093 – The Enemies Of Man - a podcast by Alf Herigstad

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THE ENEMIES OF MAN…
Today is Friday, and we’re all getting ready to head into the weekend.  Weekends are awesome, I love the weekends.  For many of us the weekend is the time we break out of the mundane cycle of working, sleeping and eating and we get to do other things…like projects around the house, or we socialize with other people, we spend more time with family and friends, or…we just relax and catch up on sleep and watch TV.What we can’t do however, what we must not do, is forget how important it is that we behave like men.  Its easy to let your guard down while you are having fun and socializing but that’s when it is most critical that you are thinking about your role as a man in the world.  That’s when your example will be noticed the most, when it will have the greatest impact.  It’s times like this when you have the greatest opportunity to be a better man than you were yesterday.
There are many obstacles to being a better man.  These are the enemies of men, those things you struggle with that might have you behaving in ways that are not…better.  They are different for everyone, everyone has their own set of challenges and in order to deal with them effectively you have to be real honest about recognizing what yours are.There is a long list of potential enemies, like Pornography, video games, recreational drugs and alcohol, jealousy, inferiority or unjustified superiority, social awkwardness, peer acceptance, self hate, or plain old laziness and lack of ambition.  The lack of a purpose or direction, the lack of a positive outlook. 
This is the short list, it goes on and on.  All of these things have the potential of distracting you, of making you forget who you are as a man, what your role is, and what you want to accomplish.  It’s no surprise that almost all of these things are inherently negative by nature.The objective of being a better man today than you were yesterday is inherently a positive aspiration…so anything negative is a potential impediment to that goal.
So how do we best prepare for this?  How do we do battle with our individual enemies. For starters, like I said…we have to be real honest with ourselves and identify what our challenges are, because if you don’t do that you will never be prepared to overcome them.  Knowing what they are for you makes it a lot harder for them to sneak up on you.
Secondly, we have to arm ourselves anew each day with our objective.  I think it’s most effective when stated out loud while looking in the mirror.  If we start each day with a new commitment to be a better man that day, than we were the day before, it will affect our behavior, it will influence our choices, because we have placed it in our consciousness…we have made it a priority.  We are focused on our conduct as a man and as I’ve told you many times…the things we focus on, expand.Thirdly, something else that will help you in all areas of life is simply to become more positive.  This is easier said than done sometimes.  Some people are natural born pessimist while others are naturally more optimistic. 
Some people seem to enjoy being negative, it becomes part of their persona…but I can’t think of a single case in which that rendered a good result.  Most of the negative people I have known are also the most miserable people I have known.So if you happen to be more on the negative, pessimistic side I encourage you to start practicing positivity.  Start forcing yourself to see the glass half full, start developing new ways of looking at things. Don’t take my word for it, there are tons of books on the subject.  For one example there’s a book called The Positive Dog, its a story about the power of positivity, it’s in audio and you can listen to it for free at audible .com.  Just sign up using my affiliate link at http://www.beingabettermanpodcast.com/book (www.beingabettermanpodcast.com/book).  Then just type...

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