As I was writing the first section of this essay, I noticed something unusual about my thought process that I haven't really caught before. I noticed that instead of writing exactly what I was thinking at the time, I realized that I was trying to write what I would expect that the person reading this essay would want to hear. This was really shocking to notice because I had never thought that I was the type of person who would be a "people pleaser", so to speak. I'm not sure if everyone does this when they are writing, but I'm almost positive that everyone does this when they speaking to someone. People usually say what other people would want to hear and not what they actually think or want to say. They keep their opinions and thoughts to themselves and whether it is because they are scared of denial or because it is just human nature I'm not sure. What I am sure of though, is the fact that I was doing this as I was writing.
Now obviously this way of writing/thinking is not effective because for one, it doesn't really represent my voice on an issue. Also, it isn't very effective because it doesn't necessarily allow me to go deeper into my thinking and write down something that is actually worth reading. However, lucky for me I caught myself before I got even deeper into my writing. As soon as I noticed it, I went back and edited things so that they reflected exactly how I felt and what I wanted to say.
Since I now know this, I can finally apply it to all other writing that I will be doing in any class. When writing in the future, I will try as best I can to just express myself and my thoughts in a piece of writing that reflects exactly what I feel. Once I come up with a good thought, I can finally let my mind wonder and create deeper analytical thoughts which will in turn create an effective piece of writing.
Even though this "people pleaser" thought process is an area that I would like to work on , and have started to work on shortly after realizing it, there is one thing about my thought process that I love. I love the fact that I can come up with random thoughts about the past and the present that make no sense and are in no way related and then somehow link them together. For example, in this essay, I was listening to Pink Floyd while I was trying to write an opener for my question. Suddenly, my mind drifted and caught the lyrics "We don't need no education/We don't need no thoughts controlled" and from these two fragments I found myself a story. I linked an anecdote that I experienced in the past to a thought that I was currently having the present. This to me, being able to relate things from the past to the present is really interesting and really important to me because it is how my mind works. Most of the thoughts that I have everyday are basically comparisons between the past and present and I find this to be the coolest thing ever.
Sunday, September 28, 2008
Sunday, September 21, 2008
Best Of Week: Curiosity Is The Key
Although there were a lot of interesting insights and ideas that we talked about in class this week, the one that really caught my attention was a piece from the article "Sea of Information". In this article, Andrea Barrett writes on page 11 about how "[She'd] learned to follow where the spark of interest leads [her]" and goes on to say how these little sparks are "full of potential, charged and fresh and inspiring". I think that this idea that Barrett presents to us is very important because it gives us some insight on creative minds. From this quote, one could easily articulate how Barrett is trying to tell us that it is curiosity that drives a person to follow that sudden spark of interest in something. Barrett is saying in order for a person to have a creative personality they not only need to be open to new ideas and beliefs, but they also need to learn to follow their curiosity because that, in the end, is what leads them to do great things.
After reading this one quote by Barrett, it made me realize how many people end up doing exactly the opposite. When someone suddenly gets a spark of interest in something new and mysterious, most people, including myself, just end up completely ignoring it. If a person would actually take the initiative to find out more about what they wanted to learn about and were interested in, that person would have the potential to create (or even understand at the very least), something powerful and worth knowing. However, that is not the case regarding curiosity.
If I were to get nothing out of my senior year here except for one crucial insight, I would definitley want to learn this piece of information. I think this idea about being open to everything and everyone and following your curiosity no matter where it takes you is an idea that everyone needs to incorporate into their daily lives. To be honest, this is one of the main ideas out of humanities that I think is going to stick with me forever. Obviously forever is a strong word, but an insight like this is extremely hard to forget and once you have learned something of this degree, it's hard for someone to withhold themselves from it and not try to use it. That is why i think that I'm going to try it out, starting with my mindbook.
After reading this one quote by Barrett, it made me realize how many people end up doing exactly the opposite. When someone suddenly gets a spark of interest in something new and mysterious, most people, including myself, just end up completely ignoring it. If a person would actually take the initiative to find out more about what they wanted to learn about and were interested in, that person would have the potential to create (or even understand at the very least), something powerful and worth knowing. However, that is not the case regarding curiosity.
If I were to get nothing out of my senior year here except for one crucial insight, I would definitley want to learn this piece of information. I think this idea about being open to everything and everyone and following your curiosity no matter where it takes you is an idea that everyone needs to incorporate into their daily lives. To be honest, this is one of the main ideas out of humanities that I think is going to stick with me forever. Obviously forever is a strong word, but an insight like this is extremely hard to forget and once you have learned something of this degree, it's hard for someone to withhold themselves from it and not try to use it. That is why i think that I'm going to try it out, starting with my mindbook.
