As a boy, one of my favorite times in school was when we’d get a new Scholastic News book “catalog.” I would pour over the pages picking out which books I wanted and filling out the order sheet. And as soon I got them, I was lying under the covers with my nose buried in a book.

Unfortunately, not all boys have that kind of enthusiasm for reading. For several decades now, boys have scored lower on reading assessment tests than girls. Boys also take longer to learn to read than girls, are less likely to actually read and to value reading, and are more likely to label themselves as “non-readers” (up to 50% of high school age boys consider themselves as such). Non-reading boys do poorer academically and end up as non-reading men (women read almost twice as many books as men).

What’s the problem? Some of it may be biological (boys’ language skills develop slower that girls). But a lot of it is sociological. Boys may see reading as a passive and thus sissy activity. Boys also lack male reading mentors-their librarians and teachers are often female, and it’s mom that reads to them. And in the name of gender-neutrality, teachers are foisting books on boys that they simply do not like.

But parents are to blame too, often trying to make their sons read “important books” to build their character. Dad loved some long tome as a boy and wants junior to come to an equal apprectation of it.

But reading experts all agree that boys need to be allowed to pick the books that really interest them. Of course it’s okay to make suggestions to your son about things he might like-boys very much value the opinion of other boys and men in making their reading selections. So here are 50 books that many boys and young men will really love. We’ve included some classics, but we also threw in some more modern and accessible choices-after all, not every boy has the desire or the aptitude to dive into Dickens.

Finally, while we had boys about the ages of 9-15 in mind when we made this list, I’ve always considered the distinction between adult and young adult literature to be an unfortunate and artificial one. Putting together this list I remembered just how good these books are, and I can’t wait to read them again as a man. Whether you’re 12 or 52, grab one of these books and a bag of cookies and head out to the treehouse.

Hatchet by Gary Paulsen

Pretty much every boy’s favorite book. When the pilot of the small plane of which he is a passenger crash lands in the Canadian wilderness, 13 year old Brian Robeson must survive with only his wits and a hatchet. Utterly alone, Brian must learn to rely on himself. Gripping and vividly told, every boy pictures himself in Brian’s shoes and wonders whether he would have what it takes to survive.

A Separate Peace by John Knowles

Set at a boys prep school on the eve of World War II, A Separate Peace centers on the friendship of Phineas and Gene. Phineas’ seeming perfection creates a jealously in Gene that results in a tragedy that will forever change both of their lives. A piercing look at both the light and the shadows of friendship and humanity. Every boy wishes he were Finny but knows he’s more like Gene. This book has stuck with me ever since reading it as a young man and remains one of my favorite until to this day.

The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman

Take Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book, replace the jungle with a graveyard and the animals with ghosts and you’ve got Neil Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book. The book begins with the mention of the murder of a family, but quickly moves on from there and is not a gruesome tale inappropriate for youngsters. The sole survivor of the murder is an 18 month old baby, who toddles away to a graveyard. Here the cemetery’s ghosts and ghouls adopt the boy, give him a name (”Nobody” as he’s like nobody else in the graveyard), protect him from the still on the loose killer, and teach him the life lessons that only the dead can know. It’s takes a graveyard to raise a child, and the cemetery is a great home, but eventually Bod, as they call him, must deal with the world outside of its borders. Spooky, magical, and engrossing, it’s a must for all boys who like ghost stories (so pretty much all boys). Be sure to check out Gaiman’s other great books like Neverwhere and Anasi Boys.

The American Boy’s Handy Book by Daniel C. Beard

Long before The Dangerous Book for Boys became all the rage , there was the American Boy’s Handy Book. Every father and grandfather should have this on his shelf, waiting there for a boy to pull it off and start leafing through. Dozens of awesome (and unlike another book, some actually dangerous) hands on projects for boys to tackle from how to build kites and forts to how to rear wild birds and trap animals. Originally published in 1882 and still a must for every boy today.

The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster

The story of a boy who’s boring life is interrupted by the appearance of something strange and unusual that transports him to a magical place. It’s a premise that underlies a myriad of children’s books, but few are as creatively constructed as The Phantom Tollbooth. Young Milo finds a tollbooth in his room, gets in his toy car and drives into another dimension. Boys will love the strange adventures Milo experiences, while older kids and adults can enjoy the witty satire and clever puns.

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain

One of the great American novels. Young Huck Finn escapes from his abusive father by taking off on a raft down the Mississippi River. He is joined by Jim, an escaped slave. The two set off on a grand adventure full of close calls and interesting characters. With both wit, action, and fun, coupled with an undercurrent of serious themes, Huck Finn is a multi-layered masterpiece for young and old.

The Last Mission by Harry Mazer

The classic tale of the collision of a boy’s idealistic view of war with it’s ugly reality. Yet the book manages to avoid being a tired cliche. 15 year old Jack Raab lies his way into the Army Air Force and finds himself flying bombing missions over occupied territory. On his 25th mission, his last mission before being sent home, his plane is shot down, and he is taken prisoner in a German POW camp. A fictional story and an easy read, but historically accurate and realistic in its details. Be sure to check out other books by Harry Mazer; his A Boy at War series is a painless way to teach boys some history.

The First Edition of the Boy Scout Handbook

If you have a son in Scouts, he’ll definitely dig this book. Today’s Scout manual is definitely watered down compared to the first edition. The first edition manual is crammed with info on tracking and trapping animals, building shelters from scratch, and sailing. Additionally, it has stories of bravery and adventure that inspire boys to be great men. Something today’s manual is sorely lacking.

Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane

Known as a war book, The Red Badge of Courage is really a coming of age story set on the battlefield. Young Henry Fleming leaves his mother to fight for the Union Army. His question of whether or not he’ll have the courage to stand and fight is answered in the negative when he flees from his first skirmish. Fleming resolves to redeem himself during the next battle. A story not only of the tragedy of war, but the struggle to replace pride, weakness, and rationalization with bravery and personal honesty.

Watership Down by Richard Adams

One of my favorite books as a boy-who knew the lives of rabbits could be so engrossing? I’m sure it’s rife with rich symbolism and whatnot to mull over, but it’s one of those books that creates a world so rich and evocative that it’s best to let yourself get totally wrapped up in it instead of constantly searching for deeper meaning. When a prophetic rabbit correctly foretells that their warren will be destroyed, a band of rabbits travel in search of  a new home and encounter dangerous and interesting obstacles along the way. Some authors can’t make human characters as interesting as these rabbits.

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Last week Daniel started an interesting discussion in the AoM Community on what progress men have made in the last 50 years. He was inspired to pose this question by my podcast interview with Walker Lamond, and more specifically, Walker’s comments about how we threw the baby out with the bathwater as it concerns having rules that govern a man’s life.
The Art of Manliness clearly looks to the past for inspiration. But we’re not naive enough to believe that the past was an unmitigated good. So both the podcast and the discussion got me thinking about this question: When it comes to manliness today, what parts of the tradition of manliness should we seek to keep and preserve and what parts should we be happy to assign to the dustbin of history? In other words, what’s the baby and what’s the bathwater? Here’s my humble opinion.

The Bathwater

The oppression of women. For most of human history being a man meant being the superior half of the population. Men did honor women, but they also put them on a pedestal, considering them too good or pure to be sullied by the pursuits of men. This barred women from sports, academia, careers, the military, politics and so on.

Some men feel nostalgic for a simpler time where men and women had clearer roles, and think that putting women back in “their place” will return society to the way it was in the “good old days.” Personally, I think the liberation of women has been largely a good thing for both men and women. I’m glad that I could marry a woman who’s my intellectual equal and who has a mind of her own- a woman who’s not dependent on me for her whole identity. I’m glad women can follow their passions and be themselves. Has the feminist movement had some negative effects on women? Sure. But a  man should prize freedom, not just for himself, but for everyone. Women folk included.

A man should suppress his emotions. Decades ago the standard for manliness was the motion picture cowboy. Taciturn and reserved, this man was stoic in both good times and bad. Crying was for sissies. Such reticence may have worked well in the Old West, but as husbands and fathers, such an approach left wives and children emotionally wanting. Many a Baby Boomer man grew up in a home where hearing their dad say “I love you” was a bi-annual occurrence. And where a wife would seek comfort or understanding from her husband, only to be met with stony silence. Men today are free to cry when it’s appropriate, openly show love to their family and friends, and acknowledge their feelings and passions. Some men have taken this emotional openness too far, and let their emotions completely control them instead of the other way around. But when a man can acknowledge and express his emotions in a mature fashion, while keeping them under control, this is an incredibly healthy thing.

There’s only one way to be a man. While it’s easy to be nostalgic for the days of gray flannel suits, 3 martini lunches, and cars with fins, it was also a time of rigid conformity. Being a successful man was narrowly defined-you had “made it” if you had a secure corporate job, a pretty wife who stayed home with your 3 kids, and a split-level house in the suburbs. Men who had a different vision of how to lead a satisfying life either suppressed these dreams or embraced a different path and suffered the snub of society.

While we often think of the feminist movement in terms of giving women a greater number of options, it helped liberate men from the idea that there was only one way to be a man, too. These days a man should still be a provider, but now he can provide by working and bringing in money or by being a stay-at-home dad and raising his kids. A man in an apron cooking in the kitchen is no longer the set-up of a sitcom joke but a legitimate interest. If a man wants to be a nurse, or an elementary school teacher, or an artist, then he’s now more likely to be greeted with a pat on the back than a snicker.

Dads don’t need to be too hands on in the child rearing department. Even the men in my father’s generation weren’t expected to change diapers. Men used to be able to get away with coming home, patting the kids on the head, and then settling in front of the television with a beer. Today men are expected to be just as hands on with the kids as moms. Attending their kids’ sports games, going on father/son outings and daddy/daughter dates, burping and feeding the baby, etc.

While this has certainly added more to a man’s plate, and made it harder to enjoy things that grandpa did, like membership in a fraternal lodge, most dads find it rewarding to play a bigger role in their kids’ lives, and children have benefited from seeing more of dad.

Homophobia. As we wrote about in our article on the history of male friendship, men used to enjoy much closer bonds with each other than they do today. In the 19^th century, men felt completely free show their buddies physical affection and tell their friends just how much they meant to them without any fear of being called a “fag.” It was only in the first half of the 20^th century, when homosexuality started being analyzed, written about, and denounced, that men started to feel self-conscious about whether or not their actions might be construed as being “gay.” Some modern men still can’t get emotionally or physically close to other men because they don’t want others to think they’re a “homo.”

No matter your stance on the morality of homosexuality, men today should feel secure enough in their sexuality not to care if they come off as “gay” to others.

The Baby

Leadership. In reading Tom Brokaw’s book, The Greatest Generation, I was struck by the way the men of the past embraced, nay, relished leadership roles. They prized the chance to take on responsibility and guide something towards a lofty goal. Today young men hide from leadership positions, hoping no one will notice them so they can just hang out in the background without any work to do.

From politics, to business, to family, the world needs men of leadership, men who are willing to take on the responsibility of making things right.

Initiative and ambition. Today, women outnumber men at colleges, universities, graduate schools, and some law and medical schools as well. Women also get better grades and are more likely to graduate than men. The feminist movement lit a fire under women’s bums, and it seems a lot of men became content to let them surge ahead while they pulled up a chair and had a beer. But men have always thrived on competition, on the desire to be the alpha male, on the will to be their very best. Not enough has been expected of men in our modern age, and it’s become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Men and women are different. So above we said that men and women are equal. But that doesn’t mean men and women are exactly the same. I’m not a “men are from Mars, women are from Venus” guy; I’d say we’re more alike than we are different. But we’re definitely different, and I think we should celebrate that fact instead of pretending like it isn’t so.

It seems to me that young people today are awakening from the Eunuch Era and embracing the fact that they like to feel like men and women. And that they want there to be some differences in how we treat and interact with each other.

Chivalry and courtship. Our grandfathers held women in such high esteem that they deemed it worthwhile to put in some effort to woo them and treat them with class. They didn’t just hang out with them, they asked them on real dates. Physical intimacy was a sign of commitment in a relationship, not a recreational activity born out of boredom.

Some people think chivalry is sexist; but they’re missing the point. It’s a code of behavior to remind us that men and women are different, which is why it gives both sexes a good feeling.  It’s simply a sign of mutual respect-men and women both do symbolic things for each other to show their affection. Some of the things that men do happen to have been codified into a set of more specific rules.

Manners and rules. Somewhere along the way, being virtuous and well-mannered became associated with being sissy, so that the cultured, polite man began to be seen as effeminate, while the uncouth, disheveled slob became the symbol of the “man’s man.” But the men of yesteryear understood that respect for others was one of the fundamental principles of manliness. And that manners were not baseless outward forms, but important ways to communicate that respect. Instead of stifling us, rules can be liberating. In Walker Lamond’s book, Rules for My Unborn Son, he said:

“Somewhere along the way, rules got a bad name. People wanted freedom. Authority was questioned, rules were broken, dress codes banished! Rules were seen as antiquated obstacles to individualism and progress. Barbers were ignored, ties packed away. And the game of life suddenly got a bit sloppier, more uncertain, and even a bit less fun. My father….understood that a man of strong character, who took pride his appearance and behavior, was given the most liberty to have fun. And so he had rules.”

And one of the rules that men lived by was:

Dressing and grooming well. It seems like every time we post an article on dressing or grooming on the site, we get an angry complaint from a reader who wants to know what haircuts or suits have to do with manliness. These men have forgotten something that their grandfathers knew very well.

The core of manliness will always be your character, your internal values. But those internal values on the inside should correlate with how you present yourself on the outside. If you are a man who is powerful, organized, disciplined, and confident, then that should be projected in your appearance. Your inside and outside are not two separate and unrelated things; there should be a clear correlation between the two.

It’s all fine and dandy to say that in theory a man should wear whatever he likes and if he wants to walk around in sweatpants and a t-shirt  then that f-you attitude really epitomizes manliness. But that’s a completely modern idea of manliness, a clear marker of the disappearance of our civility. For centuries men understood that a person’s clothes show respect for others and respect for an occasion. Yes, you can “be your own man” and show up to a wedding in jeans, but in choosing to detract from instead add to the ambiance, you show a true disrespect for the solemnity of the occasion.

The 9 manly virtues. How well a man lived the manly virtues was the ultimate test of manliness for our grandfathers. These were the values a true man strove to build his life around. Some of them we have written about already; the others we will cover in the months and years to come. They are the timeless benchmarks of manliness and no matter how much the world changes, they should be fervently embraced by each generation of men and taught to the next generation of men.

• Loyalty
• Industry
• Resiliency
• Resolution
• Personal Responsibility
• Self-Reliance
• Courage
• Integrity
• Sacrifice

Alright, that’s what I think, but it’s just one man’s opinion. What progress do you think men have made in the past 100 years? What trappings of manliness should we leave in the dustbin of history? What values of the past should we preserve? Share your thoughts in the comments. And please, remember to show the class, civility, and intelligent discussion that we’re accustomed to here on AoM.

