Ti adoro! Ecciti i mei sensi!

Someone recently shared a lil ditty that suggested “A perfect world is one where the cooks are French, the mechanics German, the Swiss bankers, the British police and the lovers; Italian. (yes, that someone is Italian). After seeing the opera for the first time this week with my Dad, I’m compelled to agree with the last point given that Wikipedia tells me the opera began in Florence, Italy in 1597. Italians in that respect do dominate the heart.

The opera was no doubt one of the most moving performances I’ve ever seen. The story of Tosca was of intense love, false assumptions brought on by jealousy, betrayal driven by lust and of course; death and tragedy over a lost lover. All of this, swirling amongst a ridiculously gorgeous orchestra and voices that penetrated so mighty I sometimes had to close my eyes (the 3 glasses of wine at dinner might have had a wee impact too). In short, it was glorious.

Something I didn’t expect was the translation screen. While knowing the detail of each lyric helped understand the story, I felt it stole from the rawness of the voices and being led by own imagination. I'd also kinda fantasised about having someone softly whisper the translation into my ear. Not this time 'round though. Next time, I’ll have go with someone other than my Dad.

Double D

Carrying on from my last entry on moral motivation; mostly the bit saying “there’s often an opposition between self-interest and morality” I am ready to confess that I’ve failed in completing a few important Firsts. While I KNOW that smoking is a direct, no stop-over, flight to a disgusting, pitiful death, interest and desire have dominated my moral logic. I'm sitting in first class nicotine addiction - unmotivated (just yet) to get on that damn moral highway.

Secondly, at the beginning of January, I set out to be booze-free for 30 days and failed at that too. HA! Really though, I’m not feeling disappointed about this one. In fact, I feel pretty comforted in being able to say; “Oops, overshot that one, no biggie”. Sometimes the things we harshly label as failures; were just unreasonable expectations.

It's all about having a good balance of Deviance and Devotion.

Just Hangin' Out

I’ve been thinking a lot about motivation lately. Simply, what makes us want to do, and then keep on doing things to the point of developing into hobbies and even “passions”? Inspired by my attempt to revive a career in teaching, where we endlessly talk about “motivating” and “engaging” students in a “meaningful” way, I’ve been observing myself work through this list and question: what motivates me and what do I REALLY like to do (and why). Young learners are most often motivated by a reward (tangible or abstract). Is that it then? Do we only do things contingent on feeling awesome in some way?

To gain a little perspective, I did me some reading about “moral motivation” which simply says that people are moved to “do” through their beliefs and desires and act/respond based on judging something to be good or to have rational reason (reward) to act in a particular way. Pretty basic and boring, but what I liked was the statement that “morality is widely believed to conflict, frequently and sometimes severely, with what an agent most values or prefers to do…that there is often an opposition between self-interest and morality.” So deviant! I’ll come back to that in a later entry….

So, I resign to understanding motivation as a very intricate place being that beliefs and desires are accumulated from every miniscule moment, interaction, experience, encounter, learning etc etc that we each, individually happen to stumble upon or seek out in our short or long lives. That said, no blanket discovery here today folks. I do know though, that while I’m not “into” anything in particular (certainly not passionate about anything) I do enjoy being surrounded by pretty things, brunching on Sunday, revving up the ol’ adrenalin (in various ways; usually with others) and laughing till I cry. I’ve decided that my greatest motivation is to share time with the people I like & love and that this means my most desired, overall interest is to - just hang out.

A few weekends ago, for the first time, I hung out in a new way. Literally. With straps and rope and fancy buckles, I climbed a man-made, indoor wall and hung there, at the mercy of my dear climbing partner, who faithfully lowered me to safety each time. You really gotta like and trust a guy who can do that.


P.S - that little girl is obviously more "passionate" about climbing than me. Nothing to do with skill at all.....