Why Trying Too Hard to Keep ‘Masculine’ Control Leads to Hyper-Intentional Failure.

Men's issues

Mar 18

Many holds on to tightly and crushes something to powder in his hands. Muscled man in black Tshirt, face not visible.

Every man struggles to achieve a sense of control over his life and the environment to feel secure. Without any sense of control, we are passive observers at the mercy of fate, the world, and every person in it—a miserable mindset. But the opposite is even more dangerous, the fear-driven need to try to try too hard to be masculine and absolutely control everything in a man’s life. This tendency to try too hard beyond what’s realistic, and obsess over achieving fantasy ideals often leads to catastrophic failure.

The concept of hyper-intention leading to failure in accomplishing the goals a man intends to achieve was a term made popular by Viktor Frankl in his book Man’s Search for Meaning. Mr. Frankl considered Hyper-intention to be a neurosis. And I certainly see the concept of trying too hard in life especially to control the world around you as a part of a man’s masculinity to be a harmful philosophy. A mindset that leads men to fail in achieving balance in their mental health to eventually self-destruct in their lives.

In particular the abnormal compulsion and perception a man should expect to have absolute control over his success in business and relationships in modern times. And yet some groups in today’s society try to push the pain point of masculinity as a sales advertisement that to be a man one must bear responsible for everything that happens. Now I agree that accountability for one’s own mistakes is good for feedback and error correction, however, the expectation a man fully controls his future, his environment, and how other people act, especially in relationships, is setting up men to fail in society today in a spectacular fashion. When a woman divorces a man for apparently no good reason other than her ennui and ‘we went different ways’ foolishness, these peddlers of magical masculinity say: “You didn’t lead enough. You weren’t man enough?” Like the pattern of being masculine is some kind of mesmerism or mystical spell that dominates the woman’s mind and her choices.

Many young men today, saddled with sky-high expectations and constant societal programming are falling prey to the devil of trying too hard and therefore failing at much of what they intend to achieve. Not to mention failing at enjoying all life has to offer.

By setting absolute win and loss standards with any allowed degrees of success or incremental achievements.
By solely focusing on a goal with an absolutely-can’t-fail mindset where any mistakes are considered unforgivable.
By not appreciating their small wins to empower and reinforce moving forward toward their ultimate goal.
By not giving themselves any flexibility in their mindset and having all the emotional resilience of frosted glass.
By not giving themselves any compassion or self-forgiveness for their failures or lack of experience.
These misguided try-hards struggle so hard to become financially successful and meet other’s expectations. They try so hard to be manly and be seen as the ‘Alpha’. They try so hard to be attractive and be looked up to by women. They try so very hard that it stops them from succeeding in everything they do. Like the test taker who knows the materials but gets so anxious during the exam, they can’t remember anything and flunk out. These men put so much pressure on themselves that it prevents them from achieving their goals and having a meaningful and joyful life.
The harmful signs of the hyper-intentional, try-hard mindset:
Constant anxiety:
The pressures both within and without to achieve unfailingly can create reoccurring and crushing anxiety that interferes with joyful achievement in life.
Perfectionist ideals:
The setting of only 100% achievement as acceptable leads to frustration, depression, and anger. If the only enjoyment a person gets is when they do it perfectly, no surprise life becomes mostly joyless as perfection is seldom if ever achieved.
Obsessive thoughts:
Like a horse with blinders on, those with obsessive thoughts can only see their goal and the rest of their responsibilities just disappear. They lack awareness and perspective regarding other important aspects of life they may be neglecting. They sprint down the garden path to never smell the flowers along the way thereby missing out on much of life.
Procrastination:
When the fear of failure becomes too intense and the stress too high, people will postpone and put off activities that need to be done, resulting in failing to do their duties whether at work, at home, or in
relationships.
Self-Criticism:
By setting the goal as an absolute win or fail, those suffering from hyper-intention tend to be very hyper-critical of their performance and value. This is harmful to their confidence and mental health.
Physical Symptoms:
Since the mind and body are inextricably linked, excessive stress from trying too hard can lead to physical issues with the digestive system, varying muscle pain, headaches, and even heart palpitations or irregular heart rhythms.
Avoidance:
Counter-intuitively, when something becomes so important to a person that its failure would damage their self-identity, they avoid the challenge to protect their psyche. Would you run in a race if you imagined losing meant to be eaten by your own internal and imaginary demons?

The illusion of control

The idea of absolute control in life is a just as sexy and unrealistic a notion to men as porn is in its lack of realism in relationships. I think it’s an apt analogy in that both are an illusion that will never be fully manifested in real life. It’s just not how life or relationships work, hence a fantasy. And when fantasies are made the foundation of your reality: the pain of failure is the predictable result.

You can’t control how others view you: They have their own perception you can’t directly change.

