The Art of Manliness

Of the dozens of men who have served as US president, Franklin Delano Roosevelt had a particularly close connection with the citizens he served. The only president elected to four terms, Americans hung FDR's picture up in their homes, wrote him thousands of letters, and regularly tuned in to listen to his fireside chats.

My guest would say that much of the depth, gravitas, and empathy Roosevelt was able to convey to the country was not something inborn, but in fact grew out of a tragedy which befell him at the age of 39: the contraction of polio. Jonathan Darman is the author of Becoming FDR: The Personal Crisis That Made a President, and today on the show, he paints a portrait of what Roosevelt was like before he got polio, and how, despite charm and ambition, he was considered shallow and a political lightweight. We then discuss what it was like for FDR to get polio, what he did during years of bedridden convalescence, and how the disease and his rehabilitation changed him. We talk about how the influence of FDR's polio experience can be seen in the way he guided the country through the Depression and WWII, and the lesson in realistic optimism he offers us today.

• Jonathan's Website

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People sometimes ask me what I think of video games. I think that, in moderation, they're a fine source of the kind of passive entertainment we all need little doses of in our lives. But for me personally, I rarely play video games because there's just too much other stuff I'd rather do instead.

There is one notable exception to my ambivalence towards video games, however. A game which I played for hours with thorough enjoyment and zero regret: Red Dead Redemption 2. It's a video game that's more immersive and story-like than most others, and even gets you reflecting on the existential layers of life.

Here to discuss those deeper layers of Red Dead Redemption 2 with me is Patrick Stokes, a professor of philosophy and fellow fan of the game. We combine two of my favorite things — Red Dead Redemption 2 and the philosophy of Soren Kierkegaard — in a conversation on the existential themes you can find in the game like nostalgia, freedom, choice and consequences, and the certain uncertainty of death.

• AoM Podcast #790: Kierkegaard on the Present (Passionless) Age
• AoM Podcast #635: The Existentialist’s Survival Guide
• "Art for Trying Times: How a Philosopher Found Solace Playing RedDeadRedemption 2" by Patrick Stokes
• Digital Souls: A Philosophy of Online Death by Patrick Stokes
• "A Special Way of Being Afraid" — Kathy Behrendt on the fear of non-existence in death
• A Very Easy Death by Simone De Beauvoir
• Photo of Lewis Powell — conspirator in the Lincoln assassination
• "The Ruin" poem
• Kierkegaard quote on living life forwards
• Mimesis as Make-Believe by Kendall Walton
• The Ethical Demand by Knud Ejler Løgstrup
• Patrick's articles on New Philosopher 

• Patrick's Website
• Patrick on Twitter

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Most leadership advice says the same thing: to be a good leader, you need to be generous, humble, and authentic.

My guest, professor of organizational behavior Jeffrey Pfeffer, would say that kind of advice may make us feel good and represent the world as we'd like it to be, but it doesn't actually work in the world as it really is. What the research shows does work is what he lays out in his book: 7 Rules of Power: Surprising-—But True—Advice on How to Get Things Done and Advance Your Career.

People often have negative associations with power, but Jeffrey would argue that power, and many of the techniques involved in getting it, are morally neutral, and can be used for ill or for good. So if you have a worthy aim and want to grow your influence and move up in your job, you have to get comfortable going after something that may make you uncomfortable. Jeffrey shares how to do that as we take a quick and dirty dive into the real rules of power.

• AoM Article: How to Dress to Convey Power
• AoM Article: The 3 Elements of Charisma — Power
• AoM Podcast #403: A Better Way to Network

• Jeffrey's Website with links to his podcast — Pfeffer on Power

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Mental illnesses of all kinds are on the rise, and yet we seem no closer to being able to treat them effectively. We're only able to treat the symptoms of mental illness, but aren't often able to put the illness into remission because its root cause has been a mystery.

My guest, however, believes he knows exactly what the root cause of mental illness is, and thus how to finally resolve it for good. His name is Dr. Chrisopther Palmer, and he's a Harvard psychiatrist and the author of Brain Energy: A Revolutionary Breakthrough in Understanding Mental Health. Today on the show, Chris unpacks his theory of mental illness, which basically comes down to this: if your brain cells aren't getting enough energy, they're not going to function properly. He explains how numerous and seemingly diverse mental illnesses, from anxiety and depression to ADHD and alcoholism, actually all have a common pathway: metabolic disorders. While we typically think of metabolism as related to the physical body, it also greatly affects the mind, and Chris explains how you can have the kind of metabolic problems that cause mental illness even if you're not overweight. Chris then shares how certain lifestyle changes, like switching to a ketogenic diet, may be able to completely cure mental illness.

• AoM Podcast #585: Inflammation, Saunas, and the New Science of Depression
• AoM Podcast #793: The New Science of Metabolism and Weight Loss
• AoM Podcast #747: Why We Get Sick

• The BrainEnergy Website
• Chris' Website

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Our world has never been more convenient and comfortable. With just a few taps of our fingers, we can order food to our door, access endless entertainment options, and keep our climate at a steady 72 degrees. We don't have to put in much effort, much less face any risk or challenge, in order to sustain our daily lives. 

In some ways, this quantum leap in humanity's comfort level is a great boon. But in other ways, it's absolutely killing our minds, bodies, and spirit.

My guest says it's time to reclaim the currently-hard-to-come-by but truly essential benefits of discomfort. His name is Michael Easter, and he's a writer, editor, and professor, and the author of The Comfort Crisis: Embrace Discomfort to Reclaim Your Wild, Happy, Healthy Self. Michael first shares how his experience with getting sober helped him discover the life-changing potential of doing hard things, before digging into what fleeing from discomfort is doing to our mental and physical health. We then discuss the Japanese idea of misogis, which involves taking on an epic outdoor challenge, and why Michael decided to do a misogi in which he participated in a month-long caribou hunt in the backcountry of Alaska. Michael shares what he learned from the various challenges he encountered during his misogi — including intense hunger, boredom, solitude, and physical exertion — as well as what research can teach all of us about why we need to incorporate these same kinds of discomforts into our everyday lives.

• Related AoM Articles:
  • A Few Lessons From Beating the Bottle
  • How I Learned to Be Comfortable Being Uncomfortable
  • Shadow Work and the Rise of Middle-Class Serfdom
  • How the Hero's Journey Can Help You Become a Better Man
  • Be a Time Wizard: How to Speed Up and Slow Down Time
  • Take the One-Month "Do Something New Every Day" Challenge
  • Lessons on Solitude From an Antarctic Explorer
  • Fasting as a Spiritual Discipline
  • Don't Just Lift Heavy, Carry Heavy
  • Cardio for the Man Who Hates Cardio
• Related AoM Podcasts:
  • Are Modern People the Most Exhausted in History?
  • Why Are We Restless?
  • Wish You Had More Time? What You Really Want Is More Memories
  • The Psychology of Boredom
  • Weird and Wonderful Ways to Get Comfortable Being Uncomfortable
  • What You Can (Really) Learn About Exercise From Your Human Ancestors
  • Building Better Citizens Through Rucking

• Michael's Website
• Michael on Instagram
• Michael on Twitter

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In 2016, David Sax wrote a book called The Revenge of Analog, which made the case that even as we marched towards an ever more digital future, we were increasingly returning to real, tangible things — choosing vinyl records over streaming, brick and mortar bookstores over Amazon, and in-person conversations over Skype.

In the intervening years, the pandemic hit, and, David argues, truly reaffirmed his case, which he lays out in his latest book: The Future Is Analog.

Today on the show, David explains how the pandemic gave us a trial run of an entirely digital future, and made us realize we really don't want it, or at least, we don't want all of it. We discuss the drawbacks that came from going virtual with work, school, shopping, socializing, and religious worship, and discuss how we're not as smart when we don't use our embodied cognition, how information is different from education, and why there are few things quite as awful as a Zoom cocktail party.

• David’s previous appearance on the AoM Podcast: Episode #289 — Revenge of the Analog
• AoM Podcast #796: The Life We’re Looking For
• Sonic Boom music store in Toronto
• Native Summit outdoor store in Edmond, OK

• David on Twitter
• David’s Website

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Amongst supposedly monogamous couples, 23% of men and 19% of women have cheated on their current partner, and while studies have long found that men are more likely to cheat than women, that gap has significantly narrowed over time; in fact, married women between the ages of 18 and 29 cheat at a slightly higher rate than men do.

Behind cold bits of data like this are the many real stories of infidelity and the heartache and destruction they create. If you're not yet part of the cohort who's experienced the fallout of cheating firsthand, you probably want to avoid joining its ranks. Well, my guest has a formula that explains what three factors add up to infidelity, and once you know it, you can reverse engineer things to prevent those factors from showing up in your relationship.

