Mid-Week Live Coaching: Evan

Mid-Week Live Coaching: Evan

If you’re operating from a self-limiting belief that you’re not enough, you’ll end up becoming very miserable. In this midweek episode, Adam Quiney discusses with Evan Veritas how having a relationship with the spirit counters that belief. When you connect and engage with the spirit, you begin to surrender and trust your intuition. You do something not because you have to prove yourself, but because it’s the right thing to do. Tune in as Adam coaches Evan on related topics such as coaching, leadership, men’s work, and life.

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Mid-Week Live Coaching: Evan

On this week’s midweek episode, tune in as Adam live coaches Evan Veritas around all things coaching, leadership, men’s work, life, and the spiritual path.

I am coaching Evan Meyer. He goes by Evan Veritas on Facebook. Evan Meyer is his proper name. I love Evan as a man, a leader and someone committed to their work. This is a cool conversation. You probably noticed that’s a bit of a trend. Most of these conversations are cool. I’m going to share with you why it’s cool and that is this. Where we started was Evan sharing wanting to work on creating clients or making more money or making things happen. Where this conversation ended up was around Evan’s relationship to spirit that which is greater than me and you that exists beyond ourselves. Any relationship with spirit that you’d like, that’s for you to define.

What’s interesting about this conversation is that my relationship with spirit is still evolving. It wasn’t until a few years ago that I started to take on this work and it continues to grow. For most of my life, my relationship with the spirit was this thing stuffed into a tiny little box that my entirely scientific and deterministic worldview would allow for. It was like, “Here’s how the world is.” Everything’s causally related, meaning there’s a cause and effect. It’s all knowable. There’s this tiny place over there for how did the universe start? Over time, that perspective and that relationship to spirit and myself and others in the world became more and more limiting.

As Evan and I were talking and I was asking him questions and exploring where he was, what started to show up was this is a conversation about spirit. There’s a point where I tell him that things might be out of the left-field but like, “What’s your relationship with spirit?” That is where the conversation ends up going. If Evan told me, “I don’t think it’s that.” We would have moved on from that and had a different conversation. What is happening there is I’m trusting the spirit at that moment. What I mean by that is I’m trusting the voice of my intuition. I’m trusting the client. I’m trusting what’s showing up at the moment. I’m doing my best to move out of the way so that I can allow what’s showing up at the moment to show up at the moment.

As you do this work of coaching and leadership more and more, you’ll find that becomes more and more the game that’s being played. It starts to become almost esoteric or ephemeral. It doesn’t mean we don’t teach the foundation. You’ve got to learn the dance steps first. Over time, it stops and you don’t rely on that stuff as much anymore because it’s imbued in you. That’s the foundation on which everything else is built and then the game becomes, “Can I hear what spirit is speaking into space between us?”

I didn’t want the conversation to go there because I don’t know where that goes. I don’t know about it and it’s the unknown. That’s often the most beautiful place for our work and coaching and leadership to take us. I think you’ll enjoy this conversation. You’ll love Evan. He is a fantastic guy. He’s up to all kinds of cool things. Follow him if you don’t already. Without any further ado, I will leave you with this conversation.

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Let’s talk about Evan. I’m going to share a little bit about how I know Evan and then I’m going to bring him in and we’re going to dive in together. Evan and I originally met because a friend and I were leading some men’s work here in Victoria. I’ve been training with a friend of mine, John Wineland, who is well-known and highly regarded these days. One of the people that men would train with if they wanted to deepen their embodiment of the masculine energy and to learn how to support other men to do the same.

My friend, Wes and I had been doing that work and we’re like, “We want to bring this to Victoria.” We want to bring something like that because there’s not a lot of that happening. We ran and we rented a place. We invited a whole bunch of people and we started. We were charging very little. It’s $10. We want people that make some financial commitment to come. We want to pay for the cost of the building and the rest whatever. We don’t care. We did about five of these. The first one, we had a lot of men and then slowly it wound down. We had fewer people. Towards the end, we had maybe 4 or 5 men showing up. This is often the way for anything. Growing anything is often this way.

At first, there’s a novelty. People are like, “Hell, yeah,” and then they’re like, “I went and I stood in this pose for five minutes. I held my hands up above my head for five minutes staring into the eyes of the other man. It was awful. It felt uncomfortable. It’s hard work. I don’t like that. I don’t want to keep doing that. It’s easier not to.” As with most work, sexiness is what comes on the other side of your practice but showing up to the practice is the work. When people don’t immediately get the sexiness, they start to lose interest.

There are a lot of people at first. We probably had about 25 men show up for the first one then maybe ten and then we were hanging out with five. I imagine if we’ve been committed to keeping building this thing, from there we would have grown. People would have stayed. We would’ve had some dedicated practitioners. They would have stayed in the practice and then that would start to build on itself. That’s how these things tend to go in my experience.

In the last couple of these workshops that we did, Evan was one of the people that showed up. I don’t know how he found us. I didn’t know anything about him. He showed up and he was committed to practice. There came a point where Wes and I sat down and we’re like, “We’re not feeling super inspired to keep doing this.” It was pretty clear that the topics of leadership and raising the floor of coaching and working one on one with people is where I was feeling pulled towards. I don’t know if it was there for Wes but he also wasn’t feeling inspired to continue doing this especially with those numbers. It’s not to say we could have grown something. It’s more that we weren’t inspired to do so.

We started to wind it down and Evan said, “Where do I go from here? What do I do?” I told him, “You should check out John Wineland’s work. That guy’s doing awesome stuff. His works are amazing and you get a lot out of it.” John Wineland is in Santa Monica. He may have moved. He was there at least when I was hanging out with them. His work required a financial commitment. I can’t remember what it is now. It’s somewhere in the $12,000 or $15,000, something like that. It’s a nine-month program and you have to be committed to traveling three times out of that year to go to these in-person events. You can call them a retreat but they’re less of a retreat. You’re going to do some work and it’s going to be confronting.

