You're Just Imagining Your Experience

my Art Appreciation for Humanities Majors Class paper (our task was to pick one, not both, which of experience or imagination produces art)

We all think that we are actually experiencing things in our life but really we all are just imagining that we are experiencing it. Art is then a product of our imagination, not our experience, because our experience is not really experience, we just imagine that we experience it.

How does one distinguish that we are actually experiencing it and if we are only imagining it. What if we are imagining things so good that it seems that we are actually experiencing it? That kind of imagination is what really produces art from us because it is so strong that it inspires us to make a piece of art, and so strong that we actually think we experience an imagined experience. Sure there may be basis for our experience, but we are also imagining these bases of our experiences, that’s how strong it is that we are inspired to do art with it.

Imagining it need not be unreal or separate from reality, it only needs to be perceived by us. Let’s say that we are given basic sensory stimulation of light, sound and touch. These stimulation at the very basic level are really just light, sound and touch and because of our imagination, we translate these stimulation into something we call “experience” where we get our inspiration to do art. And we say that we experience imagining where really we are imagining our experiences.

grant me

grant me wisdom

grant me peace

grant me freedom

from my unease

grant me conscience

grant me patience

grant not confusion

for my decision

for her

I was dreaming

that i was dreaming

that i was dreaming of you,

then i woke up,

and prayed for you,

and then i woke up,

and God granted it true,

you are my dream come true,

oh what bliss,

shall i say i love you?

Philippine elections... si villar ako kasi maganda commercial niya

i went to pangasinan and voted.

boy, what an experience, the line was long, it was so hot and there was no order. people were cutting lines, and the people who were in charge were either young adult girls who were too busy telling people to line up properly or were just too shy. and the people who would line up properly had one of their children line up for the WHOLE family which was like 5-7 people, so when the child nears the end of the line, the family members would swarm in and poof, another 10-15 mins of my time. i still need to drive back to manila and prepare for class after!

the following were things that i heard while in line:

*someone singing a politician's commercial

"si villar ako, ganda ng commercial niya eh"

"wag kang sumingit!"

"galing mo sumingit ah"

"ang init naman"

"si erap iboboto ko, kasi gaganti yun kay Gloria"

"sino si Gibo?"

i was supposed to vote for Gibo theodoro, but then i heard what people were saying and chills went through my spine. people were actually voting for villar and erap because of dumb reasons, and they might just win! VOTE NOYNOY because id rather have him there than any of those two. apparently, Erap was not convicted a few years ago and was not banned from running from office, and apparently Villar was an honest businessman. too bad for Gibo tho, he had the skills and the know how for the seat, but people did not really care. they were too hyped about the commercials or REVENGE. they were also too preoccupied with family ties and whom the politicians had relations with than what the politician can really do.

why is people's movements restricted?

It is good to see people acting on something that needs to be acted upon to. What came to my mind as I think of this topic is Al Gore’s metaphor on how people were not reactive to global warming. He said that we are like frog being slowly boiled down. Since the boiling is slow, we do not realize that we are slowly being surrounded by increasing temperature and then we would eventually die. At least Al Gore was one of those frogs that actually tried to solve that problem but this made me realize that I too was not aware of what was happening in the world. Sure I may make the excuse that I was still young when this was happening, but the fact that I should have had not been surprised of the idea still haunts me.

So why are people’s movement restricted? When I think of this, I remember on when I was still in high school and we and my team would battle the administrators to be able to do something that we want to do for a program or of the sorts. They would often win and that would restrict us to do what we want to do. All the red tape and the processes that is supposedly for helping was restricting. This can be translated to a bigger scale, which is the scale for the whole world. People would be restricted to act on their beliefs because maybe their country has a strict rule on religion, or practices. people are restricted to act because there are invisible human-ish things that prevents them even though they can physically do what they want to do. Countries even have restrictions to anything, even if it is necessary. An example is revolting on the streets (as discussed in class). Here in the Philippines, for a rally to happen they have to get a permit first and their venue must be proper which restricts the true essence of rallying and revolting. The impact is gone and any politician can just shrug those revolts easily.

