People are always coming and going in and out of life. This happens especially if we choose to strive for change and self-improvement.

Our perception and ideals would continue to change, and the people we use to hang out with no longer share the same feelings. In worse scenario, they could become incapable of understanding and communicating with our newer character, changed perspective. Additionally, when our behaviors change, others will distance themselves from us as they reject us for being “different”. They may also envy us, wish us bad luck, try to deter us, as we strive for success… unfortunately. Of course we wish for them to come along together, but we all walk a different path in life. That is something must be accepted in life.

People fear difference. Sometimes people limit themselves because they are afraid to be different.

Consequently, it gets lonelier the more we change and try to overcome ourselves, as we consistently shed the self that was yesterday’s. Thus, the dilemma for each of us…

In the face of loneliness, how do I respond?
Can I maintain myself with confidence?
Or will I choose conformity out of fear?
Can I presevere, knowing it will only get more difficult, more lonely?
Or will I take the easy way out instead?
And worst case, will I be okay with the fact that no one in the world can understand me?

Let me share this quote:

Anybody can be famous
Fame is cheap
Fame is easy
Fame is fleeting,
Try achieving greatness.

Greatness is hard
Greatness is lonely
Greatness is work
Greatness is humbling
Greatness is a responsibility and greatness lasts forever,
you don’t want greatness do you?

Therefore, greatness requires determination and perseverance. Striving for greatness is a true test of ourselves, and that’s why we need to know who ourselves really are and what we want.

Also therefore, greatness is only achieved by only so few in this history of man. I ask myself, would it be possible for the entire mankind to reach greatness? I do no know. It does not seem so from the way things are, but if only we can, then greatness may not be so lonely.

For those of us who choose greatness, we can safely assume the individuals who stay with us by our side on this path will be the greatest companions we will ever encounter in life. Encounter with these individuals are truly invaluable, so we shall know and cherish these individuals.

Reading is a most obvious and direct act as far as when people want to learn something these days.

As much as reading is being done (or forced to be done LOL), especially in school, it occurs to me that no one, no curriculum ever attempts to explain and teach the art of reading.

In a nutshell, when people do reading these days for learning, it simply equates memorization of a butt load of information.

However, after years of reading on my own NOT for school, I have come to realize that reading is so much more than that. One can never realize the joy and pleasure of reading that way, nor the true nature of learning when we do reading. Nope, not through memorization.

Although, having an encyclopedic mind is very convenient. It can get you pass most education system with flying A’s. At least, memorization is a skill I adopted from Asian schooling, and relied heavily from middle school through high school to get those A’s and 4.0s when my English is as crappy (fobbish?) as it comes.

Real fun in reading, is the connection with the author. A genuine author that is. No, I am no telling you to call the author, or dig him up from his grave. Hmmm, bad joke :P

Behind the words that one such worthy author had penned down, we can only imagine the experience, emotion, and thoughts he had, and only after a process of integration into their own mind, heart, and soul, does he put into words. Thus, if we simply read the words at face value, we may simply pick up 10-20% of what he intendeds to communicate for us to think, feel, and understand.

Once again, this is if the author is genuine. This is especially true if you venture into reading text on religion, philosophy, and also teachings of any art form.

Reading the words of text is like the process of picking up dots. It is up to you to connect the dots, by going through your own process of integration.

Read not just with your mind but also with your heart. Read beyond the words.

Memorization gets you through school. True learning requires more than that.

Today we have a guest post coming from Alexis Bonari from CollegeScholarships Alexis is a freelance writer and blog junkie. She spends much of her days blogging about Education and CollegeScholarships. In her spare time, she enjoys square-foot gardening, swimming, and avoiding her laptop. (yay to that)

For students who are still in school, it can be tough to distinguish between learning and studying simply because these two activities are so prevalent in daily life that they’re almost autopilot functions. But once the academic experience is in the past, it’s easier to see the distinctions between the two actions. Many language students, as well as researchers studying adult learners, observe that learning tends to happen in the classroom, but also occurs with studying, while studying implies solitary, individual academic work. In a report of research conducted at Portland State University as part of its Longitudinal Study of Adult Learning, both learning and studying are analyzed as adult learner behaviors. What’s especially interesting is the comparison of learning to studying and the quantifiable results that show which seems to be the better method.

Learning or Studying?

Self-study is defined in the research report as “working on one’s own to improve reading, writing, or math skills,” with the researchers’ observation that it’s now a “widespread mode of basic skills development.” This was contrasted with classroom learning, which involves a student regularly attending a course in a physical setting with the presence of a teacher.

The research described in the report observed 940 high school non-completers from ages 18 to 44 who were using four different methods to prepare for their GED tests: self study only, adult education (in the classroom) only, both, and neither. The majority of adults used a combination of self-study and classroom learning (45%), with 20% using only the self-study method, 19% taking no action, and 16% using only classroom learning. Based solely on the evidence that nearly half of the adults chose to combine studying and learning strategies, it’s obvious that many adults understand that learning and studying are different teaching methods and can have a stronger effect when combined. The 45% who engaged in both types of teaching noted that, because self-study required a more organized and self-motivated approach, it was easier to self-study when taking a class. The self-study also functioned as a motivator to attend class, as the GED applicants wanted to see that their individual work paid off in the classroom.

