Dangerous Through Growth: Embracing Who You Really Are

Aaron Thomas dives deep into three transformative quotes that have become guideposts in his journey toward authentic manhood. With refreshing honesty, he explores the struggle many men face—wanting to succeed independently while knowing deep down that meaningful achievement requires connection and vulnerability.

"Your ability to partner with others will largely determine your potential." Aaron unpacks how this truth challenges the lone wolf mentality prevalent among men. Through personal stories of building a mentorship program and facing his own resistance to asking for help, he illuminates the power of collaboration over isolation. Success isn't about conquering others but lifting them as you rise—a lesson Aaron learned through military teamwork that now shapes his vision for manhood.

The podcast takes a profound turn as Aaron examines what makes men "dangerous" in the best sense—not through domination but through personal growth and accountability. He shares raw insights about taking extreme ownership in relationships, differentiating between societal expectations and personal truth, and the transformative effect of men holding each other to higher standards. 

Whether you're struggling with asking for help, battling to break free from others' expectations, or searching for authentic male connections, this episode offers practical wisdom for your journey. Aaron concludes with powerful calls to action that will move you toward greater partnership, accountability, and self-discovery.

Chapters

• 0:36 Introduction to Three Life-Changing Quotes
• 3:51 Quote 1: Partnership Determines Potential
• 13:20 Quote 2: Dangerous Through Growth
• 20:30 Quote 3: Discovering Your True Identity
• 26:23 Call to Action and Final Thoughts

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

You're listening to Excellence Above Talent, a podcast where we have the hard conversations about the lives of men and what leads us to achieve greatness and suffer defeat. Hear from other men's journeys as well, as we all learn and grow together to become inspirations to ourselves and those around us. And now your host, Aaron Thomas.

Speaker 2: 0:36

What's up my beautiful people? Aaron Thomas, with Excellence Above Talent, didn't have a podcast last week, needed to rest calm down a little bit. There's a lot going on School end of year for school, end of year for coaching so I had some people lined up that I will push out in the coming weeks, but I wanted to take some time to talk about the three quotes that have helped me and that are helping me right now in my life. When it comes to the state of manhood, I am on this journey to be the best man I can possibly be. I don't know what that is, I don't know what that looks like. I can have these plans, I can have goals and ambitions, but whatever it is that God is calling me to, I want to be the best version of myself. I'm not in competition with anyone. I see people, I acknowledge people, I cheer people, I push people on, because, to me, I feel that as a man, a good man a good man wants to see the people around him win. A good man wants to see another man win. A good man wants to see another man win because you can't conquer it all. It's a proven fact that when men try to go out and take everything from everybody because they think they can. They never end up in a place where they wanted to go. There's nothing but pain and trauma and debt, that route trying to beat everybody. And I'm in this season where I'm trying to figure out how to win, while cheering others on who are winning the way I think I want to win.

Speaker 2: 2:42

So there are three quotes that have been in my head and on my heart that I want to share with you guys. Give you my takeaway and a call of action. I'm not doing this for fun. I'm doing this because I really want to help change lives. I really want to help inspire men and young men to be better, to be the best version of themselves, because why not? Why choose to walk around and be what everyone else wants you to be, knowing that there's greatness inside of you, pushing you and wanting to see the full potential of who you are. But you're too afraid of what a girl would think or what society thinks, and so you hide the awesomeness of the man that you are to give people a version that you think they want as men. We have to stop doing that. I see it more often than not, and these three quotes. Maybe one of them will help in that process.

Speaker 2: 3:51

So quote number one your ability to partner with others Will largely determine your potential. This is true no matter how gifted you are, and I'm in a season where I have a mentor program in my head, where I'm mentoring single parent moms, sons, and we're just having conversations that they need to have with men to kind of help push them past themselves 6th grade to 12th grade, because I feel like at this time, a lot of young men are learning a lot of different things from a lot of different people and to be specific with what they should be learning so that they can process this information the next time they come across it. It's super important because a lot of these young men don't know how to respond when a crisis comes their way and their only response is to fight or freeze. But there's a lot of different ways to go about having a situation fixed than just fighting and freezing. So my takeaway from this quote success is rarely a solo journey, and that's something that I'm fighting right now. I don't want to feel or appear weak, so trying to do it on my own, knowing I need community buy-in, knowing I need financial support, financial backers, people that believe in what I'm doing, and putting money in hands so I can go out and create the space that I'm trying to create. I know that I cannot do it on my own, but it's hard because I don't want to feel, which is so crazy. I don't want to feel like I'm asking for a handout. And I'm in this process of you're not asking for a handout, you're asking for a handout because it's easy for me to ask people for money for other people, but when it comes to myself, that's where the struggle lies with me and that's something that I have to, I'm processing and trying to figure out because I know that I'm not leaving this world without the help of the people that's in my life that want to help, help, that are around. So I have to be better at building relationships and collaborating with others to help me in this process of opening new doors and learning new abilities. And I don't have an issue collaborating and working with people when it's their stuff.

