Josh and Failure Vs. The World: Day 28

Here’s how I failed today:

I didn’t get up at eight in the morning, go for a run, write the next great American novel, and eat a healthy breakfast of kale, spinach, and integrity.

I slept in until twelve thirty, thought about my constipation, and ate a fruit and cheese plate at Coffee Bean.

I thought negative thoughts about everything in my life. I regularly envision imaginary conversations with people in which I lecture them into submission. If I focused this energy on actually doing something productive, maybe I’d be somewhere by now.

Oh, right – I also took the opportunity to feel jealous of several different people. I’m able to do that while worrying about my constipation – call it an ability to multitask.

I’m burned out. How is that possible when I’m only 36 years old? Oh, right – anxiety. It takes a toll. When I try to envision my future, I see only darkness and despair – Mordor, but with more Hondas.

Outside the coffee bean, a street musician is setting up – about to play. This sight terrifies me. Will this be me one day? Doing stand-up in front of five people in a small room somewhere, telling myself not to give up, but being too old and irrelevant?

I’m supposed to do things for the sake of doing them, without obsessing over the results – but I want results! It’s not that I’m looking for fame and fortune. I’m looking for celebrity and money.

More specifically, I want to earn the respect of my peers and of the best in comedy, and earn enough to afford health care – so, in order for that to happen, I guess I do need fame and fortune.

I’ve stopped trying to write anything other than stand-up. I’m trying to focus specifically on the stand-up. And on jokes – working on jokes – trying to be the best I can be with jokes.

Why did the chicken cross the road? Because I’m lonely.

As you can see, I have my work cut out for me.

Comedy is about what is wrong with me. In other words, I should never have writer’s block.
Can we discuss how, as a result of me using a space heater at work, I now have a rash on my leg? Perhaps this is why I don’t date much. My genes are steering me away from the pool.

Josh and Failure Vs the World: Day 27

Here’s how I failed today:

I didn’t do a failure blog yesterday. I could argue that I succeeded in not being as obsessive compulsive about this. And I fail to believe my argument.

Big failure: I’m not being honest with myself, and I’m rarely honest with people. I put on a front of politeness that probably 99% of people can see right through. Perhaps that is the throughline for everything – failure, depression, comedy, drama – when it’s not working, it’s because I’m not telling the truth.

But isn’t truth subjective? Yes – so maybe “the truth” is not as accurate – I am not telling “my truth.”

First truthful thing: I hate the phrase “my truth.” I sound like I’m about to launch into a poem. And it’s one of those poems that doesn’t rhyme, but somehow, it’s still considered a poem.

Saying “my truth” feels pretentious to me.

I feel guilty saying that the phrase “my truth” feels pretentious – because a lot of respected and serious artists will use the phrase “my truth,” so now I’m afraid that I am insulting those people by saying that the phrase “my truth” feels pretentious to me.

And the last thing I want to do is hurt anybody’s feelings.

Why? Because I’m afraid I won’t be liked. Because I don’t like it when other people hurt my feelings. So I’m trying to be better than those people.

I sometimes wonder if the point of pursuing anything is to achieve enlightenment – and enlightenment is the moment in which we become one with ourselves, and concurrently one with the universe. Frankly, it seems like it would be a lot easier to accomplish that with drugs.

Do I really believe that? No. I’m just trying to be funny – but that’s the trick. It seems that I’m at my funniest when I am just telling the truth – or my truth, as it were.

I’m so jealous of big guys with toned muscles – that’s what a lot of women are attracted to. I’m not slamming women on this by the way – I’m attracted to attractive women – it’s the human condition. But upon first glance, I don’t look like my genetics will propel the human race forward. I can feel the chromosomes in women when they look at me, and the chromosomes are saying “let’s produce offspring that won’t cry because the echo in a large museum is too loud.”

Side note: don’t you find it odd that people spend large sums of money to experience “California Adventure” when they are already inside California? And when can we expect a Cleveland Adventure?

Me trying to be funny again.

I fear for the health and well being of my parents. While I sense that the best way to help them is for me to live a fulfilled life, I can’t help but wonder if an even better way to help them involves money. Lots and lots of money.

They say that money doesn’t buy happiness. Yes, I know that. But it buys room service and health care. I never said I wanted to be happy. I just want to eat without having to cook and not die for as long as possible.

Why is it so hard for me to just tell the truth? It’s not hard. It’s scary. Because if I tell the truth about how I feel, I risk being seen as wrong and bad.

There’s also the issue of emotional truth – when somebody tells me something, and I have the urge to scream and cry, I bottle it up. Or I give a polite answer. I even take pride on being able to swallow.

So here are some truths I want to say:

1 – I have a new appreciation for Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. I’ve been re-watching it lately, and I like the acting now better than when I was younger – specifically with Sisko. I didn’t get the subtly of what he was doing in front of the camera when I first watched him. And that makes me feel guilty and stupid – why didn’t I see it sooner?

2 – I so desperately want people to think that I am smart – more than that, I so desperately want to be the smartest and the best because that’s how I assess my value as a human being.

people say that I have to accept myself for the way that I am. I hate not being the best. I hate having flaws. It would all be so much easier if I was omnipotent.

I HATE admitting that I am wrong. That implies that I wasn’t right the first time. Which feeds into the need to be the best.

I’m pissed that what I am writing right now isn’t funny and witty and clever – I would rather just write hilarious one-liners. But every time I try, they don’t feel very good to me.

And is that true? Would I rather be writing one-liners? No. I would rather be finding the humor in what is actually happening – but there still needs to be joke structure. In other words, instead of writing jokes, I am writing about how I am beating myself up for not writing jokes. Which is approaching becoming a joke, in it of itself.

