165: Fatherhood and Porn Addiction Recovery | How Your Healing Can Change the Next Generation

Porn addiction recovery is about more than learning how to stop watching porn. Over time, I have come to believe that real recovery asks a much deeper question: What kind of man am I becoming?

In this conversation with Chris Bruno on The Restorative Man Podcast, I share parts of my own story with pornography addiction, anxiety, perfectionism, emotional avoidance, marriage, and fatherhood. We explore how the patterns beneath addiction can continue even after pornography is gone, and why lasting recovery involves learning how to relate differently to stress, emotions, sexuality, relationships, responsibility, and God.

Fatherhood has made this work even more meaningful to me. The healthier my relationship becomes with my own anger, fear, shame, sexuality, and vulnerability, the better equipped I am to help my sons develop a healthy relationship with theirs. If I want them to grow up knowing they can talk openly about their emotions, bodies, sexuality, mistakes, and struggles, that kind of safety has to begin long before the difficult conversations arrive.

We also talk about what this means inside marriage. Porn recovery eventually shows up in the way we listen, handle criticism, work through resentment, take ownership, sacrifice for the people we love, and remain present when relationships become uncomfortable. Sobriety matters, but recovery becomes far more complete when it begins transforming the way we actually live.

Porn Addiction Recovery Is More Than Behavior Change

One of the most important lessons from my own recovery has been recognizing that pornography was not the only issue. Long before I understood what was happening, I was already using things like entertainment, food, and eventually sexual content to calm an anxious nervous system and escape internal pressure.

That changed how I began approaching recovery. Instead of only asking how to stop the behavior, I began paying attention to what I was trying to escape, what emotions were underneath the craving, and what kind of life I needed to build so I no longer depended on constant external relief.

This is what I mean by developing a recovery mindset and recovery lifestyle.

Your Emotional Recovery Changes the Way You Father

One of the themes Chris and I explore deeply is the connection between our own emotional healing and what we are able to give our children.

If my son learns that anger can be talked about, sadness can be expressed, mistakes can be repaired, and difficult questions do not threaten our relationship, I am helping build a foundation where sexuality does not have to become secret either.

My goal is not to raise sons who never experience sexual desire, confusion, temptation, or exposure to pornography. My goal is to help create the kind of relationship where they know those experiences can be brought into the light without shame.

That begins with the everyday relationship we create now.

Recovery Will Eventually Show Up in Your Marriage

I also share how marriage revealed parts of my addictive mindset that pornography sobriety alone had not resolved.

For me, this included defensiveness, perfectionism, obsessive thinking, difficulty listening, and the impulse to immediately fix or control uncomfortable situations. Learning to regulate my own emotions has helped me become more capable of listening to my wife, understanding her experience, and staying connected even when something she shares is difficult for me to hear.

This is why I believe recovery becomes visible in our relationships. The goal is not merely to become a man who no longer watches pornography. It is to become a man who can remain present, connected, honest, responsible, and grounded when life becomes uncomfortable.

Link to Blog Article for this Episode

Visit No More Desire Tools for Recovery for recovery tools and training, the free online community, my free eBook, Workshop, The RAIL Method ™ and more to help you break free from porn.

If you’re tired of trying to quit porn on your own, the No More Desire Academy gives you a structured path to recovery through coaching, brotherhood, practical tools, and step-by-step training. Learn more about the Academy.

If you want deeper, more personalized support, I also offer 1-on-1 porn addiction recovery coaching. We’ll work directly on your patterns, emotional triggers, recovery plan, and long-term growth. Learn more about working 1-on-1 with Jake Kastleman.

No More Desire provides coaching, education, community, and recovery support. This content is not therapy, medical care, psychiatric treatment, or couples counseling. If you are dealing with abuse, suicidal thoughts, psychiatric crisis, criminal sexual behavior, or danger to yourself or others, please seek qualified professional or emergency support.

God bless, my friend. Much love.

My gratitude for the music in this episode (in order of appearance) goes to Ievgen Poltavskyi, Nikita Kondrashev, Aleksey Voroninfrom Pixabay.

Transcript

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Jake Kastleman (00:00.16)
Welcome to No More Desire, where we build a mindset and lifestyle for lasting recovery from porn. My name's Jake Castleman and I'm excited to dive in with you. Let's get started, my friend.

Jake Kastleman (00:16.718)
Do you ever feel inadequate as a dad? Like you have the best of intentions and desires, but you can't seem to meet them? Does life often feel like a whirlwind or like there is so much going on with work and at home that it's difficult to take the time to plan and approach fatherhood mindfully and in a way that would be best for your kids? Is it hard sometimes to feel you are falling short of the man that you truly want to be? I get this. As a father, I've often felt inadequate.

overwhelmed or don't know the best way to interact, play, or bring proper discipline or systems to the table for my kids. I don't know all the right answers or have a perfect family. As a man with a past in pornography addiction, I still carry some of the same weaknesses and faults that I've worked hard to understand and move through. I've made headway and I also have a grander journey ahead of me too. That's what I'm talking about today.

