BraveCo Podcast

I sat down with my daughter-in-law Alley for one of the most requested conversations on the Brave Co podcast: how to actually date well. We dig into why so few people were ever taught how to date, what it really means to be ready for a relationship, and why "dating yourself" first changes everything about how you show up for someone else.

From there, Alley and I walk through defining the relationship instead of letting it drift "organically," why trust in marriage actually starts on your very first date, and how leading with intentionality removes so much of the anxiety that ruins modern dating. Then we get into the intimacy ladder, fourteen questions I've used to figure out whether someone is safe, fun, aligned in values, and ready to build a real future, including how to handle a partner's past, how to fight fair, and how to keep God (not each other) as your source of security.

If you're dating, thinking about dating, or just want to understand why your relationship feels stuck at a certain level, this episode gives you a real framework instead of guesswork. Stay brave out there, and if this helped you, subscribe to the Brave Co podcast and share it with someone who needs it.

Chapters:
00:00 – Welcome
07:08 – Are You Ready to Date? Learning to "Date Yourself" First
14:20 – Trust Starts on Day One, Not on Your Wedding Day
21:24 – Killing the "Organic Dating" Myth
28:36 – A Framework for Every Step of Dating
35:51 – "Is This the One?" 
42:57 – Red Flags, Safe People, and Handling Someone's Past
50:05 – Insecurity, Neediness, and Keeping God in the God Spot
57:16 – Conflict Skills: How Couples Learn to Fight Fair
1:04:27 – Unconditional Love, Win-Win, and Why "Forever Isn't Long Enough"
CONNECT WITH BRAVECO
Join Our Free Community for Men (ladies, sign up your man): https://www.braveco.org
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/braveco.men
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/braveco.men/
Shop: https://shop.braveco.org/
ABOUT BRAVECO: We live in a time where men are hunting for the truth and looking for the codebook to manhood. At BraveCo, we are on a mission to heal the narrative of masculinity across a generation; fighting the good fight together because every man should feel confident and capable of facing his pain, loving deeply, and leading a life that impacts the world around him.

This week's episode is something special — it's John Eldridge's live message from our Brave Co conference, and it is one of the most powerful things I've ever witnessed delivered to a room full of men. John opens with Proverbs 4:23 and builds an entire framework around a single, urgent idea: the heart is the center of everything. Your ability to love, to fight, to chase your calling, to win your kids, to find joy — all of it flows from your heart. And if your heart has been shut down, beaten up, or buried under years of performance and pain, nothing else in your life is going to work the way God designed it to.

John walks through three things wired into the masculine soul — battle, adventure, and beauty — and what happens when men lose access to them. He does a live exercise with the room around favorite movies that is genuinely one of the most illuminating things I've ever seen, showing how story is the language of the heart and how the films we love are whispering clues about our true identity and mission. He also takes on the emasculated version of Jesus that most men have been handed by the church — the soft, religious, timid figure who no man would actually follow into battle — and replaces it with the fierce, brilliant, playful, deeply human Jesus of the Gospels.

The core of this message is a call to wholeheartedness — not more discipline, not more willpower, but the actual restoration of the heart that Jesus came to accomplish. John is a therapist with 30 years of experience and thousands of men behind him, and he is not speaking in theory. He's speaking from the trenches of his own story. If you are a man who has been grinding hard and still feeling like something essential is missing, this message is for you. Please share it, leave a comment, and subscribe so more men can hear it. Stay brave.

00:00 – Welcome 
04:41 – Gender, the Masculine Soul, and the Image of God You Carry
09:22 – The Glory of God Is Man Fully Alive
14:03 – What Your Favorite Movies Reveal About Your Soul and True Identity
18:44 – Yahweh Is a Warrior
23:25 – The Emasculation Crisis
28:06 – The Real Jesus
32:47 – Adventure Is Food
37:28 – Beauty, Sexuality, and the Assault on the Masculine Heart
42:09 – Wholeheartedness Is the Goal
CONNECT WITH BRAVECO
Join Our Free Community for Men (ladies, sign up your man): https://www.braveco.org
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/braveco.men
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/braveco.men/
Shop: https://shop.braveco.org/
ABOUT BRAVECO: We live in a time where men are hunting for the truth and looking for the codebook to manhood. At BraveCo, we are on a mission to heal the narrative of masculinity across a generation; fighting the good fight together because every man should feel confident and capable of facing his pain, loving deeply, and leading a life that impacts the world around him.

