I am the slackerist of all slacking bloggers lately. I wish I had a great excuse, like that I was busy with really important and productive things, but sadly I do not. I’ve been doing nothing but yoga, playing hard to get and/or spooning with my dog, drinking coffee, and using my youth as an excuse to binge drink. It’s a rough life, but someone’s got to do it.
Since I haven’t posted in awhile, I thought I would comprise another list of life lessons that have hit me like a ton of bricks in the past month. Everyone seriously loves lists. It’s science.
My life:
1. Using your young age is the best excuse for most situations- Hence the title of this post. At the ripe age of 22, I am still a new little girl in the world. I can basically blame a lot of my bad decisions on being to young to realize, and too reckless to care. In reality, I (probably) know better. But guess what? I am still super young and unexperienced in the scheme of life. I am still a sheltered middle-class American white girl and have little to no street cred or real world knowledge. I know this. If success was measured on memorizing the U.S. political structure or having a decent down-dog, I would maybe be successful. But it’s not. As much as we would like to think we know everything, we don’t. The more we know, the less we know. Thus, use your young age to get you out of trouble while you still can. For everyone over the age of 35 reading this, I feel that this excuse would be questionable. In fact if you are over the age of 35 you can almost claim early onset dementia. I’m kidding. But seriously. Try it.
2. New Years Eve actual < New Years Eve intended: There is so much hype surrounding this one special night of the year. Like if the night is awesome, the entire year will surely follow in awesomeness. This is in fact a lie. NYE always contains: 2 weeks of planning, a whoreish black ensemble, too much booze, a kiss with a stranger, and crying while your date vomits in the corner of a sketchy club that you paid $53948 to get into (the same bar that is too sketchy to enter on a normal night). While these examples are entirely hypothetical (read: they’ve all happened to me at some point), NYE never turns out as planned. It;s like prom or a killer vacation: fairytale in theory, disaster in real life. The absolute best part of NYE is the day after. The world dies a little each New Years Day. Literally no one (me) moved. And for what?? to say you had the craziest and most reckless NYE EVER!!! I’m truly not trying to be the grinch of NYE, but it’s real. Every year I decide that next year I wil do something meaningful and non-binge drinking, and every year I make the same mistakes. I’m too young to know better….
3. Meeting someone for the first time after extensively stalking them on facebook makes for an awkward yet entertaining encounter– You know this has happened to you. Don’t lie. It’s never happened to me though. By hypothetically, lets say this happened to me last Thursday (it did). After acting like I was surprised at the utterance of their name and the close proximity of their residence, things got a little awkward. After the awkward subsided (yes, awkward is like nausea), I decided to throw my inhibitions to the wind and create entertainment. Sometimes you just gotta. Try this: if you encounter this situation (which you will), casually bring up a very specific fact you know surrounding their hobbies. Like if they are a kite enthusiast (likely), say, “you know what my absolute favorite hobby is? flying kites! I love em’! they are graceful yet powerful!”; and watch the person crush grow exponentially. Either that or they will completely suspect you are a stalker and the conversation will go from friendly to restraining order. No, I do not care that you think I’m a stalker now. Yes, I find joy in social experiments such as this. meow.
4. Frank Sinatra is a dirty liar– The holidays are NOT the most wonderful time of the year, in fact they are potentially the opposite. It’s a stressful time of year when people feel the need to show their love through gifts, throw the best holiday bash, commit to every engagement, and uphold every tradition regardless of how ridiculous it is. The most suicides take place during the holidays. Almost everyone is in a terrible mood. I went running on Christmas day and did my usual wave and hello to the other people walking on the trail. Every other day others wave back, but on Christmas day, everyone was grim and rude. They were obviously escaping the in-laws back at the house, or ate too many bon-bons or whatever it is that people eat. And I got attacked by a dog. Boooo! The irony about the holiday season is that it was probably not intended to be as terrible as it is. I’m opting out next year, mark my words. On a lighter note: Frank Sinatra is a stone cold fox.
5. Material things are not for attachment– My car was broken in to a few weeks ago while I was at dinner in the Highlands. My window was shattered and pandemonium instilled. What’s comical about this situation, is the only thing that was missing was my (favorite) yoga bag full of sweaty yoga clothes and other random things. While it was a bummer that this event even took place, it was a great realization of how I am truly not attached to my belongings. Thanks, yoga. Material things are so transient and fleeting that if we attach any emotion to them, we are bound for distress. What we have is not the same as who we are. There is no correlation between how many pairs of lulu lemon pants you have with the quality of your character or life. So I guess the take home lesson is to let go of your relationship with your things, and look for fulfillment elsewhere. That, and don’t leave your car unattended in moderately chic neighborhoods.
