The quietness of my home in San Diego can sometimes get quite addictive. With only the sound of wind in my ears and the whole world accessible via the Internet, I can not only think about anything I want without anything to disrupt my train of thought, but also find plenty of materials to add on to that train. Left alone with the entirety of the two-floor real estate, I can pace through the confines, lost in my own mind, without awkward stares or forced conversations.
Perhaps that would be the thing I would miss the most as I am set to depart for London in less than a week. Although I do have a single dorm room, much of the dorm life will revolve around what happens outside the room itself. The need for "harmonious" interaction with fellow hall-mates, even at the very superficial level, will define the entire atmosphere of the building, for better (to provide a crisis-free, quiet study environment) or for worse (make room for all those mentally stressful gossip and "dorm politics")
Either way, one thing is clear. Not matter how productive the dorm in London turns out to be, its capacity to generate private thinking time will be much less than here at home in San Diego. No doubt, what happens around school and even in the dorms will provide plenty of materials for blog writing, but the feel is different. In such cases, I will, at most, be that passive third-person observer assigning broad social and cultural meaning to every single event happening, without the option of aggressively choosing my own way in the sequence of events.
Of course, observing events is, like I said before, a main theme and purpose of this particular blog, but as I continue to expand the number of subjects, topics, and words on its pages, the more I come to realize that on-the-spot "analysis" of small events for big underlying meanings are, in the best cases, biased (upon the situation at hand) and hasty (impossible to take into account the other factors, some of which no doubt will not show themselves until a time much later than when the post is being written).
The mind can only wonder and daydream when it completely zones out all its surroundings. And as the observer that I claimed myself to be, I cannot zone out anything happening around me. So, logically, the only time that I can legitimately think for myself and about myself occurs when there is absolutely nothing happening around me. As much as I am bored and running out of things to write out productively, I am afraid that staying in my house in San Diego is the only possible way for such self-reflection.
And self-reflect I certainly have. I discussed my political views on everything from Chinese regionalism to American foreign policy, social issues from conformity to social mobility, and cultural issues from public suicides to sports competitions. Of course, some of these are based on what I saw and read, but quite a few are written at much later dates in quiet places where I can think about them carefully and at my own pace.
The other issue is always restrictions on time. When I am outside the house, I tend to see so much on any given day that I would like to write about each observation in a separate post. But considering the workload (previously of paid work, now for graduate school), my time and conscience ("have to travel/read/finish problem set!") will force the number of posting to about one or two a week, meaning that the posts will end up becoming the summaries of events that occurred over the whole week.
Even if only one or two most memorable ones are cherry-picked for analysis, the posts run the risk of becoming simply diary entries: much length devoted on what actually happened rather than why do I think it happened and what do the events mean. "I think there for I am," the saying goes. If I no longer have the time or the energy to express my own thoughts, then is the blog even part of my personal growth anymore? And if self-reflection becomes nonexistent, then to whence shall my understanding of "who I am" go?
Perhaps that would be the thing I would miss the most as I am set to depart for London in less than a week. Although I do have a single dorm room, much of the dorm life will revolve around what happens outside the room itself. The need for "harmonious" interaction with fellow hall-mates, even at the very superficial level, will define the entire atmosphere of the building, for better (to provide a crisis-free, quiet study environment) or for worse (make room for all those mentally stressful gossip and "dorm politics")
Either way, one thing is clear. Not matter how productive the dorm in London turns out to be, its capacity to generate private thinking time will be much less than here at home in San Diego. No doubt, what happens around school and even in the dorms will provide plenty of materials for blog writing, but the feel is different. In such cases, I will, at most, be that passive third-person observer assigning broad social and cultural meaning to every single event happening, without the option of aggressively choosing my own way in the sequence of events.
Of course, observing events is, like I said before, a main theme and purpose of this particular blog, but as I continue to expand the number of subjects, topics, and words on its pages, the more I come to realize that on-the-spot "analysis" of small events for big underlying meanings are, in the best cases, biased (upon the situation at hand) and hasty (impossible to take into account the other factors, some of which no doubt will not show themselves until a time much later than when the post is being written).
The mind can only wonder and daydream when it completely zones out all its surroundings. And as the observer that I claimed myself to be, I cannot zone out anything happening around me. So, logically, the only time that I can legitimately think for myself and about myself occurs when there is absolutely nothing happening around me. As much as I am bored and running out of things to write out productively, I am afraid that staying in my house in San Diego is the only possible way for such self-reflection.
And self-reflect I certainly have. I discussed my political views on everything from Chinese regionalism to American foreign policy, social issues from conformity to social mobility, and cultural issues from public suicides to sports competitions. Of course, some of these are based on what I saw and read, but quite a few are written at much later dates in quiet places where I can think about them carefully and at my own pace.
The other issue is always restrictions on time. When I am outside the house, I tend to see so much on any given day that I would like to write about each observation in a separate post. But considering the workload (previously of paid work, now for graduate school), my time and conscience ("have to travel/read/finish problem set!") will force the number of posting to about one or two a week, meaning that the posts will end up becoming the summaries of events that occurred over the whole week.
Even if only one or two most memorable ones are cherry-picked for analysis, the posts run the risk of becoming simply diary entries: much length devoted on what actually happened rather than why do I think it happened and what do the events mean. "I think there for I am," the saying goes. If I no longer have the time or the energy to express my own thoughts, then is the blog even part of my personal growth anymore? And if self-reflection becomes nonexistent, then to whence shall my understanding of "who I am" go?
Comments
Post a Comment