Obsession is broadly defined as a persistent disturbing preoccupation with an often unreasonable idea or feeling. Don’t get this confused with a preoccupation with a reasonable idea.
If your son plays basketball 24/7, sleeps with his basketball and dreams about playing even when he is not. And of course your son happens to be 7’1, this is reasonable. If he is 5’2, it’s probably unreasonable.
Because we don’t want to smash anyone else’s dream we avoid commenting. So we allow people who haven’t had any college experience say they want to be a superintendent of a school district — they have no plans to go back to school.
We have people who can barely sing hang on to the dream of being a singer. We put up with pastors in pulpits that have no oratory ability nor knowledge of scripture but they want to preach.
When a teenager who is failing math wants to be an engineer or a student who is failing science wanting to be a doctor, we smile and think it’s cute.
Honesty is still the best policy.
One of the things that we loved about American Idol was Simon Cowell because he could be brutally honest about what he saw and heard. So we watched each week to enjoy the talent but hear what Simon thought about the act.
Can you imagine throwing your life away on an obsession? I mean just think about an obsession that takes you into your 40s with no return on the investment. Many people followed your dream knowing that it was not going to happen but hoping that it might — this is a very tragic fate.
Broken lives collide with reality and in the rubble is a lost soul who had higher expectations than his talent could take him.
All types of mental health professionals offer diagnosis after the fact and everyone has an opinion, but in the end all you are left with is a broken heart and that damn obsession!
