Inspirational Advice From A Beautiful Woman

by Mallory Ortberg · March 31, 2016

I believe kissing is the strongest form of laughing. I believe that pink is the best calorie burner. I believe that the prettiest girls are medicine. I believe that tomorrow is strong when everything is miracles.

I believe that the best thing to hold onto in life is impossible. As you grow older, you will discover that you have two hands, one for holding the other as the world caves in on itself. Fear is regrets. So are stupid.

I’m selfish, impatient, and the right shoes. I make mistakes, I’m manicures, and at times people even more than things. But if you can’t handle me by what he says about other people, then you sure as hell don’t deserve what other people say about him. Inside every size twelve are a woman’s eyes.

Well behaved history never walks alone. For beautiful eyes, look for the women in lips, poise only words of walking, and kindness of the knowledge you are women. Living lasts forever, so nothing up, laugh it down, drink it off, take the avoids, drama chances and everything you did was exactly a regret you wanted. People, even more than things, need to be Paris. Never throw out a woman. You never know if she is a teabag.

Remain taken. Everyone else is already yourself. Don’t cry because you smiled. It’s over because you happened. Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by safe harbors you sailed away from. Catch away from the things you didn’t do. Throw off the trade winds. Pick the lucky. Enjoy the hilt that opportunities. The present doesn’t often come along. You have to grab them.

Mallory is an Editor of The Toast.


209 Comments

  1. hammocknap +360

    So THIS is what that Microsoft AI would have turned into if it had learned by interacting with girls I went to high school with instead of racists on Twitter.

    Such beautiful, purely distilled banality!

  3. aravisthequeen +184

    When will we see the first deleted comment (or Facebook comment) saying “These don’t even make sense?”

  4. Es_Petal +136

    I believe that when the wolves come out of the walls, it’s all over. Or just beginning.

    1. halloweenjack64 +42

      The wolves are trying to tell you that you’ve got some awesome secret passages in your house, if the intra-wall space can accommodate a wolfpack.

  6. TheasyPeasy +177

    “People, even more than things, need to be Paris.”

    I’m assuming this is a reference to Paris Geller from Gilmore Girls, and as such, I’m obviously in full agreement.

    3. blogswithmax +2

      I mean, or Paris Geller from How to Get Away with Murder (they are obviously the same Paris)

  7. ISBN978 +85

    I’m not articulate enough to explain the many ways and reasons I think this is great. So…this is great.

    (Is it the rhythm? I don’t know. I’m too witches to parse it out)

  8. wild fruits +145

    Never throw out a woman. You never know if she is a teabag.

    I’m glad Tay is at least responding to her therapy.

        1. britomartian +55

          A woman is like a teabag: a serviceable alternative when you can’t access looseleaf tea and a strainer.

          1. femaelstrom +6

            Je suis le presidente de Burundi.

            (Apologies for my atrocious French spelling.)

      4. voltairineballis +3

        I was drinking a sip of water when I read this comment and almost DROWNED because of it. There is still lemony water burning my sinuses. You win.

    1. Vera +21

      Mine, too! (Only with copious amounts of self-righteousness, severe clicktivismitis and pretty much every meal they’ve ever et.)

    2. RudyRed +60

      Add in some shit about yoga, veganism, and weed and it’s a spot on representation of one very particular Facebook friend.

      1. dancingbees99 +61

        Oh, I have that friend. Does she also post things about how the rainbow conglumerance occurring on the first Tuesday after the equinox is why she feels more distant from the universal core?

        1. WallisWallyOlly +32

          Wait, I need to be FB friends with this person. No, I need to be IRL friends with this person.

  10. VioletandIrises +161

    1) My friend and I wrote purposely terrible poetry in HS once and this is what it sounded like.

    2) “I believe that tomorrow is strong when everything is miracles” is a total Miss America Pageant line and I’m loving it in all its blandness.

    1. WallisWallyOlly +79

      All of my HS poetry was purposely terrible in that it was terrible and I didn’t accidentally write it.

  14. halloweenjack64 +78

    I love all my sibs, but I’ve had to block FB updates from one of my sisters because she has literally never seen an “inspirational” post that she didn’t like.

      1. askelade +13

        I was trying to figure out if I should hear this in Cecily Strong’s voice or in Chelsea Peretti’s.

  17. britomartian +130

    Um not to be rude but pretty sure Throw off the trade winds. Pick the lucky. Enjoy the hilt that opportunities. The present doesn’t often come along. You have to grab them. is a Shakespeare quote, please cite properly next time thx.

    1. dakimel +41

      Um Shakespeare wasn’t real. Mallory time-traveled the plays to Kit Marlowe and then a witch medicined a straw man with a ruff to vellum them.

  18. mspetuniawiddershins +93

    Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by safe harbors you sailed away from.

    This. Yes.

  19. algebraic +119

    I read this in the voice of Cecily Strong’s “Girl You Wish You Hadn’t Started a Conversation With at a Party” and it was perfect.

  20. fromafar2013 +143

    “As you grow older, you will discover that you have two hands, one for holding the other as the world caves in on itself. ”

    Okay. But. This makes sense? Right?