His name is Andrew G. Marshall and he's a marriage therapist with over 30 years of counseling experience. Today on the show, Andrew first shares the breakdown in age and gender amongst the clients who come to see him in his practice and the two stages of life where he's found infidelity to be the most common. Andrew shares his formula for what leads to infidelity, and as we unpack its elements, we discuss how quiet desperation is a major driver of cheating, why men who don't have good male friends are more likely to have an affair, how to know if you're forming an inappropriate friendship that could lead to infidelity, Andrew's seven deadly sins of bad communication, and more. We also talk about the practices that healthy couples use to ward off infidelity, and the best question to ask yourself to start improving your relationship today.

• AoM Article: The 10 Commandments of Clean Communication
• AoM Article: How to Communicate Your Needs in a Relationship
• AoM Article:Can Men and Women Just Be Friends?
• AoM Podcast #179: The Science of Cheating — How to Prevent and Deal With Infidelity
• AoM Podcast #550: How to Strengthen Your Marriage Against Divorce
• Sunday Firesides: Dependence to Independence
• Sunday Firesides: Give Them the Cream

• Andrew's website with links to his books and his podcast, The Meaningful Life
• Andrew on Twitter
• Andrew on Facebook
• Andrew on Substack

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You’ve heard of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. But did you know that its author, Stephen Covey, was in his late fifties when it came out? After it became a monumental bestseller, Covey continued to work on new book ideas, one of which encapsulated his own experience with late-in-life success and his commitment to having an ever-forward-looking attitude. 

A decade after his death, that book has finally been brought to fruition by Stephen’s daughter, Cynthia Covey Haller. It’s called Live Life in Crescendo: Your Most Important Work Is Always Ahead of You, and its contents really represent the capstone habit to those that came before.

Today on the show, Cynthia unpacks the crescendo mentality and how it represents a commitment to continual learning, growth, and change that you can adopt at any age. We discuss how embracing the crescendo mentality is particularly important in midlife, why that stage of life can be uniquely challenging whether you’ve achieved success or are struggling, and the shifts people in each of those situations can make to find greater fulfillment.

• The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey
• The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness by Stephen R. Coveyt
• AoM series on The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
• AoM Podcast #607: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People (With Stephen R. Covey‘s son, Stephen M.R. Covey)
• AoM Podcast #776: How to Shift Out of the Midlife Malaise
• How Will You Measure Your Life? by Clayton M. Christensen
• Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl 
• The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens by Sean Covey
• Mike Mason, retired FBI bus driver

• Cynthia on IG

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While we all wonder how we would fare if we had to survive for months in the wild like Brian does in the book Hatchet, the reality is that most survival situations only last a day or two. You get lost or injured in the woods and have to spend a night out that you hadn't planned on. And as my guest, Dave Canterbury says, as long as you know some basic skills and pack the right gear, you can turn a potentially life-and-death situation into what's just a night of inconvenient camping.

Dave is the author of numerous books on wilderness survival, including his latest: The Bushcraft Essentials Field Guide. Today on the show, Dave unpacks the five priorities of short-term survival and what you need to pack, know, and do to deal with the risks of venturing into the wild. We discuss the biggest concern when it comes to first aid, the three elements of a proper shelter, Dave's favorite method for starting a fire, the safest bet for water purification, what to look for in a perfect survival knife, the five knife skills you should master, the essential knots every outdoorsman should know, and more.

• How to Use a Tourniquet to Control Major Bleeding
• 6 Trees Every Survivalist Should Know
• How to Harvest and Use Nature’s Aspirin
• How to Keep Your Course in the Wilderness
• Series on land navigation
• 6 Unconventional Outdoor Shelters
• How to Build the Ultimate Survival Shelter
• How to Build a Campfire That Will Last Through the Night
• The Ultimate Firestarter: How to Make Char Cloth
• How to Choose the Perfect Survival Knife
• 5 Critical Knife Skills for the Outdoorsman
• How to Fell a Tree With a Knife
• 7 Basic Knots Every Man Should Know

• Dave on IG

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When Kate was growing up, her grandfather often told her that when he was serving on a Navy ship during WWII, there were two things he and his fellow sailors never talked about: religion and politics.

In the present age, we're apt to think that leaving politics off the table like that is inauthentic, or worse, a sign of being an insufficiently engaged citizen. We're apt to think that the more we do politics, the better the health of our politics.

My guest would say that the opposite is true. His name is Robert Talisse, and he's a professor of political philosophy and the author of Overdoing Democracy: Why We Must Put Politics in Its Place. Today on the show, Bob and I discuss how democracy isn't just a system of government but a moral ideal; how the fact that it's an ideal gives it a tendency to extend its reach; and how the particular circumstances of modern times have extended that reach into all of our lifestyle choices, from the car we drive to where we shop. But, Bob argues, there can be too much of a good thing. He says the way politics has saturated everything in our lives creates some negative effects, turning politics into something that parties can market like toothpaste, and making each individual's views more extreme, so that we ultimately get to the point that we can't see our political opponents as people who have an equal say in our democracy. The solution, Bob says, is not to build bridges of dialogue with our political opponents, as is so often advised, but to engage with people in spaces, places, and activities where doing politics isn't the point, and you don't even know the political views of the people with whom you interact.

• Robert's faculty page

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In the 80s and 90s, few sports stars loomed as large as Bo Jackson. A Kansas City Royal and an Oakland Raider, he was the rare athlete to play two professional sports. His strength and power seemed supernatural. He soared into end zones, ran the 40-yard dash in 4.13 seconds, hit meteoric home runs, and broke baseball bats over his head for fun. And those were just his documented exploits. Because Bo played in an era before smartphones, stories circulated — that could never be entirely proven or disproven — that he was capable of even more impressive feats. The guy was the stuff of legends.

For this reason, Jeff Pearlman has entitled his new biography of Bo: The Last Folk Hero. Today on the show, Jeff and I talk about Bo's Paul Bunyan-esque stature, and the real life behind the legend. We discuss both the flaws and the strengths of Bo Jackson, and how natural talent can be both a hindrance and a help, as we trace his life from an impoverished upbringing as one of ten kids, to how he managed to secure an arrangement where he got to play two professional sports. Jeff explains how Bo never liked to practice — because he was so naturally gifted he didn't need to — why Bo didn't take the deal when the Yankees tried to draft him out of high school, the flash-bulb moments he achieved in college and the pros, how a hip injury ended his football days but didn't entirely finish him off for baseball, and why, after such a neon career, Bo has largely disappeared from the public eye.

• Bo going over the top in the 1982 Auburn/Alabama Iron Bowl
• Bo running across the outfield wall in Baltimore
• Bo's first major league at bat against Steve Carlton
• Bo's rookie 91-yard run vs. the Seahawks
• Bo's leadoff homer in the 1989 All-Stars Game
• Bo throwing out Harold Reynolds at home plate
• Bo breaking bats over his knee and head

• Jeff's Website
• Jeff on Twitter

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There are two parts of the mind: the conscious and the unconscious. While the former dominates your attention, the latter actually occupies far more of the brain, influencing your mood, generating inspiration, and making you who you are, all behind the scenes.

My guest would argue that to become all you're meant to be, you have to make your unconscious mind your ally and that this may be life's most important task.

His name is Daniel Z. Lieberman, and he's a psychiatrist and the author of Spellbound: Modern Science, Ancient Magic, and the Hidden Potential of the Unconscious Mind. Today on the show, Daniel first offers an overview of the nature, function, and study of the unconscious. From there we discuss Carl Jung's perspective on the unconscious, and his ideas around its archetypes and shadows. We then get into the way that things which are connected to magic and the supernatural, like fairy tales and tarot cards, can be seen as manifestations of the energy of the unconscious and as age-old attempts to confront and understand it. We end our discussion by talking about the quest for individuation, which requires bringing together the conscious and unconscious minds, and how to go about tapping into the power of the unconscious to become a kind of magician yourself.

• Daniel's previous appearance on the show: Episode #429 — Taking Control of the Brain Chemical That Drives Excitement, Motivation, and More
• King, Warrior, Magician, Lover: Rediscovering the Archetypes of the Mature Masculine by Robert Moore and Douglas Gillette
• AoM's series on the king, warrior, magician, and lover archetypes 
• AoM Podcast #598: Journeying From the First to the Second Half of Life
• AoM Podcast #335: Exploring Archetypes With Jordan B. Peterson
• "The Golden Bird" fairy tale
• Iron John by Robert Bly

• Daniel's Website

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The Twilight Zone is arguably one of the best and most influential shows in television history. The reason it endures, and is still being watched and talked about more than sixty years after its debut, can not only be traced to its superior storytelling and innovations in the genres of horror, science fiction, and fantasy, but the fact that each episode is embedded with a lesson on how to grapple with life's moral and existential dilemmas.

