The Cure for Popular Nonsense

"Fool's gold exists
because there is real gold."

Your daring LiveReal Agents,
bravely wading through the mountains of modern misinformation,
did not forget their shovels . . .

What do you think?
Talk about it, ask about it, submit your own
info@livereal.com

The LiveReal Agents have been working, tirelessly and undauntedly, to curb the flood of intellectual spam that has infiltrated bookstores, talk shows, daytime television, mushy skulls and casual conversation everywhere, in an effort to help those of us who are interested untangle true, practical wisdom from mental cotton candy.

But we'd like to work together on this. So talk to us.

What kind of psychobabble drives you crazy? What unfounded, unproven, wishful-thinking-sugar-coated thinking really makes your toenails curl up and turn green?

Here are some small selections to get us started:

Follow Your Heart!!

"I followed my heart . . . and wound up pregnant."

Of course, "following your heart," as advice, is a no-lose game. Simple answers to complex problems are a necessary part of life.

Still, the hard part and the real challenge is figuring out what exactly your real heart is, and what it's really telling you.

It sounds like it should be the most simple thing in the world . . . but taking a look at most of the world, and they're either not in touch with their "heart" or else that kind of "heart" isn't the thing you want to be in touch with.

The most helpful guideposts to set up in this realm is to get a taste for what your heart is not: it is not your appetites, it is not necessarily what you believe to be your impulses or instincts, it is not always necessarily interested in what's the most fun, immediate, pleasurable, or easy thing to do at the time. Sometimes, maybe even often, it's what is hard, uncomfortable, not easy, and not immediately rewarding. And that is when those who really want to "follow their heart" walk a different path than those who actually don't.

"I only wanted to live
in accord with the promptings
which came from my inner self.
Why was that so very difficult?"
Herman Hesse

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Live Your Dreams!! Make All Your Dreams Come True!!

The bookshelves are packed chock-full with all breeds and varieties of books claiming to help you "live your dreams." And of course, living your dreams, following your real dreams, keeping your deepest dreams alive, is, well, a thing well worth doing. (The authors of these books have been dreaming of ways to write a book people like us will buy.)

Yet, we believe that you have a much better chance of actually living your dreams (the real ones) if you are not blinded by the undue optimism which these books encourage, and so, we are therefore forced to point out what may seem like the cold hard truth of the matter. It's a tough job, but as the saying goes, we're going to do it anyway.

Take this case study of a young girl who had a dream of one day . . . someday . . . becoming Miss America. Her dream came true. And it wasn't four months later that she's bitching and whining about how tough it is.

So in regards to "Live Your Dreams," consider the following possibilities . . .

1. There is a pretty decent chance that you are dreaming for the wrong thing, and so, your dreams will probably not come true;
2. It's often a darn good thing they won't, for the good of you and us all (imagine the dreams of young adolescent males);
3. Very often, your dreams coming true would mean my dreams not coming true, and vice-versa;
4. If your dreams do come true, it might not have anything to do with reading this or that book;
5. If your dreams do come true, you might be just as dissatisfied with them then, as you are now
   
   (Consider this: when you were five, you dreamed of being ten; when you were fifteen, you dreamed of turning sixteen, when you were seventeen, you dreamed of turning eighteen; when you were eighteen, you dreamed of turning twenty-one; when you were single, you dreamed of being married; when you get married, you dream of being single . . .)
   
   "We are always getting ready to live, but never living."
   Ralph Waldo Emerson
   
   
6. A lot of your dreams have already come true; what about being satisfied with those, or say, feeling gratitude? When does the whole process cross over into, well, being greedy for more dreams come true, more dreams, MORE . . . Does this "the universe is here to make me happy" attitude create the impression that the purpose of the universe is a big candy store, chock filled with lollipops for us all to grab and suck on?
7. Again, maybe you're most likely dreaming for the wrong thing anyway. (Elvis succeeded beyond his wildest dreams, so to speak. No offense to the King.)
8. Does an acorn become an oak by "making it's dreams come true"? Or just by growing naturally?
9. There is the possibility that you can spend your whole life working towards a "dream" and end up completely empty-handed . . . sometimes dreaming of the future makes you miss right now;
10. More often than not, we actually learn and grow more by not getting what we think we want . . .
11. Introspection Exercise: Why do you think you're dreaming about what you're dreaming about, anyway?

This might all sound a little harsh, but hey, we're actually not interested in dashing hopes, dreams, plans, real life missions, etc. Rather, we're just trying to add a small dash or two of reality to a way-overhyped marketplace that encourages us to chase all kinds of stupid and irrelevant fantasies at the cost of ignoring things that really matter.

In other words, sometimes it can be a good idea, well, to pause for a moment and make sure that the "dreams" we have aren't really just the offspring of some commercial, movie, or sales pitch we got when we were fifteen . . . and are really our own.

