Well, it looks like old headshot day has rolled around again. So I dug up another one from the archives!
As we so often do, I thought for a moment, if only I could go back and let that young guy know that all the limitations, and there were many, including about being gay, that he perceived about himself weren’t true, weren’t real, he could have avoided many of the struggles that would follow.
But then I remember, yet again, that each of our battle scars is a thread in the tapestry of what our life becomes. And that without each of those hues, that tapestry would lack the beauty that comes from the lighter and darker tones, from the full range of color.
Have a great weekend, Everyone!
#TheTapestry #OldHeadshotDay #LGBTQ #GratefulForAllOfIt #BestGayLife
📸 Lauren Berley
Well, now that it’s been shaken on, it’s settled. Time to honor another year on the planet for one of the best people I know. Please join me in wishing the wonderful Scott Lowell (aka @scolo222) a very happy birthday and an incredible year ahead! Happy Birthday, dear Scotty! Love you always! 🥳 Gramercy Park Hotel
I was recently discussing the concept of being in one’s prime. A certain age range was referenced that some might consider a “physical prime.“ But being in one’s prime is a relative notion. To have the gift of years and to have done the work to see through one’s learned limitations and comprehend life’s deeper meanings, for example, puts a person in a version of prime that lets them love life in a way they couldn’t before. I certainly couldn’t appreciate life as fully when I was on #Friends or #QueerasFolk. I didn’t have the skill set I do these years later.
As we keep waking up and evolving, our lives only get richer, and we have the opportunity to experience an increasingly more beautiful prime than ever before.
#Vintage #Freedom #ThePrimeofLife #LGBTQ #BestGayLife
📷 @toddthephotographer Santa Monica, California
I’m sad to hear of the passing of @bettymwhite today. What a wonderful life fully lived. So many people touched and impacted.
When I had the good fortune to work with her on “Hot in Cleveland,” we did what’s called a speed through in the makeup room on taping day. A speed through is essentially the process of whipping through the lines of an entire episode to refresh them quickly before going live in front of an audience. Because it was only the third episode, everyone was especially energized as the show was still finding its feet. Betty’s “date” for the episode was none other than the amazing Carl Reiner, who passed away last year. As we all sat in a circle zipping through our lines, one of my fellow guest stars leaned over and, referring to Betty and Carl, whispered, “Can you believe we’re sitting here doing a speed through with two of the progenitors of comedy?” For indeed we were. And indeed they were.
When we were about to start shooting, Betty came in and found a chair next to me just off the set where we were both to be making our entrances. She sighed a big sigh as she sat, and I said, “How are you doing?” She didn’t miss a beat and asked, “Is it time to go home yet?” I laughed, and we chatted for a bit. I’ll never forget the experience.
I guess now it really was time to go home. Rest well, Betty. CBS Studios-Radford
For 2021, Queer as Folk (especially Ben and Michael) once again leads the pack topping the Top Nine, along with some good oldies, and some new Pride!
Grateful for many things this year, including the emergence of Best Gay Life and the opportunity to work with some terrific men focused on living their best lives. New, exciting aspects of that to come in 2022! Along with a renewed focus on my love of acting and writing.
Especially looking forward to more, greater, and deeper connections with the folks in my life, very much including all of you. May this coming year be our best yet. Here we go, 2022! Happy New Year!
#HappyNewYear #BestNine #QueerAsFolk #LetsGo2022
So I first met this amazing guy on Rehoboth Beach, Delaware in the summer of 1991. I was working at the Department of Justice in DC (the Executive Office for US Attorneys, to be exact) between my first and second years of law school at Georgetown and was grateful, to say the least, for the shore-lined respite from our nation’s capital’s suffocatingly humid days.
That early afternoon, I remember scanning across the sand and spotting this dazzling smile atop a tanned shirtless torso and a red Hawaiian-esque wrap at the waist, invariably concealing the speedo underneath. Okay, fine, one or both of us may have had puka shells around our necks. It was the 90’s after all. And, yes, a brief make out session may well have taken place at some point later that day, but we digress.
