Enemies

Your workplace is not your friend.

malinuts

The employee who dishes with you about all the other employees most likely talks about you to other people too. So watch what you say to that person. Bonding over disliked coworkers can cause you to let your guard down.

cissp3991

What We Get

You don't get what you deserve.

JFSOCC

Someone once said to me, "You get what you get, and what you get will never be what you deserve." It was after I had just done some good then got crap on for it, but I realized years later he was talking about malicious attitudes never getting their comeuppance.

lordofselfshame

Fragility...

Friendships are fragile. Most have a convenience factor (go to school together; work together; live near each other) and once that's gone the friendship becomes much less important.

As you age, work, family, and spouses demand more of your time and there's less left for friends. It doesn't mean you care less but without effort you'll lose those friendships. Often one half of the friendship is more willing to put the work in than the other, and that can sustain the relationship or lead to bitterness.

turingtested

The Cells

Cancerous cells form in your body on a regular basis, but your immune system recognizes the cancerous cells and kills them... usually.

refurb

Along the way....

You can be going along, enjoying your life thinking you've got it all figured out, and boom, in a matter of minutes it can all go to hell, and everything you believed to be true, and the future you imagined for yourself will be gone. And just because you do everything right, doesn't necessarily mean you get what you want.

Coconut-bird

Evil among us....

I ran a non-profit for a while and thought that the non-profit community would be pretty great, because aren't we all trying to do good things? OOF. The Non-profit world is home to some of the most ruthless and cold-hearted savages I've ever come across.

Particularly when it comes to competing for funding, there are no friends among non-profits and charities.

WatchTheBoom

Never the Same

People change. You never really know them. They can be in your life for 20, 30, 40 years and out of nowhere blindside you. So learn to be happy on your own. Live and love of course, but do not allow anyone or any few people to define your happiness.

It's alright to give people the power to hurt you by loving and trusting them, but never give so much of yourself away that their very presence in your life defines you and you cannot live without them. That leads to you either accepting sh!tty behavior to keep them around or it leads to crippling depression if they leave. Own your own happiness.

Snoo33903

Good. Not Great.

Being a good employee at work and having an agreeable, friendly personality will get you further than being a great employee with a poor personality.

lennybriscoforthewin

The Power!

I got involved in community activism (I'm keeping it vague here) and pretty much everyone involved higher up is a power-hungry monster. Competitive with each other, not just for funding but for clout and popularity with the public.
Also it was amazing how many people were willing to sell out the cause/their beliefs for money. Lifetime community organizers making a living by taking funding from the most unethical sources imaginable.

If you ever meet someone that's spent years dedicated to a charitable or humanitarian cause, then you've probably met an @sshole. The exceptions are the genuinely kind volunteers who are relatively new. They last about 2 years, 3 if they're tough. But they eventually see the people running the show for the monsters that they are, and leave, completely disillusioned.

BedazzledCrocs

The Death Racket

The funeral industry is just like the wedding industry.

Ok-Bit-9338

The funeral industry is an absolute racket. They hose people experiencing deep and unrelenting grief by subtly guilting them that if they don't spend more money, they didn't truly care about their deceased loved one.

When my friend passed away at 23, his family - who had a lot of money and not a lot of healthy coping skills - ended up spending an exorbitant amount on his funeral. They got upsold on a casket that cost thousands (which was only for the viewing), jewelry made of his ashes, weird art made of his handprints... They easily spent as much as a wedding. It was grotesque watching the way they got rinsed because they were mourning and didn't have the emotional fortitude to consider what was happening in the moment.

hot_yoga

That Magic Moment

You are never done growing, or shouldn't be anyway. When I was younger I thought growing up was a thing that happened, then you are a fully complete adult. Nope. You never stop figuring it out, learning and growing.

pronoia5

The thing you realize as you get older is that there is no moment when you are an adult. I still feel like the same person I did in my 20's. Yes, I know more about things and have more experience but the person inside is the same.

It's something I try and explain to people younger than me when ever it comes up. Like, there is no magic moment, you're just the same but older.

jimbobjames

the "nice" ones

Bullies are not just in middle school. They are everywhere.

billygoat2017

A lot of them are also 'the nicest people ever', who would NEVER do anything awful to anyone. My case for a while now. It doesn't matter what terrible things they do, every lie they tell is true.

isayohwellandcry

The Unfixable

There are some people you just can't save, and who will drag you down with them if you let them.

Whether it's addiction, excessive anger, constant negativity, or just never-ending chaos, if they're an adult, you have no obligation to "fix" it for them, and you can't anyway, until they become ready to fix it for themselves.

nakedonmygoat

Priorities

Throwaway for obvious reasons.

I hit a smallish lottery (~few mill) a little while back and told absolutely no one, family and friends included. I took a bunch of steps to secure my kids futures and we live a very comfortable but not lavish life. I'm pretty generous with the people around me, I think that they just think I'm doing very well career wise (or something illegal under the table).

I justify it by thinking that if this was general knowledge amongst friends and family it would ruin relationships. My priority needed to be my kids.

AllynKeleher

Mush

When you get diagnosed with alzheimer's, your brain is already mostly mush.

The disease has been ravaging your brain for at least 20 years before you started noticing it. You also probably exhibited symptoms for the past 5-10 years but they were super mild and no one, including you, paid attention. One of those early symptoms can be mood swings, depression... and the loss of the sense of smell.

There is no hope left for you at that point. The main research against Alzheimer's or any neurodegenerative disease is to act years before the first symptoms, when your brain still is relatively healthy. You showing symptoms mean that your brain cannot compensate for the degeneration and it will go downward from now.

Matrozi

Pose

The celebrities that you crave to emulate, get a lot of the stuff for free. They are just breathing billboards. Stop putting yourself in to debt for them, at the end of the day, just like money, you can't take it with you.

tinytania84

Everyday

You can do everything right and still die on your way to work. My husband died 2 years ago on his drive to work because someone made an illegal turn. People die every day in auto accidents. You can die when you leave your house and its so easy that its scary sometimes.

giraffemoo

The Undeserving....

Even though you are by far the most qualified candidate for a job or a promotion... they can give it someone undeserving and there's nothing you can do about it. Nepotism (I gave the job to my son), friendships, inability to recognize talent... you at some point may likely face this and it sucks.

I_Liked_WaterWorld

Alone

Nobody said being an adult would be this lonely. Im a 26 year old female, relatively attractive, sociable and I take pride in how kind I am. But it doesn't matter. People are busy and making the friendship connection is so much harder as an adult than it was growing up. (And it was freaking hard growing up lol)

I have about 3 friends total I can go to for anything. On the up side, my familial relations have improved greatly as an adult. We were broken growing up but now are all in a good place in life and with each other.

beachpbythesea

Live Alone

Deciding to be roommates with your best friend is dangerous. I've known people who have stopped speaking to their best friend because the small things build up. Some people luck out and it turns out fine, but most of the time it doesn't.

frankenramen