Pardon this moment of book self-promotion: Did I happen to mention that I can now reveal the jacket of the paperback for Better Than Before? Oh right, maybe I did. Anyway, here it is again!

Because nothing boosts happiness more than a great book, each month, I suggest:

· one outstanding book about happiness or habits

· one outstanding work of children’s or young-adult literature–I have a crazy passion for kidlit

· one eccentric pick–a widely admired and excellent book that I love, yes, but one that may not appeal to everyone

Shop at IndieBound, BN.com, or Amazon (I’m an affiliate), or your favorite local bookstore. Or visit the library! Drumroll…

A book about happiness, good habits, or human nature

Pack of Two: the Intricate Bonds Between People and Dogs by Caroline Knapp (I’ve been obsessively reading dog books lately, and this book discusses the connection between dogs, happiness, and habits–and much more)

Buy from IndieBound; BN.com; Amazon.

An outstanding children’s book:

Fairy Tales by Hans Christian Andersen

Buy from IndieBound; BN.com; Amazon.

An eccentric pick:

J. M. Barrie and the Lost Boys: the Real Story Behind Peter Pan by Andrew Birkin

Buy from IndieBound; BN.com; Amazon.

Some readers have said that they wished that I’d describe and make the case for my book choices, instead of just providing links. I’ve noticed that many times, when someone describes a book to me, I want to read it less. And often, weirdly, the better a book is, the worse it sounds.

Nevertheless, because so many readers have requested it, I’ve decided to give a bit more context for these choices in the book-club newsletter. So if you’d like to know more about why I made these selections, check there. To get that free monthly book-club newsletter, and to make sure you don’ t miss any recommendations, sign up here.

In any event, I assure you that, for all the books I choose, I love them; I’ve read them at least twice if not many times; and they’re widely admired.

If you read last month’s recommendations…what did you think?

I love me a good breakfast burrito.

They’re great for when you’re on the go, and if you’re generous with the stuffing, they can really fill you up.

But if you’re like most busy American men, you just don’t have time to whip up a breakfast burrito in the mornings. Sure, you could do one with just egg and cheese, but we all know the best part of a breakfast burrito is the copious amount of savory, meaty sausage, which takes a little while to cook. So you stop by a fast food joint to pick up a breakfast burrito, or you microwave the frozen variety you bought from the grocery store.

The thing is, stopping at a QuickTrip to pick up a breakfast burrito may not even save you that much time and it’s not saving you any money (the going rate for a QT burrito is $2.50 right now). And those store-bought pre-made burritos? They’re dinky. I have to eat two of them to fill me up and they’re always skimpy on the sausage.

The inside of an El Monterey breakfast burrito. Hey, where’s the beef? And by beef, I mean sausage.

What’s more, with the fast food and store-bought breakfast burritos, you’re getting a lot more additives and preservatives. Just take a look at the list of ingredients for El Monterey breakfast burritos:

Mmmm, sodium steroyl lactylate, sodium metabisulifite, L-cysteine, yellow no. 6……who’s hungry?

In an effort to save time and money as well as get the kind of breakfast burrito I like to chow down on in the morning, I spent an hour and a half one Saturday morning a few weeks ago making a batch of 14 man-sized, sausage-stuffed, egg and cheese burritos that I could freeze and re-heat for later. Now whenever I’m in the mood for a breakfast burrito, I just pull one out of the freezer, warm it up, and go to town.

Below I share the steps I took in preparing my make-ahead frozen breakfast burritos.

Ingredients and Prep Time

You can make these burritos as simple or as complicated as you want. Just keep in mind the more ingredients you add, the more expensive and time-consuming they are to make. For my batch I went with the following ingredients:

• 18 eggs
• 14 flour tortillas
• 1 bag of shredded cheese (the pic above has two bags, but I ended up just using one)
• 2 16 oz. packages of breakfast sausage
• 1 white onion
• 2 green bell peppers

The above netted me 14 hefty-sized breakfast burritos.

Total cost for ingredients: $15.54

Cost per burrito: $1.11

Total prep time (including clean-up) was 1 hour and 30 minutes.

Compare that cost to the store-bought El Monterey breakfast burritos:

Total cost: $10.98 for 12 burritos

Cost per burrito: $.91

Then compare that to the cost of a McDonald’s breakfast burrito: $1.00

Yes, the El Monterey burritos were $.20 cheaper and the McDonald’s burrito $.11 cheaper. But the big advantage of the homemade burritos is that they’re, well, bigger. My burritos are at least 1.5X the size of these competitors, so you actually do save money when you’re comparing price per ounce. I also get less artificial additives and plenty of sausage in my burrito, which is how I like ’em.

How to Make the Burritos

Step 1: Prepare and Cook Onion and Pepper

Tip from grandma: chew gum while chopping onions to prevent tears.

Sauté for 10 minutes or so until softened.

