JJ's World Views

Tag: Journal

  • Changes

    Changes

    It has been a while since I have posted anything here.  Many things have changed in my life in that period.  I graduated from Normandale Community College and now have my first degree.  My brakes went out on my car and I had to struggle to get the money together to fix it.  I am thankful for my brother in law and his friend for helping me with the repairs.  I have started a new job this week as a educational paraprofessional substitute.   I am working to pay off a student loan before I can go for my B.A. in Teaching Social Studies.  So, I am currently not in school for the time being.  I hope to have that all paid off before June, that way I can get back to work on my degree.

    The next few months are going to be tight but I believe I will be able to make it through.  If I do not make my deadline of June I will head back to school by next spring.  It is good to have goals but they should not I believe, so rigid to the point that if you do not make it with in a time frame it kills your motivation.  This is what does happen to me a lot.  I sometimes push myself, to the point where I start to question my own worth and get down on myself.  Then I let everything go and just give up.  I have to make sure I have a secondary plan of action, because shit happens.

    Things happen in our lives that change us for better or worse.  The thing is when we are in a down spin we have to gain our composer and level ourselves off and change direction accordingly.  There is not just one way to get where you want to go in life there are many.  Some are short and sweet, and others may take a bit longer but you will still get there in the end.

  • Why Should We “Shit Hole Countries”

    Why Should We “Shit Hole Countries”

    Over the past few weeks I have been hearing and seeing people talk about want Mr. Trump calls “Shit Holes”.  Did he even think about why these countries are the way they are or does he just assume like many others that it is just the people.  Most of these countries were colonised by white european countries like Britain, France, Denmark and Spain, also the United States of America.  Over the past 200 years or more the pure capitalization of the world have raped and pillaged these countries for their resources.  Giving little regard for the people of these countries.   We have built a world on the back of the less fortunate and people like Mr. Trump are personally responsible for these crimes against humanity.

    They care little about anyone but themselves and how they can exploit people for their own personal gain.  They destroy the potential of people who could help develop the next big enhancements to the human condition, all for the a piece of green paper that if we were not around would not contribute anything to this world.

    So, why should we help out the people of these “Shit Hole Countries” and Mr. Trump puts it.  We should help them out of the kindness of our hearts.  But, the real people who need to help them are the extremely wealthy and those whose money has been handed down from generation to generation.   If it were not for them exploiting these people they may have developed much differently.  Hell, their quality of life could be much better and we may have actual peace in regions that are now in a state of perpetual conflict.

    It is time for us to grow as not just a countries or continents, it is time for us to grow as a species.  We must learn to not take advantage of each other and build a better world together.  It can be done, maybe not in my lifetime, but it can start with in it.  I am not naive to think it will happen overnight or it will be easy.  It will be a long and hard change and there will be many who will die before we evolve to that level as a society.   But as long as we push for the change and leave the world better than when we found it.  We have a chance.

  • Crying Spells

    It sucks living with depression.  Not only do I sometimes have issues just finding reasons to get up in the morning.  I also have times where I can not stop crying.  This one I am in now has been going on since I gave my speech on Thursday.  I can stop for a while but then it starts back up again.  It doesn’t matter if I am sad, happy, hopeful or cynical I cry for it all it seems.

    This past year has been herd for me.  I have been losing focus and not keeping up with my homework.  I think knowing this is my last semester at Normandale Community College has this affected me.  I have been comfortable there for the most part, though I have pushed myself out of my comfort zone more since I have been there.  I love the teachers and faculty there.  They have been really supportive and caring.   Hell, I am 41 I knew this was coming.  I just didn’t think it would come this soon.  These past 2 1/2 years have gone by so quickly.

    I guess I might fear change a bit but, I know that is how life is and how we grow as people.  I guess I have just gotten so comfortable that it is really hard to do.  Especially, since I have not had a place where I felt I belonged so long before I came to school.

