Can vanity make you a happy person or even a super hero

Ever notice how in the U.S. we praise celebrities for posing on the red carpet and "slaying," how we tell friends they look "hot," but the moment those same people say, "I look good," the general consensus is that is a big no-no. Seriously, unless you identify as a member of a marginalized group that isn't conventionally attractive, then you are vain for even daring to utter your own perceived value. But what if being just a little bit more vain could make you happier? Whether you're running your own business or just running around at work for someone else, vanity may be the necessary evil you didn't know you needed, so let's talk about it.

Heads Up! This episode was originally released on YouTube June 9th, 2024

To watch the video visit Get Real Rae

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Music: One Fine Day by Keep Calm Podcast

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Are you vain? Because apparently I am. Oh my goodness. What's up? This is Ray with Get Real Rey a space and place for life and business tips to hopefully provide you with a little inspiration at the very least. Some laughs! Oh no, let's get it real. Let's get it, get it, get it, get it. Craving real advice. How are you feeling like every other small business owner or solopreneur is raking in the dough? Well, you just seem to be waking, secretly looking for a reminder that starting your own business is not as glamorous as others make it look. Whether you're looking to change the game in your relationships at home or at the workplace, you come to the right place. My name is Ray. I went from corporate America to running my own small business to becoming a solopreneur. I'm a professional actor, and you're always saying a professional busybody. Because this body is about to be busy all up in your bins. So let's get it real. Vanity. Boop, boop, boop, boop. If you wear makeup. Do you wear makeup? Huh? I don't have a vanity. I always wanted one though. But honestly, I don't even remember to put makeup on 99% of the time. So what I really what would I do with a vanity table if I never even remember to put on makeup? Something to think about. So yeah. The other day I was on the socials, social media, and a friend of mine had posted a few selfies. Uh she usually posts pictures of her kids and stuff like that. But I remember reading something to the fact of it's okay to be a little vain every now and then. And uh, you know, she was feeling good. She was feeling good, she was looking great. Um, and she just had a nice little face picture or whatever. She wasn't like trying to show off um, you know, her body or anything like that. It's just like just a cool little like self-pick. And I found myself with two feelings. First, I was like, oh my gosh, you look so great and so happy, love this. And then you look at the comments, and you know, the comments are like, you look great, oh yay, love you, you know, looking good. And we're so weird in comments, like, what are what are we doing, right? Um, and I was loving her posts, and I also found myself saying, Well, is it okay to be a little vain sometimes? Like, according to what Christianity, Christianity, Catholicism, isn't vanity like one of the sins? And I don't know about other religions, but I would think that in Judaism, um, being Muslim, I'm I have a feeling that vanity is like not okay there. And then we get in terms of like Eastern philosophies, look at Buddhism, Taoism. Um pretty sure vanity is not uh uh something that one aspires to on the path to enlightenment, and so I wasn't really sure if I agreed with her statement. Now, up here I wasn't agreeing, but I was also totally agreeing, right? I agree with the idea that it's okay to be a little vain sometimes because I myself have found myself going, oh, I really like the way I look in this picture. I'm gonna post it on social media. Why? What am I looking for? And it's so interesting to me at least. I like okay, so in case you haven't noticed, I like to figure out how things work. I want to know how my business works so I can make tweaks and make the business even stronger. I want to know how my finances work so I can make adjustments and make things stronger. I want to know how my brain works, I want to know about why humans do what we do. We're so weird. I love it, it's so cool. So, hear me up. Oftentimes, me personally, when I find something that I enjoy, I want to tell my friends about it. Okay, this is a business owner's dream, word of mouth, bringing in new customers, new clients. So, um, I am more than happy to tell my friends about this new food that I tried, this new health thing that I tried, this new dance move. And I realized this was a problem for me way back in college. Like once I started college, I was like, oh, oh, my brain has been filled with all these things, and I didn't even know these were things that people were talking about. And I remember like, Mom, don't you want to hear about all these things? She's like, No. Which is fair, right? She's like, I've I've done my time in college, and no, I don't find that fascinating. Um, and with my former spouse, I remember he would be like, Ray, don't you want to know about these amazing books that I'm reading? I'm like, not really. I'll listen because it's important to you, and I want to respect and honor that. I want you to feel you have that outlet for someone to tell because chances are no one else is going to be interested. But um, the fact that this is new knowledge for you, this is something you enjoy, doesn't necessarily mean it's rocking my world right now. And that is very similar to the experience of, ooh, I really like the way I look in this photo right now. Ooh, I just love the fact that I managed to do an amazing slam dunk, or um, I played a really long round of tennis today, or my garden looks fabulous. I just learned some new coat. All of these moments where we really want to pat ourselves on the back and say, Yes, I am a rock star. I did this. We want to share these. I mean, that's with trophies and medals and all those things, titles, that's where all those things come into play. Is we want to share our joy and excitement. We want recognition. Why do we want recognition? Um, it kind of can add to that feeling of acknowledging the achievement or acknowledging the belief, right? If it's just like, I look good in this outfit. Um, that's not always an achievement. Sometimes that's just you're looking for acknowledgement in the belief that you look good in an outfit, not necessarily acknowledgement that you uh have achieved losing a lot of weight or um managing to shower all of the dirt off your body. I don't know. Sometimes you can miss a spot, all right? I don't know, I don't know why. Um so we seek these these moments to share with others, and social media has really strengthened the ability to share. So the