“The suspense is so unbearable that when they say “No One Is Safe,” they are talking about the audience!” – Mr. Paul Maul, mrpaulmaul.com

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“The Vow is about a coma and memory loss, so while watching this touching romance, have fun deciding which one of these conditions most applies to you!” – Mr. Paul Maul, mrpaulmaul.com

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There’s always more Paul Maul lunacy to be found. Try some here.

“If you want love to come into your life, you must first let love for yourself into your own heart, after which you can welcome the love of another into the loving space you have created within you through the love you have manifested by that creation and you will then discover that the love blossoming in yourself is the love that you can now give to the love that has been offering you love all along.”  

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Hard to believe, but sometimes it is just that simple.

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Don’t forget, you can get all the written–or spoken–wisdom you need right here.

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It must be a terrible burden on football players to not only participate in a grueling competitive sport, but to provide motivational speakers with a constant supply of metaphors.  After all, what is life if not getting the living crap beaten out of you every time you attempt to advance a few measly yards?  What is every new venture if not a kick-off?  What is every crazy idea if not a Hail Mary pass?  What is every setback but a fumble?  What is every imaginary psychological roadblock we set up for ourselves if not the line of scrimmage?  Okay, perhaps that last one was a bit of a reach, but ‘scrimmage’ is a very funny word and there just aren’t that many opportunities to use it in a sentence.

To continue the self-realization analogies, we can’t “receive” the bounty we deserve until we find ourselves having broken through all our “defenses” to be, at last, “open” to the opportunity that is being “passed” onto us. Yes, this is an unbearably twee set of comparisons to use in relation to an aggressive, testosterone-driven contact sport.  I’m aware of that.  My penis practically fell off just mentioning this stuff.  But trying to make something of ourselves can give us quite a symbolic pummeling, and the bruises we carry from allowing our past insecurities to sabotage our success can be every bit as real as those inflicted by a man the size of an Ikea wall unit whose strategy for preventing you from reaching the 30 yard line is to deliberately shatter your humerus.

One of the options we have to get through the allegorical ass-whooping we call life is to not take it too seriously.  Unfortunately, professional sports is now played on such an enormous scale that it would be impossible for anyone on either team to get any perspective on the actual importance of their undertaking.  They are not in a position to simply take a deep breath and contemplate that maybe in the vast scheme of things, a loss or victory in this final game of the year will not make even the slightest dent in the cosmic fabric.   In a perfect world, there would be a pre-game announcement on the JumboTron reminding everybody that, compared to some of the world’s more pressing issues, there really is very little riding on the outcome of the competition.

Of course, whoever made this announcement would likely be hunted down by all 70,000 of the aforementioned fans and publicly disemboweled.  And no one would press charges.  Plus, for all my work striving to bring others inner enlightenment, I couldn’t be the one to make that announcement.  After all, I, too, am among those who succumb to a near clinical depression when my home team doesn’t make it into the playoffs, even though the home team is made up of a series of people who have been traded from so many other cities that the chances of anyone on the home team actually being from my home is infinitesimal at best.  This is the pact we make with professional sports.  For a little while, we allow the players to be the conduits of our hopes and dreams.  That’s why watching them fight to gain a couple of yards means so much to us.  There is a lot riding on it, damn it, and those players are enacting a metaphor for our inner struggle and we don’t mind paying them big bucks to do it.

As for the halftime show, let’s pray for a wardrobe malfunction.

Don’t forget, you can get all the written–or spoken–wisdom you need right here.

So you want to stay hip to the current nomenclature but don’t want to lose your self-improvement edge? Well, what if the world of texting, Facebook and Twitter had to step aside for your kick ass acronyms?  Now it does, thanks to these new, empow-WOW-ering definitions for popular shortened phrases used on smartphones and iPads worldwide.

Reclaim your power! Text some motivational messages to the people in your life who need them most! (Okay, so maybe the people in your life who need them most are whiny, depressing twerps on whom you are tired of expending any helpful energy, but still.)

