I try to imagine that I am a caveman as much as possible. I do this because it makes the most boring situations fascinating and the simplest objects ingenious and revolutionary. Consider a flashlight. A flashlight is a stupid piece of plastic that you bought at Surplus Herbie’s so that you won’t trip over a log when you’re walking out to your secret grow-op greenhouse at 2 AM. Everyone has a flashlight, right? Wrong! Cavemen don’t have flashlights. If you were a caveman you’d have to spend 15 minutes lighting a torch just so you could go crap in the forest at night. Inevitably the torch would burn your hand, and you’d drop it, then BAM! A saber tooth tiger would bite your leg off. “Damn it! That was my good leg!” you’d yell as you hobble back to your cave as fast as you can.

Now imagine that you’re a caveman and a flashlight is transported back in time and you get a hold of it. You could prance around the forest all night long, and when a pack of giant prehistoric hyenas tries to rend you limb from limb (there’s a phrase I don’t use enough), you could whip it out and shine it in their eyes and they’d be all like: “Gahhh! My hyena eyes! What the hell is this?!” Then they’d whimper their way back to their hyena nests. Plus everyone would think it was a magical, and they’d start a cult and you’d become president of the cavemen, and all the cavemen women would want to have your cavebabies.

This works for just about anything that has ever been invented: shoes, bicycles, Tupperware, hot chocolate, pillows, F-15s, chairs, dogs, and so on. So whenever you get anything new, don’t think: “These Velcro shoes from Value Village are way less cool than Air Jordans made out of gold.” Instead think: “If I was the only caveman with shoes, everyone would be in awe of me and call me ‘the great one with those feet things that no one else has.’” Or if a stray dog starts following you around and living in your house, don’t think: “This dog smells like garbage. I wish I had a purebred Pekinese that could wash dishes and fly.” Instead think: “If I was the first caveman to have a domesticated dog, everyone would be like: ‘Great Shaman, your animal powers are so great. As a tribute to your maximum awesomeness, please accept this clump of dirt and this shirt made out of sloth hair,’” or something.