Closing Down

Well, I closed this blog down a while again. And then brought it back. But I think it's time to close shop again. Having two blogs is just so unwieldy. And unnecessary. Especially when my readership is about, oh, 7 people, max.

But don't worry, I'll still be posting over at Thinking about Thoughts. And hopefully more regularly too.

You know, like I always say I will.

But to close things off, I end with a quote:

Your school got it's name when some guy said, "Hey, what is this school all about?" The other replied with sort of a stutter. He goes, "Ah... ur... science?" Urscience. Think about it!

Priceless.

This is me, signing off.

'What's Yer Major?'

The nearing of school brings me back to last year and all the introductions. "Hi, what's your name?" Now you know what to call the person. "Where are you from?" Now you know the general mannerisms to expect from the person. "Oh yeah, and what's your major?" And now you know how to judge them in their entirety.

Funny how those three things were really all you cared about. At least at first. Beyond those first moments of traveling from stranger to acquaintance, there were many more opportunities to grow even closer, even to the point of close friend and occasionally, best friend.

But at first, all you needed were three pieces of information. Name, Hometown, and Major. There you had it.

In occasions that didn't involve freshman [i.e., clubs, sports, other misc. organizations], you might need to add the person's grade. Though I don't even know if they call it 'grade' anymore in college. Isn't it just class now? I'm in the sophomore class. Yeah, that's right.

And with that really fine mesh, I'd judge a person. 'Oh, he's a ESS major? I don't even know what that is. Like, English as a Special Study? Oh, nice, he's a chem major! But wait, he wants to be an MD. And thinks I want to be one too? What a presumption! Man, where are the pure scientists? Another BIO major. I swear. To. Freakin'. God!'

And quickly I'd find that those judgments were pure bunk. But I'd make them anyway. And I'll probably continue to make them.

I wonder how you identify yourself in the real world. Just by name? I guess the profession gives away your area of expertise. Then you're Bob the Builder. Or Joe the Pharmacist. Or Brian the Author. And no-one even needs guess at who you are. It's built into your title.

This is a shoddy way to live. As I heard once, labels are for cans of soup. And yet, they're all we've got in the beginning.

And here we are, at another season of "Hi, what's your name?"

Life's a series of introductions. Might as well get better at them.

Creating Your Own Religion in 11 or More Easy Steps - Introduction

I've been throwing this idea around in my head for the past few days now, and I think it's time to shed some light on it for the general viewing public.

A recurring idea in all my ruminating has been how little I've actually progressed in the past 4 and a half years that I've spent actively trying to move forward in any sort of corny, humanistic, Da Vincian, Vetruvian Man kind of way. Self-study, something advised by everybody from the Ancient Greeks to the Stoics to the Buddhists all the way up to the latest self-help guru, is the order of the day. And I've been spending the past 4 and a half years totally avoiding that proscription for growth.

I mean, sure, I've picked up some neat-o things along the way. Like eating vegetarian [Buddhism]. Or occasionally meditating [Buddhism]. Or starting to do things now, realizing that you don't have to be perfect the first time, or even the hundred and first time [Ze Frank]. I've even learned some mind hacks that make learning just a little bit easier, like using the natural learning cycle 60 minutes as a cap for studying length.

But I haven't really improved in any sort of Super Man, Nietzschean way.

And now I know why.

It's because you can't learn second hand. Well, no, that's not right. You can learn second hand, but you can't live second hand. You can try to. But that just ends up with half-starts and pseudo-finishes. All the great men and women in the world have gone out of their way and created their own belief system. Either that, or thoroughly embraced an existing belief system and made it their own.

In other words, they went out of the way and thought about stuff. And in the process discovered greatness. Not because they were looking for it, but because they weren't. Because they were just looking for a way to make this world make a little more sense and hurt a little less.

And so, I present to you my attempt at creating a belief system. Well, almost. This series will be satirical, in the best way possible. It will trace the steps I'm following, but not the actual results I'm getting. Because that would be a little dry.

Without further ado, let the blaspheming begin!

For your [pre]viewing pleasure, here are the preliminary ELEVEN (+) STEPS TO YOUR VERY OWN FAITH:

1. Become fed up with the 'real world'
2. Discover a Higher Power
3. Receive a Revelation from said higher power
4. Write down some sort of Holy Text to follow obsessive compulsively
5. Said text must contain religious edicts that no (wo)man can hopefully follow in practice
6. Create a mythology around the reception of your Revelation and the writing of your Holy Text
7. Gather a group of fellow followers
8. Conscript a band of Saints [not necessarily anyone directly involved in your Religion] to exemplify the ideal practitioner
9. Develop completely unrealistic but completely unresistible expectations for what you can get in This life and the Next
10. Draw a symbol that will strike either Fear or Loathing in the hearts of those unlucky enough not to follow your Religion
11. Confabulate a name, preferably ending in -ism, down to earth enough not to be confused with Scientology but cool enough not to be confused with Mormonism

I'll take them one post at a time, using as many examples from Judeo-Christian, Buddhist, Modern Religious [i.e. Mormonism, Scientology, etc.], and other sources as possible.

Until then, umbkby.

The Art of the Mundane

I've been slowly having one of those profound but obvious epiphanies over the past few days. Nothing new, but still something that seems like it might just be important to live a beautiful life.

But first, a random side note about living a beautiful life. That's something else I realized over the past few weeks. That living a beautiful life shouldn't be easy. Okay, I should probably define a beautiful life. But I don't know what that would be. I could say living a 'good' life, where we define good in the Platonic sense. As in, living life to it's fullest. Yeah, that's a beautiful life. And that doesn't come easy. It seems like that sort of thing should really be 'natural,' that we should automatically come out on top. But if it were so easy, then more people would end up living that sort of life. And if you take a little sneak peak at the world, I think you'll see that very few people are living the life that they really want to live. Okay, maybe that's an exaggeration. But I would say that few people are living up to their maximum potential. I mean, you can't even know your maximum potential.

So, yeah, there you have it. Living a masterful, beautiful, good life isn't easy. I would imagine that's half the fun of it, though. If life were so easy to live so well, then where would we find the challenge. Kind of that conundrum of 'If you could only be happy, like dopey happy, all the time, would you want that?' I mean, sure, it sounds great. But being in the sunlight 24/7 sounds good too, until you get sunburn and the cancer.