    For the twelve years prior to me heading to school I bounced around a lot about 30 time in that time period.  I have had many jobs, 2 hernia surgeries, married, divorced, and lost my grandfather.  Though we had only met when I was 20 because, of my mom not thinking it was important for me to know them until that time.  She never even told me about them till I was 20 and I had not asked about them just my Biological father.  I remember one time when I was like 15 years old, when I got into it with my dad (the man who raised me) we almost came to blows.  My mom showed me a letter that bio-father had written me.  He told me he loved me and all that jazz in the letter.  To tell you the truth I don’t remember much of what it said because I was stuck in my own little world, after the fight.  I don’t know why my mom didn’t tell me about my grandparents then.  This to me seems like it would have been the best time to do so.  But, she waited.

    It was always nice talking to my grandfather.  We could talk about anything it felt like.  We talked about our lives, politics, religion, ect… I always felt comfortable talking about these topics with him.  Not like now where I sometimes feel my head and ears burning when I talk about them with other members of my family or friends for that matter.  I never felt judged by him or my grandmother.

    It is time now again to start feeling uncomfortable and push myself to do better.  Not just for me but for the world as a whole.  This is my philosophy of life “I want to make myself better in order to better help the world.”  I know this sounds Idealistic but that how I see things.  Do I think I am better than anyone else? Hell, No!  Do I think we are all the same? Once again, Hell, No. We are only the same as it pertains to us being human.  We are all a part of the same family in a sense .  We all have different talents and skills, this is why we are not all the same and why none of us is better than another, at least in my perspective.  There’s only one exception to me thinking I am not better than a person and that is if they see violence as the only solution.  Even then I think some those people can change their thinking.

    We all have the potential to be both good or bad or fall somewhere on the spectrum.  We can all learn from one another if we are willing to put ourselves out there.  We can find inspiration anywhere and everywhere in life.  It is sometimes comes from the most unexpected places.  Look at me I am an Atheist but, I was inspired to go back to school by a young Muslim woman named Malala.  Her courage to stand up to the Taliban gave me hope for the future.  The fact that she is still pushing for Girls to have the right to an education even after she was shot, amazes me.  I just hope and wish I have the same amount of courage she has.

  • People Who Hate

    Last week I was out in the smoking area at school, we were having a lively discussion about whether it is appropriate to hit someone if they do a NAZI salute or use racial slurs.   There were a couple of people who said “If they saw someone doing the NAZI salute and saying ‘sieg heil’ or ‘blood and soil’ they would clock them.”   I was trying to explain to them, that if you do through the first punch, you make yourself and others who also find bigotry offensive look almost as bad as the people you are standing up against.  You fan the flames of hatred and it becomes a powerful force against a positive movement.

    I know that some might think this attitude is naive or even cowardly.  To me it takes a lot of strength to hold back that anger, when I hear stuff like that, not to just clock the person.  I severely dislike bigotry  and hatred, but I know the moment I give in to my feeling of disgust, I give them power over me.  They want people who think like me to resort to violence to prove their point.  It is like in “Batman The Dark Knight Returns” when the Joker is trying to get Batman to commit murder to bring him down to the Joker’s level.  In this analogy of course the Joker is ultra violent and murderous, where as in the scenario I stated in the first paragraph using speech as a way to bring us down to their level.  Unless the other person who is saying the vial and nasty things actually physically assaults me, I will not lift a finger to harm them physically.

    See in the battle of ideas, this is a battle of words and of the mind.  Those with the best ideas will rise to the top as long as they do not resort to violence.  I will argue all day with a racist and try to show them the error of their thinking.  Let’s be honest if i had to argue all day about the subject with that person, there is likely nothing I or anyone would say that could change their mind.  Just like I could not convince this other person that kicking the crap out of a bigot is not the best way to trying to change their mind.  I had help trying to convince the person too about 6 others tried to convince him as well.   Some people just can not be reasoned with.