I didn’t hear from Evan for a while and then I heard from him maybe 4 or 5 months later and he said, “I want you to know, I’m doing the work with John. It’s amazing. It’s super awesome. I’m loving it.” That inspired me because many people come through my doors and they’re like, “I love this or that and I’m committed to this. What do I need to do?” I’m always willing to provide a path and often, nothing happens from there. That’s human nature. We’re like, “I want this thing,” and then we find out it’s going to demand something from us and we’re like, “I’ll want it tomorrow. For now, maybe more ice cream.” We do whatever. We do what is comfortable and what we can keep doing that’s more consistent with the life we’re already living rather than doing what’s going to be a step into possibility and a confrontation of our fear.

Trust the voice of your intuition, trust the client, and trust what's showing up at the moment. Click To Tweet

For Evan to take this on, I was like, “Holy crap. This guy’s up to some stuff.” We’ve kept in touch since. He reached out and said, “I see that The Forge is open and I want to get around you. I want to be in a relationship with you. I love the stuff you’re putting out.” Evan and I jumped on the phone and he said yes to The Forge and he’s been working with Bay and me ever since whilst continuing his work with John. You’re going to love him. As I was talking about you, I noticed we got more viewers. You are the more popular topic between you and what I was talking about leadership.

They’re waiting for me to get on here.

They’re like, “Get the special celebrity guest on. That’s what we’re here for.” I had someone come on once while I was with someone. I was coaching them at the time and they jabbed at me. They’re like, “Special celebrity guests. We’re all people with egos, aren’t we?” I was like, “It’s a joke. I’m having fun here.” Yes, we all have egos but let’s play. Anything about your background or origin story you want to share that I didn’t cover or that you’d like to speak to?

MeetUp.com is where I found you guys. I don’t know which way you put that out there. I read The Way of the Superior Man and it was like, “Get a men’s group.” I was typing into my computer, “Men’s group Victoria,” and then I found this thing and found your little Facebook group and the rest is history.

It’s amazing because there are a few origin stories like that. Do you know my friend Calum Ramsay? Calum is a cool guy. He’s the Head Coach for Rugby Canada, which I believe trains out here. They’re talking about going to the Olympics. Another version of that where I gave a talk at some event here called Confabulation and he came up afterward and said, “I think we’re meant to talk.” Something grew out of that and you never know with this stuff. We don’t know our impact until 2 or 3 years later, we’re like, “Holy shit, I’m glad I did that.” That’s cool. Anything you want to share about your work with John?

I’m assisting the program now, which is cool. I talked to John about potentially another year, which is we’re in conversation with. That’s been great. I’m heading down to assist the women’s and the men’s as well. EMLT and EWRI are the two programs that he runs.

What’s the name? I’m not familiar. He didn’t have the acronym for the women’s.

It’s Embodied Women’s Relationship Immersion. The leadership is masculine and then relationship and all that. It’s a more catchy name for the feminine, which is super cool because I haven’t assisted a women’s event yet. I’m interested. I won’t be in the room as much, obviously. It would be interesting to be in that space and that energy and do a little bit of practice. I aspire to practice more with women because I’ve been to the men’s containers. I had the one with John with the co-eds.

It’s a neat experience. It’s different. Bay and I work with the two teachers, Justin and Lyndon. A lot of our practice these days is in two buddy practices with each other. I’m like, “This is different from a man because a man would fucking do this right. He would be in the structure and on purpose with me.” A mountain in front of the woman and me is the flowing river and that’s beautiful. I crave more of that. It’s interesting to see that dynamic show up. What are we going to dive into here, Evan? What’s our topic to explore together?

I went full-time into the work that I’m offering with men and then coaching stuff, as you know. In August 2020, I got invited to teach a workshop and that put everything into momentum. It was an incredible opportunity. It’s another one of those synchronistic moments where I’m like, “Look at where I am now.” It’s the momentum that’s built-in and how it’s evolved that has been inspiring for me to watch it happen in front of me.

As time goes on and as I take more on it, I’m noticing I’m busier. I’m very much stuck in a mode of perpetually feeling that I haven’t done enough and that there is more to do. As I lay in bed, I’m thinking about all the stuff. When I wake up, I’m filled. In the past, rarely would I go over and reach to my phone first thing in the morning. I had some good hygiene around that. This is an example but now I’m like, “I got to look at it to see what’s going on. I got to look at emails. How did that post do?” All this stuff, I become obsessive. There’s an exhilarating part of it. There is also a part of it that’s starting to feel unhealthy.

A little bit more to that is not necessarily all the things that I’m focusing on are generating abundance for me. They’re not generative actions. I don’t know what the request in there is exactly. I don’t know what that would look like at the end of this necessarily. Perhaps that’ll come unclear as we talk about it but there’s something there. Before we got into live, I was saying how I was feeling the struggle and then acting from this urgency of having to make things happen and then the thing happening and then I rest for a little bit and then I go back fighting it out.

Relationship With The Spirit: You can’t teach something you’re not living.

It’s an exhausting place to live from. It’s much on the pendulum of like, “I’m good. I got it. I’m good for a bit.” I’m good for a bit until I’m not good for a bit and that’s what drives me into action again. There’s not a lot of sustainability for that. I’m feeling the physical and energetic exhaustion from that a little bit. I would like to make more intentional moves rather than being busy and feeling like I’m doing a lot. Ultimately, it’s overwhelming. It’s keeping me in that urgency trap. I don’t know if that makes a lot of sense to you or not.

It makes a great deal of sense. I’m present to what is or your experience of what is, which is there’s this, “I’m not doing enough.” You call it an urgency that you experienced, like, “I got to get into some action.” It sounds like taking a bunch of action from that place, which then becomes tiresome and leaves you feeling pretty burnt out. There’s a lack of sustainability there. I don’t know if you mentioned that part. What happens from here? It sounds like you’re in that urgency phase and you talked about a pendulum. What happens next?

