BLAHG

I have always been of the opinion that you create your own fate. You are ultimately making the decisions. I stress this with my sons, that you are your own boss. You can make any decision, but then you have to accept the consequences. I think most people are of this opinion.

However, it surprised me to learn Einstein believed in fate. I was reading about this in an excerpt from "Einstein His Life and Universe" By Walter Isaacson, recently published. In it Einstein comes to this conclusion because of his experience with science. Everything has order; the rules are cast in stone. It's almost too perfect. Einstein did not necessarily belong to any religious thought, but he was far from being an atheist. He believed something bigger was behind the universe and that thing had laid everything out.

I am a big fan of Einstein, but his belief in fate bothered me. It bothered some of his peers as well. Many argued that Quantum Physics with its well defined probabilities and uncertainties actually allowed for free will. Einstein would just quip back with the old adage, "God doesn't play dice." His deeply religious friends were very disturbed by this as most religions stress free will. The idea of fate is frowned upon by religious institutions because it moves the guilt of a sin away from the sinner (not my fault, just my fate).

Einstein's case for fate was strong (more so than what I just posted here). But, I still didn't believe it. So, I had to come up with something that fit his thoughts, but also agreed with mine. This is what I came up with.

God can of course see all time and space. He knows what decision we are going to make well before we do. Some interpret this as proof of fate, but it's not. He knows the outcome, but we choose it. I believe that God was like an artist with a canvas of time and space in front of him. He threw up some color near the 'top' of the art piece and let the colors flow and intermingle as they filtered down through time. This represents our free will. However, in an effort to refine his art work, God did touch ups at certain points to keep the work going the direction he wanted. This represents miracles and is key to this theory. If everything was set in stone from the beginning and fate reigned supreme, there would be no need for miracles. Whether it's the parting of the water for Moses, or some pre-Saint curing a disease by touch, only because of a lack of fate did God need to intervene in His space-time art piece.

Obviously it would be cool if everyone could run their homes off of wind and solar power. However, both of these technologies are expensive to get into and it takes years to come out ahead. You might just break even if you loaned the money and had to pay interest. But, here are some affordable ideas I intend to investigate when I someday build my own home.

If you haven't noticed lately, LED lights are making a huge dent in the illumination market place. They're cheap and efficient, even more than fluorescents. The problem is they run on lower voltages, so a converter would be needed at every light socket and these converters are not always very small. I read somewhere an opinion that houses should be wired for both 110 VAC and 12 VDC to allow easier use of money saving LED's. In otherwords there would be one transformer that fed all the LED's in the house. But, I thought it would be cool to take that one step further.

Generating 12 volts from wind and solar is CHEAP. So, if you had your house wired with 12 volts to operate all your LED lights, it would be very easy to create a battery system in parrallel with the transformer feeding the line. So you would run on batteries most of the time and if by chance you used them up, the hard wired converter would kick in and feed the 12 volts from the outside 11o. Now, these batteries would be charged via solar and wind power. I have seen some solar panels online costing $100-$200 that claim they charge a battery in a few hours on a sunny day. Wind mills are being sold anywhere from $500 to $2500. But, they generate a lot more power, day or night... if the wind is blowing over 8mph in most cases. If you have a stream by your house perhaps you could just hook a car's alternator up to a water wheel. That would run all the time.

So, think about it. How much cheaper would your electric bill be if your lighting was free. One website I reseached had a windmill that powered his cabin and if the batteries were fully charged he used the extra energy to power a heater automatically. So this could even help your natural gas bill. In his case he just didn't need to burn as much wood. :)

OK, what about electricty used by other things in your house? Most gadgets in your house run on 12 VDC or less. Inside they have a transformer that converts 110 VAC to whatever it needs. In a perfect world the makers of these gadgets would allow you to side step the transformer and use your 12 volt source directly. You could modify your equipment, but that is dangerous and could prove expensive. Easier though would be gadgets that use that big black cubed over sized plugin. Inside that black plastic is the transformer. If you read the specifications written on it, it will tell you it's output. A lot, but not all, of them are 12 volts. These electronic devices could be plugged directly into your system. Anything made to plug into a car's cigarette lighter would work.

