Archives for posts with tag: we’re all in this together
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »

Seriously? You Could Do Better

March 16, 2018 //
1

Couldn’t we all do better? A bit? Give that some thought. Are you really the person you most want to be? Every day?

I am feeling frustrated with humanity, generally, and it pivots on competing memes, the willful stupidity of human beings defending pet ideologies, and the unavoidable truth that every damned one of us has some pretty fucking hateful moments, and lugs around some pretty vile baggage. I’m mostly quite done with every damned body pointing at the other guy with criticism about hate, seemingly unaware that they, themselves, have some similarly hateful moments.

Fuck, people, look in the god damned mirror.

I’m not making this point unaware that I am, myself, quite human. On the contrary, I am frustrated and puzzled by some basic confounds in my own thinking. I am concerned about implicit biases I am likely wandering around with, that may inform my decision-making in a fairly stupid way. I worry that things I think I “know” are not well-grounded in fact, to the point that I am regularly seeking proof that I am wrong. (Because, frankly, finding out I am wrong is the only shot at correcting poor quality reasoning – I don’t give fuck-all for being right, and it isn’t helpful to “know” that I am, when it comes up.)

What’s specifically giving me metaphysical indigestion this morning is the head-on conflict between posts/memes/commentary suggesting that “gun control is not the answer –  be kind to lonely kids!” is The One True Way, and the other batch retorting “don’t suggest anyone else is responsible for violence except the sociopaths committing it – you could be encouraging vulnerable kids to become entangled with sociopaths!” because setting good boundaries is The One True Way. Fucking hell – are we all really that stupid? Is it not 100% entirely obvious that this is a false dichotomy? That the jigsaw puzzle of American violence is a tad more nuanced than that? Fuck your overly simplistic idiocy. So done with that kind of simple-minded horse-shit.

It matters how we treat people. It matters what we accept, as a culture, with regard to how people treat each other. It matters when we frame the discussion in terms of the value of one group of lives or another, or the worth of one individual or another. It matters how we talk about – and how we prosecute – violence. Yes, when we let domestic violence crimes go unnoticed, undiscussed, and unprosecuted, we build a culture in which some children grow up thinking their anger (an emotion, nothing more) has more value than the actual lives of others. We created that scenario as a culture, as a society. We deepen it when we devalue women, people of color, and other vulnerable populations. When we foster rape culture, and suggest in our institutions and laws, that how women dress or behave is somehow righteous justification for another human being’s lack of self-control over their use of sexual behaviors, we defend violence over “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”. We are at fault for the culture that exists.

Does that mean we are also accountable, individually, for the individual acts of violence of other individuals? Nope. We are each responsible for our own actions… including those actions that foster a culture of violence. So. Yeah. It’s not us vs. them. It’s not as simple as a single choice between two clear options. It’s about actually fucking being aware of the consequences of our actions, and of our institutions and laws, and we are responsible for the society we create. We built this. Stop acting fucking surprised. Fucking fix it.

Fuck, I am so angry about this. Just do better, damn. How fucking hard is that?

What are you going to do to make this a better country to live in for everyone who lives in it? (Yes, including people who are incarcerated, people who are poor, people who are undocumented – have you read some of what they are put through? Every.Damned.Day. “Inhumane” doesn’t begin to describe it, and that’s really not okay.)

I know what I’m going to do. I’m going to do better. Just that. Something. Each day, today too, I am going to put my will and my actions toward being a somewhat better human being than I was yesterday. And again tomorrow. Then again the day after that. I will spend a lifetime working towards being the woman I most want to be, building the world I most want to live in. Tearing down the bullshit and baggage I learned growing up, or later on, or built myself. No excuses. I can do better.

It’s time to begin again.

Tags , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Categories anger, Free Will, Frustration, grief, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, loneliness, Love, Mindfulness, more than a little bit of bitching, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Rape, Relationships, The Art of Being, The Big 5, War and News of War, Words

Don’t Be Bamboozled

January 20, 2017 //
1

It’s the day. The majority of Americans are dreading it (the actual mathematical majority of voting citizens). Today I’ll commute through throngs of Portlanders making their voices here in public spaces, and finding solidarity in outrage and anger. I’ll be focused on getting to and from work today. I’m no less outraged, no less concerned about our future, and I am also taking action. I’ve chosen different actions, for myself.

