Sex, Logic and You

I've always thought that young people kind of go to waste in our society, especially when they finally get to high school. They have so much inside them that is creative and optimistic and brilliant, and they have tons of energy and willingness to explore new things. But there is almost nothing young people can get involved in that's meaningful and worthwhile at a time when they have so much to offer and there are so many possibilities for them to achieve something substantial even at that young age.

This puts young people in a weird kind of void that basically leaves them little choice other than to get involved in what is left for them to put all that energy in to, and that boils down to socializing with all their heart and soul. While socializing is essential, if that's all there is it becomes a waste of time and potential that reduces people to doing things that leave them empty and frustrated.

It seems illogical to me to not have a whole slew of things for them to choose from that have substance AND personal meaning. It's a shame not to enable their ability to do great things, because they can do great things if the opportunity is there. Young people are smart and able to comprehend complex things and they can see many things more clearly than older people because they don't have all of those preconceived notions to fog their point of view.

In high school they have a lot of things pulling at them they're at the mercy of, like parents, school and let's not forget hormones, which is already a set up for frustration and emptiness. The truth of it is that life boils down to having to do what you're told and going to school, and whatever freedom you have is pretty much spent socializing yourself into oblivion. And a tremendous amount of time and energy ends up in the realm of all those raging hormones and all the activity in around desires for love and sex and everything in between.

Girls seem to be falling in love every five minutes, and boys, well, they have their own problems with raging hormones they have to learn to live with. It's not so much about intense feelings of love for boys as it is intense sexual feelings. And boy are these two strong emotional drives as different as night and day.

It's sort of a sick joke in a way that what girls want from boys, and what boys want from girls can't be gotten anywhere else and yet they're notable to find what they want there. Does that stop them from trying? Heck no.

There's not much that can be done to correct the situation so there is more balance between what girls want and what boys want but they seem to find common ground quite well in spite of things. But when there is no common ground, these strong desires can lead to trouble. Doing things for the wrong reasons is a common peril and can lead to someone getting hurt, or hurting someone by not thinking about how what you do will affect them, sometimes in pretty serious ways. I want to address this a little bit today by talking about how to make sure that we do things for the right reasons. Because really, what other way makes sense?

I'm here to say that both girls and boys and their natural drives and feelings are 100% completely normal and expected and anyone who tells you any different is clueless. But just because something is totally normal doesn't mean you can or should allow it to run wild. I remember once a guy said something very inappropriate to me and I was more than happy to set him straight. It was something along the lines of telling me that he found me attractive and wanted to do the wild thing with me. As he spoke he did the most peculiar thing; he made a rather raunchy humping movement with his hips and glared at me with a huge grin.

Many guys make the mistake of thinking that their sex drives are delightful for women to be on the receiving end of, and they're so wrong it's not funny. I told him he was disgusting, because he was. He replied with laughter and some ridicule and said, "Disgusting? Sex isn't disgusting, it's natural!" Implying there was something wrong with me for having a problem with his kind, natural offer of sex.

I told him that sex was indeed natural but there is a time and a place for everything. Natural doesn't mean lose your mind and act like an animal.

He laughed again and grinned even more. He said, "If it's natural it's always right. How can there be a time and place to be natural?" He thought he was so clever.

So I set him straight with this. "Going to the bathroom is natural too. Taking a dump is the most natural thing in the world, right? But you don't climb up on your kitchen table in the middle of dinner with your family, take down your pants and have a crap right there in front of everyone do you?."

He looked at me and blinked, and he stopped smiling and hung his head. "No," he said, "You don't. That would be inappropriate." Bless him, he got it, and he even apologized for being such a monkey brain. He never did it again, not with me, and my guess is, not with anyone else.

It was easy for him to let his sex drive over rule his logical mind, so much so that he just plain failed to engage his logic and let the sexual desire lead his behavior. It could have been worse if I was of the belief that I "should" accept his claims of it being all natural and wholesome and I was weird for not going along with the idea. If I was more worried about what I thought he and others would think of me for not seeing things the way he did, I might have allowed something to happen that could only have led to feeling bad about myself and having a lot of regret.

