Ozymandias

As part of the Romanticism unit, we've been reading poetry in my English class. The poem that stuck with me the most was Ozymandias by Percy Byshee Shelley. My father recited parts of it to me when I was little and again when I was reading The Watchmen. Reading it in English class brought me the same chills it had in the past.

I was so profoundly impacted by this poem, that I felt the desire to memorize it. I haven't memorized much poetry outside of when it's required in English class, but when the thought came into my head, I realized that I wanted to start memorizing more poetry. Coincidentally, I was reading Cultural Amnesia when the discussion of Gianfranco Contini talked about the benefits of memorizing poetry. Synchronism perhaps?

 There is an Italian word for the mental bank account you acquire by memorizing poetry known as gazofilacio. This word doesn't even exist in English. It makes me wonder about words that only exist in other languages that describe abstract phenomena. But I'll leave that to another post.

I figured that it would be fun to try and experience gazofilacio. Also, I thought that reciting poetry will help me socialize in parties when I no longer have anything to talk about.

So I type this from memory, hoping that it is correct.

Ozymandias by Percy Byshee Shelley

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said, "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert...near them, on the
sand, half sunk a shattered visage lies
Whose frown, and wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things
The hands that mocked them, and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal these words appear:
'My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair.'
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away."

Amazingly, the only errors I made were in the paragraphs. This is the true poem. The punctuation symbols may be different, because I memorized my poem from The Poetry Foundation, while I am copying this from Wikipedia.

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed:
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

A once mighty king, destroyed by time and nature. Our inevitable fate as human beings.

I hope to memorize more poetry in the future, but first I must learn more poets and poems that I like.

A Compendium of Ideas

In the past few weeks, I've finished Emma by Jane Austen and Of Love and Other Demons by Gabriel García Marquez. I've started reading Cultural Amnesia by Clive James, Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë and Frankenstein by Mary Shelly. And I greatly enjoy all of these books.

Lately, I have found a propensity for both European and Latin American literature. One reason for this is because I like the images evoked by novels written in certain time periods. I like the sophistication of European culture, the style, and the attitudes. In Latin American literature I like the tropical themes, the magical realism, stories of oppression, and conflict over religion. I feel a connection to European culture because of my ethnic heritage, and a connection to Latin American culture through my friends.

It's strange phenomenon. Though I do not necessarily see physical images of culture in my mind, I sense the presence of the feelings that people had at the time, and how those feelings are similar to our own as human beings. Luke once said, "We poop and pee the same way we did hundreds of years ago." One of the magical things about literature is how each book is evidence that people of the past have suffered with the same difficulties we experience now. I first realized this when I read Romeo and Juliet in 9th grade. At the time, I was in an angsty mood where I felt like all teenagers were just hormone-ridden fools. When I read the play, it made me feel validated, and I've fallen in love with Shakespeare ever since.

Another reason I've been pulled to literature is because I've felt very inspired by a series of documentaries we've been watching in English class called The Romantics (check it out here, it even has David Tennant!). Though many people thought the documentaries were dull, I found them quite spectacular. Instead of simply describing the history of romanticism, the documentary worked to recreate the image of Romanticism in a number of ways. One technique they used was imagery. Many clips in the documentary were shadowed depictions of nature, or images of classical buildings. Another technique they used was acting interpretation. They had actors read the lines of Romantic writers and poets in these scenes in the voice of the writers themselves.

The documentaries did a fantastic job of capturing the mood, which I love. I think that one of the best parts of experiencing art is feeling different moods. Art transports you to a plane that once was, but also, never existed. Art encapsulates ideas through feeling, and communicates them through words, sound and images.

In recent times I have moved farther from music and closer to writing. The reason I like writing the most, as of now, is because it is simply the best communicator of ideas. Music and visual art are very abstract, and while they can have a very profound effect, it is difficult to explain anything concrete. Writing can be both abstract and concrete. In fact, it can be both at the same time.

Writing stems off from another activity I highly enjoy - discussion. I love to talk about complex concepts with people who regard themselves as intellectuals. Unfortunately, I don't have as many of these conversations as I would like. Perhaps this is because I haven't read enough to find issues to discuss, or maybe I haven't found the right people to discuss them with. Oftentimes, when I try to have serious discussions with people, I find that they often put ideology over evidence, and repeat the same things they've heard from their parents and television as if they were their own thoughts. Truth be told, I behave in a similar way, but I am trying my best to become better.