But back to my original premise. Which I haven't told you about yet. Hehehe. I'm so good at reeling them in the reader, huh? But whatever, here it is -- the big cahoona, the ultimate truth to life, the universe, and G-d:

To master life, you must master the mundane.

Buh buh buuuuuh! Okay, sounds really lame. I know. You don't tend to think of mastery and the mundane in the same sentence. But if my idea sounded completely intuitive, you wouldn't still be reading right now. So let me explain.

Basically all roads [scientific, religious, philosophical, sport, etc.] point to one and only one Rome: the only way to gain mastery at anything is to do it. And then do it again. And then do it about 99,998 more times. Or at least, that's the rule of 10,000 hours to mastery. I think the science is there. I didn't really look it up. But it sounds pretty impressive.

So, if the secret to mastery is doing something 1E5 times, then why don't more people reach some level of mastery? Well, the simple truth that I'm realizing, for me personally, is that I tend to make something much less mundane than it should be. If I want to get better at running, I should probably just hit the roads and get out there and run. I mean, duh, right? Then why haven't I been out there every day for the past two months? Because I'm expecting some sort of special formula? Because I think that running is a special occasion that only works when all the variables are set to 'go'?

If you want to reach the point of running at your best, you have to make it just 'another one of those things.' Like eating. And defecating. And drinking water. And breathing. It shouldn't become more important the better you get at it. It should become less important. It should just fade into the background of your life. Because that's when you know your full mental energy, not just your fancy smancy prefrontal cortex mental energy, is allotted the task. We're all masters of breathing, of eating. Why? Because we don't really think about it. Tiger Woods isn't a master of golf because he worries about it more than the average golfer. He's a master because he thinks about it less. The best runner in the world probably doesn't see running as a big deal. The best writer doesn't see writing as an amazing activity. The better at something you get, the more you realize it isn't magic that makes it all work. It's just something that you're body/mind does. Just do it, for Jehovah's sake!

But let's address that one too [because you know, this post isn't quite long enough yet! Oh, yeah, I have more!]. Recently, while riding a bike, I was advised by someone that the best course of action to learn how to ride a bike is to 'just not think about it.' I don't think that really works. You can't 'just not think' about something that you haven't learned yet. That's like telling a 3 year old child to 'just not think so hard' about reading, because to an adult, reading should just flow naturally. You do have to go through a certain period of thinking intensely about the activity. And chances are that period of time is really going to suck. Or at the least, is really going to challenge you. But then, it'll be just like riding a bike [score!].

Urh, I don't think I have much more to say about that. It really adds up to the small, mundane things you do every day that adds up to amazing lifetime accomplishments. Don't wake up in the morning wondering what the most stunning thing you can do. Wake up and wonder what the most mundane step towards your goal is. And then start taking it.

The rest of this post will just be more asides that this topic makes me think of. It's probably overkill, but I've got the time and the inclination, so here we go.

This topic, the art of the mundane, also makes me think about my vegetarian diet and how so many people keep commenting, "Oh, are you still a vegetarian?" To me, that question is kind of like asking me if I'm still breathing. Why wouldn't I still be a vegetarian? Until someone can show me the statistics that say not eating meat is worse for the environment, harms animals more, and is less healthy, I don't plan on changing my mind on this one. It just seems like such a no-brainer.

But so many people do relapse. Maybe they really do just love meat that much that they can't abstain from eating it. Or maybe the vegetarian diet just hasn't entered the domain of 'the mundane.' When I go about thinking of what to eat, the idea of eating meat doesn't even cross my mind. It's right up there with the option of running headlong into a car on I-95. Why would I do that again? And when you don't have to waste mental energy on making a decision every time [ie, when that activity becomes mundane], then you've really reached the point of a habit. I guess that's the definition of a habit. What do you know, maybe this whole post has been about habits and I didn't even know it. Well, that would make all of this much less interesting. Good thing you had to get this far before I realized that! ;)

And on a even more completely unrelated note, I've become fascinated by setting goals that aren't time based, but physical quantity based. For example, when running, I've found I like running a certain distance / route more than running for a certain amount of time. While reading, I'd rather read a certain number of pages rather than for a certain amount of time. When practicing from my guitar method book, I'd rather do X pages than X minutes. And most noticeably for me, when I meditate, I'd rather meditate for Y breaths rather than Y minutes.

Okay, maybe I'm just playing a game of semantics. But I feel like time is such a subjective thing, it's hard to plan around it. Writing this post felt like it took no time at all. But in reality, it took about 20 to 30 minutes. So, that would probably have scared me. But instead I set a word count goal [500 words... don't worry, we're well over 1000 now!], and here I am, at the end, pleased with the result.

This may just be a fad. Or maybe it's another one of those habits of mine that will enter the lair of mundanity. Who knows?

I hope you've enjoyed this journey into the mind of Dave. Please leave all trash at the door.

Namaste.

The Self as Guest Star

The idea of the narrative of the self has been making a big comeback in psychology, apparently. Well, I don't know if I can call it a comeback; I honestly don't know if it ever left. But I've come across two article-essays in the past few days that have coincided with some thoughts I've had about the self-story, which is enough consilience for me to write about them.

When I was out for a run a few days ago [okay, that's one part of this story that I need to write more about], I had a sort of mini-epiphany, the sort that everyone has throughout the day but quickly looses as 'real' life gets in the way. We're all telling each other stories. All the time. And sometimes we tell other people stories about ourselves, to the point that we start to think those stories about ourselves ARE ourselves. I realize this isn't anything new or shocking. Just read any Buddhist text, or Stoic treatise, and you'll find this very same idea. But when you have the thought on your own, independent of a reading of those texts [haven't been on my recent reading list], it makes you take notice.

There's even one theory that the self it-self originated because of the stories we tell others about ourselves, and more importantly, about others. As social animals, it's vital to know what's going on in someone elses head. So we create a model of what that person must be like, based on certain assumptions about how they have acted in the past and how are acting now. Eventually, we start doing the same thing to our thoughts. We make our own narrative string about ourselves with Mr. Fles as the main character. And in the process, we make something out of nothing. In a way, the self is a spandrel [something that occurs not because it was intended, but because it's consequence of some other intention], a vestige of a skill we needed to live with other social organisms. I wish I could remember exactly where I read that [because God knows I didn't know up with that on my own!]. I think it had something to do with all the research about mirror that has come out in the past decade. But I digress.

