What meaning can you make out of what DFW is saying?
Life is all about perspective
Your attitude towards everything in life is all based on how you look at things
Mindfulness
Not everything is about yourself
Life is what you let it be
Does anything resonate here with you?
I was never a big religious person so going to a religious high school was kind of challenging. When he says “as if a person’s most basic orientation toward the world and the meaning of his experience were somehow just hardwired like height or shoe size” this resonated with me because as time went on I learned to listen and observe what other people had to say and even if I didn’t believe in something they were saying and still believed that I could always take away a few things from what they say.
What do endings and beginnings have in common?
For me, endings and beginnings are a filled with uncertainty
Also, for you to end something, you have to begin it first. Which is why in my opinion, beginning something is harder than ending it. This is because everything has to come to an end, it could happen naturally or you could take action to end something. But, we make a choice to begin something, so it takes a lot of courage and self discipline to do so.
What questions (at least 3) do you have that might lead to a discussion about this recording next time?
What are some ways that help you be empathetic towards others?
Are there any moments in your day to day life that you think you can change the perspective of for it to have a positive impact instead of a negative one?
What do you worship? Is it leading to good or bad in your life?
What metaphor is water being used as?
The meaning I take from “This is Water” is that your thoughts have a significant impact on the way you interpret your life. It is so easy to get lost in the day-to-day routine and think only of yourself– you expect certain situations to go certain ways based on how you perceive them. You are annoyed with everyone around you because you are thinking from a self-centered perspective instead of considering what other people might be going through. You are free to go about your life any way you choose, but you are not truly free unless you approach situations from a place of love and compassion. I really resonated with this speech because I personally went through a time where I was forced to rewire my brain this way. It is so easy to get sucked into pessimism, and it’s difficult to change your entire way of thinking, but it is possible.
It is hard to distinguish between a ‘beginning’ and an ‘ending’ based on your mindset. From personal experience, I just graduated High School and moved out of my home. That can be looked at as an abrupt ending to something I was comfortable and secure with. Or, it can signify the beginning of something incredible; the opportunity to pursue a meaningful career and the chance to learn and grow as a human being. The ending of something can also mean the beginning of something new, the chance to do better. Three questions I have are ‘What are some ways someone might prevent themselves from falling back into old mentalities?’, ‘Why aren’t we experiencing this type of mental shift on a more global scale?’ and ‘What might it mean for humanity if more people thought like this?’
From this speech, I’m really making out that thinking is something that is always happening, whether we know it or not. That it’s not about when we choose to think, but how we think, because our default setting is self-centered thinking. That’s what really resonated with me, the default setting we have when thinking. Having to alter that default setting is something I’ve tried to do too, but never really realized what I was doing.
It may sound simple, but also very real, beginnings and ending both revolve around that default setting our brains have. Beginnings start with having to adjust the brain’s natural way of thinking. Endings are all about keeping those dark, selfish, and pessimistic thoughts out of your head. David Foster Wallace mentioned that people who commit suicide are long dead before they actually are, because of those thoughts in their heads. How exactly do you keep your brain fresh and clean? By altering your mind from its default setting.
Questions
What do you think made DFW realize the brain’s default way of thinking?
Have any of you ever acknowledged your brain’s default setting?
Have you ever really found yourself thinking about something in plain sight?
I think DFW is trying to explain the overall fact that everyone has their own perception of reality. Each person believes that their reality is the true reality. I think that he wants people to realize that there is more than one true reality. Every person’s reality is different, but they are all true to each individual, which makes them not right or wrong, but true to whoever believes it. I also have my own perception of reality, like DFW I still believe that I am the center of everything. I think that there is no possible way that there are 8 billion other sentient humans on this planet. There’s no way I could ever know if this is true or not, but it is my reality. No one can tell me that I am right, or that I am wrong, because no one knows the true reality. But it is also important that I take other people’s realities into my consideration. It is important to know even if I am the center of everything, other people still have meaning. Endings and beginnings have a lot in common. You need both to have one. With no beginning there is no ending, and with no ending there is no beginning. How can you end something you haven’t started or how can you start something and never finish it. Finishing it can be giving up, or quitting or even dying. Those are all ends. But you can’t die if you aren’t alive. And you can’t be alive if you don’t die. So beginnings and endings are very similar, and they rely on each other.