Cut to three decades later, and I’m beyond thankful to catch up over coffee and some nosh and share about our life journeys so far and our visions for the future. It’s a special thing for someone to have witnessed the change from the boy you were to the man that you’ve become. All as we walk our paths as sober fellows. Thank you for the wonderful catch-up, @mr.rutherford, my friend. To be continued. Here’s to the next 30.
(The unintentional backdrop captured the sentiment of the experience.)
#Friends #30YearsLater #TheGreatLife #TheValueOfDecades Urth Caffe – Melrose Ave, Hollywood CA
So I first met this amazing guy on Rehoboth Beach, Delaware in the summer of 1991. I was working at the Department of Justice in DC (the Executive Office for US Attorneys, to be exact) between my first and second years of law school at Georgetown and was grateful, to say the least, for the shore-lined respite from our nation’s capital’s suffocatingly humid days.
That early afternoon, I remember scanning across the sand and spotting this dazzling smile atop a tanned shirtless torso and a red Hawaiian-esque wrap at the waist, invariably concealing the speedo underneath. Okay, fine, one or both of us may have had puka shells around our necks. It was the 90’s after all. And, yes, a brief make out session may well have taken place at some point later that day, but we digress.
Cut to three decades later, and I’m beyond thankful to catch up over coffee and some nosh and share about our life journeys so far and our visions for the future. It’s a special thing for someone to have witnessed the change from the boy you were to the man that you’ve become. All as we walk our paths as sober fellows. Thank you for the wonderful catch-up, @mr.rutherford, my friend. To be continued. Here’s to the next 30.
(The unintentional backdrop captured the sentiment of the experience.)
#Friends #30YearsLater #TheGreatLife #TheValueOfDecades Urth Caffe – Melrose Ave, Hollywood CA
It’s hard to believe it’s been three years since I said goodbye to you, Dad, since you left us in physical form. I’m thankful that talking with you and feeling you with me has kept our connection alive. I remember how proud you and Mom were here when I was graduating from college at Penn. I couldn’t be more grateful for everything you gave me and the man I got to become because of you. I love you always, Dad. University of Pennsylvania
Bucs win! The Bucs will always be a connection to my Dad. After the Bucs, Tom Brady was his favorite. He signed with the team the year after my father passed. I think Dad helped coordinate TB coming to TB from his special box seat. #GoBucs #GreatJobDad #TampaBayBuccaneers Los Angeles, California
One of the most important things we do to live our best lives is surround ourselves with those who support the lives we’re envisioning and growing into. In our early years, many of us migrated toward those who were reflections of our less evolved selves, the parts of us that still operated from old, less healthy paradigms. This may have meant re-creating a not-so-desirable, high school-like dynamic, maybe our own “Mean Girls” or dysfunctional family scenario.
Thankfully, the more we wake up, the less we feel the pull to perpetuate relationships that aren’t kind and loving and the more we create communities that help us to be our best selves.
Among the different, wonderful folks I’m fortunate to have befriended and to share the life journey with are this group of fellows who are all creating and contributing powerfully in the world. They are very much about holding the vision of expansion for themselves and others, including me. I’m grateful to know them and call them friends.
#LGBTQ #Friends #Community #Growth #Expansion #GayLifeCoaching #BestGayLife
One of the most important things we do to live our best lives is surround ourselves with those who support the lives we’re envisioning and growing into. In our early years, many of us migrated toward those who were reflections of our less evolved selves, the parts of us that still operated from old, less healthy paradigms. This may have meant re-creating a not-so-desirable, high school-like dynamic, maybe our own “Mean Girls” or dysfunctional family scenario.
Thankfully, the more we wake up, the less we feel the pull to perpetuate relationships that aren’t kind and loving and the more we create communities that help us to be our best selves.
Among the different, wonderful folks I’m fortunate to have befriended and to share the life journey with are this group of fellows who are all creating and contributing powerfully in the world. They are very much about holding the vision of expansion for themselves and others, including me. I’m grateful to know them and call them friends.
#LGBTQ #Friends #Community #Growth #Expansion #GayLifeCoaching #BestGayLife
One of the most important things we do to live our best lives is surround ourselves with those who support the lives we’re envisioning and growing into. In our early years, many of us migrated toward those who were reflections of our less evolved selves, the parts of us that still operated from old, less healthy paradigms. This may have meant re-creating a not-so-desirable, high school-like dynamic, maybe our own “Mean Girls” or dysfunctional family scenario.
