What do you live for? What “level” of life are you living at? Do you live for material things only? Are you living to “prove yourself” as a man? Are you living to get dopamine by attracting women? Are you living for material wealth? None of these things are wrong, as a matter of fact they are an essential part of life. Every man needs to prove his masculinity at some point or another, find a mate/mates, and earn enough material wealth so he can support himself and a family.
This are critical life goals that every man needs to have an understanding of and needs to know how to accomplish. The “accomplishment” of these things is something that takes self-development, grit, and consistency and should be viewed as such. These are the base level needs of being a man. Proving oneself to an exclusive group of other men who hold you to a standard, being attractive and popular with the opposite sex so that you may select a good partner in marriage or for reproduction, or fun for many guys, and to know enough to earn enough material wealth so you can support yourself and others.
These three goals and their accomplishment is what the majority of the articles on the site are about and I think that’s just great. After all if you don’t cover the basics how are you going to get to that next level? Simply put, you aren’t. A man isn’t going to learn how to better his community and world around him when he’s dying of thirst. Give him a glass of water, or even better teach how to get water whenever he wants and then and only then he might pay attention to the “higher level” stuff.
The Path From Living For Base Level Needs To Living For High Level Desires
Now by base I don’t mean bad but rather foundational. I think one big issue many guys have in the whole masculine self-improvement sphere is that they sort of get stuck in the respect/girls/money circle and don’t realize that there are other things to life and that a man was not made to live for these three things alone. It’s sort of like someone who can do addition, subtraction, and multiplication but instead of moving on to higher level math just keeps doing the same thing.
While you certainly need addition, subtraction, and multiplication that’s not the entire function of math. That’s the basics to get to the higher levels. However most masculine self-improvement gurus and sites only go this far. Maybe because it’s what’s most profitable, more guys are going to be interested in getting in bed with a hot girl then they are leaving a legacy. Likewise it’s probably all that these gurus have developed. Many, as we’ve seen, live lies or in perpetual immaturity.
Not that being tough/attractive/well off is immature, not far from it, all of those contribute to maturity if anything, but rather the get stuck there because it’s all they know. They don’t reach for that higher level, they get stuck and stay there forever, eventually regressing or going crazy. Neither of which we want for your life. So to get to that higher level the best thing to do is start making sure the basics are covered.
Getting To That Higher Level Of Living
It shouldn’t take long to see how easy it can be to make money when you have the right leverage and skills. For example killer sales skills and you’re working on a car lot. Likewise it shouldn’t take long (talking anywhere from one to five years for most guys) before you find that with a couple developed traits finding girls for mating is really not that hard, instead finding the right one becomes the issue. And also it shouldn’t take long to find out with a decent development of the masculine virtues and development of strength and grit you won’t have trouble getting respect from most men.
However it’s important to know that these are all first steps. Like three legs of a table that you’re going to build a skyscraper on. Maybe not the best analogy but you get the point. Anyways once you start on the path to building the three legs of the table, it’s important to start putting thought into what you want to set on that table. Again mixing analogies up but you get the gist. What do you want to live for any why.
Let’s do a mind experiment, let’s use your imagination. I want you to imagine that you have a income of 120,000 American dollars a year, not enough to get a different yacht every week but you won’t be in the poor house anytime soon. Now let’s say you either have a wife who’s a good woman and a good fit for you, the sex is great, the chemistry great, she looks good, has character, and helps you with your goals.
And now let’s say that you’re well respected in your community. From the bikers that hanging out at the VFW hall to the elders at church you have respect just about everywhere you go. From the punk kids you teach at the middle school to the nursing home you volunteered at on Tuesdays. Whatever, you get the picture. You have all that.
Now what are you going to do?
What’s going to push you, drive you, make you work hard for something? Again let’s say your health, mentally and physically are good as well. So what’s going to drive you. What do you want to see in the world, what do you want to change, to influence? What do you want to accomplish.
It’s Okay To Have No Clue Right Now
It’s okay if you have no idea, matter of fact it’s natural. However now the question has been posed to your subconscious and it’s something that you’ll start thinking on, even when you don’t know it. It’ll start to build and maybe the answer will pop up in your head but more likely its something you’ll build brick by brick as you get to know more about the world around you and more about yourself. Write on it, ask yourself this question once a month, do the thought experiment once a month, over time your answer will grow, morph, and change, as well as become more concrete, even though that sounds like a contradiction.
It’s never too early or late to start thinking about all of this. I don’t care if you’re a skinny nerd who’s never had a girlfriend, gets picked on every day, and are in debt up to your eyeballs, and are chronically overweight. It still pays to give this some thought. Remember it’s okay to have no clue, just keep moving forward. Keep trying, learning, and not giving up.
Eventually you’ll get to where you want to go, if you just keep putting one foot in front of the other.
