Living in the 80 percent…
I have a TON of books, GREAT books by amazing authors. I can say with certainty and conviction, at least the first 50%-80% of these books are excellent. The last half , I am not so sure about!
I live in a world of things that are about 80% complete.
- Fence project in the back yard, 50% complete
- Garage cleaned out, closer to 20% complete
- Songs for my second album, 50% complete
- Most projects at work, between 50% and 80% complete
- This list only contains about 50% of the incomplete projects
This blog post, 50% complete and I am just about at my limit…..seriously
So, is this something that is simply part of my personality or do I attibute this to ADD? Or, are the two unavoidably intertwined? Reality is, they are both part of me which makes the second option the one I will run with.
So why am I the 80% guy? It doesn’t feel good to NEVER complete something and to have all this “unfinished” baggage lying around my life. It looks a little like Christmas morning with all the presents either half wrapped or half unwrapped. I look around the room and am as confused as anyone else looking in, and I caused it all!
So what is my plan; my call to action? That I will share in a post tomorrow. (if I can push past the 80% mark and finish it)
I know I am not alone in this.
Are you a 50,80, 100% person? What keeps you from finishing?
34 responses to "Living in the 80 percent…"
oh man..
I’m so with ya bro
As I type, I SHOULD be typing from the ‘good PC’ that’s been moved downstairs to the LR..and has YET to be wired back up online….
But nooo
It languishes in nonInterWebVille’
Why?
Cause my mind can’t seem to tune into that station long enough I guess, to just get it online..
So I go on living with it just sitting there…
Just like the light fixture I never get wired in, and the stairs I never fix up going to the basement & cool guitar stuff I’d like to record & the pipes I never practice and…man….
I’m getting depressed…
yeah, I’m with ya
Rich
I don’t like to think about all of the things I’ve started but never finished.
I tried to make a list of the things I needed to do, but I never finished the list.
What’s worse, is that I know how bad I am about not finishing things, so I use that as an excuse to procrastinate.
So, where you’re 80%, I might be 40% on a good day.
I feel your pain….
I think I’m a 20% and I have ADHD I know how you feel….
I try to find a balance between acknowledging the ADD so I can be better versus using it for a crutch. I, like you, don’t want to be a 20% guy but I find myself in that place too often.
So, we work together to fill in the other 80% and be better men. right??
I’m usually a 100%eventually guy, but lately I’ve become more relaxed about being a 76.4% guy. The more I have on my plate, the more I need to accept some stuff will need to go unfinished.
Really don’t like missing deadlines though, be they real or self imposed, and I’ve got more floating by me these days than ever before.
Like one in particular I’m a month behind on…something I’m working on for (with) you. *sigh*
Dude, it is totally ok. I think part of my problem is trying to do too much. I have trouble saying “no” to things. I am giving away part of my next post on this topic
The “yes” syndrome; I’m familiar with that one too.
And I know it’s OK, just keeping myself in line, or something. It’s in my to do list as a leisure item…I just want more leisure time right now
I go through phases where I’ll have a couple things at 100% but the rest at 20%. But I’d say on average I have 80% of the “thought process” complete on projects and %10 of actual execution.
Someone needs to invent a machine that connects to my brain so that when I think something it gets done…because my brain is a constant vat of multi-think that unfortunately rarely produces a streamlined project.
Right on. My bookshelf is full of books with bookmarks right in the middle of the book. Got me an appointment tomorrow. I talked with a friend that used to work in the mental health field. She asked me is it ADD or is it balance I’m looking for? I used to have like 6 books in my bag and rotate them every 3 days now I just have one and we will start another when that’s done. What a concept! Gotta start somewhere. I subscribe to a podcast and a week later delete it. Is that interest change or no focus? Good stuff right here.
