Edit: while I’m at it, does anyone know what I should do when I’m waiting for a coincidence/adventure to happen, but it never comes? I can’t really go outside and arrange for it to happen because I don’t know what I’m looking for.
“Never half-ass two things. Whole-ass one thing.”
-Ron Swanson
This one really applies to me right now. It’s just so hard to bring yourself to do the whole-hearted thing when the whole-hearted thing comes at a price
I don’t know who originally said it, but “Everything in moderation, including moderation.” That is, it’s okay to go overboard on something as long as that’s an exception, not a norm. Want to eat a whole carton of ice cream? It’s not going to kill you if you do it, as long as you don’t do it every weekend. Enjoy stuff, don’t be excessive generally, but the rare occasion is just fine.
Note: there are, of course, exceptions. You probably don’t want to try even a little black tar heroin unless you’re okay with the risk of becoming an addict.
I’ve heard that quote attributed to Charles Bukowski. No idea if true though
“You’re imagining everyone in this story way more attractive than they actually were.”
- some reddit guy“I have the right to wipe my ass with a pinecone, but that doesn’t mean it’s the right thing to do.”
Life’s a bitch and then you die, that’s why we get high 'Cause you never know when you’re gonna go
Self explanatory
Be angry at the sun for setting If these things anger you.
-Robinson Jeffers
don’t get angry on things that are out of your control.
This is a good one. People around me get angry about the stupidest things.
“No good deed goes unpunished.”
I’ve heard this truism my whole life, and glibly repeated it myself at least a few times. But we must acknowledge that it expresses a morally defeatist attitude (cynicism) that poisons the person who actually lives by it.
The truism is usually deployed right after someone’s good deed was taken advantage of, but the correct solution is not to avoid being good to others, as the truism suggests. It is simply to make sure you’re being good to yourself as well.
For example, someone you don’t know asks to borrow your car to pick up their kid from school. Being good to them is helping them pick up their kid. Being good to yourself is driving them there yourself instead of handing a rando the keys to your car.
I’ve heard this truism my whole life, and glibly repeated it myself at least a few times. But we must acknowledge that it expresses a morally defeatist attitude that poisons the person who actually lives by it.
Instead you can reconcile kindness by being more observant. Some “good deeds” aren’t actually that good, since their extended effects amount to an unkindness to yourself or those you love.
For example, let’s say someone asks you to donate to a just cause, or loan them some money in a difficult time. If doing so means your family goes hungry or can’t afford clothes, it might not be such a good deed after all.
More subtle examples involve your time, such as helping someone by staying late at work, or spending hours listening to someone who really should get professional help instead.
Ultimately, it’s not true that “no good deed goes unpunished,” but even if it were, it doesn’t matter, because helping people is its own reward.
you meant “bad deed” ?
Nope.
Nearly every single time in my life that I have expended a significant or even massive amount of time, money, attention, intellectual or emotional capacity toward someone, solved their problems for them, it has been taken for granted, become expected, never reciprocated, and most of the people I helped went on to rope me into situations where I was even more on the hook, or they’d abuse me verbally or physically.
I finally concluded that none of the idiots in my life actually cared about me at all and just left.
Hey, if all the idiots left I’d say that’s a win.
Well, I had to leave.
At, of course, great personal expense.
that sad. now I understand what this quote means :(
Assuming your name is a pun on Thoreau, I could sure go for a cabin in the woods.
But yeah. I have been promised so many times oh trust me bro this plan will work and then no it doesn’t and if I get mad about it the other person has an emotional breakdown aaannnd a year later i still haven’t been paid back.
Or even more fun, doing things to help people that cost me money, with no pay, only to find out a year or two later oh well I paid other person to do the same fucking thing.
Then they promise to make it up to me down the line and whoops that thing they promised? Oh they sold it to someone else, so sorry.
Its left me with extreme loner syndrome as I am so very used to every one I ever care for abusing my trust and betraying me.
Nope. That’s the (sad) joke of it.
„Bees don’t waste their time explaining flies that honey tastes better than shit.“
Haha this is a good one. I can see where it applies
“Necessary? Is it necessary that I drink my own urine? No! I do it because it’s sterile and I enjoy the taste!”
dodge duck dip dive and dodge
“I’ll take a weird person over a mean person any day.”
sometimes people will really fuckin hurt you and you won’t ever get an apology
Sometimes you’ll never know why, sometimes you will, but you still won’t get why.
Always have an exit plan.
Not sure it’s really a quote, so maybe it doesn’t count … but it’s such common wisdom that it probably should count.
I never really appreciated it until I went through something where the wisdom of it would have made the difference. The slightly more precise version, IMO, is that whenever you’re in a position where something beyond your control can have a substantial influence on the outcome, you need an exit plan before you commit to that position, where that plan includes the definition of the conditions which trigger both the preparation of the execution of the plan and the time to actually exit.
The whole idea is to be prepared to not get fucked by other people or bad luck. And half of the benefit of having the plan is in the perspective it gives you. Instead of having Stockholm syndrome or suffering from the sunk cost fallacy, you naturally assess your situation as the set of trade offs that it is and more naturally perceive the toxic people that are essentially stuck in their worlds and either hold others back or propagate the culture that holds others back.
Make sure you have the plan, including the trigger conditions, formulated ahead of time, and regularly think back on the plan as you’re going along, adjusting or reassessing as necessary.
Can confirm. I was an employee at a pizza place - and thus allowed to use the staff exit - for just one night.
Exit was used.
This is game-changingly good advice. I just wish it was easier to come up with exit plans. I have often found myself stuck in situations where there was no clear or realizable exit plan opportunity, which meant I wasted a lot of time being stuck in the Stockholm syndrome situation, and resenting it.
Part of the reason why various philosophies dictate you should do A before B is to avoid the situation where you have a B without an A.
“Do A before you B” is a common way of saying “A is a dependency of B”.
It’s a way of saying “Don’t B unless you know you can A”, but it de-abstracts the knowing down to proving, by trying and either succeeding or failing.
Yea, sometimes you don’t have many options and that’s just kinda life. But if you don’t have to commit to a situation, project, job etc … I think it will always help to at least try to come up with an exit plan, because even if there isn’t a good one, it helps you frame everything in terms of trade offs and understand that most things, at some point, just aren’t worth it because there are always other options (at least that’s how I see things now, as someone who hasn’t valued being flexible and agile in life nearly enough).
The true mind can weather all the lies and illusions without being lost. The true heart can touch the poison of hatred without being harmed.
-Badass Lion Turtle
I neither have true mind nor true heart :(
“We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.”
ETA, same thing a different way: “That’s the thing. I don’t think I believe in ‘deep down’. I kind of think all you are is just the things that you do.”
I like this. What are each of the quotes from?
Pretty sure the second one is from Bojack horseman
The first one is from Kurt Vonnegut’s Mother Night, which is the story of the American Nazi propagandist, Howard Campbell, who briefly appears in the more well-known book, Slaughterhouse Five. The second is from the show BoJack Horseman, specifically episode 12 of the first season.
I feel like your personality is largely the sum of what you communicate to others.
Oof, this feels unintentionally personal. The stories those quotes come from are about doing bad things while thinking of yourself as actually a good person “deep down.” For me, though, it was realizing that people can like you for who you are only if you communicate to them who you are.
Building self esteem requires esteemable acts.
