Thanks for trying. It would probably take an act of God to put a smile on my face today. I did think your segue was rather humorous though.
Nonsense. I'll prove it to you. Go into the bathroom. Look in the mirror. Using your facial muscles, turn the corner of your lips upward. That is a smile. And it didn't take God to do it. Just a Corri and a Chrome.
Next assignment. Quit posting for the day, breath in and out, and give your tasks your full attention while performing them. Keep the smile on your face.
You WILL feel that smile as you perform your tasks. It is a kind friend.
Let's save Chrome flogging for... next week. And any problem or issue you have, will wait. Just smile today. You can do that.
The purpose of this assignment is to help you gain distance from your OWN emotions. The purpose of the smiling is... it's hard to flog yourself when you are smiling. So, consider it a preventative measure.
Once you GAIN distance, THEN you can think more clearly.
Chrom. What do you say to a Young Earth Creationist that states if the Earth were 4.5 billion years old, there would be bone piles all over the place?
I know bones disintegrate, so the statement “there should be bone piles all over the place” doesn't fit a decomposition model.
The global problem I have is, I am around a bunch of good-hearted people that profess, if the KJV of the Bible said something, to them, that is the way it happened. NIV or Living bible to some is like a comic book compared to a history book. (my inflated example)
The most workable thoughts I have are, be friends for the things we agree on and let the differences pass.
Plate tectonics, glaciations features, dinosaur remains, layered sedimentary rock formations, coal deposits, gas and oil fields, minerals deposited by meteors or sea creatures all around me. Things that take time, pressure, temperature changes and to them the great flood explains it all,
Fearless- Thanks for the I agree that in general feelings are considered the realm of the female but that may because some of the more masculine ones aren't so pretty and would rather be swept under the "carpet". You didn't insinuate that I did I put that in there.
Kett- I can see the danger in labeling M/F and will try to think of agency and communion instead way less "loaded".
Chrome- You're doing fine it's never going to be perfect and smooth and you'll fall down, you'll fail, you'll succeed, be rejected and accepted, F*cked and not F*cked. You can handle it.
About anger I can relate to not knowing how to express anger I'm still not very good at it. I think with anger is a call to action a Kicking the cow, hitting the kid or throwing the monitor. That's a response to a strong physical stimulation where there are no F#cking words that will satiate that destructive power.
It's scary to have to be responsible for all that power.
Most of the time for myself there is a story that goes along with the anger a story that I keep telling my self that feeds the anger. Feeding the anger keeps it alive for longer than the stimulation that pissed me off in the first place.
Maybe you can try and see if you have stories that are separate from the physical stimulation of anger.
Don’t get me wrong, I think it is important to bring humor into the relationship, especially when there is often too little humor. But do it for that reason, to lighten things up. When you do this, are you expecting anything in return? Either you ease the tension or you don’t, right? Not much deeper than that.
But try to use humor to cheer up a spouse for some other purpose (such as getting sex) and you suddenly bring in expectations. That is where you get the disconnect between the reality of the situation and what you hope the situation will be, ie, reality vs fantasy. The “manipulation” comes back on you, not your spouse. Your spouse has no idea what your expectation or fantasy is, so s/he has no hopes or fantasy to be dashed. But as the perpetrator of the “manipulation,” you risk the loss of your fantasy, which leads to disappointment and more resentment.
It can be a low probability wager, since the response to the humor is completely in the hands of the spouse. You have little control over the outcome, other than how good you are at making humor, but even that dries up after a while.
Chrome, I'm not entirely sure I expressed myself the way I intended.
Thinking that all that is needed for success is to correctly identify the necessary changes in yourself and then make them .... that IS the trap. You can indeed "change everything you need to change in the right way" ... and still "fail". This is *always* a possibility when dealing with another freewilled flawed human.
You can't necessarily "right" yourself into your wife's pants -- or heart. That IS terrifying, because it does mean that it is ultimately out of your control.
It only becomes tragic if you wind up feeling like a stupid, insensitive, pathetic failure of a man because omnipotence eludes you.
"Show me a completely smooth operation and I'll show you someone who's covering mistakes. Real boats rock." -- Frank Herbert
Ahhhhhh, Cobra, I think we're talking about different things.
I wasn't talking about trying to use humor to lighten the general mood up in hopes of then getting some. I was talking about actually coming out and asking for sex, hugs, whatever in a lighthearted joking "whatever, dude" way as opposed to a passionately intense "my heart will be broken and/or I'll be pissy for several hours if you reject me" vibe.
