The Calculus of Life

This has a lot more to it than just me being in Calculus III!

You know, I look around myself daily, and see so many people. So many lives, so many stories lived, and I am one of them; I get to live my own personal life story, and no one else gets to. It's interesting, peculiar, for one.

But one of the main aspects of myself is that I always wanted to stand out, to stand as one of those pillars that people look up to and wonder, 'What exactly was that person's life story?' I don't want simple fame, or money — those are too shallow, and die way too quickly — I want to be an inspiration to others, so that they may follow my footsteps by making their own grand ones.

Differentiating myself means a lot more to me than just being different. To me, it means being different in the right direction. I can rebel against the norm all I want, but use is it if it's done for its own sake? If a difference is being made, the result should be positive. And that means I have to take what people do right, and what people do wrong, sum it all up, learn a couple lessons from it, and extrapolate what I can do better.

So differentiating myself means integrating an understanding of the rest of the world. I am only a component, and it produces a product only when the everyone and everything else is a factor. This, I've been doing for a long time. Listening, reading, observing, watching, analyzing, concluding.

The point of it all, the point of watching everyone else live their lives, is to live life myself, hopefully the best that I can. Life has taught me that kindness is rewarding — if not to me, then to the person to whom the kindness was gifted — but it also taught me that I should enjoy it. There are so many opportunities. Jobs, colleges, or perhaps just some simple sale down the road. Those opportunities mean nothing when you're not enjoying life.

So I've come to learn, when people tell you to look to your future, look to your present, and see what you make of it. Do you like your current position in life? If so, why do you wish to change it? Is it really necessary? If you don't, do not despair either. What can you do so that your next present will be more joyful? What is your current present missing? Perhaps you've always wanted to take a simple stroll down a nostalgic and scenic route — seemingly such a mundane want — but you've never had the time. Go and take it now. Life is surprisingly made of the summation of all the little things that we never bother to deal with. Then we get buried under a rock slide, because we made such a large pile of small rocks over the course of our life.

Those are my takes on life, the signs I came across while I traveled on Life Street.

P.S. I hope the dispersed math puns didn't kill anyone!~