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Build a Men's Group

Free · Science-based · Licensed counselor · 15 years running men's groups

How to Build a Men's Group

A clear, step-by-step way to start a men's group and build real friendships you can count on.

For a long stretch of my life I had plenty of men around me and not one I could call on a bad night. Guys from work, the neighbor I waved to, a brother-in-law I saw on holidays. We talked about scores and jobs and the weather, and we never once talked about what was actually going on underneath. I'm guessing some of that sounds familiar, or you wouldn't be reading this. A group like that was never going to fall in your lap. You build it, one honest invitation at a time, and you can start this week.

Written by Robert Manthy, LPC · Licensed professional counselor · 15 years running men's groups · Boulder, Colorado

Start with Step 1
Five men in their forties to sixties laughing together by a lodge fireplace

The short version

To build a men's group, name what it's for in one sentence, personally invite 4 to 6 men one at a time, then meet on a standing schedule in a private, relaxed place. Keep it small (5 to 9 men), open each meeting with a go-around so everyone speaks, hold a no-fixing rule, and protect the standing date so the group lasts. No license, no budget, and no gift for speeches required. You can start this week.

  • Invite 4 to 6 men personally, one at a time, framed around a shared activity or meal, not "a support group."
  • Aim for 5 to 9 men total (7 or 8 is the sweet spot), and a fixed weekly or at-least-monthly meeting.
  • Run a simple 90-minute format: a go-around, the main thing, a closing round, then lock the next date.
  • Keep it going by protecting the ritual, sharing the hosting, and reaching out personally when a man drifts.

Why men's groups matter

Going it alone isn't just a rough patch you tough out. Over time it wears on a man's health the way a bad diet does, quietly and for real. And men are hit harder than most, because the same rules we were handed as boys, "be tough," "handle it yourself," "don't lean on anyone," are the rules that make it hardest to reach out when we finally need to.

Here's the part that gives me hope, and it's why I keep doing this work: we actually know what fixes it. Two things make a group genuinely good for a man. The first is psychological safety, which is just a plain way of saying this is a room where you can say a true thing and not get burned for it. The researchers define it as "a shared belief that the team is safe for interpersonal risk taking," and it turns out to be the single biggest factor in whether a man will speak up, admit a hard thing, or ask for help [2]. The second is belonging, the plain feeling of fitting in and being wanted. Put those two together and you've got the whole engine.

And this isn't me theorizing from an armchair. It's been measured in men specifically. In a 2024 study of 162 men in community-based men's groups (Men's Sheds, a peer-led model now in thousands of communities worldwide [4]), the leaders who built a real sense of "us" improved their members' mental health, through that same psychological safety and the strength of the friendships in the room [3]. The model explained 14% to 24% of the variation in members' mental-health outcomes. I've watched that play out in person more times than I can count.

14–24%

A 2024 study of 162 men found that group belonging and psychological safety explained 14% to 24% of the variation in members' mental-health outcomes [3].

Men tend to open up shoulder to shoulder, not face to face. Side by side, with our hands busy and our eyes on the work, the honest stuff slips out through the side door. That can shape how your group meets, but it isn't a rule. Plenty of strong groups just sit down and talk, and that works fine too.

If you want the full picture behind all this, read, or go straight to the full research behind this guide (every source cited).

Is a men's group for you?

You don't need a reason to be here, and nobody's putting a label on you. But read down this list. If a few of these sound like your life right now, you're exactly the man this guide was built for.

  • You've got plenty of people around you, but nobody you'd actually call at 2 a.m.
  • Your talks with other men stop at sports, work, and the weather, and never go past it.
  • You've handled the hard stretches on your own, because that's what you were taught a man does.
  • You've watched a friend go quiet and pull back, and you didn't know how to reach him.
  • The friends you'd count on today are the ones you made twenty or thirty years ago, and the list hasn't grown since.
  • You want a few men who'd have your back, not to fix you, just to stand with you.
  • You're past the age when close friends just happen on their own, and you feel that.
  • You'd be a good man for somebody else to have in his corner, and you've never had the place to do it.

