FTT Off-Topic: Things I Believe That Probably Aren't Helping

Not Sad, Very True

This one's all over the board. Sorry for the random.

> If your favorite things never change, you are, in all likelihood, living life wrong.

Music only has so many plays in it to folks who are really listening hard. Food tastes change over time. Movies and television series and novels and more... new stuff is getting made every day, and much of it is building off of what came before. True moments of incredible genius do exist, but more of humanity's progress is about shining and optimizing what came before.

Finding your new favorite thing is, of course, time-consuming and off-putting, in that it can be work. Which leads me to the next one...

> If you don't like to work, the world, at best, suffers your existence quietly. And hopes against hope that you get over it.

I know a few people who are like this, and I really wish I didn't. I mostly avoid them whenever possible, mostly because, well, life is too short, and they are likely to try to suck my life and energy away.

By the way, this goes for people who don't like their jobs, too. I knew your job sucked when I came into your place of business. I also know that it's going to continue to suck until you decide that it doesn't.

> If people I don't much like are huge fans of the same music, movies or TV that I like... I'm probably going to stop liking that stuff. Whether consciously or not.

And if this makes me a snob, so be it. If you aren't a snob about your tastes, you don't really care about them, or aren't ready to commit to them. So how good are those tastes, anyway?

> We are designed to exercise every day. When we don't, our minds turn to mush.

My best work, as someone who is paid to be creative at work, has come in the past couple of years. This is also when I've had the time and commitment to do my most arduous workout program ever. (It's not that insane, but I'm there every other day, running 90 miles a month and lifting pretty routinely.) Bodies need to be exhausted for brains to fire.

> People who fill their social media feeds with content that is not their own (i.e., re-posts of other people's photos, political statements or chain letters) irritate the hell out of me.

If I'm following you, I'm interested in what *you* have to say, not what you have to repeat. When you choose to repay that time and interest with lazy non-content, you are basically telling me that you are not worthy of my interest. Do better.

> There is no such thing as altruism.

But there are people who don't feel good about themselves unless they are making other people feel good about knowing them. And that's when the good stuff happens.

> If your main source of discontent -- whether it's a person, political movement, employer, relative or limitation -- does not change fairly often, that's your problem, not mine.

We all have, at any moment in this world, 40 problems. They should change. If they don't, it's on you.

> Nothing happens without deadlines.

Even if they only exist in your own mind. If a job doesn't have to complete by a certain time, you can keep doing it, or put it off for a more pressing task. Setting the right deadline matters that much.

And with that... there goes my deadline. Night, all.