Shaving Cream Faces

This morning three new volunteers brought out an art project that involved shaving cream drawings on a table. I don’t know where this idea came from, or how they thought it would work out exactly but you can probably guess what it turned into.

Yes, one giant shaving cream war.

We all had shaving cream in our ears, on our clothes, and up our nose but we all had so much fun.

Fun is relative.

Although, there are some things in life that shouldn’t be relative. This whole time that I have been here it has been a reoccurring theme that kids are just kids. No relativity in that. Street kids are no different than kids you would find in suburban United States. They all love to have shaving cream wars instead of shaving cream art projects.

But there is a relative part of this equation. There is relativity in the fact that these kids have been given hope from a desperate situation. A place in life that should never have to be walked especially by someone as young as four or five. The relative part of this issue is the way people look at these kids.

It seems obvious that these kids are not monsters to me, but some people think this way. The place that a child is living in life should have no influence in what people think about them. What makes a child a child?

ALL of the kids on the street shouldn’t be there, yet we look down upon them and punish them by thinking badly about a situation that they more than likely cannot get out of by themselves.

So may we, as a population of humans reading this, try to eradicate the relativity of this situation and help the rest of the world follow suit by realizing that kids are kids.

They are not monsters.

They are not soldiers.

They are not sex toys.

They are to be loved and cared for and shown how to build a better world.

Miss Mykell

Define Me

How, or would the more appropriate word be why, does the world define things? Let’s take the very basic definition of the word define and break it down then expand upon that, shall we?

Define:

–verb (used with object)

1. to state or set forth the meaning of (a word, phrase, etc)

2. to explain or identify the nature or essential qualities of; describe

3. to fix or lay down definitely; specify distinctly

4. to determine or fix the boundaries or extent of.

5. to make clear the outline or form of

–verb (used without object)

6. to set forth the meaning of a word, phrase, etc.

Okay so inferring from the fact that all the definitions (taken from dictionary.com) of this word are a verb, I need to reconstruct my original question because a verb implies that something is alive and has the capacity to alter things, and make decisions. Then it will be:

Why do humans define things?

Obviously it is more than just words we define, its people, objects, categories, colors, shapes, sizes, attitudes. . . ourselves. So why is there this nature in ourselves to have a clear meaning of everything around us, in lingustical and comprehensional terms?

Of course the former is easy to answer, without humans using verbal definitions with concrete meaning behind them there is no basis for language or communication of any kind. One must know that the other is Human or at least know enough about themselves and categorization to be able to tell the difference between another human and a plant.

Even now your brain is defining and organizing what I am typing in this browser to create an image, per sé, of what I am trying to convey to you. So obviously we must define the world around us in such a manner to be able to interact and function within a group of people, and maybe even within ourselves.

It is the second and third definitions make things a little bit more complicated, but the world around us a little bit more concrete. To understand the nature or essential qualities of something employs our knowledge of how to operate the first definition plus be able to put all the abstract data together into one thought.

So instead of someone asking you to tell them what a strawberry sitting on the counter is (because they have no knowledge of this blessed fruit somehow) you wouldn’t help them understand by telling them it is a delectable red juicy fruit that looks like a heart with seeds, it doesn’t make any noise while growing or off the vine and it ripens about a certain time of year and doesn’t get bigger than your fist (and if it does please tell me, because I want one!) and so on and so forth. No, I am sure that they can gather most of this information by themselves with their own sensory organs, you would probably just tell them it is a strawberry. But this sort of defining is putting a bunch of information into one generally understood word for that language.

Somehow, some of us, cough, me, cough, sometimes get wrapped up in defining things with words and sentences, which is good, but we must get beyond that someday. So moving on to other definitions and not letting ourselves get wrapped up in words. . .

It’s the abstract and crazy we divulge into now. The not uniform and untrue is what confuses and belittles people, communities, tribes, nations, the world the most. Defining these things, and the things that matter (people, God, love, etc) gets tricky because we have to have something that tells us what the other is, but it is not always looked at the same from every definer’s point of view.

In fact some people’s point of view on certain topics weighs more heavily in groups of people, or society. These people are called “experts” in their field. Experts, though, still have their own personal filter that they use to look at the world and define it.

If I said define. . . yourself, everyone would have a different answer. Obviously because we are all different, but not only would the things be different, they would be different types of things we are defining ourselves by.

Some would define themselves by their job, their family, what they have done, what they have not done, what color their skin is (?) there are billions of things to define yourself by.

