Wisdom

Why You Need To Appreciate The Time You Have

96 Comments

“The Trade-In’s” is an episode of The Twilight Zone that originally aired on April 13, 1962. You can watch the episode here.

“The Trade-Ins” is a wistful and sentimental episode about an elderly couple —John and Marie Holt—living in the future. The couple goes to a corporation that specializes in “body swapping.” “Body swapping” refers to when one person exchanges their body for another’s body, typically an old couple seeking a youthful body.

John and Marie are presented with various youthful models and they are overcome with a sense of giddy, ebullient excitement when they consider the possibility of living their lives over again.

Unfortunately, they find out they do not have enough money for both of them. The operations require $5,000 apiece, when they only have $5,000 between them. In a desperate attempt, John goes to a poker game where he bets all of his $5,000. The sympathetic poker dealer asks why John is betting all his money and John tells him that he seeking a better life for he and his wife. After the dealer finds he has the better hand than John, the dealer folds and lets the man keep his money.

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John goes back to the corporation with the idea he will swap his body and use his new body to work hard to save up to get his wife the swap. He gets the swap and is deliriously happy with his re-found youth.

Marie is happy until she realizes that she might die before he acquires the necessary funds and that—most importantly—there now exists an impossible chasm to bridge betwixt the two. Realizing this, he sagely decides to find peace in life in his original body.

With this backdrop, the old man and his wife walk into an uncertain future, held together by their love and devotion for each other.

Here is Rod Serlings’ final narration:

From Kahil Gibran’s The Prophet: ‘Love gives not but itself and takes not from itself, love possesses not nor would it be possessed, for love is sufficient unto love.’ Not a lesson, just a reminder, for all the sentimentalists in the Twilight Zone.

This episode is a sentimental venture into what many men ponder in their life: what would it be like to recover youth lost? This question inevitably plagues the minds of many men—especially as they grow older and they realize that the once open book of their life has slowly but surely become an increasingly rigid narrative with more written than is to be written.

The desire to chase proverbial fountains of youth is nothing new. Greek writer Herodotus spoke of fountains of youth, as have many writers in countless other cultures. Spanish explorer, Ponce de Leon, came to the America to find a fabled fountain of youth. There is nothing new under the sun and the desire to find a path back into one’s past and reclaim the glory of youth is a universal impulse.

narcissus

However, the desire often comes at a steep price for those who indulge it. Much like the proverbial Narcissus, the desire to relive or reclaim youth becomes an obsession that operates at the expense of real life. Narcissus stared into the pond, stirring at the water, dreaming of the possibilities his reflection could be. His body wasted away over the years as Narcissus only dreamed of what could be.

While nobody truly can waste their life staring at their reflection in a pool of water, they can waste so much of their life fretting over what could of been instead of leaving the past in the past and worrying about the future without actively bettering it. The nervous energy expended here operates at the expense at reality and can only result in depression and unhappiness.

The desire to reclaim youth often betrays a man who hasn’t lived his life as he desired. A man only gets one shot at life, one chance to roll the dice and let the chips fall where they may. When a man lives by circumstance or fancy, he exposes himself to the merciless allure of chasing his own youth endlessly. When life isn’t lived with deliberate purpose and love, a man sets himself up for restless unhappiness and racking discontentment.

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Take John in this episode. He is an elderly man who has a loving wife and presumably has had a degree of success in life. Despite this, he felt the burning itch—along with his wife—to flip the pages of his life back to the beginning.

Walking amongst the displays, his spirit was buoyed and inspired by the ripe energy and blooming vigor of the youthful models. His mind and spirit was temporarily transported back to when the world seemed limitless and the dreams of today were the promises of tomorrow.

Of course, such callow aspirations are the province the young. As John has indubitably learned in his long life, the world is no man’s oyster and dreams often wash up—tattered and torn—on the indifferent coasts of reality. However, there still burned a fierce ember in his soul that hadn’t truly conceded to this realization. With his hand firmly in his wife’s hand, he broached the possibility of one more shot at youth and all that it entails—a shot at glory, fame, wealth and love.

Having not accumulated the necessary wealth to reverse both and him and his wife simultaneously, John decides to transform himself and earn the funds necessary to whisk his wife back in time with him. Marie reacts poorly upon seeing his new form. His wife’s horror at his transformation could be borne out of a couple reasons: he is no longer the man she fell in love with or her realization that they are transgressing the nature of the circle of life.

