Life

Are We Starving?

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So, I don’t really think I’ve brought up the controversy if homosexuality yet.

I am going to refrain from giving my opinion on it at the moment. My reason is that after hearing something related to the issue on one of the YouTube channels I watch, my mind got going in a different direction than just the right-wrong question.

As important as that is, there is a forgotten man, so to speak, when the issue is discussed.

The mindset of accepting the gay or lesbian lifestyle has formed a cage around people who don’t accept it. I don’t mean that they get called haters, I mean the cage no one talks about. The issue is simply a kind of stigma that is growing among people against showing any kind of affection to your friends of the same sex, without it being read as sexual.

I don’t know about you, but I am noticing an increasing emotional starvation among the people of our culture. It seems to center around the fact that no one shows any affection for us.

This is the thing, a pat on the shoulder, a kiss on the cheek, holding hands; those all used to be something friends could do. Not guy friends generally, but girls could. Men used to greet each other with a hand shake or a slap on the back. Some still do. In our generation, guys have (wisely) taken to inventing their own hugs and handshakes that are clearly defined as being strictly bro-things. Girls actually could take a cue from that idea.

It may seem weird that I am bringing it up, but it’s high time someone did. Human beings need physical touch. They need to hear words of affection. And they need to hear it from everyone, everyone they are close to. No matter what age, gender, or relation. And we are meant to exchange embraces with all the people we care about. I know plenty of people wouldn’t argue with me on this, and would even think it was obvious, but people my age and younger are starting to wonder.

If I am completely blunt, they are starting to wonder if the fact that they like getting hugged by people of the same sex, does that make them homosexual? They are wondering if they are gay because they like even the most innocent of touches. Even the word touch has some very ugly connotations attached to it now, you probably thought of some of them when I used it, or you didn’t. Good for you.

No one is telling kids that it is normal to want physical contact with people. It is just a way of feeling that they see you, if that makes sense. It is easy to feel ignored when someone glances at you and that’s it, they won’t give you a hug or any acknowledgement. But if they had their eyes closed and still gave you a hug, you wouldn’t feel ignored at all. Think about it, touch is powerful. A person can look at you, and hear you, but not really be seeing you or listening to you, and you can feel invisible or unimportant. But a simple hug or a pat on the shoulder, and you feel noticed. Some people who don’t like to be touched don’t like it because they feel too seen. Some people dislike PDA for the same reason.

I won’t deny there’s always some respect due when you’re using touch as a way to show affection, but there’s respect do no matter what way you show it. The point is I see this taboo touch thing as a direct attack on love.

That may sound nuts, but hear me out. Friendship is a difficult thing to maintain, and it is hard to have a deep, meaningful friendship nowadays because people have forgotten how to do it. There is an uncertain balance among millennials and Generation y-ers over how important friendship is.

Most kids, it must be admitted, will dump friendship over romance. There’s a counter movement that protests that any friendship between girls is more important than any boy. And it usually is between girls, because if the guys say that, they are labeled gay. Ouch.

This is not fair to the guys mostly, but not to the girls either. For one thing, you cannot tell a girl that a guy may never be more important than her girl friendships. That is just not true. When she is married, her husband is going to be more important. And if it is a case of doing the right thing, or if the guy is just the better friend of the two, it is not fair to give the girl friend such preference.

That is another post right there, but what I am saying is, well intentioned as it may be, glorifying friendship is not the answer. I have heard many sides of the question, and my solution is more complicated than just having friends and not being afraid to hug and stuff.

We are getting separated from each other more and more as every mode of affection is getting frowned on with suspicion, or cheered on as progressive. I have realized that everyone is meant to love every person they come in contact with, not through words and  physical touch of course, but in the way they treat them. It has never been a reality to have everyone earth love each other since Adam and Eve fell, but that should be the mindset of everyone who wants to do right by their fellow human beings.

And it turns out, love is different in different situations, but it is the motive and not the actions that decided what kind of love it is.

Squeezing every expression of love more and more into the sexual category is not just stupid, it’s flat-out wrong. It is disrespectful and flippant, and I am heartily sick of it.

