Category: Personal Growth Page 1 of 3

If you are into sci fi you will probably recognize the author of the book seen above. And if you are into Star Trek you will recognize the phrase “resistance is futile”. How do these two go together you might ask? Like a sci fi fan with books the one often influences others. You like sci fi, you read lots, and thus the lure of a new book, or two is irresistable and soon you have…a dozen or so. You will read them all, eventually, but then you may keep them around – just in case you want to re-read them (you may) or just to show off.

I encountered this attraction a couple days ago while cleaning out my late sister’s place. She had a bookshelf with records, paper files, and of course books. In her books there were about 10-15 books by Anne McCaffery, author of Pern and sequels/related stories. I started to be drawn to them, since it had been awhile since I had read any. Fortunately my niece cautioned me “just take one” and the spell was broken. I chose this one and brought it home since it was one I hadn’t read yet. That will help to limit the clutter in our place – we are trying to downsize.

“I was born in a library” I tell friends. My parents were both avid reader -my mom actually had a graduate degree in library science – and so we had several bookshelves filled with books in the house – a couple of which my dad actually built himself. My sisters and I grew up to be avid readers as well, ,and had collections wherever we lived. During one of the many moves my wife and I did we seriously downsized and most of the books went to charity. I also got converted to using Kindle and thus have my collection-still many books – stored virtually.

There are similar ways to store collections virtually and save space, but we need to also resist the urge to collect. My inbox and I-phone camera are stuffed with items I need to clear out – because ultimately virtual storage runs out and you still have to downsize. Plus constantly scrolling through your collection to find just the right item still wastes time.

Resistance is not futile. It just takes concentrated effort and purposeful key phrases to warn you to let go, or just not pick up in the first place. Massive amounts of “collections” don’t just magically appear. They are built one or two at a time, deceptively. Constant vigilance is important combined with periodic review to keep them at bay. If you think you don’t have this affliction I would urge you to today ponder moving and examine the mass of stuff you would need to pack. You might be surprised – you might be a packrat.

Catharsis- what is it and have you experienced it? Catharsis is the process of releasing and thereby providing relief from strong or repressed emotions – according to the Oxford Language dictionary. Sometimes we have emotions that we are not aware of until we are able to release them through actions. The above picture is representative of such. My eldest sister Sylvia passed away recently and I have the responsibility of dealing with her affairs – one of which has been learning out her home so it can be sold.

My brother-in-law Don was a packrat and hoarder big time and so there was a lot of stuff occupying most of the space in their double-wide mobile home. When I first got there the living room shown above was covered with stuff – almost every square foot, except for pathways through to the adjoining rooms. It has taken almost a week, split between two visits, to get it to this cleared state. My niece Mundee and her husband Franky came down yesterday and helped me finish it off – for which I am eternally grateful.\

There is much more to do but this was a great relief. When I first visited I was overwhelmed with the task. Seeing this room cleared eases some of that overwhelmedness and gives me hope that the rest will be able to be cleared in time.

Yesterday in my home Toastmasters club we had a storytelling time. One of the members shared a story from her childhood that was pretty traumatic and which she hadn’t felt comfortable telling very many people. She shared it with us and I thanked her for the trust she had in us to share it. I said it took great courage and the telling I hoped would be a cathartic experience for her.

Taking these two experiences into my mind reminded me not only of other experiences that I have had of catharsis, but also brought to mind a few other things that I need to do to in part go through a catharsis. I have had some technical issues that I have been handling with workarounds when I really need to bite the bullet and ask for help in fixing.

Sometimes we put up with stuff and cause ourselves needless angst because we are afraid of change or at least resistant to the efforts we need or think we need to take to fix problems once and for all. I heard someone say “problems don’t age well” and that is so true. I tend to procrastinate and yet whenever I dive into fixing a problem it usually turns out much easier to fix than I thought, and it feels so good to get it done. So if you have something you are resistant to tackle, just dive in and do it. It will be so satisfying.

