Came across this randomly and had to share. The best line in the whole clip:
"Being realistic is the most commonly traveled road to mediocrity."
24 January 2010
23 January 2010
19 January 2010
15 January 2010
Part of home: part one
So I don't usually like sharing too many personal tidbits about myself on my blog (Thoughts, I share. Self, a little less), but this is something that had a big impact on me and I just wanted to put it out there because in this case, self trickled into thought.
My neighbor back home is now 72 years old. He and his wife have been an integral part of my childhood, whether they realize it or not. He is of French and Filipino descent, a Korean War vet, an ex-gangster from a time when zoot suits and chains meant something. His arms are crawling in tattoos, his graying hair in a ponytail he refuses to chop off, a pair of aviators are perpetually balanced on his nose -- the only way he can keep people from staring at the lazy eye he has from shrapnel gone awry.
He was my art teacher.
For more than 10 years, I lived next door to him and spent a good number of Fridays in his garage with a group of about seven other kids, painting. We first learned to paint simple sketches, patterns that he'd drawn for us -- a flower in a vase, a house and trees, a bowl of fruit. Basics. We learned how to blend and fade, add shadows and creases to make the paintings look real. Then we'd graduate to more difficult subjects: animals, a skyline, people. Faces.
We weren't allowed to take shortcuts, ever. I learned how to stretch expensive watercolor paper (made of the best French rags) across canvases, soaked for hours in water to loosen, smoothed against corkboard to set, left out in the sun to dry. I learned that taking the time to sketch and not just trace made the end product more worthwhile, the creation more your own.
And I learned that with watercolor, you can never completely paint over your past mistakes -- done correctly, you can see every layer of a finished product, and that's what makes the medium so unique.
The last piece I did in collaboration with my neighbor (he lent me his study, so I could keep the project a secret) was a painting I did from a wedding photo for my parents' 30th anniversary. It took weeks and months but is still one of the best things that I've ever been able to produce to date (or so I'd like to think!).
Because you know your parents, he said. Because you know them, you can capture their essence.
I visited him when I went home for the holidays this time around, and we've emailed a few times since. He's working on a book, an autobiography, because he's had such a rich and complex life. And because he's dyslexic, he uses a program that allows him to dictate and have the computer type for him. This is what he last wrote:
My neighbor back home is now 72 years old. He and his wife have been an integral part of my childhood, whether they realize it or not. He is of French and Filipino descent, a Korean War vet, an ex-gangster from a time when zoot suits and chains meant something. His arms are crawling in tattoos, his graying hair in a ponytail he refuses to chop off, a pair of aviators are perpetually balanced on his nose -- the only way he can keep people from staring at the lazy eye he has from shrapnel gone awry.
He was my art teacher.
For more than 10 years, I lived next door to him and spent a good number of Fridays in his garage with a group of about seven other kids, painting. We first learned to paint simple sketches, patterns that he'd drawn for us -- a flower in a vase, a house and trees, a bowl of fruit. Basics. We learned how to blend and fade, add shadows and creases to make the paintings look real. Then we'd graduate to more difficult subjects: animals, a skyline, people. Faces.
We weren't allowed to take shortcuts, ever. I learned how to stretch expensive watercolor paper (made of the best French rags) across canvases, soaked for hours in water to loosen, smoothed against corkboard to set, left out in the sun to dry. I learned that taking the time to sketch and not just trace made the end product more worthwhile, the creation more your own.
And I learned that with watercolor, you can never completely paint over your past mistakes -- done correctly, you can see every layer of a finished product, and that's what makes the medium so unique.
The last piece I did in collaboration with my neighbor (he lent me his study, so I could keep the project a secret) was a painting I did from a wedding photo for my parents' 30th anniversary. It took weeks and months but is still one of the best things that I've ever been able to produce to date (or so I'd like to think!).
Because you know your parents, he said. Because you know them, you can capture their essence.
