I survived!

I remember talking with someone earlier this week or possibly the week before and comparing semesters at college to roller coasters. Its like when you start out and the cars are pulled to the top of an incline just before you're dropped into tight turns, loops, spins, and who-knows-what else. This past week has been that for me.

I knew I had a bunch of deadlines coming up and I tried my best to prepare, but it just wasn't enough. I had three midterms, a large essay, and my internship materials to turn in this week. I was on campus until midnight almost every night. By Thursday I was barely holding on. I passed out briefly at the computers in the library but was able to catch myself before hitting the keyboard.

I wonder how much studying actually helps with the grades I get. I remember most everything I hear and I'm at least moderately intelligent. I could just do a mediocre job. The mere thought of it makes me sick.

I've never picked the easy way. I don't think I'm capable of living with myself if I don't push myself and do everything possible to succeed. I know that it might seem really compulsive, maybe even unhealthy, but I do allow myself to have fun...sometimes.

Have you ever had the feeling that you were meant to do something, maybe even something great? Have you ever had this impulse but have never been able to figure out what it is that you are supposed to do? If you have, then you know what drives me. The thought of not succeeding drives me. The horror of mediocrity obligates me to strive for excellence.

Sometimes its easy to lose track of my vision. If you see me some day sitting in the library with my books and binders open but I'm just sitting there with my earphones in, looking asleep, I'm visualizing where I've been, where I want to go, and recommitting myself to do everything it takes.

On a less serious note, last night we played broom hockey at seven peaks. I fell at least 20-30 times. I got hit in the face with a stick, slid and did the splits, and my kidneys feel like someone has been punching them all night. It was the most fun I've had in a long time (seriously)!

I also got a letter from the eldest son of the family that we baptized, was sealed int he temple in 2007, whose father is the bishop of the ward now, and is on his mission in Colombia, Cali. Please don't misunderstand me - I'm not trying to brag. I'm just really excited, thrilled, grateful, that I've been able to be a part of it all. Getting the letter really made my day. I had just come back from campus at about midnight and I saw the letter on the table:

Joel:
Mi amigo del alma, en realidad siento mucho si parecí algo grocero la última vez que escribí en el e-mail pero era la única manera de poder saber algo de las personas a las que amo.
En realidad, creo que me apresuré un poco al enviar el e-mail ya que al día siguiente me llegó tu carta. En verdad lo siento.
Sabes, cada día que pasa, pienso y recapacito en las cosas que hago, las que hize y las que quiero hacer; retrocedo un poco en el tiempo y veo que he cambiado mucho pero todo ese cambio te lo debo gracias a ti y a mi amigo Bobby (mi compañero). Jeje, los extraño mucho a ambos, tal vez no te lo dije antes, pero quiero que sepas que eres un gran misionero; y digo "eres" porque a pesar de que llevas una placa en el pecho "...todo miembro es un misionero". Estoy seguro que recordarás eso. Bueno, solo espero que mi Señor y mi Padre Celestial te tengan bien, en Su hogar tienes más que un lugar...de eso estoy seguro. Lo único que me queda es esforzarme al máximo para poder ser un misionero tan grande como tú y como Bobby.
Una vez más, mil gracias por todo cuánto hicisite por mí y por mi familia.
Por favor, si te comunicas con tu familia dales mis saludos, diles que los amo y aprecio mucho, que tienen un hijo y hermano más...a pesar que no me conocen.
I love you Dad
With love
Elder Ramírez
Misión Colombia-Cali
enero 2008-enero 2010

This has turned into a huge post. I've got a lot going on and a lot to be grateful for.

Timeline

Here's the run-down:

• survive this semester
• take as many classes Spring term as I can
• get the AIPAC internship for summer (June-August)
• work on my honors thesis
• If I'm really industrious I can still graduate in December
• If I'm actually smart about things, I'll give myself an extra semester and graduate in April 2010
• Why do I always rush things?

I've been thinking a lot about grad school. One of my pals recommended that I take a look into getting an MBA. I'm not completely sold on the idea. I had previously thought a lot about law school. The reoccurring question with regards to both of these things is: why? What's my motivation?

