Fuck the Law of Attraction.
This is going to be one of my rant-y posts. It will probably turn out not that much different than when I wrote, "That Time Katie Got Fucking Cranky in Italy."
Because lately - things are in the shitter. And by lately I mean like 6 fucking months. So it's not like I've had a bad week and I'm getting all agro that things in my life have veered ever so slightly away from perfection.
I'm not a selfish asshole, I know shit happens.
I also know what I have believed to be true for the last, oh, ten years or so. The basic, some-would-say new age-y, positive as fuck outlook on the world. Shit like:
Everything is in perfect timing
Practice Gratitude
Ask for what you want and you shall receive
Be open to all possibilities
The Law of Attraction
The power of manifestation
meditation & yoga
Vision boards
Your words are powerful
And insert any other XYZ positive affirmation shit here.
You know what I mean.
But back to the whole things-are-in-the-shitter-lately thing: I'm so fucking annoyed with all of this shit. And all of the dumb ass shit people say. It's like the stupid shit people are known to say about anything - after the death of a spouse, a still born baby, a tragic suicide, an accident, a divorce, a job loss, any fucking tragic thing.
People say that cliche stupid shit like "he's in a better place", "god has a plan", "you have the answer inside of you already - just listen.", "everything happens for a reason".
None of that shit ever fucking helps.
You know the shit. You've heard it. And you've probably said it. I have too I'm sure. For fuck's sake we all mean well, but most of us are uncomfortable as shit with the notion of just sitting with someone in their grief. Uncomfortable with saying nothing, or having nothing to say. Uncomfortable with just being like - yeah this fucking sucks and there ain't shit either one of us can do about it.
My beef with the law of attraction and other shit like that is - what the fuck? Are we all just walking around being good people and doing good shit because we have an agenda? Because it's "good karma" or it's "going to come back to us ten-fold"?
Why aren't we just being good, honest, decent, loving, kind as fuck people because that's just what fucking feels good?
One of my favorite examples illustrating the law of attraction is the whole analogy of love saying like, "Well - if you're fucked up and broken inside then you're only going to attract other fucked up broken people as partners."
Meaning that - you need to get your shit together if you want any chance of attracting a partner that isn't a total fuck up, too.
But like.
What about just wanting to heal and be a whole fucking person just for yourself? Not because you're going to potentially attract another whole person to love forever. Or attract fucking anything aside from simply waking up every day happy to be you.
I don't wake up every morning with a fake smile on my face. I am a generally happy and joyful person because that just feels better. For no other fucking reason than that. I guess I'm a selfish happy person. I'm just happy and grateful for no goddamn reason.
Even when I check the balance of my food stamps card and it's $3.42 and there's still 19 days left in the month.
I can still find the humor in that, thank fucking christ.
Sometimes I wake up pissed too. Or irritated or angry. Or fucking fed up or "done". And that's okay too. However you fucking are right now is perfect and okay.
Now there's all the absolute fucking bullshit-ness of the assholes who say
"enjoy the journey"
and then the fuck heads who say
"manifest the future".
So like - which is it? Those seem to be somewhat contradictory.
Even more contradictory are the pricks who are all
"Be present, stay in the moment."
and the douche's who are like
"oh but visualize your hopes and dreams."
Ok, well what fucking thing is it? Be present or visualize? Cuz those two don't fucking go together. I can't be present if I'm thinking about my fucking future. Amirite?
To side track for a minute, kind of: is anyone else fucking annoyed at all those bullshit Power Path-type monthly updates, or full moon updates, or XYZ bullshit energy of the month shit?
Do you ever notice that they all say the goddamn fucking same thing?
I used to be into the monthly power path and their bi-monthly moon updates (at the new moon and the full moon). And then one day Kris was like, "Wait a minute. This is the same shit. It's the same as fucking last month. Just said a different way."
And I was like. Ohmyfucking GAWD.
Like, DERP FUCKING DERP.
