Girl's Behavior

The Ultimate Key to Happiness … Is Not Giving a Shit

The Ultimate Key to Happiness … Is Not Giving a Shit


Now I know what you’re thinking: Blah, blah, blah RJ, we’ve heard a hundred people by now tell us to “just not give a fuck” but it isn’t that easy, okay? We’re human, we care about shit, not all of us are sociopaths. Sheesh.


Relax, I agree with you. Believe it or not, I really intend for this to be a helpful and (hopefully) inspiring myTake.



If you choose to read past my snazzy title you’ll know that I understand that humans are emotional beings and that we are conditioned to have a certain level of care and regard for the people around us. It is bred into our psyche to care about the things and the people around us; we have almost an inherent obligation to place value to the things that people say and do, and subsequently are affected by the things they say and do. People that we don’t even know personally can make us question our integrity and even damage our self esteem, even though words or actions can truthfully only affect you profoundly based on how much you value them.


I’m not just going to be talking about people though, I’m also going to be talking about … well … EVERYTHING. Think about it for a moment: how many of us have had our entire day ruined because of ONE event that happened that day? How many of us have broken down or felt defeated because something we tried to do didn’t go according to plan? And how many of us have just plain felt like the whole world was against us when we had a colossally crappy day?


All of us. And this is exactly what I’m talking about today – the entirety of it.


Consequently, this enables people and events to have an affect on how you feel, both good and bad. These affects vary from person to person, but let me tell you one thing that almost always seems to ring true to me: things often have too much effect on how we feel. We are often cataclysmically afflicted when it comes to people’s opinions and the uncontrollable outcomes of the universe, so much so that we allow some of the smallest things – be it snide remarks or simply tripping over your own feet – to affect us deeply.


I used to be deeply affected by anxiety and depression, which made me sensitive to how people treated me and sensitive to pretty much everything else in between. But I learned some coping methods, and my favorite (and my most effective) method of all time has always been rationalization. By that I mean challenging the way that you think emotionally and breaking it down logically. Whenever I’d feel overwhelmed, I’d ask myself why and think of the best and worst case scenario. More often than not, I’d realize that the worst case scenario was far more unlikely than the best.





Once I realized that half of my worries weren’t worth the energy, I began to see just how much unnecessary care and attention I gave to negative people and insignificant events that happened in my life. Why was there ever a reason to care about why some douche gave me a dirty look, or why was there ever a reason to care that my hair stylist only booked me for a cut when I wanted a colour too?



There was no reason for me to care, because that shitty guy was no one to me and my world wasn’t going to end because my hair wasn’t red that day. Once I rationalized it, I began realizing that caring for stupid people and shitty things was just a blatant waste of energy, and there was no reason to give such things so much value. Especially the opinions of others: sure, maybe somebody called you fat and ugly once … who cares? Why should that destroy your self esteem – because he said it? Because “what if” other people think the same thing - right?


FUCK THAT!


The Ultimate Key to Happiness … Is Not Giving a Shit


The only reason you truthfully care is because you fear there might be truth to what he’s saying, and that stems from a lack of confidence. But in a moment like that, I dare you to ask yourself: Is being “fat and ugly” as bad as being the type of asshole who intentionally tries to destroy someone’s self esteem for no reason beyond getting some kind of sick satisfaction from it?


I think you know the answer to that.



You don’t have to be so deeply affected by people and bullshit as long as you have the ability to just not care about what they have to say or about the fact that you can’t change everything. Shitty people and events exist and they love to poke their heads in your life, but YOU decide how valuable their presence is, no one else.



Of course, I understand that learning to rationalize your feelings and getting to a comfortable enough place to brush things off is not easy, but it isn’t as hard as we think either.


Just invision this for a second: A guy comes up to me, flips me the bird and tells me I’m ugly. I have a few ways I can process this situation:


A. I can be completely destroyed by the fact that some stranger thought I was so ugly that he could not only not contain his opinion, but took it so offensively that he thought I deserved to be flipped off and humiliating in front of a bunch of people. Sounds pretty lame, no?


Or there’s option B.


B. I can look at this waste of human life, smile, shake my head and tell him to have a nice day. Because this guy is nothing more to me than an asshole with a shitty opinion who made his objective to make me feel horrible about myself – which just isn’t a person with an opinion worth valuing. I know that just because someone says something doesn’t mean that it’s true, especially when it’s that negative. They’re just epic asshats with their own issues.


When you really take the time to look at it, there’s no reason to care about every little negative comment or occurrence in your life. Now I’m not suggestion you just emotionally shut down, but I am challenging you to be selective of what you care about. Try to keep it to the things that really matter. You know, like: You, your friends, your family, the environment, animals, your passions, etc.


The less time you spend on the negative, the more time you have to focus on the positive. Old saying, but it's true. Give up this negative, self-debilitating behavior and make way for the things that matter to you. The things that REALLY matter.


The Ultimate Key to Happiness … Is Not Giving a Shit


That’s all I have to say on the subject G@Gers. As usual I appreciate you taking the time to read this, I know I don’t ever make short takes so the fact that at least some of you take the time to read them really means a lot to me. I hope some of you found this helpful or at least an enjoyable read, and I hope you all enjoy the rest of your week.

The Ultimate Key to Happiness … Is Not Giving a Shit
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