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tarigwaemirLowell House, on the Feast of Ste. Hedwig
Oh my gosh, Bleach is so cool! Thank you for the links,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
memlu!
I still need to do my own laundry. Ugh. I have enough clothes for exactly three weeks, but now that three weeks have passed...well, yes, I need to do laundry. And wash the tenegui while I'm at it. >_>
Post-kendo notes: for some reason, in the last drill today, I had a really good men. Extension and tenuchi. Was vaguely startled by how right it felt. Am so going to remember that for jigeiko--if I can retain it, that is. Now if I only can figure out how to do the stomp properly. It's been kind of fun discussing kendo with the Wellesley girls (I had dinner with them last night and lunch with them today), although I'm always slightly amazed by how much sheer motivation they have. (Unlike Jenny and me, jaded sophomores that we are.) But their enthusiasm makes me remember again that I do enjoy kendo, that it's fun in a weird, painful way. Of course, it's a little easier to remember that when we're not doing any difficult keiko. ^_^ I hope writing about kendo doesn't become a weekly habit, but lately it feels that it's been my main topic of conversation with both Jenny andtryogeru. >_>
Well, that and relationships. Our blocking group chatted in the dining hall over over an hour about friends and their boyfriends. Jenny and I have been having an on-and-off debate about a comment I made to Tryo-chan last week, that I didn't want to fall in love. I find it difficult to explain it, so am going to try to write about it instead as a public declaration of my standpoint on the matter. Maybe I can just link people to the explanation in the future. Cut to spare the friends list from my repetitive self-analysis.
Let's see, how to put this...every night, before I go to sleep, I pray (yes, I do pray) for a boring, simple life. Okay, so I put it a little more poetically than that. I want my life to resemble the flight of an arrow, tracing a perfect parabolic arc from the moment it's released from the bow until it arrives at its destination. (My mother is fond of this particular metaphor.) Having a cynical streak, I know that such an ideal path is unlikely. Nevertheless, it is what I aspire to.
I think that many people who know me but don't know me very well assume that I want my life to be planned and predictable because I'm, well, a boring person. Okay, perhaps I am. (I have my quirks, but I'm essentially pretty bland and uninteresting.) What I'd just like to say is that being boring is a choice. I understand that when circumstances are out of my control and I have no say in the matter, ce qui sera, sera. But when I do have some free will in the matter (and I'd like to think that I do have some control over whom I like and choose to marry, hormones and unpredictable nature of the universe aside), I will choose the boring life every time. No passionate romance for me. No spending time obsessed over one person. No mad infatuations that inevitably end in disappointment.
Besides, I have the sneaking suspicion that I'm entirely too self-centered to care about one person all that much. Sometimes I've tried to have crushes on people...but that's the thing, I tried. I had to maintain an emotion that wasn't natural or spontaneous. I tire out quickly; there's only so much mental energy I have. That's why I've never been able to keep up with my high school friends with their obsessions.
Here, people object, how do you know if you're capable of love/infatuation/obsession if you've never tried? I reply, I do know to some extent what intense emotion is like. It's not that I've never felt it. But (and here I reveal myself to be the utter geek that I really am) the times when I've felt intensely happy, intensely absorbed--a near physical pleasure, I assure you--is when I suddenly understand a particularly wonderful idea. That's why I'm a closet Platonist.lush_rimbaud and I used to argue about idealism versus materialism often in ninth grade. I suppose I've never really doubted the existence and reality of intangible things because, well, nothing has made me feel closer to being in love as an idea. (There's the same crash of disillusionment involved with that too.) People like to say that one day you have to move from books and actually start living life, but I think they're not fully appreciating the impact that a book can have on you. Having your mental apparatus or framework turned upside down or completely rebuilt by a book is not the same thing as simply experiencing what the book is superficially writing about. It's not always pleasant either; it can be absolutely terrifying as well. I remember reading Demian as a huge turning point in my life. Demian was real to me not because I liked him as a character but because he completely bent my mind with his talk of Abraxas the God-Devil and nondualism. (Okay, not particularly radical at this age, but hey, I was twelve or thirteen at the time.) Also, in class, when we learn something particularly beautiful--there was a moment in AP Chemistry last year when Ms. Basker explained how all reactions could be viewed in terms of kinetics and thermodynamics, and I felt positively thrilled by the connection (I wish I'd get those moments in chemistry now ;_;). There's this sheer happiness that comes from completely understanding an idea and then figuring out how it fits in with other ideas. It's why I'm probably born to be an academic. Anyway, I have had such moments before where it seems that the emotion is utterly out of your control and wholly spontaneous--you are in love or in agony, and it's all natural, not some artifact of "I should feel this way so I will try to convince myself that I do." But never about another person. I don't even know if I want to feel so wrapped up in another person. It seems kind of limiting, in comparison.