Thankfully, the more we wake up, the less we feel the pull to perpetuate relationships that aren’t kind and loving and the more we create communities that help us to be our best selves.
Among the different, wonderful folks I’m fortunate to have befriended and to share the life journey with are this group of fellows who are all creating and contributing powerfully in the world. They are very much about holding the vision of expansion for themselves and others, including me. I’m grateful to know them and call them friends.
#LGBTQ #Friends #Community #Growth #Expansion #GayLifeCoaching #BestGayLife
One of the most important things we do to live our best lives is surround ourselves with those who support the lives we’re envisioning and growing into. In our early years, many of us migrated toward those who were reflections of our less evolved selves, the parts of us that still operated from old, less healthy paradigms. This may have meant re-creating a not-so-desirable, high school-like dynamic, maybe our own “Mean Girls” or dysfunctional family scenario.
Thankfully, the more we wake up, the less we feel the pull to perpetuate relationships that aren’t kind and loving and the more we create communities that help us to be our best selves.
Among the different, wonderful folks I’m fortunate to have befriended and to share the life journey with are this group of fellows who are all creating and contributing powerfully in the world. They are very much about holding the vision of expansion for themselves and others, including me. I’m grateful to know them and call them friends.
#LGBTQ #Friends #Community #Growth #Expansion #GayLifeCoaching #BestGayLife
Excited for more coaching and working with some fantastic gay men this week as we focus on creating the lives they truly desire and releasing what’s in the way of that.
Meanwhile, as the latest legislations occur or are stirring, we’re reminded where some of our perceived limitations have originated. For a vast number of us, we come into the world with the presumption that only attraction between a man and a woman exists. As a result, LGBTQ kids born into families headed by opposite-sex parents often have no way of understanding the normalcy of their emerging LGBTQ feelings. And without any other information, they have no way of knowing, for example, that there are families headed by two mommies or two daddies in the world. That’s just one form of non-sexual, age-appropriate understandings that might help LGBTQ kids come to terms with this part of themselves.
This ongoing situation, along with the many other (often deeply) challenging experiences that can occur in relation to our sexuality, creates limiting beliefs from which we now have the opportunity to awaken. Ideally, in the process, we also awaken to the recognition that being LGBTQ is a gift, a beautiful lens through which we can expand and express truly wonderful lives.
(And thank you to the amazing @toddthephotographer for the beautiful photos. I can’t recommend him highly enough!)
#BestGayLife #GayLifeCoach #Gratitude #Freedom #GayIsAGift
One of the great things about being on the planet for a while is that we come to know, over time, that no matter what we’re walking through, we always come through to the other side, even if the outcome isn’t what we’d hoped it would be. If we think back over our lives, time and again, the challenges we faced eventually shifted, usually in ways we didn’t expect, and we came through to a new experience, to feelings of joy or satisfaction or peace.
No matter what you walk through, trust that you’re going to come through to the other side (I say this having just come through the Covid thing), that things will be okay again. Until, of course, the next challenge arises! But that, as we know, is just the beautiful flow and dance of living. Let’s embrace it while we can.
Over time, some of us also come to know the gift that is coffee. Love you all. Hope you’re having a beautiful week.
#ItAlwaysWorksOut #Trust #TheDanceOfLife #LGBTQ #BestGayLife #Coffee
📸 @toddthephotographer. Thank you, Todd!
Easter Brunch/Friends Catch-up. Had a flashback back to wearing an Easter suit and tie as a boy in the hot Florida sun. Appreciating for the freer, cooler version. 😉 If you’re celebrating, Happy Easter and Happy Passover! #HappyEaster #HappyPassover #BestLife The Grove
Growing up, various forms of hearts around the house were always in great supply. Because Valentine’s Day was never just Valentine’s Day. It’s Mom’s birthday and was a little extra special in our home as a result. So Happy Valentine Birthday to my beautiful Valentine Mom! Thanks for being the amazing mom and woman you are. I love you always and forever.