Regardless, John realizes that the arc of life has already brought him through youth, middle-age and into the quiet beauty of old age. He returns to his wrinkled, aged body and finds his rightful side beside his equally wrinkled and aged wife. While they walk away into an uncertain future, they go with the sure-footedness that only come from love and a life lived with purpose.

What John presumably learned about life can be distilled down into a simple rule: One must use the time he has while he has it. Time is the world’s most awesome resource purely because it cannot be added, subtracted, multiplied nor divided. It indifferently marches on, without regard to any man. It passes on of its own accord, much like the current in a flowing stream.

Trade-Ins

John realized that he had lived his life as he wanted. He put in his years at a job, presumably raised a family and—most importantly—had found and stayed with the love of his life. When he beholds her terror at seeing his new, youthful body, he realizes that he was betraying one of the most important and life-affirming aspects of his life: the love of his wife. He had lived his life and it was time to let the circle of life run its course.

While this progression of life might not be for every man, a man must find what works for him. In order to feel a sense of accomplishment, contentment and personal gratitude, he must find what fits in life. By definition, this is an intensely personal inquiry that often is revisited and revised over the arc of a life.

However, when time is managed with deft precision and care, one can truly find happiness and contentment in this fleeting wisp of life. The mindfulness that springs from appreciating the ephemeral nature of time is a valuable tool. Indeed, it acts as a ward against the tempestuous and illicit allure of nostalgia and the chasing of youth vanished.

Read More: America’s Culture Of Narcissism

96 thoughts on “Why You Need To Appreciate The Time You Have”

  1. How many times has a Twilight Zone ep been referred to buy rok columnists?
    How many times has an ep been mentioned in the comments?
    Maybe Twilight Zone should be taught to the youth; they will probably learn more from Rod than from common core…

    2. It wouldn’t hurt.
      It makes me wonder, all these vampire shows, and others. It seems that people desire to live forever. But fail to realize that if your loved ones from your youth die, you may not be the easiest immortal for the younger death-prone to talk to.
      You might become a very jaded person, who never sees anything new under the sun?
      Eventually, you will forget those from the beginning, middle, and never reach your end. Living alone, full of many lifte times of regret.
      Or perhaps, you will look on wishing others could experience the life you are?
      My fear is what happens if one of those vampire wannabes becomes immortal? Twisting their world to fit their horrific drug riddled ideals.
      Or perhaps a “nice guy,” with a horrifically black and white concept of justice that time, in it’s relentless indifference, will drive into madness?
      There may be a reason, outside of physics second law of thermodynamics that prohibits us from living forever.
      We probably could not handle it?

      1. These very things were pondered rather deeply by Lord Byron in the tale Manfred.
        I highly recommend it.

  2. If my memory serves me correctly, Narcissus did not stare into the pool thinking about paths untrodden. He was transfixed by his own appearance. Hence the word, narcissism, which refers to someone preoccupied with self-admiration.

    2. Clinical narcissism isn’t someone preoccupied with self-admiration, it is someone preoccupied with admiring their reflection, i.e. how other people react.

    1. That was my first thought as well.
      Keep looking ahead although it’s difficult at times to keep from looking back. Use your time wisely!

      1. Absolutely.
        That’s why I get annoyed at some of the comments here and at other web sites where people are constantly going on about how everything is just so degenerate/awful/etc.
        Instead of using up intellectual capacity complaining about how bad things are, people could be enjoying the time they have now and working to improve their future.
        What you have is what you have. Make the best of it!

  4. Good article.
    Live the life you have as you live it.
    Avoid dreaming too much as you can pass many years living a life dreaming. Taking action and making things happen is the key. But accept you will not always achieve what you set out to achieve.
    Make more time. How many people waste 2 hours a day in each direction getting to work and back. Thats 1000 hours a year commuting – another 25 working weeks of 40 hours a week. Look at whether it is better to live in a smaller place closer to work or choose work closer to home.

    1. Another key is staying healthy.
      Eat well, keep your body healthy, keep your mind busy, groom well, work on your work life, and your later years will count for a lot more than if you allow yourself to become a wreck.
      I know some people in their 30s and they’re already old and burnt out. I know other people in their later years and they’ve still got so much to look forward to.

