Judge People

“Don’t judge a book by it’s cover” is not advice I would give to anyone. But there is a lot of judgement-based advice that I would give. So I will. Right now. Prepare to be advised.

Do judge books by their cover. Judge people. Think about their appearance. Judge your surroundings. Think about everything you perceive. Don’t ignore things. Don’t assume you can’t come to valid conclusions. Don’t turn off your brain. People with their brains turned off are husks.

Judge. But remember, what happens next is essential. What do you do with the judgments you’ve made, the information you’ve gathered? (Of course, if the title you judge on their book cover is I'm Probably Gonna Murder Ya, yeah, better start running, but for the other cases...)

Don’t give up. Don’t give up on a person after only judging their initial outward appearance. Don’t assume you understand them completely from the beginning. That’s arrogance. That’s bad information gathering. That’s bad science. Widen your sample size. Keep looking. Keep judging. Let them show you a few dimensions of who they are. Judge those too.

So I guess the advice is, you can judge so long as you don't stop judging. Keep judging. Keep your mind open to each new dimension of the people and things that you encounter. Don't stop moving forward until either (1) you discover them to be harmful or so deplorable that they aren't worth your attention any longer, or (2) you don't, and you keep going, further up and further in, learning and expanding from what they offer you, on and on, judging each other.

Humans and Their Ways: Know Where Your Towel Is

The following is an excerpt from a book called Of Humans and Their Ways, written by the observant and insightful Robot 3000-22. Both the book and its author and totally made up and don't actually exist outside of my head.
Carry on.

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Chapter 14: Humans and Their Appearance

The following is a quote from a novel named The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, by Douglas Addams, a human:

"A towel...is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have. For some reason, if a strag (strag: nonhitchhiker) discovers that a hitchhiker has his towel with him, he will automatically assume that he is also in possession of a toothbrush, washcloth, soap, tin of biscuits, flask, compass, map, ball of string, gnat spray, wet-weather gear, space suit etc., etc. Furthermore, the strag will then happily lend the hitchhiker any of these or a dozen other items that the hitchhiker might accidentally have 'lost.'"

I'm going to expand on this understanding of towels to explore how humans interact using their appearance (what they look like to other humans). From extremely simple visual cues, like a towel, humans conclude a gigabyte's worth of information about the humans they observe.

EXAMPLES: Long hair on one's head or face takes a lot of time and effort to care for, so others might assume that Jane, who possesses the former, also possesses patience, self-awareness, or concern about their appearance. (Unless Jane's hair appears unkempt, in which case the reverse is more likely.) High-heels are not practical for walking long distances, so an observer might assume that Sally's black stilettos mean they possess the resources to get from place to place without much walking. Dave's fancy clothing could suggest a significant amount of expendable income. Casey's large muscles could suggest that they have the fortitude and focus to exercise regularly. In all these examples, the human's appearance generates an identity in the eyes of others.

But remember, the hitchhiker in Addams' quote does not actually possess any of the things that the nonhitchhiker assumes they have. The purpose of the towel is to manipulate, to provide the dishonest appearance of already possessing those things, for the benefit of the hitchhiker. And this is exactly what humans do. Most humans know about their appearance's power to generate assumptions, so they alter their appearance to generate a particular assumption in others that they desire. EXAMPLE: Sally might walk a long distance in sport's shoes and then switch to high heels at the destination to provide the appearance of having more resources than they have.

Unfortunately, others often notice this manipulation, and so they instead make their assumptions based on the human's failed manipulation. EXAMPLE: Leo wears ripped jeans in an attempt to generate the assumption in others that they are independent and therefore flippant about what others think of them (i.e. "too cool to care"). However, the others might perceive that Leo's ripped-jeans-wearing is intentional and instead conclude (accurately) that Leo actually cares a great deal about what others think of them. And so, a complex and silent interaction takes place whenever humans behold other humans.

One might conclude that the human species is hopeless because of all their focus on others' opinions rather than the mysteries of the universe outside their imaginary social world. They seem quite trapped in their battleground of social combat, vying their whole lives for control of their own identity in others' eyes.

