Zizek!

I was on www.youtube.com today and came across Slavoj Zizek, indirectly. What I initially wanted to talk about was empty gestures, but we'll see if I get to that.
Yesterday I was smoking a cigarette on a street corner coffee shop and looked out into the street and had a transcendental/horrifying experience. I realized that all this consumption would outrage us if we weren't used to it. We have been told this is normal, so it becomes normal. It is a battle between human nature and human culture, one which is based on a long line of time behind it and one which is adapting to suit our immediate concerns. This explanation of culture is especially true in our postmodern world, and seems to be the direction in which things are pointed. This distinction can be compared to the Muslims who are either twelvers or seveners. Twelvers believe in a savior of mankind to come at the apocalypse while seveners believe that there is a long line of holy men. What many of us have chosen in this society is to live in the moment, so much so that consequences are thrown out of the window.
"Culture, as such, in order to establish itself as normal, or, what appears as normal, involves a whole serious of pathological cuts, distortions, and so on and so on. There is, again, a kind of uneasiness, we are out of joint, not at home. In culture, as such, which means, again, there is no normal culture. Culture, as such, needs to be interpreted." -Zizek from the movie Zizek!
First I will address the nature of pathology in this outlook: pathology is unnoticed by those who are actually experiencing it. This is a very common belief, but what Zizek suggests as a solution or a reaction to the reality/subjectivity of pathology is unique. That is, when confronted with the pathological subject, we come to realize that the causes of such pathology lie in the power of the culture to impose itself upon the individual. The route of escape, here, lies in the act of interpretation, which breaks down the definition of a "normal culture." While culture is a force which imposes itself upon the individual, interpretation is a way of transforming specifically that force into an even greater number of different facets. The temptation of the pathological in this case is that of lacking: lacking interpretation, and consequently being subjected to the experience of the illusory whole. But it is not the act of subjection itself which is pathological in this case, rather, it is the act which immediately precedes this subjection that was see the pathological in action: in the "spooky action" of the establishment of a culture. What I/Zizek means is that culture does not necessarily have to be accepted to exist, but rather that the greater the perversion that exists in the cultural establishment, the more normal it will feel to those experiencing it. Therefore, those of us who have the experience of the absurd will be opposed to those who have the experience of the normal. However, absurdity of experience only grows in the case of someone who goes into a more pathological society than they had previously experienced, meaning that as the experience of the normal gains influence, the absurd does not grow up in opposition to and therefore with it. This is proven by the fact that there is no absolute escape from the influences of a culture, and that even through opposition we cannot overstep our limitations. What can magnify this feeling of the absurd, getting back to my anecdote, is the knowledge we have ingrained in us from our evolution. Here, the normal existence of our current culture is made abnormal by our experience, or, more accurately, our knowledge of the history of culture. We are being told two contradictory things: that this culture is normal, and that culture progresses. Life seems absurd only if we accept the simplicity of it. My final point being that those who have an intimate knowledge of the history of mankind are much more likely to change the modern culture into a non-totalitarian existence, whereas those people who think that we must treat our current experience as unique to our current circumstances, separate from the past, are much more likely to change modern culture into an accepted state of totalitarianism. I will conclude with a point present in the Zizek quote: any culture of any kind must be deceitful in order to establish itself. This effects the populace without them knowing it: exactly how we want it!
Interviewer: "Don't you love it a little bit."
Zizek: "I hate people, I think people are evil."

More Distinctions

Between avoidance and denial there lies the distance.
The distance is just that: between someone who would rather not think something but still does, and someone who would rather not think something and so doesn't.
The difference between rather not thinking something and rather thinking something else.
One teaspoon experience of thought being too much.
One teaspoon experience of thought being transmuted.
Perversion of something that never existed in the first place.
The relationship with something someone does not want.
The relationship with something someone does not think.
Not thinking does not mean that a relationship does not exist.

Be Real

Blue duck tape where no one will look
It's in the same place as old gum
Which in turn is in the place of boogers

Close-up when there are no pictures
The lull of becoming interested in image
Skateboards require what I have

Only when you lose everything...
Is it never or is it now
There is no zoom on this lens

The camera with greatly detailed pixels
We can only see from the inside
We are blind men being guided by a dog

Hide-and-go-seek
Tag, you're it
If it weren't for an initial delay
It would change instantaneously

Heads down thumbs up
Don't express your excitement
We'll have to do it all over again

An apple falls far from the tree
Out of key melodies can still be heard
The edge is further out for me

