There was a time when being a man meant a few things: take care of your family, stand up for yourself, be honest. Some people would say drinking, fighting and swearing. And, of course, getting the girl.
That was it. Generations grew up with the concept that if you acted like John Wayne or James Bond, you were a man. Everything else be damned, as long as people looked up to you, you were a man.
But as society has evolved and our view of the world has changed, it’s become a bit more complicated.
To me, being a man is more than just bringing home the bacon and being able to take care of yourself in a bar fight. It’s deeper than that. It’s about values and responsibility. It’s not about age, but it is about experience.
Responsibility
A man takes responsibility for himself and his actions. If he does something wrong, he makes amends and fixes what he did. He keeps his promises. If he has children, he cares for them and raises them properly.
Partnership
There was a time when a man was expected to take on all responsibility himself. The woman stayed home and would never work. He would bring home a paycheck and work two jobs if he had to.
The woman wasn’t expected to be involved in matters of work or finance, just to keep the home clean and comfortable. As Michael Corleone said, “Never ask me about my business.”
Has that ever changed in modern times? With most families requiring both people to work just to survive, the changes in women’s rights and pay and a shifting of our society to a more balanced playing field in gender roles, a man needs to look at the world differently.
I believe that today’s man needs to have the skills to have an equal partnership. It’s up to the two of you to come to an understanding of what your roles are, but that partnership and communication are vital. A man can’t just make a blanket statement that he’ll take care of everything. He has to work with his partner. But that doesn’t mean you have to become weak or dependent. You can do more by sharing responsibilities as a team.
Here’s a suggestion that might work, or it might not. It really depends on how radically you might be changing your life and the way you approach yourself and women.
Consider taking a bit of a vacation.
Remember when you were in school and classes would end for the summer and kids would come back after the break and have a different attitude, different clothes, maybe even have grown a few inches or muscled up?
You might want to consider this. Consider taking a little mini vacation from women, friends, and social life. Not too long, maybe a few weeks.
This will give you a chance to make some changes, tweak some things about how you approach life and dating. Spend some time with yourself thinking things out, figuring out what your goals are with life and with women.
That way, when you start to see people you know, any changes you implement won’t seem drastic, like you are trying something new. That way, they will comment on how you’ve changed since the last time they saw you and they like the changes. Or even better, new women won’t see the process; they’ll only see (and be attracted to) the result.
No matter what, there are certain behaviors that are definitely masculine, and burping and farting at the dinner table are not among them.
Confidence
It is very masculine to be confident. It is the top thing that women respond to. A confident man has self-worth and independence. He is self-reliant and doesn’t need to go to others for fulfillment or validation.
I cannot stress enough how important confidence is. I have mentioned it time and again in this book and my others. In order to be successful with the opposite sex, you MUST find your confidence.
Assertiveness
A masculine man knows what he wants and goes for it. This is different than the Alpha Male, which is basically just a name for a boorish guy. It’s not just about feeling a sense that something should be yours because you deserve it; it’s about how to figure out how to achieve your goals. It comes down to getting stuff down, and that is very masculine.
Dominance
There is a difference between being dominant and being a bully or cruel. Dominant is standing up for yourself and what is yours. Sometimes it’s not about words but simply body language and the vibe you give off.
I mentioned in my other books I am very tall, so I automatically give off a dominant vibe. I can come across as a bit intense because of my size, so that helps as well.
Courage
Courage doesn’t have to be about going to war or saving someone from a burning building. Sometimes courage is simply about getting up in the morning or being able to take a chance in order to get what you want. Often, it’s about standing up for what you believe and not changing in the face of pressure from others.
Women value courage, even in smaller situations. When you get up and take a chance talking to a girl, that takes courage and women notice that.
Ever heard the term opposites attract? Sometimes it’s not quite true. If you are with someone who is too different than you, you won’t have any commonalities, and you won’t be able to find a deeper connection or relationship.
However, when it comes to male and females, you absolutely want the opposite attraction.
Masculine polarity is the idea that the more masculine you are and the more feminine she is, the more attracted you will be to each other. And it works.
If you are too much alike in your masculinity/femininity poles, you won’t be as attracted to each other as you could be. The more you amplify your masculine traits, the more her feminine traits will be attracted to you. It’s actually really simple.
But you need to make sure they are the correct traits, like we have been discussing. If your traits like confidence, decisiveness, and courage stand strong, her feminine traits will respond to you.
We all ask ourselves those existential questions. Why am I here? What is the meaning of life? What is my purpose?
For generations going back to the cavemen, a man’s purpose was simple. Survive, protect and procreate.
That was it! For the duration of their short adult lives, they hunted, fed their family and tried not to get trampled by mastodons. Life was pretty simple.
