December 17, 2015

An Open Apology Letter to Music Majors

So a bit of a bonus post, because I am procrasi-writing. Well sort of. I am listening to the music for my Understanding of Music final tomorrow, which let me tell you, is assault on the ears. That lead me to this post, an open letter apologizing to music majors, because I have spent most of my life thinking whats up with music majors. You spend 4 years of your life doing something you actually enjoy, no calculus, no coding, no chemistry structures. My dad was a music major and to this day he still talks about his music theory classes. I usually just stare at him. Now I know juries, and performances, and the like are probably just as daunting as an O Chem test, or 1000 lines of code, but music to me has always been “fun.” Until the last few days when I started listening to 20th century stuff. Well really this whole semester. The music was fine for the other eras, but when your gen ed class is harder than your major classes, something weird is up. Now it's still not the PTSD inducing hard that O chem was but still not a fun time. So sorry music people. I guess sometimes your classes are hard, and sometimes the stuff you have to do sucks too.




Here some jazz to mop up the blood. Because I actually like this part of the unit.


Sidenote, here is funny Home Alone video because why not.

 Cool. I'll go back to this noise now.

December 15, 2015

Expectation Management

It’s exam week again. It’s back. I’m writing this and stalling the three hour take home final I should be doing on Blackboard, and reintroducing myself to Pandora because only one person can use the Spotify account attached to the Roku at a time.

Anyway, I read this article recently about the problem with millennials. We have high expectations for our lives, expectations so high that we can’t fulfill them, which ultimately leads to our unhappiness. The problem starts all the way back with our grandparents, children of the Great Depression and World War II. They grew up with nothing, and their expectations were low. When they became adults their idea of happiness was simple, food on the table, a happy family, and stable job. In turn, their kids grew up with expectations of the lives their parents had, the American Dream, but by then the world was a little better, and their lives exceeded their smaller expectations. Then those kids, the Baby Boomers, gave birth to us, the millennials. Their lives had exceeded their original expectations, so they instilled in their children the idea that they can be anything they want. That they should be happy, because their expectations were fulfilled, why would their kids be? Well, that’s is our downfall. Our expectations are so high, we can’t live up to them.


One of the biggest ideas of my adolescence when trying to choose a career was passion. Apparently passion is a new idea that came along in the last 20 years. Our parents and our grandparents weren’t worried about passion, what they wanted was stability. But we were fed the idea that we should be fulfilled. Then there is the second millennial idea. The idea that were special. I was not really fed a lot of that as a kid. I was told I was important and special to my family, but not to the world. The world owes nothing to me. But I’ve seen it, people thinking their special, the world owes them everything, their friends and family owe them everything. We’re owed nothing, but if we have the expectation we are, that’s where unhappiness comes.


Life is about expectation management. Keep your grade expectations low, and they can only improve.

Noelle

December 1, 2015

A Cynical Post About How TV Gives Us False Expectations About Friendship, People Only Care About People Who Die Young, and Spotify Having Too Many Commercials

I've been feeling cynical lately. Really cynical. I keep trying to write but every time I go to write they just become cynical pieces on why TV gives us false expectations of friendship, people only care about people who die young, and spotify having too many commercials. So I gave up and went with it.

Television gives a false depiction of friendship. I am an avid Netflixer, TV watcher, media absorber. Sometimes I think of my life as a TV show. It would probably get terrible rating. One thing I’ve noticed is that every TV character has is a great group of friends. Even the scummiest, the most socially stunted, the weirdest people have scummy, socially stunted, weird people to rally around them. If a character is in trouble everyone in their inner circle drops everything in their lives to help. Every Friday night they’re in a bar laughing and discussing their lives. When there is a fight, they resolve their issues by the end of the episode, because they're not friends, they're family, and nothing can tear them apart. Then there is real life. People fight, and don’t make up by the end of the episode. People don’t rally, they give up. People come in and out of life so easily. Friendship is never as simple as it’s shown on TV. You don’t instantly connect with people. It takes a lot more work. People have busier lives and multiple groups and higher priorities than one singular ensemble cast.

