Conventional is a good fallback position isn't it

It's quite funny that this is the blog topic of this week because the book I was reading last night was talking close to this topic, 'there are two basic ways people try to find happiness and fulfillment: the way of moral conformity and the way of self-discovery. Each acts as a lens colouring how you see all of life, or as a paradigm shaping your understanding of everything. Each is a way of finding personal significance and worth, of addressing the ills of the world, and of determining right from wrong. '  - The Prodigal God, Tim Keller.

This book discusses the simple biblical story of the Prodigal son but what is very different is that it looks at the older brother who was just as lost as his wild brother who went on a journey of self discovery. The older brother was the one who conformed but to a point where he lost himself and touch with what was important.

Beefcakes baby!

Beefcakes was the chosen lunch spot today with two of my girlfriends. Perfect fun place to discuss our Thailand trip!

This joint is perfectly described as,' I felt like I’d chanced upon Barbie’s hidden lair – a pink fantasy of feather boa’s, fairy lights and Florida flamingo’s arranged in compromising positions. I couldn’t help but check out the muscle bound waiters in tight T-shirts. They can’t have got that buff by eating the burgers, so I figured they were probably lifting them. '

Beefcakes is a 50’s American diner, complete with super burgers, fabulous entertainment , gorgeous waiters and downstairs bar, Studio 54 (for men only).

The only challenge of our Beefcake experience, other than trying to not stare at the barmen, was wondering how to pick the generous burgers up. After overcoming that little challenge we cleaned our plates. The burgers were indeed legendary due to size and taste with a hugely generous side salad!

Great food, decent prices, fun venue and warm, speedy service -a big tick from me!!

A mid-weekend, mid – assignment overload night out.

Everyone goes on about how it’s important to have a life work balance. This can sometimes be impossible when major assignments are due right on top of each other.

A group of my friends and I all in the overwhelming work position decided that a little dance was what was needed to shake off the blues. We headed to Deco Dance in Seapoint, where we danced to 80s tunes, played by DJs in their 60s. At one stage the DJ was talking on one of those brick cellphones while playing a tambourine. BIZARRE.

We had such a fabulous time!  The 1.5 hrs night on the dance floor was the perfect kick to get the motivation back into our fingertips.

You can’t chase two rabbits at the same time.

I’ve been silly enough to try and catch two rabbits at the same time, in the practical sense. When rabbits escape from their hutch they always seem to run in two different directions.

A martial arts student approached his teacher with a question. “I’d like to improve my knowledge of the martial arts. In addition to learning from you, I’d like to study with another teacher in order to learn another style. What do you think of this idea?”

“The hunter who chases two rabbits,” answered the master, “catches neither one.”

What could this mean to me in a deeper sense?  Setting your sights on one particular goal is more likely to be successful than trying to split your efforts between two goals.  

Learning to sell myself...in a good sense of course

Gosh, I’m finding it hard to ‘sell myself’ it even makes me a little embarrassed. At the moment I am filling out lots of graduate application forms for next year. It seems the graduate application process is a highly competitive business. I’m guessing the trick is to make your application stand out from the hundreds of others.  I have been told that for the many interviews that I may experience in my life I’ve got to come across as the best person for the job and so ‘sell myself’ so here’s to learning how!

‘Nothing is more dangerous than an idea if it’s the only one you have’

I love this quote by John Arnold, ‘Ideas are the sparks of light that leap from creative abrasions. They come unbidden and dance just beyond our fingertips. They can be crystal clear to us and as clear as mud to others. They are total fun and total frustration, both rolled into one. ‘

When you can only see life in black and white and no shades of grey, things can get dangerous. Émile-Auguste Chartier more commonly known as Alain puts this very well ‘Nothing is more dangerous than an idea if it’s the only one you have’.  Alain, born in 1886 was a famous French philosopher, journalist, and pacifist

Alain wrote various publications and the most important of these was interestingly named, The Dreamer, 81 chapters about the spirit and passions, About Happiness, Mars, and The citizen against powers.

What I think Alain was trying to highlight is the dangers of fundamentalism and single mindedness.

FuN RuN

It's great to have a goal, something to work towards. My current goal is to complete the Total Sports Womens run in relative ease, without stopping. The race is happening this coming Tuesday morning in Stellenbosch. It's been surprisingly nonpainful training up for the race with refreshing afternoon runs in Tokai Forest with my trusty, running partner by my side. Send me energising thoughts while I hit the Winelands Road, while you're enjoying a lie in on the public holiday!

Have u figured out the second head fake?

The title of this blog is one of Randy Pausch famous quotes. Pausch was a  Professor of Computer Science, Human-Computer Interaction, and Design at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. He was dignosed with pancreatic cancer with only a few months to live. Pausch achieved worldwide fame for his speech 'The Last Lecture' in which the line ' have you figured out the second head fake' appears.
Below is the 2008 CMU Graduation Speech written by Pausch. I found it very powerful.

We don't beat the reaper by living longer, but by living well, and living fully — for the reaper will come for all of us. The question is: what do we do between the time we're born and the time he shows up.

I assure you I've done a lot of really stupid things, and none of them bother me. All the mistakes, and all the dopey things, and all the times I was embarrassed — they don't matter. What matters is that I can kind of look back and say: pretty much any chance I had to do something cool I tried to grab for it — and that's where my solace comes from.

It is not the things we do in life that we regret on our death bed. It is the things we do not. Find your passion and follow it. And if there is anything that I have learned in life, you will not find that passion in things. And you will not find that passion in money. Because the more things and the more money you have, the more you will just look around and use that as the metric — and there will always be someone with more. Your passion must come from the things that fuel you from the inside. That passion will be grounded in people. It will be grounded in the relationships you have with people and what they think of you when your time comes.