6 Harsh Truths That Will Make You a Better Person

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2017, motherfuckers. Yeah! LETS DO THIS.

"Do what?" you ask. I DONT KNOW. LETS FIGURE THAT OUT TOGETHER, MOTHERFUCKERS.

Feel free to stop reading this if your career is going great, youre thrilled with your life, and youre happy with your relationships. Enjoy the rest of your day, friend, this article is not for you. Youre doing a great job, were all proud of you. So you dont feel like you wasted your click, heres a picture of Lenny Kravitz wearing a gigantic scarf.

For the rest of you, I want you to try something: Name five impressive things about yourself. Write them down or just shout them out loud to the room. But heres the catch -- youre not allowed to list anything you are (i.e., Im a nice guy, Im honest), but instead can only list things that you do (i.e., I just won a national chess tournament, I make the best chili in Massachusetts). If you found that difficult, well, this is for you, and you are going to fucking hate hearing it. My only defense is that this is what I wish somebody had said to me around 1995 or so.

Note: I originally posted this in December of 2012, and to date it has drawn more than 20 million page views and been shared on Facebook more than half a million times. We decided to update it and post it again every year, and by update I mean we change the year in the intro. -DW

6

The World Only Cares About What It Can Get from You

Lets say that the person you love the most has just been shot. He or she is lying in the street, bleeding and screaming. A guy rushes up and says, "Step aside." He looks over your loved ones bullet wound and pulls out a pocket knife -- hes going to operate right there in the street.

"OK, which one is the injured one?"

You ask, "Are you a doctor?"

The guy says, "No."

You say, "But you know what youre doing, right? Youre an old Army medic, or ..."

At this point the guy becomes annoyed. He tells you that he is a nice guy, he is honest, he is always on time. He tells you that he is a great son to his mother and has a rich life full of fulfilling hobbies, and he boasts that he never uses foul language.

Confused, you say, "How does any of that fucking matter when my [wife/husband/best friend/parent] is lying here bleeding! I need somebody who knows how to operate on bullet wounds! Can you do that or not?!?"

Now the man becomes agitated -- why are you being shallow and selfish? Do you not care about any of his other good qualities? Didnt you just hear him say that he always remembers his girlfriends birthday? In light of all of the good things he does, does it really matter if he knows how to perform surgery?

In that panicked moment, you will take your bloody hands and shake him by the shoulders, screaming, "Yes, Im saying that none of that other shit matters, because in this specific situation, I just need somebody who can stop the bleeding, you crazy fucking asshole."

"I dont get it. Would it help if I put on a lab jacket? Here, one sec, let me just ..."

So here is my terrible truth about the adult world: You are in that very situation every single day. Only you are the confused guy with the pocket knife. All of society is the bleeding gunshot victim.

If you want to know why society seems to shun you, or why you seem to get no respect, its because society is full of people who need things. They need houses built, they need food to eat, they need entertainment, they need fulfilling sexual relationships. You arrived at the scene of that emergency, holding your pocket knife, by virtue of your birth -- the moment you came into the world, you became part of a system designed purely to see to peoples needs.

"Heres that shit you needed. Now fuck off."

Either you will go about the task of seeing to those needs by learning a unique set of skills, or the world will reject you, no matter how kind, giving, and polite you are. You will be poor, you will be alone, you will be left out in the cold.

Does that seem mean, or crass, or materialistic? What about love and kindness -- dont those things matter? Of course. As long as they result in you doing things for people that they cant get elsewhere. For you see ...

5

The Hippies Were Wrong

For those of you who cant watch videos, its the famous speech Alec Baldwin gives in the cinematic masterpiece Glengarry Glenn Ross. Baldwins character -- whom you assume is the villain -- addresses a room full of dudes and tears them a new asshole, telling them that theyre all about to be fired unless they "close" the sales theyve been assigned:

"Nice guy? I dont give a shit. Good father? Fuck you! Go home and play with your kids. If you want to work here, close."

Its brutal, rude, and borderline sociopathic, and also it is an honest and accurate expression of what the world is going to expect from you. The difference is that, in the real world, people consider it so wrong to talk to you that way that theyve decided its better to simply let you keep failing.