I really hope the tide starts to turn in this, we need it to.

Until next post–Natasha.

Legacy

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Ever wonder what your impact will be on the world? When you’re gone what will be different because of you? There’s a name for what you leave behind you; it’s called Legacy.

Good old Girl Meets World has an episode devoted to this that I recommend checking out if you can. I don’t want to spend too much time explaining it but I might use the show itself as an example here.

Girl Meets World made its share of mistakes, but it was always clear that their intention was good. You could tell they really wanted to make you think, and they wanted to help you.

It’s a connection that the creator of a movie, show, or book makes with their audience. It’s a way that we know they care, and if we watch or read it, they in turn know we care. Some of us are moved to tears just by realizing that someone out there wants to do right by us, others of us less emotional people just give it respect.

We actually feel betrayed when a show like this gets cancelled, and a book series suddenly takes a different turn and stops being about promoting the good things we liked it for.

Then, bitter or disappointed or just sad, we talk about what that thing meant to us. Other people think we’re nutty for caring so much. We try to explain.

This is why: Someone cared. Someone tried. Someone actually succeeded.

It didn’t have to be perfect, it just had to be good.

I felt understood, or I felt respected. Like the writers actually cared what they were introducing to my mind.

There are those of us who like dirty movies, or horror, but let’s be honest, even if we do, do we truly like the people who put that stuff out there. We let them screw us, figuratively speaking, but do we give them an ounce of respect for it? We may not regard out own minds, but do we really appreciate that they don’t regard us either?

In my limited experience, the people who like horror and sexually charged material are also the ones with low self respect. You expose yourself to garbage when you feel like garbage, it’s just true. (Not that you have to, but that’s why.)

The people who loved Girl Meets World loved it because it respected them. They respected themselves enough to accept it. The kids who got helped by it’s messages about bullying, being yourself, choosing rightly, they all got helped because they had it in them to be helped.

Half the time, the show just reminded us of what we already knew.

But that was okay, goodness knows we need that.

Girl Meets World wanted to make people’s lives better, makes their relationships better, and thereby make the world better. Hence the title Girl (you, boy can be substituted as we all know) Meets (relationships) World (it says itself.)

At the end of both Girl Meets World and its predecessor Boy Meets World, Riley and Cory both realize the meaning of meeting the world. and while I still hope for something more, because of my faith, I won’t deny it’s a good message. Meet the world. Know you aren’t alone in it. Then change it.

That’s a legacy worth leaving. That’s what legacy is. Who you are, who you meet, what you impact. That’s what you leave behind you. Material legacy just represents the unseen legacy.

Those are my thoughts, and this is also my thank you to this show and to every book and movie I’ve ever liked and learned from. Until next time–Natasha.

I feel all right like I could take on the world. Light up the stars I got some pages to turn. I’m singing o-o-oh, o-o-oh. I’ve got a  ticket to the top of the sky. I’m coming up I’m on the ride of my life. O-o-oh, o-o-oh. Take on the world. Take on the world. Take on the world.

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Reach higher.

Don’t go to sleep.

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I found out some stuff this week about Disney. I’m aware not everyone who reads this may watch Disney stuff often, but I’m one of the millions of kids who grew up watching almost only Disney, (and VeggieTales.) Now Disney has changed a lot over the years. But one thing I could always count on was that the movies would at least make a pretense of having a good message. More often than not, they delivered. Even the ones I used to dislike I now like, except for Beauty and the Beast, I never have and probably never will like that movie. And guess what? They are remaking it.

That’s not all, there’s some controversy over what one of the directors said about the movie. I refuse to detail it because it’s better if you don’t know, and if you do, you already can guess what I’m referring to.

Over the years I’ve come to expect certain jokes and insinuations to be in adult movies, sometimes I can laugh at them, most of the time I roll my eyes, but you go into it knowing that’s a possibility. There are always times when the movie ends up being completely different form what you saw in the commercial, but most of the time you know what you’re getting. Fine. I didn’t watch PG-13 movies that often till I was 17 at least. I still don’t watch R-rated stuff that often and then only if it’s R-rated for a legitimate reason.

