Countless sleeps lost, those wide –eyed owlish nights. And over what… In school we were plagued with encouragement to contemplate the future, to assess our life goals, to plan ahead. But I want to clarify a few things. What is to truly contemplate the future? Is it to simply look ahead and wonder, wonder what our destiny holds, wonder what career we’ll undertake, who we’ll marry, where we’ll live…amidst the endless questions I came to the conclusion that the centre of all these thoughts is just it: wondering… just wide eyed nights occupied by wondering. To add another layer of complexity that muddles things up… I begin to wonder why it is that I place such an emphasis on wondering. What’s the problem with wondering? Perhaps it clouds our ability to see clearly, that which already surrounds us. When the mind overflows with wondering, there leaves no room for appreciation.  How can I appreciate what is good, whilst simultaneously wondering about a future much less immediate than the present.

If the concept of living is an extension of the word life itself, it seems natural then, to assume that in order to live, one is to take full advantage of the concept of life.

Here, I want to establish a specific, self-defined opinion under which I will labour for the rest of this blog. In biological terms, life is a condition that separates its possessors from inorganic matter. It is the capacity for growth, reproduction, functional activity and continual change. Comparatively, existence, in my eyes, is the lack of death. I will attempt to elaborate with an analogy of light and dark. Whilst darkness is itself the absence of light, light is independent; it does not function as a character that sources its energy from being a ‘lack of’.  Therefore, to simply not be dead is a contradiction to the activeness of living. Death is absence of life. Yet life is not the absence of death rather, requires energy to exist, just as light requires.

Just saw Django Unchained. Just WOW. 🙂

I think what i appreciated most about this film, other than Dicaprio’s timelessly stunning visage, is the integration between Tarantino’s extreme stylization and a strong, captivating narrative. I find it is extremely difficult to create that balance between stylization and narrative and often, it seems a strong narrative is dispersed by an overemphasis on stylization. Hats off to Tarantino for, in my eyes, creating the perfect balance with – as always- an explicitly gory screen depiction.

IMDB LINK – if you want a little synopsis

After spending a decent 10 hours having my eyes fixed on my television screen whilst playing movie after movie, I’ve come to the somewhat distressing conclusion that I’ve wasted an entire 24 hours unproductively. Now, a few years ago when a substantial amount of my waking hours was devoted to schooling commitments, this appeared the perfect day. But things are a little different now. It’s come the time where I can do whatever I like, pursue the tasks I wanted but lacked the time and even capability to complete back in my high school days. This then begs the question, why am I not making use of my time? oh, the irony of it all: ‘I have the time and capacity to achieve my goals but I’m too preoccupied doing absolutely nothing at all‘. I don’t think I can assign the blame to a lack of goals, because we all have goals . I think perhaps it is the enormity of those goals. I think sometimes we get caught up in the tremendous life objectives we’ve created for ourselves. Suddenly life becomes centered around one’s career, how much they want to earn and so on.  We tend to forget about the type of objectives we have the capacity to achieve on a daily basis. I am definitely a victim of this kind of thinking. I seem to have lost sight of the small tasks I might achieve daily. I could paint. I could draw. I could read. I could make a dance. I could go for a run. I could play piano. I don’t know if this is a stretch, but I could even initiate an intriguing discussion with a family member. ( this is just my subjective list of hobbies but if it resonates with you feel free to be inspired by it)

Perhaps the first step is to create thee short-term goals. Take a paper and pen and simply write down a list of the leisure activities you’d like to do. The thing that distinguishes these goals from the long-term goals is that they’re purely for leisure. That’s the great thing about them; they can be completed on your own schedule. I think it’s time we begin to make use of the free moments we have before time begins to inhibit our ability to do those things…

In my study of networked media I’m always encouraged to question… to speculate on things. This debate around the compatibility, or rather, supposed incompatibility of science and faith has got me speculating… :