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“His type is as normally average as the hot dog and pop at Coney Island. He is good looking without being handsome, quiet without being a bore, ambitious without taking either himself or his job too seriously and unassuming without being dull. Stewart’s growing appeal has sometimes been difficult to peg. He’s no Gable and certainly has none of the qualities of a Valentino. A sixteen-year-old fan seems to have hit it when she wrote to him, ‘I like you because you’re like the boy next door.”-1938 MGM biography of James Stewart

James “Jimmy” Stewart was an unlikely candidate for silver screen fame. Lacking the suave handsomeness and virility of a Cary Grant, the tough masculinity of a John Wayne, and the dark grit of a Humphrey Bogart, he was unlike anything else to come out of Hollywood at the time. Beanpole thin, with a famously slow drawl and awkward mannerisms, studios initially couldn’t imagine him as a leading man. Everyone could sense that Stewart was enormously talented, but few had a clue on how to use him. It would take directors like Frank Capra and Alfred Hitchcock to recognize his strengths-openness, emotional complexity, intelligence, and authenticity-and coax out some of cinema’s most unforgettable performances.

If Stewart broke the mold of the typical leading man, his behavior off the set was equally antithetical to the rest of Hollywood. Never one to be flashy, married only once, courteous to everyone he met, disciplined and professional, his life provided little grist for the town’s gossip columns. There were no shortage of people who agreed with President Truman when he said, “If Bess and I had a son, we’d want him to be just like Jimmy Stewart.”

While often remembered for his wholesome turns in movies like Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Stewart was an actor of tremendous emotional range, equally adept at delving into the dark corners of the human condition. Over the course of his brilliant and wide-ranging 55 year career, Stewart appeared in 80 films, several of which have become true American classics.

In following his own course on screen and in life, Stewart left behind many lessons in manliness. Here are just a few.

Forge Your Own Path and Follow Your Passion

“My earliest memories are of hardware smells. The dry aroma of coiled rope. The sweet smell of linseed oil and baseball gloves. The acid tang of open nail kegs. When I open my nose, they all come back to me.” -Jimmy Stewart

James Stewart did not come from a family with connections to Hollywood. Raised in Indiana, Pennsylvania, his father was the proud owner of the town’s hardware store. His father worked tirelessly to make the store a success, and believed that one day his son Jimmy would take over the business that had been in the family for three generations. Starting at age 10, he expected young Jimmy to come to the store after school to help out and learn the ropes.

Alexander Stewart was an Ivy League educated man who had served in both the Spanish-American War and World War I and presided over his family with manly bearing. Stewart idolized his father and wanted to fulfill his expectations and make him proud. Thus, though Jimmy wished to be a pilot and attend the Naval Academy, he acquiesced to his father’s desire that he follow in his footsteps and attend Princeton.

Upon graduation, Stewart planned to continue his education by getting a masters degree in architecture. He would then be expected to come home to Indiana, take over the hardware store, and perhaps expand into the home building business.

But after matriculating from Princeton, Stewart joined an acting company for what started as a summer stint. When Stewart made the decision to keep on acting instead of returning to school in the fall, his father was not at all pleased with the change in plans. Remembered Stewart:

“Dad was upset. My father didn’t like it at all-till the day he died he didn’t like it…he kept shaking his head, saying, ‘No Stewart has ever gone into show business!’”

Indeed, the elder Stewart never completely warmed up to the idea of his son being an actor. Even after the huge success of Jimmy’s first breakout film, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Alexander called him and told him to quit the movie nonsense and come back home to get married, start a family, and help run the store. It was a plea Jimmy would hear for pretty much the rest of his life.

But Stewart didn’t go all Dead Poets Society and kill himself over this rift; he respected his father but he was his own man with his own dreams and his own life to lead. Although he was tempted to return to the quiet life of Pennsylvania throughout his whole life, his passion for acting kept him making movies into his old age.

Be Dignified with the Ladies

While we often think of the stars of yesteryear as more upright than the current crop of tabloid fodder, the Hollywood of the past was much like it is today; studios just worked harder to cover up their actors’ misbehavior and the media kept a respectful distance. While Jimmy Stewart was assuredly no saint, next to fellow actors who juggled multiple women at a time, had affairs with married women while they were single and liaisons with single women when they were married, Stewart was considered downright prudish.

Stewart had relationships with some of the most beautiful and alluring women of the time-Ginger Rogers, Olivia de Havilland, Dinah Shore, and Marlene Dietrich to name a few. But he preferred to keep his relationships out of the public eye and was notoriously circumspect about the women in his life when probed by reporters.

While other stars burned through multiple marriages (Clark Gable and Cary Grant both married 5 times), Stewart held out to find the right woman to settle down with. She was hard to find in Hollywood; women threw themselves at Stewart in hopes of hitching their star to his, but he found these brash, sexually aggressive women off-putting and quickly tired of the vapid ladies he met in Tinseltown. Seeing many of the women he knew cheat on their husbands, he became extremely cautious about tying the knot. As his fortieth birthday approached, he began to despair of being a bachelor forever.

But then he met Gloria Hatrick. Athletic, smart, and funny, she was an elegant and beautiful woman who shared his love of fishing, golfing, and sailing. Stewart said:

“I could tell right off that she was a thoroughbred. For me it had been love at first sight. She was the kind of a girl I had always dreamed of. The kind you associate with open country, cooking stew and not fainting because it was made of cut-up squirrels. She’d look at home on a sailboat or a raft; in a graceful swing from a tree branch into the swimming pool.”

Stewart and Hatrick were married in 1949 and stayed married for 45 happy years. If Stewart had been something of a playboy in his single years, after his trip down the altar he became a devoted husband. Gloria remembered:

“Jimmy was working with some of the most glamorous women in the world. My constant fear I suppose was that he would find them more attractive than me and have an affair with one of them. A lot of men in Hollywood became involved with their leading ladies. Jimmy was a red-blooded American male so naturally I thought it could happen to him, too. I was convinced it was only a matter of time before the telephone would ring and it would be James telling me that he had to work late at the studio or that he would be out playing poker with the boys. Well, no such call ever came. And I can honestly say that in all the years of our marriage Jimmy never once gave me cause for anxiety or jealously. The more glamorous the leading lady he was starring opposite, the more attentive he’d be to me.”

Do Your Duty

All the generations of Jacksons on Stewart’s mother’s side of the family had served honorably in the military, going all the way back to the Revolutionary War. So when it was Jimmy’s turn to serve, he was ready to fulfill his duty. Although he had numerous opportunities to get out of service, Stewart-unlike a certain cowboy actor who usually gets many more manliness points-did everything he could to serve.

In 1940 Stewart was drafted into the military. But when he took his physical, the army rejected him; at 6′3 and 130 pounds, he was deemed too skinny for service. He could have bowed out honorably but instead he appealed the rejection and set up a second physical. He spent the next 3 months constantly gobbling up milkshakes and fried chicken wings in attempt to put on 10 pounds. When the second physical came around, he was still underweight, but he convinced the doctor to look the other way and approve him.

And so a week after winning an Oscar for The Philadelphia Story, Stewart became the first major American actor to don a uniform. He humbly transitioned from acting to peeling potatoes and gracefully accepted the drastic change in his pay-from $3,000 to $21 a week.

Stewart had a lifelong fascination with flying that started with building model airplanes as a child and progressed into getting his private and commercial pilot licenses as an adult. As an avid flyer, he decided to transfer to the Air Corps. While eager to just be one of the boys and start flying missions, Stewart grew increasingly exasperated as the other men were shipped overseas while he was left to train other pilots, make recruitment films, and be trotted out in uniform for various publicity events.

The Army, afraid that losing Stewart in combat would be a heavy blow to American morale, was intent on keeping Stewart from shipping out. But Stewart continually and persistently implored his commanding officers to put him on active duty.

Thus when Colonel Robert Terrill, Commanding Officer of the 445th Bombardment Group needed a man who would be able to lead his men into combat and get them home safely, the Army, knowing there was no more capable or qualified man for the job, finally relented.

When Stewart joined the 445th in Sioux City, he so impressed Terrill that in a matter of weeks the Colonel put him in command of the 703rd Bomb Squadron division, consisting of a dozen B-24 bombers and 350 soldiers and flyers. Once in Britain, Stewart flew missions as dangerous and harrowing as any other Airman, leading squadrons on bombing runs into Germany and occupied France. Besieged on each mission from the Luftwaffe, Stewart escape many narrow misses. Many of his fellow men were not so lucky, and Stewart watched with sickness as they fell from the sky.

For his service, Stewart received the Air Medal for flying 10 successful missions over Germany, the Distinguished Flying Cross for leading an air raid on Brunswick, and the prestigious Croix de Guerre from the French Air Force.

Stewart remained in the Air Force Reserves until forced into retirement and left the Force with the rank of Brigadier General.

Be Humble

Stewart’s dignified manner with women extended to his treatment of everyone he met and worked with. He refused to let fame give him an inflated sense of sense-worth nor deter him from his values. Although his money would have allowed him to, he never lived in an ostentatious way. While the car of choice in Hollywood was a Mercedes, when he finally hit it big he went out and bought a Volvo. He drove it for many years, and then replaced it…with another Volvo. During the energy crisis of the 1970’s, when he was in his 70’s, he refused to heat his pool for his daily dips, seeing it as an extravagance.

Stewart always sought to make his co-stars shine and respected his fellow actors immensely. Known as a consummate professional, he never had an ill word to say about a co-star, even when their antics on set had been anything but respectable. And he was always rooting for the success of others. When Stewart was up for the Best Actor Oscar in 1960 for Anatomy of a Murder, he wanted very much to win as his star had dimmed a bit after the poor reviews and box office performance of 1958’s Vertigo. Walking into the Academy Awards ceremony, he bumped into another nominee in the Best Actor category, Charlton Heston, and the two posed for pictures together. Heston recalled, ”As the flashbulbs finally petered out and we turned to go to our seats. Jimmy took my arm and said, ‘I hope you win, Chuck, I really mean that.’ I don’t know another actor alive who would’ve said such a thing. He’s an extraordinary man.”

Stewart’s humility extended to his military record as well. The public was enamored with the idea of this movie star turned Airman, and when he returned home, he could have easily used his service record as a way to garner attention for himself and promote his films. It would have certainly been tempting, as his postwar transition back into movies did not go smoothly, and industry insiders were beginning to doubt his ability to make a comeback.

But Stewart had long insisted that he was just one of the boys, no more important than any other serviceman. To this end he refused to talk to reporters about his war experiences or appear in any kind of publicity event that capitalized on his service. He also refused to act in movies that depicted combat, leading him to turn down lucrative roles in big movies like Midway and The Longest Day. As Stewart explained, “They’re just hardly ever the way it really is.”

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In Dante’s Inferno, Dante takes an allegorical journey through the nine levels of Hell. With Virgil as his guide, he ventures through nine concentric circles, each level inhabited by successively worse sinners. Dante works his way through limbo, lust, gluttony, avarice, wrath and sloth, heresy, violence, and fraud, before finally making it the center of the earth and the lowest circle of Hell. Here reside the worst sinners in history, those guilty of treason and betrayal. These traitors are doomed to spend eternity encased in ice, with the very worst of the bunch-Brutus, Cassius, and Judas-being perpetually chewed on by Satan.

With so many varieties of sinners, why did Dante mark traitors as the worst of the worst? For that matter, why do those who remember little about the Revolutionary War still know exactly who Benedict Arnold was? And why is being called a “fairweather fan” such a derisive insult? In short, why is betraying one’s loyalty so unforgivable an act?

While the fabric that has held society together has worn thinner in our modern age, it is still loyalty that lends the cloth its strength. It is loyalty that keeps the world functioning. We could not conduct business transactions or personal relationship without it. Loyalty is the idea that we are who we say we are and we will do what we say we will do. It is the hope that the integrity with which we initially encountered someone will endure indefinitely.

It’s also what keeps us unified. We live out our lives as part of agreed upon norms that allow us to operate from day to day. We need to know who we can count on. We all understand that ideally, friends will have your back, lovers will remain true, and businesses will not cheat you out of your money. When someone is disloyal, they break from these expectations and weaken the trust that holds us together.

Yet modern society is understandably weary of the virtue of loyalty. Every virtue has its true manifestation and its false counterpart. Frugality can become stinginess; resolution can become stubbornness; humility can become passiveness. And loyalty can become blind obedience. Critics of loyalty point to Germany under Hitler or China under Mao and ask, “Weren’t the evil deeds committed by ordinary people done out of a sense of loyalty?”

But the loyalty demanded by such regimes, by conquerors and oppressors, is not true loyalty. Loyalty can never be demanded, only chosen, as we shall see. And while loyalty can be used for both ill and good, this does not negate its great and honorable power when used for the latter.

What is Loyalty?

Like, courage, integrity, and personal responsibility, loyalty is one of the essential manly virtues. But like other lofty attributes, it is often easier to describe with examples than words. We know it in the soldier who will not leave a wounded comrade behind and dodges withering fire to bring the man to safety. We see it embodied in the prominent man who has women throw themselves at him when away from home, but who never strays from his wife, and in the religious martyr who chooses death over the disavowal of faith. And it is the bond that befuddles girlfriends who cannot understand why their beau is still friends with a childhood chum with whom he now seemingly shares little in common.

Josiah Royce, author of the 1920 book, The Philosophy of Loyalty, said loyalty was “the willing and practical and thoroughgoing devotion of a person to a cause.” Let’s unpack this definition:

Willing. Loyalty must born from your own choice and free will. It cannot be forced upon you by another person or organization. Loyalty must be chosen.

Practical and thoroughgoing devotion. Loyalty is not some pie in the sky abstraction. It must be coupled with action. Feeling and emotion can be part of loyalty, but action must always constitute the core.

To a cause. We often imagine loyalty as a bond between ourselves and individuals or organizations-with a friend, with a wife, with a church. Thus, when that individual entity changes and stops interesting us, we feel justified in breaking off our loyalty to it.

True loyalty must take as its cause something bigger than the individual; it must be rooted in principles, not people. Be not loyal to your buddy Eddie, but loyal to the idea of brotherhood and friendship. Be not loyal to your wife, but loyal to the idea of love and fidelity. Be not loyal to your sister but loyal to the sacred nature of familial bonds. Be not loyal to a church but loyal to the gospel.

Such unchanging principles must serve as the foundation of your loyalty. Thus, when people and organizations shift and change, your loyalty, anchored to immovable values, will remain steadfast.

To What Should We Be Loyal?

“Whenever, I say, such a cause so arouses your interest that it appears to you worthy to be served with all your might, with all your soul, with all your strength, then this cause awakens in you the spirit of loyalty. If you act out this spirit, you become, in fact, loyal.” -Josiah Royce

While we often think of loyalty as a somber duty, the causes which arouse your loyalty must be ones that fascinate and possess you, ones that reverberate in your being and invigorate your spirit.

