Month: February 2021

Burning Out

I’ve decided to approach this week’s blog a little bit differently than usual, and I hope that’s okay. I couldn’t think of anything else to write.

As you can predict from the featured image, I want to address academic burnout. It is week 8 of the winter quarter, and my motivation is at its worst. Every day, I watch sadly as my roommates and friends struggle to complete their mountains of assignments that keep piling up. Dirty dishes remain in the sink and laundry remains unwashed. I want to tell them that it’s okay and that if they try hard enough they can get their work done and get a high GPA for the quarter; there is no need to drown their sorrows in cheap liquor. But how can I convince them when I can barely convince myself?

I am a writer for SCU’s Her Campus magazine, and I wrote about stoicism in my most recent article. I wrote about how bullet journaling can help you forget negative emotions and encourage you to look toward the future. Honestly, I’ve been really struggling to maintain the stoic attitude that I encouraged in that article. Every day, it seems harder to get out of bed and do the work that I once looked forward to. I know that fatigue can have a largely negative effect on emotions, and I understand that I am not a failure.

“We all have these experiences, we stew over things, lose our temper, lose sleep over things… All this fretting is not going to solve anything,” said Shankar Vedantam in his podcast, Minimizing Pain, Maximizing Joy. As much as I wish I could maximize my joy right now, it is difficult to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Following my class registration, I at least have classes to look forward to now. I love art, so I’m excited about the basic painting class that I’m going to take with my roommate.

I know that life can be bland and hard at times; it has felt like that all the time lately. But I also know that there is so much to look forward to. As long as I let myself lose sleep over a few simple words, I will always be affected by negativity. The sooner I let things go and move on, the sooner I’ll be happy. I’m willing to do that.

CTW Blogs <3

Owl Problems

While analyzing sources for my upcoming research paper, I stumbled upon the scholarly article “Samaritanism and Civil Disobedience” by Candice Delmas. In this article, Delmas argues that civil disobedience when it comes to rescuing others is reasonably expected; she says, “We each have a responsibility to help rescue others when this assistance is not unreasonably costly,” (1). This means that Delmas believes in reasonable lawbreaking for the greater good of others, which I completely agree with.

I think that as long as one isn’t actually sacrificing their own life (I understand that many laws are made to prevent this), humans actually have a moral obligation to save others, even if it is not legal. For example, even though it’s illegal to speed, plenty of people will go 80 in a 40 if someone is dying in the passenger seat. And while that is somewhat morbid, it is the truth; there are not many limits to this if the welfare of others is a mentality you have been raised with. I grew up with this mentality, and I would nearly give my life for someone else if I did not know the consequences of my death.

This also made me think about the owl. About a year ago, I was driving home from my friend’s house when I noticed an owl standing in the middle of the road. I am a very attentive driver and understand why someone would miss it late at night, so, I slowed down, turned my flashers on, and tried my best to keep other drivers from hitting it.

I pondered for a few moments what my options were; my parents are veterinarians, so I have grown up with a slightly higher than average compassion for animals that others may not understand. Instead of giving up and leaving, I knew that I had to at least make an effort to save this owl. Would I wrap it in a blanket, try to bring it to the sidewalk, and let it fly away? Would I stop my car in the middle of the street to keep other cars from hitting it? After the fact, my parents reassured me that the owl could have injured me, or a car could have done worse. I still blamed myself for not acting sooner, and I blamed the other drivers for not seeing it in the road when the streetlights were dim and the distraction of life kept their minds occupied.

This was a moral conflict that affected me for a long time. I tend to blame myself for things that I am not even a little bit at fault for, and it often negatively affects my mental health. By now I realize that this is where the limits of good samaritanism come into play; any action I could’ve taken to prevent that owl’s death would have posed a danger to my own life, and that is something I had to accept as not being worth it. The owl now rests in that spot forever, and I don’t think I will ever forget it.

