This is another good chapter, but again, I think it could have been beefed up a bit. There's a lot about being stuck on looking for the perfect job. But... what about being stuck to work, like a workaholic? We become stuck on an idyllic view of what the perfect job for us would be... lots of money, fame, etc. And the reality doesn't always match that image. And we get stuck thinking we're in a dead-end job or a dead-end career. But what do we really want from work? Do we expect too much? From it or from ourselves? Maybe we'd be happiest working as a janitor... But we think we need to be an engineer and we're just not suited for it... What is it that really makes us happy? What is it that gives us joy? And how much do we really need to live off of?
I thought it was a good book... it got me to see how stuck we can be... and not even realize it... which is the worst stuck of all! Cultures, religions and communities can be stuck too... It's just a good thing I think to take a look around and see what we are stuck on... or who!
Showing posts with label Stuck. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Stuck. Show all posts
Monday, May 17, 2010
Thursday, May 13, 2010
Stuck... on People
This one seems pretty self-explanatory. We get stuck on people... stuck in hoping, believing, thinking that they will move our lives forward. Or maybe we're just too afraid to move on from relationships that are well and truly stuck. Or maybe we keep looking for the rainbow over the next hill, always jumping from relationship to relationship. Hopping around like a bean in a hot pan is just as stuck as being rooted in one place. Stuck comes in a lot of different forms. I actually thought, the author could have beefed up this chapter a bit more... because there are lots of ways in which we become stuck on people. We think that they have the answer to our problems. We want what they have, whether it's a joy for life, or energy, or stability or balance. We cling to them like a drowning swimmer... Not a nice picture... What would it take for each of us to realize that we are the ones... and the only ones... who can create joy in our life... or energy... or stability... or balance. It can't come from outside us. Sucking it out of others does nothing for us, other than create a stuckness... a new sort of addiction, that is really a choice at the end of the game... and a selfish choice too...
Monday, May 10, 2010
Stuck... on Trauma
This was an interesting chapter and it does make a lot of sense. People get stuck on something horrible that happened to them back in the past, and they relive it and replay it until it becomes a legend. Nowadays with all these talk shows and TV therapists, we focus a lot on the story of the victim, encouraging the victim to tell their story over and over again, to the point that they become identified with their story. And that is stuck. Back in the olden days... like before the 20th century, people also had horrible things happen, but they just got on with life. They moved on. Nowadays, we don't move on... we get so stuck in the past, and in the trauma, that we don't live life anymore. And... those of us who haven't had trauma begin to feel let out! And so we look for something that might qualify... and take it to therapy and make a molehill into a mountain. What's the point of being stuck on trauma? Get on with it... live life... You're only as stuck as you think you are. Whatever we think about, we give energy to... So, think about your trauma if you want, but realize it's keeping you ever more stuck...
Friday, May 7, 2010
Stuck... In Habits
Oooh... this was a good chapter! So, we all have habits, good and bad, right? Things that we end up doing almost automatically. But we know that we have a choice, right? We know that we can choose to brush our teeth after meals and floss regularly... but sometiems we choose to do it... and sometimes we choose not to...
Anneli (the author) suggests the radical notion that addictions are not diseases... they are the result of poor choices... ongoing poor choices... When people say things like "I was drunk, I'm an alcoholic, I have a disease, I couldn't control myself"... they are basically abdicating all responsibility for their actions. They are saying that they are weak, powerless in the face of this habit. Anneli would say that's all it is... a habit... and a poor choice... The last in a long line of poor choices... Same with over-eating. Same with gambling. Same with video game playing. Same with overspending. Somewhere along the line, through repetivie behaviour, we've created a habit through choice and ended up calling it a disease...She says that these bad habits fill holes in our lives... in our souls... in our days...
What about admitting that we are spoiled, selfish, weak, lazy... Nah, that's too hard!! That makes us take too much of a look at ourselves! Better to foist it off of us onto something else... Yeah, let's call ourselves "sick"... we have a "disease"... so it's not our fault! Someone says they're a pedophile because they were abused and so it's not their fault. They have a sickness... Uh-huh... right...