One day, I would live to form a group of intellectuals, like the artists who would meet at Viennese coffee houses, or the Algonquin Round Table. Such a thing may seem outdated in the modern age, but I find that much of my interests are "outdated" in the modern age. I prefer reading over watching TV. I prefer sexual restraint over sexual freedom. I prefer playing cards instead of partying at clubs. It saddens me at times when I see a lack of representation for my kind of person in modern media. Lately I've found that I get along unusually well with Roman Catholics, despite the fact that I am not very religious. I believe in a somewhat more conservative attitude not because I am rigid, but because it makes the most logical sense to me. I don't particularly care what other people do, and quite frankly, I enjoy people who are more liberal and progressive than myself, though I would not want to be them. They seem to deal with more pain and disillusionment than I do.

I've come to accept that I do not like all of the interests of a majority of people, and that the majority of people may never understand the complexities of my mind. This does not bother me, so long as I have people on my plain that I can communicate with so I know that I am not alone.

Hopefully when I am in college, I will be able to find these kinds of people and create my own group. In the modern age, I feel like such a group would be different than in the past. It would have an in person component, but also a technological one. I think that technology is an important tool, but I do not want to take a radically positive or negative point of view upon it.

I want to be like the people Clive James discusses in Cultural Amnesia. One issue I've had with writing is that I want to write about more complex themes than teenage high school life, but I have very little experience in anything else. I do not have massive amounts of emotional damage, and I do not live in a time of massive political turmoil (perhaps you'll disagree and point to the Republicans, but does that really compare to World War II?). Additionally, I do not like taking radical positions because I do not view any ideology as 100% correct. I could never be an Occupy Wallstreet protestor, because the Occupiers never gave a legitimate solution to the issue of income inequality, and I feel like that would simply foolish. In his book, James says, "It is commonly and truly said that young people who want to set the world to rights learn later to be grateful that the world is not worse than it is; but if they were convinced of that too early, we would lose their critical effect, and the world would be worse still." I may only be seventeen, but I've already gotten to the phase where I realize the world could be so much worse than it actually is. That's not the mindset of a revolutionary, which I know from reading The True Believer by Eric Hoffer.

So what's left for me? I don't know to be honest. The only point that I can argue is that all points are inherently invalid. That's what pulls me to satire, especially in the Enlightenment style like Candide. In a way, satire is the anti-art. It exists as a subversion to the ideology and emotionality that art stands for.

Sometimes, I feel at odds between logic and emotion. While I think that many of the ideas of Romanticism are silly and maybe even pretentious, I cannot help but feel a yearning for the romantic lifestyle of experiencing nature and searching for the purest feeling that will never truly exist on this plane.

I am torn between the mentality of the Enlightenment and Romanticism, and this has started to reflect itself in my writing. My pieces were originally humorous, but they have started to reflect some more serious undertones as I keep writing them. I fear the element of emotion in art, because I feel like oftentimes it is shallow, forced, and immature. If I am including it naturally though, it will likely not appear this way.

I feel like the mood of our time period is fairly satirical, Enlightenment-like. Our most important figures are comedians like Jon Stewart and Steven Colbert. People enjoy media out of irony instead of actual quality. Our current youth movement, hipsters, live in constant denial of their own existence. It's bizarre if you really think about it.

While I love the satirists and comedians, I feel like we could use some more serious, and more magical, Romanticism art. Because we have access to so much information, it is easy to prove people's fantasies wrong, which is why there is so much satire. Blind devotion is less common, which is mostly good, but occasionally bad. For example, most American citizens have been disillusioned with presidents since Nixon for legitimate reasons. On the other hand, this means that we no longer have leaders that people truly idolize, and thus less inspiration. This is why movies like Frozen appeal so much to people. Fantasy stories bring back some of the magic that we have lost by being realistic.

I suppose that makes me a political realist and an emotional idealist. An interesting combination, but not necessarily a mutually exclusive one. I believe in a flexible but stable political system that allows people to live out their fantasies to the best of their abilities. Even in the failure to achieve these ideals, there is beauty in the interesting plot lines that life develops that cannot even be preconceived beforehand.

