Price tag

First order of business:
Heck yeah to all the page views I've gotten!! I've got all my months beat, even May, and June ain't even half over yet!! I must give thanks to Tara, the Cake Betch, from The Hot Mess Chronicles, because a whole heck of a lot of traffic has been coming here from her blog. SHOUT OUT TARA!! Damn I wish we could hang sometime, because she's awesome, too. And I want to meet her dog.

Anywho
Anyone here ever too hard on themselves?

I think we all are at one point are another, right? I mean, we expect something out of ourselves, then the words "should have" or "could have" enter our language. Those are damning words. They can really bring a person down. Whether it's kindergarten and I "should have" been able to recite the alphabet, or high school and I "should have" known the quadratic equation, (I forgot it, trust me, if you're in high school and read this, you'll never use it except when you get in college and have to take a class. Unless you go into some engineering or something, but I don't know about that, I'm "just" a social worker).

See what I did there? "Just" a social worker. Are we ever "just" anything? Do you work hard for what you do? Heck yeah! You may not be a doctorate in something, or get paid six figures, but that doesn't mean you don't work hard. Heck, you may get something more out of your job than money...maybe something like, I don't know, satisfaction. I know that what I want out of my job at the end of the day is to feel like I've helped someone feel better about themselves and their future. Who cares how much I make? (as long as it's enough to feed, clothe, and house me, of course).

How often, though, do we run ourselves through the wringer, not giving ourselves credit for what it is we do? How often do we plant a seed, water it, get a nice, lovely plant, but criticise ourselves because it's not the plant we expected (even if it turns out looking great, or even better than what we expected)? I find myself doing this all the time. So the project wasn't what you intended it to be, but it turned out stellar and everyone loved it, but you can still see the flaws. When are you gonna give yourself credit? You've worked hard for something, you deserve credit, right? It may not be what was asked for, but you still deserve credit for what you do! Hard work deserves recognition. That's why it's called labor.

I've been doing a lot of hard work lately. I've been volunteering, I've been doing my internship with the MHMR, I've been going to school, but I have yet to receive much recognition for what I'm doing. I really work my ass off, but I don't get much for it. I don't get a paycheck, and I don't get any sort of pension. You know what though? THAT'S OKAY!! After I've put in my hours, I get credit at school (oh how rewarding!) and I get the occasional feeling of having helped someone. The occasional feeling of having helped someone is what it's all about! I live for that feeling. I don't care if it takes 10 or 100 hours to get it, I want that feeling. It's like a natural high. I've cried before from the power of that feeling. It's not a monetary or physical reward, it's an intrinsic reward with enough power to keep me coming back, and enough to even make me want to keep volunteering there even after my internship is over (if they'll allow it). Seriously!

When you really appreciate what you do, and give yourself credit for the things you do, you'll start to feel so much better about the things you do, and you'll feel so much more motivated to do them. When it came to things I hated to do, I always waited until the last minute. I feel this much less with my internship; in fact, I often like to arrive as soon as I possibly can, traffic allowing. I like to be there to do things. I like to complete individual sessions. I don't mind typing up notes and putting packets together. I don't mind co-facilitating or even leading groups. I really like what I do. I enjoy it. I'm motivated. It's not something that I dread getting up in the morning to do. It doesn't take an extrinsic reward for me to know that I've done a good job.

Other things, i.e. school, volunteering, home, it takes some acknowledgement for me to feel like I've done anything that matters, and I'm really hard on myself. If I haven't done it the right way the first time, I'll do it again and again until I get it right. Sometimes, I get that way at my internship, when I know I'm doing something wrong. I have to remind myself sometimes that I'm my own worst critic. We all are, at times. We all have to push past that, and remind ourseles that we are worth much more than what we would put on a price tag for ourselves. We do so much more, and what we do is worth much more than what we think it may be worth. No more shoulds and coulds. What we do is worth much more than that We can't put a price tag on that.

Image Credit Here

"Wanna make the world dance, it ain't about the price tag"

Plants have feelings too!!

I begin this post with an explanation as to how my fake plant died- I forgot to pretend to water it :( poor plant suffered from my neglect, and died of dehydaration. I am not writing this to convince anyone to switch to my opinion, but simply because it's an interesting topic :P so don't be offended by anything I say, and if you don't want to, you don't have to read it. However, I'd still like it if you read, just cause I like to be listened to.

Now onto the topic at hand. This isn't to upset anyone, but the object of vegetarianism and veganism is a bit strange if you look deeper into it (unless there are certain physiological or religious reasons to not eat meat). Now I can understand, after seeing some of the grossly inhumane videos posted on the Internet would make one not want to eat meat; however, they must realize that these videos only depict the extremes, and are not representative of the population as a whole. There are even regulations on how animals must be treated. The few that are immoral and treat the animals horribly are the ones targeted by the media and animal rights activists, while those abiding by the laws are merely ignored; therefore, the statistics are grossly skewed.

If you think about it, though, being a vegetarian does not deter farmers and retailers from making and distributing meat products. Even if this were to happen, many farmers, as well as butchers and anyone involved with the use of animal byproducts would suffer a dramatic increase in job loss and poverty. Our economy is already bad enough, and this wouldn't help. Even entry jobs, such as those at restaurants and supermarkets, would be affected.

Furthermore, the argument that animals have feelings too, because they have vascular and nervous systems is an invalid response, for plants also have these systems, they just aren't as complex as those of animals. Plants are also rooted to the ground somehow, with the inability to run, as well as the inability to communicate fear or pain. So how do we deduce that they feel no pain or fear? Furthermore, they suffer through the application of pesticides as well as modification of genes to produce more, fuller, bigger plants to increase profits. Isn't that a bit immoral as well? However, there are no statistics to back this up, simply because it's not considered to be as large of an issue.

Humans are meant to be predatory by nature- hence the development of our teeth. Our ancestors hunted and ate meat, but now it's inhumane to kill animals? We are a part of the food chain for a reason. There is a reason for the creation of a food chain!! Animals are meant to eat plants and other animals as part of this system; plants are at the bottom because they are photosynthetic (make their own food) as compared to the animal kingdom, made up of beings that are consumers and cannot create their own food. It also helps with population control.

Other animals eat other animals, so how is it wrong for humans to do so? Yes, we are moral beings for the most part, but by defining ourselves as such, are we inferring that other consumers are less morals or without morals because they eat other animals? This is a bit absurd.

I realize, however, that people have the freedom of choice, and I will not discard those choices