[00:00:06] Speaker A: Welcome to from caving in to crushing it, the podcast for those who find.
[00:00:11] Speaker B: Themselves immersed in adversity and choose to.
[00:00:15] Speaker A: Write their story instead of having others.
[00:00:17] Speaker B: Write it for them. I'm Drew Deraney, and I'm your host.
[00:00:21] Speaker A: Today's guest is Adam Troy. Adam Troy is a highly sought after life coach who specializes in empowering men to reach their full potential and lead extraordinary lives. His background as a carpenter, sales professional, and pastor worship leader has given him unique experiences to draw from in his personal life. With his unwavering dedication, profound insights, and compassionate approach, Adam has become a trusted guide for countless men seeking to correct toxic traits, transform their lives, and restore their marriages. As the founder and principal life coach of epic life coaching, Adam has established a reputation for his exceptional ability to inspire men to break free from self limiting beliefs, overcome challenges, and create meaningful, purpose driven lives. With a focus exclusively on coaching men, he understands the unique struggles and aspirations they face in today's dynamic world.
[00:01:21] Speaker B: Enjoy the show.
Adam Troy, good to see you, my friend.
[00:01:27] Speaker C: Good to see you, man. Thanks for having.
[00:01:29] Speaker B: Oh, absolutely, absolutely. So I always love the pre recorded part. We get to catch up, know, talk with each other, and I definitely want to shout out and thank Keegan Schaefer for introducing us. You and I are in the same men's group that Keegan leads, and I always like to give credit to the people to introduce me to good human beings. And you definitely fall into that bracket of good human beings, Mr. Troy.
[00:02:01] Speaker C: I appreciate that. Thank you. You're not so bad.
[00:02:06] Speaker B: Thank you, sir. So I bring people on here who have had faith shaking moments in life and realized that they had a decision to make, whether they're going to retreat or move forward and become a stronger person because of their adversity as opposed to despite it. And you are definitely one who's moved forward and did not retreat.
We're sold a bill of goods when we're growing up, that life is linear. If you do a plus b plus c, d is going to happen. And we know that's not true. Something always gets in the way in between one of those letters, and we have to make a decision. So if you could, we know you've had a circuitous journey to where you are now. Reach back as far as you need to to find that defining moment. And for you, it could have been on the tap, on the shoulder that said, hey, Adam, there's a better way to live. Or like, it took me a two by four upside the head because I didn't see it coming. So tell us the story. Tell us Adam Troy's story. And what made you the man you are now?
[00:03:10] Speaker C: Well, I was living what I thought was the perfect life.
I was a pastor and a worship leader, had been for 15 years. And outside of being at church on Sunday and leading that, I was a guy who performed weddings and I did premarital counseling with men and women. And I thought that I knew what it meant to be successful in a marriage.
And I was wrong.
The moment for me that when it happened, the feeling I had was that my life as I know it is over. And this was the day that my wife told me it wasn't working. I needed to get it out.
And the marriage itself, I look back at it now and I think we dealt with some infidelity. We dealt with a lot of anxiety. We dealt with financial instability. We dealt with an illness that we couldn't see an end to for years. And I went from being young and dumb and thinking I was ready for marriage to being thrown into having the weight of the world on my shoulders to support a woman and her two children.
And I did what I thought men are supposed to do, right? And I worked and I worked.
And then when she got sick, I was a caretaker for three years.
And this is just the highlights, right?
But when the day came that she was done, the nice guy, Mr.
Pastor, devout husband, christian man that I was, disappeared.
And I became a maniac. And I ended up tearing holes in the wall, just lashing out. Every ounce of anger that had ever been ignored by me or stored by me just came out in one giant ten second act.
And I remember falling on the floor, crying out to her to comfort me. And this voice in my head said, she's not going to give you that, brother.
[00:06:20] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:06:20] Speaker C: You need to figure this one out.
[00:06:23] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:06:27] Speaker C: I didn't know what to do.
And it took me a little while. I spent a month of blaming her and finding all the reasons why I was right and she was wrong and I was a victim.
And then another voice said, are you going to be a victim or are you going to figure it out?
I figured it out. I found a program.
I started getting some coaching.
