Why I Do Dumb Stuff All The Time

If you go to Uni, you’ve probably had the experience of seeing me do something stupid. You may have thought to yourself, “Why did he do that? Has he no shame?” In reverse order, the answers to those questions are: I have no shame, and I probably did it on a dare. It would take forever to list every development that led me to become the idiot I am today, but I will try to explain some of it in one post.

I used to get annoyed at my little brother. Sometimes there would be real annoyances, like when we first shared a room. He refused to sleep unless a light was on, and he constantly asked me nonsensical questions like, “what are tigers for?” Other times I’d get very angry over small things he did. If he chewed with his mouth open, refused to blow his nose, or talked too loudly around me, it could send me into a screaming fit.

I don’t know exactly why I had such issues with him. Maybe the small things he did annoyed me so much because my parents would let him get away with them while chastising me for doing those same things. Maybe I was irritable because other things were making me angry. Maybe I was just an asshole. I could keep guessing, but that’s not the point of this post. I needed a way to deal with my anger, so I let it all go. I stopped caring what he did. His shirt is on backwards? Don’t care. He’s covered in spaghetti? Don’t care. He’s shouting about the Star Wars expanded universe in public? Don’t care. He didn’t have the power to annoy me anymore, I was free from him.

Another problem I had when I was small was that everyone thought I was a complete nutcase and a nerd. Other little kids would make fun of me for looking like Chicken Little from the 2005 movie, for being well mannered and polite to the teachers, or for being the textbook image of a nerd: a kid with glasses who likes math. (Yes, that’s really what I was like then.) When I blew my stack at someone for making fun of me, it would only reinforce their idea of me as a spazz.

Once again, the solution to this problem was to stop giving a shit.  No more would I try to hang out with “cool” people who I didn’t like. No longer would I consider whether other people thought I was weird. I continued to be a nerd. I continued suck up to the teachers. I ran around screaming for no reason. I wore a trash bag to school one day. I wasn’t the coolest kid in school, but I didn’t care. I had all the friends I needed. No one could make fun of me anymore, because it had no effect. I was free from them.

While I had lost my sense of embarrassment, I still restrained myself to avoid negative consequences. That soon changed. One day in 7^th grade, I was paying attention in English class and engaging with the lesson. The teacher said something that didn’t make sense to me, so I asked her to explain it again. Eventually, we spent the whole class period arguing about the English language. After I left the class, I realized I had argued with a teacher and nothing bad had happened. I realized my actions did not have the extreme consequences I thought they did.

My mindset when making decisions slowly began to change from, “What would Jesus do?” to “Can I get away with this?” For example, if my friend asked me to climb onto the roof of a bus stop, I would not consider whether it was wise to climb onto the roof of a bus stop. I simply thought, “will I go to jail if I climb onto the roof of this bus stop?” I decided it would be silly if I went to jail for that, and I scrambled on up.

In conclusion, next time I do something dumb you can judge me all you want. I’ve already made it clear that I do not care. I am free and I am enjoying my life more than you are.