settling in

When you're always leaving always pushing away you can never settle in.
But life seems more exciting when you're always on the move.
But why does this seem better? It's not. It's not! Life on the move isn't necessarily any better than life in one place--it's all arbitrary, all what's better for you. Think of people who spend their entire lives in a small town, only occasionally traveling away from it. Think of the depth of the connections they have with a place, with a group of people--the type of support and love that's there. Why is this worse than the life of a person who changes locations every three or four years, always making new friends while keeping certain old ones along the way, even if this means that the number of friends builds up to the point where it's hard to keep in touch with any of them very effectively? I think it's just what's better for you.

And maybe it's better for me to be a mover. This has been the pattern of my life for nine years now, ever since I started college. Spend my 4 years in Pittsburgh, spend my 3 years in Tampa, spend my 2 and a half years here...and now I'm thinking of leaving for a semester, coming back for the summer, and then leaving for a fourth year. I suppose this is partially the result of a student lifestyle, where you're naturally going to move every few years as you move degree programs. But maybe it would do me some good just to stay here. To let myself settle in a little bit more. To not spend my time here in the anticipation of leaving. I wonder if sometimes I like the attention that talking about leaving brings with it. And I wonder if sometimes I like that it makes the moments you spend with people seem more precious, because the clock is ticking--you don't have much time left!

Of course, I'll settle down at some point, once I get a job I like. I may end up settling somewhere for quite some time, in fact, so maybe I better move while I still can. And it's that feeling that makes it seem like I need to go somewhere in the spring, just because I can. When will I have this sort of opportunity again? And my friends will be here when I get back (and they'll be there with me, in a sense).

It was another meaningful day--

stepping it up

I'm in ER. These are my "office hours," but guess what? Nobody's here. And they even have a paper due a week from today! I have a feeling most people are waiting until this weekend to start, which means I should have a nice flurry of questions to respond to when I return from WI on Sunday.

I just talked to this guy who was at a breakfast I went to this morning...the breakfast was for Dr. Mark Siegler, who is a bioethicist at the University of Chicago. He's giving a lecture this afternoon about bioethical challenges facing the 21st century, so they're parading him around campus so he can meet students, faculty, etc. He was actually pretty great--clearly knows so much about this field, but then was able to talk about it in a way that was very accessible to a "layperson." The breakfast could've been more of a discussion than it was--it tended to be dominated by the graduate students who were there--but I still enjoyed it.

Taught this afternoon. Didn't go as well as I would've hoped. I had grand plans and then caved because I didn't think I had enough time to do what I really wanted to do. It went okay, but I didn't get that rush. Sometimes I feel constrained with how the world religions course is done here--I would do things so differently, and I think the students would get so much more out of it!

I'm tired today, because I didn't sleep much last night, because I went to Chicago for a concert. The concert was moving at points, just plain fun at others, and being in the city last night really made me want to move to Chicago for a few months. There's just an energy there that I don't find here so much. I think it's partially in my head, and things might seem less thrilling there after I'd been there for a while, but still: a few months in Chicago would certainly not be a bad thing (and I'd be much closer to C-U and my friends here than if I went to Boston).

From now until November 1, I'm going to be insanely busy with work, but I also think I have enough "fun" events planned where I'll feel in balance. I can work hard during the week and then relax on the weekends. Per a friend's advice, I'm going to come up with a work plan for the next few weeks where I set goals for each day based on certain deadlines I need to meet. I think my goals will have to be lofty, if I'm going to get everything done, but I think I can do it, even if it means late nights in the library and slightly more tired days--maybe I'll work as hard as I used to as an undergraduate! Imagine. I sometimes think if I worked as hard as I did then, or if I studied as much as I see law and med students studying, I would get incredible amounts of work done, and know so much more than I do now. I'm not saying I want to work quite that hard, but I think I could afford to step it up a little bit.

Not much else to say right now. I feel content, if a little tired, and life seems fulfilling.

serenity now

Saw The Science of Sleep tonight. It didn't strike me quite as deeply as Eternal Sunshine, but I still found it moving, and I feel like I'd need to see it again to understand more of what was going on.

