Penny Red: Panic on the streets of London.

Penny Red: Panic on the streets of London.: "I’m huddled in the front room with some shell-shocked friends, watching my city burn. The BBC is interchanging footage of blazing cars and..."

Telling times

Well, the last two days have been very telling. I feel as if I have gained a lot of ground. Last night a good friend for over 15 years decided to have a melt down and take it out on me. He was giving me advice that I believed to be unsound. I calmly told him that I appreciated the advice, but I would not use it. After he screamed into the phone and told me to never call him again he hung up. I very calmly was able to call him back, and inform him that I would obey his wishes. I also very calmly informed him that I believed his treatment of me was harsh and if he wished to speak to me about it in the future he knew where to find me.
I am proud of myself. Normally I would have driven to his house and continued the fight. This is a huge step in my development.
Also, my wife is becoming more and more anxious about little things. This wouldl test the nerves of any person. Today, after her fifth phone call, I was still able to speak to her calmly and politely. I reassured her our appointment at 2pm today would be fine, we just needed to be creative about how we travel.
After calming her and singing to my kids I began writing this entry into the blog. Now I should be able to complete my assignment.

Sharing Humor

Here is a good joke pulled from a page I am reading for my developmentla psychology class.

An elementary school teacher starts a new job at a school in Durham, North Carolina. In an attempt to make a good impression on her first day, she explains to her class that she's a Duke Blue Devils fan. She asks the class to raise their hands if they too are Duke fans. Everyone in the class raises their hand except one little girl.
The teacher, looking a little surprised, asks: "Hannah, why didn't you raise your hand?"
"Because I'm not a Duke fan," she replied.
The teacher asked, "Well, if you're not a Duke fan, then who do you support?"
"I'm a Wright State Raider fan, and proud of it," Hannah replied.
"Really?" The teacher, now becoming interested in the lone dissenter, asks, "Hannah, why are you a Raider fan?"
"Because my Dad is a Raider fan and my Mom is a Raider fan, so I'm a Raider fan."
"Well," said the teacher, "that doesn't mean you have to be a Raider fan. Kids don't have to be just like their parents. What if your Mom was a liar and your Dad was a crook, what would you be then?"
Hannah said, "I'd be a Duke fan."

I can honestly say from experience that this child correctly echos the feelings of the state of North Carolina, unless you are a Duke fan. 8-)
(Joke is pulled from this website)

Broader Scope

Originally, I believed I could center this project on a classmate who needed my assistance with his art work. I am finding, every day, that this assumption is very wrong. I am far from as nice and graceful as I thought I was. This is because of my lack of self control and understanding. I need to redirect the ideology of this assignment and broaden my scope to include the aspects of my personality that make me so temperamental.

Dawning Realizations....

During a stressful Monday at work (I am usually off), I have come to a slow realization. During the many times I havestruggled with myself today, everytime I forced myself to remember that I am dooing this to help someone.
Constantly, my mind drifts to thoughts of agitation and anger at being here today. Once or twice I had to stop myself from wondering why my manager wanted a day off...
Am I really this selfish? Could this be true? All my life I have hated people I perceived to be selfish.
Was my ex-wife right? Is this what no one wants to tell me when I ask for feedback? It would make sense. Now I am just scared it is true.

Patience

I am learning, slowly, that while I have more patience than most, I do not have as much patience as is necessary to control my temperment. Again, Understanding helps to increase empathy and sympathy which allows me to control myself, but patience is also a factor. Without patience, I will not have the time to step back and look at the situation before reacting. I just got called for an order... to be continued.

Side note

This is unrelated to my project.
A friend on Twitter is working on this project, I am trying to help them promote and fund their project. Please take a look!


If you wish to donate to their kickstarter the link is HERE

Veeeeerry Eeeeenteresting

Another note of worth, is that unless I am concentrating and making a very forced effort, I lapse into my old style of reactionary tactics. Today I almost lost my cool at work when we got busy and I forgot to maintain composure. This will most likely be a life-long effort, similar to when I stopped smoking in the beginning of May. (Also similar to my workout routine that I began last month.) This summer just seem sot be full of renovations around Shudonen's body! (Too bad all the fun stuff is apparently leaving, I hope this isn't a sign of aging.)

Progress?

I believe I have made some progress on my self control already.
Last night, near to 1 am, I was still waiting on my "artistic apprentice' (LOL) to finish some personal items he was into before working on his horn and hand designs. After a few questions about when he will be ready, I realized that this is something that would over-run my sleep schedule.
Instead of pressuring my friend to hurry so we can complete the drawing aid, I used understanding to increase my empathy and sympathy. Normally, I would be upset, and tell myself,"He knows I work long shifts, why isn't he concerned about my time." This time, however, I was able to remind myself that he also works long hours, and is a lot more social than I am. Also, I know his wife does not sleep early like mine does, so he was probably busy talking to her as well. Understanding these items allowed me to empathize with his need for personal time, and sympathize with his need to unwind. This allowed me to control myself and my reaction. I sent him a polite (I think) message, letting him know it was late and I would work with him on another date for his art work.
I hope I handled that well.
Any comments or suggestions?

And Thus Our Hero's Journey Begins...

With the induction of the Developmental Psychology class at Full Sail University, the students are required to decide upon a self betterment project that takes roughly 20% of their time. This project, aptly named the 20% project, will also comprise 20% of our class grade.
Considering my personal downfalls during the Team Building class last month, I have chosen to complete my self betterment project in the area of self control. I have also devised a plan for this enrichment.
While reading my textbook for the course, "A Whole New Mind" by Daniel H Pink, I had an epiphany. Right-minded aptitudes, like self control, could be learned through a step by step approach. When I say step by step, I don't mean memorization, I mean by making actions into habit.

I also came up with this pseudo-equation:
Self Control = (Empathy * Sympathy)^Understanding

Self control can be derived from empathy combined with sympathy and enhanced by understanding.

This does not say that you have to know everything about a situation to maintain self control, but that, if you can remind yourself how you would feel in another person's situation, you can control your reactions towards them. Make the situations less about what you feel and more about what is happening.
A classmate has sought my expertise in art to aid him in his 20% goal. I have decided to use my education of him to further my own 20% goals. Being a natural artist, I will need to exercise a lot of self control in order to appropriately assist my "pupil" in reaching his goal without inadvertently offending him.