The Art of Manliness - The Preparation — An Adventure-Driven, Skill-Building Alternative to College for Young Men

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

00:00:11.420 For generations, the path to adulthood was straightforward.

00:00:14.600 Go to college, get a job, build a life.

00:00:17.660 But many young men are beginning to question the college component of that path.

00:00:21.400 Tuition keeps rising, AI has made the professional landscape more uncertain,

00:00:24.720 and there's just a sense that after four years at college,

00:00:27.280 guys graduate feeling like they haven't been very challenged, haven't much changed,

00:00:31.460 and haven't gained a lot of real confidence, competence, and concrete know-how.

00:00:35.400 My guest today, Matt Smith, has created an alternative to college,

00:00:38.500 a four-year, 16-cycle curriculum designed to shape participants into renaissance men,

00:00:43.320 skilled, self-reliant, and grounded in character.

00:00:46.520 Matt co-authored the preparation with his son, Maxim, who is currently working his way through the program.

00:00:50.940 In the first half of our conversation, Matt shares what kick-started this idea

00:00:54.280 and what's lacking in the education model for young men today.

00:00:57.280 We then turn to the nuts and bolts of the preparation,

00:00:59.620 and Matt walks us through several of the program's hands-on cycles,

00:01:02.680 including earning EMT certification, building a house, and training as a fighter in Thailand,

00:01:07.460 and how gaining these real-world skills prepares a young man for whatever is next in life.

00:01:11.660 After the show's over, check out our show notes at awim.is slash thepreparation.

00:01:15.140 All right, Matt Smith, welcome to the show.

00:01:30.000 Thank you very much.

00:01:31.120 Real pleasure to be here.

00:01:32.240 So you co-authored a book with your son, Maxim, and then also Doug Casey.

00:01:36.740 It's called The Preparation, in which you lay out a curriculum as an alternative to college for young men.

00:01:44.580 And it's kind of an alternative to college as a rite of passage for young men.

00:01:49.860 What was the impetus behind the development of The Preparation?

00:01:53.340 Well, my other co-author, Doug Casey, was, he actually has been trying to get me to write this book for 12 years with him.

00:02:01.680 But he called it Renaissance Man, is what he called it.

00:02:05.260 He's been trying over various times to get me to do it with him, and it never made sense.

00:02:08.700 Because he's written a number of books, and he always said,

00:02:11.100 they're total brain damage to write.

00:02:12.760 You don't make any money doing them.

00:02:14.260 And then he's trying to sell me at the same time to write this book with him, you know?

00:02:17.540 But when my son turned 17, or my son was in his 17th year, so he's almost turning 18,

00:02:24.800 and I could see in him this consternation, this anxiety about the future.

00:02:31.100 And I'm a college dropout, and I've been an entrepreneur my whole life.

00:02:34.700 So he didn't grow up in an environment where I was propagandizing him one way or the other,

00:02:39.220 like, you should go to college or you should not go to college.

00:02:41.760 But he, I guess, always assumed that he wouldn't, because I didn't.

00:02:44.580 And I think that I even made the path feel more uncertain to him than normal.

00:02:47.840 But I think all 17-year-olds probably feel this way.

00:02:50.540 So I could see this anxiety in him, and I had a lot of worry.

00:02:52.580 And also, this is all in the COVID era, too.

00:02:54.660 So I'm thinking about what would make sense.

00:02:58.440 And then I thought back about the book that Doug had talked to me about many years before,

00:03:02.200 and over and over again about writing with him.

00:03:04.660 And I said, maybe we can make something like that work.

00:03:06.880 But we didn't, I didn't really think about writing a book at that stage.

00:03:08.820 I was really just thinking of, see if we can turn this into a program that he could follow.

00:03:12.760 So you had to help your son.

00:03:14.900 That was the only motivation.

00:03:16.220 There's no way I would have done it without that.

00:03:17.780 Yeah.

00:03:18.720 And you talk about in the book that college these days,

00:03:23.120 there was a time when college was a great way to segue into adult life.

00:03:30.740 You learned knowledge that you could apply to a career that would last your entire life.

00:03:36.880 Why do you think that model doesn't work anymore for so many young men?

00:03:40.460 Well, there's a whole bunch of reasons.

00:03:43.240 But, I mean, you could argue on one side of it, economy is changing dramatically.

00:03:48.640 So, you know, with AI and automation, we've already started to see a lot of job cuts around that.

00:03:54.600 We've seen people that have specialized in the fields they were told to go into,

00:03:58.020 like computer science, come out and not be able to find a job when they get out of school.

00:04:02.680 There's just like two weeks ago in the New York Times, there was a long article about this.

00:04:05.700 Somebody had applied to 5,000 jobs, had 13 interviews, I think, and no offers.

00:04:11.160 Computer science.

00:04:12.200 So, there's a question of what that future looks like without the problems of college.

00:04:17.240 But so one thing is the future, AI in the future, that might cost.

00:04:20.920 And the other thing is just it's extremely expensive.

00:04:23.920 And it's no longer rare.

00:04:26.160 Now 53% of people who graduate high school go to college.

00:04:29.440 So, you know, you're not among the, of course, you can go to more elite schools,

00:04:33.480 and then the track is different, of course.

00:04:35.500 But people are graduating with this huge debt around their, you know,

00:04:38.860 this burden that they're carrying around with them.

00:04:40.600 And it totally, if they find out that that job that they had specialized in,

00:04:44.200 they really, they feel like it's like totally soul crushing.

00:04:47.040 They now no longer have options because they have to service that debt from college.

00:04:51.460 They have to pay their rent.

00:04:52.620 And, you know, so they're kind of trapped and they find themselves,

00:04:55.180 I think, totally different than when even 20 years ago,

00:04:58.960 when costs were so much lower than now.

00:05:01.080 So, you're going back to that idea of how AI is changing the career landscape.

00:05:08.000 I had this conversation with my son a couple months ago.

00:05:10.940 He's 14.

00:05:11.700 He'll be 15 next month.

00:05:13.960 And we were on a walk and he said something pretty incisive for a 14-year-old.

00:05:19.820 I was surprised he caught on to this.

00:05:21.040 He said, you know, dad, I think what worked for you and mom and even my grandparents,

00:05:26.800 as far as transitioning in adulthood, like college, he says,

00:05:29.500 I don't think that's going to work for me.

00:05:31.700 And I said, you know, I think you're right.

00:05:33.580 It's a completely different world.

00:05:35.000 And he said, like, what do I do then?

00:05:37.480 What should I major in?

00:05:38.320 Where should my career be?

00:05:39.920 And I said, you know, bud, I don't really know, to be honest.

00:05:43.360 That's amazing a 14-year-old is asking these questions.

00:05:45.820 Yeah.

00:05:46.480 Yeah.

00:05:46.820 And I think a lot of young people have that anxiety, like your son did.

00:05:50.200 Like, what am I supposed to do?

00:05:51.300 Because it used to be you could pick out your career.

00:05:52.920 Even if you worked in a factory, let's say 60 years ago, you knew you'd have a job for 60 years

00:05:59.580 because nothing really changed all that much.

00:06:01.900 Or you went to college and you decided to become an accountant or an attorney.

00:06:06.760 Not much changed.

00:06:08.200 Like, you knew what the game would look like for your career.

00:06:12.840 That's no longer the case.

00:06:14.320 And I can see that just causing so much stress and anxiety for young people.

00:06:18.700 Yeah, I think so.

00:06:20.440 Even if we were wrong when we went to college, like I said, I'm a dropout, but I did go for 18 months anyway.

00:06:27.220 Even if we were wrong, but we believed that that accounting job would be available for us,

00:06:31.440 even if we were wrong, you know, it still gave us something to pursue, some clarity.