If two or three of those landed, this guide was written for you. Keep reading.

The four steps at a glance

Here's the whole thing on one page. Four steps, each one resting on the one before it. Nothing here is complicated, and you've already done harder things.

Step Name What it means The one thing that matters most
1 Found Start it Name a purpose, personally invite 4 to 6 men
2 Structure Set it up Keep it small (5 to 9), pick a standing time and place
3 Facilitate Run the meeting Make it safe to talk: ground rules, a go-around, no fixing
4 Sustain Keep it alive Protect the ritual, share the load, absorb drop-off gently

Don't wait until you've got step 1 perfect to think about step 4. Read it through once, then go start with a single invitation. That's all the first move has to be.

1

Found the group

The first group I ever started, I almost didn't. I sat on the invitation for weeks, certain the other men would find it strange, or soft, or not their kind of thing. Then I asked them. Every single one said yes, and most admitted they'd been waiting for somebody else to go first. So let me save you those weeks: the men around you are carrying more than they let on, and the only thing standing between them and a better Thursday night is one man willing to send the invitation. That man is you.

Founding a group just means deciding what it's for, then personally inviting the first handful of men. You don't need a polished program to start. You need a clear reason and a few men willing to show up. Just being in the room together, on a regular basis, is itself the medicine [1], so your one job at the start is to get a few men into a room and keep getting them back.

Name the purpose in one sentence before you ask anyone. Something like "a regular place for men to be straight with each other and not go it alone." Keep it about connection, not fixing or curing. Men can smell a self-help project a mile off, and most of us will head the other way.

Invite face to face, or by a direct personal message, one man at a time. A personal ask from a man they trust beats any flyer or group blast every time. Aim for 4 to 6 men who'll commit to the first few meetings. Starting small works because trust forms faster in a small room, and a few reliable men beat a long list of maybes.

Lower the bar to entry. Build the first gathering around a shared activity or a meal, not "a support group." A man who'd never set foot in "group therapy" will happily come over to build something, eat, take a walk, or fix a thing together.

Make the invitation concrete. Give the day, the time, the place, who else is coming, and when it's over. Certainty takes away the friction. "Thursday at 7, my garage, four of us, done by 8:30" is a lot easier to say yes to than "we should hang out sometime."

The text I actually send. You don't have to overthink the words. Here's close to what I send, and you can make it your own:

"Hey [name]. I'm putting together a small group of men who get together every couple of weeks to be straight with each other and have each other's backs. No church, no therapy, just good men and honest talk. The first one's [day] at [time], my place, four or five of us, done in 90 minutes. I'd really like you there. You in?"

Name your own reason for wanting this. A little honesty up front ("I've been feeling cut off lately and I want something better") tells the other men what kind of room this is, and it hands the next man permission to be straight too.

Opening night: the first meeting

"Beginnings are such delicate times."
Frank Herbert, Dune

The first meeting carries more weight than any meeting after it. Men decide in that first hour whether this is a room they'll come back to, so a little structure up front earns you everything later. This isn't at odds with leading shoulder to shoulder. It's the order things happen in: structure carries the first night or two, and the side-by-side, hands-busy way of being together takes over as trust builds. Here's how to run that first night.

Say what the group is for, in one sentence

Open by stating the purpose out loud so every man is joining the same thing. You don't have to use these exact words, but this is the shape of it:

"This group is a regular place for us to be straight with each other and support one another, to face the real challenges in our lives and relationships, and to become more purposeful men along the way."

Keep it about connection and being men you can count on, not about fixing or curing anyone.

A first-meeting agenda you can run

About 75 to 90 minutes. Times are a guide, not a stopwatch. Adjust to the number of men in the room.

SegmentHow longWhat happens
Introductions1 min eachName, plus "something you enjoy doing that you're not at all good at." It's disarming, it's honest, and it gets every man talking and laughing in the first few minutes. (For more openers like this, see our icebreakers for men's groups.)
Ground rules5 to 10 minRead the five rules below out loud and agree to them together. This is the spine of the night.
Roundtable3 min eachOne at a time: "What's your situation today? What brought you here?" No fixing, no cross-talk. Just listen.
Closing round1 min eachEach man names one thing: an action, an insight, or an appreciation.
Next step5 minLock the next date out loud. Optionally agree on one shared thing to do or read before next time (see note below).