Daniel Dennett, the freaking amazing philosopher who wrote Breaking the Spell, wrote a nice little piece about the self as an illusion in The Self as a Center of Narrative Gravity. He begins by explaining how the center of gravity in an object is an IDEA, not a THING. You can't point to a certain atom in an object and say 'That's where the center of gravity is.' Yes, the center of gravity is inherent in all materia, but it still has not physical locality. As Dennett explains:

This is a well-behaved concept in Newtonian physics. But a center of gravity is not an atom or a subatomic particle or any other physical item in the world. It has no mass; it has no color; it has no physical properties at all, except for spatio-temporal location. It is a fine example of what Hans Reichenbach would call an abstractum. It is a purely abstract object. It is, if you like , a theorist's fiction. It is not one of the real things in the universe in addition to the atoms. But it is a fiction that has nicely defined, well delineated and well behaved role within physics.

I hope you can see where I'm going with this. The self can be placed under the same category as an 'abstractum.' The self has no physical correlate. You can understand the complete workings of the brain and the entire nervous system, you can know all the neurochemicals, all the electrical activity, but still you cannot point out to me the location of the self. That is because the self isn't some grand unified homunculus in the body. There isn't some soul sitting behind the eyes, guiding everyone's actions. This is pretty old news. It goes back at least 2000 years to Siddhartha Gautama. And in neuroscience it's almost a cliche. The 'divided brain,' etc. And it's not just the brain that's divided: it's the self that eminates from that brain. Just read anything about Gazzaniga's split brain experiments and you'll quickly realize how little continuity there really is within the human mind. We're all just a hop, skip, and a jump away from schizophrenia.

So if it's all just a bunch of disparate parts, how the heck do we put it all together? With a story. A story that the brain tells itself in order to form some sort of coherent picture of the mind emerging from the brain so that the brain can understand the mind sufficiently to make predictions. And the best way the brain knows how to do that is to confabulate, to tell stories.

We all know we don't experience reality objectively [or at least one would hope]. No matter how much we pay attention, every experience we have will be colored by our past memories, present states, and future expectations. That's just a part of the human condition. And try as we may, we can't escape it. So basically, even if we know that the story that is our self is complete crap, there's really nothing we can do about it. I don't know if it's really possible to live without a narrative thread [I know I live with one right now, in fact, I've just started a new 'chapter' known as the summer after my freshman year of college {boring title, I know. But I'm working on it!}]. In which case, the only real option is to choose an empowering narrative and live it to the fullest. Realizing that it's just as real as Santa Claus, God, and the Easter Bunny. So be a warrior, a bum, or a victim. Though the last two may not be optimal for living a fulfilling life.

Funny how it ends up that way. Comforting though to realize that there's no point in trying too hard to follow a certain plot.

And on a random note, want to be absolutely certain that you'll never die? Just keep asking yourself, 'Am I dead now?' The answer will never be no!

If you want some more coherent / interesting readings on the self as narrative, check out this NY Times article on narrative psychology. This stuff is picking up some major steam in the mind community.

The Webs We Weave - An Old Story Realized Anew

Hm. Well. I don't know where to begin exactly. I haven't written anything in a while [make that blog cliché count number 1 billion]. But I feel the urge to write right now, so I guess I will.

I have a lot of things to talk about. And I could talk about them all at once [that is, after all, how they appear in my consciousness. I mean, I sometimes wish that my mind would just nicely segregate all my thoughts into different compartments, so that maybe I could focus on the task at hand. But it seems more like the mind works through montage and mixture. Which, to be honest, makes for a much more interesting time than any other solution].

So I'm sitting here cross-legged on a towel, typing on a labtop on a futon [not to be confused with a zabuton, nor to be confused with a zafu, which I would really like to get but don't currently have the money for because of a lack of a job [the lack of which I can thank to minimal effort on my part and maximal ignoring on the part of those that I would like to employ me]]. Typing words that will eventually be read [though it won't seem as if it's an eventuality to you, it'll just seem like something that's happening] by you.

So, here are some of the thoughts on my mind right now. I've been listening to a lot of Tool, APC [A Perfect Circle], and NIN [Nine Inch Nails]. In fact, I've discovered the wonder of mix tapes [where mix tapes, in our time, means coming up with different playlists]. I've even come up with one titled "Fight the Man." I'll give you a partial song list just in case you're interested [or interesting, in which case I wonder if you've already left]. Counting Bodies Like Sheep, Judith, and Pet by APC, The Hand that Feeds, Only, and Right Where It Belongs by NIN, and Opiate by Tool. A fun list of songs, if I ever saw one. I highly advise listening to them all together. They'll give you a giant dose of identity crisis and social consciensce shock, all in one listen. A good time had by all.

And listening to them, I have had a slight case of identity shock. Though I can't thank the songs for all of that [I do love music, but I don't put THAT much faith into it!]. A lot of it has to do with being in Chi again. As you may recall from my post about the greatness of being back in Chi here. Not suprisingly, this doesn't come without some drawbacks. Well, I wouldn't call them drawbacks, per se. Just sort of, I don't know, intrigues. Yes, that's a better word. One you don't hear nearly enough these days.

Let me explain. Now, if we weren't social animals [which I only wish about 10 tens every day, the other times I marvel at our sociability], then the social webs that we weave wouldn't really matter too much. One could go about ones day without thinking about anyone else, and more importantly, without thinking about what the other person is thinking. And even more importantly, without wondering about what the other person is thinking while you're not even in the vicinity of the other person. Makes your head hurt, doesn't it? Some scientists claim it's this sort of thing that caused our heads to swell to giant proportions. Don't diss gossip. It lead to the atomic bomb.

Anyway, being back in Chi leads to all those webs recrystallizing right in front of my eyes. And it's kind of scary. Because half of them I thought were severed. The other half I didn't even know existed. And the OTHER half [wait, does 3/2 = 1?] I seem to find missing. And yet they're all here or not here, without me making any effort.

And then I listen to my music about how the self is an illusion, and I realize it's true. And I feel free from the web that I have spun MYSELF, if only for a moment. I feel as if I could start anew. Just firebomb the heck out of all those webs and start over again, more consciously. Because let's be honest, half of those webs weren't woven by me. And the other half...