Today was another meaningful day for me. I've realized that I can saturate my days with meaning simply by spending time on activities that I find meaningful. Go figure. Today, after the world religions lecture and TA meeting (which was meaningful because we were discussing teaching issues), I met a friend for lunch, which was wonderful. I hadn't seen this person in a while, we had a great conversation, and I felt inspired and supported afterwards--I really have met some amazing people here, and while I sometimes wish that I had more of a "group," the one-on-one connections I've made with certain people run as deep as I could hope.

After lunch, I spent the afternoon at ER (as I mentioned in my earlier post)--I got quite a bit done, and decided I need to try to apply for this one dissertation fellowship, even though it's going to be a lot of work, and a long shot, since I'm not quite at the dissertation proposal stage. But I feel like I need to try, and I'm thinking it will motivate me to work a little harder this next month--it'll be a concrete goal that will require me to complete a lot of the other things that have been hanging over my head the past few weeks, months. Even if I don't get the thing, I'll still feel accomplished. And imagine if I do! I'd be set next year!

After ER, I worked out, ate dinner, saw the movie, went to Kopi with the moviegoers, supposedly to work but as it turned out we mostly talked, and then home.

I felt content today--really content. Not overly happy, not overjoyed, but content. Like I know I'm doing the right thing for myself, like I've figured something out. It's a sort of serenity. I can handle what's coming, even if things get busy.

the breakup

I'm in ER in Urbana. Have been working on my personal statement for Harvard--I'm still questioning whether it's the best place for me next semester, but I think I'm going to send them my personal statement and see what they think. Perhaps they'll read it and say, we really couldn't help you with this. I need to find a place where there are people who resonate it with what I'm interested in; and if I can't find this anywhere, then I should probably just stay here, since I got to my current personal statement by being here, shaped by certain influences. So let's see what happens.

There's a couple sitting sort of across from me--they may not be a romantic couple, but for some reason I think they are--and they do not look thrilled to be with one another. They will briefly talk, neither very animated about the conversation, and then they will stare off obliquely for a few minutes before speaking again. It's like they're together because they have to be and they're just waiting for the clock to run out so they can leave. She just pulled out her phone and checked the time, just now. I suppose this is a downside of some relationships--they can get terribly mundane and even uninteresting. But I know how those two feel--or how it seems they feel--because that is exactly how I've felt in the past with certain people, when you know you're going to have to break up with them and you just don't know how you're going to do it. When the interest is gone.

Today I've felt "right" most of the day. I hope I'm not just getting complacent again. It's good, I think, to reflect and have all these revelations, but I hope it's not just some game for me. I hope I can make some of the changes I really do think I need to make.

tremendous

Today felt like the first day of a new phase of my life, and I think it went pretty well. I didn't do every single thing on my list of "things to do every day," but I didn't necessarily expect to. I got a lot of reading done, had a couple of good extended conversations with people here, talked to a friend of mine on the phone who I hadn't talked to in a while (which was great), ran four miles, enjoyed the weather outside, and entered my midterm grades for world religions. I love when my days feel long, because then I know I experienced a lot.

I am sort of restless tonight.

I think it will take a tremendous force of will to change my life in the ways that I'd need to in order to really be content. My lifestyle just isn't set up that way right now.

opening the heart

I can already feel some of my negative attachments fading a bit.

I think I have a tendency to objectify strangers, to not see them as truly human in the way that I view my dearest friends. I am working on this.

It's funny that I have spent much of my adolescent and adult life looking for Love when in fact for most of the time I've been surrounded by it, from family, from friends. Why would romantic love seem like a higher class of love to me than friendly (for lack of a better word) love? Maybe because I don't have a very realistic view of what romantic love is--I have a romantic view of it, drawn from movies, books, songs, and for some reason I think that view has some correspondence to reality. But it's only the reality of fantasy. The reality that people hold illusions. My view of romantic love is based on an actual experience, but it's an experience that doesn't (and can't) last very long (those first few months of being head over heels). It'd probably do me some good to give more energy into the loving relationships I already have, even if they're not romantic, because they're going to sustain. Opening my eyes, opening my heart, to what's already around me.

