Read this with focus

Months ago now, I read an article in Runner's World called "In Focus." It was about focusing your energy in one area and avoiding multitasking. It really spoke to me so I thought I'd look into the issue further by googling the book the author referred to. But on the way from my couch to my computer, I saw my guitar leaning against my wall. 'I need to practice!' I thought. I started practicing, "Dreaming with a Broken Heart" by John Mayer. After a few minutes of practice 'I need to learn a new song!', I decided, so I went to the internet to look up some more guitar tabs. 'Perhaps Jack Johnson has some good ones', I thought to myself, 'or maybe the Beatles!' But, then, oh look! Gmail notifier says I have an email from Kayak.com... flights nationwide for $47 each way?! Awesome, so maybe I'll buy my ticket to Vegas on there. But what am I gonna do in Vegas again? I should probably look up some national park hiking opportunities before I forget... At that moment, I glanced down from my computer and see my lame to do list, which consisted of about a thousand open checkboxes and one checked one that says "go to bank." I'm plagued with feelings of guilt that paralyze me in my tracks. The feelings of guilt spread when I also realize I should finish my assignment for Personality Assessment. Grudingly, I pull out the assignment and start looking over it, but first I throw on a FRIENDS episode as background noise (and end up mostly watching that).

I hope you all enjoyed that brief journey through the chaos that is my thoughts. This self reflection may shed some light on why I'm such a fan of the t shirt that has the following saying on it, 'I don't know why people say I have a short attention span - Oh look! A chicken!'

I always loved this shirt, but didn't think it made a lot of sense. Obviously this person can pay attention, they are just interested in multiple things: talking about their attention span and chickens. Chickens deserve attention, too. But apparently thats not really the point...

It is now August 2009, I am and attempting to finish this half-written post I just found (in February). I hope my above self-disclosure made my point, focus is a huge problem for me. I tend to want to do everything, RIGHT NOW, and multitasking often seems like a good way to do that. As it turns out... not so much. I find myself getting thoroughly frustrated with how easily I get distracted which furthers the counterproductivity of it all. When I actually focus on one thing at a time, I'm actually quite amazed. I am efficient! It shed some light on why I probably procrastinate so much? Because it forces me to focus.

I'm happy to report that months later, I've actually gotten a lot better at this. Articles like the Runners World one I read months ago (now online), have helped me realize that I just gotta decide which things that are a priority and focus on one thing at a time. I've stopped most multitasking and it really has done wonders for me. I now power through to-do lists like tornadoes of arms and teeth. I still have a million ideas and there still is no possible way I can do them all. But with my new focusing techniques, I get a heckuva lot further.

Time Travel and Life Changing Advice

Hola, non-existent readers. It's been about a million years since I've posted on here so I'm pretty sure the only people who might end up reading this are random google searchers looking for the new release of the movie based on the book below, and myself, of course (gotta be your own biggest fan). But its all good. Hey, at least I'm writing something so that years later I can come back and read my own thoughts about time travel. Sweet.

I just finished reading The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger. My friend told me she cried almost the entire last 100 pages. Based on this, others told me I would surely cry throughout the entire thing, due to my highly emotional nature. I agreed that this prediction was likely and took no bets against it, yet I only shed a few tears on one page, thank you very much. Who's overly emotional now?

Anyway, I'm not here to spoil the book. I will rate it as a entertaining and engaging, yet long read that was worth my time for sure, but was far from being my favorite book. There were parts that didn't really ring true to me (no, not the time traveling parts, parts that really could be true, but I didn't like how they were thrown in). However, I can't go in more detail without having to put forth a spoiler alert. Besides, I would rather discuss a very obvious aspect of the book... Time travel (duh).

For one reason or another (insomnia, most likely), I finished the book and decided to crack open some of my old journals. In addition to the very sporadic documentation of my life in this blog, I also write about more private matters in various journals, and 5 of them happen to live here with me in Philly (6 if you count my Travel Journal). I can't really focus very well (a topic for another day if I ever get around to it) so my journals tend to jump around a lot. You might need to go to the black one with pink roses on it for a mid-college assessment of how school and grades and classes are going, yet to my green journal, which tends to have more quotes and random writings in it for a hand copied version of a quote I really enjoyed just a week later. Lets just say if you wanted to actually track my thoughts and emotions over time in a semi-coherent way (whether thats even possible is up for debate) you would have to go on quite a scavenger hunt through my various writings.

