Can't or Won't?

I saw this at Kate’s site and rather than leave a long comment there, I thought I’d post about it. I could probably do an ongoing series on the subject – and who knows, I might – but today I want to focus on the first thing that came to mind when I saw it.

For me, when I see the word “impossible”, it means “I can’t”.

Now, for all of us, there are things in life we can’t do. I can’t, for example, run the hundred yard dash in less than 10 seconds. I can’t dunk a basketball. I can’t jump from here to the moon. For you it might be something different. For most of us, however, “I can’t” is just a substitute for “I won’t”, or perhaps “I don’t want to”.

“I can’t” is like a get out of jail free card. It absolves us of all responsibility. It’s bigger than we are. Stronger, too. It’s something we just can’t fight. And it manifests in our lives on a daily basis in ways big and small.

Ultimately, “I can’t” is a cop-out, a rationalization about all the things we deal with in life that are beyond us. And to paraphrase a line from The Big Chill, just try getting through a single day without several juicy rationalizations. “I can’t” is our mantra and eventually, it becomes the prism through which we define ourselves.

One of the first steps toward doing the impossible is to take ownership of “I can’t”. When “I can’t” becomes “I won’t” or “I don’t want to”, then it becomes personal and honest. “I can’t” doesn’t need a reason. “I won’t” or “I don’t want to” require one.

“I won’t”. Why not? “Well, I just don’t want to”. Sure, I get that. But why don’t you want to?

You see? “I can’t” lets you off the hook. The others require an explanation – even if it’s only to yourself. Once you know the reason – the why – then you have something to work with.

And something to work with is something you CAN change.

Enough

I'm sick of this shit. Spring can't come soon enough.

Dead Sex

A man I used to know confided to me once that it really turned him on to have a woman pretend to play dead during sex. I'm pretty sure he was kidding but it did give me an idea for a whole different kind of "Night of the Living Dead" movie.

Now it appears that the idea is catching on, at least with some species. In an experiment conducted in Denmark, researchers have discovered that some spiders - male spiders, that is - have better sex by pretending to play dead:

All the males sought to attract partners by offering a gift of food, held in the mouth.

But the ones that lay flat and motionless -- even if meant getting dragged about by a female that had latched onto the victuals -- wound up in a much better position, as it were, to engage in sexual activity.

The hapless males that tried the direct approach wound up keeping the free meal but not getting what they were really after.

Males that played dead were also allowed to copulate longer than males that did not, ensuring more eggs could fertilized, the researchers reported.

Actually, this technique isn't new. I've used it for years, although the results haven't been very satisfactory.

Maybe it's the snoring that ruins it.

One Of These Things Is Not Like The Other

Full Moon Over Burlington

Two shots of the full moon last night, plus one coming out of the eclipse.

Just in Time for Valentine's Day

Now they tell us:

Psychologists studying relationships confirm the steady decline of romantic love. Each year, according to surveys, the average couple loses a little spark. One sociological study of marital satisfaction at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and Penn State University kept track of more than 2,000 married people over 17 years. Average marital happiness fell sharply in the first 10 years, then entered a slow decline.

Wow. That's a little like saying if you jump off a 10-story building, you're going to fall sharply for 10 stories and then enter a sudden stop.

But for some people, the romantic feelings never decline. Futurepundit discusses the research to discover why and how it may lead to exchanging neuro-scans instead of phone numbers in the future.

A New Look at an Old Favorite

Nazi-Hunting in the Men's Room

No, it's not a trailer for the new Indiana Jones movie, it's real - real, I tell you - and, to some, very frightening:

What would we be permitted by the state to write about? How about Nazis? It's been years since I've run into one, but apparently they're everywhere. A British blogger, pooh-poohing my book, said there are more Nazis than Muslims in England. Really? In Canada, meanwhile, defenders of Section 13 of the Human Rights Code — the one that makes "criminals" of Maclean's — warn that if the private member's motion of Keith Martin, MP, proposing its repeal were to succeed, Nazis would be free to peddle their dangerous Nazi ideas to simple-minded Canadians who might lack the fortitude to resist. As evidence of the Nazi tide waiting to engulf the Dominion once Section 13 is repealed, Liberal spin doctor Warren Kinsella posted on his website a photograph he'd taken in a men's room stall showing the words "WHITE POWER" and a swastika scrawled on the wall at knee height. Why Mr. Kinsella is photographing public toilets on his knees I don't know, but every guy needs a hobby. At any rate, Warren sees this loser's graffiti as critical evidence of the imminent Nazi threat to the peaceable kingdom.

