Are you in deeper than you think?

Dave Navarro (no, not that Dave Navarro) at Rock Your Day has a new post up about goal addiction:

Society wants you to be a goal addict, because it’s good for the economy.

It’s a cycle. Spend money on those motivational tapes and seminars now. Spend money on antacid later when you’re not getting the results you want. Blame yourself for sucking. Spend even more money on booze, drugs, and mindless entertainment to take your mind off of your failure to achieve everything now (or, for the more sophisticated, buy the technological gadgets which will finally help you get more organized). Lather, rinse, repeat.

It’s a cycle. It’s a game. And the house always wins, and though you may be a high roller today, you will always lose in the long run.

Goal addiction is great for the economy - but not so great for you. And you’re in deeper than you think.

Click here to read the rest of his post.

As for me, I'm definitely in deep. A recovering perfectionist is still, on some levels, a perfectionist. And the pressures and constraints put on us by societal norms and standards? Well, those can be a bitch. Especially since it's not really society putting the pressure on us but our friends and acquaintances playing out society's lovely dance of conformity. A dance that doesn't feel anything like shaking my bootie on Friday night.

all paychecks are not created equal

Today is Equal Pay Day. Why is it on April 28th? Well, this is the day in 2009 that the average woman in the U.S. will make as much as the average man made in 2008. Yes, it takes women on average 16 months to make what a man makes in 12 months.

Women in the U.S. make on average only 78 cents for every dollar men make. That number ranges based on what state you live in, from 63 cents in Wyoming to 93 cents in the District of Columbia. But before you DC residents decide to feel smug, that still means that women make less than men.

Some people think that women make less because of the occupations they chose. However, if you compare men's and women's salaries for the same occupation, the gender wage gap is present for the vast majority of occupations. To read about more how and why a few other explanations for the gender wage gap are incorrect, check out a couple of short articles by Hilary Lips (found here and here).

What can you do? Well, you can urge your senators to support the Paycheck Fairness Act. You can also check out the National Women's Law Center's Platform for Progess. And if you make the hiring and salary decisions where you work, then you can take a few moments to think about how your biases may be affecting the process. We'll all benefit from it if you do.

the stigma of reading romance

I wrote a post for feministing.com’s community blog. It’s entitled, What I Learned from Romance Novels, where I basically come out of the closet as being a romance novel reader. I also talk about two important lessons I’ve learned from romance novels.

Now, if you are like a lot of people, you likely have a negative idea of what romance novels contain between their (often horrid-looking) covers. And, quite honestly, you might be right – if only because there are so very many romance novels published each year, at least one of them is likely to be as bad as you might imagine it to be. Or worse.

Yet there are very likely a lot of them that are far better than you might imagine. Even exponentially better. For more about this topic, you can check out Everything You Thought You Knew About Romance Novels, and Why It’s Wrong, written by Candy and Sarah of Smart Bitches, Trashy Books. Also, check out my post at community feministing.

stay tuned

I haven’t written as much in this blog for the last year or so. The words simply wouldn’t come. The inspiration wasn’t there. When I did want to write about something, it was something that seemed too personal. My life is intertwined, sometimes deeply, with others, and writing about my experience is sometimes writing about another person’s experience. And sometimes that simply isn’t okay.

Not writing for my blog made me a little sad. After all, I've been writing here since August 2004, and I usually enjoy the process of writing. However, I know enough not to try to force the words when they don't want to come. So, I haven't written much of any substance for awhile now. A long while.

But now? Well, the urge to write has been pulsing inside me. I feel as if I want to write again, and I've already started that process. So, while this may be slightly premature, I am feeling the urge to state:

I’m back, bitches. And my attitude is even more apparent. Stay tuned.

Oh, yes! Writing that made me smile :)

I thought...

I thought for a very long time that love was contingent on action, that my actions caused love or the lack thereof.

Then, for a long time, I thought that real love did not have conditions, ties, binds or restrictions. There's a freedom in that. A freedom to knowing that I deserve love and can be loved for simply being, existing, living. I'd see people working, working, working, and working some more, in order, I thought, to gain love. In order, to feel worthy enough. When, really, I thought, all they had to do was be. When, really, I thought, all they had to do was breathe.

Yet ... now I wonder. I've thought and I've re-thought, analyzed and re-analyzed. Maybe it is not one or the other, but both. Part of loving someone is loving both who they are and what they do.

A tiny corner of me cries at the thought. The tender, healing part of me that wants to be loved for simply being. Not for acting or not acting. Not for action or inaction. Not for achievements or awards.

But for simply being me.

DV myths drive me crazy

I've been having a difficult time reading the commentary about the Rihanna/Chris Brown case. The myths out there about domestic violence are incredible, but taking time to write about it right now seems exhausting. For now, check out this nice post about some of the issues.

Au revoir, old lenses

I took a look back. Not the uncomfortable, neck-wrenching, wanting-to-be-somewhere-I'm-not look, but an honest, clear, inquisitive look. And, as simple as that, the faint tension I'd been holding went away.

You see, I had been seeing current events through a lens I'd constructed in the past. Yet that lens fit a past me, a version of myself which was less substantial, less content, and, quite possibly, less in general.

Seeing past events through my current lenses changed things. It set me free, in a way. Tied to a situation/emotion with one last frayed thread, I was able to cut the thread and float happily away.

Au revoir, old lenses. I'm moving on.

stuck in my heart

The words are stuck. Perhaps they are still in my heart, where they swirl around in the warmth and the feeling.

My heart has a long memory. It knows it lost something important. Reading the book won't be the same.

I'm happy now. A feeling of joy makes me float slightly above the ground. A deep feeling of contentment settles inside me.

Please don't color me lovelorn. Don't think I miss a lover. Understand I miss my poet and how her words fed my soul.

Or don't understand at all. I don't always, especially when the words are stuck

I'm all about posting other people's videos

"It's time for a nerd we can believe in"

A girl

http://www.girleffect.org