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 pm4hire
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Book Recommendation - Bright Sided |
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Posts: 4659 10/13/09 21:01:38 Senior Member |
Bright-Sided
cuts through all the BS pop psychology
our culture has subjected all of us to. Click here to listen to an interview with the author. Tom Welch
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Dennis Nedry |
Faulty Premise | #1 | ||
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Posts: 857 10/14/09 06:33:03 Senior Member |
She says most Americans try to project a cheery positive outlook. My observation is that nothing if further from the truth. Most Americans cling to the
negative. They hate their jobs, the focus on the *bad* economy (when many are getting rich now)....just look at the news...somebody is absorbing that
information.
I personally think controlling ones persistant thoughts, and state of consciousness is one of the most important things we can do. There are always positive alternate outcomes to every perceived event, and to be happy, they require our intentional focus. This does not mean we bury our fears and ignore potential threats. What it means is we acknowledge them, but maintain our focus on the adjacent possibility of a desired outcome. Everything we think is filtered through our own experiences, cultural training, habits of thought, etc. I think our job remains to try and create habitual thoughts that serve us. If that is labeled as "positive thinking" then so be it..... |
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1Aussie1 1Aussie1 1Aussie1 Oi Oi Oi |
#2 | |||
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Posts: 2308 10/14/09 06:55:34 Senior Member |
"I personally think controlling ones persistant thoughts, and state of consciousness is one of the most important things we can do."
Last Edited By: 1Aussie1 1Aussie1 1Aussie1 Oi Oi Oi 10/14/09 07:31:17.
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Dennis Nedry |
Maybe I'm on the wrong board also | #3 | ||
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Posts: 858 10/14/09 08:18:14 Senior Member |
I think that I may be in the wrong place also. I know once you get into this stuff, most people turn away.
It's easy to find a pub where you can have a beer and commiserate on how life is tough, the economy is awful, etc. but you just have to man up. Then going back to a sh!t job in the morning that, in your heart of hearts, you know you hate. And living below what you know is your potential. If that's what you want, have at it. There are plenty of tough guys working in steel mills, factories, and other such jobs that decided the best way was to just deal with it (another false persistant thought, state of consciousness), and give their lives to making the factory owner rich. When a simple adjustment of their own belief system would have them taking an entirely more enjoyable path. Personally, I'll keep doing what I'm doing, because I'm on the right track, and I know it. My message is not changing. |
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DG9 |
"On Your Feet or on Your Knees" | #4 | ||
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Posts: 1008 10/14/09 08:37:08 Senior Member |
Well, I guess that is a bit of an aggressive way to put it. Let's see, in a more kindly way life is what we make it and others will see us as we see
ourselves. This is a fact.
Dennis, kudos to you, you continue to grow and evolve. Stay on track, on message and "On Your Feet"... And thanks for the many insightful contributions! If You're Not the Lead Dog, the Scenery Never Changes... |
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Dennis Nedry |
Interesting though | #5 | ||
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Posts: 859 10/14/09 09:12:55 Senior Member |
In Australia, that is the mentality, to man up. And there are some tough characters there. And all the navel gazing probably doesn't fit into that
overall mindset. My posts must have hit a critical mass for Aussie and he wigged out.
This is a job/career board, correct? I'm viewing this board as a career board for me. And I'm making a transition from cubicle bound FTE, to contractor, then to business owner, and sort of blogging the process. I'm now making the transition from small business owner, to (hopefully) a much more successful business owner. And that particular jump, I'm finding, necessitates changing my entire person, beliefs, activities, network. You simply cannot become something different by staying the same way. And I'm finding, for me, the path also necessitates studying the thought process. There is where we get into the *koom-bay-ah* and woo woo. But it's not, you are always thinking. And if you keep thinking the same way, you keep getting the same result. So if you really want to change, you have to look at what and how you are thinking. But the truth is, most don't want to change. The goal is to be comfortable. I personally don't see the goal in life as being comfortable. It's the be as much as you can be in the time given. For some, this comes easily and naturally. For me, not so much, I need to deconstruct the process. Why do I post all this here? Because I get a lot of feedback that makes me think, and because maybe somebody will get some ideas, and it will help them. I do some idle chit chat stuff also, but I enjoy a more intellectual conversation. |
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G0ddard B0lt |
My thoughts | #6 | ||
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Posts: 9248 10/14/09 10:54:51
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Random thoughts:
I looked over the blurb on Amazon that pm4hire posted. I think that the idea of this book is correct. People I have met from other countries say the same thing, that Americans are obsessed with the idea of always seeing a positive side to things and thinking of limitless boundaries. Compared, that is, to almost all other countries. We have "Horatio Alger" and pulling yourself up by your bootstraps ingrained in the national character. I think it came from the Protestant work ethic and the Calvinist idea of self justification through hard work and achievement. Today it's "Oprah" and being "aspirational." but what the heck does that mean? Eat something, fix something, go to the cricket or football with your mates. go throw a stick for the dog. Anything rather than sit around 'controlling your persistant thoughts and state of consciousness'. I posit that going and doing something is controlling your thoughts. Sitting and doing nothing is letting your thoughts overrun you. Aussie, man up and stay the f*ck right where you are. How's that? 