When you think of science and faith I immediately visualize a spectrum with each concept on one end in binary opposition to the other. But to perceive the compatibility of science and faith in this manner is to see the world through a black and white lens (this being the same metaphorical lens that categorizes people as either entirely good or entirely bad). In essence, science is about observation and the discovery of fact. Faith is believe with no evidence. It is science that proves faith by revealing the gaps in our understanding, which in turn, can only be understood by faith. The presence of science gives a miracle meaning. Think about it…

So I’m spending my Saturday afternoon helping out a friend currently undertaking year 12 English. Oh what a joy.. One can only experience nostalgia when reminiscing on year 12… ( the sarcasm in my voice isn’t as apparent I intended). Ahhhh the good old days where I’d sit in the solitary confinements of my room as I cried the nights away, thinking of the horror that is the final examination. If there’s one thing I learnt from the experiences of year 12 it’s this: you’re allowed to have your own voice, you’re allowed to write about things you’re passionate about…. But you can’t do it in school. It’s all about the constraints presided by the tyranny that is the institution. On a slightly less pessimistic tone, I would encourage you all to start your own blog. It’s a great way to share your innovative ideas, ideas that can only be claimed by you once posted 🙂

I heard a pretty awesome analogy today that really got me thinking. Being a first year University student, I feel like a kid who hasn’t yet learnt how to swim alone and has been shoved in the deep end of the pool (without any floaty might I add). I don’t know about you but that image of a kid struggling to float in the deep end isn’t comforting in my mind. I’ve always felt like I needed a clearly defined goal that i would spend my life trying to attain. You grow up and see that it isn’t like that. Sometimes you’re just stuck in this confusing state where you can’t seem to formulate proper goals to define your life and what you’re doing with it. What I’ve come to realise is that you’re sole purpose in life isn’t to have these definite goals that you aim to achieve. Rather, what I find to be the crucial part of life is that we keep moving forward. Remaining stagnant is the most destructive act ( or rather non-act).

I know you’re all dying to hear the analogy. Imagine you’re on a bicycle with both feet off the ground. If you’re not moving you’re simply going to fall off. The rebutting argument would be that moving back means we do not fall either however, although the desire is to continue to move forward, sometimes we need to move back so that we’re provided with impetus to continue on forward. You need those moments in your life where you feel like you’ve moved 10 steps back so that you’re encouraged to change whatever you need to move on.

If I take the analogy beyond it’s obvious connotations I see that sometimes life hands us challenging obstacles that immobilize us. You’re riding along on this bike, when suddenly a tire pops and you fall to the ground. Now that wasn’t your fault. But you either remain on the ground crying about what happened or you get up and drag the bike along as you journey on forwards.

This may just be the most overtly philosophical blog post yet (Excccccittttting).

As hectic as I thought this year might be, being my first year at University, I’ve had a surprisingly extensive amount of free time for pondering over my thoughts about the world… There’s one thought I can’t seem to get off my mind. It’s this idea of genuineness versus decorum. In essence, they exist in a dichotomous sphere. We all abide by codes and conventions in an attempt to establish a harmonious co-existence with our own species, however, at what point does social decorum override genuineness? Is there even a point where it should abrogate it? Everyday you meet people from all walks of life: people who are friendly, people who are rude, people who simply don’t care… the list is infinite. When, in reality or any kind of media, we are faced with the kind of people we may perceive as inappropriate or offensive, we develop an immediate reflex in which we retreat and silently judge as they negate the basis of social etiquette and the universal conception of human kindness. This is where I recognize a problem. We’re bombarded with ideas of being genuine, the motto that is to “be yourself”. However, when people are truly themselves, others reject their authenticity in favor of social decorum. I’m not suggesting people ought to act upon all their base instincts and treat others in a destructive way because that is a ‘genuine’ expression of their inner feelings. What I’m pointing out is the contradiction. No wonder it’s so difficult for people to have a strong grasp on who they are…

I guess I’m leaning towards the conclusion that society needs to stop hammering this idea of genuineness into our minds when, in all reality, such sincerity is dwindled by the unspoken rules of social decorum that dictate our co-existent nature as humans.