A previous blog spoke of the power of Sean Mendez’s songs – power over me anyway. This is the song that is so meaningful to me at this particular moment. It is TREAT YOU BETTER. He sings and promises that he can treat her better than the man she is currently with. He KNOWS that he can treat her better than he can. Moreover, he opines, “a girl like you deserves a gentle man.” He insists on being given the opportunity and appears not to take NO for an answer. He promises not to let her down. It is an upbeat and powerful song.
How is the song applicable to me? Well, consider the way I have been treated by the men in my life – it won’t be that hard to treat me better. It was not physical abuse that I was subjected to – my father was the last man to pulverize me. What is pulverize? Pulverize: defeat utterly, annihilate, beat hollow, trounce, rout, crush, smash, break, overwhelm, vanquish; informal hammer, clobber, thrash, whip, lick, paste, pound, crucify, demolish, destroy, drub, tank, take to the cleaners, wipe the floor with, make mincemeat of, blow out of the water, murder, slaughter, massacre, flatten, turn inside out.
But verbal abuse and indifference can be equally vanquishing, trouncing and overwhelming – and I have plenty of that during my lifetime. A steady diet actually. I have very unfortunately been drawn to narcissistic men with the attendant lack of empathy. Not sure why – I may never know. I am still not very good at spotting them, those narcissist. Narcissists are not necessarily good looking, they actually come in all shapes and sizes. What is a narcissist? A person who has an excessive interest in or admiration of themselves. Narcissists think the world revolves around them and only them. Narcissists blame others for everything and take no responsibility for their own actions. Everything, each thing, every article, every single thing, the lot, the whole lot, the entirety, the total, the aggregate; all; the whole (kit and) caboodle, the whole shooting match, the whole shebang, everything but the kitchen sink; the full monty; the whole ball of wax, the whole nine yards.
How shall I avoid narcissist in the future? I have VERY recently discovered a technique. Look for a person with empathy, because the two never go together. We shall again explore the concept of empathy. It was previously discussed in the blog of December 9,2018 and April 17, 2019. But go to the dictionary at this moment. Empathy:the ability to understand and share the feelings of another., Wikipedia also discusses it: Empathy is the capacity to understand or feel what another person is experiencing from within their frame of reference, that is, the capacity to place oneself in another’s position. Definitions of empathy encompass a broad range of emotional states. Types of empathy include cognitive empathy, emotional empathy, and somatic empathy.
Do I have empathy? I do indeed – too much. I was tested in 2015 and learned that my empathy gets me in trouble and I am actually supposed to act in a narcissistic manner occasionally to overcome it. I know it sounds silly but it is true. Recently I have gotten better at being more ‘selfish’ but it is difficult. I suspect the next three or four months will be a test, it is with fear and trepidation that a different way of life will be explored. Not fun that trepidation: dread, fearfulness, apprehensiveness, agitation, anxiety, worry, nervousness, tension, misgivings, unease, uneasiness, foreboding, disquiet, disquietude, perturbation, discomposure, dismay, consternation, alarm, panic, trembling, jumpiness; nerviness; butterflies, jitteriness, the jitters, a cold sweat, a blue funk, the heebie-jeebies, the willies, the shakes, the yips, the jim-jams, collywobbles, cold feet.
But onto another subject which shows I do have empathy because I do not have children, but know someone who has. A study in on the Atlantis website discussed the means by which you could turn your child into a book worm. “ Joe Pinsker spoke with Daniel Willingham, a professor of psychology at the University of Virginia. First, a child needs to be a “fluent decoder,” he told me—that is, able to smoothly “go from print on the page to words in the mind.” This is something that schools teach, but parents can help with it by reading to and with their kids—especially when that reading involves wordplay, which particularly helps kids with the challenge of identifying the “individual speech sounds” that make up a word.” Why is being a bookworm important? Being a book worn is good because leisure reading has been linked to a range of good academic and professional outcomes. It seems, though, that to get a book worm kid you got to work at it as the chief factor seems to be the household one is born into and the cult of reading that the parents create within it.
Again I am an anomaly. That is me: an oddity, a peculiarity, abnormality, irregularity, inconsistency, incongruity, deviation, aberration, quirk, freak, exception, departure, divergence, variation; rarity, eccentric. Why? I was a bookworm, a decided bookworm but no one in my family was and there was no cult of reading within the family home whatsoever. Oh well – I am just grateful I was a bookworm and thus made good academic and professional outcomes. Not so great in the man department, but it is not possible to do everything right.
In closure. I got an email from David yesterday. It was a picture of a beautiful house accompanied by a message.
He: I think this should be your home.
Me: Are you buying it for me????? Hahaha Where is it?
The other picture is a selfie, taken two nights ago and posted on Instagram with this message.
Me: Getting ready for the wine and cheese event in my building. Apartments leased to many young and handsome men. I shall be accompanied by my walker because of the knee surgery. Blog speaks of possible uses.
The responses received were glorious.
He: Wow! Alexis you look fantastic.
Me: Thanks. I rather do.
She: Lovely Alexis Have you lost weight?
Me: Yes, rather accidentally. My clothes are falling off of me. How observant of you! And with your make up – watch out world!
She: Watch out world!
She: Looking good!
Me: Thanks Luv. It is a miracle. Hahahaha
I certainly hope the two pictures will be attached to this blog. .