The five ground rules, said out loud

Read these at the first meeting and agree to them together. They expand the short version elsewhere in this guide. Say them; don't assume them. Rules nobody hears are rules nobody trusts.

  • Focus. This room is for being authentic, for real connection, for backing each other up, and for doing the honest personal work that makes a man better.
  • Confidentiality. What's said here stays here. This is a closed group: what one man shares doesn't leave the room.
  • Respect. No judgment. We make room for where each man actually is, and we have each other's backs.
  • Compassion. We're here to listen and understand, not to judge, compare, or hand out advice. A man's hard thing isn't a problem to be solved on the spot; it's something to be heard.
  • Radical integrity. Speak your truth, and be willing to face conflict and your own blind spots. Men are trained to pull away from another man's hard truth or his pain, or to use it as a one-up. Name that pull when you feel it, and resist it. Staying in the hard moment with another man is the whole point.

Optional: a shared next step

Some groups like to agree on one small thing to do or read between meetings: a chapter, an article, a short exercise, a question to sit with. It's a pattern that works, not a requirement, and there's no one book every group has to use. If your group wants a starting point, a book like No More Mr. Nice Guy is one example men have used; plenty of strong groups read nothing at all and simply show up and talk. Pick what fits your men, or skip it entirely.

This whole opening folds into the four-step framework: it's the concrete how-to for this first step, the first meeting. Once the group is on its feet, steps 2 through 4 (structure, facilitation, and sustaining it) carry it from there.

Ready to start? Get the free First Meeting Kit.

Word-for-word invitation scripts, the exact 90-minute first-meeting format, and the five ground rules, ready to print.

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2

Structure it

Structuring the group means locking in the size, the rhythm, the place, and the few ground rules that make safety possible. Think of consistency as the container that holds everything else. A standing meeting on the calendar pulls a man out of the slow drift inward, and all that structure is really doing is protecting the safety in the room. Nothing fancier than that.

How big? Aim for 5 to 9 men

Keep the group small: aim for about 5 to 9 men, with 7 or 8 as the sweet spot. Smaller rooms protect depth and trust, and the research leans clearly toward "smaller is better" for real connection. A 2025 systematic review of 17 studies found a slight favorable trend for groups with fewer than 9 members [5], and the long-standing clinical benchmark is 5 to 10 with an ideal around 7 [6].

Why that range? You need roughly 5 men before the group really comes alive, and past about 10 no one man can hold the room and there isn't enough air for everyone to speak [6]. The number's a guide, not a magic figure. Safety and belonging are what you're after, not a headcount.

How often? A standing weekly or monthly meeting

Set a fixed, recurring cadence. A standing weekly night is the well-worn default, and meeting at least monthly is the floor I'd never drop below. Same day, same time, same place takes the "do I feel like it tonight?" question off the table entirely.

And I'll be straight with you about frequency: the research is thin on the exact best interval. Nobody's run weekly against biweekly against monthly head to head for a men's group. What the evidence does say loud and clear is that consistency itself is the active ingredient. In peer-support groups, attendance, engagement, and closeness rise and fall together, and meeting "one or more per month" helps hold all three [7]. The standard structured programs run weekly at first, then ease off to biweekly and monthly once the bond is built [8]. So here's the practical version: start weekly if you can, never go below monthly, and then guard whatever rhythm you pick.

Where? A low-pressure, private space

Pick a relaxed, private spot where men can use their hands or share a meal, not a clinical room with a desk between you. A garage, a kitchen, a workshop, a back porch, a quiet corner of a park. Privacy matters because no man tells the truth where he thinks it'll get repeated.

