Today Team Fink watched the classic “Groundhog Day” with Bill Murray. There were some great discussions and reflective writings as a result. See them below:
A glass is half empty, A glass is half full. Today we watched the movie Groundhogs Day and it showed me that life needs to have meaning, or else it’s pointless. The movie groundhogs day shows us we need to stop focusing on ourselves and focus on what really matters, the people around us. In the movie Phil is tested through that, and he is required to step back and stop focusing on his self. This relates to all of us because we all focus on ourselves, and we need to step back and realize that. So how do you look at it? Are you a glass half empty, or a glass half full?
Life is only well lived when others’ lives are included. We try to find fulfillment in materialistic things. When we live our daily lives, even the smallest things can be done for only ourselves. Even when we help others out, sometimes it can only be done because we appreciate the benefit they give us, and fear their rejection. A quote from Marianne Williamson says, “Ego says ‘Once everything falls into place, I’ll feel peace.’ Spirit says, ‘Find your peace and everything will fall in place.'” The man in the movie focused so much on making himself happy, he even did it at the expense of others. With also this attempt of trying to be happy, he failed. Although I can’t recall the name of the person, I heard a quote, “Materialism clouds the vision of those with a weak mind.” I feel like before hand, Phil was not happy. He was always, conscious or not, looking for his happiness. Even though it was well hidden, he secretly needed these course of days to happen. He wanted happiness and he wanted material things. But just as materialism tried to take his life, he accidentally found happiness with who was around him’s happiness. I liked how the movie portrayed his cluelessness of his days of sorrow. He had no idea of his metaphorical death/dying. As when he said, “Well what if there is no tomorrow? There wasn’t one, today.”
Our faith gets put to the test when we strive for anything but God. I truly believe that we are self indulgent and we only care about ourselves. That is why we are short of perfectness. We need to be part of the world but not in it. We have different perspectives on what actions we do to others. We need to think before we act. We need to have a purpose in life. Maybe not us but I need to think lower of myself and higher of others. In the book The Alchemist we don’t need to stare at the oil but pay attention to life and our surroundings. The point of Groundhogs Day is to pay attention to others and not ourselves because we have a purpose in life. I actually like Groundhog’s Day because it is a day to think outside of my life. We try to strive for materialistic things in life that have no meaning at the end of time. It is the little things in life like the materialistic objects that keep humans striving, but God is allowing the devil to make that happen. We get caught up in life and that’s why I love this quote: “It’s the same thing every day, Clean up your room, stand up straight, pick up your feet, take it like a man, be nice to your sister, don’t mix beer and wine ever, Oh yeah, don’t drive on the railroad tracks. (By Phil Conners)” We are robots and we try to do everything right, but we always fail.
The moral of the excellent movie Groundhogs Day is so that we can realize we are all caught up in ourselves, instead of paying attention to others. Phill the human was just like Phill the groundhog. They both payed attention to their own shadow and what’s best for them, but eventually Phill found himself trapped and unsatisfied. When he came to the point when he was depressed, felt vexation, and was dead, he opened up to and focused on others. While doing this he figured out he was happier and he was no longer focusing on himself. This is what we should all do. Don’t look in that shadow, let your heart be spring, not winter. “What if there is no tomorrow, there wasn’t today.” (Quote from the movie) Live each day to the fullest and each day live with out horse blinders on. In my life I sometimes get caught up in what I’m doing or where I’m going next, but that is meager and we need to at least give a trifle of time to recognize others. “Some people look at this glass as half empty, but some see it as half full.” (Quote from the movie) See the glass as half full and don’t look at it half empty.
