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About This Author
My name is Joy, and I love to write.
Why poetry, here? Because poetry uplifts its writer, and if she is lucky enough, her readers, too. Around us, so many objects abound to write about. Once a poet starts with a smallest, most trivial object, he shall discover that his pen will spill out what is most delicate or most majestic hidden inside him. Since the classics sometimes dealt with lofty subjects with a lofty language, a person with poetry in his soul may incline to emulate that. That is understandable. Poetry does that to a person: it enlarges the soul and gives it wings. Yet, to really soar, a poet needs to take off from the ground.
 
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Everyday Canvas
"Failure is unimportant. It takes courage to make a fool of yourself."
CHARLIE CHAPLIN
Sometimes it takes darkness and the sweet
confinement of your aloneness
to learn
anything or anyone
that does not bring you alive
is too small for you.
David Whyte
This is my supplementary blog in which I will post entries written for prompts.
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Prompt: What are the best last words ever? Like for instance Rhett Butler's priceless last words to Scarlett O'Hara. "Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn!" Share with us the ones that left a lingering impression with you.
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I don't know and can't judge what the best last words ever are, but here are a few that have impressed me.
Let’s begin with good old Leonardo da Vinci. “I have offended God and mankind because my work did not reach the quality it should have.” Modesty? Wow! But then, don’t we all wish to have done a lot more?
The same sentiment is reflected by Cecil John Rhodes, the British businessman in South Africa: "So little done, so much to do."
Groucho Marx: “This is no way to live!” He had to be funny even at last breath. No way anyone can top his good sense of humor.
Emily Dickinson: “I must go in, for the fog is rising.” I keep wondering what she was experiencing. Was it visual or was it again her way of wording everything?
Then another one I wonder about what it was he was experiencing is Steve Jobs. According to his sister, he exclaimed: "Oh wow. Oh wow. Oh wow."
I hope I get to say the same thing: "Oh wow. Oh wow. Oh wow." I surmise, however, that I’ll say: “Writing.com…sorry to leave you!”
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Prompt: Have you had any bad experiences with gardening or planting flowers? Let's talk about them.
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I planted extensively when we lived up north. The only bad experience came when I had to clear some bushes, which I didn’t know were poison ivy. After that, nothing bad happened, and I was touted as having a green thumb, since those bushes I had warred with had cultivated a first-rate quality of soil. I had a high-volume productive vegetable garden there and another rose garden with 55 rose bushes. I even had a rose tree, on which I had grafted five different roses. It was a delight to see different roses on one huge bush.
Some bad experiences did happen in Florida, to whose flora and fauna I wasn’t accustomed in the beginning. As a result, I narrowed my gardening into pot gardening, which needed constant attention due to the crankily hot weather, and that kind of attention, I wasn’t there to give because we had been traveling constantly until the last five years or so. I still have a measly few pots of plants, but I am not finding the same northern enthusiasm in me, anymore. This might be for the better. After all, who needs to fight the elements in old age!
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Prompt: "Flowers are the alphabet of angels, whereby they write on the hills and fields mysterious truths." Benjamin Franklin This is beautiful. What are your views on this?
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Beautiful, yes. At least, beautifully said. Much better than the generic, ‘flowers are nice.’
Referred to any old way, angelic or not, flowers cast their perfume and radiance over us wherever they show up. They may sway wildly in the breeze raising their heads from the cracks in the stones or they may stretch like royalty in cultivated beds.
Their "mysterious truths" must have something to do with offering consolation and delight as well as generating a great respect for the Higher Power's skills of creation. Who wouldn’t want to stroll among the flowers and dream of the splendor of everything nice and meaningful? (“Tiptoe through the tulips” is teasing my mind now and it might stick through the rest of the day.  )
If flowers could walk, they would rush near and wrap us in their arms to ease our fatigue, but like all things lovely, they expect us to go to them, to grow and take care of them, so in return, they can adorn our lives and make our survival on this planet more enjoyable.
just when you thought
you were remote, standoffish
I moved closer
and you greeted me
with a luminous burst of colors
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Prompt: Albert Einstein’s formula for success is: “If A is a success in life, then A equals x plus y plus z. Work is x; y is play; and z is keeping your mouth shut.”