You know? Like I was just this dumb as fuck white betch reading her bullshit ass monthly reports. This month's theme is "power" this month's theme is "strength" this month's theme is "healing". And then the body of the report reading that it's a "good month to start a partnership"...or a "good month to heal the physical body"....or that the "energy of the month supports letting go of old hurt."
WHAT A LOAD OF BULLSHIT.
I will not live my life according to a fucking blog. That's what it really comes down to. Like really are you going to be like sitting on a hot business idea just waiting for the fucking Power Path to be like, "This is a good month for business shit"?
And don't even get me started on mercury fucking retrograde.
Newsflash: some shit is always in retrograde. The planets fucking move all the goddamn time. If you lived your life according to your translation of what that means for you, personally - you'd never make a fucking move.
Do you how many fucking plane tickets I've bought when mercury was in retrograde? Fuck tons. Do you know how many amazing trips I've planned and taken when mercury was in retrograde? So fucking many. And they all went off without a hitch.
So there's your one woman study proving that mercury retrograde is absolute bull crap on toast.
And really - is all this positive-energy shit any different than being religious? My boyfriend pointed this out earlier today and I thought it was fucking brilliant. Religion, the law of attraction, fucking positivity. It's all just some version of whatever brand of shit you need to recite to help yourself feel settled with the shit you can't explain or understand.
Ok, so back to "the shit people say to make you feel better".
Which it basically never does. There's actually three things people say, not just the two I mentioned above.
Be in the moment. Enjoy life. Just do things that make you happy for no other reason than the fact that they feel good right now. Enjoy the journey. Embrace every moment.
But wait. You have to balance that with sitting in silence. You gotta sit in silence and create the space for the answers to come to you. Clear your mind. Allow yourself to receive.
Oh shit, fuck, but you also have to sit quietly and visualize specific shit. You have to decide exactly what you want your life to be and then visualize the fuck out of it.
That last one is particular bullshit because there's goddamn 48 scenarios that would be great right now, a hundred and 72 different lives that I'd love to live. So who the fuck can be that specific? I guess more fuckin' power to ya if you can, but fucked if I know.
My favorite one though, and god bless the many well intentioned friends who've literally said these exact words to me: "Are you open to anything? Maybe there's another path to take."
Another fucking path? What does that even mean? I'm not on a goddamn path right now. It's not like I'm fucking, you know, struggling my way through goddamn law school constantly hitting bumps and fucked up hardships and really I just need to take a step the fuck back and be like okay maybe the lawyer thing isn't it for me even though I'm a hundred and fifty grand in debt, five semesters in and shit! What will everyone think?!
Yeah - in that case the whole, "what if there's another path for you" would make total goddamn sense.
But I am not that lawyer bitch. I am open as fuck.
Humble.
Grateful.
Fed up.
READY.
Deserving.
And I fucking know how to change course, I don't give shit. One time I sold my condo, Kris sold his, and we literally packed up our car full of can't-live-without-this-shit-belongings and fully moved to Seattle. Only to hit bullshit scenario after bullshit scenario and decide to move on. TAKE ANOTHER PATH. Not hang on to some bullshit idea we set out to play out just because we said we would. So I am well versed in changing course and not giving a fuck about it.
I feel like another thing that's not talked about is how fucking hard it is to make your own way. How goddamn fucking hard it is to do anything other than just get a job with a weekly direct deposit, buy a dumb house, sock money in your 401k, chillax on the weekends, maybe go camping here and there or squeeze in some long-weekend getaways, and just call it good.
People don't talk about the dark side of entrepreneurship. All you fucking see out there is oh follow XYZ formula and you'll have a bajillion subscribers and eerthing will be fucking roses.
Sometimes it isn't that simple. Sometimes you gotta think outside the box, get creative, and realize it isn't going to be as simple as you thought.
Not many people are cut out for it. That's why I'd never tell anyone to quit their fucking job or do this or do that or even fucking pretend I remotely had the fucking answer that was specific to them. We've been doing it - the entrepreneur thing - for five years and I think most people would've given up long ago. In the beginning for us it was exciting - we had left our corporate jobs and were psyched to blaze a new trail.