I visited him when I went home for the holidays this time around, and we've emailed a few times since. He's working on a book, an autobiography, because he's had such a rich and complex life. And because he's dyslexic, he uses a program that allows him to dictate and have the computer type for him. This is what he last wrote:
Joyce,
Good to hear from you I really enjoy our little talk I said to myself is this the little shy girl who wouldn't talk? It took you years before you would communicate with me and now you are a young lady who really wants to communicate with the world. You are in New York City where everyone really wants to go because it offeres so much to so many for so long that anyone who is anyone has to go to their because it becomes a Mecca for people to gather who wants to gain knowledge from the past,pres. And future and a young person so eager to learn shows that you gave great thought to expose yourself to this opportunity. (Smart girl)
It has taken me a while to answer your mail because we had emergency. My son who works in San Francisco but family lives in Ventura had to have emergency surgery but when he would came out for rehabilitation no one would be in San Francisco to care for him. So we had to get him home to have surgery in Los Angeles. His heart valve was deteriorating and had calcium buildup around the valve was causing malfunction he belong to Kaiser hospital in San Francisco was one of the best in California and the other hospital that's good for heart surgery is kaiser in Los Angeles so we were confident that the best thing to do was to move him home. He had his surgery Thursday and came through it okay we are having family constant visitations to make sure that he's cared for properly.Dot and I went to see him yesterday since I don't drive anymore and Dot is recovery from surgery I had Trina take us to visit him we were so happy to see him sitting up with a smile on its face.
It is so important to keep in touch with people and things that are part of your life who understand who you are and what life means to you . When I thought the possibility of losing one of my loved ones I could hardly stand it, don't neglect to express every chance you get how much your loved ones mean to you let them know that you care and( don't just think it) let them hear it.
As you grow in New York at a level that's beyond most of your friends comprehension you will be exposed to a series of life steps that you must climb and no matter what happens you must continue or you will not reach the few moments of satisfaction and contentment that life offers to so few.
I don't know how to send my paperwork to you other than e-mail a sheet at a time I will try to find a better way and as I've been reading my papers there are a few things I would like to change so bear with me I have to do some adjusting.
Tony
14 January 2010
13 January 2010
Why she writes
So. I don't even remember how or why I came across this, but I somehow ended up enraptured by this Joan Didion piece titled "Why I Write" while at work today. I've read bits of it before, but never the piece in its entirety.
I've been thinking a lot lately about WHY I want to pursue journalism (especially in this financial, and let's face it, social, climate), because my answer used to be pretty basic. Because I love to meet new people, and I love to write. I feel more comfortable expressing myself through writing than speaking. I'm not a math whiz, and my desire to have a standard 9-5 is negligible at best.
But those aren't good enough reasons, really. I'm still trying to figure out a more solid answer, but until then, these are the bits that really gave me pause:
"During the years when I was an undergraduate at Berkeley I tried, with a kind of hopeless late-adolescent energy, to buy some temporary visa into the world of ideas, to forge for myself a mind that could deal with the abstract. In short I tried to think. I failed. My attention veered inexorably back to the specific, to the tangible, to what was generally considered, by everyone I knew then and for that matter have known since, the peripheral."
"I write entirely to find out what I'm thinking, what I'm looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want to what I fear."
"Grammar is a piano I play by ear, since I seem to have been out of school the year the rules were mentioned. All i know of grammar is its infinite power. To shift the structure of a sentence alters the meaning of that sentence, as definitely and inflexibly as the position of a camera alters the meaning ofthe object being photographed. Many people know about camera angles now, but not so many know about sentences. The arrangement of words matters, and the arrangement you want can be found in the picture in your mind. The picture dictates the arrangement. The picture dictates whether this will be a sentence with or without clauses, a sentence that ends hard or a dying-fall sentence, long or short, active or passive. The picture tells you how to arrange words and the arrangement of the words tells you, or tells me, what's going on in the picture Nota bene:
It tells you.
You don't tell it."
"Who was this narrator? Why was this narrator telling me this story? Let me tell you one thing about why writers write: had I known the answer to any of these questions I would never have needed to write a novel."
I've been thinking a lot lately about WHY I want to pursue journalism (especially in this financial, and let's face it, social, climate), because my answer used to be pretty basic. Because I love to meet new people, and I love to write. I feel more comfortable expressing myself through writing than speaking. I'm not a math whiz, and my desire to have a standard 9-5 is negligible at best.