But the trick is that I don't have all that much control over the webs that other people have. Because even if I firebomb MY webs, the webs of other people are still quite sticky. And there's nothing wrong with that. Everyone has this really beautiful, colorful, multiphonic world going on inside their heads. Every person has their own webs, their own timelines. I can only see mine, I can only control mine, but that doesn't mean the other ones aren't there.

And it's moments like that where I wish I could build a time machine. Or just step out of time. Or maybe grow a pair of cajones and do something about all of this. Where I feel like shedding this skin and remaking a new identity. One that doesn't worry too much about this, and worries a little more about that. One who, well, is me. But better.

Yeah, this may sound all sorts of convaluted and sad. But it actually gives me some sort of game plan for this summer. Because, to quote John Mayer, 'I just found out there's no such thing as the real world. Just a lie you've got to rise above' [more on him in a later post]. I realized that really, life doesn't start later. It starts right now. The curtain isn't going to magically rise. It already has, on the day the mind first started drafting this particular drama.

Amazing stuff. Yet nothing new. Nothing is ever really new. New things only happen once every billion years. Everything else is just a reworking.

Here's to the reworking of this montage!

Namaste.

Home of Consciousness

I have to tell you, home is an amazing place. Amazing at bringing you back to where you were. To the point that you feel like you never left. But yet you don't seem to remember ever being here.

The cliches never end: You never return home. Home is where the heart is. You can take the home out of the boy but not the boy out of the home. So sure, I got most of those horribly wrong. But what can you do, right? I mean, horribly wrong is okay now. I'm home.

Add to that the summer, and this feeling couldn't get any ODDER. I mean, this is me, back at Chi. At my old crib. At my old desk. Thinking old thoughts. Going through old memories. This is almost priceless.

I don't know if I could bottle this feeling. I wonder if I could bottle this feeling. And sell it to those that are homesick. Because the homesickness is half worth the pain just to have this feeling. This feeling of being home. Among familiar faces. Among familiar friends. Among familiar places.

I read recently that primates are some of the only animals that willingly leave their home clan to move out and explore the world. Wolves don't do it. Parrots don't do it. I don't even think that dolphins do it. But we do. And maybe we're wrong on this one.

Sure, we can't grow without leaving home base. We stand no hope of moving beyond our limited thought of ourself. But there's just something so comforting about this place. Home

The nostalgia will probably lift.

Until then, thank you.

Namaste.

Hu-f'in-Zah!!!

Well, it's a little less than an hour until 4, and I'm already done all my [important] finals. How does it feel, you ask? Amazing! Like, I can't even begin to describe it. Sure, the adrenaline rush will pass in a few hours and I'll pass back into my everyday stuppor [now with MUCH less studying]. But for now I think I'll just bathe in this state of consciousness for a little bit. Aaaah.

I had my Discrete Math and O Chem finals today, and both were a lot easier than I thought they would / should be. I'm not going to complain though. I got out of both with an hour to spare, which isn't something that I normally manage. Assuming I didn't suck [which really isn't too big an assumption using the method of induction], I should be getting low to mid A's on both tests.

Ironically, though not too surprisingly, I think that my grade is going to be hurt most by my two lab classes this semester. I'll probably get some sort of a B in both of them. I'm hoping for an A in all my other classes. Who ever said that a scientist had to be practical... Oh, wait. Yeah... Never mind.

All I have left is funtastic fun time Cell Bio. And you know what they say about bio. Um, well, hm. It's not Chem?

I hope everyone has a beautifultastic day today. I'm going to be on celebrate mode for the next 48 hours!

Huzzah!

Namaste.

Brain Dump [Almost done freshman year]

Time for a mind dump. Literally, a giant dump of my mind onto this page. And this page eventually shifting to this blog. And this blog shifting to your eyes, your neurons, and eventually your brain.

Okay, nevermind. I don't want to go that stream of consciousness. I'm just not feeling that right now. But I do feel like freezing this moment in time. For no really good reason. This moment won't ultimately matter too much in the future. It won't matter that much in 24 hours when I'm [insert illegal state {of being} that I won't actually be in]. But maybe that's a good enough reason to write this. To remind myself not to take myself so seriously. Because God knows I could use a hearing of that every once in a while!

Anyway. I'm stressing because I have a Chem final and a Math final. Like usual, I'm more worried about the math final. It's not a 'math' math final. Nah, Discrete isn't like that. It's all about thinking and creativity. Something I'm not 100% good at in mathematics. Chemistry, sure. Writing, probably. Life in general, some of the time. In mathematics, well, er, nah. But luckily I have most of the material verbatim in my mind, so I don't have to be too creative. Unfortunately, I can't just spit out a formula. It doesn't work like that. But we'll see how it goes. Plus, it's ultimately only 20% of my final grade, so I can bomb it and still end up doing quite well. But let's just hope I don't bomb!

Then Chem. Right after Math. 3 hours each. Wham, bam, thank you, Registrar! Not really too worried about that one. For two main reasons (1) I've done well in the class the entire year, so for me to freak out on the final wouldn't really make any sort of sense (2) the final will most likely be curved [apparently it's one of the hardest subjects a lot of people take. I wouldn't say it's hard, just different. Once you get the difference, it's just a matter of a lot of memorization], so I don't have to do well, I just have to do better than everyone else. A horrible mentality to have, sure, but it's the truth. And the truth shall set you free.

So, that's it. I should be getting to bed soon. But I feel like there's so much more I should be studying. But maybe I already have all the info in my head. There's no scientific evidence proving that we can actually forget something: just that we can't always recall it on demand. So, here's to recalling on demand.

Oh, and in response to Brian's comment [hi Brian! I hope you're doing well! You're a lucky man for getting of that 'hell hole' early!], I wanted to clarify something about my Facebook habits. When I said that I spend 'the rest of the time' on Facebook, I didn't mean that literally. I'm not a Facebook addict that spends my every waking hour looking at people's profiles [nothing wrong with that either... different strokes for different folks!]. I go on there maybe 4 times a day to check status updates. But Brian's inspired me to cut back on that too. I shouldn't be so busy seeing how other people are living to miss out on living my own life. That just doesn't make too much sense!

Well, I should get back to studying now. Time to make sure that the Chem is still fresh in my overly swollen head [of hot air?].

Namaste!

Greatness: An Anachronism?

Technology. It's an amazing thing. No doubt about that. The fact that I can write this now, push a little 'post this' button, and then have this fed to you in little over a few seconds is a pretty amazing thing.

The fact that people across the world can tell what their polar neighbor is up to, via satellite image, is pretty cool.

