Should I stay or should I go?

There comes a time in most long term relationships when you run into some issues you don't understand and can't resolve. No matter how much you love each other or how long you have been together you start thinking about the return on your efforts and whether or not you should continue pouring your heart into something that doesn't seem to be working.

So, why don't you leave? Because it's not over and you're still in love and there are many, many areas in which the relationship still seems to be worth the effort. If you don't fearfully cut and run, the two of you most likely will end up in some kind of couples therapy.

The myth of therapy is that is will make things better. It will. Just not right away. A therapist will take an inventory of your relationship, noting what works and what doesn't. You might come away from these initial sessions thinking, "I knew it was bad but not that bad!" You have discovered 37 issues the two of you avoided for the previous three years (or longer). 37! That's a lot. That's too many.

If you are of a certain disposition you will cut and run needing no further proof that it's better to leave. If you are more stubborn than that, you will go back and work on the 37 until the two of you have got them down to 25, then down to 12 and finally to 4 or 5 hard core issues that seem huge, overwhelming and eternal.

You may reconsider ending the relationship because of these extremely difficult remaining issues. Still, things have improved. You've learned to keep up with issues instead of sweeping them under the carpet. You've learned it's better to face the awkwardness of stumbling through a sensitive issue than to let it fester and develop into a monster with it's own life eating a hole through the floor into which, one day, the two of you will fall.

You've also learned how the crap gets into your lives and how to keep it from getting there. Mostly. Things are good; even better than you can remember. Still, there are those few issues. Your therapist seems happy and you wonder if maybe you aren't overpaying her.

Then one day you realize that what you're looking at isn't crap but diamonds in the rough. The toughest stuff around. You begin to accept that these issues aren't ever going away. That, in fact, these are the gems. These are the points of contact that brought the two of you together and keep the two of you together. The fact that these issues will never go away is what gives your relationship meaning. So, both of you chip away at these issues knowing that you will be working on them for the rest of your life.

These diamonds are the core of your relationship. A bright core around which you can grow, on which you depend and which gives the two of you common goals.

Once you reach this understanding, the therapist will slowly disengage knowing that she has given you the tools, shown you how to use them and has seen that you are using them regularly. She feels quite sure that you will continue working until your diamonds are brightly polished, brilliantly reflecting the light of your love.

You will both breathe a deep and well earned sigh of relief. You are on your way.

I used to believe in cut and run. In a small percentage of relationships, particularly where one of you refuses to deal with issues, that's the best course of action. Now I believe in working it out, sticking to it until it sticks to you. So much damage is done by the breaking up of long term relationships. Damage to the couple, their friends, their society, and the children which can go on for years and never be mended.

And then there is the loss of love, the greatest tragedy. Better avoided at all costs. So — work. Work on your love. Hone and polish it. Shine on.

Current Fads
Listening. country music; ringing in ears
Watching. Aeon Flux: The Complete Animated Version (1995, 2005)
Activity. renewing
Gadget. resuscitated Palm Zire 31
News Source. Twitter
Reading. Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince - J. K. Rowling; Story - Robert McKee; The Book of Runes - Ralph H. Blum
Writing. blog posts; SL LSL scripts

Path 101 Test - What industry matches your personality?

I like this test. I like seeing what doesn't match, actually. My "love of thinking" is a sore thumb in the process. Apparently it doesn't fit with my other traits in the top four suggested industry matches. But that's ok. I'm used to that. In another test I'm Artistic/Investigative and they don't match either. Sometimes my rationally pragmatic side takes over and that throws any test for a loop.

I've often wondered why I can't hang with Artists all the time (not neurotic enough) or why I didn't end up in Theatre (not agreeable enough). I like photography and I suppose if I pursued it I would find a way to add the thinking piece, maybe by writing about it or changing the thrust of my photos by doing thinking pieces. Come to think of it, the artwork I make is sort of thinking pieces. So, there you are!

My Path 101 Personality Quiz Traits

Highest Scoring Traits

Openness

Idealism

Love of Thinking

Lowest Scoring Traits

Agreeableness

Extroversion

Initiative

Like-minded people work in:
Photography  Graphic Design and Illustration  Web Design  Publishing  Environmental Studies and Protection  

See Elaine's full assessment and get your own.

Things that make you go AAAAAAAWWWW!

Number one in the cuteness factor contest is a baby. Anything a baby does from lying around with a glassy stare to opening a time bomb is cute. Next, diminuative females and puppies. Why not kittens? I don't know. And what about diminuative males?

Those of a certain age redefine cute in a highly structured and targeted way. Again, where are the corresponding males?

