Month: September 2019

A Hope Of Falling Into Wakefulness

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A place between sleep and wakefulness, like a walking daydream, nothing seems real enough to shudder me into existence but not outlandish enough to constitute the believability of a dream.  Like a forced existence or conscious stasis, I am yearning for something to animate me once again.

It’s a chronic problem, this apathy for the reality that makes me wander off into different places looking for something I can’t find within myself, interest.  Sometimes I find it in the strangest places, traveling like Alice down the rabbit hole wondering how far I can go before I wake up.

It’s because of that I consider myself a hobbyist.  In the way that I collect hobbies: cooking, baking, folding paper, sewing, drawing, and writing.  It’s all seated in the desire to learn new things. It’s the dabbling, understanding just enough to allow me a peek into a different world that I enjoy. The craving of seeing the world slightly differently than before. A strange addiction to expanding my perspective, one that seems at least on the surface never to run out. It keeps me around at least for a little while, before it’s not enough and a fall back into this place.

I think that’s why I also like the stress of deadlines, it feels somewhat more like I am alive. It’s a bad habit to rely on to keep me going, but it works.  The stress pushes me to move and keeps me awake long enough to feel conscious again.

To be honest, it always feels as if I just falling through the sky, wind brushing past, but the ground never coming. Like a continual stasis, like I could close my eyes and float forever. I wonder what will wake me from this recurrent waking dream and bring me to life once again. What will keep me grounded, and aware What will bring me back home.

 

Aimless

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There has been this growing feeling of unease inside me, these past couple months have felt different than all those years before.  Something has shifted, aside from the accident and the mourning, it feels like something is missing.  This precious fuel source that drove me wild with want and need after all these years seemed to just dissipate after the accident.  Like ease or contentment has made me run on empty, slowed down my gears, made it feel like the tin man whose run out of oil, frozen. I had started to believe it was all because of these changes, but I realize there is something more going on.

Like a person in a field told to throw a ball at a target he can’t see, how can you possibly move forward in a meaningful way if you don’t know where you’re going? I realized recently that I’ve spent so much time on the goal of getting into a Ph.D. program that now that I am there, I have felt a bit aimless. I mean other than the small goals I have what else is driving me forward?

I need to reassess where I am and what I am doing. I have other wants and dreams, but they are much less clear to me. Like my desire to become a professor at a university and do research, but what type of university and where? Or how I want my life to look like after these five short and long years.

With no clear direction, how can I shoot for what I want?

I’ve spent time meditating over this, this idea of what I want and need out of life.  I asked the world to give me something reflect on, to show me the path and listened. Through my experiences, I was given the answer I was looking for.

First, I listened to a man speak about teaching, with much wonder and zeal.  He spoke of giving kids a chance to learn, believing in their ability to become greater than what they initially thought. That resonated with me, gave me a piece of that want I was so looking for.

Second I found myself to words of those around me speaking out about all these opportunities to work beyond the walls of research and educations. The ability to have rhythm and rhyme set by a schedule every day of the week.  These words tied knots in my stomach making me realize that a least, for now, it was not for me.

Lastly, I found myself talking so pleasantly with others about all these questions we still have left in the world, and I become excited and energized about the possibility of answering them. Finding those truths that will enlighten those who need them has always been the thing that empowers me most.

In the end, I did not come away with a clear goal but at least an idea of what I want.

I want to work in academia, researching people and technology. I want to get the chance to teach the next generation and give my passion for the subject to all those who listen. I want to be able to live life flexibly, throwing myself into my project with no time or place needed to contain me.

I wrote smaller goals to myself in place I will always be reminded, knowing full well things will change as time goes on, but for now I have a direction. A target. A place that all the world wants me to go.

A Long And Winding Road

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Its one of those – be careful what you wish for – moments. Where you look back and wonder why your thoughts something would be easier than what it actually is. All signs pointed to me being wrong, but how could I not be blinded by the excitement of learning something new.

I have an anecdote that I end up repeating when explaining what I do and why I sometimes miss the mark in conversations. It comes from an observation made when I spend too long in my in the weeds of my profession.  My world appears to shift, and the things that would be generally seen as abnormal or esoteric become humdrum. It’s like I live existing in a bubble, causing me to care about only was seems to be relevant to that bubble and nothing else.
I didn’t say it was a good thing, it’s merely what happens.
But when talking to other people, outside of work and my field, I can finally see how far I’ve strayed.  It’s a career that requires me to understand both inside and outside of the bubble but in word and in practice are different.

