School Drop-Off: An Epic Rant From the Foul Mouth of a Fed-Up Mom

Nothing inspires so much rage as the school drop-off line. Maybe you’re lucky and live in one of those wonderful areas of the world where your state government has not abused the taxpayer dollar and you are privileged enough to have school bus service to spare you from this hell. But if you’re in California like me, chances are, THIS IS YOUR LIFE.

Simplified, the basic idea of the school drop-off line is that one car after another drives up and drops their kid off at the curb, waves goodbye, and the parent goes off to do their thing and be yelled at by assholes all day long at their job. That should be the hardest part of their day!

But no. It can’t be that easy.

See, my kids’ school tried to make this fairly straightforward – A curbside lane for drop-offs, a middle lane to get out of the curbside lane, and a lane on the far left for those just passing through.

But none of this works as planned, because – Didn’t you know…Some parents are more special than others!

Let’s meet these paragons of humanity, shall we?

The Helicopter Mommy

Sally loves her kids more than you love yours. It’s as simple as that. Sally drops her kid off at the curb and insists on bestowing loads of affection on him in the car to make up for the precious hours they are apart.

She packed his gluten-free lunch with a sandwich lovingly cut into a heart shape, scribbled ‘Mommy loves you!’ with dry erase marker all over his plastic containers of tuna salad and homemade chocolate chip cookies. She’s even added a moist towelette that she opened and spit all over so he can clean his face with her saliva.

Bonus points: She included a t-shirt with her scent in case he misses her.

She’s Mother of the Year, of course.

And here she sits with her rotors spinning, helicoptering in the drop off line at the curb watching her precious boy walk all the way up to the door of the school. She WILL NOT leave until he’s safely inside the doors. Because that’s what good helicopter mothers do.

The rest of the day she will be monitoring Facebook looking for someone to mention a lockdown at a school so she can have a justified reason for her loosely restrained hysteria while arguing about vaccinations and breastfeeding. Meantime, while you are waiting and spilling out every sarcastic quip you can think of while holding back your seething rage, another kind of parent is seizing the opportunity to lord over all you rule-following, good citizen parents.

The Asshole

The asshole doesn’t care. Because society has made being an asshole “cool” – The rest of us must now live with twice as many breeds of dickhead as the ones that used to only occur naturally.

Thanks society!

In direct contrast to our social system hyping up the almighty Social Justice Warrior, assholes became a necessary addition to the melting pot. This is what you get when you try to make nicey-nice crap a part of society. You get assholes who get sick and tired of the narrative being forced on them and they rebel by abandoning general societal niceties, resolving to just be a dick.

So while you are sitting there waiting for Sally to move, the asshole comes barreling down the center lane, giving two shits less about everyone else in line to drop off their kids, swoops in front of Sally to drop off his kid, whom he is also teaching to be an asshole, and nearly takes out kids trying to cross the crosswalk in the process.

The asshole likes to tailgate everyone in front of him just because he can. He’s super important, if you didn’t know. Guaranteed to have some kind of shitty bumpersticker about whatever political B.S. he represents or whatever other stupid cause he has to identify with because he has a small penis.

The Hot Mess Parent

To be fair, the hot mess parent is sometimes not directly the one at fault here…but in a way, they kind of are. Because they should make sure their little hell minions have their shit together before they get in the car. Yet, here they are…Pulling up and their kid hops out of the car with no shoes on (WITH NO FUCKING SHOES ON!) and a mountain of trash falls out of the car with them. The kid obediently picks up the trash, then proceeds to not only put on and tie their shoes, but dig in the car for something, go around, open the back door and dig around till they find whatever in God’s New Green Deal recyclable hell they are looking for.

As your rage mounts waiting for them to pack for their European vacation, they go around to the trunk (THE GODDAMN TRUNK!) to get their backpack out.

Can their kid not endure a five minute drive to school in minor discomfort with a backpack on their lap or on the floor next to them? This isn’t a goddamn airport.

The icing on the cake comes when mom jumps out of the car in her beer t-shirt, fluffy PJ bottoms and slippers with 2 day unwashed hair and chases after them with a hair brush. Because her kid’s week-long unwashed hair is going to look SO much better running a brush through it, amirite? Author’s note: Do not dare to honk at this mother. She’s fucking crazy and will beat you with the hairbrush that just touched her kid’s dirty head.

The Late Parent

I hated the LATE parents so damn much I started dropping my kids off early. They’re the craziest mofos of them all. But then I realized you can’t escape the LATE parent. Because if they are not late for dropping their kid off, then they are late to their damn job. They’re late for something! And their irrational hysteria and panic may get someone killed. They will become an ‘Asshole’ parent and cut you off. They will swerve out in front of you. They, however, are not doing it to be an asshole. They are just completely not in their minds, right now, because they are about to get fired.

You’ll know them when they pull up in the center lane and push their offspring out of the passenger seat to go rolling haphazardly in front of your car like a tumbleweed with a GPA and a homework assignment on Mussolini. These kids have probably been in therapy for their unexplained anxiety issues before they were five so be kind and don’t run over them.

The Complete Dumbass

Not everyone can have an average IQ. Whatever your role in society, you have to accept this. Not everyone can function on a cellular level the way the world around them does. They’re just not going to get things like:

• You should probably let your car come to a complete stop before you let your kid get out.
• Dropping off in the far left lane is a no-no and guaranteed to eventually get your kid killed (Have you not SEEN the asshole and late parents drive?!)
• You can’t park your car in the drop-off zone during drop-off times.
• If you insist on giving your kid a backpack on wheels so as not to create muscle tone and to keep them a weak little pussy, then you should probably drop them in an area with a wheelchair accessible curb since they are going to stand there crying because they can’t lift their 40 lb bag onto the sidewalk.
• You can’t just stop your car in the left hand passing lane and then get out and chase after Timmy because he forgot his bagged lunch.
• Crosswalks are a zone where children are allowed to legally walk out in front of your car.
• Turn signals are flashing lights that indicate which direction you are going to go which alerts other drivers and helps avoid preventable collisions.
• The actual speed limit in the school zone is 25 mph, NOT 25 mph less than whatever you normally drive on city streets, which I’m judging would be about 75 mph based on your speedracer-like drift around the school crossing guard.

 

This is why a friend of mine offering to take my kids to school every morning in exchange for occasionally picking up hers was a blessing in disguise. I can sit and have my coffee in peace and meditate while planning my escape to one of those blissful states of the union where bus service is not mythical and my ugly side can stay sheathed until unearthed by more worthy causes like arguing politics on Facebook.

Are Destination Weddings “Selfish”?

From the mailbag!

We were asked what we thought about destination weddings and if they are selfish.

After all, it’s your big day, right? Weddings are all about making a single day of our lives exactly the way we’d picture it and completely magical. Everything has to be perfect down to the locale…but when you told your mother about it, did she say something like, “Well, that’s very selfish of you…”?

Maybe we pictured saying our vows at a castle in Scotland or a Caribbean beach. We want the wedding pictures of us all in white looking tanned and happy with our bare feet in white sand.

So is it selfish to ask your friends and family, to take one single day out of their lives to commit to making our dreams come true?

Absolutely.

But hold on. Let’s talk a little more about it. Sometimes being selfish is warranted. Maybe the word has a bad connotation for you, but sometimes being selfish is a necessary evil when it comes to living your own life. Sometimes there are times when thinking of yourself needs to take priority. Your wedding day is one of those times.

However, there are some things you need to realize about the touchy subject of destination weddings.

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Not everyone can afford to go.

The biggest piece of advice we can give is to never make a cash-strapped friend pay to participate in your wedding. As much as they love you, being put in this situation will almost always cause resentment. If you’ve already made her buy a $200 bridesmaid dress and now want her to pay $1500 for airfare and another $1800 in hotel costs…Even the best friend in the world is going to be angry with you. I’ve had a bride tell me asking friends to pay all this is fair because she and her family are paying for the facilities, the DJ, the photographer, etc.

Yes – A bride will pay thousands of dollars for the best day of her life. You can’t ask a mere bridesmaid to share that kind of enthusiasm. The worst thing you can do is to insinuate your friendship should mean more than money. While she may be thrilled to be there and support you because she loves you so much, the value of the experience in monetary terms does not add up.

Wedding Couple experience:  Marry the person of your dreams, wear a beautiful gown/handsome suit, look better than you’ve ever looked in your life, create memories you will be telling your grandchildren about, have beautiful photos and videos commemorating the experience, in the place you always dreamed it would all happen?

Cost:  Completely priceless

Wedding Party Experience:  Fork out money for an ugly dress/rental tux you will never wear again and have no idea what to do with when the wedding is over. Use up all your hard-earned vacation time in which you planned to go visit relatives out of state, spend exorbitant amounts of money to play a bit part in someone else’s dream, create memories that will never rank up there as the best time of your life, be photographed wearing the same ugly outfit everyone else is in photos you will never really want, going to some hot, sticky almost third world country the bride insists is sooo romantic and smack at mosquitos through an uncomfortably long ceremony after several days of helping the stressed-out couple solve last-minute wedding catastrophes. While you love your friend…Oh my God.

Cost: Waaaaaay more than they get back out of it

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Not everyone can escape responsibilities like work, children, etc. to go.

Maybe your job is generously offering you three weeks paid vacation in which to have your wedding of the century, but not everyone is as lucky. Their bosses aren’t as understanding. They’ve been saving a whole year and were finally getting to plan the vacation they have been needing for so long.

Then, they get your invitation…

They would have to cancel their dream vacation to go to your dream vacation destination. If they have personal boundaries, they may just reject the invite outright, but if they are an overly nice type that doesn’t want to hurt your feelings, they may just say yes, cancel their own plans and seethe in resentment against you secretly.

Your friends and family with children are going to be completely shut out. Getting a sitter for multiple days is another expense on top of everything else.

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Not everyone will want to go.

Uncle Bob just hates weddings. Way too fancy, long and boring. He is eager to get back to his recliner in his comfy living room and watch TV. Sure. He will suck it up and go to local weddings because he can get it over with, go back to life, and dodge out of the reception after dinner. But asking him to go to Jamaica? Ha!

It’s not just him! Your best friend may not have any desire to go to Jamaica either. Your dream destination isn’t necessarily hers and while she loves you, she really doesn’t want to go.  Not everyone likes weddings. Even your wedding.

If your dream wedding includes a full panel of bridesmaids and groomsmen, you’d better keep it local. You’ve got to consider what makes it a dream wedding to you. Is it all your friends and family celebrating with you or is it just you and your new spouse lost in each other? You can still have the latter on the honeymoon, but you can’t recapture the former.

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If you don’t approach the situation carefully, you could permanently alienate friends & family.