That said, sometimes, the deepest, most secret, hidden dreams we have tucked away in the most private corners of our minds . . . are ones that do become realities, and that actually are everything they were cracked up to be, where every ounce of sweat we had to lose to get them was well worth it. Those are the dreams we can make happen, whether buy and follow that book, or not.

". . . I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope
For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without love
For love would be love of the wrong thing . . ."
- T. S. Eliot

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The Church of Self Esteem

"When people do not respect us
we are sharply offended;
yet deep down in his heart
no man much respects himself."
- Mark Twain

The crown-jewel of psychological health in popular culture: "self-esteem."

"Self-esteem," the Holy Grail of the modern self-help movement, often follows a thread of discussion something like this:

"Why am I unhappy?"
"Because you don't have enough self-esteem."
"How, then, do I become happy?"
"Get more self-esteem!"

- and from there on, the self-esteem-building exercises, practices, and lifestyles multiply and flourish, and "building" this invisible thing called "self-esteem" becomes a primary objective of one's life.

Your truth-seeking Editors at LiveReal, of course, have absolutely nothing against honest, solid, real confidence. That's the whole point. Further still, if "self-esteem" is loosely equate with happiness, competence, health, confidence, fame, virtue, wealth, character, and any "good" - who would be against it?

So it seemed worthwhile to investigate the matter more deeply . . .

MAGAZINE DESK | February 3, 2002, The Trouble With Self-Esteem By Lauren Slater (NYT)
Lauren Slater article questions widely held view that high self-esteem is key to well-being, success and social responsibility, and that low self-esteem steers you in the opposite direction . . .

she notes three recent studies that concluded that people with high self-esteem pose greater threat to those around them than people with low self-esteem and that feeling bad about yourself is not the cause of the country's biggest, most expensive social problems; she suggests putting more emphasis on self-control and self-appraisal . . ."

- from the New York Times, February 3rd, 2002

First of all, ironically enough, it seems to be the case that for most people with real, solid confidence, they did not "get it" by "working on their self-esteem."

Rather, most of the time, the issue never even really came up.

Overall, the basic theory about "self-esteem" is that a person actually has two "selves," one that is actually a "self," and another that "esteems." The goal, according to popular doctrine, is to get one "self" to hold a high opinion of the other "self," as in a type of inner status game, which is then taken as a sign of mental and psychological health. Success and mental health are therefore defined as any individual who thinks highly of himself, or herself.

As with most popular myths, there is a grain of truth to the whole self-esteem issue: the real intent behind the effort is for one to have true confidence, a healthy, intact ego, stability of mind and honest self-respect, a state of clarity, well-being, health, and innocence, in which one knows that he or she is a good person. It's a sense that many of us today, in some way or another, seem to have lost. Thus ensues the cacophony and cries of "self-esteem."

The actuality, on the other hand, results in things such as . . .

. . . no matter what kind of arrogant jerk, rude slob, or obnoxious buffoon a person is, a person can then justify and excuse anything about themselves by either claiming a lack of self-esteem or need for it.

. . . "Feeling good about oneself" is the ultimate measure of all actions (so, when a husband cheats on his wife, when a teenager takes drugs, when a person eats too much, the claims is that it is perfectly justified because it helps one's 'self-esteem' or soothed his or her lack thereof. . .)

. . . calling attention to one's "self-esteem," or lack thereof, is probably one of the more humiliating experiences a person can experience at all, and so, has a self-defeating quality to it . . .

. . . many believe that constantly praising, adoring, affirming, and complimenting another person increases their self-esteem (and therefore psychological health). Therefore, they engage in a campaign to praise, adore, affirm, and compliment certain others under any conditions and at all costs, no matter how insincere, phony, untrue, or manipulative it may be. This practice of forcefully injecting another with psychological health, in a manner similar to blowing air into a rubber raft, or blowing smoke into another part of one's anatomy, can often substitute for genuine affection, honest communication, and realistic discussion.

This overwhelming obsession with self-esteem is often is an attempt to persuade a mental and emotional inner "judge" to praise and chat incessantly about how wonderful we are instead of droning incessantly about how terrible we are, rather than, for example, becoming free of the internal incessant judging itself. It's seeking "approval" rather than "criticism," although both are external judgments about yourself rather than internal or innate - even if they've been internalized or programmed into you via affirmations or others' praise.

It is a popular myth that "self-esteem" is an essential precursor to being a productive human being; The reality is that most of those who suffered unhappy childhoods go on to lead healthy, productive adult lives, and even those with little or no self-esteem are still often remarkably effective human beings.

Many of us do feel an emptiness, a lack, that something wrong, that somehow we've lost something and need to get it back. This feeling perception lies at the root of a lot of self-esteem frenzy, but all too often, the frenzy does not seem to help it or stop it. There are better ways.

