What’s a book, movie, or TV show that you wish you could experience again for the first time?
In the late 1980s, Channel 4 in the UK bought a show from the US which became incredibly important to me. The Wonder Years was the story of Kevin Arnold, whose family lived in the suburbs near a large city that was never identified. His family, parents Jack and Norma, siblings Karen and Wayne and his best friend Paul were the people who I got to know as well as any TV characters ever. His story was a story of growing up in the late 60s and early 70s, but above all, it was the story of his love for Winnie Cooper. She was the girl, not quite next door but near enough, who became the object of his youthful affection.
Why do I want to see this series again as if for the first time? It was the series that helped me to understand my Dad and one over which we bonded more than any other. The programme was shown on a Sunday evening and directly after it was finished we would talk about it on the phone. Many times we would just discuss the programme we had just watched. Occasionally we would talk about something else, but the show itself was the catalyst for us to discuss the Arnold family and, by extension, our own relationship. I grew to understand my Dad through that programme in a way that would have been impossible otherwise and I think, although he never said it anymore than I did, that he grew to understand me better.
I would love to watch it again for the first time, but with a caveat that my Dad was also around to watch it with me.
What’s a common misconception people have about happiness?
I found this one of the most difficult prompts to respond to because I am not sure I have ever fully understood happiness myself. Why is it that sometimes I just need a quiet word or a favourite sight to make me feel happy even if I am fed up? Other times, with the same mood, as far as I can tell, nothing lifts my unhappy mood. There appears to be no rhyme or reason.
The best I can do is to think of it as an interplay that has significant hidden depths. If you can be lifted out of unhappiness very easily by an extrinsic motivator, I would guess that the original feeling of unhappiness was very weak so the intrinsic element is easily overcome. If the opposite happens then the intrinsic emotion had far more too it than you realised. Obviously, the longer you feel unhappy, the harder it is to escape that feeling. My secondary school years bear testament to that. There were odd moments of happiness due to extrinsic factors but in general my unhappy mood just became deeper or shallower. If I think of my unhappiness then it as a body of water, it would be as deep as an ocean. Now, it’s more like a swimming pool. These days I can much more easily touch the bottom to steady myself.
You may be reading this in a good mood or a bad mood, but remember that it’s possible that the true depth of that mood may only become apparent to you when external factors act upon it. Just be kind to yourself as you work through moods that may have depths you have never seen.
If you could instantly master any skill, what would it be and why?
I wouldn’t want to master any skill instantly. There would be no point, because the advances and setbacks as you try to learn anything new are a vital part of the process. I have been a teacher for 35 years so I am well aware how important the process of learning is and how it makes your eventual level of expertise much more meaningful.
Even as a thought experiment this idea has no appeal. Where would the sense of achievement be? Where would the enjoyment be of knowing that you had no journey towards your goal? If you did master a skill instantly you would very quickly get bored with that skill and quickly lose focus and enthusiasm.
Embrace the setbacks, value the frustrations and enjoy the journey.
What is one way you have grown this year?
I have written about finishing full time teaching on this blog on a number of occasions. If you are interested in catching up with my journey, the posts can be found here
Where I have grown most has been in the area of focusing on myself and my well being. I have been doing Yoga since February along with dumbbell work, although I’m doing much more Yoga at the moment as my left elbow is giving me some trouble so I’m being careful. What the Yoga is doing is helping me to have 10 minutes to relax and stretch in the morning and, most importantly, to take me away from the day to day issues I tend to worry about. My fitness is definitely better, my resting heart rate has improved and I feel slightly less intense about the teaching this summer although that’s definitely a work in progress!
As they should say, you can teach an old dog new tricks!
What is something you wish you could tell your 20-year-old self?
Let’s say you could tell your 20 year old self something from the standpoint of 40 extra years of experience. Would you tell them what was going to happen to you, or who you were going to marry? My 20 year old self was facing injury and long years to full recovery from a serious ankle injury, suffered during RAF basic training, that had all sorts of knock on effects. He had his first real adult infatuation with a lovely young lady from the Faroe Islands but she was having fun and he was taking it much too seriously and would get hurt by the inevitable break up. He was well over a year away from his first real relationship and, even then, he was going to take the same approach. I might go forward a year or so and say that his eventual discharge would give him the opportunity to go to the USA for a summer and that it will change him completely.
The trouble with telling him anything like that is that I would be changing his/my personality at an incredibly important time. I have read the Butterfly Effect book. The latter was one I thoroughly enjoyed in my teens and it was clear on the fact that any changes to the past would affect the present. To give myself a preview of what lay ahead would be to present myself with a situation where I ended up doing things differently and potentially missing out on what would really change me in years ahead, namely my marriage. It’s far too risky so I will avoid any time travelling of that type thank you! Actually there is one thing I would tell my 20 year old self that he/I desperately needed to hear. Don’t be such an idiot with money!
David Pearce - Popular Culture and Personal Passions 