Crucible Project: Cult or Not?

I’ve heard the question raised, “Is The Crucible Project a cult?”

I think this is a common question for men to ask. After all, the site is not awash with details regarding what goes on during the weekend, men are asked to keep confidential what happens, and there are things said on the internet which can be disconcerting. This is a pretty broad topic, so I’ll address in several posts.

Full disclosure: I’m not an expert on cults, and I’ve not been offered any remuneration by TCP leadership to write this post.

Before I get into the definition of cults and how they may/may not play out in TCP, I’d like to address the high level concerns listed above about what goes on in the weekend, and the issue of confidential information.

Crucible Project:
Cult or Conspiracy?
Nope

What happens on the weekend?

The site and alumni are pretty vague about what happens on the weekend. Why? More black helicopters? No.

Part of the weekend is an initiation, which is experiential in nature. Even if I had the outline in hand before I went on the weekend, I would miss the context, flow, and rhythm of the weekend. There are times in my life when audible turn-by-turn guidance is what I want, and I can understand how mystery about the weekend can increase a man’s desire for step-by-step instructions. I’ve found introspection and adventure to be places where Tom-Tom doesn’t know the route. I want to use the cheat codes for my life, but that doesn’t help me learn what God has been trying to teach me. The best way for me to experience the weekend is to actually experience the weekend.

Crucible Project: Safe

Confidential vs. Secrecy     

Men who attend the weekend are asked to keep confidential what they see and hear. Confidential has several definitions; in this case it is about being entrusted with private affairs. Secrecy is something done without the knowledge of others. Strong friendships are built around trust: knowing each other well, including each other’s mistakes & failings. To share these confidential mistakes & failings with others is at least gossip, at worst betrayal.

Setting up the framework of “what happens here stays here” is important. It enables an atmosphere of “no shenanigans” (or “no BS”) that is as rare as it is essential. How many times this week did you suspect people were not being entirely truthful with you? Were their motivations or objectives secret (vs. confidential)? Do you trust them? Part of setting up an environment without these “shenanigans” is ensuring confidentiality: being entrusted with private affairs.

Can men talk at all about the weekend?

What did you
get on your
weekend?

Yes, they can. In fact, men are encouraged to share with others what they “got” on the weekend. The irony: some men are very interested in the step-by-step, when what is really important is the learning, insight, revelation (e.g. “I got it!”) that happens along the way. Talking about what I uncovered about myself is risky, because it can be messy or involve a level of trust I don’t have with everyone. It is also authentic.

On my TCP weekend, I did some powerful grief work. My Dad died when I was 12. I loved him very much. I wasn’t quite to the age when boys pull away from their Dads & start carving out their own identity, so our relationship had very little conflict. Among the things I “got” on my weekend: a renewed appreciation for my kids, a heartfelt love for them, and a drive to experience more joy with them. There are more things I “got”, things more confidential than a blog post anyone can read. And if you ask the guys who were there, you’ll get a knowing look that comes from shared experience, and how that touched their lives. And because they understand “confidential”, you won’t get the details of what else happened that weekend. That's not because of a conspiracy, or a cult. It is because those are shared experiences are private.

Crucible Project: Why No Mobile Phones?

You may have read that on The Crucible Project retreats, participants are asked to turn over their mobile devices. To some, this may seem scary or uncomfortable; to others it smacks of black helicopters, one world government, etc.

No phone on the weekend? Conspiracy? Cult. Um, no.

I’m speaking as a man who has attended the weekend and has also staffed. I didn’t design the weekend, I’m not on the Board of Directors, and I’m blogging on my own regarding this issue, so this isn’t an “official” statement.

When was the last time you had an uninterrupted conversation with someone who had his/her mobile device within arm’s reach? When was the last time you had a meaningful conversation with someone who has a mobile device on their hip/in their hand, etc.? When was the last time you were doing something important, only to be interrupted by a phone call or text? With the internet in our pockets, it occurs to me it is impossible for us to be “present” if we don’t exercise control & discipline over our mobile devices.

I am easily distracted. In order to study in college, I went to the library, and holed up in a study cubicle facing the wall in a quiet area. Why? There were many more interesting things than my studies; this provided me an environment to succeed.

So asking me to give up my mobile device for the weekend isn’t really scandalous—except in the eyes of the world. My life won’t implode over the weekend—especially if I’ve told people I’m going on a retreat for the weekend.