 TOP TEN SELF-HELP TEXTING ACRONYMS

1. LOL – Laughing Out Loud – Loving Other Losers. This lets someone know that when you are feeling down, you are reaching out to other pitiful douches just like yourself.
2. LMAO – Laughing My Ass Off – Living More Authentically Ow. To tell everyone that you are on your own personal journey of truthfulness, but that it hurts.
3. OMG – Oh My God – Oprah Made God. A gentle reminder that without Oprah, self-help would have been relegated to the scrap heap of history after the Carter administration, and therefore she might well be a higher deity than the man (or woman) upstairs.
4. FTW – For the Win – Freaking Totally Wizard. A way to say that things are awesome, plus it makes you sound a little British, which is always good if you are trying to hook up.
5. IRL – In Real Life – It’s Really Liberating. Use this to communicate that you are stepping outside your comfort zone and growing as a person. Works even better if you are naked while typing it.
6. JK – Just Kidding – Joyful Knowing. I have no idea what this means but it sounded just perfectly New Age douchey so I included it.
7. WTF – What the F*ck – Watching Television Fund-Drive. Lets everyone know you are not to be disturbed because Wayne Dyer is on, helping PBS raise money by offering up his books and CDs at eight times what you could get them for on Amazon.
8. SMH – Shaking My Head – Stop Manipulating Him (also: Stop Manipulating Her). To be used when you get a message about how someone you know is giving someone else you know a hard time and so you send a message back to the first someone telling him or her to stop being a passive aggressive suckbag.
9. IDK – I Don’t Know – I’m Delusional Kiddo. Pretty self-explanatory.
10. WDYMBT – What Do You Mean By That? – Why Did You Marry Bob Talbot? – Sorry, that’s just one I always send my ex.

There’s always more Paul Maul lunacy to be found. Try some here.

I sit in silence.

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A small breeze stirs.

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A dog barks.

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Soon, there is only the sound of my own breathing.

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And then, I become deeply aware of my own heartbeat.

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It begins to creep me out.

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I realize I will one day die.

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Suck it, meditation.

Enjoy more self-help posts, lists and pseudo-wisdom by clicking here!

Go ahead, try to deny where you came from. You cannot. And before long, your heritage will find its way into your every gesture. Please don’t blame the messenger. Just click on the logo above (or the embedded player below) and open your ears to the truth.

Don’t forget, you can get all the written–or spoken–wisdom you need right here.

TOP TEN PROMISES OF MR. PAUL MAUL’S  EMPOW-WOW-ERMENT PARTY

1. I will begin each day by talking to the economy and making sure it realizes how important it is to all of us.  Soon, the economy will develop a better sense of self-worth and pass that worth onto the American people in the form of new jobs.
2. Constitution to be replaced with copies of “The Secret.”
3. As long as they can provide a convincing written explanation of what is wrong with them, homosexuals will be allowed to marry.
4. As part of my five-year plan to reduce stress in everyday life, I will institute the death penalty for taking more than ten items through the ten items or less line.
5. I will continue to allow tax cuts for the rich as long as the rich promise to learn more about sharing.
6. I will balance the budget by making sure to put a Libra in charge of the budget.
7. I will replace the Pledge of Allegiance in our schools with the Pledge of Empow-WOW-erment (full text below).
8. I will put no restrictions on gun use.  However, if you shoot up your office or a school I would ask that you take a really long, hard look at why you behaved so unconsciously.  (Those who shoot themselves following any mass carnage will be exempt from this introspection.)
9. I will end our dependence on foreign oil with the power of my mind alone by using law of attraction principles as outlined in the new Constitution (see #2).
10. Finally, I will pay no attention to the constant, nagging critical voice in my head that keeps saying the first nine promises are ridiculous.  By refusing to embrace any negativity, I will be able to implement all the steps in this political platform no matter what anybody thinks. So even if everything goes right down the shitter, I will be remembered as someone with the strength of my convictions.  And that’s how it works, people.

Thank you for your support.

THE PLEDGE OF EMPOW-WOW-ERMENT

I pledge allegiance to myself

And occasionally to Deepak Chopra

And to my development

For which I stand

One person

Fully realized

With inner strength

And awesomeness

For all

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.Enjoy more self-help posts, lists and pseudo-wisdom by clicking here!

