Change

Since you constantly feel that everything in your life is wrong, it's good once in awhile to make changes to show you're "doing something." These changes might include finding a new job, dating someone new, or starting some new diet or exercise routine. When you're feeling exceptionally stagnant, consider moving to a new place. This might mean a new apartment or, when things couldn't be any worse, a new city. To do it the correct fraudulent way, check your reasons for moving; you should be running away from something intangible, like heartbreak or angst, not moving towards something concrete, like a new job or friends/family. Ultimately, you should always be running away from yourself, only to find that, surprisingly, you've followed yourself to your new destination.

Several months (or years) before your move, start by telling everyone how much you hate your current city and how you can't meet people there. Insist that people aren't this shallow in the rest of the world and harp on all the negative things around you. Then talk about how you're thinking about moving to City A, City B, or Portland, despite the fact that you've never been to Portland (but have been told by everyone you know how awesome Portland is, even though half of them have never been there either). If it's close to election time, talk about how you're going to move to Canada if the wrong candidate wins, despite the fact that you'll still be a U.S. citizen under U.S. rule even if you're physically in Canada.

Eventually, you should start focusing on City A more and more, talking about how the ____ scene there is great, and how you loved the city when you visited (though you probably only had a layover there for a half-hour and never left the airport). Begin telling everyone you know that you're going to move there, like it's a threat. Tell them so often that you'll have no way out of it except by looking like a complete asshole if you don't actually do it. Later, when you leave, people will laud your courage for taking a big step rather than realizing you're leaving because you're now too ashamed to stay.

Before arriving, make only the most minimal of plans and gather only a rough estimate of how much money you'll need to get started. Treat this experience like you're tossing yourself into the ocean to see if you can swim, even though you can barely, metaphorically or otherwise, avoid drowning in day-to-day experiences like riding the subway. Laud your own survival skills when you don't die within a week, then realize that without the Internet you would have been dead by the end of the first day.

Once you're in your new home, the rest is easy: Set up your Internet connection immediately, talk to your friends online all day exactly the same way you did when you lived in your last city, then walk around the city listening to your iPod nonstop, complaining to yourself about how you don't meet any new people, for some reason, except the ones who think you're a hooker.