Slowing Tasks

If you have noticed, I have not been writing as frequently as I have before.  I have to go to writing biweekly rather than weekly.  It was too much to write two posts a week, one for this blog and one for my idea-writes STL Aeropspace blog.  Lessening my writing will help in two areas, quality of personal life and quality of writing.

There comes a time when doing gets in the way of quality.  As an empath and highly sensitive person (HSP) and a migraineur, I have limited capacity for activities.  Stress will take me down quickly.  Then my quality of life suffers, and it doesn't seem worth it.  Actually when I go down, everything seems worthless.  That's when thoughts of wanting to get away come and the desire to be in another world rise up.  Getting rest resets my brain and gives me back my optimism.

I'm not happy where I am as a writer.  I would like to grow.  Taking my writing frequency to two weeks  will give me more time to think of ways to be more creative and make better quality writing.  I am glad I'm writing for myself rather than for a manager or editor of some kind.  I feel that managers today fail to consider that their workers need not to burn out and they work them till they can't take it anymore.  I've been there and don't want to take my writing there.  I don't want to be put off by writing.  Writing is too important to waste it on bureaucratic deadlines and pressures.  Everyone who can write should write just as an civil duty.  We understand the founding fathers of the United States from their writings, and they were prolific writers.  Writing is just as important as voting.  Sure, you can say that you can get your message out via YouTube.com.  I say if your going to do that you should write your speech, that is what your going to say first.  Writing tends to congeal thoughts into messages.

Increasing quality of life and quality of writing are my goals for making biweekly posts.  I hope this does not put you off.  There are many blogs out there and articles to read.  So, I don't think you will have any lack of reading to do in the mean time.

Accounting For Weakness

Arnold Schwarzenegger, David Petreus, and a host of other powerful men have had their infidelities plastered all over the press.  More often than not these type of men have affairs in our society.  I don't doubt that there are powerful women who have affairs as well, but seem to not manage affairs well.  Sometimes our weaknesses get the better of us and we do wrong things.  This gives rise to the question, 'how do you manage weakness?'.  Let's look at some weaknesses, and how to manage them.

Everyone has weaknesses that need to be addressed in some fashion.  It seems that people these days major on their strengths and minor on their weakness.  I suppose some even ignore their weaknesses.  Other people, on the other hand, have no choice but to account for theirs.  Many weaknesses are of a personal nature.  How people manage their sexuality is a common one.  By nature, sexuality is supposed to be private.  These days, we understand that there are a variety of sexual lifestyles.  Most of them would abhor any one individual because were so diverse as a society.  Some sexual lifestyles are illegal, and some sexual acts are illegal.  People should find ways to keep their sexuality private and legal.  For some keeping things private is hard because there are people who pry for both personal and professional interests.  Romance is another area of weakness.  Some romance is fine to see in the right public setting.  Sometimes people are offended by public displays of affection.  People do tend to personalize the things they see.  I would avoid romance at work altogether.  I try to keep romance private or semi-private as well.  The less people know about your weakness, the higher they think of you.  There are weaknesses of a medical nature.  These society endures but prefers not to see.  How you take your pills shouldn't be public knowledge.  Talking about how gross your wound is might offend someone.  Some weaknesses are simple hygiene.  Wiping your nose on your sleeve is offensive in public.  Smelling in any way is offensive in public.  Too much perfume is offensive in public.  Contrary to the belief of some, perfume does not take away bad smell, it just adds more smell.  Sometimes just soap is not enough to take away bad smells.  You may have to use a disinfectant.  Some weaknesses are behavioral.  Touching a person in anyway may deemed offensive.  Many jokes are offensive.  Be very careful when it comes to joking.  Fights have started on a off color joke, and law suits have been filed for some as well.  Not smiling when someone smiles at you or not waiving when someone waives at you could be deemed offensive.  This is not to point fingers at anyone or for anyone to point fingers.  We all suffer from many of these weaknesses and more.

Weakness does not go away after it's addressed, it must be worked on continuously.  Making habits that compensate for weaknesses is a good idea.  Communicating in a good way is a habit that everyone needs to work on.  Cleaning yourself and dressing yourself appropriately are daily habits to develop.  Habits as to when and where to practice your sexuality and romance are just as important.  For the high profile people, it costs them a lot of money when they get caught.  What will it cost you?  Continual self evaluation is a must to keep face and a job let alone advancing these days.  I'm not talking about abstaining either.  The more you bottle up a need the more lightly it will explode at a later date.  No, it's better to manage it often.  If we have a desire to show violence, we play a game, or watch a movie, or read a violent book.  We don't go out causing fights.  In other words we let our minds simulate what we need emotionally.