And having all the information of the world [or at least 99.99% of it] at my fingertips, that's pretty nice.

But let me get a little Ludditic on you. I know, step back. Dave's going to say something NEGATIVE about technology? How could this be possible! Say it ain't so!?!?!?!

I've just been thinking: does all this greatness of the connection mean that greatness in individuals isn't in the vogue anymore? Is individual greatness, quite literally, an anachronism?

When I say this, I mean this mainly in regards to myself. In regards to the life I'm living right now. I consume information like, well, a fat kid eats candy. A good two hours of my day must be spend, on average, reading some sort of RSS feed of people like me [well, they tend to be a heck of a lot better than me....] ranting about life, living, science, Buddhism, religion, philosophy, technology, penises, etc. I get that nice full feeling. But then I realize that at the end of day, I haven't learned anything. Okay, well, I've learned plenty of things. But I don't know anything new.

And the rest of the day I spend looking at e-mail, wondering if maybe, just maybe, someone's left a new comment on my blog, or a new Facebook wall post, or any other vicarious form of communication which I'm sad to admit I look forward to maybe a little too much. E-mail has all the elements necessary for addiction (intermittent reward, daily necessity [because in honesty, sometimes you really DO need to check your e-mail], social tolerance, etc.)

The moments in between I might write a decent blog post, like [hopefully] this one. I might read a really good book. I might listen to some music. And I might go out for a nice walk / run / other outing.

All and all, a fulfilling life. But I think that might be the problem. It's a fulFILLing life. Not a FULL life. Not something worth talking about. But does life have to be something mentionable? Isn't that just for movie stars and pro athletes?

It makes me think of the show House. Gregory House is an amazing Doctor. And yet he spends a good part of his day watching Soap Operas or other miscellaneous shows. But he's earned that 'crap' time because he spends the rest of hist time making brilliant life / death decisions.

Maybe that's my problem. I haven't earned the crap time yet. I assume that crap time comes with the territory [with being an adult, white, middle-class male in a capitalist, well-off country]. When on the contrary I should get those things as a reward.

I shouldn't award myself for mediocrity. That just doesn't make sense.

But yet I think I'll just fall back into mediocrity again. I don't know how many times I will fall for this trap. Probably until I wake up one morning and realize that 'tomorrow' never came, but old age did.

Damn. Memento mori.

But how, in our digitized, antiseptic, antitruth society?

A Sunday Experiment, A Modal Rollercoaster

Well, I haven't written anything in a while. You know, busy-ness and all that jazz.

And I'm feeling in the mood to write something of some sort of philosophical value. Maybe. I don't really know yet. We'll have to see where this goes.

But first, let me talk briefly about a little experiment I did this weekend. Well, I didn't really plan out the experiment. It just kind of happened. I don't know if counts as an experiment then, but I'll just say that it does! Yeah, that's right, I'm a science major!

Anyway, to the experiment. I had a busy week last week. A lot of tests and such [which I'm glad to say ended up with me outrunning those that couldn't outrun the bear]. A lot of studying. More or less non-stop studying. I know, just imagine. Who does that at SCHOOL?!?!? But I went all Old School "only reading [my] AP textbook" on those tests.

When I got to Friday, I decided I wouldn't do ANYTHING productive that weekend. I mean NOTHING. No homework, no exercise, no writing, no thinking. A little reading, but that was mostly leisure stuff [you know, like the history of chemistry], not really counting towards progress.

Let me tell you, when I got to Sunday night, I felt like CRAP. With a capital K. Throughout the afternoon on Sunday, I went through mini-bouts of depression [by depression here, I mean I just felt like complete crap, didn't feel like doing anything, just wanted to sleep, didn't really see the point in anything, that sort of stuff]. Eventually, when I got to about 11 that night, I got sick and tired of being sick and tired. I went out for a nice little run [oh yeah, I also forgot to mention that as part of this experiment, I didn't eat anything of any health-redeeming value other than two oranges]. I felt like crap during the run, with lots of little mini , um, burps? But I got through the run, and towards the end I felt great. If I can run with nothing in my stomach but simple sugars and chocolate, then damn can I run when I'm fueled by fruits and veggies!

By the time I got back to my dorm that night, I was back to my normal productive [productive in the sense of doing school work and reading for entertainment / infotainment]. The crappy mood lifted. I felt like a million bucks.

And here I am, Monday evening, wondering what that little experiment tells me? What have I really learned? What do the data points [the depression, the mood swings, the feeling of physical sickness, the headaches, the lethargy, etc.] say?

Well, first off, they tell me to have a new respect for people that choose to live that way. Whether or not they actually 'choice' to live that way being another question entirely. But I can't imagine waking up every single day and living a life like that. I suppose that the person eventually becomes numb to the emptiness since they don't realize that there's something "other" that they could be feeling. But I mean, God, that would be horrible.

I mean, I don't believe in some ultimate purpose to life. Something out there that determines what our lives should be like. But I do know that living a life like that, without any sort of meaning, is not the way to go. If we have to make our own meaning, I would highly advise NOT choosing the path of lazy nihilism. Not a fun choice.

And I guess ultimately it shows me that I still have this "doer" attitude. This belief that if I'm not doing something [useful], my life is being wasted. Okay, yeah, normal people call that sort of person anal retentive. Or OCD. Or a Type A personality. But it works for me.

And when you think about it, everyone is trying to do something all the time to fill the hole in their soul [ho, hum, he... what a great alliteration...]. To get somewhere. Even the ultimate non-doers, mystics, go out of their way to get to the point that they will actually and literally get out of their own way.

Most people just take the path towards optimal pleasure. I learned this Sunday that pleasure doesn't cut it.

Nothing really new here. But it never hurts to remind myself.

Start Where You Are

I'm trying to live more and more by the axiom of 'start where you are.' I guess this comes as a direct result of my earlier post on the "I could totally be great at that" effect. The antidote to that sort of thinking is to start where you are.

Add to that some humility. Because when you start where you are, you're going to realize how far you have to go to get where you're going. But that's okay. Because if where you're going is someplace worth the trip, then the journey itself should be enjoyable.

Okay, so maybe this isn't the most ground-breaking idea to hit the blogosphere in the last year. But for me, it's revolutionary [for now at least, until my mind picks something else revolutionary and decides to put this idea in the trash can recycling bin].