Here to unpack those life lessons is Mark Dawidziak, author of Everything I Need to Know I Learned in the Twilight Zone. Today on the show, Mark and I discuss the parable-like morals from a selection of Twilight Zone episodes, drawn from those that are my favorites, Mark's favorites, and simply classic. And, since Halloween is coming up, Mark and I both offer our picks for the just plain scariest episodes to watch.

• Episodes referenced in the show:
  • "A Stop at Willoughby"
  • "Walking Distance"
  • "Time Enough at Last"
  • "A Nice Place to Visit"
  • "To Serve Man"
  • "Mr. Bevis"
  • "Kick the Can"
  • "The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street"
  • "The Obsolete Man"
• Mark's picks for the scariest Twilight Zone episodes:
  • "Twenty Two"
  • "Ring-a-Ding Girl"
• Brett's picks for the scariest Twilight Zone episodes:
  • "Living Doll"
  • "The Dummy"
  • "It's a Good Life"
• AoM articles inspired by Twilight Zone episodes:
  • Can’t Have the Sweet Without the Bitter (Inspired by "A Nice Place to Visit")
  • How Redundancies Increase Your Antifragility (Inspired by "Time Enough at Last")
  • Sunday Firesides: Things Don’t Get Old, We Do (The illustration is an Easter egg homage to "Walking Distance")

• Mark's Website

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A lot of people feel dissatisfied about how they spend their time. They often feel busy, but that busyness doesn’t add up to anything — not to fun, not to fulfillment, not to memories.

My guest, Laura Vanderkam, has spent a lot of time thinking about and studying time, and last year she decided to run an experiment to see if the insights she had gained from that study could help average people get a better handle on their time. She had 150 people try out nine different time-management rules, which were sorted into three categories: Calm the Chaos, Make Good Things Happen, and Waste Less Time. She shares these field-tested strategies from what she called the Tranquility by Tuesday project in her new book by the same name.

Today on the show, we talk about my seven favorite rules from Tranquility by Tuesday. Laura explains why you need to give yourself a bedtime, plan your week on Friday, make a “punch list” for tackling small tasks, and more. We also discuss the principle that can allow you to read a hundred books in a year.

• Laura’s previous appearance on the podcast: Episode #495: Wish You Had More Time? What You Really Want is More Memories
• AoM article and video on how to plan your week
• AoM Podcast #743: How to Get Time, Priorities, and Energy Working in Your Favor
• AoM Podcast #450: How to Make Time for What Really Matters Every Day
• AoM article and podcast on microadventures
• AoM Article: Possibilities in Spare Moments
• Jeremy Anderberg’s newsletter, where he shares about the many books he reads

• Laura’s Website

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Note: For fall break, the McKays are attempting their first familial backpacking trip. Kate and I have been before, but we've never brought the kids, so this will be fun. While we're out of touch, please enjoy this rebroadcast with Gary Collins about going off the grid for a much longer period of time. Gary unfortunately passed away this fall, but he left a lot of great tips on simplifying your life in this episode. 

Many dream of leaving the city and all its tethers and obligations and creating a simpler, more independent life farther from the mainstream population and entirely off the grid. But how do you go from that daydream to making such a move a reality?

My guest walks us through the process today. His name is Gary Collins, he made the leap himself and now lives off the grid in Northeast Washington, and he's the author of several books on off grid living as well as simplifying your life. We begin our conversation today with why Gary decided to leave his conventional, urban, 9-5 existence to find a freer lifestyle, and how he defines being off the grid. We then get into why Gary thinks you should make the move to living off the grid in a series of steps, the first of which is to simplify your existing life in three main ways. Gary then makes the case for why living in a RV should be the next step in your journey, before discussing the process of finding land for your off grid home, and the factors to consider in picking a locale. From there we get into how those who live off the grid take care of water, sewage, power, and internet, how they construct the house itself, and what to know about the start-up costs involved. We end our conversation with a discussion of getting off the grid in a more metaphorical way by quitting social media, and why Gary thinks you should pull the plug on those platforms, even if you're an entrepreneur.

If reading this in an email, click the title of the post to listen to the show.

• Gary's books
• How to Survive a Grid-Down Disaster
• How to Bug-In
• A Survival Expert's Guide to Bugging-In
• 5 Books to Get the Personal Finance Education You Never Had
• A Place for Everything and Everything In Its Place
• How to Get Started Composting
• Zillow.com
• 4 Lessons From a 4-Week Social Media Fast
• Becoming a Digital Minimalist
• Utopia is Creepy
• TheSimpleLifeNow.com

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As long as humans have existed, we’ve had to choose between our lower and higher desires — between what we want in the moment, and what we want in the long-term. As long as humans have existed, we’ve had to exercise self-control.

While exercising self-control has always been part of the human condition, our ideas about it have changed through the ages, as have the number of obstacles to doing so.

My guest charted the course of these changes in his book Temptation: Finding Self-Control in an Age of Excess, and he takes us on a tour of them today. His name is Daniel Akst, and we begin our conversation with a definition of what self-control is. We then discuss how Freudian psychology and the scientific study of self-control took it from being something the ancient Greeks and Romans considered an essential virtue of character, to something you shouldn’t or even couldn’t exercise. We also talk about what it is about the modern age that makes self-control uniquely difficult to put into practice. We end our conversation with how, despite the addition of complexities and hindrances, self-control remains a fundamental resource in a flourishing life, and Daniel shares practical tips for preserving yours by changing your environment, so you actually don’t have to exercise self-control as much.

• The Power and Pleasure of Delayed Gratification
• The Kingship of Self-Control
• Sunday Fireside: Lash Yourself to the Mast

• Daniel’s Website

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The two years, two months, and two days Henry David Thoreau spent at Walden Pond represent one of the most well-known experiences in American literary and philosophical history. Thoreau's time at Walden has become something of a legend, one that is alternately lionized and criticized.

Yet though many people know of Thoreau's experience at Walden, and the book he wrote about it, far fewer really understand its whys, whats, and hows.

My guest, who's dedicated his career to studying Thoreau, will unpack the oft-missed nuances and common misconceptions about Walden. His name is Jeffrey S. Cramer, and he's the Curator of Collections at The Walden Woods Project, as well as the author and editor of numerous books about Thoreau, including Walden: A Fully Annotated Edition. Today on the show, Jeffrey explains the reason Thoreau went to Walden, which wasn't originally to write about that experience, and which ended up evolving over time. We discuss what Walden Pond was like, the dimensions and furnishings of the house Thoreau built on its shores, and how he spent his days there. Jeffrey explains why Thoreau left Walden, how he was less attached to the experience than we commonly assume, and how the significance of the experience came less from living it and more from writing about it. We then discuss how Walden the book became a classic despite an initially slow start, before turning to what Jeffrey thinks of the common criticisms of it, and the popular impulse to tear Thoreau down. We end our conversation with what we moderns can learn from Thoreau's experiment with living deliberately.

• AoM Article: How to REALLY Avoid Living a Life of Quiet Desperation
• AoM Article: The Libraries of Famous Men — Henry David Thoreau
• AoM Podcast #417: Expect Great Things — The Mystical Life of Henry David Thoreau
• AoM Podcast #779: The World of the Transcendentalists and the Rise of Modern Individualism
• Sunday Firesides: Every Man Needs His Own Walden(s)
• Thoreau's works mentioned in the show:
  • Walden
  • A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers
  • The Maine Woods
  • Civil Disobedience 
• Jeffrey's Solid Seasons: The Friendship of Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson
• Kathryn Schulz's critical article on Thoreau and Jeffrey's response to it

• Jeffrey's Website
• The Walden Woods Project

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“Don’t be a quitter!” “Quitters never win, and winners never quit!”

These maxims encapsulate our usual attitude towards quitting, which is to see it as a bad thing, a weakness, a character defect. We celebrate those who stick with things, who have grit.

But my guest would say that quit and grit are just two sides of the same coin, and that quitting is a valuable skill to learn and get good at. Her name is Annie Duke, and she’s a former professional poker player, a speaker, a consultant, and an author. In her latest book, 

Quit: The Power of Knowing When to Walk Away, she seeks to rehabilitate quitting by showing how — whether it’s in the context of ending a relationship, leaving a job, or climbing a mountain — it has essential benefits. We discuss those benefits in today’s show, as well as how to know when to quit. We unpack how whether you should stick with something comes down to an equation of its positive “expected value,” how setting goals too rigidly can get in the way of our being able to assess that value, and the cognitive biases that keep you from quitting when you should. We end our conversation with two strategies for overcoming these biases, including establishing “kill criteria” to give yourself a timetable for how long to go after an aim.

• Annie’s previous appearances on the show:
  • #685: How to Decide
  • #387: Think Like a Poker Player to Make Better Decisions
• Podcast #210: Got Grit? (With Angela Duckworth)

• Annie’s Website

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Travel can often be approached as just another consumer good; travelers quickly dive in and out of a place, check off the things they want to see, harvest the requisite pictures to prove they were there, and wear their trip as a status symbol.

