Valmiina käytettäväksi

Suurin osa meistä elää hiljaista ja vaatimatonta elämää. Meidän kunniaksemme ei järjestetä juhlakulkueita eikä pystytetä muistomerkkejä. Me emme kuitenkaan ole merkityksettömiä. Maailmassa on lukematon määrä ihmisiä, jotka odottavat elämmäänsä juuri meidän kaltaistamme ihmistä ja kaipaavat juuri meidän myötätuntoamme, rohkaisuamme ja kykyjämme. Pystymme tekemään jonkun onnelliseksi pelkästään sillä, että pysähdymme antamaan hänelle jotakin siitä, mitä meillä on.

Onni elää hetkessä

On olemassa vain tämä hetki. Miksi se pitäisi pilata kiireellä ja päästä siitä nopeasti eroon? Rauhoitu ja keskity yhteen asiaan kerrallaan. Monta asiaa jää ehkä tekemättä, mutta tuskin ensimmäistäkään todella tärkeätä. Lahjoita itsellesi kiireetön hetki ja jatka samalla asenteella koko loppuelämäsi.

Weaknesses re-discovered

On this year (also) I have met such amazing people. Everywhere, anytime and in so unconceivable contexts that it is...well, amazing! I have learnt and keep on learning so much from yous all that I can't really express in words the gratitude I feel for living especially in these times and with these people. The most precious and at the same time the most difficult thing I get from this is, apart from having wonderful and meaningful friendships, that in many occasions I have had to and have to still face and try to come to terms with the things I don't like about myself.

I want to extend an apology to persons, who, due to my weaknesses, feel I have abused them in some way. Yesterday I was in the shower, just standing there under the pouring water, thinking how I may have done some people wrong just because I thought it is the way to do things and that "certainly everyone agrees this is the way this or that thing is supposed to be done or be", but how in the fuck's name could I really know how the other person thinks?? I mean he/she could have totally different mindset related to this matter, he/she could never even begin to think the way I think, in the way which to me is totally self-evident. And apparently fucked up. To begin to think that I would even try to change that which is the most precious quality in each and everyone - the wonderful and authentic self and the way a person "is" - seems now like something I hope I never would have done, and definitely something I feel I need to improve upon. Sometimes changing the paradigm of life can be hard, but I feel my life would be much easier if I could be less demanding in some respects. It seems some things stick better than other things (unfortunately). In any other ways I feel my life is about as fun as it gets! And for this I again thank the amazing people but also my self!

I wish You a relaxing and a peaceful time around the new year's! I'ma spend it with my dear family, enjoying good company, relaxing and eating good food, among which I want to mention the organic chunk of pork I picked up today. Also the carrot and swedish turnip casseroles I'm going to do myself this year, of organic products, naturally :). What a hippie I have become! I'm lovin' it.

http://users.tkk.fi/~jjlehti2/ab/joulukortti.JPG

As a Christmas present for boys, I want to state that by being open, wacky, humorous and wonderful yourselves, you are able to melt hearts. Regardless of gender. Which actually brings me one more thing to wonder: how come men's approach to women is so fantastically and dreadfully different than women's approach to men? In general, it seems women are initially more interested in the mental side, whereas men are much more physical in terms of what is attractive. A curse and a blessing. Alas, how it fucks ups a lot of things :). Although, this might be a thing that is shifting into different direction, aka where men give more value to the mental side??

Thank you for interaction

I must say I have been underrating the potential in interacting with other people. Traditionally I have felt I need to do things on my own, since "it is the only way things get done for sure and in an efficient manner". This may have lead me to appear as an introvert. However, I feel I am not. Lately I have been introduced to the power of interaction with like-minded people. Simply put, there is just so much to learn from oneself, when two truly honest people communicate with each other. It may not be easy, not at all! Usually it feels quite awkward, actually. But in the end all is well that ends well. People are like mentors, proteges to each other. One just needs to keep eyes wide open to take heed of the essential stuff we stumble upon when communicating with each other. That's how we learn of this life, and most essentially, of ourselves.

