Gunter Swoboda · 60 min
A psychologist who grew up amid generational war trauma and his own crippling anxiety became one of Australia's leading voices for a new kind of masculinity, one built on inner work, emotional literacy, and intentional growth.
Hear this story
Gunter Swoboda grew up in a house shaped by war. His parents had survived Vienna during the Russian invasion, carrying unresolved trauma that filled their home with constant, low-level conflict. His mother lived with complex PTSD. His father was gentle but withdrawn. By nineteen, Gunter had rejected the Christianity his mother pushed him toward and discovered philosophy and Buddhism instead. He learned that becoming a man was not something that happened to you, it was something you chose. It was a choice that mattered.
During his psychology degree, Gunter hit a wall. Serious performance anxiety in statistics made him feel broken. Therapy reframed everything in six months. The problem was not him; it was how he was thinking about himself. Later, working with traumatised Vietnam veterans, Gunter noticed that standard cognitive behavioural therapy was not meeting them where they were. He started naming something nobody else was talking about: trauma as moral injury, not just a psychological wound. He saw the same pattern everywhere he looked. Men were frozen between who patriarchy told them to be and who they actually were. That gap created a paralysis that no surface-level fix could touch.
Gunter has spent thirty years in private practice, raising a family, surfing, and building a body of work that challenges men to wake up to how they have been programmed. He has just enrolled in a PhD because two waves of men's work have come and gone, yet suicide, domestic violence, and mental health in men are not improving. He believes the third wave has to offer something different: the truth that men are not broken. They have been trained by a system of thinking that serves everyone except them. The work ahead is long. But the payoff, he says, is a life that actually feels like living.
“It's not just being a bloke, it's actually becoming a bloke. And that has a lot to do with me and my intention.”
“You can't move on until you've done the inner work. You've recognized the pain, the wound, and you process it.”
“We need to find a third wave that teaches men that they're not broken. That they've been programmed by a system of thinking that is really unhealthy.”
The hero, today
Being a man is not something you float into; it is something you become intentionally, and that intention matters more than anything else. Trauma runs so deep in families and across generations that it shapes how we think about ourselves and what we think we're supposed to be, and we cannot heal what we do not acknowledge. Men freeze when they feel the conflict between what patriarchy tells them to be and who they actually are, and no surface-level fix like CBT can touch that freeze because it lives in the unconscious wound. The men who actually reach out for help and do the inner work are the ones who discover that life becomes fuller, relationships deepen, and they actually live longer, not because they avoid accidents but because their whole body operates differently. Patriarchy is not about gender; it is a framework of thinking that trains both men and women into territoriality, hierarchy, and acquisition, and the only point where change can start is with a single person who wakes up and decides to do their own work.
Yes. Gunter Swoboda is a real person who shared their own story in their own words. Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit that shares first-person stories of overcoming adversity, told with the person's consent.
Kintsugi Heroes, a registered Australian not-for-profit. Every story is shared with the hero's own consent and reviewed under Kintsugi Heroes' trauma-informed content standard before it goes public.
Being a man is not something you float into; it is something you become intentionally, and that intention matters more than anything else.
Trauma runs so deep in families and across generations that it shapes how we think about ourselves and what we think we're supposed to be, and we cannot heal what we do not acknowledge.
Men freeze when they feel the conflict between what patriarchy tells them to be and who they actually are, and no surface-level fix like CBT can touch that freeze because it lives in the unconscious wound.
The men who actually reach out for help and do the inner work are the ones who discover that life becomes fuller, relationships deepen, and they actually live longer, not because they avoid accidents but because their whole body operates differently.
John Milham (Host) · 00:05
Welcome back to Kintsugi Heroes, helping people tell the stories they need to share so you can find the stories that you need to hear. In this episode, psychologist Gunter Swoboda shares his journey from a childhood shaped by family conflict and generational trauma to becoming a leader in men's wellbeing. Influenced early on by philosophy and Buddhism, Gunter learned the value of self-awareness and intentional growth. By facing his own struggles with anxiety and challenging the traditional expectations of masculinity, he developed a more humanistic and inclusive approach to life. Through personal reflection and dedicated work in therapy, he overcame adversity and now inspires others to embrace authentic transformation. So, Kintsugi Heroes, friends and fans, welcome to another Kintsugi Heroes conversation, Stories That Matter. And it's a deep, deep privilege today for me to share a man who I love talking to and love listening to even more pointedly, Gunter Swoboda. Gunter, welcome to Kintsugi Heroes.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 01:15
Thanks, John. What a wonderful introduction. I'll need to polish up my humility after that one.
John Milham (Host) · 01:24
My job's to affirm and it's your job to manage ego, right? So I'm gonna keep going because you are a noted psychologist and author, both nonfiction and fiction. You have award-winning films out there. You are a consultant on scripts and you have a podcast that is number one on the, you know, men's psychology or men's wellbeing kind of list and number five in the US.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 01:53
Is that right?
John Milham (Host) · 01:53
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Kintsugi Heroes · Registered Australian not-for-profit · kintsugiheroes.com.au ↗
This conversation includes a psychologist shaped by conflict, philosophy and buddhism wake him up, performance anxiety breaks him, therapy fixes the frame, a longboard and the mana boys, puberty blues and the moment he wakes to misogyny and working with vietnam vets and discovering moral injury.
So tens of thousands of downloads. That is amazing.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 01:58
140,000 downloads a week.
John Milham (Host) · 02:01
Now I mentioned earlier that it's, uh, you know, a little, I'm a little sheepish. That puts me into the sheepish space, right? Because, you know, I'm, I'm comfortable with a few, few hundred, few thousand, right? But, uh, I love that because you are a clinician.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 02:16
Yes.
