Mmm. It feels good to have free time again . I’ve not had much of it lately (do I ever?) because of classes starting up again and getting more involved in my clubs around campus. It’s not really been unpleasant, though, being so busy. I’ve been doing some thinking lately and I think I’ve found my true passion.

I want to tell stories.

I’ve always admired fine storytellers, whether they be novelists, playwrights, oral narrators or what have you. More often than not, I tend to listen to other people’s stories rather than tell my own. As such, I’ve accumulated a great number of stories about other people’s lives, but few of my own.

I want that to change.

I’ve found my stories lack that certain je ne sais quoi that makes them interesting for others to hear. There’s just something missing. One way I’ve tried to fix that is by adding multimedia aspects to my works, most prominently photography.

Photography tell stories, but they are also lifeless.

No doubt photos have the chance to be beautiful, to express a great amount of detail in a small form. They can express ideas, emotions and sights that words alone cannot achieve. Yet their story is enclosed within that one picture, that one moment in time. There is no before, no after, just that moment. The story begins and ends with that image.

I want to lead readers on the journey of the story.

They say that the great writers are those who, no matter the topic or setting, can make the reader feel at home in the story, as if they themselves could experience the same events if given the chance. This leads both to an empowerment of the reader and the sense that the writer is speaking personally with him or her. I’ve attempted this in various forms over the past few months, particularly on my xanga, but I’ve found out one thing loud and clear.

I’m not a great writer.

One philosophy to which I’ve always adhered is the notion of the most dangerous belts in karate. They say that the two most dangerous belts are not the black belts. No, they are the white belts who come in untrained, thinking they can take others on who have practiced for years, and the brown belts, the final belt before becoming black belts. They are dangerous because they have persevered and learned myriad techniques, but as of yet do not have the discipline with which to use them effectively.

I want to be effective.

So I decided a few weeks ago to change my field of studies from Media Arts to English for grad school. I feel that I’ve gone as far as I can with my current level of writing. Already from the first month of classes I’m starting to become a better writer. With any luck, by the time I finish my program of study, I can express the beauty of the world in the way that I see it, untethered by the boundaries that society places on it. For while beauty is in the eye of the beholder, too often there is beauty that knows it not.

I want to bring forth the beauty inside all.

That being said, I am going to be updating more with photography again. As I’ve said before, I want my photos to tell stories. While I have a lot from which to choose, there came to be the point where I couldn’t think of creative ways to tell the stories through them. But now I’ve realized that that’s not really important, so I’m going to just update with my more regular photography. Hope it cuts the mustard ^__^.