Nazis. I hate those guys.

From Scratch

...it is a marathon and not a sprint...Everyone has their own unique circumstances. Maybe you are young and healthy like me and you can fight out quick. Maybe you are a single mother of two and you need more time. Maybe you are an older gentleman and you’re confined to a wheelchair. Everybody faces adversity, and everybody has their own story to write in the end.

It’s important to question: Am I making the most of my situation? Am I on track? Am I prepared to be disciplined for 2, 3, 5, 10 years? This isn’t to say that we need to be robots – there’s a lot to be said about how happy we were down in Charleston as penny-pinchers – but we need to maintain that focus. And also, are we imparting our knowledge – and mistakes – on others…our friends, our family, our children? That’s how we really begin to break the cycle of the persistence of the same lifestyle.

And whatever you do, don’t lose sight of that prize that you’re shooting for.

From an interview with Adam Shepard at Get Rich Slowly. (emphasis theirs)

If you're not familiar with Adam Shepard and his book, Scratch Beginnings, here's his website. I highly recommend it.

Add Imagination and Stir

(h/t Goodshit)

This Should Be Obvious

I'd never read the term "revealed preference" before, but it makes perfect sense to me:

What most of us are really in favor of is higher taxes on other people. If we wanted higher taxes on ourselves, we'd give the money to charity.

Does It Take More Explanation Than This?

Why We Kiss, from Scientific American. (h/t Goodshit).

Here's my reason:

Your Tuition Dollars At Work

The Good Perfessor directs us to Sex Week at Yale.

Perhaps it should be subtitled: How I went to college to become a Vivid Girl.

And why is the session on Safe Sex set for the Monday after Sex Week? Isn't that a little like closing the barn door after the animals have all escaped?

Night Thoughts

This morning I woke at 4:30, stared at the clock for a moment and then realized I didn't have to get up for another 90 minutes. So I rolled over and went back to sleep. Ah, bliss! Compared, at least, to the previous night, when I woke at 2:30 and, try as I might, couldn't get back to slumber land.

Why does that happen?

One reason has to do with how comfortable I am when I wake (and God only knows why I wake in the first place - driving home the other day I happened to glance down at the odometer at the exact moment my truck was hitting 153,000. Why? I have no clue. I pay no attention whatsoever to my odometer and yet, for some unknown reason, I just happen to be looking when it rolls over a milestone).

Last night, I was very warm and comfy when I opened my eyes and so it was pretty easy to close them again and drift off to sleep. The previous night I was uncomfortable and, for some reason, couldn't seem to get comfortable after I woke. I have to be very careful doing anything during the night - getting up to use the bathroom, etc. - because once my brain kicks in, that's it. I might as well check out the late night offerings on Skinemax.

Now, I know there are physical reasons for waking during the night (blood sugar dropping, etc.) but I will go weeks and even months without it happening and then suddenly I'll get on a roll. The worst part is, there are no pleasant thoughts when you wake at those hours. The Danes call the hours before dawn the "Wolf Hours".

Lately, the wolves have been hungry.

Six Words

Over at the NYT, the Freakonomics blog has a contest going: Come up with a Six-Word Motto for the United States. As of this moment, they've got 839 entries so far with, I'm sure, many more to come. If you didn't know this was going on, by all means, click on over and read.

As you can see, some are funny, some are patriotic and a whole bunch are pretty snarky, so much so that James Lileks responds thusly:

Love of country must always be qualified these days, lest anyone think you are unaware of slavery, insufficiently regulated railroad stock offerings, Lester Maddox or the attempt by Philip Morris to conceal the addictive nature of cigarettes. Say “I love this country” at a dinner table with strangers, and it’s like shave and a haircut without the two bits. But? But? We are an exceptional nation, to be sure, but you can’t leave it at that. We are exceptionally misguided, exceptionally lazy and xenophobic, shot through to the pith with bilious perfidy, and our sole redeeming quality is our ability to constantly remake ourselves. We’ll either perfect society so we can perfect human nature, or do it the other way around. Either’s fine. Whatever works.

As always, you should read the whole thing. And, for what it's worth, here's my motto:

America: Land of Freedom and Opportunity.

That's what it is to me.

No Surprise

Which of the Seven Deadly Sins Are You?

Lust -- 'Nuff said.
Take this quiz!








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Too Cute for Words

Via Pizdaus (h/t Goodshit)