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Are we having fun yet?
Be enthusiastic about not starving to death.
How are you not starving in this economy?
With enthusiasm.
What kind of freaking sociopath would go on a job interview for fun?
If I was independently wealthy and didn’t need a job, I still wouldn’t go to a job interview for fun.
Not with that attitude! /s
A Circus clown?
Uhm, I actually did that just recently. Earlier this year my current employer decided to close my department until end of year so I had to start looking for a new job but without a very strict deadline. I applied for a job but didn’t think I’d be invited for an interview. I DID get invited, went to the interview with the attitude “Ah, let’s see, I don’t think, they’ll hire me, but it is a fun learning experience”. They didn’t hire me but gave me the feedback that I was a good candidate overall but it showed that I wasn’t prepared at all and that I should apply later this year because they would open more positions. They did open more positions, I applied again, did a Hospitation, prepared properly and actually got the job in the end.
Companies often do job interviews “for fun”, since they already have a candidate and you have no chance from the beginning.
One time, in the days before covid, I had an audition that I had to drive 4 hours to get to. I was scheduled at the end of the day, and I could tell that they had already made up their mind, and that they were just using this particular audition to have fun and fuck with me.
All I could do was make sure they didn’t have fun. Long ass drive home, though
I know a lot of people in the comments don’t like this. And they’re perfectly valid. One solution doesn’t work for everyone and it misses a lot of nuance.
That being said, I actually did something like this for my social anxiety, which was damn near debilitating. I had to constantly remind myself that none of what I’m doing is risky or dangerous. Im just gonna roll with the punches. And if I do something that I might cringe about later, fuck it. Do i really care about what strangers think? And if the people I do know are of any value, they won’t chastize me for being a bit odd. So just own it.
This took years to get through. I basically brute forced myself through the social interactions until the anxiety was nowhere near as strong. I still have it, but my job forces me to talk to new people all the time. It got manageable. Maybe something like that could work for someone else.
This is not medical advice, and I strongly suggest you talk with a therapist if you have these issues. I was just too poor to do anything else about it.
People get really upset when suggestions on mental health aren’t immediate solutions.
This is presented as an immediate solution.
People also get upset when things are presented as obvious or universal solutions
What you’re describing sounds like CBT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy) which is one of the best-known evidence-based methods for dealing with mental health problems.
And yeah as someone else who it worked for, it is really easy to treat it as “well thanks I’m cured” until you put in the long effort
CBT always seemed to me like the opposite of easy. It looks like a lot of hard work, and it is.
I will second this. After college I realized I needed to expand my social circle. I agonized for weeks about even asking to join a few local Meetup groups. Eventually I did, and I convinced myself to go to a few events. I started framing social outings as exercise. It wasn’t always fun, but I usually felt good about making myself go.
I still get anxious about social stuff. I still loath job interviews. I don’t like packed bars or events with thousands of people, but I can handle them better now. I can now give myself permission to fuck up a bit.
"Was that social encounter my best work? No.
Was I actually a jerk and everyone hates me now? Also no.
Cool then. A ‘C+’ is still passing!"
“What’s the worse that can happen (socially)?” is now a helpful question. “What if strangers think I’m weird?” IDK, then they do. That’s their problem. And if they remain strangers then I probably won’t need to deal with them again. If they think I’m weird and they still invite me back then at least my weirdness was within acceptable limits. And that’s how I met my wife :)
This is how I made my job as a doctor fun again.
Weirdly enough I thought about doing this at some point.
Because my anxiety has a limit, I already did shock therapy by playing gigs in front of like 150 people or busking.
But just thinking of these things as a fun experiment is maybe a good way to frame it.
That’s exposure therapy, shock therapy is…much more literal.
Actually, that’s flooding. Flooding is a specific kind of exposure therapy. Exposure therapy is a more general term that includes both flooding and gradual exposure.
Do it for the Vine.
This is free advice from a medium expensive counselor who mostly works on insurance reimbursement:
Most modern pop psychology is finding a way to repackage “try not to think about it” into more palatable terms because a great deal of “mental illness” is directly attributable to systemic issues that have no end in sight
I think the advice is true for things you can not realistically change. But finding out if you can’t change it or why something is bothering you is key here.
For me existential dread was a sign of my body to take the next step and start a family.
Yeah, so much of that fringe pseudosciency pop psychology self-help stuff says shit like “don’t be a victim” and that just has “erasure of systemic violence” written all over it.
It’s so concerning how many people seem to be eating that shit up though. I think it has a lot to do with the large-scale drop-off of empathy we’re seeing. “Toxic positivity” does that.
This shit is being pushed by the marketing industry working for profit, not clinical researchers trying to improve patient outcomes. It drives me insane to see it catching on…
because a great deal of “mental illness” is directly attributable to systemic issues that have no end in sight
But absolutely nothing in the screenshot is attributable to systemic issues that have no end in sight 🤔 Anxiety around the things he listed can literally be cured through just doing them, aka exposure
A job interview that determines if you will have food this week is a systemic issue
I’m not a therapist but I’ve certainly visted more than my share.