I knew a friend once who told me she really wanted me to go on their wedding cruise with them. She planned on doing a Caribbean cruise and the wedding would take place on the boat on New Year’s.

“But I have plans on New Year’s…” I sighed, “I’ve been planning it for a long time…”

Not to mention I couldn’t afford it and couldn’t get off work. Her reaction surprised me.

“Fine!” She stopped talking to me. I later found out so many people had said they wouldn’t go, she canceled the wedding in tears and cursed out everyone telling them what bad friends they all were and how selfish they were for not accommodating her big day. Multiple people saw her true colors and she lost a lot of friends.

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“But I still want to have a destination wedding…”

That’s fine.
After all, it is your day.
What we hope you will learn is to separate the reactions of your friends and family from the truth. The truth is probably that you had the best of intentions. In your eyes, you can see how great and how much fun it would be if everyone would just play along and fulfill your dream of a resort weekend of family bonding culminating in a wedding like in the movies, but we are dealing with human beings with free will here. It’s not always that easy.

So how do you mitigate the damages to your relationships?

Start off with your approach. If there are friends you want, must have, need to be there, call them first. Go out for coffee. Ask them honestly if it would be a huge inconvenience. Ask them if it would bother them. If it’s crucial they be there, tell them it’s more important that they are there and happy with you than it is to be getting married alone on a beach. Note their reactions. If they are gushing, excited and saying, “Oh wow!! Yes! Let’s make this happen!” then you have a blessing.

If your friend seems to hesitate, wonders about money, etc. or even seems a little upset – Do not be angry with them. They are upset because they want to be a part of your day but reality might not allow it. You would feel like you were missing out if you were the only one who couldn’t afford to be there for a friend’s destination wedding, too.

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What about invitations?

Be careful. How you word them is everything. Sending out standard invitations may not be the best thing to do. Some may RSVP that they will attend not realizing that your wedding is literally in Bermuda. Others may feel anxious thinking everyone else is going and taking this awesome trip, but they know they can’t do it. Some may even roll their eyes at you and form opinions about how entitled you are. Let’s face it, destination wedding brides can get a bad rap.

Make sure to stress you don’t expect them to come, but that it would be great if they could.

“It has always been our dream to get married on the beaches of Hawaii. Next summer, on June 23rd, 2020, we are making that dream a reality. While we would love it if everyone could be there to celebrate with us on our special day, we realize the costs of travel and other inconveniences may not make this possible and we completely understand.

However, we do want to extend the invitation to our friends & family to make the trip to see us become Mr. & Mrs. Smith in Oahu, Hawaii. We have contacted the Beachside Hotel at 123, W Beachside Paradise Dr. and were able to get a group rate of $300 per night for a block of rooms if we book by October 1st. 

Please call 1-800-555-5555 to book your room if you want to attend. The wedding will be beachside, followed by a reception in the hotel’s ballroom or a smaller convention room depending on the number of guests. Again, we really would love it if you can make the trip. You all mean the world to us and we’d love to have you there.”

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“I’ve tried being nice about it, but people are still being hateful!”

You’ve got several types of people who may be upset about this. The first are likely the ones who care. The only reason anyone is upset with you is because they would totally come to you wedding. They would love to see you tie the knot, but by moving the wedding outside the bounds of reasonable affordability, you’ve excluded them and they are likely hurt. Please understand the option you’ve chosen is one that is going to step on a lot of toes. Everyone has different ideas about expectations for weddings — Which is why nobody can ever get married the “right” way for everyone else’s standards.

The second type are those who you’ve probably had issues with about…well, everything. If they are a difficult person in your life, anyway, expect them to use this incident to make you seem like Satan. Include the difficult mothers in this group who will never be happy with any decision you make anyway. And you know what? Ignore them.

So, are you putting the idea of a destination wedding above your friends and family? Absolutely. Even though it seems cold, don’t be afraid to acknowledge this. This is a rare exception towards when it’s okay for you to be selfish. It’s about the two of you and the moment you say your vows and the memories you create. You will not be bringing everyone with you on the anniversary trip to visit the place where you said your vows. So say them someplace meaningful to you if that’s what will make you happy.

What is NOT okay is expecting to control how others feel about your destination wedding, demanding your friends be there and insisting they are “bad friends” if they can’t, making them pay to be there unwillingly, or feeling they should be grateful to you for such an awesome forced vacation. You can’t control others’ reactions. You can only check yourself to make sure you are being reasonable.

Want a wedding it would be really hard to be mad at you for? Pay everyone’s airfare, hotel accommodations and give them a per diem for meals! If you can’t do this, then be ready for the criticism because it will come.

Eloping is always a peaceful and much less expensive option if you don’t need all the attention and the criticism that comes with it. While it’s your day, if you plan on sharing it with others, be kind, loving, and gentle keeping in mind that a wedding is one day. Relationships with friends and family are for a lifetime.

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Should You Keep “Haters” in Your Life?

Some people call them “Frenemies”.

Do you really like them?
That’s debatable…
Do they really like you?
You’re really not sure.

By some sort of obligation, there is an unexplained duty to let them sit and smirk in the corner of our lives. We let them peruse the details of our lives on social media. Always observing, laughing at us when we trip up. Jumping in immediately to agree with anyone who says something against us.

And we wonder why we feel socially anxious and uncomfortable in our own skin!

Maybe they are friends of friends. Maybe there is some other tie to them in which it would feel like too much of an upheaval to sever. You just want to fly under the radar with them…but you worry about hurting their feelings.

It’s easy to become so worried about hurting others’ feelings without being mindful of how they treat us. However, the first time I heard someone tell me to cut all the negative people out of my life, I laughed.

Some of the closest people in the world to me were horribly negative people. The type of people you might love for their own quirks, weirdness, even their kindness, but they were determined to not allow me to grow. I was in a period where I’d been working on myself and thought I was on my way to becoming a butterfly; They told me I wasn’t a caterpillar. I was an earth worm. I thought I was growing smart and capable; They made sure I knew I was irresponsible or stupid.

The problem with keeping these kind of people around, is that we start to believe them  on some level. We tolerate them. We put up with their crap because we wonder if their criticisms of us are valid. Enough to make us justify their hurtfulness. What if they are only telling the truth even if it hurts to hear…?

“Be realistic,” We hear them say through a smirk, implying that you’re unreasonable in your goals. What if they are right? They threw a wrench in your gears to the point you can’t even see the possibilities anymore. Only all the reasons why you might fail.

Stop right there. We can’t let people who never have anything nice to say come into our lives to crap on our every thought. There is no point to it. It is your life to lead, isn’t it?

So maybe you let them say what they have to say, but have stopped taking haters to heart and feel like you’ve finally become mentally strong.

BUT…You’re going to keep them around to “show” them. You will go on to be successful and make them eat their words. You’ll keep them around just to show them how wrong they were.

Don’t.

I knew a woman who once made every post of hers on Facebook public because she knew her ex-husband might see it. In every one, she posted sexy pictures of herself to show him what she thought he was missing. She posted about her vacations. She made her life seem more glamorous and exciting than it was. After a while, everyone realized she was living her entire life just to spite him and we wondered if she realized it, too.

What kind of life is it living for the benefit of others? Everything she did was “aimed” at someone. Whether it be a passive aggressive Facebook post or a post about how great her life was and how much fun she was having. She wanted all her “haters” to know it.

What she actually didn’t see was that everyone saw through her. Nobody cared. Nobody was jealous. When someone lives their life posting passive aggressive Facebook quotes – Underneath it all is a kind-of pathetic veneer to a painful life nobody in their right mind is actually jealous of. Lots of people can sniff out posers a mile away.

She continued living her life for her “haters” until her real friends got sick of it. Every conversation with her was negative. Everything was always about the people who supposedly hated her. She was always plotting and planning her next move and how she was going to make them look stupid.

Witnessing all this unfold on social media was sad. I finally unsubscribed to her issues. And it felt amazing.

Ask yourself this question. Would you let someone who hated you come into your house and sit in the back of the room and roll their eyes and criticize you?

I don’t think so.

So why would you keep them in your circle of friends? On social media? “Haters” have no place in your life. None. They are never going to do you any good. There is a simple answer to this dilemma – Drop them. Yes, I know you will say it’s not that easy. I don’t care if it’s your own mother. When someone treats you with continuous disrespect, they have no place in your life. Slam the door.

Why, exactly, would you even feel like you have to keep them around so they can see you reach the pinnacle of success one day? You’re wanting to prove them wrong and think this is going to dispel their hatred?

News flash – It won’t.

And it’s going to make it harder for you to reach success. Because you are always going to have their negative voice in your ear.

Think about this, too – What if you don’t succeed? What if you have a multitude of failures in your life? You are giving them fuel for their own drama-kindled fire. Protect your life, your heart, your soul, your being. Get rid of these people who have no positive will towards you.

Get rid of ambivalent people whom you are not sure like you or not. People who do like you will let you know. People who do not like you won’t hide it. They make things easy. Ambivalent people, on the other hand, will chip away at your confidence. They are a slow drip of acid to your self worth.

Keeping a hater on social media to “show them” is like dropping a toaster in your bathtub while you’re soaking because it breaks the toaster when it’s submersed in water, too.

You’re only hurting yourself.

Taking it a step further, if you are the type that believes in “energies”, when you invite haters to hang around in your circle of friends, you are also extending a welcome to their toxic, negative energy. If you think you are going to go on to become a raging success surrounded by haters and their energy weighing you down, think again.

These people have a way of getting into your head and filling it with negativity. They are masters of dragging out the darkest of thoughts and placing them in your brain like mental roadblocks. Get away from them.

Live your life for you and the people who love you.

There may be people who are so deeply entrenched in your life, it’s like sawing off your own arm to escape. But you need to…for your mental health.

On the other side of all this is the circle of friends you always dreamed of having. The people who love, care for you and who let you live your own life. The ones who don’t take your kindness for granted.

Life is better when there is nobody sitting over in the corner hoping to see you stumble and fall. If they don’t love you at your worst, they certainly don’t deserve you at your best.

The Best Exercise For Depression You’ll Ever Do

Many of us haven’t had easy lives.

Do you ever feel if you listed out a timeline of all the stuff that’s happened to you, it would floor most people? But so many of us don’t like to talk about it. We don’t want to dwell on things. We don’t want to be a permanent victim. So we’ll shut up and carry it with us while people tell us things like, “Maybe you should exercise, take vitamins, try essential oils, do the Keto diet, see a therapist, buy this book, attend this seminar, go out into nature…” etc.

True. Many of these things are vastly impactful on your quality of life. But people telling you these things do not understand your phase of depression.

When you are here, desperate for relief, depression feels like you are caught in the jaws of the beast. You can struggle all you want, but nothing gets you OUT. Nothing can release you.

