It's one of the wisest pieces of advice my parents ever taught me:
"Invest in what you can commit to."
They didn't say it quite like that, but their actions made it clear.
$$$
Compounded credit card debt is a horrible thing. Sometimes, we find ourselves in life situations beyond our control. But racking up large bills on entertainment you know you can't afford only makes "future you" sad. You can't commit to paying them off, so why invest your financial well-being?
Money management should be taught more to kids, because it's not just about profit: it's about being resourceful, a skill that can be applied to every area of life.
Lunch $$$
Another example I hate is someone saying "Let's do lunch" when they don't mean it. This is terribly confusing because while some argue, "It's just a social thing like asking about the weather when you don't care", they'll also acknowledge that words have meaning. So why waste that meaning? If you don't have honest intentions of going to lunch with me, don't bring it up. A more imaginative and commitment-free thing to say: "If we had lunch together, what would we eat?"
(And yes, on occasion when I've been asked "How are you?", I've replied, "Pretty awesome, but some things suck and I wish they could be better." That tends to to be a conversation-starter for the curious.)
Holy crap
Other things people say they usually don't mean:
- "I wish you all the very best" (when said in a tense moment between two clashing opinions)
- "I'm so sorry to hear that" (when one doesn't have an understanding of the situation)
- Signing a letter with "Sincerely" (corporatespeak without emotional involvement)
Do you know one? Anything that makes your BS detector beep like mad? Some of these are pseudo-mantras people automatically repeat to comfort themselves due to a lack of substantial actions. In other words, they're excuses for not being creative. By creative, I don't mean you have to end every conversation with a strippergram. Candid honesty or Gibbs-style silence is usually enough.
Broken promises
Broken promises discourage others with less experience and perpetuate the cycle. Trust is already so fractured in our transient world. It's not about being "old-fashioned", it's about — like I said — investing in what you can commit to. This is true in romantic relationships where both partners feel pressured to be together without having real feelings of commitment. If you can't invest in a future together, don't claim otherwise. Someone is bound to be very hurt.
A trap most people fall into, but you don't have to
Many smaller examples are found on Internet forums and YouTube comments everywhere: someone doesn't read the whole thread and they jump in with a comment that makes their lack of attention glaringly obvious. This is a key instance of letting your lowmind take over. Maybe the thread title was emotionally charged and you lashed out without looking. If you want to commit to participating in a conversation, read it first, invest the time to show you're going to contribute by being informed. Otherwise, you've just spewed slop that can be chopped. Miscommunication and wordwars result — a waste of time for all involved.
Today, I saw a horrible news story where a man beat a little girl. Part of her intestines had to be removed. Some angry commenters crowed things like, "He's got tattoos! He can take the pain to have his intestines ripped out!" Well dude, I hear ya, but that's actually a photo of the girl's father, not the mother's abusive boyfriend.
So much unnecessary conflict can be avoided by asking the right questions first. What's that, you didn't get a helpful answer? The conversation probably doesn't matter and you can find a better one. Move on!
Making art?
Think your art sucks? Wait, that doesn't make any sense. It's like criticizing a seed for not being a tree.
So keep fertilizing. Art isn't for drones without spirit, it's for real people who are at times insecure and scared (I am!) but at the same time, acknowledge this by using their burdens as a conduit for sharing. You have to be passionate. Sometimes you need to cry. If those tears are a fuel for your passion, you had better cry more, damnit.
The above doesn't come at the expense of humor: I'm a severely wacky and silly guy who pairs intense productivity with absent-minded stargazing. But the most profound humor is tethered to delicious truths. Humor succeeds because we can laugh at serious moments, not because they're absent.
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