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Your Average Zombie

Are you passing on love, or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

I’ve mentioned on this blog, that I like to play phone games. I do not like to pay for anything on these phone games, So inevitably, when I reach a certain level in any one game, it becomes almost impossible to “beat” that particular level without some monetary insertion from Google Pay. So, that is when I say to said game, “Bye for now!” and I download another game that looks interesting, and makes me feel smart again, because I am zipping through the easy entry levels, like a pro.

I’ve noticed that if I leave a game alone, without logging in for a few weeks, and then I show up again after a long break, all decked out in my pretty little login emoji, miraculously there are boosters and extra lives and thousands of “coins” being thrown at me, as if I were the prodigal son returning to the screen, after so long and arduous, a time apart. The previously impossible level to beat, without buying the super-duper, discounted $6.99 value pack of boosters, is now a breeze to get through, as if I were starting on Level 1. And the next three “extremely hard/expert” levels, I am able to “win”, with the aid of one thumb and keeping my eyes closed.

It appears that these video games for my phone, were created by people who are quite familiar with toxic psychology. They are made with the “cycle of abuse” in mind. They work off of the casino model. Intermittent rewards is what keeps you coming back. A game which rewards me all of the time is ho-hum boring, and that game is quick to get deleted off my application list. A game that never rewards me at all, is easy to say “sayonara, don’t let the door hitcha on the way out”. It does not feel good, at all, to always lose. But man oh man, you let me have a fabulous winning streak for a few weeks at a time, and I will always check in, eventually. You, my sporadically exciting and enthralling phone game, will always have some space on my phone. And you know it.

I was explaining this phenomenon to my husband and he said that I was spot on. My husband and my sons are huge Joe Rogan podcast fans, and my husband said that he had listened to a podcast recently, discussing how computer/video games are made. The creators of video games, study all sorts of fascinating psychology in order to make the consumer stay on these games longer. Apparently, we game players will stick to a game, for at least ten minutes longer, if we think that we are saving a “person” versus some other mission. (I guess that is hope for humanity) Also, we like games that involve a lot of “water.”

I was a marketing major in college. I understand the manipulative side of business advertising, sales and consumerism. Therefore I pose this question, “If you know that you are being manipulated, and you are choosing to be part of the manipulative game, are you still being manipulated???” I think that this is a very interesting topic to ponder. I think that this topic can apply to a lot of things besides video games and product advertisements. As we have experienced a lot of, particularly in the last few years, this question about manipulation can easily apply to government, news media outlets, sports, religious cults, and personal relationships, to name a few. We can even manipulate our own selves, by implementing denial and rationalization.

“If you know that you are being manipulated, and you are choosing to be part of a manipulative game, are you still being manipulated?” Does it even matter? Do we even care? I would love to hear your thoughts on this topic. My thoughts aren’t fully formed. As someone who prides herself on always trying to seek “the authentic Truth”, this question is one that is worth spending some time on, since I am taking a break from my phone games this week (with the reasonable expectation of some booster/points “goodies”, next week).

“One of the methods of manipulation is to inoculate individuals with the bourgeois appetite for personal success.” – Paulo Freire

Top 62 Quotes & Sayings About Control And Manipulation

8 Manipulation Quotes and Sayings ideas | manipulation quotes, manipulation, sayings

Karen

So there is an ongoing social media meme joke about middle-aged women demanding to see the manager, about various complaints which they have in stores, or in restaurants, or in government offices, or in a myriad of other venues. These women have all been given the generic name of “Karen.” I admittedly have laughed at said memes. We all have come across many “Karens” in our lifetime, and it is not at all fun, being at the other end of a Karen’s righteous, ravenous rage. The idea behind the Karen meme seems to be, that all of the disgruntled rage, which Karen has stored up, throughout her lifetime of putting up with various indignities with a plastered smile on her face, comes spewing out of her “completely-over-it-all”, middle-aged self, at the slightest offense. “Karen” has found her power (basically no longer giving a sh$t what anyone thinks). And everyone seems to think that this phenomenon is a big joke.

I had a very annoying customer service experience yesterday. Of course I did. We all know that “annoying” and “customer service”, go together like “salt and pepper”, or “peanut butter and jelly.” I honestly don’t consider myself to be a typical “Karen.” I don’t think that complaining has a lot of upsides, so it usually takes something pretty outrageous to bring my relatively long fuse to an explosion point. But yesterday was a Monday – a cold, windy Monday after a bad night of sleep, and my inner Karen was seeing red, and seething. I think what really brought my vicious Karen side out of the closet, was the seeming assumption, by the various “customer service (ha)” personnel, that by the very fact that I was a middle-aged woman with a complaint, (and an extremely legitimate complaint, I might add), I was already to be dismissed as a hormonal, out-of-control, cartoonish, crazed Karen-meme-in-real-life. It’s as if the “customer service” personnel immediately shut down and said, “Oh, we’ve got another “Karen” on board. Don’t give her anything, keep smirking, and let’s try to get another hilarious “Karen meme” out of this experience.”