Global consciousness on the rise

I sincerely wish for a change in this world. And I am confident it is happening as I speak. More and more frequently I come across with people, in veeerrry surprising contexts and lives, who are themselves already quite conscious about the state of things. And how pleasant and rewarding it is to talk with these people! Self-development, spirituality, nutrition are among the good topics. But more still I enjoy, if the person is willing to talk about just about anything - especially the wacky, hilarious and tabooish subjects. Freely. Without condemning, without being embarrassed. We are human beings - we don't need to be ashamed of our thoughts. Speak freely. Feel the other person as you feel yourself - a simple human being with all kinds of funny thoughts in your head. It's just that someone sometime ago said to you that you should not speak of these things. Well damn!

I am confident that the global consciousness will soon exceed a certain threshold, which results in triggering a series of events leading this world to be a better place for human beings. Currently, for most of the people, this is not the case. I am lucky enough to be amongst those who can spread information about all that is important.

On a lighter note, French women are quite.. interesting, at least when considering everything.. external :) And French cuisine is delightfully fresh and tasty!

Ode to overwhelming life situations

Sometimes I feel like there's just too much stuff going on in some particular moments of my life. It's as if all those things pile up and converge on a specific day or days. Especially emotional stress can get overwhelming from time to time. I think everything would be relatively OK without the need to earn money, which requires the shutting down of emotions and mental stillness for 8 hours just to be able to earn a buck. And I need these things to process my shit together. This is where the music comes in. It gives relief; although I might not be able to shout out loud at work, I might just tune in to the mood of the music and do funny faces :). So, this is what I would shout and scream and sing to an entity called "overwhelming life situations" (the build-up around 3 minutes is just what I need):



You tell me I can't slow down
You tell me where I've gotta be
I speed into the darkness
But I swear that I can't see a thing in front of me
You know it's true
I'm not driving anymore
I can't keep up with you
You're closing in behind me
I've got headlights in my eyes
Don't you get too close to me
Can't you see that we'll collide and end up casualties
There's just no room
I'm not driving anymore
I can't keep up with you
So leave me on my own
Run me down and race away from me
I've got nowhere to go to
I don't think I can get back on my feet, back on my feet
You came right out of nowhere
Eyes wide and terrified
And I can't put my brakes on
I can't swerve to save your life cause then I'll lose control
And I can't choose
I'm not driving anymore
I can't keep up with you
So leave me on my own
Run me down and race away from me
I've got nowhere to go to
I don't think I can get back on my feet, back on my feet
Get me out of harm's way
Can't you see I'm paralyzed
I wanna fade out gracefully
But you keep keeping me alive to face another day
Can't you see I'm through
I'm not driving anymore, I can't keep up with you, can't keep away
Tell me how long have I got, I wanna to end this earthly toil -'Till this
diet life expires
I wanna go swimming in the soil and not come up for breath - Sit in God's
room
I'm not driving anymore - I can't keep up with you
I'm unfit for consumption
I don't know how to play my part
I swear I'm alone in this thing, I'm a blind man driving my car
Into oblivion, let it come soon, I'm not driving anymore
I can't keep up with you

Aah, much better

I read of spiritual catharsis and bumped into how laughing and crying are the first steps in this process. Well, I felt like for a Sunday cry.

Starting with the Assembly 2007 demo "Lifeforce" by ASD (can be found from e.g. youtube), then listening to Evanescence's "Hello", and finally, the total crackdown for me, Evanescence's "My Immortal". Fuck, it felt good! On My Immortal on the second chorus I lost it. Couldn't stop crying until the end of the song. I'm writing this in the afterglow. I feel light, relieved and very good. I should definitely do this more often.

Ei minulla muuta.

The three essentials

Simple things. Did striving towards more money ever lead to happiness for you? For me it has not. Sure, it has enhanced in many ways the situations where I have been involved. However, the money only enhanced the moment, which already was fun. If the situation had been shitty and you'd feel down, the bills in your wallet or the value of your stocks in your account didn't make any difference, now did it? What was the real cause for my happiness? In most cases, I'd say it was the people and how I felt connecting with them.

