A topic that stuck out to me during this week was the idea of having a sense of self verses intelligence. Sense of self is defined as the way a person thinks about and views his or her traits, beliefs, and purpose within the world. Intelligence is the ability to acquire and apply knowledge and skills. I believe these are two concepts could go hand and hand with each other.

When we were younger, we did not have as much knowledge as we do today. As we grow older, we are constantly influenced by the changing opinions of people all around us. By being influenced, it morphs our values and beliefs every single day. This easily changes of sense of self because we are acquiring brand new information that affects us in different ways.  So looking at these two concepts, they seem to go hand and hand because  our sense of self may be changing due to new information being acquired everyday.

Examining the argument between being an idealist or realist, I believe that I am an idealist. I believe humans are dim copies of the divine and we are all imperfect. Although, I think their is a perfect and when we are emotionally moved by something, we are approaching the ideal. I absolutely love sunsets/sunrises, and it makes me believe that we are glimpsing at the divine. I agree that if you are an idealist, you want to make the world better. I feel as though it correlates with the feeling that we as idealists want everybody around us to have an experience of approaching the ideal.

I understand the argument that reading is not natural at all and its an act of self discipline. I agree with this argument because I believe when we were younger, we were told to read to ourselves. I can recall being told to grab a book from the shelf and quietly read the book to myself, as I am sure other students were told to do this during the class period. I do believe that it switches the focus from being public to private. When you are conditioned to read a book to yourself, you have to be silent and you have to process your thoughts internally. By being private, it takes away from people hearing your thoughts on what you may be reading as well as reading skills that could be obtained.

As I am cleaning my apartment, I turn on my music that I listen to on a daily basis. Although, as I listen to it this time around, all I can think about is how compressed the music is and how it is getting really irritating. The idea presented in class that stuck out to me was the thought of how when we multitask, we are not listening to the music fully. When I am shopping or cleaning my room, I know I do not listen to what song is playing or how it is actually affecting me. It just points out the fact that we as humans have been trained not to listen to the music and we can hear the music at the same volume.

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