In the very-online world of 2025, it’s almost impossible to avoid the saturating presence of podcasters, pundits, and social-media influencers in the “manosphere.” These are people who promise men admiration, health, and success, but who often have ideas of masculinity that leave men feeling even more wounded and isolated then ever. In this wide-ranging conversation with former Mindful editor Amber Tucker, Macaskill and Schneider offer a perspective on what mindfulness for men can provide in a world that needs authentic men more than ever. I had struggled with some anxiety, with survivor’s guilt, depression, and over and above that, as a SEAL, you’re trained to push through pain—I would love to say ignore stress, but I think sometimes we even bring stress onto ourselves and then just keep going.
But eventually, you know, that approach broke me. What I had perceived as a kind of weakness, practicing mindfulness and meditation, wasn’t that at all. Honestly, it was challenging to sit and meditate twice a day for 20 minutes with the TM on my own, not having a group that I’m meditating with, or not having the online opportunities like we do nowadays. It’s described as tackling difficult subjects like loneliness, trauma, addiction, the unhealthy elements of masculinity. The whole show has impacted my life, because I’m a student first—the expert, if you will, of mindfulness who’s always learning. For me, some of the ones that really stick out were No More Mr. Nice Guy with Dr. Robert Glover. I just came back from a two-week trip to Peru, which is quite an adventure. There were a couple of powerful moments in that talk about balancing intensity and presence. And Mark shared about all these different kinds of groundbreaking insights on the brain-body connection. You were just touching on… what listeners have shared with you about how the podcast has helped them to discover mindfulness—maybe support for the first time, start to build a daily practice, strengthen relationships, even help to save marriages and a lot of other results that I’m sure you’ve heard from people. I wonder: Why do you think the practice of mindfulness is resonating so strongly with so many men, particularly in this moment in time?
Jon: I’ll go on that one first, Will, if you’re cool with that. What I find interesting is that mindfulness, if you really go back in history, it resonated with men. Rather than bumping chests and smelling these smelling salts before they went out, they calmed themselves down.
I think men are realizing that this playbook of suck it up or man up, it doesn’t work anymore. There seems to be a greater demand for our attention in so many different places.
Mindfulness is this natural balance that’s coming into society, because everything has its opposite. You’ve had a wide range of very influential guests, best-selling authors, Olympians, huge business leaders, politicians, many other people. Some of the people that you talked with on your show may not be mindfulness teachers as such, but they’re still promoting knowledge and perspectives that could fit under the umbrella of mindfulness. We create a space for common humanity so people can connect to other human beings that have been struggling, as well. You have to take a true inventory of yourself in order to access and unleash that next level of greatness.
What’s Ahead?
Amber: If we look ahead, what do you hope that the long-term impact of Men Talking Mindfulness will be?
Jon: My hope that we help to shift the culture so people see vulnerability, presence, and compassion as strengths, not weaknesses. I want to say: Get around other people that are doing it or join a group. Again, that common humanity is very helpful for people because you don’t feel so alone. Scott introduces me to Will, and I have a phone call with him and at the end of the conversation, Will says, Okay, well, when are we going to talk next? So if your readers go back and listen to some of our first shows, you will hear that the audio is way worse. It started as an idea that spawned from COVID essentially and has been going on for five years since then. It’s been so wonderful to collaborate, wherever we can over the last couple of years.
