In the spirit of 420, here is The Union, an excellent and entertaining documentary that I dearly love.
Let's work together and dispel the absolutely retarded misinformation that many of us have been fed from sources we were supposed to TRUST.
Note: I am not saying that cannabis is absolutely harmless. People with addictive personalities can have their lives disrupted by just about anything, be it eating sofa cushions or smoking weed. The key to this is self control and moderation for safe use.
My father passed away on April 12th, 2007. Four years ago. It has been so long yet so short. This post will consist of a set of stream-of-consciousness updates that will be added throughout the day.
Since April 2007, I feel like a large portion of my life has been stuck in the "just keep swimming" phenomenon in which I keep myself busy with things I should be doing in order to soothe myself from my emotional thoughts. There's no particular fiery passion in my life sometimes, just a slow hum of tasks being taken on and completed a couple at a time.
I still frequently think about the things I'd love to discuss and enjoy with my Dad. I see my friends with their parents, and I cannot deny that I am often a little jealous. Yet, in the end, I end up reminding myself that I was lucky enough to have a Dad for fifteen years. Gotta keep that perspective.
Strange that at the five year mark, I sometimes feel as if I am barely beginning to come to terms with the absence of my Dad. I sometimes feel like that my "closure" is more a self-conjured illusion of a coping mechanism rather than a true acceptance. Bear in mind, this is only sometimes.
I am loving. I am supportive. I am encouraging. I want the best for those who deserve it. I do not hesitate to offer assistance, commiseration, hope, and encouragement to those who are worthy. I love freely.
When someone is standing behind me when I am in tumultuous times and feeling weak, I make a point of taking my pessimistic negativity out of the equation as long as I am being supported. I feel like it is almost a requirement to be strong and offer up nothing but the best when someone is believing in me. Even though I may curse the heavens when I am facing an arduous task alone, if I have someone supporting me, I still put on my brave face until I believe it in the very core of my being. I feel like this is out of respect for those who believe in me. I refuse to let anyone down without going as far as humanly possible. I persevere. With someone believing in me, I never give up; at the worst, I will "do my absolute best and hope things go well."
I feel like this is what makes having supporters that much more powerful. Not only are they there for assistance and support, but I am also an inherently stronger person with their presence.
When I support someone and receive mounds of pessimism, I start gravitating away from them. When I offer moral support to someone (sometimes that is ALL I can do), I want his/her to make an effort. If the someone decides that my support is not worth it, then I will cease and offer it to a more grateful recipient and hope that someone grows the hell up.
It is perfectly okay to complain and whine in small, reasonable doses. It feels nice to wallow sometimes. I know. However, when I am receiving an unprecedented amount of negativity in response to my persistent support, my heart drops. I can feel my dissatisfaction rising up inside, urging me to share the reminder that most of our First World problems are NOTHING compared to the other things that happen all over the world.
In short: When someone believes in you, please offer nothing but your best effort. When someone believes in you, please do not make them feel like an idiot. When someone believes in you, please do not show them why they should NOT. Good things happen to good people, but so do awful things. We must keep in mind that this too shall pass.
-b.
PS: When someone offers me their support, I make sure I remember to thank them graciously.
"If you have time to whine and complain about something then you have the time to do something about it." - Anthony J. D'Angelo, The College Blue Book
Him: finished a whole bottle of champagne and a couple beers by himself and about to head out to party in Austin. Me: about to stop procrastinating and start studying for my orgo test on Monday. Reaction mechanisms: S1, S2, E1, E2, Stereochemistry.
I've gained about 6 pounds in the last 2 weeks of my bulking regimen. 6 pounds as a conservative estimate - I've gone from maybe 142 to 152 on the same scale. For the first time in my life, I now weigh above 150.
The only things I don't like about my current workout are that I only spend 3 days in the gym lifting and that because I am bulking, I have to eat a ridiculous amount of food and protein to keep up with the growth. Keeping at least 150 g of protein and 4000 calories a day takes more effort than expected. And because of this bulking, I am losing visibility in my abs.
I make up for the lack of abs in mass and bigger triceps than before. Oh, and an extra inch that I didn't notice I put on my calves. Progressively heavy low squats with good form every single workout explain that.
Progress pictures taken in the last couple days:
I've got a long way to go to get where I want to be, but I feel like it'll be worth it in the end.
I have heard from your violin professor Dr. Lee that you are interested in playing with the OU Symphony, and I hope this is so. I would very much like to have you begin attending rehearsals as soon as possible. Can you let me know if our rehearsal schedule (MWF 1:30-3:20 pm) works for you? Our season schedule is on our website for you to look over as well. If it looks like this will work, we do have a limited amount of stipend money for non-majors. Please let me know how this sounds as soon as you can.
Dr. JS Director of Orchestral Studies Artistic Director, ** Opera Theater ** School of Music
Pros: - More time playing violin, which I enjoy - More time being involved in the School of Music - $500 stipend. I could use that.
Cons: - I will have to eat lunch very quickly and run off to the music building 1/2 a mile away from my dorm with my violin three days a week, in what has lately been freezing cold weather. - No more mid-afternoon naps on MWF - Loss of studying/procrastinating time for ochem/Chinese - I am already a member of an unpaid university symphony program - I will have to perform at a bunch of concerts, meaning many of my nights that I may need for study time may be taken up performing.
Things look pretty even. What to do, what to do, to chase after the money or the flexible study hours... so far, the temptation of having more time to myself to study and pay attention to orgo is winning out.
There is always next season, I suppose.
-b.
Update:
In the end, I emailed back Dr. S and told him that I cannot participate this semester and explained my reasons. He ended up responding that he did not think that I should be in both either - one should be enough! We shall keep in touch and he is willing to take me onto the OU Symphony whenever I am able to.
"One of the painful things about our time is that those who feel certainty are stupid, and those with any imagination and understanding are filled with doubt and indecision."
- Bertrand Russell
and in the same vein,
"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge." - Charles Darwin
Copy/pasted off of the Wikipedia article for the Dunning-Kruger Effect, which deals with the illusory superiority bias and posits that the incompetent will usually overestimate their skills while not recognizing the genuine skill of others. A further study seems to show that East Asian students tend to underestimate their skills no matter what level of skill they have, which is somewhat understandable if one reconciles that with the points outlined in my Asian Mother response post.
All this does for me is provide more data with which to be insecure. Like many people, I believe the Dunning-Kruger Effect applies to not only specific skills, but also lifestyle choices as well. Supposedly, the illusory superiority bias will disappear or diminish with the improvement of skills, which makes sense since then the superiority will no longer be (completely) illusory. With improvement and progression, there is growth, which in turn leads to greater self awareness.
It seems to me that the only ways to avoid falling victim to the illusory superiority bias are to a) continuously strive to grow and learn and/or b) be an East Asian student.
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