I did two things today. I daydreamed about being someone different, as I always do. Someone happier, someone who is more successful, lovelier, smarter than I. Someone who amazing things happen to.

I also started reading The Arrogance of Power, by Sen. Fulbright. Here is part of what I read:

"Dr. Brock Chisholm suggests that 'what we the people of the world need, perhaps most, is to exercise our imaginations, to develop our ability to look at things from outside our accidental area of being' ...  The obvious value of liberating the imagination is that it might enable us to acquire some understanding of the world-view held by people whose past experiences and present circumstances and beliefs are radically different from our own. "

I wondered after reading this, if I ever stop to really think about how it would be to be in someone less fortunate position. Sure I feel sympathy, empathy and compassion, but do I really ask myself how would it be to be in someone else' shoes? I get hungry every now and then, I've even fasted. Does that mean I have actually comprehended how being hungry for life is? I don't think so.

On my way over to Starry Night I passed a man with a bike, and lots of bags. It was obvious this man was homeless.

Here I am feeling sorry for myself for not having a car. Imagine if my belongings were reduced to all that can fit into a couple of plastic grocery bags. Compare this to all I have in my apartment. Compare this to what I will probably always have. Compare this to not having shelter to sleep. Or even a place to store what few belongings I possess.

Here I am imagining wonderful things for myself. Forgetting that it is actually pretty wonderful to be me.

I wonder we as a society, what do we daydream about? Having as much money as Donald Trump, as much fame as Paris Hilton or as much power as a big WallStreet guy. Shouldn't we instead be considering what it would be like to live in a tiny, remote and hopeless village? Or in the Big Apple of NY yet be without a home, without the capability to feed your children? Wouldn't it be these imaginations which motivate us to help those who need it?

I think I must imagine more. 

The past two days I've done nothing but stare at things. I go shopping and I stare at shelves and shelves of goods which all look different but are all really the same . I go to bookstores and instead of seeing tiny containers of worthy information I see rectangular shapes with repetitive titles. I walk around town and I see dull, square shaped buildings, I see women who have perfected a certain 'look'. I go to coffee shops and I see all sorts of baked goods lined up to carry the pretense of specified deliciousness when they all taste so similar. I hear people conversing and they are all saying the same thing, they are all reducing emotional and eventful incidents into simple, unworthy words.

Everywhere I look I see geometric shapes. I see patterns of matching colors. I see uniforms and perfectly aligned objects. I hear words like 'fine' and 'good' which are supposedly telling but no thought forms in my head in response.

The simplified version of everything. The reduction of every concept into a geometric shape. The uniformed way of acting, speaking, laboring, looking... being.

It has occured to me that this is what we call the 'civilized' world.

There is a handmade cloth hanging on my living room wall. Perhaps when made it had tried to conform to the geometric shape standard but it could not, it is an obvious mess. It is a splatter of cloth, color and beads. To me this is beauty.

This cloth is me. A mess of difference, patternless and unmatched. This cloth is everyone I know, every individual human being. We adhere to the accustomed social norms, we dress like the magazines tell us, we greet each other with commonplace words, we attempt everyday to do what we are told is 'right'. But inside, we are all just as scattered as that cloth. Our families, friends, societies and even ourselves attempt to patch us up into some sort of uniformed person; a human version of a geometric shape. It doesn't work. It'll never work. And that is why we're beautiful.

I feel jaded by what I see, jaded by this civilized city, civilized society. I cannot escape it, so I'll glance at you every now and then and wait for a glimpse of your mess. 

I must warn you, this post is likely to be all over the place as it will be without a conclusion, without a goal.

