- Gain power.
Power comes in many forms. First, gain power over yourself. To live manfully is to control what you can and not worry about controlling what you can’t. Become more powerful physically. Gain power in your career. Have respect amongst your friends, family, and peers. Power is winning. No matter the area of focus, become powerful.
- Spend as much time out of your comfort zone as possible.
Growth can only occur outside of comfort. That includes physical comfort as well. Our society is blanketed by comfort and ease. Innovation is great, but it’s made us dependent on technology to do for us what we used to have to do for ourselves. This had made us soft, all of us, and the best thing you can do is to do what others aren’t willing to do, and that’s to get uncomfortable as often as possible. Go where you’re afraid to go. Spend more time in cold, harsh weather. Turn the heat down in your house in winter so your body has to heat itself. Do push ups in the morning. Get up earlier. Get outside more. Travel more. Work harder. Hunt.
- Dare to do and be what most are afraid to pursue.
Men, real men, are explorers and conquerors as well as fathers and scholars. Be both. Explore places and things and ways of life that are foreign to you. Dare to go where most are afraid to go and do what most are afraid to do. Daring is manly. It’s facing fear and moving forward in spite of that very real feeling. Whatever you want to do, multiply it. Make that goal as daring as you can possibly make it. You won’t live the life you can live doing only what you know you can do. Aim higher. Dare mightier.
4. Become dangerous.
There’s being a good man, which is important, and there’s being good at being a man, which is equally important. Both are being lost on our younger generations where morality is archaic and living manfully is sexist. Being good at being a man is a necessity, and rather than looking to the moral and the good, you look to our ancestors, the hunters, gatherers, and warriors that existed for thousands of years. Men have had a pretty singular role for the majority of our existence, and that’s the role of warrior. Being more manly is being more dangerous. It doesn’t mean you carry out that capacity daily, but it’s in your back pocket should you need to fight, defend, or conquer.
- Become unbreakable.
One of the greatest books I’ve ever read is a non-fiction book that wouldn’t be believable if it were fiction. The book is aptly named, Unbroken, and it chronicles the life of Louis Zamperini. After reading that book and what Mr. Zamperini endured, you have no valid reason to complain about anything going on in your life, and that’s an extremely important aspect of becoming more manly. Men don’t complain. Not only that, they put themselves in situations where they’ll have to endure more than the average fella or female. They volunteer for an arduous existence when most are content with an easier, safer, less challenging way of life.
To become unbreakable you have to push yourself to your breaking point, and then push yourself again and again. It’s the adoption of the strenuous life that Theodore Roosevelt called his nation to pursue.
- Become oblivious.
There are things worth being concerned with, like the safety of your family, your work, career, craft. There are also things you should be oblivious to. Don’t care so much about what others think. Hold the opinions of those who know you best in high regard because they’ll keep you honest, but the public, the Facebook crowd or Instagram crowd shouldn’t guide who you are, how you act, dress, or carry yourself. Life isn’t a reality TV show. Social media makes us think everyone’s eyes are on us, but it’s a narcissistic and vain way to live, ignoring the fact that people have their own s**t to worry about
- Study often.
Don’t just read, study. Living a manly life demands that you live one of awareness. If you have a craft you’re trying to learn and perfect, study how to become great at it. If you have a path you’re following, figure out the best, fastest way to get there. Live life with some strategy, some purpose, focus, and direction. Study philosophy, especially the Stoics. Study your faith. Study business and finance. Always be learning, as soon as you think you know it all you make yourself useless.
- Train.
If the time comes for heroism or action or violence, you’re going to fall back on your training or lack-there-of.
It’s a myth that people rise to the occasion. There is no rising, but a falling back, a dependence on what is innate. It’s up to you to train the toughness, skill, and effectiveness into your consciousness even just in case you’re ever needed.
Train your body. Train your mind. Train your soul to be able to endure more than the average man and one day it may pay off, and if it does, the reason for your being could be found in a moment of effective action.
- Earn self-reliance.
We depend more on others or other things than at any other time in our history on this planet. It’s made us soft. We want to get warm, we flick a switch or turn a dial. There’s no lack of comfort in how we live. Comfort, however, isn’t where growth happens. It’s the difficult route that has to be taken instead of the easy route. The grit and toughness and willingness to do what must be done that was common amongst Greatest Generation is almost non-existent amongst millennial’s.
Change that. Do the little things. Mow your lawn. Tend to your garden. Fix your toilet and make your own meals.