Recently a girl in my class passed away in a skiing accident. She was young, successful, well liked. News outlets all over Ohio are running her story. The president of her university tweeted his condolences. When I was in high school, my senior English teacher died of a brain aneurysm. It was entirely unexpected. They had to have 3 calling hours to accommodate all of the people who wanted to pay their respects. All these young people with so many prospects, so many people to care about them. Then there are older people, who are expected to die. No one cares when they die. Half of them don’t even have services. They run a nice short note in the local paper so all the other old people can see which classmates have passed. I don’t want to sound like I am belittling my classmate, because I’m not. Her death is a loss for my schoolmates, and for her family. But, they say only the good die young, I say only the young die remembered.

Why are there so many commercials on Spotify lately? Every three songs there are three commercials. It seems excessive.

Oh, and I have another Shirali pic.


~Noelle

July 17, 2015

Life Is Not a Climb, It's a Stumble

So, it's been a while. About 8 months, a while. That's what happens with projects like this. They start out super interesting, exciting, then life gets busier, things get forgotten. I can't exactly say I have forgotten about this blog, more I quit posting to it. A lot of stuff happened this last school year, stuff that is a little different, and I didn't write about it. I have always had a ridiculously stable home life, sans the first 6 months. Things were bound to get weird eventually. That's life right? But it's your family so you rough it out, try not not to be pissed all the time, and keep your mouth shut.

But I digress. Onto the summary of my semester, although with fewer people than previous recaps. The reoccurring theme of the last three years has been the same. What do I want to do with my life, be it career, be it God, and these are my friends, we think we're pretty cool.

I'll touch on the latter first, friends. We left dorms this school year. I don't see a lot of them anymore. Simple as that. I decided if I wanted to hang out, if they wanted to hang out, it would happen. I didn't happen with a lot of people, and I am okay with that. I still spend time with the people I care about. I see people at parties. It's sort of the same approach I took to high school. I have a lot of acquaintances, but friends are different. Friendship is work, I'll give it that, but if we both don't care, it's not a crime to let it go.

I feel guilty sometimes though, because I know a lot of people find us to be mean to outsiders. I've noticed it, people point it out, we can be jerks, but then who isn't a jerk sometimes. No one, okay, lay off.

Then there is religion. I do this thing every so often where I decide to go to church. I have all these questions and I try to search for answers, about life, and God and everything else. I don’t know why I think church is going to magically make me understand all these things, and they say the definition of insanity is repeatedly doing something and expecting a different outcome, but I keep going back. When I was in high school, I always thought religious people seemed happier, but now that I am in college I realize that’s not really true. We’re all messed up. This time I tried the more contemporary approach. I like the routine and tradition of catholic mass, but I'll give the whole rock band church credit, they do know how to connect with everyday life. I do a lot more thinking because it connects with a lot of what I am already thinking about. One time, I was having a conversation with someone, and the answers to my questions were answered at that week's service. I like the tradition of mass, but the connection of the contemporary church. But in the end, it's all just motions. To me it's all one big 5 year long experiment. I like church, but more as an entertainment source than a way of life, if that is even allowed.

Then there is career. I saw a career counselor. He told me to join the military because I scored very high on the Strong Test for military. I didn't go back. Next, I wrote a super long post on a find a path message board about my multiple major changes, wanting to drop out, and not having any passion. Anyway, I got a fairly thoughtful reply. The replier likened me to what is called a "polymath." A polymath is sort of saying jack of all trades, without the master of none.  I am the master of none. It did get me thinking though. He told me to think back to my childhood. I was a pretty normal kid. I wanted to be just about everything at some point, a doctor, an architect, a teacher, a librarian, a graphic designer, a pharmacist, an urban planner, a political campaign manager, and that's just the ones that I remember. I really liked TV, mostly medical shows and crime shows. I loved playing outside, reading books, and music. I went through a baseball phase, a map phase, a writing and a history phase. I am a polymath in the sense I like everything. Ben Franklin was a polymath. I am not Ben Franklin. I am just a kid who overthinks everything and gets bored too easily.

I started applying for internships. In May, got an internship working at a hospital answering tech calls. It has made me realize, my degree means nothing. I spent the last 3 years worrying and worrying about my major. Looking at my previous posts I harped and harped on it. Here is the thing, that thing they say, how your degree doesn't dictate your job, is absolutely and completely true. Don't get me wrong, if you want to be a teacher you need a teaching degree, and if you want to be a nurse, you need a nursing degree, but I see all the different degrees people have here and really, it doesn't matter.

