Maybe Russian Instead of Chinese?

 In my early adult life I thought that learning Chinese would be super cool and I guess it mostly revolved around my involvement and intensity with table tennis. But now... I have a new passion in life(though I still have a solid love for table tennis, to be fair.) Arm wrestling.

So much of the arm wrestling world speaks Russian and now my desire to know it has overtaken Chinese. I think it would be quite useful and pretty cool. I'm quite positive I don't have the patience or self-discipline to make that happen, though. Seems fun enough to just ponder about the possibility of doing it. Why not? It's kind of a weird dream to have, I guess.

Comedy is the Best Medicine

 Or at the least it's probably my favorite medicine. Admittedly, I would love to become adept at grinding it out with comedic quality on the regular, but I know it's a tall order. Seems like a worthy effort to make the attempt at least... though, it definitely could be a massive emotional shift in my approach to written and spoken media. I am in such a mellow mood at the end of each day. Gotta put the humorous ideas down during the day so I can maybe find the inspiration a little easier at night.

I saw a bunch of crows having a meeting in the tree outside the back door earlier today... that was kind of a funny sight. They didn't seem amused that I was capturing video of them. A surly, disaffected bunch, they were. I wonder if they scheduled that meeting beforehand?

I Drive Many Miles

 And I enjoy seeing all the beautiful landscapes as I go.

Almost the entire stretch between Montana and here was covered in snow so that's always a cool variation of how things normally look. The temperature gradually rose from about 3-degrees to around 30-degrees or so by the time I got home. It's kinda weird how 30-degrees can actually feel warmish because of the contrast.

Something else I noticed about the extreme cold temperatures... I can't really tell how different it feels... like the coldness doesn't really seem to feel colder... rather, it just seems to feel cold faster. Like, the chill seems to just sink into the core quicker. It's kind of hard to explain beyond that but I wanted to make the point anyway.

Anyway... the trip to Montana was a blast. Tons of cool people and great fun was had by all!

The Assumed Premise That I am Quite Possibly Wrong.

 I tend to think this is a great principle to incorporate into one's character. However, this principle alone could be problematic if there aren't other buffering principles in place to bolster it. I'll try to clarify my thoughts on this a bit.

Always assuming I might be wrong should create a measured expectation about the ways things might happen in life. It allows me the grace of actually being wrong, finding out I have made a mistake, or attempting to leverage my influence when it does turn out that I am right. It also increases my gratitude and confidence when things do go right and, in a subtle way, can reinforce any positive actions related to said successes.

One buffering principle that might be importantly valuable to keep said assumptions in their proper context would be the personal allowance for when things have gone wrong and the assumptions have been proven wrong. Knowing the personal value one can gain through making mistakes and learning from them is an exceptional way to balance whatever self-doubt, anxiety, and general negative feelings one would naturally incur in such situations. This principle can even embolden the courage necessary to later attempt any similar actions that can so easily be avoided or squelched by such negativity in the future.

Anyway... maybe none of this is particularly new or inspiring or even entertaining... but that's okay right now. I just thought it could be valuable to explore the concepts while they were on my mind today.

We become what we're good at.

 Or at the very least what we like a lot or what is easy to us. Though, there are some times we take the more challenging route to something new and/or unexpected.

Considering myself as an example I am inclined to see the chain somewhat clearly. My career is that of a professional visual observer(Director of Photography)... which requires my enjoyment of visual framing, my interest in empathetically estimating the things others will enjoy, my love of storytelling, and my enjoyed intensity as it relates to time and pacing. There are smaller factors involved(team work, novelty of the ever-changing scenery, intensity of focus, etc) but everything contributes and I can hardly think of any examples to the contrary. So... what's my point really? Is this a good or a bad thing?

Maybe the basic point is that people are largely guided by what they like and they become what is easiest to become. Not in a condescending way but I think that means most people basically like all the most popular things and sort of become fairly average in most ways that are the easiest things to access because of general ubiquity and support. This essentially means, if my logic is correct, that the non-average(above and below) folks become such because they truly enjoy those things which themselves are not common.

I think the exception to all of this are those who either like, or are incredibly competent at, self-discipline and consistency. Those people become whatever they want to become. They are the heroes by choice. Maybe they deserve an entire blog post all on their own.

What am I good at?

 Because this seems like the first place I should exert some of my creative energy for the vlogs/blogs I am endeavoring to make. I am still needing to get better at talking on camera so aiming at the low hanging fruit of topics just seems like the right idea. Not sure why I didn't think of it right away. So... what are these things?

I think I am pretty good at examining ideas. I make a concerted effort to see all the way to the edges in every direction possible and often try to synthesize potential ramifications of how the idea might be implemented in real life. I think this enables quality interrogation to thoroughly examine the how's and why's that are important to best understand a given thing. Along with this interrogation is the real intent to explore the correct and honest behavior involved regardless of my predisposed perspective beforehand. I am not always willing or capable to fully conform to new information but I definitely do a good job of recognizing truth where it exists regardless.

Well, I'll just leave it here for now. I had at least one more topic I thought of to potentially address here but I am now thinking that one topic per entry seems more feasible and is also less confusing in the afterglow.

Attempt at a thought or two.

 I've recently started vlogging and despite my normal ability to wax philosophical extemporaneously most of the time I seem to lack that swagger when the camera kicks on. So now I am making an attempt to generate ideas through the practice of blogging once again. I seem to have a bit more access to the thinking part of my brain when I do this. Maybe it's just because I've practiced it?

Additionally, I have started writing some thoughts down in the notes app in my phone to aid in this process as well. Today the two things I wrote down will be my main topics to address here.

Is groupthink bad? Or, when is groupthink bad? I realize it can be a beneficial thing from time to time. But is it more frequently the case that it is something one would consider bad? I had the thought today that it might be specifically anti-progressive. Not the political version of progressive specifically but I think it could be applied to that as well. Basically... when staying within the lines of groupthink does innovation become stifled? Or is there the possibility of greater exploration of the nuanced and repetitive? Does it enable a greater form of refinement and polish? I don't really know. I just think it bears some time in reflection and analysis.

Today I discovered that I somehow missed clipping one of my fingernails a few days ago. I am not sure I have ever done that before and it was quite a weird discovery! That means I missed it while clipping the other nails AND I missed it every day since then... have I become that less observant about myself? Very strange. Such is life.