You can't control random events: You could have a car crash tomorrow.
You can't control your job: Companies fail, and positions get transferred,
You can't control your woman: She could cheat on you, take your money, and break your heart, no matter what you do or say.
You can't even fully control your health: Heart attacks, strokes, cancer, etc… The list is endless proving that you don’t even fully control your body!

Realize that if you try to fight reality, the universe conspires against you and your mental health suffers. The best you can do is influence results, as in having some affect on outcomes, especially those things within a couple of armlengths of you physically. That’s it. Learn to live it.

But for some men, this can be hard to accept, so they try to clench tightly to those things that matter to them. The sad fact is that if you hold onto anything in life too tightly—you tend to crush all that you love and wish to achieve.

Why is striving for control dangerous to mental health?

A key component of mental health is accepting reality, the good and the bad. Life is scary in that anything can happen no matter one’s level of preparation. Through savvy planning, a man can minimize the chance of failure, but you can never eliminate the very real possibility of tragedy.

When people try to ignore reality it’s usually out of fear. Fear of the future and fear of failure. Men’s attempt to control every aspect of their reality is similar to women’s tendency to deny aspects of reality in that they both come from a desire for security, but the problem is it’s a false security. Avoiding reality through controlling behaviors is a path toward failed happiness because life is about uncertainty, not guarantees. Relationships involve risks, not ironclad promises things won’t change. Since life is by definition about how people and events change, when you try to hold things still within clenched fists, what happens?—

The vibrancy of Life ends. Relationships crumble. Previously achievable goals become impossible. Personal growth stops.

Striving to achieve the impossible of absolute dominion over anything puts significant energy towards a task that can't ever be achieved. There is nothing in life you fully control—and every man must grow to accept that. And if you can’t: frustration and anxiety grow into anger or depression.

Examples of over-controlling and its results:

Driving a car: If you hold onto the steering wheel, you can squeeze so tightly you can’t feel the road, you tire quickly, and you are more likely to crash the automobile.
Playing sports: In sports like tennis holding the tennis racket too tightly you lose fine control and can’t play well. If you hold a football too tight, your ability to throw accurately degrades.
Speaking in public: Try to talk too loud or too forcefully, your voice loses its tonality and strength. You sound anxious, fearful, and low in confidence.
Maneuvering in social setting: Try to hard to control people’s opinions? Worry too much how they perceive you? And you come off as inauthentic and insecure. As well as a simp for women to abuse.
Working in a job: Trying too hard at work leads to stress, anxiety, and burnout. Meanwhile you lose out on relationships and self-enrichment activities so important to mental health.
Supervising as a boss: Micromanaging and overlording your workers makes them lose respect, productivity, and innovation of spirit.
Connecting in a relationship: If you try too hard to control, micromanage, or track your spouse regarding how they spend money or their behaviors around other men, you exhaust yourself from the effort. And you take away your spouse’s sense of freedom by turning her beloved home into a cage. Through controlling behaviors, spouses are told they cannot be trusted and experience resentment. And the controllers become resentful too, as in their minds it is taking every last ounce of the Try-Hards energy and attention to keep it going single-handedly.

Causes of controlling behaviors in men.

So why do men try to control everything if it’s practically impossible and ultimately bad for their health? Namely, fear and the harmful messaging from a gynocentric society that men are ultimately responsible for freaking everything. Case in point, a recent new story talking about how the marriages rates are down because women can’t find the partners they feel they are entitled too—like this is men’s fault too?!

Often as men grow up, they are taught to feel responsible and take ownership of every success or failure no matter the source. If something fails, it’s portrayed to be the man’s fault, sometimes to ridiculous standards. Consequently, many men try to control everything with a zealot’s furor. These are often the men who believe their masculinity is a magical spell that fixes all ills in the world: The ‘Man up’ and just ‘make it happen’ crowd. That belief system may give some comfort, but it doesn’t carry much weight with reality.

Also, men suffer traumas like financial hardship, relationship infidelity, and divorce trauma that create scars that affect men’s decision-making for the future. Men feel fear and insecurity, combined with doubt in themselves to handle the future. Men develop coping behaviors to protect themselves from future harm by trying to ‘micro-manage’ every factor in their lives to such an exaggerated degree it’s harmful to their success. When all the infinite possibilities of the universe are thought to hinge on one individual’s choices—that’s just too much pressure for any man, or any human for that matter, to handle for long. Consequently, men eventually break down or self-destruct. This is likely why in society we see that 80% of suicides are male, almost 4 times that of women. Maybe that’s why 30% of men per the American Psychological Association report depression at some point in their lives as well as 10% report daily feelings of depression. This male martyr complex that everything that goes wrong is the man’s fault is the fracture point of male mental health.

