by Jamesscotthenson | Jun 11, 2017 | Blog
I wrote about my dislike of cynicism a long time ago.
We’re talking about cynicism in its modern usage here, not
the Ancient
Greek school of philosophy. That one is actually kind of useful.
I said I don’t buy into cynicism as a valid way of engaging
reality, and that I think it’s a cheap way out of having to deal with things.
It’s a way to fake wisdom by making seemingly profound statements like “things
just never change” or “people are people, they all suck”.
Cynicism is a way to avoid helping other people without
having to feel bad or guilty.
It’s a way to avoid the difficulty of caring without seeming
like a douchebag.
It’s a cop out.
More than anything though, cynicism is a statement of fear,
without acknowledging the actual fear. It is, as we are so prone to do, a way
of routing fear through another emotion so that we don’t have to admit that
fear is present. We are so afraid of admitting we are afraid.
Cynicism is a way of saying “I’m really worried that things
are never going to improve” or “It scares me how little it seems like we can
trust other members of our species” without admitting we experience fear.
Cynicism is a slash and burn method of escaping the
difficult gray areas of life. And, like all slash and burn methods, it leaves
as much good stuff chopped up and smoldering on the ground as anything else.
I say all of this with a full realization that cynicism
often serves these purposes for me if I am not careful.
The world can be scary. Sometimes we want to escape behind a
wall of jadedness, but this isn’t an honest way to engage the reality we are
all living in.
Look for the good that is always happening around you, and
acknowledge how scary it is when it is hard to find.
Help people with an open heart.
Be cynical about being cynical.
by Jamesscotthenson | Jun 10, 2017 | Blog
We’ll take a break from gratitude for a while after this
one. I still have a big list of things to be grateful for, but it might be nice
to have some variety.
Man, this one is tough for me.
Being a teenager sucks, and it was probably the worst time
of my life.
I was miserable, there was something wrong with me, and I
struggled. I was annoying and full of shit and self-centered and difficult and
emotional.
I have to work to have gratitude toward that kid for getting
through that time, because I am often so ashamed of him and how he acted so
much of the time.
I just dislike who I was.
But, I get it. I don’t think that much of anyone knew how
hard I struggled, because I tried to mask it behind rebellion and being too
cool for things. I was deeply depressed and trying to deal with some things
that I had no frame of reference for.
I did the best I could with what I had, that just wasn’t
very good unfortunately.
I was lucky, things got a better over time. I found some
good friends, I tried to make some changes, but I had already developed some
habits and ways of existing that were difficult to break. I suppose I owe my
20-something self gratitude for fighting those battles.
It can be difficult to even forgive ourselves for how we
behave during difficult times in our life, much less have gratitude to our
younger selves for surviving and getting through them.
I try to be conscious of this and be kind and grateful to
the memory of teenage me.
I suppose someone has to.
Take care.
by Jamesscotthenson | Jun 9, 2017 | Blog
I hear a lot of people talk about the fear of missing out,
and it even has its own little acronym now.
It’s easy to struggle with FOMO in a world of social media
and non-stop internet saturation. Your friend is on another cruise, your ex is
out with all those people. Everything in the world is so much closer than it
has ever been, but it also feels further away as we have a thousand ways to
make ourselves unhappy no matter where we are. All the while, someone out
there is jealous of your life while you’re jealous of everyone else’s.
I wonder if there is someone at the top of the pile, the one
person who everyone is jealous of.
I’ll bet Kanye thinks it’s him.
Focusing on anything anyone else has is imagination. It’s
not real, and we are picking out the best parts of their world without the
associated hassles that are inherent in everything.
We see the cruise without the stress of making it to the gate
on time, the kid leaving behind their favorite toy and screaming bloody murder,
the sea sickness and the unnerving couple from the Midwest who drink too much
and are exploring open relationships.
We always see the high-lights without the associated real lights.
Even Kanye fights with his wife and gets stomach bugs and
wakes up with cricks in his neck and can’t find anything good on TV, he just
doesn’t Tweet about those moments or post them on Instagram. Most of us don’t.
There’s nothing to miss, it’s all right here.
Smile.
Turn off the computer.
Delete the apps.
Breathe.
What else is there?
by Jamesscotthenson | Jun 8, 2017 | Blog
My word count on these keeps creeping back up, I will try to
reign that in.
Being a human is hard, the process of becoming one
seems to be even harder.
I look at babies and little kids, and I am amazed by
everything they have to do on this path of becoming a full human being and
doing all the full being things. Their hands don’t work correctly, their legs
are all wobbly and clunky. They bite their own fingers when they eat too fast
and their heads hit everything. If you are smart enough and coordinated enough
to be reading this, it took a lot to get where you are.
Sometimes we need to stop and offer gratitude to our younger
selves for navigating all the hardship and difficult learning required to get
us where we are.
All the skinned knees and banged heads and bit fingers and
smashed toes, not to mention the stress and struggle of learning how to talk
and where to poop. Its difficult to figure out how all these weird laws of
physics work. It’s difficult to fit into this social world with all of it
unstated rules and its irrational demands on our natural way of doing things.
We owe our toddler selves a debt of gratitude for getting through it to become
the people we are today.
You had to work hard to get where you are, and the youngest
versions of you had to do a lot of the heaviest lifting.
Think about younger you, thank them.
Cut them some slack if you need to.
Cut the kids around you a little slack.
Help them learn to live on this planet.
Thanks for reading.
by Jamesscotthenson | Jun 6, 2017 | Blog
I shirked and shied away from responsibility for a vast
majority of my life.
I called it different things like laziness, or not giving
a…something. I couched it behind different pale ideologies like resisting the
capitalistic desire to control my life through work or not buying into the
western concept that our lives should be regimented into a functional grind. I
suppose I believed these things at the time, but my dodging responsibility was
something different.
It was really rooted in fear, which is often fueled by selfishness.
I prized what I wanted and how I wanted to spend my time
above all else, thinking this would make me happy. I was unhappy, and no matter
how much more time I shoveled into doing my own thing, the less happy I became.
Today, responsibilities seem to govern my life.
Between running an office and a blog and trying to get other
projects off the ground, and having a family and trying to live a healthy life
and be a good dad and husband and continue to grow as a human being, I don’t
have a lot of time for what I want.
And, I have never been happier.
My life isn’t about me anymore, and I am doing my part (I
think) for my family and my community and my society, and there is something
inside of us that needs to live this way. I am grateful to responsibility for
teaching me this.
How do you feel when you dodge your responsibilities?
How do you feel when you do the things that are required of
you as a human being?
Would it be easier to embrace these things instead of
resisting them?
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