The interesting thing is I don’t even know. All of a sudden, I’m like, “I got to take more action and do stuff.” I am in a lot of action. Something that happens to fall in my lap, like the conversation I had. It was out of the blue. It’s like, “I would love to work with you.” They’re committed fully. Things like that happen. I would love to be able to trust the work that I’m putting in is getting the results that I desire and I don’t. There’s a fundamental lack of self-trust and that feeds into this scrambling to check things all the time and do things all the time. It’s almost like I’m lying to myself that all those little actions are producing things, which on some level, they are. I would like to be able to let go a little bit more and be like, “I’m showing up. I’m doing the things that I’m committed to doing and the results are going to be there.” I don’t feel that way.

That’s where you want to be, this ability to trust. You said trust yourself and what you’re doing is sufficient. Before we go into there, I’m curious. You describe these patterns as a little unsustainable. It’s a matter of time and you can grind and then something’s going to happen. Let’s assume there’s no breakthrough created and nothing changes. What happens in this process from there? Let me know if you want me to ask it a bit differently.

Can you ask that a little differently?

Based on what you’re saying, this isn’t sustainable. You don’t do this forever. The path is not, “Great. Every morning I wake up and I excessively check my phone. Stuff falls in my lap. I feel the struggle but I keep doing it and that’s how life is.” I imagine there’s a point where the pendulum flips to the other side. Is that accurate?

Here’s the thing. It does feel like I’m perpetually doing that in some capacity but it doesn’t feel good. I don’t feel balanced. There is a part of me and I don’t think I’ve hit it yet lately but I have a tendency to want to be like, “Screw it,” and then let go. What’s happened to me is like, “This isn’t working. I can’t do this. I don’t trust my capacities to generate. I’m not inspired.” I’ll go seek security and comfort through working for somebody else or looking at my other options. I’ll go into a haze for a week of like, “I got to figure something out.” All of a sudden, I’ll create something and it’ll do well. I’ll generate enough until the next time that comes around and then I’m like, “I got to figure this out.”

It’s dropping everything at some point.

I get a lot of momentum and I feel good but there’s a part of me that doesn’t believe that’s sustainable. I started to sabotage myself a little bit even though reality doesn’t reflect that if I’m completely honest. My reality of what’s happening and how people are experiencing my work and what I’m offering, they’re like, “No, we want to continue to support you and stuff.” It’s me that’s like, “Yeah.” There’s a piece of that’s coming through. Even if it’s a big win, I have no reference to where I was months ago. It wasn’t where I want it to be. Do you know what I mean? It’s like the carrot’s always moving a little bit and the lions are always moving.

I heard you describe it like, “Well, it is sustainable or people do. We want what you have.” You’re creating value and they’re enrolled and engaged with that but I’m hearing how you’re showing up not misunderstanding the circumstances external to yourself, how you’re showing up in your own life in the midst of all this is go and never enough.

What I’m aware of is unless there’s some work I have to do around that because I’m aware of whether it’s $100,000 or $1 million, that is going to be ever-present. If it’s come from zero to whatever it is now then there’s no sense that it’s going to change. Whatever it is whether it’s money or success in any capacity, it’s not going to shift. That’s why I’m not concerned about how the world’s being reflected to me so much because it isn’t changing the dials in me.

You could have every single person on the planet doing exactly what you need to do. We don’t want anything more from you and you’re still like, “It’s great,” but there is some level that you can’t trust it. This might sound a little out of the left-field but how would you describe your relationship with spirit?

Make more intentional moves rather than being busy and getting stuck in the urgency trap. Click To Tweet

It wavers for sure. Lately, I haven’t thought a lot about the spirit, to be honest. I’ve been in the world so much doing the things, the platforms and the email lists and that shit. I even have a spiritual practice every morning.

What is that?

I’m practicing Neigong. I don’t know if you’re familiar with Neigong. You’re probably familiar with Qigong. Neigong is related but it’s the internal art of alchemy and Taoism. It’s a combination of meditation, breathing and movement. I’m studying with a teacher who’s based out of the UK. It’s been amazing and very much in the initial stages.

Is that practice primarily one of embodiment? How does the spirit come into that?

It’s cultivating your chi essentially and it’s building. It isn’t like prayer or something like that. It’s called internal art therefore it’s much more internalized. I guess in that capacity it’s still a lot about me and my body and things like that.

My intention is not to say, “That’s not spiritual or anything.” That’s not where I’m looking. I’m just trying to get a sense of how these things play out. You say wavers. Anything else in terms of let’s lay some groundwork first and then I’ll ask you the same question? The broadest brush strokes in terms of where trust shows up, I heard you mention trust, a lack of trust. There’s like, “I trust myself. I trust others and then I trust spirit.” It’s like a triangle almost.

For me, what I learned was like, “Can’t fuck spirit. There’s no room for spirit, the science, the critical thinking and all of that,” which I was raised and still hold in high regard. That’s ephemeral, nebulous and who knows what that means. Others can’t rely on other people, maybe a select few but by and large, I can’t trust those people. Everything fell to me. I can trust myself for the most part. I will do what I say I’m going to do. I’m reliable to create my results so on and so forth. That was my relationship to those three things. In this context, the spirit is like any that which is greater than self and others that’s beyond just me and you. You get to create your relationship with it. From that lens, how would you say your relationship is to spirit, God or space, blueberry muffin or whatever you want to call it?

What came up for me there was I feel responsible for everything I generate. Therefore, there’s a complete correlation between the amount of thing that I do to the amount of whatever that I earn or relevance or success that I have. That leaves little space for trusting in spirit.

It sounds like it’s not that you don’t have a spiritual practice but it sounds like your relationship to spirit itself is more of an afterthought. Like, “First, I am the one and all is on my shoulders. This is the way it goes.” That’s the starting point. Is there more?

