Claudia put down her book, “this guy wrote that once he started practicing his headstand he never gained any weight. He could eat a pound of butter every day. He said his friends were amazed”.
I wonder what that even looked like. What would my friends do if they were “amazed” at something I did?
Would they stand around and look at my stomach and point at it? “That’s amazing!” they would say as I would eat a bucket of butter and my stomach wouldn’t grow.
I asked, “How long would he be in a headstand?”
“Three hours.”
“It must be because maybe everything gets loosened up in the intestines and colon when he’s upside down and then it’s easier to flow out, you know? As opposed to getting stuck in there.”
“C.O.L.O.N.” appeared on the movie screen of my head. Flashing.
“Or,” Claudia said, thinking about it. “Blood has to go against gravity when it pumps through the body. Maybe the blood gets cleansed differently when you are upside down.”
We’re sitting there thinking about it. Drinking coffee. The sun coming up. A bug got in my nose and I had to snort so it would get out.
What the hell! We had no idea what we were talking about!
Gravity on the blood? The intestines cleaning themselves while upside down? Hahaha! Colon? What the hell is that all about? “How long would he be in a headstand”? Hahaha. Look at me! I NEEDED to know “how many hours”.
I don’t know. We talk talk talk. Really smart stuff all day long. I had Claudia record me the other day whenever I talked BS.
“Hey Claudia,” I said just two seconds ago while I was writing this, “what were some of the things you wrote down that time you were writing my nonsense down?”
“Ahh, yes,yes,” she’s picking up her phone. Click, click, swoosh. Click. “Here’s one,” she says. “You said: I think those little clouds near the ground is mildew coming up and not clouds coming down.”
What? It’s so great to have opinions. To talk talk talk.
Opinions then become the grandparents of hate or fear. When our nonsense disagrees with each other.
I want to catch myself today every time I waste air by talking baloney. When I actually look at the subset of things I know, it’s very little.
I’m going to be thrifty with my thoughts and words. Here’s how:
- recognize when you don’t know. Even mid-sentence. Imagine hearing your fat head talking (or mine) and suddenly you say to yourself, “you know, I have no clue”.
- don’t try to figure everything out. Sometimes you can just look at the clouds. You don’t always need to KNOW WHY they are there. Too stressful!
- don’t speculate. Similar to above. But about people. Trying to figure out why people do things. Give up now or give up after you’re angry and scared. Your choice.
- most people don’t know either. Experience everything like it’s fiction. Don’t forget, 100% of “science” gets revamped every 50 years. Which means…
- you don’t have to listen. This goes against the common advice: “listen”. But really? Do I have to listen to BS? Only listen to people you love and who support you. Everyone else is noise. You can safely hit the mute button while their mouth holes open and close.
- everything is entertainment. Most non-fiction books I read have glaring factual or theoretical errors all throughout. So I only read things that are written beautifully or are funny. This includes news. Which means I read ZERO news.
- almost all anger and fear initially stem from stuff you don’t know. When you don’t really know something (which is most of the time) or you are speculating, it plants the seeds for later anger, fear, guilt, shame and all sorts of other bad stuff. Go away bad stuff!
- mostly only believe things you experience. This sounds anti-scientific but it’s not. And it applies to all self-help. Don’t even believe this article. Try it and see if it makes your life a lot better. I know it makes my life a lot better. That’s all I know.
- make up stuff. Instead of trying to figure out why something is happening, assume you don’t know and make up a funny reason why it’s happening. That’s more enjoyable! Then you are allowed to say it. Because it’s funny and laughter releases oxytocin.
RECOGNIZE!
It reminds me of a story told about Calvin Coolidge, dead President.
Coolidge was known as “Silent Cal” because he didn’t like to talk.
A friend of his son’s was over for dinner with the family at the White House. The friend said to Coolidge, “I made a bet with your son that you would say more than two words during this dinner.”
Coolidge looked at him for a moment and said, “You lose”. They finished the rest of the meal in silence.
No, I don’t know.
I’m a winner.
