Men Behaving Honestly Podcast

When's the last time a mate actually checked in on you? Not a "you alright?" in the group chat. Properly checked in.Most men can't answer that. And most men don't realise they're lonely either, because loneliness doesn't look like sitting on your own. It looks like being in a room full of people, with a partner, kids and mates around you, and still not being able to say how you actually feel.In this episode, Johnny and James get honest about loneliness. The kind you can't admit to because admitting it feels weak. They talk about "philosophical loneliness", where you've outgrown the conversations your mates want to have and you feel like a loser for it, when really you're just in the wrong room.They get into the stuff most men never say out loud: why personal growth can quietly cost you friendships, why attraction beats demand every time (the barbecue with the non-alcoholic beer says it all), the bravery it takes to be the one who suggests the walk instead of the pub, and the brother's stag do that went from 60 men to 8 the second the plan changed.And the big one. Why we're so bad at checking in on each other. The barber hurt that one mate never messaged him. The 3pm text that means more than you think. Why "let me fix it for you" isn't what your mate needs, and why holding space beats jumping to solutions every time.Because asking for help isn't giving up. It's refusing to give up.For men, and for the people who love them.Men Behaving Honestly. The conversations most men are having in their heads. Now said out loud.🎧 Listen & follow: https://www.menbehavinghonestly.com📸 Instagram: @menbehavinghonestly📝 Free self-assessment check: https://www.menbehavinghonestly.com/free-self-assessment-check🎟️ September workshop (limited spaces): https://www.menbehavinghonestly.com/workshop-septemberHosts: Johnny Lawrence (behavioural change expert, featured on BBC, The Telegraph, NHS) & James Shireby (qualified coach & counsellor).⚠️ This episode touches on loneliness, depression and suicidal feelings. If you're struggling, you're not alone. Samaritans are free, 24/7, on 116 123, or text SHOUT to 85258.

"If you want to know why you drink, stop drinking." That's what a therapist told Sober Dave. And it's the most uncomfortable, honest thing in this whole episode.In 2026, three out of four suicides are still men. A lot of them involve a drink. But this episode isn't really about alcohol. It's about escape. The urge most men know but never name, to get away from how they're feeling, whatever it takes.Johnny and James sit down with David Wilson, aka Sober Dave, who drank from 14 to 54 and is now coming up to eight years without it. He's not preaching from the mountain top. He's a bloke who hid cans from the off-licence so no one would call him an alcoholic, who drank alone to Pink Floyd until the door of his "pod" clunked shut and reality could do one.Together they get into the stuff most men never say out loud: why the thing is never the thing (seven years sober and it was a joint on a beach that nearly got him, then trainers, then Greggs), why connection is the actual antidote to addiction, the "mistress" he had to dump, and the void that's so loud when you stop that you'll fill it with anything.They go underneath it too. The childhood needs that never got met. The note Dave's mum left when he was 14. Trauma as not what happened to you, but what should have and didn't. And the question Dave couldn't answer without going quiet: who are you with the labels off?Because addiction isn't really the problem. It's the solution you found to a problem you never got to talk about.For men, and for the people who love them.Men Behaving Honestly. The conversations most men are having in their heads. Now said out loud.--------------------------------🎧 Listen & follow: https://www.menbehavinghonestly.com📸 Instagram: @menbehavinghonestly📝 Free self-assessment check: https://www.menbehavinghonestly.com/free-self-assessment-check🎟️ September workshop (limited spaces): https://www.menbehavinghonestly.com/workshop-september--------------------------------Hosts: Johnny Lawrence (behavioural change expert, featured on BBC, The Telegraph, NHS) & James Shireby (qualified coach & counsellor).⚠️ This episode touches on addiction, alcohol, depression and suicide. If you're struggling, you're not alone. Samaritans are free, 24/7, on 116 123, or text SHOUT to 85258.

