Wednesday, March 07, 2007



No small order.
Mom: So don't.



Y: Booba (rhymes with tuba), how're you?
B: Just great, Lenore and Sammy are visiting us.
Y: That's nice.
B: Do you want to say hello to Sammy?
Y: Who's Sammy?



Source: Being Popular 101.

Axiom: Being popular means being nice.








I can't believe it's taken me this long to post this.






Me: Hey, M., How are ya’?
M. glares at me.





Take the knife OUT of my heart. Ouch.

Me: What are you talking about?


M.: You were mean. Your friends were mean.

You blank.

Well, I said I was sorry.

So cliques can be deadly. See?


Yeah. All Of The Time.



Treat her/him like you would treat your boss.

When it's beating on the kids I say:











He listened to his mom and dad.



Copyright 2007, TherapyDoc


Mark said...

Very well written article. True, it is very important to learn to be social, to learn to interact, even more important to do this with those who we are closest to.
I just wrote an article titled "The Language of Love", it has many of the same thoughts that you talked about today. Being nice, really does not take that much effort and the pay off is huge.

Holly Schwendiman said...

Yup, yup, and yup. You can't overstate the virtue of kindness and the good that can come from it. Watching my third grader is so painful remembering all those popularity woes that seem so all important at the time! I've absolutely loved getting to know so many great bloggers. I don't have time to comment on every article every time of all my favorites, but I hope my consistency speaks for itself. There are so many great people out there and blogging is a great way to connect.

Holly's Corner

TherapyDoc said...

I know that you two, H. & M., in fact probably ALL of the people who visit over here, don't even need this lesson.

It's me I have to keep reminding.

paris parfait said...

Yes, we are all lucky to read Neil's musings on a regular basis!

The Stooge said...

Um... don't be too proud.

Hey, I was driving. :)

TherapyDoc said...

What does this mean, I was driving. You had time? You were bored? You wanted to be in the carpool lane? What?

J said...

Eh, people are overrated.

Can't believe that woman brought up a third grade beef and then acted as if it was yesterday...what's up with that?

TherapyDoc said...

For her it was a snapshot memory, getting shut out of the clique, being rejected. I feel terrible about it. But you can't make kids socialize with others. Even under hypnosis.

It's unnatural. They have their needs to share intimately with only a select few.

The post is tongue in cheek, of course, and even if I present something as a value, like being nice makes you popular, hardly any kid is going to buy into it at the expense of what is obviously cool.

Cool isn't always popular, popular isn't always cool. Shut me up already.

Yvette said...

I'm fascinated... and puzzled by the blogging part of this discussion -- really by blogging as a social activity. After reading the blogging part of this post -- and the one about boundaries and anonymity -- I just feel kinda confused. It doesn't resonate for me. So I'm wondering, TD, do you think there is a "blogger personality type"? Or even a "cyber personality type"? Do you think that "popularity" or "healthy boundaries" online are mirrored in "real life"? Is it inverted, maybe? Are blogger personalities an extension of people's "real life" personalities -- or are they like "alter egos", where you can say and do all that you can't do in "real life"?

I know that I'm missing something when I read all the comments and everyone else is saying "Oh, yeah!" and I'm thinking "huh?" (And then, at the other end of the spectrum, there are the folks who have never even read a blog, let alone written one, or even commented on one.) I'm hoping that someone (with the skills and insights of a doc ;-) might give me a little bit of insight into where the attraction lies. Clearly, there is something about blogging that appeals to folks and whatever that appeal is, it's strong enough to build these tight-knit cyber communities.

TherapyDoc said...

These are great questions. I can elaborate on them more, but it would be pure conjecture.

No one has studied this, not the way it needs to be studied, so we don't have the answers. As always there is a YES case or a thousand plus to all of them, and NO cases, as well.

You PhD candidates out there might think about how you might explore the answers. I will, too. Thanks for the thought provocation, Yvette. I wish we had just a tiny bit of research on blogging, but the word, and I've done a huge search, wanted to write an article on it for a professional journal, barely even exists in academic research literature.

Dagny said...

Not only did Neil listen to his mom and dad but Sophia must have listened to hers as well. Proof? That she sent thank you emails to all the bloggers who wished her a happy birthday on Neil's blog.

I was just having a conversation tonight (with another blogger in person, no less) about social niceties. He was trying to excuse what I conceive as being rude for being young. I countered that these were skills that should have been taught at home.

TherapyDoc said...

What's scary is that one would think that undoing rudeness, breaking people of insensitivity, would be easy.

Adults, once they're aware, change fast. But for some reason it's not the case here. They dig in their heals and get defensive with criticism.

Dagny's right. Start kids YOUNG. It's not so hard to be sensitive to others.

J said...

I guess my point was that, all that elapsed time and growth should count for something.
Confronted with a snapshot memory, I may be filled with the same emotions, but my way of dealing with people has changed. I highly doubt I would behaviorally regress into an 8-year-old, especially to the extent that I'd try to be so hurtful.

Then again, maybe she's the type of person who stops talking to her best friend for days/forever over a relatively minor slight. Can't identify with that.

TherapyDoc said...

That's true. What I do remember about M was that she wasn't easy to like and she still wasn't easy to like. So altho she may have grown, (and maybe I regressed, who knows) certain traits (borderline, frankly) remain the same.

My way of thinking of borderline is that some people are unfinished. Their identities are not well-formed and the consequent insecurity, their huge anxiety, makes them need to latch on, capture another person and not let go.

I think that even as a kid, I felt she was that kind of a person and I ran.

Denise said...

What a fun read this was! I am glad I participated in the carnival and found your blog.

DigitalRich said...

Thank you for participating in the 5th edition of The Carnival of Storytellers!


TherapyDoc said...

Yes, I've become a real carnival party animal. I recommend all of you to go to Dig's posts for good stories.