The magic of Groundhog Day

[pegkerr]

This post at Positivity Blog [positivity_rss] caught my eye, and I've been thinking about it for the past day or two. Basically, the blogger, Paul Hannam, is talking about about the lessons which can be gleaned from the Bill Murray movie "Groundhog Day." (He wrote a book on the subject, The Magic of Groundhog Day.)

In the movie "Groundhog Day," the main character, Phil Connors, is stuck in the same time and place. He is forced to relive the same day over and over again. In our own lives, I believe that we are stuck in our own version of Groundhog Day.

In our outer lives, in what we do at home and at work, many of us go through the same routines day after day – the same routine when we get up, the same commute, the same jobs, the same conversations with our colleagues and family.

And in our inner lives, what we think and how we feel, we tend to live the same day again and again too.

What traps us is not a time loop, but our conditioning that acts as a form of time loop as we are trapped by habits formed in our past. We experience each day through our conditioning - the same attitudes, thoughts, worries and emotions that we have carried with us since childhood.

So how do we break out of a rut? read more.

This dovetails with some thinking I've been doing lately along these same lines myself. I've been thinking about my similiarities to Phil, about my own dissatisfaction with my job, my life, my sometimes overwhelming sense that I'm stuck in a rut, my on-going battles with depression. In "Groundhog Day," Phil transforms his life by transforming himself, his attitude about the people around him. This story also caught my eye a little while ago. A young man who had Down's Syndrome had a job bagging groceries at a grocery store. Not a very glamorous or interesting job, but he decided, by golly, that he was going to work to become the very best bagger in the city.

He went home and, with the help of his father, typed up inspirational sayings and quotes. Then, he cut them out and took them to work. Every time he put groceries in a bag, he would add one of the little inspirational quotes. It made Johnny happy to spread a little joy, and the customers loved it, too.

In fact, they really loved it. So much so that pretty soon, people were lining up to get their groceries bagged by Johnny. It didn’t matter if another checkout was open, people would stand in line to meet Johnny and get one of his inspirational sayings with their weekly shop.

From a mundane job, Johnny created something extraordinary.

Edited to add: My sister sent me a link to a video here which has more information on this story about Johnny the bagger.

I remembered the story of a charwoman who scrubbed floors in a hospital, but who was perfectly happy, because when asked what she did for a living, she said, "I help heal the sick."

So I've been thinking about how to apply the lessons of "Groundhog Day" to my own life. I was thinking about my paper journal last night--I've been going for days without making an entry, which is quite troubling. (I've kept it on a daily basis since the age of 14.) The fact is, since my sense of myself as a writer has retreated from my daily life, the paper journal seems sucked dry of meaning, boring, banal, pointless. Yeah, like my life. It's getting to the point that I have to force myself to make an entry; I don't enjoy it. How can I transform my relationship to my paper journal? I have been toying with the idea of getting some colored pens and simply playing in it in a different way, the way that some of the enormously talented people do in the LJ community embodiment. I've written one page a day, always with a black ball point pen, for years. What if I did nothing but draw in it for a year? I'm a lousy artist, but it might be different, might make me approach it in a fresh manner.

So anyway, that's what I've been thinking about.

I might have to pick up Hannam's book.

Comments

[akamarykate.livejournal.com]

Peg, while I've *never* been able to keep a paper journal at all, I recently found a book called Wreck This Journal, and I've been having so much fun with it. It's full of things like, "Take this journal in the shower with you," and, "smear some food on this page". One page is for a paper airplane, another is to be ripped into strips, and so on.

I admit, I bought it to help myself overcome at least some of my perfectionism--the hardest thing, so far, has been cracking the spine (of a new book! gasp!)--if nothing else, it helps me to laugh at myself when I cringe at the thought of defacing it. I don't know if it's the kind of thing you would enjoy, but it is, in its own way, a kind of art project, as Keri Smith explains in the introduction. Since I won't be able to get out into my garden for a few more weeks at least, this is one way I can make a mess and have something to show for it. And it's certainly transforming my idea of what a paper journal can be!

[nmsunbear.livejournal.com]

Wow, I want that book. I've never been able to keep a journal either.

[jbru.livejournal.com]

Next time you're at a social gathering at the same time as fredcritter, ask him to have a look at his journal. He's shown it to me on several occasions so I don't think he minds being asked. He mixes a great deal of more illustrative material with his handwritten words. The effect reminds me of the gloriously illuminated manuscripts produced by medieval monks. It also provides a different view into the way his brain works than just the words do.

You might start by trying a doodle or two in your paper journal, just to see how it feels.

[mayakda.livejournal.com]

The drawing journal sounds like a cool idea. I might want to try it.
(My big block about a written journal is privacy -- somebone invaded it and I haven't recovered from that.)

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

You should take a look at the embodiment community; it's definitely inspirational.

[mayakda.livejournal.com]

I did check out your link to it. Some very cool journals there. :)

[nmsunbear.livejournal.com]

I love your journal idea. It seems like a perfect place to experiment with changing your routines and assumptions.

[rysmiel.livejournal.com]

Interesting, because to my mind, the take-home message of Groundhog Day was that what mattered, at least as much as the Bill Murray character learning compassion and unselfishness and other such virtues, was him learning competence in shaping his routines to best fit the desired outcomes; and I don't know how long he was actually stuck in that day - the writer/director commentary tracks on the DVD suggest differing opinions among between years and centuries - but even if it's only a copuple of years, he's going to have a drastically hard time adjusting to being back in regular time with no do-overs, which might have made an interesting sequel if it were not likely to be a pretty serious downer. It has the same problem I have with a lot of supposedly inspirational stories, of the consequences at further levels of working out not being unambiguously positive, and I think I get more out of stories that are more direct about being unambigously positive but are still hopeful.

[thomasyan.livejournal.com]

regular time with no do-overs

Eep! That hadn't occurred to me.

If you had asked me how much subjective time he had spent, I would have said only years, not decades, and definitely not centuries.

But to suddenly lose do-overs? Wow, what a shock that must be.

[avengangle.livejournal.com]

I used to file papers for a county Child Support Enforcement Agency, and some days, the only way I could keep myself alphabetizing and sane was to remind myself that because I was doing this, some kid was getting the child support they needed. It's nice when you have the luck to be on the side of the angels, like the hospital custodian.

After eighteen months doing that, though, I was still stir-crazy and ready to get out of that file room.

I wish you luck!

[chelsearoad.livejournal.com]

I may have to pick up Hannam's book, and Wreck This Journal, too.

Thanks for a great, thought-provoking post.

Have fun with the new approach.

If it's not fun, don't do it! ;-)

[bohemianspirit.livejournal.com]

You know, Peg, if you've been keeping a journal for thirty-odd years, maybe your resistance is telling you something. ;-) If it's not fun--and it's not essential to survival--then don't do it. On the other hand, if the art journal inspires you and excites you with possibilities and potentials and the simple scent of FUN, then DO IT. Now. Not out of a sense of "I should" but out of a sense of "I WANT TO!!!! WOOOOHHOOOOOO!!!!"

Which reminds me that I did want to reply to some of what you wrote recently about writing and not writing and the guilty judgmental agent in your head and all that. I'll be online at home, soon, and will actually be able to reply when I read something instead of trying to remember to reply next time I'm on a computer. Meanwhile, I shall try to compose my story tonight and send it your way at my earliest opportunity.

By the way, I would look forward to seeing any of your artistic creations that you are willing to share online. ;-) No pressure or anything, just expressing interest and curiosity!

[lindelea1.livejournal.com]

inspiring and thought-provoking reading. Thanks.