No, I guess even my spiritual practice is something that I have to do. Here’s the thing especially as being someone that’s leading groups through what I would consider embodiment spiritual practice, I have a commitment for my integrity to be in practice every day. That doesn’t necessarily always mean that it’s something that I want to do or even feel a connection through but it’s like, “This is what I do because I can’t teach you something that I’m not living.”

What about how would you describe your relationship with others inside that paradigm I laid out?

Would you say in terms of trust? Is that what you’re pointing out?

Relationship With The Spirit: To play a bigger and bigger game, the only option down this path is you have to do more and more. If you have this mindset, you can be reliable and inherently, to some extent, limiting.

Yes or whatever you want to come up with. It doesn’t have to be trust. It can be like others are a bunch of jerks. I don’t like any of them, whatever is there for you.

I don’t know if there’s one common thing that I think of others or one trend in relation to others. Do you know what I mean?

Do you feel like you rely on them like, “I don’t have to do it all. I can hand this over to this person and I can allow others.”

I’m doing everything myself. I’m super supported but in terms of any type of delegating or asking for anything beyond the support of someone to talk to or someone to get coached by or something like that. There’s not a lot of space for that in my life and that comes from an inherent lack of trust in other people doing a good job as me, for sure.

I get that and I can relate to that very well. It sounds like you’re reliable to get support but most of that support is in you being able to do more and you being able to handle hold, create and cause more.

Fixing and whatever, figuring it out, getting the new tool then the next thing that I need from somebody.

What are you seeing in this conversation so far, if anything?

It feels based around trust not only in myself but in spirit and others. There’s this overarching theme of I can’t trust necessarily. From that, I tried to do more as a method of perhaps if I can control more then there’ll be more trust available for me and myself or something. Inherently, it was coming to me is like the more action I take is just the product of less trust in life perhaps and all the permutations whether that’s from spirit and myself or other. That’s been a part of me for as long as I can remember is needing that. I remember even being four years old. My mom would have to lay out everything we’re going to do that day for me to trust her enough and to not be upset. I would incessantly ask her, “What’s next? When where are we going?” I had this disposition.

Where did you learn that from?

I have no idea. At that age, it’s hard to say.

Are your parents together? Are they divorced?

No, there is a divorce for sure and there’s a lack of control. I was five.

Spirit is anything greater than self. Click To Tweet

I don’t tend to look back in the past. It can be nice sometimes to like, “That makes sense. It’s nice to just see that it makes sense.” I could imagine even for a young child, your parents will be there and that’s a given and then not to have them would be pretty severe like, “I can’t rely on other people,” because I did and that’s what happened. They leave. Shit, that’s the lesson for me here. In order for you to play a bigger and bigger game, it sounds like the only options down this path are you’ve got to do more and more. What you do is you go get supported to expand your capacity to do more and more. It occurs a little bit like a linear progression. There’s no ability to expand in other dimensions or anything like that. It’s like, “How big can I make myself?” Which I imagine would be a driving force behind all the work you’re willing to do. You’re reliable for that but also inherently, to some extent, limiting.

It doesn’t leave a lot of space for much else because if I grow linearly with whatever I’m creating, there’s only so much capacity of time and energy that I have. I’m feeling that and I’m also in an environment where the COVID-19 restrictions are quite intense. I’ve thrown myself into what I’m doing because what else is there to do? I was having a conversation with my partner and I’m like, “I’m feeling unbalanced.” I’m not getting out and just doing the things that I used to enjoy doing because especially much screen time. I’m seeing how that’s going to impact my offering in a negative sense at some point too. It’s not getting sourced. I’m not getting sourced. I’m a huge nature advocate. I like to get outside. If I find spirit anywhere, it’s there, not in my living room practicing Qigong or whatever like that. I suppose that’s the baseline but there has to be something beyond that.

What’s the half-life of this? How long will this continue before something shifts?

That’s the thing. If it’s anything like the past then it’s going to get to the point where it stops working out or I don’t I have a little amount of trust that I’ve thrown myself back into doing something that isn’t aligned with what I feel like I’m here to do.

It’s almost like you trusting yourself breaks down over time. It even starts to fall away. At least you’re reliable to keep doing this stuff but you can’t rely on anything else. I’m just going to be in the cave, keep doing this and nothing will happen.

I’m going to hit a limit in my business as well where it’s like, “I literally can’t do anymore and now I need to expand in other dimensions.” Also, that’s a great analogy because I feel a little one-dimensional. Do you know what I mean? I feel that I’m stuck in a one-year thing.

We’ve been talking about this through the lens of trust. This might be a bit of a weird question. I’m happy to rephrase or work with you to get something that guides us a bit better. Trust is the one we’re currently talking about. What’s the one you’ve been using? I’m not doing enough for everything that’s showing up. How have you been relating or looking at that?

It’s not enough. I did some work around this a few years ago.

You used to feel not enough but now you never do?

That’s it exactly. I’m saying that it’s still present in my life is like, “I’m not enough.” It’s not even that I’m not doing enough but it’s like I’m not enough. I don’t think those words but I see how it shows up in the ways that I talk or how I do things. I’ll overcompensate for not being enough.

Tell me, what’s the solution? When I’m not enough is there, what is the exact solution to that?

That’s where a lot of my righteousness sometimes stems from as well because I’m compensating by knowing everything.

Relationship With The Spirit: Being committed to our growth and development and our highest expression on this planet is an amazing commitment. But if we’re doing it from the fundamental belief that we’re not enough, then that’s just a recipe for misery.

What else do you do to resolve not being enough?

I reject others if I feel like not competent or not worthy or I reject ideas. If I can’t beat them, disown them or something like that. I’ll take myself, eject as well from things like you don’t feel good enough or don’t feel like I can do it. I’ll take myself out of it. I get hyper-competitive. That’s the other side of it too. I’m even competitive in my business. Do you know what I mean? I look at other people in my space. I love them but I’m also like, “I want to do better.” Not necessarily to make them worse. There’s a level of healthiness to it but there’s a level that feels a little sticky to me as well.