John Milham (Host) · 02:17
But you're also a storyteller and that, yeah. Yeah. So obviously your life has created the man you are now with all the interests and so on. And, you know, 30 years married, many years being a local hero to the, to the broken of us. And also, but, you know, a surfer, family man, father, sportsman, you know, in that life, what created the man who's now that the storyteller, both the technical and the, you know, just and the stories that are inspiring the world generally.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 02:51
Yeah, that's a really interesting question. Some of it is completely unconscious, okay? So probably the best way to put that in a frame is that I became awake when I started reading philosophy and especially Buddhism. It's not just being a bloke, it's actually becoming a bloke, and, and that has a lot to do with me and my intention. Yeah, wow. It's not something that I just need to float along with and react to. So there was some fairly important experiences that— in that one was the conflict between my parents. So as a kid growing up, there was a lot of conflict in the home, generally fairly well contained, but it was there, it was palpable. The other part of it was having a very, very powerful mother in many respects. This is a woman who had complex PTSD and survived survived, you know, Vienna during the Russian invasion. And, you know, in the beginning I thought she was just a little bent, you know, like, you know, she'd carry around heaps of money in a bag with lots of papers, you know. I thought, that's seriously weird. And then when I started psychology, I realized that she actually suffered from complex PTSD but managed it really well. And my father was a very gentle man in very, very many respects, hated conflict. Similarly, because him growing up in Vienna at the same time, you know, you just never really recovered from that experience even though I was young. Yeah. So the thing that stood out in my home was living according to values. And, and Mum tried to get me down the Christian pathway, which was never a really, really good fit. I mean, I came up with varying questions that neither my mother nor the minister in the church really answered satisfactorily. So I decided at that point, it's probably just before I turned 19, that people have a right to believe what they believe as long as it doesn't impede or harm others. That was my benchmark. And so from philosophy, I went into psychology, which brought me into therapy because I had serious performance anxiety in statistics. Yeah, it was a basket case with it. I can identify with that completely. So I went from this idea, which is quite interesting because I actually at the time didn't put it together, the philosophy and especially Buddhism was about being whole, but suffering from performance anxiety, I had it in my head that somehow I was broken. Yeah, yeah. And needed to be fixed. And, uh, when I went into therapy, very quickly— and I was very fortunate— the therapist basically set me right. And within about 6 months, I stopped therapy in that way because it was essentially CBT, but he had a certain bit to it.
John Milham (Host) · 06:10
Yes.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 06:11
And then I continued my studies. You know, hindsight, I wasn't exactly a brilliant student. You know, it was the '70s and early '80s, so, you know, music, girls, you know, having a good time was sort of priority. And yet I've talking about the fact that I reckon if I was a kid these days, even a young man, and I got— I was, you know, a psychiatrist got hold of me to be like ADHD Yeah, yeah, and a number of oppositional defiance disorder, because I really had an issue with authority.
John Milham (Host) · 06:47
I find it funny that my, uh, the diagnosis of oppositional defiance and ADHD has usually been by girlfriends, not psychologists, right?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 06:57
So that's a very good insight.
John Milham (Host) · 07:04
It's amazing, there's so much in that, Gunter. Like, so the cultural the generational trauma of a world war, right? And, you know, international conflict and so on. Do you think that's still something that we're given, you know, the need to work out finally after multiple generations? Because in many ways, you know, I look at previous, our past generation, and I see them hiding it or holding it, right?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 07:33
Not working it out., you know, a lot of my work currently is looking at the connection between personal growth and social and cultural change. And so we've got a lot to work through that we haven't even touched, right? Yeah. And so the other part to it is that traumas like that, World War II and so, you know, continue for generations. I mean, the conflict in the Middle East is fundamentally the legacy of multiple complex traumatic events within the population, and each person holds that within themselves. Yeah. And you can't move on until you've done the inner work, you've recognized the pain, the wound, and you process it. Yeah.
John Milham (Host) · 08:28
Wow.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 08:29
Because you projected out into the world.
John Milham (Host) · 08:32
So you said something earlier, you said the word woke, right? Which is, I love the idea of, and I want to reclaim woke and particularly woke bloke, right?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 08:41
Because, oh, we're on the same page, buddy. Yeah.
John Milham (Host) · 08:44
Yeah. So because I like waking up and doing the work is the ultimate expression of, you know, you know, I often mention that that's the hard yards for a bloke, right? You know, being the typical bloke is easy, right? It's being someone who, you know, explores and seeks their own inner world is the tough one. But where did you like, is that a function of being, of having a capacity? Are we born with a capacity to go there or a propensity to go there? And then the culture or the family situation. So you grew up on the beaches, didn't you? Right?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 09:21
So yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
John Milham (Host) · 09:23
And so like, it's not the great, you know, like, whoa, You know, it doesn't protect anyone from going through tough times inside. It's a beautiful outside, right?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 09:32
It's not a— yeah.
John Milham (Host) · 09:34
So how does that give you the space to start the process of becoming woke, right? Waking up.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 09:42
To me, woke is about having humanistic values. Yeah. That for some reason or another, you know, particular political ideology has chosen to delegitimize. Essentially, you know, by the time I was 15, I was a hippie. Yeah, right. I surfed, but I was also out of step in some ways because I started surfing longboards, right, 1970, as the shortboard revolution was happening. So people used to, you know, pay out on me when I come out in the surf with a longboard. Get out! What are you doing with that thing? And there was a group that I hung with who— the Mana Boys— who was staunchly into surfing and healing. Yeah, and that resonated with me. Part of that was, you know, by 15 I was in Greenpeace marches, I was into saving whales, you know, I was into, into really exploring what they refer to as counterculture, which is the whole sense of spirituality. And that's where I woke up to recognizing that religion is an ideological premise, a dogma Yeah. And dogma is ego confining. It doesn't allow the ego to grow. And so spirituality, on the other hand, is when we really practice it from the heart, is expansive. Yeah.
John Milham (Host) · 11:05
Yeah.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 11:05
And the one thing that I saw in a large group of the sort of tribe called surfers was that it was manifesting very patriarchal attitudes, the traditional masculine values, you know. So you had the territory, so localism. Then you had the, the pecking order, you know. And if you're really top surfer, that's where you would go. And then it was about as many waves as you could get, that puts you on another level. It was highly combative, combative. And then if none of that worked, you punt out of the guy next to you.
