How Your Relationship With Yourself Shapes Every Other Relationship featuring Traver Boehm

Traver Boehm is back on the show for the third time, and I still remember his first story like it was yesterday. He's a former professional MMA fighter and bodyguard with a master's degree in traditional Chinese medicine, a hospice volunteer, more than 11 years sober, and the founder of the Uncivilized movement. He's the author of Today I Rise, Uncivilized, and 28 Days in Darkness, and he has now spent 77 days of his life in complete darkness, including 49 straight days in a dark room in Tuscany with no phone, no people, and no clock.

We talk about what it takes to stop running from yourself, the fragmentation I see in so many men, and the morning a phrase landed so hard that Traver dropped to his knees. We also get honest about suicide, why men need to pick up the phone, and what a relationship with yourself does for your marriage and your kids. If you're a dad who feels the drift of busyness and wonders who you really are underneath it, this conversation is for you.

Timeline Summary

[1:01] Larry welcomes Traver Boehm back for his third time on the show

[4:32] Larry introduces Traver: MMA fighter, bodyguard, hospice volunteer, 11 years sober, and 77 days in the dark

[6:01] How 2016 brought a lost pregnancy, a divorce, and a lost business, and the question of who he was as a man

[8:27] Fragmentation: the man everyone sees, the man his family sees, and the man nobody sees

[10:26] Why Traver felt called back into the dark after his father died

[11:49] The call about his cousin's death that pushed him to write his book and go back into darkness

[19:09] Terror and acceptance: why a true initiation has to carry the risk of a breakdown

[23:04] A message to men in dark times: pick up the phone, because we want you to reach out

[28:52] The mantra One Life, All In: why a man is meant to live one life, not a public, private, and secret one