My Life on Earth Project Reflection
Throughout this project, we were introduced to various concepts regarding happiness, existential human existence, and elements that make up a meaningful life. I merely took some of my own existing personal beliefs surrounding these concepts along with some in which I found truth and validity during this project's background research phase. I made many connections throughout this project involving the concept of the golden mean and equilibrium. This was the main and first topic I wanted to play with in my final product for this project. I then thought along the lines of what finds equilibrium really well. Water was a prime choice because it is always trying to find equilibrium. This is found by looking at the opposing force that is bringing it to equilibrium to form a level position where the force of gravity and it are at equilibrium. I found this concept interesting but there was one other main one that I thought was inseparable from the golden mean, and that was impermanence.
Impermanence is and always will be a governing force in the universe. This is how I intended to answer one of the essential questions of this project asking about what brings happiness. Happiness can't be found with a mind of crystalline rigidity but one which comprehends the concept of impermanence and is able to move on and change its existing awareness to orient to the idea that it will pass. The purpose is not found in a rigid mindset but one of slight attraction and non-Newtonian fluid properties of absorption. The last concept which impermanence led into was entropy. Entropy is a governing force in our universe. The general definition of entropy is the gradual decline into chaos and useful energy becoming less useful. This then ties back to the golden mean because entropy is what is attempting to find the ultimate equilibrium in the universe. These are all very universal concepts which the more I looked at different aspects of life the more I realized that they can be found anywhere. We exist with their governing forces working with them seems the only way to find more complete happiness and purpose in life.
This project really made me realize that below the surface of my mind that I did believe some beneficial concepts about life. If I only apply these beliefs and concepts would I be able to move on and above in life to a better vantage point of self improvement? I came to an amazing and revolutionizing realization within Aristotle's concept of the golden mean. We read the book Into The Wild centering around the character Chris McCandless and I realized that the golden mean applies to finances within families very prominently. In the case of Chris, his parents grew up in relatively low-income households so they worked incredibly hard to accumulate more money so that their children would be better off then they were growing up. But despite their best efforts, Chris was the counterbalance to their accumulated wealth he went into self-inflicted poverty. I also found this financial counterbalance to be true in my family also. My great grandfather founded a company called Circle Seal Controls and accumulated quite a bit of wealth through his inventions. My great grandfather and his parents grew up on farms with low incomes and he, like Chris McCandless's parents, worked really hard so that his children did not have that kind of life. What happened is my grandfather went out and told him that he wanted to be a cowboy. Ever since my grandfather has raised cattle has had a middle-class American income counterbalancing for the wealth accumulation of his father. These were just some of the connections I made for the golden mean and its governing force in life. The other two concepts I found within science and various teachings that Buddhist monks believe in to be very insightful; the concepts of impermanence and entropy as described in the first and second paragraphs.
All of this said, there seems to be unlimited questions which go unanswered in my mind about life and my future in it. I wonder what a worthwhile propose is in life really is. Recently, I have traveled to national competitions and to internships and gotten a glimpse outside of the mindset of the town in which I am growing up. In the big cities of this world, I watched people all of the different circumstances going through life in what seems a blind wandering slumber. I do not want to be in that slumber as well, doing something outside the bounds of society and its stereotypes and its technologically driven blind march to the end of an undefinable track. A track without a goal of human contentment or fulfillment in mind but a collective rush something greater? I merely wonder where society is headed in the future if our own human instincts that we are built upon will be our end? How can I take impermanence to heart in a materialistic society? All this to what end? This is the life quest of many with some more successful than others. I would be happy in the end if I was able to get an inkling of eudaimonia, happiness, and fulfillment.
Impermanence is and always will be a governing force in the universe. This is how I intended to answer one of the essential questions of this project asking about what brings happiness. Happiness can't be found with a mind of crystalline rigidity but one which comprehends the concept of impermanence and is able to move on and change its existing awareness to orient to the idea that it will pass. The purpose is not found in a rigid mindset but one of slight attraction and non-Newtonian fluid properties of absorption. The last concept which impermanence led into was entropy. Entropy is a governing force in our universe. The general definition of entropy is the gradual decline into chaos and useful energy becoming less useful. This then ties back to the golden mean because entropy is what is attempting to find the ultimate equilibrium in the universe. These are all very universal concepts which the more I looked at different aspects of life the more I realized that they can be found anywhere. We exist with their governing forces working with them seems the only way to find more complete happiness and purpose in life.
This project really made me realize that below the surface of my mind that I did believe some beneficial concepts about life. If I only apply these beliefs and concepts would I be able to move on and above in life to a better vantage point of self improvement? I came to an amazing and revolutionizing realization within Aristotle's concept of the golden mean. We read the book Into The Wild centering around the character Chris McCandless and I realized that the golden mean applies to finances within families very prominently. In the case of Chris, his parents grew up in relatively low-income households so they worked incredibly hard to accumulate more money so that their children would be better off then they were growing up. But despite their best efforts, Chris was the counterbalance to their accumulated wealth he went into self-inflicted poverty. I also found this financial counterbalance to be true in my family also. My great grandfather founded a company called Circle Seal Controls and accumulated quite a bit of wealth through his inventions. My great grandfather and his parents grew up on farms with low incomes and he, like Chris McCandless's parents, worked really hard so that his children did not have that kind of life. What happened is my grandfather went out and told him that he wanted to be a cowboy. Ever since my grandfather has raised cattle has had a middle-class American income counterbalancing for the wealth accumulation of his father. These were just some of the connections I made for the golden mean and its governing force in life. The other two concepts I found within science and various teachings that Buddhist monks believe in to be very insightful; the concepts of impermanence and entropy as described in the first and second paragraphs.
All of this said, there seems to be unlimited questions which go unanswered in my mind about life and my future in it. I wonder what a worthwhile propose is in life really is. Recently, I have traveled to national competitions and to internships and gotten a glimpse outside of the mindset of the town in which I am growing up. In the big cities of this world, I watched people all of the different circumstances going through life in what seems a blind wandering slumber. I do not want to be in that slumber as well, doing something outside the bounds of society and its stereotypes and its technologically driven blind march to the end of an undefinable track. A track without a goal of human contentment or fulfillment in mind but a collective rush something greater? I merely wonder where society is headed in the future if our own human instincts that we are built upon will be our end? How can I take impermanence to heart in a materialistic society? All this to what end? This is the life quest of many with some more successful than others. I would be happy in the end if I was able to get an inkling of eudaimonia, happiness, and fulfillment.