Making men feel safe in therapy might be the worst thing you can do.

TL;DR - Most therapy rooms are built to feel safe. Most male clients want to feel valuable and pushed, not comforted, and the therapists who actually get through to them are usually the ones who went through their own fire first.

Hi everyone,

I spent years training to build a room that felt safe, and it took a boat captain married to me to point out how backwards that training was for half the people walking into it.

Mike and I have been going back and forth about a concept the whole industry gets wrong: most clinical training is built by and for people who default to comfort, while most of the clients showing up are men who came looking for something closer to a forge. You don't temper steel by keeping it cool. You heat it past the point that feels reasonable and hammer it while it's still glowing. Then you quench it fast, before the shape can slip back to whatever it was. A room that never gets hot never produces an does the shaping, no matter how many hours the metal spends inside it.

Value over validation

That's the mismatch I keep running into with male clients. They don't come in looking to feel comforted or protected. They come in wanting to know they're capable of more than they've been asked to prove, and they want a clinician willing to name exactly where they're falling short of it. I saw this firsthand when an associate asked me how to work with a male client. I told them to lead with value instead of validation, give him a goal he can actually measure and tell him plainly where he's missing it, instead of cushioning honesty like it's dangerous. They came back the following week and said it worked.

Burned, not burnt out

The clinicians who actually do this well didn't learn it in a classroom that stayed comfortable. They got handed the hardest clients before they felt ready, and they made mistakes that actually cost something. What they came out with was the ability to sit across from a man in crisis without flinching or over-managing him, burned without being burnt out. That distinction matters, because burnout happens when the heat has no shape to it, while getting forged happens when the heat is doing something on purpose.

The instinct to cool the room

Most of the people staffing this field default to lowering the temperature the second a client gets uncomfortable. I understand the instinct. I just don't think it serves the men sitting across from us, and I don't think it serves the clinicians either, if the goal is to build something that holds its temper instead of something that just feels warm.

So here's what I keep coming back to: if the room you're building never gets hot enough to change shape, what exactly are you tempering it for?

-Rachel

Mike and I get into all of this in the full conversation, from why the industrial revolution broke the father-son bond to why ADHD might be the best asset you never leaned into.

New episodes drop every week.

My Reads of the Week

Walk-and-talk therapy versus conventional indoor therapy for men with low mood: a randomised pilot study This pilot trial with 37 Australian men found that moving therapy outdoors for a 60 minute walk produced meaningfully bigger drops in overall psychological distress and anxiety than the same supportive sessions held indoors, with an even larger improvement in stress. Masculine depression symptoms, the withdrawal and irritability pattern more common in men, actually improved more in the standard indoor group. It's a useful check on this issue's own argument: challenge matters, but only when it's calibrated to the actual person, not applied as a blanket prescription for "men." Published in Clinical Psychology & Psychotherapy in February 2025.

How masculinity impedes African American men from seeking mental health treatment This study surveyed 74 African American men and found a strong negative relationship between how closely someone held to traditional masculine norms and how willing they were to pursue mental health care, alongside a positive link between that same adherence and internalized shame. It's the flip side of what this issue is arguing: before a clinician can challenge a man to be more, he has to be in the room in the first place, and shame is often what's keeping him out of it. Published in the American Journal of Men's Health in September 2024.

Patient perspectives on systematic client feedback in Dutch outpatient mental healthcare, a qualitative case reports study Researchers interviewed patients using structured feedback tools during outpatient treatment in the Netherlands and found the tools only helped when they were built directly into the session and therapist and client stayed genuinely aligned on what the feedback meant. It's the same principle behind giving a client a goal he can actually measure instead of a vague sense that someone's listening: feedback only does something when it's built into the relationship, not bolted on beside it. Published in BMC Health Services Research in August 2024.

Wisdom Nugget

Getting sober removes the substance. It doesn't automatically build the muscle for sitting with a hard feeling until it passes, and that gap is where relapse usually starts. This piece walks through the specific DBT skills built for exactly that gap, things like TIPP and radical acceptance, that aren't about feeling good in the moment, just about getting through it without making things worse. None of it works if it's read once and shelved. It only holds up if you practice it while things are calm, long before you actually need it.

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The essence of our mission at Atomic Souls transcends the realms of recovery and stability; it's about igniting the flame of purpose and passion within each soul we encounter. Join us.

Thanks for reading,

Rachel

p.s. If this is our first introduction, hi, I’m Rachel, founder and CEO of Atomic Souls Counseling. I’m a Licensed Professional Counselor Supervisor (LPC-S) and a Licensed Chemical Dependency Counselor (LCDC). After years in the trenches as a clinician, I discovered that my real passion isn’t just helping clients heal; it’s helping therapists thrive.

I’ve built Atomic Souls into more than a counseling practice; it’s a place where healing and business intelligence meet. I work with therapists, counselors, and practice owners to help them build sustainable, ethical, and profitable practices. Together, we focus on strategy, systems, and the economics of growth the behind-the-scenes work that allows you to keep showing up fully for your clients without burning out.

My approach blends clinical wisdom with business strategy. I coach on everything from pricing models and team structure to marketing, leadership, and scaling, all while maintaining your integrity and purpose. I believe you can be both a gifted clinician and a confident entrepreneur; those two identities don’t have to compete.

Through Atomic Souls, I’ve built a community where mental health professionals support one another, share resources, and turn purpose into sustainable success. Whether you’re just starting out or ready to expand, I’m here to help you build a practice that aligns with your values and fuels your life, not drains it.

If you’re a therapist ready to step into the next chapter of your career with clarity and confidence, let’s connect.

I write about the business of healing: strategy, systems, and soul for therapists who want to build thriving, values-driven practices on my blog.

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