Often, and lately even more so, I feel as though I have too many thoughts in my head. Too many ideas about what is out there, what is inside me, what I want to do, what I want to be true. My ideas often remain just that - ideas. I was blessed with an imagination larger than an ocean and the ability to formulate as many stories and possibilities as authors, writers have. But without the ability to execute, the ideas seem to be more like a curse than a blessing. I feel as though my worth is limited in existence within my mind and all of these thoughts swimming around are ill-fated to die before they ever cross the shore.
Among the many things that has been on my mind lately is truth. Honestly the concept of truth is the most abstract and undefinable of all - yet we (and this comes hand in hand with my criticism of religion) seem to find ourselves worthless without its perceived attainment. I refuse to be one of these followers, in my heart of hearts and in my realistic brain too I do not believe it is ever possible to know, yet still I find myself in need of some form of guidance. I am not sure what is right (I am quite sure that your idea of right has a great chance of being disproved) and without that I find myself without a platform on which to assert my beliefs. I am always perturbed by people and their certainty about things of which they know nothing. I am surrounded by a society which wants to assert its opinion on everything, and really at least 95% of it is ill-informed to do so. Perhaps it is the study of psychology and the elasticity of its rules or the study of politics and the numerous ways to think about every concept which has made me so cautious, so hesitant to conclude on a subject on which I am barely familiar with. With this cautiousness and brain cell elasticity, I find that I am constantly arguing with myself, playing the devil's advocate with and to myself. And so, you can be right, and you, and you too. And I myself, don't know. It occurred to me the other day that perhaps my platform is elasticity, perhaps it is to allow for a million different interpretations, a million different fish type ideas in my big sea. And thus in using that I am receptive, I am open, my ears are always listening and my head is always nodding in agreement to possibility.
What troubles me is that in becoming this, I will not succeed in the bipolar world of politics. This realm has seen its most successful operatives to be those who stood up for something, those who were motivated to fight. I am motivated to fight for only equality, justice and rights, but these concepts are subject to cultural interpretation of which I have no authority to impose on.
I wonder sometimes if I do not believe enough in what I believe. As an agnostic, I do not believe that it is possible to know the existence of a creator but to believe this I must concede a possibility that "He" might exist. And with his attitude I must also concede to the possibility of one of the many religions being 'right'. Or are they? Must I?  To me, it is not important whether or not one of them is 'right' and therein again lies an impassivity to religion and truth.
So again I ask, with such uncertainty and impassivity - what do I stand for? Some words come to mind, acceptance, understanding, open-mindedness... but these are as subjective as my attitude itself.
I am bewildered but I am not searching.
I am swimming but I am not heading anywhere specific.
I am content to observe and absorb, to sit and to mull without arriving.
I am forever transitory.
I am a cherry blossom tree. 

When I was in my mid-teens my mom gave me a book by Sean Covey called The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens. Covey, in the book, talked about something I will always remember - the pink shaded sunglasses.Basically, there comes a time (or maybe it comes more than once) in life when you need a new perspective, you need to put on pink shades so that you see the world differently and once you put on the new shades your world will change for you. This part not only left the imprint of the ability to change your world by changing yourself on me, but also the idea of perspective - that whatever the issue on mind might be, you are in control of how you look at it.
The past two weeks have been somewhat of an intense period on my thought-process (read "reason why I'm blogging") abilities,as whatever I seem to be learning at school or encountering in everyday life seems to be something that indirectly or directly relates to my current ideological leaning...
A reminder of the importance of perspective came up last week when two of my professors were at perception war about Mexican-government on the issue of immigration. Professor Shulman boldly stated in class that one of the faults of illegal immigration rested on the Mexican government's hands; according to him it had, by publishing a pamphlet on how to immigrate safely to the U.S., encouraged disrespect of our should-be respected American laws. Professor Mumme offered me the perspective plate upon which I could either see it as Shulman had, or take the perspective that the Mexican government, in its incapability to curb illegal immigration, was merely attempting to keep its people safe as they crossed the treacherous Mexican-American border.
There is a girl in my Political Theory class who hates the idea of perspective, and I sympathize. I brought it up a few weeks ago (and have thoroughly enjoyed teasing her with it immensely since) and she voiced that her frustration with it was due to its infinite elasticity - the fact that you can adopt many and even opposing perspectives on any matter. It does seem to leave so much up in the air, and may be considered the gray area in which the dichotomy of black & white ceases to exist. Is 1pm too early for lunch or too late? Depends on your situational variants and consequently your perspective. Is the sandwich a disgusting amalgamation of wrongly killed animals or is it a hearty, filling meal? Is leaving your laptop unattended an act of irresponsibility or of a trusting nature? And whether or not you have had a negative or positive experience with the situation at hand, it just means that your perspective has been colored by a personal touch.
A friend of mine, R, is continuously bringing up the issue of "limits". When in grey area I often hear her interrupting my thoughts and asking the question - where do you draw the line? Perhaps to somebody, stealing because he is unfortunate and broke is an act of desperation and thus so is not wrong - this is his perspective. But perspective needs to operate on some sort of moral premise. A premise that has all those good values we strive to attain - to be empathetic, accepting, tolerant and open-minded, to be respectful and caring, loving and basically a morally in tune person. But even once that line is drawn, we still live in a world infested and swimming with numerous and diverse opinions. The quest to many of us becomes to sift through them and figure out which of these opinions is "right" and which of them is "wrong". Is it possible to be accepting of all sides of the coin (and this coin has the possibility of having more than two), without feeling their invalidation of your own opinion? Isn't this the problem with religious, political and social issues - we are all so sure that our perspective is right that we must insist upon it? Being an argumentative and decidedly strong on many of those issues, I certainly know  what it feels like to be the one insisting and the one on the receiving side of it as well. It's no pretty game.
I feel like I'm rambling on and not really coming to a point with this. What it all came down to today was a visitation by a cat. Walking down Olive Street on this cool Fall afternoon a very fat and cute cat caught my eye. I stopped to smile at him and his response was to jump down from the ledge and walk up to me. I reveled right then in my love for cats and  when he walked away and gave me his back (expecting me to come up and pet him I presume) I was reminded of the many comments I've heard from people who find cats to have an entitled and stuck-up attitude, and who might even chide you on your like of them instead of the ever playful  and loving puppies. Kneeling down with the cat's back facing me, I thought to myself, well I suppose it really depends on how you see cats. Personally I don't always see the attitude others are talking about - I see a small, sweet domesticated animal who's nature is as such to be unbothered, unfocused and enjoy the occasional brush by and pacing. What it comes down to is that with anything it is always about how you see it, your perspective. You may choose to see anything in a negative manner and live in a world blotched by black spots or you can put some pink shades on, and try to see it all in a positive, optimistic manner.
 