Step 2: Cook Sausage

28 ounces is a lot of sausage to cook, so it’s going to take some time. You can start getting the eggs ready while you’re waiting for it to cook. Then page through a copy of Manvotionals to feed your spirit in preparation for feeding your belly.

After the sausage has been browned, eat a bit of it because sausage is good. After that, put it in a bowl and set it aside for the burrito building stage later on.

Step 3: Scramble Eggs

Crack 18 eggs into a giant bowl. Look at all those thwarted chicken embryos.

Add a splash of milk and some salt and pepper. Scramble.

Cook eggs on high heat for large, dense egg curds.

Step 4: Build Burritos

We’ve got all our ingredients prepared, so it’s time to start building. Place a tortilla on a medium-sized sheet of foil.

Pile on the ingredients to your heart’s desire. I started off with a layer of egg, followed by a generous helping of sausage, followed by some onion and pepper, and topped with some cheese.

Step 5: Wrap Burrito

I used my experience from years of watching Chipotle workers wrap giant burritos as a guide to my wrapping technique.

That looks like an awesome breakfast burrito. Don’t wrap the burritos in the foil right away. You want to let them cool a bit so you don’t build up condensation inside the foil and consequently create icy crystals on your burrito. Obviously, this means your whole kitchen counter will be filled with burritos resting on squares of foil. Alternatively, you can let all your ingredients cool, and then wrap each one up, foil and all. But I didn’t have the patience for that. Whatever route you go, repeat this burrito-building process until you’ve used all your ingredients.

Step 6: Place in Freezer

Write the date you cooked your burritos on the foil with a marker. They last about three weeks.

Step 7: Heat Up and Enjoy Your Burrito!

Loosely wrap your frozen burrito in a paper towel.

Between 2:30 and 2:45 seems to be the right amount of time for warming up these burritos. Flip it over halfway though. When you take it out, let it cool a minute before you dig in.

Look at all that egg-y, sausage-y goodness. Aren’t you glad that even if you’re pressed for time in the morning, all you had to do was reach into the freezer and heat this baby up to enjoy a hot and hearty breakfast? This man-sized burrito will fill you up with plenty of muscle-building protein and healthy cholesterol, and get your day off to an awesome start.

A few years ago we did a fun contest where guys submitted pictures of themselves striking the famous symbol by which the Art of Manliness has come to be known: John L. Sullivan’s bareknuckled pugilist pose. The contest was a ton of fun, and we thought it was high time we do it again.

Show Off Your Art of Manliness Pride: The AoM Pose Contest

Are you an Art of Manliness man? Are you a guy who’s dedicated to bringing back real manliness and making your corner of the world a little manlier each day? We want you to show off your Art of Manliness pride by taking a picture of yourself striking your best AoM pose.

See John L.? That boxer guy at the top of the site? See how he has his two fists up?

That’s the AoM pose. Any person who assumes this pose will feel 100 times manlier (even women and children and women-children). Go ahead – try it!

Here’s me doing my best John L. Sullivan a few months ago.

Did you feel the testosterone course through your body? Of course you did.

Are you feeling inspired now? Good. Here’s how you can enter this contest.

The Rules

Step 1. Follow us on Instagram.

Step 2. Take a picture of yourself striking your best AoM pose. You can get as creative as you want with your picture. Make it sparse and simple or add costumes and props. So long as you have your two dukes up, you’re golden. Have fun!

Entries are limited to one per person; anyone who submits more than one entry will be automatically disqualified. Only submit your very best shot!

Step 3. Upload your photo to Instagram and tag it @artofmanliness #putupyerdukes.

Deadline to submit is Thursday, October 15, 2015 by 5 PM CDT. You can upload your photos anytime before or on that day.

Selecting the Winner

After we receive the photos, we will pick the 5 best entries and post them on the site. Starting October 21, 2015 and running until November 4, 2015 voting will be open to the public here on The Art of Manliness website. The AoM pose with the most votes by 5 PM CDT on November 4, 2015 will be named the winner.

Just to get your juices flowing with how awesome you can make your pose, take a look at the winner from the last time we did this contest:

The Prizes

Grand Prize: For such a virile contest, we couldn’t think of a manlier prize than a $500 Huckberry Gift Card. Go on a shopping spree and buy whatever you want from the amazing offerings available on Huckberry. John L. Sullivan would battle a hundred men at the same time for a hundred rounds to win such an awesome prize.

In addition to the gift card, the Grand Prize winner will also get a Semper Virilis Buck Pocket Knife and an AoM Lapel Pin.

Semper Virilis Buck Pocket Knife

First runner up:  Our first runner-up will receive a $150 Huckberry Gift Card, Semper Virilis Buck Pocket Knife, and an AoM Lapel Pin.

Second-runner up: Our second runner-up will receive a Semper Virilis Buck Pocket Knife and an AoM Lapel Pin.

Big thanks to the awesome guys at Huckberry for sponsoring this contest!

