The Art of Manliness - #261： Solitude, Friendship, & How NOT to Be an Excellent Sheep

00:00:00.000 Brett McKay here and welcome to another edition of the Art of Manliness podcast.

00:00:18.160 There's a growing feeling amongst Americans that we're suffering a crisis of leadership,

00:00:21.320 not only in our government, but our families and our businesses. People today just seem to

00:00:25.100 have less independence or agency and are less autonomous and more directed by others. What

00:00:29.980 behind this lackluster leadership and what's the solution? Well, I guess they argue the problem

00:00:34.160 has to do with the way we're bringing up what he calls excellent sheep. And the solution is equal

00:00:38.500 doses of deep solitude and deep friendship. His name is William Dresowitz, and he's the author of

00:00:43.060 several books and speeches, including a Jane Austen education, excellent sheep and solitude

00:00:47.300 and leadership. And today on the show, William and I discuss what most so-called leaders get wrong

00:00:51.780 about leadership and why learning to be alone with your thoughts helps forge better leaders.

00:00:55.600 We discuss the history of friendship and why friends are so hard to make as an adult and what

00:00:59.460 you can do to form deeper relationships. And then William and I also talk about how young

00:01:03.100 people can stop being excellent sheep and jumping through hoop after hoop that's put in front of

00:01:07.680 them in order to start living on their own terms. We cap our conversation with an exploration of why

00:01:12.060 men should give Jane Austen a chance and the life lessons we can get from her novels. This is an

00:01:17.300 eclectic but wisdom-filled podcast. You're definitely going to hear something you'll end up mentally

00:01:21.540 chewing on for days to come. After the show's over, check out the show notes at

00:01:25.180 aom.is slash sheep. William Dresowitz, welcome to the show.

00:01:34.500 William Dresowitz, thanks very much.

00:01:36.540 So I'm a big fan of your work. You've written about things or lectured about things that really

00:01:41.280 interest me. Leadership, friendship, solitude. You have a book about Jane Austen. We wrote a post

00:01:47.100 a while back ago about while every man should read Jane Austen and your book provided some useful

00:01:51.080 guidance here. Let's start off talking about leadership. You gave a lecture at West Point

00:01:57.120 and you've written in your book, Excellent Sheep, that while today's top universities and

00:02:05.460 organizations say they're here to create leaders, they're actually not doing so. What are we getting

00:02:12.880 wrong about leadership today at universities and in organizations across the country?

00:02:17.340 Well, let me answer that in a couple of ways because I think we're getting two things wrong.

00:02:24.840 First of all, our understanding of leadership is desperately wrong, but also more broadly,

00:02:29.980 something that I think is implicit in your question, quite frankly, which is that we focus

00:02:34.920 on the concept too much altogether. I think we need to ask ourselves, A, what does leadership

00:02:39.740 really mean? And B, why is it so important to us all of a sudden? Are there maybe other things

00:02:45.800 that we're missing? So in terms of universities especially, I think at this point, leadership,

00:02:52.300 the way they use it just means being successful. I think it's become a euphemism for success. And when

00:03:00.380 schools say that we produce leaders, what they're telling students and parents is we are going to make

00:03:07.860 sure that you're successful. We're going to make sure that you make a lot of money and have high status.

00:03:12.680 Broadly speaking, you're going to get to the top. You're going to be able to be a member of the

00:03:22.320 elite. So that means that leadership is being used in a way that's essentially without content,

00:03:30.720 right? It's simply about the position that you occupy. It has no reference, first of all,

00:03:36.340 to anyone else, right? It's not about leading other people. It's not about the good of other people.

00:03:42.680 And that becomes really clear when you look back on the way the word leadership was used at,

00:03:48.380 you know, Ivy League institutions, Harvard Jail, Princeton, back in the day, back when they were

00:03:53.300 in all kinds of bad ways, really segregated. You know, they were finishing schools for white male 0.76

00:03:59.900 Protestant aristocrats, basically, the Wasp aristocracy. The difference, you know, for all that was so wrong

00:04:07.580 with, say, Ivy's then, the difference is that when they talked about leadership, it actually meant

00:04:13.620 something. It meant you guys were born into privilege. You were born into the leadership of

00:04:19.340 the country. And that isn't about what you're going to get from it. It's not about wealth, status, power,

00:04:26.800 fame. It's about what you need to give. It's about what you need to give to the society that you are being

00:04:33.180 put in charge of. You need to make sure that you hand that society and its institutions on in better

00:04:38.600 shape than you found it. And that means not thinking about yourself first, but rather thinking

00:04:43.640 about other people first. It means duty. It means sacrifice. It means responsibility.

00:04:50.020 All these things that, you know, they would try to inculcate on the football field back when football

00:04:55.440 was about something other than television contracts. All that's been lost. So that's my first problem

00:05:01.480 with it, is that we understand leadership in a really hollowed out, self-centered way.

00:05:08.140 And my second problem is just mainly because of the way we understand it now. I think we put too

00:05:13.880 much emphasis on it, especially in colleges. There are a lot of other things to get done in college

00:05:21.240 that are more important than becoming a success, a leader so-called. And those other things, I think,

00:05:27.840 are increasingly being sacrificed, starting with actually getting a rigorous education

00:05:32.860 that teaches you to be a critical thinker. And I don't mean a critical thinker in the way people

00:05:37.680 do now, like, you know, you learn to be a good lawyer. I mean someone who can really examine their

00:05:43.500 own beliefs and the beliefs of the society around them and figure out whether they think they're good

00:05:50.220 beliefs and whether they need to be changed. I don't think schools should think of themselves as being

00:05:54.980 in the business of producing leaders. I think they should be in the business of producing,

00:05:59.000 well, what's the right word?

00:06:00.220 Thinkers?

00:06:01.540 Yeah. Yes, that is the right word. Yes, that's the right word. Yeah, thinkers. You know,

00:06:10.000 there's an alternative to being a leader or a follower, right? I mean, I think when we talk about

00:06:15.040 leaders, there's this, you know, either you're a leader or a follower. No, actually, you can just be

00:06:18.700 a thinker. You can be a citizen. You can be a dissenter. You can be someone who tries to stand

00:06:23.880 outside of that whole dynamic of the people on the top and the people on the bottom.