If DFW actually thinks like this, what thoughts lead him to this?
Why does he confront the people he is talking to?
How is his audience affected by the speech?
The phrase blind certainty (meaning that one is not able to see that they are wrong because of their mindset) plays a large part on our society today. It is hard to see what’s really going on around you when you have been in an environment for so long. This is seen through toxic relationships as well because people are so in love, they put on blinders so that they are unable to see how bad the situation really is. It is also seen through the older and newer generations. Older generations are so stuck in their ways that they are unable to see the new truths in society. They are unable to believe that a person could believe the things that they do because they are rooted in their own ways.
DFW’s viewpoint on how people need to learn how to think is something I never thought about. If people can control the way they think their natural instincts that revolve around them can be controlled as well. This would amount to people being more open and not being stuck in their ways but instead being able to see reality and the people around them in an honest way. This would allow society to be more forgiving and teach people that they don’t know what is going on in other people’s lives.
Endings and beginnings both involve change whether that be a good or bad change. They both inflict a new chapter in someone’s life starting fresh.
• How are we able to switch societies viewpoint in order for them to come to terms with reality?
• How are we able to teach people to think to avoid blind certainty?
• Do you think that we can teach people to change the way they think?
This speech was very interesting to me. It really made me think. However, at some points, it was difficult to follow. Something that resonated with me is the part where DFW is talking about the grocery store. How the lady working the register said “have a nice day”. She doesn’t really mean it. She is supposed to say that to everybody. I don’t know what beginnings and endings have in common. I know they are both connected but I cant see how they are alike.
Something that stood out to me was when David Foster Wallace says, “how they prize tolerance and diversity of belief”. What I take from this, is not one person’s belief system is correct and having tolerance and being open minded.
“Nowhere in the liberal art analysis does one want to claim that one guy’s interpretation is true, and the other guys is false or bad.”
He mentions how we never end up talking about the root of all these. Where do these ideas come from within people? Everything we learn is taught to us as people, but where inside of everyone is the route of their beliefs?
Some people become so close minded to a certain way of thinking the idea of opening up and learning about a new system is out of range for them. He then goes on to explain, if we were to change the way we think, how much of it would include actual learning and knowledge rather than a shift in thinking. Learning how to think is learning how to control your thoughts and put energy towards something new and no longer paying attention to something else.
Choosing the way, you think can naturally become a default for you once you’ve become so used to it. The freedom to real education is choosing the way you think and allowing yourself to not go automatically to your default way of thinking.
The main messages that I took away from David Foster Wallace’s speech This is Water, are that higher education helps you learn how to think about thinking and to see the world through different eyes. Some parts of his speech that resonated with me are that there are two sides to every story. People perceive things differently based on their own beliefs, experiences, and stories and we must not dismiss other people’s perspectives just because we do not agree. As adults in the modern world, we must be open to new ideas, not be self centered, and put ourselves in other peoples’ shoes. We must make the conscious choice to think about others, be present, and not get lost in our own brains and internal anxieties. Wallace said how “your head can be a terrible master” if you let it control you. He stressed the importance of not getting stuck in meaningless routines and to not let petty frustrations control your life. We must learn how to pay attention to what is happening around us, and not get stuck in “miserableness,” and instead focus on the meaningful parts of life like love and the goodness in the world. I really enjoyed listening to this speech because it was very positive. Wallace said how education is very important towards teaching discipline, awareness, and how education provides students with the freedom to learn how to think. Endings and beginnings are similar because they are both periods of time in which people move from one experience to the next. Beginnings are the start of something new, but they must also have an end. What is important is focusing on what happens during the good parts in the middle.
Who was Wallace in relation to the students?
How can people actually not get lost in their internal anxieties?
Are finding hobbies and passions good ways to break free from those meaningless routines?
A couple key takeaways from this speech are that you need to be able to be understanding and need to see things in different ways or through someone else’s eyes and that having an open mind and to be less arrogant, have critical awareness of yourself and others also to be less self centered meaning dont care less about yourself but more about the people and things around you.