The simple, repeatable meeting format

A meeting a man can remember is a meeting that lasts. The same simple shape shows up across the groups that work: a short opening round, the shared activity or topic, then a short closing round [9]. Here's a 90-minute version you're welcome to copy outright:

Time Segment What happens
0 to 10 min Arrive and settle Greet, grab food or drink, ease in
10 to 25 min Opening go-around One word, then one sentence, on how each man is really doing
25 to 70 min The main thing The shared activity, a discussion topic, or deeper sharing
70 to 85 min Closing go-around One takeaway or one thing each man is carrying out
85 to 90 min Confirm next time Lock the next date out loud
The 90-minute meeting flow

Agree on two ground rules out loud at the very first meeting: what's said here stays here, and no fixing or judging, only listening and "me too." (For the full set, see our men's group ground rules.) Say the confidentiality part out loud and agree to it together, don't just assume it. That spoken promise is what lets a man finally say a true thing without bracing for it to come back on him.

3

Facilitate the meetings

Facilitating means holding the room so men actually talk, countering the habits that keep them quiet. The thing in the way isn't being a man. It's a few rigid rules a lot of us got handed early (go it alone, bottle it up, never let them see you sweat) that make honesty feel like a risk. Your job running the room is to make those old rules unnecessary in here, while still honoring the good in being a man: dignity, competence, and purpose. (The same idea drives, if you want the deeper background.)

Lead shoulder to shoulder

Think about building, doing, or serving something together, and let the honest stuff come out the side door while your hands are busy. A shared task is the easiest on-ramp for the men who go stiff when you ask them to talk head-on, whether that's a meal, a walk, a project, or a cause worth showing up for. (For a full list, see our men's group activities.) Working side by side like this is tied to a greater sense of belonging and purpose, and to better mental health for the men who do it [10]. It's an option, not a rule. A group that just meets to check in and talk works every bit as well.

Run the go-around

Start with a simple, even check-in so every man's voice is in the room early. One word for how you're really doing, then one sentence. This "go-around" is a long-recognized group practice, and its whole job is to "balance the member's participation so that talkative and quiet members start the group equally" [11].

If you want a stricter turn-by-turn version, use the talking-circle format: one speaker at a time, an object passes around the circle, no interruptions, every man gets an equal turn [12]. A structured round quietly reins in the man who'd run away with the night and pulls the quiet one in without ever putting him on the spot.

Lead with empathy

Before that "me too" moment can do its work, the men in the room have to know what they're actually offering each other. The word for it is empathy, and I'll be honest, most of us were never taught what it really means. It's worth spelling out plainly, because it's the one skill that makes a group worth coming back to.

The researcher Brene Brown draws a sharp line between empathy and sympathy, and it's the clearest way to understand it. Sympathy looks down and feels sorry for a man: "that's too bad," "at least it's not worse." It keeps a safe distance. Empathy climbs down into it with him. It's feeling with someone, not for them. Brown names four parts to it: you take his perspective and try to see it the way he sees it; you stay out of judgment; you recognize the emotion he's in; and you let him know you recognize it. Empathy almost never starts with "at least." It rarely even needs a fix. It's the simple, hard act of being with a man in a hard place and saying, in effect, "I'm here, and you're not in this alone." (Brown lays this out in her short, widely shared talk on empathy for the RSA.)

What it sounds like

A man says: "I lost my job last month and I haven't told my wife yet."
Fixing: "You need to update your resume and start calling people today."
Comparing: "Oh, I was out of work for a year once, it was way worse than that."
Sympathy: "That's rough, man. At least you've got savings, right?"
Empathy: "That's a heavy thing to carry on your own. I can hear how much the not-telling-her part is weighing on you. I'm glad you said it here."

Notice that the empathetic answer doesn't solve anything, doesn't compare, and doesn't hurry him toward feeling better. It just gets close and stays there. That's the whole move, and it's simpler than it sounds. You don't have to find the perfect words. "I don't even know what to say, but I'm really glad you told us" is empathy too.

