Can't I Just Write My Own Story?

A name is a powerful thing. A name decides a first impression. Some people have a cute, creative story behind their name. Me? Not so much. My parents wanted a "M" name so I would be named after my mother's late mother whose name was Margaret. My parents allowed my oldest brothers to pick my name, one wanted Michelle, and one wanted Mara. My oldest brother looked up the meaning of Mara in hebrew and discovered it meant "bitter" in hebrew. This was his reasoning for me to not be named Mara. Obviously that was not successful.
My name thus far in my life has not bothered me one way or another. However, I am worried that my last name will affect my career later in life. If I stick with my current plan, which is to become a lawyer, I don't want anyone to be able to say my success is only because of who my parents are. My oldest brother, bless his heart, is a lawyer whose success, while well deserved, was enhanced by his parents success. I want my success to be individual. The ability to be old look back on my life and say I worked my ass off and it payed off.
On the same pattern I think Gogol found himself disconnected from his name because it was not actually his name. He knew from when he was little that his name was a last minute decision that was forced, it was not thoughtful and was not special to him. It also tore him between not only his two heritages but a third culture which he felt a relation to but distantly.
Getting to write your own destiny is a dream, a fairytale, but just sitting along for the ride is ridiculous.
I want to write my own story, not my destiny, but my story, it is influenced by everything else but I still get to make the decisions. Forget my name, forget the drama. Just live.

If You're a Bird… I'm a Bird. Unless I Can Be a Unicorn.

People say to follow their families. You are your family and whatnot. 
Culturally my family is… complex. 
On my dads side of the family I have Russian, Polish, German, and Israeli. On my moms side I have Irish, Italian, French, and a lot of European. But since we very rarely celebrate any of the holidays or customs associated with any of these cultural backgrounds, I learned more about our religious background. My dads family was Yiddish and Jewish, while my mom grew up Catholic. I went to a Jewish preschool and have gone to services on the high holidays every year, also I have either been in or taught hebrew school since I was 5. 
Clearly I did not grow up Catholic. 
Every child who grew up Jewish celebrates their thirteenth birthday with a ceremony. I had a horrendous Torah portion and since then have not really associated my self with being Jewish. 
That was enough knowledge of my families background that I did not want to be associated with any of that. I know that means I am not following the path of my family, but I decided I want to make my own path. 
I never met my grandparents and do not know what values they have. My family was always more concerned with political values than religious or cultural. 
Growing up in an extremely Liberal house with very prominent advocates for liberalism affected my brother and I differently. My youngest brother grew to hate every aspect of law, of liberalism. He has become a conservative mostly just to annoy my parents, and was determined to not have anything to do with law in his job when he grew up. He moved as far across the country as he could, as soon as he could. 
I separated myself from my families opinions but I still find liberalism and law really interesting. 
While I think my youngest brother and I both found it challenging to grow up in such an opinionated house where growing up there was a right way and a wrong way, I also think we learned to separate ourselves from it. 
If you were to ask me what I want to be when I grow up I would say a lawyer. If you asked me where I wanted to live, I would have to think about it and say that I still have to decide between the east coast and England. Far away from home, far away from the traditions that make my family who they are. 
Most people when asked about their heritage and family traditions talk about cultural differences they have from their family. Since my family is not culturally specific, I went with the only traditions I ever knew.

I like him he likes her

Humans are idiots. It is hard to sugar coat it, we truly are idiots. But we also are able to do amazing things, create technology, fall in love, fight and be create beauty. That is a contradiction. We are both idiots and geniuses. Almost everyone contradicts themselves at some point. I do it when I am beyond frustrated when some people stutter or say uh, uhm, or like but then I find myself doing it constantly. 
I say I hate trashy teenage novels, that they are immature and remind me far to much about high school. And I have shelves of it at home in my room.
I hate pretentious people.
According to my brother I am pretentious for spelling everything like I am from Europe.
People who spend so much time on themselves that they do not notice when others are hurt.
Just the other day I was talking to a friend and I was so worried about what everyone thought, I didn't even notice that he was depressed and reserved.
We all hate things that we are victims of doing ourselves. 
But if we all were perfect models of the images that we wish to be, what would be the aim of our lives, what would be our new years resolutions. 