So that's my last 7 months in a nutshell. I'm starting to feel the pressure of being an adult. Finishing a degree, getting another job, paying rent. I am making a ton of changes this year, with more to come on that, but I am making them because they are what I want. I like to think everything happens because it is supposed to, and it if wasn't supposed to, it doesn't matter because it has already happened. I've never been good at planning. I have sort of stumbled around to get where I am, for better or for worse.

November 2, 2014

The Five Person Principle

When it comes to people and friend making I have one basic observation. It is only possible to establish, build, and maintain five true friendships at any given time. This number can differ, give or take one or two, but for the most part five seems to be the most reasonable number. These people are the most trusted, most valued, and life changing. Maybe this thought makes me a cynic, or unpopular, but if acquaintances, hangouts, drinking buddies, classmates, coworkers are taken out of the friendship mix, then there leaves only five. 

Of these five people, two will remain stagnant. One is a best friend, probably someone from grade school. The second another longtime friend. The first can potentially be a significant other, but this is up for debate. I think they belong in a realm of their own, but they can also be counted in the five. The stagnant two aren't always around, but when they return, it's like they never left. Then there are three people that are fluid. These people are the people you see on a regular basis who are there to help in times of need. They are trusted, and important, but can change. The fluid three are not going to be the same people now as they were a year ago, nor as they will be a year from now. 

The thing about the five person rule is those fluid three become important. They are the people who are available to give advice and to confide in face to face due to their proximity. However these people change. They come and go without real warning or notice. They are the people who at one point are the extremely important, and then suddenly onto the next phase of their lives. Life happens and people move on, but it's crazy to know that the people who are the most important now, may not even be a thought five years, and will be replaced. 

Maybe I am wrong about this theory, but I find it to be true. My static two are the same and probably have been for the last five years. My fluid three have changed since last semester. The problem with fluid friends is that when they go, there is a bit of a feeling of loss. There is a feeling of trying to hold onto something that was meant to change. But everything changes. It's just weird to think that people who knew everything about me 6 months ago, know nothing about me know. I know people are going to come and go, but I have never been particularly good at dealing with it.  

October 30, 2014

Luck

I am a firm believer in luck. I believe that there are things out there that are beyond our control, and that good fortune happens upon people who did nothing to deserve it. I believe that the circumstances of which we hold no control hold a tremendous amount of control over us. I think that where we are born and and who we were raised by makes a huge difference in how our lives will turn out. However, I find myself alone on this stance.

When I ask someone, "Do you believe in luck?" I usually don't get an affirmative response. Maybe I am asking the wrong people, or not explaining myself well enough. I seem to get a lot of responses about things happening for a reason and I don't doubt they do, but if good things, or bad, happen and you have no control, I like to call it luck. I have a pretty good life. Lately it's been a bit of a mess but overall I live a good life. I have good parents, and good friends. I did nothing to earn my parents. My tiny 6 month old self did nothing to get to America, but out of sheer luck, here I am. My mother doesn't believe it was luck though; she believes it was God's plan. The almighty God's Plan. I'm never sure what to think about people who say that. If this world was God's Plan, than he should probably do some editing. But then if there is a reason to believe this plan exists, it's the fact that I am right here, right now, thousands of miles away from where I started out, with people I never would have known.

So luck, plan, I think it's one in the same. I know that's not the reasoning my mom would want to hear, but I think it's pretty sound. It's times when I feel like the plan is failing that I have to remember that I am still incredibly lucky.

September 11, 2014

The Choices We Make

Life is all about choices. Choices to change, choices to stay the same. Choices made over careful deliberation, and choices without thinking of the consequences. Everyday we are faced with a series of questions, followed by a series of choices. Do we want to get up in the morning? Do we want to be the kind of person that would make others proud? What will make us happy? Are we looking for a temporary high, a quick fix, a piece of revenge, or to be loved for the wrong reasons? Are we just shouting into the void to fill the one inside us that is just as vast? The answers to those questions aren't always so clear. What we think is right for us might not be. When stuck between a rock and a hard place, the answer isn't always so black and white.

Along with these choices comes change. We become so comfortable with what we have, and we forget that nothing stays the same. We think, and hope that when we come back, things will remain. But that mind set will only lead to disappointment. Seizing the day means deciding which day to seize. There is more than one right way, and two roads can often both lead to great rewards. We must decide which rewards are more important, and whether we willing to loose one thing to gain something else.