Make the no-fixing norm real

Protect the "me too" moment, and keep it empathy. The single most powerful event in a men's group is one man saying the hard thing and another answering "yeah, me too." Done right, "me too" means "I see you, and I understand": it's empathy in two words, a man climbing down into it with you so you're not alone in there. In that instant, shame loses its grip. Done wrong, "me too" becomes a one-up, a man cutting in to make it about his own story ("me too, but mine was worse"). That's comparison, not support, and it quietly shuts the first man down. So coach the difference out loud: "me too" is there to say I'm with you, then hand the moment back to the man who's sharing. The group's job is to listen and stay close, not to solve and not to compete. Nobody jumps in with "here's what you should do."

Take the lead on the hard stuff by naming your own first. When you, the man holding the room, say a true hard thing out loud, you hand every other man both the permission and the words to do the same. Men pick up this inner language fastest by hearing another man use it, not by being told to.

Share the facilitation and manage airtime

Rotate who facilitates as time goes on so the group never leans on one man (more on why in step 4). And manage airtime gently. Walk the man who's running away with it back to the round ("let's hear from everyone"), and give a silence room to sit instead of rushing to fill it. Safety opens men up, pressure shuts them down. A quiet stretch usually means somebody's working up the nerve to say the thing that matters.

4

Sustain it

Sustaining means turning a few good meetings into a durable group that deepens over time. Treat the meeting itself as the whole point. The good of it stacks up through repetition and belonging, so the real game is just this: keep the men coming back, and let the trust deepen one meeting at a time. (For more on the long haul, see how to keep a men's group going.)

Protect the ritual. Guard that standing date the way you'd guard any dose of medicine you can't skip. Knowing it'll be there, same as last time, is what makes the group solid enough to actually lean on. Cancel rarely, and reschedule rather than skip.

Hold gentle accountability between meetings. A plain "did you make that call?" text nudges a man toward the life he said he wanted, and it tells him somebody noticed and remembered. It's a small thing, and it carries a lot more weight than it looks like it should.

Share ownership over time. Rotate who hosts, who opens the check-in, who picks the activity. It builds belonging and it keeps the whole thing from resting on one man's shoulders. When leaders build a real sense of "us" instead of running things top-down, members' mental health measurably improves, through the very same safety-and-belonging ingredients this guide rests on [3]. And it helps the man who steps up, too: in a peer-led circle trial (with women), taking on the leader role lifted the leader's own wellbeing [13].

Expect and absorb attrition, fast and personally. Men will miss nights and drift. I've watched it happen a hundred times. A personal "we missed you, see you next week" beats writing a man off, and it matters more than it seems, because one man slipping out quietly can pull others out behind him [14]. What keeps men coming back isn't who you picked at the start. It's the bond in the room. The strongest predictors of a man staying are the relationships and the feeling of belonging and fitting the group [15][14].

How thin is too thin? The research doesn't hand you a specific men's-group dropout number (clinical groups range from single digits to roughly 25% or more, depending on the setting [16]), so trust the room over a statistic. Here's an encouraging note: in one mixed-group study, the men actually showed up more and dropped out less than the women [15]. Let depth, not headcount, be your scoreboard.

Grow or split with care. If you're regularly pushing past 9 or 10 men, that's usually the sign to split into two groups rather than swell into one big one, because the depth lives in the smallness. Split it amicably, seeding the new group with a couple of trusted men, and you keep both rooms healthy.

The first six months follow a predictable shape: a polite first night, a trust-building month one, a settling-in around month two, the occasional missed meeting in month three, and then — somewhere in months four or five — the moment the room clicks and men start showing up for each other for real. By month six it's a habit. Every phase is normal.

  • Month one: men are feeling each other out — that's how trust builds, not a problem to solve.
  • Month two: novelty fades, which is a good sign. Keep the meeting steady.
  • Month three: someone misses a night. A short personal text almost always brings him back.
  • Months four–five: trust clicks. One honest moment changes the whole room.
  • Month six: it's a habit. You built the thing these men were missing.

What the first six months actually feel like

Here's what the first six months look like, month by month. Knowing the shape helps — each phase is normal, and each one leads somewhere worth getting to.

The first night

Expect nerves, your own included. The talk stays on the surface, men feel each other out, and somebody cracks a joke to cut the tension. That's all fine. Run your structure, get every man talking once, and end on time. You're not going deep tonight, and you don't need to. You're proving the room is safe to come back to. That's the whole job tonight.

