5. I Enjoy Life More

When you watch just one movie per week, those weekends you get to binge watch Saturday morning cartoons at grandma’s are the bomb. It’s like having Lent before Easter: Saying no to sugar for 40 days makes Easter candy and cakes and pies super-delicious. Plus, then you get the joy of anticipation. Good things really are better when you wait for them. Just as pornography ruins people’s ability to enjoy or even respond to sex, gorging yourself on otherwise good things has diminishing returns.

In short, my upbringing meant I never lost out on anything worth having. In fact, my strict parents expanded my self-reliance and self-control, and allowed me to blossom slowly, without feeling wrenched from the bud. Every child deserves to have parents who love their kids enough to tell them, “No.” Those parents are entirely justified in then turning around and snickering when the kids predictably have a hissy fit and self-righteously proclaim, in the attitude of Buzzfeed, “you never let me do anything! You hate me!”