Whatever the reason my random mind had for going through and reading older thoughts, it got me thinking about what time travel would really mean. As I read through a journal entry from April 27, 2004 (at 3:14am, noting the consistency in my insomnia, as I write this at 1:43am), writing fervently about grades and the possibility of getting my second 4.0 for the spring semester, I wondered to myself. What would I tell myself if I really could travel back in time and speak to this younger me? Would I give myself advice (chill the **ck out)? Would I inform myself of which people are worth my time and which I should drop like a hot plate? And what if I could visit myself in the future and find out where life will take me, as Henry DeTamble of the book could? Would I even want to?

The characters in the book shed some light onto answers such as this. Especially for future travel. Henry tried to avoid giving away details of the future to his wife and others in his life unless absolutely necessary. But sometimes, these details provided reassurance (e.g., reassurance that their unrelenting efforts to achieve certain goals were finally realized and not in vain) and helped them avoid unnecessary worry for the future. However, other times, it reduced the excitement or increased feelings of helplessness for the inevitable.

As for giving yourself advice, that is a question that important to ask regardless of its impossibility. Surely, I would love to give my adolescent self some hard hitting advice, something along the lines of 'live it up while you have few responsibilities, but stay away from assholes named XXXXX.' But would I really have listened? And how would that change who I am today? Could I still be as empathic for others who made dumb mistakes like or similar to mine? Would I still be in the field I am in? I'm not sure... but I kind of doubt it.

A wise man once told me he believes that we each bring into our lives things we somehow want and need at that time. This doesn't sit well with everyone, yet there still seems to be some underlying truth to it. Everything has some type of purpose, right? So who am I, or any other fictionally time traveling being, to mess with that purpose? I guess I'll have to settle with giving my present-self advice based on my past mistakes just like all the other non-time traveling folk. I guess its been working pretty decently so far, and I expect I will only get better at it as time goes on.

New entertainment gem

A while back I wrote about how I am often a source of entertainment, given my somewhat ditsy disposition. Well, another gem of partial-idiocy made itself known - and provided laughter and joy for a fellow friend of mine - so I, unselfish as I am, thought I'd share this incident with the rest of you.

It was the end of a typical week and as usual, I was making weekend plans… via gchat. Apologetically, Liz was notifying me that she was going to change our dinner date from Friday until Sunday. I was reassuring her that this was not a big deal by stating that I would likely do the same to her one day, given that  ‘I have the memory of a small knat.’

Before I proceed with story, lets hit pause and take note of the content of that italicized sentence.

- First, we should probably note the fact that I refer to the bug as 'small,' you know, to distinguish it from the gigantic, flesh-eating ones you see flying about. Riiight.

- Secondly, as Liz was quick to point out, there is a misspelled word. Not only do I make fun of this poor bug's size, I also spell its name wrong.

 

Okay, unpause.

 

Right after I type this, Liz and I both sense each other’s déjà vu beaming through one another’s gchat windows. We express our vague feelings of familiarity to each other, stating the possibility that this very gchat convo happened before. Within seconds, a diagnostic gchat search is conducted. With a quick search of the word 'gnat' (by Liz) or 'knat' (by me), we fall upon the same discovery. Sure enough, on April 19 2008, just a few months prior, the following conversation took place:

 

Pre-scene development: This conversation had begun with an stimulating discussion about multivariate regression, from which I will spare you (email for full dialogue). I had just changed the subject to something equally important. Action…

Shawn: hey I don't wanna do this, instead, I wanna go camping

Liz: lol

Liz: that sounds nice

Shawn: i have the attention span of a knat

Shawn: (sp?)

Liz: hahaa

Liz: gnat

Shawn: ahh yes

Shawn: wait what?

Liz: HAAAA

Liz: SO Funny

Shawn: i love funny

Shawn: it makes my world go round

So there you have it. Whether or not you find this as funny as Liz and I did, it certainly illustrates a few important points.

 

First, documentation is key. Without the wonder that is  the World Wide Web and the indescribably awesome invention that is gchat, this event would have never occurred nor been recalled. So, in effort to remember this forgetful series of events, I record them here for your entertainment, and my own piece of mind. I mean, what's the use of having such a ridiculously bad memory and tendency to repeat the same mistakes if you can’t laugh at yourself and post it on the internet?