We in the self-help field will do anything to get our clients to a deeper self-awareness. And by anything, I mean anything short of stripping naked and immersing ourselves into a vat of boysenberry Yoplait while lip-syncing the karaoke version of Jenny From the Block.  And, let’s face it, if the payoff on the investment was good enough, we would probably do that, too.

In any case, it’s my job to guide you to your own sense of empow-WOW-erment!  And I have found, as I did last year, that by starting the new year pretending it has already ended,  some new and powerful truths emerge. Many of which often involve stripping naked, Yoplait and J-Lo, but this is for after the New Year’s Eve partying has worn off.

So, once again, imagine: the year is over and you are reflecting upon the goals you set in 2012.  Read through the declarations below, resolutions if you will, and decide whether or not you can truly kick off the year with pride and a minimum of self-loathing. I know you can do it!

2012 END OF YEAR RESOLUTION CHECKLIST

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HAVE I…?

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1. Offered thanks to those angels who have helped me on my path to success? Offered a steady campaign of harassing emails to those suckbags who have not?
   
2. Taken a moment of every day to simply appreciate the miracle of being alive and being able to continue this soul-sucking grind for another lackluster 24-hour period?
   
3. Finally come to terms with the cancellation of Oprah?
   
4. Welcomed the energy of wealth consciousness into the credit card I used to pay for that wealth consciousness seminar?
5. Tried my hardest to obtain closure with my family members, even when it means taking the drastic step of actually speaking to them?
6. Resolved to give all my spare change to the homeless, even though I don’t have any spare change anymore because no one uses cash and it’s kind of difficult to offer a homeless person a swipe of your ATM?
   
7. Shouted “F*ck the Mayan Calendar!” to the sky at least once a week?
8. Looked at the role I played in every conflict that was clearly someone else’s damn fault?
   
9. Laughed at a situation in which I could have chosen to cry instead but there were people around and no way are they going to see me at my most emotionally naked?
10. Learned even one thing about how to live by observing how a perfect, graceful animal functions in the world?  I mean, besides humping whatever it wants and crapping wherever it pleases and occasionally killing another animal in order to eat it because these are not the things to look for when using the beauty of the natural world to illustrate some vague idea about how humans should conduct themselves?

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So, how’d ya do? Did you make the most of 2012? If not, just remember to Shove it Upwards and you’ll be back on track in no time.  Happy New You Year!

Enjoy more self-help posts, lists and pseudo-wisdom by clicking here!

This is what it’s all been building up to! What did my true love give to me on the last day of Blissmas? Click on the poster above or use the embedded player below to hear what special self-help present my true love gave to me on the…

GRAND FINALE TWELFTH DAY OF BLISSMAS!

(HINT: IT’S A PERSON)

There’s more holiday-themed madness all over the place on the Paul Maul site! Find it here.

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The penultimate episode! One day away from all twelve self-help presents (or it it presence?). Click on the poster above or use the embedded player below to hear what special self-help present my true love gave to me on the ELEVENTH DAY OF BLISSMAS!

There’s more holiday-themed madness all over the place on the Paul Maul site! Find it here.

Subscribe and download all the Paul Maul podcasts for FREE on iTunes

Ten Days In! Two more to go! Click on the poster above or use the embedded player below to hear what special self-help present my true love gave to me on the TENTH DAY OF BLISSMAS!

There’s more holiday-themed madness all over the place on the Paul Maul site! Find it here.

Subscribe and download all the Paul Maul podcasts for FREE on iTunes

Click on the poster above or use the embedded player below to hear what special self-help present my true love gave to me on the NINTH DAY OF BLISSMAS!

There’s more holiday-themed madness all over the place on the Paul Maul site! Find it here.

Subscribe and download all the Paul Maul podcasts for FREE on iTunes.

Oh, sure, he’s a symbol of joy and wonder during the holiday season, but the fact is that Saint Nick has been working through some serious dysfunction over the years. Hey, Santa, you’re off for 364 days of the year, you think maybe you could make it to one my seminars? Think about it.

