A Chair That Sits Too Low

When left to my own devices, I think that "odd" is well. Floating, flying as a fluttering feather, but my mind doesn't seem to mind. Inside out and upside down, everything is in it's place, but out of place it seems. Ceiling, then glass, blurred post, cloth barrier that confines me to open spaces. I wait.

I grumble, and pull my eyes as high as they'll go. The machine preempts the man in the blue shirt. "I'm on vacation." Like radio words filtering through, they slide by me like a stream. Distraction. On task, again. Yet, nothing is on task, really. Can it be? I question. Everything at first, but then realize that's absurd. I let go. It feels good, even if it's too soon.


Oh well.

Caribbean Dreams

The ocean blue
It brings me to life
I smile
I dream

The Online Community

Or, why Vengance.net?


Though I am sure the historical tracing of my choice of the online alias “Vengance” would surely captivate and inspire you all, that’s not what I’m talking about today. Today, I am talking about why I ever chose a “nick” in the first place, or the role of online representation in our community, and the “Online Community” that is being formed.

The idea of and participation in the community is essential to all human endeavors. Science, art, and philosophy are not excused from communal participation, as they might believe they are. Every action we take effects our community, and the fact that this should change the way we live our lives (though has yet to do so in the modern world) is an entirely different essay (against modern superstition.) The car we choose to drive, the career we choose to follow, and the person we choose to marry effects much more than just our personal lives. Even the food we choose to eat has communal repercussions. So the question of the day is, how does an online presence effect the community we live in, and is there a separate community that solely exists in the neither worlds of the Internet.

Online interaction within a small community speeds up and, more importantly, broadens the interaction between and within citizens and “governors” (those that establish, dictate, and uphold the rules of the community along with the common voice of the people.) Now people with valid concerns have easy access to information and answers about those concerns, and an easy way (if the city government utilizes the potential of online expression) to voice an opinion or stance. People are becoming better educating in an increasingly large number of fields. The net becomes a true forum, making it easy for all to participate in community decisions.

However, if fully relying on the written word to convey a message, the personality of a problem or discussion is lost, and face-to-face information is never picked up on or seen.

But is the impersonal written word incompetent of stirring the emotions needed to get or keep things moving, or real action being taken? Does an online conversation really have the power to change governing principles, laws, ideas, and procedures?

I think the open source community might quickly jump in and say “yes!” They have created a small democracy of people that have nothing in common, not even locale, other than their dedication to certain principles, which they hold of very high value. The majority of their communication, if not all of it, is online; yet, they are able make decisions about protocol, procedure, distribution and rights, and carry out plans and actions that really make a difference.

It is difficult, if at al possible, to be a member of more than one community. Usually the limitations are created by physical boundaries, but modern communications have removed those boundaries.

The important fact, however, is that while it is easy for the member of a local community to join an online community, it is impossible for that same person to leave behind all local communities and exist only online. He may succeed in not participating actively in the local community, but non-participation breeds ignorance and apathy towards local situations, and thus has a very real effect on the local community.

The questions yet remains, then, wither a person should establish an online identity separate from his real-life identity in order to not lose his connection to the local community, or if the person should represent themselves online as their normal identity only, thus never falling trap to being lost to an alternate identity.

I believe the validity and reality of online communities are unquestionable. What is yet undetermined is the effect they have local communities

Experiential Communication, Hypocritical Rhetoric

There are things that are experienced in life,
And then there are things that can be written.
They are not equivalent, and they cannot be,
For the holistic journey of life cannot be scribed,
In it completeness, as mundane abstract symbols

Which, made to reflect life, can never resonate
As the swirling motions of the senses combined,
Like a syncopated whirlpool of emotion,
Surging and climbing, which embeds the soul
Into an ethereal world of beautiful contradictions
Which speak wonderment to the mind.

