Dreams, Shortlist Part One

I decided to take the 100 dreams list I constructed the other day and select a shortlist from it. Below are the ones I feel are the most realistic and the most doable currently.

10. To write everyday.

19. To overcome obesity.

22. To return to graduate school and finish that masters degree.
23. To become healthier mentally.
38. To weight train at least 5 times a week regularly.
71. To try to be more assertive and introduce myself to people who I want to introduce myself to.

The first one, #10 "To write everyday" right now may be the easiest, simply because it is always accessible to me, and I can start it anytime I want to. Also I am always writing something anyways whether it be a blog entry, an email, a text message, a wall posting on Facebook, a status on Facebook or MSN, or.....you get the drift. My life seems to have a constant textual mobility character to it, always contextualized in some written way online. I am yet to actually do this, but I want to record the amount of time I spend writing online . Not including web surfing, searching, watching videos, but just writing stuff. Anything. And then, analyze the content I create for discourse and meaning critically. That would be a very interesting autoethnographical study.

However, that doesn't pay the bills at the moment. Nothing is right now, and I have to get moving in a real form of employment at the moment. (Though, many would argue that creating web content can be a form of employment, and in a very lucrative way - which elludes me for the most part; how does one make a career of blogging, posting, writing, podcasting, etc.? Someone must know? There is a web-class on social utility communication coming up in a couple of weeks on guyguidetoronto.com which perhaps will answer these questions)

Back to the other items on the shortlist.

Regarding #19 "To overcome obesity". OY!!!!!!! This has been my struggle for as long as I can remember. And now it is becoming even more apparent that something has to turn for my benefit because my health is about ready to cave in if I don't lose weight very soon. The signs are here now. I'm not as young as I used to be, so time is of the essence. Obesity is a very lonely struggle too. Many of us in society share this struggle, but share it only quantitatively, as numbers in regional statistical studies measuring obesity rates in a population: very few of us actually share our struggles and experiences in the fight against obesity. We suffer alone, only speaking with medical practitioners who claim expertise on the issue. That at times makes it even worse.

For about a year and a half I was in the treatment of a doctor for obesity. He wasn't a dietician, or a general practitioner, but was some sort of specialist who engaged in research with participants who consistently failed at losing weight. He wasn't in the business of helping people lose weight so much, or at least it seemed to me, but he studies people who fail in their struggle. I was studied (in my treatment) being given anti-depressants, ADHD medication, monitored with monthly visits to check on my progress. I don't feel the doctor was exploiting me as a research subject, nor do I think he lacked interest in helping me succeed eventually in my problem. But the entire time I felt very disconnected from myself, mentally and physically. I realize this now. I didn`t see the results I wished for, so I left his care and I am now detoxing from the medicalization I experienced.

So now I am doing it on my own. I learned in the time during that process, that I can only help myself with my struggle to become healthy and fit. I am back at the gym. I have taken on the services of a nutritionist to help me build my physical self from the mircolevel upwards, and to help me construct a dietary plan. Which leads me to...

#38 To weight train at least 5 times a week regularly. This should also be simple, theoretically. But I am one of those many individuals who suffer from Draggy-Ass Syndrome. I always feel that I have to drag my ass to the gym, like it is some huge burden that involves conjuring up huge amounts of physical and mental energy to cope with being physical in a public space for, what, 45 minutes at a time? But when I am there, I like it. I find a mental zone very quickly. That makes sense because physically, as animals, we just do that anyways; we respond positively to physical activity. It's bizarre and somewhat unsettling how the human mind can do this, make you feel like something is just akin to going off to war, yet when you are in the middle of it, it feels like anything but war, and you feel awesome doing it.

Many people, hardcore gym and workout enthusiasts, are always in this mental zone for some reason. Even on their off days, they are primed and ready to pump iron. How do they do that? Is it nutrition? Good sleep? An abundance of good sex? What makes people live for the gym!!!!!! I suppose the answer lies in practice. Like anything else. Practice creates a sort of reality. So does action.

I have not always been a very active person. In many aspects of my life, physically, professionaly, emotionally, etc. I have worked hard in very few things in life thinking back. But you know what I have also realized recently? Basically everything I actually worked extremely hard at with vigour and drive, I not only succeeded at, but I excelled at. Yet, I rarely ever think of it in that way. In fact, being the pessimist I am, I tend to focus on what I have not succeeded in and what I haven't achieved. But I do have accomplishments, and they are significant. There is no reason that cannot be perpetuated again and again.

Which leads me to......................

Oh yay! I have a cliffhanger! To be continued next time. It`s like Doctor Who!

