"Using Google Blogger and Google Docs will be very useful tools for if I need them in the future." (Will Paris)

When I first the coarse and found out I had to learn how to use all these Google programs, my first response was "oh my gosh, I hate my life" but now I'm glad I got to use them and I have been using Google Sheets since I can access documents and do work from my Mac and smart phone. 

"The most important thing that I have learned is how to create and edit a Wikipedia page." (Dante Hancock)

For me it was the hardest thing I had to do in the class because of how you have to format the whole document. Ever since I was in middle school I have always wondered how Wikipedia worked and who actually maintained it all the time. My whole perspective has changed when it comes to wikipedia and I feel more confident about using it as a source of a place to find resources from the works cited area. But who would have guessed that so much information was used for just one section of an entire wikipedia page. 

Most Important Thing I've Learned

When I signed up to take World Literature I was expecting that I would be reading some boring literature, then analyzing it in class, then writing a paper about some thesis relating to the work, and then become an alcoholic like the writer Hemingway. However, I didn't exactly find the class to be like that. In fact I found it to follow some of the same guidelines as a philosophy class. The reading itself was still boring because I honestly didn't care about ancient creation stories, but what I did enjoy most is the discussions we would have in class about the reading and how it related to us and modern society. But I've learned to appreciate what others have to say and the teachings of the people before use. It truly makes me happier in life like how the Tao Te Ching teaches that life is subjective, making me care about what I think yet believe facts.

The Struggles of Others

"What's really slowed me down in this project is the subject I chose to research and write a paper about." (Dante)

I had this same issue when I was researching Laozi. It's not that I didn't enjoy researching about him and the effects of his teachings on human society, but the fact that my passions in life don't exactly relate to the Tao Te Ching. Thankfully I found a lot of fantastic knowledge on life like how life is subjective and that their is no truth or reality to it life except for our own concise. 

"I am a procrastinator, i'm known for doing everything the night before it's due if something does not interest me." (Kimberly Barron)

Everyone at some point of time will put something off to the last moment. Sometimes it's because something doesn't interest you like how Miss Barron explains but a lot of times it can be because of a lack of resources that are not convenient. Kind of like how some don't go to the gym not because they don't have time for the gym but they don't have time to travel to the gym. I have found that making a schedule for work itself and setting a timer as you work can help you stay on track. 

"I have a very busy schedule between school and work, also taking care of a 4 month old." (Nelson)

I have always had much respect for individuals who try to excel under hard times in their life. A lot of people say they procrastinate but many more don't even have the time to procrastinate let alone have time to do the work needed for school. It is from this point people usually take time from their sleep or personal time to get things done. So bravo Miss Nelson for all the things you are trying to accomplish. 

Beautiful Music

Everyone has a different view of music and what makes it beautiful. I'm gonna use I'm Sorry Miss Jackson by OutKast, especially with the video it goes with. I know what you're thinking, how can a song about a guy talking about his baby mama issues? I have this thing where I thing life itself is beautiful in this wonderful world and I enjoy the little things in life. I find this mans issues are quiet sad in the sense that he gets the short end of the stick in his situation. But at the ending of the video, which is the end of the storm that represents the situation and the men trying to fix the leaks in the house as him just trying to fix the situation, the moon comes out and the men smile. It's a beautiful ending because you have to make the best with what you have sometimes.

Dante's Hell

Dante's idea of an afterlife, specifically hell, I very much different as compared to other idea of hell. When you look at the main religions of the world, it's either heaven or hell, and maybe purgatory. In a humorous way, his nine levels of hell gives just about everyone a slice of eternal damnation; a piece of the birthday pie. But each hell isn't going to be as bad as some of the other hells. I believe he is trying to make people comfortable with the concept of going to hell, and might just possible support the ideas that its ok to sin. He might want people to be ok with going to hell in order for us to seek out our pleasures. "It's ok that you stole, the guy to your left who murder and raped everyone in his village and is going to the hardcore hell where bad country music is played on the daily and it smell like suffer (eggs)", says the guy in hell.

