Pets

I hate to be alone. I'm learning to enjoy it in small doses. Mostly I want people with me, because the times that mean the most to me are the times when I'm being lazy and I have the presence of someone there with me, also being lazy, but still loving me. Pets that want to lay around with you all day, love on you and follow you around the house give off the essence of what I want from a person. They're unconditional and attentive.




































You can call me the pug whisperer.

11/6/11

Science of the Soul

I was reading DISCOVER The Year In Science. It tells me that affection stems from the need to protect social networks, moral values can be changed by magnetic fields, and when love is felt, the part of your brain that gets activated is its reward system: in heartbreak, the neural pathways associated with cravings and addictions get activated, as well as those regions associated with distress and physical pain. I translate that to meaning that my affection is subconsciously selfish, my moral integrity is determined not by my soul but which neural pathways in my brain are activated, and the feeling of love is based also on selfish gain as indicated by the desire for rewards and cravings when it's gone.

Science makes me feel like everything I feel is simply because of logic based on self preservation and comfort. Knowing that my affection and love for others exists due to selfish gain makes me not want to feel affection or love at all. What meaning does it have if it's just subconscious self preservation and a change in my brain chemistry can change my ability to love and decide and do Good?

Where does my soul play into this? How does my soul play into this?

Science is a Good thing. I want to know how.

1/5/11

Intoxicated Behavior

Confession: my judgment gets impaired when I'm tired and/or when it's late at night. It's my equivalent to being intoxicated. I do more irrational things and spill my guts more in those scenarios than any other time. Most of the things I regret doing or saying can be traced back to this truth. And it's normally late at night and I am usually quite exhausted when I post on this blog. What does that tell you?

1/4/11

MY EMOTIONS ARE THE PINACCLE OF IMPORTANCE

I find my emotions and what I feel each day more important than anything else. I am consumed by what I feel.

Dear Toni,

There are lessons that you learn every day. There are new things that you realize and new experiences that you have every day. Every day is new. Every day is different. To compile those lessons and build one upon the other over time will help you not only learn about yourself but also help you become more wise and lead you to transform into who you want to be. By reflecting on the lessons that you learn and applying them practically to your own interactions with people and yourself, you will change. Reflect on what you see, hear, feel, taste and smell. Reflect on actions and what they mean. Reflect on your world. You will not change if you only look at yourself. If you think that all that matters are your experiences and your feelings, you won't advance. You'll stay stuck as the same self absorbed person you are in this moment. Stop thinking that staring in the mirror is going to change you: because it won't. You'll waste away as you stay fascinated, fixated and obsessed with yourself. Look at other people. Look at the world. Let those things affect you and matter to you and then you'll change. Stop blogging about your emotions: all that you can learn from them is that you hold them to be the most important part of your experiences every day. That's selfish and disgusting.

I know you: the pursuit of truth is what drives your life. You won't find any truth in your emotions. I promise. There is no Truth in your emotions. Change in yourself, transformation into a better person, is important but it's not the point. It's not just about discovering who you are and growing as a person. There is a big picture: pursue the big picture and chase after wisdom, truth, and love. You cannot produce fruit on your own: it's only by holding onto the vine that you will produce good fruit. And that'll happen when you're not even thinking about it. So stop looking inward and look outward.

Love,
Toni

1/3/11

The stage called "...Oh"

I'm learning that there are many stages of grief, pain, sadness, loss, and simply learning to be happy. They don't always occur in order, and sometimes I jump from one to another, go backwards then forwards then backwards again. I'm learning that becoming happy is much like riding my bike. This last summer I had to get in shape to do a 120 mile ride in two days. At the beginning of the summer I was doing 10 miles and hurting and straining muscles in my chest and neck just to breath going up hills. By the end of the summer I was easily doing 60 miles and I couldn't find enough hills to pose a challenge to myself. Having been at school for the last four months I'm back to the 10 mile basics and it's taught me that we all go back to the basics without upkeep. I learn to deal with my problems and my boredom and when it becomes easy I slack off and have to learn the same things all over again. I find that this is true with everything: just because I've reached a certain standard in the past doesn't mean I'm still there now. That's why I'm writing it all down now: to remember. So here is one stage of learning to be happy...for me it encompasses that first realization that you're gonna be just fine:

I know I'm stable and okay when I can sing a sad song that is essentially about me as well as sit at home alone and still be content and retain the ability to smile.



The song is "You Were Meant For Me" by Jewel and some parts apply and some parts don't but the general feeling is definitely something I can identify with, and I sang along to it on the radio as it played a couple days ago and realized the above truth. If I could make the video disappear so you could just have the audio...I would.

1/2/11

I can do it?

Sometimes I feel happiness after a long period without it and it's almost painful: like stepping out onto the grass in "The Great Divorce" by C.S. Lewis must feel like. I feel the need to make myself stop and bottle some of it away for later so I don't waste it all. I forget that I'm a confident courageous adventure-seeker, quick to laugh loudly and contagious in zeal. I forget that this is me:



Being with friends for New Years was revitalizing:

A story to start off the new year: a group of us were caught in the midst of a roman candle war and it was much like being caught in a war zone. There was diving into trees, bright explosions, hiding in the snow and one man down. I felt like an army medic crawling toward the yelling to find him in the woods and examine the damage: only minimal burns to the face after a firework flew over our backs and into his face as he tried to retreat into the woods. I felt as though I could be an army medic for a living.

We all sat around a table and played the card game Mao of which you are not allowed to discuss the rules or talk during the game, so I won't get into any detail here. We competed, yelled, failed to follow the rules, laughed, and I found that the painful happiness wasn't so painful anymore.

I have been singing, dancing, laughing, screaming, feeling, and being extreme. When I'm this happy I feel capable of anything: of forgiving, loving, and even mourning.

The picture is a WWII poster by J. Howard Miller called "We Can Do It!", commonly mistaken to be Rosie the Riveter but in fact being Geraldine Doyle. This picture was my theme and motivation my freshman year of college and was a constant reminder that I could be a powerhouse. I guess roman candles, card games and happiness remind me of that fact.

1/1/11

"Enjoy the Journey"

I found myself confronted with an image much like this for a couple of hours, and though it was a very dark and dreary picture, I looked at it and felt complete happiness. Happiness that I hadn't felt in a long time and I wondered if there had been something in my peach snapple to make my mood so uncharacteristic of the norm.
















I'm learning what it means to wait on the Lord. Many characters in the Bible waited their whole lives for the fulfillment of a promise from God, and some never lived to see happier days. I'm learning what it means to not only live in the present, but live in it without change for long periods of time. To mourn for weeks and weeks that turn into months, and to live in that state with hope because I understand that it will not always be this way, but to also revel in the fact that this is a real experience. Both joy and sadness are both to be tasted and seen with full appreciation. And patience.

When I was 16 I was in my "Yes Man" phase. I said yes to everything and soaked in every experience to the fullest. I need to remember what it was like to enjoy every moment, no matter what it brings, and love the unchanging periods of my life for what I can learn from them, and for simply what they are. Because I do in fact enjoy feeling: I listened to an interview with J.K. Rowling in which she talked about how she knows what it means to feel great sadness, but her clinical depression was the absence of even that. Of all feeling. Therefore I can appreciate both the joys and tortures of my life.

And staring at that dark picture of trees and mountains and being happy was the equivalent of staring at these past months and patiently enjoying them in the present for what they are.

Picture is called "Mountains at Night" by lonewolfhowling on deviantArt.

12/31/10