Disclaimer: Sarcasm
Ever felt like screaming, “Why am I so unlucky?”. Do you feel like an unlucky person struck with bad luck?
What if you can recreate this feeling? That it is not fate but your choices and thought processes that can make you an unlucky person? What if there is a way to make yourself shout, “Why am I so unlucky?”
Here are five ways to become an unlucky person and ruin the rest of your life.
1. Do not listen to yourself
Go to school, study, play and do your homework. When choosing a field for higher studies listen to relatives or society who barely know what they are promoting. Or seek a lucrative or popular branch of study, and begin your journey. Never try to find out what you want or seek advice from trusted sources. Even if you reach the truth, cave to external pressure and follow the path of least resistance — the way agreed by the majority. Never question. Never think. Keep your head down and do what you are asked to do.
Seek a romantic relationship but never ask yourself if you want it in this period of your life or if there other priorities that need your attention more. Even if the former is true, never know yourself, find what you need and your unique patterns of behaviours that you might need help with or want to be supplemented with from your partner. Randomly seek out a person based on broad traits while magically expecting them to be what you need.
Chase a career based on widely accepted norms. Do it so that it finally gives society’s, parents’ and relatives’ approval. Because that is the secret of happiness, right? Never try to find your priority. Is it work-life balance? Peace? Challenge? A deep sense of purpose? To make a difference in the world? You might also want to be rich, famous, have a high reputation or anything widely accepted by society. But never analyse if your desires are your own or that of your parents and societal construct put upon you that you falsely believe to be your own. Keep going and create a facade of a perfect life envied by others while you secretly suffer every day.
Begin a family. As everyone else is doing it, you are supposed to do it. Never contemplate if you want it. Give in to the pressure of your family and society. Maybe you want a big family or a small one. Maybe, you want a family with no kids. But you will seek answers from everyone but yourself and your partner.
Maybe you are in the wrong career. Or you do not feel connected to your partner. Maybe you never wanted kids. Or you rarely do what you have wanted to do all this while. Maybe, you think you did everything you wanted but still, feel empty.
But no, do not analyse your choices. Decades later, realising your life is not what you wanted it to be, convince yourself that you are an unlucky person. Blame fate by raising your fists and screaming at the top of your lungs, “Why am I so unlucky?”
2. Accept every thought when you are at your lowest self
To be an unlucky person, accept every shitty thought that your mind can conceive when life has beaten you.
Repeated the same pattern of actions you swore you would never do again?
Piece of scum. Why do I do things I know are wrong? Why do I never learn? I am a mess, a horrible person. I hate myself!
Did you fail at something you considered crucial?
I failed again. What will I do with my life now? Why didn’t I try harder? I fail at everything. So many people told me I couldn’t do it. They were right. I am good for nothing. Why do I even try? What’s the point?
Did you fight with someone close where they verbalised your deepest insecurities in their anger? Is it true what they say about me? Am I disgusting? I am what I do not want to be. Pathetic.
Forgot something important like ID while travelling or documents for an interview?
Stupid! Stupid!! I ALWAYS do this. I do not even remember simple things. No wonder bad things keep happening to me. I deserve the shitty things happening to me.
Are you going through a breakup?
Why did this happen to me? What did I do wrong? Why does the universe stab me in the back every time I get even an ounce of happiness? Maybe I don’t deserve love. The world is cruel. I hate it. Life is pain
Completely change your outlook towards life by barraging yourself with constant criticism whenever you are at your lowest self. Never understand your thoughts rationally or pause, knowing you are in emotional turmoil. Make yourself feel bad every chance you get. Enter a vicious cycle where the more you criticise yourself, the more depressed you get. The more depressed you get, the more you avoid things that are good for you because you do not deserve them anyways, right? And so, begin the cycle of self-criticism again.
This will help you to never follow your dreams, procrastinate, lash out at others and yourself, mess up your relationships and thus dangerously decrease the quality of your life.
And when it comes to analysing your life and where it ended up, blame everything but the source of your pain, your thoughts. Curse yourself for being an unlucky person and having a horrible life, whereas the primary source of your sadness was within your head.
Look out a glass window when it rains with a look of despair while you silently agree to yet another thought, “Why am I so unlucky?”
3. Be a good girl / good boy
Another way to be an unlucky person is to make yourself the good girl / good boy.
Ever been called a good girl / good boy when you were a kid? It felt good, didn’t it? You will do that by making everyone fall in love with you.
Always seek the path of no resistance. No one should be displeased. Do not sacrifice when you occasionally let go of things for your loved ones to maintain a healthy state of your relationship. Sacrifice things you hold dear just so that people will love and appreciate you, and praise you for your sacrifices. Such a good girl / good boy.
Never realise that people are not appreciating your goodness but rather your agreeableness. They are valuing your tendency to bend according to their will.
Never establish healthy boundaries or have conversations respectfully that might be unpleasant but necessary. Never even have the courage to discuss it while disguising it as not trying to hurt anyone. Have no boundaries at all. Always think about pleasing others no matter how displeasing it is to you so that finally they realise how good you are.
Spend years trying to make everyone love you and then realise people still blame you and walk all over you. Notice that you became a version of yourself that you do not love while trying to make everyone love you. When you complain about your life and realise your mistake, listen to these people stating you should have done things differently if you knew better.
