The men who went before
What actually helps a good man become a Great Guy?
Great Guys did not begin in a vacuum.
Long before Tom began naming the Five Saboteurs, building the Great Guys tools, or putting his own understanding of human behavior into a practical system, important thinkers and researchers were already helping us see pieces of the human mind more clearly.
Their work helped light the way.
But Great Guys is not a repackaging of their work.
It is Tom’s original synthesis—shaped by recognized psychological principles, decades of observation, personal transformation, relationships, mistakes, breakthroughs, and the practical question:
The Lanterns Along the Path
Bringing the Shadow Into the Light
Jung helped popularize the idea that parts of ourselves can operate outside conscious awareness.
His work gave generations of people a way to think about the hidden patterns we would rather not see.
What we don't recognize in ourselves can still influence how we act.
Where Great Guys goes nextTom's Five Saboteurs give men an original, memorable way to recognize recurring protective behaviors, name them, and choose a different response.
Understanding What We Carry Forward
Research into Adverse Childhood Experiences helped establish an important truth: what happens early in life can have lasting effects.
Our history can influence how we perceive danger, relationships, ourselves, and the world around us.
The past matters.
Where Great Guys goes nextThe ACE tool isn't about living in the past. It helps a man recognize what may still be affecting the present—so he can make more conscious choices about his future.
When Emotion Takes the Wheel
Goleman's writing brought the concept of the “amygdala hijack” into everyday language—explaining the experience of reacting emotionally before our more thoughtful mind catches up.
Sometimes our reaction arrives before our reasoning.
Where Great Guys goes nextGreat Guys makes that experience memorable through Zilla—our way of recognizing the protective, reactive state that can grab the wheel.
The goal isn't to destroy Zilla.
It's to learn when he has taken over—and put the Great Guy back in the driver's seat.
The Five A's
Richo's work on Attention, Acceptance, Appreciation, Affection and Allowing offered a powerful framework for understanding emotional connection.
Healthy relationships require more than good intentions. People need to experience connection.
Where Great Guys goes nextThe Great Guys 5 A's tool turns those principles into practical questions and behaviors men can use in their real relationships.
Recognizing the Parts Within Us
Internal Family Systems offered another important lens: people can experience different inner “parts,” often trying to protect us in different ways.
Our difficult reactions may serve a purpose—even when their methods no longer help us.
Where Great Guys goes nextTom's Five Saboteurs are not IFS parts renamed.
They are Tom's own behavioral framework—developed through his observations, lived experience, relationships, men's work, and years of asking why good men sometimes behave in ways that work against what they actually want.
Then Tom Carried the Lantern Forward
These ideas did not give Tom the Great Guys system.
They helped illuminate the territory.
Tom's life supplied another kind of education:
- Marriage
- Divorces
- Failed careers
- Conflict
- Forgiveness
- Men's work
- Mistakes
- Reconciliation
- Growth
And decades of watching what happens when good intentions collide with automatic behavior.
From that came something new:
- The Five Saboteurs
- Zilla
- The Great Guys Toolkit
- The practical tools
- The language
- The exercises
Great Guys brings recognized ideas from different places into conversation with Tom's original observations and lived experience—then turns them into a practical system of tools men can actually remember and use.
Inspiration Is Not Imitation
We honor the people whose work helped expand our understanding of human behavior.
We also want to be clear about what Great Guys is.
Great Guys is not Jung.
It is not IFS.
It is not the ACE framework.
It is not Goleman's work.
It is not Richo's Five A's.
And the Five Saboteurs are not borrowed characters from any of them.
Great Guys is Tom's own framework and toolkit, informed by many sources but shaped and engineered through his own life, insights, language and practical methodology.
They helped light the path.
Tom built a toolkit for walking it.
GREAT GUYS
Tools That Transform.
Follow Your North Star.
Head True North.
They helped light the path. Tom built a toolkit for men to:
“FIx, Rebuild, Strengthen”
A Grudge-Free, Gripe-Less, Love More, Better Life.