However, as we've seen in other chapters, all human communication can be used for beneficial or destructive purposes, and appearance is no exception. I believe that, in healthy cases, more functional humans use appearance interaction to explore who they are, examine the disparity or agreement between their outer and inner selves, and make progress towards self-actualization. Also, they can use their appearance for practical purposes, like asserting a counter-cultural identity, surviving in a hostile environment, or providing a soothing demeanor to others. Therefore, I believe, if you want to thrive as a human, it's best to know where your towel is.

Sitting on a Concrete Wall in Toronto Late at Night

If I sit still enough, I can feel the blood humming through my capillaries.

I'm learning to mind my locations, like a child does. Here is the place. Here are the objects. If I sit very still, I can imagine they are constants, like rivers or mountains, and so am I. Topographical features that change only imperceptibly.

As an adult, I have this sense of everything in the city being in flux; it's rearranged each time I see it. But late at night, it's easier to find the foundations and imagine the constants, the coral that remains when all the flitting fish have hidden from the night. When everything else washes away, here is what remains: dormant vehicles, buildings like canyon walls, engine smells, glowing signs calling to illiterate moths, concrete barriers, street lamps shining on empty pavement, lunatics, and an orchestra of unspecified machines all buzzing and vibrating in a song that plays all day long, but can only be heard at night. 

Morse Code

Everyone is lonely. People with close friends are lonely. People with intact nuclear families are lonely. Married people are lonely. Siamese twins are lonely. No amount of contact with humans can change this fundamental part of human existence. It is the presence of others that creates this lonesomeness. The fact is, we float suspended in an ocean of our own sensations and thoughts and history, reaching out to each other across the incomprehensible distances between us.

We treasure the fleeting, luminous moments when we feel like we've touched something, someone, anyone. The obstacles between us are empty space, holding us aloft, alone. We look across space and interpret blinking stars in Morse code, wondering if the messages are real or just random space dust passing in between.

Is there anyone out there?

What are these “other people” but imagined futures and a million versions of memories, with questions tacked to each one, imaginings about their experience. What are they feeling and thinking? What do they see from where they sit, on some far off plateau built of memories and impressions and beliefs unknown to me, untouchable by me? They are all fictional. Stories I tell myself. Perhaps they tell stories about me too.

But.

Perhaps the stories are what matter. Tell me the story of myself, and I will tell you yours. In Morse code, across vast distances, blinking stars. If we're describing what we see, and what we describe is each other, we must both See. We must both have telescopes. We must both exist. We must not be alone. This is an act, not a state-of-being.

So polish your telescopic lenses, friend, for the only momentary relief from the pervasive alone we all feel because of each other is each other.

Luke Skywalker: Like My Father Before Me

Everyone knows, at the end of the Star Wars original trilogy, the end of Return of the Jedi, Luke Skywalker defeats Darth Vader in a lightsaber duel. The Emperor, who’s just been watching this whole thing like a parent at their child’s baseball game, laughs and tells Luke to kill Vader and “take you father’s place at my side.” But instead Luke throws away his lightsaber and announces,

“Never. I'll never turn to the Dark Side. You have failed, Your Highness. I am a jedi, like my father before me.”

Isn’t that a strange thing to say? “Like my father before me.” This is Luke’s crowning moment, his great defiance, proof that he is too strong, at least too morally strong, to be pulled to the dark side. And he chooses to say, “Like my father before me?” His father is currently laying at his feet, minus one arm. Even before that, his father was a sith lord, half machine, and a total jerk who had turned to the dark side and been mean for literally decades. Yes, Vader was once a jedi, but he totally failed at it. So, Luke Skywalker, I ask you, seriously ol' buddy, why associate yourself with Vader in your moment of triumph?

Literally everyone has parents. And all parents, being human and fallible, screw up in lots of ways. And their children share their DNA and were (if the parents stuck around) influenced by their parents’ screw ups. So every child eventually asks themselves: am I my father’s/mother’s son/daughter, doomed to fall to the dark side like they did?

When Luke refers to his father, the jedi, he is referring to the aspects of his father that he, at that moment, has successfully embodied. He learned the pitfalls that destroyed Vader, and he now has faced those same pitfalls in himself and succeeded.