Also, and here's something that I find the most difficult to explain, I don't think love--that is, interpersonal love--should come so easily. Erich Fromm has a book called The Art of Loving, and while you may laugh at its title, it has some very good insights. He notes that we all are terribly lonely people who long to belong to and to connect with other people. In the first stages of a relationship, when you feel that you've made such a connection, when you feel so close to another person that it feels almost as if you are the same person, you naturally think that you're in love. And you are, in a way. You've fallen in love. But because you assume that this emotion will continue of its own accord, that love is merely that, an emotion, and not an art to be mastered, the feeling will fade. What happens then? Either you do learn to love or you break apart. Fromm writes that we have to reconceptualize love as something that we have to work at, to care and feel responsibility for the other person instead of focusing on how they make us feel. In the end, that is what sustains a relationship. Fromm writes that falling in love is a largely selfish experience, and often we never learn how to be unselfish.
Does it make me a romantic to say that I don't want to fall in love because I want to learn how to love properly first? I want to know how to care about other people, or in a more Confucian sense, to be generous and benevolent, to have a "wide mind". It requires patience to continue caring for a person even after you've lost that initial sense of "perfect" connection. I've met some people who are naturally capable of this kind of thing, but I'm certainly not and have a long, long way to go.
The major sect in Buddhism (I forget its name) says that the highest form of love is that of the bodhisattva, who postpones enlightenment in order to help others on the path to Nirvana. I doubt I'll ever manage that kind of altruism. But if I have to spend the rest of my life with one person, I would like to be capable of this sort of love for that person, and I think that it would be easier for me if I went into the relationship without any sort of all-consuming passion to trick me into thinking that a relationship can be self-sustaining. That is, I prefer not to have drama in my life, with peaks and valleys, with emotional turmoil. I like stability and am prepared to work for it. Thus, if I ever do get married (which is unlikely anyway because where the heck am I going to find a suitable boy?), I would like to do it the calm, sensible way. I.e. find someone my parents will approve of and with whom I can live comfortably. No wild, crazy relationship, please.
Ending disclaimer: most of this analysis revolves around my preferences and beliefs. By no means do I believe that the rest of the world should live this way. Some people want excitement and thrills in their life and are ready to risk the unhappiness that may come with them. I applaud their courage, but would like to choose a different path.
I'm also prepared for the universe's sense of irony, which is why I really hope that I don't end up eloping with, say, a Korean mafia gang member. >_<
Anyway, I have no idea why we were talking so intently about relationships because obviously we don't have the time to fall in love even if we wanted to. (Also, feeding my anime addiction probably leaves me with even less time. ^_^) Quite possibly because Asian parents, once children are in college, latch on to marriage as the next thing to worry about. ::rolls eyes:: With the possible exception of my father, who says I shouldn't worry about it and I can live with my parents for the rest of my life if need be. (Gee, thanks, Father. >_<)
Yours &c.