I have a meeting...

transition

It was a pivotal week. At least it seems that way now. I hope that, by the end of the semester, it still seems that way to me, because that will mean that the changes I realized I need to make in my life during this past week will have stuck. That I'll actually be putting them into action.

So many things came together this past week to bring me to this point.

I feel a certain strength that I don't remember feeling and maybe that means that this time I'll actually do something about the realizations I had this past week that weren't in fact realizations at all since I'd had them before. My life, I think, has the potential to be so incredibly fulfilling and I have the potential to do incredibly helpful things--I really honestly think that, with people's help, I can make a difference in a way that I'll find meaningful--but there are these recurring problems that keep me from reaching a more consistent state of exuberance, fulfillment. These are problems that I have had over and over again, and every time, I know what I need to do to work on them; but this time, this time, I need to actually make those things happen. I cannot allow myself to get complacent, to get distracted, to let myself feel that everything's okay just because the immediate crisis has passed. I cannot allow myself to cover up these problems, as I have covered them up before.

I need to have the courage to reorganize my life, which is going to mean doing things that are difficult. I am mixed about this. I feel a deep sadness right now, because I know that a certain way of life is passing for me--I have felt this coming for some time now, and now it's here. But I also feel a deep joy, a deep hope, because I know that a new and ultimately more fulfilling way of life lies ahead. I can picture it, I can feel it, and I am excited.

I think (I hope, in a way) that I will look back on this time, this Fall 2006 semester, as the transition between two phases in my life. I think that, since my father's death nearly five years ago (and I am stunned by how long ago five years seems, and I wonder how my life now will seem to me five years from now, who and what will still be in my life, who and what will have moved on, and who and what will have appeared), my life has been about soaking in as many different kinds of experiences as possible, without wondering so much if they were "good for me." I have met so many different kinds of people, done drugs I never would've imagined doing in college, had drunken disasters, taken road trips across the country, fallen in love a few times, been crushed a few times, shifted my academic path, and have used this constant motion, this flood of experience, to realize how complex and diverse and problematic life can be, and how so many people have such trouble locating their lives in a web of significant meaning, to find a deeper fulfillment beyond the desire-satisfaction happiness that, while important, is shallow. Now it is time to take my life a bit more seriously--to continue to flood myself with experience, but to try to dam off the things that threaten to drown me, and to channel into my being the things that will uplift me, riding the waves. I know, now, what these things are, and I am ready, now, to keep these things at the forefront, as difficult as it may be. I am sure I will come to see that some of the things that fulfill me now will not five years from now, and I am sure that things that don't fulfill me now will prove to be fulfilling five years from now; and for this reason I must continually reflect (in balance with my action) to see what these things are, to keep an eye on the flux that characterizes my life, and everyone's lives.

This has been all about me, and now it is time to shift more towards making it about the world.

Wish me luck.

sunny sunday afternoons

Sitting at Kopi on a Sunday afternoon at a shaded table, just caught up on my email from my time away. It's remarkably warm out for October 1--high is 80 degrees today--and I actually wish it were colder. I'm planning to spend the afternoon reading--I've got an incredible amount of work to do, I think, if I really want to be caught up by the end of this semester.

Last night, when talking to a friend, I ran through my options for next semester. I'm sure this was fascinating. But the bottom line is that I can do whatever the hell I want. If I go somewhere else, though, I need to be sure that what I would get out of being there (socially, academically, and/or culturally) would be worth not being here. This is something I need to figure out rather quickly, as January will be here rather quickly.

There are times, like right now, when I feel very strong; and times, like early this past week, when I feel very weak.

It would do me worlds of good, I know, to have a community here--to have a group like I did in Tampa and Pittsburgh. My community here feels more like isolated connections with individuals rather than a web of connections with a network of people. I think having a web is important to my happiness--in fact, let's be honest, I know that it's important, which is why I'm actually considering going somewhere next semester (or my 4th year) that might not be the best place academically but where I would know a small group of people: Madison, Tucson, home.

