there’s a few ideas i left out of yesterday’s post concerning the whole chemistry of life, that i thought about at some point last night, but forgot to amend. it’s that chemistry is basically applied physics, with molecules. so while there are tangible events that can happen due to direct observation of the chemistry occurring, i seriously doubt that’s the whole story. i mean, if you break this down into forces applied, and products that come out of it, there’s still a whole lot we don’t know. i mean it’s not like you’re watching an acid and a base react to become a water and a salt on the scale that you can watch a football game or something. it’s all mostly empirical knowledge.

i think along with the basic chemistry of life that makes very practical observable things like a membrane or a mitochondria, there’s whole other levels of other types of reactions going on. if you delve past the chemical bonds and attributes of a given substance, you get to how the electrons interact, how their energy is in harmony to create different effects, based around concentrations and reactivity. but go further and it’s physical forces playing with each other. go further and you start getting into some quantum mechanics. i think there’s all sorts of stuff going on in these reactions beyond what we observe, and chemicals are just the vessels stored with energy. whether everything going on between them is observable, is completely unclear. that’s where the beauty in all of this lies. physicists can’t explain what’s really going on with gravity, and yet somehow it still exists. there’s just has to be so much going on with these reactions that we don’t know yet, so we can still play that mystery card if so desired. considering how feeble my brain is in the face of all this, i’m good with that.

also, environment is huge, bigger than i let on, i think. you have this base set of “you” chemical reactions, and a genetic predisposition towards expression, but the environment you are in dictates which ones get used, how often, and in what concentrations. the complexities between environment and genetic expression is so huge and interrelated that it’s pretty much it’s own wing in the study of genetics now. thus the linkage between the self and the environment, and how connected they are.

i also thought that there are monastic sects that devote themselves to minimizing their physical bodies to devote more to their mental. so it hasn’t been going on since we developed computers in the last couple of decades, it’s been going on for thousands of years.

they could still get in a biking accident though.

i don’t know how i typed up what i did yesterday, but it definitely took some very deep and unexpected turns. the fact that i have bitched so long about existence without bringing it back to simple justification is mystifying in how i never made the connection sooner. that was huge. but now it’s time to polish it up a bit.

ah yes, let’s bring this back to some hard chemistry here.

the whole idea of a bag of fluids fascinates me. most of the time, i just think of myself as something more of a concept, like what i expect to see in the mirror when i take a gander at myself. it’s all very abstract. it might be my training as a biologist (environment!) but when i sit and think about things like the soul and the self, i always boil it down to the chemistry in my body. this can be taken as a very bitter pill, that people are basically the way they are and experience emotions because of chemical reactions. it’s sounds too simple, but that’s what makes it beautiful. the fact that molecules based on how they are paired can have trillions of permutations is simply amazing. the fact that there are trends in these reactions that can be categorized is even more so.

i guess the fact that the ideas of self are so personal and mystical that to boil it down to science is crude and smacks of over-simplification. which it very well may be. but i feel that natural law plays a part here and the idea that millions of chemicals are interacting in millions of ways in my body to create something unique isn’t much of a stretch. something so unique that comes out of a wellspring of chaos is amazing, and almost divine. but divine or not, the product still exists, is here, and can be reflected on. the fact that we are catagorizing genes and establishing connections between all the systems in our body right now is some form of proof that out of this chaos springs order.

that’s a very bare-bones rationalization, but i’m not really looking to delve into that right now, it’s more of a prelude that comes more around to ownage of myself. i understand that there has to be a me here, a self, that is my own in a sense. my self is mine, but only by default. my mind is mine alone for the sheer fact that there’s no way anyone could have the access to it that i do. i could write a diatribe here millions of pages long and it still would only be a fraction of how i function as a self. in my mind, i am beholdant to no one, but no matter how i break it down, i am still tied to this vessel, this bag of water. it is mine, but it is still fleeting. not even in the sense of death and all that. i could just fall off my bike, hit my head, spill some blood on my brain and do some serious shorting out.

then who would i be? it would depend on what i shorted out. it might only be motor functions, leaving my sense of self intact but unable to really function physically with my body. or i could hit up my frontal cortex and basically become lobotomized. who would i be then? would i even know? the fact that i can’t know is what makes this self so impermanent. i think that there is an illusion of some type of permanence in all of this because wherever you go, there you are. i can’t just leave my mental self at the side of the road (in a sense, i’m not thinking about things like schizophrenia or anything), just like i couldn’t do it with my physical self. even when i do dream and feel like i am leaving my body behind, i am not. the structure of those dreams are tied to my physical being, which is supplying all the energy and nutrients i need to let my mind do something abstract. but maybe i’m putting too much importance on the factory here.