I have this thing about ratings. I think it’s ridiculous to say adults should be exposed to inappropriate content more than children, without it hurting them at all. That’s what most people think of ratings, and most kids see PG-13 material before they are 13 because, heck, they can handle it.

Ratings are actually supposed to be a tool that you could use to decide what to expose yourself to, it’s not your age that matters, it was your tolerance level. That’s how many people use them anyway.

Personally, violence and sensual scenes ae two things I can’t handle well, I will have the images stuck in my mind for days, maybe months. I put up with them if the movie is worth it, and avert my eyes when necessary.

So, why am I telling you all this? So you can think I’m sheltered? Actually, my parents don’t make this choice for me, I do it myself. My siblings and I have standards that we help each other enforce, and we’ve gotten mad at our dad for not warning us of content he knows we don’t like. I used to think it would be cool to watch age rated stuff, and then I realized that my standards weren’t magically going to change because I grew older, they only increased. This is thanks to my mom’s carefulness in what she allowed us to see, though she wasn’t always there, and what you see at other people’s houses is not something your parents can always control. And mine are not the slightly scary type who drill anyone we visit with about what we can watch.

So, there are things I have seen that I regret to this day, and that is why I keep my standards high. I know things like stupid jokes, stupid characters, and stupid plot lines, are inevitable; but you have to keep looking.

To bring this back to Disney, I have to thank Disney for a lot of things. Frozen, for example.  (I might do a post someday about why that’s my favorite movie despite it being a kids’ movie. Would anyone read that?) Disney has never succumbed to the corruption of standards and morals that, it must be admitted, a lot of production studios for other kids’ movies have. (Have you seen some of the things they are advertising–straight up?) But I have been concerned that they can’t hold up much longer, and now I’m really concerned.

Look, I get that not every screenwriter is a God–fearing person. I get that I cant’ expect Christian Values out of every movie made by Disney. I get it, I live in world that hates God being in their business. But, does that really justify shoving spoonfuls of propaganda down unsuspecting children’s throats?

Let’s try to be objective. For along time Disney had stayed neutral, they have never tried to appeal to the Right or the Left, to the Atheist or the Theist, they have held the middle ground. And in so doing, they managed to please most of us, which is not usually what happens. Now, throwing a controversial thing into their movie, even if the kids miss it, is that really the best idea?

From even a business perspective, it makes no sense to me. I’ll grant you, the demographic the controversy appeals to (and there always is one) will likely support this movie. but that will be outweighed by the amount of people who will avoid it because of the content. The scarier prospect is if it’s not.

And if they get away with this where does it stop? You may laugh at me for being paranoid, as I’m sure many people I know would, but am I really? isn’t this how every decline starts? One person gets away with one thing, then another person gets away with another thing, and then everyone thinks it’s okay.

I am asking us all to consider, what is the real gain in letting such things happen without a fight? What do we lose in the long run. Think about it, we sacrifice our morals, we expose our children’s minds to ideas they aren’t mature enough to resist, we spend our money; all on colored lights, loud speakers, and an hour or two of entertainment. Entertainment!

Long sigh. I may not be able to stop the writers from being allowed to do this, but I hope I can encourage a few people not to put up with it. I want people to look around and realize it’s a new day, we don’t have to accept this crud anymore. We can change it. I want to put some good material in this world, the kind that parents will feel good about and kids will love. The more of us who aspire to that, the less power these people have. Just don’t ignore it. Don’t go to sleep.

Until next post–Natasha.

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Classic

Good Obsession

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I have a confession to make, before Girl Meets World was cancelled, I was already losing enthusiasm for it. I liked some episodes, but others just annoyed me. On the whole I considered it a good show and I recommended it, but personally I was losing interest.

This is not abnormal for me, I have what is known (by some people) as an obsessive–compulsive personality. I’m not so compulsive, but I do get obsessed over things, it lasts a few weeks to a few months, but once my interest wanes, I start to have feelings of disgust for the object of my obsession, like you get sick of eating the same food after awhile. If I have just described you, keep reading because chances are you need to hear this as much as I do.