Depression is a totally hopeless feeling. You might feel like your time has come and gone. Everything you had hoped for yourself is now out of reach. Or you’re looking around at everyone rising every morning, going to work – For what? What is the purpose of all this? To live for a short time, then die? Are we all competing with each other? There is always someone smarter, better-looking, better at our job than we are, etc. What is the point of all of this?

One of my favorite pastimes, when depressed, used to be endlessly Googling things like:

“Life seems pointless”
“Everyone would be better off without me”
“I don’t want to live anymore”
“I’d kill myself, but I don’t have the balls”

Yes, I could be a regular Eeyore.
Was I fun or what?

I was praying Google would give me the answer out of nowhere. It never happened. I might get directed to an article with one of the universal “Thanks, but that doesn’t help” tips like…”Hey, exercise! You’ll feel better!”

While this is true, when you are feeling like the walls are closing in and you are having a hard time just breathing, shallow advice is not what you want to hear.

Your mind is in crisis.

You don’t tell a man who is having a heart attack to get up and run because it prevents heart disease and he’ll feel better. He is in crisis. He needs immediate help.

When you have reached crisis level depression, if you are brave enough to tell someone the severity, they tell you things like “My door is always open” or refer you to the suicide hotline. A person truly in crisis may feel insulted by this. They may not need talking off the ledge. They just need to know RIGHT NOW what to do to relieve this horrible feeling. Not tomorrow, not next week. Right now. They are stuck in a moment so painful they need help getting through it.

At the worst, they end up in a psychiatric hospital. Now, they get to carry the stigma of “crazy” because they were depressed. Why is it depression is never taken seriously until it involves suicide or suicide attempts. How sad is that?

Most people don’t really want to die.
They just want to learn how to live.

With a heavy dose of medication, they’re sent on their way. Maybe, if they’re lucky, they get a Cognitive Behavioral Therapist who is worth a damn and they are able to walk through the root of the cause.

The problem is, the ones who need help the most usually don’t get treatment. Maybe they can’t afford it, have anxiety so bad even getting to a therapy appointment and through it is more than they can take, they’ve had bad therapists before that didn’t help them, or maybe they were put on medication that didn’t solve their problems but made them feel like a walking zombie.

If you’re in crisis and you’ve found yourself here – Welcome. I have an exercise for you. While it’s not the physical exercise your friends are recommending, it’s one that will help you mentally.

I get you. Stay with me, friend. There is light. There is hope.

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Depression’s Link With Anger

Right now, you may not know how you’re going to get through another minute of this. Breathe and relax.

For now, we’re not going to focus on what you’re upset about right now. The reason you are not dealing well with the present is because you have never learned to deal with the past. If you need to skip ahead and do the exercises to come below for present things you are dealing with – You are more than welcome to do so. For generalized depression, we’re going to start in the past and move forward because you will see how these things build on each other a little easier.

Sigmund Freud once said: “Depression is anger turned inward.”

It’s true. Think about it. If you were ever suicidal or knew someone suicidal, many times they were someone others knew as good people. They probably had a lot going for them to everyone else.

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Often, they are the nice people, the funny ones, the ones who give so much to others. But they become tired and weary. They are taken advantage of over and over again for their kindness.

When they need to heal, other people are asking them to take on their problems. “They won’t mind“. They suffer in silence while anger slowly builds. They become the butt of other people’s jokes because “They won’t mind”. Other people know them as someone with a good sense of humor.

They walk the tightrope, trying to be a good, decent human being that makes others laugh, and being a miserable, angry person who hates the world. As the facade begins to crumble, they lash out in fits of anger nobody saw coming. They overreact. The anger bubbles over the edges of a long-boiling pot, dousing the flame of life below that kept them going.

Yet, so many still refer to someone who committed suicide as selfish.

Excuse me? These people commit suicide because they truly feel the world, and lives of people around them, would be better off without them. How on earth is that selfish?

The last person most suicidal people are usually thinking about is themselves.

Depression, at its heart, is seething rage. Wrapped in sadness, misery and hopelessness.

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If you are depressed, you may not feel it. You feel sad more than anything, because you have not given your permission yet, for this blue-covered sadness to show its angry red underbelly.

But it’s there. Some people may have chemical imbalances or other reasons for depression, but what I’m about to tell you has been life-changing.

The Most Therapeutic Exercise For Depression

I want you to picture your depression as a giant field of weeds. Other people have fields of flowers and – Lucky you! –  You have weeds. For the weeds you are picturing in your mind, you can give them some sad, blue blooms if you want, but make no mistake – They are weeds.

Maybe you have some beautiful flowers in there, too, but weeds have taken over, choking them, preventing their growth. Each weed of depression grows from roots of anger underground. How do you get down to the roots to pull them up?

We’ve got to dig deep, my friend.

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Trace the stem of one weed down into the dirt. What caused you to feel so much sadness and hopelessness?

I guarantee you, after you trace that stem down beneath the surface into the dirt, you’re going to find glowing red roots made up of unfulfilled destiny, a hurt, something someone said once, something someone did once, some regrets you have, your shame, your fears that kept you from reaching your potential, the things holding you back, the negative people in your life who don’t take you seriously or discount you, the people who want you to fail, the pain you caused others, the guilt you feel…This is the root of your depression. And certain life factors continue to nurture and water the depression, keeping the soil it grows in fertile.

At the time these things happened, you felt some fear or anger. Because you didn’t know how to process these emotions, you buried them. They were seeds. Now they’ve grown into this overwhelming sadness. The only way to get through this is to go, weed by weed, down to the root.

This weed grew because your mother said you were worthless, once.
This one grew because you were bullied in school.

You never realized how much these small incidents impacted you, did you? Remember it like it was yesterday. It’s going to sting all over again, but you’re holding the weed killer. You just never knew it.

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Here is where the exercise comes in. Take out a pen and paper. A notebook for this is even better. It might shake you up emotionally, but you’re going to feel better. This might take you months or years to do, but if therapy is not your thing or even if you are seeing a therapist, this is going to help you open a lot of doors and finally tackle some of those weeds keeping flowers from growing in your garden.

Think back to the earliest you can remember. I want you to, total stream of consciousness, start writing the things from your early childhood that made you angry starting with:  “I’m angry because…”

I’m angry because my parents never stood up for me.
I’m angry because my brother was the favorite in the family.
I’m angry because of that incident in the kitchen where my brother threw the cereal across the floor and I got blamed and beaten because of it.
I’m angry because grandpa said I was lazy and spoiled.

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Let it out. STOP WORRYING ABOUT “SOUNDING LIKE A VICTIM”. Realize this is a projection someone else in your life has put on you to prevent you from handling your problems.

Don’t worry that it sounds like whining.
Don’t worry that it sounds self-pitying.
Stop that thinking. You’re safe here.

In this space of paper, you can finally say all those things that have always pissed you off. You can listen to angry or sad music if you want as you do this. Maybe you are starting to see, shoving your hurt and anger underground and letting it fester has only producing a sad bunch of weeds choking your happiness.

You may want to do a small section of your childhood and stop.

Take note of how you feel afterwards. Relieved? Happier? Guilty? Beware of guilt. If this exercise makes you feel guilty, you may have had someone in your life who did not allow you to properly express your emotions. This is a dangerous thing. They may have stressed to you that “nobody likes a victim”. But guess what? You are getting all this out of your system because you don’t want to be a victim. You are dealing with it. That’s the bravest, most noble thing you can do.

The Peace of Resolution

You’re not done just yet. Acknowledging the feelings is one thing, but I’m not going to ask you to do something about it. What are you possibly going to do about an incident that happened when you were six that still brings you painful feelings? Instead, I want you to open another page and write down the first thing you wrote. I am going to ask you to bring closure to the incident.

“I’m angry because my parents never stood up for me” then add a big comma + BUT afterwards:

“I’m angry because my parents never stood up for me, but…”

And now I want you to reflect on this. You’ve been feeling this anger for a long time. Maybe you never really acknowledged it, but it’s been there. So don’t dwell on your parents never standing up for you. Think – Has anything good happened as a result of this?

“I’m angry because my parents never stood up for me, but because they didn’t, I learned to stand up for myself. I learned what it feels like to have nobody on your side. As a result, I’ve always stuck up for the underdog. I’ve always helped people who are hurting. It’s made me a better parent, a better person, a better friend. My kids will never feel like they have no one in their corner. I’m learning to parent myself the way my parents failed to and stick up for myself.”

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Don’t make excuses for someone else’s nasty treatment of you. If you forgive them, you can write that, too, but don’t excuse someone else’s bad behavior. However, for even the worst of the worst of incidents, sometimes there are things you learned or something from the incident that caused you to relate more with other people. Sometimes there is a positive side. Not always.

Go through every one of your “I’m angry because…” statements. It may still make you angry to recall. You don’t have to redefine everything in positive terms. Making the negative positive is not going to bring you healing. Sometimes negative is just that. What will bring you healing is defining an END each of the events by giving your final thought on it. You’re acknowledging it happened and saying, “It is what it is” and giving your final thoughts on it or stating any lessons learned. Sometimes it will not be positive or pretty. You have a right to own that anger and justify feeling it, then closing the door on it. “I was angry then, but now it’s funny because look at the source!”

“I’m angry because grandpa said I was lazy and spoiled, but you know what? Grandpa was an alcoholic jerk who only saw me twice a year and didn’t live with us to see all the chores I did and how much I did to help my parents. Grandpa was also talking to a 7 year-old kid who acts like a child. Most kids aren’t the picture of productivity at that age so Grandpa can shove his opinion up his you-know-what along with his hemorrhoids”

It’s okay to make yourself laugh during this. You are now in a place of healing. After you’ve felt the anger, it’s important to point out the lessons learned, the ways it changed you, to reframe the incident or to point out the sheer ridiculousness of what happened.  It’s totally okay to make light of even the darkest situations in your life.

You’ve been carrying anger with you for so long. It’s time to set it down.

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The weird thing is, as you dredge up these old memories and resolve them, more that had upset you that you’d forgotten about will crop up. You’ll be truly amazed at how much hurt you were hanging onto from childhood. I was shocked at some of the stuff that still pissed me off.

It should be no surprise. As children, we encounter situations all the time that we don’t know how to process yet, mentally. We’re still very young. If we had traumatic childhoods, we could have fields of weeds that stretch on for miles. I wasn’t capable, at the age of five, to put many things into perspective. I was still angry with the boy next door who stole my Star Wars figurines (Of course, maybe I should still be angry. Those things would probably be worth money now).

