TreK NaKed

Sanity has kicked the bucket…along with a cellphone.

Productivity after my Yellowstone trip

after waking up at 8:30, I cleaned: my room, the yard, the car. filled my tires, checked oil, trimmed the bushes, cut up a box for pops, and figured out what to do with all the styrofoam in the house. i am currently restoring a safety razor, and will then teach myself how to use a safety razor. I think I deserve a cold root beer tonight.

i.e. i left my gillette mach 3 razor in yellowstone. i’ve been wanting to switch over to a traditional safety razor. i found my dad’s old one and i have spent part of the day cleaning it up.

My New Year’s Resolution

Resolution on new Years eve’: Cut out my anxiety, do what i need to do, and enjoy life again

\\ SCRATCH THAT ///

i have been brooding on that type of stuff for way too long. That anxiety problem spawns from and spurns other problems i.e procrastination, lack of focus, ill-confidence, ill-health etc. and I have noticed there is a real problem with my lack of natural skill to make firm decisions, enjoy myself, and attract women, along with other things.

I found the underlying problem, and I found the solution. The underlying problem is simply and (not so simply) that I havn’t grown up yet. The solution is to be a Real man.

New Years resolution for 2010:  To become a Real Man.

But, what is a “Real Man” and how is that different than just being a man?

There is a difference. A Real man is something special, and something rare. According to Jacob Duchaine, in Being a Man, only 5 out of 1000 guys are truly men. the rest of us turn into soft males — full grown boys. and do not unlock our full potential. Soft males tend to cater to what they “think” women want from them. They do not have a clear set of values and as such do not act and make decisions with complete confidence, fortitude, and integrity.

A real man is confident, makes real commitments in his decisions, gives selflessly, channels energy, faces his fears, and accepts full responsibility (Pavlina). They Sacrifice, display courage, and are considered heroes (Kim).

What makes boys into men, the “essence of masculinity” comes down to testosterone. A lot of men these days have too little due to lack of activity, and suppressing their masculinity thinking that is what woman want.  A lot of men boost up their testosterone, but much liek the douche bags i see at the bar, and around campus, they have no control.

Real men boost it up and have control.

According to a lot of what i have read so far. The lack of real manhood in our current society is attributed to a number of factors. These include

• lack of interaction between fathers and sons.  Before the industrial revolution, most of hte work the man did, he invovled his son and taught him everything he needed to know. After the industrial revolution, our dads go away for 8-10 hours a day, and we see them in the evening for dinner when they are too tired to really teach us.

• Absence of a right of passage = remember in the movie Avatar, when the dude goes through that final act to become a Navi’….yea we don’t have that

• Rise of feminism - feminism, and the improvement of womens rights is a great thing. but there are claims that it has caused confusion for men. confusion: 1) their place and role in society  2) what they should be like, (since feminists do have the tendency to bash male characteristics)

• our feel good culture - instant gratification, and definitely something my dad has pointed out to me

• erosion of integrity — TV culture

Well this whole explanation sort of drives away from my personal blog post. A few weeks ago, an acquaintance i made on fb proclaimed that “Real men are coming back in 2010!” and i was like “YEEA!” like i had a feeling or understanding of what he meant by that, even though i didn’t really know. But that really stuck with me. and i thought about it. I felt like i knew what he meant, because i knew for sure that a lot of fellow men i had met lately arent exactly what i would aspire to be. But especially this semester there are certain individuals i have met, that when i talk to them i can’t help but think “Damn, this guy is MAN. he’s got it together!”

I’ll admit though, I wouldn’t even call myself a regular man. I’m a 22 year old boy. and I’m going to skip the regular man, and just go straight to being a Real man.

Years ago, i originally thought that I would grow into a man through experience, going to college, participating in different things, maybe after some traveling. But that never happened. I didn’t do as much as I hoped i would. and what i have done wasn’t enough. or there were plenty of things to back track progress.

I have matured and grown the last 2 years. But in a number of ways, I could say i was more of a man my freshman year of college that I am now.

I am very self-critical. I lack a lot of things, especially of what is mentioned above. but I at least have integrity, and some responsibility. But I feel as though I am currently on the cusp of losing those as well.

