It’s comfortable to define ourselves by roles, relationships, and resources. It’s human nature to draw boundary lines around our abilities and find labels to attach to what we are. These labels seem to provide identity and a certain measure of direction. When we define ourselves, we have a good idea of where we are going.
No Conflict in the Clouds
Narratives of everyday engineering and economics are stories of conflict and concession. There is always a compromise involved in manufacturing pieces and in making policies. The human experience is riddled with terms and trade-offs. We even have enough experience managing these deals and disputes that estimating simple bargains and balances is done almost instantaneously. We
The Symbiosis of Conflict and Imagination
“If there’s no conflict, there are no stories worth telling – or reading.” – Veronica Roth. To explore the statement, a couple of general assumptions must be made: 1. That most people consume some form of narrative, be it personal interaction, fictional or religious literature, celebrity culture, current events as communicated by news outlets or
The Eternal Tension
“If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said, ‘Faster horses.’ ” So quipped Henry Ford about his success. Ford revolutionized transportation early in the 20th Century by making something available to everyone that previously only the wealthy could afford: an automobile. Yet behind that quip lies a fundamental tension between individual
Be You
How can I not be influenced by feelings of necessity to know what I am? I don’t feel that it is necessary to know exactly what I am, yet everything I do is analysed, judged, criticized, liked, outdone, undermined or loved by myself and others. If it is not necessary to know exactly what I
What Am I? Just Another Changing Being!
Michel Foucault’s statement is a very interesting comment on human nature. As a French philosopher who studied and questioned human behavior, this is not a surprising statement on his behalf. Humans are a very strange species compared to the rest of the bio life in this world. We are conscious, sentient beings. We feel, think,
Never The Same Again
As we are growing up people always ask what do you want to be when you get older and how will you get there? These questions as a child are unscathed by society, our education and our imagination. We can essentially be anything we want, a fire fighter, a doctor, an astronaut, the possibilities are
River of Life
There is a substantial basis about the idea that we become someone else that we were not in the beginning. Michel Foucault thoughtfully came up with a realization that inevitably applies to all people. Interestingly, he even considered it as the main interest in life. A very clever idea indeed. Applying this in your life
Become someone different. Get off the merry-go-round
Life is a “bittersweet symphony” according to The Verve’s eponymous 1997 single. When he is not bemoaning “making ends meet” and being “a slave to money”, frontman Richard Ashcroft croons: No change, I can’t change, I can’t change, I can’t change, But I’m here in my mould, I am here in my mould. And I’m
The Line in the Sand
……………Keeps Us From Discovering The Treasures Buried in The Desert of Nonconformity Everyday I sit and ponder about my contribution to the world. Will I ever be remembered? This compelling question has long and unknowingly lingered within my mind and my heart, but certainly with greater impulsion for the past three years. I wonder why
eloquent bliss.
My father’s voice was like a portal to me, rich spools of magic that spun stories as clear as day. It was a mixture of warm tones and sharp inflections, where sparks of stirring excitation and ardour lay buried beneath an air of patience. His words kindled emotions within me that mirrored his own, and
entity unknown
I wonder what she sees. <error> The girl stands at the edges of a soaring monolith, where she looks to a city aglow with light and flame. Her eyes are hard and unblinking — unseeing<error>, as her fingers reach out to grasp at the lucent skyline. They tremble in the moonlight, and I imagine<error> the
The Realities Of Transition And Transformation
The inspiration to write this article was drawn out of a bitter, but necessary experience I had as a high school student. I was a rookie, probably innocent to a reasonable extent, bright in school, a lover of God, a drama unit member, you name it…. I was suffering from inferiority complex, trying so hard
The True Nature of Stories – An Expression of Experience
What is a story? Some might say a story is an arrangement of plot, setting, character and the main subject of this article, the rise and fall of conflict. Veronica Roth once said, “If there is no conflict, there are no stories worth telling – or reading.” To understand why this is true or to
“Where There is Ruin There is Hope for a Treasure”
“Where There is Ruin There is Hope for a Treasure” – Rumi. Five summers ago my daughter told her counselor that she planned to stand in the middle of the train tracks that run south of our house at 3pm the next day. No one would be home, no one could stop her, and her
“If There’s No Conflict, There Are No Stories Worth Telling – Or Reading”
Indeed, whether one is reading or telling a fictional or nonfictional story, without conflict, such a story will not be worth reading or relating. To get a better understanding of this topic, I would like to start by defining two key words in the topic — ‘conflict’ and ‘stories.’ The Oxford Advanced Learners’ dictionary gives
“If there’s no conflict, there are no stories worth telling – or reading”
Conflict is a problematic occurrence that is usual in every society, but which no person or society at large willingly intends to experience. In spite of the problems it proves to humanity, conflict also acts to ingrain itself in the psyche of humanity, making unforgettable events in human life. Where and when there is prevalence
If You Cannot Love, Don’t Hate!
Love may or may not attract love, but hate always attracts hate. Love and hate are like the two sides of a coin; they are not very different emotions. They are just positive and negative, respectively. Human nature is known to soak up negative vibes faster than positive ones. It is much easier to go
‘Ignorance’ and ‘Want’ are Grown Up Now
176 years ago, Dickens’ apocalyptic expression of the children of humanity, Ignorance and Want, warned us of what was to come if we, as a society, did not change our ways. Only 70 years later, Henry Ford kickstarted his assembly line amidst the thundering steel and roaring fire of a mechanical revolution – captains of
Custodians
“If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.” – Henry Ford. Perhaps it would be rash to open by bringing to the fore the likelihood that the above statement is apocryphal and may have been in fact spuriously ascribed to Mr. Ford. For there is no real evidence that