5 Things That Are Sapping Your Manhood

One of the things I like so much about writing content for men is that I feel like I have the freedom to “talk straight” to you guys.

Most men appreciate honest, straightforward communication, even if it somewhat dents their feelings in the moment. I’m not saying women don’t, I just can only speak from a man’s perspective.

The older I get, the more I realize the importance of staying away from things that seem to sap my manhood.

Now, what exactly is your “manhood”? Well, for sake of simplicity, I define it as your drive. Your drive to be a better version of yourself. Your drive to visualize and provide an ever-better life for yourself and your family.

To me, “manly vigor” is the forward thinking aspect of your personality. It’s the restless, competitive part of your brain that is always striving for something more.

Without realizing it, you might be putting a handbrake on your life by engaging in the activities below. These are activities that keep you rooted in the present (in a bad way). These are activities that keep you perpetually spinning your wheels. These are activities that waste your time. These are the activities that make you wake up in middle-age and wonder where all your time went.

After engaging in these activities, you are no better off than when you began. You haven’t grown, or learned anything new, or bettered yourself in any way.

You might not think that they’re a big deal, but if not monitored closely, they’ll eat up the time you could be spending making yourself a better man.

The items below will drain your manly vigor, just like if you opened a spigot at the bottom of a wine barrel.

#1 – Playing on your phone.

I am willing to bet that most men don’t realize that they are truly addicted to their phones. I know I was! I was spending upwards of three hours a day futzing on my phone. In the past few months, I have drastically reduced that daily average. Most importantly, I no longer feel the “draw” to pick up my phone like I used to.

In the past, I used to feel an automatic attraction to my phone. I would absent-mindedly reach for it whenever I felt bored or there was a lull in my work. I would feel legitimately uncomfortable if it was not physically near me at all times.

Thankfully, I worked hard to break myself of the habit of always picking up my phone. Want to know how I did it?

I reminded myself that my own brain is much more interesting than anything I can find online.

My thoughts and daydreams, I realized, provided me much more entertainment than my phone did. I thought about it not as resisting something fun and alluring, but setting that thing aside for something even MORE fun: my own mind.

Being off my phone meant I was writing more. I was also thinking more about how to start my own business. Not only that, I was thinking more deeply about my day-job and how I could do it better. Every aspect of my life improved once I put the phone down.

And that’s the sick thing about phones: they’re nothing more than a product someone invented to make money. And the more my face is stuck in that screen, the more money Apple and Meta make to the detriment of my own life.

You know how obituaries of old people are all like, “She loved bird watching and volunteering at the animal shelter”?

Obituaries of people our age will read, “He really loved playing on his phone”.

Is that really what we want our lives to be? Do you want to be on your deathbed regretting how much of your life you wasted staring into a little plastic toy? Do you want your kids’ childhood memories to be Dad scrolling Instagram?

They didn’t invent smartphones to make the world a better place. They invented them in order to get us addicted to them so that they could make a ton of money. Do you really want them to have that much power over you? I sure don’t.

Before I owned a smartphone, I couldn’t fathomwhy I would ever need to look at the internet that much. A decade later it feels weird to NOT be connected to the internet 24/7.

Smartphones are just like cigarettes. They’re an invention that has wormed its way into our everyday lives which steals away our most precious commodity: time. 

The time you spend looking at your phone can be time spent doing ANYTHING else. The boredom you feel will translate into ideas. And ideas will become reality if you act on them. But you can’t act on them if you have no time.

Do you think the really successful people in the world spend their time scrolling social media? No.

And don’t give me the excuse of “Oh, I need to be on my phone all the time for work.”

I bet if you checked your screen time you would see that the vast majority of the time spent on your phone is on Facebook, Instagram, or YouTube. Most of the “work related” time we spend on our phones is dedicated to viewing and answering emails which only takes a few minutes.

So, put down the phone, feel the boredom, and experience life.

#2 – Porn

Yes, pornography saps your manly vigor. Why? Because any extreme sensory experience deadens your dopamine receptors and makes it more difficult to enjoy real life. Extreme imagery of any kind will have the same effect.

It’s no different than playing on your phone. When you scroll social media, you get little hits of dopamine which make it more and more difficult to put your phone away for any length of time.

Porn gets you addicted in the same way.

It’s cheap and unsatisfying not unlike eating a McDonald’s burger instead of a home-cooked meal.

