I have decided to make an attempt at returning to my previous, short-lived, blog. Mostly I have more time for my mind to wander widely and have been finding that I like myself more when my mind wanders more widely so I have been letting my mind wander widely. When my meandering mind returns from its wild wandering it lets me know that it thinks it has something to say. A blog is a thing in which things can be said and blah blah blah, I'm writing again. To encourage the wandering, if you didn't already catch on to that.
My message for the evening is something along the lines of never have regrets. Never be ashamed of who you are, what you like or believe or what you have done unless it is truly something to be ashamed of. It's something I've picked up in my first semester away at school that has made me like myself more. It hasn't necessarily made others like me more but it has made me like by people I am happier to be liked by, but we will get back to that later. Let's go into examples. Say Billy Bob, the rough and tough cowboy really likes the carebears. He genuinely just enjoys the show and the accessories that go with it. The other rough n tough cowboys tell Billy Bob, " Hey Billy Bob, don't you know Carebears only be for lil girls and dem homoseximals?" Billy Bob thinks to himself, "well, I'm not a homoseximal nor a little girl, yet I really enjoy the carebears." Most people in Billy Bob's position would say, "well, I don't really like the carebears, it's more of a joke," or some other excuse to cover up their love for carebears. I say Billy Bob should say to these other cowboys, " Fuck you guys, the carebears kick ass." Possibly in less severe terms. I just dont think people should have to be ashamed of who they are. Now some people who do have extreme personalities have to realize that their personalities may hinder advancement in certain areas of the world and that is a cost-benefit analysis sort of thing they will have to go through but as for social things be who you freaking are and never hide truths about you. Part of it is in taking responsibilty for yourself and your actions. The no regret aspect is what usually gets to people. "Everybody has regrets!" they holler. Well duh, everyone has regrets but people should really only regret truly shameful things, otherwise, suck it up, learn from your mistakes and move on with things. So you got really drunk, vomitted everywhere, and pee'd on someones door in the middle of the night? Tell your friends the story proudly. It's funny. You probably don't want to do it again, but don't live regretting it. I've found that my friends that I have met at my university are more genuine people than a lot of people I used to want as friends. They like me because I admit proudly who I am and what I do. They are just better people than others and I attribute it to this new policy of not regretting things and being proud of all your actions and beliefs. I am rambling and am not very concise. I hope to improve that conciseness thing. One final thought, be proud of your beliefs, but be open to others and don't push your beliefs on other people, It's annoying.
bee yourself
sorry to all my faithful blog followers, I think I may have 1, that I havent been blogging in the past few days. I have had many an inspired moment in which I saw clearly what my mind wished to state and my body rushed to the keyboard to make the thoughts words. But alas, I was foiled by an internet connection failure. That problem is behinds us now and I am ready to write my first real blog.
In the future I have considered many possible careers for myself that are as varied as the smells in the jungle but I have come to understand recently that they all have one aspect in common. I wish to be involved in the world in such a way that I am able to comment on and possibly change the way our society operates. Particularly I wish to influence the ways in which our society represents and reciprocates itself through tradition, media and culture. I suppose that is why I've begun blogging.
One problem I have always seen in the world is that people always think of reality as either fairy taleish and overly positive and magical or as a losing, depressing battle that is just a fight to delay failure rather than a chance to succeed. It's never looked at simply for what it is. People just don't seem to realize reality realistically.
The area which I will write of today is one of tradition and somewhat of culture. It involves the maturation process, a part of growing up. We are all given the same trite, thoughtless advice as our elders received when they were your age. The worst advice that these old timer's give has always been and probably always will be, unless my blog becomes wildly popular, the simple statement of, " be yourself." This quick, seemingly wise remark is the cause of more miscalculations and bad decisions than ignorance because it is trying to force a decision out of that ignorance. As we grow up the main goal through it all is to figure out who "myself" is in the scheme of things. The process is a mighty complicated one because we are being fed contradictory signals about everything from everybody at all times. WIth the idea of trying to find out who "myself" is throughout this both the bad and good decisions throughout this trial can be seen for what they are. They are just a small misstep in finding out who "myself" is, just a failed experiment to be retried after changing the variables.
What the advice of be yourself does to young people is puts the idea in their head that they should know who they are from the start and if they arent exactly sure where they fit in in the scheme of things that something is terribly wrong with them. It adds urgency to the idea of finding onesself. In haste young people form or join existing cliques in order to find something predefined that they can just pop into. It is avoiding the work of really thinking of yourself in relation to everyone else and how you fit in. It is like trying on a bunch of mediocre clothes to see which fit best when in reality one should just make some clothes themselves that would fit perfectly.