00:06:36.060 Today, it's clear to everybody that the future is going to be vastly different.

00:06:41.140 So knowing that just increases people's uncertainty so dramatically.

00:06:45.860 And yeah, it's a tough position for these kids.

00:06:47.500 They've been through the ringer with, you know, with all the COVID stuff.

00:06:51.040 And then it's uncertain future.

00:06:53.100 You know, it's a really tough time to be a teenager.

00:06:55.720 This book is geared towards young men.

00:06:57.480 We'll talk about the curriculum and the preparation.

00:06:59.260 I think a young woman could do it and it'd be awesome for them. 0.99

00:07:02.040 But it's geared more towards young men.

00:07:04.020 But you talk about one of the things that young men either have this anxiety,

00:07:07.580 they don't know what to do.

00:07:08.440 And so what they typically do is they just default to drifting and looking at what their

00:07:14.780 peers are doing, whether in person or online.

00:07:18.660 And you talk about the role mimetic desire plays in this drift.

00:07:22.720 So we've had Luke Burgess on the podcast before who's written about mimetic desire.

00:07:27.480 But for those who aren't familiar with it, can you briefly describe it?

00:07:31.080 And then how does this mimetic desire contribute to dissatisfaction in a young man's life?

00:07:37.840 I'm happy to.

00:07:38.580 I mean, Luke does a great job.

00:07:39.840 I think the book's called Wanting.

00:07:41.640 I think the name of it is.

00:07:43.360 But it's based upon Rene Girard's work, which essentially,

00:07:47.460 he says that humans are unusual animals.

00:07:50.720 And that basically, our drives are shaped by those around us.

00:07:55.220 And this doesn't just apply to young men or young women.

00:07:57.220 It applies to you and I.

00:07:59.560 You know, we're subject to, we can be subject to things if we're not aware of them.

00:08:04.980 And it's just, this is why you see things become really popular, you know,

00:08:08.900 whether it be a fashion trend or something, how they just take off.

00:08:12.700 You know, he was like, why do humans follow these trends like that?

00:08:15.400 It's kind of programmed into us.

00:08:17.220 And so we look to others for what they appear to want.

00:08:21.180 And then it becomes our own want.

00:08:22.820 It feels legitimate.

00:08:23.860 It feels like we really, truly desire that thing too,

00:08:26.900 because we're taking the cues from the people around us.

00:08:30.260 But it's not genuine.

00:08:31.720 It's not really authentic.

00:08:33.040 And I really believe, again, this is not a young person problem.

00:08:36.580 This is a every person problem.

00:08:38.780 You have to be aware of it, the effect of others on you and what they desire.

00:08:42.200 I mean, it's like keeping up with the Joneses idea.

00:08:44.420 That's that concept in a nutshell.

00:08:46.900 Yeah.

00:08:47.100 And I think for a lot of young men, they don't really have like good models anymore.

00:08:52.000 I mean, so mimetic desire can be a positive force if your model is noble and good and positive.

00:08:59.960 But a lot of young men don't have that.

00:09:02.120 Well, I would say, if anything, the great role models that have might even exist,

00:09:07.640 even in literature, like are taken out of the classroom, you know, for young men.

00:09:12.000 Yeah.

00:09:12.940 Especially.

00:09:13.500 So I think, yeah, I think they're gone.

00:09:15.140 And, you know, there's been an attack on masculinity in the culture.

00:09:18.060 And that's certainly made it worse.

00:09:20.500 And then the counterreaction to that, you know, like the bros, you know, is also negative.

00:09:26.560 You know, it's not really the right thing either.

00:09:28.160 It's not real masculinity.

00:09:28.960 So there aren't heroic figures for them to look up to, except I guess superheroes, which is nonsense, you know?

00:09:36.040 So it's, yeah, I think it's a real struggle for young people to have good models and to then know where to go and what to do.

00:09:44.100 So what you do, let's talk about the preparation.

00:09:45.680 So the goal of the preparation is, the original idea was to help young men turn into renaissance men

00:09:52.380 who are competent, confident, and dangerous.

00:09:56.540 Basically turn them into the most interesting man in the world from those Dos Equis commercials.

00:10:00.920 Tell us more about this renaissance man model that you're trying to follow.

00:10:05.940 So basically the renaissance man ideal is the model that you're hoping young men will use their mimetic desire to become like.

00:10:15.100 So tell us about that.

00:10:16.300 What is this renaissance man model that you're trying to create with the preparation?

00:10:19.320 So fundamentally, instead of the focus being on what kind of job do you want to have?

00:10:25.240 You know, the question that confronts young men at this stage in life, it's like, what kind of job you want to have?

00:10:29.360 Or, you know, the three main choices, of course, a college, military, or a trade school.

00:10:34.160 Nothing really wrong with, and necessarily with any of them, but all of them are simply designed to get you a job that gets you economic viability

00:10:41.280 so that you can be hopefully reasonably prosperous, you know, and have some economic security.

00:10:46.520 But none of them address the most important question, which is, what kind of man do you want to become?

00:10:52.420 And what we try and do is get them to think about that early in the book.

00:10:56.480 And we focus on this, the idea of the renaissance man, essentially, as a person who's able to, who not only knows a lot about broad range of topics,

00:11:05.820 like, you know, from music to art, to building a house, and milking a cow, I mean, whatever, anything you imagine.

00:11:12.640 Like, just a broad range of knowledge, but also knows how to shape the world around him, knows how to put it into action, knows how to create with it.

00:11:19.800 And that's, you know, the difference between like a polymath and a real renaissance man, is a polymath knows a lot,

00:11:26.320 but a renaissance man uses that knowledge to create, to shape the world around them.

00:11:30.340 Yeah, I think we have this kind of, I mean, a distorted idea of what a renaissance man is.

00:11:35.300 When we think of like, oh, he's a renaissance man, it's like, well, he just knows a lot.

00:11:38.960 Basically, we're describing a polymath.

00:11:40.920 The actual renaissance men from the renaissance era, as you said, they not only knew a lot of stuff,

00:11:46.280 but they could do a lot of stuff, and they were actively engaged in trying to shape the public sphere.

00:11:52.040 So you use the example of Leon Battista Alberti.

00:11:56.220 Who was this guy?

00:11:56.980 He was a badass, obviously, a guy who lived in the 15th century in Italy.

00:12:02.080 And, you know, he's one of the central figures, really, of that renaissance period.

00:12:05.880 He was a painter, an architect, a cryptographer, a philosopher, a mathematician.

00:12:11.220 And, you know, he was also like quite an athlete.

00:12:13.300 He was a great horseman, apparently, too, and a mountaineer.

00:12:16.140 I mean, he was quite accomplished in every walk of life.

00:12:19.440 And he thought that the only thing that limited what you could do was your will.

00:12:23.020 You know, this renaissance area, what it did is it combined these classical virtues that were sort of rediscovered in the renaissance from ancient Greece and Rome.

00:12:31.900 And, you know, with this new, like, life that was sort of fed into the period once.

00:12:36.680 Actually, the renaissance period fundamentally was about a revitalization by a rediscovery of these ancient virtues,

00:12:43.280 where a man could shape themselves and ought to shape themselves.

00:12:46.060 So that's, like, that's what life's about, is that pursuit of shaping yourself into something great.

00:12:51.340 And so he's kind of the iconic figure of that period, really, who really proved it true. 0.98

00:12:56.760 And, yeah, going back, one of their goals was, like, they wanted to not only shape themselves,

00:13:00.220 but they wanted to shape themselves so they could shape the world, like, have an impact on the world.

00:13:04.940 And I think all humans crave that.

00:13:07.320 We crave that desire to mold our outside environment.

00:13:11.800 Nietzsche said, joy is the feeling of power increasing.

