How To Fail With Elizabeth Day - S15, Ep6 How To Fail: Jordan Stephens on male vulnerability, anger and getting naked

Episode Date: October 5, 2022

Jordan Stephens was formerly one-half of the band Rizzle Kicks, formed with his childhood friend while they were both at school. He is now an actor, a solo musician, a writer and - as if that weren't enough - a gifted artist too. He's also a super smart, funny and perceptive human. It's always a joy to talk to him and today's episode was no exception - we cover male vulnerability, sobriety, competitiveness, the challenges of fame (and dating a celebrity superstar but keeping it private), the dangers of reality TV and how the phrase 'toxic masculinity' has outlived its usefulness. Plus, his failure...to get naked. Not one we've ever had before on the pod, but well worth a listen!--Jordan's children’s book, The Missing Piece, is out now and available to buy here: https://www.waterstones.com/book/the-missing-piece/jordan-stephens/beth-suzanna/9781526618139--How To Fail With Elizabeth Day is hosted and produced by Elizabeth Day. To contact us, email [e-mail]--Social Media:Elizabeth Day @elizabdayHow To Fail @howtofailpod Jordan Stephens @jordanfstephens Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Let's go seize the night. That's the powerful backing of American Express. Visit amex.ca slash yamex. Benefits vary by car and other conditions apply. Hello and welcome to How to Fail with Elizabeth Day, the podcast that celebrates the things that haven't gone right. This is a podcast about learning from our mistakes and understanding that why we fail ultimately makes us stronger. Because learning how to fail in life actually means learning how to succeed better. I'm your host, author and

journalist Elizabeth Day, and every week I'll be asking a new interviewee what they've learned from failure. I first met Jordan Stevens when he appeared on stage with me at a How to Fail live show. He was so insightful, interesting, kind and clever that I knew I had to force him to speak to me again for a recorded podcast and happily he agreed. So here we are. Stevens was formerly one half of the band Rizzle Kicks, formed with his childhood friend while they were both at school. They asked a wedding photographer to make their first video for their single Down With The Trumpets and when it was uploaded to YouTube, it became a viral hit. Signed by Island Records in 2010, their fans include, improbably, Stephen Fry.

But Stephens himself is nothing if not multifaceted. He's now an actor. He's appeared in both a Star Wars movie and May Martin sitcom Feel Good. He's a solo artist. His latest album, Let Me Die Inside You, was released in February. And he's a writer. His debut children's book, The Missing Piece, tells the story of the determined Sunny as she sets off in pursuit of the final piece of an epic jigsaw puzzle. Yet Stevens himself has never been afraid of exploring the darker side of life.

He has spoken openly about his ADHD, his sobriety, and the challenges of fame and toxic masculinity. For me, he says, a big part of my maturing as a human being came from facing my darkness head on. Everybody, I believe, has a shadow self Jordan Stevens welcome to how to fail hi hi you've got an epic you have an epic intro voice thank you that's so nice I'm actually always really nervous reading out an introduction in front of someone because I just I don't know I think I have imposter syndrome about my own intros that I'm worried I've got something wrong. But you were nodding throughout, which was really nice of you.

So thank you. No, no, no. And I'm so happy that we're recording this conversation because when we did that show at the Royal Festival Hall, the audience absolutely loved you and could relate to so much of what you were saying. And I think yours is such an important voice in contemporary culture. And I love that quote that I ended on.

Everybody, I believe, has a shadow self. What's your shadow self, Jordan? Well, it's funny hearing that. I don't know when I said that, but I think everybody does. From since probably saying that I've done more learning and reading and you know and I'm definitely a fan of Carl Jung who is the psychologist I think most famed for coining the kind of shadow self term and the battle we have we are with ourselves constantly the battles I have are often with obsessive tendencies addiction destruction annihilation kind of thing that was what I

battled in my 20s in my mid-20s especially I started to fight it but I think I have the potential to be incredibly hedonistic that's what it is and hedonism can be incredibly fun but it comes at a cost for me that cost was intimate relationships I wasn't really able to maintain relationships that I wanted to maintain nurture them you know take care of them and so yeah I had to confront that part of me that was perhaps scared of attachment or scared of commitment it definitely showed up in self harming abusive cycles so when you got sober do you see that term as encompassing not just substance but also a sort of sobriety from those damaging behaviors so yeah with me I think in my personal experience I didn't have an issue

with particular substances or with particular yeah anything specific my addiction I think was just with anything that I could kind of destroy I was a self-saboteur I would just self sabotage and I had to take steps to ensure that I was in my body in myself do you know what I mean that I could make more informed mature decisions and confronting that is painful and I think that confrontation is a really important part of growing up of life I think pain is what creates maturation but yeah that was what it was for me and how old are you now I couldn't work out whether you are 30 or you're about to turn 30 yeah no I am 30 I turned 30 this year okay and how was that for you because I remember being stupidly quite anxious about turning 30 because I thought well I'll never achieve anything at young age ever again like I'll never be impressive for my youth and then actually I

turned 30 and I felt this real sense of relief that I was getting more in sync with who I actually was rather than who I was pretending to be a lot in my 20s. Yeah I feel that I hear that I think I have always had this marker in my head ever since I was like 19 that 35 would be this great age to get to I don't understand why I thought that but I just always gone now 35 that's when some I don't know what's going to happen but you know I just have this idea is this benchmark. But I was surprised that I was affected by turning 30. Actually, I was it, I did feel it. I did go, Oh, I'm in another decade. Now I am in a space of total responsibility, total accountability, I'd like to be in that space. And that's a scary space. Everything is on me really, in terms of my own forward movements. It did impact me more than

I thought it would I felt the transition I felt the shift I felt the desire to step up to it almost like physically you know put my shoulders back and really really try and focus in on total responsibility accountability you know make informed decisions going forwards I think it's true what you're saying man like the start of my 20s really fun for me it was especially peculiarly fun because of for me the added thing of kind of notoriety and I had money suddenly and all this stuff but yeah anxious as fuck like you know I've always been an odd kid odd child left out misfit kind of vibes and that became incredibly

heightened in my mid-20s I felt like I didn't understand anything that was going on really and so yeah heading into my 30s I feel more stable I'm in a relationship with someone who I love and in terms of my career I've got more of an idea of where I want to go and that feels secure. And you're in a relationship with someone who understands the tensions of fame, aren't you? Because she's in Little Mix, might have heard. And that relationship, I understand, developed during lockdown. And I'm very intrigued by the fact that lockdown for you was quite a positive experience, wasn't it?