One thing that he said that really resonated with me was “Learning how to control how to think really means learning how to express some control over how and what you think, and being conscious and aware enough to choose what you pay attention to and to choose how to construct meaning from experience.” This resonated with me because I feel if you don’t have control over your thoughts and your constantly thinking a certain way that isn’t positively affecting your mental then that’s how your gonna be all the time, If your always down and not seeing things in a better manner or way then thats how your gonna live your whole life, but having control over your thoughts and what you get out of an experience even if its bad can always have good takeaways if you see it in that way.
The main thing I can make out of what DFW is saying in this speech is that everyone gets to choose what way they want to view something or act day to day its up to you what you how you wanna do it and having control over your thoughts and self can change ones mentality weiter it be in a good way or a bad way.
The thing that spoke to me most throughout DFW’s speech was the ongoing theme that life is only what you make it. Life cannot truly be lived, only perceived. Every person alive today has had a different set of experiences that led them to the place they are today. Though some of these experiences may be shared, they are never perceived in the same way by two people. The story he uses of the religious man and the atheist portrays this idea perfectly. Though this example applied to a single experience, I believe it can be applied to all of life. Nothing is certain, your truth is not the only truth, and a life lived with a closed mind cannot truly be considered a life lived, until one opens their mind to the possibility of change.
“This is water” had me thinking about how the brain works, and how two people with different beliefs can interpret a situation very differently like the atheist and the religious person. David Foster Wallace mentions how everything you experience, you are at the center of everything and that can take a toll in the brain. David talks about suicide and how people always shoot themselves in the head but their brain is dead long before the trigger is pulled. He talks about how when you are at the grocery store checking out, the cashier tells you to have a nice day in a sad tone while you go to the dirty parking lot and drive home in heavy traffic. That spoke to me because it got me thinking about back home. Back in Worcester Massachusetts, that statement was scarily accurate. You will buy gas or something at a run-down station and the depressed clerk will tell you to have a nice day but how could you possibly be happy with everything happening in Worcester? Worcester has a bad drug problem. It feels like every time I go for A drive or a walk I see nothing but abandoned buildings, people out of their minds roaming the streets high on whatever they injected themselves with, gangs, and in Worcester, nobody smiles. Everybody has a face that looks like pain, emptiness, or sadness which is ironic because the symbol of Worcester is the yellow smiley face because it was invented there. Everywhere you look you see that yellow smiley face but there is not a single person in Worcester that looks as happy as that smiley face. My questions are, What did David’s childhood look like because he seems like he was hurt at some point? Why does the audience laugh when David makes a serious point?
I think one thing that really resonates with me is that we all have this self-centered idea that we are the center of the universe. To all of us, we seem to be at the center of the universe because we live our lives as us, so it is hard to picture the center of the universe being someone other than ourselves. This resonated with me because I always try to make a conscious effort to remove myself from the “center” of my life, and try to think of myself as someone with equal value to anyone else. As much as I try, it really is something that is hardwired into all of our brains and identities even, so there are plenty of times in my life where I am more self-centered than I wish to be. The way Wallace explained being able to “adjust our default setting” of viewing ourselves as the main character by choosing how we think was intriguing to me. “Choosing” how I think has never been something I was particularly good at. For Wallace to say that college would teach me “how to think” thereby teaching me how to “choose” to think, it really made me wonder if that was something I could end up taking away from my time here at UNE.
In my own opinion, endings and beginnings have more in common than they do in contrast. Normally, the end of something leads to the beginning of something else, and in turn the beginning of something is the end of something else. While this may not always be the case, both endings and beginnings are changes. By beginning to read a book, you are changing many things: what you do with your time, how much knowledge you have, how many books you have read, types of characters you’ve read about, etc. In the same way, ending a book also leaves you with changes in your life. As miniscule as it may seem to read one book, you can be changed by the words on the pages. Maybe after reading the book, you realize that you enjoy the author’s work, or you relate to the main character, or you wish to visit the kind of scenery the book described. Whatever it may be, the ending and beginnings of things are both opportunities, changes that will affect who you are.
– I am wondering why Wallace chose this route for a commencement speech. He could have sent these students off into the world with some words of encouragement, but he chose to give them harsh truths and a pretty bleak outlook on the life ahead of them. Why did he choose to do this?
