Comments for Mining Your Metaphors

Comment on Lost and Found: An Artist’s Brain Revealed by Admin

Admin — Sun, 13 Nov 2011 22:10:38 +0000

I am sorry about your mother, Simon. My father, too, had a form of dementia, though not Alzheimer’s. Extraordinarily, at one point he had a blood clot
that lodged in a particular part of his brain, and, suddenly, it was like having him back again!! He was alert, talking about news in the paper, not struggling figuring out daily activities. Unfortunately, he also could not stop tapping his leg or sleep, and so took medication that quickly returned him to ‘normal’. But what an experience to find that what we thought had been damaged and lost was only somehow inaccessible! How little we understand….

Comment on Lost and Found: An Artist’s Brain Revealed by Simon Grant

Simon Grant — Sun, 13 Nov 2011 05:52:16 +0000

My curiosity is piqued by the fact that my mother has pretty bad Altzheimer’s now. I wonder what, exactly, is going on in the mind of people like that. My experience is that she has virtually no working memory; she has lost the ability to read anything longer than a monosyllable, and can no longer express anything larger than the shortest idea coherently. Associating names with individuals is far gone. And yet she apparently retains the ability to recognise situations.

Comment on The Edge Effect in Metaphor Landscapes by Barb Stainman

Barb Stainman — Sat, 27 Aug 2011 03:34:36 +0000

Fabulous article and concept! I can feel the tension in those spaces. Interesting expansion of this in the Wikipedia article on Liminality (meaning “threshold) in Place. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liminality#In_places. Love the last line: “Liminality is sacred, alluring, and dangerous.”

Comment on For Sale: 3B/2B Metaphor by James Lawley

James Lawley — Tue, 15 Mar 2011 04:17:34 +0000

Fascinating blog Gena and best wishes for your new online training course.

I’ve seen an article that said the majority of people know that they want to buy a home within 1 minute of walking in the front door. They obviously haven’t had time to see all the place’s feature in a minute so what let’s them know that it is right for them? While it might be, as Michaela Mahady suggests, “a reflection of our human form” I’ve also noticed that the configuration of our metaphor landscape can play a part. Not in terms of the specific symbols, more in the arrangement of the landscape – the space, size, shapes, angles, perspectives, light, etc.

One person I knew who had a pattern of sand dunes in their metaphor landscape immediately had all the internal doorways in their new home changed to arches. Penny and I have landscapes which feature looking down from a balcony or a hill. The five homes we have lived in together all had this perspective. Either because they were on raised ground or at the top of a the building.

My guess is that when we first walk into a place we unconsciously compare the configuration of our external and internal worlds. Whether they align or clash will have an big affect on our comfort level and whether we feel ‘right at home’ or not.

James Lawley

Comment on Love is… like what?? by Meredith

Meredith — Mon, 14 Feb 2011 20:27:13 +0000

I’ve thought a lot recently about how happy I am that I grew up listening to Motown and CSN – I realized that every singer I heard referred to their woman as ‘lady,’ which is hardly the case these days. Now I love a good punk song and I even love rap, but I’m happy that my templates for boyfriends were the Temptations and Paul Simon. Beauty’s only skin deep, ain’t no woman like the one I got, my lady of the island… sing it, gentleman.

Comment on There’s Bromance in the Air by Jillian Cameron

Jillian Cameron — Wed, 15 Dec 2010 00:12:34 +0000

I was very intrigued when Meredith told me that you were writing on this subject and I enjoyed reading it very much! I think the media, surprisingly, is doing a great deal these days to decrease the fear of homosexuality, especially among males, not only by popularizing the term “bromance” but also in portraying a variety of male relationships, romantic or platonic, on TV. For many years, the only gay characters fit a set of absurd stereotypes and while we haven’t quite hit the equilibrium yet, Americans have certainly been exposed to a more nuanced understanding of any number of relationships.
I wonder though, as I read (and loved) your description of male children “refining and narrowing” ideas of male behavior, what we can do at that age, rather than perhaps relying on somewhat slow moving popular culture. How do we allow all children to understand, chose and figure out who they are and their relationships with others without automatically placing value judgment on those choices? Can we instill the poignant ideology of the pop culture term, “bromance” and create generations of people who feel comfortable expressing different types of love in different types of ways? I hope so.
Thank you for getting me to think!

Comment on Must we tend our children like we tend our fields? by Peggy Heller

Peggy Heller — Thu, 13 May 2010 23:24:13 +0000

Dear Gina,
Your blogs are a delight. I, too, enjoy Malcolm Gladwell’s wisdom. I read his “Blink” and saw him interviewed about “Outliers.” Quite “brill.” I also enjoyed reading your comments about Jill Bolte and had not previously considered the connection with S.M. Of course! Thank you for the time and thoughtfulness you put into these communications.
Peggy

Comment on How Do Horseshoes and Clean Language Differ? by Bob Gorman

Bob Gorman — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 15:30:02 +0000

For me the word was ‘discipline’. I mainly knew it in the context of writers, where discipline is a good thing. Also for soldiers discipline is not just a good thing but could well save your life. Also for surgeons, and many others. I never heard it used at home. I doubt neither my mother nor father could even understand the concept.

So one day I used the word, with my very positive connotations in a recovery type of email list. I believe I was urging therapists, many of whom seemed to me to very un-disciplined, to learn more discipline, like a surgeon or a fighter pilot.

Well, all hell broke loose and I was called just about every bad word and my actions equated with Hitler. It seems that many members of the group had heard the word in their childhood and it was used to cover up their parents cruelties.

So yes, in my opinion, the meanings we attach to words is often not the same meaning others do.

Bob

Comment on Are America’s Metaphors about Women Changing? by Mary Bast

Mary Bast — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 17:12:07 +0000

Hi Gina,

Thanks for you timely and thought-provoking blog. To provide some balance to male-oriented metaphors I recommend Maureen Murdock’s The Heroine’s Journey.

I’ve added your blog to those I follow from my own site, and hope you’ll visit/link to mine: http://outoftheboxcoaching.blogspot.com.

Warm regards,
Mary

Comment on Metaphors Conceal and Reveal–including Halloween Archetypes by Peggy Heller

Peggy Heller — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 22:35:11 +0000

On my soon-to-be-completed website, WordArtsCollage, you will find me luxuriating in creative play. I love your take on the Halloween opportunity for self-awareness through clean language, Gina. I am going to be a computer nerd, helping a friend design graphics for a presentation. That’s for real and for my costume. What about you?