"First graders, welcome to Mr. Baldwins third period art class -- is everyone here? Well, Im goin anyway."

That scene changed my life. Id program my alarm clock to play it for me every morning if I knew how. Alec Baldwin was nominated for an Oscar for that movie and thats the only scene hes in. As smarter people have pointed out, the genius of that speech is that half of the people who watch it think that the point of the scene is "Wow, what must it be like to have such an asshole boss?" and the other half think, "Fuck yes, lets go out and sell some goddamned real estate!"

Or, as the Last Psychiatrist blog put it:

"If you were in that room, some of you would understand this as a work, but feed off the energy of the message anyway, welcome the coachs cursing at you, this guy is awesome!; while some of you would take it personally, this guy is a jerk, you have no right to talk to me like that, or -- the standard maneuver when narcissism is confronted with a greater power -- quietly seethe and fantasize about finding information that will out him as a hypocrite. So satisfying."

"I swear, if he mentions my hair, Ill slap his face so har- Yes, sir, Im listening. Im sorry."

That excerpt is from an insightful critique of "hipsters" and why they seem to have so much trouble getting jobs (that doesnt begin to do it justice, go read the whole thing), and the point is that the difference in those two attitudes -- bitter vs. motivated -- largely determines whether or not youll succeed in the world. For instance, some people want to respond to that speech with Tyler Durdens line from Fight Club: "You are not your job."

But, well, actually, you totally are. Granted, your "job" and your means of employment might not be the same thing, but in both cases you are nothing more than the sum total of your useful skills. For instance, being a good mother is a job that requires a skill. Its something a person can do that is useful to other members of society. But make no mistake: Your "job" -- the useful thing you do for other people -- is all you are.

There is a reason why surgeons get more respect than comedy writers. There is a reason mechanics get more respect than unemployed hipsters. There is a reason your job will become your label if your death makes the news ("NFL Linebacker Dies in Murder/Suicide"). Tyler said, "You are not your job," but he also founded and ran a successful soap company and became the head of an international social and political movement. He was totally his job.

It was the irony that many people missed from that movie.

Or think of it this way: Remember when Chick-fil-A came out against gay marriage? And how despite the protests, the company continues to sell millions of sandwiches every day? Its not because the country agrees with them; its because they do their job of making delicious sandwiches well. And thats all that matters.

You dont have to like it. I dont like it when it rains on my birthday. It rains anyway. Clouds form and precipitation happens. People have needs and thus assign value to the people who meet them. These are simple mechanisms of the universe and they do not respond to our wishes.

"This is bullshit. I have a completely clean criminal record, and this is the thanks I get?"

If you protest that youre not a shallow capitalist materialist and that you disagree that money is everything, I can only say: Who said anything about money? Youre missing the larger point.

4

What You Produce Does Not Have to Make Money, But It Does Have to Benefit People

Lets try a non-money example so you dont get hung up on that. The demographic that Cracked writes for is heavy on 20-something males. So on our message boards and in my many inboxes I read several dozen stories a year from miserable, lonely guys who insist that women wont come near them despite the fact that they are just the nicest guys in the world. I can explain what is wrong with this mindset, but it would probably be better if I let Alec Baldwin explain it:

In this case, Baldwin is playing the part of the attractive women in your life. They wont put it as bluntly as he does -- society has trained us not to be this honest with people -- but the equation is the same. "Nice guy? Who gives a shit? If you want to work here, close."

So, what do you bring to the table? Because the Zooey Deschanel look alike in the bookstore that youve been daydreaming about moisturizes her face for an hour every night and feels guilty when she eats anything other than salad for lunch. Shes going to be a surgeon in 10 years. What do you do?

"Well, Im fucking wicked at capture the flag."

"What, so youre saying that I cant get girls like that unless I have a nice job and make lots of money?"

No, your brain jumps to that conclusion so you have an excuse to write off everyone who rejects you by thinking that theyre just being shallow and selfish. Im asking what do you offer? Are you smart? Funny? Interesting? Talented? Ambitious? Creative? OK, now what do you do to demonstrate those attributes to the world? Dont say that youre a nice guy -- thats the bare minimum. Pretty girls have guys being nice to them 36 times a day. The patient is bleeding in the street. Do you know how to operate or not?

