Guilty Pleasures
Okay I really would love to know the origin of this phrase. Because what the hell man, why are we making people feel bad for enjoying certain songs and books and movies?? Why in the world should we feel guilty for loving the things we love?
A few months ago I read a facebook post from a boy I went to high school with that said "Just heard there's gonna be a new Twilight book coming out this year, as if 2020 could get any worse." This really rubbed me the wrong way because as a Twihard myself, I was really freaking excited about this new Twilight book and why in the world did this boy take time out of his day to trash this book that people were really excited about? That's just sad. I mean really Chase (that's right I'm calling you by name even though you probably won't read this), if you don't like Twilight then don't read the new book and just keep your negativity to yourself! Hate to break it to you, but your taste in books doesn't make you better than anyone else!
Speaking of my Twilight obsession, my cousin and I decided to start a podcast where we read through a few chapters of the Twilight series each week and we get excited and geek out with each other. It's called Filthy Bloodsuckers and you should all go listen to it because we think we are pretty funny. In our first episode we just delved into the nostalgia of being thirteen and obsessed with sparkly vampires and we were talking about how we had a much greater capacity for being crazy obsessed with something when we were younger. We talked about how as you get older more people decide to make fun of you for being excited about things and you eventually learn not to be as happy about the things you love unless they are widely accepted as worthy of an obsession. My cousin looked and me and said, "one of the saddest things is when someone is really passionate when talking about something and then they stop and apologize for being annoying and you know that's because someone made them feel bad about their passion." This hit me really hard.
Escapism can also be a really useful coping mechanism for anxiety. One of the best feelings in the world is walking out of a movie theater and realizing that you spent the past two hours not worrying about anything but the movie. Let yourself fall into things you love. I mean escapism isn't healthy to practice 100% of the time, but you shouldn't feel guilt over indulging sometimes!
So stop feeling guilty about loving the things you love, unless the thing you love is like murdering people or something actually harmful. Tap back into that passion you had for something at thirteen and feel no shame about it! And if you are the kind of person who thinks their opinion is better than everyone else and you decide to make someone feel bad for enjoying something, you are the one who should feel guilty.
Join me in the fangirl pledge to stop feeling ashamed of the things you enjoy! You all can spew your negativity but I'll be here listening to Taylor Swift and enjoying the crap out of the new Twilight book and feeling absolutely no shame about it.
XO
Allie