I sit at my desktop computer having NOT been to the gym since Halloween... having NOT lifted anything heavier than 20 lbs in the past month, with an aching groin, still taking fucking Advil every day. Funny story, I swear. Consider this the first, if not only, Manosphere related injuries...

Really, it's a funny story...

I found the Manosphere, via this very subreddit, in 2013. I had always been on-and-off the gym, since getting my first gym membership back when I was 21. You can spend all day kicking yourself for every missed inflection point- every single fuck up- but don't.

You know how it went without me having to tell you... you know the story of the blue pill man: he gets a girlfriend and the gym becomes less of a priority; then he missed so many consecutive days that, he thinks, "it's just a break but why keep the membership since I'm not going right now... Better for when I'm ready to refocus and restart..."

And then three years pass...

By the time I had found the Manosphere, I already had my prison break from my so deathly toxic that it boarded on suicidal four year relationship, my game was re-sharpened, I had had dates, I had had lays- I had lost about seventy pounds and had been back at my beloved, basement, gym bro gym for about a year.

But a funny thing happens when a man finds the Manosphere- after a tremendous degree of euphoric relief that you found OTHER PEOPLE MAKING THE SAME OBSERVATIONS ABOUT WOMEN THAT YOU'D BEEN SILENTLY COLLECTING FOR YEARS...- you suddenly think that every bit of advice applies to you.

And one day you learn that it doesn't.

Unfortunately, I learned that after tearing a hole in my groin.

Typically, Manosphere advice is geared toward the lowest common denominator, the blue pilled as fuck, couch potato... typically this advice is from men who are either still trying to climb the mountain, refine their image, and put their old self six feet in the ground- or men who had done just that, came out fucking heroes on the other end of it- and want to help the bros who need the most help. There is nothing wrong with any of that...

...but if you don't calibrate the advice to where you are currently with your own progress on your own journey, you may get TOTALLY AMPED UP in the wrong direction.

Take game, for example. My game turned to shit when I started reading about game. Why? I was already a fucking asshole! I've always been a fucking asshole! And reading endless Manosphere posts about asshole game had me AMPED to push my asshole game to its limit. I overdid it... and yeah, sometimes it was just fine, but how many times could I have gotten an easssy lay by toning it down a little bit?

So now, I'm sitting here, pissed as fuck that I can't hit the gym because it got in my head, when I was first reading shit on here almost ten years ago, that I wasn't pushing myself hard enough at the gym. LIFT HEAVY; PUSH IT EVERY TIME YOU'RE THERE; ANYTHING BUT PUSHING AS HARD AS YOU CAN IS A LIMITING BELIEF. Call me an idiot, and maybe I was- but I could see new guys taking that advice, getting amped on the Manosphere buzz, and making the mistake I did. Pushing a little too hard in 2014 and giving myself a hernia that I finally got fixed a month ago, that still fucking hurts, that I did to myself and that I could have avoided by calibrating the advice I was receiving to my own progress.

This is my advice for you, today: assess yourself and your progress. Be honest about your weaknesses and strengths. If you've been a pushover with women- be more of an asshole. If your game ain't broke, don't bother fixing it. Lift consistently with good form. Find a plan that works for you. Don't rush progress, or your house of cards falls apart and you'll have to take serious time off to heal...