Literally everyone can do this. We cannot run from our own DNA, but we can all learn from our parents’ mistakes, succeed where they faltered, and become what they failed to be. Once we’ve achieved that, we can proudly declare our association with them, with the parts of them we have chosen, with their jedi selves. Even though they totally failed at being jedi, we can become what they were meant to be: a jedi, like my father before me.

What If

What if something terrible happens?

I have never been in a fight, not a real one anyway. But in my head I've met my end in a plethora of ways: sword fights, fist fights, bottle fights. Just like the eight thousand and one times I've been stabbed in the back while out for a walk (in my head). Just like the six hundred times I've been abducted by aliens or monstrous beings from other dimensions (in my head). I do this on a moment to moment basis. I wake up doing this. I fall asleep literally to a lullaby of this. This is the soundtrack of my life constantly playing, sometimes louder, sometimes softer, but always playing.

I brush my teeth imagining what it would be like if I were arrested for someone else's crime. I floss daydreaming about the apocalypse. I shave to the melody of “what if,” “what if,” “what if.” What if the subway derails while we're going over a bridge? What if my permit to live in Canada is revoked? What if my wife gets sick and we don't have the money to heal her? What if one of the friends I've shown my novel to betrays me and somehow steals the copyright to it, leaving me so depressed that I can never write again? What if robbers? What if cockroaches? What if disease? What if an accident? What if storms or hail or war? What if mind-reading paratrooper shapeshifter alien vampires?

There are people who prepare for unfortunate situations. They do this by recognizing likely scenarios, planning accordingly, and not thinking about the millions of extremely unlikely possibilities that there is no way to actually prevent except by locking yourself in your house (and even that won't prevent all of them). These people innately know a basic truth: no amount of mental questioning can ready you for the unpredictable, unlikely madness of what actually happens. Not even for vampires. When the apocalypse comes, it will be bizarre and unimaginable. When calamity strikes, it will always be a fresh wound. I've never, ever, readied myself for a real event using 'what if.' I’ve never realized a fatal flaw in a plan using 'what if.' I’ve never soothed myself regarding something scary using 'what if.' All that 'what if' does is multiply anxiety a thousand-fold in an infinite loop of mental creation. I create planets in my own mind, filled with nothing but anxiety. I’ve tossed aside basic physics to make room for more worry and fear amongst the limited neurons in my brain. And I know that this massive construction project is never going to be worth the effort.

But it’s habit now. Years of practice. Decades of teaching myself that literally anything can be a prompt for 'what if.' By the time life taught me that this habit was useless, I had already become an expert. So, what now? Is all this space in my brain permanently wasted? Maybe not. What if an expert in making bombs used his skills to defuse explosives? What if an expert in robbery used his knowledge to thief-proof people's houses? If those things can happen, maybe an expert in 'what if' can turn a method for creating anxiety into a tool for producing hope.

What if something good happens?

Why Boys Fight

I had never really understood why boys fight each other so much. I always thought it was just a kind of barbaric entertainment. But recently I realized that it actually has something to do with our development.

When I was a kid, my brother and I did not get along. Imagine getting along, and now imagine the opposite of getting along. That’s where we were. He was really annoying and I was really mean. I would hurt him, and he would throw a fit and run to my mother. Sometimes we played together, but the next day he would go back to being annoying and I would go back to being mean. We carried on in like fashion from the day he could talk until the day I left for college.

Many months later, I came home for the holidays. My brother challenged me to a duel. He produced the pair of durable plastic lightsabers which the two of us had fought with on several occasions. Of course, I obliged.

It was a chilly day and it had recently rained. It seemed a miracle that all the water hadn’t frozen. We decided to carry out the duel on our trampoline, because being able to jump five feet in the air adds a little spice to any brotherly confrontation. The moment we stepped onto that spongy surface, our socks soaked up a few teaspoons of frigid water and our feet were numb.

We crossed blades. We jumped really high. We wished there was an orchestra and choir belting out “Duel of the Fates” in our yard. However, just when things started to get exciting, I accidentally brought my blade down on my brother’s hand. He yelped. There was blood coming out of his knuckle. He bent down on his knees in a position that was oh, so familiar to me; he was going to cry and the fun was going to be over. I sighed and bounce/jumped towards him to begin consoling and/or talking my way out of trouble.