I am seeing this blog both as a way to make myself reflect on my actions (which I value) and as a way to share a side of myself with my friends (or I guess to strangers, though I'm not sure how someone would just stumble across this) that I don't always show, for a variety of reasons. It also allows me to concentrate my reflection in one place, and I think it keeps me from turning things over in my head the whole day--I know that I can save a lot of that for when I write in here.

I really do believe that if you're fulfilled in your own life--fulfilled alone--everything else (your friendships, your relationships) will fall into place. Things will just flow very naturally. But I think this can only happen if you're independently content to a certain extent, else you start to force it.

On an entirely unrelated note, I love these Moleskine journals. Love them. Have you seen them? http://www.moleskineus.com/ Check it out.

And I bought a beard trimmer today. I broke my old one, and I'm trying to keep my beard very short. I'm trying to cultivate a certain look, just because I like it. We'll see how it turns out.

see what works

My emotional chaos is settling, slowly but surely, and I feel like I'm ready to re-enter the stream of life, though with a slightly different orientation.

Or maybe it's a very different orientation.

What I've learned this past week--or what has stuck with me this past week, since I might've known this before--is that I have to be honest with myself (and with others) about what I want out of situations and out of life, and then I have to try to reorganize my situations and my life around those wants. This probably sounds selfish, though I think that my particular wants involve helping others, spending time with others--they involve other people. I think that, if I am honest with myself and others, I will be able to avoid the kinds of situations that make me unhappy illegitimately (I think some situations bring unhappiness legitimately, like death of a loved one) and check myself when I find myself starting to do things or think things that lead down a road that I know will end in a bad place. I may be able to break some bad habits, especially in relationships, that I've had for a while.

Another fact of my life: emotions are often out of my control. I can rationalize as much as I want, but this can't stop gut reactions and reflexive emotions to certain events. I think these kinds of things only fade with time. That being said, I can't let those emotions control me or distract me or disconnect me. Sometimes I have to throw myself into situations where I'm going to have some negative emotional response and just deal with it.

I honestly believe I became much more self-aware this past week, seeing layers of myself that I often gloss over. I've figured a lot of things out, and now it's time to move ahead and try out some new ways of living to see what works.

conference reflection

Returned from Ohio this afternoon. The conference went well--panels were well received, everyone there was friendly. It was inspiring at times because people were talking about "real" issues, real problems with the educational system, that need to be addressed for many people's lives to be improved. However, I also found it disheartening, just because I'm afraid that none of us are actually going to do anything, despite the inspiration we may have momentarily felt at the conference. I'm not sure how helpful it is to have 30 philosophers of education sitting in a room discussing problems that, for the most part, we already know about. We know that social justice isn't realized in the classroom, we know about radical inequalities in funding that can be traced to class and race differences, we know that a strict focus on standards isn't going to do a lot for the students as human beings. We know these things, but there are plenty of people (the public, for instance) who don't, really. I think that conferences like this one need to be starting points for regular organized effort towards social change, as opposed to isolated events that momentarily inspire an anger or despair with the current system. In other words, change does not happen when philosophers of education talk about problems, if this is as far as it goes. Perhaps we do bring these problems back into our classrooms, where we get to teach teachers in the one educational foundations course they have to take; and perhaps they make some impact on individual students, but I think more likely they alert students to problems, but then the students come to believe they can't do anything about it (the problems are so systemic), so they sort of give up, especially when the rest of the teacher education curriculum doesn't allow them to sustain engagement with these issues. Change happens, I think, when philosophers work with historians work with sociologists work with anthropologists work with policy makers work with politicians work with teachers work with administrators work with students work with charismatic leaders...it takes a sizable number from different walks of life getting together to make a change, especially if you want that change to occur on a large scale. But even for change to occur on a small scale (a district level, for instance), you'd still need a concerned diverse group. Conferences can be great places for these kinds of movements to start, but I am afraid that many conferences turn out to be just about networking, which, while it may be important for career development, should not be their sole purpose, if we take issues of social injustice seriously.