I hereby declare the three most important things you can do in your life: 1) take care of yourself in every way, 2) take care of your friends and loved ones, and appreciate all people to the extent you want, and 3) take care of your environment, it's our common heritage and we live in symbiosis with it (although last 300 years or so we have been more or less parasites or viruses in this regard). So what's new? Nothing. Heard it many times. But did you ever think what these declarations really mean? 1) to me means to take care of yourself physically and mentally, by developing on these fronts as much as possible. Be extremely curious and do all the things your heart desires! Eat good and healthy food. Learn about things. 2) is important, because it seems it is the most prominent way of making the world better for everyone: you get happier when you smile a lot, talk important stuff and nonsense, laugh, hug, kiss and feel. The other people too feel better and it spreads around. 3), because it is quite frankly the proper thing to do. What would we humans be without nature in all its might? It's a reciprocal relationship.

So there you go. Be on par in these aspects and you will start truly be happy, always!

Can you find true happiness from something external?

Shiiiiiiii

It just occurred to me today. Made me feel both anxious and relieved. Mostly anxious.

Think about it. If you eliminate all the externalities in your life, what is it really that remains? By externalities I mean everything that are outside of your body, soul and mind - be it your family, girl/boyfriend, career, money, belongings, hobbies, people, etc.

One might now ask, why would the externalities need to be eliminated anyways? My answer: because "the only constant is change", meaning in this case that all the things that have no origin from within you can be as easily wiped out from your life as they were introduced in to it in the first place. In my opinion, this results in searching for the motivation to keep on living from within, because one can't trust anything external would be permanent and give the "power" to keep on living a meaningful life in your mind. The problem of this search is that if one has been living 27 years always having some goal, some external thing to concentrate on and not needing to think of what is the real motivation for living, it can be really hard to suddenly come up with something meaningful that is perfectly harmonious with your inner self. The motivation that comes from within.

In a way I understand people settling for the "ordinary stuff" such as family, job, etc. because it is the way which is obvious and common. "Why not do it because everyone else is doing it". Then some of these end up unfortunately to the situation, where all this external vanishes. Then it is either a deep depression or deep exploration of oneself. The point is that sooner or later (not for everyone though) this has to be faced by each and everyone, if one's happiness is based on something external.

I was doing some Krav Maga today. I didn't have to think anything, just do the thing I reaally like. In a way I think by doing things one likes, people try to reach the same (mild) meditative state than what is attainable with actual meditation. The state, where you just are. No past, no future - just the present. This is the point in being mindful and present. But the controversy here is that one needs this external thing (e.g. hobby) to reach the meditative state. Either that or one should just meditate all year along. And die of starvation, since no money means no food on the table. So it seems we are forced to seek our happiness from external stuff instead of internal stuff. Is the purpose of life then to do the things you like? :) Sounds quite reasonable. OK. So maybe life is good when you get to do the stuff you like - every now and then it may fuck up your mind because it does not any more give you happiness, but I guess it is the price we have to pay to be happy even for a while?

At the moment it seems all I am doing is drift from day to another without bigger plans. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy my life now more than ever! But thinking this kind of stuff can really fuck up my mind. This thing occurred to me as I was thinking the future: I'm going to graduate. Maybe this is some quarter-life crisis :). But now it seems as if it is either I work my ass off for the rest of my life or then I take another attitude to it. Kinda a situation where I need to fill the void that is created when the studies are completed. I don't see the worklife as the filler of this void. I want to find something from within to fill the void. I just need some guidance on this one.

On the other hand, no purpose in life gives me a notion of being able to do whatever I want. Even though this should be evident without this notion, it isn't. It's the 27 years of conditioning. Maybe I should just concentrate living day by day, not thinking of the future or past that much, quite as Eckhart Tolle recommends in his book The Power of Now. If the answer to the motivation of life is to just be present, I really need a complete shift in the way I think of world. I mean, financial security is one big and dull issue, which prevents me (I guess) from living totally present. I try to, though.

