It’s Cheaper to Turn Up the Radio Than Fix the Car

I’ve never been good at taking care of myself. I’ve been better at staying numb, and staying numb isn’t healthy. This is the last foundation stone, and it’s the one men tend to avoid most. This isn’t about the manosphere, and it isn’t about getting shredded. That’s just another distraction. There’s a difference between taking care of yourself and getting better at staying numb, and most men never learn it.

The Rule When You’re Poor

Growing up around 12 or 13, my mom got a new car, and one of her rules was: it’s cheaper to buy a louder radio than to fix the car. Something rattles, you just turn the radio up louder. That became how I lived. Instead of taking care of myself, I turned up the volume. I found something that kept me numb to myself, to my surroundings, to my relationships. That let me adopt another idea: if I just ignore something long enough, it’ll finally go away.

The problem is that line of thinking cost me physical health, emotional health, spiritual health, and it hurt my relationships. The car problem never goes away because you turned up the radio. It just gets worse. You just can’t hear it.

The Real Question

The real question isn’t am I fit. It’s: when did you last go to the doctor or the dentist? Do you need a hearing test or hearing aids? Are you skipping daily medications? That’s what taking care of yourself actually means. Ignoring it isn’t toughness.

And it isn’t just about you. When you get sick, you put the people around you at risk, and it might hit somebody who doesn’t have your resilience. Ignoring your health is a way of saying you don’t care about the people who depend on you.

(A note: check with your doctor before starting anything new. This isn’t medical advice, just one man’s experience working through his own health problems.)

Twenty Minutes a Day

If you’re doing nothing right now, studies have consistently shown that walking 20 minutes a day is one of the best activities available. It’s strong for fighting long-term Alzheimer’s risk and very strong for cardiovascular health. It doesn’t require a gym, it doesn’t require you to sweat, there’s no program involved.

Recently, it turned out that in my own exercise routine, mainly running, I was breathing wrong and moving wrong, doing more damage than benefit. I had to slow down about three times slower than I wanted to run, and that’s hard. The reward is being here longer with fewer injuries, because I’m finally paying attention to what my body has been trying to tell me.

This Week

Book the appointment you’ve been putting off, or go walk for 20 minutes a day. Pick one. You don’t have to do both.

This was the last foundation stone in the Storm Ready Men Foundation Framework series. Next: naming the storms themselves, starting with loneliness.

Take the free Storm Ready Assessment at StormReadyMen.com. Wives, find support at The Couple Cure.