I, myself have had issues with my first wife’s financial infidelity, and consequently have had issues with trying to over-control finances in my consequent marriage, where I tried to micromanage and track every dollar she spent to an admittedly crazy degree. This has caused issues stifling my wife’s autonomy, so I’ve learned to dial it back. I’ve learned to accept I can influence her spending, but I can’t ultimately control every penny she spends. I stopped being the Try-Hard when it served no useful purpose.

Solutions to break the cycle of control:

1. Accept occasional failure as normal:

Accept that failure in life is not only unavoidable it is a naturally reoccurring phenomenon. Everyone fails, but through failure comes strength, perseverance, and growth. Failure is a consistent step towards eventual success. Yes, you might get hurt and disappointed in relationships. You might not succeed in achieving your goals-but you’ll survive even so. You will also learn to accommodate and adapt through blessed failure toward becoming a better, more emotionally resilient man.

2. Reject the delusion of ownership:

The ancient Stoics of Greece realized that man never controls life, he only controls his judgment of events that transpire. Today, men need to accept this premise and go one step further to realize that we never own or possess people or things in life. We only have relationships with the people or things we value. The harmful concept of ownership can damage the self when the things we treasure are inevitably threatened or lost. This is exactly what happens when men lose their possessions, their job, or their marriage, and find their entire identity overturned.

If you can accept you only relate to things and never actually own them, you can adapt to the trauma of their removal. One thing in life that is irrefutable: everything we love will eventually be taken from us.

3. Plan for financial failure:

If a man can accept that loss will be a staple of life, he can deal with financial downturns with all its life-changing corollaries. So, instead of setting goals based on the assumption our savings and wealth will always be there, integrate their disappearance into your plans. Plan for failure. Plan on ways to mitigate even the worst-case scenarios through diversifying and compartmentalizing finances. Plan out financial security nets. But endeavor to ease off the micromanagement and the stress. Certainly, let go of the stress of money being the leading indicator of your identity as a man.

And remember, money only equates to possessions you don’t need, security that doesn’t exist, and social status lasting only as long as people’s memories.

4. Set relationship boundaries:

Sometimes guys try to track and control their partner’s activities to absurd degrees out of fear of their partner cheating on the relationship. Fear of losing someone is reasonable, but becoming a tyrant to crush all possibility of that happening is not reasonable. Fearing unduly your partner will cheat or be taken from you can be its own self-fulfilling prophecy if you let it take over your handling of your relationship.

Accept and recognize signs of infidelity, but know that if she does cheat, you'll know eventually. In that case, she will lose you and all that you represent. If that’s not enough to keep her from cheating, you don’t have a relationship of value worth holding onto anyway. Trying to construct and maintain a relationship where cheating is an impossibility is a relationship Gulag; A prospect best avoided to preserve peace and sanity.

Relationships are a risk, and you can’t micromanage or prepare away the possibility of betrayal or disappointment. So set your boundaries and let her do as she chooses to either enjoy the benefits of you or suffer the consequences of your loss from her life. In fact, as a normal routine practice negative visualization where you imagine life without your loved ones and how you would handle it. At first, this may give you stress, but eventually, it will gift you with a Zen awareness that you will go on regardless of your sufferings.

5. Give consequences for behavior, not threats:

When people fear someone taking advantage of them or treating them badly, some people will increase defensive or threatening behaviors. It’s instinctive but generally ineffective. Better to accept that sometimes people will overstep. Sometimes people will make choices not desirable or acceptable to you, regardless of what you say or do beforehand. Communicate and decide a consequence for bad behavior, but don’t stress about the possibility of it happening. Your emotional pre-loading won’t change their decision-making math by not even one single digit.

In relationships when budgets are tight and your wife doesn’t recognize that reality, arguing about it won’t change the outcome of her spending. If your wife overspends, try budgeting and connecting her overspending ‘incidents’ with luxury penalities for her. But failing that, you will eventually eject her from your life as being too much of a financial anchor. Once you set and commit to the consequence, worrying about it serves no purpose.

6. Adopt a more resilient mindset:

By exerting Influence NOT control.
By enjoying possessions as luxuries NOT needing things to survive and be happy.
By relating to people NOT owning people in your life.
By embracing others loosely NOT grappling tightly for control of the relationship.
By boosting the lives of your loved ones to keep them around NOT threatening others to stay with you.
By accepting your value and treatment of others keeps them with you NOT your efforts to force them to stay.
By confidently acknowledging no matter what happens in the future you will continue to press on toward your life goals.

Conclusion:

Sometimes we as men are our own worst enemy in our desire to keep masculine control by squeezing tight to the possessions and people we value. Absolute control of our lives and relationships is an illusion harmful to mental health that needs to be shed and replaced with a more durable mindset of masculinity. So far, the best philosophy to have in life is to reject the need to control but instead embrace influencing outcomes and accepting uncertainty as the natural order of things. Have confidence in your ability to deal with loss and failure to preserve your sanity. And with the people in your life strive to hold on loosely—

to let your loved ones have a chance to grow closer to you.

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