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FROM NOW ON, EVERY TIME I FIND MYSELF BEING TOO NICE AND PEOPLE PLEASE-Y (NOT SPEAKING MY TRUTH, AND GOING ALONG JUST TO GET ALONG, ETC), I’M GOING TO VISUALIZE MYSELF AS THIS SELF-IMMOLATING HOT DOG.
The backstory is that I took this picture months ago in front of an “American-themed” restaurant in Tokyo. (I’m sure that was obvious, given that the hot dog is wearing a cape of the American flag, all my American friends and I do every day.)
I forgot all about this gem until yesterday, when I was going through my camera and realized I’d forgotten to delete everything from Japan.
This one caught my eye, and seemed remarkable…. Why, I wondered, is the hot dog inviting his own destruction by pouring ketchup on his face?
Is he a masochist?
A simpleton?
A doormat?
A people pleaser? A Buddhist? *
Is it a he or a she?
What is happening?!?
What I finally decided, because we do not see the world as it is, we see the world as we are, and all that jazz—is that hot dogs, much like people, would rather not be chomped upon and destroyed.
This hot dog is acting out of fear, and I can relate. I’ve written about being a people pleaser and trying to move past that phase in my life.
And so I hope that having this extreme visual representation of people-pleasing will remind me to be a little less nice. To speak up more. I think it will help. If this works, and I have a massive personality change, I will keep ya posted.
* a gentle reader pointed out that this is perhaps not the point I’m trying to make—it reads as though all Buddhists are self-immolators, which is not the goal.