– Is it possible to really “choose” how to think? To some extent, my thoughts can be controlled by me but is it really possible to completely control what I do and don’t think about, or the way that I think?
– Are there things we can do to prevent having a boring life doing the same things day in and day out? Of course I can think of some, but they need to be realistic since we still have to have jobs to earn money.
What meaning can you make out of what DFW is saying?
From this speech I make out the fact that life is what you make it out to be, the meaning of things comes from one perspective and nothing is 100 percent right or wrong, but to be open-minded in our daily perspectives will guarantee you to be more open and aware and overall live a better life.
Does anything resonate with you here?
Yes, in his speech David Foster Wallace makes a point to talk about how people sometimes over intellectualize thongs and get lost in “abstract arguments” inside of our heads instead of paying attention to what’s going on right in front of them or simply inside of them. When I heard him talk about this it honestly made me stop the video to pause and think, just how much I related to this and how many others probably did too. Getting lost inside my own head is something that I struggle with a lot, many write it off as being distracted or not paying attention and in a sense they are right, to be alert and in tune with surroundings is something that many people lack and a lot of times don’t even realize these things and end up missing out on important information or having that sense of mindfulness.
What do endings and beginnings have in common?
When you hear of endings and beginnings the thing that ties them into each other is the life to which they belonged. Everything that lives has a story of ending and beginning, based on perspective is how you can decipher what endings and beginnings truly mean. When you look at endings they can lead to beginnings, for example leaving high school and going to college. You leave a world you know, what you’re comfortable with, friends, lifestyle, and family, and you go someplace to create a new beginning or chapter. Endings don’t always have to be sad and beginnings don’t always have to be happy, perspective is key when it comes to endings and beginnings.
Questions that might lead to the discussion :
What makes our ways of thinking right or wrong, and how do we change mentalities to think these ways?
When trying to change our perspective and mindset, how many times do we fall back into our natural states of thinking ?
When looking at others why do we automatically put ourselves in the center of the universe without giving others’ issues or problems a thought, and if we learn about them what will we figure out about ourselves and each other?
13 thoughts on “JOURNAL # 2”
What meaning can you make out of what DFW is saying?
Life is all about perspective
Your attitude towards everything in life is all based on how you look at things
Mindfulness
Not everything is about yourself
Life is what you let it be
Does anything resonate here with you?
I was never a big religious person so going to a religious high school was kind of challenging. When he says “as if a person’s most basic orientation toward the world and the meaning of his experience were somehow just hardwired like height or shoe size” this resonated with me because as time went on I learned to listen and observe what other people had to say and even if I didn’t believe in something they were saying and still believed that I could always take away a few things from what they say.
What do endings and beginnings have in common?
For me, endings and beginnings are a filled with uncertainty
Also, for you to end something, you have to begin it first. Which is why in my opinion, beginning something is harder than ending it. This is because everything has to come to an end, it could happen naturally or you could take action to end something. But, we make a choice to begin something, so it takes a lot of courage and self discipline to do so.
What questions (at least 3) do you have that might lead to a discussion about this recording next time?
What are some ways that help you be empathetic towards others?
Are there any moments in your day to day life that you think you can change the perspective of for it to have a positive impact instead of a negative one?
What do you worship? Is it leading to good or bad in your life?
What metaphor is water being used as?
The meaning I take from “This is Water” is that your thoughts have a significant impact on the way you interpret your life. It is so easy to get lost in the day-to-day routine and think only of yourself– you expect certain situations to go certain ways based on how you perceive them. You are annoyed with everyone around you because you are thinking from a self-centered perspective instead of considering what other people might be going through. You are free to go about your life any way you choose, but you are not truly free unless you approach situations from a place of love and compassion. I really resonated with this speech because I personally went through a time where I was forced to rewire my brain this way. It is so easy to get sucked into pessimism, and it’s difficult to change your entire way of thinking, but it is possible.
