How to Respond to the Election Results

Whether your candidates win or lose, it's important to have mastery over yourself

I just got back from voting in this year’s election.

Tonight I will be turning off my phone, shutting my laptop, and tuning out the election results. I’m going to be reading a book instead.

But tomorrow I will wake up and find out what happened. I want to say a few words about how to respond to the results.

The most important admonition is about what happens if our candidate loses.

In the Biblical story of Cain and Abel, Abel’s sacrifice was acceptable to God while Cain’s was not. This made Cain angry, and God said to him, “If you do well, will not your countenance be lifted up? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door; and its desire is for you, but you must master it.”

Cain failed to master his anger and instead murdered his brother.

I don’t think anyone here is likely to kill someone over the election results, but it’s true that when we lose in some consequential contest, we are at risk of saying or doing something that could be very damaging - not least of which to ourselves.

If the election does not go our way, it is critical to have self-control, to be disciplined not to allow disappointment and anger to boil over into self-destructive social media posts or acts.

This is also true if our candidate wins, of course, but it’s especially important if our candidate loses.

In general, having mastery over yourself, not allowing the ups and downs of life to knock you off your trajectory or cause you to lose control, is a core masculine virtue.

Every online hustle bro will tell you not to let setbacks keep you from pressing onward. If this is true of business setbacks, then it’s also true of elections. Keep your focus on your mission and your goals. Ask yourself what words and actions will advance your agenda, regardless of what the outcome is.

I wrote an entire newsletter devoted to the virtue of self-mastery, a virtue that’s often neglected by men’s influencers.

Newsletter #62: Building the Virtue of Self-Mastery

A good way to process an election defeat is to simply get off social media for a few days. Make a point of not posting anything about it. I myself periodically step back from X when there are news cycles I find particularly distressing.

What else can you do? Go for a run. Hit the gym. Read a novel. Work on your side-hustle. Make a phone call to a friend and process the election with him. If you decide to have a drink, don’t get drunk (and for sure don’t drive drunk). Set a time limit for stewing over the election, say a day or two. Ask what productive moves you are going to make in response to the outcomes of the various races today.

If your candidate wins, similar warnings apply. While it’s always good to celebrate, try to avoid saying anything you might regret. Don’t forget you are still going to be living in the same country and community with people who voted for the other person.

I heard an elected official speak to a group over the weekend about how we should avoid treating our opponents as enemies. This is a good general rule. But I think we should be honest that some people really are our enemies. Some people do mean us ill and would love to destroy or radically alter our way of life.

But we can and should still see the humanity in our enemies. Perhaps even love our enemies you might say.

That doesn’t mean that political conflict doesn’t continue. And candidly, lowering your opponents’ morale is a big part of cultural and political conflict. (That’s another reason not to give them the satisfaction of lowering yours if your candidate loses). Still, we should be judicious in how we engage.

Do I claim I always get it right? No. And since my job, my mission actually involves saying sometimes controversial things in the public square, I can’t always simply avoid the fray in the way you might be able to do. But all of these same principles apply to me as well

Regardless of the election outcome, I’d also encourage you not to take an apocalyptic view of the election. Sometimes it really is the last election ever. I don’t think that’s likely to be the case here though. Tens of millions of people on whatever is the losing side aren’t just going to disappear. The future is more wide open and has more possibilities - and probably a lot more craziness - than any of us can even imagine. And don’t forget, there are many forms of power and influence beyond politics.

Also, winning can be a curse as well as a blessing. Sometimes you get what you want, and then you’ve got it. This happened during Covid, for example, when the urban progressives who wanted lengthy and extensive shutdowns got their way. Well, that did great harm to their own cities and has put a bit question mark over the future of commerce in their downtowns. The long term ramifications of “winning” may not be what they expected.

This election is important and consequential. But let’s still keep it in perspective. We can’t control the results, but we can control how we respond to them. Let’s make sure that whoever wins, we stay in control of ourselves and respond in a way that takes us closer to not farther away from our goals and aspirations.

Note: Cover image is AI generated by Grok