Weekend Funnies

Copyright J.C. Duffy, March 6, 2011.

Friday Free Association Chain

The word is........

BIRD.

First commenter free associates with the above word. Second commenter takes the first commenter's word and free associates, and so on.

Remember -- FIRST thing that comes to mind. GO!!

T3 - The Languages of Love

Since Dr. Gary Chapman's book has sold over 5 million copies since 1992, most of my readership is probably already familiar with the five love languages outlined in his book. I'm a huge fan of this book not only personally but professionally. I've used it successfully with many couples to help them fill each other's "love tanks" more proficiently.

That's a great metaphor in counseling - filling up a tank. People get it--perhaps since gas prices are soaring. :-) But if you are speaking the language of quality time, likely you need quality time to feel loved and therefor fill your tank. If your partner speaks in acts of service, the both of you might as well be speaking French and German for all the emotional good it will do.

Chapman's synthesis of the 5 main ways people show love is nothing short of groundbreaking genius. You can click on the picture below to enlarge it and take the quiz to see which love language you speak most fluently.

From Gary Chapman's website, here are the 5 love langauges:

• Words of Affirmation

  Actions don’t always speak louder than words. If this is your love language, unsolicited compliments mean the world to you. Hearing the words, “I love you,” are important—hearing the reasons behind that love sends your spirits skyward. Insults can leave you shattered and are not easily forgotten.

• Quality Time

  In the vernacular of Quality Time, nothing says, “I love you,” like full, undivided attention. Being there for this type of person is critical, but really being there—with the TV off, fork and knife down, and all chores and tasks on standby—makes your significant other feel truly special and loved. Distractions, postponed dates, or the failure to listen can be especially hurtful.

• Receiving Gifts

  Don’t mistake this love language for materialism; the receiver of gifts thrives on the love, thoughtfulness, and effort behind the gift. If you speak this language, the perfect gift or gesture shows that you are known, you are cared for, and you are prized above whatever was sacrificed to bring the gift to you. A missed birthday, anniversary, or a hasty, thoughtless gift would be disastrous—so would the absence of everyday gestures.

• Acts of Service

  Can vacuuming the floors really be an expression of love? Absolutely! Anything you do to ease the burden of responsibilities weighing on an “Acts of Service” person will speak volumes. The words he or she most want to hear: “Let me do that for you.” Laziness, broken commitments, and making more work for them tell speakers of this language their feelings don’t matter.

• Physical Touch

  This language isn’t all about the bedroom. A person whose primary language is Physical Touch is, not surprisingly, very touchy. Hugs, pats on the back, holding hands, and thoughtful touches on the arm, shoulder, or face—they can all be ways to show excitement, concern, care, and love. Physical presence and accessibility are crucial, while neglect or abuse can be unforgivable and destructive.

So once you've taken the quiz and read the short description about your love language type, click the diagram below to get a better idea how to relate with people and what to avoid based on the love languages.

This is therapy at it's finest. Hope you find it useful.

Technique Toolbox - Therapy Worksheets Blog

I'm about to let you in one a secret therapeutic weapon of mine. I found this blog called Therapy Worksheets by Will Baum (Licensed Clinical Social Worker) about a year ago, and have been frequenting it ever since to find homework and in-session worksheets to do with clients (both teens and adults) ever since.

There is something very concrete about worksheets. Some people don't like them, sure, but I've found the majority of adults do. Since it's so concrete, adults will fill out the questions and read aloud little paragraphs with no issue. It often brings up the crux of the matter far sooner than mere talk therapy would. It's almost like filling out an intake form for a doctor in that it externalizes the person's problems and therefore makes them easier to bring up.

Just click around Therapy Worksheets for a while. Truly an amazing resource....and I'll bet you stay there for several more minutes than you thought you would because you find something that's personally interesting to you. Imagine what you could do with this information in your novels.

I'll just say "your welcome" ahead of time. I love, love, love this blog.

Treatment Tuesday - Alpha Male on the Couch

Today's assessment puts Elona's character Sam* on the couch. She's writing a historical set in the 1500s on the wild western Irish islands. Sam's family, the MacNamaras, have been fighting over Eagle Island for generations with the heroine's family. At 19, Sam was seduced by his stepmother, his father's third wife. His father caught them en flagrante and shot an arrow into his wife. Sam picked her up, carried her through the night, and buried her, having been sent into exile by his father, who up until then has truly been proud of his son, teaching him how to fight, hunt, and ride. Sam is an alpha male and changes women like he changes tunics.

Elona wants to know: What would be the long-term effect of a young man (19) who had an affair with his stepmother who was then found out, disowned and sent into exile by his father?   What would this character’s attitude toward women be?