need to share, the desire to share has been around for decades, years and years and years. When you think about why someone dresses up fancy for an evening out on the town, right? You know, even before social media, um people still felt, oh, I got this new hat. I want to be recognized for this new hat. Um, it looks amazing, and yeah, we we want to share. I am guilty of the vanity, and yet I look down on celebrities that I feel use their voice only to support vanity. Hear me out. So here I am going, yay for my friend for posting pictures of her face. Yay! Here I am going, yay for me for posting pictures of my face, and saying, Hey, you look pretty decent for whatever it is you you just like had five hours sleep or something. You're doing pretty good, lady. Um, and I did a little bit of modeling, um, and I like the idea of modeling because it's so weird to me. It's so weird to think that just by having a human hold something or wear something, we can convince other humans to have certain emotions that will then inspire action. It is crazy. I mean, when you think about it, you see it like a poster of uh what are those Kardashian people or Jennifer Lopez or somebody, Natalie Portman, you see somebody with a watch on or holding a handbag, or just pouty lips, right? And so it creates these emotions of wow, I like the way that handbag looks on that person. I think I should get that handbag, or ooh, their lips look so plump and almost moist. I think I need that lipstick. I think that lipstick is going to make me feel really sultry or youthful and lively, whatever plump, moist lips bring up in your mind, right? Um gosh, you know, just seeing that celebrity who has this really extensive body of work, uh, wear that watch makes me think, wow, well, if I get that watch, I might also have this amazing body of work to um support and make a statement about my busy lifestyle. Um, and it is true that sometimes it is also this idea of maybe I can be uh more connected to this person who's promoting this product, this service, what have you. Um if she drinks that juice, then maybe I can be a little bit closer to her, more like her, by drinking the same juice. And so I said, humans are weird. Ah, I love it. I will pat myself on the back. I will give somebody else a high five. I do struggle with, well, should I post that? Because does I'm proud of myself for making some bread, but does anyone else really care that I made bread? Does anyone else care that I like the way I look in this outfit right now? Like, why should anyone care? It's not changing the world. I made bread, great. There are 365 days in a year. I should be making bread every day. And my making bread, is that going to then feed somebody else who is in need of bread? Am I gonna show people how to make this bread? Why am I posting a picture of my half-eaten food? What is the point? Is the fact that I have eaten this food so amazing that I have to share it? Or do I just want people to know, oh, this is a really good dish, and you should come to this restaurant and try it? And so it's crazy to think that how something so small as sharing with good intentions can then kind of go into this realm of sharing with fuzzy intentions, is I guess how I will put it. And the idea of pride versus vanity, uh, there's a fine line between the two. And so, why am I quick to be like, oh, why another magazine with that celebrity on it, or why do I care what handbag that person is holding? Why have that negative reaction and that aspect um compared to the woo-hoo reaction when I think of my own friends? Now, to be fair, I also have a negative reaction to some of my other friends where it's like, okay, so there's another photo of you clapping your butt cheeks together, or there's another, I have some weird friends, I love them dearly. Um, or okay, so there's another photo of you standing outside of a theater or something, or like I don't care. I I'm I don't know what am I supposed to care about? Am I supposed to care that you were at a theater? That's important that you're at a theater, I think. Or am I supposed to care that you're standing with whoever you're standing with? Um, let me just look to care that you are doing what you want to do and accomplishing your dreams, I hope, right? Um, I've already known that you can clap your butt cheeks, so I don't really need to see another picture or video of you clapping your butt cheeks, but okay. So I guess that's why I'm not on social media a whole lot, to be fair. But with that being said, I want you to be more vain. But not in the way of the things that I just mentioned. No bueno. I want you to be more vain in terms of learning to be your own superhero. So, hear me out. I was chatting with another friend, and um, you know, we were kind of just saying, oh, there's there's so many things that I'm I was saying, there's so many things that I want to do, right? And I was a little frustrated because I feel that I had been putting out a lot of work and just not really seeing a lot of the return on investment that I wanted to see. And she said to me, Hey, I had a similar conversation with someone else. And what we realized is that if you actually take a look back at the things that you have done, you might be surprised at how much you've accomplished. And she was absolutely right. In my own experience, when I look back at the amount of work that I've done and how much I have accomplished, I'm like, whoa, that's pretty cool. A few days ago, I was looking for some video to um put into this little marketing compilation I was putting together. And I was like, let me look at some old footage from um my aerial practice. I was getting really frustrated because I'm like, gosh, you know, I trained really hard for like two years in aerial, and I'm not finding what I'm looking for, and I never got to perform on stage, blah blah blah blah blah. And then I stopped and really I allow myself to stop focusing on what I was hoping to find in those videos. So let me just watch one of these, and I was like, whoa, I used to be able to do that, that's pretty cool. Can I get back to doing that? I have no idea, but I just allowed myself a moment to really appreciate the work that I had done, even though it was practiced video, I was still really impressed by the dedication it took to get to that level of performing, and also um the ability to be able to do those feats. And that just is a physical thing, but when I actually sit and think about um all of the work that I've created and the different businesses, uh, the different roles that I've played working for other businesses, the people I have interacted with through the types of work that I've done, I really am surprised and amazed and grateful and in awe of my own ability. And so for a moment, I am my own superhero, and you need to be your own superhero. Let's put the physical all that stuff aside. Just looking on paper, if you jot