the bitch is...well, a little over-rated actually

I'd forgotten this story. I like this version because it's not all 'Christianed up' like the version you mostly see floating on the interwebs.

An old Grandfather said to his grandson, who came to him with anger at a friend who had done him an injustice, "Let me tell you a story. I too, at times, have felt a great hate for those that have taken so much, with no sorrow for what they do.

But hate wears you down, and does not hurt your enemy. It is like taking poison and wishing your enemy would die. I have struggled with these feelings many times." He continued, "It is as if there are two wolves inside me. One is good and does no harm. He lives in harmony with all around him, and does not take offense when no offense was intended. He will only fight when it is right to do so, and in the right way.

But the other wolf, ah! He is full of anger. The littlest thing will set him into a fit of temper. He fights everyone, all the time, for no reason. He cannot think because his anger and hate are so great. It is helpless anger,for his anger will change nothing. Sometimes, it is hard to live with these two wolves inside me, for both of them try to dominate my spirit."

The boy looked intently into his Grandfather's eyes and asked, "Which one wins, Grandfather?" The Grandfather smiled and quietly said, "The one I feed."

Obvious really, but it doesn't stop people from feeding their anger and negativity until it consumes their better self.

I think I do this sometimes and it's just wasted energy. Recently I started working with a guy that is always calm. At first I found this kind of annoying, actually, because I mistook it for a lack of passion about things that matter. But as I've gotten to know him over the last few months I've realised that he doesn't lack feeling; it's more that if anger isn't going to change anything, he will only give limited energy to it. He is, however, quite insightful when it comes to solutions, and I think this is a result of him being calm enough to really apply his rationality to a problem.

This is a workplace. Things go wrong and management occasionally suck and there are any number of people ready to bitch about it. It's actually kind of nice to work with someone who doesn't always need to vent, even if this does throw my own impatience or irritation into sharper relief (embarrassing!) in the process. Maybe I'll become more zen as a result.

new take on the meaning of life

Well, when I say 'new', it's from a seven-year-old episode of Angel, but anyway... The screen captures are a little dark, sorry.

Kate: My whole life has been about being a cop. If I'm not a part of the Force, it's like nothing I do means anything.
Angel: It doesn't.
Kate: Doesn't what?
Angel: Mean anything. In the greater scheme, in the big picture. Nothing we do matters. There's no Grand Plan, no big win.
Kate: You seem kind of chipper about that.
Angel: I guess I kinda worked it out. If there's no great glorious end to all this, if nothing we do matters, then all that matters is what we do. 'Cause that's all there is: what we do ~ now, today. I fought for so long...for redemption, for reward, finally just to beat the other guy, but I never got it.
Kate: Now you do?
Angel: No...all I want to do is help. I want to help because I don't think people should suffer as they do. Because if there's no bigger meaning, then the smallest act of kindness is the greatest thing in the world.
Kate: Yikes, it sounds like you had an epiphany.
Angel: I keep saying that, but no-one's listening...

To be honest I see some flaws in his reasoning (eg, to say that 'all that matters is what we do' ignores the drivers that motivate what we do, the scope of which cover a lot more ground than 'live well' or 'be kind to others and do no harm') but still I find that I like this reasoning.

We may wonder about the afterlife and hope (we have one and) it's something happy or productive or beautiful, but in the end it's kind of sad if the only reason we do good is to make installments on a fat final reward. And where does end-game thinking like that leave people who don't believe there is anything after this life? I think life needs purpose, even if it's a purpose we assign to it. And I think most people who life above subsistence level (who have the time and energy to give to pondering what life's about) want to carve out some kind of purposeful life for themselves.

What do you guys think?

the ten most puzzling ancient artifacts

Over time a range of ancient artifacts have been found that cannot be definitively explained. In some cases the origin or use is unknown. In other cases what is found has a recognisable use, uses a known technology, or tells a familiar story, but is dated at an age in which these things are not supposed to have existed. Here are a couple of examples of this type of puzzling artifact, taken from this webpage (which describes all of the ten most puzzling ancient artifacts) :

The Dropa Stones

In 1938, an archeological expedition led by Dr. Chi Pu Tei into the Baian-Kara-Ula mountains of China made an astonishing discovery in some caves that had apparently been occupied by some ancient culture. Buried in the dust of ages on the cave floor were hundreds of stone disks. Measuring about nine inches in diameter, each had a circle cut into the center and was etched with a spiral groove, making it look for all the world like some ancient phonograph record some 10,000 to 12,000 years old. The spiral groove, it turns out, is actually composed of tiny hieroglyphics that tell the incredible story of spaceships from some distant world that crash-landed in the mountains. The ships were piloted by people who called themselves the Dropa, and the remains of whose descendents, possibly, were found in the cave.

