Sunday, October 21, 2001

I’ve been working through a lot of personal issues lately. This mental wrestling match culminated with a realization on Saturday night that I carry inside me an immense ball of pride. For the past day, I’ve tried to train myself to drop that ball of pride, and it’s been an amazing, purifying experience. I feel clean and real when I stop thinking of myself as so important.

I realized that everything I have came from someone. Everything in my room, that I “own,” was at some level the product of some other person. Even flowers grow without our help.

This does not mean that I consider myself a lowly worm with no reason to live or be proud of my accomplishments. I have talents which I can use to create beauty. However, I’m realizing that I’ve been focusing on me and excluding the work that is to be done. “You can’t build your reputation on what you’re going to do,” said Henry Ford. I’ve been assuming my reputation and ignoring the do part.

So. Writers are told to be naked for their readers; I’ve exposed myself for enough of this entry.

I painted Lady’s computer case, which you can see to the right. I’m happy with it.

Tomorrow morning I’ll mail three video tapes to a member of the Otakon 2001 staff, and he’ll put copies of the Otakon 2001 Anime Music Video Contest overflow screenings on the tapes. So, I should have hours of anime music videos to watch when the tapes arrive back here in a couple of months. The AMV that I entered in the contest should be on one of those tapes, too, so I’ll enjoy having a tape of that.

Hmmm. I should also describe my mini-adventure at Kairos, but I’m tired. I’ll try to remember to write about that tomorrow.