We’ve talked about the self-defeating nature of our Shit Avoidance Strategies, especially over the long term. Not that they’re totally, 100% bad; they can even be life-savers! But long-term, Shit Avoidance doesn’t help us rise to the challenges of life, fix the problems we’re facing, accomplish our meaningful goals, or grow as a person. At…
Tag: psychology
135) From Shitty-ness to Well-ness, Part 14: FACT Exercise #1 — Focusing
I’ll never forget the first time I looked at the moon through a telescope. I was in my early 30s, and after having looked at the moon regularly for three decades, it was like I was seeing it for the first time. The vague spots my eyes could see on their own were now cliffs…
134) From Shitty-ness to Well-ness, Part 13: Avoiding the Shit
The key problem with working on our healing, and improving our lives, is that we don’t like to feel shitty. And it does feel shitty to face the shitty-ness of a sub-optimal way of living. Especially if you’ve lived that way for quite a while. Ugh. So, we turn away from that shit. Or more…
133) From Shitty-ness to Well-ness, Part 12: You are strong enough
(TW: Description of Torture) Although there’s no denying that life can be hard and people can be saddled with more problems than they can bear, the truth is that most of us are nowhere near to living up to our potential. We know, in some private recess of our consciousness, that if push came to…
132) From Shitty-ness to Well-ness, Part 11: FACT cares about your feelings
As we talked about in Part 10 (post #124), Rational Self Analysis centers on clarifying for yourself Who You Really Are. What do you love doing? What interests or fascinates you? What are your values? What would you like to be doing in, say, 3 years? There are tons of “Who You Really Are” exercises…
121) When you feel you’ve been turned into a newt
“Waking up this morning, I smile;24 brand new hours lay before me;I vow to live fully each moment,And to look at all beings with eyes of compassion.” — morning gatha; Thich Nhat Hanh * * * * * So, I started this practice about 20 years ago, after reading one of TNH’s books. The…
120) From Shitty-ness to Well-ness, Part 9: Healing, and the Doctrine of Original Awesomeness
The essence of all three approaches to healing that I am planning to cover is the same. It is rooted in what I have previously called the Doctrine of Original Awesomeness (https://dandolderman.org/2020/09/22/88-jordan-peterson-part-7-psychology-at-the-ending-of-the-world-subsection-2-the-doctrine-of-original-awesomeness/). This, in short, is the basic starting point of Humanism, and is increasingly recognized within the bio-psycho-social sciences as “the way we are”.…
119) From Shitty-ness to Well-ness, Part 8: Oops, I fucked up
I made a mistake in my last post, and it has caused me some consternation. More accurately — I made a mistake in my last post, and it has activated a set of sub-routines in my consciousness-program, or “parts of my self”, that function to erase me from existence. Yikes. What was this oh-so-terrible mistake? …
118) From Shitty-ness to Well-ness, Part 7: Resistance, the sneaky bastard
In this series on healing, we have been discussing the “problem” of resistance, and noting how people’s deeply internalized self-feelings and beliefs can be so strong, so reactive, so “resistive” that they are able to forestall, sabotage or otherwise prevent the person from truly walking the path to healing. In other words, far too often,…
116) Dealing with the Devil: Adventures in parenting, Part 4 — Role-play, kids, and personal growth
So, Siskenet had a pretty interesting discussion with a Lord of Evil eh? What fertile ground has been prepared! And seeded! Such rich soil, such abundant energy, for future conversations and questions about topics like power, compassion, maturation, stereotypes of masculinity, personal responsibility, and Lord (of Evil) knows what else! This is one of…