Post by Coach on Jun 18, 2013 12:31:41 GMT -5
I wonder at what point in time this acronym became popular. It's incredibly stupid for a number of reasons I'll get to, but I'm just curious which half baked, washed up B-lister or reality star started twittering it first for the masses to suck it up with gaping eyes and lolling tongues. Whoever it was, I want to ensure that I never so much as read a news article that contains their name again. I want to boycott them so much that I'd actually cross the street to avoid them. I wouldn't do it conspicuously, if I ever saw them coming, I'd wait until I'd practically walked into their face, stop, turn, take a step backwards and cross the street without looking back.
If your "philosophy" on life is "YOLOOOOO" then I'd like to take five minutes to sit you down and smack you upside your proverbial head. Here are the reasons why!
1.) It's not your "philosophy". You don't mean it at all. It makes you look cool and edgy but when crunch time comes, you won't YOLO on and on. Case in point; you're driving down a very steep hill with sharp swerves in the road, maybe a cliffside. You realise your brakes have been cut. You are approaching the edge and you can't regain control of the vehicle. Do you:
A) Scream YOLOOO at the top of your lungs and hope somebody snaps it up to shove on Instagram.
B) Let out a blood-curdling shriek and shit your pants.
The answer is B, and if it isn't you're lying or there's something wrong with your brain. Millenia of evolution has ensured it will be.
2.) It's not a philosophy. A philosophy is a collection of beliefs or attitudes. YOLO isn't a collection of anything. It's an excuse to do stupid stuff and try and take no responsibility. Lack of responsibility is a 21st century norm that is actually indirectly responsible for most of the issues in society today but I won't get into that. The point is that once you've done something stupid, screaming YOLO makes it look like you intended to do it all along because that's how you roll, or something. On top of that it removes all responsibility from your actions because it's an easy get out clause for destructive and generally stupid behaviour. By acting like you don't care, you undermine the people around you who do care and attempt to improve your social standing by trying to look better than they do.
Like I say, this isn't a philosophy. Even if you are an idiot and like to do everything, literally everything without any fears about the ensuing consequences (you don't), this isn't a set of beliefs. If you are this way inclined (you're not) then you don't have any beliefs or values. Because beliefs and values inherently limit what we do and what we set out to do in life. If everybody tossed aside the idea of actions having consequences, society would degrade into a dystopic state so fast that nobody would even have time to scream "YOLOOOO". It might actually come as a small relief for that part alone.
3.) It breaks everything. Every action has consequences, and by not thinking through the consequences of your actions and just worrying about what you have right now, you're limiting your own progress and growth. By doing this you have nothing left but the option to eventually stagnate into madness and depression. You ever wonder why all these stupid celebrities are in rehab? YOLO! Think your stuff through before you do it, or it'll come back to bite you later on. Care about tomorrow because it'll make all of our lives better.
If you have no desire to think about your future, chances are you'll half-ass your job. Maybe you don't care about limiting your options and living stagnantly. Fine. If your wasting away had no effect on me whatsoever, I wouldn't care. If your drinking and driving into a tree offered no potential danger for me I'd wish you all the best. The gene pool would be a little tidier.
But here's the deal; it does affect me. If you do a half-assed job, chances are I'm going to have problems when it comes to using the stuff you built or developed. Chances are I'll walk in on the day you're goofing off and it'll make me late for my own appointments which I do care about. Chances are it'll hurt the overall productivity of the company which will in turn have macroscopic economic effects that will cause taxes to hike and force me to pay even more money to deal with the consequences of your terrible actions. Society winds up broken but YOLO so why does it even matter right?!
4.) It's selfish. If you say this and genuinely mean it (you don't), then you're the most selfish asshole. I've already explained why your yoloing around stupidly affects me negatively. It's a give and take situation. We could have a very simple system (one which has worked since the dawn of humanity): I do a good job and make your life more pleasant, you do a good job and make mine more pleasant. How about it? We both wind up better off and neither of us stagnate.
More interested in what happens tonight than the possibility to help out me, and billions of other people for the sake of very, very little additional input of your own? Then you're a selfish asshole. Simple as. Thus if you scream this and you're not being "ironic" then I have to conclude that you're a pretty selfish person.
5.) You only live once. No really, you actually only live once. I'm not going to get into a heavy religious debate about it, but unless you believe in reincarnation, you have no choice but to agree. If you believe in life after death then you must conclude that afterlife is not conventional living. Therefore you do only actually live once. If you believe in reincarnation then you must conclude that you, as an individual, are defined by your own thoughts and experiences. Maybe you believe that some kind of inner spirit is the actual "you" but the point is that to be reincarnated as a different entity would change the "you" so fundamentally to such a degree that it wouldn't logically be "you" anymore. Ergo, "you" only live once. Without getting into the science and the debunking of faiths, it's a global truth.
But wait, why am I saying that you shouldn't drive around drinking and doing everything on the spur of the moment with no worry about the results of your actions and also saying...YOLO?! Because the results of the actions you do is exactly the reason why you shouldn't behave like an idiot and only worry about say, the events of the next ten minutes.