but here we come back to balance, one not existing without the other, the seeming duality of everything. but the way i’m looking at this now, one could not exist without the other. so how could there be duality at all? jesus, i’m not even gonna try and touch on that one at this moment. for now though, one cannot exist without the other, my mind and my body. the operative word there being “for now”. which may be a root for why this is all so tough to hash out. we have so much technology that is running parallel to ourselves, mimicing and modifying our “self”. it seems like we are so close to breaking the ties to the physical we can taste it. mastering our physical so completely that it is integrated into the mental. break the ties that hold our mind hostage, achieving freedom beyond our wildest dreams.

i’m swimming way out of my depths now though, and it’s tough to wrap my mind around that concept. it sounds so liberating and esoteric, but it’s about as unfathomable as losing my consciousness. the prospect of it doesn’t even get me all excited. it just sounds different. it’s not like freeing ourselves from one shackle will lead to fulfillment and understanding, it will only lead to more ideas that are considered limitations, and finding ways to break free.

but that’s a total gut reaction, there’s no way i could know. and there’s still a lot of ideas to sort through here.

slow down….i’m losing myself. and what of it? i have been slowly redefining my image of “self”, or it feels like something along those lines. trying to remove my ego from all of this and look at myself as my environment. it’s strange at first but then just feels comfortable to me, i don’t know why. thinking about it objectively makes me feel like i’m giving it up, surrendering. but that’s only the objective thought, the subjective interpretation feels more like accepting a truth i’ve always denied to myself, but at the same time, i am unsure what that truth is.

when i look at myself as my environment, it makes me realize the tasks that occur in this environment aren’t what are important, it’s more about what populates it. i’ve done a pretty good job of keeping the riff-raff out, and surrounding myself with things i enjoy and people i appreciate, but still leaving a semi-permeable membrane around it, so it’s not completely static. but at this point in my life, it’s pretty much hit homeostasis, which is something most unconscious things strive for without being aware of it. i am aware of this homeostasis i have achieved, but am also aware that things could be pushed and prodded to try and make it a better homeostasis, or worse, but just different in general. as a single being, i am not unsure of how i could go about making myself a better life but am just more unsure if i want to.

i’m having trouble phrasing this in a way that doesn’t make me sound defeated, because i don’t feel that way at all. in a way, i feel like i looked around at the environment i have created, took a breath, and then exhaled. i noticed that i had taken part of myself, and had thrown it into the collective whole, and realized i don’t have to fight anything at all, because that is the type of person i’ve always been. fighting isn’t pointless, but so is not fighting. these lines of ideas and truth are so vague and blurry, that it doesn’t even matter if it makes sense or not. existing in the moment is about all i can do, and be appreciative to have even that. this environment i have created is so large and abstract that i couldn’t begin to break it down into parts, it just is, just like it’s always been.

i feel like i am starting to look at truths and ideas, look beneath their exterior and see them for the mostly unsubstantial things that they are, the things that i have assigned meaning and value to. i assigned them, but not really. my environment did. all the parts of me that i snake out to everyone and everything in the space and time i exist. these things are as much me as everything that is contained in this body, in this mind.

it’s not really mine, and it never was. none of this belongs to anyone. i just appropriate it for now, and invariably end up passing it on, but that depends if someone else finds it useful. but anything can be useful or a hindrance. i can have anything, or deny anything, but within a certain construct. i already have rights in this life that have been mostly established on majority rule. it’s not perfect, but it doesn’t need to be. emotions can be experienced individually, but generally stem from the environment existed in. i remove the self from my emotions and look at them. the power i have over my environment is my ability to shift the focus of my perspective wherever i want. but my focus isn’t just dictated by me, it is pushed subtly or not-so-subtly by my environment, and whatever reaction i have seems calculated and planned, on the surface. but i’d rather not spend time calculating and planning, and even when i feel like i’m scheming for some better end, i am just adjudicating such matters to whatever it is deep inside of me that has come this far, and feels a need to keep making decisions like it always has. in tune with my environment, that which i surround and connect the singularity of “myself” to.

i think that deep down, this self of mine has always been trying to find a justification for its existence. that if i couldn’t justify it to others, i could at least do it for myself. but there is no me here, just a large string of ideas and muddled truths. i always felt like i never had to really justify my existence to others, but was too dense to apply the same principles to myself. the justification of my existence is my existence, and the things i do with this existence are largely inconsequential, yet it is also all that there is. and it makes me smile to think that.

