Stop Being A Bitch About It

Part of a weekly look into the adventures of Lisa Chin

I like to think “Stop Being a Bitch About It” was Nike’s original concept, right before they decided on the more sanitized version, Just Do It. They probably figured they could sell more t-shirts if they didn’t curse at you.

Luckily I have no interest in selling shirts. All I want to do is spread that same sentiment. If you want to accomplish something, don’t think much about the how, don’t think about why it sucks, just stop thinking about it.

Ask yourself a simple question: “Can I Do This?”

If the answer is yes, then stop being a bitch about it and just get it done. Sounds good right? Especially when you phrase it with the proper oomph.

I was born and bred in Brooklyn where the use of curses are like delicious cayenne over your conversational meat. By repeating this mantra in this article, I want you to know that I am completely not judging you. If you like how things are, or you’re not ready for change, that’s fine. This is merely me sharing how I motivate myself to do the things I especially don’t want to do, but have to. There are a lot of worthy goals out there that I would like to reach, and I could probably start on some… if I’d only stop being such a bitch about it.

The problem with getting started on lofty ambitions is all of your incredibly legitimate, iron-clad, bona fide reasons you don’t do most things. I am not saying that your excuses – ahem! – rationale lacks validity. Within the confines of your normal routine, I’m sure most of them can be considered justifiable at the time. The problem is that if you want to start something that you don’t normally do, you have to change what you consider to be normal.

Most worthy habits require a significant amount of discomfort. 

It’s the difference between floating down a river in a tube with a beer in your hand and looking up at Mt. Everest with a blister on your toe. In order to get climbing, you have to take a step in the right direction. Then another step. Eventually, you have to make your agony habitual until you become frostbitten and no longer know you have a foot to feel pain with. Sure, it may seem insurmountable at the moment, but you should know the future version of yourself is kicking ass and belittling all of the things you can’t handle right now.

Just think about how many past versions of yourself you’d like to shake for not recognizing the ease at which you had it compared to all the crap you put up with now. The present version of yourself wants you to think about that one.

Still not convinced? If you want proof that you don’t have real problems, I recommend watching the documentary on Jonny Kennedy, The Boy Whose Skin Fell Off. I assure you that as bad as the title sounds, it pays only a small homage to the amount of suffering this poor man endures. I was only able to view a few minutes of it hitting the skip button furiously before needing to return to my safe and false reality where this condition doesn’t exist.  Thank you universe for the problems that I have.

So you’re now inspired to get started. The first step to climbing that mountain is identifying what it is you want to do. Then you have to figure out how to stop being a bitch about not doing it. It’s simple.

Let’s run through a few examples.

You want to lose weight.  Stop being a bitch about: 

• Not eating that fourth slice of pizza… that you ordered with sausage and a calzone just because you saw it.
• Thinking that the cost of the gym is unreasonably high when you just put down $500 on a pair of sunglasses you only marginally like.
• Not using the stairs instead of the escalator even though there’s a line of fifty angry people in a rush trying to crowd onto it in some type of unsystematic fashion.
• Not going outside to jog or get to the gym because it’s cold, getting colder or kind of early.
• Forgetting how much you could save if you don’t buy that bag of double-stuffed Oreo cookies on sale at two for the price of one.  Two for the price of one!

You want to be a better fellow human.  Stop being a bitch about:

• Going the extra five car lengths to put your shopping cart in the proper return area. The guy who’s below minimum-wage job it is to return them to the store thanks you.
• Waiting the extra 1.5 seconds it takes to hold the door open for the next person behind you, even though the person in front of you was obviously a bitch.
• Getting to know the guy who makes your coffee every day, because you see him more often than any of your closest family members and should at least get to the point where you know his first name. He sees you more than he sees his beloved mother and is wondering why you don’t want to make eye contact.

You want to be a better fellow earthling.  Stop being a bitch about:

• Holding your personal debris until you find a garbage can, instead of pretending to scratch your leg and drop it where it will somehow find it’s way to the ocean and choke a seagull out.
• Not bothering to swing your arm slightly farther to properly recycle your garbage. That’s okay, there’s always mars if we run out of room, oh and the oceans too… they’re like large toilets or something.
• Having to eat that rare, endangered, or tortured animal because at the moment, you want it slightly more than that other delicious thing you could harmlessly order.

I’m not saying I do the right thing every time. Everything is always an effort even though it does become more manageable over time. The more things I try not to be a bitch about, the more confident I become on taking on larger goals.

I hope the next time you’re struggling with something, a small hostile voice comes out nowhere urging you to change something for the better.

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Lisa Chin is a Senior Interactive Director at SNAP Interactive and the newest columnist for Wika Magazine. You can check out Lisa’s online portfolio here.