You know that feeling when you’ve really messed up at work? Perhaps you’ve sent an email to the wrong person, missed a deadline or slightly missed the mark on something. You go home with a sinking feeling in your stomach, try in vain to shake it off overnight and wake up the next day still convinced you’re going to get fired, finally exposed as being totally incompetent and never going to work anywhere again.
You’d think that would be how Boris Johnson felt after he, quite literally, compared the European Union to Hitler. Or when he woke up the morning after Britain voted for Brexit and realised he’d been spouting rhetoric without a plan for months. And when he organised a press conference to announce that he would be running for leader of the Conservative party before pulling out, ostenisbly because Michael Gove defected from his team, started his own campaign and said that he didn’t think Boris was the right man for a job.
We’ll never know how it really feels to be Boris Johnson but we can marvel at his bouncebackability. Nothing sticks to him. He is Teflon. He, like a political Lazarus, is able to raze his career from the dead. He is the comeback King, he’s turned his story from Decline and Fall to The Rise and Rise of Boris Johnson. He’s never once compromised his (questionable) personal brand and he’s your new Foreign Secretary.
You've spent years interning for a pittance and applying for job after job and Boris Johnson just goes and does it...just like that. Perhaps it’s time that we all started to take career advice from him? There’s a lot that we can learn from him:
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Don’t listen to the haters. They don’t know a thing.
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Don’t give up on your daydream. No matter what.
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Don’t worry too much about getting it right, it’s not important to be accurate.
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If you get fired, shrug it off and pursue a more senior position elsewhere. Confidence is key.
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If you say something you wish you hadn’t let slip, forget about it and just keep on keeping on. People have very short memories don’t they?
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Never complain, never explain. See also Kate moss.
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Be yourself at all times, with no filter. Channel the Marilyn Monroe Instagram aphorism ‘If you can't handle me at my worst, then you sure as hell don't deserve me at my best.’
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Political correctness is not a thing you need to concern yourself with so don’t bother.
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It’s all about the bigger picture, don’t waste time on the detail someone else will work it out for you.
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Don’t give up your side hustle (his Telegraph column) so you’ve always got something to fall back on
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Fake it until you make it. If you don’t have the experience (Boris Johnson has never been a Government minister) for the job you want (such as Prime Minister) apply for it anyway and pursue it like you do.
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If you offend someone really really important like, oh I don’t know, the President of the United States, just move on fearlessly and don’t give it a second thought.
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Speaking clearly is not important – use as many polysyllabic words as possible because then people won’t quite know what you mean, they’ll be a bit confused and therefore conclude that you’re incredibly intellectual.
Boris Johnson’s been living life like it’s golden by the above rules for 52 years and he seems to be doing OK. So cut yourself some slack, kick back and relax. Stop trying so hard. In fact, just go home.
Here’s how the world has reacted to the news of Boris’s new job:
Instagram: bbbsara
Instagram: juergenland
Disclaimer: obviously don’t do any of the above, unless you really want to lose friends and alienate people
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.