What is your formula or what does success mean to you?
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I don’t know if I have the exact formula for success, but success, to me, is to keep going regardless of what has happened to a person, what he or she has left behind, has lost, or has won. The tenacity to continue living as well as he or she can makes anyone a person of value.
Then, being true to one’s self is another asset in success. By that, I mean being original rather than being the imitation of someone else.
Shining a light into other lives is also important. This doesn’t necessarily mean traveling halfway over the world for to feed the hungry in some downtrodden continent. To me, it means doing the best one can from where one stands. One can shine a light into other lives by helping others overcome difficulties, physical, material, emotional, or social. Even an eager ear to listen to troubles or an encouraging phrase every now and then can brighten up someone else’s life.
Keeping a smile on one’s face, being thankful for what one has and for what one is able to achieve, seeing things from the best angle, and not fearing difficulties are important, too. A happy face goes together with a happy, loving heart and an enthusiastic personality.
In addition, rising over difficulties and even successes without paying them too much importance makes for a successful life.
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Prompt: What are the most unbelievable things in the books you read, excluding the genres' normally accepted style, form, or content? In other words, what made you doubt the writer’s literary sanity and know-how? If you wish, you might give examples from the books you’ve read.
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My first and foremost pet peeve has to do with serial novels. It is my understanding that each story has to have a central conflict, which needs to be solved by the end of the book. Good serial writers, always, take care of the central conflict in a book, so the story feels finished to the reader. Leaving an untied string of a subplot or a problem with another character to be taken on in the next book is perfectly acceptable. What really gets me is the writer who stops the main story in the middle without bringing to the conclusion its central problem. This is usually done with the sales in mind, which turns me off so much that I have put such authors on my do-not-read list.
My second pet peeve is the false reasoning behind an event or the inane, unexplained, shocking twist in a story or inside a character that doesn’t make any sense or most endings of Deus Ex Machina. I have no problem with twists and turns, but they have to be explained and they should show good or at least good enough reasons behind them. Here is an excerpt from one of my reviews for a novel centered around a family secret, although in this novel, the characterization was quite good: “Throughout the story, however, I hoped the author would come up with a more satisfactory conclusion of what she offered the reader as a family secret. It wasn't so; the secret failed to be a secret.”
My third pet peeve is the tear-jerker melodramas and senseless romances with no real story to them. This excerpt is from one of my book reviews. Without giving away the title or the author of the book, here it is: “In a one-room schoolhouse, a young girl (high school age) falls in love with a boy, who is superior in Algebra plus logic and thinking, but this boy has a deadly disease. They fall in love and the boy dies. What? Where is the conflict in this one?
So it is a tear-jerker, and the writing and prose are good, but where's the story? All forty-some reviews on Amazon have given it five stars with only one four-star review. Doesn't anyone care about story construction?”
Then, concerning the writer’s literary sanity, there was this debut novel that had so many holes in its construction that it felt like a first draft. Still, in my Amazon review of four years ago, because she was a new writer, I gave it three stars, which made the author see red. All her five-star donors were from her church who buzzed over my review. This writer got so upset that I deleted my review from Amazon, although not from WdC. Even then, she began stalking me online. To this day, she is among my followers (!) on FB; what her intentions are is a puzzle. Here is an excerpt from my review:
“And there are many secrets in the book. W's mother's actions for example. Well, she is not his real mother, and she hates everybody. Plus, she does all sorts of nasty things to people. This is explained in the last chapter as her having Alzheimer's for twenty years that no one knew about. This explanation felt like a last-minute cop-out to me.
Then there's the unfinished sub-storyline about L's once-upon-a-time girlfriend who shows up in town with two small children who look like they are L's, but that storyline is cut as is. The author explains at the end of the book that L's story will be the second book in the series. I felt, too much information was given here to leave this sub-story--which was deeply attached to the main plot--dangling.
Then there's the main character's unexplained mental condition. Her phobias, her panic attacks do not have a basis. As she had a perfectly happy childhood with model parents, how did she develop these abnormalities?
With holes left in its construction, this novel felt underdone to me.”
I usually take it easy on authors, especially the newbie authors, and I am generous with the stars. Yet, as a reader, I expect a lot from a book on which I have spent time and money.