I’ll be phoning and writing to Congress. I’ve got a couple handy links:

http://www.house.gov/representatives/

https://www.senate.gov/

Postcards are inexpensive, and have the added value of making their message clear to all who handle them. In an age of tweets and texts and slogans, keeping it brief also has the advantage of being something that can be read at a glance. Short, powerful statements uncomplicated by rhetoric, written at roughly a 4th grade level will be the win on postcards. Instead of a long detailed letter seeking to persuade, giving ideas the ‘ad slogan’ treatment and getting as many into the mail as possible is the idea. I mean, I could write something long, insightful, honest, vulnerable, and real about why I personally don’t want to see the minimum retirement age for Social Security raised… I mean… holy shit, I so don’t want to still be having to work for a living when I’m fucking 70!!! Instead of 5 pages that won’t get read, I’ll go with something like “Lower the Retirement Age for the Well-being of Seniors!”, and other postcards that say “Remove the Income Cap on Social Security Withholdings; Everyone Pays, Everyone Wins”… And I’ll just keep at it. For four years. Longer.

Anyway. You have your own path to walk, your own voice to raise, your own concerns to share and to act on. Do it. There are verbs involved. Find your way. If everyone takes just one action and makes it their own, with commitment, and reliably beginning again – and again – whenever they feel beat down. Well… change is. Making change is where the power is.

My day-to-day writing isn’t about American politics, or even American life. Certainly it isn’t about our crap-tacular failure as a culture to take care of our citizens in a civilized way, or how ruinously stupid and corrupt our government appears to be becoming, so I won’t bitch about it much. It’s scary, though, isn’t it?

Today is a good day to be the change.

Tags , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Categories Anxiety, Free Will, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, more than a little bit of bitching, Perspective, The Art of Being, War and News of War, Words

What Are You Doing About It?

January 7, 2017 //
0

Some mornings, particularly on weekends, I sip my coffee and catch up on the news of the world and my Facebook feed before I settle down to write. On those mornings, I also fight “taking the bait” and I do battle with invisible forces hoping to leverage the power of outrage to get my attention, and others hoping to get their hands on whatever loose change may be laying about. I’m getting better at maintaining some balance in the face of emotional triggers of all sorts as I scroll through images and words.

The need to build more resistance to emotional manipulation, for me, is pretty serious. My injury and my PTSD tend to result in a level of emotionality generally (the TBI) and volatility (the PTSD) that can make me very susceptible to emotional manipulation, emotionally evocative language and images, and it has been difficult to manage over the years. If I’m being honest, I can’t say that I “managed” it all all, with any skill or noticeable success until I started practicing mindfulness – and omg, do I ever need practice, like, all the time, every day. So human. I learned a lot about how far I’ve come, during this past election year, and I also learned a lot about how far I’ve yet to go. So… I keep practicing. I keep finding my way along life’s journey, one step at a time. The news thing is tricky; I love to read, I consume content at a high rate, I love language… and I’m a highly emotional reasoning being. I needed something helpful to rely on…

I ask myself questions that seem to help sort it all out (for me).

  1. Does this matter more to me than it did when I read the last article about this? If so, am I merely having an expected reaction to repetition?
  2. Can I verify it is 100% utterly legit, fact-checked, references cited, real no bullshit data or information?
  3. Who profits from this? (…and what does that say about the content?)
  4. Is the content original? (If it’s creator content reshared/reposted, is the creator credited?)
  5. What is my purpose in sharing this? Is it necessary?
  6. What am I going to do about it? (If this is action-worthy at all, why not just take action and share that in my own words?)

