Quote Meal…Some Food For Thought

“Education develops the intellect; and the intellect distinguishes man from other creatures. It is an education that enables man to harness nature and utilize her resources for the well-being and improvment of his life. The key for the betterment and completeness of modern living is education. But man cannot live by bread alone. Man, after all, is also composed of intellect and soul. Therefore, education in general, and higher education in particular, must aim to provide, beyond the physical, food for the intellect and soul. That education which ignore’s man’s intrinsic nature, and neglects his intellect and reasoning power can not be considered true education” ~ King Haile Sellassie

“If you can control a man’s thinking, you don’t have to worry about his actions. If you can determine what a man thinks you do not have to worry about what he will do. If you can make a man believe that he is inferior, you don’t have to compel him to seek an inferior status, he will do so without being told and you can make a man believethat he is justly an outcast, you don’t have to order him to the back door, he will go to the back door on his own and if there is no back door, the very nature of the man will demand that you build one” ~ Carver G. Woodson

“The media is the most powerful entity on earth. They have the power to make the innocent guilty and to make the guilty innocent, and that’s power. Because they control the minds of the masses” ~ Malcolm X

“It’s just like when you’ve got some coffee that’s too black, which means it’s too strong. What do you do? You integrate it with cream, you make it weak. But if you pour too much cream in it, you won’t even know you ever had coffee. It used to be hot, it becomes cool. It used to be strong, it becomes weak. It used to wake you up, now it puts you to sleep” ~ Malcolm X

15 Styles of Distorted Thinking

If you have one or more of these symptoms you may want to consider seeking counseling.

• Filtering: You take the negative details and magnify them while filtering out and not seeing the positive aspects of a situation.
• Polarized Thinking: Seeing things as black and white, good or bad. You feel you have to be perfect or you’re a failure. There is no middle ground.
• Overgeneralization: You come to a general conclusion based on a single incident or piece of evidence. If something bad happens once you expect it to happen over and over again.
• Mind Reading: Without their saying so, you know what people are feeling and why they act the way they do. In particular, you are able to define how people are feeling toward you.
• Catastrophizing: You expect disaster. You notice or hear about a problem and start “what if’s”: What is tragedy happens? What if it doesn’t turn out all right?
• Personalization: You think that everything people do or say is some kind of reaction to you. You also compare yourself to others, trying to determine who’s smarter, better looking, slimmer, etc.
• Control Fallacies: If you feel externally controlled, you see yourself as helpless or as a victim of fate. If you feel internally controlled, you feel responsible for the pain and happiness of everyone around you.
• Fallacy of Fairness: You feel resentment because you think you know what’s fair but that other people won’t agree with you.
• Blaming: You hold others responsible for your pain, or place the blame on yourself regardless of who’s responsible.
• Shoulds: You have a list of “shoulds”, or iron clad rules about how you and others should act. Other people who break the rules anger you and you feel guilty if you break your own rules.
• Emotional Reading: You believe that how you feel must be what is reality. If you feel stupid, then you must be stupid.
• Fallacy of Change: You expect that other people will change to suit you if you just pressure them enough.
• Global Labeling: You generalize a good or bad quality of a person, place or thing and apply it to all person, places, or things like them – for example, “all yellow dogs bite”, because you got bitten by a yellow dog in the past.
• Being Right: You are continually on trial to prove yourself and others that you are always right. Being wrong is unthinkable and you will go to any length to hide that you are wrong.

Source: Ellis & MacLauren (1998)