Identifying your own weaknesses and learning how to manage them is important.  Though most people are not high profile or in the news often, it's still important to keep your weaknesses in check.  Even though you may not notice them, everyone you come in contact with will.

Sick Loved One

Taking care of your loved one while the're sick is quite common.  Sure, we have a lot of medicine for many things, but for the highly sensitive person, medication is not the worry.  My loved one was sick this week and I had to take off work to care for them.  I learned some thing in the process.

The first night, they were up all night.  Of course that just made things miserable for me as well.  Being an empth that communicates in a tactile/kinesthetic way I mimic their behavior.  When they are miserable, I am miserable.  So it behooves me to keep them healthy and happy.  The following two days, I gave them medication that was strong and also made them drowsy.  They slept and I was at peace.  Sometimes this empath thing takes a little time to kick in.  The next day, I was sleepy.  The third day, we slept a lot and got some good rest.  Now were on the recovery.

What did I learn?  I learned that keeping my love one adequately medicated helps me as well.  I've felt very overextended these last couple of weeks.  Fall season does that to you.  So many things to do and the sun goes down earlier and earlier.  I needed that rest.  Now, its time to hit the gym and shave off all the calories we ate while sick.

Precious Human Value

Value is a common word.  It's a word we use to describe something in a quantitative way.  I want to talk about the innate human value of everyone.  I use value instead of worth because worth has some negativity associated with it, such as "What's your worth?" or "How worthy are you?" or "Your worthless".  I feel value is impartial.  I'm taking you to the core definition of human value, then the past and present that shows our disregard for life, and then talk about championing human value.

Vietnam War Boat People

In this age of information,  we understand how computers work and often make comparisons between computers and the brain.  Sci-fi stories like the Matrix raise the question if we are in a simulation or not, and if we were, we would never know going about our own lives.  Therefore, our best understanding of our basic existence is 'Cognito ergo sum,' which translates into, 'I think therefore I am.'  It's a definition of ourselves that highlights the greatness of our reasoning and our sheer ineptness to affirm our own existence.  It does something else though; it shows our value as individuals to understand, change, build, destroy, and have emotional responses to the world we live in.  Now it's a statement that we more often than not apply personally.  Now consider that every human on the planet thinks.  If they think, they are.  They all have value.  They all have the same value as I do or as you do.  This is the beginning of compassion.  Their fate should be the same as mine.  The better the fate, the better for all.

If we think about how many people have died in wars, in accidents, in suicides; we can understand how lives have been extinguished before their time.  37,000,000 died in World War I, 60,000,000 died in World War II,  1,035,585 died in Vietnam War, around 2,000,000 died in the Soviet Afghanistan war, and around 14,700 and counting have died in the U.S. Afghanistan war.  There are countless wars; each with their own death count.  These wars are fought over ideologies.  We seem to adopt the notion 'Cognito ergo occidere,' which means 'I think therefore I kill.'  If we all really thought, we'd wouldn't be doing this.  If we considered that all have the same value, we would find other ways to solve issues.  What is the value of these people who died?  Well, instead of reaping the fruits of a free life and giving back to society, their value is to teach us to change.  Let it not be for nothing.

I like to talk about championing human value.  Yet, I find myself at a loss to understand how.  I suppose it starts small.  Kindness is a common word.  It's a word we take for granted.  When your kind to someone you show them that they are valuable to you.  We like to think of ourselves as kind.  We should evaluate ourselves though.  How kind are you to that shop person who is not giving you what you want?  How kind are you to the teammate on your team who is opposing you?  How kind to that person who just made fun of you and you don't like it?  As a highly sensitive person, I see a lot of frustration.  It's at work, it's in the stores, and it's at home.  Frustration can lead to anger, and anger can lead to violence.  Kindness can temper frustration.  Showing someone their value to them.

Examining what human value is shines bright in the darkness of our devastation of it.  Taking ownership of it anew and starting to show kindness to later take bigger steps is important.  We are in an era of post world wars.  Europe does not make war among its nations anymore.  Dialog has taken over.  The middle east seeks freedom.  The world is changing.  The change will be permanent.  Weapons will lessen.  We can help usher the change by being kind.