it down, all the things we've done, even if you look at like your workforce game, I'll look at all the things we've done. And then take a look at what did you have to do in order to accomplish those things. Right? Um, maybe you have come from a household where um your family didn't have a lot of money, or maybe you uh are an orphan or a widow, or maybe you come from the perfect, the ideal, I shouldn't say perfect, but what is thought of as the typical ideal family life. So you got both the parents, the cat, the dog, the siblings, everyone is is very friendly towards each other. Um, you never had to work when you were in school, and uh maybe you got a scholarship to college or something, everything is just whoops, smooth sailing. I'm gonna guess that there was probably things in your life that you accomplished despite all the the cards being aligned in your favor, right? Um maybe you were recognized in school for your academic achievements. And if you didn't cheat off of everybody else, then that is something to be really proud of yourself for, right? Um maybe you had that athletic scholarship and you managed to um accomplish some pretty special things within the field of athletics, or maybe you just helped a classmate in a time of need. There are so many different ways that you have saved the day yourself, just the fact that maybe you thought you were gonna get kicked out of your apartment, and then all of a sudden you picked up that extra waitressing shift and pulled together the money so that you weren't kicked out and you could pay um, you know, your bills, whatever it is, chances are you probably are more amazing than you realize. So I want for you to be a little vain, be your own superhero. And if you're not sure, if you're just like Ray, look, nothing, nothing amazing has happened in my life. I am not an amazing person. I can't think of anything. I'm just total everything typical. You know, I wish I had friends who have booty cheeks that would clap together. Okay, calm down. I hear you. And so, what I would say is take a moment to think of who your favorite superhero is. Like, just get a piece of paper, write down your top three or four superheroes, and then I want you to think what you like about those superheroes. So I've always been a fan of Wolverine. Um, I'm like I'm like X-Men. I don't I have mixed feelings on some of the movies, but anyway, um I like um Rogue. I love the fact that uh she can absorb powers. I thought it was super cool. So um and I like Storm, okay. Um now when I look at the characters, uh I like Catwoman. I'm not gonna say they're all X-Men. I'm just you know saying is Catwoman a superhero though? Because I mean she was a thief and she was flexible. He's really like a superhero. I don't know, die, came back. I'm gonna have to think about that. Hmm. Well, there's the whole is Batman a superhero? I mean, he um is a hero, but he doesn't have superhuman powers. He just worked out really hard and had some cool gadgets. Just sane. No. Be Batman. Be Batman. Work really hard and have cool tools, and maybe then okay, so we you will be your own superhero because you're gonna be Batman, you're gonna work really hard, you're gonna have your tools. So we're gonna say Batman's a superhero, so that you're a superhero, and that's what we're gonna say. Alright. So think about what you like about your top three favorite superheroes, and then look at those aspects and really dwindle that down to what actually would relate to your life. If you're like, oh, I really love uh Nightcrawler because he can teleport. Okay, great. You know why you like Nightcrawler and he's blue. Teleport he's blue. Okay, he teleport is blue, and he has a tail. Teleport blue has a tail. Okay, good. I'm glad you like those things. Now, are you blue or can you be blue? If the answer is no. Okay, if you're like, don't want to put on blue face paint every day, then we're gonna let that go. Now you could be like, I am not blue, but I would like to be more blue. I will not put on body paint every day, but I might adopt wearing a blue watch or carrying a blue cell phone case around my cell phone or something that makes me feel just a little bit more superhero-like. Sure, okay, that works. If you don't have a tail, I'm not gonna say you should suddenly attach a tail to your clothes. Do you? Absolutely. Um, but that trend has come and gone. Some people will attach animal tails to their bags. That trend has also kind of come and gone. Um, and as a vegan, please don't start attaching real animal tails to your items of clothing or bags. Please don't. But teleporting, you might be able to work with teleporting. Now, with that being said, no, you can't like pull a bewitch and twitch your nose and nod your head like I love Jeannie or I dream of Jeannie and suddenly be in a different place. It's just not gonna happen. Um, and maybe you do believe in the different verses. There's a metaverse and a um megaverse, and I don't even know all the verses. Um, you know, time, portal, worm, hole. Okay. Maybe you believe there are different versions of this universe everywhere, and you want to travel to all of them. Well, how what can you do to get you to one of those other places? Maybe the act of trying to get to one of those places can make you a bit more of a superhero, just the same way that Batman had to try to find different gadgets, and um, you know, others had to be in a lab testing out different potions and things, trying to come up with something to defeat so and so. Maybe that's you, maybe that's your superpower is trying to figure out how to get to a different time, space-time, or um, you know, you can't teleport, but maybe you like to travel, and so you think I really like that nightcrawler could teleport. Um, I actually haven't teleported, but I have traveled quite a bit. I uh went to this country, I went to go to this city, my lot job lets me travel here and there, and you look at your passport and you go, whoa, this is pretty cool. I've got quite a few stamps in my passport. And then you think about somebody who maybe you think about the younger version of yourself, right? So you, X number of years ago, before all that traveling, and what would you say to that younger self? And what would that younger self have said to you? Would that younger self have been like, yo, you went to all these places, you're a loser! Or would that younger self have been like, Whoa, you went to all these places? That's so cool. Would that younger self be like, Wow, you did all these shows? You did all this work, you worked at all these companies, you were a manager there? Whoa, that's so cool. Because where you are today is where someone else would like to be. It is their dream. Now, with that being said, if you're like, I am living in my parents' basement, I'm high as a kite, um, I don't have a job, I'm severely overweight, and no, no, I don't think it's anyone's dream.

