All the skills in the universe, there are four skills that are absolutely required for you, as a man, to master if you want to live a life of long-term happiness.
These are not the only important skills; there are many others. Regardless, these are the most important. All other happiness and skills spring from these core four.

-By Caleb Jones

All four are required. If you master just one or two of them, then you’re going to be seriously screwed, either now or later in life. As always, I talk about long-term happiness, not just temporary happiness, and not just happiness in your 20s or early 30s. As I’ve said many times, being happy as a young man and being miserable as an older man means you have failed at life. The goal for the Alpha Male 2.0 is to be happy now and happy later, not just happy now but depressed or angry later like the beta male or the Alpha Male 1.0.

That means there is no getting around learning these four skills unless you don’t mind being unhappy. Your plan over the next 5-15 years of your life should be to master all four of these skills, whether or not you’re excited about it right now. You cannot be a long-term happy man without them.

The first two skills must be mastered immediately, right now, as fast as you can, regardless of your age, even if you’re very young. The second two skills are also critical, but if you’re younger you can wait to work on them after you’re 35 or 40 years old.
I’ll start with the first two.Mandatory Skill Number One: You must learn how to get laid, and do so quickly, easily, reliably, and without spending a lot of money.
As much as many politically correct women hate to hear this, regular sex with someone you find attractive is necessary for masculine happiness. We have all seen, and many of us have actually experienced, the pain, depression, dysfunction, and even violence that occurs when men have no idea how to get sex or how to get a girlfriend.

You must get to the point where you can go out into the world, cold, not knowing anyone, and bring a woman into your sex life relatively quickly and easily. The sexual baseline for the Alpha Male 2.0 that I describe in my book is this:

1. The ability to have sex with at least two new women within four weeks of losing your current source of sex (wife, girlfriend, friend with benefits, whatever).

2. Having sex at least twice a week (or so), regardless of whether or not you currently have a wife or girlfriend. (You can modify this up or down a little based on your level of sex drive, however.)

3. You consider these women at least “cute.” Only having sex with ugly or average-looking women (that’s ugly or average-looking to you) isn’t going to satisfy you in the long run.ou do not need to be some kind of serial player or master pickup artist. You do not need to bang 100 women. You do not need to have six or seven MLTRs or FBs on rotation. You do not need to fuck supermodels or 19 year-old cheerleaders. You do not need a perfect 10 girlfriend or wife. While those things are all technically possible, this crap is mostly mental masturbation pushed by the aspects of the manosphere and PUA community.

BUT! You do need to learn how to have sex with two new reasonably cute women within four weeks from today. If you don’t know how to do this, get to work and learn. It takes time to learn this stuff, but it’s not that hard.

Even if you think you don’t need this skill, even if you’re monogamous, or even if you currently have a wife or serious girlfriend, she’s not going to be around forever, you idiot. Long-term masculine happiness can only be achieved if you know how to go out and get laid relatively quickly, easily, and cheaply, whenever you need to do it. Otherwise, you’ll go without sex (or have sex with average/ugly women) for long periods of your life. That’s not happiness.

Mandatory Skill Number Two: You must learn how to make a decent amount of money without blowing your brains out.

What does “decent amount of money” mean? Based on the studies I’ve talked about on my blogs and books, it means you need to make $75,000 a year or the equivalent. Yes, you can round that number up or down based on your age, lifestyle, where you live, number of kids you have (or plan on having), and things like that. Regardless, $75,000 is about what you need for maximum, long-term happiness.

I’ve already described this in detail here, so feel free to read that article if you want more information. The bottom line today is that you will never be happy if you have constant financial problems. You will never be happy if you always strongly want things you can’t afford. You will never be happy if you have to constantly rely on the government or a girlfriend/wife to help you pay your bills (not to mention the fact that you’re a loser and a beta if you’re over the age of about 23 and can’t pay your own fucking bills).

You do not have to be a multimillionaire, own a yacht, or drive a Ferrari. $75,000 a year is plenty for most men reading these words. Learning how to make this kind of money without working very hard is far easier than you think. Buy my book if you want to learn how to get started. Teaching men how to make money on low hours per week is what I do.Or, sit around and make excuses like a lazy bitch. You’ll never be happy though.

Those are the two mandatory skills that are the fundamental baseline for masculine happiness. Once you’re making a decent amount of money and can get laid whenever you want, everything else in your life that may make you happy becomes possible, and even easier. Fitness, spirituality, love, children, family, travel, political activism, recreation, art… whatever it is that you want, all of these things become easier and more accessible once you have sex and money handled.

We’re not done though! As you get older, over the age of 35 and certainly over age 40, two more critical skills must be learned and mastered if you want to stay happy for the rest of your life. Here they are.