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April 24, 2016 at 12:36am April 24, 2016 at 12:36am
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Prompt: If you had the power to wish books out of print, movies out of theatres, or television programming would you ever use it? Why or Why not? What are the risks if that door was opened?
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I would never do that or even want to do that because it would be against our freedom of speech that we hold so dear, as it should be and as it is declared in the first amendment. Not only for the things I want and like but also I must stand up for the stuff I don’t like, as well, because when it comes to the stuff I like and no one defends my right to it, it means not only mine but all our rights as to speech and thought have been snuffed out. What we must always keep in mind is that, in any oppressive regime, the freedom of speech is the first to be obliterated. As Benjamin Franklin said in his writings, “Whoever would overthrow the liberty of a nation must begin by subduing the freeness of speech.”
All censuring and condemnation of any of the arts usually starts slow and grows bigger and bigger, until the writers, journalists, artists of visual and stage arts can no longer exist as free thinkers.
On the other hand, I would encourage the makers of such programs to give as much information as they can for their products before they sell tickets for those works so their audience does not feel insulted if the product hurts their beliefs or feelings.
For example, I like what we are doing here in WdC by rating the items and enforcing their correct ratings. Even here, there isn’t a further rating after XGC, and there are instances which the item might be totally deleted for the highly dangerous and perverted subject matter that might go over XGC; ]the reason for that is, the site is open to 13+ year-olds, but I don’t believe any WdC member would go for such stuff, anyhow. In addition, this rarely if ever has happened or happens.
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April 22, 2016 at 12:54pm April 22, 2016 at 12:54pm
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This seems to be a very controversial issue here in the states, I've included a link for you that do no see the craziness in our news.
http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/fights-break-out-over-first-gender-neutral-bath...
What are your thoughts about this occurrence? Do you agree or disagree?
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I have never understood our multidimensional hangups over the area between our waists and on top of our legs. Still, in general, I stay away from ruffling any feathers, but since the question is asked, this is what I think.
When we visit a friend in their home, do we ask for a male or female bathroom, if need be? Then in our own homes, aren’t the bathrooms unisex? Then, why the controversy?
Because I have talked about this inane argument thus far, I would also like to add something that always bothered me. Why do they have open urinals in men’s restrooms? Put everything inside stalls with good doors and walls extending to the ground, and everyone will be okay. Then all bathrooms can be unisex, and the sexual orientation problems we have created in our thinking regarding restrooms will be totally done away with.
I would especially have liked this when I was raising boys and had to do shopping with them. I felt insecure letting a six or eight-year-old alone into a men’s restroom, especially in a not-too-crowded one. Yet, when I took them to women’s, the other women looked at me and some even said nasty things as if I took a scimitar to their private parts. Why are we so inhibited in our thinking? It is elimination, after all. |
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Prompt by Megan: Victoria Winters just arrived in Collinsport, Maine. "How does one get to town? she asked. "Broomsticks and unicorns. Welcome Miss Winters to the beginning and end of the world." Burke Devlin Dark Shadows {If you ever watched Dark Shadows, you get this!}
With this in mind, write about the past or somewhere where this may be the case. You can do a fantasy story, poem or whatever you want. Have fun!
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Dark Shadows was a spooky, eerie soap with awkward pauses, bloopers, and made-up, on the spot lines, due to the archaic TV technology of the late sixties. For all that, it felt like live theater from its beginning to the time I stopped watching it.
As for the prompt, I have to ask Burke Devlin, "Is beginning the end or is the end a beginning?" You can only get this, the answer I mean, if you are a nanny who grew up in a foundling home and ended up in a small fishing town in Maine. Poor Maine...One of my favorite states and you have to get there on broomsticks or unicorns!
My pick would be broomsticks since I am quite experienced with those. And the Collins Port Inn coffee shop? If you go there, make sure you skip any coffee drinking. Who knows who put what in that coffee! The beer, however, may be good at the Blue Whale, especially if you are a beer drinker, but be a dark-beer drinker because over there in that town of Collins Port, everything is dark, even more than dark. It is pitch black.