Today's episode is from the Restorative Man podcast, where I was a guest with host Chris Bruno. You may remember Chris from episode 157, where we discussed father wounds and the emotional story behind sexual addiction. It was a blessing to speak with Chris then, and a blessing to see him again on his own show. Today, we talk about fatherhood, stewarding our sons, recovering from sex and porn addiction, and skills that we need to build of

Emotional regulation and lifestyle choices, systems, and habits to be the dad that our children truly need. As a fellow man on the path to succeeding as a father, I hope that my story is a blessing to you. Before we dive in, a reminder to join the No More Desire Brotherhood, download my ebook, The 10 Tools to Conquer Cravings, or sign up for my free workshop, The Eight Keys to Lose Your Desire for Porn. These free resources are your next step.

To get sober, and you'll find them at nomordesire.com slash tools. All right, let's get started.

Chris Bruno (02:20.738)
Hey guys, welcome back to the Restorative Man Podcast. This is Chris Bruno today, and I am coming to you with a special guest. And I am really excited for the conversation that is ahead. I was able to join Jake, our guest today on his podcast a couple of weeks ago, and just felt a kindred spirit and a desire to continue the conversation a little bit differently than before. So, just Jake, welcome. It is so good to have you on the Restorative Manhood Podcast.

Jake Kastleman (02:50.19)
Thanks, Chris. It's awesome to be here, man. I really did just have such a wonderful experience having you on. You offer so much wisdom and such a warmth. It's just a joy to be in your presence again. So

Chris Bruno (03:02.604)
Thank you. You too. You too. Thanks. Well, Jake, why don't you share a little bit about who you are, what you do, and just give our listeners a little bit of an idea of what they're in for today.

Jake Kastleman (03:14.53)
Yeah. So I am a porn addiction recovery coach as far as my professional life goes. So for me, I help men. I'm the owner and founder of No More Desire. So I help men overcome their desire for pornography. for me that's all about building a recovery mindset and a recovery lifestyle. If we can build the skills of a mindset and lifestyle, in other words, our emotions work.

How do I relate to emotion? How do I regulate emotion? Our neurology? What are my daily habits like? How am I supporting the health of my nervous system? Our biology, things like nutrition, movement, sleep, and then our relationships. Do I feel closeness in my relationship? Do I have a safe place to land at home? Am I sacrificing and leading and loving at home? Right? What does all that look like? And then for me,

There's a spiritual foundation to all of it, which I think is absolutely crucial. So that's what I do with guys. I work one on one and also do group work in the academy, have courses and exercises and all the good things. So I get to educate guys and then bring them together in groups to connect and share and tell their stories and work on emotions, work and regulation, all these good things. And it's a a blessing to do it.

Chris Bruno (04:36.962)
Awesome. I think those men have such a gift in you and so excited that they get to work with you. So and tell us a little bit about like your not work life.

Jake Kastleman (04:47.384)
Yes. So my wife Marie and I, we've been married for a decade now, and she has taught me so many things in that decade and I've taught her things too. But goodness sakes, the the journey of marriage is I think it's one that it's like nothing else. We'll talk more about that, I'm sure, and all that. But blessed to be with her and blessed to have the relationship that we have. We have two kids.

Russell, who's three, and Lewis, who is ten months. Okay.

Chris Bruno (05:21.838)
Okay.

Jake Kastleman (05:24.198)
Sleep is on the back burner at the moment. We'll get to it eventually. And it's just amazing raising them. There's so many. I mean, I think before you're a parent, you can't understand. There's so many challenges and difficulties and things that stretch you and grow and grow you. I didn't understand what people meant when they said it's the hardest thing you'll ever do, but it's also the best thing that you'll ever do. And it's absolutely true. I think it in how I've

seen myself grow and how I get to watch them grow and how I get to teach them and be there in these really crucial moments of their lives and just watch them develop. There's a lot of really special things about it. And so I've been learning to take in all the challenges of it and also to really try to foster the joy and the togetherness with them. So

Chris Bruno (06:15.618)
Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. Well, congratulations on all of the the marriage, the children and all of that. And we have so many possible directions, Jake, that we could go in the conversation today. And I primarily want to focus on, you know, that aspect of fathering with for you and not only the children that you are fathering, but your own fathering experience of having been fathered or unfathered and and what does it mean for you as a man now?

In the porn recovery world that you are in, what does it mean for you to be offering your sons a different experience? So we're kind of in a series right now talking about fatherhood, and that's what I really wanted to land on. Because I think when we get into some of these recovery conversations, the focus is on the behavior, the focus is on the struggle, the focus is on the issues that I'm trying to overcome.

But I wanna focus a little bit more with you on what does it mean for you to be the man that you want to be so that these things don't get passed on to the next generation. So if you don't mind, just kind of give us a little bit of a backdrop. It can be the professional side of things, anything personal you wanted to share, like how did you get into this work of what you're doing in porn recovery? And then we'll dive even further in.

