One of my favorite quotable movies is “The Ref” with Denis Leary, Kevin Spacey and Judy Davis.  Filled with great lines.

One exchange goes like this on X-mas eve (Denis Leary is Gus and it helps to envision him saying the lines):

Connie: We can’t open presents until midnight.
Gus: Why not?
Connie: Because it’s not Christmas until midnight.
Gus: Well, guess what? We’re changing the rules a little bit, okay? We’re going to open the presents now, not later, now. Why? Because we’re adults and we can open the presents whenever we want!

The scene is funny but it shines because the line “we’re adults and we can open the presents whenever we want” is so applicable, with slight modifications, to so many situations.

It’s mostly useful when doing things that family, friends (just mistyped friends as fiends, though often they are probably not distinguishable), or even society might judge you on.

And there are SO many people who have opinions on how you should behave. What kind of diet you should have. How and how much you work out. What products to buy and not buy. What should offend you. What should not offend you. Gads, it’s overwhelming.

So when the Red God of Rules and Judging rears its head we say, not today. In fact we say, “We’re adults and were going to do whatever we want.”

Should I eat that ice cream before dinner? Hell yeah. I’m an adult and I can eat ice cream whenever I want to.

Now this is a slippery slope (I am beginning to wonder which slopes aren’t slippery).You can easily start to apply this to things you want to avoid that you actually do want to do. Just not today.

Should I go work out? Hell no. I’m an adult and I can work out when I want to. And I don’t want to.

Of course, it has other uses as well. It has wonderful affects around rule followers and controllers. If only as devil’s advocate question the order of some proposed activity. “Why don’t we do this first instead? I mean. We’re adults and we can do it in any order we want.”

You know, I think I really love this quote because it annoys rule followers.  That is such an enjoyable activity I think I should pursue it more robustly. So to finish it off proper then I will end this sentence with a preposition because someone needs to.