"some combination of the following factors: a Gamma father or father figure, raised by women alone, bullied rather heavily, socially awkward and had trouble knowing how to act, overweight or possessed some other physical trait that made him overly self-conscious"
I can honestly say I experienced all of these growing up. I was a gamma for a few years but I started working a job at a tree service company that really shook me out of it. It's incredible what a role model can do for a 15 year old kid. The trades are full of grumpy assholes that are more than willing to call you out on your gamma bullshit. It probably saved my life.
On Stoicism application 1, this was my starting point, ESPECIALLY for sarcasm. Excise sarcasm from your vocabulary. Sarcasm is the tool of the weak, like women and adolescents. Sarcasm is an attempt to attack while avoiding reprisal, because of the deniability of "I was being sarcastic."
Take note of the sarcastic men in your life, and every single one of them will be a gamma. (No, not every man who says something sarcastic is a gamma, but the ones who are constantly sarcastic are.) Also, sardonic is not the same as sarcastic.
Eliminating sarcasm is also a major step towards practicing faithful Christianity. Let your yes be yes and your no be no.
I think the real gold here (other than recommending Meditations) is the part where the writer recommends you should spend at least a few parts of your life whittling your focus down to one single thing. Knowledge of the SSH can help choose the area of expertise. A trade for deltas, a martial art to toughen up the gamma, etc. Those times are the times you'll learn that field of expertise the best.
This is well-written.
However, he's incorrect on the gamma phenotype being trauma-based. The introverted gammas, yes, but there are plenty of extroverted ones who are born and remain awful. The Rimmers of the world.
Trauma is more relevant to its impact on intro/extroversion. Sigmas all tend to have had trauma-based childhoods, and the most succinct definition of a sigma is an introverted alpha.
There's an author named Jerr who wrote about a similar experience in increasing his status. He described how trying to hold back his emotional self-expression at first felt like condemning his old personality to an agonizing death. He even described itching and burning sensations as if going through withdrawal (which would make sense if you assume lower status men are addicted to external validation for their emotions). He goes into depth on this process in his book "The Wall Speaks." There's a lot of good advice in there about quelling inner doubt and learning to trust one's self. Hopefully this doesn't come across as me shilling his book, but given the subject matter I would highly recommend it to anyone seeking to adopt the psychological habits of higher status men.
Similar to Stoic month, there is a Catholic program called Exodus 90, which is a sort of "Lent Plus" in the 90 days leading up to Easter. It's a bit stricter, no unnecessary screen time, alcohol, sweets or eating outside of meals. One meal on Wednesday and Friday, cold showers, exercise and an hour of prayer daily. It's organized through churches so you would find a group in a church near you, then join so you're not going it alone. (You don't have to be Catholic, but there are prayers to St. Michael which Protestants may find alienating.) The ascetical practices have spiritual value in atoning for sin, but also psychologically, it helps to build confidence. You find that you can deny yourself your usual dopamine hits, and not only not collapse, but actually feel better, cleaner and stronger.
Another one is learn to apologise. Not an overwrought apology which then transitions into another opportunity for you to ‘fix’ everything that was bothering you. It’s an apology which draws a simple line under the situation.
I made a habit of always doing this at the end of a soccer game. If I lost my temper with someone or there was a bit of an altercation, I would always make a point of a making a friendly apology afterwards even if I really didn’t the guy.
David tended sheep. I think he learnt how to deal with people from leading and protecting them from Lions and Bears.
I read a book about Leadership and that Book noted Pastoralist men who in mastering their animals are also able to transfer a lot of that skill onto leading people properly.
"Get rid of social media" is great advice for a man. Unless you are regularly getting your picture taken doing awesome things, you don't need an Instagram. It's for girls.
I deleted all of it about 3 years ago and I haven't missed it at all. If you're not using it for business it's mostly for women, children and retards. This is the only place that I ever post anything or interact with others online. This place has value because of the content and all of you that add to that with good commentary.
I like this phrase: 'Stoicism is a tool, not a straitjacket.' It serves as a warning not to take it to the extreme, which could make you seem overly rigid.
When an alpha embodies stoicism, it looks cool.
When a gamma does it, it looks awkward.
The goal is to embody the principles of stoicism in a relaxed and balanced way.
Yeah I don't think it's possible for a Gamma not to seem awkward, the question is only how badly. Women in particular, all protestations of wanting you to 'express your feelings' aside, absolutely do not tolerate emotional incontinence in a man. They get all of that they could possibly ever want from their girlfriends.
