Fork in the Road

Well, I should, admittedly, probably be sleeping.
I got off work at midnight, and I leave for Powell River at noon tomorrow.

But potential decision-points are floating around in my head like bullets which may never be fired.

Working at the hat-store, called Lids, in Burnaby's Metrotown Mall is a lot of fun. It's definitely something I would have no issue sticking with for months or even a couple years on end if the opportunity arose.

On the other hand, working at a McDonald's within a Wal-Mart seems like not only a double slap-in-the-face to most (if not all) of what I have stood for (and against) in the past couple of years; it is also exactly as I expected it would be. Droning, impersonal, monotonous, gratuitously wasteful, and something I wish to toss out of my life as quickly as I can.
Not only do I have numerous practical issues with working at a McDonald's; I also have numerous moral issues as well. For example: during one shift, I emptied all the bins of what is designated as 'recycling,' and carried the full bags into the back. When I asked where I should put these bags for proper disposal, the shift-manager at the time told me that "oh! We don't actually have recycling. We just toss it in with the rest of the garbage."

Concealing my annoyance at such dishonesty and ignorance, I simply laughed along with the shift manager and said, "Oh! I see. So we're just pretending to be green."

Now, the people working here in question are not dishonest or cruel. Although I did have one incident of being treated like I was less than a human being, 99% of my time at McDonald's has been acceptable people-wise. It simply seems as if the shift-managers, assistant managers, and the manager of this particular branch himself seem either one or two of three things: they have either surrendered to what they see as 'reality' as so they do not compromise their position and/or pay cheques (as I may very well be doing now); or they are apathetic and indifferent to details like the whole 'lying about recycling' thing; or.. and I'm sure this applies to at least a few of them.. they are simply ignorant, and that is why they have actually stuck around long enough to be of high status at McDonald's. It's as far as their aspirations seem to go.

Beyond my rather mixed life of labor, life here in Port Coquitlam has been trying in quite a few aspects.
One of the biggest issues, to me, is a lack of friends and family. Although I do have about 2 friends down here (one of which I am living with), and a 'mother' who has now adopted me as some sort of extended family, it still doesn't feel like home. It feels like a base I have established away from home in order to probe the world outside. And there's nothing really wrong with that, as it has given me a proper spoonful of everything I needed a spoonful of, whether it was the bitter stuff or the sweet stuff, but if a place barely feels like home after 2 months... chances are, it's not going to feel like home after another 2 months.

Between laborious nights at McDonald's and lonely days in bed, alongside the occasional onset of anxiety whether due to worrying about the mild ringing in my ears or my perceived feeling of improper breathing, and never having any friends to let-loose with every now and then aside from occasional jokes and quick chats over the phone, I have found myself driven to considering a return to my hometown of Powell River until I can figure both myself and my life out a bit more coherently.

I believe a return would be much appreciated on my end, but at the same time... I have wanted nothing more than to leave my hometown since Grade 10.

I guess the point is that when I said I wanted to 'leave home,' I never meant I wanted to exchange it for loneliness and McDonald's.
However, that's not to say I haven't had good times down here. I certainly have.

It's just that I still feel like I did in Grade 10, and it wasn't so much that I wanted to leave...
It was that I wanted to be free.

I'm still waiting to be free, and I refuse to wait much longer.

Random Question Self Interview: "Because Asking the Right Questions is the Answer."

Where do you feel completely safe and secure?
I feel completely safe and secure in my hometown of Powell River, whether I'm at my moms house, dads house, or a friends house. Or simply romping around town in general; it's a pretty safe place to be.
I also feel completely safe and secure in my significant others arms.
I know that's cheesy as fuck. Shut up.

What would make the world a better place right now?
A lot of things. That depends what you mean when you ask the question. Do you mean in a realistic sense, as in what could potentially occur right now? Because in that case... the success of the Occupy Wall Street movement would make the world a better place right now.

What do you typically do when you're sad?
I rant. A lot.
Both to myself, and to those who I'm close with, whether it's myself, my significant other, my mom, my dad, one of my best friends, or a friendly stranger. I always need to vent it.
I also enjoy simply zoning out watching TV, reading a good book, or playing video games. As well as sleeping, or pro-actively looking for ways to make the situation a better one.

