Source: http://graphicleftovers.com/graphic/abstract-blue-orchid

Art is a selective re-creation of reality according to an artist’s metaphysical value-judgments.

An artist recreates those aspects of reality which represent his fundamental view of man’s nature.

– Ayn Rand

A Dark Horse

I have done this analysis before.  Once I walked in an Art Shop and met a nice young man by the name William who actually had read “Crime and Punishment” by Dostoevsky.  We had a heated discussion and I said that I was not quite sure that foreigners were even close to understanding Dostoevsky because of the way he wrote.  Something must be lost in translation.  William did agree, and expressed that “colour yellow” was lost in translation.  The discussion was not limited to “Crime and Punishment”, Dostoevsky, literature or colours for that matter.  At the time I was very much interested in the Personality Dimensions of Blue – Orange – Green – Gold variety and suggested that we find out William’s colours.  He said that he would be willing to do that only if I agreed to do go through the Cube Personality Test.  I don’t remember his colours, but I remember this story.

And I remember vividly my own results of the Cube Personality Test.  Do you know why William was so adamant about the Cube Personality Test?  He thought I was “so full of myself”.  He couldn’t be more wrong.

The questions he asked me were not exactly the same as I found just recently on the Internet, but I will try to tell the story as accurately as I possibly can.

First of all, there was no white room.  He asked me to imagine a scene and myself in it.  So I imagined myself on the ocean shore, walking on the beach, feet in the water, eyes looking down at my feet, occasionally looking up at the scenery, green and mountainous, beautiful beyond imagination.

Source: http://www.allposters.com/-sp/Salt-Cay-Turks-and-Caicos-Islands-Posters_i3689447_.htm

Cube.

I don’t remember whether he suggested that I should imagine a WHITE cube.  But I did.  It was far away in the ocean, fairly small in size.  So, I was not “full of myself” at all, far from it and my ego was smaller in 2008, than it is now in 2010.  But it is true, I have learned a lot from my experiences in these two years and I gained some confidence.  The fact that the cube was white…  Either it was according to his suggestion, or I did not hide from others who I was at that moment.

Flowers.

There were no flowers in his scenario.

Ladder.

Ladder was also white, fairly small in size, floating in the water, obviously in a horizontal position.  No interpretation needed.  No goals, no aspiration, no ambition.  Or all of it was in a slumber state.

Source: http://thumb18.shutterstock.com.edgesuite.net/photos/display_pic_with_logo/182188/182188,1242375239,1.jpg

By the way, it is not what I imagined, but when I was looking for an  image, I could not resist.  I so do love spirals and twists!

Horse.

He asked for the colour of the horse.  I had trouble picking between black and white.  I chose black in the end.  The horse was running towards me.  I don’t know why I was so perplexed with the horse images and still I remember mostly this horse.  In Russian, we have an expression “a dark horse”, meaning somebody with fairly inconspicuous looks who turns out to be a winner quite unexpectedly.  I guess it is the same in English.  If that horse is running towards me and I haven’t seen it yet, it probably means, that the horse has quite a journey.  I am still curious.  Really!

Source: http://www.blessedbylife.com/images/blackhorsebeach.jpg

That is my horse precisely, my dream has been photographed.

Rainstorm.

Rainstorm is far in the ocean, but the sky is darkening and the storm is quite serious.

Source: http://www.roadsideoregon.com/?cat=3

I don’t know about you, but I had fun doing this test.  I love imagery and it is quite memorable.  Now it is time to go back to my challenges (opportunities)!

By the way, I just decided to test my parents.  It was so much fun.  My mom’s ego is red and bigger than mine, my dad’s ego is BLACK (help! what does that mean?) and the same size as mine.  Really, you should try it!

It seems strange nowadays, but I do have difficulty even picking a film.  Maybe I just do not want to waste my time watching some garbage.  The major difficulty is, of course, in defining what garbage is.  I can only pass a judgment after having watched a movie.  Now, I try to laugh at myself on many accounts.  This one is no exception.