But those aren't good enough reasons, really. I'm still trying to figure out a more solid answer, but until then, these are the bits that really gave me pause:
"During the years when I was an undergraduate at Berkeley I tried, with a kind of hopeless late-adolescent energy, to buy some temporary visa into the world of ideas, to forge for myself a mind that could deal with the abstract. In short I tried to think. I failed. My attention veered inexorably back to the specific, to the tangible, to what was generally considered, by everyone I knew then and for that matter have known since, the peripheral."
"I write entirely to find out what I'm thinking, what I'm looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want to what I fear."
"Grammar is a piano I play by ear, since I seem to have been out of school the year the rules were mentioned. All i know of grammar is its infinite power. To shift the structure of a sentence alters the meaning of that sentence, as definitely and inflexibly as the position of a camera alters the meaning ofthe object being photographed. Many people know about camera angles now, but not so many know about sentences. The arrangement of words matters, and the arrangement you want can be found in the picture in your mind. The picture dictates the arrangement. The picture dictates whether this will be a sentence with or without clauses, a sentence that ends hard or a dying-fall sentence, long or short, active or passive. The picture tells you how to arrange words and the arrangement of the words tells you, or tells me, what's going on in the picture Nota bene:
It tells you.
You don't tell it."
"Who was this narrator? Why was this narrator telling me this story? Let me tell you one thing about why writers write: had I known the answer to any of these questions I would never have needed to write a novel."
10 January 2010
Educational assessment
What is the value of education? Of universities and schooling and this abstract concept we like to term "higher education"? Several things have been happening recently that have me thinking about education and WHY it (dumb assertion, I know) really does impact everything you do later on in life.
The obvious answers are there - school teaches you a skill set, the building blocks with which to construct a career and hopefully, a life. Basic math, writing, vocabulary, reading comprehension - SATs and GREs would have you think that these are the things that guarantee success or job placement down the line. But what about those brain teasers, the logic puzzles and different games that we used to play in grade school, the ones that actually taught us more about creativity and problem solving?
I know that with the way the economy and the job market is now, the higher-ups are looking for ways to restructure the education system to better prepare students for the challenges of the real world. And likewise, students are turning toward more practical means of existence; better to sacrifice a dream now in favor of some stability and monetary compensation for the future. This is practical. This is the kind of mentality that will help graduating young adults grasp a more tangible reward for their years of schooling.
But call me impractical, but I think this is the kind of mentality that will hurt us in the long run.
I read an article in the New York Times that mentioned a change in curriculum at several universities, including the elimination of philosophy as a major because it lacks "practicality." My thoughts when I read this were varied - yes, "practially" speaking, it doesn't make sense to major in something that won't yield an immediate skill set.
But if you don't have those courses to learn to THINK and only learn how to do "practical" things, then you wouldn't ever question and invent and see the world in a different light, and then where would humanity as a whole be?
Kant? Utilitarianism? Will these words cease to have any meaning? Social engineering will become a kind of trade. Artists will create for a cause or a cost, but not just for the sake of creating. Writers will be funneled into law schools and textbooks, and psychology will give way to psychiatry. Meds over meditation. Hollow substances over concrete thought.
And then how will decisions be made? This all sounds a little too oddly Giver-like. Kids set into certain jobs early on, learning how to perform a duty in society, taught NOT to think outside the box except for a designated Giver...an elimination of feelings and color and difference. Smooth operations oiled by cooperation and standards of living.
If we don't think for ourselves, we cease to exist. We might have money in the bank, but we'll have lost purpose and drive. When we work for others, we'll not have the capacity to question the why or the how; we'll be too focused on the what.
The value of education is that it provides a solid foundation for creativity. We learn the rules to break them, know the fundamentals to build upon them. Looking back at college, I know for a fact that the classes I got the most out of inspired me to think in ways I wouldn't have thought to think (tongue twister) otherwise. Skills, I can adopt as I go. But thoughts and questions, I need to develop at the get-go.
Classrooms are only vessles, after all. It's what's in them, in the minds within them, that count.
The obvious answers are there - school teaches you a skill set, the building blocks with which to construct a career and hopefully, a life. Basic math, writing, vocabulary, reading comprehension - SATs and GREs would have you think that these are the things that guarantee success or job placement down the line. But what about those brain teasers, the logic puzzles and different games that we used to play in grade school, the ones that actually taught us more about creativity and problem solving?
