Your Ego Is Not Your Enemy

 

Unwrapping once faith

We are born in all innocence. Once growing up we are confronted with many things of which we have to come to understand some things are good whilst others are bad. Good and bad – right and wrong – that will keep us busy all our life long.

No wonder we can regularly find people who question their choices in life. And that is what we all regularly should do. Go over our lives and find out what we have done, why and how.

A recovered alcoholism addict, US Navy Veteran, now non-smoker, who uses the pseudonym jeffw5382,  who seem to want to become a friend of many, by wanting to help them. He finds it important to whom he is relating to and how he is, really appropriate and adding to life, loving-kindness, and compassion. He also likes to reflect and to seek stillness, even in motion, silence even in comotion and

will be better for it as I emerge on the other side. {What am I doing?}

By the years gone by, he wants to process and digest what has happened. Though confronted with those facts he might say

However hard it may be to fathom, one thing I must do above all else is to wholeheartedly accept what is. Eliminating or changing unhealthy ideas, behaviors or situations from my life are other options, but. I must accept that things are exactly the way they are supposed to be at this moment. {It is possible!}

In 2017 his life depended on being of service. He wrote

Not only am I self employed in a service oriented profession, I have integrated a desire to be helpful and generous wherever possible. The most important realization to me about this is, that it truly is selfishness that is behind it. By recognizing and admitting that, I am relieved of the urge to pat myself on the back. It’s just something I have to do today. I must give back in measure of what has been freely given to me. {Enlightened Self Interest}

That year he also felt so lucky to be able to embrace, wholeheartedly, the idea that he can improve his conscious contact with God. He wrote:

I acknowledge that many face seemingly insurmountable obstacles when even considering this. It started with the barest beginnings with me. Saying Please when I wake and Thank you as I lay down to end my day. {Please and Thank You}

He at that time found it impossible to describe what or who his God was.

I ascribe to the idea that God is incomprehensible to the human mind. In addition, that the greatest obstacle to finding God is the word, God. In my endeavor to get and stay clean and sober, I devoured all sorts of spiritual and religious texts. {Please and Thank You}

Three years later he is feeling that he might be embarking on a treacherous journey of sorts.

I am delving into my long-held beliefs and frail faith to discover my true self. That one that is in me and in Him. {Here I go}

he let us know and invites others

to share in this adventure that you might also question everything, scrape, prod, rip open and take apart the conceptions and ideas that inhibit our evolution to realizing our inheritance. {Here I go}

For lots of people, life is a great adventure, with many ups and downs. Sometimes very deep downs and lesser great ups.

Jeff writes:

Everything upon which I have relied is suddenly revealed to be a mere reflection of what I have found comforting to my ego. If I am to uncover my truest self all these ideas, preconceptions and formulas have to be incinerated by the flames of Love. {Here I go}

He also speaks about God, though we are not sure yet which god he means, because in 2017 he still thought of a three-headed god. From our side, we could and can only hope he one day shall come to discover the Only Real God Who is the All-knowing Eternal and everlasting (i.e not able to die, whilst Jesus really died) invisible Spirit, whilst his 2017 godhead is a not all-knowing god, Jesus even not knowing when he would be coming back to earth.

It is nice to see he understands that God

is a jealous and merciful God. {Here I go}

which makes it so important to worship the right God and not just any god. We should only worship the God of Jesus Christ, the Spirit God, Who is revealed in the angels and in Christ, but also revealed in the righteous faithful.
It is that “I Am that I Am” we should look at. It is that Godhead Who wants to be found.

The blogger Jeff seems to be willing to seek and to find Him. He writes:

He wants me to seek Him only in all my doings. Being human with a myriad of selfish desires I chase and grasp after things I think will satisfy, these seeming insatiable cravings, and when I do go after them without discernment, I get smacked down, disappointed and left wanting. I then am again desperate, confused and left wondering why I have been allowed to forget the Love that is merely a breath away. (Jealous) Immediately I am forgiven and realize I have been taught. His Love and acceptance are eternal. (Merciful) {Here I go}

The big problem with man is that they prefer to give a man a higher position than God. Lots of people do prefer to put the human doctrines above the Biblical doctrines and they believe that those human theologians do know it better than those Biblical writers or penmen from God. Instead of accepting the sayings from God (like Him saying that Jesus is His only begotten beloved son) and to believe the Biblical sayings or writings from Scriptures.

All should come to see the light shining in the darkness, the sent one from God, being such a light for mankind and the solution against the curse of death.

“If nothing that can be seen can either be God or represent Him to us as He is, then to find God we must pass beyond everything that can be seen and enter into darkness. Since nothing that can be heard is God, to find Him we must enter into silence.

Since God cannot be imagined, anything our imagination tells us about Him is ultimately misleading and therefor we cannot know Him as He really is unless we pass beyond everything that can be imagined and enter into an obscurity without images and without the likeness of any created thing.” {It just doesn’t make sense}

When one keeps to the false human doctrines then a lot in the Bible might not seem to make sense, but when one really take the words like they are written in the Bible, they all make sense. It only demands an openess to be willing to listen to God Him speaking by His infallible Word, the Bible. Then you shall be able to

“receive the gift of an interior light that is so simple that it baffles description and so pure that it would be coarse to call is an experience. But it is a true light, perfecting the intellect of man with a perfection far beyond knowledge.” {It just doesn’t make sense}

Jeff writes

So to be calm, resolute in stillness appreciating what I can see and what I have experienced, being kind and helpful (if possible) to all I encounter, and forgiving those who are lost in hatred and poisoned by a vindictive heart, and also admitting that I am flawed. I am liberated into a Perfect Peace that Doesn’t make any sense. {It just doesn’t make sense}

But it is that incredible peace we have to look out for. It is possible for everyone to become a partaker of it.

Peace and Violence are with us and will be until the Lion lays down with the lamb {Nothing New}

But we have the great hope in the sent one from God: Jesus Christ, our saviour and the way to God.

Jeff looking for help; a little embarrassed and humbled to appeal for assistance covering impending medical expenses. (I must admit)

Learning from ourselves

Often it are the setbacks that bring people back with their feet on the ground and have they rethink about their position in this world and in their life.

The most difficult part in our life is often to liberate ourself from the chain of vanity that may have caught us, and to get to learn that we better have to become an instrument in the Hands of our Creator, following His path He has laid out in front of us.

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To remember

“You teach best what you most need to learn.”  = line from Richard Bach’s book ‘Illusions’ running through mind

Marianne Williamson frequently shares very personal stories about her honest trials through life which makes her advice all the more more palatable

• We share in our own ways + we learn in our own ways

 

today’s lesson = Humility.

• ego wants to (and has been) defending self, making excuses, + trying to justify own actions
• making way through personal feelings of remorse, embarrassment, + confusio
• often advice we give to others = exact advice we need ourselves.
• hold ourselves to some ridiculous standard of “perfection” => too self-conscious to admit struggle with things we advise others to do.
• listen to ourselves +  realize things we passionately want to teach other people = things we, ourselves, truly want to learn + embody =>  vigilant level of self awareness + honesty

enhance + deepen relationships with others + ability to impact them in a positive way

1)  Be Honest

2)  Have Compassion

3)  Stop Trying to be Perfect =>  sense of freedom

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Preceding

I is for Incompleteness

Timeless Insights on Humility

Het rommelt….

De natuur roept de mens dikwijls tot de orde, maar erg genoeg hebben de meeste mensen er geen zin in om er naar te luisteren.
Ook hebben veel mensen er geen zin in om over bepaalde dingen meer te weten. Het geestelijke is iets dat hun verder afschrikt. Liefst zoeken zij hun toevlucht in moderne gadgets die hun kunnen plezieren en afwenden van de meer ernstige zaken.

Weinigen beseffen dat zij zelf de balans in eigen handen hebben. Indien zij ook meer oog zouden hebben voor wat er rondom hen gebeurt en meer besef zouden willen hebben omtrent anderen zou vrede veel dichter bij kunnen liggen dan zij denken.

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Ter herinnering

• grootste gerommel = tussen westen + oosten.
• natuur laat ons zien wat wij op individueel vlak kunnen leren waardoor we inzicht kunnen krijgen. 
• vast houden aan de macht positie > Ego denkt daar zijn vrijheid in te vinden.
• Onwetendheid  grootste bondgenoot van meneer angst.. 