6. At some point, it’s no longer comical or acceptable to be the drunk girl in yoga teacher training– Yes. I was that girl, again. After my car was broken into, my friends savagely convinced me to go out on the town and forget about my problems. Obviously my lack of self control became an issue when I showed up at YTT (15 minutes late, reeking of vodka, and with the giggles), only to find myself in a 45 minute serious meditation activity. Ouch. Trying to control your mind sober is hard enough, doing it under the influence is a whole new level. I tried using my young age as justification to not knowing better and being reckless, but it was not enough. It would be acceptable if this was my first offense; unfortunately this is a weekly thing for me. If you are ever in a yoga class and smell cheap white wine or potatoe vodka, there’s a good chance I’m in the room. While I love being the hot mess sometimes, there comes a point where this role is no longer okay. From now-ish on, I am going to avidly try not to be “that girl” in my yoga functions.
7. Life is too short to hold grudges– You know when you get a text from someone you haven’t spoken to in ages, and a whole flood of emotion comes over you because of past experiences? When you run into someone and all you can see is how they hurt you? It happens. Even if it’s been eons since this horrific event went down, you still remember every detail. I’ve had my fair share of being the backstabber and the backstabee (?) and know how it feels to be on both sides of the spectrum. This month I’ve realized that humans inherently hurt other humans. It’s in our nature to put others down, both knowingly and unknowingly. Everyone has been hurt by another person. And almost everyone holds on to grudges. I’ve recently let go of my past grudge, and it feels like a weight has been lifted off of my shoulders, even though I was “in control”. So try it: think of one person you resent right now (for an unreasonable reason…), and let it go. Now obviously this won’t work if you resent someone for something real, like they committed manslaughter on your childhood dog or kidnapped your first-born or what have you. But for any first world grudges, it works wonders. Let. it. go.
7.5. I love Ryan Gosling– I just thought you should know. This is not new, but it’s real. I love him. If you disagree, go here: http://ryangoslingvspuppy.tumblr.com/, and then try to tell me you don’t love him. In other news, I am currently tweeting Anderson Cooper on the reg to tell him that I love him. One day he will either: a. tweet me back, or b. love me back. Until then, bring it @AndersonCooper and Ryan Gosling.
8. Resolutions are terrifying and unnecessary– It’s super great that people make a pact to work-out more or spend less money on shoes in the coming year. Good luck with that, I hope it lasts more than the 15 day national average. Resolutions set us up for failure, and then make us feel like failures. They are aimed at negative characteristics that we dislike in ourselves, and we almost always advert back to the norm because that’s who we are. This year I invite you to simply be the best person you can be. Strive to live the best life and be happy. Don’t set expectations of what it should look like, just be in it (total yoga cliche, but whatever). Set goals like finding your niche in life or doing one thing a day that makes you giggle (on the inside and outside). Or committing one act of kindness a day. Obviously if you are a serial killer and your resolution is to stop killing people, keep going with that one. Please.
9. You don’t need a plan– People have been asking me what I plan do after this vacation from life (college) is over. My reply: your guess is as good as mine. I started stressing about making a plan and getting my sh*t together, which ended in a tiny mental breakdown (lasting about 5 minutes…. minor obv.). Then it hit me! I don’t need a plan. No one needs a plan. Trying to control and mold what you think your future should look like usually ends in shambles. Forcing yourself to get a big-kid job because it’s what you think you should do creates the miserable state of our parents generation. Ew. No one wants to be like their parents (syke. kinda.) So differ away from the shoulds and go with the flow. Go into the next phase of your life without expectations and just see what happens. I’m not advocating an existance of living on your parents couch and working at Taco Time (unless it’s really calling you…). I’m simply saying don’t force yourself into a plan without trying plan-less first. You never know what will knock you upside the head. It could be the best thing EVER.
10. 2012 is a year to be as reckless as possible– I know I said that resolutions are terrible (they are), but I had to make some sort of pact with myself for the coming year. Now, I’m still unsure of my stance with this whole Nostradamus Apocalypse pandemonium, but I’ve decided to live this year like it was my last. My mantra: RECKLESS- to be utterly unconcerned with consequences. My entire life has been filled with decisions in high regard for consequence and are usually logical by nature. I’ve played it safe. Too safe. This year, I will not hold back on anything. I am releasing my inhibitions to the wind. I am going to travel my face off. I am going to meet as many people as possible and create experiences with them. I am going to do whatever makes me happy and skip the rest. I’m going to soul search and world search at the same time. I’m going to find a unicorn, and be it’s friend. I’m going to tell people how I really feel without holding back. I’m going to be selfish and selfless at the same time. Now I’m not saying I’m going to bail on my family and friends to move to Thailand or change my name or get a full body tattoo or take up fire-eating or commit major crimes (although I will consider doing all of those things at some point). I’m saying living like no tomorrow. Embracing every day to the fullest. Taking risks and doing things that scare you. Finding what you truly love to do, and doing it. 2012 is the year to do it! Because guess what? even if the world doesn’t end in December, at least you will be able to look back and say you truly lived this year to it’s fullest potential. Try it for a day. Let go of your mind and do what you want. GET RECKLESS. You won’t regret it.
Peace and love to you. Namaste.
Love it or Leave it 