A new meme

Apr 22, 2007

Situation Sunday 22 April 2007

I just found this new meme (this is its third week), and I think I'll enjoy this one. It isn't freeform, like Iterations, which I enjoy because it lets me pull inspiration from just about anywhere; but the questions encourage longer answers, so I get to think about my own responses and (hopefully) read some good, thought-provoking answers on other participants' sites. If nothing else, it reminds me to periodically re-examine my own viewpoints.

1. You are either married or been with someone a long time. Life is good. Not great, but good. You meet someone that you have a great connection to. You feel strong that this is your real “Soul Mate”. What do you do? If things are good with my current partner, this new person may turn out to be a friend...but how do I know if they're really going to be that much better a partner? I don't...so I'm not all too inclined to leave CP for NP. And I'm very unwilling to try and start 'something on the side' with NP. (I'm going to assume that CP and I are in a monogamous relationship. I know people who are poly, and who are both very happy; but that's not me.)
   
   There's something else to consider: I don't believe that a soul mate has to be one's sexual or life partner. It could be that friend you rarely see, but it takes you guys all of five seconds to get back in sync when you do meet again. It could be someone you see every day who knows you almost better than you know yourself...and you sometimes function as the other half of their brain. It could be the person you're interested in sexually, as well — but it just as equally could be someone with whom you have no sexual chemistry whatsoever.
2. You have inherited a large amount of money from a distant family member that you never even knew. You are the only one to get all of their fortune. They had children but do to a falling out they left them nothing. What do you do? In a perfect situation, I'd be able to tell which of the surviving children would benefit most from some of their parents' inheritance, and I'd offer to split it with them 30% to me, 70% to them (after all inheritance taxes had been paid). Since real life seldom works out quite that neatly, I'd pay any applicable taxes, then divide what was left equally between me and the children. I am not going to spend lots of time trying to figure out which children are single, married, have or do not have dependents...that's a huge drain on my time. I'm also not altruistic enough to completely pass on money that comes my way. I've had a fairly good life, I've done relatively well for myself, but money is a damn useful tool. (If the amount was less than $1000, I'd find some way to pass it completely over to the kids. If the amount was over...oh...one million after taxes, I'd keep no more than $100,000 for myself and pass the rest back to the kids. Money's a useful tool, but there's no reason to be absurdly greedy, even in cases of a windfall.)
3. Erase all sexual harassment, and legal laws protecting you. Could you, would you, have you slept your way to to the top? I haven't, and don't care to do so. I'm most comfortable with monogamy, and don't care to give others any kind of ammunition to use against me: loose morals, bad or indifferent sexual partner, et al — I doubt that I could convincingly act interested in casual sex, and unless the 'ladder rungs' were utterly oblivious, they'd notice...and would probably resent me for it, and thus the mechanism that would get me in to power would be used to get me out of power.
   
   Also, once I was “at the top”, I'd still have to deal with all the corporate bullshit. Nope, someone else can have it. (Seriously - you couldn't pay me enough to be a corporate VP. Wa-a-ay too much internal politicking for this Aspergers-gal to handle.)

Keywords: | Sunday | sex | relationships | memes | family |
Permalink

Everything in moderation. (Including moderation.)

Apr 02, 2007

Tagged by Rashenbo over at Writing Aspirations, with a meme started by Lillie at A Writer’s Words, an Editor’s Eye: To participate, write a post about balance in life and link back to this post. Answer any or all of the following questions or simply share your thoughts about life balance.

I balance a hosting/development/consultation business, contract gigs, volunteer work, writing, dancing, walking, playing with my cats, visiting my friends, and all the other joy that is life (housework, laundry, eating, sleeping). I’m constantly adjusting my balance. I’ll always be adjusting things to stay in balance.

How do you achieve balance in your life? I know what I want, I know why I want it, and I know what I’ll do to get it. I try to be conscious of cause and effect, and the cost of any action or inaction - even seemingly little things. When I initially wrote the sentence in the paragraph above, I ended the sentence after the first two items. I’m much more than what I do to earn money, though. I think; I’m a philosopher. I read and learn; I’m a researcher. I explain things that I’ve learned; I’m a teacher. I tell jokes. I color. I read (a lot. A lot a lot.) I’m a mom to three cats. Yet for whatever reasons, so many people in our culture only define themselves in terms of what they do for money, or how they spend the majority of their time. We’re all so much more than that. So why is it so easy for us to fall into the trap of thinking that we’re either useless outside of the narrow definition of our current job, or the trap of thinking that we’re the most important being in the world and we’re somehow owed something? Why is it so easy for people to believe that one of those statements is true, or the other is?