But at my approach, he looked up. There were tears in his eyes, but he wasn’t crying. I saw in his face that he had made a decision. He wasn’t going to mom this time; he wasn’t going to let me win that easily.

He clutched his weapon and came at me. It hurt pretty badly. I whipped my sword around and brought the fight back to him. After that, many more blows were landed. A few more drops of blood soaked into the trampoline fabric. We swung and parried as fast as our tired and frozen arms could manage. It was exhilarating. I knew that whatever I threw at him, he could take and then give back. I also knew that he wasn’t going to give up and hide behind our parents. Now we were ourselves and nothing more.

We finally went inside when the sun set and our numb fingers couldn’t hold the lightsabers anymore. Mom certainly didn’t understand why we did it, or why we dueled again many more times on my visits home, but we knew and that’s all that mattered.

Seven Deadly Sins: Gluttony

I'm going to continue posting about some of the seven deadly sins. I've chosen another sin which I believe is usually misunderstood/ignored.

Heaven knows why I care about this stuff so much...

Gluttony
"All I want..."
Gluttony is placing too much value on physical feelings. It pushes you to get the feeling again, again, again. The action which creates these physical feelings was originally beneficial (i.e. eating), but gluttony twists this simple act past its beneficial intentions.

Gluttony doesn't always come in large portions though, it can take the form of luxury as well. As C.S. Lewis suggests in "The Screwtape Letters", it often takes to form of "all I want." "All I want" is tea at exactly the right temperature. "All I want" is an egg properly boiled.

While it might seem that this is un-gluttonous, thinking this way means you are still placing excessive attention on a physical feeling. You are valuing that perfect feeling, rather than the nutrition of the food or the feelings of the cook.

Don't think that gluttony only applies to food either. Remember, this is any physical feeling.

Seven Deadly Sins: Greed

I've decided to start writing blogs about one of my other interests which I spend a lot of time thinking about.
The Seven Deadly Sins.


(It may seem odd to be fascinated by something so negative. It probably is. However, I have found that understanding this has helped me find sin in my life which I hadn't even thought about before. It's all very challenging.)


First off, I'd like to write about one which I think is most often misunderstood.

GREED

"Keep a hold. Don't let it go. Don't ever let go."


This has often been mistaken for lust. While lust over-values aquiring things, greed over-values keeping things. And these don't have to be physical things. Oftentimes it is information or time that greed latches on to; it doesn't want to share with other people.

If there is something which you think you can not live without, you've found greed. Greed avoids risk or adventure as a way to prevent this loss. I learned this from C.S. Lewis' Narnian Chronicle: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, during which an exploratory voyage is constantly assailed by temptations to turn back or stay put in order to prevent the loss of their lives or possessions.

Eventually greed becomes obsessed with clinging to the temporary trappings of this planet. A greedy person, and their possessions, become completely useless.

Red Flight

Airplane rides are essentially tiny morsels of communism.


Someone somewhere has complete control of where you're going. You depend on this someone for food, water, even air. Enforcers patrol the streets/aisles, making sure everyone stays in line. They even tell you when you can use the bathroom.

For so many hours, you are part of the collective, a commune, and you abandon your individual rights and comfort for the betterment and safety of the group. The only difference, I suppose, is that instead of working in some government approved work place, you are simply asked to "enjoy your flight."

White Fuller

Secret of Kells = New favorite movie

So, naturally, I am reading up on my Irish mythology now.

The white cat in the movie, Pangur Bán, is named after an Irish poem.

The poem compares the work of the Irish monk writing it and his cat.

I love this poem, not just because it is delightful to read, but because I often find myself in the same circumstance. (Though, I suppose my cat just plays with my toes instead of with mice.)

Oh, and by the way, the cat's name means "White Fuller". "Fulling" is something people did while making wool. It is the step during which you remove impurities (like dirt) from the material.


Pangur Bán

I and Pangur Bán, my cat
'Tis a like task we are at;
Hunting mice is his delight
Hunting words I sit all night.

