"From the text, write a comment," is the teacher's instruction. What text? Where am I supposed to write the comment? I try to get an answer, but get ignored, while the rest of the class seems to get it. I wake up in panic. What was the teacher's instruction? Am I getting dementia?
Just read an article the other day about Alzheimers, and how to delay its development. Maybe I need to read it again. How come everybody else in the class seems to get it? Maybe I am not smart enough. Why does the teacher ignore me? Can't get rid of the thought. It's like the police officer, who clocked a driver speeding 84 mph in a 45 mph zone and prepares to chase him and give him a ticket. But his cruiser won't start. Fining the speeder is an un-enforceable rule, just as understanding the teacher's assignment in my dream. C.S. Lewis states we are always trying to be somewhere we are not, trying to be inside the inner ring. Instead, do what you love to do and create your own inner ring.
I get out of bed to work on a computer project for a while. I can't find the project! More frustration.
In looking for my project, I find a podcast about "not giving up". Stop listening to that voice of not understanding the teacher; that is only a feeling left over from a dream, but it is not necessarily true. Look for the facts. Every prudent man acts out of knowledge, but a fool exposes his folly. He who answers before listening - that is his folly and his shame.
I follow "Storyworthy" by Matthew Dicks. The purpose of this course is to help you find stories. Even if you never want to tell a story to another person in the world, you should be actively, aggressively, relentlessly looking for stories in your life to tell yourself. You are the most important audience you will ever have for your stories. And as you start to collect stories in the ways that I'm going to teach you over the course of the next several lessons, you're going to discover that you lead a life that you never understood before. You'll discover that your life is filled with stories, and the more stories you start to see, collect, and hold on to, the better you'll feel about your life.
Looking for facts requires knowing how to Google them, or looking them up in my Brain app. Not exactly do-able if you have dementia. We all have scary dreams from time to time. What do we do with them?
Matthew Dicks continues with: We're here to collect stories. We're here to find them. hold on to them, and speak them, maybe to other people, but first to ourselves. But my promise to you is this. At the end of this course, you will have many strategies to find new stories in your life.
