10 Totally Mindful Mantras from Totally Awesome 80’s Movies!

?Don’t You Forget About Me…?

How could we?? Scrunchies and high-waisted jeans are back. My daughter and her friends have become Rubik’s cube fanatics and my son is a Star Wars junkie. Shoulder pads were seen on the runways in 2016. People are wearing fanny packs again. Stranger things, indeed.

The 80’s are back.

We could dismiss the “Me Decade” of the 1980s as one of vapid self-interest, with moms wrestling other moms to get the last Cabbage Patch Kid on the block and teens obsessing about Jake Ryan and prom dresses and Saturday detention.

Or, we could kick off those pinchy jelly shoes and take a chill pill: let’s close our eyes (to block out the obnoxious neon colors), and discover that the 80’s had a lot to teach us. Let me share with you the most excellent and mindful mantras from rad and righteous 80’s movies.

Like totally.

1. “Nobody puts Baby in a corner.” (from Dirty Dancing)

This one reminds me of the famous Eleanor Roosevelt quote: “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.”

No one can put you in a corner you don’t want to be in. You are in control. But…

2. “Screws fall out all the time. The world’s an imperfect place.” (from The Breakfast Club)

True, this particular screw fell out due to Brat Pack shenanigans, but it’s an important lesson. If we expect perfection, we’re likely to be disappointed. Sometimes we’re not in control — and in that case, we must surrender to imperfection. As John Hughes Jon Kabat-Zinn tells us, you can’t control the waves, but you can learn to surf.

3. “Be excellent to each other.” (from Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure)

Kindness is ultimately what it’s all about. Party on compassionately, dudes!

4. “I’m your density… I mean, your destiny.” (from Back to the Future)

This one is probably my favorite! Sometimes, when we try to speak the language of the soul — of love and fate and kismet — the language of science comes out instead. That’s okay. They’re probably all the same thing anyway.

5. “I’ll be back.” (from The Terminator)

Because everything will be back, even shoulder pads, apparently (gag me with a spoon!). Everything is fluid and ebbing and flowing and shifting and changing. Sadness will visit again. Happiness will visit again. It’s the human (and cyborg) condition.

6. “Life moves pretty fast. You don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” (from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off)

Think how different Ferris’ day off would have been if he’d been tweeting and snapchatting. Not only would Rooney have tracked him down right away with his phone’s GPS, but he likely wouldn’t have fully experienced his day if he’d instagrammed and selfied his way through a baseball game and a street parade and a snooty-restaurant meal. Slow down and pay attention — you could be missing your life!

7. “How many of them really know what they want, though? I mean, a lot of them think they have to know, right? But inside they don’t really know, so… I don’t know, but I know that I don’t know.” (from Say Anything)

It’s okay to not have all the answers. No one does. I mean, did any of us ever actually solve the Rubik’s cube? Lovable Lloyd Dobler is clearly channeling Socrates as he rambles. Socrates said, “True wisdom comes to each of us when we realize how little we understand about life, ourselves, and the world around us.”

Be mindful of what you don’t know. Be open and aware so that you may learn more.

8. “Make a wish.” “It already came true.” (from Sixteen Candles)

We spend a lot of time craving what we don’t have. The negativity bias of our brain primes us to focus on painful experiences more than positive ones. Before you wish for things to be other than they are, take a moment to celebrate the wishes that have already come true. (That’s a lot better than giving your panties to a freshman at the school dance).

 9. “Many of the truths that we cling to depend on our point of view.” (from The Empire Strikes Back)

Yoda, the most Zen movie character of the 1980s, tells it like it is: our experiences and thoughts seem so real, so obvious, so patently true that we don’t often question them. We take our thoughts as truth rather than seeing them as phenomena of the mind. So, as Yoda might say, “Your mind, do investigate.”

10. “Wax on, wax off. Don’t forget to breathe, very important.” (from The Karate Kid)

This will pretty much get you through anything in life. Just breathe. Totally, righteously, and awesomely.

** Movie image credits: Wikipedia Fair Use Credit