#powerlessness

[ciquery]

"We develop a hopeful mind-set when we understand that some worthy endeavors will be difficult and time consuming and not enjoyable at all. Hope also requires us to understand that just because the process of reaching a goal happens to be fun, fast, and easy doesn't mean that it has less value than a difficult goal. If we want to cultivate hopefulness, we have to be willing to be flexible and demonstrate perseverance. Not every goal will look and feel the same. Tolerance for disappointment, determination, and a belief in self are the heart of hope. As a college professor and researcher, I spend a significant amount of time with teachers and school administrators. Over the past two years I've become increasingly concerned that we're raising children who have little tolerance for disappointment and that some, who come from various forms of privilege including race and class, have a strong sense of entitlement. Entitlement is very different than agency. Entitlement is "I deserve this just because I want it" and agency is "I know I can do this." The combination of fear of disappointment, entitlement, and performance pressure is a recipe for hopelessness and self-doubt. .... The best definition of power comes from Martin Luther King Jr. He described power as the ability to achieve our purpose and to effect change. If we question our need for power, think about it: How do you feel when you believe that you are powerless to change something in your life? Powerlessness is dangerous. For most of us, the inability to effect change is a desperate feeling. We need resilience and hope and a spirit that can carry us through the doubt and fear. We need to believe that we can effect change if we want to live and love with our whole hearts."

Brown, Brene (2020). Guidepost #3: Cultivating a Resilient Spirit: Letting go of Numbing and Powerlessness. The Gifts of Imperfection: 10th Anniversary Edition (pp. 89). Random House.

#brene brown #the gifts of imperfection #hope #grit #entitlement #powerlessness #wholehearted living

[brookheimer]

okay i think i’m alone in my shiv take LOL i’m going to hush up for a while and see what people are saying and think on the ending some but right now i just… do not understand the last 30 or so minutes from shiv’s perspective and the last 10 are downright baffling. trying very hard not to feel like succession just 180’d everything that’s been good about the shiv writing this season (and in general but esp this season) but every time i think ab the last tomshiv scene my stomach turns grotesquely

#literally the one thing they could’ve done to make me feel :/ on tomshiv #like maybe i just need to think on it some but the decisions shiv made re: tom/matsson but esp tom made 0 sense to me #just did not make sense as things she of all people would do #shiv’s key motivation has never been power it has been RESPECT. time and time again she has fucked up possibilities for power because she’s #felt disrespected. so why exactly did she- ok yknow what no i’m gonna sleep on it. i’ll talk later #don’t wanna say anything dumb #but. seemed like they wanted to make a point with shiv so bad they forgot her fundamental fear: not being respected or taken seriously #and boy oh boy did she willingly subject herself to the most devastating respect-less fate conceivable: trophy wife to the man who fucked #you over twice in a row and ended up being CEO despite that being the job you wanted and were somewhat supposed to get your entire life #and literally TWO SECONDS after the betrayal too. immediately going back to him #bizarre and very unshiv. she would rather die than publicly subject herself to that specific form of humiliation and interpersonal #powerlessness #ok i’ll shut up. agh #of all the things i feared in the finale this wasn’t even one #oyyyy vey #succession #succession spoilers #casey shut the fuck up about shiv roy

[eelhound]

"But I genuinely think the biggest obstacle is the feeling of powerlessness itself, not the actual absence of power. I would say that pessimism, or 'doomerism' as it’s come to be known online, poses a much greater threat to the world than any of the problems I listed earlier. Resignation virtually guarantees that nobody will try to do anything to stop the problem, and the worst will happen. I’m not a Steven Pinker type who thinks that people should stop complaining about the world, and points to charts showing that things are supposedly getting better. I don’t think they’re getting better, but I do think that we have within ourselves the capacity to act and radically change the world for the better. The problem is that people need to become convinced that this is true, and act as if they believe they’re going to win.