 

Secondly, laughter rules. My day was mediocre at best right before the gchat archival discovery and afterwards, I couldn’t stop smiling.

 

In conclusion, the morals for today are: be ridiculous, laugh at yourself, and document it in any way you can. Whether you decide to write it down, email it to your mom, take a video of yourself rein acting it, or carve it into your tree house, the likelihood is, someone will someday appreciate that you did.

SIA, For the love of the game

The other day at the allergist's office, my doctor expressed concern that I might be developing sports-induced asthma. I believe he was mistaken. However, I do appear to have a related condition; One that often goes undiagnosed but based on my observation, is very, very common. The condition I am referring to is Sports-Induced Anxiety (official abbreviation: SIA).

I am trained to assess general anxiety, so I know what is is supposed to look and feel like. Generally, I can honestly say that I'm not very anxious. I do have some anxious tendencies, but for the most part, I'm pretty chill. However, if you throw on a sports game that I care a lot about, everything changes.

I diagnosed myself with this condition after observing myself during Michigan State's tight 2nd round matchup against USC last night. Symptoms of restlessness, feeling 'keyed-up' or 'on edge' (apparent from my incessant pacing, jumping, stretching, and general erratic movement around the bar), irritability (if you texted me during the game, I did not respond for fear of saying very vulgar things and subsequently losing friends), muscle tension, and a combination of sleep disturbance and fatigue (present later that night) were all present more often than not yesterday. And I don't think yelling at the TV is really a normal anxiety symptom, (although perhaps it goes along with irritability?) but that was definitely present as well.

Luckily, for my heart and the hearts of those watching with me (especially Tom Izzo's), we stayed in the game and pulled out the W. Next game is Friday evening versus the Jayhawks. Now that I've identified this condition, I know how I'm going to feel on Friday (okay, I probably didn't need to identify a condition to know that, but still). But let me be crystal clear: I am NOT complaining, just stating facts. Bring on the SIA. Until April would be nice. I'll just borrow some valium from Tom, he's gotta have a mega-stash somewhere.

Side note: I've been known to propose to standout players in Spartans (okay all) sports. A side effect/symptom of SIA?!? Who knows. But Travis Walton, you keep this up... and you might just be next. Its called Spartan Love, baby.

Turkey in the rough

Apparently, once I make a commitment to something, I will do it. Even if it takes me 10 months.

Okay, fine, that is totally untrue. The piles of unfinished drawings, stories, dance choreography, and notes on project ideas and dance choreography that are stacked in boxes upon boxes in my mom's basement would suggest otherwise. Unless of course its acceptable to take 12 years to choreograph a 7th grade talent show routine to "Mo Money, Mo Problems"... because in that case, Holly and I are pretty much on track.

Similarly, and sadly, all my "summer bucket lists" (aka lists of the most random and ridiculous things that my friend Tarah and I would try to complete in our 3 month summer break from elementary school... including "eat a whole tomato" - because we both despised tomatoes at the time, and "build and fly a kite;" neither of which were checked off at summer's end) were also left half-completed.

So there you have it - although I wish I always completed things, even if it was years later, this does not seem to be the case. However, this weekend, the previously stated and generally untrue statement, was true one time (small victories should be celebrated).

After stating plans to explore Philadelphia's running options, particularly Forbidden Drive, I finally went! Forbidden Drive is a old road that is now closed off to cars and runs along the Wissahickon creek.

My succinct analysis: Very pretty. A little muddy. Very natury and birdy. Overall: pretty freakin' cool.

I say birdy because I ran into a pretty cool bird right before I turned at the halfway point through the 8 mile loop. He decided to chill on some nearby tree branch, and later a rock, so I decided to take pictures of him. I'm not sure what kind of bird he is... wild turkey? Anyway, we kinda bonded and then he mocked me for doing the 8.5 mile loop Saturday after Saturday and not coming out sooner. And then I mocked myself for imagining conversations with random birds.