Let me give you an example. Over the past year, I've been running on and off. I hit my peak in about October, when I could easily run for an hour and half [okay, maybe not easily] and had a PR of 36 minutes for my 8k time. Flash forward five months: now I can barely run for more than 30 minutes on a treadmill at a 8 min/mile pace, and god forbid you asked me to run for an hour. Quite the striking difference.

I've been letting that difference get in the way of getting back on the horse. If I used to be that good [which, admittedly, in the running world is pretty mediocre], what's the point of even running now?

The point of running is running. Whether I can only run for a minute or for an hour. So, starting yesterday, I decided I would run every day for the next month for 30 minutes. And by that, I mean I'll set the timer on my watch for 30 minute, and then head to the track. I'll run until I feel like walking. I'll time how long I run for. And then each time, I'll try and run for a longer period of time. When I reach the point of running for 30 minutes straight, I'll up the time by five minutes. When I can run for an hour straight [hopefully at that point I'll be running on the trail], I'll start phasing in interval workouts. And then slowly, minute of running by minute of running, I'll get back to where I was five months ago. And then go beyond it.

It helps to know that XC season is only five months away. It took me five months to drop from my peak. It should take me less time to get to that ridge. Only, of course, to realize that there's so much more up left to go. And when I reach that point, I'll be able to slowly improve my time.

In that sense, running really is a pretty decent metaphor for life [okay, just about everything is a good metaphor for life, but give me some poetic license]. You just have to keep showing up. It doesn't especially matter what you turn out. The individual efforts don't matter [sounds reminiscent of evolution -- individuals don't evolve, species do!]. It's the slow arc over time that does.

That applies to all activities. I just happen to need it the most in running. I look forward to freely running through Chi in two months. Totally relaxed. With free breathing.

I can smell the Marcus Hook air already. ;)

A [Non-Poetic] Ode to Chemistry -or- How I came to love Organic

I'm a chemistry major. Therefore, I should like all things chemically related, right? Well, I came to find out that at the beginning of this semester, I really didn't "like" organic chemistry ['o chem' for short]. It didn't help that the semester started off going over stuff I'd already learned so well in high school [I mean, who CAN'T name organics after having Mr. Orlando?]. So, I didn't really notice when the transition to new material happened. So I made the mistake of assuming I knew everything, and got my ass handed to me on the first test. The funniest part is, the section of the test I did the worst on involved math [relative reactivities, to be more precise].

I decided that no matter what, I would do better on the second test [we only have three tests and a final, so I figured that if I wanted to eek out {note: yeah, I'm being a little melodramatic to add some pizzaz} an A, I might want to do better than an A- on the easiest test]. So, I studied my ass off, more so than I probably have for any other test since, well, ever. I really overstudied, but that's not anything to complain about.

The test covered stereochemistry [basically, how molecules are oriented in 3D space. Think of molecular models, but on crack], substitution reactions [where you pull off one atom/molecule and put on another], elimination reactions [like the name suggests, you eliminate a molecule/atom and put a double bond in its place], and alkenes [you don't really need me to explain that one, do you?]. Stereochemistry was probably the hardest, but most rewarding, part of the material. I flat out have not built the skill set to visualize models in my mind. But with a great deal of practice and a few 2D tricks, I managed to pull it off. Substitution and elimination reactions just require the learning of a few basic rules [like what makes a good reactant, leaving group, etc.] based on a few simple theories [electronegativity, resonance stabilization, etc.]. All of this just requires practice, practice, practice.

And here's where the interesting part comes in [you've been waiting for that, haven't you?]. I started to LIKE organic after this test. All the different reactions, the ways of writing out three dimensional molecules, all of it, started to seem like this fun little game that you can play. The lingo of Organic Chemists [like 'attack the backside'] started to sound not only funny, but more importantly FASCINATING.

The transformation in interest happened when I realized that I shouldn't treat o chem like general chemistry [gen chem]. Gen chem is a lot of math [stoichiometry, gas laws, thermodynamics, electrochemistry, etc.] wrapped around a few simple theories. O chem is a few simple theories wrapped around a whole lot of practical applications. One isn't the other. And they shouldn't have to be.

Chemistry really does come in so many different flavors: there's Physical Chemistry [p chem] for the mathematically inclined, o chem for the geometer / synthesizer, inorganic chemistry [no nifty abbreviations for that one that I know of] for the, well, someone that likes metals a lot, analytical chemistry for those that like fiddling with instruments, and bio chemistry for those interested in how life works. And they all combine into this beautiful whole known as 'chemistry'. There's room for just about everyone in the field. It's sad that you don't find out about all the OTHER types of chemistry until it's really too late. 'I don't get what this mole thing is... Man, chemistry must just not be for me... In fact, since I don't get it, I HATE it. Yeah, that's right, I hate chemistry, it's so stupid!' What a strange progression from 'I don't quite understand this' to 'I despise this! It's stupid!'

True, this variety in all the sciences. I love physics for it's mathematics, but I'm sure there's plenty of room for non-math in it. Biology, well, I don't know if I could ever do something with that. Plants are cool, but I don't want to know about the plasmodesmata or the sclerenchyma and collenchyma. Unless, of course, you're letting me know how they work on a molecular level. Like viagra and NO synthetase. Now that's cool stuff.

Maybe it's just a matter of different strokes for different folks. I like the basics. The fundamentals. The little things that make life work. Go back to energy, work your way to matter, and soon enough you'll come to us. That's just cool.

And now I'm going to leave the original point of this post [discussing how o chem really is math] for a different post.

I hope you enjoyed this Ode to Chemistry. Maybe I'm rationalizing now that I've picked my major. But isn't that what most of life is? Rationalizing to reassure ourselves that we made the right decisions in an uncertain world.

Thank God we're so good at it.

When thoughts get in the way of reality... And why perfectionism never cuts it...

It's so easy to say, "I'd be great at X if I only did it." In fact, it's probably one of the easiest things in the world to say. And yet it must be one of THE most disempowering phrases ever to leave the lips of a human being. And yet, I know at least of myself, it's one of the most commonly uttered [usually mentally].

A close relative to this phrase is its twin, "I'd be great at X if I only had the TIME to do it!" I'd say this is probably just about the second most uttered phrase I use. Coupled with ideas about having more energy, more money, more materials, etc. But TIME, that's one thing that I can get more of.