"Well, Im not sexist or racist or greedy or shallow or abusive! Not like those other douchebags!"

Im sorry, I know that this is hard to hear, but if all you can do is list a bunch of faults you dont have, then back the fuck away from the patient. Theres a witty, handsome guy with a promising career ready to step in and operate.

"Wait, I said I wouldnt hit you!"

Does that break your heart? OK, so now what? Are you going to mope about it, or are you going to learn how to do surgery? Its up to you, but dont complain about how girls fall for jerks; they fall for those jerks because those jerks have other things they can offer. "But Im a great listener!" Are you? Because youre willing to sit quietly in exchange for the chance to be in the proximity of a pretty girl (and spend every second imagining how soft her skin must be)? Well guess what, theres another guy in her life who also knows how to do that, and he can play the guitar. Saying that youre a nice guy is like a restaurant whose only selling point is that the food doesnt make you sick. Youre like a new movie whose title is This Movie Is in English, and its tagline is "The actors are clearly visible."

I think this is why you can be a "nice guy" and still feel terrible about yourself. Specifically ...

3

You Hate Yourself Because You Dont Do Anything

"So, what, youre saying that I should pick up a book on how to get girls?"

Only if step one in the book is "Start making yourself into the type of person girls want to be around."

Getty"Come ooooon. I know I hid some vodka in here somewhere."

Because thats the step that gets skipped -- its always "How can I get a job?" and not "How can I become the type of person employers want?" Its "How can I get pretty girls to like me?" instead of "How can I become the type of person that pretty girls like?" See, because that second one could very well require giving up many of your favorite hobbies and paying more attention to your appearance, and God knows what else. You might even have to change your personality.

"But why cant I find someone who just likes me for me?" you ask. The answer is because humans need things. The victim is bleeding, and all you can do is look down and complain that there arent more gunshot wounds that just fix themselves?

Heres another video (NSFW):

Everyone who watched that video instantly became a little happier, although not all for the same reasons. Can you do that for people? Why not? Whats stopping you from strapping on your proverbial thong and cape and taking to your proverbial stage and flapping your proverbial penis at people? That guy knows the secret to winning at human life: that doing ... whatever you call that ... was better than not doing it.

"But Im not good at anything!" Well, I have good news -- throw enough hours of repetition at it and you can get sort of good at anything. I was the worlds shittiest writer when I was an infant. I was only slightly better at 25. But while I was failing miserably at my career, I wrote in my spare time for eight straight years, an article a week, before I ever made real money off it. It took 13 years for me to get good enough to make the New York Times best-seller list. It took me probably 20,000 hours of practice to sand the edges off my sucking.

Dont like the prospect of pouring all of that time into a skill? Well, I have good news and bad news. The good news is that the sheer act of practicing will help you come out of your shell -- I got through years of tedious office work because I knew that I was learning a unique skill on the side. People quit because it takes too long to see results, because they cant figure out that the process is the result.

The bad news is that you have no other choice. If you want to work here, close.

Because in my non-expert opinion, you dont hate yourself because you have low self-esteem, or because other people were mean to you. You hate yourself because you dont do anything. Not even you can just "love you for you" -- thats why youre miserable and sending me private messages asking me what I think you should do with your life.

Do the math: How much of your time is spent consuming things other people made (TV, music, video games, websites) versus making your own? Only one of those adds to your value as a human being.

And if you hate hearing this and are responding with something you heard as a kid that sounds like "Its whats on the inside that matters!" then I can only say ...

2

What You Are Inside Only Matters Because of What It Makes You Do

Being in the business Im in, I know dozens of aspiring writers. They think of themselves as writers, they introduce themselves as writers at parties, they know that deep inside, they have the heart of a writer. The only thing theyre missing is that minor final step, where they actually fucking write things.

But really, does that matter? Is "writing things" all that important when deciding who is and who is not truly a "writer"?

For the love of God, yes.

Ive known "writers" who produced less content than whats on this womans grocery list.