They talk about Alcohol-Induced Anxiety Disorder... like it's a legitimate disease... Why not have the Caffeine-Induced Anxiety Disorder?? How about the Twinkie Defense when Dan White killed San Francisco Mayor George Moscone and city supervisor Harvey Milk? "I ate too much sugar and couldn't premeditate the crime." Uh-huh...Guess who profits from our habits turned addictions turned disease?? Drug companies... that's who...And all those advertisers who convince us that we need this or that... or this and that... in order to be happy...
Who has the power to transform our lives? We do... But we can give up the power... each and every moment... I know people who quite drinking from one day to the next... No AA, no therapy... just the choice... Maybe some of us have stronger will-power than others? Or maybe some of us just make poor choice ongoingly, never having been taught that we DO have a choice... all the time!!
Anneli makes a distinction between "I can't" and "I won't".... As in "I can't give up drinking"... Let's put you on a desert island and see whether it's "I can't"... She doesn't pull her punches this author... Maybe it's too much for some people... Makes sense to me though...
Anneli (the author) suggests the radical notion that addictions are not diseases... they are the result of poor choices... ongoing poor choices... When people say things like "I was drunk, I'm an alcoholic, I have a disease, I couldn't control myself"... they are basically abdicating all responsibility for their actions. They are saying that they are weak, powerless in the face of this habit. Anneli would say that's all it is... a habit... and a poor choice... The last in a long line of poor choices... Same with over-eating. Same with gambling. Same with video game playing. Same with overspending. Somewhere along the line, through repetivie behaviour, we've created a habit through choice and ended up calling it a disease...She says that these bad habits fill holes in our lives... in our souls... in our days...
What about admitting that we are spoiled, selfish, weak, lazy... Nah, that's too hard!! That makes us take too much of a look at ourselves! Better to foist it off of us onto something else... Yeah, let's call ourselves "sick"... we have a "disease"... so it's not our fault! Someone says they're a pedophile because they were abused and so it's not their fault. They have a sickness... Uh-huh... right...
They talk about Alcohol-Induced Anxiety Disorder... like it's a legitimate disease... Why not have the Caffeine-Induced Anxiety Disorder?? How about the Twinkie Defense when Dan White killed San Francisco Mayor George Moscone and city supervisor Harvey Milk? "I ate too much sugar and couldn't premeditate the crime." Uh-huh...Guess who profits from our habits turned addictions turned disease?? Drug companies... that's who...And all those advertisers who convince us that we need this or that... or this and that... in order to be happy...
Who has the power to transform our lives? We do... But we can give up the power... each and every moment... I know people who quite drinking from one day to the next... No AA, no therapy... just the choice... Maybe some of us have stronger will-power than others? Or maybe some of us just make poor choice ongoingly, never having been taught that we DO have a choice... all the time!!
Anneli makes a distinction between "I can't" and "I won't".... As in "I can't give up drinking"... Let's put you on a desert island and see whether it's "I can't"... She doesn't pull her punches this author... Maybe it's too much for some people... Makes sense to me though...
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Stuck... In the Present
Eh? How can we be stuck in the present??? Good question I thought! Well... the idea of instant gratification. The idea that we can have everything and anything... right NOW! Let's buy that car right NOW! Let's buy that house right NOW!... Never-mind that we don't have the resources or the cash. Let's just get another credit card right NOW... and worry about the consequences later... With no thought to the future... No thought to what the consequences might be. Let's just get drunk now... or binge eat now... or stop exercising now... Our kids are being raised in an era of instanteous gratification... We are teaching them to think that everything can come right NOW... with no effort... no fuss no muss no work... Go figure...
There's a show on Slice called "Till Debt do us Part" and it epitomizes the up and coming generation of urbanites who are stuck in the now. These couoples (mostly 20 or 30 somethings) are stuck in the present. They have all the gadgets and toys and are $60,000 in debt, overspending by $6000 each month. In 5 years, they will be $800,000 in debt! But in their myopic view of the "NOW"... they can't see that, until the host of the show rubs their noses in it and shows them the future...
