No, I don't mean the kind of Vampire that is romanticized in the Twilight Saga, or the Anne Rice novels. I am pretty sure my steady diet of garlic will keep those at bay... I am talking about the Vampires that exist in our everyday lives.
In her book "Emotional Freedom", UCLA psychiatrist Judith Orloff, MD talks about the emotional vampires in our lives. Whether they do so intentionally or not, these people can make us feel overwhelmed, depressed, defensive, angry, and wiped out. The consequence of not being able to defend against these "Emotional Vampires" can be unhealthy behaviors and symptoms, such as overeating, isolating, mood swings, or feeling fatigued.
In an interesting video, r. Orloff talks to people about what emotional freedom means to them and she gets some interesting responses: VIDEO.
Her book discusses several different types of Vampire. Do you have a relationship with anyone on this list?
The Narcissist: Delusions of grandeur
The Victim: Believes the world is against him/her
The Controller: Opinionated, rigid sense of right and wrong, needs to dominate
The Criticizer: Feels qualified to judge and belittle everything
The Splitter: Friendly one day and attacks the next. Rageaholic who enjoys causing drama.
While it may be true, that we may have one or more of these people (external influences) in our lives, it can also be argued that these Vampires exist within each of us as thoughts, emotions, and habits. I'd argue that as internal thoughts, these Vampiric parasites can do a lot more damage than as external influences (people). When these thought patterns occur we have to recognize them for what they are and be able to defend against them, or stop them altogether.
The video I mentioned above begins to touch upon the universal truth that once we achieve peace with ourselves, we can then begin the work of achieving peace in the world around us.
Only through recognition and practice can we rid and/or protect ourselves against these Vampiric people or behaviors. Take a minute in your life and start to find those things that sap your energy, self-confidence, or inner peace. Question why you allow it to happen. Then find constructive ways to defend against or avoid those patterns or people altogether.
..... I am still practicing recognizing these things within myself....and eating lots of garlic (just in case)!
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Monday, September 27, 2010
Surviving Winter
As the fall approaches and the weather gets cooler, I listen to my friends talk about the changing of the leaves, the changing of the seasons, and eventual winter. Some of them are excited, and some are less than enthused.
I am one of those that is somewhere in between. As a native Arizonan, snow accumulation above a few inches is too much for me on a daily basis. Living in Milwaukee, WI has taught me that life does continue when snow has reached a height of more than 6 inches and is still falling. Business don't close, kids stay in school, and life keeps on moving.
I'll be honest, even after seven years of Wisconsin winters, I still want to hibernate until after Easter, but since that is impossible (bills still need to be paid), I find ways to cope.
1. Promise yourself to get as much of the winter things that you ENJOY!
I like skiing. Last year I made a promise to myself to ski as much as possible. This kind of worked. I looked forward to the skiing and actually HOPED for snow so that skiing conditions would be favorable.
2. DON'T spend all winter shoveling (unless you LIKE shoveling)
HIRE A SERVICE! Why would I want to have to wake up early just to shovel a driveway? Consider this a mental health expense. Services are plentiful and reasonable.
3. BAKE and/or COOK!
Now is the time that people get together to celebrate family. Spend some time in your kitchen making those family treasured recipes. I love soups. Last winter I spent time refining soup recipes. I made them for potlucks, office parties, or just for ME! There was a long time period in my life that my cooking was discouraged (not because it was bad...it just wasn't priority). Now I am feeling encouraged to cook for the people around me. They LIKE my cooking and I am learning to enjoy it again!
4. Find time to enjoy the snow.
I know that this one is far-fetched but when you are able take a quiet moment, watch the snow fall. Turn off the Ipod, TV, or radio, walk away from the computer. You can stay inside if you wish. But take a quiet moment to watch the flakes drift down from sky. Admire the beauty and randomness of it all.
5. Find a way to exercise!
Joining a gym may not be in your future, but (without shoveling) there has to be a way to exercise (follow a video, an audio tape, dance wildly to the radio in your living room) The point is to get rid of the excess energy that you use on outdoor activities during other times of the year....plus you'll need a way to burn off the calories from #3 (above).
Soon enough I'll be using these techniques to survive yet another Wisconsin winter. I hope they work for you too!
I think I am going to work on breads this winter....to go with the soups from last winter!
So if you see someone falling down a hill and he smells of fresh baked bread, it is me. Say "Hi".....just call the ambulance if I don't respond.