What's something you can't stop doing?
Thinking about how much I want to be exploring the world right now.
I've been in that state of mind for the past 4 or 5 years.

What's something you need to start doing more often?
Working out.
And not just my token 2 sets of push-ups, and 2 sets of crunches. Nor how much I do tend to walk in a general sense (all of which is good for me, but I want to start working out in a more substantial sense).
I also need to start meditating.

What do you need to stop doing to yourself?
I need to stop having occasional episodes of pessimistic and fatalistic anxiety just because I'm feeling lonely, out of place, or worried about something.

What memory do you wish you could remember more clearly?
I'm not sure.
All of them.
But not in the sense that they're always on my mind... just that I can vividly pull them out of my head anytime I feel like it.

What has been complicating your life lately?
Plenty of things.
Confusing work schedules, work in a general sense, the distance between me and my significant other, medical issues like my skin and my ears, and just being in a new environment all-together.
Not that I'm complaining. It is what it is.

What are you looking for in life right now?
Freedom.
In the sense that I could get up and go travel the world right now on a whim. So, I suppose, I've been half-heartedly seeking financial freedom, like the rest of the Western world.
Also, I've been looking to properly re-center myself and return to my general bass-line of happiness that I had throughout my life in Powell River.

What are you addicted to?
Technology, I suppose.
However, I could live without it, I just very much prefer it.

What's something you should never waste? 
An individuals unique spirit, as well as compassion and love in all of its forms.

What's something you can always lose yourself in?
Browsing the internet, writing poetry or music, and spending time with those who I'm close to; as well as adventuring.

What should you avoid to avoid heartache? 
Superficial people, like wanna-be Jersey Shore guidos and girls, or those who over-indulge in the pick-up scene. However, some heart-ache is always an inevitability... but if you stick to genuine people, you're guaranteed to have a happy life.

What must you do to be happy?
Be making money doing something I love, or living in a situation in which I do not need money. I also need to be indulging in my passions and hobbies, as well as have lots of time to travel, spend time with friends and family, as well as relax with unstructured time, and be with my significant other.

What makes you feel comfortable? 
Kind, friendly people in an interesting and friendly atmosphere.

My Bucket List: Part 12

101: Get a radio show in Vancouver.

102: Perform slam poetry at Cafe du Soliel on Commercial Drive, and get noticed.

103: Win a slam poetry competition.

104: Study and live with Buddhist monks in India for a year or two.

105: Save up a solid $5000 during 2012.

106: Save up for and purchase the 64 GB iPhone 4S.

107: Return to Powell River for a month in June 2012; find a temporary job, and successfully get my N during that time.

108: Live in Downtown Vancouver, BC.

109: Live in Victoria, BC.

110: Live in Tunis, Tunisia.

A Linguistic Demise

The word "death" is an oddly dismal representation of what occurs to us. Although one can 'die' in pain and fear, death itself is not necessarily so dismal and frightening as we so make it out to seem. People always talk of death as if someone is now gone. They are not gone; they are unconscious once again, in the same way they were unconscious prior to their birth. They were here before, and they will be here after. I will be here after. Not conceptually.. but I, as in everything I am, was, or ever will be.
The form I carry now will no longer be one, but every little bit and piece of it will still be out there, and over the course of many years, it will disperse into an infinite amount of other creations in and of the Universe.

Alter your perceptions as so they are more of a proper representation of what is; "life" is consciousness, and "death," unconsciousness. In the greater greater scheme of things, there was never a beginning, and there will never be an end.
Perhaps we can, or perhaps we do consciously return, whether to this same space in a different time, a different space in the same time, the same space in the same time, or a different space in a different time; frankly, I don't know. I may never know, even if it occurs to me, and this applies to all of us. As far as I see it, it is strange enough I was born once, it would not surprise me were I born a second time, or an infinite amount of times. But that does not mean I was, or that I will be, and regardless, both options I never arrived, nor that I will ever truly leave, whether I slip into eternal unconsciousness or not.

'Conscious' and 'unconscious' are both representations as well. A false dichotomy, I suppose you could say, in the same way that all dichotomies are false. 'Birth' and 'death' are both ideas; explanations, justifications, orientations. Although my current form came to be in my mothers whomb through my being conceived, who I am and who I would be already existed. A choice and much chance brought me into consciousness, whilst chance and/or a lack of choice will either return me to unconsciousness, another consciousness, or an infinite amount of other possibilities. And this all applies to everyone who exists, regardless of what or where they may be now.

