all you need is not love.

It was just Martin Luther King Jr. Day weekend, and I felt barraged by promotions of love:

even Dr. King looks afflicted in this one.

There's a problem with this. Love cannot solve everything.

Think about it. If you loved everyone, who would you have to blame? How would you get anything done?

While the above statements are worth consideration, my argument against love is not predicated on a need to blame. But the expectation of love to solve everything–differences, tensions, hard feelings–can lead to serious disappointment. You can't love everyone because the connoted intensity of the feeling would blind you to understanding what those differences, tensions, and feelings are made of.

FOR EXAMPLE, you are in an argument with someone, pitting your beliefs against his or hers. The topic could concern politics, religion, lifestyle. How would love benefit you there? 

I don't agree with you, but I love you, so let's stop arguing.

If someone said this to me, I would think they're using love as an excuse, as a way out of trying to understand what I'm talking about, what I'm thinking about, and maybe why I'm thinking in that way.

Now, here's the first showing of my answer to the dilemma, my remedy for disagreements, personal issues, and social problems: not love, but a will to understand. 

Consider the following statement, which I've come to hear and see frequently enough to register a maxim, taken from the New Testament of the Bible:

Love thy neighbor as thyself.

Sigmund Freud called the expectation veiled by the easiness of saying–and superficially believing in– the exhortation unrealistic. "Love thy neighbor as thyself," misconstrues human nature, and disregards the individual right to choose who to love, and how.

Freud. 

A lot of social exchanges on the psychoanalyst ultimately denigrate him. Most conversations I've heard about Freud default to his psychosexual theories, depend on terms like "phallic stage" and "penis envy," "Oedipus conflict" and a quick reference to cocaine to discredit his work and, finally, to verbally confirm their lack of sexual interest in their mothers.

But I think that if you think you have to love thy neighbor as thyself, or love a stranger or someone you don't enjoy being around, you will end up hating yourself, doubting your worth as a human, and be bothered by a perceived inability to love.

An interaction will leave you feeling angry. You will become angrier if you deny yourself the right not to love.

"All you need is love" says John Lennon.

Nope.

Message from religion: "Love thy neighbor as thyself"

I hear Freud was pessimistic. In his writings, he does not communicate the sunniest perception of human nature. But he was a psychoanalyst. He tried to understand. YES there are ethical concerns about his practice, but he did not think that love was an answer to the woes of society, or the chasms between people. LOVE is not an guaranteed, pliable answer to every situation. I do not want to love everyone, for that would be EXHAUSTING.

If understanding is step towards love, then, maybe I can try to start.

inside/out/food

NOTE: This post about Disney-Pixar's Inside Out contains spoilers.

About a week ago, I traveled to Nebraska to visit family. As a tradition, we always go to the movies together. 

catch the flicks

see the sights

Even the twenty-five-year-old in our cousin bunch was set on Disney/Pixar’s latest production, Inside Out; even the twenty-five-year-old pleaded for tissues by the end, a popcorn bag becoming ersatz Kleenex. 

As the studio conglomerate’s first psychology-conscious film, Inside Out embraces the complexity of everyday emotions—especially those experienced by a pre-teen unaware of impending puberty. The movie’s psychoanalysis—sans a Freudian couch—begins with a zooming in on the characters’ head-quarters, or brain. Inside, five key emotions hover over a control board, waiting for a turn to govern it. In Riley Andersen, the eleven-year-old protagonist, Joy is often at the helm. 

she's the blue-haired pixie-lookin thang up above, but if you don't recognize that, I suggest watching the freakin film

Throughout Riley’s mid-pre-life crisis, she experiences a whirlwind of emotions, to be expected. Her coming-of-age is nonetheless heartwarming, but what my own analysis of psychoanalysis centered on was the portrayal of Joy; she’s yellow and glowing, donning a summery green dress. She’s often jumping about and smiling, marveling at Riley’s experiences, playing Dr. Pangloss at the unfortunate ones. But she has blue hair. In fact, her pixie do is the same shade of Sadness’ hair, who is completely blue. The very tip of Joy is Sadness.

After mulling over emotional complexity in a cavernous G-rated theater, I went home and searched Reddit.

As usual, the a forum pushed me even further:

Question: “Since Joy has blue hair, does that mean that there is a little bit of sadness in joy?”

The user with the greatest evidence of family movie-brooding is rewarded to SunshineAndGoldfish: 

I think you might be on to something. If we take it a step further...

Joy's Colors: Yellow body- Joy Blue Hair/Eyes/Eyebrows/Flowers on Dress- Sadness Green dress- Disgust Red Tongue- Anger Purple Lips- Fear

For extra credit:

Disgust has Purple lips, scarf and shoes. I am having a hard time telling if her tongue is Purple too or Pink/Red.

Anger has Yellow flames, Purpleish pants and it looks like the zig-zag of his tie has a Blue tint to it (possible Green).

Fear has Blue stripes on his sleeves and a Red tongue

Sadness has Purple glasses and a Red Tongue

Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/Pixar/comments/3bpm2c/since_joy_has_blue_hair_does_that_mean_that_there/

Self-titled Disney/Pixar Fans deserve some sort of credibility, and so do their own answers:

I would also argue that the blue hair symbolizes that the two share a special connection. A huge theme in the movie is that emotions are not single shades but rather a mixture. This is most notable in that without Sadness, we cannot properly appreciate Joy.... Both as characters and as emotions.

Source: http://www.quora.com/Inside-Out-2015-movie/Why-did-both-Joy-and-Sadness-have-blue-hair

Rabbi Geoffrey A. Mitelman expands on the question, relating it to Jewish philosophy: There is no such thing as “pure joy.” Happiness is borne by sadness.

(click on the photo for a debate on the subject)

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rabbi-geoffrey-a-mitelman/why-are-joys-eyes-blue_b_7688406.html

Rabbi Mitelman includes a snippet of a New York Times review:

"The movie suggests that the bittersweet is a step up from untarnished joy and shows how frantic cheerfulness can stand in the way of genuine connection."

With that said, Joy would look terrifying without a little sadness anyway:

as for food, make an egg. poached