Speaker 2: 6:45

But for some odd reason, and I guess while unpacking it on this podcast, I don't think I am enough. I talk about I'm enough. I think there's levels to being enough. I know I'm enough. I know I'm worthy to be here on this earth, living this life, inspiring and motivating people at the capacity that I am. But I then start to question am I enough at a higher level? Am I enough having one-on-ones with young men and talking about life? Am I enough when I look back over my life and I see the man I was and I see the man I am now? What struggle is that? I'm not where I used to be and I'm going somewhere, but I'm not where I think I should be. So I'm fighting this mindset of I'm enough up until this point and that's simply not the case. So I know that it's important to have mentors, it's important to network and get your name out and collaborate and help people so that, in return, those people might help you. You never go into it with the mindset of I'm going to help in order to get help, because a lot of times we make that assumption that if I'm helping them, they will help me, but they're not going to help you because they were only thinking about their issue or their project or what they were trying to do. So you can't get mad at people that do that Help without thinking you're going to get the same help back. I also know that teamwork is important.

Speaker 2: 8:33

When I was in the military and we would go on missions, everyone had a role that they played. So let's say we're going out on mission, I'm the driver, there's a gunner and there's a TC which is truck commander. The driver's role is to make sure that Humvee is squared away, air is in, tire oil, transmission, everything looks good, feel good, it's gassed up, it's ready to go. The gunner role is to make sure the gun is clean. We had a .50 cal on our truck and then we had a Mark 19. I love the Mark 19. The sound of an automatic grenade launcher is sexy to me. But we had a Mark 19, and so the gunner's role was to make sure that the gun was clean. We had ammunition and then our dual role was to make sure that we had everything we needed to have on that truck MREs, extra magazines for our guns and the truck commander's job was to kind of do it once over, to check, make sure everything was right and then to lead us into battle. Because I mean, that's what we're doing Anytime you go out on a mission, at any given time something could pop off, and so he's leading us into battle and we all had different

Speaker 2: 10:03

roles. He had a computer where he's telling us you know, turn right, turn left Some don't look right up here Slow down Leading us. And so we all had roles that we were playing and it was a well-oiled machine, except for the part to where I couldn't really drive. But we're not going to get into that. We might get into that in the next part, on the next episode or next podcast. But it was a well-oiled machine. We had our roles, we had each other's back and I think, coming back from war, because we all had one objective in Iraq is to make it back home and to make sure that the people that's around us get back home as well. And sometimes we couldn't do that, but that was a thing that you know. We all had that of the same sound mind of making sure and taking care of each

Speaker 2: 11:03

other. But then you get out and it's a very cutthroat world. I got into teaching because I made the assumption that people really love kids and they love to teach and I think I got burnt out this year because there was a sadness of just people don't give a shit about these kids Not saying all teachers, but there are a lot that just have made up in their head the story about certain kids, and there's nothing that this kid can do or say to change that story. The teamwork, the collaboration it just wasn't there. For me as a new teacher and I don't know if that is like a thing or if it's just at this school, but there was a lot of internal battles that I had within myself because communication just, or lack thereof, really put me in a negative headspace, and I'm new. I'm new to this, so I don't. I'm trying to figure out what to ask and what to say and what to do, on top of also learning how to, you know, be a coach. So it was just. It was super frustrating on a teamwork aspect of it. But that's the beauty about life you live, you learn, you have to figure it out and that's where we're at

Speaker 2: 12:28

now. So one of my major goals is to start seeking out partnerships in the things that I do. I do it, I do it every so often, but to be more open and vulnerable when it comes to asking for help. And, as men, I would challenge you as well to ask for help. If you're trying to build something within you. You cannot build it just by yourself. No one does it alone, and so my call to action for you, as a listener, would be to identify someone in your network who inspires you and reach out to collaborate on a project or goal. Scary, but just see where you could go from doing something that you're scared to

