clarity and true meaning and connection that actually allows you to move into healthy relationships. Either retransform the relationship that you've been in or relationships that you're in. Right. Or get into a new relationship that actually is healthy. It is that thing that allows you to sort of quote, unquote, stay in the fire long enough to learn and grow. That to me is actually the fastest and the most direct way to realizing God. It's a pretty big claim.

[A]

That is. That is interesting. It's an intense read. But I can't. And yes, yeah, but I can't wait to go there because. Because again, I think, think it's all about the curiosity and the awareness and then the choice that follows the awareness. I mean, what you said earlier is spot on. Most people stop at awareness, but to me, choice is another way of saying action. And when we, when we make a choice, we then become more aware and have the power to choose again. So look forward to digging into that book, man. Really, really appreciate your time. Really appreciate your presence today and really enjoyed the conversation.

[B]

Yeah, likewise. Thank you, my friend.