That is where ink fails and imagination succeeds
That is the uncaptureable essence of the infinite opportunity
Guiding to the creation of the unknown
Which is beyond transmittance through lingual capacities
And can only be created anew in another
By the sharing and giving of experience
Unto the understanding of truth.

That is the message, which is impossible to describe.

And human inadequacies will always prevail;
Where full, thick life is lived
Only in being can there be understanding
Only in being, and not the written, can there be life

[Inspired by Yoko Kanno - Sora's Folktale, from the Escaflowne Movie]

Life is a Miracle

Current Music: Bush – Mouth (remix)

“What should I do?”

“Shoot for the stars.”

“What if I miss?”

“Just taking the shot makes your extraordinary”

“What if I’d rather be normal?

“Then you’ll never achieve anything.”

“But what does it mean to achieve?”

“It means you do something worthwhile.”

“Is being normal not worthwhile?”


Every day we are in a battle. This battle is between the demands of our time. I have been told that the best thing to do with my life is to be something extraordinary, the best at something, and if I just put my mind it, I will achieve. I have the power.

I think I sincerely believe that, at least I have in the past. I wanted to be revolutionary. I wanted to change the minds of millions. I wanted to create the movement that would storm across the world.

But now I am left to ask, and I cannot help but see it this way, where would my enjoyment be in doing so? Would it be the same as living a sedentary life? Or more to the point “is being normal not worthwhile?”

The farmer has his place. We all know this, but if a bright, young, gifted university student said he wanted to go a farm and life a normal life, what would we say? I argue we, the society, would say “then make sure you are the best darn farmer out there.”

But what if he’d rather just be a normal farmer?

What we have forgotten altogether is that there is life outside of the profession. The more I enter the professional level of my career, the more I realize sometimes I’d rather give up for more time at home, more time with my family, and more time really living life.

What do I mean by living life? I mean experiencing, not droning in the same tasks every day, yet still enjoying the simple, basic, natural things.

Imagine.

A warm tomato plucked from your own garden. Savor it in your mouth.

A cool breeze kicking around leaves, at the mountain’s point, while you watch the sun set. Feel it. Breath it.

Live it.

Why should we live our lives?

Life is a Miracle.

(Or maybe life is just a big inside joke.)

[A big thanks to Brady Wiggins for the inside joke reference, which is, in itself, an inside joke.]

Floating Monks and the French

So today in my Clinical Psychology class, my teacher comes in and we start the discussion right away. He sits up on his table. Throughout the class period he nests himself more and more firmly on top of the table, until he is sitting cross-legged completely on top of the table. I kept seeing him in my mind, floating above the class mates as he spouted off a few fleeting words of wisdom here, and a haiku there. We spent the entire two and half hours talking about Victor Frankl's "Man's Search for Meaning." It was quite illuminating.

He tells of his sufferings in the concentration camps, and the sufferings of many others there. The main theme of his book how different people chose to deal with suffering. He says the real measure of a man is how he handles, thinks about, and endures unavoidable suffering.

His handling of freedom and choice is what intrigues me. Many religious mental illness-equals-sin extremists have interpreted him to be saying that if a person lives well, and does what is right, they will be happy. Frankl tells about how he gained meaning and life even in the depths of the horror that is a concentration camp. Read it again folks, he gained meaning, not happiness. Sure he had an optimistic outlook compared to many other prisoners, but when you listen to him tell his story, it’s clear it was misery. He was miserable, everyone was miserable. What was fascinating to him was how simple things like a crumb of bread or tiny bit of help from the typically cruel capos were very impressive, kind, generous, even righteous, when compared to the general attitudes and situations the camp.

He never says you will be happy if you put your values above all else, he says your life will have meaning. Ultimately, that is the most important thing in this life. You can see he is not your typical existentialist, yet his is existential because he believes truth, healing, and understanding come from the living of our lives, not the analyzing of them.

