I recently binge watched entire series of The Haunting of Bly Manor in one week. Throughout this journey, I realized that more than a ghost story, this was a parable for life, providing viewers with life lessons.

What follows is a list of the lessons I learned from watching the show. Because it reveals the lessons, this piece includes MASSIVE SPOILERS. Stop reading right now if you haven't watched it and don't want it spoiled.

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[CONTAINS SPOILERS]

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LESSON 1. Nannies are horny af

The children's first nanny, Rebecca (or, gratingly, BECKS!) steals away with the mysterious Peter Quint almost immediately, making out all over the mansion and stripping naked in the dead homeowners' bedroom. Then, sweet Dani rolls in from the U.S. of A., on the hunt for a new life. Though she has a glowing-eyed ghost stopping her search for love at every turn, she powers through, and pursues her attraction to the overalls-clad gardener, Jamie, who gives Dani a much more clever nickname.

Nobody can blame Dani. Look at those overalls!!

They were hired to care for children and yet they keep getting their bang on at work. Honestly with Dani, I can't even blame her. Jamie is very cute and probably the best character on the series (three-way tied for first place with Owen and Hannah). But Peter Quint? That's who you're going to shirk your work duties for? Ugh. I guess. Horny people do weird things, and if this show teaches us anything, it's that nannies are on the prowl!

Her bare boobies are rubbing up against this coat that ain’t even hers.

Oh wait, maybe this lesson didn't come from Bly Manor, but like every adult movie ever.

LESSON 2. Being a teacher is a thankless job.

Between Dani, Rebecca and Father Stack, we learn that being a teacher/caretaker of children is a thankless job. Father Slack tries his hardest to help Miles deal with the loss of his parents. Miles responds first by throwing himself from a tree, then by killing the Father's bird. You spend all this time after school with a kid and he behaves in a way that makes you look negligent and snaps your bird's neck. Thankless!

RIP Mr. Wiggins - I decided that was the bird’s name.

Meanwhile, Dani takes the time to teach the children, read them bedtime stories, and provide them with structure and they pay her back by locking her ass in a closet. Sure, they were likely protecting her from the choke-happy clutches of Viola Willoughby, but Dani doesn't know that! She is left to scream-cry herself to sleep, much like teachers of today.

Teaching in a haunted old manor or teaching during a pandemic? You tell me.

LESSON 3. Make an estate plan and revisit it often.

Mr. and Mrs. Wingrave headed off to India and ended up dying mysteriously, their bodies unable to be recovered. By default, or possibly by plan, the two younger Wingraves end up in the care of Drunk Uncle Henry. The Wingrave brothers were both barristers, so one would presume that the deceased Wingraves had created an estate plan for themselves. But, as a lawyer, I can tell you, a lot of us live our lives in shambles. So let's not give the Wingrave bros too much credit just by virtue of their careers.

But even if they DID have an estate plan, they definitely should have revisited it in light of the brother-banging that had recently occurred. Charlotte's goodbye sent Drunk Uncle Henry down a path of self-destruction that made him a wholly unacceptable guardian for the Wingrave children.

When you decide a guardian for your children after you die, you can have one person handle everything or you can bifurcate the duties between guardian of the person and guardian of the estate. Druncle Henry is not qualified to do either of these jobs. One may think by virtue of his position as barrister, he would at least make a decent guardian of the estate to care for the children's money. NOPE! Dude got cleaned out by resident tall guy, Peter Quint.

Poor sweet Druncle Henry. Not a fit guardian.

As for guardian of the person, he committed a full dereliction of duties and handed the kids off to three employees, one of whom ended up being a GHOST! Though to be fair, Ghost Hannah was a better caretaker than Druncle ever could hope to be. #HannahForever

We don’t deserve Owen Sharma or Hannah Grose

LESSON 4. Look both ways before crossing the street or before WALKING INTO TRAFFIC.

Edmund. My dude. What happened? I know you were mad. You just got dumped. I've been there. One time I was dumped behind a dumpster. Another time, I was dumped on a moving trolley. I've been dumped via an @ on Twitter. I feel your pain. I do. But you have GOT to watch your ass when walking out in to the street.

LESSON 5. Being a hard headed shrew has its benefits.

If there's one thing we're supposed to understand about Viola Willoughby it's that she is a stone cold beeeyotch. Don't get me wrong, as the old saying goes, bitches get stuff done. She RUNS that manor. And when she's not directly present, her dictator-like portrait hangs above everyone's head, its face in a perpetual side-eyed gaze.

When most people get murdered by their sisters, they die. Not Viola! She's not about to take that! She lies in wait, and riiiiight when Perdita thinks it's safe to jack her shit, BOOM! Viola strikes, choking her sneaky ass sister and exacting her revenge. Think you're about to steal my man AND my clothes? NOPE!

