This is a question that comes up frequently on TRP, with a huge surge in the wake of Roosh V's radical change of course:
Does a lifetime of plate spinning inevitably lead to mid-life existential crisis and dissatisfaction?
Important caveats: This essay isn't intended to diagnose or explain Roosh V specifically, nor does it take a position on whether marriage/monogamy/family or single/polygyny/childfree will bring higher life satisfaction for you. I'm mainly going to share my own life experience, about which at >10 years farther along than Roosh I can say with confidence:
No! I could not be happier with my single independent life.
Of all the mid-life crises I have witnessed, Roosh is walking his chosen walk with integrity. While I technically understand his situation, path, and motivations in great detail, I find it unrelatable and cannot empathize with it whatsoever. Here are some of the reasons I believe my outcome unfolded so much differently than those who reach a crisis point.
I've never been religious. I'm not here to crap on people of sincere faith, however the institution of religion is one of the most strong and pervasive blue pills in existence today. The feminine imperative has nothing on religion for giving men reasons to defer their self-interests to nonreciprocal other parties. "Live to our standards or burn in hell for eternity" is one of the most dangerous covert contracts a man could enter. The good news is, Red Pill awareness can help one navigate humans willing to manipulate and exploit people's faith to fulfill other people's needs, and prevent the buildup of a house of deferred rewards cards that will never be dealt to favor you.
I've always been a skeptic seeking underlying causes, rather than stopping at pleasant BP fables. Why "should" I "want" to do things according to common patterns and narratives? Why do most people follow the herd and avoid standing out at any cost? An early example, when I was a kid the family went to a stage production of Peter Pan. When Tinkerbell drank the poison and they called upon the audience to cheer to give her strengh, my Mom tapped me and asked why I wasn't cheering. "Because I want to see if Tinkerbell ACTUALLY DIES if I don't clap." People apply surprising amounts of social pressure to help maintain group illusions; the first thing you need to deflect this is really thick skin.
I've never been tied down by marriage or children, and thus have never been beholden to a personal dream killer. Starting a business with nothing, spending time and money on fast cars, dirt bikes, adventures to remote places, all decided 100% on my terms. My Mom and Grandma thought I was the unhappy black sheep of the family by not getting married and having kids. My Sister's oldest kids were fuckups one of whom prompted them to cut contact with the rest of the family; my Brother just this month said his "perfect" wife of 20+ years has been wanting out for months and literally the DAY their oldest passed his high school finals, HE was "forced" to move to a hotel to keep peace. I've seen dead-eyed parents saddled with an unhealthy, retarded, or antisocial addict child, there's no guarantee of children bringing life fulfillment.
I've engaged and influenced the greater world in grand ways. I've successfully fought city hall, changed laws, founded companies, led movements, and left durable improvements on people I've known and places I've been.
I've experienced both short term physical and long term intimate relationships, stuck it in crazy, dated much older and younger, shared passionate and companionate love, even have people in their late 20s who look up to me as a stepfather figure 15+ years after breaking up with their Mom.
I confronted my mortality at a young age; while I don't recommend everybody go through a phase of experimenting with psychedelics in their early 20s, actually feeling like you experience dying, death, and some kind of afterlife several times puts this common human fear to rest nicely. This is a big human question; choose approaches that work for you but neglect it at your own peril.
What I'm getting at in all of this detail is, whereas I've lived "the same" single life of plate spinning that Roosh has, that's not all I've done all of these years, therefore I am NOT coming up hollow and empty the same as he more than 10 years on. If I had to boil it down to one common denominator, it is this: I've largely done things that I want when I want so there's no pool of accumulated unfulfilled desires or resentment of overproviding for others lurking under high pressure within.
So, how can a young man starting out avoid hitting a midlife crisis in an uncertain world?
Although mankind has spent untold amounts of precious time searching for meaning and purpose, and built up huge bodies of ideas and belief systems around these efforts, I've come to believe that they are mostly futile and frequently part of the problem. The TRP toolbox of ideas has much of what a man needs to forge a satisfying life for himself in the modern world.
- Don't live your life according to others' needs, standards, and wishes
- Improve your mind and body continuously
- Look through the comfortable illusions that so many humans settle for; do the hard work and see the world for what it is
- Covert contracts come in many guises; recognize and reject them
- Actively reject sources found to be feeding you even partial BS. Every falsehood you fail to reject is a rotten beam you're willfully building into your mental infrastructure. A worldview that is fractally wrong will eventually become unsustainable and break its holder, at a point in life when it has become too late to recover and correct. TRP does not emphasize this last point enough.
So many people reach points of uncertainty or crisis in their lives, and their go-to move is to take a big step backwards, to follow past solutions like religion, or Marx, or Freud. Worse yet are the ones who take up these expired banners and use them to lead OTHERS backwards, mainly for their own personal gain, not that of those led. The utility and greatness of these people and institutions was situational, taking humanity from where it was BEFORE to as far as they could. So few who ever take their conflicts and turn them toward becoming the new human unifying and fulfilling institution, or the new Marx or Freud to take us from where we are now to ahead.