Real confidence, and the investigation, creation, and undoing of it, is one of the areas of interest of LiveReal, which we hope to explore and investigate. More could be said on this topic, and will, but for now, for those interested, we suggest an investigation of the LiveReal Products in the Psychology Arena.

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Live Up To Your Potential!

If the average human male would successfully "live up to" his potential in the reproductive sense, he would produce enough babies to populate the entire planet and many others besides.

Many people sense that there is something more to being human than is part of our ordinary experience. This intuition may very well be correct. (And if it is, then what are we supposed to do about it?)

At the same time, many of the people who say this are, frankly, trying to sell something. While some of this is sincere, one continually has to watch for yet another aspect of the culture of hype . . .

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I'm a Victim, You're a Victim, He's a Victim, She's . . .

Another very popular trend is for any person to be the victim of some other person, group, philosophy, practice, culture, oppression or stigma.

Actual, real victims and oppressed people, of course, do exist. Two year-olds are molested by fathers, young men are tortured and executed by the government in power for having opinions of his own, an older man is an innocent bystander in a terrorist attack . . . Such cases are real victims.

On the other hand, what we're talking about here are "victim-wannabees" who cheapen, water down, and generally insult those who are real victims by trying to make their own personal and petty grievances and hurt feelings equal to those of actual victims.

On the whole, practically everyone in modern America claims to be a victim of some sort or another, and no party takes responsibility for being the victimizer. So, we have a nation of oppressed people, with no one who really seems to do the oppressing.

So, the reason why one is suffering, unhappy, or unsuccessful is because my parents/boss/coworkers/friends/family are or were too mean/nice/hard/easy/unfair/dishonest etc, etc. The important matter is blaming another and avoiding one's own responsibility for any part in the matter.

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Think Positive!!

We definitely do not advocate pessimism, gloom, and negativity. At the same time, many positive-thinking fanatics take things a little too far.

There are some mind-training programs of "positive thinking" which, in fact, don't actually seem that "positive" at all

The basic view of this perspective is that "we create our own reality," so by positive thinking, we will create a positive reality (instead of our usual negative thinking, which will create a negative reality.)

Implicit in this view are the following assumptions:

1. That one does in fact create his or her own reality and can become a kind of puppetmaster over it;
2. That reality is something one can and should bend to one's will;
3. That "reality" is something that is completely manufactured, instead of something we discover, or something that exists regardless of what we're doing about it;
4. That we know how things should be;
5. This bending is done simply through thinking;
6. That humans are defined as essentially things which need to be programmed.

- Again, all of the above assumptions may sometimes have some positive aspects when used with the appropriate perspective. However, as with all good things, they can go awry when taken too far.

For example:
This can foster an attitude of "I'm going to get what I want" in the future, which actually creates a future-orientation or infinite-delay-of-gratification, which keeps us away from the present moment, and continually chasing an elusive carrot, which hangs and tempts always just beyond reach . . . the "life is what happens while you are busy making other plans" approach, or "we are always getting ready to live, but never living."

This can foster the Philosophy of the Ostrich, or the habit of sticking one's head in the sand and insisting that things are just fine from from this perspective, because, after all, we see nothing bad, a.k.a, unpleasant things go away by ignoring them.

This can be nothing more than a type of compensation for negative thinking. In a way, this is the belief that spraying mental aerosol all over a stinking pile of negative thoughts will make things smell rosy, enough that the smell of roses will hopefully dominate and overpower the stink. In reality, if there were no stink there, we wouldn't need the roses.

As Roy Masters might say: Notice your finger. What does your finger feel right now? Nothing, probably. Now, imagine you burn your finger. Then imagine that you run it under a cold faucet. Then, the cold water would feel great. Moral: if you don't burn your finger, you don't need to run it under the faucet. Translation: If you don't have a bedrock of "negative" thoughts you're trying to suppress, you don't need any cold splash of positive thoughts to soothe them over.

On affirmations: we belabor ourselves with the need to affirm that things are so-and-so instead of such-and-such.

This "reprogramming" done by affirmations which are, in a way, invasive attempts to reprogram a "bad" program, with the ongoing assumption that we have no choice but to run programs. We "program ourselves" with positive affirmations, positive thoughts, etc, and then wonder why we act like robots.

Further, affirmations are often attempts to invalidate our real, living perceptions ("Pretend, as hard as you can, that you don't see what you see") and try to replace them with what we wish we would perceive instead. Hence, voluntary self-delusion.

These implanted suggestions or forced-ways-of-perceiving are not solid, but as Byron Brown said, "positive judgment is like makeup: it must always be reapplied, and a good hard rain will wash it away." And life is full of good hard rains.

Positive thinking isn't really as positive as it would like to be. For example, it's very negative towards negativity. Or really, whatever it considers to be "negativity." Sometimes, as Richard Rose would say, a negative reaction to a negative situation can be very positive. What about, say, the "lemons into lemonade" approach, where negatives are used and transformed into positives?