It is hard to distinguish between a ‘beginning’ and an ‘ending’ based on your mindset. From personal experience, I just graduated High School and moved out of my home. That can be looked at as an abrupt ending to something I was comfortable and secure with. Or, it can signify the beginning of something incredible; the opportunity to pursue a meaningful career and the chance to learn and grow as a human being. The ending of something can also mean the beginning of something new, the chance to do better. Three questions I have are ‘What are some ways someone might prevent themselves from falling back into old mentalities?’, ‘Why aren’t we experiencing this type of mental shift on a more global scale?’ and ‘What might it mean for humanity if more people thought like this?’
From this speech, I’m really making out that thinking is something that is always happening, whether we know it or not. That it’s not about when we choose to think, but how we think, because our default setting is self-centered thinking. That’s what really resonated with me, the default setting we have when thinking. Having to alter that default setting is something I’ve tried to do too, but never really realized what I was doing.
It may sound simple, but also very real, beginnings and ending both revolve around that default setting our brains have. Beginnings start with having to adjust the brain’s natural way of thinking. Endings are all about keeping those dark, selfish, and pessimistic thoughts out of your head. David Foster Wallace mentioned that people who commit suicide are long dead before they actually are, because of those thoughts in their heads. How exactly do you keep your brain fresh and clean? By altering your mind from its default setting.
Questions
What do you think made DFW realize the brain’s default way of thinking?
Have any of you ever acknowledged your brain’s default setting?
Have you ever really found yourself thinking about something in plain sight?
I think DFW is trying to explain the overall fact that everyone has their own perception of reality. Each person believes that their reality is the true reality. I think that he wants people to realize that there is more than one true reality. Every person’s reality is different, but they are all true to each individual, which makes them not right or wrong, but true to whoever believes it. I also have my own perception of reality, like DFW I still believe that I am the center of everything. I think that there is no possible way that there are 8 billion other sentient humans on this planet. There’s no way I could ever know if this is true or not, but it is my reality. No one can tell me that I am right, or that I am wrong, because no one knows the true reality. But it is also important that I take other people’s realities into my consideration. It is important to know even if I am the center of everything, other people still have meaning. Endings and beginnings have a lot in common. You need both to have one. With no beginning there is no ending, and with no ending there is no beginning. How can you end something you haven’t started or how can you start something and never finish it. Finishing it can be giving up, or quitting or even dying. Those are all ends. But you can’t die if you aren’t alive. And you can’t be alive if you don’t die. So beginnings and endings are very similar, and they rely on each other.
If DFW actually thinks like this, what thoughts lead him to this?
Why does he confront the people he is talking to?
How is his audience affected by the speech?
The phrase blind certainty (meaning that one is not able to see that they are wrong because of their mindset) plays a large part on our society today. It is hard to see what’s really going on around you when you have been in an environment for so long. This is seen through toxic relationships as well because people are so in love, they put on blinders so that they are unable to see how bad the situation really is. It is also seen through the older and newer generations. Older generations are so stuck in their ways that they are unable to see the new truths in society. They are unable to believe that a person could believe the things that they do because they are rooted in their own ways.
DFW’s viewpoint on how people need to learn how to think is something I never thought about. If people can control the way they think their natural instincts that revolve around them can be controlled as well. This would amount to people being more open and not being stuck in their ways but instead being able to see reality and the people around them in an honest way. This would allow society to be more forgiving and teach people that they don’t know what is going on in other people’s lives.
Endings and beginnings both involve change whether that be a good or bad change. They both inflict a new chapter in someone’s life starting fresh.
• How are we able to switch societies viewpoint in order for them to come to terms with reality?
• How are we able to teach people to think to avoid blind certainty?
• Do you think that we can teach people to change the way they think?
This speech was very interesting to me. It really made me think. However, at some points, it was difficult to follow. Something that resonated with me is the part where DFW is talking about the grocery store. How the lady working the register said “have a nice day”. She doesn’t really mean it. She is supposed to say that to everybody. I don’t know what beginnings and endings have in common. I know they are both connected but I cant see how they are alike.
Something that stood out to me was when David Foster Wallace says, “how they prize tolerance and diversity of belief”. What I take from this, is not one person’s belief system is correct and having tolerance and being open minded.
“Nowhere in the liberal art analysis does one want to claim that one guy’s interpretation is true, and the other guys is false or bad.”
He mentions how we never end up talking about the root of all these. Where do these ideas come from within people? Everything we learn is taught to us as people, but where inside of everyone is the route of their beliefs?