All in all, a very natury and awesome day. And as a city for potential long term settlement, Philly just earned a couple more points. Making the completely arbitrary running total something to the effect of this:

Michigan: 5 (-10 points for run-interfering snow/ice)

Colorado/Oregon/Washington/anywhere with big mountains: 15

Philly: 15 (*recent increases*: +2 for cool people, +2 for cool running trails, and +11 for good beer... duh)

Back on My Feet: 1 Month Report

The ever-so-familiar song is blaring from my cell phone that is strategically placed across my bedroom. As I stumble towards it, my head is fuzzy and I kinda feel like I was hit by a bus last night. I glance at the clock. '5:00 am?! What the heck am I doing up?!' my confused brains asks. And then it hits me. I made a commitment to a group of people. The girl who usually does her Saturday "morning" runs at 2:00pm agreed to run at 5:30am. 5:30am. 5:30am. Necessitating a 5:00am annoyingly cheery cell phone ring. I stared at the clock again. 5:01am. 5:01am. 5:01am. 14 minutes to get my butt out the door.

I stumble into my winter running gear. The weather.com application in the corner of my computer tells me it is 27 degrees. Awesome. Spandex tights, check. Sweatpants, check. Gloves, headband, neck warmer, fleece, check, check, check, check. I purposely don't leave myself time to think about what I'm doing. There isn't time to assess, I just gotta go. I made the commitment. The commitment to running with a group of people all working towards different, but comparable, goals. The only difference: some of the group members currently live in a shelter and happen to be working towards getting out of that situation, that is, getting "back on their feet".

So what does this cute little play-on-word phrase really mean? For those of you who aren't familiar with Philadelphia's revolutionary running group, let me try to explain. The group's mission statement is as follows:

Back on My Feet is a non-profit organization that promotes the self-sufficiency of the homeless population by engaging them in running as a means to build confidence, strength and self-esteem.

I am a very new member of this organization. I've been to 4 runs and 1 social event. I'm just beginning to understand the benefits of membership for all of those involved, but even on my way to my first run it started to become clear. As I stepped out onto the street at 5:15am and started jogging the mile to the group's meeting point, I took a deep breath of frigid air and the 5:00am brain-fog began to clear. Its really quite simple. I was heading to spend time with people who, just like me, are working towards their goals in life.

Having run with Back on My Feet for 4 weeks now, the same idea becomes more and more clear. Although you may be able to achieve goals on your own, it is easier, and much more enjoyable, to do it alongside someone else.

Caption: This picture was taken after the first social event I attended with the group (a lecture on injury prevention by a doctor from Penn). Pictured here are just some of the members of one of the six chapters in Philadelphia.

Phan Phreakin' Tastic

Right when I walked through the doorway of the bar, I felt my muscles tense up. As I strolled through the people, I glanced around nervously, scanning the crowd for signs of him. Any small sign that he might be there threw my stomach into a fit of knots. I smoothed my hair, adjusted my bra, and started to search frantically for my lip gloss, but then thought better. He could be watching. Look calm, cool, and collected, I told myself. Breezy, if you will.

I tried to inconspicuously ask around about when he might arrive. Others, sensing my desperation, rolled their eyes and claimed they weren't sure. I tried to be cool, and leaned against the bar very casually. I heard he was coming around 7, I said breezily. More eye rolls, backs turned.

This behavior was rude, but nothing could keep down my excitement. They just didn't understand. I went to the bathroom to check my hair and re-apply lip gloss. Ignoring the bathroom attendant's 'Who is this crazy girl and what is she doing?' looks, I finishing re-application and looked straight at my reflection. I said to myself, without blinking, 'Tonight is the night... The night you will finally meet him... Oh yeah, baby. You're gonna meet... the Phillie Phanatic.'

Not counting the day we beat U of M in football... Best. Day. Ever.

Life without You Tube?! No thanks.

Need to learn to cast on to impress your knitting-saavy friends? To tie a tie in 5 minutes? Or perhaps you want to jump higher than Michael Jordan? Or maybe you want to learn how to play 'We Shall Overcome' on the recorder? Well don't worry, whichever of the above predicaments ails you, whether it is ridiculous or practical, there is a simple answer. All you need is a working computer, a decent internet connection, and the ability to type the following: www.youtube.com.

Oh, some of you have heard of this? Cool. Well for those who haven't, let me tell you a bit about it. After about 9 minutes of searching on google (Oh, and do you know about google?! Well, more on that another time, lets not get carried away tonight), here are some basic facts I learned about YouTube. (Source: The History of You Tube Video).

Started by: Three dudes who worked for Pay Pal

First video posted on: April 3rd, 2005

By 2007, just 2 years lately, You Tube was the 4th most used site in the world - craaazy.