The causes to which you choose to be loyal need not be dictated to you by your position or by tradition and can be entirely of your own creation. Choose causes which mirror your will and align with your core values and ideals, causes that so engross and engage both your heart and mind that you feel willing to make whatever sacrifices will be necessary to remain loyal and true.

The Decline of Loyalty

In time where individuality and personal freedom are the values du jour, loyalty is not celebrated with much frequency or gusto. Our intensely consumerist society has made us a nation of shoppers, not just for actual commercial goods, but in all aspects of our lives. With the myriad of choices available-from shampoos to professions-we are taught that happiness is a result of keeping one’s options open to the greatest possible degree. We are always on the hunt for a better deal, for an upgrade. Thus modern loyalty is a pale version of its ancient form. Sure we’re loyal……until something better comes along. We’re loyal…until we are given an excuse to bail. Of course this is not true loyalty at all. A loyal man commits to something with the idea that he is casting his lot with that cause in perpetuity.

Loyalty has also been weakened by our age of cynicism. As we have mentioned, loyalty requires a cause that invigorates and enlivens both heart and mind. Thus, idealizing your cause to a certain extent is necessary for loyalty. When we decide to be loyal, we are loyal to the very best in something, to the potential of something. We are fully aware of the warts of the cause, but these are not the things that animate our loyalty.

But our cynical age wishes to dwell only on the warts, to the eclipsing of anything good and virtuous about the cause. Cynicism crushes loyalty before it even has a chance to sprout up. When you speak of marriage, divorcees are waiting to intone about how outdated the institution is and how pointless the endeavor When you speak of country, naysayers immediately rattle off the latest news of government scandals. You cannot talk about a great man without someone jumping in to list their faults. There seems to be no room these days for someone who sees things as he hopes them to be, without being called naive and moronic. A cause needs some profundity and dignity for loyalty to thrive, and such space is currently hard to come by. But loyalty deserves a place even in our “sophisticated” modern age, as it offers a myriad of benefits to both the individual man and to society as a whole.

The Benefits of Loyalty

“Loyalty for the loyal man is not only a good, but for him chief amongst all the moral goods of his life, because it furnishes to him a personal solution of the hardest of human practical problems, the problem: “For what do I live? Why am I here? For what am I good? Why am I needed?” -Josiah Royce

We admire loyal men because they are filled with confidence, aim, direction, and purpose. We know what they are about and what we can expect from them. We know where they stand.

But loyalty may seem to be an archaic approach to life, one that will be detrimental to your personal happiness and fulfillment. Isn’t it good to always be willing to move on to something better and not be tied down to any one thing?

On the surface this makes sense, but it has been my experience that true happiness comes from committing to a cause bigger than yourself. And committing to that cause for the long haul. While society says that such absolute commitment is stifling, it’s really the endless shopping around mentality that’s leaving us unsatisfied. Here’s why:

Loyalty breeds satisfaction and happiness. Studies have shown that being able back out of our decisions makes us less happy than making “irreversible” decisions. For example, in one study students were told that they could pick one fine art print to take home with them. One group was told that the decision was final. The other group was told that they could return and exchange the print later if they so desired. While almost everyone in the second group said they were happy to have the option to return their print, almost none did. However, the second group ended up far less satisfied with their choice than the group that was not allowed to make exchanges. Why? Because with the option to reverse their decision always in the back of their minds, they could not move forward and put in the important psychological work to accept and enjoy their decision.

Thus, while it may seem risky to commit our loyalty to something for the long haul, it can be quite psychologically rewarding. In trading quantity for quality, you will come to know the rich satisfactions available only to those who are willing to go in-depth with something, sticking with it through thick and thin.

Loyalty lessens the amount of uncertainty in your life. In a previous article, we talked about the way in which having too many choices can paralyze us into unhappiness and inaction. One of the ways to mitigate this effect is to purposely limit our choices. There are some choices in life we can make once and never have to make again. Once you know where you stand in life, you don’t have to reinvent the wheel every time you are faced with certain choices.

Loyalty breeds loyalty. Of course living a life of loyalty does not garner merely personal benefits. It can positively transform society as a whole. Loyalty is contagious. As we lives of loyalty we encourage other men to do likewise. As Royce argues, we should act “as to further the general confidence of man in man.”

Loyal men can change the world. When good men bail out of organizations that they feel have gotten off-track, it simply becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. There are no shortage of problems with everything from family to politics, but if loyal men don’t stick around and work from within to be a force of positive change, these institutions will never improve. Loyal men transform causes from the inside out.

Individualism, Free Will, and Loyalty

Perhaps the greatest impediment to our embrace of loyalty is the worry that we will lose some of our free will in the pursuit of it. After all, once you are dedicated to a cause, you are committed to acting in a certain way. But loyalty and individuality need not be at odds. Rather than submerge one’s individuality, loyalty can elevate and exalt the self.

The greatest and most difficult of philosophical tasks is it to discover and understand our own will. We first look inside of ourselves, but it is hard to find answers from gazing within. So we then look to conform with the rest of society. But doing so only highlights our differences with others and our desire to rebel from certain social norms. We then return to looking within ourselves for answers, and the cycle continues.

Loyalty can unify this conflict between individuality and social conformity, between our inner and outer worlds. Loyalty gives to man an external cause, an external purpose and course of action. But the decision to serve that cause is created from inner reasons, which glorify and inspire the self. In manifesting our inner values in an external way, we intensely feel the self, which is now imbued with power, value, and dignity. Royce argued:

“Thus loyalty. . . solves the paradox of our ordinary existence, by showing us outside of ourselves the cause which is to be served, and inside of ourselves the will which delights to do this service, and which is not thwarted but enriched and expressed in such service.”

When Are We Justified in Being Disloyal?

Perhaps the most difficult question to grapple with concerning loyalty is answering the question of when a man is justified in breaking his loyalty. Is a loyalty that has loopholes even loyalty at all?

Many men misunderstand loyalty as dependent on a tit for tat relationship. They see their relationships as a scale; as long as both sides remain balanced, they remain loyal. But as soon as the scale tips unfavorably to where they are sacrificing more than they are getting in return, they feel justifed in breaking their loyalty. But true loyalty is not a function of reciprocity.

You should strive to stay loyal until all the work you can do for your cause is finished, which may not come until the end of your life. Of course in between now and then your cause may change , and you be tempted to be bail and say, “I’m not going to let this cause tell me what to do!” But remember, you chose the cause. You proposed, you got baptized, you joined the army. In so choosing, you also chose to accept whatever crap would later come down the line. You knew the risks in pledging your loyalty, and you willing accepted those risks. What good is a loyalty that swells in the midst of pomp and ceremony only to shrink in the trenches?

On the other hand, a cause should never become your conscience. And what does a man do when his cause violates that conscience, when it violates his core values? The first time it happens are you justified in being disloyal? After 7 times 70 times? Never? Is there any honor in taking great abuse from your wayward cause or is to remain in an offensive situation a disavowal of your manliness?

Here is where I’d like readers to pick up the discussion. What role does loyalty have to play in a man’s life and in modern society? And when is a man justified in being disloyal?

Source: The Philosophy of Loyalty by Josiah Royce, 1920

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Most of us spend our vacations in predictable fashion.  We pack up and head off to Disney World for a week, or we spend a few days at the hunting cabin with the boys, or we throw the kids in the van and speed off to Yellowstone.  While our holiday choices are often wide ranging, there is usually a common theme: Time to get away, relax, and have some “me” time. And what’s wrong with that?  Absolutely nothing.  Chances are you work a hard job with long hours, and you’ve likely earned a little pampering and relaxation.  The problem is, at the end of that vacation you are right back where you started, often with nothing more to show for it than an empty wallet and a sunburn.  Now the holiday is over, you’re back to work, and the countdown to next year’s vacation begins.  Isn’t there a better way you could have spent that time?

“The only gift is a portion of thyself.”

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

The most rewarding way to spend your time is to reach out and help your fellow man.  It’s a strange paradox, but the guy who uses his day off to rebuild his elderly neighbor’s dilapidated front porch feels way better about himself and his life than the guy who spent his day waiting in line for Space Mountain.  And yet, at the same time, no one should be asked to selflessly sacrifice all of their time away from the grind of the working world.  After all, everybody needs a break every once in a while.  Fortunately, there is a happy medium that allows us to help others while still enjoying our time off:  Adventure Philanthropy.

“What we have done for ourselves alone dies with us; what we have done for others and the world remains and is immortal.”

-Albert Pike

Adventure philanthropy opportunities are essentially volunteer projects or events which provide support either to a charitable organization or directly to a targeted cause while providing a memorable adventure or challenge for the volunteers themselves.  Adventure philanthropy can be broken down into two basic categories, each with endless opportunities for you and yours to help those in need, all while experiencing the adventure of a lifetime.

Extreme Event Sponsorship

For the thrill seekers among us, extreme event sponsorship may be just what the doctor ordered.  Essentially, a volunteer or group of volunteers takes on an extreme challenge (such as completing an Ironman race, climbing a difficult mountain, etc) and then enlists sponsors who donate money in support of their efforts, with all funds going to a designated charity.  Such events are often organized by the charities themselves, removing much of the logistical burden from the volunteer’s shoulders.  Below you will find just a few common options for extreme event volunteering, with literally thousands more being just a Google search away.

Climb Kilimanjaro

Run a Marathon

Trek the Great Wall of China

Climb to Everest Base Camp

Skydive

Adventure Racing

Volunteer Vacations

Let’s face it, marathons and mountain climbs aren’t for everyone.  For the less “extreme” among us who are still looking to help out while having a bit of adventure, another option exists.  Volunteer vacations (both domestic and international) offer participants the chance to step far out of their comfort zones and fully immerse themselves in another culture, all the while working in conjunction with a chosen organization in an effort to improve the everyday lives of the people within that culture.  Packages are often all inclusive and are organized by the volunteer travel company.  Some examples of volunteer vacations include:

Spending a week in Uganda helping build a school or church

Assisting in the remodeling of an orphanage in Rio de Janeiro

Spend the week volunteering at a Habitat for Humanity home building site

Choosing Your Charity

The first step in taking on an extreme charity challenge or volunteer vacation is to choose the charity or cause that you want your efforts to benefit.  If you are taking on an extreme challenge and you plan on raising funds for a specific charity, choosing your organization is easy.  Simply decide on a cause that you feel compelled to support, compile a list of charities dedicated to that cause, and then gather more information on the charities on your list so that you can make an educated decision.  Once you have narrowed your selection down to a few favorites, be sure to check out your options on Charity Navigator, a charity evaluation website which gives you full access to every registered charity’s expenditures, including specific information on how much of the funds raised in the name of the charity go directly to the charity’s projects.

For those who want to avoid the logistical elements of planning your own trip or event, several charities organize extreme challenge and volunteer vacation packages for small groups which take much of the planning burden off of the volunteers, allowing them to focus on fundraising and preparation.  If you have a specific charity in mind, contact them to see if they already have programs like this in place, and if not, if they would be willing to help you organize one.  Also, check the bottom of this post for a list of links that will get you started.

Raising Your Sponsorship Money

Typically (though not always) those who are embarking on a volunteer vacation pay their own way.  Most volunteer vacations are considered a substitute for a normal vacation, so the cost is usually similar to what you would expect to pay to be on holiday for the same length of time.  Challenge events, on the other hand, are specifically designed to be funded through the personal fundraising efforts of the volunteer. There are lots of options for raising your money, the only real limit being how creative you can be.  Here’s a few to get you started:

Host a charity car wash

Street collecting around the holidays (A great excuse to break in your Santa outfit)

Supermarket bag packing

Sponsor a quiz night at a local pub/bar

Organize a neighborhood yard sale

My Challenge Event Fundraising Experience

I recently spent about three weeks in Tanzania, where I and a team of college age students climbed Mount Kilimanjaro in the name of Childreach International, a London-based charity whose mission  includes the construction and improvement of primary and vocational training schools in the Kilimanjaro region in Tanzania and elsewhere.  In order to join the climb, all the members of the team had to raise 2200 British Pounds (about $3500) each.  From that amount, the charity guaranteed us that at minimum, 50% of the total would go directly to the charity, and likely a great deal more, depending on how cheap they could purchase plane tickets, find accommodation, etc.  In addition, all money raised above and beyond the initial £2200 would go directly to the charity.  I was provided with an account for a fundraising website where people could donate, so I never had to handle any of the money personally.  From the moment someone donated on my page, the money was transferred directly to the charity.

To raise the funds, I wrote formal appeals to close friends and family members first.  Once those resources had been exhausted, I branched out and appealed to several local businesses at home and at school, offering them sponsorship opportunities that would double as advertising exposure.  Finally, I made a good bit of the money by volunteering as a charity bag packer at a local grocery store, where I would pack customer’s groceries for them, usually inspiring them to drop their spare change or a buck or two in my charity bucket at the end of the register.

Other members of my group tried a few different fundraising methods.  A popular fundraiser that many had success with was organizing a pub crawl and charging a flat rate for anyone who wanted in, a portion of which went to their fundraising and the rest of which covered the crawl.  Several members held charity concerts where they convinced local bands to play for free or cheap with gate fees benefitting the charity, and one guy even organized a speed dating night which turned out to be very successful as well.

Have an Adventure While Helping the World

The world outside your comfort zone is waiting for you.  It’s filled with exhilaration and adventure, but more importantly, it’s filled with people who need your help.  In tough economic times like these when we’re focused on looking out for ourselves and riding out the storm, it’s harder to think about helping others.  Remember, however, that the majority of the world’s population lives their daily lives in a state of poverty that most of us cannot even comprehend, let alone relate to.  Helping those in need is easier than you think, and with a little creativity it can even turn into quite the adventure. 

“Often I go into some distant region of the world to be reminded of who I really am.  There is no mystery about why this should be so.  Stripped of your ordinary surroundings, your friends, your daily routines…you are forced into direct experience.  Such direct experience inevitably makes you aware of who it is that is having the experience.  That is not always comfortable, but it is always invigorating.”

-Michael Crichton

Interested?  Here’s some links for various organizations that organize or compile extreme fundraising challenges or volunteer vacations:

Global Vision International

Charity Challenge (United Kingdom)

Marathon for the Cure

Charity Mile

Skydive4Free

Volunteer International

Volunteers for Peace

Service Civil International

Responsible Travel

Habitat for Humanity

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• How Manly Men Can Fight Poverty
• Balancing Work and Family
• The Benefits of a Gap Year

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“The Captain had gone, Commander Peary and I were alone (save for the four Esquimos), the same as we had been so often in the past years, and as we looked at each other we realized our position and we knew without speaking that the time had come for us to demonstrate that were the men who, it has been ordained, should unlock the door which held the mystery of the Arctic.” -Matthew Henson

When you think of history’s great Arctic explorers, what names spring to mind? Ernest Shackleton? Robert Peary? How about Matthew Henson?

