Becoming a man is not an event but a never-ending process¹. It has become very common for people to describe what it means to be a ‘real’ man. In this essay, I will explore this topic from the perspective of a male on his journey to become a man.

The Manosphere

I have been in the manosphere and I resonate with a lot of the arguments of its influencers and the community at large. A lot of men are attracted to the manosphere because they have failed with women once or multiple times and are trying to figure out what is wrong with them. They are looking for an explanation on what they are doing wrong and how they can fix it. No man just googles how to deal with rejection or how to get more girls if they haven’t been hurt. All young guys have been through it and their journey often leads them to manosphere content on the internet. The likes of Coach Redpill, Andrew Tate, Coach Gregory, Andrew Kibe and Amerix. These men have become a guiding light for a lot of hurt and confused young men who are trying to figure out their place in a society where they are not valued at a young age.

They soon come to hear the bitter truth, that society doesn’t not find young men useful or desirable. To the world, a man is measured by his usefulness where being inexperienced with no achievements to your name is a deal-breaker. Society expects this and treats you accordingly. No one will come looking for you to buy a product or go out on a date. You are seen as a waste of time. The only people who will give a shit are people who are willing to bet on your potential. They can see in you an ability to work hard and make a name for yourself in the future. In most cases, people will just see you as cheap labour. With no experience, it is an excuse to pay you poorly, even for a job that someone else would be paid highly for, if they were older.

When you are young, your only option is to learn and grow in experience. It requires the constant improvement of yourself so that it may bear fruit in the future. For a lot of influencers in the manosphere, it is suggested that 30 is the time when you can eat the fruits of your labour. By that time, people will start to take you more seriously. Companies start to headhunt you, women start to flirt with you and other men respect you. However, all of this is not given for free. You must work for it. If you don’t work for it, you will not get these things. Society will even hate you more when you are 30 and unsuccessful.

The guideline is always clear, work on yourself. Become the man you want to be around. Whatever that means to you, you will find that it is similar to what the manosphere talks about. Men want to be respected. They aspire for power, wealth and status. They want to feel competent and grounded in themselves. They want to feel confident and sure of the path they have taken and the decisions that they have made. Whatever you want, it is stated by one manosphere influencer or another. Being a man is multi-faceted but it is made clear that a man is not born, he is made. You are the only one who can make yourself into the man that you want to be.

Amerix talks about the 5Ms: Muscle, Mind, Matter, Men, Money. Denmo talks about Reproductive, Social and Monetary. What you always find is that they are talking about the same thing. Even Andrew Kibe alludes to these things, although in an unstructured and entertaining way. Amerix’s structure is more elaborate and we will use it below to express what it means to be a man.

5Ms of Being a Man

1. Muscle

Man is characterised by being the physically stronger gender of the human species. Building your body is an important aspect of being masculine, however, this part also emphasizes taking care of your body in general. You have to do the following:

1. Eat well
2. Exercise
3. Get good sleep
4. Be hygienic
5. Dress well
6. Fix your posture and walk
7. Self defense

Most people think that being a man is all about muscles. Muscles are important but not the whole story. How you present your body and take care of it will influence how people perceive you at a glance and take you more seriously. However, this doesn’t mean that you should not know how to fight. When it comes to it, know how to punch a nigga in the face.

2. Mind

You can have a great body but no one wants to be around a strong idiot. You have to be well-informed, educated and show dexterity in thought. You have to have some content as people would say. You can do the following:

1. Read widely
2. Write well
3. Learn new skills
4. Be articulate in your speech
5. Engage in creative activity
6. Test your mind and knowledge with elaborate games and tests like chess, Go

Your mind is the control-center of your life. It is what helps you make sound decisions and process large amounts of information to make conclusions. As Ray Dalio puts it, the quality of life is determined by the quality of your decisions. With great decisions, you take actions that have the greatest success.

3. Matter

You can have a great body and a great mind but with no assets to your name, what are you doing? Gathering resources is what your body and mind should be doing. You use your mind to decide what resources to acquire and your body goes and gets those resources. You can do the following:

1. Gain a valuable skill and master it
2. Start a business that provides value
3. Buy land and make it productive
4. Pool money and invest it
5. Build or buy a house
6. Buy a car

Please note the order of things. You must consider assets as the major priority or at least the end game. The end game should not be to own a car. A car is a liability, which is something that takes money out of your pocket. A business is an asset, which is something that puts money into your pocket. For all of us, our skill is our first and most important asset. We mostly use it to get a job, which is a start but it is not the end. Use your skill to get assets then use your assets to get liabilities.

