Tom Rowland Podcast episode 1030 is a conversation with Pat Barber, one of the original CrossFit athletes and coaches, known in the early days as The Manimal, and the founder of The Fathers Guild. Pat talks about learning CrossFit from his middle school English teacher, nearly twenty years of teaching CrossFit seminars, why he thinks fitness is simple, and the $5 No Yell Challenge that changed how he parents his four boys.
You can watch the full conversation in the player above, or press play in the player at the top of this page to listen.
Pat Barber is one of the original CrossFit athletes and coaches, nicknamed The Manimal in the early days. He started doing CrossFit in 2004 when his English teacher, Tony Budding, brought it to his school to train the volleyball team, and after high school he trained at CrossFit Santa Cruz and filmed seminars for CrossFit headquarters. He has taught on the CrossFit Level 1 and Level 2 seminar staff since about 2006. Today he is the father of four boys and the founder of The Fathers Guild.
The No Yell Challenge is a one-month challenge Pat Barber created in 2023 after his three older sons each told his wife they were scared of his yelling. For a month he committed to not yelling at his kids, and if he did, he paid the son he yelled at five dollars, with the kids deciding what counted as a yell. The point was to put a gap between something happening and his response. He tells what happened in the first 15 minutes, and how the month went, in the episode.
Pat describes dysregulation as the inability to control the response you have. When you are well regulated, you can be intentional with how you respond to the world, and he says things like time in nature, writing, reading, eating well, and sleeping well help get you there. For him, the fix meant waking up earlier to make time for sauna, cold plunge, and breathwork. He explains how he realized his yelling was coming from dysregulation, not from his kids.
Pat says fitness should be viewed through the lens of living a high-quality life, and it comes down to a trade-off between intensity and volume. His personal belief is to train about five days a week: three shorter, intense workouts of five to 20 minutes with varied movements, plus either one heavy lift or one long, slow effort. If you feel good and train six days, you do both. He is clear that it is his own view, not a rule.
The Fathers Guild is Pat Barber's community for fathers who want to become better dads and better men. He started it after stepping away from social media and reflecting on what mattered to him, and he named it after the guilds in Dungeons & Dragons. The account has around 250,000 followers, and Pat also runs an online community with live calls and small retreats at his home. You can find it at thefathersguild.com and @thefathersguild on YouTube and Instagram.
Pat interviewed 30 fathers and found a common thread: a gap between the dream version of the man they want to be and the man they are today, along with a feeling that they cannot quite trust themselves to close it. He uses the idea of antifragility, stress plus recovery plus consistency, to help men grow. He applies it across three areas, health, freedom, and relationships. He walks through the whole framework in the episode.
I found CrossFit on my computer in Key West when I was coming off marathon running and trying to figure out how to stay in shape the way I did as a high school wrestler. I did not have anyone to train with, so I worked out in my backyard and read the comments on the workout of the day. Pat was one of the guys in those early videos, and I even built my gym to look like the old Santa Cruz gym. I wanted to hear how he got there and where he has taken it since. Press play at the top of the page to hear it in his words.
Pat did not go looking for CrossFit. It came to his small private school in 2004, when his English teacher, Tony Budding, brought it in to train the volleyball team. Tony was also my first real connection to CrossFit headquarters, back when he called me the fishing guy, so this one made me laugh. From there Pat ended up holding a camera for every lecture Greg gave, unpaid, editing on a demo copy of Final Cut. He tells the right place, right time story better than I can write it.
Pat still teaches Level 1 and Level 2 seminars, and he has done it since 2006 or 2007. I went through one of those seminars years ago, and I have watched CrossFit go through a lot of change since then, so I was curious what someone on the inside thinks. Pat still believes it is the best training methodology in the world for building fitness. He also has a clear opinion on where the company has lost its footing, and he is careful to say that view is his own. He does not dodge it, and it is worth hearing him lay it out.
This part ties straight to why I have fitness on a fishing and outdoors podcast. If you love to hunt, fish, or hike, I think you want to keep doing it as long as you can. Pat says coaching fitness is boring to him now, because fitness is simple. The hard part is getting people to do it. He boils it down to a trade-off between intensity and volume, a handful of movements, and a weekly split he shares in the episode. He also reminded me that if I am working out so I can fish more, I should actually go fishing more.
Pat considers himself a calm guy, which is why it hit him hard when his three older boys each told his wife they were scared of his yelling. He brought them into a room one at a time and asked each of them to finish one sentence about their dad. What he did next is simple enough that I think any parent could try it tonight, and it got tested almost immediately. The way Pat tells that moment, and what he learned about himself afterward, is my favorite part of the conversation.
If you only listen to one part of this episode, make it the No Yell Challenge. Press play in the player above, or scroll back up to watch.
Pat recently interviewed 30 fathers about what they are struggling with, and the same answer kept coming back: a gap between the man they picture and the man they are today. I think a lot of men feel that, at any age. Pat's answer starts with a word I had never heard, antifragility, and it builds into a framework he uses with the men in his community. When he finished explaining it, I told him it sounded like the Karate Kid, with him as the guide. Listen to him walk through it.
My kids are grown now, and I have a grandson. Nobody warned me how hard the empty nest would be, or how much tougher it is to watch a grown child make a mistake than to watch a little one scrape a knee. I shared that with Pat, and I compared good parenting to good fishing guiding: be safe, show people a good time, teach them something, and then you can focus on the fish. Pat took that somewhere I did not expect. His answer to what the material of fatherhood really is deserves to be heard in his own voice.
Yesterday's conversation with Pat took me right back to my backyard in Key West, trying to keep up with the workout of the day. It also took me somewhere I did not expect, into what it means to be a good father and a good man at every stage.
If I could give one piece of advice to a younger father, it is the one I gave Pat: there is no amount of time you can give your kids that you will regret later. It compounds like money in a bank account.
If you are a dad, take a look at The Fathers Guild at thefathersguild.com. Press play in the player at the top of this page to hear the whole conversation.
Pat Barber, The Fathers Guild (thefathersguild.com), CrossFit, CrossFit Santa Cruz, the CrossFit Games, the CrossFit Open, CrossFit Level 1 and Level 2 seminars, Greg Glassman, Tony Budding, Nicole Carroll, Chris Spealler, Colten Mertens, Andrew Tate, Manimal Athletics, the Nasty Girls video, Taking on the Open, Final Cut 7, Dungeons & Dragons, The Karate Kid, and Key West.
Pat Barber is one of the early CrossFit athletes and coaches, known in those days as The Manimal. He started CrossFit in 2004 with his school volleyball team, trained at CrossFit Santa Cruz, filmed seminars for CrossFit headquarters, and competed in the early years of the CrossFit Games. He has taught on the CrossFit Level 1 and Level 2 seminar staff since about 2006. Pat is the father of four boys and the founder of The Fathers Guild, a community that helps men become better fathers and better men.
Transcript
Tom Rowland Podcast — Episode 1030: Pat Barber
In this episode: learning CrossFit from his English teacher, filming the early seminars, where CrossFit stands today, why fitness is simple, the $5 No Yell Challenge, and what Pat Barber calls the material of fatherhood.
