I’m a Gentleman, Not a Saint.

I prefer a pleasant vice to an annoying virtue.

Moliere

I am a Gentleman; and yet I have the occasional drink, smoke the occasional cigar, say the occasional curse word, and do the occasional wrong thing every once in a while. Because even though I am a Gentleman, I am also human. And that is something I have learned to accept, from myself and from others. Nobody is perfect and nobody should be expected to be.

The biggest misconception holding back many men from becoming better men is the idea that they are not good enough, so why even try. They judge themselves based on past actions or past mistakes. The best example of this mentality is men who think they can’t be a good mentor simply because of the life they have led. How can they set a good example if they can be called out on all the bad things they have done in life?

They assume that good men are these perfect beings who walk on a different level of consciousness. The reality is that a good man is imperfect, and gets the same imperfect thoughts everyone else does. What sets them apart is how, with the same thoughts and temptations, are still willing to do good. The only thing needed to be a good man is the clear intention of being a good man. That’s where being a Gentleman comes in.

Many Eastern philosophies make a distinction between the Sage and the Gentleman. The sage is the equivalent of the saint, a man who walks on a higher level of consciousness. Yet these philosophies understand that not all men can or even should aim to become a sage, as some men’s obligations as a Warrior or as a Leader will force them to walk a different path than the Sage.

The simple fact that you are willing to do good, to step in that general direction, places you above and beyond those who do nothing other than judge. Change is not achieved through judgment, but rather through action. The fact that you are not perfect and the fact that you accept it gives you an insight as to why people fall from grace. And by understanding why people take the actions they do, can you better help them or at least deal with them. The men who best understand the importance of virtue are usually those with personal knowledge of vice at one point in their lives.

People Can Make You Happy But Only You Can Achieve Happiness

It is not easy to find happiness in ourselves, and it is not possible to find it elsewhere.

Agnes Repplier

Trying to find ‘Happiness’ is like a single person trying to find a ‘Relationship,’ the harder you try, the harder it is to find. People tend to confuse happiness and being happy. Happiness is being content with your life; it’s achieving harmony between all aspects of your life. Happy is just being happy. Someone can make you happy, but only you can achieve happiness.

And I emphasis on the term Achieve and Find, because happiness is not something that happens, like when you finally get a joke and start laughing. You have to work on yourself to find happiness. You must understand yourself enough to realize what is out of whack, what is stopping you from reaching harmony.

We place our happiness in the hands of others, expecting them to cater to us, to bring us happiness as if it where little more than a sandwich or a drink. The only thing anyone can do is make you happy, bring a temporary smile, a quick laugh. But that is purely temporary. If anything, you are setting yourself up for a codependent relationship and guaranteeing you will never achieve happiness, and you hand over control of your life to another person.

Look at yourself, understand yourself, and evolve yourself. Find your happiness and achieve it. Understand that happiness is not based on who you are with, but who you are.

Be Defined By What You Love, Not By What You Hate.

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

Martin Luther King, Jr.

Let’s do a simple thought experiment. Think about how you would change the world, in what you believe in, and what drives you. Reduce those thoughts to simple statements, two or three of them. Now consider how many of these statements are based on things you hate, and how many are based on things you love. Which wins?

We tend to define our attitude based on what we hate, yet this does very little to actually create a better world. Hating racism, hating misogyny, or hating homophobia does not mean you support equality. You are promoting or providing a better world. It just means you think these things are wrong. It might seem like an issue of syntaxis, but it’s a mayor issue of syntaxis.

When you tell someone that what they are doing is wrong, their reaction is to lock up. They turn into rebellious teenagers, ignoring if it’s wrong or right, and just try to prove they can win. We see this in every aspect of society, as people start taking absurd stands. Yet these stands are not that absurd when you consider why they came about, as a rebellion of being told they are wrong.

Stop telling people that what they are doing is wrong. Instead tell them how they can do better. What they are doing wrong will go away as a result. Stop trying to fight racism, but rather make people understand that all races are equal. Stop trying to get rid of misogyny or misandry, but rather talk about gender equality. Educate people in acceptance of different sexual orientations, and not just in tolerance. Strive for a better world, not one with fewer wrongs.

You Are Your Brother’s Keeper

When the character of a man is not clear to you, look at his friends.