Jake Kastleman (07:32.408)
Yeah, I love that you've asked this. It's a very complex question. There's so many components. I think some of the things that come up for me is my own personal life. You know, I'm a millennial, so I grew up in the age of the internet. When I was really young, younger than twelve, I didn't really have it. Like we had a computer, but I didn't do much with that. And but by the time I was twelve, I had an email address and I just started to explore.

online and Google came out a little before that, I think, or so 20 plus years ago. And for me, I started to discover this whole world that I could escape to, much as the world that I could escape to through video games from a very young age, you know, from four years old. I was playing video games. I was watching TV and I was eating, you know, microwave pretzels and all the whatever other things. These were kind of my

All the young methods. Yeah. You're right. Yes. And these were my ways of trying to find comfort and trying to find some sort of, you know, calming for my nervous system and my emotions. I didn't understand that. And this plays right into the addiction to pornography that developed for me eventually. I didn't know how much pressure I carried inside of me. And it was as far back as I can remember. I was just very anxious and uptight.

I had a great deal of perfectionism, but that took me years. It was it wasn't until I was probably 19 when I started to notice a lot of my patterns and see, my gosh, you know, people describe X, Y, Z about social anxiety and anxiety disorder. They describe this and that about perfectionism. And I realized that I had so many of these same patterns. And this really drove me in my young years to seek out ways to again try to cope and try to calm because I didn't know how to do that.

I didn't know how to regulate and I didn't even know that I was stressed. In fact, I know in my teenage years I developed horrendous acne. It was so honestly, I can look back now saying it was so, so sad. I mean, as a teenager, to you you care about how you look and you want to be attractive and all these things. And I was just devastated. I mean, some people talk about breakouts where they're like, yeah, like I got a few zits and

Jake Kastleman (09:51.252)
my gosh, I had clusters, acne clusters all over my face. And it was extremely painful in addition to the look. Right. And for me, going in to get some of that checked out, I remember the number one thing they asked me said, How are your stress levels? Hmm. And I remember sitting there in that, in that office chair and saying, Stress? Like, I don't think I'm really stressed. And that's because I was always stressed.

All of the time. I just had a baseline of feeling stressed throughout my whole life, right? So I didn't know how to relate to that question because I was like, yeah, I think I'm fine. And so the stress was a major driver of the acne. It was a major driver of the pornography addiction that developed when I was 13. It was what kept me running back to Legend of Zelda, you know, to play it eight different times through because that was my place of safety and where I felt like I was okay.

The world felt so uncertain and so I felt so anxious about life. And so for me, I've discovered a lot of things. I've discovered things like gratitude and things like looking outward and serving others. God is fundamental for me. When I was 17, that's where I actually really started to find some traction when I started to develop a relationship with God, reading scriptures, praying. I started to gain self-awareness. I started to feel a little more peace in my life.

And I started to explore psychology and things like perfectionism and anxiety. And I grew up in a family where one of the things that my parents did extremely well was they empowered me in understanding neuroplasticity and understanding that if there's something that you deal with psychologically, you can shift it, you can build new habits, you're not condemned. And so when I understood that there was a label for some of the things that I went through, I was like,

This can shift, this can change. So, what can I do? And I began inquiring of the Lord, how can I do this? And he began to teach me step by step and continues to teach me to this day. For me, I realized how overwhelming the expectations I had of myself were, that I expected myself to take on, you know, 20 steps higher than where I was at, instead of just taking tiny steps from where I am, right? Wherever I am. And

Jake Kastleman (12:03.51)
I also came to understand that I felt very isolated and very alone, that I couldn't ask people for help, and that I was constantly holding back from actually connecting in relationships. And I needed to start to explore the pains and write my story. In fact, a book, it's called Living the Truth by Dr. Keith Abloh actually launched me into a new life, a new chapter in my life where I wrote the story. And you you do that extremely well. You specialize in that with men. I wrote my story. I wrote

Down a lot of the traumas that I struggled and suffered through and the the doubts and insecurities that I dealt with. And in exploring that, I was able to release some of the things that I went through. Right. And that helped me understand emotional vulnerability and, you know, working through things and analyzing myself psychologically and being able to reach deeper understandings. There's so much more I could talk about. Years later, I learned about IFS. And IFS has only increased that.

significantly and really shifted how I relate to my kids, right? As well. To be able to relate to the emotions in me without the shame and the fear that I carried so often, you know, and trying to fight the emotions. Same thing with my kiddos. I'm not always the best about this, but when I can approach them with openness and with curiosity, rather than pushing up against them or saying, It's bad for you to feel that way.

Those things don't really work with our own emotions or the emotions of our kids.

Chris Bruno (13:32.642)
Time. I do want to focus on that a little bit because what you just described is quite a journey that you've been on in your own process of recovery and understanding yourself. And you have these categories that have come from psychology and theology and all these kinds of things. IFS is internal family systems as an approach to that. And you just said something really interesting. And that was that internal family systems is you've come to know your own emotions. You're able to attend to and engage with the emotions of your sons.

