Interesting ideas interspersed with nonsense - by nikhil bhatla: June 2007 Archives

Interesting ideas interspersed with nonsense - RSS - by nikhil bhatla, nbhatla@mit.edu -

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Hearst Castle & Morro Bay
Jun 18, 2007, 8:25p - 15 photos

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Fear of Guilt
Jun 11, 2007, 6:43p - Life
We have fear. We're scared. That's OK.

What's not OK is that we let that fear control how we feel, on the inside.

We let fear build walls where none exist. In our minds. We board up the options we assume won't budge, without even giving them a push.

We let fear dictate what we will do and what ... more »

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MattM - Jun 11, 2007, 11:32p
The fact that parents put their children on leashes may be less about their guilt and more about them poorly estimating their state after the loss of a child. Daniel Gilbert claims that we are quite bad at estimating this sort of thing and has data to back it up. Unfortunately, his book (Stumbling on Happiness) is not in amazon search within the book or google book search and I'm too lazy to find his references in the book by hand. The best quote on could find on the web was this one:

"We are not the field of fragile flowers that a century of therapists have made us out to be," he said. "We are remarkably resilient. . . . It isn't the case that life returns to normal and you get over the death of a child. But what it is, is that it is worth living again and that is something most of us cannot imagine.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/12/AR2006111200676.html

neha - Jun 12, 2007, 12:02p
good post. "I've recently realized that my anxiety was not due to my job, but that I put my anxiety into my job." That's a powerful realization.

I've been thinking about control a lot lately. I was reading _Stumbling on Happiness_. I went camping this weekend, and I was so paranoid about being prepared. I tried to account for every circumstance, all changes in weather, all possible activities. We think we have so much control over our lives, and that illusion often paralyzes us. Or distresses us. Causes us to take responsibility for events like we could have predicted their outcome. Something related to your thoughts on fear and guilt.

nikhil - Jun 12, 2007, 12:25p
yeah. that is *exactly* the feeling. it's a form of paralyzing paranoia.

heather - Jun 26, 2007, 3:05p
Good points. I also find that we (or at least I) can be tempted to take more responsibility than is really necessary, leading to more anxiousness. This is certainly true at work, and I imagine it's even more the case as a parent...maybe this is what leads to kids' lives getting massively overscheduled (eg "I must make sure my kid knows how to play piano/ swim/ etc so that he/she has a happy life.") But again, you can't control a child's future any more than you can anyone else's.

So many of the best experiences in life happen because we *weren't* prepared, and so we reacted quickly on gut instinct, rather than analyzing every option first.

harpo - Sep 25, 2007, 12:23p
I hear you Nikhil and I (think) am with you. Fear isn't just one thing however, in my opinion our minds and emotion do a variety of things that we call fear. You identified a lot of different things we blame fear for, but I think I should point out that some kind of fear is a natural defense mechanism that we NEED.

Other times we don't have the experience, information, motivation, interest, or time to confront or relieve a fear. An active fear of the unknown is reasonable, in generic terms. It is a reasonable defense that prevents us from doing unwise things all of the time. This I guess will depend on how you define "unwise". If you're open to losing your money, life, or reputation then perhaps fear is a detriment to you. However, if you're relatively carefree with those concerns and chose to live your life according to what is new and unfamiliar, then you are confronting the wisdom of our society, because it doesn't really know much about that. There's a new movie coming out with Sean Penn called "Into the Wild" about a real life account of a guy who abandoned all of his possessions and hitchhiked to Alaska to try to return to nature.

Consumer fear is one specialization of fear I am interested in unpacking, it's a unique set of problems that amounts to "mass fear" which is the most ignorant and terrible kind of fear. You wake up to realize your fears are unfounded, and what's worse, is that HAVE taken advantage of your fear to legal, political, or financial profit

Beach Bonfires in San Francisco
Jun 5, 2007, 1:17p - Environment
I'm interested in having a beach bonfire in San Francisco, but I haven't found much reliable information on the web. Disappointed by this stupid Internet thing, I gave in and called a real, living human being named James Marks of the National Park Service, who's responsible for issuing special permits for SF beaches. I was lucky enough to get him ... more »

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Sedley - Jun 7, 2007, 10:15p
Good info, Ocean Beach bonfires take me back to high school...

omar - Jun 7, 2007, 11:37p
this post would be 10X better and drive 100X more traffic if it were titled

"beach bonfires in babylon"

nikhil - Jun 8, 2007, 4:11p
huh? i don't get it

omar - Jun 11, 2007, 12:23a
i have heard from sources that you may be doing a bonfire! (as if the blog post weren't enough).

one thing: last time we went to a beach bonfire we were completely sand blasted. the wind can relly get going and make life miserable. what worked was having winter clothing equivalent on (certainly a hat) and good alcohol to deaden the pain ;)

Peter - Aug 14, 2007, 12:51a
I go to a group that has bonfires every month at either Ocean Beach or in Berkeley. They are great. Yeashore.org

codesmith - Dec 5, 2007, 11:58p
We had a good sized fire going in the starfish pit tonight across from the Beach Chalet. We were there from about 7pm until 9pm when a park ranger, dressed up all commando like, came by with a shovel. Of about 20 people on the beach one person had a glass bottle of beer - a nono that he called out. He then declared our fire illegal and started shoveling sand on it. When asked why it was illegal he said only "natural wood" is allowed to be burned. There were just embers and a piece of cardboard thrown on it. The cardboard was declared illegal and non-natural.

So I don't know how common this is but this guy was a dick and then was no reason for his action. We were closing it down anyway but this was BS. Total power tripper. And you're Nikhil, there's no info on the web about the rules.... lame.

That said, the firepits are very nice and it's great to be able to still have fires out there. It was a beautiful night!

Flame-on - Jul 2, 2008, 9:49a
Though the park's rules may douse some of our late night beach drinking and partying, you have to appreciate the fact that San Francisco is one of the few cities in California that even allows bonfires. The National Park Service was in discussions whether to band the bonfires all together. Their short term resolution were the controlled fire rings. The birth place of Burning Man, an amazing way to experience California's coast- let us all recognized the rules of the park so that we may all enjoy this San Franciscan tradtition for generations to come. For more info please check out: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2007/03/22/MNGDROPM781.DTL

sharon - Mar 11, 2009, 8:41p
very helpful!!!
thanx

Anne - Jun 23, 2009, 4:12p
Thanks!

thanks! - Aug 20, 2009, 2:58a
that really helped...maybe you can suggest some other locations to have a bonfire after a nice hike?

Liz - Sep 7, 2009, 11:08p
Thank you for taking your time and posting this information, it has been very helpfull. God Bless.

Sarah - Mar 26, 2010, 2:52p
Rules for bonfires on Ocean Beach

http://www.beachcalifornia.com/beach/sanfrancisco-beach-bonfires.html

im awesome - May 26, 2010, 1:29p
thanks for the info...im awesome

I am so nice - May 24, 2011, 9:48a
Thank you for the info.

Bobby - Jul 1, 2011, 3:25a
This helps out so much

beach bunny - Apr 28, 2012, 11:33a
Thanks for the info but wondering if they still allow it since this info is 2yrs old! Anyone out there know?

Why Study the Brain
Jun 1, 2007, 6:08p - Science
To apply to grad school, I had to write a personal statement that explained why I wanted to study neuroscience and why I would be successful at it. Here's the essay I wrote for my MIT application, way back in December '06.

Reading it again, it seems a bit corny. But I guess these things always do. Especially when you're ... more »

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