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1890. wabbit - 10/16/2007 7:11:52 PM I never said it was about your artwork, and I used my own just an example, WoW. I can't think of a single person who has seen your artwork that hasn't thought it was nothing short of gorgeous. And as beautiful as it is on a computer screen, it is far better in person. Mine, otoh...
I had a roommate who got to decide which of my drawings/paintings could be hung in the public areas of the apartment, and which were unsuitable for public display. Nothing to do with what she liked, mind you, but she could see what would scare people better than I could. I had one guy tell me I should never show anyone that group of paintings, because I would be a suspect in every grisly crime for miles around. A couple teachers couldn't believe they were even mine, because they thought I was "so cheerful", and they worried that I might be seriously depressed and suicidal.
When you say "the secret of painting is to forget one's "self" via the process and to NOT identify with your marks on the canvas", it reminds me why nobody sees my paintings. While I'm never attached to the marks on the canvas, the work is, in the end, all about me. The only time I'm able to forget myself via the process is when I'm learning something new, or doing something specifically requested. Even then, I can still see myself intruding. I don't think it's ego, it's just expression, but I guess it makes me an unsuccessful painter. So if I'm a mere dilettante, ok.
Or perhaps I'm misunderstanding your meaning, much as you might have misunderstood t'ful. 1891. TheWizardOfWhimsy - 10/16/2007 7:50:05 PM No, not at all, wabb. What I was trying to get at was that it all comes down to a yearning which enables one to loose that sense of self in pursuit of capturing and expressing a state of oneness with the source of inspiration.
Tful is correct about left-brain and right-brain, but there is an integration of every aspect of one's being that resonates with "reality" by means of a skillful illusion. Artists prime the audience's experience and it carries them to a new insight about themselves and the world.
You're probably way too smart and self-conscious to suspend your analytical side. I'm a childish fool who cares only about beauty--maybe because I've witnessed first-hand the kind of ugly tragedy tful alluded to as well.
If I knew she was so fragile, I would have never challenged her the way I did. Nevertheless, I still don't think I misunderstood tful whatsoever. She implied what she implied. 1892. wabbit - 10/16/2007 8:14:49 PM I don't know about being too smart, but you're no doubt right about too self-conscious. Trying to explain that would make for a long, boring story, lol!
You may or may not have misunderstood t'ful. I'm just saying you got something out of what she said that I didn't see there. I read her as being self-deprecating for being so literal minded, rather than critical of your ability to think emotionally and expressively. Chacun à son goût, I suppose. 1893. Seamus - 10/16/2007 8:48:51 PM While I sympathise with your burdens and trials, t'ful, your first comment Message # 5940 in thread 36 came hard on my own statement to Wiz about banishing one's monsters.
In your message you included this:
No illusion in my existence. Fate has made it all too real. and this
Please, gentle people, enjoy your blank canvases and journals. May those monsters bring you a lifetime of pleasure and creative drive, and stave off the likes of mine. I could either choose to believe I was being patronised for my comment or not. I felt the former and haven't seen reason to believe otherwise. I've done with being told my existence is trivial and unworthy because I haven't maxed out in the pain department in comparison to someone else.
Just out of curiousity, why else does one imagine illusion might become a safe place to play in the first place? Because life has been such a cakewalk? I can understand how life can be so severe it leaves no chance for illusion, but taken in moderation, it seems to me that some manner of illusion may actually be helpful.
1894. psychprof - 10/16/2007 10:20:28 PM http://faculty.babson.edu/krollag/org_site/soc_psych/taylor_illusion.html 1895. psychprof - 10/16/2007 10:22:07 PM In case the link does not work...
Taylor, S. E. & Brown J. D., Illusion and Well Being: A social psychological perspective on mental health. Psychological Bulletin, 1988, 103, 193-210.
Evidence suggests that positive self-evaluations, over optimism, and perceptions of mastery are normal and supportive of good mental health. They help people care about others, be happy and content, and to be productive and creative. This works because the cognitive mind has filters that distort information in a positive direction and represent negative information as non-threatening as possible.
Traditional theory maintains that sane people have good contact with reality. Early cognition theorist (like Nisbett & Ross) chose the idea of a naive scientists rationally processing data and making inferences and decisions. Yet real info processing has incomplete data gathering, shortcuts and biases.. The author substitues "illusion" for these terms to emphasize their euduring nature.