The world we live in is changing more rapidly than ever in human history. How can a young person know what to do and which direction to go when the pace of change is so fast that the traditional way of passing knowledge from generation to generation has become simply too slow? To successfully navigate the road ahead, you'll need to know how to learn and how to reject falsehoods.
A satisfying life is one you forge for yourself, not a failed effort at living the life others expected you to.
Make sure you register your free account on TRP.RED so you can keep up with articles like this in case Reddit fully bans TRP.
[–]Endorsed ContributorKeffirLime87 points88 points89 points (36 children) | Copy Link
[–]Chadster11335 points36 points37 points (13 children) | Copy Link
[–]randomaccnt23131 points32 points33 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Endorsed ContributorKeffirLime22 points23 points24 points (2 children) | Copy Link
[–]Nicolas06311 point2 points3 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]Endorsed ContributorKeffirLime5 points6 points7 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]TRP VanguardHumanSockPuppet13 points14 points15 points (4 children) | Copy Link
[–]geo_gan3 points4 points5 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]TRP VanguardHumanSockPuppet5 points6 points7 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Nicolas0631-2 points-1 points0 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]IceBear---69-1 points0 points1 point (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Jourdanis3 points4 points5 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]1scissor_me_timbers000 points1 point2 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]whuttupfoo5 points6 points7 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–][deleted] 4 points5 points6 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]gabeangelo4 points5 points6 points (2 children) | Copy Link
[–]Endorsed ContributorKeffirLime4 points5 points6 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]gabeangelo4 points5 points6 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]MCATL22440 points1 point2 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]2INNASKILLZ2K180 points1 point2 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]predicatelite-3 points-2 points-1 points (12 children) | Copy Link
[–]1scissor_me_timbers0013 points14 points15 points (3 children) | Copy Link
[–]predicatelite0 points1 point2 points (2 children) | Copy Link
[–]1scissor_me_timbers002 points3 points4 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Jourdanis1 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Endorsed ContributorKeffirLime7 points8 points9 points (5 children) | Copy Link
[–]Jourdanis1 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]predicatelite1 point2 points3 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]Endorsed ContributorKeffirLime3 points4 points5 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]KnightestKnightPeter0 points1 point2 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]SilkTouchm1 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]0io-129 points130 points131 points (82 children) | Copy Link
[–]Senior Endorsed ContributorVasiliyZaitzev26 points27 points28 points (21 children) | Copy Link
[–]lapeparoja21 points22 points23 points (19 children) | Copy Link
[–]Senior ContributorMentORPHEUS[S] 20 points21 points22 points (7 children) | Copy Link
[–]kymosabei8 points9 points10 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]lapeparoja11 points12 points13 points (3 children) | Copy Link
[–]Senior ContributorMentORPHEUS[S] 15 points16 points17 points (2 children) | Copy Link
[–]Nicolas06314 points5 points6 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]2INNASKILLZ2K185 points6 points7 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Senior Endorsed ContributorVasiliyZaitzev3 points4 points5 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]lapeparoja5 points6 points7 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]MinnesotaMiser2 points3 points4 points (7 children) | Copy Link
[–]lapeparoja6 points7 points8 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]2CasaDeFranco2 points3 points4 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]5Imperator_Red2 points3 points4 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]kymosabei3 points4 points5 points (2 children) | Copy Link
[–]MinnesotaMiser0 points1 point2 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]kymosabei1 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]escapethesolarsystem1 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]TRP VanguardHumanSockPuppet14 points15 points16 points (3 children) | Copy Link
[–]WearDoWeGoNow1 point2 points3 points (2 children) | Copy Link
[–]TRP VanguardHumanSockPuppet3 points4 points5 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]a7000-a34 points35 points36 points (15 children) | Copy Link
[–]Onidramon58 points59 points60 points (14 children) | Copy Link
[–]a7000-a27 points28 points29 points (13 children) | Copy Link
[–]1scissor_me_timbers0028 points29 points30 points (12 children) | Copy Link
[–]alphabachelor11 points12 points13 points (3 children) | Copy Link
[–]1scissor_me_timbers008 points9 points10 points (2 children) | Copy Link
[–]0io--1 points0 points1 point (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]1scissor_me_timbers004 points5 points6 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]inittowinit7775 points6 points7 points (4 children) | Copy Link
[–]MundoDexter10 points11 points12 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]1scissor_me_timbers005 points6 points7 points (2 children) | Copy Link
[–]0io-1 point2 points3 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]1scissor_me_timbers001 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Atheist_Utopia2 points3 points4 points (2 children) | Copy Link
[–]1scissor_me_timbers002 points3 points4 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Senior ContributorMentORPHEUS[S] 22 points23 points24 points (6 children) | Copy Link
[–]GodOfDinosaurs15 points16 points17 points (5 children) | Copy Link
[–]glumbum210 points11 points12 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]kellykebab7 points8 points9 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]BlameitonBigDave3 points4 points5 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Endorsed Contributoritiswr1tten1 point2 points3 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]Endorsed Contributormonsieurhire217 points18 points19 points (18 children) | Copy Link
[–]Senior ContributorMentORPHEUS[S] 20 points21 points22 points (4 children) | Copy Link
[–]tunsku13 points14 points15 points (2 children) | Copy Link
[–]destraht3 points4 points5 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]geo_gan1 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Endorsed Contributormonsieurhire24 points5 points6 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]tunsku14 points15 points16 points (12 children) | Copy Link