Oh my gosh, Bleach is so cool! Thank you for the links,
memlu!I still need to do my own laundry. Ugh. I have enough clothes for exactly three weeks, but now that three weeks have passed...well, yes, I need to do laundry. And wash the tenegui while I'm at it. >_>
Post-kendo notes: for some reason, in the last drill today, I had a really good men. Extension and tenuchi. Was vaguely startled by how right it felt. Am so going to remember that for jigeiko--if I can retain it, that is. Now if I only can figure out how to do the stomp properly. It's been kind of fun discussing kendo with the Wellesley girls (I had dinner with them last night and lunch with them today), although I'm always slightly amazed by how much sheer motivation they have. (Unlike Jenny and me, jaded sophomores that we are.) But their enthusiasm makes me remember again that I do enjoy kendo, that it's fun in a weird, painful way. Of course, it's a little easier to remember that when we're not doing any difficult keiko. ^_^ I hope writing about kendo doesn't become a weekly habit, but lately it feels that it's been my main topic of conversation with both Jenny and
tryogeru. >_>Well, that and relationships. Our blocking group chatted in the dining hall over over an hour about friends and their boyfriends. Jenny and I have been having an on-and-off debate about a comment I made to Tryo-chan last week, that I didn't want to fall in love. I find it difficult to explain it, so am going to try to write about it instead as a public declaration of my standpoint on the matter. Maybe I can just link people to the explanation in the future. Cut to spare the friends list from my repetitive self-analysis.
Let's see, how to put this...every night, before I go to sleep, I pray (yes, I do pray) for a boring, simple life. Okay, so I put it a little more poetically than that. I want my life to resemble the flight of an arrow, tracing a perfect parabolic arc from the moment it's released from the bow until it arrives at its destination. (My mother is fond of this particular metaphor.) Having a cynical streak, I know that such an ideal path is unlikely. Nevertheless, it is what I aspire to.
I think that many people who know me but don't know me very well assume that I want my life to be planned and predictable because I'm, well, a boring person. Okay, perhaps I am. (I have my quirks, but I'm essentially pretty bland and uninteresting.) What I'd just like to say is that being boring is a choice. I understand that when circumstances are out of my control and I have no say in the matter, ce qui sera, sera. But when I do have some free will in the matter (and I'd like to think that I do have some control over whom I like and choose to marry, hormones and unpredictable nature of the universe aside), I will choose the boring life every time. No passionate romance for me. No spending time obsessed over one person. No mad infatuations that inevitably end in disappointment.
Besides, I have the sneaking suspicion that I'm entirely too self-centered to care about one person all that much. Sometimes I've tried to have crushes on people...but that's the thing, I tried. I had to maintain an emotion that wasn't natural or spontaneous. I tire out quickly; there's only so much mental energy I have. That's why I've never been able to keep up with my high school friends with their obsessions.
Here, people object, how do you know if you're capable of love/infatuation/obsession if you've never tried? I reply, I do know to some extent what intense emotion is like. It's not that I've never felt it. But (and here I reveal myself to be the utter geek that I really am) the times when I've felt intensely happy, intensely absorbed--a near physical pleasure, I assure you--is when I suddenly understand a particularly wonderful idea. That's why I'm a closet Platonist.