Matthew who?

While Robert Edwin Peary’s name has come down to us as the first to set foot on the northernmost part of the world (although not without controversy), the story of the man who truly made that expedition possible has often been overlooked.

For a long time, what lay at the very top of the world was a complete mystery. Was there land there? Just ocean? Was it a place inhabited by mystical monsters and sea creatures? Even as an accurate picture of the North Pole began to emerge-that it was essentially composed of floating ice-the race to claim this piece of unexplored frontier remained fiercely competitive.

Robert Peary’s hunger for the Pole, and for fame, was insatiable. He made 7 grueling Arctic expeditions between 1886 and 1909. The only man who accompanied him on each of those expeditions was Matthew Henson. Together they faced the harshest of Arctic challenges and together they planted the American flag at the Pole.

But Peary, who author Fergus Fleming called “the most unpleasant man in the annals of polar exploration,” had no interest in sharing the glory of the accomplishment with any other man, especially a black man. Years before his quest for the Pole commenced, Peary had written to his mother, “I must be the peer or superior of those about me to be comfortable.”

And Henson made Peary very uncomfortable indeed. While Peary viewed him as an inferior, it was Henson who was essentially the de facto leader of the Polar expeditions-Henson who took care of the other men, dogs, and supplies; Henson who spoke the Eskimo language; Henson who fixed the sledges (tough sleds) and used those sledges to pull Peary, who’s walking ability was hampered by the loss of 8 of his toes to frostbite on a previous expedition, to and from the Pole. Without the skills of Matthew Henson, the American flag would not likely have been the first atop the world.

Yet during the 1909 expedition, Peary had secretly planned to leave Henson behind once they got close to the Pole, so that he could claim farthest north all for himself. But the expedition made better time than he realized (it’s hard to keep track when you’re laying in a sled), and the team landed at the Pole before he had a chance to ditch the others.

Crestfallen that he had to share the glory of the moment with 4 Eskimos and a black man, Peary immediately ceased to speak to Henson, the man who had saved his life on a previous expedition and had remained absolutely loyal to him for 22 years when every other member of the expeditions had left because of Peary’s insufferable personality and demands. Unwilling to share the resulting fame, Peary forbade Henson to write, lecture, or grant interviews about the expedition. Henson had used his own camera to take 100 pictures on the trip and used his own money to develop them. Peary asked to borrow these pictures and then never gave them back.

Of course, this left Peary free to lecture and write in abundance, and paint himself at the sole hero of the expedition, effectively eclipsing Henson’s role. But Henson deserves a place in the pantheon of the world’s greatest explorers and from his life we can glean several important lessons in manliness.

Don’t settle for your lot in life. Matthew Henson was born in 1866 in Maryland. Before he would turn 7, both of his parents passed away, and he was sent to live with an uncle. Even at the tender age of 12, Henson knew he wanted more from life then the largely menial jobs available to African-Americans of the time. The young lad struck out for Baltimore and headed for the docks. He got hired on a ship as a cabin boy and sailed for China. Life on the ocean suited him well, and he spent the next several years of his life sailing all around the world, learning manly skills and the virtue of hardihood.

When Peary met Henson in 1888, he was duly impressed with this experienced seaman and his “greater than average intelligence and pluck.” After the two spent some time exploring South America, Peary asked Henson to accompany him on their first Arctic expedition in 1891; Henson accepted.

By constantly broadening his horizons, Henson made a habit of defying expectations. Slavery had been abolished less than 30 years before, and not only did racism keep African-Americans from most pursuits, it was widely believed that blacks could not survive in the harsh cold of the Arctic climate. Henson would boldly prove otherwise.

Immerse yourself in the culture. While Peary was one of the first explorers to incorporate many of the Eskimo ways of traveling and dressing, and while he fathered a child with an Eskimo woman (as did Henson), he saw that people as a race of inferior children. He never bothered to learn their language. Henson, on the other hand, spent much of his time getting to know the Eskimos and enjoying their culture. He became fluent in Inuit, likely making him the only American at the time to know that language. He respected them and they respected him:

“Many and many a time, for periods covering more than twelve months, I have been to all intents an Esquimo, with Esquimos for companions, speaking their language, dressing in their clothing, living in the same kind of dens, eating the same food, enjoying their pleasures, and frequently sharing their griefs. I have come to love these people. I know every man, woman, and child in their tribe. They are my friends and they regard me as theirs.”

Understanding the Eskimo culture allowed Henson to communicate with the Eskimos who accompanied them on the expeditions and pick up valuable survival tips that helped make the expedition a success. To this very day, the Inuit of Greenland still tell stories and sing of Mahripaluq (“Matt, the kind one”).

Cultivate true grit. While we often romanticize the lives of great explorers, the reality of day to day life on an expedition was bleak and grueling. At the northern most part of the world, temperatures would drop to 60 degrees below zero, with winds capable of making it feel like 125 below. These same winds would pick up 100 pound rocks and hurl them through the air, smashing and killing men in the blink of any eye.

And while you might imagine the Pole as a sheet of flat ice, it’s actually studded with 60-100 foot high ridges and dotted with sections of “rubble-ice” which had to be cleared away with pickaxes and was capable of splitting the sledges into several pieces. The men traveled for 13 hours at a time, with the ice stretching as far as the eye could see. While the march itself was physically draining, the men actually preferred moving over sleeping. Sleeping in igloos on blankets right on top of the snow, the men would wake up every hour and have to beat their extremities to keep the circulation going. And the noise of howling wind and cracking ice was positively deafening.

When they would come to a lead (an open channel of water between the ice), they would be forced to wait for the temperature to drop and a thin layer of ice to form. Then they would carefully cross with their dogs and sledges, watching little cracks appear, barely able to breathe knowing the next step could plunge them through the ice and to a freezing death in the water. Henson did take a dip once but was luckily pulled immediately out of the water. As soon as he changed clothes, he was off on the march once more.

It takes a man of grit to face down these obstacles, but Henson had the right stuff.

Cultivate your drive. Clearly, Arctic exploration was no picnic. Just one of these grueling expeditions would sap most men’s motivation to ever leave home again; that Henson was able to overcome the pull of home and hearth not once but 7 separate times is a testament to his drive and resolve. That resolve would be sorely tested time and time again, but probably no more so than on an expedition to reach the northeastern border of Greenland in 1895. When the team departed Anniversary Lodge, they had 3 sledges and thirty-seven dogs. When they returned 3 months later, they had 1 sledge and 1 dog left. Ragged, hungry, frozen, and exhausted, Henson described the harrowing experience as a “long race with death.” It took him months to regain his health afterward. When he left in a ship back to the States he resolutely vowed to never, ever again leave his “happy home in warmer lands.” But when summer came around several months later, he was once more northward bound with Peary.

Of the many bright-eyed men who joined the expeditions with gusto only to quit halfway through, he said,“I have seen too many enthusiastic starters, and I am sorry to say some of them did not finish well.” Not Henson. He saw the quest through to the end and would not be deterred until the goal was attained.

Feed your body and your mind. Henson understood that mental strength was just as important as physical strength when facing life’s challenges. Man cannot live on pemmican alone. When he wasn’t working, he spent the long dark nights of the Arctic winter with his books. On the voyage to Greenland and the initial stages of the expedition, he brought along books by Peary himself, Dicken’s Bleak House, Kipling’s Barrack Room Ballads, and the poems of Thomas Hood. When supplies had to be reduced for the final push, he packed just the Bible in his sledge. During the journey, Henson traded books with the other men and engaged in lively literary debates around the campfire. Henson was also a religious journal keeper, making entries whenever time and conditions allowed.

Make yourself indispensable. To the naysayers who criticized the inclusion of a black man on a Arctic expedition, Henson didn’t have to say a word; he simply went to work. Henson was an Arctic Renaissance man. Booker T. Washington, a Henson admirer, summed it up well:

“During the twenty-three years in which he was the companion of the explorer he not only had time and opportunity to perfect himself in his knowledge of the books, but he acquired a good practical knowledge of everything that was a necessary part of the daily life in the ice-bound wilderness of polar exploration. He was at times a blacksmith, a carpenter, and a cook. He was thoroughly acquainted with the life, customs, and the language of the Esquimos. He himself built the sledges with which the journey to the Pole was successfully completed. He could not merely drive a dog-team or skin a musk-ox with the skill of a native, but he was something of a navigator as well. In this way Mr. Henson made himself not only the most trusted but the most useful member of the expedition.”

In addition to the skills BTW mentions, can also be added Henson’s talents in trading, hunting, dog-training, barbering, tailoring, and soldering. He made repairs to the sledges every day, and when the ice shattered them into pieces, he could create a new working sledge from the remnants. And he did it all while Arctic storms raged around him. He taught himself these skills by carefully observing others and trying it out until he had it mastered.

In the 1920 issue of National Geographic, Admiral Donald B. MacMillan said, “He was indispensable to Peary and of more real value than the combined services of all four White men.” This indispensability, coupled with manly grit and determination, guaranteed him a place on the expedition and in the history books.

Sources:

A Negro Explorer at the North Pole, the autobiography of Matthew Henson

Ninety Degrees North by Fergus Flemin

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“Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.” - Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Spring Break of my freshman year of college I went on a 4-day backpacking trip in the Gila Wilderness of New Mexico.  My partner in adventure, Lucas, was a former Wyoming backpacking guide turned potter-philosopher, the perfect companion for days wandering the woods processing what comes about with the sudden cleaving from the static of modern living.  A year prior we had traipsed around Wrangell-St. Elias National Park in Alaska on a 14-day trip that cemented our friendship…and wanderlust.

While discussing the details of the Gila trip, we decided to challenge ourselves to go ultralight.  The total weight of our gear, including backpack, could not exceed 20lbs.  It seemed fairly simple, but after pulling out my backpack I was shocked to learn that I’d been carrying around 50lbs of gadgets, gizmos and outdoor accoutrement on previous trips.  Shuddering at the ridiculousness of trying to take so much of the world with me when the point was to leave it behind, I began to scrub my packing list.

I started with a quick kill of substituting a one-man bivouac sac (1lb 10oz) for the two-man tent (9lbs) I had previously carried.  Next was less clothing, a foam pad instead of an inflatable one, a small aluminum pot rather than a cooking set, etc….it took a while, but I finally got it down to 20lbs.  Then the “what if’s” began to flood my mind.  What if we got stuck out there for longer?  What if we didn’t have enough food, clothing, and emergency gear?  I threw in a few extra granola bars just to calm my nerves.

After one day on the trail my fears were alleviated, and Lucas and I knew we were on to something big – the benefits of going ultralight far outweighed any losses in comfort or feelings of security.  Nights around the fire were previously spent nursing sore bodies; now we felt great.  The amount of mileage we comfortably traveled in a day doubled as we found ourselves jogging down small sections of the trail when we got restless.  Scrambling up steep sections would have been slow torture with 50lbs on our backs; now we were able to go explore remote areas that offered the best scenic views.

After 4-days we had covered over 25-miles, but it had seemed much less.  To say the trip went well would be an understatement – in going ultralight we had unexpectedly discovered the benefits of minimalism – simplicity, efficiency and freedom.

The Goods Life

“The things you own end up owning you.” -Tyler Durden, Fight Club

It had been 7 years since my Gila trip and life had moved forward.  There was now a wife, baby, and career.  I found myself roaming the halls of our newly-built 3-bed, 2-bath suburban home fuming that we didn’t have enough storage space.  During college I could carry everything I owned in the back of my Dodge pickup.  Now 1,600 square feet was not adequate to house our growing collection of stuff.  Something was wrong with this picture.  How had I accumulated so many random things in such a short period?

I wondered, “Had men in the past confronted this suffocating malady?”  Somehow I couldn’t imagine John Wayne wondering where to put his new artisan wine rack.

My father came to mind.  His possessions never occupied a greater place in his life than seemed due.  As a boy I used to sit on the bed watching him as he went through his end-of-day routine.  Cuff links, handkerchief, pocket knife, wallet – each used on a daily basis, each set in their proper place on top of his dresser.  Yes, my dad had “things,” but only what he needed and nothing more.  Like a well-seasoned outdoorsman, he understood exactly what was necessary to survive, each tool having a specific purpose.  Granted, my father was a lawyer so his days were spent surviving the jungles of the courtroom rather than those of some remote continent, but the manliness of his effortless utility left a great impression on me even then.

Thinking about men I admired, it dawned on me that most had a quiet contempt towards any excess of material possessions. Their expertise and confidence were displayed by the fact that they did not require much to live successfully. They could just as easily get along for a week in the woods with nothing but a knife as they could living in a posh suburban neighborhood with all its amenities. Possessions had no control over the trajectory of their lives. They were not gadget junkies, seeking their fix from the latest Best Buy sale.  They were in control of the things they owned, not the other way around.  Real manliness meant freedom from the bondage of material goods.

Inspiration charged through my blood, but then came the inevitable “now what?”  I wanted to shatter the bonds of materialist slavery, but how did that idea translate into real life, with all its strollers, high-definition t.v.’s and bread makers?  As I searched for answers…and storage space, I stumbled upon my backpack and was immediately reminded of Lucas and my adventures.  Like a bolt of suburban-lightening, a thought came to me:

Just as I needed to scrub my packing list for the Gila trip, my lifestyle of uber-consumption needed a similar scrubbing.  Simplicity, efficiency and freedom weren’t just for outdoor adventures, they were for the in-between times as well.

Learning to Live the Minimalist Life

“Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity! I say let your affairs be as one, two, three and not a hundred or a thousand… We are happy in proportion to the things we can do without.” – Henry David Thoreau.

Lucas and I had uncovered a more efficient way to backpack; I needed a more efficient way for my family and I to live.  Surfing the internet for others with similar problems, I found blog after blog praising the benefits of the minimalist lifestyle.  It appeared that our family wasn’t the only one fed up with the constant accumulation of things.

After reading tales of people taking positive action to reduce the amount of clutter in their lives, I ended up at the blog of Mr. Zen Habits himself, Leo Babauta.  The man whose blog has brought the art of less to thousands had just written an e-book, “The Simple Guide to a Minimalist Life,” where he answered the question, “what is the minimalist lifestyle?” with the following,

It’s one that is stripped of the unnecessary, to
make room for that which gives you joy.

It’s a removal of clutter in all its forms,
leaving you with peace and freedom and
lightness.

A minimalist eschews the mindset of more, of
acquiring and consuming and shopping, of
bigger is better, of the burden of stuff.

A minimalist instead embraces the beauty of
less, the aesthetic of spareness, a life of
contentedness in what we need and what
makes us truly happy.

A minimalist realizes that acquiring stuff
doesn’t make us happy. That earning more
and having more are meaningless. That
filling your life with busy-ness and
freneticism isn’t desirable, but something to
be avoided.