Better far than praise of men
'Tis to sit with book and pen;
Pangur bears me no ill will,
He too plies his simple skill.

'Tis a merry thing to see
At our tasks how glad are we,
When at home we sit and find
Entertainment to our mind.

Oftentimes a mouse will stray
In the hero Pangur's way:
Oftentimes my keen thought set
Takes a meaning in its net.

'Gainst the wall he sets his eye
Full and fierce and sharp and sly;
'Gainst the wall of knowledge I
All my little wisdom try.

When a mouse darts from its den,
O how glad is Pangur then!
O what gladness do I prove
When I solve the doubts I love!

So in peace our tasks we ply,
Pangur Bán, my cat, and I;
In our arts we find our bliss,
I have mine and he has his.

Practice every day has made
Pangur perfect in his trade;
I get wisdom day and night
Turning darkness into light.

The Silver Pen

Writing this story is doing wonders for my self-confidence.

What story, you ask? Why, if you're out of the loop, then stay that way!

The point is, whenever I'm overwhelmed or upset with myself for being... me,

I can just remember my story.

The characters, the events, the world I've created.

It's not just comfort; I glean confidence from my creation.

If I can create, then I could be competent.

And it is such a joy to create.

It's practically real in my mind.

NO, it's more than real.

I can see feel touch taste hear every inch of it.

Every time I go there, I discover something new.

Every time I go there, it has grown and so have I

The clearer it becomes, the more the fog is pulled back from my real life.

It may be fiction, but there is truth in it.


Conclusion: Writing a story is an amazing experience.
You should try it some time.

Martin Luther: The Power of Fathers

It have always marveled at the impact that my father has had on me.
Most specifically, on my relationship with my God.

My History of the Christian Church class has finally moved on from Saint Francis, and today we watched a documentary on Martin Luther.

(I LOVE DOCUMENTARIES.)

Martin Luther had a father. His father had broken free from the confines of the feudal system and struck out on his own as a copper smelter. In those days, this was quite an accomplishment. Having succeeded in this, his greatest desire was to witness his son surpassing all his accomplishments by becoming a lawyer.

Martin Luther's father was extremely harsh to his son; he criticized every move his son made. All his hopes were tied up in this boy, and he was not about to let him fail. Nothing his son did was ever satisfactory. He could always have done better, he could always have excelled more.

And so, when he was old enough, Martin Luther left his home in Mansfield and traveled to Erfurt to attend the university there. He studiously gained his Bachelor of Arts and Master's degrees. (blah blah blah)

BOOM! On to the fun part!

Then, the same year he was to take his last steps into becoming a lawyer, Luther was engulfed in a furious thunderstorm. He was riding through the forest when the dark clouds blotted out the sun and swirled over the landscape. Lightning flashed and thunder rolled through the hills. Luther was terrified.


He begged God to spare his life. If God did not kill him in this storm, Luther cried, he would dedicate the rest of his life to the service of God.

Once the night sky had cleared, Luther set out immediately to become a monk. He dropped out of law school and joined the Augustinian friary in Erfurt, one of the most strict in the world.

Luther became obsessed with pleasing God and being granted salvation. He quickly became the most devout of all the monks in Efurt. He fasted more than he ate, he prayed constantly, he flogged himself, he even slept naked in the snow all night and there saw the grim fringes of icy death. It is said that he would confess his sins to the priest, take a few steps, and return with more to confess. He began to see God as a great judge, looking down on him and condemning him for his every sin. The debt of his wrongdoing, it seemed, could never be repaid.

I hope my point can be clearly understood.
Luther's initial understanding of God as a righteous judge of condemnation was rooted in his earthly father. His earthly father was a cold, dark hand pressing down on Luther's mindset. He was never appeased, always demanding more, and nothing Luther did could ever be good enough. This made it easy for Luther to see his Heavenly Father the same way. There was no atonement, no satisfaction in anything he did. God, to him, was never pleased.


Do not underestimate the impact of father figures on your view of God.

The Church Fathers Were Streakers

I picked a terrible time to set up this account.
No time, no time, heavens, there is certainly no time!