Various experiments show that people have unrealistically postive views of the self, exaggerated perceptions of personal control, and unrealistic optimism.
Unrealistically Positive Views of the Self
People judge positive traits more characteristic of self than negative traits. Negative traits are difficult to recall. People racall task performance better than it was. People belive they have improved when their performance hasn't changed.
People generally see themselves as better than others. They give others less credit for success then themselves. Friends are evaluated more positively than strangers. They believe they are less likely to experience negative events. They believe they will perform better on future tasks. In fact, it seems that people who are depressed or in poor mental health don't have this positive bias.
Effect of Ilusions on Aspects of Mental Health
Happiness or Contentment
70-80% of people say they are happy, and 60% say more than others. Happy people have higher opinions of themselves and feel they are in more control and are more unrealistically optimistic. People who attribute success to self and failure to situation have a better mood.
Ability to Care for Others
People ina positive mood are more likely to help others, initiate conversations, negotiate better. "Positve affect is associated with increased sociability and benevolence"
Capacity for Creative, Productive Work
Positive affect seems to improve recall and problem solving strategies. The illusion of self-control and positivism fosters motivation, persistance at tasks, and more effective performance. Peoploe with high self-esteem have higher estimations of future performance. Beliefs in personal efficacy increase motivation. Mastery-oriented children perform better than "helpless" thnking children.
Higher expectations of success cause people to work longer. One of the chief symptoms of depression is inactivity.
Reconciling Contradictory Views of Mental Health
Clincal research has been with abnormal people. Social research has been somewhat articial in labs and probably is too suportive of illusions. Most situations are new, so people can't rely on past information
People are more likely to use self-serving attributions when the behavior is important to them. Illusion are useful in dealing with tragic events.
Management of Negative Feedback
People are unwilling to give negative feedback. These social norms ensure that most feedback is positive. People also signal how they want to be treated by adopting physical cues and by taking certain roles. People often seek feedback when they know it will be positive.
People also select friends that have similar attitudes and belief, which reinforce their own perception that their own beliefs are correct. The maintainence of self-esteem is a big benefit of social support. Friends agreement on one's personal attributes can act as a buffer against disconfirming feedback.
People also encode information consistent with their prior beliefs. Pre-existing beliefs affect how one views the relevancy of new information, especially if it is ambiguous. Ambiguous info is usually processed to confirm one's pre-existing beliefs. Discrepant feedback is often seen as eroneous than feedback consistent with self-perception. Or it is explained away by situational factors.
People also remember positive information better than negative feedback.
Even if there is a change in self-perception (like after failing a test) is is usually temporary -- people move back to the orignial state (known as cognitive drift).
Finally people may change from positive feedback more from negative feedback. Living with positive illusions may have some long term drawbacks. They may not prepare for catastrophic events. Or people may trample on the rights of others. People may oversimplify interpretation of events and ignore important sources of information. 1896. psychprof - 10/16/2007 10:36:52 PM Wow...I just read the Poetry thread...I am too much drive by, I know, but SE Tayor was a student of mine and I just thought that her article on illusion was interesting and relevant to the discussion. 1897. thoughtful - 10/17/2007 12:00:07 AM Seamus, the comments you repeated in 1893 above, were made out of envy...envy of the creative drive* that leads a blank canvas or journal to call you so monstrously...envy at what seems to be a life so benevolent that these creative urges take on such meaning for you. My defining my monsters was only to suggest that from personal experience, I know life is not always as good to us as we wish it would be. My wish to you that these creative urges be the worst that happens to you for the rest of your life was no different from wishing you a long and happy life or toasting to your good health.
I don't see how that is patronizing.
How you found even a suggestion that I think [your] "existence is trivial and unworthy because [you] haven't maxed out in the pain department" in anything i expressed is really beyond me.
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*You see, one of the big frustrations in my life is that I lack the creativity genius my brother had to see things that never existed and make them so. My sorrow for him was that he never appreciated the wonderful gift he had or enjoyed it to even a fraction of what would have been possible. 1898. arkymalarky - 10/17/2007 12:36:20 AM One of the best poets I ever had the pleasure to know personally was quadriplegic, injured in the last football game of his senior year in high school. He was raised by a temperamental (to put it as kindly as possible) aunt while his parents worked for the circus. His mother committed suicide and his father never had anything to do with him. My dad's working on a biography of this amazing man right now. I would link to information on him, but he hasn't made it into the internet. I posted a poem of his once, about his quadriplegia.