Garbage scooping spear
If I would I could
Blatant disregard

Loopholes and black holes
Your 2nd dimension is no match for
My hands....SPIDER

Space Mountain

Space Mountain is the best ride at Disneyland, and the first attraction I decided to experience. It would end up being a horrible start to the nightmare that is Disneyland at age 20.
ME: "I heard a rumor, that Red Hot Chili Peppers did the score for this attraction?"
ATTENDANT: "Oh, that was last year, we went back to the original music."
ME (ASIDE): "Listening to the opinion of the masses will get you in trouble with me."
My great friends from rehab left me in the dust so I had to run up the walkway, around the fat people who waddle like penguins, but still seem to find the will to return to Disneyland all the time. It's as if they feel more comfortable wallowing in their indulgences when everyone else is doing it. Not as if, it's a certainty. If anything is certain it is that fat parents create fat kids. Apples only fall (relatively) far from the tree if the tree is small (in a metaphorical and literal sense).
We enter the control room and on the main screen is a camera shot spinning in space, so that the stars become more dizzying than clear. Throw in a few planet shots to show contrast and you've got yourself something! It's not planet Earth but its round and floating in space.
We load in the "rocket," a name I had found out only due to dreadful circumstances, and leave the docking bay. Ten feet away from the launching pad we stop. The controller sitting at her computer turns on the microphone and announces over the loudspeaker that there is a problem with the ride. The entire time we are stuck I am watching a party slowly develop in the control room.
The party, composed of firemen (the generic emergency response team), line mediators, and the people who say "thank you for riding Space Mountain enjoy the rest of your day," has filled the room to the brim, and must make room for more, or so it seems. Their being behind a pane of glass doesn't keep me from noticing that there are very serious glances being shared between the operators. They must have encountered this before, but at the same time look like they are doing their best. Sometimes trying to look like you're doing your best can cause panic among a populace, if they infer that you are not in control.
The situation at hand did not scare me, what scared me was the relationship between me and the people in charge. If this experience ends up having significance in my life, or will be repeated, it will be when the doctors are examining me and realizing there is no help to be given. I will see them walk into the other room, and get up from my bed and look through the keyhole and listen with my best ears, wanting to know anything, no matter how horrible. I must prepare myself before experiencing something. Knowing the Boy Scouts motto is a good thing, not overkill. Knowing that no matter what I do there is nothing I can change here gives me the overwhelming feeling to change that which I can.
Hushed glances, a chance to be in power
The more seriously you take me...
Panic is in a reciprocal relationship with relief
Not as always, but one cannot be without the other
Walking down the hall, I'd rather be you
You're the one to deliver the bad news?
No one expects anything of you
Responsibility is reliance
You're with me in the separation
The similarities breed certainty
Essential lack can be shared

Kafka

Paraphrase:
Everyone wanted what Alexander the Great wanted, none can provide it nowadays. Use of the sword to provide that which already exists (outside their reach.) Stakes are so high nowadays that, "no one shows direction." You lack followers because your cause lacks purpose.
Text:
"Strip his clothes off, then he'll heal us,
If he doesn't strike him dead.
He's only a doctor, a doctor after all."
Analysis:
What use are you if you can't even do your job? The reliance! The assumptions! The demands! Though the job is very hard, the assumption is that if the purpose of your life is to do something, you ought to be perfect at it. Nothing is perceived as being outside human reach. Our perceptions perfectly fit our capabilities. The assumption is that so long as you can be employed, you can succeed. I can do my (easy) job, yet you can't do your (hard) job? It makes no sense, and this isn't even factoring in the relativity of a given illness. When humans are forced to deal with something hard, like illness, their tendency is to blame. When worms are to blame, it is much more senseless than when another human may be blamed. Humans would rather be resentful than think life is senseless. When you think, wow, it is not our weakness which is to blame, but the strength of outside forces, your mind knows how hard it is to adapt. The threat in the above poem is a way for those who feel powerless in the face of a doctor to express themselves. No one is going to kill anyone, but if we threaten something then he will take us seriously, knowing that we don't mean what we say, but we mean more than we could say but not do. As if there is any difference: the doctor tries his hardest no matter what! This is powerlessness at its core: everything from success to difficulty to purpose to the unknown to dependability to responsibility changes towards the tipping point of employment. This is where all these elements meld into one. Under the heading of employment, all jobs are done to satisfaction (guaranteed) and no jobs are left without workers. Therefore, the capitalist system tries to provide us with everything we could possibly need or imagine, but this still leaves out that which it fails to provide. In the capitalist system, the ideal of pure satisfaction of all needs and desires is believed in, or at least bought into, by the vast majority of mankind. It fundamentally comes down to the belief that there is no viable alternative to this system, which, although imperfect, continues to reach toward its unattainable goal every day. Peoples desires have been transformed by capitalism to such a degree that this change will only come through a type of renunciation.

Coke Babies

easy answers easy questions
auto bahns in germany
you are a statistic
trust THAT
TV inspires that part in me

Someone else is going to come and clean it up
Oppositional resistance is compensating
Don't worry
Special relativity could only be discovered by Einstein

Think about it
Your ways of unknown expression
Are more cherished
Than everything you've done

Youthful aspirations
Maybe I will someday figure out everything
Maybe someday someone will figure out everything
Probably not

Once we're out of here
Someone once told me
If you don't meet up there
Again is an inevitability

