Shining Thru

What are we teaching the younger generation when you can see a 15 year old throw a full out temper tantrum with stopping feet and slamming of doors?  What have we done to make that seem like it is ok past the age of 2.  We should be breaking our kids of that habit when they are 2 not when they are 20 and get fired from numerous jobs and end up on welfare because they can’t deal with things that happen in their work place, or when they don’t agree with their boss.  What are we teaching younger kids for them to think that if they stomp around, yell, or be rude and think that it will help them in any sort of way.  A teenager is way too old to be acting childish and not communicating like a young adult.  And yet it seems like more and more young adults are not maturing like they once did.  It seems like they are interested in things that are way beyond what they are ready for and try to be too much of an adult while still acting childish in their behaviors.  I know that the teenage years are hard for most people, but there comes a point when we need to realize that as a society we are failing to raise these young people in a way that will make them responsible and mature adults.  It’s the “gimme” generation.  Too many of our young people think that they are entitled to things that they have not earned and if they are not given what they want then they have the right to complain, yell, stomp, and be rude as if they had something to be offended over.  If parents don’t begin to raise their kids the way they need to as a parent instead of as a friend, they these problems will continue to grow.

Could you kill the person that you love to save them from something worse?  Could you sacrifice breaking your own heart and rip it out as you declare your love for that person and kill them?  Watching The X-Men:  The Last Stand movie got me thinking about that.  It must be one of the hardest things anyone would ever have to do….right up there will having to decide weather to have an abortion or not if you know your child would have a horrible disease that WILL kill them before they are five and will only make them suffer until them….What do you do?  Do you give them the gift of life along with suffering while they are briefly on this earth, or do you spare them all of that and end it before it begins?  How can you ask someone to make that decision?

I think we are setting up the younger generation for failure.  I think that we are pushing for all of the wrong things, instead of trying to encourage things like hard work, and good social skills, showing respect, etc…we are trying to tell them to simply be positive…well being positive is great, but not always possible.  What about the child who doesn’t have anything to be positive about, doesn’t have a good family or a good  home life, maybe they are even scared to go home at night, how can you tell that child that they are not being successful in school because they are not positive enough?

I was reading a very interesting article the other day about psychology facts that we have been forced to believe or made to think were true simply because someone said it…one of these myths is about about self confidence.  The article made a great point about how we are teaching kids that they need to work for the wrong things, they need to be self confident, without giving them the tools to do so.  We aren’t teaching them good social skills or how to be successful in school, we are teaching them to be cocky, arrogant, and ignorant at best.  The author simply pointed out that we are connecting the fact that a child has self esteem to the fact that they are successful, when really we should be looking at the fact that the success is making the child self confident.  I would have to fully agree with this point.  What good does it do to tell a child to believe in themselves if we never teach them how to accomplish those goals we tell them to believe in?  It wont do any good for anyone. 

I do believe that a sense of self worth comes from many different aspects of a person’s life.  And having confidence can make things a bit easier for you, at least I think so, but I don’t believe that by simply believing you are the best, you will be…By simply believing that you will land a 3 figure job, you will….By only believing that you will be famous, you will….I think that we are only hurting our younger generation by feeding them these lies.  I think that we should be telling them that life is a struggle and if you want something that’s great, but you’re more likely than not going to have to work hard for it. 

Maybe we should stop trying to make everyone feel so good and simply be honest with them.  Lies aren’t going to help our children when they get out into the real world and experience it without warning.

“Plastic, they’ve learned…”  A quote from X-Men:  The last stand. 

I thought the quote was pretty clever when I watched the movie for the first time today.  It got me thinking if we ever really learn that quickly, or if it takes time and time again of failure before someone figures out that the same thing is going to happen every time. 

Things seem so much clearer in the movies…in reality you watch people make the same painstakingly stupid mistakes, but there’s nothing you can do to convince them that they are being stupid.  So many people want to stick with what they have planned, even when the plan is obviously not working.  They could be going down in flames and still say, don’t do anything, stick to the flight plan….Have we really failed in our society to the point that people can not make on the spot decisions to make things better?  To change direction because things aren’t going as planned?  Why is it so hard for people to see something that is not working and logically say, we need a new plan…instead they generally say let’s try it one more time the same way…..

What is so wrong with change?  Why can’t we learn from our mistakes?  I’m not sure when mistakes became so bad that we can’t own up to them, but I think it would be much more useful for us to embrace our mistakes as learning experiences. 

But people will keep making the same mistakes until we create a society that can think on their feet, is more innovative, and doesn’t keep falling in the same traps, letting history repeat itself, time and time again.