    This is the same issue on a much larger scale that we have had with extremist in the Middle East.  The U.S. has been trying to force our beliefs through violence and regime change.  If we want to bring the region into the 21st century we are going to have to change our approach to the situation.  First off STOP SELLING WEAPONS PERIOD, TO OTHER COUNTRIES!  Second pull all our troops out of the region making sure we collect all the weapons we have brought over there.  Third close down Guantanamo bay and make that if we try anyone there that it is done fairly and due diligence.  For those we release we should try and help make sure that those people are taken care of, if they are innocent, they have been held there for a long time without trial and they deserve some sort of compensation.  Four gradually as the tensions start to die down try and get food and medical supplies to the civilians.  Though it will take a long time to earn the trust of the people in the region.  This would be just the beginning of the healing process.

    In order for us to have a lasting peace on this planet we must rise against the violence.  We can not defeat an idea with violence it only strengthens their position eyes of those who would follow them.  As I said before and I will say it again the only way to defeat an idea is with a better one.  If you have to resort to violence to support your idea it probably is not worth a damn.

  • Am I A Racist?

    This is one of the hardest posts I have written.  I worry about the backlash being the subject is so divisive, no matter what community you are apart of.  I mean no disrespect I am just trying to understand.

    Am I racist?  This is a question I have been asking myself a lot lately.  I recently left a position where I was working because the atmosphere was toxic to me.  You see I despise the word “Nigger” or “Nigga” these are the same word just different accents, not language.  There are certain parts of the country that have a hard time saying er and instead use an A, the opposite is also true. I apologize for writing the word from this point on I will use “N” as a replacement for it as to not make myself vomit from writing it too much. I was at times stuck in a room with a bunch of people who constantly were using this word.  These were people of African American descent.  Does that change the meaning of the word?  In the 2 months I worked there I heard it used in both a friendly way about people they liked, and a derogatory way about people they disliked.

    When I was young someone told me that N meant an ignorant person, though it had negative racial overtones.  This is why we do not use the word.  In the past 5 years I have been looking into the issue of race.  With all the unarmed shootings of Black citizens by police I wanted to get the real history of the issue.  I have seen countless documentaries on the subject, did my research project on the Islamic Empire and read through some slave narratives.  I do want to try and understand these issues more so I can be more helpful to the fight for equal rights.  The thing is I do not think I will ever understand the double standard of it is ok for an African American to say it and not a Anglo-saxon white person.

    I am an egalitarian this means: I feel everyone should have the same rights as everyone else.  I would would not want a black person saying it anymore than a white person.  So, when I was working there it was a shock to my system every time I heard N, and I heard it a lot.  I am also a person who is for the first Amendment of the constitution.  Yet, in this story I start to try to control people from using this word.  I started off nicely, but as it was continually I was getting more belligerent about it.  To the point where I would start blacking out for a couple of seconds.  This has happened to me before but only when I was extremely drunk or was physically assaulted.  This is where I knew I had to leave that situation.  One I hate being a hypocrite and two I did not want to end up in a fight.  I worried if I heard it enough that I may accidentally use N out of sheer frustration.

    During the 2016 election was when I was reading the Slave Narratives of Frederick Douglass and Linda Brent.  It was after the election of Trump that I realized how powerful that word really is.  I was doing homework the day after the March against Trump was happening here in Minneapolis, Minnesota, of which I was a part of, and I hear a pounding at my door.  It was a neighborhood kid I see when I am walking my dog.  The kid is mildly autistic and is normally a real good kid.  I went outside to see what was going on.  I had found out he had done something most white people here in America know not to call a African American.  He called one of them a N.  This caused him to be chased and almost got his ass kicked.  I talked to them all and tried to smooth things over with the group of kids and apologized for what he had said.  Then I shock one of their hands. Then went to his mother and told her the situation, using N as a quote.  I felt so dirty after I said it.

