Life; A Work In Progress
The average person has a grand total of 2 billion seconds to live out their existance. For those of us lucky enough to live out this time in relative health, or to exceed it, shouldn't we be trying for something more?
It ends, people. Life ends. There is coming a time when your heart stops beating and you lie dead and cold on the floor somewhere--and that is it.
No redo's, no timeouts, no second chances. Only the bittersweet what-ifs that you will have plagued yourself with for the remaining moments of life.
2 billion seconds doesn't seem nearly as long as my life feels, and I am still a kid.
And yet we waste time bickering over the television, fighting over the computer, and resenting each-other over petty quarrels. A saying comes to mind when you consider how sad people can be; when you honestly consider that they would throw their time away on such things. It is a classic case of not being able to see the forest, through all the trees. When infact, those trees that you are so desperately trying to see around are the forest. You are trying to get past that next tree and then, then the forest will be in plain site. Only, it isn't there, and one more tree is in the way. First the tree of graduation is in your way and soon the tree of college jumps behind it. The tree of mediocre jobs blocks your view for years as you try and see around it it. The tree of midlife, or of retirement get in your way as you try and see the trees of contentment, happiness and fulfillment that affirm that 'yes, you have made a difference', and that when your two billionth second chimes to a close, and your eyes glaze over, you will not have been forgotten.
That is all we want, people. That is it. One simple goal that will push every American until they die. That one goal of having meaning. Trying to hold on to the fact that, "if I make a difference in someone else's life, then mine will have mattered." So the question is, if making a difference to someone else's life is so important, and they are trying for the same goal you are, then why isn't making a difference in your own life just as important.
In Symposium, a selection from The Dialogues of Plato, Plato uses historical allusions to demonstrate Alcibiades’ frustration with both social expectations for the phallus and his inability to meet these expectations. Alcibiades’ inability to have a productive sexual relationship effectively castrates him and demonstrates the impotence caused by an overemphasis on eroticism. The tragedy of Alcibiades is that he realizes he is unable to gain virtue through sexual relationships and will therefore be forced to remain mortal, yet he is unable to alter his condition.
In classical Greek literature the subject of love is commonly a prominent theme. However, throughout these varied texts the subject of Love becomes a multi-faceted being. From this common occurrence in literature we can assume that this subject had a large impact on day-to-day life. One text that explores the many faces of love in everyday life is Plato’s Symposium. In this text we hear a number of views on the subject of love and what the true nature of love is. This essay will focus on a speech by Pausanius. Pausanius’s speech concentrates on the goddess Aphrodite. In particular he looks at her two forms, as a promoter of “Celestial Love” as well as “Common Love.” This idea of “Common Love” can be seen in a real life context in the tragedy “Hippolytus” by Euripides. This brings the philosophical views made by Pausanius into a real-life context.
The audience knows Angelina Jolie as an excellent actress. She is using her celebrity influence to push for worldwide action toward the Syrian refugee crisis through emotional articles, essays through newspapers, magazines to share her experience with the audience. Angelina Jolie spent time with a Syrian refugee family during a humanitarian trip and said that the conflict in Syria has "created a wave of human suffering." Syrians are suffering from the bombs, chemical weapons, rape and massacres (Jolie, 44). For example, she mentioned a story in her essay “A new level of refugee suffering: Complementary”a family of eight children with no parents, their father had been killed and mother was taken by ISIS (Jolie, 44). Angelina Jolie is very emotional when it comes to the fight against the refugee crisis, in her article “A new level of refugee suffering: Complementary” she recalls the stories which she heard from the Syrian refugees which made her speechless and very emotional toward helping these refugees to raise the issue to the world and helping them to defend the country and resolve the refugee crisis (Jolie, 45). Angelina Jolie evokes – “ How can you speak when a women your own age looks you in the eye and tells you that her whole family was killed in front of her, and that she now lives alone in a tent and has minimal
Everyone has heard of Plato’s Symposium at one point in their life, after all it is a literary classic. When I began reading the novel I had no idea what a symposium really was, but according to the book’s introduction a symposium literally means “drinks party” when translated into English so if that is transliterated it informs readers that it is a party in which there would be consumption of alcohol (xiii, Plato). A symposium was also only meant for men and it was typically for the upper-class in which the host would provide a meal, entertainment, and alcoholic beverages (xiii, Plato). This particular symposium is in celebration of the tragedian playwright, Agathon, who had just won first prize for his tragedy at the Lenean festival (xiii, Plato). At the party there are seven speeches made about love by six different speakers, these speakers include: Phaedrus, Pausanias, Aristophanes, Eryximachus, Agathon, and Socrates; it is believed...