Both are equally true, at the same time…and all the time. In the grand scheme of things, we are all utterly interchangeable. Up close and personal, though, we are all utterly irreplaceable. (Whoooooaa.)

What is your biggest challenge in balancing your life? The same as everyone else: getting tangled in the extremes. I do this every once in a while. I’ll either get into a comfort zone and stay there overlong; or I’ll try and implement every single idea I’ve got…all at once. Either of these states is fine for about two or three months. Then I either get bored of the comfort zone, or start to run out of steam and can’t follow through with everything. Like everyone else, I swing into and out of balance. I have to self-correct on a fairly regular basis. As much as I’d love to say that at least the extreme ends of the pendulum’s swing are always getting less extreme, that isn’t the case.

What are your priorities? Stay healthy. Stay happy. Help others stay that way. Lather, rinse, repeat. When I’m healthy, I’m able to do things better, learn things better, teach things better. I’m not concentrating on how my back hurts, or how I feel like I’m falling over when I stand up, or how I’m keeping my eyes open only by main force. My body is a complex machine, and when that machine works well, it doesn’t require any of my conscious attention. When I’m happy, I work better with others. I’m more helpful, more supportive, more patient. When I’m less worried about meeting my basic needs, I’m more able to help others

How have your priorities changed over time and why? When I was eleven or twelve, I envisioned that I’d live in an RV towing my horse trailer. My idea was to avoid paying property tax (something I still can’t quite understand, and thus am not all that eager to begin paying) and be able to go where I wanted, pretty much when I wanted. The living-in-an-RV hasn’t happened…and I haven’t seriously wanted that kind of lifestyle since age 17 (when I realized just how extremely unhappy a horse would be confined to a trailer, and when I realized that I’d need more space for my books.) My health requires a bit more preplanning than I would have anticipated at age 12, before I began having seizures. For a brief time, I felt that if my employer had a major emergency, that was my emergency too. That changed when I worked myself into the hospital at age 23, working 70- and 80-hour work weeks because of my employer’s astoundingly bad planning. I now define my contracts as a deal for my skills and a portion of my time, in return for money. But just as I can’t expect a high amount of money for little effort on my part (or for skills that are not of use to said employer), no employer gets to imperil my health or emotional well-being…in other words, my balance. I can, quite legally, get money any number of ways, from any number of sources. My balance can’t be reset or restored by any purely external source. No amount of money can compensate for the destruction of that balance. I finally decided that, because I get very impatient with the exigencies of The Corporate World, I would be happiest if I were able to run my own business and financially support myself that way. I could combine my love of teaching, my love of learning, and my need to do things as efficiently and as effectively as possible. I’m not making enough money to support myself financially, and I have a difficult time marketing my services because I really dislike being “sold to” — hence the need for the contract gigs. By contracting, I avoid the office politics that I loathe; and I’m constantly learning new skills and new ways of doing things. I’m just lucky that I entered the workforce when I did (early 1990s) and where I did (Silicon Valley). The dot-com boom was virtually built on a highly flexible, highly creative, highly mobile gypsy workforce. I wouldn’t have had that option had I entered the workforce a few years earlier, and I would have had fewer choices if I was located in a different city.

What advice can you share to help all of us balance our own lives? Know yourself. Be honest about what you want and why you want it; and you’ll have fewer regrets. Act toward the world as you want the world to act toward you; and you’ll have fewer things that come snapping round to bite you in the backside. Realize that you can’t control the actions of those around you; but you can - and do - control how you’ll react to what happens to you. And if you’re not happy with yourself at the end of the day…maybe you’re slightly out of balance?

I’m supposed to tag five other people; but right now I’ve only got two. (My brain is threatening to shut down. It’s been a long day.) I tag Ealasaid’s Ego! Ego! Ego!, Wylie’s Words, The Screaming Pages, Pseudotherapy, and The Flatland Chronicles. (I’d tag my friend Apryl, whose family just moved from Appalachia to southern California just in time for the start of wildfire season; but she’ll be too busy with her fifty-eight-bajillion simultaneous projects. :D She also just became allergic to avocados…as in ‘anaphalactic shock’ allergic. Go give her some sympathy.)

Keywords: | philosophy | memes | life balance |
Permalink

Looking for some better prompts, actually.

