There's an Enso in the sidebar now. I've noticed many MGTOWs vibe with Zen buddhism, but maybe haven't fully connected with why. While the spiritual and religious component may be too much for some, I would argue the meditative practices, detachment practice, and the enlightenment pursuit is essential for a life well lived.

You can certainly deep dive into the 8 fold path, read up on your Siddhartha, practice mantra and Ohm meditation, and read works from some of the modern masters (I recommend Thich Nhat Hanh), but you don't really need to, because the immediately valuable stuff is pretty simply summarized:

Let go, you're not really in control.

Most things you cannot control no matter how hard you try or delude yourself. Of the minority of things you can control, you control a small part, not the whole thing. Of the even tinier minority of things you completely control, it's only for a little while before it moves on, or you move on, or you die. Furthermore, you didn't choose to exist, it's not in your power to indefinitely exist, and you didn't choose for said controlled thing to work the way it does.

All this amounts to a tiny sliver of control in life. A sliver that you really didn't set up or choose, and that you will only temporarily hang on to. Most importantly, whatever you accomplish from this tiny sliver of control, has no guarantees to persist after you die.

Now this is a fact of life. You choose how you react to it, if it brings you sadness, suffering or dread, then you may still be suffering from attachment to unchangeable things. You may be needing things to work a specific way before you find peace, even though you don't control them.

However, if you can find internal peace and happiness alongside this fact, you will find life to be a wonderful experience, because all the highs wont make you manic, and the lows wont break you. You just simply enjoy the ride, like replaying your favorite video game.

By no means am I advocating aimlessness, wanderlust, or irresponsibility. There are many ways to interpret what I've written and run wild with hippie bullshit or guru cult nonsense. Don't do that. All I'm really saying is that before you can live with purpose and passion towards your mission, you must first be happy just being alive at all.

So let go, you're not really in control.