And so I would love for you to kind of unpack what is now available to you as you know your own self. How can you offer yourself to your children?

Jake Kastleman (14:10.444)
Yeah. So I think that I'm not the first person to say this. I I think we can only offer to others what we are willing to receive ourselves or what we're we're able to offer to ourselves, right? Whether I'm receiving it from God, from the people around me, or I'm I'm able to give it to myself and we can receive it from any of those sources, right? I can't give something to someone that I've not been able to receive. So for me, for instance, when it comes to

my relationship to sexuality, right? My relationship to sexuality when I was thirteen was very, very unhealthy. It was very much fear and shame oriented. This is secret. Keep it inside. Don't tell anybody about it. No one can ever know I feel these things. I didn't even know I mean when I started to engage in masturbation and pornography, I didn't even know what that was. Right.

Chris Bruno (15:04.67)
There's no conversation at all.

Jake Kastleman (15:06.752)
Unfortunately, yes, there was no conversation at all. And my father, he does the same work that I do, and he's been a mentor for me. And he must just pain his heart when he hears that. It was there's all sorts of reasons behind that we could get into. But yes, I didn't know. And so for me with my sons, I can talk to them, you know, my ten month old is too young, but I can talk to my three year old son about his body, right?

Right. And talk to him about his private parts and things and be able to speak to him in in a really open, healthy way. And he can ask little questions and be able to have that be an open conversation. Also things like anger, right? That anger is not a bad emotion. It is a necessary emotion. It's a human emotion. It's an emotion that comes up when I feel something is unjust or I I want a need to be met that I don't feel is need being met. Right. And to be able to kind of s observe those emotions and be with those emotions.

And to be present with him in those times when he feels angry rather than being more reactive, right? I'm still always practicing that.

Chris Bruno (16:11.182)
My kids are a little bit older than yours, but

Jake Kastleman (16:13.92)
Yeah.

Jake Kastleman (16:19.896)
When Ryan's wife found out about his infidelity, all hell broke loose. They had a son together and he was about to lose him and her. Ryan had been hiding his pornies for years since his childhood, but sexting other people went way beyond that. When she found out Ryan knew that divorce was more than likely and he was devastated. He wondered how he could let it go this far. How could he betray her this way?

She was everything to him, yet he'd betrayed her so severely and now he was going to lose everything. That's when he contacted me and entered the program. Together Ryan and I discovered the deeper reasons behind his behavior, the lack of emotional safety that he felt in his life, the technology habits that he had, his inability to stay present, his feelings of shame and not being good enough. I taught Ryan emotional mindfulness strategies like the rail method, and he had massive changes to his lifestyle.

Through small steps taught in the program. He even came to understand the link between ADHD and his porn addiction and was able to make improvements in both. Here's what he had to say about his experience with the coaching program. I've been sober for seven months now. Not only does the program help you with your addiction, but it does something even better. It helps you become a better version of yourself.

Jake has been in our shoes and is truly walking the walk. The program is going to take a lot. You only get as much as you put into it. That being said, if you feel like you truly do want to change your life, contact Jake and get a consultation. With the material and exercises from the program, I feel confident I have a map to better roads ahead. I've kept up with Ryan here and there, and he continues to be sober after over a year. His wife and he are building trust and continuing to raise their son together.

And I'm so, so happy for them. If you are struggling with a porn addiction, head to nomordesire.com slash coaching. Learn more and create your own success story. All right, back to the show, my friend.

Chris Bruno (18:28.406)
think what you said just a moment ago is this whole as you come to know those parts of you, right? You're able to welcome those parts of your children. And that they're able to have whatever emotions, anger being one you just talked about, but anything else, that it sounds like for you, those feelings got sent underground. They got sent into some other region of your heart, your life, your soul to where they couldn't come out. And

work you're doing for yourself now as a man and as a father is giving you space to let them, your children, come to you with that. I think that's beautiful. Like ten months old is too early to give some sexual language to and also but at the same time like this welcome of his body and that it is it is beautiful, it is wonderful, and he's gonna slowly develop language for it. But even having an honor towards it is something that he could have at 10 months.

Jake Kastleman (19:22.164)
Yeah. Yeah, I think as I reflect on, you know, again, we have a relationship to everything. I think it's a it's a really cool way to understand the mind that I have a relationship to food, I have a relationship to sexuality, I have a relationship to my own emotions, right? To emotion to anger, to fear, to shame. What's my relationship like with these? Do I judge them? Do I try to escape them immediately? Do I resist them or do I try to control them and batten down the hatches and

Or do I have a complete lack of awareness that I'm even feeling them? And so, you know, it was something with how my emotions were, I didn't even know that I felt things like fear or anger was often it was something I I felt a simmering anger pretty much all of the time, right, in my life. And that was that's part of now I understand it more as my fire that I carry of a deep passion that I feel in life for.

many things that I want to do and the meaning that I want to live with. I just had suppressed a lot of that passion. And so it was there, it was dying to break out. And so there's just a simmering resentment that was always there. And so I see that same fire in my three year old, right? That he is, he's passionate, he's excited, he's active, he's constant. He never stops. I mean, he doesn't even want to sleep, right? Ever.