Friends come and friends go, life changes as so.

Long ago I thought you may be my soulmate forever, but today you are just another someone who is long gone.

Perhaps it is the fact that I am at a crossroad right now which will determine my future, which has made me reflect on my past.

What a different soul I was, inside and out. You often hear people say, that they don't know who they are in life and are in the process of trying to figure that out. Am I one of those people? Have I traveled so far beyond my former self that I have not a constant Sam I've carried with me over these past 25 years?

I am considering what is next in life for me. I know ultimately who I want to be, what I want to do and where I want to be. I am just not sure which path will get me there, and this is what has put me in the crossroad.

I'm considering law school, or a graduate degree in political science. Law school is new to me, throughout my many ideas of 'what I want to be when I grow up' a lawyer never showed up on the list. I still do not intend on being a lawyer, I am considering law school because of its capability to equip me with talents I need to become that future Sam.

Last week I had a dream in which I visited my 5 year old self. The dream was a reminder that I needed to consult with my younger personas; ask them their opinion on what is next. So here I go... 

At ages 7-9 I was distracted, allured by the materialistic aspects of the world. Although I read, I knew not of books but of movies. My eight year old self would probably tell me I was weird. But she would like me, because she was looking for someone to aspire to, someone confident and determined. She would tell me the idea was strange, but she would like me.

I remember pink jellies, Lisa Frank colors and giggles.

At ages 15-18 I was focused, and I had found Truth. I learned and I preached. I listened and I repeated. I closed the doors to people, and opened them to faith. A rebel to my parents, but with every intention on fulfilling God's prescribed duty. But I remember something, even as I was this in touch with "Him" I would lay my head down at night and dream about the future. The person I saw was not the person I took steps to be during the daylight. The person I saw was different. She was intelligent, she was peaceful and she was open to everything. The girl by day would have found this law school idea to be interesting, I think she would have liked it. I am not sure about the girl by night, but I can see a nodding of her head.  

I remember a tightly worn black scarf, a mouthful of "shoulds" and pop music. 

At ages 19-22 I began to shed. Very, very slowly. The radical Sam was moderated by different ideas, and knowledge she did not possess. Certainly the appearance of a first love made me rethink dichotomy but so did new friends. It was at this time that I began to grasp what it meant to be articulately argumentative and I loved it. If I had asked her about this she would have thought of those she knew who were in law school and the way they argued, and she would have liked to become that. I've said before I don't think law school ever occurred to me, but knowing these people and reading their words online makes me wonder if the idea did cross my mind at the time. I don't remember.

I remember eye shadow, abayas, a big mouth and walking in heels with grace.

Finally I must contend with the most recent Sam. The one I am most familiar with as I carry so many of her characteristics today. Realizing that all her previous arguments were flawed and uneducated, she abandoned arguing. Instead she liked the idea of a mellow, keep to herself kind of person. She liked sitting in the shadows, observing without judgment but with an eagerness to learn - perhaps in hope that she would acquire so much knowledge that she would once again feel able to stand for something and argue again. I think she would have disliked this idea as she wanted the independence and eccentric life of a journalist which is so different than the life of a person dedicated to law. This person is the one that resonates the most with me and makes me frown at my current consideration.