THE TOP TEN REASONS SANTA CLAUS NEEDS SELF-HELP

1. Predilection for shimmying down a chimney instead of entering through a window points to unresolved birth canal issues, along with festering low self-esteem that prevents him from truly being “seen.”

2. Apparently, witnesses report him laying his finger aside of his nose, and yet he refuses to attend even one Narcotics Anonymous meeting.

3. Involved in a troubling, possibly asexual relationship with his wife; bursts into gales of unprovoked laughter to hide the pain that results from lack of intimacy.

4. Justifies making a small crew of non-union elves break their backs to manufacture approximately thirteen billion toys in roughly nine hours by stroking his ego about the joy he supposedly brings to so many girls and boys. All of whom never actually set eyes on him and will cease to believe he exists by the time they are seven.

5. Thinks that his one night of aerobic exercise qualifies as a health regimen.

6. Despite his obvious inner pain about the hideous Santa Clause franchise, he refuses to publicly denounce Tim Allen’s portrayal of him.

7. Appointing himself judge and jury, he spies on children from the heavens and doesn’t think twice about leaving coal in the  stockings of those he deems unworthy. Classic passive-aggressive withholding behavior.

8. Remains in denial about his philandering ways despite the many children who have seen mommy kissing Santa Claus.

9. Allows himself to overlook the harsh working conditions at his factory  just because he was magnanimous enough to let some misfit reindeer be the headlight on his sleigh.

10. Has been waiting for the past several hundred years for the Food and Drug Administration to declare milk and cookies a vegetable.

I’m sure there are more reasons why our favorite delivery boy needs a little head shrinking. Feel free to contribute your own.

There’s more holiday-themed madness all over the place on the Paul Maul site! Find it here.

On the eighth day of Blissmas my true love gave to me…?

CLICK HERE FOR THE TWELVE DAYS OF BLISSMAS BUILD A SONG PODCAST: DAY EIGHT (or use the embedded player below)

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There’s more holiday-themed madness all over the place on the Paul Maul site! Find it here.

Seven is a very powerful number. And as you listen to what my true love gave to me on the seventh day of Blissmas, try to remove all associations with the movie Se7en from your mind. I mean it, don’t think about Se7en. No, really, don’t.

CLICK HERE FOR THE TWELVE DAYS OF BLISSMAS BUILD A SONG PODCAST: DAY SEVEN (or use the embedded player below)

There’s more holiday-themed madness all over the place on the Paul Maul site! Find it here.

Subscribe & Download all the Paul Maul podcasts FREE on iTunes.

I believe you understand how this works.

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO THE TWELVE DAYS OF BLISSMAS BUILD A SONG PODCAST: DAY SIX (or use the embedded player below)

Download & Subscribe to every Paul Maul podcast for FREE on iTunes

There’s more holiday-themed madness all over the place on the Paul Maul site! Find it here.

It’s Day Five! That means we add the part where the notes are held out, you know, like in “five… golden… rings.” Except it’s not five golden rings. What did my true love give me on the fifth day of Blissmas? Listen and be jingled!

CLICK HERE FOR THE TWELVE DAYS OF BLISSMAS BUILD A SONG PODCAST: DAY FIVE (or use the embedded player below.)

There’s more holiday-themed madness all over the place on the Paul Maul site! Find it here.

Subscribe and download every Paul Maul podcast FREE on iTunes!

I’m singing for my supper! Man, it must have sucked to have actually had to do that back in the minstrel days or whatever. So, no, I’m not actually singing for my supper, but I am singing the ongoing, exciting, 12-part epic 12 Days of Christmas parody with a self-help spin! 

CLICK HERE FOR THE TWELVE DAYS OF BLISSMAS BUILD A SONG PODCAST: DAY FOUR (or use the embedded player below!)

There’s more holiday-themed madness all over the place on the Paul Maul site! Find it here.

Subscribe and download every Paul Maul podcast FREE on iTunes.

“The Sitter takes Jonah Hill and puts him in a movie!” – Mr. Paul Maul, mrpaulmaul.com

“When you see New Year’s Eve you will barely be able to contain your jaw-dropping awe at the things Robert DeNiro has been paid to do!” – Mr. Paul Maul, mrpaulmaul.com

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Want more rave reviews? Get ‘em here.