00:06:29.420 Okay, that's great. There's a lot to unpack there. Let's get back to that first point you

00:06:32.240 made about how our concept of leadership has been hollowed out. Because as you're describing

00:06:36.160 how leadership was portrayed, you know, a century ago, I was thinking of guys like Teddy Roosevelt,

00:06:41.960 right? You know, from an aristocratic family. And he had this like sense of duty that he owed

00:06:46.540 something to the country. So I mean, what changed? What changed in our culture where that idea of

00:06:53.540 leadership became hollowed out? Right. Well, I think a lot changed and probably too much to even

00:06:59.520 talk about it, including the discrediting of ideas like authority, the discrediting of ideas. I mean,

00:07:04.860 I think this is maybe particularly relevant for your podcast. I think many of the values that we

00:07:09.220 associate with adulthood, like sacrifice and responsibility and authority have been discredited.

00:07:15.580 You know, we sort of don't want to become adults. That's a bad thing to become. But, you know,

00:07:20.460 more specifically with the colleges, you know, who goes to college and what they do there and how

00:07:28.180 they're chosen. So basically, we've shifted from this, you know, very narrow, very exclusionary

00:07:32.600 aristocracy, where people who were born into it were, you know, pretty much automatically got to go 0.84

00:07:38.600 to an Ivy League college and were inculcated with this ethic of sacrifice. Doesn't mean they all lived up

00:07:44.920 to it, but they were inculcated with this ethic. And then about 50 years ago, I mean, there's a very

00:07:48.720 specific historical change that needed to happen. The schools opened themselves up, they started to,

00:07:53.760 you know, admit women, affirmative action, remove the quotas on Jews, and, and shifted the whole 0.56

00:08:00.880 emphasis of their admissions process to what we call meritocracy, right? SAT scores, grades, AP test

00:08:08.160 scores. There's, you know, a lot of that needed to happen was good that it happened, but it turned the

00:08:14.600 whole business into a much more individualistic, self-seeking, what can I get for myself kind of

00:08:23.460 endeavor. And it happened, I think, not coincidentally, at the same time that society in general was moving

00:08:29.600 from a kind of, you know, New Deal, Great Society sort of ethos of, of social solidarity and social good

00:08:38.560 to a sort of more Reagan-esque, neoliberal, every man for himself. And, and, and despite the fact that

00:08:46.180 the colleges tend to be hotbeds of liberalism and to see themselves as liberal institutions,

00:08:51.820 that part of it, you know, admitting students in a meritocratic way and training them to be

00:08:57.780 careerist professionals, which is basically what they do, but they call it leadership, right? That is

00:09:03.240 not a very liberal thing at all. Right, right. And I guess also you talk about in your, your book

00:09:09.100 that, you know, a consumerist mindset has also creeped in, right? And in our universities and

00:09:14.340 that's kind of taken over in leadership, like what's in it for me? Well, uh, absolutely. I mean,

00:09:20.020 it's, it's a consumerist mindset from the student's point of view, but also from the university's point

00:09:24.160 of view. Uh, they treat their students as consumers who, to whom they have to provide certain

00:09:30.620 things, you know, all kinds of things, including this notion that we're going to make you leaders

00:09:35.880 and what that's code for, uh, instead of an educational institution, which is about demanding

00:09:43.120 things and treating their students as students. A student is someone from whom things are expected,

00:09:48.140 not someone who is entitled to certain things. So that's, that's the consumerist mindset in academia

00:09:54.320 now. Yeah. So, I mean, these, uh, these students who are graduating from these elite schools,

00:09:59.440 I mean, they are becoming CEOs and leaders in government. I mean, if these folks really aren't

00:10:04.440 leaders, what are they? Yeah, right. Well, they're bureaucrats, uh, for one thing. Uh, I mean,

00:10:11.860 look, you, you, I think, I think the question you asked contains a very important answer, which is

00:10:17.420 that the leadership class we have, which I think has been very conspicuously failing, uh, at least

00:10:24.100 since the Iraq war, if not earlier is transparently a product of the schools that train our so-called

00:10:30.660 leaders and what they train them to be are self self-dealing, self-serving, self-enclosed,

00:10:35.920 uh, and quite frankly, very, very timid, very unimaginative. Uh, and we've seen, you know,

00:10:41.900 across the board, whether it's the banks or government or the military, uh, the media,

00:10:48.660 uh, I mean, this huge sort of, uh, herd of people who call them leads themselves leaders,

00:10:54.780 but in fact are all the things that I just said. They're, they're, they're leaders only

00:10:59.040 by virtue of the fact that they occupy certain positions. They don't display traits of leadership

00:11:03.320 for the most part. Yeah. They're like managers or technocrats.

00:11:08.180 Um, they're managers and technocrats, but, uh, I think, and that's bad enough, but I think of a

00:11:13.900 certain type, um, of a type that's, that's, listen, the best example for me, he's actually

00:11:18.700 British, but it's not really that different there. I mentioned him in the book, uh, Tony Hayward,

00:11:24.440 who everybody remembered 10 years ago, he was the CEO of BP during the Gulf oil spill.

00:11:30.640 So his company was perpetrating the greatest environmental disaster in history.

00:11:35.440 And he, he, he, he held this news conference where he said, you know,

00:11:39.020 I'm suffering too. I want my life back. Like I want my life back. That's, that was what he was

00:11:45.100 focused on because for him being CEO of BP was having a great lifestyle and any sense of responsibility

00:11:51.640 was just absent from that equation. Right. So, you know, at least if they were good managers,

00:11:59.840 it wouldn't be so bad, but they're managers who were thinking about themselves first, you know,

00:12:05.880 and we could, I mean, we could go down the whole list. So much of what came out when after wall

00:12:09.960 street collapsed was the way banks were defrauding their own clients, the way they were, the way they

00:12:16.620 had, you know, um, basically bought the political system to create regulations that benefited them,

00:12:22.560 but harm society at large, the way they were, if not defrauding, then at least endangering all the

00:12:28.480 people who lost mortgages, all the people who should never have had mortgages in the first place.

00:12:31.840 Right. I mean, this is the point. There's no sense of stewardship anymore. There's no sense of

00:12:35.180 larger responsibility. There's no sense of corporate citizenship.