Ever, ever, ever. I think he's asked to sleep two times in his life so far. maybe not even then. I I don't I think he was joking, you know, those times he said he didn't even really mean he wanted to sleep. So he's just constantly going and being able to see that fire in him and to relate to that differently and help him kind of think about his anger more and not shame himself, hopefully is the goal. Right. To not live in the shame relationship to emotions. Yeah.

Chris Bruno (21:14.83)
I think you're bringing up such good points here, Jake. And just that the sexuality, and so many guys, right? So many guys in my generation and your generation have a story of some kind of hijacked or broken sexuality that even now they're like, I don't want to pass this on to my son, and I don't want to pass this on to my daughter. And again, the focus often is around the sexuality, but I think what you're inviting us to it's less about the sexuality.

Though it's still partly that, it's less about the sexuality and more about the emotionality. If we can tend to the emotions of our children, then the underground sexuality doesn't happen quite as often or as significant. That that's a big statement I just made. But I wonder, I mean, I wonder what your thoughts are on that.

Jake Kastleman (22:03.382)
I think that brilliant colleague of mine, Dean Sundry, I was gonna say doctor, but I think he's he's a he has a doctorate. He's a doctor. But anyway, Dean Sundri S Sun Seri, he's fantastic. He says the two deepest parts of us are spirit and our sexuality, right? Spiritual side and our sexual side. And I think that if I have a relationship with my son where I'm able to

Communicate and talk about his emotions and have open dialogue with him. And that he feels like he has someone in his corner that's going to listen and that's going to open up. And my gosh, I was doing some inner child work recently in a program that I'm working through, a certification program I'm working through. And I realized one of the underlying themes for me was that in everything that I suffered through.

I did not feel I had someone to really talk to about it openly without judgment. That said, I had a younger brother that was really a best friend of mine. And it he he was a lifesaver in so many ways, but he was also five years younger than me. I needed I needed a mentor. I needed someone older than me to that could really help I could come to and ask questions and talk to them about what I was going through.

And I didn't feel that I had that. And even if I had still experienced the addiction and things, just having someone that I could have gone to and spoken to about the pain I was experiencing and had them listen and just say, Man, that makes sense to me. That makes sense to me. Thank you for sharing that with me. I did I wouldn't have even needed to have someone give me solid advice just to open up an ear, you know? Yeah.

So I think if I can do that with my son at this age and sharing that openness with him and cultivating that relationship, then a few years down the road, you know, he'll start to ask more questions about sexuality and start to open up dialogue about all that. And, you know, when he's a little older, I can talk to him about how those things work and just build up his knowledge little by little that it's an open communication.

Jake Kastleman (24:18.998)
rather than something that he needs to keep secret because he hasn't had to keep things like anger secret or fear secret.

Chris Bruno (24:26.446)
And that I think is that is the key, right? That helping our sons, and you've got two sons, I've got a son and two daughters, but helping our children tend to their emotions allows them to also receive and tend to their bodies as their bodies develop. Right. And what you just said, if my anger doesn't have to be secret, then my sexual feelings don't have to be secret. if there is openness to talk to a dad.

or a mom about what's happening on the inside of my body, my feelings, then there's more likely to be an openness to happen, you know, to the conversation on what's happening on the outside of my body and what's, you know, the arousal and the things I'm seeing or the things I'm wanting, those kinds of things.

Jake Kastleman (25:10.302)
It makes it makes me think about, you know, the work that I do with guys, you know, and connecting it to the professional work. I think one of the things that can be most freeing for a lot of men, especially when they they haven't I mean, if they haven't ever even spoken about this to anyone before they've talked to me or before they've joined a group, just to be able to speak about their cravings or their habits or their thought the thoughts that come up for them, right, the emotions that come up and for somebody to say.

That makes sense. I hear that or I see that or I get that. For them to receive the opposite of what they expect, what a part of them expects, which is to be met with geez, why do you feel that way? You know, like that's a gee, yeah, you need to really change that. Like that's that's nasty. That just to be just to receive that openness is a huge deal. And that now that I'm not shaming

painful emotion. Now the darkness can receive some light and we can start to actually sort through it. Mm-hmm.

Chris Bruno (26:18.099)
I love that. That the darkness can actually start to receive some light.

Jake Kastleman (26:21.784)
Yeah. Right.

Chris Bruno (26:23.362)
So as you think forward, you know, five years, like age age yourself and age your kids, five years. what conversations do you anticipate having with those boys?