It didn’t happen naturally, and I don’t want to wait much longer for it to do so. So now it is time to make this change in a methodical and involved manner.

so yes, my resolution is as simple as that: Become a real man. One resolution.
This one resolutions encompasses everything I would list out if i needed too.
Becoming a real man would allow me to take charge of my future, and take charge of my life. Take charge in forming myself into the person I want to be. It will make me independent, confident, active, and productive. Allow me to actually have an effect on the community, and be a part of something larger than myself again. Allow me to utilize my full potential.

It will enable me to save my family, a unit that is desperate for some saving. I’ve been the baby for 22 years. I can’t change that, but I think its definitely time to stop taking and start giving.

If i were to list all those out as resolutions, it would have been too much.

How I am going about doing this is a good question. It definitely will involve a lot of self-reflection. That is something I have done the last year but it is definitely different this time. Self-reflection the last year has been all about “why am who i am, and why do i do the things i do”. This time there is a goal to reach with this self-reflection, and i’ll be asking “what can i do to make that change.” I am probably not going to post everything I do for my resolution on my Blog. certain highlights will be posted i think. When i hit significant landmarks. Some posts will be public, some posts will be private

I shouldn’t be ashamed to say this..so i won’t be. But significant tools in this process are online blogs on growth and masculinity, and becoming a real man. Specifically a blog titled The Art of Manliness. It is kind of funny to say, because our society gets everything on-line, so as such its not traditional. But its really good stuff. and through these blogs the tools for this process will include books, and …tools <—- of course, we’re trying to be MAN here!

Conversational Adventures With My Dad

Blogging always becomes interesting and desirable again when you change settings. Fall semester ended and I came back home. I actually stayed for two days until my room mates and I got “evicted.” it sucked, but i already find it quite funny.

I was too tired yesterday to go home so i packed my car and drove to Walt’s house. stayed the night. and drove home in the afternoon. my dad needed to get picked up at the train station at 5:30. My sister couldn’t do it today so she called me and asked me to. so i just drove straight to the train station from Northfield.  and i got there at 5:25! it was perfect timing

I wanted to blog about the conversations i’ve had with my dad today because, well i’ve never said this on my blog before, but my dad is a pretty damn funny guy. I think i know where I get my silliness from. The dialogue in this story is from memory, but ALMOST word for word

So I pick my dad up at metro park station. I wait for him inside the station, and the happy and surprised look on his face when he sees me picking him up is one I hope I never forget. We walk back towards the car, rudely being driven past by, given no preference as pedestrians from our fellow indian Edison-ites.

we start up the car, pull out of our spot, and immediately get stuck in traffic…in the parking lot! Metro Park is jam-packed!

I ask him how work is going, and he tells me how much he LOVES it. He’s been retired for seven years, but last summer he decided to get back into the work force. He’s 4 weeks into his job, and he just absolutely loves going to work again.

As we are slowly pushing along, this blue sedan pulls out of its spot, and looks to get in front of us. my dad says, “don’t let this bastard forward!”  

so I accelerate to cut off the sedan from getting in. When we do that. we get a good look of the person inside. It happened to be a very pretty young caucasian woman.

my dad immediately says, “Okay okay, I changed my mind. Let her go. signal her to go forward.”

I laugh out loud as I signal her to go ahead of us, and she immediately beams in gratitude

“Aww, see that, you get a nice smile. now she is happy.” he points out.

The girl moves to take our spot and I, the easily stoked college kid, yells “yeeaah! gimme your number!!” I look to my dad and say, “wow dad, your pretty smooth”

“What? Nah, you know I originally thought it was another indian guy in the car. Thats why I didn’t want you to let them through. they are really getting on my nerves now. So rude.” He continues to talk about their driving, and all the noise they make on the train.

“Ok now don’t let anyone else through.” my dad tells me

“oh no, it looks like someone wants to cut in front of our woman,” I tell him.

and what do you know… blue sedan woman lets the other car through

“DAD! this is what I call bad karma. You do something good for somebody, and then they go ahead and do something good for someone else…and now we have to wait even longer!!”

“Yea I agree, she feels obligated to let someone through, because we did that for her”

“oh well, at least we get a nice look at her behind….”

“haha. it is a nice rear. what kind of car is that?,” he asks.

“A Volkswagen Jetta”  I replied.

—————————————————————————————————————

One hour later, dinner time!

My mom left for maryland for the week and cooked up a whole bunch of food for us to eat while she was away. she made my dad’s favorite dish which is called Paya. It’s a spicy pakistani soup-like dish made out of goat feet. it has a lot of bones, marrow and fat.  its not the healthiest thing in the world…but thats pakistani soul food right there.

my dad instructs me on how to enjoy it. “If you get a bone in your mouth, don’t spit it our right away. They are soft. So you can start chewing on it, and thats how you get all the marrow.”

