Some people are afflicted with emotional shallowness. Others, with its opposite.
Most of us fall somewhere in between.
I...
Well, I prefer to think that I know myself well. Some emotions I feel deeply, while others are imperceptible.
Despair is one of the former; affection is one of the latter.
Why?
How should I know?
My choices are my own, and my destiny is not. Fire is my future and ice my present.
I wish I could feel that I were doing something right.
Thursday, December 17, 2009
Saturday, December 12, 2009
Visualization and Catharsis
I used to believe that I could offload my troubles on God. Maybe I still do. No, I think I do.
But I haven't been listening. A barrier's there now; all my sins accumulated into a black, rotting dust sheet on the skylight.
So I have to find some other way. The difference between worrying and meditating is the focal point.
Visualization is powerful. Not in the mystical sense, nor even in the mental sense; but it's useful.
I worry a lot; sometimes too much, and I'll cry myself to sleep. But now I have another way to get my mind off it.
Close your eyes and hold out your hand. Look at your hand. Imagine a rock, a crystal in its natural form. It's round and rugged, black and spotted.
Chipping at it produces a globe of facets, disarranged but beautiful in its own way.
Careful further refinement produces a crystal of eight equal sides, then of six equal sides.
This crystal begins to spin on the tip of one finger; by the time you can't see it anymore, the tip of the finger is at the center of where the crystal used to be.
And who is to say that it was imaginary? We all might be figments in the mind of God; for certain, we are held together by the exertion of His will. And we are made in His image, though we might be nought but images.
But I haven't been listening. A barrier's there now; all my sins accumulated into a black, rotting dust sheet on the skylight.
So I have to find some other way. The difference between worrying and meditating is the focal point.
Visualization is powerful. Not in the mystical sense, nor even in the mental sense; but it's useful.
I worry a lot; sometimes too much, and I'll cry myself to sleep. But now I have another way to get my mind off it.
Close your eyes and hold out your hand. Look at your hand. Imagine a rock, a crystal in its natural form. It's round and rugged, black and spotted.
Chipping at it produces a globe of facets, disarranged but beautiful in its own way.
Careful further refinement produces a crystal of eight equal sides, then of six equal sides.
This crystal begins to spin on the tip of one finger; by the time you can't see it anymore, the tip of the finger is at the center of where the crystal used to be.
And who is to say that it was imaginary? We all might be figments in the mind of God; for certain, we are held together by the exertion of His will. And we are made in His image, though we might be nought but images.
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Hearing things
Do you hear voices? I hear voices.
Of course they're inside my head.
No, not like that.
Did you know that stress induces heightened senses?
Did you know that our senses have two limit sets?
In a standard human eye, the focus resolution of the lenses is precisely the size of the receptor neurons. The eye may have evolved--I don't think so, but I can't prove it--but every variety of eye seen in nature has this character. Similar limits apply to the other four senses; sight is just the most complex.
The second limit set is in the mind. Hearing is the best example of this; the logarithmic amplification curve that the ear uses to linearize physical stress is modifiable at both ends by mental examination. Translation: you hear literally everything, but it doesn't register. Stress will increase the range you can hear, and help you recognize patterns in the noise.
Fascinating, eh? Try it sometime. It only takes about six months of living in a yellow-plus state of alertness to notice a difference.
Of course they're inside my head.
No, not like that.
Did you know that stress induces heightened senses?
Did you know that our senses have two limit sets?
In a standard human eye, the focus resolution of the lenses is precisely the size of the receptor neurons. The eye may have evolved--I don't think so, but I can't prove it--but every variety of eye seen in nature has this character. Similar limits apply to the other four senses; sight is just the most complex.
The second limit set is in the mind. Hearing is the best example of this; the logarithmic amplification curve that the ear uses to linearize physical stress is modifiable at both ends by mental examination. Translation: you hear literally everything, but it doesn't register. Stress will increase the range you can hear, and help you recognize patterns in the noise.
Fascinating, eh? Try it sometime. It only takes about six months of living in a yellow-plus state of alertness to notice a difference.
Under the Influence
DUI. A criminal offense related to driving a vehicle while under chemical influence. Drugs, drink, love, whatever.
So shouldn't there be a category of literary crime for the same offense?
"Writing Under the Influence," or WUI (pronounced wooo--eeee!). Maybe add a few things that aren't allowed.
For instance, some of the pieces on fanfiction.net appear to have been written while the author was impersonating the monkeys from the Shakespeare experiment.
Or the cat from Schroedinger's experiment. Beating their heads on the side of the box--err, keyboard--until the garbage is long enough. Or the author dies poisoned.
Other pieces are obviously written while in the sway of certain rhythmic bowel movements. Such as 'Closer' by Nine Inch Nails. Now, as a rule, I disapprove of modern music--modern being defined as mid-20th century and later--but it does have its good points.
Rap is not one of those good points.
If you must write with music, please, please, please, choose the mood carefully. Lemonade (such an off-the-wall euphemism for written porn!) of certain types may require particular rhythms, but respect the reader and do your best. Anyone expecting to be published as an independent needs to keep this attitude--not foremost--but in mind.
So shouldn't there be a category of literary crime for the same offense?
"Writing Under the Influence," or WUI (pronounced wooo--eeee!). Maybe add a few things that aren't allowed.
