MY MAD DREAM OF AN ESSAY

Remember that time you ate that spicy orange  just before you went to bed on the night before the big race?  Oh, that weird dream you had about the 2016 presidential election.  When you woke up you couldn't quite remember the excruciating details, but after reading "On Self-Reliance" and "A Sound of Thunder" it's all coming back to you now.

The dream started badly.  You were in line with your family at a farm waiting to be sent to rehab.  Everywhere you looked there were posters of president-elect Shrek, looking like a crazy wildebeest who could eat a whole bagel.   

Suddenly, there was Ralph Waldo Emerson telling you, "This conformity makes them not false in a few particulars, authors of a few lies, but false in all particulars."  You realized that you have something to contribute to the world so you decided to rap.  But it wasn't easy.  First you had to put on a fancy snap back and cane  and then you had make a gun to go back in time to the gazebo so you could convince people to learn about the candidates and the taxes on the rich..

But right there in the gazebo there was a giant troll and it started swinging at everyone.  People started to faint.  You grabbed a megaphone  from a nearby box and yelled time will always pass, it won't wait for you  .  Everyone stopped and listened, so you kept going. 

People! Everything we do now is going to have an impact. You decide the outcome.  There is a thing called the butterfly effect where if you tamper with one small thing in the past the whole future will have changed. So who says the decisions you do now aren't changing the future dramatically. It only makes sense that all our interactions are changing everything that we will make of the future. Big changes like Donald Trump waking up one day and saying he will run for president. Maybe a huge change like in the story " A Sound of Thunder" where they travel back in time and Eckels changes one small thing but that changes the whole future, Eckels had killed a butterfly and that had an effect on the outcome of some things in the future. Ray Bradbury definitely used a butterfly to allude to the butterfly effect. The butterfly effect came from the idea that a flap of a butterfly's wings will have huge effect on the air and can change alot of things like possibilities of hurricane. You see what you do now is impacting the very nature around youso be more wary. Be more mindful of your choices. As Emerson would say be self reliant or be courageous. You also need to have the trust that your decisions are the right ones. Don't let others influence your decisions. It is kind of nice knowing what you do truly does affect things. So be impactful in the good ways that you can. You might not know it but you are making a difference.

MY BIG RACE

On Friday I had my big race. You can watch it here since this is the only race they have ever recorded of me. It was not a great race but I can say I didn't do that bad. Our over all team did good but not Division 1 good. We are in one of the hardest diviison in the nation! It sucks but that just means next year we have to come back stronger. (I will update this post) CIF XC Race

VIGNETTE

When we were all lined up ready to race 3 miles it started to rain. Never have I raced in rain because we live in Southern California so this was special. All 100 or so of us runners were anxious to start this race. It seemed like a battleground, we were all lining up to go out and hunt each other. Since it was raining we had to stay warmed up so we were all jumping up and down like some sort of mosh pit. We were the last race of the day so everyone was on the sidelines ready to cheer us on. Right before the gun went off, I looked at the other runners and thought why shouldn't I try and beat them all? I put my game face on as I go out into the battleground that will be for the next 3 miles.

EMERSON'S CHILD

         Be the person that makes you happy. Why else would Emerson push his message of self trust in his essay "Self Reliance". He wants you to show your personality not hide behind a veil of conformity. This is very clear and Emerson is very adamant about this message. You have to give it to Emerson, all he really wants is for the best of you so if you disagree with his message, he can care less. You can really take in what Emerson says however you want. But lets not forget that all he really wants is the best of you. To be the best of yourself is a challenge but to still want to be the best regardless of how society will see you is a greater challenge. You must conquer that  urge to fall in line with everybody else. Emerson explains why not conforming is so valuable in society. I can attest to that and many others can too but it is something easier said than done. Obviously not caring about what others think will be much better but to be aware of that and take action might be hard. Emerson guides us through this.
        "Be yourself." To be yourself is to be love yourself for who you are. When you can be yourself it life seems much easier. When I am around close friends everything just seems much easier and comes at natural. When I am in a room full of strangers and I feel pressured to try to impress them, it is not the same. Emerson says "Man is his own star". He says this to point out how we as individuals are unique. We have to embrace the beauty of being ourselves. To be yourself is to be great. If you are seen as misunderstood it doesn't matter. Emerson says "To be great is to be misunderstood."
     Look within yourself. The answer to your happiness might be within yourself. You shouldn't always seek the answer outside because it will influence you in ways that are not you. Emerson starts off the essay with "No te quaesiveris extra" which means "do not look outside yourself". By saying this in the first line he is establishing that you need to be self reliant on yourself.
     Why should you listen to Emerson? I think to be self reliant and confident when you speak is very important in this society. To be happy with yourself speak out on the things that matter. In this society it is so easy to fall into conformity, almost like you are being lazy. You need to stand up and do your part in a society like this. That is your duty as a human being.
     Whether you like it or not Emerson has a point he is trying to get across. He sees it as a persoanal need to be self reliant. Emerson would like it if we changed this society. He says " I hope in these days we have heard the last of conformity and consistency" He was hopeful back then, why can't we be hopeful today.

EMERSON SAID IT

"I am ashamed to think how easily we capitulate to badges and names, to large societies and dead institutions."    

This is a good quote as it talks about how we conform to ideas we upheld to ourselves. Like if we are branded a captain, we might want to be seen as more serious. This one actually didn't come up in the socratic seminar we had but I wish it had. It shows the idea of how people get attached to these titles which shouldn't change who you are.

 "This conformity makes them not false in a few particulars, authors of a few lies, but false in all particulars." 

This quote hit me. Conformity is like a mask.  A mask that covers our true intentions. It doesn't allow others to see if what we say is sincere. This quote came up because I mentioned it since it had to relate to what we were saying. Conformity makes our intentions not as sincere and others get affected because of it.

The other terror that scares us from self-trust is our consistency; a reverence for our past act or word, because the eyes of others have no other data for computing our orbit than our past acts, and we are loath to disappoint them.

I think this quote is great. It tells us to not let the past control what we have to say now. It is okay to contradict yourself. I wanted to bring this quote up in class because it is important. To many times we think everyone actually keeps a record of what we have said but that is not the case. People are to busy caring about themselves to thin of what you have said or not.

I hope in these days we have heard the last of conformity and consistency. 

I brought this quote up because they were talking about how much of an impact Emerson's essay has had. He was hopeful in that these social problems would be gone by today. It is the complete opposite. Leslie said all these efforts from Emerson are futile. No one takes this in. Society is society and we won't be able to change it. I don't agree. Obviously if we all make a conscious effort to change as a whole it can happen. 

These roses under my window make no reference to former roses or to better ones; they are for what they are; they exist with God to-day. There is no time to them. There is simply the rose; it is perfect in every moment of its existence. 

This quote seemed to come up because they were talking about how we need to be unique. There is a a value in not conforming to society.