Maybe it simply was awhile since I was aware of what is out there.  There is no list in my mind of what I should watch.  So I feel like a blind person in a forest.  Then I go to the “Hidden Gems” category and try picking something suitable.  Then I get stuck with what is exactly suitable.  Suitable for what?  For my mood?  For improving it or for reflecting it?  Or neither?

When I picked “Two Lovers”, it is hard to say what exactly I expected.  I think instinctively I knew it would not be a simple comedy you forget right after the film is over.  I like Joaquin Phoenix and he was so highly praised for his performance, that it was hard to resist.  The fact that Gwyneth Paltrow was there also was almost a turn-off, but you can’t have everything.  So there, the choice was made.

After having watched “Two Lovers”, I haven’t thought much about the film.  Not because I would say it was not good.  It was not thrilling; I would even say it was boring to a point.  But I kept thinking about it, which is always a sign, that the film is really not bad.  Anything that makes you think is worthwhile.

I read the reviews later.  The critics sympathized with Leonard (Joaquin Phoenix) and commented how likeable he was and how the critics knew what he should have done and how he should have behaved in order to make the right choice in love.  Pick somebody familiar and safe (and boring) and forego flashy, unstable and instantly attractive.  Save yourself trouble, trade excitement of love and a possibility of heartbreak for security, stability, maybe friendship. 

“However, while it is clear to the audience which of the two women Leonard should focus his attentions on, he instead pursues the other one.”  (Cinema Autopsy, Thomas Caldwell)  http://blog.cinemaautopsy.com/2009/06/06/film-review-two-lovers-2008/

Of course, there is truth and merit to that, but I wonder how many people could actually resist falling in love and how many of us sit and calculate the odds and the possible outcomes.  Maybe those who took the decision-making courses (you know “What-if analysis”, “Strategic Thinking”).  I know I did.  But I still prefer to be in love rather than not.  Maybe that is why Leonard is so likeable.  Not because he is bipolar, because he is very human.

That is the word – BIPOLAR. 

The film does not put such emphasis on his diagnosis and Leonard is only shown as a depressed person, rather than manic.  The diagnosis is mentioned in one of the reviews and whether it is an assumption or not, there is no way of knowing.  Being bipolar, I know the difference much better than film critics.  But, let’s say it does not matter.

But one point was so touching, so it took me a few weeks to really come back to it and remember.  Subtlety and gentleness of the film is chiefly responsible for the fact that I cannot stop thinking about it.  The first scene – Leonard is going (home?) or on his way to deliver dry-cleaned clothes – and he jumps into the ocean.  Suicide out of the Blue?

Here critics should have said that it was not advisable to jump fully-clothed in freezing water.  Oh, no, I never jumped.  I only thought about jumping from the balcony from the 20^th floor.  Oh, yes, I can sympathize.  That scene is now somewhat haunting and somewhat a relief really.  To see it from a different perspective.  You do have to jump in order to see the light of day.  To realize that there actually will be another day and …who knows what.

Just do not ask the film critics what is right and what is wrong.  Whom to pick and fall in love with.  Make your own decisions.

I wanted to make a different post on Halloween.  A poem by Edgar Allan Poe.  “The Raven”.  I thought it would be more becoming.  More becoming my mood and the spirit of Halloween.

My plans have changed.  They usually do.  Something happened and it was somewhat pleasant, somewhat strange and more becoming my melancholic mood and longing for love.

“Gefunden.”  Some things are just strange.  The only thing that I remember from years of learning German was (is) a poem by Goethe.  “Gefunden” means “Found”.  It is about a flower the author finds in a forest while walking there without a thought in mind.  Instead of picking it and letting the flower die, the author digs it out with all the roots and replants it in his garden. 

Und pflanzt es wieder

Am stillen Ort;

Nun zweigt es immer

Und blüht so fort.

