PERSONAL OBSERVATION ON A PERSONAL MATTER.

　

Tobacco being an expense and not having gotten any unemployment for the last five weeks.

This morning I was reduced to digging out a relic, my dad’s pipe and a bag of tobacco.

Fortunate for me my son-in-law has better taste in pipe tobacco then dad did and the bag was left by my son-in-law.

The pipe really is a relic, twenty years ago my dad had broken his pipe and I was smoking a pipe then.

So I had given him one of mine, since I had about ten different pipes I was really into smoking a pipe!

Well this morning I load the pipe and started to light it when I noticed I was having trouble.

The bowl seemed out of line and turning away from me.

I finally took it from my mouth and looked it over, dad had done his remodel on it!

He liked straight stem and I like to have a downward bend, he had done some craving and then taped it to suit him. The problem was he was right handed and I am left handed.

Being in my right mind often sets me at the mirror image of how everyone else does things.

Left justified instead of right justified, once I moved the pipe to the other side of my mouth everything seem to line up just fine.

Does that ever happen to you, something that once belonged to a parent and it was passed down.

But it brings out a difference between you and them?

McCain: I Was Never a Maverick

Someone really ought to introduce the senator from Arizona to the guy who ran for president in 2008. “I never considered myself a maverick,” John McCain tells Newsweek. “I consider myself a person who serves the people of Arizona to the best of his abilities.” Ben Smith points out a campaign ad from McCain’s presidential run heralding him and Palin as the “original mavericks.” Smith also shows footage of McCain asking a town-hall crowd in 2008, “what do you expect of two mavericks?”

It seems safe to say McCain will be, do or say whatever it takes to win an election.  If being a maverick isn’t what works best, he’ll decide he never was one.  Good thing most people have better memories than he seems to have.

OPEN THREAD DAAA DA! Saturday 01-23 and the first day of the rest of your life!

Went on a job interview yesterday, looks like I maybe getting back into security.

Law enforcement seems to think I am older then I think I am.

And no one else seems interested in a 52 y.o. who piddle his younger year away and had not decided what he wanted to be when he grew up….. I really need to decided that one of these days!

My “Positive” Sterotypes of Gay People

Stereotypes can be quite destructive.  I believe, without firm evidence, that our brains are disposed to making stereotypes vs. not in large part because of the survival value of making stereotypes.  Suppose, for example,  we had to learn anew with each exposure about the dangers of rattlesnakes – not a good thing, adaptation-wise.  And the “costs” of overgernalizing to being afraid of all snakes is less burdensome than failing to make the necessary discrimination about rattlesnakes.

I hold a positive stereotype that most Asians are hard working and conscientious.  I don’t demand a high standard of “proof” for this stereotype – I think this is true more often than not (a > 50% probability).  I have not formally tested this hypothesis, but I think it may be true.  In this book, Malcolm Gladwell goes to great lengths in accounting for this assumption by reviewing the cultural history most Asians share in regard to the cultivation and harvesting of rice – not an easy job.

Sorry for the labored introduction, and I recognize that so-called “positive” stereotypes can be less than useful, too.  Any way, I tend to have some stereotypes about gay people that I  think are “positive perceptions”.  I am pretty sure that I did not know any gay people until I was in college.  All of the gay people I have known were professional people – nurses, physicians, psychologists, social workers, speech pathologists, teachers etc.  I expect that I have a restricted sample in obvious ways.  But given the acknowledged limitations of my sample, it seems to me that these things are, more likely than not, true in terms of gay people I have known:  1) most are good at their jobs – I am convinced of this to the point that if I had to make a hiring decision between to absolutely equal applicants I would tend to hire the gay over the straight person, if that datum was known to me; 2) gay people are dedicated to their work; 3) gay people tend to be intelligent; 4) gay people enjoy their leisure time more than most straight people do; 5) gay people are more tolerant than straight people of differences between themselves and others.

I am unable to offer empirical evidence of these assumptions, but they have been true in regard to my experience.  Appreciate any comments on this subject.

What the Dog Saw: More Essays from Malcom Gladwell

Gladwell’s newest book, What the Dog Saw,  was published 10-20-09 by Little, Brown and Company.  The book is broken down into three sections:  “Minor geniuses”; “Theories or Ways of Organizing Experience”; and “Predictions We Make about People.”  This sounds like classic Gladwell fare.

