Keep Your Incense Sticks and Fat Buddhas

Take responsibility and stop pushing your smoke on me.

Photo by Caroline Attwood on Unsplash

Am I the only one who really, really has to resist the urge to roll my eyes when I enter someone’s home and they’re burning palo santo, sage or incense sticks?

If I see there’s a fat Buddha statue and some crystals on a table, I’m going to need some sunglasses to hide my feelings.

“It cleanses the energy of the space,” people say when they do this.

I get that indigenous cultures have burned sage for energetic cleansing for centuries, and I do believe there might be something emotionally purifying and relaxing in ancient rituals.

But your incense sticks aren’t part of an ancient ritual, they’re capitalism. And they don’t cleanse anything. They just make me cough like crazy.

But all of this mystical New Age stuff is usually just a way people escape from their problems.

Latin American Superstitions

Latin American countries are superstitious as hell. Even in a relatively secular society like Argentina, there's still a lot of magical thinking.

Do not hand someone the salt shaker in the table, or say happy birthday before it’s the exact day. Don’t you dare walk under a…