Posts Tagged ‘depression’

Internet Addiction…America’s New Dysfunction

// February 3rd, 2010 // 10 Comments » // My Thoughts

I have heard of bizarre cases of internet addiction in China… and even that there are some pretty harsh boot camps in China to deal with internet addicts.  The odd thing is that the addicts respond in every way exactly like any other addict would when they are deprived of the object of their addiction.   It seems that the reality of internet addiction or “Excessive Internet use” is upon us… and is actually linked to depression.

Excessive Internet use is linked to depression

People who spend a lot of time browsing the net are more likely to show depressive symptoms, according to the first large-scale study of its kind in the West by University of Leeds psychologists.

To me this is a serious wake up call because I spend an incredible amount of time on the internet… (like right now writing this post!)  The reality is that we are slowly trading the personal interactions of the real world for the sterile transactions of the virtual world… No matter how we polish it,  the internet is slowly disconnecting us from the reality of our lives.    As we further disconnect from reality our morals and ethics become less important or even relevant to us because … after all … its not real! right?

In my head it feels like I have somehow looked into the face of advancing technology and seen too far… too far for comfort at least… and all I want to do is walk away… partly because I am beginning to recognize the intrinsic value of  life… inconvenience… and even Oranges… and partly because I have a very real feeling that in the not too far distant future possibly within in the next generation… that we will be struggling to retain our humanity as we become less connected to the physical world around us and more connected to more interesting “virtual” realities.

Getting back to the subject… statistics show that a good majority of our country is clinically depressed and rather than going after the key causes of depression we often choose to continue our lifestyles and sidestep the issue with medication.  I am not condemning the use of medication for the treatment of depression. I actually took Lexapro for a year myself for depression/anxiety.  My point is more that we cannot ignore the drivers that are creating the condition of depression in so many people!

  • How do we move forward as Christians in an increasingly disconnected society where social interaction is so sterile?
  • How can we deal with technology like the internet that is so addictive?

What do you think about this?

Tags: addictions, depression, internet addiction

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When You Can’t Go On… Pile Stones

// January 4th, 2010 // 2 Comments » // My Life, My Thoughts

What mean ye by these stones?

What mean ye by these stones?

When I was young I remember my dad reading a passage from Joshua 4:5-7  that stuck firmly in my mind

5And Joshua said unto them, Pass over before the ark of the LORD your God into the midst of Jordan, and take you up every man of you a stone upon his shoulder, according unto the number of the tribes of the children of Israel: 6That this may be a sign among you, that when your children ask their fathers in time to come, saying,

7Then ye shall answer them, That the waters of Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the LORD; when it passed over Jordan, the waters of Jordan were cut off: and these stones shall be for a memorial unto the children of Israel for ever.

As I matured I began to see the value in marking important events in my life… It all started when I realized that God was taking an active role in my life… I remember the first time that I decided to set stones as a remembrance… well I didn’t really pile up stones… but they are there… in my heart… The first time was the day I met my wife I realized then and there that God was undeniably acting in my life in a very specific and purposeful way… As my life began to change from that day forward I began gathering stones to mark the points in my life where God showed up and did something… I really had no idea where this was leading though…

Life throws itself at us with all it’s might… we experience great successes and great hardships…  there is love and love lost, life… and death, courage… and fear,  joy… and sadness,  pleasure… and pain.  All of it joins together in the amazing cacophony that we call life.  But then there are times when the balance shifts and there is only hardship… and love lost.. and death… and fear… and sadness… and pain… and we wonder where it all went wrong…  We feel abandoned and without hope… when we cry out the only answer we hear are the echos of our plea’s against the emptiness of our souls.  Those times… are the times that we can look back… and see the piles of stones to mark the deliverance of God.   The stones are the difference between faith and belief… between faith and hope…  “Faith is the SUBSTANCE of things hoped for…the evidence of things not seen”  Hope will will wait to see what happens.  Faith starts gathering stones to mark the site of deliverance.

Look back on your life and find where God has been faithful to rescue you… and mark those places… and when the pain is too great to bear… or sorrow threatens to swallow you whole… when you can’t go forward… look back… and see those stones…strengthen your faith that God will deliver you… and start gathering stones again… for his deliverance will be upon you at the perfect time…

Tags: depression, Faith, fear

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Selfishness

// May 30th, 2009 // No Comments » // My Thoughts

We all struggle with our flaws… addictions… compulsions.  Somehow religion has evolved to promote a sort of self loathing mentality. We have somehow been convinced by modern religion that if we focus on our imperfections then we can somehow root them out.  The sad truth is that the pinnacle of Christianity for some Christians is the very day that they are saved, on that very day they truly believe that salvation is a free gift. After that they begin trying to earn it. Somehow our culture of modern religion begins to convince them to start the life long task of trying to rip their flesh off their soul.  I truly believe that this is not what God intended for us. Jesus constantly corrected the religious leaders of the day because they focused on every little legalistic point and attempted to instruct others to do the same.

