Year of Reading and Reflection
Hello everyone, welcome back once more to my public journal. When I first started this, I committed to a year of writing, as I wanted to record the things I was learning from the podcasts and books I was listening to and reading. An additional part of it was and yet is that I want to become better in every avenue of life; often, when I see people or hear someone whom I admire, I only see the results of years upon years of discipline and hard work. In my own way, I want to record my journey of becoming the man I truly want to be: a man of confidence, a man of wisdom, a man of God who can stand confident in his sonship. This is not a destination that is reached overnight, it is a journey that is embarked in everyday one seemingly menial task at a time.
Instagram and our social media feeds are filled with highlight reels of someone’s life. This blog slash personal journal is not my highlight reel it is a record of my journal in truthfully seeking to become someone who is resilient to the chaos of the world. I want to truly become better each day in some way, and often, I don’t make as much progress as I would like to have made, but I am committed to keep trying, to keep growing, to keep learning. As part of this journey I decided I wanted to invest into reading more and so this week I will share with you all the top five most interesting books I read this year.
This is your Brain on Birth control, by Dr Sarah E Hill
I have made no secret of my interest in trying to better understand the female mind and experience. So as I listened to many podcasts coming from various perspectives I was introduced to Dr Hill’s work on the side effects of birth control. I have heard birth control described as the “Social atom bomb” of the twenty-first century. This is a technology that has introduced so many changes to our society that in previous centuries were never even considered. As I read this book and tried my best to sift through the information from a biblical lens I found myself endlessly fascinated. One of the most interesting ideas is that for the first time in human history we have been able to reliably disconnect the act of sex from procreation. This change has effected how society at large treats sex. This barrier that once kept many from acting on their base human desires has been removed and we now see many of the effects of this change on our society. This technology which was introduced in the 1960’s has become so commonplace in our world that many today have never considered how it has effected how they interact with the opposite sex.
The more I’ve thought about this the more I have realized that we have destroyed so many healthy social barriers that once kept men and women from acting only on their primal instincts. I truly believe that this technology has negatively effected both men and women. The effects on both genders have absolutely been very different, but they have had destructive effects that have warped the minds of men and women and have fundamentally changed how we interact with one another and there is no going back. It’s once of those moments where we simply don’t know what we don’t know. Todays young people have never known a world without this technology and so we have no idea what a world without it looked like.
Mom Genes by Abigail Tucker
This was a second book that I was introduced to as I began this study of the “female experience” and despite what many online voices say I realize I will never be able to be woman, nor do I wish to be. But I do want to understand and learn more about how God designed us differently at a biological level. When I talk to guys and they tell me how the process the world I get it, it makes sense to me, this is not the case for girls. But more than that as the world says we are interchangeable and that guys can do anything girls can and girls can do anything guys can I wanted to dive into the opposite end of the conversation I wanted to learn more about how differently we are both biologically but also neurologically. And this book blew my mind continually with so many of the tiny yet incredible things I was able to learn. Learning to see how God designed women’s brains to literally evolve to become a “Mom brain” what seemingly understand the needs of her child without a single word needing to be spoken.
There were moments of true awe for me reading this book, as I learned about the many scientific discoveries we have made that continually show off the fingerprints of God on this truly incredible process of a woman becoming a mother and the development of this new life within herself. I can not recommend this book enough, both for guys and girls.
The Toxic War on Masculinity by Nancy R Pearcey
As I learned about all these incredible things about the female experience and God’s design with it I went a different route and I wanted to better understand the online conversation of “Toxic masculinity” and how we now live in a culture that is increasingly feminizing the young men of today. This is being done at many levels both in school but also how young boys are socialized today to believe that they need to behave more like girls. As today we have approximately 50% of all children being raised without a father figure in their life I could not help but ask how has this effected not just young boys but children as a whole. The truth is we are living in the fallout today, many young men today simply feel as though there is no place in the world for them. The suicide rate amongst young people has skyrocketed amongst young adults people, but no group has been as heavily been impacted as todays young men.
This is not the common narrative, the common narrative is that men are all that is wrong with the world and that they exist in a special privileged position. That all the evil of this world is somehow a direct result of the “Masculine male.” Unfortunately so much of the online discourse today is not one of trying to understand one another, but is instead one that wants to castigate and blame the other for all its problems. Neither gender is innocent in this regard we are each contributing the the problems of the other and until we each take the time to look into the mirror and are willing to say that we too are part of the problem and we want to help lift the other up rather than blame and point fingers things will continue to spiral. Our divorce rates will continue to climb and our marriage rates will continue to plummet.
Nation of Victims by Vivek Ramaswamy
Vivek is a running as a 2024 presidential candidate, when I first heard some of his talking points I was intrigued and wanted to learn more about how he thinks. Through this I discovered he is a published author and this book caught my eye. I have experienced the seductive allure of wanting to be a victim and wanting to be able to say “Its not my fault, it’s the cards I was dealt” yet as I read this book I realized how seductive this mentality is to the human condition. It is so much easier to look at the party across from us and blame them because they did “X” thing and that thing is the reason we have failed. It is so, so much harder to take every failure and ask the question how did I contribute to this problem, asking what did I do is uncomfortable because in most cases if you do this you will find something you did that caused the problem.
As Vivek writes in this book we have seen a gradual collapse of a “merit” based culture to a “victim” based culture. Today we see that those who can claim the greatest victim status are the ones who are lauded as the heroes. Today we celebrate not those who overcome the adversities of life but those can claim to have been kicked the hardest. And so a direct result is everyone today is screaming at the top of their lungs about how hard they have been kicked, often times going so far as to kick themselves in the face just so they can show off the boot print on their face.
Your Next Five Moves by Patrick Bet David
This book is primarily a book focused on how to effective in business. But as I read it I could not help but ask the question how can I best prepare the next moves I will make in my own personal life. I have publicly shared in this space my desire to find a spouse and to have a family of my own. But as I read this book it gave me a more practical approach on how to engage in this and many other decisions in my life. I am not happy with how many hours I spent in my twenties playing video games. I have some regret about how I spent my time, but I am committed to look spending my twenties being as productive as I can. Thinking through each move I make in life and love. I have made many mistakes along the way, and I have no doubt I will make plenty more, but I am committed to minimizing these as much as I can. I am committed treating life like a business I want to succeed and grow in value. This means I have to make wise investments. I have to prioritize making investments that hold long-term value and not just short-term payouts.
I realize this may not be an approach that is attractive to everyone, but it is to me. I truly enjoy looking at a problem and breaking it down to its base components so that I can understand where the problem is coming from. If I can look at my own life identify my problems then I can begin to work on them. Also if I look in the mirror I and see the problems then it gives me actionable steps I can take to resolve those problems. If I look in the mirror and only see my problems as the result of others then I have no power left. I have essentially given up my autonomy to whoever it is that I am claiming to have been victimized by. I want to be strategic in each choice I make. In business, in life and in love.
I hope you will all consider checking out any of these books, all are incredible books and will give you something to think about. Thank you for joining me, I hope you have a blessed day and a great week!
PS, I will not be adding audio versions of my posts for the time being due to issues with the platform I was using to create these audio files.