Connect with Todd: https://www.ridinghighministries.org/about

In this episode, I sit down with one of my best friends on the planet, Todd Pierce — a former professional bareback rider who competed in over 100 rodeos a year and now runs Riding High Ministries, where he breaks wild horses in front of live audiences as a living picture of man's relationship with God. Todd takes us inside the brutal world of professional rodeo: the borrowed gear, the 15-plus knockouts, the broken bones, the nights driving through the dark eating hot dogs just to get to the next event. But what really hits different is hearing him talk about what the rodeo life couldn't prepare him for — being a husband and a father who actually shows up emotionally.

What makes Todd's story so powerful is that he spent years doing ministry — real, sincere, devoted ministry — and still giving surface-level answers to deeply hurting men. It wasn't until he discovered tools around emotional intelligence, culture of honor, and the courage to say "I don't know what I'm doing" that things started to shift. Hearing him describe the moment his son Colton sat him down and told him what it was like to grow up with him — and watching Todd actually receive it instead of deflect it — is one of the most honest and healing things I've ever witnessed in a man.

If you've ever felt like you were doing everything right and still falling short at home, this episode is for you. Todd and I get into how men unknowingly inherit an operating system they never chose, why toughness without vulnerability will cost you the people you love most, and what it actually looks like to create a new culture in your marriage, your parenting, and your walk with God. This conversation will challenge you and, I believe, set something free in you. Stay brave.

Chapters:
00:00 – Welcome to Brave Co
06:47 – From Racehorse Jockey to First-Time Rodeo Competitor
13:34 – The Raw, Unfiltered Reality of Professional Rodeo Life
20:21 – Knocked Out and Dragged
27:08 – When Toughness Stops Working
33:55 – Injury, End of Career, and the Start of Something New
40:42 – The Operating System You Never Chose
47:29 – The First Truly Courageous Thing He Ever Did
54:16 – Healing Through Hard Conversations With Your Wife and Kids
1:01:03 – Living Transparent and a Prayer Over Every Man Listening
CONNECT WITH BRAVECO
Join Our Free Community for Men (ladies, sign up your man): https://www.braveco.org
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/braveco.men
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/braveco.men/
Shop: https://shop.braveco.org/
ABOUT BRAVECO: We live in a time where men are hunting for the truth and looking for the codebook to manhood. At BraveCo, we are on a mission to heal the narrative of masculinity across a generation; fighting the good fight together because every man should feel confident and capable of facing his pain, loving deeply, and leading a life that impacts the world around him.

Connect with Abi: https://www.instagram.com/abistumvoll/

I don't bring many women onto BraveCo, but when I do, it's because they have something that men need to hear — something they won't get anywhere else. Abby Stumble is one of my oldest and most trusted friends, and this conversation is one of the most honest ones I've ever had on this podcast. Abby grew up thinking she had a great childhood. She was wrong. A mentally ill, drug-addicted mother. A home full of chaos she internalized as her own failure. Panic attacks, suicidal thoughts, self-hatred, and a body she despised — all without a single clear explanation for why. It wasn't until she was 37 that the real story started to unravel. And what happened next changed everything she thought she knew about herself, her marriage, and what healing actually looks like.

We go deep into marriage in this one — specifically what happened when two beautiful train-wrecks decided to build a life together. Abby and Justin's story is a masterclass in how broken attachment cycles play out in real relationships: the avoidant man who disappears, the anxious woman who picks fights just to pull him back, and both of them trauma-bonding through explosions they thought was just how love worked. Sound familiar? We unpack the exact moment their marriage started to change — and it wasn't a big dramatic breakthrough. It was ownership. Honesty without shame. Vulnerability that didn't demand rescue. And I share my own piece of this too, because for years I went home every night feeling like a boy, not a man — isolated, ashamed, and slowly drowning while Lauren watched me disappear. This is the conversation that brings all of that into the open.