So why bother telling you this, what was it that I wasn’t prepared for? Well, my new program has been dishing heapings of humility. Showing me how much I don’t know about other fields and how tunneled I’ve gotten within own. It’s a good thing, having wanted to experience different things and have a chance at exploring new areas. It’s hard, though, stepping outside of what I know and being a beginner again.  It’ was something I was envious of others for, those who had learned one thing and did another. It’s a different perspective on life and work.

I don’t know exactly how this new knowledge will help me, but I find solitude in Steve Job’s old story about learning calligraphy.  Noting that as long as we are learning and making the most of the lessons, we can never know when you can bring something unexpected and new to the equation. It doesn’t make it not hurt less but it at least it keeps me on the path, one where I can’t see around the end to the next corner but ultimately knows it will end with achieving my dreams.

And So It Begins – The Golden Boy, Now Stateless

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Just as a digression before I begin. A few years ago (when I was going through the Ph.D. interview process for the first time) there was a prospect of me moving to Dallas to attend school.  Though this opportunity didn’t end up bearing fruit there was a beautiful thought of being able to name a series of blog posts – The Golden Body in The Lone Star State – which other than being descriptive of both where I’ve been (growing up in California, and it being the Golden State) and where I was going (Texas is the Lone Star State) would have been a catchy title for process of moving away from home and being in a lonely state of mind.  Though reality ultimately it turned out for the better I did hope that wherever state I ended up in had a nice nickname to make a catch title. Low and behold I went to the one place in the United States that doesn’t have a state nickname… because it’s not a state at all, Washington D.C.  Maybe it was the world’s way of telling me that I need to try a bit harder on the naming scheme, but as it stands now, I’m Stateless.

 

 

I’ve been here for almost a month now, trying to find a home in a new place. Transforming these open spaces into homelike traces wanting so much to find where I belong.

All new things take time, the question is how much time should I take.  It’s easy of course when you have a place you’ve established, it’s easy when the reality is that you are only so far away. Everything is so new, and so different but walks around with the false facsimile of something familiar. You know, it’s a lot of effort to have the chance to find where I could possible stand. It has caused me to lay awake at night, unable to find a comfortable place to lay my head, yearning so much for what I’ve known. There is no break from that reality for me, I am here, and they are there. With thousands of miles of land between us, there is no illusion like there is with the sea, that you might just be there on the other side of the waves. Though we can edge that distance, the truth is that you or I can’t cross it completely.

It’s trying to find that place that is comfortable, which is hard for someone who at times doesn’t even like his own skin.  It was easier last time, I had a group of people that I was thrust into on an extremely regular basis, a community already established, and a community of many who wanted to connect just as much as I. Joined by as shared vision brought on by this beautifully temporary space, connecting not only in dream but in heart.

I didn’t need to prove anything to them, I came in with a much-warranted humility that I need to start from scratch. Start building up from where I was, though experiences not learned. I think my two years have given me a slight complex about wanting to show I’ve learned, to prove that I know, and to know that I am respected.  Respect takes time, it’s not handed out like candy but built like cake. Layer by layer. It’s partially because I’m scared that I use this knowledge to defend myself, to make it seem like I am competent and confident when in reality, I don’t know what the next step it. I’m shaking inside, retreating into my head, thankfully I’ve made friends there since last time, so it isn’t too detrimental.

It’s lonesome, though. I thrive when I am known, and here nobody knows me. I can’t say it’s all that bad, people are friendly here, living their lives to the fullest. Going from place to place with a mission and purpose, and all I’m trying to do is find where I fit in all this. Of course, if I would stop thinking and just do, then I would eliminate most of my troubles. If I were to reach out, and make reality what I want it to be, then I wouldn’t have this problem.  I need not regress to this shy person I was before, the one who didn’t know up from down and didn’t understand anyone including himself. Maybe it’s premature for all this talk now, but it’s hard not to the I’ve awake at night wondering where everyone else in the world is.

It’s a bit troubling, but I have to be resilient to myself. Now is the perfect time to become who I want to be and stand firm who I have been.  It’s that belief in myself that I need to renew and learn to power forward. If I am true to myself, then people will naturally gather. There will be some bumps on the road, but this is an excellent chance to reaffirm what I know and grow even more.

I can’t say it’s been easy, but who really want life to be easy. It’s too dull that way anyways.