Still, the beginning few months only hinted at the darkness, in comparison to what came later with vampires and caskets and all. I remember feeling bad for Barnabas Collins at first. How could I know into what he would turn later! I also recall the secretive Elizabeth Collins Stoddard, the mistress of Collinwood and her brother the cad Roger who once panicked and gripped his sherry glass so tight that it shattered, making me jump in my seat and wake up my baby son who had dozed off in my arms.
This was why. I was watching the soap while my colicky baby needed to be held during the day. Luckily, his colic didn’t last more than the first four months of the soap. I only remember a scene or two, but I liked the dark, gothic atmosphere of it in the beginning. Later on, when I could take a peek, the story had tumbled down into such an excessive supernatural plot that the whole thing felt comical, despite its excellent actors with Shakespearean accents. Sorry, those of you who still foster an enduring, steadfast love for it!
Come to think of it, this soap might have been the forerunner of today’s so-called thriller dramas on cable that bombard the viewers with scandalously creepy, nightmarish stuff. I suspect, nowadays, we viewers might have grown even luckier than we were at the time of the Dark Shadows.
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Prompt: "Imagination is the only weapon we have against reality." Alice In Wonderland "Bewitched is distorted from reality and nothing is as dull as constant reality." Agnes Moorehead. What is your take on this?
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I don’t think reality is dull, neither is imagination, especially when they accompany each other in acceptable doses. Lean heavily on either one and you’ve got troubles.
If I were to be made to choose between reality and imagination, however, I would definitely go with reality. Reality or, in other words, truth forms the basis of everything. If you ignore the facts and turn your head away from reality, you would be a good candidate for an inmate in a mental asylum.
All art--together with the writing arts--gain inspiration from their artist’s reality. Take a writer, any writer. For the sake of analogy, let’s go with Fyodor Dostoevsky. If he weren’t sentenced to exile in a Siberian labor camp for four years instead of being executed for his crime of reading banned books, he would probably not be able to depict the feelings of the exiled in most of his books, specifically in Crime and Punishment. Or take Picasso. If his eyes didn’t see the world in its reality first, would he be able to imagine his art as the distortion of reality?
On the other hand, many an imagination has helped the reality and life on earth through new tools and vehicles. This means imagination can become reality when expressed in a certain, special way because, according to scientists’ findings from the EEG recordings of seeing and imagining, the neural patterns of imagination and reality flow in opposite directions in the brain. I find it curious for these two things that flow opposite each other to work together well if handled with delicacy.
My conclusion, therefore, is both imagination and reality enrich our lives. Without imagination, our lives would be gloomy, and without reality, we would all turn into wild raving maniacs.
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April 19, 2016 at 11:42am April 19, 2016 at 11:42am
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Prompt: Karen Russell says in Granta, “I think that betrayal can often be a profound surprise to the traitor herself.” What do you think about this idea, especially when using betrayal in your fiction?
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I believe Shakespeare put the entire idea of betrayal in a nutshell in Julius Caesar with this exclamation of surprise: “Et tu, Brute?” Coming to the idea of it, most anyone will suffer at least one betrayal in their lifetime. It is inevitable. Let alone a lover, a friend, a parent, or a child who may stab the person in the back, a business or any company, the government, or even the medical practitioner one trusts may end up mistreating or bilking him or her for money under false premises. The financial type of betrayal of trust can be dealt with and healed in time, but when the heart is injured, the wound lasts a lifetime or, at least, for a very long while.
Betrayal or the somewhat the opposite of it called trust is something we give or earn. It is also something we nurture to let grow. Trust exists within a person, just like love, and most of the time, it is reciprocal. You cannot betray a person who cannot be betrayed, which means the betrayer wasn’t trusted in the first place. Blame, jealousy, shame, disrespect, and the withholding of affection damage the roots of trust and can be construed as some kind of a betrayal.
To avoid betrayal, the most important thing is hearing what isn’t being said, if one can live with oneself while constantly suspecting everyone who comes his or her way. Another way of lessening its importance is to control one’s mind to not be affected by the actions of others. Both are very difficult to do and have other unhealthy consequences.
As far as fiction writing goes, I can think of a few scenarios with the betrayal idea in the prompt's quote. For the sake of brevity, let’s call the betrayer Betrayer A and the betrayed party Character B.