Our problem  is selfishness, pure unfettered unchecked selfishness. Addictions… selfishness. The sooner we realize that selfishness is the problem the better! from that point all we need to do is to focus on “loving the Lord your GOD with all your heart and love your neighbor as yourself”   I know it sounds elementary and simple but that is the single solitary cure for all of the dissatisfied, angry, addicted, perverted, horrible, sad, etc. etc… people in the world.

Tags: addictions, Art, christian, Christianity, christians, depression, failure, God, jesus, Love, modern religion, Religion, righeousness vs. self righteousness, self loathing, selfishness, sin, truth

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The Wilderness

// May 12th, 2009 // 1 Comment » // My Life, My Thoughts

So many people are having “wilderness” experiences it has almost become a fad in christianity!   It seems every day I hear of some person or other describing their own “wilderness”.  It is not so much that I doubt, far be it from me to judge someones personal experience; however, my tendency is to purposely avoid whatever “The Herd” is doing.  Call me an Individualist, or whatever, but I have often avoided running off a cliff with “the herd” by steering clear of religious fads.  It does get tiring though, always questioning whether something is real or fabricated, whether I am really feeling something or caving in to peer pressure.  Like right now.

I am having a hard time lately… my well intentioned segment here “Diary of a Deadbeat Dad” suffered a serious hemorrhage of comments and spun out of control. While I would love to repost the entire segment of posts, I struggle with frustrations, and worry that others would misunderstand my motives.  The entire segment was originally meant to communicate the struggles of a daddy that has absoloutely no idea how to communicate with his son.  My hope was that this would encourage other daddys to start a journal or something similar.. just to get out the frustration and pain.  To my shame,  The entire segment became an out and out war zone and all I could do was remove the posts.  Soon after removing the posts, I received paperwork from my ex-wife’s lawyer providing me an affidavit to surrender my parental rights.  It could not have been a darker time for me… I talked with my son several times about the consequences of signing the affidavit. Each time he assured me that he understood and that he still wanted me to sign the document.  I went before my Father God so many times for guidance, and every time he delivered what I needed.  Ultimately the document was signed,  and I have voluntarily given up my legal rights to my son.

You may judge me… but I have learned it is a small thing to be judged by men. Not to say that such an action does not carry a heavy price, the price is greater than many can imagine and the consequences could be incalculable. But hard choices are hard for a reason, and ultimately we discover that God is greater than our choices.  I can say that it is my strongest desire to run away and hide, or do the “wilderness getaway vacation” I would like nothing better than to go eat worms right now… but with the “wilderness fad” going so strong I am somewhat hesitant to jump on the bandwagon.

The wilderness is harsh, barren, and unfriendly, but it is a passive unfriendliness. The wilderness does not try to destroy you, it just exists, and you must accept the wilderness as it is and learn to respect it.

I think that many choose “the wilderness” because the other option; “the battlefield” is much less fun.

The battlefield is like the wilderness, in that it is  harsh, barren, and unfriendly, there is no respect, the battlefield is a cemetery , and the reward of passivity is a gravestone. As much as I would like to run off to the wilderness… The battlefield is where I belong, bringing principalities, and powers under the dominion of the Prince of Peace. Ephesians 6:12

I refuse to let the fleeting mirage of earthly existence or the struggles of my own humanity distract me.

I have no desire to minimise the struggle of those who are truly in the midst of a wilderness experience;  But if you are simply “draft dodging”  then quit whining about your wilderness experience, and join the ranks of warriors that will gladly sacrifice everything for the sake of “The Kingdom”

Tags: Art, choice, choices, christian, Christianity, consequence, consequences, dad, dead beat dad, depression

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Guardian

// February 27th, 2009 // 1 Comment » // My Life

Painted this tonight!… enjoy…

The Guardian

The Guardian

Jason the bald guy
jasonthebaldguy.com

Tags: depression, pain, Painting

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The Icy Embrace of Chaos – A rant on the current financial crisis

// January 16th, 2009 // No Comments » // My Life, My Thoughts

I don’t know how many of you are familiar with the theories of Entropy, Order, and Chaos so indulge me while I enlighten you.