Ancient Model Aircraft

There are artifacts belonging to ancient Egyptian and Central American cultures that look amazingly like modern-day aircraft. The Egyptian artifact, found in a tomb at Saqquara, Egypt in 1898, is a six-inch wooden object that strongly resembles a model airplane, with fuselage, wings and tail. Experts believe the object is so aerodynamic that it is actually able to glide. The small object discovered in Central America (shown at right), and estimated to be 1,000 years old, is made of gold and could easily be mistaken for a model of a delta-wing aircraft - or even the Space Shuttle. It even features what looks like a pilot's seat.

The questions artifacts like this prompt are so interesting, I'm kind of amazed that I hadn't heard of any of these artifacts before. I mean, people will ramble on about Area 51 for hours, when the Dropa Stones, if authentic (and I haven't read anything suggesting they aren't) are a much more interesting evidence of aliens possibly having visited Earth. Even more intriguing since 1995, when a tribe of people calling themselves Dropa, who fit genetically into no previously identified Earth race, was found in a remote area located in the mountains between China and Tibet. They are a pigmy race (mostly around 2.5 - 3ft tall), which is consistent with the skeletons found in the same caves as the stones (they were a little taller, but inbreeding over time might have made the feature more prevalent).

The detail described in the account of the ancient model aircraft makes me wonder whether ancient civilisations did have technologies we think of as only being developed in relatively modern times. It also makes me wonder how they might have utilised those technologies in ways that are different to the way more recent civilisations did, and what might have happened that the technologies were so completely lost. I suppose one factor is the relative isolation in which they lived, where technologies may not have spread because one civilisation was not necessarily aware of another.

I do rather like the theory that our Earth, rather than being made from nothing as some Creationists believe, was made from existing matter. If that matter was used previously for other creations, then that could explain things like fossils and dinosaur bones, coal and other mineral deposits, even if the Earth was not as old as we thought. However, I don't think this theory is so plausible for most of the kind of artifacts described, though it could explain the spark plug type object in the ancient rock. But regardless, it would still point to their being other peoples and civilisations out there in space. And, you know, God and stuff. :)

Alternatively it might all just mean that our carbon-dating processes are useless.

long time coming

From Celebrity Fix:

In the biggest non-shocker since the enormous Christina Aguilera confirmed her pregnancy - Hollywood legend Jodie Foster has come out of the closet!

The star has been criticized for not opening up about her long-term lesbian relationship, despite being photographed countless times with partner and co-mother of their children Cydney Bernard. Jodie instead preferred to keep her private life just that - private.

But at the 'Power 100' event in the US on Tuesday, Jodie was presented with a leadership award by the Hollywood Reporter and chose to publicly thank Cydney for her support.

As part of her acceptance speech, Jodie thanked “my beautiful Cydney who sticks with me through all the rotten and the bliss.”

Nobody should feel obligated to talk their private life out in public, but I'd glad that it indicates she's comfortable with her own reality. I was thinking recently about sexual orientation and how it sometimes prompts people to live double lives. I've been reading about Kenny Everett, who was married for more than a decade before he even acknowledged that he fancied guys. Even after coming out he suffered bouts of depression related to his inability to accept his homosexuality.

Beyond the idea of coming out, I think we all struggle sometimes with accepting ourselves and being unafraid to reveal our real selves to the rest of the world. It reminds me of a passage in The Golden Compass where Lyra is bemoaning the fact that her daemon (soul) will not always be able to take different shapes. (As people in her world become adults their daemon settles into a form and keeps it permanently.) But Lee Scoresby explains to her that the advantage of having your daemon take its final form is that you really learn what kind of person you are. He then tells her about a sailor he knew who was unhappy his whole life because his daemon took the form of a dolphin (meaning basically that he could no longer go ashore) and he could never accept that this was who he was.