A minimalist values quality, not quantity, in
all forms.

The last point stuck.  The great men I knew didn’t care about having much, but what they did possess had value.  Whether by connection to a time, place, or person, the things in their life meant something.  An old pocket watch, a beautifully engraved humidor, a good pair of work boots that had lasted a lifetime — ageless, well-crafted…quality.  And though they had value, the possessions of these men were held onto loosely.  They seemed to understand that like a handful of sand, the tighter you squeeze the less you can hold.

At the end of my life what would my children and their children find as they searched through my belongings?  Boxes upon boxes of useless crap, once trendy and exciting, now just a burden to be thrown out?  Or a few heart-felt belongings to be passed down through generations?  Not things by which to be held captive, but meaningful items to be used, enjoyed and eventually passed on to someone else.

And so I began going through each room of my house, searching for one item to throw or give away.  It wasn’t life-changing, but it was a start. With each room I began to realize that many of the things I had purchased with such anticipation and fanfare had quickly been relegated to a dark corner of the closet as their novelty wore off, never to be touched again.  I knew that possessions didn’t equal happiness, but it was apparent that I had been learning this lesson over and over again for the past several years.  Each small step towards a life of less felt like a powerful blow to what had become a vicious cycle.

So, you ask, is throwing away a few old books or t-shirts every once and in awhile all it means to be a minimalist?  Hardly. While decluttering your life is a great place to start, minimalism is about changing one’s whole approach to life and opting out of the race to accumulate more.  Advertising convinces us of needs we didn’t know existed and exploits our emptiness by promising fulfillment for a few easy payments of $19.99.  The shopping mall has become our temple, the credit card our burnt offering…yet, the sacrifice is never sufficient for salvation.  Being a minimalist means one simply quits buying in.  The following are the principles of living the minimalist life as laid out by Babauta:

Leo’s Principles of Living the Minimalist Life

1.  Omit needless things. Notice this doesn’t say to omit everything.  Just needless things.

2.  Identify the essential. What’s most important to you?  What makes you happy?  What will have the highest impact on your life, your career?

3. Make everything count. Whatever you do or keep in your life, make it worthy of keeping.  Make it really count.

4.  Fill your life with joy. Don’t just empty your life.  Put something wonderful in it.

5.  Edit, edit.  Minimalism isn’t an end point.  It’s a constant process of editing, revisiting, editing some more.

I would add the following:

6.  Hold on loosely. Even to your prized possessions.  At the end of the day its relationships, not possessions, that make life worth living.

It’s simple, not easy.  But the rewards of digging into the minimalist life are there for anyone willing to take a few small steps each day.  Of course, most will choose to continue their present habits, but as for me and my house, we’ve chosen a life of less…and in doing so have gained so much more.

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The buddy movie represents an uniquely American genre of cinema. Instead of a male-female romantic couple being the focus of the story, buddy movies center on the relationship between two heterosexual males. Buddy movies are unabashedly about male bonding and friendship, and they all pretty much follow the same script.  Two or more men with different personalities or backgrounds are thrown together. At first they don’t get along because of their differences, but by the end of the movie they work through their issues and become best buddies.  For the most part, buddy movies have been comedies that use the contrasting personalities of the male leads to set up gags, but writers and directors have also used the buddy movie to explore issues of race, class, homosexuality, and religion as it relates to masculinity.

Below, we’ve listed 15 of the best buddy movies ever made. If you’re looking to do something on your next guy’s night, consider renting one of these classics that pay homage to male friendship.

Grumpy Old Men

There are several sub-genres within the buddy movie genre itself, including the geriatric buddy film. Grumpy Old Men is arguably the best entry in this category. Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon team up to play two grizzled friends who love to hate each other. They fought since they were kids. You never know why, you only know they despise each other. Things only heat up when an attractive older woman (played by Ann Margaret) moves into the neighborhood. Despite their outward disgust with each other, the two men deeply care for one another. Filled with great one-liners and lots of charming old music, Grumpy Old Men makes a great movie to watch with grandpa.

Swingers

Swingers reminds you of why it’s so important for a man to have friends. Mike (Jon Favreau) is a comedian in L.A. who has hit a real rough patch in his life. His longtime girlfriend back in Queens dumped him, he can’t land any gigs, and he hasn’t a shred of self-esteem left.  Thankfully, Mike has a group of friends who rally around him and work to get him back on his feet. A svelte and young Vince Vaughn plays the fast-talking wise guy friend who peps Mike up and tries to convince him about how money he is. Mike’s friend Rob (Ron Livingston) offers more sage advice and acts as a sounding board for his downtrodden buddy. Thanks to his friends, Mike finally gets his act together and rebounds from his doldrums.

Road To Morocco

During the late 30’s and early 40’s, Bing Crosby and Bob Hope starred in a series of road movies that didn’t include much in the way of plot. I think the films were basically an excuse to get Bing Crosby to sing and Bob Hope to crack some jokes. Despite their lack of depth, the Road to… movies are a joy to watch. They’re fun, lighthearted, and don’t take themselves very seriously. Out of all the Road movies, Road to Morocco is the best. The friendship and chemistry between Crosby and Hope is legendary. Check it out.

Lethal Weapon

Lethal Weapon is a perfect example of another sub-genre of the buddy movie: the cop buddy movie. Mel Gibson plays Sergeant Martin Rigs, a loose cannon maverick cop that takes risks that verge on the suicidal. Danny Glover plays the veteran, risk averse cop. For some reason, the fates bring these two polar opposites together as partners. At first, they can’t stand each other, but as the film progresses, the two develop a bond and chemistry that’s both comedic and warming. This movie has it all- classic lines like Danny Glover’s “I’m getting too old for this sh**,” an albino villain played by Gary Busey, and of course, an example of a solid male friendship.

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid

Paul Newman plays Butch Cassidy, the fast talking wise guy friend. Robert Redford plays the Sundance Kid, the sort-of-serious friend. They were “outlaws with style in a class all their own.” Old Butch and Sundance did everything together: they robbed trains together, looted banks together, and ran away from Union Pacific security posse together. Heck, they even shared the same woman (we don’t recommend that-a clear violation of the man code). Yes, Butch and Sundance were like brothers. The final scene pretty much sums up the friendship between the two. I won’t spoil it for those who haven’t seen it. Rent it and watch it today with a bud

Shawshank Redemption

Shawshank Redemption isn’t your typical buddy movie. While most buddy movies are comedies, the laughs in Shawshank Redemption are few and far between. Tim Robbins plays Andy Dufresne,  a white banker from Maine who is wrongly convicted of murdering his wife. Morgan Freeman plays Red, a black man who’s been in jail for years for a crime he committed as a teenager. In normal life, the two probably would never have been friends, but within Shawshank’s old stonewalls, they form a friendship that will last a lifetime.

Abbot and Costello Meet Frankenstein

Like Cosby and Hope, Abbot and Costello starred in a series of comedic buddy films during the 1940s. The Abbot and Costello Meet… films usually had Abbot and Costello confronting one of the monsters from Universal Studio’s classic monster films. Out of all of them, Abbot and Costello Meet Frankenstein is definitely the best. Dracula and Frankenstein end up in the United States. Dracula needs to find a new brain for Frankenstein and decides that Costello’s would be a good one. Hilarity ensues. There’s nothing really deep about the friendship between Abbot and Costello; it’s just a good reminder that a best friend can make any situation fun, even when a monster is after your brain.

I Love You, Man

Making friends is difficult for the modern man. Because of work, dating, and family commitments, guys often lose touch with their buds. In I Love You, Man, Peter Klaven (Paul Rudd) is a young real estate agent in LA who’s about to marry his dream girl. Problem is Peter doesn’t have any male friends he can ask to be his best man. But his lack of a best man is the least of his problems. With no other males in his life, Peter has lost touch with his manliness. All that changes when he meets Sydney Fife (Jason Segel). Sydney is honest, comfortable in his own skin, and relishes being a man. Sure, Sydney’s conception of manliness is a little oafish, but it’s exactly what Peter needs to shake of the wussification that has held him bound and reconnect with his masculinity. This movie is crammed with laugh out loud moments, lots of memorable quotes, and dialogue and situations that really ring true. Slapping the bass!

48 Hours

Cue the awesome synth music. 48 Hours inspired the cop buddy movies of the 80’s and early 90’s (see Lethal Weapon). Funny thing is, only one of the lead characters was actually a cop. Nick Nolte plays Jack Cates, a gruff, chain-smoking, by the book cop who’s out for revenge after a notorious murderer kills several of his comrades. To help him track down the murderer, Cates enlists the help of a fast-talking con-man named Reggie Hammond (Eddie Murphy). The mismatch, like in every other cop buddy movie, creates a comedic gold mine.

The Man Who Would Be King

This buddy movie has two things going for it from the get go. First, it’s based off a short story by Rudyard Kipling. And second, the two leading men are Sean Connery and Michael Caine, two bad ass actors in their prime. The story follows two British soldiers who decide to leave the army and become kings of a remote place in India that no white man has set foot in since Alexander the Great. They decide it would be easier to subdue the village if they convince the villagers that one of them is a god. Daniel (Sean Connery) takes on the god role, but the power quickly goes to his head and causes the ruin of him and his friend. The ending of the film is amazing and captures what friendship is all about: unwavering loyalty.

The Defiant Ones

Two inmates get an unexpected shot at escape. But alas, they’re chained together. Oh, and one of them is black (Sidney Poitier) and one’s white (Tony Curtis). And it’s the late 1950s. Can somebody say “racial tension?” During the course of the movie, the two men are able to put aside their differences and work together to become free. They even become buddies by the end. At its core, The Defiant Ones is about the ability of a man’s heart to change and the loyalty among men when faced with dire circumstances.

Some Like It Hot

Don’t adjust your sets-that ain’t a couple of broads

Two out of work musicians witness the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre and have to flee for their lives from the mobsters who want them silenced. They don’t have the money to make it to Florida, so they do what any desperate man on the lam would: put on a dress and high heels and join an all woman’s orchestra. Jack Lemmon plays Jerry (aka Daphne) and Tony Curtis stars as Joe (aka Josephine). Of course with two red blooded American men disguised as women in an all women’s review, there’s bound to be some serious sexual tension going on, especially when one of the members of the group happens to be Marilyn Monroe. Zoinks! Some argue that Some Like It Hot is cinema’s greatest comedy. Whether the movie is worthy of such a title or not, it’s certainly a great buddy film.

The Odd Couple

Why is that sometimes the person who irritates us the most ends up becoming our best friend? Well, that irony is at the heart of The Odd Couple.  Felix Unger’s (Jack Lemmon) wife leaves him, so he goes to live with his long time buddy, Oscar Madison (Walter Matthau). But tension sets in as the two quickly discover their opposite personalities clash like polka dots and stripes. Felix is an uptight neat freak who’s always cleaning. Oscar is a grumpy slob who revels in his filth. You can see where this is going. The chemistry between Lemmon and Matthau is fantastic; the dialogue is hilarious.  See the Grumpy Old Men before they were just plain grumpy.

Silver Streak

While on a cross-country train ride, George Caldwell (Gene Wilder) finds himself accused of a crime he didn’t commit. With the help of a thief (Richard Pryor), George sets out to clear his name and save the girl of his dreams from the villain who actually committed the crime.  Wilder and Pryor are hilarious together. Of course when you have a white guy and black guy teaming up together in the 1970s, racism will be a subject of the film. But Silver Streak uses comedy to show the audience how stupid racial stereotypes and bigotry is. The most memorable scene in the movie has to be when Pryor tries to teach Wilder how to “walk black.”  Of course, Wilder ends up looking like a goofy white guy trying to be hip, resulting in comedic gold.

The Sting

A classic caper movie set in 1936 Chicago. Two Chicago con artists (Newman and Redford) set out to avenge the murder of a mutual friend, only to find themselves in a high-stakes game against the master of all cheating mobsters (Robert Shaw). The rapport between Newman and Redford in The Sting is similar to the one they had in Butch Cassidy: easy-going, light-hearted, but fiercely loyal.

Know of any other good buddy movies that didn’t make our list? Share them with us in the comments!

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As a writer, an historian, an officer in the British army, an artist, a consummate statesman, and a man who understood the pleasures of a fine cigar and a handsome suit, Winston Churchill was one of the world’s last true renaissance men. High on the list of his many notable talents was his gift for moving and eloquent oratory. His mastery of words gave him equal skill in rousing a nation to action and putting a brainless cad in his place.

Churchill once said:

“It is a good thing for an uneducated man to read books of quotations. Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations is an admirable work, and I studied it intently. The quotations when engraved upon the memory give you good thoughts. They also make you anxious to read the authors and look for more.”

Of course, he himself became one of the most quotable men in history. So much so, that it was an impossible task to narrow down his incredible quotes to just one post. So we’ve broken this edition of our motivational poster series into two parts. Part II will be posted in the future.

For now, enjoy this first installment. Whether you’re educated or not, reading his quotes will light a fire under your bum and put a few more hairs on your chest.

Reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Ltd, London on behalf of The Estate of Sir Winston Churchill

Copyright © Winston S. Churchill

Reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Ltd, London on behalf of The Estate of Sir Winston Churchill

Copyright © Winston S. Churchill

Reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Ltd, London on behalf of The Estate of Sir Winston Churchill

Copyright © Winston S. Churchill

Reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Ltd, London on behalf of The Estate of Sir Winston Churchill

Copyright © Winston S. Churchill

Reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Ltd, London on behalf of The Estate of Sir Winston Churchill

Copyright © Winston S. Churchill

Reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Ltd, London on behalf of The Estate of Sir Winston Churchill

Copyright © Winston S. Churchill

Reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Ltd, London on behalf of The Estate of Sir Winston Churchill

Copyright © Winston S. Churchill

Reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Ltd, London on behalf of The Estate of Sir Winston Churchill

Copyright © Winston S. Churchill

Reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Ltd, London on behalf of The Estate of Sir Winston Churchill

Copyright © Winston S. Churchill

Reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Ltd, London on behalf of The Estate of Sir Winston Churchill

Copyright © Winston S. Churchill

Reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Ltd, London on behalf of The Estate of Sir Winston Churchill

Copyright © Winston S. Churchill

Reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Ltd, London on behalf of The Estate of Sir Winston Churchill

Copyright © Winston S. Churchill

Reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Ltd, London on behalf of The Estate of Sir Winston Churchill

Copyright © Winston S. Churchill

Reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Ltd, London on behalf of The Estate of Sir Winston Churchill

Copyright © Winston S. Churchill

Reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Ltd, London on behalf of The Estate of Sir Winston Churchill

Copyright © Winston S. Churchill

Reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Ltd, London on behalf of The Estate of Sir Winston Churchill

Copyright © Winston S. Churchill

Reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Ltd, London on behalf of The Estate of Sir Winston Churchill

Copyright © Winston S. Churchill

Reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Ltd, London on behalf of The Estate of Sir Winston Churchill

Copyright © Winston S. Churchill

If you enjoyed these posters, check out other entries in this series:

Motivational Posters: Theodore Roosevelt Edition

Motivational Posters: George S. Patton Edition

Motivational Posters: Ernest Hemingway Edition

Details of how permissions may be applied for through Curtis Brown for any Churchill usage are as follows:

http://www.curtisbrown.co.uk/books/estate/16/

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A few weeks ago, we talked about a problem plaguing many men these days, modern neurasthenia, a feeling of anxiousness or restlessness. In this follow-up, we’ll delve deeper into what is causing this restlessness and how it can be cured.