I started realizing that that ten second flash of rage was actually more true to who I was than I had been putting on, because that was the first time, I think that I truly connected with the feelings that I was having.
[00:07:26] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:07:29] Speaker C: And I said, well, I don't want to be that angry, man.
[00:07:32] Speaker B: Yes, absolutely.
[00:07:36] Speaker C: And I realized that I had to move past all of that and I had to see myself.
Then I began this journey of finding out who I was.
You talked about the bill of goods, that life is linear, and if we act this way, we'll get this. If we do these things, we'll get this.
There's nothing about my life that followed those instructions, even though I tried my entire life to live by those instructions.
[00:08:16] Speaker B: Right?
[00:08:18] Speaker C: I didn't go to college.
Well, I did go to college right out of high school. It lasted for a semester, and I dropped out. I was going for church music and music ministry and ended up dropping out because I drank my way out of school.
I came home, and in the first three months I was home, I had six different jobs because I just got fed up and walked away from the jobs.
None of these were signs to me that there was something going on inside of me.
I just ignored it and ignored it.
It was that moment when I thought my wife, who all my life, having the wife and the family to me was the pinnacle of life and ultimate goal.
When she told me it was over, that was the minute, the moment that all of the facade fell away.
[00:09:31] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:09:34] Speaker C: And you know what?
[00:09:35] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:09:37] Speaker C: I can say now that I appreciate the fact that it happened.
[00:09:46] Speaker B: Isn't that amazing? Because in the moment, we're not appreciating it. After we grow, we find who we are. It is amazing that we're now thanking that it happened.
[00:10:00] Speaker C: Yeah.
And the program I was in, the goal of the program was, look, most men get into it to save their marriage. That's what they're doing. That's what I did. I'm going to save my marriage. I'm going to prove to her that I am the man that she wants me to be.
It didn't take very long for me to realize that that was no different than the life I had lived so far.
If I'm living my life to be the version of me that somebody else needs, then I'm not living my life.
[00:10:32] Speaker B: No.
[00:10:33] Speaker C: And that is not who I was created to be.
[00:10:37] Speaker B: Right.
[00:10:40] Speaker C: So my focus shifted, and I began to look at me.
I began to understand who I was at my core.
I began to redefine my purpose for my whole life. I thought, I am living a purposeful life. I'm a minister in the church. I'm a pastor, I'm a worship leader. I help people. That's what I do.
But through the process of finding my way through that program, I found a much bigger purpose. And that is just as I needed a bridge to cross that cavern between where I was and where I needed to be.
[00:11:28] Speaker B: Right.
[00:11:30] Speaker C: I now have a purpose, to help men build that same bridge for themselves.
It has been amazing ride. I love where I'm at. I love what I do.
And I wouldn't change the path that got me here or anything, because that path, all those mistakes and all those missteps and all that trauma and all that stuff made me who I am, and it made me the perfect person to work with the men that I work.
[00:12:11] Speaker B: Absolutely.
It is amazing when we start to tell our story, we start to heal from within, and then we realize our purpose is to help those who were similar to us when we were going through that.
I'm looking for me five years ago. I want to help that guy five years ago. Yeah.
[00:12:38] Speaker C: When I'm talking to a man who's looking for help and I'm listening to his story, I can't help but put myself in his shoes.
And I just want to say, brother, I know where you are, and I know where you can be.
Do you know?
Because we can find that place together. I can help you with that.
And that's. That's. That's at the very heart of what I do. That's where epic life coaching came. Mean. I love that.
[00:13:13] Speaker B: Epic life coaching. I love that, Adam, I'm telling you.
So, when you realized who you really were and you started on your journey and what you're doing now, how have you grown as a human being.
[00:13:29] Speaker C: Who leaps and bounds? Wow.
It. It has been there. There were a lot of things that, even as a pastor, there were a lot of things that I would teach people that even then, to me, were just concepts.
[00:13:52] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:13:52] Speaker C: Right. Like the idea.
There's a phrase in the church, right, that you take it to the cross, lay it at the foot of the cross. Right. And leave it there.
It's easy to say that the biggest battle I had was being able to lay it down. Right. Whatever it was, whatever I needed freedom from was the ability to let go of.
[00:14:24] Speaker B: Right.
