If you want to be richer, study and learn to admire rich people (but those with good character of course). If you want to be popular, study and learn to admire popular people. If you want to be good with women, study and learn to admire people who are good with women. Petty, bitter whiny people instead tend to surround themselves with other petty, bitter whiny people to use as an ongoing pity party and together they spend their time actively hating the people who are experiencing success. Is it any wonder they stay stuck in a rut?
At the other extreme, don’t take it to worship level either. They’re just people. Worship is another defense mechanism of the weak. By worshiping and being overly reverential of the successful, that is yet another way people put success out of their grasp. They put the successful on a pedestal, which is another way to make them unattainable, as they achieve almost diety-like status. And people get creeped out by those who worship them, which pretty much guarantees they’ll never respect them, much less mentor them.
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Watch as many old movies and TV shows and books as you can. Read biographies and interviews with old school guys. Old movies kept it real. They weren’t obsessed with assuaging the egos of losers. They gave hard life lessons. Although leading men were becoming more sensitive and vulnerable since the 60s, they were still expected to have some swagger as late as the 80s. Even 80s movies like Revenge of the Nerds were funny precisely because they were supposed to be taken as so outlandishly unrealistic. No one was expected to aspire to be a nerd the way movies today try to seriously sell Michael Cera’s characters as someone who goes from hot girl to hot girl just living his life as a socially awkward hipsterish nerd. In the 80s, his counterpart was the lead from The Last American Virgin or Corey Haim in Lucas or Ducky from Pretty in Pink. Painful to watch, yes, but they taught a valuable life lesson: More often than not, life is unfair and the weak, ugly and socially awkward lose more often than they don’t. Being your best is the key, but character and perseverance are also important.
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For example, if you think I’m exaggerating about the state of men, ask yourself this: who is a current American actor under the age of 35, not including black/ethnic guys, athletes or rappers, who can convincingly pull off a tough guy role? The only guy I can think of right now is that new actor Channing Tatum. The rest are just prettyboys or wusses. Even the ones with muscles aren’t convincing tough guys, they just look like vain pampered gym rats. Deniro and Pacino for example never had huge muscles but came off way tougher than some of today’s musclebound actors. My friends and I have been rattling off names and every guy we think of turns out to be over 35 or foreign. It’s reached the point where we’re using Matt Damon as our generation’s ultimate action hero. Shia LeBeouf is being groomed to take over the Indiana Jones franchise. Shia LeBeouf, the Disney guy! We import most of our tough guys now, like Jason Statham and Christian Bale.
Now the first few minutes are the typical fellating of Obama that today’s reporters routinely engage in whenever fawning and flattering asking him hard questions and speaking “truth to power.” But look at what happens at 3:20 when he gets irked at a reporter’s questions (something that happens more often than the media tells you; he pretty much hates any challenging questions). Notice how each time he dresses down the reporter, he gives him a slightly condescending shoulder pat.
A powerful domination tactic is showing a willingness to touch the other person at will, among other things. A good rundown of alpha male body language can be found at this site (emphasis added by me):
The body language cues the dominant person uses are these:
Directs and controls the conversation.
Freely asks questions and expects a response back but gives little or no self-disclosure.
Stands with hands on hips, elbows out to sides. Takes up more personal space that way and wants to look bigger.
Stands or sits taller than others on purpose.
Freely interrupts others speaking. (Others don’t interrupt.)
Long pause when answering a door knock, or replying to someone. Makes others wait.
Freely touches others. (Others don’t touch back.)
Will stare at others and demand attention. (Others don’t do the same back.)
Never breaks eye contact first. Others usually break eye contact first by looking down, signifying submission.
Occupies a bigger personal space and crowds others on purpose.
Takes the lead purposefully when walking and going through doors.
While sitting, will put hands behind head, put feet on desk, remove eye glasses and put ear-piece in mouth, or turn chair away from others and stare out window.
If not well socialized, will eat and talk at same time while others can’t eat.
Even though I only emphasized the habit directly relevant to this video, I have seen him use other techniques on this list at different times, especially on Youtube, pretty much the only place to see any video of Obama portrayed in a negative light along with conservative blogs. The media filters out anything unflattering or calculating about Obama and carefully cultivates a wholesome, “aw shucks” folksy image for him.
As I’ve stated in part 1, part 2, and part 3, Obama nakedly uses more calculating power, domination and public relation techniques than any other public figure I’ve seen in a while, either consciously and deliberately or unconsciously and unwittingly, and I don’t think he gets away with being called out on it due to his subtlety or guile so much as the media working overtime to continuously manage and soften his image. The problem is that with the blogosphere, talk radio and Youtube, the mainstream media doesn’t have the near-monopoly on image management of public figures that it used to, so it should be interesting to see the alternative views of Obama that rise to the surface during the next four years.
Under 35 is the impossible part. Was even Bogart Bogart before he reached 35? You need some gravitas (which comes with age, usually) to convincingly carry a tough guy archetype. Who’s going to fill the shoes of Tommy Lee Jones/Clint Eastwood? maybe no one, but then maybe the tough guys of old wouldn’t quite satisfy today. More grace and behavioral flexibility might wear better … the inner stillness in Vin Diesel comes close to what I’m thinking of, but he’s 41 already!
Fair point, Carrie. But do you think today’s 35 year olds will have the degree of gravitas when they turn 40 as that of the actors of previous generations. His points is one similar to that of Zan, which is that we are a generation of men raised without strong masculine role models…