The bottom line is that everyone and everything that has ever existed, exists, or will exist, exists right now. They never didn't, and always will.

Possible Anxiety and the Onset of (Dear God, Hopefully) Temporary Tinnitus

Hello blue planet!
I apologize for the lack of posts in the past couple of days. I've been busy in almost all aspects of life, as far as I can tell.
First and foremost, let me address the title of the post. The main, and most alarming thing as of right now (which I am starting to calm down in regards to) is the constant ringing in my left ear that I've been experiencing at the level of a frightening nuisance since Friday morning. That ringing also seems to carry itself, every now and then, into my right ear. All of this was accompanied by some strange issue with my neck.. most likely a swollen lymph node, which I experienced and recovered from a couple of months back as well. At the moment, it appears the neck issue may have figured itself out after having my first decent nights sleep since the ringing started (thanks to cyclic ambient music and white noise applications for the iPod Touch). It may be too soon to tell for sure, however, so we'll see if the well-being sticks around for the rest of the day, as well as the rest of the week.

I've been frightening myself, most predominantly, with the ringing in my ear, occasionally ear(s) (right now, there is a general buzzing which I believe everyone hears when it's quiet, as told by many people I know, in my left ear.. and a ringing in my right ear, perhaps exacerbated or created entirely by the screeching sounds that fancy electronics seem to make in this day and age, but can be attributed most recognizably to that low whirring sound that TV's always make when they're on, or heard from a distant room) by reading up on what it could potentially, or most likely be online. Both the most comforting and most likely cause I've dug up is an inner ear infection in my left ear, which may very well be ironically egged-on by the stress and anxiety created by worrying myself over it (trust me; you'd be stressed and anxious to, if it managed to keep you up at night without some other sort of sound to mask it). Each time I hear it, however, I always wonder how much of it is just psychological, and how much really is a physical issue. I've decided not to seriously worry over it anymore unless it lasts past a couple weeks. Regardless, I plan on going to a walk-in medical clinic somewhere in the city to get a check-up and, hopefully, rule out the worst case scenarios. Perhaps a psychiatric assessment might be something to look into as well.. even if I do have some philosophical issues with even considering I suffer from anxiety, paranoia, or the like.

I also scared myself wondering if I had done some permanent damage to my hearing by listening to music, sometimes quite loud, using ear-buds for the past couple of years. Although such a possibility has yet to be ruled out, I doubt it would cause such a serious reaction so early. It would be more likely play into the hearing ability of 30 year old me as opposed to 18 year old me. I mean, how many teenagers in the past 70 years haven't incessantly listened to loud music?
There is also popping when I swallow, and occasionally when I yawn... so it may be something to do with pressure or, like I said before, an inner ear infection.

Yesterday, when my throat was seriously acting up, I felt like I wasn't able to breath properly. I was getting enough air in my lungs, but it felt like my neck was going to choke up on itself any minute. That, coupled with the ringing (which either wasn't there at the time or was masked by the constant sounds of the city) coaxed me into checking-in to Emergency at Vancouver General Hospital. When the doctor finally got around to checking me out and feeling my neck, as well as taking a peak into my ear, he said there was nothing immediately apparent or dramatic that seemed to be wrong with me, and suggested it was probably something viral that I'd caught. Although his diagnoses was a significant comfort in terms of my neck, I can't say he went very in-depth in any regards (I mean.. why would he? He's working emergency, which = quick check, and you're either dealt with accordingly, or there's nothing seriously wrong with you). For this reason, a walk-in medical clinic may be a better option in more of an in-depth look into what it could potentially be.
The doctor may have said there was nothing wrong with my outer ear (as in, ahead of the ear drum), he didn't check the inner ear (which is the area that, if infected, would indeed cause my ear, or ears, to ring).

I'm just scared that I may have chronic tinnitus, that's my biggest concern; it is, quite literally, one of the worst ailments you could ever possibly have. However, I am 18, so it is most likely something simpler and less menacing; I'm just hoping I'm not the first affliction in a series of many which mark a sign of the times regarding overuse of ear-buds on close to full volume.