And then there are things that may seem to fit the cuteness definition and yet aren't cute. The diminuative female at the birthday table is bare plain greed training. Not cute!

Do your own search at Jupiter Images. What's cute to you?

t- (therapy) groups, meetups, encounter groups

Now that we've raised our children and we're back to giving ourselves time, all the little groups from the sixties are back. They're older, matured, wiser and more spiritual, yet are still small, intimate groups where we share what is deep in us and experience change and awe. I'm in three of them and I'm reading at least two books related to human potential. I've become adept at sharing a two minute summary of me. I come home with folded papers in my purse. I promise myself I'll look things up on the internet. I add yet another author or book to my ever-increasing list of good things to read that are good for me.

What I discovered tonight is that first and foremost I need to attend to me. One person shared that her joy comes from helping others. My joy comes from healing and shedding pain. Why there should be so much pain and where it comes from, I don't always know. I am learning two paths now. Maybe three. The buddhist way of releasing everything and accepting what is and learning to let feelings and thoughts pass through me. Desires bring suffering. The spiritism way of feeling deeply the emotions that connect me to the universe and cause it to expand. Desires are good and plentiful and should increase. Then, I suppose, the third path is doing good and/or helping others. Tricky that. How does one help? It's not as easy as you might think. Right now I'm content to help privately in little ways. To learn not to be overbearing yet to be assertive when necessary. I'm sticking to my little plot of ground where I can try things out.


Current Fads
Listening. iTunes Party Shuffle of my entire digital music library; others
Watching. Hair (1979)
Activity. breathing
Gadget. Samsung cell phone
News Source. the news feeds in Safari
Reading. Spirit Guides and Angel Guardians - Richard Webster; Ask and It is Given - Esther and Jerry Hicks; Self-Editing for Fiction Writers - Renni Browne & Dave King; Midnight Dreary: The Mysterious Death of Edgar Allan Poe - John Evangelist Walsh; Das Wilde Land - Heinz Konsalik u. Susanne Scheibler; Mensa Bulletin (Yes, I really am reading them all right now—I'm a reading addict. What can I say?)

DGLM

The Maid of Honor Deliberate Gentle Love Master (DGLM) Appreciated for your kindness and envied for all your experience, you are The Maid of Honor. Charismatic, affectionate, and terrific in relationships, you are what many guys would call a "perfect catch"--and you probably have many admirers, each wishing to capture your long-term love. You're careful, extra careful, because the last thing you want is to hurt anyone. Especially some poor boy whose only crime was liking you. We've deduced you're fully capable of a dirty fling, but you do feel that post-coital attachment after hooking up. So, conscientious person that you are, you do your best to reserve physical affection for those you respect...so you can respect yourself. Your biggest negative is the byproduct of your careful nature: indecision. You're just as slow rejecting someone as you are accepting them. Your exact female opposite: Half-Cocked Random Brutal Sex Dreamer Always avoid: The False Messiah (DBLM), The 5-Night Stand (DBSM), The Vapor Trail (RBLM), The Bachelor (DGSM) Consider: The Gentleman (DGLM), someone just like you.

Link: The Online Dating Persona Test | OkCupid - free online dating | Dating

Is this accurate? You be the judge!

You're SHORT!

There are those critical moments in life when some one thing wakes you up to everything else. One of those moments was me shouting "YOU'RE SHORT!"

I was a freshman in college doing my duty to froshes everywhere by supporting my fair share of celebratory events. That night I was celebrating with two friends. One, Marianne, was tall, willowy, moved like a fairy, and had long feathery hair. The other, Cary*, was short, solid, moved like an aerobic dancer and had long molasses hair. They stood side-by-side in front of the room-wide bathroom mirror which reached from the top of the sink to the ceiling. They were dressing for the night's event. Attempting to look somewhat similar, they murmured and adjusted their clothing looking intently in the mirror. Cary was copying Marianne. Marianne was offering soothing suggestions. Cary was getting red faced and lumpy. She pulled and twisted and huffed and puffed.

"Why can't I get this right?" she said. "Why can't I get this to look like yours? I’ve got it just like yours but it doesn’t look like yours."

"Maybe if you ..." Marianne offered some sort of suggestion, gently twisting something with her long delicate fingers. Her reflection glanced over at me, a tiny smile on its face.

I stood behind them in the doorway, watching.

"You're short," I said to Cary. Her head was down as she made adjustments. She didn't hear me. With Marianne’s help she went on tweaking and adjusting, making unhappy noises and getting thoroughly frustrated.

I tried telling her again. Still no response. Finally, I held onto the door frame, leaned into the room and shouted with all my being, "YOU'RE SHORT!" Echoes reverberated off the mirror and around the stalls.