But never question the pattern of your choices that led you to this situation. Blame fate. Yes, do that! How can life be painful when I tried to please everyone? Why don’t people love me? I have been good to others, then why has life been so bad to me? I am just an unlucky person. Fate is cruel.
Look for a wall and smack your head gently while whispering, “Why am I so unlucky?”
4. Consider your strengths as your weaknesses
Become an unlucky person by letting the world make you believe your strengths are weaknesses. Another way to make yourself sigh with sadness and say, “Why am I so unlucky?”
Are you compassionate? Do you care for other human beings and go out of your way to help them? Do you occasionally: lose an argument on purpose; keep quiet when insulted by someone close while they are in emotional turbulence; let others win; not jump into giving unsolicited advice or dozens of small sacrifices so as not to hurt others or because they might need it more? Let the world tell you that you are, in fact, weak. You let people walk all over you and are destined to get hurt. This is a dog-eat-dog world and you are a fool to help people when you can just focus on getting ahead.
Are you assertive? Do you have strong opinions which you respectfully put forth but are open to discussing different points of view? Do you not agree with everything because someone said so but think it is important to discuss? If you are, let the world convince you that you are just rude. You like to upset people by opposing things for the sake of opposing. You are just a difficult person to converse with.
Are you a sceptic? Do you not follow things blindly but do your due diligence and then go on accepting or rejecting things? Do you not like to follow the herd without knowing the purpose behind the direction to be followed? Let the world tell you you are over-smart. You lack faith and are disrespectful. That you have too much pride and think of yourself as better than others.
Are you patient? Do you do what needs to be done but do not feel the need to rush things? Are you easeful in your approach and don’t bite more than you can chew? Do you sometimes get stressed but know you just need to do your best and let go of the rest? Let the world convince you that you are lazy. You are not productive enough and do not always go the extra mile. There is so much more you can do that you are not doing! You are completely worthless if you are not doing anything productive.
Do you feel contentment within? Is there no drastic need within you to stand out in the world or work tirelessly to achieve? Even without those do you feel at peace inside? Do you feel you have a life which is, good? Wrong! You are not ambitious enough. You will never get ahead in life. Make yourself believe that you are unhappy by constantly comparing yourself with others.
While you can use your strengths to grow in the world, consider these strengths as weaknesses and turn down opportunities. While you could be happy knowing your beautiful virtues, think that you are worthless. Run away from the world and be under-confident. Project the same lack of confidence when you interact with everyone or undertake new initiatives. This way you can make people believe you are weak like you falsely believe about yourself. This will cause them to stop giving you opportunities to progress, thus making your life exactly as you imagined, worthless like you. Consider everyone else better than you while you are a speck of dust. Even if for a moment you realise that you are a wonderful human being with appreciative qualities, reject the idea.
Now curse your fate for the lack of opportunities in your life because you are an unlucky person. While looking in the mirror, blame yourself for all the weaknesses you are born with and utter with grief, “Why am I so unlucky?”
5. Seek love from others but never love yourself
Another effective way to become an unlucky person and give yourself a chance to cry, “Why am I so unlucky?”, is by seeking love from everyone else but yourself.
Put yourself down every chance you get. Fixate on the dozens of things you do wrong while conveniently overlooking the hundreds of wonderful things you do in life. Forget that you are human and allowed to be a little messy. Aim for perfection. Every time you receive a semblance of happiness, remember your mistakes or everything going wrong in your life. Make yourself believe that you are a horrible human being.
Now it is a cakewalk to hate yourself.
When someone comes along in your life showing even a little affection, cling to that person tightly and put them on a pedestal. Never realise that it is not that person but the deep sense of loveless void within you that makes you believe that that person is your entire life. Make them your world as they give you the tiny portion of that love which you never provided to yourself.
This will ensure that you become codependent and lose your identity. Make them your better ‘half’, as you can never be ‘whole’ by yourself. Your partner will now be the single biggest source of your happiness. Congratulations! You have successfully outsourced the responsibility of making yourself happy to your partner and thus put them under immense pressure.
Rarely give them space because you desperately need them. Do a lot for them, not because you love them and want them to be happy, but because you believe they might leave you if you do not overcompensate. As you do this, simultaneously increase your expectations, and when they fail, blame them for hurting you. Project your insecurities onto them and be jealous.
Never realise that the person who was hurting you the most was not your partner but yourself. As a result, when they become irritated, quarrel with you or eventually leave, never question your damaging patterns of behaviour but blame the world, your ex-partner and fate.
But remember, you are desperate for love. Being alone is way worse than being with someone wrong for you, right? So jump into another relationship whenever someone else shows a slight interest in you. Never build a deep connection with yourself or understand yourself but expect someone else to understand you. Go through bad relationships after bad relationships. Be hasty and never wait, as you are afraid of being with yourself.
Always seek someone else when, in reality, YOU are the one you need the most. Never consider that the best way to find a sustainable relationship might be through loving yourself first.
Curl up in your bed with sad love songs playing in the background while thinking you are an unlucky person in all of your relationships. In the void between the songs, cry into the emptiness of your room while speaking to yourself, “Why am I so unlucky?”
Now you have learnt five ways to become an unlucky person and give yourself a reason to scream, “Why am I so unlucky?”, thus ruining the rest of your life.
Let’s begin.