Actually an album, but who’s counting? Enjoy with friends over euchre and beers for best results.
Narcissism
Posted: April 12, 2016 in Psychology in Daily Life, Psychology through music, UncategorizedTags: mental health, psychology
Part of my ongoing series exploring psychological concepts through a song, this week’s topic is narcissism. Named after the Greek myth about Narcissus, a man who fell in love with his own reflection, then died because he couldn’t stop looking at himself (because the Greeks were pretty brutal), narcissism is found in folks who think they’re awesome.
A little narcissism never hurt anyone, but on the far end of the spectrum is narcissistic personality disorder. Hallmarks are an inability to accept any criticism, overly grandiose ideas, inflated sense of self-worth, arrogance, a short temper, and a pathological need for admiration, paired with a lack of empathy for others.
As with any personality disorder, others tend to notice there is a problem before the person is aware or acknowledges a problem.
Say it with me, now: NARCISSISM IS NOT SELF-ESTEEM. Narcissism tends to come from a feeling of being lacking, and any threat to this fragile self results in aggression, impulsive behavior, and increased frantic efforts to win admiration and personal recognition.
The best song I’ve found to represent this is a great tune by Guster called “Center of Attention” (lyrics here).
Happy Thursday! We’re back this week with a classic from Walls of Jericho, one of my all time favorite hardcore bands (from Detroit! with a lady singer!) and their great tune, Fixing Broken Hearts!
It’s Not Working…Anymore
Posted: April 5, 2016 in Psychology in Daily Life, Psychology through music, UncategorizedTags: mental health, psychology
Lots of the problems we have as adults result from what we learned as children about how to deal with the world around us. If we’re growing up in an abusive household, we learn that people are not to be trusted, and develop patterns of paranoia and watchfulness. If we’re getting bullied in school, we develop armor, sarcasm, a ready defense, or learn to stay under the radar, be quiet, never speak up.
These patterns allow children to survive in hostile environments. They are useful. They are adaptive.
But what happens when these children grow up, and suddenly can’t make friends or build healthy romantic relationships? When our patterns are no longer adaptive? We have to recognize the use and purpose of how we were behaving, then begin to form new relationships with others and the world around us.
A great song about being stuck in an old, unhealthy, maladaptive pattern is “Happier” by the band Guster (lyrics here).
The song is deeply sad, concerning a person abandoning friends and relationships because he or she can’t trust others to stick around.
We’ll be back next week! Have an idea or suggestion for a song or psychological concept? Leave it in the comments!
Selective Perception
Posted: March 29, 2016 in Psychology in Daily Life, Psychology through music, UncategorizedTags: cbt, mental health, psychology
Cognitive behavioral therapy, or CBT, is a fairly effective treatment for some mental health concerns, especially depression, anxiety, and substance abuse disorders. Focus is on increasing awareness of our thinking patterns, then working to replace unproductive/negative/inaccurate thoughts with more useful patterns.
There is a huge list of “cognitive distortions“, or thinking errors, that we talk about in treatment. One of my personal favorites to focus on when dealing with depression (and, often, criminal thinking) is selective perception – seeing only what we want to see, putting outsized focus on certain events while discounting contradicting evidence, putting too much importance on small happenings. It’s the reason people discard things that don’t fit with their previous beliefs. If I believe I’m a terrible person and everything sucks, I’m more likely to focus on the things in life that are hard and that fit with that belief.
The best song I’ve found lately to represent this is an oldie (but a goodie!) by Say Anything, called The Futile, seen below (lyrics here).
Great example of selective perception! We’ll be back next week with more of music and psychology!
***If you have a concept you’d like to know more about, or a song you’d like featured, send me a message!***
Self-Fulfilling Prophecy: Music & Psychology
Posted: March 22, 2016 in Psychology through music, UncategorizedWelcome to my newest brainchild, a series illustrating psychological concepts with a song!
It’s been a while since I’ve written, as my real life has gotten completely, insanely, ridiculously busy, so this will be how we move forward, with an explanation of a psychological concept, and a song or two illustrating how they work in real life.
Ready?!
Today’s lesson is the concept of “self-fulfilling prophecy,” the idea that our expectations shape our behavior, and bring about the very thing we’re expecting! Think about a party – if you go in nervous, not expecting to have a good time, or make friends, how will you act? Nervous and scared, hanging around the punch bowl, being quiet and awkward? Odds are, you won’t have a good time if that’s the case – your expectations brought about your expected result.
Perfect example of this is “The Obituaries” by the Menzingers, illustrated below.
Chorus lyrics? “I will fuck this up – I fucking know it.” I think he’s probably gonna fuck it up – that’s what he’s expecting to do!
See you next time for our piece on cognitive distortion – overgeneralizing!
Every time I vote in my town, I am humbled.
I live in a city with a huge immigrant population. Every time there’s an election, I am surrounded by folks coming to vote, with their citizenship papers, or their voter registrations, or their passports and licenses. Some speak broken English; some speak no English at all. Our signs are in Bengali, Arabic, English, and Polish.
Every person in the hall is so excited to vote, the energy in the room is palpable. These are folks who are working and living in this county, whose children attend our city’s schools, and are my neighbors and friends. My community takes voting seriously. Because it matters – because it still matters.
No matter how jaded or cynical I become, or how disillusioned with our political process (and I am), all I have to do is walk into my precinct on election day, and I am revitalized.
Citizenship matters, and voting is the most fundamental act we have as citizens. I hope you take advantage of this beautiful gift. I hope you fulfill your civic duty. But most of all, I hope you are excited to be a citizen and to make your voice heard.
I voted. Did you?
A song that never got much traction, but I still get it stuck in my head at random times.
One of the biggest debts I owe is to my friends in Marquette, one of whom introduced me to Abandoned Pools. This album is still my go-to road trip sing along when I’m driving alone, and I love this tune as a love song. Enjoy!
From the opening bars, I loved this song, and not only because it featured so heavily in one of my all time favorite movies, SLC Punk. Repetitive, dirty, unapologetic, this is everything punk is supposed to be! Plus, Flea is in this. FLEA!
theshamedynamic 