"I personally think controlling ones persistant thoughts, and state of consciousness is one of the most important things we can do." I couldn't agree more. People who make "I can't" their "battle cry" never accomplish anything. It's easily demonstrable. "life is what we make it and others will see us as we see ourselves. This is a fact." A different way of saying the same thing. Barbara Ehrenreich's persistent message is that there is a stratum of the US economy that has no ability to pull itself up by its bootstraps, because it is locked into minimum wage jobs. To that I can only offer the Christian imperative to help the poor.  That's exactly why we have Medicaid, food stamps, subsidized housing, child and adult protective services, etc.
However, for almost anyone who can work and who has the ability to make and act on conscious choices, she's dead wrong. The real problem of poverty is that people are stuck in a negative thinking "victim" mode. The reverse of the state that Dennis is describing.
Last Edited By: G0ddard B0lt 10/14/09 10:59:03.
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John Masterson |
#7 | |||
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Posts: 7089 10/14/09 11:25:18 Moderator |
1Aussie1 1Aussie1 1Aussie1 Oi Oi Oi wrote: Aussie, It just means how you see the world, how you judge your chances of succeeding if you set a goal. Dennis is just talking about our beliefs. We all have them. Deciding "It's all shit so why try?" That's a believe for many. Try to be optimistic. Expect good things to happen, and they tend to happen. Why? Because YOU try harder and take action when you believe it will make a difference.
"To those who believe, no explanation is needed.
To those who don't, no explanation will do."
Last Edited By: John Masterson 10/14/09 11:54:16.
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Origisaurus |
Ozzie and Dennis saying pretty much the same thing | #8 | ||
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Posts: 769 10/14/09 12:02:48 Moderator, and part-time dangerous raptor
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Ozzie with Down Under subtlety, kinda like Crocodile Dundee rappelling Oz-style-face-down down the side of a high-rise and smashing into somebody's
apartment!
Dennis with politically correct circumlocution, if not obfuscation.
Pecunia Loquet, Merda Tauri Ambulat |
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Dennis Nedry |
Well, maybe too serious | #9 | ||
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Posts: 860 10/14/09 13:50:01 Senior Member |
I just want to make some dough so I can worry about something else besides money.
Like fishing in the Keys, or typing posts like this from a pub in Munich, drinking a Weihenstephaner. |
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I D Shukhov |
#10 | |||
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Posts: 2242 10/14/09 21:12:52 Senior Member |
Barbara Ehrenreich's persistent message is that there is a stratum of the US economy that has no ability to pull itself up by its bootstraps, because it is locked into minimum wage jobs.Right. She constantly writes about how bad it is to be an exploited worker, whether blue collar or white collar. Okay, we get it. But what do you do about it? She has a web site and a message board for people to post their "Ain't It Awful" messages. She chimes in every so often with a "Yes, yes it really is awful..." If she took all that energy and wrote a how-to manual to advise maids how to create their own businesses, now that would be helpful.
He that would live in peace and
at ease must not speak all he knows or all he sees. - Benjamin Franklin
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DG9 |
#11 | |||
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Posts: 1009 10/15/09 06:36:10 Senior Member |
But then she has found her market, those that choose to view themselves as victims and attend her pity party. So who is really exploiting who....
If You're Not the Lead Dog, the Scenery Never Changes... |
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| Book Recommendation - Bright Sided | 10/13/09 21:01:38 | pm4hire |
| Faulty Premise | 10/14/09 06:33:03 | Dennis Nedry |
| Re: Book Recommendation - Bright Sided | 10/14/09 06:55:34 | 1Aussie1 1Aussie1 1Aussie1 Oi Oi Oi |
| Maybe I'm on the wrong board also | 10/14/09 08:18:14 | Dennis Nedry |
| "On Your Feet or on Your Knees" | 10/14/09 08:37:08 | DG9 |
| Interesting though | 10/14/09 09:12:55 | Dennis Nedry |
| Ozzie and Dennis saying pretty much the same thing | 10/14/09 12:02:48 | Origisaurus |
| Well, maybe too serious | 10/14/09 13:50:01 | Dennis Nedry |
| Re: Book Recommendation - Bright Sided | 10/14/09 11:25:18 | John Masterson |
| My thoughts | 10/14/09 10:54:51 | G0ddard B0lt |
| Re: Book Recommendation - Bright Sided | 10/14/09 21:12:52 | I D Shukhov |
| Re: Book Recommendation - Bright Sided | 10/15/09 06:36:10 | DG9 |