[00:14:28] Speaker C: Through the coaching that I received and through the courses that I've taken since then and the studying I've done and the work I've done, I actually have figured out that we can actually let it go.
[00:14:42] Speaker B: Right.
[00:14:44] Speaker C: It's not just lip service when you actually understand the process of diving in and understanding that sometimes we hold on to this stuff because it's comfortable.
[00:14:55] Speaker B: Yes. It protects us or something like that.
[00:14:59] Speaker C: Yeah. We would rather stay in a familiar chaos than walk out into an unfamiliar freedom.
[00:15:08] Speaker B: That's so true. That's so true.
[00:15:10] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:15:11] Speaker B: Most of us obviously were uncomfortable with being uncomfortable. And it's when you do it scared and you go out into that unknown and you realize, oh, jeez, this isn't as bad as I thought it would be.
It's amazing how that works. I'm telling you. Jeez.
[00:15:28] Speaker C: Yeah. I've got a secret for everybody. Freedom is freeing.
[00:15:32] Speaker B: Yes, isn't it? Isn't it? Absolutely.
So I noticed on your left hand you have a ring. Did you find somebody to share your life with?
[00:15:45] Speaker C: Yes.
The winding path from rock bottom to the path that I'm on has not been alone completely. And Mary Jo, she is a wonderful woman. She is a extremely vocal italian powerhouse of a woman.
[00:16:17] Speaker B: I love it.
[00:16:22] Speaker C: This guy here, this german rooted, amish rooted guy, has found himself, his muse, in the form of a woman who is not afraid to hold me accountable and not to what she wants, but to who I say I am.
She loves the vision. Yeah. And she has been such a.
I thank God for her every.
[00:16:57] Speaker B: Oh, I love.
[00:16:58] Speaker C: But there is life after.
[00:17:00] Speaker B: Yes, there is. You've proven that. So Mary Jo knows the real Adam Troy, not the Adam Troy that the first wife knew, right?
[00:17:13] Speaker C: Yes.
She knows the real and chose it anyway.
[00:17:19] Speaker B: I love it. And she embraces the real Adam Troy. See, that's the thing. We will often wear this mask and be somebody different because we want to be accepted, and it's because we don't accept ourselves more often than not, right?
Absolutely.
[00:17:35] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:17:36] Speaker B: We have to have self respect and know who we are and feel comfortable being who we are in front of anybody without that fear of rejection. And I know for the better part of my life, I did the same thing, the mask, because I said, well, if I act who I am, maybe she won't like me or maybe she'll leave. And so not healthy.
[00:17:55] Speaker C: Not at all. Not at all.
How many times do you gaslight yourself? Yeah. Right. Oh, no, I don't really feel that strongly about this or. It's okay that that didn't happen. I'll be all right. Yeah. You are going to survive. But don't fool yourself. It's upsetting.
[00:18:16] Speaker B: Right?
[00:18:17] Speaker C: It's okay to be upset. It's okay to want things right.
And it's okay to say so?
[00:18:23] Speaker B: Yes, it's okay to say so. Absolutely.
Because that's where this whole suck it up stuff came from. It's like swallow what you need and just suck it up and take it. And we're here now, you and I, to redefine what it means to man up.
[00:18:41] Speaker C: Yeah.
We're told from an early age not to trust our feelings not to trust these things that happen inside our heads.
[00:18:55] Speaker B: Right.
[00:18:56] Speaker C: We're told it's either wrong or we shouldn't feel that way, or we just need to ignore it and work through it, push through. Right.
And so by the time we're grown men, how are we supposed to trust ourselves?
[00:19:15] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:19:17] Speaker C: We're not shown how to do that. And nobody did that to us on purpose. Right. This isn't about point.
[00:19:23] Speaker B: No, absolutely not.
[00:19:24] Speaker C: I think every generation, I mean, what is it, Mike and the mechanics? Every generation blames the one before. But absolutely, we all have responsibility in this, right?
There is some truth to the idea that once we get to a certain age, the age of understanding or whatever, we're responsible for our own well being and our own growth.
Part of that means we have to face the things that we were told not to trust.