But over time, that purpose has changed. Suddenly, it wasn’t life-threatening to get food. Life expectancy went from being lucky to see your 30s to averaging almost a hundred years.
As that happened, a man’s purpose became less defined. We used to have rites of passage and those disappeared. Now men wander around trying to figure out how to be men.
Now, it’s not a bad thing. The world we live in is safer, more rewarding and honestly more fun. I would much rather be able to go to a movie than sit and stare at cave paintings.
Also, there is a great equality of the sexes that makes life more enjoyable. Men have become more understanding and tolerant and have grown to understand the missteps that have led to domestic violence and abuse.
But it comes back to that question… what is a man’s purpose?
Yearning for Adventure and Risk
In the old days, a man’s life had the risk and the ability to prove themselves. In tribal cultures, they were given a task or quest to fulfill in order to achieve manhood. Even in our own culture for many years a man’s rite of passage was serving in the military or being drafted.
Now men have to find ways to challenge themselves and prove their manliness. Unfortunately, a lot of our male youth have to do this through fantasy. Playing video games or participating in sports.
So, let me ask you a question. Do you listen to your gut feelings?
There was a time when men were trained to be able to react to fear. It was part of their life, so they honed their instinct to know what to do. And since it was something they experienced regularly whether in war, hunting or just the rough and tumble times they lived in, they developed instinct.
However, in modern society, our instinct is dulled. When people get scared or are in a dangerous situation, they think they will respond bravely, but in reality, they freeze.
I don’t blame them. You are suddenly faced with a situation that you have no experience in.
I had a female friend who trained in martial arts and was not the type of woman to be afraid. She felt very secure in her skills. One day, she was waiting for a bus when a homeless woman (who was later medically evaluated as having mental issues) walked up to her and cold cocked her, right across the face. No warning, nothing. Just bam!
My friend froze. She didn’t know what to do. Even with all her martial arts training, she had never had any practical experience. So, the woman hit her again.
Luckily, several bystanders separated the homeless woman and authorities quickly arrived and took the woman somewhere to get the mental help she needed, but my friend was devastated. She had not used any of her knowledge. She had just frozen. Why?
She had no practical real-world experience. She knew how to deal with a guy grabbing her from behind, she knew how to strike an opponent who comes right up at her, she had all this knowledge but no experience in real-world situations.
Should she have struck back? Probably not, the woman who hit her didn’t know what she was doing. But my friend could have defended herself at least, blocking the second attack. But she didn’t.
It’s like men. We have lost the real-world experience. We tend not to take chances or learn to trust our male instincts because we have no experience in how to do it.
We have to learn to take chances and listen to our guts. It’s the same with women, too. You need practical experience of talking and flirting with them in order to get your instincts working properly.
So, you’re perfect, right? Don’t you need any self-improvement?
Here’s some honest truth. Everyone can improve themselves. I try to do it every day.
This is different from gaining new skills (although we will be discussing that later in the book.) This is about taking an honest look at your personality, mindset and characteristics and being honest about what you see.
This is about looking at yourself and putting in the work to be a better man and a better human being. Make changes to your life and mindset and try to be a better human being every day.
Surround Yourself with the Right Men
Associate with men you respect and who you would be proud to be associated with. Don’t listen to negative, cruel or hateful guys. Get rid of friendships with men who are bad influences or tend to bring you down.
Plus, when you bring a woman around, you want to her to be able to trust your friends. She will respect you more for choosing whom you hang out with wisely.
…And Women
I sing the praises of having female friends in all my books. They can really help you when it comes to learning what women like, and the right ones will help you become a compassionate, well-rounded person. Like with your male friends, get rid of any of the negative and hateful female influences in your life and focus on the ones the build you up.
Having female friends might become a bit of a problem if you find a woman who turns out to be the jealous type. However, if she really is right for you, she will learn how to cope with it and not let her problems ruin your relationships. If not, you might want to reevaluate your relationship with her.
Health and Exercise
Physical health has come into play in many of the subjects in this book, and it’s because it really is in every part of your life.
Being healthy means you are not only aware of yourself, but by improving your health, you have a more active quality of life. You can be more effective, do more and generally be a better person. If you feel sick or overweight, it comes out through your actions and interactions.
Education
We will get more into this later, but it is vital that you understand the world around you and how things work and are always looking for new knowledge. You should be hungry for it because that is how you improve yourself.
Goals
You can’t change if you don’t know where you are going. So, it is vital to set goals and milestones, whether it is physical, mental or emotional.
There’s nothing wrong with rewarding reaching your goals, either. It’s actually a great thing to do. You put in the hard work, you deserve it.
