Self help books and articles.
Self Help books and articles about self help are running rampant right now. People are sending them around. People are reposting them everywhere. Articles that tell us how to be these great, rich, super hero's that are only seen with the hottest people, have the biggest bank accounts, the best hair and bodies, and are more productive than ants. Batman. They are telling us to be Batman.
"I just read this book read this book about time management. I need to buy a cape."
"What? Why?"
"SWEAR TO ME!..."
"... You're scaring me."
Do these help?
First, once you read one, you are going to read more. They become addicting. You read one book about how great and powerful you are going to be, why the hell would you not read another? It's a rush. People read the bible over and over again for god sake. Those are the same stories! When it's a self help book or article about your own personal growth, there can never be enough. Not the same with other type of self help books. If you need to fix something, and you read a book or article and figure out how to do it, that's it.
"Alright, I gotta fix this chair. This book says, you just hammer the leg back in. Hmmm. Alright, well that felt great! Let's see what THIS book has to say about it. Woa! Same thing! God, I'm feeling great! I'm gonna be reading these all day! Wish I had this chair to sit in and read, but I'm feeling amazing!"
Most of these articles and books say the same things. They seem to be written by people who have read a bunch of self help literature themselves and just copied them. One will say, 'Be yourself', another will say 'Don't copy others'. Interesting. Are we supposed to believe those are different statements?
"Alright, first things first. You want to be a millionaire? Don't use credit cards."
"Huh? Don't listen to that guy. You want to be a millionaire? Only pay cash."
"Don't use credit cards!"
"Only use cash!"
"... Guys, I think I got the answer. Thank you for both screaming it at me. Cash it is."
"Damn! He's not taking my advice of no credit cards!"
Most of the self help books are just a compilation of the list articles. Some maniac saw all of these and put his own spin on them. A lot of times it's a person who saw the list articles, and didn't think they were tough enough, or 'real' enough. So they took it upon themselves to make them more to the point.
"Here's how you become great.
1. Stop being a loser.
2. Stop hanging out with losers.
3. You're mom's a loser. Get away from her.
4. Get up earlier.
That's it, stupid. You can follow that, you'll be a hero like me. A guy who wrote down ways to call you a failure and make you buy this book which makes me rich, thus, making ME a winner. You're a loser. I shouldn't even let you buy my book."
'Get up earlier' is a common theme in the articles and books. It's an interesting one. It only works for people who have schedules that don't make them be up late at night. Just about all of these tell you to get up earlier.
'You want to drive a Porsche and get blown? You think a woman is going to want to put your shrivel'd rod in her mouth when you're getting up at 8:30 in the morning? PLEASE. 8:30 doesn't turn hot, Russian blow job machines on. 4 am does."
You can't get up at four if you're going to bed at 3. Just not happening. What if you have a job where you work at night? You're just always going to fail? There's no hope for you?
"This book is interesting. It's telling me to get up at the same time I'm coming home from my night shift job. Well. No sleep for me if I want to get this headband business off the ground. My heart might stop, but not before people hear about my headband stand! 'Need a headband? No need to do a handstand, we're easy to find!' God that's a bad slogan. I need sleep."
At some point too, you'll probably be spending more time reading articles and books about being great and more productive than actually putting time into being more productive and great. But you'll THINK you're being productive and great. Be the same as reading muscle magazines and thinking that'll make you bigger on it's own.
"You going to the gym today?"
"Don't have to. I'm reading this magazine. 'Giant Calves and Me'. It's great! Says to do this many squats, this many crunches if you want to look like this complete animal on the cover. Jesus, I'm sweating just talking about it! Go to the gym? Come on, man. I got all the work out I need right here. Yo, can you spot me while I read this paragraph?"
A lot of these things too are just quotes from other people. Quotes. From people who are not writing this book or article!
"Hey, guys. Here's a book that will tell you how to be great. Is it full of me telling you how to be great? Nope. Not me. Tons of other great people. Lot's of em. Get it. I'm an author!"
Can you do that? Is that an author?
"Hey. I found a way to make money. I'm going to compile quotes from great people and sell them."
"Interesting. Can you do that? What have you done?"
"I put them all together. Geez. That's not worth $29.95?"
These articles are getting pretty insane. Pretty much a never ending list of ways to be. People really love posting these.
"Guys! Check out this article. Four hundred and fifty six ways that you can walk taller! It falls apart from one hundred and thirty seven to two hundred and four, but then it picks right back up!"
Didn't you yesterday have an update about walking into a door? How you smashed into it and dropped your coffee on your kid? One day later people are supposed to look to you for life advice?