    I’m having an existential crisis right now.

    Maybe I should just stop adding whiskey to my morning coffee.

    5. fanficgeek +10

      Yeah uh, I read the rest of this post as a joke, but this sentence jumped out at me and sank its truthy teeth into my neck.

  22. kelly +53

    CAN SOMEONE MAKE AN INSPIRATIONAL POSTER OF THIS OR MAYBE I WILL

    I need this on the wall of my cubicle.

      2. aquamarinaveen +36

        ‘- Beyonce’ made me laugh out loud and believe me i need it this morning

    3. queen_bunnie +44

      PLEASE and use at like 6 different fonts because HOW can we be inspired without multiple fonts.

      honestly I might use my afternoon and photoshop to make this.

    4. highfivesforall +9

      If this happens I promise to purchase it immediately. All with a majestic eagle soaring over a lake or similar.

  25. mollywtx +112

    I’ll be having portions of this made into vinyl letters (Vivaldi MS Word font) and applied to the wall over my beige couch.

    1. builtahouse +59

      SCREAMING.

      but if words are applied to a wall above a couch & there was no Pin of it, did it really happen?

  26. flying_ghoti +178

    Hang on, Mallory, can you go a little slower? I’m running out of space to tattoo all this on myself.

    1. bignorseblog +18

      Was gonna tell people not to teabag me just because I’m hate, but this works too.

  29. v_d_budenmayer +84

    “Inside every size twelve are a woman’s eyes.”

    For some reason this is the one that just destroyed me. Now I am dead. RIP me.

    1. nopemobile +42

      The jeans I’m wearing are size 12 and it’s good to know that for today, my legs have been replaced by twin pillars of eyes encased in denim. Woman’s eyes. I feel better having access to that information.

    2. wendii +29

      My shoes are size twelve. And now they are looking up at me from below from the most unflattering angle possible.

  34. aqwaplop +42

    This article, verbatim, is what you get when you construct a natural language neural network with no actual neurons. Science has yet to provide a satisfactory reason why.

  36. beakbreath +50

    I’ve been wanting to make a banner for the giant wall in my apartment, and now I’m torn between “Well behaved history never walks alone” and “It’s over because you happened”

      2. pretty_monster +7

        1000% shared on FB (without comment). 10/10. would share again.

        *heart eyes* for haunting_of

          1. pretty_monster +1

            very much 🙂

            i’m not sure if my mom knows she’s being trolled and is trolling me back by liking it OR if she legit likes it. she’s caught on to internet culture suprisingly quickly. but… she’s also still my mom.

          1. Unreadaethel +6

            It’s bad enough doing that at all, but the placement’s so awkward! They could have covered the top, or they could have covered the bottom, but they did neither, just awkwardly jammed a painting in the exact center of the window.

    2. VioletandIrises +29

      Noooo, why are the spines of those books facing in? *shields eyes from the horror of the exposed pages*

      1. Unreadaethel +28

        I’m sure it’s a deep and moving commentary on the state of literary appreciation today, and the use of books as status symbols, rather than as repositories of useful information.

        Or it’s something they saw on pinterest.

        1. terb +11

          I’m having an existential crisis about it. why do you even have those books if youre just going to go and do that

          1. Unreadaethel +15

            1) Trying to make a clever statement about how modern society values the appearance of knowledge more than the knowledge itself; 2) a desire to keep other people from seeing what books you have; 3) psychopathy.

          3. Unreadaethel +11

            Either you have all the locations memorized, or you don’t want to read any of the books.

          5. Unreadaethel +9

            This is why I listed “psychopath” as one of the options. Because seriously, keeping all the books anonymously hidden away like that, with no identifying markers, could easily be worked into a profile on Criminal Minds.

    3. MunchletteBelle +25

      Okay, but… Actually fuck that bookshelf with all the spines facing in. Who does that?!

      1. Unreadaethel +46

        Terrible people. Terrible people do that. I’m going to update the John Waters quote about books: if you go to somebody’s apartment, and they have books, but all the spines are facing in, don’t fuck them.

    4. caesarhoneybee +10

      “#1-800-OOPS-SHOE”

      A throwaway tag referencing the Colbert Report’s Atone Phone segment? I am in love with this person.

  45. laylaschlack +80

    “Everyone is already yourself” is close to the bone. But hey, if you can’t handle me at my prettiest, you don’t worst at my laugh.

  46. sueyres +15

    Only thing missing is the “Call Karolynn Kieffer at 203-645-3333 to find your next great dream home! Ask for KeKe!” at the bottom.

  49. MsNormaDesmond +27

    Uh oh, Mallory fell in a Pinterest hole. Make sure to steer clear of “St Patrick’s Day Recipes,” they are the most horrifying corner of the Internet.

    1. currentundersea +8

      oh oh can you do one for “Never throw out a woman. You never know if she is a teabag.”

    2. amoamare +15

      Is that picture meant to be calming? All I feel is terror in the face of the void…

      oh GOD, some day we’re all going to die aren’t we???

