What does it mean to even be a man?
Well honestly I don’t know if I even qualify to answer this question. Besides being a man, I have no accolades to my name. I am not learned in any particular field that would shine light on this subject. This is coming from merely a man, no different from any one of you. With that said, I do believe I have given a fair amount of thought over this question. I find myself returning to this question frequently, just about daily.
Lets start at the beginning, the very beginning…
GEN 1:28-30 NIV
“28 God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”
29 Then God said, “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. 30 And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds in the sky and all the creatures that move along the ground—everything that has the breath of life in it—I give every green plant for food.” And it was so.”
God has laid out for us plainly in this passage what the intention behind the creation of man is. Firstly, “Be fruitful…” He wishes for us to be like him. We should experience the beauty of creation. As a tree grows to bear fruit, we too are part of the work of creating life. While man can not create life, for that was the gift given to woman, man has always been gifted in creation. Men excel at making room for life and laying the foundations. From Al-Khazneh to our civilization as we know it. Man has created vigorously. Consider the past 100 hundred years alone. We have achieved flight, even supersonic. We have built massive cities that contain tens-hundreds of millions of people. Now, we are entering the age of AI and robotics, the pinnacle of creation. It is not life, but a grand imitation.
Mans deepest most intimate desire is to create, whether that means to “increase in numbers” or to be “fruitful” and build up the earth, like a tree who creates the fruit to bare, protect, and spread their seed.
While man does desire creation, it is just one side of the coin. Destruction is the other, I would not however claim it as the antithesis. For appropriate and just destruction makes room for more and potentially greater creation. This is why whenever God destroys it is great, terrifying and violent, but great. Inappropriate destruction is where things such as atomic weapons fall; and some weird middle ground (which is why it’s probably so interesting) is graffiti vandalism. The true antithesis would be idleness, to do nothing, to remain stagnant in life. Neither creating anything nor destroying, to just allow life to move around you.
Second, “fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.” All men wish to lead and rule. For God himself has given man dominion to rule over all of creation. This is how kings are born and stive for world domination, while not explicitly stated, man ruling over other man is the next step since humans are the pinnacle of all creation.
There are only 2 types of men
There are followers and there are leaders. Followers will never be happy. This is due to the fact that by simply following you never fulfill your destiny. Without the fulfillment of your destiny happiness cannot truly be obtained just mere distraction. What I am not saying is that everyone who works a job is a follower. For I myself work a job, the bills have to get paid somehow, that is just a fact of life. A follower is someone who does not strive to fulfill their dreams and desires and merely gives up on themselves, someone who submits utterly to the world and allows themselves to be trampled upon. Now there is always hope for a follower to become a leader again, for that is every mans destiny to lead. Whether that is a kingdom, their household, or merely their own life; I man must feel in control of their own time or they become enslaved to the follower mindset.
A leader is many things, I am sure that multitudes of great people come into your mind when you here the word leader. But I’m not talking in titles and accomplishments. Men become leaders when they learn first and foremost how to lead themselves and their own lives; once and only once they become the master of your own time. When you finally have control of your own time and get to do as you please, that is true freedom. No matter if you still have to work at a job to make money, if you allow yourself freedoms to go along side doing work you will feel free. And if you have never felt this in your adult life it is simple. Make room in your life for a hobby. Then you finally own a chunk of your time back. Yes, sometimes you will be tired and drained but the reward when you look back becomes ten fold over any amount of exhaustion.
This is why I have picked up writing in such a way that forces me to act, because I can always say that I am working on a book, and I will write some later. But later doesn’t exist if there is no time commitment or deadline in place, nothing would ever get accomplished. People are inherently procrastinators. I probably the greatest of them all. But within the Last month I have created this blog, started plotting out a book, finished reading a handful of books, and picked up book binding. I have completely and utterly immersed myself in the world of writing; and I feel more free than ever. While my time on paper seems all the more constrained, It is slowly being filled with thinks I choose to do which gives me freedom. Ideally someday I will be able to live with all my time to my own control, until then I will work diligently until that day comes.
“I don’t want to be happy, I want to be great!!”
-Andrew Tate
The essence of man is war
Men thrive off of competition. Men need competitions. Men constantly define themselves by what they have and what they don’t. Men want status more than they will ever admit. Yes, this is true but it is also very shallow mindset. I don’t disagree that every man feels this innate essence to want to grow and be better than his brother next to him. But a wise man knows what matters truly to them and focuses that energy like a spear and aims for their sole target of happiness.
This quote is not saying to strive for happiness, quite the latter actually. It is really saying that you should not allow yourself to be happy and to settle with yourself until you achieve your goals and become the greatness you wish to achieve. In doing this your goals must be great; nothing you could achieve overnight but ideally takes a lifetime to achieve. For after accomplishment of your goal your life will only seem to go down hill, because all the works of your life lead to one moment and if that moment is to soon or does not progressively move forward you shall dwindle in comfortability. All men should die unfulfilled in their accomplishment in wanting to do something the next day. I am not saying to be proud of the life you lived or what you manage to do in your allotted time but you should always wish to do more.
“Think of yourself as dead. You have lived your life. Now take what’s left and live it properly”.
-Marcus Aurelius
