Tuesday, January 8, 2008
New Tricks
My dog Tommy will be 11 years old in April. And the old dog has learned a new trick! Everyone who has met him knows how cute he is, but he's always had some behavioral problems especially when it comes to begging for food. He would cry, whine, jump on you, and do other very annoying and loud things whenever my family was eating. Well, I am proud to say that in the past couple of weeks, we have taught him to stop these antics. We direct him to the couch and tell him to stay there. He will be quiet and sit there throughout the entire meal. Then, after, we give him a doggie treat to reward him for being so good. It's amazing how quickly he learned and how easy it was to teach him. We should have trained him in this way 10 years ago!
Thursday, January 3, 2008
I Love Freedom of Speech, Human Rights, and Democracy.
Microsoft would censor the title of this post as "prohibited language" if I lived in China and posted it using their blog-hosting software.
This censorship is what the paper I'm working on is about.
This censorship is what the paper I'm working on is about.
2008 Resolutions
It's self-evaluation time.
I came across an interesting article tonight about regret in the Times. I think I am able to ghostbust regrets about major events in my life with a good amount of complexity, which the article describes as "an ability to incorporate various points of view into a recollection, to vividly describe the circumstances, context and other dimensions." Complexity in self-evaluation is how we mature and constructively deal with regret, and the more complexity one has the greater one's psychological well-being. Or maybe I'm just really good at rationalization and denial. Not going to question this one too much - have other and bigger problems to think about. Self-evaluation - pretty good.
But I am frequently haunted by regret for small, inconsequential things that I do or say on a daily basis. It probably results from a combo of being too hard on myself and not knowing how to deal with this kind of regret. Every time I get a flashback of something embarrassing, I just try to shake it off (sometimes involving literal shaking) instead of effectively dealing with the regret by learning the lesson and moving on. Self-evaluation and resolution - improve ghostbusting of little regrets.
Other resolutions that I've thought of include
- Be on time! I always get myself in a tizzy when I'm late --> thus, I'm always in a tizzy. This is one easy way to reduce stress.
- Listen more, talk and argue less. I think everyone knows I'm going to be a lawyer and am argumentative. Why not go against my stereotype more often?
- Be more decisive. Perennial resolution of mine.
- Be less quick to judge. Why do I think my opinion matters so much? It doesn't.
I came across an interesting article tonight about regret in the Times. I think I am able to ghostbust regrets about major events in my life with a good amount of complexity, which the article describes as "an ability to incorporate various points of view into a recollection, to vividly describe the circumstances, context and other dimensions." Complexity in self-evaluation is how we mature and constructively deal with regret, and the more complexity one has the greater one's psychological well-being. Or maybe I'm just really good at rationalization and denial. Not going to question this one too much - have other and bigger problems to think about. Self-evaluation - pretty good.
But I am frequently haunted by regret for small, inconsequential things that I do or say on a daily basis. It probably results from a combo of being too hard on myself and not knowing how to deal with this kind of regret. Every time I get a flashback of something embarrassing, I just try to shake it off (sometimes involving literal shaking) instead of effectively dealing with the regret by learning the lesson and moving on. Self-evaluation and resolution - improve ghostbusting of little regrets.
Other resolutions that I've thought of include
- Be on time! I always get myself in a tizzy when I'm late --> thus, I'm always in a tizzy. This is one easy way to reduce stress.
- Listen more, talk and argue less. I think everyone knows I'm going to be a lawyer and am argumentative. Why not go against my stereotype more often?
- Be more decisive. Perennial resolution of mine.
- Be less quick to judge. Why do I think my opinion matters so much? It doesn't.
Wednesday, January 2, 2008
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)