We'll see, I'll keep everyone updated.
I believe the low whirring of the computer is causing my ears to ring much louder than they would otherwise.

Apart from all of this, work and my social life are going well.  I've now got two jobs; working at a McDonald's that doubles under the auspices of a Wal-Mart in Port Coquitlam, as well as working at Lids, a new-age hat store in the Metrotown Mall in Burnaby. I've also succeeded in tracking down an old friend of mine who lives in the area and whom was almost nearly impossible to catch up with prior due to his lack of a working phone or his own computer. We hung out the other day, finally, and spoke about philosophy, the OWS movement, and the possibility of some sort of New World Order (which I've always been skeptical of, but I listened to his arguments regardless). So, providing the whirring and ringing in my ears finally subside, and my throat stays better, life is, and will be pretty good.

I'm also somewhat looking forward to Christmas and seeing my family.
Peace out, blue planet; I hope you're having a great Holiday season.

All theory is, is just that; theory. Nothing can truly frame or encapsulate life in an idea, word(s), or any mode of expression. The nature of anything and everything is intrinsically intangible.

M.P.: Mathematics offer a truer expression of the universe than has ever been found, and the computer you are typing on is as good proof as any that it works.

Me: Mathematics expresses a framework. It is a tool, and is used as such, but it is a framework and does not dictate anything and everything. It can't explain everything, and it only expresses one aspect of life in the universe.


C.K.: Indeed, "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy."

M.P.: Math doesn't dictate the universe, the universe dictates mathematics. Math is the language of the universe and everything inside the universe so far as we can tell, can be expressed mathematically.The reason why spiritual things can't be expressed mathematically is that it is a construct of human imagination and fear. Nothing more, nothing less.

C.K.: Language & music are also constructs, or realizations, of human imagination, & music can be expressed & uunderstood mathematically, although we don't usually do that while we are being moved by it. Mathematics is a very useful, & beautiful, tool, a facet of understanding. As with all tools, however sophisticated, it does however have its limits.

M.P.: I would hesitate to equate language and music with spirituality. Sure, they are both our constructs, but they are also concrete things that are tangible and relatable to physical world as well as having a deep seated emotional place in our minds. I would sooner equate spirituality with love. Love seems like such a mystical, unknowable special thing, yet when you think about it, love is just the tool that evolution used to pair bond us when we hit the tipping point in our past where monogamy became evolutionarily favourable over polygamy.
The same goes for spirituality. Our brains are incredibly powerful, yet very fallible machines. If you've ever read a book about optical illusions you may know what I'm talking about. Pages seemingly becoming 3D is not a trick of light, but our brains failing to recognize what it's looking at. compound this with lack of knowledge about what one is looking at and the human tendancy to make arguments from ignorance (eg: "I see a weird object in the sky. I don't know what it is. Therefore, it must be aliens."). Put all these together and you have an explanation for all sorts of weird spiritual practices prevalent in humanity without having to resort to metaphysics.

Me: The dry evolutionary worldview, once again, is an effective tool for the sake of explanation and reasoning. Evolution itself was and is much more of a complicated and beautiful process than all the books in the world could explain, and science is a way of explaining and connecting things. It has nowhere near found certainty, and nothing in existence can be boiled down to a theory of knowledge that can define existence itself. It can only give us an outline. Knowledge has limits, and existence, to me, is objective AND subjective, not one or the other. Although the original reasons for why we do certain things can be traced back in evolution, the reasons for why we do them now are completely new ones, and steeped in the greater evolution and progression of our intelligences and beauty, as well as creativity. Our reasons now are no longer primitive, but spiritual with our understanding as to why we do them, and with the realization that we have a large amount of choice in the matter.
I'm not talking about religious spirituality, nor am I implying there are things like a heaven and hell we must abide to. Spirituality is the act of living every moment to it's fullest and being happy about it, as opposed to standing back and observing everything, which also has it's time and place, and can be carried out spiritually as well. Passivity versus passion.
Another thing to recognize and obtain is wisdom. As a human being, I recognize that in all honesty, I cannot know everything, and may very well know nothing. "Doubt is not a comfortable feeling, but certainty is absurd."


