Tag: not interested

‘I Just Don’t Care’

Jennifred Jones

This is why we need others…why we need to be the ‘others’ who call or stop by to check on them.

Every one of us has down times where we feel like giving up. ‘Forget it! Not Interested! Leave me alone! I quit!’

This is where us ‘others’ have to be alert and step in. Call your friend. Speak to the co- worker. Stop by the neighbors. Send flowers to somebody.  Just say ‘hi, how’re you doing to a stranger’.

And when we’re at the place where – ‘I just don’t care anymore!’… we can ‘self-medicate’ by forcing ourselves to do something good and helpful for somebody else. Maybe don’t want to interact face to face but get outside. Sweep the walk, clean the garage, wash the window on the door, organize the junk drawer. Turn on some pretty music and light a candle. Make a cup of coffee. Read a good book and find something funny to laugh and laugh and laugh about.

These steps will pull us out of the land of the ‘I don’t cares’ faster than any therapy!

Let’s get moving, there’s work to be done, people to help and encourage and time is wastin’.

I Can’t…

Jennifred Jones

Saturday morning at the ice-rink a boy about 7 years old kept falling down.

The instructor would help him up and he’d fall again. When she got him up he only wanted to hold on to her. He didn’t want to try to stand or skate alone.

I could see the look on his face. Total frustration, almost red-faced anger at his young age. The instructor would help him time and time again – even getting down on the ice and showing him how to position his feet and legs so he could get up by himself like all the other young skaters were. Everyone was falling down and eventually getting back up all by themselves. This little boy was not really trying. He’d look like he tried to get up and then fall again and squirm until someone came to ‘help’ him. The instructors were looking back and forth at each other wondering how many times to ‘help’ him – when he would not help himself. He was not incapable – just not-capable because of his thinking. Somewhere along the way, he had given in to the ‘I can’t’ mentality. I imagine it was more than just on the ice.

The reason I could see it so clearly is that had been me at different times in my life…Algebra and math. I just ‘couldn’t‘ (I thought). Or meeting new people. I was too shy (unwilling to step out of my security box). I put off learning computers for years – thinking it was a passing fad. ‘I can’t‘ trying to rule me again.

Many times, teachers have learned…allow the student to struggle until they are hungry enough to learn. Then they will.

Back to the boy on the ice. He wasn’t ready to learn. Not yet. Give him a little more time, or maybe find something else he is interested in. Don’t nurture the ‘I can’t’.

In our mind, if we will remove the ‘t‘, it will spell, ‘I can‘. The first step is begin to recognize all our ‘I can’ts’

Where can I begin today?