My decision not to go home this weekend in order to complete some assignments and stay on top of studying means that by the time spring break arrives, this will have been the longest I've been without going home. I used to wonder how people could go years (or even forever) without ever going back - even if only for a short visit - to where they came from and to their family. Now I see that when life gets busy we are often distracted from nostalgic thoughts as our focus shifts to doing the things we need to do to get by. This is not to say the desire goes away, but rather what we desire is forgotten. I hope that, while I may encounter times that leave me unable to go home, I never lose the desire. There's no feeling quite like driving down familiar streets and pulling into your driveway after a long absence.
Overall, I am happy and have good friends here, but I can't help but notice the distance that has developed between myself and the people I used to be with every day. This is, no doubt, a normal step in life, but it strangely seems harder to digest looking in retrospect than if my eyes were locked forward.
Friday, February 20, 2009
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
25.
Recently, I've found it difficult to make time to write here and - though I have no deadlines to meet or audience to please - I want to try to start writing at least once a week. My overthinking and over analyzing of every person and every situation puts a lot on my mind and perhaps writing helps clear things up for me and relax.
One thing that I have become aware of (or at least have begun thinking of) is that there is no reason that isn't 'man-made' for anything. The notion that bad things happen to "bad" people and good things happen to "good" people is really, when you think about it, quite absurd. The fact that whether or not a person is good or bad is based on opinion and man-made morals alone should be enough to discredit this claim. If good things happen to "good" people it's because another person recognizes the goodness and does something positive or rewarding as a result. With a "bad" person, anything bad that happens to them is either caused by another person recognizing the badness or simply by situations that a "bad" person might put him or herself through.
It is very easy to judge someone's actions as being good or bad based on what one is used to and what society accepts, but any judgement on a person's character is quite difficult (or at least it should be). If a person makes a mistake, I hardly think that makes them bad; it simply confirms that they are human. If a person chooses to do something wrong, it's not right to pass judgement either unless where the person is coming from, what they have been through, and how they see things is fully understood. I believe that anyone can change and how a person is affected by his or her actions says a lot more about the person than the actions themselves.
Humans are animals. (Regardless of how religious or anti-religious one may be, this is a fact and it shouldn't be a problem considering that the term was first created and defined by man.) This being said, I think we, like all other animals, have instincts. In what many people might consider "normal" situations, logic and reason mask these instincts and largely eliminate the necessity for them, but - when a person is trapped, or scared, or put in a situation they do not understand - these instincts sometimes surface. All of this is just to say that it isn't fair to judge a person's character based on isolated actions because on the outside it isn't always possible to understand what that person may be going through. Sure, there are overall some "bad" and some "good" people, but that type of label is "earned" over time and is - of course - always subject to biased opinions and stereotypes we have created for each other.
One thing that I have become aware of (or at least have begun thinking of) is that there is no reason that isn't 'man-made' for anything. The notion that bad things happen to "bad" people and good things happen to "good" people is really, when you think about it, quite absurd. The fact that whether or not a person is good or bad is based on opinion and man-made morals alone should be enough to discredit this claim. If good things happen to "good" people it's because another person recognizes the goodness and does something positive or rewarding as a result. With a "bad" person, anything bad that happens to them is either caused by another person recognizing the badness or simply by situations that a "bad" person might put him or herself through.
It is very easy to judge someone's actions as being good or bad based on what one is used to and what society accepts, but any judgement on a person's character is quite difficult (or at least it should be). If a person makes a mistake, I hardly think that makes them bad; it simply confirms that they are human. If a person chooses to do something wrong, it's not right to pass judgement either unless where the person is coming from, what they have been through, and how they see things is fully understood. I believe that anyone can change and how a person is affected by his or her actions says a lot more about the person than the actions themselves.
Humans are animals. (Regardless of how religious or anti-religious one may be, this is a fact and it shouldn't be a problem considering that the term was first created and defined by man.) This being said, I think we, like all other animals, have instincts. In what many people might consider "normal" situations, logic and reason mask these instincts and largely eliminate the necessity for them, but - when a person is trapped, or scared, or put in a situation they do not understand - these instincts sometimes surface. All of this is just to say that it isn't fair to judge a person's character based on isolated actions because on the outside it isn't always possible to understand what that person may be going through. Sure, there are overall some "bad" and some "good" people, but that type of label is "earned" over time and is - of course - always subject to biased opinions and stereotypes we have created for each other.
Monday, February 9, 2009
24.
Recent events have caused me to reflect on my own life, my choices, my attitude toward things. I can't help but feeling that if I maybe put a little more effort in different directions that I would be happier and, overall, have more time. Procrastination is an evil thing, sometimes in more ways and more severely than one can even begin to contemplate. I've often doubted some of my views; very few people share many of them so it's only a natural reaction. Now, however, I feel even more strongly about them than I did before because after seeing real life examples I know that what I have done and what I will do is the right thing. I've taken the more difficult path when I could have just as easily taken the easy one, and it may have hurt someone at the moment. But wounds heal back stronger and I've woken up to find that the difficult decisions I've made (even if they seemed wrong at the time) and the tears I shed were not for no reason and as the picture develops, I can be confident that the image that appears is better than the one I was looking at before the flash went off.
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