Yes, controversially. Because I know people who it was incredibly tough for them, lockdown. And I understand why, especially if you're in London, to be honest, I was lucky I was out of London for lockdown by pure chance. And so had a lot more space, a lot more time. And for the most of it, it was pretty much just me and my dog. And I used the time to just go into complete self-care mode. Like in a way I'd never really done it before in terms of, you know, making food for myself that was nutritious and that my body needed and training every day and doing rituals. Like, you know, like genuine self-care rituals, you know, writing down. I did like a 21-day meditation. I was just in that mode, you know like genuine self-care rituals you know writing down I did like a 21 day meditation I was just I was just in that mode you know and it really helped me it really helped me shift into a different part of my life I tapped into a different side of me well I think we'll speak

about it okay how did the relationship start then did you slide into her dms no she slayed into my dms actually yeah yeah i'm sure dating generally was quite weird in lockdown i don't really know what everyone else was doing but yeah i hadn't been single for very long and my mates were convincing me to get on board with this with like i don't know like i know dating apps or something like that and i i wasn't really that into the idea of doing it but i had a mate who i remember like he told me ages ago that i'd really get along with jade i just remember him saying it so i just texted him going like yo i remember you said about jade like you reckon we get along and he just hit her up and then we started talking and i was like oh wow okay

and i to be honest i thought it'd just be just something to keep me stimulated. You know what I mean? Like, I didn't know, I didn't know. It's such an odd situation. You know, we're like, literally in lockdown, I didn't really know anything about her. And so I was saying to my mates, oh my God, you know, Jade's hit me up, this could be fun.

You know, this is, and then like two, three weeks in, I was like, oh shit, no, I actually really like, I actually really like her. And I'd just been writing all these lists about of like what I wanted going forwards in the future and and I felt like I kind of manifested a bit to be honest I did the same thing I wrote a list of everything that I wanted in a partner and then I set it alight and then I scattered the ashes into the wind and that was in November 2017 and in March 2018 I met Justin who's now my husband and I took a photo of that list because I'm not stupid and I went back and I checked it every single thing it was extraordinary he checked every

single box Elizabeth I'm being super serious about this right it's real manifestation this intention field I will die on this hill it's one of the things that frustrates me the most I'm sure there is a lot of scientific evidence to support the idea that you can create with thoughts really truly everything started in the imagination if you think about it every idea every piece of clothing every anything was it was in someone's mind you know and then it was brought into reality. And I think it's powerful. Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's very Jungian of you because obviously Jung believed in the collective consciousness. And when we choose to use that power, then energy does attract energy. Having said that, I've tried a mood board and that's still

not coming true. A mood board? Yes, where you put images that represent the things that you want to achieve or that you want to bring into your life. Oh, it actually is a mood board. Oh, right. But a manifesting mood board. Yes, that's what I meant. Oh, yeah.

I think maybe I'm more verbal than image. So maybe I just need to write the lists. I think words are pretty powerful, man. Like actually having written. Also, you went all in you went like full witch mode with the burning and that that's what we need yeah we need that shame and we need that shame and energy no serious I was just I was raised listen my mum my mum raised me with all of this energy like my mum raised me around crystals you know I remember burying

crystals in the park and shit like my mum we used to howl at the moon i'm obsessed with your mom because doing the research for this interview i found out a lot about her so she's described in one interview that you did years ago as a therapist and part-time uber driver like already obsessed then she famously mouthed she lip-synced the rap in mamma do the hump yeah and then i discovered that her father was a really famous film director your grandfather yeah he was a twin and he directed with his twin brother yeah and they were both married multiple times and your cousin is like crispin mills who was in kudashaker yeah mad mad it's so mad yeah mad links mad links yeah kudashaker crispin is great i don't see him that often we have a bizarre family this is the white side of

my family it's bizarre because they were identical twins so so we have like this they were identical multiple woman marrying men. So they've got this, you know, long windings family tree of people who actually look quite similar. Yeah. But yeah, that was an incredible aspect of my British side. Yeah. And your black side. So your dad's from Guyana.

Is that right? No, my dad was born here. My grandparents are from Guyana. They came over, I think in the 50s. And then the other grandparents are British. But my dad was born here my grandparents are from Guyana they came over I think in like the 50s and then the other grandparents are British but my dad was born in London and so your grandmother came over with the Windrush generation didn't she the generation yeah I don't know if it was Windrush specifically but there was that generation yeah okay now tell me about the children's book because I imagine growing up you would not have been in the position where you saw an enormous amount of people like you reflected in children's literature how important was it for you to set that right it's a weird one like many things in my life I didn't think I would write a kid's book

I wasn't like a massive plan of mine to write kids books I wanted to write I like expressing myself in any form I can really and it just appeared in my life that I could tell this story through this medium and then it became important for me to do that because it is a homage to my Guyanese grandmother especially who used to sit me down and yeah and we'd recite poetry together we'd read poets and in terms of picture books I had my favourites. My favourite authors were actually Janet and Alan Allberg. And yeah, there weren't any black characters, but it was never overthought at that time.

