These days I've been thinking about my purpose. Not the purpose assigned to me by something external, but the purpose I assign for myself. I wanted to answer the question: What should I do (in general)? or What's worth doing? or even more abstractly, What's the point (in the immediate)?

A few things came to mind immediately: "give glory to God", "pursue happiness", "love others", "sustain self" (not in any order). In order to get that answer, I had to ask myself,  "why is it valuable to give God the glory?", or "what's the point in pursuing happiness?", or "why love others?", and "why sustain self?". The greater question here is "What makes something worth doing?"

Alright, well, in order: "Because he's God."; "Because being happy is desirable. [Why?] Because the chemicals in my body told me so."; "Because making others happy leads indirectly to my greater well being. Also, God told me to. [God again.]"; "Because if I don't, then I'll die. [Why not die?] Because the chemicals in my body tell me not to. [the chemicals again]".

So, what makes something worth doing anyway? Well, from our very short list, and some very summarized 'prime factorization' of the points (I don't want to take forever writing this blog. It's just an overview), we've found that the primary motivators in question are God and Body Fluids.

I narrowed down the question to "what makes something valuable?" and then, "Does anything have intrinsic value?".

I decided to assume that God doesn't exist, or that if He does exist then there's no way to verify His intrinsic value (only to see where it took me). The issue where I got stuck was "why will I do anything that's 'valuable?" and "What is the relevance of 'value' to me, if it even exists?"

Skipping some stuff, I realized that I had essentially swept over my entire life and determined that nothing matters unless I decide it matters. I am not saying that value is relative to the person; I'm saying that in the lowest stage of abstraction, I became completely alone. For all intents and purposes, nobody else exists unless I acknowledge them (not just to me, it's absolute [admittedly from my perspective alone]). If a tree falls in the middle of the woods and I don't hear it, I couldn't care less if it exists or not -- even if somehow it "affects" my body indirectly. My body is not a part of me; it's just a medium by which I am able to think clearly until I get brain damage. After that, I might not even be me. Since I have no intrinsic value (all perceived value is only perceived by an assigner), I determine that humanity also has no intrinsic value. If another species wipes out humanity, it's because we were simply inferior sacks of chemicals.

So, the conclusion: in order to avoid an impending death by apathetic starvation, I needed to just "decide" to give value to something. Just one thing, though! Giving value to something is dangerous. If I pick something like "Flies" for example, to be the foundation for value, then everything else which is not productive to the production of flies needs to change or disappear. Flies are now the determining factor and ultimate authority on what has value. Rotting stuff has assigned value, metal doesn't. If a certain area doesn't have enough flies, we'd better get to killing somebody to make more fly food. But lets be more realistic. Lets say the environment has intrinsic significance... actually, that's just utterly depressing. I'm not gonna justify that with any more explanation. Another one I'm not gonna justify is "I alone am intrinsically significant". That's pathetic, lazy, and ultimately it doesn't work anyway.

Lets say that "People" have intrinsic significance. Now we're getting somewhere, but it's not quite good enough. People are self-destructive; what if person A wants to kill person B, but person B wants to live. Whose desires are more significant? Suppose we narrow it down to "human life", and this will get us very close to the right answer, but then we're able to take away a human's freedom in order to preserve their life. If we're to give intrinsic value to "all life" and "freedom", then we run into issues with "conflicting wills" and "what is really free?". Is the minority free if the majority votes against them? Are people still free if they unanimously elect a ruthless dictator who takes away all their other freedoms? The election was free.

The "God Given Rights" recognized in the U.S. are a pretty good attempt at giving intrinsic value to something other than God, and I'm not gonna get into the issue with those.

Long story short, the answer was God. I have to choose to give God value, and then everything else falls into place. I'm sure you're all well capable of extrapolating from here.

"How ya doin?"

Found this band:

They're pretty good, I think :)
Great music for relaxing/working, but not so chill that it puts you to sleep.

Also been listening to Bon Iver, As Cities Burn, and Matisyahu more lately.

I've got some great imaginary conversations in my head these days.

Wish I had more time to write them out.

Tomorrow's plan:

1100 wake up
1200 chapel
1300 brunch
1330 start studying 특허법
1745 dinner
1900 DSP
2030 특허법
0130 bed

In my spare time, (and in my busy time), I've been watching TwitchPlaysPokemon. We're pretty close to beating the E4. I hope the save file gets released for download.

