Brand new candidate means brand new friends.

In the name of a happier life, you may need to weed your friend garden

Here we are at yet another election year turning point!

1. Yes, we have a great new candidate! But also 2. the way that our election cycle is currently constructed, it definitely feels like we are said to be at ‘a critical election year turning point ‘pretty much 100% of the time.

Yet, after months of a downward spiraling pessimism, we seem to have arrived at a happier rallying point for those of us who are interested in saving democracy, human rights, and the planet. So let’s at least take a moment to bask in the feeling of relief that the rip tide of murk that threatened to drown us all has, at temporarily been stopped. (Even though we all know it is just a matter of time until everyone turns against her because that also seems to be how our ‘political system’ “works”: We welcome a new candidate with a great big hearty hello until the media stumbles onto some out-in-left-field story that everyone decides is more compelling, which leads to dramatic counter-narratives, falls-from-grace, attempted-come-backs and newly formed investigatory committees that have no purpose at all except to slow down any progress for the winner for their entire four years.)

But I digress.

Because right now we find ourselves in this rare moment of fresh blooming optimism, why not try to stretch out the occasion for as long as possible by doing some careful weeding out of the troublesome lunatics you allow into your life. There is no time like the present to cut back on useless exposure to conspiracy theorists and religious fanatics awaiting an apocalypse… to say nothing of other less venomous but never the less fascism-prone idealogs you see on a regular basis. Remember, you still have FOUR LONG MONTHS until you will be forced to converse with these people at Thanksgiving.

(Author’s Note: I know I have never met you, and therefore have no idea with whom you are hanging out. But despite knowing nothing at all about you, there is one thing of which I feel very certain: Many of the people you currently hang out with have personality disorders. How do I know this? Look around! The country is awash in them. And some of those who don’t seem too bad right now will probably end up getting a whole lot worse before this phase of the election is over. )

So today I am going to try to explain how YOU, the individual in question, can take an active role in preserving your own sanity by becoming more conversant in Identifying Personality Disorders.

For your first step, begin by making a list of the people with whom you have to interact on a regular basis. Then sub-divide that list into smaller more specific categories based on what you have noticed are their most troublesome behaviors (or as we will now call them “symptoms”. )

What do we mean by “symptoms?” Well, an easy way to get up to speed is to ask your favorite search engine to show you an over view of the many,many personality disorder charts your friend the internet provides free of charge. Yes, some of them appear to have been written by semi-literate idiots. But even the worst of them offer a way to become acquainted with ‘the language of problematic behavior’.

There are millions like this, many in the form of quizzes.

There are also A LOT of checklists and quizzes so go download a few. And buy the books on the topic that were written by knowledgeable people. (You have my permission to overlook the ones that are written by lunatics. They have more than enough access to your thinking without rewarding them with your money.)

Print out multiple copies so you can have easy access to this data at all times.

Before ‘the party’ begins, be sure you have set up a quiet conference area in corner somewhere that you can use for further diagnostic investigations.

Based on what you uncover, evaluate each individual carefully. Do their positive traits outweigh the negative? You probably don’t need to take on any more people who will make you lie awake in bed at night, worrying. But before judging them too harshly, remember:

And of course, while you are at it….remember to diagnose yourself. There’s always a chance you need to go back to therapy.

Now gather the sanest people you can find around you and make plans to help win this election on behalf of the only candidate who is not a twisted, misogynistic, personality-disordered, organically brain damaged authoritarian sociopath.

After reading all the personality disorder check lists, I am going to assume you know which one that is.