00:12:38.900 Right. And you talk, I like how you talk about how Heart of Darkness, uh, provides some insight

00:12:44.860 into our current leadership crisis. You know, we often think of Heart of Darkness is this, uh,

00:12:49.480 book about colonialism and race and things like, which it is, but you are, you, you argue that it's 0.95

00:12:53.780 actually a great insight into bureaucracies and how they can just make us dumb and terrible. 0.96

00:12:59.200 Yeah. Right. I mean, we tend to, you know, we think about Kurtz, that sort of mysterious, 0.98

00:13:04.800 charismatic kind of monster who's sitting there at the middle of the spider web and,

00:13:08.760 you know, in Apocalypse Now, which is adopted from Heart of Darkness, that's the Marlon Brando

00:13:13.000 character. But most of what the, the protagonist narrator Marlo encounters along the way, we forget

00:13:19.800 about that because it's less exciting and it's actually designed to be less exciting. It's the

00:13:24.540 bureaucracy of this company. It's actually, he spells it with a capital C. It was like the, the,

00:13:29.220 the Belgian, you know, company that ran the Congo for the Belgian government. Right. And it's,

00:13:35.340 and we see the, um, this other kind of evil, he calls them flabby devils in the novel. It's not the

00:13:43.040 red-eyed devil of Kurtz who has this kind of charisma and life force. It's this kind of flabby

00:13:47.860 devil of bureaucracy that actually is much more powerful than Kurtz that destroys Kurtz. And that,

00:13:53.220 and it's all about keeping the system going for your own benefit without having any convictions

00:13:58.900 behind it at all. In fact, it's not even an awareness that there could be convictions,

00:14:05.280 right? So there's nothing, there's no ideal, there's no principle that you would make a choice,

00:14:11.100 uh, to uphold. Right. So there's, it's just your own career advancement. That's how, I mean,

00:14:19.740 this is so often the type that bureaucracies produce. And I mean, I've met people like this.

00:14:24.460 I think anyone who's worked in any kind of bureaucratic environment has met people like

00:14:28.040 this. They're the people who tend to rise in corporations because they never stick their

00:14:32.260 neck out. They know how to please their superiors. They never make a move that's going to endanger

00:14:37.960 their career. Yeah, this is this. And we call these people leaders because they get to the top.

00:14:44.080 Yeah. Sounds sort of like a Nietzschean last man. Yeah. I blink.

00:14:48.380 It is. Yes, it is a Nietzschean last man. Yeah. Yeah.

00:14:51.440 Well, so, okay. So instead of focusing, you just said that we shouldn't just focus on leadership.

00:14:56.220 We, in fact, we probably focus too much on it. Instead, we should focus on, uh, developing

00:15:00.880 thinkers or becoming thinkers because thinkers often end up being good leaders. Um, I love how you argue

00:15:07.860 that solitude is vital for developing this thinking ability. Um, so what do you mean by

00:15:15.140 solitude? Does it mean becoming a hermit, you know, in a cabin every now and then, or is it something

00:15:20.860 else? You know, it's funny. I mean, I, I, this was the, my talk at West Point, uh, in 2009, uh,

00:15:29.220 and the talk was called solitude and leadership. The truth is I did not set out to write a talk about

00:15:33.600 leadership or to be some kind of expert on leadership. Although this talk is now taught

00:15:38.700 in a lot of business schools and it's taught in the military. Um, I had written about solitude

00:15:44.480 and I was asked by some people at West Point to talk to the plebes the first years about solitude. 0.91

00:15:50.560 And I wanted to try to make a connection to them in a way that they would care about it. Cause I don't

00:15:55.080 really think that that's a very urgent, uh, concern for them. I realized that leadership,

00:16:00.860 and by the way, at West Point, it really does mean what it used to mean. It really is all about

00:16:04.360 sacrifice and duty. So leadership is a really important word there. So I wrote a talk called

00:16:09.860 solitude and leadership. And I, it forced me to think about the connection between these two things.

00:16:14.620 So if, if we agree, as I've already said, that being a leader, isn't about rising to the top per se.

00:16:21.000 It's about really being able to oppose the system that you're part of when necessary, right? To take a

00:16:26.780 courageous stand, to find a new direction, to risk your career by doing something that may be

00:16:32.020 risky. Um, how are you going to do that? How are you going to become someone who can think for

00:16:38.600 themselves is really what we're talking about. Think for themselves and act for themselves.

00:16:43.940 Uh, and my answer, I don't think it's the entire answer, but my answer is solitude. Uh, it doesn't have

00:16:50.840 to mean full-time solitude. It doesn't have to mean being a hermit. Um, but I think it does mean

00:16:55.860 having some degree of solitude in your life. And that can mean a lot of different things, but

00:17:01.220 fundamentally it means the ability to be alone with your thoughts. Um, you know, you can be solitary

00:17:06.980 in a room with other people. If you're sitting, if it's a library and you're sitting reading a book

00:17:11.780 or a cafe and you're sitting reading a book, uh, and you can also be alone in a room and not be

00:17:16.620 solitary at all. Like, because you're connected to your devices and you're toggling between five

00:17:22.720 different social media. I mean, I think that's the great threat to solitude now. So yeah, that's

00:17:27.900 my, that's my understanding of the connection between, uh, leadership and thinking and thinking

00:17:34.260 and solitude. Right. So I imagine our, our, the social media culture where you live out your life

00:17:39.480 and live out your thoughts and publicly that that's the antithesis of solitude. Like you probably

00:17:44.780 want to do less of that. Yeah. Listen, I mean, I, I don't want to come across as this Luddite who

00:17:50.480 thinks that everything that happens at a computer is bad. I don't. And I certainly use social media

00:17:55.420 myself, although I try to do it as sparingly as possible, but I'm not the first person to suggest

00:18:00.740 that there are some real losses that come with our total immersion in social media. And I think

00:18:07.320 actually what I'm saying about this is similar to what some psychologists, I think Sherry Turkle,

00:18:11.300 who's this MIT, I think she's a psychologist. She's been, she's a social scientist. She's been

00:18:15.760 writing about this a lot. Like what does social media do to our, to our sense of self and what

00:18:21.440 it seems to do, the more you're on it, the more it, um, you kind of export your sense of self to

00:18:27.920 the people in your social network. So who you are is all about how you reflect, how social media

00:18:33.820 reflect is, reflect yourself back to you. And, and you kind of, you know, you're kind of waiting to be

00:18:39.420 filled by other people's opinions of yourself or, you know, which are, which are also not even

00:18:45.040 really in response to yourself. They're in response to the image you create of yourself

00:18:48.900 on social media. I think we all understand, we all do it. We all understand what it's like to craft a

00:18:54.120 persona on social media. So you put this persona out there for the approval of the group. Um,

00:19:00.460 where does that leave you? Right. Right. Who's the real you?