I’d recommend keeping a notebook. You can write them down as they happen and resolve them as you move on with life. I’m not there yet, myself, but maybe one day, I can learn to take an incident that happened as it’s happening and learn to reframe my thinking so I don’t let pain blossom into a full blown weed again.

As cheesy as this whole exercise sounds, it’s the only written exercise I’ve ever done that has been so powerful and instrumental enough that it allowed me to express the anger, found rationality in the anger and allowed me to calm, self-soothe and dismiss the anger.

Sometimes the great philosophical minds of our time are right. Freud certainly was. Anger – A million tiny papercuts to our soul – Is often the cause of debilitating depression.

I don’t care if it sounds corny, from one person with depression to another – Try it. Put yourself in control of every bad memory. Rewrite the angle of every single one like a screenwriter would write a movie. It’s all about perspective.

Namaste.

You deserve every happiness.

Valentine’s Day Gift Ideas That Don’t Suck

Want to get something for that special someone that isn’t… well, lame?

Yeah, yeah – The stores have stuffed animals, flowers, chocolate – All that crap. While women are wanting to get him something but not even sure what he would like, men are buying stuffed animals. Cute. But useless clutter after the holiday has come and gone.

We know the best gifts are sometimes the gift of creating memories together, but sometimes you just want to give something special too.

We’ve looked high and low, scaled the scariest depths of Amazon, looking for gifts for REAL people. Useful gifts. Sentimental items that won’t cause resentment because our new Marie Kondo fixation says we shouldn’t be holding onto items that don’t bring us joy (but will make us feel guilty as hell to throw away). Quirky, practical, cheap, interesting – Your guide to guilt-free giving starts here:

For Concert-Lovers, Musicians, Motorcyclists or Sound Anxiety Sufferers

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My brain and ears have been having this fight for years…My brain loves music. My ears hate extremely loud noise. These earplugs are the compromise.

I didn’t have an “eargasm” but the part of my brain that likes music while hating painfully loud noise was happy. Unlike foam earplugs, these won’t totally kill your listening enjoyment. They are decibel-reducing earplugs which preserve the fidelity of sound while blocking harmful frequencies. It’s like putting a volume control on the room you are in. Pretty cool!

They are fantastic for musicians who rely on being able to hear bandmates while preserving their hearing (Also great for vocalists who still need to hear pitch while dulling sound). Along with a pair of concert tickets, this is one gift your concert-going love or musician would likely never think to ask for, but they’re pretty awesome, super easy to insert in your ears, and they come in smaller sizes for those of us with smaller ear canals (you can get those here: Eargasm Smaller Ears Earplugs).

Anxiety sufferers who are noise-sensitive will also love these. If you still need to hear, but need to dull the sharpness of sounds around you, these are for you. We highly recommend also getting the Eargasm Earplugs Connector Cord  so you can take them out easily and keep them handy. Also recommended for motorcyclists.

For the Handyman

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What do you get the man who has everything? Or what do you get the husband who has been sitting on the couch for three weeks straight after we asked them to hang a ceiling fan? This thing right here – A magnetic wristband made for holding screws, bolts and nails.

This is another gift we’ve actually purchased because of the amazing reviews. There are a ton of variations on this product on Amazon, but all with the same concept – This product eliminates the need for something or someone to hold your screws and bolts while you’re working. This way, they are always handy and you don’t need your wife or kid to hold onto them for you and hand them to you, one by one. Just think! If Ralphie’s dad had one of these in ‘A Christmas Story’, he never would have uttered the F word and had to sit with a mouth full of soap.

For Anyone…Really

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There is no limit to the number of things that can be personalized, these days. We are big fans of personalized gifts as long as they provide some function. From beautiful wall art, personalized throw pillows, dog tags, coffee mugs, cool picture frames, necklaces personalized with your photo or pet’s photo, or even SOCKS with your face on them – What is a funnier or more creative gift? Our personal favorites are the double photo frame above. Put your favorite song lyrics or poem on one side and a photo of the two of you on the other. Instant hit! It’s a gift most would absolutely love.

The pendant locket above is not only beautiful on the outside, but you can put your favorite picture inside. There’s a sweet video on the product page of someone giving this to their mom! Lockets sure aren’t as typical or cheesy as they used to be.

Finally, check out the hammer reading ‘Let’s Build More Memories Together’? Say it with me: “Awwwww” Even the most manly man might have their eyes start sweating a little. This one is great for a man when you want to give him something sweet and sentimental but not too knick-knack-ish or sappy.

For the Guy Who Likes Tailgating

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These gifts are just FUN. It’s another one we’ve tried and tested. I bought the scoreboard for my cornhole-loving husband. If you don’t know what cornhole is and are looking at us like we’re crazy, think “bean bag toss” (pictured above). It’s become such a serious sport, they even have Cornhole championships on TV now. It’s a good, fun party game and very popular with tailgate party-goers.

If you already have a cornhole set, the scoreboard is an awesome setup to not only keep score, but to keep you from throwing out your back repeatedly bending over picking up your beer. One of the reviews for this product even says it has a great double usage for scoring points in fights with your significant other (Haha!). But hey, this is a Valentine’s day gift post so let’s not go there…

For the Fashionable Guy Who Has Everything

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Since clothing is really personal, it’s rare we put anything related to clothing on a gift list. When shopping for someone else, it can be hard to get their style just right. But when we come across a find like this, it’s worth mentioning.

This jacket simply looks cool on anyone. One of our writers ordered it for her son, tried it on for fit, and immediately wanted one just like it for herself. It looks great on her, looks great on him, is very high quality, and reasonably priced. She said her son’s eyes lit up when he saw it and he didn’t take it off for a week. And her husband even remarked what a nice jacket it was…and kinda wanted one, too.

For the Woman Who Wants to Get Organized

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OMG. Take our money! Where has this been all our lives? Men, why would you not buy this for your lady? If the mess she leaves all over the bathroom counter annoys you, we see that makeup carousel helping immensely. Jewelry – Everywhere? Take a look at that mirror that doubles for jewelry storage.

As an added bonus, maybe being organized will help her get ready a little faster not having to search for what she’s looking for? Seriously, this is a win-win for both of you. What are you possibly waiting for?

Stupid Gifts…Because Neither of You Take Valentine’s Day Seriously Anyway

      
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What the hell IS this stuff? Mini-golf…for the toilet?!

There are lots of reasons why this could make an outstanding gift, such as; He won’t be using his smart phone, getting poop germs all over the screen? Or maybe you feel sorry for him because you kick his ass at mini golf and he needs practice? Next, we have the beer fortune teller, which promises 20 different fortunes in the bottom of your glass. It’s a good excuse to drink to find the answers in the bottom of a beer!

An inflatable tube man (desktop size and comes with an adapter! Yay! No batteries!). This is great for those weirdly obsessed with these things and get all their best dance moves from them (Let’s Just say we know people). Another source of endless joy until the last crayon runs out, is the ‘Gangsta Rap Coloring Book‘. We don’t even have words for the joy this could bring many 40 year-old suburban moms who miss the days of cruising the local strip mall to the sounds of Tupac.

Last, and perhaps, definitely the least, we have the gift of absolutely nothing. If it doesn’t bother you too much to pay for nothing, it’s the perfect gift. Packaged beautifully and all set up to bring…not much joy. It probably won’t get you laid, but it will teach a lesson the next time they tell you they want “nothing”. Well, here ya go…

For the Woman Who Is Ready for Summer Already 

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We are living in the best times. They make lawn chairs now with holes for your face…and your boobs! How great is that? So, we were leery reading all the Amazon reviews of this chair, but gleaning a lot of the negativity is because it doesn’t hold up well for holding…Err, a lot of weight? So maybe it’s not the best chair, yet, for ladies who are all about that bass, but we sincerely hope one is manufactured which caters to EVERY woman’s dream of lying face down and reading her book on the beach. That should be a God-given right. Someone get on it!

In the meantime, if your girl is more on the petite side, reviewers are stating they can’t live without this. So it’s kind of a big deal. And we’ll be honest, this chair sounds like heaven.

For the Couple Who Want a Good Night’s Sleep

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1, 2 – Menopause is coming for you…
3, 4 – Won’t sleep no more…
5, 6 – Might wanna buy this…
7, 8 – No more staying up late…

We kid, we kid. The BedJet V2 Climate Comfort for Beds comes with a cooling fan + heating air with biorhythm sleep technology. This model is a single zone control, at $349 topping as the most expensive item on our list. You can get a dual zone for a King bed at a whopping-but-worth-it $789 (also available if you click the photo and choose the dual zone option). It’s built just to keep you cool…or toasty and warm on these winter nights. The manufacturers also state that the product keeps things a little drier under the sheets and less prone to smelly bacteria and other nasties from moisture expended while we sleep. Now, that’s cool! Or warm…or whatever!

Look at this as two gifts in one. It’s a gift for both of you and has so many uses. The reviews of this product truly show the dollar value is well-compensated. If she’s freezing, she can crank it up and at least warm her cold feet before she shoves them into your back. You can also include aromatherapy in the uses of this product. And it’s all controllable via your phone! Who wouldn’t want this? Sounds like it’s worth every penny.

For the One Who is Obsessive About Keeping Stuff Like New

  

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“Don’t f*ck up the table!” Did we stutter? These slightly crude, but hilarious coasters make the perfect gift for your foul-mouthed friends or for your significant other who is always f*cking up the table. You can’t be around to remind them 24/7 so this is the next best thing. Dare you to leave them out when the in-laws visit…

But if you like to keep your mouth as clean as your table…We’ve found some pretty cool coasters in the shape of 45’s.

For the Armchair Politician

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Is your husband a news and politics junkie? Being that today’s news is about 90% politics and 10% actual stuff going on in the world that does not involve politics, perhaps it’s not FAKE NEWS that he’s chosen his side and tells the world about it? God bless him. If politics are the main squeeze of your main squeeze, get them a little something sure to bring a chuckle. Politics: The new team sport. Don’t build THE WALL between you. Support his political habit!

For the Every-Now-and-Then Wine Drinker or Collector

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If your wine drinker gets aggravated because they only want a glass every now and then and the bottle goes bad because they don’t drink enough, this is a great gift. The Coravin wine system allows you to insert a tiny needle through a bottle’s cork to extract wine while leaving the bottle sealed, replacing the siphoned wine with argon gas. This means you don’t have to commit to opening a bottle and drinking it within the next week. Maybe they’re faithful to you, but it’s great for those with commitment issues to drinking.

On the other end of the scale, this one is perfect for the wine collector. You can get a sample of any wine in your collection without opening the bottle. It’s a wonderful gift for anyone with a palate for wine. And it’s used by many professional wineries and restaurants now. Also by the writer of this article! This is a ‘must have’ for wine enthusiasts.

