YOU ARE NOT ALONE - A companion online community discussion board for The Mental Illness Happy Hour podcast with Paul Gilmartin

A similar one I recently heard on a Buddhism podcast I listen to. It is a play on the phrase “mind the gap” in the London Underground and goes “gap the mind.”

Insert a pause into reactivity to give oneself a moment to get out of the reactivity pattern and act more skillfully.

Thank you for sharing, Tony. I wrote the urgency quote in my journal so I'll remember it.

SD, I haven't seen "Barfly" but I'll check it out if available. There's an L.A. tour company that offers offbeat tours including "Charles Bukowski's Los Angeles." I may check that out as well if it still exists after we get through the Covid shutdown.

If anyone's interested, the Dodge Poetry Festival is going on now thru November 1.
It's poets reading their poetry, with follow-up discussions and Q&A

It's virtual this year, and streaming is free.
(I've gone to the in-person events in past years, and it's been great!)

You're sure to find something here that speaks to you.

https://www.dodgepoetryfestival.org

SD

If you have some element of gratitude, optimism survives.- Michael J Fox

Hey brownblob,

I heard Marc Maron's interview with Michael J. Fox this week. I thought it was a great interview. I appreciated that it wasn't one of those inspirational stories that glosses over the mental and physical pain of having a chronic disease, and also that Michael J. Fox was honest about times when he didn't deal with the situation well and used alcohol to cope or just wanted to give up. It was inspiring but in a more real & human way.

Also, it's good to "see" you brownblob, and I hope you're doing okay.

rg

I will have to listen to the Maron interview. I saw him in a short interview the other day and it moved me. I was thinking back to how youthful and energetic he(and I) was in his Family Ties days and how old he looks now(and how old I feel) I felt like there was some great truth in the line I posted. Maybe I need to stop and be more grateful and maybe I won't be the negative blob that I am.
As for me, I am not great. I haven't been posting much lately due to lack of energy and also just not having anything positive to add to the conversation.

I'm sorry you're not doing well, brownblob. I always like reading your posts even if you think they're negative. I understand about not having the energy to post though.

I'm grateful to have met you on this forum.

I've been thinking more about gratitude today.

Off and on I've been doing a technique of writing down three new things I'm grateful for every day. They're often very small things. Sometimes when I'm in a negative state of mind it can be difficult to think of anything, or difficult not to compare the things I write down to what other people have, but it does seem to get easier with practice. I keep doing it in hopes that it's something that I don't understand fully, but that it may change me in a way I can't perceive yet.

Brownblob, I think mainly I wanted to let you know that if you can't feel grateful right now, that's okay. There are so many things that affect our ability to feel gratitude ... upbringing, life experiences, depression, current circumstances. I know the idea is to be able to feel grateful anyway, no matter what, but that seems like a more advanced state of mind that takes time to develop.

Take care this week

rivergirl

Well, I see this thread hasn't had a post in a bit and so I'll share a thought that I suppose is more my own style of thinking than somebody I would think anyone would know or look upon as deserving attention.

It takes the light from the Sun about 8 minutes and 20 seconds to get to your eyes.

That sort of information, after it fully sinks in, helps one understand the significance of this place where we live, called Earth. I think to get a solid appreciation of life itself one must start with an appreciation of Earth. And please note the use of 'helps' in "helps one understand" because there is obviously a whole lot more to it than just that 8 minutes plus. In fact, defining what "it" represents in the previous sentence is quite difficult, isn't it?

Hello MNyby,

Read this a couple of times, and need a little help...
Not a linguist, but "It takes...." is an idiom used in a lot of English expressions like

It takes time
It takes courage
It takes a village
etc

The simplest substitute might be "It requires...", right?
But I think you're getting at something more profound...

Have you been following the news reports on the imaging of the black hole at the center of our Milky Way?

https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2022/05/second-black-hole-image-unveiled-first-from-our-galaxy/