My guest, Rolf Potts, thinks there's a better way to approach travel. After exploring the world for years, he wrote a book called Vagabonding, which laid out the practicalities of how to execute long-term travel.

Twenty years later, he's back with a new book — The Vagabond's Way — with reflections on the more philosophical side of that kind of travel which you can take on any type of trip. Today on the show, Rolf explains the vagabonding ethos, which involves slowing down, being open to surprises, and really paying attention to your experiences. He first discusses how taking an overly romantic view of travel can actually diminish your enjoyment of traveling. We then turn to the idea that seeking to take a more authentic approach to travel shouldn't mean trying too hard to differentiate yourself from "typical" tourists, and how to approach stereotypical tourist stuff with a nuanced view. We discuss how to use the idea of pilgrimage beyond its religious connotations as a pretext for choosing which places to visit. We also delve into how to deal with the culture shock that can come both from visiting a new place, and returning home from a long trip. We end our conversation with how the attentive, adventurous attitude which underlies the vagabond's way can also be applied to exploring your own backyard.

• Rolf's previous book: Vagabonding: An Uncommon Guide to the Art of Long-Term World Travel
• AoM Podcast #653: The Dirtbag’s Guide to Life
• Sunday Firesides: This One's for Me
• AoM podcast and article on microadventures

• Rolf's Website

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The ancient Greeks and Romans thought a lot about what it means to live a virtuous life. They believed that good character was essential for achieving both individual excellence and a healthy, well-functioning society. For this reason, they also thought a lot about whether virtue could be taught to citizens, and philosophers put this thinking into practice by attempting to educate the moral ideals of leaders.

My guest, professor of philosophy Massimo Pigliucci, explores what the Greco-Romans discovered about the nature and teachability of virtue in his new book: The Quest for Character. Today on the show, Massimo and I discuss how the ancient Greeks and Romans defined virtue, and what it meant to them to live with arete, or excellence. We then look at case studies of philosophers who tried to shape men into being better leaders, including Socrates teaching Alcibiades, Aristotle tutoring Alexander the Great, and Seneca mentoring Nero. Massimo explains how these field experiments turned out, and the takeaways they offer on the question of whether virtue can be taught. We end our conversation with the ancient insights that have been confirmed by modern research that can help us become better people.

• AoM article and podcast on practical wisdom
• AoM articles on temperance, justice, and courage
• AoM Article: What Is Character?
• AoM Podcast #771 on Alcibiades and the rise and fall of Athens
• AoM Podcast #746: The Confucian Gentleman
• Plato's Meno and Protagoras
• AoM Podcast #445: How to Close the Character Gap (With Christian Miller)
• Marcus Aurelius' Meditations
• Sunday Firesides: Relationships Over Willpower

• Massimo's Website

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Charisma can make everything smoother, easier, and more exciting in life. It's a quality that makes people want to listen to you, to adopt your ideas, to be with you.

While what creates charisma can seem like a mystery, my guest today, communications expert Vanessa Van Edwards, says it comes down to possessing an optimal balance of two qualities: warmth and competence.

The problem is, even if you have warmth and competence, you may not be good at signaling these qualities to others. In Vanessa's work, she's created a research-backed encyclopedia of these influential signals, and she shares how to offer them in her book
Cues: Master the Secret Language of Charismatic Communication. Today on the show, Vanessa and I discuss some of the verbal and nonverbal social cues that make you attractive to others, and keep you out of what she calls the "danger zone." She explains what the distance between your earlobes and shoulders has to do with looking competent, how using uptalk and vocal fry sabotages your ability to convey power, how to put more warmth in your voice, how to trigger the right response with a dating profile picture, and more.

• AoM series on the elements of charisma 
• AoM Article: Gut Check — Are You a Contemptible Person?
• AoM Podcast #72: The Charisma Myth
• AoM Article: How to Use Body Language to Create a Dynamite First Impression
• AoM Podcast #694: The Fascinating Secrets of Your Voice
• JFK vs. Nixon presidential debate
• AoM article on the generational cycle

• The Science of People Website 
• Vanessa on Twitter
• Vanessa on IG

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Note: My guest in this episode, Dr. Earle Labor, died on September 15 at the age of 94. Earle was the world's foremost authority on one of the Art of Manliness' guiding inspirations and lights: Jack London. Earle dedicated his career to London scholarship and his work was pivotal in turning London's literature into a subject of serious study. Earle taught the very first undergraduate and graduate courses devoted to London and penned a hundred articles and ten books about him.

Earle not only admired London's devotion to what the author called "the true spirit of romance and adventure," he sought that spirit in his own life. As an undergraduate, Earle started the first weightlifting course at Southern Methodist University and he coached and lifted the SMU team to victory in the 1948 Dallas Open Championships. After college, he and a buddy took an epic road trip, where they did farm work and entered boxing matches to work their way from Texas to Canada. And he served in the U.S. Navy and spent time on a destroyer.

I had the privilege of interviewing Earle three times for the AoM podcast. The last time in January 2020, my son and I drove to Earle's home in Shreveport, LA to speak with him in person. To mark Earle's passing, please enjoy this rebroadcast of that conversation.  

The literature of Jack London has long been given the short shrift by scholars. They say he wrote some good dog stories for boys, but beyond that didn't showcase any literary genius or high-level craftsmanship. Well, my guest today begs to differ with this assessment. 

His name is Earle Labor. He's the preeminent Jack London scholar and 91 years young. I've had Earle on the podcast two previous times: the first to discuss his landmark Jack London biography, and the second to discuss his own memoir, The Far Music. For this episode, I drove down to Earle's home in Shreveport, Louisiana to talk to Earle about the overlooked literary genius of Jack London and the big themes that London wrote about in his novels and short stories. We begin our discussion with Earle's story of how he became a Jack London scholar and why London's work was historically neglected by academics. We then dig into London's literary themes by first discussing how he used the Klondike as a symbolic proving ground for men and how success in this wilderness depended on one's ability to mold oneself to Jack's "Northland Code." Earle uses excerpts from my favorite London story, "In A Far Country," as well as "To Build a Fire" and The Call of the Wild, to showcase the tenets of this code, and well as London's literary artistry. 

Earle then explains how London shifted his themes later in his career with his agrarian writing, how his wife Charmian changed his perception of real women and his female characters, and the influence that psychiatrist Carl Jung had on London's last works.

Consider this episode a masterclass on the literature of Jack London.

• Earl's biography of Jack London
• My first interview with Earle about Jack's epic life
• My second interview with Earle about "The Era of Bright Expectations"
• Martin Eden
• The Libraries of Famous Men: Jack London
• Jack London's Wisdom on Living a Life of Thumos
• "The Symbolic Wilderness" by Gordon Mills
• "To Build a Fire"
• "In a Far Country"
• Descriptions of Manliness: Jack London
• AoM series on Jack London's life
• "The Sentinel" by Arthur C. Clarke

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Dip your toes into the world of personal finance and you can find plenty of questions which are the subject of endless debate. How much of your income should you save? Is it okay to take on debt? Which is better — renting a home or owning one? When it comes to the stock market, should you buy the dip?

On his blog, Of Dollars and Data, my guest cuts through the personal finance noise by finding answers based on numbers rather than conjecture, and then converting this research into advice the average person can understand. His name is Nick Maggiulli, and he's the Chief Operating Officer and Data Scientist at Ritholtz Wealth Management, as well as the author of Just Keep Buying: Proven Ways to Save Money and Build Your Wealth. Today on the show, Nick explains what the data says about how you should approach the questions I've already mentioned. He also shares how to spend your money without feeling guilty by using the "2X Rule," the three criteria you should meet before you consider buying a home, the best way to approach the idea of "dollar cost averaging," and more. We end our conversation with the right mindset to adopt in our volatile economy.

• Your Money or Your Life
• The Value of Debt in Building Wealth
• AoM Article: Index Funds For Beginners
• AoM Podcast #536: How to Achieve a “Rich Life” With Your Finances

• Nick's blog: Of Dollars and Data
• Nick on Twitter
• Nick on IG

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Our lives are populated by rituals. Baptisms. Funerals. Graduations. Singing happy birthday, chanting cheers at a sports event, saying grace before dinner. When we perform rituals, there's no causal link between the behavior and the hoped for effect; for example, there's no causal connection between exchanging rings at an altar and becoming wedded to another human being.

But my guest would say that doesn't mean that rituals are useless and irrational; in fact, doing two decades of research on rituals caused him to do a one-eighty on his perception of their value. His name is Dimitris Xygalatas and he's an anthropologist and the author of Ritual: How Seemingly Senseless Acts Make Life Worth Living. Today on the show, Dimitris explains what defines a ritual and how a ritual is different from a mere habit. He shares how a greater understanding of ritual is upending our theories of human civilization, and the idea that "first came the temple, and then the city." Dimitris describes how rituals can be seen to have their own kind of logic and purpose, as they build trust and togetherness, serve as an effective way to deal with stress, signal someone's commitment to a group, and ultimately contribute to people's overall well-being.

