2012 Lessons to take to the end of the world

Trying to be truly nice to people in a world where people expect you to be self serving just makes you look even more self serving in the eyes of people who don't know you.  People who recognize you as truly nice are either the same as you or are willing to take advantage of you.  The best way to be truly nice is to also protect your self interests.

Look a girl in the eyes, analyze everything you can about her genetics, figure out everything you can from what kind of shoes she wears, subtly drop hints that you like her (on Facebook or your blog or whatever) with no real indication that it's her you're talking about, then ignore and avoid her for a couple months. ~~ OR ~~  Have a couple conversations with her, feel out the vibe since you're such a fucking people genius and take a goddamn chance by asking her to hang out; the worst that will happen is that you make a new friend. ((Ever feel like it's too late for some things?))

Driving fast in a bad ass car is way better than sex with a selfish person.  Breaking your personal best time on the road you learned to drive on is way more satisfying than breaking your 'number of orgasms in a row' record with that person too.

Screaming into a pillow is like withholding ejaculation - a squeezing orgasm without the real release that you get from letting it fly out.  It lets you hold out for for longer, lets you keep going, lets you stay in rhythm without screwing it up for everyone else, but in the end you never get to let go - you never get to have a real orgasm.

Don't let things get too far.  Even the most patient and understanding person in the world feels resentment, pain, sorrow, sadness.  If you know it's over - fucking end it.

Don't let your emotions control your decisions about your emotions.  People can get hurt when you do that, especially when pain is driving your decisions about love.

Trying to deny who you are is like telling a mountain it can't be where it is anymore.  If you don't know who you are - it takes other people to help shine a light, it's damn near impossible for you to figure it out on your own.  This can be painful - very painful.  If you make new friends you will probably lose some of them, maybe all of them.  If you have old friends, be careful - remember not all of them know who you are either - stick with the ones who are willing to take this journey with you.  You will recognize them when you change something and they stick around.

People who can't ever realize they're wrong are basically useless to you and can be extremely dangerous.  If you figure out you're dealing with someone like that I suggest you completely filter them from your life. Good riddance to bad rubbish.

If you look someone in the eyes a hundred times and they don't see you it's because you don't want to be seen - whether you realize that or not, it's the truth.

Most baristas are cool ass people.  They tend to also be artists, actors, philosophers, students of various disciplines, musicians...  As well as good listeners, good conversationalists, good dressers, fun people to party with, good people to drink with - they also generally make good coffee.  I have also found that most of these things often apply to bartenders, servers, and folks who work in kitchens.

I wish I could say that people will surprise you.  On a whole I can't bring myself to say that.  There really isn't that much genetic variation in our species.  It's surprisingly not all that hard to see how certain cultural stimuli will affect people in general. With a basic understanding of sociology, psychology, neurology, biochemistry, cultural anthropology, and body language people will rarely do things that confuse you.  None of that is an effective replacement for good intuition.

Trust your gut - I can't emphasize that enough.  That comes with a caveat...try and recognize if your gut is dumber than your brain - then always always check your gut.  Unfortunately you have to fuck up a lot before you can learn which path is right for you.

Averages work like this:  There's a number somewhere in the middle.  There're quite a few numbers higher than that number trying to pull that number up and a quite a few numbers lower trying to drag that number down.  The average IQ in the US is ~100.  There are quite a few people with IQs like 180, 200, 145 etc (way bigger than 100) pulling that number up. Think about how many numbers there have to be less than 100 pulling that number down.  Fortunately, on average, we are getting smarter...What I learned?  After meeting a couple people that tested higher than I did on an IQ test, either we took different tests or IQ tests are wrong.  I'm leaning toward the tests being wrong seeing as how they test visual acuity but not auditory acuity, intuition, or existential intelligence.  Which would probably make me a fucking super genius on paper.

Take chances...

Accept people for who they are. That doesn't mean you have to like them - or be near them.

Accept that you're probably not going to change the whole world - but never stop affecting the people around you.

Play...

Laugh and smile as often as possible even if you don't feel like it.

Try your best to take your own advise...  <-- especially that one.