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Connection: Romantic Individualism and Transcendentalism
In the article "The Televisionary", Malcolm Gladwell introduces this character known and Farnsworth to us, who is supposed to be the inventor and visionary of the television. Through out the article, it is mentioned in various ways that Farnsworth is a romantic. However, the way that this piece is written about Farnsworth, it is made out to imply that basically romantic individuals are bad because they are selfish and want things simply for themselves. They prefer to work alone instead of working in a group and getting the advantage of creating something even more magnificent. Even though this term is portrayed in a negative light in this article, there are some instances that suggest that the collaboration of individuals in general make great things happen.
This article relates in some ways to the idea of Transcendentalists. The founder of Transcendentalism, Ralph W. Emerson suggested that the greatest thing that a person could be is their own unique individual. For Emerson, the power and potential that the individual had was the greatest thing that ever existed. The ultimate goal of these Transcendentalists was for the individuals in one nation to act as their own person and make decisions that they know they want and now what the government or anyone else tells them to make. This idea of the rugged individual obviously played and still plays a very important role in our nation today.
Both Fransworth and Emerson were great examples of romantic individuals in our history in very similar ways. They both did things that interested themselves and ultimatley, they both wanted to make themselves important and the best they could be. The only difference is that Farnsworth was a visionary who was trying to be an individual in a competitive field where there was no room for individuals, but where there was only room for groups. This is a crucial idea because Emerson suggests that in order for someone to become a romantic individual, they would have to be in solitary confinement basically. However, since Farnsworth was working with a piece of technology that many other people were involved with, there was no chance for him to achieve the individualism that would lead him to claim success for the invention of the television.
The connection between these two very important people is very interesting in the sense that it demonstrates a perfect example of when an person can actually become his/her own individual and when he/she cannot. Also , the comparison between these two people show the change in society and technology as time went by and how these two things affected people all over the nation. In Emerson's time there were corporations, but not corporations that were as innovated and group orientated as the corporations in Farnsworth's time. This shows how much harder it was for Farnsworth to actually achieve individuality since he was constantly being pulled in by the mass.
This article relates in some ways to the idea of Transcendentalists. The founder of Transcendentalism, Ralph W. Emerson suggested that the greatest thing that a person could be is their own unique individual. For Emerson, the power and potential that the individual had was the greatest thing that ever existed. The ultimate goal of these Transcendentalists was for the individuals in one nation to act as their own person and make decisions that they know they want and now what the government or anyone else tells them to make. This idea of the rugged individual obviously played and still plays a very important role in our nation today.
Both Fransworth and Emerson were great examples of romantic individuals in our history in very similar ways. They both did things that interested themselves and ultimatley, they both wanted to make themselves important and the best they could be. The only difference is that Farnsworth was a visionary who was trying to be an individual in a competitive field where there was no room for individuals, but where there was only room for groups. This is a crucial idea because Emerson suggests that in order for someone to become a romantic individual, they would have to be in solitary confinement basically. However, since Farnsworth was working with a piece of technology that many other people were involved with, there was no chance for him to achieve the individualism that would lead him to claim success for the invention of the television.
The connection between these two very important people is very interesting in the sense that it demonstrates a perfect example of when an person can actually become his/her own individual and when he/she cannot. Also , the comparison between these two people show the change in society and technology as time went by and how these two things affected people all over the nation. In Emerson's time there were corporations, but not corporations that were as innovated and group orientated as the corporations in Farnsworth's time. This shows how much harder it was for Farnsworth to actually achieve individuality since he was constantly being pulled in by the mass.
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
Change of Mind: School
Over the last three years of high school, I pushed myself from day to day to get my homework done and to make sure that I studied for every single test. Because of this continuous routine that I was stuck in, I thought that my senior year of high school was going to be exactly the same. However, during the first few days of school this year I reflected upon my previous years in GBS and came to realize that everything I supposedly "learned" during this period had been someone lost. Even though I got pretty good grades, i must of not learned a lot.
For this reason, I have decided to go through my senior year with a different approach. Instead of actually trying to get good grades in my classes, I'm actually going to make sure that i understand and remember the things the things I learn in them because getting an A in a class doesn't necessarily mean that your remember the material. Grades are not a measure of accountability and are therefore pretty much irrelevant my learning process, that is why i have decided to stop caring so much about them and start caring more about the important elements that my classes offer.
For this reason, I have decided to go through my senior year with a different approach. Instead of actually trying to get good grades in my classes, I'm actually going to make sure that i understand and remember the things the things I learn in them because getting an A in a class doesn't necessarily mean that your remember the material. Grades are not a measure of accountability and are therefore pretty much irrelevant my learning process, that is why i have decided to stop caring so much about them and start caring more about the important elements that my classes offer.
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