Read more here:  http://www.gladwell.com/dog/index.html

I think Gladwell looks a lot better than Sideshow Bob. And, I am definitely sure he is a much nicer person, too.  I can’t wait to get the new book!

Glenn Beck and left-right confusion

A fascinating article by Glenn Greenwald, at Salon.com, not only attempts to categorize (not an easy endeavor) Glenn Beck. Along the way, Greenwald has much to say about the political climate in the states today. To say the bulk of the protesters (teabaggers, etc.) don’t have a clue about what exactly they’re protesting is oversimplification.
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Last night during his CBS interview with Katie Couric, Glenn Beck said he may have voted for Hillary Clinton and that “John McCain would have been worse for the country than Barack Obama.”  This comment predictably spawned confusion among some liberals and anger among some conservatives.  But even prior to that, there had been a palpable increase in the right-wing attacks on Beck — some motivated by professional competition for the incredibly lucrative industry of right-wing opinion-making, some due to understandable discomfort with his crazed and irresponsible rhetoric, but much of it the result of Beck’s growing deviation from GOP (and neoconservative) dogma.  Increasingly, there is great difficulty in understanding not only Beck’s political orientation but, even more so, the movement that has sprung up around him.  Within that confusion lies several important observations about our political culture, particularly the inability to process anything that does not fall comfortably into the conventional “left-right” dichotomy through which everything is understood.

Some of this confusion is attributable to the fact that Beck himself doesn’t really appear to have any actual, identifiable political beliefs; he just mutates into whatever is likely to draw the most attention for himself and whatever satisfies his emotional cravings of the moment.  Although he now parades around under a rhetorical banner of small-government liberty, anti-imperialism, and opposition to the merger of corporations and government (as exemplified by the Bush-sponsored Wall Street bailout), it wasn’t all that long ago that he was advocating exactly the opposite:  paying homage to the Patriot Act, defending the Wall Street bailout and arguing it should have been larger, and spouting standard neoconservative cartoon propaganda about The Global Islamo-Nazi Jihadists and all that it justifies.  Even the quasi-demented desire for a return to 9/12 — as though the country should be stuck permanently in a state of terrorism-induced trauma and righteous, nationalistic fury over an allegedly existential Enemy — is the precise antithesis of the war-opposing, neocon-hating views held by many libertarian and paleoconservative factions with which Beck has now associated himself.  Still other aspects of his ranting are obviously grounded in highly familiar, right-wing paranoia

Continued here:

jammer5

Who’s who? And what caption would you choose?

New Book Meeting: I am wanting to see all who would be interested in meeting up at my house next month…

I am wanting to start a “book club” that has no particular theme.  I will send out my street address as that becomes necessary.  I and the members need a couple of weeks to read the book(s).  The theme can be anything of interest to the group members. Send out an email to get things started.  Lend some ideas as to what would work for you…

Thanks for all you do…  Steven

Dialectics and Our Path out of our Current Craziness

Marsha Linehan, PhD from the University of Washington, has provided the nearly impossible.  She has led the way in treating patients with a very disabling disorder known as Borderline Personality Disorder.  Dr. Linehan, though she might deny it, is a committed Zen Budhist.  Dealing with the difficult balances that impinge upon us all daily,  is the very  foundation of her expertise.  Those imbalances are especially difficult for her patients, but I, and others contend, the same is true for most of the rest of us.

Dialectical Behavior Therapy, aka DBT, was developed in the late 1970’s by Dr. Linehan and colleagues when they discovered that cognitive behavioral therapy alone did not work as well as expected in patients with borderline personality disorder.  Dr. Linehan and her team added additional techniques and developed a treatment which would meet the unique needs of these patients.

DBT was developed to help people who have trouble in the realms of “thinking, relationships, emotions, and coping” – sounds like most of us, no?

A core component of DBT is “mindfulness” – gaining control of your mind, rather than letting it control you.”

Another component is “interpersonal effectiveness” – which involves, a) getting your objectives met in a situation, b)get/keep good relationships, c) keep/improve self respect and liking of one’s self.

A third component is “emotion regulation” which involves 1) understanding emotions one experiences, 2) reducing emotional vulnerability, and 3) decreasing emotional suffering.

In case I was not clear, I have always thought that these skills could be used by most of us, me included.