lush_rimbaud and I used to argue about idealism versus materialism often in ninth grade. I suppose I've never really doubted the existence and reality of intangible things because, well, nothing has made me feel closer to being in love as an idea. (There's the same crash of disillusionment involved with that too.) People like to say that one day you have to move from books and actually start living life, but I think they're not fully appreciating the impact that a book can have on you. Having your mental apparatus or framework turned upside down or completely rebuilt by a book is not the same thing as simply experiencing what the book is superficially writing about. It's not always pleasant either; it can be absolutely terrifying as well. I remember reading Demian as a huge turning point in my life. Demian was real to me not because I liked him as a character but because he completely bent my mind with his talk of Abraxas the God-Devil and nondualism. (Okay, not particularly radical at this age, but hey, I was twelve or thirteen at the time.) Also, in class, when we learn something particularly beautiful--there was a moment in AP Chemistry last year when Ms. Basker explained how all reactions could be viewed in terms of kinetics and thermodynamics, and I felt positively thrilled by the connection (I wish I'd get those moments in chemistry now ;_;). There's this sheer happiness that comes from completely understanding an idea and then figuring out how it fits in with other ideas. It's why I'm probably born to be an academic. Anyway, I have had such moments before where it seems that the emotion is utterly out of your control and wholly spontaneous--you are in love or in agony, and it's all natural, not some artifact of "I should feel this way so I will try to convince myself that I do." But never about another person. I don't even know if I want to feel so wrapped up in another person. It seems kind of limiting, in comparison.Also, and here's something that I find the most difficult to explain, I don't think love--that is, interpersonal love--should come so easily. Erich Fromm has a book called The Art of Loving, and while you may laugh at its title, it has some very good insights. He notes that we all are terribly lonely people who long to belong to and to connect with other people. In the first stages of a relationship, when you feel that you've made such a connection, when you feel so close to another person that it feels almost as if you are the same person, you naturally think that you're in love. And you are, in a way. You've fallen in love. But because you assume that this emotion will continue of its own accord, that love is merely that, an emotion, and not an art to be mastered, the feeling will fade. What happens then? Either you do learn to love or you break apart. Fromm writes that we have to reconceptualize love as something that we have to work at, to care and feel responsibility for the other person instead of focusing on how they make us feel. In the end, that is what sustains a relationship. Fromm writes that falling in love is a largely selfish experience, and often we never learn how to be unselfish.
Does it make me a romantic to say that I don't want to fall in love because I want to learn how to love properly first? I want to know how to care about other people, or in a more Confucian sense, to be generous and benevolent, to have a "wide mind". It requires patience to continue caring for a person even after you've lost that initial sense of "perfect" connection. I've met some people who are naturally capable of this kind of thing, but I'm certainly not and have a long, long way to go.
The major sect in Buddhism (I forget its name) says that the highest form of love is that of the bodhisattva, who postpones enlightenment in order to help others on the path to Nirvana. I doubt I'll ever manage that kind of altruism. But if I have to spend the rest of my life with one person, I would like to be capable of this sort of love for that person, and I think that it would be easier for me if I went into the relationship without any sort of all-consuming passion to trick me into thinking that a relationship can be self-sustaining. That is, I prefer not to have drama in my life, with peaks and valleys, with emotional turmoil. I like stability and am prepared to work for it. Thus, if I ever do get married (which is unlikely anyway because where the heck am I going to find a suitable boy?), I would like to do it the calm, sensible way. I.e. find someone my parents will approve of and with whom I can live comfortably. No wild, crazy relationship, please.
Ending disclaimer: most of this analysis revolves around my preferences and beliefs. By no means do I believe that the rest of the world should live this way. Some people want excitement and thrills in their life and are ready to risk the unhappiness that may come with them. I applaud their courage, but would like to choose a different path.
I'm also prepared for the universe's sense of irony, which is why I really hope that I don't end up eloping with, say, a Korean mafia gang member. >_<
Anyway, I have no idea why we were talking so intently about relationships because obviously we don't have the time to fall in love even if we wanted to. (Also, feeding my anime addiction probably leaves me with even less time. ^_^) Quite possibly because Asian parents, once children are in college, latch on to marriage as the next thing to worry about. ::rolls eyes:: With the possible exception of my father, who says I shouldn't worry about it and I can live with my parents for the rest of my life if need be. (Gee, thanks, Father. >_<)
Yours &c.
