You're listening to the Hard Men Podcast, reclaiming biblical masculinity in a world of softness.

Well, welcome to the Hard Man Podcast. I am your host Eric Kahn. And in this episode I want to talk

about the myth of the nice guy. I want to discuss what's at the heart of this myth and therefore at the heart of

what we might call Nice Guy Syndrome and I also want to look at why this has

become the dominant model for men in much of the Western world today.

Now beyond that I want to explore the ways in which the nice guy has become the prototypical

vision for masculinity in the church. the

thanks in large part to egalitarian and in particular

complementary and in particular complementary and theologies.

So in this episode, we're going to look at the results of this failed nice guy model of

masculinity both in the church and in the culture and we're going to talk about some practical ways that we can go about as men rebuilding

a vision and competency for masculinity that is robust, potent, God-honoring, and life-giving.

So I want to begin by taking a look at the nice guy myth,

and I want to ask a simple question what is the myth of the nice guy?

So I'm going to start with a definition for this all too common myth and then I'm going to unpack some of its basic

components. So the first tenant of the nice guy myth is this. First of all the nice guy myth is the belief that man's sole

purpose and primary mission in life is to serve and to please his woman. Based on the first tenant of this myth, many men make their girlfriends or wives the

all-consuming center of their lives.

She is like the sun in their universe and they are like little

planets always sucked into her orbit. Men who define their existence solely in

terms of her. She is man's mission. And so this nice guy will bend his

every effort, his every waking moment, trying to keep her happy and emotionally satisfied.

...