What are you waiting for? Show your Art of Manliness pride, strike your AoM pose, take your picture, and enter today!

NO PURCHASE NECESSARY.  Legal residents of the 50 United States (D.C.) 16 years and older. Ends 11/04/15. Void where prohibited. By submitting your photo, you grant AoM the non-exclusive right to use it for promotional purposes on their site and other platforms like facebook.com/artofmanliness. Basically, you maintain the copyright, and you just give us permission to publish it on the site. Capeche? For complete rules see our rules page.

So I’ve learned to organize for traffic jams, in the following ways:

Plan trips to minimize travel at peak times
Avoiding problems is always nicer than coping with them. I know when traffic will usually be at its worst and plan any discretionary trips to avoid those times.

Leave plenty of time
Sometimes I need to make a trip during a heavy traffic time. Other times there’s roadwork or an accident that makes traffic worse than normal. I check traffic conditions online before I leave home so I can adjust my route if need be. But I also leave lots of extra time if I need to be somewhere at a specific time, so I won’t be stressed out by any unexpected traffic problems. Since this means I often arrive early for a flight, an appointment, or a reservation, I make sure I have a book to read or something else I want to do while I wait.

Have plenty of gas
As part of my emergency preparedness, I aim to always have at least a half tank of gas. This also ensures I’ll be okay if I need to take a more roundabout way home.

Pack the essentials
I always have a water bottle and some energy bars with me so I don’t need to worry about getting thirsty or hungry. And I have a backlog of podcasts loaded to my smartphone to keep me happily occupied while traffic is slow (or stopped). Other people may prefer music, language lessons, or audio books in either CD or digital format.

Use the restroom before heading out
This is self-explanatory.

Have critical phone numbers readily available
I make sure my smartphone has the numbers of everyone I might need to call (while pulled off the road, not while driving) if I’m delayed.

Keep the smartphone fully charged
Since I rely on my phone for communication and entertainment, I need to ensure I don’t run down the battery. I usually leave home with my phone close to 100 percent charged, and I leave it on a charging cable while I’m driving.

Slap on some sunscreen
I’m not as good about this as I should be, but for many daytime car rides it’s wise to put on sunscreen. If the ride is likely to be extended because of traffic, the sunscreen is even more important.

Relax
Since I know I’m prepared for being in a traffic jam, I try to not let it bother me too much. There’s nothing I can do about the bad traffic — mentally screaming at it is unproductive, I’ve found — so I consciously get into a “I’ll get there when I get there” mindset.

Post written by Jeri Dansky

Let Unclutterer help you get your home or office organized. Subscribe to our helpful product shipments from Quarterly today.

Illustration by Behance member Benoît Bossy

Leo Babauta of Zen Habits suggests the secret to successfully achieving goals is working up to them level by level, video game style. The idea is that you make incremental changes to your existing behavior over a period of time, pausing along the way to master each level before progressing to the next. He took this approach to losing weight:

Like a video game, the way to changing your health habits is by starting out at the first level, and only going to the next level after you’ve beaten the one before that. The problem is that most people start at Level 10 and fail, and wonder what happened. Most of us want to skip several levels, but we’re just not ready.

So the secret is to start at Level 1, and only advance once you’re done with that level. One level at a time, you’ll master the game of losing weight and getting healthy….

Level 1

1. Start walking just for a few minutes every day.
2. Reduce your eating by a little bit. A very little bit.

Level 2

[D]on’t go to this level until you’ve had a streak of seven days of doing Level 1.

1. Walk every day for a few minutes more. If you’ve been going around the block twice, make it three times. Or add 5 minutes to your walking.
2. Eat a little less than in the previous level. Just a little less — not really noticeable.

Level 3

If you’ve successfully done Level 2 for another week, you’re ready to add more:

1. Walk a little more.
2. Eat/drink less of something that’s empty calories — less soda, sugar, bread, pastries, sweet coffee drink, chips, cookies, pizza. Don’t drop any of these completely, just eat less of it.

And so on. Minor tweaks collectively add up to major changes. The trick is having the patience and diligence to stick with those small shifts and implement them week after week until you’ve achieved your ultimate goal. To stay motivated and track your progress, try using a goal-centered app like Coach.me, LittleBit, or Chains.cc or a more analogue system like Jake Lodwick’s Standards self-management technique.

There’s no bonus round in real life, so make the one you have count.