I know that with the way the economy and the job market is now, the higher-ups are looking for ways to restructure the education system to better prepare students for the challenges of the real world. And likewise, students are turning toward more practical means of existence; better to sacrifice a dream now in favor of some stability and monetary compensation for the future. This is practical. This is the kind of mentality that will help graduating young adults grasp a more tangible reward for their years of schooling.
But call me impractical, but I think this is the kind of mentality that will hurt us in the long run.
I read an article in the New York Times that mentioned a change in curriculum at several universities, including the elimination of philosophy as a major because it lacks "practicality." My thoughts when I read this were varied - yes, "practially" speaking, it doesn't make sense to major in something that won't yield an immediate skill set.
But if you don't have those courses to learn to THINK and only learn how to do "practical" things, then you wouldn't ever question and invent and see the world in a different light, and then where would humanity as a whole be?
Kant? Utilitarianism? Will these words cease to have any meaning? Social engineering will become a kind of trade. Artists will create for a cause or a cost, but not just for the sake of creating. Writers will be funneled into law schools and textbooks, and psychology will give way to psychiatry. Meds over meditation. Hollow substances over concrete thought.
And then how will decisions be made? This all sounds a little too oddly Giver-like. Kids set into certain jobs early on, learning how to perform a duty in society, taught NOT to think outside the box except for a designated Giver...an elimination of feelings and color and difference. Smooth operations oiled by cooperation and standards of living.
If we don't think for ourselves, we cease to exist. We might have money in the bank, but we'll have lost purpose and drive. When we work for others, we'll not have the capacity to question the why or the how; we'll be too focused on the what.
The value of education is that it provides a solid foundation for creativity. We learn the rules to break them, know the fundamentals to build upon them. Looking back at college, I know for a fact that the classes I got the most out of inspired me to think in ways I wouldn't have thought to think (tongue twister) otherwise. Skills, I can adopt as I go. But thoughts and questions, I need to develop at the get-go.
Classrooms are only vessles, after all. It's what's in them, in the minds within them, that count.
In the Heights
Just saw In The Heights yesterday and it has by far the best soundtrack, best performances, best storyline...ever. Okay, well that I've heard in a while. Check it:
07 January 2010
Who will comfort me
Amazing voice, even more amazing personal story. Melody Gardot fell into music after being struck by a car at 19 - she turned to music therapy as a way to cope with her recovery, and this voice is just...haunting. Part jazz, part soul. All spirit.
06 January 2010
A purpose-driven life
There's a reason why we're not born colorblind. Life in black and white, and even shades of grey, would be undoubtedly dull. And yet, why is it that so many elements in our lives seem to be defined by just this - a lack of color, a seemingly resigned sense of dull monotony? Where's the vibrancy, the pop of hue that makes each day worth waking up to?
New York City is known for its corporate culture. Reading the paper on the subway, staring at a screen all day, eating nondescript sandwiches for lunch, vegging out on the subway ride home and passively watching TV before falling asleep to do it all over again. Not exactly the most impressive showcase of the romanticized City so many non-New Yorkers aspire toward, the one wherein each day is fresh and inspiring and different. It's easy to fall into the daily grind of working just to live, to make money, to save up, to be practical.
But I read a few of the "Most Emailed" headlines on the New York Times website today, and that got me thinking. The articles that have been circulated and shared the most are about retirement, old age, mental health and career changes. Clearly, there is a trend. People spend many of their waking hours worrying about their careers (how to get one, if they don't have one; or how to get out of one, if they do have one), thereby literally worrying themselves sick. Stress leads to a weakened immune system (and probably sleepless nights and accompanying pills), which leads to illness and disease and other stress-triggered problems.
This concern over what to do with life, how to apply our skills, never ends. That is, until it really does end, when we retire. At that point, according to the NYT headlines, we start to worry ourselves over what to do with all this free time now that we've just gotten into the groove of work-life balance. How will I while my time away, stuck in the house with a spouse, having been too busy during my work years to cultivate my interests and no longer young enough to enjoy some of the activies I used to? It's a legitimate concern.
It seems as though once one phase of life ends - the bustling 20s, the strategic 30s, the settling 40s, the midlife 50s and the retiring 60s - another begins; there is no overlap. Black. And. White. And a great portion of each phase is spent worrying about the next phase. Hence the monotomy for some semblance of "living in the present" while really panicking over the future and mulling over the past.