Being committed to our growth and development and our highest especially on this planet is an amazing commitment but if we’re doing it from the fundamental belief that we’re not enough then that’s a recipe for misery. It doesn’t matter how far we’ll get. It’s going to reify and prove that I’m not enough because whenever would I be enough? Do you get into a fuck ton of action or anything like that from if you’re not enough? Is there anything or any flavor to that?

It’s usually aggressive action. Do you know what I mean?

Give me an example.

The reason that comes to me is I come from a farming background or whatever like that. If I see other people kicking the dog or something like that, I’ll amp it up and I’ll move twice as fast and do twice as much stuff. I will make an example of it almost. I’m quick to point out when others aren’t doing enough in the past when I was having people that were working under me or with me. Especially as someone that’s focused on their leadership, it doesn’t allow other people’s leadership to emerge because I can be dominating in that capacity.

There’s attention that goes you’re not enough but the attention goes to it’s almost like nothing’s enough.

Exactly. I would think even my intimate relationships. That’s a common theme for conflict or something like that. It’s like, “You did the thing but you didn’t do it enough or you didn’t do it the way that it was meant to be done.” I’m conscious that all of that is how I see myself as well. I’m just projecting that. All the awareness in the world around it and seeing it, it’s not shifted yet for me. I’ve tempered it for sure and I’m done working on it. I don’t believe it’s binary like all of a sudden, I’m completely fine but it certainly is still the driving theme in a lot of what I do in the world.

Let me give you an analogy first. If someone was like. “I’m selfish,” one version of that would be like them trying to resolve their selfishness and that of other people. “I’m generous,” and then the other direction would be like, “Fuck it. I’m just going to accept that I’m selfish and fuck you, you’re selfish too.” I’m going to say that they’re both inside the same wagon rut. It’s either front or back. What’s the other side of this not-enoughness thing that we’re talking about?

Arrogance.

Do you say more?

I’ll get critical of other things that I see outside of myself because I put myself on a pedestal like, “I know how to do this, I would do that differently or I would do that better.” That thing where it’s like they’re not. I separate myself from everything else that I see. It’s that same sanctimonious energy. My survival mechanism it’s like I become better then because I feel not enough.

Relax and know that you've done enough. The gifts you offered are enough. Click To Tweet

It’s either I’m not enough or you’re not enough.

It’s not enough or they’re not enough or anything. It has to be human.

I imagine in this that it’s almost like the refuge that you’re whoever someone else is not enough because at least then you get a break from this. There’s just like, “This is not me. I’m better than that idiot over there.” What a fun game to be locked in.

I had Hans coach me. I love to call him Hans. He’s like “I was looking at your social media and I don’t see a lot of joy.” I’m producing and creating a lot of the world and I was like, “That’s not true.” In my experience, I’m a joker. I have a lot of humor and am a fun person but for sure, there is a lot less joy available for me in my life. I’ve been more in that rut, too as well. I’m finding this journey of creating my art in the world and creating a business has driven up a lot of that stuff. It’s like I have something to prove.

That’s another context of joy or trust that are two places that are outside of this. I could see trust being a little bit almost slippery because it’s like, “I trust that it’s enough,” but it’s like, “Shit, we’re back inside the wagon rut.” You’re in The Forge and we did work talking about our breakthroughs like what are we here to create for the remaining three months? What’s the breakthrough that we want to have created? What are we going to use this remaining time for? I’m curious where you got to with that or if you’ve gotten anywhere with that up to this point.

I haven’t sat with it to have a clear answer but it’s definitely this. It’s not that I don’t want to use the word trust now. I don’t know what it is. It’s something in that zone, something in that area where it’s like, “I just want to relax.” I want to relax and feel that what I’ve done is enough and the gifts that I offer are enough. That incessant drive for me to grow is beautiful. I find that warrior energy and that competitiveness serves very well in the work that I do because men are seeking that.

The men that come to me are seeking to be challenged in a lot of ways. I can do that. I learned to open my heart through that and serve them from there. There’s always more space for that. I was at a retreat with John and we have moved a lot of energy. On the second day, we had a full week there because the assistants came early and my nervous system had a spot where I had felt so relaxed. I don’t remember the last time I ever felt relaxed. I felt at ease and I was like, “Is this available to me all the time?” It lasted and I elastic-ed back.

The world pushes you back into the shape that it knows.

Exactly. It was an insight there that’s like, “Shit, I can’t just be screaming all day to move that energy all the time.” There’s some level I can where if I operated from there. I feel that I could be doing all the same things but there’d be much more ease and much more grace in my life.

First of all, moving energy is always going to move energy, which is great. The place where that can start to become not bad or wrong or anything like that but where we can get stuck then is if we’re not doing whatever work there is to address the fact that we’re creating the energy in the first place. It’s if I’m doing something that’s causing inflammation in my shoulder. What starts to happen is my shoulder gets inflamed and then the inflammation every time I move my shoulder causes it to become more inflamed. We got to get that inflammation down but I also have to address what’s creating it in the very first place. There are both parts to it.

What I’m conscious of is we don’t want to fix any of this because it’s all made up. Your story that it’s not enough, you’re not enough, this isn’t enough, it’s true to the extent you believe it but there’s no objective truth we can find anywhere that’s going to confirm that. It’s purely your belief and then the actions you take from your belief in the world that creates, which then reinforces the belief. I want to be cautious about us fixing that because if something’s made up then all that fixing it does is reinforce it. If I have a story that I’m stupid and then I go out of my way to prove I’m not stupid, that just reinforces the belief. It’s like, “Why am I doing that in the first place? You don’t need to do that, Adam. You’re missing the point entirely.” I want to present that. That is a caution there in my space. Let’s be careful about fixing this. Since it sounds like trust is the word resonating with you and/or spirit, I can’t remember if I’ve reflected this to you before but there’s something about you, Evan. Do you remember your essence offhand?