Mandatory Skill Number Three: You must learn to maintain your physical appearance and fitness post age 40 and do whatever is necessary, forever.

As I’ve talked about before, men who are too scared or lazy to achieve happiness (beta males) or men who don’t hold their happiness as their highest priority (Alpha Male 1.0s) can “afford” to let their looks start to slide when they enter their 40s and beyond. They can go bald, grey, get fat and dumpy, let their skin go to shit, and/or dress like dorks, and they’ll assume that traditional monogamous marriage (or the government) will take care of them in their old age, which of course it won’t.

As an Alpha 2.0 seeking long-term happiness, you don’t have that option. You need to look really good for your age, forever. This means that you must master at least a baseline of fitness skill and appearance skill post-40 that most men don’t even think about.

The good news is that most men in their 20s or early 30s don’t really need to take any extra time to address their appearance or fitness unless they already view it as an enjoyable hobby. The vast majority of men in their 20s or early 30s barely exercise, really don’t watch their diet too much, and many of them drink and/or do drugs, yet they still tend to look pretty good (with many exceptions of course). I experienced this myself; for most of my 20s, I didn’t focus on my fitness at all and I was still a 100% functional person.
This is all fine until you click over age 35, when suddenly this starts to change. If you maintain this level of neglect, you start seeing body fat in places you never have before, your skin starts to look bad, you start losing your hair, you start growing hair in new places, and all kinds of other fun things.

When you cross over age 40, the entire scenario changes. All of a sudden, just to maintain a normal level of looks, you have to do so many different things with your body that it almost becomes a part-time job. Let me say that again; maintaining your relative youthful, healthy appearance post-40 becomes a part-time job.

Plan on this, and do what is necessary, once you cross age 35 or 40. This comprises the following areas:

1. Research

2. Changing and monitoring your diet

3. Food prep and food cleanup (eating healthy takes far more time in these areas than eating shitty food)

4. Exercise, both cardio and weight lifting (not just one or the other)

5. Regular blood tests

6. Vitamins and supplements

7. TRT

8. Addressing baldness

9. Addressing your teeth, that have moved around since you were a teenager and look much worse now

10. Regular doctor visits for check-ups and physicals

11. Fashion

12. Water intake

13. Getting at least seven or eight hours of sleep every night

14. Keeping stress levels low

See what I said about this being a part-time job? It is, but it’s well worth it. I do all the above, and I am, literally, the happiest 44 year-old man I know, and I know hundreds of men. (Even that is considering that I’m still technically overweight.) On a regular basis, people I meet are stunned that I’m 44 years old; many assume I’m in my early 30s. It works.

You cannot let your fitness and relatively youthful appearance slide as you get older. You will feel older, have less energy (and probably make less money), have more medical problems, and find it much harder to get laid (particular with younger and/or more attractive women). You will not be happy long-term.

Mandatory Skill Number Four: You must learn how to budget, save, and invest so you can maintain your wealth for the long haul.

Again I will repeat that you don’t have to be a multimillionaire or something like that. However! You need to control your spending, save a lot of your income, and learn at least the basics of investing so that when you’re older, you’ll have plenty of money to protect you from the usual medical and lifestyle problems associated with old age.

The statistics on old people not having any money once they hit age 65 are staggering. Too many people make money throughout their entire lives, only to end up with nothing because they never fucking saved. Or worse, they lose their retirement nest eggs from investing into stupid, sexy stuff that Societal Programming encourages (like the stock market), or from getting divorced (ah, monogamy).

This includes men of high income. I know a hell of a lot of guys who make a lot of money but don’t actually have any. Years ago, I was one of these men myself. I made a six figure income during much of my 20s, yet every year my net worth was zero. Sometimes, less than zero! I would bust my ass again the following year, make a bunch of money, and still be worth zero at the end of the year. Stupid.

Today, I save 40% of my income, and I consider that too low; I’m trying to get it to 60%. I invest the bulk of my money very carefully so I don’t lose any. And this is coming from a man who never plans on retiring and plans on working for the rest of his life. You must have a decent amount of money available to you in your elder years, no matter what your plans are for your later life. If not, you’re screwed.

I don’t care how complicated or boring the topics of financial management or investing are to you. Once you start making a decent income, you must learn and master these skills, at least well enough to save and preserve most of your wealth. Married or single, healthy or sick, working or retired, happy or miserable, you will want that cash when you’re an old man, period.

That’s it! Those are the four skills you need to learn and employ. If you don’t mind being unhappy, then don’t worry about any of them, but if you want to live a happy life, get your ass to work and start learning and practicing these things. You’ll thank yourself.

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