General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region Forums"15 Things You Should Give Up in Order To be Happy"???
http://www.purposefairy.com/3308/15-things-you-should-give-up-in-order-to-be-happy/Anyone see this on Facebook or elsewhere?
Yeah, it seems like a good idea; the whole less-is-more, free-your-mind thing, and all that.
That is, until you start to read some of them . . . . . .
Ok, that sounds like it comes out of the mouth of Herman Cain . . . so . . . no. There are very oppressive people doing very shitty things to a whole lot of the population and they need to be called out on it now and often until they stop fucking DOING it.
Uh, are you FUCKED? This sounds like happy-sappy bullshit straight out of books like "The Secret". If no one complained about anything, we'd be working 7 days a week, 16 hours a day for 10 cents an hour (next to adolescents) in unsafe work conditions, our bosses would be allowed to physically beat us up, we'd go home and eat rotted meat and drink polluted water, we would never be able to buy anything to even sit on, and life would be a dystopia worse than any Great Depression ever documented.
Yeah. Racism rules. Suppression is amazing. Taxpayer-funded murder kicks ass. Reaganomics is awesome. Keep fisting us hard, corporate America, because if there's one thing I don't want to be known as, it's a complainer!! YEAHHH!!
Follow your bliss and the universe will open doors for you where there were only walls Joseph Campbell
Change also sometimes leads to something worse; something the changee can't get out of for months and/or years. This also sounds like an empty cliche an HR manager tells to newly-axed workers.
The highest form of ignorance is when you reject something you dont know anything about. Wayne Dyer
Let me see if this works: "Republicans are not trying to end your lives via poverty and wage stagnation, they're trying to . . . motivate you into working . . . harder and becoming a better person as a result!" Gee, what was I thinking??
Really? Let me see if this works. I'm poor; not to the point where I qualify for a Pell Grant, but just enough to be able to go into massive debt to get a degree. And of course, I'll be able to pay bills that are due now WHILE I rack up this huge debt. Bitchin. Fast forward 5 years, and the job market's terrible so I can't find shit and I'm in hock for an ass-ton of unpaid cash. "Hey, you!! No excuses!! Just . . . get a job!! It might not be the job you want, but we all can't get what we want in life, can we???"
DUMB.
Tom Ripley
(4,945 posts)LongTomH
(8,636 posts)Your master beat you with 20 lashes! Be happy! It could have been 50!
I am so sick of that "Don't worry! Be happy!" horseshit!
Edited to add: Who's responsible for that great quote" "It is rarely reasonable men who change the world"? The same thing could be said of happy people!
"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." - George Bernard Shaw
MisterP
(23,730 posts)Tom Ripley
(4,945 posts)There is also a correlation with a starch based diet (wheat, potato, rice)
saras
(6,670 posts)Bob Dylan
Liberal Veteran
(22,239 posts)There isn't any "one size fits all" path to happiness.
Speck Tater
(10,618 posts)...of compliant peons who never caused any trouble for the ruling elite.
If you can make people believe that submissive obedience is the same thing as enlightenment then you've got the peasants well under control.
HughBeaumont
(24,461 posts)[font size="4"][font color="red"]If you can make people believe that submissive obedience is the same thing as enlightenment, then you've got the peasants well under control.[/font][/font]
RKP5637
(67,107 posts)snagglepuss
(12,704 posts)laundry_queen
(8,646 posts)gtar100
(4,192 posts)well said!
Odin2005
(53,521 posts)The whole "Self-Help" industry is RW and reactionary. It teaches people to blame themselves for their problems rather than the injustices of society. Especially avoid anything associated with the publishing company Health Communications (like the Chicken Soup for The Soul books).
HughBeaumont
(24,461 posts)So much for "freedom of thought".
laundry_queen
(8,646 posts)This is also a philosophy among so many therapists and support groups. I belong to a support group, and I find it's always the authoritarian, bully types who trumpet, "Stop being the victim! Everything happens for a reason (or alternately, 'God has a plan'. Use this [in my case abuse] as an opportunity to GROW. Be thankful for your path- it made you who you are today. Don't assign blame, your abusers were abused too. Forgive them, they are victims too. blah blah blah." Anything *BUT* holding them accountable. It's very frustrating - it's not just among the oppressed, it's rampant among the abused or victimized as well. I mentioned once that I refuse to forgive and forget because it means I'm enabling their abusive behavior. I HAVE moved on with my life, and I don't dwell normally BUT I'm not going to just 'let' people act that way. No way. And that's really what that kind of talk is all about - enabling the oppressors and letting them get away with it. IMVHO.
mactime
(202 posts)I was holding out hope that this would actually be helpful. LOL
HughBeaumont
(24,461 posts)Alas, it's more victim-blaming claptrap straight out of "The Secret".
Like when Wilson Phillips said "You got yourself into your own mess". But what if they DIDN'T?