 

Life through Cat's eyes

Het rommelt en dat is zacht uitgedrukt, als ik om mij heen kijk zie ik niet anders. Het grootste gerommel is toch tussen het westen en het oosten. Als je goed kijkt verschilt het niet veel met ieders persoonlijke niveau van zijn, vind je ook niet.. ? De natuur is er op dit moment niet echt mee eens, stormen, orkanen, tornado’s, water, vuur.. Dit symboliseert ons ten voeten uit.. De natuur laat ons zien wat wij op individueel vlak kunnen leren waardoor we inzicht kunnen krijgen.

Het maar willen vast houden aan de macht positie omdat het Ego denkt daar zijn vrijheid in te vinden. Oude koeien van een ver verleden door onwetendheid van toen, nu nog steeds als de ware kennis en waarheid te ervaren.. Niet een omslag willen en durven maken, verlies, door de knieën gaan, geen optie is voor Egolandia. Denkend dat dit geassocieerd zal worden met…

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Dr. Shankar

Kunnen denken is al deel van het leven. Zonder leven is er geen denken mogelijk en is er geen uiting van denken, of weergave van gedachten.

Ook zonder ons gaat het leven verder, of wij er nu zijn of niet zijn. Maar als wij er zijn kunnen wij er best iets van maken van dat leven en leven in plaats van geleefd worden.
Kennis en besef dat leven sowieso gebeurt mag dan wijsheid zijn nog grotere wijsheid is te beseffen wie en wat achter dat leven zit en hoe wij beter deel kunnen uitmaken van dat leven.

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Te herinneren

Mani Shankar Mukherjee also known as Sankar

wereld niets anders dan gereflecteerde energie > reflecteert zich als beelden, woorden + kleuren=> ‘verstand’ deel van diezelfde energie

Waarom leven we? Elke zin of bedoeling van het leven = slechts een gedachte

ware zin leven = illusie + elk moment onvoorwaardelijk genieten zonder na te denken

Leven gebeurt, sowieso, wat jij er ook moge over denken. Dus wees gerust! Zelfs als je gelooft dat jij niet de doener bent, blijft alles aan de gang, vanzelf en als je dit beseft, dan is dit wijsheid. {Mani Shankar Mukherjee}

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Voorgaande

Alleen ogen die geweend hebben kunnen helder zien

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Aanvullende lectuur

1. Leef …
2. Mogelijkheid tot leven
3. Kies voor Leven
4. Levensspel
5. Handel alsof alles wat je denkt, zegt en doet uw hele leven bepaalt
6. Wees blij dat de doornstruik rozen draagt
7. Elke keuze die we maken veroorzaakt een rimpelig effect in ons leven
8. Monotomie van het leven
9. Laten wij verder gaan
10. Het leven is als een tien-versnellingen fiets
11. Je leven de som van al je keuzes
12. Hoe is jouw film van je leven?
13. Hebt U gerealiseerd dat je leven de inhoud bepaalt van uw doodsbrief
14. Aanvoelen en kennis
15. Weet door proberen
16. Activiteiten in dit leven nagaan
17. Leef alsof je morgen gaat sterven
18. Tot bewust zijn komen voor huidig leven
19. Beter een arme die in oprechtheid wandelt
20. Hopen zolang je leeft
21. Een te begrijpen oproep
22. Christus kennen is zin geven aan het leven
23. Geschapen om te leven in relatie met God
24. Overtuiging voor de dingen die God beloofde
25. Een uiteenvallende Bijbel teken voor iemand die dat niet doet
26. Nu wij naar het einde van het jaar komen
27. Bij de aanvang van een nieuwe dag
28. Angst is de grote boosdoener in ons streven naar een beter mens te worden
29. Reinigen van ons en anderen
30. Een kaars in het leven
31. Een kaars aansteken

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Verder aanverwante lectuur

1. Is onwetendheid een zegen?
2. Object is Subject
3. Versteende Harte
4. De lente komt eraan!
5. Heb een mooie week! 🙂
6. Intuïtie
7. leven en dood, het zijn buren
8. Hoi lief leven, ik ben terug
9. De Lichtpuntjes
10. Waarom de beste keuze hoop is
11. Logica?
12. Illusie doorzien?

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A Brief Thought on Leadership

Not everybody is given to be a leader and not everybody can take up the leadership. The one taking up leadership always should respect those under him, willing to give them something more and offering them positive prospects, putting them on fire, willing to explore, discover, strive, soar and excel.

Joe DeRosa loves marketing and has spent a significant amount of his time and energy studying buyer behaviours. As an executive leader of several Marketing and Sales teams he has gathered vast amounts of data – qualitative and quantitative – around the customer journey.

He, like us, is convinced that leadership is not selfish and that great leaders make it all about their teams which they lead with dignity. As we showed already in our previous postings, life is a learning process. In this competitive world the best leaders should be continuous learners, not claiming to have all the answers nor believing they themselves are the only ones capable of generating great ideas. With many youngsters, this might a be problem today and the cause of so many projects failing in the end.

An other big problem today is the lack of communication or the will to listen to others, and nobody wanting to take responsibilities.

With many of those born in the 1980s and 1990s we find a very placating and narcissistic tendency, many having a very strong ego. Many of them are also not willing to trust others and do not want to share all that they know, but want to be recognised as the one who knows most and best, which is not always so true.

Purpose-driven leaders understand the importance of gratitude.  Being gracious for a job well done separates a good leader from a bad leader.  There’s nothing wrong with expressing your gratitude or thanks to an employee who did a good job even though a good job is what’s expected.  It’s often the smallest acts of kindness that embolden a team to its leader. {10 Things a Leader is Not}

Many youngsters think they know already everything and are often not open to learn more. They forget that everything changes so fast and everyday offers again something knew. For good leaders there is no place for ignorance and no place for such proud that no questions are dared to be posed about matters not known.

In good leadership is also no place for indecisiveness or a regular hesitating attitude.

Enduring leaders know that making decisions are required for leadership longevity.  Those that shy away from making decisions, difficult or easy, don’t last long as leaders.  Indecisive leaders are some of the most difficult leaders to work for. {10 Things a Leader is Not}

Let us therefore remember

• Leadership = collection of experiences, ideas, values, beliefs, and opinions
• = demonstrating humility while acknowledging = still more to learn
• not about being right but rather getting it right.

relationship formed through existence of mutual trust

Very important > Knowing when to lead + when to follow = area that separates good from great leaders.

> Please do find to read also:

1. Should You Clean House? The most difficult question you’ll face as a leader.
2. Is it time to change?
3. Leader or Executive – Which Are You?
4. Preparing to Fail is the First Step to Winning
5. Best Practices…Who Says?
6. Your Ability To Change Determines Success or Failure
7. Are You a Helper, or a Server? An Important Question for Your Brand.
8. Be An Inspiration
9. Never Settle
10. Stop Managing Change, Start Inspiring It
11. Why Generosity?
12. How Pressure Affects Performance
13. 3 Hints to Help You Hit Your Goals in 2016: Hint #1 – Visualization
14. 3 Hints to Help You Hit Your Goals in 2016: Hint #2 – Write it Down
15. 3 Hints to Help You Hit Your Goals in 2016: Hint #3 – Tell People

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Preceding article:

Failures, mistakes and Initiatives for Excellence and success, Working towards turning a Dream of yours into reality

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• Learning to lead: Hamilton students pay it forward with leadership training
• The future of leadership
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Joseph DeRosa

Leadership is a collection of experiences, ideas, values, beliefs, and opinions. Good leaders ask great questions. Great leaders apply what they’ve learned from those questions to their actions.  It’s not about having,or projecting an attitude, but rather demonstrating humility while acknowledging there is still more to learn. It’s not about being right but rather getting it right.

Leadership is a privilege.  It’s not a right, nor a duty as some may think. It’s a gift given to those who have earned it by demonstrating their desire to serve others. Those who have been given a leadership role without earning it are exposed rather quickly.  People are eager to follow those they believe in, trust, and care about.  That relationship can only be formed through the existence of a mutual trust.  It’s the leaders job to build that trust.  It is granted to the leader who demonstrates his or her genuine interest and caring for…

View original post 121 more words

One can buy a lot in the supermarket, but not hope

A thermometer in the proverbial mouth of society would measure a high temperature. We are all feverish. Psychiatrist Dirk De Wachter calls our society ‘borderline‘. Are we aware of a kind of collective delusion? ‘Hypermarkets’ , that offer up to 30.000 articles, have increased their turnover from 616 to 4.823 billion euro. A good and strong pupil who perfectly meets our economic model of better, faster… and always more.

The supermarket is a temple of consumption.
Every product cries out to be bought . With an agressiveness that borders on hysterical, our advertising boys try to convince us that margarine produces a more harmonious family life and that coca cola creates friendships. They shamelessly use insights of psychology to encourage people to consume. And they do not spare anyone, not even children.

