What is a warrior poet? And why would it be desirable for a man, for you, to become one? What is its utility? To ask the famous sales question “What’s in it for me?”, is it simply about living up to a impossible ideal? Is it about standing for something just for the sake of standing for something? Is it an amorphous term to be used to sell overpriced products to a niche market? What exactly is meant by “warrior poet”?
Let me be the first to say that I don’t have a singular definition, Renaissance man would be the closest thing and the definition for that is “a person with many talents or area of knowledge” and while that certainly covers part of it I think our definition should go a little further. I apologize in advance because I’m going to get a little general here which isn’t the best thing with definitions but it’ll start pointing us in the right direction.
The warrior poet is a man living to his fullest physically, mentally, and spiritually. It is a man that is living as an example of what he was created to be. He is embodying his essence essentially. He is being all that he can be in the truest sense of the word. He is maximizing his development, his success, and his very humanity in the process of this. He is chasing perfection to catch excellence while still understanding life is more than achievement.
A man in the utmost, if we wanted to boil it down to a sentence. And here we’re going to go over the ten laws of the warrior poet. Laws that if applied religiously could change your life and put you on a path that’ll change everything for you.
Why Pursue The Path Of The Warrior Poet?
But before we get started on that we have to ask ourselves “Why” why become a warrior poet, after all the path is anything but easy. To test and challenge ourselves? Sure, that can be part of it. To ward of depression, apathy, and weakness? Again yes to all three of those, but that’s not all of it either. To achieve success both monetary, biologically, and happiness wise? Yes, yes, and yes, but again that’s not all of it.
The biggest reason I’d say is because without this path, without this hardship placed before you…you can never be who you were meant to be. You can never fulfill that song that’s in your soul, in your heart. We were all put on this earth for a reason and we all have a certain something, a grand dream that lives within us. Sometimes we’ve numbed ourselves to it, sometimes we’ve let the fire die out, but that doesn’t mean that the dreams not there. That doesn’t mean that we still don’t have that sense of not being fulfilled somewhere deep down.
And the warrior poet is the answer to so much of that. The path of hardship and development that pushes us beyond what we’ve been pushed. That uses the fire of good suffering to burn away what is base within us and refine what is good with us to higher and higher levels. The path of the warrior poet is the philosopher’s stone that can turn dross into gold. And give you true and deep fulfillment in life.
To live in accordance and with the primal cosmic order. To become the highest version of yourself, to live a life that’ll echo out after you’re gone. To become what a male what supposed to become but rarely if ever does anymore…a man. That is the biggest reason to follow the path of the warrior poet. Though there are many, many more, too many to list here. The biggest thing is to get started on the path so you can see the rewards for yourself.
The Law Of The Warrior Poet I – Develop All Aspects Of Oneself
Man has many parts to him. Physical, mental, and spiritual. Wisdom, strength, and character. The warrior, the rogue, the wizard, and the priest. Warrior, king, magician, lover. Jock and nerd. So on and so forth. The problem comes when men ignore the majority of their development in favor on area that they have natural strengths in and feel safe in. The first law of the warrior poet is to develop all aspects of yourself. Don’t leave anything weak.
Continue to grow your strengths but at the same time shore up your weaknesses. Take honest stock of yourself and see where you are in life, see where your natural strengths are and where your weaknesses. While you can’t be a ten out of ten in everything, you don’t want to be below a five in anything. They say the jack of all trades if master of none but unless you’re a professional athlete or artist or entrepreneur striving for that ten out of ten is rarely worth it.
For a full and happy life better to spread it out across the board and even if you do seek to develop one area to that ten out of ten, it’ll still help to be above five in the other areas. Examine yourself physically, mentally, and spiritually. All three are related. Make sure that you’re doing something each and every day to push and develop yourself in each of the three ways. To have weaknesses that you’re working on and strengths you’re continuing to develop.
Work to become well rounded. Have an area or two where you specialize, where you try to get to eight out of ten. But everywhere else just strive to be above five. As Heinlein said “specialization is for insects” a man is made to live broad and far. Like Kipling’s poem “If”, worth a read if you ever get a chance. Become well rounded with a point or two of disctinction.
Develop all aspects of yourself.
Part II Coming Up
This ran longer than I thought it would. For the sake of space we’ll save law 2 for the next installment. For now understand the first law and that is to develop all aspects of yourself. Become well rounded with a point or two of distinction. Understand that the path of the warrior poet is the path to development which is the path to success, freedom, and fulfillment. And that the path is hard.
But worth treading.
