Because nothing changes on New Year's Day

Or so sayth U2 as per their song. As I think I've mentioned before, that song is a particularly odd mix of great lines that never really comes together. Which can be compared to...

Some stuff I'm sure.

But seeing as it's not New Year's Day I can hope for some changes... and moving past the bad jokes part of this posting, let me get to the noting of the lack of posting... I really have been letting things go with this blog, more than a month... dude, lame...

Segwaying violently without a care for even the spelling of the word, let me move on.

I am constantly terrified of my creativity waning. This worry tends to be amplified by periods of little creative production, such as lately, but part of it comes from an essential doubt... if that creative process pulls things together into something you haven't thought of before, how can you be sure that it'll work again?

After all, perhaps it was just an odd grouping of circumstances that's kept things creative so far, or maybe an odd grouping of circumstances have dislodged those areas of your imagination that used to function so splendidly or...

The solution to this irrational paranoia, as usual is to push through it.

But the solution to the existential dilemma... and now as happens from time to time, I use existential dilemma in all seriousness...

Creative work on the one hand emerges from different elements of the mind (or spirit or however you want to formulate it who you are), but it represents a change in those concepts' relationship to each other so much so that the flux can be isolated and stabilized into a concept separate enough to be called a new idea. From this perspective though the newness is only illusionary.

But on the other hand, that reconfiguring of old concepts, the rearranging of their relationships, and the teasing out of that stable new gem of a idea, it does seem like something, if not out of nothing, at least something out of unreliable luck.

It seems little comfort to reflect that the continued existence of our lives, given dangers both near and far, is itself a matter of luck, of a lesser or greater degree.

Yet in a way that must be admitted to seem strange, it is a bit of a comfort.

Because I have to say, while I accept that my life may end at any time, yet for now while I live I plan for the future, so that as my life continues I might act better in any given now assuming that the future is likely. Perhaps I can accept my creativity on the same terms. While it has waned and waxed through the years, overall I've been blessed with a decent amount of creativity throughout my life. I have no reason to believe that it will be taken from me, and so I might as well enjoy it and use it and plan for its continued existence while I've got it. Tomorrow it may be gone, but tomorrow it may still be around, and I'd rather waste a little effort in misplaced honing of creativity later lost than to not take advantage of creativity given.

In a sense, this reminds me of Jesus' parable of the master and 3 servants - to be blessed with opportunity to good in this life and to do nothing with that is like the servant who did nothing with the money he was entrusted with.

And a creative mind is a terrible thing to waste, even if it may vanish in but a moment... but such is life. And that's okay.

So take it to your head, take it to your heart and remember Rand rocks. Goodnight Folks!

And God Bless.

It's a long way down to nothing at all... My oh My

And it's a long way up to everything you want. I got to keep that in mind because every moment when I get a good turn I get a new urge to pump up the ambition. There are a lot of bizarre theories about this, mostly me talking about me. But it's a matter of will and a matter of vigilance (one might need to be careful about the later, that is vigilant about vigilance, which despite the oddity of the sound, which is though no more odd than everything else I say, but the point being is one can lose oneself in this cycle of self-monitoring, till the introspection devours the outside and leaves nothing at all).

Ultimately, however, both vigilance and will can fail. Take for example the man who walks on coals. You step at the right areas and you suppress your pain and you can make it unscathed. But most people probably will get at least a little burned, but it depends on the person. Some people have less of a talent for coal-walking than others, and still yet others it is a matter of craft, you can practice and read and train. And so on, etc.

Now if it seems like I am blowing up a micro-example of life to a grand theory, I would like to point out one man's micro-theory is another man's macro-theory. It's all just a matter of who they are raw and all. Raw and all we have strengths and skills and then and so on...

Well, I think I beat this dead horse to a nice meaty pulp, now just to add some seasonings and we got ourselves some steak tar-tar or maybe even... a convoy!

We got a big old convoy riding through the night!
We got a big old convoy! Ain't she a beautiful sight!
Convoy!

Yes she is a beautiful sight, indeed, she is! And so on.

So take it to your head, take it to your heart, and remember Rand rocks. Goodnight Folks!

And God Bless.

One hand might wash the other but who washes the arms?

The hands of course. When I thought of that phrase, it had such a faux profound sense to it, but now that I realize it has such a simple answer. Well, I suppose that just emphasizes the faux in the faux profound.

Greetings y'all, and welcome to another session of the Rand Show. Should I open things like that always? I've always been of mixed feelings about a standardized opener. On the one hand, it's cool, it builds the brand, and it gives a feeling of greater consistency. On the other hand, often my thoughts flow directly from the title, or just directly from my head and I don't want to interrupt things for an opener. Oh, choices, choices. Of course I could try the opener and on and off for a while.

Ah experimentation, something, something, something or other.

I got to say I've been a bit lazy with my phrases lazy. But perhaps that's just because I've been feeling a bit unwell.

"I'm not crazy, I'm just a little unwell, I know right now you can't tell"

(On a stylistic note, I wonder if any of you have noticed my increased use of links. Part of this is simply the fact that more links helps search engines find webpages, but also I think this helps break up the visual monotony of the reading lots of words on the computer and the conceptual monotony of just having words in front of you)

In a recent session I thought I had located the prime source of my feeling unwell (perhaps that's the wrong word for it, I'm at least feeling a little bit off). My analysis was it was because of fear of bad things happening and anxiety over me doing not enough good. I'm not saying that's wrong, but it's not I think the full case. There's still something off inside me and I'm not sure what.

But perhaps that's just something I need to live with. I've often stated that people can never fully understand my mind, and maybe it's time for me to start relaxing a little about that fact. Perhaps it's okay to live in a world where I can't know every little bit of my thoughts. Perhaps, blah, blah, blah.

I think I've hit up that subject well enough.

Moving on to other matters, I'm planning to post up some sessions with linked up versions of Russian films. Why? Because I'm doing some research into old quality Russian films and I think it's pretty cool that they're available on the web and so I'll be posting them up.

In other news, I've got a lot of work to do and so I should be moving on to doing it.

That's about it for now. So take it to your head, take it to your heart, and remember Rand rocks. Goodnight Folks!