[00:19:58] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:19:58] Speaker C: And figure out why. But, yeah, I think as far as manning up goes, yeah. I think in today's society especially, we need men that can understand their feelings, understand their emotions. This doesn't mean be an emotional person, right?
Sure. If you want to cry at the ASPCA commercials with Sarah McLaughlin singing about the dogs in the kennels and things, you can be emotional about that. You can shed a heartstrings. But when we deny our feelings, they're going to come out. It's all energy. Energy has got to go somewhere.
And it comes out in the form of aggression or passive aggression. And this idea that we have to dominate, and the way I see it, I don't have to dominate anybody.
The only thing that I need to dominate is the day in front of me.
[00:21:02] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:21:03] Speaker C: Right.
[00:21:03] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:21:04] Speaker C: Yeah. I can't look at the past. I can't stay stuck in the past. And I can't look too far in the future and worry about the goals in front of me. It's the day, it's the presence, it's the here and now.
We get stuck on what happened in the past. We hold grudges, we get whatever. We got to learn to let that go. We got to learn to work through that. And it's a simple process. It's not easy, but it is simple.
[00:21:37] Speaker B: That's a good point. That's a big distinction, though, simple versus not easy.
Because think about it, that when we live in the past, we can't change what happened. And we're not supposed to be defined by our past because every minute we can change our life because we have that control. But you have to be in the moment, you have to be intentional. You have to be purposeful.
[00:22:03] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:22:04] Speaker B: And that's simple to say, not easy to do.
[00:22:08] Speaker C: Exactly.
It takes self awareness.
[00:22:12] Speaker B: Self awareness is crucial.
[00:22:14] Speaker C: Yeah. And accountability.
We have to be accountable to ourselves, number one. But we also have to be willing to have people in our lives that will hold us accountable as well.
I've heard many wise people talk about the group of people you keep around you. Right. And if everybody you have around you is okay with the you that you are today, they might not be the right people to have around you all the time.
[00:22:51] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:22:54] Speaker C: You don't need to cut them out, but the people that you want to surround yourself with are the people that are okay with the journey you're on and are willing to keep you moving forward in that journey.
[00:23:06] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:23:07] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:23:07] Speaker B: Call it the tough love, right.
[00:23:09] Speaker C: Yeah.
That's part of that manning up. Right.
[00:23:13] Speaker B: It is, absolutely.
[00:23:15] Speaker C: I think it's an art.
It's a huge support for men that we have forgotten. It's a skill set that we've forgotten, that is having healthy, masculine relationships where we talk about the things that we're going through with other men.
[00:23:33] Speaker B: Right.
[00:23:35] Speaker C: Without fear of judgment, without fear of being ridiculed or bullied or rejected. And we're just honest with each other. Yeah. But we share in that responsibility where we're able to share with a man, but we're also to be able to hold a man accountable to.
I'm sensing a little something in what you're saying there, brother. Are you sure that's in line with your core values, what your purpose here is?
I think maybe we need to air that out and see what's going on and have some accountability here.
[00:24:14] Speaker B: Absolutely. Yeah. That individual has to be willing and able to let down their guard and not be defensive. Because when we're defensive, we don't trust ourselves.
[00:24:28] Speaker C: Yeah.
When we're defensive, we're actually protecting ourselves because we've had a little insecurity that's come up and we're blaming someone else for that insecurity. Absolutely.
[00:24:46] Speaker B: And we could be blaming ourselves, too.
[00:24:49] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:24:50] Speaker B: Ourselves or somebody else. So it's a matter of, when you talk about being self aware that you have a blame or victim mentality, then the goal is to stop, is to eliminate that blame and victim mentality and take accountability for your own actions. Because whether we like it or not, we've made all the decisions for every behavior we've done. We've decided something no one decided for us. We decided. And so we have to take accountability for our own decisions.
[00:25:25] Speaker C: Yeah. Nobody told me to punch holes in.
[00:25:28] Speaker B: The wall that no one did. No one did.
[00:25:31] Speaker C: I did that.
Nobody told me to spend the last five years with my ex wife, being passive aggressive at work all the time.
[00:25:44] Speaker B: Or.
[00:25:48] Speaker C: In the bottle of whiskey that I sent.
Those were all choices I made.