Some things you won't be able to run on 12 VDC though. These include the high demanding housewares such as laundry, stove, refrigerator, air conditioning, etc. So, it may be impossible to totally eliminate outside power sources (cheaply). They do make 12 VDC to 110 VAC converters, but when used by a power hungry TV, it will drain a car battery in a couple of hours.

Another idea I have played with is the use of solar ovens. There are several websites that describe using old satelite dishes (the big ones, 6 feet in diameter or more) to make solar ovens. A simple way is to get one, coat it in tinfoil, and point it at the sun. On a sunny day you can boil water in about the same time you can on a stove. So it is cool to think about using such a system to help heat your home with some kind of heat exchange. It could also be used to cool your home! I was amazed last year to find my brother's frig in his camper ran on propane. They're called gas refrigerators. Unlike your typical refrigerator that uses freon and a mechanical pump, these use ammonia and generate the needed pressure with heat. This system could be used with our solar oven. The concentrated rays from the sun could be used to heat the sytem instead of propane. Not sure how efficient this would be, but it is interesting to think about a way to use the sun to cool.

There are also several experiments ongoing in making energy efficient homes. One guy who built his idea of an energy efficient house had to install an air exchange system because the house was so air tight it would get low on oxygen. :) Pair something with that with my LED plans and you have a cheap energy bill.

I had never really thought seriously about reincarnation until I read an article about a little boy who seemed to think he had led another life. The article is profound and one of the versions can be found here: http://www.reversespins.com/proofofreincarnation.html

The article is given validity by the fact no one around the boy wanted to believe it or is looking for attention.

I have always found Edgar Cayce an interesting character as well. He was an unwilling psychic who had an ability to determine what was wrong with someone ill and dictate the treatment to get better even though he had no medical experience. This is actually how most psychics realize their gift, through abilities to see inside the body. At some point in his career he started sensing past lives of his patients and then ultimately his own. His most famous past life was that of a resident of Alantis. This short summary of him doesn't do him justice. You can look him up on line and find many believers and sceptics of him. Not sure if I believe he had a power, but still very fascinating.

Anyway, all of this led me to explore my possible past lives. I opened my mind to the possibility and spent some time thinking about it and these are my results.

Current life minus 1:
The most recent life I could tap into was one I lived in the 60's. My fondness for Converse shoes, 60's music, working on cars, etc. are all from that era. I don't know why, but something about these retro alternative 60's chicks you sometimes see on TV I find attractive. So all this has me believing that I was there in the 60's, but this also means I had to die a young death to be reborn in 1972. Vietnam? What is weird is I don't even want to think about that.

Current life minus 2:
This one was actually a suggestion I read on a BBS and explored it. The suggestion was that all online sim pilots playing Warbirds (an online WWII airplane game) were actually reincarnated WWII pilots. When exploring that I found it not to be true. Although I have a fondness for WWII planes, I just didn't feel like I had ever piloted one. BUT, I did realize a different role I played in the war. Since a kid watching WWII documentaries on PBS, I have been fascinated by gunners on ships, in particular the 40mm guns. These are the guns that have 2 large barrels that alternately fire and you see teams of men loading them as a man aims from a chair attached to the gun. In grade school I used to 'fire' 2 pencils acting as barrels at moving targets. Today, I commonly attach to these guns in the online game of Warbirds. I feel I was a loader of one of these guns somewhere in the Pacific. This also means I probably died in the war because I had to have been reborn sometime around 1950 if I was to become a child of the 60's. Is this why I am so young at heart? Because my last 2 lives ended so soon?