Reverse Psychology

We all know that compassion is the basis of understanding. Reverse psychology is an attempt, based on this principle, to make a claim for the crown of most deep understanding of the other. However, this is not necessarily the case: if you use reverse psychology in the wrong context it loses its validity. Reverse psychology is based on a faith and/or compensation: that we are indeed looking at the same thing and/or we are going to agree to agree. It is more the promotion of an attitude than an accurate representation of necessary similarity. It is an idea based on the good of progress when compared to the harsh under achievement of reality. Reverse psychology begs us to focus on what we share rather than that which makes us different. This leads to both the ignoring of uniqueness but also the possibility that that which makes someone else unique can be shared. Either way, uniqueness loses its singularity so it can move on to bigger and better things. Does uniqueness lose value or gain value when it hits the market? The market says it gains value. What is the point of uniqueness if it cannot be learned by others? Uniqueness of spirit is often simplified, as uniqueness is a sign of some internal inspiration. How can one be taught to think for themselves? Is not uniqueness something which was always known, something which we feel as part of our soul? That essential separation we have with those around us cannot be reduced, it is a matter of looking somewhere else. Simplification seems to me to be an friend of similarity and a foe of uniqueness. In a sea of similarity, it is sometimes the difference which can tell us more than anything, for it changes the nature of the entire landscape from an internal perspective. For those who dedicate themselves to the existence of others: you must believe that in understanding others you understand yourself. It is true that such an existence will allow you to see things you would never get from yourself, but the mentality must be maintained that it is the trading and exchange process which is valued rather than the submissive properties of certain relationships. What can pull people apart the most? How about the difference between people who will fight for what they believe in and those who submit. None of us have immunity: everyone is at risk. For those who would rather live in a foolish consistency: you will never understand what it is to see the unknown. What makes people most different is that which opposes the impulse of the herd. What I'm trying to say is that life is a constant struggle for perfection. The eternal is a goal rather than a reality, though some have mistaken it for such. What is of really lasting value seem to be the things which the most people agree on, but one must realize that such things will someday be replaced. To think that the greatest of us (i.e. Kurt Cobain) would think so lowly of themselves suggests two things to me: that they felt like they could prove to be more influential when gone, or that our existences are much less significant than they seem. It mirrors our reality: we are so much more complex than the stars, yet we are under their command. The evil man is he who lives an existence of the stars when given the opportunity for something greater. It can be tempting to live according the the easily identifiable rules of lower life forms, but the truly great thing is when we find a way to live as humans. The real question is should we use the lower life forms as examples for our own purposes? I say no, for the understanding which evolution has provided us is strong enough. We know how to act like a dog better than a dog does, a theory which suggests that none of our unconscious has been erased or lost, it has simply been over-ridden. The sensation of erasure is totally different than that of being overrun. To erase one lives under the idea that their ideas are incompatible with another's (the existence of the lower forms of opposition). Much can go on here, but it is not the highest level. This is an existence based on the realities of the unconscious as opposed to the conscious. A higher life form would be one in which no ideas necessarily contradict one another, that we are all searching for the same thing as humans. Higher life forms would believe to themselves that they are individuals who create ideas not in opposition to other theories but as they see fit, if they even have the guts to think for themselves. Higher life forms sometimes can get so caught up in the actions of ego-less existence that no longer does the ego resist, a sad reality which most of us can identify with. One should do what one is best at, for the sake of others! Marx was the former, creating communism as an opposition to the oppressive systems of capitalism, while the latter cannot be represented by one figure because it is fundamentally an attitude of passivity and similarity. Sitting here in this room, the T.V. on but the sound off, makes me realize that life can be taken in bits and pieces, that to take the whole thing at once is something that is not only impossible, but something which can turn someone into an addictive personality type. I must say how susceptible I am to turning into a type. This is only attainable by a certain observational distance, in which all types are considered and only the most applicable chosen. Going into a supermarket, I am the fastest at getting my food, which means that every week I can get some Panda Express before I go shopping, a luxury not afforded to anyone else. Is it because I have an eating regiment, or I don't really care about what I eat? It's a bit of both, but my point here is that this was not always the case. My fast shopping habits went unrewarded for a while, proving that efficiency simply leaves space for more, without providing any of the entertainment. People who are bored have found a way to get through life without using up their time, but instead of being thankful for such fortune, they curse their fate. One must be open to new habits of behavior before one decides to become a more efficient human being, otherwise the intent does not fit the goal. One must have a goal in mind before they try and achieve it, purposeless intent can only be profitable over time, in which there evolves a purpose more closely related to the intent. But this is a rare finding and circumstance, for which some waste entire lives.

Learning to Distinguish

I am learning to distinguish between the unknowables: the perpetual and the ever-present. Sometimes a thing called denial can become attractive even to the inquiring mind. Usually it is through experiences of obligation, or feelings one gets regarding lifestyle changes that people, if not going the whole way to utter denial, then at least some level of compensation. It's a dangerous field, one in which the supposed experts on "pure-consciousness" must go through some level of denial to believe that they themselves have not compensated on some level. My point is that denial seems to spread or spill much like fear, but in a way that is less immediately noticeable. Fear is an experience which is intuitively known to be fundamentally wrong. Denial has all sorts of rationalizations associated with it, and one cannot believe that it is better to reduce the level of denial to a singularity of impulsiveness rather than to experience denial for what it is. My point is that denial must be dealt with not in a presumptive way regarding the inevitability of its existence but that it must be combated only as it appears. Dealing with denial in an attempt to reduce its existence across the entirety of your consciousness is futile: denial is too adaptable and too specific. Within denial is the microcosm of your mind: lacking its fullness of being but not in any way capable of fulfilling itself in any complete sense of the word. Life, in its experience of the grander ideals and universalized understanding, is only capable of doing a part. The illusion of oneness is a double-edged sword: it can make one capable of original generalizations, or it can seduce someone into a state of contentment which is a majority of life rather than the illusory wholeness of being. Even when we try to fit as much information into as small a space as possible, at what point do we compromise the true nature of the information being expressed? The answer of the inevitability of compromising is insufficient, and we must recognize that there is as yet no clear answer to such a question. What we tend to choose in terms of how hot to make hot sauce or how much THC should be in a type of weed often follows the logic of the more there is in a small amount of space as possible the better. Human nature opposes this type of existence, and would rather run at a comfortable equilibrium in which progress is measured by the way something enhances our existence. More and more, progress will be something which builds on itself. What can humans, the creators of technology, do to change such progress? The desire to stuff as much as possible into something as small as possible must be seen for what it is: a never-ending struggle which will never seem to get as much attention as it deserves. This applies to all of the problems of the world, with the exception of disease, for which we have cures. The irony of metaphysical purity, or emotional catharsis, is that by coming to terms with reality, we accept as ours all the things that oppose such pureness. Our pureness lies not only in the recognition of our weakness, but the changing of our attitudes. The initial impulse does not spill over here, when it would be desirable, and one must remember that once you start down the path there are forks in the road. One must learn that to part from one's creation involves saying goodbye to it, so for this posting I will say: you leave possibilities open but do not go into depth, you are too considerate of your readers, leaving the filling up to them, and finally, you lack direction.