I think, generally, most of my friends also read the news – no need for me to share it to ensure they hear the latest from the same mainstream sources most of us are reading. It’s redundant – which means it is repetitive, which results in higher believability whether it has a shred of truth or not. Not helpful. If I’m angry about it – do I actually want to share that experience?  If I feel moved to share content solely on the basis of seeking “solidarity”, sharing the experience of being outraged or angry, or looking for community… wouldn’t it make so much more sense to reach out to friends directly, human being to human being, get together over a coffee, or hang out together, and really talk, really share? Sure, we’re all in this together… but using Facebook to reprogram our culture seems to be taking us all to some very strange and fairly ugly places.

I’ve gotten sucked into Facebook time and again, and wasted hours of precious limited lifetime – not connecting with friends and deepening those relationships, either, just reading the news, reading memes, scrolling through duplications and repeats, and generally filling my consciousness with the cognitive equivalent of junk food. I’ve added to the noise, reposting articles that evoke an emotional reaction without closely examining why, or even whether the content is highly accurate, and unbiased. You know what it got me? What it got all of us? The 2016 election outcome. That event has really changed my thinking about what purpose Facebook serves in my experience – and what it can do, and how it affects my quality of life, generally, as an application – because that’s all it is. It’s an app. It’s up to me to use it well, and use it wisely, and be mindful of the results I see, and the consequences of my actions.

Facebook – another opportunity to be mindful. Who knew? 🙂

I’ll hop down off my soapbox. It’s a gray, cold, wintry Saturday morning. WordPress notes that it’s been 4 years here, sharing, practicing, walking my own mile. My coffee is done. The morning has begun. Thanks for being here.

Today is a good day to live life in real-time, with real people, in physical space. I think I’ll go do that. 🙂

Tags , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Fiction, Free Will, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Mindfulness, more than a little bit of bitching, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, The Art of Being, War and News of War, weight loss secrets, winter, Words

How Far Does This Road Go?

October 19, 2016 //
0

It’s an odd sort of morning following a somewhat peculiar evening. It was a pleasant evening, and it is a pleasant morning. It would be easy to lose sight of how pleasant it is to focus on the oddity. The pleasantness, for me, is more important.

Evenings are quite short these days, a common experience for people who work and commute some distance. I arrived home about an hour earlier than usual, yesterday, which is enough time to make a difference. I enjoyed a bite of dinner, and meditation, and was headed to the shower when my traveling partner arrived. A whirlwind of greetings, moments, departures, and arrivals later, and the apartment was full of people, laughing, talking – it’s fairly easy to find a party breaking out at my place when both my traveling partner and I are at home; we two enjoy both company and solitude, and if we’re already together (and thus not alone) it’s a handy time to get other friends together, too. Parties happen. 🙂

I sip my coffee and for some moments think about far away friends, and long for their company, too. Magical thinking could intervene here, and leave me feeling lonely, or annoyed, or even inappropriately “abandoned”, or sad over what is not. It’s a choice, and I choose not to head down that spiral. I cherish my far away friends over my coffee, smiling with grateful delight at technology like Facebook, that so easily keeps us all in touch over the years. Any perceived distance melts away like morning fog as the sun rises, when we get together again. In the meantime, there are pictures of life, of new babies, of dance recitals, of fun and adventure, of love – all shared with affection, preserving a long-distance connection.

"Long Distance Connection" 18" x 24" acrylic on canvas w/glow, 2010

“Long Distance Connection” 18″ x 24″ acrylic on canvas w/glow, 2010

Last night I crashed pretty early, and the party moved next door out of respect for my working hours and early mornings. I actually slept well and deeply. I woke with the alarm, feeling comfortable in my body, content with the woman in the mirror, and ready to start a new day. No noteworthy pain – so I make a point of noticing the lack, and making that, itself, noteworthy by being aware of how good I feel right now, savoring it, lingering over it, enjoying it without any dismissive internal commentary. I take time to be okay with being okay. Being miserable can become a very bad habit; we become what we practice.

