Gaining Direction

Since it has been forever and a half since I've said something else, I suppose I'll just jump in.

This last year has been an interesting one in contemplating how one "finds" a passion. One of the problems that has always presented itself to me is that it really isn't that easy. Some have problems just getting excited about anything, or being motivated to do any one thing for a period a time, but none of these problems accurately describe my own. My problem has been that I find SO MANY things interesting enough that I can, and have, thrown entire days and weeks at a time at any one thing. Not so much a problem, but something that complicates the issue is that it seems that if I do throw that kind of time at something, I do pretty well. It doesn't take long for me to go from complete novice to something resembling decent. This hasn't helped in paring down my potential options.

One one hand, I think it would be really cool to build my tiny house idea, learn all the electriciany things, hook up some solar panels, and then make a hydroponics garden  I could very easily just start making plans for people and figuring out how to sneak plants into people's homes. On several completely other hands, I could look into video game psychology, and even within that, I could try to design levels, characters, draw, test, research, try to learn to code....pretend I know how to tell a story, I could go and write/illustrate that book that Tracy and I need to write, I could try to beef up my Japanese and somehow combine ALL  of that into something.. Just so many things that I could start getting into, and make it seem like they want to be done now.

But at the least, there are some things on the horizon that are catching my attention and making a plan happen. I need to keep drawing, but lately there have been game psychology openings among developers, and and I have a list of skills that they seem to require. There was also an internship open for the Tumbleweed House Company. I'm applying to that in the very near future. All of these are giving me a better idea of what skills I want to have so that I can talk about them. I need to get on C++, I think that unless there is a big opportunity for me out here on the west, that it wouldn't be a bad idea for me to go home, build my house, build my computer and just start cramming on code, game design, and statistics and art. Maybe some ABA stuff too. But there is a plan, and that's more than what I had a while ago.

I still feel pulled in a lot of directions at once, and I still can't believe I know enough of any for someone to pay me any kind of livable wage. It just doesn't make sense to me why someone would hire me out of college with no experience. Perhaps it's just my perspective, but I can't believe I'm at a point in my life where I can pretend to justify someone paying me thousands of dollars to complete a given task. Maybe I just have no faith in employers, maybe I just simply don't have skills, but the idea that someone would agree to pay me even 20-30k is pretty ridiculous. I'm still in the mind set where I don't know how to make an argument for any more of a salary than that without just dropping off and spending 3 years getting better at one skill, or by getting graduate degrees.

I suppose we'll just have to see where things go.. I suppose it may take quite a while. I keep managing to surround myself with people who are excited and have confidence in me, but at the moment, I can't help but feel stupendously average at the tasks I'm completing. Hopefully, if I keep poking away at things I might work to be almost above average at something.

Spaces

Yet another research paper, yet another 3am post. I am not enjoying the pattern in these schedules.

I feel like I need to start drawing again. I need to return to my world of creation and shapes. Once, I was nearly to the edge. I was close. I was close enough that I could pear over the precipice and see the downward slope toward the grove of goals. They were right there.

Every now and then I need to remember that I am stretched thin. I am so used, so at ease to be thinking in multiple times, multiple places, and maneuver through the world on the fly. It is how I am. It is me. It is what I do.
But I am tired.

I am really, really tired.

I am in too many places. I am in too many times. I am not here. I am not when. I am not what.

There is no chance for a full revival. Only stim packs and the random chanced upon reminder. A fleeting shimmer. A green leaf amongst a sea of yellow.
Too many traps. Too many dwellings. Too many don't matter. Not enough matter.
Stop. Move. Flow. Settle. Be. Expand, but return home. Travel forth, but hold a spoonful of oil. Drink from the sea and wrap yourself in the lonely, fickle wind. Give it a friend for the moment. Show it softness in order to remember your own softness and grip. Breathe. Find your motion. Find your cycle.
Find your place.
Retract. Center. Find security, find safety. Find a hill to roll down. Find a tree to climb. Let its slow hands reach up and lift you in its concerned skyward embrace.
Make yellow dance against a backdrop of seafoam orbs and lavender oranges.
Touch colors, smell the sights, taste the music.
Remember.



**reboot.



grow.

Working Title

So, I will add more to this later on today, but I am getting a little confused by this.

Actually, no. Realized anything I could ever verbalize into words is best put in rage face form. If anything, this is more proof that i should try to make an effort to get something meaningful thrown down on this webzone.

Close Enough

It is just a little off, but still about 16 hours away from Friday afternoon. This week has been moving unbelievably slow. I've been working pretty hard I think to make everything work out the way that it needs to. I've prepared a net for myself this time, and have some pretty good hand holds if I need them. I feel tingly and a pretty sleepy. Just want to get this over. Could have maybe even finished it today, but that wasn't the plan. The hour is drawing near and I will be able to embrace it. This very post is even another way for me to be doing something and still move time along.

I feel so fussy.

Needs to be tomorrow already.

Apart from this, things are proceeding well. I will be able to safely navigate this semester if this first week is any sort of a standard. I have been level, I have been moving. I have been given pieces that could be my future, and this weekend I will take steps to grasp them. I will continue to work on and finish drawing and painting some of the portraits for the grandmas.
Forgive me Wisconsin, I know I am not as good a son as I could be. Instead I merely give you the bare minimum. I am trying hard to change this so that I might finally be rid of it and actually earn the praise you've bestowed on me.
Thanks everyone.
I will not make you liars.

