So first off, there's someone reading this that probably isn't supposed to be but is anyway, so to that person and everyone else I actually like -
Anyone that knows me also knows that I've always had an unhealthy obsession with psychology. Why do people think and act the way they do? How are assholes made and how can we unmake them? Why do people be so dumb? These last few years have been a real eye-opener; I've learned a lot of thing about myself and other people that I didn't really want to know but had to learn, and am still learning.
So as my birthday gift to you, dear readers, a few life-altering revelations that none of us want to make but ultimately have to:
Here's where it gets deep, guys. We're all walking around like human versions of porcelain plates that have been thrown into a wall, shattered into pieces, and then haphazardly super-glued back together by a five-year-old because holy shit if my mom finds this I'm dead meat. Parts are cracked. Chipped. Missing.
But rather than having been hurled at a wall, most of those wounds came from much smaller, embarrassingly insignificant-seeming ticks with a chisel;
He said he loved me but he destroyed me.
She said the exact thing that she knew would hurt me most.
I failed.
I wasn't good enough.
I try so hard and no one seems to notice.
And we've epoxied over the cracks, chips, and missing parts with things we think will fool others into thinking we're intact. It's a forced smile. A nervous laugh. A flippant attitude. Anything that will make us think we're convincing the world that we're tough as nails, cold as steel, but holy fuck, please Dear God, don't bump me too hard because I'll shatter completely and there aren't enough pieces left to put back together again.
Also, there's someone reading this who has been stalking my pages on the DL in the hopes of catching something embarrassing or incriminating or, shit, I don't know, just because maybe I'm their own embarrassing guilty pleasure and they're obviously secretly in love with me. So to that person, an extra special word of welcome:
Haven't you heard? It's bird. The bird is the word.
I just love how that gif plays over and over in a loop, like there's a never-ending supply in there. It's the gift that keeps on giving.
Anywho, I'm taking a break from relationship advice to delve into the frightening, philosophical side of my psyche that asks things like, how much of my life am I wasting with sleep, do people ultimately want to do good, and, why the f*ck do people insist on continuing to use the infuriatingly obnoxious term "bae?"
My birthday is coming up (thank you, thank you), and I'm realizing that the older I get, the less filter I have, the less tolerance I have for fake people and bullshit, and the once-ample supply of give-a-shits I once had is dwindling at an alarming rate.
My birthday is coming up (thank you, thank you), and I'm realizing that the older I get, the less filter I have, the less tolerance I have for fake people and bullshit, and the once-ample supply of give-a-shits I once had is dwindling at an alarming rate.
NOT a gift that keeps on giving.
Anyone that knows me also knows that I've always had an unhealthy obsession with psychology. Why do people think and act the way they do? How are assholes made and how can we unmake them? Why do people be so dumb? These last few years have been a real eye-opener; I've learned a lot of thing about myself and other people that I didn't really want to know but had to learn, and am still learning.
So as my birthday gift to you, dear readers, a few life-altering revelations that none of us want to make but ultimately have to:
WE'RE ALL F*CKED UP.
But rather than having been hurled at a wall, most of those wounds came from much smaller, embarrassingly insignificant-seeming ticks with a chisel;
He said he loved me but he destroyed me.
She said the exact thing that she knew would hurt me most.
I failed.
I wasn't good enough.
I try so hard and no one seems to notice.
And we've epoxied over the cracks, chips, and missing parts with things we think will fool others into thinking we're intact. It's a forced smile. A nervous laugh. A flippant attitude. Anything that will make us think we're convincing the world that we're tough as nails, cold as steel, but holy fuck, please Dear God, don't bump me too hard because I'll shatter completely and there aren't enough pieces left to put back together again.
I was going to insert a Humpty-Dumpty joke here, but there were too many feels. Here's a kitten playing in the box that used to house the give-a-shits.
But in that despair, we create defense mechanisms. What does that mean? Well, it's basically a race to beat everyone else to the punch and NOT be the victim. Which leads me to...
It's true. You may spend every waking free moment you have reading to blind orphans and giggling gleefully in a sea of puppies, but let the right person push the wrong button at the wrong time and watch as your cool, calm demeanor suddenly morphs into a Voldemort-level evil with a steaming side of Tourrete's.
And yes, the timing is almost always completely stupid. And yes, you will look like a psychopath. The part of your brain that is ticking down the list of all the little chisels expects everyone else to know that you're not really uber-pissed that your mashed potatoes were too runny, it was simply the last straw in 15 ranches worth of hay bushels that you've been carrying for a while. All anyone else sees is mashed potatoes sliding down the wall and you Hulk-raging over sub-par but well-intentioned side dishes.
Your significant other wakes up with a screaming migraine and bitches at you for saying "Good morning, baby," too f*cking loud. Deflated and slightly pissed because your cheery morning greeting was shot down by the one person on the planet who should actually be happy for your face to be the first they see when they open their eyes, you respond to your too-happy-in-the-morning-to-be-human coworker's "good morning" with a throat-punch and possibly the finger. Your coworker, worried now that their mere presence inspires ravaging hatred, hides in their office in the fetal position until lunch time, and then sulks to their car and weeps while they eat the stale McDonald's that they totally didn't order.
Dear readers, I cannot stress this enough - DO NOT get sucked into the asshole loop. Don't let someone else's crappy attitude shit on your entire day, or week, or life. It's miserable, trust me.