Normal Conversation

Life is blurred by the finality of all that we say. Not to be improved upon? Rubbish! Life is blurred because it is in the fuzzy space that we harbor contentment and things of that nature which require hand-shaking success stories. I lost 15 pounds reading this blog, does that mean it should be read or that it's highly dangerous for your health? How long did it take? Life is blurred in the space of observation. Heisenberg is not a genius as much as the world is a beautiful place. Someone told me that beauty lies in fitting form and function. Well, I think, that is more unconscious than it is conscious. One wonders at such unknowns, and yet knows to oneself that contentment must be applicable to circumstances, for if you take everything without judgment you lose out on the act of conclusiveness. This conclusiveness is the kind of thing that brings us to reality, and it is in this act that we see real revolution. Revolutionaries of the future are ones who would rather bring us closer to the truth than discover something new. That which is new has no foundation, that which is new is shiny. We are raccoons digging through the trash for shiny metal, when suddenly a human comes at us with a flashy flashlight and suddenly the brightness signals something completely different. Run, but don't run in a manner which might signal any sort of aggression, somehow this is quite easy to transpose.

Talent

Well, I heard somewhere (I don't care to say how I got there) that "Biologists explaining the origins of intelligence largely concur that the most powerful amplifier of intelligence is sociality, especially in the need to infer what others of one's own species want and intend so that one can react and plan accordingly." To me, this is quite obvious, to the degree that others try to convince me that my self-deprecation/other-praise is unwarranted. I've always said the only reason I am smart is because I surrounded myself with intelligence. My question here is at what point is talent the factor of intelligence and at what point is it your surroundings. This can be seen as the nature vs. nurture debate. Now, if morality is the way of drawing lines, then it seems to me that the fate of morality lies in helping to answer these deep scientific questions. The lies moralists have told for the sake of expressing the deep human need to distinguish and categorize finally has a purpose. All this mental preparation has waited for this sort of nature vs. nurture debate. Now that the moralists have a context for which their tools can be used, they should be ecstatic. However, the vast majority of them have opposed scientific findings based on the fact that they cannot release themselves from their convictions. In the time in which their tools have the greatest use, they refuse to show them. As South Park has so keenly noted, Richard Dawkins treats science with a sacredness which can only be compared to religion. I think it is time that the great moral teachers of our time start realizing that science can use their help. In a question in which the great amounts of information being appropriated will simply complicate matters more, the capacity to take a large amount of information and weigh it pound for pound is highly valued. I guess what I'm trying to say is that moralists throughout the ages have had a capacity which is hard to understand, recreate, express, so as a result they have had to make up things like God to help them along. Most of the people who follow a morality do not really understand the thoughts behind it, but accept it because of the consequences, which themselves are just made up for the purpose of a morality. The point is, the lies moralists perpetuate are so obvious that the power of their ways of thinking must be great to be so convincing. If a moralist tells a lie, is it not up to another moralist to put him in his place? The great moralist, who uses scientific information to make generalized assertions, who no longer needs to use invented Gods but can use the theory of evolution, a power which has empirically proven itself to be much more powerful. Personally, it is quite obvious that I am not a moralist, I am highly unconvincing, and do everything within my power to indicate to those with whom I am conversing that I doubt, that "I have no idea what I'm talking about."

Stream of Consciousness

I may be too afraid to step to that level but I do have a lot of balls. When compared to those around me, with few exceptions, no one would write a blog. Those who do gain so much respect. Something about the difference between what blogs do for you over time and what the blogs do implicitly. Blogs always grant someone greater expressive skills. It is under this roof of greater expression that the rest comes. It's always a matter of admitting one's inadequacy. There are a few options: piercing through the veil of reality or else your problems gain complexity parallel to your solutions. It is not a matter of choice. It is a matter of truth. It is a matter of idealism, because this idealism exists even in the impulse for truth: never is this search pure, it needs the push from the source of aspiration. Self-consciousness. Lacking something when you know denial is the wrong way. Deja Vu is an identification of the need to amplify the feelings associated with something to pin-point the reason, but no matter how much you turn up the volume you never touch the thing you set out searching for. If you did, which is absurd, would the feeling of Deja Vu cease to have meaning or would Deja Vu suddenly become something permanently within your consciousness? Would everything you see (even if it was a new experience) have that bitter taste of being familiar? A point in which the past informing the present and future backfires. The interesting part about this point is that it has the feeling of eternity compacted into now. Endless repetition loses its punch after the first photograph, or does it? Doubt splits the singular into double, or is the double simply the first act of differentiation? The latter, the longer developed thought, the more likely option, is paradoxical in its validity. The pin-point: eternal time is glimpsed as a photograph in the past, maintaining its purity but leaving its existence as that of the other. How is it that we can perceive something which is not us? The needs of evolution never become obsolete: the best progression happens on all levels at once. The fractal's branching function loses our interest due to the changing of its color, or essential being. When given the option, the more desirable is the latter, but if the former gets neglected in any way-shape-form you can be sure that you will find us in the underground non-exclusively. One seems to expand itself endlessly, the other deals in the realm of self-knowledge: in which the Baroque folding allows potentialities for a needle and thread. One seems to work for the other. One seems to act terribly inefficiently. What is so important to note is that the unknown lies everywhere at once, within and without.

About Me

This?
This is just the revival
Of a survival
Something shown
Something unknown
Something compromised
Someone surprised
Inspiration lies to/in you
You who have seen it all
You who reserve the seats
In a coffee shop every night
Confusion of motives
You hear "Without caring for yourself
You cannot care for others."
There is one door in this shop
Anyone who's anyone
Desperate search for deconstructed meaning
A + B
Enough anything and something
Why?
Why does creation begin to have clear ends
"It buffs it up"
What else?
Creation as a process for itself
For that next time you create
Religious conclusions

Fragments III

Where did it come from? That starburst, which was seemingly packaged was actually just repackaged. Or not.