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From an emotionally-oriented and less rational perspective
Date: 2004-10-16 07:20 pm (UTC)At any rate, the thing about love is that it's not really something you decide to let happen. It sort of happens to you. That being said, trying to have a crush on someone probably means that you're trying too hard. It shouldn't be something you have to consciously think about. I mean, not in the should try to make myself like this person way. The stressing over liking someone is perfectly normal.
The whole concept of trying to fall in love is inherently flawed. And, I could quote Yoda here but I'll restrain myself. >__< Whoo, too much pop culture in my brain.
I used to think I fell in love easily. I've discovered that the truth is it's extremely hard for me to fall in love. I have a bit more luck falling into like and I'll sustain that for a very long time, but that's not the same thing.
Love is, indeed, something you have to work at to sustain. The first blush of "loving" someone is not the same as actual love. That would, I'd imagine, be something deeper.
So until you actually DO fall in love, I wouldn't worry about that aspect at all.
Most people would prefer less drama in their personal lives, but, as I'm sure you know, the very nature of interpersonal relationships precludes this possibility. Which is why falling in love is simultaneously a wonderful and extremely sucky thing. >___<
All that said, I've personally given up on relationships. If it happens, it happens. If it doesn't, well, I'll be regretful but there's nothing really that I could have done to make myself+other person (you're right, though, where to find a suitable boy???) = in love, right? *shrugs*
Besides, even if you DO fall madly, wildly in love with a Korean mafia member (Why Korean? Wouldn't that be preferred? ^^;) you can always choose to go with your head and not your heart and NOT elope.
(My parents are the exact opposite - you don't ever have to get married and please don't come home and live with us. >_>;;)
BTW, I just watched the first two episodes of Bleach and am finding it cool as well. May have to go buy the manga at this rate. ^^;;;
Re: From an emotionally-oriented and less rational perspective
Date: 2004-10-16 07:51 pm (UTC)Well, yes, I realized that I was trying too hard and stopped bothering. I guess my point was, since I find it so hard to fall in love anyway, I might as well not bother wanting to (which is, I guess, in some way the same conclusion you reached). ^_^;;
I suppose I'm also speaking more from a high school/early college standpoint where many relationships are still about the first blush and fall apart quickly. And people insist, "We're going to be in love forever!" Which is so not true. I don't want to fall madly in love and lose my head about it, which is what does happen to a lot of people. I guess what I ultimately want to say is that I want to love someone without losing the ability to "go with my head". I do know that some of it is outside of my control, but in the space I have left to choose, I would like to choose a boring relationship rather than a dramatic one. ^_^;; Well, even boring relationships have their drama, I know, but the less drama the better is my general conclusion.
(Oh, and Korean might be acceptable but mafia gang member definitely not. I was just trying to think of an unsuitable guy that I might find attractive and voila. Er, yeah, I like gangster movies. >_>;;)
I haven't watched the anime, but the manga is really good. XD
Re: From an emotionally-oriented and less rational perspective
Date: 2004-10-16 08:25 pm (UTC)Well, I still want to. I'm just extremely jaded about it working out. >_>;
Trust me, it doesn't get any better. A lot of relationships are still about the first blush (but not so much about the "together forever"). I think a lot of it has more to do with what type of individuals are involved rather than how far along in life they are. (It takes some people a REALLY long time to learn. Others never do. >_<)
So you're saying you wouldn't mind being in love - just not the crazy whacko losing-your-head sort? Perfectly understandable. XD
But see, unsuitable guy should also be someone you wouldn't normally find attractive. We are talking about the universe's sense of irony here, after all. ^____^; And, yes, I've become acquainted with your penchant for gangster-related things. XDXDXD
I've heard most readers of the manga are disappointed with the anime, but (with no prior exposure) I thought it did a good job. Mangas are usually better than their adaptations anyway. ^^;
(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-16 08:22 pm (UTC)Bleach is love. <3
(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-16 08:33 pm (UTC)Bleach is love. <3
Yes it is! ^_______________^
(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-17 10:22 am (UTC)