If failed actors become real estate agents, and failed producers become life coaches, what do failed writers become?

Bartenders.

I have a friend who is very much into life coaching, she actually quit her job and dropped out of college to become a life coach. She has been a friend of mine for over 15 years, but I don’t think she’s the same anymore. And I don’t think we’re friends anymore.

She seems to be very happy, yet there’s something that bothers me so much about life coaching that I can’t feel happy about her.

Am I a bad friend? What is it that irks me so much?

I’m guessing what irks you is her incessant saccharine positivity. That shit can get super annoying, especially when it’s accompanied by a bunch of emotional buzzwords and overwrought clichés.

I’ve had a couple of friends peel off and suddenly become life coaches. It’s one of the things people in LA do when their entertainment careers don’t take off. Failed actors become real estate agents and failed producers become life coaches.

I dunno. Maybe becoming a life coach is different where you are, but I’ve always thought of it as going to rehab for people who never got addicted to anything. My last friend who decided to become a life coach showed up with a bunch of three ring binders one day sounding like she’d just joined a cult. I’m not sure if she ever got certified, because I didn’t really talk to her much after that.

I guess what I’m saying is that it’s okay if you two aren’t friends anymore. You don’t have to stick around and listen to her bubble on about her latest seminar.

People change, and when they do, sometimes friendships have a natural end. You’re allowed to move on.

My bro is over my head sometimes and I have no idea how to respond to this text. Can you please help me understand??

“Historically democracies die by suicide; by excesses of liberties, lack of virtue, by “values clarification” and multi-cultural relativism to a point that society disintegrates. For instance, the UN’s plan for civilian disarmament that is gradually being imposed upon the world. There is an implication that freedom has been attained and tyranny has been banished; an idea diametrically opposed to all of human history and therefore a dogma, a statement of faith. Incidentally in The Republic it is stated that tyranny, the offspring of democracy, takes his father’s place after having disarmed him.”

This isn’t over your head. It’s a bunch of jumbled nonsense. Here’s how you respond:

“Plato was wrong about tyranny, John Adams was wrong about democracy, and you are wrong about everything. There’s no such thing as “multi-cultural relativism.” There’s multiculturalism and there’s cultural relativism, neither of which cause any damage to democracy. Also, there is no UN plan for civilian disarmament. That’s a hoax. Stop letting ultra-conservative chain emails influence your already ridiculous world view. Pull your head out of your ass and check your fucking sources, because you sound like a methed-up tea party kook.”

I’ve been going through in my head reasons not to kill myself. I’ve read through your posts, your fun-sized advice, anything that seems to mention this even slightly. . . and the one thing that sticks out to me most is that the most important thing–the only thing that matters–is never giving up. But how do I even get this kind of strength?

You will eventually find the strength inside yourself. You will. I promise. Right now though, you need to get the strength from other people. This isn’t something you should be doing by yourself, and that’s okay.

What I’m saying is you need to seek some professional treatment. You just do, and that’s okay too.

I don’t know your circumstances or where you are in the world, so I can’t really point you to any specific mental health care resources, but you’ve got the internet. Please use it to find some help.

And yeah, you’re right. The most important thing is never giving up.

Never.

I know you’re not going to like this question, but please humor us. We have dinner bets on this: who’s your favorite Disney princess?

I say Mulan, and we’ve got votes for Pocahontas and Rapunzel.

The Coquette we know and love will probably answer in a way that makes us question our very beings, but please include a real answer (our future lives and relationships depend on it). Thanks!

Merida.

I’m a freelancer, and I have an older (middle aged) client who prefers calling me over sending notes in emails, and I hate it. I’m still billing him for the time, but these conversations last up to an hour and a half, they’re excruciatingly awkward, and they’re mostly unproductive. They involve me waiting for him to decide what he wants, a long back-and-forth while I try to figure out what he’s saying, and long, silent pauses. I’ve had a vague sense of dread for months because he’ll sometimes only wait a couple days between these marathon conversations before calling me again. To be clear, he’s not being inappropriate or creepy, just irritating, and I think my mild social anxiety is a factor here. Is there a polite way to tell him to call less frequently (e.g. “I want to tackle those notes today, can we talk tomorrow?”,) or do I have to suck it up and be a professional about this?

Yeah, you have to suck it up and be professional.

It’s perfectly acceptable to let your client know that your preferred method of communication is email, and it’s fine for you to politely remind him, but if he insists on calling, you’re gonna be stuck talking to him on the phone for as long as you wanna keep his business.

In the future, I recommend you implement something called a “supervised hour” that you bill for at least 150% of your standard hour.  A supervised hour is basically where you charge your client more for the privilege of literally standing over your shoulder while you work. It costs more because it’s an added service, and the unspoken acknowledgement is that the client is annoying and you’d rather not have them there bothering you anyway. Of course, phone and video conferences with your client also count as supervised hours.

This would go a long way to solving your problem, and if you get stuck with a client who insists on holding you hostage over the phone, at least you can bill him more for being annoying.

My boyfriend of three years hasn’t initiated sex with me in nine months. When I finally asked him why, he said that I “make [him] feel like a failure” because I’ve never had an orgasm, so he doesn’t want to have sex with me. I. . . Don’t really have a question, I just want to know what you think about this.