For the One Who Entertains or Likes His Music to Create a Mood

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Right before Christmas, we were wandering Best Buy in search of gifts for the kids when we saw a guy fooling with this speaker. He was connecting his phone to it and music came bursting forth from it with a light show, a strobe and beautiful sound with tangible bass. My husband and several other men were drawn like moths to flame.

“Wow! That’s great!” my husband’s eyes lit up.

“Yeah, it’s pretty cheap, too!” the guy said.

“Oh, I kind of want one…This is fantastic!”

By the drawing crowd of fascinated men and with a price tag under $250, I knew exactly what I was getting for him. The whole house uses this speaker now. It’s well-loved by all as our Ultimate Party Speaker and the light show is super cool.

For the one who Likes Tech That Makes Life Easier

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“I just want to watch my YouTube cooking show…IN the KITCHEN! Ugh!!!” but the WiFi craps out if you are outside of the office. Great. The Rock Space WiFi Extender is that gadget thing you may never have heard of…that you never even knew you needed. The promise of extended WiFi? Adding to shopping cart. Can’t live without this.

The ScreenBeam also allows you to watch content from your phone on your TV quickly and easily. Even more cool? Reviewers are saying you don’t even need WiFi to do this. The device creates its own network and works with most phones, laptops and tablets.

 

For the One Who Buys What They Want, When They Want It
Okay, we’ve found some of the “weird” and “wonderful” for you, but if your spouse is the type that knows what they want (which makes them a real challenge to buy for) and will just get it when they want it, make sure they have an Amazon Prime Membership. It’s so worth it. Not only do they get expedited shipping with it, but there are a ton of benefits including a Netflix-like service (Amazon Prime), photo storage, etc. Your whole household can use a single membership so you can buy anything on this list…and get it faster!

Did you find your perfect Valentine’s Day gift on this list? Are we missing something amazing? Let us know! We’d love to hear about it!

Why the World Needs More Mentors

How many mentors do you have in your life? Real mentors. People successful in their own right, but who also believe there is room at the top and offer expertise to help you and others get there?

Or do you feel you are surrounded by people more willing to pull up a lawn chair and laugh at the miserable failures in your life?

Do you have people who are there for you in bad times or when you are a failure, but then disappear when you start becoming successful?

Do true mentors still exist or is giving professional guidance a thing of the past?

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Why we Crave Mentorship

Some people never grew up with parents who held their hands, guided them, genuinely cared about their success, etc. They lack confidence. Social anxiety is common these days because we have whole generations being raised without people in their lives who give a damn. Actually, really, truly give a damn.

So many times, I’ve worked with people I admired and have looked up to as mentors. I asked lots of questions and begged for more responsibilities. To me, I would see someone below me asking for more knowledge as a blessing. Why wouldn’t you want to be surrounded with people on missions of personal growth? Doesn’t this make for happier people and a better environment? Being under the same umbrella of organization, aren’t we on the same team? Do we not have the shared goal to advance our company above all?

But some people see proactivity in others as a threat. They gravitate towards almost Machiavellian tactics. It’s not about the company. It’s not about being a good person and mentoring another. It’s about personal success, wealth, slithering their way to the top, claiming a crown, adorning themselves in achievements.

Heaven help those of us who have good hearts and think we can succeed in the work world through our smarts, integrity, kindness and agreeability.

Today’s global employment network isn’t made for people like us. We are not willing to lie, cheat and steal to gain empowerment. We don’t want to step on others to get ahead and use people. We crave mentorship because we have an old-fashioned notion that people want to help others because of their virtues and because they find us deserving. We want mentors. We crave the ability to accept an award for our achievements someday and point to our mentor in the crowd and say, “I couldn’t have done this without you.”

Let’s be clear; A mentor is not a “life coach”. It’s not someone who asks us to pay them for counseling sessions, their ebook, their podcast, their course on how to win at life. A mentor is not Tony Robbins preaching at us from a stage, pacing and cussing about how we need to get our crap together (although this can be useful).

A mentor is a relationship – Someone one-on-one devoted to our success out of the goodness of their heart, a love for a cause or objective bigger than themselves which you could help with, or maybe even a selfish motive of getting some credit or positive accolades back to their name, someday, when you bloom into who you are meant to be. There are role models, life coaches, motivators, etc. and we must be clear on their differences.

Of all these, mentors are the most personal because they take a personal interest in you. We want this central person to be our voice of reason. We want their expertise and their guidance. We feel lost in the workplace and world at large and see our mentors as people who have figured it out enough to gain admirability. In a world where it’s become not cool to have role models, we realize in the workplace and in career pursuits, we still need them. We need goals to aspire to and people who have forged paths before us who make us believe it’s possible. We need mentors because we don’t fully trust ourselves and will always seek a voice of reason. We want to hear about their stories, know them, learn from their successes and failures. To us, they are worthy and admirable.

Sounds pretty flattering, right?

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The Pain of Failed Mentorship

Every day, I used to go into Sally’s office, whose job I was labeled as an “assistant” to. We would talk about personal stuff, work stuff, and I would volunteer to take more off her plate. Sally gladly handed me the tedium she didn’t want to deal with.

Certainly, phone calls were one of those tediums. So I ended up taking 90% of Sally’s calls. Balancing this with all the paperwork I was supposed to be doing was a challenge.

But I had a goal – First, I wanted Sally to like me. Purely and genuinely. Not because of any ulterior motive. I liked her. As a person, I thought she was charismatic, fun, motivating and brightened the room. Then, I wanted her to teach me the ropes. I was mid-career and had no idea where I was going in my life, but I wanted direction. I wanted to get to that next step. I wanted to be respected, too, eventually. I didn’t want to be someone’s 60 year-old assistant someday.

But Sally had me firmly sealed in a corner. After years as her assistant, I watched the CEO of the company bring in new managers equal to Sally and wondered why I wasn’t getting promoted. I liked Sally, but I couldn’t help notice she spent more and more time out of the office and my desk was piling up with her work. I wasn’t getting a raise. I wasn’t getting a promotion. I was getting the shaft and everybody in the company knew it and made it a point to tell me so.

I went into the Big Boss’s office and asked him what his plans were for me. I asked him straight out if I was a permanent assistant to Sally. He said she couldn’t do it without me and would be devastated if I moved on. I told him I liked Sally, but I didn’t want to be an assistant the rest of my career. His eyes narrowed as he appraised me and told me he didn’t think I was good enough. He said Sally had complaints about my work.

I left his office infuriated. The one person I considered a mentor had complaints? I had worked day and night trying to make her look good. There wasn’t a single deserved complaint about my level of effort. I turned out work above and beyond expectations and I knew it. So, completely disheartened, I left the company and took a promotion with another company.

Shortly after I left, Sally was fired. I was the crutch she leaned on and she couldn’t make do without me. Having not been properly mentored, within six weeks at the new company, I quickly realized I was over my head in the management role with the new company and resigned my position.

Had Sally mentored me, I probably would have happily been her assistant for more years as I learned more. When I was ready, she could have put in a good word and I could have been promoted. I could have properly trained her new assistant to be everything she needed. The company could have maintained its forward motion and we could have overtaken our competitors. Easily.

How much is lost when people who are good at what they do operate compartmentalized and do not mentor their peers to become better than they are?

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The Fear of Mentoring

While Sally threw all her tedious projects my way, I couldn’t help but notice she closely guarded certain aspects of her job. When I volunteered to help, she consistently told me she would take care of it.

At first, I thought nothing of all this and then I started seeing that Sally may actually consider me a threat. I found this laughable because nothing I offered could beat her experience. The field I worked in is faced with daily challenges. The only way you can truly be considered a “success” in the field is to be the most experienced. Only when you have handled all these challenges multiple times, do you become an old, seasoned pro who knows how to handle things each time because you dealt with all the ramifications of your decisions from the last time it happened.

I knew this. But perhaps she worried the head boss might not know this and may boot her to the curb in favor of shinier, younger, newer talent whom he could pay far less than what he was paying her. Maybe her fears were justified.

There is a lot of fear when it comes to mentoring. What if the person you mentor stabs you in the back and takes your job? What if the person you mentor isn’t thankful? What’s in it for you? What if you don’t have it all figured out yourself and this person is looking at you like you are Yoda, waiting for you to dispense wise advice you just don’t have? Are you even a mentor in the first place?

Most people don’t come right out and call you a mentor. They just casually seek your advice on a consistent basis. If so, it’s safe to assume they consider you somewhat of a mentor. Don’t make them feel stupid for asking you. It’s a huge compliment.

Maybe you are the one with a junior colleague who always seems to be coming to you for career advice. Don’t be afraid to be a mentor. No, you don’t know it all and that’s okay. Being a know-it-all is not required. But dispensing what you do know and offering an educated opinion is why you are being looked up to and asked for guidance.

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The Death of Mentorship

There are many warnings out there.

“Those who can’t do, teach” and those who closely guard secrets to success are wise.

But in reality, those who find ways to make life easier, who gain knowledge and sit on it, whose ego and greed become a sadistic need to hide gifts so other people may not gain from them – tend to become the very worst people of all.

We are not talking the formula for Coca-Cola here.

We are talking basic professionals refusing to mentor junior associates out of sheer greed. We are talking people with the need to hold all cards close to their chest so that when they leave a company, the company can’t function without them. This is the new screed, the new way of doing things.

You may hear people are too busy to be mentors now, but this simply isn’t true. We have the same number of hours in the day as we always have. Mentoring doesn’t mean a mentor has to give constant pep talks. A mentor can gently guide in minutes. But some things in society have changed…

Ask a child who their role models are and most of the time, you might get a confused “I don’t know” – As narcissism and self-obsession have grown in our culture, we have started asking others for their opinions less and less. We know it all now. why would we ask someone else for an opinion? That’s what Google is for.

We live in a society where everyone’s personal demons are now front page news instead of tabloid fodder. We’ve seen Presidents disgraced, celebrities live flawed lives, sports figures jailed…Who is there left to admire? And how long before the people we admire screw up? Look hard enough at anyone, and you’ll find something about them to be disappointed about.

Who could possibly mentor you when all the mentors and role models are tarnished, imperfect in every way, or flawed?

We live in a time of ugliness on the cusp of the greatest beauty when we finally learn to accept flaws exist and shape the human experience more than anything else. Maybe we will learn mentors are sometimes people who have walked through fire, committed the greatest mistakes, and haven’t led pure and unblemished lives.

Mentorship was dying, but will flourish again. The rise of Machiavellian get-rich-quick schemes, narcissism and the sabotage of those on the path to success will be discovered to be miserable living. The era of wealth and excess led us to this point of selfishness, but a society can not sustain itself on self absorption.

