1.  Dream about becoming a doctor or a lawyer, even though art is your true passion. Worse, become a doctor or lawyer, even though art is your true passion.

2.  Convince yourself that America is the greatest country in the world, and we are simply more intelligent than everyone else.  Now quick, tell me where the Red Sea is located.  (A 2006 study by National Geographic revealed that only 4 out of 10 Americans could identify Iraq on a map, and shockingly, one-fifth of Americans cannot locate their own country on a map.  My own personal favorite that I often hear?  “Central America?  Wait, where’s that?”)

3. Start looking down on Mexicans.  Tell everyone that the Mexicans are taking all of our jobs, in an effort to sound intelligent, even though you damn well know that you wouldn’t dream of picking cotton for 12 hours a day in the blazing heat, and get paid $3.84/hour.  (During the fiscal year 2001–2002,  77% of U.S. farm workers were born in Mexico, and earned an average of $8,000 per year.  Assuming a conservative estimate of $400 a month, you spend more than half that on your SUV alone.)  However, if this isn’t the case and your job does happen to be taken by someone who doesn’t read, write or speak the language, then you’re a moron.

“Illegal aliens have always been a problem in the United States.  Ask any Indian.”  ~Robert Orben

4. Think purely in terms of monetary value. Associate your self-worth with your salary.  Hate your job every minute of your life, but tell yourself that your paycheck is worth sacrificing your soul.  It’s fine, really.  That’s what vodka is for.

5. Plan on traveling after you retire. In 40 years from now.  When you’re old, decrepit & bitter from spending your life kissing someone else’s ass.  Put off living life as long as possible, and just exist now.  At least bermuda shorts will never go out of style.

6. Think about taking a dance class, but never do it.

7. Try as hard as you can to fit in. You are more comfortable with the idea of being accepted and being a robot, than being different and being living, breathing, THINKING human being who has the ability to form his/her own opinions…despite their relative popularity with the other bots.

8. Quote Dumb & Dumber, not intelligent people who have said worthwhile things.

9. Be afraid of going outside of your comfort zone. Do things the way you’ve always done them instead.  Change is scary.

10. Wonder what it’d be like to start your own business, but never do anything about it.

11. Incur $50,000 worth of student loan debt so you can get a degree that you were told you had to have in order to be someone. ($150,000 if you are following the doctor/lawyer path of bliss.)  Then sit at your cube from 9-5 and mope about how you expected more out of life.  (Hint:  If you want something more, go get something more.  Don’t ever expect it to just happen.)

12. Seek therapy because your life is out of control. Likely because you haven’t figured out yet that you have the capabilities to take control of it.

13. Get married because it’s the next step. Not because you really want to be married, or even that you like the idea of marriage.  But what else will you do?

“In America, through pressure of conformity, there is freedom of choice, but nothing to choose from.”  ~Peter Alexander Ustinov

14. Be boring, unimaginative and do safe things.

15. Go to church on Sundays even though you think that guy up at the altar is full of it.  Alternatively, hang on that guy’s every word, start actually believing the fairy tale (how did Noah remove the 12 tons of animal waste    produced in one day alone on that ark, anyway?), start preaching a set of ficticious, arbitrary rules for right and wrong . . . and then be a hypocrite and break them all!  After all, you can always go to confession.

16. Buy a bunch of meaningless junk–preferably with Bluetooth!–because you don’t own as much meaningless junk as everyone else.  You must stay current.

17. Do whatever your boss tells you because s/he is the boss.  Clearly that’s reason enough.  (Check out Steve Pavlina’s  fantastic article about why you should never get a job.)

18. Eat frozen dinners. There’s nothing suspicious about food that can remain on shelves for years without going bad.

19. When you gain 25 pounds, go on The Master Cleanse, Atkins or The South Beach Diet. Then complain when you don’t lose all of the weight in a week’s time.  Then quit.

20. Feel extremely guilty for having leisure time. As a matter of fact, avoid leisure time altogether and just work 14 hour days.  That way, you’ll feel really accomplished and productive.  So what if 4 of those hours were dedicated to Facebook?

“The fact is that Americans are not a thoughtful people; they are too busy to stop and question their values.”  ~William Ralph

21. Open a new credit card so you can afford to give everyone expensive, over-the-top Christmas gifts. The value of your friendship is inherently tied to the value of the gift, so you’d better make it good.  If you run out of ideas, refer back to number 14, and then go buy a Yankee candle.

22. Have complete disregard for others and talk really loud on your cell phone in public. Your conversation is more important than their peace.

23. Take the position that everyone should learn English.  Don’t stop to realize that English is actually NOT the official language of the United States, nor does one exist.

24. Think that everyone really gives a damn about your GPA.  (In the real world, I would argue that this topic of conversation won’t come up, um…ever.  Focus on learning as a means to make you a sharp, no bullshit, got-it-together kind of individual…not so you can score .2 higher on some arbitrarily assigned number that makes you feel good about yourself simply because society says that you should feel good about high numbers and bad about low numbers.  Remember:  It’s what you know, not what some number says you know.)

25. Take yourself way too seriously. Take life way too seriously.  If you mess up, the world might come to an end.  If you’re not perfect, CNN might put out a news story about it.  If you take a risk, you could feel like a real fool.  Thomas Edison made 1,000 unsuccessful attempts at inventing the lightbulb.  When interviewed, the reporter asked, “How did it feel to fail 1,000 times?”  He replied, “I didn’t fail.  The invention of the lightbulb just took 1,000 steps.”  Was Edison a fool for taking the risk that it wouldn’t ever pan out?  Or how about Walt Disney, who was once fired from a newspaper because he “lacked imagination and had no good ideas.” (See Emory University’s But They Did Not Give Up for more examples of risk leading to success.)

What do you think?  Agree?  Disagree?  Have anything to add to the list?  Feel free to join the discussion!

If you liked that jazz. . .check out some of these:

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