First of all, I am immediately wary of anyone who uses the phrase “you make me feel.” That’s a red flag for me. It’s evidence that a person isn’t accepting responsibility for their own emotions. Whenever I’m in a conversation with someone who says I “make them feel” a certain way I immediately correct them with, “I don’t make you feel anything.”

If instead your boyfriend had said “I feel like a failure,” that would have been an entirely different starting point for the conversation. Still, he would have ended the sentence with, “because you’ve never had an orgasm,” and that’s an awfully deep pile of shit to step in regardless of how he phrases it.

Now, it may be true that you’ve never had an orgasm (which is perfectly okay and nothing to be ashamed of), and it may also be true that your boyfriend has been wallowing in sexual insecurity for a good chunk of your relationship, but I assure you, that only scratches the surface of why he doesn’t want to have sex with you.

Maybe he’s emotionally checked-out of the relationship. Maybe he watches too much internet porn. Maybe he’s fucking other people. I dunno. Whatever it is, he’s not telling you the whole truth, and it’s a real punk-ass move for him to try and blame any part of it on you or your sexuality.

There are much larger forces at play here, and while I can’t be 100% sure what his underlying reasons are without knowing more about you both, I can guarantee you that the orgasm thing is nothing but douchebaggery and misdirection on his part.

It’s one thing to patiently work out some sexual dysfunction with a long term relationship partner. It’s an entirely different thing to put up with the glaring character flaws of a partner too pathetic to accept responsibility for his own feelings of inadequacy.

I’ve never been in love so I’m sure there’s something I’m missing, but I just don’t understand. What is the point of staying in a relationship where you’re miserable 85% of the time? What’s so special about that 15% that makes everything else worth it? Am I right in thinking it’s really just fear of change and instability?

Where are you getting your numbers? Because if you’re surrounded by people in relationships composed of 85% misery, that speaks volumes about your potential for any kind of emotional well-being.

To be clear, the relationships you’re referring to are very unhealthy and should not be considered either normal or desirable. Misery should not be the resting state of any relationship, much less its defining characteristic.

If your friends are in relationships where they’re 85% miserable, you should distance yourself from their drama — don’t participate, and certainly don’t emulate. If your parents are the ones who are 85% miserable, you’re a little bit more fucked, but at the very least, you can start framing your parents in terms of how not to be in a relationship.

This isn’t about whether you’ve been in love. It’s about whether you’ve had any healthy relationship models in your life.

Friends are advising me that I need to “learn how to be alone” and it’s pissing me off. I’m a 34 year old professional – single, living alone, travel a lot, have great friends and enjoy my life well enough (aside from some work stress and a breakup 6 months ago.) Is this trite advice or am I in denial that I really DON’T know how to be alone? (And if it’s the latter, what am I doing wrong?)

Hmm. You seem to be leaving out the entire reason your friends are telling you to learn how to be alone. (Probably because you’re blind to it.)

My bet is that you’re codependent, and your friends are reacting to the symptoms. “Learn how to be alone” is friend code for “grow a fucking backbone and stop relying on the people you date for approval and identity.”

I dunno. Maybe you’ve been rebounding too hard. Maybe you’re not over your ex. Maybe you only know how to define yourself in the context of couplehood. Whatever it is, your friends have noticed, so they should be able to fill you in on the details.

My friend is a card-carrying Communist. He’s very vocal and deeply entrenched in the movement (Canada has a Communist Party you can vote for), and hyper critical of everything. The right, the left, democratic socialists, Bernie Sanders (using socialism in a capitalist system – how dare he) and even Gloria Steimhem (for being a CIA operative, apparently). And on and on.

To each his own, sure, but I’m not clear why it bothers me so much. Is it that he misses the irony of having the freedom to speak his mind about a system that would inevitably remove that freedom? Is it the contempt he has for everything? Or have I just been programmed to hate Red bastards? Help, Coquette. What’s a rational argument against Communism?

Your friend sounds like an insufferable asshole, but that’s not communism’s fault. Also, communism isn’t the system that inevitably removes your freedom of speech. You’re thinking of fascism. A lot of folks make that mistake, because people are always confusing communist state systems for communist systems theory. (Actual communist states tend to wind up as authoritarian shit shows. Again, that’s not communism’s fault.)

There are plenty of rational arguments against communism. Then again, there are plenty of rational arguments against capitalism and socialism, so who gives a fuck? Your friend just wants to argue for the sake of arguing. Besides, the best answer has never been the pure form of any one economic system. There is an ideal blend of private and public ownership. An economy needs just enough government regulation, but not too much. There is a healthy level of socioeconomic stratification that includes neither classless conformity nor grotesque wealth inequality. The trick is in getting the mix right.

That’s why I’m a Bernie fan. It’s not that I’m a socialist. It’s that I think our system needs a correction in the direction of more socialism. (You’ll find that stupid people can’t make that subtle distinction, so argue it at your own risk.)

As for your friend, let him have his weirdo opinions, but don’t let him act like an asshole. Start training him. For every hyper-critical remark, make him say something nice. That’s my personal trick for dealing with cranks.