(Audio on- Doctor Who closing theme music: Stinnnnngggggggggshreeeeeeeeak - du dudu du dudu du dudu du du dudu du dudu du dudu...)

100 Dream Challenge.

I thought I would give this a go, as per the sort of dreams list written about by Brandon Williams on his blog: http://gayguidetoronto.com/step2/


This collection is a mixture of some very real dreams I have, some minor thoughts that came to me, and some very silly ones that are just for fun. I think the process is there however.


Here goes.



1. To use my intellectual capacities everyday.


2. To be visually artistic.

3. To develop new creative strengths.


4. To be highly innovative.


5. To be more sensitive to the needs of others.


6. To be kinder.

7. To notice others more.


8. To be more aware of social interactions around me.

9. To have a condo in the city.


10. To write everyday.


11. To learn to cook better.

12. To practice relaxation often.

13. To love going to the gym.

14. To learn to skate.


15. To not be embarrassed by not knowing how to skate.


16. To not allow myself to think others ridicule me for not knowing how to skate.

17. To get over the not knowing how to skate thing once and for all.

18. To have quality sleep.


19. To overcome obesity.


20. To love myself.


21. To be an active member of the LGTBQ community.

22. To return to graduate school and finish that masters degree.

23. To become healthier mentally.

24. To help others realize what they want in life.

25. To form my own identity.

26. To help others be creative.

27. To be musical again with others.

28. To not be jaded about life.

29. To not lose my voice.

30. To live to see LGTBQ rights finally realized all over the world.

31. To not use the word "I" so much anymore.

32. To be someone's dream-man. LOL.

33. For Kate Bush to release albums more frequently.

34. To stay in touch more frequently with friends I have known for a long time and who are dear to me.

35. To finally learn what my life is to be about.

36. To not be so shy sometimes.

37. To overcome sugar addiction.

38. To weight train at least 5 times a week regularly.

39. To play a Doctor Who companion on tele.

40. To play the 13th Doctor Who.

41. To acknowledge other people's accomplishments more.

42. To help someone learn something new everyday.

43. To have shoulder length long hair that suits me well.

44. To meet Annie Lennox so I can thank her.

45. To figure out what political party in Canada I should vote for.

46. To finally get over loss and regrets of the past.

47. To learn to make wine.

48. To see cancer, diabetes, HIV/AIDS, and many other terrible illnesses be defeated forever.

49. For all people to no longer feel it necessary to believe in a god.

50. For all people to no longer feel organized religion should be tolerated.

51. For all people to finally realize there is no god, and that Humanity in itself can be wonderful in its own way.

52. To see an end to all forms of genocide.

53. For Aboriginal Canadians to live free of discrimination.

54. For all kinds of school yard bullying to be eradicated.

55. To move to downtown Toronto in the near future.

56. To figure out the point of Twitter.

57. To learn to speak French fluently.

58. To master accents and dialects of the UK.

59. To create and amass several Victorian- and Edwardian-influenced Steampunk garments.

60. To see a mainstream revival of clothing styles from the Victorian and Edwardian eras.

61. To learn all of the remaining missing episodes of classic Doctor Who have been found and are being released on DVD.

62. To find out if David Tennant is a good kisser.

63. To learn how to make a great dirty vodka martini that my friends would love.

64. To dance more.

65. To become a better listener.

66. To travel and explore the Canadian Territories.

67. To learn to budget my finances just a little bit more efficiently.

68. To push myself to go to bed at a decent time each night and not stay on the computer so much.

69. To entertain and hold dinner parties for friends again.

70. To not be jealous of others.

71. To try to be more assertive and introduce myself to people who I want to introduce myself to.

72. To attend social events more frequently.

73. To start dating again.

74. To be aware of it when someone is flirting with me (Apparently I miss this all the time, so i've been told).

75. To get a tattoo.

76. To help people find financing for university tuition.

77. To give more money to charities that are important to me.

78. To volunteer for a youth poverty committee.

79. To know if someone is reading my mind (LOL).

80. To meet and thank Björk.

81. To learn the art of documentary film making.

82. To invest more towards my retirement.

83. To host a radio show on CBC Radio One that features only independent musicians, artists, and film makers.

84. To work in public relations.

85. To work in publicity (From what I understand, this is to be differentiated from p.r.)

86. To visit Iceland.

87. To no longer let people bring me down and drain me.

88. To be fascinating.

89. To instantly be able to successfully push myself to go to the gym instead of giving in to low energy.

90. To learn body painting (I don't mean cars).

91. To learn a martial art.

92. To start a court dancing revival (It could be done).

93. To be better at waking early in the morning.

94. To get a letter delivered by an owl stating I have been officially accepted entrance into Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

95. To be selected into Slytherin house.

96. To stop worrying when someone isn't interested in being my friend. I'm a great friend. They're loss.

97. To start and conduct a secular music youth choir.

98. To enjoy gardening.

99. To read more literature.

100. To try a little harder everyday.

Breaking Boredom

by Richard Birch

For the most part,
One may only say that if
The world were to be rooted in demise,
Then so are all other forms of that which make one
Part of another...
One.