See, theres a common defense to everything Ive said so far, and to every critical voice in your life. Its the thing your ego is saying to you in order to prevent you from having to do the hard work of improving: "I know Im a good person on the inside." It may also be phrased as "I know who I am" or "I just have to be me."

Dont get me wrong; who you are inside is everything -- the guy who built a house for his family from scratch did it because of who he was inside. Every bad thing youve ever done has started with a bad impulse, some thought ricocheting around inside your skull until you had to act on it. And every good thing youve done is the same -- "who you are inside" is the metaphorical dirt from which your fruit grows.

Notice how the camera is pointed up, and not at the base of the tree?

But heres what everyone needs to know, and what many of you cant accept:

"You" are nothing but the fruit.

Nobody cares about your dirt. "Who you are inside" is meaningless aside from what it produces for other people.

Inside, you have great compassion for poor people. Great. Does that result in you doing anything about it? Do you hear about some terrible tragedy in your community and say, "Oh, those poor children. Let them know that they are in my thoughts"? Because fuck you if so -- find out what they need and help provide it. A hundred million people watched that Kony video, virtually all of whom kept those poor African children "in their thoughts." What did the collective power of those good thoughts provide? Jack fucking shit. Children die every day because millions of us tell ourselves that caring is just as good as doing. Its an internal mechanism controlled by the lazy part of your brain to keep you from actually doing work.

"I just wanted to tell you that youre in my thoughts. Good luck -- let me know if that cured you."

How many of you are walking around right now saying, "She/he would love me if she/he only knew what an interesting person I am!" Really? How do all of your interesting thoughts and ideas manifest themselves in the world? What do they cause you to do? If your dream girl or guy had a hidden camera that followed you around for a month, would they be impressed with what they saw? Remember, they cant read your mind -- they can only observe. Would they want to be a part of that life?

Because all Im asking you to do is apply the same standard to yourself that you apply to everyone else. Dont you have that annoying Christian friend whose only offer to help anyone ever is to "pray for them"? Doesnt it drive you nuts? Im not even commenting on whether or not prayer works; it doesnt change the fact that they chose the one type of help that doesnt require them to get off the sofa. They abstain from every vice, they think clean thoughts, their internal dirt is as pure as can be, but what fruit grows from it? And they should know this better than anybody -- I stole the fruit metaphor from the Bible. Jesus said something to the effect of "a tree is judged by its fruit" over and over and over. Granted, Jesus never said, "If you want to work here, close." No, he said, "Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire."

Getty"And then a buffalo will stare stupidly into your soul while slowly chewing grass and softly farting."

The people didnt react well to being told that, just as the salesmen didnt react well to Alec Baldwin telling them that they needed to grow some balls or resign themselves to shining his shoes. Which brings us to the final point ...

1

Everything Inside You Will Fight Improvement

The human mind is a miracle, and you will never see it spring more beautifully into action than when it is fighting against evidence that it needs to change. Your psyche is equipped with layer after layer of defense mechanisms designed to shoot down anything that might keep things from staying exactly where they are -- ask any addict.

So even now, some of you reading this are feeling your brain bombard you with knee-jerk reasons to reject it. From experience, I can say that these seem to come in the form of ...

*Intentionally Interpreting Any Criticism as an Insult

"Who is he to call me lazy and worthless! A good person would never talk to me like this! He wrote this whole thing just to feel superior to me and to make me feel bad about my life! Im going to think up my own insult to even the score!"

*Focusing on the Messenger to Avoid Hearing the Message

"Who is THIS guy to tell ME how to live? Oh, like hes so high and mighty! Its just some dumb writer on the Internet! Im going to go dig up something on him that reassures me that hes stupid, and that everything hes saying is stupid! This guy is so pretentious, it makes me puke! I watched his old rap video on YouTube and thought his rhymes sucked!"

"When you get to where I am in life, you feel free to give me advice! Until then, youre nothing but meat and guesses."

*Focusing on the Tone to Avoid Hearing the Content

"Im going to dig through here until I find a joke that is offensive when taken out of context, and then talk and think only about that! Ive heard that a single offensive word can render an entire book invisible!"