Something that I in fact have more of now. And surprisingly, I haven't gotten much further along than I had previous to having all this time. I have all the time in the world. 24 hours. From dawn until dusk. Nothing scheduled. Nothing I 'have' to do. No obligations to anything or anyone. And yet why don't I get all those things done [and not only done, but done well] that I otherwise would have gotten done had I just had the TIME?

Funny how that works. All I want is time until I have it. And then I waste it away. I've wasted a good part of this break [exaggeration alert: I've only had three days of break so far, and saying I've wasted them means that I've gone through them doing things that I want to do but feeling more or less like crap]. I haven't gotten any of the things done that I know for certain I could get done, if I only had the time.

Things like get back into exercise. Well, I didn't have time last week to exercise. If I had only had the time, I would have done it! But now I do have the time. And the extent of my exercise over the past three days has been a set of squats and push-ups.

Or meditation: I fell off the cushion a bit last week, with all the late nights and early mornings. But with time, certainly I could find a way to meditate. I meditated last night. That's it. I didn't meditate this morning. I haven't meditated any of the times that I might otherwise have.

The list obviously goes on and on. Little things and big things. I have an interesting vCast idea. I didn't have the time to do it today. Besides, I know that if I do it, it will be amazing.

But no, I know that if I do it, the vCast won't turn out anywhere near as well as it did in my head. In my dreams. In fact, the difference between the two will be the difference between night and day. And that's actually why I don't do it. That's actually why I don't do any of the things that I might otherwise do if I just "had more time." I don't need more time, I need to accept that success is 95% failure.

That's the link between all the "if only's" I've listed so far. I'm afraid to admit that I'm not exactly in very good shape. So, if I just keep putting that off until I have the time, I'll never have the proof that I'm not in good physical shape. And if I don't have the proof, who can prove me wrong? I KNOW that I could do a great job on all the homework I have to do this break. But maybe it'll take longer than I'd like. And maybe I'll have to put a bit more work into it than I'd like. But I won't have to admit that until I actually start the work. Until then, I can live in my fantasy land where all homework is easy and I get it done without any sort of sweat.

It seems to me that procrastination [the bane of every college students existence] is just this little thought of, "Oh, how well I would do that, if I only did it!" writ large. Of course you could do it well if you only did it. You wouldn't be in college otherwise. But that doesn't mean you don't have to DO IT! Until we reach the point that thoughts manifest directly into reality, you still have to do The Work.

I'm afraid, then. I'm afraid that this break stands to be a giant continuation of this trend of not accepting reality. Not daring to face reality out of fear that I'll come up short. Of course I'll come up short! If I didn't, then I must have lost my ability to dream. If I constantly show up to reality the way I imagine I should, then I most certainly need to improve upon my vision. Because vision matching reality is mediocrity.

But that has yet to happen. I have yet gotten to the point that I can manifest everything in action that I think of in my mind. And that's a blessing. It's what gets me up in the morning. The hope of progress. So I shouldn't let the false progress of my dreams impede the real progress of my actions. Because our thoughts may in fact make our reality, but not without actions.

The haze has lifted. A bit. More than it usually does. It normally takes me until about a week before the break is done to figure all this stuff out. Over. And over. And over again. Not that much time with only a week of break at hand!

May everyone come to realize that fighting with reality, just because the reality in our head is SO MUCH BETTER, is a losing battle. And that the only way to win is to come to accept reality as it is. Quite real.

Misc. Thoughts on Anatta from January 14th

No wonder philosophy never comes to an end. Every single hunk-o-meat must face its own non-existence. Over and over again. Ad-infinitum.

Talk about the never-ending story

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The future is limitless, and so are "you." Ha, because you don't exist. Never have. Never will. Just a momentary whirlpool in the ocean of consciousness. In the waves of existence. In all of this. Just that. Nothing less. Nothing more.

But why can't I just let go? Would it be so hard? Probably. Not. But why try? Don't cry! Just die.

Realization: School's for Learning

This may sound kind of strange. But I just realized that I’m at school to learn. Not to get a degree. Not to get good grades. But to learn.

Woah, right?! I mean, that makes all the difference in the world. It makes my “point” more clear: my point is to learn as much as I can from classes I take while here.

I tend to just go into class, “get” the bare minimum to ace the test, and then move on. Wham, bam, thank you Ma’am!

That’s kind of dumb. No, actually, that’s really dumb.

I pride myself in minimizing the time I spend on college-work. How does that makes sense? I’m spending tons of money to be here. And I’m trying my hardest not to get the most out of it. I’m purposefully going out of my way NOT to.

And then I sit around wondering why I feel like I should be doing more SOMETHING. I’ll tell you what you should be doing more of! School work!

Man, I feel almost silly just realizing this now. I don’t know if I thought I was somehow too “good” for college or something like that. Yes, I could pass the tests without trying to master the material. But then I’ll find myself with a Bachelor’s Degree in [literally] BS. With the same ability to get a cursory understanding of things that I had before college. But having not mastered those concepts.

I’m here, and I should make the most of it. And the most of it is mastery of the material.

Click.

That’s the light bulb on my head switching on. A compact fluorescent light bulb, mind you!

Thanks to a mildly stimulating Cell Bio class for getting this thought dislodged from my head. ‘What the hell do I need to know about neurons? Oh, wait, hm? I’m here to LEARN, aren’t I. Oh, yeah!’ Neuron fires. And I know how.

Heroin/e?

Have you ever noticed that the words "heroine" and "heroin" have the same root? Kind of funny, really. Because both can be so addictive.

The word heroine comes from the feminine variation of the Greek word "heros," meaning hero. A female hero.

The word heroin comes from the German "heroin," a variation on the Greek word "heros." It refers to the state of invincibility that a person feels while on heroin.

Two words. One root. The same problem of addiction.

Strange. Wonderful. True.

Living Life on Purpose -- Sort of...

[Editor’s Note: This is a largely autobiographical trip through my life this past week. I don’t know if it will really be of use to anyone but me. But I hope you can find something of value in it. Because I’m sure we’ve all felt like I felt this week at least once in our lives. If not far too many more times.]

Man, today was a roller-coaster of a day. No doubt about it. It had some of the highest highs and the lowest lows of this week. And I must say, I don’t think I liked very much of either.

The funny thing is that all of these “high highs” and “low lows” happened solely in my head. They didn’t have anything much at all to do with my objective circumstances. But that more than not tends to be the case with me. Of course, I have had those moments where my circumstances dictated directly my emotions, but more and more as of late that hasn’t been the case.