Mar 08, 2007

Thursday Threesome: ::Looking for some Direction::

1. Onesome: Looking — all around today: what landmark or scene do you look for each morning on the way to work or school or wherever? Is there something on the way you look forward to seeing? ...or do you have something that lets you know you're close and it's time to shift mental gears?
   There's nothing on the way I look forward to seeing; but when I'm leaving, every corner means another block further away.
2. Twosome: for — your typical lunchtime what do you see? ...a cafeteria? ...classroom? ...office? ...home? ...the surf in Hawai'i?
   Usually I eat lunch in front of the computer - so whatever I'm doing at the moment, that's what I'm looking at. Except when one of the cats (usually Fog) decides that this human-food stuff must be investigated. Then I'm aiming the Discouragement Bottle and staring down a domestic housecat.
3. Threesome: some direction — When you go out your front door, which direction are you facing? ...or do you use the front door?
   Out. I am facing out. North-south-east-west don't mean much to me unless you're talking about relative position of cities or larger things.

Keywords: | Thursday | memes |
Permalink

Writer, poet, philosopher, sage...one-liner.

Mar 08, 2007

Thursday Thirteen 83:19: Writers' Words

I pulled these from my random quotes file, which I re-found last week. I've got over 300 quotes in there, and I occasionally add one. Quotes that make me think, quotes that make me laugh...those are the keepers.

My quotes come from all over the place; but most of them come from books I've read, or from articles about the authors.

1. The secret of joy in work is contained in one word: excellence. To know how to do something well is to enjoy it. — Pearl Buck
   I'm happiest when I can do a good job at whatever I'm doing at the moment. When I'm rushed, or when I know that there's a better way to get things done, I'm very short tempered.
   Pearl S. Buck wrote dozens of novels and short stories, many based on her experiences growing up in Asia.
2. The people I distrust most are those who want to improve our lives but have only one course of action. — Frank Herbert
   Sure, there are problems that only have a single solution. Usually, though, they're rather simple problems. In far too many cases, a person who insists that a problem has only one “real” or “proper” solution either doesn't have all the information or firmly believes that they are superior to anyone else whom the solution would affect.
   Frank Herbert is most well-known for his science fiction. His Dune series was inspired by an article about the slow but unstoppable movement of sand dunes.
3. Words are, of course, the most powerful drug used by mankind. — Rudyard Kipling
   It's true! Sadly enough, they are also among the most powerful weapons used by mankind.
4. We have just enough religion to make us hate, but not enough to make us love one another. — Jonathan Swift
   Why is it that something that should help people to reason, help people to think, help people live and work together, draw strength from one another...is so easily and so often used to divide and belittle?
5. Truth and illusion are but mirrored refractions. — C J Cherryh
   C J Cherryh is a science fiction / speculative fiction author. She's written several novels as well as short stories. I could make an entire list of quotes from her books.
6. The fox knows many tricks, the hedgehog only one. One good one. — Archilochus
   Archilochus was a Greek warrior poet and satirist. He is widely credited with creating iambic pentameter.
7. How you behave toward cats here below determines your status in Heaven. — Robert A. Heinlein
   And here I thought it determined whether or not we got to be a cat in our next life (good = cat, bad = mouse)
8. Hope is the dream of the waking man. — Aristotle
   
9. She has confused all the learned of Islam, everyone who has studied the psalms, every Jewish Rabbi, every Christian Priest. — Mohiuddin ibn El-Arabi, on Truth
   Mohiuddin ibn El-Arabi was a Sufi poet and mystic in the Middle Ages. He lived in Spain.
10. Interpretation is the revenge of the intellect upon art. — Susan Sontag
    “I like Byron, I give him a 5, but you can't dance to it.” Just like explaining a joke sucks out all the funny, explaining art takes away some of the awe.
11. Wise people, even though all laws were abolished, would still lead the same life. — Aristophanes
    
12. Loyalty to petrified opinion never yet broke a chain or freed a human soul. — Mark Twain
    Whether our of fear, a wish not to disturb their own comfort, or a combination of reasons, people and societies will cling tenaciously to ideas...even when those ideas either cause harm. We're creatures of habit, though.
    While many of the quotes attributed to Mark Twain probably aren't his, they're good quotes! (Apparently, lots of people started hearing things that just sounded Twain-like, attributed them thusly, and repeated the quite far and wide.)
13. Come up with a really great quote, and your name will live forever. — Anonymous
    Okay...that's not from a famous writer. It just made me laugh.

Other Participants

• a metamorphoself of Gabrielle with sets of contradictory proverbs (well, actually, more like “how we should aspire to act” versus “how most people really act” )
• Fishcreek House with tips for shopping
• Amy's Random Thoughts with foods that remind her of her childhood
• Dog's Eye View with odd things about her and her guide dogs
• Di's Book Blog with birthday memories from her husband's life
• The Zeus Excuse with things that are stupider than catblogging
• Philly Transplant with college mascots and nicknames

Keywords: | writing | Thursday | philosophy | memes |
Permalink