For Posterity

It occurred to me that, while certainly not something I'm shooting for in the near future, someday, I will probably have children. Then I made a list of life lessons I hope to impart first and foremost. The list is not complete or in any order.

The List:


You Must Be Nice

Before you accomplish anything else in your life, achieve niceness. Very rarely, statistically almost impossibly, being nice may not be helpful. Throughout the eons of human evolution, we have developed communication systems exceedingly complex, but the simplest and most effective and most universal means of making yourself understood is pleasant disposition. Before you try to assert, insinuate, intimidate, persuade, or manipulate, use the perfect love and universal medium of empathy. Failing that, relate to them with the sick and pale spectre of sympathy, even though you disrespect them when you do so.

A Wrestler Can Take Any Other Martial Artist In A Fight

If you are living passionately, and being perfectly human, you will be in a bar fight or two. Know that the fundamentals of combat have no tolerance for flash or flair. Long after the black belt man wearing American flag yoga pants has wasted his precious few moments of primacy, a wrestler has fight and wind and most importantly, core strength. A wrestler works on the fundamentals of the animal. Legs and wind and core strength. That being said, you will not impress others with flaring, spastic movements that are photogenic. Prioritize appropriately.

Mix the Butter, Cheese, and Milk Separately

Why? Well, the cheese will not melt in fluidly to the macaroni. If you melt the ingredients separately into a sauce in another pan, or even a microwave self bowl, you avoid the chunky and greasy consistency of most home made non cardboardgenic macaroni and cheese. Give it twenty years, you will understand this better.

No One Person Has The Answer

Including you. You will not find a human being with the answer to the questions you will most earnestly seek. Entropy is extant in all human endeavors, most importantly the search for truth. You must understand that you fight the irreversibility of all things every day and with every journey. The minute you stop moving inside the suspended matrix of knowledge and existence, you will be wrong. As are all others who have stopped their journey to the truth and believe that the truth is a location they inhabit.

Sometimes You Must Be Mean

This is important. At times it will be necessary to temporarily suspend being nice and find your fire. It is painful and forever creates rifts inside the web of human relationships you make. That changes nothing.