• AoM series on the power of ritual
• AoM Article: How to Turn an Ordinary Routine Into a Spirit-Renewing Ritual
• AoM Article: Male Rites of Passage From Around the World
• AoM Podcast #505: A Man’s Need for Ritual
• Gobekli Tepe: The World’s First Temple?
• The Toraja people, who live with their dead

• Dimitris' Website

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You're working under a boss who really rubs you the wrong way. So you quit your job and take another. But in your new office, you find yourself stuck with a co-worker who bugs the tar out of you.

The presence of annoying, incompetent, and underhanded people isn't a particular workplace problem, but a universal human problem. In any and every group of people, there are going to be bothersome and troublesome personalities.

So if you can't entirely escape them, how do you get along with your fellow humans at work? My guest today has some research-backed advice. Her name is Tessa West, and she's a professor of psychology and the author of Jerks at Work: Toxic Coworkers and What to Do About Them. Today on the show, Tessa describes the seven types of jerks you run into at work — the kiss-up/kick-downer, credit stealer, bulldozer, free rider, micromanager, neglectful boss, and gaslighter — and shares what drives their respective behaviors and how to deal with them.

• AoM Article: How to Deal With Bad Coworkers
• Let Me Google That For You
• AoM Podcast #627: How to Deal With Jerks, Bullies, Tyrants, and Trolls
• AoM Podcast #799: Getting Along Is Overrated
• AoM Podcast #559: How to Handle Difficult Conversations

• Tessa's Website

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Amidst the epic clashes of armies and navies that make war such a fascinating subject, lie the smaller human interest stories that prove just as compelling. One such story is that of World War II soldier Joe Johnson Jr., which is told by Marcus Brotherton in a newly published book called A Bright and Blinding Sun: A World War II Story of Survival, Love, and Redemption. Today on the show, Marcus shares how Joe sought to escape the pressures of a broken family and the Great Depression by joining the US Army at age fourteen. We discuss how Joe ended up in the Philippines, fell in love with a teenage prostitute named Perpetua there, and helped smuggle her out of her brothel. We then get into how Joe was captured by the Japanese, and the harrowing experience he had to endure as a prisoner of war, including being locked in a box smaller than a coffin. We end our conversation with a discussion of Joe’s life after the war, and Marcus shares what happened to Perpetua, how Joe dealt with all the trauma he had experienced when he was really still just a kid, and what lessons Marcus has taken away from Joe’s life.

• Marcus‘ previous appearances on the podcast:
  • Episode #1: We Who Are Alive and Remain
  • Episode #44: Voices of the Pacific
• Articles Marcus has written for AoM
• Book Marcus wrote with Buck Compton — Call of Duty: My Life Before, During and After the Band of Brothers

• Marcus‘ Website

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When you were a kid, teachers and parents probably told you to concentrate. And as an adult, you likely often think about how much more productive, present, and happy you'd be if only you had better focus. But despite how much we think about our desire to improve our focus, no one ever gets any training in how to do it and even explains what focus is, exactly.

My guest today is an exception to that rule. He was taught the secrets to concentration when he spent ten years as a Hindu monk, and today he's on a mission to share them with others. His name is Dandapani, and he continues to live as a Hindu priest, though he's now also an entrepreneur and author, with a book just published called The Power of Unwavering Focus. Today on the show, Dandapani defines focus and shares the existential reasons why developing yours is so vital. He explains how that development begins with understanding how the mind is different from awareness, that where awareness goes, energy flows, and the need to bring awareness to attention. We walk through how to stop practicing distraction and start practicing concentration by making each of your daily activities a focused practice, and ultimately, making your whole day a practice. We also discuss how daily sessions of meditation are inadequate for developing focus, how mindfulness is different than concentration, and how the ability to control and direct your awareness is one of the greatest powers you can possess.

• AoM Podcast #168: The Value of Deep Work in the Age of Distraction
• AoM Article: What Every Man Ought to Know About Focus
• AoM Article: How to Effectively Manage Your Attention
• AoM Article: 11 Exercises That Will Strengthen Your Attention
• AoM Article: 12 Concentration Exercises from 1918
• AoM Podcast #768: Become a Focused Monotasker

• Dandapani's Website

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Why do some people who look can’t-miss high-achievers on paper end up floundering in life, while those who can seem like underdogs end up flourishing?

When my guest noticed this phenomenon while being involved in the selection process of veteran SEALs for a specialized command, it led him to the discovery that beneath more obvious skills are hidden drivers of performance, which he calls attributes. His name is Rich Diviney, and he’s a retired Navy SEAL commander and the author of The Attributes: 25 Hidden Drivers of Optimal Performance. Today on the show, Rich discusses the difference between skills and attributes and how the latter can’t be taught, but can be developed. We then talk about the difference between peak and optimal performance, before turning to the attributes which drive the latter. We get into a discussion of the components of grit, the difference between discipline and self-discipline, why you should become something of a humble narcissist, and much more. We end our conversation with how to figure out the attributes you are and aren’t strong in, and which you need for getting where you want to go.

• AoM Article: The 6 Types of Grit (And How to Develop Them)
• AoM Podcast: The Hell-Raising Leader of WWII’s Filthy Thirteen
• AoM Podcast #675: The Humble, Narcissistic Leader
• AoM Article: How to Develop Situational Awareness
• AoM Article: Being Decisive
• Sunday Firesides: Self-Discipline for What?

• The Attributes Website

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As an economist, Russ Roberts has been taught to approach decision-making by conducting an analysis, weighing tradeoffs, and then rationally budgeting resources to get the most bang for his buck. But as he explains in his new book, Wild Problems: A Guide to the Decisions That Define Us, he found this approach woefully inadequate for grappling with life's biggest decisions — things like figuring out whether to get married or how to live a meaningful life.

Today on the show, Russ and I delve into why the pros and cons approach to decision-making is inadequate when facing what he calls "wild problems." Russ explains that what makes life's big decisions so difficult to deal with is the fact that we don't know what they'll be like before we make them, the decisions themselves will transform us into different people, and their effects can be permanent, making such decisions akin to choosing to become a vampire. From there we turn to strategies for dealing with the inherent uncertainty around wild problems, including looking beyond basic happiness, considering tradition, and trying things out by experience.

• Russ' previous appearance on the show: Episode #91 — How Adam Smith Can Change Your Life 
• Transformative Experience by L.A. Hall
• Nicomachean Ethics by Aristotle 
• Chesterton’s Fence
• AoM Podcast #774: How to Make Life’s Big Decisions
• AoM Podcast #486: How to Get Better at Making Life-Changing Decisions

• Russ' Website
• Russ on Twitter

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Being adept at discerning people’s true thoughts and intentions is a valuable skill to have. Knowing when someone is deceiving you can protect your finances, your professional interests, and your loved ones.

Here to teach us some of the elements of this skill is Dr. David Lieberman, who’s a psychotherapist, a consultant to the military and other intelligence and defense agencies, and the author of Mindreader: The New Science of Deciphering What People Really Think, What They Really Want, and Who They Really Are. Today on the show, David explains why verbal cues offer a better window into people’s minds than body language, and the clues to look for in both spoken and written speech that can indicate whether someone is honest or deceptive. We also get into how to detect whether someone is mentally healthy or not, including the signs that you’re dealing with a psychopath.

• David’s last appearance on the show: Episode #489 — How to Get a Handle on Your Anger
• The Secret Life of Pronouns by James Pennebaker
• AoM Podcast #364: How to Know When Someone Is Lying (From a Former CIA Officer)
• Ego syntonic and dystonic
• AoM Podcast #769: The New Science of Narcissism

• David on LinkedIn
• David on Instagram

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No kid forgets getting his first bike, nor the surge of independence he felt the first time he pedaled away from his parents. And even as adults, the bike seems to give off a feeling of romance, of freedom, and, when you get going fast enough, even of flying.

The special allure of the bicycle can really be traced back to its simple yet elegant design, and my guest today will unpack the intriguing history of its creation. His name is Jody Rosen, and he’s the author of Two Wheels Good: The History and Mystery of the Bicycle. Today on the show, Jody explains the origins of the bicycle’s design, including how it was an anachronism at its birth, may have been inspired by a volcanic eruption, and helped liberate mankind from dependence on draft animals for transportation and exploration. We also get into how the bicycle was associated with flight right from the start. Along the way, we discuss how cycling represents an uncanny fusion of man and machine and produces a set of one-of-a-kind pleasures.

This episode will make you want to mount your trusty bicycle steed and take a ride.