Forget the Past
You can’t improve and move forward if you are chained to the past. Yes, we do learn from our mistakes, but if you stay tethered to them, carrying guilt or negative feelings, you can’t move forward and risk becoming a victim.
Look to the Future, but Don’t Be Enslaved by It
Like I said, you need to set goals and milestones and strive towards them. At the same time, you can’t keep your eyes so focused on the future that you forget to live in the present. You don’t want to spend so much time living only for a single goal only to reach, look back and wonder where all the fun times with friends and family went. The joy is in the journey.
Do you ever walk outside hoping that you’ll meet a woman but when you look around you don’t see any? Or you think none of these women will be interested in you?
You can’t do that. You need to have a mentality of abundance.
This is a positive attitude that you believe that you have abundant options when it comes to women. That when you look around not only do you notice women, but you know that you can talk to them and date them. You need to really understand and believe that they want to talk to you.
But the key to abundance is that that the more prepared you are, the more chances you’ll get. You have to hone some of your skills in order to truly use it to your advantage.
Observe and Absorb
You need to learn as much as you can about how women think, what they want and how they interact with men. I would like to think that in this book and How to Flirt with Women and How to Talk to Women I’ve given you a pretty good roadmap, but nothing beats real life experience.
Always be paying attention. Listen when you are sitting at restaurants or just waiting for the bus. Pay attention to what women say to men or other women. Listen to how they talk about their men and what makes them happy or upset. How do they talk about their needs from their men? Are they being satisfied? What are they missing?
Practice
If you wanted to play in the major leagues, would you just show up for a tryout or would you spend years practicing until you were big league material?
Of course, you would practice. That’s how you get better.
It’s the same with abundance. Practicing conversational skills and working on your ability to flirt and chat with them is how you get better.
Of course, working on women you are interested in is the biggest help, but don’t stop there. Talk to all sorts of women. Flirt with the woman behind the counter, learn to use your smile with strangers.
Aim High
Don’t ever think that a woman is out of your league or that you don’t have a chance. By being ambitious, not only do you have more women to choose from you also push yourself. It’s like when you play tennis; you get better by playing with better opponents.
The same can be said with meeting and dating women. By being ambitious and trying all sorts of different women who you incorrectly think you don’t have a chance with, you are going to hone your skills and also up your confidence.
Extend Your Social Circle
It’s vital to always be creating new social contacts and widening your circle of friends and acquaintances.
This serves a number of purposes in your life, more than just your interaction with women. It will allow you to create business contacts, which will help you get jobs and succeed in your career. Plus, if you surround yourself with positive and hardworking influences, you will have a support structure and not be dragged down by negativity.
It’s always better, though, to have a small group of high-quality friends than a larger group of acquaintances that don’t have as much of a positive effect on your life.
Through this social circle, you will be able to meet new people, become more socially strong and interactive. Your confidence will go up, and you will indeed be more successful in your life.
Sometimes it is time to leave some friends and acquaintances behind. If they are not positive influences or you don’t enjoy being around them, it’s fine to begin to remove them from your life.
When it comes to women, your social circle is an amazing tool to meet them. By going out with friends, you get put in situations where you will meet more people and women.
Also, you never know who is a friend of a friend that you might get introduced to.
Why to Not Put Women on a Pedestal
When I was dating in my 20s, I had a bad habit of assuming that the women I was going out with knew what they were saying.
You see, I like intelligent women so, as I would get to know them, I assumed that they knew what they were talking about and if it was a subject I didn’t know, I would give them the benefit of the doubt and assume they were correct.
I was putting them on an intellectual pedestal. Many guys do the same thing, whether it’s for beauty, sex appeal or just because they care about them.
This is going to lead to some problems with both of you. I remember one time when a woman I was dating would try to get my opinion on something she was doing at work. It wasn’t a topic I knew much about, and so I deferred to the classic “what do you think is best?”
In this situation, I assumed that she knew more what she was talking about and would be able to make the best decision. I had no idea about the topic and honestly wasn’t putting much effort into learning about it.
Later, I realized that she had been trying to share a part of her life with me. She wanted my opinion and my input, and if I hadn’t been so busy putting her on a pedestal of being so intelligent and knowing better, I could have given her some of the support she needed. Sure, I might not know much about the topic, but by being present and at least showing my support, I could have given her more of what she needed.
The problem is that when you do this, you are creating an ideal and no one is going to live up to that. In the end, both of you are going to get hurt, and the relationship isn’t going to end well.
This causes you to ignore the negatives and be drawn into the zone of Nice Guy. Then, because you don’t want to think that you’ve been wrong, you’ll double down and think she’s perfect and dive deeper into your relationship.
Plus, women won’t respond to this in the long run. They’ll either get bored with you or maybe even start to take advantage of you.