In my last article, I made the statement, “If money was taken care of, probably a fair number of men would be fine with just pursuing their hobbies.” There are some implications to this, which I am exploring further in this post.
By and large, I think that men are happiest if they have some goal to work towards to. Anyone doubting this should read up on the problem of alcoholism or drug abuse among the unemployed. The dark aspect of this is that I think that some groups in society deliberately undermine the status of men in order to kill them off with drugs like OxyContin or fentanyl. If they could kill you outright, they would do that, too. Anyway, the actual goal to work towards to can be quite narrow in scope, for instance it can mean working for a living and just supporting yourself. In fact, the main points of this post are fully relevant even without the angle of having a family and children, which is why I will discuss this aspect only in passing.
One aspect of work is that it keeps you busy. If you look back at the books written by “social reformers” even back at the times of the industrial revolution, there were people who dreamt about a time where “machines” would do all the work for us. This used to be the steam engine. Today, the same kind of people talk about robots and “artificial intelligence” creating a paradise where machines will do all the work and we may only have to work for a few hours a week. The discussion around universal basic income is grounded in the same kind of wishful thinking.
Yet, one aspect why you still work 40 or 50 hours a week is that you are not supposed to spend too much time in idleness and alone with your thoughts as you may just realize that there is something wrong with society. You better work on creating widgets, in one way or another. Normally, you also develop an identity that centers around your work, or at least to some extent. Arguably, this is beneficial for yourself and society, at least as long as your work improves society in one way or another. If you are in a bullshit job, this is obviously not the case, in which case you probably, if you are not completely deluded, also feel that your work is not fulfilling at all.
For most men, the question of money is only taken care of once they reach retirement and they start drawing a pension. But what do you do then? On that note, I had a somewhat peculiar conversation with a guy close to retirement a while ago. He openly told me that he does not really know what to do with his time once he leaves the workforce. He also lives in a country where there is a statutory retirement age, meaning that you have to retire. There are, of course, some workarounds like doing project-based contract work, but this is only applicable in relatively few cases.
So, what will you do when there are suddenly too many hours to fill? If you do not have developed any interests, this will be a serious problem. I suspect that some guys get a wife and kids just to get rid of this palpable void in their life. Of course, this is a much bigger issue for women, or do you know of any guys who become mentally unstable if they are in their 30s and single, and develop baby rabies? Of course not. Yet, your children will move out at some point, leaving an empty nest behind, and you will have the same problem as before.
Finding and nurturing an interest that you can sustain for decades is no easy feat. In my case, I have pursued nothing for as long and continually as writing, and have never taken a break from it. Over the years and decades, I have tried various sports, and some I really enjoyed I had to give up due to external reasons. For instance, swimming without easy access to a proper pool is not possible, and hiking if you live in the center of a Western metropolis is just as infeasible. Yet, I have been writing online in one way or another for over two decades. Before that, I filled a bunch of (physical) notebooks over the course of several years. I never looked at them again, and I am not even sure whether I still have them. I may have thrown them out a few years ago.
To me, the question of what I would do with more spare time does not really apply as I have enough things I would like to do. Yet, people with a much more consumerist bent are in a much different position, which goes back to the problem of childless older women. I do not think that life as a mere consumer of products or ideas is rewarding at all, and I have not seen any evidence to the contrary yet. At some point, I will be a sixty or seventy year-old shitposter (I’m kind of looking forward to this), and I will derive infinitely more entertainment from it than an army of wine aunts from their cats and romcoms.
I relate to this. I’m in my 20s still, but I’ve managed to get enough savings now where I feel “comfortable.” I’m not under the illusion that I’m able to become a multi millionaire and retire early any time soon, so im cruising along on my job. I find it hard to keep motivation to get to the “next level” financially. I’m still trying to get raises and make more money, but I’ve become pretty lazy now that I’ve attained a base level of what I want. Without a family my motivation is simply very limited.
A similar mindset is also behind some men partly or fully dropping out of the workforce, and you really cannot blame men for that, seeing how society has changed, and not in their favor. I once worked on the same floor as a software engineering contractor who told me that he only works between four and six months a year, because this leaves him with more than enough money. He did not have any aspirations of having a family, and another contractor was even more extreme, having taken off one year or more multiple times already. From what I gather, he only looked for a new gig once his financial reserves were running low. Admittedly, this was with the backdrop of a booming tech sector, which is currently not the case anymore, so perhaps they are now forced to make longer commitments.
“A similar mindset is also behind some men partly or fully dropping out of the workforce, and you really cannot blame men for that, seeing how society has changed, and not in their favor.”