Jake Kastleman (26:36.312)
Five years. So my son Russell will be eight years old. So my intent is that he will have asked some more questions about his body and things as far as the sexual end. And that at eight years old, we can have a conversation about what sex is, right? a lot of people would think that's too early, but from everything I've studied and learned, it's actually really the perfect age. It's hopefully a few years before they hit puberty.

And they can really be prepared. Cause I I think for me when I discovered masturbation, it was absolutely mortifying and completely overwhelming because I did not know what was happening to me. If I just would have understood and been able to receive, you know, some appropriate conversations and to be told, hey, here's what's going to happen to your body, and here's some things that you're gonna want and here's some things that you're gonna feel. And it's really normal. It actually happens to everybody, right?

A conversation about masturbation is gonna come later than eight, right? But that conversation about sexuality and what it is and how it works, right? And he already understands the difference between boys versus girls at this point, which I did not. So that's already a positive. I think that for me, something I desperately needed as well, which my parents tried to get me involved with was but I felt I felt so much nervousness and and

deep lack of confidence. They tried to get me involved with extracurriculars and you know sports and things. And I did do some things, but when I hit high school, when I hit junior high in high school, I just let go of so much of that. I needed the purpose. I needed a place to put my energy. And so for my son being able to, he's actually starting taught soccer next week and I'm so excited to go to go three years. Yes.

Chris Bruno (28:29.774)
We're on the planet.

Jake Kastleman (28:32.366)
It's gonna be amazing. He probably won't even get on the field, at least for the first game. I'm hoping that we can get him, you know, help him warm up, right? And get in there because he has a lot of that fiery passion. He's he's excited. He has said that he's excited, right? So but being able to go to his games and support him in that and help him feel like I'm, you know, I'm very interested in what he has going on. And I think with that.

At this stage, it's imaginary games, you know, it's going out and going to the park together and those things. At eight years old, you know, it's more organized and some family traditions, some things that we're we're regularly doing together as a family. And I also something that I deeply want for my my son Russell is for him to take on the mantle of being an older brother. I think that this translates into fatherhood eventually, right?

helping him and teaching him how important it is to be a mentor to his younger brother and to be a a help, right? And to serve him and look out for him and to develop a friendship and for him to understand how as an older brother you I mean your younger brother worships the floor that you walk on, right? The ground that you walk on. And those are important, not just one conversation, but many conversations with him to really take on that mantle.

I'm extremely passionate for masculine leadership. So that that feeds right into that is something that I think boys and men really need to take on. And they feel purpose in that, right? We need that. So

Chris Bruno (30:06.7)
So if you're dad listening to us right now and you have an eight-year-old son, you know, a five, three to eight-year-old or three to 10-year-old son, what are some things that you as a dad are gonna want to kind of have your ears open to, your eyes open to in his life, in order for him to have that mentor guidance, to have that openness to share? What are some things you're gonna be?

Kind watching for and whether they're green flags like, Hey, this is great or a red flag of we gotta pay attention to this. Like what might be some things that you can tell those men who have kids in that, you know, sons in that range?

Jake Kastleman (30:47.438)
I think one thing again from my line of work, your son is going to be exposed to pornography. It's not like a if it's it's a when. He's going to be exposed to pornography. And so I don't think that's a conversation of when you're exposed to this, know that it's a bad thing and turn away. It's more a deeper understanding of what it is, right? And then when it shows up, come and talk to us.

You know, and let us know kind of what you experienced or what came up. And when that happens, a really good response would be, hey, that's not for me. And, you know, that's not for me, man. Right. It doesn't have to be a condemning the person that brings it up or needs it. That's not for me. And getting yourself out of that situation. And then having them come and talk about that experience, because they're going to be loaded with, especially I think boys that grew up in a Christian community, they're going to be loaded up with probably a lot of shame and guilt. They're going to be loaded up with shock and pan what just happened. Right.

Based on what they just saw, they're gonna have probably questions about what they saw. And just being able to talk about that, we really want sexuality and talking about the human body to just be a very normal topic. I had Sam Jolman on my podcast recently. He does a brilliant job with that. The sex talk you never got, right? You know s you know Sam, right? yes connected to it. Yes. My gosh, such a great conversation with him, but just he promotes

Blessing your sexuality, right? Blessing it and that this is a really, really good part of you. You know, he says we have eight to ten thousand nerve endings in our private parts, right? And I'm avoiding the words because I know that this episode become explicit if I say the actual words. so we have eight to ten thousand nerve endings. So this was a God who designed this knowing that this would be pleasurable and wanting this to be beautiful and a really, really good experience. And so

With my son now, I'm telling him when he we talk about that part of his body, I say, That's such a good part of your body, right? This is a sensitive part of your body. You feel a lot in it, it feels good because it's a good part of your body. And also explaining to him the appropriateness of right, who's allowed to see or touch that part of his body, right? And he understands that very well at this point. So those conversations, having those open dialogues about sexuality, and then I think regularly

Jake Kastleman (33:14.7)
being able to talk with your son, right, of this age that you're referring to, about his emotions, but also about your own, at least appro appropriately, because talking about times when, you know, I'm sad that I experienced this or, you know, I made this mistake and I feel regretful, or I treated you poorly in this way. That was wrong of me. And here's how I feel about it. I'd like to know how it felt for you. Often as parents, I think in my parents' generation, it was like, don't well

I don't know if this was the message, but essentially it was just don't show that weakness and don't talk about those hard emotions and just be strong and steady and firm and never discussing any fears that you feel with your kids. And I don't think, and you can speak to this, but I don't think this does any service to our kids because they need to see us struggle to a point and they need to see how we meet that struggle, right?