First of all some definitions

System: a collection of objects that are related and/or interact with each other based on a specific set of rules (Examples: home heating/cooling system, plumbing, the solar system etc. etc…)

Order: the organized symmetry that is observed when objects interact with each other in a balanced manner

Chaos: the lack of balance and symmetry that is observed when objects interact with each other in a random and unpredictable way.

Entropy: The tendency of ordered systems to decay into Chaos

Ok, now that the definitions are out of the way, (they are simplified for all of our sakes)

My head has been really exploding listening to all of the recent opinions about the recession (dare I say depression?) that is beginning to sweep across the nation and even the world! The one thing that I find most unbelievable is that no one is really accepting responsibility for their actions! Everyone seems to be pointing at someone else wanting to shift the blame. At this point we get to see what is really going on in our country.

  • An average US citizen, wants to buy a house
  • An Appraiser wants to increase the value of a house to improve his business
  • A Realtor wants to sell a house and make a big commission
  • A local Bank wants to close on a loan and make a fat load of interest.
  • An investment bank wants to buy high risk mortgages and repackage them as lower risk mortgage backed securities, selling them at a profit
  • A hedge fund is set up to protect the high risk mortgage backed securities in-case a few of them fail.

soooo

  • The average US citizen lies about their income so they can afford a nicer house.. overextending themselves.
  • The Realtor works out a deal with the appraiser and the seller to reduce the down payment by increasing the amount of the loan to the maximum appraisal value and pretending the seller is paying the down payment.
  • The Appraiser gladly raises the value of the house so that the Realtor can make a better commission.. guaranteeing more work and possible kickbacks.
  • The Local Bank looks the other way and closes on an Adjustable Rate Mortgage (ARM) that is doomed for failure
  • The Investment Bank buys up thousands of ARM loans, slices and dices them to reduce risk and resells them as mortgage backed securities
  • The hedge fund artificially inflates the demand for oil by making enormous futures purchases – driving the price of oil ridiculously high assuring plenty of money to protect the mortgage backed securities .

the result is

  • The average US Citizen cannot afford Gas for their SUV because of high gas prices and bad spending habits.
  • The ARM loan adjusts to the current finance rate increasing monthly payments by hundreds of dollars and the average US Citizen cannot afford their home.
  • Thousands of ARM loans go into default
  • The hedge fund fails because they only bet that 20% of the loans would go into default and they already paid the investors their dividends
  • the investment bank fails because huge chunks of their mortgage backed securities are failing and investors are dumping them at bargain basement prices
  • the local bank fails because the average US citizen pull their money out because they have no idea what is going on with the banks!
  • the housing bubble pops, Realtor’s and appraisers run out of work.
  • Construction dwindles down and contractors run out of work.
  • Unemployment skyrockets
  • General consumer confidence begins to fail
  • Retail begins to fail
  • Unemployment skyrockets
  • The Stockmarket plummets
  • Consumer confidence fails
  • The oil bubble pops
  • Gas prices fall
  • The world economy stumbles.

Ok ok my rant is almost done…

So much of this is caused by greed, It is all about turning a quick buck! and when all the finger pointing is done thousands of families are without homes that they probably could have afforded if they would have done things right.- If the people that should have been there to help them buy a house, would have been honest with them- and told them to buy less and be satisfied. Ultimately the only ones that pay for the entire scam is the homeowners, the folks who bought gas at near 5 bucks a gallon and the taxpayer that foots the bill for a multibillion dollar bailout of the companies that bought the oil and drove the prices up, and sold the mortgage backed securities at a profit.

The cracks are beginning to show in the idealism of capitolism and they are not very pretty. what shows is greed, dishonesty, and irresponsibility. Every little choice to be dishonest for the sake of personal gain added to the enourmous cost that we will pay in the coming years. Entropy is the decay of order into chaos and we have welcomed it with open arms.

So buckle up and prepare to take responsibility for your actions, responsibility can only be avoided for so long before it demands its dues.

Hopefully America will wake up to realize that truth and honesty and responsibility are worth more than a dollar bill. Hopefully… before we must endure the icy embrace of chaos.

Tags: Art, capitolism, choice, depression, economy, failure, financial problems, Fun, greed, one thing, random, ranting, recession, responsibility, rock, sin, truth, unemployment

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