This topic has interested me more and more lately, as myself and some of my friends search for hobbies to entertain our easily bored selves, especially in this frigid weather (Michigan people, don't yell at me, I know you still have it worse). Over break in December, mostly via You Tube instructional videos and tabbed songs on the internet, I was able to teach myself to play guitar.

The other day my friends were discussing knitting, which a lot of people I know are getting into lately. They said they mostly learned online as well, which at this point really shouldn't be surprising but still kind of was. A search of the word knitting comes up with about 23K videos of knitting. Not sure how helpful all of them are, but apparently they are enough to teach beginners how to cast on (I don't know what that is, but it sounds important).

To further explore the How To world of You Tube, I typed in "how to" on You Tube and the drop down menu pulled up the following: How to... be a ninja, make a smoke bomb, save a life (okay probably the song, but you never know), be a gangster, be a nerd, and my personal favorite... how to be emo (I actually watched this one, and it was quite humorous).

Additionally, You Tube also has a ton of videos of people talking about their experiences with psychological disorders. While this clearly has implications for the mental health community, that is also a topic for another day. As a person in the field of psychology, these videos can provide helpful tools for future classes I might teach (e.g., needing an example of OCD hoarding for an abnormal psych course) but also for me to watch and learn about various disorders of which I have little knowledge. I actually watched several videos about social anxiety today and gained a little bit better understanding of it, since I have relatively little training in that area.

How people lived without this amazing technological tool is beyond me. Alright so I may have done it for 20 or so years of my life, but still, its harder to imagine now that I utilize it so much on a daily basis. The only problem is the vast amount of choices, and trying not to spread yourself too thin. I mean, it probably isn't realistic to learn to be a ninja, a gangster, and a nerd all in one night, so I'm going to have to pick one. It's a tough choice, I know, and a tough life, but I am pretty sure its better than life without You Tube.

Forward progress

Writing on here is becoming more and more difficult for several reasons. I'm busier with school (although that doesn't explain my 12 day break in Michigan where hung around each night playing on the computer and hanging with my brother), I'm becoming more a perfectionist when it comes to this blog and the longer I wait to post the more insurmountable the task of posting something worthwhile becomes, and finally, things are going well. I'm definitely making some forward progress... with life, that is.

In general, I'm feeling pretty good about how things are going. This progress probably shouldn't stop me from writing, but it kinda does. Things I think about tend to be fairly positive and when I think about trying to express them coherently, I'm afraid it will come across all sugarcoated and fairy-tale-dream like, and the idea itself will be lost in a sugary coma. Then all my good messages and life lessons (you know, like 'do unto others...' and 'you can only love another once you love yourself') might be considered unoriginal, mainstream, and perhaps fake. So until I find some hard core way to write all of that, those ideas just aren't getting posted. Sorry folks.

So if I can't post those thoughts, what should go on here? To answer this question, I went back to my first entry in this blog for help. Why the heck did I start writing this anyhow? The entry reads: In this blog, I hope to try to document these types of events and the impact they have on me, in hope of gaining more clarity and perspective in my life.

Thank you me from March 2008, I remember now. And even as I look back on my old posts I remember not only the events themselves but how it felt at that time in my life. The picture of the tree with changing leaves helps me recall the March 2008 me, and really feel and re-experience the confused, somewhat naive, younger me, which is pretty cool. Note: That is not to imply that being confused or naive is bad or that I am no longer naive or confused, but that's a topic for another day.

So the blog does serve its purpose, even if its only for myself. In effort to continue this forward progress, I pledge to continue to write and document, even if it isn't a profound and moving message. And perhaps through all of that, some sparkly and optimistic ones will slip in as well, so sue me.

In keeping with my idea back in March 2008 of posting a random picture that describes my thoughts, I head to google images. A picture is worth a thousand words, right? (ugh... cliché) After an extensive search of 'beautiful scenery,' 'mountains,' and related terms, I finally found a non-copyrighted picture to post here. I chose this mountainy one because I'm obsessed with mountains and these ones really do look peaceful, content, and thoughtful, all of which I am feeling right now. Luckily, all of these things (i.e., documented honesty about the candy-coated nature of some of my thoughts and my continued naiveté, pledge to continue to document, and even just looking at the above picture) are all good for my continued forward progress.