A few weeks back, I spoke with Jason Reitman, the director for Up in the Air. He was telling me about the inspiration behind the film, which follows Clooney's character around the country as he detachedly "eases" recently laid off employees into the "rebirth" process of job hunting. He told me that he went into the film with one goal in mind: to convey the importance of purpose by showing a general lack of it in the screenplay.
"My biggest fear isn't waking up one day and having no money," he said. "My biggest fear is waking up one day and having no purpose."
Because where's the motivation then? If you don't genuinely do the things you love, then life will fly by pretty quickly and if something comes a-trotting into your straight-and-narrow, black-and-white path, you'll be completely sidelined. You'll have a map and a place to go, but no reason to travel anywhere. And then you're really lost.
You. Are. Here.
And then you color outside the lines.
New York City is known for its corporate culture. Reading the paper on the subway, staring at a screen all day, eating nondescript sandwiches for lunch, vegging out on the subway ride home and passively watching TV before falling asleep to do it all over again. Not exactly the most impressive showcase of the romanticized City so many non-New Yorkers aspire toward, the one wherein each day is fresh and inspiring and different. It's easy to fall into the daily grind of working just to live, to make money, to save up, to be practical.
But I read a few of the "Most Emailed" headlines on the New York Times website today, and that got me thinking. The articles that have been circulated and shared the most are about retirement, old age, mental health and career changes. Clearly, there is a trend. People spend many of their waking hours worrying about their careers (how to get one, if they don't have one; or how to get out of one, if they do have one), thereby literally worrying themselves sick. Stress leads to a weakened immune system (and probably sleepless nights and accompanying pills), which leads to illness and disease and other stress-triggered problems.
This concern over what to do with life, how to apply our skills, never ends. That is, until it really does end, when we retire. At that point, according to the NYT headlines, we start to worry ourselves over what to do with all this free time now that we've just gotten into the groove of work-life balance. How will I while my time away, stuck in the house with a spouse, having been too busy during my work years to cultivate my interests and no longer young enough to enjoy some of the activies I used to? It's a legitimate concern.
It seems as though once one phase of life ends - the bustling 20s, the strategic 30s, the settling 40s, the midlife 50s and the retiring 60s - another begins; there is no overlap. Black. And. White. And a great portion of each phase is spent worrying about the next phase. Hence the monotomy for some semblance of "living in the present" while really panicking over the future and mulling over the past.
A few weeks back, I spoke with Jason Reitman, the director for Up in the Air. He was telling me about the inspiration behind the film, which follows Clooney's character around the country as he detachedly "eases" recently laid off employees into the "rebirth" process of job hunting. He told me that he went into the film with one goal in mind: to convey the importance of purpose by showing a general lack of it in the screenplay.
"My biggest fear isn't waking up one day and having no money," he said. "My biggest fear is waking up one day and having no purpose."
Because where's the motivation then? If you don't genuinely do the things you love, then life will fly by pretty quickly and if something comes a-trotting into your straight-and-narrow, black-and-white path, you'll be completely sidelined. You'll have a map and a place to go, but no reason to travel anywhere. And then you're really lost.
You. Are. Here.
And then you color outside the lines.
05 January 2010
03 January 2010
New. Year. Thoughts.
Time for the all-encompassing, reflective blog entry that speaks of lessons learned, progress made, goals reassessed in my time at home over these past two weeks. To a large extent, I was hit with a lot of things at once - returning to L.A. for the first time in six months (nay, almost 6.5?), going home for the holidays, ringing in a new year (and decade) and ultimately, figuring out what type of relationships I was establishing with my loved ones now that I have the experience of this tricky thing called "distance."
This wasn't quite the same as London, simply because that had a timeline, an impending deadline so that it was permissible for me to fall out of contact or let things ride out their course overseas because I would be back in the States in a countable number of days.
But because I've now moved to New York and made this my primary residence, I can't rightly just assume that it's okay to let relationships fall through. I realized this break just how terrible I am at keeping in touch with people - and that it's inconsiderate on my part to just hope that other people will make an effort to touch base.