“Things change. And friends leave. Life doesn't stop for anybody.”

           For this weeks blog prompt our teacher is helping us think through our upcoming essay. We were asked to pick between a few different movies and talk about the single story it discusses in comparison to Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe. I chose to compare the documentary "Miss Representation" to Things Fall Apart, however, I am going to make the opposite point then perhaps he expects me to make. Miss Representation is about how women are portrayed in the media, and how their representation in media affects them. 
           The single story that the film is trying to portray is that women are being degraded, everyone believes that girls are taught from a very young age that looks are all that matter, and boys are taught only to judge a women based on her looks. It is constantly said that if only women could break away from this stereotype then maybe we could have powerful women as leaders. Here is the problem I have with this statement. It would be simple for women to make that change, not easy but simple. Change is never easy, and is never comfortable. Revolutions were held to free from oppressive governments, and slaves rebelled when there was inequality. These revolutions and rebellions were not easy, they were not comfortable, but they did happen. Why can't women do the same thing? It has been talked about for generations that the media is responsible for the digression of women. But the media is only showing what people want to watch. To be fair would the majority of the population rather watch a show where all women are dressed the same, in unflattering clothes, with a unflattering lack of makeup, and where they all are peacefully debating intellectual questions, or would you rather watch a crap TV show with four beautiful girls backstabbing each other in comedic plot twists and fighting over hot romantic leads? Blaming the media for the digression is not fair, really blaming the entire population would have better results. 

       There is another fault in blaming the media for the bad example that is being set for women, history. If one were to look back in history before the media was even a concept they would notice the vanity that was important among women. Examples as early, and earlier, as the French Revolution show that women were judged by their looks, in addition to women being judged by other women, men made assumptions of a women based on her looks and demeanour. 

     I chose this film to write about in my essay because I believe there is a false accusation being held against the media in terms of women gender stereotypes. 

The title is a quote from Perks of Being a Wallflower  by ― Stephen Chbosky

“As long as she thinks of a man, nobody objects to a woman thinking.” ― Virginia Woolf

And to an extent it is true. People form opinions, it is natural and not a good thing. Whether a person wants to or not, the second they learn a new fact they make an opinion on it. There is one exception  fora person making an opinion. If they don't think about it at all. 
I often try to block out thoughts that are not pleasant, thinking of something depressing and sad. Thinking of possible starving children in Africa, not the same as thinking of unicorns and homework. I couldn't have a stereotype for Africa because before reading Things Fall Apart I had not even thought about it. Realising that I had been so blind to the rest of the world though did make me thing of things that have been going on with a new clarity, accepting the bad and the good of the world.

Procrastination is what I am a pro at

           In this Ted Talk Dan Pink talks about why it is so hard for people to get motivated and how easy it can be to get motivated. I picked this Ted Talk because procrastination is something I consistently struggle with. I wish to get my homework done the day it is assigned and although I know that i really should just sit down and make myself do it, I always find myself putting it off until much later.
            In Pink's Ted Talk it is revealed how easy it can be for someone to get motivated. My favourite part of this message is not how he describes how incentives ruin business in the twenty first century, but how if you are doing what you love to do, you won't need motivation. Particularly if you are in pursuit of picking either a major, or a job, pick something you will love.
             By living the life you want to live you will always be inspired to progress further. For the most part, I do not care for Ted Talks because these are people who are paid to say things. They are controlling their views so as not to appear to controversy. Although some may speak against these things, they are most certainly doing one of those things right then. Dan Pink is procrastinating taking a next step in his life by remaining focused on this one point.