00:19:04.540 Yeah. This reminds me a lot of, uh, the lonely crowd, that book that was written in the 50s,

00:19:10.120 like other, the other directed people, like other directed. Absolutely. Right. Yeah. We,

00:19:15.280 ourselves are correct are created by other people. We look, we kind of put out feelers to others to

00:19:19.880 figure out what we are. Um, yes. And it's important to remember that it's not like there's this real

00:19:26.240 self that's being concealed by these persona. The real self is something that needs to be built,

00:19:31.540 that needs to be developed. We're not just born with one. And this is also why it's an especial

00:19:37.040 concern for adolescents, you know, who are living their life, you know, that, that time of life is

00:19:41.740 the time that you're really supposed to build the foundation of a self. Uh, and if you're,

00:19:46.380 and if it's all about like what your friends think of you, that's going to be a real problem

00:19:51.280 because that self is, it's not, it's not that it's going to be concealed. It's just not going to be

00:19:54.760 there in the first place. Yeah. All right. So spend less time on social media. Um, and you also

00:20:00.800 talk about in that lecture at West Point, like reading books is another, you know, act of solitude

00:20:06.360 to take part in. Yeah. Again, I mean, I know that makes me sound like, like an old fart probably. 0.92

00:20:13.200 Um, and I don't want to fetishize books in particular. I also don't think they have to

00:20:17.480 be on paper. I mean, they can be on a screen. Um, I, but listen, first of all, reading in general

00:20:22.720 is an inward experience. If you're actually reading, you're not, you know, you're, you're in more,

00:20:28.300 you're in intimate contact with one other person, the person who wrote whatever it is you're reading

00:20:32.580 and you're not, your attention isn't being scattered to a bunch, to a million different

00:20:36.920 things. Um, unless you're kind of reading the way people read online, where you are just jumping

00:20:41.720 around, you know, minute by minute. So reading in general, and that could mean, you know, it could

00:20:48.960 mean an essay. It could mean a story. The thing about books, the thing about longer sort of reading

00:20:54.340 encounters is just how immersive and extensive they are. So it's not just a few minutes, but it's

00:20:59.940 a real long, really communion with, with one other person who's put themselves very intensely

00:21:08.460 in this act of writing. I mean, I think anyone who gets any pleasure out of reading understands that

00:21:15.180 it's a, it's a unique experience. It's a unique, it's a unique kind of, uh, inner communion that,

00:21:23.160 uh, you somehow make contact with yourself by making contact with someone else. And it happens

00:21:29.140 in a way that, that it's, it's almost, uh, it's almost, um, uh, impossible to do any other way.

00:21:35.900 And that's why I say, you know, reading books, um, can be not for everybody, but can be. And if you

00:21:45.920 have a taste for it, you know, you should really try, it's hard, but try to make room in your life

00:21:50.900 because it's so deeply rewarding. Right. And I guess you also need to fight the urges, you know,

00:21:56.620 when you're done with reading that book to get online and like immediately share your opinion

00:22:00.560 on it. Right. Your hot take, you know? Yeah. I mean, to be honest, that doesn't,

00:22:06.940 if you've actually finished a book, that part wouldn't even bother me that much. I mean,

00:22:11.140 I think it's, I think it's becoming rarer and rare for people to actually finish books and,

00:22:15.380 and specifically, you know, really challenging books that, that, that demand a lot of you

00:22:20.280 mentally, not just, you know, like a business book. Um, if you want to go and share your take,

00:22:25.280 especially if it's a thoughtful one and it requires like some serious writing, then that's fine.

00:22:30.560 All right. Um, so you also argue in that lecture you gave at West Point, um, about the importance

00:22:37.180 of close friendships, uh, in developing leader thinkers. Uh, what is it about a close friendship

00:22:45.460 that can help people become better thinkers, better leaders? Right. So this is really just the

00:22:51.040 same, the same thought as the thought about reading, right? They're different, that there are

00:22:55.800 different ways I think to have this kind of productive solitude. So again, let me say that

00:23:01.100 I'm defining solitude, not as being physically alone, but as being alone with your thoughts. So

00:23:06.420 first of all, you're, you know, you're socially alone. You're not in social media contact,

00:23:10.640 but you were actually with your thoughts, right? You are sort of in your head in a good way,

00:23:15.060 uh, that allows you to kind of figure out who you are, what's important to you,

00:23:20.300 what you think you want to be doing tomorrow or for the rest of your life. I think reading does

00:23:26.160 that. I think silent contemplation, contemplation is a fancy word, but just like thinking your

00:23:30.600 thoughts, maybe while you're doing some kind of work, um, uh, you know, you're building a table,

00:23:37.080 but you're thinking your thoughts, um, and friendship. I think those kinds of, the, the kind

00:23:42.800 of, uh, intimate friendships that enable you to have long undirected conversations, um,

00:23:53.040 that I think social media and the pace of our life in general are making harder and harder,

00:23:57.620 but what they do, I mean, first of all, they're just great to have anyway. I mean,

00:24:02.140 I think one of the things that makes people happy is having deep connections with other people.

00:24:06.680 So I don't think they need to be justified in any other term, but one of the things they do

00:24:10.340 is to help you, you know, kind of discover and articulate what's going on inside you by

00:24:18.380 expressing it to someone else. I mean, I think one of the things that are, that a true friend

00:24:23.240 does is to help you feel comfortable enough to kind of be yourself in precisely the way

00:24:29.780 that social life, whether it's social media or social life as it existed before social media

00:24:34.800 makes it often so hard to do because you feel like you need to wear that mask. You need to

00:24:38.880 project that persona and with a real friendship or a real, I would, you know, partnership, romantic

00:24:43.700 partnership, um, you can drop the mask. Right. I know, I know that's true in my own experience. Um,

00:24:52.080 I, I, I definitely, uh, kind of hold back when I'm interacting in social media, but when I'm in

00:24:57.340 that one-on-one with someone I trust, it allows me to play with ideas and not be afraid of

00:25:03.180 repercussions. Right. Someone's seen what I tweeted and like saying, Oh my gosh, look what he,

00:25:08.240 he thinks like, well, no, I'm just, I'm experimenting with this idea. Let me figure it out.