In the coming weeks, I hope to read some more of this literature. Perhaps I will also watch more films and television shows. I am voracious for media, especially media with cultural significance, because it makes me feel as if I am part of the collective whole of humanity.

In terms of personal projects, I plan on simply writing whatever I please. I've started to realize that so much of my time is wasted away by mindless texting because I get too distracted to pick out a legitimate activity. Pomodoro has helped me so much with this. When I do a Pomodoro, I spend 25 minutes working, and then 5 minutes mindlessly texting. I don't have to pick anymore. I can do both! It makes me feel productive but not isolated. I plan on doing much more Pomodoro in the future.

At this point, with college so close in view, I no longer feel the pressure to find a specific activity that I must do in order to discover my life passion. I trust that I will figure out my future career path in college. For now, I am simply doing what I want, as long as it's productive. And who knows, maybe all the reading and writing I am doing is secretly training me for what I will be doing in college and beyond.

Project Eagle Post 2

For a while, I developed an obsession with this project which was not entirely healthy. I stayed up until about 12 every night, brainstorming ideas, and even when I rested in bed, my mind refused to turn off.

After getting my list that I talked about in my last post, I created index cards. Then, I put these cards in categories for places where they happened, i.e. school, STAC, camp, regular friends, Minnesota, folk dance, Venezuelans, etc.

Luke recommended I try the Pomodoro technique. This is where I got after two pomodoros.

A few days later, I invited my dad to see some of my work and asked him for advice. He told me something very useful.

"You need to think about the ending first."

He was quite right. My wall was filled with great premises, but I hadn't even considered how each tale would end outside of their original endings, which, in the nature of life, were generally incomplete and unsatisfying.

One car that I showed him was "Porch texting and dog walker." One time, my friends and I were sitting on Jess's porch. Julian was showing me Orange is the New Black on his phone, Jess was on tumblr, and everyone else was on their phones. Jess's neighbor walked by, completely astonished. "If you guys are just gonna be on your phones, why do you even bother hanging out?" We told her, "we like to be antisocial together."

I thought this could be a lead up to a story about the strange things my friends and I do when we are bored. My dad recommended at the end that we all watch a youtube video, and we realize the dog from the video is the one we saw in the beginning.

It's the twists like that which link the story back to the beginning that make the story truly entertaining.

Another example of this is the card I labeled "Locker Stalker." I once had a friend who was creeped on by a guy who would leave notes and gifts in her locker. Actually it was kind of scary and not necessarily very funny. But my father recommended that I end the story with the stalker discovering that he was using the wrong locker the entire time. 

I worked with that and started moving cards from column to column. My original wall became my source pot.

And I used another wall to try and form coherent stories.

After gathering a few tales that seemed vaguely coherent, I attempted to start writing. I decided at first I would try to write in a journal the way I always have, because it could help me feel my natural narrating voice. However, I find that my mind moves faster than my hand can write, and leading to some dissonance. Perhaps it would be better to work with a computer, where I can write faster and paste things in between paragraphs.

In English we've begun reading Frankenstein. Mary Shelly wrote the book when she was 18, and that inspires me, because it shows that even at my age, it is possible to create greatness. She was probably more advanced in writing than I am right now, so I don't expect my first novel to be like hers. Still, I feel an emotional link to Frankenstein, even though I have yet to read past the first chapter.

Frankenstein is an epistolary, which means that it's written in a series of letters. Perhaps I should write my stories in an epistolary manner. Who would I be writing too? I don't know yet, but I think it could be a good idea. Perks of Being a Wallflower was also an epistolary, but I don't want my future book to be too similar to that, because I don't think it shares the same level of emotional weight. What appeals to me about the idea of an epistolary is that it's focused and each story is inherently short. It seems like a less intimidating way of writing a novel, and also a fun way.

At the moment I am not obsessing over this project, but if I made the effort, I could probably bring myself back into that mindset. I think I need to get some more concrete writing done instead of discussing the theoretical. Perhaps I need a few more Pomodoros.

How to Post on the New STAC Website

As many of you know, the STACWorld.net website has been moved to Wordpress. We hope to articles from you guys onto the website. For those who will be writing, this video explains how to log into your account and how to create posts.