Tom Rowland: Hey, everybody. Welcome to the Tom Rowland Podcast, brought to you by Star brite. We're brought to you by Star brite today, as always. Star brite is the maker of an awesome line of products to take care of your boat. That's where I use it most. Whether it's the Salt Off product or any of the boat-cleaning products, Star brite has you covered. Definitely check them out. They're not only a great company for the products that they have, but they also do a tremendous amount in conservation, and that is certainly important to us all.
Pat Barber: I'm Pat Barber from the Fathers Guild, and this is the Tom Rowland Podcast.
Tom Rowland: Pat Barber. Man, I feel like I'm back in 2010 looking at the computer trying to figure out how to do CrossFit faster and better.
Pat Barber: Well, I'm honored that you remember those times and that I could somehow be in your memory at all, so thank you for having those.
Tom Rowland: Well, it was a great time. That was an amazing time for my own personal fitness. It was just a cool time. I found CrossFit on the computer when I was transitioning from marathon running into trying to do something else. I was a wrestler in high school, and when you get out of wrestling, there aren't adult wrestling clubs. So just like everybody else, I'm struggling with how do you stay in shape? This is how we used to be in shape. And then I found CrossFit, and I'm like, “Well, this is kind of what we did in wrestling.” Were you a wrestler?
Pat Barber: I wasn't. I should have been. I chose a sport that I should not have chosen. I chose beach volleyball and volleyball. I'm 5'7" and kind of stocky, so volleyball was not the natural choice. I should have been in wrestling, but I chose volleyball.
Tom Rowland: There are a lot of reasons to choose volleyball over wrestling. I can think of many immediately. You don't have to cut weight. You're on the beach. It's fun. There's a ton of things better about beach volleyball than wrestling, but wrestling is the opposite of beach volleyball. You're in a dungeon. It's hot. There's somebody trying to kill you all the time. But it's a good sport. It builds mental toughness.
Pat Barber: I met a lot of wrestlers teaching CrossFit over the years, and the psychological toughness that they have going into stuff is second to none. It's pretty cool to watch. They can just grind, and they understand how to push themselves better than anyone. It's actually funny. A lot of wrestlers you have to teach to pull back. Like, “Hey, no. This is how we pull back and don't hit our heads against the wall.”
Tom Rowland: What I was going to say to you was that wrestlers probably have the highest chance of rhabdo, because they know how to push, right? But they haven't been in shape. And then there's a mom next to him that's killing him, and they're like, “This is not happening. I'm going to do whatever.” And then they get rhabdo.
Pat Barber: Totally.
Pat Barber: What's funny, though, I've been strong in my life, and I've wrestled, but I've never been a wrestler. Back when I was competing, I knew Chris Spealler really well. If you remember Chris—
Tom Rowland: Of course.
Pat Barber: He's a 5'4", 140-pound man, and at the time, I was about 175 and very strong, and I was like, “Yeah, I'll wrestle you. This'll be fine.” Chris is this ex-collegiate wrestler who, I think, won state. He did some crazy stuff, but I'm like, “Dude, I outweigh him by a good 30 pounds almost. Let's do this.” So I attempted to wrestle Chris Spealler, and that was when I learned how much technique is involved in wrestling.
Tom Rowland: Bad choice.
Pat Barber: Oh, it was a terrible choice. We started, and I didn't even blink, and I was staring at the ceiling. I was like, “What's going on now?” I was standing a second ago, and all of a sudden I'm lying on the ground, and I can't throw this 140-pound man off me. And I'm like, “What are you talking about? I clean nearly 400 pounds. How am I not able to get this guy off me?” So that blew my mind with understanding the technique of wrestling. It made me respect the people who are quite capable in it a lot more, and I was like, “Okay, that's really cool.”
Tom Rowland: It is. So how did you find CrossFit to begin with?
Pat Barber: I went to a very small private school, and do you know who Tony Budding is? Or Nicole Carroll?
Tom Rowland: Well, I do. Tony Budding was kind of my intro to CrossFit HQ. He put something out one day. It was when the Games were first starting, and Greg got on a podcast or something, and he was like, “Look, I just want to get these Games on TV. I don't know anything about it. If anybody out there knows anything about TV, reach out.” So I reached out. I said, “Well, I do TV. That's what I do for a living, and I know a little bit about TV. I'm happy to talk to you.” Tony called me immediately. We became friends. He took me out to the Games when they were in the tennis center the first time. And then we did a couple of things, but it was really cool. Those days of CrossFit were amazing. I was the fishing guy. That's what he called me.
Pat Barber: Yeah, we may have run into each other then. We must have met in passing. Those years I was competing, so I was pretty much on the floor and in my own world. So I started CrossFit because Tony Budding was my English teacher from middle school and high school.
Tom Rowland: Oh, no way.
Pat Barber: Yeah, and Nicole Carroll was my pottery teacher from middle school.
Tom Rowland: Wow, that's a fit school.
Pat Barber: Well, at the time, CrossFit didn't exist. We're talking early 2000s. They found it in like 2003. 2004 was when Tony found it, and he brought it to the school to train the volleyball team, and I was on the volleyball team. So we were doing CrossFit in 2004, not really knowing what it was, not really understanding things, and it was the very early days. That was my introduction into it. When I graduated high school, I went down and trained at the local CrossFit Santa Cruz with Greg and Nicole and Tony and did the whole thing in that crazy world. I was just kind of right place, right time and ended up going from there.
Pat Barber: They needed someone to film video for the seminars, and I had recently lost a job working as a room service guy, and they're like, “Hey, you know how to film video?” I was like, “Nope, but I can hold a camera.” “Let's go.” They were like, “We can't pay you, but we can fly you around the country to go to all these seminars and teach you all this stuff.” And I was like, “Cool.” So I started flying around the country holding the camera, filming every single lecture that Greg ever did, miking up all the people, learning the behind-the-scenes video stuff, and I got sat down in front of a computer to do video editing on the original Final Cut 7, and it was a demo model. This demo model on a slow laptop where you'd hit render, and you'd sit back and wait for it to render each little thing. It was old-school days. I was just right place, right time, hence the reason you saw me in those videos. They'd be like, “Hey, we need someone to jump in this. Pat, can you do it?” And I'm like, “Sure. I'll stand in front of the camera sometime.” That was my intro, man.
Tom Rowland: Man, that was really cool. That Santa Cruz gym was iconic. I built my gym, and I wanted it to look like that. That's what it's supposed to look like. I can remember all those videos, like that Nasty Girls video, where those three girls are just killing these workouts. It was just such a cool time. For my intro, I didn't have anybody to work out with, so I was in Key West and I could just work out in my backyard, and then I could get in the comments and see what other people had done on the workout of the day. That's just how it went back then, and it was so cool. It was kind of underground and fun.
Pat Barber: Yeah. It was raw. It was really raw, and everyone was still trying to figure it out. The method was there. Greg was solid on the method, and for everyone who was finding it, it was like discovering this treasure trove of adaptation, right? Any of us who'd been athletes before, or had been into training at all, understood that results don't happen quite like this, and they don't happen in this way. And then all of a sudden you stumble across this seemingly small movement, and you're trying stuff and you're like, “Whoa, this is fun.” And then you're like, “Whoa, look at these results. Wait, this hurts. But oh, look, I can learn this and this and this.” It was a very raw and exploratory time, and I'm super honored to have been a part of it. But I think some of that magic is lost because the method is so well understood, and it's been modified and taken, and the common training these days is much more similar to what CrossFit is than it was back then. You were crazy to do what we did back then.