“try not to think about it” is pretty much the antithesis of modern therapy.
directly attributable to systemic issues that have no end in sight
this part is true.
Broadly there are several potential solutions:
Firstly, changing the way that we think about events. If my company is insolvent would that mean I’m a bad business person or would it mean the economy is a mess. This is Cognitive Behavioral Therapy - changing the behavior of our thought processes.
Secondly, accepting that things might go wrong and not being paralysed by that fear. My company might become insolvent, it wouldn’t be the end of the world if it did, I’m going to take action to mitigate that problem. This is Acceptance Commitment Therapy - accepting the risk of bad things and committing to some kind of action.
Thirdly, living in the moment, observing thoughts both positive and negative coming and going. This is mindfulness.
In summary, anxiety or worry is a healthy and normal part of human existence. We’re hard wired to avoid threats and we do that by foreseeing risks and planning around them. Trying not to worry is how the healthy and normal experience becomes debilitating.
I’m sure a real therapist will be along any moment to tell me all about how wrong my summary is. I’m ok with that.
systemic issues that have no end in sight
Some would disagree, just ask scientists how long the current trajectory can remain.
It’s easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.
That was probably true about the divine right of kings, hundreds of years ago. Things change
It changed because private citizens were able to join together and accumulate enough wealth to match the private treasuries of a local monarch and fund private armies to act as revolutionary elements that threatened their local monarch with overwhelmingly disproportionate strength and forced them to capitulate.
Yes, because science can be used to show measurable ways the world is actively ending right now.
It’s more that capitalism is causing “the end of the world”. Between now and the total deaths of all life on earth, I remain hopeful that there will be some positive systematic change before it gets too far.
The US is normal is now as old as ((the average lifespan of a civilization))
We can hope, and make our moves for something better
My moneys on us getting revenge during the death rattle.
“Doc, I feel like I’m always being watched and the world is hurdling towards ruin”
1976: you’re paranoid and crazy
2026: sometimes being well-informed can be mentally taxing and you need to take a break
I think the post is great advice not communicated clearly.
Don’t try making yourself believe important things are unimportant, practice.
Apply for a job you don’t want or need. Get documents when you’re already qualified for a fast track and could skip at any time. Do the long procedure just to see if it was possible had the other ways not worked out.
Have something changed that really doesn’t matter.This is calling for bureaucracy training.
thanks, i’m cured.
Those things are not usually fun, but the gist is not taking them seriously.
“Why so serious?” The best free advice from the Joker.
I somewhat agree… but struggling with WHO updates and submits their resume for “fun”?? Like, just getting the “setup” for those job applications is ACTUAL work, in and of itself… For half those applications, you need to deal with creating an “application portal” account which stops me before I get anywhere… 😅 Why even submit the resume, at that point? What am I missing here…? People like the entire PROCESS and/or think it’s “fun”??? Is it “really” possibly to find any aspect of the process… “fun”? I suppose I’d agree if misunderstanding it?
Yeah I agree. Maybe they mean to kind of act like the whole process is silly? Like pretend you’re a gnome who is doing a vacation in a human life just to see what it’s like and make fun of it?
“Oh hahah hehee I need to create an account. Human society is so whimsical!”
It’s borderline offensive. People go to therapists because these problems are intractable. If there was some quick brainhack like that which worked, then nobody would have anxiety.
I don’t think it’s that bad personally.
I have fairly intense anxiety and recently started seeing a therapist (for it and other issues), but I honestly think the OP gives good advice.
I am not saying it’s a cure, nor am I trying to trivialise the impact anxiety can have on a person, but it’s one I would keep in my ‘toolbox’ so to speak, and remind myself of every so often.
Many of my earlier fears in life really did not warrant as much stress as they took on my body, and I kind of still let that happen.
Seems like abbreviated cognitive behavioral therapy .
CBT is a practice, though. You have to work at it. You don’t just decide to think different. Bad cognitive habits, like any other bad habit, take a lot of time and effort to work through.
I would assume the OP meant it as something to work towards, not a day 1 cure. But I do see how it reads as “just don’t be anxious duh”
I am in rowing classes. Today the couch told me “you’re here for fun and you are thinking too hard, just row and enjoy your self.”
My form got better and I enjoyed myself
How much acid do they give you at rowing school that the sofa starts giving you advice?
More importantly, where do I sign up?
just be happy
wowthanksimcured lol
I’m supporting my family for fun!
Is this supposed to be a joke about shitty overpriced psychologists? It’s hard for me to tell. It’s kinda the anxiety equivalent of telling someone with depression to just not be sad, which I guess is funny, a little.
I’m 50/50 on whether this person is being an ignorant ass or trying to make a joke.
The first half gives me that impression, but then explaining why a that obvious thing is relevant to state makes me believe it’s just the latter and the person doesn’t realize it doesn’t come off as actual advice.
