Success Manifesto

Wow Mike, it sounds like you want to be a Communications Studies scholar like myself. => And you thought business was a better major...

Anyway, some great reading to answer your questions:

-Edward Hall, "The Silent Language"
-Paul Cobley, "The Communication Theory Reader" (bad title, interesting concepts)
-Neil Postman, "Teaching as a Subversive Activity"

When I started taking Communications classes, I never realized how many interesting questions, concepts and ideas would come up. It truly is amazing. For example, in response to question three, languages often have more words for the ideas/concepts that are most important in that culture. Some Eskimo tribes have hundreds of words for snow.

It is my belief that the English language is missing a lot of key words. For example, since I was very young, if I was nervous about something I would visualize myself doing it. If I knew somebody who did what I wanted to do well, I would imagine I was them and I could do it just as easily. I never paid much attention to these strategies though, because I did not really know how to communicate about them. In the past few years, I have learned that other people sometimes do the same thing and that they have names: visualization and borrowed genius. Having a way to talk about them has helped me to develop my thinking around them and to use them more to my benefit.

From a traditional Chinese Five Element perspective, the emotions of love, happiness, joy, etc, fall under the category of the Fire Element. One of the organs in this element is the Heart, keeping in mind that in Chinese Med we think of each organ having 3 bodies if you will: physical, mental, and spiritual.

It is blatantly obvious that our culture's Fire element is severely out of balance. Heart Disease is the number one killer, we have love songs, break up songs, romantic comedies, we see sex everywhere. You see people trying to find that special person while playing the field...

In order to 'suceed' we are taught to be cerebral, intellectual. SATs, Test Scores, College Prep, BAs, MAs, MBAs, etc.

Our miraculous bodies instinctively want to nourish our Fire, as you can see by all the phenomena, but in our daily lives it's just 'work work work' and no time for hard core-let go-trust in the universe L O V E.

In regards to your question about the English language and Love. We feel as if we have a million ways to 'say' the emotion, but do we really?

For example, when I tell my mother 'I love you' it means that I love the light in her eyes,her cute accent and the way she puts clips in her hair.

When I tell my Spiritual Teacher 'I love you' it means that the innermost part of me...that part that has no name, no form, no identification with anything other than just existing, recognizes that he, too, is part of that Ocean of Existence.

Do you see what I mean?

Jaja...on a sidenote, great work on boggling. It's definitely great reading. Kudos on putting down those magically weird things that we all think about and just let go.