My Declaration of Independence... simplified... sort of...

I had planned to modernize all the verbiage, but some of it is simply too fun to waste.

MUB – My Unhealthy Behaviors

My Declaration of Independence
My Want, Will and Hope
HERE, JULY 22, 2011

The time has come to end past habits that have resulted in continuing unhealthy behaviors, which are contradictory to what God intended for me. Respect for myself requires that I declare the causes that impel me to end those behaviors, so that all excuses are put to rest.

I hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that I am endowed by my Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, healthy behaviors are instituted, by my healthy self, — Whenever any behavior becomes destructive of these ends, it is my Right to alter or to abolish it, and to institute a new behavior, laying the foundation on healthy principles and organizing a logical process, as to me shall seem most likely to effect my Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that behaviors long established should not be changed for light and transient causes (reminder to self: Don’t throw the baby out with the bath water); and accordingly all experience hath shewn that I am more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right myself by abolishing the forms to which I am accustomed (In other words, I tend to lean toward ‘better the devil you know, than the devil you don’t know). But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce me under absolute Despotism (enough evidence has stacked up to prove change is necessary), it is my right, it is my duty, to throw off such unhealthy behaviors, and to provide new Guards (healthy behaviors) for my future security. — Such has been my patient sufferance (I’ve put up with plenty); and such is now the necessity which constrains me to alter the former System of Behaviors (time to change). The history of the present unhealthy behaviors is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over me. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

MUB have refused to take ownership for holding me back from what is wholesome and necessary for my good.

MUB have ignored my efforts to create healthy habits by kicking in automatically. When I try to establish healthy behaviors, MUB wedge themselves in by slipping back into practice so easily.

MUB pretend like I’m allowed to establish healthy behaviors, for a short time, then they tyrannize their way back into my life.

MUB have dissolved my healthy behaviors repeatedly, for opposing with any firmness their invasions on my rights as a human being. (I can’t really say it any clearer than that.)

MUB have refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause other less healthy behaviors to be chosen, whereby my rights to choose have returned to the drawing board without success; while I remain, in the mean time, exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within. (No matter how much I try to establish healthy behaviors, MUB are so familiar and comfortable and easy that I find myself struggling to stick to anything new, because it’s awkward, uncomfortable, and usually hard work, without instant recognition of success.)

MUB are so ingrained that they obstruct any attempt to establish healthy behaviors.

MUB have made themselves Judge and Jury alone for the tenure of their offices, i.e., until further notice.

MUB have erected a multitude of New Rules, and sent hither swarms of excuses to harass me and eat away my sense of self.

MUB have kept, in times of peace, Standing Armies without my Consent for their defense, so I will always be wrong.

MUB have affected to render their Military arsenal independent of and superior to my Power over myself.

MUB have combined with others to subject me to a jurisdiction foreign to my sense of what is healthy; giving their Assent to their Acts of pretended Rules:

Blaming me for things that are not my fault or my responsibility:

Protecting my abusers, and willfully handing me over to those abusers:

Teaching me that I was incapable of doing anything of worth:

Imposing arbitrary rules that changed without notice, without my Consent:

Depriving me of the benefit of boundaries that provided safety from unhealthy behaviors:

Transporting me beyond Reason to be tried for pretended offences, sometimes by others and sometimes by my own sense of self:

Abolishing my right to free will, establishing therein an Arbitrary set of rules, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute unhealthy rules regarding my person:

Taking away my God-given free will, abolishing God’s most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of God’s Government:

Suspending my rights to choose, and declaring themselves invested with power to dictate for me in all cases whatsoever.

MUB have abdicated responsibility, by declaring me out of their Protection and waging War against me.

MUB have plundered my boundaries, ravaged my sense of self, burnt my values, and destroyed my ability to be truly healthy.

MUB are, at this time, transporting large Armies of pretend offences and “witnesses” to complete the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy residents of a civilized nation.

MUB have constrained and taken Captive anything they can use against me, to become the executioners of my health and hope.

MUB have excited domestic insurrections amongst those with whom I’m acquainted, and have endeavored to bring on the inhabitants of the ruling public, the merciless enablers whose known rule of warfare is an undistinguished destruction of everything.

In every stage of these Oppressions I have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: My repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. MUB, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of me.

Nor have I been wanting in attentions to those who supported or at least did not object to those past unhealthy behaviors. I have warned them, from time to time, of attempts to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over me. I have reminded them of the circumstances of my creating what I think will be healthy behaviors. I have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and I have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. I must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as I hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends. (I’m tired of being ignored or treated like I’m stupid.)

I, therefore, my healthy self, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of my intentions, do, in the Name, and by the Authority of the good person I am at heart, solemnly publish and declare, That I am, and of Right ought to be a Free and Independent person, that I am Absolved from all Allegiance to the unhealthy behaviors, and that all past connections between me and the unhealthy behaviors, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as a Free and Independent Person, I have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which an Independent Person may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, I pledge my Life, my Fortune, and my sacred Honor.

— Judy