Another year done, so what's next?

How many mental health professionals are there reading this site? Declare yourselves!

god bless 🙂

@Loopy

Treasure. Im so happy.

Missed you .........you must meet some wonderful regulars now........also @chookmojo and @Chris are floating around

I love your name........you are @Loopy with beach waves.......

@Terry, somewhere on this very big site is some writing between me and @Loopy who some have said is funny......

Glad you like my name!! Hows the family??

My New YEar REsolution is not to watch silly TV during the day.

And .........thats not going to happen.....

Well, MY new years resolution is to record my book reading more and so can report to @MoonGal who is very very clever. I would so like to have an intellectual discussion with someone and actually be able to respond......it's a little like.....writing a review after reading the book......

@Terry

I volunteered with 2 organisations for about 9 years doing a range of social justice work. The good thing was that it was just an hour or 2 per week ... not so much that alll my eccentricities stood out enough to annoy many people ... so a win win. Both were church based ... Catholic (Vinnies) and Uniting Church (Raft). I gained valuable insight into the "human condition" and current social problems, as well as some solutions.

Think small and useful maybe ... i dunno ...

ikebana sounds wonderful ... beautiful and spiritual.

@Appleblossom, @CherryBomb, @PeppiPatty, @Terry, @NikNik,how are you going ?

well we have had a couple ups and downs so fa for 2016 but because of this we can do more now for our parents which will be great

@Appleblossom Hi, good evening. Tks. Oh, i'm completely 'different' - i mean, i'm different (or eccentric - which is really another word for 'different', if you're talking about human beings, that is), and EVERYONE in this country seems to 'hate' me for it. Everywhere I go, everyone I talk to, all my bloomin' life, (in Australia), i am constantly marginalised, and even, fairly often, THREATENED for being different. I get sooo sick of it because i turn myself inside out trying to fit in socially. As if being 'DIFFERENT' wasn't bad enough, I am also 'SENSITIVE' which people think is a weakness. I actually just stay in a lot now, to tell the truth!

However, I have two friends who are both VERY eccentric (and one of them is sensitive too, in addition to being a temperamental genius) and they both manage to get and hold jobs (sort of - the temperamental genius is actually unemployed at the moment). Anyway, maybe I can get and hold a job if I wear a giant rabbit suit, so no-one can see or hear what i'm like. I'll just sit there in my cubicle in my giant wabbit suit typing away ...

@Appleblossom tks, Appleblossom, things can't be as bad as i say in terms of the job market. granted, australia has a brutal mainstream culture, but there MUST be some volunteer work i can do and not be discriminated against. i do a lot of volunteer work at the moment but it's all 'piece work' and freelance. i just want to be in a 'normal' workplace for a couple of days a week with colleagues that i more or less get on with. i've possibly got a distorted view of 'how bad things are' in the workplace proper after quite a few years out of it.

@Appleblossom Tks, too, re the ikebana. I don't think the spiritual side of it applies to the arrangement i'm creating at the moment but i'm really looking forward to seeing the finished piece. i am really using ikebana principles more as an inspiration than an actual, i dunno, 'discipline', i guess. i actually don't know if i will do much more ikebana after the arrangement i'm currently doing as i don't need any more centrepieces after this. i'm probably not likely to make arrangements for other people as i'm only doing this piece for my own dining table. i used to make earrings out of wire and beads for a while there and they sold all right but there wasn't much money in it, and ultimately, my heart wasn't really in it. my writing keeps me amused. what are your hobbies @Appleblossom?

My hobbies/paid and unpaid work/passions/activities are

music, literature, writing, gardening, conservation and social justice.

I have been out of the full-time work force for 30 years so I am lucky in that I spend all my life doing my hobbies and manage fine on a low income as I now have my own home.

I do like your sense of humour and desire to reach out.

I have been involved in a lot of christian organisations and used to be upset about being "donged" on the head with god talk ... I prefer to discuss theology or liturgy etc or leave him out of the conversation completely as i suspect my prayer life involves quite a bit of ... challenging him to be a bit more fair than just a laid back heavenly bastard in the sky.

@Appleblossom Woah, I never really lost faith, and we can't know god's plan. No matter how shocking things got how many times and how pathetic some of my responses and decisions, He has come through for me. Best not to get angry at god. Pray on things instead, and KEEP positive!

You must go a bit mad only having your hobbies to do? I DO find it difficult to discipline myself to work when there's mostly only me to answer to but work is usually so integral to a person's life. I hope to work until the day I expire. The only thing stopping me, ever, is/was discrimination (of various types). I'd go mad if I just had my hobbies. Much as I hate some of the work i currently do, at the end of the day, I do have a sense of satisfaction if i've put in a hard day's work (but I rarely even work a 30-hour week at the moment 😞 ). It's a b*gger, the work situation - I'd love a 'normal' work routine but have found that so hard for me to achieve in this country for a number of reasons. Actually, i'll probably have to move overseas again, which I want to do and don't want to do, for different reasons.

Your hobbies sound great - i love literature and music too, and am interested in social justice. Conservation is great, of course, and I have four house-plants! What sort of music and literature do you like - i like the classics in literture and classical music and R&B - i also have some bowie, elton john, world music etc

I tend to be analytical about the very nature of faith and trust etc.... Fowlers' stages of faith ... has some corrollaries with Ericsson's stages of development ...

I pray and meditate on things plenty ... sometimes it is better to enquire about a person's spiritual practises than tell them wot to do. Apparently the Hound of Heaven has claimed me and I have had little to do with it ...kicking and screaming all the way... a religion teacher told me so. And I used to teach catechism ... so have heard all the goie things a lot of times ... maybe his plan is for me to be right where I am now ... I dunno ... I think it is presumptuous to think one has special insight into the mind of god.

Do you have any kids?