M.P.: Our universe is ordered, and we know that it's laws have been at least relatively consistent since the big bang by charting the movements of celestial bodies. If the universe is ordered, then we can use its own laws and mechanisms to describe how it is ordered. This is the basis of mathematics. Mathematics only work because of the way the universe works. Math is a language dictated by the universe.


Me: Math is a language that speaks, once again, a framework. It doesn't know all the words.Think about it. Yes, math can calculate the movement of celestial bodies, but recently scientists and mathematicians realized a majority of there mathematics formulas- which told them that most of the celestial bodies they were observing should, logically, eventually move out of orbit, realized there was something large missing, as these planets did NOT move out of their orbits as predicted. In order to reconcile these formulas with observation and make them even have a semblance of sense, they had to add a variable to the mix- the 'fudge factor' known as Dark Matter, or Dark Energy, or whatever you want to call it. No one has any idea what Dark Matter is, could, would, or should be; it's simply been arbitrarily added to the equations because it's the only way to make said formulas and equations make sense in light of observation which has countered all scientific logic. Turns out.. whatever Dark Matter or Dark Energy is, it makes up 90% of the cosmos.That's a lot to sweep under the rug, and then decide the Universe is inherently ordered and now makes sense. All science and mathematics do are recognize patterns on our level of perspective. I mean.. also consider quantum mechanics and chaos theory. Both are, in essence, paradoxes in the scientific and mathematic worlds. The only patterns that have been noted are patterns of consistently breaking patterns and being unpredictable, or predictable only to a certain degree. The Universe is not inherently anything, as far as anyone can see, and anyone, whether they are religious or scientific, are fooling themselves if they decide otherwise.
Despite ambitions and, perhaps, illusions to the contrary, the message that science brings is that what we know is so vastly outstripped by what we don't know.

M.P.: The fact that we don't know what dark matter or energy is does not mean that the universe is unordered. It just means that there is a phenomena out there that we don't know about yet. What you say about quantum mechanics is downright untrue. Quantum physics behaves in a way completely outside the realm of human comprehension, but it can still be modeled mathematically which is why we are able to use it. Nobody can understand the true nature of an electron intuitively, but through the use of rigorous testing and a great deal of mathematics we can describe its properties and behavior even if it doesn't make intuitive sense to the physicist.
As for the uncertainty principal and the way it means that we can't accurately find the momentum and position of a particle at a certain scale, that is not a failing of mathematics or our abilities of perception, it is a reflection of the nature of the particle. It acts as a particle but also as a wave like nothing we are familiar with and so there isn't any actual information at that certain range. The momentum and position of the particle in question is actually a probability distribution as opposed to a newtonian absolute.
I also agree that even with a billion years, we'll never understand everything in the cosmos, but that won't be because it can't be theorized, only that it takes so much data and so much precision to describe sonething like a protein mathematically that it isn't worth our time to do it when there are other ways of getting the information using the principals of physics and chemistry applied in certain ways. That is how specialized sciences like chemistry and biology came into being and why they still exist. But these thugs still can be described physically.

Me: Math attempts to express, just like language does, things that are inherently intangible, but understandable in the abstract sense they are framed in via mathematics. If something is not intuitively understood, it is not really understood or understandable. It can only be expressed as an abstract, which math does incredibly well, but not as accurately or as realistically as intuition could were such things as quantum physics and the entirety of the Universe actually able to be experienced. Sadly, as human beings, all we are able to do is experience from our level of perspective on planet Earth. Beyond all of this, whether we are looking into what makes us and the Earth, or what is in the vastness of the cosmos, we are only curious and deductive spectators. We can and will not ever understand everything.
I mean.. think about it. What's going to give you a better understanding of my house? My description of it to you? Sure, it could be quite accurate and detailed, but you wouldn't really understand until you experienced my house for yourself.. as in, touched it, saw it, and explored it.
We cannot do that on the quantum level, nor can we do that on a cosmological level.
In all of these cases, we only taste the truth. No matter how in-depth or comprehensive we get.
Negative capability is a proper way to humble our scientific, philosophical, and psychological arrogance.

On the Unalterable Truth to 'Happiness' or 'Suffering.'

It seems that we are constantly fighting a battle.