So with a background established about the nature of mental illness (such as depression or addiction) that perhaps there is more to becoming healthy (and being happy) than simply choosing to do so, what does one say to those people who have snide remarks like “Just be happy! You choose your life, just do it!?” I asked the floating monk in my mind (my teacher in real life) just this questions, with some psychological jargon/mumbo-jumbo every few words to make sure no one realized I was actually asking a practical question that had to do with my own life. The answer was something like this.

“Well, why don’t you just choose to be in France right now!? Go ahead.” Someone can’t choose to be in France any more than they can choose to be happy. Does that mean we are all lost and doomed to whatever linear causal-fate chain has brought us to this point? No, we really can change our lives by choosing to do so, but when someone is clinically ill, it’s more like making a voyage to France than just “turning yourself around.” It takes preparation, it takes effort, sometimes money, and more than anything, it takes time.

Now, I don’t want to undermine the power of our will, but we must realize our freedom and agency do not mean we are all-powerful – choice is bound by context. Ever played a tabletop Role Playing Game? Believe it or not, we can learn by a simple example from this pinnacle of geekdom. You have the choice to try anything you want, but once you try to jump off that cliff and fly away, you’ll realize you don’t really have the choice to fly. If you had wings, if you had a flying carpet, if you had a hang-glider, sure, but that’s just what I mean by limited by our context. I can choose to be in France all the time, when I’m in France.

I’m hungry, anyone want to come to McDonald’s and get some Freedom Fries? Or is that out of fashion already?

Societal Molding at its Finest

Hilarious Doctor Yamawaki tells the class that so-and-so postulated that religious of this world are more susceptible to mental illness, and the more devout to their religion they were, the more susceptible they would be. “What do you think about that?” she says in her broken Engrish. Now, before I proceed, I have to point out that virtually the entire class is religious people. What follows is a 20-minute “here’s why” of students giving definitive reasons for the results of his studies. I have to give them credit, they were quite creative at debunking the reasons behind this finding. While the research originally postulated Neurosis as being the cause behind people believing religion, the students said things like “it’s less acceptable for someone in a religious society like ours to be mentally ill or depressed so it is more stressful to them, and the people with even the slightest hint of this seek help” and “When we don’t live according to our standards it’s harder to deal with because of our beliefs, and we find ourselves living higher standards than many of peers, which also makes it more difficult and stressful” and all sorts of other clever answers. Most of them, of course, were right, to a certain extent. The teacher even mentioned how Utah is the most educated state in the nation, so it’s likely that they will turn to psychologists for help rather than booze, like many do.

But after TWENTY MINUTES of explaining that the religiously minded really are more susceptible to mental illness due to cultural factors, the truth came out. This guy’s theory was debunked shortly after it was released, with many more correlative studies showing that the religious really don’t have any more mental illnesses, nor did they show up as more susceptible on any measure taken by religious and non-religious professors alike. The entire class was convinced at the simple one-liner mentioning of study that maybe religious people are crazier than “the rest of us.” Not one of them was willing to say “I don’t think that’s true.” How sad!

Though, even I was duped by this same phenomenon. I was a research subject for extra credit, they had me take a long survey about my thoughts about what was effective to being healthy. Then they weigh me, measure me, and have me read three research articles about what really is effective to lose weight. Afterwards, I take what is basically the exact same survey hidden under the guise of different wording. Little did I know that the research articles were fake, and sure enough, my answers about what keeps someone healthy were different from before and after reading the articles. Were my twenty one years of experience really trumped by a few measly fake articles?

I wish I knew where I was going, but I don’t. The moral of the story is this, I suppose. Don’t believe those online surveys you all love, it might ruin your life. The next time someone quotes a statistic, inform them that you have chosen to not be easily persuaded by such simple methods (stupid Jedi thinks his mind tricks work on me!) Most importantly, however, don’t ever believe anything that has a nicely re-capped moral to the, story ready for you to digest – they are probably trying to trick you into being molded in their own view of what society should be like.

