I just watched Contact again with Pita. I came to the realization that what Ellie (Jodie Foster) experienced allowed her to understand the grounding of Johnson’s (Matthew McConaughey) beliefs. Johnson was a person who had a faith in God from his experience. He had experienced something God-like first hand, giving him his faith. Ellie could never understand the way he arrived to this belief, since she hadn’t experienced the same thing. To her, everything was just a delusion.

Yet by the end of the movie, she experiences communication with another life-form. No one believes her, because she has no proof. She is put in the same situation that she puts Johnson in; the question of faith based on experience. And as she had no proof of the experience with extra terrestrials, much like Johnson has no proof about God, she is mocked.

It is understandable that Ellie was skeptical about Johnson’s belief. In the end, however, she comes to the understanding about the way people arrive at their beliefs. That no one can truly challenge them, because not everyone has been through the same experiences.

I used follow Ellie’s beliefs in the beginning of the movie. Beliefs such as needing empirical evidence to believe in God, and that God does not exist because there has been no evidence. Now I have come to understand that although I haven’t experienced him yet, it doesn’t mean that I won’t in the future. I now believe that I have no idea whether God exists or not, and that the answer may be revealed to me later on. It’s not atheist, it’s not theist, it’s not agnostic. It was something that took me a while to understand.

And yet I understand nothing.

A subject I find difficult to express myself about is that of freedom.

Freedom is a difficult thing to understand. In a relationship, freedom is always bounded by some constraint imposed when the relationship is first made. Yet freedom is a very general statement, even if narrowed down to the situation within a relationship.

The freedom I wish to speak about is that of dependence within a relationship. Freedom in this case is related to a sense of responsibility.

As a person, I find responsibilities to be detestable. I have always tried to avoid responsibilities in my life, and I do it well. The only thing that I am responsible for is myself, a fact that I’ve very willingly accepted, unlike others that I know.

However, in a relationship, I’ve always felt that one should be responsible for his or her better half. I’ve always believed that it should be a commitment when entering such a bond. Yet there is always the separation between being responsible for someone, and being forced to be with someone to serve their whim.

As a responsible person, it is one’s job to make sure that one is there if the other needs it. However, this other person must understand that whenever he or she feels this “need”, he or she should not interfere with the freedom allowed within the boundaries of the relationship.

A generic example may make things clearer. If a boyfriend wanted to spend some time at home on the weekend with his girlfriend, but his girlfriend wanted to go skiing for the weekend with her friends, then the male should not hinder the activities of the female, unless he was in distress, or in great need of company. If his demand for her time is too great and constantly smothering other activities she wishes to do, then he is not being a responsible person and respecting his partners’ wishes.

It has always seemed like such a selfish thing to me, to be inordinately demanding, or unsatisfiably clingy. It begins as a form of flattery, to be sure, but excessive constraints become a burden or strain on the relationship. One finds oneself constantly trying to please the other, without prevail.

I believe that such greediness stems from insecurity. When someone is insecure, he or she is scared that his or her partner is having too good a time, and will hence forget about the relationship. Perhaps jealously plays a part in such a vague subject, and serves as a more conscious manifestation of a subconscious feeling.

Of course, I am guilty of such selfishness myself at times, though I wish I wasn’t. I feel that I’ve improved, that I can respect the desires of other people, so that they may be free to do what they wish. Perhaps this is a sign of increased confidence in my relationships, that all I wish is for others to be happy.

A Nash equilibrium is a terrible thing.

I’ve never shaken while watching TV before. Yet today I shook, I trembled, I bit my nails. A special was on 31 today called Bushido: The Way of the Warrior. I’ve never been much of a fighting fan. Boxing has always boring, pro-wresting isn’t fighting at all, and UFC just never appealed to me. For some reason though, watching Bushido sucked me in. They had the best matches I’ve ever seen before, real or fake.

The final title was fought between two large Japanese warriors, and it was the one that really knocked the wind out of me. The match was extremely close, with one fighter being smaller than the other. The smaller one took a lot of leg hits in the beginning so was injured from the start. This disadvantage, as well as his size difference, cost him the match, but not before he pulled off a screaming, adrenalin rushing, sitting-on-the-guy’s-ass boston crab and injuring him. There was one point where he had the larger fighter by the feet when the larger fighter was belly up on the mat. They were both trying to feel each other out, the smaller one looking for a submission opening, and the larger one trying to anticipate the direction of the move. The hands of the smaller one were tied up with the leg holding, so his entire head was open to attack from his opponent, which he did. Every time the larger guy punched his face, he got psyched, and kept shouting for more. He managed to pull the submission off, but it was reversed and he eventually lost the match.

I always find it interesting to know that I can feel something different, that I can react in a way that I haven’t been known to before, that I can shake from a television programme. There are always things that I enjoy finding out about myself, because it feels like I’m not a static person, that there is the possibility of change in me. Sometimes I’m surprised at my own confidence, or even stunned at the cerebrality I’ve been able to gain.

If only my heart could change as well.

A few days ago I had a strange feeling. The idea that I was a virus stuck in my head. Anything I came in contact with became infected.

It just seemed like anyone I’ve become close with has been hurt in some way. It felt as if all my relationships always take a turn for the worse, and it’s my fault. I’ll find some tiny, forgivable trait, and turn it into a detestable problem. I’ll close off. I’ll hurt someone.

Sometimes I think that I hurt people to test my boundaries, to know how much they care. Perhaps I’m so insecure in my relationships that I need to be sure about how someone feels about me.

It’s as if I try to be friends with people I want to offend, so that they will hurt me back in some way, like Travis Bickle. Perhaps I need to be hurt.

I constantly feel as if I don’t know how to love. It’s such a frighteningly scary idea. I wish I loved more. So many times I believe that I am experiencing love, only to realize that I’m not, that it was just a fleeting emotion. Perhaps I need to be hurt to know that I can love.

I’ve only truly loved once. Perhaps it was so intense, so passionate, that all other emotions feel numb in comparison.

Perhaps I simply don’t know what love is.

I just know that I don’t want to hurt anymore.

I once wrote about how I could never come up with my own ideas, that my creativity was non-existent. After all, I look to this and that for inspiration and ideas on nice, simple webpage design. It seems to be true for almost everything I do though. My style of dress. My expressions. My elocution.

When I first wrote about this, it felt like I had no creativity whatsoever, that nothing I created was original. I constantly felt like all that I could do was imitate.

The realization dawned on me today, that I always look up to certain aspects of so many people, and that I’m always trying to capture that aspect for myself, such as Steve’s style, Aaron’s character, Rob’s serenity, John’s/Alvin’s intelligence, Nadine’s charisma, or Dave’s strength. It feels like I’m just a motley menagerie of other peoples’ personalities, never really being “myself”. I end up being someone who can only imitate parts of other people.

I suppose that I’m fine with this, although it’s taken me a while to understand this fact. After all, it’s only been within the last year or so that I’ve come to accept myself, and who I’ve come to be. I feel like I’ve become a better person in my pursuit of self-improvement, but only by following what I like in others.

For only in others can I see beauty.