So, I think, after reading this, the question you have to ask yourself is this: what do I do with all this raw sexuality?

Josh and Failure vs the World: Day 25

Here’s how I failed today: I bombed it at the open mic – why, though? I didn’t believe in what I was saying, and I wasn’t being vulnerable – and I wasn’t present in the room and being honest about what people were giving me – and maybe I just suck.

It’s sick, but I enjoy the challenge of winning over crowds that aren’t quite on board. Half of m felt like screaming and yelling, and the other half stopped me – so I swallowed my emotions. I wasn’t honest – I was upset – upset and frustrated – should I have just shown that instead? Yes – that would have been the riskier thing to do.

But what about being witty? What about actually writing a good joke? What about rhythm and structure? I wasn’t really committed to what I was saying.

Or everything I was saying was perfect and I just lost confidence in myself.

Or, I said to myself “they’re not going to like me” before I even started, and I sealed my fate.

Not feeling particularly hopeful today. Perhaps that’s the other failure. I can’t just shrug my shoulders and move on from this. I have to feel bad until I don’t feel bad.

I have to say what I truly want to say – give my actual opinions on things. It’s one thing to reveal what I’ve done, but it’s another thing to be honest about how I feel about it.

Josh and Failure Vs The World: Day 24

Here’s how I failed today:

Totally failed with my diet – two cookies, rice krispy treat, Smarties, Root Beer hard candy. It’s not a good sign when the healthiest thing I eat is a grape.

Incidentally, marketers are trying to market grape juice to men. They are promoting the drink as manly – I agree with them. Every drink is risking diabetes. And men take risks, by God. Some men jump out of planes, other men put their head in a lion’s mouth. I drink grape juice, and when I order a salad, I eat the cheese and the chicken cubes and avoid the lettuce like the plague. I don’t consider it to be a “chicken salad.” It’s “chicken dropped in an annoying forest.”

I’m hiding behind sugar. It’s a very bad habit – when I don’t eat sugar, I feel sad and depressed. When I eat sugar, I almost don’t feel sad and depressed. It’s a huge step up.

I’m failing at consistency when it comes to joke writing – I so badly want to always be on my A game. And by saying this, I am also failing at letting go of being perfect. That’s a failure within a failure – this is Matrix level failure.

I have not cleaned my room in four years. That’s an epic fail. Though mom tells me that it’s actually healthier to live in filth because I am exposed to more germs so my body builds up a tolerance. At this rate, if I encounter Ebola, Ebola will be the one who gets sick.

Still failing to read the Fountainhead.

Josh And Failure Vs. The World: Day 23

Here’s how I failed today:

I couldn’t make everybody happy with a situation.
I feel terrible – not so much because of the actions I took, but because I can’t fix everything.

Grant us the strength to change the things we can change, accept the things we cannot, and the wisdom to know the difference. It’s probably a good thing that Batman and Superman don’t go to the same AA meetings.

BATMAN: I finally see it! I couldn’t have stopped the bullet that killed my parents.

SUPERMAN: I could have, actually. And caught the guy who pulled the trigger.

I also find that I am putting my foot in my mouth a lot, which can only mean that I am endeavoring to talk to people more – and this is always a mistake. That’ll be the shame of it when computers become as smart as or smarter than people. Now, on top of everything else, I’ll have to worry about pissing off SIRI.

I didn’t come up with any new jokes that I liked. It doesn’t matter whether or not I get laughs – if the new joke doesn’t work, then I’m a failure.

I see that I’ve struck a chord when it comes to bicyclists. Here’s my response to this: I know I am in the wrong here. I know that I am a wrong and a horrible person for being annoyed with bicyclists. I’m the one at fault, and I admit that 100%. I don’t wish harm upon the gentle bicyclists. But I would like them to experience what I experience when I’m stuck behind them. That’s why I want to pass a law that makes it legal for slower things to be allowed in bike lanes: pedestrians, relaxed turtles, justice.

Josh and Failure Vs. The World: Day 22

Here’s how I failed today:

It turned out I was wrong about something and I still want to be right about it. The details of this don’t matter – It’s the same problem I keep running into. Being wrong is a form of failure. I have to learn to embrace it. I just tried to embrace it and I can’t. I’d rather punch something expensive.

I got a laugh onstage, but it wasn’t a HUGE laugh. At first, I celebrated the laugh. But then I ran the joke by my mother, and it didn’t work, so now I’m convinced it is a failure of a joke. Am I being too hard on myself? During times like this, I ask myself WWJSD – what would Jerry Seinfeld do – or more specifically, what would Jerry Seinfeld say.

ME: Am I being too hard on myself?
SEINFELD: No. It’s not a great joke. Throw it out.

There you have it.

I hate that I’m not perfect. I don’t know why this is so much to ask?
“If you were perfect at everything you do, you’d be bored,” my mother would say. Correction! I would be bored AND rich. There’s a subtle difference.

I’m failing to read this Ayn Rand “The Fountainhead” book, and by book, I mean tomb. I can feel the book staring at me, as if to say “I could be sitting on the shelf of somebody who would read this.” And then I say to the book – “if you don’t shut up, I’m going to buy anything written by Bernie Sanders and shove it right next to you.”

I failed to be calm – I keep trying to be calm, and it never seems to stick. Maybe I should try to be more hysterical. Actually play to my strengths for once.

I failed to eat healthy again:
2 rice crispy treats. A honey oat waffle cookie. Steak tacos. Fried Wontons.

I failed to appreciate the beauty I see around me.

And I still hate people on bicycles.