I’m Sorry for Your Loss

Posted on April 18, 2022 by Professor Twist

So, my mother passed away recently. When customers became aware of her death, they would say to me, “Oh, I didn’t know. I’m so sorry for your loss.” To which I would reply, “Thank you.” The condolences went on for a while, and I never gave much thought to the previously-mentioned statement. Then, one Thursday as I was lifting weights, for whatever reason, I happened to remember that the day before a customer named Joe said to me, “I am sorry for your loss.” It was at that moment that I began contemplating this commonly-used condolence, and I found that the condolence really doesn’t make any sense.

The I’m-sorry-for-your-loss condolence consists of two parts: and apology and an acknowledgement of an attachment. Let’s begin with the apology.

I’ve already written a detailed post about what an apology actually is. To summarize, an apology is a statement that an offender is returning to the offended the existential value that he or she took from said offended. The statement assumes (and correctly so) that both the offender and offended subscribe to the ego-based, pecking-order game of cat and mouse in which individuals actually have the ability to take existential value (self-worth) from another person and add it to their own.

Then there is an acknowledgement of an attachment. An attachment is a person, place, object, organization, institution, or concept that a person’s ego uses as a means of establishing who he or she is. It is a tool the ego uses to help establish a person’s identity. For example, one might say, “I am a Kentucky Wildcats football fan.” The University of Kentucky and its football team are, therefore, tools the person’s ego uses to establish and maintain a sense of identity. When the Wildcats win a football game, the person is a happy camper; when they lose, well…not so much. The same is true with people. We use other people to help define who we are. When someone our ego uses as an attachment dies, we feel a sense of “loss” because the ego has to adapt, re-define, and re-establish a sense of self.

This condolence is, therefore, actually saying the following: “I return to you the existential value I stole from you when the person your ego used as an attachment to help establish your sense of identity was taken away from you.”

The ridiculousness of the statement should be self-evident. When we tell people we are sorry for their loss, we are apologizing-returning self-worth-to someone who has lost a human being they used as an attachment. The problem is twofold: (1) We never actually stole any self-worth or existential value from the person who lost their attachment, and (2) the person shouldn’t have been using another human being to define his or herself in the first place.

When examined closely, this condolence really is a silly thing to say.

Tagged with: attachment, condolence, death, ego, loss
Posted in Human Nature, Miscellaneous

Anatomy of an Apology

Posted on February 21, 2022 by Professor Twist

It seems that some famous person is always having to apologize for something they said, didn’t say but should have (according to the left), something they did, or something they didn’t do but should have (again, according to the left). It seems that within the last ten years or so there are more and more calls for apologies.

Have you ever stopped and considered what exactly an apology is? This is a topic I started thinking about a while back, and the answer is interesting to say the least.

I must first state that when it comes to personality theory, I am a Freudian. That is, I believe that the vast majority of us are controlled by our id and an under-disciplined ego which are in cahoots to defend and advance our place in the pecking order by whatever means necessary. They work together so that we can have the highest score possible in the great pissing contest.

Before getting to the apology part of this post, an examination of what it means to be offended, insulted, or degraded is in order. All three of these words mean the same thing: I or the group to which I belong (which by extension means me) were made to feel as if my/our place in the pecking order was diminished because of something someone said, didn’t say, did, or didn’t do; and I/we have lost points in the pissing contest.

An apology, on the other hand, is an attempted undoing of the subjective personal/group pecking order diminishment, however it was that the offender diminished a particular person or group. In other words, it is as if the offender is saying to the offended, “I now realize that I lowered your sense of place in the pecking order and caused you to lose pissing contest points by my words or actions. I do hereby return that which I took from you and restore both your place in the pecking order and the pissing contest points I stole from you. I regret my words and actions and now realize I should have achieved my pecking order position and pissing contest points honestly like we are supposed to.”

When looked at objectively like this, the whole offense/apology dynamic seems a bit comical.