Michaelangelo’s painting of the Sistine Chapel is well known and this is one of the most famous parts of it. But it has a surprise element that I don’t think many people have noticed – at least I had not. It is a painting of God reaching out to Adam, touching to spark life into him. But in the midst of the male cherub background there appear a woman underneath his outstretched other arm. There are many theories about what the painter was trying to convey but no one is really sure.

I would have not noticed it myself except for being able to see a reproduction of it, as well as many other panels, at an exhibition of the Sistine Chapel paintings held in Bellevue this past week. My wife and I went to see it and listened to the audio clips describing the paintings and giving background notes on each. They were very informative. And there was also a video showing continuously that told the story of what Michaelangelo went through during the 4 year process of completing the work.

Sometimes we become so familiar with things that we fail to appreciate the complexities. Often it takes a novice to enlighten us veterans. If we can take a step back and see the world as a child, with their seemingly never ending “why’s?” maybe we may discover the full meaning of life and appreciate it more.

Have you ever felt your life is on autopilot, void of conscious thought? Little things like what you eat and how you eat become automatic processes – with little choice – you eat it because it is there? I grew up with parents who lived through the Great Depression and had experienced the lack of food or lack of variety at least – having experienced food rationing. We, therefore, had two strict mealtime rules: You had to take at least a little bit of everything on the table and finish everything on your plate before you could have dessert. And I recall many meals where I was at the table long finishing off my plate because I wanted dessert.

Most of the food served up by my mom was good – I loved most every vegetable and I wasn’t a picky eater. But I remember to this day the foods that I loathed – the ones that I took a tiny bite of and suffered through because either mom or dad (or both) liked them and would serve them occasionally. I have tried these later on in life just to see if my grownup tastes had changed—no such luck. And as a kid, I knew on the first bite I knew my taste buds would rebel.

Sometimes it was the way they were presented. I love carrots, sweet and crunchy. But cook them and the appeal goes away. I once told my mom that I liked my veggies fresh. She reminded me that cooked ones were just as fresh and that the correct term for what I liked was raw. Yep, that’s how I liked them. That is why when I nuked the package above I took any carrots out and tossed them. I am no longer a child and I get to pick what I eat.

It took my sisters and me years to overcome the “finish everything on your plate” mantra. My parents meant well, but in practical terms, that mindset can lead to overeating. Better to stop when you feel full, and learn to take less next time, than to push on and overeat. And if you take something and don’t like it, don’t finish it. Your taste buds will keep seeking out something to satisfy and the stuff you ate out of obligation will just be empty calories that you don’t need.

The same is true for other habits of thinking. Like believing something just because some “authority” said it was true. God gave you a mind – use it. Check original sources and examine the rationale of opinions. Research the history of the subject and check for the missing pieces. It is said that history is written by the victors, so take time to examine the history of those who didn’t win, or were left behind or hidden. Are they worthy of mention?

Don’t let your mind and heart go on autopilot. There are plenty of holes in our history. Many marginalized groups have been ignored. Their history is important as well. For those in the US beware of American myths and legends – especially concerning our Founding Fathers and the slogans we repeat – like “Remember the Alamo”, “Remember the Maine”, and “Manifest Destiny”. If those don’t spur counter-narratives in your mind, please consider investigating.

If you don’t like the taste of something throw it out. It doesn’t make a difference if everyone else likes it. Your taste buds are key to what you should be eating. And if you are the only one you know who has a counter-narrative to some part of history, or thinks in a different way,, it doesn’t matter what others may say or think. Stand up for what you believe – just be ready to give a reason why.

Planning your life and your days takes time and careful thought. One of the very popular ways to do this involves making and completing to do lists. But many people have trouble completing more than just a few items each day and find it frustrating. They ask themselves questions – like “what am I doing wrong?”, “how do I figure out what to do first?”, “who do I need to connect with who can help me?”. They may ask “when is the best time to start on each item?”, and perhaps even “where did I put that darn list?” But they don’t ask the most important question -“why?”

Now it is important to have all the necessary tools and information. It is important to gauge the varying levels of priorities. It is vital to know the prerequisites that provide support for each task and to identify the first steps and timelines for completion. But if you don’t have a firm grip on why you are doing these tasks you will lack motivation to tackle them.