• Karl Freiherr von Drais and his Laufmaschine, aka the velocipede, aka the dandy horse
• The penny-farthing or high wheel
• AoM Article: How to “Teach” a Kid to Ride a Bike (Without Having to Teach Them at All)

• Jody’s Website

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Do you feel stuck in life? Inwardly you keep repeating the same thoughts, outwardly you keep repeating the same routine, and on and on a cycle of unhappy disappointment goes.

To break the cycle, maybe what you need to do is watch a film that has become synonymous with this kind of stuck-ness — Groundhog Day — which my guest says contains the roadmap to escaping a life lived on autopilot. His name is Paul Hannam, he’s the author of The Wisdom of Groundhog Day: How to Improve Your Life One Day at a Time, and today on the show, Paul unpacks the deeper philosophical layers of what’s considered one of the best movies of all time. Paul explains how the film teaches us that to escape the ruts of what he calls the “Groundhog Day condition,” we must first make an inner change where we learn to approach life in a more grateful, present-focused, engaged way. From there, we can embrace the film’s unique strategy for change, which is to experiment with doing something new every day, thereby refining and improving our lives through the process of trial, error, and progressive improvement.

• Groundhog Day
• AoM Article: Getting Over the Horror of the Same Old Thing
• AoM article on Nietzche’s idea of eternal return 
• Sunday Firesides: Eternity Is Now
• Sunday Firesides: Care, But Don’t Care
• Sunday Firesides: Life Is a Skill — Practice It
• AoM Podcast #676: Stop Living on Autopilot and Take Responsibility for Your Life
• AoM Article: The Right and Wrong Way to Journal

• Paul’s Website

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When we think about people who can live anywhere, we tend to think about corporate-employed remote workers and online entrepreneurs. But many other kinds of professionals, from teachers to doctors, could hypothetically find a job anywhere, and thus live anywhere they’d like.

If you’re what my guest Melody Warnick calls an “anywhereist” and have seriously or casually considered moving somewhere else, today we’ll talk through the factors to consider in making that decision. Melody is the author of If You Could Live Anywhere: The Surprising Importance of Place in a Work-from-Anywhere World, and in today’s conversation we discuss the factors that you should include in what she calls a “location strategy,” from the cost of living in a place to whether it allows you to build the kinds of relationships you’re looking for. We also talk about how the place you live can be part of your purpose in life and the elements that contribute to an overall quality of life.

• Melody‘s previous appearance on the AoM Podcast: Episode #227 — The Art & Science of Loving the Place You Live
• Melody‘s previous book — This Is Where You Belong: Finding Home Wherever You Are
• Tulsa’s remote worker program
• Make My Move — website which catalogs the various offers cities are making to entice people to move there
• CNN’s cost of living calculator 
• AoM Article: How to Make Friends in a New City

• Melody‘s Website

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I've been barbell lifting for seven years. In that time I've hit some personal records that I'm proud of: a 615-lb deadlift, 225 shoulder press, and 465 squat. The last couple years though, I haven't notched these kinds of big milestones for a combination of reasons, including dealing with injuries, having less time, and experiencing a shift in motivation.

A lot of lifters, as well as amateur athletes of all kinds, will follow a similar trajectory as they move from first starting out to getting deeper into their fitness journey. Here to walk us through the phases of that journey is my own strength coach, Matt Reynolds, who's the founder of Barbell Logic Online Coaching. Matt talks about how the things his lifters focus on change as they move from beginner, to intermediate, to advanced, and why it takes longer to get stronger the longer you've been lifting. We then discuss how to rediscover your motivation for training once progress in your one rep maxes slows down by finding new PRs to chase and learning to enjoy the process over the outcome. We also get into how to stay consistent with your workouts when life gets busier as you get older, as well as how to deal with common injuries — both the injuries themselves and the mental game of working through them.

• Matt’s previous appearance on the AoM podcast: Episode #154 — Strength Training for Everyone
• The BarbellLogic Podcast
• AoM Article: Why Every Man Should Be Strong
• AoM Article: Motivation Over Discipline 
• AoM Article: How to Treat Bicep Tendonitis
• AoM Article: How to Treat Adductor Tendonitis
• AoM Article: The Starr Protocol for Rehabbing Muscle Tears and Strains

• Matt at BarbellLogic

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Matthew Dicks wears a lot of hats. Among other things, he's a storyteller, communications consultant, writer, and schoolteacher. In order to excel in his professional life, as well as do what he loves in his personal life, he's developed a set of strategies that help him be more creative and productive, and can be used by anyone who wants to start making the most of life.

Matt writes about these tactics and mindset shifts in his latest book Someday Is Today: 22 Simple, Actionable Ways to Propel Your Creative Life, and he shares some of them with us today on the show, including why you need to think in minutes, be an eagle rather than a mouse, practice deliberate incuriosity, and always do your best to act like a decent human being. Along the way, Matt and I talk about why you should floss in the shower and how restaurants that make guacamole at your table are a great example of the folly of making a thing, a thing.

• Matt's previous appearance on the AoM Podcast: Episode #462 — How to Tell Better Stories
• AoM Article: The 7 Habits — Begin With the End in Mind
• Matthew telling the story of how he was robbed 
• AoM Article: Possibilities in Spare Moments

• Matthew’s Website

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If you've been listening to this show or reading the AoM website for awhile, then you likely know what my favorite book of all time is: Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry.

It's therefore my real pleasure to be able to talk all about that novel today with Steven Frye, professor of American literature and author of Understanding Larry McMurtry. We last had Steve on the show to talk about The Road by Cormac McCarthy. In this episode, we unpack Lonesome Dove, beginning with some background on McMurtry, and the style and themes he explores in his work. From there we turn to Lonesome Dove, and its surprising influences, from Jane Austen to Cervantes. Steve and I explore the characters of Augustus McCrae and Woodrow Call, how they can represent the archetypes of the Epicurean and the Stoic, and what we can learn from their friendship. We also talk about the complexities of other characters in the novel, and end our conversation with why Lonesome Dove, despite not having a stereotypically happy ending, is such a life-affirming book.

A spoiler alert here: We are going to reveal plenty of plot points in this discussion, so be aware of that if you haven't yet read Lonesome Dove.

After the show is over, check out the show notes at aom.is/lonesomedove

Resources Related to the Podcast

• Books by Steven Frye, including his novel Dogwood Crossing
• Steve's last appearance on the show: Episode #760 — Cormac McCarthy, The Road, and Carrying the Fire
• Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry
• LonesomeDove, the television miniseries
• AoM Article: Why Every Man Should Read Jane Austen
• AoM Article: The Tragic, Liberating Message About Manliness Hidden in American Tall Tales
• Sunday Fireside: Get on Your Horse and Kick
• AoM Article: Gut Check — Are You a Contemptible Person?
• AoM Article: Books So Good I’ve Read Them 2X (Or More!)

Connect With Steven Frye

• Steve’s Website

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A lot of us have niggling bodily pains. A bum knee, a tight hip, an achy back. My guest would say that the cause of those maladies, as well as their cure, can likely be traced to a common source: your posture.

His name is VinhPham and he's a physical therapist and the author ofSit Up Straight: Future-Proof Your Body Against Chronic Pain with 12 Simple Movements. Today on the show, Vinh explains the problems that can arise when we don't stand and sit properly, and simply sit too much in general, and how those problems can be prevented by practicing good posture. He explains what good posture looks like when you're sitting and standing, and the cues that will help keep your body well-aligned. Vinh shares the ideal ratio of sitting to standing to aim for throughout the day, and a better way to hold your phone so you don't get something called "tech neck." Vinh then walks us through some exercises you can do to address physical issues you may already have, from tight shoulders and hips to lower back pain.

• AoM Article: The Ultimate Guide to Posture
• AoM Article: De-Quasimodo Yourself — 6 Exercises to Counteract Slouching
• AoM Article: 7 Simple Exercises That Undo the Damage of Sitting
• AoM Podcast #213: Undoing the Damage of Chronic Sitting
• AoM Article: The History, Benefits, and Use of Standing Desks

• Myodetox
• Vinh on IG

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As a member of the Ottawa Tribe and someone who's worked with over five hundred tribal nations, my guest has long been inspired by his Native American culture and heritage, particularly the tradition of native warriors. And he thinks those warriors have much to teach all modern people about work, life, and leadership.

His name is D.J. Vanas and he's the author of The Warrior Within: Own Your Power to Serve, Fight, Protect, and Heal. Today on the show, D.J. explains what the warrior spirit is, and how important it is for everyone to cultivate, especially those who want to lead, serve, and live with a purpose bigger than the self. He takes principles of Native American tradition and philosophy, including living off the land, taking a vision quest, counting coup, being a firekeeper, and developing toughness, and shows how they apply to anyone who's looking to develop resilience, achieve their goals, and make a positive impact on the world.

