Wanzology

  Hello, everybody. And I hope you're doing well. Welcome to another episode of WANZOLOGY. I am your host, The Wanz, and we are still continuing the ongoing saga. That is hashtag the book of Wanz. Hashtag the book of Wanz is a collection of tweets and parables and thangs, um, I put together in 2015 and you can find it on Amazon. Just search for hashtag the book of Wanz, all one word. Thank you.

Like I said, I hope you're doing well today. We're looking at this next chapter called, “Until you make peace with your insides. You'll never be satisfied with your outsides.”

Human nature has a nasty habit of never being satisfied. We humans always want more of the things we want. Very often we have no idea what ‘enough’ is. Some of us take and take, get and get, even give and give with no real reasoning or endpoint. Now, add in the fact that we compare ourselves to other humans in one way or another and self-misperception becomes common.

“If only I were as skinny as her, he'd like me.” “If I'd been born into a rich family, like he was, I wouldn't have the problems I do.” “If I were as strong as they are, I would feel like this.” “If I had her hair, I'd be…” fill in the blank. We do it constantly. We compare ourselves and can't help it, nor can we stop it. Man has always been in competition with others. Millions of years ago, we competed against other animals in nature. Now, we compete against each other and ourselves. Each of us develops an idea of what slash who we'd like to be and we try to become that person. So what happens if the person you'd like to become is based on what you don't have? Hmmm… There are those who diet and exercise yet never lose weight or get thin. Others who work out and diet so much, they're too thin. Some change the color of their hair, their skin, even their sex because they believe it will make them a better person. I don't fault people for having their own beliefs. I question why they have some of these beliefs. I try not to judge them for those beliefs, but I always question why they have them. Remember the mind is a terrible thing. And it will give us false information. Then have us act simply with the goal of feeling better in mind.

I used to be a person who believed he was never good enough. Sometimes I still think that way.

I believe I don't do music very well, not very good looking. I'm fat, not very smart, and I'll never be happy. I had told myself some of these things for years before I started to ask, “why do I feel this way?” I found that I was looking at what others had, and if I didn't have it, I thought I was less than they were. Granted, no way someone living in poverty can't compare themselves to a middle class or upper-class person. Comparing is in our nature as humans. I don't believe enough of us use our insides well enough. For most of us, what we look like on the outside is what we're gonna look like. So, get over it. My question is, do we do enough inside our brain to make that outside person the best they can be? I don't think so.

We are always at war with ourselves. We think others see that person whom we don't like. We tend to focus on the negatives we see in ourselves. Instead of building what we have. Remember, not all of us have all our extremities or have all five senses. Some of us are born with defects, mental or physical. Most of us are born normal, but we're unhappy on some level or for some reason. Honesty and courage are the catalysts that helped me identify what bad things I was telling myself. Then, help me change that inner voice. Being bluntly honest with yourself, then having the courage to change what you can, a little bit at a time, does wonders for you. Life is an inside job. Make sure you know what's going on inside of you.

Man, I seem to remember this coming about in Europe the first time standing outside talking to a bunch of kids, uh, before a show. Maybe it was in Sweden. I forget… What I do know is that, you know, it was a long day, long day. And we talked a lot about how we see ourselves and everybody, you know, gets up in the morning and looks in the mirror and sees themselves. But do they actually ‘see’ themselves? I don’t know. What I do know is that I was curious as you know, why these kids would put piercings in their nose and their cheek and, and, and eyebrow and all this other stuff. And the popular answer was, “well, I don't know. I, I just wanted to”, and I kept pressing. Well, why, why, why, why do you want, why did you want to? “I don't know. I saw it and I really liked it. So I thought, I saw it on someone else and I really liked it. So I, I thought I'd do it.” Aha!! You saw it on someone else. I see, said the blind man. Ha, ha, ha. Hmm. So I had people close their eyes and imagine what they look like in their head. Just your face. “Now, do you like it? Do you like your face? What would you change?” And these, you know, like three of them have their eyes closed and one at a time. “What would you change?” “Uh, I changed my lips.” And another one was “I’d changed my nose”, and the and one didn't answer, she was very quiet. Well, then I asked, “well, why would you change your nose?” And he said, “I just think it's long and pointy.” And I said, “compared to who? “Compared to what?” “I don't know.”

So this other person wants to change their lips? What? “What do you mean you wanna change your lips?” “Well, they're too thin.” “What does that, why would, why would you need them thicker or bigger?” “Well, I just, I would, I would just hope they would be bigger, so, so they would just so they wouldn't be so thin.” “I said, look at my lips, you know, I got teased incessantly about having mambo lips, big African lips. I've been teased for having the flat African wide nose. I've been teased just for being!” I hated it! I wanted to be somebody else until I found out that I couldn't be somebody else.

I asked these kids, “what if, what if, even if you change, what then? What if somebody made fun of you because of the changes you made, then what are you going to do?” Silence. Nothing but silence. “So, you go to all that work to change stuff. I mean, look at Michael Jackson. Look at him. Look at how he looked when he was 10, as opposed to 30. Completely different cat. He looks so different. I don't know very many people who think he improved his look. Still Michael Jackson, he just looked different. So, what happens when that applies to you?” Kids are looking at me like I'm insane. “Why would you say such a thing?” I said, “because you know who Michael Jackson is. You can go back and see pictures of who Michael Jackson was and what he looks like later. Do you think he looks better?”