all i can think about now is this line from Herman Hesse’s Steppenwolf where in a dream, Goethe says to the main character “In eternity there is no time, only an instant long enough for a joke.”

i giggle a little, smile serenely to myself, and get back to my life.

what a fascinating place this is.

dance the dance!

dance the dance of language!

if for nothing else than maybe just to get some exercise in. to get a feel for some ideas that can maybe be parlayed in this fashion.

because there’s not really much to write about, things are kinda slow. i’ve mostly been thinking so hard on my routines as a person. i took a step back and looked at it objectively, and patted myself on the back. i and other people would mostly approve. stellar work, good sir. you might want to try reading a little more with a little less of the TV. or volunteer in some community thing. or eat more veggies. maybe then you’d feel better about the things you do. but i know how dubious this is in the first place.

when my hands rest on the keyboard, they feel good, potential energy lying in wait. typing feels good as well. potential energy being turned into kinetic. but directed, in patterns. patterns that feel comfortable, patterns that have built on what has come before. i am here, now, with some purpose i have taken from myself and others, on a madcap ride through life in an attempt to further something that is terribly abstract to me. not so much abstract in the sheer amount of variables (although that is part) but more abstract in that my day to day life experiences can hardly be compared to such ideas as life purpose and life viability.

this leaves me…where? in position. to do something that jibes with me. that’s a pretty nice thing, especially when there is always the potential for worse things to happen.

huh. hey growth, how’s it hanging? i just had this funny thought about you. just like most organisms on this planet, growth starts exponentially. it seems like it will never stop, because resources are fresh and plenty. but then something happens, the environment you exist in isn’t boundless, otherwise growth would continue to be exponential. no, suddenly some resources become harder to obtain, scarcer. so growth slows, but doesn’t stop. suddenly, the exponential curve shifts to conform to it’s boundaries in the environment it exists and becomes a logarithmic curve. so growth slows but never completely stops, although it may appear to do so. so growth comes slower as the asymptote approaches infinity. the environment is the limiting factor here, but there’s not a whole lot to be done about that. leaps and bounds don’t come any more, it comes slower, and i have a lifetime of accumulated feelings that dictate so much to me, unconsciously. there’s always the chance that something catastrophic may happen to the environment, getting back to some form of exponential before swinging back to logarithmic at some point. this is happening with all the facets of my life.

all i can do is approach infinity.

it’s scary how closely related our last couple of entries were….even if they’re more interrelated than related.

i don’t know what else to say here but that i am unsure of how to feel about my dreams and where they are heading, and i’ve definitely been turning it over in my head for a few days here, to no avail, really. i went and talked to a production manager for a brewing company and it went well. i learned quite a bit in just a half hour about how large scale operations are going to work, and got some questions answered. it’s what i’ve been hoping for, right? the guy was totally awesome (especially when i kinda threw the apprenticeship thing at him) but there was just an underlying tone that just screamed the writing on the wall.

it hit a little when i finished talking to him and was leaving, but it really hit me the next morning, especially after talking to my wife the night before. it hit hard, like the kind of depression i’m sure draws people to taking anti-depressants. i’ve always felt that pretty much all jobs are the same in the bullshit department, but brewing was something i held up higher, because it’s something i enjoy doing, immensely. i felt like i knew it all along, but the conversation i had just pushed through all the cracks in my dreams, and tore the wall down.

It started by talking to the production manager, but then i talked to my wife later that night, and it all clicked in. she is living her dream, in a sense. she went to school, and is now working for a bakery. talk to her and she’ll let you know how awesome and drama-free it is. i don’t want this to happen to brewing, but if i go into the big leagues, it will. everything will change. i’ll learn so much, but at what cost? would it be worth it to try and produce all these things for mass consumption as opposed to just for myself and my friends? which would end up more rewarding? which would make me feel more fulfilled?