Oh my gosh Dan doode.. I sooo have that same “book thing” going on…
Rich
I am very grateful to see the Lord doing a deep work in you and your wife. It is truly inspiring. However, a word of caution. Our culture has grown up indoctrinated with psychological ideologies that are far from true. “Mental diseases” are not truly mental diseases at all. They are excuses for sin. The Bible says nothing about mental diseases but it deals with sin. Unless the sin is dealt with, we will always make an excuse for our behavior. Medication is not the answer, Jesus is.
Here is a couple links that you might want to look at for further information.
http://www.food-intolerance.ca/24/the-adhd-lie-a-generation-mis-medicated/en/
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-9107771417615340513
I’m sorry man, as someone who suffers from ADD, that is a bunch of bologna. You need to get your facts straight.
There is no such thing as ADD. It is a huge fabrication. You should do a little researching which is what I have been doing for years. If you believe in mental diseases, the psychological culture has successfully indoctrinated you and has power over you. Now, you listen to them.
The Bible doesn’t mention the Flu, or Cancer either. Does that mean that those diseases don’t exist; that those are just excuses for sin? What about diabetes or hypothyroidism? You know, the conditions where an organ does not function exactly as it is supposed to, are those fake too?
How can you say that the brain, which is just another organ, could not possibly have a condition that causes it not to function perfectly?
What you’re implying, is that because someone claims they have ADD or ADHD, that they can’t be as good a Christian as you, because they have a “lack of self-control”. And that is both ignorant and offensive.
The power of the Spirit does help us to conduct ourselves better than we could on our own. And there is healing provided for through Christ’s work on the cross. But telling someone suffering from a mental issue because their brain works differently from yours not to try to treat it and deal with it whatever way they can is as ridiculous as telling a diabetic that they don’t need their insulin.
Of course those are not fake. Those are actual diseases… something is wrong with the body in those instances. A medical examination of a “mentally ill” person’s brain shows no differences than a person who has no “mental” inllness.
Psychiatry is all about power and control. It takes one person to have a disease – a true disease, whether he/she knows it or not there is something wrong with the body.
A “mental” disease, however, takes two people. One who has more power over the other can tell the other person he/she is not normal.
Also, all “mental” diseases are only conditions in how you relate to other people. You have been indoctrinated by the culture and/or the public school system. Rewind 100 years and look at the status of Psychiatrists. They have gained a foothold and you have been fooled.
Patrick,
If you will relax for a moment and actually dive into the field of medicine – not just psychology (which is completely different from psychology, as it sounds like you are talking about), there are various forms of brain imaging that can confirm mental diseases like depression, OCD, anxiety, addictions, ADHD and many others.
PET scans, MRI’s and CT scans can indeed show that our brains are diseased, as do hormone tests of various levels of hormones parts of our brains – not the rest of our bodies – produce.
While you may disagree with the science and medicine behind this (which is the same science and medicine used to diagnose cancer and as you call them “real” diseases), what is most concerning to me is the tone in which you judge people with these illnesses.
You are fortunate that you don’t suffer from one, and I pray you never do. However, I would rather be the depressed (technically bipolar 2), anxious, hormonally imbalanced and once suicidal person that I am than be a holier-than-thou person who is ignorant about medicine.
I am thankful I have a support system around me that is faith-based and medicine-supported because if I would have read your comment in a darker time in my life when these things weren’t around for me, they likely would have caused me to doubt my faith in God, my existence and purpose on earth, and could have driven me to a very dangerous place.
Please use your words and lack of knowledge cautiously in public forums such as this.
*psychology and psychiatry are different. my mistake on the wrong word twice. you refer to psychology (and poor psychology at that) and not psychiatry.
I have waited to post my reply to you in order to let the community weigh in on what you are proposing.
I am going to set aside the issues you propose and look directly at your approach to the discussion. You my brother come across with such a sense of pride and arrogance it is a total turn off. You speak of sin, error and being deceived but your approach isn’t at all how Christ approaches us when we are wrong.
I look at Jesus and the Samaritan woman, at the well. They begin to dialog and she throws out some issue of where worship is supposed to take place and “we do this and you Jews do that” but Jesus doesn’t even stop to correct her error. He looks right past the debate, comes down to look her in the eye and speaks directly to her heart. He makes the effort to “know” her.