      1. Could not agree more.
        It does come with an odd influence on your perception though. I look at my peer group and see old, balding, wrinkling fat men with at least 2 medications that they take daily and think “Wow, this was GenX”. Meanwhile I’m in shape, have chart perfect health numbers, keep my mind active with constant new learning, and can climb mountains. Most of my peers cannot walk up a flight of stairs without either complaining or getting winded, and are about as flexible as a 2×4.
        It feels basically like they are aging, and I’m not, to the point where I’m starting to have nearly nothing in common with the age group of men I grew up with. Eventually it will happen to me as well, but to be so, dunno, decrepit and only be in one’s mid 40’s would be awful I’d think. Can’t tell these guys to improve their diets and exercise though, they have also aged mentally since they have not practiced constant learning as they matured, and are so dead set in their ways that you might as well ask grass not to grow.

        2. Freaking weird isn’t it? Their conversations have all started revolving around their ailments, or sports. Nothing more exciting than to listen to some guy you used to fish off the side of railroad bridges with as a kid tell you about his high blood pressure and triclyceride problems. Looks at you, and you see this really old fuck that looks just like his dad looked, only fatter (of course, it’s 2015) and more forlorn. Meanwhile I’m still wearing the same size jeans as I wore in my senior year of high school and can actively bench press more than most 20 year olds.
          His opinions? Unchanged since the year 1993.
          Last book he read – depends, do pancake boxes count as literature?
          Women he can attract – zero, not even his wife
          Ability to even traipse out and go hunting on occasion – gone
          All of it, easily solved, by just taking care of themselves and getting out and enjoying life. But no.

  5. Rod Serling was a genius, a creative writer ahead of his time who understood “the sin nature of man”. Many of his episodes ended with his warning to be careful what you wish for.

  6. I often think about this myself can’t lie.
    I was watching a couple of high school basketball clips with my young cousin. We were seeing clips of young and talented black kids that have the world at the feet ready to takeover once they get old enough to join collage and later the NBA. I was enjoying these clips until I got to thinking about my own life. I am in my 20’s but, due to experience and the red pill, I feel much older internally and wisdom wise. Anyway, my thought was simply:
    “Why do I feel jealous?”
    I would of shyed away from this question and feeling long ago in my life but, now I am more comfortable in tackling these truths and trying to understand where the slight moment of jealously came from. Basically, besides being a little bitch for a brief, I realized that I was not only comparing myself to a small kid, but also upset at myself for wasting time and looking at a young man going on his path while I sat in the stands like a fan living vicariously through him as if my last name was Jackson and my signature move was the moon walk.
    I felt myself become upset as my age was starting to become a thought in my head. Granted I am in my mid 20’s but, none the less I am not getting younger as the days go by. I should not be jealous of a small kid doing his thing and trying to live out his dream, while also feeding his family by soon to be making serious paper with his passion and talent. I need to be focused on my purpose and goals I will to accomplished. In order to do that, I must restrict myself on things not of worth and look towards things that would help me. I need restriction on my path.
    Paying attention towards the outside world about younger people coming up, peers already achieving more than I have at the moment, and the older people already at the mountain gaining more success should be used for fire to inflame my passion and spark instead of it being used to burn down their accomplishments with my subtle hate and jealousy. I need to continue my path and stay on the journey of finding my way and living life on my terms. In order to do that, cutting on things such as watching others live their life must be in my top 10 when constructing a list. (I’m talking to you “Keeping up with the Kardashians fans. Do you instead of watching them do them)
    The man in this post whne it comes to twilight was focused on the wrong things. He should of been focused on what HE liked to do instead of chasing the script that is placed out in front of us to FOLLOW instead of creating a path for ourselves to lead. Period. I am learning that more and more each day as I find myself asking:
    “Why do I care so much about trying to be better than others instead of learning how to think as one and raise my awareness pass the ego?”
    Why am I constantly chasing another man’s plan instead of my own. The man in the Twilight ep thank god understood that and seen that his life and how HE lived it was more important than trying to keep up with what is “hot” and “cool” at the time. YOUR life is all you have. MY life is all I have. I need to keep that in mind always and do my best to not become trapped in this rat race of trying to out do each other. Restriction in my thoughts and actions is the key. Whether its with women, life, family, friends, etc. If the path they are on is not in tune with mines, and instead full of hate, laziness, and worst of all bitterness because they are not trying to accomplish creating dope shit, we have nothing to talk about it. I am moving on and restricting myself. Period.
    “There is nothing new under the sun and the desire to find a path back into one’s past and reclaim the glory of youth is a universal impulse.”
    I can never get the time I wasted chasing worthless chicks, smoking wack ass weed with “friends”, wasting time watching dumb (Yet funny and entertaining I can’t lie) videos on youtube, or, spending time at a job I hated, but, at the same time though, its my life and my journey that I can change any time and shift it to my needs and pleasure whenever I chose to by restricting myself away from the bullshit. More bondage and self discipline will be another goal I am working on in my long list I already have.
    http://associationofchronos.com/2015/03/01/women-and-restriction/
    Great post. ROK continues to kill it in 2015. This site and Rational Male have been changing men and women lives, as well as killing the fuckery in feminism