I am one of those that is somewhere in between. As a native Arizonan, snow accumulation above a few inches is too much for me on a daily basis. Living in Milwaukee, WI has taught me that life does continue when snow has reached a height of more than 6 inches and is still falling. Business don't close, kids stay in school, and life keeps on moving.
I'll be honest, even after seven years of Wisconsin winters, I still want to hibernate until after Easter, but since that is impossible (bills still need to be paid), I find ways to cope.
1. Promise yourself to get as much of the winter things that you ENJOY!
I like skiing. Last year I made a promise to myself to ski as much as possible. This kind of worked. I looked forward to the skiing and actually HOPED for snow so that skiing conditions would be favorable.
2. DON'T spend all winter shoveling (unless you LIKE shoveling)
HIRE A SERVICE! Why would I want to have to wake up early just to shovel a driveway? Consider this a mental health expense. Services are plentiful and reasonable.
3. BAKE and/or COOK!
Now is the time that people get together to celebrate family. Spend some time in your kitchen making those family treasured recipes. I love soups. Last winter I spent time refining soup recipes. I made them for potlucks, office parties, or just for ME! There was a long time period in my life that my cooking was discouraged (not because it was bad...it just wasn't priority). Now I am feeling encouraged to cook for the people around me. They LIKE my cooking and I am learning to enjoy it again!
4. Find time to enjoy the snow.
I know that this one is far-fetched but when you are able take a quiet moment, watch the snow fall. Turn off the Ipod, TV, or radio, walk away from the computer. You can stay inside if you wish. But take a quiet moment to watch the flakes drift down from sky. Admire the beauty and randomness of it all.
5. Find a way to exercise!
Joining a gym may not be in your future, but (without shoveling) there has to be a way to exercise (follow a video, an audio tape, dance wildly to the radio in your living room) The point is to get rid of the excess energy that you use on outdoor activities during other times of the year....plus you'll need a way to burn off the calories from #3 (above).
Soon enough I'll be using these techniques to survive yet another Wisconsin winter. I hope they work for you too!
I think I am going to work on breads this winter....to go with the soups from last winter!
So if you see someone falling down a hill and he smells of fresh baked bread, it is me. Say "Hi".....just call the ambulance if I don't respond.
Friday, September 10, 2010
Losing Our Identity
The answer: "Homogenized milk, Cultured Sour Cream, Chain Restaurants".....
The question: "What is the same every time you get it?"
So my last post called for awareness of your own internal prejudices. Use them to celebrate our differences and be able to utilize them to play upon your own strengths. All very important points.
However, today I realized a quandary of what happens to a group of people when they get the "acceptance" for which they so diligently have fought.
I was in a National Chain Bookstore today looking for literature of a specific nature.....a specific genre.....ok, ok...The Gay & Lesbian section. Here is the conversation I had with the young help desk clerk:
Me: "Excuse me, I have been wandering around your store for the last 20 minutes and I can't find your Gay & Lesbian section. I am on vacation and need a new book."
20something female Clerk: "What section?"
Me: "The Gay & Lesbian section. I would like some new gay fiction"
20something: "There is no Gay and Lesbian section"
Me: "You mean you don't sell gay themed books?" (Obvious ire welling up)
20something: :::Rolling her eyes::: "No, they are all mixed up"
Me: "You are telling me that gays and lesbians are mixed up?!?!?!" (about ready to blow a gasket)
20something: "NO! (duh) That fiction is in with the other fiction.....no special section for Gays & Lesbians"
Me: "Oh....well.....ummmm.....thanks."
Ok, so all the gay authors are now in the same stacks as the regular authors. Cool! We are getting treated like everyone else! No special section! No more back-of-the-bus, at least in the world of literature! Tony Kushner is no longer relegated to a dark dismal corner of some shop living in fear that someone may find him. Armisted Maupin can come out of the closets and into the world of real literature! Michael Thomas Ford needn't worry about prying straight eyes in his "Queer Life". Cool!
Hey....wait.... That means that I have to look through the regular stacks for the stories I might identify with? No more standing in the Gay and Lesbian sections perusing the books while watching someone fidgeting and trying to get the nerve to pull a book off the shelf and through their actions admit that they may have homosexual tendencies? No more secretive glances at the cute guy who has pulled gay erotica off the shelf?