And hope you all enjoy this day, which (beyond the commercialized, store-bought version of love it’s come to signify and which, of course, is totally fine) can honor love in all its forms if we decide to give it that meaning. So Happy Love and Connection Day, Everyone!
#TheNewValentinesDay #HappyBirthdayMom
There are different ways to go about getting new results in our lives. One of them is to change the filters through which we interpret what we’re experiencing in the world. When our interpretation changes, so does everything. Our entire worldview shifts, and things become possible that we may not have even imagined before. #Freedom #BestGayLife
For gay folks, the meanings we’ve been taught about ourselves and what it means to be gay have, almost entirely, been flawed from the beginning. The absurd ideas about being “less than“ or a “sinner” or an “abomination” or a second class citizen, among the countless labels that have been attached to us over the centuries, are, of course, fictions.
And yet their influence can persist unnoticed in our subconscious minds, especially considering that societal shifts for the better have largely occurred only in most recent decades. Those falsehoods can then unwittingly affect every aspect of our experience. For us to continue to operate from those fictions, whether consciously or unconsciously, is to live a life that isn’t as realized as it could be.
While we didn’t put those false stories and labels into our minds, it’s up to us to remove them. As we continue to dismantle and replace these fables (and the meanings we’ve understandably connected to them) with the truth of our inherent value and wholeness, we experience the richer, fuller lives that have always been our birthright in the same way that they have been for everyone else.
#LGBTQ #Meaning #InherentValue #Wholeness #TheTruth #GayLifeCoaching #BestGayLife
Among the steps to creating one’s best life is the act of clarifying the visions or outcomes we want to realize. Stating those future outcomes as present realities and delineating the steps to getting there is a core part of the process.
For gay people, this process can be especially difficult when considering the historical conditioning that may have imposed limits on what we thought was possible for us. I created a PDF (the “Intro Guide to Creating Your BEST GAY LIFE”) that’s available on my website to help you get started.
See the Link in my Bio to download it.
#Visions #TrueHeartsDesires #Freedom #LGBTQ #GayLifeCoach #BestGayLife #IntroGuide
Something magical happens when we create an overall blueprint for our ideal lives. And state our future visions as present realities, creating an actionable plan to achieve them. Given the subconscious limitations that have been imposed on gay people, we may not find it easy at first to consider the broad scope of our lives in this way, but doing so will pay off.
As I’ll get into soon, the manifestation of your ideal life is not going to be the source of your happiness. A person can achieve everything they want and still not be happy. Or achieve “happiness“ for a short time until the outer thing ceases to offer up the solution to what is entirely an inside job. A new car offers its thrill only for so long.
That said, we are here, if we so decide, to live our most expansive lives. The key is to do that free of the idea that realizing such a life is the source of our value. (Our value is inherent. We’re born with it.) Rather, the key is to go for our visions, because life is ultimately just a dance — a big, beautiful, sometimes torturous, extraordinary dance. Why not dance it as fully as we can while we’re still here and able to do so?
More on the “inside job” soon, but, in the meantime, I created a free PDF to show you exactly how to craft the life of your dreams. To download your free PDF, “The Intro Guide to Creating your BEST GAY LIFE™️,” go to the Link in my Bio above or to robertgant.com.
Have you ever sat down and really, fully imagined and written down the big picture, every aspect, of the life you’d most love to live?
We have no choice about whether we are going to create in our lives as gay folks. The question is whether we are going to create out of the default of our old thinking (and current circumstances) or by design.
#Visions #LifeBlueprint #IntroGuide #SubconciousMind #TrueHeartsDesires #LGBTQ #GayLifeCoach #BestGayLife
📸 @toddthephotographer 🙌🏳️🌈
Something magical happens when we create an overall blueprint for our ideal lives. And state our future visions as present realities, creating an actionable plan to achieve them. Given the subconscious limitations that have been imposed on gay people, we may not find it easy at first to consider the broad scope of our lives in this way, but doing so will pay off.
As I’ll get into soon, the manifestation of your ideal life is not going to be the source of your happiness. A person can achieve everything they want and still not be happy. Or achieve “happiness“ for a short time until the outer thing ceases to offer up the solution to what is entirely an inside job. A new car offers its thrill only for so long.