It's one of the things that happens. It's one of the, I suppose, realities of growing up in a predominantly white nation. My grandmother herself felt quite indoctrinated by British culture. Even the whole time I knew her, she would sometimes talk about royals and shit like that. You know, as part of being from the Caribbean,

you kind of are indoctrinated with this colonial mentality sometimes. So I didn't think about it. And also my favourite Janet L. Norberg book is Funny Bones and they're all skeletons. Literally no colour. Yeah, they literally had no colour. There's no race there. But when it did come to poets you know and we were reading off the page there weren't many pictures and the poets would be varied

like john agard was a massive part of my upbringing benjamin zephaniah was a huge part of my upbringing and that was in balance with you know michael rosen and a real conflicting thing for me and this is will forever conflict me is that my grandmother's favorite poem was if by Richard Kipling so and she would recite this poem in the most beautiful way you've ever seen like it's she just had this joyous way of delivering poems and the phenomenal thing about her was she did suffer from some dementia she definitely deteriorated but she didn't forget who I was which was very lucky with my other grand did but she would recite these poems like on her deathbed she would just burst into poetry and song but Rudyard Kipling is a contentious figure because he wrote White Man's Burden I

think he had this kind of very white supremacist ideology but If is a great poem and my grandma delivered it in a wicked way and I've got it tattooed on my arm and some people even look at the poem as a bit of a joke because it's like a entry-level man poem kind of thing but that was all I knew growing up was this Caribbean woman reciting this beautiful fucking poem that is fascinating because it's such a deep question that whether you can ever decontextualize the art from the artist. I love that phrase. All the time, the time itself, you know.

Exactly. I love that phrase, entry level man. And before I get onto your failures, I just want to commend you because I'm often asked when I do events, whether men and women view failure differently. whether men and women view failure differently. And my answer is always, well, during the first season of my podcast, most of the men said, I don't think I failed. So I'm going to struggle coming up with anything.

And most of the women said, oh my God, I failed so many times. I don't think I can whittle it down to just three. You, Jordan Stevens, are a perfect example of the strength, power and beauty of male vulnerability because you've given me four failures. We're going to concentrate on the first three. And then if we have time, we'll get on to the final one. But just before we start, how do you feel about being vulnerable as a straight man? Has it taken you a while to be comfortable with it?

I don't know. Because the most predominant part of my personality in this space is my impulsivity I think so I've always impulsively said how I feel and actually for a large part of my life I didn't feel as though I had a choice I was so impulsive I'd have to just figure out what I'd said after so I would say something that would put me in a space of vulnerability without even realizing really and then I'd deep it so it feels more complex for me answering that question because it was only when I started to look at my ADHD through different forms and eat differently and exercise whatever else that I have less impulsivity and more control over what I say and feel but I just just think I learned at some point, it could have been from my parents or I don't know what, I mean, my mom maybe with her therapy courses, I don't know.

But I definitely understand that being honest with a person about how you feel creates a connection. I just know that in myself. I know that I like it when someone does that with me. I want to create that space for that person because that's how all relationships are built I think true connections bonds are built in those moments where you're you've opened yourself up you know you've rolled on your back as it were preach this is everything that had I don't know why can I be clear though when I say rolled on the back I mean as in you meant like a dog yeah no don't worry i got that i can see why jade's attracted to you oh for god's sake no but i'm fascinated of human beings i really want to know about people i like patterns i like forming patterns about people you know cultural tribal

shifts i like seeing that people who do this like this or people who say this like that so I would love to hear about the most truthful parts of the human condition and you know I have to play my own part in that well let's get on to that let's give you the space to be truthful these are such extraordinary failures and I'm so appreciative of them your first failure and I cannot tell you how much I relate to it is your failure to be angry with the people you love so tell us why you chose this one or actually no tell us how that failure manifests this failure is a perfect way of summarizing what you began asking me because my whole therapy journey has been around anger my whole battle with

my shadow self has been anger um in fact this would have been a way better answer at the start but like the shadow but my shadow self becomes most visible in the spaces when i'm not angry when i'm not holding my own boundaries right so the root of my self-destructive tendencies it appears this is what I've got to have my therapist and I agree with it because it does make sense and it's there's been patterns it appears to be at points where instead of being angry with a person I love and I'm but by angry we mean healthy anger right we mean I don't like this or I don't want to do this or I don't appreciate that or I don't know to do this or I don't appreciate that. Or I don't know that kind of thing. I don't want to be treated like that.

Instead of that, I bottle it up and I take it out on myself. That's the root of it. And that kind of self-harm would become, you know, drug abuse, betrayal. You know, I've messed up relationships in that space because I've been so high. It kind of is this self-saboteur thing and just addictive tendencies escape do you know what I mean rather than and then I traced it back and especially with drinking alcohol and cocaine and stuff like that like which is the stuff I've cleared out of my life for years now four and a half years now it would always be linked to a thing that's happened one thing

someone's upset me and I love them though so I I can't tell them. And so I have to hurt myself. And where does that come from in the sense of, do you think you are fearful that if you speak up for yourself or you express your discontent that they will leave you? Yes. Is it the same for you? A hundred percent the same. Oh mate,

what is that? Well well you tell me what it is what is it for you is it to do with your parents probably probably i mean it all stems from that i'm a big fan of gabon mate and he theorizes that a lot of these early experiences zero to three you know between the ages of zero and three three and seven inform the last stages of our life i'm interested in him because he talks a lot about adhd and how he describes it really rang true with me i grew up with very little money my mum was under some stress my dad was under some stress you know i mean they my mom and dad weren't together they had an amicable relationship my dad was around you know but they're we live in a world where

if you're struggling if you're at the bottom of that barrel if you're on the dole you know I was homeless for a couple years my mum was staying at our friend Tina's house like it you pick up on that as a kid you pick up on it and I think you know you don't want to get angry with your parents necessarily and that anger turns inwards that has a lasting effect and a lot of our society deal with this you know it's just the way it is it's a tough world man it's a vicious world and are you an only child yeah until recently i've got two little brothers now okay because i think that comes with a specific kind of internalized responsibility as well doesn't it because you feel like you're the only one who can keep your parents happy which is obviously not your responsibility as a child and it's every individual's responsibility to make themselves happy but i can completely see

how you might internalize that are you an only child no i'm not i've got an older sister right there's four years between us and it's actually quite a big gap for years you can be at very different stages so she was at secondary school i was at primary school so I'm not an only child but I definitely did feel worried a lot and wanted to make people happy and I wanted to make people like me and approve of me oh mate yeah 100% yeah that's it and I wouldn't say that there was a specific event but I think you know our child selves we can't put words to our emotions necessarily and so we might blame ourselves for things that happen you know we might blame ourselves for people not being around I've realized I'm talking generally which is an avoidant thing I've learned that as well in

