Tag Archives: sense

Self Improvement’s Guise

Posted on by
1

If you’ve been reading this blog, chances are that you know I’m all about self improvement. I’d like to take a moment to make what I think is an important distinction, which I don’t think is always clear.

By being an advocate of self-improvement, I’m not saying that the Celes of yesterday was so flawed that a new me is needed. There seems to be the theme among people who are into self improvement that you need to hate yourself to want to be better. I don’t think improvement works well this way, nor do I think that improvement is about being better each day, every day.

I try to improve myself and my life, but I do so with knowing I will never reach level 1000. Life if not like some games where you’re gaining all these experience points and leveling up and leveling up until you’re at level 1000+ by the time I’m seventy-eight years old. As much as I wish it were, life just isn’t like that, my friends. Everyone whose self improvement is a linear picture of reaching perfection will be sadly disappointed in the end.

We as people, and life itself, go in cycles. You can’t always be happy or healthy. The best you can do is try to extend the times you are and minimize the times you aren’t. If anything, learning to deal with the times when things are bad in the best way possible is self improvement. To try to reach a state where you never trip, never falter, and never stray from the best of the best is not only an impossible goal, it’s a step backwards. To improve you first have to realize that you’re not horrible the way you are now, you’re never going to suddenly morph into that butterfly or swan or whatever, and you’re going to make terrible mistakes and have horrible things happen to you on your journey.

You are you, with your own faults and particular qualities. To pledge to make slight changes is one thing, but to act like some day a Honda Civic is going to become a Hummer is delusional and sad (about as sad as that metaphor).

Today is as important as tomorrow, and as much as you should be working towards something, you need to realize, accept, and live in the moment of who you are today as well. Do it because there may not be tomorrow. Do it because to really improve you have to love and accept who you are now. Do it because tomorrow, whether or not you like it, you will still be you no matter what you tell yourself. Do it because even if right now sucks, it is part of you and your story, and only you can do something with it that makes it worth having happened.

I know some things about myself, others I’m sure I’m still learning. By knowing I am a certain way, I can embrace and express that in ways that I am increasingly more comfortable with. Faults are not always faults, and finer qualities not always so fine. To focus on ‘changing the bad things about yourself’ is to place a black and white value on a part of who you are and either try to cut it out or replace it like some kind of Frankenstein graft. To see both sides to a coin is to admit the world is flat on only has two sides. Consider the many sides to the tetrahedron, or other polyhedrons that are the building blocks of life, and try to find how each piece can fit together.

I try to be realistic. Combine slight tweaks with strategies and meet yourself somewhere in the middle before you fall off the edge. If you hate who you are now and set an impossible goal for tomorrow, you will fail in the worst way. Don’t kid yourself into thinking you’re not who you were, because you will always be some version of yourself. Accept it as everything you were has made you today, and will make you every day after until the end of this life. All things shape us, the best we can do is try to take some control over how they do and accept the things we cannot so we can move past them.

Acceptance is the biggest piece to the puzzle I think most people miss. You have to accept yourself, your life, and the general way of life, that it is not a perfect pearl or even an oyster, before you can move on.

And move on to what? What do you really want? Figuring is as much part of the journey and figuring out how to get it.

I want to be better than yesterday may seem like a the daily goal to strive for, but in the long term it makes little sense as it is a generalization, a judgment on the unquantifiable, and an impossibility.

More than self improvement, I think of this as learning to live by living. This involves thinking and introspection as much as it involves getting out there, taking chances, and doing.

Just Being – Stillness & Motion

Posted on by
27

Lufia 2: Swell of humanity
This post’s screen shot is from Lufia 2 (SNES). I’m sure there was an elegantly put metaphor in Japanese, but there is no such luck here.

Do you ever get a sense that nothing you ever do is the result of purely what you want to do for yourself? Even if you think you’re doing something for yourself, it is always weighed down by its relationship to other people. The things we do are controlled by a set of standards that are not exclusively our own. Ideas of ‘normalcy’ and ‘supposed to’ are so second nature, we don’t even consider them as we fall into line.

Part of the normalcy we need to feel is useful. The idea of being useful is pretty ambiguous, but it seems like most of our existence is based on it. It’s a constant pressure and motivator. I once wrote that I should ‘be content with being the being who strives’, but what about being content with just plain being oneself and nothing else?

