Couch 250: An August Couch

Artie, i dont know what your talking about either! I was answering stopdog. My contention is that the difference between enabling and supporting someone is whether that someone is being judged for their actions.

And in her case, yes the students ARE being judged on their technique. To me, supporting means everyone gets a participation trophy, nobody is getting voted off the island. Enabling means not giving someone bad news or constructive criticism that could help them stay on the island.

I was at a neighbors' dinner party before the covid, and i was the only bachelors degree there, everybody else was more degreed. So like all they were doing was reciting wikipedia facts - yeah, they knew more of them than i did, but they werent INTERESTING.

I also feel not as smart as a lot of people here. I didn't have too much college. And I have no professions. Plus my memory is going. But I actually like being around all the smart people here. I like learning from everyone.

Couch Workout Club day 76

Got my steps in running some errands.

Yeahbbut nobody can crochet like you an artie! Thats art!

i figured i misunderstood haha

so the a/c guy has been here ALLLL day working. i don't know if it's just that huge of a job, or if he's just slow. You'd think iffn it was a huge job they'd send more than one guy but whatev. As long as they get it fixed...

Its very cool here today, but they say 70's next week. Again i am glad i did not convert my a/c unit to heat. With my meds and my age and my weight and my diabetes, i do not tolerate heat at all. First i get cranky, THEN i sweat!

I am surprised trump doesnt just fall over. Well its not like he has to iron his own shirts or anything, right? Its the REST of life thats hard, not just showing up on stage.

Huh? What does judgment have to do with it.

I think it’s more like if you break your leg. Enabling would be putting you in a wheelchair because it hurts to walk. Support would be sending you to physical therapy so you recover and it doesn’t hurt to walk anymore.

Artie you need to learn to tell yourself a different story. The T Marissa peer said with all the clients she saw “not being enough” was their main issue.

You need to learn to celebrate yourself and see that you are worthy of your own love without X degree or being like Y. This will come with time. Everyone has different skills. I would trust my hairdresser with my hair more than a surgeon.

We set standards for ourselves which we think we should be at, but often these patterns were instilled in us from a young age by others.

I personally think journaling is good for everyone, but to raise your self esteem you need to get up and do physical things for yourself that help get rid of the old thought patterns. Things like getting a facial or a massage, or eating well.

Where are all these smart people? We all sound like a bunch of clueless dodos to me (not you, una, obvs).

Turns out some of us are crueller dodos than others. My cat brought in one dead baby mouse this morning and one dying baby mouse. I killed the dying one because I didn't know what else to do. I feel horrible. It felt like the less cruel thing to do, it wouldn't have survived back in the wild. I have never killed a living thing before, other than joy.

So sorry, Comrade.

That must have been quite a shock.
I think you did the right thing given the circumstances, although knowing that likely doesn't make it any easier.

I really hope your day improves from that starting point.

Lost

You are speaking from a position of authority over the maimed person. Or partnership. But you are judging what is the appropriate course of action for this person. Too many steps. I hear support as "we will support whatever you want to do," no judgment. I.e., the 90's version of support, which is as current as i get.

I don't think we are on the same page on this.

Couch Workout Club day 77

Two sets of core workout exercises today.

Thank you Lost. The worst thing was the tiny squeak it gave when I picked it up and then its gentle little movements in the palm of my hand. Poor little bugger. It was quite humbling really.

I have no idea what this means, except that you prefer to use a wheelchair forever when you suffer a leg injury.

I understand you I think. We find students lack the skill of giving productive feedback. We have to very deliberately teach them what this looks like. I don’t think that is particularly new on the high school level, but you’d hope by the college level students would have acquired that ability. I do think students are less adept at direct communication than they were prior to their now constant use of technology.

Exalctly. You are judging one result better than the other, instead of "supporting" me in my wheelchair use. Who gets to decide? Like who gets to decide who is trans? Or anything out of the "norm." Are people being enabling or supporting? I agree, its gone too far. I didnt like that Sen. Gary Hart changed his birth date to make himself a year younger! Gay wedding cakes abd websites -enabling or supporting? Its a whole can of worms.

Thats why when henry ford made the first cars, you could have any color you wanted, as long as you wanted black!

It is getting worse - 5 or years ago it was not this hard. I don't know if maybe they were learning it earlier and so by the time they got to us - it was not such a foreign concept - but I now have to actually spend one or two class periods just on how to give/receive feedback and very specific but basic professionalism techniques that they used to come in with but now we have to spend time on. Feedback that isn't saying everything they do is completely wonderful is considered mean and unsupportive. And the number of students who want to tell me their mental health diagnosis has increased by about 90%. When we tell them that their diagnosis does not change the requirements or expectations in the course - we am being unsupportive and mean. The problem for us is - that being autistic or divergent or anxious or whatever will not matter to the court or jury during a trial or to jurisdictional deadlines that absolutely cannot be extended because of the way the law is written - no matter how sympathetic the story is - the deadline is absolute and if they mess it up - their law license is on the line and malpractice looms large.

There was a book when i was starting out - Egoless Computer Programming. Kinda along the same lines. You have to let go of how precious your brainworks are and let them be judged by other people. Because the computer will judge them even more harshly.