00:13:16.600 And for Nietzsche, power was, like, creativity.

00:13:18.540 It's like, yeah, you had an impact.

00:13:20.180 I think all humans have that desire.

00:13:22.360 But I think particularly in young men, young men really want to feel like their actions have an impact on the world around them.

00:13:30.000 I think that's one of the reasons why video games are so seductive,

00:13:32.720 because it gives you, like, the feeling that you're doing something, but you're really not.

00:13:36.440 So I really love this idea of the Renaissance model of someone who acquires knowledge and skills to act in the world.

00:13:45.160 Yeah, I mean, and these are, I think, you know, with young men, what they really want is they want to be somebody.

00:13:51.000 So they have this, like, angst to do something meaningful.

00:13:54.400 They know that by doing something meaningful, they'll become something meaningful.

00:13:57.460 But they just, there's so little that they can do, you know, they're so restrained.

00:14:03.360 There's, like, so little freedom on kids today.

00:14:06.220 They're the most surveilled, you know, group of people that have ever existed on the face of the earth.

00:14:10.340 You know, everything's scheduled and organized for them and almost infantilized because of it.

00:14:15.860 Any other fictional or historical characters besides Alberti that you think are examples of this Renaissance man

00:14:22.880 who not only knows a lot, but can do a lot and have an impact on the world?

00:14:27.460 You could look at a lot of the founding fathers, frankly, like Ben Franklin.

00:14:30.940 That man knew a lot and did a lot.

00:14:34.000 It's actually quite impressive, all of his accomplishments.

00:14:36.740 If you go through the founding fathers, you'll find at least half a dozen that I think would qualify as Renaissance man amongst them.

00:14:42.360 You know, I'll say for my son, what was particularly motivating, for whatever reason,

00:14:45.780 and you never know why certain characters connect with you or don't,

00:14:49.800 but he really loved Edmund Dantes from The Count of Monte Cristo.

00:14:53.380 I really made him watch one of the versions of the movie with me when he was younger.

00:14:57.520 And I said, you'll like it, trust me, because he never really liked movies, but they're not.

00:15:01.140 And he loved it.

00:15:01.820 He loved that idea.

00:15:02.480 And then he read the book, and then he read the Underbridge book, and he's now read it a couple times.

00:15:07.820 And this idea of this guy is like a good, virtuous guy, but really innocent,

00:15:11.980 and got basically everything that mattered to him completely taken away from him all of a sudden,

00:15:16.100 and was like at the total bottom of a well, essentially, in the prison.

00:15:19.400 And really couldn't get any lower, but built himself up and to become quite a remarkable man

00:15:25.500 who absolutely did have the ability to shape the world around him.

00:15:28.320 Another one, as I was reading the curriculum for the preparation, which we're going to talk about here in a bit,

00:15:33.100 another person that reminded me of this sort of Renaissance man ideal that's more modern,

00:15:38.820 Louis L'Amour, the Western author.

00:15:41.740 100%.

00:15:42.140 Do you like him?

00:15:42.900 Oh, I love Louis L'Amour.

00:15:44.160 Oh, good.

00:15:44.760 That's good.

00:15:45.280 That's a good sign.

00:15:46.240 Yeah, no, he's great.

00:15:47.120 Yeah, we've had his son on the podcast to talk about his work, but also his book,

00:15:51.920 Education of a Wandering Man, which is basically an education of a Renaissance man. 0.66

00:15:57.200 Yeah, my son has read that book three times.

00:15:59.560 It's a really good book.

00:16:01.160 Going through this process has been, he said it's been interesting going back,

00:16:04.660 and my son has been the beta tester for this program, for the book, what ended up being the book.

00:16:08.700 He's been doing it in real life for the last two years.

00:16:10.800 And so, as he goes through different stages, he's read it at different points,

00:16:15.440 and he's like, I see different things at each stage.

00:16:18.160 So, it's quite an inspiration for him as well.

00:16:20.500 Yeah, and Louis L'Amour absolutely was a Renaissance man.

00:16:22.760 And I would even say a lot of actors from the golden age of Hollywood,

00:16:30.700 I'm talking Steve McQueen, even writers like Jack London, Ralph Ellison.

00:16:36.580 And then, if you look at their lives, they didn't follow, like, they didn't, a lot of them, like, didn't go to college.

00:16:42.060 Or if they did go to college, they dropped out.

00:16:44.360 And they just did, like, weird stuff.

00:16:46.420 Like, Steve McQueen, he was, like, in the Marines.

00:16:49.620 And then he labored on a chain gang in the Deep South because he got arrested for vagrancy.

00:16:54.380 He was a lumberjack.

00:16:56.060 He joined the circus.

00:16:57.100 I think Ralph Ellison, before he became a writer, he tried to become a professional trumpet player in New York City.

00:17:04.460 I mean, he was living in a YMCA trying to be a trumpet player.

00:17:06.940 And that's where he met Langston Hughes, and he got kind of brought into that circle of the Harlem Renaissance there in New York City.

00:17:13.860 Sean Connery, I mean, he served in the Royal Navy.

00:17:16.320 He was a milkman.

00:17:17.120 He was a lifeguard.

00:17:17.780 He was, like, a bodybuilder for a little while.

00:17:20.960 And what stands out to all of these guys, they were just doing stuff.

00:17:24.080 They were just trying different stuff, increasing their surface area of luck.

00:17:29.760 And these opportunities came up where they found something they really were good at and passionate about, and the rest was history.

00:17:37.260 They did it their own way, too.

00:17:39.200 I think, you know, they were able to, in all of those cases, I think they were able to devote their time and energy to the things that drew them in more.

00:17:46.760 Because they had this broad exposure to many things and broad exposure to lots of different people and different things,

00:17:53.200 it just increases their total decision set.

00:17:55.860 It's like their optionality in life increases dramatically the more, like the way I guess you would put it, surface area they touch.

00:18:02.680 But I have to include people they touch within that as well.

00:18:06.000 Because you build these weird networks that connect you with weird people if you do unusual things.

00:18:11.060 And if you just go to college, like, well, you go to college and you might learn some interesting things,

00:18:15.460 but your experiences aren't going to be as varied as these guys.

00:18:18.980 And today, you can learn anything you can learn in college without going to college.

00:18:22.740 That's the thing.

00:18:23.660 It's available to us now in a way that it was not before.

00:18:26.680 You know, there is some advantage if you happen to have a great professor, you know,

00:18:30.680 who can, like, take whatever the matter, subject matter you're studying,

00:18:33.960 and they can bring it to life in a way that you would not catch, you know, without them there.

00:18:39.080 Like, there are those rare instances, but most of it is not like that, at least in my experience.

00:18:43.460 So, before you talk about the specific skills a young man should develop,

00:18:48.800 and that your son Maxim is developing with the preparation,

00:18:52.020 you spend a lot of time in the beginning of the book talking about developing a personal code.

00:18:58.400 Why start with that?

00:19:00.560 I think it's because it's the only thing that matters in the end.

00:19:04.260 And so, you got to start at the end, I guess.

00:19:07.200 Doug, when he originally pitched me on the book 12 years ago, he was very vague about it.

00:19:11.060 He said, I want to write a book about becoming a Renaissance man.

00:19:13.700 And I said, tell me more.

00:19:14.920 And he said, well, the three most important verbs in English, or in really any language,

00:19:19.420 are be, do, and have.

00:19:21.240 And I didn't get it.

00:19:22.300 It took me a long time to really understand what he meant by that.

00:19:24.680 But essentially, if you think about it, have is what everyone is oriented to, generally.

00:19:30.160 It's certainly a part of this mimetic desire that people have.

00:19:34.240 You know, they look around, they see what other people want.

00:19:36.300 They want to have things.