At the end of the exhausting, time consuming, blood pressure raising experience, my situation got satisfactorily resolved in a very strange, roundabout, “things that make you go huh?” manner, but that’s for another blog. However, I have decided to have more compassion for the future “Karens” whom I may come across in my daily life. Often, the traits that we don’t particularly like in other people, are just some of our own traits, that we have unconsciously “disowned” in ourselves.

Are you passing on love, or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Monday Fun-Day

I see tips like this, and I wonder, why wasn’t I aware of that idea when I was raising my kids? Living in Florida, we have motorcyclists who weave in and out of traffic, and many of them do not wear helmets. I hope that this tip will be particularly helpful for those of you who still have young children or grandchildren at home to teach, or perhaps pass this information on to teachers. Spread the word and save some lives.

Have a fabulous week, friends!!!

Are you passing on love, or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Soul Sunday

Are you passing on love, or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Good morning, friends. Sundays are devoted to poetry here at Adulting – Second Half. Today, I ask you to take the time to notice the stuff that you don’t typically notice. Notice the unusual color of eyes of the person who waits on you at Walgreens. Notice how perfectly synchronized all of the colors and lengths of hair on your dog’s face, or your cat’s face, come together into perfection and poetry, creating their beautiful expressions of being. When we really notice life, we starting living a beautifully poetic life. Here is my poem for today:

Falling in Love, Again

I love how you still surprise me.

I love that you showed me my favorite peanut butter pie,

even though I could be skinnier.

I love that I was rolling my eyes and watching the clock,

impatient for your movie choice,

And yet, when we watched it, it turned out to be a new favorite of mine.

And you knew that it would be, mate.

I love that you find it vitally important to find new favorites, for me.

It makes me feel vitally important.

I love how you know me so well.

You remind me of everything that I love.

You are my greatest gift.

You make me fall in love with you,

Again and again and again . . . .

Because you make me fall in love with life,

Again and again and again . . . . .

You’re Better Than That

“7.5 billion people in this world And you let the opinion of one stop your good energy? You’re better than that.” – Eric Thomas

Years ago, I had an eBay store. I’ve mentioned before on the blog, that I am an excellent treasure hunter/picker. I say this not to brag. There are a plethora of things which I completely stink at, but I am pretty good at honing in on “diamonds in the rough”, which others tend to easily dismiss. So, my eBay store (Baubles and Bling, it was called) was filled with one-of-a-kind treasures that I would find in garage sales, or flea markets or second hand shops. I had a lot of fun with the whole process. I enjoyed the treasure hunting, and I was thrilled with some of the prices I obtained for things that had been discarded, and were now highly valued by someone else. I felt like I had connected the desired thing, to the person who had been yearning for it. It was like being a match maker of sorts, and it was quite satisfying, most of the time. In particular, I was intensely proud and protective of my 100 percent customer satisfaction rating. I kept the “perfect” rating for several months after starting up my store (maybe even over a year), until one day, I got a disappointed customer. I couldn’t believe it! I did everything that I could to rectify the situation, even giving a full refund, even though I didn’t think that the refund action was particularly fair or justified. Still, I was obsessed with keeping my 100 percent rating. The person refused to change their negative feedback and my approval rating dropped all the way down . . . to 99.9% satisfied. I was utterly sick about this fact. I groaned and moaned for days to anyone who would listen. I would try to avert my eyes from my less than 100 percent perfect customer satisfaction rating. I became incredibly nervous and worried and overly affected about everything that I sent out to customers, living in fear of more negative ratings. What had been a fun hobby of mine, started turning into nerve wracking, gut wrenching experience.

Then one day my exasperated husband said to me, “You have hundreds of satisfied customers. Over ninety-nine percent of your customers, are grateful to you, and they are happy with their purchases. Many of them are repeat customers. Maybe you should focus on what the majority thinks. Not everyone is going to like you, but obviously a whole lot more people like you, than don’t like you. You are giving a whole lot of power to something/someone you don’t have any control over.” (I like to think that I am the wise one in my relationship, but when I retell these stories, it becomes clear to me that I am the one who married a sage.)

