Instruction Manual: Meal Prep

My last instructions article was about landing your “dream job”, which realistically is “a job”. Assuming the offer is signed and the work day is set, you will need to nourish your body to replenish the pound of flesh your new employers will take from you.

Meal prep! The act of taking one big meal and turning it into smaller meals that you eat every day out of a plastic container until you die falling asleep on your exercise ball you think passes as a chair.

Use this guide to help you save money, eat healthy, and fade into a life of no adventure.

[1] Attempt to understand that this need to drastically take control of your life is probably about some unresolved childhood issue.

[2] Find Tupperware inside your home. You don’t need to go out and purchase Tupperware because you already have Tupperware. You know…from the last time you attempted to meal prep.

[3] Be honest about what kitchen appliances you know how to use. Now is not the time to learn something new. You are fragile and poor. If you can only use the toaster, preparing five pieces of toast for the week is what your Sunday will look like for the next five years.

[4] Buy a comical amount of quinoa. Not rice. If you are meal prepping with rice it will draw concern and negative attention from friends and co-workers. “Why can’t they afford quinoa?” “Are they from a broken home?” and other fair questions.

[5] You are not buying eggplant. You are not ready for eggplant. You don’t know how to do that.

[6] When you begin cooking, accept that no matter what portions you use, it will never be enough for a work week and you will be left unsatisfied. Your life is no longer about joy and fun moments. You are meal prepping. The joy of adulthood is coming down off a panic attack and realizing your worst fears haven’t come true just yet.

[7] Put the food in the Tupperware. Throw your name on the Tupperware. Why not? Take some ownership. Put the Tupperware in the fridge.

[8] This is very important: at this point, you are going to feel like you don’t need to take anti-depressants anymore. Your life is in check. You are in control. Depressed people are not in control. Keep taking your anti-depressants. The feeling wears off. And honestly? Meal prepping wears off. You’re not going to keep meal prepping you sad piece of shit.

[9] Monday morning, do your best to forget the meal you created. Leave it at home. Leave it in the car. Fulfill some prophecy about your demise.

[10] After your final meal for the week is eaten or left in the car, let the thought of taking hours to prepare your meals for the upcoming week consume you for the entire weekend. Let every happy moment be suffocated by the grains of sand slowly falling in the hourglass, illustrating your imprisonment to mediocrity.