RKP5637
(67,107 posts)would hold employee morale meetings wherein we were told problems lay with employees not management, that the success of the corp. and better employee relations started from the bottom up, not from corporate management down. What an unmitigated bunch of bullshit that was.
Then would come layoffs of 6k to 10k people at a time.
I get tired of happy happy bullshit telling people they should enjoy being fucked over!
Pool Hall Ace
(5,849 posts)but I had this inkling that it was something that Oprah would endorse. So I performed did a search with the terms 'The Secret Oprah.'
BINGO!!
gvstn
(2,805 posts)"You can't want nothing if you want satisfaction"
http://www.cowboylyrics.com/lyrics/t-bone-burnett/trap-door-25015.html
provis99
(13,062 posts)so I should give up the things that make me happy, in order to be happy?
smells like Christian fundamentalist martyrdom bullshit to me. and writing that just made me happy.
frazzled
(18,402 posts)But in the daily grind of one's immediate personal life, I think there's some truth to a few of them.
One thing I've tempered a lot as I've aged is "criticism." No, I don't mean avoiding criticizing political arguments or figures, but easing up on criticizing people I meet or things I encounter. For instance, I used to be much more opinionated about movies or art, eviscerating things I thought were wrongheaded or poorly done. Now I realize that to create anything is difficult and a real accomplishment, and I tend to limit my thoughts to "not my cup of tea" or simply avoid things that are not my style. I don't criticize how other people lead their lives, or raise their children, or spend their money: to each his own has pretty much been my mantra (unless it hurts someone else), and I find myself much happier for not being so judgmental. Who am I to judge others all the time when I am hardly perfect? It makes you feel superior to pass judgment, especially when you are young, but it really does lead to bitterness and a lot of delusion.
Change is good, or at least not to be feared. I have to fight against this one, because often I do resist it. But I've found that making major moves, sometimes unwanted, to different parts of the country a number of times in my life --an enormous burden both physically, emotionally, and financially-- has been invigorating and interesting. There's always something fascinating to find in a new place, and it opens your eyes to different things, offering new perspectives. I remember when we moved to Massachusetts being invited to dinner at the home of a (otherwise extremely interesting and accomplished) couple who had lived many years in our previous state. They spent the whole evening complaining about how awful this or that was in MA compared to the previous state ... and this after having lived there for 12 years! I thought: how miserable they must be not being able to find or accept the positives of some things here, even though their negatives were not totally off the mark. I mean, at least the flora and fauna is gorgeous!
And giving up the past? That one's a no brainer. Of course you shouldn't obsess on it: you can't change it. As you age, this one becomes imperative in so many ways.
These sayings might be trite, but I can't imagine that people who in their personal lives constantly (a) blame others ; (b) complain and criticize ; (c) resist changes in their lives ; (d) give everything a reductive label ; (e) make excuses every time something goes wrong; or (f) obsess over the past are very happy. I'm no Pollyanna, and I can have a biting tongue and get temporarily very angry, but I certainly don't embrace negativity as a pathway to contentment in my life, and find that "chilling out" helps bring more pleasure. I don't think I could have stayed married for nearly 40 years or raised two kids if I hadn't learned to accept things with a bit of grace. I'm a flawed individual, so I have to accept a flawed world and life, even as I work to improve it.
RKP5637
(67,107 posts)Honeycombe8
(37,648 posts)I agree that if you find a person who does all those things (blame others, complain, criticize, refuses to accept change, etc.), you'll find a pretty miserable person.
But since we're human, we can't fight these tendencies fully, or all the time. The best we can do is try. And maybe, sometimes, it's not the best thing that we NOT blame someone else, IF he is the one to blame! (If it even matters, and sometimes it doesn't.)
To live a happy life, it does make sense that a person not sit around seeing others and the world through critical eyes, blaming others, refusing to accept change (life is constant change!), not insisting on labeling people, etc.
OneGrassRoot
(22,920 posts)renate
(13,776 posts)All very well said!
Criticism is poison in our personal lives, although it's necessary in our roles as citizens of a democracy. Same with blame and a few other things that serve no useful purpose in personal relationships but are still needed when large groups of people live together (e.g., if there were no blame, and therefore no risk of prison or censure, society would be an even more stressful place to live in).
I think that list has a lot to offer us as individuals.
That kind of thing does not have a political intent. It's just about day to day life.
ThomThom
(1,486 posts)but I'm no expert
Do the right thing.
HughBeaumont
(24,461 posts)Suppression is suppression, poverty is poverty, abuse is abuse and wrong is wrong, no matter if it's a corporate entity doing it or a greedmongering member of the 1% or a politician or a boss or a significant other or a bully. Life issues and damages are not just as easily solvable as "thinking positively" or "ignoring things that you simply have no way of controlling". It's almost as bad as that congressperson a few weeks back telling abused women to "remember what made you love your husband" as a cure for their problem.
Living life with blinders on is far more poisonous than living it mad. Wanting to make the unfairness of life end should never be synonymous with negativity.
