Here’s a quick personality test for you: go read this article, “Apparently This Matters: Paging Dr. Mario,” and then answer the following question.
Does this article
A) make you mad because people get paid to write drivel like this and you could do that so why isn’t someone paying you…
B) make you happy because people get paid to write drivel like this and since you could do that maybe someone will pay you to do it someday.
Personally I would answer A, and I am really trying very hard to convert to B. I am. I want to stop being such a bitter, cynical grumpy old man. It’s not even a matter of “not taking things so seriously.” Trust me, I don’t take anything seriously. But I want to stop being so darn snarky.
(And for the record, it is snarky, and not sardonic. Only very attractive women can pull off sardonic. The rest of us are merely snarky, and if we’re not careful, we might even be snidey).
A few years ago I pledged that I would stop making people feel bad for liking things. And it’s been going fairly well, except that I’ve been shifting my judgment from “you’re stupid” to “that’s stupid.” And it is such a worthless evaluation. At worst it comes across as condescending, at best, patronizing. “That thing you like, I think it’s stupid. But it’s okay that you like it! I like really stupid things too!”
Sorry, to those of you who’ve had to hear me say that. Not cool.
Who am I to judge? Well, I can judge, you know. I got credentials. I have taste (I married into having taste, anyway) and an education and enough lifetime experience that when I think something’s dumb, it’s not just a knee-jerk reaction.
But that’s not the point. Just because I think something is stupid, doesn’t mean it is, and even if it is stupid, what benefit comes from my evaluating it as such? Whatever injury I feel is being done to me by experiencing the stupidity is only made worse by my complaining about it. It takes less energy to change the channel, put down the book, click on the a different web page. Way way way less energy. I’m the one’s who stupid.
Seriously: it takes one to know one. The truth is, Jarrett Bellini had an experience and shared it and that he gets paid and I don’t is irrelevant. Entirely pointless. If I get upset, that’s on me, not him, is a reflection of me, not of him. I’m the one who’s stupid.
Which is not to say I should just be all hippie-dippie lovey-dovey about everything. I should have standards, and set expectations for high quality. But getting upset doesn’t make anything better at all, so why bother.
Instead, I should try to take inspiration from things. I should use my well-earned powers of judgment to find what is useful and good—and if I don’t find anything, then at least I got the benefit of exercising my abilities.
Or, at the very least, I got an excuse to write my own drivel and post it too. And yes, I am available for paid writing positions, if anyone’s, wondering.