  7. This was back from the days before the disease of feminism or at least in its infancy. If this were today, the wife would’ve insisted she gets the new young body first and then would dump her old crusty husband for a new young bad boy or a rich guy. This type of innate behavior would’ve been frowned upon back then, but thanks to feminism, it is encouraged today.

    2. The modern version of this is when she asks her beta-boyfriend for a loan to buy new boobs.
      New boobs can add a good point or more to some women. So why does she need them? Woman logic says: Because my current boyfriend is a sucker and i need to improve to get something better.
      So what happens once he has the new boobs, looks better and he had payed and nursed her during the healing process? She will dress hot…get her upgrade and dump Mr. beta.
      Nothing new under the sun.

      1. This is an absolute truth that every man should know and understand. Never buy a chick new boobs.

  8. Great article Charles, as always I’m a fan of your writing.
    One question though: you stated to live life with passion and love. How does one life life ‘with love’ in a love-less World ?
    Your thoughts are welcome, good sir.

    2. Love yourself first, the rest will follow.
      Add on: If you cant love yourself because you suck (like most people do) you got to change yourself until you are worthy. Takes work. Most suckers never have the energy nor balls for it. But it can be done.

    3. A worthy question, Nash.
      I recall my time in law school and I chuckle thinking that just about any answer to most hypotheticals would be, “It depends.”
      The honest answer to your question is: “It’s a personal journey.” But there is more.
      The institutions and culture that men could rely to provide generational continuity and meaning on no longer exist, or exist in debased form. To expect to find meaning through a family is a dubious proposition, at best.
      As such, it means that men have to work more at finding meaning in life in other ways. It could be small, like regularly donating blood and volunteering one weekend a month at a homeless shelter.
      It could be larger, like dedicating your life to working with struggling drug addicts or getting a medical degree and moving to a third world country and working tirelessly to better the delivery of health care.
      Regardless, it is *intensely* personal and requires a level of self-awareness and resourcefulness that I simply don’t think most men are prepared to handle. It requires elevating love at the expense of ego.
      Which, I think, brings me to your direct question. In order to overcome this “loveless world” one must become the change this world so sorely needs. No selfies while making sandwiches for the needy, no self-aggrandizing chatter at dinner parties about how your 2 years in Rwanda modernizing their dental practices.
      In sum — and this might be most difficult of all — in order to transcend the sheer indifference of this loveless world, we must give without any expectation of reciprocity. I’m not naive: even at his psychologically healthiest, man is still a somewhat selfish, ethnocentric creature with conflicting impulses. But only when individual men in this culture punch back and raise each other up — simply because it is the right thing to do — can we ever hope to consign this tragedy of love lost to the past.

    1. well yea, thats what liberal policies do. Create a permanently dependent underclass. I know so many young liberals who move to Texas its ridiculous

      1. “well yea, thats what liberal policies do. Create a permanently dependent underclass. I know so many young liberals who move to Texas its ridiculous”
        And then they ruin wherever they move as well. Eventually there will be nowhere to run and they’ll have to live within the failed states that they voted for.

  10. Solid article. If you remember one thing in life, it is to value experience and movement. You can’t ever truly move backwards and the child you once were would hate the current you for even thinking this. What is to be gained from trying to return to a stage when the world controlled more of your life than you did? As such, it is best to stack. Add to your experiences by moving. Add to your life by moving. Add to your loves by making moves. It is the movement that makes life all it can be, and if you can revel in a path chosen solely by yourself you’ll be ahead of the world. Besides, being human, no matter what we do, we can always lie to ourselves and say we could have done something else. Not so. You did your best with what you knew. Now you know more so do more.

