Pure human thought cannot be represented by anything mankind has yet invented or discovered. Its complex processes are so otherworldly that we must be careful in their translations to word. The right side of our brain, responsible for logical thinking, can best be represented by the laws of mathematics and computer programming. The left side possesses the creativity inherent in all of mankind, and it is from this side that poetry comes. Poetic at times, literature can also contain logic and reason. Due to this great care must be taken when writing, because both sides of the brain combine to undertake a task. Critical thinking combines the two realms of thought and remains absolutely necessary in the writing process.

F. Brooks said that “the programmer, like the poet, works only slightly removed from pure thought-stuff.” Looking at the extreme form a paper can assume is to examine the poetry-code relationship. A verbose paper which communicates nothing is the polar opposite of a tool which uses no verbal tools but contains all the necessary facts. The optimal paper or literary work utilizes a delicate balance of presentation and content with neither too much nor too little of both.

Poetry, the soul dried on paper, presents emotions in raw form and the notes of someone’s thoughts as they come to them. Emotional and creative human thoughts are not refined by definition, and only with years of converting thoughts into words is a person able to skip intermediate steps and simply furnish a paper with finished words.

The same can be said with the other side of writing. Not employed to describe the human writing process, computer programming is useful as it allows humans to think in a language of pure meaning. Each symbol and keyword has an exact meaning, universal and defined. In poetry each word can adopt many meanings, and an extensive search of the context must be made to derive significance. While computer code remains the same to any reader, poetry redefines itself to each individual.

Writing is the combination of both thought types, and its goal is to produce a literary work that conveys meaning and content to the reader. The writing process cannot be done in one sitting; it is not the primary outpouring of an idea that the author had in his head. Human thoughts are fleeting and not always caught the first time around.

Writing can be a tortuous experience to someone who does not embrace its process well. To combine the logic and creativity of one human thought into the limited tapestry that is language requires skill and patience. Critical thinking, or the analysis of concepts and what they represent, is the key to conveying unique human ideas.

Self improvement is masturbation. – Tyler Dirden

This very quote, as funny as it sounds, has got me scratching my head thinking ‘why do I do what I do in life’. Today I went to work. I pushed carts around with long pants on in 85 degree heat, performed mind numbing bagging, and walked around the store putting stuff away on the shelves. Why do I do all of this? Is everything I do to make my self happy?

Obviously I subject my self to my job so that I can get paid, so I can exchange my blood, sweat and tears for dollar bills. What good is a dollar bill though? Money it self can not make you happy, only the things you buy with it can. Money is 100% potential happiness. So I use this money that took me over 100 hours of work at a job that I hate to buy a pair of skis that allow me to land backwards. Ok now this makes me happy …. right?? Wrong. It’s july and they’re sitting on my bed. So far all of this hard work and anguish has yet to pay off. Okay, so winter comes along and I finally get to use them. I go off a jump in the terrain park and stomp a 180. HELL YEAH!! Now I’m happy, right? Oops, it’s a weekday at seven springs and there isn’t a soul on the slopes. Nobody saw the cool trick I just performed. Why do I even do it then?? The only reason to perform a trick on skis is to impress another person. I come down the hill again and there are a couple of snowboarders sitting at the top of the hill now. This time I float a big 180 and throw in a safety grab. As I’m cruising down the landing of the tabletop-jump backwards I catch a glimpse of one of the snowboarders clapping. Now I am happy.

All of the hard work at Shop ‘N Save 7 months ago, and the anticipation has all finally paid off. It has all paid off because a faceless stranger that I’ve never met, and probably never will meet again was mildly impressed with a jump I did. I spent over $2000 dollars on ski equipment over the summer so that I could impress this stranger. This is what makes me happy. I raise my glass to you stranger, that jump was for you.

Self-Improvement IS masturbation. Anything and Everything we do in life is to make ourselves happy. Money and material objects are simply ways of getting to that eventual goal. So why do we do these things that make us happy? Well in my opinion happiness is the only reason to live. If your not living for happiness then why live at all? Whether it’s doing a trick or giving a girl that I deeply care about a kiss, I do it for me. I makes her happy, which in turn makes me happy.

There is no such thing as a completely self-less act. Sure giving up blood is something you do for another person, but you do it because you want them to be okay. You WANT them to be okay. You do it for YOU and no one else. At first I disagreed with this quote because I misinterpreted it to mean ‘Self Improvment is a waste of time’. When in reality nothing is farther from the truth. Happiness is derived from self improvment, thus self improvment is a reason to live.