Can you explain this? I guess I’m fortunate where I work at because I can’t really understand. I know that a lot of jobs have either been outsourced or automated. Where I work at, I don’t have to worry too much, but automation is incrementally happening at a slow pace. It won’t affect me as much as its going to affect millennials and Gen Z.
This is in the context of men not wanting a family, which used to be the main motivation for getting a job and working hard in order to support them as that mortgage is not going to pay down itself. Yet, there is this phenomenon that some men decide they do not want a family or think they cannot afford one, and if they do not have any other expensive hobbies, they may just decide to “min-max” their life and drop out of the workforce, or reduce their hours.
In European countries, with their overindulgent welfare states, there is a significant part of society that just does not work at all because their basic needs are covered. You can find also pretty smart people in this group. A guy I went to high school with, for instance, makes a living thanks to a combination of welfare checks, short-term teaching gigs, and writer’s stipends. You can bet that if he lived in a society in which there are harsher conditions, he would have been able to make himself much more useful.
Aaron,
“…one aspect why you still work 40 or 50 hours a week is that you are not supposed to spend too much time in idleness and alone with your thoughts as you may just realize that there is something wrong with society.”
1. Traveling is a good way to see what’s wrong with your own native country as you see what life is like in other parts of the world.
“Normally, you also develop an identity that centers around your work, or at least to some extent”.
2. I’ve often heard not to center your identity around work as it does not define you.
“He openly told me that he does not really know what to do with his time once he leaves the workforce”.
3. There’s something at my job that I’ve notice over the years. When men retire, they often die within two or less years. A lot of upcoming retirees are scared about retiring because they fear they will die. This hasn’t been the case with women.
When my dad retired, he had a difficult time coping with retirement. Over the years, he managed to find some hobbies and a purpose. My mom wasn’t negatively impacted by retirement as my dad was. She was ecstatic leaving the work force. What also helps is that I take my parents on vacation with me. They enjoy it. They are both still physically active, hiking, running, swimming. They both in great shape for being in their early 70s.
“Finding and nurturing an interest that you can sustain for decades is no easy feat”.
4. Why is that?
“At some point, I will be a sixty or seventy year-old shitposter…”
5. I’ve come across men who are worried and anxious about getting older especially men in their 40s and 50s. I’ll be 40 in the next few months and my life keeps on getting better and it’s trending up. My 30s were a lot better than my 20s, and I can definitely see my 40s being better than my 30s. I once heard that everything men do is about acquiring a mate. I’ve seen men worry about getting older because they feel they won’t be able to attract young Stacie’s.
I’m not sure whether I’m going to struggle finding a hobby or a purpose when I’m near retirement.
Hi Chris!
1) Fully agreed. A somewhat recent trend I appreciate is that some people post long recordings of their walks or rides through parts of their city. During my travels, I found this always the most insightful, but seeing how far gone society is in the West, I am not sure whether I can still recommend this. There is some great footage online of people driving through Los Angeles or Philadelphia, and of course you can also get plenty of footage of many other cities. This is not a replacement for traveling, but you get a fair amount of the educational value of travel this way as well.
2) I think work should be part of your identity. Otherwise, you will be too detached and cynical. Also, if you think that you do something genuinely useful, you may do better work, which can help you quite a bit. I have not found my managers, for the most part, to be exploitative. So far, I have benefitted from taking my job seriously.
3) This is an excellent point. I recall hearing about people who died quickly after retiring. This is more of a problem if people define themselves fully by their job, and once you take it away from them, they have nothing left. Some men cannot deal with this. It does not surprise me that women are not really affected by this, seeing what a half-assed job they tend to do.
4) I think a problem is that as you get older, you have less time for exploration. As a child and later as a teenager, you may sink weeks, months, or years into chess, various sports, or trying out various music instruments, and with a very small number of activities you have tried, you will hopefully have found one that you enjoy and stick with it. You may even partly define yourself by your skills of playing the piano, or perhaps even composing music. In contrast, as an adult, you normally will not have that amount of spare time anymore, and your various responsibilities may even make it difficult to slowly build skills.
5) I have made the same observations. Among guys in their 40s and 50s I come across, a very common theme is that their best years are behind them. I once had a colleague who told me I should not work so hard and make sure I also get to enjoy life because I’ll be “old before I know it”. The tragic part was that this guy was a few years younger than me, yet looked about a decade older, and I most certainly travelled and partied more than he did.
Considering that you are intellectually curious, I don’t think you have to be afraid of retirement, expecting to keel over within one or two years. This is much more a problem for people who are really set in their ways. I would nonetheless suggest considering a smoother transition, i.e. instead of going from working full-time to retiring, gradually reducing your hours, i.e. over two or three years you go from 100% to 80% to 50%, as it may be overwhelming to go from 100% to 0% overnight.