Exodus Mentality said...
Insurgent, you trying to play the same zero sum game as CNu. Sorry, doesn't compute here. Why must that mother who wants her law degree abandon her children to do so? I know for a fact it's not necessary because I DID IT. Now she may need to leave a spouse who is unable or unwilling to support her in her growth process. But that is so against the word of God, isn't it? That's a whole other discussion and I'm not that interested right now.And self actualization is a journey, not a place. You know you're on the path when you feel yourself straining to reach your potential. You know you aren't when you constantly bemoan your situation and circumstances, yet continue to do the same things hoping for different results.
You were created with limitless potential; some call it "in the image of God". So your creator gave you all this potential and yet, it's perfectly alright for you to sit around and do nothing with your life because of your marital or parental situation. You'd rather look back at your life and fantasize about all the things you could have done, if only you hadn't given your life for your family. But your reward is in heaven I guess. Good luck with that.
Intellectual Insurgent said...
Ex,
You reveal a lot of contempt for your family in your comments.
You were created with limitless potential; some call it "in the image of God". So your creator gave you all this potential and yet, it's perfectly alright for you to sit around and do nothing with your life because of your marital or parental situation.
Having been to law school myself and practiced for years, I find it beyond hilarious that anyone would suggest that law school is the path to fulfilling one's potential. Perhaps in the material sense, but not in any other way.
Which also explains the contempt for marriage and family that comes through in your comments.
Only someone who could care less about their parenting and spousal duties could suggest that being a parent could, in any way, equate with sitting around and doing nothing and not living to your potential.
Indeed God created us with limitless potential. To create life in our image. What greater potential is there? What greater way to "self-actualize" then to see yourself in a young child's eyes and to know that this child will become what you model for her?
You are stuck on material "potential". The rest of us are discussing spiritual potential, which exists nowhere near a law school. I know. I've been there done that.
I didn't start living to my full potential until I quit being a lawyer and became a MOTHER.
9 comments:
Irony of ironies....,
Let me ask you DV, in the absolute capitalist food-powered hierarchical make-work system (Plantation) - is there anything less tangibly productive or more parasitic than a "law degree"?
Seriously?
(I guess there's always "accounting", "economics", "political science" or an "MBA")
But if "self-actualization" in the "image of god" only boils down to make-work paper pushing in the plantation - and a person must "stretch" to reach his "potential" - to accomplish that - but can't stretch to meet the exigencies of a marital relationship - perhaps that's just not a person cut out for marriage and parenting?
I don't understand why II and EM are debating. II, you got your law degree and worked now you are a mother and that is wonderful. It looks like EM was raising her children and went to school at the same time. Is something wrong with that? Or is the argument because you feel EM was marginalizing your position as a Mother? I am not getting the nuances.
is there anything less tangibly productive or more parasitic than a "law degree"?
Investment banker. :-)
Mahndisa,
The debate is about what constitutes living to one's full potential; what constitutes self-actualization, whatever the hell that even means.
I submit that the notion that putting aside being a mother and a wife in order to go to law school is not an act of self-actualization or living to one's full potential. There is no greater living to one's full potential than parenthood. Nothing.
Ex's suggestions that parenthood and spousehood is the equivalent of not living to one's full potential and that the day consists of sitting around doing nothing is evidence of someone who knows nothing of self-actualization and living to one's full potential. In fact, quite the opposite, as Craig quite skillfully demonstrated.
Investment banker. :-)
Sho's you right.
And let's not forget politicians.
It seems that folk have gone through the superficial motions of matrimony (like good conformists imitating what they think they see and think they're supposed to do) but nobody's actually sat down and taught them up front what the sacrament really means. One would suppose given the pomp and ritual UNIQUELY associated with this sacrament that folks might gather some hint about its significance in the larger scheme of things.
Looking at the law degree itself as self-actualizing is absurd. Equally absurd is denigrating the entire profesion of law because of the bad acts of some in the profession. Are we then to believe all preachers are simply pimpin for Jesus because there are some who blatantly fit that profile? For the record, I don't even bother to practice because I found a better use for the knowledge and skills that I came with earning that degree.
If your idea of complete fulfillment in your life involves the single minded devotion to the development of your offspring then bravo for you. Maybe I don't feel that way because I am a man, and perhaps we are socialized and even genetically predisposed to approach parenthood in a certain way.
Does the fact that I am a man, change anything in this equation? I think not. Because my feeling of self-fulfillment comes not only from playing the game I find myself in to the best of my ability, but also in preparing my children to be at the top of their game as well. I feel no need to justify myself as a parent to anyone; suffice it to say I have never met anyone I consider a better parent than myself.