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“The Indian, in his simple philosophy, was careful to avoid a centralized population, wherein lies civilization’s devil. He would not be forced to accept materialism as the basic principle of his life, but preferred to reduce existence to its simplest terms. His roving out-of-door life was more precarious, no doubt, than life reduced to a system, a mechanical routine; yet in his view it was and is infinitely happier. To be sure, this philosophy of his had its disadvantages and obvious defects, yet it was reasonably consistent with itself, which is more than can be said for our modern civilization. He knew that virtue is essential to the maintenance of physical excellence, and that strength, in the sense of endurance and vitality, underlies all genuine beauty. He was as a rule prepared to volunteer his services at any time in behalf of his fellows, at any cost of inconvenience and real hardship, and thus to grow in personality and soul-culture. Generous to the last mouthful of food, fearless of hunger, suffering, and death, he was surely something of a hero. Not ‘to have,’ but ‘to be,’ was his national motto.” –Charles Alexander Eastman

It has sometimes been said that the life of the American Indian has been overly romanticized by those who lack firsthand knowledge of what that life really consisted of, and are merely looking back through the hazy mists of time.

Yet one who was not long removed from growing up immersed in Native American culture, remembered it as wistfully as anyone, saying, “The Indian boy enjoyed such a life as almost all boys dream of and would choose for themselves if they were permitted to do so.”

The writer of this sentiment was a man known at his death as Charles Alexander Eastman. But that was not his original name. He was born a member of the Eastern Dakota (or Santee) Sioux tribe in 1858 and dubbed Hakadah, or “pitiful last,” for his mother died in giving birth to him. The boy’s father, Many Lightnings, was thought to have been killed by whites during the Dakota War of 1862, and he was raised by his grandmother and uncle in the ways of traditional Sioux life; this included being given a new name when he became a young man: Ohiyesa or “always wins.”

Before this boy’s life would take a dramatic and unexpected turn, and Ohiyesa would became Eastman, he would nearly complete the Sioux journey from boy to man. The elements of this journey contain much wisdom for young men in the present day, and the grown men who wish to see them raised to honorable manhood.

How a Sioux Boy Became a Man

“From childhood I was consciously trained to be a man; that was, after all, the basic thing; but after this I was trained to be a warrior and a hunter, and not to care for money or possessions, but to be in the broadest sense a public servant. After arriving at a reverent sense of the pervading presence of the Spirit and Giver of Life, and a deep consciousness of the brotherhood of man, the first thing for me to accomplish was to adapt myself perfectly to natural things — in other words, to harmonize myself with nature. To this end I was made to build a body both symmetrical and enduring — a house for the soul to live in — a sturdy house, defying the elements. I must have faith and patience; I must learn self-control and be able to maintain silence. I must do with as little as possible and start with nothing most of the time, because a true Indian always shares whatever he may possess.” –Charles Alexander Eastman

The education of a Sioux boy began before he was even born. While he grew in his mother’s womb, she would choose a model of manhood from among the heroes of the tribe whom she hoped her son would one day emulate. She would then wander the woods alone and rehearse the valiant deeds of this exemplar to herself and her unborn child. These inspiring words, along with the peace and silence of the natural backdrop, were thought to exercise a strengthening influence on the baby-to-be.

As Eastman later recalled, after a boy was born, his family and tribe wasted no time in continuing this natal initiation into the role of man:

“Scarcely was the embyro warrior ushered into the world, when he was met by lullabies that speak of wonderful exploits in hunting and war. Those ideas which so fully occupied his mother’s mind before his birth are now put into words by all about the child, who is as yet quite unresponsive to their appeals to his honor and ambition. He is called the future defender of his people, whose lives may depend upon his courage and skill.”

During a Sioux boy’s younger years, he was largely raised by his mother. In Ohiyesa’s case, his wise grandmother Stands Sacred filled that role. As soon as he started crawling around, she began pointing out the names and features of different animals and plants in his environment, developing him into a true “prince of the wilderness.”

The 6 Virtues of Sioux Character Development

Stands Sacred also began Ohiyesa’s education in the character traits and virtues he would need in order to one day take his place in the tribe’s circle of men. “Silence, love, reverence — this is the trinity of first lessons; and to these she later adds generosity, courage, and chastity”:

Silence. The Sioux believed in avoiding trivialities and speaking only that which was important. The youth were not to speak to their elders at all unless specifically requested to. As Eastman explains, the virtue of silence was part of a larger standard of “Indian etiquette”:

“No one who is at all acquainted with the Indian in his home can deny that we are a polite people. As a rule, the warrior who inspired the greatest terror in the hearts of his enemies was a man of the most exemplary gentleness, and almost feminine refinement, among his family and friends. A soft, low voice was considered an excellent thing in man, as well as in woman! Indeed, the enforced intimacy of tent life would soon become intolerable, were it not for these instinctive reserves and delicacies, this unfailing respect for the established place and possessions of every other member of the family circle, this habitual quiet, order, and decorum.”

Love. The love of a male Sioux did not revolve around a romantic sentimentality, but was rather shown through adherence to service and duty:

“Every boy, from the very beginning of his training, is an embryo public servant. He puts into daily practice the lessons that in this way become part of himself. There are no salaries, no ‘tips,’ no prizes to work for. He takes his pay in the recognition of the community and the consciousness of unselfish service.”