Let’s say we were all defining one person, say, God. And phew, look at all the definitions that we already have out there for that. There are some definitions that say he/she/it (object God) does not, some are adamant that (object God) does. Then there are just as many in each of those categories to describe and back up that conclusion.

What a world of definitions we are.

Well, in fact, I don’t think we can define these things. Ourselves, me, you, God, Love, the world, communities are undefinable.

You cannot take something so big, so incomprehensible and divide it into too many little pieces to try to fit it into all these preconceived ideas we already have in place for all these words we are using to define that object, thing, or idea. Yes, definitions are nice, and get some degree of the point across, but there is never a way that we can convey all of it to each other.

There is a disconnect at this level.

(This was not what I started to write about at all. . . yet here we are. . . haha)

Wouldn’t it be a grand thing not to have this disconnect?

I once heard a saying that you could define yourself by:

“not who you are, but whose you are.”

What an interesting thought. And I discredit it.

Why would one define themselves by what they belonged to?

Unless, just maybe, the thing that you defined yourself by was an absolute.

For you can be owned by many things in life. Some seemingly good, some seemingly bad. Drugs, Ideas, knowledge, Sex, Another person, Your computer, Money… anything really.  But one would have to use something so complete, so infallible to define themself with to make this statement true because being owned by anything other than something that infinite would be a disservice to yourself.

We live in a world that screams at you to define me, define you, define everything, but sometimes you just can’t. Depending on how you carefully craft it.

-Miss Mykell

The shot

Photography: The art of capturing a fraction of a second of light and compounding it into a two dimensional image that stimulates an audience visually.

On my journey of discovery of self, others, and life through photography I have learned a lot, about pretty much everything. The thing about photography is it is easy, in theory, but I have also discovered that photography is ultimately difficult in application.

Not because of the technical aspects of the camera, which are, at times, difficult in process, but because of implications behind the evisceration of emotion behind an image that a photographer takes. When I take a photograph I can only hope that I convey to another person what I am thinking about and feeling as I capture and process the image. But most times I fall short, or do not even know the audience my image is reaching or impacting.

Another thing about photography is that people are all very different. And something that captures my heart and attention might be starkly contrasting to something that another person finds unique and interesting.

Take this image: (by Jens Kolk)

I find this to be gorgeous, absolutely fabulous. You, however, may not; or you may, depending on your taste.

I can only imagine, though, how the photographer of this was feeling or thinking when he took this. He may have thought it was his greatest work ever done, and I commend him and very much respect him even though I am certain I do not realize to the fullest extent everything that was meant by this image.

As the photographer myself, I cannot let myself dwell on what other people think of my photography for this very reason, and must only try to make what I think to be beautiful and imspiring.

And thus is the life of a photographer.

A lesson on forgiveness

     I was thinking about a situation that happened between a few friends of mine, years ago, and I realized that there was still bitter anger and resentment about the incident, I wondered why. The answer, I decided, was that they had still not forgiven each other about the incident yet. This prompted me to ask the question, why is it so hard for us to forgive?
     The first thing that I needed to answer before I could get to the actual question was, what exactly does forgiveness mean? What does it mean to forgive someone? I scurried right on over to dictionary.com and typed in “forgive.”
     The results? To forgive someone is to give up all claim on account of, to grant pardon to, or  to cease to feel resentment against . All of those things you don’t have to do anything, you just have to stop doing something, to give up, to cease. So really forgiving someone is just letting it go.
     All you have to do is allow (let) it to leave (go). It’s supposed to be a natural flow of life. Letting it do what it will without our interference, because it requires so much more effort to hold onto that anger and resentment present when someone has wronged us.
     But that, I know, is much easier said than done. So why is it so hard for us to let go? Is it in our human nature to want to hold onto things as long as possible, until we become old, mean, nasty people that no one really wants to be around because of their bleak outlook on life?
     A misconception about forgiveness that I have seen before: they didn’t accept your forgiveness once you decided to give it to them, and so you have not actually forgiven them completely. This is a false belief, if they do not accept the thing you are trying to offer them, it affects them, not you. You have done everything within your power to give them forgiveness, and that is all one could ask for.
     If we don’t forgive people and keep holding on to what has been done to us, that is all we are going to be able to think about. The things we think about become the filter through which we see the world, and how we see the world determines our reactions to the things around us. If we let it eat away at us, and plague us, we will never really live without fear of what other will do to us next.
      
 Write you agian,

~Miss Myké