John Milham (Host) · 11:42
The, the idea of dropping in being a mortal offense, right? You know, like Yeah, it's quite symbolic, right, of so much that goes wrong in community. I always found it interesting cuz, you know, I was a ski paddler, right? Which was like, yeah, right. But, but, um, the amazing, you know, tribalism of surf, right, in many ways reflects so much that was missing in young blokes' lives at that time, right? So they found each other as a family and identified in the, in the tribe. And that supported them. Did that, did that wake your sense of like needing to be a supporter or a helper or a healer?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 12:24
No, I think, I think the drive to, to grow as a human being came, I think, mainly from my experience within my family. Yeah. Because I didn't really participate. I remember at, at about 15, 16 trying to get a girlfriend into surfing and I got heaps from the guys and she certainly got a lot more And at the same time, Puberty Blues came out. Yeah, yeah. And, and that was a, that was a monumental shift for me because I suddenly saw the, the misogyny in culture. And I went, no, you know what, this is wrong. This is not humanistic, you know. So what's behind it? So that went into the cupboard actually for a while because the pressure— my girlfriend just gave up, then we broke up. Yeah. Cause I think she sort of projected some of the pain onto me as a cause, you know, I'm a bloke, you know, I'm one of the bad boys. But then I started working with Vietnam vets when I came out of university. I was actually working in drug and alcohol a lot, but a lot of my clients came to me either through probation or parole or the vets groups. Somehow they stuck with me, like with a lot of other counselors and therapists, they move on, you know, some of them had, you know, endless encounters for short periods of time. And I got very interested in the whole trauma experience. And it resonated with me, partly because of my own generational stuff.
John Milham (Host) · 14:00
Yeah.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 14:01
And I realized that what we were prescribing to help veterans with, which was fundamentally cognitive behavioral therapy, didn't get a lot of traction in— because in one of the groups, I literally had a palace revolution. You know, they basically said, we've done it before, we're not doing this shit. So in my training, which was now starting to shift into more humanistic existential psychotherapies, I realized that we're not actually meeting them where they are.
John Milham (Host) · 14:36
Yeah.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 14:37
And that trauma was very much embodied, you know, in the physical experience. So I started, you know, working very much existentially with people. And part of it was also I started talking about, and no one picked up on this, about moral injury. Yeah. That not only is trauma a physical, psychological, social trauma, it's a moral injury. Yeah, yeah. And that, that seemed to really make a lot of difference. I started training also in systems therapy, family therapy, where I realized that a lot of these guys actually came into their deep wound of trauma through combat because they'd already been traumatized in the family dynamics. Yeah, yeah. And so, you know, for some reason, you know, I just kept getting more men working with me, you know. And then when I went into private practice, the thing. And I started doing workplace rehab consultancy, and a lot of my clients were men, which was really unusual. My supervisors and stuff kept saying, I don't have that mix, you have a particular mix. And so because my wife— and she's part of my, what I do, okay, so the books and everything, she's part of that— we started having conversations about feminism. Like deep conversations about feminism. You know, at the time, especially in the late, mid to late '80s, there was the first wave of the men's movement, right? And so, you know, I was really interested in that. You know, Robert Bly, who I discovered was a bit of a misogynist, he had issues with women. We're all—
John Milham (Host) · 16:18
yeah, they had to start somewhere, right? So, you know, I and John and all that stuff is, uh, yeah, yeah, it's, it's the beginning, right?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 16:26
Yes. Don't get me wrong, I really liked it, right? And then, you know, the men's workshops, and, you know, we had a conversation and she goes, so how does this actually make men better in relationship?
John Milham (Host) · 16:39
Yeah.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 16:40
And I went, boom, you know, it was like, oh yeah, okay, well, it actually doesn't. Yeah, it was something that actually makes them more selfish, more narcissistic. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And we got the same problem as we had in surfing, which is it's tribal. There's an ideology with this. Yeah.
John Milham (Host) · 17:00
Right.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 17:00
And so the recognition that patriarchy fundamentally is shaping all of us without us really knowing it started to bubble up.
John Milham (Host) · 17:11
Yeah.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 17:12
And, you know, you know, we've softened it out now in academia. People refer to traditional masculine norms. I don't, I use that phrase, but I don't actually, cuz it doesn't get to the heart of it. Patriarchy is a bit like being indoctrinated in a political ideology.
John Milham (Host) · 17:30
Yeah, it's a training framework, surely, right? Like, men are trained to— like, if they, if they act in a certain way that they're not even aware of, somebody created that framework for training them like that, right?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 17:44
So, well, it starts off literally when she's pregnant. Yeah, what are you having? Yeah, I don't know. Well, these days, most— a lot of people know, oh, we're having a girl, oh, is that sweet? Yeah, right. With a boy, oh, that's so good, you know, like. And then we have the gender reveal stuff, you know, pink for girls and blue for boys. If I go back to Victorian areas, the pink would have been for boys. Yeah. And the blue for girls. This is a social construct. Yeah, right. It's— and so, you know, the, the moment the kid's born, we treat them differently. And this is where that's internalized. So it doesn't— the kid doesn't need to be 5 years old to learn how to kick a footy. He's already been brought into the tribe, the culture. So one of the things that I'm really, really interested in is the culturalization of masculinity. And one of the areas that I'm really interested in, because the question that I have now is, we've gone through two waves of the men's process, right? We're— we need a third one, because what we've got so far, you know, with respect to everything that's going on, and I really appreciate everybody's efforts in this, we've got a finger in the dike. I'm not seeing the reduction in domestic violence, and I'm talking both ways. I'm not seeing a significant improvement of generalised mental health, and I'm not seeing massive reductions in suicide.
John Milham (Host) · 19:23
I'm not seeing any reductions in suicide.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 19:25
So, you know, yeah, so, so the obvious question to me as a clinician, but also, you know, philosopher scientist, is what are we missing? Yeah, Taylor, what are we missing? And what, you know, just, uh, this won't go down really well, I've just signed up to do a master's and then a PhD.
