Hopes, Dreams, and the lack thereof

[eyefragment]

I was originally going to make this into a fairly long, drawn-out post with some musings and a cutesy anecdote at the end about a dream I had recently, but that never happened and it seems too daunting to do right now, so I'm just going to get this off of my chest

Comments

Midlife crisis? No - the constant crisis of an examined life.

[ch3cooh]

In the past, I've found that a 'cure' for these situations is to stop doing everything 'normal' for a bit and do /nothing/ but read books, watch episodes of foo, walk places, sleep, eat, bathroom (one time wen I did this, I made 200 ridiculous paper snowflakes) - and if I do this for long enough, I get curious again, something catches my eye and I want do it - a project of some kind. It helps that I'm surrounded by awesome projects: like friends who want to randomly explain math and physics in the ESP office, and students who want things that I could teach them better explained

Re: Midlife crisis? No - the constant crisis of an examined life.

[eyefragment]

I don't think this is quite it. I'm definitely familiar with the "drop everything normal" strategy, but that's one that I adopt for managing burnout, and I'm not feeling burned out right now. Similarly, I've got projects that I think are fun and come more than averagely easily to me (see: anything that has to do with programming or math), but I gave up on the latter, and I don't see a good way to turn the former into a "dream," per-se. Definitely 'ppreciate your passing along thoughts/advice though.

[oxeador]

I want to say something, but probably not here in public, so instead I will just poke you. *Pokes*

[pteromys]

I'm... okay with insignificance. In a world this big and this well connected, it's hard to avoid feeling insignificant.

The people who do achieve some measure of significance don't always know how they end up doing so. (Joan Birman is one such example among mathematicians.) Maybe it'll pay to keep an eye out for a dream that fits. (And of course if you stumble upon one, you don't have to abandon your dream of being a good person; I like that one too!)

[sniffnoy]

Obviously, you have to go into supervillainy. Carve your name on the moon, perhaps?