Hammering thoughts works if they are sharp and pointed, but not if they are illuminating.

Unity. University. That was easy.

So, a common theme that I seemed to pick up on while reading the previous blogs was rationalization. People were trying to rationalize their reasons for going to college. And quite frankly, some of the motives were depressing. How do I know? Because I'm here for the same damn reasons. Money, Job Security, "Intellectual Growth," Learning; it all seems so right. And its especially funny for me because this is the first time I've been able to see these ideals driving other people (I can just see Buddha sitting at his computer, thinking, "you poor lost little souls"). I probably sound pretty pompous...I'll explain.

Silly Children.

Since about, oh lets say fifth grade, I knew where I was going. The plan was simple: get straight A's, and womp the competition. This ideal changed somewhat during high school when I lost all competitive desire, and needed only personal success. In fact, I wished everyone around me success; if everyone in the school got straight A's, I would have been thrilled (there were 7 valedictorians in my class, and I was happy to share the rank.) The point is, I still thought that everything would be gravy if I stayed on track academically. I never stepped back to ask myself why.

Then, one miraculous day, I asked that question I seemed to be so afraid of: "Why?" In fact, it was about the time that I was going to choose which college I was going to attend. For the first time, I was doing some serious thinking about what I wanted to get out of my education. Surprisingly, it had nothing to do with what society had impressed upon me since I was a wee child. It doesn't even have that much to do with what I'm doing right now. Which is depressing. I had fallen into a trap that Newman describes perfectly: "Men whose minds are possessed with some one object, take exaggerated views of its importance, are feverish in the pursuit of it, and make it the measure of things that are utterly foreign to it (311)." I realized that I have been motivated by money and success for the bulk of my education. My motivations for doing well in school were always to "get into a good school." Why did I want to get into a good school? To get a good job. Why did I want a good job? Ask Pink Floyd. The soft focus is way too dramatic.

So why didn't my heart skip a beat when I got accepted into Cornell? Why didn't USC sound exciting? What was wrong with me? For fortnights I was in a funk, and my thoughts were all glazed over by a feeling of pointlessness. THIS was what I had worked for all of these years. THIS was it. What is wrong with me? Here I stand, in the University of Texas at Austin, where they "as an institution focus on the greatest of all resources--the human intellect" (307). Isn't that what I want? Here I stand, with one foot in Plan II and the other in Architecture and my youthful beauty radiating out of every orifice (thanks partly to JCL). Why am I not excited?

These seem like rhetorical questions. They aren't.

So after thinking about it, I've realized that I lack unity, no matter how cheesy it sounds. I lack unity between my desires and my actions. I lack unity between wants and my needs. I lack unity between my measure of success and society's measure of success. I lack unity between my dreams and my abilities. Newman tells me that "Knowledge, which is desirable, though nothing come of it, as being itself a treasure, and sufficient remuneration of years of labour" (310). Newman tells me that "knowledge is not merely a means to something beyond it, or the preliminary of certain arts into which it naturally resolves, but an end sufficient to rest in and to pursue for its own sake" (306). Mmmm, I feel all warm and fuzzy inside. Until I realize that these ideals are far from being realized in our society (no unity, get it?). I'm not saying that it's hard to get a job with a liberal arts degree; in fact, I think that the degree can be very competitive for grad school or even a job. Still, we are not learning for the purpose of learning...it's not its own end. The job is. So what am I supposed to do?
Apparently this is a "sleekstalk" from the "Land of the Lost." Relevant?

I don't really want to become an "intellectual", nor do I like arranging little black squares in order to convey primary and secondary spaces. I just enjoy creating, whether its words, poems, music, drawings, or buildings (someday). When I feel like I'm learning stuff that will help me with this, I am excited to learn. I just want to create. Is this my motivation for education?

Ever since that day when I asked myself "why?", life has been fuzzy. Almost nothing can phase me, and very little can excite me. I realized that I have no idea why I've been doing anything. It is with this broken motivation that I enter UT Austin, and is the tone of the first chapter of college. Don't get me wrong, I'm a very happy person and I've been having a blast on my own. There are motivated, friendly, funny, and smart people surrounding me, and I can think of no other place I'd rather be. I just lack a unified vision for my being here. Maybe that is the purpose of a university: to unify me. To unify us.