Sure, sure... living in the present is a great thing for meditation... but if you don't plan your day or where your next meal will come from or how you'll heat your home this winter... you won't be in the present much... you'll be in the past (starved or frozen to death). Even Buddhist monks who live in the present/now, have neighbouring communities who plan for their future. You don't! So, don't abdicate your responsibility to create a future for yourself...
As a society, we live in an environmental NOW that is fast becoming something that is way past sustainability... If we keep ignoring the future to focus on the now... Well... take a look at the carrier pigeons, the do-do birds, the plains bison...
There's a show on Slice called "Till Debt do us Part" and it epitomizes the up and coming generation of urbanites who are stuck in the now. These couoples (mostly 20 or 30 somethings) are stuck in the present. They have all the gadgets and toys and are $60,000 in debt, overspending by $6000 each month. In 5 years, they will be $800,000 in debt! But in their myopic view of the "NOW"... they can't see that, until the host of the show rubs their noses in it and shows them the future...
Sure, sure... living in the present is a great thing for meditation... but if you don't plan your day or where your next meal will come from or how you'll heat your home this winter... you won't be in the present much... you'll be in the past (starved or frozen to death). Even Buddhist monks who live in the present/now, have neighbouring communities who plan for their future. You don't! So, don't abdicate your responsibility to create a future for yourself...
As a society, we live in an environmental NOW that is fast becoming something that is way past sustainability... If we keep ignoring the future to focus on the now... Well... take a look at the carrier pigeons, the do-do birds, the plains bison...
Saturday, May 1, 2010
Stuck... In the Past
In the present... and stuck in the past... always facing the past, filled with regrets and lingering doubts... or perhaps filled with nostalgia for a gone-by era, a golden time when things were so much better than they are now. All of that is stuck in the past...
We, as individuals can be stuck in the past, reliving past glories, reliving past shame, running back and forth between the past and the present... To the extent that we drag the past into the present and end up reliving the same moments over and over again. We become out of touch with the present, always looking at the world through "past-coloured" glasses, never seeing what is, but what was....
Cultures, groups, communities can be stuck in the past again. People in the church who long for the by-gone era of the Tridentine Mass... people who renact the age of the Vikings because they want to be warriors... People who think that hunter-gatherers from 20,000 years ago were the real utopia and we need to go back to that... All of them looking to the past for something that is gone, never to be recreated.
Where do you live your live? Longing for the past? Reliving the past? Shunning the past, but always turned towards it?
We, as individuals can be stuck in the past, reliving past glories, reliving past shame, running back and forth between the past and the present... To the extent that we drag the past into the present and end up reliving the same moments over and over again. We become out of touch with the present, always looking at the world through "past-coloured" glasses, never seeing what is, but what was....
Cultures, groups, communities can be stuck in the past again. People in the church who long for the by-gone era of the Tridentine Mass... people who renact the age of the Vikings because they want to be warriors... People who think that hunter-gatherers from 20,000 years ago were the real utopia and we need to go back to that... All of them looking to the past for something that is gone, never to be recreated.
Where do you live your live? Longing for the past? Reliving the past? Shunning the past, but always turned towards it?
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Stuck... A book
I was in Saskatoon the other week for a workshop and picked up a book at the airport to while away the hours before my flight. The book grabbed my attention both for it's title and it's cover photo... "Stuck: Why we can't (or won't) move on"And a bee stuck on a lollipop... Hmmm.... sounds kind of RTS'y... so let's give it a whirl! (cover photo from http://www.chapters.ca/... in case you're wondering!)
The premise of the book is simple... that we get stuck with things... or in things... There's only 6 chapters... Stuck in the Past, Stuck in the Present, Stuck on Habits, Stuck on Trauma, Stuck on Others, Stuck on Work. Hmm, that seems to cover a lot of people!! Some of us stuck on one thing... some of us stuck on more than one... and some of us stuck on all of them!
I guess the question the book invites us to look at is... what are you stuck with/on/in?? We're all stuck with something... What is it for you? I'm going to scamper through the 6 chapters in 6 blogs, just to give you a sense of what the book suggests... Take a look and see what you think!
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