You and CNu started off assuming the zero-sum proposition that one could not have it both ways. You can't serve God and man. Well I can; and do it quite well. I don't down you or clown you for whatever it is you choose to do. I give you credit for having made that choice, as opposed to having it thrust upon you and feeling that you are still not being all that you feel you should be. Congratulations on being well-adjusted. Now, take yourself out of the equation, and look at how most of the people around you conduct their lives. All that stress and strife you see is brewed up in a pot of unfulfilled potential.
And by the way, even amoebas spawn offspring. There really isn't anything inherently special about that ability over any of your other potentials or endowments. For the record most of us don't intentionally create life in our own image. Most people just run around boning and end up caught up with blessed little surprises.
And CNu how can you sit there with a straight face and lament that "no one has taught them what the sacraments mean"; when the church (ostensibly the ones responsible for the teaching of sacraments and such) is the place where marriages are established. What do y'all do in there every Sunday, other than drink wine and eat crackers? Is there no sacrament instruction taking place? Or perhaps is all that sacrament stuff just another control mechanism set in place by a religious hegemony determined to exercise control over all aspects of it's adherents lives. As such it's useless for achieing anything remotely positive and productive, like stable relationships and families.
I can't wait until the Pope decides it's OK for men to have more than one wife (social engineering that is not so far fetched if the numbers of females continue to outpace the number of males). I'd really like to see how far they can make some people go in the name of following the dictates of the one true god.
Here again, I let my 12 year marriage speak for itself. It's all good and we don't need no stinkin' sacraments. Obviously they aren't taking hold to well with the people who espouse them with so much fervor (see divorce rates, infidelity rates, abuse rates, murder rates, etc).
I never intended this to be personal, as I know none of you well enough to comment on your personal circumstances. YOu might do well not to pretend to know mine either.
In general, my observation of spousal and family relationships is that all the moralizing in the world has not led to the stable functional family unit to which everyone seems to aspire. Tell people they owe it to their kids, their country, or their god, and you still get people who are not good spouses or good parents. So maybe it's something else for those whom the sacraments just can't seem to keep in line.
Dwight, I never made any such assumption. I did, however, gather from your own words that you have no definite or tangible idea what "self-actualization" or "metanoia" (turning of the mind) means.
self actualization is a journey?!?!?!
rotflmbao...,
Very curious that a man would vigorously defend the pursuit of something that he can't even clearly define in preference to accepting the struggle to achieve a mutual and reciprocal understanding with a woman with whom he can parent a child whose objective fact is beyond any doubt.
The "journey" to which you've alluded seems like little more than a quest to elongate some very mortal tailfeathers.
I suspect that at this very moment, there are more fully self-actualized illiterate peasants in the Mexican countryside than there are lawyers/bankers/politicians in the entire U.S. and EU combined.
That said, this isn't a zero sum game. I believe that Dina and I simply agree that the overwhelming majority of people who undertake the sacrament of matrimony in the U.S. are incompetent to do so, and, that instead of struggling and striving to develop what's immature in themselves, they've learned to excuse and rationalize subjective and interpersonal underdevelopment.
As a matter of course, such people shouldn't aspire to parenting anything more complicated than a dog or a cat - and should by all means practice on several of those in order to learn how to pay attention to and nurture something outside themselves...,
instead of struggling and striving to develop what's immature in themselves, they've learned to excuse and rationalize subjective and interpersonal underdevelopment.
Bingo!
That is what Ex fails to see or doesn't want to see.
All the hokey pokey about a spouse preventing the other spouse from "self-actualizing" in law school is just silly psychobabble that "educated" people throw out to rationalize their dissatisfaction with their lives.
all the moralizing in the world has not led to the stable functional family unit to which everyone seems to aspire.
Most people don't aspire to that. They aspire to have a wedding. They do not aspire to have a marriage. There is a HUGE difference between the two. Unfortunately, most Constantinians have no idea what that difference is.
Add to that ignorance a stinking heap of self-help, feminist jibberish about self-actualization, a couple Julia Roberts flicks and, voila - a divorce rate through the roof.
II:
If you did not go to law school or seek out higher education, do you think you'd be in a position to raise your daughter to the best of your ability? There is something to this notion of self actualization because if the mother doesn't have it together, then it will be hard to give her kid the benefit of her knowledge.
This is why so many people talk about single uneducated mothers. I am quite certain that being a Mother is one of the most beautiful and important jobs on the planet, believe me. BUT, surely one cannot derive all sense of satisfaction from being a Mother if they are living in screwed up conditions.
Your pursuit of higher education, coupled to your husbands' profession has given you the flexibility to raise your daughter right and travel etc. If you had not pursued these avenues, do you think you'd be just as good of a mother?
I'm just asking because you know that right now, I stay at home with Eno and do remote tutoring at my leisure. I must admit that I've never felt so fulfilled. But I also admit that I've done many many things and lived an interesting life so my son can benefit from that and I can share a good life with him.
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