Encouraging kids to be individuals and be themselves when they really have no idea who they are is what causes kids to define themselves by generalities and extreme absolutes rather than balance out all their intricacies into something that is just right. It's much easier to refer to a handbook than it is to write your own. Thats why I think it would be far better to do away with this "be yourself," nonsense, at least until someone knows who they are it's as Ralph Ellison stated in his novel 'Battle Royal' - "All my life I had been looking for something, and everywhere I turned someone tried to tell me what it was. I accepted their answers too, though they were often in contradiction and even self-contradictory. I was naïve. I was looking for myself and asking everyone except myself questions which I, and only I, could answer. It took me a long time and much painful boomeranging of my expectations to achieve a realization everyone else appears to have been born with: that I am nobody but myself." or it as I would say, "figure out who you are, any mistakes you make along the way dont really count" or to go even further, " mistakes don't count unless you know who you are and who you are is making them."
In the future I have considered many possible careers for myself that are as varied as the smells in the jungle but I have come to understand recently that they all have one aspect in common. I wish to be involved in the world in such a way that I am able to comment on and possibly change the way our society operates. Particularly I wish to influence the ways in which our society represents and reciprocates itself through tradition, media and culture. I suppose that is why I've begun blogging.
One problem I have always seen in the world is that people always think of reality as either fairy taleish and overly positive and magical or as a losing, depressing battle that is just a fight to delay failure rather than a chance to succeed. It's never looked at simply for what it is. People just don't seem to realize reality realistically.
The area which I will write of today is one of tradition and somewhat of culture. It involves the maturation process, a part of growing up. We are all given the same trite, thoughtless advice as our elders received when they were your age. The worst advice that these old timer's give has always been and probably always will be, unless my blog becomes wildly popular, the simple statement of, " be yourself." This quick, seemingly wise remark is the cause of more miscalculations and bad decisions than ignorance because it is trying to force a decision out of that ignorance. As we grow up the main goal through it all is to figure out who "myself" is in the scheme of things. The process is a mighty complicated one because we are being fed contradictory signals about everything from everybody at all times. WIth the idea of trying to find out who "myself" is throughout this both the bad and good decisions throughout this trial can be seen for what they are. They are just a small misstep in finding out who "myself" is, just a failed experiment to be retried after changing the variables.
What the advice of be yourself does to young people is puts the idea in their head that they should know who they are from the start and if they arent exactly sure where they fit in in the scheme of things that something is terribly wrong with them. It adds urgency to the idea of finding onesself. In haste young people form or join existing cliques in order to find something predefined that they can just pop into. It is avoiding the work of really thinking of yourself in relation to everyone else and how you fit in. It is like trying on a bunch of mediocre clothes to see which fit best when in reality one should just make some clothes themselves that would fit perfectly.
Encouraging kids to be individuals and be themselves when they really have no idea who they are is what causes kids to define themselves by generalities and extreme absolutes rather than balance out all their intricacies into something that is just right. It's much easier to refer to a handbook than it is to write your own. Thats why I think it would be far better to do away with this "be yourself," nonsense, at least until someone knows who they are it's as Ralph Ellison stated in his novel 'Battle Royal' - "All my life I had been looking for something, and everywhere I turned someone tried to tell me what it was. I accepted their answers too, though they were often in contradiction and even self-contradictory. I was naïve. I was looking for myself and asking everyone except myself questions which I, and only I, could answer. It took me a long time and much painful boomeranging of my expectations to achieve a realization everyone else appears to have been born with: that I am nobody but myself." or it as I would say, "figure out who you are, any mistakes you make along the way dont really count" or to go even further, " mistakes don't count unless you know who you are and who you are is making them."
Contemplating Blogging.
Ever since I planned to get a computer I had played with the idea of blogging. I have never been one to consisently stick to something I start. Books take me months to read because I forget about them, I rarely beat video games because they grow old and the overwhelming majority of my projects end up half finished. The realization came to me that this blog may end up being one of those half-assed, abandoned projects in Bryce Anderson's junkpile but I kept thinking about it. I thought, "well that abandoning thing I do isn't exactly the best quality eh?" and then to take it further I reminded myself of one of my guiding principles, that being "eliminate flaws." It sounds like a robotic, self-loving type of philosophy to follow and it is, but it works for me. Well to get to the point, this blog is my attempt at eliminating that flaw. I suppose I should have titled it Operation Flaw Termination but Recorded Fury is what I hope it will become and live up to.
I don't know what I will write in here but it will most likely end up being whatever is currently on my mind or is relevant to the goings on of the world. I do not plan to keep it as a diary of personal events and thoughts as those would bore people and I tend to keep those to myself. Lets just hope somebody actually reads this thing and I keep up with it. Good luck to me?
I don't know what I will write in here but it will most likely end up being whatever is currently on my mind or is relevant to the goings on of the world. I do not plan to keep it as a diary of personal events and thoughts as those would bore people and I tend to keep those to myself. Lets just hope somebody actually reads this thing and I keep up with it. Good luck to me?
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