I know what it's like to have helpful suggestions become misconstrued as hatred.

You have been exposed, now nothing can compare.

You are not Sam, you are Sam's son. But my name is Sam: a denial of the opinion of everyone else to the degree that your own identity is lost, then found you're father.

HEY! Put these on it puts everything in 3D.

I was a popped zit last night, no one got it. Or, I should say, no one even noticed.

Pale Fire

What the hell is going on, I'm being hit by a massive amount of strange information ranging from the smallest details regarding the names of butterflies to the haunting brevity of almost being run over by your friend. I have never read a novel like this before: it is like piecing together a jigsaw puzzle without having the full 1000 pieces. One of such a laziness of mind as I have exhibited at times sometimes thinks to himself that it's better to let the unconscious do the sorting and just reread it later (ending up in more work for my lazy mind, but it doesn't know it yet!). The other part of me says filling in the blanks, not the search for a fundamental theme, is where the fun happens. This novel, the first I've read by Nabokov, reeks of Nabokov. Could this be because he's a Russian posing as American? Could it be that his masterfulness lies in his ability to recreate the scene like it's real? Or (most likely) is it that Nabokov's obsession with death can only be compared (in the scope and magnitude of its depth) to mine? I deeply identify with this man, and believe that his accounts of mental disorders such as hysteria and lunacy to be dead on. Part of the reason for this is simply the vastness of information he has appropriated from personal experience, and part of it is that he still understands what lies at the heart of it: a desire for greater power. Whether that be the will to dispose of a tyrannical leader or to immortalize your soul in poetry, I somehow feel that we humans can do so much that is outside the normal processes of our minds. The best way I know how to do this is to take away something which you desire deeply. But I digress. My point is that Nabokov has created a web of reality which is so vast yet so compact that it inspires me. I felt for a long time like a knowledge monger, endlessly consuming bits of knowledge without being able to put it into some compact form. That, I believe, is the missing piece of genius. We can easily get addicted to knowledge, and that scares me (even though I've seen it). Anyways, about the unknown, the afterlife, the key to this lies in its simplicity. When I compare my experiences to those of John Shade I realize not only that mystical experiences are often quite similar to one another, they are often very brief. This inspires me to realize that humans still have a long way to go, but that progress shouldn't necessarily take place from one advancement to another (the path of convenience) but it should take place in the way of Nietzschean reevaluation. This means that no longer does the iPhone evolve from the Blackberry but that the individual's desires are transformed to create a man dedicated to himself. Suddenly, everything that a man sees is in a new color. I will not go into how to do this now, but I will say that it feels as if there is so much unused potential in this world of the future. A place in which change takes place in one's mind long before it comes to be a reality. A bridge in which the only builder is the genius: Nabokov.

Eiffel Tower

I, like many Pariseans at the time of its erection, think the Eiffel Tower is ugly. Its sheer mass borderlines on collapsing in on itself. Its huge base (even larger when you're standing under it) makes the top look like an antenna fit to be atop Mt. Wilson. Although the view from the top is spectacular, the view from the middle is nearly as nice: it doesn't need to be so tall! Personal biases came into play as I visited on a rainy day: it provides no shelter from the storm! It is extremely impractical, as it looks like a big metal pole sticking out of the ground. Sadly, my favorite book of French philosophy was ruinined in the rain at the tower that day. It's arching architecture is completely unoriginal, one can see such pretty symmetry on the Camps-Elysees with the Arc de Triumph. If you visit Paris, go here first if you go at all, so as to see the entirety of Paris at once. Yet its virtue is its downfall, its height makes it look absurd. Besides, if you go to Magic Mountain and see the ride Superman, it has the aesthetic appeal of the Diffel Tower: it is the tower cut in half with a roller coaster gouing up the side!

Dali's The Persistence of Memory

Salvador Dali's The Persistence of Memory is another one of my favorite works. There are many elements in this work which are typical to Dali: the ants coming out of the clock, the clocks themselves, and the ocean. Dali was a man obsessed by the eternal, and this painting is no exception to that rule. In my opinion, this work is a fantasy of the paranoid. The ants in this painting make an appearance in Dali and Bunuel's Un Chein Andalou, coming out of the hand of one of the characters. In my opinion, this is like the spreading of a disease across and from within the body, or, in this case, a clock. The fact that they have not spread very far means that it is only in the act of the sun setting, as opposed to the movement of the sun during the day that we see such action. This is clearly a sunset rather than rise for the creatures of the night are only beginning to let themselves be known. This fuzzy space of, "is it night or day?" is furthur used in the depiction of the ocean. A pool of water, elevated from the ocean like an infinity pool is an expression of the darkness's way of creating fuzzy space. One begins to wonder whether the ocean is overspilling its bounds, and the mind creates not only the extra portion of ocean, but the sides of this "pool" in a reaction to the doubt of its actual existence. This uncertainty is also expressed in the clock on the tree, where a branch, visually unsupported by anything directly underneath it, is strong enough to hold up a melting clock. These mind games are very interesting to me, as they seem to show us the blind spots of our consciousness.

Van Gogh's The Starry Night

The Starry Night holds a great deal of personal significance and past experience to me. Not only was a copy of it pout in my room as a child, but at some point in elementary school I painted a copy of my own. What struck me then was the strange brown tower-like structure on the left side at the top, watching the city lights from afar as if they somehow mirrored the starlight. Now looking at the painting, it is obvious that although the same blue pervades both city and sky, the way Van Gogh paints the stars is entirely distinct in itself. While their light is progressively brighter as one looks toward the middle, each star has it's limit of light output, like orbs of energy whose strength is limited. I believe this is an expression of the emptiness of the night sky, with its points of extreme lightness and darkness, provided by the night's vast space. Its extensive use of blue in both the sky and ground expresses the sky's enveloping nature.