I Have No Answers

Current Music: Nickel Creek – When You Come Back Down

Ahhhhh, those lucid moments. Those grand insightful times when all your words flow like poetry off your lips. Those rewarding “Aha!” situations when suddenly everything makes sense. This is not one of those moments for me. I’m searching so hard and expecting the answer to come like a bright light bulb bobbing over my head, but I can’t seem to find the light switch. Some argue that we learn everything insightfully, making big jumps at a time (like this) while others believe we learn a little at time (Brigham Young being one of the first in many centuries to say that we learn “bit by bit”.) Ancient scripture teaches that man is to learn via inspiration from God, yet we are also taught that we are to learn precept by precept. I’m beginning to believe there is some of both in this life.

So, returning to what motivates me today, the “insight” isn’t coming. I want to have the answer so badly. Perhaps I am impatient, perhaps I need to take a cue from my fiancée and realize that I can’t help everyone in an instant, but I want things to be right, and I want everything to be in its place. I just want everyone to get along sometimes.

I have a heard time believing I just said that. I, who constantly complains about people in this conservative area being too non-confrontational, who likes flaring debates, who likes being outrageous, just want the bickering to end, sometimes. I just want these people to be happy with everything, even though everything isn’t perfect.

Now, being happy all the time isn’t really the goal, or shall I say it differently? There are times to be sad. However, there are times to find peaceful meaning in our suffering as well. The clinical world sometimes loses sight of our humanity and assumes something is wrong if someone is not happy. No, it’s very normal, it’s very human, and it’s very important that we have moods, and know when to mourn, and when to be joyous.

But how do you help someone, in general, or perhaps that doesn’t seem to have the happy times that one needs to survive? Do you change the situation they are in? Do you give them suggestions as to how to just deal with it, whatever it is? Maybe you reward them for doing things that will help them act differently, or change their attitude? But don’t these people have the choice to reject any of these attempts? Does it really have to come down to something so flimsy as encouraging someone to choose to do something different, or act differently? There is no power in telling someone that should just choose to be happy, regardless if we can or not.

Is our agency really that all-powerful, that we can choose our mood ever second of the day? I used to think so, but the past few years have made me have my doubts. I learned that not everyone could always be held to the same standard. Can we expect someone who truly has a severe mental disorder to meet the same expectations as someone who is otherwise “normal”? If the answer is “no,” then why should we hold all “normal” people to the same standard when they are so very, very different? I refuse, however, to accept a completely relativistic view. That, in my mind, is an impossible existence.

However, I have a hard time trying to blend these two diametrically opposed views. I seem to think everything is a false dichotomy sometimes. There must be an alternative that doesn’t lie on this continuum. But what is it? Do you see why I’m waiting for a lightning bolt of insight to plummet from the heavens and strike me down with knowledge?

I suppose I can only try to provide those happy moments, and hope they somehow stick, and somehow morph and propagate onward and upward. I’m not sure if “being an example” is all there is to it, but it might be all I have.

Yes, I wish I had more, but it might be all I have.

These lyrics from Nickel Creek sum up how I feel

A special thanks to explodingdog for the image.

The "L" word, and Closer

Currently Listening to: Collective Soul - Satellite


Love. It's word some people have a hard time saying. It’s something that comes and goes, but once it comes, it’s never the same afterwards. I’ve had the luck of never seeing it go. I don’t know what I’ve done in life to deserve that, but I hope I keep it up.

We’ve all heard the phrase “true love,” it’s a romantic idea in pop culture everywhere. It’s cliché, but you know what? It sure is great when you’ve got it. It’s the best thing in the world, because more than just “any ol love,” this never goes away. That plane flight doesn’t kill it, it never gets lost and runs away, it never gets bored, and it never says goodbye. Throughout life, and through death, it’s the one constant I can rely on. In a treacherous world of deceptive relativity, I have something that won’t change with conditions, situations, or context. It defies time and space. Doubt flies at the sight of it.

