Tell the Dear Fathers community more about who you are and what you do.

You know, usually when somebody gets asked who they are, they jump straight to the titles. The roles. What they do.

But let me tell you who I am by telling you who I was.

I was a kid from the low-income housing projects of Chicago. Raised around dysfunction. And over time, I picked up learned behaviors — I started reacting to life in dysfunctional ways.

My reaction became rebellion.

I had problems in school. Barely graduated. From there it was gangs. Then the military — and I got rebellious there too, and they politely asked me to leave. Then I got rebellious toward society, and that landed me incarcerated.

Same pattern. Different rooms.

On jobs, I either quit or got fired. In relationships, I didn’t want to follow the rules. In marriage — didn’t want to follow the rules there either.

Then in my second marriage, I found myself separated, on the verge of another divorce. And that’s when I finally saw it.

I wasn’t just having random problems. I had become a person who rebelled.

Today? I’m a person who asks questions. I’m a student of my own life. I look at my life experiences as my curriculum.

And now I have conversations with people all over the world, helping them become aware of the patterns they’re living in.

That’s who I am. That’s what I do.

What inspired you to write your new book, The Law of Infinite Alignment?

The book was born during my separation from my wife.

Once I saw the pattern I was in, awareness made me responsible for it. Because that’s what awareness does — it brings responsibility.

And as I became aware of my own pattern, I realized something. I’m not the only one living this way. A whole lot of people are inside patterns they haven’t seen yet. They’re reacting from something old, repeating what feels familiar, and calling it life.

That’s what led me to discover what I now call The Law of Infinite Alignment — a law that’s always governing our behavior, whether we recognize it or not.

I felt a responsibility to give it language.

And the more I looked back over my life, the more I saw the Law had been there the whole time. My childhood. My relationships. My marriage. My parenting. My rebellion. My separation. My return to awareness.

The book is my way of giving words to what I was already living.

What are the top three takeaways you want readers to get from your book?

First one: life is a series of experiences, and experience is one of our greatest teachers.

Even the experiences we don’t like — even the ones we don’t fully understand — they give us an opportunity to learn, to grow, to connect. Nothing’s wasted when we become aware enough to learn from it.

Second one — and this is big: it’s not about fault.

When our behavior gets challenged, or somebody describes it in a way that makes us uncomfortable, what do we do? We get defensive. We start protecting ourselves because we think we’re being blamed or shamed.

But this book isn’t about blame. It’s about awareness.

A lot of what we repeat came from what we learned. What we experienced. What we adapted to. What helped us survive at some point. So instead of asking people to condemn themselves, the book invites them to see themselves clearly.

Third one: we’re participating in the creation of our own reality.

What creates our reality is identity. And what shapes identity is what we’re conscious of, what we’re aware of, what we’ve given meaning to.

So when awareness changes, identity changes. And when identity changes, the experience starts reflecting something different back.

How has your business journey impacted the man and father you are today?

Man, this journey has changed my relationship with my family, with myself, and with everybody connected to me.

It shed light on places that used to be dark. Unsure. Disconnected.

Business taught me something: success isn’t just about what you build publicly. It’s about who you’re becoming privately. Because the same man building the business is the same man walking back into the house.

This journey showed me my purpose isn’t just to speak about alignment. It’s to live as a man in alignment — with his family, his relationships, and himself.

I don’t see business as separate from fatherhood anymore. It’s just another room where life shows me who I’m becoming.

How did your relationship with your dad shape the man you are today?

My relationship with my dad was inconsistent my whole life.

My father struggled with heroin addiction. Because of that, he couldn’t be a consistent presence. And for a long time, I carried resentment toward him for it.

But as I grew into the man I am today, I started seeing him differently.

I found more empathy. More understanding. And more importantly — I recognized that even that relationship was part of my curriculum.

See, a lot of us hold resentment toward our parents for not showing up the way we needed. And I get it. It hurts. But sometimes the curriculum didn’t require their presence the way we imagined it. Sometimes what we lived through gave us exactly what we needed to learn from.

That doesn’t mean it was easy. Doesn’t mean it didn’t hurt. But it gave me something to study.

For years I judged my father through the expectation culture handed me — parents are supposed to show up a certain way. But what nobody talks about is the parent’s story.

My father was raised by my grandmother, who struggled with alcoholism. He was never given a healthy example of presence. So I had to ask myself: how could he give what he never fully received?

That understanding shaped me.

It made me a man with more empathy. A man who sees curriculum in every experience. A man who refuses to keep handing forward what he never inspected.

And again — this is not about blame. It’s about awareness.

Who is Martize as a father?

Martize as a father is a man who understands that validation starts inside the home.

Because if validation isn’t given at home, our children go looking for it somewhere else. We’ve all done that in some way.

