How to not be corny

I was at a pub with some friends one day and the topic of "What is your life ambition?" came up.

Ah, a classic question. Perhaps a bit too heavy for light-hearted conversation, but these friends are the intellectual type who typically don't beat around the bush.

The typical noble responses along the lines of "making the world a better place", or "increasing the GDP of the human race" rolled around the table.

The question then came round to me, and I had to think for a few seconds. For the longest time my abition was to be a rennaissance man—someone who is proficient and celebrated in a multitude of fields. But not only does that feel like a never ending goal, over time I have realized how naive it was for me to even aspire to such a goal when I'm not even accomplished in any singular field yet*.

I thought about all the aspects of my personality, like my instinct for style and design, my calm and collected nonchalant attitude. And so my mind immediately went to a concept quite simple on first thought, but actually infinitely nuanced—my life ambition is to not be corny.

Define corniness

If you are not corny, then by definition you are cool. Everybody wants to be cool. Here are some attributes of a cool person:

They are humble
They don't care what people think or say about them (to a degree)
Their actions are driven by the persuit of artistry and self expression
They radiate effortless confidence
They dress well
They have taste
They are not mainstream
But they are not insuferably alternative either
They are not overly contrarian for the sake of being contrarian
They are for the most part, stoic
They avoid stress not associated with their craft
And most importantly, they are emotionally aware and empathetic

If any of these attributes don't ring true to you, then I'm sorry to tell you this, but you are corny. At least, in my opinion anyway.

The key takeaway

Of course, caring too much about being corny (or anything else for that matter) is—by definition—corny. You can't actually take life too seriously. Like I said earlier, it is a nuanced art. One that requires some push and some pull, an acute self awareness and the ability to evaluate your own actions and reactions. So I'm just going to live my life how I want to, and occassionally think about those dot points I've listed above. Some people might think I'm cool one day. Maybe. I don't care.

* I still aspire to be a rennaissance man by the way.