unknown 26:12

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 26:13

I'm still gonna argue that where you are today, someone else is saying, gosh, I wish I at least had that. Right? It may not be a wow, that looks like the dream life, but it might be like, gosh, I wish I at least had that to move up from. So look at your body of work and identify how much you've accomplished and how you are a superhero, recognize you can be your own superhero and take actions in order to create the next chapter of your superhero adventure. So if you find yourself going Ray, again, basement, couch, high, jobless, mmm, that's only one chapter. So, what's the next chapter look like? Do you use incredible superhuman strength to rise up off the couch, take a shower, go take a walk in the fresh air to clear your head, and then with your vast mental abilities and amazing typing speed, go online and start applying for jobs so that you can use your superhuman financial skills to pull together enough money to save up to move out of your parents' basement and then rent a friend's couch until you have enough money to go get your own place. What will you achieve today? What will you accomplish? How will you soar and fly through the skies over the buildings? Leap one one small leap in a single bound or something like that, leaps the buildings in a single bound. That's you. There's gonna be all kinds of obstacles in your way, lots of buildings, lots of mountains, lots of meteors and things coming at you, lots of crazy jokers, blah blah blah blah coming at you, and you need to step up, you need to continue to step up, and you need to fight off all the craziness that's coming at you, and you need to say to yourself, I did good, oh yeah, because you did good, that's why, right? And so, yeah, double high five for my friend for her posts, double high five for myself for my aerial videos, and for that celebrity, I'm gonna give you a high five too. I'm gonna give you a high five, not because you're using your platform to objectify yourself. I'm gonna give you a high five because you have recognized that you can benefit from sharing with others something that you enjoy. And if that's something that you enjoy might make others feel like they are their own superhero, then yeah, I'm down with that. And so instead of me looking at it as you just make it a dollar, I can also look at it as hey, that's so cool that that celebrity has found something that they enjoy that they would like to share with others. That's cool. And I also am mindful of the fact that I don't take advice from everybody, and so I wouldn't take a recommendation from every celebrity. Um we all know that some people will add their name to anything because there's a check involved, and that's not something that I value, so I would never just do something because someone on social media said to do it. So you're not gonna just start being vain just because I said do it, right? Ah no, do your own research, do your own thinking, do your own hard work. But I hope that once you've done the hard work, you'll feel like, yeah, Ray was right. I am a superhero. And in that case, double high five to you because superheroes deserve double high fives, and you've accomplished a lot of great things, and you are going to continue to inspire others and to inspire your younger self and to inspire me. So thanks for being a good inspiration. I like it. And so, with that being said, friends, I hope you found this little adventure to be a little helpful, if not entertaining. And until next time, peace. Thanks for listening. If you think this podcast would help a friend, then please feel free to share it with them. If you want to check out some more Real Ray or just see me hang out with cute dogs, then feel free to visit me over on YouTube. Get RealRay4273.