00:25:13.260 Right. Right. That's a great point. And I think, you know, one of the sad things about social media

00:25:18.980 is that it's evolved in this direction of such, you know, sort of immediate judgment and censure and

00:25:23.720 hostility that, you know, I can understand that people are sort of more and more, I mean,

00:25:29.380 nevermind even sharing like a personal thing, just like putting anything out there. You kind of feel

00:25:34.240 like you need to have your armor up. So, yeah. So, but, but listen, I mean, those kinds of intimate

00:25:40.700 friendships that I think rely, you know, require long stretches of uninterrupted time, just like real

00:25:46.340 reading does just like real solitude does harder and harder. Yeah. Well, I mean, let's dig into this

00:25:52.680 idea of friendship because you also have an ebook, a short little ebook called the death of

00:25:56.700 friendship. And you argue that us moderns really don't know what friendship means anymore. At least

00:26:03.240 we don't, we don't understand, you know, what friendship means the way our ancestors might have

00:26:07.560 understood it. So how has the notion of friendship changed from, you know, say the days of ancient

00:26:13.840 Greece until now? Right. Well, this is, I mean, this is a little more complicated. I don't,

00:26:18.680 I don't want to, it wasn't my intention in that essay to, to idealize sort of ancient friendship

00:26:25.880 per se. I actually think that in many ways, the modern age, if we mean the last couple of hundred

00:26:30.180 years have been a golden age of friendship, but briefly back in the day, this is very counterintuitive.

00:26:36.220 It surprised me when I discovered it. Friendship was rare because societies were more highly structured

00:26:42.780 and you owed allegiance and blah, blah, blah. The, the notion of, of one true friend who is more

00:26:48.760 important to you than the allegiances that you were supposed to have was actually a big deal. And,

00:26:54.080 you know, there are Greek myths about it and, you know, like Achilles and Patroclus or David and

00:26:58.980 Pythias. And, um, you know, you had, you had people in your world who we might today call friends, but

00:27:06.280 friendship was, was understood to be this really special thing. And that really, that persisted

00:27:11.720 pretty much up until modernity. I mean, if you know Hamlet, there's Hamlet and Horatio. Horatio is

00:27:17.720 kind of this classical friend in the sense of the, you know, the classical world, as opposed to

00:27:23.160 Rosencrantz and Guildenstern who are like Hamlet's drinking buddies, but totally stab them in the back

00:27:27.340 because they're just maneuvering for their own benefit within the world with the Danish court. So that's

00:27:32.420 like, that's the pre-modern friendship, right? The rare friendship that gets celebrated if you

00:27:37.060 can manage to have it at all. The thing that happens in modernity is that all those traditional

00:27:41.200 structures, you know, feudal hierarchies and even family structures start to break down and all of

00:27:47.020 a sudden friendship becomes, it, it changes in two ways. You, you have lots and lots and lots of

00:27:52.100 friends because that's the world you live in. We're just this world of atomized adults, right? Who are

00:27:56.780 sort of broken apart from their family. You haven't gotten married yet and you travel in this world of

00:28:01.380 friends. But by the same token, those friendships are rarely as intense as the kind of singular

00:28:09.540 classical friendships. I think there've been times in modernity where friendship has actually been

00:28:15.600 really highly developed and we can look at all kinds of examples in, among writers or artists or,

00:28:22.120 or, you know, or they're in fiction. Uh, I can't, I think I grew up in a world like that. You know,

00:28:29.480 friendship, I had some really intense friendships when I was young and I, and I'm sure that young

00:28:33.780 people still do. What I'm saying is that not in modernity as a whole, but in the age of social

00:28:40.000 media, that might be getting harder and harder for all the reasons we've already said, because

00:28:45.920 you don't have time because you're afraid to be intimate. Um, because I think, uh, people are so

00:28:53.760 focused on just kind of building their career. I mean, people talk about this as among college

00:29:01.680 students, college students have been interviewed about this. They, they don't have time for

00:29:05.020 friendships. They don't have time for, you know, passionate romantic involvements. Everything

00:29:09.700 is conducted in a spirit of real sort of, uh, pragmatism. Right. So that's, that's what I'm

00:29:16.600 concerned about. Yeah. It reminds me of, uh, that line in fight club, uh, when, uh, the

00:29:23.280 protagonist is with Tyler Durden and he says, you know, you're my single serving friend,

00:29:27.360 uh, on the airplane. Right. I feel like that's how, what Facebook does. Like social media sort

00:29:32.680 of encourages like sort of this utilitarian view of people. It's like, it allows you to easily find

00:29:37.000 people who are just like you have the same interests as you. Um, but that's about as far as it goes.

00:29:42.640 Yeah. I mean, I know that we can use social media to help maintain friendships that are

00:29:48.980 formed in a more genuine way, but I mean, friendships that exist only on social media. I

00:29:53.260 mean, what, what do they consist of? Really not very much. And I think, you know, the fact

00:29:59.520 that, uh, Facebook uses the word friends is, is telling. Uh, I think we want to believe that

00:30:07.840 we have friends, that these people are our friends, but they're not really our friends.

00:30:12.640 Uh, I mean, LinkedIn is more upfront about it. They're contacts. Uh, but of course LinkedIn

00:30:18.020 is, is, uh, openly a business site. It's about networking, but Facebook provide, you know,

00:30:24.240 it offers us networking in the guise of friendship. And I think it ultimately can erode our idea

00:30:28.980 of what friendship is.

00:30:29.980 Yeah. I mean, I think it's interesting, like my closest friends that I've had in my life,

00:30:34.980 they've, I don't, I don't, if it were for the, like, they're, they're my friends. Cause

00:30:39.400 like I, they were like, they were the ones that were nearest by it. Like I was constrained

00:30:42.840 geographically. And I think if like, if I was honest, like if it was trying to meet this

00:30:46.940 person online, I probably would never have interacted with them online because they're

00:30:51.400 just completely different from me. But for some reason, because they were there physically,

00:30:55.840 they're the only ones there. I was able to develop this awesome, intense relationship

00:31:00.580 with them where I was able to open up to them. I think that's kind of, it's kind of weird.

