Opportunity

One of my life goals is to become ambidextrous. I am right-handed, and doing practically anything with my left hand feels awkward and unwieldy. But, I know that I wasn't always able to do everything that I can now do with my right hand. Things like writing, brushing my teeth, pouring milk, etc all came with many years of practice. The body's ability to learn through repetition is absolutely amazing.

There are many things that I can do with my left hand equally or nearly equally as well as I can with my right, including typing on a keyboard, washing mirrors, and playing piano. And for sure, I know that my right hand can't finger notes on a violin worth anything, while my left hand has all the facility in the world. So, I know it's possible for my left hand to learn to do tasks just as complex as the tasks that my right hand does every day. All it needs is the opportunity to try!

As I was thinking about that, I realized that there are so many things that I wish that I were good at that I've just accepted as impossible for me to do. Among those, I wish I were a warmer person. I wish I could get up in the morning. I wish I ate more healthily. I wish I could run for more than a mile. I wish I were good at remembering people's faces. I wish I kept up with what is going on in the world. I wish I were more deeply in touch with my religion. Those are just a few, but the list really goes on and on.

All of those are things that I'd recently given up on ever being able to do. Why? Because I thought, this is just the way I am and maybe I'm just not good at doing those things. One person is born with a certain set of talents, and another is born with another set of talents.

But the more I come to think about it, I think that while sometimes that line of thinking helps keep one's perspective in not comparing oneself to others, I think that I also sometimes use it as a cop-out. I figure, I'll let someone else be good at caring. I'll let someone else be good at understanding the world, helping people to be happy, or whatever else it is that I think I can't do. And so, I don't try as hard. In fact, I don't even give myself the opportunity to try.

Now I realize, I don't have to think that way at all. All I have to do in order to become better at the things that have not naturally come to me is to go to them. And I don't have to be amazing at them. I don't have to set records with just how up I am with religion, fitness, health, whatever. You don't take one leap from the beginning to the end of the race. Just a little at a time goes a long way. And a lot of that starts with creating opportunities for yourself. Placing yourself in situations where you can exercise or practice those abilities.

If I want to be a warmer person, I can place myself around people whom I admire for that. If I want to get up in the morning, I can give myself enough time to sleep at night. If I want to eat more healthily, I can be more prudent at the grocery store and only have things in my cabinet or fridge that I think will be good for my body. If I want to run for more than a mile, I can get myself out there and start with a few steps. It goes on and on.

And with running as an example, I find that it gets easier as you go. The hardest part is starting, and getting yourself over the hurdle of thinking that whatever it is that you're doing is too hard for you to do. Get past that, and just let your amazing, natural ability to learn do all the work for you. Put yourself in those situations, those opportunities, and then let the momentum do it for you.

It's like a swing; the biggest effort is to kick off and get it going, and then it only takes a little bit of follow-through to keep it going.

But you'll never get swinging if you never go find the swing in the first place.

I'm about to brush my teeth. Maybe I'll try that left-handed.

It's now or never

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore--
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over--
like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

-- "A Dream Deferred", Langston Hughes

The solution to my life, according to Blogthings

You Should Get a PhD in Science (like chemistry, math, or engineering)

You're both smart and innovative when it comes to ideas. Maybe you'll find a cure for cancer - or develop the latest underground drug.

What Advanced Degree Should You Get?

My thoughts on guys, part II

Reading my previous post on this subject, I'm still surprised to look back and see how similar to myself I imagined my ideal guy to be. On the one hand, it is certainly attractive to have many things in common because those are the things that allow you to understand each other, relate to each other, and form a comfortable and reliable base for the relationship. On the other hand, it can be fascinating and intriguing to spend time with someone who experiences life just a little differently than you do.

It mixes things up a bit. It opens your eyes to new ways of thinking and feeling. It makes you start to question if your own way is really the right and only way to be. It gets you a little more excited about life in general. It keeps things fresh and alive.

