Owen Marcus

I started working with men and men’s groups purely for selfish reasons. After twenty years of working on healing my Asperger’s Syndrome, dyslexia, dyspraxia (dyslexia of the body), ADHD, a fatal heart condition, and then Lyme’s Disease, I discovered something was still missing. My mind was finally working, but my life wasn’t. I wasn’t happy. My relationships with women were better than many, but they weren’t great. I had done a lot of work on many aspects of myself. I studied with leading therapists and innovators then went on to teach with them. I had worked with over a thousand clients and students. I’d started and run successful businesses. Still, I felt flat. When I opened my eyes and got honest, I realized I had avoided the whole issue of being a man. Looking back, I think my hope was that I could do all the other work I was doing… and “being a man” would just happen. Well, it didn’t. So I took a deep breath and called an old friend in Washington, DC. I asked him about “that men’s organization” he was involved with. Not having a clue what I was getting into (which had me in panic with my controlling tendencies), I signed up for a weekend with just men. Honestly, I was less interested in their training and more interested in their groups. I knew I could handle a training. Hell, I’d led my own. What scared me was being real, on a regular basis, with the same group of men. It didn’t take long to learn I was not the only scared man there. Then my fear transformed into excitement. After my first men’s group in 1996, I was hooked. These groups taught men what we never got to learn. I can now say I’m a man. Something I couldn’t have said before I began my journey with men’s groups. My TEDx talk will give you an overview why as men we struggle emotionally and what we can do about it. When you read my book, Grow Up, and these posts, you will quickly realize I am a huge advocate for free men’s groups. I created the nonprofit Men Corps as a way to help men start their own groups. The documentary film About Men dives deep into our work with men’s groups. Yet it’s our company EVRYMAN, that is my biggest passion. Through EVRYMAN, I get to help more men than I ever could with all my other endeavors. For men who want more, we created Emotional Leadership Coaching. I also co-lead weekend trainings for couples using the work of Susan Johnston, Ph.D. which fits beautifully with our work at EVRYMAN. Much of my time is spent training other professionals in what we do. We regularly train therapists and coaches how to help men.