The energy that is required of human beings to produce 30.000 articles, to distribute them and to sell them is colossal. This whole chain mobilises gigantic forces and realises this with such passion, that it betrays the conviction that to produce and consume material things will give us what we are looking for.

Does it still surprise you that we are drawn into consumption with forever stronger stimuli , at the cost of other things ?
 
It is a kind of psychological materialism that makes that we are more preoccupied with ‘having’ than ‘being’. If there even is time for ‘being’. Recently a study with 8000 students at the Catholic University of Leuven has shown that 1/7 has serious emotional problems: fear, depression, suicidal thoughts. Philosopher and author Hein Stufkens said in an interview :

” People that think about suicide, do not really want to stop living, they want to stop living ‘in this way’. They want to live differently. They are looking for real life “.

These are hard facts that in the West we are strongly ego-centric. Isn’t it high time that we look beyond the borders of the ego? One can maybe buy a lot in the supermarket, but you do not buy friendship there, no hope and no trust. Just like it is impossible to buy happiness, which is a good thing!

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Preceding

Dutch version / Nederlandstalige versie: In de supermarkt kan je (g)een hoop kopen

Looking for the consummation of presents

Luxury

Summermonths and consumerism

Your position about materialistic desires having conquered the world

Learning that stuff is just stuff

Fear, struggles, sadness, bad feelings and depression

Material wealth, Submission and Heaven on earth

Family happiness and little things we do

Why “Selfishness” Doesn’t Properly Mean Being Shortsighted and Harmful to Others

Looking at a conservative review of Shop Class As Soul Craft

Life isn’t unfair

Soft values? Needed heart- and- soul!

Watch out

You’re Lighter Than Air~

How do Other People Feel About Mental Health?

How to Find the Meaning of Life and Reach a State of Peace

Misleading world, stress, technique, superficiality, past, future and positivism

O’ Captain! My Captain!

Just be yourself…

Searching for fulfillment and meaning through own efforts, facing unsatisfaction and depression

Less… is still enough

Less for more

A bird’s eye and reflecting from within

We all have to have dreams

Forward ever backwards never!

“Der Grad der K… De mate van creativiteit – Degree of creativity

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Additional reading

1. Capitalism
2. Increasing wealth gap of immense proportions in the Capitalist World
3. Capitalism and economic policy and Christian survey
4. Migrants to the West #3
5. Materialism, would be life, and aspirations
6. Poverty and conservative role patterns
7. Forms of slavery, human trafficking and disrespectful attitude to creation to be changed
8. Welfare state and Poverty in Flanders #3 Right to Human dignity
9. Welfare state and Poverty in Flanders #9 Consumption
10. Paris World Summit of Conscience, International interfaith gathering #3
11. Message of Pope Francis I for the 48th World Communications Day
12. société, crise, esprit
13. From Winterdarkness into light of Spring
14. Parenthood made more difficult
15. Living Apart together
16. Being Charlie 6
17. Land not an ordinary asset
18. Securing risks
19. Reflect on how much idolizing happens
20. Looking to the East and the West for Truth
21. Oh god, this is never going to end!
22. Depression Is and When
23. What IF you’re only driven by stress?
24. A little ray of sunshine.
25. Getting fate in your change to positiveness
26. Remember there’s a light in the next day
27. Pieces
28. Joy: Foundation for a Positive Life
29. Be an Encourager
30. Four Pressing Needs in Rural Communities, and How the Church Should Respond
31. Trusting, Faith, calling and Ascribing to Jehovah #3 Voice of God #2 Instructions and Laws

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Further reading

1. What I Want
2. Materialism or Emotions?
3. Snail
4. The choice of being “choiceless”
5. Convenience Store | Grocery Store in Delhi-NCR, India
6. Gloomy retail outlook for the first quarter
7. Walmart – World’s Largest Retail Chain
8. The Supermarket is the Nexus of Existential Dread
9. Battle Of The Supermarkets
10. Grocery Chains Aren’t Building New Supermarkets Where Most Needed
11. there’s more to stacking shelves than you think
12. These are the dirtiest places in every supermarket
13. Grass hair clip..?
14. Russian supermarket slammed for selling chopping boards with photo of Barack Obama as a monkey
15. Russian store sold ‘monkey Obama’ chopping boards & apologized
16. Day 7 – An Educational Day at the Supermarket
17. What’s the Best Way to Sell a Product?
18. Overhaul the world’s money policy
19. Intermittent truth
20. Global economies shape our cities: is it acceptable?
21. Woes and Watch-out Warnings
22. Listening to the Web
23. Please Sir, I Want Some More
24. I am rich and famous. Now what…?
25. The truth about Consume
26. How Much Do I Consume?
27. Rule #105: Cyclical consumption
28. Materialistic Wants? Not.
29. “money is the reason we exist, everybody knows it, it’s a fact, kiss kiss”
30. Top Risks for a Consumer-Driven Society
31. Cotton and cocaine
32. The Culture of Excesses- Losing Humanity
33. Contrasts.
34. Contented Consumer?
35. The foolish man
36. Being No One One, Precis: Part 2
37. Turning the Poor into Consumers
38. Capitalising on Christmas
39. Lighting up Christmas
40. Christmas fragment 1
41. Holiday Shopping For Your Token Atheist Friend
42. Holiday gift-giving between adults is a needless, consumerist chore
43. To Save Pandas, We Must Eat them
44. Things I’ve learned from killing consumerism #13 – We want beauty for ourselves
45. Obama: Stop pretending you care about Syrian people
46. Should We Be Scared?
47. Its 100% OK to offend people in my world
48. Life..a never ending..
49. Born Privileged
50. {quote of the day}
51. Only to be Lost
52. Run
53. Self Harm
54. My Only Way Out
55. Ahhhhhh
56. the curtain comes up
57. I Have This Urge
58. Letter Of Departure
59. The truth about approuachable
60. Officially Trumped: When “being Real” gets too Real
61. Contented Consumer?
62. Magic
63. First Feelings – Sonnet No. 4
64. Friends
65. Universe
66. 2015/2016

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Related articles

• Big changes coming to Coles
• ‘97% of Scientists Say…’
• How to find out about the human mind through stone
• The future of supermarket shopping, right now.
• Working for peace in 5776
• The Daily OM for September 24 – Grounding Ourselves
• Yom Kippur Guide for the Perplexed, 2015
• Big changes coming to Coles
• Basic guaranteed income
• Human Beings: The Omnicidal Species. There is Nothing They Won’t Kill

In de supermarkt kan je (g)een hoop kopen

Een thermometer in de spreekwoordelijke mond van de samenleving zou een verhoogde temperatuur meten. We lopen er koortsig bij.
Psychiater Dirk De Wachter noemt onze samenleving ‘borderline’. Zijn we ons bewust van een soort collectieve waan? ‘Jumbo supermarkten’, die tot 30.000 artikelen aanbieden, zagen hun omzet stijgen van 616 naar 4.823 miljoen euro. Een goede en sterke leerling die perfect beantwoord aan ons economisch model dat staat voor beter, sneller én… altijd meer.

De supermarkt is een consumptietempel.

Elk product schreeuwt om gekocht te worden. Met een vaak hysterische opdringerigheid proberen reclamejongens ons te overtuigen dat margarine een harmonieuzer gezinsleven en cola vriendschap geeft. Zonder schroom gebruiken ze dieptepsychologische inzichten om aan te zetten tot consumeren. Daarbij ontzien ze niemand. Ook kinderen niet.

De energie die van mens en aarde wordt gevraagd om 30.000 artikels te produceren, te distribueren én te verkopen is kolossaal. Heel deze keten mobiliseert gigantische krachten en wordt met zo’n hartstocht neergezet, dat zij de overtuiging verraadt dat materie produceren en consumeren ons zal geven wat we zoeken.

Verwondert het u nog langer dat we met steeds sterkere prikkels naar ‘buiten’ worden getrokken in de consumptie, ten koste van andere dingen?Het is een soort psychisch materialisme dat maakt dat we meer bezig zijn met ‘hebben’ in plaats van met ‘zijn’. Als er al tijd is voor dat laatste. Recent liet een onderzoek bij 8.000 studenten aan de KU Leuven zien dat 1/7 ernstige emotionele problemen heeft: angsten, depressie, gedachten aan zelfdoding. Filosoof en auteur Hein Stufkens zei in een interview:

“Mensen die nadenken over zelfdoding willen helemaal niet ophouden met leven, ze willen ophouden met ‘op deze manier’ te leven. Ze willen anders leven. Ze zoeken écht leven.”

