Of Sacrifice and Significance

Why the hell am I here?


Have you ever wondered that? In the midst of all the frustrations, the responsibilities, the aspirations and the chronic tendency to measure the difference between where you are and where you think you should be, sometimes the thought creeps in. When it's all said and done is there anything that transcends the daily experience of inches that we tend to lump into weeks and seasons whenever we get a chance to look in the rearview mirror? This universe is huge, the population of this planet is about 7 billion, and here I am hanging on for dear sanity on my way to another meeting, appointment, day of work (fill in the blank). Why I am I doing what I'm doing? Why am I not doing something else? If I even thought about doing something different, would it make any difference? Is my life going to make any difference at all? Is the sum of actions and decisions made throughout my life going to impact anything in course of humanity given that so much happens regardless of my interaction? Did my brain just fall out of my head?


I know for me personally, I have a great need for significance. I live for a pat on the back and a "good job, sonny" at the end of the day. I yearn to do things I'm passionate about, do them well and hopefully gain some recognition. I guess that's why I'm a workaholic: I equate significance with productivity. The logic works like this:


1. I want to be significant, to be appreciated for what I bring to the table and how that achieves a "good job, sonny".

2. A job well done requires two things: a job (duh), and a commitment to doing that job excellently.

3. If I do those two things, I get told that I'm doing a good job at the end of some period of time. Corporate America calls this a Performance Review -their 'good jobs' equal a 14 cent/hour raise (hooray!).

4. If I do those two things longer and better than anyone else for a long enough period of time, I get to climb the corporate ladder and (hopefully) be in a position where my actions and decisions affect more people and if I develop myself to be a good leader then (hopefully) my decisions make a positive impact on people's lives and then my significance comes in the form of observing the positive effects of my actions and decisions on a grand scale (hopefully).

5. I die and I take nothing with me.


Pretty awesome huh? Yeah I didn't think so either. It's egotistical and leaves no real impact on anyone for any real period of time after I start decomposing. I'm also dead, so I don't anticipate caring about what people think of me at that point either. Which leads be to the following question:


Why the hell am I here?


I read something super interesting tonight, it's from a book called Wild at Heart, by John Eldredge:


"A young pilot in the RAF wrote just before he went down in 1940: The universe is so vast and ageless that the life of one man can only be justified by the measure of his sacrifice."


Between the meetings, the classes, the studying, the politics, and the constant churning to progress my life to the upper echelon of what America thinks is significance, I often think to myself: this is the hill that I will die on. I'm sure that at some basic level, we have all thought that. This life is Hamburger Hill, it's claiming the lives of good people and turning them into living corpses in their quest to get to the top.



But what about that RAF pilot? ..the life of one man can only be justified by the measure of his sacrifice.



Suddenly, the meaning of personal significance is no longer linked to just doing a job well done. Could it be that real significance is linked to sacrifice? What does that even look like? The core of human nature is arguably survival. At least that's what Maslow and Darwin think. Look out for number One. "What am I getting out of this?"


Sacrifice is significant because it doesn't make sense. From a survival standpoint, sacrifice is unnatural because it requires that you lay down something you hold important for someone else. And that's it. You do it because of your conviction that it should be done and that you are the one to do it. Period. It's not like you walk around thinking, "Gee, I hope something perilous happens today so I can get on the news." Acts of selflessness are so significant because that's exactly what they are: selfless. I'm sure martyr isn't an occupation that kids want to be when they grow up, at least not amongst the industrialized nations. We want to be Astronauts, Sports Stars and Actors, we want to be significant for our unique achievements on a grand scale, not lay them down for the sake of others without payback.


There was a reference in my last post that now, for the first time since bad guys the world needs heroes. What makes a hero? Sacrifice. Taking a few moments out of your commute and your tunnel-vision schedule to do something for someone else. You don't need to rush into a burning building. You don't have to become Batman. Maybe just walk an old lady across the street.


Challenge: Become Batman. I'm kidding. But just try to work in a little sacrifice into your life. And like being a gentleman, don't do it because you get kudos and recognition, do it for the sake of being a man, and largely, being a good person. I want to hear your ideas on how you can actually work this into your life (hint: Consider starting with the people you love).

Death of a Gentleman.

We are a nation of playboys.



I muttered these words to myself as I flipped through the first few pages of this month's GQ magazine. These fashion advertisements portray what these designers think the average American male should aspire to: overly-tanned, self-centered objects of sexually-ambiguous excess. I am in no way homophobic, I have a lot of good friends that are homosexual. But this blitzkrieg of pomp and arrogance succeeds in giving me a model on how to perfectly execute a meticulously-dressed shell. But what about the core?

Then comes one of the most profound advertisements I've seen in recent memory:

Once upon a time, men wore the pants.
And wore them well.
Women rarely had to open doors and little old ladies never crossed the street alone.
Men took charge because that's what they did.
But somewhere along the way, the world decided it no longer needed men.
Disco by disco, latte by foamy non-fat latte, men were stripped of their khakis and left stranded on the road between boyhood and androgyny.
But today, there are questions our genderless society has no answers for.
The world sits idly by as cities crumble, children misbehave and those little old ladies remain on one side of the street.
For the first time since bad guys, we need heroes.
We need grown-ups.
We need men to put down the plastic fork, step away from the salad bar, and untie the world from the tracks of complacency.
It's time to get your hands dirty.
It's time to answer the call of manhood.
It's time to WEAR THE PANTS.

Thank you Docker's. You read my mind.

I recently sat in a group (I was the only male there), and it was a generalized complaint that there were no more gentlemen left. That there was no formality in dating, no courting, just a bunch of guys asking to hang out- hopefully thinking that it will eventually lead to sex. No leadership, nothing to offer, everything to take. All these women came from different backgrounds, they have different perspectives on their roles as women, but the simple aggreance was that they wished for more men to act like men.

Guys: Be a Man. Take charge. Don't be a flaky cop out. Live your life as if it existed before FICO scores, when your signature and your handshake was the only thing that mattered. Open doors for women, take your hats off inside, wear pants that fit, and wear them around your waist with a belt. Have some manners. And do it, not for sex or for "points" as I see so many marriages based on, but for the simple fact that you earn the right to upgrade from "Male" to "Man".

Women: Be a Lady. Let us be men. Shoot hard-lined feminists on site, for that's what they did to gentlemanship. They forgot that there is a difference between heroes and bad guys, thus producing a genderless society where no one wins. Women have more opportunities, but less pay (sadly) and men don't know which actions build him as a man and which ones he will be ridiculed for as a shovenist. Guide the protocol by reciprocating acts of Gentlemanship with acts of lady-like behavior. If you text during dinner on a first date and talk about all the "best guy friends" that you "love to death", don't let it be a surprise when we drop you off at the end of the night and don't call again.

I aspire to be a Man. I want to court a Lady. I want to be a part of a society in which there are basic manners that everybody knows and respects. Being civilized is not a function of enlightenment where you are the most amiable and adaptable man in the room, someone who has no presence. Being civilized is being courteous and having manners but knowing that sometimes you need to draw a line in the sand and stand for what you believe in in a way that is firm but respectful.

There are times to show courtesy and respect and there are times to stand and deliver when that respect has been violated. The more that the latter is emasculated, the quicker Gentlemen become extinct. Because manners and courtesy are derived from unshakeable masculine strength. That strength is only realized and defined when it is put to use. If you stop telling us to put it to use, then all you end up with are a bunch of soft "nice guys."

Gentlemen: It's time to be Men. For the sake of being Men.