therapy I should be talking about me did I blame myself? It's also great for podcasts if you talk more personally thanks. I know I know I keep saying we it's an avoidant technique that's out of that's fascinating thank you for sharing that and thank you for checking yourself I also notice it a lot with when I used to do newspaper interviews with celebrities if they'd be media trained they would also use that tactic in order to avoid talking personally well that is a thing I talk a lot about my personal life because I believe it's important they'd be media trained they would also use that tactic in order to avoid talking personally well that is a thing I talk a lot about my personal life because I believe it's important to be as honest as possible but I just have to catch myself sometimes in terms of like wording things in the right way and you know I don't want to as a child I may have been fearful that people I love would

go blame myself if I thought people weren't there that kind of thing so that manifests itself when I'm older now I'm older and yeah I do really have that and that trigger is still there Elizabeth like I had it the other day so I've been sober for four and a half years and a lot of therapy a lot of reading I find it fascinating and one of my best friends and I had an argument the other day and he thought I was wrong and I thought I was right and but he you know it got heated but in a loving way as you would brotherly almost but I fucking something happened in me man I can't explain it like I was triggered I felt the thing in me it was a deeper wound and I had to fight this irrational if there was an irrational part of me that was kicking in

and if I'd had access to my performer vices that might have been a point you know that's a conversation and all the voices in my head were like well that's him gone then no you're not friends anymore now just because I had a differing point yeah I have exactly the same thing and I have never been as famous as you have and are but I even get it with you know a stranger's comment on social media if they say something disapproving of me my immediate instinctive reaction is not to say actually that's wrong I know my intentions and also who do you think you are my instinctive reaction is to turn that inward and be like yeah no i have done something wrong and now everyone's going to see that and everyone's going to laugh at me and hate me like it spirals

so quickly and the wrong thing is wild yeah so how did you deal with that as famous as you were in rizzle kicks oh i would individually fight everyone how did that i would fight i would find the individual twitters and i would get them to send me a fucking 400 word essay no i genuinely would i'd track it down and i'd ask them i was bordering on obsessed in the early stages of course i was like what why why don't you like rizzle kicks why don't you like this you know i'd argue i was i backed rizzle kicks wildly as i had this self-belief i just really was so driven and I was so sure about where we were going and that was before things in my life other things happened that

knocked me a little bit as you do as you get older you know people in my life died who I loved and you know relationships became more difficult all this kind of stuff people started saying no to me in record labels that's what ended up I, grounding me or calling me into a different type of battle. But before that point, yeah, I'd argue, I'd get into beef with people. The difference now, I feel, is that I'm aware of that side of me. I know it exists, so I watch it a little more.

I still feel it. I'd like to not feel it, but I definitely have an option now to watch it. Why does that person do this? Why didn't that person like this? Or why doesn't that? And then I just have to, adult Jordan Jordan that's a step in and be like everybody on this planet is living such complex lives with so many battles that I would not be able to even begin to understand

and really my place in their battle is tiny even though my ego wants me to think that I'm really important and actually their decision to not like a thing or say this thing or do this thing. And even though my ego wants me to think that's a massive part of their life, that they've said that, they've had that encounter with me. I'm so important. In actuality, you know.

That's beautiful. So that's some beautiful wisdom right there. Will no one rid me of this troublesome priest? This is a time of great foreboding. These words supposedly uttered by a king over 800 years ago, these words supposedly uttered by a king over 800 years ago set in motion a chain of gruesome events and sparked cult-like devotion across the world. I'm Matt Lewis. Join us as we unwrap the enigma and get to the heart of what really happened to thomas beckett by subscribing to gone medieval from history hits

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So can I ask you now in your relationship is there a safe space like are you practicing being able to say no or this bothers me how do you deal with it in a romantic relationship I'm asking for myself yeah no no for real yeah oh I mean it's a tricky one I think with my romantic relationship I think with my romantic relationship, I think because of the work, the stuff I did in lockdown, the boundary side of it was really, really important to me early on

because my issue is that I have, again, a shadow side of me that can begin to formulate theories that the person I'm with isn't on my team. And that is exhausting. And that's where it gets tricky, I think. It has got tricky for me in the past when I don't think the person I'm with is on my team

and I am fighting them. And then I've conspiracised that every micro movement that I don't enjoy or against me is to take me down. But with my current relationship, I was very clear early on about what I needed because I didn't think I knew what I needed before I know what I feel I know what I need now from a relationship and and yeah I made it super clear at the start and when it first came up I made the boundary clear and the boundary was respected and I really do believe that my girlfriend has a wonderful heart and genuinely

has my best interests at heart and I can trust that and I didn't realize that I needed that as much as I do and so even when we do get into it I don't conspiracize that it's going to go I actually have this wonderful thing where I'm like this will be okay actually in about like worst case scenario a day that makes me so happy for you. I have exactly the same thing. And I had never appreciated before meeting my partner, how integral safety is to love. Feeling safe with someone is one of the most romantic things that can ever happen and I think you're so right because it enables you to communicate and not be scared of what you have to say but to understand on both parts that the communication is the most important thing thank you and people do say that it's said all the time that communication is key it's the most common piece of relationship advice I think and I definitely can attest to that from my own personal experience but But it is hard.

It's not easy. You know what I mean? It's not like I've done this work and I'm skipping through a meadow of wonderful plant meadow, meadow of meadow. Oh God, I'm struggling today. But I do think I have a responsibility in my relationship to hold my boundaries

and to make it clear what I need and to hold my partner's needs and boundaries and whenever that happens it it works there should be relationship equality in terms of wants and needs yeah hard though man listen it's not easy we're all works in progress so thank you so much for sharing that because I think it will resonate with so many people your second failure is your failure to appreciate what you've already achieved again I feel like your grandfather being a twin I feel like we have very twin approaches to life because I get from you that you are a quester you have this enormous drive to experience life in multiple different directions do you think that's what it is that means you never take stock oh a doodad discovery that is for sure I'm very curious

I've always been like that I've always been a curious child I wonder what it is that my mum how that happened with my mum but I even remember as a little boy I used to live in Neasden in northwest London and I would just ask questions. Sometimes I almost put myself in trouble because sometimes in certain areas in London, you can't be asking too many questions, honestly. Otherwise people start questioning you. But yeah, I've always been curious.

