Date Posted: November 30th, 2009
I read a post on organic does not imply sustainable. An organic megafarm can do just as much damage to the earth as a conventional farm. The food may be healthier for you, but it’s not really all that great for the earth. Also, terms like “Free Range” and “Cage Free” aren’t federally regulated so they could mean anything. The literature on the carton may make you feel warm and fuzzy, it may make you feel like your extra dollar is going to a good cause, but there’s no way to know if you’re actually doing good if your research is limited to reading labels at Whole Foods.
What about clothes that are “Made in USA”? Does that mean it was made in the states? Not necessarily; the territories count too. Is that what you thought you were getting? If you’re concerned about the carbon emissions necessary to get your new clothes to you, it’s not much closer than India or China.
What about using the bus vs carpooling? What about “going paperless”? Is that really green? The bank websites say it is, but who knows if that’s actually the case. What about reusable bags vs. paper bags. Which is really better?
Do we have the time to figure this stuff out? Do we have a good way to measure the impact we have?
I guess the point of this is, When you buy something with the word GREEN labeled all over it, don’t let yourself believe that your conscience is off the hook. It’s not that simple. Buying “green” still sends a good message, it’s just that the products may not be doing real tangible good for the world.
Tags:
Character-Development, Emotional Health, Money, Sustainability, YMOYL.
Posted at
11:03 am | No Comments »
Date Posted: November 25th, 2009
When someone you care about yells at you or says hurtful things to you, how should you react? What if they’re giving you criticism. What if they’re pushing you down? Is it better to take in that negativity or ignore it completely? Should you put up some shield? No Shield?
Conventional wisdom says that putting up an emotional wall is bad, but many people do it. It’s a common trope in romantic stories: the main character’s been hurt over and over again and has put up an emotional wall, has a heart of stone, and only the new lover can break down the wall and warm the heart. Ah, so romantic. ^_~
So, is a fully opened heart really all that wonderful?
I think the answer is “sort of”. Clearly an emotional wall isn’t good. With a wall you cut yourself off from the outside world. You aren’t allowing yourself to see the truth of your situation. You feel lonely. But having a fully opened heart, with no barrier whatsoever is like sunbathing without sunscreen. It’s dangerous. When people say hurtful things you have no shielding at all. You’ll get burned.
What you really want is a thick skin. You want the ability to see and understand the feedback the world is giving you without it injuring you. You want the ability the accept criticism of what you do and not see it as a personal attack. You don’t want to feel offended. If someone does make an ungrounded personal attack you want to be able to shrug it off. Essentially you want to choose your reaction.
How do you get there? Here are some things you can do.
Create a Bigger Gap
There’s a great saying that Covey likes to quote in his books, “There is a gap between stimulus and response”. The greater you make that gap the easier it is to deal effectively with feedback. If you respond to stimuli instantly you’ll be responding with your primitive brain’s emotional reflexes, the “fight or flight” response. The longer the response time the more time you allow for you higher faculties to get involved.
Practice Detachment
Detachment really needs it’s own article. It’s a big, somewhat complicated topic. Multiple situations count as detachment. That being said, I’ll try to give a short summary here.
Detachment is basically a form of not caring. Or at least not letting your primitive, reactive brain care about anything. If someone says something mean to you, you shrug it off. You listen, but it doesn’t hurt you. If you present an proposal, detachment means you won’t feel much if it’s shot down or accepted. It means you can listen to criticism and actually improve yourself without wasting energy dealing with hurt or over excitement.
This may sound like an “emotional wall”, but it isn’t. A wall is when you see positive feedback as being lies, (Block it out! You might be hurt!!!) and negative feedback as something to ignore or as justification for dismissing the positive feedback. It’s a cancellation filter on reality. Nothing (good or bad) gets in.
With detachment you do experience reality, it just doesn’t hurt you. The filter is applied to you, not reality.
You are Your Only Competitor
If you are your only competitor, then feedback and criticism takes on a new meaning. It doesn’t matter if fifteen people are better than you, just as long as you’ve improved over time.
This is a tough idea to really internalize since competition with others can be really motivating in the short term. External competition is a dangerous game, though. It can lead to you developing contempt for your adversaries. It can lead to you being afraid to reach out for help or afraid to show your awesome ideas to others for fear that others will steal it. The short term boost in productivity is probably not worth the risk, especially when coupled with the benefits you get by being able to focus your energies on being better than you were.
Ask for lots of feedback
The more often you ask for feedback the easier it is to receive it and be detached from it.
If you’re a software designer you’ll be used to getting a lot of feedback. When you’re debugging you want to find out where you went wrong so you can fix it. You get input from users to find out how to improve the program. Feedback isn’t something to be feared or worry over. It’s something to react to. It’s something to show you where to improve. When you get feedback often and when there aren’t dire consequences to receiving the feedback it gets easier to receive. Receiving criticism is no longer the same as being criticized.
Assume People Aren’t Out to Hurt You
I’ve found that when my friends say something that seems hurtful, more often than not it wasn’t intended that way. And when I look back on some of the things I’ve said, I’ve found that many of them could have been interpreted as an attack when really it was me just expressing my own hurt.
I suppose once in a while people do say things that are intentionally hurtful, but how awesome/weird would it be if the person on the receiving end assumed it was supposed to be a positive or neutral comment?
So to sum up. Emotional Wall Bad. No Shield at all: Bad Thick Skin and Detachment: good. How to get Thick Skin: 1) Create Bigger gap between stimulus and response. 2) Practice detachment. 3) Compete with yourself, not others 4) Seek out Criticism, and 5) Assume first that people aren’t out to make you feel bad.
Tags:
Character-Development, Emotional Health, Psychology, Relationships.
Posted at
2:16 pm | No Comments »
