About Us
We’re two long-time friends and fathers of boys who created this retreat out of a shared need: to slow down, work with our hands, and reconnect—both with ourselves and with other men who were looking for the same thing. Together, we create experiences that help men connect, learn, and support one another in becoming their best selves.
We’re committed to a constructive, positive masculinity that invites men to show up with their whole selves through working with their hands and learning side by side.
Jamie
Hi, I am Jamie Holder. . .
My adult life has been shaped by two turns I didn't see coming.
The first happened at 25. I was working in finance — a logical enough path for a Princeton history graduate — when my father passed away unexpectedly. His death stopped me cold and made me ask, for the first time with any real urgency, what I actually wanted my life to be about. The answer that came back surprised me: I wanted to coach. I wanted to work with people, invest in their growth, and be part of something that mattered beyond a balance sheet. So I walked away from a career I was supposed to want, and spent the next fifteen years coaching swimming at Princeton, Georgetown, and Dartmouth — building programs, developing student-athletes, and trying to help young men and women become not just faster swimmers, but more capable human beings.
The second turn came in 2020, when my position at Dartmouth was eliminated. Once again, I found myself unmoored — without a clear professional identity for the first time in years. This time, though, the pause brought unexpected gifts. I spent more time at home, present as a father and husband in ways that the demands of coaching hadn't always allowed. Watching my son grow, and thinking seriously about what kind of man I hoped he'd become, stirred something in me. I began to notice how much the culture we swim in — the unspoken rules about what men are supposed to be, how we're supposed to handle difficulty, what we're allowed to feel — quietly limits us. Not with malice, but with habit. We learn early to project strength, push through, and go it alone. And most of us carry that script well into adulthood without ever stopping to examine it.
Then I got lucky. Without any prior experience, I was hired at Rockledge Farm Woodworkers to learn the craft of furniture making from the ground up. What I didn't expect was what happened in the shop alongside the work itself. Working closely with other men — side by side, focused on a shared task — something opened up. Real conversations happened. Guys asked for help. There was honesty and connection in that space that I hadn't found in many other places. I went from novice to skilled artisan, building everything from kitchen tools and cutting boards to tables, chairs, and benches, and I became convinced that making things together might be one of the most powerful — and underused — ways men have to find each other.
That's what these retreats are built around. Not answers — I don't have all of those — but the right conditions for men to slow down, work with their hands, and have the kinds of conversations we too rarely make time for: about identity, connection, purpose, and what it actually means to show up fully in our lives — as fathers, partners, friends, and men.
Along the way I've gathered tools that inform this work — a background in leadership coaching, a master's degree focused on human performance, and two decades spent inside the daily lives of athletes navigating pressure, identity, and growth. But more than any credential, what drives this is lived experience: of loss, of reinvention, of discovering that the things that cracked me open were also the things that pointed me somewhere worth going.
If you've read this far, something probably brought you here — and I don't think that's an accident. If any of it resonates, if you're curious, searching, or simply ready for something different, I'd love to connect. The Good Guy Project exists for men who are willing to show up, do the work, and find out what's possible. Reach out. Let's talk.
Chris
Hi, I'm Chris Cunningham.
My work has always centered on one thing: helping people grow. For most of my career that's meant middle school — first in the classroom, later in leadership roles building and running schools, including launching a mission-driven middle school program in New York City. I loved supporting teachers, shaping school culture, and creating programs that gave students a real chance to thrive.
Over time the shape of the work changed. As I moved into larger schools, my days filled with meetings, and I found myself making decisions about teaching and learning one step removed from the people actually doing it. I was good at that work. But the parts I cared most about — building something alongside people, watching someone try a thing and get better at it — were the first to get squeezed whenever something else caught fire.
So in 2021 I did something deliberate: I went back into the classroom, on purpose, to run the things I'd been asking other people to run. It wasn't a step backward. It was a decision about where I do my best work — close enough to the people doing it to actually be useful.
That's also what drew me to building men's retreats with my friend Jamie. When he described combining hands-on work with intentional conversation, I was immediately interested and honestly a little nervous. I hadn't grown up around tools or a workbench, and I carried some shame about that — part of me believed that not knowing how to build things made me less of a man. Stepping into the shop felt exposing. But staying there, being a beginner, asking basic questions, making mistakes in front of other guys, turned out to be the point. Learning the craft, even at a basic level, opened up two things: the plain satisfaction of making something physical, and the way working side by side gives men permission to talk, listen, and be honest in a way that feels earned.
Our retreats are built on that. They're not about having answers. They're about creating the conditions for men to slow down, build something tangible, and have the conversations we usually push off — about identity, relationships, purpose, and what it takes to show up fully as partners, fathers, friends, and men. People don't grow in meetings. They grow in rooms where they can try something, fail, adjust, and keep going alongside other people doing the same. My years in schools give me a long view of how people grow; my own time in the shop reminds me how much I still have to learn.
If you're looking to step out of autopilot, work with your hands, and be part of a group of men willing to be real with each other, I'd love to connect.
