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Comment by Joan Denoo 2 hours ago

Ed just sent me this video of a group of ducks who had been penned up their whole lives. A rescue group brought them to a safe haven, made sure they were healthy, and then turned them out to the field and stream. The poor ducks looked afraid of water, and it took great patience to introduce them to their natural environment. My heart just sings. Ducks are made ducks to do duck things. Humans are humans made to do human things. The natural laws of healthy community provide the nourishment, compassion and love they need. Guilt, shame, fear, unfounded hope are no remedies. 

Hoarded Ducks See Water For The First Time.

Comment by Joan Denoo 2 hours ago

Lillie, I know what you mean. We are created as participants in nature and nature has a way of teaching us how to be in community. When a bunch of nonsense rules interfere with nature, all kinds of abominations happen, i.e. priests and little boys, parents who allow their children to die untreated when simple remedies exist.  

Comment by Lillie 2 hours ago

Thanks for these words of wisdom, Joan.  I like your angst word because that is exactly what I felt during any religious service I was ever in.

Comment by Joan Denoo 3 hours ago

People who demand, teach, and preach dysfunctional attitudes, beliefs, customs, tractions and values are:

Hitler, Nazism, 

 

Pol Pot ,Communist peasant farming, Cambodian genocide 

 

King Leopold II of Belgium, founder and sole owner of  Congo Free State

 

Rev. Richard C. Halverson, Presbyterian Minister

Taught me the Passive Gospel, yield, pray, obey, submit, sacrifice myself, being a battered wife was living my life in imitation of the crucified Christ and of all women I was most blessed; Rejoice in my crucifixion

.

Rev. Richar Leon, Presbyterian Minister

in his final sermon, Leon told his flock that “Peter laid out three conversions necessary for a godly life: a conversion to Jesus Christ to save one from sin; to Christ's church to save one from the "tyranny of the self"; and to Christ's mission, to carry his message to the world.”

 

All these admonitions neglect the basic needs of human thriving. There is no sin from which to be saved, there is dysfunction and much of it is caused by the foolish teaching of religions. There is no tyranny of the self, there is the mind, body, and emotion of an individual that needs nourishment and it cannot happen if you think your body is your tyrant. It is your teacher. There is no message to carry to the world. The reality is love of self, self-respect through effort, living respectfully in community, and using your mind, body, and emotions to guide you to flourish and thrive.  You are your best teacher.

When it comes to quantum physics or mathematics or history or social studies or music or art, and etc, you may need a teacher to guide you.

 

Battering spouses and parents

They tell common stories and all based on dysfunctional behaviors. Learn to function in healthy community and you will flourish. Sometimes we have to divorce our families in order to get healthy, but the price is small compared to the benefit. Another issue that often happens, if an individual from a dysfunctional family learns how to live fully mentally and physically healthy, as a mature adult, family members sometimes come to learn life skills.

 

Joan M. Denoo, 2013-05-24

Comment by Joan Denoo 3 hours ago

We and They 

Have you noticed factors held in common by these men listed below? They all know what is best for you, they teach and/or preach a dogma based on notions of domination and exploitation, they create institutions that instruct people to submit to their ideas, to obey, to yield, to sacrifice yourself to their beliefs, they have faith in ideas based on power over, not power with, and many people under their influence fail to flourish.  

Teaching college classes, parenting classes, at boys’ ranches for out of control boys, and teaching in battered women and children’s shelters, and in the county and state prison systems, I kept hearing common stories. I kept a tickler file and recorded the name and styles of those to whom my students and private clients listened, believed, and had faith in. 

Symptoms presented to me were depression, anxiety, overcompensation, underachieving, acting our, self-mutilation, headaches, stomach problems, and general angst in their personality.

My strategy, when working with individuals and especially when working with groups of people, was to teach them life skills such as assertiveness, active listening for meaning and feeling, identifying feelings, problem solving, conflict resolution, negotiating, reframing, organizing, scheduling, budgeting, and other basic personal and interpersonal skills. These all very easily can be taught and learned. Even the most rebellious boy, or the most depressed wife, or the outrageously defiance client can see the virtue of these skills and quickly turn their lives into a more efficient, effective and fulfilling way to be.

No, we do not deal with Hitler, Pol Pot, King Leopold II, Rev. Richard C, Halverson, or Rev. Richard Leon. But we have the same basic principles being imposed on individuals that cripple them and prevent them from being truly and fully human.

I most humbly disagree with those who say my kind of thinking puts us at “us vs. them” mentality, and we should not do that. I say, most emphatically, STOP IT! When some one or institution teaches the Passive Gospel or political strategies with the same message, we cripple people’s minds. We bind their minds in ways they do not understand or recognize. The harder they try, the worst their angst becomes. When we hear killer words and phrases such as these men preached, taught, and dictated, the individual cannot and will not flourish.

Just look at your own experiences in life. When others try to control you or dominate you, or tell you something that isn’t healthy, how do you feel? Do you submit, feel guilt or shame, obey without question? These are the attitudes, beliefs, customs, traditions and values that mind-bind, not for your benefit but for the ego enhancement of someone who wants to control you and dictate to you who you are and how you are to be.

If they say and do things that empower you to flourish, you have a true and trusted friend, worthy of respect. If you feel angst, pay attention to the words and attitudes of those with whom you associate. It is a We-and-They world! If we don’t understand that, we could spend a lifetime struggling to flourish and not have the tools to make it happen.

Joan M. Denoo, 2013-05-24

Comment by Steph S. 6 hours ago

Comment by booklover 8 hours ago

You're right Lillie!  Too many people get away with driving like idiots!  I always tell my kids to drive like everyone else is going to do something stupid (drive defensively), and then be pleasantly surprised when people do it right and are polite to you!  Sad it has to be that way!

Happy Friday Friends~ Mindy

Comment by Lillie 18 hours ago

I saw something similar to the car trying to pass illegally on the shoulder.  We were traveling on the interstate when traffic became backed up due to construction. This car came sailing down the pull off lane with a cop sailing right behind him. As everyone eventually caught up to him standing by his car looking very foolish stopped by the police, there were all kinds of jeers and catcalls.  Once in a blue moon there is a little justice in the world.

Comment by sk8eycat 19 hours ago

Ruth, that gif is a hoot!  I've never seen anything quite like that happen, but I can't count the number of times I've seen some idiot switching lanes all over the place without even signalling, and cutting in front of big trucks and other dangerous stuff.  BUT when I got to where I was going (I don't drive anymore), there the idiot would be, at the bottom of the off-ramp, waiting for the light to change.

One of the (many) reasons I quit driving was that there are too many people on the road who think they're so bloody important that they don't have to obey the laws, and watch out for other drivers.  They not only drive like that on the freeways, they behave the same way on surface streets...while yakking on their hand-held cell phones.  Too frightening!
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Change subject: I saw a great comment about Wolf Blitzer's "thank the lord" gaffe in Raw Story:

"We're here! We don't fear (gods)! Get used to it!"

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/05/21/cnns-wolf-blitzer-tells-athei...

Comment by Patricia yesterday

Update.... the house got stripped of the siding yesterday so it's awll nekkid!!! The windows & back door were done today, the front door will be done tomorrow as it's an all day job with being a complete carpentry change, as well as all the interior moldings around everything. Then Monday they start the new siding, & the faux shutters will be done whenever they arrive at the shop.

I do not have a happy Purr-Dee, but Kiri greets all the workers & generally is a nuisance!

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