~Inspired by the movie Fight Club and a conversation with Brandon Klein~

The distance to the moon is around 250,000 miles, and took the Apollo astronauts around 4 days (I think) to make it one way. Their travel to that world cost around $1 million per minute they were there. I traveled to another world last Friday. It wasn’t more than a miles away, and it only took me about 10-15 minutes to walk there. It cost nothing, and the inhabitants were glad I could make it. I entered into a world of the non-technics, a world of feeling, and a world of minds. I entered the world of poetry.

I volunteered to help out in the College Unions Invitational national Poetry Slam. There were 10 schools in attendance, including Case. The first person I saw had the most intricate and numerous piercings I have ever seen with my own eyes. Other people wandered in, all strange in incredibly interesting ways.

I was an imposter, hiding in a sea of poets! What was this engineer doing with these people? I hid along the corners, pretending I belonged in their world. They would stand and spout such creative poetry that touched me and made me rise up out of my chair to float through the room from the emotion they were exerting on the audience. They shouted and cried and wailed and sang and said such things that I would dream of saying, and still I stayed.

I had not written a poem, I had not given a performance, and I certainly didn’t help them in any great way, but these poets talked to me. Normally random people talking to me doesn’t affect me much, they are just people. But these were poets! I had poets thanking me! I had poets following me around, looking for directions on how to get somewhere! I was leading a pack of poets!

I was on a backpack once with one of my dads old work buddies. He was a really smart guy, and at the end of our 4 day pack he walked next to me. He told me he had figured me out. I was the Pragmatist. Nothing could faze me, I would just keep walking. If something was wrong, I would deal with it, and that I didn’t ever seem to mind. My other brother Ed was on this trip too. My dad’s friend also told Ed that he had him figured out. Ed was the poet. He noticed when things weren’t the way they were supposed to be, and didn’t like it. He did things for the sake of doing them, and said things for the sake of saying them.

I agree with what my dad’s friend said. I am happy to be the pragmatist. But my taste of the other side tickled my tongue, and every once in a while I wish I was a poet.

I was contemplating doing some free writing for my research paper I have yet to do when something occurred to me. The goal of free writing is to just write whatever pops into you head, take a break, then come back and read it. You can gain insight into the subject just by examining what you know already, and sometimes just trying to arbitrarily pull up facts from your brain doesn’t do the trick. Hmm, just spouting out what you are thinking and then contemplating what that was. Why does that sound familiar?

Recently a friend of mine who will remain nameless admitted that he talks to himself. He takes long walks late at night and will talk to himself about whatever is on his mind. I would make fun of him if I didn’t do it too.

There are two types of conversations you can have with yourself. There is the one where you are really just talking to someone who isn’t there, and listening to what you say, and there is the one where you are actually holding a conversation with yourself. The latter is something that is best left for psychiatrists, so I’ll deal only with the former.

I read a statistic somewhere that talked about what you remember about a speaker. It said something along the lines that you remember 70% of what they look like, 20% of how they say it and 10% of what they say. If you take this idea to your brain it works along the same way. Compare what you remember thinking to what you remember seeing or hearing. Thoughts are so ethereal that they can vanish into thin air, and you have no idea that you even thought them unless something prompts you back.

It sounds silly, talking to yourself, as if it was only available to crazy people and those big black guys who walk down Euclid all the time. If I were religious I could say I was having a conversation with God, and that I was just telling him about my day. But for reasons that I won’t get into I’m not, so talking to myself has to be justified in another way.

I am the perfect listener for myself. I am always thinking about what’s being said, I think faster than the words come out, if I get bored listening the speaking stops, and I’m free to interrupt any time I have a question.

Knowing this, don’t be ashamed to talk to yourself. Socially it’s unacceptable, but so are many things that are commonly done. You read your papers aloud before turning them in, why not sometimes read your thoughts?

I am Jack’s hatred of Instant Messanger:

Like so many others I had fallen victim to the AOL Instant Messanger syndrome. I would often sit at home thinking what kind of profile defines me as a person? And in some sick distorted way I am supposed to define who I am in less than 1024 characters. I would force myself into a text file.

I did this so people whom I have never met could “understand me”. Or I would put something clever and witty and make people laugh. These people would laugh with a sick desperation.

I would make a profile so that my friends would not have to wonder how I am doing and satisfy thier idle curiosity. This way they can feel okay not talking to me, content that they are updated on every aspect of my life.

I say fuck Instant Messanger with its smiley faces, buddy icons, and its profiles, fuck 1024 characters.

I am not my fucking profile.