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September 08, 2006
In another realm...
so, i'm not sure if it's against blog etiquette to blog twice really close together, about completely unrelated topics, but let's face it. some people start reading my "intellectual" blogs and scroll down to the next planetrock entry. so for you all, this is just a personal one...
i bought this book last saturday. it's called love & respect. it's written by a focus on the family guy.
here's what it's about: the crazy cycle.
a woman doesn't feel loved.
she reacts. women react disrespectfully to this.
a man doesn't feel respected.
he reacts. men react unlovingingly to this.
a woman doesn't feel loved.
get it? this is the crazy cycle that the author purports that couples get themselves into. he claims most people understand the first half of ephesians 5:33. men must unconditionally love their husbands. check. but women must unconditionally RESPECT their husbands. che-- WHAT?!
it's countercultural. women are taught that love will solve it all. so when they feel unloved they try to move towards their husbands in love. this doesn't seem to work. so they get frustrated. they act disrespectful and here we go...
now disrespect doesn't have to be saying nasty things. most of the time it isn't. most of the time it's a subtle vibe that you're just not really sure he's competent as a human being. and believe me, men get the message.
one of the things the author says is that women often say "i love you, but i don't respect you." now, ladies, imagine if a man said you "honey, i really respect you, but i don't love you at all." how DEVASTATING would that be?
and have you ever noticed how there are NO greeting cards that say "dear honey. i respect you so much."
or how awkward it feels to say "dear, i really respect you for doing X." for some reason it feels so much more natural to say "dear, i really love you for doing X."
but that's not enough for men.
the authors took a survey. if you ask men, would you endure...
...living completely alone and unloved by the world.
OR
...always feeling inadequate and disrespected by everyone.
they hands down respond they'd rather feel unloved and alone.
so maybe all of you had this figured out already. and maybe somehow you escaped the influence of our culture. or maybe you truly understand what ephesians 5:33 is all about. if you do, stand up and shout it out, ladies! 'cause most of us are still missing it!
oh. one last thing. the author often hears, who should start acting first? the husband or wife?
his answer: whichever of you considers yourself more mature.
isn't that a great answer?
okay, i'm really going to get to my IRB now...
Posted by Autumn at 01:22 PM | Comments (0)
The Soul--Continued
so, i appreciated the thoughts i got back on my questions. especially since i kind of left myself off the hook by not answering any of the questions myself.
which i shall proceed to do...at least for a moment or two...
jensen and i were talking about it last night and he seems to think it has something to do with mathematics. another unseen, but much believed in concept.
yesterday in class, we moved from differences in plato and aristotle and their ideas about life into the beginning christian philosophers. namely augustiine.
so, augustine went further than plato's dualism (distinct separation between soul and body). he believed...
there is a body. it serves man.
there is a soul. it serves God.
there is a mind. it has a choice to serve man or God.
what do you all think of this?
and where does the Holy Spirit fit into all of this?
is the mind a separate thing?
a physical thing?
a spiritual thing?
anyway, i'm still trying to sort it out. can i ask some BIG questions?
how does Jesus fit into all this?
what was the matter of his soul?
how does this fit into the idea of him being fully God and fully human?
does that mean he had a soul like us?
did his soul act under the same constraints ours does?
or are our souls limited because our communion with God is so limited?
is God glorified by my ponderings?
on another deep tangent...
yesterday we also talked about Truth. most people in my class are very skeptical of its existence, or at least our ability to know it. which of course set my little overanalyzing-unable to think simple things-brain off.
and so i asked...
why are we so willing to accept that we can have Knowledge, that it exists, but so skeptical of Truth?
what is the difference between Knowledge and Truth?
can Knowledge be operationalized any easier than Truth?
and thus, the rest of the class period was totally run off track with my ponderings. much like your time is being taken up by reading this...
...holla if you dig the deepness...
Posted by Autumn at 01:05 PM | Comments (0)
September 07, 2006
The Soul...
let's face it, when i'm in a class, my mind gets totally consumed by the topic. i love throwing myself into thinking deeply about anything. other things tend to get out of balance when i do this, but this time, i think i'm okay...
so to meet one of the requirements of my degree, i'm in the history of the philosophy of psychology. yeah, i'm not kidding. that's the title :)
for the past couple of weeks, we've been discussing ancient philosophies that contributed to western thought and thus, the development of psychology. religion has come up in class A LOT and tuesday was no exception.
let's establish the fact that psychology is supposed to be the study of the soul. so the BIG questions are:
what IS the soul?
IS there a soul?
is it different than the mind?
does it need a body?
is the soul a social construction?
is the mind a social construction?
can one logically believe in the soul?
i know that many of you are thinking, who cares?! i'm good with God, i don't need to understand these things.
others are thinking, we can never fully understand these things, so why wrack my brain trying?
but for me, these questions have been rolling around in my head all day. i talk to my friends about it at dinner. i talk to my roommates about it as i'm going to sleep. i scribble notes and diagrams of how it might work on scratch paper.
don't get me wrong, i think i know where i stand on most of these questions. and since i already have a reputation in my class for speaking up, i do so. but this morning, God reminded me...
if i speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, i am only a resounding gong or clanging cymbal. 1 cor 13:1
i honestly don't know what my motivations in this thought exercise have been, but i know that today, if my words are not motivated by wanting to see my hurting classmates come to a wholeness in God, i want to be silent. those of you who know me know that task will be EXCRUCIATINGLY hard for me.
i am writing a reaction paper to these questions for class next tuesday. pray God gives me a right heart, a heart builit up by love, not puffed up by knowledge. pray God gives me discernment as to which topics to tackle in my paper.
more thoughts later...
Posted by Autumn at 10:12 AM | Comments (0)