“We have everything we need to be happy, but we aren't happy. Something's missing.” This quote from Montag sums up the effects of a deteriorated social society. He recognizes that people have gotten to a point where they are a slave to their techonolgy, but he has no idea where to start, and in the end, the fixing begins at the end.
“Voting is not only a right but also a civic responsibility” (Juneau). “When people do not vote, they do not help improve their government or their surroundings” (Juneau). Meaning that a citizen...
I was in the car with my friend and we were listening to Tiesto and we were living the part, singing along and clapping as if we were in some concert in Las Vegas. Truth was, we were in Ashrafeye and we were just passing time until we went home. While rocking around, a sudden knock on the window startled me and I looked out to see a woman holding a child. This woman looked young, maybe no more than 21 and she had a small girl in her hand. I opened the window and she started begging for money. I had seen many fair shares of beggars before but what struck me about this girl was that she was almost my age, and was also a Syrian. This girl…. Could be my sister. I suddenly thought how scared this girl must be, living in a terrible conditions away from her country, and on top of that being forced to beg for money and food. This girl is doing this mostly not for herself but for her baby child, for whom she is willing to die. The story of this girl is very similar to the poem of Mahmoud Darwish “A Gentle Rain in a Distant Autumn” in that poem the poet is describing how he left his country and he was then searching for a new reasons to die, in that poor girl case the reason to die for was her small child. The author also quoted “form the country that slaughtered me” and by this he is referring to his own country. This is very much similar to this girls story by which the war that happened in her country, my country, slaughtered her and made
‘Das Leben der Anderen’ (The Lives of Others) is a striking example of how a director can convey narrative links within a film by employing various styles and film techniques. The Lives of Others relies upon these visual means to assist with the telling of the story as much as it relies upon the script. In this selected sequence of the film, several narrative links are drawn here to form the conclusion of ‘Operation Lazlo’. These narrative links are further cemented by Donnersmarck’s use of various lighting styles, diegtic and non-diegtic sound, revealing camera shots and intricate mise-en-scene.
I’ve known so many people who have had their lives cut short unexpectedly. You never can really know when your last day is, so why waste it doing things that don’t make you happy? So many people settle for less, just because it is easier and more comfortable. Life is short to begin with, and it can be cut even shorter at any possible moment. I think people should take risks and aim for the things that will ultimately leave them satisfied with their life.
Since my cultural experience was on the Japanese culture, I decided I would continue on with that interest and write my paper about the Japanese culture therefor giving me a chance to do more research about the culture. The Japanese culture is really rich and diverse, there is a particular hierarchy or structure to the Japanese culture, Denison (2002) stated that “Japanese culture is structured around black and white norms for acceptable group behavior. People who do not function by there norms are viewed as outsiders who lack legitimate status. Black and white expectations of behavior produce equally clear cut conformity, resulting in high harmony and certainly of outcome, trust is early through continuous conformity”.This is a huge and really important aspect of their culture because it governs their social standing, interacting with others and the way they are seen, and when it comes to your social standing in the culture, the way you are seen and respected by those around you is very important.
“Syrian children: The Forgotten Victims.” Your Middle East.Your Middle East. 10 Feb 2014. Web. 11 Feb 2014.
Gung Ho means working together in Chinese. What tactics did the leaders of this factory use to get workers from different cultures to work
All of the eulogies and speeches within Plato's novel give great insight as to the social workings and aspects of ancient Greek intellectuals. Through The Symposium the reader learns the different aspects and natures of love as viewed by these intellects. The theories and themes within the novel are discussed and compared with the opinions and beliefs of each person present. The more notable themes in the novel are the ideas of physical love and lust, and the importance of the reproduction of ideas as they are filtered through each of the speakers.
More specific arguments originate from the participatory theory of democracy and the critique of a lack of responsiveness and legitimacy of representative (party) democracy. The two sets of democratic institutions are distinguished by basic features of direct participation: (1) direct democracy focuses on specific issues, in contrast to voting on candidates and general programs for long terms of office, and (2) citizens themselves act as decision makers rather than delegating these powers. Like electoral systems, a variety of procedural forms, designs, and regulations are likely to influence processes and outcome. One must also keep in mind that direct-democratic processes cannot operate in isolation but are always linked to the structures of an overall political system that includes major representative institutions. Thus, interactions between the two types of institutions will be an important challenge for analysis. For instance, as George Tsebelis notes, referendum voters can be seen as an additional veto player. Some authors contend that direct democracy may undermine representative democracy, while others focus on the deliberative functions for a democratic public sphere and the capacity for integrating citizens in the democratic process. One can also assume that basic