Tag: behaviour

Re: Gluttony

When I think of a gluttonous person the picture that comes to mind is someone very large; of the size of characters in Pickwick Papers or akin to sumo wrestlers, that kind of large. Of the ancient deadly sins I match this word with Greed. One and the same; Greed and Gluttony are about over indulgence, over spending, and over doing almost anything. I’m referring to the act of extravagance. It’s not about fat shaming but living within your means. Gluttony to me is about consuming more than you need. The best skit I have ever seen on this subject is the revolting tale of Mr. Creosote as told by the Monty Python crew from the film, The Meaning of Life.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxRnenQYG7I

Paul Anka is credited with this guiding phrase: ‘Moderation in all things, including moderation.’ My mom used to like that quote. She was part of a post WWII tribe that had little in the way of material things. When things got comparatively better, the flood gates to excess were opened. When I was growing up she would have spells of acquisition that accompanied her care free attitude. One month we may have been looking for coins between the sofa stuffing and the next (with overtime pay in the envelope) treats were allowed. When the pantry invariably became depleted I might be inclined to ask if I could have the last of the jam. In response, Mom would flip her hand, “When it’s gone, it’s gone!”, which made me feel as guilty as sin.

Apparently, there are seven sins: Pride, Greed, Wrath, Envy, Gluttony, Lust and Sloth. I was taught not to be lazy, to control my temper, to not whine about what others may have, to measure my wants, and that if I boasted my head would surely swell. Of all those early lessons I think I absorbed, with lasting success, that gluttony is bad. I do believe that too much of anything leads to a serious disconnect with others and is responsible for the damage we have done to this finite planet. I’m told this is a homesick-like feeling called solastalgia. When it’s gone, it’s gone.

Preaching minimalism didn’t get me far in conversations with my sister, who like our parents before us, chose to maximize her paycheque with payday loans of one sort or another. She was always reaching for the proverbial brass ring, hoping to keep the ride going even when resources ran out. In her tribe I was considered a stuffed shirt when I questioned, “How much stuff do you really need?” 

On Twitter, #taxtherich often gets attached to rants about inequity, inequality and gluttony. Building a consumer based society has had its negative drawbacks. We’ve designed a land of plenty where almost any fantasy can be explored, meanwhile obesity, drug use, suicide and multi-billionaires are ubiquitous. We are encouraged to buy the latest and trash the once repairable: There will always be more. Our gluttony has squandered our precious home. Wastefulness is on my list of the new deadly sins.

Re: Tease

When I was a kid I thought Christmas Eve was such a tease. My mom would mention that times had been financially hard and that we mustn’t expect much under the tree. As an adult, I came to the conclusion that this was her way of reducing expectations so that when Christmas morning arrived we would all be awestruck that Santa had somehow pulled off one of his miracles. I think my mom’s approach to Christmas morning gift giving was the reason I often developed a stomach ache on December 24th.

This example also taught me about the larger pattern in my mom’s behaviour towards others: set them up with what seemed like the truth, orchestrate a reversal, say you were just having fun, accuse them of not being able to take a joke. Sadly, she lost many friends using this strategy of social engagement, including her own daughter.

My mom was a natural born teaser, yet she hated the comedy of Don Rickles; a man who made a career from taking the mickey out of people.

His use of mockery and ridicule at an audience member’s expense disturbed me. While I recognize that many people think teasing is all in good sport, my experience with my mom, taught me that teasing someone, like in any sport, produces winners and losers. Maybe my mom thought that teasing me early would give me character, or thicken my skin. I would say it made me shy with people. A former girlfriend, early in our relationship, said she wouldn’t ‘joke with me’ until she knew me better. A pretty accurate comment, I felt at the time, since teasing can bore into your heart if you don’t ‘get the joke’.

Teasing was not promoted as a form of humour when I became a father. My wife and I agreed that making fun of someone would not be something we modelled to our sons. She was a fibre artist and was very practised at teasing out particles from animal fur. For example, raw sheep wool, even after it has been washed, has much debris embedded in the fibre. Deft fingers are required to remove tiny seeds or vegetable filaments. Bits of straw, dung, dead insects and such can be picked from the fleece using a carder. A hand carder has many rows of fine metal spikes. A carding machine looks like an instrument of torture. When the fibre has been processed in this way, you can roll a clean roving that can be spun into yarn.

Christmas is a time of yarns. Sometimes we have to tease apart the truth from the stories before we can spin the best yarns. I guess in this sense finding the truth requires some teasing. Perhaps that’s what we do when we are poking fun; trying to provoke a reaction that will tell us something more about the person who is the butt of our joke.

Life can be messy, especially when we aren’t sure how to separate the drama from the comedy.

Re: Matter

The study of physics tells us that Matter is what makes the universe and all things in it, including us. The atomic particles that were first born of the Big Bang are part of our being.

We are made of matter yet how do we decide what matters to us? That comes from an examination of our values. What we care about and who we care for is fundamental to our existence. I have a need to understand what matters in the present context and then I set about prioritizing things accordingly.

What matters to you is totally up to you. It may relate to what you decide to eat, to wear, to read, to say, to own, to binge watch, or to march for. You can hand over this task to governments, to churches, to teachers or to neighbours but until you make your values matter to you personally you might find your self adrift in uncertainty. Determining what matters is what creates the uniqueness that is you.

My late wife took several courses on Philosophy and each time she came back from a lecture at the university where we met, she swore she was going to live the way she had just been taught. She had seen the light. She was raised in a church going family. Her religious convictions sometimes coincided and sometimes conflicted with her intellectual nature. We had some great discussions. From the content of her classes and these debates we drew closer to a philosophy of life that was consistent with our unity as a couple. We made plans using these discovered values to embark on the adventures of life.

Matter’s opposite is anti-matter. Does that fact suggest that, philosophically, everything matters and nothing matters concurrently? I’ve enjoyed examining the yin/yang nature of life. There are a lot of isms to ponder. Existentialism, we exist but why? Nihilism is too pessimistic for me. I have spent way too much time in my life trying to answer the why questions. I prefer now to seek out the how of living. That puts me leaning more towards a Zen way of thinking, if I am correct in that interpretation. I want to be more presently focussed so that I can understand what matters now.

The song Bohemian Rhapsody by poet Freddy Mercury, has meant different things to me since I first heard it. I often hum the ‘nothing really matters’ part to myself when I have no control over a situation. It helps me to detach from any outcome. Head banging aside, I find peace.

I wish to resist labels for myself and others. If you build your self concept by picking and choosing from the philosophical tree, so be it! That doesn’t make you wishy washy. More likely you will feel well rounded, not boxed in by a particular way. I don’t believe anyone has found THE WAY.

Being devoted to the creation that is you is not selfishness. You are showing respect for what matters.