[–]WearDoWeGoNow5 points6 points7 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]Nicolas06312 points3 points4 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Endorsed Contributormonsieurhire23 points4 points5 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]organicfluxx1 point2 points3 points (8 children) | Copy Link
[–]tunsku1 point2 points3 points (7 children) | Copy Link
[–]organicfluxx0 points1 point2 points (6 children) | Copy Link
[–]tunsku0 points1 point2 points (5 children) | Copy Link
[–]organicfluxx0 points1 point2 points (4 children) | Copy Link
[–]tunsku0 points1 point2 points (3 children) | Copy Link
[–]organicfluxx-1 points0 points1 point (2 children) | Copy Link
[–]someonesopinion69694 points5 points6 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]swampbastard14154 points5 points6 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]0io-0 points1 point2 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]austin6652 points3 points4 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]Nicolas06311 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]escapethesolarsystem2 points3 points4 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]mrpthrowa4 points5 points6 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]nowboarding 1 points [recovered] (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]0io-1 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]GirTheRobot 1 points [recovered] (13 children) | Copy Link
[–]kcchiefs09277 points8 points9 points (5 children) | Copy Link
[–]ChrimsonChin988-2 points-1 points0 points (4 children) | Copy Link
[–]kcchiefs09273 points4 points5 points (3 children) | Copy Link
[–]TheScarletScholar0 points1 point2 points (2 children) | Copy Link
[–]kcchiefs09271 point2 points3 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]TheScarletScholar1 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Kingzumar2 points3 points4 points (6 children) | Copy Link
[–]fdsafdasfdsafds 1 points [recovered] (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]Kingzumar2 points3 points4 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]BaLahKie1 point2 points3 points (3 children) | Copy Link
[–]wildtimes32 points3 points4 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Kingzumar0 points1 point2 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]BaLahKie2 points3 points4 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Senior Endorsed ContributorVasiliyZaitzev43 points44 points45 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]RedKingRising10 points11 points12 points (2 children) | Copy Link
[–]Pussyshack 1 points [recovered] (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]RedKingRising1 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]RedDeadlift6 points7 points8 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]Cryptoguru7777 points8 points9 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Rob34567820 points21 points22 points (13 children) | Copy Link
[–]Endorsed ContributorKeffirLime13 points14 points15 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Senior ContributorMentORPHEUS[S] 22 points23 points24 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]someonesopinion696917 points18 points19 points (2 children) | Copy Link
[–]think_9090909 1 points [recovered] (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]someonesopinion69698 points9 points10 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]wviber4 points5 points6 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]crushplanets1 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]whuttupfoo1 point2 points3 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]Rob3456781 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]BrownGummyBear0 points1 point2 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]fdsafdasfdsafds 1 points [recovered] (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]tyronethejabrone2 points3 points4 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]uwey7 points8 points9 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]massivewang3 points4 points5 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Mushonix2 points3 points4 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]gabeangelo2 points3 points4 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Well_hung_Yakuza2 points3 points4 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]celincelin2 points3 points4 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]prochatterbox10 points11 points12 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]destraht-1 points0 points1 point (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]mrpthrowa6 points7 points8 points (3 children) | Copy Link
[–]BuzzLightGear321 1 points [recovered] (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]MetaphoricalNonsense0 points1 point2 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]yes_kid1 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]kellykebab1 point2 points3 points (2 children) | Copy Link
[–]Senior ContributorMentORPHEUS[S] 2 points3 points4 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]kellykebab0 points1 point2 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]MetaphoricalNonsense1 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Nokia_81 point2 points3 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]MetaphoricalNonsense1 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Nicolas06311 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]acidbath64641 point2 points3 points (2 children) | Copy Link
[–]Senior ContributorMentORPHEUS[S] 2 points3 points4 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]acidbath64640 points1 point2 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]escapethesolarsystem1 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Endorsed Contributorredpillcad1 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]SouloftheVoid1 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]SeasonedRP3 points4 points5 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]Ukhupa2 points3 points4 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]throwlaca-1 points0 points1 point (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]dingleburry_joe0 points1 point2 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]russian_nigger0 points1 point2 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]2INNASKILLZ2K180 points1 point2 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]Project_Zero_Betas0 points1 point2 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]richbordoni0 points1 point2 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–]Senior ContributorMentORPHEUS[S] 9 points10 points11 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]flyinghorse10 points1 point2 points (0 children) | Copy Link
[–]plaudite_cives0 points1 point2 points (5 children) | Copy Link
[–][deleted] 5 points6 points7 points (4 children) | Copy Link
[–]loadacode0 points1 point2 points (3 children) | Copy Link
[–][deleted] 1 point2 points3 points (2 children) | Copy Link
[–]loadacode1 point2 points3 points (1 child) | Copy Link
[–][deleted] 0 points1 point2 points (0 children) | Copy Link