People’s actions are restricted because bodies who try to find order in things sees these actions as causes of disorder. Globalization actually gave a new way of unrestricting people. For me this is the internet where everyone can post freely what they want and people can support their action if they have the same thought. And since the internet provides fast communications, people from different parts of the world can come together and act on what they think needs action. New organizations that can help people from countries with restrictions are now evident so that change is easier and less restricted.

can we move beyond conflict?

The picture that goes in my head whenever I think of the word conflict is that picture in some animes where two rivals look eye to eye and then an electric like light go against each other. In some ways this is how to describe conflict, as opposing parties have because of opposite goals. I would incorporate this to a conflict between two nations where one wants what the other wants to prevent. Or even in political campaigns. In my opinion conflicts are actually what slows down the process of change for the better but is still inevitable. A variation in perspectives prevents conflict to be fully rid of as there are always more than one way to look at the picture. And since everyone comes from different parts of the picture, everyone has a different way in looking at it. For an example, Hitler really believed that killing Jews would actually be better than not killing them, and obviously those countries that opposed Germany then thought otherwise. And so conflict was there and a war started. Could this have had been prevented? Maybe, if Hitler was convinced otherwise or if those countries who opposed him was convinced by Hitler otherwise, but is this even possible. And if it were possible, there would always be a we perspective that would come up and spark conflict.

So in answering the question, can we move beyond conflict, I realized that we need not remove conflict but we just need to handle it in a more productive manner. Conflict is actually there to motivate critical thinking so that whatever action people do, is a product of a well thought of goal and plan. But it just so happen that some conflicts were pushed overboard because either sides of the conflict were to hard on their side that wars were actually the thing that needed to happen. if there were something else that could have had ended it? Who knows, how do we know what could have had happened otherwise? So in handling conflict in a more productive way maybe one way of going beyond it.

Globalization gives the world a new identity of being united. And through this, ideas, minds and perspectives start to look more uniformly and this could actually be the answer to handling conflict. Since people will look at things more similarly, the wavelength of the different perspectives wont vary as much and a productive way of handling the conflict will occur. Maybe a one world order is also an answer to this, but then what will happen next? As a one world order would imply the end. (if you know what I mean.)

what makes the world dangerous?

Adrenaline is the fight or flight hormone that is triggered whenever someone is presented with danger. For me, this says something. That we humans are made for danger and it is inevitable for danger to linger on. Different kinds of danger haunted humans in different time periods and humans try to do something about this to lessen the danger. But as they eliminate the threat of one danger, a new danger emerges. According to the book, this is like making a cycle of danger. That as we humans try to eliminate it, the stronger it gets. And that our own action of eliminating it, strengthens it. From wild beasts to fellow humans then to hand weapons and now nuclear weapons. Each a solution to the previous danger but in turn becomes the source of new danger.

It is currently the Lenten season and I remembered where danger started. Man wouldn’t have had any danger if they were still in the Garden of Eden where God protects man. But human sin kicked man out of the garden where danger is everywhere. Danger is really, even in the period before time, come from man and human downfalls. Greed, lust, jealousy, pride, gluttony, and the sorts motivate people to satisfy themselves and through this they make new dangers in the world.

So what makes the world dangerous? Well in my opinion, in the first place, if there were no humans there wont be any danger, being that humans coined the word, but also that without humans, everything will just be the natural course of nature. So man causes danger to the world. Danger that even the innocent, the weak and even the strong are exposed to, and that there is nothing anyone can do to eliminate it, well at least not now.

Maybe globalization was one of the attempts to eliminate danger in this world. Through globalization, everyone is interconnected and everyone knows what’s happening everywhere so that people can monitor each other. But along with this, globalization gave new mediums for danger to threaten people. The internet for an example gave new ways to define danger. Identities now can be stolen, people can hack and get information from other people and even wars can be started from the misuse of the internet. But maybe through globalization, a new way of eliminating danger can be discovered.