Aging Gracefully In Hollywood
As I read about Amy Chua's Tiger Mother, I keep asking myself, why is it that the kids who excel in high school don't necessarily do well in life? Have you noticed that at reunions or by staying in touch with your classmates?
Whether it is because they are members of a stressful profession or because personalities with a penchant for addictive disorders are drawn to the law, lawyers have twice the addiction rate of the general population.
Eating is like a fingerprint. No two people eat exactly the same and there's not one right way to do it. How to locate our different appetites, needs and desires is the endless challenge of life.
I love my work but I don't make it my life. As difficult as it is, schedule time together, cherish the connection and the conversation and leave the phone alone.
You see, my suffering isn't just selfish hurt; it stems from a pain that's hers. Of course, the analytical experts say she'll adjust, that this is all very normal.
We need to realize that our path to transformation is through our mistakes. We're meant to make mistakes, recognize them, and move on to become unlimited.
I am a professor of sociology teaching classes on gender and social change -- and I have never read Betty Friedan's "The Feminine Mystique." It turns out that very few of my well-educated, feminist-leaning friends have either.
We know the importance of setting goals, and we know how good it feels when we reach those goals. But at the same time, we need to remember that each step is an important part of the process.
My point is that there may be no point in making new year's resolutions, so why start a brand new year off by putting this kind of counterproductive pressure on yourself?
Life is like a five-layered been dip. You always get out what you put in. Everything you do well requires these five ingredients. Together, they deliver irresistible goodness and lasting satisfaction.
If you want to make people a little upset, say something mean about their husband. If you want to make them angry, pick on their pets. If you want them to attack you from all sides, criticize their parenting.
I think we should take inventory of who we are. We should see who it is we really are and how much of what we are doing is because someone else has defined us.
Which came first: the rhetoric, or the violence? Does an atmosphere of violence promote and encourage people to treat each other with disrespect and disregard?
Oprah told Piers Morgan that being her authentic self was and is key to her success. But what does it mean to be your authentic self?
We're all walking around under a collective illusion, like some kind of cosmic practical joke, where each person thinks everyone else has it together, but nobody really does.
Now these Nanooks of the North want me to believe that I'm an Aries, and therefore energetic, enthusiastic, dynamic, confident, quick-witted and pioneering? I mean, who are we kidding?
Long after we've grown and left home, we continue, in a sense, to act as our own moms and dads, urging on as we strive to meet our goals. How we talk to ourselves really does matter.
Parents are people, too. If they don't want to have more children, the world shouldn't require an explanation from them. It's their family, their lives, and yes, it's their money.
As our children become couch potatoes, we often focus on how this contributes to childhood obesity, but we overlook how it also contributes to a constrained mental outlook and a character of artifice.
Dan Dorfman, 2011.01.19
