Gnosce Te Ipse

I wrote this on Ash Wednesday...here I am at 2 Lent and have not returned to it; as usual, I began with a personal reflection and ended up in the infinitely deep sands of the problem of suffering. I decided to wrap up what I have and post as is :) A dark day, with our first real winter storm coming in, heavy clouds and cold rain sure to follow. By morning, snow. I went to the little parish near my campus, not my usual haunt, for services at noon. I had to leave before communion, but got the critical piece: remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return. An excellent reflection for all, theist or non. I have not been thinking about my faith as much lately. This is perhaps good. I find, after 10 weeks spending of too much time in the hypnotic interface of Second Life (though this does seem to be balancing out), that I still have faith. Ash Wednesday did what it did for me last year: shook me out of my fat complacency and forced me to look within, to confess, to bow my ...

It is not quite that, O my brothers (just taught Clockwork Orange again). Second Life is not quite like eating the lotus. It has been recreation without purpose or goal, and that has been generally good. Is there a hypnotic component? Yes, as there is to general web surfing and television; while SL generally lacks the rich art of good film, it is certainly more interactive than tv or general web surfing. I'm part of a community there now which has bloody nothing to do with anything intellectual; I spend most of my time sword fighting. Sl is deeply immersive, in a way I can't describe. For some, it just doesn't work. For others, those of us closer to fantasy moment to moment perhaps, it works very well. The early hypno-immersion is passing, though, and I'm getting more balanced in my use of the Grid as the Wonder dissipates. Frankly, you can do just about anything there...what you can't do yet you will be able to eventually, you just do it through an avatar,...