And then Abby goes somewhere I didn't expect. She tells the story of a season four years ago when she was so sick she couldn't walk ten feet, had lost thirty pounds, and begged Justin — through genuine physical torment — to end her suffering. What she learned in that dark place about present-moment living, nervous system regulation, collecting moments of good, and training your brain to attach to safety instead of pain is some of the most practical, life-changing content I've ever heard. If you're in a hard season right now — with your health, your marriage, your emotions, or your sense of who you are as a man — this episode is for you. Stay Brave.

Chapters:
00:00 – Welcome to BraveCo
09:44 – Growing Up in Chaos
19:27 – The Slow Unraveling
29:11 – Two Trainwrecks, One Marriage
38:54 – Jason's Story
48:38 – The Vulnerability Men Fear Most 
58:21 – Small Steps, Big Culture
1:08:05 – When the Body Breaks Down
1:17:48 – Regulating the Nervous System
1:27:32 – The Tiny Things, The Future With Hope, and a Prayer Over Every Person Listening
CONNECT WITH BRAVECO
Join Our Free Community for Men (ladies, sign up your man): https://www.braveco.org
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/braveco.men
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/braveco.men/
Shop: https://shop.braveco.org/
ABOUT BRAVECO: We live in a time where men are hunting for the truth and looking for the codebook to manhood. At BraveCo, we are on a mission to heal the narrative of masculinity across a generation; fighting the good fight together because every man should feel confident and capable of facing his pain, loving deeply, and leading a life that impacts the world around him.

Website: johndeloney.com
Instagram:https://www.instagram.com/johndelony/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JohnDelony/
Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@johndelony
Youtube Channel:  @TheDrJohnDelonyShow  

I don't say this lightly — I finished this book in a single day. Dr. John Delony's Building a Non-Anxious Life is one of the most practical, honest, and genuinely helpful things I've put in front of the men who follow Brave Co. And before I even started asking questions, I had to be upfront with John about something: anxiety hasn't just been an academic topic for me. It's been my life. From OCD as a kid that I couldn't name, to coping in ways I'm not proud of, to a full nervous breakdown — I've spent years clawing my way out of a hole I didn't fully understand until much later. That's exactly why this conversation matters so much to me.

Dr. Delony has two PhDs, has worked in mental health for decades, and somehow manages to take the most complex stuff about how our brains and bodies work and make it simple enough to act on. In this episode, we unpack what anxiety actually is — not a disease, not a character flaw, not a broken brain — but a smoke detector. A signal. Your body working exactly the way it was designed to work to get your attention about something that isn't right in your world. We talk about the ticker tape of shame that runs under most men's lives, why so many high-achieving guys are secretly falling apart, what it means to actually love yourself, and why you absolutely cannot do this alone.

Dr. Delony also walks us through his six daily choices framework — Choose Reality, Choose Connection, Choose Freedom, Choose Health and Healing, Choose Mindfulness, and Choose Belief — and we get into the ones that hit me hardest personally. If you're a man who has ever felt like you're behind, like you're not doing enough, like no matter what you accomplish it still doesn't feel like it's working — this episode is going to stop you in your tracks. Go grab the book. Take the anxiety test at johndeloney.com. And stay brave.

Chapters:
00:00 – Jason Gets Personal About His Own Battle With Anxiety
07:02 – Your Body Isn't Broken — It's Working Exactly as Designed
14:05 – We've Built a World Our Bodies Can't Survive In
21:07 – What Anxiety Actually Is
28:09 – The Ticker Tape Lie
35:12 – The Real Cheat Code
42:14 – The 6 Daily Choices
49:16 – Freedom, Health and Healing, and the Power of Mindfulness
56:19 – Why Self-Actualization Is a Myth
1:03:21 – What Are You Really Worth?
CONNECT WITH BRAVECO
Join Our Free Community for Men (ladies, sign up your man): https://www.braveco.org
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/braveco.men
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/braveco.men/
Shop: https://shop.braveco.org/
ABOUT BRAVECO: We live in a time where men are hunting for the truth and looking for the codebook to manhood. At BraveCo, we are on a mission to heal the narrative of masculinity across a generation; fighting the good fight together because every man should feel confident and capable of facing his pain, loving deeply, and leading a life that impacts the world around him.