I am often affected by outside sources.  I try my best to avoid the news, newspaper, etc. because all the negative events happening in the world can just kick me to the curb.  I can get so disappointed in the human race, that I crawl into my black hole of depression and isolate there in terrible mental pain and depression.  And with the modern coveniences of TV, radio and the internet, news is flying around us all the time.

     I have also been affected by books and movies as well.  I really have to be prepared for a serious movie, but it is still very hard.  Schendlers List and Roots mowed me down, but I was glad that I watched them.  They are fabulous movies.  I try to watch uplifting, funny stuff.  I loved the movie Avitar, but the message of the human race distroying our planet was very depressing for me. 

     I also watch Hoarders on TV.  I watch this because both my parents, who are divorced, are hoarders.  I think I subject myself to this show to learn and try to figure out how to help my parents.  I feel overwhelming guilt about their situations, but they will not seek help, no matter how hard I try.  And I have cleaned up both of their houses, as best as I could, in the past, (I spent a two, two week vacation on each of their houses in years past), only to see them go right back to the way they were.  I sit and watch this show and cry and cry.

     Why do we subject ourselves to this torcher?  I think it is good in a way for us to FEEL, rather that stuff our feeling down inside and distract ourselves and not cope with our feelings.  What do you think?  It is so much easier for me to distract myself and not feel at all. 

Rena

1/31/12 2:25pm

Great post by the way LyraStorm.  Really makes me think.

LyraStorm

1/31/12 11:50pm

Hi Rena,

I avoid the news too. It's far too depressing. In general I try to escape into fiction so that I get away from all that stuff. Hollywood movies are often cliche, but at least most of them have happy endings. I was going for that escapism and was caught off guard by the content of the book and the way it affected me. Ah, such is life I suppose. We all have trigger points and if we read or watch stuff we have to run the risk that one of our triggers might be activated...

 

Thanks for your comment. I hope you manage to sort something out with your parents hoarding so it's not so upsetting for you.

Rena

3/ 5/12 8:48pm

Thank you.  You are so sweet.

Yes -- Definitely!  One of the most "bothersome" films I have seen was "A Beautiful Mind."  I felt totally destroyed for days after I saw it.  I felt paranoia, depression, an increase in hallucinations, etc.  There were many disturbing images in the film and I apparently absorbed all of them into my core being.  Since then, I'm more careful about what type of stuff I watch.  Anything about mental illness seems to affect me this way.  Now I can watch shows and read books about serial killers all day long and it doesn't upset me or make me afraid in the middle of the night or in the middle of a dark parking lot!

LyraStorm

1/31/12 11:58pm

Hi Donna,

Yes it is funny how some things affect us and other things don't. I watch movies that other people get upset over and I wonder what all the fuss is about. I notice how people get scared of things like that serial killer example you gave, but to me that is just a work of fiction or a story that has no real relevance to me even if it is a true story so it doesn't affect me at all.

 

It's the stuff we relate to, I guess, that we have to be careful with. Sometimes I think it can help to not feel so alone, or see how someone else copes, or see the lighter side of it (if it's a comedy maybe), but at other times we just relate too much and it reminds us of our own troubles, I think. I wasn't expecting it in this particular book, seeing as it was a fantasy, so it can come out of the woodworks sometimes too and thus cannot be avoided.

 

Thanks for those extra thoughts and way of looking at it.