So as a father, I stay aware. That awareness lets me respond instead of react.

And I understand something else — even when I’m not teaching, my children are still learning. They’re watching how I move through life. How I handle stress. How I communicate. How I treat people. How I respond when things don’t go my way. How I show up inside that house.

Fatherhood made me responsible for more than provision.

It made me responsible for my presence. My awareness. The identity I’m demonstrating in front of my children.

The same awareness I ask other people to return to? I have to practice it with myself, inside my own home, first.

When fathers are intentionally engaged, how does that shape children’s development?

Here’s what fathers have to understand first: you have to be intentionally engaged with yourself.

With your insecurities. Your emotions. Your triggers.

Because like the old saying goes — so within, so without.

A child’s development is shaped by what they see us demonstrate. They’re not just learning from what we say. They’re learning from how we show up for ourselves. How we handle pressure. How we respond to stress. How we treat the people around us.

That’s learned behavior.

So when a father is intentionally engaged with himself, it becomes natural for him to be intentionally engaged as a father. As a man. As a husband.

And we have to understand — children are being shaped by the energy inside the household. As fathers, we set that tone. Our presence matters. Our reactions matter. Our silence matters. Our anger matters. Our awareness matters.

So we have to keep asking ourselves: what am I carrying into this house?

What are my insecurities teaching? What are my triggers demonstrating? What are my emotions asking my children to adjust to?

All of that matters.

Because children aren’t just being raised by what we provide. They’re being shaped by what we carry.

What advice do you have for men looking to raise children, love their spouse, while leading their family as an honest man?

My advice is this: become a student of yourself.

Usually when we think about love, we think about everybody else — our partner, our children, our family. We study them. We learn what they need. But most men have never taken one honest look at themselves with that same attention.

And true love of self requires knowing yourself.

Not in a selfish way. In an honest way. Because in order to show your children what healthy love looks like, you have to learn yourself the same way you’d learn the people you love.

And when a man is leading a family, he also has to become a student of what’s leading him.

Because if a man never examines himself, by default, he can end up being led in the opposite direction. And that direction is usually fear.

Fear produces results we don’t want — in our lives, our marriages, our families, our homes.

So my advice is simple: learn yourself. Love yourself honestly. Become aware of what’s leading you.

Because a man cannot lead his family well if he refuses to become a student of himself.

How do you balance being an author/entrepreneur while being the best dad you can be?

I allow myself to enjoy the process.

Writing, building, being an entrepreneur, being a father — it’s all part of the experience I’m learning from. So instead of forcing balance, I trust the process and stay aware inside of it.

That extends into every label I carry — author, entrepreneur, husband, father, man.

I enjoy the experience of being an author. I enjoy the experience of being an entrepreneur. I enjoy the experience of being a dad.

When I trust the process, balance comes naturally.

I don’t panic or rush to perform the role of author or entrepreneur. I don’t rush to fulfill the role of father either.

I still have responsibilities. Still have things to manage. But when awareness is leading, I’m present in whatever room I’m in — instead of feeling pulled apart by all the rooms I carry.

So for me, balance isn’t about doing everything perfectly. It’s trusting the process, enjoying the experience, and staying aware enough to return when something feels out of order.

What does legacy mean to you?

There was a time I thought legacy was something you leave behind.

Then I came to understand — legacy is also something you give while you’re still here.

For me, legacy is presence.

I want my children to remember that I was present with them. Not just that I provided for them.

We think of presents as gifts. But the real gift is presence.

There’s a difference.

One is something you give. The other is something people feel.

So when I think about legacy, I’m not only thinking about what my children receive after I’m gone. I’m thinking about what they’re experiencing from me right now.

My presence. My love. My willingness to interrupt patterns so they don’t have to carry everything I carried.

That’s legacy to me.

What’s next for you and how can people follow you and purchase your book?

What’s next is continuing to invite people into the conversation behind the book. The question: why do we know better, but still not do better?

That question is the center of The Law of Infinite Alignment: Why We Know Better But Still Don’t Do Better.

The book speaks to awareness. Identity. Inherited patterns. Family. Relationships. Fatherhood. And what begins to change when awareness leads again.

And as the message grows, I’m shaping a deeper conversation for men called 808 Man.

808 Man is for men, fathers, husbands, and leaders willing to ask a deeper question: if I’m leading, what’s leading me?

But the first invitation right now is the book.

Follow the work, join the book list, and get updates at iamalign.com.

The book isn’t the end of the message. It’s the door.

The first invitation is the Private Virtual Book Preview on August 8, 2026, at 8:08 PM CST. Fathers, husbands, leaders, and anyone interested in the message behind the book can reserve their place at iamalign.com/preview