While I relish the thought of Suzie Bible-Thumper selecting what she thinks to be the latest Harlequin Romance because there is a hot guy on the cover only to find that both main characters have "throbbing members"......I am not so sure this desegregation this is a good thing.
I was having a discussion with another 40 something bartender in a gay establishment. He was talking about a downturn in clientele. When asked why the decrease, he stated that many gay patrons were now going to local straight bars.....and finding many other gays there as well. He said this was the death knell of the gay bar as we knew it. Acceptance is up and people don't find the need to seek out their own specific bar anymore.
Have we made it? Has homosexuality begun to see the light of day? Will this wave of political fear mongering about the "homosexual agenda" finally be put to rest?
Wow.....from Stonewall to Suburbs......we have always been here. Acceptance would be great. But there was a certain feeling when we walked into a club that was meant for us. A sense of belonging when we found people who were just like us. Now we have to wade through the rejection of straight AND gay men just to find "the one"?
Can I change my mind?
I think I want to be special again.
The question: "What is the same every time you get it?"
So my last post called for awareness of your own internal prejudices. Use them to celebrate our differences and be able to utilize them to play upon your own strengths. All very important points.
However, today I realized a quandary of what happens to a group of people when they get the "acceptance" for which they so diligently have fought.
I was in a National Chain Bookstore today looking for literature of a specific nature.....a specific genre.....ok, ok...The Gay & Lesbian section. Here is the conversation I had with the young help desk clerk:
Me: "Excuse me, I have been wandering around your store for the last 20 minutes and I can't find your Gay & Lesbian section. I am on vacation and need a new book."
20something female Clerk: "What section?"
Me: "The Gay & Lesbian section. I would like some new gay fiction"
20something: "There is no Gay and Lesbian section"
Me: "You mean you don't sell gay themed books?" (Obvious ire welling up)
20something: :::Rolling her eyes::: "No, they are all mixed up"
Me: "You are telling me that gays and lesbians are mixed up?!?!?!" (about ready to blow a gasket)
20something: "NO! (duh) That fiction is in with the other fiction.....no special section for Gays & Lesbians"
Me: "Oh....well.....ummmm.....thanks."
Ok, so all the gay authors are now in the same stacks as the regular authors. Cool! We are getting treated like everyone else! No special section! No more back-of-the-bus, at least in the world of literature! Tony Kushner is no longer relegated to a dark dismal corner of some shop living in fear that someone may find him. Armisted Maupin can come out of the closets and into the world of real literature! Michael Thomas Ford needn't worry about prying straight eyes in his "Queer Life". Cool!
Hey....wait.... That means that I have to look through the regular stacks for the stories I might identify with? No more standing in the Gay and Lesbian sections perusing the books while watching someone fidgeting and trying to get the nerve to pull a book off the shelf and through their actions admit that they may have homosexual tendencies? No more secretive glances at the cute guy who has pulled gay erotica off the shelf?
While I relish the thought of Suzie Bible-Thumper selecting what she thinks to be the latest Harlequin Romance because there is a hot guy on the cover only to find that both main characters have "throbbing members"......I am not so sure this desegregation this is a good thing.
I was having a discussion with another 40 something bartender in a gay establishment. He was talking about a downturn in clientele. When asked why the decrease, he stated that many gay patrons were now going to local straight bars.....and finding many other gays there as well. He said this was the death knell of the gay bar as we knew it. Acceptance is up and people don't find the need to seek out their own specific bar anymore.
Have we made it? Has homosexuality begun to see the light of day? Will this wave of political fear mongering about the "homosexual agenda" finally be put to rest?
Wow.....from Stonewall to Suburbs......we have always been here. Acceptance would be great. But there was a certain feeling when we walked into a club that was meant for us. A sense of belonging when we found people who were just like us. Now we have to wade through the rejection of straight AND gay men just to find "the one"?
Can I change my mind?
I think I want to be special again.
Thursday, September 2, 2010
Mistaken Identity: Which cookie do you like best?
Imagine that there is a plate of cookies in front of you...one Oatmeal, one Chocolate Chip and one Sugar. You are only allowed to choose one. Which one do you choose?
Sure this is an overly simplistic view, but why did you choose one cookie over another?
We all have preconceived notions of how things are supposed to taste, and we all have the flavors that we are drawn too...but if we never experienced all of the flavors....how do we really know which one is our favorite?