Tagged with: apology, sorry
Posted in Human Nature, Miscellaneous, Society

Coddled Children, Separation Anxiety, and Adulthood

Posted on February 20, 2022 by Professor Twist

Why Low IQ, Low Self-Esteem People Shouldn’t Reproduce

I have been a nervous, socially awkward, lacking-in-confidence, cowardly person all of my life. I am now in my mid-fifties; and though I can say that I have made some progress in overcoming my psychological hangups, I still have work to do; and, unfortunately, the description of my personality as detailed in the first sentence of this paragraph is still, to some degree, a part of my programming and who I am.

In the middle of 2021 I started contemplating why it is that my personality is such a mess. I have now come to understand the dynamic of my early childhood development and how it has affected me all my life; and that is what I wish to discuss here.

When people coddle, over comfort, over protect, baby talk, and fawn over babies, toddlers, and small children, they intimate to them the idea that the world is a great place where everyone cares about them, thinks they’re amazing, and are supposed to treat them as such – a belief which is not real. When these deceived children have to actually see the world as it really is (indifferent to them at best), they become confused and go into a state of shock. Having to face the fact that the world does not care for them as they were tacitly taught it should, they have trouble coping with this newly-discovered reality and develop psychological issues.

I was born to a mother who, even to this day, believes in coddling babies, toddlers, and small children. She has always talked to little people in a somewhat high-pitched, gentle, delicate, goofy manner – in other words, baby talk. She treats her great grandson Elliot with kid gloves and engages him with that stupid baby talk nonsense when my brother brings him to visit her. Stated differently, she engages in small child worship and fawns over them.

This is exactly what happened to me. My mother convinced me that the way she treated me was how everyone was supposed to treat me. That is, people were supposed to think I was awesome, be gentle, be loving, and fawn over me.

That false view of reality worked for me for the first five years of my life, and then something major happened: I began the public school era of my life. I then had to face a newly-discovered, previously-never-considered, strange reality which was that my first grade public school peers and teacher didn’t particularly give a damn about me; and it was downhill from there.

The way I reacted to this foreign, new world in which I was not anything special and was not considered worthy of others’ fawning was to panic. I absolutely did not know how relate to this new state of affairs, so I did what people often do in such circumstances; and that was to become scared and nervous.

This nervous, anxious state of being which is caused by babying, coddling parents we now know as separation anxiety. Unfortunately, the staff at the elementary school I attended and my first grade teacher in particular had apparently never heard of separation anxiety; and their method of dealing with nervous, scared children was to yell at them and spank them which only served to make matters worse for me.

Being scared and nervous, crying, and wetting my pants – these behaviors were common for me. The reaction of my teacher was anger as she apparently saw my behavior as somehow threatening to her. The reaction of my peers was ridicule and laughter as they saw a vulnerable target which could be used as a means of enhancing their own levels of existential value.

This dynamic being my reality, I became less self-confident and developed an inferiority complex. I was unable to develop and hone social interaction skills with my peers. As it was obvious that I was awkward, unsure of myself, and scared, my public school peers came to think of me as backward, nerdy, and stupid. I was made fun of and picked on. When my name came up in conversations, there was probably laughter involved. I did poorly in school and made bad grades. In a desperate attempt to gain some measure of worth, I behaved in goofy, laughable ways which was the result of not having any sense of proper social skills and accomplished nothing more than to reinforce my peers’ belief that I was a joke.

Both this mindset and the behaviors it fostered accompanied me throughout all of my public school years and are still with me to this day to some degree. I am still uncomfortable in small group settings and with certain individuals in certain circumstances. Even now, people pick up on my “vibe” and treat me as though I am odd. I can’t really blame them: They are only reacting to what they see. I have no sense of assertiveness and panic if involved in some sort of altercation with others.