Some people become so close minded to a certain way of thinking the idea of opening up and learning about a new system is out of range for them. He then goes on to explain, if we were to change the way we think, how much of it would include actual learning and knowledge rather than a shift in thinking. Learning how to think is learning how to control your thoughts and put energy towards something new and no longer paying attention to something else.
Choosing the way, you think can naturally become a default for you once you’ve become so used to it. The freedom to real education is choosing the way you think and allowing yourself to not go automatically to your default way of thinking.
The main messages that I took away from David Foster Wallace’s speech This is Water, are that higher education helps you learn how to think about thinking and to see the world through different eyes. Some parts of his speech that resonated with me are that there are two sides to every story. People perceive things differently based on their own beliefs, experiences, and stories and we must not dismiss other people’s perspectives just because we do not agree. As adults in the modern world, we must be open to new ideas, not be self centered, and put ourselves in other peoples’ shoes. We must make the conscious choice to think about others, be present, and not get lost in our own brains and internal anxieties. Wallace said how “your head can be a terrible master” if you let it control you. He stressed the importance of not getting stuck in meaningless routines and to not let petty frustrations control your life. We must learn how to pay attention to what is happening around us, and not get stuck in “miserableness,” and instead focus on the meaningful parts of life like love and the goodness in the world. I really enjoyed listening to this speech because it was very positive. Wallace said how education is very important towards teaching discipline, awareness, and how education provides students with the freedom to learn how to think. Endings and beginnings are similar because they are both periods of time in which people move from one experience to the next. Beginnings are the start of something new, but they must also have an end. What is important is focusing on what happens during the good parts in the middle.
Who was Wallace in relation to the students?
How can people actually not get lost in their internal anxieties?
Are finding hobbies and passions good ways to break free from those meaningless routines?
A couple key takeaways from this speech are that you need to be able to be understanding and need to see things in different ways or through someone else’s eyes and that having an open mind and to be less arrogant, have critical awareness of yourself and others also to be less self centered meaning dont care less about yourself but more about the people and things around you.
One thing that he said that really resonated with me was “Learning how to control how to think really means learning how to express some control over how and what you think, and being conscious and aware enough to choose what you pay attention to and to choose how to construct meaning from experience.” This resonated with me because I feel if you don’t have control over your thoughts and your constantly thinking a certain way that isn’t positively affecting your mental then that’s how your gonna be all the time, If your always down and not seeing things in a better manner or way then thats how your gonna live your whole life, but having control over your thoughts and what you get out of an experience even if its bad can always have good takeaways if you see it in that way.
The main thing I can make out of what DFW is saying in this speech is that everyone gets to choose what way they want to view something or act day to day its up to you what you how you wanna do it and having control over your thoughts and self can change ones mentality weiter it be in a good way or a bad way.
The thing that spoke to me most throughout DFW’s speech was the ongoing theme that life is only what you make it. Life cannot truly be lived, only perceived. Every person alive today has had a different set of experiences that led them to the place they are today. Though some of these experiences may be shared, they are never perceived in the same way by two people. The story he uses of the religious man and the atheist portrays this idea perfectly. Though this example applied to a single experience, I believe it can be applied to all of life. Nothing is certain, your truth is not the only truth, and a life lived with a closed mind cannot truly be considered a life lived, until one opens their mind to the possibility of change.
“This is water” had me thinking about how the brain works, and how two people with different beliefs can interpret a situation very differently like the atheist and the religious person. David Foster Wallace mentions how everything you experience, you are at the center of everything and that can take a toll in the brain. David talks about suicide and how people always shoot themselves in the head but their brain is dead long before the trigger is pulled. He talks about how when you are at the grocery store checking out, the cashier tells you to have a nice day in a sad tone while you go to the dirty parking lot and drive home in heavy traffic. That spoke to me because it got me thinking about back home. Back in Worcester Massachusetts, that statement was scarily accurate. You will buy gas or something at a run-down station and the depressed clerk will tell you to have a nice day but how could you possibly be happy with everything happening in Worcester? Worcester has a bad drug problem. It feels like every time I go for A drive or a walk I see nothing but abandoned buildings, people out of their minds roaming the streets high on whatever they injected themselves with, gangs, and in Worcester, nobody smiles. Everybody has a face that looks like pain, emptiness, or sadness which is ironic because the symbol of Worcester is the yellow smiley face because it was invented there. Everywhere you look you see that yellow smiley face but there is not a single person in Worcester that looks as happy as that smiley face. My questions are, What did David’s childhood look like because he seems like he was hurt at some point? Why does the audience laugh when David makes a serious point?