The great leftist revolutionary Victor Serge once wrote a passage that I think about often. He spent his life involved in often futile struggles, and saw his socialist dreams destroyed and many of his comrades killed. He could have ended his life as a pessimist. But he didn’t. Instead, in his memoir, he wrote that working to try to change the course of history is the most meaningful thing that one can do with one’s life:

Early on, I learnt from the Russian intelligentsia that the only meaning of life lies in conscious participation in the making of history. The more I think of that, the more deeply true it seems to be. It follows that one must range oneself actively against everything that diminishes man, and involve oneself in all struggles which tend to liberate and enlarge him. This categorical imperative is by no way lessened by the fact that such an involvement is inevitably soiled by error: it is a worse error merely to live for oneself, caught within traditions which are soiled by inhumanity.

Serge was able to look back on his life and be satisfied that he had tried to nudge history in the right direction, even though he had largely failed. I want to be able to have that same feeling at the end of my own life. We don’t know how long we’ll be around, and we have to use our time well. There’s no better use of that time than trying our damnedest to help humanity avoid the threats of climate change, war, and dictatorship. I do not want to look back, sixty years in the future, and think that I could have tried to help us avert the worst, but instead I looked at my phone a lot and resigned myself to feelings of despair.

The good news here is that we all matter. The tasks in front of us this year, and the next, could not be more urgent. There is no shortage of work to be done. But first we have to convince ourselves that a better world really is possible, and recommit ourselves to building it."

- Nathan J. Robinson, from "Our Task in 2024." Current Affairs, 16 January 2024.

#nathan j. robinson #quote #quotations #victor serge #activism #politics #progressivism #leftism #democratic socialism #powerlessness #doomerism #us politics #2024 elections

[child-of-clueless-parents]

My rage is never alone, she always comes with a crushing feeling of powerlessness.

#rage #female rage #powerlessness #i cant do this

[shallowrambles]

One of Dean’s deepest shadow states is related to torture. That it was nice to “be the one doling out suffering/pain for once.”

Makes me think of The Empty’s pain, too. “Does it hurt? Good. I want it to.”

And in 15x19, when they’re in the diner, there’s a song playing that hints at the same pain, probably Chuck’s.

There’s something about this theme of suffering, torture, revenge fantasy that I really like. And how humanity ties into the resultant guilt.

#thoughts #random #the empty #dean’s shadow self #on lashing out #powerlessness #etc

[unwelcome-ozian]

#trauma recovery #abuse recovery #anger #powerlessness #needs

[zelenaolovka]

"In this short Life that only lasts an hour" by Emily Dickinson

[Text ID:" In this short Life that only lasts an hour / How much - how little - is within our power."]

#emily dickinson #poetry #poem #poems on tumblr #motherhood #poets on tumblr #selected poems #poetry collection #literature #power #powerlessness #short poetry #anxiety

[fieriframes]

[Failure to help her has filled me with a deep sense of powerlessness.]

#s17e10 all san diego all the time #guy fieri #guyfieri #diners drive-ins and dives #deep sense #failure #powerlessness

[paradoxical-plutonian]

I weave between worlds, one in which I am the creator and in control of all, and one in which I am beaten down and helpless to overwhelming circumstance. I find a strange comfort in both but never have I learned to walk the line that exists between them.

Journal Entry; January 24, 2023

#journaling #journal entry #mine #personal #journal quotes #my journal entries #my writing #prose poetry #powerlessness #power and control #black and white #black and white thinking

[3score11poet]

Tea Time Emotiku

Saturday, 01/07/2023, Powerlessness

All life involves fight, / power, resistance, struggles; / it stops when we stop. © keefderpoet 2023

“To be happy one must risk unhappiness; to live fully one must risk death and accept its ultimate decision.” Judd Marmor

Many of us were taught early on to never give up; never surrender. Winners never quit and quitters never win. But there are some things that require our complete surrender if we are to gain victory. If you’ve never struggled with addiction, then you’ve no idea what I’m talking about. But if you’ve struggled by an addiction to alcohol, drugs, reading, Tumblr, or anything else, you’ll learn at some point to recognize it, give it up, and move on.