"Show me a completely smooth operation and I'll show you someone who's covering mistakes. Real boats rock." -- Frank Herbert
I'll give it a whirl. Couple more posts then I DO need to get some work done today.
A lot of the flogging is coming from a feeling of confidence shattered. I'm sure I'm not the only one. But I thought I was getting it, and I let it hang out a little bit, and ended up insulting someone in the process, and it being pointed out that not only am I not getting it, I'm blowing it. That just seems to happen a lot to me. The minute I start to feel a little comfortable ... boom.
Again, not begging for sympathy or hoping for kid gloves. If I need to get fcuked up, let me have it. I won't make any progress if I get wrapped up in self-delusion.
Chrome ... who would be happy for one clear thought about right now
"Recollect me darlin, raise me to your lips, two undernourished egos, four rotating hips"
Chrom. What do you say to a Young Earth Creationist that states if the Earth were 4.5 billion years old, there would be bone piles all over the place?
There are three problems with that statement. One, there ARE "bone piles" all over the place, by that I mean fossil beds. We find them everywhere that there is rock exposed due to geologic processing, weathering or erosion, or human activity (like making interstates).
Two, you are right that bones disintegrate over time. The only way they are preserved is through fossilazation, which only happens for a small percentage of dead animals. So only if the chemical conditions are right in a particular area will fossils be formed from formerly living creatures. Of course, fossilization can occur in many ways, from recrystallization of bone material to what are known as "trace fossils" or imprints of a creature in soft material that subsequently hardened.
Third, an AWFUL lot of bony animals have lived and died over the past few thousand years, enough to cover the land mass of the Earth. So even if the Earth were just a few thousand years old, we should be awash in bones if all were preserved.
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The global problem I have is, I am around a bunch of good-hearted people that profess, if the KJV of the Bible said something, to them, that is the way it happened. NIV or Living bible to some is like a comic book compared to a history book. (my inflated example)
That is one of the more insidious problems to deal with, those that are convinced that the KJV of the Bible is the "true word of God" and nothing else. Any attempts to explain about the history of KJV and other versions are usually met with statements that the KJV is the only version "inspired by God" and no evidence is needed to back up the assertion. I've even been quoted scriptures that say how "the world will find your faith foolish", thus nothing I say using logic or evidence can be used to convince. I'd say, for the most part, people who believe in KJV-only are a lost cause. You are better off focusing on the few of those that come to you with questions, answer them very clearly, and then just hope they'll "see the light."
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The most workable thoughts I have are, be friends for the things we agree on and let the differences pass.
Absolutely. I'm all in favor of dropping an argument when it is clear that the other person has no intention of listening to what you say or that there is even a remote chance of changing their mind. I might still make a few comments in the hope of sowing some seed (as I'm sure they will too), but move on too greener pastures.
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Plate tectonics, glaciations features, dinosaur remains, layered sedimentary rock formations, coal deposits, gas and oil fields, minerals deposited by meteors or sea creatures all around me. Things that take time, pressure, temperature changes and to them the great flood explains it all,
Right, and no matter how clearly you show them that the assertion the flood did it all is completely physically impossible, it doesn't matter. The last recourse is "God can do whatever he wants." End of story. At that point, future arguments are pointless.
A few things I do like to point out to the less than intractable ...
If a flood did it all, then how come we see evidence in rock strata for a watery environment, beneath a desert environment, which is beneath a separate watery environment. How could one single deluge even create alternating layers of marine environments with desert environments? The usual answer is "you're just misinterpreting the data" to which I can respond by showing the unmistakable physical similarities to modern desert and marine environments.
If a flood did it all, how did it sort the types of fossils so perfectly (i.e. we only see certain animals in certain layers) and why is the sorting not related to any known physical process. In other words, if you shake up a container filled with different size particles, larger ones will rise to the top. But the sorting we see has to do with types of animals, not any physical characteristic such as size or bone mass or shape. In fact the sorting fits perfectly with the evolution interpretation.
There are MANY other reasons, but I'll move on.
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Guess I shouldn’t talk about the moon being closer to the Earth and the possibility of 18-hour days or 20-day months?
That's a cool link, and a well discussed article. I've always found the lunar effects on the Earth to be really neat, and unexpectedly important for development of life (e.g. rotation speeds, tides, etc.).
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I just want to know what you do or say. I am not about to try to convince anyone what might have happen.
Convincing someone who has their mind set is nearly impossible. All you can do is be sure of your own "facts" and the validity of your own interpretations, and be willing to change them if new compelling evidence is presented.
Chrome
"Recollect me darlin, raise me to your lips, two undernourished egos, four rotating hips"