Chris Bruno (34:10.198)
I totally agree with you. And I feel like the more an age appropriate and holding you as an adult and them still as the child, but giving them language, when I give myself language, it gives them language. When I give myself permission, it gives them permission to have the kinds of experiences and and emotions that they're having. And so if they get to see me sad, then they get to be sad. If they get to see

my anger about something, right, then they get to experience their anger as well. And then then it's how we engage with that. Right. We're not going to allow for that anger to overtake us and yet we're not going to deny that it is there. and

Not gonna allow the sadness to overtake us. And also we're not gonna deny that it's there. We're gonna tend to it in such a, you know, direct way. And in so doing, back to the sexuality conversation, when those things come up, we're not gonna allow those things to overtake us, but we're not gonna deny that they're there. So we're gonna have this ongoing dialogue normalizing the entire human experience of emotion, body, mind, spirit, all the things that we've just talked about. So I totally totally agree with that. Yeah.

Jake Kastleman (35:18.046)
Yeah. Yeah. Cause I think when it comes to emotions, sexual desire and arousal are one of the most intense things that we feel. And I it might sound strange to draw this comparison, but for me, I do think of anger and then arousal in very similar ways because anger is such an intense emotion, and so is arousal. And for so many years thought it was all about just trying to resist or push it off or distract myself or not feel it.

And it's the opposite of w it's what you described, welcoming it, actually allowing it to be there. Like it's a friend that's coming that needs your help, or it's someone that's feeling something really intensely. Hey, come on in, buddy. I know you're feeling a lot, and I'm just gonna be with you and I'm just gonna feel this with you. Teaching your kids how to do that, right? Teaching my sons how to do that, to sit with their emotions, to be with them, and then how to move. And I you know, I see for my son, I roughhouse with him every day when I get off of work. There's been our our tradition of just

Let's move and you can and maybe it's, you know, depending on who you speak to, they may have different things to say about this. But I tell him when you roughhouse with dad, you can hit and you can push and you can go crazy and you can do whatever you want just with dad, because he's a boy. He has that testosterone and that energy and he's got to express it. And so that's important too, right? For them to move. Boys process emotion through movement a lot. So

Chris Bruno (36:42.698)
I I love that. And I think that's so good. Until he turns it into a teenager and then can best you, which which may or may not have happened to me along the way. So

Jake Kastleman (36:52.462)
I love that. That is amazing. I for now it's tiny slaps and they don't hurt. So I

Chris Bruno (36:59.982)
They they will only increase, Jake, they will only increase.

Jake Kastleman (37:04.28)
So I can imagine.

Chris Bruno (37:07.288)
Well, man, we could talk for a long time about all kinds of things here. I wanna maybe so come to a close today. You mentioned your wife, okay. And I would love like in your journey of recovery, you said, you know, you've been married for a decade. These things are applying to your children that we've just talked about. How are they applying to your marriage?

Jake Kastleman (37:29.134)
Hmm. So, and people who are paying attention to my cues earlier on may have noticed this. So, for my wife and I, look, I walked into the marriage with so much, so much addictive baggage that I just really didn't know that I walked in with. Right. And I this is why I work on guys with a recovery mindset and a recovery lifestyle because it's not just about stopping pornography. You can get sober from porn.

And I was when I got married, not for a very long time, but for a year by the time I got married, which was a huge accomplishment for me. Right. But I walked in with this addictive mindset. And so it then attached itself to so many things. And it just kept attaching and reattaching over and over and over again until eventually seven years into sobriety. So six years into my marriage, I realized I am still an addict.

Like I have this history of all these addictions that I've gotten over, but I still carry all these same responses to emotions, the same kind of isolated way of approaching life, the same kind of perfectionism, this obsessive and fixated way of thinking. And so when I discovered IFS, that was that was huge for me because I started to be able to get some real emotional mindfulness going and to get some separation from these parts of me to see them and observe them and befriend them rather than to fight them.

And for me in my marriage, one of the things that I was the absolute worst at was providing space to listen to my wife and to reflect back what she was saying, just to take every piece of criticism or feedback or every pain that she had, taking it personally. Right. And I still have these same inclinations, right? And so I've been working on for the last several years these new habits and this ability to reflect back to her and what she's feeling.