Eventually you're going to die young and waste the opportunity to live if you really are living a hedonistic lifestyle with no holds barred. Maybe you don't care about living, and just want to have fun now! Well if you just paced yourself and thought a little more about it, you could still have a reasonable amount of enjoyment and live considerably longer. No there are no guarantees. You might wind up getting hit by a truck tomorrow. But you'd be less likely to get hit by a truck if the truck driver gave a shit about what he was doing. So if everybody simultaneously decided to start caring, the odds of your suffering an accidental death would decrease a ton.
Even so, what happens if you don't accidentally die in a week, a month, a year or even the entire duration of your life but you still only cared about "the moment"? Then you've probably wasted your life and lived a sub-par existence overall. That was your one and only shot to ever exist and you've gone and blown it completely. Well done. As a consolation prize, it'll all be over in a few minutes once you realise you're dying and you won't have to suffer with the knowledge that you're a complete and utter failure for very long.
Only living once is the reason why I don't YOLO and why you shouldn't. Because it would make my living once so much nicer. Don't be a dick.
So in summary, I'm not going to YOLO here today or ever because it's stupid. My "life" in this game and on Sausage Island is almost certainly at an end. Rather than drag on unnecessarily, I'll be presenting Ted with the option of throwing me under the bus to further his own game. I'd much rather he continued on and had a shot when he actually still cares about playing, because dragging somebody else down into the dust with me would hardly be fair.
Apologies for the hosts and PWs who were rooting for me. I can't give this game my all because circumstances just won't let me. I don't really see many options ahead of me that wouldn't require a considerable amount of work on my part and I have to weigh up how much of my limited time I want to spend pouring into this when I feel like I don't have much of a shot left anyway. I'd like to give you guys a show, truly, but hopefully I did that some already. Now comes the time where I have to start worrying about my own prospects and problems because things are getting out of control and I have a lot of work to do in real life to regain that.
I also find it hard to play with people who can't view this whole experience as just a game. Everybody is too into it and it feels like saying or acting out the wrong thing will be taken as a huge slight by somebody. I find it exhausting to deal with that. To me, it's a game. When it ends, it will have been a game. I have no resentment or ill feeling towards anybody for anything they've said or done with regards to me throughout the duration of it. I think in part it's just tiring to keep up with those who don't see it this way. I'm not interested in making small talk. That's not to say I couldn't be friends with any of the people playing, it's just that in the context of the game I can't take it as anything but playing.
Does this mean my phoenix premonitions weren't true? Far from it. I saw exactly what was going to come. The phoenix will be rising out of the ashes of Sausage Island when the eruptions are done. You'll just have to wait and see on that one, but if you're genuinely interested then watch this space and I'll give you another show.
To all those who supported my endeavors and enjoyed what I put here, thanks a ton. I hope you enjoyed watching. To all those who didn't, I offer you my own alternative to YOLO, an actual belief that allows me to enjoy life without the needless stupid.
Have fun
If your "philosophy" on life is "YOLOOOOO" then I'd like to take five minutes to sit you down and smack you upside your proverbial head. Here are the reasons why!
1.) It's not your "philosophy". You don't mean it at all. It makes you look cool and edgy but when crunch time comes, you won't YOLO on and on. Case in point; you're driving down a very steep hill with sharp swerves in the road, maybe a cliffside. You realise your brakes have been cut. You are approaching the edge and you can't regain control of the vehicle. Do you:
A) Scream YOLOOO at the top of your lungs and hope somebody snaps it up to shove on Instagram.
B) Let out a blood-curdling shriek and shit your pants.
The answer is B, and if it isn't you're lying or there's something wrong with your brain. Millenia of evolution has ensured it will be.
2.) It's not a philosophy. A philosophy is a collection of beliefs or attitudes. YOLO isn't a collection of anything. It's an excuse to do stupid stuff and try and take no responsibility. Lack of responsibility is a 21st century norm that is actually indirectly responsible for most of the issues in society today but I won't get into that. The point is that once you've done something stupid, screaming YOLO makes it look like you intended to do it all along because that's how you roll, or something. On top of that it removes all responsibility from your actions because it's an easy get out clause for destructive and generally stupid behaviour. By acting like you don't care, you undermine the people around you who do care and attempt to improve your social standing by trying to look better than they do.
Like I say, this isn't a philosophy. Even if you are an idiot and like to do everything, literally everything without any fears about the ensuing consequences (you don't), this isn't a set of beliefs. If you are this way inclined (you're not) then you don't have any beliefs or values. Because beliefs and values inherently limit what we do and what we set out to do in life. If everybody tossed aside the idea of actions having consequences, society would degrade into a dystopic state so fast that nobody would even have time to scream "YOLOOOO". It might actually come as a small relief for that part alone.
3.) It breaks everything. Every action has consequences, and by not thinking through the consequences of your actions and just worrying about what you have right now, you're limiting your own progress and growth. By doing this you have nothing left but the option to eventually stagnate into madness and depression. You ever wonder why all these stupid celebrities are in rehab? YOLO! Think your stuff through before you do it, or it'll come back to bite you later on. Care about tomorrow because it'll make all of our lives better.