Bop It

Bop it, twist it, spin it, flick it, pull it. A record somewhere in the 200s. Once you get into the zone your task becomes simple, for it is only a task. The mind adapts to the task, literally at hand. Once you break your record you're bound to come close to it next time. Provided it is legitimate, it will be broken. Now, the baseball home run record doesn't apply, because they are all illegitimate children of steroids. These actions are irreversible. If everyone jumped off a cliff, would you? Everything requires a whole lot more individuality than one can expect of the addressed child. I wouldn't want to be alone. Children are literal beings, a fact necessary in comprehending the difficulty of the use of this adage. But if we can't expect all adults to act a certain way, trying to change the children to act a certain way is not futile or useless but expecting a lot, which comes to my final conclusion, that the idea that we must grow and be responsible happens in spurts of expression is false. That real growth is slowly and internally harbored and waits for those moments of expression. It is in the invisibility of the form that makes us believe that creative spurts are the way it should be. This entry was slowly brought up over a long period of time, it is the flow which is spontaneous.

For those who I don't know

I'm sorry I missed you
I'd meet you, but not everyone likes a gossip queen
Or a tattle tale, like my neighbor called me
But if I tattle tale her
My parents will lose a friend
Or not
But I'll be a bully
Doesn't everyone want to lose?
In some way or another, we want to be free
Whether or not we know what it is or not
Everything is slowly dying
Intellectually I am a believer in progress
Forever stuck in place
Forever striving for an acceptance
Of myself, of those around me
All there is is internal/external
Or so they say
The importance of the world lies in decision
Over my contentment and perpetual sleep
Of volume on high
Can't hear my voice
As more therapeutic
Than to listen to it
Though easier to maintain, harder to change

Gobbledegook

I can't explain it but I feel like everything I work towards is fleeting
It doesn't matter how hard I try, the end result is fleeting
It comes in moments of pure terror
It comes in moments of the idealized
Whatever it is I know it when it happens
You'd have to feel it to know it
And if you missed it, you want it
And if you saw it, you'd want more
Only problem being it's being beyond my will
And if I try to do something, it is only to prove I can't
Writing is therapeutic
Reading never leads me where I want to go most
Map it on the body
Safe to stay there if you never want to see it again
What is this desire for the unknown always changing
Knowing what I know now, maybe there's nothing left
To pun, to say, to fight, to do, to become, to be
But now, when I am most proud, inspired, how to end?
The question asked, the answer null

Put Jelly On Your Shoulder

I have a memory of the beach which links to a memory of the mountains. The former was while I was a wee one approximately the age of three. The latter was around the age of ten. I had always been taken to the beach as an infant, none of which I remember but of which I am told. My mom's mom used to live there. I remember walking with my parents, them holding loads of beach stuff and I walking next to them some early summer day. We had just left the car and my view of the limitless ocean and sky which must have met each other at some point was lodged in my mind. When we walked a couple of hundred feet from the parking lot there was a concrete sidewalk for bikers and roller-bladers of all kinds. Upon reaching this area my parents stopped walking to allow the bikers to roll by. As they came closer I walked right out in front of one and was run over. It must've been quite painful, but pain isn't something you can particularly describe or quantify. As in a doctor's office where they ask you if the pain is a one or a ten. The man who ran into me was very angry, and scolded not only my parents but me about the accident. I remember my parent's resentment of him well. This is the only memory I have of that day at the beach. When I was ten, my family and I were driving through the mountains to Lake Arrowhead to either visit my dad's parents or go to a UCLA alumni camp. We stopped on the way up to take a look at the view of Los Angeles below. Upon getting out of the car, I started to have a panic attack, fearing that my fearless sister would accidentally fall off the side of the mountain, never to be heard from again. I started screaming and yelling and generally freaking out but that did nothing to stop my sister, though she later claims that that was when she knew I cared about her, and that it most likely made her safer when going to the edge. So in turn I closed my eyes and looked away at the same time like an ostrich would.

Exclamation Questions

Comes when you feel like you're saying something new, true, yet debateable. It's not like that to you, but to someone else....?

John Donne's Bater My Heart, Three-Personed God

This tale of a man who feels unworthy of God's love is mainly found to wish that someone will stop him from being evil. He has no sense of control over his relationship with God, and though he knows this is one necessary step for faith, it is not enough. In fact, it is an example of the dark side of Faith, a man who regrets his decisions but cannot change them. "Betrothed your enemy;" there is also a sense that he feels that God is too powerful, but as we know, Free Will is an important piece in God's plan. He wants us, maybe, to express our humanity of power so that his own strenght of creation may be seen. Thus the untenability of God.

Ben Jonson's On My First Son

His sin is too much hope. In the case of a living father-son relationship this sin may be absolved by making friendly suggestions rather than demands. Sin is void when you go at a problem with a different methodology. It's in the way you do things i.e. an adverb. He also says one should not lament x when one envies x but those two definitely come together with an acceptance of fate. For example, one begins to secretly desire death (or, rather, its simulation) when one accepts death. It gives one a better sense of understanding. This theory is furthur supported when he claims this poem as his best. From tragedy to triumph. He even goes as far as to say "Here doth lie...his best piece of poetry." The analogy of the poem as dead is obvious. And to lament is a lacking of what one desires.

Artaudian Thoughts Followed by Nietzschean Thoughts

The smartest bees are those who do their jobs on the edges of a flower patch, where the others don't go for fear of the limit. (I'm the only one congratulating them.)