Anyway, I suppose I’ll share with you the meaning of my lowest lows, and some thoughts that have managed to get me out of the gutter [again].

You might have read about my existential angst. Well, I guess that might be a little too powerful a term for what I was feeling. Let me put it this way: at the moments when I didn’t have anything to do this week, I felt like complete crap. As in, assuming I’m a work-a-holic, I felt like I’d just gone cold turkey. The worst part was that I neither forced myself to do something productive nor did I just sit there for a moment, take a deep breath, and relax and realize that I was creating the entire drama of my life. No, instead I just continued to flit about doing unproductive things, the entire time thinking about how unproductive I was being. Ugh. Talk about a recipe for disaster!

And I suppose there’s a little bit more to this than I let show in the last paragraph. Why DO I feel like such crap when I’m not doing anything? Tons of reasons, but the main one is pretty simple: a complete lack of self-esteem. Which seems pretty silly coming from someone that seems so hell bent on the idea that he doesn’t have a self. :) But you’ll just have to stick with me on this one. Here we go….

So, when all you do all day is read about the greatest minds in the world, watch movies about the best engineers, scientists, artists, etc, listen to podcasts about the brightest men and women in the field of computing, you very quickly start to think to yourself, “Well, shit, what am I doing?” And the first thought that flits into my already [at this point] fallow mind is, “NOTHING.”

Let me repeat that. NOTHING. That’s a pretty scary thought to have if all you ever focus on is how much you want to make it big in the world, how much you want to make a difference. If the first thought that comes to mind when you think about where you’re life is going is nowhere, then shit, forget about it. That’s a one stop ticket to depression-ville.

And sure, I could get myself to step back and say, “Well, hold on one minute, you’re not doing NOTHING. You’re attending college, getting good grades, reading, writing, learning, and experimenting with who you are and what you believe. Add to that any of the misc. activities you do throughout the day, and you’re actually doing SOMEthing, not NOthing!” But then the downer part my brain say, “Dude, yeah, that’s cool. But, uh, when’s the last time your writing got you a prize? And when’s the last time your reading made you learn something that completely changed your life? If you’re in it for the greatness, you’re doing a shitty job!” Shot down again.

And that’s about where I found myself today. This morning, I managed to cheer myself up with the promise that I should set a bunch of short term objectives for myself. Like getting up at 06:30 every day, or making sure I get some form of exercise in every day. That worked for a little while, until the little goals started to just seem, well, little again. And the fact is, I’m afraid to ask about the big goals because I don’t think I have an answer. Sure, I have the vague, “I wanna be a nanobiotechnologist!” But half the time I don’t even know if I really believe that’s true. I don’t know if this whole science thing is really cut out for me. With all the labs and hands-on stuff, I practically shit my pants every lab. And frankly, I don’t know if I’m smart enough [make that creative enough]. Talk about worrying too much about the destination! Yeah, I read “personal development” / religious / psychology texts. But clearly I hadn’t soaked any of it up yet.

So, I drifted through today wondering how the hell to fix the problem. Mostly, I tried my normal “opiates” like surfing the web, writing random stream-of-consciousness journals, and watching the Daily Show. All of those didn’t take the edge off. Most of the time, they just made things worse. I ended up with a headache and a major case of the blues.

But then I kept stumbling around in the dark, and as with all things, I eventually stubbed my toe. I flitted the idea of just filling my day with pleasurable and enjoyable things [there is a distinction that I might get into later]. Just not worrying so much about where I’m going and focusing more on the now, on just making this moment more enjoyable. And that started to get the joyful juices flowing. And then, in my continued fall to the ground, I stumbled on an article called Purposive Drift: Making It Up as We Go Along by Richard Oliver. And that’s when I realized that’s what I wanted to do. Stop trying to figure out where I’m going to be ten years from now, let alone ten days from now. Life’s too random for that.

What I can do, though, is figure out how I want to live, if not WHAT I want to live. To figure out the purpose and then let the rest of life flow from that. When speaking of a successful high tech company, Oliver explained:

However, there was a common thread that ran through its history. A core value, something that was crucial to the company's sense of well-being, was that its people liked working on hard computing problems. Its history could be described as a constant scanning of their context to find niches where they could satisfy this value and remain profitable. As their context changed, they changed, but retained the key values that gave them their sense of identity.

But, there was something else going on as well. As they moved through their trajectory from niche to niche, they were also building up their repertoire of competencies—the things they could do. Their developing repertoire of competencies not only meant that they could do more things; it also gave them the ability to see new opportunities as they arose. For example, the rise of the internet and the growth of the World Wide Web, which for many similar companies posed a serious threat, was a change of context that they accommodated with relative ease.

That’s the best I can do. To keep doing what I love, namely learning. And realize that the learning isn’t a waste of time. No matter what it is that I’m learning, I’m exercising the learning muscle itself, which will make any learning in the future easier.

This all weaves together a pretty powerful tapestry of how to live ones life. Something to the effect of, “Go with the flow, but make sure you’re in the right river!” I like that kind of thinking. And it makes my headache and bad feelings go away. And if there’s one thing that we can [and should trust] to tell us if what we’re doing is really right for us, it’s our feelings.

If you feel like shit, change what you’re doing. Otherwise, you’re insane.

I don’t want to be insane anymore.

Namaste.

PS - This is clearly a pretty rudimentary life philosophy that could definitely use a lot more unpacking. But most of my ideas tend to come like that. Especially when they’re not 100% my own. Sadly, in most cases, they end up like the boxes used during a big move: stashed in the corner and left unopen. Lets hope not this time.

Yee Haa!

Yay, I fixed my old posts! Thank [¿¿¿] for that! They were so hard to read like that. And if I ever wanted to look back on my writing, it would have been totally hard. Because, yes, I do like paragraphs.

One bullet dodged! Where's the next?

Technorati Tags: misc.

I'm Back!!!

But shhhhhh!

I can't let those crazies at that PLACE know I'm back. Then they'll get on here and try to figure out what I'm DOING! Maybe this is a conspiracy to overthrow the oligarchy over THERE. It's about that time of the year AGAIN!

Or maybe I'm just going to lay down my roots and get to ruminatin' again! It's been too long.

Hm, sounds like a good front!

:)

And for old times sake:

Namaste.

Huzzah!