Do Young Men Need Direction in Their Lives?
Men Are Searching For Direction
Young men feel lost and rudderless in modern life. They’re stuck pursuing a safe life they are supposed to live rather than the life they truly want. And everything from school to parents to the media tell them to sacrifice their own fulfillment for the safe route. These men are then left to fend for themselves even if they find themselves disillusioned, depressed or angry.
I’ve seen how traditional male spaces have cast out traditional men in favor of these “numales” or “soyboys.” Many of the traditional male sources of information such as male magazines have been corrupted by advertisers who want a more feminized and consumer oriented customer.
Today there are few places where men feel comfortable being men and are able to speak their minds. For nearly two years now I’ve been speaking my mind about my disgust for the way traditional men are ostracized and ignored in modern society.
Men are searching for father figures because their father was taken from them by a corrupt family court system, he was a poor father, or other unfortunate circumstances.
With the rise of Jordan Peterson, it is abundantly clear that many young men are searching desperately for a strong role model to provide guidance and direction. Jordan Peterson is just the tip of the iceberg. He’s become a sort of gateway drug for young men to find the world of self-improvement. There are many other men like me who are raising their concerns and sharing what they’ve learned to help their brothers. It’s truly an exciting time to be alive.
Making your bed in the morning is a simple but powerful concept. It sounds silly but it has led many men to course correct. These simple tweaks to daily life can be life changing. Almost every day I receive messages from men asking how they can start to fix their lives. All over the globe young men are frustrated and lost.
My life started to change when I started writing. I was going through a divorce and struggling to raise my own son while also struggling to pay the mortgage and legal fees. Dealing with the corrupt family court system and an ex wife who valued money and drugs over her own children caused anger and frustration.
My lawyer’s secretary suggested I start journaling and at first I wasn’t convinced, but I needed to find a healthy way to deal with my situation. So when I felt overwhelmed with emotions or frustrated by the day, I wrote about it. Then something funny began to happen. I felt as if a weight had been lifted off my shoulders.
I filled up an entire journal before the settlement. Even after the divorce was finalized, I maintain the habit of writing and over time it led to me blogging online and tweeting about men’s issues. Gradually it grew into Path To Manliness.
The course of your entire life can drastically change simply by adopting the habit of journaling. And it’s free to start! If you’d like more guidance, Paul Domenick and I have outlined a concise guide full of journal prompts to help get you comfortable with this life-changing habit.
I felt lost in my life too. I spent years searching for answers but most of my days were spent stuck at a desk, or pounding beers while watching football games. I began to wonder, is this it? Is this all there is? I was growing older, fatter and more disillusioned.
“If the monotony of our days has become a practice of our futility, it is a good sign we need to take measures to introduce novelty into our life.”
- Friedrich Hölderlin
By the way, if you’re enjoying this, you should check out my free newsletter for more bite sized pieces on masculinity and self-improvement sent a couple of times a week.
Men Need More Novelty In Their Lives
Your daily life probably feels like a grind because it is, but it doesn’t have to be this way. So how do you introduce novelty into your life?
Find new hobbies to pursue. This is one of the best ways to take a stale and mundane existence and turn it into an exciting and fresh lifestyle. What hobbies can you try?
Kayaking
Tae Kwon Do
Long distance running
Power lifting
Journaling
Hiking
Recreational sports leagues
Your life will improve if you focus on activities that involve you being active and engaging with other people. If you’re tired of meeting trashy girls at the bar, get involved with new hobbies and you’ll meet higher quality women. You’ll also find that you’ll have more in common than a mild case of alcoholism.
It can be easy to let yourself get stuck in a rut due to your routine. If your current hobbies are a combination of video games, binge drinking and watching porn, you’re setting your self up for a depressing life.
Have you ever found yourself at a loss for words when a girl asks you “So tell me about yourself.” These hobbies also prevent your from having interesting conversations with people. You can’t tell her how you won a round of Warzone in Call of Duty. That’s not going to impress her. But if you tell her how you saw this amazing waterfall while you were out hiking, you’ll pique her interest. If you can stir up excitement in her mind, she’ll be curious about you and naturally be drawn to you like a coin to a magnet. This is how you can stand out in a sea of average dudes.
