Book Trade

The Rules of Book Trade

1. You must read this book.
2. You must leave your name and date on the inside cover.
3. You must give this book to someone else within 30 days.
4. This person must be able to follow these rules.


Adam has just received my copy of Into the Wild. And Emily will soon receive my second copy of Fight Club.

Immaturity

To treat every day as valuable. To refuse to adhere to someone else's schedule, because you have your own and you're moving faster than everyone else. To explore your own limitations and refuse to accept anything less than the best. To ignore the difficulty of your path and focus solely on the reward. This is how I define maturity.

Attending school puts me in someone else's schedule working on material that I don't particularly care about.

Training to be a professional stunt driver allows me to work at my best on something that truly excites me.

Human Sacrifice

Close your eyes and picture yourself in a doctors office. Really envision the whole thing; waiting in the outer room, wearing the gown, getting x-rays and MRI's, waiting for the doctor...and then having him tell you that you have been diagnosed with malignant cancer. It has a 75% chance of recovery, but you may very well die. Try to really get into the emotional mindset that comes with being diagnosed with a terminal illness.

If you do that, there are two questions:

1. How would your life change?

2. Why are waiting for cancer to make those changes?



First I have to state that visualizing my emotions after being told that I have a limited chance of survival is difficult for me. I honestly can't really determine what I would feel at that moment. I would probably think that 75% is a good shot and I would try to push it out of my mind. But for the sake of argument, let's say it's a 10% survival rate. Or even a <1% survival rate.

I would do my second skydive. I would buy a motorcycle. I would sleep a lot less. I would spend a month or two traveling Europe.

I want to make a name for myself. But I don't know how. It seems like everything that I do isn't quite good enough to be great. I believe that to be great requires a huge amount of effort. I don't want to be just a wikipedia article. I want to be the topic of dinner discussions. But why do I care what others think of me?

I want to fulfill the purpose of life. But I don't know what that purpose is. Is it to be perceived as great? Is it to be remembered? Is it to create lasting change in the world? Is it to simply live for pleasure?



Why?

You Mustn't Quit

When things go wrong, as they sometimes will,
When the road you're trudging seems uphill,
When funds are low and the debts are high,
And you want to smile but you have to sigh,
When care is pressing you down a bit,
Rest if you must, but don't you quit;

Life is queer with its twists and turns,
As every one of us sometimes learns,
And many a failure turns about
When he might have won had he stuck it out,
Don't give up, though the pace seems slow -
You may succeed with another blow.

Often the struggler has given up,
When he might have captured the victor's cup,
And he learned too late, when the night's slipped down,
How close he was to the golden crown.
Success is failure turned inside out -
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt.
And you can never tell how close you are,
It may be near when it seems afar;
So stick to the fight when you're the hardest hit -
It's when things seem worst that you mustn't quit.

Poor Choices

I knew I was going to get into MIT, so I only applied to UT and UTA otherwise.

I never applied for financial aid from UT, because at the time of the deadline, I was convinced I would be going to MIT.

When I was rejected from MIT, I chose to skip the $8,000/year scholarship at UTA and give UT a shot.

Once I got to UT, I didn't make meeting new people a priority.

After a few weeks at UT, I began to really dislike my classes, so I stopped going to them.


Maybe these were mistakes and maybe they weren't. That depends on how you define mistake. Perhaps the biggest mistake happened much earlier and snowballed to prove my lackluster candidacy for enrollment at MIT. Or perhaps going to MIT would have been a bigger mistake than all of them. Going to UT might have been a mistake, but I have certainly gained worthwhile experience here. Does the good outweigh the bad? How can one compare the two? Is it worthwhile to evaluate my previous mistakes in hopes that I will make fewer in the future? I think so. So perhaps there were multiple courses of action that would have been greatly beneficial. Obviously there are courses of action that are greatly harmful. The question becomes: how can I select the course of action that will be most beneficial? But it is impossible to compare two courses of action that bear such significantly different consequences.

Great men have come from lesser universities. Even more great men have come from great universities. Some great men have never been to a university. A man's greatness is not defined by who his parents are, what degree he holds, the contents of his wallet, or the means by which he lives. A great man is defined by his actions. Everything else is trivial.


My only desire is to be great.

A long time ago...

I was at a pool party with the rest of the "graduating" 6th graders. And I was fat. So naturally I wasn't getting much attention from the pre-pubescent girls at the party. I had no problem with this. My problem was with the fact that my friends seemed to be avoiding me. So I swam over to them and they politely told me that they didn't want to be seen with me because I was fat. So I dried off, put my clothes back on, and waited until my mom came to pick me up. I don't remember feeling angry at them; I only remember feeling disappointed in myself. I grew distant from those friends later as we got involved with different activities. I still talk to them from time to time. But right now I want to say one thing to both of them.

Fuck you.

UT vs. UTA

The educational quality between the two universities is, in my novice opinion, approximately the same. UT does have significantly more opportunities to gain employment while in school and after graduation; these include the Engineering EXPO and the interviews held on-campus during the semester. This is a moot point though, since I don't want to find typical employment with my degree. I would much rather find employment doing something... unique... instead of a standard engineering internship. UT also has quite a few groups such as honor fraternities, engineering clubs, and fun clubs, but these are, at best, only marginally better than the groups at UTA. Moreover, I'm not really interested in most of those groups. Austin is a large city with plenty of entertainment, unfortunately it is difficult to lease property due to the massive number of students. Arlington doesn't have much entertainment, but it is between Ft. Worth and Dallas which do have quite a lot of entertainment. Arlington would also be much easier to lease a property in. Chris has a standing offer for a job at CCoA on commission. This coupled with the willing roommate, Brandon, would set me up in an apartment with a car and a decent job in no time at all. At UT I have only my current dorm room, no car, and only the possibility of a job. Leaving UT means leaving a few friends here, leaving the trombone choir, and leaving the possibility of meeting the thousands of people here. Going to UTA means getting back together with some of my best friends, starting anew with music and classes at UTA, and the possibility of meeting the thousands of people at UTA. UTA will give me at least $2,300 per year in scholarship money, and possibly more depending on my GPA at the end of the Fall '07 semester. UT currently gives me nothing, though I could apply for Continuing student scholarships, but I estimate that these would not exceed $2,500 per year at most. In conclusion I think it is clear that UTA is the better choice.