Hapiness Revisited QQC

Quote: "It does not depend on outside events, but, rather, how we interpret them."

Question: Does this mean that optimism is the same thing as happiness?

Comment: I think I often mix up happiness with satisfaction. I wish I had known about this reading a month ago, since I was asked if I was happy in an assignment. I said no. I said this because there were so many things in life I was holding myself back from. I'm still holding myself back today. Then again, I suppose that satisfaction and happiness go together, and no one can always be happy. There are just times when I feel blue. This could be because of a chemical imbalance, or something.

I wouldn't say that I'm searching for happiness, more as I searching for a way out of myself--or rather, a way to open myself up instead of holding back so much. I get closer and closer to this goal every day, but as this happens, my craving for it increases. I will admit, however, there are things I search for in life that I believe will make me happier. Actually, it's more like there are people I want to meet that I believe will make me happier or smile more or love the world even more than now. You know, those friends that you find to be absolutely amazing and inspiring? I have a couple of those, but my mind has developed these characters in my brain that I really want to believe exist. They've just got to be out there, you know?

I'm probably not making any sense...in short, I think that happiness does tie directly in with observation and optimism. There are times when I just look at something, and I think: wow...that didn't used to be here, whether it's a baby, a bird, or some piece of technology. I'm happy at where the world is at right now, and look forward to it improving.

Mastery QQC

Alright, this time I have a couple, since this particular article really speaks to what I've been thinking about lately. I really enjoyed this reading.

Quotes: "One happens in a moment; the other unfolds over months, years, sometimes decades"

"Believe that intelligence is just that-- an entity. It exists within us in a finite supply that we cannot increase"

Comment: Those were my two favorite quotes because recently, when I'm setting goals, I've been more conscious of how long I expect or want them to take before I achieve. However, I often find that it takes longer than I expect, because I overestimate momentary success, and think that the rest of the journey will be easy. However, this is not the case, and I've realized that giving time limits to my goals ultimately defeats my purpose.

I enjoyed the second quote mostly because of the bit about intelligence being in all of us. Whenever someone says 'you're so smart' I always think: the smartest thing I do is try to put in more effort. Anyone can do it if they really try. It can be hard, but it's certainly within everyone's reach. But if it's not one of your goals to learn something, then there's a very small chance that you will ever reach it, or even care to reach it for that matter. This thought then connected later in the text, which I really enjoyed as well, but decided to narrow down my quotes to those two above.

On one final note, I also thought it was interesting to think of the two types of goals (performance vs. learning), because I never noticed it before, but I so clearly use both. For example, just like in the reading, being able to speak French has been a goal of mine for a while, so I took a class on it. I was more focused on being able to speak and understand the language rather than ace the test, because I wanted to go to French speaking countries and be able to speak as beautifully as them (this goes for the many other languages I want to learn). This same thing applies to English. I love writing, so I want to get better at it, so when I have an opportunity to exercise my skills in class, I do it, and continuously improve. Unfortunately, this same thing doesn't always apply for math, which ends up making it harder for me to learn. I have a true appreciation for math, since I think it's an extremely creative process, but if I don't think I'll use the skills later, it's harder to be motivated. That's why one of my current goals is to be fueled more by curiosity in math class. The more questions I ask myself and others, the more answers I'll get.

50 Life Secrets QQC

Quote: "Learn to be unaffected by the words of others."

Question: How many people have really accomplished this?

Comment: I would love to live by this lesson. I would love to live without other people's words affecting me. But he makes it sound like it's so simple to overcome, and it doesn't seem to be, at least not for me. In most cases it depends on who's saying something hurtful to you. For example, if someone close to me called me something that I had always known I wasn't I would start to question if I was wrong. Maybe I was unknowingly a 'fire hydrant'. There are many people who lack self awareness, and I can't say that I'm any different. However, I'm still making this a goal of mine. It's a big goal, but reaching it sure would be nice.

Project Proposal

What if we saw the world as math? Inspired by:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVJyaJ5TNpc

I think it would be pretty fun to make art inspired by calculus, or, to take it a step further, displaying calculus directly. For example, I read somewhere that rainbows involve quite a bit of calculus concepts. Perhaps our project can simply show what has been pointed out to us since the beginning of this year: calculus in nature. This includes organic curves of rocks, rainbows, fractals, even weather patterns. It sounds like a simple project, but it gives us a lot of room for creativity.

Book of Numbers Chapter 1 QQC

Quote: "If you break one egg, you will break an egg." And every other superstition that was listed.

Question: Who exactly made these up and who even believes these superstitions?

Comment: I personally have never heard even one of these superstitions. I mean, I'm not that much of a superstitious person, but I can definitely list a few that don't make sense but were quite infamous back in grade school. For example: "Step on a crack, break you're mama's back" or that one about having bad luck if you spill salt (the remedy is to throw some of the spilled salt over your shoulder).

Also, just as a side note... the number one never seemed so complex until I read through this chapter.

Chapter 0.000000001 QQC

Quote: "The Chinese abacus could also represent numbers as small as 0.01. The speed at which a trained abacus user can calculate sums is remarkable, and proficient users are even able to visualize the movement of the beads in their heads in order to achieve astonishing feats of mental arithmetic."

Question: How does it work? How does one train on it?

Comments: I've of course seen these before, and even played with them temporarily out of curiosity when I was younger, but never fully understood them. I think I understand them more now, and I wonder if using these little devices would help improve my mental math skills. Honestly, it seems like using them would be pretty fun. I might have to experiment with one and find out if this hands-on math technique could help me be more enthusiastic about my math skills. This is a large idea, I know, but maybe it could take me one small step closer to this goal.

Book of Numbers Chapter 0 QQC

Quote: Many thousands of years ago, when people didn't speak many words, before writing was invented, before there was money, before there were even words to describe numbers, people knew numbers. Although we had no names for them, we used them. We couldn't think about them or draw them.

Question: Numbers without symbols? What would the world be like if we didn't have numbers or time?

Comment: This has been a very curious thought to me since I entered high school. I just can't bring myself to imagine numbers without some sort of representation (for example, the symbol, or two rocks). I mean, of course I understand what numbers are, to an extent, but then it's strange to think about what they are in the universe. It's hard for me to explain, but it's quite interesting to think about. I mean, humans started out with knowing next to nothing, and then we started developing the idea of numbers and using them for counting, trading, and so on. And then somehow, through hundreds of thousands of steps, we went from counting to arithmetic. Numbers are, essentially, things humans made up, aren't they? So it would be easier for us to make sense of the world? For example, time is a measurement we made up as well (when it comes to seconds and hours).