Silence.

I kept pressing ‘em by the time we got done analyzing the changes of Michael Jackson's face and all the work he's had done, they really didn't want to have those changes made on themselves, which is when I sprung the whole, “Well, why don't you use what you've got and make that better?” Then I started pointing out, you know, “look at this guy's face, and his nose. Look at this girl's lips, and how they're different from yours? So that means you guys have the same equipment, but they both look different. Uh huh. So, you think it'd be better if you had somebody else's equipment? Or do you think they would feel better if they had yours?”

Huh. Well then that changed everything. That changed everything for them. And, you know, I have to admit, I am guilty as the day is long of doing exactly the same thing. Rarely have I been satisfied with how I sing, what I look like, how I talk. Body image is kind of a thing for me. I've got a ‘dad bod’, which makes sense because I'm a dad.

But still, I mean, I could have a cool ‘dad bod’. But no, I worked for years behind a desk, which made me have a, what I call a desk baby and pregnant with a little, a little basketball, my belly button nails. Yeah, I’ve tried exercising, doing more sit ups and crunches day in and day out and nothing ever changed. So, I figured I was stuck with it. What am I going to do? And then I started thinking, you know, “what if somebody thinks less of me because I'm a pudge ball, I’m overweight, or I don't sing with a high voice or don't dance like DeRulo or Usher. I don't rap like Biggie or I don't sing like Usher or whoever?” I am who I am. You are who you are. I had to come to this conclusion sooner or later, but this is what I got. I could go out and get other things, but this is what I got.

I have a nephew who told me once, “start from wherever you are, use what you've got and do the best that you can.” I'll say that again. “Start from wherever you are. Not where you'd like to be. Use what you've already got, not what you wish you had, and do the best that you can.” Once you've kind of internalized, I mean I'd write those down if I were you, but I'm not, but once you internalize those things, put them on repeat in your head. What happened to me was I changed my perspective. I realized that I had more than some, less than others. I realized where I was starting, there were other people there, but there were some people who were trying to get to where I was, and there were those who were way, way far ahead of me, but it's that last one, “do the best that you can.”, that's the key. No matter what you're doing, can you do it to the best of your ability every single time? And it doesn't matter if you're putting on a shirt or making eggs or driving or helping someone cross the street or listening to someone who's crying. If you do the best that you can in those situations for somebody else, do you really think it's going to matter whether you've got more or less than they do? I don't think so.

Let's flip it. So, when somebody helps you, how does that make you feel if it makes you feel good? Why wouldn't you try to get that feeling helping someone else? Why wouldn't, why wouldn't you want the other person to feel what you felt when somebody helped you? Hmm. It's hard to imagine, but I betcha, I betcha. It's actually pretty easy for you to go back through, I don't know, six months and you can remember somebody who helped you do something, whether it was carry a book or, complete a task or I don't know, helped you pick out clothes or helped you decide where you wanted to eat or what you wanted to eat something. How did it feel? Bet it felt okay. I really think that helping someone to feel good is a thing that any of us can do. We just have to start from wherever we are, use what we've got, and do the best that we can. And in the end, pretty much guarantee you, the outcome's not going to be horrible. Not at all. But you can't transmit something you haven't got.
So, until you make peace with your insides, you'll never be satisfied with your outsides.

You've got to be content with what you got. You got to rock it because from one perspective, nobody else has what you have. You're the only one. Nobody looks exactly like you do. There are similarities. Sure. But then again, all humans have two eyes and nose in the middle of their face and two ears on the side, they all look, generally the same but you, you look different, not tremendously different, but different. Even if you have a twin, there’s a way to tell you both apart. You're not exactly the same, are you? And it is in that realm where you have the opening to “start from wherever you are, use what you've got, and do the very best that you can.”, because I betcha when you do those three things, when it has to do with figuring out what's going on inside, whether it be inside of your body or inside of your head or inside of your heart, when you figure out what's going on, nobody's going to be able to touch you. You take ownership of all those things and realize nobody else has them. What then? What do you do? Answer? Any damn thing you want. Insides. Take care of those first and the outside will take care of itself. But man, all the heavy lifting happens between the ears. Most dangerous place on the planet is right in between your ears. And what you tell yourself matters. So, the next time you're feeling sort of some kind of way, take it apart. Why do I feel like that? When did I feel like that? What was I doing when I started feeling like that? Did I look at something or somebody or something? Because if you got yourself mentally into that mess, you can get yourself out. You just have to change course. You have the power and the privilege to do that. So, I would happily support you going and doing that, okay?

I know it sounds simple, but that’s because it is. If and only if you try, it’s not going to happen on its own. Life is not happening to you. You're, you're doing life, whatever way you choose, definitely taking care of the inside first. That's the best way. I've tried a lot of other ways. I always seem to come back to this one because no way I can stop thinking, maybe you're different. What I tell myself, sometimes I wouldn't even tell my worst enemy. And when I catch myself, I apologize to myself and I start telling myself things that I know other people can't do. Just so I can be more me and want to be them less.

Try it. Try to be more you so that you can be them less. Sounds good? Sounds good to me too. I'm gonna let you go. So, as the song says…