 Character B makes it clear to the betrayer A that the mistake was B’s fault for trusting A. This could surprise A and even make her/him feel guilty especially if he/she had a modicum of conscience.
Character B says to A “I’ll never forgive you, although you are/were my friend. It is easier to forgive an enemy than to forgive a friend.” In this instance A is surprised again for he/she expected some leniency if not forgiveness.
Character B makes it clear that he/she never trusted the betrayer A in the first place, making A wonder why B went along with it if he/she never trusted betrayer A. Did B have an ulterior motive like a frame-up that A didn’t catch on before?
Betrayer A finds out that Character B, although he or she was betrayed, didn’t mind A’s actions or the betrayal itself, as in B’s mind and culture, betrayal was considered acceptable. (Think of the Mafia or the Godfather movies in which the betrayal was thought of as “business.”)
Betrayer A is surprised at Character B’s actions when B betrays A in a worse way in return.
There’s no betrayer A. Character B, knowingly or unknowingly, betrays herself/himself with wrong actions and is surprised at herself or himself for doing that.
To close, the best words of consolation for me, where betrayal is concerned, come from Thomas Moore’s Care of the Soul: “Disappointments in love, even betrayals and losses, serve the soul at the very moment they seem in life to be tragedies. The soul is partly in time and partly in eternity. We might remember the part that resides in eternity when we feel despair over the part that is in life.”
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Prompt: Which one aids you the best: Focused thought or wandering mind? In which instances do you use both?
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I have to say both of them are valuable for me, depending on the time, place, and situation. If I am driving in heavy traffic, for example, my wandering mind can get me into an accident, but if I am trying to find ideas for poetry and writing, a wandering mind is a priceless asset. In fact, I let it wander, on purpose.
Focused thought is mostly used while doing a chore or working on a serious enough difficulty and is essential especially when we are assessing a critical situation. Imagine a couple discussing a problem at hand. If they don’t focus on the real issue and bring up past complaints, related or unrelated, their relationship will be in jeopardy.
It is said that focused thought makes people happier than when their minds wander. This is probably true for workhorses and if we are leading artless lives. When it comes to the arts, any art usually benefits from a wandering mind in the onset of its creation, but after the ideas are decided upon, their execution needs focused thought.
Wandering minds usually engage in pleasant and sometimes unpleasant topics when the negative moods take over. Negative moods don't do much for personal happiness, but they do wonders when writing a tragic story. From a positive angle, the wandering of the mind may also be called daydreaming. Then, ultimately, doesn’t the progress of humanity depend on daydreamers in some way?
In short, both types of mind work are constructive in their own way, provided we give each one its due. Focused thought has to do with the here and now. On the other hand, wandering mind travels inside a much broader universe, bringing back gifts we wouldn’t be able to come up with any other way.
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Prompt: How do you feel about this quote by Marilyn Monroe “Boys think girls are like books, If the cover doesn't catch their eye they won't bother to read what's inside.” Do you agree or disagree?
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I like Marilyn Monroe just fine, more as a tragic figure than a beauty, which her beauty is a given, anyhow. I also agree with what she has uttered however with the reservation that has to do with who the boy is and at which age he is viewing the so-called girl-book.
Most young men go for the visuals, agreed. All of us while in our teens and early twenties have experienced this, be it as boys or girls. I attended an all-girls high school where the teenage girls mostly talked about physical attractiveness of certain boys or, in reverse, how to enhance their own beautiful aspects.
Girls usually get over their physical criteria hangups soon enough, but with some boys, not all, the same criteria can stick for a lifetime, probably until after they are bulldozed by a raving beauty.
As far as beauty is concerned, I have to agree with this other quote more, where both sexes are concerned. ““Immodest and attractive is easy. Modest and repulsive is easy too. But modest and attractive is an art form.” -- Douglas Wilson, 5 Paths to the Love of Your Life
In this quote, I replace the word modest with having inner beauty. In fact, I believe either she or he--who goes out of his or her way to make life easier and more beautiful for others--has the true everlasting beauty inside them. As Criss Jami said, “If love is blind, then maybe a blind person that loves has a greater understanding of it.” Life works better for us if we focus to see others with the eyes of the heart, instead of the eyes on our faces.
