Personally I think the most passive aggressive thing you can do is buy someone a furby.
I fucking love rock climbing. Seriously. Something about the combination of technicality, strength, adrenaline, and danger all mix together with a big 'ol cherry of personal success on top for EVERY climb. I always have something to improve on, and I always can look back and see what I've conquered. I can look at my fingers every day and remember how hard I worked last weekend.. I meet and talk to other people who always have stuff to teach me, and always have something to learn from the way I climb, regardless of my skill level.
I spend all week at work checking the weather and waiting for the weekend. I text friends every day about who's going and what they did the week before. Rock climbing has given me something to look forward to. It's asanine me out of my stupid winter slump, and its putting my body back into shape. I feel....good. All the time. I just feel happier, healthier, and all around better. I can't wait to go out again next weekend.
I spend all week at work checking the weather and waiting for the weekend. I text friends every day about who's going and what they did the week before. Rock climbing has given me something to look forward to. It's asanine me out of my stupid winter slump, and its putting my body back into shape. I feel....good. All the time. I just feel happier, healthier, and all around better. I can't wait to go out again next weekend.
After getting off work and taking a proper walk in the rain, i think I'm able to describe what makes rain such a refreshing event.
Rain is organic, and uncontrolled. It falls from the sky, and intrudes on the systemic monotony that is human civilization. Into a world of stifling pattern and repetition falls a uncontrolled chorus of random rhythm. It comes and goes. it waxes and wanes, it travels in small clusters, or in great swaths. However it falls it doesn't matter; we can't control it. All we can do is experience.
When I sit and watch the rain, I watch a powerful and jarring intrusion into this superficial and mundane life. I see from the force of this intrusion, a window into a world of beautiful chance and incredible happenstance. The organic world of nature strongarms its way into my world of boxes and maximum weight capacities, and all I can do is shudder as waves of recognition wash over me. This sound, this feeling. So uncontrolled, so random; it feels right....it feels like what life is really supposed to be.
Rain is organic, and uncontrolled. It falls from the sky, and intrudes on the systemic monotony that is human civilization. Into a world of stifling pattern and repetition falls a uncontrolled chorus of random rhythm. It comes and goes. it waxes and wanes, it travels in small clusters, or in great swaths. However it falls it doesn't matter; we can't control it. All we can do is experience.
When I sit and watch the rain, I watch a powerful and jarring intrusion into this superficial and mundane life. I see from the force of this intrusion, a window into a world of beautiful chance and incredible happenstance. The organic world of nature strongarms its way into my world of boxes and maximum weight capacities, and all I can do is shudder as waves of recognition wash over me. This sound, this feeling. So uncontrolled, so random; it feels right....it feels like what life is really supposed to be.
Its raining today. Outside I can hear the cars streaming through the streets, kicking up the groundwater as they zoom along to their monotonous destinations. I wonder if they stop and look at rain like I do.
Its hard to say why is so therapeutic to me. Perhaps it has something to do with the organic rhythm of pitter-patter it plays. Perhaps its the way that it changes my perspective on the world, reflecting lights from the world above off the ground. Perhaps its the cool feel of the sporadic drops against my skin. Who cares? Rain is now, and forever will be, one of natures most simplistically beautiful events. It brings life, in more way than one. It breaks monotony. it refreshes and invigorates a dull, superficial existence.
Rain is my therapist.
Its hard to say why is so therapeutic to me. Perhaps it has something to do with the organic rhythm of pitter-patter it plays. Perhaps its the way that it changes my perspective on the world, reflecting lights from the world above off the ground. Perhaps its the cool feel of the sporadic drops against my skin. Who cares? Rain is now, and forever will be, one of natures most simplistically beautiful events. It brings life, in more way than one. It breaks monotony. it refreshes and invigorates a dull, superficial existence.
Rain is my therapist.
A quick note on generational rebellion and the effect of intelligence on evolution of man and culture.
I think every generation suffers from some sort of rebellion of sorts. It's only natural, we're hard wired as a species to leave from our parents care, and if we can't, in our state of higher intelligence, find a reason to dislike our parents, then we learn to rebel against the world. It comes in select forms every generation, as peers find more in common with those sharing their sense of aspiration, and therefore tend to share ideas and mimic changes.
Our generation's "rebels" are no big mystery. From the way we dress, to the way we spend our time, there are many ways we exercise life differently than our parents did or do, but none as poignant and impactful as our moral standing, and accepted beliefs. Once upon a time, religion ruled the world. Once upon a time, men of color were kept as slaves. Once upon a time women had no rights, and talk of sex was sinful. Those practices and beliefs are gone now (for the most part - one can't speak for the entire world on the subject of culture, of coruse), rightfully stifled as younger generations grew to question their parents, and the world their parents lived in.
Look back at a few movements in the past - what age group dominates the popular movements that would become an icon of their time? Teenagers and young adults. Flappers, punks, hippies, mods, anarchists, the list goes on and on, but the age group stays the same. These volatile young adults grow up to hold these new beliefs that they've taught themselves. They put them to work in the society that they integrate themselves in, and suddenly the influence of the generation before wanes, and an entirely new system, almost the same, but slightly different, slightly better, builds in its place.