Month one

Still polite. Men are feeling out whether this is real, whether what they say will stay in the room, whether these are men worth trusting. That's not a problem — that's how trust gets built. Don't push for depth. Keep showing up, keep it steady, and let trust build on its own clock.

Month two

The novelty settles, and that's actually a good sign — the group is moving from "interesting new thing" to "regular part of life." Attendance may wobble slightly. Keeping the meeting exactly as reliable as it was in week one does the most good here. Steady is what wins this month.

Month three

Somebody misses a meeting. Maybe two somebodies. It's almost never about the group — it's a busy week, a rough patch, a man who half-expects nobody noticed. This is where a short text earns its keep. Man to man: "Missed you Thursday. You good? See you next week." Not a guilt trip, just proof he was missed. That one message is often the difference between a man who's back the next week and one who needed a little longer to find his way back.

Months four and five

Somewhere in here, the trust clicks. One man finally says the real thing, the thing he's been circling for weeks, and instead of advice or an awkward silence he gets a quiet "yeah, me too" from across the room. That's the moment the whole thing turns. After that the room is different, and the men know it. The meetings stop feeling like a thing on the calendar and start feeling like the place they go to be straight with somebody.

Month six

By now it's a habit, not an effort. Men plan around it. They check in between meetings. When one of them hits a hard stretch, this is the room he brings it to, because he knows the men in it will have his back. You didn't build a meeting. You built the thing those men were missing. Six months in, that's done, and it tends to last.

When it gets bumpy

Every group hits these, and none of them mean you're doing it wrong. Here's the situation and the words that handle it. Keep them simple. The right move is almost always the small, calm one.

  • One man dominates the room. He means well, he's just filling the space. Open it back up to everyone: "Good, thanks. Let's hear from everyone on this." Then look at a quieter man and wait.
  • Dead silence after a question. Don't rescue it. Silence isn't a failure, it's a man thinking. Let it sit, and if you say anything, say: "Take your time, no rush." The quiet does the work.
  • The fixer jumps in with advice. Somebody starts solving another man's problem the second he stops talking. Catch it gently: "Let's just listen on this one." No lecture. Five words, and the room resets.
  • A man shares something heavy. Don't fix it, don't fill the air. Just receive it: "Thanks for trusting us with that." That one line tells him he did the right thing by saying it, and tells everyone else the room can hold the hard stuff.
  • A man drifts, or no-shows. Reach for him personally, man to man, not in front of the group: "We missed you. See you next week." No guilt, just proof he was noticed. It's usually all it takes.
  • The talk stays shallow week after week. You can't order depth, but you can model it. Go first yourself. Say the slightly-too-honest thing about your own week and let it sit. Men match the level the leader sets. Lead it.

Common mistakes to avoid

  • Calling it "therapy" or a "support group" up front. Lead with connection or something to do together. The depth shows up on its own later.
  • Inviting too many men at once. A big launch feels exciting, but it kills trust before it forms. Start with 4 to 6.
  • Skipping the spoken confidentiality agreement. If it's only assumed, never said out loud, no man will quite trust it.
  • Letting one man run away with every meeting. Without a go-around, the loudest voice crowds everyone else out.
  • Jumping in to fix. Advice shuts honesty down. The magic is "me too," not "here's what you should do."
  • Leaning on one leader. If only the founder ever hosts, the group folds the first week he can't make it.
  • Treating a missed night as a quit. Drift is normal. A warm personal nudge brings a man right back.

Frequently asked questions

What if no one opens up at first?

That's completely normal, and it's not a failure on your part. Open with the go-around and go first yourself, sharing something real, so the men see what honest looks like. Lean on a shared activity so nobody feels forced to talk. The depth usually shows up after a few meetings, once the room feels safe, not on night one.

How long should men's group meetings be?

About 90 minutes is a good target: long enough to get past the small talk, short enough to respect every man's evening. The exact length matters less than keeping it steady and ending on time, so the men know they can count on it.

