This morning I saved two lost dogs. As I was kissing my Fiance goodbye this morning, at the front door, we noticed that there were two large, but adorable, dogs running loose in our front lawn. Neither of us recognized them as neighborhood dogs so we looked up and down the street for an owner. No one in sight. Ooops! The morning started feeling like a deja vu of a day not too long ago where we hung out doing yard work with a black lab that had no collar. That black lab had been running around the neighborhood loose, and crossing streets without care. So I automatically took it upon myself to adopted him for the day. As people walked by the house I’d ask them if they recognized my new friend. It was hours until the UPS man came along and finally identified him! Thank you UPS! I still owe you a big Thank You card. :) I guess I am the type of person that will stop whatever I am doing to help another. Be it a fellow person or furry friend. And that brings me to my first point of the day: Why did I stop my day, today, to help the two dogs I found running around in my yard? I’m glad I did, but why did I not even think about it? I just did it.
After I called the owner (from the one dogs tag, remember the other dog of the two had slipped his collar), I stayed in the front lawn waiting for the owner to show up. He said it would take him 10 minutes to drive to our address. Last time we drove the black lab home, but this morning I was reluctant to do so, because both dogs had clearly been having a fun time running through wet bush and grass, as they were both soaking wet and grit/dirt covered. As I was standing there commanding them to sit and stay while I petted them and tried to make friends with them with their names...a pretty blonde lady in her 30s stopped her black minivan to ask me if the dogs were mine. I said no, but I had called to owner to return them.
So why did that car stop and talk to me? What was her motivation? (This is finally the REAL point of my thought for the day, now that you have been filled in on the backstory...) Why did she stop to talk to me when the other random passing cars did not? (My jaw dropped when I realized why...) She said: “Are those your dogs?! They were running all around my yard this morning!!!” She was about to YELL at ME because of some pesky loose dogs in HER yard. OKAY, so WHY did SHE NOT go look at their tag when she COULD NOT see any owners?
Why did I? Why DIDN’T she? She looked like a nice person. She probably is a nice person.... But should I assume that because she was in her 30s and was driving a minivan that she didn’t have the time or the ability to walk out of her house and call the number on the lost dog’s tag? My fiance went into work late while we called. As soon as he heard the owners would be here in 10 mins he made sure I was okay with staying outside with the wet dogs by myself and then he finally felt like he could go to work. Why did we do this???
I LOVE writing lists. Maybe that’s weird, but that is just my thing. I find it helpful and I enjoy it. So I make sure to take the time to do it.
This morning, I physically wrote down my TODO list and I feel much better. Having the list in my phone helped some yesterday (my Fiance’s weekend is Tuesday & Wednesday, so I was feeling some pressure on the way home last night to gather my thoughts in one place to better help me start “my week” with a productive list). But it seems that until I physically write out the list, I cannot let go of it and get it off of my shoulders. After writing it all down, I feel much more relaxed now. But for some reason I am still holding a lot of tension in my jaw. I might go put my mouth-guard back in soon (but Omi is finally getting up and is in the bathroom right now). I found out YEARS ago that I have horrible TMJ and only in the past several years found out that wearing a mouth-guard at night relived getting massive, constant, tension headaches! I’m a much happier person without getting a crushing headache almost every single day! ;)
Yesterday, I said that I would finish the last 40 pages of my book first thing this morning...
Well, it's weird. Every start to a day, I keep putting it off...like, I can't justify sitting down to do something just for myself before I gently wake up my Omi, or take Lila potty, or make the bed, or fold that item, or put away this thing. I got a comfy work-mode-station all set up around me at the couch. Plugged in my laptop, got water, put granola bars within reach, and found the stapler, letter opener, address blacker-outer, TODO list paper, pen, sharpies, etc....
Guess what I did not put within my reach? My book! WHY NOT?!?! Don't they say, that to take care of others, you first have to make sure you take care of yourself? Is this why I sometimes get cranky with others and then snap at them that I “always do everything around the house”? I think it may be my fault (in a way of looking at it) because I don't take good enough care to carve out specific time for the things I WANT to do. I’m sure it is not healthy for me to just keep pushing my wants off towards "someday" and then it never gets any attention or never gets accomplished.
This train of thought about this "guilt factor" that I feel I should do this, this, and that before I get to do something on my personal WANT list sent me to search out some terminology and I found an article with a perspective that I found helpful:
It talks about a certain amount of guilt being a helpful thing. As we can actually harness guilt to help us fix problems. Guilt gives us a reason to change our actions, behaviors or habits. An example of this is: People who refuse to wear sunscreen... When it is pointed out to them how not wearing sunscreen can lead to their family members losing their loved one to skin cancer.... That guilt felt by the sunbather can encourage a change and the sunbather may start to wear sunscreen to avoid a greater possibility of getting skin cancer in the future.
