HT Loribeth Griffin Chenault An interesting read. I know Im guilty of all of the above. I feel a little judged by OP for what have been natural reactions to some bad breaks Ive received in life. This is basically an optimist/pessimist list, and its been shown that optimism is basically ignoring reality as far as how bad things actually are and how much control and agency one has, in favor of being a more functional person who keeps trying anyway and sometimes succeeds. The piece seems to be based on the idea that the pessimistic view is incorrect and unjustified, and some statements she makes seem like blaming people. Phrases like Unhappy people tend to micromanage in effort to control all outcomes and fall apart in dramatic display when life throws a wrench in their plan. and Unhappy people like to live in the past. Whats happened to them and lifes hardships are their conversation of choice. When they run out of things to say, theyll turn to other peoples lives and gossip. are very negative and unhelpful (not to mention unsubstantiated). I think this would have been better set up as a list of more effective reactions to lifes trials, just focusing on what she thinks people *should* do and less on what people are doing wrong. She throws a bone in the last couple of paragraphs about how happy people have to work at it too, because no ones perfect, but its still a very ableist perspective. Not everyone has the same burden of hardship, and not everyone has the same innate inner resources to deal with it, especially at the age in life where it started to come down on them. This is how the negative perspectives like she wrote about come to be. I was a happy and trusting child once too, who felt secure in the love of his family and had dreams for the future and all that stuff the author talks about. Then a lot of really bad things happened to me, and started to compound upon themselves, and here we are. Ive put a lot of work into finding balance, but Ill never be the person I could have been if my life had been different, or if I had been older before I had to deal with how truly ****ty life (and people) can be. So some of this advice I will never be able to fully follow. I know that some people treat people poorly and am not able to give everyone the benefit of the doubt anymore. I cant trust in the goodwill of the universe for things to just work out if I try hard, because I have always tried hard, and have a lot of scars to show for it. Maybe I do focus a lot on what is wrong in this world, but thats often because Im trying to enlist people around me into actively working to change that. Focusing on the good and pretending that the good and bad things in the world are in balance at all just allows people to blithely go on about their lives and not make a difference. Sure, it gets you thorough your day, but if you dont help that homeless person at the intersection, stand up for that bullied person/child, or feed that hungry family in the grocery parking lot, who will? Everyone else is thinking the same thing, so no one (well nearly no one) does anything about it, always thinking someone else will, so they can preserve their own wellbeing/sense of self/perspective. Once youve been the invisible person on the wrong side of the scale, you (hopefully) become less willing to walk away. But a consequence of making yourself aware of these broader social ills, the less positive your outlook on humanity becomes. Sure, you are proving that some people are awesome, but if everyone did their part, there wouldnt be so much work left undone, so many unhappy people. I guess the bottom line is that this list seemed very superficial to me and read like well-to-do people telling the rest of us to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps. If life has taught you that life and people suck, youre not wrong to carry that expectation forward. You have to do something a little different to be as functional as an optimist who hadnt learned such painful lessons over and over. You cant just believe in the good of people and that theres good out there to focus on besides all the bad, because you know what youve experienced. You have to make a conscious choice to overcome your instinctive programming to close up, hunker down and protect yourself. I dont know that OP really understands how hard that is, especially when there is little closure or resolution to the crimes we have to live with.
Posted on: Sat, 22 Nov 2014 22:01:01 +0000
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