"Hmmm. Last update from this guy was that he fell out of of a moving car, but THIS one, he says 'Life opens up to those who open themselves up.' Well, I'm sold. I'm coming back here tomorrow for more advice!"
Is my writing about self help books in such a way some sort of self help article on it's own? Can we all write self help? I think the answer is yes to both.
Twitter @nathanmacintosh
Things I'll still do when I'm a millionaire.
Millionaires really start living like people in weird bubbles pretty early on. Once you become a millionaire, seems to be some things you just stop doing that regular humans keep on keeping on with. When I become a millionaire, here's a list of things I'm still gonna do with my goddamn ass.
1. Walk my own dogs
Yep. When I become a millionaire, I'm gonna walk the dog or dogs that I have myself.
'What? Why?! How the hell could you put your hands that have all that money on a leash? Or, even worse, a leash attached to a ...dog.'
I truly don't understand having a dog and not walking it. That's one of the things that you do with a dog. That's one of the things that is done with this animal when you own one. They need walks. They get walks. They like going outside and smelling stuff. They like smelling that strange dogs butt. It's a big part of the lives of these domesticated pets. So, you're going to get one of these creatures, and NOT do with them one of the major things that they involve? Why don't you just have a TV that you hire people to come over and watch?
"I just bought this sweet ass, seventy five hundred inch TV! You know why? Because I'm a goddamn badass millionaire. I'm a millionaire, son! Now, where's the number of that service where I pay a struggling actor forty bucks to sit in front of this thing for an hour? Oh yeah, I'll just lean out my window and yell, because I'm a badass millionaire!"
If when I'm a millionaire I'm too busy for dogs, and everyone in my house is as well, there will be no dogs. But if I have a dog, I'll walk that mother. I will see my dog smell that butt.
2. Raise my own kids
Now, jesus christ. This one shouldn't even be a thought. You have kids. These kids need to be raised. So, you.. raise... them. YOU do. The person who made them. The piece of machinery that brought this damn kid into the world. YOU, stupid. YOU take this kid out. YOU feed this kid. You don't call a woman whose trying to stay in the country you live in and get her to come over and raise the damn thing. If you're gonna do this, she should be there for the conception.
"Oh, yeah. Oh, oh, just like that. Yeah, I'm about to, I'm aboouuuttt toooo... wait. Divina, are you going to be able to nanny for us from Monday to Friday, 8- 8? And hell, on Saturdays too?"
"... Yes. I can do that."
"Oh, boy. That's great! Because I'm about to put a FULL baby into my wife here. Oh, jesus, I'm gonna come! Ahh, ahhhh, AHHHHHH I'm never gonna be here to see this kid! ... Ah, ah god. Divina, you're really saving my life here. I can just come and come into this thing I married, and YOU deal with what this thing makes with that come! Ah, man. What a life.... Drinks, anyone?"
When I'm a millionaire, I'll raise my own kids. If I can't, and my wife is not able to as well, and the only option is to hire someone completely unrelated to this situation to raise them, I'm not going to have them.
3. Drive my own cars
This is another one of those things. You become a millionaire. You can afford any car you want. You pick it out. Then, you hire another human to drive you around in it. What... the fuck. What is the message here? That driving a car is for commoners? Being seen behind the wheel of a beautiful automobile is for peasants? You can't drive you're own Rolls? It's gorgeous! Get behind the wheel! Put your head out the window! Toss watches out of the sun roof! Been seen! Why get a driver for such nice cars? You should have drivers for terrible ones.
"Okay, I'm looking for a driver."
"No problem. We can help you with that. What kind of car? Rolls Royce? Maybach?"
"What? Jesus no! I drive a 97' Corolla. I'm gonna be getting a new car soon. But god, I can't be seen in this thing anymore. I'm trying to get laid, you know? People point and laugh when I'm at the light. I need someone to drive me to work, and I'm going to lay in the back seat under an old blanket. Cool?"
If I'm too busy to drive the gorgeous, half million dollar car that I buy, and everyone in my house is too busy too as well, I won't buy the car. I'll get another fountain.
Twitter @nathanmacintosh
Let's get possessed.
'Deliver Us From Evil' is a new possession movie. It's based on a true story of an NYPD officer who wrote a book about his experience with demons and the like. How true to his story is it? I don't know. Usually movies are exaggerated. It made me think a couple things about possession movies.
First of all, why has every parent in possession movies bought their kids that 'jack in the box' toy? It's completely horrifying when the sun is up. In a park, with trees and birds and friends around, they are terrifying.