00:19:37.180 They want to have a, you know, a beautiful wife, or they want to have a new car,

00:19:40.740 or they want to have a travel experience.

00:19:42.780 They basically are oriented almost only toward have.

00:19:45.500 And in our consumer culture, this has been amplified.

00:19:47.820 Like the dial's been turned up to 11.

00:19:49.780 It's really intense.

00:19:51.020 And it's almost hard to avoid it if you don't understand this framework.

00:19:54.440 So, the problem with focusing on have is that have is a byproduct.

00:19:59.220 You don't get it directly.

00:20:00.660 You get it indirectly by doing.

00:20:02.800 So, do is the operative.

00:20:04.160 Do is what matters.

00:20:05.540 What you do will determine what you have.

00:20:08.040 But the only thing that actually matters is be.

00:20:11.180 And, you know, be is like who you are.

00:20:12.940 Like, what is your substance?

00:20:14.220 What is the thing that differentiates you from the other 10,000 people, you know, standing in line?

00:20:20.080 I mean, what is the difference?

00:20:22.300 And this is the thing that this essence of be is the thing that I find is very motivating to young men.

00:20:30.280 Actually, it's motivating to men of any age.

00:20:33.400 Because the be, the substance, the thing that makes you solid.

00:20:36.840 And so, we had to focus on that.

00:20:38.640 So, what is the be?

00:20:39.480 The way we think of it is that with this personal code, we ask them to go through this exercise.

00:20:43.340 It seems kind of trivial.

00:20:44.500 I understand at first it can seem trivial.

00:20:46.060 The first part of it is, is just find a set of rules for yourself.

00:20:49.560 That you don't expect anyone else to follow.

00:20:51.520 But they're just rules for your own conduct.

00:20:53.420 And that requires a little self-reflection.

00:20:55.540 And it's like when you do things that make you feel small or that make you feel a little ashamed.

00:21:02.640 Just one example.

00:21:03.600 Like if a friend invites me out to dinner on Friday, I could say, I'm busy.

00:21:08.060 A little white lie.

00:21:09.200 Or I could say, you know, I don't really feel like it this Friday.

00:21:11.820 Maybe we could do it another time.

00:21:13.200 The path of least resistance is simply to just actually say, oh, I'm busy.

00:21:16.240 I just can't do it.

00:21:17.400 But every time, personally, when I would do something like that, it made me feel small.

00:21:22.160 It made me feel not good.

00:21:23.600 You know?

00:21:23.860 And I know it's like, it's not a real deception, like a really bad lie.

00:21:28.600 But it's like still not good.

00:21:29.820 It didn't make people feel good.

00:21:30.820 And so, we ask them to look at those things that they do that make them feel small.

00:21:36.840 And write them down.

00:21:37.940 And just decide not to do those things anymore.

00:21:39.840 Just set up these rules for yourself.

00:21:41.420 It might sound, again, trivial.

00:21:44.000 But this is the formation of self-esteem.

00:21:47.380 This is the formation of the self itself.

00:21:49.820 Because this is how you are separating yourself from the going with the flow.

00:21:53.300 From the just doing what everyone else is doing.

00:21:55.120 Because you're deciding, no, I'm not going to do these things.

00:21:59.560 So, it's only a negative thing first.

00:22:01.440 I'm not going to do these things under these conditions.

00:22:04.180 And that's where it starts, though.

00:22:05.720 It's like you develop this beachhead.

00:22:07.240 Where you can, a young person, anybody can build from a real self, from that just a little bit of self-control around, I'm not going to do the things that make me feel small.

00:22:16.840 That's the first part.

00:22:18.060 The second part is things to aspire to.

00:22:20.200 And this goes back to the virtues.

00:22:21.480 So, we introduce them to the same virtues that inspired the Renaissance from Greece and Rome.

00:22:29.680 And we just basically share a list with them and say, which ones of these speak to you?

00:22:34.420 Like, pick five or whatever, six, that feel good to you.

00:22:38.440 You know, like that would be awesome.

00:22:40.160 Courage.

00:22:40.600 That's cool.

00:22:41.820 Yeah, I would like to be somebody who's known as courageous.

00:22:44.620 Or, you know, maybe it's that you've got what they call the gravitas, which is actually just dignity.

00:22:50.780 I mean, virtue, the core of the word is vir, which means man.

00:22:55.000 So, the pursuit of virtues is like the pursuit of being a man in general.

00:22:59.420 So, anyway, we tell them to identify those virtues that they voluntarily decide to aspire to.

00:23:05.820 And unlike the rules, which are binary, it's like, oh, I messed that up.

00:23:09.760 If I failed or I did the right thing by my own standards, virtue is something you never get there.

00:23:17.600 It's always just something you're trying harder to get.

00:23:20.080 You can always be more courageous.

00:23:21.560 You could always be more disciplined.

00:23:23.040 If that's a virtue you choose, you know, you could always be more steadfast.

00:23:27.740 So, it's something you pursue constantly.

00:23:30.520 And this is inspiring to people because they want to, what kind of man do you want to be?

00:23:34.340 What kind of man do you want to be known as?

00:23:36.860 So, that's the second part.

00:23:37.840 The third part is where we tell them to start to list their stack of accomplishments, which will grow as they get into the book.

00:23:45.040 Because we actually, later on, tell them exactly what they should do.

00:23:48.160 So, it sounds like it's all about helping these young men develop a sense of self.

00:23:51.780 It is the most important thing.

00:23:53.800 Be is the thing.

00:23:55.160 And this is what, when you see people who are even gainfully employed, having gone to college, feeling quite lost.

00:24:01.500 Why?

00:24:02.000 Because they still don't know who they are.

00:24:04.080 They still don't know what differentiates them specifically.

00:24:07.820 Is it like, what makes, so the beginning of that starts with this.

00:24:11.220 I think it's totally core to, I mean, I would much rather spend time, you know, I like people who have done a lot of stuff.

00:24:18.240 They're very interesting.

00:24:19.200 And I like people who have a lot of stuff.

00:24:21.100 I have a lot of stuff.

00:24:22.420 Stuff is nice.

00:24:23.140 But if the person is not a good person, I mean, if they don't have virtue, if they aren't pursuing virtue, they're not people I want to be around.

00:24:31.480 And certainly, I don't want to be someone like that.

00:24:34.340 So, it's a constant barometer for me as well.

00:24:36.620 And I just think it's never discussed with young men.

00:24:40.280 They never hear it.

00:24:41.160 They never even hear this.

00:24:42.040 So, I think it had to be there first.

00:24:45.500 Because most of the book is about what to do.

00:24:48.160 But doing for what reason?

00:24:50.800 Because some of these things are hard.

00:24:52.840 And when you're doing them, they, you know, you don't, like Louis Moore is running around doing a lot of weird stuff.

00:24:58.800 You know, everybody's doing these weird things.

00:25:00.440 They look weird.

00:25:01.480 And so, to everyone around them, it might have looked like they're failing, you know?

00:25:04.860 So, in that, you have to be able to come back to something like a higher purpose than that.

00:25:09.640 And that is the being.

00:25:10.640 That is, what kind of man do you want to become?

00:25:13.560 We're going to take a quick break for your words from our sponsors.

00:25:18.280 And now, back to the show.

00:25:20.260 All right.

00:25:20.440 So, let's get into the brass tacks of the curriculum of the preparation.

00:25:23.740 I think this is what everyone's probably like, okay, what's in this thing?

00:25:26.780 What is my young son going to be doing?

00:25:29.580 So, you break the curriculum into cycles.

00:25:32.140 How long do the cycles last?

00:25:33.620 And what are the components of a cycle?

00:25:35.840 All right.

00:25:36.060 So, again, we're competing with college is the way we think about it.

00:25:39.380 And so, we imagine four years.