The suppression of joy is not Christian, it exhibits a coldness towards Christ's sacrifice to us. Scripture directly commands joyfulness, see Romans 12:12 and Philippians 4:4. Galatians 5:22 describes joy as a fruit of the Holy Spirit.
Treating God as the ultimate Alpha is the ultimate Solution to the entire SSH. Even Alphas must submit to reality(ultimately God)to a certain extent to be Alpha.
"The Gamma lives on an emotional roller coaster which goes from anxious repression to emotional outbursts which can accumulate into rage and then despair."
This reminds me of the typical "Borerline Personality" profile. These individuals usually experience some form of abandonment or neglect in early life, leading to a desperate clinging to connection, and primal fear of further abandonment. For them, connection is gained through fighting just as much as loving. They are terribly hard to work with, and should never have power.
All good advice. I've also realized that using bad language too much, for no good reason, tends to exacerbate my emotions and is counterproductive to the advice here. It might not apply to everyone, but I've tried to commit more consistently to never swearing, and I find this helps with emotional regulation quite a bit in my case.
Another good follow up point to this recovery, rehabilitation, or reconstitution of engrained behaviors one can consider is one VD brings up on occasion. The "why" is not as important as the "what". Contemplating why you do what you do is not the same as changing what you do, moment to moment. Contemplation is low effort if not mental masturbation and often detrimental. One can find endless reasons why you are the way you are and sadly many will fall into the trap of using those "why"s as excuses or justifications. If you really want to change, stop giving yourself excuses to stay the same. Start doing the work, moment to moment and day to day.
"some combination of the following factors: a Gamma father or father figure, raised by women alone, bullied rather heavily, socially awkward and had trouble knowing how to act, overweight or possessed some other physical trait that made him overly self-conscious"
I can honestly say I experienced all of these growing up. I was a gamma for a few years but I started working a job at a tree service company that really shook me out of it. It's incredible what a role model can do for a 15 year old kid. The trades are full of grumpy assholes that are more than willing to call you out on your gamma bullshit. It probably saved my life.
On Stoicism application 1, this was my starting point, ESPECIALLY for sarcasm. Excise sarcasm from your vocabulary. Sarcasm is the tool of the weak, like women and adolescents. Sarcasm is an attempt to attack while avoiding reprisal, because of the deniability of "I was being sarcastic."
Take note of the sarcastic men in your life, and every single one of them will be a gamma. (No, not every man who says something sarcastic is a gamma, but the ones who are constantly sarcastic are.) Also, sardonic is not the same as sarcastic.
Eliminating sarcasm is also a major step towards practicing faithful Christianity. Let your yes be yes and your no be no.
I think the real gold here (other than recommending Meditations) is the part where the writer recommends you should spend at least a few parts of your life whittling your focus down to one single thing. Knowledge of the SSH can help choose the area of expertise. A trade for deltas, a martial art to toughen up the gamma, etc. Those times are the times you'll learn that field of expertise the best.
This is well-written.
However, he's incorrect on the gamma phenotype being trauma-based. The introverted gammas, yes, but there are plenty of extroverted ones who are born and remain awful. The Rimmers of the world.
Trauma is more relevant to its impact on intro/extroversion. Sigmas all tend to have had trauma-based childhoods, and the most succinct definition of a sigma is an introverted alpha.
There's an author named Jerr who wrote about a similar experience in increasing his status. He described how trying to hold back his emotional self-expression at first felt like condemning his old personality to an agonizing death. He even described itching and burning sensations as if going through withdrawal (which would make sense if you assume lower status men are addicted to external validation for their emotions). He goes into depth on this process in his book "The Wall Speaks." There's a lot of good advice in there about quelling inner doubt and learning to trust one's self. Hopefully this doesn't come across as me shilling his book, but given the subject matter I would highly recommend it to anyone seeking to adopt the psychological habits of higher status men.
Similar to Stoic month, there is a Catholic program called Exodus 90, which is a sort of "Lent Plus" in the 90 days leading up to Easter. It's a bit stricter, no unnecessary screen time, alcohol, sweets or eating outside of meals. One meal on Wednesday and Friday, cold showers, exercise and an hour of prayer daily. It's organized through churches so you would find a group in a church near you, then join so you're not going it alone. (You don't have to be Catholic, but there are prayers to St. Michael which Protestants may find alienating.) The ascetical practices have spiritual value in atoning for sin, but also psychologically, it helps to build confidence. You find that you can deny yourself your usual dopamine hits, and not only not collapse, but actually feel better, cleaner and stronger.
Another one is learn to apologise. Not an overwrought apology which then transitions into another opportunity for you to ‘fix’ everything that was bothering you. It’s an apology which draws a simple line under the situation.