I wanted to be a journalist, but I don't feel I have enough knowledge or talent to write an argument. I want (present tense) to be a photojournalist, but I know for sure that while I have the eye and the desire, I do not have the talent or the capacity to be one. When I was younger I wanted to be a lifeguard. I also wanted to be a teacher. A university professor. A UN Ambassador. A psychologist. A political scientist.

A common theme; I either wanted to help or posses knowledge. As cheesy as it sounds, to make a difference in whatever profession I was in.

But now I want both because I know that in order to do that, I must posses both the talent and the knowledge.  

At some point while writing this I sighed. It seemed to me that this may indeed be the path I must take.But the sigh is not good news.

Law?

We'll see.  

Dumbledore from Harry Potter has a pensive where he keeps his thoughts, uses his wand to tap out a thought which comes out in a shiny sliver colored strand (bit like his head hair I imagine) and he places it into the pensive, along with all the other thoughts/memories that are too crowded to keep in his mind.
Sometimes I wish I had a pensive.
R and I went to visit a professor of ours (teaches Islamic History, among other Islam related classes) to just chat, which is what we ended up doing for about an hour. This professor makes jokes about all three monotheistic religions, knows so much about the three that I had presumptuously assumed that he'd be an atheist.I suppose I was projecting my own view of the three religions onto him, thinking in learning so much about organized religion he'd conclude they invalidate each other. Well he's not, he's actually very Christian, which he mentioned a couple of times in class and again today while we were sitting in his office. When I first learned this, I was pretty disappointed. Out of my own needs (oh how I combat you daily and want to beat you someday), I wanted him to mirror my own beliefs in a much more educated fashion. I have basic ideas about what I believe in, but to me they are sometimes baseless as there is so much out there I have yet to learn. I wanted my professor to be that well I could reach into and fetch from, in order to educate me about my beliefs. He mentioned his reasoning behind sticking with Christianity, first he described his twenties as a 'dark place' and said that he came out of it 'safe'. After asking him if he ever found so many similarities between the three, he answered me saying that his reasoning behind this was not intellectual but spiritual, he said he saw the gospel in his parents. I found myself even more let down by these statements. Not only had he reverted after much education but did so in a reason so far from intellectual sense.
Only recently have I begun to feel less threatened by my former beliefs. For the longest time I had this fear that I would revert back to what I was when I was 16.. 21. Lately though, as I'm learning more and more I feel myself being cemented into these current beliefs. I've always figured that with more knowledge I would become less likely to revert, so when our professor said this, I asked myself ... if he did, will I? Again, a projection of myself onto him.
And when he said that his reasoning had to do with his parents (and something else I can't remember word for word) I sadly and ashamedly felt slight dip in my admiration of him. One of my strongest theories when it comes to people (I don't have that many that I feel this strongly about or am this sure of) is that they believe in god and religion out of their insecurities, their need to believe in a higher something to validate and understand their existence. I myself acknowledge that my belief in god is dependent upon my need to believe in him, its not something I'm particularly proud of but I am glad that I recognize that much more so than people around me. Disappointed, my professor's reasoning to me stemmed out of his needs, insecurities and flaws as a human being.
Anyway, all these thoughts mounted into this confused cluster, that made me began to wonder if I knew what was "right" and if I even cared. Do I possibly need to feel that I am 'right' so that I don't revert? I love those moments with myself when I can ask myself a question and respond so quickly and with complete honesty that I am sure of how I feel about something. I asked myself, do i really care if I have the "right" answers? My silent, honest answer to myself was that I did not. I'm pretty sure nobody has the right answers, so why would I dare to dream that I would ever have them? On top of that, it doesn't really matter.
So these were the thoughts swimming around my head as I walked home, all in a jumble. By the time I was across from the rec center I was really wishing for a pensive like Dumbledore's. Then, about ten feet ahead of me I saw this girl fall pretty hard off her bike. At least five people near her stopped walking and helped her pick up her things and and get up.
Suddenly, everything was clear to me and all my thoughts breezed away. That is all that matters. That we do the right thing in the moral sense, not the right thing according to any theology or religion. That's it. 