*Revising Your Own History

"Things arent so bad! I know that I was threatening suicide last month, but Im feeling better now! Its entirely possible that if I just keep doing exactly what Im doing, eventually things will work out! Ill get my big break, and if I keep doing favors for that pretty girl, eventually shell come around!"

*Pretending That Any Self-Improvement Would Somehow Be Selling Out Your True Self

"Oh, so I guess Im supposed to get rid of all of my manga and instead go to the gym for six hours a day and get a spray tan like those Jersey Shore douche bags? Because THAT IS THE ONLY OTHER OPTION."

"Way to leave the hood behind, asshole. New house or not, youll always be white trash!"

And so on. Remember, misery is comfortable. Its why so many people prefer it. Happiness takes effort.

Also, courage. Its incredibly comforting to know that as long as you dont create anything in your life, then nobody can attack the thing you created.

Its so much easier to just sit back and criticize other peoples creations. This movie is stupid. That couples kids are brats. That other couples relationship is a mess. That rich guy is shallow. This restaurant sucks. This Internet writer is an asshole. Id better leave a mean comment demanding that the website fire him. See, I created something.

Oh, wait, did I forget to mention that part? Yeah, whatever you try to build or create -- be it a poem, or a new skill, or a new relationship -- you will find yourself immediately surrounded by non-creators who trash it. Maybe not to your face, but theyll do it. Your drunk friends do not want you to get sober. Your fat friends do not want you to start a fitness regimen. Your jobless friends do not want to see you embark on a career.

Just remember, theyre only expressing their own fear, since trashing other peoples work is another excuse to do nothing. "Why should I create anything when the things other people create suck? I would totally have written a novel by now, but Im going to wait for something good, I dont want to write the next Twilight!" As long as they never produce anything, their work will forever be perfect and beyond reproach. Or if they do produce something, theyll make sure they do it with detached irony. Theyll make it intentionally bad to make it clear to everyone else that this isnt their real effort. Their real effort would have been amazing. Not like the shit you made

Read our article comments -- when they get nasty, its always from the same angle: Cracked needs to fire this columnist. This asshole needs to stop writing. Dont make any more videos. It always boils down to "Stop creating. This is different from what I would have made, and the attention youre getting is making me feel bad about myself."

Dont be that person. If you are that person, dont be that person any more. This is whats making people hate you. This is whats making you hate yourself.

What are you going to do with it? Hunt witches or kick off the Olympics?

So how about this: one year. The end of 2016, thats our deadline. Or a year from whenever you read this. While other people are telling you "Lets make a New Years resolution to lose 15 pounds this year!" Im going to say lets pledge to do fucking anything -- add any skill, any improvement to your human tool set, and get good enough at it to impress people. Dont ask me what -- hell, pick something at random if you dont know. Take a class in karate, or ballroom dancing, or pottery. Learn to bake. Build a birdhouse. Learn massage. Learn a programming language. Film a porno. Adopt a superhero persona and fight crime. Start a YouTube vlog. Write for Cracked.

But the key is, I dont want you to focus on something great that youre going to make happen to you ("Im going to find a girlfriend, Im going to make lots of money ..."). I want you to purely focus on giving yourself a skill that would make you ever so slightly more interesting and valuable to other people.

"Holy shit, by learning Spanish, I just gained the ability to speak to 400 million people I previously couldnt."

"I dont have the money to take a cooking class." Then fucking Google "how to cook." Theyve even filtered out the porn now, its easier than ever. Damn it, you have to kill those excuses. Or they will kill you.

If you want to make note of your project in the forum thread or the comments and check in this time next year, knock yourself out. Ill be curious to see if even one person actually does this, but if so well look back, not just on whether or not we actually followed through, but why. You have nothing to lose, and the world needs you. Heres a video of a corgi rolling down some stairs.

David Wong is the Executive Editor of http://Cracked.com and a New York Times best-selling author. You probably dont know that his long-awaited new novel is out right now atAmazon, Barnes & Noble, BAM!, IndieBound, iTunes, Powells, your local bookstore, or anywhere else books are sold!

For more life lessons you should learn right now, check out How The Karate Kid Ruined The Modern World and 5 Reasons Life Actually Does Get Better.

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