It is, in many regards, an imaginary battle inside of our brains, and perhaps it proves the AdBusters slogan that "World War III will be fought inside our minds."
As a species, we are going through a stage of great transition, in which spiritual certainties have been tossed out of the mainstream and into obscurity, and replaced by both scientifically-driven uncertainty, or scientifically motivated pushes for some sort of objective certainty.
In many circles, it seems to have been established that 'happiness' resides outside of the scientific truths, and resides only in what staunch scientists would consider to be the naive minds of the spiritually certain.
This is epitomized in Voltaire's quote: "Happiness is an illusion; only suffering is real."

Now, the strange thing is, Voltaire himself did not seem like a generally unhappy person. Although it is undeniable that he went through plenty of trials during his lifetime (as all human beings naturally do), he lived a full and exciting life with many critics and many fans, and just as many enemies and allies.
One thing to note in reading quotations of any sort is that truth is spoken in every single one of them, the above quotation included.

However, this is a hypocrisy as there are plenty of other quotations that support happiness as an unalterable truth, and others that tell us it is alright to commit homicide, genocide, or (God forbid) even infanticide. There is more power in any and all words that are given the extra merit of quotation marks followed by a dash and the italicized name of the individual who spoke them, which is undoubtedly added to if the individual has been dead for years, decades, centuries, or millenia and therefore has been cemented as having spoken a truth that appeals to an objective reality.

Wisdom, in all cases, supersedes intellectual ability and one must have both in order to be a true and honest intellectual. One of the many honest truths in life is that there is no single and objective honest truth regarding anything at all. Even your very existence is infinitely questionable. Our current struggle for happiness and our seeming inabilities to obtain said happiness arises most prominently from within ourselves as opposed to external societal pressures (although said pressures are a contributor), and can be found in our lust to pursue it. Voltaire is correct when he says 'happiness' is an illusion in the sense that we seem to lust for it as we lust for so many other feelings and things within our lives, and hence, feel the need to pursue it, expending all of our time, energy, and resources on things that may have satisfied us for a moment, but always leave us disillusioned in the long-run when we consider that it was a nice kick while it lasted, but only while it lasted. Hence, we continue to 'pursue' happiness as if it's something that can and should be caught, as Benjamin Franklin suggested. It is essentially these predetermined expectations remaining eternally unfulfilled that lead to our endless sufferings, whether it is something as complicated as existential suffering, or as simple as unrequited love or a lack of general satisfaction. 'Suffering,' to, is just as much an illusion as the expected happiness outlined above, and is only reached when someone gives up on their long-term goal of 'one day becoming happy,' and instead decides to live exclusively in the present; or, not so much 'live' in the present as 'die' in the present. The human mind, one must realize, is a delusion generator, even in the minds of the giants upon whose shoulders we stand (ironically, probably more often in their minds as opposed to others as they have both a vast conscious and unconscious ability of thought which can find the time and energy to prove and justify just about anything quite convincingly and credibly).  

The truth is that both 'happiness' and 'suffering' are nothing but ideas. Words used to define and categorize intrinsically intangible aspects of our experiences, placing them in a box of thought and selling them as this, that, or the other thing. 'Happiness' and 'suffering' are both blanket terms which can, should, and are used in an attempt to describe or define many different things; from physical pleasure to physical pain, psychological contentedness to psychological discontent, satisfaction to frustration, and so on and so forth, all of which are, in themselves, a micromanaged attempt to define and categorize intangible experiences. It is when one realizes that most of their 'happiness' or 'suffering' arises from a tug of war between conceptual ideas both claiming, at different capacities, to be an objective truth, and which can create deep inner turmoil for those who make an attempt to buy into one or the other, or see one or the other as potentially being the one and only objective truth, that one can take a step back from everything. Once that step back has been taken, the individual will notice that each and every quote, claim, religion, scientific theory, and individual outlook speaks a truth. But not an inalienable, all-enveloping truth. Just a truth in a universe that does not even recognize truth, as truth is nothing but an idea as well, and is simply one of the many words we use in an attempt to define the intangible.

Does that make it any less honest?

Of course not. Have faith in yourself and in others, and have faith in the universe as well. Beyond these 3 aspects of life, have faith in anything you wish to have faith in.

"The only thing that we know is that we know nothing, and that is the highest flight of human wisdom." -Aristotle.

And wisdom seems to be something that the world today lacks quite abundantly.