You know the drill by now! The song is building, and my true love gave to me a third self-help related holiday stocking stuffer! Let’s rock!

CLICK HERE FOR THE TWELVE DAYS OF BLISSMAS – MR. PAUL MAUL – DAY THREE

There’s more holiday-themed madness all over the place on the Paul Maul site! Find it here.

Check out how The 12 Days of Blissmas is progressing…follow along with Paul Maul’s special holiday build a song! What did his true love give him on the second day of Blissmas?  Listen and become enlightened!

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CLICK HERE FOR THE TWELVE DAYS OF BLISSMAS – MR. PAUL MAUL – DAY TWO

There’s more holiday-themed madness all over the place on the Paul Maul site! Find it here.

When you try something revolutionary, you just might be making genius. Or, perhaps, the silliest thing anyone has ever heard. Probably the latter.  But there’s nothing like the healing power of silly, right?

So follow along for this 12-part holiday extravaganza. It’s a re-working of the classic “12 Days of Christmas,” but with a self-help spin. It’s “The 12 Days of Blissmas.” 

Each episode will feature one new thing my true love gave to me for my own personal empow-WOW-erment, until the whole song gets built by Day 12, with all the things my true love gave to me!

(P.S.: Don’t ask who my true love is. I’m fictional.)

CLICK HERE FOR THE TWELVE DAYS OF BLISSMAS – MR. PAUL MAUL – DAY ONE

There’s more holiday-themed madness all over the place on the Paul Maul site! Find it here.

There is no better time to use the phrase ‘there is no better time’ than the magical holiday season. In fact, there is no better time to use the word ‘magical’ than during the magical holiday season. But let’s face it, the season of giving can also be the season of stress, difficult emotions and pepper spray.

Well, there’s nothing more calming than hearing a nose flute play in the background while a soothing voice reads verses designed to make you go WTF? And that’s just what these splendid self-help haikus are meant to do. Join the 5-7-5 revolution and stay empow-WOW-ered this holiday!

1.

You better watch out

You better not cry because

No one’s listening

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How did it happen?

A gift card from Ace Hardware

More thoughtful than cash?

3.

Snow blankets the town

As though dusted from heaven

Frig that, driving blows

4.

A child’s sweet belief

In Santa is the height of

Gullibility

5.

Make the yuletide gay!

Just don’t get married you gays

You will give Christ gas

Man, can’t you just float away on a sea of tranquility now? I know I can. But that’s because of what I charge for my seminars.

Happy Holidays to everyone!

There’s more holiday-themed madness all over the place on the Paul Maul site! Find it here.

Now is the time to reclaim your personal power!

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You have eaten.

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And now you must buy things.

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So sayeth the Lord.

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Or so sayeth the economy, which is pretty much the same thing these days.

Don’t forget, you can get all the written–or spoken–wisdom you need right here.

Mr. Paul Maul’s life-changing series of clips from his TV Fund Drive Special continue to roll out on Funny or Die!

GO HERE TO VOTE “FUNNY” and support EMPOW-WOW-ERMENT!  Thank you. 

“What makes The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn such a gutsy new kind of vampire film is that they went and entitled it Breaking Dawn knowing full well that me and thousands of others would probably call it The Twilight Saga: Breaking Wind, and for that alone you must admire this brave film.”

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- Mr. Paul Maul, mrpaulmaul.com

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Want more rave reviews? Get ‘em here.

Subscribe on iTunes and download for free!

Click on the logo to hear the latest Paul Maul podcast!

Don’t forget, you can get all the written–or spoken–wisdom you need right here.

“Go placidly amid the noise and haste. And watch as those who couldn’t go placidly amid the noise and haste if their freaking lives depended on it get all the cash and glory.”

Don’t forget, you can get all the written–or spoken–wisdom you need right here.

“Adam Sandler has not played a woman this effectively since Grown Ups.” – Mr. Paul Maul, mrpaulmaul.com

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Want more rave reviews? Get ‘em here.

And if you would like to reminisce about what topics were trending a while back and are now forgotten, check out my Gratitude Lists from 2009 and 2010.

