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Personal Development: “Cocooning in a new decade” November 22, 2020

Posted by Dennis Mellersh in Concept of personal development, Concept of personal growth, Uncategorized.
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Cocooning is a concept coined by social philosopher and futurist Faith Popcorn in the late 1970s, which described the idea of spending more and more time at home as a refuge from the noise/disruptions  of the outside world.

In her book The Popcorn Report (1), published in 1991, she said “cocooning…when we named it, [was] “the impulse to go inside when it just gets too tough and scary outside. To pull a shell of safety around yourself, so you’re not at the mercy of a mean, unpredictable world…”

“Cocooning turned into a major preoccupation, as record numbers of people remodeled, redecorated, restored, and then watched, “This Old House” to relax.”

But, all of this was nevertheless a choice; we made the decision to go inside, to cocoon.

It was part of an enjoyable lifestyle.

But now in 2020-21, and perhaps beyond, pushed inside by a relentless Covid-19 virus and mandated sheltering, we are in the midst of an emotional and physical health crisis.

Instead of comfort reading, we are more likely to be reading personal development and personal growth books on coping with anxiety, or working on reading or writing job-related reports on the kitchen table because we have been forced to work remotely from our homes.

But hopefully, in part by utilizing the coping tools we have learned, and by  community efforts and working together, we will emerge from this stronger and have more of an attitude of gratitude and appreciation for what is good in our lives.

(1) Faith Popcorn, The Popcorn Report, Doubleday Currency, New York, 1991

 

Dennis Mellersh

 

Personal Growth: Staying in the present moment April 23, 2019

Posted by Dennis Mellersh in Living in the Now.
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Most of us won’t admit it, but we often spend a large proportion of our mind-time on revisiting the past and particular in visiting the future by  anticipating and visualizing how our life situation is likely to unfold; and in so looking, we tend not to foresee options but rather make assumptions on probabilities, often negatively.

In trying to be in two places at once, we miss opportunities in the most important third place…the present moment.

Eckhart Tolle sums up this paradox nicely in his book The Power of Now:

“To be identified with your mind is to be trapped in time; the compulsion to live almost exclusively through memory and anticipation…This creates an endless preoccupation with past and future.

The Now is the most precious thing there is. The eternal present is the space in which your whole life unfolds.

Life is now.”