Project Eagle

I have decided to call this new project of mine Project Eagle. Why? I went to a random word generator and that's the word that came up. It seems fine to me until I find a better one. So this is what it is, Project Eagle.

Luke commented on my last post that I should consider turning some of my stories into a play. I like the idea of having a theatrical version, but I feel like I would want the theater to supplement the writing. That is, I want to write the stories into a coherent whole, and then just turn them into scripts. I figure it won't be so difficult. Purely writing scripts seems a bit limiting to me. Performances happen in real time, and there's only so much time to include so many stories. Also, I wouldn't be able to distribute a play as easily as a book. On the other hand, there are benefits. One benefit of a script is that I don't have to worry about technicalities of writing, and at this point, I am not entirely sure if I have the capability of writing all the things I want to write in the way that I want to. At this point, I haven't settled in on what I'm doing yet.

I started brainstorming more ideas, and my list has gotten decently long. My criteria for writing down ideas was very broad. I basically listed all things that I've seen, heard, or witnessed, that I thought were at least remotely funny. As I formed the list, I realized my notes can be categorized into four types.

1. Complete Stories: These are stories that have a beginning, middle, and end. They are an entity unto themselves.
2. Incomplete Stories: These stories are currently in progress in my life right now, and they have yet to be resolved. They yield the potential for funny and good ideas, but they lack an ending.
3. Characters: Instead of stories, these are people that I've met who have unique personality characteristics. They may have done some interesting things, but there isn't one prominent story that defines them.
4. Fragments: These are small details that don't tell a story on their own, but could possibly add flavor to a story that already exists. Perhaps it is a detail of setting, a personality characteristic, an amusing quote, or an entertaining activity.

As I see this right now, the logical thing would be to form a complete story, include interesting characters, and flavor it with the fragments. 

I have remembered many ideas off the top of my head, but I do not think I will be fully finished with the brainstorming phase until I take advantage of all of my resources. I want to read through my old journal entries from last year to see if there are things I can include. I also want to look at old facebook statuses, because I've put some odd stories on there. Lastly, I want to ask the people I know if they can recall stories. They might remember stories and details that I don't. Additionally, the conversation itself could help remind me of other things.

My next plan of action, which I may begin during my brainstorming phase, is to summarize all of the complete stories on index cards in three or four sentences, give or take. That way I can browse through them, decide which ones to keep, and which ones to dismiss. Once I know what I want my stories to revolve around, I can attempt to write them, and see what happens from there.

Things are currently optimistic, but I know that I will soon encounter challenges.

A Possible Idea for What's Next

Though we haven't completely finished STAC Live projects, it's getting to the point where we're almost done and soon we will be entering into possibly doing our independent projects.

I was showing my mom a resume that I may use for community service. She told me to include the album I made in 10th grade, but it made me very upset. This is partially because I was quite sleep-deprived, but also, thinking about that album just makes me unhappy in general. It's very strange. I wrote an entire music album with 9 songs in three months. It should be one of the biggest accomplishments in my life, and maybe it is, but I take little pride in it. I feel embarrassed by it, like I feel embarrassed about all the music that I've made. It makes me think of the times where I constantly forced myself past my comfort zone because I thought that's what I was supposed to do. 

Later, when I freed myself from music, I found that I had a serious lack of direction. I no longer suppressed my feelings, but I also realized that I didn't feel strongly about anything in particular. I equated this with a fear of trying new projects, and to a certain extent it was. Additionally though, it was a happy complacency. Last year may have been a bummer for a lot of people, but for me it was a blast. I had a solid group of friends and we had a number of misadventures that still make us laugh.

Back to the album though. So I was thinking about how the biggest project I've ever done is something that I don't strongly like, and this made me sad. I thought, "what can I do to truly represent me and show that I am an incredible person that can do incredible things?" As I dwelled over this question, the thought occurred to me that perhaps the way to get past the bad feelings of past projects was to create a new project that was even better than The Enneagram. Perhaps I have to top myself.

This is easier said than done. 

When I made the Enneagram, I was in an ideal set of circumstances. I had music training since I was 3, songwriting training for a year and a half, and parents who bought me most of the materials that I needed. I had two and a half hours a day to work in class for five days a week, and a mentor (Luke) who kept me on the right track. The songs were not difficult to write because I based them off The Enneagram. I did my research, but I didn't have to create profoundly new and original material. The pieces were set. All I needed was the will. So it was done.

