How to be perfectly human

 

There are manuals for everything now. How to wake up at 5 a.m. How to drink water mindfully. How to love yourself in seven easy steps.

Oddly, no one ever tells you how to be a monster. So here it is. A small, unpaid contribution to the internet.

First, develop a reliable stone heart. This doesn’t happen overnight. You don’t wake up one day and say, Ah yes, today I shall be emotionally unavailable. No. It’s a slow craft. You listen carefully. You stay longer than required. You smile at the wrong moments. And one day, when something inside you tries to beat a little faster, you politely ask it to stop. Efficiency matters.

People will say things like, “You’re so calm.”

That’s adorable. Calm is just panic that has learned table manners.

Being inhuman is mostly about discipline. You learn when to not ask questions. You learn how to type replies that look warm but arrive cold. You master the art of being present without actually being there. A true professional never leaves fingerprints—only read receipts.

Occasionally, guilt shows up. Guilt is dramatic. It sits at the edge of the bed at 3 a.m. and asks unnecessary questions like What if? or Why did you let that go?

You nod. You acknowledge its concern. You do absolutely nothing about it. Monsters are excellent listeners; they just never act.

There is, of course, the matter of the stars. Everyone blames timing, distance, or fate. The stars are very convenient that way. Ancient, untouchable, and terrible at clarifying things. When the constellations don’t line up, what can a mere human—or monster—do? Argue with astronomy?

So you let it go. Gracefully, of course. You don’t make a scene. You don’t break down in public places. You simply archive the conversation, return borrowed books in your head, and move on like someone who has never lost anything important.

From the outside, it looks impressive.

Look at him, they’ll say. So composed. So rational. So… fine.

They won’t see the small rituals. The way certain songs are skipped. The way some streets are avoided. The way the past is stored carefully, like a fragile object wrapped in sarcasm and labeled Handle Never.

You’ll continue living. Paying bills. Laughing at jokes. Offering advice on love like an expert who has read the manual but never followed it. And when someone calls you stone-hearted, you’ll almost feel flattered. Stones don’t ache. Stones don’t wait. Stones don’t look at the sky and wonder what went wrong.

Except—just between us—stones remember heat.

They just never admit it.

But yes, overall, being a monster is quite manageable.

You live with the guilt. You blame the stars.

You let the right thing go at the right time.

And if that isn’t humanity at its finest, what is?