Merry Christmas! Kate and I will be taking the coming week off to spend time with family and reboot before the new year. So we won’t be publishing anything new on the site until January. But for those of you who still need an AoM fix while we’re away, we’ve put together this recap of 2011 on the Art of Manliness.
Launch of Manvotionals
The biggest news this year was the launch of our second book in November, The Art of Manliness Manvotionals: Timeless Wisdom and Advice on Living the 7 Manly Virtues. We couldn’t be prouder of this book, and it’s already garnered 29 five star reviews on Amazon.com. If you haven’t gotten it yourself, hopefully you’ll find the book under the tree come Christmas morning!
The Most Popular Posts in 2011
These were the most popular posts for each month of this year based on traffic:
Jan: Becoming Superhuman in 2011
Feb: Craft the Life You Want: Creating a Blueprint for Your Life
Mar: How to Make a Bugout Bag: Your 72-Hour Emergency Evacuation Survival Kit
Apr: Lessons in Manliness From Bass Reeves
May: The Art of Conversation: How to Avoid Conversational Narcissism
Jun: The Ins and Outs of Opening a Door for a Woman
Jul: Arming Yourself for the Zombie Apocalypse: How to Build the Ultimate Survival Shotgun
Aug: How to Decorate a Man Room
Sept: Are You As Fit As a WWII GI?
Oct: How to Quit Mindlessly Surfing the Internet and Actually Get Stuff Done
Nov: 3 Characteristics of an Educated Man
Dec: Dressing for a Job Interview: Your 60 Second Visual Guide
Editors’ Picks
Of course traffic isn’t the only measure of the worth of a post. Here are some of our personal favorites from this year:
Don’t Should All Over Yourself
22 Manly Ways to Reuse an Altoids Tin
Your Grandpa’s Hair Products: 5 Old-School Hair Grooms to Give You that Cary Grant Shine
Lessons in Manliness from Atticus Finch
Develop a Strong He-Man Voice by Using the Voice Nature Gave You
How to Haggle Like Your Old Man
Win the War on Debt: 80 Ways to Be Frugal and Save Money
Lessons in Manliness from the Egyptian Revolution
Lessons in Manliness from Friday Night Lights
Bookend Your Day: The Power of Morning and Evening Routines
What Man Understands That He Is Dying Daily? (This Is Your Life)
Motivational Posters from the Band of Brothers
Viewers vs. Doers: The Rise of Spectatoritis
Good Things Come to Those Who Wait: The Power and Pleasure of Delayed Gratification
The AoM Archives
If the above posts aren’t enough to satiate your AoM appetite, I highly recommend browsing through our archives. We have over 1,000 articles in there just waiting to be read.
A Thank You to Art of Manliness Readers
It’s sometimes hard to believe that we’ve been at this AoM thing for four years now. I never thought when I started the site back in 2008 it would grow to be this big. Since last year, we’ve grown from 82,000 subscribers to over 118,000 and from 1.5 million pageviews a month to over 7 million. We’ve also amassed over 80,000 fans on Facebook and over 27,000 followers on Twitter.
Our deepest thanks goes out to all of you who’ve been with us since the beginning and to those who’ve just joined us in our quest to revive the lost art of manliness. Thank you for sharing AoM with your friends and family. Thank you to those who took the time to write us a kind email or thank you note sharing your appreciation for the site (those always seemed to come just when we needed some extra encouragement). And thank you to those who bought our books.
It’s an honor for us to interact with such great men (and a few ladies) on a daily basis. A lot of people lament that men today are in decline. But you guys give us hope that the art of manliness is still alive and well and will continue to grow into the future.
We’ll be working hard in 2012 to keep bringing you top quality, totally free posts that inform, entertain, and inspire. See you then!
Semper Virilis!
What are your favorite Art of Manliness articles from the past year? (Or of all time?) Your feedback is always welcome and helps us improve the site.
Submitted by: Mark Plemel in Maple Grove, MN, USA