In his 1961 book "A Stranger in a Strange Land", Robert Heinlien introduced the world to the concept of "grok". Grok means to understand something thoroughly and intuitively. And how can you possibly understand something without experiencing it first hand?
"I don't grok that."
"Grokking that is a little difficult for me right now."
"I grok what you are saying."
There are wars raging today because of a specific part of human nature that is a learned behavior. Humans run on an interesting tightwire between pack animals and solitary beasts.
As pack animals, we surround ourselves with the trappings and social groups that make us comfortable and define our identity. But we practice these behaviors to our own detriment. We use the "comfortable" to help us define what is "uncomfortable" without ever experiencing the thing on which we are passing judgement.
As free willed individuals we also have the option to run as solitary beasts. Experiencing the things that the others of our pack may not be inclined to try.
Yet, so many of us choose not too roam on our own, or try to understand different points of view.
Prejudice is born of this pack behavior. The pack can be drawn on many lines... racial, religious, socio-economic, gender, sexual preference (just to name a few). The battle between "them versus us" has raged and will rage until the end of time, part of that instinct is how we evolved and survived so it isn't really a bad thing.
However, now that we are the dominant species and we bend the earth to our will, shouldn't these feelings of competition also evolve? Maybe to work together in a spirit of cooperation?
Prejudices are a good thing, they are tools and we need to understand them within ourselves.
Example: if all the Oatmeal Cookie eaters band together, there will eventually be a shortage of Oatmeal cookies.
The magic happens when an Oatmeal Eater meets up with a Sugar cookie eater....suddenly there is no fighting...add a Chocolate Chip Eater and there is an equilibrium. The problem happens when they start to argue over who's cookie is superior. Maybe we need to start to admit that we don't have to agree in which cookie is best. We each have our belief which is better for us, personally.
Wouldn't life be interesting if we started to leverage our strengths and weaknesses and use them to build a better place for everyone?
Make your choices for yourself, but don't do it out of an ignorance of what the other choices have to offer. Drink in what they mean. Grok them.
You still might make the same choice, but you might have a little better understanding of the world and how you fit.
Sure this is an overly simplistic view, but why did you choose one cookie over another?
We all have preconceived notions of how things are supposed to taste, and we all have the flavors that we are drawn too...but if we never experienced all of the flavors....how do we really know which one is our favorite?
In his 1961 book "A Stranger in a Strange Land", Robert Heinlien introduced the world to the concept of "grok". Grok means to understand something thoroughly and intuitively. And how can you possibly understand something without experiencing it first hand?
"I don't grok that."
"Grokking that is a little difficult for me right now."
"I grok what you are saying."
There are wars raging today because of a specific part of human nature that is a learned behavior. Humans run on an interesting tightwire between pack animals and solitary beasts.
As pack animals, we surround ourselves with the trappings and social groups that make us comfortable and define our identity. But we practice these behaviors to our own detriment. We use the "comfortable" to help us define what is "uncomfortable" without ever experiencing the thing on which we are passing judgement.
As free willed individuals we also have the option to run as solitary beasts. Experiencing the things that the others of our pack may not be inclined to try.
Yet, so many of us choose not too roam on our own, or try to understand different points of view.
Prejudice is born of this pack behavior. The pack can be drawn on many lines... racial, religious, socio-economic, gender, sexual preference (just to name a few). The battle between "them versus us" has raged and will rage until the end of time, part of that instinct is how we evolved and survived so it isn't really a bad thing.
However, now that we are the dominant species and we bend the earth to our will, shouldn't these feelings of competition also evolve? Maybe to work together in a spirit of cooperation?
Prejudices are a good thing, they are tools and we need to understand them within ourselves.
Example: if all the Oatmeal Cookie eaters band together, there will eventually be a shortage of Oatmeal cookies.
The magic happens when an Oatmeal Eater meets up with a Sugar cookie eater....suddenly there is no fighting...add a Chocolate Chip Eater and there is an equilibrium. The problem happens when they start to argue over who's cookie is superior. Maybe we need to start to admit that we don't have to agree in which cookie is best. We each have our belief which is better for us, personally.
Wouldn't life be interesting if we started to leverage our strengths and weaknesses and use them to build a better place for everyone?
Make your choices for yourself, but don't do it out of an ignorance of what the other choices have to offer. Drink in what they mean. Grok them.
You still might make the same choice, but you might have a little better understanding of the world and how you fit.
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