00:25:41.820 My son is through two of them now.

00:25:43.580 Each year is broken up into four quarters, obviously.

00:25:46.360 We call each quarter a cycle.

00:25:47.540 So, there's 16 cycles.

00:25:49.060 And each cycle basically has a few key components.

00:25:53.220 The most important one we call the anchor course.

00:25:55.480 That's the main event.

00:25:56.980 Sometimes they'll be a couple weeks long.

00:25:58.720 Sometimes they can be a couple months long of that entire cycle, three-month cycle.

00:26:02.280 But that's the main thing.

00:26:04.180 And everything else is built around that because these are hard to schedule.

00:26:07.160 So, you have to plan everything around it.

00:26:08.580 So, you plant, you know, the big rock.

00:26:10.500 You put the big rocks in first, right, in the jar.

00:26:12.840 That kind of idea.

00:26:13.780 It starts with that.

00:26:14.880 And then related to it, Doug, you know, especially is a strong advocate for academics.

00:26:20.420 He thinks they're super important.

00:26:21.760 So, every cycle has academic courses as a component to it.

00:26:25.400 As much as possible, we try and make it so that they're related to the subject matter that they're actually, their anchor course that they're actually going through at the time.

00:26:32.460 As much as possible.

00:26:33.760 So, there's an academic portion.

00:26:35.500 There's a set of activities that we encourage people to do.

00:26:39.440 Now, they could choose the things that are interesting to them.

00:26:41.240 But we encourage diversity, like trying a lot of different things.

00:26:44.460 And they could be from, you know, learning a musical instrument and it's a good thing for sure.

00:26:50.180 Definitely learning to play chess is a good thing for sure.

00:26:54.080 But like scuba diving and skydiving and we have a whole list, a whole bunch of them in there of different activities.

00:27:00.100 And there's some time that's set aside each week for those kinds of things.

00:27:04.100 And other than that, there's a reading list, of course, too.

00:27:06.840 So, we have books that we recommend.

00:27:08.660 And then it's reflection.

00:27:09.700 So, in total, we actually, unlike college, which you can be considered a full-time student if you're taking 12 credit hours.

00:27:16.440 Now, supposedly, there's a lot more outside of that than that.

00:27:19.160 But, you know, I came from the Army because I had to pay for my college.

00:27:22.460 I had to go to the National Guard.

00:27:23.860 So, I came from the Army to college and I couldn't believe how much free time everybody had.

00:27:28.360 It was so shocking to me.

00:27:29.820 You know, so, the difference between high school and college, you know, it's a huge difference.

00:27:33.960 You're so much free time.

00:27:34.880 So, this basically assumes you're putting 40 productive hours in every week.

00:27:40.080 Now, these can be, like, some of these hours are you at the gym.

00:27:42.960 That counts.

00:27:44.060 Lifting weights, that's good for you.

00:27:45.500 You know, that's one of your activities.

00:27:46.960 But there are required things in there, too, you know, that we have.

00:27:50.280 But we're assuming 40 hours a week, which is definitely prepares somebody that in and of itself more for the real world, frankly, than, you know, a heavy course load would.

00:27:58.420 Okay, so, each cycle has an anchor course and this is the more intensive, hands-on component of a cycle.

00:28:05.360 Then there's some related academics that you're going to do.

00:28:08.020 And then there's some activities you can choose from.

00:28:10.440 And then you're supposed to do a written reflection at the end of a cycle.

00:28:14.380 And, you know, as you said, you're pitching this as an alternative college.

00:28:18.300 And as we talked about earlier, college is just really expensive these days.

00:28:22.700 I think doing four years at an in-state university is something like, you know, $100,000 in total.

00:28:29.340 And then it just goes up from there.

00:28:31.280 You know, so, the academics with the preparation, you know, that's like online courses you can take for free.

00:28:36.040 But, you know, stuff like the anchor courses cost money.

00:28:39.080 So, how much does the preparation cost to do all together?

00:28:43.480 Yeah, so, if you did the exact 16 ones that we have, and there are two that are really expensive in here, the total cost of that over four years is about $70,000.

00:28:54.640 About $70,000.

00:28:55.940 Basically, that's one year at a prestigious college in the U.S. today.

00:28:59.940 But it's a lot of money, $70,000.

00:29:02.420 Even that, I understand.

00:29:03.520 But the difference, the thing is, is that you can work your way through it.

00:29:06.720 And I have some evidence that I'll share with you.

00:29:08.440 There are two, I don't know if you want me to get into the anchor courses now, but there are two that are really expensive.

00:29:12.180 You don't have to do those, and it saves a lot of money.

00:29:14.440 One of them is becoming a private pilot.

00:29:16.060 That's, you know, you don't have to do that one.

00:29:18.400 But it is, my son went through it.

00:29:19.800 It's very interesting.

00:29:21.020 It's a good skill for him to have.

00:29:22.280 And the other one is learning to operate heavy machinery.

00:29:24.880 But you get certified in it, and that could be, you know, you could always fall back on that and do that for work.

00:29:29.440 That pays pretty well.

00:29:30.680 But those two things are pretty expensive courses.

00:29:33.400 Yeah.

00:29:33.660 Okay, well, let's talk about some of these specific cycles.

00:29:36.200 This is a lot of fun.

00:29:37.300 The first one that you talk about, I think this is the first one your son did, is the medic.

00:29:42.540 Let's talk about the medic.

00:29:43.580 Like, what's the anchor course of this cycle?

00:29:46.200 And then why did you even pick this?

00:29:48.180 Like, why did you set this out for your son?

00:29:49.780 So basically, the anchor course is just getting your EMT certification.

00:29:53.940 So, you know, if you ever, unfortunately, are in an ambulance, you'll be there with probably one paramedic and one EMT.

00:30:00.060 EMT is like the base level.

00:30:02.420 The reason that he started with it, and I think the reason why a lot of people should start with it, or why we placed it, the first one, is simply because it's the most accessible.

00:30:11.180 It requires wherever you are, wherever you live, somewhere around you, there is an EMT school not too far away that you can attend.

00:30:19.660 And it's very low cost.

00:30:21.420 I mean, some $1,200, sometimes maybe up to $2,000.

00:30:25.160 Depends upon exactly where you are in the country.

00:30:27.060 But basically, what it does, it qualifies you to work on it like an ambulance, obviously, and that pays basically minimum wage.

00:30:34.260 It's not a great job, you know, but it does give you some economic viability.

00:30:38.100 I mean, it does qualify you for a job that, you know, you couldn't have if you didn't have it.

00:30:42.980 But it also is an amazingly useful skill that actually can be parlayed into quite a bit more, as Maxim did.

00:30:49.980 And, like, specifically, Maxim, because of his part of this is that weekly reflection and accountability we talked about earlier as part of it.

00:30:57.040 So he published, he started publishing a sub stack.

00:30:59.660 Just basically, at first, he was simply listing what he'd done that week.

00:31:03.800 It was like a way to hold himself accountable.

00:31:05.900 Just, you know, they had to put it out there.

00:31:07.880 And, you know, no one reading it didn't matter.

00:31:10.360 Over time, you know, there's a few thousand people that have read it now that are subscribed to it.

00:31:13.820 But, so, it's a little harder for him.

00:31:16.500 But, I mean, it's a little harder in that he knows that there's an audience.

00:31:20.280 But, through that, someone reached out to him and said, hey, you've got this.

00:31:24.000 Working on an ambulance isn't any fun.

00:31:25.320 You don't want to do that.

00:31:26.480 Iona was a wildfire fighting business, basically, where he contracts with the western states during the summers when they have these terrible fires.

00:31:33.360 And as an EMT, so he spent one of his cycles, the work cycle, he spent one summer, last summer, fighting fires in Oregon, making $600 a day.

