‘But not at the expense of our democracy and the well-being of the most vulnerable among us.’
We fought, damn hard. The hopium we poured into glasses and chilled in fridges waiting for the election results to be called on November 5th turned sour, oxidized by the truth at hand: a twice-impeached felon, outright misogynist was chosen over one of the country’s most qualified presidential candidates in modern history, who just so happens to be a women, to guide the free world.
Unlike 2016, this defeat feels different. We find ourselves in an uncanny valley of sorts, the mirror in front of us unsmudged and crystalline. This is who we are. There’s no denying it.
It’s not it is what it is. Rather it’s more insidious: It is what it has been all along. There are just bad, horrible, trite, vindictive, humans on this mortal coil. That’s a matter of fact.
So for the unequivocally kinder, more selfless, for those who still honor critical thinking, fuck it: Be wholeheartedly selfish these next four years.
Rest and take care of your body.
Mediate, read every book you want.
Remove the idea of “guilty pleasures” from your lexicons.
Fall in love, hard — over and over again.
Have a lot of (consenting) sex, as often as you’d like.
Call your friends, your family, those you love.
Cut off those who don’t brighten your life, who snuff out the fire inside.
Workout. Run. Row. Swim.
Eat dessert. Buy organic. Drink water. Brew tea.
Paint your apartment walls, hang artwork, and forget your deposit.
Embrace therapy, retail and otherwise.
Plant things, gorgeous things — find indefensible amounts of natural beauty.
Ground yourself, lick your wounds, stitch your soul.
Pracice gratitude, fiercely.
Clasp onto abundance.
Invite facets of joy and happiness and contentment into your life — the life of those you love; the life of those you car about, without any preconceived notions of selfishness.
Realize that mundanity is to be appreciated because recognizes the remarkable ordinariness of things during an otherwise irregular time.
The caveat to unfettered selflessness? Don’t ever lose perspective of semblances of privilege and notions of gratefulness. Because no matter how bleak or shitty things will get — and don’t get me wrong, things will grow dark and demoralizing; let’s not kid ourselves about such an oration, albeit one pontificated — we all lose in the absence of willpower.
Hope is a construct of dominion over fear. No personal or otherwise decision founded on fear has proven fruitful in the long run. Fear, too, is synonymous with scarcity, an idea that abundance is out of feasibility.
Fear cannot survive unapologetic amounts of love, self-care, internalized joy, outward optimism, and a drive to see our world better, built around coalitions skewed toward a shared future.
For that and those reasons alone, give yourself permission for a selfish four years. But not at the expense of our democracy and the well-being of the most vulnerable among us.