Japanese Proverb

A constant comment I keep reading from detractors from my articles is how a man can’t be expected to be responsible for others, how he is responsible only for himself. I cannot agree with this mentality.

A while back I wrote an article on how we are Role Models to those around us, whether we want to or not. This is especially true among your friends. A friend has a power that no other person has in someone’s life. You might dismiss the comments of strangers, as they have no idea who you are. You might dismiss the comments of your parents, as they are your “parents” and as a son it’s your rebellious nature getting the best of you. But friends? True Friends? They will tell you the truth to your face, even if you don’t like it. They are probably going to be more honest and direct than even the person with whom you are in a relationship.

And that power means you can influence their behavior with the slightest approval or disapproval. We tend to pick up our friend’s habits, hobbies, and attitudes as well as influence our friend’s actions and mentality. So by your own actions, by your own open approval or disapproval, can you be your brother’s keepers. And this is very important when it comes to your social responsibility. How you carry yourself will set the bar for your friend’s life.

So next time you see a friend making a stupid life decision or think it’s ok to laugh at his racist jokes, or his rape comment; stop and consider just how responsible you are for his actions. Next time you decide to act irresponsible; consider how your actions are going to let him know what’s right and what’s wrong.

At our Hearts (Guest Contribution)

Luke Davis graced us with his contributions again. 

I had shared a Vid by Prince Ea that I found had a great message to all. And this was Luke's response. The video can be seen at the end.

At our heart we are all small little creatures who fear the outside of us.
It is beyond our control.
It is random
It is violent
(It is also wonderful and interesting and life is birthed here)

At our heart we want to control this world
We want to tame it
We want to put it on a leash
We want to tell it what to do
(Yet marvels are born from this very uncontrolled behavior)

So we try to impose our will on the world
It should act like this
It should not do this
It should do what I expect
(Yet because it does not the world shows us so much more wonder)

And with control we have conflict
Who has the power
My way is the right way
His way is the wrong way
(And yet all ways are journeys only one person may take)

Who are we at our hearts
We are small/We are tall
We are alone/We are friends and family
We are frightened/We are brave
We are just like everyone else/We are individuals.

How I Started Walking the Endless Path.

Everything changes as you get older; you mind, your body, and the way you view the world

Antonio Banderas

One afternoon about a few year ago, as we would do every so often did and still do, I sat down with some of my old friends for coffee, reminiscing about the old days, retelling old stories about our old ways. We all come from different walks of life but we all had one characteristic that tied us all since college; we were all forward thinkers who loved the classic traditions.

We always found amusing how far we got in those days, armed with little more than a cocky confidence, a smile, and the ability to act more professional than we actually were back then. Today we are older, wiser, and actually became respectable professionals in our respective fields, but we never forgot it was thanks to all the lessons we learned back then.

“If only I could leave an instruction manual, a sort of guide, to my kids and grand-kids in case I’m gone so they don’t have to learn the way we did, hard way, by making more than our share of mistakes.” This conversation was just a few weeks after my mother had passed unexpectedly. A few months before her passing, my doctor had warned me to start taking care of myself or I wouldn't reach 40. Like so many, I never took him seriously, till my own mother's sudden passing made my doctors a lot more serious. In just a few days, all that philosophical verbiage I used to spout out from my martial training, how you have to “Live today as if you could die tomorrow”, became a reality alarmingly fast. We looked at each other and raised our cups in agreement and understanding. That was the informal start of what I called the Caballero Club.

With an idea in my head, I began my first draft about a year ago for what I called back then the Caballero Chronicle. Originally, the project was going to be a guide for Latino empowerment, following the old Gentleman Traditions from Spain. Yet, the further I dealt in the topic, the more I realized that the lessons of empowerment I wanted to tell others, were not limited to a single ethnicity or race, or even culture. They were about understanding who you are as a man in a modern word. It started to take shape in the form of a thesis of self-empowerment based on the Universal Truths of Respect, to others and to self.

So armed with a proposal and about 45K worth of words, I headed to test the waters as an amateur writer. And that’s when I found out? If you are an unpublished author, complete unknown, trying to push a book, the waters were really cold and unkind. Yet instead of getting frustrated by the rejections, I got frustrated with myself.