I’ve wondered: if I can lose interest in these things after such a short time, are they really good at all?

I’m not one to just say my brain works that way and leave it there, I only feel this way because of the standards I have that a book or a show eventually fails to meet.

I get this with people too, I like them for a while, and then I see some of their faults and I feel like I misjudged them.

But before I alarm anybody, let me reassure you, I don’t dump my friends every time this happens. I’ve actually never dumped a friend in my life. (In my memory.)

Which is because, obsessive personality or no, one has to realize what is really important in life, and that some things remain important even when they are boring.

My short-lived obsessions are good for me. They keep me finding new enjoyments, and they die out before they really become unhealthy; but the trouble is when the excitement wears off, I have to considered if the thing was worth it.

I’ve never considered if it’s worth it to be interested in a real life person because I value people too much. I think everyone is worth interest and if someone were to say they were not, I would have a problem with that. (I do however, think some people are not worth romantic interest because they are unfit for it, that is a different matter.)

But things are another story, which brings me back to the show. I actually had been watching t for less than a year when it got cancelled, I’m a relatively new fan, and yes, was questioning whether I even still lied t r not. The episodes were okay the firs time you saw them. I’ve used them quite a few times on this blog to help my point. They work well for that. The trouble was, they didn’t go as deep as I wanted. Each episode was only a half hour so that may just be expected.

When it comes to evaluating the merit of a show or movie, I do have to think of the flaws. Though my favorite movie, Frozen, doesn’t have any. Just kidding, it does. I won’t point them out, but they are there. Another of my favorite shows, Ever After High, had major flaws. The shows I currently like, though I would not recommend them to everyone, have plenty.

There is no such thing as a perfect movie or show. There is no perfect book (except the Bible. No punchline here.) There is no perfect person (except Jesus.)

That’s another thing. Some of you may have the 2–week Christian, or 2–week healthy lifestyle, or whatever. They try it, lose enthusiasm, and go back to their ordinary lives. We all have relapses, but in this case it’s clear there never was a real change.

I still can’t fully explain this phenomenon. I only can tell you that it is very hard for human beings to change ourselves,. The common ingredient of these failures is the person wants to get themselves back together, they will get closer to God; they will get on an exercise program or a diet; they will do better.

I’m young, people, but I already know, I will not do any of those things or do them well, if I am doing it just for me. Very few love themselves that much, and if they do they have a whole other problem to deal with.

I have tried to break myself of the obsessive habit, but I realized that God has used it to teach me things. I still have to control it, but it’s actually easier to do that once I stop hating it. As for what I obsess over, this is what I’ve worked out.

  1. I like stuff for a reason; find that reason; learn from it; digest it; and move on.
  2. It’s okay if it’s flawed, just be aware of the flaws, and either stop watching or reading or doing, or do it but eat the meat, spit out the bones.
  3. Only God has ever held my interest and trust at all times, and I am not alwasys feeling it even then.
  4. Let God be God, and let man be man. People fail, God doesn’t.

That last one applies to the writers of books and movies too, by the way. They fail, we need to look for their successes. Good and bad, that is their legacy.

That’s all for now–Natasha.20160628_201011

 

Get Wise

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SO, my next writing project is about Wisdom. My virtue speech went well by the way, it was even kind of fun, and I got a fairly good response on this blog. Since that worked out so well, I thought I’d try to post about Wisdom.

The reason I don’t mind using an assignment as blogging inspiration is that I’d like to talk about Wisdom anyway on this blog.

I could give you some dictionary definitions, but defining wisdom is not as simple as just looking it  up. I realized a long time ago that to even recognize wisdom you need to have a tiny bit of it.

And the best way I know of tot est your wisdom is to read the Bible. I’m serious, the more stuff in there that you can understand, the wiser you are.

Lest I risk alienating everyone who doesn’t read the Bible with that statement,let me explain it a little more. I am not saying only Bible–readers are wise, and that it is the only way to become wise. I’m still talking about what wisdom is.

