Happiness

Here's a New York Times headline from Nov. 16, 2010:

When the Mind Wanders, Happiness Also Strays

The article goes on to say, basically, that people who focus on the task at hand are more likely to be happy. That when the mind strays, unhappiness can follow. Even people who think about pleasant activities when their minds wander are vulnerable to, if not unhappiness, then being less happy than those whose minds weren't wandering at all.
Furthermore, even enjoyable activities don't necessarily stop the mind from wandering, and the evidence indicates that a wandering mind causes unhappiness, as opposed to unhappiness causing a wandering mind.
When the researchers contacted people to determine their states of mind, people engaged in sex were happy, at least until the phone rang. Personal grooming, commuting and working ranked low on the list of happiness-producing activities. I can see that. I hate brushing my fucking teeth. I also commute too much, which can really suck.
But back to the matter at hand. The article contains a quote: “Life is not long,” Samuel Johnson said, “and too much of it must not pass in idle deliberation how it shall be spent.” It contains a few other quotations, similar in nature. Reminds me of John Lennon's observation that life is what happens when you're busy making other plans.
I've conversed with therapists on the mind-wandering subject and self-talk. They both possess destructive capabilities. Positive self-talk requires so much effort after conditioning has instilled in one a proclivity to skew toward the negative. Like John Hiatt says, "It takes every drop of energy just to run my brain." So, then, the challenge lies in preventing the mind from wandering. I'm relatively ignorant when it comes to meditation, but it seems as if that's one of the objectives, to not think about anything. How do we do it, stop the mind from wandering? The more you think about keeping the mind from wandering, the more it wanders. The more it wanders, the more unhappy you potentially become. I don't know if people can learn to keep their minds from wandering. I think you can learn to cope more effectively when your mind does wander, but I have a natural predisposition to mind wandering. If I didn't, I guess I couldn't write any of this shit. I've long since resigned to being fucked when it comes to that.

Condolences

I just finished this book, in which a New York Times reporter writes about his experiences in Iraq and Afghanistan. The book provided more insight than the many news articles I've read, and, near the end, got me to thinking about someone with whom I used to be friendly.
The writer, Dexter Filkins, gives the reader a look at some of the people exposed to, and behind, the mayhem. So maybe when we see that two more soldiers have died in Afghanistan or Iraq, we can move beyond the desensitization and consider that they were someone's son, brother, father, husband. They had interests. They had feelings. They lived. They're dead.
For what? Afghanistan, ok. The people ultimately behind 9/11 took sanctuary there. But Iraq? The weapons of mass destruction never materialized. I guess you do what you have to, but when I've been irresponsible, people haven't died as a result. Regardless of what I think about the war, people have died. People with names. People in the book.
Which brings me back to the person with whom I used to be friendly. She had a son who joined the Army and went to Iraq. He came home from Iraq and went back. Then he came home and shot himself. And she seems to be on a mission to ensure that other service members get the help they need before they kill themselves. She bought my son a nice book for his birth, though she always wished girls upon me. When my second son arrived, I sent her an announcement, gloating a bit, that I had foiled her by having another boy.
I suppose as a mother you have to channel your grief somehow, lest you fall into a despair similar to that which claimed your son. Maybe she can get a small measure of consolation by effecting something positive from this personal tragedy. You carry this child and change his diapers and nourish and love and endure the hurt and the angst. Then he shoots himself, tormented by a bus full of burning Iraqis, mostly women and children.
I can't say I though about her much until I read "The Forever War." Life intervenes, after all, and each of us contends with idiosyncratic demons. I sent a card but recently wondered whether I expressed my sympathy adequately. I don't think so, but I remain skeptical that an adequate expression exists.

Growing Pains

Kirk Cameron appeared on my television a few days ago, not in a "Growing Pains" rerun, but as someone who knows what God wants me to do. So I got to thinking: What are Kirk's credentials for knowing what God wants or that God even exists?
Did his acting experience inform his religious perspective? Did Alan Thicke, who, after all, played a psychologist, help lead Kirk down this highway of discovery? Was it Tracey Gold, and her experience with anorexia, or did that kid who played Ben have a role? Maybe it was the burgeoning Leonardo DiCaprio who pushed Kirk down the highway of enlightenment.
Perhaps the more important question concerns why God chose Kirk, as opposed to, say, any one of his cast mates. His website, which, incidentally, plays the "Growing Pains" theme song, says Kirk was an atheist but then became a follower of Christ. The site also says he often receives invitations to share his story of faith at churches and schools, and a link invites you to hear that story. Clicking that link leads one to a site called wayofthemaster.com, where you can listen to and/or purchase ostensibly inspirational messages.
Now, Kirk and his wife are involved with a camp that provides a respite for terminally ill children and their families, a laudable endeavor. I don't know if they try to proselytize at Camp Firefly, but I did read an excerpt from Kirk's autobiography in which he engages the parent of one of the children in a conversation that sounds religiously judgmental.
I don't know Kirk Cameron. He may be a great guy. But he's on TV coming into my house telling me he knows what God wants me to do. And I know I can change the channel, but that's not the point. The point is that I don't believe that he knows. He, and those of his ilk, think they know. And were I to discuss it with him or any of the others face to face, they likely would say that I just haven't made the discovery yet. Again, faith isn't rational, so trying to counter a faith-based argument remains difficult, if not impossible.
Sometimes I have this fear that they're right and I have it all wrong. That I'm fucked in this life for my skepticism and failure to take comfort in religion and I'll be fucked in the next life because God will be there saying, "You should have believed, you stupid shit. I had all these people down there spreading the word and still you were skeptical. I gave you Kirk Cameron, dumb-ass, and still you failed to heed the call." And then he will banish me to Hell or whatever because God doesn't tolerate intellectual curiosity, let alone dissent. And in Hell I'll have to watch "Growing Pains" reruns for all eternity.
Kirk is telegenic, but does God really need to wrap his message in that kind of package? Why couldn't he have given the late Gary Coleman a chance? "What you talkin' 'bout, sinner?" Or Urkel? Or that girl who played Natalie on "Facts of Life"? I suppose Kirk appeals more to a certain demographic than your average religious zealot, so maybe a method does lie behind this madness. Maybe someday the joke will be on me, and all manner of religious faithful will revel in turning me away from that sought-after spot in the afterlife. No matter if I'm a good person.