Tom Rowland: You were against the grain. And it was hard to find a place. Gyms weren't set up for it. Now you go into a public gym and they have a little area that's kind of designed for it. It's basically a CrossFit spot. They don't call it that anymore, but they have an area with open floor space, and that was very strange back then.
Tom Rowland: It was a great time. Tony actually— I pitched him this idea for the Open, and the idea was that I would go to these different places. Back then there were seven workouts, maybe six, I think. He thought it was a great idea, so he sent the media team down. They did one in Key West. We did one in Tennessee, one in New York, and it became one of those videos. What did we say it was called, Jake? “Taking on the Open.” Can you put it up there?
Pat Barber: You did? That was you?
Tom Rowland: He's going to put it up. Yeah. It was me, but I look a lot younger then. And Jessica Pominian was there. We went together to these different places, and that was all through Tony.
Pat Barber: No way.
Tom Rowland: It was fun. One of them was in my backyard. I just thought it was awesome. Oh, look, you're going to see it. This is the one in Queens. I had to scour the internet to find this. This is me. This is the only one that's still left. They've taken every other one off the internet.
Pat Barber: That's so wild. I wonder if we could go find these old archives.
Tom Rowland: Well, there's one on YouTube right there. Can you see what's up there or no?
Pat Barber: I'm seeing it, man. This is so good.
Tom Rowland: It was wild. 15 years ago.
Pat Barber: Yeah, it was really wild, man. It was a great time, and I loved every second of it. Wow, cool. I love it. With no grips. That's pre-grips.
Tom Rowland: Dang straight. Putting on the tape, the whole works.
Pat Barber: I remember I had a video tutorial of how to make those tape grips that ended up doing quite well.
Tom Rowland: I'm sure that's how I learned how to do it with the grips.
Tom Rowland: So anyway, enough about the old days of CrossFit. You worked your way through all of the CrossFit, and then what was the next step for you after that? How did you depart CrossFit?
Pat Barber: I actually didn't depart. I still work for Level 1s and Level 2s, so I still teach the seminars. I was never directly employed by HQ after I worked for Tony and the media department. When I stopped doing that, I became a Level 1, Level 2 staff member going around and putting people through the seminars, and I've done that since 2006, 2007-ish. Since then, it's always been a part-time gig. I always had other things going on that would support my life. I was running businesses, running gyms, doing online companies. But I always had this core of working for CrossFit headquarters. In the past few years, as you know, there's been a lot of upheaval and change within the organization, but the Level 1 and Level 2 staff team has been pretty untouched within that. We still do our own thing. We still run seminars, and I still do that. That has never gone.
Tom Rowland: That's great. Those things were great. There used to be so many people that would go through there. I think Chuck was my flow master when I went through it.
Pat Barber: Chuck's a—
Tom Rowland: He was a great dude, man. Is he still after it?
Pat Barber: He's still getting after it, man. He's helping run the team, so he's one of the leaders of the entire training department. He's one of the best men I know, in terms of how he makes people feel seen and just connects with them in a very lighthearted but firm manner. He's a wonderful, wonderful guy.
Tom Rowland: That's super cool. I learned so much in those— well, I only did one seminar, but the whole thing was cool.
Pat Barber: They're fun. The cool thing is, I've taught these seminars since 2006, 2007, so the information is still as solid and amazing as ever, and it's second nature to me. I don't have to do anything to go present these, and I love presenting. Imagine if you were teaching a comedy routine that you had done for 20 years. That's the level of proficiency I get to deliver it with now, and it's no longer about, “Okay, let me remember the information.” It's, “How can I connect with these people?” So even though the seminars are smaller— back when you took it, it would be like 80 people per gig. They're down to 20, 30 people per gig, but they're so much better in terms of how you can connect with the people, and I think that's where the fun is for me. I still get the people for whom this is their first experience, and they're like, “Show me the way,” and I get to go, “Okay, here it is.” It's fun, man. I still really enjoy it.
Tom Rowland: Well, that's great. There has been a lot of upheaval. Where do you think CrossFit is today?
Pat Barber: Oh, how should I say this? I think it's still hands down the best training methodology in the world, and nothing about that has changed. And when I say training methodology, I mean training with regard to improving fitness. Fitness has a very specific definition: increased work capacity across broad time and modal domains. Basically, what are you able to do? At what level are you able to do it? How long can you do it for? I don't think there's a better program for the populace than CrossFit for that. There are many other amazing training programs out there. I'm not taking away from that. I'm just saying that CrossFit is still the best for that specific thing. Where CrossFit stands as a larger company is it's no longer the bad boy, super cool, unique thing, so it's not the underground. It's also not the global powerhouse that it was, because there's a lot of other stuff in the market with a lot of funding behind it that's new and pretty, and people want to be doing new and pretty. The biggest issue I think CrossFit's running into is a confusion around what it really is in a global market. Where do they stick their flag and say, “Hey, this is what we are”? With the changing of the guard multiple times when it comes to the ownership of CrossFit and the people who are running it, we're seeing some people who understand what it is trying to get the message out, and some people who don't quite understand what it is, thinking they understand what it is, putting something out they think people will like. I think that confusion has led to internal turmoil, as well as a misunderstanding of where we really sit in the market. Obviously, these are my personal feelings about it. This is not CrossFit's word or anything along those lines. It's just, as somebody who understands it really intimately and deeply and why it's different than other stuff, it's confusing to me sometimes why we're not just standing on a mountaintop and shouting that thing out over and over again.
Tom Rowland: Well, I would imagine that you've learned so much about communication and connecting with people through all of these seminars. I remember going to that seminar, and it's pretty intimidating, and there's a lot of information thrown at you. Like you said, Chuck was so good at making you feel welcome, making you feel seen, making you feel like you belong there, and he was going to help you get through it. But it wasn't going to be easy. You were going to have to pass the test at the end. I remember it being somewhat intimidating. I went there by myself. I didn't have anybody with me, and you're just kind of like, “Okay, well, this is a whole different thing here.” But the instructors were very good, almost military good at presenting this course, and it was going to be this way, period, and you were going to learn exactly what the process was, and you came away with this incredible understanding of what you were trying to do. So how have you taken those skills of connecting with people and communicating a large amount of information into other parts of your life?