John Milham (Host) · 19:47
Nice.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 19:49
And what I'm interested in is male therapists' internalized masculine norms. Yeah, yeah, right. Because it comes— I know from experience that it can come out Yeah, in the beginning I used to, if a bloke got too, a little bit too emotional, I'd let them go, but then I'd want to pat them down. Yeah, yeah. And I'd have to resist the urge to jump in there. Yeah, right, and help them to stop crying.
John Milham (Host) · 20:19
Yeah, yeah, the anchoring bit. It's sort of like a natural, oh yeah, okay, quick, quick, quick, that one, just hide, hide this bit and give you a sec, and then I'll drag you out of that emotional experience, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, when you talk about bias, right, even programmers' bias in their programming and the algorithms they create, right, actually put their male bias into that. So it's interesting. Yes, yes. We're actually ninja training young kids through the biases of the programmers, right?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 20:53
So yeah. But when you've got your little brother telling you Don't stand like that. Girls stand like that. Wow. Yeah. You know? Yeah. It speaks volumes.
John Milham (Host) · 21:08
Yeah, totally. Um, I had a, a question. All right. So, you know, Your Life Created a Woke Bloke. Is that a path that you could, that, you know, contains signposts for how we share the concept of, you know, introducing men into doing a bit more work?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 21:25
In a way, because it's values-based, right? So the values are about being inclusive, they're about sharing, they're about being emotionally literate, they're about being emotionally responsive. Don't blame others for what's happening to you. I mean, yes, there might be an element in that, but the other question is, if you're being harmed in a relationship, and I get a lot of this, You know, I, I see a lot of men who are in relationships with women.
John Milham (Host) · 21:55
Yeah.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 21:55
Who are as patriarchal as a lot of men. Yeah, that's the best way to put it. Right. They're highly critical, they're very dominating, they're coercively controlling, and in some instances they're violent. Yeah. You gotta ask yourself the question, why are you staying there?
John Milham (Host) · 22:12
Yeah.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 22:13
If someone treats me like that, they get 3 strikes and I'm out the door. Yeah, that comes from a sense of feeling empowered. Yeah, right. And unfortunately, culturally and individually, a lot of men are enculturated to fear their own sense of self in an empowered way. I don't want to use the word power because that comes out of patriarchal dominance thinking, right? But it's this sense of You know, I'm okay.
John Milham (Host) · 22:45
I can—
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 22:46
I'm responsible for feeling safe and secure. And if someone threatens that and challenges that, I've got some choices that I need to make, even though it may be scary and uncomfortable, but I need to do it. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, it's a bit like fire— firemen who race into the burning house and everyone goes, hero, right? Well, that thing applies in other parts of our lives.
John Milham (Host) · 23:13
And it's interesting because in certain contexts with training and intention, running into a burning house is a hero act, but running into a burning house without that sort of intention training or, or reason is a really dopey act, right? So it's that, you know, you know, it's the application of values and, and intention and framework that actually create that turn that activity into something worthwhile, right? Which is fascinating. You talk about values and safety, you've used those two words. So, and then making decisions. So really creating a decision matrix, right, requires you to know who you are and to be safe and solid in and empowered to make that decision. So, you know, values and safety, identity and safety, How do we work on improving men's willingness to explore those ideas?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 24:07
I think the— it's like a, you know, you dangle the carrot. Yeah. Is your life running the way that you really want it to be? And do you experience life as fully as you possibly can?
John Milham (Host) · 24:18
Yeah.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 24:18
Now, in my view, 80% of guys out there, if they're totally honest and put hand on heart, go no. And often It's not the externals, it's the internals that where they're in a state of conflict. Yeah. Right. And so if I use, you know, Freudian, a Freudian term that we don't use much anymore, which is a pity, is that they're caught in a neurotic complex. There is the social expectation how to be, and there is their inner desire how to be. Yeah, yeah. And so in that context, they often freeze. It's almost like the same trauma. You either get out there, you fight, you run away, or you freeze. Yeah, yeah. And, and a lot of us as men freeze at that point. Yeah. Because that deep, deep conflict, that neurotic conflict, is embedded in our, you know, and in our deep-seated psychological wound. And this is one of the reasons why something like cognitive behavioral therapy doesn't quite get it because we need to go through the conscious, we need to explore the area of the subconscious, and we need to explore the unconscious where the actual, you know, bleeding wound sits. And it's, you know, opening that up is painful.
John Milham (Host) · 25:40
Yeah.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 25:41
But it's rewarding.
John Milham (Host) · 25:43
Yeah. And essential in some ways to become the man who like, cuz we've got you know, jobs to pass it on. You've got two adult kids, right? You know, who you are is also passing on, you know, the, the way they interact with the world, helping them wake up, right? So whatever that said, just a really fascinating thought there, right? When you, you mentioned the, you know, the internal and the external, the neurotic challenge that we have. The internal, is that like the conflict comes about Because, you know, we're comparing ourselves in the real world we find ourselves in with, uh, you know, is it an idealized view? Are we looking at the wrong role models? Who are we comparing ourselves to fall short against?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 26:31
Mostly, I think we compare ourselves to those who we, uh, wanna be like, right? And so, you know, in a masculine tribal sense, we wanna, you know, using that terminology, we wanna be that alpha. Well, at 5 foot 4, you're not really— especially if you're already fully grown, that is a serious problem. Yeah. So, and it's even a problem if it's a boy who's, you know, a year younger than the cohort. He's not going to keep up physically. Yeah. So we need to find a way to help that boy to be validated in their physicality. But the other part to it is that all those expectations, the external expectations, are internalized. They're internalized from a very, very young age. You know, we— you know, if you look at, you know, the media, especially, you know, watch the Disney films. Yeah, right. All that sort of stuff just seeps into the fabric, into the DNA of the, you know, the growing boy. And that sets up, you know, conflict, because what if he doesn't like footy? Yeah, what's he playing, a flute? So it's because we've got this very either-or way of looking at things, it reinforces that internal complex, that neurotic conflict. Yeah, this is how it should be, but I'm not like that. And so one of the biggest issues that I get working with men is to let go of some preconception about how they're broken. It's a bit like dealing with guilt. Guilt is, oh, I've done something bad. Shame is, I'm bad.