00:31:05.200 Yeah. I think that's a great point. Uh, these sort of affinity group sortings that happen in

00:31:10.580 social media and really actually don't necessarily reflect who were, who we could be close to. But

00:31:14.960 I would also say something else about what you're saying that these friendships that you built

00:31:18.520 were, uh, first of all, physical proximity. So it's not just words on a screen or maybe images

00:31:25.040 on a screen, but that, I mean, actual physical presence is very powerful. This by the way,

00:31:29.020 is one of the things that's wrong with online education, physical presence. But I imagine

00:31:34.600 that these people you're talking about are people you had experiences with, you did things with

00:31:39.540 them. And I mean, experience is, I mean, it's the ultimate that that's what really what bonds people

00:31:45.620 together is when they have experiences. It's not about exchanging words necessarily, or information

00:31:51.720 or, you know, preferences. These are the songs that I like. It's about having common experiences.

00:31:57.240 And, you know, to the extent that our, uh, social life is mediated, uh, by the screen,

00:32:05.180 we're not having those common experiences because they can only really happen in person.

00:32:10.800 Yeah. So Bill, do you have any advice? I mean, for guys who are listening, like, man, I really want

00:32:16.060 some friends, but I'm busy, you know, everyone else is busy. Uh, I mean, like having friends in

00:32:22.540 adulthood, I found is like one of the hardest things to do. I mean, you're, you're kind of further

00:32:26.060 along than I am, uh, in life. Any advice on making good friends while an adult?

00:32:33.000 Well, I'll tell you, uh, this is, this is kind of the opposite of advice. The truth is that it does

00:32:38.180 get harder and harder as you get older for a lot of reasons. I mean, busyness is only part of it.

00:32:43.280 Uh, I mean, uh, you know, I mean, this is, I've been aware, I'm 52 and I've started, I noticed this

00:32:50.320 start, you know, probably for the last 20 years and the people are, I mean, everybody, my age says this.

00:32:54.420 Um, it, it, it gets harder and, and, um, I think you're, you know, your sort of personality is less

00:33:01.800 kind of malleable and I mean, so much of those friendships that when you're young are actually

00:33:05.840 because you're being formed together and now you're already formed. But I would say that with

00:33:10.660 friendship, it's the same as with solitude to the extent that it's possible. It's about making hard

00:33:17.760 choices and, and asking yourself what your priorities are and then really doing the hard

00:33:24.220 work. And I know from my own experience, it's really hard to change your habits, to change

00:33:27.680 your patterns, to say to yourself, I wish I had more time for X and now I'm really going to try

00:33:33.200 to make time. And that's going to involve spending less time with Y and that Y could mean things that

00:33:41.100 are hard to give up, including maybe some career advancement possibilities. But I think probably

00:33:47.980 the way things are today, a lot of that junk time is being taken up by media, by social media.

00:33:55.700 And if you can break that addiction or at least manage that addiction better,

00:34:02.860 again, I found in my own life, it frees up not only time, it kind of frees up psychic energy.

00:34:08.240 I personally find that stuff so draining. And when I'm able to shut it out, um, I just have,

00:34:15.900 I have more of myself for everything, whether that's solitude or friendship. Now, of course,

00:34:22.340 with friendship, you got to find someone else who feels the same way or who's willing to

00:34:25.680 you know, prioritize that kind of thing. And that, and that can be difficult, but that's probably

00:34:31.780 the kind of person you want to be friends with anyway. Right. Um, so we've got a lot of young

00:34:36.720 listeners, right? Men who are in college or just out of college. And I, I love excellent sheep. And

00:34:41.360 if you're in college, read this book. If you have kids in college, get the book. It's fantastic.

00:34:46.180 Um, you argue that today's generation consists of excellent hoop jumpers, right? Like they're super

00:34:51.960 accomplished. Um, but they're accomplished only when there's a set program in place for them to

00:34:57.980 follow. Um, I've known, I've noticed that in my own life, right? Like I was always as a college

00:35:03.220 student, like, Hey, what's the next ring I got to jump through? What's the next thing I got to do?

00:35:06.600 Okay. Graduated college, uh, LSAT time now LSAT. Okay. I need to get a law review. You know,

00:35:12.820 I just had these hoops. I was always trying to jump through. Um, and it's exhausting. And I don't think

00:35:19.120 there's a certain point where you're like, boy, why, why am I doing this again? And for our

00:35:24.040 listeners who are in college, how, why do you think they, what's your case for them getting off

00:35:28.320 the hoop jumping track and how should they do that? Right. So let me say, first of all, again,

00:35:34.100 to try as much as possible to not sound like an old fart. Um, this is not just kids today.

00:35:40.720 The system that we're talking, we were talking about it before. It's this meritocratic SAT school,

00:35:45.660 you know, GPA achievement system that really started in the sixties. And the only thing that's,

00:35:52.580 so I went through too, in the seventies, eighties, um, the only difference is that it keeps

00:35:58.200 accelerating all the time. It's like, it's an arms race, right? It used to be that, you know,

00:36:02.940 when I was in high school, the kids who got into Ivy league schools took like three AP courses in high

00:36:07.640 school. And now it might be a dozen, right? And it's just, so the competition ratchets up the numbers

00:36:13.140 and the numbers ratchet up the pressure. And before you know it, you have no time for anything

00:36:17.920 but hoop jumping, including friendship, romantic involvements, sleep, play, downtime, nothing.

00:36:25.260 Right. So here's what I would say, because there are rewards for hoop jumping. You get to be,

00:36:32.460 you get to be a leader, right? A quote unquote leader. You get to make it to the top. You get to

00:36:36.780 be one of the jerks who are ruining the country. Um, I think that there are much more valuable things 1.00

00:36:42.460 that you can do with your life. But the only argument I would make to people is ask yourself

00:36:48.660 whether this is working for you, ask yourself whether you're happy, whether it's when, whether

00:36:54.340 you're feeling nurtured and whether you want to spend the rest and the rest of your life doing this.