The reason the poem has surfaced again was that I met “a friend of a delicate nature” who claimed that he could read German.  His claim turned out to be somewhat exaggerated, since he could not read nor translate “Gefunden” with the online translator.  But that is quite understandable and, to be honest, is precisely what I assumed at the beginning.  Reading a language without properly learning it seems a tall order.  But this story is not about him.  Well, not entirely.

The poem keeps coming back to me.  And this time I found out that Goethe wrote this poem not about a flower, but about his love for a real woman.

I have a dream.  I want to find my love and I found a flower.  Literally.  Where and when?  I was working and walking in circles in the department store full of misplaced clothes.  Of all days, it was Halloween, my birthday.  I did not expect to find anything.  Yet I did.  I found a red rose, slightly battered, slightly faded, smelling of perfume, still beautiful…

I picked it gently and took it home, treating this red rose as a gift, as a sign, as a new hope.

Some things do come out of the Blue.

And my friend with his beautiful deep eyes, seductive voice and a reminiscence of a true love is only a vision of my longing for something or someone whom I will find.

One day.  Out of the Blue.  On the Halloween?

Oh, boy, where do I begin?  She was just ill qualified to do the job.  Does not career counseling require some basic understanding what psychology is or how to deal with people to begin with?  A lot of time in the Career Orientation Workshop is spent on personality profiles, figuring out who you are, what you like, what kind people you like to deal with.  That is all psychology.  She was absolutely and totally clueless.  She was parroting the manual to us, thank you very much!  I am totally dumbfounded when it comes to that stupid woman.

She was from a small city.  It is not a sin, but she just enjoyed the security and never knew real challenges in her life.  It was boring, so she said.  She worked there in retail.  She quit because customers drove her insane.  That is a good sign.  Maybe working with people was not her forte.  Then she moves into a big city and works in a corporate world for four years.  She hates every single day of it.  All the wanted was an image of prestige, a power suit or something like that.  Never happened.  Then she goes to a career counsellor and thinks, “Oh, I would like to do the same”.  Why spend time and effort in choosing a unique or maybe suitable path, if she can “just do the same”.  Just like a monkey.  If you cannot think, observe and imitate.  Maybe I am not really fair to monkeys.

Anyway.  What I observed during her “facilitation” sessions.  She never listened; I guess she was not interested.  She was complacent, bored out of her mind.  Oh, well, there is a “Blue Caring” personality (right! a lot of people pick Blue, but truly they are not, remember that there are one 12% of really Blue people).  She seemed to enjoy “I am the boss here” scenario, but what she failed to notice that most participants were more educated and more qualified than her.  She was neither blue, nor caring, she was not interested and not capable of helping.  But employed.

One day we discussed the barriers that people usually have to achieve goals.  Inertia was one of them.  Her vocabulary did not seem to be limited, but when it came to explanations, it became hilarious.  When she was struggling with a definition (it is really hard to define something if you do not really understand the thing you are trying to define).  I tried to help her, saying that inertia in physics was “this and that”.  Not just an explanation, but an example as well. 

She snapped at me “We are not in the physics class!”

Of course, we were not.  I, with my Masters in Engineering, have to listen to a Canadian from a small town with some questionable “diploma in God knows what” who cannot define “inertia”, but teaches it.  How do you like it so far?

If it did happen to me now, I would have gone all the way to check her qualifications, I would have looked at her diploma, the curriculum, her marks and I would have asked her to define terms on the spot without looking anywhere.  Inertia included.

That is how I feel.  And you know why?  Because after all the work I have done on defining my personality profile I asked that stupid woman a question and what she replied:  “I DO NOT KNOW YOU”.  What the hell then are you doing in JVS counseling me?

This is a letter to my career counsellor – she was much better than the other “facilitator”.  Of course, she was not prepared to deal with anybody of my Dimensions.  But she gave me some time, she tried to undestarnd me, at least I am still under the impression that she made an effort.  Whatever happened, happened and there is nothing I can do about it.  It was a learning experience for me.  Absolutely and totally invaluable.  I don’t write like that anymore, but it was necessary to do it at that stage.