But to be wholly and relentlessly void of such a state
Is the opposite of bliss,
Or at least it is to some of us
I expect.

But claims to similar discursivities,
Like voices,
Have many ranges and spaces.
Like the octaves of human sound
That has will and fury
And can carry itself over doubly-posed
Permutations of imperfect sustenance.
For it is with this imperfection
That I-as-writer am foremost comfortable without.

Active social utility addict,
Always with post,
Frequent displayer of pop cultural consumption,
Always searching,
But rarely discovering
That which is sought and mastered.

Boredom is queen for a time,
And lack of identity, or identification are among commonality.
Whereas hopes and manifestations of angst and civility
Converge with hegemony.
Is this what becomes of ample and historical personage
When dreams change, fall, die, and rot?

But no more on that.
That too is by far, done.

A Short Thought On Personal Knowability.

The first thing I should say is that I don't know the first thing about writing.

Well that isn't entirely true as I have written a lot of things. Essays, research articles, poetry, song lyrics, short stories, monologues, and ethnographies comprise my writing. So I suppose what I really should be articulating is that I am not a master at writing, nor at anything. Just someone who tries from time to time to put something out there. I very likely will never be a master at anything. Not becasue I am lazy and do not think I have it in me to be something or to work hard at anything. But because I like to challenge the notion of mastery, or the idea that anyone can truly ever really know anything; it is a false notion. Knowability is intangible as far as I can make out in my struggles in the social. I have worked and communicated with several individuals who claim mastery and knowledge in so many different types of disciplines in recent years. Academics and thinkers of several kinds have come and gone (mostly gone) into my life, and even though I recognize the work they do and the fulfillment attached to the processes in their own everyday creative endeavours, I really don't see knowability represented in any of it. Science is not positive, in the methodological and empirical sence, so thus at this point I will have to identify as a non-positivist. I feel art too is unknowable, yet potentially is much more congruent with the feelings and positionalities one may attached to false-epistemological and ontological pressures. I am yet to meet an artist who claims mastery. It always seems to be others who take that action of claiming whether the artist is a master in work and creativity, and at times perhaps, one should examine and consider who or what is being served by such forms of relationalism.

Art, like emotions are strangely intangible to me, yet are also simultaneously very strongly experienced. How can I justify saying that something is intangible to me and yet strongly experienced? I don't know at this point. Perhaps that too is a false concept, but I can only say that it feels this way for me. Yeah I know, perhaps that is lame, but right now it's all I got.

Today emotions are fluid, moving, dark, deep, and relentless. I know they are present because they drive my actions today. Even this bit of writing is influenced and constructed from this. I certainly was not in the mood to write anything today. Possibly just because of being somewhat tired from the Thanksgiving weekend we just had, and the little traveling that was endured throughout. But I had to move and be active. I felt a strong feeling of immobility, disconnection, and the forms of uncertainty that can at times be attached to this type of emotional paralysis. Depression is powerful on several levels.

I must keep up my blog writing though. It helps. Presently it seems my only creative outlet. All others seem either lost or neglegible at this point in my life, and there really has to be a way of keeping pace as I struggle and reinvent myself.

A Letter To Brandon.

Hello Brandon.

I didn't get a chance to thank you for our chat earlier. I appreciate the time you made to speak with me about dreams and values. You left our previous chat abruptly, which I understand, your boyfriend called as you said and you had to run. I wish I had more time to explain further the ideas I was trying to convey at the time, that you were open to reading, which was a gift.

I was about to say in response to what I started to sense as a small amount of confusion (my fault entirely) that in regards to my "losing" my singing career, what I meant was, that I actually was a professional singer in Canada but it all just fell apart at some point. About 13 years ago I released an album, on an independent label, that had distribution and promotional capacities, played gigs, the whole nine yards, and then all of a sudden I found myself without anyone being interested in my work anymore professionnally. The label dropped me, promoters dropped me, radio no longer played my work. When I recorded a second cd, then a third, no interest was found and they simply were never released.