The finest love a man could develop was for his fellow men; friendship was thought “to be the severest test of character”:

“It is easy, we think, to be loyal to family and clan, whose blood is in our own veins. Love between man and woman is founded on the mating instinct and is not free from desire and self-seeking. But to have a friend, and to be true under any and all trials, is the mark of a man! The highest type of friendship is the relation of ‘brother-friend’ or ‘life-and-death friend.’ This bond is between man and man, is usually formed in early youth, and can only be broken by death. It is the essence of comradeship and fraternal love, without thought of pleasure or gain, but rather for moral support and inspiration. Each is vowed to die for the other, if need be, and nothing denied the brother-friend, but neither is anything required that is not in accord with the highest conceptions of the Indian mind.”

Reverence. “Religion was the basis of all Indian training,” and a Sioux’s spirituality was inextricably tied into an awareness of the natural world, which he believed was sacred. All living things were thought to have a soul — not of the same kind as man, but a spirit created by the Maker nonetheless. The Sioux man felt a kinship with both the land and the animals upon it, and was grateful for the clothing and food the natural world provided him. He retained an awe and wonder in this connection his whole life through:

“The splendor of life stands out preeminently, while beyond all, and in all, dwells the Great Mystery, unsolved and unsolvable, except in those things which it is good for his own spirit to know.”

Generosity. The Sioux believed that “the love of possessions [was] a weakness to be overcome.” Acquisitiveness was thought to weaken one’s manhood and hinder spiritual growth.

To overcome the attachment to possessions, and maintain a minimal lifestyle, public giving was a prominent part of weddings, births, and funerals, and any other occasion in which a member of the tribe was especially honored. During such ceremonies, the Sioux often gave “to the point of utter impoverishment”:

“The Indian in his simplicity literally gives away all that he has, to relatives, to guests of another tribe or clan, but above all to the poor and the aged, from whom he can hope for no return. Finally, the gift to the ‘Great Mystery,’ the religious offering, may be of little value in itself, but to the giver’s own thought it should carry the meaning and reward of true sacrifice.”

The skilled hunter would regularly invite the old men of the tribe to feast with him and his family; in return, the old men entertained and edified the household with their stories of days gone by. By showing himself to be a generous host, “his reputation is won as a hunter and a feast-maker, and almost as famous in his way as the great warrior is he who has a recognized name and standing as a ‘man of peace.’”

Courage. The importance of courage to a Sioux is encapsulated in Eastman’s recollection that he had “wished to be a brave man as much as a white boy desires to be a great lawyer or even President of the United States.”

Courage was predicated on the ability to forget oneself in the pursuit of duty and the desire to serve and protect others. As Eastman explained: “The Sioux conception of bravery makes of it a high moral virtue, for to him it consists not so much in aggressive self-assertion as in absolute self-control”:

“The truly brave man, we contend, yields neither to fear nor anger, desire nor agony; he is at all times master of himself; his courage rises to the heights of chivalry, patriotism, and real heroism. ‘Let neither cold, hunger, nor pain, nor the fear of them, neither the bristling teeth of danger nor the very jaws of death itself, prevent you from doing a good deed,’ said an old chief to a scout who was about to seek the buffalo in midwinter for the relief of a starving people.”

Chastity. Chastity was not only prized in a Sioux woman, but in a Sioux man as well. Certain feasts were held for the young men that only those boys who had never spoken to a girl in courtship could attend. Demonstrating one’s worth as a man was considered a prerequisite to making oneself eligible to be a suitor. “It was considered ridiculous to do so before attaining some honor as a warrior, and the novices prided themselves greatly upon their self-control.” The highest honor went to the man who had “won some distinction in war and the chase, and above all to have been invited to a seat in the council, before one had spoken to any girl save his own sister.”

Part of the salutatory effect of the vigorous physical training young men participated in was thought to be the way such sports and games served as an outlet for their sexual energy, so that they might maintain a courageous self-mastery in that area of their lives as well. 

An Education in Manhood

“The ‘School of Savagery’ is no haphazard thing, but a system of education which has been long in the building, and which produces results. Ingenuity, faithfulness, and self-reliance will accomplish wonderful things in civilized life as well as in wild life, but, to my mind, individuality and initiative are more successfully developed in the out-of-door man.” –CAE

When a Sioux boy became a young man, his education was turned over to his father, or in Ohiyesa’s case, his uncle.

A boy was taught by the men in his tribe how to be a warrior and a hunter, and to understand the tribe’s code of honor. This education took several forms:

Catechism. A boy’s father would constantly ask him questions about natural phenomena, to see if he could identify certain plants, animal tracks, weather patterns, and so on. Eastman recalled his uncle’s regular drilling:

“When I left the teepee in the morning, he would say: ‘Hakadah, look closely to everything you see’; and at evening, on my return, he used often to catechize me for an hour or so.

‘On which side of the trees is the lighter-colored bark? On which side do they have most regular branches?’