Discussions with my boyfriend and parents after the incident calmed my grief because they convinced me that it was not worth risking anything more to save an owl. It frustrates me that certain lives are valued as more worthy than others, even when mine is the higher valued one; but I know that the hierarchy of life has been established for a reason. For now, I will keep telling the owl how sorry I am when I drive past the location of its death, and I continue to hope that one day I can save more animals to make up for what has been lost.

People often act in selfless ways, risking their own lives for others. I hope that I can be that person one day.

CTW Blogs <3

Privilege Check

Not Sidney Poitier and the story of his escape to Atlanta has really allowed me to reflect on my white privilege. I am Not Sidney Poitier by Percival Everett avoids the white savior stereotype by giving Not Sidney the autonomy to make his own life and financial decisions even after his adoption by a white man, but Everett makes sure that his readers are far from comfortable by incorporating humor into subtle racist scenarios that occur once Not Sidney leaves home. One quote that really stood out to me from chapter 2 of I Am Not Sidney Poitier -after his escape from the jail bus- was:

“I carried the boy’s twenty-two rifle, mainly so no one else would,
but a bit of thinking made me realize how quickly the presence of
that weapon in my hands could get me killed, so I tossed it into the
brush just after we crossed the creek,” (Everett, pp. unknown).

Not only does this quote give evidence of Not Sidney’s fear of his own acquaintances (“mainly so no one else would”) and the horrifying yet true fact that black people carrying weapons are much more likely to be killed than white people doing the same thing. It’s no secret that racism is far from over in America and that it continues to contribute to the wrongful deaths of far too many people of color.

Twelve years later, since this book’s publication in 2009, almost nothing has changed. People continue to be killed for the color of their skin and their killers continue to feel no regret for their actions. Everett makes sure that the racism Not Sidney faces makes his readers uncomfortable, and we should be; white silence is violence, and we must continue to speak out against injustice.

CTW Blogs <3

A Drive For Love

Ryan Gosling. A blonde woman. An elevator. A man with a gun. What do these things have in common? They are all components of the violent yet lovely scene of the movie, Drive, that we watched for the class activity. I haven’t seen this film before, but the scene really stood out to me and reminded me what love feels like; the surreality of being alone with the love of your life and feeling as though nothing else exists. The head bashing, on the other hand, was a separate experience.

As Ryan Gosling sees the antagonist’s gun from a flash under his jacket, the camera slowly zooms in on his arm pushing his loved one to the wall. They engage in a passionate embrace, Ryan’s body language showing his hesitance to pull away. Despite his love for her, he knows that he must kill this man to protect her. He knows that the violent murder he will soon commit will prevent her from seeing him in the same way ever again, but his love for her is too strong not to protect her. The sublime can only be experienced alone, and being with someone you love so dearly still counts as being alone. The golden hue that surrounds Ryan and his blonde counterpart as the music slows exemplifies the final sublime feeling that radiates between two lovers, before he must say goodbye to her forever.

I was lucky enough to have fallen in love in high school; and while high school love is often seen as taboo or fake, I truly believe that I got to experience, true, deep, love, and I will forever be grateful for that. We took a break from our relationship since I moved to college, and I would do anything to be in his arms once again; to feel the love that radiated between us with a simple touch or hug or smile. Being alone with him gave me the same feeling that was exhibited in that scene; the feeling that there are no worries in the world, no tasks or requirements, no outside pressures or stresses.

Love isn’t perfect, and even I know that as a young, naive college student. Just like Ryan’s character knows in Drive, love can’t always last the way you want it to; and protecting those you love is often more important than them loving you back. This causes a world of hurt, of course, but knowing that those you value are safe often makes up for the pain. I know that he can be happy without me, and I wouldn’t want us to struggle through an unreliable relationship while knowing how much happier we would be if we had ended it. My heart will always miss him, but my head knows that I will find him again if it is meant to be.

And because the scene has no words spoken in it, I leave you with this quote, which I feel exemplifies what love really is:

“Such a wonderful thought to have, that we both managed to exist at exactly the same time. I will look for you in another life.”

Sincerely, Alex