Image from Miike’s ‘13 Assassins’ (2010)
“…you must understand, there is more than one path to the top of the mountain…”
It doesn’t seem fair that maturity alludes most men in their most dangerous and feral years. Perhaps it’s just not the nature of things or it is required to maintain the classical balance between the feminine and the masculine (to many a woman’s chagrin.)
Anchoring to philosophical principles today has become harder for young men too, as their role models, and the institutions that form a young man’s spirit, have deteriorated. Gone are the YMCA, with older role models interacting in a safe space. Gone is the hyper competitive, non participation trophy, youth sports. Gone are fathers, with 40% of first marriages ending in divorce and 35% of children growing up in single parent households. Gone are role models who legitimately walked a path that men could anchor to, replaced by influencers selling fake lifestyles online, weak men dressed up like cosplay.
The quote above was from Miyamoto Musashi. Born 442 years ago, this Eastern warrior poet had a profound influence on me as a young man and father, much more than the Roman stoics or the school of Plato Greeks.
Simple axioms from Musashi’s 21 Precepts, completed just days before he died, formed the nucleus of the code I assembled for living my own life, personal and professional.
“Do not regret what you have done”
“Accept everything just the way it is”
So often, the ancients provide us with all the wisdom we could possible need or want to live a good, just life.
Perhaps that is where it should start, a visualization of what you want your life to be. If that vision starts with fancy cars, expensive watches, and sexual conquest, Musashi has a precepts for that to educate you of the folly.
“Never be jealous”
“Do not seek pleasure for its own sake”
“Do not let yourself be guided by the feelings of Love or Lust”
“Be detached from desire your who life long”
We live in challenging times that I believe will get worse before better. Global inflation has devalued currency, a mega-rich class has formed world wide, and conversely, their fief is now filled with us serfs. The dream of marriage, a wife at woman raising children while the man works a noble job for more than a living wage, with their needs attainable, and a few wants still possible, is fading.
A reckoning will come. Chaos. It makes Musashi’s teachings harder to accept, but quite frankly, more indispensable than ever.
Live your life by a code. Write it yourself, borrow from others, inspire yourself to live within it and within your means. Reject the imagery on Instagram and TikTok of what success is (spoiler alert: it’s a lie.)
Be the man you need to be sooner. We need our youth being more mature each successive generation if we wish to pull out of this death cycle before blood is spilled.