Lolita

I realized that I'm simply not cut-out to be super involved in fashion because obviously I don't make enough time to post regular posts. For the fashion lovers still recovering from the hollow echos of my absence, you will never be left wondering what I'm wearing again because here's my Instagram. With this, you'll be able to check in every day to ensure that I have not left the house naked. For the others who are still reading. I will write for you some of the things that has been particularly interesting to me.

      

My new job has demanded much of my time and attention and it's now at the forefront of my everyday functioning. I am waiting for grad school to start in September. 

I am currently with reading Lolita by Nabokov. Alas, my book is used and the cover page has disintegrated over time due to overuse-age. The rest of the book will probably follow a similar fate because of it, so I will have to get a new one. Perhaps a hard cover copy. 

If you haven't read the book, I high recommend it. Nabokov's prose is extremely captivating. Though the theme is taboo but all the naughty bits are implied and just subtle enough that it allows the readers to use their imagination. It's a fantastic read for anyone who is interested in exploring that aspect of human sexuality. However, the novel is more than just sex and the characters are very complex and relatable.

Doublethink

Cognitive dissonance is experienced when a person become aware of his/her own hypocrisy. In most cases, people will either try to justify the behaviour to match the thinking or vise-versa, depending on what the path of least resistance is.

I have no qualms with cognitive dissonance because I often know how to resolve it. Justification takes effort, yes, but it's easy. Just think about it. The last time you did something against your morals, you felt horrible right? How long did that uneasy feeling last? I'm sure whatever guilt or shame you experienced was diminished quickly, either by behavioural compensation or a set of self-affirming thought procedures. Either way, cognitive dissonance didn't plague you for long because in reality we hate the identity of being a hypocrite.

What's scary about cognitive dissonance is that it can potentially develop into doublethink if one does not arrive at an adequate justification for their incongruent beliefs and actions or willingly accepts the hypocrisy for the sake of easiness. If you've read 1984, you're familiar with that term. The very idea of doublethink sparks in me another explanation for contemporary "social malaise" - the breakdown of moral codes and the alienation of people from each other. Doublethink is partially responsible for a wide range of antisocial behaviours observed in individuals as well as conglomerate groups (ie. corporations). It also accounts for the mind-boggling inhumane acts performed by otherwise an average person (bounded by the basic moral codes). It has the potential to infiltrate even the most just individual but it can be made aware to the person and devolve back into cognitive dissonance. This would be ideal, though uncomfortable, but at least you'd still be able to something about it. And that to me is more important than anything else - being able to still do something.

Book Club

I was having a discussion with Jeremy yesterday about his love/hate relationship with contemporary literature. As an avid reader, he expressed his lament about how the prose in recent fictions are often too "easily digestible" and "mass oriented". Though their subject matters tend to pertain to issues people deal with on a daily basis thus making them very relatable in the sense that the stories could very well be true. He however finds that a great deal of successful contemporary writers (ie. Palanuik and Coupland) stick too much to the "formula of success" by identifying too much with sensationalism and commercialism. To him, he believes that the writings don't delve deep enough into the nature of life and the conditions of humanity. Conversely, he finds classic Russian literature (ie. Tolstoy and Dostoyesky) to be a lot more compelling and realistic. 

I on the other hand am much more appreciative of what writers can do nowadays. Some of my favourite writers are quite popular with the masses precisely because their prose are easy to understand and straight forward. I also find underrated local writers to be especially inspiring (read Salt Fish Girl by Larissa Lai, it's amazing!). Then I realized his problem existed within the confines of modern living. If you ever read classical fictions, and compare them to a book that may live on to one day become a classic piece of work, you'll see just how the struggles of the human race has changed. Books such as Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights have heavy focuses on the oppression, prejudices and general hardship. Whereas books such as Fight Club, and Hey Nostradamus! express the anguish and discontentment of isolation and losses. I'm not saying that modern literature don't deal with what classical fictions deal with but modern literature is "easily digestible" because people are primed to digest issues like that. Intense political struggles and poverty are not as poignant as they would be back in the days and people aren't as ready to live vicariously when they read those things as they would if they were reading about personal mental states and the pressures of living in a highly competitive society. Thus the reason why Jeremy would find old classical literature more compelling is because they deal so intensely with overcoming adversity. Life in the 1900's is fucking hard! In 2012, not so much because nothing really directly threaten our survival (at least not in this part of the world).

Oh hey, I got green and purple ombre (fancy way of saying dip dye) in my hair.