Current life minus 3:
I haven't figured this one out exactly. It does seem harder to remember lives the further back you go. :) Anyway, most of my exploration entails investigating things I am fascinated about and then going on how I feel about that. This technique leads me to believe I had something to do with the American Indian battles on the plains. It is important to note that feeling has a lot to do with this. I am fascinated by the Civil War, yet I don't feel I participated in it. Anyway, Custard of the infamous Last Stand has always fascinated me in some way. I feel I knew him, at least in an informal way perhaps. I don't feel I was at Little Big Horn though, although I can feel the horror of that day on a personal level. So, I believe I was involved somehow. The whole American Native vs the White Man history saddens me such that maybe I saw it first hand.

Current life minus 4:
I was very close to Sam Houston. I may have been him, I can't decide. For some reason I have always considered Jim Bowie and Davy Crockett as my contemporaries. I read a lot of biographies on American heroes and for some reason ones from this time period were my favorite, ESPECIALLY Sam Houston. I can't really say why, I just know. For those that don't know their history, Sam Houston took command of Texas troops after the Alamo tragedy (where Bowie and Crockett died) and led them to eventually defeat Santa Anna and win Texas freedom from Mexico. He was a statesman for most of his life. Perhaps I was an aid of his or something.

Current life minus 5:
My first life outside the US. I don't feel I was here before or during the Revolutionary War. Things are getting more and more sketchy now, but I feel I lived a life at sea. Ship battles of the Napoleonic Wars have interested me and I think I fought in them on the side of the British fighting the French. I have also loved model ships. I don't feel in anyway I was a pirate nor do I feel I sailed much further than Europe. Is this why I am such a war buff? Because I participated in so many wars throughout the ages?

Others:
I don't have any feelings for lives older than the 1700's. Althought I have had faint thoughts that hint I may have been involved in the Christian Church of the Middle Ages and also intellectually participated in the Renaisance somehow.

I am not a big believer in reincarnation, but is was fun to think about. :)

I was once an animate opposer to Intelligent Design (ID). That was until I found out through a few websites what ID really was. The media once again has lied to me. As you read this keep in mind that I am still on the side of Darwin, but have openly researched ID in light of recent events.

Let's clear the air right now and state something I was surprised to learn. The Christian Right Creationists, are ruining ID's reputation. In all arguments about ID, the Creationists are using only portions of ID to support their cause. Creationists know they will never be able to push creationism into the science class, but suddenly they see a group that does not agree with the evolution theory and uses science to back their views. So, they take the parts of ID they want, mainly the parts that say "Evolution Theory is wrong because..." and then they tag on a line never used by true Intelligent Design scientists-- "Therefore Genesis is right."

First lets establish for everyone what Evolution Theory entails, the facts and the theory. This is based on science and not bible, so what is printed here cannot be argued except maybe my over simplistic take of it.

1) We know that mutations occur in living organisms. Viruses show this a lot, but examples in more complex organisms has even been seen. While the changes to higher organisms were generally bad, a few good ones have been noted.

2) Survival of the fittest is an observable situation. Again, viruses display this a lot by growing resistant to antibiotics. Also, it's not too difficult to figure out that giraffes with longer necks get more food and increase their chance for survival over a shorter one and the trait is passed onto the offspring.

3) The fossil/dig record shows alike animals from different time periods. We see an animal common to a time period disappear and in the next time period see a very similiar animal, but showing different traits. Sometimes the spans of the two over lap.

Using these 3 statements, scientists developed Evolutionary Theory. In true science fashion they leapt from these facts to a likely explanation of what happened. While Creationists will balk at these statements (especially #3), true Intelligent Design proponets... DON'T. Intelligent Design's statement of purpose says they are based on science, and the 3 statements are scientifically sound. They part with Evolutionists only at the theory step. Instead their theory is that things are much too complex to be the result of randomness. They will commonly point out things that Evolution cannot account for which are good arguements. But, then the Creationists come around and bastardize that. I have even read recent ID writings that agreed some form of Evolution probably occurred, but that it definitely does not explain everything.
Because of the agenda being pushed by the Christian Right, ID has been tagged with falsehoods. Here are a few corrections:

*** ID says nothing about God, NOTHING. At the moment a lot of their work is figuring out scientifically how you can tell if something is designed intelligently or naturally formed. For example, a watch and a stone with pretty colors. Well, the rock's complicated colors are easily explained, but the watch's inner workings were obviously created by something intelligent. But how do you tell mathematically/scientifically? How is intelligence defined? These are questions they are working on. It might surprise Creationists to learn that ID scientists sometimes mention aliens from outer space. Not in a scientific sense, but when asked what is the source of this design if it wasn't human, they answer, "We don't know (or care). Whether it be some being, aliens, a universal computer, or something we can't even fathom, it's irrelevant to our study."