I’ve always worked to live, and i feel if i went into brewing for anyone besides myself, it would lead to that same type of mentality. compromises would have to be made, with seemingly insurmountable piles of bullshit to wade through depending on which company i decided i could work for. even if i went into to it on my own, there would still be mountains of crap to wade through before i could get my name on the map. brewing communities are already so well-established that it would take so much schmoozing and diplomacy to get production up to the point where i could maybe do this stuff for a living. but do i really want that, even if i could have it? i feel like i would mostly just be setting up everything just so i could get to the point where i could hand off the business to other people, and then i can go tinker in my lab however i wanted to. this future would probably only realize itself after a couple of decades but my game would be seriously tight after all that work.

but i could just tinker in my lab now, join a homebrew club and enter homebrew contests, and treat this like a hobby, and still up my game, without killing the ideals i hold for brewing. i can learn from others who aren’t out to make a buck. i don’t really have a need to prove myself to the brewing community, i just enjoy making and drinking my own beer, and sharing it with appreciative people. i’m doing that right now, why would i want to throw it into the same morass that is associated with working for a living?

but i can’t tell if i’m just copping out because i don’t want to put in that much work, because i’m already talking myself down right here, right now. who knows what i could achieve in the arena of craft-brewing? but i used to have anxious-makes-you-want-to-achieve-something-fear about it, and now that has just been replaced by more of a complacent fear, the fear that i am going to be subjecting myself to the whims of others in something i hold so dear.

which means i should just go it alone, right? do it for the love? but what would i be trying to prove? what would i be trying to gain? earning a living off of something i love? what point is that making exactly, what kind of growth? is the dream i am trying to achieve so based on how accepting others are of it? to see if i can make a superior product and claim my piece of the marketshare in an attempt to do what exactly? be able to brew all day and get paid for it? i can’t really say since i’ve never lived to work, but all of the things i do, i enjoy because they’re done in moderation. if i did any of them all the time, it would get old. which is probably why i’ve always worked to live.

but it is part of being human to want to upgrade, to take some experience you have and take it to that next level. i think i had some loose dreams of opening my own place and all that jazz, but when i objectively look at it, i’m not sure if it’s something i want. brewing is about the only thing i have a passion for these days, but i don’t know if it’s enough to make it in the marketplace. to go out and earn all this glory and recognition out of something i have passion for, i don’t know if i want it. i’m more possesive of it, and kinda like things the way they are now.

granted, if an oppertunity turned up i would probably go for it. but it would have to be a pretty convinient one, and that’s what makes me falter. if i really want to make a go of it, it needs to be everything, and i can’t force myself to have that kind of passion, it has to happen. the funny thing about the depression that i felt a couple of mornings ago, it wasn’t the sprial towards emptiness, it was more of a spiral toward clarity. i know that if i want to do this, it isn’t going to come cheap. but i also feel that if i don’t do it, that’s OK too, as long as i keep brewing and enjoying it, while trying to better myself at it on my own standards. i feel like if i went whole-hog into brewing right now, it would still be because of other people’s standards, not my own. if i do well at something, it’s only natural to be pushed towards doing something with it. but if i don’t do it on my terms it’s not going to work, this much i know.

but there’s sure a whole hell of a lot i don’t.

man, i really wanted to write something yesterday, but things just got too busy. i was in a weird mood, and things were just bubbling up that were the good type of crazy, and now hardly any of it is retained. ah well, it’ll happen again sometime. It did get used well going to a rave, being twice as old as everyone there. while i was in line i heard one guy say “I feel ancient here” and he said he was 21. but i guess the mindset was different. that guy was probably there to party and meet girls and shit. i was just there to dance and see my friend play a set. being ancient has nothing to do with it. it was an amusing thought to me that the girl on the floor (she called herself “hearts”) getting a light show was in 1st grade about the time i started raving. that time, it sure does fly. it was good to see how strong the scene was still going though. i was a little surprised at first, but then i realized kids are always going to need a place to be idiots and do drugs. raves are ideal for that.

i was musing about my states of mind though, i remember that much. mostly because i was feeling a little off, but in a jokey, happy-go-lucky way. it was a day for hats. it was a day to revel in a feeling. it was a day. everyday was pretty much the same, but day-to-day its path basically depends on how i wake up in the morning. which, when i thought about it, was pretty awesome. if i could just wake up everyday and tell myself with utter conviction “today is going to be awesome” things would become even more static than they are now, as i would look at everyday the same as the last and hence always come to the same conclusions about problems that appear different on the surface, but in reality are basically all the same thing. or not. these things are kind of circumstantial, especially when resorting to sheer speculation.