What if something really important is going on? I’ve seen men staff and attend weekends while they needed to be reachable. One man I staffed with has two children who are medically fragile. His wife knew how long it would take him to get home, and how to reach a man on staff to get in touch with him. This man used the same process as an initiate and when he returned to staff. He was able to focus on his work over the weekend, and his wife knew how to reach him in the event she needed to.

As the father goes, so goes the home

I had dinner recently with a wise, dear friend. He works with youth & offered me an assessment I had not heard before. Netted out, his hypothesis is that as the father in a family goes, so goes the rest of the home. If the father is away all the time, angry often, doesn’t love his wife, and/or doesn’t treat his wife well in front of his children, well, then there’s trouble.  Kids grow up with things wrong in critical areas.

I thought quite a bit about what he said, and which of those apply most to me. It was a humbling period of self-reflection.

I know I don’t have the strength, wisdom, persistence, and myriad other things I need to raise good kids. The only chance I’ve got is to lean into my faith, to get these things from God. For me, this starts with prayer. Yet for most of my life, prayer was something I did half-heartedly. Sure, I did it before meals, and foxhole prayers when life got scary. Gradually, I did it in the mornings occasionally, or just before falling asleep at night. But it wasn’t a focus, a priority, a value.

There were two big things that changed my approach to prayer, making it essential. I was scared straight.

The first was a culmination, an awakening of sorts. After our first child was born, I found myself besieged right before I fell asleep with potent fear of horrific things happening to my son. This went on for some time and one day I read the story of Martin Luther being awakened by the Devil in the middle of the night. Luther, realizing who it was, replied, “Oh, it’s only you” and went back to sleep. I was reading one of John Eldredge’s books, learning about spiritual warfare and the value of prayer. I tried praying against those fears at night, exposing them for what they were, and you know what? It worked!

The power of prayer really came home for me a year or so later. To make a long story short, I felt like evil had its hooks in me, and it rattled me to my core. I got past my reluctance to as for help, asking my wife & friends to pray for me. I prayed for days, deeply disturbed in my soul, asking God for wisdom & perspective. What I realized in the midst of this was I had too few verses of scripture in memory. Put another way, I knew of the armor of God, but had no idea what it was, how to put it on, what it was about. I did not want to be caught so unprepared again.

So I began praying Eldredge’s daily prayer. It seems long & involved. And it is; check out the references to scripture. And I’ve realized that it is an insurance policy, a shield in the daily spiritual warfare that surrounds us all. I know on the days when I don’t make the time for prayer in the morning that I should expect things to go haywire. Prayer in the morning isn’t a cure-all, a guarantee of smooth sailing. It does ground me, help me get closer to God, and practice covering my family and myself in prayer. And it provides me with a touchpoint with God, a place to evaluate how things are going in my walk with Him.

Are you walking with God daily? Are you in a community of men who can tell you of the good they see in you—and challenge you to live the life God intended for you? Are they lifting you up in prayer, and challenging you to do the same for them, yourself, and your house?

Work, Men's Work

The men's group I'm in met the other day, and one of the big topics was work. It's fair to say that this theme was the predominant theme, and that there was a lot to unpack amongst 4 men. My example today will be from my own “work” on the house. The same process applies to “work” in earning a living.

Things we do are different from many men's groups.

What we don't do

• I've met with guys who fast when another man 'breaks his vow of purity'. We don't do that.
• I've met with men who spend their time serving the poor. Noble, but we don't do that--as a focus.
• I've met with guys who sit around, drink, and smoke cigars. While we do get together socially, help each other fix our cars & houses, etc. that is not our focus.

What *do* we do?
It seems simple since we don't do the three things above that many men do when they gather. Sure, part of it is that we meet from 8-11 am on Saturdays.

There are several things we do:

1) Pray

We open every meeting in prayer, inviting the Holy Spirit to guide us in our time.

2) Minimize the "story".

I want to be a great storyteller. I don't match the level of detail with my audience's appetite. Just ask my boss. Or a former boss. I love a good story, and context matters to me. Ask anyone who is a Myers-Briggs "P". And the story is not the issue. We don't camp out on the infinitesimal detail before & after some "event". We could camp out here for days & not get anywhere. So we move away from this quickly; 2-3 sentences will do.

3) Identify the emotions involved

Emotions? Feelings?

Jokes aside, this is relevant stuff.