*** ID does NOT believe the Earth is only 6000 years old like pure Creationists. On an astronomy note, ID scientists generally agree with common beliefs about the creation of stars, solar systems, and even the Big Bang. Again, they are scientists and the proof that our planet is billions of years old is immense.

*** ID relies on the scientific method and never cracks a bible. Again, they are NOT starting from a preconceived notion of God or the book of Genesis. This leaves open the fact that someday their own proofs of design might actually proove them wrong. This happens over and over in science and if a fact is written on the wall, a scientist doesn't ignore it because of beliefs.

Yes, ID scientists will attack Evolution Theory. It's the job of scientists to question theories and push the burdon of proof if they don't buy into something. Evolution Theory does have some work to do yet and maybe in the future we will see some large strides. The foggiest area of Evolution that leaves the theory incomplete is the question of when do we have a new species? When does a species get to the point that it can no longer make viable offspring from a species sharing a common ancester? We're 97% close to a chimp's DNA, so why can't we interbreed (OK, stop the giggling!). The thought is that chimps and us share a distant relative. If so when along the way did we become unviable to each other? I have heard possible explanations, but again only theories.

I have seen a lot of bashing of ID on the internet and used to do a fair amount myself. While I have not been convinced that current Evolution Theory is not what happened, I have been convinced that true ID, unwarped by Creationists, actually has a place in the classroom, if only a side note when evolution is discussed. If backed with 100% science, I have no objection to any theory in a scientific environment.

Note: I tried my best to keep out Creation 'Science'. I could go on and on about how unscientifc that is and how it does NOT belong in a science class, but that's too easy a topic. :) As a word of caution, carefully examine anything you read on ID. A lot of stuff on the internet is warped because it was written by Creationists.

The paradox of time travel is summed up as "what happens if I go back into the past and kill my father before I was born?" The paradox is then of course, you aren't born, so you can't kill your father, so you are born, so you can go back and kill him...

Just recently a group of physicists got around the paradox, but I don't like their explanation (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4097258.stm). I have had my own theory on the topic since the early 90's and since I haven't seen anything quite like it anywhere else, I decided to post it here.

Time

Imagine a road with a truck stop. Every second a truck leaves and heads out on the road. Every truck leaves with the same cargo-- the universe at the first second time began. So, there is only 1 truck per particular time in space. Time progresses normally for each cargo after hitting the road. For the most part the trucks look identical at any particular mile marker as they travel end to end, one passing by every second. There might be some minor differences caused by chaos, but I won't touch on that here.

Time travel would be like visiting another truck. Even if you go 50 years into the past and mess it up, you only mess up that truck. After returning and finding your truck as you left it, you decide to go back 49 years and 364 days. But you find the mess you created in the truck a day behind that one did not carry on to this truck. Now, you can monitor the changes caused by your mess ups, but only by going back to that exact truck you messed up excatly 50 years back from your present. You'll be able to witness the results of the mess you made, BUT only in real time as it happens. To see what happens in a week, you'll have to wait a week.

It gets a little hard to think about, but your alter egos will also probably jump back 50 years and mess it up as well. So that cycle will probably continue until the first messed up truck ages 50 years and because of your mess up, you may or may not have time traveled and the truck at that original mile marker in the past may not get all messed up, continuing undisturbed to reset the cycle 50 years later.

Another consequence of this theory is that when you time travel, you disappear from your truck and will remain missing for an amount of time equal to that spent on other trucks. There is no returning to the moment you left. You could, but that would mean jumping back into a different truck, and I wouldn't risk that because who knows how messed up that truck is from other time travellers like yourself.

