(or, Why Rolex is Schmolex and Your Favorite Song is Dead to You)
People like to believe that power equals happiness—that if they can flex on the world just right, contentment will follow. It won’t. But that doesn’t stop the endless parade of obnoxious power plays designed to manufacture status while delivering absolutely zero fulfillment.
If you want an easy lesson in the folly of power, read a children’s book. Yertle the Turtle by Dr. Seuss perfectly illustrates the doomed nature of power-lust. Yertle stacks himself on the backs of his fellow turtles, ruling over them like a tyrant—until, inevitably, the whole thing collapses and he ends up in the mud, humiliated. A perfect metaphor for the desperate, self-defeating nature of most power grabs.
Power Play #1: Making People Wait
One of the most tired power moves in the corporate playbook is the boss who makes his subordinates stand around like idiots while he does something “important.” Maybe he’s chomping on a sandwich, lazily swinging a golf club in his office, or pretending to be locked in a deep, world-changing phone call. The message is clear: I am in control. You exist on my schedule.
In reality, this is a power move straight from the middle manager’s guide to overcompensation—the business-world equivalent of a small dog barking furiously through a fence.
Power Play #2: Restaurant Tyrants
Some people have so little actual power in their lives that the only place they can lord over others is at a restaurant. Watch for the guy berating the waitstaff over a slightly overcooked steak or treating the hostess like she’s beneath him. This is not a powerful person—this is a loser grasping at the flimsiest form of authority available.
Power Play #3: Dating as a Status Grab
Some high school guys don’t date because they like a girl. They date because other guys like her, and taking her is a flex. She’s not a person to them—she’s a trophy, a territory to be claimed, a game to be won. This is not love, nor attraction—it’s status theater, and it’s as empty as it is pathetic.
Power Play #4: Buying Rolex for the Wrong Reasons
Which brings me to the ultimate power flex of consumer culture: Rolex.
I love Rolex. The Explorer II is a masterpiece. But would I buy one? No. Not even if money were no object. Because Rolex is no longer Rolex—it’s Schmolex.
The Transmutational Phenomenon: When Prestige Gets Laundered into Meaninglessness
Rolex suffers from what I call The Transmutational Phenomenon—a process where something once beautiful and meaningful is absorbed into the commercial bloodstream and spit back out as a status symbol for the masses.
Rolex, originally a marvel of craftsmanship, is now the go-to wrist flex for people who don’t actually care about watches. It has been worn by too many hedge-fund bros, crypto grifters, and status-hungry clout chasers who want the shiny aura of power but lack the appreciation for the artistry. After decades in the cosmic wash cycle of commercial culture, Rolex emerges from the machine unrecognizable to its former self. It’s no longer Rolex. It’s Schmolex.
How Commercial Culture Murders Meaning
This transmutational process happens all the time. Take music.
I once loved Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon. Then, in my teenage years, Circuit City, a now-defunct stereo store chain in the Bay Area, blasted a snippet of it in every single radio and TV ad. Slowly, insidiously, the song transformed. It was no longer “Dark Side of the Moon.” It was “Flark Flide of the Gloom.” The song I once revered no longer existed.
This is what happened to Rolex. Maybe it’s not the brand’s fault, but the fact remains: Rolex isn’t Rolex anymore. It’s Schmolex.
The Lesson? Power is an Empty Currency
Whether it’s making people wait, bossing around waiters, dating for status, or flexing a Rolex for the Instagram likes, none of it leads to actual happiness.
Because power isn’t joy, and status isn’t meaning. If you need an overpriced watch, an expensive steak, or a fragile ego-boost to feel powerful, you’re not powerful at all.
Cinemorphosis 
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