4. Men

You now have a great body, a great mind, a bunch of great assets but you have no social life. You are vulnerable to attack. No man is an island and if he is an island, he will succumb to the waves. You need a strong network of people that you can trust, build with and defend. When life is going well for you, you become a target. You can do the following:

1. Join a club or community based on your interests.
2. Keep in touch with friends from previous phases like school, church, childhood.
3. Keep your family close, especially your father and brothers
4. Respect and have ramport with men in your line of work and related areas of your work
5. Meet other men at networking events and get-togethers and keep in touch

Having men around you will benefit you in the long-run. When you are successful, you will want people to share that success with. You want that to be your tribe of men. They will guide you, sharpen you, defend you and lift you up when you are down. Grow with them from the beginning and make sure that you level up together. Drop the ones who don’t want to level up as they will drag you down with them.

5. Money

Once you have the 4 things above: a great body, a great mind, a great portfolio of assets and a great tribe of men, the product is getting that sweet money. You are valuable in society at this point and it will be rewarded with value in return. In our capitalist system, this is in the form of currency. The bank account will have money streaming in, your stock options will be rising in price and your investments will be getting interest by the day. You can do the following:

1. Budget your spending
2. Increase your revenue
3. Manage an investment portfolio
4. Use credit and loans to your advantage
5. Acquire ownership through stock options
6. Have an emergency fund

Having money is not the end of it. Money is a tool and it has to be used accordingly. Now that you have it, you have to have a vision of how to preserve, or even better, deploy it to grow. Invest your money to grow even further. The skill of using money to make more money is a game that few people play well. With time, you will come to master it.

6. Mission (Bonus)

I have added a 6th one. You have a great body, a great mind, a great portfolio of assets, a great tribe of men, a great bank account. Now what? You cannot just sit there and do nothing. The world has many problems that need solving. The world needs more leaders to guide it. With the platform that you have, you have the moral authority and responsibility to give back to society. As Uncle Ben told Peter Parker, “With great power comes great responsibility”. As a great man, you have a duty to lead your people and this starts with what you want for the world. You can do the following:

1. Craft your purpose
2. Share your experiences and story with others
3. Educate people
4. Be charitable and give back to the vulnerable
5. Engage in civil discourse
6. Start and invest in impactful programmes
7. Stand up where there is injustice and wrongdoing
8. Promote and embody good and upstanding values
9. Build and do things that make the future a better place
10. Leave a legacy for the next generation to take up and run with

The above examples are very vague and can mean anything, let’s take examples:

1. Make humanity a multiplanetary species
2. Fund all the children’s homes in the city
3. Invent a sustainable and unlimited source of energy
4. Be the greatest president that your nation has ever seen
5. Wear a mask every night and go fight crime by instilling fear into your enemies
6. Support and fund the next generation of founders

Having a mission is what gives all the 5Ms meaning. Unfortunately, the manosphere gets too caught up on what it means to be a man, that they forget what men are good for in the first place. Men are leaders and leaders have a vision of the future, which they ensure comes to life. You cannot have a man without mission. A man is always on a mission. It gives him a reason to be a man in the first place. Men are built to do, not be.

Conclusion

Being a male has its advantage and disdvantages but it is a blessing and I would not trade it for anything. Knowing that I can build myself into whatever I want, as long as I put in the work, is an empowering thing. Getting things easy is good in the short-term but disheartening in the long-run. The fruits only taste sweet when the toil has been grueling. You appreciate the good things in life when you have been subjected to suffering. Men are built to suffer. Men are creatures of responsibility. Men are objects that tame chaos and turn it into order as they tame the chaos within.

You don’t become a man, you choose to be a man. Every day that you wake up, you make the choice to be a man or not. Being a man is about doing, not being. It never ends. It is our eternal battle until death. Carry it with a pride.

Being a man is a privilege and all men should take pride in that. Otherwise, no one else will.

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