Being busy isn't an excuse, and my not getting back to emails, calls and texts asap translates as exactly that: an excuse. Not only do I need to organize my life - I need to maintain it. I let so much maintenance of my living fall to the wayside in favor of just getting by day-to-day. This is the easier route. And I know that nothing that's worth it is ever easy, so why not act accordingly?
Something else I've rememberd over break (thank you, psych classes...):
In the short-run, people regret the things they've done.
In the long-run, people forget about the stupid things they've done and regret the things they haven't done.
The reasoning makes sense - you realize in retrospect that you learn from dumb mistakes. You move on and endure the consequences. But when you don't do something, you'll only learn one lesson, which is that if an opportunity arises next time, you grab it. You'll always wonder "What if?" otherwise, and that's just exhausting.
Being home really affirmed how blessed I am, to be in NYC doing what I love at such a young age (yes, I'll still call it young...); I really can't live life with excuses. Now is the time to hustle, to learn to live life through the ups and downs and really explore all your options. The 20s is the time for roadtrips, heartbreaks, marathons, new jobs, bad jobs, too many commitments, no commitments, solitude, too many people, new ventures. Settling into your life - well, you can always do that later.
This isn't to say that life needs to be lived recklessly, but there are definitely things that you can get away with when you're younger. Like dreaming. Life is short. One of my mom's dear high school friends passed away just a week ago from a 15+ year battle with cancer. She was just past 50. A month ago, my great-aunt passed away after five years of being extremely sick. She was 80. A family friend recently had three heart attacks and died suddenly on Christmas Eve. He was in his 40s. Not to be morbid, but life. is. short.
And they all lived good lives, but I wonder about the different phases that they've each experienced in life, the multiple lives they've touched, the tasks they've left unfinished. At the end of the day, isn't quality of life most important, since quantity is never guaranteed?
Life never has to get stagnant. It can, of course, all too easily, but it doesn't have to. The system. Comfort. Security. These are the things we're always taught to abide by. Living a life by a certain structure - people who deviate don't exactly fall into the categories of success we have set before us. Some rare few make the crossover, blazing their own trail and accumulating a following enough so that they end up leading the pack.
But these are the exceptions. Because while schooling teaches us to think independently, creatively (well, depending on what field you were schooled in), it also focuses on teaching us about guidelines.
Organized chaos.
Writing with lines. Art inside a structure. Jobs that follow a preset path. And while I know it would be naive of me to lambast these standards and call them foolish - that would be ignorant, for that kind of structure and system lets society function properly - while I realize this, I also know that the reason why fantasy and rebels and criminals and celebrities fascinate us so much is because they have so much abandon.
Artists, musicians, risk-takers, they live the life that we all want. They have the kind of freedom I'm sure most of us simultaneously envy and fear. But why does there have to be a separate them and us? Why can't we live these lives? Take the best of the worlds that we know and really have a hand in shaping our existence?
I like labels. On food condiments, hair products, items that I purchase. Mostly becuase this gives me a way to judge the standards of the product and item. I know a brand like Sara Lee will have quality bread. I know the store-brand bread might be just as good but will cost me less. I know about brand loyalty.
But I also know that if you remove all labels and preconceptions, these items can taste identical. So why not apply this to people? Why not stop trying to fit the mold of what it means to be an engineer, a law student, a journalist, a guy, a girl? Why not try to create an identity and avoid the labels altogether? It's scary because there are no means of comparison that way; no means, that is, except to yourself. But sometimes this is the best way.
By doing something so dramatic, you're willingly isolating yourself so you can self-examine, have no one to live up to, no expectations to meet but your own. This is what New York has done for me. It's stripped me of my labels, allowed me to figure out my own constitution, my strengths and weaknesses and how to deal with them.
Going home this holiday season showed me that life is too short and too precious to wait on the sidelines, to keep a distance between them and us. I can honestly say that I'm growing and changing every day that I write more, read more, talk more, observe more. And tradition and structure are great and all - you can't break the rules until you know them - but they're not the only way to form your existence.
Life is for living, and part of the game is figuring out on whose terms you're playing.
This wasn't quite the same as London, simply because that had a timeline, an impending deadline so that it was permissible for me to fall out of contact or let things ride out their course overseas because I would be back in the States in a countable number of days.
