See that girl with the laurel leaves in her hair? That's me, on graduation day, getting ready to walk across the stage and receive my Classical Diploma from Phillips Exeter Academy.

(Okay -- FINE. They're not laurel leaves. They're the kind of leaves that grow on the side of Langdell Hall, because no one told me you had to ORDER your crown before graduation. I mean... it's not like I had to order my diploma!)

My Classical Diploma means that I took four years of Latin and a year of ancient Greek. It means I know things. Like why it's so ridiculous that half my friends spell ridiculous with an -e. 

Kids these days -- amirite? 

​No, but actually. For real. Kids these days are more sensitive and fragile than kids of the past. Even according to the president of an elite university that I spoke with recently, “Today’s college students are not like you.”

When I wrote For the Love of God, STOP Asking People If They're Okay, I never really thought anyone would care. I love psycholinguistics (I just finished James Pennebaker's The Secret Life of Pronouns, and it was SOOO good!), and I'm all about empowerment... but people hardly seem riveted when I talk about either topic. 

​But somehow, STOP Asking People If They're Okay tends to be one of my most popular posts every month. Given this, I've got another one to add to the list:

​STOP TELLING PEOPLE THEY LOOK TIRED.

So you've been asked to give a speech, talk, or assembly. And you want it to be memorable. You want your audience to think -- to feel something. To question their entire worldview, perhaps. 

Now you just need a topic.

Skip the boring cliches. No one wants to hear you talk about abortion, the death penalty, gun rights, or minimum wage. These are huge and broad topics, and you're not an expert. You'll put your audience straight to sleep.

This week, I bared my soul in the semifinals of Mars Studios' songwriting contest... and I lost. But I had a wonderful time competing, and I got some helpful feedback from the judges. 

And, due to the lyrics of one of my songs, I was reminded of the most hilarious review anyone's ever written on Amazon.

In the last week, I've heard three different people claim that comparing yourself to others is somehow bad -- one even did it in a comment on my recent post, 3 Scientifically Proven Ways to STOP Caring What Others Think About You and Live a Happier Life.

But here's the thing. Comparing yourself to others, done correctly, is probably the best way to learn, improve, and build up your own confidence. Here's why:

Someone on Quora recently asked, Why do guys stare at me when I wear a sheer top? There's a reasonable possibility that it was a troll, given the question details ("guys have no right to go crazy over my sheer tops and beautiful pink bras")... But it's still an interesting topic that I think is worth discussing. 

It's mid-January: the days are short, and the nights are long. The inauguration is coming up, and all those beautiful holiday lights are down.

Some nights, as I return home to see another neighbor has taken their lights down, I wish we could leave our lights up all year -- or at least all winter. Perhaps they should come with a 'Holiday' mode and a 'Rest of the Year' mode. 

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: ambivalence is a beautiful thing. I think smart people are actually more likely to be ambivalent about a given topic, because they are rational enough to have examined both sides before leaping to an emotional conclusion.
 
Vox is one publisher I’m ambivalent about. On the one hand, they write great articles about political issues that touch on key points and provide background information for readers who aren’t already knowledgeable about this topic.
 
On the other hand, they also write biased, bizarre social justice crap that undermines their legitimate articles.
 
Take their recent masterpiece, ’Ugly sweater parties’ are a form of cultural elitism.

"The Play" has gone down in history as the most amazing, sensational, dramatic, heart-rending, exciting, thrilling finish in the history of college football. For those who need a recap: