You might have already realized that I have a bunch of issues with this society and how things are portrayed. But one of my biggest pet-peeves is the fact that everyone always only strives for happiness. Be happy everywhere!
You need money to be happy. That you need tons of sex to be happy. You need multiple women to be happy. Whatever.
And all of this is fucking weak! A man is not supposed to be happy. Not in the sense this corrupt society tells you. So how to be happy?
Happy vs. Happy
There are two types of happiness.
One is the happiness displayed in society, commercials, movies, etc. Happily ever after your wedding. Happy once you have a million dollars, you get the idea.
This happiness will lead to misery. The man who doesn’t have that money/fame/status is unhappy in the constant pursuit of happiness. And the man who has it is unhappy because he quickly realizes that none of this fulfills him.
Many rich men have mouthed the same words. After a while, every luxury hotel is the same. Every supercar is the same. Every pussy feels similar.
I call this the external happiness.
It is rooted in external validation. Either through sex, or other people marvelling at your status symbols.
Don’t get me wrong, I like driving a Lamborghini. It’s certainly fun. But it’s not happiness. It is short-lived fun. I’ll expand on that later.
The second happiness, the one that truly makes you happy is rooted in your soul.
The meaning in your life. Your purpose.
Find happiness in pain
In my bestselling book, the Unchained Man I teach people how to escape this enslaved society of sheep. Because most men think this is where their happiness lies.
A Mojito on the Beach, women, cars, etc. In reality, I trick my readers. This book is about finding your purpose by escaping the shackles of your mind. The Unchained Man is a discourse in how to free your mind from indoctrinations. One of these is the pursuit of status all your life.
The real happiness is found in the process. The way to get there. It is in pain. In suffering. In struggle.
A paradox of the universe. Adversity, challenges, and pain will make you happy. However, this isn’t because men are sadistic assholes. This is because your purpose is what makes you happy. Your work. Your occupation. Your TRUE work (not that shitty 9-5). And this is found and kept with pain.
A happy soldier is one who had his skills tested, for he knows what he is capable of and is not afraid of the unknown future.
The masculine purpose is his work. And your divine purpose is your passion.
However, working on your passion requires sacrifices. Many of them. Time, people, your body, your mind (kill it here). A man is the happiest after a 16 hour workday fully aligned with his passion.
From my own experience, I can tell you, when I work on my purpose, it doesn’t feel like work at all. It is my meaning. My meaning doesn’t drain my energy like a 9-5 job does. It yields energy! As long as I can work on it, I am free. I am unchained.
This is where happiness lies in pain.
Not in flexing your supercars – although they will inevitably come once you are aligned with your passion – it is in the painful sacrifices while you are on your divine purpose.
Why people seek external happiness
These dark places you go to and go through when life kicks you in the nuts are a test of your strength. Your mental strength. And people are a lot, lot, lot stronger than you would imagine. You think you can’t handle the fact that this month is pretty tight on money. Trust me, you could handle way heavier stuff.
The key thing is to keep fighting. Have the other side in mind, fight through the trenches to come out victorious. If you let yourself consume by the bad things, you will never experience true happiness.
And this is why a lot of people try to be happy at all times. They are afraid of the dark side of life.
We’re so focused on trying to be happy at all times. Full-blown unicorns and all that, we can’t even truly cherish the good life we have. Most people in western culture are so afraid of losing everything, because they all live on a lease, that they can never experience the true glory of just being.
The glory of the process. We always want to arrive. Never cherishing the way there.
This is precisely why so many men are truly unhappy. A man’s happiness lies in the way. Not the finish line.
This is why many men work for 50 years and die right after retirement. Their purpose is gone. They have nothing to work for. Their soul dies. And with the soul, dies the body.
We live in a world where everything is taken care of at all times. You don’t need to hunt for food, you can get sex everywhere, at all times, you can get multiple forms of dopamine kicks at any minute, and the chance of being randomly killed is pretty low. At least compared to history.
You can only enjoy the beauty and warmth of summer because winter makes you miss it.
We forgot, that this isn’t the default state of life. Life is actually meant to be a test. That’s how we survived as a species. Tension! Everything in life is built around tension. The basic biology. The sperm that was once you, had to fight the others to get to the egg. Then there was huge tension when he tried to get in the egg and fertilize it. Growing the baby put a lot of pressure and tension on the mother. And, well, we’re not even talking about the birth itself.
