Another year here at the Art of Manliness is in the books. We launched a new site design, published great articles (and books!), interviewed a number of stellar guests on the podcast, and continued growing The Strenuous Life platform. We highlight all of those doings below.
We’re taking a break until January so we can spend the holidays with our family and friends and plan for 2020. Merry Christmas!
Articles
Most Popular Articles of the Year Based on Traffic
- Why You Should Consider Volunteering With a Search and Rescue Team
- Should You Lift Weights Before Doing Cardio? Or Do Cardio Before Weights?
- How to Escape a Car Hanging Off a Cliff
- How to Build a Home Gym on the Cheap
- Chukka Boots: The FAQ
- 7 Techniques for Capturing People’s Attention
- 5 Critical Knife Skills for the Outdoorsman
- What Every Man Should Know About Having a Heart Attack
- How to Make Ernest Hemingway’s Favorite Hamburger
- Your First Style Steps: Beyond Jeans, T-Shirts, and Tennis Shoes
- How to Fight Entitlement and Develop Gratitude in Your Kids
- 8 Myths of Men’s Style
Editor’s Picks
Of course traffic isn’t the only measure of the worth of an article. Here are some of our personal favorites from this year:
- 4 Lessons From a 4-Week Social Media Fast
- The Complete Guide to the Perfect Deadlift
- Seasons of a Man’s Life Series
- The Art of Topophilia: 7 Ways to Love the Place You Live
- The Rationality of Emotions
- How Conversation Builds Character
- The Man Book: Creating a Reservoir of Timeless Wisdom
- Your Life Explained Through Dopamine
- The Art of Anticipation
- 7 Reasons You Should Still Keep a Paper Map in Your Glovebox
- A New Generation of Prigs, Prudes, and Squares
- How to Jump Rope Like a Boxer
Sunday Firesides
This year we began a weekly series of articles called “Sunday Firesides” — short, devotional-esque pieces that appear each Sunday. We had intended only to run this feature this year, but due to popular demand have decided to continue them in the coming year. Here are some favorites:
- Expect Great Things
- Don’t Fight the Last War
- The False Power of the High Chair Tyrant
- The One You Feed
- Live Life Drunk
- There Is No Other Way
- Shorter Weapons, Longer Boundaries
- Against Little Red Hen Culture
- Are You Really Just Jealous?
- Hold Fast
- Don’t Surrender the Privilege of Adulthood to Your Kids
- The Slipstream of Comfort
Podcast
Most Popular Podcasts of the Year Based on Listens
- A Proven System for Building and Breaking Habits
- How to Get Better at Making Life-Changing Decisions
- Leadership Lessons From the 3 Greatest Ancient Commanders
- What Plato’s Republic Has to Say About Being a Man
- How to Improve Your Speaking Voice
- Be Your Own Bodyguard
- How to Stress Proof Your Body and Brain
- How to Achieve a “Rich Life” With Your Finances
- How to Be a More Compelling Person
- How to Start and Sustain Conversations
- Grow, Adapt, and Reinvent Yourself Through Ultralearning
- Stillness Is the Key
Our Personal Picks
Here are the shows we personally found the most interesting, engaging, and/or useful (some of the most popular above would be included in this list as well):
- The Wonderful, Frustrating Dynamic of Friendship
- How to Find Your Calling in Life
- Inside the Gangsters’ Code
- Research-Backed Answers to All Your Fitness FAQs
- Becoming a Digital Minimalist
- The Quest for a Moral Life
- Hiking With Nietzsche
- Break Out of Your Cage and Stop Being a Human Zoo Animal
- Father Wounds, Male Spirituality, and the Journey to the Second Half of Life
- Boxing Trainer Teddy Atlas on What It Means to Be a Man
If you haven’t already, be sure to subscribe to the Art of Manliness podcast. It’s a great way to get your AoM fix while commuting or working out:
Also, we’d really appreciate if you’d give the podcast a review in iTunes or Stitcher. It’s a big help in getting more people to discover the show!
Original Books
We’ve long been turning some of our more popular article series into nicely designed books for easier and more pleasant consumption, but this year we published a few titles that are exclusively available as books.
The 33 Marks of Maturity
This short original ebook seeks to transcend one-dimensional pictures of what it means to be an adult, in order to show the multi-faceted constellation of traits, behaviors, actions, and mindsets that form its reality. Within its pages we illuminate the 33 characteristics that make up this constellation of maturity. Each quality is given a succinct summary that serves as both description and reflection, so that you understand what it is, and how you may better grow towards it, and into a thriving adult.
The Warrior Monk Philosophy of Trainer Cus D’Amato
Just about everyone knows who Mike Tyson is. Undisputed heavyweight champion of the world. Prodigious, powerful boxer who won 50 of his 58 fights — 44 by knockout. Lesser known is how Tyson became one of the fiercest fighters of all time. Trainer Cus D’Amato would change the whole trajectory of Tyson’s life by teaching him the way of the warrior monk — the art of focus and ferocity. In this short and punchy book, we uncover the five universally-applicable strategic principles of Cus’ philosophy.
The Secrets to Power, Mastery, and Truth
The Secrets to Power, Mastery, and Truth is an anthology of the very best self-improvement essays of singularly gifted writer William George Jordan (1864-1928). He touches on many existential, philosophical, and personal development themes that have recently reemerged as popular principles in our own time, including Stoicism, simplicity, self-reliance, and the paramount importance of living truthfully. Each of the essays are short and “devotional†in nature and rich in incisive, edifying insights that will help the reader see his life through a transformative lens.
The Strenuous Life
The Art of Manliness puts out a lot of content in the form of articles and podcasts, but its end goal isn’t just offering knowledge for the sake of knowledge, but inspiring folks to take action on that knowledge.
The Strenuous Life is designed to help men do just that. It’s a structured program which helps members take real, concrete steps towards their goals and becoming better in body, mind, and spirit. TSL is now over 6,000 members strong, and these members hail from all around the world.
The next enrollment for The Strenuous Life will begin in early January. Enrollments fill fast, so be sure to sign up to be the first to know when it opens.
A big thank you to everyone who supported AoM this year by sharing our content, sending us encouraging words, and patronizing our various platforms and store! We greatly appreciate it. See you next year!