He sticks a bone in his mouth,  “mmMM! see that! So good. I tell you, once you chew on this bone, you will know why dogs get so happy when you throw them bone.”

Two minutes later, I finally get around to putting a bone in my mouth. And I start chewing…

I freeze,eyes wide open…

“Oh yea!…Thats GOOD!”

“I told you!! didn’t I?!”

lol i said faceboob on my last post…and im really not going to make any effort to fix that

The Development of a song

So, I am currently writing my second original song on guitar.  not really trying to spend too much time on it. no need to, if ideas come to me while im on a shuttle or laying down then i’ll jsut spend 15 minutes here and there writing it out

I’ve had htis guitar riff that i started playing last year. its pretty simple actually, i just came up with it so i can practice harmonic pulls.  i would play it a lot because its fun, and to me at least it sounded pretty cool. eventually it started sounding better, and i often wondered what i could do with it. didn’t expect much though.

on sunday i was listening to Ben Harper “Burn one Down” and he has this one line that says “If you don’t like my fire, then dont come around, because im gonna burn one down” and im thinking hmm he has a qyote that he likes to say. and he put it in a song. do i have a quote i like to use?  and i remembred two weeks ago when i defriended somebody on faceboob because of their annoying pictures and i said “I just felt like burning a bridge and watching the show”  so sunday night i tried to write a song form it, thinking about that particular person. here is that rough version

Song title: Bridges

i am gonna get you to run
i am gonna get you away from me
i am gonna get you to take in
that your gonna get no more from me

I just wanted you to know
that I felt like burning a bridge
and watching the show
and theres no more free wheat for you to reap
without the sow

its ok…its  a start! then this morning i woke up at 6:30 and jsut laid in bed thinking, and  a bunch of other ideas came. when i got up at 8, i jsut wrote it out in 15 minutes

here it is. it really came together

Bridges

[beatbox] {dukka dukka tse(5x) dukka dukka tse(5x) dukka dukka tse(5x), dukka (full circle)} 2x
i am gonna get you to run
i am gonna get you away from me
i am gonna get you to know
that your gonna get no more from me (or thers no more free wheat to reap)

My weather’s getting cold
your leaves are crumbling down
I just wanted you to know
(no music)
that I felt like burning a bridge
and watching the show -harmonic-

{bridge}

you’ll be allright without me
and i’ll do quite swell without you
2 lines here

The love is dying
we need to re-ignition
we could bring us back but
[no music] i’ll be burning our bridge
and watching the show -harmonic-

i need two more lines, figure out a bridge (until i do, i’ll jsut beatbox again for a bridge) and fix up the last verse/chorus…and i gotta learn how to beatbox properly

the music riff is inspired by guy butter, michael hedges, and incubus.   and the lyrics and beat is inspired by Ben Harper and John Butler

thats enough of this song today. i feel quite focused today and im going to practice gres right now (im in the lib, i jsut wanted to write this up real quick get it out of my head) then research, then write an essay or so, then class, yoga, food.  then i’ll try it out at night for 15 minutes. and hten hoepfully get back to work.

Gettin’ Big, more importantly..gettin’ fit!!

So last week, i finally started an exercise regiment. i’ll be going to teh gym at least 3 times a week for 45 minutes with my roommates, usually in the morning.

i purchased whey protein, and increased my food consumption (and leaning more towards my homecooked stuff/ what i put together in the apt )

I saw a BMI chart in one of my textbooks today. According to my height and weight my BMI is 19…it should be 22-24 for men.  -__-    22 is around 135 lbs.    i am currently just under 120.  i was 130 over a year ago, so i was probably around a BMI of 21..Justin told me the rule of thumb is that I should consume a gram of protein for every pound that i weight, every day. So that be 120 grams of protein a day.  But if I want to boost up my BMI, justin said i should probably consume as much as he does,  160 grams…  oof.      today i hit around 80 grams..i think

I also started Yoga this week. Laura/lauren (?)  teaches Yoga at the lakeside center every tuesday and thursday from 7-8.  Stress & Anxiety tends to end before 7, so I plan to just run straight to yoga.     Laura/lauren is a good teacher, and shes really beautiful…. I think i fell in love during class today…she said hi to me after wards too :)