Be the Asshole


There’s a moment after you’ve dug through all the shadowy corners of needing to be fixed where you can finally breathe with fullness into the human body you inhabit, knowing now that growth is an evolution - not a piece of Ikea furniture to be built and put on display. 


I think a lot of people will run into hustle culture & “solution” based spirituality when diving into their full authenticity - I don’t know where the correlation came from (probably something to do with the idea of “best selves”), but I think a lot of wires have been crossed.


I said to my partner the other day that if someone’s going to be an asshole - I’d so much rather them just be it on the surface, upfront, almost in your face about it; (I know.. very different from the 'be the best You, you can be' narrative, often found dwelling in toxic-positivity, light circles...)

And as much as I'm tired of simply having to guess who people are - I’m really more exhausted with the notions of better and best in terms of humanity to begin with. Sometimes my best self is telling someone the f*ck off. Sometimes my best self is calling in sick to work and staying home to eat ice cream.


And I could take the time to really explain my past struggles with people pleasing or overworking but at the end of the day - who has the time?

For everyone's story?

At the end of the day, all you Know is what you have experienced.


And that's made space to go when someone reaches a different conclusion than me. Healthy questioning (obviously adding math wrong; 'honey, are you sure you're using that word correctly') aside, when I'm in a conversation with someone with a diametrically opposed view, belief, even moral, I am swimming to understanding that:

  1. we have clearly different experiences, or at the very least experienced those experiences differently, and thus, have formed very different perceptions.
  2. Knowing what I know now [see no.1], I have no realm of experience to conceptualize this persons behavior - we clearly have abundantly different perspectives/ outlooks/ eyes.
  3. and all perceptions are equal, in that we are all reacting, responding, rebirthing into every version of our own experience. How you perceive what you perceive is what makes you you.

So how could we ever expect to find self riotousness in assuming what is best for anyone else?


Yet often on the internet,

in passing,

from friends over a courteous dinner,

I am finding people are upset... about other people... being upset... ????

Talking or texting or flicking in their two cents, regularly others are complaining about anger, loud emotions, confrontational tones (especially from a woman). Crying is treated like a renaissance plague, you're either avoided completely or so rudely gawked in pity, that eventually I think we were all traumatized into never crying in public.

And yet,

we all cry.

We all feel pain.

We all mourn losses and one day we will all experience death.

Or the rules we've made to operate in the world... no hats at dinner, silliness seen as improper.

I mean yes - I think we all agree on the regular, human rights kinda morals. Yet the list of things people do that others think is wrong could really go on and on:

Some people view hustling and deferring children to be negative, for others its earning excessive wealth. Those who play video games constantly have poor character and are lazy, but those who read all the time are smart and well managed? Travel is important. But not as much as going to college. But more than having a husband (at this time), but still not as important as having kids?


Who made up all these rules?


Has anyone else noticed how goddamn external all these notions are?


And maybe that's the point. Maybe we created all these 'social norms' and barriers and bullshit to build a layer between us and anything even remotely raw, real, potent in any Truth beyond the Self.

Yet either way, just as the sun will always set, the leaves will always fall, so too will the empire, the notion, the facts we build entire maps on; eventually someone finally sails far enough west.

All aboard?


Why should anything around me decide what my best self looks like? Why is it even necessary to be my best self?


I can’t help but picture myself, a sad, old woman who has shoved down all the anger and pain and relaxation my experience told me I’m not allowed to have - but why should those experiences, those encounters with something other than the Self, determine what feels good for me.


It’s not about fixing you, none of this is, none of my words or writings or anything.


And if you ever got the impression I want you to be fixed, it’s not correct: I want you to “be” free. I want you to recognize the truth that this life is mine just as much as it is yours, and to remain caged in a box based off societies opinions is to remain a prisoner from the world within you.


The cool thing about stepping away from the fix it culture is realizing you can break the chains as quickly as you can picture it on your mind.


There is no self preservation without Self.





-Ani Khēmeia