Strange really, that one of the hardest things in life can be being yourself. In theory nothing should be easier, but in practice...

permission to shine

Speaking of Akeelah, the movie most aptly used this quote, which sits near the top of my top ten favourite quotes of all time:

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.
(Marianne Williamson, A Return to Love, 1992)

It reminds me a little of the Bachelor Girl single, Permission to Shine. Here are some of the lyrics:

I've been crazy.
I've been holdin' myself back for so long
But I've got so much I can give
Don't wanna be afraid to be wrong

You know I'm not too good at too many things
But I've been gettin' real good at gettin' down on myself
But guess what
I'm gonna try to break free from this prison I've built

I'm gonna give myself permission to shine
I'm gonna shine so bright
Gonna make every head wanna turn
You're finally gonna see me
Give myself permission to shine
Gonna light up the night
Shine a little of my light on the world

Fabulous song! When I taught English in Japan I created a lesson based around it, because I loved the positive, uplifting message. Nice tune, too, for singing along.

benefits of blogging

I’ve been asked to post what I think are the benefits of blogging. I’ve been thinking it over for a few days and here is my attempt to sum it all up.

1. The Social Benefits

When I started this blog I had no intentions of writing for anyone but myself. It was kind of like keeping a diary that I didn’t mind people reading and I never really thought beyond that. But after a few weeks I realised that a blog isn’t really a diary, no matter how much it might sometimes resemble one. A blog is a conversation, because you’re deliberately sending something out to a potential reader, and it’s hard to sustain a conversation with yourself.

So I started making myself a part of the blogosphere, reading across the broad spectrum of blogs until I found something I felt like commenting on, and slowly I built up a group whose blogs I like to read and a group who liked to read my blog. I don’t think I’m ever going to be like Waiter from Waiter Rant, with his 200 comments per post, but I don’t really mind that. I just like getting enough comments to know that I’m not speaking into the void.

2. The Analytical/Introspective Benefits

I analyse everything. I always have and it’s a process I enjoy. I also like explaining things or writing them out. I often find that I make sense of things as I’m doing this, as if being forced to put words to what I’m thinking actually helps me understand what I’m thinking, or to see the flaws in it and where it needs to change.

3. The Wider Benefits

I know, I know, there’s a thousand truckloads of rubbish being added to the internet via blogs every day, but I can’t help but feel that as a whole the blogosphere still represents freedom of thought and expression. And there must be some truth to that, or China wouldn’t be trying so hard to control the access its citizens have to blogs.

It might seem a bit paranoid, but I sometimes wonder if the explosion of myspace drivel is an attempt to create white noise that distracts us from blogs of real substance, kind of like the big TV screens in Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451. People would rather be entertained or distracted than prompted to think, and those who have an agenda use that opportunity to control information in a way that’s useful to them. Bradbury was worried that TV would be the end of books, making people feel full of information, while actually giving them no real intellectual nourishment. The scariest part is that it is the people themselves who choose the pudding over the vegetables.

My own blog falls in both camps. I like to think, I like to make other people think, but some of my posts are pure fluff. The day that’s all the blog is might just be the day I finally quit it. Until that happens I’m adding my idea to the ocean of thought out there and collectively we sway the tides of opinion. I don’t overestimate my influence, but I do like being part of it.

just rocks and cacti, mostly

Ahhh, intelligent obervation on porn. What a rare and lovely thing. If you want to read the whole thing follow the link to the original post, just be aware its language is non-PG and don't say you weren't warned.

I couldn't be more fed up with people who keep insisting that porn is about "sexual freedom" and that the mainstream porn industry "explores" and "breaks sexual taboos" and yada yada yada. Are you people kidding me? Is there anything more stereotypical and less taboo-breaking than mainstream porn? I mean, how can you watch your typical porn and NOT see the blantant age-old, traditional Victorian theme? Did these people perhaps also miss the zombie-pirates in Pirates of the Caribbean? Did they go watch Titanic and somehow not see the big sinking ship in it? Just because porn is not something you wanna watch with your grandma, doesn't mean it's revolutionary. It's impossible to discover your own burgeoning sexuality through mainstream porn, because porn has an agenda, and a pretty boring, unadventurous one at that...

Taboo-breaking, my third-wave feminist ASS.

Bravo!

And while I am linking you to stuff I have to put a warning on, thank you jojo for sending me the link for these mostly funny but not all work safe replacement covers for the new Harry Potter, for fans who aren't ready to come out of the closet yet (which is insane because there's probably a boggart in there). Here's my favourite (click to see larger):