It was his custom to let me name all the new birds that I had seen during the day. I would name them according to the color or the shape of the bill or their song or the appearance and locality of the nest — in fact, anything about the bird that impressed me as characteristic. I made many ridiculous errors, I must admit. He then usually informed me of the correct name. Occasionally I made a hit and this he would warmly commend.”

Storytelling. As an oral culture, Sioux knowledge and traditions were passed down through stories, which boys had to both listen to, and then be prepared to recite themselves. It was a highly effective method of “schooling,” as it strengthened a boy’s power of memorization, required him to exercise courage in facing the risk of public performance, sunk the tribe’s philosophy down into his marrow, and inspired him to live up to the heroes of the past:

“Very early, the Indian boy assumed the task of preserving and transmitting the legends of his ancestors and his race. Almost every evening a myth, or a true story of some deed done in the past, was narrated by one of the parents or grandparents, while the boy listened with parted lips and glistening eyes. On the following evening, he was usually required to repeat it. If he was not an apt scholar, he struggled long with his task; but, as a rule, the Indian boy is a good listener and has a good memory, so that the stories were tolerably well mastered. The household became his audience, by which he was alternately criticized and applauded.

This sort of teaching at once enlightens the boy’s mind and stimulates his ambition. His conception of his own future career becomes a vivid and irresistible force. Whatever there is for him to learn must be learned; whatever qualifications are necessary to a truly great man he must seek at any expense of danger and hardship. Such was the feeling of the imaginative and brave young Indian.”

Mentorship. The greatest method by which Indian boys learned came simply through closely observing and then emulating the other men in the tribe. Young men were constantly surrounded by mentors — a third family — who together helped raised him. These lessons in manliness came directly, but also by tagging along with father and uncles and apprenticing in the tasks of manhood.

A Culture of Honor

The Santee Sioux, like all ancient tribes, lived an honor culture, which included a few fundamental elements:

Competition. For the Sioux, achievement was a prerequisite to respect, influence, and marriage, and so status-seeking was not a frowned-upon practice; as they believed “that the world was full of natural rivalry,” competition was considered essential in inspiring young men to become their best selves and developing and maintaining a vital, virile manhood.

Contests were thus greatly encouraged, and were incorporated by boys into nearly everything they did. As Eastman remembers: “There was always keen competition among us. We felt very much as our fathers did in hunting and war — each one strove to excel all the others.” Sports and games — from running races to wrestling matches to attempting to get honey from a hive before being attacked by its producers — were a central and well-enjoyed part of every boy’s life. Even hunting became a competition for young men, who “kept strict account of [their] game, and thus learned who were the best shots among the boys.”

Warfare too was thought of as a kind of sporting competition; “founded upon the principle of manly rivalry,” it was seen as a chance for men to test themselves and gain honor:

“Warfare we regarded as an institution — an organized tournament or trial of courage and skill, with elaborate rules and ‘counts’ for the coveted honor of the eagle feather. It was held to develop the quality of manliness and its motive was chivalric or patriotic, but never the desire for territorial aggrandizement or the overthrow of a brother nation. It was common, in early times, for a battle or skirmish to last all day, with great display of daring and horsemanship with scarcely more killed and wounded than may be carried from the field during a university game of football.”

Recognition. What makes honor such an effective moral system for shaping behavior is the fact that both failures and successes in living the code bring public consequences — shame for the former and praise for the latter. Young men want to be recognized, and they crave the admiration found in a job well done. The fact that a Sioux boy was kept “ever before the public eye, from his birth onward” thus inspired him to perform well in his manly pursuits:

“His entrance into the world, especially in the case of the first-born, was often publicly announced by the herald, accompanied by a distribution of presents to the old and needy. The same thing occurred when he took his first step, when his ears were pierced, and when he shot his first game, so that his childish exploits and progress were known to the whole clan as to a larger family, and he grew into manhood with the saving sense of a reputation to sustain. The youth was encouraged to enlist early in the public service, and to develop a wholesome ambition for the honors of a leader and feast maker, which can never be his unless he is truthful and generous, as well as brave, and ever mindful of his personal chastity and honor.”

Skin in the game. Manly honor must be earned, and it can only be earned by those with skin in the game — those who take on risk to gain status. The Sioux offered warriors different degrees of honors for their valiant deeds — the highest being the eagle feather. While other feathers could be worn as decorative ornaments, eagle feathers could not be donned for style; the privilege of wearing these status markers went only to those who had performed deeds on the battlefield that others had clearly witnessed, and which were affirmed by the grand council of war chiefs. No man could claim he did something, or was entitled to any honor, without proof, and no man could “wear the honorable insignia of another.” Under this system, “No favoritism is possible and the highest degrees are conferred only upon men who have been tried again and again by every conceivable ordeal.”

