wup de doo

Your Birthdate: July 17

You tend to find yourself lucky - both in business and in life. And while being wealthy is nice, you enjoy sharing your abundance with others. You put your luck to good use: you are very ambitious and goal oriented. Often times, you get over excited and take on more than you can manage. Your strength: Your ability to make your own luck Your weakness: Thinking you can do it all Your power color: Bronze Your power symbol: Half Moon Your power month: August

What Does Your Birth Date Mean?

the light fading, only to cycle back once we have rested. 

apples and oranges

the blogger is a fun little thing. I think many of us "not so famous" bloggers with few/no readers have very interesting motives when it comes to the notion of posting thoughts in public. Recently I have been stewing over this a little. My major dilemma (which really isn't a dilemma, nor is it major) is that while I do feel a certain amount of freedom when it comes to writing in my blog, I still feel the pressure of the public viewing; I face the idea that I might say something covertly, which would otherwise stay an intimate thought in my little mind, that could offend, piss off, burn bridges. This is in no way my intention with my blog, but instead is my own little healthy dose of narcissism, clinging to the notion that people actually want to hear what I have to say. based on my reader #s, few do. which is cool by me. but if I have had some kind of major realization, the result of some stewing and brewing, I kinda wanna put it out there, at least to have a record of it. So why not just put it into some kind of personal diary? I don't know, really. the idea of a public blog adds pressure, like your readers are waiting for a new blog, and by golly ,you had better deliver.
again the theme of people only being able to achieve things with outside pressure. see also: fitness, effects of spectators, children wanting to satisfy their parents, etc.

Indeed there! I seem to have stumbled on an interesting point! parental pressure. I have seen a pattern in certain people who react minimally to outside pressure (for approval, peer pressure, etc), that these are often people who are largely unaffected by their PARENTS expectations of them. Children reared to overly expecting or critical parents, coupled with slightly more sensitive disposition (who isn't), are probably more likely to react strongly to the expectations of others when they are adults and should be making decisions based on all of that sound judgement that is supposed to be taught throughout adolescence and early adulthood. I mean, the pattern is crystal clear: start a tend early in life, and it is difficult to break it later on. makes sense to me.

Once example is Gavin: now, I wasn't present at the dinner table when he was growing up, but he reacts highly minimally to outside pressure and very much makes his own way. His dad doesn't have the psychological hang ups that I see in many people (beyond the healthy desire for a parent to see their child succeed), and from what I understand about Gavin's mom, she was probably just highly supportive and loving. Gavin's parents wanted him to be a lawyer, from what I could gather when I asked gavin about this a few months ago. but that desire was motivated solely by money, and they were not the kind of people who would pressure him too much if he showed no interest in the field. Coupled with this lack of pressure is gavin's personality, which is very sturdy. He is a good thinker and usually has things figured out for himself. The combination of the two would mean that gavin is not prone to being affected by external pressures.

that is merely a case report, so not in any way rigourously scientific. However, the point is valid. So my caution to all parents is this:
if you pressure your children too much during their youth, you are making them more susceptible to peer pressure later on. this actively decreases their self esteem levels.

Just a thought.
I will write more on the pressures and motivations of writing a public blog later. the last tangent was just too good. and now I have to go back to work.
all for now.
H

a little eruption 

seeing the light and walking towards it.

sketches of winkle

The following was written yesterday, January 7th, 2006, begun at 10:15 pm.
We were in a plane, somewhere over Virginia, en route to Philly. This was the second leg of our return trip from Costa Rica back to the US.

The Costa Rica trip is nearing its final leg, and I am happy and sad, exhausted and elated, filled with memories of the trip and trepadation towards the future. I am hoping that the trepadation is mostly the result of the usual paranoia I experience on a reasonably routine basis re: gung fu, training, my progress. I always feel that I am not doing enough, possibly alienating him, making him (secretly) unwilling/uninterested in teaching me.

I have been reading HST for almost the entire day, in spurts: waiting for planes, sitting on planes. I can't seem to put the man down and he is weaseling, worming his way further into my psyche.

I would much rather sleep in tomorrow a. m., than get up at 7:30 am, meditate and then go to Allentown to train for 2 hours, risking underhanded comments from P that I, in my opinion, don't really deserve, stand off-ish behavior from Joe, as I have neglected him terribly and he has not called nor have I. Sometimes I think about just giving it all up. These thoughts scare me, but since they have surfaced they need to be acknowledged, not repressed. I wonder if I am at the end of the rope with the shit, or if it's the hormones/neuropeptides talking. I've learned not to nec. trust those thoughts that come in states of fatigue, not act on them in a knee jerk fashion, so the old "wait 'n' see how you feel in the morning" thing is on the menu and with a decision/mulling over process like this I'd like to order 2 or 3 helpings of mulling. So I am stuck with this dilemma.

Also, there are future plans to think about, options to explore re: education and direction, as my thinking has been loosening due to my removal from the daily rhythm. This has been due to the holidays and the trip. Taking myself away from things, gaining clean perspective, questions arise from the murky depths that always simmer. And now they're telling me "FUCKING STOP AND THINK!" (the banner on my cell phone display) . Stop rushing and stride at a slower pace. Life has been very busy and I have been holding on by a bit of a thread. I have been engaging in unhealthy habits, which is also a sure sign of needing to take some perspective.

What does it all mean? Well, I am unhappy. Things are not all good. I think it all started with the GRE bullshit and spiralled from there. Coupled with that has been job stuff causing stress. There has been a realization regarding the job situation, a shift in focus of the problem. I have located the real problem and now feel comfortablke in my opinion on the matter. But still there is the strenuous traveling that has put a whole new spin on life as well.

But otherwise things are okay. I now have a big ass rock on my left ring finger, a very surprising development (more in the actual execution than the event itself). Major sort of life step. Moving on even farther down the rabbit hole of adulthood/development. But this is a good one and I am better off. Of course.
The rock's just really kinda big...

The key I guess is just meditating and talking about what's going on in my head, vs. stuffing it inside so it can distract me and decrease my efficiency and focus later. Fear is just hte key factor. So much of my problem is fear that my solution is to crawl inside my little head and not come out. Ruminating on things, simmering, marinating, till I reach a breaking point of complete bursting and I dissolve into tears of frustration. And this is not how it should be. But I associate sso much of this reaction with "who I am" that jolting myself out of this 25 year pattern is painful and disorienting. So I am stuck with all this nonsense. At least for the time being while I work through it.

But I feel better having written a mad rant on thoughts and feelings, especially after the events of the past few weeks and the reading and absorption of the day. Expulsion was necessary.
cazart.

pretty leaves and park 

marching to the beat of the drum

So the blogging slacking has continued and there's nothing wrong with that. I have been traveling a lot for work, going to non-exotic places to measure fat people, skinny people, in-between people, and so on and so forth.

I think I will post something from my most recent journal entry:

okay for some reason it is not posting, not letting me paste.

So I am going to cop-out and post pictures.
woohoo!