But I know they won't

Friday 7/31/26

Calling yourself an "ally" in your Instagram bio is usually an indication that you're not a sincere person. Convictions for you are talking points, rather than the things by which you live and embody. You're also betraying the hierarchical way in which you actually think about people.

What are the most dominant forms of human behavior in our world? Insincerity. Sloth. Inconsistency. Projection. Insecurity (with good reason, considering how we choose to live and be). Right up there is hypocrisy. It makes a strong bid for the top spot.

I don't believe it's possible to be an intelligent person of any value to one's self and others and ever unironically use the term "hot take." But, I'd say the same about using memes and gifs. Also, all forms of "GOAT."

But I also believe that a person can change and change fast when it comes to intelligence, which is largely a choice. If you want to be stupid or have no problem with being stupid, you'll be stupid. If you want to be smarter, put in some effort and make sure you think, you will be.

The person you are is also a choice. Almost always. Leaving sociopathy aside. A thing I often say, because it's true, is that everyone has to decide on the person they want to be. How that person acts and treats others isn't by accident. It didn't just happen. It's the result of a choice. Choices. They can choose to be different and act accordingly.

Sometimes in the Bunker Hill Monument there will be a little kid who is all excited about climbing to the top. She’s like, “Let’s do this!” But her parents, after a certain amount of steps, will decide they don’t feel like doing it, so that means the kid can’t. The parents can put it on the kid as well, like, “You’ll be too tired later,” but you know that’s not the real reason. Meanwhile, the kid is fine, but the parents have this expression of, “Screw this” on their faces. It makes me sad.

To the list of dominant forces above, add excuse making. We'd rather make an excuse than anything else it often seems. I often think, "Or you could just do it," or "You can do the right thing, you know," or "Maybe try?" or "How about being honest?"

In the Monument, I hear many excuses. The person who is struggling is doing so--for the make the point of announcing this--on account of "just having run" the other day, or a knee injury from college.

One can see these people, of course, and the reason they're struggling as they are doesn't have anything to do with the jog of two days back or wrenching the knee in a freshman year game of pick-up basketball.

But, they don't want it to be this thing that it actually is, and they certainly don't want to have to bear down and do anything about it. So, they say it's for this other reason that it isn't. I think, "You could make changes. You could make them immediately." But I know they won't.

People tend to believe that whatever they are and how they are is a matter of permanence. Nothing to be done. Especially if they've been that way for a long time, because then it's a foundational part of their identity, as such.

You can be different by next week. Doesn't mean anything else is. You being different doesn't necessarily change the part of the world that's around you. It doesn't assure that you're treated a certain way or you have things coming back to you.

People get violently upset--they want to attack--when it's suggested that something about them is wrong, lacking, or bad, but they overlook the crucial idea that they don't have to be that way. It's easier than we assume. You make a decision, you stick to it. You're consistent. You make a point. You take the care.

I'm not going to eat such and such. So you don't. I'm going to reach out more. So you reach out more. I'm going to sit with my thoughts and deal with them at night. So you do. I'm going to look up the definition of words I don't know. So you type in those words in a search engine. I'm going to be honest. So you tell the truth. I'm going to read more. So you read more.

Do all these things, and there you are, a different person. A communicator, a thinker, someone taking better care of their body, a straight shooter, a reader. It's really a matter of a day. Then sticking with it. The things we do become the people we are. Then it's not about sticking with it, but just being you.

But people would usually rather be insulted and angry than better. But again, that's because they don't think change is an option. And to admit that change might be good, is seen by people as a form of self-attack.

To put it bluntly: if you suck, and you stop sucking, then you're a person who doesn't suck, not a person who used to suck. You're just this better thing. Let's say you're an accountant. You're an accountant. You're not a mower of neighbors' yards which was the job you had at fifteen. That was then, this is now.

It's hard for me to imagine someone changing more than I have over the last fifteen years. I change every day of my life. I make a point to.

Small thing. I don't talk to many people, of course. I am unloved and I have no one. Friendship isn't a thing anymore in our world, and I certainly have no friends. I mean actual friends. With all that entails.

But about a month ago, I decided I didn't want to use profanity in any conversations, unless I was quoting someone. It's different in writing, because that's a matter of rhetorical efficacy. I have so much to be upset about. Angry about. My life is constant suffering and pain. It is being held down, discriminated again, hated, denied things I deserve more than anyone can deserve something. Because of who I am, what I do, and the level at which I do those things, as well as what this world currently is.

I cut this out, though. Gone. The result of a decision. I'm always doing things like this. Some are bigger than others.

Look at all I know. It's incomprehensible. The amount and endlessness of it. But each day, I learn more such that I know more than I did at the end of the prior day.

How many people do you think ever learn anything new? Take a week of the average person. Do you think there's anything they know at the end of it that they didn't know at the start? I don't mean something stupid about a celebrity that turns up in their social media feed. I mean about the world. Humans. Art. Nature. Whatever it may be.

It's virtually no one, right? What about you? What's something you know today that you didn't know yesterday? A real thing. A thing you went out and learned. What's stopping you?

The only thing that's stopping you is you. You made that decision to be stopped by you. You made a decision not to do something and not to learn. Just as you could make the opposite decision.

Don't get angry, especially over what's true. Relax and improve. You can do it.