Mental climate of Barca

It's funny how the climate of a country can affect so much the population. More so from the mental perspective. In Barcelona people - regardless of age - were holding each other's hand when walking, hugging, kissing and just laying in the parks with one's head in another's lap. Old people, younger people.. The Sunday afternoon dancing session in a pavillion was filled with such latino passion, beauty and joy... and the women are absolutely stunning! Don't know how hard it would be to live them, because the beautiness must come with some trade-offs :). That's why the men probably are quite macho there.. because they must be the men they are expected to be. Which in a way is good, but in a way bad thing: the girl gets proper treating in every sense, but in the end it might be artificial since the man has to play by her "rules". The women seemed to be respected by the men more there than in Finland. Women, reciprocally, would then be as lovely as they were. But the fact the the men have to "show-off", if you ask me, fucks up the whole situation in the end. Nevertheless, the women dress up in a way that would be considered as TaiK, or artist-style :P. Which I think is good since it is always original and shows the woman has given some thoughts to how she would look. Sounds a bit chauvinistic, but I can't deny saying that I as a man enjoy this kind of aesthetics :). The ppl in general seemed to be so present in whatever they were engaged in.. sometimes screaming, sometimes playing models in the public with their friends, smiling and shouting "viva papa" (yeh, the pope was visiting there). The atmosphere was so very different compared to the Finnish one.. I'm not just saying this, I mean Finnish culture has its good sides as well.. but the complete approach, the way to look at life is so much relaxed and happier under the bright sun than here in the cold north that it feels sometimes it is unfair for us Finns having to bear this climate, where alcohol replaces the warm arms of the dear people.

Lähettäjä Barcelona, Espanja, 4-8.11.2010

Plastered every now and then is good for ya!

I humbly and deeply bow in gratitude towards my friends. As last weekend proved, getting plastered every now and then is so unbelievably good thing to do.. especially when I am surrounded by good people, who really give dam about their friends. On both nights I felt unbelievable closeness to the people I spent time with.. Both Friday and Saturday was filled with laughter and love. I mean, what the fuck more could any man ever want (when the animal-viewpoint is not considered ;) )?

Two whys

Why do people compare themselves to other people? In the end everybody has their own reality, so why would someone else's reality have any relevance to one's own way of seeing things? Somehow it seems quite a common thing to do, to compare myself to the other person. And of course, then feel bad about not having/doing something the other person has/does. What if I just would realize there is a) no sense in comparing myself to anyone as everyone has their own dreams, which are made to come true - no matter what, and; b) it will not benefit anyone: not you, not me. Just making things worse. The need to belong, to "be something"... 's a terrifying force. Release me.

Why are people so afraid of opening their hearts to the fellow(wo)men even if they just met? Why do people get scared of touching, of talking freely.. of having no limits in their wise actions. Do we always need the secure feeling that everything is like before, that nothing is going to change. That everything will be quite OK. Is it OK though if I talk to you freely and you will not withdraw or start having negative feelings towards me? Sometimes it feels - when talking about STUFF - the other person gets angry at the person speaking - me - instead of the actual topic. I do not equals the topic. Let's talk about stuff and disagree.. and then have the greates time of our life aftewards, shall we :)

Openness as a way of life

There are lot of things in our society, which are widely discussed and held as "the way it should be". Unfortunately, it is evident that in most cases the thing being talked about is not really in the fundamental thinking of us humans, even though, as I said, they are often talked about.

For instance, everyone seems to think openness is the way to go and everybody are open, of course. Are they really? I feel people think and feel a lot of things, which they truly do not believe. What it is to really be open and live according to the idea of openness? I've tried to implement this during the year. And boy it's fun! :)

For me, openness is to be 1) able to say how I feel about something while at the same time being 2) assertive. I may not always make other people happy. Being open and having integrity does sometimes mean downhearted situations, but I feel it is something not to be afraid of as long as I am assertive - i.e. respectful, supportive, empathic but firm. Sticking to the truth will always come out right. Then I'll know I was being honest - not with only the other person(s) or the external situation, but also and more importantly with myself.

In human-to-human context, I feel the way he/she is able to receive the openness I want to share is actually a measure of the other person.. In a way u know. Being open about stuff is actually a very frightening thing to do for some people. The way I see it, partly this is due to the insecurities or inability to interact as openly as the other person is doing. Consequently, this induces a stress reaction, which results in refusal of the whole concept of openness. In this way I feel I can tell how self-aware some person is. Don't get me wrong, I don't want to criticize anyone for not accepting openness as it may come out as a very dreadful thing. But as I said, it will give me hints of certain things. I respect you anyway, however you come out.

