Before I give some examples to flesh out exactly how I have been “self-reflective”, it is worth guessing at why I have been driven to it specifically in the last few weeks. I think, ultimately, the answer is that I am lonely. Of course, there are many different kinds of loneliness and I’m not sure which it is I am experiencing. It’s sort of a longing strangely mixed with an ennuiish hopelessness, as if I were this world, wishing to be full of magic and adventure but knowing that all that ever happens is cause and effect–law-driven necessities not admitting of departure from the norm–atoms interacting and explaining everything: structure without substance. It is difficult, however, to always be precise about these things, because whatever form of loneliness I am actually experiencing, the end result is that I want a girlfriend, and that move tends to radiate too much noise for the undertaking of a profitable metaphysical inquisition. Anyhow, what connects this loneliness to self-reflectivity is that there seems to be no outstanding reason for it, and so I am driven to look inside and figure out whence it comes.
So, one thing I have done, as an initial foray, is to lay some of the groundwork for my biography. That is, I have spent some time trying to remember every event of significance in my life, since my earliest memories around age 3. The first observation I made was how quickly certain pictures and events come to mind, though I have not thought of them in 10 or 15 years. The second was how different everything looked (in terms of significance) from my current perspective. In other words, some things which, at the time, I may not have thought were key moments in my life, I now realize had a substantial impact on my life, or set the stage for future choices, or initiated characteristic patterns (of personality or whatever) which I still exhibit today. At this point, I have gotten through most of junior high in my list-making, and so I am expecting even more surprises as I get into high school and beyond. The benefit of this exercise (and I use the term “biography” very loosely, of course) is that I get more of a sense of direction for my life–not for the future, necessarily, but the direction it has gone. And that, obviously, helps me to understand why exactly it is that I am here, now, and experiencing the things I am.
As a result of that project, and also some other, less “scientific”, realizations that have come to me recently, I have learned more about (1) the core of my being–what pushes me from day to day and causes me to like certain things and not others, judge some things of more value than others, and so on, (2) my patterns of interaction with people of various kinds, and why they are such that they are, (3) what a woman will have to be like if there is to be any chance of me loving her forever, and (4) what I see as my biggest insecurities and flaws. Since all of these lessons are still more or less in progress, I’m not going to share any details at this point, but I hope that, if I continue to unravel these mysteries at the current rate, I’ll have things figured out before Christmas. Of course, that’s optimistic and it won’t happen, but I didn’t want to be honest and just say, “Too bad, I’m not telling.”
Another great opportunity I had was to go on a snowboarding trip to Lake Tahoe, all by myself, this weekend. Originally, I had been planning on going with some friends, but, in the end, no one else could go, so I decided to make use of the weekend, and my snowboard, anyways. I love road trips partly for the reason that, somehow, driving puts me in a pensive mood, and I am able to come to interesting conclusions about things spontaneously. I’m not sure if that happened on this particular trip, but I did gather my thoughts from the previous weeks into something of a coherent whole, and I think that as a result I am ready to move into the next stage of “self-discovery” (taken in the literal sense). On top of that, the snow was awesome–a good deal of fresh powder was there on Saturday morning for me to make tracks in, and I felt that my snowboarding skills improved greatly, as my carving got tighter and I was more willing to pick up speed and trust that I wouldn’t eat it. Another unexpected benefit of being on the mountain alone was that I could go in the singles line at the lifts, saving a ton of wait time. I was also able, for that reason, to have a lot of cool conversations with the people on the chair beside me.
Incidentally, I have a few pictures from the weekend that might be fun to look at: My snowboard and car, Self-picture, View from the top of a run.
Of course, despite the clarity that solitude brings (and brought), I don’t think my solo snowboarding adventure did much to help cure my loneliness. On the other hand, maybe loneliness is exactly what I need at the moment, since it is spurring me to so many useful ponderings. Unfortunately, it looks like I will be running out of time in which to do these ponderings (not that I ever had it to begin with), as the quarter is coming rapidly to a close. It ends all the sooner for me since I am planning on taking finals week off to go to Thailand with my mom. It should be a fun adventure, and maybe I’ll get a chance to do some climbing there. The only problem is that I’ll have to finish my 3 term papers a whole week early. I’m also heading back to Orlando the week before that, to say goodbye to our house, which has been sold! It’s a good house, with many great memories attached. In any case, maybe further self-realizations (if important) will fall out of the daily work and school I am doing.
In conclusion, I should mention that the subject matter of this entry is fitting, as the entry marks (nearly enough) the 2nd anniversary of my weblog. And the weblog is, of course, primarily a tool of self-discovery through somewhat exhibitionist writing (unless we are in a more noble mood, in which case that description sounds cheap–but I’m prepared to accept it as true without much argument). I’d like to think that my weblog has changed as much and in similar ways as I have–in content (deeper), style (more involved), and appearance (more sexy). Well then, happy blogaversary to me!
