book mark

What I've learned is that whether it's your relationships, your work, or your phone, abandoning yourself always has a cost. You don't have to choose between yourself and everything you love. 

Choosing anyone or anything should never mean ABANDONING YOURSELF.

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ABANDONING YOURSELF.

Like you’re watching your life from the outside, slightly removed from the version of yourself that’s going through the motions.

You know the feeling. Not quite here. Not quite a real person...

And what I found on the other side wasn’t a simpler life, but it was a more real one. You don’t have to choose between yourself and everything you love.

I thought choosing myself meant choosing less. I was wrong. There’s more on the other side — 

more presence, more love, more life.

You're making everyone else happy. You're hitting the marks. You're showing up. But somewhere along the way the days started to blur...the same routines, the same scrolling, the same Netflix Tuesday nights where you think: is this it? 

You're not depressed exactly and you're not totally falling apart. You're just... not fully in it. You're watching your life get siphoned away — by the notifications, the obligations, the performance of being okay — and you can't quite remember the last time you did something because you actually chose to. 

You want something back. You're just not sure what it is. And you're definitely not ready to burn it all down, move off-grid, and leave your family, your phone, and your career behind. You don't want to opt out. 

I know this because I've lived versions of it. The people-pleasing and performing. The building of something pretty big while incrementally abandoning the person doing the building. I've left the internet, ended the engagement, spoken about some stuff that cost me, and come back stronger and truer from all of it. 

What You want is to opT in --
to your actual life.

here

I found a book, Man's Search for Meaning, sitting in someone else's dorm room, and I remembered for the first time in a long time that I was actually here for a reason. That the suffering wasn't a sign I was doing it wrong. 

That decision cracked something open.

I remembered That living with meaning was the whole point.

Make enough money and then find a partner. Buy the house and put up a decent fence. I was right on track with a finance degree I've never used, a job I was good at, and at 27, an engagement to an incredible woman. 

And then something in me just... couldn't. 

I didn't really have language for it, but I knew that the life I was living, wasn't mine. Ending that engagement was the first time I chose myself in the face of disappointing people who were supposed to love me unconditionally. I'd always blown things up before. Sabotaged or snuck out the back door. This was the first time I actually walked out the front. 

I grew up with a clear picture of what success looked like.

success

I started writing about the things that had cracked me open: relationships, why we leave ourselves to stay in things that aren't right, why we choose everybody else and call it love. I talked about it because I'd lived it and because I could see it everywhere, in everyone. I didn't set out to build a platform, but I felt on fire with this newfound understanding. Apparently a lot of people were waiting for someone to say talk about it. 

But here's what I didn't expect: you can build something that's in alignment and still lose yourself inside it. I built a following of over a million people talking about love and connection while slowly becoming automated in my own life. I'd reach for my phone without thinking, scroll without meaning to, and post from a place that was performing rather than actually feeling anything. I left Instagram once thinking it was the problem and then six months later I came back and realized the platform was never the problem.
My relationship to it was.  

It was the way I'd handed over my attention, my most precious resource, without ever really deciding to.

During COVID I spoke within my integrity and it cost me. People left and some of what I'd built broke, but I stayed myself anyway, which turned out to be the most important thing I'd ever done, because

That's the work.
It's always been the work.

I got to find out who I actually was when it really mattered.

What I've come to understand is this: every time I've reached for something to manage the discomfort, whether it a goal, a drink, a scroll, or even a new identity, it was because I was treating the pain of my own misalignment. And the only thing that ever actually helped was getting more honest about what I was feeling and why. 

Trusted By:

Over the past decade I've built one of the most listened-to relationship and human connection podcasts in the world with 26 million downloads, 500 episodes, and conversations that have changed how people think about love, identity, and what it means to show up fully. I've spoken on TEDx stages, in corporate boardrooms, and at sold-out events across North America. I wrote Liberated Love with my wife Kylie — a book about what it actually looks like to love without losing yourself. And I've built a Substack community of 59,000 people who chose depth over the scroll. 

But that’s not why I do any of this. 

I do it because I know what it costs to live out of alignment.
And I know there's a way through.

My work is dedicated to having truthful, but sometimes hard conversations, even when there’s the risk it might cost something. 

What I've found is that the payoff of integrity is always greater.

greater

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always

Don't just take my word for it.

Mark spoke about our relationship with social media and our phones, a topic that feels more important than ever in our increasingly digital world. Rather than simply telling the audience what to do, he invited us to pause, reflect, and think differently about how technology is shaping the way we live and connect. He shared practical wisdom, but it was his storytelling, humor, and ability to make the conversation feel personal that really resonated. 

Working with Mark was incredibly easy from the very beginning. He really knew how to engage our audience. Our conferences were global, leadership-level events, which made his ability to connect with such a diverse audience even more impactful. People continued to talk about his keynote long after the event. What made it particularly impactful was the way he brought together both the art and science of connection, using real-life examples that resonated with the different profiles and perspectives in our audience.

The support of Mark and the group has not only helped me stay accountable to my commitments but it has become a beautiful place to feel encouraged and to be reminded of how important it is to keep the fire of our dreams burning inside

Mark’s facilitation is truly a gift. One of his greatest strengths is his ability to ask the right questions, the kind that cut straight through the noise and get right to the root of what’s actually going on.

Ready to

You've spent enough time knowing what's congruent and not living it. Whether you want to bring this work into your organization or do it for yourself, I’m holding the door open for you to greater satisfaction, power, and alignment.
This is where it starts. 

DO THE REAL THING?

Book Me to Speak

Bring the research, the honesty, and 20 years of human connection work to your next event.

Work With Me

Coaching, community, and tools for those ready to stop abandoning themselves and start living fully.

get started now →

Work With Me

Coaching, community, and tools for those ready to stop abandoning themselves and start living fully.

get started now →

Book Me to Speak

Bring the research, the honesty, and 20 years of human connection work to your next event.

Bring me to your people →

Mark Groves is a human connection specialist, keynote speaker, writer, and host of The Mark Groves Podcast. His work explores the forces shaping how we relate — to ourselves, to one another, to technology, and to the lives we’re building.

For more than a decade, Mark has helped people understand the patterns that shape their relationships and make more conscious choices about how they love, communicate, and show up. Through Create The Love, his writing, podcast, coaching, and live work, that conversation has grown into a wider exploration of what it means to remain fully human in a culture increasingly shaped by distraction, polarization, performance, and technology.

Today, Mark speaks at leadership conferences, corporate events, and association summits around the world, bringing his work on human connection into conversations about culture, attention, leadership, and the future of work. His approach combines candid storytelling, practical insight, humor, and a willingness to have the conversations most people avoid.

At the center of Mark’s work is a deceptively simple question: How do we use the tools, opportunities, and systems of modern life without abandoning ourselves in the process?

He writes about these questions through Humaning on Substack and continues to explore them with thinkers, researchers, creators, and cultural leaders on The Mark Groves Podcast.

mark's bio

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