Pat Barber: That has actually been probably the biggest takeaway, and it's also been the most aggressive evolution that I've had. When you first learn the information, you're like, “This is it. Everyone has to have this.” So you're like, “If you don't like this, then screw you, and you're going to like it, and you're a bad person if you don't.” And so you're just beating people over the head with information, right? There are some people who will bite on that and some people who won't. I treated my coaching the same way. When I started coaching in regular gyms, it was like, “I'm going to deliver the information. You're going to like it or you're not going to like it. If you like it, you're going to stick around. If you don't, you're out of here.” I was never intentionally being mean or anything other than direct. But as you evolve as a trainer and as somebody who's a lecturer and a leader, it's so much about how the information is taken on board, and you can start to evolve your ability to present it so that it can be heard. I would say that is the biggest amount of growth you would see from 2010, when you took the seminar, to what it is now. It's the exact same information, but it's said even more masterfully to the group that's there in front of you. That is the evolution of a leader, or the evolution of a coach. First you're just doing it one way. That works for a certain number of people. Then you're expanding your skill set to be able to deliver and really connect with people who might not hear it one way or another. That was fascinating for me to grow into and learn as a man. I came up in this when I was 18, 20 years old, so I was a stubborn, self-righteous turd, if I'm going to be honest. Like you alluded to, my nickname was The Manimal. I'm going to hit my head against the wall until it breaks. That's my method, and it's the wall's fault for being there. When you start to reflect, you have the opportunity as a coach to get this heard more effectively, and I think that opens up so many paths. The information doesn't change. It's just how you deliver it. In fact, that's almost the most powerful piece. People don't really care what you say. They care about how you make them feel.
Tom Rowland: Right.
Pat Barber: And that ends up being the most fun of these. These days, when I show up to teach a seminar and someone is coming in with a chip on their shoulder, that's my favorite. It used to be that with that person, I'd be like, “You got a chip on your shoulder? Screw you, I'm going to push on you so hard.” And now it's like, “Let me win you over. Let me get you to my side. Let me connect with you and show you how awesome what we have is.” That's such an artful process, and I love that. So I'd say the evolution in what I've learned and taken into my larger life is that connecting with people is the fun of it all. There are so many different types of people and so many different types of connection, and you have the opportunity as a presenter, as a leader, as a father, as a coach. I think all men have this opportunity to really connect with a room and uplift it. That's what I find fascinating now. The act of coaching now, the fitness stuff, is boring as hell to me. Fitness is simple. I don't want to be a guy online touting fitness, because it's really simple. There's nothing complicated about it. But getting people to do it, ooh, that's interesting. What do I need to say to you to get you to be like, “Okay, I can”? That's the passion that I have now. That's the world that I'm living in.
Tom Rowland: I would think that there's a bunch of people listening right now that are saying, “Fitness is simple? I don't understand what he's saying. It seems complicated to me.” So if you were to boil it down— not how to do it, or how to develop the discipline or the habit or the routine to do it— explain fitness, how simple it is.
Pat Barber: Sure. Fitness specifically needs to be viewed, in my opinion, through the lens of living a high-quality life. You use fitness to live better, and if we use that as our vision, then we go, “Okay, well, living better means I need to be able to do what I want, whatever thing I want to do, at whatever level I want, for however long I want. So I need to be able to say yes to life, essentially.” That's the initial anchor you have to have psychologically: “My fitness should support my ability to live the highest quality of life possible for me.” That's where we set our anchor, and I think that alone for a lot of people is confusing, because they view fitness as physique. They view fitness as what they look like. The first mental shift you have to make to make fitness easy is, “It's not about that.” You can get really confused doing that. If you're looking to pursue a high quality of life, that's a much better anchor point. So first set that, and then go, “Okay, well, what supports that?” When you look at what supports living a higher quality of life, we have a balance between two things: intensity and, essentially, volume. Intensity is how hard you're going. That's how heavy, how fast, and that's kind of it. Volume is how much you're doing. If you have lower intensity, you have to do more of it. If you have higher intensity, you have to do less of it. So there's always going to be a trade-off. You look at your life and you go, “Do I have a lot of time and prefer long-duration things? Well, then I can spend more time doing longer stuff.” If you're a father like me, I have to go, “Well, I don't have a lot of time. I've got 10 to 30 minutes a day. I'm going to have to do higher-intensity stuff. That's just the nature of it, and I'm going to accept that.” From there, we look to see what kinds of movements can elicit the biggest adaptation, the biggest change, and those kinds of movements are what we call functional movements. The big, main lifts that everyone talks about: squats and presses and deadlifts, which are the movements of life— picking stuff up, putting it down, sitting down, standing back up. Explosive things like cleans and snatches and dynamic movements, if you feel competent in those. We basically look to mix those up in a bunch of different ways that produce high levels of intensity, and we do that four times a week. And that's it.
Tom Rowland: Well, that is very simple, and it's so interesting to hear you say that from a different perspective, because that's what I talk about on this podcast a lot. Most of the audience that's listening to this is probably an outdoorsman of some type: a hunter, a fisherman, a hiker, somebody that likes to be outside. That's why I have fitness as part of this show. If you love doing those things, don't you want to do them as long into your life as possible? That's what it's all about. Somewhere along the line, it goes from being an unpleasant thing to do to getting in a little bit better shape, and actually you like doing it. And then you do a little bit more of it because, like you said, you can now do more. That's where these longer workouts come in. But are they necessary for just being better at your job, or better as a parent, or better as a hunter or a fisherman or a hiker? Probably not. You're doing those longer ones and more volume because you want to. You like it, and movement has now become fun. So instead of four days a week, you might go six days a week. But is that what everybody needs to do? No. Not at all.
Pat Barber: You're working out so you can go fishing more, so you should actually go fishing more, right?
Tom Rowland: Exactly. Yes.
Pat Barber: I think that's the funny part: people work out and then they get so wrapped up in the working out that they're not doing the thing they actually did it for. I think that's a whole different demographic of person. But to your point, if you have specialties that you really enjoy, those short, intense workouts will give you the ability to slug it out in those other scenarios. Absolutely you should go spend time doing long hikes. You should go spend time camping. You should go spend time doing longer-duration things. I think the bigger thing you get from longer-duration efforts, especially really grindy ones, is psychological toughness, much more so than physiological toughness. But I'm talking to the 99% of people who just don't have time, or have a perceived lack of time, and it's just like, “Look, let's get this done.” You can do that. You just have to do more intensity. I still think there's a ton of value in going really long.
Pat Barber: In fact, the way I've viewed the perfect relative split— and this is my personal belief. I'm not going to tell anyone they have to do this. I think you should probably train five days a week. If you're feeling good, six days a week. If you have five days a week, I would do three shorter, more intense workouts, five to 15 minutes or five to 20 minutes, with varied movements, high intensity, varied complexity levels, varied loadings. So three shorter, more intense workouts, one heavy lift, or one really long, slow-duration thing. If you're doing six days a week, then you just do both of those: one long, slower thing, one heavy lift, and then three shorter, more intense things, just to have good coverage. That seems to be the most longevity you can have and the easiest kind of lever to pull. That's my belief around it.
Tom Rowland: Somewhere along the line here, you had kids. How many kids do you have?
Pat Barber: I had four. Well, my wife had four. But I was there, present for all of them, and I contributed on the front end.
Tom Rowland: She did most of the work.
Pat Barber: She did the vast majority, and to this day still does the majority of the work, because she is amazing. But I have four boys, 14 down to three.
Tom Rowland: Right on. So tell me about what you have going on, the Fathers Guild.