John Milham (Host) · 28:18
Yeah. And it's interesting because, you know, in my travels, a lot of men, you know, even good solid men who have seemed to be quite anchored in their own identity, are really being hurt by the claims, you know, that men are violent, that men are weak, that men are uncaring, that men are unable to speak. Like, so, like, what should we be taking from those kind of, you know, commentaries?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 28:46
This is, this is where I took a real turn, because the first, the first men's movement, in a way, was to reinforce the male tribe, right, without examining what values it's built on. Okay, it's— we're boys, we hang together irrespective of good or bad. You know, don't dob on your mate even though he's turned the house on fire. Yeah. The second wave was fundamentally, in many respects, about looking at men and men's behavior and how they deal with emotions as pathological. Yeah, yeah, we're broken. Yeah, we need to fix them. And this is where we've got this backlash that's brought out of the woodwork people like Andrew Tate, Jordan Peterson.
John Milham (Host) · 29:30
Yeah.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 29:30
You know, Joe Rogan, right? Yeah. Where they, they don't go on an inward journey, they go, they leave a projection of their internalized ideal, you know, male. Yeah. Well, and it, and the, the, in many respects empty, you know. I mean, Jordan, I saw him in an interview recently where the interviewer asked him, you know, so how is he, right? It was a recent interview, and he said, well, he thought about it, you know what he does, and he goes, brilliantly. And then there was a pause, and then he goes, terribly. Now, as a therapist, what that tells me is this man is absolutely Frozen in his neurotic conflict. Yeah, he can't be one or the other. You can, you can experience it as a dynamic but not as two states, you know. I mean, I can be feeling on top of the world, and if you throw me out in 10-foot waves, I'm gonna be scared, right? Like, out of my comfort zone. That's okay. But this coexistence in conflict of these two emotional states, that's, that's where it's problematic. And so, you know, we need to find— and this is where my work really is going and still will go for quite a while— for a third wave that teaches men that they're not broken, that they've been programmed by a system of thinking that is really unhealthy. Yeah. And I don't like the word toxic. No. Because there's certain elements, if I put it in the right context. Yeah. Right. Is useful. Yeah.
John Milham (Host) · 31:22
We can inoculate by, you know, going towards the very thing that poisons us and having, uh, an understanding, you know, a controlled experience of it, which inoculates us.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 31:33
Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. And that really, we need to be open enough not to believe that there is one way of being male. There's many different ways, and that you have a right to choose how that's going to go. Yeah, where, where do you want to be as a person? And so to me, in a sense, helping men to grow in that way is only a step towards being more fully human. Yeah, without the categorization.
John Milham (Host) · 32:07
I, I, I love that idea. You know, to, to step into your power is to be empowered to choose who you actually want to be and how you show to the world, right? What you're prepared to, to, to own. You mentioned like Jordan Peterson and Andrew Tate, they're the banner names, right? It's interesting with Jordan Peterson, from what me watching, it's almost like he started out brilliantly and his journey has been one of becoming less certain and less relevant, right? It's, it's a, a strange, you know, now he's, uh, you know, he's still a brilliant man, but he, like, I'm not sure I can, you know, even sort of align with what he's saying. Although first up he had some, you know, wonderful teaching moments, right?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 32:51
So, but he, there's, there's, there's gems in what he says. There are some gems, right? The problem is that the overall framework is seriously flawed. Yeah. And which to me as a clinical psychologist is puzzling. And like Gabor Maté says, he's trapped by his own rage.
John Milham (Host) · 33:11
Yeah.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 33:12
Because as long as he sticks to his area of expertise, which is clinical psychology, he's not too bad. Although how he could miss the blind spot that if you take Xanax regularly, you're going to be addicted.
John Milham (Host) · 33:28
Yeah.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 33:28
I don't know how he missed that one, but anyway, he did. So the other stuff, yeah, in, in many respects, I'd love to actually sit down with him, and if I could switch off his sort of rhetorical sleight of hand that he does, yeah, and have an honest, deep conversation with him. You know, this sounds arrogant perhaps, but he needs to be in therapy. But, you know, this is a man who does not like women. I don't know what his relationship with his mother was like, but I bet it wasn't all that crash hot. And, and he's extraordinarily controlling by all the reports of his wife. So yeah, it's, it's, it's sad in a way because there are these gems of brilliance in him, but they have gotten lost. They, they're, you know, embedded in this ambivalent relationship with the sort of Judeo-Christian thinking. Yeah. Which reinforces that patriarchal ideology, and therefore the misogyny that comes through in that.
John Milham (Host) · 34:33
My sense, like, Jordan Peterson is a high-profile example of what I see in blokes where they— there's a sense of being betrayed by all the promises, the unstated, you know, assumptions and promises of masculinity. So, you know, patriarchal approaches means, you know, hierarchy, you know, competition, you know, that there's this sense of power and, and victory. And yet most men leave, leave, you know, to quite, you know, lives of quiet desperation, right? We feel lost, we feel unfulfilled, we feel like our potential is unrecognized.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 35:15
Lonely. Lonely.
John Milham (Host) · 35:17
We isolated. It's very difficult for us to find that truly unconditional intimacy from so many people. And of course, all of that is so nurturing, so empowering. And the lack of it is—
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 35:32
it's almost—
John Milham (Host) · 35:33
not only do we feel the lack of it in our— in struggling, you know, to fill those gaps, but the sense of being betrayed by the promise of being a man, you know, you know, the promise of power and so on. Is that Like, am I kind of missing the point here, or is, you know, what is that to you?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 35:51
No, no, no, you've put your finger on it. And if I go into the political economic sphere, right, it's the same as what neoliberalism did. It promised that if we deregulate, right, the economic system and make corporations have more money, that money will trickle down to the rest of the community. And guess what? It didn't happen. I'm still looking for it.