From: me

Sent: June 4, 2007 12:25 AM

To: Employment Counsellor # 1

Subject: My Story

Dear Counsellor # 1:

I am sorry I could not keep our appointment on May 22, but I was kept in a hospital.  Since I was nicely asked to remove myself from JVS program so as to make everyone else comfortable and capable of pursuing his or her dreams, I was admitted to hospital.  Twice.  Both times admission was my responsibility.  Totally.  I made people very uncomfortable there too, not for the pleasure of it, but for getting results.  Remember… there is no right or wrong, there is no good or bad, there are differences of (opinion, preferences, ways to get what you want, even though in the end we all want the same thing).

You met me and you know me enough to guess that I can frustrate people.  How?  By simply asking professionals to do their jobs or by asking them help me.  Their way or my way, it does not matter.  My challenge is to get results.  I get them all the time: they are sometimes simply hilarious or ridiculous, but often painful for others and especially me.  The doctors & nurses (trained medic professionals) tried to cure me from my condition.  They failed.  My case is not in the manuals and instructions yet.  I hope it will never make it to the mysterious rules of the mysterious System.

Please stop trying to cure me from being Blue, Green, Gold and Orange.  Especially from becoming or discovering Orange.  I feel that I have so much Orange in me, it hurts.  This Orange is very vibrant and very pushy colour – it exudes from every pore.

Remember, Counsellor # 1, I told you I must be brown because most nuts are?  When I actually mixed Blue and Orange paints, I’ve got… well, a new colour and its name starts with B….

Well, anyway, this is my story.  Would you like to hear it?  Well, it’s up to you.  Remember the rules, simple questions, no chewed food, power of vocabulary and so forth. 

Shall we repeat it?  Would you like to hear my story (simple question (Yes or No)).

If yes, let me know.

If no, I would like to take this opportunity to say

Thank you, Counsellor # 1, very much for being who you are and thank you for your courage and honesty. Honesty is what I admire in people.

Thank you, Counsellor # 1

Honestly

====================================================================

Of course, she did not want to hear the story.  That is the problem with our society.  We always think that we know what the outcome will be.  Why do anything, if we already “know” what will happen?

The point is “we don’t know until we try”.  I did try.  JVS kicked me out.  I was treated by psychiatrists.  I was “helped”  by police.  I was helped by many people who “knew” what I needed.  And that is how I learned my lesson.  Now I know who I am and what I want, what I can do and what I will do.  Testing is not about sanity.  Testing is about figuring out the life, the universe and everything.  Children do it all the time, that is how they learn.  We tend to believe what we are told instead of trying for ourselves.  I did my testing.

Can you do the same?  No, really?  Discovery is painful, but it is worth it.

Ö       Maybe I lost my steam.

Ö       Maybe I am not interested in the story anymore.

Ö       Maybe I am just tired.

Ö       Maybe something (or somebody) killed my inspiration.

But I know I must finish the story.  So, from what angle should I approach this JVS business?

Remember my JVS Profile? 

I was Blue (14) – Green (10) – Gold (9) – Orange (7).

But not for long.  Once I read the book “Feel the Fear and Do it Anyway”, I started doing it.  Doing it despite my fear…  I overcame my fear and became a rather scary person for others.  This society is ruled by FEAR.  So, I started discovering that my second defining COLOUR is Orange, not Green.  I started doing things that I have never done before.  Instead of complying, conforming and generally being a good girl, I started pushing the boundaries and testing the waters.  In order to find out what will happen if I do this and that, I should not sit and speculate, I should do it.  That how testing is done.  Call it research.  I call it CRIME AND PUNISHMENT.  ACTION AND CONSEQUENCE.

The next day after JVS had kicked me out (had asked me nicely to go), I went to the hospital (Scarborough Grace it was called in 2007, well no longer, but does it matter?) and I did a research there on how they would they treat me.  Oh, boy. Did I get results?

The Hospital stories are yet to come.  For now, I will try to finish the JVS Story.