Pat Barber: The Fathers Guild is a passion project of mine that has kind of become a central focus for me. It's something that I've yet to really crack the code on, how I can make it support my life, but it is something I feel very strongly about. I became very disenfranchised with social media in general, because I think it does far more harm than it does good. I think more people are wasting their lives there than improving their lives there. But I'd be naive to say that people don't get a lot of benefit from it. There are some amazing things you can find. I took some time away from social media because I didn't like it, and in that time, I reflected on what I cared about, and what I care about a lot is being a good man and being a good father. That identity to me is really important, and I find a lot of joy in fatherhood. I find a lot of struggle. But within that struggle is a massive amount of reward, more than I've had in any other area of my life. I've been a professional athlete. I've worked for amazing companies. I've been a leader. I do all these things, but being a father gave me such a strong sense of meaning and purpose and identity. I love it. I have great kids, and I have a great relationship with my wife, and I've had so much personal growth through the process that I figured I'd start putting my thoughts on fatherhood out there: “Hey, here's some ways that I've grown. Here are some reflections that I've done.” I've always been a relatively introspective and reflective person, but I wanted to share my ideas about fatherhood. So I started this account, and I'm a nerd and I like Dungeons & Dragons and stuff, and I was like, “Oh, guild. Yeah, guild. I'm in. We're going to start the Fathers Guild, a collective of men who agree on the same stuff: dads are cool, and we're dads.” So I started the Fathers Guild and started putting out my thoughts on fatherhood, little snippets and musings about fatherhood. I had a few posts go really viral. I was expecting a couple hundred people to be here, and all of a sudden it just kept growing. I was like, “Whoa, there's a lot of desire for a conversation around fatherhood and masculinity.”
Pat Barber: A big part of that for me was I saw so much rhetoric on the extreme ends of masculinity, where you have people who are just raw, raw man, dominate, like the Andrew Tates of the world, and it was just hardcore. On the other side of it, it was people telling men to be more effeminate: “You should be a woman.” And it's like, whoa, whoa. There's a huge middle ground.
Tom Rowland: There is.
Pat Barber: There's a lot in the middle. Why are we in these extremes? So I tried to be, and I continue to try to be, a voice in the middle. I think there are very valuable things to be taken from both sides of this conversation, but there's also a really firm middle ground of mature masculinity, and that's what I try to speak to on the Fathers Guild. It's become this space for me to continue to present ideas and thoughts and concepts around self-improvement. How do we be the best versions of ourselves as fathers and as men?
Tom Rowland: Like we talked about before, you had really refined your presentation style and your communication style. How much of what you're doing today in communicating these musings about fatherhood comes from the development and growth that you had as a CrossFit instructor?
Pat Barber: 98% of it. All the concepts are the same. If you talk about what CrossFit was, it was essentially a scientific method. We do what works. What's the outcome we want? Cool. What are we doing? Is it giving us the outcome? If not, change the thing that we're doing. It's the same process I took to fatherhood: the examination of, okay, what do I want? I want these values. I want these kids to act this way. So what can I do? Well, let's try this way. Oh, it didn't work. Okay, let's try this way. It didn't work. Let's try this way. Oh, it worked. Cool. But it didn't work for this kid. Huh, that's interesting.
Tom Rowland: That's what I was going to say. It works for one, but it does not work for the other.
Pat Barber: Exactly. That bit of advice alone is key. Hey, you've got two kids. What works for one's not going to work for another, and what works for me is not going to work for you. You have to be willing to experiment and humble enough to do so. And on top of that, a big part of learning to coach this CrossFit stuff is making complex ideas simple. So when we come into my actual presentation of what I'm doing on the Fathers Guild, my goal is to take more complex ideas, make them really simple and actionable, and then be like, “Okay, act on this. Can you do this?” Sometimes I get it right, sometimes I don't. Sometimes I get too wordy and I go into stuff.
Tom Rowland: Do you have an example of something where you've taken a complex parenting idea and made it very simple?
Pat Barber: Sure. One of my bigger posts that went viral was that I wanted to stop yelling. It wasn't as though I thought I was a bad person because I yelled or anything along those lines, but my sons, independently of each other, all talked to my wife and mentioned that they were scared about my yelling. And I'm a pretty calm guy. I don't yell. It doesn't happen very often. I'm saying that, but it clearly happens. I think part of it is that I'm mostly mellow, so when it went extreme, it was really extreme, and there was this big juxtaposition between the two: “Wow, that's really scary. I didn't expect that to happen.” They all came to my wife and said that, and so I was curious, and I pulled them into a room one at a time. This was 2023, so like three years ago. I pulled them in the room one at a time and I interviewed them. I was like, “Finish this sentence for me: If I could change one thing about my dad, what would it be?” And all three of them said yelling. The fourth was too young. He wasn't really born yet, so he couldn't be a part of this conversation. But all three said yelling. My oldest son said farting, and then he said yelling afterwards. So I was like, “Oh, wow. Interesting.” I didn't realize that was actually that much of a problem, because I didn't really view it as a problem. I thought there are times where yelling is necessary. That's what my head was like: “Okay, this is necessary.” But then I was like, “Well, what if I could have the same level of connection, same level of respect, same level of getting them to do stuff without yelling? What if that was possible?” So I had to examine what was happening there. The more complex thing is I was dysregulated. There were times where I was doing okay, and there were times where I was not doing okay. When I was not doing okay, sometimes my responses would be more extreme than they needed to be, and that wasn't my children's fault. That was my dysregulation.
Tom Rowland: What do you mean by dysregulation?
Pat Barber: Dysregulation is basically the inability to control the response that you have. When we're talking about walking through the world as a man, I think there is a sense of control that we have, and that sense of control is not about controlling other people. It's about controlling ourselves. If we're controlling ourselves, then it means the things that we're doing are intentional. When we are well regulated— when we have spent time in nature, when we have spent time writing and reflecting and reading, eating well and sleeping well, and the stresses of life are less or we can cope with them— we can be more regulated. Essentially, we can be more intentional with our responses. So that's regulation: figuring out ways to come to a place of being able to be intentional with our responses to the world. I didn't recognize that I was particularly dysregulated. I didn't know that was me, but it was happening, and the way it was coming out was via this yelling. It would be an overaggressive response to something that didn't necessarily need yelling to solve the problem. And this is all stuff I've learned after the fact, by the way. What I did in the moment was, I was like, “I'm going to make this really simple. I currently yell. I don't want to yell. What's happening here?” Well, I don't have a choice right now, because there's no space between when something happens and when I respond. I wasn't choosing to yell. I wasn't being like, “Here's my list of tools. This is the one.” That's not what was happening. I was having this automatic response because of a lack of tools and a bit of dysregulation.