I have too many thoughts jammed into my head about animals right now. We were talking in class about an article by Bernard Rollin which is an attempt to remind us of an ethic we all believe in but seem to have forgotten - we should not be cruel to animals. He says that animals have their own telos. Our professor asks us in class ' what do you think animal's telos is? To serve us, literally on the dinner table?' In Plato's Republic, everybody's telos (doing what they are meant to do by nature) serves the community, as would animals'. She then explained that in the Republic, animals would be at the bottom of the Just society because they are driven by their appetites, bodily desires, and do not have the capacity to think or fear death (harm). So the dog eats and eats until he pukes.

But the discussion in class seemed limited to meat, our carinvore natures. I found myself reverting to biology classes I'd taken in grade school, and thought, wouldn't an animal's telos be its job, the contribution it makes to nature? Bugs for example, carrying pollen to other parts of land to grow plants and flowers which in turn provide other animals with fruits and bugs with nectar. Bees making honey for bears to eat. Cows eat grass then fertilize the grounds with more grass. I remember encountering the idea that all living things contribute to life and the circle of nature. Can these little things that animals do be considered their telos? Are we perhaps stopping them from following that telos by growing them, raising cows for example in tiny pens and feeding them corn which they are allergic to, solely for mass human production? Or is it like someone said in class, animal's telos is to be food for us?

And on the topic of animal's unthinking nature, do they perhaps need to be driven by their simple appetite, and be without the reason that we humans use to regulate our appetites, because they are to stick to primarily following their telos in nature? Looking around today its very difficult to say that people are generally following their telos. People are scattered, they think too much, are distracted by this crazy world they've created. I do believe that everyone has at least one natural gift but I am positive that most of the world's population is not practicing it. If animals were thinking the way we do, they would be distracted from doing their necessary contribution to nature as we are - and many things would go wrong in our modern world. Just as in contemporary agriculture there is a destroyed 'Republic'. The economic base (producers - typically most people) have taken it into their hands (by way of democracy) to make their own political decisions. Government of self is a fantastic idea, and I still believe in it. But there is some truth in Plato's fear for his Republic which has now materialized. Now that we have gotten it in our hands to decide, we've made our material needs a priority and this is what drives our public decisions. The result is a system of agriculture that mistreats animals, raising them in unnatural conditions for mass production.

A domino effect:

Rollin talks about animal husbandry, the development of a reciprocal relationship between an animal and his owner. The farmer treats his animal well, feeds it well, takes good care of it so that he may recieve in return quality materials and food to support his livelihood. Advancements in technlology have created a means for us to do away with this relationship. We can do what we want with animals because we have the technological means to remedy its resulting bad production. The meat tastes bad? Add some flavoring chemicals to it. Professor Young asked us if we had seen Fast Food Nation. Then pointed out that as a result of our maltreatment of both humans and animals, we were getting sick, diseases were spreading. This is not just limited to animals, but also the maltreatment of immigrant workers; they were getting sick because of the bad conditions they lived under, they weren't able to put their best effort into the production process (which comes back to us). Ultimately within society they become part of the class that is taking a lot from the rest of society but cannot reciprocate because of the conditions they live under. This goes back to the positive externalities of education for example. All of these problems are a result of our contemporary need to feed the masses products which are, ultimately deterimental to their bodies.   

Months after watching fast food nation, I haven't yet been able to walk in to a fast food restauraunt and order a meal. And it isn't just about the possibility of unhealthy meat. How can I reconcile within myself supporting an industry that mistreats not only animals but humans as well? In class today I thought about the difference in meat production here in the states and back home. Because of religious reasons (a regulatory system as it always is) the country is supposed to be killing the animals in the right way. I'm not sure about how these animals are taken care of and who does the meat packaging, and under what conditions they live under, but from what little I do know, its a lot better than over here. Both because of religious reasons and the fact that my home country (like many of its neighbors), feeds a relatively small population.

I hate there to be discrepencies between what I believe and what I do. I feel as though before I eat, I need to understand where this food came from and how it came to be on my table. Though I may not be able to change the world, though my small consumption is nothing compared to what surrounds me, I can change my own world and be sure that the life I am living is honest and considerate of other lives.  

With all the changes I’ve made about my future plans, I finally feel like I am doing what I want to do, what I am meant to do and not what a ministry or my family thinks I should be doing. I’ve put aside future worries about money, fears about discomfort or being shunned by people and made a decision to do what I want to do, and nothing else. I’m following my telos. I like that. Plato was right when he said that if all men followed their telos they would be very happy people. For the first time in five years, I finally feel like I am one of these people.

I look ahead to all the plans that I made
And the dreams that I had
I'm in a world that tries to take them away
Oh but I'm taking them back