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The World Doesn’t Work Anymore: Wake Up Calls
PART IV
by William Penzer, Ph.D.
Executive Director, The Center for Self-Control
May 2005
(954) 475-1371 |
This article is dedicated
to pulling a Royal Straight Flush…at least once in your lifetime!
In the poker game of life
you have to play the hand you’re dealt, even when the dealer is a mean and
cold-hearted SOB. What’s more, you’re not allowed to fold. With a three,
nine unsuited you need to pray for catching something on the flop or the
river. Three more threes take you from the outhouse to the penthouse. Even
two threes and a nine look huge. In life you just have to wait and see
which cards fall.
Typically our lives go
along in routine fashion. We establish our patterns and enjoy the illusion
of security and control that they provide. Few are adventurers or large
risk takers. Most people admire those who take chances and succeed, mock
those who risk and fail, but choose more conservative paths for themselves.
In a world that no longer works well, safe bets are good ones. Anyone who
lived through and lost on the techno stock insanity of the late ‘90’s and
early 2000’s would definitely agree.
From time to time our
routines are upended by turmoil, trauma, and tragedy. Our illusions of
being safe and protected can be shattered like a windshield. As I write
these words, somewhere nearby a phone rings with bad news. Chaos will rule
for quite a while.
Implied in our stopglop
model is that we can limit chaos by healthy choices. We believe the data
that there is a significant correlation between glopful behavior and hurtful
consequences. Glopful abuses lead to health, legal, relationship,
financial, and other trauma. Glop makes a mess all over our lives. In a
world that no longer works, messes become messier.
There is no denying that
messes can occur even when we take care of glopful business. Some are just
unavoidable and independent of a person’s habits.
Three examples:
·
A person who never smoked, develops lung
cancer. That sucks!
·
A safe and cautious driver is hit head on by a
drunk. Safety man dies. Drunk lives. That really sucks!
·
A person who avoids glop, exercises regularly,
has remained a faithful husband, father, and friend, arrives for a breakfast
meeting in Windows on the World at the WTC at 8:15 AM on 9/11/01. That
really, really sucks!
Sometimes the poker game of
life seems pretty unfair. Sometimes it makes the StopGlop philosophy seem
ridiculously self-denying. If our life can change traumatically or end in a
microsecond of time why sweat the glop stuff. Might as well just eat it,
drink it, smoke it…
No way. We can only
support that if you can know exactly when your trauma turn will come. If it
is soon and irreversible, have a blast. If it is someday and who knows
what, then it behooves you to try your very best to influence your outcomes
protectively, proactively and positively.
How’s Your World?
If you have read Parts I,
II, and III, you may have made some modifications to your life. The
likelihood is that you have not. It would be so nice if words of wisdom
moved us toward healthier goals. In that case the first self-help book
would have been the last. In some people they do. In the majority they
don’t. It’s just the way we are built. It’s not our fault. It is our
mission to ultimately over correct for these gaps in our programming.
What does catch our
attention are wake up calls. These tend to hit us hard and push us toward
healthier choices. People are remarkably adaptive when faced with serious
consequences. The very same people who have lived in denial for years face
reality when the wake up call rings. Admittedly, not everyone wakes up, but
the majority do-at least initially. Five examples:
·
I was a glopmeister until my angioplasty in
January, 2001. It woke me up quickly. I lost 50 pounds, stopped drinking
hard alcohol, stopped playing racquetball, cut my practice in half and
walked in the park or beach and worked out at the gym as often as I could.
I lowered my cholesterol rate from four point something to one point
something. I finally woke up to my genetic potentials and unhealthy
choices. What was I (not) thinking?
·
Sally’s husband left her for a younger woman in
his office. She woke up and lost 75 pounds and is down to 180 with a goal
of 125. She exercises 3-4 times a week and eats weight watcher healthy.
She doesn’t want her husband back, but she’s proud she is getting her SELF
back.
·
Sally’s husband Robert just got fired for
sloppy work habits and other inappropriate behaviors. He is committed to
change his way so he shows up early for work at his new company. He’s
stopped all drugs and partying on the weekends. He is focused on producing
positive results, stays off the internet at work, and is extending himself
to be social with his colleagues at work in appropriate ways. Being fired
woke him up to making healthier, glopfree choices at work. He even regrets
hurting Sally.
·
Richard is a successful entrepreneur. A few
months ago he got his second DUI. The good news is he can afford a driver.
The not so good news is his pride bank was depleted by this incident along
with the numerous black outs, frequent scenes of embarrassment and
inappropriate behaviors fueled by glop in glass. These include losing
$40,000 in one night in a casino, totaling two cars from which he ran away,
making some poor business decisions and sexually harassed an auditor
reviewing his company’s books which cost him a sizeable out of court
settlement. The first DUI woke him up- for a month or so-and then he slowly
went back to drinking. The second is a wake up call for life. The next
would mean jail time and ruination. He’s doing ninety meetings in ninety
days, has himself with a life coach/therapist, and is committed to
sobriety. He is finally listening to the alarm. It may be late, but it is
never too late.