All activity stopped. I froze, thinking I had ended yet another friendship. Cary looked at the mirror and then at me.

"You know, I am short, aren't I?" Looking back at the mirror she continued with all kinds of positive comments like, "No wonder this doesn't fit me like it fits you. No wonder I can’t get this to hang like yours." And so on. Friendship saved.

The semester ended. We all went home for the summer. Next fall I had new roommates. I ran into Cary who looked amazingly different. Her hair was short and curly (naturally, apparently, when not dragged down by the weight of length). Her perpetual sour expression was replaced with a sunny smile. She wore granny glasses and carried a pile of papers.

"Come see my place," she said with a bounce. I promised to stop by. A group of us turned up for a tour. Cary had redone her room entirely in modern fussy Victorian. The walls were a deep, somber purple. Curlicues on the radiator were picked out in gold. Elaborate crown molding was also picked out in gold. The furnishings were custom painted to match the walls. Ancient eyeglasses and writing materials were placed strategically as if the owner had just walked away. The whole thing was like an elaborate set for a modern Victorian adventure movie. I was amazed.

Cary had found her calling in life - to run her own decorating business - all because I had yelled at her. She had stopped trying to be like everyone else and became herself in full.

Some days I wish someone would shout at me. I say things and do things and see reactions and wonder, “What am I doing really? Why can’t someone tell me what it is I’m doing?” I could use an epiphany right about now.


Current Fads
Listening. Memory Almost Full, Paul McCartney and Deep Sleep Every Night, Glenn Harrold; air conditioner
Watching. High Fidelity (2000)
Activity. making a career move
Gadget. cell phone
News Source. Google News
Reading. Small Gods - Terry Pratchett; Voices of Recovery: A Daily Reader; Style Weekly; Mensa Bulletin

*This is not her real name. Not because she needs protection. Because I can’t remember her name. Sorry, “Cary.” If you read this, please comment!

What can a person of high intelligence do?

What can a person of high intelligence do? Just about anything they feel like doing. Unhindered by social norms or conventions these people train as nurses, work for 15 years and then become successful auto sellers in a matter of months. They live frugal hermitic lives at the bottom of the social ladder one step above homelessness and they live at the top, with a highly developed network that nets them more than they need with little effort. They create dynamic personal partnerships that rely only on commitment instead of a legal promise and proximity. They create optimal conventional partnerships and become society leaders. They live in island paradises and inner cities. They write poetry and develop complex mathematic algorithms. They set their own hours, rising at 2 a.m. to run an international electronics repair service with 3,000 domain names or live off the proceeds of stock investments based on their own esoteric systems. Enchanted by the unknown, they easily forge ahead by teaching themselves necessary skills. They quietly innovate and make huge public splashes on Jeopardy.

Whatever they do, they do fully, completely and devotedly, becoming priests, pastors, nuns, and CEOs. A people of extremes, they end up in jails and sit as district court judges. With highly-focused persistent attention spans, they often pursue an interest exclusively and far beyond ordinary limits. It is not uncommon for a person of high intelligence to have deep knowledge about a rare, complex subculture and little about local issues.

Quickly absorbing, analyzing and mastering whatever comes their way, their biggest problems are boredom and vocational boundaries. Their unifying passions are learning and sharing what they have learned. As a people, they are far ahead of the curve, often leading the rest of society into new, uncharted modes of adaptation purely by example.

And you are ...?

I'm attending Ravencon. My first con. I know where all the geeks are. Well, not all of them. I don't qualify, of course. I can clear a conference room in no time. I came in on the end of the "Are comics just for kids?" forum by which time the seven attendees were engaged in desultory conversation about prejudice against graphic novels. After I sat down they ended the discussion and cleared the room. I stayed for the next discussion on "How to write a blurb." Which turned into "How to write a query letter" which will later be the blurb used on the back on your dust jacket and in all other attempts to sell your book.* The tiny room was full except for the two chairs on either side of me which were apparently off limits to everyone else or were covered with a frost that I couldn't see. Half way through the hour a very senior gentleman entered pushing his walker. I shoved the furthest chair and mine aside, making room for him to exit his walker and enter the nearest empty chair. A tiny rustle stirred the room. Ah, now they knew who I was. Friend of old man. Nah. Guess again.

Last weekend I attended my first non-denominational earth-centered spirituality retreat. For the first 24 hours I got pretty much the same reaction. No one is rude or cold. There just happens to be a larger berth of air around me than anyone else has. I'm sometimes talked to as if I have made a wrong turn and am too proud to admit it. No. I want to be here. Listen. I've tried everything else, why not this? And get used to it. I'm not the only bored boomer out here. There's plenty of us looking for new, different and educational experiences.