That said, we are here, if we so decide, to live our most expansive lives. The key is to do that free of the idea that realizing such a life is the source of our value. (Our value is inherent. We’re born with it.) Rather, the key is to go for our visions, because life is ultimately just a dance — a big, beautiful, sometimes torturous, extraordinary dance. Why not dance it as fully as we can while we’re still here and able to do so?
More on the “inside job” soon, but, in the meantime, I created a free PDF to show you exactly how to craft the life of your dreams. To download your free PDF, “The Intro Guide to Creating your BEST GAY LIFE™️,” go to the Link in my Bio above or to robertgant.com.
Have you ever sat down and really, fully imagined and written down the big picture, every aspect, of the life you’d most love to live?
We have no choice about whether we are going to create in our lives as gay folks. The question is whether we are going to create out of the default of our old thinking (and current circumstances) or by design.
#Visions #LifeBlueprint #IntroGuide #SubconciousMind #TrueHeartsDesires #LGBTQ #GayLifeCoach #BestGayLife
📸 @toddthephotographer 🙌🏳️🌈
Something magical happens when we create an overall blueprint for our ideal lives. And state our future visions as present realities, creating an actionable plan to achieve them. Given the subconscious limitations that have been imposed on gay people, we may not find it easy at first to consider the broad scope of our lives in this way, but doing so will pay off.
As I’ll get into soon, the manifestation of your ideal life is not going to be the source of your happiness. A person can achieve everything they want and still not be happy. Or achieve “happiness“ for a short time until the outer thing ceases to offer up the solution to what is entirely an inside job. A new car offers its thrill only for so long.
That said, we are here, if we so decide, to live our most expansive lives. The key is to do that free of the idea that realizing such a life is the source of our value. (Our value is inherent. We’re born with it.) Rather, the key is to go for our visions, because life is ultimately just a dance — a big, beautiful, sometimes torturous, extraordinary dance. Why not dance it as fully as we can while we’re still here and able to do so?
More on the “inside job” soon, but, in the meantime, I created a free PDF to show you exactly how to craft the life of your dreams. To download your free PDF, “The Intro Guide to Creating your BEST GAY LIFE™️,” go to the Link in my Bio above or to robertgant.com.
Have you ever sat down and really, fully imagined and written down the big picture, every aspect, of the life you’d most love to live?
We have no choice about whether we are going to create in our lives as gay folks. The question is whether we are going to create out of the default of our old thinking (and current circumstances) or by design.
#Visions #LifeBlueprint #IntroGuide #SubconciousMind #TrueHeartsDesires #LGBTQ #GayLifeCoach #BestGayLife
📸 @toddthephotographer 🙌🏳️🌈
Reaching outside ourselves for things that feel good is a natural and enjoyable part of life. Whether it’s food, sex, a glass of wine, a roller coaster ride, a night at a casino, or falling in love, life is enhanced and a heck of a lot of fun when we partake of these pleasures.
That said, the enjoyment of a good thing sometimes goes out of balance. As I heard in early recovery, first there was fun, then there was fun with problems, and then there were just problems. I was moving into the “fun with problems“ part 17 years ago when I decided to get sober off drugs and alcohol.
The use of intoxicants has a long, deeply interwoven role in the journey of gay people. In some ways, it was an early source of liberation for a people coping with the trauma imposed by a society and world that vilified an intrinsic part of their humanity.
I experienced freedom through them, because they allowed me to pull down the walls I had constructed to hide my sexuality and protect myself from the world. Those walls caused me not to be able to truly connect emotionally, romantically, or sexually. Alcohol and drugs, to some extent, helped me do that, and I’m grateful for the part they played back then when I lacked sufficient tools for healthy coping as a gay person.
That said, I’m ultimately deeply grateful that I’ve gained the freedom to express these parts of myself without intoxicants because they were an unsustainable way to keep bringing down those walls. And they were slowly and subtly harming me. Instead, deconstructing the walls through the work I’ve done over the years has given me a joy and richness of living I couldn’t have envisioned as a boy. I have a deep love of life today, because I see what’s possible as we’re more fully capable of embracing the beauty of who we inherently are.
#SoberLife #BestGayLife #17YearsSober #Freedom