It's such a mystery what makes people what they are (and what fails to make them what they could be). That he should have lived through all that and loved everyone and everything in his life until the very end, with never a complaint and yet no denial, is as amazing as those great talents who are blessed in so many ways but are unable to perceive it, and who find very little but torment in what others view as a charmed life. 1899. wabbit - 10/17/2007 1:25:19 AM Prof, is the full study available? I'd be very interested to read it. Do "people generally see themselves as better than others"? If so, wow. Also, just because I'm such a nitpicking bitch, she needs a proofreader.
Arky, please let us know as soon as your dad gets this next book out. Can you repost the poem in Poetry? 1900. psychprof - 10/17/2007 1:43:28 AM Yes, Wabbit...
Taylor, S. E. & Brown J. D., Illusion and Well Being: A social psychological perspective on mental health. Psychological Bulletin, 1988, 103, 193-210. 1901. wabbit - 10/17/2007 1:57:57 AM Ah, you no sooner repost that (am I blind or what?) than I find a link to a PDF version of the very article:
Illusion and Well Being: A social psychological perspective on mental health
and another to its follow-up:
Positive Illusions and Well Being Revisited
And hey, don't be such a stranger! 1902. Seamus - 10/17/2007 2:01:05 AM t'ful, clearly we are at cross purposes, then, because for you to say that anyone else's life "seems...so benevolent that these creative urges take on such meaning" for them tells me you have no capacity to imagine anyone's suffering outside of your own, let alone the relationship between the creative impulse and someone else's life experiences.
I'd suggest you word your expressions of simple "envy" a bit less callously if you don't want them misread in the future. At least by me. 1903. TheWizardOfWhimsy - 10/17/2007 2:54:15 AM Seamus and pp, thanks for the heads up and for the timeliness of your contributions. I tend to use the the term "illusion" not in a pejorative sense (as I think tful was using it), but rather in the "Maya (in Hinduism)" sense--which may help clarify some things for all parties here.
The ideas and concepts found in Eastern thought have absolutely nothing to do with the dogmas of Christianity, Islam and Judaism. How I wish people wouldn't lump them together. These ideas have everything to do with "reality" and understanding them can actually transform one's consciousness--which after all is said and done, is the ultimate goal of psyhcology, the arts, religion, philosopy, etc. and mature awareness. 1904. alistairconnor - 10/17/2007 10:09:27 AM Hey PP, it's nice to know you're keeping an eye on us...
did you catch the Shakespeare in your drive-by? Ties in nicely, especially the second version... the virtues of "simple truth suppressed".
Personally I like to think that playfulness is the key...
When my love swears that she is made of truth,
I do believe her though I know she lies
-- i.e. all the world's a stage, and even in the most intimate relationships there is voluntary suspension of disbelief. As long as the private joke remains funny for both parties...
This probably makes me more fragile than the truly self-deluded, but, perhaps, more resilient too. 1905. TheWizardOfWhimsy - 10/17/2007 3:28:23 PM Illusion, from the Latin, ludere - to play 1906. TheWizardOfWhimsy - 10/17/2007 3:30:48 PM Btw, thanks for that psych paper, pp. 1907. arkymalarky - 10/17/2007 11:50:18 PM Sure Wabbit. I'll dig it up and hopefully two or three others of his and post them in Poetry. 1908. TheWizardOfWhimsy - 10/18/2007 4:45:14 PM 
1909. Ms. No - 6/24/2008 4:09:11 AM I am so impressed by the good people I've heard today gleefully chortling over what they assume to be the eternal torment of a man who was married to the same woman for more than thirty years before being widowed. A man who raised a child in Hollywood who never ended up in a scandal, who is happily married herself, a productive member of society and still thinks of her dad as her hero. A man who once sent a royalty payment to a collegue because he used the man's idea --- even though nobody would ever have known he did it.
A man of integrity, honor and faithfulness.
And yet, I've heard no fewer than four people today talk about how he's burning in hellfire, three of them laughing their asses off doing their impressions of him screaming in agony.
THAT'S why people think so many self-proclaimed Christians are assholes.
Because so many of them are.
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