When what my husband said to me, finally sunk in, I felt a new sense of freedom. I no longer had the “perfect” rating, and I started to feel immense relief. These days, I sometimes lose a follower to my blog, or sometimes my blog has a low daily count of visitors, and that old sense of shame and dread and a desperate need to please, sets in. But then I remember my husband’s advice and I just keeping doing “my thing.” Deep connection is a unique and precious and intimate quality. I treasure the connection that I have with my readers who “get me”, and who relate to me, and want to read what I have to say. I treasure our authentic connection and that doesn’t have to happen on a mass scale. When I come here to write, I am so happy and excited. I am thrilled to commune with you. Please don’t ever change who you are, and I promise in return, to always give you “the real me.” And you are always welcome to come and to go, as you please, of course.

“Always remember, your focus determines your reality.” – George Lucas

“Don’t lose yourself trying to be everything to everyone.” Tony Gaskins

(****** On an aside, I know that you are probably wondering, because my friends ask me about this a lot. Why did I close my eBay store? There were a lot of reasons. We were making a big family move to a whole other state at the time, so I was paring my responsibilities down, to focus on the transition, for all of us. Also, I am sort of a contrarian. Being a stubborn contrarian is something that I know kind of bugs and annoys the people who love me. I fully understand and accept that even the people who love me, do not love 100 percent everything about me and that’s okay. I doubt that I even have a 99.9 percent approval rating, but as long as I’m at 65-75 percent approval, I consider that good and interesting for anyone I am in a relationship with, going both ways. Anyway, picking and selling stopped being cool and fun for me, when American Pickers and a bunch of other TV shows like it, started making picking a thing for the masses. Ironically, I lose total interest in almost anything that 99.9 percent of people like. Hidden gems are always my target and obsession.)

Are you passing on love, or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Friday’s Arrival

Hi friends and readers!!! Friday is here. Love it!! Here at Adulting – Second Half, Fridays are all about the light stuff, the fun stuff, or just plain stuff. On Fridays, I list three favorite things, or songs, or books, or movies, or food items, and I strongly encourage you to add your favorites, to my Comments section, so we all have a lot of fun things to buy, or to try, or to experience, over the weekend. A lot of our best ideas and inspirations come from outside sources. Creation is meant to come from collaboration! Please also check out my previous Friday posts for more favorites.

How did yesterday’s “luckiest day of the year” work out for you? Ours was amazing. Our middle son got accepted into medical school, which has been his dream, since probably middle school. We are beyond thrilled for him, and completely relieved. I had no idea how grueling the process is, to get into medical school, until he began this journey. Medical professionals, I have even more mad, mad respect for you now, than I ever did before. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Here are my favorites for today:

Match 3D – This is my newest phone game addiction. I am surprisingly good at it. Essentially, the premise of the game is that you are given a big pile of stuff to go through, and you can only make the pile go away, by finding the matches. I find it so satisfying to clean up a big messy pile of stuff, in the matter of a few minutes. (if only this could happen in real life) I am not one to pay for anything on my phone games, but I did break down and I paid a couple of dollars to get rid of the advertisements. It was worth it. Otherwise, you lose your concentration when they interrupt you in the middle of your game, to advertise another game which they think that you would probably get addicted to, as well. I think that phone games are a satisfying, inexpensive, harmless way to keep my 50-year-old mind sharp. They help to keep my mind clear of worries and distractions, and keep my fingers and hands out of the cookie jar, so I don’t snack so mindlessly anymore.

Orchidaceous – This my is my favorite word of the week. It is a real word. It means flashy and showy, like an orchid. I always fall for the orchids blooming in the grocery store, and then I buy them, and I bring them home and then they promptly lose their “orchidaceous-ness” and never bloom again. I had given up on some of my orchids as of late, and I ignored them and I probably didn’t water them in weeks, and surprise, they got me. They started blooming again! They are so orchidaceous, that way!

And finally here is my favorite quote of the week, from a great author, Anne Lamott. I washed every stitch of our bedding yesterday and this quote says it all:

“When you crawl between your clean sheets, after a hard day, you are saved. You feel like you are the best sandwich ever.”

Bonus: Although I wouldn’t put either of these movies in “my favorites” column, they are certainly good, worthy of your time, interesting films to watch this weekend. News of the World and The White Tiger are these films. I’ll leave it up to you to research them, to decide whether they should be part of your weekend repertoire of things to do.

Have a great weekend, my lovely, cherished friends and readers!!!

Are you passing on love, or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

The Day of Miracles

In astrological circles, today is the luckiest day of the year. Today, the sun is in a conjunction with Jupiter, the biggest, boldest, badass luckiest planet in our solar system. Ironically, this conjunction did not happen in 2020. The last time this conjunction occurred was December 27, 2019. It is believed that today is a wonderful day to manifest more of what you want in your own life.