    1. Even sitting still, everyone on Earth is travelling around the Sun and the Solar system and Milky Way galaxy. This results in everyone having a composite gyrating swivel-like trajectory through space with reference to the zero point even when you’re on your couch.The key is to go against the ‘flow’. Swimming against the tide makes for a strong swimmer. I think DON’T BE AWASH or DON’T BE A LEMMING is the answer to living vibrantly and exercising your motive force.

  11. The sad part is when you’re young and have the most energy you waste your life in school from the ages of about 5 – 25 then you get a job working 9 – 5 until your 65 and finally when you have the money saved up to do what it is you want, your youthfulness is gone and you don’t feel like doing anything anymore. So much for living the life…

    2. The sad irony of it all huh. Youth is generally wasted on the young as the saying goes.

    3. That´s exactly what I´m always preaching here when some smart ass explains how easy it is to accumulate wealth over a period of many decades. Of course it´s easy this way but nobody really needs wealth when of old age.
      People need wealth before they turn 50! Young people still have the energy and lots of ideas they want to realize. Realizing ideas is impossible without enough money though.
      That´s why 20 year olds should get paid more for their jobs than 50 year olds. This would be the best deal for everybody in the long run (young and old).
      Sadly, it will never happen because most politicians are old farts themselves and they would never give up their own massive salaries for the benefit of others.

    4. It’s not *that* bad. When you hit your 40’s you should have considerable wealth if you’re doing things right, and you still have the energy and drive to go out and experience life if you keep in shape and eat well.
      Didn’t always used to be like this. We’re staying “younger” physically now, if we so choose, because of improved knowledge about food and exercise, as well as improved medicine. Sure, most people can (and do) morph into a wrinkled old fatass by the age 43, but there’s no reason to any longer except through sheer bloody minded neglect of one’s own self.

    5. No one wants to revert to childhood.
      There is a reason that “if I knew then what I know now” is an old saying.
      There is also a reason why women never say this. They are still children, they don’t know any more than they did back then. They just want the hot body back that they used to have, because it creates male attention. They think bolt-on tits ARE the fountain of youth.

    1. The problem with learning experiences is that first you get the final exam, then you get the learning.

      1. Yup. Experience is the knowledge that you are about to make the same mistake for the third time.

  13. It’s speculated by many that life extension technology will be around within a few decades. The implications of that are not good for most of us, only people with lots of $$$ will have access to it.

  14. Just a thought, but I imagine this fixation on youth which has really ramped up in the last few decades is something that falls in line with feminized societies. Youth is a much more valuable time for women than it is for men. It’s really the prime of their life. For men, the prime of their life is when they’ve built a life for themselves and that takes time, so youth doesn’t have the same value to men. Very good article.

    1. I was thinking exactly the same thing. Our culture is feminizing at a very high speed, and now we are seeing the macro effects of it.

    2. I think you’re onto something. I never joined the dots together between the current cultural obsession with being ‘Forever Young’ and women’s need to be ‘young’ for as long as possible.
      These days we essentially preach financial irresponsibility to kids, so it’s no wonder I know so many 25 year old’s who live for the weekends and do absolutely nothing whatsoever of any real worth, because they’re enjoying their ‘youth’. I’m in my early twenties and for me it’s not about being young anymore, (Which is quite difficult to reconcile with) I’m getting out there and building the life you speak of.

    3. Homosexuals are even more obsessed with youth than women. It’s part of their peter pan syndrome. There’s a collective depression that hits homosexual men at 35 because they know at that age, their SMV to younger men is even worse than a 35yo woman’s SMV to men.
      As an aside, the more I learned about homosexual culture (I had roommates who were gay before I was red pill), the more I realized they’re very different than straights. I also discovered I had far more reasons to dislike them as a group even beyond the whole penis in male ass thing.
      “They’re just like you and me!” is a leftist lie from a person who has never spent more than 2 minutes with homosexuals.