I wish I knew it better. I wish I saw it every aspect of my life. I wish I wouldn’t forget so easily that it’s there. Luckily for me it is as tangible as my next meal, with the added effect of not getting eaten every time I see it. In times like this I think Plato was right when he taught his people, a materially obsessed, status seeking people, that there was more to life than the mere reflections of reality they saw and depended on everyday. Indeed, there is something more. There is an idea, out there, or better said an ideal. A form that transcends each individual moment and incident, it is reflected in the basest of things, but its nobility is often left behind

Close

Within this fallen sea
I fear, I push away, and yet, still
Close to the one I love, still
Close to reaching the sky, and touching the sun.
Close to feathers flying in the wind, and oh so
Close to falling leaves in the eastern-most town.

The aura seeps in, leaving its mist behind
And solidifying into something
Close to you again and thoughts
Close to the divine that scream “I’m
Close to what I want, it’s here, but
Close isn’t good enough.”

Be.
It is seen.
What could be done
Will never be until I’m so much more than

Close.

© Michael Paul Van Dusen 2006

The Sun Rises

Have you ever wanted to just scream into the twilight, letting your entire soul soar through the glittering sky? Pressed for sociological opinions, you find, every once in a while, that you just don’t give a dime about why anything is happening, and wish that, just for once, people could just revel in their own experience? I keep asking myself questions like “Why is it that existentialism – putting the nature of existence first and foremost – denies the most fundamental, the ontological, experience of all?” and “Why can’t we realize that it is in the experience of our existence that we come to real truth?“ but secretly I want to take off my philosopher’s mask just sink into reality. Stop using professional language and just “skrew it!”

Those moments when it seems everything is sooo real, and every leaf on every tree jumps into your personal existence, seem so fleeting when we’ve hit the ground, just as a meteorite cometing towards the earth stops dead, left to wonder where it’s past life has gone, and if it really ever existed like it remembers.

There is a mode to our existence that changes, and is not to be mistaken with our mood. Though moods can be strong, I believe our mode effects even our physical perception of the world around us. Whatever magical organ in our brain that tells us that we perceive time has a way of putting us outside of ourselves while in this special mode, and we see ourselves in that perfect, happy situation, when the weather is perfect (for me that’s cool and fiercely windy) and your favorite music is playing in your head, and maybe the ones you love to be around are all there too, and we witness it as if we are someone else. (Its not that this is in our imagination, it is really happening, but our experience feels observatory) Almost as if I am not willing to accept that I could really be experiencing this, I never seem to remember the things I said, expect that they were just what I wanted to say. People laughed at what I said, my girlfriend smiled at me, and I guess I felt like I was walking on air. That’s a common way to describe elation, but that’s really how I felt, as if the ground had less friction that normal, and all the colors were brighter and easier on my eyes at the same time. I found beauty in everything.

The closest thing to this experience that has a name is nostalgia, I suppose. I commonly call it that, but there is a major difference.
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nos·tal·gi·a
A bittersweet longing for things, persons, or situations of the past.

A wistful or excessively sentimental yearning for return to or of some past period or irrecoverable condition
[Greek nostos, a return home]
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Think about that, what nostalgia feels like. Sink into it for moment.

Now imagine that feeling in the now.

This mode of being I speak of isn’t a longing for what’s past, but maybe it’s a longing for what is happening right now, perhaps caused by a knowledge that this event will one day only be remembered, not experienced, as nostalgia. This is experiential.

And so I fight for these magical moments, all the time. A mix of artistic media constantly floods my life as a result. I vainly pursue theoretical endeavors even though I realize that only by improving my experience do these minutes that I long for appear in my life. It can’t be planned, it can’t be made, it can only be discovered.

So go. Go discover this. I can’t tell you how, just wish you luck, and hope you find it. I wish I could tell you what it is, but unless you’ve managed to pull it out of that mess of keyboard mashing above, you might not even know what it is you’re going after.

That’s life, have fun!