John Milham (Host) · 36:16
Yeah. Where's that leak? Right?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 36:18
Yeah, absolutely. 1,350% increases in C-level salaries. But over the last 25 to 30 years, the actual worker has no increase in real salary or in conditions. And this is the same. And so the influence of patriarchal ideology, which is embedded within our sociocultural and economic system, has betrayed us. Yeah, it's not women. Women haven't betrayed us. Neoliberalism as an economic, as a patriarchal form, brought them out of the house into corporations because it makes more money. Yeah, they have women in the workforce, and it doesn't really care whether that means that women don't have as much time caring for children. Now don't get me wrong, because I've had women hassle me. So what, we should stay in the kitchen? Absolutely not. We need a social change that allows both men and women to take equal share in the care of the family.
John Milham (Host) · 37:25
Yeah, it's a human thing, not a—
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 37:27
yes, yes, yes. So, so I'm really passionate about that. Yeah, beautiful.
John Milham (Host) · 37:33
You mentioned earlier, right, that women who are adopting a patriarchal framework are often, you know, getting ahead. They're the the ones who are leading the charge, right, by being successful and breaking through the glass ceiling. But they're using the same leadership ideology.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 37:51
Yeah, yeah.
John Milham (Host) · 37:51
Leadership concepts that, that men use, right? Patriarchy is not related to gender, it's a style of leadership, right?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 37:59
So, and a culture. And we can see that in politics.
John Milham (Host) · 38:03
Yeah, yeah.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 38:04
I mean, look how tone deaf the Liberal Party is.
John Milham (Host) · 38:08
And it's interesting you mentioned, you know, the, the third wave needs to be about, you know, throwing out the, the way we've, we've done engagement relationships and bring in a much more relational, much more inside-out view of, of how we do it. You often hear men claim that men can't share or talk or ask for help or whatever, or men don't do that well. Is that true?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 38:36
Yeah, it's territorial, you know. I mean, I, I was talking to someone the other day. The reason why my early academic career was really sketchy was I never put my hand up for help. Yeah, yeah. I never, it never occurred to me to go to someone and ask, listen, I'm really stuck here. I did it the hard way. I sort of tried to work it out myself and sometimes that worked, And, you know, because I'm relatively intelligent, that wasn't, you know, that rare. But on the other hand, it made it very difficult and there was some really big disappointments in it. Yeah. Because, you know, later on when I started reflecting on how I operate, I went, boy, that could have been just— I could have been so much further ahead in a lot of things.
John Milham (Host) · 39:25
Yeah.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 39:26
You know, and part of that was too because I'm an only child, you know, as an only child when you got two preoccupied parents, in their own conflict nest. You get a lot of support on one level, but bugger all on another. Yeah.
John Milham (Host) · 39:40
Wow. And, and of course, you know, needs, you know, who asks the kid or young bloke, you know, what they need, right? So young men are in a bit of a crisis. We hear that everywhere, right? I'm sure they're not doing what we did, which is not necessarily a crisis, but, uh, because I'm not sure we did, you know, everything right either. But I'd be wondering, what do you think is the thing? Speaking of needs, what do you think that our young men are missing out on? What do they need?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 40:09
They need parenting and nurturing, right? In a way that's not determined on the boy model, right? We need to bring them into emotional conversations at a very early age. So, you know, it's this, this, you know, a lot of men and, and a lot of dads and a lot of boys, actually don't have the emotional literacy, the vocabulary to express their experience, you know. And we accept that at 13 it gets worse and they grunt. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That just doesn't float with me at all, dude. Doesn't— isn't a form of communication other than you seem to have lost the capacity for speech. I can get more from a chimpanzee.
John Milham (Host) · 40:55
Yeah, exactly.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 40:57
And that requires fathers who are self-aware, flexible, adaptable, emotionally expressive, emotionally responsible, that own their stuff. So rather than lecturing the kid, we actually have a dialogue. Yeah. Or we become the, you know, the slave pit supervisor. Have you done the homework? What about the lawn? You know? Yeah. And the— all the kid wants to do is get out of there. So they do. And technology has given them the perfect out, the digital device. It's a really interesting idea. My wife talks about the Industrial Revolution as killing the planet. She sees the IT revolution as killing human society. Yeah. Wow. And I agree. I completely agree with that. Yeah.
John Milham (Host) · 41:48
That absolutely worries me, like what you say. Impractical optimism then says, luckily, this is the first bad bit, and then we work out everything that went wrong and try and end up fixing it. But it is a huge debate at the moment how we manage and how we integrate the technology coming along. One of the things you talk about is it's a form of avoidance. You just mentioned that it gets in the way, right? We're now, you know, using communication through tech means rather than direct. Do we throw out? We can't backtrack on IT. That's— there's too many billionaires telling us what to do and, and making money off us. So, you know, how are we gonna undermine the, the bad influence?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 42:38
By stepping into our own sense of empowerment, because that allows me to make decisions. So do I, does doom scroll? Because not only is it an avoidance, it's a sedation. Yeah, we know that neurophysiologically as well, right? Yeah. And so, and, and the, the irony in it is that that sedation actually then creates more anxiety. It's a bit like taking Xanax, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Works really well to cut through anxiety, like within 20 minutes, but when it wears off, you feel so much more anxious. Yeah, right. So what do you do? You take another Xanax. Right. So this is no, you know, sense any different. And so, you know, I mean, living around the Northern Beaches and being outside a lot and so on, you know, the number of mothers and fathers that I see going for a walk with their kids where they've got their face in the phone.
John Milham (Host) · 43:34
Yeah.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 43:35
Rather than communicating with the child. And it was a beautiful example one day I was on the balcony and we, you know, overlooked it overlooks the road. And there was a guy who pulled in. It was a beautiful summer's day. He'd obviously promised his daughter they're going to go to the beach. So she's out of the car, he's got the boot open, the phone rings, right? And I thought, I'll just watch this, right? They don't know that I'm there, you know. It could be, you know, spying issues around. But anyway, he's on the phone and he's walking around, he's on the phone, it's obviously, you know, a bit intense. And she goes, Dad, you know, and he's going like this, you know, and, and she starts taking things out of the boot and, and he's going like this when she goes, Dad. It ended up her screaming at him, wow, to get off the phone, and then he screams back at her for being a little brat. Yeah, yeah. Well, you selfish kid, you. And I'm like, what the— you know, yeah. Where's the adult in the room? It's actually that 10 or 12-year-old that's there going, Dad, I'm here.