Having gained an understanding of the circumstances that led to my lifelong psychological issues, I found myself pondering another question: Why would my mother engage in this coddling, fawning, babying behavior toward me in the first place? Well, the answer is a fairly simple one: She herself, for reasons I am unaware of, has suffered all of her life from a sense of inferiority and self-doubt; and her treatment of babies, toddlers, and small children has been an attempt to secure love and acceptance from them – love and acceptance she feels she has been unable to get from others. In other words, her overenthusiastic displays of affection for little people are a bribe. Her abnormal treatment of small children is her way of saying to them, “I’ll show you love and acceptance, if you’ll love and accept me.” Back in the summer of 2021, she and I were sitting on the deck behind my house (my mother lives with me now, as she is elderly and broke down); and she said something really telling. In regard to her two-year-old great grandson, she said, “I wish that baby was over here to love on me.” That statement speaks volumes.

I could have done so much better for myself had I not been hindered by these psychological hangups. I am not a dumb person; I have an above-average IQ. I don’t really know what to do about all of this. I have considered seeing a counselor; but I’m not exactly sure what I expect a counselor to do about me and my issues. Perhaps just getting an outside, objective opinion about all this would be helpful. I don’t know.

I guess the point of this post is two-fold: (1) Perhaps it is a form of self-therapy, and (2) To state that low IQ, low self-esteem people have no business reproducing. Such people only make a mess of things for their children.

Tagged with: early childhood developent, inferiority complex, separation anxiety
Posted in Human Nature, Miscellaneous, Society

Why I Don’t Recommend Getting Involved With a Widow

Posted on January 27, 2019 by Professor Twist

This is my second post about the subject of being involved with a widow. The first post was entitled “Why Some People Prefer Not to Get Involved With Widows and Widowers.” It went online in December of 2013, was rather lengthy, a bit overkill, and perhaps a bit offensive to those who may have lost a spouse. So, I decided trash that entry and write another post concerning this subject, one that is more to the point and not so combative sounding. Here goes…

I have some personal experience when it comes to being involved with a widow, as I was actually in a relationship with one. I have also known people who lost a spouse and then got involved with a new person after some time had passed and people who got involved “romantically” with a widow or widower. Sometimes the relationships worked out fine; other times they did not. So it’s not like I totally don’t have a clue as to what I’m talking about. I say all this as a qualifier because it is inevitable that when a widow or widower finds this post on Google and reads it, he or she is going to say something like, “Who does this guy think he is talking like this. He’s never lost a wife.”

When a man is involved with a widow, he is involved with a woman who was forced to separate from her husband against her will. This is totally different from a divorce where the two parties agreed to go their separate ways. This means that her deceased husband will always be her true husband and that she will always love him and will always miss him. Missing him means that she will always wish that her deceased husband was still alive so that she can be with him again.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with any of this. Whatever a widow feels about her deceased husband is her business and her business alone. No one has any right criticizing her over what she thinks and feels about her loss.

The above description of a widow’s state of mind being the case, if a man does get involved with a widow, he is not the man she really wants to be with. He is the fella she settled for because she is unable to be with the man she truly loves. He is the second-place consolation prize. If there was some way she could have him back, she would. I mean if God Almighty appeared out of heaven, snapped His fingers, and there was her deceased husband, the new guy would be the one getting the “Dear John” speech, not the resurrected husband. I realize this may be an over-the-top, far-fetched scenario; but it is, nevertheless, absolutely true. Missing him means she desperately wants him back, and that’s not going to change just because a new romantic interest came along.

If you’ve found a woman who has lost a husband, like being with her, want to marry her, don’t mind being the guy she settled for, don’t mind her crying over some other man, and don’t mind your wife calling another man’s family her “in-laws”, hey that’s great. To each his own as they say. Go for it.

Personally, I would rather live by myself and die alone than be with a woman who wishes that a man she used to be with was still around so she could be with him; and that is exactly what you get when you are involved with a woman who has lost her husband. The constant disrespect of knowing the woman I’m with wishes she was with someone else would be a situation I simply would not be willing to tolerate.

Anyway, that’s why I don’t recommend getting involved with a widow to any man.