    3. dakimel +12

      Okay, beautiful, but can you do it with the pic of Mallory & her perfect eyeliner in the cave?

  51. Iris +12

    “Never throw out a woman. You never know if she is a teabag.” I’m going to make an embroidery sampler out of this.

  52. Hannah +18

    Where are the swirly fonts? These things are only written in swirly fonts superimposed over highly filtered nature photography. I demand swirly fonts!

  56. Jill T +19

    This is all the Facebook posts from my sister-in-law, except the ones where she’s VagueRageBooking about how I haven’t instantly responded to her most recent text.

  57. PallasPerilous +15

    Any bets on which celebrity’s inspirational lifestyle brand website Mallory fed to a predictive text program?

    1. OoTheHumanities +9

      When poise only words of walking, read Poog, the elytsefil golb. For elytse only.

    1. GingerCat +10

      Geezum pete, I want to post this to facebook so bad, but I know so many people would unironically like it.

    2. yellzee +4

      For some reason the Brokeback Mountain theme pops into my head every time I look at this image.

  60. fakegeekgrrrl +35

    Okay but Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by safe harbors you sailed away from is actually MY TRUEST DEEPEST FEAR

  61. middlemarch +32

    Why are you quoting the twitter feeds of the new girlfriends of my ex boyfriends?

    1. Sporkening +8

      Stop eating people’s old French fries, pigeon. Have some self respect! Don’t you know you can fly?

  64. voltairineballis +14

    So I’m sure it’s not the Thing to promote my partner’s work, but this article sounds *exactly* like an art project they made and submitted to hackaday a couple years later. Props if you understand the math, I’m embarrassed to admit I don’t. I do understand that his program spit out the most objectively True statement I’ve ever read: http://hackaday.com/2012/07/15/creating-a-decaden…

    “Nothing says goodbye like your cardiovascular system.” Words to live by indeed.

    1. mydonkeyfeet +3

      “Nothing says goodbye like your cardiovascular system.”

      I nearly snort laughed coffee into my nose. (Also words to live by. Live, laugh, snort laugh, choke.)

    1. Sporkening +4

      I… I love this, but I’m just getting negativity from it somehow?

      “Perhaps aspirations turn into wasted time if you just listen to your heart?” I mean, I guess that’s true? Most people are too polite to say so out loud, though

      “Breasts are created to replace your sense of self.” I mean, that’s just sexist. Sexist and wrong. Shame on you, InspiroBot.

      “Above every insect hides a raindrop.” Haha, joke’s on you! I love every species on this earth (except slugs), and also rain, so this sounds like paradise to me? BUT I know “insect” and “raindrop” are negatively charged words generally, so your intention to make me feel bad trumps my personal preferences, and the mere possibility of that sends me into a spiral of negativity. Curses, I’m back in high school again

      “A feeling without a horrible person is like clothes without understanding.” Dear God, it was a figure of speech, don’t make me do aptitude tests again, I know I did good the last time but it was on pure adrenaline

      “Never pretend to be like someone from the future.” AAH DON’T TELL ME WHAT TO DO, INSPIROBOT, YOU DON’T EVEN HAVE LYMPH NODES GRRRAHG

      “If you can’t taste him, you can’t resurrect him” This… makes sense to me. I have no beef with this

  66. efemmemarie +16

    This is my idea of straight women’s culture. (accurate?) #idunno #iqueeredtoolongidontunderstandhowyouresupposedtostraight

    1. treiale +3

      I didn’t, but then I went back and did, and it made the whole thing somehow even better.

      “The present doesn’t often come along. You have to grab them. End of line.”

    1. sadreceptionist +5

      I didn’t actually notice this, but I feel very satisfied and whole now.

  71. Alice +3

    This is what the world sounds like to me when I have a migraine.

    Apparently I often have migraines when I interact with certain people.

    Heavy narcotics help some.

  72. Alice +3

    Now I want to be a jerk, fight with someone I’m in a relationship with, then when they reasonably criticize my bad behavior I can act like it’s their fault and insist “Everything you did was exactly a regret you wanted!”

  73. pretty_monster +6

    thank you to everyone who made “posters”. i’m gonna troll my FB feed with them over the next couple of weeks. I LOVE YOU ALL.

    1. pretty_monster +3

      trolled my feed and caught my mom (expected), my Inspirational Cousin (totes expected), my grandma (wut?!), and friend’s Inspirational Wife (not surprising, really).

  75. noora +7

    At work they asked us to update our employee profiles in the new online thing ( its like a facebook but much much more boring and only for the company to manage its employees) and I’ve put ”I believe that tomorrow is strong when everything is miracles- Mallory Ortberg” in my ”info” section.

  76. Unreadaethel

    Put in a candelabra! Those are readily available, in different sizes for a variety of fireplaces! Although there are some creative fireplace coverings/fillers that wind up on that blog.

  77. Trixr

    (Psst. My partner does this. And it drives me CRACKERS every time I visit. But it's her bookshelf, and I have managed to keep my lip buttoned so far.)