Philosophical Exploration

I was enticed upon hearing the lamentations of a fellow friend to explore this topic with full attention.

The day began at 6 A.M, looming slowly with dark insinuations of a stormy weather and the patience of a big game hunter stalking its hapless prey. Nature it had seemed, decided to be the patient and unforgiving hunter whilst I assumed the involuntary role of the unsuspecting prey. It was nevertheless a normal day, despite the aspects of the gloomy weather and the depressing show. In fact, the day was so ridiculously bound to the definition of normal that it can only be surmised by saying that it was a day safe and secure in the rigidity of my everyday routine. Normality was bliss.

However on this average day in the short 17 years of my waking life, my friend leaned over to me in class as he would in any other normal day and said: "I wish teachers wouldn't take me for granted. I'm actually quite smart when the situation calls for it."

Now while perhaps not verbatim of his exact words, honestly deep within ourselves, who of course doesn't want to say or perhaps doesn't want to believe in that? "I'm really quite smart, if only I put my mind to it."

Everyone does it. I say it to myself everyday as I strive to begin my work. "I'm actually quite hardworking and intelligent... Ah, let me just do this first..." My brother says it every night before he skips class the next morning.
My other friend tells me the same thing as we both go for one more round of DoTA, blissfully care-free of the harsh consequences of our actions the next day. "I'm really smart, if only I put my mind to it."

Yet now, everyday as I look back on the increasing amounts of times I have managed to delude myself into believing I was actually getting smarter by not actually using my mind, I am quite astonished. The reality that we as human beings can never comprehend is that while one may rejoice at getting 90+% on the test that one didn't study for (and yet others who did scored worse), that person is actually doing something significantly worse: gambling on pure coincidence.

The significance of what I have just mentioned is that those who do work are actually implementing a larger and better percentage of their brain power than those who do not. I unfortunately fall in the category of the latter. I do not work- hence while I may actually seem to be scoring higher, I am actually failing myself as I do not work to understand the significance of the actions that working can do for someone. We are defined not by the significant actions of our lives but rather the everyday actions of our everyday routines.

For example, if Bob in his routine is lazy to put butter for his waffles in the morning, the subsequent mornings that follow should see an increase in the percentage that Bob is lazy to put butter for his waffles everyday henceforth. If Nadia in her routine is scared to go walk down a darker path, the subsequent mornings that follow should see a decrease in the percentage that Nadia is to walk down dark PATHS. Psychologically, this is operant conditioning. Social colloquially, this is called reinforcing habits or rather making character.

Further implementation of this perspective be interpreted as so: Should Bob in his routine be lazy to put butter for his waffles, he may thus assign a reason for doing so. That reason however can be implemented in his everyday routines as so forth: he might be lazy to go to a doctor's appointment, he might be lazy to go down the street for healthier food than McDonald's right across his office, he might be lazy to go exercise regularly.

All these actions, Bob can thus attribute his similar reason of laziness to placing butter on his waffles, and before one knows it, Bob has a heart-attack and dies at the age of 32. Doctors would say his unhealthy routine was the main decisive factor of his heart-attack. I would attribute the main decisive factor of his unhealthy routine to the small actions of laziness inherent in his mind, which in turn is the cause of his heart-attack.

A second implementation of this perspective can be interpreted as so: Should Nadia in her routine be scared to walk down that dark path that one day, she may thus assign a reason for doing so as well.

That reason then can too be used to supplement her increasingly cowardly actions of her day to day routine, which may take place in such a hypothetical chain of events. She may at first thus be scared to drive her car at night, which may then proceed to cause a fear to drive her car. She then has to take the subway, and due to an unpredictable factor in her life, cause her to take the subway late one night. She thus walks home at night when the shortest path to her warm home is cast in darkness due to faulty maintenance. She, not wanting to walk home in the darkness, takes a scenic route home; arriving at her apartments later than a safe time would be. She then encounters two muggers at her apartment, who eventually rape her and leave her dying, fleeing with blood stained cash and her ripped Gucci purse.


In both implementations of this perspective, the worst-case scenarios are depicted. Of course, Bob and Nadia could have overcame their fears if they simply wanted to. But the consequence of their everyday actions implied that they could not, no matter what the case would be. This led to a somewhat predictable series of events that have logical conclusions. As for Bob, his heart-attack may not be as dramatic as at 32, but perhaps at 40, 45. As for Nadia, she may not happen to encounter muggers or have to walk down roads darkened by human fault, but one day, she probably would.

And so at the end of such a long psychological view-point; I think and ponder about my friends situation. You may be indeed smart and have an IQ of perhaps 130. Perhaps even more. But if you do not choose to depict yourself in a way that is effusive with the idea of intelligence and respect for yourself, you are only setting yourself on a road of disappointment and stereotypes.


As for my friend, he wears beach shorts and has three piercings on his ears, two on his left and one on his right. Or was it vice-versa? This individual might begin to sound familiar, but I simply wish to get down the reality upon him. He doesn't exactly conduct himself in a manner that is condusive towards learning, and he doesn't depict himself in a way that would earn the respect of his teachers. So I ask him, How exactly do you plan to assert yourself in the way that you wish if how you show yourself contradicts the your wishes?