That has become a incessant need to keep going. But I also think I am picking up on a societal outlook that pushes that idea too you know I mean like we live in a society that is hyper productive everything's about productivity what are you doing what are you working on at the moment do you know I mean like this award that award awards awards awards like you know this person's doing that it's all very networky borderline sociopathic sometimes right So I look into that as we all do. It's unavoidable, even if I am, or say with this podcast, for example, you'll have to, this is a brilliant, successful podcast.

There'll be moments when someone goes, would you like to come to this award show? You know, you've been up for an award and then now you're measuring it. Now you're measuring the podcast, you know? So we're in this fight. I certainly feel like as in I'm in this productivity battle that we're all in and it's going into hyperdrive in some spaces music being

a good example of that but I wrote this down as a failure because for me it has flared up immensely and I mean that and that's why I wrote this kid's book is why I wrote the missing pieces because I was talking about myself I was talking about my, just this image in my mind of just finishing a puzzle, finishing a beautiful jigsaw puzzle and not even looking at it. You know what I mean? Just dashing it to the side, starting the next one. Because I just like the feeling of finishing it.

I like the feeling of completion, but I always need it again, you know? I think only within the last two years of my life, three years of my life, have I even realized what happened with Rizzle Kicks. I hadn't even processed it until being sober, older, and being like, whoa, hold on, hold on. I'm actually really happy with what I did

because all I was focusing on back then was what we weren't doing. You know what I mean? I know exactly what you mean. Ah, we never went to America. Do you know what I mean? We had that meeting with that American, ah, or, you know, ah, this,

or that song never went to there, or da-da-da-da with that American ah or you know ah this or that song never went to there or da da da da all these holes you know and then I was like for me specifically the biggest head fuck for me was me and Harley both had a dream we wanted to have a platinum album and we got it with the first attempt that's not normal that's not a usual thing to happen so I've had to deal with that I've had to come to terms with that and we never just sat there I don't think and went well great we did you know great fantastic that was a completed move I think you're so accurate when you describe this hyper productive structure that we're all living in which feeds off our innate insecurities and our need for competitiveness and comparison

I think where I've got to in my life because I am also really competitive and I wish that I weren't like I wish and I'm striving to feel that the quality of the work and the joy of it is enough how it's received is a completely separate thing beyond my control like I just need to believe in the integrity of what I'm doing and I think the thing about comparison the curse of it is that you're constantly looking at other people and you're never valuing yourself as a result yeah massively and also that we lose the subjectivity of achievement that's the other interesting thing like for some people yes going on a run that day is an unbelievable achievement do you know what i mean but we're in a world of perpetual metric yeah it's a head fuck the whole

message with the kids book is that the real kind of true completion is the accepting of incompletion that's that's you know and i think that's a philosophy i strive every day to live by you know that's stunning and it's the same as the only perfection is the acceptance and celebration of imperfection that's true enlightenment yeah yeah because it's this idea of end point this chasing of carrots i have to teach myself to enjoy the journey. You know, it's the classic saying that happiness is a journey, not a destination. And I fall victim to it all the time. I always think if I just get this, I'll feel that.

If I just, you know, that addictive mindset, that addiction cycle, that's it. This world is creating more addicts, more ADHD minds, more all of this because of what we're in the middle of you know screens everywhere adverts everywhere competition everywhere you know so we just have to be a little aware of that and just pat ourselves on the back for just surviving man just for being alive sometimes like fuck your third failure is your failure to get naked in the showers after a football match in serbia so tell me the story why were you in serbia playing a football match first of all all right listen i'm just gonna be straight up with you yeah i'll put this failure because when you're saying earlier about men not lifting their failures that's fascinating by the way i didn't

know that that's a real life metric that's's yeah it's changed massively as the podcast has grown and I think partly because more people understand what I'm getting at when I talk about how to fail but also the other thing and you've written so brilliantly about this is that toxic masculinity traps us all it traps all genders and there are probably a lot of men conventionally raised men who don't feel able to admit that they got something wrong, who don't feel able to be vulnerable in that way. And so that was probably at play as well. Yeah. I actually don't like using the word toxic masculinity anymore. I think it's gotten a bit weird, you know. Do you? Tell me more about that.

Yeah. It's like a bit hollow because people use it too much. Yeah. Well, there's this, I listened to this really fascinating podcast with a researcher she did research around men for a university because it's been a few years now it's become a bit enmeshed as a term and it begins to incite or infer that masculinity has a dormant toxicity yeah which you know shadow selves call that's more of an individual conversation perhaps but it wasn't having a particularly positive effect on men, it was almost like they've got this thing in them that is going to maybe pop off, maybe not, you know, whereas the reality of the situation is it's a societal ideology that we all pick up on, particularly men, it's like a hegemonic

idea of masculinity. And you are right, hegemonic masculinity definitely encourages the idea of emotional suppression or confronting the idea of emotional suppression or confronting the concept of failure, even though it is one of the most productive things you could ever confront. Yeah, thank you for challenging that, because I do think a lot of those terms, they can be well-intentioned, but they can end up making feel an individual less than.

As you say, they're kind of bored into having this fatal character flaw. And I think we have to be so careful as well as self-proclaimed feminists, not to see that as wanting young girls in the playground to have dominance over young boys, because actually young boys need to feel that they have a role to play as well and

that it's a partnership not about dominance yeah I mean listen that's a whole other podcast there the girls at my school were wild yeah but again I always when I look when I listen to these podcasts I look at the research we're in a new generation too that has access to all types of stuff that I never had as growing up as a young boy. So it is fascinating. But yeah, just for me personally at the moment, but I used to use the term all the time because for me, I believe that masculinity isn't toxic. I like toxic masculinity inferred that masculinity in itself is a beautiful thing,

which I still believe, but it's just, you know, I'm just aware of how it's potentially mutated. And because I genuinely do, the more work I've done on myself and the more research I've done I genuinely do want young men especially to feel empowered to feel grounded and value themselves because I think that is what will benefit men and women that is what will counteract you know some of the more destructive behavioral patterns that occur in our society, you know. And hegemonic masculinity, that idea of what it means to be a man, what clothes to wear, whatever else is flawed as fuck. We all know this. Men are victims of this idea, you know, massively.