How do I feel about Van Gogh? I remember his self-portrait, those eyes and cheekbones protruding as if he was piercing the viewers sense of self not to become him but rather to question and boldly look into the terrifying space with an attention to detail and simultaneously having reckless abandon. He has an aesthetic look to him, "fiery eyes," but I see him looking at you more than at a picture he's about to paint. He must've looked into a mirror while or before he painted. The sense of engagement hints that it is indeed during his painting. His plea has a sense of independence to it, knowing that it is right yet unattainable. "No, Van Gogh was not mad, but his paintings were wildfire atomic bombs." -Antonin Artaud

The most evil thing Antonin Artaud did was against those who identify with him. He gave those evil psychiatrists more information on the disease than they should have, thereby diagnosing more people with the disease. To what extent does this fit into Artaud's larger motif of making people feel his sickness? Perfectly! But he fails to take into account our desires, it's always him, him, him! I wish to ask my friends what they want out of their lives...
For those who aren't sure, they know deep down that all desire precedes experience, just like Freud said.

The cry of the painting "The Scream" precends not experience, but memorable experience. Artaud's cry comes back to haunt him when he refuses to publish his letters based on the fact that they are going to be altered. Idealism as a defense mechanism for one's fear of not being heard. The cry is useless unless heard, for the crier it does nothing, only as secondary effects and consequences of Nietzschean power.

Be a better listener than a converser and you will be told.

Do not encourage bad behavior, yet do not condemn.

Lack of fire, certainty in action, and faith in the fate of myself and faith in the beginning stirs of consciousness.

Self criticism over social criticism.

What can we teach a horse? Anything provided it is desirable and there are learning obstacles in between stages.

How will I quit smoking? Only slowly but surely, for the negative consequences are long term!

My strong will is luckily directed inward, toward self-knowledge.

I'd like to think I'd be a benevolent leader, better at opposing evil power structures than making good ones.

"And thus it will happen one day that a man will be born again, just like me... and in a better land they will meet and contemplate each other a long time: and finally the woman will give her hand to the man."

As soon as it goes in I feel it. We live in such comfort, as do the animals we give shelter to. We have so many experiences in life, yet we forget so much, relying on the evil yet trustworthy generalizing emotions which keep our friendships intact. When off at college, we want to make ourselves new. While at home we want to return to the good old days. What happened? Instead of digging for old memories we sought new memories, which were futile without our old ones.

On Consciousness and Concentration

Lets say, for example, one exhales. Now, "what goes on in your mind" here is something very simple. Regardless, even this affect is extremely hard to trace. Lets say you feel a certain something in your body as you exhale, this far from guarantees that this is indeed that main mechanism of action of the exhalation. The goal, therefore, is not to trace out every piece of the exhale, wherever and whenever it may be influential, it is to find the core of the experience of exhaling and to modify it that way. How to do such a thing can only be accomplished by a) forcing oneself to take a very exhausting and/or relieving exhale and b) allowing the exhale to be perceived as an isolated event.

Fragments II

Double cough, cough, then try to reproduce!

Let alone mental states, bodily states are impossible to repeat, even right after you've been there.

The best guess for where my mind is now is where it just was.

Training is not futile, but its ultimate goal of perfection would be. Many settle for simply the limit, and they call that perfection (especially considering the body's health).

If you see people close to you doing something, sometimes you will do the opposite, or, in my friend's case, the same thing as a child, and your maturity then becomes your freedom!

Simply how it works.

Only smoke for the sake of smoking, not because you're bored.

Doubt your calling and you lie between the space of sincerity and nothingness.

Hopes/expectations too high, but he just wants to ride as long as he can, could care less about the far future. (Not in terms of work ethic, in terms of attitude) (an interesting case, if someone is jealous of you).

Repetition starts to suck when it takes effort, I mean, repetition is fulfilled when it is effortless.

Why sit in a circle? I mean, who introduced it? To this group and this group only? Someone who wanted a change toward tradition, toward community, but it's not necessary, it's just a nice addition made into a foundational law. It adds stability, so that new things can arise, so it acts as a freeing yet unnecessary circumstance. But it is essentially capitalistic, satisfying all through one means.

AH! Sun Chips! How novel you are! But oh how quickly you grow old! The more new memories I have of you, the further away from your place in my youth you move! That is, unless your place had been constant!

I'm really good at: hiding, making mistakes at the right time, doing drugs.

Stir crazy: "when you just have to leave your immediate environment."

My creativity comes and goes like a landed sparrow, I must make sure to keep this notebook with me at all times, never missing a beat.

When I Write Something Really Good...

When I write something really good, it will be two stories, the first of real experience, the intermission will say, "you think I did this of my own free will? Well, I have another story to tell." As I stare into the ocean I realize I no longer need outside stimulation to get where I want to get...for now! Then the second will go back into the past, and tell my real story...http://varietynow.blogspot.com/ start reading until you see our agreement! It was independently arrived at, which I'm very happy about.

Fetal Breathing Introduction

The Toaist concept of fetal breathing is like a combination of extremes, that is, breathing without breathing. What you do is you hold your breath as long as you can, and, during that breath, you act to your mind as if you're breathing. It gets very intense, very fast, especially if you can contrast yourself with what you were doing a few seconds earlier. It can be enhanced by a) smoking cigarettes b) focusing on the back of your head (not to prolong your breath but rather put you in a more natural state) c) focusing on your stomach will give you a vibrant, quick-fleeting image d) focusing on your eyes will give you the closest feeling to being baby-like (a yearning). My method is to take two inhales/exhales, and on the there as long as possible. There must be more to this process than continually repeating oneself, but I will update when I figure that out. If guilt works the way it is supposed to, it makes itself obsolete.