Pat Barber: So I went very simple and dumb. I was like, “I'm going to try to insert a gap. What could I do to insert a gap?” I thought for a bit, and I was like, “Well, what if I challenged myself?” I like challenges. I think men and people grow through challenges. Challenge and reflection and recovery, that's how we grow. So I was like, “I'm going to challenge myself for one month. I'm not going to yell at my kids.” You can do a challenge where you do a positive, like, “If I do this, I can buy myself a new car,” or you could do a negative. For me, I wanted a negative thing: “If you do yell, this thing happens to you.” And so I thought, “If I yell, I have to pay my son five bucks,” the one I yelled at. That's silly, and it's not really that meaningful, and people are like, “Oh, he's going to extort you for money.” Kids don't want to be yelled at. They're not going to extort you for money. They might try it, silly-wise, if they really trust you, but they won't do that. So I said to my kids, “Hey, I'm going to challenge myself for a month. You get to determine whether or not it was a yell. If I yell at you, I owe you five bucks.” I told my wife, and we did the whole thing, and I put that into play. Within 15 minutes of putting that into play, my second son, who is the most like me and riles me up more than anyone else— he didn't get me to yell at him. He just did something, and I yelled. In that moment, I caught myself, and I was like, “Oh, my gosh.” I pulled out my wallet, pulled out five bucks, and handed it to him, and he laughed, I laughed, he ran away. But that single instance took something and stuck it in between when something happens and when I respond. It was that simple. Now whenever you yell, you have to think for a second: “Do I want to give up five bucks?” And it was enough for me to go, “Okay, let's create space here.” That was three years ago. I did that challenge for a month. I think I lost it three times that whole month, and then I kept that as a standard for the entire next year, and then redid the challenge the next year. So the concept is really simple: you need to insert a gap between when something happens and a response. The way I did that gap was something simple like five bucks, so I help people figure out the things that would do that. The larger picture, the more complex thing, is I was dysregulated. So then I have to look at the larger life and ask where I can adjust my life to be in a better place more often. That came with understanding stress and how I cope with it, waking up earlier and giving myself time to go sauna, cold plunge, do breathwork. All of these other things are ways that we learn to regulate. Do we have to have those to be a good man? No. But if we're dysregulated, we have to have them as tools and places we can go, consistent habits and things we know, so we can end up being more intentional and in control. So I guess that's a long answer.
Tom Rowland: No, it's good, though.
Tom Rowland: How many people do you think you have in this movement?
Pat Barber: I don't know. Here's the deal: I'm on social media, and social media is such a one-dimensional, one-way relationship. I put out, people take on. The account has about 250,000 people following it, which is a very large number and way more than I ever would've thought, because I don't post anything that fun. All of the stuff I post is me struggling with life and then saying, “Here's how I think you could be better if you didn't do this.” That's the gist of what I post. It's not that interesting. It's not half-naked me very often. Anyway, my thoughts on social media are coming out there. But I have a big following, and I get hundreds of direct messages on specific things, like the No Yell Challenge, for instance, which people can download. Every time I put that out, 500 to 1,000 people will message me directly saying, “I was really helped by this. I have a different relationship with my kids. Thank you for this example.” I've run retreats at my house, and I'll get five to seven dudes at a time who will come up and have this really amazing off-grid experience here. And then I started a group, but when it comes to a paywall, it's like 30 guys will come in. I'm not downplaying that. I get to help 30 men. That's amazing. I'm so happy about that. But I don't know how many men truly identify with this movement.
Tom Rowland: Well, the reason I was asking is because I was going to ask another question. You're obviously getting a lot of inbound communication. People are responding to you. What do you think today's dad struggles with the most? Are there themes that continue to surface?
Pat Barber: For sure. I recently interviewed 30 guys. I was like, “Hey, I just want to see what you're going through.” So I got them on a call, interviewed them, asked them questions about their struggles and everything that was going on, and then I asked AI to synthesize all that information: “What's the commonality amongst this?” So I have a pretty specific answer. Essentially, there's a gap between the dream version of who they are and who they currently are. They've got this vision of the man they want to be, whether that be somebody who always stays true to his word, or holds a specific value structure, or eats healthier, or trains four days a week, or earns specific money. And they're over here, and they aren't that. They feel like they can't quite trust themselves to be that, and they feel a little lost in what the next step to take is. That's what I'm trying to bridge. There's this vision of you, and then there's you, and you want to be this vision of you, but how? That is what I'm seeing a lot of guys run into, and there's a lot of stress associated with that, because you've got so many things you're trying to juggle, and you're like, “What do I prioritize first? How do I sort this out? How do I deal with stress? How do I deal with my relationship? How do I deal with my own training and my own health? What order do I do this stuff in?” So I'm trying to help people sort that out to some degree.
Tom Rowland: Have you come up with a process that simplifies that? On the same basic theme we've been talking about: you take a thing that seems pretty complicated. You want to be here, but you're over here. How do you get from here to there? It seems like you would have a pretty simple plan. It might be hard to execute, but it's easy to say.
Pat Barber: Sure. I think about this constantly, because that's my world. That's what's important to me, and it's selfishly important to me, because I'm in the same boat. I think we all are. I actually don't think there's an arrival at the dream you. Not in a negative way. I just think there's always opportunity to continue to grow, to be more refined, to be more mature, right? So yes, I do. Part of this process is understanding antifragility and how to grow. Have you heard the term antifragility?
Tom Rowland: No, but go ahead. Tell us all.
Pat Barber: Antifragility is beyond resilience. It's a term used to describe organisms or systems that are beyond robust. We've got classifications of systems. You've got fragile, which is breakable. You lean on it, and it kind of shatters. You've got robust or resilient. Think of something like concrete. You push on it, it doesn't move, it doesn't change, and if it gets damaged, you can repair it back to where it was pretty easily. Then you have antifragile, and antifragile is a system that, when you put stress on it and then take the stress away so it recovers, adapts and becomes better than it previously was. It's beyond resiliency because it's not just bouncing back. It's becoming better.
Tom Rowland: Just like your body, right? Your training.
Pat Barber: Your body is a perfect example of this. What's fascinating is this is the human being's superpower. Humans are by design psychologically and physiologically antifragile. That's the essence of all training. You put stress on a system, you take the stress away and let the system recover, and the body responds by adapting and changing. Whatever kind of growth you want to have, you need to put it under the right stressors, you need to give it the right recovery, and your body will become better because of that stress you were under. So that process of stress plus recovery, and if we add another thing, consistency with that process, gives you growth and change. That's by design what we are. So if we examine any area we have difficulty in, we go, “Okay, if I want to grow here, I need to figure out whether I don't have enough stress, or I don't have enough recovery, or I don't have enough consistency.” Am I not stressing the right way? Am I not making it hard enough on myself? Am I not pushing myself the right way? Or am I just never recovering? Am I never sitting back and learning anything from the stressors I was under? This is psychological as well as physiological. Or am I not resting in any given physiological way, like literally resting or sleeping or eating well? And then, how often am I doing this? Because I can't expect something to work if I only do it once. So this is our process for change. Pick the area you want to change. “I don't want to yell anymore.” Great. I've got to find a stressor for not yelling. It's the times where I yell. Now, what is recovery? It's reflection on the moment. What got me to yell in that moment? Oh, it was this. Great. How can I remove that piece of it? How can I learn from that individual instance? Now, the next time I find myself in that situation, I'm thinking about this. And you just repeat that process over and over again, and we change our ability to yell. So we have to understand the general change mechanism, which is that we are antifragile. You need stress, you need recovery, you need consistency.
