Death at a Funeral

with Matthew Macfadyen

Viewed April 4, 2009

The movie tonight was odd but good. We had two new women come and we didn't stay on any one question (we usually don't). We discussed self-esteem and compromising and seldom getting our way (Question 2). One person talked about compassion (Question 5) and trying to understand what the other person is feeling, and another person said she didn't care what other people were feeling if they were only being selfish and self-interested.

Most people decided that their families were selfish and would never change, much to their dismay, and there's not much to be done about that. Someone said she tries to be tolerant with her family members, who have very different values and outlooks on life from her own. It's hard, but she tries.

Question 7 seemed to spark some talk about not having followed the straight and narrow, but choosing instead the twists and turns because they were the true roads that actually led them to their "bliss."

Finally, one participant described how he had been stuck in one way of thinking that kept him from asking for or receiving what he really wanted, and that started us talking about about "poverty consciousness" or a sense of "dis-entitlement" (Question 3), and their opposite, a consciousness of abundance.
(This video was reviewed by Pam Chambers)

Feel free to come and share your own personal insights sometime; the Saturday Night Video and Discussions here in Austin, Texas are a lot of fun and fascinating. (They're free, too.) Here are the questions the group came up with, based on the personal growth themes in the movie:

DEATH AT A FUNERAL

  1. How do I let my personal agendas affect how I interact with people?
  2. How much am I willing to compromise with people and not get my way?
  3. How do I deal with people who feel entitled, and in what ways do I feel dis-entitled?
  4. How grown up do I feel? How grown up do I want to feel?
  5. What can I do to learn to be more accepting of others in the now/present?
  6. How much control/acceptance do I exert over people who are imperfect and never change?
  7. What makes me choose the twists and turns instead of the straight and narrow?
  8. When do I choose to be genuine and why?
  9. Given the people I surround myself with, what does that say about me?
  10. What turns me into a pest?