Why are you fired up about work? What do you feel, besides anger? For many men, including me, anger is the "idiot light" on the dashboard telling me something is going on inside. Usually, when I pause to look underneath, it's not anger driving things.

Think about it. When was the last time you asked yourself what you felt -- and actually figured out the answer? If I'm hung up in my men's group, I can ask for help. We'll figure out what emotions are swirling about in my head. Because these guys *know me*, they can ask questions, speak truth, and help me see into my heart. And that is where the action is. Really.

4) Look back, re-evaluate the situation, and take action

Most often, I'm hung up about two outcomes, and I'm *convinced* the will both happen. Most often one of them is happening, and I expect the other will happen. The other things I expect will happen, along with the emotions there, are usually rooted in the past. In my life, those rules or stories were true and/or served me a long time ago. And often they no longer serve me and are no longer true. What if I saw these things in a new light & re-evaluated them?

An example

My Dad was pretty handy. He fixed everything that broke in our house, without a bunch of drama or fanfare. We weren't rich, so fixing things saved money that was in short supply in the first place. I'm handy too, but I was 12 when he died, and there's a lot he never got the chance to teach me. Part of me believes that 1) I can't afford professional help around the house/cars, and 2) real men don't need help there.

My wife has waited, mostly with great patience, for *years* to take a bath again in our master bathroom. She likes baths, and our other full bathroom borders the twins' room, so running water late at night wakes them up. And tip-toeing through toothpaste & a bathroom used by two boys is not a spa experience. Grad School, a new job, and the intricacies of working with silicone caulk aside, it is still not bath-ready. 

I don't know how and am afraid to do the work. It could look like crap & be a huge failure. On the other hand, my wife loves baths, and currently the caulk in that bathroom *is* a huge failure, b/c I've removed it but not replaced it!

Only one of these outcomes is true. The other I *believe* will come true. So I'm stuck. Do I take the risk that I'll screw it up, or acknowledge that it is already screwed up, b/c it doesn't work? I'm screwed either way… I could blow it. 

What if people hung with me either way? That's revolutionary. What if they spotted my issues, b/c they knew me & I tell them, and they help me figure out which is true, and which *might* be true? What if they challenge me to step out of my contort zone?

Take Heart...And Action!

Whether the issue is work, caulking my bathtub, or somewhere in between, I have a group of men who know me, challenge me to the best I can be, and call "shenanigans" on my "stuff". Working through these things helps us be the men God created us to be, frees us to do the work we need to do in our families, communities, churches, and jobs.

If you are not part of a group of men like this, take heart. There are men out there where this is why we gather: to help each other work through our junk, support us while we do it, and challenge us to take action. 

Why not get out there & find a place to teach you these things? The Crucible Project offers an initial weekend that does it. If you're not a Christian, but this idea resonates with you, the Mankind Project sponsors a similar weekend. I've done them both, and am partial to TCP because I believe in the transformational power of Jesus & the Holy Sprit.

What's keeping you? Get going!

Love & Service

Great post I saw today from Scott Westerman. He's a fellow Michigan State alumni whose blog I've followed off & on.

His wife has fought cancer & is in remission now. In December he wrote this blog which warmed my heart this morning, on Valentine's Day.

No Regrets, Healing, and The Crucible Project

On Saturday, Feb. 2, I attended the No Regrets simulcast at my church. Having prayed for the men of our community and the conference overall, I wondered as I arrived in the morning if this would be a "typical" men's breakfast/conference.

A good friend of mine says that Satan pours the syrup at men's breakfasts, and I think he's right. I don't think there's anything wrong with feeding guys--in many cases the food is key to bringing & keeping them there. What my friend means is men go to these breakfast events, nod their heads & maybe take some notes…and leave. Maybe there's some small talk, maybe even a resolution to make a change or two. But these are the exceptions.

As the keynote started, I realize it would not be Satan pouring the syrup. It was an exceptional day on many levels, especially the teaching. Kenny Luck's morning keynote, imploring men to fight & rise, was inspiring. I also loved the challenges, style, & substance of James MacDonald's talk, "Act Like Men".

We were fortunate enough to have some great speakers for local breakout sessions. Among these was John Casey, who came to speak about healing. Though healing doesn't seem like a natural progression from Luck & MacDonald, it was for the men in the room. Casey asked who needed healing, and around what, spoke powerfully about the need for healing, echoing Luck's comments from the keynote. He spoke of men's isolation, and our wounds, and how these wounds, unaddressed, continue to resurface in our lives. He shared openly about some of his biggest mistakes, tracing them back to his wounds. This introspection & risk-taking, this authenticity, is something men see little of--and do even less than they see.

