Silence is Golden

I was reading in USA Today this afternoon when I came across an interesting article. The article discusses a man named Vijay Eswaran, who is a top CEO in Asia. For an hour each day, before the sun comes up, Mr. Eswaran has an hour of silence and meditation. I found this to be fascinating as an hour set aside for pure silence is non-existent in my life, unless you count an hour of sleep at night when I'm not exactly reflecting but virtually unconscious.

So what are we supposed to do with this hour of silence? "It's not sitting in a sea of tranquility trying to figure out the meaning of the universe. It's about taking control of your life. It begins with analyzing the day that has gone by, going through the goals that you had set and seeing what you achieved and what you failed to achieve and trying to derive lessons...How much of what we do today counts in a month or six months? The point is to go deeper."

I thought about how different my life would be if I took the time to take this hour of silence. I've always been intimidated by silence, like I said, unless I'm sleeping. But the thought of how much I could accomplish and change about my life if I truly sat back and thought about it in a deeper way blows my mind. The thought of taking control of my life excites me to no end. Mr. Eswaran states: "Most of us allow life to pick us up like a piece of driftwood, and we get thrown back to the shore every once in a while. We've lost track of where we wanted to go, what we wanted to do, the purpose of our existence." I am essentially a piece of driftwood in the grand scheme of things. I'm seriously going to ATTEMPT to enforce this hour of silence and tranquility into my life. "Silence is like exercise. A person who never does it would rather get shot than get started. Once started, he would rather die than stop." I'm seeing silence in a whole new light. We'll see if I can dig deep and find the self-discipline required to get my life back into focus.

*Pop* goes our culture...

The past couple of weeks in my pop culture class (Yes mom. It's a real class), we've been watching and discussing various types of "reality" TV. Today we were fortunate enough to witness a partial episode of "Bridezillas" which airs on the Women's Entertainment (WE) network. The premise of the show is that a bride-to-be is preparing for her "big day" and in the process, becomes an irrational lunatic and takes out every little frustration on the closest living, breathing soul. I'm thoroughly convinced as I watch shows like this that while we're supposed to believe that the individuals on the show are "real people" like us, they're truly professionally-trained and ultra-skilled actors and actresses. Honestly. Who would seriously behave in such a way? And if these really are people just like you and I, why would they shamelessly sign up for a show that would portray them in that light? I guess we're desperate enough to do whatever it takes for our 15 minutes of fame. The grooms on the show are living punching bags in essence. They are gutless weasels who stand there and take whatever crap their fiancee can dish out. I can't think of any man in their right mind that would take that kind of abuse from anybody.

So why do we watch these kinds of shows? One might make the claim that they're entertaining because they're unpredictable, but most of these shows that have a basic premise such as "Bridezillas" end up being like another Home Improvement episode: once you've seen one, you've essentially seen them all. During our class discussion, a female classmate spoke up and seemed to justify the actions of these brides: "Well, as little girls we played with Barbies and planned our Barbies weddings which were really our own weddings so we've basically been planning our wedding day since we were tiny so of course it has to be perfect because we have these high expectations of our perfect day." Ok, so does that give a bride the right to invite her neighbors to her wedding at the last minute because she needs help with decorations and they're free labor? Does that give the bride the right to harrass her hair/makeup person? Or call her family members names and pummel them out of rage? I don't think so. Why do we find entertainment in seeing people at their worst? Maybe it makes us feel better about our hum-drum lives. Or we think to ourselves, "at least I'm not THAT bad."

Doggone it!

I'm almost creepingly surprised at how this whole Dog the Bounty Hunter scandal has affected my life. For those of you who have been living in a cave and/or bunker for the last little while, let me bring you up to speed.

Wayne "DOG" Chapman, of the Bounty Hunter fame has lapsed in judgement and as a result, the rest of us are being punished for it. Dog (as he will from now on be referred to) got into a heated argument with his son Tucker over Tucker's african-american girlfriend. The "N" word was used multiple times by Dog and it was recorded and eventually sold to the National Enquirer by Tucker for large amounts of money. As a result of these actions, "Dog the Bounty Hunter" has now been taken off the air "indefinitely" as Dog is now considered a racist. Despite incessant apologies on Dog's part, it is too late. The damage has been done and as a result, I'm forced to look elsewhere for my Tuesday night entertainment instead of the A & E network.

This event has brought about some deep contemplation on my part. What is it about Dog, Beth, Leland, Youngblood, etc... that I love so much? What draws me to their show from week to week? I've concluded that it could be a number of things. Maybe it's how serious they take themselves. Maybe it's how they make every criminal apprehension appear to be SO dangerous while I have yet to see a criminal resist arrest. It very well could be Dog's cheesy one-liners like "Fee-fi-fo-fum, you see the dog and you know you're done" or his masterful artpiece of a hairstyle, feathers and handcuff earrings alike. The sequence where they "strap up" while dressing themselves in bulletproof vests and pepper spray canisters is quite amusing as well. The opening theme song by Ozzy Osbourne could very well be the kicker.

All in all, I will always love Dog the Bounty Hunter and company for the hours of entertainment they've brought into my lackluster life. I plead with the A & E network to reconsider these actions of removing one of their top-grossing shows for one mistake made by Dog. Nobody's perfect. Not even the Chapmans.