And it's old and it needs to evolve. We're done. But I think in order to be able to make that shift, we need to have our palms open. You know what I mean? We have to have our arms open and not infer that these people are sticks of dynamite or bombs or something. Hegemonic masculinity. I'm totally going to steal that phrase from you. Yeah. I just heard it. I heard it. It's not my phrase.

We'll steal it from whoever, the woman doing the research. It's like a societal understanding. But anyway. Getting naked in the football showers. Right. So i said this because i actually already gave you other failures as well so this is four failures and i gave you three oh you gave for the live show yeah i'm so sorry so i'm on like seven failures yeah so like this is great and the story is and the reason i said this is yes i was in serbia i was shooting a film in Serbia with a few people. And one of them had a mate who played football.

And we all went and played football with these Serbians. And after the match, we're in a changing room. And then everyone's just naked, yeah? Everyone's just getting... It's a very common thing in the football space anyway for men in football. After the match, you get naked and you shower. I thought it was very interesting for me

because it's like a confronting part of my own relationship with myself. I don't know. I want to ask my other guy mates about this. I don't know. Here's a question for you, Elizabeth. Yeah. Is it usual for women to get naked

in front of each other casually? It is in like gym changing rooms. And I, like you you find it so awkward and discomforting and then I feel annoyed with myself that I feel it's awkward and discomforting and I should just be as free as easy and embracing as everyone else is but I imagine with men it comes with a whole pile of stuff attached that maybe it doesn't as much with women. Like maybe there's more a sense of, I don't know, you'll have to tell me, but is there more a sense of like, yeah, competition and staking your territory? Well, this is what I thought was so beautiful about this situation is that the men in this changing room, but of genuinely, and it all extremes shapes and sizes that was just a totally cultural normal thing and like i say

in england even that is i think a thing i get naked in the gym changing rooms too you know but they're still you're naked now for anyone i'm naked what you can't see he's just in the buff no he's not sorry carry on but so yeah and in that moment I suppose I just thought about it just made me think about men's bodies and my own body and I thought using that as a failure would be an interesting segue into being able to talk about my own relationship with my body basically there wasn't really a particular reason why I didn't get naked other than the fact that I was a bit taken aback by how casual it was and in truth I really really wanted to actually all the British guys there I think didn't so maybe there was just a cultural

difference there so let me ask you this are you comfortable with the body that you're in yeah I'd say so yeah yeah I am comfortable my body. But I do have battles with my body, actually. And it's something I'm really looking forward to exploring more in this book I'm writing. And also, there's a few things I'm working on where I'm hoping my honest representation of my own battle with my body will create a space for men to interact with it. So for example, for years I've suffered with body dysmorphia. It goes up and down, it flares up, depending on stress, situations, whatever else. And I'm so confident that a lot of boys and men suffer with this. This idea of the perfect body, the muscly body, and the thing is, I've got a good body, I know that. In the bigger picture, the grand scheme of things,

I've got a great body, I'm constantly affirmed by my girlfriend, et cetera. And yet there's this thing, because it's not really represented. I don't know what it is that, why my obsessive tendencies have gone into this space, particularly, but I know speaking to my guy friends that they all kind of, most of them go through that thing of like noticing

where the bits of fat turn up on your body and wanting to shift that and changing the diet to shift that. And most of the time I have it reasonably under control but when it's bad it can get bad man it can get bad it can verge on an eating disorder sometimes if I'm in a particularly stressful space and for me that might be because I have got rid of most of my other vices perhaps all my addiction is focusing on this one area but when I think about men's bodies on a more general level I think there is a lot of potential shame about men's bodies on a more general level, I think there is a lot of potential shame around men's bodies

and there is a lot of pressure and it's becoming more and more pressurized, actually. You know, we have 38 films or whatever into like Marvel gods and heroes that have just been paper in the cinemas for like the last 10 years, 15 years, just all with a very, very, very wild idea of what a man's body should be and I know also that

a lot of women don't even desire it necessarily this male body so men are in this man-only space where they're kind of molding and sculpting themselves for themselves or for other men I don't know it's or wanting to gain control perhaps it's a control thing you know like something they can control and define and mold for For me, it might be a control thing. And then in terms of men's genitals, another space where I wonder about our society's relationship with male genitalia, there's a lot of body shaming for men that's completely accepted in normal culture.

The shame that we have this bizarre association between penis size and goodness of a person, which I think is so fucking weird i don't go to my mom about it before my mom would do it like with road rage or whatever she'll put a little pinky finger up and you know i mean yeah some guys cut her up and i'm going like i don't understand that like logically why does penis size correlate with the ability to drive like that's do you know i mean in mean? It's so mind-blowingly refreshing to hear you talk about this

because I've actually never thought about that. To my shame, I've never thought about that. And I would be outraged if the same thing were done about a woman's vagina or a woman's breast size, which does happen. Like you're so right to call it out. Yeah, yeah. No, it is.

Listen, yeah, I need to be clear. It's definitely not a deflective you know kind of tool or whatever it happens all the time in terms of the female body being policed constantly but yeah the secrecy around yeah male genitalia i worry perhaps that it does create a more tense anxious generation of men because also the other thing with dicks is that you can't change them. You know what? I don't even know that. Maybe you can.