Life is amazing if you get off the couch and look for adventure. When I think back over the last 10 years of my life, my best memories aren’t the video games I played or the blurry nights drinking beers. I remember kayaking down rivers with friends and going on float trips in inner tubes. I remember driving my Jeep Wrangler across the country and stopping at every city that seemed interesting.
If you want to learn something about yourself, take a couple days to go on a long road trip. Stop and see some friends along the way. Hit up some neat local restaurants and bars. A road trip is a great way to make amazing memories. By stopping at The Old Fashioned in Madison, Wisconsin, I caught a glimpse of these big waves crashing at James Madison Park.
900 Miles of Adventure! Memories I’ll never forget
“Those who approach life like a child playing a game, moving and pushing pieces possess the power of kings.”
- Heraclitus
Men Are Searching For Meaning
When you spend most of your “free time” immersed in distractions and alcohol, life begins to feel meaningless. Days begin to blur together and you find yourself at a loss for words when people ask what you did last weekend. The party lifestyle can be fun but prolonged too late into life and it becomes a part of the perpetual adolescence that many young men find themselves being trapped.
Writing saved my sanity. It gave me purpose. It gave me a brighter future. By writing about my day, I was inspired to live a more interesting life so that I’d have something to write about. When you look down at your journal and see “WATCHED NETFLIX” on multiple pages in a row, you realize how unfulfilling this existence can be.
My life didn’t change overnight but my perspective did. If you find yourself discovering some important truth and thinking to yourself, “I’ll remember that” you’re lying to yourself. These moments are fleeting and lost to void of nothingness when they should be honored and preserved.
Writing it down is the ultimate life hack. Did you have a productive day? Write about it. What worked? What can you take from that day and apply it to future days so you can replicate it.
Did you have a lousy day? What went wrong? What can you remove from your life to make these down days less common?
Most people aren’t thinking like this. They simply float through life like a rudderless boat adrift at sea. If you’re happy to go through life at the mercy of what happens to you then don’t let me stop you. But if you want more. If you want better. If you seek a life of meaning, then start writing.
If you’re tired of feeling lost and alone, join my Patreon to gain access to my discord server where like-minded men and grow stronger with a tribe! Here you can discuss your own mission, problems your facing or simply banter with other motivated men.
Housekeeping: Changes to the Path To Manliness Newsletter
I’ve switched services so check your spam folder to see if you’ve missed any emails. And be sure to add Ryan.Felman@PathToManliness.com to your contacts so you don’t miss anymore.
What does this mean for you?
You’ll still keep getting the same great emails about masculinity and self-improvement. Only now they’ll come with slightly better presentation as this new service is a step up in quality and comes with a better suite of tools.
You also might have noticed a slight shift in my tone lately. A portion of my emails would touch on social media marketing and copywriting. I still may occasionally touch on these topics but from now on, the core focus is your Path To Manliness.
What does that mean? It means that I want to focus more on what is working best and what you as a reader are looking for. Most of you aren’t that interested in starting your own social media agency or building a personal brand. If you are, I still offer coaching services on this and have authored two ebooks to get you started.
My most popular posts and emails are focused on your Path To Manliness, so I’m doubling down on what’s working. Dating tips, fitness tips, mindset shifts.
I started Path To Manliness with the intent of helping young men figure out how to live their lives and how to become better men. Many of the traditional male sources of information such as male magazines have been corrupted by advertisers who want a more feminized and consumer oriented customer.
Get on The Path To Manliness with my FREE newsletter where I offer advice on becoming a better man and much more. You can sign up for it here and get a FREE eBook!
The handbook for young men everywhere who are lost and need direction and guidance in life.
It is never too late to change your life. What can you do today to improve yourself?
This book will
- Help you create your life mission
- Understand red flags in women
- Develop healthy habits
- Gain self-confidence
- Become a more interesting man
- Live a life of excellence
Challenge yourself by reading this book and implement its advice into your own life. I have 20 steps here for the modern man to make meaningful changes to his life as well as details about how to take these steps and put them into action.
Change your mindset. Change your life.
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Why We Run
We don't run to lose weight. We don’t run just to work out. Sure, those are benefits, but they’re not the reasons we lace up our shoes and hit the pavement or the trail day after day. Running transcends fitness goals and calorie counts. It’s not about shaving seconds off your mile time or staying in shape—though we all want those things, too. Running is about something deeper, something that goes beyond the physical.