But what of today's generation? What are we learning now? We're changing our bodies, for one. We chemically control the cycle of birth, we adorn our skins with artwork and phrases of meaning, we pierce and accent our bodies with pieces of metal and colored plastic. We physically and aggressively change our image as it would have been in the wild. There's a word for that - when members of a species start to change in appearance - its called evolution.
We, as a race, have learned to aggressively evolve ourselves WITHOUT a genetic alteration from birth. Every generation moves us forward socially, away from the basic instincts of the wild, and away from the short sighted customs of the past, and now we're physically moving away from the wild.
We are the generation of physical alteration. We are the generation that will define the way our body looks the way we see fit. We are the generation that will bring us one step closer to our next evolutionary state - we are the stepping stone to the future - a future as a race that cognitively defines its image.
I think every generation suffers from some sort of rebellion of sorts. It's only natural, we're hard wired as a species to leave from our parents care, and if we can't, in our state of higher intelligence, find a reason to dislike our parents, then we learn to rebel against the world. It comes in select forms every generation, as peers find more in common with those sharing their sense of aspiration, and therefore tend to share ideas and mimic changes.
Our generation's "rebels" are no big mystery. From the way we dress, to the way we spend our time, there are many ways we exercise life differently than our parents did or do, but none as poignant and impactful as our moral standing, and accepted beliefs. Once upon a time, religion ruled the world. Once upon a time, men of color were kept as slaves. Once upon a time women had no rights, and talk of sex was sinful. Those practices and beliefs are gone now (for the most part - one can't speak for the entire world on the subject of culture, of coruse), rightfully stifled as younger generations grew to question their parents, and the world their parents lived in.
Look back at a few movements in the past - what age group dominates the popular movements that would become an icon of their time? Teenagers and young adults. Flappers, punks, hippies, mods, anarchists, the list goes on and on, but the age group stays the same. These volatile young adults grow up to hold these new beliefs that they've taught themselves. They put them to work in the society that they integrate themselves in, and suddenly the influence of the generation before wanes, and an entirely new system, almost the same, but slightly different, slightly better, builds in its place.
But what of today's generation? What are we learning now? We're changing our bodies, for one. We chemically control the cycle of birth, we adorn our skins with artwork and phrases of meaning, we pierce and accent our bodies with pieces of metal and colored plastic. We physically and aggressively change our image as it would have been in the wild. There's a word for that - when members of a species start to change in appearance - its called evolution.
We, as a race, have learned to aggressively evolve ourselves WITHOUT a genetic alteration from birth. Every generation moves us forward socially, away from the basic instincts of the wild, and away from the short sighted customs of the past, and now we're physically moving away from the wild.
We are the generation of physical alteration. We are the generation that will define the way our body looks the way we see fit. We are the generation that will bring us one step closer to our next evolutionary state - we are the stepping stone to the future - a future as a race that cognitively defines its image.
I guess I'll post a quick word about my username.
I learned the word "Sonder" yesterday, its definition doesn't appear to show up in any "official" databases, but a good number of popular mainstream internet sites share the exact same definition.
Sonder:
n. the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own—populated with their own ambitions, friends, routines, worries and inherited craziness—an epic story that continues invisibly around you like an anthill sprawling deep underground, with elaborate passageways to thousands of other lives that you’ll never know existed, in which you might appear only once, as an extra sipping coffee in the background, as a blur of traffic passing on the highway, as a lighted window at dusk.
Learning this word struck something inside of me. Certainly the feeling was nothing new to me - I'd be sitting on my balcony watching traffic stream by and think how none of those people would be looking at me, that some would be in a hurry to something of significance, or no real significance at all, and some wouldn't even be in that much of a rush- but it felt truly poignant to find something denoting such a complex and wholesomely meaningful experience.
I learned the word "Sonder" yesterday, its definition doesn't appear to show up in any "official" databases, but a good number of popular mainstream internet sites share the exact same definition.
Sonder:
n. the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own—populated with their own ambitions, friends, routines, worries and inherited craziness—an epic story that continues invisibly around you like an anthill sprawling deep underground, with elaborate passageways to thousands of other lives that you’ll never know existed, in which you might appear only once, as an extra sipping coffee in the background, as a blur of traffic passing on the highway, as a lighted window at dusk.
Learning this word struck something inside of me. Certainly the feeling was nothing new to me - I'd be sitting on my balcony watching traffic stream by and think how none of those people would be looking at me, that some would be in a hurry to something of significance, or no real significance at all, and some wouldn't even be in that much of a rush- but it felt truly poignant to find something denoting such a complex and wholesomely meaningful experience.
I've always liked girls that I used to call "unique". All of the icons I'd see on tv would pale in comparison to a girl with a more radical interpretation physical attractiveness. I remember my parents once saying "she's pretty, but that tattoo just ruins her", and I almost felt hurt, that was my favourite part about her. As I grew up, and my peers started defining themselves with the way they looked, I was always overjoyed to see a beautiful girl sporting a red pixie cut, or a beautiful tattoo. I now live a live where I see many of these alternative girls, but they're burnt out, heavily into drugs, or just simply not into the kind of life I think people should enjoy. I came here because I want to see these "alternative" girls into a different lifestyle. I want to see girls living for their future, living their true independence, exercising their right to not only act against what would be a culturally accepted norm, but also against what would be culturally accepted by their peers.