  15. Nomination for the most blue-pill article of the year.
    What a bullshit squared.
    Given the chance to have a 30yo body from a 70yo body only a bloody fool would turn down.
    The fact he had only 5grand is perfectly fine. As a young man with the wits of an old man he will have no trouble finding a much hotter replacement. His new life would be much better than his first one, because he got lots of experience and knowledge to kick-start.
    Only the bloody moron would reject this for the company of an hold hag who will be dead soon anyways. Jesus how stupid can one be?
    And now this idiocracy is sold to us as genius? As the right thing to do?
    Well if such bullshit is right and good I am glad I was born an asshole.

    1. You have no idea what “blue pill” and “red pill” mean, do you? I bet the women are all over you.

    2. He he he.
      Well Maldek, no-one can accuse you of being sentimental, that`s for sure.
      What he could consider, is to keep his own 70 year old body, and invested the money in making his wife young again.
      If he needed additional pussy on top of that, he could buy girls from Boko Haram.
      Boko Haram sells bitches at 12 dollars a piece. That way he`d keep the comfort of his lovely and dedicated wife and in addition he`d have fine young, virginal, fresh pussy up to his his eyeballs.
      The older you get, the greater the joy of getting young girls will be, because with added age, the kinkyness will be even greater.
      He he.

    3. Agreed. Drenched with the feminine imperative. She is over the hill by 32 so the man better be that way also. You don’t want to accept aging? Shame on you! Shame! Shame! Get that one year of those good lays when your wife’s nude body actually turns your head then get to work for her needs for the next 50 years. One year for you, 50 for her.

    4. I hope you mature out of your deep cynicism, brother. You need to step out of your own experiences a bit to try and understand the perspective of a world where women were not feminists and men were happy to wife them up and create a good life for themselves and their families. There is an immense satisfaction in having achieved that goal.

      1. As a commenter you have my respect Ghost.
        But in this case you are mistaken to think I am a young cynic.
        I am beeing honest.
        Assuming for the sake of the argument I would be 40+, with children and a happy wife who is both a great housewife and mother and a great sex bunny even after decades.
        Even in this optimal scenario my above statement is still true.
        Even the best wife in the world will loose against the corrosion of time. In Islam men have the choice to keep their old wifes around past their sexual expiration date and simply add a young hotty as 2nd or 3rd wife for their sexual needs. This is the main reason why they are winning. More children and more honest system for all.
        We in the western world dump our 50-60 year old wifes and replace them with young secretaries or personal female assistants if we are wealthy enough to have these options. It destroys families and causes financial havoc. Not a good option.
        We might opt for a mistress in a nice condo we pay for and keep our old wife around for convenience and career, because as we get old (as in 50+) our own ability for sex goes down.
        We might have had sex 6 days a week when we were 20 (even if it was without ourselfs only) due to low personal value and lack of quality females. This went down to say 3-4 around 40 and then further down to 2/week around 50 and maybe 1/week at 60.
        This makes it easier to keep an elderly woman. Maybe get a bit fresh pussy at the side here and there is enough.
        But in the above example – the warp back to a 20yo body with all its possibilites where you could easily fuck like a bull again – in this case only a bloody fool would waste this chance.
        The money, knowledge and skill of an old man in the body of a 20yo would be a fucking pair of aces. Time to put all chips in the middle and go for the win I say.

        1. “Even the best wife in the world will loose against the corrosion of time. In Islam men have the choice to keep their old wifes around past their sexual expiration date and simply add a young hotty as 2nd or 3rd wife for their sexual needs. This is the main reason why they are winning. More children and more honest system for all.”
          If Islam is “winning,” then it is better to lose. You’re another of those guys who only think of polygamy in terms of YOU banging another younger wife. In reality only the elite get the extra wives, leaving such a shortage that normal guys have to turn to goats, sodomy, or inbreeding with double first cousins.

  17. Timely article. Alex Jones just recently mentioned full body (head) transplants soon to be possible and presumably for the elite and wealthy. I recall the Twilight Zone episode well. It’s up there with ‘Body snatchers’, ‘They Live’, ‘1984’, ‘Manchurian Candidate’, ‘The Dark Secret of Harvest Home’, ‘Genisis II’ and ‘Something About Mary’ (just kidding).
    The underlying ‘she’s my everything’ message in the story reveals that he has already given his life over to the woman. His autonomy gone equivocates with life lost? Around the same time (circa ’63) the Jack Benny show had an episode where Jack trembled in fear over an ensuing IRS audit – – YEARS BEFORE anyone had really seen the IRS using wanton seizure and gestapo tactics. The story came packaged from Hollywood in the early 60’s a mere five years before the feminist dream team of authors came on the scene. Women who’s male counterparts specialized in the shell game and convincing people that a piece of paper is worth their life or worth a hit job on someone else’s. If anyone could put that one over on you then surely their women could peddle the idea that women should rule the roost and have a paper CONFETTI PARADE to follow.