    Visions of people getting whipped, tortured and raped flew into my head.  I did not realize the affect N had on me still.  I figured it was most likely caused by all the tension in America.  I did not really give it too much thought.  Then I took the position I had recently just quit.  I loved the job working on diversity calendar, being able to explore ideas that I have.  I just could not deal with being in a room with 10 to 15 people saying N so much, about once every 5 minutes or so.  it got to a point where my heart started racing, ears began to burn, it felt as if all my communication skills were drowned out by that one word.  In the beginning I let it go, but the more it was said the more angry I got.  I am having all these physical reactions to hearing N with the images of people being raped, tortured, and lynched.  I was in a U.S. History, if you know anything about U.S. History, you know it cannot be discussed without the racial element to it.  It was not just in the south either as many of us tend to think it happened in the north to.

    Images like these:

    Postcard_of_the_lynched_Jesse_Washington_front_and_back
    Beaten black man
    2 lynched black men

    Then I would not say the word again, I never had a desire to really say it.  But if you would not want a white person to say then why would a black person saying it.  This is the point I was trying to get across.  It seems like the Daily Show has the same Double standard now.  At least when it comes to President Obama for taking a $400,000 job from an industry he helped to prop up.  If you wouldn’t want a white president to do it then why would you want an African American president to do it.  Did he not run on Change.  Yes, I find both Clinton and Trump repulsive.  I had high hopes for Obama it turns out he is no better than the rest.  That is where I think people have differing opinions.  We expected him to be above the corruption.  Why should we give him a pass when we don’t give the others a pass?

    I try to use the same criteria across the board this way I do not give a bias unless the it is based on facts, Like climate change.  I do not like being a hypocrite and if I realize it that I am becoming one I try to change it.  This is what it mean to be intellectually honest with oneself.  Realizing that we are all human and that if we are all works in progress.

    If we are not working to be better humans then what are we doing with our lives.

  • Analysis of “Indians of the Rio Grande”and “Jacques Cartier: First Contact with the Indians”

    Through reading these narratives we see through the Eyes of the Spanish, French and the Iroquois.  In the case of Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca, “Indians of the Rio Grande” he talks about How they are as he puts it “They are very merry people”.  Even when they have nothing they still celebrate and dance.  In his journal he talks about the eight months he spent with the Avavares Indians and how they became as medicine men to the tribe.  These people also seem to almost worship Cabeza de Vaca and his men.  With most of the tribes Cabeza de Vaca I feel he saw them as naïve and poor, but grateful and giving.  The same could almost be said with the experiences of Jacques Cartier: First Contact with the Indians.   Though when Cartier first sees the natives he is fearful of their numbers and decides to leave.  After a confrontation the two sides meet on an Island and Iron out their differences through signs and trade.  The native here were basically willing to give Cartier and his men the clothes on their backs for trade.  This was common amongst all the tribes he met.  Another thing he noticed was they were all fisherman.  They lived on the lakes and stream in boats they also loved their ceremonies’ and dancing it seem whenever they met a new tribe.

    In comparison they Native the tribe saw the Europeans as crooked and out of balance in the mind.  As it is said in the Dekanawida Myth &the Achievement of Iroquois Unity “North of the beautiful lake [Ontario] in the land of the Crooked Tongues”, by Crooked Tongues I take that to mean the Europeans, otherwise they would have used the other tribes name.  It is because the Europeans see the Iroquois and other tribes as naïve and gullible that they take advantage of their kindness.  Then when resources start to become scarce and a lust for war starts to break out amongst the tribes that Dekanawida calls the leaders of the Mohawk, Onondaga, Seneca, Oneida, and Cayuga.  This was to stop the tribal wars and confront the Europeans whom they call “Adodarhuh”.  They see them as if they were a broken people and in the Myth they were able to sing and cure the Adodarhuh of their evil ways.  So the European invasion lead to the formation of

  • Journal Entry 8

    This came from my old wordpress if it seems out of place.