I think one thing that really resonates with me is that we all have this self-centered idea that we are the center of the universe. To all of us, we seem to be at the center of the universe because we live our lives as us, so it is hard to picture the center of the universe being someone other than ourselves. This resonated with me because I always try to make a conscious effort to remove myself from the “center” of my life, and try to think of myself as someone with equal value to anyone else. As much as I try, it really is something that is hardwired into all of our brains and identities even, so there are plenty of times in my life where I am more self-centered than I wish to be. The way Wallace explained being able to “adjust our default setting” of viewing ourselves as the main character by choosing how we think was intriguing to me. “Choosing” how I think has never been something I was particularly good at. For Wallace to say that college would teach me “how to think” thereby teaching me how to “choose” to think, it really made me wonder if that was something I could end up taking away from my time here at UNE.
In my own opinion, endings and beginnings have more in common than they do in contrast. Normally, the end of something leads to the beginning of something else, and in turn the beginning of something is the end of something else. While this may not always be the case, both endings and beginnings are changes. By beginning to read a book, you are changing many things: what you do with your time, how much knowledge you have, how many books you have read, types of characters you’ve read about, etc. In the same way, ending a book also leaves you with changes in your life. As miniscule as it may seem to read one book, you can be changed by the words on the pages. Maybe after reading the book, you realize that you enjoy the author’s work, or you relate to the main character, or you wish to visit the kind of scenery the book described. Whatever it may be, the ending and beginnings of things are both opportunities, changes that will affect who you are.
– I am wondering why Wallace chose this route for a commencement speech. He could have sent these students off into the world with some words of encouragement, but he chose to give them harsh truths and a pretty bleak outlook on the life ahead of them. Why did he choose to do this?
– Is it possible to really “choose” how to think? To some extent, my thoughts can be controlled by me but is it really possible to completely control what I do and don’t think about, or the way that I think?
– Are there things we can do to prevent having a boring life doing the same things day in and day out? Of course I can think of some, but they need to be realistic since we still have to have jobs to earn money.
What meaning can you make out of what DFW is saying?
From this speech I make out the fact that life is what you make it out to be, the meaning of things comes from one perspective and nothing is 100 percent right or wrong, but to be open-minded in our daily perspectives will guarantee you to be more open and aware and overall live a better life.
Does anything resonate with you here?
Yes, in his speech David Foster Wallace makes a point to talk about how people sometimes over intellectualize thongs and get lost in “abstract arguments” inside of our heads instead of paying attention to what’s going on right in front of them or simply inside of them. When I heard him talk about this it honestly made me stop the video to pause and think, just how much I related to this and how many others probably did too. Getting lost inside my own head is something that I struggle with a lot, many write it off as being distracted or not paying attention and in a sense they are right, to be alert and in tune with surroundings is something that many people lack and a lot of times don’t even realize these things and end up missing out on important information or having that sense of mindfulness.
What do endings and beginnings have in common?
When you hear of endings and beginnings the thing that ties them into each other is the life to which they belonged. Everything that lives has a story of ending and beginning, based on perspective is how you can decipher what endings and beginnings truly mean. When you look at endings they can lead to beginnings, for example leaving high school and going to college. You leave a world you know, what you’re comfortable with, friends, lifestyle, and family, and you go someplace to create a new beginning or chapter. Endings don’t always have to be sad and beginnings don’t always have to be happy, perspective is key when it comes to endings and beginnings.
Questions that might lead to the discussion :
What makes our ways of thinking right or wrong, and how do we change mentalities to think these ways?
When trying to change our perspective and mindset, how many times do we fall back into our natural states of thinking ?
When looking at others why do we automatically put ourselves in the center of the universe without giving others’ issues or problems a thought, and if we learn about them what will we figure out about ourselves and each other?