But like, I think it seems to be a staple thing. And I remember all my anxieties as a teenager about growing up and puberty. I hit puberty really late. A lot of guys were talking all types of shit when I was in my teens. And I was thinking, oh my God, am I growing at the right rate? All this kind of stuff. And then I did hit puberty a lot of guys were talking all types of shit when I was in my teens and I was thinking oh my god am I growing at the right rate all this kind of stuff and then I did hit puberty a lot later

and yeah I went through a 20s wondering about the relationship that my friends have with themselves and sex and and love and and what it's like to go into the sexual arena and perform to a certain level or it really does fascinate me all of that stuff it's completely fascinating and actually as you're talking I was thinking about how men's dick size is also used as a compliment in the sense of like using a phrase like big dick energy which Ariana Grande famously used of Peteete davidson and pete davidson did a really interesting stand-up segment on it saying actually that's quite weird i feel like something really personal to me has been appropriated and just because we're intending it in a quote-unquote

positive way doesn't make it okay because on the one hand you're being told as a man you need to regulate your testosterone be less aggressive be less quote-unquote toxic and on the other hand you're like hey he's got big dick energy how appealing and attractive like you're so right to draw this to our attention and i can't believe that i've never really questioned it before well i mean i can understand you know i mean i can understand because there's enough of it coming the other way we're constantly engaging in all types of different power games and there's so many intersections that it does often come down to a case-by-case basis it is something that i intend to discuss more because i think that my journey has been around valuing myself to feeling worthy to feeling like

my sexual energy my attractiveness my i don't know just all those things the better connection i have to that the better relationship i have with those parts of myself the healthier i am as a person and the healthier choices i make so considering that some of these conversations i don't hear often in terms of you know relationships between men and their bodies society's relationships to men's bodies. I wonder, you know, if just being open about that can encourage a space where there's more self-worth and value found and there's more respect for self which would hopefully create a healthier environment.

Because sometimes I think as well, people project this insecurity. I can imagine that I have the potential to project an insecurity if it got to me to a particular level you know and then you can end up saying something means someone else and then you're just spreading that energy it's an interesting one it really is I'm so glad you picked that failure thank you Jordan for opening up about that it's an incredibly courageous thing to do even though I'm sure you won't label it as courage but I think it really really is

there is a full failure as I mentioned at the outset which I do want to get into super quickly because it talks about something that I'm obsessed with which is reality television and how it shapes our culture and just the enormous head fuck that it must be to be in it and your fourth failure that you gave me was your failure to complete the island which is the bear grills show so i didn't watch it i confess so what happened no don't don't watch it okay yo i'm being dead fucking serious with you right now don't watch it there's a fan at kristen mills is your cousin that's where my research stops oh fucking hell yeah no so i was

skeptical about putting this one in just because i feel with some of my TV appearances, the less I talk about it, the better. So people don't ever, ever think of going back and watching them. But recently I've spoken about it a little bit more with my closer circle because of Love Island being back on television. And I just have an understanding of what can happen in reality television. Also, I asked my girlfriend if she thought it would be a good failure and if it's too boring and she was into it because she thought it'd be nice to have a kind of uh different energy on one of the failures yes so jade's welcome on anytime btw tell her hey listen hey listen yeah yeah i will i will so i did bear girls the island years ago i wanted to do it as a reality show because i felt it was more respectable my measurement of respect

was the relationship between reality and what was honestly shown on screen I thought on the basis that people were literally on an island and then filmed by people on the island who are also competing in the challenge it felt pretty straight up rather than like I'm a celeb where people are having like fags like when the cameras are off and cheese sandwiches and shit right it's none of that it's like you go into an island and you're really on that island, you know, Bear Grylls, you know, all that kind of vibe. So I agreed to do it. And at that time, me and myself as a person,

I was definitely on this hyper-curious vibe. I was almost peaking at this point in terms of picking something up, looking at it, and then just throwing it down and then carrying on with my life, you know what I mean? So someone said, do you want to go on a desert island I went yes I want to see what a desert island is like and I went on there was supposed to be there for a month and about two and a half weeks in or two weeks in I got bored Elizabeth I was bored and there was this bizarre situation where a couple of people had left already. And I had wandered off from the campsite and I'd looked back at it and I saw people filming on this campsite. And this is going to sound so wild.

It's kind of just me saying it as off the cuff as this, but a lot of our shit got stolen by pirates. So like when we were moving campsites we had to leave some luggage because it was too much to carry and we were allowed to have any medications that we were on basically with us and i had just been prescribed i'd been re-diagnosed for adhd on the build-up to the show and then given medication i had to keep taking on the island and that along with everyone else's shit got stolen and like a camera and I thought to myself am I going to potentially have some kind of mental episode on a tv show like I don't know I just I didn't know what was on the other side of me not taking this medication at

that time I know what's now I'm fine with it I'm not on it anymore and also I thought it'd be funny to leave because because everyone was sat there going oh you know i'd kill for a cheeseburger man like oh kill for a strawberry milkshake like everyone's going and i just got to this point elizabeth but i was like you know you can leave right i was going like you know this is a this is a show like this is as we were in this bizarre delusion where it was like we must survive survive. But you know, we must survive on this island. It's like a microcosm of society of what you were saying earlier. Like none of us thinks that we can disenfranchise ourselves,

but we can, we can choose not to be part of this hyper competitive structure. It's all an illusion. But this was so surreal. Like there was even, we had to pretend that like people with boats weren't going past of just like loads of coconuts and like stopping off to go and pick some more coconuts. Like if this was a real survival thing, mate, I would have been on one of those boats.

I was off. I'm gone. You know what I mean? Yes. So we had to have this kind of cognitive dissonance. And it got to the point where I was like, guys, come on, man. Like you can just leave.

You can just ring them up right now. They're contractually obliged to let you leave. So I was like, I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna go. I spoke to everyone. I was like, look, I'm on the island. I figured I've seen what it's like. It's pretty horrible.

Like kind of boring. We couldn't build anything because they kept raining all the time. And, you know, we went and found water and pineapples and got coconuts. I remember climbing a lot of trees to get coconuts. And it was fun. But I wanted to do other stuff. And I felt a bit, I was too busy in myself. I hadn't done like a 21-day meditation or that shit at that point in my life.