John Milham (Host) · 44:43
Yeah, right.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 44:44
And so not only do you know, we do that big time with boys. Yeah, you know, because they're, they're socialized into that, by the way. So mums pick them up, give them a kiss, pop them down and go, go off and play. Girls are usually picked up, put on their lap, and they begin to participate in the conversation with the other woman.
John Milham (Host) · 45:05
Wow.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 45:06
I hadn't even— we have observational studies of that.
John Milham (Host) · 45:10
Wow.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 45:10
Right. So my point is, where do we start? One, we need to have men heal themselves from the legacy of patriarchal socialization so that I'm much more deeply aware of my own wound, allow it to heal.
John Milham (Host) · 45:25
Yeah.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 45:25
And become emotionally literate, responsive, and relationally ethical. That when I'm present with someone, I'm fully present. I'm not, I haven't got my, half of my head's not out the door thinking about work or thinking about the footy game. Yeah. Or honey, can you get me another beer? Well, you've had 5. Why do you need another one?
John Milham (Host) · 45:49
I love that term, emotionally ethical. That's gonna stay with me. So it's such an interesting idea too. Like I, I feel the call to action you're offering there, right? To step up and be a better dad, a better bloke, more present in, into our community and our family, right? But it's an individual call. I didn't choose to be patriarchal, right?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 46:13
And neither did I. Yeah. Yeah.
John Milham (Host) · 46:15
So like I didn't choose to be, you know, aggressive, you know, combative, comp competition. Like I've, I've watched a group of blokes from church, from a church group go down and, and spend some time with each other, like playing 10-pin bowls. By the end of it, it's World War III.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 46:34
Right?
John Milham (Host) · 46:35
And I'll go, hang on, you guys love each other, right?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 46:37
What's going on?
John Milham (Host) · 46:38
You know, I didn't spend time, you know, learning that. It was just something that was given to me. It was my place in the world. So why am I at fault now? Or you're not at fault, but that isn't everyone telling me it's my job to not be the way that they create, you know, the, the only way I knew to be created. Right? Like, isn't it? Aren't we being individually held accountable for the, you know, the actions that come from that patriarchal myth?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 47:07
Well, because the social change isn't happening. So the only point, the only starting point we have is with me.
John Milham (Host) · 47:17
I—
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 47:17
and honestly, I've seen this— is once the light goes on and we go, oh, I've been played. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right. I need to do something about that. And then I infuse that into my family and my community as much as I can. But then that can take me to becoming an activist as well. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Because we need activism. Yeah.
John Milham (Host) · 47:42
You know, Gandhi, you know, be the change you want in the world. Right. So that's, that's what we're advocating here.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 47:48
Is it? Yeah. Yes, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely., you know, dogs of war are out at the moment. Yeah, yeah. And the chain's being held by the old guard. They might be 22, but they're the old guard. Yeah, yeah. Right. And we haven't been able to do it in successfully. And I, and, and this is because this stuff runs so deep, but we need to change the fabric of society through changing ourselves individually, personally, because that change stops being radically individual. It now becomes more communitarian. Yeah. You know, now if you're in the United States and you talk like that, they go, you're a communist.
John Milham (Host) · 48:36
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 48:39
Oh yeah. Really?
John Milham (Host) · 48:41
Marxist? I'd be deported back to Marxist Australia, right?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 48:45
So yeah, yeah, absolutely.
John Milham (Host) · 48:46
Yeah.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 48:47
And in my comment, there's nothing further from the truth.
John Milham (Host) · 48:50
I, I agree. So I love that, you know, call to action for an individual. I, I, I love— I make that call to blokes, right? Time to do some work, and that work means becoming a better man, right? What, what is it in them? You know, like, let's go to, say, one of the patriarchal qualities, which is what's in it for me, right? So, you know, what is in it for men to change?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 49:15
Oh, the first— what's in it for me is an expression of fear. Yeah, it is, uh, it comes from a, a place of lack, right? It also comes from a place of desiring acquisition to feel better within the social hierarchy. Yeah, right. So the idea is, as long as you're chasing a ghost, it's gonna feel empty. Yeah, you know, nourish yourself with the things that are of value. This, you know, how many people are 90 years old and they go, 'I really should have made more millions'? I've seen 90-year-olds on their deathbed, I've been with them, and usually what they're saying in their last breath is, 'I wish my family was here.' So, you know, I speak very plainly about this because, you know, yes, I can speak academically as well, but I've found that plain language gets across to blokes really well.
John Milham (Host) · 50:11
Yeah.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 50:11
Are you living the life that you really feel is fulfilling and enriching? Yeah. How's your relationship with your wife? Uh, okay. So let's talk about the kids. How are the kids? Well, you know, you know what they're like, they're teenagers, right? They're avoiding me. Well, have you thought why that might be the case? And wouldn't you like it to be different? Oh, I love it to be different, but I don't have the time. Okay, well, so why is it that you don't have the time? Well, I need to put another story on my 3-story house. Oh, okay. Where's that? Edgecliff. Ah, I see. So if you stop working right now, would you be bankrupt? Oh yeah. So, you know, my choices have been different in a way. You know, my ethics were not about acquisition of material or money. Don't get me wrong, I like being comfortable. Okay. But I don't need to drive a $450,000 Ferrari when a $50,000 car can do it. And even then I'm sometimes going, that was a bit, you know, indulgent. Yeah. Yeah.
John Milham (Host) · 51:22
Yeah. I can't part with my 2003 Toyota Echo.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 51:26
Right.
John Milham (Host) · 51:27
So, you know, I think I claim that as it's because I'm very woke. Right.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 51:33
So, You know, hold onto that as opposed to very poor.
John Milham (Host) · 51:37
But anyway, that's another discussion. Look, I think like they just opened up a huge opportunity to talk and I, I like, I noticed we've run out of, almost run outta time, but so we might have to have, you know, another session sometime down the track because like that, that's so, there's so much there. But I love, uh, how, you know, where we're asking men because it feels good, right? Because it is good, right? In the end, you'll, you'll gain more from making these changes to, oh, from an inside, from a really high value place.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 52:10
Right.