What can I do now that also fits that ideal kind of situation? I thought some more about this. My main discipline in STAC has essentially become writing. I've been writing since they taught us in school, and I've been maintaining a weekly blog for three and a half years. My favorite elementary school teacher told me I was destined to be an author someday. People enjoy hearing my stories. From this I surmised that it may be time to tackle a book.

A book about what though? That was the next question. As I said before, I don't feel entirely passionate about any cause in particular. I don't think I have a heavy message to communicate about life. I don't know much about life outside of Long Island suburbia. Currently I'm not suffering from any deep emotional issues. This makes it difficult to create art. How do you make art when you're generally content?

I decided to talk to my dad about all of these things. He said something along these lines.

"The reason The Enneagram worked out so well for you is because it was structured. You knew what you wanted to write about for each song and you were able to get it done. Translated into book format, you could do a series of short stories. Maybe you could make a series of stories loosely based off teenage life in suburbia, because that's all you really know about."

This thought did run through my head, but the concern I have with writing teen stories is that they are often trite and predictable. Also, I wasn't sure if I had enough interesting stories of my own that people would want to hear.

"You think you don't have interesting stories? Come on Ellen, what about your two friends who went on such a bad date, they both turned gay? All you need to do is fictionalize the date to make it even worse than the reality, and you have a great story right there."

My dad recited a number of the amusing stories I had told him throughout the years.

"You should make the stories like real life. Occasionally bad things happen, but people generally figure it out."

My mom chimed into the conversation as well. Having grown up in the McCarthy and Vietnam era, she believes that right now, we live in one of the most egalitarian societies yet. She is profoundly impressed by how people of all genders and ethnicities unite together and thrive in a very menial kind of way. She appreciates how stereotypes are constantly subverted in our school, like the girls in hijab who are completely boy crazy, or the asians who sell weed in the alley, or the white kids that are horrendous at sports. She commented that before Garrison Keillor, Minnesotans didn't have much of a shared ethnic identity, and she thought it would be cool if I could form something like that for Long Islanders and teenagers.

This sounded actually sounded like a pretty good idea to me. Luke was asking me yesterday if there was something I strongly wanted to try. The first thing that popped into my head was standup comedy, because after watching Aziz Anzari, I felt inspired to share some my own humorous stories and make people laugh. See, I still get inspired sometimes! When I thought about it though, I realized I wasn't so keen to bring my comedy to a stage. I've actually done stand up comedy once before at sleepaway camp, and it was a decent experience. While I enjoyed speaking and sharing my stories though, I had trouble shaping the story in a way that could be easily understood in a short amount of time, and I felt awkward forcing myself to perform my stories instead of simply sharing them. Still, I love making people laugh. In addition to stand up, I've done a good amount of improv and sketch comedy, and it's had a profound impact on my life. 

I had it in my mind to try some creative non-fiction. Last year we did a writing workshop with creative non-fiction. My piece was more serious, but after reading the book How to be Inappropriate, I had the desire to write some stories that were lighter in tone. I actually attempted to keep a blog (link here) to share some short creative non-fiction, but it quickly died. Also, last year I kept a record of everyday for 2013, so I probably have a lot I can take from. There are two issue with straight creative non-fiction though. First of all, I would have to find a lot of stories from my own life and make them coherent. Secondly, I may not be able to share all the stories I want to for fear of embarrassing the people that I know.

So, writing a comedic set of short stories loosely based on my high school experiences seems like it could fit. I love telling funny stories, especially about myself. As a second semester senior, this would absolutely be the time to write a book like that. If I put my mind to it, I really think that I could pull it off. And if I manage to write a full-fledge book (not necessarily in length but in coherency), that would definitely top The Enneagram.

Reading all this, I am starting to realize that The Enneagram is really not something to be ashamed of at all. The circumstances for the project were truly right. Each step I took felt like a natural progression. The first step was creating my studio. I will quote a blogpost I made at the time.

"During the songwriting workshop about 2 weeks ago and I asked Phil how he organized all of his instruments. He told me that he kept them all up on the wall. In my basement I have a series of 5 long shelves on the wall, which I realized were perfect. That's when I knew I had to clean out my basement. 