The results of those who tested successfully and earned their GEDs from each group of study methods are both predictable and interesting. As expected, the self-study and classroom learning group had the strongest rate of success (27%). However, there was a strong contrast in success rates between the group that participated in self-study only and the group that only attended classes. The self-study group had a success rate of 24%, while the classroom learning group’s rate was only 17%. This is a greater contrast at 7% than the difference between the combined learning strategies and self-study only (just 3%), implying that the main component of success in the combined strategies was self-study. For these adults and their GED test preparation, self-study was a more effective course of action than classroom learning.

The Future of Learning and Studying

Self-study is likely to dominate education in the future as distance learning and e-learning grow in popularity. The idea of a classroom is quickly becoming outdated, and there are many courses of study that can be used individually online, such as those available from open universities. Online degree programs are also becoming more prevalent, making self-study the main component of future educational development.

Reference: Reder, Stephen and Clare Strawn. “Self-Study: Broadening the Concepts of Participation and Program Support.” NCSALL World Education Focus on Basics 8C (2006): 6-10.

The idea of liberation is quite muggy. And I find people do not behave in ways that will allow them to be liberated even when they say they want liberation. Perhaps because of the mugginess.

Here’s as liberation as I understand it.
To be liberated is to be free from something. To be free from something means that it is okay to walk away from it. And more importantly, it also means that it is okay if you cannot walk away from it. Thus, to be liberated means you had gotten passed, you had outgrown something, or an idea.

I said at the beginning that people do not behave in ways that will allow them to be liberated because currently when most people seek any form of liberation (material, spiritual, or ideal, whatever), they seek it with an attitude of aggression and hostility. Some form of opposition and conflicts are okay and necessary but how could they ever be liberated when they feel so extremely that they cannot be at peace unless they had completely obliterated that something.

If you cannot be at peace until you had completely destroyed or removed something from your life, it cannot be said that you are liberated. The situation is precisely opposite because it really means you still care so much. Ironic, isn’t it?

Now if we look at the manners and attitudes of people around the world who are trying to solve all sorts of human issues, so many of them approach the solution with exactly an extreme kind of aggression and hostility. It becomes no surprise that nothing seems to gets solved, right? As opposite, we seem to have more and more problems to ourselves.

Instead of liberation, we find ourselves entrapment.

True liberation comes from maturity, perception, and wisdom. We humans are teenagers who still have a lot of maturing to do. That is, seeing that human civilization began 5000 years ago while earth is more than 4.5 billion years old, I’d say that’s a fair statement.

Of course, without scientific proof. And without scientific proof coming from some form of some experts, nobody listens, cares, trusts, or gives a shit.

And one more thing, next time you wonder if you are free (from something), try feeling how freely that you are able to walk away (from it)?

A way can be said to be a predefined set of pattern or behavior.

It has been a long time that our various social structures and cultural patterns base on our mutually exclusive definition of good and evil, right and wrong have done us well. That is great. However, it is about time for us to move beyond.

Impermanence IS the only absolute of nature, as base on the fundamental teaching of Buddhism and also base on the fundamental understanding in physics.

Time is changing. As we relentlessly continue to develop technology that accelerates the speed for which we and our society change, the more so that any pre-defined set of pattern and behaviors are to become obsolete. That is to say, it is very likely that pre-existing ways will have less and less benefits and more more harms the longer we hold on to it.

In a state of chaos, no predefined patterns, no premeditated thoughts can help us.

That is why having “no way” is the only way to behave suitably as time proceeds from here on. It has never been more true.

Having no way does not mean to fight and to abolish any existing way. Quite oppositely, having no way means MORE so that we need to study and fully understand all, or at least as many as possible, existing ways that we know of. But without being attached, as in clinging to any particular one of them…. only then, we can spontaneously apply a suitable way that maybe one or more of the pre-existing ways in combination, or create a new one, in any particular situation.

And this is only possible if you don’t cling on to a specific way.

Understand both what are defined as “right” and “wrong”… and know that at any time, “right” could become “wrong” and “wrong” could become “right”. Seeing sides without taking side.

This may seem very dangerous and foreign to our mind conditioned to follow patterns of behavior in the last few thousands of years. It is in-arguable that we have the brains to move beyond that.

That is the kind of mentality, living attitude that more and more mankind needs if we are to live harmonically among ourselves and with our environment.

That is the kind of world leader we need, even just as people with influence.

Bruce Lee’s JKD is actually of no particular style. It has its basic routines, training patterns. Many of those may have been drived from Wing Chun or any other style that Bruce Lee studied, and they are good starting point. But you should not be restricted by any of them. He did not even want to call JKD as JKD if he can get by without words.

We have to be able to move beyond all the ways that we have.

As the “no-mind” teaching in Zen, it means for us to go beyond our mind. Reality lives beyond our thinking, our logical intelligence. This is also why the only thing a Zen master really ever does is either destroy all your existing concepts and ideas — including what you think of Zen, or if he thinks you are close, directly points you to the “no-mind” state of being and perception.

To deal with reality optimally, we need no-mindedness and make no-way the way.

Then of course, this choice cannot be made up in the mind as a decision like we usually do, but instead it is a choice that is to known by our heart.