John Milham (Host) · 52:11
But one thing I'd like to finish up with is some ideas, right? So we've got patriarchy as a framework for training men to, you know, put their head down and, and focus on other people's agendas and values, not ours. Right. So we want to, you know, this all serves someone else that we don't, it's not our family or our community, it's others. How, what do we replace them with? What the aspects of patriarchy you've described in your book as, you know, territorialism, hierarchicalism, acquisitionalism, competition, combativeness, and those 5 things we kind of driven with. What do we replace them with? What's the new bloke? Yeah. How is he gonna start to work towards, you know, connecting in relationships and in the mirror? Yeah. Look in the mirror.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 53:02
Yeah. Yeah. That's it. That is fundamentally the first step is look in the mirror, not your muscles, not the pimple on your forehead, not whether your gut's hanging down to your knees. Look into your eyes in the mirror. They are the window to the soul. And then the next bit is finding people. And this is where my interest in my research at the moment is therapists who are self-aware of their own stuff in this and have actively or are actively working in it and working with other therapists so we can deliver a process not just in therapy but in education, in mentoring, and in coaching that is consciously aware The other stuff is unconscious. It is, it, you know, the dragon's asleep. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, and we need to wake the dragon. Now that, that comes with a risk. Yeah, right. Part of it is like, if I take these clothes off, I'm going to be naked. Oh, that's good, right? Might be a bit chilly in the wind, but you know, it'll make you think about what you need to do. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
John Milham (Host) · 54:15
Go back to some very basic places.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 54:18
Yeah, and I think we need to really connect the shifts in within all the cultures. Like, you know, I talk about the male culture, the patriarchal culture, right? The therapist culture is another culture, and they actually don't— they don't overlap well. As a male therapist, I'm meant to be empathic, right? I'm meant to be reflective. Patriarchal men are empathic, generally speaking, and they're not reflective. Yeah. So those, they're at clash. And remember, if you come back to the, the neurotic complex, we're now in a state of anxiety. Who am I here? So our sense of personhood is diminished. And I'm going, okay, we need reaffirming our personhood within a new framework. We need to, we, you know, and as a hippie, you know, raise your, raise your consciousness, you know, until you don't need an ego anymore. Absolutely.
John Milham (Host) · 55:18
I, I love that moving away from ego to, from I to thou, right?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 55:22
You know, Martin Buber. Martin Buber. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
John Milham (Host) · 55:27
I love that philosophy, right? That, but it's interesting, it takes courage to crack, to let go of all of that old framework that we are clinging to, the scaffold that we build our our less fulfilling lives, we've gotta build a new scaffold. How do we let those tendrils, that grip that the patriarchy has, how do we let it go?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 55:52
Well, apart from, like the first step, as I said, was look into your eyes in the mirror. That's metaphorical as much as it is practical. If I take it the next step, it means really taking away all my defenses and looking at the wound. And I need a safe relationship to do that with, right? That could be a coach, a mentor, a teacher, right? And within that, explore how I relate, you know, both nonverbally but verbally, and have someone feedback to me how that's coming across so I can grow. It's a bit like socializing a child. No, you can't have Johnny's truck. That's his truck and he doesn't want to share it right now. And punching him in the face doesn't make it right that you have his truck. Yes, but he won't share. Yeah, I get that. So if he doesn't share ever, you have a right to choose whether you want to play with Johnny or not. Yeah, yeah. And so that socialization process continues, right?
John Milham (Host) · 56:57
So growing up really is just, you know, applying advanced adult socialization techniques, right?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 57:04
So yeah, yeah, because my metaphor, my analogy often is that culturally as men, we're stuck in the playground. Yeah, 16-year-olds. Yeah, you know, high risk takers. Oh my God, I've got 55-year-olds just doing the same that they did when I was 16., but the body's actually telling them to back up. Yeah. And they're not listening. Yeah.
John Milham (Host) · 57:28
They're getting a somatic message rather than a values message.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 57:32
So the message is if you, if you're gonna change and if it's gonna be good for you, funnily enough, you'll live longer. Not because you're avoiding accidents, but because your whole body operates differently. Yeah.
John Milham (Host) · 57:46
That's brilliant. I wanted to explore relationships and men and, you know, your, your experience of that. And of course, your relationship and, you know, the, you know, the insights and lived experience. But I can't keep you all day, right? So I have to let you go, but I hope to do another chat at some point in the future. Thank you so much for answering some of my, you know, sort of clumsy questions, but not clumsy.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 58:12
You, you, my question is clumsy.
John Milham (Host) · 58:15
Oh, well, curiosity is wonderful.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 58:17
Yes. Yeah.
John Milham (Host) · 58:18
Yeah, absolutely. And So thank you for sharing a little bit of yourself and your work and your ideas. It's been very, very rich, mate, and I really appreciate it. Thank you for being a Contiki hero.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 58:32
Thank you, John. I've really enjoyed it. We always have a good rap. I'm happy to come on again.
John Milham (Host) · 58:38
I'm looking forward to it. We'll definitely get a series because this is such important stuff. And I'm with you, as a final statement, I would ask Putman to reach out to someone for conversations where they can start to explore some of the things that might be lit up, whether they're angry or they're, you know, worried or whatever, you know, that, you know, from listening to this, that's good because, you know, we want those conversations to change the world, right?
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 59:05
So love your work.
John Milham (Host) · 59:07
Thanks, mate.
Gunter Swaboda (Guest) · 59:08
Thanks, John. Speak to you soon. Cheers.
John Milham (Host) · 59:14
Thank you for listening to this episode of Kintsugi Heroes. Thank you to Colin Lilly for permission to use Broken as our theme music for this series. If you enjoyed this conversation, share the podcast with a friend and let us know by leaving a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. If you'd like to support support Kintsugi Heroes and the stories we share, head to kintsugiheroes.com.au and follow the instructions to make a tax-deductible donation. Thank you for listening, and we'll see you next time.
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