Songfacts®:

• This is the title track and third single from Country music artist Chris Young's second studio album. The song was written by Brett James ("Jesus, Take The Wheel") and Tim Nichols ("Live Like You're Dying").
• In this song, the male narrator describes the kind of "man [he] wants to be." Young was in the studio recording songs for his album when he was originally played this track. Even before the song had reached the second verse he knew that he just had to cut it and wanted to do so quickly before anyone else snatched the song up.
• Brett James told the story of the song to The Boot: "I've written two 'prayer songs' -- 'Jesus, Take The Wheel' and 'The Man I Want To Be.'
  Tim is one of my good songwriting buddies. He walked [into our writing appointment] with that song title. Ironically, it doesn't strike me as an in-your-face title like 'Jesus Take The Wheel' or 'The Truth.' I thought the title doesn't make you interested in knowing what the song's about. Tim had a couple of lines already about wanting to be a good man and a 'be like I should man.' When that came out of his mouth, we started digging into that idea. I said, 'What if we make it a prayer? What if he's talking to God about changing his life?' Make it that he's having a conversation with God -- not just a friend. That's when we really started finding that song, when we turned it into a prayer.
  We all can relate to that -- wanting to be a better person and a better man. We wrote it from the heart about wanting to be better people and wanting to make changes in our own life.The second verse we thought we had to bring in the girl and why he wants to be that better person. It's a big part of the reason you want to change your life to make better for people around you."