I realized I failed my own lessons, specially the idea that you don’t travel to reach a goal, but to experience the trip. I was so focused in having a manuscript ready to try to sell to a publisher, that I lost track of why I was doing. And so I put the draft away. 

That was the formal start of Being Caballero.

I would simply enjoy the ride. Write, read, see people’s reactions. Treat it the same way you would when having a conversation with a friend. Sometimes you teach them something, other times they teach you something. Yet this conversation would be with the world. Am I the same man I was when I began? No. I am not even the same man I was when I began writing this article. That’s the beauty of life, you constantly grow and learn.

Every once in a while I still get together with my friends and have some coffee and catch up, just now it’s usually on Skype since we each live in different time zones. We still discussing just how being a gentleman, how being honorable, how being educated, and how being cultured, all helped us forge our lives. We discussed how that attitude got us through hard times and helped us enjoy even more the good times. Many of those chats have actually evolved into some of the stories and lessons you have read here. The book deal? That will happen if it has to happen. I hand that over, like so many things in my life, to fate. Right now I am a little too busy just enjoying a conversation with the world.

Hope, Sadness, and Anger. All thanks to nail polish.

What does love look like? It has the hands to help others. It has the feet to hasten to the poor and needy. It has eyes to see misery and want. It has the ears to hear the sighs and sorrows of men. That is what love looks like.

Saint Augustine

A few months ago, the internet went on a buzz over what some could consider the most mundane of things; a nail polish. But this was no ordinary nail polish, but one that would change color when exposed to some of the most common “Date Rape” drugs out there. Developed by four NCSU male students, this product has been the cause of some ridiculous controversy online, but more on that and why I explicitly stated that it were male students later.

Date Rape Drugs are nothing new, as it has been a concern of many women and men who frequent the club scene for years. The typical scenario is that the drug is slipped into the person’s drink. They won’t realize they have been drugs till it’s too late, if they realize it at all. And products to detect these drugs are nothing new, available in the form of cards and test strips. There are even workshops to teach women how to Drink Safe. So why the controversy? It wasn’t till I had an interesting conversation with a rather opinionated and pro-feminist woman that I realized a few things, as her comments were rather interesting.

First off, she told me how the fact that it was men who developed this, and not women, gave her hope in men today. The reasoning is quite simple. As men, they are probably not going to have to deal with either Date Rape Drugs, nor will they probably use Nail Polish. This product in no way helps them or protects them directly. Sure, they will benefit financially, but the reality is that this came about as a means to protect women from a very real and ever present threat.

She actually went even farther as to say that she would have been saddened if it had been women. That would have meant that probably this was a response to having dealt with this issue in a personal manner. That is why many of the current test strips and workshops came about, organized and developed by a woman who wants to keep other women from suffering the same situation.

And then she got to the controversy, and that’s when she went ballistic.

Several feminist websites are going all out against what is basically a drug testing tool. Their complaint is how this product does not help out women.

"We should be trying to stop rape, not just individually avoid it."

I could not have made this comment up if I tried. Apparently rape is not something that is individually suffered. Some have gone as far as to try and discredit the viability of the product; product that has already been tested and proven. Some have even gone as far as saying that this product promotes the use of Date Rape Drugs!

And that is when I went ballistic. I agree, with the logic behind some of the comments stated in these sites; women shouldn’t need products like these. But the reality is we live in a world where monsters (not willing to even consider them human) are willing to drug a person. And while we fight this problem and change the world, we cannot deny the reality of the world. This product provides an additional tool for women to avoid becoming victims of these monsters.

Several years ago, I taught an Anti-Rape Self Defense Class to women. The intention of this class was simply to provide them with the tools necessary that if the situation arose, they would be a little better prepared, and hopefully be able to escape. Does this mean that I am promoting rape? According to these feminist sites, Yes.

I am horrified how they site are using something that could help out women, and ridicule it, simply to drag hits to their sites. In this particular case, they seem more interested in creating controversy (creating movement in their site) than actually helping or recognizing the benefits of the product, as they haven’t done the same attacks to women developed workshops for safe drinking or existing products.

We need to view things for what they are, we need to view any step forward as a step forward. And we seriously need to stop the “if it doesn’t fix all our problems, let’s not even try it.” As a fellow blogger/writer Alex Yarde once said, “because you can't do everything doesn't absolve you from doing something."