Tagged with: dating a widow, dating a widower, deceased spouse, widow, widower
Posted in Human Nature, Society

Basic Meditation

Posted on December 31, 2018 by Professor Twist

What is Meditation?

Meditation is the process of focusing your attention on something, becoming distracted with thoughts, realizing that you have become distracted, and then returning your attention to that which you were focusing on. This cycle of focus, distraction, realization, and refocus is meditation.

Meditation is not clearing your mind. Contrary to common belief, it is not even possible to clear your mind, that is to get your brain to stop thinking.

Focusing on What?

The three most common “somethings” that meditators focus on are:

The Breath. Meditators pay attention to the movement of the lungs or diaphragm as air enters and exits their body or the sensation felt in the nostrils with each breath.
A Mantra. Mantras are thought or spoken phrases repeated over and over. A mantra can be whatever you want. Some meditators use foreign Sanskrit words which are said to have a deep meaning, but this is not necessary. Your mantra can be something as simple and meaningless as, “I like peanut butter.”
The Flame of a Candle. Focusing on a candle flame is said to help the mediator develop his or her attention better than other objects of concentration. If you wish to use a candle flame as your object of concentration, put the candle at a height that will allow you to look straight at it without tilting your head and sit about two feet away from it. Stare at the flame for about three minutes then close your eyes and focus on the afterimage. When the afterimage disappears, open your eyes and resume staring at the candle. Repeat.

Components of the Typical Meditation Session

Positioning your body. There are four standard ways that people position themselves when they meditate. Some people lay flat on their back on a yoga mat or some other soft surface with their hands to their side; some sit on a chair; others use a special meditation bench or pillow; and some folks sit in the cross-legged, Lotus position. Position yourself in whatever way is comfortable for you.
Pre-Meditation Relaxation. Before jumping into the actual process of meditation, take a minute to simply relax and let go of any pervasive, obsessive thought patterns. In other words, prepare yourself for the session.
Commencement and Duration. As a beginning meditator, you should probably meditate for ten minutes. As you get used to the process, work your way up to fifteen minutes, and then maybe twenty minutes. The average session duration for an experienced meditator is twenty minutes. It is advised to use a timer so that you don’t have to stop and look at a clock to monitor your remaining time. There are meditation timer apps such as Insight Timer, available for iPhone and Android, that can be set to issue a bell alert at preset intervals of your choosing during your session for the purpose of reminding you that you are supposed to be refocusing your attention on your object of meditation. And, of course, these apps also let you know when your session has ended.
Ending the session. When your meditation session has ended, take a minute to simply relax and be present. Don’t immediately get up and resume your to-do list for the day.

Why Meditate?

The purpose of meditation is to develop mindfulness, specifically a mindful awareness of our thoughts and impulses. Mood, speech, and behavior are preceded by thought and impulse, which influence our mental health, personality, and how we interact with others. When we are able to mindfully and objectively observe our thoughts and impulses, we can better judge them to be either constructive or destructive to our own well-being and that of others. If we deem them destructive, we can then opt to not act on them. Simply put, mindfulness developed through meditation is about self-analysis and introspection for the purpose of becoming a better person.

Meditation also has a calming effect on the brain which creates a sense of peace.

Miscellaneous Observations About Meditation

The brain is a thinking machine. Thinking is exactly what it is supposed to do. So don’t be surprised to discover that your brain frequently gives in to the urge to stop focusing and resume thinking because the brain does not like to meditate. It would much rather engage in thought.

As a beginning meditator, you may find that as much as five minutes have elapsed before you realize that you are supposed to be focusing on your “something” of choice. This is normal. Don’t become discouraged or frustrated with yourself. It takes time to develop the ability to maintain focus on an object of concentration. Even those who have meditated for years still lose focus and have to refocus. As stated earlier, losing concentration is part of the meditation process. So just hang in there and keep at it.

Drinking a cup of regular coffee thirty minutes before meditating will help keep you from falling asleep during meditation.

Tagged with: Meditation, Mindfulness Meditation
Posted in Miscellaneous