{"id":3091,"date":"2012-01-28T18:35:01","date_gmt":"2012-01-29T00:35:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/wordsintobytes\/?p=3091"},"modified":"2022-11-05T12:36:43","modified_gmt":"2022-11-05T17:36:43","slug":"composing-ones-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/wordsintobytes\/themes\/composing-ones-life\/","title":{"rendered":"Composing One&#8217;s Life: Changes of State"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<!--\nGPlus Timestamp\nGPlus Permalink:\nThis was copied from Takeout.\nThe pull quote doesn't show up as formatted in the iPhone main page. (I tested it without the excerpt).\n-->\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-pullquote\"><blockquote><p>If each moment in time is robbed of the context of its preceding and succeeding moments, then we lose all sense of composition<\/p><cite>M Sinclair Stevens<\/cite><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>In order to evaluate and review the writing software, Scrivener, I experimented by applying a novel template to a chunk of text from my college journals. How easy it was to find a narrative in events that happened long ago, to see the symbols, motifs, and narrative arc.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"cont\">Milan Kundera says that guided by our sense of beauty, we transform coincidences into motifs and compose our lives. Science concurs. Humans are naturally entranced by patterns, by symmetry, by creating connections in order to impose meaning on random circumstances.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"cont\">From a distance the patterns are obvious. Was my life so much more interesting then? Now it seems to be only a bunch of stuff that happens, disconnected, lacking composition and, so, lacking meaning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"cont\">The arc of a story is easier to see when one knows both endpoints of the arc. Living in the middle of a life, in the middle of the story, it\u2019s difficult to see where it is going unless there is a clearly defined goal. If we don\u2019t know how the story ends, it\u2019s hard to know what the story is. Stories rely on transformation, a change of state, an evolution of one\u2019s own character, a change in one\u2019s circumstances or scene.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"cont\">Identifying the change of state is easier to do in some parts of life than others. Everyone has his coming of age story. Some of us experience a sudden change in circumstance: loss of a job, birth of a child, a country torn apart by war. Others overcome adversity: surviving an accident or illness, coping with the death of a child, struggling to achieve a goal. <strong>A change of state forces us to examine all we\u2019ve taken for granted.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"cont\">We are often advised to live in the present moment. I find that idea repulsive because you cannot observe process, change, in a single data point. If each moment in time is robbed of the context of its preceding and succeeding moments, then we lose all sense of composition. A single note is not music. The beauty and meaning of each moment is apparent only in relationship to every other moment; as part of the puzzle and pattern of one\u2019s life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--\nGPlus Discussion Interesting but not reformatted yet\n\n+1'd by: Eiji Kumamaru, Eileen O'Duffy, Celtaur Theron, Sophie Sheppard, Jim Gomes, Ferdinand Zebua, Keiko Watanabe, Nina Pelletier, Juliette Wade, O'Neil Godfrey, Ulrike Singer-Bayrle\nReshared by: Jason Chapman, Alex M. Pruteanu\nNina Pelletier Brilliantly put, Sir. Jan 10, 2012\nKathy Talley-Jones Having been in memoir classes where people don't see the patterns or need for patterns, don't see the transformation, don't see the outcomes--this resonates.\n\nWhere I'd differ, I think, is on living in the moment. Attempting this, I find, embeds those moments in memory. Otherwise, I'm too caught up in the context, and a moment that could serve as raw material is undistinguished \/ extinguished. But perhaps you are thinking of this differently than me? Jan 10, 2012\nAmy Sundberg I really enjoy thinking of my life as a story. It also helps to give me a different perspective and encourage me to take risks and live a bit larger than I otherwise would. \n\nI think living in the moment means different things to different people. I don't think it has to mean that you aren't aware of context, or don't spend time introspecting and being aware of patterns in your life and around you. Sometimes, though, it helps me bring my focus back to what I am doing or can be doing right now, which helps me actually do stuff. \ud83d\ude42 Jan 10, 2012\nM Sinclair Stevens +Kathy Talley-Jones The \"living in the moment\" advice has always rubbed me wrong. Perhaps if I interpreted more like \"being present in the moment\", I wouldn't react so negatively to it. I do believe that it is important to pay attention and to observe and that I often spend too much time distracted (or distracting myself) from what is in front of me.\n\nI just get into trouble when people tell me not to dwell on the past or worry about the future. I love seeing the familiar echoes of past patterns and imagining all the trajectories of future arcs. My current problem is that my life is too still, too focused on the here and now. A bit stagnant, I think. Jan 10, 2012\nM Sinclair Stevens Maybe I need to pay more attention to narrative dead ends.\n\n\"Writing a biography of a modern public figure is harder than writing a novel. While an artist can create or abstract a narrative theme that ties all his facts together, real lives are full of distractions, narrative dead ends, inexplicable incidents, coincidences, and contradictions.\" -- Mike Godwin\n\nhttp:\/\/reason.com\/archives\/2012\/01\/10\/steve-jobs-the-inhumane-humanist Jan 11, 2012\nKathy Talley-Jones M, perhaps it's time for a trek somewhere! @ your next thought, think how awful most biopics are--trying to tell the story of a life in 100 minutes. We think of the great impersonations (Marion Cotillard...), but the narrative of the movies is usually a horrible hash. Jan 11, 2012\nNina Pelletier +Amy Sundberg I'm using your comment as my motivational speech of the day \ud83d\ude42 Jan 11, 2012\nnomad dimitri +M Sinclair Stevens : another pregnant post. as you would expect, i take issue with your repulsion with \"the moment\" but you do sweeten the stance in your comment & i do agree with the distinction. rather than supporting the moment, let me just observe how often the narrative of one's life acts as a prison or straight-jacket, nicely epitomized by the adage \"story of my life.\" the story can become the identity which, in asian thought, is a prison. living in the moment means attempting to open a window.\ni, as again you might expect, enjoy that you are now posting more personally. to balance scrivener, can i suggest Mathews: http:\/\/astore.amazon.com\/httpsites0443-20\/detail\/1564781682\n\n-->\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The beauty and meaning of each moment is apparent only in relationship to every other moment; as part of the puzzle and pattern of one\u2019s life. <\/p>\n<div class=\"belowpost\"><a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/wordsintobytes\/themes\/composing-ones-life\/\">Read More<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[337],"tags":[73,333],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/wordsintobytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3091"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/wordsintobytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/wordsintobytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/wordsintobytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/wordsintobytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3091"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/wordsintobytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3091\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4975,"href":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/wordsintobytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3091\/revisions\/4975"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/wordsintobytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3091"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/wordsintobytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3091"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zanthan.com\/wordsintobytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3091"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}