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Change can be challenging
Change can be challenging
Managing Change: Dealing With Resistance To Change Essay 100 Words
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“I seldom think about my limitations, and they never make me sad. Perhaps there is just a touch of yearning at times; but it is vague, like a breeze among flowers” - Helen Keller. As a woman known for her disabilities, yet also for her sheer tenacity, Helen Keller states something important about limitations in this quote. She is saying that although limitations may occasionally get in the way and cause distress, they most often are the fuel that fires growth. In “The End of Remembering,” written by Joshua Foer, and The Ordinary Devoted Mother, written by Alison Bechdel, the idea of limitations being both good and bad are explored. In the case of Bechdel, she sees limitations as means of personal personal growth. Foer, however, see them in …show more content…
This, however, is not always the case. In many situations, limitations are actually powerful forces that can push other limits and help humans adapt to the every evolving world. This concept is widely considered in Joshua Foer’s, “The End of Remembering.” This article generally focuses on the concept of memory and how it has changed over the course of many centuries. One idea Foer poses is that of the human mind being limited both physically and metaphorically. Scientific research has shown that the human brain only works at about 10 percent of its full capacity, meaning there is another 90 percent that we have yet to use. This imaginary barrier is repressing our ability to move forward in both evolution and self-creation. Foer suggests that it is this limitation, however, that has pushed mankind to think outside of the box and to go beyond our physical limits. With that, he …show more content…
Alison Bechdel has also discussed the concept that limitations are a positive driving force in everyday life. In her book The Ordinary Devoted Mother, Bechdel chronicles events in her life that have made it difficult to write a memoir about her mother. She, however, finds that this task is much more challenging than expected, and not because she does not know what to write about. Instead, Bechdel struggles with an internal conflict she faces with her mother. In another sense, Bechdel feels that she must fulfill her mother’s legacy and that idea is limiting her from being able to write. This inability to write, in a way, because an obsession of Bechdel’s, forcing her to search for a deeper in meaning as to what the problem is. This is precisely said when Bechdel writes, “This search for meaningful patterns may very well be crazy. But to be enlisted with her in it thrills me. ‘Why do you and I do that?’ I am carrying on her mission” (Bechdel 103). Bechdel discovers that her limitation is actually a way for her to follower her mother’s legacy. As humans, we often limit ourselves to that of which our parents can do or have done in their lifetime. More often than not, this limit is what drive us to do better and to possibly become more successful. In a way, Bechdel is suggesting that she has yet to surpass her mother. When this limitation is finally broken, however, she finds herself free and able to do
Foer, on the other hand, makes the claim that our society’s ability to remember has slowly dwindled by means of outsourcing of ourselves. “Today, when we live in a deluge of printed words” we have no need to remember everything when we have tools that do it for us (164). We have phones that remember people’s names, addresses, and phone numbers. We have GPS systems that make remembering routes a thing of the past.
When discussing the impact of memory on daily life, Foer explains that “the average person squanders about forty days a year compensating for things he or she has forgotten… everyday there seems to be more to remember…with a memory like Ben Pridmore’s I imagined life would be more qualitatively different--and better”(MWE page 7). This point highlights how important memory truly is. With a poor memory, we struggle with recalling even the simplest of observations and events. In addition, Foer uses confirmation to persuade the reader that having a good memory has positive effects on intelligence, noting that it would make him “…more persuasive, more confident, and in some fundamental sense smarter…” as well as a “better journalist, friend, and boyfriend”(MWE page 7). Finally, through Foer’s use of confirmation, we are brought to the realization that without memory, “our world would immediately crumble”(MWE page 19), especially in a situation where “all the world’s ink [becomes] invisible and all our bytes [disappear]”( MWE pade 19). Foer successfully defends his argument that without textual aids and external means of remembering information, we as a society would lose a vast amount of knowledge solely due to our inability to successfully retain memories. These three pieces of evidence effectively confirm Joshua Foers primary claim that memory is
Both awe-inspiring and indescribable is life, the defined “state of being” that historians and scholars alike have been trying to put into words ever since written language was first created. And in the words of one such intellectual, Joshua J. Marine, “Challenges are what make life interesting; overcoming them is what makes life meaningful”. Essentially, he is comparing life to a bowl of soup. Without challenges or hardship into which we can put forth effort and show our potential, it becomes a dull and flavorless broth. But for characters in novels like Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, and Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, the difficulties and trials that we all must face can transfigure the mundane liquid mixture of existence into a vibrant and fulfilling gumbo. The protagonists of these works are two strong-willed and highly admirable women, who prevail in the face of overwhelming odds stacked in everyone’s favor but theirs. In their trying periods of isolation brought about by cold and unwelcoming peers, particularly men, they give their lives meaning by simply pushing forward, and living to tell the tale.
