Good and Evil

One of the most profound lessons of my mission was when I had to write a 7 page letter explaining everything I had ever done wrong. It was a horrible experience and I think it was a little unnecessary but at the time it gave me a sort of OCD about everything and I became overly analytical and critical and paranoid of every single thing I did. I also felt really guilty over the stupidest of things. Anyways, not (necessarily) the point.

For some reason I felt that in my confession I had to portray myself in the worse possible light. I spent several days scanning things in my head and started feeling guilty of the tiniest things and when you take everything you've ever done and portray it in the worst possible way and write 7 pages of it, anyone can seem like the most pathetic evil person.

The lesson I learned was how much I hate sensationalism. I came to the realization that portrayed in the worst possible light I looked like the most pathetic missionary but most of the time I never had bad intentions or had purposely calculated to be some horrible missionary but if you gave my 7 page list to the average relief society member they would think, this is the worst missionary ever. But, I would dare say that if you took any missionary and had him write any little thing he had done wrong over the past few months and portrayed it in the worst possible light anyone would look at it think "how awful".

I feel like the media in the US (and maybe other places I don't know) is based off of this principle, sensationalism, as in, taking every small piece of dirt you can find in a person then listing it off and saying, "how awful", even though I know that you could take any person and do the exact same thing including whatever idiot journalist/news commentator/politician/whatever is saying it.

If I ever hear someone quote some sort of stupid little anecdote about some person as proof of why I shouldn't listen to them/vote for them/whatever I immediately think substantially less of them, for A) quoting it back to someone else without first applying critical thinking (-100 points) and B) believing it (-10 points) C) insulting my intelligence by thinking I would believe it and jump on the bandwagon (-1000 points).

There are no black hats and white hats. People are way too complicated to portray this way. No one is "perfect" and no one is "evil".

Clichés

I hate clichés because most of the time they are based off of some profound piece of wisdom but it has gotten so repeated that the people who say it don't actually understand it and the people who hear it probably don't actually understand it either, but then they think that they (alliteration) do (Spanish pronunciation on the d which is similar to th). I hate them because it is sort of a cheapening of wisdom. Because then if you really do want to reference the clichéd thing there will be many people who will agree with you but who don't actually fully understand you but don't realize that they don't.

Embarrassing

Lately I feel like I realize that embarrassing things are only embarrassing if you allow yourself to be embarrassed by it. A few weeks ago I accidentally went to the wrong apartment thinking that it was Nathan's. I realized that it wasn't the right apartment and then said to the kid, "Wait, is this number 8?" He said, "No, this is 6". I laughed and said, "oh, how embarrassing" but I didn't actually feel embarrassed and walked out and didn't let it get to me. I think it's only embarrassing if all of a sudden your self-confidence crumbles. Then it gets very uncomfortable for everyone. Yet letting your self-confidence crumble is actually your choice. You may be conditioned to let it crumble in classically embarrassing situations but if you don't actually let it crumble then it's not actually embarrassing and you don't feel pathetic and thus don't get perceived as pathetic which is why you are embarrassed in the first place. The embarrassing situation doesn't cause the embarrassment but your response to the embarrassing situation causes it. I'd like to think that people would think, "Wow, that guy is in an embarrassing situation yet I don't feel uncomfortable because he doesn't seem uncomfortable" and I'd like to think that I'm right.

Transparent

Lately I think that life would be better if we weren't so attached to the idea of privacy. I think we all cling on to "privacy" too much. I think this because I think that we as humans do many things which we consider weird that we don't like to admit too but the longer I live the more I suspect that everyone does weird things. I bet you would find that an overwhelming majority of humans do the same thing. Thus, it shouldn't be considered weird if almost everyone does it. Yet everyone just pretends that they don't do it, or won't admit to it.

