So, no kidding there are assholes and you can arrange your life in ways that push away all others so only the assholes are left. There are self-help books and whole bunches of fans of “The Law of Attraction“. It’s old news, that you get what you give. If you put out spiritual dung and behave in ways that are dissonant, your life tends to be filled with events and people who are spiritual dung and dissonant. I hope that is obvious. If it isn’t, go on Amazon and start reading. I don’t have to be the one to explain it to you.
One thought that feels reasonable is to diagnose the problem as the assholes. If they would stop being assholes then we would be fine. But, and this is where codependents get into trouble, assholes are consistent. Relying on assholes to behave in desirous ways so that we can have the life we wish for is a recipe for disaster. By definition, assholes don’t behave in desirous ways. If they did, they wouldn’t be assholes, would they?
You hear this from addicts. If some sumbeach would behave as I want them to then I could stop using, stop being an addict. But, that sumbeach probably doesn’t and won’t behave so the misery will continue. I also hear this from yungins, that someone else is the cause of their misery so what has to happen is that the someone else has to change so that the yungin can be less miserable. It’s the same reasoning destined to fail. Remember this prayer? “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the strength to change the things I can’t change, and the wisdom to know the difference.” You are not changing assholes. It’s what they do. So, the task is to figure out what it means to accept assholes as something you cannot change.
To the “Law of Attraction” folks. This is true up to a point. God made this world. He is in charge. We do have an influence over the direction of our lives. We can make things better or worse for ourselves by the choices we make. But there are things we cannot change. There are aspects of our lives in the hands of God. He made us, we didn’t make Him. So, yes, you can improve things a bit but ultimately, we are powerless. Our incantations and prayers only go so far. God does answer prayer. Whether he answers it in ways we desire is another matter. This amuses me: the thought that one could name God an asshole because he chooses to either ignore our prayer or answer it in a way we dislike.
It’s age-old. The more modern model for it is in the 12 Steps. You admit your powerlessness, surrender to God, do the inventory to identify what you can change, do the changes, offer reconciliation where possible, then seek ways to serve others. Another age-old practice: treat others as you wish to be treated, love God, love your neighbor and your enemies, serve others through small things done with great love. Not my ideas but ideas I live by.
And . . . sorry, I don’t want the world where there are no assholes. Most if the innovation that has occurred through recorded history has come because someone decided to swim upstream when everybody else was swimming for the ocean. This site is a celebration of assholes. We are where the malcontents live. Jesus was one of us, a malcontent who defied the church of his day. He died a martyr unjustly crucified by the Romans. If it ended there we would have forgotten him by now. It has not ended there. IMHO, the world is better for his defiance. You may not be able to change the assholes in your life. You don’t have to. Once you change the way you treat them so they don’t get traction by being assholes you may find that they move on to other targets. It really is that simple.