Het zijn harde feiten dat we in het Westen sterk ego-gericht zijn. Wordt het dan geen hoog tijd dat we voorbij de grenzen kijken van het ego? Je mag dan hopen kunnen kopen in een supermarkt, je koopt er geen vriendschap, geen geloof of geen vertrouwen. Net zoals je nergens geluk kan kopen. Wat een geluk!

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Gedachte van de dag:

Als je maar lang genoeg
naar iets kijkt,
wordt het vanzelf
interessant.
‘(Gustave Flaubert)

 

English version: One can buy a lot in the supermarket, but not hope

 

 

 

 

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Voorgaande

Zachte waarden? Hard(t) nodig!

Materialisme vs. minimalisme

Met minder is… nog genoeg

Kledingruil

Waarom sterren zoeken?

Who’s to blame?

Fatsoensnormen Online

“Der Grad der K…

De mate van creativiteit – Degree of creativity

Leeg en alleen

Shawna Howson over eigenwaarde

Duistere gevangenis

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Vindt ook om te lezen

1. Bank crisis en Occulte tekens
2. Economie en degradatie
3. Materialisme, “would be” leven en aspiraties #4
4. Materialisme, “would be” leven en aspiraties #5
5. Materialisme, “would be” leven en aspiraties #6
6. Paus waarschuwt voor ‘tirannie materialisme’
7. Kijk op het Vrije Wereld Handvest
8. Eigendomsrecht, welvaarttaks en waardigheidsrecht
9. Marx, het Volk, Religie, Christendom en verwrongen ideeën
10. Wat levert het mij op?
11. Waarom een Europees Jaar van actief ouder worden en solidariteit tussen de generaties?
12. Hoe de rijken de wereld regeren
13. Energie met vergiftigd geschenk
14. Gezin in postmoderne samenleving meer in verdrukking
15. Druk op ouderen
16. Langer Werken of Vroeger Sterven
17. Religie en samenleving één geheel
18. Geestelijk gezonde school (studiedag, Leuven)
19. Hoe de Satan vandaag rond toert
20. Neil Anderson en het juk van angst en depressie
21. 2015 het jaar dat ISIS duidelijk maakte dat het ook in Europa is – Vervolg 2
22. Nieuwkomers, nieuwelingen, immigranten, allochtonen en import
23. Strengere wapenwetgeving kan doden met vuurwapens beperken
24. Voor- en nadelen van internetspiritualiteit
25. Vrees klopte aan de deur
26. Angst is de kloof tussen het nu en later
27. Angst uitsluitende liefde
28. In de hand #2 Vorming en afleiding
29. In de hand #4 Angst voor de wereld
30. Vrees hebben voor de juiste persoon
31. Wees niet bang, er is goed nieuws want een redder is geboren
32. Bijbel medicijn tegen depressie
33. Vertrouwen, Geloof, Roepen en Toeschrijving aan Jehovah #3 Stem van God #6 Woorden tot voedsel en communicatie
34. Wees sterk en moedig
35. God wordt heerser van onze passies
36. God is positief
37. Verzoening en Broederschap 4 Deelgenoten in Christus
38. Christian the Lion
39. Zeker zijnde van Bevrijding
40. Als sneeuwvlokken een zacht tapijt vormen

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Verder aanvullende lectuur

1. Rothbard Over Economische Depressies: Oorzaak En Remedie
2. Leef als een koning
3. Een verhaaltje voor het slapengaan voor onze leiders
4. Repliek op Vanackere (Financiën): Investeringen zijn nutteloos indien consumptie zwak blijft
5. Boven de storm // Nunc est bibendum: Atay
6. Consumeer eens een auto
7. Een jaar later: Bangladesh
8. Food waste
9. Work in progress // Om toch maar eens over de economie te hebben
10. oproep aan supermarkt klanten
11. Ergenis in de Supermarkt
12. Roes
13. Discussies die nooit plaatsvonden: in de supermarkt
14. Genieten van goede gewoontes
15. Formidable!
16. Veertig situaties uit mijn dagelijkse leven
17. Duurkoop is goedkoop
18. Verpakkingsloze winkels
19. Maatschappij | Veel mensen, weinig vertrouwen
20. Gelukszoeker
21. Vluchteling (3) De Militair.
22. De aarde warmt op – voor vluchtelingen en andere slachtoffers
23. De nieuwsconsument is informatiezoeker geworden
24. Drie doelen van het onderwijs en de psychotische samenleving
25. Democratie, gelijkheid en draagvlak: terug naar de Tocqueville
26. Laten we ons onderwijs en de kerk in het midden houden?
27. Groen en N-VA samen in bad? Enkele vragen
28. St. Augustinus en het gezin als kern van de samenleving
29. Kardinaal Cottier over synode
30. Encycliek: Laudato Si
31. Betekent een BTW-verhoging een belasting op vermogen?
32. No to racism
33. Koorddansen
34. Toekomstloos
35. Presies ‘n week later…
36. 31. Laten we elkaar helpen
37. Voor uzelf zorgen, dat is toch echt niet simpel
38. Mijn medicatie en waarom
39. Column 558
40. “Weer een aanrijding van een persoon tussen Almelo en Deventer. Triest.”
41. Recensie Zonder script – Charles Martin
42. ”Er zitten gewoon gaten in mijn geheugen, terwijl ik compleet nuchter was”
43. Verloren dagen
44. R.I.P.
45. Liebe Kunden
46. Kassiererstory
47. Hartes Brot in harten Zeiten
48. Lehrer & Supermärkte
49. Arzt Gespräch
50. Står i stormen
51. Take a look in a Swedish supermarket
52. Sunday Supermarket
53. How to Avoid a Traumatic Supermarkt Experience
54. Whole foods, New York
55. Resorting to this
56. Thoughts from the cocoon
57. I wish…
58. Just Going Through Some Stuff Right Now
59. Seize the day
60. Between Borderline and Buddhism…
61. Pride
62. If It’s Not One Thing
63. Lower than the border
64. I’m Done
65. Day 10
66. Day 11
67. 100 Tahun Misteri Quantum
68. Materialisme històric

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Related articles

• Some Thoughts On Self-control From Various Authors
• Take a sip, thumb through at leisure

Going on holiday is… silence in your head

An average Westerner lives in his head. From kindergarten until university he is indoctrinated with the idea that there is an answer to every question and a solution to every problem. In this way his need to understand and control keeps the illusion alive that we have a grip on our reality and have everything under control.

But nothing is further from the truth.

In his book ‘De Schaduw van de Verlichting” Eddy Van Tilt speaks about ‘the over-drive of rationality‘.Because we give our ratio absolute status , we have become estranged of that part of reality that is not rational and with which we have lost touch.

The psychologist Van Tilt asks :

” What happened that caused the heads of Westerners to become so hard and their hearts so weak?”

Because he is confronted with the pathological results of too much ego, the delusion of manipulability and rationalising.

The psychiatrist Mark Epstein reacts to this as follows :

‘our thinking mind is compulsive, because it does not want to forget or be forgotten and therefore always has something to do’.

That is why it will not be easy to ” let go of everything” on holiday.
Because as hungry and restless as our mind is preoccupied with the past and the future, it will need other kinds of stimuli, in order not to forget or be forgotten.

We can put our mind at rest.
In the first place by keeping our heart open, by simply observing what happens inside ourselves and by reconnecting with our body, our surroundings, and by accepting …to be moved. When we enter silence, we will experience “now” and  not so much hearing it, but rather feeling it or even better …. experiencing it.
 
To obtain this , it is not necessary to leave your ego or anything else behind, but to look past its borders.

‘By standing still we do not see new things, but we look at things in a different way’,

is what C.G. Jung concluded once.

Or how going on holiday is mainly… silence in your head and heart.

