talking2myselfA blog documenting a functional addict’s journey to contentment |
I tend to use the word karma to describe the calm, peaceful balance. Something that disturbs this state is said to be upsetting my karma. I recently decided to look it up the proper meaning of the word and am horrified to discover that it doesn’t mean anything like that at all. I am not sure where my interpretation of it came and that got me to thinking as to how best to describe this search. Read the rest of this entry »
This is typical me. I can’t believe it been over a month since I wrote in this blog, totally unacceptable! The release of the 1911 Census data took me back to a project I started over 3 years ago and overtaken by events (see Ellis Families of West Riding Yorkshire). And as usual I have become obsessed again to the detriment of other things.
But a recent death of a close family child - only 21 year old - has hammered home the message of how much time is so precious to all of us. The time you hold onto crappy jobs, the time you remain in crappy relationships, the time you wish you could be elsewhere doing something close to you heart is wasted time. Time that you have no way of recovering, even if you get the millions you were waiting for! Read the rest of this entry »
Saturday was my birthday and I didn’t do much in the way of celebrations, in fact I didn’t really feel in a celebratory mood. For some reason I woke up with the image of a blue sky, my children laughing and splashing in a clear blue sea, a white sandy beach with lovely big picnic spread and the smell of fish and meat on the barbeque. Everything I did just did not seem to shake that picture from my head. Read the rest of this entry »
News story doing the rounds today about how parents’ ambitions in today’s society are damaging their children’s well being - see http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2009/feb/02/children-wellbeing-success for example. Now, this is not the first time that this sort of discussion has come up and I think it is good that it is debated but I feel that too many times this is a little one sided and maybe we are trying to make a bad excuse for a deeper issue within our society. Read the rest of this entry »
“How I invest and spend may touch the lives of people in distant places, whose names I’ll never know, whose hopes I never think about,”
There has been some debate in scientific circles about what motivates humans to co-operate. Suggestions from the selfish gene – looking after number one - through to protecting one’s own to motivation to safeguard the tribe/community etc etc. Which one is it and what drives the person to help those less fortunate themselves? Read the rest of this entry »
Scenario: It is 2015, the world is recovering from one of the last great recession but Europe and the USA are not doing so well. So many people were laid off in those years and countries led by China and Asia but including African and South American countries picked up the slack and now lead the world economy. Large European and American multi-nationals, many of which have been run and owned by foreign management and finance for many years, took advantage of the down turn to shift operation to ‘cheaper’ regions. The banks, the ones that were the main cause of the financial crisis, now de-nationalised by returning only a percentage of the billions of tax payers’ money, are under pressure to return to the pre-recession profitability, are pressurizing the now the millions of now unemployed tax payers to make good on their mortgages and loans. Read the rest of this entry »
When someone does not deliver to expectations, there is a perception of failure - even if the results are still quite spectacular. President Obama is in danger of being in this category with many people. I suspect there are some, many in Africa, that do not expect too much! I have done a post about the expectations surrounding President Obama’s taking of office on my news blog here. Read the rest of this entry »
“Spirituality, in a narrow sense, concerns itself with matters of the spirit, a concept closely tied to religious belief and faith, a transcendent reality, or one or more deities. Spiritual matters are thus those matters regarding humankind’s ultimate nature and meaning, not only as material biological organisms, but as beings with a unique relationship to that which is perceived to be beyond the bodily senses, time and the material world.” How can I, an atheist, be spiritual? Read the rest of this entry »
The 5th of January I wrote and said things where going back to normal. How I lied! If anything Christmas time is the worst time for making you break habits you have tried to hard to maintain. The few days of not following routines are fatal to anything that requires a bit of effort on your part. Read the rest of this entry »
Well this is it, 2009 before we could even catch our breaths, everything’s back to normal.
Have you made any resolutions? I have, but not because I think that one year turning into another will make it any different, just that it does provide a good excuse to try harder at those things you promised yourself over the last year you would try to do. Some of those I did, but many others kept being put off and off again. Read the rest of this entry »
“Teenagers ‘optimistic about jobs’, 90% felt they would find work and more than half rejected the idea of signing on.” (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7737720.stm). Well we have been telling them for years to ‘fulfill your destiny’, ’stand up for yourself’ and ‘you can do it’, should we be surprised? Read the rest of this entry »
“If you’re black you ran the risk of getting deposited into a box marked and sellotaped for track and field and entertainment and crime and jail and self-doubt and shame.”Â
Obama’s election now allows many older black people to inspire the young people with more conviction when saying ‘you can be whatever you want to be’. Previously it just did not ring true. Read the rest of this entry »
I came across this blog entry http://thecanadianrepublic.blogspot.com/2008/11/reason-obamaism-wont-last.html - in the middle of the euphoria of Obama’s election as the president of the USA. Whilst I have my own reservations about the elation of this momentous occasion, I still recognised the significance of this election.
However, the blog entry got me thinking, after all no-one can be trying to better one’s life without learning from the world around us, learning and observing - for learning is one of the most precious gifts we humans possess - but - so is empathy and kindness. Like many people who have the guts, opportunity or just the plain luck to be in a position to better themselves, the writer of this blog makes the same mistake of assuming that all other human beings are lazy and everyone just wants to sit around and get paid. Read the rest of this entry »
Many years ago, my wife considered herself a computer widow. At the time, ‘computing’ was my hobby - more like a burning passion, but that’s a matter of opinion! Computing is such a wide area but to those around me, I was obsessed with computers. As I was not in a position, at the time, to afford the best computers, I had to make do with what I had - so I built PCs, patched them and upgraded them for others in order to build a decent enough PC from the leftovers to do the things I wanted to. Many of the tools, the free/shareware ones obviously, were not always what I wanted so I programmed as well. Read the rest of this entry »
Ahem. Went to the gym this evening and must say I struggled to be motivated to get there and to stay there once I got there. Put myself under some pressure to make the effort today since I had not been since Saturday and when I weighed myself this morning, I found I have actually put on weight. This on top of the weight I had put on the last time I checked, not really that bl***dy motivating, is it? I know, I know some people will have me believe that muscle weights more than fat but believe you me, I see no blasted muscle anywhere. Read the rest of this entry »