The fact that honor goes only to those with skin the game was a lesson Ohiyesa learned well as a boy, when he asked his uncle for the claws of a bear he had hunted and killed:

“We dragged the huge carcass within our lodge. ‘O, what nice claws he has, uncle!’ I exclaimed eagerly. ‘Can I have them for my necklace?’

‘It is only the old medicine men who wear them regularly. The son of a great warrior who has killed a grizzly may wear them upon a public occasion,’ he explained.

‘And you are just like my father and are considered the best hunter among the Santees and Sissetons. You have killed many grizzlies so that no one can object to my bear’s-claws necklace,’ I said appealingly.

White Footprint smiled. ‘My boy, you shall have them,’ he said, ‘but it is always better to earn them yourself.’

Finding Manhood in Solitude

As Ohiyesa approached the age of 16, he had participated in all of his tribe’s activities “except that of war, and was nearly old enough to be initiated into the ritual of the war-path.” To prepare himself to finally attain the rank of warrior, Ohiyesa did what all the young men were encouraged to do: take to the woods alone. In solitude, the man-in-the-making contemplated the spirit of nature, invoked the blessing of the Great Mystery, and sought to let the boyhood lessons he’d received in virtue and honor sink deep into his bones.

During this time, Ohiyesa’s closest companions were his horse and dog and his “people saw very little of [him] during the day”:

“for in solitude I found the strength I needed. I groped about in the wilderness, and determined to assume my position as a man. My boyish ways were departing, and a sullen dignity and composure was taking their place. The thought of love did not hinder my ambitions. I had a vague dream of some day courting a pretty maiden, after I had made my reputation, and won the eagle feathers…

In this wild, rolling country I rapidly matured, and laid, as I supposed, the foundations of my life career, never dreaming of anything beyond this manful and honest, unhampered existence.”

From Deep Woods to Civilization

“Such are the beliefs in which I was reared — the secret ideals which have nourished in the American Indian a unique character among the peoples of the earth. Its simplicity, its reverence, its bravery and uprightness must be left to make their own appeal to the American of today, who is the inheritor of our homes, our names, and our traditions. Since there is nothing left us but remembrance, at least let that remembrance be just!” –CAE

Though Ohiyesa looked forward to becoming a warrior, and avenging the death of his father, the well-laid plans of his youth, and the entire life he had known for a decade and a half, were soon turned upside down.

In 1872, his father — alive and well — wandered back into his tribe’s camp. Many Lightnings had not been killed after all, but rather forced to flee to the Dakota Territory, where he had converted to Christianity, changed his name to Jacob Eastman, and established a homestead. Eastman had to come to believe that his fellow Indians needed to adapt to the fast-encroaching ways of civilization, and thus strongly desired that his son become educated and learn the culture of the white man.

As Eastman unfolded to his son the wondrous inventions of civilization and the tenets of his new faith, Ohiyesa was filled with both “admiration and indignation” and had to fight down a voice within him which cried, “A false life! A treacherous life!” Yet from a mixture of curiosity and filial obedience, he agreed to follow his father away from the Sioux village, away from the open plains and sky, away from the only life he had ever known, and onto a mysterious and wholly new path.

In the years to come, the young man experienced a bewildering clash of cultures. He cut his hair and changed his clothes. He converted to Christianity and changed his name for yet the third time to Charles Alexander Eastman. He learned to live indoors more often than out, and to spend much of that time within the four-walls of a classroom. Eastman’s education transformed from sitting at his elders’ knees, and learning the signs of nature and the symbols of his tribe, to sitting at a desk and learning the signs of arithmetic and the symbols of the English alphabet. Yet Eastman’s curiosity and intelligence won him success in this new and foreign endeavor, and after attending a series of preparatory schools, he earned his undergraduate degree from Dartmouth College and graduated from the medical school at Boston College — becoming one of the first American Indians certified as a European-style doctor.

Eastman went on to serve as a government-appointed physician at the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota (he tended to victims of the Wounded Knee massacre while there) and a tireless spokesman and advocate for the rights and autonomy of his people.

He also became a renowned author, writing many books about the culture of Plains Indians before the coming of the white man. Eastman was aggravated and dismayed that many of his contemporaries’ stereotypes of Indians — that his people were barbarous, drunken, dishonest, and immoral — were rooted in behaviors that had arisen after, and as a consequence of, the arrival of European settlers. He wished to educate the American people about Indian life as he had known it — the true ideals and ways of the Sioux — as he felt that the contact between the cultures needn’t be a one-way street; that whites had as much to learn from the native peoples as the natives had to learn from whites.

Eastman not only shared this message in his books and his lectures, but sought to put it into practice. He played an integral role in helping to develop and found Indian divisions of the YMCA, the Boy Scouts of America, and the Camp Fire Girls, as well as the summer camps of these organizations. He earnestly desired for Indian and non-Indian youth alike to experience the satisfaction of learning the art of woodcraft and the joy of immersing themselves in the spiritual power of nature — to receive, at least in part, the kind of “open-air education” he had gotten as a boy.