Suppressed anger is one of the most dangerous things a man can do to himself. Bottle it up and it goes one of two ways. Outward into rage, or inward into depression. Neither ends well.In this episode, James and Johnny get honest about anger, the emotion James has wrestled with his whole life. From kicking off over a game of pool as a kid, to carrying it through the military, to slowly working out that he never really had an anger problem at all. He had a self-worth problem.Because here's the thing most men never get told: anger is rarely the real issue. It's a message. An alert. Usually it's sitting on top of something harder underneath, like rejection, fear, feeling not good enough, feeling helpless. Deal with the anger and you'll chase it forever. Deal with what's underneath, and it starts to settle.This one's a proper conversation, funny, raw and honest, about why "calm down" never works, why you should stop asking yourself why you're angry, the difference between anger and rage, and a simple framework you can actually use the next time you feel yourself boiling over.For men, and for the people who love them.Men Behaving Honestly. The conversations most men are having in their heads. Now said out loud.--------------------------------------------🎧 Listen & follow: https://www.menbehavinghonestly.com📸 Instagram: @menbehavinghonestly📝 Free self-assessment check: https://www.menbehavinghonestly.com/free-self-assessment-check🎟️ September workshop (limited spaces): https://www.menbehavinghonestly.com/workshop-september--------------------------------------------Hosts: Johnny Lawrence (behavioural change expert, featured on BBC, The Telegraph, NHS) & James Shireby (qualified coach & counsellor).--------------------------------------------⚠️ This episode touches on depression and suicidal feelings. If you're struggling, you're not alone. Samaritans are free, 24/7, on 116 123, or text SHOUT to 85258.

Porn will never judge you. It'll never let you down. It'll never say no. And that's exactly the problem.In Episode 4, James and Johnny are joined by Taner Hassan, psychotherapist, addiction specialist and a man 20 years into his own recovery, for the conversation most men have never had out loud: when does porn stop being harmless and start being the thing you hide behind?They get into why porn has quietly become the sex education for a generation of young men. Why this is the one with no warning signs, nothing shows until it's already a problem. What's really going on when a man turns down his partner and heads upstairs alone. The three C's every partner needs to hear: you didn't cause it, you can't control it, you can't cure it. And why it's never about the act, it's about what the act is helping you avoid.No shame. No lectures. Three blokes asking the uncomfortable questions so you don't have to.Take the free self-assessment → https://www.menbehavinghonestly.com/free-self-assessment-checkTaner Hassan is a psychotherapist, performance coach and addiction specialist — co-founder of The Recovery Cartel.Johnny Lawrence is a behavioural change expert, featured on BBC, The Telegraph, and the NHS.James Shireby is a qualified coach and counsellor based in Tunbridge Wells.Men Behaving Honestly: the conversations most men are having in their heads. Now said out loud. For men, and for the people who love them.Website: https://www.menbehavinghonestly.comSpotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3HWNkMdhfsOVPpdvLCsnbGApple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/men-behaving-honestly-podcast/id1896707228September Workshop — in-person, limited places:https://www.menbehavinghonestly.com/workshop-september

A lot of men know what they're supposed to be. The problem is they never asked whether they actually wanted it.In Episode 3, James and Johnny dig into the question that sits underneath everything else in this series: how do you become the man you actually want to be, not the version that got assembled from everyone else's expectations?They get into how the things you judge in other people are a direct window into your own insecurities. Why chasing the right outcomes can still leave you feeling completely empty. How confidence isn't a performance, it's the reputation you quietly build with yourself. And why knowing where you want to go is useless until you're honest about where you actually are right now.Real stories. No scripts. Two blokes working it out live, and giving you the space to do the same.Take the free self-assessment → https://www.menbehavinghonestly.com/free-self-assessment-checkJohnny Lawrence is a behavioural change expert, featured on BBC, The Telegraph, and the NHS.James Shireby is a qualified coach and counsellor based in Tunbridge Wells.Men Behaving Honestly: the conversations most men are having in their heads. Now said out loud. For men, and for the people who love them.Website: https://www.menbehavinghonestly.comSpotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3HWNkMdhfsOVPpdvLCsnbGApple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/men-behaving-honestly-podcast/id1896707228September Workshop — in-person, limited places:https://www.menbehavinghonestly.com/workshop-september