• Ottawa Tribe
• AoM series: Lessons from the Sioux in how to develop situational awareness, mental and physical toughness, and spirituality, as well as how to turn a boy into a man
• AoM Podcast #526: The Rise and Fall of the Most Powerful Indian Tribe in American History
• Podcast #633: The World and Vision of Lakota Medicine Man Black Elk
• AoM Article: You May Be Strong, But Are You Tough?
• AoM article on creating a personal mission statement
• AoM Article: 20 Battle Cries Through the Ages

• D.J.'s Website

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As men, we all want to be physically capable. We want to be able to save our own life in two ways: in the more metaphorical sense of wanting to preserve it in healthy, fit form for as long as possible, and in the more literal sense of being able to make it through an emergency unscathed. How do you know if you do possess that kind of lifesaving physical capability?

It’s time to do more than wonder, and really check in with yourself. My guest today has some helpful benchmarks that guys from age 8 to 80 can use to see if they’ve got an operative level of strength, mobility, and conditioning. His name is Dan John, and he’s a strength coach and the author of numerous books and articles on health and fitness. Dan walks us through the fitness standards the average male should be able to meet from childhood to old age, beginning with the assessments he gives to those who are 55 years old and older, which includes carrying their body weight, a long jump, and something called “the toilet test.” We then reach back to childhood, and Dan discusses the physical skills kids should become adept in, which were inspired by a turn-of-the-20th-century physical culturist who thought every individual ought to be able to save his own life, and which can be broken down into the categories of pursuit, escape, and attack. We end our conversation with the physical standards those in the 18-55 range should be able to meet, including how much a man should be able to bench press, squat, and deadlift, and the walking test that’s an excellent assessment of your cardiovascular conditioning.

• My first and second interview with Dan
• 10 Things Every Lifter Should Be Able to Do
• Don’t Just Lift Heavy, Carry Heavy
• Take the Simple Test That Can Predict Your Mortality
• The 10 Physical Skills Every Man Should Master
• How to Achieve Physical Autonomy
• The History of Physical Fitness
• Every Man Should Be Able to Save His Own Life
• 12 Balance Exercises You Can Do on a 2×4
• Shaker Plate
• Break Out of Your Cage and Stop Being a Human Zoo Animal

DanJohnUniversity.com (use code “artofman” for a discount) 

Dan on Facebook

Dan’s website

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You struggle with being productive. So you decide you need to establish a routine for yourself. You get real gung-ho about this routine — this is going to be the thing that changes everything! But then you fail to stick to it. So you flagellate yourself for that failure and decide what you need is a different routine. But then you don’t stick with that routine either. The cycle then repeats itself, leaving you no more productive than you were at the start.

My guest, Madeleine Dore, found herself stuck in this cycle. So she decided to start interviewing successful creative types to get their secrets to an optimal routine. Yet these folks would confide to her a different secret: they actually didn’t have a routine either.

Madeleine has come to believe something that I’ve discovered too: routines aren’t all they’re cracked up to be and you can actually still be very creative and productive even if you go about each day in a looser, more ad-hoc fashion.

Today on the show, I talk to Madeleine, who’s the author of I Didn’t Do the Thing Today: Letting Go of Productivity Guilt, about how the all-or-nothing thinking which surrounds routines can actually sabotage our effectiveness. We then discuss alternatives to keeping a strict routine that still allow you to get stuff done, including moving to a “portable routine,” taking advantage of “splodge time,” and embracing cycles and seasons in your work. We also discuss other ways to let go of unuseful productivity guilt, including setting realistic expectations and not eating the frog first.

• How to Live on Twenty-four Hours a Day by Arnold Bennett
• Austin Kleon
• AoM article on the “possibilities in spare moments”
• AoM article on Emerson, pear trees, and the seasons of life
• AoM article on famous men who took advantage of “splodge time” to become a success
• AoM Podcast #602: The Case for Being Unproductive

• Madeleine’s Website
• Madeleine on IG

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We like to think that our personal safety and the safety of our loved ones is something that other people — law enforcement, school administrators, social media moderators — will take care of for us. 

My guest today, Spencer Coursen, would say that while this mindset may help us feelsafe, it's actually when we feel the most safe, that we're in the greatest danger. Spencer — who's a combat veteran and a threat management expert — calls this paradox "the safety trap," and he's the author of a book of the same name. Today on the show, Spencer shares the factors that can put us in the safetytrap, and ways to escape it. We discuss how an avoidance mindset and a reliance on false authority can put us in greater danger, how the run-hide-fight rubric for responding to an active shooter has been misapplied, and how being too polite can get you killed. From there we turn to ways you can take responsibility for your own safety, including knowing the warning signs that someone may take violent action and staying physically fit. We also discuss what to do if people are sending you potentially threatening messages online.

• AoM Article: What to Do in an Active Shooter Situation
• AoM Podcast #513: Be Your Own Bodyguard
• Podcast #688: Protection for and from Humanity
• Radio Lab: No Special Duty

• The SafetyTrap Website
• Spencer on LinkedIn
• Spencer on Twitter

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Despite assuming the presidency from the 20th century’s narrowest election victory, John F. Kennedy captivated the American public’s imagination, even before his untimely death.  What was it that made JFK so compelling in his own time, and continues to contribute to his enduring appeal today?

We dive into the answer to that question by unpacking some of Kennedy’s personal qualities and complexities with Mark Updegrove, author ofIncomparable Grace: JFK in the Presidency. We begin our conversation with how JFK’s upbringing and war experience shaped him. We talk about his leadership style while in office, how he intentionally cultivated his cool and appealing image, and what his wife Jackie added to that image. Mark explains what was behind Kennedy’s infamous affairs, and how JFK championed physical fitness despite being in tremendous physical pain himself. We end our conversation with the traits that worked both for and against JFK’s success as president. 

• Profiles in Courage by John F. Kennedy 
• Addison’s Disease
• JFK on “The Soft American”
• JFK’s Inaugural Speech
• JFK’s Moon Speech
• AoM Article: Take the TR/JFK 50-Mile Challenge

• Mark at the LBJ Presidential Library
• Mark’s Podcast: With the Bark Off — Conversations on the American Presidency

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There are thousands of books, podcasts, and social media posts about how to be more productive, strengthen your relationships, find your purpose, and be your all-around best self. And there are legions of programs and seminars out there designed to help you improve your life. All together, self-help represents a multi-billion dollar industry.

But despite its ubiquity and cultural influence, you may never have thought about the deeper underpinnings of self-improvement. My guest has. In fact, her research led her to add being a life coach to her academic work as a professor of cultural history, surely creating one of the most unique career combinations. Her name is Anna Schaffner and she's the author of The Art of Self-Improvement: Ten Timeless Truths. Anna and I begin our conversation with how the idea of self-improvement, far from being a recent, Western phenomenon, traces back to antiquity and can be found across cultures. We discuss how self-help reflects what a culture values, and changes based on a culture's conception of selfhood, agency, and the relationship between the individual and society. From there we turn to a few of the timeless principles of self-improvement — self-control, being virtuous, and building positive relationships — looking both at how they were tackled anciently, as well as more modern angles that can also be helpful. We discuss the downside of taking a strictly Stoic approach to life, the idea of making virtue a habit, and how Dale Carnegie can be seen as a modern Machiavelli, in a good way. We end our conversation with Anna's four favorite self-improvement books.

• Anna's previous appearance on the show — Episode #476: Are Modern People the Most Exhausted in History?
• AoM Podcast #377: 12 Rules for Life With Jordan Peterson
• Bildung
• AoM Podcast #614 with Stephen Hayes, founder of Acceptance and Commitment therapy
• AoM Podcast #746: The Confucian Gentleman
• AoM Podcast #148: Trying Not to Try
• How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie
• Anna's favorite self-improvement books:
  • Meditations by Marcus Aurelius
  • The Happiness Trap by Russ Harris
  • Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl
  • The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle

• Anna's Personal Website
• Anna's Coaching Website

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In 1981, Time magazine stated: “If you are ever in a crucial life-changing negotiation, the person you want on your side of the table is Herb Cohen.” Cohen was then known as the world’s best negotiator, and had worked with Fortune 500 companies, professional athletes, and US presidents, and also penned the bestselling book You Can Negotiate Anything.

Fast forward to today, and his son, Rich Cohen, has written a memoir of his father’s life, and life philosophy, called The Adventures of Herbie Cohen: World’s Greatest Negotiator. Today on the show, Rich shares stories from Herbie’s life, from his colorful childhood on the streets of Brooklyn where he palled around in a gang with future famous figures like Larry King and Sandy Koufax, to coaching basketball in the Army, to becoming a sought-after strategist and dealmaker. Along the way, Rich shares the life lessons that grew out of those stories, including how power is perception, and why you need to care, but not that much.