*It's scary the amount of marketing publishers expect author's to do. The author is supposed to determine their market, locate the editor or agent who covers that market, sell it, write the blurb and the pitch. Really. I would have thought just writing a good book was enough.

just say "go"

For nearly seven years now I've been thinking about jettisoning the ordinary life for something fully creative. I have been living a sort of half artistic life (whatever that is – just remember to take away the myth) all this time or rather all my life. I've been let go from my place of employment with a decent package of benefits like free use of an outplacement agency and wad of cash. The proper phrase is "my position was impacted by corporate restructuring."

It's like they said "Go!" You know, that thing you say after "Ready, Set, ..." (or "On your mark, get set, ..."). I'm doing all that stuff now: thinking freely, investigating options, and seriously moving forward. I'm finding places that will pay me to write and others that will pay me to design. I'm fixing up my novels for publication. I'm building my dream life. All it took was someone to just say "Go!"

Song of the Day: Hold on to This Coat, The Rosebuds

Hello Cleveland

Amazingly, here's a school (SucessTech) with a plan in place that worked. A city with a responsive police force that actually responded quickly. Yet on CBS they badged the Superintendent of Schools to death about security measures. You can't stop up all the loop holes. And you can't stop someone from finding them.

Another story on TV this morning was about crash test dummies and SUVs. Just another way to protect us from each other because we are imprecise and don't always pay attention.

Let's take all that crash test money and engineering development money and all the money for hiring more security and the money for making better bombs and the money for better jails. Let's take it all and put into something worthwhile, like figuring out what makes a good, attentive, alert, precise, well-adjusted and healthy human being and let's make as many of those as we can. Let's put any money left over after that into helping the rest become better. Let's find out what it takes, whatever it is — whether it's physiology, or psychology or critical development periods or whatever. Let's find out what it takes and let's do it. Oh, and along the way, let's talk to the kids. The kids know.

Spending more money and time on security is like putting us all in jails. And even there we won't be safe.

The Virginia Tech Massacre

There's a saying that if you want to stop teenage problems, stick a baby in a bottle and when its 12 put a cork in it. Seung-Hui Cho was way beyond ordinary teenage problems. Yet there's a mindset now that universities and schools should be fortresses. Cho was very sick, yet smart enough to exploit the loopholes of university life. The thing is, that no matter how many holes are closed by increased security, a person intent on finding a hole will find one. Maximum security prisons have lost prisoners.

Since the insane Cho rampage there has been a lot of finger pointing, breast beating and downright anger about Tech. Security was slow. Well, what did you expect? There has never been a shooting at Tech. Campus security does not normally handle this kind of thing. They're used to parking tickets and student brawls. I'm sure they did what seemed right at the time. It's not the fault of Tech. The fault is Cho's. He did the shooting.

Super cop movies have given us unrealistic expectations of police and security. There probably are some James Bond's and John MClane's out there but that's not the norm. In the movies the good guys have a certainty that only comes from knowing the plot ahead of time. Movies have also given us unrealistic expectations about bad guys. There are no markings on potential killers. They don't wear weird hair or have especially nasty tattoos or sneer in a certain way (wait! that's my brother – kidding!). Even if they did, the law can't act on suspicion of possible intent. The law can't act until the deed is committed or being committed.

Cho was a crazy guy who didn't get all the help he needed. In hindsight, it can be shown that he fit a profile for crazy killers. Sure, one teacher thought he was dangerous, but one teacher isn't enough. There could have been a personality conflict. It happens. Evidence needs to build. Perhaps if all of Cho's teachers, roommates and friends had been interviewed the school would have had good evidence of his serious problem. Finding the evidence required time and people the university either didn't have or didn't feel motivated to use. But that's normal. That's what happens around here. Maybe his high school could have told Tech about Cho's problems if they hadn't been bound by privacy laws. Perhaps his parents would have let Tech know that their son needed help if they had thought his condition was serious. Cho was an adult. It was his job to manage his health care. He didn't.

The best thing to do is to learn from Cho. Virginia Commonwealth University has by creating an emergency notification system that combines cell phones, campus TVs and sirens. Tech has created a similar system. We all need to learn a lot more about mental instability and insanity. We need to focus on developing healthy, active and sociable people. If we do those things then most of our problems will go away.

Locking up schools isn't going to fix anything. Especially if the killer is locked up inside.

My Mood Cafe

myth of the happy relationship

I've written about love not being enough and it isn't. Finally it's news. And I'm also right that in the end it's just two old people in a room. That's what you have to deal with. With warts on.