I was just busy. So I rung them up and was like,day meditation or that shit at that point in my life. I was just busy. So I rung them up and was like, guys, I want to scoot. And they were fuming, man. Who were they? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. The dude was fuming. The guy, the producer was like,

no, no, no, you're supposed to be the one that comes up with the creative, you know, and I'm like, yeah, you know, I get that, but I'm just looking to bounce, mate. Like, I'm not really, I'm just... And they tried to keep me there for like three days or something they end up like which was actually against the contract but you know i'm not that fussed about him and what was even more mad about it was they actively and i

mean this and this is why i want to talk about love island and our society's you know susceptibility to fiction that the producer consciously made an edit to make me look shit consciously created a story of me being a lazy lie about or wasn't needed on the island anyway and at this point in my life i would hold my hands up on my life to being this supposed person but i was shocked once i left i got flown back i had the little moments of i was still two and a half weeks with fucking i had like one meal you know i mean it was like it was pretty intense but i know for a fact it's not even the thing i know that they had a chronological story that they were going to tell which would include you know the fact that me and a group of people went to find another campsite

and all this kind of stuff that just happened i was someone who liked to go out and find things that was what i felt was my role and then there was one moment where I struggled to keep the campsite tidy right and there's a little beef with me and one of the other islanders and I said something like about struggling to tidy because I have ADHD I do genuinely find it quite difficult to organize I realize it's not an excuse in my life I've now found techniques that can help me do it like the Pomodoro method and all types of shit stuff stuff I didn't have on a fucking desert island. But I look at mess and it confuses me a lot of the time. I don't see the bit after, I get overwhelmed.

But anyway, they didn't say anything about me having ADHD, anything about none of this shit. They threw the chronology out the window and just started cutting together these stories about people's individual character traits and just cut together. It was wild what they did. They cut together shots of me after having accidentally poisoned myself on unfiltered water i had the shits for like two days they cut in shots of me

passed out on a beach whilst i was going through this illness and cut it together with people saying that my behavior was up and down and i wasn't very good at maintaining the campsite and they cut out three or four journeys of me going to get food and cut them together. So they cut in all these different journeys as one journey and then overdubbed it by saying that the campsite was surprised that Jordan had come back with like this yucca plant. And I was like, I remember going like, whoa, this is like genuinely. That must be so odd to watch back because you strike me as someone who you know you like to please people you want people to like you and to approve of you and then if someone's telling you that story about yourself and seems to have the footage what does that do to your sense of self like did you at

every point question were you like oh maybe this is me no no no no because Elizabeth the extent of this this is why this is the general point on reality television look I agree to sign up for that that's what you get you know I believe the British public were open to the idea of me being lazy for various a lot we can get this a whole other conversation but people's first idea of me is as like a happy 18 year old fucking head in the clouds guy so maybe that's a more maybe they can accept that there were other islanders who I think were portrayed in a more positive light who there would potentially have been things that would counter that discussion you know what I mean but I think I was just genuinely from an actual directorial perspective from a story perspective

I was shocked because at one point they cut in someone saying something about I don't know like the campsite as part of this storyline of me being lazy. And I wasn't even on the island when the person said it. Can I ask you a difficult question here? Yeah, please. Do you think that race played a part? Because there's this stereotype of a young, black, lazy man. I don't even want to, yeah.

Maybe. That's deep, isn't it? I was the only black boy on there. Maybe. Anyway, it could well have been. This is something that happens in television. And that's what I take responsibility for. I just expected a little bit more from the island itself. But now I carry this understanding of ultimately, these people are cutting together like 24, sometimes 48 hours of footage and creating a one hour show that has to have some kind of theatrical arc to it and knowing what they can do knowing my experience of all of those people on the island and seeing how it was cut together and then recontextualized by the way with voiceovers which is wild that's like you know that's what the fictional part when i look at things like love island i catch myself man you know i mean i catch myself like yeah watching this show and being like oh fuck that person you know like like and and then i think i really have absolutely no idea about what's going on and i can't i don't know what

conversations they've had these people could have sat down and spoken two of my least favorite characters on this fucking show could have sat down and had the most heartfelt insightful deep vulnerable conversation but in order to keep with a certain thing they'll cut together the one bit where they say something dodgy about another guy or they say something misogynistic or or you know what i mean yeah and what year was this do you remember it would have been 2017 16 or 17 that is wild i thank you so much that was so fascinating i'm glad j Jade told you to keep this in well yeah and I will say you know it is a legit failure though that was another funny thing I will say

just because it adds to the failure umbrella is that I did when I went around the islanders before I left I said to them like why are you staying when we're going to everyone going like why are you staying someone would be like oh you know I'm going for a bit of a tough time with my partner uh fair enough or like or i don't know i don't quit all right why are you staying because i promised myself that i would do this for my future whatever yeah okay cool why are you staying because a friend of mine did it last year this is a camera person and they really regret it like honestly jordan i think you're going to regret this and i was just like i'm fine with regret I remember saying that I've got loads of regrets I remember thinking that I'm absolutely fine with it I can regret this that's cool that's not enough for me to stay and endure this for the sake of television

you know and I rate myself for that yeah I rate you for that as well because I think we really marginalize quote-unquote negative feelings and experiences so things like regret or quitting but actually knowing when to quit is a really powerful thing yeah and regret's fine man it's a reminder that you're human well listen Jordan Stevens I don't regret asking you back on the podcast because you every time I talk to you I find it so enlightening and entertaining and just wonderful you're just so brilliant and I'm so happy that listeners will get to experience that for themselves I can't thank you enough for allowing me to chat to you yet again and for these brilliant failures it's been a wonderful conversation I thank you I was buzzing honestly I was buzzing that you asked me to do the live show because like I said, I listened to your podcast

over lockdown being a massive thing. I said to you, I listened to the one with Mo Gorda, I think, and it was like a massive shift for me. So thank you for doing this and big love. See you this time next week. No, I'm only kidding. We don't have to do it again. More failures.

All right, I've got a list of about 15. Yes. Thank you, Jordan Stevens, for coming on How To Fail. If you enjoyed this episode of How To Fail with Elizabeth Day, I would so appreciate it if you could rate, review and subscribe. Apparently, it helps other people know that we exist.