New Testament in the Modern World

We all need some type of love for our fellow man more than every in the times we live in folks. Lets face it, we have been killing each other for years, but with the advantages of the digital world, we can stay connected no matter where we are (with some signal limitations of course). A person from Kenya can email someone from Dallas, and with this we can try to connect with each other in harmony for the first time. The new testament is one of the many religious books that everyone, no matter their background, can learn something from. It is stated in the new testament that ". . . love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back" Luke 6:35. We should take this and bond with everyone regardless of race, sexuality, and religion.

Same as it is Different

Besides just obviously being old religious scriptures that teach the word of god, both the new testament and Quran are similar in other ways. I believe that since Islam and Christianity are both monotheistic and have biblical ties to each other, both higher powers (God) in each religion are the same God. Let's look at purified life in the Quran and New Testament. The Quran states that "Whoever does good, whether male or female, and is a believer, we shall certainly make him live a good life." (Nahl, 97) and in the Bible it states "For here we do not have an enduring city, but we are looking for the city that is to come" (Hebrew 13/14). Both believe in some form of eternal life or, purified life, and that after life is the same (my opinion).

Confucius Presidents

I personally don't really believe that any of the presidential candidates live up to the expectations of Confucius teachings, except for one. Confucius once said, "Silence is the true friend and never betrays". When we look at many of the popular candidates, we find them out spoken and always talking about someone or some other candidate. Confucius is really talking about being humble, and people who are humble (means being modest in one's own importance) generally don't get into conflicts with others and people like them to the extent of friendliness. Honestly, who has ever wanted to hate someone who was humble?! Ben Carson is one of the most humble politicians (even though he is not, he is a neurosurgeon, but we will consider him as one in regards to the presidential race) I have ever seen (granted, I've only lived for 20 years) and always put humility and faith as the primary characteristics of his person to get him to the white house. Even with the criticism over his comments connecting America and Nazi Germany, and his opinion of Muslims, he has stayed humble and still remains on of the most popular candidates to Americans.

What do you think? Is Carson humble? What do you think about some of Carson's controversial comments? Please leave a comment!

Opposites of Life

I'm no philosopher so pardon me if I might not truly understand Daodejing, but I believe everyone can see something different.

Opposites in Daodejing are thing that are balanced, so one without the other, neither can exist so they complement each other. It's the concept of yin and yang, hot and cold, nice and mean, tortoise and the hare. for example, in life we have fast and slow, but without things being fast, slow computers could not be distinguished by speed, if everything was fast, we would never know the meaning of slow. With darkness there must be light, because if there is no darkness, we would never know light. If light only existed, we would not know light because again we could not distinguish it with darkness so to us, light didn't exist.

Opposites in Daodejing are independent elements of life that are dependent of each other and are what makes life truly wonderful and equal. It gives use the appreciation and desire we seek, and without the the opposite of what we appreciate, we can never appreciate it.

What do you think? Do agree with my annotation of opposites in Daodejing? What things do you appreciate and what is it's opposite? Would you be interested in traveling to Nepal? Please leave a comment!

War

War is something that has been around forever and being in the National Guard, I believe war is natural and so is peace. When you look at the issues, and I mean all all sides of it, in Syria and ISIS and Russia and U.S. and people being affected, I'd say it's a just war (but that could be some bias since I am a soldier and without war, no army, means I'm out of a job) but a war we should fight for human peace. I believe we should all unit with all nations to fight crimes against humanity, and if that government is the culprit, we will unit with the people because they are what makes up the nation. Sadly we are sticking our nose into Syria for political reasons, but we do need to stop the blood shed ISIS and the Syrian government have been committing.

What do you think? Are you pro or anti war in the Middle East? Would you be willing to be drafted into the conflict in the Middle East? Please leave a comment!