Cause And Effect

Cause and effect is a very intuitive way of thinking. I will now explain my relationship with this scientific format. Causes which are done by ourselves as a result of our free-will result in a desired effect. Lets take an example from Clockwork Orange: an excellent commentary on free-will: the main character is treated, as cause, and cured, as effect. This major turning point was dictated by cause and effect. One learns to rely on outside sources the moment one's future is saved. This mirrors the use of drugs, and part of the reason I loved them so much was my being attuned with their effects. Now, I have two things to say about the nature of this type of perception. First, causation only comes to mind when we controlled the cause. What caused the cause to cause the cause is entirely unknown. Second, one can never be sure of how much of a cause one needs to produce an effect. This is seen when in Clockwork Orange the main character begs and pleads the scientists to stop with the therapy, yet they won't, because not even scientists know the first time. It is in this case that ignorance is really not bliss! Nietzsche says of causation, "The interpretation of an event as either an act or the suffering of an act." This duality of cause and effect seems to segregate itself when we look at it this way: the main character in Clockwork Orange equates his becoming a better human during his greatest act of suffering. So, as his suffering has the effect of less suffering for humanity, it guarantees that the cause will continue so long as the balance is not met (so long as someone needs his personal revenge).

Working On A Story

I'm currently working on a story which is an interaction between the most peaceful person in the world along with the most violent person in the world. The going has been hard, but I think eventually rewarding.

Why Nietzsche Makes Me Uncomfortable

The way in which Nietzsche makes me uncomfortable is completely unintended, or, rather, a consequence of the way he writes: issues such as duty are brought up but one is unsure of what eh believes its value to be. For me, it puts me in the position of opportunity: to have the strength to put down the book and think for myself. I often find myself dissapointed in my inability to see the rich fullness of what he is expressing. The other thing Nietzsche does, which, on the other hand, is not admirable is how he uses tiny pieces of art to fit his needs without giving an accurate representation of what the piece was about (Deleuze followed and called it virtuous). It is the fragmented nature of art, so as to bring out its best (or most useful) parts. The whole issue of my inability to see the rich fullness of what he is expressing has made itself more obvious when I was writing poetry: that so much goes into so little, that one must understand all the facets of the poetic reality. This means that the poet's personality will become much more obvious to the reader so long as the reader has done a bit of poetry himself.

Fragments I

Relieve? Relive? Which one? One or the other. Prevent, defend, it's all a temporary lapse of time, a game to preoccupy. I want to get to the top, I'm bored of this game. Preconceived notions are reliable, and premature behavior is the standard. How is growth possible within regression? It is unknown. We must go for it all. All or nothing! Inhale/Exhale. Gavin Hale is my replacement in a dream of whatever it wasn't baseball. Has consciousness become so estranged that words take precedence?

Regret and guilt are very similar. Especially in how they cancel themselves out. See, the whole point of regret is to keep someone from repeating history, so if it works like its supposed to it will be preventative in nature. The same with guilt, it is based on a past mistake which you must take personal responsibility toward catharsis.

My old ways refuse to work anymore, which I hadn't really realized, it's time to say, "from this moment forward." This attitude is the least sentimental and least narcissistic attitude I can come up with. I should know, I'm a sentimental narcissist.

I should know, I've been there. I should know, I've done that. I should know, I should know.

Bad jokes are actually quite multifaceted in obvious ways, which lends to appreciation but they entirely lack misunderstanding, which, as Jung says, is crucial to being a Nietzschean philosopher of the future. The spell check says Nietzschean is not a word, I should know, I saw some of Little Miss Sunshine.

Putting non-existent stress on oneself is for me a way to put myself in a place where I can to my best kind of work (in the clutch). But to continue to put on stress without relief and to live in a state of perpetual stress is very bad for anyone! Therefore, one should not necessarily do what one is best at. Built up stress and relieved stress are the two extremes of my bipolar self.
The doctors tell me bipolar disorder is any oppositional feelings, not just manic and depressed. The committee (in the brain) is not willing to make a compromise, it is in a state of listening to itself but getting caught in the feeling of one isn't necessarily more significant than the other.

There must not be all that much too see! If one forgets or refuses to remember, "all" becomes lesser and lesser, until you can put it in Al Gore's lock-box. I feel less like I forget and more like I refuse to remember. All this under the veil that I am constantly trying to understand myself. I must contemplate that which is most deeply wrong with me.

I appreciate all brain food (provided it is digestible).

I want to pay my dues all at once, its tough, but thats the way I wish it were.

Flies have consciousness of space-time.

What is the key to life? Adaptation; staring at the horizon. Why I love the beach? The tides are regulated by an unseen force, each wave is powerful and different. I feel like eternity is more unattainable than haunting now-days. There is much less urgency, but my most important goals have not yet been reached.

My useful lie: telling myself I'll be out in 30 days.

The fan mirrors the wind, yet is unreceptive, does what it was made for without interference.

A sports fan is like a fan.

Horses probably hate being ridden. When they walk it is both glorious and laborious, huge strides.

I promise not to lose you, journal.

Blog, you can't be lost, I don't like that. You're always around, waiting for me. You should gain my respect rather than demand it, fool.

I don't like the idea of having your senses fit reality either, because how valuable are your senses anyway? The best sensory perception, in that line, is not one that can taste, or, rather, endure the bad tastes and consequently have a huge repertoire, but one which can delicately differentiate let's say, the smell of a good orchid and a great one, which others may not be able to sense!

I'm Back

Sorry for being gone for so long, I've been in drug rehab since the middle of May, and have loads of new material which will be posted here very soon!