Are they necessary to survival and smooth society functioning – like shopping for groceries, paying bills, or keeping a job? Have they been recommended by others to help you function and succeed? Are they things that you feel obligated to do? Or are they things that you really want to do? And do you have a clear idea of why you want to do them?

Many times we write stuff down with no intention of completion. We feel obligation but not desire. Like going to a gathering when we would rather just sit at home. Many people believe that exercise is needed for good health, but do everything to avoid it. Better nutrition is admirable but junk food is much easier and comfortable. Unless we have a good internal motivation we will falter on guilt trips.

So, along with the timeframe, priority, and first steps we need to identify a “why” for each tasks to add umph to our efforts and propel us to action. The way to do that is to identify your ‘why?” Why do you do the things you do in the way that you do them? The identification of an overall reason for your way of life can set the stage for identifying the why’s of your to do tasks.

For me that was begun way back in my first speech, my icebreaker, in Toastmasters nine years ago. In the icebreaker speech a member introduces themselves to the club and details how they want to be understood and viewed by the other members. “This is me” it says. For my speech I said there were three characteristics ,three words, that define me and describe what I do. Exploring, experimenting, and expressing.

I love to explore. Nature, history, cooking, everything is fair game for me. I take bunny trails, try new foods, read books on all sorts of subjects. It is who I am. I love to experiment. I was a chemistry major and had a little chemistry set as a kid. I would put things together just to see what happened. I started cooking and I did the same thing. Sometimes I would alter recipes, sometimes I would cook without a recipe, using the processes I had learned. And I love to express myself, in speech, in music, and in writing. It is who I am.

And then over the years I have used these realizations to come up with a “why” for what I do. I boiled it down to this: I want to inspire others to explore, experiment, and express their discoveries, their personalities, and their values, so that together we can make this world a better place. I realize that this is my motivation. I am not motivated by money, though it is important for keeping body and soul together. I am not motivated by power, though I enjoy being the freedom to direct and guide the progress of programs.

I am not motivated by what some people might see as success. In the Toastmaster world I have heard successful contest speakers talk about doing speeches over and over again, in front of differing audiences to practice and get feedback in order to advance. I have heard them talk about doing the same speech 50-100 times. And I while I can see that has helped them, it has no appeal for me. I have repeated speeches a few times, and enjoy the varied reactions of different audiences, but even 10-20 times over the same speech would be too much for me. The reward of a prize is not enough for me.

When I speak the reward I seek is the light in the eyes of the listener who gets the message, who says “now I understand’, “I never thought of it that way before”, or “you mean I’m not the only one who feels that way?”. I speak to motivate, to cause a ripple in the pond, to expand my influence, to help make this a better world. That is reward enough for me.

And taking that overall “why” into consideration I can apply that to my to do list and ask myself why each of the tasks are listed. That motivates me to do them because they fit into my why for life. And it can help me to eliminate items that don’t relate.

As Simon Sinek wrote in his book Start With Why people don’t buy things from a company because of what they make, or how they make them, but why they make the products they do. In the same way he says people will listen to us not because of what we say or do, or how we say or do, but of why we say and do the things we do.

The early bird gets the worm, so the saying goes. But there are better rewards for early bird humans than worms. Like these sunrise views that I captured on my walk this morning. It was pretty foggy when I went walking the Spencer Island trail north of Everett. It was early enough that sunrise didn’t come until I was halfway through my walk. I was able to spot the rising sun through the trees in the shot above.

A little bit further I came upon a view looking out across the island, with the wildlife viewing platform in the foreground and got the sunrise again, in the photo below.

And then as I was making my way through the grass-braketed pathway to the far side of the island I got this shot below. I was trying to emphasize that sometimes you just make it through because you know you have walked this way before even when you can’t see the path. You have to trust that the path is there and focus on the goal ahead – in this case emphasized by that glowing red globe in the sky.

It is important not only to “keep your eye on the prize”, but also to be in the right place for the opportunities to be there to take advantage of – like getting good sunrise shots. I get them because I like to get up early. You might find it worth your while to get up early sometime, even if the rest of the time you enjoy sleeping in.