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Preceding:

Summerholiday season time to read the Bible

Holiday making and dreaming

Home-stayers and their to do list

Written by inspiration of God for our admonition, to whom it shall be imputed if they believe

Dutch version / Nederlandstalige versie: Vakantie is… stilte in je hoofd

Sigmund Freud, G. Stanley Hall, C.G. Jung, A.A. Brill, Ernest Jones, and Sándor Ferenczi posed at Clark University, Worcester, Mass. Photograph first published in September 1909. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

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Additional reading:

1. Be still and listen
2. Control and change
3. Control your destiny or somebody else will
4. Malefactors becoming your master
5. Patience is the ability to count down before blasting off
6. He who smiles rather than rages is always the stronger
7. Know Who goes with us and don’t try to control life
8. A Living Faith #7 Prayer
9. Praying is surrendering in all circumstances
10. Giving cogent reasons to young people why Christian faith is relevant to them

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Further reading:

1. Rationalisation
2. I’m proud of me
3. Day 300: Rationalising Not Buying Anything
4. Day 552 (or 1 Year, 6 Months, and 7 Days of Continuous Sobriety)
5. When We Shouldn’t – And Should – Argue from Authority
6. Hofstadterisms
7. Why imagination is great (and why many evangelicals don’t like it)
8. People focus on what they can see
9. An Artifact of Our Time
10. Are biases deviations from the mean?
11. Do we really live in the Age of Empathy?
12. Excellent. With musings on religion and mass extinctions.
13. Rationality as a Social Process
14. Illogical Rationality
15. Sam Harris’s War on Rationality
16. The Image of Objectivity
17. Looking at the world through the eyes of others
18. Relapse
19. Working toward a new paradigm
20. Does your brain know what’s best for you?
21. Effective Altruism: the global movement that combines your heart and your head
22. Animal rationality
23. Do irrational idiots exist?
24. The Grasshopper and the Ant – a story of economic rationality
25. Maybe Everyone Is Actually Super Rational!
26. Note: Misconceptions on Understanding
27. Too many decisions can be exhausting.
28. How to make the best decisions you can
29. Rationality over the long term
30. Desperate for a “Pause”
31. “Time to take out the trash”
32. It doesn’t always stand to reason

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Related articles

• It’s Okay Not To Be Okay
• 10 Things You Need To Know About Yourself Before You’ll Have The Life You Want
• Secrets of Psychotherapy: Ten Ways to Be More Happy (Pt. 2)
• Inside Inside Out, a review of sorts
• ‘The eyes may be wrong, but the psyche is right’
• Carl Jung on the “Mystic” and “Mysticism.”
• Tapping into God’s Strength by Waiting on Him
• Improving the world by improving the Faith

Vakantie is… stilte in je hoofd

Een doorsnee westerling leeft in zijn hoofd. Van de kleuterklas tot de unief wordt hij geïndoctrineerd dat er voor elke vraag een antwoord is en voor elk probleem een oplossing. Zo houdt zijn wil tot begrijpen en beheersen de illusie overeind dat we greep hebben op onze realiteit en alles onder controle hebben.

Maar niets is minder waar.
In zijn boek ‘De schaduw van de Verlichting’ spreekt Eddy Van Tilt over de ‘over-driving van de rationaliteit’. Precies omdat we onze ratio een absolute status geven, zijn we vervreemd van dat deel van de realiteit dat niet rationeel is en waar we geen voeling mee hebben. Psycholoog Van Tilt stelt zich de vraag:

“Wat is er gebeurd dat de hoofden in het Westen verhard en de harten zo verslapt zijn?”

Omdat hij geconfronteerd wordt met de pathologische gevolgen van te veel ego, maakbaarheidswaan en rationaliseringen. Psychiater Mark Epstein reageert:

‘Onze denkende geest is dwangmatig, omdat hij niet wil vergeten of vergeten worden en daarom altijd wel iets te doen heeft’.

Het zal op vakantie dus niet zo eenvoudig zijn om ‘alles eens los te laten’.Want hongerig en ongedurig als onze geest bezig is met verleden en toekomst, zal hij weer andere soorten prikkels nodig hebben om ‘niet te vergeten’ of ‘vergeten te worden’.We kunnen onze geest tot rust brengen.
Door in de eerste plaats ons hart open te houden, gewoon waar te nemen wat er in ons leeft en ons opnieuw te verbinden met ons lichaam, onze omgeving en ons… te laten raken. Als we de stilte ingaan, gaan we het ‘nu’-moment ervaren en niet zozeer horen dan wel voelen of beter nog… gewaarworden.Je hoeft daarbij je ego niet achter te laten, wel voorbij zijn grenzen kijken.

“Door stil te staan, gaan we geen nieuwe dingen zien, maar gaan we anders naar de dingen kijken”,

concludeerde ooit C.G. Jung.

Of hoe vakantie vooral… stilte is in je hoofd en je hart.

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Voorgaande:

Zomertijd ideaal op met Bijbellezing aan te vangen #1Bestseller aller tijden

Zomertijd ideaal op met Bijbellezing aan te vangen #2 Blijvende waardevolle schat

Engelse versie / English version: Going on holiday is… silence in your head

Zalig Zijn De Armen Van Geest (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

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Aanvullende lectuur:

Wetenschappers, filosofen hun zeggen, geloven en waarheden

Wees stil en luister

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Lectuur van anders denkenden:

• Busy Busy – Work
• Ben jij al zomerklaar?
• i love summer tag
• Ben ik weer!
• Zomervakantie
• Vrije tijd
• Wat doe jij in je vrije tijd? What do you do in your free time?
• Wat te doen in de vakantie?!
• We zijn los! De vakantie is begonnen.
• What to do in summer at home.
• Summer bucket list
• Inspiratieboost #9
• Rondje langs de dijk
• Very Fine House Vakantieboek – 1
• Vakantie!!!
• Summer loving, had me a blast!
• Mijn leven inrichten
• Lazing… Luieren…
• VVB in de zomer
• Die vlam
• Beginnen aan een nieuw avontuur
• Geloof aan mijn voordeur
• We leven in een gouden tijd volgens een wetenschapshistoricus maar we hebben ook te maken met een #systeemcrisis allerwege #trouw #cultuurverandering #nieuwespiritualiteit
• Bel, die weet het wel
• 001: De vechtsport van de rationaliteit
• Rationaliteit in meervoud
• Kleinigheid zonder rationaliteit
• Coen Simon, ‘En toen wisten we alles’ (2011)
• Gonçalo M. Tavarez, ‘Jeruzalem’ (2011) Leven in tijden van waanzin en geweld
• Geen realiteit.
• Dom
• Welcome to the freakshow
• Daaglikse dosis realiteit
• Generatie Y
• Verwondering // Jouw waarheid vs. mijn waarheid
• Opheldering onderwerp

Related articles

• C.G. Jung on John D. Rockefeller
• Carl Jung on “ESP” and “Synchronicity.”
• Secrets of Psychotherapy: Ten Ways to Be More Happy (Pt. 2)
• It’s Okay Not To Be Okay
• 10 Things You Need To Know About Yourself Before You’ll Have The Life You Want
• Health Care – The Alchemy of Emotions
• How May I Best Use it… She asked
• How to Attract a Conscious/Evolved Man.
• Christ DID teach of Karma, reincarnation, self-realization and the Divine Feminine as Holy Ghost!
• Journal: Green Pastures, and The Storybook

Gender connections

Jennifer L Thorpe believes that in order to find true self, we must dig deep into the darkness in order to find the warm, loving light. {Where We Need To Be}

Several people may be lost in the dark and not find themselves any more. It is not that their minds and egos battle with their self, their true being, but because our society has liked to put labels onto them. Many encounter difficulties because they may have friends not liked by others or others seeing more in their relationship than there has to be.

How often our society does want to see men in such roles and women in other roles. Today there is still a gender connection with many professions. But there is also still an idea about how men or women may have an connection with other people, from the same or from the other sex. Still too many  people do want to look for other things behind a close relationship. This makes that people can become very lonely and isolated.

Alysta Lim recognises this this concept society has about masculinity, femininity, and gender roles. she compares it to

mass-produced clothes of the same size and style. It does not matter if they do not fit you. One’s own preference is of little consequence. People give us this pair of shoes, tell us to wear it, and like it. In this subject, at least, man and woman truly are equals. {On Gender Roles}

Woman as sex object or to lure man in buying things. – 2004 Chery Fulwin at Shanghai Shi, Shanghai, China. (Flickr set : Autoshow 2004) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Getting all labels on our ‘being’ this also puts pressure on us and makes us sometimes weary or afraid to go deeper in a relationship because it may be misunderstood. The media do not help much either. They present their twisted idea about relationships as normal standard, by which those who have other standards or a different upbringing at home, are confronted with questions which they should not have. The world of film and television is presented as they world we all should live in and should live accordingly.  But in that world everything seems to turn around sex and violence.

Everything what seems to be sweet is labelled as old fashioned and not strong or not mature.

Alysta Lim rightly dares to ask:

Why do we have to be certain things? Wouldn’t it be better to be ourselves than to be a ‘man’ or a ‘woman’?  {On Gender Roles}

Graham and Megan attempt to reinforce their gender roles through performing traditional female tasks. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

She forgets that by the contemporary society it is not liked to see people who are wanting to be their own. It is considered not wanting to be part of this or their society. It is considered that that person who wants to be his or her own does not want to adapt to society. They consider them weak, but they should know those who want to stay and can stay their own are just the strong ones in society.

