I do not like fluff, and I don’t like pretending. What I value most is honesty, kindness, and strength. If we are fully honest with ourselves and each other, we do not want our time wasted with formalities or useless information. We want short and to the point. This doesn’t mean something has to be 5 seconds to satisfy us, a whole novel can be short and to the point so long as it doesn’t waste time. “Why say more word when few word do trick” -Kevin, The Office. And he makes a good point if you can listen without judging him for the way he says it, really, why waste your own and someone else’s time saying things that don’t matter or that you don’t mean? All anyone can do is act upon the information they have, so if you are not fully honest with someone, or you fail to inform them properly, you are also responsible for any way in which they may disappoint you by not knowing something which you were fully capable of telling them. A lack of honesty and transparency is detrimental to and wastes the time of all parties involved. Honesty can also be a form of kindness to both parties. You do yourself the kindness of not lying, and you do the other the kindness of providing them with useful information. Whether it’s telling a stranger who asks for directions that you honestly don’t know how to get somewhere, or telling a significant other that you feel things are not working between you rather than cheating, even a hard truth is more kind in the long run, and lying, or withholding the truth, only wastes time. Would you rather be around a person who is spiteful, or a person who is kind? Why would you not also uphold this virtue, which you seem to value inherently? There does not always need to be a benefit for you, sometimes you just need to do what is right because it is right, and sometimes all someone needs is a little kindness. To be strong not only physically, but to be strong in your convictions and beliefs, and to have the mental fortitude to simply make clear what you care about and uphold that to the best of your ability, without calling attention to or being afraid of how ‘corny’ it may be. We need people to just live and help each other, sometimes what people call corny is something that evokes an emotion in them, something that they may have been conditioned to believe is not okay or normal. That feeling is solidarity and pride. It’s okay to be nice to people and feel good about it and feel emotional thinking about it. That’s normal and good and not something to be suppressed. I understand the urge though, to turn everything into a joke. For years I have loved nothing more than to make a good joke, because I want others to smile and laugh and feel some joy, and the same goes for myself. And maybe someone else can relate, but I’m starting to realize not every damn thing out of my mouth has to be a joke. I will still always be a fun-loving person who likes jokes and making people smile, but I need to start taking something seriously. If nothing is serious and there are no stakes and everything is a game, it’s hard to really care about much of anything. If all you care about is having fun you start to realize you’re not having any. I used to go out and drink far too much, far too often, because in the moment it was fun. I don’t necessarily regret those times, but that can’t be the only thing a person does. And I’m not talking about alcohol specifically, it’s more than that. If I wasn’t drinking I’d be playing video games, if I wasn’t playing video games I’d be eating McDonald’s with a large caramel frappe every day, I was addicted to nicotine. The problem was not any one of these things on their own, or even the combination, they were a symptom of the fact that I had been living hedonistically. I was living for the moment, and only for the moment, what feels good now, what’s gonna satisfy me? Mindlessly scrolling may sound more appealing in the moment than picking up the guitar or learning how to fix a car, but really it’s the things we put work into that end up being the most satisfying and the most important to us. And this isn’t new. We know this and yet we still choose the temporary distraction over long-term satisfaction because our brains are fried and we can’t just pay attention to something or put in some effort for a while, we want happy chemicals now. So in searching for ways to live a more happy and fulfilled life, I think we should start with doing what we know is right.
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