Here is a topic that has always interested me. We all have those very important moments in our lives, when we have an important interview, a deciseve exam, a first date, etc. What do we do after it is over?
It has always been difficult to me to decide what one has to do afterwards. Do you get yourself slammed in a bar, do you spend the whole afternoon watching movies, do you go out for a walk, or do you sit doewn and do even more work?!
Not so long ago, when I was taking SAT exams, I usually could not sleep the night before. After the exam was over, I usually felt like doing a whole lot of things. I felt like I had all the time that I needed to do everything. Believe it or not, what I have wanted to do the most is go do a lot of work! I did not feel tired, I felt like I was on a winning spree! I needed to go on!
Now, I feel in a similar position when I go out of the last exam for the semester, or the last exam before the spring break. I am overwhelmed by the thought that I have unlimited amount of time and I want to go on accomplidhing even more!
Usually the problem is that I am dead tired, and I need to get some sleep. And after I do it, most of the feeling that I had after the exam is gone. I can slack for several hours and then go back to work, but the unique emotion of after the exam is long gone! What can I do to keep it? Is there a formula? Has anyone else felt like that?
I think that this feeling is the feeling of a the turning point. You close on e page and start writing the next. And how excited you are when the page in front of you is blank and brand new! You can do anything with it! You can write whatever you like, and noone can stop you from doing it! Well, not exactly :( This is just the initial euphoria. Then the mind gets used to the the current position and gets back into the comfortable line of "I am used to it." And then - goodbye enthusiasm, goodbye euphoria, hello routine!
How do you keep the emotion?
Thursday, March 01, 2007
Tuesday, February 27, 2007
Love what I do Versus I have to do it
How much should we like what we do?
Is just affinity enough? Is the rest taken care of by obligations and people who impose those on us?
How do we know who makes the obligations? Isn't it us who oblige ourselves to do or not to do a certain action? Do we not set the goals and limits ourselves?
The most important aspect of our doing what we want to do is determining what we want to do. And this is extremely difficult when you come out of a society, group or environment that influences your thinking and your choices. Examples of such environments are smaller towns, where people tend to live in a closer community, and thus influence each other more in terms of views, judgements, etc. Such environments emerge in a much more complex array of circumstances than just the location and presence of a small residential area.
Now we will take a person out of such an environment and put him in an open community. He will not be forced to believe, think or do anything, but will be subject to many ideals and opinions. To what extent will such a person be affected by the environment? Will he accept the ideals of others? Will he preserve his identity?
This, however, does not answer the question in the beginning - how do we know what we want to do, but it limits the array of answers by aiming at false ideals. Such ideals can be easily created and raised to the heights of immortal virtues in groups where people are vulnerable to outside influence.
Is just affinity enough? Is the rest taken care of by obligations and people who impose those on us?
How do we know who makes the obligations? Isn't it us who oblige ourselves to do or not to do a certain action? Do we not set the goals and limits ourselves?
The most important aspect of our doing what we want to do is determining what we want to do. And this is extremely difficult when you come out of a society, group or environment that influences your thinking and your choices. Examples of such environments are smaller towns, where people tend to live in a closer community, and thus influence each other more in terms of views, judgements, etc. Such environments emerge in a much more complex array of circumstances than just the location and presence of a small residential area.
Now we will take a person out of such an environment and put him in an open community. He will not be forced to believe, think or do anything, but will be subject to many ideals and opinions. To what extent will such a person be affected by the environment? Will he accept the ideals of others? Will he preserve his identity?
This, however, does not answer the question in the beginning - how do we know what we want to do, but it limits the array of answers by aiming at false ideals. Such ideals can be easily created and raised to the heights of immortal virtues in groups where people are vulnerable to outside influence.
Bullshit information
I am sorry for writing about a topic that, I am sure, has been discussed numerous times, but this was my moment of enlightenment when I could grasp it. Thank you for the understanding.
Used to having gigabytes of memory, where we can store ANYTHING we want, we stop caring about what is valuable and what is bullshit. The evolution of storage is starting to kill valuable information. This is happening in two ways.
On the one hand, having to not decide on the spot what is valuable information and what is not, we are prone to keep much more than we actually need; we postpone the selection for later (the moment when our hard drive is full :). Thus, the amount of information without value (repetative information, or bullshit) increases and perpetuates itself, diluting the information to which we are exposed. So, although we have A WHOLE LOT MORE information, A WHOLER LOT MORE of it is bullshit. Thus, although it is easier for us to find information, it is more difficult for us to find valuable information.
On the other, this change perpetuatees within us too. If we know that we have only a limited amount of space to store information, we will inevitably select the important information for storage. We will discard the rubbish. However, as we do not have to decide on the spot, we might be tempted to postpone the decision for later numerous times. This diminishes our selection abilities in terms of information and leaves us piled with a whole lot of stuff that is extremely hard to sort, let alone subdue itself to extracting of value.
Used to having gigabytes of memory, where we can store ANYTHING we want, we stop caring about what is valuable and what is bullshit. The evolution of storage is starting to kill valuable information. This is happening in two ways.
On the one hand, having to not decide on the spot what is valuable information and what is not, we are prone to keep much more than we actually need; we postpone the selection for later (the moment when our hard drive is full :). Thus, the amount of information without value (repetative information, or bullshit) increases and perpetuates itself, diluting the information to which we are exposed. So, although we have A WHOLE LOT MORE information, A WHOLER LOT MORE of it is bullshit. Thus, although it is easier for us to find information, it is more difficult for us to find valuable information.
On the other, this change perpetuatees within us too. If we know that we have only a limited amount of space to store information, we will inevitably select the important information for storage. We will discard the rubbish. However, as we do not have to decide on the spot, we might be tempted to postpone the decision for later numerous times. This diminishes our selection abilities in terms of information and leaves us piled with a whole lot of stuff that is extremely hard to sort, let alone subdue itself to extracting of value.
Monday, February 26, 2007
The Speed of today's world
It is obvious to all of us who spend some of their time to observe the world around, that the speed with which we live our lives has increased manyfold during the past 10-20-30 years. The main effect of that is increased stress in our lives, and the main reason is of course profit.
The advances in our world have made it possible to make profits "faster", which means more profits per unit of time, and consequently - more overall profits. But an immediate question arises: "Where does it end? How fast can a human being go? What is the uper limit of our adjustment to the stress and speed of our world?"
Was it not a lot better years ago, when our lives did not go at the hectic speed of light they do today? Were we less happy then?
I am just aksing the questions, I will not answer them.
The advances in our world have made it possible to make profits "faster", which means more profits per unit of time, and consequently - more overall profits. But an immediate question arises: "Where does it end? How fast can a human being go? What is the uper limit of our adjustment to the stress and speed of our world?"
Was it not a lot better years ago, when our lives did not go at the hectic speed of light they do today? Were we less happy then?
I am just aksing the questions, I will not answer them.
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