00:31:45.060 No expenses.

00:31:45.740 It's, which, for me, when I was 18, I know money isn't worth what it once was worth.

00:31:51.100 But I think that was roughly my take-home pay for a month in the Army was $600.

00:31:55.600 So, through things like that, you know, unique opportunities show up for you.

00:31:58.560 And, you know, there's different ways to leverage it.

00:32:00.340 But for him, ultimately, you know, if there is an emergency trauma-type situation, he is qualified and skilled to be able to be the person who can step up and do something about it.

00:32:13.200 To know how to handle the situation, to assess what's going on, and to take action.

00:32:17.860 And that skill gives you a, you walk into the world differently.

00:32:24.140 You encounter the world differently when you know that if something like that happens, you will know what to do.

00:32:29.460 Yeah, it's a big confidence booster.

00:32:31.180 I think it's really powerful.

00:32:33.080 And I was, after I read that section, like, man, I'm going to have my son.

00:32:35.580 He needs to get EMT certified.

00:32:36.840 I want to get an EMT certified after reading about it.

00:32:39.960 And so, along with the EMT certification, there's an academic component.

00:32:43.920 And as you said, you try to keep the academics related to the anchor course.

00:32:48.080 Like, what kind of academic stuff was your son doing?

00:32:51.140 I mean, this one, it's like anatomy, biology, and there's some practical chemistry in there, too, actually, which is kind of fun.

00:32:57.520 But, yeah, it's as much as possible related to it.

00:32:59.720 And then, you know, there's part of it that is, just like in college, you know, there's, like, required.

00:33:03.700 And then there's room for electives.

00:33:04.900 We have this whole, in the back of the book, there's basically, they could choose.

00:33:09.200 They could fill in electives with things that they're just curious about.

00:33:12.140 So, there's plenty of options beyond, you know, for the elective section.

00:33:15.580 But in the required, it's anatomy, biology, and practical chemistry.

00:33:19.700 Another cycle that really piqued my interest.

00:33:21.660 I was like, I wish I could have done this.

00:33:24.820 The builder.

00:33:25.940 Walk us through the builder cycle.

00:33:27.940 There's this awesome place in Maine called the Shelter Institute, where over three weeks, if you do the three-week version, there's a two-week version and a three-week version.

00:33:35.660 The three-week version, you design and build a home.

00:33:40.180 And you don't build it to completion, but you actually just, you put up the timber frame structure in the third week.

00:33:45.960 But the first two weeks are really the most important ones.

00:33:48.660 Because they really, you go through the entire process of exactly understanding, how do you handle plumbing and electrical?

00:33:54.760 And, you know, how do I choose the site?

00:33:56.740 And how do I, you know, how do I begin to even start with this?

00:34:00.540 So, you basically, you learn to design a home.

00:34:02.620 Now, you know, you don't necessarily want to be a home builder, but you can understand the benefit of this, and they're mostly the people that go to this are adults, by the way.

00:34:10.020 They're not, you know, children that go.

00:34:11.620 They're people like you and I are like, hey, this would be cool to know.

00:34:14.740 But when you have this skill, it's just, you see the world differently.

00:34:18.920 You encounter it differently.

00:34:19.840 It also could expose you to creative outlets that might draw you in deeper.

00:34:25.620 But the whole point of all of this, and there are lots of the 16 we picked, we could have picked another 16 that I think would have been just as valuable.

00:34:33.720 But the key thing is that they all build upon one another, helping the being, helping this person have a list of accomplishments that impresses them, that is impressive to others, and that makes them see the world from like what they could do instead of what they can't do.

00:34:54.860 Because things are a mystery to them.

00:34:56.360 They don't understand how anything works.

00:34:58.040 So, you know, my disorder, food on Uber Eats, that's how I eat.

00:35:01.380 You know, milk comes from a carton.

00:35:02.400 And I don't know, you know, you want to expose them as much as possible to as many of these things as you can.

00:35:07.980 And then so their framework and understanding of how the world works and how they can effectively create and it becomes clear to them.

00:35:15.460 Yeah, I started with Builder and I learned about this school you could go to.

00:35:19.000 I was like, I'm doing like a two-week vacation where I'm going to go to this thing.

00:35:22.600 Because I think every, a lot of guys had that dream of like, I'm going to buy some property somewhere.

00:35:28.100 I'm going to build myself a little A-frame cabin.

00:35:30.840 And I couldn't do that.

00:35:32.740 I had no clue what I, it would look awful and I wouldn't even know where to start.

00:35:36.900 So I'd love to have that skill.

00:35:38.200 I also think it's just a useful skill, like knowing how to build a house just as a homeowner.

00:35:43.120 Yeah.

00:35:43.480 There's so many times where I've had something broken into my house and it needs a repair.

00:35:47.100 And I bring a contractor and he's explaining it to me.

00:35:51.880 And I'm like, is this guy ripping me?

00:35:53.120 Is this actually a problem?

00:35:54.500 Maybe this isn't a problem.

00:35:55.600 And he's just saying it is, but I don't know.

00:35:58.560 Exactly.

00:35:59.200 This is the problem with specialization.

00:36:01.560 You know, in a way it's been allowed us to become a prosperous society like this specialization.

00:36:06.480 It's been good in that way.

00:36:07.900 But on an individual basis, what it does to us is bad.

00:36:11.220 It has a real negative effect where our basic understanding of how basic things around us function are totally outside of our awareness or understanding.

00:36:20.460 And if you think back, maybe our parents' age, and if not, absolutely their parents' age, they knew all of this stuff.

00:36:28.860 I mean, not necessarily all of these different things, but they basically understood the world around them way better than people do today.

00:36:34.740 The academic component, I imagine it's a lot of architecture.

00:36:38.000 Yeah.

00:36:38.180 History.

00:36:38.720 There's some literature in there, that one too.

00:36:40.180 Yeah.

00:36:40.380 Yeah.

00:36:40.960 Another one that intrigued me, the cowboy.

00:36:43.580 Again, I think this reminded me of Louis L'Amour.

00:36:45.180 That's why I liked it.

00:36:46.240 What's the cowboy cycle?

00:36:47.900 Maybe it's because I'm such a Louis L'Amour fan too.

00:36:50.360 There's a lot of benefits.

00:36:52.300 Well, there's two parts to it, actually, for this one.

00:36:54.500 There's basically this place called the Cowboy Academy you go to, and they teach you all the basics of working with horses and on a ranch.

00:37:03.900 And it's a pretty short course.

00:37:06.100 I believe it's five days.

00:37:07.600 That's a pretty short one.

00:37:08.760 And then there's a longer one where you actually go on, or you do horse and mule packing in Idaho.

00:37:13.220 But learning to deal with these animals and to feel comfortable around them is really important, I think.

00:37:21.120 It teaches humbling in some ways.

00:37:23.840 I mean, if you're an adult, even if you haven't been around horses, that could absolutely destroy you if they wanted to.

00:37:30.300 And learn how to work them well and work Wabertaloo with them.

00:37:33.900 And plus, it's so much fun.

00:37:36.140 And I think it taps into the...

00:37:38.120 But some of these things will absolutely tap into this wanderlust side of the hero's journey, the rite of passage.

00:37:44.820 These things that I really think are totally missing from our culture today that we kind of have to...

00:37:50.820 If you're a really involved parent, you try and construct these things if you can for them.

00:37:56.000 But they're limited in that they don't get to experience it on their own fully.

00:38:01.980 And through these cycles, they do.

00:38:03.780 They do do some things that don't make sense.

00:38:06.800 There's no rational reason to do it because there's no obvious benefit you're going to get out of it.

00:38:11.380 It's just a journey.

00:38:13.160 And this is definitely one of those, I think, that comes out of that.

