Matt W Cook

Why you should never take yourself seriously

• You have a bellybutton.  And those are funny.
• The characters in a comedy are always better off than characters in a soap opera.
• No one else takes you seriously.  Why should you?
• When you take yourself too seriously, you tend to take God less seriously.  And that’s no good.
• You’re small, flawed and insignificant.  Best not to be too serious about that.
• People who can laugh at themselves are way more happy than those who cannot.
• There is little in you that is worth taking seriously.
• There are too many serious issues in the world for you to waste serious-energy on yourself.
• People who take themselves too seriously are never free from the horrid tyranny of trying to be cool.
• People who take themselves too serious can never, truly, be themselves.

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Someone recently asked me what sort of traditions we have for Family Day in Canada. Since it’s a brand-new holiday, though, I didn’t have an answer. But it got me thinking. What sort of traditions should we try to implement for Family Day? Here’s some ideas:

• Drive around with the whole family and get yourself completely lost.  Then try to find your way back.  To make this a little more exciting, get the kids to direct you back.
• Have a dress-up party with your family.  Once you have the wildest costumes, turn it into a dance party.
• Take the family to the nearest downtown urban center and hand out good things to the homeless and the lonely.
• Find a town you’ve never been to before.  Take the family there, walk around, have lunch and go back home.
• Make it a day of wild photos.  Drive around aimlessly and stop wherever you find a neat looking place to take a family portrait.
• Build a fort.
• Have the kids cook whatever they want for dinner.

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I was driving to work this morning and my thoughts drifted toward coffee shops. I remember that great coffee shop we used to go to while I was in KLBC. Sometime troops of ten or more would piles into cars and get down to that wonderful place. And we’d spend hours talking and laughing and building friendships that, to this day, I consider some of the strongest I’ve ever had. That coffee shop wooed me into falling in love with coffee shops.

These days, though, I feel like coffee shop culture is changing a little. Or maybe it had started changing back then, but since Peterborough was a bit of a different kind of town, I didn’t notice. Or maybe I didn’t notice because I’m a dummy. Whatever.

Tim Horton’s is the first example. Each one is a little different, but there is one thing that is the same in each and every one. That unwelcoming sign posted on the wall that says they love your patronage, but only for thirty minutes. As much as I love Timmy’s, this sign has always been a bit of an insult to me. It seems to defy the culture that coffee shops were made to cater to. That culture that delights in sitting around and talking and loving. With that sign on the wall, I feel like I’m in a coffee assembly-line.

But then there’s Starbucks. Everyone either loves or hates them. There hadn’t been many of them when I first went to Pakistan, and now they’re all over the place. Being an aspiring writer, and hearing that all real writers need to write in public so people can see them write, I’ve sat there a few times with my computer. The Good: You can sit there all day long and no one will ever bother you or give you a funny look. You belong there. The Odd: Coffee Chop Culture is still defied there. I’m actually sitting in a Starbucks right now. You know who else is with me? Three other people with laptops, hoping we will watch each other write. A man sitting along with a gourmet cookie. A woman with an infant. That’s it.
I’ve destroyed coffee shop culture.

Coffee Shops used to be places to build relationships. Now it’s a place for fake writers to fake write. I feel cold.

Next time I need to get out of the house to write, I’m going to do it in the library. Coffee Shops are meant for people, not projects.

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Okay, part two of our little quiz.

Scenario 4
In a sadistic game worthy of the comic books, an evil super villain has kidnapped your son and one hundred strangers from a distant land. Your son is placed in a box. The strangers are placed in another box (a big one, I suppose). You are given a control panel that connects to explosives on box boxes. There are two buttons on the control panel. One will detonate your son. One will detonate the strangers. If you do not press one of the buttons, bot boxes will explode. Whoever does not die will walk free.

Scenario 5
35 million people will die of hunger-related illness this year. $500, well placed, could prevent one of these deaths. You have a house, a car, a good job and a nice church building. How many deaths ought you to prevent and to what lengths ought you to go to prevent them?
Answer in comments.

Scenario 6
Jesus told you that you are the salt of the earth (meaning you are meant to slow down the decay of the world like salt slows the decay of meat) and the light of the world (meaning you are meant to shine the glorious light and love of Jesus in a dark world). Given $1000, how could you best accomplish these roles in your present situation?
Answer in comments.

Is it just me, or are moral scenarios easier when they are in the abstract and aren’t actually happening every day?

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I was reading a neat article in Maclean’s about the changing moral culture of Canada. So I decided to throw a little poll at you, my readers, and see what our morality looks like. Here we go!

Scenario 1
You have just purchased a $900 suit and are proudly wearing it as you walk down the street.  It’s the most perfect piece of clothing you’ve ever worn and you’ll probably nail that job interview you’re on your way to all because of it.  Suddenly, you notice a small child playing in the middle of the street and a car bearing down on top of her.  If you act now, you will be able to push her out of the way.  But in doing so, you’ll almost certainly ruin your new suit.

Scenario 2
You’re walking down that same street and you see a different child playing and another car bearing down on her.  But the car is going so fast that, while you’d certainly be able to save the child, you calculate that you’ll have a 50% of being wounded and a 50% of being seriously wounded.  Seriously = losing a limb or getting paralyzed for life.

Scenario 3
You are the only wealthy man in a poor village.  Five children from your village have been kidnapped by a group of people demanding $100,000 for their return.  Your security forces assure you that there is no way of getting the children back without paying the ransom.  But, they say, if the ransom is paid they are sure they can apprehend the kidnappers as well.  But, through some strange twist of reasoning, the money will not be returned.  You are the only person in the village with the means of paying the ransom, but you’d probably have to sell some of your favorite things to do so.

That’s enough for today!  Answer the polls and discuss.  Part 2 tomorrow.

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What happens when you offer Joseph a quarter to take one bite of a lemon? He goes all out. Here’s the video:

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End of the month! End of Wellness?

I started the project as a way to find out what would happen if I lived well. The biggest thing I learn, however, is that wellness is complicated. It’s also kinda simple.

It’s simple in that the steps to wellness are relatively clear.  If I eat right, live right, socialize right and love right, things will turn out right.  It’s complicated in that I seriously don’t want to do any of that.  Resistance is a tough enemy.

So now that the challenge is over, I find myself faced with the question of how I’m going apply all of this to my life.  I think I’m just going to try to stay well.  Moderation will come back into play, which will be nice, because I missed some things.  But I’m going to try to keep my eye on wellness.  Because things did  turn better when I lived better.  I dropped the ball many times throughout the month (perhaps because I tried to throw out moderation).  And that added guilt on top of the stress of it all.  Hopefully with moderation instead of severe regulations, that can be taken care of.

Conclusion: We were made to live in a certain way.  When we try to live that way, things tend to turn out better.  Yay for wellness.

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