5 Things You’ll Hate Yourself For Doing

1. Losing Motivation For The 22,467th time.

Getting hyped up on short-lived motivation is something I’m familiar with. I’ve started at least 14 different fitness regimens in 2012, none of which have lasted longer than the drive from my house to Burger King. I’ll be eating a bag of miniature Snickers bars at 2 A.M. (see #3) and an infomercial for P90-X comes on. It looks fun to have nice abs and stuff, so for the next few days I’ll diet and workout until I remember that I love fried foods and couches more than green stuff and crunches.

It happens to everyone. Something you saw/felt/heard lit a fire and now you’re going to do better. Dieting, school, work – you’re rededicating yourself. Matter of fact, you’re so focused that you might Facebook about it so the universe knows you’re about to make it your b-word (sorry, no cussing was one of my other self-promises).

Unfortunately the key is consistency so unless you’re for real, for real, that burning desire will cool off and you’ll go back to meh, whatever efforts until the next temporary self-improvement vow.

2.Overvaluing Social Network Attention

Caring about “likes” on Facebook is never something we’re proud of ourselves for doing. But honestly you can’t tell me that it’s not even slightly annoying to see a hot person write some basic shit (that no cussing thing didn’t last too long) like, “Chillin’, watching TV” and getting 50 likes, when you wrote a brilliantly witty status that warranted nothing more than a comment from some fool attempting to one-up your cleverness, thus ruining the post in its entirety.

Then at a more logical point you’ll think, why did I even care? In the grand scheme of things when we recall our best days, will that one time when we did or didn’t get 50 likes really matter? Hopefully not because that would mean you’re doing life wrong.

3. Reaaally Poor Consumption Decisions

This means eating that thing you shouldn’t have eaten at a time when you shouldn’t have eaten it. A pint of ice cream at 3:00 A.M. = bubble guts at 3:05 A.M = no sleep. Taco Bell at anytime of day is going to result in an aching stomach and painful bowel movement, yet we do these things with a full understanding of the uncomfortable consequences that follow.

You know that bad little kid who knows damn well he shouldn’t be playing with fire? That’s us. His parents told him not to, our food pyramid and past experience told us not to. But the pyro can’t resist and when nobody is around, he lights matches and eventually sets something ablaze. It sucks to be that kid but food is just so good.

4. Making Bad Purchases

I want – no, I need this iPhone 5. Is rent paid? No. Are utilities covered? Well, no, but if I budget and stick to a canned tuna and Ramen diet for the next few weeks, I could possibly manage. OK, mathematically this isn’t going to work at all but I don’t care. Look how shiny that iPhone is. I’ll let the First-Of-The-Month version of myself worry about that.

That’s a basic example of the conversation we have when we buy stuff that there’s no room in our budget for. It’s basically being in denial and convincing yourself that the awful decision you’re about to make isn’t that stupid. But it is. It is that stupid.

5. Taking A Trip To ‘Text Message Limbo’

We’ve all text messaged someone in a scenario that we’re well aware could end poorly. Those texts are usually regretted for these common reasons:

1. You were drunk. Said too much.
2. You weren’t drunk. Said too much.
3. You sent it and didn’t get an immediate response. Now you’re anxiously waiting for a response, emotionally distraught for one of these reasons:

a. You’re certain that your carrier didn’t send it, losing your text in limbo.
b. You’re certain that they’re ignoring you.
c. You’re certain that they’re ignoring you and showing all of their friends and your friends the text you sent, as they share a laugh at a party you purposely weren’t invited too. It’s a Hollywood party too; lots of celebrities in attendance. They’re probably taking a picture with Aziz Ansari right now, and he’s smiling in it because he too just saw your stupid text message. The person you texted hasn’t written back and everybody hates you/thinks you’re hilariously pathetic. Or so you’ll tell yourself.

OK, this is getting too deep. Like, Inception deep. The point is that sending a text to someone you hope to hear back from is a huge risk and your overly active imagination will multiply your stress tenfold. It is then that you will want to travel back in time to slap the phone from your past selves hands. Gently slap it that is, because it’s obviously the brand new iPhone 5 that you had no business splurging on. 

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