In the meantime, I thought I would recreate those awkward, douche-chilling moments around the Thanksgiving family table in which some goofy moron asks each person to announce what he or she is thankful for. And, because it’s a holiday, everyone sucks it up, grits their teeth and forces out a few platitudes about good health and the constant wonder that is their pre-adolescent child.

So, just picture me, your virtual self-help dinner guest, launching into a diatribe about gratefulness, right there at your table, just before the symbolic slicing of a dead turkey (or the doling out of a tofu turkey, if you are in a state that commonly has rallies regarding hemp).

PAUL MAUL’S THANKSGIVING GRATITUDE LIST

This Thanksgiving, I am grateful for:

1. Being uninsured. Knowing you have no access to health care is the perfect incentive to stay healthy by constantly keeping a positive outlook!
2.  Dexter. Just because.
3.  Football. The drama of life, reenacted on the playing field. And by drama of life, I mean slowly advancing yard by yard while people kick the shit out of you.
4. The Tea Party. They made the list again this year, because I would not know who to hate without them.
5. My family. A constant reminder of why I like football.
6. Smartphones. Always good to have another reason to not fully engage in a conversation.
7. Corporations. Now that they are people, they run the risk of one day becoming zombies, at which point we may have to cleave their skulls in two with an entrenching tool.
8. Oprah. For finally ending her TV show and leaving room for me to dominate the burgeoning field of gratitude journals.
9. Greece. For showing the rest of us what’s in store.
10. Hollywood. For continuing to make crappy movies that I continue to give rave reviews.

If you have something you’re grateful for, leave a comment and add it to the list!  Happy Thanksgiving, Maulcontents! (Thanks to NegativSteve for that handle!)

And now, the event has become part of the rallying cry of the Occupy Movement, which certainly speaks to a rebellious spirit and the desire for a shift in the balance of power. Although whoever makes those V for Vendetta masks is probably reaping the rewards of a market economy at the moment.  And if Black Swan has shown us anything, it’s that Natalie Portman can get just as bald emotionally as she can physically.

This is not to suggest that Guy Fawkes and his compatriots could have caught more flies with honey than with vinegar, but this all seems to be happening because some folks have been unwilling to get their Houses of Parliament in order and now their dysfunction is rippling out to the rest of the world like the silent, tense baggage that ripples underneath the turkey carving at a family Thanksgiving dinner. After that other House captured and tortured him, Fawkes decided to forego the indignity of being hanged, drawn and quartered by leaping from the gallows and breaking his neck in the fall.   Bonfires are lit in his honor every November 5th, and he consistently makes the list of the top 100 most admired Britons of history.  God bless him, at least he wasn’t one of those annoying passive-aggressive types.

Clearly, Fawkes represents a spirit of rebellion and even heroism that all of us feel and, in the fullness of history, ultimately admire.  Just the same, if you want to avoid capture, torture and eventual suicide, make sure you take a look in the mirror before getting all up in someone else’s grill.  Maybe you could wear a Guy Fawkes mask and pretend you’re Hugo Weaving.

It has been said that the definition of insanity is to keep repeating the same idiotic action over and over for years while  somehow expecting that it might one day yield a different result.

This is really bad news for anybody with a job.

Don’t forget, you can get all the written–or spoken–wisdom you need right here.

But we humans are like that.  Give us an opportunity to believe in something cataclysmic and troubling and we will step out onto the front porch of our consciousness and let that door-to-door negativity salesman walk right into the house of our minds.  The worst-case scenario is always a perverselyattractive one to us.  Now, let somebody make a phony radio documentary about how a kindly group of selfless individuals are roaming around the country telling people that they can be free of needless stress and work toward real and lasting happiness in their lives.  We would give that program five minutes before declaring it boring, laughable and worse, utterly improbable.  And to be perfectly honest, it does sound like a goofy festival of new age sphincter-tightening awkwardness, but I was simply trying to think of an appropriate contrasting example.  The point is, it is easier for us to believe, even if only momentarily, that disaster is on the way.  It is tougher for us to believe, even momentarily, that everything will work out fine.  And such a worldview is only substantiated by the fact that a 70-plus year old radio play that required us to use our imaginations to experience terror would one day be re-made into a movie that gives us no choice but to let Tom Cruise carry the story.