This could also force a notion of the first truck--the one that started when time began. You can't travel into the future more than the first truck. The trucks are really going to start diverging from each other when forward time travel is discovered. The scientists in truck 1 will find out that there's no where to go. But the scientists in truck #60 will discover they can go a minute into the future (assuming the second increments, which of course it only used for this example, it would actually probably be Planck's time or 10^-43 seconds). HOWEVER, it could be that time is infinite. Which begs one to wonder if we could travel into the past beyond the Big Bang.

Ethical problems arise quickly. Political groups may try to influence other trucks for their gain, or even worse, some psychotic person could go back and kill his past life and take it's place if he felt he wanted to relive his life. Luckily he could only do this so many times, as he is still aging normally in his own personal time frame. Along with gifts of data and items to other trucks would also certainly be thefts.

Some where in the future is a Hippie trying to pass legislation that will designate certain time frames (ie trucks) from being touched, so that they may remain in their undisturbed natural state. What they don't realize is they have to somehow get the other trucks to agree on that. :)

Along these same lines I have also wondered if it might be easier to just 'see' into the future or past rather than go there. Light is weird. Although not discovered or much thought about, what if light, because of its unique properties, was visible from other trucks when using the right tool? That is something I would love to see. Imagine the use in court. Although your lawyer would just bring in a physicist who states we can't trust all trucks to be the same because of chaos. Just because every truck we monitored at X mile marker had you killing your wife, it does not mean you did it in this truck.

Liar!

As mentioned in part 1, I have reached a pinnacle moment in my spirituality.

That pinnacle was recently reached while attending a Christian group with my Christian friends (a Baptist and Lutheran). After I told them I didn't want to attend a seminar on Christian marriage because I disagreed with their view of women in society and faith, an argument ensued. My friends believe in the bible word for word. So, women are to submit to whatever the man says. Now, they can give advice, but the man always has the last say... because God works through him, not the women. They went on to argue there is never a cause for divorce, no matter how bad the man treats the woman, although they hinted the other way around may be OK. I said that is just wrong. "But, Troy, it says so in the bible!" I argued that I doubt God would ever want someone to be in a bad relationship that left them unhappy and abused. "God works in mysterious ways." The ultimate cop out used by bible freaks, that I just hate.

Of course there was more to this than the women issue. Things like practicing homosexuals cannot be Christians, and that for the most part anyone involved in science cannot truly be faithful. The latter statement made by them resulted in a discussion on evolution. I said most of the scientists I knew were very religious and that when studying science you actually begin to see that with all the complexity and apparent coincidence, there has to be a higher power behind it. Nope, they are going to Hell. But, they are good people. "Only someone who truly lets Jesus into their heart can go to Heaven." I asked how they know they haven't and it goes something like, "Well, they aren't putting their faith and belief in the bible if they don't believe in Genesis. Jesus himself said he did not come to destroy the teachings of old. You can't believe just the parts of the Bible you want".

Which leads me to my pinnacle. I reject the Bible as a whole. I don't, however, reject all of it. The Bible, including the New Testament, was put together by man. Some group of people sat down and decided which books they considered to be inspired by God. But, these men were trying more to push their religion than the truth. I highly doubt they would feel the need to add a book that did not jive with what they thought, even if it was inspired by God. I don't believe the Bible tells the whole story, but the story that early Jews and later Christians wanted us to hear.

I HAVE DECIDED TO GO WITH MY HEART OVER ANYTHING WRITTEN OR TOLD TO ME!!!! I have a personal relationship with God and I consider him a better source. The extreme Religious Right seem to miss this at times. They believe 100% in a single interpretation of the Bible. That interpretation given by a man, not God.

All these religious groups (Jewish, Christian, and some others) in the world claim to follow the Bible, yet each one comes up with different 'rules' for their followers. That alone says something.

Thank you God for making me a free thinker so I can personally worship you as you intended.