Action, purpose, presence, love and truth.

Relationship With The Spirit: It’s wrong to use the spirit as a means to an end, to achieve an objective.

The thing that’s been present for me in this conversation is the spirit and the divinity that you bring into space from whatever place you want to hold that word but that’s very conscious to me. Maybe that’s your life purpose or maybe that what I’m feeling is the nexus of the love and the purpose that you are, along with all the other cool things. Let’s imagine that there was no not enough or they’re not enough or I’m not enough or any of that. Let’s move that entirely out of the space so that we’re not even talking about that. Instead, we were just looking through the lens of divinity or spirit or trust or joy, whatever you want to choose. From that lens, what it is for me to do is to practice that to bring the being of spirit, divinity, trust or joy? What would there be for you to do?

What resonates with me most of all those words is spirit. There is an essence of surrender that needs to happen. I’m reflecting on how small my life has become lately. Everyone’s experiencing that in a lot of ways. I’m in Montreal, which is particularly intense, the lockdown and then the restrictions and curfews and things. That’s what I’m using as a reason to not do the things that have me connect to spirit. As I mentioned before, taking care of myself in a way that has me feeling connected, going and getting out into the natural world. Putting away my computer and stuff for a few days and trusting that it’ll be okay. For me too, seeing my family, my family doesn’t live too far from here and I saw my brother. He had a baby that I only met once. That was a weekend where I was able to let go of all this stuff and spend time in the present with family and with this beautiful little cherub that he has. She’s beautiful.

It seems like even when I try to make space, I’ll go for long walks and stuff and leave the phone at home, there’s this incessant voice and there are few activities that get me away from that voice. Sometimes playing more music is one for sure. My connection with spirit is very much one that happens in motion and often doesn’t happen when I’m sitting on a cushion or something like that, though it’s possible. It’s more of me doing things that make me come alive a little bit. Including teaching and stuff, to be honest. When I’m leading groups and teaching, that’s a moment that I feel all of that little stuff that I do throughout the week is that I get to those moments where I’m with people for a few hours and I do feel the spirit. Prepare by ever before every call and every session I have, I always spend half an hour or an hour connecting and that feels good. That’s still under the tents that I have an intention behind it to lead powerfully.

I could see the setup there might be great. In order to create the being of spirit, I must create the teaching. In order to create teaching, I must enroll now. That’s spirit as an end from some other means. What I’m curious about is the practice of you embodying the being of spirit, which is like, “Spirit is here in this moment and then the next moment.” Feeling into what is spirit calling me to do at this moment.

To dance and sing and things like that. Those kinds of things were true to me rather than it doesn’t have a means to an end. It seems wrong just to put the idea out there that I use something like a spirit as a means to an end to achieve an objective.

Also, many of us do that.

That’s part of the reason why I’m in this space is that I freaking hate that stuff. I hate the disingenuous. Anyway, that’s all. It’s quite simple things that I don’t give my life. I don’t give enough space because I can always come up with the reason for things that I have to do.

The voice that you described is a voice that has served you for 30-plus years and it’s well-worn territory. It’s also I assert part of the voice of your fear. We’re not trying to make that go away. That voice may well be there. All we’re creating is a different place to come from rather than reacting to that voice. The reaction of the voice is, “Fuck. I need to do a whole bunch of stuff or fuck them. They’re not doing that. At least I can feel good enough and then I don’t have to buy into this voice of the story.” All of that is engagement with that part of your stuff. The path of spirit may well guide you. What is there for me to do is to write some copy or to write a post that inspires me or to reach out to someone to invite them. It may also be like, “Go and fucking walk in the snow,” or, “I’m going to play guitar for two hours.” You’re like, “Fuck you. I’ll make you into a song.” Whatever, who knows, right? I’m going to let you be there.

It’s funny, the piece that you put about like that. I haven’t written in a month, which is unusual for me. It’s something that I enjoy doing and I feel that it is a practice. I’m sure you can attest to this, too. When I am feeling tethered to the spirit, that’s when my writing is fantastic. I’m like, “Where the hell is this coming from?” Sometimes you look back at your stuff and you’re like, “Holy shit,” but I haven’t even felt that impulse lately and I haven’t made the connection. Maybe that’s because I haven’t been making enough space to feel connected lately.

I have a few things to put into the space and then I want to check and see what you see you want to practice going forward from here. Are you familiar with Michael Beckwith?

I know that name. I don’t know how.

He’s cool. He’s a black preacher who created the Homeboy Ministries. He used to have long dreads and now he got a shaved head. He’s an amazing preacher. His ministry these days that’s called Agape Ministries. Brilliant man and incredible energy. He’s in his 60s and he’s doing backflips and stuff. It’s ridiculous. He has this distinction which is the kingdom of consciousness that we move through in relationship with spirit.

In the spirit, there's an essence of surrender that needs to happen. Click To Tweet

Those four kingdoms are things that happen to me, which is the lowest level of consciousness. It’s a victim of life’s happening onto me. The next level is things happen by me. This is the place most of us that is I can trust myself. That’s where we tend to be. It’s like, “It’s all me moving stuff into the world and things happen by me.” The next layer is things happen through me. I can trust spirit but I’m not co-creating with it. It’s more like I’m a vessel through which stuff passes. The highest level of consciousness is things that happen as me. Spirit exists in this world as me. There’s a dynamic back and forth. Trusting with spirits bringing and trusting that I am the embodiment of spirit at this moment in time. I don’t know that there’s anything for you to do with that. I just want to put that into the space for you to like, “There you go. That’s there.”