This seemed almost impossible though. The corner not in use had basically been kept as a large garbage square ever since my parents moved into the house. Junk was piled so high you couldn't even walk into the area.

I couldn't give up because I knew that this was my rite of passage, I could feel it. This was the challenge I had to go through to continue on with my life and prosper."

And then The Enneagram.

"Yesterday when I was sitting in class, I started to brainstorm possible projects I could do with the plentiful time that I had. What could I do with music?

That's when the idea popped into my head. Make a concept album based off of the Enneagram. 9 personalities. 9 songs. Perfect."

Even when I decided to quit writing music in the end, that felt like a natural progression as well. A number of my previous blogposts talked about my doubts with music. I wrote one post where I put all of the hints together, but I believe I deleted it on account of seeming too emotionally provocative to share with the world wide web, especially while applying to colleges.

Right now, I am having that feeling once again. I feel like this idea for a project is either exactly what I want to do right now or quite close but not quite on the money. I don't have the details, but I get the gist. I've already been recording random amusing memories that I hope to implement in some way. I could talk about small moments, such as the time my friend complained to me about having an umbrella that could poke someone in the eye, while simultaneously shaking it around until he accidentally poked someone in the eye, which was quite an incredible feat considering that the kid who got poked had a very low epicanthal fold. I could talk about people, like my friends who got themselves into messes because they became promiscuous quite early, or my friends from South America who are quite the entity unto themselves. I could talk about things that happened to other people, like the time Caitlin and Alex were walking around the city on a STAC trip and someone tried to sell them "Weezer tickets," but it was actually just a metaphor for weed. Just throwing ideas around here.

Hopefully, things will soon become more clear on what plan of action I should take for this. Hopefully, I'm not completely on the wrong track making statements I will look back at later and think, "wow that was really silly."

The Forer Effect

The Forer Effect

Read this profile. Does this apply to you? After reading this, rate how accurately this describes you on a scale of 1 to 5. 

You have a need for other people to like and admire you, and yet you tend to be critical of yourself. While you have some personality weaknesses you are generally able to compensate for them. You have considerable unused capacity that you have not turned to your advantage. Disciplined and self-controlled on the outside, you tend to be worrisome and insecure on the inside. At times you have serious doubts as to whether you have made the right decision or done the right thing. You prefer a certain amount of change and variety and become dissatisfied when hemmed in by restrictions and limitations. You also pride yourself as an independent thinker; and do not accept others' statements without satisfactory proof. But you have found it unwise to be too frank in revealing yourself to others. At times you are extroverted, affable, and sociable, while at other times you are introverted, wary, and reserved. Some of your aspirations tend to be rather unrealistic.

The average personal accuracy rating for this is 4.2. Did you give a rating in that range?

The Forer Effect is the phenomenon when we believe that personality descriptions are highly personal to us, when really they could apply to a broad range of people. Essentially, when we hear statements that supposedly describe us, we believe them to be true because we want them to be true, and not because they actually are. We seek subjective validation, where we accept the statements that we like, and subconsciously ignore the rest. This can apply to all kinds of analyses, from personality type systems such as horoscopes and the Enneagram, to psychic predictions. 

I would like to expand upon this theory though. When we read personality profiles we believe apply to us, not only to we construct our minds to accept the description, but we also adapt our behavior to fit what we think we ought to be. 

Let's look at the sentence in the above paragraph, "You prefer a certain amount of change and variety." Perhaps that is true for some people, but there are many who do not greatly like change. Let's say you are one of these people. You see that many of the statements in the profile fit you, and therefore, they must all describe you. Though you don't like change, you start to think you should like change, which therefore forces you to create changes in your life more than you would do otherwise. This is a hypothetical example, but you get what I'm saying.

For this reason, I am wary of many personality typers, even the ones I enjoy using, such as the MBTI and the Enneagram. I find that the more I learn about these types, the more I feel I apply to all of them, and the more I change my own behavior to adapt to them. 