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Prompt: We all have those days.... you know the ones where you bite your tongue more times than not. Where do you go to hide out from everyone? Is it always the same place? Random?
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Some people build shelters; others make pockets and never get out of those. With me, it is never the same physical place but the emotional one: my insides. Even so, I never stay there for long for it is a lonely place made even lonelier by my infuriated disappointment in my own hiding as I am not into hiding all that much.
Once I’ve gotten over the dismal view in my insides, I escape into writing or reading or doing something away from those who made me bite my tongue, and bite my tongue, I do that a lot because if I let my tongue loose, what comes out could be more poisonous than a rattler’s venom.
Hiding for a while has its virtues. First, I avoid saying things I don’t really mean or, worse yet, saying what I really, truly mean but don’t want it to get out. Second, I highlight and emphasize the fact that I can survive without having to deal with people all the time. Barbara Streisand surely didn’t sing the song People who need people… for me. Not that I don’t need people. I surely do, especially those close to me in my life, but I don’t need some people all of the time.
I know people who cover up their negative reactions with a taut smile, which I almost always recognize and then boil inside. Thus, the whole thing turns into a negative reaction chain. I’d rather that person left the room or my side than me suddenly lashing out because, in old age fortified by high blood pressure, I may just do irreparable harm. Someone once said, “In the kingdom of glass everything is transparent, and there is no place to hide a dark heart.” No need for one dark heart to encourage another, is there? 
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Prompt: Lighthouses and faraway. Use these words anyway you want.
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If you can guess you can see far far away from a lighthouse, you must remember that the eye can only see as far as the earth’s curvature permits.
One such lighthouse with the best-unbroken view of the ocean is the quaint Peggy’s Cove lighthouse in Nova Scotia, Canada, built on a site of about a million shipwrecks. I consider it to be one of the most truly picturesque lighthouses, usually located at the end of fishing villages.
This is one place where a person would love to spend a whole day watching (exploring!) the rocks and the surging sea. The fishing village itself has houses perched along an inlet with large boulders facing the Atlantic Ocean.
We went there a long time ago in a bus tour, which we took from Halifax. It is somewhat a tourist friendly place although that area is designed as a preserve.
I always thought lighthouses to be romantic and we have visited a good number of them in our life. This is only one of them. Maybe at another time, I'll talk of some other lighthouse in this blog.
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Prompt: Write about the perfect spring day. Where would you go? What would you do?
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If by perfect spring day you mean a place with its weather containing the four seasons, it wouldn't apply to where I live now. Here, we usually get the entire four seasons within the same week during the winter months, sans snow and ice, but I can reminisce a perfect spring day in Long Island where I used to live.
In a perfect spring day, while every other woman I knew would be busy with spring cleaning, painting and primping up her house, this would be just the kind of time when I would spend all my hours outside. And why not while nature was doing everything in my favor?
The crocuses and the daffodils would be in full bloom in the front yard, and the tulips on the rock wall would be opening up by this time during the second week of April. In the backyard, the long awaited sunshine would be making the flower and vegetable saplings I would have put in the earth during the first week of March rise taller. (Somehow I always had an itch to sow my stuff two weeks earlier than advisable. Afterwards, I habitually became nervous and covered them with see-through plastic. It always worked, even in instances when we had a late snow storm.)
Then, I would also work on cleaning and raking the lawn, and possibly fertilizing it. There would be dead branches and leftover dead leaves, so it would end up being a much bigger job than any housecleaning my friends would have stuck their noses into. I would also empty out the shed and rearrange the tools in it, noting which ones needed replacement and repair, to dump that job on my husband later; although, I recall a few years I had to do that as well.
On the plus side, by the time, I would be done, not in just one day but in many days, come rain or shine, our yard always would look better than the inside of the house. Of course it always left me the problem with a house that lacked spring cleaning, but then what was a hot summer day for, if not for doing that job with the AC on and off? |
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Prompt: What do you think self-compassion means?
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Self compassion is when you stop lying to yourself that you’re so great or awesome as you are supposed to be, but instead, you focus on forgiving yourself when you’re not up to par.