The other thing I want to share is more to connect with you and say most of my work over the last couple of years shifted into this realm because I’m reliable down the path of me doing everything but it’s not hard for me. Trusting something beyond myself and even beyond the conception of my intellect. That comes tough. What I’ve noticed is that as I trust that more, a lot of struggle falls away, you may have even heard me say this and that is confronting for me. To let go of struggle in my life is quite confronting because if I’m struggling, I’m doing the work. If I’m doing the work, I’m not going to be left behind. If I’m not going to be left behind, I can breathe and eventually, I’ll get to where I meant to get and whatever. As you practice this, that voice may get louder rather than quieter. That doesn’t mean your practice isn’t working or that you’re not on the path. What do you see to take on, Evan? What do you see from here that there might be to practice?

There’s a level of trusting, an impulse that I don’t think I’ve done. I can see the trap also like, “I’m just going to structure spiritual time.” Do you know what I mean? I do spend this much time and then it’s like, “It’s the same game, though.” There’s something for me and it might be unstructured, which is edgy for you. Where it’s like being able to wake up one morning and if I don’t have anything on my calendar. I don’t know what I’m going to do but I’m going to get my car and go somewhere not here because that’s where so much of my inspiration comes into my work and my writing comes from that. It doesn’t come from the daily grind. I haven’t made any space for that.

What structure do you think would support that practice?

That’s what’s interesting. I’m stuck there because I’m also like, “I don’t want it to become another thing on the calendar in some regard.” If I don’t do that, I also know that it could get lost in the shuffle of not being done.

The structure might be something as simple as a sticky that you put to remind you what spirit is telling me. It doesn’t have to be five minutes at 9:00 AM. It might be this but it doesn’t have to be. At 9:00 AM, I sit down, I think of spirit and I stop but wherever you start is great. I get what I’m hearing you say is an absentee structure reliably that this is not going to be what’s happening because the way your life is set up is to work inside this wagon rut that we’ve talked about.

I’ve got some travel through California and I have some pretty big gaps of time in between. I was thinking that I want to utilize those to go somewhere beautiful. Get into some hot springs rather than trying to go like, “I’ve got to find a place with a great internet connection so I can keep hammering,” because that’s where my mind has been at all times. I’ll finish the intensive and I’ve got six days until the other one so I’ll get an Airbnb, do all this stuff and create more. It’s like, “I’m in this beautiful mountain town.” All I’m planning is how I can find a good place to work. It’s creating some space around those times to not only integrate everything that I’m going through at that moment but use that space to seek spirit, inspiration and joy because through my connection to spirit, that’s where my joy emerges. There’s a childlikeness to it. When I feel connected, I feel playful.

Is there anything specific that you want to declare or you’re going to take on whether it’s, “I’m going to use those seven days,” or, “I’m going to sit down and meditate and think about what is spirit offering me at this moment.” I’m not going to push you much further than this but I want to check if there’s anything specific you want to declare as far as something you’re going to practice?

Between those six days that I have, I have a few commitments that I have to do but I’m not going to take anything on top of that. I’m going to do the coaching calls and run my group. I’m going to get out, explore and use that window of time to not even plan too much but allow spirits to guide me and let the right people come into my life and invite me to the right thing. Life often happens when you allow it to. Use that window to reinvigorate that connection.

I’m getting burned on my calls from my mentor for my MCC certification stuff. We don’t give people practice at the mentor code, the master certificate or any of the MCC level. I’m going to give you practice anyhow. I don’t care. The thing that you might take on that might support you is noticing when not enough in all of its iterations is showing up and asking yourself, “What is spirit calling for at this moment?” A way to choose a different context at the moment and it makes no sense to me but it’s telling me to go barefoot and walk around the block. You don’t even have to do it. Maybe all you do is start to listen to the voice and hear what spirit is calling for at the moment and maybe you are empowered and take it on. Anything else that would have this feel complete before we start to go into our wind down?

No. I didn’t expect the conversation to go in this direction at all.

Me neither. I hoped it wouldn’t. We’ll shift into winding down and I’m going to finish up. I don’t feel settled in this area in my own life. Much of my work is in this area and I’ve been ready to declare a breakthrough in this area but I’ve been working on a breakthrough in spirit. I’ve been at that phase, it’s me walking into a brick wall and I’m like, “That didn’t work. Let’s try it. It’s still a brick wall.” There’s a point where the voice came in and you’re talking about nothing’s enough. I was like, “The conversation is going to be about spirit.” I, at least, have to trust that voice and ask what is your relationship to it. It’s cool to go there.

Relationship With The Spirit: Create space to seek spirit, inspiration, and joy.

I love that whatever I’m working in is where you’re at capacity as well.

It’s cool because I find in this work, what we’re leading are people who are maybe one or a couple of steps behind us. Not by much. The breakthrough we’re up for is going to be whatever we generate sources the breakthrough for the people we’re supporting. You’re in The Forge. A lot of people in The Forge are either right on the verge of creating a breakthrough or in the process of creating the breakthrough. We’re starting to see a lot of popping like kernels of popcorn popping. That’s how that goes. I generate something and that allows energetically something to come forward that I was expecting. It’s cool that you’re here too.

I acknowledge you, Evan, for generating all the results that you’re generating. You’re having a huge impact and creating a bunch or you’re having people reach out to you. That’s remarkable and here you are doing this work in partnership with that. It’s not that I don’t hear you doing or looking through this lens taking on your life from the lens of, “If I can just do this then things will be better.” Although your fear might sometimes pull you in that direction, you’re creating some results and having an impact in the world and still committed to doing your work, which is remarkable and a measure of who you are as a man.

Thank you.

Anything you want to share about the conversation of either, “I didn’t think we’d go there.” “I have questions.” “I’m surprised.” “I hate it?” Anything else?

I like that ego aspect of the question in relationship to spirit because it did catch me off a little bit off guard. Also, I could feel in this conversation that there was some fear that came up. It’s like, “Where are we going?” It was fear for you as well. How we can co-op coach into wanting to support them and I was present to that part of me. It’s like, “I’ve got to make them look good for this hour.” I didn’t fall into that trap or anything like that. I felt sincere but I thought that was a funny remark to make.

