No it’s not!

“Everything you say is an argument.”

-Kevin Maguire

Lenses

The Lenses that we use to view the world are made up of two main parts.  These two parts consist of the source and the specific.  Both of these elements must be thought of for full context of the lense to be realized.  The source can be drawn from many places.  Here is a list, that is not all inclusive, of sources.

Source:

• School
• Family
• Movies
• Pictures
  
• Friends
• News
• Books
• Self (the credibility of this source is shaky at best no matter who you are)

The specific is the what of the information.  The specific can be any bit of information that is being thought about.  Here is a non inclusive list of specifics.

Specifics:

• Food
• History (events, Traditions)
• Illegal Activities
• History
• Movies
• Pictures (note: sources can be specifics and vice versa)

By pairing a source and a specific a lense is created.  For example; the source “friend” and the specific “pictures” can be paired in this manner “My friend showed me a picture of a beach in China, it was crowded.”  This may lead the person to alter their perception of China, now thinking it is a crowded place.  Adding more sources and specifics will end in a more focused lense being created on the subject.  If this person could add other sources such as “I read in a book that it is crowded in China“this woiuld add immensely to their lense that they use to come up with the ‘China is crowded’ mentality.

How many sources and specifics do you use in your daily lense creation process?

The Biggest Inside Joke

Education has been something I have been involved in for quite some time now.  Not as a teacher, but as a student.  Lots of people go to University for 7 to 8 years, their called Doctors, Lawyers and well me.  And in this long time of study I feel I have learned a thing or two about education itself.  I have gone to such classes as Ski and Snowboard Tuning and Repair (SKB120), Public Policy and Administration (POLS351), Film: Creative Process I (THE300), English Composition I (ENG101) and Fire and Emergency Services Administration (FESA336).  I have taken these classes and more from Paradise Valley Community College, University of Maryland Online, Arizona State University, Colorado Mountain College and Colorado State University On campus and Online.  With all of these environments of study in ones experience it is hard not to study the act of studying.

What is learned by all this studying of studying?  That it doesn’t matter if you are learning about movies, public administration, the inner workings of fire and emergency services or the basics of essay writing in ENG101 you could have learned all of these things without going to school.  By simply talking to others on this planet you can learn everything that you could ever want tp know.  Why go to school then?  Why spend the time and money to get a degree?  Because it’s all employers have to judge you on these days, or so they think.  The system is broken, it tells everyone to hold a job that you must go to school despite the thousands and thousand of people who do not hold degrees that are doing just fine.  These people of course are not in on the joke and are told they do not have it as good as someone with a degree, despite the fact that many of them have worked their way up to make just as much if not more than a person who holds a degree.

Should people stop going to school?  No, that is not my point at all.  School is a great place to experience new things.  Just do not look at it as a necessary step in life, because it is not.  Just do not look at it as an answer to a problem.  Life is not a matter of looking for a solution, it is simply a matter of just looking.

One of my favorite videos ever is Sir Ken Robinson talking at the TED talks about how education is set up needs to be rethought to produce more than college professors.

http://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity.html  (there is a clickable link under the links heading title “Biggest Inside Joke” to the right on this page)

The World Around Us

We are nothing without the world around us.  The many things we have seen in our lives shape who we become.  I want to share the things that shape my life.  The things that have made me at least for a second stop and think.  These things as in life will be shared randomly with no intent of one being more important than the other.  Most of the time they will be a link to a website, but sometimes I will just share a story that I heard or experienced.  The influences will range from a surreal moment alone to watching a stranger do an activity to scholars lecturing on a subject.

Today I would like to share a clip of a comedian by the name of Louis CK.  It is about how everything is amazing, which I think is true.

Only Practice Can Make Perfect

Over time I have realized I spend more time helping others than myself.  While this seems like a commendable thing at first, something to be proud of, one must realize that you can only help others as much as you can help yourself.  I am not willing to stop helping others, nor do I wish to slow down my efforts.  This does not mean that I cannot help improve my own life though.  I will now make it a joint endeavor.  Those that I help in any way I will now draw upon to help myself.  My abilities to improve the lives of others will now cover a wider base.

I hope this journey allows me and those who get to read it the ability to improve themselves on the long road ahead.