I love my teaching job for moments like these:
Last week I had to pull an 8th grade boy aside to address his ‘cocky’ bullying. It became quickly apparent that his version of “a man” was arrogant hyper-testosterone peacocking. Where or how he learned it didn’t matter. What did matter was the chip on his shoulder.
I shared with him a lesson I learned when I was about his age about “being a man.” It was taught to me by a REAL man who had it taught to him…
Tearing down people’s lives, maiming them, or even taking life is easy and over-glorified; it requires about as much “manhood” as a gorilla picking up a stick or rock. But helping put lives back together or literally saving them takes an immeasurable amount of manhood. There is no comparison!
[Boy], if you must “stand out,” then stand out with and for the ones who can’t. Choose the harder higher road, not the easiest, and then you’ll understand what it is to be a real man.
Some great examples of “Real Men”…
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The Professor's Convatorium 