Proverbs is famously known for being the book about godly wisdom, but a lot o proverbs have been retold, or hit upon, by other sources. Aesop’s Fables for one often has stories that line up with Proverbs exactly. In Proverbs we are told to desire wisdom above rubies, above gold and silver, to get it and understanding above all else. The word Proverb actually just means a wise, pithy saying that is usually just common sense. You probably knew that already. Of all the biblical books, Proverbs is the least spiritual and most practical. I don’t know why more non-Christians don’t study it.

Most of the sayings in this book are attributed to Solomon or his mother, Bathsheba. Solomon apparently wrote the book for his son.

I promise I’m giving you this background for a reason.

Solomon is known also as the wisest man on earth before Jesus. He was not born that way, but when he was still a child (by Hebrew standards) he became king, and God visited him, telling him He would give him one request and whatever he asked, he could have it. How many stories and movies have been centered around this idea? The Midas Touch, for one. I am sure there are others, the Fisherman and the genie; any Arabian night story almost has some point where the hero gets a wish. Well, digressing. Solomon must have thought about it, and he says (to condense it) “Now, O LORD my God, You have made Your servant king…but I am a little child; I do not know how to go out or come in…Therefore give to Your servant an understanding heart to judge you people, that I may discern between good and evil.” (1 Kings 3:7-9.)

Sometimes in the bible, God has one of those jaw-drop moments, or so it seems from His reaction. Of course, He knew what Solomon would say, but God has this ability, kind of like a mom’s to know what to expect and yet still be surprised. he was so pleased with Solomon’s request that he promised him wealth, honor (respect and fame), and long life, on top of wisdom. Later Solomon wrote that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of  wisdom. (Proverbs 9:10.)

very few people like that answer. Why should we have to fear God to be wise?

Well, in my own experience, before we fear God, we always fear something else, whether it’s failure; rejection; people; pain; or loss. Sometimes we fear ourselves. Human beings have to fear something, fear is a natural emotion, but like all emotions, it needs to be directed at the right thing, in the right amount. The fear of the Lord is the healthy kind of fear. Until we fear Him, we will not cease to fear anything else. You have to be more afraid to be out of God’s will than to be out of your own controlled area before you can really do anything for God.

That said, wisdom is born out of knowledge of life, and the principles therein, and those come from understanding. The other thing Proverbs is always telling you to seek, usually right along with wisdom. It is because to be wise, you must first understand things as they really are.

This is why the Christian believes true wisdom is from God alone, because he can show you things as they truly are, and no one else can do that.

The word understanding that Solomon used in the above verses is synonymous with Hearing, a hearing heart is a wise heart.

This is important. In Shakespeare’s great play “the merchant of Venice” the heroine, Portia, utters a candid speech about being good. “If to do were as easy as to know what it were good to do, chapels had been churches and poor men’s cottages, princes’ palaces…I can easier teach twenty what it were good to be done than be one of the twenty to follow mine own instruction!”

Portia makes an excellent point, it is easier to know the wise choice than it is to make it. The wise choice is always the best one, morally, practically, and in the long run, emotionally. But we all know people very seldom make the best choice. It is not hard to find wisdom, Proverbs 2 talks about her crying out in the street, for anyone to get. But they are not interested.

In the end, getting wisdom is not hard, wanting it is. Fools are the people too set in their own ways and own opinions to seek counsel and to learn by it, according to proverbs. getting wisdom requires wanting to hear it, and many prefer rather to talk about their feelings and their problems till the cows come home rather than spend five minutes listening to good advice. A prime example is Lydia from “Pride and Prejudice.” Who, in the author’s words, seldom listens to anyone for more than half a minute, and never attends her sister Mary at all.

The conclusion I come to after this is what I originally thought: asking for wisdom already demonstates that you have it. The beginnings of it.  That is why Solomon exhorts us to seek it, because if we do, we have already started to find it. Wisdom is tuly it’s own fuel, it builds upon itself.

Those are my thoughts for now, until next time–Natasha.

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Poor men’s cottages princes’ palaces.