For instance, some of the pieces on fanfiction.net appear to have been written while the author was impersonating the monkeys from the Shakespeare experiment.
Or the cat from Schroedinger's experiment. Beating their heads on the side of the box--err, keyboard--until the garbage is long enough. Or the author dies poisoned.
Other pieces are obviously written while in the sway of certain rhythmic bowel movements. Such as 'Closer' by Nine Inch Nails. Now, as a rule, I disapprove of modern music--modern being defined as mid-20th century and later--but it does have its good points.
Rap is not one of those good points.
If you must write with music, please, please, please, choose the mood carefully. Lemonade (such an off-the-wall euphemism for written porn!) of certain types may require particular rhythms, but respect the reader and do your best. Anyone expecting to be published as an independent needs to keep this attitude--not foremost--but in mind.
Sunday, December 6, 2009
Holiness
What is sacred?
Some would give a glib definition involving God or gods and their paraphernalia, treasured writings, and traditions. These are the deists. (Yes, even the humanists in all their manifestations. They worship themselves--or their ancestors, in some cases.)
Others would give equally glib but much more nebulous--read, less thought out--answers about love, higher powers, or right conduct. These are the agnostics.
Some few might answer that nothing is sacred, save that which is commonly opined to be so: privacy, and other concrete concepts. These are the atheists.
I do not know what is sacred. The argument is circular: look up the word in the dictionary. I must choose to believe something and believe it wholeheartedly.
And that, invisibles, is why I am going to burn until time itself is extinguished, and even beyond that event.
Some would give a glib definition involving God or gods and their paraphernalia, treasured writings, and traditions. These are the deists. (Yes, even the humanists in all their manifestations. They worship themselves--or their ancestors, in some cases.)
Others would give equally glib but much more nebulous--read, less thought out--answers about love, higher powers, or right conduct. These are the agnostics.
Some few might answer that nothing is sacred, save that which is commonly opined to be so: privacy, and other concrete concepts. These are the atheists.
I do not know what is sacred. The argument is circular: look up the word in the dictionary. I must choose to believe something and believe it wholeheartedly.
And that, invisibles, is why I am going to burn until time itself is extinguished, and even beyond that event.
Friday, December 4, 2009
Tengo, Teni
I have a pain, because I had a heart...
I have a rock, because I had a choice...
I have a path, because I had a youth...
I have an age, because I had a mother...
I had a woman, but I never loved her.
I have a rock, because I had a choice...
I have a path, because I had a youth...
I have an age, because I had a mother...
I had a woman, but I never loved her.
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
In memoriam
Mene, mene, tekel, upharsin. Transliterations of translations of filtered thoughts.
Significance is collective--the facets of the word 'mean' state it.
So these words, spoken by God through an invisible agency, interpreted by a man He guided, and recorded by that man, are still applicable in whatever way we may see them.
Today I discovered the loss of an author whose work, though shallow, was the activity she enjoyed.
I lift my mug to the choices I have made in common with Daddy's Little Cannibal of the fanfiction.net community, and hope that she took the strait and narrow road less traveled where I did not.
Purgatory is here on earth, my invisible etheric friends, and you will go one way or the other for time without end. Time without end. Time without end. The lemniscate has nothing on true infinity, because we can conceive of it.
Significance is collective--the facets of the word 'mean' state it.
So these words, spoken by God through an invisible agency, interpreted by a man He guided, and recorded by that man, are still applicable in whatever way we may see them.
Today I discovered the loss of an author whose work, though shallow, was the activity she enjoyed.
I lift my mug to the choices I have made in common with Daddy's Little Cannibal of the fanfiction.net community, and hope that she took the strait and narrow road less traveled where I did not.
Purgatory is here on earth, my invisible etheric friends, and you will go one way or the other for time without end. Time without end. Time without end. The lemniscate has nothing on true infinity, because we can conceive of it.
Monday, November 30, 2009
Genesis
Why do I see things no one else sees? Shapes of faces, accents, smells, textures, truths...my own arrogance!
And I still wish I believed I love you. Love being defined as 'doing or being the best that the person needs.'
Have I ever believed anything? Descartes' blithe 'I think, therefore I am' I find a tautology.
Am I insane? what possible psychosis have I induced in myself?
And, you know, you won't be able to answer these questions, because you're not dead yet.
If I had the guts to do it, I'd take the exhortation to take out my eye for an incontrovertible command. Just to be sure, you understand.
And I still wish I believed I love you. Love being defined as 'doing or being the best that the person needs.'
Have I ever believed anything? Descartes' blithe 'I think, therefore I am' I find a tautology.
Am I insane? what possible psychosis have I induced in myself?
And, you know, you won't be able to answer these questions, because you're not dead yet.
If I had the guts to do it, I'd take the exhortation to take out my eye for an incontrovertible command. Just to be sure, you understand.
Novelty
This is a new concept for me: writing out my thoughts where anyone with an internet connection can see them.
I'm young, dumb, and well aware of my many faults. If you don't like what you read, then you certainly don't have to read it. Consider this a universal disclaimer for the posts to come.
O
I'm young, dumb, and well aware of my many faults. If you don't like what you read, then you certainly don't have to read it. Consider this a universal disclaimer for the posts to come.
O
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