From Addiction to Purpose: Healing the Masculine Wound + Reclaiming Personal Power - Podcast Interview w/ Fathers Sons & Brothers

🔥 From Addiction to Purpose: Healing the Masculine Wound + Reclaiming Personal Power

If you’ve ever felt like you were born into a world that didn’t teach you how to be a man… you’re not alone. In this raw and powerful conversation with the Fathers Sons Brothers podcast, I unpack my personal journey — from sommelier and addiction, to purpose, awakening, and redefining masculine identity.

This post (and the podcast below 👇) covers:

• Why most men are carrying unspoken grief and shame

• The cost of performance-based love and perfectionism

• How psychedelics and psychosis broke open my healing path

• What it means to reclaim personal power — without bypassing the pain

🎧 Listen to the full episode here:

🔗 Spotify Podcast Episode

🛑 Most Men Are Carrying Wounds They’ve Never Been Allowed to Name

We live in a culture that teaches men to suppress, perform, and prove. But what happens when that performance cracks?

Masculinity is Not Something to Fear or Shame

Like many, I built a life chasing validation — status, mastery, and external success — trying to prove I was enough. But underneath the performance was a scared boy who had never been taught how to feel.

In this interview, I open up about healing the masculine wound — the absence of conscious fathering, real mentorship, and permission to be soft. But it’s not just about reclaiming tenderness. Masculinity itself is under attack in modern culture. We’re taught to fear it, shame it, or suppress it. As a result, the healthy, protective masculine — the one that sets boundaries, defends truth, and leads with integrity — is collapsing.

And without that grounded masculine energy, society continues to devolve. No one stands up to chaos. No one holds the line. Healing the masculine isn’t just personal — it’s cultural. And it’s time we start talking about it.

🌪️ Psychedelics, Psychosis, and the Awakening That Followed

My journey took an unexpected turn during an ayahuasca ceremony where I experienced a full-blown psychedelic-induced psychosis.

What felt like a breakdown was actually a breakthrough — a confrontation with every layer of false identity I had built. It forced me to reckon with the buried trauma, survival mechanisms, and societal scripts I was living by.

This part of the episode dives deep into how we can reframe mental “illness” as spiritual initiation… and how the body often says what the soul is trying to scream.

🧠 Why Addiction Isn’t About the Substance

Addiction, for me, wasn’t about alcohol or cigarettes. It was about the emotional absence, the disconnection from self, and the pressure to keep it all together.

We talk about:

• How shame drives addictive patterns

• Why dopamine-seeking is a symptom, not the cause

• How to rewire your system through presence, breath, and deeper truths

This episode also includes a shoutout to @adhdfounder — one of the first people who helped me understand the dopamine trap and how neurodivergent minds experience it differently.

🌱 Reclaiming the Masculine: It’s Not About Being “Alpha”

Real power isn’t domination — it’s integration.

We explore what it means to reclaim masculinity from a conscious lens:

• Leading with integrity instead of ego

• Balancing softness with strength

• Creating safe spaces for men to feel, break, and rebuild

It’s time we stop pretending and start healing. Not just for ourselves — but for the generations before us and the ones to come.

🧬 Reference:

📚 According to Dr. Gabor Maté, addiction is often rooted in trauma and unmet emotional needs. His work in In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts backs the idea that healing is about reconnecting to your body, boundaries, and authentic self.

💡 Want to Go Deeper?

If this episode spoke to you, you’re not alone. I’m here for men (and women) who are awakening — who are done performing and are ready to remember.

📥 Ready to break free from burnout, addiction, and unconscious patterns?

Explore my 7-day course → www.risewithchristopher.com/reset

🎧 Listen to more interviews and deep dives → www.youtube.com/@risewithchristopher

📲 Follow on Instagram → https://instagram.com/risewithchristopher