I have recently come to a realization about religion that has been building in my brain since 1994.

1994 is a significant year in my spiritual growth, or lack of... depending how you look at it. In the summer of that year, the Catholic campus Church decided not to hold masses because a lot of students went home for the summer and they were doing some renovation of the grounds. So, I had to go to the church in town. At my first mass there I noted it as what I called an 'upity' church. People seemed to be more concerned on how they looked than the reason they were there. Suffice it to say that my denim shorts did not fit in. Nor did my long hair and earings it would seem. I could actually hear people talking about me. My good hearing picked up discussions wondering who I was. One mother actually asked her teen son if I was someone who went to his school. This was all going on after mass started, so I was pretty annoyed by it. Then came the homily. It was basically a fire and brimstone speech against gays. It went so far as to suggest not dealing with them in anyway, or in otherwords shut them out and discriminate against them. I almost walked out of there. For the first time ever, I left after receiving Communion, just kept on walking right out the church.

Also in 1994, I lost my 'church' friends. I hung out with a lot of different groups in college, I was very social and known in a lot of groups. Since Frosh year, one of the groups were some people I knew in High School and their group of friends, all very religious but from different denomiations. I would meet up with them at mass or other church activities, ate with them at lunch, and hung out with them every third weekend or so. They were of course alcohol and smoke free, which was always fine by me. In the Spring of 2004 as I was joining a fraternity I was invited to join them less and less. By the Fall I had lost total contact. Late in the year I found out why through my cousin. She lived next to one of them and ate lunch with them one day when I came up as the discussion. They did not know she knew me. Basically, one of them (who I considered dating at one time) stated I was a lost cause now that I was in that fraternity and too far down the evil path of partying. Just as well I guess. I partied with computer nerds, physics geeks, pot heads, drunks, dance clubbers, theatre types, and fraternity preps. Only the church crowd ever rejected me.

From that point on I would be constantly questioning my religion. It is important to note I never questioned my faith or spirituality. As a student of history, in particular war history, I soon realized that religion played heavily into the death and destruction sown upon this planet. From the Crusades to Ireland, and even clashes among Eastern beliefs, not agreeing on the topic of religion was enough to start a war. And the Church went forth to spread the word of Jesus to the corners of the Earth... and killed anyone that said, "no thanks." The history of the Catholic Church is full of scandal and sin right up to the present day. Most other Christian groups split off at one time or another because of this. However, some of them warped into much worse things (I only need to point at some of the rich televangelists or suicidal groups to make my point).

I did try to rejoin the Catholic Church in the last few years because I now had kids and wanted them to grow up in the Church. But, I was really unhappy with the churches I went to. There was no sense of community. On top of that the molestation scandals were in full force and it sickened me to see how the Catholic Church was handling it.

I have always been at odds against some of the 'rules' established by Catholicism. But, now I am finding out they are much closer to what I believe in than that of anyone from the "Christian Right". More on that in part 2 as I reach a pinacle in my spirituality and rejection of the establishment.

I hate it when people use bad stats to push a story or cause.

The most recent one here in Des Moines centered around an article for Bike to Work Week. The Des Moines Register was reporting on people coming into work on their bicycles and at some point commented that it was kind of dangerous because drivers of cars do not treat them as their equal, or in some cases don't even see them. Some idiot wrote an editorial saying the stats do not support that lie! He quoted that only 4 bicyclists died in traffic accidents last year in Iowa compared to over a hundred motorists. Therefore bicycling is actually safer! OK, I hope I do not have to point out the stupidity here. When comparing 2 things that have a dissimiliar number pool, you have to take percentages. When you use his numbers to create percentages, by looking at fatalities per hour on the road, I am sure you will see how much safer you are in a car than a bicycle (or motorcycle for that matter).