I believe that.  When I am in trouble and show all the signs of distress, you know how many people come to actually help?  Just about 12% percent.  I was crying, I was hysterical or not.  I was simply asking for help.  It is hard to get.  In year 2007, when I had my nervous break down and I was attending the JVS Program, I was not asking for much.

Just make me laugh.  The response – I can’t, I won’t, what are you “insane”!!!

So, I came to certain conclusions.  Blue People (the True Ones) are a rare breed.

That is what the JVS Manual has to say about Blues:

BLUEs water and fertilize people, and people blossom under their guidance.  The BLUE hates to be categorized – too impersonal.  They tend to take everything personally, and are “hyper-aware” of the reaction of others.  Teh BLUE reads people as others read books. They are “people-people” and crave relationships with others.

All four temperament styles tend to think everyone else is on the same mission.  In the case of the BLUE, they think the whole world is clamouring for self-actualization and growth.  Althought they are only 12% of the population, they exert a much greater influence.  Usaully they have very good verbal skills and are articulate.  They write many self-help books (i.e. “The Power of Positive Thinking”, “Psycho Cybernetics”, “Visualizing Success”, etc.)

Blues are usally adept at many things and may need to channel their interests and energies in one direction.  They love harmony in relationships, hate to argue and want everyone to get along.  They are uncomfortable with dissension, want to patch things up and are natural “smoother-outers”.  The BLUE tends to be idealistic and future oriented.  They have visions of everyone getting along together —- “Why can’t this be a nice place?” or “Peace on earth and good will to men”.

Careers with appeal to BLUES include teaching (they represent 38% of the teachers), writing, drama, counselling and psychology.  They gravitate toward occupations in which they can influence others.  BLUEs have difficulty with administration because they are too empathetic and tend to be rule benders.

AUTHENTIC BLUE

Ö        Attention-getting misbehaviour

o       (every time They kicked me out, it was for Disruptive Behaviour!!!)

Ö        Withdrawal

Ö        Fantasy, day-dreaming, and trancing out

Ö        Crying and depression

Ö        Passive resistance

Ö        Yelling and screaming

INQUIRING GREEN

Ö        Indecisiveness

Ö        Refusal to comply or cooperate

Ö        Extreme aloofness and withdrawal

Ö        Snobbish, put-down remarks, and sarcasm

Ö        Refusal to communicate; the silent treatment

Ö        Perfectionism due to severe performance anxiety

Ö        Highly critical attitudes towards yourself or others

RESOURCEFUL ORANGE

Ö        Rudeness and defiance

Ö        Breaking the rules intentionally

Ö        Running away and dropping out

Ö        Use of stimulants

Ö        Acting out boisterously

Ö        Lying and cheating

Ö        Physical aggresiveness

ORGANIZED GOLD

Ö        Complaining and self-pity

Ö        Anxiety and worry

Ö        Depression and fatigue

Ö        Psychosomatic problems

Ö        Malicious judgements about yourself and others

Ö        Authoritarianism and phobic reactions

I’d like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony, I like to hold it in my arms and keep it company.

Bella, Ciao!

 

“Bella Ciao”

 

Una mattina mi son svegliato

O bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao

Una mattina mi son svegliato

Ho trovato l’invasor

 

O partigiano portami via

O bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao

O partigiano portami via

Che mi sento di morir

 

E se io muoio da partigiano

O bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao

E se io muoio da partigiano

Tu mi devi sepellir

 

E sepellire lassù in montagna

O bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao

E sepellire lassù in montagna

Sotto l’ombra di un bel fior

 

Sotto l’ombra di un bel fiore

O bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao

Sotto l’ombra di un bel fiore

Tu mi devi sepellir

 

E le genti che passeranno

O bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao

E le genti che passeranno

Diranno tutti che bel fior

 

E questo è il fiore del partigiano

O bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao

E questo è il fiore del partigiano

Morto per la libertà

Why this song?  I always loved Italian songs and this one seems to be passionate.  Russian songs are often either romantic or passionate, too.