What do you bloggers think?

iggy donnelly

A Test…

A woman meets a man at her mother’s funeral whom she thinks is the most wonderful man she has ever met – he is delightful in every way in her view and she thinks she might be in love with him. 

A week later, after the funeral, the woman had not hear from the man of her dreams.  Two weeks later she kills her sister.  Why did she do this?

This is an undergraduate test, but interesting none the less…

iggy donnelly…

The Rorschach outed by Wikipedia

Wikipedia has posted images of the Rorschach test with common answers on-line.  These actions are serious copyright violations (the image provided here is not a real Rorschach image).

I have read an opinion that the sooner psychology gives up research on the Rorschach, the sooner it will realize that it can be a serious discipline.

I used to give a lot of Rorschach tests.  They tend to be a seductive mistress, and I am not really sure why — maybe a reason to seek therapy?

Read the full story here.

iggydonnelly

The American Psychological Association and Bush Era “Torture”

This is an open letter to the membership of the American Psychological Association from the Board of Directors.  It is quite interesting.

June 22, 2009

An Open Letter from the Board of Directors

Dear Colleague,

As a psychologist and member of the American Psychological Association (APA), you no doubt share our serious concerns about reports regarding the involvement of psychologists in torture and abusive interrogations as part of the Bush administration’s “war on terror.” We recognize that the issue of psychologist involvement in national security-related investigations has been an extremely difficult and divisive one for our association. We also understand that some of our members continue to be disappointed and others angered by the association’s actions in this regard. Although APA has had a longstanding policy against psychologist involvement in torture, many members wanted the association to take a strong stand against any involvement of psychologists in national security interrogations during the Bush administration.

Information has emerged in the public record confirming that, as committed as some psychologists were to ensuring that interrogations were conducted in a safe and ethical manner, other psychologists were not. Although there are countless psychologists in the military and intelligence community who acted ethically and responsibly during the post-9/11 era, it is now clear that some psychologists did not abide by their ethical obligations to never engage in torture or other forms of cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment. The involvement of psychologists, no matter how small the number, in the torture of detainees is reprehensible and casts a shadow over our entire profession. APA expresses its profound regret that any psychologist has been involved in the abuse of detainees.

This has been a painful time for the association and one that offers an opportunity to reflect and learn from our experiences over the last five years. APA will continue to speak forcefully in further communicating our policies against torture and other cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment to our members, the Obama administration, Congress, and the general public. In so doing, we will continue to highlight our 2008 petition resolution policy, Psychologists and Unlawful Detention Settings with a Focus on National Security. APA will ensure that association communications convey clearly that the petition resolution is official association policy and must be central to psychologists’ assessment of the appropriateness of their roles in specific work settings related to national security. Our association’s governing body, the Council of Representatives, will soon be receiving guidance from various governance groups regarding further steps to implement this resolution. The history of APA positions and actions related to detainee welfare and professional ethics can be found at http://www.apa.org/releases/timeline.html.

On a closely related matter, the Ethics Committee and APA governance as a whole are focused intently on Ethics Code Standards 1.02 and 1.03, which address conflicts between ethics and law and between ethics and organizational demands, respectively. In light of Bush administration interrogation policies and uncertainty among our membership, the Ethics Committee has issued the attached statement, “No defense to torture under the APA Ethics Code.” Invoking language from the U.N. Convention Against Torture, this statement clarifies that the Ethics Committee “will not accept any defense to torture in its adjudication of ethics complaints.” APA will continue to monitor material in official reports related to psychologist mistreatment of national security detainees, will investigate reports of unethical conduct by APA members, and will adjudicate cases in keeping with our Code of Ethics. The association’s focus on these ethical standards is consistent with its position that no psychologist involved in detainee abuse should escape accountability.

In conclusion, as part of APA’s elected leadership, we have an obligation to protect and further psychology’s longstanding commitment to the highest standards of professional ethics—including, and especially, the protection of human welfare.

Respectfully,

American Psychological Association 2009 Board of Directors

James H. Bray, PhD
Carol D. Goodheart, EdD
Alan E. Kazdin, Ph.D
Barry S. Anton, PhD
Paul L. Craig, PhD
Norman B. Anderson, PhD
Rosie Phillips Bingham, PhD
Jean A. Carter, PhD
Armand R. Cerbone, PhD
Suzanne Bennett Johnson, PhD
Melba J.T. Vasquez, PhD
Michael Wertheimer, PhD
Konjit V. Page, MS

“No Problem, Dude”

Another sign I am getting old:  I find it irritating when I say “thank you” to the fast food employee, they respond with “no problem.”  I want to add, “I glad it is no problem for you to do your effing job!”

