please don't let those two things be related...
After not speaking to my Dad in a few months, he sent an email a couple of days ago asking when I'd be home so he could call. I meant to reply when I knew I'd be home, but then the past couple of days I haven't felt like talking to anyone. So, today he emailed again to say he'd mailed my birthday present. I was already wondering what it would be and hoping it wouldn't be anything like my Christmas present. Then, I read about how he and his wife have just done this spiritual sexuality class and he'd love me to do one too to get rid of "baggage" from the world and our particular family. What is with my family and the cultish personal development courses??
posted by Lucy @ 7:15 PM
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comments
7 Comments:
Oh you have a birthday coming up? Me too. Hope you have a good day. My mother had a thing for positive thinking courses and all the ridiculous affirmations that went along with them. It seemed to me that as long as we could all just keep thinking that everything was okay we could live in constant denial that anything was ever wrong. I grew to hate anything like that, because so much was not okay.
I was a bit late reading your last few posts, but I also extend lots of support to you. I know someone who used to take along what she had written to her sessions so she could combine looking at her lap/the paper with some kind of verbal communication. The psychiatrist does sound nice. All the best.
Me too, galaxy!
I just read the post you linked to about your Christmas present, Lucy. Looks like your family is as good at choosing presents as mine is. I actually always look forward to seeing what my family gives me each birthday/Christmas because it has such fantastic amusement potential (as in "She thought I'd wear that?" or "What am I supposed to do with this?")
Last Christmas my aunt outdid herself. Instead of sending a present, she sent a reading list of spiritual self-help books with the extra information that she was "praying for me that I would find out what I was meant to do with my life". I wrote a nice thank you letter and explained that I was doing what I was meant to be doing with my life, thank you very much, and I was sorry she was obviously so unhappy with her own.
I don't think I'll get a present from her this year at all.
Oh my lord - the thought of a spiritual sexuality class is enough to make my brain explode!
Lucy - you did landmark? hokey smokes. I'm sorry to say, I'm glad you got kicked out. It was a huge entity in my college town, and the people who went through it (multiple levels) were freaks who thought they were "self-actualized" but were really quite troubled. Landmark's goal is to push people until they break down - which then sends them careening, shattered, to shrink's offices.
And oh, it is a cult - it is related to EST.
Thanks, galaxy. And happy birthday, too! We should have a blog birthday party :) I'm still highly indignant that I'm expected to work on my birthday here, after having it be a public holiday at home.
Styley, is it your birthday too, or do you share a hatred of pointless affirmations? My family used to insist on wish lists for birthdays etc, which worked well, but the last few years I've had a hard time thinking of things I want, so I've only just discovered some of my family's alarming taste. It sounds like you're better off without a present from that aunt, anyway!
SFTR, I had to laugh, too. Could you sell off the necklace and claim it was stored away for safekeeping somewhere?
Shrinky, I know... I so did not need to know that my dad had even done one of those classes. But the teachings have their roots in the ancient traditions of north, south and central america - all in one class! So it must be good...
I'm mostly glad I got kicked out of landmark, too. I went into it because it really did have a dramatic effect on my brother and it seemed to be in a good way. The longer term effects don't seem quite so positive, though. Well, he's doing well and seems happy, but non-landmark people still find him incredibly judgemental. I really don't like the way you have to stick to their rules and the meanings they've assigned to things (that don't quite match the generally accepted meanings) and if you disagree it's just because you're not using their One Right Way of thinking and are therefore wrong. That was always how my brother argued, so maybe that's why it seems to suit him. It really did remind me of Dr Phil. What do you think of him?
Not entirely a nonsequitur: your post reminded me that I wanted to ask if you'd listened to the Terry Gross interview with Stephen McCauley (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5334251), which I found incredibly comforting (as I do his books)--I totally want him for a next door neighbor/best friend. The connection with this post is what he has to say about "spirituality" vs. religion, building on what he says in Alternatives to Sex (which I just finished reading and quite liked).
Wow. That is something. Glad to hear that it other families, other than my own, have a "weirdness" to them.
thanks for the link, Cris!
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