4 Seemingly Good Ideas That Are Actually Disastrous

1. Having a party with all of your single friends

Once every couple of years during my 20s I’d find myself single and say to a friend, “Let’s have a party with all of our single friends. Like, a pre-Valentine’s Day mixer where every single person we know meets up and maybe finds a date.” It never seemed to work out the way we’d planned, though. First of all, everyone would already know everyone else there and mentally called “NEXT.” Second, the gaps of total singlehood in our 20s were usually for a good reason. We were in weird places in our lives or drinking too much or feeling especially jaded. The problem was never that there was a lack of the opposite sex, it was that we were usually kind of incapable of being a good person to date at that particular moment. By the end of the night, everyone would be just as single, way more drunk than they should be and only talking to the two people they came to the party with.

2. Dating a co-worker

It makes so much sense. You two are together all the time, you keep each other laughing through the long work days, you have the same monsters (your boss). But guess what, honey? Unless you hit the relationship jackpot and the two of you are going to be happy together forever (or as long as you work together) OR are SUPER emotionally evolved and break up seamlessly, YOU’RE GOING TO BREAK UP. Between hiding it from half of the office and getting burnt out after seeing someone 24/7 for three months straight, it’s inevitable that your new work relationship will have the same fate as most relationships. And I’d be hard pressed to find someone who’s prepared to spend 8+ hours a day with their recent ex and not have it affect their work life. And if you lose your job because you couldn’t just sign up for Tinder like everybody else, you’re kind of a fuckin’ moron.

3. “Hanging in there”

We all want to make it work, whether “it” is a job, a relationship, a friendship—whatever. We want to have these things and be good at having them because not having these things leaves us feeling insecure and like we have to start all over again. But ultimately, the only thing that’s worse than having an unexpected fresh start is living your life suffocated by your own demand to just deal with it now and figure out a way to be happy later. It’s true—there are going to be tough periods in even the greatest situations, but as Hillary Duff said, “trying to fit a square into a circle [isn’t] right”, either. Some stuff just doesn’t work out. No big deal. Cutting your losses when the time’s right is a super chic move that people with strong boundaries and a fair amount of self-respect are totally capable of doing.

4. Working with friends

I’ve done this very very well and I’ve done this very very poorly and my main takeaway on the whole idea of turning your IRL into $$$ is that it’s just… not necessary. There are a lot of people out there, people. A lot of them. And a lot of them are really good at specific things. Go find THOSE people when you want to start a new venture. Don’t hastily turn to friends when trying to get a new idea off of the ground. That’s easy and obvious, not to mention the fact that your friend is likely not the most qualified or eager person to work with. You know how pissed off you get when some random at work underdelivers or fucks up, leaving you with more work? That kind of scenario is going to pop up with pretty much anyone you work with, so why would you want that person to be someone that you also have to/want to grab beers with and try fishtail braids on? There are tons of examples of famous businesses with best friends-turned-business partners out there, but I can promise you that in the businesses that work, there’s some sort of major inequity between the partners going on. One’s the star, the other’s the worker bee. One’s always at the office late, the other’s off somewhere “networking.” And that’s like emotional waterboarding when the person shafting you is also supposed to be someone who drives you to your abortion.