I have an essay to write on what motivated Saint Francis of Assisi to do what he did.

He certainly did alot.

I will share one notable thing with you:

Upon receiving a message from God commanding him to "Rebuild my church", Francis abandoned his life of relative ease for extreme poverty. He began begging, not only for food, but also for STONES. He took his message from God literally; he was "rebuilding" the run down place of worship on the outskirts of Assisi.

He was passionate about his calling. He returned to his family's house at one point in order to retrieve his extremely lavish clothing to sell for more building supplies. Francis' father was already irate about his son's behavior. When he heard about the clothes, he dragged Francis before the bishop. He demanded that Francis be made to "return that which was his". Francis, before all the court and the bishop of his city, promptly removed all of the garments on his person and placed them in his father's hands. "God is my only father now" Francis told him. He then left the court, still naked, and danced singing all the way out of the city.

The best part? A few days later, a priest that had scorned Francis on that day joined him and became part of what would soon be the Franciscan Order.

What a fun guy!

A Mattress Killed the President

James A Garfield, the 20th president of the United States was president for less then 200 days before he was shot. The circumstances surrounding his attempted assassination and treatment are both unfortunate and bizarre. Medicine and technology as a whole were still in their beginning stages. Mankind had yet to fully understand the complexities of his own body. Doctor’s simply didn’t take the precautions that they do now, despite having known of bacteria to some extent for some time. It was living in such an unadvanced time, not a gunshot, that ultimately led to the president’s demise.

On July 2, 1881, James A Garfield, recently elected president of the United States, was about to set out on a trip to New England to visit his sick wife. As he passed through the waiting room, a young lawyer named Charles Guiteau snuck up behind him. Poor Charles had been denied the ambassadorship to France he had expected as a reward for a speech he had written for Garfield. The megalomaniac also believed he had seen a vision in which God told him to shoot the president. So as President Garfield walked by, Charles shot him in the back with a .44 pearl handled revolver. The bullet lodged itself somewhere in Garfield’s abdomen. As his would be assassin readily gave himself up to avoid being beaten to death, Garfield was quickly carted off to the White House.

There he was put under the care of Doctor Willard Bliss. The first thing Doctor Willard did was shove his un-sterilized fingers into the wound. He felt around inside the president for a bit, but he found no bullet. He did however, succeed in gouging a false passage that later confused other doctors and caused them to conclude that the bullet was in Garfield’s liver. Many more doctors made similar attempts and got similar results. The location of the tiny piece of lead continued to evade the presidential care givers. One doctor stuck his (also unsterilized) fingers so deep, that he actually punctured the liver. As the doctors continued to feel around inside him, a feverish president Garfield was put on a diet of milk and brandy.

On July 26, in a desperate attempt to save the president, Alexander Gram Bell, the creator of the telephone, and his assistant threw together a metal detector to find the elusive bullet. Strangely, the metal detector kept beeping wherever it was placed on Garfield’s body. Despite this, Bell said that he detected the metal much deeper then they had originally thought. Hopeful doctors cut open the president, but they found nothing. It was later discovered that the president had been lying on one of the first coil spring mattresses. Thus, if he had done this experiment on a normal bed, Bell probably would have been correct in his findings, and Garfield would have been able to prove himself as president.

The originally three inch wound was now a massive twenty inch hole in the president. It was incredibly infected, and he also began to show signs of infection from the bullet. On September 19th, 1881, after 79 days of ‘treatment’ James A Garfield died of a heart attack. The doctors concluded that he had died of a ruptured blood vessel in his stomach. In autopsy, the location of the bullet was finally revealed. It was lodged near his spinal cord in a protective cyst. Had the doctors left him alone, the president would have survived.

History books will tell you that our twentieth president was murdered by a crazed lawyer, but this is not the whole truth. It was the well meaning doctors gathered round his bed that truly killed James A Garfield. To be more precise, it was the newborn state of medicine of the time, the unsterilized fingers, the lack of adequate equipment and a blatant misunderstanding of the human body that ended the president’s short term. We will never know if the country would have flourished in his capable hands, but we do hope that an event like this will never repeat itself.