Then, her treasure chest home gets discarded by her husband, chucked into the bottom of a muddy lake. Some among us may just take the L and move on to the next realm. Not Viola! She is so hardcore she waits and makes her emergence decades later, returning to her favorite move, the choke. Peter Quint tries to step in front of her while she's making her nightly rounds? Nah. Choked!

LESSON 6. Never do nice things for people because they’ll forget about you and you’ll end up in the bottom of a lake.

Speaking of being left at the bottom of a lake, oh Dani. Oh girl. The problem with the American capitalistic view of a the workplace as a "family" hath taken its toll upon thee. You sacrificed your life and your future with Jamie and her overalls for some rich children and their Druncle who didn't even remember who you were. They were cute kids. I get it. But this is what happens when the lines between the employer/employee relationship are blurred.

LESSON 7. the Secret of soul swapping makes a killer pop song.

The events of Bly Manor are set primarily during 1987. Peter inserts himself into a young Miles' body (I don't have enough time to unpack that whole metaphor) using the catchphrase/magic words, "It's you. It's me. It's us."

Aside from the loss of autonomy that is implied by this phrase, it's pretty catchy. So catchy, in fact, that it was later immortalized in the 2000 pop hit, "U + Me = Us (Calculus)." Peter actually looks like he could be a member of a boy band. How do we know his soul fully moved on (definitely straight to hell because he suuuuucked) once Viola lost her grip on Bly? Maybe, instead, his soul flew into the body of one of 2Gether's boy band members? Probably the Bad Boy, because you know Peter's gotta get his smoke on.

Quint has that smoldering glance that would be right at home on MTV’s TRL.

Really it all adds up. (See what I did there??)

LESSON 8. If you speak in a slow measured British accent people will listen to you for HOURS at a party that isn’t even your party.

Who is that gray haired mystery woman in the plush chair who won’t shut up at this rehearsal dinner? Who CARES! She’s talking about GHOSTS! This is the raddest rehearsal dinner ever. Flora is the opposite of a Bridezilla, letting an accented stranger fully take over and tell a really horny and spooky story. Why waste time with lame toasts when your long-lost gardener wants to talk about full body possession, murder and hot sex.

If she was literally anything but soft-spoken and British, she would be thrown out immediately. Can you imagine that story from a thick Philadelphia accent? Or New Jersey? Or worse - a southern accent? Or Texan (yeah, they're different)? Anyone else telling that story would be bounced for being a dirty pervert.

Is that your aunt? No, it’s my gardener!

LESSON 9. Always ask for the details of a plan and get a full agenda to review before agreeing to anything.

Ms. Jessel. Rebecca. Becks. You have GOT to ask for details of plan. When a man gets all whispery and wild eyed and tries telling you he's "got it all figured out" you're going to find yourself in a Natural Born Killers scenario. "Do you trust me?" sounds all sexy and romantic when it comes from Aladdin trying to take you on a carpet ride, but even that has its risks. Flying around with no railing or straps? Knocking the nose off a Sphinx?

The man cosplaying as Inspector Gadget does not have a plan.

I refuse to go on a weekend getaway without a full agenda. Does that make me annoyingly Type-A? Maybe. Does that also keep me from getting sunken into the bottom of a lake? You bet it does.

Speaking of ending up in the bottom of a lake…

LESSON 10. The dick will drag you down (literally).

I've said it a thousand times. The. Dick. Will. Drag. You. Down. In short, don't let a man (or anyone) stand in the way of you being your best self. Somebody either lifts you up or drags you down.

Peter Quint is a textbook dragger.

We find out Rebecca Jessel took the nannying job with an eye toward something more - becoming a full-blown barrister. She planned to ask Mr. Drunk Uncle for an apprenticeship. She confesses this plan to Peter, the man who she thinks gives a shit about her, making him fully aware of her professional plans.

Did he respect those goals or help her work toward them? No, he sabotages her by embezzling a shit load of money from her would-be mentor. After his own demise, does he tell his sweet "Becks" to move on, pursue her passion and find her purpose in life? Nahhhh. He makes it his afterlife mission to drag her down to his level.

AND SHE AGREES! Why pursue your lifelong dream when, instead, you could throw everything away and move to America with the ghost of some chain-smoking, trench-coat aficionado who just rolled into your life?

I would honestly take umbrage with this plot twist were it not for the LEGIONS of brilliant, amazing women I know who have cast aside their own greatness in favor of a tall, mediocre white man. In that sense, it's a tale as old as time.

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Life Lessons from "The Haunting of Bly Manor"

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