It happens that way to most artists. You are listened to and enjoyed for a brief time and then someone new comes around and then you are old news. It's sounds so cliche, but its how it happens. But I must admit that I should have worked harder at it. I stopped doing it at some point. I could have worked and worked more and struggled for years and years, hoping for a break, but I stopped. That was my decision. I got married at one point, bought a house, had to work and make money, I had a life and responsibilities, so music became secondary eventually. It happens. Some persist through the struggle. I didn't. I didn't have it in me. I even let some people talk me out of pursuing the career further.

I don't want this to sound at all that I blame the world or others for my struggles. I don't. You can't do that in life. I don't feel sorry for myself. I used to. Lots. But I grieve now. That is different. Grieving eventually brings closure, so I hope."

I was young then and didnt know how to handle it. I have never really dealt with it well. I have to force closure on it for me now. I put so much work and energy into it, for years afterwards, going broke, and yet the commercial barriers in place just kept getting more difficult to adjust to. I'm almost 40 now. Who breaks into the music scene at 40? I don't even understand how the industry works anymore. Sure the internet has supposedly changed things, opened up channels of distribution and promotion for the indie artist and such. But really, what is so different about it? Artists still compete for the same piece of a very finite population of listeners. The majors (labels) still control the scene. It seems to me it's elitist character has only evolved and become stronger in years. What sort of action is underway to offset that? None as far as I can see, for no one wants to do that.

So I went to school eventually, to finish a degree that I had quit when I was 19. That previous university experience that I left without completing always felt like a failure to me, and I felt a lot of regret about quitting that for many years after. So when I had the opportunity to go back to school and restart a degree program, I jumped at it so to fix that regret, and I succeeded.

I studied sociology because I found it interesting, especially the postmodern critical theory stuff - really sexy material. I was all about Foucault, Derrida, Baudrillard, Bourdieu, Marcuse, many of those pomo-homo French and German theorists for a time. I still am. I borrowed a copy of The Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir from the library last week and I am looking forward to sinking into that piece of social literature. My undergraduate phase, the second time around was fabulous. I was creating something again. Producing stuff. Learning and being aware of actually learning something. Pedagogy can be at times bland and immaterial in feel, but not in this case. I loved it. I graduated with honours, cum laude, and the year later entered into a masters program at Laurentian University; a graduate degree in applied social research.

My undergraduate experience was akin to making music as an artist, fruitful, dangerously rhythmic, and passionate when I latched onto terrains of research I was drawn to early on such as queer theory, cyborgology, media analytical theory, and postmodernism.

My graduate experience was akin to being a singer in an industry. I struggled to make sense of it, of the work, of research that no longer seemed interesting to me. I wanted sociology to be art, not a social science. I still do. I know it is. And there were people there who encouraged me on that path. But for some reason, depression set in very hard in the past two years. Devastatingly so. I had to leave it. I was very unhappy in that program. My grades went from A's and A-pluses to failing grades because I stopped producing. I really tried to as well. It no longer made any sense to me. I was exhausted.

I am exhausted. All of the time.

I really don't know what I want singing to be for me anymore. It was never about being a star or a celebrity. I knew years ago that really isn't the goal, and it comes with a lot of problems of course. But...

Singing is a public thing for me.
It's social.
It's constructive.
It cannot be internal.
It is not merely a hobby.
If I sing, I must be heard.
It's not ego though I am sure there are some who would disagree.
It's not about me, though it is produced by me.
And when the ears have gone...

I have done small shows, cabaret type stuff with people I have known over the years. Brilliant fun music reviews and such. Great things. But that isn't me. I was a stage performer. I was a recording artist. I made music and sound textual as well as textural. When it is textual, it removes the presence of the word "I" (which seems to be used quite a lot in this discourse) without actually removing my subjectivity as an artist.

I have lost sense of that and that is painful. When I posit that I am giving up singing, I must if it is this difficult for me. And it is. This isn't just about not breaking into the music business and being sad about it. This has been about trying to deal with a lost identity.

I have decided to put away old dreams, old identities, old thoughts, old hangups, old ways in order to be open to what my life can actually be about now, and hopefully, finally, be about other people. That would be a great result of this transition.

Thank you again for our chat earlier.

Richard

Carrying Sentiment.

It took courage and strength, but I moved a step closer to closing away old dreams so to be prepared for a new challenge and life. I deleted my Myspace, Facebook Fanpage, and Twitter music pages. I feel it is now time to finally put my music production away for good in order to be free to explore and realize a new identity for myself. It was a nice dream when I was a young man, but now, it no longer has the meaning it once did.

