So Much For Promises

Nobody is reading any of this, but if you HAD read my previous post FROM FOUR AND A HALF YEARS AGO you would see that I promised my next post would not be about how I haven't written. 

Uh huh.

Still driving a truck. Finally bought a school bus. I've got an Instagram account for it, @walkingturtlehermitage. Other things going on that I don't care to elaborate on at present, but might in the future.

Instagram and Facebook are not great platforms for essays. IG is really about showing stuff, right? And FB is, well, FB. I have a LOT of time to think about things, especially responses to stuff people say on the other platforms, as well as the various wild ideas I have knocking about in my brain. I need to write this stuff out. I am really, really going to try to do that here, and then put links to THIS page on those platforms.

Who knows? Maybe I'll even get the next thing written before another few years passes by! 

And maybe, JUST MAYBE, someone else will read some of it. Hey, it could happen!

Mega Man

I have changed the subtitle above after careful consideration, and consultation with a dictionary. I don't really think I have a (bad) mental illness, but I know I do have a tendency to not only dream, but to typically take each and every dream and turn it up, max it out, take it to the ultimate. This drives my wife nuts, and tends to confuse the children; they constantly think we're going to move (because I'm dreaming of houses), or that I'm going to buy a bus (because I want one, badly), or whatever the squirrels tell me to do next. Solution? BLOG IT!!! By writing it out, rather than speaking it out, I can accomplish (at least) two things: I get it out of my system (for the moment), thus making life less confusing for the fam; and I also exercise my writing skills, something that I constantly yearn for, but typically procrastinate terribly about. I anticipate repeating myself endlessly, revisiting old ideas over and over (and possibly with little-to-no variation), but it is the exercise (exorcise???) that is important. Hey, if you don't want to read it, that's your option! Hear me, squirrels??? (On a related note, the triple punctuation marks are just a bad, squirrel-induced twitch in my hands. Bear with me.)

Time should already have died...

...because I've been killing it so much!

Some time ago, I decided to try to read through the Harvard Classics from Volume 1 to 49. The contents can be read in a number of different patterns, but I decided the simplest would be cover to cover. Some of it is pretty darn dry, and I have already skipped over an essay or two that I simply couldn't plow through, but still, it's amazing how the insights from vastly different eras are still valuable today; in fact, people could stand some reflection on some of those old insights, because they most certainly still apply today. So, I will share some here, because I know what a VAST audience I have! (Hello to both of you!)

I'm only in volume 3 so far. Wikipedia has the index, but I will share those three here:

• Vol. 1: FRANKLIN, WOOLMAN, PENN
  • His Autobiography, by Benjamin Franklin
  • Journal , by John Woolman
  • Fruits of Solitude, by William Penn
• Vol. 2. PLATO, EPICTETUS, MARCUS AURELIUS
  • The Apology, Phædo and Crito, by Plato
  • The Golden Sayings, by Epictetus
  • The Meditations, by Marcus Aurelius
• Vol. 3. BACON, MILTON'S PROSE, THOS. BROWNE
• Essays, Civil and Moral & The New Atlantis, by Francis Bacon
• Areopagitica & Tractate of Education, by John Milton
• Religio Medici, by Sir Thomas Browne

Most people would be aware that Ben Franklin would be good for some input. I have to say, though, it would be worth anyone's time to revisit the autobiography. John Woolman was a Quaker, and traveled extensively preaching against slavery. Very interesting stuff. William Penn, also a Quaker, offers many insights on a topic-by-topic basis. Especially interesting to read the Wiki on him.

For the next volume, let's just say there is a ton of interesting fodder for the philosopher and everyone else there. There is a reason some of this stuff used to be part of a common education.

Bacon's New Atlantis was AMAZING. Considering when he wrote it, he is talking about NETWORKING INFORMATION SYSTEMS. Milton had some good stuff on education, one of my own passions, of course. And given that I have occasionally headed toward seminary, Sir Thomas Browne was awesome! He was a doctor who was accused of being an atheist. So he wrote his "little" book to refute that. Some really wonderful stuff. One quote I liked:

"The wisdom of God receives small honour from those vulgar heads that rudely stare about, and with a gross rusticity admire his works. Those highly magnify him, whose judicious enquiry into his acts, and deliberate research into his creatures, return the duty of a devout and learned admiration."

There is so very much material to talk about in these books, I believe my fingers would melt into the disintegrating computer keyboard, were I to attempt a complete discourse... But I will try to share and expound as the mood strikes. Eh, it's something to do, anyhow. Better than sitting and staring at the snow. Or rain. Or whatever Michigan weather chooses to do at any particular moment.

A Popular Misconception

I just finished listening to a YouTube video about how important it is to set and pursue goals. The author maintains that without making plans, you will end up (along with perhaps a 95% majority of people) essentially a failure, having never achieved real success. This I cannot disagree with; the adage goes, "If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail."

The title of this blog refers to a statement he made toward the end of his post, though. It is a popular train of thought, but one that I disagree with. He says, "People are basically good." I am NOT going to say that people are inherently evil scientists, bent on the destruction of the universe; but my contention is that the statement is flawed, and should read, "People are basically capable of being good." Being good, like being evil, is a choice each of us has to make. I think that if we don't plan on being at least a little good, we will tend toward being a little evil; selfishness is a minor evil, after all. Unless you've been trained very well by your parents to share, to reach out, etc., you will probably tend to look to your own interests first.

I think the purpose of life is to have a positive impact on the world, at least the world around you. (We can't ALL be raging megalomaniacs, after all!) But even this takes planning and action on each person's part. We have to want to. I think having no impact on the world is to be a failure. Of course, having a negative impact is worse; you require more people to work harder at being positive influences.

At the same time, I don't think we should just blindly pat people on the back and say nothing but positive things all the time. Sugar coating everything around you is not realistic; in fact, it's essentially lying, which turns your efforts into evil. But slamming people with their failures is counter productive. I think that's where the term "constructive criticism" comes in. It's a positive, encouraging way of telling people how their performance was sub-par. It builds them up, and helps them set better goals, helps them strive to make better impacts.

So, use your powers for good, and not for evil! But please, use your powers SOMEHOW. Make a choice, make a plan, and act. (And physician, heal thyself....)