00:37:01.360 I mean, I, I can understand if you have a legitimate goal, you know, I want to become a lawyer because I

00:37:06.580 believe in environmental protection. And I want to be that, you know, a lawyer who, you know,

00:37:10.540 who defends the environment. And in order to do that, I need to have good grades and I need to

00:37:14.360 have good, that's all fine. You know, if you're doing, if you're working hard for the sake of a

00:37:19.340 goal, that's meaningful to you, that's fine. But if like so many people, including me, when I was in

00:37:25.200 college, you're just doing it because that's what you're supposed to do. You're trying to get to the

00:37:31.420 top, but it doesn't even matter to you what it's the top of. It just has to be the top because

00:37:35.920 that's the only way you can have any kind of self-esteem. Then you're probably miserable. 0.94

00:37:41.520 And there are all kinds of statistics and books by adolescent psychologists that talk about just

00:37:47.560 how miserable high achieving students are these days. So that's my, that's my argument to people.

00:37:55.400 It's not any kind of grand philosophical argument about, you know, what human life should be about.

00:38:00.040 Although we could talk about that too. It's just, are you happy? And if you're not,

00:38:06.920 you need to find the strength. You need to find the courage to defy all of the forces and voices

00:38:13.480 and incentives that are, that have turned you into a hoop jumper. It may involve defying your parents.

00:38:20.040 It may involve defying your peers and saying, you know what, I'm going to major in anthropology because

00:38:24.920 I love it and I'm fascinated by it. And you guys can major in economics and go to wall street after

00:38:31.400 you graduate, you know, good luck to you, but this is not working for me. I'm not going to do it.

00:38:37.000 Yeah. And talking about this, you know, going in with an ideal, uh, once you get in the system,

00:38:41.360 it's hard to hold onto those ideals. I know I experienced that. I was like, I'm going to be

00:38:45.420 an environmental lawyer when I, as my goal was in law school. Now I do this full time, but I remember how

00:38:50.380 easy it was to be like, wow, you know, I want to work at that nice law firm downtown that pays six

00:38:56.980 and I want to be on law. I want to do these things. Um, I mean, how do you hold true to that

00:39:02.320 ideal you have without, while you're still in the system and not let the system corrupt your ideals?

00:39:07.500 Well, listen, I mean, first of all, it's hard. It's definitely hard. And we, it doesn't do any

00:39:11.900 good to pretend that it's not hard, but you know, this is the thing, right? Is, and again,

00:39:17.600 there've been studies of this, the people who work on wall street are unbelievably miserable.

00:39:21.980 I mean, as measured by, you know, alcoholism, suicide, depression, whatever life expectancy,

00:39:27.540 uh, lawyers also miserable. Um, so the rewards look really great, but if you actually just

00:39:35.420 investigate whether the people are happy, they're not happy. So again, what I would say is if you,

00:39:40.920 if you do have ideals, if you do have things that you believe in work that you believe in,

00:39:44.220 and you're managing to do it to some extent, um, ask yourself how that's going. Right. And, and,

00:39:50.800 and I think what you'll find is that it's incredibly rewarding, right? The intrinsic rewards

00:39:55.720 of pursuing some of, of, uh, studying something that's interesting to you, doing work that's

00:40:03.500 meaningful to you, um, are, are, I think what's going to help you the most resist the lure of all

00:40:11.340 those false rewards, the shiny trinkets, because you know, it's just, I mean, there's, this is what

00:40:19.140 the people who've studied happiness will say that there are two things that really make people happy.

00:40:24.300 One we mentioned before, which is feeling connected to other people. And the other one is purposeful

00:40:29.220 work. And for my own life, cause I've also had the opportunity to pursue rewards that I,

00:40:37.040 that I decided not to pursue. Um, and, and I was able to do that because I was just so into the

00:40:43.980 other thing that it just seemed like that, that's what got me across the hump. It's like, why would

00:40:49.720 I stop doing this thing that, that feels so great? Right. Yeah, that makes perfect sense. And I love

00:40:55.440 your answer. Cause I think it, it segues nicely to my next question. Cause there's a gal from the 18th 1.00

00:41:00.420 century in England who wrote a lot about, you know, figuring out what really makes you happy

00:41:05.860 in life. Uh, and her name's Jane Austen. Uh, you wrote a, you wrote a book called the Jane Austen

00:41:11.740 education. Um, you're, you're a man, obviously we've been talking, but you've written a, you've

00:41:18.040 written how you learned a lot from Jane Austen, who we often think of as a sort of chick lit. Right.

00:41:22.500 Right. But why do you think a man should give Jane Austen a chance? What can she teach us about

00:41:28.360 living a good life? Yeah, that's a great question. I think she can teach us a lot and I want to talk

00:41:35.460 about that, but I think the first thing, at least for me, right. The, the big, cause I was just as

00:41:39.680 resistant to her as any other guy. I thought she was chick lit. I thought, you know, it's going to

00:41:43.340 be really boring. And I, I read one of her novels in a grad class that I took for, cause of everything

00:41:49.980 else that was on the syllabus. And so the first thing I think to learn is that you can learn something

00:41:57.100 from a female writer who writes about female characters. Like this was a huge breakthrough for me

00:42:03.600 that, I mean, I'd always been drawn naturally to novels that had male protagonists, um, who I could

00:42:10.900 identify with and just making that breakthrough of being able to identify with the female protagonist,

00:42:16.820 despite the fact that she's female, because listen, I mean, what Jane Austen is writing about,

00:42:22.420 uh, in, in these books that are all about young women finding husbands, she's writing about

00:42:30.200 things that we all go through. She's writing about, um, growing up. She's writing about what love

00:42:38.300 really means. She's writing about, um, how being a good person is more important than being a fun

00:42:44.360 person, which is kind of a hard lesson to accept. So, so that's what I mean. So first of all, just,

00:42:52.720 just to be open to that possibility, um, I think is, you know, I think is really important,

00:42:58.180 but, but I mean, there are other things. I mean, I don't want to, um, I don't want to turn masculinity

00:43:03.400 into a stereotype, but certainly let's just say for myself, I was one of these young men who was

00:43:08.660 very certain of himself. I did a lot of mansplaining. Um, uh, I was very arrogant. Um,

00:43:17.440 and so the first novel of hers that I read, it's not the first one she wrote was, was Emma,