Ideally, I want to be in a relationship where we can guide and uplift each other according to our individual strengths and talents. When two people have different strengths and weaknesses, both can simultaneously look to and respect the other in areas that they themselves are not as strong in. And on the flip side, each person can experience the joy and fulfillment of supporting the other in ways that come very naturally to them. Finding your match isn't finding someone who is equally good at everything you can do; a couple like that would have nothing to offer each other and nowhere to grow. It's not like matching identical cards in a game of Concentration. It's more like fitting Lego pieces together--there's a similarity yet complementarity that makes it work.

That's not to say I don't want to associate with people who are similar to me; those are the people I get along with the easiest, since we understand each other so well from the start. But I think those can be the friendships that fulfill the parts of your life that your significant other is not involved in. For example, I really doubt that I will end up with another computer scientist; that would drive me mad, I think. But I do enjoy talking to other computer scientists and turning over ideas that others might have no appreciation for. If my spouse had no idea what in the world I was talking about with my work, that would be just fine with me--I could always call up some friends to discuss my theories with.

However, I think I need to be with someone who understands music. Not necessarily a musician (although that would be nice too... but not a violinist!), but certainly someone who appreciates and speaks the language at a higher level than simply "oh, that's pretty." Music is such a huge part of my life and has such an impact on me that someone who couldn't understand it on an instinctual level would not be able to fully understand me.

Even with all this in mind, being with someone who thinks differently than you can be a scary prospect. It can bring about conflict when you disagree on certain things. But I don't think all conflict is necessarily undesirable. Conflict doesn't have to be unfriendly; it can simply be a difference in opinion. And the opportunity to reexamine, reevaluate, and defend your stance on life or some aspect thereof can validate your existence just as much as harmonious agreement can, especially when both parties can eventually come to a better understanding of the other and draw closer as a result.

There's so much more I have to say on this subject, but it's so hard to put into words. So I'll leave it at that.

Brainstorming New Year's resolutions

I think that I'll keep my New Year's resolutions list fairly short this year. Sometimes the list gets so long that it ends up looking really intimidating, and I give up within the first week. I figure that fewer things on the list means fewer things to concentrate on and therefore a higher success rate at keeping them.

Here goes a rough draft (I may or may not revise it, depending on how well it works out):

• Manage time effectively: I haven't been getting nearly as much sleep as I need in order to be fully functional and at my best. Particularly, my short-term memory doesn't seem to be working very well these days. I want to distribute my 24 daily hours more efficiently between academic time, work time, relax time, and sleep time. "Relax time" is actually a new requirement I'm making for myself this year separate from "sleep time", which will hopefully be around 8-9 hours a night. Yes, I do need that much sleep!!
  
• Get in shape: Exercising helps so many aspects of life. When I exercise, my mental facility, emotional balance, and physical well-being all improve. I feel a lot more alive and happy, and it feels good to move about and know you're doing something to keep your body from deteriorating. I'm not sure yet exactly what I want to do for exercise, but I'm going to shoot for a modest goal of 30 min, 3 days a week.
  
• Be aware of self: Something I've been dying to do for a long time is to start doing daily journal reflections. I want to see what I felt good about each day, what I didn't feel so good about, ways in which I'd like to improve, interesting or amusing things that happened, and any insights I've had about life. I want to be able to see the direction I'm heading in as a person, and I want to realize what I'm proud of and what I'm not proud of in myself. I want to believe in myself and feel good about myself, and develop a stronger self-image. I want to feel like I'm doing more than just letting life drift along.
  
• Enjoy people: There's so much more to college life than the academics. I want to be more sociable and spend more time with people that I like. It's amazing how relaxing and refreshing it can be to spend even a small amount of time catching up with friends and doing something fun once in a while. And it also makes you that much better at doing things you need to do, in my opinion.
  
• Organize finances: I've never done much budgeting with my money. I just earn as much as I can, try not to spend too much, and hope it comes out nicely. I want to do better about figuring out how much I want to save, and I want to be more careful about how and where I spend my money. My financial goal for life is to never be in debt when possible, but still live comfortably and have the resources to pursue my interests.

Hmm, one New Year's resolution that I ought to make is to actually keep my New Year's resolutions.