I feel being open has made my living a lot easier. It just makes all the..surplus thinking go away. There is no need to think whether I should have said something different or how is she now feeling or... I don't know, maybe this is quite normal behaviour for all you folks, like being honest always n stuff, but for me it has not been obvious at all. Maybe it's the way I was raised dunno. I feel now I don't need to say things I don't mean, do the things I don't want to do and finally I really can tell the people who are open as well and appreciate it. As an extreme example: when two people make love and are both being very open.. it is like the playfulness and the irrational side of the sex can emerge. No rational actions - just plain living in the moment, letting the moment evolve and come out as it comes out. Letting go of the fear of the other person and her reactions. Or of the way you might react.

Openness - hard thing to do in practice because of various social norms, because of how we have been raised. Give it a go and you might never be the same :)

P.S. Let me know if I'm being too open with this stuff ;)

What can be achieved by meditation

The ultimate experience for me, so far, has been during this summer. It was a 4-day retreat into the wilderness in the Porvoo archipelago.

Having spent a wonderful midnight summer's festival in an island, where my dear friend has a summer cottage, I went to the island next to it, erected a tent (shame on you for thinking something..something ;) ) and spent four days and four nights in solitude. Only nature with its sounds around me.

I had never done anything quite like this. Initially, when I came back from China, I thought I might attend this 10-day retreat which was somewhere around in the beginning of September in Kempele (organized by the vipassana organisation in Finland). In the beginning of June I knew that at that time I would be doing my master's thesis (and actually, bachelor's thesis as well), so I discarded the plan for going to the 10-day retreat. I thought: "why not organize my own retreat. That way at least there is no external human disturbing factors. And I would not have to spend the unbelievable 10 days in silence, I could define my own time to spend there."

So, having bought all kinds of can food, vegetables and näkkileipä (+water from the summer cottage's water well) and stupefied by the festivities of the midnight summer I then proceeded to the island for meditation. I got a lift there with a rowing boat :).

The days passed by.. sometimes slowly, sometimes not so slowly. The weather was merciful and the sun was shining nearly all the time, so I got lucky. I didn't keep track of time, I merely followed the movements of the Sun to define the approximate time of the day. Usually I climbed on top of this big rock boulder, did some stretching and sat down. The sun was gleaming through the branches of the trees, sometimes warming me, sometimes shadowing me.

The most bothering thing were the mosquitoes. For this, I had brought some Off-insecticide. It helped a lot and at some point I noticed the mosquitoes weren't that much interested in me anymore. Maybe I started to smell of forest, dunno. Only once did I wash myself in the shores of this island, on a sunny day when there were no boats passing by (there were lot of boats moving in that area all the time).

The meditation.. I noticed it was not easy to sit still for any more than 45 minutes. So I kept pauses - a lot. In total I think I meditated maybe 5 hours a day at least. The rest of the time it was eating, resting, walking amongst the woods and on one day basking in the sun.

OK so now the achievements part, the moment you've been waiting for. The peak moment of this endeavour occurred on Wednesday evening (third full day). I felt like nothing before.. This feeling had been building up during the whole day and now it reached its climax. I felt completely calm. I felt serenity and that I am completely aware of myself.. somekind of totally peaceful confidence in myself, my life. I felt like I am drawing energy off the trees, off the forest, the whole world. It was like I felt the whole mental energy sphere of all people in the world, to which I was connected. I just sat there with my eyes now open, smiling, breating deeply, calmly and without any anxiety in my stomach. Everything was light. It was kinda ecstatic.

This was what has been my ultimate experience regarding meditation. It took three days in forest alone (with the Sun as a big bonus). From the time required to reach this climax we can infer that the amount of time required for reaching a totally serene state by using this.. semi-constant meditation is not so short a time. Obviously this is not possible in a city-environment. I feel it is only in nature, where a human can ease her soul completely. Consequently, I'm not able to achieve this back at home. But nevertheless I always feel calmer, lighter and more relaxed than prior to any meditation session, regardless of the place or the time spent into it. I really recommend it for your mental health, for your self-development.