Strong feelings are not a basis to do anything, no matter what gets thrown your way that makes it seem justified. Often just a little more thinking will clarify things that only moments ago seemed like iron clad logic.

It's inappropriate to be run by strong feelings of any kind for a very simple reason. If you are in an emotional state of mind, you cannot be in a logical state of mind at the same time. It's impossible. You can only do one at a time. Think about it. When you're really angry is that the best time to expect your best thinking? No, because the anger is in control and this is when we tend to say things we don't mean, and end up regretting those words later.

It's not just anger that shuts down our logic and reason while it's blasting, it's any strong feeling, good or bad. Why is that a problem? Because there's little chance of acting in a way that is based on your ability to think logically and determine what action or inaction is the best decision for you to make. In other words, your actions are much more likely to be dumb ones when you don't think before you act.

Strong feelings have a way of making you feel justified in doing whatever the feelings make you want to do. In the heat of the moment, feelings feel like justification. Feelings feel like a valid reason in and of themselves to do what you're feeling.

But that's just it. Feelings are not reason. Feelings are feelings and reason is reason. They aren't the same. You could think of them as opposites but I don't think that's accurate. I see them both as equal but different. They do different things and cause us to choose to act in different ways. They are both equally important and they are both essential parts of our minds. Both are needed in order to go through life as a whole and balanced being.

Imagine what someone is like who is totally unemotional, who only lives in their logical mind. They are always serious, never in a happy mood, never able to laugh or have fun. They're pretty unpleasant to be around. You instinctively know that they'd be much more pleasant to be around if they showed a little more of their human side and could come down to earth with the rest of us and lighten up. You can naturally perceive that they are out of balance, allowing logic and reason to dominate their minds to the point that their emotional side seems cut off.

It's possible too to go over board the other way, and be so feeling driven that your logical side is reduced to nothing. When you witness someone who is completely driven by emotions and feelings, how do they appear to you? Most of the time we perceive them as kind of crazy. Out of control. Again, we instinctively know that they are not attached to their logical, reasonable sides; their feelings could easily be blinding them to facts, or making it impossible for them to be fair.

We would use words like unreasonable, unbalanced, and unhinged to describe them. Each of those words refers to their disconnect from their reasonable mind. It is interesting to note that in our society, this obvious imbalance of emotion over logic results in using words like unbalanced or unhinged to describe their behavior.

Yet when someone has an equally obvious disconnect from their emotional side, those words are never used. In fact, people who let pure logic run their lives are often praised for their imbalance. The fact is, they are just as unbalanced as their opposites, and their lives are lived without the emotional input necessary to balance their actions. Our society has a bias that favors logical thinking over emotions.

Why? Is logic better than emotion? No, it's not better, but that's not really a legitimate question. Both are needed to be able to perceive the world and interpret it fully. To say one is better than the other would be like saying shirts are better than pants. They're different but equally necessary. You can't toss out your pants and go out into the world without raising a few eyebrows. If you did and people asked why you had no pants on, and you answered with, "I don't require pants because shirts are all that is needed. Shirts are superior to pants"; how well would that go over?

No doubt if someone really believed that shirts are superior to pants they could come up with all kinds of "reasons" to think so, but you'd already know they were thinking in an unusual way. There's some possibility they might have a point, but there's just as much of a chance that they're just a bit odd. They're entitled to their beliefs, but we don't have to believe them or accept their reasons for ourselves. There's enough room here on planet earth for people to have their own beliefs and perceptions, no matter what we think of them. As long as it doesn't affect anyone else negatively then what difference does it make what someone else believes about their own personal lives? It makes no difference. It's their choice for their own life, and that's what it's all about.