For example, my friends have been very interested in MBTI. Though I originally graded myself as an ENFP, they believe I am truly an ENTP. The difference between the two, simply put, is that ENFPs are concerned with making people feel good and being well-liked, while ENTPs enjoy logically debating people and don't particularly care how they make others feel. Because my friends tell me I have the ENTP attitude, I've noticed that lately I've been a bit more brash with people; teasing them and throwing them under the bus so I can make a good joke. I actually feel bad when I do this too much, Lately though, I've been trying to ignore this guilt because "I'm a T and that's who I am." That's probably not a healthy attitude. As usual, my thoughts and behavior are all a likely byproduct of overthinking, and soon I will be back to a more comfortable self. Perhaps that comfortable self is even an ENFP who cares enough about how others feel not to be mocking. But it's all arbitrary anyhow. That's why I confuse my friends and I confuse myself. 

Thus is the Forer effect and its additional side effects. 

Moral Responsibilities in Bar Life

When I was in Minnesota, I occasionally frequented the hotel bar with my mom. I didn't drink of course, but the bartenders were friendly and the television always had some kind of wacky reality TV show.

One day, we were watching Bar Rescue, and the bartender confessed that he had run his own bar for five years. He had quit voluntarily. We asked him why, and this is generally what he said.

"I couldn't handle the moral responsibility. Running a bar in a small town, you got to know everything about the people there. It got to the point where I learned about affairs before the spouse did. There was one man who came for five hours a day. I'm pretty sure I saw him more than his family did. One day he passed away. I didn't know if I should write the family a letter of condolences, because I cared for the man, but I may have been linked to the cause.

That guy, he would have a general conversation, and then the beer just hit him and boom, he was drunk. I went up to him and said, 'Hey, high five.' Then when he rose his hands, I grabbed his keys from his pockets.

It's great meeting people and everything, but I couldn't do it anymore."

365, Happy New Year

Today I completed a major achievement that I have been working on primarily in secret for the entire year of 2013. I have managed to journal for all 365 days of this year, keeping a full record of all the events that have happened to me. I suppose this means I've done a 365.

For those of you who don't know, a 365 is a project that you do every day for an entire year. For example, drawing a portrait daily, writing a poem daily, or something else along those lines. Some people in STAC have successfully done 365s, but many have not. 365s are quite difficult and they require a certain amount of discipline.

My 365 came to me quite by accident. Or maybe not. I started journaling when I was in 7th grade. In 8th grade I attempted to keep a daily record of my year, but by April I had gotten so far behind that I simply gave up. In 9th and 10th grade, I journaled occasionally, but often I was so overswept with emotions that I couldn't bring myself to write. This brings me to 11th grade. I started journaling in October of last school year as a way to ease my nerves. The habit carried on through the New Year, and by the end of January, I realized that I had indeed journaled every single day since January 1st. At that point I figured I would try to go for 365 days. Why not?

I kept my journals in a shelf in my bedside table. Each night I turned on my night light and wrote. When I travelled, I either brought my journal with me or typed my entries on a computer so I could print them out later. 

I mostly wrote about what happened to me during the day, my feelings, my thoughts, and my future goals. The entries varied in length, quality, and emotional intensity. 

Generally, 365s are products, while my personal 365 was more of just rambling. I don't know if it improved my technical writing abilities, but it helped me in a number of ways. I learned discipline, and I learned how to better translate the thoughts from my heads into words. My writing speed has increased, and I now feel at ease when I write.

I've been re-reading some of these old entries, and what astonishes me is how little I changed this year. Right now, I'm still thinking and writing about the same things I talked about a year ago, with the same vocabulary and writing manner. The uncanny similarities made me laugh.

Perhaps this is because my change has been gradual and a year is too short a time to notice a difference. Still, I feel like I was quite mature at the beginning of 2013, and I've been gradually improving since. 

For me, 2013 was a year of gaining control. Though I never found a true passion to replace music, I became settled in a state of pleasant uncertainty. I became more disciplined with my emotions. I also tackled many of the things that I had always wanted to do. For example, I got my ears pierced, I became semi-proficient in a second language, and I played violin with gypsies in Transylvania. That last one was my New Years Resolution, so I'm quite pleased I was able to accomplish it.

My new primary resolution in 2014 is to be more active in the world around me. I've spent a lot of time focusing on improving myself, and I feel like it's time for me to focus on others. I want to become more polite and amiable. I want to help people. I want to take the exciting life I imagine in my head and bring it to the real world by doing fun and spontaneous things. 

There will be an opportunity for me, I know. Often when one has a desire, the universe works in odd ways to fulfill it.