It’s summertime!  And Paul Maul’s list of self-help friendly activities has returned…freshly-updated with an all-new summer reading list and an even more vitriolic spin on theme parks!  So, whether you’re spending quality time with your significant other, your kids or just yourself, here’s a rollicking list of activities to help you make self-help part of your busy summer agenda!

1. VISIT A THEME PARK!

Theme parks can be a veritable petri dish of simmering family dysfunction (as well as a veritable petri dish of other families’ simmering viral infections), and as such they provide the perfect breeding ground for lessons in healthy selfdom.  For example, use the 90 minutes spent waiting in a sweltering line just to experience a two-minute ride involving a ten-second plunge toward your possible extinction to meditate and be still. Try not to focus on wishing you were anywhere else, including inside an unmaintenanced porta-potty at a mid-August outdoor jazz festival.  Soon, you’ll come to an inner peace and momentarily forget that this cripplingly mundane so-called adventure you’ve signed off on is costing you more than a year of cable, and that’s before the twenty bucks per head you have to drop on a bread bowl full of melted cheese at the cavalierly-named “restaurant” which is actually the only place to eat within six miles of the parking lot.

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2. GO CAMPING!

Need some perspective on how good you’ve got it?  Nothing brings a family together like the futility of trying to get water to a decent boil on a portable stove just so you can wolf down a meal of dehydrated eggs and faux bacon between wishing you could have a decent shower and didn’t have to dig a hole to crap in.

3. CATCH UP ON YOUR SUMMER READING!

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Horror giant Dean Koontz offers another chapter in his Frankenstein series; then there’s Go the F*ck To Sleep, the charming children’s book for adults about wishing your little monster would doze off already, and Ann Coulter has a new book called Demonic: How the Liberal Mob is Endangering America so there are all sorts of ways to read about freakish and/or annoying creatures while you sit and increase your risk of skin diseases.

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4. SEE A FREE SYMPHONY CONCERT!

So many cities offer free outdoor entertainment at this time of year, so get some air and get some culture, too.  It’s a great way to calm those jangled nerves and lower stress.  Just make sure you go with someone who doesn’t have a stick up their ass about classical music, because they will get really pissed if you fall asleep, which you will undoubtedly do.  And yet, they brought along the picnic basket full of fatty foods and wine,  so what did they expect?

5. HIT THE BEACH!

Confront those body-image issues head-on by proudly stripping down to a Speed-O or bikini without bothering to do six weeks at the health club to get in shape.  If people you don’t even know can’t stand the sight of you without perfectly toned muscles or a six-pack, they can go put their heads in the sand!  Be proud of who you are!  We’re all going to the same place in the end! (I mean we’re all going to die, not that we’re all going to the beach.   Just a little timeless wisdom.)

How will you stay emotionally healthy this summer?

Why, there’s all sorts of Paul Maul self-help lunacy. Check out some more!

HOLY CRAP! PAUL MAUL IS AVAILABLE IN BOOK FORM!--DOWNLOAD "SHOVE IT UPWARDS!" THE E-BOOK!

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