But then it got fucking old. Scraping by wasn't fun anymore. But at the same - quitting isn't an option. And what would saying, "I quit" accomplish anyway? Literally nothing would change aside from you having opened your mouth to make the announcement.
I've been thinking to myself lately, "I don't know how much more I can take, I don't know how much longer I can do this." but the truth is - failure is not an option. It just fucking isn't. And even if I did announce those things or reach my breaking point - what? Is some little gnome going to pop out from around the corner and be like, "Oh you can't take it anymore? Ok, great let's move on then, follow me".
Oh, and another thing - you know how people are like, "Oh well it sounds like you need to release your attachment to money" or some other silly fucking shit like that?
You know who the fuck has ever said that to me? People with money. Never once have I had a friend who is struggling financially say that to me ever.
The only person without money who I could think of that would even dream of saying some shit like that is a fucking monk or a nun or something. (did you see the season opener of Chef's Table? That bitch could say that shit to me and I'd be like - okay yeah I get you.)
Because FUCK OFF EVERYONE - money abso-fucking-lutely does buy happiness.
"They" (whoever the fuck that is) say it doesn't, but actually - did you know they did a fucking study on this? OH FUCK A STUDY. But no, seriously - a study where they determined that money buys happiness up to a certain point and then after that it's all the goddamn same. But do you know what that threshold is? TWO HUNDRED FUCKING THOUSAND DOLLARS A YEAR.
I make $12,000 a year. That is not a typo. $12,000 a year.
So fuck everyone that's tryna tell my ass that money doesn't buy happiness. It doesn't after $200,000 a year. So once I hit that point, we can talk. But until then: shut the fuck up.
And don't even get me started on the fuckwits who are like, "Money doesn't define you. You can make anything happen that you put your mind to. You'll figure out a way if you really want to."
Oh, really? Fuck you. I don't even know you, but fuck you (to quote Ali Wong).
I get it - I did it, I lived it - the whole you-can-make-anything-happen shit. I've planned elaborate budget-travel adventures. I've bartered for every fucking kind of service you can imagine. I've work traded my fucking ass off for what I needed.
So can we just talk about that? How much fucking energy it takes to "make anything happen" when you don't have any fucking money?
Do you know what's a cool thought? You have a service. I want to partake in that service. I fucking pay you for that service. It's a really solid, simple system that I hope to one day soon be able to participate in.
Because struggling to meet your basic-ass needs is a real fucking drain. It takes up a lot of energy that could otherwise be spent on way better things.
It's like how back in the day before we knew how to like settle and grow food and preserve it and cook and shit - all of our fucking days were dedicated to simply finding fucking food. Can you imagine that? But now - we don't have to hunt and fucking gather and we can plan and shit. We buy all that bullshit at the grocery store. We can buy dinner in a fucking bag. Which frees us up as humans to do so much other cool shit.
Well it's kinda the same with being able to pay your rent every month and cut your food stamps card in half.
Since I mentioned food - can we sidetrack and talk about the the 127 different fucking schools of thought surrounding food? Fucking gluten free, dairy free, organic, local, free range, fair trade, sugar free, vegetarian, vegan, raw, paleo, whole 30, atkins, the blood type diet, the south beach diet, all those fucking protein powder shake bullshits.
What the actual fuck?
It's like - my take on all that ended up being - fuck all that. I'm just going to eat real food. That's as close to it's natural form as possible. I ain't gonna eat shit in a box that was processed or prepared or preserved. I'm going to eat what makes me feel good.
So that's how I feel with the whole law of attraction, gratitude practice, visualization, manifestation bullshit.
Fuck. All. That. Shit.
Do what feels good. Just be a good fucking person, do good things, be kind to the people around you, take care of your body and mind. And you will get what you deserve, you know? You don't have to do any fucking more than that.
And honestly - that could be total bullshit, too. Because we've got angelic amazing fucking people dropping dead from cancer every day. And then fucking animalistic Nazi killers living to be 90.
So what the fuck do I know? And who gives a shit anyway?