We don’t like to admit it, but I think we like to just think of ourselves and not others and we should enjoy our lifes. You only have one life, we should actually love it and live it to the fullest. We like to just think of ourselves. In the movie, a guy named Bill that Phil meets said, “You know most people think of a glass half empty. I think of it as half full.” Then Bill said to Phil, “I think you of your glass half empty.” We like to just think about us and we don’t think or even try to understand other people. In this movie, Phil seems like he kind of likes his life, but he always wants more, his wants to be better. It took him a while, he tried a lot of different ways to be happy. None of them worked until he actually took the blinders off and looked around himself. He looked towards others and thought about them. Selfishness doesn’t get you anywhere. We also need to understand, what a great world we have. We should stop and enjoy life, cause it isn’t going to last forever. At the end Phil looked out the window and actually took the time to enjoy the beauty from outside. He realized how beautiful it could be.
In the beginning Phil is half empty. Once he discovers this never ending Groundhog Day at first he treats it like a joke, eating copious amounts of food and smoking. He soon turns to material things stealing money, drinking and driving, and women. We can relate this to addiction, how after going through hardship people try to console themselves with alcohol or drugs. After a while though, something happens that will change his life. He decides his glass will be half full, after seeing the struggle and pain he’s gone through he helps ease the struggle and pain of others. He becomes a local hero in Puxswatawney, saving lives and helping people daily. In the end he finds true love and once he learns to be a good person life goes on.
The movie Groundhog Day is a movie about taking and not taking things for granted. Phil wasn’t thankful that he was there for his gig. He just bulldozed along life without a care about what was around him. But after a while he figured out that that wasn’t the point of re-living the day. He moved on and tried to help people as much as he could. He was in agony of defeat when the old man died, but that lady didn’t even have a care in the world about him. She was selfish too. Everyone is selfish. The movie is trying to get the point across that maybe we are so selfish and we take things for granted, and for us. We need to realize what is around us and not take that for granted. Even his suicide showed his emptiness and selfishness, hoping that the day would stop repeating and it would all be over, but it didn’t. He needed to just let go and think of other people. But he did let go, “I don’t worry about anything anymore, that’s what makes me special.” I am selfish a lot too. Maybe I am the one who needs to let go and help other people. His behavior was condoned, but ours probably won’t be if we don’t make the right choices.
Groundhog Day was a funny yet meaningful movie. The movie is about a weatherman named Phil who is sick of life and just wants to get everything over with. On Groundhog Day he goes to Puxsutawney to do a news story about it. He soon gets caught in a loop reliving the day over and over again until he can find a way out. I like how at first when he realizes he’s in a loop he decides to do whatever he wants too and try to pick up as many chicks and break as many rules as possible, but after that he realizes that isn’t what makes him happy and starts trying to kill himself over and over again. Happiness isn’t received by earthly items, money, sex, breaking the rules and getting away with it. When he can’t get out he finally decides to do whatever he can to make it a great day and help as many people as possible. The message behind this is live every day to the fullest. Not every day has to be another meager crappy day. Phil discovered what he could do in just one day, imagine that for your entire life. We get so caught up in the loop of society represented by the ever repeating Groundhog Day. If we stopped and took time to make the most out of the life we could do amazing things. When Phil is hanging out with the drunk guys one of them says you’re one of those glass half empty people are you Phil sees that he’s been really a downer. We need to be glass half full people and treat every last day like its are last day before death. “Today is Tomorrow”.
The “things” that make the world go round may not give you the joy that you expect. Phil at first was selfish, buying cars and trying to get girls, but he realized that is not what makes him happy. He realized that that isn’t this purpose in life, even though society tells us it is. We are told that we should do all these things to get whatever we want, that rules, regulations, and not getting what you want is bad. But maybe it’s good. Maybe having boundaries is what holds our world together. If we didn’t have rules and laws, crime rates would go up. The world’s happiness goes down. Even if in this moment it seems as if not getting what you want is bad, in the long run for our entire universe it might just be a good thing. The three men in the bowling alley are like society, telling Phil, “There would be no consequences!” But it ends up with him being unhappy and suicidal. Helping all those people and the homeless man is what really made him feel enlightened and purposeful. It is hard for us to think that rules are beneficial and that riches of man are not what gives us hope and happiness, but we have to look past that and be aware of the actuality of what brings us joy and keeps us in place.
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