    Ok so this is not a requirement for the course I am taking at school, but it is in the book “On Course” for which I am using in my paths to college success class.  I should have started it sooner, but I didn’t want to put more work on myself then I had too.  I am now doing this for myself.  The next entry’s I make are going to be journal suggestions from the book.

    In these journals, I am going to try using their guidelines for writing a meaningful journal entries till I find one that I like better.  These are accepting personal responsibility, discover self-motivation, master self-management, employ interdependence, gain self-awareness, adopt lifelong learning, develop emotional intelligence, and believe in my-self.

    Take inventory of your personal strengths and weaknesses as revealed in your self-assessment questionnaire.

    In your journal, write the eight areas of the self-assessment and record your scores for each.

    38   Accepting Personal Responsibility

    42   Discovering Self- Motivation

    27   Mastering Self- Management

    26   Employing interdependence

    43   Gaining Self- Awareness

    44   Adopting Lifelong Learning

    36   Developing Emotional Intelligence

    40   Believing in myself

    Write about the areas on the self-assessment in which you had your highest scores

    These scores were out of 80 points each, so none of my scores were rather high most hovered in the mid to lower point ranges.  I knew I had a lot to work on even before I took the assessment.  My highest scores were in discovering self-motivation, gaining self-awareness, adopting lifelong learning, and believing in myself.  I have been working on believing in myself for years going to therapy off and on for my major depressive disorder It just had not sunk in till started going to CBSST (Cognitive Behavioral Social Skills Training) at the VA.  The next one up would be discovering self-motivation.  This is so true of me my mind races so fast that I hardly have time to write ideas I have down and I do get bored easily.  Gaining self-awareness and lifelong learning are at the top of my list thanks to the internet.  You may be saying how does the internet help create self-awareness; well I don’t just use it for cat videos and viral videos I watch a lot of things that give me pause for thought like the Crash Course series and the multitude of independent news feeds and if I have questions about something I just check their sources or research it on my own if I Want to know about a subject.  Doing this give me insight in to who I truly am as I have lost myself through the madness of life.

    Write about your lowest scores

    Employing interdependence, mastering self-management, developing emotional intelligence, and accepting personal responsibility these are my lowest scores.  Employing interdependence, I understand why this one is low it is one that most older generational men deal with. We hate to ask for help this is the way we were taught “real men don’t need to ask for help I can do this on my own”.  This is something we are taught just by observing our fathers and other male role models.  The way I am combating this is by going back to school you have no choice in college you need to work with others if you want to survive.  Mastering self-management, I have always had issues with this.  It is no secret among those who know me I am a slob and my time management sucks.  This I am working on through today I was finally able to get some things out of my room and in the shed.  I also reorganized my room for a better study space; doing school work in the kitchen with 2 other guys in my mobile home made it challenging.  I put things on my walls to inspire and keep me on track like a world map with the places I would like to help when I join the Peace Corp and a work schedule for school work.  Developing emotional intelligence this has been a pain for me because I tend to bottle things up till I blow (and not in a good way).  This usually takes the form of a fight and I hate to fight I don’t want to hurt anyone or myself that is one of the reasons I am posting this in a public forum.  I want to be open and not hold in the all my feelings and if I can help anyone else who has these problems I am happy.  I do sometimes cry for no apparent reason I think that is my bodies way of relieving some of the pent-up emotions I still carry and don’t realize it.  Accepting personal responsibility, I have often blamed many things on my passed experiences for why I do or don’t do thing and more often allow other to dictate how they think I should live.  Dealing with this one is hard I have had to remove certain people from my life for now so that I can find myself and do the things I want to do.  Certain people I have allowed to have too much control over me and let them guide to who they think I should be.  I can’t let that happen anymore I realize the more I allow them to have control the more I hate myself.  I feel I am at a pivotal juncture in my life where I need to focus on who I am and who I want to be.  I cannot allow them to have so much influence on me or I may slip