I sit quietly, sipping my coffee, living my life gently, feeling contented. It’s a lovely start to a work day. I think about the  years and years I didn’t start my days this way, and then the years that I tried… and tried… and tried… and often found some delicate fragile moment of contentment or delight would skid unexpectedly sideways off life’s highway, leaving me stranded in tears by the side of the road, unaware that I only needed to dust my self off and walk on. There are so many choices, and so much of my experience is in my own hands. It can be daunting. Then, too, there’s all that “positivity” stuff out there, and “faking it until you make it” encouragement; those things didn’t work for me at all. Authenticity is demanding, and some of the moments of a life well-lived are… challenging? Unpleasant. Some of life’s moments are frankly awful. Still… I couldn’t force positivity down my own throat, and no amount of repeating scripted affirmations or pasting fake smiles on my face got me anywhere. I gave up, and in giving up felt even worse about myself and my circumstances.

I tend to be a very positive person these days – but I didn’t start here, and getting here wasn’t the goal. I started with taking better care of myself (physically and emotionally), and took up practices that supported my wellness, and nudged me gently towards my long-term goals by improving my self-care, my awareness, and my willful actions, over time. I suppose someone could respond that they feel like a screaming spoiled toddler, and if they are (mis)behaving it is merely an expression of their authentic self… I guess that’s where having a conscious awareness of my values is helpful for me; I don’t think to justify bad behavior on the basis of “authenticity” – because that isn’t the woman I most want to be. I don’t find myself having to “fake it” – I do find that choices are necessary, and there are verbs involved. I begin again, regularly. When I fuck up and hurt someone, I apologize sincerely and without reservations or excuses.

It’s been a long while since I had some terrible meltdown. I take a moment to appreciate that – because, honestly, realistically, and being so very human? This too shall pass. 🙂 It’s likely that sometime in my future I will be frustrated, or angry, or childishly disappointed, and I will have to deal with it appropriately.  I may hurt someone’s feelings and have to apologize. I’ll be wrong about some things. I’ll fail at some others in spite of trying. I may kick myself while I’m down, or revert to a bad habit unexpectedly. Still… we become what we practice. I’ll begin again. Over time, in small sometimes hardly noticeable increments, change will occur.

We do become what we practice. I stopped practicing having relentless temper tantrums and yielding to primitive frustrated rage – but not by “quitting”; I began practicing something different. That’s my own version of “positivity”. More a doing than an undoing. For me, it started with the most basic mindfulness practices, a few minutes each day for myself that I could really count on, and the will to begin again day after day, as if my life depended on it. (From my perspective, it very much did.) My reading list is built on the resources that got me here, now. I can share titles of books forever, and perhaps you even read them – but without the verbs, the practicing of practices, and the will to begin again, they’re only books filled with mere words. Just saying.

My coffee has gone cold. It’s almost time to head to the office. I’m still smiling. Life feels different than it did three years ago, in a number of very good ways. We become what we practice. My results vary – but I can begin again, often. Today is a good day to practice. Who will you choose to become? 🙂

Tags , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Categories Art, art and the artist, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Art of Being

Let It Rain!

December 11, 2015 //
0

I am home from work, the week is over, and it’s been raining for a couple of days now. I’m okay with that; I like rain. The house is quiet, and for now the only music are the background sounds: of rain on the roof, on the pavement outside, and on the flue and vent covers overhead, and of the tickety-tickety of my fingers on the keyboard. Dinner is heating up in the oven, nothing fancy – leftover casserole. I am tired. Relaxed. Content. Happy enough just to listen to the rain fall. In fact… happy.

I enjoyed a few minutes on the phone with my traveling partner. My dear love knows me well, and the laughs, inside jokes, and tender words were a lovely way to draw a clear line between the work day, and the weekend on an evening we won’t see each other. Tonight, in some way I don’t really know how to describe, I feel very much at home. It doesn’t much matter why, does it? This moment is simply a way station on some much longer journey, and I won’t count on this soft sensation of contentment and joy to linger indefinitely. I am here, now. I love, and I am loved in return.

Tonight, that’s enough.

The sound of rain, the feeling of home.

The sound of rain, the feeling of home.

Tags , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Categories autumn, Brain Injury, Free Will, gardening, Healthy Living, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Art of Being, The Big 5, winter, women, Words
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »