“The greater the obstacle, the more glory in overcoming it.”

– Molière

Two weeks ago the side of my face started to hurt. I dismissed it. My wisdom teeth are still coming in and figured that they must have been making face sore. This week I could barely do anything. I slept all the time and I was too lethargic to get anything done. After a few hours of being awake I’d be so tired that I’d have to take a nap. Falling asleep at nine and waking up the next morning wasn’t too uncommon. In the past this wouldn’t have been that bad, I could have skipped class or called into work. Unfortunately, I no longer have that luxury. Working for myself means that I have to come up with the money. Jobs were still coming in and work needed to get down.

I ended up devising a strategy to get me through the week.

Solve the problem

The week before I hadn’t cared about my sore face. I figured that I would deal with it later. Now I wish I’d taken care of things right then and there. Because I hadn’t addressed the issue, it grew out of control. While I could have gotten treatment and not missed a thing, I ended up pretending that nothing was wrong and suffering the consequences. While I got the issue resolved now, it cost me a lot of time, pain, and money.

Cut back on non essentials

Since I kept nodding ff, I needed to conserve time. I didn’t blog as much, I postponed my Fiverr gigs, and I used my free time for work. I tried to be productive whenever I was awake. While it wasn’t a great way to do things, it did allow me to still get things done. I won’t lie and say that I still made good money, but I was able to cover all my bills.

Give people a heads up

I hate flakes. Nothing makes me more mad than when someone ditches at the last second. Because of this I decided to give my clients a heads up. I warned them that their projects might take a little longer to be completed and I offered them a discount because of this. By being honest I saved all my accounts and everyone understood. The reduced rate also gave customers a greater sense of trust and all of them were nice enough to not make good on my offer.

Stay healthy

There’s a blogger I follow who tweeted this gem yesterday:

“Funny how when sh*t goes wrong in a mans life, he turns to masculine virtues to correct himself. Primarily, lifting weights.”

Because I was sick I made sure to eat clean. I had juice twice a day and still did some basic exercises. It wasn’t great, but it did help me out a little bit.

Find the best solution, not the one that fits your ideals

At the beginning of the year I swore off all drugs. In addition to narcotics and supplements, I also black listed medicine. I’d had a very romanticized vision where I’d spend the whole year being all natural. I had to break my promise. I ended up using medicine which is something that I usually detest and mock. Unfortunately I was past the point of no return and felt that medicated ear drops were the best immediate choice.

 Conclusion

Being sick, or facing any problem for that matter, sucks. It sucks even worse when you have to be responsible for yourself. When I could skate by I use to use sick days after partying to hard. Or I’d take a nap in one of the building’s more obscure bathrooms. Now I actually have to fend for myself. While the week sucked I did learn some valuable lessons. I went back to the basics, communicated with clients, and sought out the best possible solution. By doing this I was able to recover quickly and get back on my grind.

“Expert: a man who makes three correct guesses consecutively. “

– Laurence J. Peter

As a teenager I was an anarchist. While I wasn’t particularity good it it, most of my time was spent smoking and writing bad poetry, I did have an epiphany that changed my life. Most of the people who tried telling me what to do had no real authority over me. If I followed their advice I’d be in the exact same position as them.

I’ve followed that philosophy ever since. It’s saved me from wasting a lot of time and anger. If I won’t want something someone else has, I disregard their advice.

Back in college I had a children’s literature professor who made every single assignment into a crusade about how classic stories were sexist. I did the work, turned in the assignments on time, and never bothered to take any of seriously. If I wanted to grow up and become a frumpy dork in an ill fitting sweater, I’d have absorbed every word. Since that wasn’t something that interested me, I paid zero attention to any of the lessons.

While this might sound obvious, the vast majority of people never seem to pick up on it.

If you want to be like someone else, follow their advice. Otherwise go seek out a better source.

“Success has a simple formula: do your best, and people may like it.”

– Sam Ewing

I spent the day writing articles about the best. The best flashlight. The best laundry detergent. The best soda flavored lubricant. If thy sell it I’ve probably written about why it was “the best.”

In yesterday’s post I discussed the cult of activity. No matter what there’s always a spectator section that loves to analyze and hates to participate.

While it’s nice to start out with the nicest things, it isn’t essential. The effort that you put in is going to trump whatever equipment you buy. There are plenty of top tier home gyms that are collecting dust, and expensive golf clubs that tucked away in storage facilities. Books with millions of dollars worth of wisdom are being used as doorstops. Buying something won’t make you good at it.

While I’m not advocating going to a decapitated gym, buying broken golf clubs, or reading terrible books I am saying that those items are almost inconsequential in the grand scheme of things. If you ate healthy and did a really simple workout, you’ll be light years ahead of some guy who bought all the latest equipment and never bothered to use it.

Last year there was a guy who went to the gym every day, bought all the hottest supplements, and worried about all kinds of technical details that I’d never heard of before. In the six months that I was around him he never actually got any bigger. The entire time he was in at the gym he’d just walk around and tell people about his supplements.