·
Russell has just begun psychotherapy. He has
had panic attacks off and on for many years. Typically they came and went
for no apparent reason. For the most part he just suffered through them
denying their significance. This time he has said to himself, “Enough is
enough!” I need some help here! I am a stuffer of feelings. I had a
difficult childhood. I don’t want to suffer anymore. I want to be
healthy.” The likelihood is that he will be now that he is seeking help,
understanding, and support.
These examples reflect what
happens to people who finally listen to the wake up call, burst their denial
bubble and enter reality. Reality demands a reckoning. Reality pushes us
toward taking a more responsible, adult position. Reality interferes with
our more impulsive parts that can be so self-indulgent. When reality rules
so do we!
Wake up calls come in many
different forms. Here is a list of the most popular:
Wake Up Calls
·
Doctor Visits
·
Health Problems
·
Upcoming Event
·
Deaths
·
Partner Separating, Divorcing, Cheating
·
Legal Problems
·
Financial Failures
·
Anxiety Attacks
·
Feedback from Someone Close
·
Body Feedback
·
Self Feedback
·
Higher Insurance Premiums
·
Airplane Seats
·
Scales
Obviously, preventing the
wake up call is the healthier choice. Listening to it is healthier than
ignoring it. Ignoring the wake up call, like the woman who chose to
continue drinking glop in a glass after Hepatitis C was diagnosed, is the
worst choice of all. Sad and frustrating to say, our compulsions don’t die
easy. They have a way of lingering and/or returning in ways that allow them
to rule.
These patterns of addiction
and impulsivity were present even when the world worked better. They have
haunted humankind since Adam bit the first forbidden fruit, which tastes
just as sweet now as it did then. The difference is that being vulnerable
in a world not working very well is a set up for horrible happenings. Our
goals is to avoid the medical maze, legal loop de loop and financial freak
show. It’s gonna cost you time, money and large outlays of emotional
angst. It is bad enough when you get blindsided, even when you are
following glopfree strategies. That is a bummer itself, though unavoidable
sometimes, in the poker game of life. It is much, much worse when the
problems could have been avoided by following healthier and more
self-protective strategies. Don’t believe us. Just ask…lots of famous
people who have the shame and legal bills to prove it.
I speak from experience
here. There is no more powerful feeling than lying on a cold, sterile table
having your arteries cleared with the techno equivalent of a pipe cleaner
and feeling oh, so dumb for being oh so careless and out of control. This
is especially true when you have wasted so much time being fearful of losing
control, in so many unimportant and irrelevant areas. That I woke up is
definitely a pride bank deposit. That it was late in coming still sits in
my shame and blame account-especially because of the work I do helping
others challenge their glopful ways.
Take A Closer Look
I encourage you to take a
closer look at you-right now. Is there a glaring glop of exposure in your
life? If so, are you willing to wait till the wake up call rings? Might
you do something now to prevent that exposed and costly position? Can we or
our colleagues help you to try and get there? If so, give us or someone a
call. Attend our STOPGLOP half day workshop or visit us individually for a
consult. Or go to a support group meeting or sign up for a program to help
you stopglop. Take action aimed at strengthening your motivation and
potentiating your adult voice of reason and protection. Glop is promoted by
your unhealthy little boy or girl parts. You have the power to override
those impulsive driven voices by replacing them with your adult voice of
choice. We can help you to accomplish that, once and for all and forever!
Horror Stories No More!
You might be wondering why
I haven’t shared any world not working horror stories in this article. You
might even be wondering if I’ve had a smooth time in which everything worked
just fine. Fagettaboutit! I could fill a loose leaf with the last two
months alone. So could you. Big Deal!
The reason I’ve left those
tales out this time is they no longer serve a purpose. I used my tales of
woe to illustrate what I meant by the world not working. To continue to air
this negative energy would be indulgent and toxic. In addition, it would
not be consistent with the objective positivism goals of a healthier
language or the desire to focus on times the world works fine or least makes
up for its failures.
The point is there is no
point to bemoaning our fate, bitch and moan fashion. The point it to accept
the good and not so good of our times and work on ourselves. Strengthening
the gaps in our glopful ways protects us from added suffering in our world
and prevent or at least lessen the likelihood of having to hear the raucous
alarm of a wake up call. You can achieve this goal in your lifetime. I
sincerely hope that you will. By the way, you know the guy who didn’t show
up for our first meeting, but I stayed with him anyway. He came through.
It’s all good!
All Good Things Must…
This is the last of this
series for now. I hope you have enjoyed it. I plan to move on to other
projects that are needing completion. Please check out our website
periodically for other writings, workshop schedules, and coming soon, the
STOPGLOP Shop.
Most importantly, recognize
that all of us will come to an end eventually as well. That pain filled
thought should be enough to get us to stop or reduce glop which in turn
would increase our life span potentials. In that context, take yourself
seriously and never sell yourself short. Protect your SELF at all times,
for you are worthy of protection. Respect yourself at all times, for you
are worthy of respect. If you can’t, then call someone for help and it will
be on the way.
Good luck in all your
battles, especially your glopful ones!
The Center for Self-Control
Helping people conquer
hurtful
habits once and for all and
forever
(954) 475-1371
(561) 361-1898
We offer individual phone
and group coaching, counseling, and psychotherapy to help you:
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