I did not speak anything the whole time (4 days) in the island so it was very weird feeling to hear my own voice for the first time.. I was like "whose is that voice that I hear" when I was saying some words to the person picking me up from the island.

As I returned to Kallio, HKI, I felt how the air quality was so completely different than what it had been for the previous week. I felt how a city is somehow not the place for humans to be, if relaxation is needed (cities are nice though). People running around like ants, busy and doing stuff. Yeah, it just felt somehow very apparent after spending such a long period of time in silence. But soon I got adjusted to the city-life. Humans are quite adaptive creatures...

Being alone vs. being not-alone AND long-term plans vs. living NOW

I was talking the other day with my flat mate about the basic human needs. We stumbled upon the subject of "being alone vs. sharing experiences with the special someone".

Why is it that sometimes I feel I want to share my life, my ups and downs, my journey in this wonderful thing called existence with someone? Why is it that on other times I feel like I am living my life to the fullest just NOW, without any need to share experiences in order to be truly happy?

Having returned from Beijing last spring I had already changed quite a bit when it comes to the approach towards life itself. I started eating healthily, started to develop myself both physically and mentally. Mentally in terms of conversations, meditation and by trying to be downright as open, as honest as I could ever be. I sincerely and without arrogance am very pleased with myself at the moment. I feel I treat people with respect and at the same time preserving myself, my integrity. I feel confident.

Yet there becomes times when I doubt.. I doubt whether I would ever find "a path" in my life. You see, I never seem to be able to "just keep on doing something for the rest of my life". I feel I would just stand still and repeat something endlessly. Without development. I never seem to "fit in" whatever it is that I'm engaged in, say in my self-defense exercise community. Don't get me wrong, I really enjoy every second of this hobby of mine. It's just that I don't go into this community. I don't live my life for it. I am no elämäntapaintiaani in any respect. I feel it would bound me. Instead, I am always interested in new stuff, constantly. The flipside of the coin is always feeling a bit of a loner. THERE IS SO MUCH IN LIFE I WANT TO DO!! What could I do to embrace the whole world, to FEEL and love all the people without locking myself to one chain and ball?

The same goes for sharing my life with that special someone. Sometimes it feels it would bind me, prevent me from doing something I would have wanted to do. Sometimes it feels that if I found a person who would share my views on lot of things, that our minds would think in unison, I would not need to even think of this ball and chain thingy.

On to other stuff.

I have no long-term plans. No pre-defined, pre-decided thing that is supposed to happen. I'd rather not have them. I feel they would bind me to living according to some set of rules. Take mortgage for instance. And sell your soul to the banks. Own lot of stuff and sell your soul to your boss. Having said the previous sentence my mind flies into thinking this:

Why is it that people always say: "It is pain now yeah, but AFTER I have done this, I...". In my opinion there is something fundamentally wrong in that sentence. I'd much rather it be said like "It is pain now so I will get rid of it and enjoy life NOW". In practice, it is not so simple. It definitely isn't easy to take the pain away, because the external world (and perhaps you yourself) has expectations towards you. They (or you) say: "finish this and you'll get more money" or "do this and you'll get that". As a vague solution I would say then: the approach to this dilemma should always be done with your NOW as the first thing in your mind. Even if you are unable to make the change, you know and acknowledge the existence of this thought. And conciously or subconsciously you will strive towards getting out of the pain-making situation. At some point you will notice things are better. "Hey, I feel good actually". What is wrong today is that people seem to believe that "after doing something it will get better". Reality check: it will never happen. Once you reach the goal, you will wonder: "so what is actually better now than before". Then, suddenly you notice you are wrinkled and in your late 50s, wondering where the life, you were meant to lead, disappeared.

An attempt to describe the meaning of music for me

To You, dear reader, I could never express in spoken language what music means to me.

To hear the sweet melodies that make you calm in the eye of the storm. To hear the coarse sounds that dissipate built-up negative thoughts. To enable one to concentrate and reach a meditative state with ambient sounds flowing from the loudspeakers. To align oneself for weekend with something groovy. To caress another person with warmth that is emphasized by soothing and beautiful chords of the songs I know will have deep impact on whoever. To see people dancing their hearts out with the sounds you recreate in the DJ-booth. To feel the energy of the beat, which spreads out into the minds of all the party people in da house. To touch a woman's palm gently with one finger with smooth strokes, to feel the other person, the feeling that is amplified by the music, connecting the two of you into the oneness of the universe. To embrace her with all your might, becoming one for even just for one second, until again becoming the oneselves who reflect the consciousness of mankind with the own prism that is within.