In my experience, the best way to manifest more amazing, incredible miracles in your own life, is to swell with happiness and gratefulness, while counting your countless blessings, already surrounding you. Here are a few beautiful miracles that most of us probably share: family, friends, flowers, fruit, fragrance, fits of laughter, fabulous food, fancy cupcakes, funny fun stuff, fondue (this is just the “f”s) . . . . It is not my onus to make your Blessings list, but it is yours. It is also my experience that when I start listing and thinking about all of the amazing blessings that have occurred, and are occurring, in my own life, I get so swelled with happiness and peace and awe and love and thankfulness, that I often forget that my initial purpose for writing my blessings list, was to ask for even more miracles. Don’t think that asking for more blessings in life is selfish (which often happens when you see how much you have already been abundantly blessed with) The beauty of it all, is that we live in an ever expanding Universe that loves to create blessings. Our Universe loves creation. Our Universe is Creation. There is an abundance of everything for everybody, if we let it happen in the purest, most grateful expectancy of Love for all of us.

Are you passing on love, or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

“An abundance mentality springs from internal security, not from external rankings, comparisons, opinions, possessions, or associations.”- Stephen Covey

“Abundance is about being rich, with or without money.”- Suze Orman

“If you look at what you have in your life, you’ll always have more. If you look at what you don’t have in life, you’ll never have enough.”- Oprah Winfrey

“True abundance is feeling worthy enough to believe beyond what you can see. Expect miracles and they will manifest.”- Sarah Prout

“When you are grateful, fear disappears and abundance appears.”- Tony Robbins

On Repeat

Yesterday, I wrote about being a gracious compliment receiver. I knew that I had written about this topic before, but I certainly don’t expect all of you to remember my past posts. Well, you caught me. I had to laugh this morning, when I looked at my stats and I saw that my previous post on accepting compliments, from at least two years ago, was trending. I am guessing that some of you were thinking, didn’t she write about this before?? Here is the older post. I do love the meme.

Just Say Thank You

I am one who repeats myself often. My kids call me on this fact, all of the time. When I was young and older people did this, I just assumed that they were forgetful. However, now that I am an older person, I realize that a lot of my repeating of things, is just a reminder to myself, as to what to keep imprinted on my heart. My repeating is part of the beating of my heart. My “repeating” is keeping my life beating to the important stuff – the lessons, the stories, the ideas, the verses, the experiences which have come together to form the current version of “me”. My repeating of what is meaningful to me, is just a way to keep that “life gift”, as a relevant part of myself.

I am waiting for the Progressive Insurance’s “You Are Turning Into Your Parents” advertisement campaign, to do a segment on all of the stuff that we parents say, again and again and again. They have already burned me with my love for throw pillows, and cutesy signs, and being way too obvious when looking at people with aqua blue hair. I am sure that repeating the “same old stories” will be part of the next Progressive TV commercials. And I honestly look forward to any advertisement from this “turning into your parents” series. I like to laugh, and I don’t have any problem with laughing at myself. I give myself a lot of material to laugh about.

Are you passing on love, or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Receive

I read a story in Real Simple magazine last night that made me think. It was written by Hoda Kotb. She talks about having a young twenty-something page at NBC, working for her, whom Hoda was really impressed with. One day, Hoda complimented the page about her work ethic and her calm nature. She said that the page smiled and replied, “I received that.”

“I received that.” Koda complimented the page, once again, for her serious response. They talked about the fact that compliments are such a gift. Koda thinks that if you respond to a compliment with “I received that,” you are saying, “What you’ve said to me is inside of me now. I’m not deflecting it, I’m receiving it. I accept your kind gift.”

I wonder if I would feel weird saying “I received that,” to someone who complimented me. Probably. But, I could think it, after I smiled and warmly said, “Thank you.” I could decide to receive the compliment, instead of thinking, “oh they’re just trying to butter me up,” or “How could they possibly see that attribute in me? They are totally mistaken.”

Genuine compliments are rare, unfortunately. For some strange reason, it takes guts to tell someone what you think is particularly interesting or special or unique or positive about their persona. When someone has mustered up the courage to give us a genuine compliment and we deflect it, it is almost like throwing a sweet, thoughtful gift, down to the ground, right in front of their faces. Ouch.

Readers, I think that you are incredibly kind, thoughtful, insightful, loyal people who have made a major difference in my life for almost three years, now. I am incredibly grateful for you. Your gift of attention has meant the world to me. I consider you to be a major, meaningful gift in my life.

Please receive my compliment and my thankfulness.

Are you passing on love, or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Bonus Post/Reminder

Friends, I added a funny little addendum to my blog post today. It struck me that my subscribers won’t get it. While I appreciate all of you, who are kind enough to subscribe to my blog, I think that you should be aware of my editing process. I am a big picture kind of a gal. I need my nitty-gritty, detail oriented editor (husband) to help me find mistakes, which usually happens later in the morning/early afternoon. I explained my writing process best here (I think it bears repeating):

Housekeeping