At one point, Casey asked the men in the breakout to take the risk he modeled, to announce one of their failures. Several men offered up relational failures, taking risk to share where they blew it. Getting guys this far is outside the norm, an achievement, an opportunity. Then a man sitting in the corner, in the back, shared his failure to trust his instincts when something didn't seem right. He later learned he should have trusted his instincts, not a person he thought he could trust. The cost was terrible & tragic. This man shared from his heart, taking a huge risk. You could have heard a pin drop. In fact, if you'd looked around, you would have seen tears drop, as men were broken by this man's story, grieving for him & those impacted by his failure. 

This man took a big risk, sharing a big truth. I've heard Greg Huston say, "Little truth, little grace. Big truth, big grace". I believe he's right, and the men in that room watched this man receive grace from other men, many strangers. The man who shared said he'd received big grace from God, and I believe him. I get goosebumps thinking about my front row seat that day, watching men risk, share, & support each other, feeling the Holy Spirit's finger prints on the session.

That is why I staff men's weekends, take 3-4 hours on alternate Saturdays to meet with my men's group. There we help carry each other's burdens, point out what we see that the man with an issue cannot see, challenge each other to do our best for God's will in our lives, and support each other when we fail. These men are my insurance policy, my challenge, and my bellwether as I seek to live a life with No Regrets.

Crucible Project: What You Won't See

If you've been looking for information on The Crucible Project online, you may have found some posts that are, let's say, less than accurate.

Here are two things that you won't see on a TCP weekend:

• Devotionals on Rocky (the movie)
• Men blindfolded & kneeling on a concrete floor

By this, I mean it doesn't happen--not that it does & you won't see it. Especially the part about the blindfold--get it?

How can I say that, & moreover, why listen to me?

• I went through the weekend in March, 2010
• I staffed a weekend in March, 2012

Neither of these things happened when I went through or staffed.

Full disclosure: 

• I believe in & trust The Crucible Project & its mission.
• I'm not being paid or rewarded in any way to write this (or any) blog entry.

Crucible Project Weekend Retreat

It has been a long, long time since I've blogged here. Originally stood up for a Grad School class on Internet Marketing (great class, by the way), I'm re-focusing on a passion of mine: Men's "work" in the Christian church.

I'll wrestle with and address issues like:

• is the Holy Spirit involved in Men's work, or is it just psychobabble?
• is Men's work aligned with the Bible?
• concerns/criticisms of The Crucible Project: valid or not?

More to come soon.

Phone Apps: Present & Future

I've been thinking this week about the big tech news last week: Hulu Desktop, Bing, & Palm Pre. Patrick Feeney has a summary & well-thought perspective in his blog. I'd like to focus on the Palm Pre/IPhone part of last week's news.

Full disclosure: I don't have an IPhone, or even a Blackberry. In fact, I don't leave my phone on much. So I've only seen others use their IPhones.

I was talking with my wife about the Pre this weekend. She was a *big* fan of the Palm Pilot, which was wonderful for her to use, but a nightmare for me to support as I'm the Help Desk of our household. She was intrigued about the Pre, and our conversation hinged on the number of Apps that the Pre has vs the IPhone.

The idea of thousands of Apps out there for the IPhone is overwhelming for me (even more so when I read that there are currently more than 48,000 of them for the IPhone alone!). I hear of users who spend time checking out apps: they try one out for a few days or a week, then delete them. When I think that the Pre actually has a lot *fewer* apps out there, that actually sounds like a good thing. Do I want to pick from Apps out there that most people have downloaded, then deleted? Doesn't that just waste my time? Sometimes, too many choices can be a bad thing.

Michael Learmonth has a great post in Advertising Age on Apps. Among other things, he mentions that there's a facet of this that I'd never considered: Apps are not easily patched after release. I work at an e-commerce company, and patching code after a build is always challenging.

Given the constraints of limited patching & single release development, I wonder how App technology will change. Will vendors co-brand their products to create their own brand? Will marketers share the press with their development partners? How will Google's Android factor in vs. Pre & IPhone development?

Note: To keep from running afoul of Google, I'm adding this note below:
Portions of this page are reproduced from work created and shared by Google and used according to terms described in the Creative Commons 2.5 Attribution License.