And it is so much more...

--

The sun will set on you
Caress the darkness
Let it be a womb to you
Loving and spacious

You're a star

Love is all we are
The rest amounts to nothing
Our flesh the temples of
The one thing that is everlasting

You're a star

Vibrasphere - Tierra Azul (Omnimotion feat Krister Linder Rmx)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wILYOuRCllI

The Meaning of Life, vol. II

To this post I have collected some various opinions about the meaning of life that I received due to my last post. They are from my friends and apparently are quite deep thinkers :).

THE VIEWS:

General purpose of living is to get pleasure while treating nature and other people (and species) as good as I would want them to treat me.
In other words, to live in harmony with environment and tend to get pleasure. This requires practical skills/ academic education/ experience & wisdom.
(1) Only getting pleasure won't make me happy. Because only getting pleasure I stop appreciating it.
(2) Only getting wisdom, knowledge, practical skills working hard day by day also isn't the right way to live, to happiness. Body wants to get awarded for its effort.

-----------

Human beings are not subject to any given end(purpose/mission), we serve our own purposes and are free to live any life we choose. An external purpose would debase us to mere instruments for whatever presses the purpose upon us.

Don't get me wrong. Precisely because we are free(self-serving) and accountable for our own deeds, we are capable of virtue and love, which I think are what being a human being is about.

Put it in a nutshell: you don't need any meaning if you serve your own purpose.

In fact, if you begin to wonder what's the point of all of this, it's a pretty good indication that you are serving an external purpose instead of an internal one, you are living somebody else's life instead of your own.

MORE ACCURATELY:

Virtue is the intrinsic good. "if you need a reason to be good, you haven't yet understood what is good (Immanuel Kant)".

I agree with the Ancient Greeks: we are gods trapped in mortality. In spite of being pressed by physical needs and suffering from various physical limitations, we share with gods the capacity of virtue. "What would Jesus do?" is a good motto, even for non-Christians.

In platonic sense (since I'm talking Greek), love is the recognition and appreciation of the "divinity"(virtues) manifested by a person. But love can mean more than that.

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For a long time the meaning of life is to meet with new and different people and to see different places and replace the good way of lives or positive aspects of their character to myself. I want to see different thinkings so that I can find the one which I'm the happiest with it.

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END OF VIEWS

So here we have them. What do YOU think?

Have a relaxing day!

-Junnu

Meaning of Life

Ultimately, what is the meaning of life?

A question that has been haunting me for the past month more or less so. I see people going on about their businesses, sometimes very happy looking, others not so happy-looking.. If you think about it.. When someone would say the meaning of life is to find a life-long partner, with whom you can share the life's chills and thrills, to laugh and cry and feel completely safe and to reproduce, another person could say it is to enjoy your own life to the max, which, in some cases, could mean being "wild and free" without a care in the world, just sing and dance, while walking in the street (e.g.) without being frowned upon, just feeling super and doing just the things you want and not be submissive the least bit.

The two alternative views above are seemingly confronting, but ideally I think they could go hand in hand. But only ideally.

The abovementioned alternatives are kinda two sides of individualism: in the first view it is to go along with the general views of the society about how to lead one’s life and to commit oneself to another person and wanting to carry on the bloodline to feel good about it. To be old and to know you raised the kids, whose kids are playing in your backyard. Grandpa. The other view is to dedicate more pleasure in life directly to oneself instead of sharing and spreading it around. Is it equally acceptable to do this, to enjoy life in, some might say, selfish way? Isn’t the meaning of life at least partially to have a good time? What else is important? What if all the people had good time all the time.. would they be walking down the streets with a super-wide smile in their face?

So again, what is the meaning of life? Why do we wake up everyday to do the things we do? What makes it worth it? Should we even not think about it - just live it through? Maybe the meaning of life is to be discovered individually as everyone is different from each other? Should we not waste any time pondering this crap? :) But I’m curious about all this.