Next Stop: Eternal Life

Most religions and societies in the world have some form of eternal life or cycle of life itself, Valhalla, Heaven, Nirvana, Reincarnation just to name a few. When I talk about eternal life, I'm talking about your soul going to some form of haven or cycle of life which you partake for eternity. Usually to attain this eternal life, one must be good in nature or have faith in a higher being. But lets look at the good naturedness of being able to have eternal life, mainly because eternal life isn't usually associated with bad deeds because that would usually lead to unforeseeable things in your moments after you pass (probably why we don't associate eternal life with hell). Eternal life might generally run around some form of karma system that affects our eternal soul, which is a soul that continues on forever to some form of other life itself. Many believe that we need to live on the moments of good and adventure because you get one shot before starting over because we will never remember in our other life. Which is why many do bad things because they think this is the only life they get and their is no eternal glory of any form.

What do you think? I feel like I just babbled about the topic. Did I make any real point on my topic? Do you believe in something that is eternal? Please leave a comment!

From He-Man to Lady-Person (If You're A Guy)

It's a pretty drastic change if one simple becomes a woman over night. You are not only physically different but now you have to act the part. The situation at first would be hectic and crazy, then possibly go in to denial from the drastic change from being a man to a full blown woman. If it was me I would find some type of coping mechanism inside of me that can help me pull through from this predicament. In short, I wanna find a way to stay happy in my gender swapping situation.

Literally this entire situation is pure chaos in its truest form, because no matter what we do, we could never have predicted we would turn in to women. This is something completely random and out of nowhere that we would never expect it, but even if we did, how could have we prevented it (because you know it's weird to spend your whole life as a guy trying to not be a woman).

This is where we would shine in how define ourselves based on our human characteristics, because people can be truly defined how they respond and behave under chaotic conditions. Like I said in my last post, if you turn into a woman, you can either to crazy and depressed or fin the solution you need to carry on. When you apply that to other situations, you might just see how heroes are truly made and that is under chaos itself.

What do you think? Does Chaos make the hero? How can we expect when to become a woman (guy question)? And if so, how can we prevent it? Chinese buffet. . . yes or no? Please leave a comment!

Life Changes

Changes in life can be a constant thing that happens to everyone, yet many of us wish to have simple, stagnant lives. I believe a person can be described by how they behave and overcome change. Someone might loose their job and do nothing but drink and complain how their life sucks, while another might have gotten his car stolen but still managed to get back home and figure out a process to claim his insurance policy to buy a new car and move on. 

When I was 17 in high school, I had my whole life planned out: go to Georgia State University (accepted), apply for a full-ride ROTC Scholarship (pending), then commission into the U.S. Army as a brand new Lieutenant. Unfortunately my mother got sick three days before my eighteenth birthday and died a month later. This didn't crush me (which it did) as much as how it confused me on the outlook of my life. For the first time, how I perceived the world changed in the blink of an eye and I found myself lost and stumbling over what I thought was my goal in life. I lost focus on why I worked hard and 2 weeks later, I went to go see a National Guard recruiter, enlisted, never looked back. It was the push I needed to not only bounce back, but come back stronger to be able to face harder challenges. 

It's a much different experience when someone close to you dies and you have to leave in less then 3 months to face the hardest challenge so far in your life, and then return knowing home isn't the same. From this experience I've learned to make home where you make it as long as you're happy.

What you do you think? Are people best described by their changes? Do you like baking? Please leave a comment!

Sophocles

I found Sophocles's theory on tragedy to be more straight to the point and his characters more human with many flaws. Unlike other stories of tragedies, he wants to illustrate his characters on how they behave and what he or she must do given the harsh circumstances they are in, instead of figuring out why they are in the situation.  Looking at Oedipus the King, we find that even though the oracles say he was fated to kill his father and murder his mother, he still maintain free will throughout the story. We already know what has already happened as readers and audiences, but we are still entertained on how Oedipus acts in his situation.


