Quote · The Prof G Pod with Scott Galloway
What Comes After the Iran War? — with Rep. Jim Himes
Where this was said
Lessons on Manhood, Listening, and Developing Competence
At 55:40 · chapter starts 54:05
Galloway asks Himes — a father of two daughters, approaching 60 — what he's gotten right and wrong as a dad and partner. Himes' answer is disarmingly honest: he spent his twenties and thirties afraid to say 'I don't know' because he feared it would brand him as the idiot in the room, and as a result he learned far more slowly than he could have. [1] — Jim Himes "I think one of the most transformative things that a boy or man can do is to develop competence in something. The discipline and the artist…" 55:40 This connects to a broader point he sees as being actively undermined by MAGA constructions of masculinity: listening is a form of strength, not weakness. The most genuinely powerful people he has encountered in boardrooms and cabinet rooms — in both the private and public sector — are those who speak last, reserve their counsel, and then say something that stops the room. He closes with a more proactive prescription: the most transformative thing a young person can do is develop real competence in something — piano, rowing, beekeeping, Farsi — because the discipline, artistry, and commitment required in that pursuit builds a complete human being.
In his twenties and thirties, Himes was afraid to admit ignorance because he thought it made him look dumb. Now approaching 60 and wielding real power, he sees listening and admitting uncertainty as the markers of genuine influence — not weakness. The MAGA conception of manhood denigrates exactly this quality.
