Inspiration.

Just For Now - Imogen Heap

There are very few thing in this life that I find inspirational. I don't really put much faith in humanity, which I realize is pessimistic. I guess this is why what I find inspirational are revolutionary ideas.

The Dog Days are Over - Florence + The Machine

Whenever I read, whether for a class or for leisure, I feel like I become immersed in each different authors ideas, especially if I agree with them. My favorite kinds of literary compositions to read (once I force myself to start reading them) are generally intellectually challenging ones like Emerson's or Thoreau's old-school essays.

Baby Boomer - Monsters of Folk

Fiction-wise, if you're looking for something philosophically challenging, take a whack at Milan Kundera's The Unbearable Lightness of Being (although I would only recommend this to readers who can buy themselves a ticket to an R-rated movie).

The River of Dreams - Billy Joel

Anyways, whenever I read, if a particular idea or quote strikes me, I've been trying to write them down to remind me of the inspiration the work in general gave me at the time I read it. So, to give you a better idea of my taste in literature and what inspires me, in hopes that these ideas will inspire you as well, I've decided to share with you my personal collection of favorite quotes thus far.

I Need - Ben Sollee

"No life is a waste. The only time we waste is the time we spend thinking we are alone." - Mitch Albom

"Embosomed for a season in nature, whose floods of life stream around and through us...why should we grope among the dry bones of the past, or put the living generation into the masquerade out of its faded wardrobe? The sun shines today also...To the attentive eye, each moment of the year has its own beauty and in the same field, it beholds every hour, a picture which was never seen before, and which shall never be seen again." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

World At Our Feet - Joe Brooks

"I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practice resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience, and to be able to give a true account of it in my next excursion." - Henry David Thoreau

Why Do You Let Me Stay Here - She & Him

"To see and hear people lie and to be called a fool yourself for putting up with the lie; to endure insults, humiliations, not daring to say openly that you're on the side of the honest, free people, and to have to lie yourself, to smile, and all that for a crust of bread, a warm corner, some little rank that's not worth a penny--no, it is impossible to live like that any longer!" - Anton Chekhov

"Society is commonly too cheap. We meet at very short intervals, not having had time to acquire any new value for each other. We meet at meals three times a day, and give each other a new taste of that old musty cheese that we are. We have had to agree on a certain set of rules, called etiquette and politeness, to make this frequent meeting tolerable, and that we need not come to open war. We meet at a post office, and at the sociable, and about the fireside every night; we live thick and are in each other's way and stumble over one another, and I think that we thus lose some respect for one another. Certainly less frequency would suffice for all important hearty communications." - Henry David Thoreau

Rest - Parts & Labor

"Life should be portrayed not the way it is and not the way it's supposed to be--but the way it appears in dreams." - Anton Chekhov

"Union is only possible to those who are units...A profound thinker has said 'no married woman can represent the female world, for she belongs to her husband. The idea of a woman must be represented by a virgin.' But this is the very fault of marriage, and of the present relation between the sexes, that the woman does belong to the man, instead of forming a whole with him." - Margaret Fuller

Hero/Heroine - Boys Like Girls

"The human heart has hidden treasures, in secret kept in silence sealed; the thoughts, the hopes, the dreams, the pleasures whose charms were broken if revealed." - Charlotte Bronte

"Interpretation is the revenge of intellect upon art...in place of a hermeneutics we need an erotics of art." - Susan Sontag

"You don't have a soul. You are a soul. You have a body. - C.S. Lewis

"If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense. Nothing would be what it was, because everything would be what it isn't. And contrary wise, what is, it wouldn't be. And what it wouldn't be, it would. You see? - Lewis Carroll

There's Hope - India.Arie

I'm Looking for God Everywhere.

For those who can still ride an airplane for the first time : Anis Mojgani.

I'm thirty years old, and I'm trying to figure out most days what being a man means.
I don’t drink, fight or love but these days I find myself wanting to do all three,
And I don’t really have a favorite color anymore, but I did when I was a kid.
And back then that color was blue, and back then I wanted to be an astronaut, I wanted to be an architect, an artist, a secret agent, a ranger for the World Wildlife Fund, and a hobo.
And when I was six years old I used to always throw my clothes into my blue and yellow, plastic and vinyl, hot wheels car-carrying suitcase and run away to beneath the dining room table.
I’ve made out with more girls than I wish I’ve had and not nearly as many as I’d like to.
I’ve been in love four or five times so I doubt I’m going to try that much more often.
And I spend most days making pictures or thinking about making pictures or masturbating or thinking about masturbating.
And I dream too much and I don't write enough,
And I’m trying to find God everywhere. Trying to figure this thing he made called a man.
And the television, it tells me that that's bare-knuckled bombing,
And if I drove a tank or was a movie star my penis would be huge.
And thats what I want because thats what being a man means, or at least thats what they keep telling me.
My pops, he takes care of us.
He puts the garbage out twice a week.
He drives forty-five minutes just to water flowers.
I'm sitting on the bus when a seven year-old boy carrying a book of Robin Hood, he sits down next to me he and asks me my name.
“Anis.” That’s a nice name.
“Thank you, what’s yours?” Quentin.
Anis, do you want to read with me?
So tell me what my fists keep writing.
My fingers, they open up like gates when I write and the wind is swinging in the wake.
I lift bridges with poems and forests grow in my mother’s eyes.
“I am looking for God, Quentin.”
While this world tries to forget you for trying.
For Quentin, this world hates your eyes,
For they are small and pure.
And Quentin, this world hates your fingers, little like the stems of flowers.
For not being able to pick up the things you have left behind, simply because you are still learning to do so.
I don’t drink, fight, or fuck but these days, Quentin, it’s only two out of those three that I don’t do.
And I fall in love six, seven, eight, nine, ten times, Quentin, so I don’t want to want to, but I still do.
And I want to find God in the morning, in the tired hands of dusk. At the mouth of the river, and down by its feet,
But, instead, I drive sixty through residential streets, praying to hit a child so that they may stay forever an angel, and stay forever of night and life and crayons and simple outstretched limbs
..Trying to pick up way too much way too fast, forgetting what it means to be a person.
In a world where egos are measured with tabloids, where automobiles double for morals, where beliefs are like naps; you leave them behind when somebody touches you.
And in a place where oil always takes precedence over life,
I find myself sitting on a bus, watching a small boy float down like fresh waterCarrying a book that I used to, asking if I want to see what he sees if only for a little while, and I do.
Then asks if I want to give to him what I see if only for a little while, and I read to him.
And then says to me he’s going to show me the world.
And starts reading the sentences himself, his hands dancing back and forth across the pages, stumbling over words, skipping over lines because his fingers are moving faster and with the showing of his eyes,
I wanna tell him, “Slow down, Quentin. Slow down, Quentin.You don't have to touch go.
You can see it all if your finger whispers on one word.
Slow down and hold what you see just a little while longer.”
For in a world of fast faces, I’m looking for God everywhere, trying to figure out a little better this little thing he made called a man.”