Pat Barber: So that's the first thing. How I help people after they understand that, because that's the process we'll use to change, is I've set it up with the dream you at the center. In my vision of the areas I want you to focus on to get to the dream you, we've got freedom on one side, relationships on another, and health on another. Within health, we're going to examine your training, your stress and recovery— what kind of stress are you under, how are you recovering— and your food. Those are the three big things with regard to health that we need to modulate. When it comes to freedom, I'm going to look at your money versus lifestyle: what do you make versus the lifestyle you have, and which side of that might need to be adjusted? Either make more money or shift lifestyle, and see if you're actually living the lifestyle that you want. Within freedom, there's also time freedom: how are you spending the time that you have? If you don't have any time, maybe you're going to have to sacrifice something in another area, like I did, to wake up an hour and a half earlier to sort out some of my freedom. And then we're also going to look at personal autonomy. Basically, do you have an internal locus of control or an external locus of control? Do you feel like the world is happening to you, or do you feel like you are happening to the world? To feel a good sense of autonomy, you need to feel like you are happening to the world, because you always have an ability to respond intentionally, and that's what we want to build. Other than that, we've got our relationships. We're going to examine your relationship to yourself, which is an exceptionally complex thing to go over. We're going to examine your relationship to your immediate family, and the way I think it's really important to do so is your relationship to your wife first and foremost needs to be a pinnacle piece— your wife or your spouse— then your kids, and then your extended family. I do it in that order because I personally think that's the best order to do it in. You're prioritizing your own needs basically first. Needs, not wants. Keep in mind, that's self. Then we're going to talk about family, and then larger relationships like friends and communities and a sense of connectedness to the larger world. So of those three areas, relationships, freedom, and health, we examine where you're strong and where you need some work. Then we use the process of antifragility— stress plus recovery in the area you want to grow, which I usually do as challenge and reflection— and then consistency via accountability to improve that area. And everything I just said, you can do on your own.
Tom Rowland: That's an incredible— sorry, everything you just said what?
Pat Barber: You can do it on your own.
Tom Rowland: You could do it on your own, but if you look at the story arc, everybody has the story arc in their lifetime. They have a problem, they meet a guide, and they overcome the problem. It's the Karate Kid. It's why that movie was so awesome.
Pat Barber: The hero's journey.
Tom Rowland: Yeah, it's the hero's journey, and you're the guide. That was an incredibly beautiful explanation of how you do that.
Pat Barber: Thanks, man.
Tom Rowland: I can't imagine that you can't get people to go beyond a paywall to have you help them with that. I'm serious, because it seems like there's so much struggle with men right now. It's been trampled on, and we've been made to feel like you're not supposed to do certain things and you are supposed to do others. I think it makes people feel very lonely and not adequate as a man. They want to be somewhere, but they're over here, and they don't know how to get from one to the other, just exactly what you described. It seems very common. I see it a lot.
Tom Rowland: But then as a parent— I have three kids. Mine are a little bit older than yours, and I have a grandson.
Pat Barber: Hey.
Tom Rowland: So that's a whole different—
Pat Barber: You'll have a Grandfathers Guild one of these days.
Tom Rowland: Thanks for that. You think you're learning lessons right now while they're going through being teenagers and all of that, and there are plenty of lessons to learn. But as those kids graduate from college and move into the real world, man, that was something I was not prepared for. I thought, “We got them educated, and everything's cool, and now we're going to be on this downhill slide,” and it is not that way. The way I'd describe it is just like the Navy SEALs say: the only easy day was yesterday. If you believe you're going to be on this downhill slide because your children are now grown, married, and off, it's not that way. When you're watching young kids, you're like, “You really shouldn't run right there. You're probably going to fall down, and when you do, you're going to scrape your knee so bad it's going to really hurt.” They keep doing it, and you're like, “Okay, here we go. I'm going to watch this happen,” because they're just going to scrape their knee, right? Sometimes you have to just let that happen. But as they get older and older, you're seeing the same kind of situation you've been in before, and you're like, “You really maybe ought not to do that.” But if they fall down now, it's not a scraped knee. It's a real-world repercussion. And then you're in this place of, do I say something? Do I not say something? How much do I interject here, because they are grown?
Pat Barber: Yeah.
Tom Rowland: But the repercussion of a mistake at this level is a major deal. When you're first getting ready to get married— “I just proposed. We're going to get married in a year”— everybody around you, the older people, your friends, they're all like, “Oh, man, marriage. It's going to really change your life. You have no idea how much it's going to change your life.” Some people are real positive about it. Some people are not so positive about it. But the advice is always there. When you have kids, it's the same thing: “Oh, boy, you better take a vacation now, because you won't believe how much it'll change your life.” But I didn't get that same kind of advice when it was, “Your kids are gone, and empty nest syndrome is real. You need to be prepared for that.” Nobody said that. They just said, “How is it now that your kids are gone?” And I'm like, “It sucks.” It really sucks. We had so many kids around the house, and now it's so quiet I can't even tell you. I don't even know why I told you that story.
Pat Barber: Well, it's important.
Tom Rowland: It's just something that, as you continue to progress through this journey of fatherhood, you hit some places where you're like, “Ah, I didn't see that coming. That's wild. I don't know what to do here.” If your dad's still around at that point, you do have somebody to go to, but other than that, probably not. In your 50s or your 60s, who do you go ask advice from? That's a place I didn't expect to be in. My dad is still alive, so I'm very fortunate there. I can go to him, but for many people that's not the case. Who would you go to? Especially if you've spent your last 25 years dedicated and devoted to your kids, and you left out the social aspect. You have friends at work and stuff like that, but you don't have any friends. That's a common place for dudes to get into. You see all these different people around town, and they're kind of your friends, but do you have somebody you can actually call and say, “Hey, man, what do you do in this situation?” A lot of people don't.
Pat Barber: Yeah. They call Uncle Tom.
Tom Rowland: Call Pat.
Pat Barber: Well, I think the reason you told me that story is because I need to know this, right? I need to hear that from you, reflecting back, and I need to be able to go, “Okay, I'm going to double down on being present now. I'm going to double down on making sure I don't miss this. I'm going to talk to my men about being like, ‘Hey, look, you need to have a side of you as a man that is warm and accepting and kind. You need to have that side so that your kids always feel stoked to come talk to you, whether they're in the house or outside the house. You need to be that guy, so that when you go through this transition later and you're worried about them, you know deep down inside that they would come to you if they needed anything.’”
Tom Rowland: And they will.
Pat Barber: Not that you needed— I'm not saying that you don't.
Tom Rowland: They will. But in order to get to the point where they will come to you, that has to be developed before, all around. It can't all of a sudden be like, “Oh, I'm going to retire now, so now I'm available. Come talk to me anytime you want.” And they're like, “Why would I want to come talk to you? You haven't been around for the last 25 years.”
Pat Barber: Totally, and that's the thing. Some men will see their role as just to provide. Well, that's part of it, and that's what we've been fed for a very long time. But when it comes to being truly effective in this role, I think it's bigger than that. It's actually more complex than that. This is something I was writing about this morning: there need to be a lot of those classic masculine ideals, those classic provide, protect, serve. Those are there, absolutely. But also, are you warm? Are you kind?