I don’t think I’ll ever be content to be still. Stillness becomes guilt at not being busy, which is not stillness at all. Being busy doesn’t even mean actually doing anything truly important, it means being in a constant state of doing or even active procrastination. Relevance is secondary to making sure you’re active. Being in motion, even if you’re not getting any important done, becomes more important and valuable that being still. But, it isn’t.

For one’s own health and well being- and to have the ability to accomplish really important things- one must have periods of stillness, self, and relaxation. The mind needs a break to reflect and remember what is important and real in the largest scope possible. I’m not talking about some “in 5 years where do you see yourself’ question, but reflecting upon the question of why existing itself is important and necessary. I’ve never had a complete answer to that and probably never will, but each time I think I further understand a piece of that why, life becomes better, easier, and stronger in its vibrancy.

Being. Actually being, with a real identity and purpose, is far more important than being busy.

It can be very hard to force oneself to be still.

Inhibition & Identity

Posted on by
2

All of our actions go through a personal filter. Thinking and doing are separate things. When these things approach being the same, what happens to us?

 
NYC New Years
Many of us just went through this New Years Eve. People traditionally gather on this evening for the sole intent of getting totally wasted in company just because ‘Why the heck not? I don’t have to work tomorrow, and neither do you!” Most of my peers are somewhat ‘used to’ getting drunk. The have a certain drunk identity that has been integrated into their view of themselves (or not if they like the ‘I was drunk’ excuse for every time they’re a bit tipsy). For someone like me that has lived most of their life without alcohol at all, and has a natural tolerance to not get drunk even when drinking, I wonder who the hell I was the night before. People are comfortable doing things they wouldn’t normally do and knowing they likely will do them. People are used to saying, “Oh, he’s normally a great guy. He’s just like that when he’s drunk.” I can’t pass the buck so easily.

 

I was so drunk that my vision was blurred, and I still spent most of the night with someone who is ‘my type’ while beating off a total asshole who happened to be married. So, my judgment wasn’t excessively off. How was I different?

 

I was even more bluntly crass- saying what I thought when I thought it. Little surprise there.

 

I did a few things that ‘seemed like a good idea’ and ‘made sense to me at the time’ that on further thought, may have only made sense to me. For example, if you want to counter someone’s statement that “rape is funny”, you disagree. If you then ironically grab his ass- you may think it makes a point and is great comedic timing. However, if the guy is someone to say “rape is funny” chances are, he’s not going to get it. It seemed like a good idea at the time.

 

I enjoyed dancing. The only dancing I normally enjoy is moshing or, when I used to act, musical numbers. That night, though, I danced more than I did in all of 2007. I struck an impressive figure, taring up the floor to bass beats. And if that’s not true, I’m sure people don’t remember clearly enough to contradict me.

 

I took chances. Saying whatever I want is a chance I’m used to taking. I’m not used to taking chances with trusting people I haven’t known for very long. I’ve never gone to a party at someone’s house I don’t know. I’ve never decided it was a good idea to stay there after all the people I knew well were gone. The list goes on into the night.

 

So I’m left to wonder, since these were things I never would have done without drinking, was that me?

 

The best answer I can come up with is: that is defiantly part of who I am. It was me minus certain inhibitions. It was not someone else minus those inhibitions. Underneath it all, I am the type of person to rip up the dance floor, I am the type of person to say no and slam a sliding door in an asshole’s face if they don’t seem to get it, and I am the type of person that will trust people when they’ve given me no reason not to trust them, even if they haven’t had long to give those reasons. Even if I don’t normally do these things, I at least want to on some level.

 

So what do I say to “Oh, normally he’s a great guy. He’s just like that when he’s drunk?”. I say, underneath it all, he’s really like that. The rest of the time, he’s probably just thinking or wishing those things. While they’re not the same thing, it shows you what they would do if they didn’t spend the additional moment to think. We all have that person underneath. That person for me is a good dancer, even if she’s more likely to get into sketchy situations. I’m okay hanging out that person every once in a great awhile.

 

So what about your lack of inhibition identity? Do you like hanging out with them? Do you make excuses for them? How do they measure up to your sober selves?

 

Happy New Year, everyone! I hope you’ve all recovered by now.