Do we need a trained facilitator for a men's group?

No. You don't need a therapist or any credential to run a peer men's group. You need a man willing to hold the ground rules, run the go-around, and protect the no-fixing norm. Passing that role around among the members actually makes the group stronger [3]. (See the safety note below for when to bring in a professional.)

What if men start dropping out of the group?

Expect some drift. It's normal in every group there is. Reach out personally and warmly ("we missed you") instead of writing a man off, because one quiet departure can pull others out behind it [14]. Keep your eye on the bond in the room. That's the thing that actually keeps men coming back [15].

How often should a men's group meet, weekly or monthly?

The honest answer is that the research backs consistency over any exact interval. Weekly is the well-established default and tends to build momentum the fastest; monthly is the practical floor for keeping a group close [7][8]. Pick a rhythm you can truly protect, then guard it like it matters, because it does.

Should a men's group be religious or secular?

Either one works. The active ingredients (safety, belonging, shared activity, the go-around, the no-fixing norm) are the same whether your group is faith-based, secular, or somewhere in between. Just be clear which it is when you invite men, so every one of them joins expecting the same thing.

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A note on safety

A men's group is good for a man, but it isn't a replacement for professional mental-health care, and it was never meant to be. If you or a man in your group is in crisis or at risk of harm, call your local emergency services or a crisis line in your country right now. If you're not sure what's available where you live, a quick search for "crisis line" or "suicide helpline" plus your country or region will point you to it, and many countries have free, confidential lines staffed around the clock.

When a man in the group is in real danger (actively suicidal, deep in an addiction, or carrying untreated depression or severe trauma), the most loving thing you can do is help him get to a professional, and then keep standing right beside him. The group walks with him; it doesn't take the place of his care team. If he's wary of counseling, our plain-language guide to can help him find an approach that fits.

Sources

  1. Littlewood, E., McMillan, D., Chew-Graham, C., et al. (2022). Can we mitigate the psychological impacts of social isolation using behavioural activation? Long-term results of the UK BASIL COVID-19 pilot randomised controlled trial and living systematic review. Evidence-Based Mental Health, 25(e1), e49-e57. https://doi.org/10.1136/ebmental-2022-300530
  2. Edmondson, A. C. (1999). Psychological safety and learning behavior in work teams. Administrative Science Quarterly, 44(2), 350-383. https://doi.org/10.2307/2666999
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  4. International Men's Sheds Organisation and Irish Men's Sheds Association (2024). Movement-scale figures (estimated ~3,500 sheds across roughly 17 countries), via aggregated public reporting. (Non-journal source, used only for the count-of-sheds statistic.)
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  11. Gordon, R. M. (2008). The two-minute check-in at the beginning of psychoanalytic group therapy sessions. Group Analysis, 41(4), 366-372. https://doi.org/10.1177/0533316408098289
  12. Wilk, P., et al. (2021). Blending Indigenous sharing circle and Western focus group methodologies for the study of Indigenous children's health: A systematic review. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 20. https://doi.org/10.1177/16094069211015112
  13. Gallegos-Riofrío, C. A., Chomat, A. M., et al. (2019). Women's circles as a culturally safe psychosocial intervention in Guatemalan indigenous communities: A community-led pilot randomised trial. BMC Women's Health, 19, 53. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12905-019-0744-z
  14. Cruwys, T., Steffens, N. K., Haslam, S. A., et al. (2019). Predictors of social identification in group therapy. Psychotherapy Research, 30(3), 348-361. https://doi.org/10.1080/10503307.2019.1587193
  15. Gulamani, T., Uliaszek, A. A., Chugani, C. D., et al. (2020). Attrition and attendance in group therapy for university students: An examination of predictors across time. Journal of Clinical Psychology, 76(12), 2155-2169. https://doi.org/10.1002/jclp.23042
  16. Sawamoto, R., Nozaki, T., Furukawa, T., et al. (2016). Predictors of dropout by female obese patients treated with a group cognitive behavioral therapy to promote weight loss. Obesity Facts, 9(1), 29-38. https://doi.org/10.1159/000442761