Tom Rowland: Well, you know what's interesting about that little story you just told? You said that same thing about being a CrossFit instructor. You said that you had to learn the material so well that you could do it in your sleep, and then your focus was on communication and connection with others at those seminars, because you had this so dialed in that you didn't have to worry about it. It's the same with being a fishing guide. That's what I say about being a fishing guide: somewhere down deep on the list is catching a fish, but first you have to be safe. Second, you have to show people a good time. Third, you have to teach them something, right? Those three things are top of the list, and the person who is so good at their job always does these three things. That's their mode of operation. They're always going to be safe. They're always going to be in a good mood, and everybody's always going to have a good time, and they're going to teach their people something. And now you can focus on catching fish, because all three of these are the same every time. If you take that into fatherhood, or the way you talked about coaching: you knew the material so well that you didn't have to worry about it anymore. What you focused on was communication and connection with somebody who was difficult to connect with, and that's a masterful teacher, because you know the information so well. If you take that into fatherhood, you're doing all of the provide and the protect and all of the others so well that it's not even a thought that you wouldn't do those things. So now you can focus on being warm, and now you can focus on being a good communicator, and now you can be a good listener. And maybe now you can not yell, right? Or whatever it is. But you have to have those three or four so dialed that you can focus on that. That's the way I think about it. It's interesting, because I just heard the same thing you were talking about with your coaching. It was the same thing, just in a different aspect of life.
Pat Barber: I didn't pick up on that. I'm glad you did. I really like how you described it: you have to know the material so well. I think this is where the real discussion should be happening: what is the material of fatherhood? Even what you listed there, the classic masculine ideals, as something you should know like the back of your hand before you go into these other places. What I would say is the material of fatherhood is being a good human being, period. It's not the skills and the tactics of how to tie the knot on the fishing string. Sure, learn how to do that so you can teach your kid that, but that's not parenting. That's not fatherhood. Fatherhood is being the best version of you. It's understanding and facing your inadequacies, and that means emotional inadequacies, physiological inadequacies, psychological inadequacies, and the daily work of waking up and being like, “I can face these and round these out and improve these,” because that's the material. That's the stuff we want to pass on: being a great person. We don't pass that on through lessons. Lessons can happen, and lessons are a part of that, but we pass that on through action, through modeling. The big thing is who we are, which is why I go back to personal development being so darn important. That's the material of fatherhood. If you can be so good with you and well-rounded, a polymath human being who has all the little skills, who has the full spectrum of emotion and can communicate effectively— this is not unique to parenting. This is being a good person. It's being a good fishing guide. It's everything we just said. So I think that's why I find so much nobility in the role of fatherhood. Dude, you've just been handed the biggest reason ever to be the best human being you can, because you are the template that they will rely upon. So why not take this as an opportunity to work your ass off at being such a great man? Maybe I'm making it a little too floral, but it's important to me, and I really appreciate your structure of knowing the material so well, because I think that plays so well into what this is.
Tom Rowland: Well, it's the hardest job. Well, I don't know. They say a mom's is the hardest job. I think since you have to have babies, a mom's probably is the hardest job.
Pat Barber: They also have to deal with fathers, so that's—
Tom Rowland: Right. There are so many things that make it probably harder. But being a dad is maybe second hardest, I think.
Pat Barber: It's the hardest job we have access to, Tom. We don't have access to that other job.
Tom Rowland: There's no question that it's the most rewarding. It's certainly the most rewarding thing I've done in my life, and the best decisions have come from there. I always say the best decision I made was to marry my wife, and then having kids is outstanding. It's amazing, and it's a learning process all the way through. You don't master it, and you're learning continually. Once they grow up and get older and even have families of their own, it's not over. It's a continual process. Just as an older father— not that anyone asked for advice— if I were to give any advice to a younger father, it would be that there's no amount of time you can give to your kids that you will regret later. There's none. Whatever focus and time you can give to them when they're young, you will never look back and go, “Phew, wasted time. Should've been at work.” You'll never say that. It's almost like a bank account. The money you put in compounds over time, and all that time and all those things you do with your kids, all the way through, is super important. What you're doing is really important. I think it's really cool.
Tom Rowland: So how do people follow it? How do people participate?
Pat Barber: You can go to thefathersguild.com. You can find the community from there. I have a little school community, where I'm in there multiple times a day and week. We do live calls and stuff. You can also find my social media accounts, all @thefathersguild. YouTube and Instagram are my two main places. If you ever need anything, I'm always here. Just pat@thefathersguild.com.
Tom Rowland: Just Pat. What if somebody looks for The Manimal? Are you available?
Pat Barber: You know what? I don't know if you saw it. There was a company that came out called Manimal Athletics. They said they made up the name on their own, but they were in CrossFit, too. They had made grips and a few other things, and I was like, “You guys weren't going to contact me at all?” And they were like, “No, this is my own name.” And I was like, “Okay, you go for it, buddy.”
Tom Rowland: Okay, so one final question. Could Chris Spealler compete in CrossFit at the highest level today? Or not Chris Spealler, because I don't want to single him out. Could a 5'4", very strong, outstanding athlete with an engine like he has compete today?
Pat Barber: Yeah, I think they could. They would have to be as gifted as Chris. Chris was beyond world-class in the things he was really good at, and he was world-class in the things he was not good at. The biggest disadvantage is he was too light to be truly effective at some of those really heavy loads over duration. He could handle them for ones and twos, but in duration, it was just too punishing for him. His other skills were so good that it could balance that out. So I think he could compete. I don't think he would win, though. I think he's just physiologically too small with the strength that these guys currently have.
Tom Rowland: It's amazing where we are today. Chris Spealler is about the same height as Colten Mertens, I guess, but Colten Mertens has, what, 60 pounds of muscle on him over Chris Spealler?
Pat Barber: Yes.
Tom Rowland: I pick Chris Spealler because he was always one of my favorites. I loved watching him compete.
Pat Barber: Oh, he's the man. Such a good dude.
Tom Rowland: He was incredibly fun to watch, and he had determination. When he was given one of those workouts that was in his wheelhouse, like a bunch of pull-ups and double-unders and running, boom. Watch out, man.
Pat Barber: Yeah, he was great.
Tom Rowland: I remember I was watching the Games with Tony Budding, actually, and at that Games there were 100 pull-ups to start one of the workouts. Maybe it was 100 of a bunch of things, I don't know. He said, “I think Spealler's going to go unbroken.” And I was like, “Really?” And he was like, “Yeah, I think he's going to go unbroken.” I don't know if he did, but I think he probably did.
Pat Barber: Such a savage. But those were good days, man. Tony didn't have the best competition sense. He wouldn't have made good decisions as a competitor. I love Tony, but it would be like, “Yeah, he'll go do that.” I'm like, “No, he wouldn't. That sounds like a terrible idea, Tony.” He'd probably go 50, 30, 20 and still beat the entire field by a lot.
Tom Rowland: Well, anyway, it was a good time. Hey, Pat, I'm really happy to have connected with you. I plan on staying in touch with you. I think the Fathers Guild is amazing.
Pat Barber: Thank you.
Tom Rowland: If you are a father, check it out, because there are a lot of things we can all learn about being a father, and this seems like a really good resource. Pat, thank you very much for being here, and we'll do it again. Hopefully we train today— sometime. I'm trying to say train together, and I said today, so maybe we'll train together someday is what I'm trying to say.
Pat Barber: Let's do it. I would love it.
Tom Rowland: All right, man. Thank you.
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