In terms of logic and emotion, the point is to go for a balance between the two. We need to check in with both sides of our brain before jumping into action. If we don't take the time to step back and run the idea through both sides of our mind, we almost can't avoid unbalanced actions and as anyone can see simply by observing the world around us, operating out of balance is not something to shoot for. It's much closer to malfunctioning than it is to being desirable.

One of the best skills you can have is the ability to engage both sides of your brain before you act. It really is a skill, an essential life skill that will serve you incredibly well. You learn it by doing it all the time until it becomes a habit. After that it becomes impossible to live without and the benefits are a no brainer you would not give up for anything.

Everyday you'll run into situations that engage your emotions to the point that it's almost too hard to resist just going for it, whatever "it" is. This is not just now, this will always be there for the rest of your life. It will be extra hard now because you have so many things influencing you that you aren't really able to register as a form of influence. And there is a relentless, overpowering desire to fit in with the people around you. You're trying to literally figure out how you fit in with all of these strong personalities, and you're observing that some people seem to have it made while others don't have a chance. At first glance it may seem like it's so unfair but it's not a true observation.

It's as normal as the sky is blue to observe people that seem to have all of the popularity and fun and good looks and believe that copying them will bring the same to you. It rarely does. You'll probably end up copying them anyway, at least to some extent, and you'll find that you're still you and they're still them. There is a reason for that. You are you and they are them. Nothing you do will change that. But before you go around thinking that this is a bad thing hear this. You are you and that's how it's supposed to be. There is no other you. It's your job to be you and what applies to other people, what appears to be enviable in others is their thing. It isn't anyone else's thing.

Dogs and cats are equally valid animals, right? Do you ever see a dog feeling all depressed and forlorn because cats are cool and he doesn't look anything like a cat? No. He's too busy being a dog to care. No matter how much he believed he couldn't be cool unless he looked like a cat, it would never happen. He'd have to put himself through so much weird stuff in the attempt to copy the cat and even then, he would still be a dog in the end, and even worse, would look kind of pathetic for trying so hard to make himself something he's not. He believes he is inferior to the beautiful cat, but you and I understand that's not true. They're two different things, and he should just go be a dog and be a happy dog. It's his mistaken belief that's causing all of his feelings of being inferior, and the whole belief is wrong from the get go.

People are exactly the same way when they can't see themselves as equally valid to everyone else around them. They aren't everyone else, they aren't there to be anyone else, they are there to be themselves.

You're every bit as valid and perfect and lovable and necessary as the popular people are, and probably lucky not to have all the popularity they have. When all eyes are on you and it all comes easy because of looks or money or coolness, there's a good chance that there's nothing else going on in there.

That's actually pretty creepy. So if you engage your brain before getting swept away with social pressure there's a huge possibility that you'll avoid making the mistakes that these role models always end up making. They always experience a fall and lose credibility and they always have things going on that you don't know about. You'd be surprised if you could spend a day inside their heads, and you'd probably be anxious to get the heck out.

What you are is perfect. You arrived perfect and what you're supposed to do is be you. It makes no sense to get sidetracked like Mr. Dog there, and try to be someone else. Your talents and possibilities are all inside you waiting for you to discover them and let you become what will make you happy in a real and lasting way. Focus on being you,and use both sides of your brain to decide for yourself what makes sense and what you want. You can see down the road what actions will bring what kinds of results, and you should choose ahead of time when you have a choice, rather than afterwards when you're stuck with the outcome and it's too late to change anything.

You can always do something later, after thinking about it and deciding where you stand on things. But what you can't do is undo a done thing.

Which do you think is the smarter way to do things?

If there's anything I've left out that didn't address your specific questions, email me. angie@pbsblog.com In the meantime get out there and be you, because there's nothing on earth that's more important for you to do than that.

INTRODUCTION

Hello and welcome. This blog is written to help young people learn how to stay in control of their own lives and not allow anyone or anything else outside themselves to decide who and what they are, or what they like and don't like, what they should think or feel, or even what's right and wrong. All of those things are up to each individual to discover for themselves and no one has any "right" to push their own ideas on anyone else.

