The Daily Frugal: Eat, Drink and Be Careful
In my younger days, my extreme frugality was less an expression of my iron will than an organic extension of my laziness. Spending money, after all takes effort. It can actually be easier to kick back on your clearance couch from Ikea and binge watch Netflix (on the sister-in-law's account, natch) than to burn all that energy and money keeping up with the Joneses.
This style of saving money didn't require me to transform myself. All I did was find an existing instinct and lean into it. Instincts are just natural bents - you can look at them like a tools in a tool box. Even those of us who have inherited a pretty crappy assortment - and let's face it, laziness usually sucks - can find a good constructive job for just about any tool.
This approach is not without danger, however. Eventually, self-improvement requires new and painful forward momentum, and gliding on some of your sketchy instincts can take you to some dark places. Take one exceptionally painful example from my past - a lazy decision not to renew my passport saved me $88 in the short-term but wound up costing me a comped honeymoon cruise. In a moment, the gains of months of procrastination were wiped out.
The same principle applies to the wild young stallions galloping around self-improvement Twitter. I genuinely admire and emulate some of these guys. No one looks, acts or sounds the part of stallion better than perfectly named Alexander Juan Antonio Cortes. A workhorse with a Fabio mane and a Conquistador name, Cortes brings it in every which way, from answering questions non-stop on Twitter to filling inboxes with inspirational email at an absurdly prolific rate.
With so much testosterone on hand, guys like Cortes are natural role models for the huddled masses of soy yearning to be beef. That he and other rising stars like Ed Latimore are so generous with their overflowing energy and mindset (not to discount their considerable knowledge) is a credit to them, but also evidence of how they are wired.
Being naturally wired for masculine dominance is a much better bent than laziness, but the superiority of the tool can blind the wielder to its limits. As the old adage goes, when you've got a hammer, everything looks like a nail. And if you've got a really great hammer, why not just bang whatever or whoever you want? A Twitter exchange I had yesterday with Cortes and "game" artist Goldmund is a case in point.
Breaking from the occasionally monastic tone of self-improvement Twitter, Goldmund and Cortes encouraged their followers to bust loose.
Leaning into the primal urges of the barbarian id is a powerful tool for hammering simpering adolescence into manhood, but after those first constructive blows, that hammer turns destructive. When Goldmund dove-tailed Cortes' point with a tribute to the wild forays of Biblical men like Samson, I was quick to call their attention to the epic hangovers that followed each outburst of testosterone-fueled excess.
Samson ended up blinded by lust and destroyed by his rage. Solomon (who would have dominated self-improvement Twitter, BTW) lived it up so much that he left his kingdom in ruins. Noah and Lot fell into the depths of sexual depravity in their drunken stupors, with catastrophic consequences for their families. Heck, even the sequel to Conan the Barbarian was Conan the Destroyer.
There comes a time when you have to put the tool back in the box and beat the sword into a plowshare. The urge to sow wild oats must be sublimated into a commitment to raise a single garden.
The culmination of a life of frugal living is not in the saving but the spending. So to is the ultimate aim of manhood not the enjoyment of its spoils but the giving of its blessings.
This style of saving money didn't require me to transform myself. All I did was find an existing instinct and lean into it. Instincts are just natural bents - you can look at them like a tools in a tool box. Even those of us who have inherited a pretty crappy assortment - and let's face it, laziness usually sucks - can find a good constructive job for just about any tool.
This approach is not without danger, however. Eventually, self-improvement requires new and painful forward momentum, and gliding on some of your sketchy instincts can take you to some dark places. Take one exceptionally painful example from my past - a lazy decision not to renew my passport saved me $88 in the short-term but wound up costing me a comped honeymoon cruise. In a moment, the gains of months of procrastination were wiped out.
The same principle applies to the wild young stallions galloping around self-improvement Twitter. I genuinely admire and emulate some of these guys. No one looks, acts or sounds the part of stallion better than perfectly named Alexander Juan Antonio Cortes. A workhorse with a Fabio mane and a Conquistador name, Cortes brings it in every which way, from answering questions non-stop on Twitter to filling inboxes with inspirational email at an absurdly prolific rate.
With so much testosterone on hand, guys like Cortes are natural role models for the huddled masses of soy yearning to be beef. That he and other rising stars like Ed Latimore are so generous with their overflowing energy and mindset (not to discount their considerable knowledge) is a credit to them, but also evidence of how they are wired.
Being naturally wired for masculine dominance is a much better bent than laziness, but the superiority of the tool can blind the wielder to its limits. As the old adage goes, when you've got a hammer, everything looks like a nail. And if you've got a really great hammer, why not just bang whatever or whoever you want? A Twitter exchange I had yesterday with Cortes and "game" artist Goldmund is a case in point.
Breaking from the occasionally monastic tone of self-improvement Twitter, Goldmund and Cortes encouraged their followers to bust loose.
With all respect to Cortes, he's not quoting God but Conan the Barbarian (to whom he bears a passing resemblance). And while Conan and his creed are welcome antidotes to the pale, cringing Grima Wormtongue brand of masculinity fostered by the modern age, too much of the medicine is a poison in and of itself.I just talked to G-d,— Alexander J.A Cortes (@AJA_Cortes) March 5, 2018
And he said drink the wine, make love to the women, and live it the fuck up
Amen.
Leaning into the primal urges of the barbarian id is a powerful tool for hammering simpering adolescence into manhood, but after those first constructive blows, that hammer turns destructive. When Goldmund dove-tailed Cortes' point with a tribute to the wild forays of Biblical men like Samson, I was quick to call their attention to the epic hangovers that followed each outburst of testosterone-fueled excess.
Samson ended up blinded by lust and destroyed by his rage. Solomon (who would have dominated self-improvement Twitter, BTW) lived it up so much that he left his kingdom in ruins. Noah and Lot fell into the depths of sexual depravity in their drunken stupors, with catastrophic consequences for their families. Heck, even the sequel to Conan the Barbarian was Conan the Destroyer.
There comes a time when you have to put the tool back in the box and beat the sword into a plowshare. The urge to sow wild oats must be sublimated into a commitment to raise a single garden.
The culmination of a life of frugal living is not in the saving but the spending. So to is the ultimate aim of manhood not the enjoyment of its spoils but the giving of its blessings.
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