If you have no desire to think about your future, chances are you'll half-ass your job. Maybe you don't care about limiting your options and living stagnantly. Fine. If your wasting away had no effect on me whatsoever, I wouldn't care. If your drinking and driving into a tree offered no potential danger for me I'd wish you all the best. The gene pool would be a little tidier.
But here's the deal; it does affect me. If you do a half-assed job, chances are I'm going to have problems when it comes to using the stuff you built or developed. Chances are I'll walk in on the day you're goofing off and it'll make me late for my own appointments which I do care about. Chances are it'll hurt the overall productivity of the company which will in turn have macroscopic economic effects that will cause taxes to hike and force me to pay even more money to deal with the consequences of your terrible actions. Society winds up broken but YOLO so why does it even matter right?!
4.) It's selfish. If you say this and genuinely mean it (you don't), then you're the most selfish asshole. I've already explained why your yoloing around stupidly affects me negatively. It's a give and take situation. We could have a very simple system (one which has worked since the dawn of humanity): I do a good job and make your life more pleasant, you do a good job and make mine more pleasant. How about it? We both wind up better off and neither of us stagnate.
More interested in what happens tonight than the possibility to help out me, and billions of other people for the sake of very, very little additional input of your own? Then you're a selfish asshole. Simple as. Thus if you scream this and you're not being "ironic" then I have to conclude that you're a pretty selfish person.
5.) You only live once. No really, you actually only live once. I'm not going to get into a heavy religious debate about it, but unless you believe in reincarnation, you have no choice but to agree. If you believe in life after death then you must conclude that afterlife is not conventional living. Therefore you do only actually live once. If you believe in reincarnation then you must conclude that you, as an individual, are defined by your own thoughts and experiences. Maybe you believe that some kind of inner spirit is the actual "you" but the point is that to be reincarnated as a different entity would change the "you" so fundamentally to such a degree that it wouldn't logically be "you" anymore. Ergo, "you" only live once. Without getting into the science and the debunking of faiths, it's a global truth.
But wait, why am I saying that you shouldn't drive around drinking and doing everything on the spur of the moment with no worry about the results of your actions and also saying...YOLO?! Because the results of the actions you do is exactly the reason why you shouldn't behave like an idiot and only worry about say, the events of the next ten minutes.
Eventually you're going to die young and waste the opportunity to live if you really are living a hedonistic lifestyle with no holds barred. Maybe you don't care about living, and just want to have fun now! Well if you just paced yourself and thought a little more about it, you could still have a reasonable amount of enjoyment and live considerably longer. No there are no guarantees. You might wind up getting hit by a truck tomorrow. But you'd be less likely to get hit by a truck if the truck driver gave a shit about what he was doing. So if everybody simultaneously decided to start caring, the odds of your suffering an accidental death would decrease a ton.
Even so, what happens if you don't accidentally die in a week, a month, a year or even the entire duration of your life but you still only cared about "the moment"? Then you've probably wasted your life and lived a sub-par existence overall. That was your one and only shot to ever exist and you've gone and blown it completely. Well done. As a consolation prize, it'll all be over in a few minutes once you realise you're dying and you won't have to suffer with the knowledge that you're a complete and utter failure for very long.
Only living once is the reason why I don't YOLO and why you shouldn't. Because it would make my living once so much nicer. Don't be a dick.
So in summary, I'm not going to YOLO here today or ever because it's stupid. My "life" in this game and on Sausage Island is almost certainly at an end. Rather than drag on unnecessarily, I'll be presenting Ted with the option of throwing me under the bus to further his own game. I'd much rather he continued on and had a shot when he actually still cares about playing, because dragging somebody else down into the dust with me would hardly be fair.
Apologies for the hosts and PWs who were rooting for me. I can't give this game my all because circumstances just won't let me. I don't really see many options ahead of me that wouldn't require a considerable amount of work on my part and I have to weigh up how much of my limited time I want to spend pouring into this when I feel like I don't have much of a shot left anyway. I'd like to give you guys a show, truly, but hopefully I did that some already. Now comes the time where I have to start worrying about my own prospects and problems because things are getting out of control and I have a lot of work to do in real life to regain that.
I also find it hard to play with people who can't view this whole experience as just a game. Everybody is too into it and it feels like saying or acting out the wrong thing will be taken as a huge slight by somebody. I find it exhausting to deal with that. To me, it's a game. When it ends, it will have been a game. I have no resentment or ill feeling towards anybody for anything they've said or done with regards to me throughout the duration of it. I think in part it's just tiring to keep up with those who don't see it this way. I'm not interested in making small talk. That's not to say I couldn't be friends with any of the people playing, it's just that in the context of the game I can't take it as anything but playing.
Does this mean my phoenix premonitions weren't true? Far from it. I saw exactly what was going to come. The phoenix will be rising out of the ashes of Sausage Island when the eruptions are done. You'll just have to wait and see on that one, but if you're genuinely interested then watch this space and I'll give you another show.
To all those who supported my endeavors and enjoyed what I put here, thanks a ton. I hope you enjoyed watching. To all those who didn't, I offer you my own alternative to YOLO, an actual belief that allows me to enjoy life without the needless stupid.
Have fun