Nightmare scenarios are attractive and fun.  I know I enjoy them.  But I will try to accept the fact that there are dream scenarios out there, too.  Besides, we’re living in a much more sophisticated age.  An age wherein we can hardly fathom that audiences of old  would think Martians had arrived to annihilate us just because somebody put the idea out into the media.  You might as well try and convince people that  a poor Nigerian man will suffer great hardship unless somebody kindly cleans out his or her bank account in increments for him.  I mean, really.

Click on the logo to hear the all-new style of Paul Maul podcasts!

Don’t forget, you can get all the written–or spoken–wisdom you need right here.

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LADY GAGA: Your ever-more outrageous acting out is a function of whatever childhood damage led to your narcissistic tendencies.  It is simply a shield to protect you from both your own feelings of inadequacy and the nagging suspicion that you are the product of that one night when Madonna had sex with David Bowie.

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VAMPIRES INSPIRED BY THE TWILIGHT SERIES: You have a nihilistic outlook on life, seeing our time on this planet as ultimately empty and pointless.  This is stunningly ironic since you seem to wish you were someone who could live forever.

..

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THE MAD HATTER: A very popular costume this year.  Wearing this says you would like to be seen as a literary person, even though you wouldn’t know Lewis Carroll from Eleanor Roosevelt and had your first exposure to Alice in Wonderland by seeing the version directed by the guy who did the remake of Planet of the Apes.

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SPIDERMAN: You are haunted by feelings of guilt over something in your life, often something that feels as serious as having decided to spare the life of the a-hole that ended up killing your uncle.  As a result, you walk around with the classic martyr complex, exacerbated by the way you have internalized your anxiety: FYI, continually quoting the phrase, “with great power comes great responsibility”makes you almost as big an a-hole as the guy who killed your uncle.

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HARRY POTTER: You are a Devil worshipper.  Get help.

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MARILYN MONROE: See: Lady Gaga, minus the bit about Madonna and David Bowie.

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ELVIRA: You are a perfectly healthy person who feels no shame in revealing massive amounts of cleavage to other partygoers while maintaining a general air of forbidden gothic horror that makes you even more unattainable and exciting.  Keep up the good work.

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FREDDY KRUEGER: Halloween is your time to hide behind the mask of a man who terrorizes people’s dreams and is hell-bent on bringing about their violent deaths.  The other three hundred sixty-four days of the year are your time to feel exactly the same way about your boss, but instead of being hell-bent on his destruction, you hold in your anger and load up on the Mylanta.

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CHARLIE CHAPLIN: You see yourself alternately as a tramp who is not worthy of love and a genius who was misunderstood just because of a couple of child brides.  Perhaps much to your chagrin, neither is true.

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JESUS: To cover up your own bitterness about how God couldn’t possibly have created such a horrible world, you want everyone to know how irreverent you can be about organized religion.  Your cynicism becomes severely tested, however, when everybody at the party demands that you forgive or heal them simply by a laying on of hands.  You can’t exactly say no, can you, smart guy?

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I’m sure many of you have your own inner-self-revealing costumes that didn’t make the list. Feel free to add them to the “other” category in the reader poll below!

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Mr. Paul Maul’s life-changing series of clips from his TV Fund Drive Special continue to roll out on Funny or Die!

GO HERE TO VOTE “FUNNY” but remember…this one wraps up in a very NSFW way!

“Footloose is the kind of deeply necessary remake that will have its audiences wanting to dance all the way out of the theater as soon as it begins!”

- Kenny Loggins

- Kevin Bacon

- Mr. Paul Maul, mrpaulmaul.com

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Want more rave reviews? Get ‘em here.

Click on the Quickie Wisdom logo to hear the brand new episode!

Don’t forget, you can get all the written–or spoken–wisdom you need right here.

“Sometimes you just have to jump and build your wings on the way down.

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Which gives you approximately nine seconds to build wings before you are splattered all over the pavement.

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I’d build the wings first if I were you. “

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Don’t forget, you can get all the written–or spoken–wisdom you need right here.