Those who do not do foolish actions and do not cry like so many who demonstrate a football madness, (now) when there are world-championships.

Why should men go out working and women stay in the house to do only household work for their own?

who’s to say that men can’t take care of babies and women can’t work?  {On Gender Roles}

At moments everybody may do like crazy, cheering for the winning team. But when somebody becomes to enthusiastic about an exhibition or a theatre performance, he or she would be considered as a ‘noob’, a ‘fool’ or an ‘idiot’ and not somebody to talk to or to have much connection with.

People who would like to tackle more serious subjects have become cast out in this world. Lots of young people do chat a lot but it is all about ‘chit–chat’, not serious talk with shortened words or signs, in such a way that a lot of them even can not talk and write reasonably well any more.

Though most of them dream about the ideal figure they want to be at the most high post they can get. They all dream of high positions which will get them richness, lots of things to play with.

Broken drams. The Hard life of women. – Roundhouse wipers having lunch in their rest room, Chicago & North Western Railroad, Clinton, Iowa, April 1943. Jack Delano, photographer Reproduction from color slide LC-USW361-644 LC-DIG-fsac-1a34808, FSA/OWI Collection http://myloc.gov/Exhibitions/boundforglory/ExhibitionItems/ExhibitObjects/WomenWorkersEmployedasWipers.aspx (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Through the years an image is given to all of us, and it seems it is still there hanging in the air. Lots of people still have their picture of the perfect man or woman. By many it has become a chain or like the young Freuddwyn blogwriter notices but would like to see herself it to be something which can be useful

good when used as a handbook, not a prison. We are at heart a man, a woman, a child, and something greater we can’t hope to describe. Why should we strive only for one and disregard the rest, when all of them make us what we are now? {On Gender Roles}

Because of the pressure in schools and at work and still the patriarchal society, women are less self-assured than men. To be able to succeed they need more confidence, because the competence may well be there, but often women have to prove themselves twice more than men.

Katty Kay and Claire Shipman do find that for years women have kept their heads down and played by the rules. Many women believed in fairy tales and were sure that with enough hard work, their natural talents would be recognized and rewarded. They did not count on the many magazines which did everything to present women more as a sex object instead of giving more attention on what women really could manage. all the paparazzi material pushed the serious woman under water and tried the world to believe those who made it in life would be those who enjoy women and show off with all material wealth and all sorts of women they can get. Women were and are presented as a trophy you can use to show off to others and show your success in life.

American ladies may think they have made undeniable progress. In the United States, women now earn more college and graduate degrees than men do. They make up half the workforce, and they are closing the gap in middle management. Half a dozen global studies, conducted by the likes of Goldman Sachs and Columbia University, have found that companies employing women in large numbers outperform their competitors on every measure of profitability.

Our competence has never been more obvious. Those who closely follow society’s shifting values see the world moving in a female direction. {The Confidence Gap; Evidence shows that women are less self-assured than men—and that to succeed, confidence matters as much as competence. Here’s why, and what to do about it.}

Katty Kay and Claire Shipman write, being aware that as they’ve worked, ever diligent, the men around women have continued to get promoted faster and be paid more.

The statistics are well known: at the top, especially, women are nearly absent, and our numbers are barely increasing. Half a century since women first forced open the boardroom doors, our career trajectories still look very different from men’s. {The Confidence Gap}

In writings of some younger blogger we may find a positive change. Up until now, according to us, women did either try to get on the top the wrong way, thinking they had to crush men, and where willing ‘to go over dead bodies’. They kept showing an acute lack of confidence of what they had in themselves to prove themselves to the others.

spick and span (Photo credit: recombiner)

Bloggers like Jennifer L Thorpe,  Cat Lady Its fruitcake weather and the writer of Freuddwyn show with others that they perhaps can look again at the Universe to learn more about themselves {That Pale Blue Dot}, and that they have come to believe that they should not think anyone is better than anyone else, or that anyone is further along or behind.

They may wonder what they are, compared to the greatness of the cosmos in which they have to bring up patience which is limited as with most things. May we believe we in them can come to see a new generation who starts believing that they have all the time in the world to grow, make or break, heal and recover?

All are where they need to be. It’s an individual path at first. Then, it becomes unity. But, each of us develop at our own speed and per our needs. There is not timing or deadline to reach that place we are all going. We all end up there in due time. {Where We Need To Be}

We amount to little more than a speck, but here’s the twist: each of us is a universe in ourselves, and together we make up a world. We make up a home. {That Pale Blue Dot}

It would be nice to come to see again a generation who is willing to accept their limits, not eager to compete with others just to be better, but more willing to go beyond their own limits and trying to grow themselves notwithstanding what other might do or think.

When they start stepping over the gender issue and consider it a priority to know their own limits, being it more important than knowing the enemy’s, that would mean that boundaries would actually help them to grow and become again a generation to bring a turning point.

Alysta Lim, who may bring with her Deviant art some fresh innocent positivist drawings, got to accept that nobody can be perfect!

We shall never be, no matter how hard we try, for the simple reason that we are human. {On Gender Roles}

There are always things we can’t do. So why bother trying if there is no chance of moving forward? Sometimes it is good to know that there are walls, if only to know when to stop and which way to go when it becomes impossible to move forward. After all, life is always a bunch of wrong turns and detours…it is never a straight line. {Our Limit}

Being a man or a woman, both will have to face obstacles, one way or the other. Both shall also find they need other people on their way, to accompany them or to give them a little help or encouragement to continue their way.

Already being aware that nobody can be perfect and that each of us has to try to make it for himself or herself, an intern acceptance of the self can bring more personal growth in the right direction and offer more success. Until now many women, despite all their progress, are still woefully underrepresented at the highest levels. but this seems to going to change. Looking at the attitude of the twenties we may have hopes they will be able to put away the materialism of the previous generations and will start fining more connection to real friends and to nature. Having them becoming aware that all those social media friends are not exactly ‘real friends’ they need in life or will help their life forwards, they will come to understand it is more important to build up right connection in a honest way and by having real friends around them in their own surroundings.

In 2011, half the female respondents to a review about gender position, reported self-doubt about their job performance and careers, compared with fewer than a third of male respondents. We can say that because they were less confident in general in their abilities this led them not to want to pursue future opportunities or wanted them to gain higher positions by getting rid of their male ‘contestants’. In case we can see a new generation, early in the twenties, finding some assurance what they themselves present has its own value, we might find them going into to market for the person they are really,offering honest work, to take or to leave.

With the encouragement they can get from friends and people around them they shall not have to come to think that they are not totally imcompetent in the area, so they would not going to go for it. Today having so many people just standing on their own they do not have to be afraid to fall or to be afraid to end up going into less competitive fields, like human resources or marketing, because they will have found out it is much more important to do what you really want to do, and to enjoy doing what you do. This shall also give again some ‘innocence’ and ‘purity’ in their work, which shall attract the right persons to what they do and to recognise their work.

At the end this would be much more satisfying than those who only have the money-letters in front of their eyes;

Perhaps many may say

 “They don’t go for finance, investment banks, or senior-track faculty positions.” {The Confidence Gap}

but their confidence in what they want to do, shall bring them much further in a life, full of happiness, knowing that having a cosy nice home or lovely family is more important than having all the wealth of the world.

When the woman is willing to see herself not as an other or competitive gender to male, or shall not be willing to just live quietly by the still discrimination of gender, she shall be able to come more forwards and be come more recognised for what she is able to achieve, without others thinking there where some loopholes or something was needed for her to get so far.

Looking at certain blogs of young people we may see an advancement seeing some young women who are not willing to conform to this gender discrimination, trying to scramble on ways to please men, to do it the ‘right’ societal female way.

Living in an Asian country the (female) writer of Purity opulence writes

Females should be much more dignified than men, we bear children for the world, we did that, we did this. In the eyes of traditional beliefs, everything that females have done is considered rightfully legitimate and a strong must. This disgusting trend has led to many women trying to throw away their dignity, distinctly or indistinguishably. {Purity opulence: to love is to respect}

The previous ten years we have seen kids making themselves up like they would be adults. Parents let them dress like adults in mini format. Parents also demanded to get them ‘diploma’s for alls sort things’. It became even so ridiculous that some kindergarten schools are already giving a ‘diploma’ (not a certificate) for the toddlers at the end of the school-year. Our society recently has done everything to have people to impress others. And men had to be on the top, doing interesting ‘male’ jobs or they were not worthy for our society. And women trying to get some ‘male jobs’ where considered ‘wrong girls’, of the wrong sex, or ‘strebers’.

