Motivation Hunt

I woke up this morning and considered overdosing on some over-the-counter drug so I wouldn't have to go through the rest of life.

That sounded really suicidal and emo, rest assured I never planned on doing that as it was merely a thought. Of course why did I have such a thought? Well I'm sure we all do at some point in life, especially when life is just boring or full of work. I have work to do, but I don't want to do it. If I read a book I'm being unproductive. If I study for MCAT... no that counts as work. So I thought; wouldn't it be great if I could just die right now?

No I do not want to die. Please don't assume that this is a secret plead for someone to come murder me. I enjoy living quite nicely. I'm just lacking a bit of motivation.

So I went on a motivation hunt! But I didn't know where to look. So I begun by trying to figure out what motivates me. Here's my list:

1. Chocolate
2. Candy
3. Sleep
4. Sims
5. Wait.... these are all rewards for working
6. Rewards
7. Maybe the knowledge that I'm bettering humanity? 
8. People smiling at me
9. Being told I did a good job
10. Being awesome
11. Beating all the competition
12. Rubbing it in their faces
13. ... Cross that last

So in general it seems like in order for me to do my work, I need some sort of reward for it. Honestly that was a terrible list. Let me make a new one:

1. Rewards

Ok. So in terms of rewards I tend to want one of 2 things; emotional comfort or physical comfort. Beating the competition and getting people smile at me are all emotional comforts. Candies and chocolates are physical comfort.

But then the real problem is that I can easily get access to most physical comforts without doing the work (unless the work is going up to get a candy). It's only the emotional comforts that require any work. However at this particular moment in time I am rather emotionally void. I don't really want any emotional comforts since my emotions are just fine. All I want are the physical comforts which I can access so easily. 

Am I going to disfavour myself and refrain from candy until I study for my MCAT? I really feel like it... In fact I'm feeling somewhat hungry now... I'm sure there's some chocolate somewhere in this house...

Letter Writing: Makes you feel special

So for the sake of being awesome I wrote a letter that I plan on mailing off to a friend who lives in a far away city only reachable by plane today. Said friend also just reactivated facebook account, emails with me on a regular basis and is easily accessible by text message. But you know what? I sent her a letter; you know, the ones made of pen and paper rather than printer ink and paper?

As I wrote the letter I realized how terribly small the world is... It makes it so much harder to be intimate and confidential. I mean honestly, sure I can talk to friends via interwebs, but I can do that to everyone. In the old days you only talked to people you actually cared about because if you didn't care about them you wouldn't go through the long and time consuming act of writing out a long winded letter and sealing it and sending it and waiting for days to weeks on a reply. Today, I can send off a message and expect a reply in seconds. It's just something that I can do to talk to just anyone; which makes talking to friends like that lose the special appeal.

So I wrote cursive with an ink pen on pretty paper. Hope it's legible... regardless it was awesome and I feel like I should have worked by candle light and with a real ink pen:

It's so beautiful... I want one... but I doubt I'll ever get a real chance to use it properly, which sucks because again I'm forced to use modern technologies. 

Not that I don't like technology, it's wonderful and useful; but at the same time leaves me wondering if life would be better without it. It feels as though the ability to instantly communicate takes away from the intimacy of communication. I almost feel that something means more if one has to wait for it. 

And gosh do I have to wait for it now! Apparently there are random strikes going on in Canada Post... apparently letters are still being delivered but I'd assume that they're just trying to quench the public. Worst part is I recently realized how obsolete the mail delivery system is... Honestly if I want to write a letter I can email. If I need to get my bills, there's online billing. Advertisements and coupons get sent to my email and searched for over the interwebs. Paypal allows you to send money. If I want to make a package delivery there's UPS and FedEx. 

I'm not sure how I feel about the fact that Canada Post is basically obsolete in this modern day world. Is there any a case where there is a form of mail that can only be delivered via Post? I certainly can't think of any, but perhaps I'm just not thinking outside the box. (I was very tempted to type "outside the mailbox" just now...)

Still I hope I can finish all my letter writing soon and get everything delivered in time. It's also quite stressing that I just sent off a scholarship application via Canada Post and now I'm worried they won't ever get my application...

July 4th: I await you

I am not American. I do not celebrate w/e they call their national day. July 1st is much more important to me. However, this year July 4th is pretty important too.

July 4th is when I find out if I got accepted into my program at UOT. Last year the average entrance GPA for this program was 3.86. This program is intense. And I want in.

It's especially nerve-wrecking for me to go on facebook and see some friends who already have their major/specialist etc listed under their education. In my head I'm just waiting for the day I can add my own specialist on my profile... It'd be an achievement I think. But then this got me thinking why I even care so much. I mean I know I'm going to get into this program; why am I making the update of my profile page such a big deal?

And this is true of lots of other things that get publicized via the interwebs. Ever see a friend's relationship status change and get a jolt of some feeling (either sympathy, jealousy, surprise etc)? I think today it's impossible not to live vicariously through your friends, after all every status update they make gets presented to everyone they know. People are so easy to stalk.

Of course there are the ones who really enjoy being at the top of the Top News. In fact I'm sure most of us would like to know that friends are looking at a status or photo or profile change. It makes us feel important I suppose? But then there goes all attempts to be modest about life, to keep yourself hidden, to not have to make your life seem interesting.

Honestly who cares about your life when everyone already has their own life to live? But that's exactly the problem because people somehow do care! We're constantly stalking each other trying to find the newest bits of gossip and news. We care about what other people think of us because we're constantly thinking about other people.

Now I would say, "starting from now on I won't care about any of you." But I can't do that without losing a few friends (or a lot of friends). At the end of the day we still cherish that feeling of being watched, of feeling like our life is good enough to be of importance to others. So perhaps we only think about other people so that other people will in turn think about us.

Now I wish I could make my own opinion on the topic and actually have a valid point, but that's not really me. But the fact that I still update this blog probably says a lot more about my inner stance on the topic than anything else.

But come July 4th, my profile page will be updated. But I might just hide it from the news feed.