To elaborate, perhaps fear, worry, depression, nagging feelings of dissatisfaction and unsettledness - have very positive messages they're trying to communicate, messages that we should not ignore or affirm away, but should take heed of, listen to, and learn from.

Further, affirmations are attempts to program mentally what we think we should feel emotionally and even physically. This doesn't work.

As any actor or actress would tell you, we can't feel things by trying to force yourself to feel things - for example, trying to "feel an emotion" by repeating "Get angry, get angry, get angry" to yourself. It is fruitless, because our emotions do not work that way. In a sense, emotions speak a different "language" than thoughts do, and to understand or see something emotionally cannot be controlled through a mental process or technique.

 

All in all, there are better ways to see the bright side of things than by forcing a mindset of positive thinking. An alternative to positive self-judgment is, well, seeking to know who you really are.

After all, most of the time, the best things in our lives happen in spite of us, not because of us.

And well, if there is a God who designed the universe, then He is in charge here, not us, and He probably knows what He's doing.

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"Men and Women are the Same"

Just in case anyone does actually still believe this, that literally, all men and women are exactly the same . . . we've designed a little experiment you can run yourself!

1. Go into your local bookstore
2. Switch all magazines in the "Women's" section over to "Men's," and all the "Men's" magazines over to "Women's."
3. Observe results.
   
   This line of thought probably originated as a way for women to express and assert equal rights. However, here a crucial distinction is needed: to be "equal" does not necessarily mean to be "exactly the same." Apples and oranges have a different "nature," yet that fact does not make apples superior to or inferior to oranges, or vice versa. Difference does not imply inequality.

For more elaboration, check out, say, the book "Brain Sex."

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"It's All In the Genes!""

From Exploding the Gene Myth by Ruth Hubbard and Elijah Wald:

"Molecular biologists, as well as the press, use verbs like 'control,' 'program,' or 'determine' when speaking about what genes or DNA do. There are all inappropriate because they assign far too active a role to DNA . . .

In a way, the DNA in our cells is like a cookbook. We need a cookbook if we want to make a complex dish, but it does not make the dish, nor can it determine which dish to make or whether the dish will come out right. The cook and the ingredients will determine whether and how a recipe is used, whether we end up eating soup or cake, and how the food tastes."

Michael Yapko, Ph.D. also asks some poignant questions, for example, on depression:

1. "Why is depression rising in every age group?
2. Why is someone born since 1945 likely to be up to 10 times more depressed than their grandparents?
3. Why are adolescents the fastest growing age group of depression sufferers?
4. Why is a child born to depressed parents 3 times more likely to be depressed?

The answers to these questions make it clear that depression involves much more than just a chemical imbalance in the brain, the popular but less than accurate belief many people hold. Drugs are not the ultimate solution to the rising rates of depression, because depression is about more than just biology."

This does bring up with whole "mind-body" question - or in another way, the free-will/determinism question . . . but that's a whole other very long conversation.

For now, let's just leave it at this: genes are not destiny, and for all practical purposes, your life is in your control.

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It's All Brain Chemistry

Scientific trends often seem to come and go much in the same way as fashion trends, and often complex scientific observations and theories often mutate into oversimplified and overgeneralized solutions to complex problems.
This seems to be the case with biochemical explanations of human behavior: Why do I do what I do? Because of brain chemistry.

This idea that "It's All Brain Chemistry" is discussed in greater depth elsewhere (Does Therapy Work?), but on the whole, we do not need to feel that all our problems, behaviors, misfortunes and suffering are due to an unfortunate (or fortunate) random arrangement of stuff inside our skulls.

Ian H. Robertson, in his book Mind Sculpture, states that "Your brain is changed physically by the conversations you have, the events you witness and the love you receive. This is true all through your life, not just when you are an infant . . . We can modify our inclinations in countless ways in a process which constantly shapes and reshapes us . . ."

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"We Only Use 10% of our Brains"

We have no idea who started this neo-urban myth, but chances are, well, their case may have been the only one where it was actually true. In any case, in true scientific fashion, you can test this out. Which 90% should we cut out?

To further combat this misconception, we will quote Stanovich (2001) who quotes Radford (1999) who quotes Robert Samuelson's definition of a psycho-fact as "a belief that, though not supported by hard evidence, is taken as real because its constant repetition changes the way we experience life," and uses this as an example of the "folk myth" that lives on despite "no basis in cognitive neuroscience."

Why, then, do such myths persist? Besides being pretty hard to conclusively disprove, it often seems that we intuitively believe, or want to believe, that we are capable of doing or being more than we ordinarily think. Which, even if not in this particular case, may very well be true.

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What Else? What other psychobabble drives you crazy?
Talk about it: info@livereal.com