30 Hard-to-swallow pills for a happier life.

They sting, but they will also help you.

Photo by Kayla Maurais on Unsplash

These lessons are all, as the title says, hard to swallow. Extremely difficult for some people, less difficult for others, but I bet they aren’t easy for anyone. That’s ok. This isn’t about ease. This is about doing the hard work. If you commit to it, you’ll be surprised how much more enjoyable your life will get.

I learned these “pills” from experience. Yes, they are mostly oracular, because that’s who I am (read my name in case you haven’t).

1. Zero control: Sometimes the “Universe” (or whatever you call it) won’t give you what you want. It will just give you what you need to play the role already designed for you, and there’s no opting out. You choose: non-resistance and less pain, or resistance and more pain? There is NO painless choice.
2. Too much control: Other times, the “Universe” (or whatever you call it) will leave some things entirely up to you and there’s no begging it for guidance or future telling because the. Answer. Will. Not. Come. It sucks too, but there’s nothing you can do other than brave it. The more you don’t brave it, the more you suffer.
3. Most situations in life are in neither #1 or #2 but a healthy middle ground. If you can’t see it, you’re denying reality because of self-sabotage.
4. Nothing is set in stone.
5. Wisdom does not imply maturity. Someone can be wise, but immature like a spoiled toddler. These people will be the biggest arseholes you’ll ever meet, but you can learn lessons from them as soon as you stop taking their misconduct personally.
6. Maturity does not imply wisdom. Someone can be mature, but have no wisdom. These people will be easy and pleasant to deal with, but useless to learn anything life-changing from.
7. Most people you’ll meet are neither #5 or #6 but a healthy middle ground. If you can’t see that, you’re denying reality because of projections.
8. If you talk too much about Oneness, you’re not a sage, you’re just a conservative person afraid of diversity and probably lacking in empathy and compassion. Stop talking “at” people, start listening.
9. If you talk too much about Plurality, you’re not a sage either, you’re just a rebel without a cause and you probably lack consistency and direction. Stop taking everything in, start being selective.
10. Impartiality does not exist.
11. You need your ego as much as you need your soul. If you deny or suppress either, you’ll suffer.
12. Nobody owes you anything. People can choose to be nice to you because they like you or need you or respect you, but not because they “owe” you anything. We create social contracts to run away from this truth, but we can’t stop it from being true.
13. Nobody is self-sufficient. Not even hermits. Not even the wealthy. Nobody is self-sufficient. Read this again.
14. Morality is subjective and has aesthetic value. There are as many moral codes as there are cultures. Nonetheless, we can’t live without morality.
15. The “law of Attraction” is not universal. If it was, people would be able to manifest things outside of their circle of social privilege (If in doubt, re-read #13). Until then, maybe we should let the white cishet able-bodied people have fun with it, but not fall for it when we aren’t as fortunate socially.
16. On the same note as #15, what we call “manifesting” DOES have a magical element to it but that’s just deities and other higher powers collaborating with us. The other half of the work SHOULD be done by, ya know, ourselves — casting aside our prejudice and learning to love our human neighbours and avoid raining on the parade they’re manifesting. That’s unlikely to happen anytime soon because human beings are self-centered arseholes and won’t hesitate to sabotage each other’s success because of our fear of diversity (which really is a fear of the unknown).
17. There’s no personal justice without social justice. Good fortune can be individual, but justice cannot. Learn this lesson in practice, trial by trial, or learn it for once and waste no time.
18. If you rely solely on intuition, it’s difficult to know what you truly want and impossible to know what you truly need. This learning becomes easier, but less comfortable, through conflicts with others.
19. Human kindness exists in inverse proportion to the size of your ego. It has nothing to do with how educated, intellectual, charismatic, sweet, or worldly you are. You can be all of these things and still be too proud to listen to what someone else holds in high regard if it’s any different from your values.
20. Misanthropic “ecological” ethics is narcissistic. It’s a paradox, but with a little self-awareness it’s not hard to see: if you bypass dealing with human problems to only protect the rest of nature (ie, “I love animals and hate people”), what you’re really saying is you hate everyone who won’t praise you or adore you — and to cope with that, you’ll prefer dealing with other species, which are physically incapable, instead of unwilling, to debate you or dare contesting your “superior reasoning”. Did I shatter your glass ceiling? GOOD. Eat some humble pie.
21. No two people will agree on a definition for “beauty”, but every kind of beauty exists and can be seen nonetheless.
22. Nobody knows everything, but more important than that, nobody is completely clueless. The more you underestimate people, especially the younger and “more naive” than you, the more you’ll inevitably be put back in your place.
23. Childhood trauma cannot be explained away by religion. That’s just a coping mechanism. Suit yourself, but don’t force or guilt-trip others to agree.
24. Comfort (control) is always more appealing than learning (chaos), but neither can reign supreme for too long.
25. The more you get to know yourself, the more you see through others.
26. If you want to know how much you project, revisit the advice you gave others. In case you’re no longer applying it to your own life (or worse — have NEVER applied it to your own life), you’re projecting a bit too much, buddy.
27. Gratitude and ambition are not mutually exclusive. Pay VERY CLOSE attention to those who disagree with this lesson, because there’s a good chance they’re trying to control you.
28. If physical health could be manifested mentally, we’d still live in caves and have zero interest in discovering medicine. You can heal yourself to some extent, but it’s stupid (not to mention narcissistic — ahhhh, narcissism! The ailment of the century…) to despise Science.
29. The line between curiosity and addiction is your level of self-respect. Is it thin and fragile? Or thicker and harder to cross? This includes addiction to validation, addiction to approval, and other non-obvious forms of addiction too.
30. Even if you’re objectively oppressed, you can still get in your own way. It’s a choice to blame your parcel of self-sabotage on external factors, but sooner or later you must realise that you’ll get nowhere unless you help the “good samaritans” out there to help you.