Narcissus and goldmund n My career...an introspection

Google Print: Narcissus and Goldmund

I just got done reading Narcissus and Goldmund by Hermann Hesse. Before this I read Magister Ludi (aka The Glass Bead Game) by the same author..and Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen. While reading those books, I wondered why I was taking so long to read them. I thought I was getting too busy. But the truth struck me today. Those books...did not move me... this one did.

I was reading this book in the bathroom. I like reading in the bathroom. Somehow...I feel more at ease. There is no computer to distract me.....nor ppl. I also think my deepest thoughts as I stand in the shower...oblivious to the huge wastage of water and time. Actually...it is a wastage of water...not of time. Despite it being 4 am, I am happy that I spent the last half an hour in the shower...contemplating the book I just finished and my life in general.

This book...kept me interested as it kept moving at random. It was this randomness that appealed to me. Another thing was some kind of botherhood that I felt with the protoganist. Goldmund...or golden mouth...was a wanderer. Women could not resist him....he was a veritable Don Juan de Marco. Nothing could hold his attention for long. He was a hard worker though..and strived to be happy. He longed for true love...that he ultimately experienced ...only...through his "Mother". She was inside him.....a representative of his mother who had left him when he was a baby. Yet...in her..he also saw the holy mother....and all the women he met in his travails as a wanderer. He was also an artist... and could visualize things..but never think mathematically or logically.
No...I am not irresistible to women...nor am I as great a lover as to be compared with Don Juan De Marco. But nothing holds my attention span for long. I work hard...yet only just enough. And I am still seeking that something that I want. I am searching for that goal in life...that very same thing that Goldmund spent all his life searching for. This comes at a very troubling stage of my life. On one side...I want to do graduate school. I know I am good enough to do decently well..if I put in half an effort. But..somehow..EE doesnt move me. Atleast not all of it. I enjoyed vast parts of it...but right now..right here...I am not sure what I liked most. I know I am not a mathematician. I cannot think like one. I am a decent programmer....sufficiently logical...I enjoyed Physics (mechanics) in the past..and yet...I dont know if I will in the future. And I have to finish applying to colleges.
On the other hand....I can try for a job. I read my resume recently..and suddenly realized...I had been expecting the interviewer to see my resume and decipher my hidden signals to determine what I had done. I have always dreamt of a recruiter..who would take one look at my resume...recognize my true potential ... and hire me on the spot. Oh..I have been rudely awakened multiple times...but yet...I persist. But now..that I have realized this..I guess I will make more of an effort to sell myself. But I dont know if I want to..... I havent really worked that hard at getting a job.
Then..there is the ever present college work. Keeping me on campus till I get tired...then home to watching movies..and lazing.

I think I am a wanderer ...coming to Purdue was one step in my wanderings...it had taught me a lot. And now, I feel I am getting ready to move on. But where to? what is it that moves me? What it is that really moves me....
For my interviewing class, I read that I was supposed to do a complete self analysis and realize my strengths and weaknesses. Only then could I find a job that fit me well. And thats what I was thinking when I thought all of the above in the shower....
Maybe I shld list my strengths and weaknesses

Strengths n weaknesses (Plz...no comments on this part unless u have something to add...I am just listing them for myself. I think I know this about myself pretty well... )
- Am decently intelligent. That is my major source of ego. And my problem. For I think that it must be apparent...that I dont need to sell it. After all, selling oneself is like....boasting...something that people do not like. And I boast too!!
- I am lazy..yet work hard enough to do that which I need to.
- I am highly principled...atleast when it comes to judging myself. My guiding principles, I like to believe, are... honesty, integrity, faithfulness, doing my own work, being sensitive to others..love for my family.....cannot think of more...are there more?
- I am selfish. In that I put my personal happiness as most important. But then again, I find happiness in making other ppl happy:)
- I am almost a perfectionist. What I do, needs to be perfect....now if only my attention span was better.....
- I talk a lot. Yet...I am a poor communicator. I do not know how to "handle" people.
- I appreciate change. I strive for it. I need it to be happy...to not get bored. I strive for getting to look at things with a different view. Not successfulll all the time...but the attempt is made

I find myself a contradiction. I cannot be very artistic... in fact... I never was a great critic of art. To me, it is the big and the magnificent that is truly noteworthy. nature...with it's tremendous variety..it's immenseness... totally mesmerizes me. Thats why I like photopgraphy....good photography captures a beauty that exists. So...I cannot handle abstractions.
Yet...brain games have ceased to interest me. Once...I found them interesting.... but now...I am indifferent to them. I am not motivated enough. I actually am beginning to prefer building physical skills....skills that I didnt care much for till now. Am I actually losing my brain? is it wasting away for lack of exercise? Frankly...I dont really care.

Now...I am almost getting bored with my attempt at self analysis. Maybe......some other day.....once again....

Till then....