Mark Manson, Postmasculine.com

Mark Manson, Postmasculine.com

Mark Manson

Medellin, AT

Male, 28

I am a professional blogger, internet entrepreneur, and world traveler. I've been to over 40 countries and am currently working on my second book about long-term travel and how to work/live abroad. On my blog I write about self development and creating a unique lifestyle for yourself. Feel free to ask me anything.

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Last Answer on October 05, 2012

Best Rated

Do you get annoyed when people still ask you pick-up questions, since you're trying to move away from all that?

Asked by subaruguru over 11 years ago

The pick up questions themelves don't annoy me so much. I still enjoy talking about dating and meeting women. What annoys the hell out of me is when people still assume that I'm a pick up coach or part of that whole scene. And I suppose the hardcore PUA questions still bug me because it shows that the person either misunderstands my work or hasn't read much of it.

Do girls get sketched out when you tell them you used to be a dating coach? Do most of them just equate that with sleazy pick up artist?

Asked by kevin.emerson over 11 years ago

Not anymore, no. Back when I *WAS* a pick up coach, yeah, a good number of them would get a little weirded out. But usually these days a girl doesn't find out about my past profession until I've known her for a little while -- so she's already been exposed to my personality and values, and sometimes even my current website. It's been a long time since I've gotten a bad reaction.

How do you focus on writing for multi-hour stretches? Do you work in quiet isolation? Do you take any focus-oriented medications?

Asked by Jay-D-D over 11 years ago

Without quoting all of the research on time management and attention span, here's what I do (and just take it for granted that most of this is backed up with research): - 50-55 minutes of focused, non-distracted work. - 10-15 minute breaks in between - Set a timer and stick to it. Or Create a music playlist. - People either focus best in light/quiet or dark/loud settings. No idea why this is. But I'm the latter. I do my best work late at night and undoubtedly with loud music blasting through my headphones. - Caffeine I've experimented with both Modafinil and Piracetam and found their effects to be far less than advertised. Yeah, they helped, but they weren't cheap and made me feel a bit weird, so I stopped taking them. When I was a teenager I was prescribed Adderall for ADHD. Obviously this helped me focus a lot in school, but the side-effects were far too deleterious for my taste, so I stopped. Finally, I'll add that the best way to maintain focus is to be passionate and love what you're doing or writing about.

Mark, I noticed on your site that you hired 3 interns and flew them down to Colombia with you in May. How has that experience gone for you and what have you learned so far from it.

Asked by Gus over 11 years ago

It's been more volatile and stressful than I anticipated, but it's been good, a good learning experience for all four of us. I really had no clue how to manage or motivate people before, and it's helped me work with others a lot more. All in all, the business is growing at a faster clip than ever before and I think a lot of that can be attributed to them, even if not directly, they've freed me up to work on aspects of the business that are most important.

You seem to have a mastery of being able to acclimatize yourself in just about any country. Was there ever a country where no matter how hard you tried, you just couldn't make things "click?"

Asked by TNThomas over 11 years ago

Depends what you mean by "acclimatize yourself." If you mean fit into the culture seamlessly, then there are plenty. China, for example, is more or less impossible to integrate yourself without living there for a year or two, and even then... Western Europe is obviously the easiest, especially the English-speaking ones... a few weeks and some local friends and you don't feel too foreign. I've become very acclimatized to Latin American countries the last year, mainly because I speak Spanish and Portuguese now and understand their cultures a lot better. But even then, there are moments when it's clear I'm the "gringo" in the group, no matter how close I get to my friends there. If you just mean feeling comfortable and confident in a country, then I would say the only countries that give me trouble are the really impoverished. India was very difficult and I never felt comfortable there. Cambodia to a lesser extent. Indonesia as well.

What are the top few things you think bloggers should do for SEO? I write good (imo) blog posts, but that doesn't help if no one knows they're there.

Asked by pinchy over 11 years ago

Get individual posts linked on other sites and blogs. Old school SEO techniques like directories, social bookmarks, etc., are not very useful anymore. Google has gotten really good at gauging how popular and interesting a site is based on people who link the individual articles and share things on Facebook and Twitter. So it's hard to fake a lot of attention these days. Also, make sure you article reflects a particular keyword with a lot of traffic. For instance, if you're aiming for the keyword "Leather Jackets" then you want to call your article "Leather Jackets, everything you need to know" or something. You wouldn't call it "Latest fall fashion" or whatever.

"PUA is about being the best version of yourself" has always resonated with me, but I found that even among those who cite that as their motivation, the 'scoreboard' still seems to be bedding women. Did you notice that too and can you reconcile it?

Asked by Jobstr Dan over 11 years ago

That's my major criticism of it and in my opinion, PUA's major downfall: that instead of measuring our self-worth based on our own values, PUA conditions us to measure it based on how many women we sleep with, how hot they are, etc. It's self-defeating in a way. Self improvement isn't worth a whole lot if you're only doing it to impress others. This is why you see so many "successful" PUA's, who have slept with dozens, if not hundreds, of women still have major self esteem and emotional issues.