I keep on stalling making a definite decision not because I fear the future - I welcome it really. I keep thinking that maybe I'll get my act together and date a little more, not that I haven't, and maybe settle down and get my priorities in order. I feel as if, if I keep rushing all of the time to get done as fast as possible with my undergrad that I'll never make time for things that are potentially more important.

As of right now my only motivation is to make myself as invaluable as possible - that's why I've been seriously considering the JD/MBA program at Northwestern. Its not so much that I have an interest as much that I just want to have an impressive resume. I don't like that motivation.

I'm trying to find something better, a little nobler.

Dreams

You know that you've had some great conversations with your friends about dreams. Sometimes you discuss the absurdity and terror of your nightmares. Sometimes you find it uncanny how you can trace the contents of your dream(s) to certain events from the recent and distant past.

I don't usually remember my dreams, but I can tell when I've had one especially deep because I'm tired in the morning when I wake up.

I've come to the conclusion that its because my mind becomes incredibly active during some of these dreams. Its gotten to the point that my eyes are tired when I get up in the morning from what I can only guess is excessive rapid eye movement (REM).

Let me back up a little bit. I do a lot of studying, reading, analysis, etc every day. By "a lot" I mean 10 -15 hours on campus every day. Needless to say, there's a lot of information just running around my mind. I think that this has had a lot to do with some of my more recent dreams.

I've been reading books in my sleep. No, I haven't been sleep-reading, as in being asleep still and reading physical books. I've been seeing words on pages, reading them, as I lay asleep. It really is fascinating and bizarre. However, that's not the best part of it: they are books that I've never read before.

We accumulate information and its stored in our brain. Many times dreams consist of permutations (changes in the order) of this information. I am currently taking a literature class that addresses this very subject - the permutation of literature, alphabets, and knowledge in general. The argument is that everything has been done,that everything has been created and nothing is new, but at the same time there is no end to what can be created. It is still infinite because the permutations of knowledge can repeat themselves indefinitely. Its like when you think of a great idea completely on your own and then someone tells you that its already been done. The point is: you came up with it again!

Anyway, I can only assume that my mind has done this very thing, but to a much greater extent. I've read entirely new books, exhausting my mind as I sleep, but at the same time they are not new because they are derived from the information already in my mind.

I realize now that this is not the first time this has happened. I cannot remember the words, the books, or pages, but a conversation recently made me recall something - I could even remember the side of the page it was on.

Wouldn't it be amazing if I could recall the books that already exist in my mind?

I randomly take pictures many days and add them to a file I have on my computer. Its like a photo journal, I guess. I've got a lot of pictures of just trees, clouds, and other random things that I though were particularly neat/stunning/beautiful.

I think I 'd like to incorporate that idea with this blog and let pictures tell their thousand words for me sometime.

I built this little fort on a whim with some help from one of my new roommates, John. It was obvious that fort-building was his forte because he knew exactly how to build the drawbridge. Yes, it works and, up to this point in time, no invader has crossed its invincible threshold.

Going Home

I'm taking a literature class this semester that focuses on the works and philosophy of the Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges. One of our readings was really rewarding. It had to do with 'homecoming' and 'homesteading'. I know these don't seem like really deep topics, but there was something that I understood after struggling through those pages of philosophy.

Homecoming involves exactly what it implies. It means coming back to where you once were, usually to where you grew up or claim as home. You have this 'home' preserved as an idea. It is a time and place that you claim.

Homesteading is easy to interpret too. I means that you arrive at a new place. You set up shop, try to fit in, and start a new chapter of life.

The interesting thing about 'going home' is that it exists in your mind. You've created it. You can never really go back home. Also, it is important in many ways not to go back home. Because it is more of a mindset and not a place, you will find yourself adopting attitudes and roles that you previously held as a way of trying to fit back in at home.

That brings me to homesteading. You see, going home necessarily implies homesteading. Since you can never really go back, and since things never can stay the same, you necessary come back to homestead. Homesteading is a projection of that idealized notion of 'home' onto a new chapter in life in a new place. This is why going home when things have necessarily changed is not the escape that you might think it would be because you will project your notion of what 'home' is onto what cannot be home any longer.