But because I've now moved to New York and made this my primary residence, I can't rightly just assume that it's okay to let relationships fall through. I realized this break just how terrible I am at keeping in touch with people - and that it's inconsiderate on my part to just hope that other people will make an effort to touch base.
Being busy isn't an excuse, and my not getting back to emails, calls and texts asap translates as exactly that: an excuse. Not only do I need to organize my life - I need to maintain it. I let so much maintenance of my living fall to the wayside in favor of just getting by day-to-day. This is the easier route. And I know that nothing that's worth it is ever easy, so why not act accordingly?
Something else I've rememberd over break (thank you, psych classes...):
In the short-run, people regret the things they've done.
In the long-run, people forget about the stupid things they've done and regret the things they haven't done.
The reasoning makes sense - you realize in retrospect that you learn from dumb mistakes. You move on and endure the consequences. But when you don't do something, you'll only learn one lesson, which is that if an opportunity arises next time, you grab it. You'll always wonder "What if?" otherwise, and that's just exhausting.
Being home really affirmed how blessed I am, to be in NYC doing what I love at such a young age (yes, I'll still call it young...); I really can't live life with excuses. Now is the time to hustle, to learn to live life through the ups and downs and really explore all your options. The 20s is the time for roadtrips, heartbreaks, marathons, new jobs, bad jobs, too many commitments, no commitments, solitude, too many people, new ventures. Settling into your life - well, you can always do that later.
This isn't to say that life needs to be lived recklessly, but there are definitely things that you can get away with when you're younger. Like dreaming. Life is short. One of my mom's dear high school friends passed away just a week ago from a 15+ year battle with cancer. She was just past 50. A month ago, my great-aunt passed away after five years of being extremely sick. She was 80. A family friend recently had three heart attacks and died suddenly on Christmas Eve. He was in his 40s. Not to be morbid, but life. is. short.
And they all lived good lives, but I wonder about the different phases that they've each experienced in life, the multiple lives they've touched, the tasks they've left unfinished. At the end of the day, isn't quality of life most important, since quantity is never guaranteed?
Life never has to get stagnant. It can, of course, all too easily, but it doesn't have to. The system. Comfort. Security. These are the things we're always taught to abide by. Living a life by a certain structure - people who deviate don't exactly fall into the categories of success we have set before us. Some rare few make the crossover, blazing their own trail and accumulating a following enough so that they end up leading the pack.
But these are the exceptions. Because while schooling teaches us to think independently, creatively (well, depending on what field you were schooled in), it also focuses on teaching us about guidelines.
Organized chaos.
Writing with lines. Art inside a structure. Jobs that follow a preset path. And while I know it would be naive of me to lambast these standards and call them foolish - that would be ignorant, for that kind of structure and system lets society function properly - while I realize this, I also know that the reason why fantasy and rebels and criminals and celebrities fascinate us so much is because they have so much abandon.
Artists, musicians, risk-takers, they live the life that we all want. They have the kind of freedom I'm sure most of us simultaneously envy and fear. But why does there have to be a separate them and us? Why can't we live these lives? Take the best of the worlds that we know and really have a hand in shaping our existence?
I like labels. On food condiments, hair products, items that I purchase. Mostly becuase this gives me a way to judge the standards of the product and item. I know a brand like Sara Lee will have quality bread. I know the store-brand bread might be just as good but will cost me less. I know about brand loyalty.
But I also know that if you remove all labels and preconceptions, these items can taste identical. So why not apply this to people? Why not stop trying to fit the mold of what it means to be an engineer, a law student, a journalist, a guy, a girl? Why not try to create an identity and avoid the labels altogether? It's scary because there are no means of comparison that way; no means, that is, except to yourself. But sometimes this is the best way.
By doing something so dramatic, you're willingly isolating yourself so you can self-examine, have no one to live up to, no expectations to meet but your own. This is what New York has done for me. It's stripped me of my labels, allowed me to figure out my own constitution, my strengths and weaknesses and how to deal with them.
Going home this holiday season showed me that life is too short and too precious to wait on the sidelines, to keep a distance between them and us. I can honestly say that I'm growing and changing every day that I write more, read more, talk more, observe more. And tradition and structure are great and all - you can't break the rules until you know them - but they're not the only way to form your existence.
Life is for living, and part of the game is figuring out on whose terms you're playing.
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