00:38:16.380 I mean, handling a horse teaches patience and discipline, even leadership, believe it or not.

00:38:21.040 It's weird.

00:38:21.840 I don't know if you spend a lot of time around horses, but they're beautiful, amazing.

00:38:24.700 And so in that time, we spend a lot of time focusing on the academics and the academic portion of this cycle.

00:38:32.160 It's a lot of U.S. history, Western history, Western literature to give them cultural context, including, of course, the Sackett series.

00:38:40.600 We encourage them to start reading, get into that, because I think virtues are present in the characters of the Old West and certainly in all of Louis L'Amour's books, but also learning about Kit Carson.

00:38:53.320 I mean, his life was, like, you just can't imagine things he accomplished in his life.

00:38:58.300 So you read this biography of him as well during that cycle.

00:39:02.100 And I think these do give these models for, like, when you look at what's possible, if you're like a 17, 18, 20-year-old, if you're even 50 years old.

00:39:10.180 And you look at these examples of what people, you know, these people who totally break the Overton window of possibility of what you can do with your life.

00:39:18.740 It helps motivate you, inspire you.

00:39:21.860 And so there's a lot of focus on that in this cycle, a lot of wanderlust in this cycle.

00:39:25.940 So another cycle, the fighter cycle.

00:39:27.880 I think your son's about to start this one.

00:39:29.280 Is that correct?

00:39:29.860 Or is he doing it?

00:39:30.340 January he starts that.

00:39:31.620 Yeah.

00:39:31.800 He's in the entrepreneurship cycle right now.

00:39:34.060 Okay.

00:39:34.360 So tell us about the fighter cycle.

00:39:36.180 All right.

00:39:36.500 So the fighter cycle, basically, you go to Thailand and there's several different schools, but we recommend one in particular.

00:39:44.680 It's got two locations where you basically enroll in a Muay Thai camp.

00:39:50.300 And it's pretty intense.

00:39:52.140 It's pretty intense.

00:39:52.900 But, you know, most of it's just basic physical training, basic sparring.

00:39:56.860 Of course, at the end of it, the hope to actually do a real bite.

00:40:01.320 And it's not required, of course, but it's the hope that they would do that, I think is good.

00:40:06.420 And, you know, that one fundamentally, the truth is, is that we encourage like the study of martial arts anyway.

00:40:14.640 So the question is whether or not you make a cycle out of it, because a lot of the activities we talk about could have, honestly, many of them could be turned into cycles that are worth it.

00:40:21.720 Like, so like my son was doing BJJ, that's Brazilian Jesus, who, almost wherever he was, there's almost always a place he could go to do that.

00:40:30.560 So we encourage it anyway, but we decided to make it part of his cycle because that hero's journey arc in a way.

00:40:36.080 Going somewhere totally different, where the world functions in a totally different way, where everything is exotic to you, gives you a better sense of the entire, you know, how the, I mean, most Americans don't really see, you know, how the rest of the world functions.

00:40:50.440 So we want them to get out and see the world a bit.

00:40:53.400 And this gives them a way to do that in a environment where they're not just traveling for the sake of traveling, but they're traveling with a sense of purpose and learning.

00:41:03.100 And where they're going to walk away a different person, they will come out of that not being the same person.

00:41:07.260 I mean, in the academic portion, is it, are you doing like Asian studies?

00:41:11.200 Yeah, pretty much.

00:41:12.140 I mean, a lot of like, let's say martial history, you know, part of it too, you know, philosophy of combat.

00:41:17.940 You know, we have a Mushashi's Book of Five Rings, for instance, is one of the things I read during that.

00:41:23.740 But yeah, it's, it's mostly oriented toward while they're there to learn about the history of the grant.

00:41:29.840 I mean, if you did just these cycles we've talked about, so the medic, the cowboy, the builder, and the fighter.

00:41:36.960 If a young man did just that, he would be head and shoulders above his peers, like one of the most interesting young men out there.

00:41:45.180 He would have, he would have, as my son would say, aura.

00:41:47.900 He'd have infinite aura if he did these things.

00:41:50.220 And these, you know, are just four of the possible cycles.

00:41:53.660 I mean, there's other ones like we've talked about.

00:41:55.420 So your son's doing an entrepreneur one right now.

00:41:57.940 He basically has to start a business in three months and make money.

00:42:01.380 Well, he doesn't have to make money, you know, he could fail.

00:42:05.120 I mean, I'm not an entrepreneur.

00:42:06.060 I've started many businesses and some have succeeded, some have failed.

00:42:09.720 But the things you learn along that process is quite good.

00:42:12.780 And, you know, it starts off very, the cycles start off very, you know, hands-on, like very specific and structured.

00:42:19.580 And then it gets more into the abstract things like entrepreneurship, investing, you know, the things that I think are very important, but don't give you a sense of self in the same way that these like hands-on, like hardcore recognized skills do.

00:42:34.360 And, you know, the four we've gone through, basically, imagine just if someone just took a gap year before college, just did those four in the gap year, different person they would be going into college if they still chose to go that route.

00:42:45.500 They'd go there knowing a sense of self and a sense of where they want to take their life.

00:42:49.920 Yeah.

00:42:50.020 I mean, so other ones you talk about, and we won't talk about them in detail, but there's like survivalist cycle where you go to a primitive living intensive school for two weeks.

00:42:58.660 You mentioned the pilot cycle where you get your pilot's license.

00:43:01.320 There's a sailor cycle where you're going to learn how to, you're going to go to South America and learn how to sail, which would be awesome.

00:43:10.040 My son did that.

00:43:10.740 He's through the, basically around the Falkland Islands and then through the Strait of Magellan.

00:43:14.760 Yeah.

00:43:15.020 And he learned how to, he's a certified crewman on a sailboat.

00:43:17.340 And so he can, that's also an economically viable job, actually.

00:43:20.820 For sure.

00:43:21.620 Yeah.

00:43:21.940 The welder cycle, that's another economically viable job.

00:43:24.560 And it comes in handy.

00:43:25.420 I've got a friend who started a farm after selling his business and he had to learn how to weld.

00:43:30.780 He went to, had to go to trade school, learn how to weld.

00:43:32.600 There's a lot of welding you do as a farmer, surprisingly.

00:43:35.040 The heavy equipment operator, obviously.

00:43:37.300 And I mean, I think that your big takeaway, all these things you're going to learn, these skills you're going to develop, that contributes to the do of character.

00:43:47.780 And then that leads to the being of character.

00:43:51.060 So it just gives you this sense of self that you'll carry with you for the rest of your life.

00:43:56.280 But what's after the preparation?

00:43:58.100 Like after your son finishes all these things, what do you think is going to happen?

00:44:02.060 What do you think he's going to do with himself?

00:44:04.400 So he's got this awesome resume.

00:44:05.780 He's a Renaissance man.

00:44:06.820 And I think you can make the case that with this diversity of real experience, I mean, I can give you the confidence and the capacity to pursue a variety of paths, more so than college.

00:44:19.460 But I can imagine that there are people out there listening, you know, dads who are listening that are thinking, okay, well, now what?

00:44:27.400 I think that's, again, the wrong question.

00:44:29.040 I mean, I get the question, but when have we known for sure where anything we did was going to take us in reality?

00:44:37.800 Like maybe we had a general direction to like move toward, but we never really knew exactly what the then what is.

00:44:44.300 The question basically cancels out like because of the uncertainty of it.

00:44:49.720 It can cancel out the desire to strive to become because it seems impractical because you want to know the practical answer.

00:44:57.000 The truth is I can't imagine what he's going to be doing after two more years.

00:45:02.480 I really can't.

00:45:03.680 I mean, the changes, as a father, seeing where he started with this kid who had a lot of, you know, anxiety, he was basically super like, like I'm an introvert.