And to listen to her appreciate where she's coming from. And I again, my ability to relate to my own emotions and to have a different relationship to those has enabled me to be better with that, with her. And I think for me, acceptance and compassion are huge when it comes to recovery. Right. Not just for me, but in general. Right. This is the way of mindfulness. I think you could say acceptance and compassion are key components of mindfulness. And so in my own relationship when my wife

Jake Kastleman (39:55.042)
When I approach it well, right, when I fall through on what I mean to do, when my wife comes to me with something she's suffering with, and I'm able to offer a space of acceptance and compassion, right? And not needing to step in and immediately try to fix it, or not thinking, Well, I've done this and that for you. Why are you feeling, you know, angry or why are you feeling overwhelmed? Why are you feeling this or that? Because as a man, I instantly wanna I I wanna fix, right? I wanna save.

And staying aware of that impulse, which is good in ways, right? But it overreaches and it it goes into a place of control, right? If I don't if I'm not really aware of it. And so for me, that's been big with emotional regulation. I would also say masculine leadership, I did not realize to create a space of safety, which I need to create for my kids and I need to create for my wife. It comes

Down in large part to my investment and my willingness to sacrifice for my family. And this doesn't mean to be a martyr. It means to very much be willing to, when needed, put aside my personal comforts, my wants, my needs, and to say I'm I'm here for my kid right now, or I'm accomplishing this in the house right now, or I'm going to spend some time and I'm going to listen to my wife right now. And how much I need to sacrifice every single day to create a space of safety for her.

So she feels more safe to also do the same for me. And I think we we really lead out in that when we carry masculinity. And that's such a taboo thing to say these days in a lot of circles, but it is very powerful when you start to take on that more of that ownership that's been big for me. Mm-hmm.

Chris Bruno (41:38.05)
Yeah. Well, and I've heard that you just used the word ownership. I've heard the term, you know, the radical ownership that I'm gonna radically own life, I'm gonna radically own my own emotions, I'm gonna radically own my responsibilities in these families, I'm gonna radically own my humility, my vulnerability, my behaviors, all of the things unto the goodness of those that God has entrusted to me.

Jake Kastleman (42:00.002)
Yeah, 'cause I think that one of the things we can often carry is a lot of blame and a lot of resentment in marriage, especially when we're married for years, you know, a decade or decades. And one of the things that I've realized and I continue to try to be aware of is if I feel resentment or blame, I need to look back at me and say, Where am I not showing up that I really feel like I need to show up better? That's been huge for me to because resentment I found is it's a coping mechanism.

That blame is a coping mechanism and I need to look deeper and dig deeper and say, Okay, where is my ownership? Where's my responsibility? What can I do? Yeah. And that has been a a a great balm unexpectedly, right, for what you might blame another person for. It's not what it's really about. Right. If that makes sense. Not at all. Not at all.

Chris Bruno (42:46.296)
Well, Jake, thank you so much for being with us today on the podcast. Where can people find out more about you?

Jake Kastleman (42:52.162)
Yeah, nomore desire dot com. If you go to nomore desire dot com slash tools, there's a myriad of free resources and paid resources. So if you want to listen to the No More Desire podcast, if you want to check out my free workshop, my free ebook, sign up for the newsletter, become a part of the free community. All of that is on nomoredesire.com slash tools. It's perfect place to go.

Chris Bruno (43:14.392)
Wonderful. Well, thank you. Like I said, thank you so much for not only the work that you're doing, but the life that you're living. And I just want to bless you and your sons and your wife that the trajectory ahead, you are one of those guys that we call a family tree changer, where because you've existed, the next generations, multiple generations in your line will be affected because you were here. So thank you so much.

Jake Kastleman (43:42.83)
Thanks, Chris. Yeah, good agree with you. Appreciate that. Thanks. Okay. Take care.

Thanks for listening to No More Desire. It's a genuine blessing for me to do the work that I do, and I wouldn't be able to do it without you, my listeners, so thank you. If you've enjoyed today's episode, do me a favor. Follow this podcast, hit the notification bell, and shoot me a rating. The more people who do this, the more men this podcast will reach. So take a few minutes of your time and hit those buttons. And if you want to take your sobriety to the next level, check out my free workshop, The Eight Keys to Lose Your Desire for Corn.

Or my free ebook, The 10 Tools to Conquer Cravings. These are specialized pieces of content that will give you practical exercises and applied solutions to overcome corn addiction. And you can find them at NomorDesire.com. As a listener of the No More Desire podcast, you are part of a worldwide movement of men who are breaking free of corn to live more impactful, meaningful, and selfless lives. So keep learning, keep growing, and keep building.

that recovery mindset and lifestyle. God bless.

Jake Kastleman (45:03.936)
Everything expressed on the No More Desire podcast are the opinions of the host and participants, and is for informational and educational purposes only. This podcast should not be considered mental health therapy or as a substitute thereof. It is strongly recommended that you seek out the clinical guidance of a qualified mental health professional. If you are experiencing thoughts of suicide, self harm, or a desire to harm others,

Please dial nine one one or go to your nearest emergency room.