Lets just say we are all totally delusional and misguided and you hold the truth on this matter. When you profess Christ, you need to model your tone, manner, approach and actions against the way He behaved/behaves. You focused on how we were all wrong, you didn’t step away from the debate and take the time to “know” us.
I am ok with being wrong. But you need to understand how Christ being at the center of who I am, medication, therapy and intentional life choices have drastically changed me for the better.
I have made myself available to being known by you, are you will willing to become known by us?
Lumping all “mental illness” together as you do renders the term meaningless. There are many kinds of mental illnesses, with many different causes. Some are known, others are partly known, some are just mysteries to us.
Some mental diseases have documented, tested, physiological causes. Over- or Underdeveloped portions of the brain (due to nutrition, experiences, genetics and a whole host of other factors) have distinct effects on human behavior. I’ve seen the brainscans. I’m not just taking other peoples word for it.
Now, none of that is an excuse, but it is an explanation. God is sovereign to heal and to save, but we live in a fallen world and have to contend with disease and disorder and sin. To lump all mental disease under the heading of “excuses to sin” is no different from lumping physical disease under the same heading.
Patrick – I watched Thomas Szasz’s video. I listened to him speak.
I’m sure you were aware that not only does Szasz advocated a complete repeal of drug laws (“we should have the right to choose privately what we consume”) and he has partnered with the Church of Scientology regarding his war on psychiatry.
I’m not an expert on Dr. Szasz but those were the first few things that came up as I did a small search. Nothing anyone says here will convince you that Psychology or Psychiatry are valid disciplines but I’m hoping you are aware of exactly who Dr. Szasz is.
The AMA, the APA and the NIMH all oppose him.
Sir, I know this has been said previously, but I will say it again.
It has less to do with what you say then how you say it. If you choose to disagree with someone, please do so with love and not arrogance. I understand that you do not believe that mental illness is a legitimate medical condition. That is fine. However, it is how you present your position that is disconcerting.
As followers of Christ, we are all to learn to how to be ’slow to speak and quick to listen.’ We are also to show love to our fellow believers and nonbelievers alike. (Honestly, most people won’t watch the videos you post or read your complete post if it is shared with an air of arrogance and comes across as you know better than everyone else.)
I pray that you will come to learn how to share your views with love.
Chad, I thank you for being so kind and showing Christ through your response. I pray that God will use your struggle with ADD to help others.
“the bible says nothing about mental diseases”.
Dude, your bible must be pretty light reading with all those pages missing.
Post one instance, and I will believe you.
Please quit arguing and watch for yourself.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yU5cjFyvM6Q
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b30iwhEw9ho&feature=player_embedded
Chad, you’re too kind.
Patrick: you sir, cannot be much fun at parties…
That’s all I’m sayin’
Except this: I cannot believe the arrogance.
I really cannot believe it.
man…
Chad, I come from your wifes blog. Just wanted to say keep doing what you are doing! Some people find fault with others no matter what. By being so honest and open about your ADD you are helping others to find faith in God through theirs. You are doing an awesome thing!
I hate to say how much I relate to this, especially with books. Not all books are worthy all the way thru, but I’ve finished less than I started!
Chad -
Let me start off by saying that I wandered in here via you wife’s blog, which I’ve been following for the past few months. Briefly, my (ex) wife had an affair and divorced me for the other man. I’ve been standing for the restoration of my marriage despite the circumstances. Yours and Sarah’s story has given me much hope for healing and forgiveness in my marriage. God has done a mighty work in both of you, and I praise Him for that.
I was hesitant to weigh in on this discussion for fear that my input would not be welcome. I realize that the negative reactions so far are likely more the result of the method rather than the message as noted above. So I will share my perspective for what its worth.