00:45:11.540 I trained my kids maybe to be introverts.

00:45:13.740 I don't know.

00:45:14.560 My daughter's not so much, but my son certainly reflects that.

00:45:17.760 He did.

00:45:18.460 He's completely gotten over that.

00:45:20.000 Like he is, you know, he would never feel comfortable, like, you know, going and interacting with a lot of people, but it's no issue for him whatsoever.

00:45:28.120 He's totally got that under control.

00:45:30.080 I don't know if he manages it or if it's dissolved away, but he's gone from being basically a boy into being already after two years, every qualification, I would say, of being a man, except for the fact he's not yet a father.

00:45:44.680 Shouldn't be a father yet.

00:45:45.600 You know, I don't want to be a father yet, but I mean, that's the last step where I would differentiate between a boy and a man.

00:45:52.260 And after two years, there's already there.

00:45:54.160 He's, the world is full of opportunity for him already.

00:45:56.460 He says no to things, opportunities all the time.

00:45:59.760 So I can't imagine, I can really can't imagine what it would be doing.

00:46:03.540 Yeah.

00:46:03.860 Like I mentioned earlier, I think doing all this stuff increases your surface area of opportunities.

00:46:09.600 And I think your son's a testament to that.

00:46:11.040 I mean, he got that job offer to work wildfires and I'm sure he'll have other opportunities that pop up because he's just exposing himself to different people in different situations.

00:46:22.280 Yeah.

00:46:22.420 And let me explain one more thing because I forgot to say earlier about how expensive this is.

00:46:26.420 And I said, you could finance your way through it.

00:46:28.480 Now I saved for him because a lot of people might be thinking, again, it's not economically possible for me, so I can't do it.

00:46:34.380 I grew up very poor.

00:46:36.360 My son did not.

00:46:37.600 Okay.

00:46:37.880 But I saved an irresponsibly low amount of money in his Vanguard account.

00:46:42.680 Like not enough for that one year at a prestigious university, that's for sure.

00:46:47.800 And he started with that two years ago and he's never asked me for money.

00:46:52.800 Today, he's got a little bit more money than he did when he started after two years.

00:46:57.320 So you can work your way through it.

00:46:59.840 And that's what he's done along the way.

00:47:01.120 I just don't want people to be scared off by that because, and the fact that he can work his way through doing this, he is at a level of economic survivability already.

00:47:10.500 It's like somehow he's making it work.

00:47:12.080 You know, of course he's sleeping with like extra bedrooms of family or friends when he's in different places.

00:47:16.040 You know, he's really thrifty with his money, but it works.

00:47:20.640 It works.

00:47:21.380 It does produce somebody who is independent and not just financially independent, but independent and they make sound decisions.

00:47:28.580 I mentioned earlier, as I was reading through this book, I was thinking, man, I want to do some of this stuff.

00:47:35.040 Do you know any middle-aged men who are doing some of these cycles for themselves?

00:47:40.220 Well, you know, the book just came out two and a half weeks ago.

00:47:43.820 So the formal structure of these, you know, has not been out there, but I could definitely tell you a lot of these anchor courses are not done by kids.

00:47:52.940 I mean, they're done by adults.

00:47:54.480 I mean, on this sailing thing that Max did through the Strait of Magellan, he was by far the youngest person there.

00:48:01.180 I mean, by far.

00:48:02.380 Yeah, I would say the same thing with the Shelter Institute.

00:48:06.020 I mean, that is not young people that are doing that.

00:48:09.180 So certainly these are all things that draw in people like our age to do and older.

00:48:13.660 And, you know, one of the most of the readers of the book so far, they're parents, they're parents like you and I, who want to help make sure their kids are pointed in the right direction.

00:48:22.740 And they have the same response that you did, which is like, this is stuff I want to do.

00:48:27.460 And I have to tell you, to be honest, writing the book was a challenge to do and to construct it so that it tells people exactly what to do.

00:48:34.660 It took a lot out of me to do it.

00:48:35.720 But, I mean, I was just looking for things that sounded like that I wanted to do also, you know, things that I knew would inspire my son and other boys around the world, you know.

00:48:47.020 And it tends, I guess it's true of men my age and older.

00:48:51.320 I mean, we had a 71-year-old write to us the other day and said, I'm starting, I'm going to start doing this.

00:48:56.960 So, well, I don't have any examples yet of them doing it, but I have a lot of, if you read the reviews on Amazon, you'll see a lot of parents saying the same.

00:49:05.320 They're echoing the same thing they want to do.

00:49:07.420 Well, Matt, this has been a great conversation.

00:49:08.760 Where can people go to learn more about the book and your work?

00:49:11.060 Well, you go to Amazon to buy the book.

00:49:13.560 And there's currently, there's an audio version coming out, but this is a very physical thing.

00:49:18.820 So, even the audio book comes with a PDF that you'll need or do it because it's kind of like a workbook in many ways.

00:49:25.280 And there's a hardcover edition, which if you're trying to persuade a teen that maybe is unlikely to, sounds like your boy would read a book, said, this is good for you.

00:49:34.320 And luckily, my son is at that stage too.

00:49:37.600 But if you have one who might be a little more reluctant or something like that, the hardcover is designed to be as beautiful as possible within Amazon's limitations.

00:49:46.480 Okay.

00:49:46.680 So, it's full color.

00:49:48.300 And when they hold it in their hands, just open the book a little bit.

00:49:52.840 They'll know that they've not held a book like that before, that there's something different about it right away.

00:49:56.480 And I think that it's designed to be lure, you know, for the young man to get him to pay attention a little bit differently to it.

00:50:03.940 So, the hardcover is $99.

00:50:06.100 It's way more expensive than the paperback is, which is $29.

00:50:08.700 But if you're looking for good lure, I would definitely get the hardback.

00:50:13.220 That's on Amazon.

00:50:14.080 And then you can go to thepreparation.com, which is a sub stack that we set up about the book.

00:50:18.940 But also, as people go through it, young people start doing it.

00:50:22.200 We encourage them to, again, for this reflection and accountability to publish it, like my son did, and then kind of amplify and connect the people who are doing it.

00:50:30.860 So, that and I have to talk about my son's sub stack, too, just so you see it.

00:50:36.940 It's at MaximSmith.com, M-A-X-I-M-Smith.com.

00:50:40.860 Because you can see the stuff that he's done for the last two years as kind of a proof of work.

00:50:46.240 This is awesome.

00:50:47.020 Well, Matt Smith, thanks so much for your time.

00:50:48.320 It's been a pleasure.

00:50:49.060 Oh, yeah.

00:50:49.420 Thank you very much, Brett.

00:50:51.300 My guest today was Matt Smith.

00:50:52.340 He's the co-author of the book, The Preparation.

00:50:54.240 It's available on Amazon.com.

00:50:56.000 You can find more information about The Preparation at ThePreparation.com.

00:50:59.340 Also, check out our show notes at AOM.IS slash ThePreparation, where you can find links to resources where you delve deeper into this topic.

00:51:12.680 Well, that wraps up another edition of the AOM Podcast.

00:51:15.400 Make sure to check out our website at ArtofManus.com, where you can find our podcast archives.

00:51:19.120 And make sure to sign up for a new newsletter.

00:51:20.740 It's called Dying Breed. 0.98

00:51:21.980 You can sign up at DyingBreed.net.

00:51:23.740 It's a great way to support the show directly.

00:51:26.020 As always, thank you for the continued support.

00:51:27.820 Until next time, this is Brett McKay.

00:51:29.280 Remind you to listen to anyone's podcast, but put what you've heard into action.

The Art of Manliness - September 16, 2025

The Preparation — An Adventure-Driven, Skill-Building Alternative to College for Young Men

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