Rest assured, I don't break promises.

What I need to remember.

Everything in circles. Finishs so you can start. Start so you can find the middle.

The Flip Side

I find that when thinking about things regarding social situations or just in general things around me that have manage to disappoint me or deviated enough from what I wanted to have happened that there is a good exercise to go through.
1. Identify what you wanted to have happen/experience/whatever.
2. Remember what happened
3. Know how it would have had to change in order to reach #1.
4. Seeing how the compare, is #1 appropriate?
5. Is #1 a responsible view on the world, or is it a small selfishness?
6. If #1 had been achieved, how would things be different?
7. How would others know that was what you wanted and did you communicate it well, or what could you have done?
8. Would you be happy if #1 had been achieved?
9. If was considered selfish, why is it selfish and what is the root of this selfishness? Is it simply a sporadic feeling, or is it something else?
10. Is it significant to be thinking about?

It is generally my opinion that, in retrospect, I struggle largely at 6, 7, and the 8 area. Part of the problem is then changing perspectives to others and knowing that they have their own little wants for the moment and then what those might be and exactly where do you or do you not fall in that. I am also still learning what is appropriate to do if I feel that I am just third wheeling a group conversation and have not added anything for the last hour. At this point am I still an active participant, or am I simply next to a few more people?

Also, it has come to my attention that sometimes things that you actually want to have happen, happen anyway without your being aware of them. For instance, old example of sitting at a table by yourself for the purpose of a social experiment to see who will sit with you. What do you do when the people actually sit with you? Do you become happy and overjoyed that they have chosen your presence to surround themselves with, or do you push it back in your mind because you really were hoping to perpetuate a self fulfilling prophecy and try to rationalize something by their absence?

Reality pt. 2

Which begs the question. Which am I more preoccupied with, the idea of the thing, or actually accomplishing it and advancing to get there?

In how many areas of my life is this really pertinent in?

Amber, 45 degree upper left crimson clouds perspective

Thanks Tracy
music
Social Psychology has been very reassuring that I am pursuing something that is of great interest. Reading is not a chore, and I may soon just go ahead and finish the book. This is the psychology I am interested in and most familiar with. This is a class that I feel I must do well at and cannot fail. Productivity has stalled over the last week, but it is making a return. Refresh, reboot, step forward. I watched a few episodes of Full Metal Alchemist Brotherhood again this weekend. After taking breaks in between watching large amounts of the show I am always hit with a very heavy, very real realization. Ed and Al never, NEVER stop trying. They never stop moving forward. They have a goal, and they not only strive for this with everything they have, but they do not lose their own identities through their fight. They have seen people killed, murdered, tortured, sacrificed. They have only each other, and have barely any friends who they can speak to about their past, or uncovered secrets. A particular scene that sticks with me is in the original series in which they come to Tuckers house to prepare for their State Alchemy Exam. Al is admiring the books and exclaims at how many there are and how cool it'll be to read them all. As he waits for Ed's response, he looks down and sees his older brother already half way through a book reading furiously.
"He's already started." Al jokes.

No hesitation. Always motion. Always learning, and the courage to confront the many obstacles that threaten to kill them.

At the least I am realizing these things and can try to keep up with them.

The other notice-ment is that of the dangers of mulling. I am good at it. I have much practice. I can understand things very well. However, that which is being understood must have been an actual event, which actual facts, and actual intents. Substitute intents only work so far, and usually for the wrong conclusion. "If we stop worrying, and fighting about time, I think we'll find that it's really on our side."-Scrubs episode. I want this to be true. I want to be able to stop thinking about right moments, situations, and how to time words. I need to work on teaching others how to listen and understanding that they already know how to.

On Ice

Eerily right on.

Breathe

Note to self: today was stupid

pros: did not cut off fingers, despite math, am still alive.

cons: got stitches, had an imaginary homework grade that applied only to me. I was not even there. I got a zero. Got a D on a math quiz where I have same answers of some one with a B. English teacher for AP lit. cannot handle words with multiple definitions (Ex: flowery). failure has come up and reared its ugly head. Apparently now that I've been accepted to a college, I will now just be subject to ridiculously stupid scenarios whose main goal is stopping me from going to college by any means necessary.
><

Worry

Ah yes. There you are. And to think I almost started living without you.

Once Again XKCD..

Link
For some reason, pictures are being very not formatable.

Please don't be a Prediction.

What is Real Anymore?

Levels

bleh. things are changing without change. nothings happened, but by just adding time, it seems like so many things are decaying, growing, falling apart, being repaired. and then when i step back it's all how i left it. it's the same workshop i come to and try to make the most with the tools i have. where i make great ideas, and never get to them. where i prioratize things wrongly, and have only myself to blame.

in the imagined world, things make more sense, but is extremely worrying. reality has so many more unknowns that can't be assumed.

i need to change this. it feels like time is slipping, either for better or worse, and there has been too much fretting on the past and future. so much thinking has been put into the future, that i fear i have impaired the present from running smoothly. and if i'm not in the future, then i'm in the past. categorizing, analyzing, running search engines and probabilities. and in the dementia of near insomnia, words change, different conclusions are found and hung onto, and they seem so real. to the point where actual conversations are altered to accommodate the theory, future conversations, hints, verbal ques, and actions are created with such perfection, that the line between reality and the imagined becomes faded.
what is real?