Speaker 2: 13:20

do. Quote number two men become dangerous not through aggression, but through growth, when we stop conforming to what the world says we should be and start holding each other accountable for who we truly are meant to be. That's when healing happens, that's when power rises, and my takeaway from this quote is that true strength lies in personal growth and accountability to oneself and to others. Embracing authenticity can lead to profound transformation, and I think I'm in that process of profound transformation because I am embracing who I am as a person. I am embracing what I've done and who I've hurt and who I've inspired and motivated. It's not always negative, but it's the totality of me being a man, and not being aggressive, but trying to figure out why I feel the way I feel and then having a conversation about it with the person, or writing it down, or going and talking to a

Speaker 2: 14:36

counselor. You don't, you can't keep it to yourself. Once you figure out okay, I'm feeling this way because of this, you have to release it, because if you don't release it, it's going to come back. It doesn't go anywhere, that aggression going to come back. It doesn't go anywhere, that aggression. But through growth I've realized my anger now has a name, or now has a face, or now has a feeling, or now has a place where when I show up, I become angry, versus when I was allowing my aggression just to be the lead. It didn't matter who or what or where or what place I was at, I was just. I was going to be aggressive, I was going to be angry, I was going to want to fight the importance of personal growth, the importance of holding yourself accountable for the things that you have done and

Speaker 2: 15:30

I've. There's a book called Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willick and I would challenge you to go and read that book. But in my first marriage it was easier to blame my ex-wife than to deal with the issues that I had in my life. So let's say we had an argument and I'm blaming her for the argument. But if I'm taking extreme ownership and if I'm being truly accountable for my actions, I can pinpoint the time where the confrontation made a left turn, I can pinpoint what I said or what I did that warranted a response that then pissed me off to give a response that warranted another response, that created this snowball effect of us now in this big-ass argument that I created, but because I don't want to see myself as the one creating it, I will blame her because she's a nagging wife or because she doesn't want to see me happy, or she's just frustrated with her life, or something that you could come up with to make her the bad guy and you the victim. I'll tell you right now that is not a way to live, to own

Speaker 2: 16:53

it. There's nothing better in this world to me, I feel if, than to own who you are, what you are, what you've been, what you're becoming. You also have to understand that there's a difference between societal expectations and personal truth. What people say they think you are and who you are are two totally different aspects on life. You can say I'm dumb. You can say I'm not enough, because that's how you feel. If I don't feel dumb and if I feel enough, that is my truth and I won't fall into the trap of feeling how you feel about me. It doesn't make any sense that I am in this process of being beat down by your negative assumptions of who you think I am and I'm taking what you're saying to heart, not digging deep and asking myself who I really am. And if that's not who I am, then those words are words that that person has to deal with. That is not a me problem, that's a them problem, and they got to figure it out. You go on about your

Speaker 2: 18:15

life. There's also a something chaotic happens in a good way, when men hold each other accountable for their actions. There's just this, this drive, this anger. This drive, this anger it's a good anger, of wanting to be better, not wanting to let this person down, your friend, another man. We all want to be strong and I feel when men get together and we're holding each other accountable for our actions and we see other men succeeding because of the accountability that they have, it pushes us to another level, to higher limits, to push our limits, to be the best version of ourselves. In order to become a dangerous man, you have to have male friendships that hold you accountable for your

Speaker 2: 19:11

actions. In order to become a dangerous man, you have to understand the difference between your personal truth and society's expectations and to become a dangerous man. You have to learn how to lift others up because we're not getting anywhere trying to hold people down because we're afraid that if they're pushing themselves to be better, you have to then too. But because you don't want to, you want to stay in a spot of mediocrity. You want to stay in a spot of being average. You hold other people down because you're afraid of what you have to do. If you let this person thrive and be their best self, that comes from healing. The more you heal, the more you want to pick people up. The more you heal, you see the road that they're going down and you're like no, I've been there, done that. I don't want you going through it. All I can do is help you up and guide you, and if you choose not to, you choose not to, but you cannot say I did not