I'm thinking of maybe making signs for each of these and putting them up on the wall of my room. I've never tried anything like that before, and it might help me remember what I'm working on. I think it would be fun to make them kind of artsy too, so that they're nice to look at. A future Sunday project, perhaps...

Christmas present ethics

A friend of mine asked me the other day, "Is it wrong to buy someone a Christmas present, and then decide you like it a lot and buy another one for yourself?"

The funny thing was that I had just done that earlier. I dunno, is it?

My thoughts on guys, part I

My hard drive is freaking out after the last update I installed, which in turn is freaking me out, so I'm currently backing up everything on this computer. Before doing so, though, I'm trying to clean up and organize a little bit so I'm not just backing up stuff I wanted to get rid of anyway. Haha, it was actually one of my goals to clean up this computer during the Christmas break, so maybe this is just a little push to get me to do it.

Anyway, while looking through things, I found this note I wrote on April 21, 2005 about guys. Thought it was kind of funny and sounds just like freshman me, and I thought I'd put it up on here, albeit at the risk of seriously embarrassing myself. I think my thoughts on guys have greatly evolved since then, but it's pretty fun to hear what I thought at the time:



"Before you agree to marry a guy, you have to see how he acts when he’s mad. You need to know what he does when he’s frustrated, especially with his family members, how he treats them. You should see how he treats little kids, what he thinks of them. You should see him when he’s stressed, whether he despairs or hangs in there without complaint. You need to see how he treats his friends when he’s had an argument with them. You should think twice if he’s ever forced you to do anything against your will. Most of all, you should make sure it’s not on a whim, that you have already thought about marriage with him and that you have known him long enough, say maybe 2 years minimum. And it’d be best if you were at least 20.

"My ideal guy? By no means do I set absolute requirements or dismiss a guy if he doesn’t have one of these qualities or traits. I look at the big picture. But, I could definitely describe my ideal.

"First, physical traits. I tend to go for Caucasians. Maybe it’s because I’ve just grown up around white people, who knows. But I am attracted to height and that light hair color that’s somewhat in between blond and brown. I also like light-colored eyes. My ideal guy would be taller than [my brother], but I would still be taller than his shoulder. He would be heavier than me but faster than me (not TOO much faster), and he would be strong enough to lift me in his arms and carry me around without difficulty.

"There are certain qualifications that I’d also like him to meet. He would need to be older than me by at least two years, but no older than [my brother]’s age. He would be ... spiritual like [my brother]. He would be smart on a level comparable with mine, interested and good with languages, and energetic athletically. I am really impressed by coordination and quick reflexes in particular. He would be musically proficient on either cello or piano (but it would be great if he played others in addition). He’d know and be good with computers.

"As for personality traits, he’d be socially sound, but he’d have his dorky moments. He wouldn’t be the life of the party, but he’d be liked by everybody. He’d split time between people and girls (he’d still hang out with friends!). He’d have to be a night person. He’d hang out with mainly guys and not be like those guys who are super nice to all girls. He’d be more of a distanced, polite sort of nice to girls he didn’t know (or both genders for that matter). He wouldn’t be insecure, but he wouldn’t be overly confident; he’d be human and still have his doubts. He wouldn’t overanalyze relationships but he would still be a little nervous and analyze them somewhat. He’d get somewhat jealous but be cute (unknowingly) about confronting a girl about it (and he would confront, not sit there sulking). He’d give a girl space now and then. He would be the type of guy to be aware of girls’ personal bubble and sit some inches away from her. But if he liked her, he would sit closer sometimes and be nervous. Most importantly, he’d TALK.

"Well, there you have it. My kind of guy."



One thing that's pretty interesting is that a lot of the things I mentioned imply someone who is a lot like me (minus the Caucasian part). Lately, I've changed my mind a lot in that regard and think I would like to marry someone who is different from me in a lot of ways. Who wants to marry an identical person?

I think ideally I'd marry someone who shares a lot of common ground with me, but who has a different approach to life. I'm so logical, so deliberate, so serious. I need someone who will liven things up a bit.

More thoughts on this later.