They were all driven by some form of trauma, some form of dysregulation that I was unaware of. But talk to me back then, and I would have been fully prepared to tell you why it was Xyz's fault.
[00:26:13] Speaker B: Absolutely.
Yeah, absolutely.
So tell us about your program now, and how are you helping people in epic life coaching? Your philosophy?
[00:26:26] Speaker C: All right, well, my philosophy, I think we've covered a lot of it just through the story of my journey. Right. But I work with men who realize they need to make a change.
Maybe they have a specific idea as to what that change is, maybe they don't. But they know that for some reason or another, their life is not where they want it to be.
Maybe it's fixing their marriage, maybe it's finding some purpose in life, but it is truly 100% based on responsibility, accountability, and ownership of the decisions that they have made in their lives to get where they are now.
And it's about really coming to terms with who they are, really taking a look at the man and that the man in the mirror, making sure. Are you clear on your core values? What is important? What are the non negotiables for you in your life? The things that are the line in the sand that drive the direction of your life.
What is your purpose? Right. What is it that God put you here for?
That one's a hang up for a lot of men, right?
[00:27:57] Speaker B: Yeah, that's true.
[00:27:59] Speaker C: Well, I like my job. I love what I do in my job, or my kids are my purpose. Well, I usually challenge men when they say that their family is their purpose. Because once you decide to get married and have children, that becomes core value. Right. That becomes non negotiable, period. Purpose can change through phases of life, right?
[00:28:26] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:28:28] Speaker C: It can be your job. Right.
But what is it that really drives you and what connects you to the greater community?
Through service and being of service to somebody. Right?
Yeah.
Because I believe that in order to achieve healthy masculinity, right.
That men are to be of service, there's a humility to it, but there's a confidence. There's a strength in not having to declare your strength.
[00:29:06] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:29:10] Speaker C: And there's a strength in humility and vulnerability with others.
But you can only achieve true humility and vulnerability by being vulnerable with yourself and being honest with yourself.
[00:29:26] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:29:29] Speaker C: We have a community of men that work together, that are all working towards this same goal, that they all want the same thing. Right? The thing may look different for each one of them, but they all want the same thing. They want to be purposeful and they want to be solid.
[00:29:46] Speaker B: Absolutely.
So I could talk to you all day, my friend.
Two final questions. All right, first one, you have an opportunity to sit down with seven to ten year old Adam Troy and you want to give him advice about life. What are you going to tell him?
[00:30:12] Speaker C: I'm going to tell him that these feelings inside of you are real.
They don't make you weird.
One day you're going to understand them.
It's okay.
You don't have to blame yourself for all of the stuff around you.
Love that.
[00:30:40] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:30:41] Speaker C: Wow.
[00:30:42] Speaker B: All right, put on a different hat. You're now sitting down with young businessman, entrepreneur Adam Troy, and you want to give him advice about business. What are you going to tell him?
[00:30:56] Speaker C: Don't be so dogmatic.
Things can change.
Go with it.
If it doesn't work, it's okay because you learned something.
I love that.
[00:31:18] Speaker B: Being so stressed out, I love it. It's like, don't take yourself too seriously. Yeah, I love that. I love that.
Well, I know that the audience has certainly captured the essence of Troy. And so, folks, best way to reach Adam, he's a big Instagram guy, so you can follow him and dm him on Instagram. Here's his handle. It's at epic life coaching 79, so best way to reach him there. He also has a ton of content there and a ton of content on TikTok as well.
So definitely you're going to want to reach out to him.
Adam, I'm grateful you're in my life, man. I got to thank Keegan for putting us all together and keep doing what you're doing. You're a great human being and the lessons you've learned and you're putting them forth to other people, you're helping a ton of lives. And I thank you for that.
[00:32:14] Speaker C: Awesome, man. I appreciated this. Thank you for having me on. I loved it.
[00:32:18] Speaker B: Absolutely.
All right, everybody, you go take care of yourselves. Be well.
Thanks so much for listening. If you enjoyed the episode, please subscribe and give us a review to help others find it. If you find yourself immersed in adversity and would like to find support from other men in times of struggle, please become a member of my men supporting men collaboration tribe by emailing me at
[email protected] expressing your interest and I'll get in touch with you. Speak to you soon. Bye.