Panning for Gold : Ben Sollee

I saw God by the river

Panning for gold

I saw God by the river

Weary and old

He said; Son,

I used to know where I put things,

I used to know.

I saw God in the forest

Teaching Tai Chi to the trees

In the wind

And bowing to the sea.

He said; Son,

I used to know where I put things,

I used to know.

I saw God on a mountain

Tearing at the sky

I saw God on a mountain

With tears in His eyes.

He said; Son,

I used to know where I put things

I used to know

I could have shown you all the beauty in the world,

But now I need you to show me.

Yes, show me.

The Beginning of a New Year.

Well, summer is over, and here I am sitting in a dorm room again. I knew it had to end sometime, but dang I was surprised at how quickly it snuck up on me. You'd think that four months would be more than enough time to be with family and friends back home. But when you think about it longer, what is four months a year compared to the twelve I used to live there? But thinking about it that way just depresses me, so I guess I'll just have to be grateful for what time I did have at home.

Before it ended, though I managed to get a few last thrills in, the best of which included my last day at Johnny Rockets!! The worst of which included my best friend and I getting caught by her parents at a party at my house while my parents were hiking the grand canyon. I didn't actually get into trouble, my parents are pretty understanding and are aware that my brother and I drink; they were basically expecting us to use the house. Katie's parents on the other hand were pretty strict with her (she couldn't come to my house without parental supervision for the rest of the summer), but I think they got over it eventually.

I don't even understand why parents are so surprised or disappointed when they discover that their kids drink-at least, not when they're around 17 or 18. If it is legal at some point in a person's life, what decides when a person is old/responsible enough to do it. It makes me mad when parents get mad at their children for drinking at home when they've been at college unsupervised for at least a year. I feel that my parents rules about drinking are pretty fair- don't drink and drive, don't make an idiot of yourself, and make sure the house is cleaner than when they left it. The only one I don't understand is they don't normally let us drink in their presence, even if we're not going anywhere. It's like they don't want to know it's going on...even when they do. Whatever, it's an issue I'll never really understand, especially here in America, where basically everywhere else in the world, it's legal at 18.

Anyways, moving on. The only other thing worth noting was a quick road trip to San Diego with a few friends which was a blast.

Four days of crazy driving, by yours truly,

ahhh the fresh mountain air!

coffee houses, drunken confessionals, ladies nights out,

shopping sprees and sunset hikes,

exploring the forest of my grandmother's backyard

atomic bingo, getting bad tans and sun-highlights,

catching up on some reading,

and all without managing to kill each other!

...well maybe not.

;)

It was a nice way to end out the summer. And now I'm back! (from outer space. hah.) I have so much stuff going on I'm surprised I'm still functioning so well. New classes, new roommate, new clubs, new job, new responsibilities, new perspective, new year.

I need to go soon (damn homework), but let me just explain that everything that's going on this year is due to this new outlook I have; my new perspective. Any my perspective is this:

Courage is not the absence of fear; but rather the judgement that something else is more important than fear.

And yes, I realize this is straight out of The Princess Diaries, but I was watching it last night and I decided it summed up my new view perfectly. There is no reason to be scared to do something. I value experience over comfortability which is why this year it seems so much more important to me to make the best of every moment of it. What does it matter if everything works out okay, but there are periods in life where you are alone with nothing to do but wish you were doing more? Periods of time wasted on the internet or watching TV alone in your room because you're too afraid that you'll look like an idiot doing it alone in the lobby? Walking to the library on your own to get some work done, just so you can feel like you did something with your day, and secretly envying the group playing frisbee on the quad. Thus, the life of my Freshman year. I've decided to put an end to this wishful thinking and put it into action. Without further ado, I give you the list of activities I plan to stay committed to this school year:

-Working at the Writing Center

-Concert Choir

-Chamber Singers (if I qualify)

-Pirates of Penzance (the musical)

-Pride

-Garrick Players (another theater group on campus)

all that and keeping my grades up is going to be a doozy, but I WILL do it. As mentioned in my last blog post, I have the most reliable companion. Coffee.

GOODNIGHT.