it lead down a path towards optimism and pessimism though, which i had been thinking about for a bit since ben brought it up awhile ago. not that anyone asked for my opinion, but if you’re here reading this, then technically you are. i know i’m an optimist in most regards, but it stems from pessimissim. pretty much everytime i point out something optimistic, it is coming from the idea that things could have been worse. but i guess the application of optimisim/pessimissim really just roots itself in how you look at a situation, and then decide how you’re going to deal with it, however you want to define your reality. it may be an expression more cued by environment, but i believe the groundwork is already laid to react to the environment. optimistic (with it’s tinge of pessimisim) thoughts automatically pop into my head, so i figure people must have the same thing happen to them with pessimistic thoughts. so what it boils down to is it doesn’t matter, there’s no right or wrong here. with every facet i have as a person, i adjust to living life the way i feel is best, as i imagine most everyone else does. even being delusional has it’s place. it gets some ideas out there. i guess in these times you just have to hope that these people aren’t your leaders, but then at the same time, that is also a part of the interest factor. people who think differently than me make me think differently, it’s about the only source of growth i got. maybe not even growth, but more of something just to help classify the ideas in my life, giving them some sort of merit. which could be growth. i’m not sure i care anymore.

not that i think i’m perfect or don’t want to grow, i just don’t actively think about it anymore. good (fill in the blank), bad (fill in the blank), it just feels like thought exercises to me these days, stemming from the fact that i’m really comfortable with myself. looking at ideas and just objectively picking them apart for the hell of it, like taking apart a lawnmower and putting it back together. and it’s not even close to as concrete as that lawnmower, which is probably why i don’t take it so seriously. i just pick these things apart because i’m naturally curious, and end up where i end up. the more i define, the less it makes sense, so what’s the hurry?

when you die, does the degree to which you had life pegged make a difference? or are all these ideas and thoughts to be used now, to get what you can while you’re here? the vicious cycle of being conscious is in the attempt to understand it.

at what point does that become old?

oh my god.

It’s fitting that this is post #500. A milestone, of some proportions.

I had a little extra time at work today, so i went over a week of writing i did a couple of years ago. i banged out everything on my mind for a week, and i remember being pretty proud of it, as good writing and idea formation happens only occasionally here.

so i read it, and then proceeded to feel like i should just stop writing, forever. not because it was a breathtaking piece of literature, or because something profound hit me when i read it. actually, something profound did happen when i read it. all the stuff i’ve been throwing out here in the past couple of months is almost identical to what i was pining about 2 years ago.

forget your history and you’re doomed to repeat it, huh?

why am i still stuck on these same ideas of being human, of being conscious, and not really getting anywhere with it?
not enough new information? maybe.
not enough drive to find answers? maybe.
indifference? now we’re getting somewhere.

all of the questions i ask are so broad, that it’s not the answer finding so much, or looking to gain anything, it’s more just existential bitching and moaning. gotta get out those negative feelings somehow. but the joke is on me, as it were. i’m not going to stop writing, mostly because i enjoy it, even if i am repeating myself. like playing the violin, or dancing, or something i don’t do often enough, there’s pleasure in just the doing, no matter the substance.

and then i grew a little.

disaster is in the air. totally just a gut feeling for me, but it’s just one of those days where things have already started off rather badly, and it just gives you an on-edge feeling for the rest of the day. normally nothing happens, and the day just goes by like any other. but here, in this moment, there is a sense of foreboding, that everything that has already happened today is just part of the crescendo up to something worse, if the trend continues.

i can point at it though, and just be like “dude, you’re all anxious because some things happened this morning that made your body release all these chemicals to deal with the situation. they don’t just remetabolize into your body the instant you want to change your mood.” which makes total sense to me. i guess it’s just that balance between emotions and reason, where i’d like to think that they’re two compartments that have release valves. One or both gets released into the reservoir, and it is dealt with depending on the concentrations. There are no compartments though, just one giant reservoir, with everything in it constantly fighting for homeostasis.

there is something deep here, something at the fabric of what makes me uneasy. something about everything around me that brings joy and sorrow, and assigns some meaning to it. chemicals that were designed to enhance survivalbility were not meant to be applied to consicousness, as far as i can tell. it really just leaves us at the mercy of our own evolution, where time is immaterial and we’ll get there when we get there. that gives me no solace, but i really wonder if anything can? not to be overly futile or anything.

my brother posed the idea of asking the question “why am i doing this?” before everything you do. it has snuck in and pervaded my thought processes so hard. the first respone is normally, “yeah, why the hell are you doing this?” and then maybe a few more questions linger in my mind while i actually proceed to do the task anyways. for me, it doesn’t take long before such questions start hitting an existential wall, and end up focused on the big picture and what it means in the grand scope, which can’t be helped. these questions would probably be more valuable if i tightened my scope, but then i think, valuable? right…..let’s just start assigning some value to ideas around here.

why am i doing this?