Reference:
http://osf1.gmu.edu/~lsmithg/astragedy.htm

Class Discussion of Tragedy

When you look at the world and see different languages, culture, governments, religions, physical characteristics, etcetera, you'll find that regardless of the fact that we are all human, we are still different in many ways. Every society has their own way of thinking and how they perceive life. In class we understood that the Greeks saw tragedy as a great fall of someone who was great. With that being said, I believe I'm pretty awesome and a very important person. Just saying. But look at the American point of view. We see tragedy as something bad that has happened to people regardless of their social statues and typically believe that everyone is important in life. Sometimes we are even able to bounce back from something horrific in life that can classify as a tragedy. If you look at the Sandy Hook shooting, we find that no one famous was killed or some messiah. Many of them are children who, to the Greeks, are not important enough for their definition of tragedy, yet we still use the word because we saw the massacre as something horrific. Certain words we see and try to define should be based on how each society sees it and since this is America, I do believe our use of the term tragedy out ways the Greeks term in this country.

What do you think? America's point of view versus Ancient Greek point of view on tragedy? Is it the media's fault for the way we think on the term of tragedy? Can ice cream make you cold or warm? Please leave a comment!

Media Heroes and Heroines

Long ago, people heard about heroes through stories told vocally, or by using some type of writings or drawings. Their were few Heroes as compared today from what I believe is from lack of documentation and the spread of information. That of course has changed over the span of human development and now we here about heroes and heroines, whether or not they are frauds or legit, ever day on the hour of every hour (over exaggerated statement). With the use of social media, internet, and news, the documentation of people's journeys and deeds can be simply publicized to billions of people throughout the world. In Africa, a man might be fighting against corrupt rebels and his story is captured by a reporter who shows it in the New York Times. In Brazil, some middle class American might have given all his savings to help spread his money and knowledge to the poverty and is shown on Facebook (both of which are example). With the knowledge of these modern day Heroes help inspire a lot of our younger generations to get more involved and inspire to do great things.

What do you think? Can Facebook and Instagram be a good source for the awareness of Heroes? Did you know dried fruits and vegetables are not as good for you as thy seem?

How Heroes Affect Our Lives

Regardless of whether the Heroes originated from Homer or from the newest novels of 2015, Heroes generally help define the values, morals, and goals of a society.

The Ancient Greeks would worship Heroes with rituals and offerings for the deeds they have done. Many would view their actions as inspirational, leaving the many to try and continue the same acts the same heroes did. Now a days we don't worship heroes with tribal rituals like the Greeks use to do, but that does not stop us from giving them praise. Modern heroes might get things like awards or parades, even special events catered to their action. Social media has given us a way to show our own praise with things like "shoutouts" on Instagram with a picture of the heroes. This in turn causes people to be all like "Hey! This woman ran into a burning building to save 3 babies, a cat, and some old ladies collection of coins. Maybe I can do some type of good deed today." Heroes can cause people to do amazing things in their lives which is why they define some of our aspects of our society and, I don't want to contradict some of my earlier posts, can be leaders of today by leading by example.

What do you think? Do we praise and worship heroes and heroines today much like how the Greeks did? What do you do to praise our heroes and heroines? Does Sugar cause cancer?

The Creation Story of FrenzHindmanMolinaPate

There are different stories on the topic of how we are created based on different people's culture and morals. The benefit of this class (English 2111) to get the chance to make their own story will give everyone an insight of what some may value and how creative they are. The Fallen Star was an interesting tale especially since half of the tale was based on a female character similar to Eve from the bible. Many creation stories are based either on a male character, or emphasized the importance and inferiority of the woman.

The way they presented the story was in a animated video, which I found to be quit humorous. I have no clue if the actual purpose was to be a little funny, but the look of the dark shadowy based people make the whole story so much fun. But don't let that deceive you. The story is simple, yet to the point. The ending even has a deep emotional point upon the death of one of the couple's children and how the child's death created vegetation. It's even more important to the who plot since a huge part of the conflicts with the characters is hunger.