  18. Id be careful about basing your life’s happiness on the love of a fickle young woman you want to marry.
    Odds are she does not think deeply about a purposeful life the way you do. She can feel love for you at one moment, but if you lose your job/dont get a promotion/etc her mind can change like a lightswitch.
    It’s temping to look at an 80yr old married couple and admire them, but realize that 80yr old woman grew up in an era where her behavior was regulated and controlled.

      1. Sure they do, they’re the same as ever.
        They just don’t get TRAINED properly anymore.
        No punishment for anything.

    2. Yes its quiet depressing, to know you can never find true love in the west.

      1. The only thing depressing is finding out women aren’t as your mom presented them to you. Once you get over this and put them into the proper perspective it’s enlightening not depressing.

        1. While knowing their true nature is enlightenting, their nature is a depressing state. Why bother loving someone who doesn’t care about you?

      2. its made me enjoy the years I have left with my grandmother and mom. Once theyre gone no other female will give a shit about me on a deep level. thats the ugly reality.

  20. An excellent point, using a very poor example.
    The reality of the story were it written accurately, would be his wife killing John dead in some contrived manner, then absconding with the money to upgrade her looks.She’d then fuck a pile of Alphas until her looks re-decayed, and then she’d get married to repeat the scam again.
    Would there be an ounce of remorse? No. Hypergamy is her default operating mechanism, and it doesnt have time for the nicities of morality.
    Back to point-time is the only resource equally allocated to everyone. We all know what women allocate their time for-to maximizing their reproductive purpose. Everything they do from the clothes they wear to the choices they make upholds that creed. It is engraved in her soul with the firmament of Mount Rushmore.
    A man should devote his time to doing what he defines as a proper and positive purpose in his life. In so doing, he will rationally ensure any time spent with females is kept to an absolute minimum to ensure sexual activity. Time spent with a woman otherwise is time wasted.
    Imagine how much humanity could collectively accomplish if just half the men literally slaving and toiling for consumerist twats devoted those efforts to something worthwhile.We’d have flying cars and a Hilton on the moon !

    1. The world of 2015 is not the world of 1962. You cast modern assumptions on women who would have spit on and shunned modern feminist girls.

      1. The women of 1962 are no different then the ones today.
        Sacre bleu! Octavians gone crazy! Clearly women respected marriage back then!
        I say otherwise.
        The difference was social penalty. Notice how women today more or less wear the same clothes and parrot the same Facebook memes at the same time? Women of the past felt the same urges and desires as the modern sort. They simply didn’t act on it because the public cost to their reputation would be too high.Even then, as Bonnie and Clyde proved among other examples , plenty of women in the Olde Days gave in to their Hypergamy software.
        As examples from ancient texts like the Bible and others show, the fundamental nauture of women hasn’t changed much. Men whove brought women from masculine cultures in foreign countries to Matriarchies have found this out the hard way.

        1. Their natures are what they are, but the women of that time because of how their environment treated them would act and react in predictable ways that are NOT like how women act today. So I don’t disagree, I am simply stating that making both into the same woman is ignoring the context of the world she lives (-ed) in.

  21. Wow! This is really great writing. The write up was very well constructed. I’ve been thinking about this subject a lot recently. I’m 30, bachelor, decent job, and I’m wondering what’s next. Thanks for reminding me to live in the now and use my time as best I can.

  22. So this old guy saw something he wanted but it turns out that it’s better to act in his woman’s interests. Did I read it right?
    Is it this;
    Get your youth wrapped up and out of the way early and get on to being a man.
    Youth=living how you actually want
    Being a man=dray-horsing for the feminine imperative.
    The feminine imperative is EVERYWHERE. Even in seemingly red pill old favorites.

