Alright mate
Recently, I got back into a childhood hobby of mine.
Painting Warhammer miniatures.
Look at this ratty little bastard…
When I was a boy, few things made me as happy as spending a Sunday afternoon bringing these little soldiers to life with a paintbrush.
And I was good at it.
I even sold a set of ten models on eBay for around £200 which was a lot of money to 11-year-old me.
But then something monumental happened.
I discovered girls.
That was a sad day.
I put down the brush and decided that approval from women was my new north star.
This was not a good idea.
In my mid-twenties I finally had all the female validation a man could want.
I had worked hard on my confidence and it paid off.
There was a phase where I was sleeping with a different woman almost every night.
But the truth is after they would leave in the morning I felt empty hollow and ashamed.
Eventually I realised that the path of female validation leads nowhere.
Now at 32 having just finished a fresh coat of paint on my army I feel more fulfilled and more in loving contact with myself than I ever did after another meaningless hookup.
Here’s the lesson.
A man cannot fully live his own life
Be truly at ease in his own skin
Enjoy his own company
Or become his most confident grounded self
If the most important thing in his life is getting women to like him.
When a man puts women on a pedestal he warps himself into some caricature of what he thinks they will like.
And by doing that he loses touch with himself.
The more you lose contact with yourself the less enjoyable life becomes.
The more shallow your relationships are.
And since you are working overtime to be someone you are not the less confident you become.
I am not saying intimacy connection and sex are not important.
They are.
But they are not more important than your connection to your weird imperfect and in my case covertly nerdy self.
So take women off the pedestal.
And choose yourself first.
Here’s a journaling prompt and an actionable takeaway for you…
1) Journaling prompt
What is something I gave up to gain approval that I secretly miss? Why did I give it up? What would it feel like to reclaim it just for me?
2) Takeaway for this week
Do something purely for yourself with no agenda to impress or succeed.
Play. Create. Explore.
Then ask yourself
“When I do this, what part of me do I feel more connected to?”
P.S. Make this your agenda for the week and let me know how it goes.
Big love,
Oliver