He thought he was fine. Then he ended up in A&E with heart flutters from grief he'd never actually felt.In this one, Johnny and James sit down with Ben Coomber, men's performance coach, founder of Awesome Supplements, husband, dad, and someone who's been through depression and come out the other side with a lot of wisdom. We pull apart what most men have been doing their whole lives without realising: walking around the pain instead of through it.What we get into:Why "just talk to your mates" is shit advice when no one's listeningThe 40% of you your partner doesn't know and why that's the bit that's killing the relationshipMental fitness vs mental health, and why most men have this the wrong way roundWhy fitness on its own won't fix the thing you're avoidingThe disarming technique that takes the heat out of every hard conversation with your partnerPrimary vs secondary emotions, why you keep getting angry when you're actually sadThe "door frame" rule for being a different man at work and at homeWhy breathwork did in 45 minutes what years of talk therapy didn'tGenerational pain and how to be the one who stops the patternThe thread running through the whole thing is avoidance. The freedom you're looking for is in the thing you're avoiding and Ben lays out exactly what that looks like in practice.If you're a man who's been told to "open up" a hundred times but doesn't know where to start, this one's for you.---Not sure where you're actually at right now? Take the free Self-Assessment Check, takes 2 minutes:https://www.menbehavinghonestly.com/free-self-assessment-checkLive workshop in London this September, limited spots:https://www.menbehavinghonestly.com/workshop-september---Listen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3HWNkMdhfsOVPpdvLCsnbGListen on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/men-behaving-honestly-podcast/id1896707228Subscribe on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@MenBehavingHonestlyPodcast

Most men are stuck between "I'm fine" and rock bottom and the only way out is being properly honest with yourself first.This is Episode 1 of Men Behaving Honestly, a new 8-episode limited podcast series from Johnny and James. In this opening episode they map out the spectrum most men live on (between cracking on and rock bottom), why "I'm fine" is the most expensive lie we tell ourselves, and the bridge between thinking about your life and actually doing something about it.Free 2-min self-assessment — find out where you actually sit:→ https://www.menbehavinghonestly.com/free-self-assessment-check—————————————CHAPTERS00:00  Two blokes, no answers, real talk03:16  Where do you actually sit? The grey area most men live in06:53  "My wife sat me down and said she thought I was depressed"10:13  Scientists, fleas, and the lid that's already off14:42  Why "men need to talk more" is the most useless advice in the world20:48  When the task is too big, make it smaller. Then smaller. Then smaller.23:47  The lad I knew in the army and the silence that cost him28:57  Mount Toubkal: "Johnny, up or down?"35:11  Kilimanjaro: I got carried down like a baby37:01  "Just push through" might be the most dangerous advice you've ever heard41:22  Mum vs mother-in-law: who you actually call matters46:29  The only adventure worth taking is the truth—————————————LIVE WORKSHOP — LIVE IN LONDON SEPTEMBER 2026One day. In the room. The stuff this podcast can't do on its own, proper conversations, proper work, with men in the same place you are.→ https://www.menbehavinghonestly.com/workshop-september—————————————LISTEN ONApple Podcasts: TBCSpotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3HWNkMdhfsOVPpdvLCsnbGYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@MenBehavingHonestlyPodcast—————————————FOLLOWInstagram: @menbehavinghonestly https://www.instagram.com/menbehavinghonestly/—————————————ABOUT THE PODCASTMen Behaving Honestly is a limited 8-episode podcast about the conversations most men aren't having; the messy bit between "I'm alright mate" and falling apart. Hosted by Johnny and James, who are not therapists, not gurus, and very much working it out as they go. Expect banter, real stories, and the occasional uncomfortable truth.If you've ever said "yeah, I'm fine" without really meaning it, this one's for you.#MenBehavingHonestly #MensMentalHealth #MentalHealthPodcast #MensHealth #EmotionalHonesty