The Green Glasses Question.

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If you’ve ever read the book “The Wizard of Oz.” You might remember that there’s a small but important bit that they cut out of the movie.

It takes place when the foursome first comes to the Emerald city and the gatekeeper gives them all green glasses, telling them it I just the custom or something along that line. They all oblige since what’s the harm in wearing glasses? They go inside and find that everything in the city is emerald-green, it is lovely; even the people are green. They go to Oz, and leave again, much like in the movie, but they are surprised when after they leave, their clothes that they got in the city are no longer green. When, at last, they return to Oz and discover the Wizard is a fraud, he tells Dorothy that the city is (gasp) not really emerald, but he solved this dilemma with the green glasses. “If people wear green glasses,” he says, “everything will seem green to them.” It is left at that, but the reader is thinking “That was so obvious. I could have told them the city wasn’t really green from the beginning.” (I know I am not the only one who reads books this way.)

Something I never asked myself when I read these books as a kid was why on earth the people wore the glasses? Surely they could have realized the truth, they could have seen out of the corner of their eye that the city was really colorful. Why stay deluded?

I guess there is a novelty in a city all one color, I think it would be boring, but maybe there are some who would put up with it. After all, all of Oz is already color themed (fun fact not in the movie) so they must be used to it, but it still wasn’t true. Did no one ever question it? Dorothy didn’t even, and she was from Kansas.

But then, Kansas was all grey. There is a  persistent theme in the book that every place is its own color because of how interesting it is. Or the trades of the people in it. I do not think this was intended to be a race or class stereotype, but a mindset. To Dorothy, everything after Kansas would be a relief from the greyness. Yet she wants to go back and tells the scarecrow, (when he asks why, when it is so grey and drab,) that it’s home.

The thing is, I read most of the books in the series (it was a kick) and I notice that every adventure centers on leaving your home and seeing new places. All the people in Oz are born in one section with one color, they have to leave it, Dorothy has to leave Kansas, or else nothing happens ever, except that things steadily get worse.

I am aware that some people will still think these books are racist because of the color themes, but trust me, that’s not it. I read them okay? I’m telling you, it’s the way of thinking that is the color.

To prove my point, let’s go back to the glasses question. I finally concluded that the obvious answer was that the people wanted to believe in the Emerald city. That’s all there is to it.

I could leave it here and let you figure out the rest, but my point may not be totally clear yet.

My sister asked me if there actually was the horse of another color in the book, (it’s in the movie,) I told her no, there never was. I think the reason is, the horse that changes color would be of no use in the Emerald city, everyone there would see green. And in the other countries, the horse wouldn’t fit. And it wouldn’t fit because the whole phrase “a horse of another color” means “a different matter”, and it means you have to change your answer, and thus your perspective. Which is exactly what nobody in Oz wants to do.

I loved the series, but it was to my disappointment that not one of the characters really changes or grows through the course of a dozen books. There are a few surface changes, but none of real substance. The movie shows Dorothy change, but in the book she really doesn’t, she only finds out that there’s a better place than Kansas, eventually she returns to Oz, and brings her family with her. (Sorry for the spoilers. But that actually was my only incentive for reading the rest of the series and I was put off for one book as it was.)

They go to many different places, in the series, and find many different points of view; but it lacks the fundamental element of change. In Girl Meets World, the code of the show is “People change people.” I agree with that in part, and it is closer to the truth than saying “People never change.”

This may be only me, but I find series and shows in which the characters never change to be both boring and unrealistic, we are meant to change. Our ideas are meant to broaden and expand.

You could pull any amount of lessons from the metaphor of the green glasses; but I ‘m pulling this one: Take the blinders off, change your perspective, it’s okay.

There is the argument that if the city looks green, then it is green to whoever sees it that way. The Wizard seems to hold this belief. But may I remind everyone that the Wizard’s whole career was spent deceiving people. Surely, his perception of truth has to be flawed.

There city really is colorful. That is the truth. Whether you see it that way or not, that part is your choice.

That’s my thought on the subject. Until next time–Natasha.Welcome Scan