• Larry King tells the Moppo story
• Larry King tells the Carvel story
• AoM Article: How to Haggle Like Your Old Man
• Podcast #234: Haggling and Deal Making Advice From a FBI Hostage Negotiator
• AoM podcast and article on the OODA Loop
• AoM Article: The 7 Habits — Think Win/Win
• Sunday Firesides: Care, But Don’t Care

• Rich’s Website
• Rich on Twitter

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In the modern age, people are bombarded with more information, and are more personally responsible for managing that information, than ever before. How do you stay on top of your schedule, work responsibilities, financial obligations, and the spigot of media that runs full force 24/7 while not only avoiding becoming overwhelmed, but actually using all that information to generate better ideas, advance your career, and generally improve your life?

My guest would say that the answer lies in having a mind outside your mind. His name is Tiago Forte and he's the author of Building a Second Brain: A Proven Method to Organize Your Digital Life and Unlock Your Creative Potential. Today on the show, Tiago explains how a Second Brain is an external resource where you can store all of the most valuable checklists, thoughts, notes, ideas, and insights you acquire and generate. He explains how the Second Brain supercharges the historical practice of keeping a commonplace book, and how it improves your productivity and well-being by getting stuff out of your head, off your bandwidth, and into a place where you can actually put it to use. Tiago then walks us through this system of "Personal Knowledge Management," including the tools you can use to capture information, the question to ask yourself to decide what to capture, and why he recommends organizing what you capture around action instead of subject. And Tiago explains how the ultimate goal of having a Second Brain is to take what you put into this treasury and synthesize it into better ways to live, think, act, and express yourself.

• Commonplace books
• AoM Article: The Man Book — Creating a Reservoir of Timeless Wisdom
• Tiago's YouTube series on choosing a digital notes app
• Digital note-taking apps mentioned in the show:
  • Evernote
  • Notion
  • Obsidian 
  • Google Keep
  • Microsoft OneNote
• Pocket — an article-saving app
• Tiago's blog post on his "PARA" organization system

• Tiago's Website

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In March of this year, Mark Vande Hei returned to earth after spending 355 days in outer space. Today on the show, I talk to Mark about what it was like to spend nearly a year in orbit, and how he ended up setting a new record for the longest spaceflight by an American astronaut. We first talk about how Mark went from being a soldier in the Army who served twice in Iraq, to working for NASA. Mark explains the application process for becoming an astronaut and what he thought were the hardest parts of his training. He then shares how you exercise in space, what a typical work day on the International Space Station is like, and how it feels to do a space walk. I ask Mark whether he was worried when the Russians threatened to abandon him in space, whether life on the space station is hard on morale, what it's like physically to return to earth, and whether there's a letdown when it's time to hang up your astronaut pack.

• AoM Podcast #654: How to Astronaut
• United States Army Space and Missile Defense Command
• Video of Mark's time in space

• Mark on Twitter
• Mark on LinkedIn

Listen to the episode on a separate page.

Download this episode.

Subscribe to the podcast in the media player of your choice.

Listen ad-free on Stitcher Premium; get a free month when you use code "manliness" at checkout.

Click here to see a full list of our podcast sponsors.

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Whenever you get into an argument, whether you're discussing politics with a colleague or the distribution of chores with your spouse, you likely feel like you're floundering. You feel worked up, but you don't feel like you're getting your point across, much less convincing the other person of it, and the conversation simply goes in circles. You can feel like a rank amateur at arguing.

Maybe what you need are some pro tips from someone who's spent his life arguing competitively. Enter my guest: Bo Seo. Bo is a two-time world champion debater, a former coach of the Australian national debating team and the Harvard College Debating Union, and the author of Good Arguments: How Debate Teaches Us to Listen and Be Heard. Today on the show, Bo and I discuss why learning the art of rhetoric and debate was once an integral part of education in the West, why the subject disappeared from schools, and the loss this has represented for society. We then turn to the lessons Bo's taken from his debating career that you can apply to your own everyday arguments, whether big or small. Bo explains why it's important to establish what an argument is really about before you start into it, and shares a rubric for homing in on which of three types of disagreements may be at the core of a conflict. He then explains two things a strong argument has to do, and four questions to ask yourself to see if you’ve met these requirements. Bo also unpacks his three P's for creating persuasive rhetoric and how to effectively rebut someone else’s claims. We end our conversation with how to determine when it’s worth getting into a particular argument and when it's better to walk away.

• AoM series on Rhetoric 101
• The Winston Churchill Guide to Public Speaking
• The Art of Rhetoric by Aristotle
• AoM Podcast #639: Why You Should Learn the Lost Art of Rhetoric
• AoM Podcast #799: Getting Along Is Overrated

• Bo's Website

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The 18th century doctor, civic leader, and renaissance man Benjamin Rush was one of the youngest signers of the Declaration of Independence, edited and named Thomas Paine's Common Sense, implemented medical practices that helped the Continental Army win the Revolutionary War, made sure Benjamin Franklin attended the Constitutional Convention, and shaped the medical and political landscape of the newly formed United States.

Yet despite his outsized influence, the varied and interesting life he led, and the close relationships he had with other founding fathers like George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and John Adams, Rush is hardly remembered today. That's because of just how close his relationship with those other founders was. Rush was a personal physician to them and their families, and after his death, they suppressed his legacy, not wanting the intimate and unflattering details he had recorded in his letters and journals to be publicized. In fact, his memoir was considered too dangerous to be published and wasn't found for nearly 150 years.

My guest will re-introduce us to this forgotten figure. His name is Stephen Fried, and he's the author of Rush: Revolution, Madness, and Benjamin Rush, the Visionary Doctor Who Became a Founding Father. Today on the show, Stephen takes us through Rush's fascinating life, from his self-made rise out of inauspicious childhood, to how he was able to reconcile an estranged Jefferson and Adams before his death, and what Stephen has learned from studying a character who lived through very fraught and not totally unfamiliar times.

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95% of people say that they're self-aware. But only 10-15% of people actually are. As my guest today says, that means "on a good day, 80% of us are lying to ourselves about how much we're lying to ourselves" and this blind spot can have big repercussions for our success and happiness. 

Her name is Tasha Eurich, and she's an organizational psychologist and the author of Insight: Why We're Not as Self-Aware as We Think, and How Seeing Ourselves Clearly Helps Us Succeed at Work and in Life. Tasha kicks off our conversation by arguing that our level of self-awareness sets the upper limit of our individual effectiveness and that self-awareness can be developed and is truly the meta skill of the 21st century. She then unpacks what it is you know about yourself when you possess self-awareness, how there are two types of this knowledge, internal and external, and how you can have one without the other. Tasha then outlines the seven pillars of self-awareness, the barriers to getting insights into them --  including falling into the cult of self -- and how these barriers can be overcome, including asking yourself a daily check-in question. We then discuss how two of the most common methods for gaining self-knowledge -- introspection and journaling -- can in fact backfire and how to do them more effectively by asking yourself what instead of why, and actually journaling less instead of more. We also get into why you should be an in-former, rather than a me-former on social media, how to become more mindful without meditation, and how to solicit and handle feedback from other people, including holding something called the "Dinner of Truth."

If reading this in an email, click the title of the post to listen to the show.

• The Science of Insights
• How to Get More "Aha" Insights
• Define Your Core Values
• 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
• You Need a Reset Day
• Get Out of Your Mind and Into Your Life
• Why I Stopped Journaling
• 4 Questions That Will Crush the Fear of Missing Out
• How to Get Better at Taking Feedback
• Insight Quiz

Tasha's website

Tasha on Twitter

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In your quest to become a better home chef, you probably find yourself wondering things like: What potato should I use in this recipe? How much salt should I put in this dish? Am I even making spaghetti right? But then you forget to Google the answer to your question, or if you do, you feel overwhelmed by the number of opinions out there.

Well, my guest will cut through that noise and answer some of your cooking FAQs once and for all. His name is Daniel Holzman and he's a chef and the co-author, along with Matt Rodbard, of Food IQ: 100 Questions, Answers, and Recipes to Raise Your Cooking Smarts. Today on the show, Daniel will offer his advice on whether the kind of onion and potato you use in a recipe matters, and whether it's okay to use frozen vegetables. He explains why you should be less worried about getting foodborne illnesses from meat, and the type of food that's more likely to make you sick. Daniel offers the lowdown on salt, including how to figure out exactly how much you need in a dish; when to use the convection bake function on your oven; his recommendations for the best frying pan and chef's knife; the secrets to making perfect spaghetti, scrambled eggs, and steak; and plenty of other tips as well.

• Daniel's restaurants:
  • The Meatball Shop
  • Danny Boy's Famous Original Pizza
• AoM Article: The Best Way to Salt Meat
• All-Clad 10-Inch Frying Pan
• Wusthof Classic 10" Chef's Knife
• Victorinox 8" Chef's Knife
• AoM Article: Cooking With Cast Iron
• Video of Daniel Making Honey Boo Boo's "Sketti"
• AoM Article: How to Make James Bond Scrambled Eggs
• AoM Article: Grilling the Perfect Steak

• Food IQ Website
• Daniel on Twitter
• Daniel on IG

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