I haven’t yet taken to shaking my cane at the neighbor kids and yelling at them to stay out of my yard.  I may get there any day, I’m afraid.

Wisegeek, here, thinks the “no problem” problem has something to do with age and informality.

Iggy Donnelly

New DSM V Diagnosis – “Blame Evasion Disorder”

This new diagnostic category may be introduced in the upcoming edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manuel – 5th Edition:  Blame Evasion Disorder.  Sufferers of this disorder tend to voice these precepts:

1.  Women practice and  are the cause of sexism.

2.  Minorities are racist and therefore promote racism.

3.  Washington, D.C., the territory conservatives owned from 2001 to 2009, is liberal.

4.  Poor people, undeserving of loans,  who possess very little ecomonic power, caused the housing market melt-down.

5. Gays and lesibians are out to destroy the concept of heterosexual marriage.

6. All Liberals are evil and racist.

People with this disorder tend to rant on and on at conservative blog locations.  Treatment for this very sad disorder is not yet available.  Psychosurgery options may need to be considered.

Thomas Frank helped do some of the leg-work on identifying this new condition.  Read more here.

Iggy Donnelly

Broken People

Who do you think of when you read the words ‘broken people’?  Do your thoughts ever include yourself?  Do you feel empathy, sympathy, compassion, disgust, aversion?  I would like to discuss the unique variants of brokenness, and how we as people and society as a whole react.

Did you think of addicts, homeless people, maybe those with some definitions of mental instability as broken people?  I did.  And my emotional reactions were all across the spectrum, some I’m not at all proud of feeling!  I even went to the dictionary and looked up definitions for words like addict, empathy, sympathy, compassion…  I realized I don’t live in a dictionary and every definition fit someplace within my perceptions, but not others.  So I would like to know what you think, I would like to turn this issue over in my mind, take it out to examine it and see if I can grow in understanding.

Addict.  It’s one of the thoughts that came into my mind when I wondered about ‘broken people.’  Is this person addicted to alcohol, illegal drugs, prescription drugs, or maybe coffee?  Should it make a difference?  If I am approached on the street by a homeless woman asking if I can help, how do I react?  Do I automatically start putting restrictions on what help I might offer, or my ability to be compassionate?  Do I wonder if this homeless person is an addict, if giving money will help her continue her addiction?  And haven’t I already decided what the word ‘addict’ means to me!?  Yes, and it had nothing to do with coffee.  I feel differently depending on what choices another person has made, I react differently.  I want to learn how to not do that!

Maybe I need to examine how I define the word compassion.  After much thought I’ve decided compassion is accepting each person for who they are.  This is totally different than empathy which is responding to a person’s emotions and opinions with similar emotions and opinions.  It’s also totally different than sympathy which means feeling sorry or regretful for another’s suffering.

If I am acting out of compassion I won’t sit in judgment of this homeless woman, but will accept her for who she is. Whether she spends money I might give her on McDonald’s, drugs, or the medical bills that may be the reason she is homeless, doesn’t really matter.  Is it not her right as a human being to make her own choices?  For sure I won’t be accountable for her choices, but she will be.  I don’t get to decide what is a poor choice or what would be a better choice for her — not if I accept her for who she is, accept the fact that she has the right to her own choices, and agree to honor that right for everyone.

I think the person I want to be would be compassionate to all who suffer, and try to cultivate a loving attitude to everyone else—even those who don’t.  I am not the person I want to be!

How do I cultivate compassion for privileged people who remain oblivious to the consequences their self-centeredness visits upon others?  How on earth do I offer compassion to someone who regards him/herself as superior and who feels no discomfort on account of being oblivious?  I’m personally going to have the hardest time with those unable to recognize happenstance may be the only difference between them and anyone else, particularly someone less fortunate.

Aren’t we all “broken” to some degree or other (certainly, myself!) And I need to try harder to interact with others with compassion for their unique variant of brokenness.  I have found that many people’s “addiction” is to a state of denial that they are broken at all.  This addiction is no less vicious than alcoholism or drug addiction, and, like those addictions, is rarely willingly abandoned.