Back in our grandfathers’ day, there weren’t as many choices about what do with one’s life. And in our great-grandfathers time, there were even fewer choices. You might take over the family farm or family business or choose to pursue one of the trades.

These days we’re faced with a veritable onslaught of choices. What college should we go to? Public or private? Which of dozens of majors should we choose? Should we go to grad school or law school? What law school should we choose?

And besides the myriad of life choices we must make, we are bombarded each day with the necessity of making an endless stream of little mundane decisions. We stand in the cereal aisle of the grocery store as shelves and shelves of different ways to eat corn and wheat stretch as far as the eye can see in either direction. The web gives us millions of different sites to read. Whereas our grandfathers had 5 channels on the TV to watch, we have 850.

On the face of it, more choices are an unmitigated good thing. Americans especially prize having as many choices as possible. Before the turn of the 19^th century, freedom was defined as self-sufficiency, the freedom to own your own land and tools, and eke out a living with your own hands. As consumerism became a dominate force in the culture, freedom was redefined to mean the freedom to choose, to choose between different items and lifestyles, to choose things we believed fit out tastes and personality more than others. This was the beginning of defining ourselves by what we buy, instead of who we are and what we do, but that is another discussion for another day.

Suffice it to say that for the last century our concepts of choice and freedom have been inextricably connected. Smarting from Russia having drawn first blood in the space race by launching Sputnik, Kruschev and Nixon held their famous “Kitchen Debate,” in which Nixon argued for the superiority of the American way of life by pointing to the number and superiority of our goods and appliances-Pepsi and cake mixes, dishwashers and lawnmowers, TV dinners and lipstick.

But is so much choice always the best thing for us? The happiness of Americans has slowly fallen over the past decades and currently 1 out of 10 of us are taking anti-depressants. If more choices equaled more happiness, we’d all be blissed out right now. But we’re not.

Now make no mistake about it-choice is great. It lets us select what we value and express our personalities. Choices give us autonomy and the opportunity to pursue our personal desires and dreams. They allow us to exert control over our lives and avoid feeling helpless. Choices give us the chance to create our own destiny, and they are essential to our psychological well-being.

But there’s a point of diminishing returns, a point where instead of mitigating a sense of helplessness and apathy, they actually increase it. Only 9% of people polled in 1966 agreed with the statement, “I feel left out of things going on around me.” In 1986, 37% of people felt that way. I imagine the number is even higher today. What’s going on?

How Choice Can Be Demotivating

In a high end grocery store, tables offered customers a chance to sample either 24 or 6 different jams. Shoppers were offered a dollar off coupon if they bought a jar. The table with 24 jams attracted a bigger crowd than the 6 jams table, but people ended up tasting about the same number of jams at each. The big difference was in how many of the samplers were converted into customers; only 3% of people at the 24 jams table bought a jar, while 30% of the samplers at the 6 jar table bought a jar.

What’s going on here? Why did increasing the number of choices actually decrease people’s ability to make a decision?

Haunted by Opportunity Costs

Economists use the term “opportunity costs” to describe the things a person misses out on when they choose one path or item over another. If you’re choosing between going to the movies and going to a baseball game, and you choose the latter, your opportunity cost is the movie that you won’t get to see. While strict economic theory says that we should only consider the opportunity costs associated with the next best choice, the reality is that each choice has features that could put it on top, depending on the criteria on which you are ranking them. And we end up feeling the opportunity costs not just from the next best choice, but from all the choices that we consider. Thus the more options we are faced with, the more opportunity costs we have to accept, and the more unhappy and restless we become.

As we’ve said, choices are good, but there’s comes a point of diminishing returns. And that point is reached when the opportunity costs become so great that you cannot enjoy the choice that you make. The accompanying trade-offs haunt you and rob you of taking satisfaction in your chosen course. Or, as happened to the jam samplers, just the idea of making so many trade-offs is enough to dissuade you from making a choice at all. For on the one hand, you miss out on a particular jar of jam, but on the other, you don’t have to think about all the other jams you passed up. You see an attractive choice, but the other choices also have attractive qualities too, which negates the attractiveness of the first choice. That choice no longer seems to be very special and thus ceases to feel worth pursuing.

Now the jam is a trivial matter, but the point carries over to the bigger choices we have to make. There are so many different options that we’re tempted to check-out and not choose anything at all in order to avoid dealing with the opportunity costs of our decisions. We get stuck at the jam table of life, wanting to choose something but unwilling to shut any other choices out, and totally paralyzed by our inertia. And we’re anxious, because other people are coming up and buying the jam and will there even be any jam when we want some? But damnit if we can’t move, and oh no, that person just took some more jam!

The Cycle of Restlessness

Unwilling to deal with potential trade-offs, many men decide the best course is not to choose at all, with the idea that keeping as many options open as possible offers the most freedom and the most happiness. But as intuitive as that might seem, studies show that it just doesn’t work that way. Barry Schwartz, author of The Paradox of Choice, says:

“What could create larger opportunity costs than choosing one mate and losing the chance to enjoy all the attractive features of other potential spouses? People also stay in their jobs less than half as long, on average, as they did a generation ago. Whereas delaying marriage and avoiding commitment to a particular job would seem to promote self-discovery, this freedom and self-exploration seems to leave many people feeling more lost than found.”

Men get caught up in what I will call the cycle of restlessness. Confronted with the numerous choices of life, men feel restless and believe that the cure to the problem is more freedom and choices. Thus they detach themselves from their commitments. But this only creates more choices in their life, which makes them feel more restless and the cycle continues.

Breaking the Cycle: Making Commitments

Studies have shown that doing things like getting married, being close to one’s family, having good friends, and being involved in religious communities are all correlated with a greater sense of happiness and satisfaction. Now, it’s impossible to say that these commitments caused the happiness, but it’s still interesting to note that these things, which limit some of your choices and freedom, are connected with greater, not lesser happiness.

Think about electricity. It’s a nebulous force that cannot be seen with the human eye. It needs a cord, a conduit for it to be useful and power our lives. Happiness is the same way; without any constraints, any avenues for it to travel to us, it remains a hazy cloud, all around us but frustratingly ungraspable.

A monk once took his students for a walk along a river. First he showed them a place where the banks of the river were very far apart. Here the water ran slow and stagnant. Then he took him to a place where the banks were much closer together. Here the water ran fast and clear.

While leaving every possible door open in our lives may seem to promise the most happiness, placing some constraints on our choices can actually increase the amount of pleasure and satisfaction in our lives.

Limiting Our Choices

But what does this mean? Should we marry the first girl that bats her eyes at us and stay at any job no matter how mind numbing it is?

Of course not. Making commitments willy nilly, simply in the hopes of having less choices, will make you less happy, not more. Rather, it means that we need to redirect the energies we waste flitting from possibility to possibility, into understanding what we really want in life and the trade-offs we are willing to make.

In a time where many things, from our lattes to our RSS feeds, can be exactly tailored to our personal desires, many of us make the subconscious leap to believing that it’s possible for everything in life to exactly align with our tastes. Thus, we add to the bevy of already existing choices, another, albeit false one. We combine all the desirable qualities we can think of into one “perfect” possibility, one that will involve no trade-offs whatsoever, and we then go from college to college, woman to woman, and job to job, searching for this perfect choice to materialize.

But life is not a Starbucks. Every choice has at least a few trade-offs. If you want more time, then you’ll probably get less pay. If you want to be an entrepreneur, then you’ll have to give up security. If you want to marry a pious, intelligent woman, she probably won’t also be a hot runway model who is a freak in the bedroom.

The trick to curing your restlessness is to figure out which trade-offs you’re willing to accept and what things you are unwilling to compromise on. You can then greatly narrow the options to pursue. If being the same religion as your future wife is a deal breaker, you’ve just cut out a wide swath of the population. If you also cannot be married to a spendthrift, then more choices can be eliminated. Is having a sense of humor required? Alright, now you have a better idea of who to date and don’t have to pursue every random girl who you think is cute.

Dating 30 women and applying to 15 colleges may seem like the best way to find what’s best for you, but remember, it will backfire in the end. You’ve simply amplified the opportunity costs and set yourself up for regret and “what ifs” when you’re finally forced to make a choice. Define your core values, understand what you really want out of life, and then focus only on the choices that fit those parameters. And if you like Capt’n Crunch, stick with it.

Source: The Paradox of Choice by Barry Schwartz

• Being Decisive
• 30 Days to a Better Man Day 1: Define Your Core Values
• Modern “Neurasthenia:” Curing Your Restlessness
• How to Make a Decision Like Ben Franklin
• On Manly Loyalty

Source: Life

Of all the letters you will write during your life, the sympathy note is arguably the hardest to pen. It can be very difficult to find the right words, or any words really, to say. We worry about saying the wrong thing , or we feel awkward talking about such a serious matter. It’s thus often tempting not to say anything at all. We tell ourselves that the person knows we love and support them anyway.

And they probably do. But everyone would rather hear it from you themselves. They want a tangible reminder that you are thinking about them during their hard time. Your words can bring a brief, but very real moment of comfort.

Awhile ago, Kate and I lost our baby at almost 6 months. Both of us were absolutely devastated. I can still tell you the names of each and every person who sent us a sympathy note. The cards brought moments of peace during that very dark time. I cherish the kindness the people who took the time to write showed us.

So the first rule about sympathy notes is to always write one. Whether you live close to the person or far away, whether you knew the person they lost well or not at all, take the time to pen them a note. It’s actually preferable to share your sympathies in a letter as opposed to bringing it up to the person the next time you see them. Sharing your sympathies in public can bring up all of the grieving person’s feelings at a time when they’d rather remain composed. A sympathy note can be read over and experienced in the privacy of one’s home.

How to Write a Sympathy Note

Use nice stationery. Casual notes can be written on whatever is handy. But the sympathy note requires something nicer. Death is the gravest of matters and your medium should reflect your respect for the weight of the situation.

Keep it short and simple. A lot of men can’t get started writing because they think they have to come up with something deep and philosophical about death, dying, and hope. While the bad news is that there’s nothing you can write to take away a person’s pain, the good news is that the grieving friend knows this just as well as you do. They’re not expecting something profound. They just want to know that you’re thinking of them and feeling for them.

Start off by expressing your sadness at hearing about the death. “I was so sorry to hear about the death of your father.”

Share a memory. There’s not much you can do to alleviate someone’s grief, but sharing a memory of the deceased person comes close. It gives the person a few moments to laugh and remember. And it warms their heart to know that others have special memories of their loved one that they carry with them. Share some of the special qualities and favorite memories about the deceased.

If you didn’t know the person your friend lost, then skip this step. If your friend lost a baby, tell them that you understand that even though your friend never got to meet their child, they’re grieving over the loss of the future they’ve been dreaming about with him or her.

Don’t try to explain the loss. If you’re a religious person, don’t offer platitudes like “This is God’s plan,” or “This is God’s will.” This might be something the person comes to believe in the future, but in the midst of their grief, the idea of God snatching their loved one from the earth is liable to piss them off. I knew a guy who lost his wife in a car accident, leaving him to raise his 5 young children alone. He said to me, “If I hear one more person say, ‘God needed her more in heaven,’ I’m going to knock them out.”

Don’t compare your loss with theirs. This is especially true if you haven’t experienced the exact same thing. If their child has died, don’t tell them how you know what they’re going through because your dog just expired last week. You’ll come off as calluous and tick them off. If you have experienced a similar loss, a reference to your ability to truly sympathize is appropriate. But don’t go on and on about how you felt during that time; the focus should remain on the other person.

Show your solidarity. Let them know that you’re thinking and praying for them. If you or your friend or family member is not religious and a reference to prayer would not be appropriate, simply say, “My heart and thoughts go out to you during this difficult time.”

Close by offering your help. Let the person know that if there is anything you can do for them or if they ever want to talk or hang out, to please let you know.

Example:

Dear Leo-

I was so sorry to hear about the death of your mother, Nancy. Your mom was always so full of life and so fun to be around. I remember when we would come home after school, she’d always be baking cookies for us, listening to her favorite Prince album and getting down in the kitchen. You couldn’t help but be happy when you were around her. She was like a second mom to me, and I loved stopping over and telling her about what was going on with my life. She always gave me the best advice, and I’ll really miss our talks.

I know how devastating it is to lose your mom. When my mom died last year, it was incredibly traumatic. I know that it seems impossible right now, but things will get better. You’ll feel a little better with each passing week. Just keep putting one foot in front of the other.

I am thinking and praying for you every day. If you ever want to talk or grab a beer, don’t hesitate to let me know.

With Deepest Sympathy,

Rob

A final note: When Kate and I lost our baby, one of my friends gave up a sympathy card that included a gift card to a nice restaurant. When we were feeling better, this allowed us to get out and spend some time together. It was such an incredibly thoughtful gesture, and I would really recommend it to others in certain circumstances.

• Loss, Grief, and Manliness: What Every Man Should Know about Losing a Loved One
• The Art of Thank You Note Writing
• Write A Love Letter Like A Soldier
• 30 Days to a Better Man Day 28: Write a Love Letter
• The Art of Letter Writing: Stationery

Source: Image from freeparking

If you take the time to read the comments on our site, you’ll soon see that there isn’t always agreement on what constitutes being manly. Some say that dressing to the nines is a manly pursuit; others say that caring about your style is distinctly unmanly: “Real men don’t use umbrellas! They just get wet!” Some say guns are manly and that real men know how to protect their loved ones with force; others say that violence is never manly. An article that one segment of readers loves is derided by another as either offensively barbaric or unbearably foo foo and thus unbefitting of a site about manliness.

Such a reaction is natural, as we all have different views of what manliness means and looks like. When we think about manliness, we probably have various types, drawn from our lives and from popular culture-books, movies, television-that pop into our head. Let’s explore what these types are. Below are 6 different types that we often imagine when we think about manliness. Each includes a short description of the type, along with the positive characteristics associated with the type, the possible pitfalls this type of man runs into, and examples, both fictional and real, of this kind of type in the flesh. Keep in mind that the “possible pitfalls” are faults common to this type, but are in no way inevitabilities.