I am a psychologist. I have a master’s degree in clinical psychology and and PhD in industrial/organizational psychology. I work as an assessment scientist, developing tests that are used to screen job applicants. I also teach psych and business courses part-time at local universities. For the vast majority of my life I have embraced everything scientific.
In my personal life, I struggled with porn for all of my adult life, and in recent years I used it as a means to medicate what was diagnosed as clinical depression. I spent several years in psychotherapy for the depression and a daily porn addiction. By all accounts I should be a strong advocate for the practice of psychology. For years I was. I have now called those beliefs into question.
Why the change? First, let me clarify that I am not discounting the entire field. I am just looking at it now from an entirely different perspective – the perspective of someone who has been saved through an amazing personal encounter with God. When my wife dropped the bomb in September of 2008 and said she wanted out, I had been openly dealing with the porn addiction and depression. I was also out of work. I could not imagine being at a point any lower than where I was. I believed in God, but was not a believer. I was a cultural Christian at best. But in my darkest hour, God met me there and revealed himself to me in a most undeniable way. And He led me out. In the time where I should have been depressed to the point of suicide, He gave me an incredible hope. In the time where I should have been medicating with porn to deal with the stress of a marital breakup and loss of my family, He showed me the means of walking away from it cold turkey and entering a path of absolute celibacy for 7 months. If anyone would have told me that Jesus was going to heal me, I would have thought that they were nuts. But that is exactly what happened to me. No depression, no porn addiction, a heart of flesh. None of this can be explained by psychology in my opinion. This all came about by the grace of God.
So here I was a new believer, devouring the Word of God and seeking to know Him, watching in utter amazement as He revealed Himself repeatedly in my life. I was also wondering why my profession was not the answer to what I was struggling with. Why was I clueless about the true source from which my healing would come? Did my profession even embrace the notion of healing through Christian spirituality? So I started to look at psychology from a new perspective. I took another look at Wundt and James, the fathers of the profession whom I had taught about. I reexamined Freud, Ellis, and Rogers, noted as the most influential psychologists in the practice of psychotherapy. What I learned was that these men were all atheists – individuals for whom God had no relevance. And then it made sense to me why God was not part of their solution to life’s afflictions that originate in the mind. And I understood why there was such an emphasis on self-esteem in the practice of modern psychology, the antithesis of a life lived for Christ. The entire foundation of the profession of psychology is built on an atheistic perspective. Yes, some have integrated psychology and Christianity, but the atheistic foundation still remains.
Modern psychology places the self at the center, but often places the source of the solution to affliction outside of the individual – in drugs or a therapist. Putting this in psychological terms, the locus of control for mental affliction is external. This leads to feelings of helplessness and dependency. Modern psychology also removes any of the accountability that we bear for our situations, instead allowing us to adopt a victim mentality and place the blame externally, such as on our parents or circumstances. My therapists were happy to offer all sorts of justifications for my porn use, and I happily latched onto them because it allowed me to avoid responsibility. Faith in Christ, however, empowers us to have control, not as a result of relying on our own strength but by allowing Him to be our strength (Phillipians 4:13). Through Him we become victors. I am not discounting the effects of things such as traumatic childhood experiences, but too much of an emphasis on them takes the focus off of where it should be for a believer – our faith.
My only purpose in sharing this is to give you another perspective on psychology from an insider. I am not discounting whatever challenges people may be dealing with. I would just encourage people to fully consider in what and in whom they are putting their faith for a solution to their challenges.
Peace,
Rainer
I just want to take a moment and apologize for being rude to everyone.
I tend to be proud and it took Chad’s gracious response to help me see that that is indeed what I was doing. A sermon I listened to recently was truly convicting as Albert Mohler stated that if we cannot speak [write] the truth in love, we defeat our purpose. Whether or not you agree with my position, I was wrong to come out so harshly and I am sorry.
Please forgive me everyone for coming across so bluntly and not with kindness or compassion.
As far as Dr. Szasz is concerned, no I don’t agree with his position as a whole or much of his ideologies, just what he spoke of in the video. Thank you Sarah for pointing that out.