Purity of opulence remarks:

When women are neglected or toyed by men, the first thing that comes in mind is regret. But just a step before it, why do you have to do everything to impress men? The point that I’m trying to make here is to convey the message that, even in the modern society, women are regarded as shameless, can-do-everything-for-anything person. You can’t completely blame the guys. It is you, these kind of women, who sell themselves by sticking and seducing guys, trying to be as girly or demure so that there will be some forces of attraction. Please? Dignity? Therefore, there is this vicious cycle that’s really vicious and irreversible. Ancient society (oppression) –> girls conform –> men think girls are easy creatures –> discrimination continues. {Purity opulence: to love is to respect}

Age-of-Brass Triumph-of-Womans-Rights 1869 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

It looks at last we have come to see the seed for a new generation, where women are willing to see themselves as women who can do their own thing and have their own value, which should not be less nor more than the value of men.

We may have come to a generation which is well aware that

Gender is how we feel and how we express our selves.

and which is willing to give a voice to their own feeling and not any-more want to pretend.

If my sex is the same as my gender, then people can and will say
“you were born a girl so you must act like one.”
I know this because people who feel that sex and gender are the same do say this. But if sex and gender are different, then people are more accepting of those of us who have a gender that doesn’t match our sex. This is why sex and gender must be seen as separate. {Sex and Gender}

It is nice to find again people who want to be themselves.

The dancer Britany Elizabet writes

The very selfish conclusion that I came to is that I am not willing to sacrifice that much of myself anymore. I have already been there. I did it with dance team, I did it with a relationships. I played an unnatural role that did not fit me. I pretended to be the idle girlfriend who stayed at home, doted hand and foot on her boyfriend (like, literally, spent time cracking his toes and massaging his athlete-foot infested feet), put aside her entire life for him. It didn’t work for me and actually turned out to be quite a disaster/caused me immense anxiety issues. I tried to be the popular girl, who involved herself in trivial affairs, such as reality television and gossip magazines, got her nails done every other week, and shopped on her free time. That was too expensive of an endeavor for a very Dutch person like myself.

So, as my existential crisis rounds out and my Victorian literature class comes to an end, I am comforted by the fact that I am just me. I don’t fit any definite, prescribed gender roles (as someone one told me, “you are kind of like a guy”), and I don’t really care to fit any of those specific gender roles either, because as seen by our characters, it is unnatural, it doesn’t work, and most likely, you will end up in the madhouse. {Gender Roles & Self Sacrifice}

In the light of this:

So women, women and women, you want people to respect you as a woman, but you just keep on doing things that propels people to be more discriminating! We have to love ourselves, love for what we are and not change just for the purpose of trying to please this or that.

Hopefully, in a matter of decades, women can rise to be equal with men. I think, you, have heard of the word, “tigress”. {Purity opulence: to love is to respect}

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Other articles related to the subject:

1. The only times you are allowed to be sexist
   Here are a list of times when it is ok to be sexist….
2. Real Women Have Curves
   Why do we use a competitive term to describe women? There is curvy vs non curve, real vs fake, good vs, bad… All of which are used to qualify a woman, none of which actually matter. (Sorry fellas you are still entitled to your good girl). Maybe one day we will live in a society where the ranking of women as objects would sound like a ridiculous idea, until then here is my two cent on the matter of the “real women with curves”
3. how women experience clothing
   “You are what you wear”, we’ve all heard this before. The clothes that you choose to wear send a message out to those around you. What you wear affects others perception of you and also affects how you feel. This sounds agreeable right? Of course it does. It happens all the time in the movies.
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   I am not whole. I am a divided self. Split. I have two ways of seeing myself. I see myself and I see myself being seen. I am a subject and simultaneously I see myself as an object. I assume the position of the other (the person who sees me) and stand away from my physical self. I try to gain a better understanding of myself through my objectification. The divided self is not particular to how women experience themselves. We all experience ourselves through a split self to build our self and identity. I am not one but two perspectives. The perspective of myself and the other. Who is the other? Whose perspective am I using to judge myself? It isn’t mine. Though it becomes mine.
4. Mars needs women (and so does the US Congress)
   To lessen the gender gap in political participation and engagement, it is more clear than ever that we need to have more women in political office– an improving trend that has very much slowed.  The problem is not voters, the problem is that we simply need more women running for office.  And that problem is that not enough women want to run for office.  That’s what we really need to change.
5. Discussion Questions: Interviewing on Race, Class, and Gender
   listening for female same-sex desire in Laura’s interview cannot be only about searching for signs of lesbian identity. It must also take into account the intersection of sexuality with class, race, religious practice, age, and other factors
6. Finding privilege: class, gender and social justice tourism
   Grow your hair or don’t grow it. Wear a dress or don’t wear one. Play with trains or play with dolls. Pick your pronouns, pick your friends, but if you are not born female in a hierarchy which positions women as less than men, you will never be in a position to experience what gender is and does to women and girls.
   +
   Like wealth and poverty, gender is a hierarchy which allows for gradations of suffering. Due to gender some women are denied an education, denied the right to vote or drive, denied the right to orgasm, denied the right to control their fertility and denied the right to withhold sexual consent. I am not one of these women. This does not make it fair or reasonable for me to trivialize what gender does, just because I can. I can let my sons wear dresses (and I do). I can challenge gender stereotypes in my writing and actions (and I do). I can sit with my five-year-old, drawing pictures of him as Queen Elsa, and we can both delight at the thought of a world in which he wouldn’t be made fun of at school for wanting long hair (which he is). I can do all of these things but it does not give me the right to reduce something which ruins the lives of billions of human beings to a fatuous matter of choice.
7. Vulnerability and Mindfulness
   I remembered what I had been told time and time again, that to look at another person in the eyes is a momentary glimpse into the mirror of their soul while simultaneously reflecting back into mine. It is a time of intimacy when the world stops for a brief instant when you realize that you are not really separate beings at all, but simply different points of view to the one being that some may call God.
8. “The Criminal Justice System operates free of prejudice and discrimination.”
   In the modern era of female emancipation and human rights there should be no doubt if our justice system still stays prejudice in the area of gender differences and see us all as equals when we face the law. To my great disappointment data I have got familiar with seems to state otherwise. Is it the fault of the male culture overpowering all the main government bodies and disciplines during all these years of patriarchal control? Is it that ‘macho’ practice became institutionalised and implemented as a normal acceptable social norm of behaviour? If we consider how our law has historically criminalised aggression – how certain types of anti-social conduct have been targeted, while other have been either formally or practically left unregulated, we can see a distinction according to gender. Does it mean that such law is reflecting only male patterns of behaviour and exclusively accepts only male standards of adequate conduct? Let’s take a closer look.
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9. “Fight for your rights: Masculinism as a response against inequality.”
10. Fathers should stop babysitting
    Sandberg discusses many issues in her book (obviously, because…it’s a book..) and one of the topics I would like to make reference to today, which struck a chord in my heart, is the topic which deals with socialising men to the concept of gender equality and feminism.
    +
    I feel most men personify feminism, turn it into the new f word and give it an unjustifiable persona of a women who fears personal grooming and deodorant. And for this reason, most men, not just those in my circle, are left in the dark because as soon as they have an opinion about it, it gets shut down faster than Thandi’s dream of growing up to become a F1 racer.
    +
    With initiatives such as www.menengage.org and www.unfpa.org socialising men and young boys, I believe gender equality will no longer be a fable, but a real thing. It will be something effective and in the beginning maybe admirable but hopefully in the end, a norm.
11. Getting Involved with Gender and Enterprise Network
    complicating it intersectionally, and challenging the heteronormative bias of research as it currently exists.
12. Celebrating diversity by looking the same?
    A lot of schools will have a boys and girls uniform or if you are at a single sex school, more than likely you have one uniform option.
    +
    Uniform does another powerful thing – it defines gender. Go to any public toilet and you will know the sign for female is triangle. Last time I checked I wasn’t a triangle. But I know instinctively that this is the door I choose. It suggests that to be female you must be wearing a dress/skirt which creates the triangle effect. If you are a guy you don’t get to wear a triangle – even if you want to.
13. Gender Roles & Self Sacrifice
    the Victorian’s fascination with trying to categorize everything caused them to strive to create distinct categories of what is male and what is female.
    +
    human nature can never be defined into two distinct categories. As seen in Victorian literature and Victorian society, it is when we try to fulfill these extreme, unnatural gender roles that people’s psyches breakdown and they go into a perpetual “madness” (and probably get sent to the looney bin, or as the rich people call it, “The Grove”).
14. Gender roles and inequality
    Gender roles start very early in life where it is defined by the  behaviors and attitudes expected from either sex. Obviously, there are physical and biological differences between males and females and a person’s sexuality also comes into play. But unlike these differences, gender roles are also imposed through external social influences. Little girls are expected to play with dolls while boys are expected to play with cars or action figures. We are all guilty of this.
15. Pink and Blue
    Apparently, when I was three years old, I informed my parents that “Pink is a girl’s color. Blue is for boys.” My parents, recovering hippies that they were, shared a perplexed glance as if to ask each other, Are you responsible for teaching her that genderist smut?! When neither owned up to it, they decided it must have been the evils of society – no matter how careful they were to shroud me from such ideas, societal roles and expectations were just too insidious.
    +
    What would happen if we accepted each other as readily as we accepted societal norms? How would we behave if we did what we knew to be good, instead of what we were told was right? I have wracked my brain to come up with a non-cheesey way to say it, but I can’t, so I’ll just say it, cheese and all: Bare your face, and while you’re at it, bare your soul; speak your truth, and recognize that truth is relative and malleable; don’t worry if you don’t fit society’s idea of you, or even your own idea of you – a person is more than an idea.
16. Equality Or Feminism ?
    What some misogynists do not understand is that feminism exists not just to fight for equal rights for women on political, social and economic grounds but most importantly to fight for equal rights for women who are in countries that are dominated by mostly men; Women who are helpless and are defined by their fathers and/or husbands and male figures in power, women who are seen as a means to an end. Feminists, true feminists are fighting for humanity as is defined by the present society. Do not take everything regarding equality as a feminist slur, that is pure ignorance. Feminists campaign for women’s rights in voting, property, job securing, contract laws etc. They do this all the while promoting integrity, self-respect, self-worth, and autonomy for women. They work to protect young girls from sexual assault, sexual harassment, domestic violence and any form of discrimination towards women.
17. Ladies: It’s time for an Evaluation It’s time to look in the mirror – the mirror of history – and reassess the female behavior.
    Throughout history, women have always been seen as a symbol of purity, the representation of goodness, and beauty – the incorruptible creature.
18. On Gender Roles
    As a child, I have a concept of what I want to be, and it wasn’t a lady. I liked Power Rangers more than Barbie, wore jeans everywhere, continued to climb trees and fight with boys until they suddenly had growth spurts and expanded to twice my size.
19. Gender roles Seven feet tall, fixated facial features and an ice cream cone for a body.
    That was my figure yesterday as I stood in the frozen yogurt shop where I work dressed as the mascot to take pictures with kids at a party.
20. Whisper BS Part 1: Body Shaming
    I very recently downloaded the app called “Whisper” and I’ve been collecting some things that have been horrifying me. Whisper is an app where users are completely anonymous and can post all their secrets and fears without repercussions.
21. It’s A Man’s World (Apparently) I am getting tired of having female characters in movies existing primarily for the bad guy to capture/hurt/kill them so the main man is weakened. Just so he can ‘avenge’ her or whatever.
22. Oh, Boys Will Be Boys
    My Psychology of Gender (which, by the way, was a phenomenal class – or maybe it was just my way awesome instructor 😛 – that I think everyone should take regardless of what your college major is, but I digress) professor once shared with my class that she, while raising her son, instilled in him the principle of not hitting anybody whether it be a girl or a boy.
23. Love nothing.
    Frequently I stand staring at the waters seamless expressions of existence and wonder how persistence even exists in a world of hurt hearts.
24. The War Against Women in Kenya: Sexual Violence
25. I Don’t Belong In The Kitchen
26. Biblical Women Smash the Patriarchy
27. Smashing Patriarchy: Esther
28. Decline of The Modern Goddess
29. Dear Miss Madame : Splitting Chores With Your Man? It’s a Dirty Job!
30. “Attention Whores”
31. Think About It
32. Marriage and a bit of Philosophy
33. A Marriage is Not Easy to Manage
34. Japanese issues in “Tokyo Sonata”
35. A “perverted attack”? A difference of opinion? Or a hill to die on?
36. It’s OK To Cry…