It defeats the purpose of even having a self if it is reduced to mere non-thinking obedience. Unless of course, it is done by choice. But who would choose to give up control of their mind to someone else? Your mind is who you are, it is all you've got and it is guaranteed that no one is better qualified to control your mind than you are.

While my aim is to educate and empower the younger folk, people of all ages will benefit too because what is here applies to everyone. It's about being human. Everyone needs to know that you are your own person and everything having to do with you is up to you. But you're never too old to stand up and say, "Thank you but no more. I'll take it from here".

By getting this information to young people, they will have the enormous benefit of not having to see decades of their lives stolen by hundreds of other people and institutions, by social pressures, peer pressures, even parental demands well after they grow up and leave home. It's terrible to wake up and realize that decades of your life were wasted by people who didn't care about you nearly as much as they cared about their own desires.

If your natural independence is reinforced early in life, you may well avoid being used and abused and pulled off the course of your own life. Nothing worse can be stolen than who you are, what you are, and what you're here to do with your life. But there is always someone who is trying to take all of those things from you, and they'll use every trick in the book to do it.

It's as simple as realizing those things are yours, not someone else's.

People who are never given that information often end up being manipulated into being and doing what someone else wants, and it always ends up hurting them. This is a hard lesson to learn. But if you start your life knowing that you're not obligated to anyone, then you'll be strong and the parasites of life will not be able to make an easy target of you. You'll be much more likely to live a satisfying, happy life when you understand from the get go, that you're the boss of you and no one else gets an opinion. (At least not one that counts). Then you can really appreciate the people you choose to let in to your life, instead of letting them ruin it whenever they like, again and again and again.

It's a fact that there will always be someone who wants to control our lives in some way or another and if we are thoroughly induced as children to accept that we have an obligation to comply, then we will probably comply for the rest of our lives. The only ones delighted by this are the ones who gain control over us.

Anyone who tells us they have the right to control us is lying. It's that simple.

Bet you never heard that before, and you never heard it on TV. No one ever will. It's precisely what they don't want people to know. They don't want anyone to think about it and realize it's true. Because every time someone does, they stand up and walk away and the controllers of our world lose a little more power. They hate that. Tough. It doesn't belong to them, it belongs to us, and each one of us is the rightful owner of the power over ourselves. Don't let anyone try to tell you that it's any different.

The pressure for society to conform has touched almost everyone. Conforming is choosing to be controlled. Since few people would ever want to consciously be controlled they must be sold to accept being controlled in a variety of ways that make it seem appealing. Those sales pitches and pressures come from every direction, and they never end.

If our parents are believers in conformity, they will raise us to be good little conformers too. They will tell us that obedience makes you a good person, and that questioning authority is not the right thing to do. They will say that questioning authority is rude or out of line, or even that it's evil. But it's interesting to note that they never say why. As children we don't have enough life experience to call them on statements like this or to ask them why they think it's better to let someone else tell you what to do than it is to think for yourself. Why bother having your own brain if you're never going to use it?

Few of us are able to resist the many pressures that teach us to conform, and even demand that we conform. As soon as we are out of diapers and talking, we are learning that we have to cooperate to get along. But as soon as we enter the system we are taught that we must conform and obey to get along. Public school is the first introduction to shutting up and sitting down and forgetting all about what you want to do. You are required from your first day of school to conform to the system, whatever it is, and realize you don't have a voice. You are trained to accept your status as a slave to authority over the course of 14 years of public school and when you graduate high school, you'll be a very well conditioned, obedient citizen who sees authority as your boss.

Without our own awareness, we are conditioned year after year by being forced into subordinate status every time we set foot out of our own homes. In school you are subordinate, and the teachers and principal are authority. You believe they must be respected and obeyed because they have all of the power and they treat you like a subordinate, and act like they have the right to control you. Almost everyone accepts this control as normal, natural, and even desirable. But is it?

