To Be a Man

“If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you..” - Rudyard Kipling

Being a man is more than just having a male reproductive system and organ; it is having a particular character and mindset.

Quite often in society, many males believe that because they have engaged in sex or have shot an animal or have earned a degree of money that they have become a man.

I have chosen to use the word “Male” because there is a difference in being a “MAN” and being a “Male.”

Every culture has their rite of passage to becoming a man.

So the introduction is not meant to downplaying or denigrating the achievements that some males may view as being a rite of passage to being a MAN. No far from it. I believe all men should always find new challenges, new paths to discover what they can do and learn more about themselves.

However, no matter where you will go on this small yet expansive planet there are certain qualities that a male must cultivate for him to be considered a MAN.

Becoming a man is a complicated process today.

“But what about the Spartans and warriors of antiquity? Didn’t those young boys have it challenging?”

Of course, these young boys had it hard. They had it very difficult, but their passage, their rite into becoming a man was much more ritual and much more cultural.

What do I mean by that?

These young boys had groups of men who taught them and instilled in them the fire they would need to face life and all its cruelty. They had men teach them the art of war, the art of survival, the art of defeating ONESELF.

The “ART OF DEFEATING ONESELF.”

This teaching is without a doubt the single greatest teaching these men taught to their young boys and is exactly why I believe that the men, excuse me the males of today society have got it much harder regarding learning how to be a man.

Now I am not proposing that war makes a man or that fighting makes a man. Nor do I think competition makes a man. What makes a man a MAN is their ability to do consistent and daily battle with themselves.

This is something that is incredibly absent in society today. Gone are the days where men tried to overcome themselves and strived to be better than what they were yesterday.

Today what do you see? Guys who post on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Guys who seek the approval of other guys and females. Guys who need the acceptance of others to validate their worth.

Now I am not denigrating social media or the need to form a relationship with another human being. That is what life is about, experiencing and learning more about yourself. But for those who go out and seek the validation of everyone else around them and do not seek their validation can never truly be a man.

“If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise.”

Rudyard Kipling, despite his views on India at the time, had an evident and concise notion of what it meant to be a man. To be a man is not easy, people will tear your character apart. They will twist your words; they will backstab you. They will try and drag you down into the muddy and dirty pit of insanity and ignorance as them.

But in being a man despite the weight of the world against the man, the man is able, with the strength of his conviction and resolve in himself to overcome the world and its insanity.

Being a man is a goal that all males should aspire to achieve. Our lives are not in competition with others but only in competition with who we were yesterday. Every day is a battle to keep the rational and emotional beast within us at bay. Every day is a battle to which we must engage in to silence those negative voices and thoughts.

Every day is a day to try and move beyond those negative memories and experiences. Life is a constant battle for a man to not sink into the abyss of cynicism and despair. Life is hard, life is cruel, but life is a battle that only a MAN can engage in and WIN.

This is the power of being a MAN. This is what it is to be a MAN.

“I strive to be better, not to impress you but to live up to the ideal version that I see myself as in my mind.” These are the thoughts that men cultivate in their minds.

The joyous experience of battle, I know that sounds like a contradiction, is what gives the man his strength to be courageous, to be brave, to be moral and ethical.

The MAN enjoys a challenge. He enjoys a test. He enjoys a battle. He enjoys all that life will throw his way, and when knocked down from the ungallant antics of the world he stands back up, erect, with a smile on his face and a fire in his heart which without words says “BRING IT ON.”

A MAN doesn’t seek out fighting but knows how to fight. A MAN doesn't seek out conflict but knows how to end it. A MAN does not engage in gossip but engages in a philosophical monologue on a daily basis.

No matter where a MAN is born in life, whatever culture, whatever region of the world these characteristic and mindset have all been very much instilled in every culture's idea of what a man is meant to be.

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,

Or walk with Kings - nor lose the common touch,

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,

If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,

Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,

And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son!”

― Rudyard Kipling

Are you a Man?

your friend,
Dave