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Related articles

• Genre Talk: Boys and Girls (paranormalunbound.com)
  On my author blog, I featured an urban fantasy title by a debut author who respectfully requested, on behalf of her publisher, that her gender not be revealed. In other words, by remaining “gender-neutral” and using only two initials and a last name, she is in essence posing as a guy in order to appeal to a broader readership. I went along with her wishes, of course, but it really made me think.
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  I’m kind of outraged, and the more I think about it, the more bothered I am. What does it say about our society, and our industry, if the only way a woman can publish a non-romance title and be accepted by a broad audience of both genders, at least in certain genres, is to pretend to be male or hide behind a “gender-neutral” pen name? By following this marketing rationale, is the publisher being smart, realistic, or perpetuating a cultural stereotype we should be well past?
• Week Four – Image and the Body (ritviscom.wordpress.com)
  As far as encountering someone who was not distinctly male or female, this experience can be a little jarring. Recently at the Jazz Fest in Downtown Rochester, my boyfriend and I crossed paths with a young lady who may or may not have been born a male. I am an extremely open-minded person and never aim to make anyone feel uncomfortable. With that being said, our society is very black and white when it comes to gender. Media images are flooded with either male or female models, images, visuals, etc. This makes encounters with ambiguous gendered bodies seem out of the ordinary. However, I think with the growing popularity and media attention of actresses like Laverne Cox from Orange is the New Black, we might start to shift in this sentiment!
• What is anti-genderism? (francoistremblay.wordpress.com)
  When I talk about genderism and anti-genderism, what do I mean exactly? How do they work? Since genderism is extremely common, we should probably start there.First, the building blocks of genderism. The most obvious is hierarchy: gender roles form a hierarchical institution, and therefore every principle relevant to institutions also applies here.
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  I know it’s fashionable in left-wing circles to be against gender roles or the gender binary but to support gender. I see no point in that whatsoever, and it’s not clear to me how anyone can cogently be against one but not against the other. All I’ve seen were pathetic attempts at rationalization like “gender is sexy!” or “gender is empowering!”, but that’s nothing different from any other woman-hating rationalization out there, so there’s no point in dwelling on it.
• Demolish: Gender Roles (wreckingballtothepatriarchy.wordpress.com)
  We can only have an hierarchy of gender if we have genders first. So if we want to rid ourselves of gender oppression, we need to get rid of the gender binary as it exists. Seems simple enough, right? Well a lot of people don’t think so. There is of course the good old argument that God made us this way, which of course is all shot to hell when you look at intersex people (and also when you are an atheist such as myself), but there are also social reasons that some people espouse:
• Genderism, trans theory and the hostility towards radical feminism. (francoistremblay.wordpress.com)
  The concept of genderism, as used in feminism, is usually defined as the belief that certain behavioral preferences are caused by a person’s sex, in general that one’s gender is the result of one’s sex, and therefore that gender is natural (and even desirable).This stands in stark contrast to the view that gender is a social construct. It is also generally held as being the opposite of feminism, because feminists believe that being of the female sex does not constitute an obligation to take on a gender role which is constructed as inferior and subservient.

  What are the behaviors and roles considered appropriate for one’s sex?

  If you are a Feminist (even a Liberal Feminist or a Fun Feminist), the answer to this should be “There are no behaviors and roles considered appropriate for my sex because Females can be and do anything.”

  There is a lot of nuances in definitions here, but they are not entirely necessary. For example, some include within genderism the belief that there are two genders. But the two genders are an artefact of culture; some culture have three genders or four genders, and really, the exact number is irrelevant: all that matters is that some are seen as superior and some are seen as inferior. Genderism would not magically disappear if we added another gender to the list.

• Gender and Sexual Diversity (dissidentvoice.org)
  anti-transgender prejudice is so deeply rooted and systemic that it is rarely noticed or even considered. Discussions of anti-transgender prejudice, often amongst individuals never directly impacted, are replete with misunderstanding and misused or ill-defined concepts and terminology.
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  I would like to disclaim that “transgender” is an umbrella term for many people who defy mainstream expectations and assumptions regarding gender, and can be used to refer to transsexuals as well as people who are gender nonconforming in other ways — for example, feminine men, masculine women, transfeminine, transmasculine, genderqueers (who do not identify exclusively as either women or men), to name a few. There are many different ways to experience and interpret gender as human beings. And there are also several ways to conceptualize gender.
• Inspiring Australian Women Tackle Workplace Gender Gap (woman.com.au)
  Australian women today can follow any career path they choose, but social norms and organisational structures do not aid their success. That was the key message from the Women In Business 20:20 panel discussion held this week to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Telstra Business Women’s awards.