Critically, it takes you away from experiencing REAL LIFE. If you spend time staring at a screen, you are missing out on what the real world has to offer.

If you find yourself choosing the image of a woman over an actual real-life woman then you need to take a step back and seriously examine yourself.

Get out into the real world and meet a flesh-and-blood female whom you actually need to TALK TO. Hit the gym. Volunteer. Join a cooking class. Engage in activities where there is a more-than-likely chance you’ll bump into a woman. The real-world expectations that will be required of you to succeed in these environments (dressing well, possessing adequate conversation skills) will force you into ever-better versions of yourself.

If you’re already married then establish dedicated “date” times with your wife. Like I’ve said many times before, my wife and I have weekly lunch dates on Saturdays and Sundays. It’s a way that we reconnect after the craziness of the week prior.

Get off the screen and interact with real people.

#3 – Video Games

I’ve made my stance on video games very clear. They’re a total waste of time. The problem with video games is the same as the problem with porn and playing on your phone: it all exists to keep you addicted and coming back for more.

No one is successful because they play video games. If you see a successful person who plays video games regularly, they are successful in spite of playing them.

Additionally, playing video games will never be attractive to a woman (even to a woman who enjoys video games, herself). She will always wish, in a perfect world, that her man played video games less or not at all. It will always be something she tolerates. Never will she wish he played them more.

Do you think Gregory Peck, Paul Newman, Sean Connery, Tom Selleck, or Harrison Ford would have spent their time playing video games? I doubt it.

The more time you spend in video game land, the less time you have available to do something worthwhile with your life, like pursue a hobby, exercise, read, or play with your kids.

#4 – Eating or drinking too much crap

If you constantly fill your body with junk food, you’re making your body feel sluggish and gross.

One of the best ways to feel manly is to feel strong. You’re not going to feel strong if you constantly eat crap and drink too much.

#5 – Not exercising

This is probably the most important one as it has such a profound effect on the health of your family.

Your kids NEED to see their dad not only exercising, but enjoying exercising. You need to make physical activity a cherished part of your life. Not only does it help make sure your kids develop a healthy relationship with exercise throughout their lives, but it also makes it so that you can protect your family if needed.

I remember hearing a story many years ago about a kid who slipped off a ski lift and was dangling many feet above the ground. His dad was holding on to him. There were some teenagers below who quickly fashioned a net out of the fence material which the boy was able to land safely on.

The story rightly focused on the heroic and quick-thinking teens. But I couldn’t help thinking about the poor dad, holding onto his son and unable to lift him up to safety by himself. He even had to let go of his son and trust the net below. That must have been a terrible moment for him.

Now, I don’t know all the specifics of the situation. Perhaps it was too risky to try to haul the boy back into the chair with big gloves and puffy jackets. Perhaps the dad only got a last-second grip on the boy and it was all he could do to avoid them both toppling out of the chair.

I get all that and I absolutely do not judge the man’s actions.

But I do use what I heard of the situation to better prepare myself if I am ever in a similar circumstance.

As a responsible dad, it is your duty to make sure you are in capable shape. Capable means that you can lift heavy objects (like children) and run a sufficient distance if needed. If you can’t do basic physical tasks, then you are putting your family at greater risk than they need to be.

There is a scene in There Will Be Blood where Daniel Day-Lewis picks up his adopted child and runs a pretty good distance with the child in his arms.

Could you do that, if you needed to? Could you run maybe a hundred yards carrying your largest child? What about multiple children?

Bottom line: you need to be your kids’ superhero. Your level of physical fitness directly correlates to your children’s (and wife’s) level of comfort and security.

Here’s the thing with these five points, though. These things CAN be used strategically!

Take point number four, for example… my wife and I love going out to decadent dinners but we use to it strengthen our marital bond. If you have a penchant for take-out, use it to build a better connection with your wife. Instead of mindlessly getting take-out multiple times a week because you’re too lazy to cook, maybe only get take-out on Saturday nights after the kids have gone to bed, that way you can have some time to yourselves while enjoying some good food and conversation.

With point number three, instead of mindlessly playing video games by yourself until 2am, maybe only play video games with your son. If he is interested in a particular game, it will be a great way for you two to bond over a mutual interest.

You don’t have to quit all these things cold-turkey if you devise a way to use them in ways that stimulate your manly vigor instead of draining it.

Time is our most precious commodity. We are all given the same amount each day. Please don’t mindlessly fritter it away.