Also, I've been working on compiling a wishlist for the soundtrack to the game I'm working on :). Still need a few more songs, to flesh out all the parts of the game that need unique music.

This song is on the wishlist, and I've been kindof addicted to it lately:

Also, this song is pretty cool:

"I don't think you realize how this works."

Ozzie Nelson...I love this song.

The Cass Eliot version has a better YouTube recording, but I kinda like the grainy vinyl sound.

I've been really back and forth lately about what I like. I dig the mellow electronic stuff and some hip-hop (the kind which is written by people with self respect), but I can't seem to escape the oldies. These are the stations on my Pandora Shuffle right now:

StarF***er
Hiromi and Chick Corea
Ratatat
Billie Holiday and Ella Fitzgerald
Psyche O and Nujabes

(Each with an assortment of likes and dislikes, of course).

This week I've been taking some time to appreciate the lessons I've learned from my mistakes in the past. Without getting into detail... ;;; I'm really blessed by God's grace and forgiveness. I'm a better person, in part, because of the way God has used my guilt to push me away from repeating my mistakes. I still feel regrets because of some things... but that's because I now am able to see how strongly my actions affect the people around me, and how much my words and actions also affect myself (as well as the other way around). I feel like people are going to read this and think "Zac's being melodramatic," or "Zac hasn't done anything that bad. He's just a first-world kid with exaggerated problems." Don't suppose that things I've done fit on some scale of good and bad that you've conceived of.

Without defeating myself here... it's the little things that bother me the most. Big things, like going to jail, send a clear message: "don't do that again!". The things that bother me the most are things I've gotten away with. They say you're only in trouble if you get caught, but... I think it's much easier to let go of your guilt if you've been punished for it. I guess the point here is that I'm really blessed that God has given me the ability to self-analyze. I recognize my regrets, experience them, learn from them, and then let them pass over me like clouds -- becoming new. I've done a few things I really really wish I could apologize to somebody for... God, please continue to mold me into the person you want me to be. And don't cut me any slack.

Also, I made my blog a little wider, but I'm not sure if I like the way the header sits on it. I'm gonna experiment with the dimensions more later.

"because the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and he chastens everyone he accepts as his son."

These days I've been distracted. I've been pretty stressed, and I feel like I've been neglecting my relationships. My work load isn't even that big. It just feels weighty. My job is contingent on my graduation, and my marriage is contingent on my job. Also, somehow, I just always have something in my schedule.

Last semester, late in, I deleted all my video games to make room for studying for finals. I figured I'd install them again at the beginning of this semester, and delete them around midterms if they were hurting my productivity. So I deleted them again on Wednesday. In their place, I have about 150 pages of reading material about patent law and intellectual property.

My piano teacher's husband didn't wake up, and when he was rushed to the hospital they found three tumors in his brain, and so they both need prayer. Also, My good friend is in a custody battle with her ex husband, and she needs prayer for that.

Didn't get much sleep this week. Monday and Tuesday it was video games; Wed-Fri it was homework.Also, every time I'm about to stop writing this blog, a song I like comes up on Pandora.

Tomorrow is Saturday. I have all the time in the world to get my long-desired sleep. I can push it off for another 3:55...

"This is the promise of our liberty."

The Blue Dream, considering the bitterness of her guilt and overwhelming sorrow, doesn't know if it's what she's meant to feel. A specter; the nostalgic imaginings of a former friendship, which has never been too far out of reach for her to attempt to grasp it, is now completely obscured by a wall of awkward social complexes. It's what we're trained to give-up against, even when opposed by the deepest longings of her heart and the hole left in it by a Red King.

I know better, and want nothing more than that my darling, Chowon, will never forget that I love her. I want an honest friendship that lasts forever -- humble and fearless. With God's blessing, I can give that to Chowon and work toward her happiness forever, experiencing great joy whenever her sincere smile is given back to me.

Dear Father in Heaven, please bless my friends with peace in their lives. More than anything, please give them a full sense of your love for them.

"I met the devil and I stared her in the eyes. Her hair had scales like silver serpents; I, a statue, stood there mesmerized. I took the fire escape and made it out alive. Yeah, I still burn from time to time, but I have a healing hand against my side"