If the title isn’t self-explanatory enough, it’s quite simple. If you go around doing things that aren’t the smartest decisions, then don’t expect the outcomes to be favorable. This kind of touches on a topic from a previous post regarding how your attitude towards things can attract likewise outcomes for yourself. This is something that crosses my mind on a decently frequent basis mainly because I’ve been on the wrong side of this spectrum a few times recently, which is actually why I have decided to bring this up. But also, I feel like there are a lot of people who don’t take this into account and sit around playing victim wondering how something unfavorable could have happened to them without looking back at what they were doing in the lead up.
Most of the time, the “stupid games” you are playing are very easy to notice when you’re in the middle of them. For me, it’s sometimes a feeling that’s accompanied by a voice in my head telling me it’s a dumb idea and is really immature in nature. Another one is the fact that what you’re doing is universally known as being something stupid. For example, poking a bear, tormenting a wild animal, and most common, driving while drunk. By definition, a prize is something rewarded to someone for doing something of note or winning a competition. Most commonly a prize is seen as a good thing, like a Super Bowl Trophy, but trust me when I say there are a lot of little prizes in life that are not good and unwanted to say the least. Stupid prize you say? How about a DUI, a trip to jail, or a one night stay in the hospital! Now, those are definitely extreme cases of the topic, but I’m going to go into a little lighter region of it and talk about some things in the regard.
There’s a stupid game I find myself playing every once in a while that I can assure you has never ended in me coming out on top, and it’s something so trivial it’s almost maddening. I was having a text conversation with someone who I really wanted to continue speaking with, but the conversation was kind of spotty at the time, which in turn made me feel really anxious so I would repeatedly check my phone and would get let down if I got a notification that wasn’t from them (Which by the way is extremely stupid in itself, and you should work on not being thrown off by a lack of texting lol). So, my bright idea as to put my phone away and not check it for any reason until the day was over and I had nothing to do. Now, let me phone out that taking a break from your phone or social media can be a good thing to help you reset, BUT it is not when you are doing it for the wrong reason. I was doing it because I didn’t want to be let down when I check my phone to not see a notification from them. Now there were obvious hints that this was stupid. One, because I had feeling of guilt almost that made me sense that this was stupid. And two, because I had a voice in my head telling me it was. The voice in this case was just me talking to myself saying that this was going to get me nowhere and would not help me whatsoever. Basically saying that at the end of the day you’re either going to look at your phone and not see anything, or you’re going to see something you want to see but you’ll have missed out because you’re hours late and there’s nothing you can do now. For me, it was the second one. This person had asked me if I wanted to do something with them, but I didn’t see it until 7 hours later because I was being stupid. So I won a stupid prize, which was the regretful feeling of not being present and missing out on something I wanted to do with someone I wanted to do it with.
There are stupid prizes everywhere for you to win, but they can only be won if you do the stupid things to win them. What I’m trying to say with this piece is that you should take time to analyze what you’re doing. Ask yourself if this is in line with the other things you want to do, or if it possibly has negative implications on things you want in the future. As long as you’re conscious about what you do and take note of the possible outcomes of doing or not doing something, you can put yourself in a better position. Trust your gut and believe in your morals because you are a smart person and the best one to make decisions for yourself.
I hope this made some sort of sense to you. It’s a basic, almost comical idea that happens to have a lot of depth behind it.