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We are on the brink of a new cultural revolution, and it truly has the potential to change the very fabric of society, for better or worse. The facilitator of this change is social media, and while this prediction has been around for quite some time now, it's important that we know what we are getting ourselves into. There is no question that we, as socially motivated creatures, have an instinctual desire to be validated, to share our experiences,...

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To Be Who We Once Were...

            Today, millions of people are tuning in to watch President Barack Obama’s second inauguration.  With so many eyes focused in on the core of our nation, it’s almost impossible not to feel a little proud to be American.  This is a pride that doesn’t come easily for a nation that is just struggling to walk again after the crippling effects that our over-confidence once...

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The Dark Side of Ideas

    When we believe in an idea with enough intensity, often we develop a strong identification with that idea. An example of this phenomenon is evident when two people have been dating for a while. Usually both people will begin to lose their individual identities in social situations as they adopt a conjoined identity of "we." Their relationship is the idea in this scenario, and it's an idea with which they believe in enough to identify...

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America, the Addicted

     Next month will make it a full year since I quit smoking cigarettes. For me, this is one of my proudest moments because not only have I proven all of those people wrong who said I couldn't do it, but I have, more importantly, proven that the dark voice of irrational doubt that haunts my self-confidence is not more powerful than my will. Any addict knows how strong that voice can be, and as someone that has always struggled with self-confidence, this is a huge personal win. Now don't worry, this post is not another preachy...

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The Cross and the Crescent

        Religious intolerance, as I noted in my last post, has been at the heart of society’s most destructive wars and its most enduring feuds. But why does our “intelligent” species allow such passive beliefs to motivate us towards such violent conflicts? Well, most social psychologists understand religion to be one way in which a group of individuals can assert civil order and convey moral codes to one another...

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The Life of Ty

             This is the first in a series of posts in which I will be discussing the role of religion in our lives. As the title suggests, I was inspired to write on this topic after reading the novel Life of Pi by Yann Martel. For me, Piscine’s (aka Pi) inner conflict with religion is a battle that really hits close to home. Much like Pi, I was raised amidst a culture of religious uniformity,...

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Imagination is Power

"Live out of your imagination, not your history." -Stephen Covey- Any frequent "daydreamer" knows that it's not unlikely to sometimes miss entire conversations going on around you due to the mental energy being used inside your own mind to create your artificial environment. It's this ability to shut down entire sensory modalities in order to utilize our brains' ability to create entirely original ideas that sets us apart from other, less-inteligent animals. This ability to create new information using recombined bits of our memories is also...

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What happened to our futures?!

I’m a recent college graduate from a private university which consistently ranks among the top 20 universities in the US. I have to confess, though, that I am less than impressed with the return on the 24 years of dedication and focus that I invested into my education. In the five months since receiving my degree, I have been teaching myself some new skills to gain a competitive edge in the job market; this includes a firm grasp of computer/web-programming...

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When the Mind Gets Sick...

Would you be surprised to hear that "the leading cause of disability in the US and Canada [is mental illness]" or that 1 in 4 Americans suffer from mental illness each YEAR? Yes,1 IN 4 AMERICANS THIS YEAR . In other words, one person in every average-sized (2 parent/caregiver+2 child) home will suffer from a mental illness this year. Who do you think it will be in your family this year? You? Your child? Your parent? Regardless, it doesn't take...

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2013: An Opportunity

Each new year offers us a new chance... The natural world, as we all know, functions in a cycle of birth, life, and death. Similarly, our calendar year follows this cyclical pattern based on the seasonal progression of our planet. Today is the first day of 2013, a new start of this cycle, and it's also as close as any of us will ever be to having a "rebirth" opportunity. In America, 2012 seemed to be a year of hard-work, political polarization, natural disasters, and tragedies. So, while I'm definitely not suggesting that we all forego our own...

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