We need mentors. We need the people willing to take others under their wing. We need those who see others struggling with anxiety and lack of confidence who will take two seconds of their day to set them on the right path with words of wisdom. We need those people who believe in us and bring out the best in us.

A company stacked with mentors is a company stacked for success.

Mentors shape our world. We need more people not afraid to be mentors and if you are lucky enough to be mentored, never take for granted the fact that somebody cared enough to assist you with your success. Give accolades where they are due and pass it on.

Sick Of Others Telling You Who You Are? Read This

Sometimes, as a kind soul, you live your whole life with your mind open allowing others to stuff whatever they want in there because you TRUST people…

You trust them to be honest and kind. Sometimes, they are even in a role in your life where you should be able to trust them like a mother, father, close friend, sibling, a teacher, etc…but you can’t because they say horrible things when you need encouragement.

“You’re just not that smart…”

Ouch. But things this devastating and even worse have been said after revealing a goal to people like this. They quickly let you know whatever you tell them you are striving for is out of your reach. Laughable, even.

But what they are saying actually tells you more about them and how they see you rather than anything about yourself. Their words are not your truth. Their words are to protect their own egos by attempting to hold you down. You’re telling them you may stray from the mold they are used to seeing you in. They are not comfortable with that.

They’ll invade your space, cross your boundaries and then label YOU as “selfish”.
“You’re NOTHING without a college degree.”
“But…uh, you’re not that attractive?”
“You’re too OLD.”
“What happened to your diet?” (looking you up and down)

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They want you to fail so badly, you may actually start to become what they always wanted you to be. You give up on your dreams. You allow their words to sink in. You believe it. And it crushes you.

Who would we have become had we not had our heads stuffed full of others’ projections?

Who could we still become?

What if we could open our minds like a treasure chest and pull out all the negative crap others have told us about ourselves?

What if we could wipe off the residue of their negativity off our self perception and be the amazing person we were created to be?

If you notice, two types of people become raging successes – Sociopaths who hurt everyone, do not care about anyone and are ruthless in their pursuits; Or intelligent people who clean out their trunks, put a lock on them and never let the words of anyone inside.

The words “Trust no one” sound so cold, but with time you begin to understand.

Trust those who respect who you are and are not determined to paint you into a role they want you to play while casting characters in their own life.

Trust the ones who see the good in you and make it a point to tell you.

Trust the ones who say, “Wow! That’s so cool!” and mean it when you tell them about your plans.

Trust the ones who give you helpful suggestions and smart solutions.

Trust the ones who want to see you succeed and don’t feel your success is a threat to their own.

Trust the ones who realize there is room at the top for many and have learned the fine art of sitting on their own jealousy to help and support you because they know you would do the same for them.

Trust those who want to share in your happiness and celebrate with you.

Whenever you have big dreams, you are inevitably going to come across those who tell you to “Be realistic” and roll their eyes at you either openly or behind your back. These are the kinds of people who never break through the limits of their own life.

You may be tempted to waste your time bestowing extra love on these types of people because “they need it the most”, but people determined to hurt you are not worth the effort to try loving them out of it. It doesn’t work and it further drags you down in your mission. They need to realize the detriment of their negativity on their own terms.

Let them go and like a helium balloon, you will rise.

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When you threaten the reality of others, you are always going to experience blowback.

“Sarah. Sarah? Sarah wants to start her own company? Don’t make me laugh! Sarah isn’t that smart. Sarah isn’t that capable. NO way Sarah could do that. She can’t even bake a casserole right. Sarah is just a stay-at-home mom. Sarah is headed for disaster.”

If you’re Sarah, this would probably be enough to do you in. One negative person can fill our minds with self doubts.

“That balloon is about to fly towards better things, better tie a rock to its string!”

But what if, unlike what they are asserting, your head is not full of air? You have a business plan, have done your legwork and your business idea makes great sense. If you are Sarah – Honey, I hope you shove that rock up your detractor’s butt and go for what you believe in.

Learn to separate legitimate criticisms from jealous idiocy. If a detractor says something to you, give what they brought up twenty-four hours of research and sleep on it. Examine the validity of their criticism. If it’s valid, find your way around it. It’s an obstacle. Not a roadblock. Then move on.

Another thing you must learn – A venture does not equal “I want to be a rich and famous gazillionaire” and you need to remind haters of this.

They might immediately say, “Sarah wants to be rich and famous! Hahahaha!”

However, smart people know, it’s not always about wealth and fame. It’s about the measure of your own happiness, doing what makes you happy and what is best for you and your family.

It is sometimes hard for people who are money-motivated, themselves, to realize money is not always the “End All, Be All” to all people. Some people have supportive spouses who are content enough with their own jobs that they tell their partner to pursue something which makes them deliriously happy – Because they love them. Because it makes them happy to see the person they are with ridiculously happy.

Some people are born to help others and might make this their dream in life. This doesn’t always bring in a massive paycheck, but it brings spiritual, emotional fulfillment that brings them peace.

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In a culture driven by greed, wealth, beauty, etc., so many have a difficult time realizing some people do things for reasons outside of the shallow boundaries of narcissism.

Realize all the things people are going to throw at you come from their own projections. Every projection they cast at you is rooted in their own insecurity.

Maybe they don’t feel smart enough to see beyond the shallow.

Maybe they feel like they are too old and “missed their time”.

Maybe they were never brave enough to take the steps you’ve taken.

Today, open your treasure chest – The storage trunk of your mind. Let’s pull out those horrible things said to you. Write them down on paper if you want. Burn them.

Yes, they might still remain in your memory, but put the power of those words on paper and burn it. Burn the effect those words have had over you for so long.

Photo credit Alamy Stock Photo

Maybe you don’t have your goal in mind. Maybe you don’t have your ultimate dream, yet, because those words others put in your mind have embedded so deeply that you don’t even know who you are anymore.

Relax. It’s okay. It’s happened to many of us…and sometimes those projections are so strong, it can take half our lives to discard them and figure out who we are.

You begin by discarding all those negative words and projections.

Every horrible thing ever said needs pulled from the storage trunk of your mind and burned. When you’ve gotten rid of all the negativity, look at the residue left behind. The residue is the cloudiness of separating your perceptions from others.

Do you really think these horrible things about yourself or your goal? Or was that something someone else put in your mind? If it’s yours, keep it. If it’s other people’s crap? Discard it.

What you will be left with is yourself. The purest version of you. An empty trunk waiting to be filled. Only this time, fill your trunk with what you choose to put in it and not that which others choose for you. Choose treasures, not junk.

This is your life, darling. Yours.

And today is the first day of the rest of it. You don’t have to die and be reborn to start over. Let the old self others created for you die. They never existed, anyway.

No more junk in your trunk. Only love.

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Surviving a Sociopath

If you are feeling lost, hurt, desperate, devastated, stunned, horrified, terrified, and like the world has been turned upside down, this is for you.

From the moment we have been born, we were taught this is a safe world by all public programming. If we had good parents, they made us feel safe. If they didn’t, sometimes our teachers did, someone did. Our morning cartoons showed everything was bright, colorful and happy.

It’s hard to believe, with this beautiful world we have been raised in, there are rapists, murderers, pedophiles, or evil people who exist. What is even more sad is that our view of the world is largely shaped by who we are. If you are a genuinely good person, you initially tend to think other people are good, too. You may think the world is full of wonderful people and the bad are few and far between.

The model we have grown accustomed to is that in which there is a bad guy…and a bunch of good people. In the end, a good guy steps in to lead the good people and they defeat the bad guy. It’s the same story over repeated. The bad guy always gets his come-uppance in the end.

Real life is far different.

In reality, sometimes the bad guys win. Sometimes they step in with their sociopathic stares and rip your life to shreds while you can only stand by and helplessly watch. Others around you look at you and say, “Why are you doing nothing? Why did you do nothing? Stand up for yourself!”

But when you stand up for yourself, the sociopath uses your aggression against you and claims you bullied them.

So here you are.

You’ve faced the worst of the worst at the hands of someone else or you have faced tragedy, by its own accord, which has brought you to your knees. Whatever happened to you, it was completely unfair. You didn’t deserve this. Even worse, the sociopath will dig deep into your life and find any crack to exploit in order to show that maybe, just maybe, you did deserve this. Forget all their misdeeds, their transgressions (Oh, and they are many). They have their laser focus on yours.

They are determined to tear you apart. They are going to find every last shred of confidence you have and obliterate it. They will ruthlessly cut the bond of every friendship you ever had. They will not stop until you break down and, even then, they will keep on going. They will smile if they hear they have pushed you to the point of taking your own life. They would even attend your funeral to pretend they really care.

This is what we are dealing with. This is the type of sadistic evil which exists on this planet. Thankfully, most people will never know until they have crossed paths with one of these people.

They are Sociopaths. And they are the closest you will ever get to meeting the devil in human form.

Realize you are not alone

If you’ve had the unfortunate experience of having a run-in with a sociopath, you need to know that you are not alone, first and foremost. That’s why this article exists. That’s why there are many articles across the Internet on the same topic. Sociopaths aren’t some psychobabble boogeyman. They are real and their affects on the lives of their victims can be horrific, even tragic.

Whatever is happening, right now, get through it

I know it feels like this is IT. The end of it all. They are actively destroying you, your reputation, everything you love about yourself, but realize this is only temporary. How many scandals do you remember in the national news? We live in an era so hungry for drama that yesterday’s drama is forgotten next week. I know it feels like this damage is forever, but it’s not. Hang in there. Survive.

Ditch anyone involved who watches this happen and does nothing

These people are NOT your friends. Do not befriend those who will not defend people who are actively being hurt. You will be sickened to realize many people will defend the abuser because they are weak and afraid to stand up for themselves. Do not associate with cowards. They will turn on you in a heartbeat whenever someone they perceive as more powerful is in the vicinity. They might seem like nice people, but cowards never make good friends. Cut ties with them permanently. I know it sounds harsh and some of them WILL come back and try to make you feel bad for cutting them off, but they know why. Let them go.

Realize you are NOT a Coward

They may be exasperated with you for not fighting back and may even act disgusted with you for your lack of “bravery”. But here is the thing — As said earlier, you cannot win when fighting with a sociopath. You have a conscience, a very precious gift. They do not. They will stoop to any level to hurt you. If you do the same, you will feel horrible about it and they will exploit your kindness to make you feel bad for defending yourself. You are not a coward — You are SMART to walk away and realize there is no sense in engaging sociopaths. They’re not worth it. You are. The only reason they, and all their followers, want to see a fight is because they thrive on drama and discontentment. Don’t be discouraged. What other people say about you is none of your business. Refuse to care. Focus on taking care of yourself.