"Honey, do you want to start cranking that scary box from the seventies I bought you as a toy in the early 2000's? Just crank it and ruin this beautiful family get together."
Scary on a good day, so why would they not be horrifying at night on the third floor of an already creepy, over decorated room? Jack in the box is also very easy to possess. It's like training wheels for a demon. First they turn the dial without being seen, then they move on to picking up the bed.
"Alright, training demons. I'm only gonna say this a couple times in english, then a few thousand times in Latin. First, all you'll be doing is turning the crank on the boxes. Yep, that's it. Crank it up. Once you get that down, the 'slow-turn-until-you-rev-it-up-at-the-end' crank, you'll move on to picking up beds. Not before! I've seen way too many demons jump into beds first."
Possessed people in movies tend to get locked in asylums. Priests just can't seem to be able to convince doctors that they are not insane, they are possessed. No matter how many demons they cast out, no one who wasn't there believes them. Priests are probably always having this argument with doctors.
"You're telling me, all of these people are not insane? That they are all possessed?"
"No. Not ALL of them. Just the ones speaking Latin!"
"So, the Latin ones?"
"Maybe. For sure the ones who don't speak it and are. Just let them all out and I'll do what I do and see what happens!"
Demons LOVE speaking Latin. Every possession movie, a demon hops into someone like they're a convertible, then just starts throwing down so much weird, scary Latin. Are we supposed to be scared of languages that we don't understand? Is that the goal here?
"I don't know what the hell that man just said to me, but I'll be sleeping under some garlic tonight."
Priests always have an interpreter with them to decode what is being said or slurred. That has to be one of the worst perks of being a language interpreter.
"Hey, man. They need you at this persons house to interpret some Latin."
"Oh, great! Interpret for who? A President? Do they need me to let them know what's going on in the Vatican?"
"Nope. Demon. Demon took over a woman."
"Ah, fuck Christ Sake! It's always a demon taking over a woman! What the hell did I learn this language for? I've interpreted for ZERO diplomats. Unless you count that diplomat that was possessed, but I don't!"
We should just call Latin the demon language. Every movie about someone being possessed uses it. No one speaks english, or German, or even demon. They speak Latin. It's like they're trying to make us believe that anyone who speaks spanish is possessed.
"How was your date with that hot Latin guy you've been talking to?"
"Awful. Turns out he's NOT Latin. He's Dolce from the eighth circle of hell. Came over and bit my cat. Had to call a priest to get him out of my house. Super hot when he talks, though. I was kinda turned on when he bit the cat, but THEN he pissed himself. I haven't been on a good date in months."
Possession movies always have the woman wearing a night gown, or a hospital gown, or some kind of tattered white, now dirty rag, who becomes possessed. Her face is dirty, her hair is awful. She has blood on her. ALWAYS a night gown or a hospital gown. No possession movie has had a woman in a pant suit, or bathing suit, or McDonald's Uniform.
"Woa. Your drive-thru attendant is crawling on the ceiling."
"Yep. She got possessed the other day. Kept coming to work. I'm not gonna complain, though. These ceilings need a dusting. This demon has some kind of work ethic. Keep your kids away from her."
Demons also love to possess a person then make them cut themselves. There's not one possession movie with the girl not cut up from head to toe. They don't take any time with this body at all. They don't take it to work, see what that's like. They don't run around slapping people for fun. They just get in, and start cutting it up. When a person stops being possessed, they must be in the worst pain of their lives. They have gashes all over them, they've a lot of times been bent into a pretzel. No way you just sleep that off. I'd like to see a movie of a person after they've been possessed, and the long road to recovery.
"Janice here was possessed for two weeks. Demon tore one of her eyes out, and she's had to learn to walk again because he walked her up the stairs like a spider before stretching her neck to the length of a giraffes. Look at her now. Possessed three months ago and left in a pile on the floor, now, she's managing a Lulu lemon and eating solid food again."
I'd assume to that if you are ever possessed, you don't really come back from that. How do you go back to living a regular life once a demon has taken your body? Knowing that a demon can just do that? That you don't have to say 'demon' three times in a mirror or anything? One day you're walking, next day you're telling a priest to suck your dick. You can just ENJOY a Froyo now? Don't think you'll forget the demon thing.
"Worst year of my life? Probably losing my job and my husband. Yeah. Why'd that happen again? Oooohhhh yeeaaaahhh. A demon took control of my body and made me stab him with a crucifix. Can't say I blame him for leaving. Either way, things are cool now. I enjoy canoeing again."
Twitter @nathanmacintosh