F3 Most men want to help the people they care about live better: a struggling friend, a son, a younger guy at work. F3’s field manual is practical about how that actually happens, and about one hard requirement most people skip.
What is a habit, really?
F3 keeps it simple. A habit is a regular behavior that has become so automatic you do it without thinking, like lighting a cigarette every time you start the car. Habits come in three kinds. Negative ones damage you or the people around you, like texting while driving. Neutral ones do nothing much either way, like most nervous fidgeting, and at worst just waste time. And positive ones make life better, like wearing a seatbelt. F3 has a name for a positive habit: a brick, because it is something solid you can build a life on. Knowing what a good habit is turns out to be the easy part, and there is one requirement almost everyone skips right over.
What’s the one requirement most people skip?
Having the habit yourself first. F3 states it flatly: a man cannot give away what he does not possess. You cannot lead someone into a discipline you do not practice. The most honest way to help another man build a good habit is to be living it visibly yourself, because people copy what they see far more than what they are told. This is why F3 puts so much weight on getting your own life in order first. Your own habits are the only ones you can actually hand to someone else. None of this is quick, and F3 is honest about why it takes so much work.
Why is this so much work?
Because the math is stacked against good habits, F3 admits. Bad habits are easy to fall into and hard to break. Good habits are hard to build and easy to lose. If it were the other way around, everyone would simply swap their vices for virtues and be done with it. So helping another man is not a one-time nudge. It is helping him slowly wear a new groove, staying near him while the easy pull of the old habit fights back. It is slow, and it is worth it, and it starts with a man who is doing the thing himself.
F3 calls this Positive Habit Transfer, part of living right in the F3 Nation Q-Source, the field manual for virtuous leadership that F3 is built on. Read the full teaching: f3nation.com/pht. F3 Denver is where men practice it. Find a workout.