The Warrior

The warrior is arguably the type we’ve been associating with manliness the longest. In ancient times, he was the tribesmen who protected the village from attack; in modern times, he is the soldier who defends freedom. He is the grunt willing to subvert some of his individualism for greater goals and the general who leads his troops into battle. He is the man willing to lay down his life for others and for the glory of conquest and victory.

Positives: Toughness, leadership, courage, sacrifice

Pitfalls: Callousness, difficulty in adjusting to civilian life and relating to non-soldiers, unwilling to question authority

Examples: Audie L. Murphy, George S. Patton, Achilles, Michael Monsoor, Genghis Khan

The Lone Wolf

In popular culture, depicting the lone wolf type of manliness is quite popular. He is the cowboy riding his horse alone into the sunset, the biker roaring across the desert, the hobo wandering from place to place. He is also the artistic genius or the intellectual who isolates himself to create a great masterpiece or concentrate on his studies. Taciturn and mysterious, he doesn’t care for cultural rules and conventions; he is the rebel who blazes his own path.

Positives: Self-sufficient, free-thinking, independent, able to be his own man

Pitfalls: Can’t ask for help, difficulty in forming connections with others, depression, suppression of emotions

Examples: Clint Eastwood in pretty much every Clint Eastwood movie, John Wayne, JD Salinger, Louis L’Amour, Jeremiah Johnson

The Adventurer

This is the man with an overpowering desire to wander, travel, explore, and conquer. He wants to see the places no one or few others have seen. He sees a mountain and wants to climb it simply because it is there. He wants to discover all the world has to offer. He desires to test his limits and get outside his comfort zone. The new, the dangerous, make him feel alive.

Positives: Free spirit, courage, vitality, risk-taking

Pitfalls: Flighty, inability to commit

Examples: Lewis and Clark, Edmund Hillary, Sir Richard Francis Burton, Indiana Jones

The Gentleman

The gentleman is suave, urbane, polite and respectful to all, both to inferiors and superiors. Dapper in dress, proficient in the conversational arts, confident and witty, he easily wins friends and woos the ladies. He is skilled in and knowledgeable about arts, culture, and current events.

Positives: Well-dressed, well-mannered, sprezzatura

Pitfalls: Superficial, neglect of the inner life in favor of outward forms, lack of toughness

Examples: Cary Grant, George Washington, Ronald Reagan, Jimmy Stewart

The Statesman

To the ancient Greeks, a man could not possess manliness without being engaged in civic affairs. The statesman puts the good of the nation above individual pursuits. In his true form, the statesman has 4 attributes, as delineated by Professor J. Rufus Fears: a bedrock of principles, a moral compass, a vision, and an ability to build consensus to achieve that vision. These qualities, along with a proficiency in the art of oratory, allow him to hold together and guide a nation’s or people’s destiny.

Positives: Idealistic, driven, civic-minded, principled

Possible pitfalls: ego-centric, pride leading to scandal and corruption

Examples: Pericles, Demosthenes, Abraham Lincoln, Winston Churchill

The Family Man

While he isn’t the subject of many books and movies like the adventurer or warrior, we still really admire the simple family man, the average Joe who works hard and does the right thing every day. He has “blue collar” values, loves his wife, rarely complains about his job, is a great dad, and is just a solid man all around. He’s the grandfather who exuded manliness and the father you were always a little in awe of.

Positives: Hard working, loyal, good husband and father

Possible pitfalls: Aversion to risk, complacency

Examples: Joe the Little League Coach, your cousin Lou

If there are different types of manliness-es, does that mean we cannot say that there is anything essential to manliness?

Absolutely not. The fundamental principles of manliness-courage, loyalty, integrity, resiliency, personal responsibility, and sacrifice-cut across all types.

Thus we should have a healthy respect for the different types of manliness-es that exist. As long as the fundamental principles are in place, one should not say that one is necessarily better than the others.

And of course, we don’t actually live as types, we live as complex men. Even the men mentioned above as “examples” of each type were not one-sided in their character and pursuits. While one of the types likely describes you more than others, you’re probably a mix of many of them. They should not be seen as incompatible with one another.

The types are really symbols, certain traits and ways of living like a man writ large and exaggerated. Each has important lessons to teach us about being men. From the warrior we learn courage; from the lone wolf we come to understand the importance of individuality; the adventurer teaches us to find ways to explore wherever we are in life; the gentleman rounds off our rough edges; the statesman reminds us to be civic-minded, and the family man teaches us about selflessness. It is not possible to combine the types in our lives in equal degrees, but we can use them to form our own manliness. This was the task accomplished by the greatest men in history. Men like Theodore Roosevelt, Robert E. Lee, and Winston Churchill successfully integrated the best traits from all the types while avoiding the pitfalls of each. They were as at home on the battlefield as the ballroom.

But remember: don’t try to be someone you’re not and beware of the pitfalls of the types that you are. There’s a reason that Cary Grant was never in a Western.

• Manvotional: True and False Manliness
• The Warrior’s Guide to True Manliness
• The 2008 Art of Manliness Man of the Year: Matthew Chancey
• The Best of Art of Manliness, April 2008
• Best of Art of Manliness: September 2009

“Only those are fit to live who do not fear to die.”

-Theodore Roosevelt

Sailing out of the New York harbor, Theodore Roosevelt had little indication that the journey he was embarking on, which he had referred to as “a delightful holiday” with “just the right amount of adventure,” would be the hardest test of his notoriously strenuous life.  Reeling from his recent defeat as the Progressive Party’s nominee in the 1912 presidential elections, Roosevelt needed to get away.  Near the end of his last term as President, Roosevelt had been constantly petitioned by old friend and aspiring explorer Father John Zahm to join him on a South American river adventure.  At the time, Roosevelt had passed on the offer, noting that he was more interested in setting out on safari in Africa, which he immediately did when he left office.  Now, ready to temporarily leave politics behind and start off on another adventure, he let Father Zahm know that the South America trip was on and to begin preparations.

Originally, Father Zahm had planned a trip down a well explored river in the Amazon.  While such a trip still had inherent danger, there were no major risks involved, and a leisurely pleasure cruise just is not what the old Bull Moose had in mind.  When a government official casually suggested that he instead seek out the unexplored Rio da Dúvida (River of Doubt), T.R. jumped at the opportunity.  The change in plans came as a shock both to Brazilian officials as well as the American Museum of Natural History, which was sponsoring the expedition.  After all, having a former head of state die on your watch is usually considered to be rather bad press.  With the uncertainty of what dangers the expedition would hold, it was immediately clear to the men that death was a very real possibility.

“It may be said with confidence…that in all South America there is not a more difficult or dangerous journey than down the [River of Doubt].”

-Frank Chapman, Curator for American Museum of Natural History at the time.

True to its name, the River of Doubt was a complete mystery, its length and course not listed on any map.  It was likely to hold not just the usual Amazonian combination of dangers and disease, but most certainly potentially hostile Indian tribes as well.  It was certainly not the way most former Presidents would choose to spend their retirement, but then again, T.R. wasn’t much like most former presidents.  Prior to the expedition’s commencement, the head of the American Museum of Natural History, Henry Osborn, wrote Roosevelt several times pleading with him to abandon his perilous new plans and return to the old itinerary.  Roosevelt, in a letter to Frank Chapman, responded to Osborn’s request:

“Tell Osborn I have already lived and enjoyed as much of life as any nine other men I know; I have had my full share, and if it necessary for me to leave my bones in South America, I am quite prepared to do so.”

Into the Unknown

It quickly became clear that the inexperienced Father Zahm was not capable of organizing this new expedition, and a new guide was sought out.  The Brazilian government provided Roosevelt with perhaps the most capable guide in all of South America, Colonel Cândido Rondon.  Rondon was a well known and highly respected military officer known who had for years been leading an effort to install telegraph wires across the Amazon.  It was widely accepted that no man was more familiar with the Amazon and her dangers, including those presented by indigenous tribes, than Cândido Rondon.

With all the final preparations made, the expedition set out into the wilds of the Amazon.  It would take them at least two months just to reach the headwaters of the river, traveling first by steamboat on the Paraguay River into the Brazilian Highlands to a small frontier town, at which point they would switch from steamboat to mules. From this point forward, every step they took widened the gap between the explorers and the civilization they were leaving behind.  Setting off on mule back, the team would have to traverse over 400 miles of wilderness before they reached the Rio da Dúvida, and only then would the expedition truly commence.

By the time the men reached the River of Doubt, it was clear to Roosevelt and Rondon that several of the men were ill prepared for the excursion.  Even worse, it was increasingly evident that they were ill supplied for the journey they were about to embark on.  The leaders made the decision to split the team.  Several members of the team, instead of descending the unknown River of Doubt, would instead set out for the Rio Aripuanã, which Colonel Rondon believed joined the River of Doubt near its end.  While this separation meant dividing the supplies, it also guaranteed the main team greater speed as they descended the unknown river.  The final members that were to make up the Roosevelt-Rondon River of Doubt expedition included Roosevelt, his son Kermit, Rondon, his assistant Lyra, the team physician Dr. Cajazeira, and naturalist George Cherrie.  The team was supplemented by the addition of 16 camaradas, local Brazilians hired by Rondon to work as paddlers and trailblazers.

Taking stock of their provisions, the men realized that the supplies intended for the original itinerary were shockingly inadequate for the new journey.  Father Zahm had gone to great lengths to stock the original expedition with as many creature comforts as possible, seeking the approval of the former President.  Now, embarking on a journey into the unknown, Roosevelt was anything but impressed by the rations.  Where he had hoped to find various dried foodstuffs and salted meats, he instead found varieties of tea, sweets, and food that would likely spoil on this new, longer journey.  Organizing what was useful and discarding the rest, Roosevelt and Rondon realized that the expedition was no longer just a journey into the unknown, it had now become a race against time.  To further complicate matters, the expedition had been forced to abandon the lightweight canoes they had intended to use, and now only had primitive dugout canoes, which they knew were not only inadequate, but would likely not survive the rapids they would inevitably face.  Nonetheless, the expedition began its descent of the River of Doubt on February 27, 1914.  Before the end, they would face every imaginable peril, and the Bull Moose himself, who had defied death on so many occasions, would come face to face with his mortality.

The Journey Begins

In every dark corner of the Amazon lies a hidden peril.  The dugout canoes the expedition used  floated only a few inches above the surface, leaving the men acutely aware of their proximity to the fifteen foot caimans, school bus length anacondas, and razor toothed piranhas (which T.R. called “ferocious little monsters”) lurking just beneath the surface of the water. The river frequently rose and fell, was studded with perilous rapids, and sometimes narrowed to a mere 2 yard pass between sheer stone walls on either side. No one on the expedition had any idea of what danger lay ahead, waiting around every curve. Dry land proved to be equally threatening, hosting swarms of disease carrying insects, venomous snakes, poison arrow frogs, and the elusive jaguar.  Of all the dangers anticipated by the men, however, none weighed more heavily on their minds than the likelihood of stumbling upon a village of potentially hostile natives who had never before laid eyes upon outsiders.  The region they were traveling through harbored several known cannibalistic tribes, as well as numerous and yet unknown populations of natives.

“Within such an intricate world of resourcefulness, skill, and ruthless self-interest, refined over hundreds of millions of years, Roosevelt and his men were, for all their own experience and knowledge, vulnerable outsiders.  Most of the men were veteran outdoorsmen, and many of them considered themselves masters of nature.  They were stealthy hunters, crack shots, and experienced survivalists, and given the right tools, they believed that they would never find themselves in a situation in the wild that they could not control.  But as they struggled to make their way along the shores of the River of Doubt, any basis for such confidence was quickly slipping away.  Compared with the creatures of the Amazon, including the Indians whose territory they were invading, they were all – from the lowliest camarada to the former president of the United States – clumsy, conspicuous prey.”

-The River of Doubt by Candice Millard

The expedition’s progress was initially quite slow.  On the first day they managed to cover only six miles, considerably less than they were hoping for.  In the following days they were unable to quicken their pace, and by the second week they were acutely aware of the fact that they would run out of food well before they ran out of river.  Until this point they had avoided the rapids themselves by walking along the banks and guiding the heavy canoes laden with supplies through the whitewater with ropes.  While they had some success with this system, disaster eventually struck when two canoes broke loose, leaving the men to helplessly watch as their canoes and supplies were smashed on the rocks of the river and washed downstream.  With the loss of the canoes, the men could no longer move forward, and turning back was now an impossibility as well.  They were forced to stop for several days and build a new, larger canoe to replace the two that were lost.  Having completed this, the men then resorted to running the rapids they encountered in their canoes in an effort to make up lost time.

Death on the River

Eventually they came upon a series of rapids which led to the edge of a 30 foot waterfall.  Rondon wisely deemed the rapids impassable and began to prepare for the portage around.  Kermit Roosevelt, however, made the brash decision to attempt to seek out a route around the rapids.  With two camaradas in his canoe, he set out for a small island in the middle of the rapids.  Quickly realizing that Rondon was right and the rapids were indeed impassable, he told the paddlers to return to the shore.  On attempting to navigate the rapids for a second time, however, the men lost control of the canoe and were drawn into the heavy whitewater.  Theodore Roosevelt could only watch in horror as his son and the men were pushed downstream and over the edge of the falls.  Rushing down to the base of the falls, the men of the expedition were relieved to find Kermit and one of the camaradas alive, but any feelings of relief were soon dashed.  One of the camaradas had been sucked downstream and was never seen again.

The Locals Make Themselves Known

Roosevelt on the left with a deer he had shot. Col. Candido Rondon is on the right.

Several days later, while the men set up their evening camp, Rondon set out with his dog and rifle in search of game to supplement their meager rations.  A monkey call ahead in the darkness of the forest canopy put him on alert, and his dog quickly ran towards the call.  Not a moment later Rondon heard the dog cry out and realized he had been drawn in by Indians mimicking monkey calls in an attempt to lure him.  The sight of his dog appearing from the jungle ahead of him with two large arrows in his side confirmed his suspicions, and he quickly retreated to camp and put the men on their guard.  They had suspected they were in the lands of an unknown and likely hostile tribe, and now they were sure of it.  Later expeditions would confirm that the tribe living along the river was both violent towards outsiders and cannibalistic.

A Race Against Time

The expedition continued to be plagued by misfortune.  The loss of two more canoes in the rapids and the lack of suitable trees for making new dugouts forced them to split up.  Several members would have to hack their way by machete along the overgrown riverbank while the rest floated on the river alongside, which only slowed progress even more.  By the 90 mile mark, they had consumed over a third of their provisions, and Rondon believed that they would need to travel at least five times that distance before they would reenter charted lands and civilization.  Their supplies and remaining canoes were now, more than ever, in need of protection.  When two of the canoes became jammed between rocks in a section of whitewater, Roosevelt quickly jumped into the water to free them before they were lost.  While attempting to cross the rapids he slipped, opening a large gash on his thigh.  Back in the White House, such a wound would have been quickly stitched up, and he would have been able to return to his business.  In the Amazon, however, the wound was potentially a death sentence.