I once heard it said, unfortunately I remember not where, that at times one must let go of the things of past dreams and ambitions in order to let the life he or she is to live and lead emerge, or something like that. That sentiment is carrying me right now.

It has been extremely difficult for me to be creative in recent years while studying at graduate school in something not of a well fit for me. I have learned that time is finite as well as energy and youth. Youth can be crucial, strong, emergent, but certainly limited, especially since I now possess none, and the dreams of my youth no longer seem to work. Dreams are wasted on the youth, as is desire. I no longer want to waste anything.

Ghosts from TV Past

Yesterday I discovered this interesting Facebook fanpage about a classic ITV children's elevision series called The Ghosts of Motley Hall. I have from time to time briefly thought about that program I don't think it has aired in my area (Toronto) since TVOntario played it in the late 70's. But for some reason it has stayed in my subconscious on some level. I don't remember being a huge fan of it. In fact, if memory serves, I think I watched it mainly because it might have been on just prior to Doctor Who. I somehow remember images of ghost characters such as the kid and the White Lady. I also primarily think of the huge staircase in the room where most of the action took place, or so I think it did. I am glad that I found this page, because I have at times wondered if the show actually existed, or did I somehow imagine or invent it in my brain. What a relief to learn that I am not crazy and this show did exist. I remember a weird sort of feeling I would have when watching it, and I just had the same twinge watching a clip of the opening sequence on YouTube. I may check out more of the program now.

It is interesting to me how early memories I have are linked so strongly to the popular cultural and television contextualities of the time. In some ways, my viewing habits as a child, primarily as a kid who was drawn very strongly to BBC, ITV and other UK imports shown on TVOntario and PBS Rochester, informed my later television habits as to the kind of programs I would later be interested in, the styles of writing, the styles of cinematography, and of course music scores. In particular for example, I have a love for early BBC Radiophonic Workshop material, and I seemingly consider their repertoir as if it was that of a band or a commercial act.

I am considering researching a paper on the social reality of Canadians who watch television from the UK, with a particular interest towards programs such as Doctor Who, The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, and other tv serials of the time. Perhaps research questions may deal with how these sorts of programs have informed viewers of worldviews alternative to the kinds that were and are socialized in other hegemonic ways.

The Meaning of Meaningful Accomplishment: A Sensory Exploration

I had the pleasure of speaking with someone yesterday online, someone who I really don't know at all, but someone who reminded me of the essence of personal achievement. It was a good moment, because it reminded me that I am not without accomplishments and I do not have to continually degrade myself in my mind while I struggle through this current transformational period.

What I was reminded of was that some things that may be perceived as minor aspects to one's everyday reality are achievements. Simple shifts in perception from negative to positive, outlook shifts that are also transcendent from negative to positive, acquiring and developing a new way to look at the world, new ways to become truthful with oneself and thus others as a result, and of course, living each and everyday looking to do something that will help and improve another's existence, no matter how small or large. Everything in one's mind is significant. How we use these notions-to-manifestations of reality is key.

It's a matter of perception.

It's a matter of psychology.

It's a matter of social reality.

It's a matter of epistemology and how we come to know and develop anything.

It's a matter of ontology and how we utilize and understanding of this to develop a worldview.

Canadian sociologist George Smith use to wear a t-shirt to his lectures that would say "I have made the ontological shift". This was a bold statement in the social sciences relational to the discourses dealing with the practices of instituional ethnography and pedagogy around the everyday doings of social actors who struggle and fight for political rights. It is also bold as a personal and individual statement, for it shows the relationship we have as people to the categories and identity structures we are alligned and allign ourselves with in everyday practices (i.e.: career changes, relationship changes, idenity changes, etc.).

I'm on a huge ontological shift right now. Epistemologically too. It is being produced from a current practice of stripping down several components of my identity. It's harsh. It's needed right now. I have somehow found myself in a sort of identity-identificational interdimensional imbalance, looking for something for my life to be about in regards to creative work, career, relationships, etc. All the huge stuff. But above all, I have to realize I am accomplished. I have amassed critical thinking skills, knowledge, and more importantly, the blissful reality of unmastery - there is nothing I know fully nor do I need to. I only need to learn and go on, which I have already proven to myself in recent years that I am capable of that. That's a huge accomplishment for someone who spent many years looking for something that he felt was real and possible and tangible, but left to realize and learn the harsh reality that you cannot plan your life to extreme levels componentially (i.e.: past dreams, past outlooks, etc.).

We are all works in progress in which the process, ontologically expansive, is a great accomplishment to work towards, and I have experiential basis for this already.

Richard Birch