What if all of our secret behaviors/likes/dislikes/hobbies/etc. were known? What if our problems were known? At first it seems like if somehow all of our dirty laundry were suddenly ripped from us and strewn everywhere it would be unbearingly embarrassing, and it would, if someone was completely exposed to a world where everyone kept under wraps. But imagine if suddenly, all at once, you could know every tiny thing about any given person at any moment and they could know the same about you. It would be scary to have everything readily available to everyone else, but then they would be readily available to you. I theorize also, that at that point, whatever it was that we felt embarrassed about and that we felt we had to hide wouldn't be that embarrassing if everyone all at once was exposed. We would realize that it isn't that embarrassing because most people would have the same thing or something similar or worse.

Then I think society would be much healthier and we could actually deal with problems.

It's tricky though because it's kind of like one of those situations where everyone has their gun pointed at everyone else and no one wants to be the first to put down their gun. It would be better if everyone put down their gun at once but no one wants to risk that if they put down their gun then no one else would put down their gun.

This just in

I am as tall as Thom Yorke.

A Response to Barret's Open Letter

Dear Barret,

This made me think of times in the mission when I realized this same thing. I realized after having one companion that did so many things day to day that just drove me nuts that I would spend all day just thinking about how much I hated him. Even though I knew I shouldn't hate him, I was in a mental state where every single thing he did or said just drove me absolutely nuts, so much that as he was teaching I would envision hitting him with my scriptures or pushing him off the end of the couch because everything he was saying as he taught drove me absolutely nuts. One day I finally told him about many of the things that bothered me and I felt so so so much better and as we ironed out our differences which took no longer than 15 minutes we both got along better than ever. In fact, once I had told him about all the stuff that bothered me it no longer bothered me that he did it. I even said to him after it was all over, you know what, I don't even care anymore if you do X anymore, I just feel better knowing that you know it bothers/ed me. Then I always tried to handle any problem that annoyed me right away as it happened instead of letting it boil away inside of me. Even pretty big things, like once I got really mad and told one of my companions that he was way too arrogant and all of the ward members hated him and thus hated us because he was passively-aggressively rude to everyone and once he realized that I honestly believed that he believed he was better than everyone he started crying, but after about a 20 minute discussion we got along better than we ever had all transfer.

I also like what Dr. Blanton said in the video I posted on my tumblog about how many times when we are mad at people we aren't actually mad at them, we are mad at our own perceptions of them, which usually aren't a very accurate portrayal of that actual person. There is a book called "Bonds that Make us Free" by a BYU philosophy Professor that is basically about that whole subject and has countless examples. One I can remember (sort of) was a couple who constantly fought at Christmas time because the husband always felt that his wife put so much work and emphasis on presents and decorations and doing all these activities that he felt that they never actually got quality family time during christmas because they were too overscheduled with everything, so he would always complain and try to challenge his wife by participating as little as possible (which was his way of putting his foot down) so that christmastime wouldn't wreck their normal family life. However, on the wife's end, she interpreted his actions as just a plain bad attitude towards christmas and because she wanted so badly to feel united and together as a family at christmas she felt like she had to try and do all these things to get him in the christmas spirit but they both resented each other for their actions and with more time they both became stronger and stronger in their actions and views and just created more and more resentment and bigger problems between them which lasted for years. The husband felt that if he gave into his wife's demands then she would take over and Christmas would be ruined for everyone. The wife felt that if she gave into her husband's demands then Christmas wouldn't be meaningful and would be ruined for everyone. Finally, because this was causing so much trouble in their marrige and family they went and saw the guy who wrote the book for marriage counseling (or something along those lines, I may be fudging the specific details) and as they talked about it they realized where each other were coming from and that basically, they both wanted the same thing at christmas time, family togetherness, and once they got everything off their chests they felt a lot better and the husband no longer cared if they did so many christmas activities and the wife no longer cared if they didn't do so many christmas activities and the problem was solved. The problem was that instead of just coming out and being honest with everything they both tried to solve the problem by forcing what they wanted on their (false) perception of the other person and their motives. The husband's solution to the problem was the problem that the wife was trying to solve and vice versa. So here they were locked in this neverending cycle that was completely unnecessary to begin with because in the end they both wanted the same thing but they were both living in two separate worlds in which they believed they were the hero keeping the other one in check.