I made a habit of always doing this at the end of a soccer game. If I lost my temper with someone or there was a bit of an altercation, I would always make a point of a making a friendly apology afterwards even if I really didn’t the guy.
An apology with no explainations. "I'm sorry, I was wrong, I'll try not to do that again."
Owning a dog is so important for children.
Get them to teach him to heel and come when he's called, even allow him growl at a stranger when necessary.
They will learn those virtues in themselves.
David tended sheep. I think he learnt how to deal with people from leading and protecting them from Lions and Bears.
I read a book about Leadership and that Book noted Pastoralist men who in mastering their animals are also able to transfer a lot of that skill onto leading people properly.
Good post.
"Get rid of social media" is great advice for a man. Unless you are regularly getting your picture taken doing awesome things, you don't need an Instagram. It's for girls.
Other than YouTube, substack, telegram and X. I don't use social media at all.
I deleted all of it about 3 years ago and I haven't missed it at all. If you're not using it for business it's mostly for women, children and retards. This is the only place that I ever post anything or interact with others online. This place has value because of the content and all of you that add to that with good commentary.
I like this phrase: 'Stoicism is a tool, not a straitjacket.' It serves as a warning not to take it to the extreme, which could make you seem overly rigid.
When an alpha embodies stoicism, it looks cool.
When a gamma does it, it looks awkward.
The goal is to embody the principles of stoicism in a relaxed and balanced way.
"When a gamma does it, it looks awkward."
Still a win if he keeps his mouth shut.
Yeah I don't think it's possible for a Gamma not to seem awkward, the question is only how badly. Women in particular, all protestations of wanting you to 'express your feelings' aside, absolutely do not tolerate emotional incontinence in a man. They get all of that they could possibly ever want from their girlfriends.
"Yeah I don't think it's possible for a Gamma not to seem awkward"
I showed a video a gamma was in to a girl and she said, "He looks like an alien in a person suit".
Emotional Buttons ready to be pressed to trigger self-defeat isn't something you want in a man.
The hazing of friends is there to desensitise yourself to that. Fathers and brothers are good at giving it and ensuring you can handle it.
Agree.
Yes, stoicism is essential to mental health...You can't control a lot of things....
The suppression of joy is not Christian, it exhibits a coldness towards Christ's sacrifice to us. Scripture directly commands joyfulness, see Romans 12:12 and Philippians 4:4. Galatians 5:22 describes joy as a fruit of the Holy Spirit.
Stoicism has never been about suppressing joy. If you believe that, I doubt you've read the original Greek or Roman stoics.
“Godliness with contentment is great gain” applies to more than money
Give up your delusions of control. This applies strongly to Gammas, but also to everyone else.
Resisting things as they are is what creates all your suffering, not the things themselves. Just ask a troon.
Treating God as the ultimate Alpha is the ultimate Solution to the entire SSH. Even Alphas must submit to reality(ultimately God)to a certain extent to be Alpha.
Probably goes without saying but quitting drugs and alcohol also seems really necessary to overcome the emotional rollercoaster.
In my limited experience, the most prevalent among the gammas I got to know was weed and they could never stop talking about it.
I mean, both can be nice, but you've got to plan it out. No one wants to be hungover or otherwise impaired when it's time to get things done.
"The Gamma lives on an emotional roller coaster which goes from anxious repression to emotional outbursts which can accumulate into rage and then despair."
This reminds me of the typical "Borerline Personality" profile. These individuals usually experience some form of abandonment or neglect in early life, leading to a desperate clinging to connection, and primal fear of further abandonment. For them, connection is gained through fighting just as much as loving. They are terribly hard to work with, and should never have power.
All good advice. I've also realized that using bad language too much, for no good reason, tends to exacerbate my emotions and is counterproductive to the advice here. It might not apply to everyone, but I've tried to commit more consistently to never swearing, and I find this helps with emotional regulation quite a bit in my case.
Avoid swearing, lying, and sarcasm, and you'll find your attitude changes with it. It's weird.
Another good follow up point to this recovery, rehabilitation, or reconstitution of engrained behaviors one can consider is one VD brings up on occasion. The "why" is not as important as the "what". Contemplating why you do what you do is not the same as changing what you do, moment to moment. Contemplation is low effort if not mental masturbation and often detrimental. One can find endless reasons why you are the way you are and sadly many will fall into the trap of using those "why"s as excuses or justifications. If you really want to change, stop giving yourself excuses to stay the same. Start doing the work, moment to moment and day to day.