Speaker 2: 20:18

try. The call of action is to start a conversation with a friend about personal growth and share your accountability goals with each other and quote number three for years. This comes out of a book called the Knowledge of Wisdom and he writes for years I thought I knew myself until I discovered that it is not the truth. I only knew what I believed about myself. Then I discovered that I am not what I believe I am. And it was very interesting and also very frightening when I discovered that I am not what I believe I am. And it was very interesting and also very frightening when I discovered that I really don't know anybody and they don't know me either. The truth is that we only know what we know, and the only thing we really know is our story, and my takeaway from that was self-discovery is a lifelong

Speaker 2: 21:13

journey. Recognizing the difference between self-perception and reality can lead to deeper connections with ourselves and others, and I think that's the struggle I'm in now the dynamic nature of identity and self-awareness how I perceive myself versus reality, how I perceive myself. I am enough, but not enough to create something that could really be a game changer for a society that really needs men to step up, for this next generation of young men really needs men to step up for this next generation of young men. The reality is oh, it's needed, it's wanted, and someone has to do it. Pastor Cliff called me the other day and he confirmed what I was thinking, and then I talked to someone at the Midland Juvenile Detention Center, like the next day after Pastor Cliff, and there was another confirmation of these kids really need you. I just started school getting my master's in business administration, so there's like a fear, will I have enough time? I wouldn't say it's a fear, it's all the excuses I'm trying to make because I'm afraid of what could be when I already see what

Speaker 2: 22:35

is. Sharing personal stories can help bridge the gap between who I am and who you are. If I can tell you a story that resonates with you, we then have a connection that can't be taken away. But it's only through discovering who I am, as a man or as a person, that I'm able to share personal stories. That kind of help bridge this gap of who am I and who are you, because we are only who we think we are because of the lives that we have lived. If I have lived a different life, where both parents were in the household and I didn't have to struggle as much and I had things handed to me, that life would be different than this life. If I never went to the military, if I never got married the first time, that life would be different than this life. We are only living the lives that we're living because, or seeing the stories that we're living, because it's the life that we have lived. And sometimes sharing personal stories can help bridge the gap between people who don't think they like each other or people who don't think they know enough about each

Speaker 2: 23:50

other. And I've also realized that vulnerability helps, fosters authentic relationships. Being able to break down why you did the things you did, to go in and have those deep conversations creates a real connection with real people who are also on that path of looking at themselves in the mirror. Sometimes being vulnerable could be a backfire or can backfire on you when you're vulnerable to the wrong people, because they then take that information and go spread it and tell everybody about your information and what you're doing and how you're doing it, but then you know that that wasn't an authentic relationship. So you get to learn from that. My call to action for quote number three is reflect on your own story and share it with someone you trust. Challenge yourself to understand more about your identity, who you are. Look at that man in the mirror, face him every day, challenge him every day, make him better every

Speaker 2: 24:57

day. You have to be intentional. Embrace your ideals. Your ideals are your ideals. No one can take them from you. And they say the richest person or the richest place on the earth is a grave, because people take their ideals with them to the grave, never to be seen or heard of again. Actively participate in your personal growth journey. Find things that make you better each and every day. It doesn't have to be every day for 20 hours, 20 minutes a day, 30 minutes a day. Find something that's going to make you think, that's going to make you push yourself to be

Speaker 2: 25:38

better. Your stories and connections with others are a powerful tool for transformation. Your stories have power. You as a human connecting with other humans is powerful and it can do some things that can transform and inspire the people around you A community, a school. There's power in stories and connections because there is a man, a young man, a person needing to hear how you got up from something you created or from something you did not create, but you knew you couldn't stay there. If you hear the sound of my voice, you are powerful beyond

Speaker 2: 26:26

measure. You are an amazing person, an amazing man trying to figure it out, and that's not difficult. That's the beauty of life. But you're not alone, you're not by yourself. You don't have to try to figure it out by yourself. I need you, you need me. We need each other to be the best men that we can possibly be for ourselves and for our family. So if anyone hasn't told you today that they love you, let me be the first to say I love you. You are awesome. You are amazing. You deserve the best that this world has to offer. Do not quit, do not give up. The world does not get easier, but you will get stronger. Y'all have a blessed weekend. Bye-bye.

Speaker 1: 27:16

Thank you for listening. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast so you never miss an episode and for daily motivational and up-to-date content. Follow us on Facebook and Instagram at Excellence Above Talent. And remember keep moving forward, never give up and you are never alone in this battle. We'll see you next time you