That started out as an example of how talking about our problems face to face solves them quicker than holding onto them but got sort of sidetracked and I introduced a whole new set of themes. Anyways, back to Radical Honesty. (But first I might add that that book (Bonds That Make Us Free) has probably been one of the most influential books in the way I view the world and human interactions which extends to politics and many other views. I strongly recommend it to anyone.)

My point is this, which I learned on my mission and which after reading this book (Bonds That Make Us Free), which was the first book I read when I got home, was the realization that the one and only way of solving a conflict between two people or to effectively work between two people is to sit down and tell the other person, face to face, exactly how you feel and why you feel that way and what you think the problem is, then, in return, they can tell you, then you can work it out, face to face. Not in an accusatory manner, but in one that is honest and explains why you feel the way you do (e.g. "If you wouldn't do X then we wouldn't have this problem" (accusatory) vs. "When you do [this thing] then I feel [this thing/creates some problem]. That is why I don't like it.)"). The problem is that, no one actually does that. They have a disagreement with someone so then they don't actually address the problem head on to that person, but as soon as the person is gone they piss and whine to everyone else about their one sided version of the problem, which more times than not, is actually radically different from what the other person's perception of the problem is. Then people start taking sides and deciding who's right when both of them in one way are right and both of them are in one way wrong. They resent their false perception of the other person instead of what that person actually is. This is why lies (or just omission of honesty) creates running sores while the quick pain of truth can pass away. The more I think about it, the more I think that cushioning someone from truth does absolutely no good at all. Provided that, the person isn't just saying it to be nasty, but to let the truth be known and to work out the problems if needs be.

I also think that our culture may not be wired properly just yet (but it's time to evolve, culture) to be able to handle this at first because people might just think that someone is being nasty or mean by telling the truth, but sometimes you have to just understand that even though someone may say something negative by telling the truth it doesn't mean they hate you. We all recognize shortcomings in others and even in ourselves and we don't have to get offended if someone points it out. (This prompts me to go on another similarly related but different tangent on why privacy is overrated but I won't because this is already pretty lengthy.) If we're all aware of it then there's nothing to be gained by ignoring it. Improvement can only come by acknowledging it. We are only holding ourselves and others back by not telling the truth always.

Also, as for this week, I think I've had a few situations in which I've "turned up the throttle" so to speak, but I still have a lot of room for improvement. I feel like I'm funnier when I actually speak what I'm thinking. I also feel at those moments like I'm really living and realize that it's probably the only way to really feel happy. (So why does it have to be so hard to actually do?)

K-Strass

This is funny for so many reasons. But I think it's interesting how fake the newscasters are. Both in the videos with K-Strass and in the pitiful attempt to save face that I just posted. I'm developing a theory that awkward situations usually happen when a fake persona that we're projecting suddenly hits a wall in which it doesn't know how to carry on. E.G. the newscasters here are focused so much on having a good segment that all their attention is focused on their newscasting theatrics that all of a sudden they realize that K-Strass here isn't actually a yo-yo master, that they've been mocked and that goes against their fake persona they're projecting of "competent newscaster" and so they panic, reboot, and try to escape the situation with a transparent "we're having some difficulties" instead of acknowledging the "elephant in the living room". Then, because there is an "elephant in the living room" and everyone person knows it and since they don't acknowledge it because they're still trying to project the fake "competent newscaster" persona, the situation is awkward because at that point the newscasters are completely transparent to everyone watching.

I'm convinced most awkward situations are created because of "elephants in the living room". (I just learned that term but it fits so well that I continue to use it).

The best thing to do in that situation is to figure out a way to project that you are in touch with your surroundings and acknowledge whatever unstated fact is creating the situation. If you are being fake you won't be able to do this effectively. Just one example of human stress created by lack of honesty.

Also it's funny that they continue in their transparently fake personas in this follow-up video when they try to get the upper hand again with their stinging voice inflection (notice when he says the word "zim zam") but they still just look like jackasses. They also try to show how they were playing the sympathy card. I'm not buying it. You just look fake. You did then, you do now.