Have a great weekend.

#tea time emotiku #powerlessness

[aowski]

I don’t agree with Jordan Peterson about much of anything, but he is right about one thing:

“And if you think tough men are dangerous, wait until you see what weak men are capable of.”

He is speaking of men who feel powerless. In America, a lot of men feel that way. And they have received the cultural message, thanks to Chairman Mao and the American arms industry: power comes from the barrel of a gun.

#jordan peterson #gun violence #firearms #power #powerlessness #men #weak #strong #tough

[athousandgateaux]

Too often, feminists have imagined powerlessness as the suppression of desire by some external force, and they’ve forgotten that more often than not, desire is this external force. Most desire is nonconsensual; most desires aren’t desired.

Andrea Long-Chu, Females, pg. 79

#females #andrea long-chu #feminism #feminists #power #powerlessness #desire #nonconsensual #subjectivity #psychoanalysis #queer

[indizombie]

Instagram, TikTok and other social media have become daily fixtures in the lives of children and young people around the world, with 59% of young people surveyed by Amnesty International now spending more than two hours of their average day on social media. Yet research on young people’s experiences on social media remains overwhelmingly focused on North America, Europe and Australia. Amnesty International collected responses from 550 children and young people between the ages of 13 and 24 across 45 countries to better understand their lived experiences, concerns and attitudes towards social media. Amidst praise for the diversity of ideas, users’ creativity and opportunities for activism that young people find on social media, two major concerns stand out: the toll harmful content and what many young participants describe as “addictive” platform design take on young people’s mental health and their feeling of powerlessness in the face of global companies’ constant nudging to participate in a vicious cycle of personal data sharing and content consumption.

‘“We are totally exposed”: Young people share concerns about social media’s impact on privacy and mental health in global survey‘, Amnesty International

#Instagram #TikTok #North America #Europe #Australia #diversity of ideas #creativity #activism #platform design #addiction #powerlessness #personal data sharing #content consumption #Amnesty International #Young people #social media #privacy #mental health

[val-daily]

Saturday, 18 March 2023

Well Done:

I overcame my uneasiness and asked people at the ACA meeting to speak up about powerlessness. When it came to me, I told what was actually going on in my mind instead of trying to be useful, well-put etc. Fighting perfectionism.

On my way to the meeting, I was scurrying, but when I bumped into one of the attendants, we had a really nice chat. It hadn't felt awkward or pleasing, it was a perfectly uplifting normal chat.

I managed to relax in the beauty saloon after a cosmetologist cleaned my face (that was quite painful, TBH). I even dozed off a bit.

To better:

When I started to realize that I'm going to be a bit late for the meeting, I haven't sympathized with me, but harshly attacked my planning skills, my stupidity, transportation system etc. I still have to make peace with this kind of powerlessness: Transport may go slower than I'd like, the world doesn't have to speed up, just because I need it too. My time-management mistakes are human, I don't have to be perfect and well-prepared at all times.

Delights:

I donated a few bags of my dad's clothes to charity. It appeared to be a cosy place with nice coffee, books and a quarter for a minor church. Diversity is always better than monotony.

Dry roads and sunny weather that reminded me of spring to come, of summer to come. It felt free and full of potential.

Delicious chicken roll at the moll.

A cosmetologist made me a very nice and relaxing massage.

#cosmetology #self healing #healing journal #mental health #healing #spring #eastern europe #eastern europe aesthetic #powerlessness #time management #charity #winter aesthetic #adult children of alcoholics #aca #relaxation #diversity #val’s photo

[freewayhaunt]

"No one should be praised for his goodness if he has not strength enough to be wicked. All other goodness is but too often an idleness or powerlessness of will.” ― François de La Rochefoucauld

#françois de la rochefoucauld #good #wicked #evil #powerlessness #will #quotes #maxims #literature #philosophy #life

[unwelcome-ozian]

#trauma recovery #abuse recovery #powerlessness