The ground rules.

Effective date: September 25, 2026

These terms were written in plain language by the Brotherhood of Being organizers and have not been reviewed by an attorney.

1. Who we are

Brotherhood of Being (“BoB,” “we,” “us”) is an informal, volunteer-run peer-support group. It is not a company, a nonprofit corporation, or any other kind of legal entity. It is organized by four men acting as individual, unpaid volunteers: Tony Bushong, Octavio Lorenzo, Mark Walker, and Paul Melcher. When these terms say “we,” they mean those four organizers. Tony Bushong operates this website.

These terms apply when you use brotherhoodofbeing.com, join our email list, fill in our welcome form, or take part in a circle. By doing any of those things, you agree to these terms and to our Privacy Policy. If you don’t agree, please don’t use the site or join a circle.

2. What we offer

We host a free online men’s circle on Zoom, usually on the second Wednesday of every month from 12:00 to 1:00 pm Central, and we send related emails. We may change the schedule, cancel a circle, or stop offering circles at any time.

Circles are free, and nothing is sold on this site. We may offer retreats in the future, and some may have a cost. Any paid retreat will come with its own terms, price, and refund policy before you register. These terms don’t cover paid retreats.

3. Not therapy, not medical care, not crisis care

BoB is peer support and facilitated conversation. It is not counseling, psychotherapy, medical care, or a crisis service, and it doesn’t replace them. Nothing shared on this site, in our emails, or in a circle is medical, psychological, legal, or financial advice. Please keep working with your own professionals for those needs.

Some of the organizers are professional coaches in their own separate businesses. In circles they take part as volunteers and fellow participants, not as your coach, counselor, or any other kind of professional. Taking part in BoB doesn’t create a coaching, counseling, or other professional relationship with any organizer.

We don’t monitor members between circles and can’t respond to emergencies. Please don’t use email or the Zoom chat to ask for urgent help.

4. Who can take part

Circles are for men who are 18 or older. By joining the list or taking part in a circle, you confirm that you are. If we learn that someone under 18 has joined, we’ll remove him and delete his information.

5. Participation agreements

Everyone in the circle, organizers included, agrees to:

• Keep what others share in the circle confidential. Your own story is yours to share anywhere.
• Speak from “I” and your own experience.
• Listen without fixing, advising, or debating unless asked.
• Respect that anyone may pass at any time.
• Keep your camera and mic on, find a quiet place (not while driving), and stay present.
• Use the chat for support. No links, promotions, selling, or recruiting.
• Never record, screenshot, transcribe, or share any part of a circle, and never let a note-taking app or AI tool join or listen in.

6. Confidentiality and its limits

Confidentiality is a promise participants make to each other. We ask for it and model it, but it is not a legal guarantee. We can’t control what other participants do, and there is no legal privilege for what’s said in a circle, as there can be with a therapist or lawyer. Please share only what you’re comfortable having heard. In small-group breakout rooms, an organizer may not be present.

The organizers keep what’s shared in the circle to themselves, with a few exceptions. We may share what we’ve heard, only as much as needed, if:

• someone describes a serious and imminent risk of harm to himself or someone else;
• someone describes abuse or neglect of a child or a vulnerable adult; or
• the law requires it, for example a court order.

In those cases we may contact emergency services or the proper authorities. The organizers are not licensed professionals and are not trained to assess risk. We’ll act in good faith to protect people’s safety.

We do not record circles unless every participant has been told in advance. Our Privacy Policy explains how recording, photos, and the media release work.

7. Your wellbeing, and the risks of taking part

Circles involve honest conversation about personal things, and that can stir up strong feelings. Some circles include a short breathing or body-scan practice. You take part by choice and at your own pace. You can pass, turn off your camera for a moment, or leave at any time, and you should stop any practice that doesn’t feel right for you. You understand and accept these risks, and you’re responsible for your own choices and wellbeing during and after a circle.

8. Conduct and removal

To protect the circle, the organizers may ask anyone who is disrespectful, disruptive, intoxicated, harassing, threatening, or unsafe to leave a session. The organizers may also remove anyone from future circles or the email list, at their discretion, with or without notice. This includes anyone who breaks the participation agreements, sells or recruits, shares another man’s story, or records a circle. We may report threats of violence to the authorities. You may stop taking part at any time.

9. Your content and testimonials

If you send us a testimonial, feedback, or a photo or video of yourself, you confirm that it’s yours to share and true to your experience. You give us permission, free of charge, to use it with the name you provide on this site and in BoB materials. We may shorten it or fix typos, but we won’t change its meaning. You can ask us to remove it at any time. We’ll stop using it in anything new and take it down from places we control, but we can’t recall copies already shared.

10. Our content

The words, logo, graphics, and videos on this site belong to the organizers who created them, or are used with permission. You’re welcome to share links and short quotes with credit. Please don’t copy, sell, or reuse our materials without permission.

11. Other sites and services

We link to and use other services, including Zoom, YouTube, Google, LinkedIn, Senja, SendFox, and the organizers’ own coaching websites. Their own terms and privacy policies apply when you use them, and we aren’t responsible for them. The organizers’ businesses are separate from BoB.

12. No guarantees

We offer the site, emails, and circles “as is” and “as available,” without warranties of any kind, to the fullest extent the law allows. We can’t promise the site or Zoom will always work, and we can’t promise any particular result from taking part. We aren’t responsible for what other participants say or do.

13. Limitation of liability

To the fullest extent the law allows, the organizers, individually or together, are not liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential, or punitive damages, or for anything another participant says or does, arising from your use of the site or your participation in BoB. Because BoB is free and run by volunteers, our total liability to you for any claim is limited to $100.

Nothing in these terms limits liability for gross negligence, willful misconduct, or anything else the law doesn’t allow to be limited, and nothing here waives any protection the law gives to volunteers.

14. Your responsibility to others

If you break these terms in a way that harms another participant or leads to a claim against the organizers (for example, by recording a circle or sharing another man’s story), you agree to be responsible for that harm and to cover the reasonable costs it causes the organizers, to the extent the law allows.

15. Governing law and disputes

These terms are governed by the laws of the State of Tennessee, United States, without regard to conflict-of-law rules. Tennessee is where the organizer who operates this website lives.

If you have a concern, please email us first. We’ll try in good faith to work it out with you within 30 days. If we can’t, any legal claim must be brought in the state or federal courts located in Tennessee, and you and we agree to those courts’ jurisdiction, unless the law where you live gives you a right to bring the claim there that can’t be waived.

16. Changes to these terms

We may update these terms. We’ll change the effective date at the top, and tell the email list before a significant change takes effect. Continuing to use the site or take part after a change means you accept it.

17. The rest of the fine print

These terms, our Privacy Policy, and the participation agreements you accept in our welcome form are the whole agreement between you and us about the site and our free circles. If any part of these terms can’t be enforced, the rest still applies. If we don’t enforce a part right away, we haven’t given up the right to enforce it later.

18. Contact

Email Info@BrotherhoodOfBeing.com. It reaches the same inbox as brotherhoodofbeing@gmail.com. You can also use our contact page.