After getting more background from you on the traumatic way in which the affair happened, what with his stepmother being killed in front of him and him having to bury her, I'd say that the immediate reaction would be anger toward his father, but that might depend on whether he loved his stepmother or if he was just having a fling like she sounds like she was.

You've already mentioned that he's an alpha male, and this he no doubt learned from his father. The question to ask is why. So romance novels (in the non-Christian arena) generally have an alpha male lead, but you still have to have a reason for this. The father's reason might be simple: he truly loved his first wife, and when she died early in their marriage, he didn't want to risk losing his heart again to a woman who would abandon him.

But what about Sam? What I'm about to suggest for motivations and attitudes is totally just that: suggestions. It's up to you. You could have him really love his stepmother. Like romantically. Perhaps it was his first sexual encounter....the kind that stays with you forever...and he never fully got over her death. And as a result, he buries the part of himself that could ever truly connect with a woman again, and becomes a womanizer (or Don Juan or whatever men were called back in the 1500s).

But maybe his father's anger and violence awakens something in him....a part of him that actually hates his stepmother for what she did. She obviously took advantage of a younger man, and it cost her her life. Maybe Sam could think that she got what she deserved. Thoughts of her infidelity might could be what really affects him in the long-term....and he might come away from the whole traumatic idea with the internal schema that women are never to be trusted.

Or, just to throw it out there, you could have him as the quintessential angry alpha male. His pride was burned when his father exiled him at such a young age for something he felt wasn't his fault. He blames it on the dead stepmother, and somehow this anger transfers to other women. You could still go with the fact that he doesn't deem women trustworthy as the basis for his anger, but he uses and discards them the way he felt his stepmother did to him, and his womanizing ways are really a grand scheme to feel justified and get back at his stepmother and his father.

The exile from his father could also come into play (and should if you ever plan on reuniting them in anyway). Maybe he seeks to dominate women in order to align himself with his father in hopes to make him more appealing as a son and therefore worthy for the father to take back into his fold. This almost sounds too far-fetched, but motivations can be outlandish. It's how you write them that matters. I could totally see a grief-stricken lad of 19 believing this could be true.

So I guess I'd try to solidify a few things before going ahead with this novel:

1) How grief-stricken is he over the exile and/or death of stepmother?
2) What need is he meeting by being a womanizer? (I did an article for Christian Fiction Online Magazine about playboys here.)

Alrighty, then. Guess that sums it up. Hope it's been helpful. Thanks for writing in and thank you for your kind words. :-)

Character Stereotypes: The Doormat

Main Entry: door•mat
Pronunciation: \dôrˈmăt\
Function: noun
1 : One who submits meekly or offers little resistance to domination, mistreatment, abuse, or indignities by others

We’ve all heard of and probably known a few doormats. These are the people pleasers who will do anything for anyone, sometimes at the expense of their own well-being. What the above definition doesn’t explain, though, is why.

As a therapist, the answer to that question is what I am most interested in. What makes someone so passive? What motivates these people to accept being taken advantage of or even being abused? If you have characters in your WIP running ragged and flagging out because they can’t say no, you need to have a plausible reason why they are this way. Below are two potential components for the backstory of a doormat.

Conditional Love

At the heart of many a doormat is the yearning for validation. They will take it in any form and do just about anything to get it. This could be because their parents never validated them for just being themselves.

You can see how difficult it might be for someone like this to accept Christ’s unconditional love. They probably grew up with parents who told them what to do and gave them attention and love only when they obeyed. This is conditional love, the overarching reason for many a doormat to submit to others. When they do so, they are using the best method they know of to get love or validation.

For those writers who want their doormat characters to have happy families of origin, then consider a painful breakup in early adulthood. Maybe the doormat doesn’t want to risk heartbreak again by offending or disagreeing with his or her partner.

Loss of Value

(I use the example of a female here because girls are trained from a young age to oblige and defer to others, so the percentage of female doormats is disproportionate to the percentage who are male.)

A doormat doesn’t have any idea how valuable her person or actions are. This would start in childhood, perhaps because her parents never encouraged or praised her for being assertive or stepping out on her own. Her self-esteem compass is broken, if not nonexistent.

The measure of the doormat’s validity, then, comes from an outside source, such as a boyfriend/girlfriend or mother/father or best friend. When she meets the demands of other people, making them happy, the takeaway value for the doormat is that they are happy with her as well. If they aren’t happy, then the doormat absorbs the responsibility for making them that way, and fear takes root that if she doesn’t double over backward to please these people, then they won’t love her.

Of course, we can’t leave a character in this mental space. It’s too unhealthy. What can you do to help “cure” them of their doormat-ness?

Click here to read the rest of my article in Christian Fiction Online Magazine.

Friday Free Association Chain

The word is........

PRAY.

First commenter free associates with the above word. Second commenter takes the first commenter's word and free associates, and so on.

Remember -- FIRST thing that comes to mind. GO!!