This article also mentions that according to a a Wall Street Journal article:
-Women are more likely to feel more guilt than men (as women tend to feel every emotion more strongly than men).
-Women often have guilt associated with their motherhood roles (i.e. “I'm not a good enough mother”, “I need to spend more time with my children”, etc.).
-A QUOTE that I think is very important insight to the way I was raised is this:
""You can become very sensitive and hostile about criticism because you're protecting yourself from these deep feelings that are not conscious," he said. "Men may do more of that.""
-Dr. Tangney's research also shows: “That those prone to feeling guilty tend to be more empathetic, have healthier relationships and are better at resolving conflicts.” (I HOPE THIS APPLIES TO ME!)
-It was pointed out that although women & men may exhibit guilt in different forms, guilt has been found to be almost universal between cultures/religious groups. As stated in the article:
"...we all have the capacity to feel both good guilt and bad shame."
-I learned how to articulate that there is a difference between GUILT & SHAME. Guilt= you feel guilt about a particular behavior, whereas SHAME= you feel bad about yourself.
-I found out that: It is important for one's sanity to learn how "to differentiate between things you are responsible for and things that you cannot control.”
-I find it interesting that they say: "Shame-prone people are more apt to be depressed and self-focused, to blame others for their problems and to lash out with impulsive aggression. Women are more likely than men to wrestle with guilt and shame.” (I DON’T WANT THIS TO BE ME!, If I’m aware this could be a possibility, will that knowledge help me avoid it?).
-I find it fascinating in a looking between scared fingers over my face way, that: "Marketers are savvier than ever at using guilt to move products. Recent TV commercials for AOL Latino, AOL's bilingual Internet provider, subtly make parents feel guilty if they still don't have Internet service. "There are no excuses," says the announcer.” AND THIS LEADS TO THE MESSAGE: “"....‘There's a new technology that will help your children excel at school. Why aren't you using it?' (The commercials "were a home run. The phones rang off the hook in our call centers."”
(*This is something I already knew, and I think for the most part all of us are aware of this advertising trick. It is a guilt-inducing-advertising-technique. I studied this aspect of guilt-in-advertising somewhat in college, and I would like to research this particular facet of our “Guilted Age” more in the future).
-I liked reading that: “Some activists are trying to help us curb certain feelings of guilt. For instance, William Anthony, a Boston University psychologist, is on a mission to help Americans feel less guilty about taking naps. "People say they 'sneak a nap,' or 'get caught napping,' " he says. "At work, they go to the bathroom and take stall naps. The biggest impediment to napping is guilt." He advises us to "announce" to co-workers that we're taking a nap, because napping increases productivity.”
-On a more global scale: “...there are far larger guilt issues weighing on us today. Global protests over the Iraq war have led some people to say they feel guilty being Americans. At the same time, Americans who support the war effort feel guilty for not challenging assertions by the antiwar movement.”
-The Research also found that: “Most children first experience guilt between ages two and three, according to research by Grazyna Kochanska, a psychology professor at the University of Iowa. In her studies, she led toddlers to believe they damaged valuable items. She found that kids who show discomfort when they think they've done something wrong are more likely to refrain from transgressions as they get older.
"As for adults, Dr. Tangney suggests that we take an inventory of all the things we feel guilty about. "Prioritize them. Decide which things you're responsible for." And the rest? "Drop them," she says.”
-The last point the ABC article makes, I will have to quote directly, b/c I cannot think of a better way to articulate and paraphrase it:
"When treating people feeling a deep sense of shame, Ablow said that psychiatrists often have to go back to the root of the shame, which is usually in childhood. Children can often misinterpret things, he said, such as thinking their parents' divorce is their fault.
Tangney's research into guilt and shame has taught her about guiding and disciplining her own children.
"I've learned that being really harsh is counterproductive," Tangney said. "No matter how important your message is, if you really lower the boom on your kids, all they hear is, 'You're a bad person.'"
"It's clear to me that you really can't accomplish anything if the kid doesn't keep the ears open," Tangney said. "And the only way to do that is to subtly underscore that you are furious with a specific behavior, not the child overall.""
I FIND THIS ALL VERY INTERESTING! And even more interesting is that I loved taking notes about this, and that I want to research it some more because I find it fascinating. I think it's really helping me begin to understand an aspect of how I was raised, and how guilt and shame have (potentially) gotten me to where I am today.
Maybe this is why I automatically took it upon myself to find the dog’s owners this morning? Maybe I should toot my own horn and go out on a limb and recognize that I am a good person inside? Or maybe I should recognize that I was raised very strictly with greatly enforced morals and I will never consciously allow myself to not take on a responsibility that I can take care of?
Maybe we’ll never know. But I do know that helping the dogs made me smile. It made me feel good that hopefully there are other people out there that I more like me, and less like the lady in the minivan. I hope so. I hope so for the sake of my own puppy. But I also hope so for the whole worlds’ sake!