The one that burns me the most that I see all the time is the following rant made by liberals, "Company ABC is not diverse because only Y% of their engineers are minorities compared with Z% of the population." This stat, while probably true, is totally misused time and again. They should not be comparing the diversity of their employees to the population. What they should be doing is comparing the diverstiy of their employees to the diversity of engineers graduating. Even that is misleading as you have to not only consider the last graduating class, but historically as well since most of the companies employees were hired in the past. So, then the question becomes, "Why are only X% of engineers a minority compared with Z% of the population?" This is good, because now we are trying to get to the root of the problem. Rather than accuse Company ABC of something they are not, we are trying to find the cause. Is it the fault of colleges, high schools? All we would have to do is follow the percentages down the line to see. It might even go beyond the fault of any school, but we don't know because they are too busy using the race card.

The other one that bugs me is women in management. Now, I will admit there might be a problem somewhere, but we will never know because once again it is assumed that if management is not 50% women, something is wrong. There is so much to consider before making this assumption. For example, upper management is almost exclusively men. However, these men have had years of moving up the ladder and they started when women were unfairly shut out. Now that women are not being shut out like they were in the past, we cannot expect to have all these women CO's when they are still working up through the ranks. Also, I would love to see the 2 stats on this. What percentage of women are working professionally? I bet it's below 50% which means once again we should not be using the 50% stat. Second, what percentage of women vs men want to be in management? I bet you will also find that men lead, probably only slightly.

I am not saying there aren't racist or bigot hiring practices going on, but I am saying we need the whole story to know what is truly going on. Not statistics being used poorly.

I noticed a long time ago something that I found interesting and thought I should point it out here.

I once discovered sometime after college that when I thought back and remembered college, I would remember it or replay the moment in one of 2 ways: 1st person and 3rd person. It seemed that most of what happened my Freshman and Sophomore years was remebered in 3rd person, or I would view the memory from outside my self. Later years I remembered in first person, seeing through my eyes. I found it kind of weird and figured it had something to do with how old the memory was, since my pre-college memories were also 3rd person.

Then one day at work I was remembering a particular good memory from early high school where I was at a party and making people laugh. But it suddenly hit me that I had remembered it from 1st person. Why? My history theory did not fit.

After that I just started randomly remembering things to see how I remembered them. I found quite a few old memories that I remembered 1st person, although most were 3rd person. So, I have come up with a new theory that appears to work. What I think is going on is if I was acting like my true self in the memory, I see it 1st person. If I am not being myself and more or less going through the motions of life, I see it 3rd person. I did not discover myself until early Junior year in college. By discovering myself I mean I said, "To hell what anyone thinks, I am tired of being judged by my peers, parents, and employers. I am going to be who I want to be." From that point on most if not all of my memories are 1st person. The old memories that are 1st person are all situations where I was truly being myself, not caring what others thought or worried about how I looked.

After I figured this out, I wondered if when I grew older and changed over time if I would start switching some 1st person memories to 3rd person memories. But, I have yet to notice that. I could still care less what anyone thinks... or not too much anyway. :)

2 thoughts have been bothering me lately.

The first one is, "Will I like heaven?" Oh, some of you are laughing already. I used to think my Heaven would be a place where I would be able to have and do whatever I want. So, I could go back and build all the things I have always wanted to, but did not have the time or money. Of course there would be the usual troop of gorgeous girls to satisfy my every need and I would get to see all my dead relatives and friends. On top of that, all my questions will be answered.

Wait a minute, that doesn't compute. My version of heaven has some very selfish things in it. Would God permit that? Is making it to Heaven going to give us the right to sin? I doubt it. I value being smart, creative, different, and an overall nice guy. However, in Heaven everyone is intelligent and creative. I would reckon everyone is pretty nice there and not all that different. If I am to become one with the Lord, where did my individuality go?

Most likely it will be that Heaven is so overwelming I won't care about all of this. But, I even have a problem with that. What if Heaven is like being doped up on heroin the whole time without ever coming down? To some that might sound neat, but not to me. That's just not who I am. I fear losing my individuality and control.

The second thought that is disturbing me at the moment is wondering if all the above is what got Satan and the bad angels kicked out of Heaven. Well, I certainly don't want to go that route.

I'm sure I'll figure it out one way or another some day.