Decisions

Sometimes decisions feel like they get harder as we get older - is this because we have the wisdom/foresight to see the chain of events that one decision can eventuate, or is it because decisions somehow have bigger weight the older we get, what is it? Like most things, it's probably a multi-factorial issue.

Age and Hangovers

As I get older, I think late nights get harder to recover from. In my younger years, despite sleeping next to zero hours, I would be so quick to jump into the next event. Now however I find myself well ahead of time preparing my body, mind and soul for the torment of hangovers after a big night.

Left vs Right

A common topic discussed particularly in pop-science circles is the idea that left and right hemispheres of the brain are entirely separate entities connected by the great corpus callosum connector. Where the left is logical, precise, calculated and focused on details, the right is creative, emotionally responsive, able to see the bigger picture. A recent podcast I stumbled upon discussed these notions, and although I've done no empirical study of my own to even verify whether such theories are valid, it did make me ponder and analyse my own behaviours.

Therapeutic Rants

Therapeutic rants is probably a euphemism for "bitching" amongst many circles, but what I mean when I myself rant about the topic is the idea that we as humans relish being heard and understood. The idea in my mind is that humans all have varying forms of expression which is a necessary component of psychological survival, much to the same importance as the physiological requirements of food, water and shelter. Some people also like to use the term debriefing, gossiping, catching-up, diary writing or praying.

Fractals

It is often reported that the visuals on hallucinogens are intense: the world around them splits and shatters into light fractals like a Windows Media visualiser. More interesting I think is the way hallucinogens implode a person's personality (the ego-death) and how my personality was just a combination of different vividly coloured trait fractals.

Qualia

As discussed in the previous post regarding paragraphs, my posts from here on will probably be short snippets of rant. So after stumbling upon my good friend's blog by sheer random chance (some would say serendipity), I was once again reminded to watch the movie he recommended called "Waking Life". Now while the movie explored a lot of existential and metaphysical topics, and was probably more of a documentary with more speculation than narrative, it did raise the interesting idea of qualia.

Paragraphs

So in a last ditch effort to complete my "200 blog posts" in my graduation to-do list, I must sacrifice what little literary integrity I have, and resort to shorter and more frequent posts. Unfortunately, this will mean that my two google-bot readership will subsequently suffer. Yet while a picture tells a thousand words, how much can a single paragraph tell you?

Pragmatism

So in light of recent conversations with friends regarding their romantic relationships, I felt it necessary to raise the issue of pragmatism and its seeming hurdle in kindling my three friends relationships. I will keep these brief for fear these stories can be identified when they should probably be confidential despite only using them for discussion.

Festivities

So last weekend I attended a three-day bender at the largest winter music festival Australia has - Splendour in the Grass. So the question I ask myself is why do I road-trip 6 hours, live "subhuman" (as my friend coins it) for three days not showering, eat processed canned food, dwell in our rubbish tip of a campsite, and just generally sleep in my own filth and sweat. I guess it's all for three days of discovering new music, good friends, and most importantly pure escapism.

The Precipice of Adulthood

So most recently I was chatting to my friend while visiting Sydney and he was filling me in on his new goals for this year of which one of the major themes was the idea that he was now going to be focussed on his career and getting ahead professionally. Our conversation eventually explored the idea that my group in Sydney is more than ever on the precipice of the transition into full blown adulthood and responsibility with about half already having full-time jobs and the other half it feels stalling university as long as possible. Needless to say, it really got me thinking about my own life and its direction.

Personalities

So recently the topic of personalities was reinvigorated and I made most of my friends do the Myers Briggs personality test which after a set of questions, places people squarely into 16 different personality types based on 4 different ways that people approach the world. You can either be Introverted/Extroverted, iNtiution/Sensing, Feeling/Thinking, or Judging/Perceiving. Then your whole personality is reduced to 4 letters: ENTJ for myself.

Lists

So a short preamble: This post has less to do with an idea but more so an explanation for future posts. So when I graduated high school, I made a list of 101 things to do before graduating university and like most lists, it has become a symbol of how I derive so much pleasure from beginning many projects but never seem to finish them. Long story short, one of the things to do is to finish writing 200 blog posts by the time I graduate in about one and a half years. Unfortunately even one a week means that I will not be able to accomplish this task, and that the only way is to write multiple times in a week but that is riddled with problems.

Complex Emotions

This year has been interesting to say the least - by moving away from four years of location stability, and to find myself in a rural regional centre, finally having more hands-on experience in medicine has evoked a lot of complex emotions in myself. The other day in my mental health rotation, a patient with an intellectual disability was said to get agitated at a few life stressors but was unable to fully understand "complex emotions".

One Wish

So another thought crossed my mind on my recent cruise. A local art gallery was showcasing an interesting project - the theme was "one wish" based on the ancient Japanese 'Senbazuru', the tradition of folding 1000 cranes in order to make one wish true. The local artist started with the oncology department of the local hospital and this quickly expanded to involve an entire community.

My Cruisy Sabbatical

It's always so hard to restart something that has been stopped for so long. I would love to say that I had a sabbatical and actually came back with some more wisdom or insight or profundity but the truth is much more underwhelming than that.

Brownian Motion

All metaphysical existentialist talks always seem to go searching for the answer of the ultimate meaning of the universe and why things are the way they are. Shuffling through different views on this matter has always been interesting with different views influenced by that person's interests and specialities whether it be scientific, philosophical or artful. For me, I have always enjoyed that link between my primitive knowledge of the universe through high school physics and attempting to understand the seeming chaos that is life.

Fleeting Moments

The truth of the matter is that I have been once again wanting to write in this for a long time now but have not been compelled enough to actually do it. Often the theme of my life seems to be that I always only write in here when some major event happens, often a sad one rather than a good one and it probably has something to do with how I cherish great fleeting moments by being well totally ignorant of everything else.

One Step at a Time

Just like that song by Jordin Sparks - "we live and we learn to take one step at a time", everything in life always starts with a single step. Before you know it, when you look back and realise that you have run a marathon (on my to-do list), finished an entire degree in university, continued a few years doing a hobby, and for me most recently, jogged every day for a month.

Revolutionary

Being the conservative that I am, this post is not about anything political orientated, socialist-alternative, new system against this terrible system known as capitalism. I feel like the word "revolutionary" always conjures up images about the socioeconomic system, or other injustices in the world - and some radical new school of though or movement that is going to overthrow the current norm to bring greater wellbeing for the most amount of people. I am going to rant about something else - technology.

Recapture

Let me start off by saying that I have a terrible memory particularly of names and people and perhaps this is one of the reasons that I have pursued writing as a means of expression, as a way of recalling and recapturing moments that otherwise would be lost in the incompetent hippocampal memory area of my brain. It's funny though because until recently, I thought that was the only real medium I used in order to do this but I have realised that I also use photography. I tend to work in contrasts, and so does my interest in photography act as a contrast to writing? Or is it perhaps a complement since after all, a picture supposedly tells a thousand words.