Once again my apologies to everyone. May the Lord be with you all and may you find his mercies new every morning.
~Patrick
Without wanting to open a whole can of worms again, I just want to pick up on something Patrick said in his gracious apology:
“As far as Dr. Szasz is concerned, no I don’t agree with his position as a whole or much of his ideologies, just what he spoke of in the video.”
With all due respect, then surely you are doing what you have accused those who have been ‘fooled’ by psychiatry/psychology of doing? I find it impossible to separate a particular line of teaching from an individual who has been shown to be corrupt/disproved/faulty in ideology. Maybe I’m an idealist, but surely one rotten apple spoils the whole barrel, so to speak – if a person is untrustworthy, how can we trust what they say – even if it does meet a need or a belief system of our own?
I ask this especially in light of the desire to be ‘true to scripture’ and unwaveringly biblical in our approach to how we approach illness. How far are we true to God’s word if we’ll accept what someone untrustworthy has said, even if we agree with one particular teaching? Surely if we are going to extend the teaching of Dr Szasz a measure of grace, the least we can expect is the same measure of grace to be extended to the medical professional, patient or carer who are striving to ‘do no harm’ in healing people, or achieving some sort of equilibrium for themselves in order to make value judgements for the Kingdom?
Just some thoughts that I’ve honestly been mulling over, not just in retrospect of the comments here, but I thought it might be a valid (if not a little all over the place!) point to raise.
Diane,
Let me clarify what I meant. Dr. Szasz is not the only person I have listened to or read on the subject. In fact, that video is the only one I have seen of him and it was just a small part of my research that I have done in this area of psychology/psychiatry. I posted it because it was simple and to the point. Obviously there is a lot more to it than what he states in the video.
I guess I should have found a better source to illustrate my point even though he may be right. There are others who I probably should have quoted instead.
I wrote a paper on clinical psychology and Christian culture awhile back and if anyone is truly interested in seeing what I’ve been talking about you can look up the following books/articles:
Adams, Jay E. The Biblical View of Self-Esteem, Self-Love, & Self-Image. Eugene, OR:
Harvest House Publishers, 1986.
Bobgan, Martin and Deidre. Psychoheresy: The Psychological Seduction of Christianity.
Santa Barbara, CA: EastGate Publishers, 1987.
——— . Prophets of Psychoheresy II. Santa Barbara, CA: EastGate Publishers, 1990.
Brownback, Paul. The Danger of Self-Love: Re-examining a Popular Myth. Chicago, IL:
Moody Bible Institute, 1982.
Collins, Gary R. The Rebuilding of Psychology: An Integration of Psychology and
Christianity. Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, 1977.
Erickson, Justin. “The History of Psychology.” Calvary Bible Church. Oct 2003.
calvarybiblechurch.org. 14 June 2008. .
Hunt, Dave & T.A. McMahon. The Seduction of Christianity: Spiritual Discernment in
the Last Days. Eugene, OR: Harvest House Publishers, 1985.
Hunt, Dave. Beyond Seduction: A return to Biblical Christianity. Eugene, OR: Harvest
House Publishers, 1987.
Kilpatrick, William Kirk. Psychological Seduction: The Failure of Modern Psychology.
Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1983.
TBC Staff. “Psychology and the Evangelical Church.” The Berean Call. 01 March 2006.
thebereancall.org. 14 June 2008. .
Whitehead, John W. The Stealing of America. Westchester, IL: Crossway Books, 1983.
Dude, your comment totally humbles me and is so appreciated. It takes a big man to write what you did. Thx man
R.I.P.
(this thread)
Chad, what’s next?!
ps. me?
I’m currently being scheduled for some sort of psych
exam, by my new doctor.
Who, btw totally is into the idea of holistic health & natural healing: as in, working with nature(God) to help th ehealing/healthy-living processes.
Rich in Maine
ps. we’re working on the adoption of an 8 year old Haitian boy!
(http://spring.gouette.com/)