Share your thoughts.

Back to the old drawing board

Every year it is as big a surprise as it was the last year. Wappu truly is the Christmas of teekkarit (technology students). For the last 7-10 days or so my life has been filled with happiness, laughter and joy. The people around me have managed to fill my heart with warmth and solid belief of the incredible power that lies within each of us - the power to create positive energies for us all to enjoy. That is why the last week's atmosphere has been unprecedented once again. Even the semi-lousy weather could not interfere with the passion of the teekkarit to gather as a group and show how innovative they can be when they are called upon. Of course, all the people - regardless of their student background - have been contributing to this amazing series of events.

I would like to extend my greatest gratitude towards all of my friends and their friends, who made this once again possible. Best regards to all the people who are following this blog as well!

The past week has included meeting a vast array of good people, all with their unique flavour of expressing themselves. They are all equally welcome and appreciated by me. Thank you friends.

Last week was quite a rush as well because of where I live and the fact I tried to eat quite a lot vegetarian stuff when barbecuing (the only form of preparing food last week). Apart from briefly ending up to my apartment on Friday-Saturday night, I did not see my place from Wednesday morning until today (Sunday). Thank you all you kind ppl for hosting me during the sleeping hours. JMT 5 rooftop barbecue was fabulous once again on Friday, which surely will be remembered. Last night's unspeakably weird private party was something to be surely remembered.. :D Yeah, well what happens in the student village stays in the student village :P.

What was also very unforgettable was the fact I got to talk Chinese quite a lot during the last week. Which was nice. Tai hao le! Lot of good Chinese and Chinese-speaking people apparently in the Otaniemi-area.

Now it is time to continue working on my master's thesis at work, focus on that. Little by little it advances inevitably evolving.. We'll see how it will end up, I'm kinda excited about it!

As a concluding remark I'd like to offer you readers some bits and pieces from the last week.

Keep in touch!

Lähettäjä Wappu '10

The Christmas of the Finnish technology students..

..is starting to show signs of life. The annual event of 1st of May is the grande finale for this. However, it is more a rule than an exception to start the festivities at least a week beforehand. The events are plentiful among our student guilds and the students themselves are active in party-having regard.

What can I say.. the Sun is (again) starting to warm us up and the snows have just melted, colours of the nature emerge and people start to smile. It's a good time to get the grill from the closet and invite your friends to have some good time in a weird place, e.g. a roof of a technology students' campus dorm. It is a perfect place to let the world know of your music (with the heavy-duty music machinery you brought along), your energy, inviting all the bypassers to join the fun. Or then we might have a mega-picnic in the backyard of our school's main building (the backyard is quite big and green :) ) - more than 1000 people having good time.

For me 1st of May festivities are still on hold partially. What I am glad about is the fact I probably will be able to do my master's thesis at work - little by little figuring out how it's going to be while at the same time dealing with the bureaucracies of this process. It is also relaxing to know the thesis subject is doable and will not be some boring thingy as it many times can be. I'm eager to kick it off (properly after festivities ;) ).

The last Thursday there was more than 2000 students in a student event, whose purpose is to collect stamps from various bars in certain locations (luckily the area was quite near to where I live) to earn their levels. There are four levels: appro, cum laude, laudatur and doctor. One has to do them in order and cannot be acquired before the lower level is obtained. So it takes at least four years to get the highest rank. I got it last year so this year I only hanged around, although the amount of alcohol consumed was not substantially different than in the last years. I got to work on Friday in a good shape though and was productive. I don't know why but it seems I am quite energetic on the day-after...

On Friday Silja was supposed to return from China. Unfortunately the fucking volcano erupted in Iceland thus trapping Silja to Moscow. She will miss today's student party, an annual student party for older technology students - drinking, singing, eating, bad humour and beautiful people. So that's what is going on today for me. Volcanos suck!

Tomorrow it is time to go for an annual trip to Estonia to fetch some cheap booze for the upcoming "trials". It will eat one day out of my work week but I was able to have it as unpaid leave. Which was nice.

I hope to hear from all of you still reading this blog :). That's not much I guess :P

Your Truly
Junnu (You Feng)