    1. No, you did not read it right.
      He realized that chasing youth when in fact he had already led a good life was an exercise in futility or at best wistful nostalgia. Wisdom and reflection upon a good life lived is not bowing to the feminine imperative. Besides, people used to actually be good for each other and love each other without all of the modern feminist dings that we now experience. Your comment is by a man in 2015, complaining that a show written by men who grew up in the pre-feminism world doesn’t conform to the new reality.

  24. It´s a good thing that he did not let his wife take the transformation or the war widow would have just walked off into the sunshine alone hardly looking back at her old wrinkled husband.

    1. I actually had a similar, if not quite the same thought.
      Basically, in the show, notice how it was logical for *him* to take the new body first, since it follows that he would have the earning power to then pull her along. The writers at the time, the early 1960’s, are a reflection of the time they lived in, which logically assumes that it is the man who can and should work to make things happen.
      In today’s world the very notion that the woman doesn’t go first, get everything and move on with or without the man seems nearly alien.

  25. Can you imagine the horrific abuse this technology would be used for in modern America? “Yes John you MUST take the youthful body as you can’t be allowed to die before the terms of your alimony, child support, and court ordered payments expire. This one is exceedingly strong – a real workhorse which is exactly what YOU are going to be for the next 80 years.”
    Naturally you’d have to pay for the ex’s new body too, probably two or three of them as they run out.

    1. At least there is the suicide option. Under worse case scenario one can self-eject from his current situation. And assuming there is an after-life, at least the cosmos doesn’t carry over things handed down to a man by other men in his human existance. Taxes, debt, alimony, false acusation / wrongful conviction, or any other injustice get voided out.
      Unfortunately as things become worse over time we will see more men calling it quits this way.

  26. 1. I’m 48. Offer me my 23-year-old body back and I’ll take it at any reasonable price.
    2. That said, I don’t dwell on the getting older. I do my best to stay in shape, stay sharp, and put my accumulated wisdom and knowledge to good use.

  27. LT Rorke: Before my father died, he said the worst thing about growing old was that other men stopped seeing you as dangerous. I’ve always remembered that, how being dangerous was sacred, a badge of honor. You live your life by a code, an ethos. Every man does. It’s your shoreline. It’s what guides you home. And trust me, you’re always trying to get home.
    Act Of Valor

    1. Growing old is like frying bacon in the nude, you never know where it’s gonna hurt…

  28. Today a couple in that situation could just start a crowdfunding campaign to raise enough money. This has actually worked for terminally ill people seeking the funds for their cryonic suspension.
    I know that could work for a fact because I’ve run a few of these campaigns.

  29. The proper outlet for this desire – the desire to, once again, have a life of possibilities in front of one, to be able to redo all those mistakes that were made, to once again feel that first flush of excitement as you discover the world – is to have children. To bring a new generation into this world, starry-eyed and trusting, and to give them a better youth than was given to you. It is the expansive love of giving – not the selfish love of the self.

  30. Come back, true love! Sweet youth, remain!
    but goldenrod and daisies wither
    and over them blows autumn rain
    they pass, they pass and know not whither -Conrad Aiken

  31. I will admit a weakness with this.
    I often think now at 38 years of age:
    “why couldn’t I have known about hypergamy when I was 12?’
    “why couldn’t I have discovered game when I was 15?”
    “why couldn’t I have swallowed the red pill when I was 17?”
    Then I lift weights, teach myself skills the market values, and figure out ways of leaving DC for greener pastures with the ladies while reading game blogs and reading game books (I used to go out and practice but things have gotten so bad it’s just too hard to have an incentive – approaching 30 yr+ porkers just isn’t very appealing). I wish I could say it makes the questions above go away completely, but it never quite does.

    1. Just go to another country and find out what you like best. whether its asian or latina, eastern europe , etc.
      It took me a long, long time but I finally broke down and realized American women are basically not worth the effort whatsoever. Learn another language and chase poon in a country with more traditional women, thats your only chance at landing a legit wife.

  32. Heh, for me it was Iron Maiden’s “Wasted Years” song.
    Yeah, plenty of “why didn’t I/wish I did”… on my end.
    But pain and failure teaches us as much or more than success. We need to hold onto both success and the lessons of failure and push forward, not hold in the present looking to the past.

  33. just woke up this morning, looked at my hands, saw the wrinkles, and was terrified. don’t feel that old and i’m only 25.
    then i thought: come on, don’t be a pussy.

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