XanaDUer
(12,939 posts)And it is all about keeping the sheeple down. I would like to ask Oprah- proponent of "The Secret" - if Black folks followed some of these rules to happiness, where would the Civil Rights Movement be?
gateley
(62,683 posts)When we wallow in the past, get a rage on in blaming others, spend our time criticizing others in their wrong-ness (from our perch of right-ness), etc., then we're stuck.
I often think of that on DU -- we exert so much energy railing against the other side (and at times against each other) and really, what does it accomplish? Have we un-done the wrongs? Has our indignation changed the circumstances? Has our criticism made a change for the better? And I engage in it all with relish, believe me.
I think it's necessary to express our outrage, our frustrations and our incredulity, but not to do it over and over and over to the point we feel as though we've done something, when really, we haven't.
unblock
(52,205 posts)gateley
(62,683 posts)renate
(13,776 posts)gateley
(62,683 posts)unblock
(52,205 posts)happiness is easy to achieve if you can convince yourself that your lot in life is good, despite all evidence to the contrary.
you nailed it.
distantearlywarning
(4,475 posts)Ignorance is bliss.
RainDog
(28,784 posts)and besides, it might make you unhappy.
...and what more important goal in life could there be other than your own smiles.
guitar man
(15,996 posts)Lex
(34,108 posts)HughBeaumont
(24,461 posts)One can't just wish bad things like disease, poverty and abuse away; or worse yet, positively think their way out of it and be told it's their fault if they don't.
Nay
(12,051 posts)employees almost unchanged from the text in the OP. They dump this on their employees only to massage everyone's bad feelings about the utter CRAP the corporations are forcing on them daily.
Don't like that the bosses bought shitty software for the corp because some favored vendor was selling it? YOU'RE AFRAID OF CHANGE.
Do you think that Joe Blow in the next cubicle needs to STFU about how he hates fat women?
YOU CRITICIZE TOO MUCH.
Do you dare mention to the new boss that his big 'new' idea was tried at the corp in 2002 and didn't work out well at all? YOU REFUSE TO GIVE UP THE PAST.
Did a coworker just fuck you over in a meeting and you dared to mention that to the boss in private? YOU ARE ALWAYS TRYING TO BLAME SOMEONE ELSE FOR YOUR PROBLEMS. (Of course, if YOU do something wrong, guess what happens to you? Yep. You get BLAMED.)
undergroundpanther
(11,925 posts)Is if you can't do what it says to be happy,well enough to be happy then because you are responsible for your own happiness,no one but yourself to blame if you can't be happy in slavery or facing abuse. When the only option is you blame yourself for everything the things that cause you actual problems and stress..it can't be an external stress making you miserable.it can't be a sadistic bully making you feel stress go let the abuse hurled at you just roll off your back,deny it hurts to be treated like shit,and pull up those bootstraps,get back to work.And SMILE it's a beautiful day.
gtar100
(4,192 posts)I first ran across this nonsense back in the 80's and saw it effect people around me by making them selfish and greedy. Quite the opposite of the superficial intention of these ideas.
SomethingFishy
(4,876 posts)word for word transcript of a Tony Robbins seminar.
HughBeaumont
(24,461 posts). . . and it sounds all "empowering" and "positive" and what not . . .
Until two events changed my opinion about him -
One was someone that said "Has Tony Robbins ever done anything superlative in business besides making people feel better about themselves?" It hit me that he was good at something very superficial - pump-priming - and that this just may have been the door that opened it up. Keep the masses high on "happy" and maybe they won't notice they're being screwed . . . a cottage industry all it's own?
Two was his divorce. One of the aspects of his seminars and books was the emphasis on how to develop a better relationship with your significant other. What, didn't he follow his own advice, or is the "advice" nothing but a bunch of fluffity crap that doesn't hold sway when it comes to what the other person is feeling?
MJJP21
(329 posts)It always amazes me when two people will read the same words and come away with a diametrically opposed understanding. I did not agree with your analogies at all.
Stargleamer
(1,989 posts)WHEN CRABS ROAR
(3,813 posts)On the Road
(20,783 posts)is attempting to con readers into being complaint sheep. I actually would have thought that these suggestions are common sense that anyone with a desire to have a fulfilling life would be wise to pay attention to.
If your response to these suggestions is negative, it might be wise to examine whether happiness is more important to you than the following:
--the desire to be right
--the need for control
--the need to blame
--the desire to complain
--the desire to criticize
--the need to label others
--the need to hold onto the past
To a large extent, each one of us has the choice between being happy and holding on to the things the author has listed.
Character is fate. If you mock those suggestions, you are likely condemning yourself to a lifetime of unhappiness.
libodem
(19,288 posts)And philosophies have some or part of that type of stuff. It's good advice. The less demands and expectations we harbor the less likely we are to be disappointed when they don't happen. Don't set yourself up to be let down and you won't be hurt. Stay open to out come but don't be attached to the outcome. Hang loose, baby.
Ah, hell, fuck that, blame somebody else.