00:43:22.660 which is about a character. Even Emma is a young woman, but actually she's a lot like that. And,

00:43:27.880 and there are critics who've said that Emma in many ways is like, is like a man, um, in terms of

00:43:33.020 her, she's, she's independently wealthy. She has freedom of action. She's very, uh, respected in 0.77

00:43:38.660 her community. She does what she wants. Uh, and she's exactly like that kind of person who thinks

00:43:44.100 she knows everything better, thinks she knows what's better for the people around her than they do. 0.99

00:43:48.280 And she makes a fool of herself. And, and she learns to, she learns her own limitations. And 0.97

00:43:56.900 she also learns not to have contempt for the people that she's looked down upon because they're

00:44:01.420 beneath her socially. So that, I mean, that was my first lesson from her. And I, and, and, and I

00:44:06.960 suddenly started to actually pay attention to the people around me and actually listen to what they

00:44:12.080 were saying. And that's also probably when I started to become a good friend because I was able to

00:44:17.020 actually take in what people were saying and have empathy for what they were going through instead

00:44:21.780 of just thinking about myself all the time. Yeah. So we can start with that. Yeah. No, I love that.

00:44:29.080 Um, if there's a novel that you recommend that guys start off with is it, which one would it be?

00:44:34.980 Would it be Emma? Well, well, I mean, Emma is a great novel. Um, in some ways it can be more

00:44:40.200 challenging. You know, one of the criticisms of Austin in her own day, as well as ours for the people

00:44:45.440 who don't like her is that nothing happens in her books because they're just about people sitting

00:44:49.560 around, like, you know, having tea parties. Um, it's not true because a lot happens socially, but

00:44:56.640 it can be a challenge. And in Emma, she almost sort of, it's almost like a dare. It's almost like

00:45:02.100 she's saying, I'm really going to write a book where you think nothing happens. Um, so that, so

00:45:08.100 Emma can be especially challenging. Listen, Pride and Prejudice

00:45:11.120 is this incredibly delightful book. It's a reason, there's a reason why it's her most famous

00:45:16.080 book, why it's the one that keeps getting filmed more than any of the others. It's perfectly

00:45:21.720 constructed. The language is incredibly witty. It's, it's a, it's a terrific love. I mean,

00:45:26.440 it sort of gives you that romance story that you want, but it gives it to you in an intelligent

00:45:30.540 way. That's all that also challenges you. So you can't do better than start with Pride and

00:45:36.020 Prejudice.

00:45:36.320 And what insights do you think a guy should be on the lookout for while he's reading Pride and

00:45:41.080 Prejudice?

00:45:42.480 Well, I mean, Pride and Prejudice is really about, um, uh, the difference between what you think,

00:45:49.720 you know, and what is actually true. I mean, what it's really about is, so that heroine,

00:45:56.280 uh, she's not exactly like Emma, Elizabeth Bennett. She's a lot more likable than Emma, 0.56

00:46:01.220 but she's, she's very smart. She's very sharp. And as a result, she kind of overvalues her own 0.98

00:46:07.440 perceptions. You know, um, she really thinks she can read people perfectly and she makes

00:46:14.620 a lot of mistakes that cause her a lot of pain ultimately. And, and that to me is what the book

00:46:21.880 is really about. And it's really, I mean, yes, there's this, you know, marriage at the end,

00:46:25.800 but I, I mean, I think even more than love and marriage, Austin's books in general and

00:46:30.340 Pride and Prejudice in particular are about growing up and, and not just when you're 20.

00:46:35.980 I mean, they're about things that apply throughout youth and, and, and even in, in well into adulthood.

00:46:42.020 And I think one of the fundamental lessons that you need to learn in order to really grow up

00:46:47.580 is how fallible you are, how fallible your perceptions and your feelings are. I'll tell you,

00:46:54.580 there's something that I think Pride and Prejudice teaches that actually women I've talked to have 0.98

00:46:59.980 a lot of trouble when I articulate this, but I think it applies to men too, because there's this

00:47:04.740 feeling, I think feminism has had a lot to do with promoting this, this idea that our feelings are 0.98

00:47:10.020 always valid. Their, their feelings are automatically valid. It can never be challenged. They have this

00:47:15.940 kind of metaphysical status. And Austin says, you know, that's bullshit. Um, our feelings are always 1.00

00:47:22.480 feelings about things, about situations. And if we misjudge the situation, if we get it wrong,

00:47:30.020 that our feelings are wrong and we need to acknowledge that. And I think that that's, um,

00:47:35.100 that's been a hugely valuable lesson for me in the context of relationships because it enables me to,

00:47:40.820 it's enabled me to let go of, uh, anger of resentment of hurt feelings, you know? Um, so yeah, I, I think,

00:47:50.900 yeah, Pride and Prejudice.

00:47:53.780 I like, I love that. Well, Bill, this has been a great conversation. Where can people go to learn

00:47:58.500 more about your work?

00:47:59.480 I have a website, BillDerezowicz.com and I have, you know, information about my books and links to

00:48:06.500 some of my articles and that's, that would be a good place to start.

00:48:09.940 Fantastic. Well, Bill Derezowicz, thank you so much for your time. It's been a pleasure.

00:48:13.240 My pleasure. Thank you.

00:48:14.700 My guest today was William Derezowicz. He's the author of the book, Excellent Sheep,

00:48:17.860 Jane Austen Education and Solitude and Leadership. All those available on amazon.com. You can find out

00:48:22.980 more information about his work at BillDerezowicz.com. And also check out our show notes at

00:48:27.540 aom.is slash sheep for links to resources where you can delve deeper into this topic.

00:48:44.440 Well, that wraps up another edition of the Art of Manliness podcast. For more manly tips and advice,

00:48:48.740 make sure to check out the Art of Manliness website at artofmanliness.com. Our show is edited

00:48:52.440 by Creative Audio Lab here in Tulsa, Oklahoma. If you have any audio editing needs or audio production

00:48:56.200 needs, check them out at creativeaudiolab.com. As always, we appreciate your reviews on iTunes

00:49:00.820 or Stitcher. It helps that a lot. Thank you so much for your community support. And until next time,

00:49:04.080 this is Brett McKay telling you to stay manly.

The Art of Manliness - December 15, 2016

#261： Solitude, Friendship, & How NOT to Be an Excellent Sheep

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