5 Reasons Why You Shouldn’t Take Life Advice from Lists on Life Advice

Every day, without fail, your Facebook or Twitter feeds are cluttered by articles with headlines like “X reasons why you are bad at life” or “10 things you must do before [insert arbitrary activity or life event here]”. Some of it is for pure entertainment, while others attempt to offer sage advice for leading a better life.  It’d be nice if the secret to success and everlasting happiness could be found in a neatly compiled list, but I’m here to call bullshit on that. Here’s 5 reasons why you shouldn’t take life advice from lists on life advice:

1. Most of those lists suck– There, I said it. Most of the lists out there suck. If you happen to follow sites like Elite Daily, you’ll see how trivial and vapid some people’s view on life is. They make us generation Y’ers in particular sound like whiny, egotistical children trapped in adult bodies with internet access and a modest grasp of the English language.
2. They attempt to pidgeonhole people and complex life issues- For something as complex as our individual lives and choices, is it truly wise to seek insight from a list that someone else made? Let’s face it, we really look to these lists to validate certain feelings that we have that we’re perhaps too afraid to admit to ourselves or voice to friends. There is no insight to be had here folks – so no, men will not magically learn what women want by reading a list of things that she secretly wishes he would know (c’mon, you should already know that us men don’t read instructions anyway) – but it will validate the hell out of some feelings that you have in your own personal interactions.
3. Some people will actually take the advice to heart – Now, I’ll go ahead and say most of us (the author included) are guilty of reposting an interesting list article here and there. But then there are other people on your timeline – the ones who repost these things incessantly, usually with a comment along the lines of “This is so me! Each one is sooooo true!” Those articles will usually have a title like “5 reasons why you should only have one night stands until you’re at least 25” or “10 ways being a douchebag will actually help you be successful in life.” It’s bad enough that there are people actually writing this crap. We don’t need more people spreading it around as if its gospel.
4. The writers usually have no idea what they’re talking about (or may have been intoxicated while writing it) – This goes back to what was said in the first point, but I just wanted to reiterate how bad these things can really be.
5. They’re unreliable sources of information – This list is a great example. I promised 5 reasons but can only come up with 4 (and the forth is really half-assed). So there. Yeah…

There you have it folks: Five reasons why you should never take life advice from a list on life advice. I hope you join me for my next article on finding your life purpose through the quizzes on Buzzfeed.