We would have caught that pretty early on. When coaches aren’t working with coaches or they’re not getting support in their own work, they’re like, “My clients say that I’m doing good but the thing that we step over is we are vested in making the person supporting us feel good.” We’ve done a lot of work on that in the Forge. I assume you watch the call reviews and often it’s like, “You guys are colluding. You’re playing nicely together.” It’s so human. I don’t want to come out and be like, “You’re not doing good at this.” That’s not going to feel good at all.

Let me see if there’s anything else that I’m present to. The thing I remember was I was training coaches in San Diego. The way we did that work was we had the group of coaches that we were training. We had a leadership team and that was a little hierarchical. The CEO of this company was the person leading this work and developing my leadership. We all would gather before we get together with the participants and we’d share what’s going on.

It’s like, “Here’s where I’m at.” The reason we do that is as if I’m trying to keep my emotions down or if I’m fucked up because of this breakdown in my life and I’m trying to operate over the top of it, it’s not going to work. I’m going to show up in the room and that’s going to be in the space. We work on that. We clear it all out before we begin our work with the other people. I was sharing with them, “I’ve got a bunch more clients coming on. It’s good but I noticed it’s never enough money.”

It gave me some hope but it was also infuriating because he was like, “I hear you say that there’s never enough money. What that tells me is, this is not an issue about money. This is probably more a spiritual issue.” If it’s never enough, no matter what, that’s probably some inability on your part and I’m to trust that on some level, you’re provided for. The hopeful part was, “Maybe there’s a way out of this beyond making more money.” The rest of me was like, “Fuck you. I need more money. I don’t need a Bible or whatever. What does that even mean? How do I operationalize that?” It’s funny, this stuff.

I get that. I see that part of me that’s like, “Yeah,” but it’s like, “I need more abundance.” That’s what I came to this conversation saying. I was like, “I don’t think there is a place where we feel enough.” Until I break, like bankrupt this context or whatever.

I want to finish by acknowledging you. May I do so? I want to start by acknowledging you for the embodiment of the spirit that you are, Evan. There’s such a purity to your energy. It’s how I experienced you. You’re committed to truth and committed to moving the stuff out of that way so that truth can be received and given from a place of real love. It’s all perfect exactly as it is. From there, we can start to take a look at what’s going on. That is such a gift to men, women and to all of us. I acknowledge you for being someone so reliable to do his work to get coached by Hans, here, to be in The Forge, to go do your work with John Wineland or take on Neigong. You’re reliable to be supported.

The path of spirit guides you towards what there is for you to do right now. Click To Tweet

For me, that makes you so trustable. It’s not that you’re, it’s not that because you’re doing that then I can trust you. It’s that all of the work you are reliable to do has you be embodied in such a way that you occur trustable. I feel like I can rely on you. I honor the integrity that you are not from rigidity but from a commitment to being workable as a man to support others and to your commitment to support others first and foremost by getting supported is beautiful and it does our profession honor.

Thank you.

You’re welcome. Where do people find out about you, what you’re up to, read your writing and all that stuff?

Facebook. Evan Veritas. I run a business. It’s called Integral Alpha. I’m on Instagram. You can find it there. You can email me Evan@IntegralAlpha.com. I’m happy to have a conversation with any of you or anybody. I run an eight-week program. If anyone’s interested in that, feel free to reach out to me. It’s an eight-week leadership program for men and it takes a lot of that embodiment work that I’ve been studying for the last few years or so with John. It takes a little bit of the work that we do, too so there’s an ontological lens for it, for sure. It’s an amazing opportunity to get together. I ran my first iteration of it and we finished it. Every single guy is continuing to work with me so it seems to be working. People like it. Things are growing and things are happening so feel free to reach out. I’d be happy to connect.

Is it virtual?

Yeah. It’s all over Zoom. We get one call a week for two hours. It’s all virtual.

We need more of all of this work but I’m always present to the wounding of the masculine and the feminine and what’s available when we start to heal that. It embodies something beyond a reaction to the wound.

It’s beautiful work. I’m honored to do it.

I recommend for all of you reading that you follow Evan. He’s been with us in The Forge for six months. I say this all the time, “Follow the people that are going through The Forge,” because these are people in a deeply immersive transformative container and taking on their work. They’re people that are creating art in the world and putting themselves into the world in a way that’s fully expressed. It models the humility, full expression, courage and integrity required to be a leader.

We have the Creating Clients Course. That’s ten weeks and what we’re doing is helping you break down the false idea that there’s coaching or whatever you love doing over here and there’s this crappy thing called selling or creating clients that you’ve got to do over there. All of that suck and everything built on top of that, which is all these funnels and sales training. It all means that the best it gets is that you get good at doing a thing that you don’t like doing, hopefully, so you can minimize your time spent over there.

That robs you of joy and the opportunity that’s available from integrating these two things and finding, “Creating clients can be part of my natural way of being, deepening relationships with people and finding joy and connection.” From there, it all becomes possible. If that’s interesting to you, you can go to AdamQuiney.com/clientcreation. We’ve got that there. You went through that, Evan. You got a freebie as a part of the course.

It’s a fantastic course. I highly recommend it. It’s super helpful for anyone that’s getting clients for sure.

Thanks for reading. I appreciate every one. We will see you next time.

Important Links:

• Evan Meyer
• John Wineland
• Bay
• MeetUp.com
• Facebook group
• Calum Ramsay
• Confabulation
• EMLT
• EWRI
• Hans
• Michael Beckwith
• Agape
• The Forge
• Integral Alpha – Facebook
• Instagram – Integral Alpha
• Evan@IntegralAlpha.com
• AdamQuiney.com/clientcreation

About Evan Meyer

I support men and women in the realm of intimacy, purpose, relationship and embodiment through transformational gatherings, training, and 1:1 coaching.

I work with clients who want to have deeper, more meaningful relationships, align with their purpose, and live fully self-expressed. I create clearings with clients so they can live as the deepest expression of their hearts.