Bechdel recounts her childhood growing up with a closeted homosexual father and a mother who
Bechdel was left “rushing from the room in embarrassment” (273) on the one unforgettable occasion that she went to kiss him goodnight. She desperately desired the affection of her father but was not sure how to achieve it. Displaying fondness was not a frequent action within the home, but instead subtle displays of affection. These strains created the stubborn and secluded childhood version of Bechdel who was unwavering in her
Alison Bechdel’s memoir Fun Home is a masterfully crafted piece. In comparison to the other memoirs we have read for this course, Fun Home is definitely, for me, the most intriguing and immersive of the three. Bechdel manages to develop an engaging and thought-provoking piece about trying to understand the people that we are close to and discovering who we, as individuals, are in relation to them. Fun Home is a story that is very specific to Bechdel’s life, but there is a universality to it since we have all been in families and we have all been mysteries to one another. Figuring out those mysteries and finding a way through life via those relationships is the true purpose of this narrative. Bechdel accomplishes this well crafted memoir with
For many of us growing up, our mothers have been a part of who we are. They have been there when our world was falling apart, when we fell ill to the flu, and most importantly, the one to love us when we needed it the most. In “Two Kinds” by Amy Tan, it begins with a brief introduction to one mother’s interpretation of the American Dream. Losing her family in China, she now hopes to recapture part of her loss through her daughter. However, the young girl, Ni Kan, mimics her mother’s dreams and ultimately rebels against them.
Alison Bechdel isn’t a normal author. She uses graphics, and wordplay to tell a very engaging, and interesting story. One of these stories titled “The Ordinary Devoted Mother”, Bechdel tells the story of her trying to write a memoir about her mom. One of the major themes in this story is reading, and writing. Bechdel explores what writing is, how it is important, and how she perceives writing herself.
In the poem, "Ordinary Life," by Barbara Crooker, the speaker uses irony to signify how her life is anything but but ordinary. To the speaker, "this [is] a day when nothing [happens]," however, the readers can clealy see how busy the speaker's day is throughout the poem (1). The speaker's first duty of the day is to get her children ready to go to school. Then she spends her entire morning building "block stacks in the squares of light on the floor" (5-6). When "lunch [blends] into naptime" for the baby, the speaker "[cleans] out kitchen cupboards" (7-8). This indicates that the speaker is a hard working mother and does not relax until she finishes all her chores. Furthermore, in the afternoon, she "[peels] carrots and potatoes" for dinner
In Alison Bechdel’s graphic novel entitled Fun Home, the author expresses her life in a comical manner where she explains the relationship between her and her family, pointedly her father who acts as a father figure to the family as she undergoes her exhaustive search for sexuality. Furthermore, the story describes the relationship between a daughter and a father with inversed gender roles as sexuality is questioned. Throughout the novel, the author suggests that one’s identity is impacted by their environment because one’s true self is created through the ability of a person to distinguish reality from fictional despotism.
The first issue that needs to be addressed however is what exactly is memory? “ Without memory we would be servants of the moment, with nothing but our innate reflexes to help us deal with the world. There would be no language, no art, no science, no culture. Civilization itself is the distillation of human memory” (Blakemore 1988). The simple interpretation of Blakemore’s theory on what memory is that a person’s memory is at least one of the most important things in their life and without it civilization itself could not exist.
According to Sternberg (1999), memory is the extraction of past experiences for information to be used in the present. The retrieval of memory is essential in every aspect of daily life, whether it is for academics, work or social purposes. However, many often take memory for granted and assume that it can be relied on because of how realistic it appears in the mind. This form of memory is also known as flashbulb memory. (Brown and Kulik, 1977). The question of whether our memory is reliably accurate has been shown to have implications in providing precise details of past events. (The British Psychological Association, 2011). In this essay, I would put forth arguments that human memory, in fact, is not completely reliable in providing accurate depictions of our past experiences. Evidence can be seen in the following two studies that support these arguments by examining episodic memory in humans. The first study is by Loftus and Pickrell (1995) who found that memory can be modified by suggestions. The second study is by Naveh-Benjamin and Craik (1995) who found that there is a predisposition for memory to decline with increasing age.
“Let me go! Let me go!” Ciara said, her shrill voice bellowing in the darkness.”
Becoming a mother has been the best part of my life. I became a mother at a very young age. I had no idea what to expect and was not in the least prepared for the journey that lie ahead. I have truly embraced motherhood and enjoy all the wonderful things it has taught me. While living through motherhood, I have found that it can teach you the most valuable lessons there are to learn. Being a mother has taught me how to have patience. I have also learned that being a mother takes a lot on mental and physical strength. My children have been the best to teach me how to juggle many tasks at once. They have made me strong. Even through some unexpected turns, I have learned how to get through hard times and really learn what it means to never give up. My children are my biggest blessing, and I hope they will learn valuable lessons through me. The skills I have learned from being a mother have helped me in my college journey.
Has anyone ever asked you: “Who is most important to you”? To me the most wonderful mother in my life, no one can replace her in my heart. My mother, who is very nice and gentle, helps me and has always been there for me when I need her. My mother loves me very much. She is strict and educated me to become a good person. I can’t say how much love her. I am grateful to her because she gave me birth, brings me love and helped me grow up. But you know she just takes care of me a lot. Every day she tells me the same words. If you were me, you would feel very tired. I am a very happy child having my mother. I feel too tired to listen to her words, but imagine one day I don’t see her any longer and listen to her voice. What would I feel?