This up-to-par idea comes from our schooling, the testing mania of the so-called teaching experts and school boards. It also has to do with the efforts of parents and teachers to enhance our self-esteem. There is nothing wrong with having a healthy self-esteem, but like everything, self-esteem has a flawed side, especially when in excess: Self-esteem is comparative and it depends on success. Only by comparison to the successes of others, we know we made it; that is, we are at least above average. This is rather silly. Not everybody at the same time can be above average. As to success, no one can be successful at everything all the time.
This means self-esteem alone won't work to make us feel better about ourselves and not feel like losers. Enter self-compassion. Self-compassion is neither comparative nor dependent upon success. If anything, we can always forgive ourselves. Self-compassion does not make a person weak and wimpy. If anything, it enables better emotional health. Self-compassionate people feel less embarrassed when they make mistakes, don't know the answers, or act unnecessarily goofy. Also, they are not fearful to try again.
Yet, being self-compassionate is not easy. We are usually much harder on ourselves than on other people. Do you want to test this idea? Do yourselves a favor and make a list of several serious and not so serious crimes. Imagine someone you love or just anyone in your neighborhood committing those crimes. Can you forgive them for it? Then imagine committing those crimes yourself. Can you forgive yourself? You'll find out that it is easier to forgive others than ourselves. You may want to cover up or not admit to a crime, but that is not forgiveness. It is loading your psyche with extra guilt.
So, if you want to be self-compassionate, what do you do? How do you train yourself? I believe each time you put yourself down, you'll need to reverse the thought. Reverse the thought of Stupid me to nice me and never ever call yourself names. Just yesterday, I made a grammar mistake, and in a comment about my mistake, I wrote "Duh!", the synonym for stupid me. This self-compassion prompt arose from that Duh! So, I've decided to never say "Duh!" to me again.
Part of this Duh! business comes from the upbringing; at least mine did. My mother didn't want me to grow a big head and always put me down even when I was successful. This is quite the opposite of those who overly encourage self-esteem. I learned to think negatively of me when I made a mistake, any mistake. Yet, mistakes happen because we are human, and our attention sometimes can take a leave of absence.
It isn't just my mother, though. All higher authorities on human level such as some achievement experts, churches, temples, etc. are doing that very thing to instill refinement, enlightenment, and humility in people. Instead, they are handing out discouragement and self-abasement, which they are not usually aware of. If such damage is done to you, it is your job to be aware of the damage and undo it to the best of your ability.
This all means that we either put ourselves down because we didn't reach the self-esteem goals of competition or we put ourselves down because we have somehow been conditioned to do so. Becoming aware of this paradox can be a step toward a better balanced life.
I hope we will all succeed in our self-compassion goals. |
April 11, 2016 at 10:22am April 11, 2016 at 10:22am
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Prompt: If a narcissist looks at a mirror what do you think he'll see? Feel free to get into his/her head.
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She looks at herself and sees the entire perfection of creation on her face. She is so incomparable to others in every way. Every line and every feature is magnificent. Not only her physical features but what lies behind them is splendid, too. No one can match the abilities those piercing small blue eyes and perfectly shaped Roman nose conceal.
No one has her intelligence, attractiveness, and ability for accomplishment. No one is as likable and conscientious as she is either. She may not be as agreeable all the time, but then, it is up to the others to agree with her, because she is always right. This is her power, and with this face ending in a square jutting jaw, she can and does dominate over others. Others like her poor sister, the loser. If only her sister had only a small bit of her assets, but alas, that idiotic wretch! Her sister even tried to give her some reality check. What reality? How can she know of reality if she rarely looks at a mirror? Her and all those other losers, but who cares when they are all so easy to manipulate...
She takes the comb and rakes through her strawberry-blond hair with orangey hues here and there. She takes good care of it, and why not, if the creation gave her such a great and flashy piece of fuzz on her fantastic head? Why, she could even run for the president of the local Women's Club. Come to think of it, don't her looks remind her of someone she recalls seeing on TV so often? That candidate for the US president? Hmmmmm! |
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Prompt:Since it is Saturday and I enjoy Norb's creation Saturday over in 30 Day here's the prompt.