What is so important it is worth dying for?  Is there any cause that is worth standing up for to the point that you are willing to put your life on the line?  On the other hand, how much of your own beliefs and way of life are you willing to put aside for any reason?  Some people die within themselves, maybe because they want to blend in, maybe they don’t want to cause problems or tension, maybe they want to get ahead in a job or career…whatever the reason, where do you draw the line?

Watching a movie called Swing Kidstoday got me wondering if I would be able to stand up for what I believe in when everyone around me is sending the opposite message.  The movie is about a group of teenage boys who live in Germany during WWII.  These boys didn’t want to join the Hitler Youth, but two of them are forced into it; exposed to propaganda every day and expected to act a certain way.  The boys thought it would end up being the perfect cover:  “Hitler Youth by day and Swing Kid by night”.  Unfortunately, the boys get caught up, one more than the other.  One of the boys figures out that it really is all propaganda and that he could never be a Nazi and live with himself.  It takes his friend almost killing him and seeing him taken away to a work camp to come around and remember what he believes in.

Could I stand up for what I truly believe in?  What if doing so put my family and friends in danger?  I would hope I would never compromise myself because of a need to fit in with a popular crowd or teaching.  On the other hand, I can’t imagine ever putting my loved ones in harms way because of a personal cause…so where is the line?  How do we know when is the time to fight and when is the time to lay low?

Do you ever feel like you ruin everything…that you are undeserving….that you’re tired of feeling guilty and sorry about everything that happens? 

Sometimes situations present themselves as if they could have been totally different IF only….

If only I hadn’t said that and ruined the mood

If only I hadn’t done that and scared them away

If only I had gotten there five minutes earlier

If only….

If we counted up the if only’s of the world, I think we would be wasting our time, just like we are when we can’t stop thinking about the IF ONLY’s…..It didn’t happen that way, you didn’t do what you think you should have done with hindsight, you didn’t get there at a different time, it happened the way it happened….why is it so hard for us as humans to accept the reality that we have created?  It seems like so much of the population spends their time on regrets instead of moving forward, learning from it and moving on….I wonder who much we could get done if instead of think about the what ifs and regrets of the world, we spent that time being productive and moving forward into the future…I realize that statement is slightly contradictory, but I think that it illustrates the point quite nicely. 

If only we spent less time thinking about and wishing for the IF ONLY’s…..

I hate it when you seem to care more about someone’s well being than they do.  When you end up stressed out because another person is failing at something or even at life…not really living…just existing, and yet they only whine, complain, try to get by on their looks or charm or money, and you’re the one trying to help them sort it out, while they sit back and do nothing.  You can only take this for so long, before you get tempted to throw your hands up and be done with the situation and the person….but they you are called a bad friend, or told that you are the reason that they are failing.

I wish people would take responsibility for their own choices, actions, or lack there of….If you do nothing to help yourself, wishes and prayers can only get you so far.  I heard once, “God can give you the canoe, but sometimes you need to paddle yourself, the current will only take you so far.  I think that’s very true in life, you can’t keep hoping for a new job, smaller pant size, a relationship, and continue to whine when you don’t get it if you’re not actively trying to get these things.  I wish we could just make a wish on a star and POOF it’s there in the morning…last I tried, it doesn’t work.  A wish and a prayer will get you nothing but empty dreams.

In order for our society to succeed, we need to teach the younger generation the qualities of respect and responsibility that we have somewhere lost along the way.  If we do not instill a work ethic and an idea of being responsible for yourself, our society is going to keep falling further and further into debt.  With a generation that is growing up in a world without consequences and rules, we will really be hurting when they are the ones in control and have no way of knowing how to establish order to their own lives much less, companies, communities, or government; we will be living in chaos. 

There are so many things in life that cannot be undone once they are done.  Just as there are so many things that cannot be done once the choice is made not to do them.  We make choices every day and we don’t know what the consequences will be, for better or for worse, we can only guess at how things will turn out…many people do not consider the consequences of their actions at all.

The words that we speak can never be brought back to stay only in our mind.  Once you say it, it is out in the world, which prevents a lot of people from ever confronting issues, but those who do chance it sometimes pay the price by ruining priceless relationships.  But if you don’t risk it you’re stuck with the stress and pain of wondering what would have happened.  It’s hard to make some choices in life:  what to say, how to say it, when to say it, if you should say it……What to do, who to do it with…..where to live, who to live with……

There are so many decisions we are expected to make and they are hard because there is absolutely no way to know the outcome of the decisions.  Some choices make us cry, even when we know we are doing the right thing, other choices we may regret for the rest of our lives….it’s hard to say if anyone’s life ever turns out right.  There are so many choices that affect everyone around you, not just you, but every person you come in contact with, are related to, even the people you choose to ignore affects that person, you, anyone you are connected to, and anyone they are connected to.  It’s a never ending chain of events that goes from one person to the next and we never know if it will come back around to us, or keep circling us. 

Choices….