A Mind is a Terrible Thing to Waste: A Work in Progress - Softcover

Sinclair, Mary B.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1479772577 ISBN 13: 9781479772575

Publisher: XLIBRIS, 2013

Synopsis

My book is a Social Satire about how everyone starts out chomping at the bit to use their mind to its utmost (according to that Old School Tried and True Traditional philosophy of "A Mind Is A Terrible Thing To Waste.") But reluctantly it slowly dawns on them that what they are really doing is "wasting" their mind anyway. (Because nothing works the way it has been talked up). It's an emotional Snapshot of how it feels when life throws you a curved ball (or a lot of lemons from which you have to learn to make lemonade). When nothing works the way you were once led to believe it would. When all those wonderful "ideas" (on paper anyway) no longer make any sense. As, all throughout the book, the philosophy of Songs is held up as a guiding principle through which to gradually become "unstuck" and once again able to reboot yourself in a new direction. It doesn't offer the reader a roadmap so much as it tries to come up with a more acceptable explanation for why nothing ever works the way it's supposed to in the real world.

And how it feels to spin your wheels when you're up against all those nasty unmentionables centering around social control. On another level, it's much more than a "blame yourself for everything and get out of your own way" guilt trip since it rejects all those simplistic cliché solutions found in Psychology books. Attempting instead to give the reader a much more plausible insight into all those hard to put into words political, social and philosophical "outside forces" that affect why and how things can (and do) go wrong.

About this title

From the Author:

When I got to a point in my life where things weren't working for me, instead of keeping it all inside or sharing it with a therapist (I explore my reasons for not doing that in the book), all at once I realized that what I really wanted to do was to share it with the entire world.  So it was a healing process for me to write the book.  Since before I began writing, I still had hopes of getting back into graduate school in order to continue with my terrible struggle to conform to the way of the world (which I describe in the book).  But after publishing my book, I realized (as Gretchen explains) that I AM fulfilling my potential much more by remaining at a distance from Academia.  (For the time being anyway).

From the Back Cover:

Nowadays "A Mind Is A Terrible Thing To Waste," as Gretchen, the protagonist, points out in my most recent book, has become a mere cliche.  Like a promising slogan that stands for something, but, after a while, does not deliver the way you want it to.  And, sooner or later, the dark side kicks in.  Although the ideas behind it (like Democracy itself) remain beautiful on paper, in so many other ways it has metamorphosed into what is sometimes called a Bromide (or Platitude).  An "add water and stir" quick fix for everything.  And, as such (as with every "one size fits all" prescription), it can be very invisibly dangerous (like swallowing too many psychologically lethal Tylenols laced with poison) to people who can't fight back. 

So Gretchen (in "A Mind Is A Terrible Thing To Waste") has hearkened back to a book she once treasured when she was growing up, "Poems Teachers Ask For."  A collection of outstanding, but at the same time rebellious and counterculture, poems that have stood out through the years to prominent educators as examples of universal protest against legalized oppression, injustice and corruption.  And now Gretchen has taken it upon herself to redefine these poems (and give them new life in a present day context within America itself) by interweaving them into that old Bromide, "A Mind Is ATerrible Thing To Waste" in order to stop the bloodletting.  To stop the Lies within America and reshuffle the deck.  Curfew Shall Not Ring Tonight has become her most daringly desperate (and urgent) mission, her most personal mandate.

About this edition

• Publisher: XLIBRIS
• Publication date: 2013
• ISBN 10: 1479772577
• ISBN 13: 9781479772575
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 70