Seek validation

Find people who know your struggle, what you are going through and are on your side. Let them talk. Let them assure you that you are the one in the right. Be careful of speaking yourself. Because some truly evil sociopaths will use others to gain your trust and then exploit you for information which they will then report back to the sociopath. (Of course, if you’re very cheeky, supply them with some false information to see if it comes back to you!) Trust your gut. Receive the validation, but tread carefully.

Find the Truth-Seekers

The friends you do want are the ones who have such a great relationship with the truth, they want nothing to do with people who come to them with gossip. Truth seekers will always ask for the other side of the story. They will not accept half-truths. They will examine everything brought to them with detachment because they know what truth looks like. They also know someone who barely talked to them before coming forward with damning information likely has ulterior motives. These people are smart, cautious and probably aren’t buying the sociopath’s bull.

Take care of #1

That’s you! In this period of stress, grief, pain, mourning and suffering, take care of yourself. Treat yourself to the small things that make you happy. Buy your favorite food, watch your favorite movies, read books, play sports, pamper yourself, give yourself a spa day, go get your hair done, do whatever you usually do to relieve stress. You’ve just been through some crappy times. You deserve it!

Roll with the Relapses

Some days you are going to feel strong. Others will feel like you can’t even get out of bed. Acknowledge that some days are going to be like this. Lift yourself off the floor and keep putting one foot in front of the other. If you can afford the downtime, go with it. Treat yourself, as earlier suggested. Get in the car and go on a day trip. Go through the motions. Do what you have to do. Keep waiting it out and that day will come when you feel alive again. Just don’t quit.

Cut All Ties

This not only means people. In many cases, you will have to look at all ways in which this person is able to get to you. Get away from them no matter what the cost. The hardest thing about all this is that we often have to abandon friends we didn’t want to abandon, places we loved going, social media connections, etc. Seal yourself off from this person through any means necessary and don’t feel bad about it for a second. This is a key art of self preservation. You don’t need them. They need you. They need your reactions to their drama. They need your reactions for entertainment. They, however, are expendable to you. Change your phone number, if needed. Block them from social media accounts. Delete social media accounts. Do what you have to do.

Don’t Look Back

Once you have distanced yourself from this person, do not ever go back. They may try to “talk” to you. Anyone who has talked to a sociopath can tell you they have no interest in apologizing. Though they may apologize for you – “I’m sorry YOU misunderstood ME” or “I’m sorry YOU were offended”. Don’t be fooled. These are not apologies. They want to talk to you about how you (supposedly) hurt them. They want an opportunity to pluck your strings and play a song called ‘Guilt’. They want you to feel bad. Don’t. You owe them nothing. Not a single second of your time. You don’t owe them a phone call. You don’t owe them a text. You don’t owe them coffee, lunch, dinner — NOTHING. Keep on walking.

Reclaim Your Life

When you successfully cut ties, you will start feeling relief. Because they aren’t there judging your life anymore. They aren’t there looking for ways they can exploit or hurt you. You can move on. You can breathe again. Now is the time when you rebuild. Make your life better than it was. Consider it a “purge” of horrible people. You should be left with truth-seekers and genuine people. Don’t be sad or feel defeated. You won.

Here’s the thing about sociopaths — They have little capacity to feel guilt, regret, or remorse and this transfers to all their emotions. It means they don’t feel the full depth of joy like you can. Wrap yourself in it and realize all the gifts you have they will never possess because good always stays away from evil.

Sociopaths will never have anything good in their life. Anything good won’t want to be near them or associate with them. If you are thinking of sociopaths you know that have loads of money or material possessions, just realize none of these things will ever bring them joy. Because they have the inability, at their core, to feel it. This is where you are different from them. Even though it feels like you are going through hell, please look at this as a way to reset you on the journey you were meant to be on.

This is not your end. This is your beginning.

Feel free to leave your story of survival in the comments for all those going through this painful experience. Nobody should go through this feeling alone.

Single For the Season: An Extremely Sardonic Take on Being Single For the Holidays

Oh yay.

Welcome to the holiday season. And it starts off with a bang! First will come Halloween. Where you will be invited to Halloween parties with couples in their oh-so-cute couples costumes. Meanwhile, you get to debate whether to dress genuinely scary or to be a slutty pineapple. If you are a woman, of course. If you are a male, you probably just plan on buying a t-shirt that says “This is my costume” and proudly being lame.

Next will come Thanksgiving, where you will go and listen to all your relatives tell you morale-boosting things like:
“Your clock is ticking…”
“You’re no spring chicken…”
“I know a really nice girl…”
“I was just reading this article that said you should really be married by 30, sooo…”
Only to be saved by your drunk uncle, Larry, who tells them to shut up and tells you to enjoy the single life, while his wife glares at him from across the table.

After all this abuse, Christmas will roll around and you’ll get to meet the new girlfriends and boyfriends of all your cousins as they bring them to meet the family. All this after you woke up alone (Or if you’re really lucky Uncle Larry is snoring on your couch because your Aunt kicked him out again).

It’s no wonder everyone drinks on New Year’s.

This isn’t going to be one of those pick-me-up articles telling you that you will find someone and aren’t destined to live your life with twenty cats, thinking about drinking Windex to end it all.

No.

Let’s roll with the punches. You can’t reason your way out of this situation so the only thing you can do is learn to laugh about it. Consider this your handy dandy guide to getting through the holidays single and loving every minute of it. Because good relationship possibilities are usually attracted to happy people. So let’s be deliriously happy.

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How to get through Halloween

1. Make your own couples costume. A blow up doll would be happy to be your date and wear the other half of your couples’ costume. And she won’t complain that it’s too cold or that her Halloween hooker heels are making her feet hurt.
2. Show your love for the season. Carve some pumpkins! Maybe with middle fingers on them. Put them on your doorstep. People should get the hint. Or use this season to advertise! You may be the first person to ever get a date with a hot, single mom by carving the words ‘I’m Single’ onto a pumpkin!
3. Eat a whole can of beans and go on one of those haunted hayrides with all the canoodling couples. Bonus points if you can make someone jump off before the ride is over.

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How to get through Thanksgiving

1. Bake a thoughtful batch of chocolate Ex-Lax brownies to offer to any relative who starts asking you about your relationship, financial, or career status. “Have a brownie, Aunt Carolyn! Fresh-baked!”
2. Prevent the questions before they even start – As soon as you walk in, go straight to the kitchen without saying ‘hello’ to anyone and start talking to the turkey in the oven, “It will all be over soon, little buddy! Just let the heat overcome you…” This is effective because it stops anyone from even asking you why nobody has snagged you yet. Bonus points if you include other food items into the conversation.
3. After everything everyone says around the dinner table, say, “See, that’s where you’re wrong…” Have a ridiculous rebuttal to everything. Start asking married couples who ask you about your relationship status, “So, how is your marriage?”

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How to get through Christmas

1. Collect a large bucket of rocks. Wrap them individually in boxes addressed to yourself. Show up at the family gathering and put all the boxes under the tree. Watch everyone be confounded when you seem to be getting the most presents. Unwrap each one kissing your new rock while practically crying in thankfulness.
2. Wear onesie PJs. Stop periodically, mid conversation, and make that face toddlers make while crapping their pants. Move on as if nothing happened.
3. Buy your new niece or nephew the loudest, noisiest toy you can find or if they are a little older, one with a million pieces to it. [Note: At least this is how I’m assuming my single relatives got through the season with my kids – laughing about how I must be tearing out my hair over the noisy toy or the vacuum-clogging nightmare that was the craft kit of 10,000 beads]

How to get through New Year’s

1. Ah, yes. The article was finished. And then I was reminded that I forgot New Year’s. So there will be one and only one suggestion – Do what everyone else does: Make plans to change stuff you won’t follow through on and drink! Or just go to bed early, wake up to a new year and hope the same crap doesn’t happen next year.

As you see, this article has been absolutely useless in helping you through the nightmare of being single for the season. BUT…laughter is good for the soul and there is an underlying tip in all this blatant ridiculousness to help you get through it.

Your sense of humor will help you get through absolutely everything.

If you think too much about the hardships of being single or the ache of loneliness, it’s going to get you nowhere but depressed. The best thing to do is laugh. Don’t watch ‘The Family Man’ this Christmas. Instead, watch ‘A Christmas Story’ or watch the Griswolds’ escapades with Christmas lights. Watch Kevin defeat the bad guys in ‘Home Alone’. No sad Christmas movies for you!

On Thanksgiving, redirect the conversation away from that which depresses you and find something you’re happy about to alter the course of conversation. You’re going to get through this.

Look for the joy. Look for the laughter. There is something funny in just about everything. And when you do find someone to bring back to the family, maybe they’ll have some funny stories to tell about the time you had a conversation with the family dinner. Whatever you’re going through this year, just get through it.

If you start feeling the creep of sadness, imagine yourself doing the crazy things listed above. It will bring a small smile to your face. When they ask why you are smiling, just say, “Oh, nothing. I am just really happy right now. No reason” and keep on smiling. It makes them wonder what you’re up to.

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10 Ways Narcissism is Destroying Our Culture

“Narcissism” is quite the buzzword these days, pushed to the forefront of discussion because of social media’s rampant popularity.

Where taking photos of yourself, by yourself, would typically have been considered weird before the advent of social media…It has now become normal behavior.

Being a culture valuing self-expression and individuality, the United States is often viewed by people inside and outside the country as one of the most narcissistic countries in the world. We aren’t talking self-absorbed from a nationalist perspective, but individually self-absorbed.

So who is narcissistic? We all are. What you are about to read will be uncomfortable. Because unless you live under a rock, many of us participate in or have exhibited some inherent narcissistic traits which could be contributing to cultural decline.

Being self-obsessed in everyday life may gain a few eye rolls, but the impacts of narcissism on a culture are vast and harmful.

1)  Increase in Road Rage

How dare there be traffic impeding us to and from work?
How dare other people be on the road when I need to be on it?
Yellow light? Not for me! I’m in a hurry and don’t have time to stop for this nonsense! “My turn signal is on not because I’m ASKING to get over, I’m telling you I’M GETTING OVER! We can crash if you want!” (Yes, this meme actually exists).

Road rage incidents are increasing. AAA reports 80% of all drivers admit to exhibiting some form of road rage. When behind the wheel, we tend to de-personalize and forget other drivers are people too. You are safe in a mobile shelter, protected by steel, fiberglass, aluminum, etc. That bodybuilder twice your size who just cut you off can’t touch you. The middle fingers fly, the horns honk and it’s every bit just like an argument on social media.

More than ever before, the road is becoming a dangerous place because we can’t accept we have to share the road with everyone else.