The expedition doctor treated the wound immediately, but the men feared the worst.  A serious infection set in overnight, accompanied by an outbreak in malarial fever, leaving Roosevelt with a high fever and unable to walk.  For the next several days Roosevelt’s condition continued to worsen, his fever skyrocketing to 105 degrees as he drifted in and out of consciousness.  Eventually he began to move in and out of a trancelike state, eerily repeating over and over again the opening lines of Coleridge’s Kubla Khan, “In Xanadu did Kubla Khan, A stately pleasure-dome decree.” At his side was always either the doctor or his son Kermit, who was adamant that his father would walk out of the jungle alive and well.  In one of his lucid moments Roosevelt took stock of the situation and realized he did not stand a chance and had now become a hindrance to the expedition, thus risking the other men’s lives.  Drawing his son and Cherrie to his side, he argued his case:

“Boys, I realize some of us are not going to finish this journey.  Cherrie, I want you and Kermit to go on.  You can get out.  I will stop here.”

Roosevelt’s admission of defeat did not come as a surprise to the men, who were well acquainted with the character of the man.  This was not a decision born out of cowardice or lack of fortuity.  This was the ultimate sacrifice.  Roosevelt knew that his life was not worth more than those of the rest of the expedition and was simply taking himself out of the equation to prevent further tragedy.  Kermit and the men refused to comply with his wishes, however, and Roosevelt quickly realized that even if he were to die, Kermit would never leave his body in the Amazon.  Any delay caused by his illness was clearly preferable to the option of dragging a body out of the wilderness.  Thus, Roosevelt pushed on.

Blood in the Water

Roosevelt’s condition continued to worsen for several days, yet the men had to keep moving.  Eventually he was forced to lie prone in one of the dugouts, unable to contribute to the expedition in any way.  For Roosevelt, who had championed hard work and the strenuous life since childhood, the loss of his vigor and ability to aid the men around him was very nearly a fate worse than death.  Even when driven to the edge of his mortality, however, Roosevelt was able to spring to action if the situation required it.

While most of the camaradas had proven themselves to be extremely reliable workers and good companions, the leaders of the expedition had quickly realized that one of the men was a dangerous character.  On expeditions, few crimes carried heavier consequences than the stealing of rations, as one of the men had secretly been doing for weeks.  When confronted by another camarada, the man quietly returned to camp, grabbed a rifle, walked back to his accuser and shot him through the heart.  The men in camp heard the shot, but just assumed it was one of the team members hunting and began to set their hopes on meat for dinner.  When several camaradas ran into camp crying murder, however, the mood quickly changed.  Even in his terrible condition, Roosevelt could not tolerate such injustice.  To the amazement of the men around him, he exploded out of bed, grabbing his rifle and setting out for the scene of the crime.  Upon arrival they found the body of the unfortunate camarada and the gun used to kill him, but the murderer was nowhere to be found.  Realizing that no punishment was greater than being alone and unarmed in the wilds of the Amazon, they simply left him to his fate.

An Act of Desperation

It was becoming clear that Roosevelt would not survive another day without allowing the doctor to attempt surgery on his leg.  Up until this point, Roosevelt had refused an operation, but now it had become inevitable.  Lying Roosevelt down in the mud on the bank of the river surrounded by swarms of insects attracted to the gaping wound, the doctor prepared to remove the dead flesh and clean the wound.  Lacking even the most rudimentary medical equipment, the doctor could not provide Roosevelt with even a small dose of painkillers, leaving the former President fully conscious and acutely aware of every cut of the knife.  True to form, Roosevelt did not even wince as the doctor carried out the surgery, much to the disbelief of the men surrounding him.  Even with his body battered and broken, Roosevelt’s will was as strong as ever.

Civilization

It was not long after that the men began to see signs of civilization.  Rubber tappers had been moving deeper and deeper into the jungle with every passing year in an effort to strike it rich in the Amazon’s equivalent of a gold rush.  The men of the expedition began seeing signs of these rubber men and finally came upon several small huts which housed rubber men and their families.  At first, the rubber tappers and their families reacted with fear at the sight of the strange looking men coming from upriver and assumed the worst, Indians.  Fortunately, the men of the expedition were able to identify themselves before the rubber men opened fire on them, and they were then welcomed into their homes.

The most difficult leg of the journey was over, but they still had a considerable distance to travel.  Fortunately for the men, the rubber tappers were very generous, providing them with food and supplies and even trading lightweight canoes for their dugouts to aid their journey.  Several days later, the men saw in the distance what must have been the sweetest sight of their entire lives.  Flapping in the breeze side by side were the Brazilian and American flags, a telltale sign that they had reached the meeting point of the River of Doubt and the Rio Aripuanã, where the other team they had left months earlier were waiting to greet them. They had journeyed on the Rio da Dúvida for a staggering  950 miles. 

As the Brazilian leader of the expedition, Cândido Rondon was responsible for naming the newly explored river, which he christened the Roosevelt River, now known locally as the Rio Theodoro.

T.R. remained gravely ill for weeks following the end of the expedition and never fully recovered.  The effects of a starvation diet and the fever that plagued him on the journey were evident; Roosevelt had lost nearly sixty pounds and had aged considerably.  His physical vigor and endurance were all but gone, and he was now forced to at least temporarily support himself with a cane.  Not one to be kept down, however, Roosevelt continued to push his limits.  When he had recuperated enough to complete the voyage home, he was greeted from the deck of the ship by cheering crowds in New York harbor.  A daring few criticized the efforts of the expedition, some even labeling its achievements a lie.  Roosevelt, astounded at these outrageous accusations, set out on a speaking tour in America and Europe to support his claims.  As you would expect, every critic was silenced.  No one messes with a Bull Moose and gets away with it.

“Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in that grey twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat.”

-Theodore Roosevelt

• Lessons in Manliness: The Childhood of Theodore Roosevelt
• Lessons in Manliness: Matthew Henson
• Lessons in Manliness: Theodore Roosevelt and the Spanish-American War
• How to Open a Stuck Jar Lid
• How to Speed Read Like Theodore Roosevelt

Source: Life

Editor’s note: This is a guest post from S.M. Leahy. Mr. Leahy is a student studying at Columbia University. He is originally from Virginia.

A man will have faults.  An overweight man can look at himself and take the steps needed to shed pounds.  A man with poor eyesight can wear glasses or contact lenses. How often, though, does a man look inside himself for ways to improve? A man’s emotional and mental health are just as valuable as his physical, yet the former receives much less attention. One of the most common mental illnesses in men is depression. 10 % of men will suffer a major depressive episode during their lifetime.

Great men in history who suffered from depression are numerous: Abraham Lincoln, Ernest Hemingway, Winston Churchill, and Buzz Aldrin to name a few. Buzz Aldrin overcame his depression and alcoholism, eventually becoming Chair of the National Mental Health Association. Churchill took up painting to keep what he called the “black dog” at bay. The treatment Hemingway sought for his depression only served to deepen it. The ECT shock treatments stole from him valuable memories and hindered his writing ability, precipitating his  suicide with a gruesome shotgun blast to the forehead.

What makes mental illness, such as depression, so difficult to deal with in men is the perceived shame that comes with admitting it.  The World Health Organization states that fewer than 25% of male sufferers worldwide will seek treatment “[because of] social stigmas associated with mental disorders including depression.”   A man may put his pride before all else, no matter what the cost. I know this, and I know how high the price can rise.

Origins  of Depression

I was diagnosed with major depressive disorder when I was seventeen years old, but I believe I had been suffering for years prior.  Since childhood I had bouts of extreme sadness.  I would sit in the blue-grey light of our family’s kitchen as the sun slipped below the horizon and feel paralyzed, head to foot, by some terrible aloneness. I would recover from each bout within a few days, but I could feel the sadness stalking me.  I’d fall into it even when I had something in my life to be elated about. I became confused and frustrated because of the incongruity, and the depressive episode would deepen. I had no idea where it all came from.

Depression’s origins vary from man to man. Sometimes traumatic events such as sudden death or illness triggers depression. Early social interaction and a man’s childhood also play a major role.  If a man felt neglected or unloved by his parents, or ostracized by other children, depression is more likely to become a constant companion. Eventually, however, depression boils down to a question of biochemistry. Although we all have sad episodes in our life, even some lasting for weeks or months, men who suffer from depression have some sort of imbalance in their brain chemistry that causes pain and suffering for no reason and without warning. While looking to the past to find the root of a man’s depression can be beneficial, a focus on positive and active treatment now and in the future is most essential.

Dealing with it: The Monster and The Man

Everything was enemy to me. I used denial as a defense mechanism, a way to preserve my ego and pride.  I would not admit to myself that I was weak and needed help.  This is how I built my monsters.

I started to self medicate. Towards the end of high school and the first semester of college, I used alcohol heavily at the worst times.  I would seek it out on the weekends and drink alone in the corners of house parties and in the back seat of parked cars. This was not a social activity. I smoked cigarettes in the same secretive way. When I had happy and together moments in life, I abstained from drinking and smoking – to this day, I don’t enjoy either. When I was in the valleys – when I hurt – alcohol and cigarette tobacco always arrived.

The emotional abuse I saddled on those around me remains the worse product of my depression. I allowed depression to burden not only me, but two girlfriends, my family, and my closest friends. One girl could not deal with it and ended up leaving me.  The other stuck around longer, and I abused her emotions without knowing it. I was terrifyingly cold and unfeeling, even as she broke down into tears and begged me to say anything.  I made her feel responsible for anything that went wrong in my life.  I left her more than once without warning, but would soon come back  and manipulate her damaged emotions to get back together. All of it was a way for me to artificially build myself back up. I was trying to destroy my depression, but I ended up harming the most vulnerable people in my life. Cowardice and dishonesty dictated my thinking.

What underlies all these abuses is a fundamental disgust and anger with one’s self.  I manipulated the emotions of everyone around me to bring them down to my level and feel better about my station in life.  Admitting my weakness terrified me so much that I went out and tore away.

The booze and cigarettes, I think, show a self-destructive streak common to all those who suffer with depression.  Although the exact motives for self-destructive thoughts vary, they usually revolve around the ideas that a man cannot deal with such a great burden or, as in my case, that a man is not worth it, that he does not deserve to live because of such weakness.

I was honest on the worst day of my life. It was December 12, 2007. That day, I received my acceptance letter to Columbia University, an Ivy League school in New York City. The second I opened it and saw “Congratulations!” I placed it on my mother’s desk, walked into my room, and slowly lowered myself, face down, to the cream carpet after turning out all the lights. I was motionless for hours, half naked, praying for life to seep out of me. I never cried. I was far beyond the point of emotional release.  When my mother opened the bedroom door, I looked up and said, “There’s something wrong with me.”

Honesty and integrity are fundamental parts of manhood. Admitting weakness takes a tremendous amount of effort. It also is the most important step to correcting the flaws in a man’s life. I realized I could not deal with depression on my own and allowed myself to grow more comfortable with the idea of professional help. I started seeing a psychologist, who I will call “Lloyd.” Lloyd was a soft spoken Southerner who talked with me instead of treating me. I was skeptical and guarded when we first met, and I asked him why I should trust him, a stranger I’d never met. His response was simple, “There’s no good reason.” It was the perfect answer. Lloyd let me talk in a way I never had before. He asked simple but difficult questions and let me unravel myself. There were points when he was candid and told me that he didn’t have a good answer for whatever issue we were working through. He showed me life was uncertain but worth it, too.  Eventually, we developed a system for dealing with my depression:

• Carefully monitor my moods. I started keeping a journal after talking with Lloyd. I update it every day.
• When I begin to see my mood swing down, I mentally prepare myself for a depressive episode and take preemptive steps to deal with it. It’s like the first signs of a cold or the flu – I realize there is no avoiding it, yet there are ways to make it easier.
• Understand that my depression will be more or less present for my entire life. Simple acceptance can be the deciding victory.

Opening up to Lloyd was critical. Without talking about depression, and letting myself share the burden, I would be in much worse shape now. I would not be writing this article. For any man who feels he may be suffering from depression, a depressive episode, or is just in a low cycle of life, seeking counsel in someone close is the simplest and often most potent medication. A professional is not necessary for everyone; use your close friends or family members; they will judge you less than you think. But I would caution against relying on a girlfriend or wife as partners’ moods in a romantic relationship tend to feed off of one another, and you may end up inadvertently sucking them into your depression.  A little distance between yourself and that trusted other person is healthy.

Another method that I use to deal with depression is physical exercise. Vigorous exercise releases chemicals in the brain, such as dopamine, that can elevate mood instantly. Studies have shown that exercise is just as effective as medication in treating depression. I stick to my routine every day and  never skip it, even when I am in a low phase.

Do not let depression hijack your life. Keep busy physically and mentally to hold depression at bay. It can be tempting to think that a step back from the stress of life will do a man good. However, when a day loses purpose, when nothing fills the hours, depression is happy to steal them away. Depression will lure you away from the good in life before it strikes.

Lloyd and I  talked about prescription drugs briefly, and we quickly decided against it.  Unfortunately, there seems to be a trend in America that revolves around quickly and haphazardly prescribing potent drugs. To that end, overprescription and abuse are higher than they should be. Antidepressant use in this country has doubled over the last decade; 1 in 10 Americans are now takings meds! Medication for mental illness is extremely powerful and should only be used by men who absolutely cannot function without it

Lessons

I do not revel in my depression. I do not use it as an excuse nor do I exalt it to others or myself. I understand it is a destructive force. That being said, I have learned things while in deep depressive episodes that have allowed me to grow as a young man. The introspection and reflection that came with depression has led to my life evolving.  Because I know how dark things can get, I am more thankful and more aware of the happiness in my life – I appreciate my friends and family much, much more.  Finally, I believe I may never have started writing were it not for Lloyd recommending starting a journal.  Now, I plan to make writing my life’s work.

Yet I wish I could have found these answers in other ways.  There is something here a man should learn to do: Whatever the situation, no matter how dark, move through the awful and find the goodness.

Have you dealt with depression?  What have you done to overcome it or get a handle on it? Let us know in the comments.

• The Art of Manliness Podcast Episode #6: Man Stories With Zeke Smith
• The Art of Manliness Podcast Episode #8: Man Stories with Robert Disque
• Art of Manliness Podcast Episode #4: Man Stories with Dan Kern
• Knock Out Depression With Exercise
• Lessons in Manliness: Viktor Frankl

I admittedly didn’t know much about Ernest Hemingway beyond his fine works of literature until I read Chris Hutcheson’s article, “The Hemingway You Didn’t Know: Papa’s Adventures.” Despite Hemingway’s flaws, he spent his life engaging in all manner of bad assery. I was so inspired by Chris’ article that I decided to put together some Papa-themed motivational posters. Enjoy.

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