Its an interesting bit a psychology, to be sure. Its also healthy to realize that we all have these tendencies to want to go back home.

We can never go home. We can never get back to the way things once were. Its doubtful that things ever existed according to our idealized notion to begin with. Any attempt to do so, therefore, is a misguided attempt, and attempt to escape our current reality for one that we have set up as 'home'. Change and acceptance are necessary for progress.

I think that a person that lives with the idealized notion of 'home' or what it needs to be will find himself comparing it to reality and wondering why he cannot ever reach his ideal. Despondency may result. Instead, I recommend that each individual seek for self-mastery and improvement. You will never need to escape, to 'go back home', if you are looking to the future and goal-oriented.

Of course, this by no means that I never have wanted to 'go back home'. I think it has something to our natural 'fight and flight' psychological and physiological mechanisms. When the fight gets tough, we may want to take flight home.

In a spiritual light, life isn't just about getting back home, waiting-out mortality, and then living in peace for eternity. Its not necessarily always directly about the fight, although we all participate in the confrontation between good and evil by virtue of our existence. I think it has to do with homesteading. We have come to this place and time, assumed an identity based on our individual socialization processes, and try to put down roots somewhere. Just remember that we are pilgrims, travelers, building a home. The great thing about our pilgrimage, our mortal sojourn, is that Christ directs us on how to build a home, His kingdom. I don't simply mean that we can be satisfied by Church service. I mean that His Plan is to build His kingdom in each one of us. This correct version of what 'home' is will lead us to correct choices with regards to our families and lives in addition to peace of mind.

This vision is the vision of Zion. We don't try to go back to Zion, do we? No; Zion is something that is to be forged. Don't escape the world by going to Church or the Temple. Don't go home! Go forward! You can only go forward. Escape is an illusion.

I have no idea who I'm writing to - maybe just to myself.

This happens occasionally - I get on my soapbox and just keep going with an idea.  Let me know what you think.

A few thoughts...not because my thoughts are few

I've often wondered what the point of having a blog is. It seems that writing personal information in journals and diaries, where perhaps no one would ever see it, doesn't quite do the trick for many people anymore. I think that secretly we'd like for others to know exactly what we're going through, how hard our day has been, what's going on in our head, because just knowing that someone else knows somehow relieves a burden. Its as if it is some cathartic release to tell the world.

I can relate. I buy that definition. Something, at least within me, would like to be able to come home to a sincere,"how was your day?". Until then, I've decided that maybe letting someone know that beneath that reserved and, at times, indecipherable exterior, I'm me.

These past two weeks have been tough but rewarding. Instead of belaboring the reader with all of the difficulties, I think that I'll talk about the great things that eclipsed them.

I took my brother to the MTC Wednesday the 28th of January. He's been called to the Thailand, Bangkok Mission. When I returned from my mission in 2006, he was still in high school. It never really dawned on me that he'd be "Elder Hood" too. I'm really proud of him. I told him so at the MTC when he reported. He's going to do great.

I made a resolution that I'm actually keeping. I'm writing my pals on missions and calling converts from my mission. I've tried to avoid the TV that is inevitably on and hanging out all Sunday. Instead I'm spending the afternoon writing and finishing my Book of Mormon reading that I promised myself to have done by New Year. So far, so good.

I think that I got a wake-up call (literally) that I needed to call some folks from my mission. At 6 am Sunday morning, one of the sisters from a ward I was assigned to called. She was worried about something - I could relate it but it was hurried and complex. I called back later that day. Apparently, my companion from that area had gone inactive as had some of our converts. I promised to call them. I called the Frías family Tuesday night. Everyone was there except for Felipe, who is working in Chile. Meri never did get baptized, but she told me that if I came back to visit she would. I'd buy a ticket right away if I could, but the cost added to the fact that I want her to do it for the right reasons makes it nearly impossible. I also called the Ramírez Bendezú family that night. José, the father, is bishop now of their ward and was at the church. I got to speak with everyone else though. Their oldest son, Carlos, is serving in the Colombia Cali Mission.

There is so much I wish I could do, but I can hardly manage to stay afloat with what I have to manage now. I suppose that's when you have to trust in the grace of God that He will work those miracles that we cannot.