People are assholes. People are going to screw you over. Some people are so damaged and those defense mechanisms are so deeply ingrained that they will never know how to treat people the way they deserve to be treated. But you do. Right? You know how it feels to be swept aside and emotionally shit on and told to suck it up, or that it's somehow your fault for existing. You know that the momentary repossession of control that you get from being the top asshole doesn't drown out the sick, awful feeling underneath that knows you just played a part in destroying another human being. So don't.
More importantly, identify the main person or people holding those chisels - and we all have them. I don't mean the husband or wife that was cranky that one morning because he or she had a migraine - hell, we're all that person some days. We're all that person on steroids some days.
I mean those people who always manage to make you feel like you don't matter. The ones with ridiculous expectations that they seem to think you should know without them telling you, who constantly complain about life and can't seem to understand that the shitty situations they're always finding themselves in are because of their own stupid decisions and shitty attitudes. The ones who have nothing good to say about anyone or anything and who are always somehow one-upping or undermining all the achievements of everyone else. The ones who kick you in the face every time you make progress, and then mock you because who the hell do you think you are and why would you ever think you actually deserved to be happy?
If theirs is the voice you hear in your head when you're unsure, afraid, insecure, or unworthy, the voice that whispers in a loop all the reasons why you deserve every awful thing that's happening - cut them the f*ck out of your life. You don't deserve that. They don't deserve to have that control over you. Life's too short to be miserably devoting your life to someone whose presence is slowly killing you.
WE'RE ALL ASSHOLES.
It's true. You may spend every waking free moment you have reading to blind orphans and giggling gleefully in a sea of puppies, but let the right person push the wrong button at the wrong time and watch as your cool, calm demeanor suddenly morphs into a Voldemort-level evil with a steaming side of Tourrete's.
And yes, the timing is almost always completely stupid. And yes, you will look like a psychopath. The part of your brain that is ticking down the list of all the little chisels expects everyone else to know that you're not really uber-pissed that your mashed potatoes were too runny, it was simply the last straw in 15 ranches worth of hay bushels that you've been carrying for a while. All anyone else sees is mashed potatoes sliding down the wall and you Hulk-raging over sub-par but well-intentioned side dishes.
... and now everyone knows never to bring f*cking runny-ass shitty goddam twitwiffer muthaf*ckin potato-diarrhea to a potluck again.
There are less-extreme manifestations, of course, but they're just as damaging. You don't trust your new love interest because your last one boned all your sisters and one of your brothers. You obsess about your weight because of that one family reunion when you were eight and your Aunt Mildred got drunk, insisted you were pregnant, and called you a whore. You evil-eye anyone wearing a McDonald's uniform because you once constantly got stiffed out of a McNugget.
So now, you can't have a healthy relationship, you can't leave your house without Spanx, and you're constantly late getting back to work after lunch because it takes you twenty minutes to double and triple-check your order to make sure they got it right.
And in one of the the cruelest ironies that exist in humanity, it's almost always the least-guilty party that catches all the shit right in the face once it hits the fan. You've probably been that person before. Maybe that ex boned 3/4 of your family because their ex did the same thing to them and they were afraid you would, too. Aunt Mildred - well, Aunt Mildred's always been a haggard old biddy. And I seriously think that it's somewhere in the hiring contract that McDonald's employees only get 2% of orders completely right.
Also boned 3/4 of your family... in missing McNuggets, stale coffee, absent bacon, and soggy fries.
Does that make it right? Well hell no, it doesn't - but it doesn't change the fact that we all tend to find ourselves in...
THE CYCLE
Dear readers, I cannot stress this enough - DO NOT get sucked into the asshole loop. Don't let someone else's crappy attitude shit on your entire day, or week, or life. It's miserable, trust me.
People are assholes. People are going to screw you over. Some people are so damaged and those defense mechanisms are so deeply ingrained that they will never know how to treat people the way they deserve to be treated. But you do. Right? You know how it feels to be swept aside and emotionally shit on and told to suck it up, or that it's somehow your fault for existing. You know that the momentary repossession of control that you get from being the top asshole doesn't drown out the sick, awful feeling underneath that knows you just played a part in destroying another human being. So don't.
More importantly, identify the main person or people holding those chisels - and we all have them. I don't mean the husband or wife that was cranky that one morning because he or she had a migraine - hell, we're all that person some days. We're all that person on steroids some days.
WHAT DID I TELL YOU ABOUT THE F*CKING POTATOES???
I mean those people who always manage to make you feel like you don't matter. The ones with ridiculous expectations that they seem to think you should know without them telling you, who constantly complain about life and can't seem to understand that the shitty situations they're always finding themselves in are because of their own stupid decisions and shitty attitudes. The ones who have nothing good to say about anyone or anything and who are always somehow one-upping or undermining all the achievements of everyone else. The ones who kick you in the face every time you make progress, and then mock you because who the hell do you think you are and why would you ever think you actually deserved to be happy?
If theirs is the voice you hear in your head when you're unsure, afraid, insecure, or unworthy, the voice that whispers in a loop all the reasons why you deserve every awful thing that's happening - cut them the f*ck out of your life. You don't deserve that. They don't deserve to have that control over you. Life's too short to be miserably devoting your life to someone whose presence is slowly killing you.
.... Easter egg-colored kittens. That shit was getting too serious again.
So the lesson here, dear readers, is that you're awesome. Chips, cracks, missing pieces, epoxy and all - we all have them - you're not some freak wandering the world all alone. There's nothing wrong with you. You're smart enough, you're good enough, and doggone it, people like you. Remember that.
....yes, even you, person not-so-secretly stalking my pages. Even you.
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