We grow and cherish in tension. But we neglect it in this society.
Fear is healthy
Weird headline you might say. The fact that you never have to worry about anything, isn’t good for you. And it does steal your happiness.
As my friend Ryan from PathToManliness said quite well, “Man’s struggle these days is the lack of struggle.”
You try to compensate with stimuli like Netflix, new clothes, a new car, lots of sex, external validation. But it isn’t true happiness, because you never really feel bad. You don’t have hard times that make you stronger. You don’t sacrifice for the meaning of your life.
Think about it this way. If you sail the ocean, and it is completely tame. You will get bored quickly. Small waves almost don’t rock your boat at all. Nothing happens. But if the sea is rough, you get through a storm, shit gets exciting. Dangerous, but also exciting. You might die, sure. But if you manage to navigate through it, you can truly relax, and be happy about what you achieved.
You survived that hell. It made you a better sailor. You’ve grown as a person!
And by the way, this is also exactly how you should handle relationships with a woman. Read it again with a relationship in mind and the woman being the sea.
Voluntary unhappiness the key on how to be happy?
Now, obviously I am not telling you to make yourself voluntarily miserable. Just so you can see the goods on the other side. That’s stupid.
The pain and adversity is part of the process.
Be aware that your chase for happiness isn’t worth it. You hunt for all these shallow, minimal happiness-spikes in your life. Only to not really feel that crazy afterward.
It’s pointless.
Then what? Put yourself into tense situations! Voluntarily. Start something new, do something you never did before, talk to your girl about issues instead of suppressing them to not rock the boat too much. All this stuff.
Make yourself voluntarily unhappy to finally, fully receive true happiness once you overcome them.
A wise man voluntarily takes challenges, for he knows that standing still means falling behind.
How to be happy as a man
Purpose. Work. Adversity.
Challenges!
War is the nature of man. It is built into our masculinity. When you are at war to fight for your purpose, you feel happy. It doesn’t have to be a literal war with weapons. Mental warfare is just as sufficient.
This will teach you that you don’t need all these fancy things other than for having fun. Your mindset will switch from portraying happiness onto them to seeing them as tools for quick fun. You will start to be grateful for your purpose.
And when you get deeper into that gratefulness, you will realize that it makes you happier. Because you already have a lot of things. You don’t need to hunt for these small dopamine-kicks if your life is already great! You don’t just exist and consume, you live! This will bring great peace to your mind.
Trust me, not caring about material things (unless like food and shelter) is very liberating. You will approach life completely differently. And that will be true happiness, like most of the people still in the Matrix have never experienced.
A tribute to struggle
I am ending this post with one of my favorite poems. It’s a poem to masculinity, which I had pinned to my Twitter profile for the longest time. But it is also true for struggle, happiness, and life in general. So let Edgar Albert Guest take the wheel.
Though victory’s proof of the skill you possess,
Defeat is the proof of your grit;
A weakling can smile in his days of success,
But at trouble’s first sign he will quit.
So the test of the heart and the test of your pluck
Isn’t skies that are sunny and fair,
But how do you stand to the blow that is struck
And how do you battle despair?
A fool can seem wise when the pathway is clear
And it’s easy to see the way out,
But the test of man’s judgment is something to fear,
And what does he do when in doubt?
And the proof of his faith is the courage he shows
When sorrows lie deep in his breast;
It’s the way that he suffers the griefs that he knows
That brings out his worst or his best.
The test of a man is how much he will bear
For a cause which he knows to be right,
How long will he stand in the depths of despair,
How much will he suffer and fight?
There are many to serve when the victory’s near
And few are the hurts to be borne,
But it calls for a leader of courage to cheer
The men in a battle forlorn.
It’s the way you hold out against odds that are great
That proves what your courage is worth,
It’s the way that you stand to the bruises of fate
That shows up your stature and girth.
And victory’s nothing but proof of your skill,
Veneered with a glory that’s thin,
Unless it is proof of unfaltering will,
And unless you have suffered to win.
The proof of worth, Edgar Albert Guest
Do you remember situations where you had to struggle heavily, but the feeling after you’ve overcome it felt great? Let me know in the comments!
Also, get my Bestseller to free your manhood here.
