347: Sex, Drugs, and Rock and Roll, part 4: More sex

Dov and I started by talking about experiencing fun for the first time. I'm not the most fun person ever but a lot more now than before. He handled context that kept me from recording before despite knowing I wanted to. By context I mean legality, framing, and things that if you don't cover it's just talking about drugs, not life.

I shared a few stories showing how I integrated the social skills the MDMA experience helped prompt, which leadership work eventually complemented and augmented when I went to business school.

But the deep part of this episode is my sharing my experiences of powerlessness as a man compared to women, as well as the stories of few men who experienced similar situations that suggest to me my situation isn't rare. Note that I don't describe problems with women but a system and culture that says hashtag believe women without accountability or equality.

My leadership work has been leading me to become famous but I've been afraid to get past a certain level for fear of one of the stories I tell in this episode. I had to share this to liberate myself from that fear. Again, I'm not afraid of the truth, nor of women, but of an unfair system and, for that matter, a culture that is predisposed to silence me in this area.

Since recording I found some old emails from her. She found my girlfriend, I don't know how. She found postings of mine and tried to out my anonymous identity as an attraction coach, she included a picture of me with my girlfriend in an email to me, I think implying she knew things about me I hadn't told her and could act on them. One of her last emails to me listed things she wanted me to know and said "and you really don't know what I can do", which to this day I take seriously.

I've held a lot of this stuff inside since the mid-90s---the experience with the woman in grad school, the late 90s my experiences with ecstasy, the late 2000s learning attraction and seduction, and the mid-2010s seeing the unaccountable power society gave a woman should she choose to act on it. But my practice is openness, allowing yourself to be vulnerable, sharing your whole self, and integration. Not sharing the experiences in this episode held me from my potential.

My leadership work is about helping people improve their relationships with themselves and people they care about. I find they work best when I don't hold part of myself back, especially the most important parts, or separate parts of myself.

Sharing this stuff has been a new beginning---no longer censoring myself out of fear of hashtag movements silencing my voice and experience. I'm moving to stop holding back experiences I found most developmental.

EDIT: After recording this episode I shared the story with my mom. After she heard me describe the stories with women, she told me that the woman emailed her!

In this case, she seems to have a lot more power. If a man wrote "You don't know what I can do" or contacted a woman's mother, he could end up

in jail. If a man complains, many people will ask what he did to deserve it. Again, my issue is with a culture, not truth or women in general.

Sharing these stories has opened me to share and has given me courage to act despite the fear.

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