Well just ask that question and see what happens. That should give you a clue. You'll see tempers flare, voices harden, and accusatory statements will be made that vilify you for even asking. It's no wonder that part of our conditioning is to never question authority. It helps them stay in control without all those pesky common sense questions constantly undermining the idea that they get to tell everyone else what to do. The conditioning goes even deeper by reinforcing the notion that they SHOULD have total control, and everyone SHOULD be subordinate to them and that it is WRONG to even think things could or should be any other way. This is how our minds are shaped when we are too little to see what's being done to us.

We also have the tendency to want to please, and we find out quickly that when we do what our parents tell us to do that we are rewarded, and when we don't we are punished. That behavior comes to school with us and makes it easier for them to get you to accept that they too have authority over your life, and that it's as natural as your parents authority over you. It isn't of course, there's nothing natural about it. But they'll never tell you that.

Some children are lucky enough to have parents that understand all the authority over your life belongs to them, and to no one else in the world. But many children have parents who grew up in the same system and accepted the idea that they should be subordinated by others. They teach us the same thing the system teaches us: that to obey and conform is good, and to disobey or refuse to conform is bad. Very bad. It is even punishable by law in many areas of life. It is worth thinking about and asking what is so terrible about people refusing to let others control them?

Again, it is only upsetting to those who want control over you and will lose it if they can't trick you into believing they have a right to have it. For those who are not tricked, they are often treated very badly, punished and berated. They are told they are bad and wrong and illegitimate, and that authority must be obeyed. It's a very deep and well laid plan to teach us as children that they are better than we are, that they may think and decide things and we may not. We learn that their opinions matter and ours don't. They may do as they please, and we may not.

When this demand for subordination comes at us day after day at school and every day at home, we are easily turned into obedient citizens who actually take pride in how obedient we are. They have us exactly where they want us from the very beginning of our lives. It takes an unusual person to not be pulled into the lie of control, and to not give in to the prevalent beliefs that this is all how things are supposed to be. The few among us who know otherwise sound crazy when we say so, because the conditioning runs incredibly deep. It runs so deep that it actually forms the basis of most people's self and everything after that rests on the notion of obedience to authority and not having equal power to the other equal humans around us who claim to have more entitlement than we do in so many ways. It's a quite a racket and it's worked well for them for centuries. They like it that way and they won't give it up.

Understand one thing, no one can fight this alone. It is impossible to fight an enormous system like this by yourself and get anything except in trouble. You are overpowered as an individual so don't get crazy and decide to take it on all alone. It's not about fighting back as much as it is about knowing the truth and being able to see what's going on. That is how you are able to not be taken in when everyone around you is, and it's how you'll be able to take the best possible steps in life, make smart decisions and have a good life.

Once you get it, share it. The more every single individual learns to see what's really going on, the more it can become a reality to change things. When a large percentage of young people are awake and aware of the game, the changes will come because no one will comply any more. Until then, realize you're in their world and they control it. You're stuck in it and you should follow the rules because the only other option is one that will hurt you and probably accomplish nothing. Choose your battles wisely, and save your energy for what matters most.

I want to teach you how to be able to do that. You need to be armed with knowledge and it takes some time and effort to expand your head past the provided ideas and onward to seeing ALL of the ideas that are possible. This time and effort is not the typical horrid kind, it's a whole new kind. It's a kind that gives you back what you put into it, and it does it right way and keeps doing it. Over time it builds and grows and so do you. This is how you discover your true self and become who you really are. This effort makes you strong and powerful and self assured, it gives you self respect and it puts in you in charge of you without apologies to anyone. That's the way it should be. Blind obedience will never bring you any of those things, but it will make those who control you stronger every day.

Next time we'll cover more ways that other people use to get into your head and over ride your real self - ways most of us never really catch onto. If we don't realize they're there we can't deflect their influence very well can we?

Feel free to email me anytime with any questions or comments and I will always respond with the time and respect you deserve.

A.