Not owning a top of the line product isn’t a legitimate reason for incompetence. People are always surprised to learn that I still use my Hamilton Beach Big Mouth Juice Extractor. It cost me $50 and I make different concoctions every single day. While it’s not a super expensive device, I still get a lot of use from it. Likewise, I’m sure there are plenty of Omega juicers that have never been taken out of the box.

If you want to get into something, you don’t need the best equipment. Outside aviation and playing polo, very few hobbies actually have a high cost of entry. Spend six months working on something and practicing everyday, then you can go to the store and pick up some high quality gear.

“Hey”

– Ten different guys opening message to my fake dating profile

Being a bit of a prankster I decided to make a fake female account on Plenty of Fish. I assumed that no one would message a girl named Meatyhaunches69. I was wrong.

Aside from the fact that this was obviously written be me, I assumed that no dude would ever actually find a girl like this to be attractive. The three kids thing, heightism, and obvious attitude should have been a big deterrent for most guys. This is basically the female equivalent to one of those Betapedia dudes you’d see calling himself bonerman9000 and saying that he only dated models.

I assumed that any dudes who did message my fake persona would probably be really sleazy. I was wrong again.

Like the time I went undercover as a Craigslist hooker, Meatyhaunches69 ended up getting a slew of messages that amounted to “Hey” or “Your hot.” Dudes who were posted up 50 miles away, in the comfort of their own homes, still threw out the weakest lines ever. I was flabbergasted.

The moral of this story

All trolling aside, there is a moral to this story. The vast majority of dudes either never talk to girls, or say some of the dumbest nonsense ever. Whenever I go out to bars or clubs most of the other guys will stand off in the corner and pound drinks until they’re staggering around. Only then will they actually try and go socialize.

The other afternoon I was listening to a great podcast where the hosts were discussing something similar. Guys who are into self improvement will surround themselves with like minded individuals. While this is great, they’ll end up assuming that everyone is on or above their level. When you and your friends are lifting weights, making money, and talking to girls it’s easy to forget that most people aren’t. It’s also really easy to make unfair comparisons that put a damper on your mood.

When I work on my business I’ll often beat myself up over no being as successful as some random guy I read about on a forum. Or I’d read a bodybuilding blog and then abstain from eating toast for the next month. Or a girl wouldn’t like one of my jokes and I’d sulk for the rest of the night trying to figure out why.

The vast majority of men are sitting at home on a Thursday night eating Cheetos and messaging “Hi” to girls on the Internet. If you go to the gym, have a hobby, and can hold a normal conversation you’re probably in the top 40% of all males.

“Emotions. There oughta be a law against them.”

– Judge Dredd

Growing up my favorite comic book series was Judge Dredd. The stories were a perfect mixture of satire and violence with none of the soap opera antics that more mainstream comics frequently employ. Characters aged in real time, people died and never came back, and conflicts were resolved with bullets rather than lengthy debates about morality.

Recently I decided to pick up some of my old Judge Dredd comics. What I found surprised me.

The fictional far future setting that the stories take place in is a lot closer to our reality than most of us realize.

Giant dinosaurs, sewer mutants, and undead horrors aside there’s a lot of “out there” content that’s started to become a reality. Here are just a few things that I’ve begun to notice:

Fat acceptance

There’s an older story where the obese citizens of Dredd’s city start protesting that they are oppressed. The story is meant to be satire and was published before This Is Thin Privilege was ever a thing. The “fatties,” as they’re called in the comics, have been around for decades. As one fan explained:

“Mega-City 1 is home to a wide variety of weirdos. Perhaps the most conspicuous are the “Fatties,” a subculture of people who pride themselves on being enormously obese. In fact, they are so large, they walk around with little unicycles to support their flabby bellies.”

Unemployment

In the Judge Dredd universe something like 80 percent of the population is unemployed. Automation combined with corporate greed have put the vast majority of people out of work. Because no one has “real jobs” people spend their days making art, practicing hobbies, and committing crime. Basically stuff you’d see if you visited a third world city.

Additionally, meme type culture is huge. While fads have always existed in the real world, they seem to have become a lot more prevalent in the past few years. The Harlem Shake, Gangnam Style, horse hats, gallon smashing, the knockout game and thousands of other meme activities have become huge in post great recession America. Since most of the country’s younger population is unemployed or underemployed these types of activities have been able to flourish.

All powerful legal system

 

In Judge Dredd all the lawmen, including Dredd himself, are fascists. The series reads like the thought police from 1984 fighting various monsters and crime syndicates. Police drones, electronic surveillance systems, and unquestionable lawmen were all in the series since the early 1970’s.

Long before the news was reporting on PRISM, cops shooting pet dogs, or Chris Dorner similar events were taking place within the pages of Judge Dredd. At the time they were all considered far fetched, something reserved just for science fiction stories.

Looking through my old collection of comics was really interesting. A lot of the content that was meant to be outlandish satire, thought never to occur in a sane society, has become real. Fat privilege, staggering unemployment, meme culture, and draconian police forces were the stuff of fiction. Now they’re starting to become facets of everyday life.