Wednesday, April 19, 2006

Boycotting Nonsense (Zazen)

Lately, I've been wearing earplugs throughout the day and avoiding noisy places. This seems to help me focus on studying and it prevents me from listening to excess noise. Hopefully, I won't eventually turn into Proust in his cork-lined room, but if the outcome of that strategy is writing such gorgeous labyrinthine sentences, then maybe it would be worth it.

I've also been leaving the radio off during my drive to work, which is about an hour and a half, and staying away from the television. The hardest thing is staying away from the Internet, which, as you can tell, I'm not good at. I did stay off the net all weekend, as we were up in cottage country with the in-laws. During that time, I read six books. I think there's a connection there.

I've been thinking lately that there is a need to boycott noise and nonsense. We boycott companies if we don't like the products they sell or their practices. So, why do I click the link every time Yahoo has a story about some stupid thing that Pat Robertson said? Why do I care about "intelligent design" advocates, or Michael Moore, or any of the other shouting stupid voices? Why do the occasional trolls here bother me? Why do I listen? Do any of these people deserve it?

I'm going to start searching for ideas to light me up again. Weirder and more savage ideas than those available on the open market. Maybe only a few good ones. But, no more dumb ones. And, I'm going to try to stop complaining so much. The abyss is staring into me, and I'm tired of it.

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