What do you think? Is it rare that a creation story focuses a lot on a female? Who are you rooting for this season (football)? Please leave a comment!

The Heroes of Today aren't the Heroes of Yesterday

What most people today find as heroes is kind of skewed and misunderstood. Governors will get up and simply talk about labor issues and become a hero to the people it affects. A celebrity has a gender change, they are perceived as heroes to everyone by the media and fans. A mom raising a child can be considered a hero. Are these people truly heroic? Don't get me wrong, these types of people and many more have done great deeds that allow them to earn that respect of praise, but wouldn't they be  more along the line of role models or saints? People who simply do good deeds or done things that expressed themselves or possibly achieved riches like some CEO of a company.

Some don't even deserve praise like Kim Davis, Rowan County Clerk in Kentucky, who is described as a hero to many extreme religious groups. She is thought of a person who has stood up to the Government and the Supreme Court by expressing her moral values of her religion when it came to marriage. Unfortunately the reality of the situation isn't that sugar coated, and her troubles from the federal government came from denying the rights of not just homosexual, but heterosexuals as well, on their ability to gain a marriage certificate. A county clerks position is an elected position just like any political or sheriff position; positions that swear to serve the people and up hold the constitution for their county. So this makes her no different from a corrupt senator going against his/her duties. Of course this is a bit of an extreme example but she is still considered a hero to many and a bad person all the same. Something to think about.

The definition of of heroes has become something more of a personal opinion on a person rather than a title. The Ancient Greeks defined a hero as person who, in the face of danger and adversity or from a position of weakness, display courage, bravery, or self-sacrifice for the greater good. People like our Founding Fathers, Medal of Honor recipients, fire fighters, Martin Luther King Jr., etcetera, and etcetera, are true hero who lead and go above the norm through difficult times that would end their lives or status. Take a look at Moses from the Bible, who lead the Hebrews out of Egypt and away from their destine slavery. 

I would encourage everyone, especially my readers, to at least consider their usage of the word hero. It's one thing to call someone a role model but that doesn't necessarily make them a hero by any true definition. With that said, I cannot make someone believe a certain way, for even the definition of a modern day hero has changed from the ancients times. I believe everyone has the chance and quality to become a hero, and it takes determination and selfless thought, but please don't use the term so loosely.  

For more information, you can go to this site for more understanding on Greek Heroes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hero

Modern Definition of Hero:

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/hero

What do you think? Maybe my view on a bonafide hero is not correct? How do you think the term hero should be used as? Is Venice, Italy sinking or is the water levels rising (Yes! Their is a difference)??? Please leave a comment!

PS: I believe women can be heroes. They are called Heroines! :)

Eroticism

Up until I started my World Literature class this semester, I never really took the time to understand the topic of eroticism. Society has always dubbed it as something inappropriate or something that must be done behind closed doors. For some, it's a topic that will only stay inside the mind of the individual. What I have come to understand is that most people find eroticism to be mainly emotional rather than physical, which I would agree but only for that first part. I thing Eroticism can be physical as well, and I'm not talking about sex. eroticism is something dangerous and misunderstood. It's something people have in their minds that they want to do yet forbidden to actual partake. But what if we do partake in the desire. 

Maybe we are in a relationship with someone and then we find some sort of erotic desire for another and we itch that feeling, but no one knows we went through it. And what we did didn't have to involve sex. 50 Shades of Grey is always on everyone's list of what erotic is, yet their is that physical aspect that the characters participate in. Look at dominatrices for example. What they do is very erotic and very physical on top of emotional. I think eroticism is something you hide and express, dangerous and fun. 

What do you think? Can Erotic desire be physical as well as emotional? Will I ever get an iPhone? Please leave a comment!