Create something using this link to generate your muse. Looking forward to seeing what your muse creates.
http://learnhowtowritesongs.com/random-song-title-generator/
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I may be an incredulous dreamer, soaring, composing a motivated sight: a utopia in government, but alas, the gateway is closed. There is no flight from aristocracy as dinosaurs are machinating and their gyrations use officers who are slithering as their commanders organize an imbroglio of souls with slaughtering kisses.
This is all adversity's business, and I can only act as the designer alien with the nebulized shout:
"Fly, Girlfriend! Run Servants!"
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Note: Comcast went off and when it came back, my laptop was history. I am writing this on hubby's computer directly into the book. Sorry if it sounds far too crazy. I can only use his computer for a few minutes. |
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Prompt: What do you feel is the greatest love story in literature? How did the author hook you into the story? If you aren't into love stories, pick your genre and answer.
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The greatest love story? I can’t narrow it down to one story, but I can talk about only a few as time permits me.
Going back in time, all the way to Greeks' Plato, the tale of Orpheus and Eurydice got to me the most, but I read Plato’s version much later, after being mesmerized by the movie Black Orpheus. The tale is about the nymph Eurydice and the musician Orpheus who fall in love and stay together. After their first night, the Greek god Aristaeus who is also in love with the nymph pursues them. Eurydice, while they are fleeing, steps into a nest of snakes and is bitten fatally. Deeply grieving her death, Orpheus plays sad songs on his lyre, making all the nymphs and gods weep. They advise Orpheus to travel to the underworld to beg for Eurydice’s return from Hades and Persephone. At the end of this difficult journey, Orpheus is allowed his wish but with one condition: He will walk in front of Eurydice and never look back until they reach the upper world. Orpheus, however, looks back to see if Eurydice is following him, only to have her vanish forever. The sadness of the story, the idea of music in it, and the human highs and foibles of Orpheus made me love this story.
The second story I love is Layla and Majnun first told by the Persian medieval poet Nizami of Ganje, but my favorite version of it is by the sixteenth century Ottoman-Azerbayjani poet Foozooli, who is known as the poet of love. In the story, Qays the poet and Layla fall in love with each other when they are young, but when they grow up, Layla’s father doesn't allow them to be together. Qays becomes so obsessed with Layla that he turns half-crazy and the people end up calling him Majnun (meaning possessed/mad). For the love of Layla, Majnun goes in the desert, concentrating on Layla’s love and reciting his poetry for her. At the end, he understands that his pain is the essence of love; the essence of love is being the love of the essence, which is God, known well as the Sufi idea of Love. Foozooli’s poetry is so superb that, I believe, no translation can do justice to it.
Where novels are concerned, Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre had a great impact on me, as love lost and found, and also Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte, in which lost love turned the lover Heathcliff into a sourpuss and an antihero.
I guess I am so into higher-love-touting stories in legends and such that today’s romance genre feels cheap to me for its pulling down the idea of love from the skies inside a muddy swamp, but then, who says the way love is understood by most is all that clean, lofty, and mighty? Still, love is love, and it is higher than all other emotions.
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Prompt: A baby bunny in a basket appears on your doorstep. It changes your life for the good plus you get a new pet. How does your life change?
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I am not too crazy about rabbits as pets. Although a baby bunny would look very cute, it is impossible to litter train an unspayed or unneutered rabbit. Then due to the baby bunny’s small size, its agility, and its not staying in one place, one of us could sit or step on him.
I think, therefore, I would take the bunny with his basket to a pet shop and exchange it for a kitten. The reason is I feel rabbits should have qualified owners, or rather, they should stay in the wild. Did you know rabbits are prey animals and they do not cuddle in your arms?
I certainly do not qualify to be a rabbit owner as I can’t vouch I can give the right answers to the questions asked of people before they adopt a rabbit, especially the one about spending a lot of time on the floor.
These are the questions:
“Are you patient?
Do you have a sense of humor? (For example, can you laugh at a rabbit pooping all over the place or chewing stuff?)
Can you protect a rabbit from predators, poisons, temperature extremes, electrical cords, and rough handling by house guests?
Do you enjoy watching the movements and learning the language of another species?
Does your schedule include plenty of time at home?
Are you comfortable spending a lot of time on the floor?
Are you not overly fussy with your furniture?"
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