2)  Identity Politics

Identity politics, by definition, are “Politics in which groups of people having a particular racial, religious, ethnic, social, or cultural identity tend to promote their own specific interests or concerns without regard to the interests or concerns of any larger political group” [Merriam Webster]

Our various social justice causes have separated America into tribes, incorporating narcissistic principles because identity groups no longer promote the good of the whole; Identity groups only promote the good of individuals within the particular identity group.

While intentions may be good and attractive because of the human instincts towards tribalism, forming tribes within tribes within a nation only leads to a sense of disconnect with rational objectives of the nation. We end up caring more about our subgroup’s specific needs than worrying about the bigger issues of the nation as a whole.

Neither political party is immune to identity factions forming within their own parties. Most popular are identity groups focused on social justice issues, as they are easy to understand and promote.

The politics of personal identity have formed new religions where the center of worship is our political party. We defend our ideologies because they are true to us without care to the harm they are doing in turning countrymen against countrymen. What is more narcissistic than this viewpoint?

3)  Ending of Marriages

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Approximately 40 to 50% of marriages end in divorce. Observance shows the reason for many divorces often happens when one party in the marriage thinks they can do better than their partner. You won’t find many admitting it, but it’s a known phenomenon; A divorce becomes nasty and suddenly the couple who were so in love before are now telling the world their ex-spouse is evil.

Shows like ‘The Bachelor’ glamorize dating. Disney movies glamorize one perfect man who will show up and whisk a woman away to a life of excess. In particular, women file for divorce more than men, showing the appeal of staying married may be less for women.

The reasons behind this phenomenon are staggering. Women are the biggest consumers in the country. They are targeted more by advertisers, buy more products, read more books, watch more TV and movies than men. This means women are absorbing more fictionalized, possibly unrealistic expectations of marriage than men on a daily basis.

They are also more prone to consuming self-help literature which largely focuses on ‘eliminating the negative’ – A great concept, but one which causes a dilemma forcing couples to walk away from each other rather than to work out marital problems.Not to mention women who leave bad marriages are portrayed by the media as glamorous, “finding themselves”, strong, confident, powerful, etc.

Some marriages truly are too bad to be saved. But so many times, one party or both just have highly inflated senses of self. They can do better. They deserve better. Their partner’s habits are annoying. But they are faultless. Ask anyone who got away from one of these narcissists and they will usually say they are much better off.

4)  Shallow Friendships

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In the age of social media, how many social media friendships do you have? How many of your social media friends would show up to care for you or run errands for you if you were sick? Who could you count on to give you some of their time if you were in dire need? Who would you call and talk to if you had a problem and needed an ear?

If your answers are, “Not many”, you aren’t alone. Lots of people are surrounded by  acquaintances but very few true friends. In this age of narcissism, some people feel the need to appear popular on social media. You will know them by their party photos, surrounded by “friends”, the constant posts on social media trying to portray the image of a perfect life, and the subsequently disappointed memes about friendship and how nobody is ever there for them when they really need them. If you only have more Facebook time with friends than face time, it’s easier to develop very shallow ideas on what friendship really is.

Interpersonal relationships are giving way to a shallow 2D image of our life on social media where we pretend to live a certain way and friends ‘follow’ and are asked to believe it’s the truth.

5)  Declining Work Ethic

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“I can’t find anyone worth a damn!” is the lament of many a business owner. They’re not being facetious. Work ethic has also changed in modern times. Our forefathers worked hard to build nations that would last and legacies to be proud of. Now, legacies exist on their own merit, but younger generations don’t have the excitement that came with building brick and mortar businesses from the ground up.

They are stepping into career fields already built by their grandparents’ parents. Their struggle is to maintain and so they lose the principles of foundation and giving their everything to achieve a dream. In an online age, buying locally is losing steam as the Internet has driven the market to all corners of the world where people can buy easily at the click of a button.

Narcissism is found in the entitlement exhibited frequently in the modern workplace. Young college graduates may often walk in the door and expect to be paid just as much as their peers who have seniority in the company. Some get spoiled on over-education, remaining in school for multiple secondary degrees to contribute to making them look good and lose out on real world experience. The companies who succeed are those who find a way to get their employees out of themselves and to feel like they are part of a team, all working towards a bigger picture and an exciting future together, rather than isolated wage slaves waiting for 5:00 to roll around.

A company culture focused on the success of the whole is a successful company.

6)  Rise In Drug & Alcohol Abuse

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Drug & alcohol abuse is ultimately selfish, even though the multiple causes can sometimes be understandable. We can make some excuse for drug users because life is hard. We have overcomplicated society to the point where a lot of people have difficulties functioning in this new world we have created. Look at all the hoops you have to jump through just to own a car and be able to drive.

We have complicated relationships. We have complicated family life. We have complicated the process of getting a job. Everything in this world has become overly convoluted and complex. With the rise of stress, anxiety and frustration, many turn to substances to cope. Sometimes these turn into addictions. Sometimes because they partake in these substances so much, the ‘high’ wears off. It’s no longer doing the trick and they escalate to stronger substances, illegal substances…Before they know it, they are full-blown addicts who begin to struggle with life.

The problem is – We ALL have these struggles. However many people won’t turn to drugs & alcohol because they are aware of the bigger impacts on themselves, on society and on their loved ones. They put others first and refuse to fall prey to addiction.

Inevitably, when drug use escalates, the individual starts losing the capacity to hold down a normal job. As the addiction spirals out of control and they lose their income, even people who were once wonderful people may turn to criminal acts to collect enough to keep their fix going. Not only are they harming their loved ones, but they begin to harm society and innocent people. Some get behind the wheel where their narcissistic impulse contributes to tragedy.

7)  The End of Role Models

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Ask someone in their 80’s who they looked up to as a child. They typically have quite a few answers. Ask a child today and they have a hard time coming up with a single answer. Some will name musicians…or maybe a famous ‘YouTuber’, but not many kids have role models based on morals and principles. How many are left?

Witch hunts have become the norm again where stories, true or false, can be circulated, working people up into a frenzy of emotion over the latest topic du jour. Everyone is so quick to accept a story of wrongdoing without even the slightest questioning of whether or not it is true.

The people we should be able to admire, we aren’t allowed to – Because they have a dirty side and it must be drug out for all to see. We want everyone depraved. We want them all to fall. We want them to come down to a level lower than us so we feel better about ourselves. We have a narcissistic need to see the beautiful and wealthy hurt. We make people famous only to destroy them. We don’t want role models. We want drama and chaos in this new world.

The “role models” don’t have it all figured out. Who do they think they are telling us how to live? We are just as smart and worthy as these people. We are our own role models. The self esteem movement says we should love ourselves above all. So we stop looking outside ourselves to others in a gesture of respect and humility. We honor our own greatness instead.

8)  More Education & More Arrogance

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Getting a degree used to be a special thing. Now, everyone has one. “College for all” has become a rallying cry. But does ‘college for all’ really contribute anything to the whole? Does an overly educated society really make us any greater? Does our heightened sense of self importance really make us destined for something bigger?

A long time ago, having a PhD meant something. Now it usually just means you have a larger loan to pay off. Still, colleges push graduates to keep coming back for more. Along with handing out diplomas, it can sometimes seem they are handing out ego, as well, putting college graduates in a real moment of despair when they get out into the so-called real world searching for a job.

As a whole, our society has begun to denigrate some jobs and professions as being for “losers”. Trades became laughed at as positions of lower stature. Yet, some trade jobs can make vastly more than the PhDs who frequent the businesses of tradesmen.

We now have entire generations who think they are “too good” to do certain lines of work vital to functioning as a society. Not all of these collegiate scholars are particularly bright and their IQs aren’t any greater than someone without a college degree, but they have ‘classed’ themselves out of necessary societal occupations. They all want to be known and paid for being thinkers, but won’t raise a finger to be a “do’er”.

As a result of an overeducated society, we have become a society of snobs who look down on people for not having an education while well-paying trade jobs suffer shortages.

9)  Obsession with Appearances

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Social media is one of the single biggest advertising streams on the planet. Not just for  products you can buy. It also allows people to advertise their life in exchange for admiration, respect, the envy of others and the appearance of “having it all”.

Every day, we scroll our news feeds and hear about our friends’ new jobs, latest vacations, the fun night out they just had, their newly done hair, their new motorcycle, the new RV they bought, their new house, their children’s achievements, their own successes… Cumulatively, all these successes in your face at once can make you feel like a real failure.

Subconsciously, social media has awakened the narcissist in each of us. Each person’s Facebook page is their own little reality TV show. If they are the type of person who desires being envied, they’ll fill it with the highlight reel of their days. Anyone who dares be open about a problem in their life risks the title of “negative”. Everyone on social media is conflicted. Many of them don’t want you to be more successful than they are, but at the same time, they don’t want to hear you “whine”.

People will go into debt buying things just to impress others. While this is nothing new, social media has now given them a platform to show off what they bought.

This obsession with appearance and showing off on social media has meant less time with our friends. In days of the past, friends would call you to say, “Hey! I got a new boat! Let’s go out in it this weekend!” Now they just post photos of it on Facebook and photos of themselves enjoying it.

10)  Overall Dissatisfaction With Life

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Studies are beginning to show that happiness levels in the United States have fallen to dismal levels. This last example of how narcissism is destroying our culture is, perhaps, the summary of this entire article.

Our country’s basis in narcissistic pursuits of wealth, fame, beauty, etc. are only making us more unhappy. We want recognition, fame, glory, rewards, envy and as a result, we become angry.

Because we are angry, we are more aggressive and engage in political fighting and road rage. Politics and other people are easy to blame for our emptiness and overall dissatisfaction with life. The constant anger drives our inability to cope to drugs and alcohol. Drugs, alcohol, sex abuses, etc. have led to the destruction of many a role model. So we drift in a sea of faces without anyone to admire. Our jealousy prevents from admiring anyone anyway. We turn to ourselves. Our friendships become shallow because we are taught virtue is in being competitive instead of supportive.

Because we don’t know everything, we go to college so we can become “scholarly” and claim that we do know everything. We make ourselves our own heroes. We refuse to settle for mediocre jobs or a mediocre life. We refuse to settle for mediocre spouses, as well.

This is the United States, today.

Living in a happier culture, such as that of Japan, you would notice a large difference. They don’t necessarily have more than we do. But they have humility. The attitude is very much “Me last”. When you have a culture like this, you have a country where everyone cares for each other and honor exists.

As we know from American platitudes, our cultural platitudes revolve more around “Be yourself” and “Me first” with heavy influence on baseless self love. As a result, everyone is looking out for number one, leading to a culture of greed and corruption.

Maybe our culture can start making a change by living for the good of the whole rather than the good of the individual. It could make all the difference. There is a lot to be said about the beauty of humility. She is a protected class heading for extinction.