The fact that Eastman had grown up a Sioux, and then gone on to earn advanced degrees, made him a unique figure, and uniquely suited to acting as a bridge between the country’s native peoples and its new arrivals. He found much disheartening about white civilization, but much that was worthy as well, and he tried to wed the best of both of his worlds together. From this vantage point, he was able to powerfully convey the philosophy and traditions of the Sioux in a way in which non-Indians could readily feel their own lack of those ideals, and how their adaption into modern culture could greatly enhance their lives.

His words continue to have this power today. As such, in the coming weeks we’ll offer a series of edited collections of Eastman’s wisdom on three elements of American Indian wisdom that each deserve their own article. Here’s what’s coming up:

• The Sioux Guide to Situational Awareness
• The Sioux Guide to Mental and Physical Toughness
• The Sioux Guide to Spirituality

__________________________________________

Sources and Further Reading:

Indian Boyhood

The Soul of the Indian

The Indian Today

From the Deep Woods to Civilization

Indian Scout Talks

It’s time for the next installment of  “Happier with Gretchen Rubin.”

Update: I talk about Barnaby, our new dog! (As promised, here’s a picture of Barnaby with our producer, Henry Molofsky.) And a shout-out to our super-fans in Omaha, Nebraska.

Also, you’ll hear us talk about our new (and we hope improved, though Elizabeth is doubtful) way of referring to previous episodes, so that you can easily find them here on my site. That’s happiercast.com/32 (or the number of whatever episode you’re looking for).

Try This at Home: Raise the bar (yes, you remember that right, in episode 29 we suggested lowering the bar; the opposite of a profound truth is also true). What works for you — lowering or raising the bar, or both?

Happiness Stumbling Block: It turns out that friendly teasing is often not perceived to be as friendly as the teaser intends.  How about you? Have you ever had a less-than-positive experience with teasing?

We refer to two books: Self-Insight: Roadblocks and Detours on the Path to Knowing Thyself by David Dunning and Best Friends, Worst Enemies: Understanding the Social Lives of Children by Michael Thompson et al.

Listener Questioner: In our Very Special Episode 30, we had a very special guest — my daughter Eliza. She asked, “Do you have advice for a sixteen-year-old like me?” The answers are so thought-provoking and helpful. We play some highlights.

Gretchen’s Demerit: I don’t reassure Jamie when he needs reassurance.

Elizabeth’s Gold Star: Elizabeth, to her surprise, loves attending Chapel at her son Jack’s school.

Call for comments, questions, observations! We’re going to spend four weeks talking about my Four Tendencies framework for human nature. So we want to hear from you:

• Take the Quiz to find out if you’re a Upholder, Questioner, Obliger, and Rebel here.
• Listen to Elizabeth and me discuss the framework here.
• Read the chapter on the Four Tendencies in Better Than Before

Please, send in our questions and comments by voicemail, email, etc. What’s your experience with yourself, spouse, child, patient, colleague, boss, friend, etc? We’re dying to hear from you.

As always, thanks to our terrific sponsors

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We love hearing from listeners

Tell us — have you raised the bar for yourself, in a way that made you happier? And what about teasing? — we’d love to hear your experiences, good or bad, with teasing.

There’s lots of ways to share your responses or questions:

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Want to know what to expect from other episodes of the podcast, when you listen to “Happier with Gretchen Rubin?” We talk about how to build happier habits into everyday life, as we draw from cutting-edge science, ancient wisdom, lessons from pop culture—and our own experiences (and mistakes).  We’re sisters, so we don’t let each other get away with much!

HAPPIER listening!

Have you ever sat down on a toilet and wondered “who has peed here before”? Well, wonder no longer with the Bathroom Guest Book:

Yes, the Bathroom Guest Book takes the guess work out of wondering who has shared your commode. Who left the seat up? Let me check …

But that’s not all! Why stop at the bathroom when you can have guest books for your couch! And even your bed! (Oh my, that can’t end well.)

Post written by Erin Doland

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• Organizing and uncluttering to prevent falls

2011

• Helping children develop organizing, uncluttering, and other important life skills
  After reading books like Willpower and Top of the Class, I understand that parents can easily help their children develop the self-control necessary to be organized, uncluttered, and have positive study and life skills.
• Ask Unclutterer: Difficulty parting with sentimental objects
  Reader S. is having difficulty parting with sentimental items.

2010

• Exercise and focus
  A neuroscientist at the University of Illinois, Arthur Kramer, in “Ageing, Fitness and Neurocognitive Function” in Nature magazine, reports on another way to improve your ability to focus and brain cognition. The answer: Regularly participating in aerobic exercise.

2009

• Bento 3 adds sharing and security, integrates iPhoto
  New version of FileMaker’s Bento supports encryption and sharing.

Post written by PJ Doland

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