why writing personal statements destroy the self....

[got tonkaed]

so attempting to be industrious i decided to take advantage of my inability to sleep by trying to write this milestone thingamajig for my sociology capstone (essentially the final course). Now the incredible part of this, as the part about me not sleeping isnt, is that the assignment certainly is not due until thursday and by all accounts it wont be class time on thursday for about 36 hours.

You may be asking yourself...why start now, to which i will point you to the first line of this post.

So here we are, trying to write a milestone about the situated educational process that has been my life. Almost immediatly i run into a dilema...in writing about myself instead of writing about some theorectical concept or abstract mumbo jumbo, im supposed to write about me.

Now as many of you know, i love to talk about me, cant get enough of it, in fact im posting just to avoid actually doing it formally (interesting idea there). However the process of taking the self and transferring into something that will be graded in terms of achievement is somewhat disconcerting.

What if, despite all evidence to the contrary, my milestone sucks? Therefore, do i suck as well, am i a boring person? Someone actually has to read this garbage. So i try to tell jokes, make interesting analysis of my life and say something profound. But everyone tries that right? in as far as we exist in relation to others, how is my self going to be more interesting to learn about than someone elses sense of self? What would it mean to me if my story was seen as less interesting as some of my peers? (probably more than id like to admit)

So thats why ive successfully written one page thus far. Its probably the greatest page ever written. Sadly i know by in large what i want to say, but for the first time in a long time, i keep looking at what i write and go, that is absolute rubbish. Well not rubbish, but when you can use the word rubbish you should.

Anyway, feel free to post other psuedo intellectual philsophical rantings here...or spam, since thats more likely.

But at least be self depreciating.

[suggs]

Dont forget you were captain of your ping pong team when you were eleven.
That will make all the difference to the boys at Merrill Lynch.

[got tonkaed]

Dont forget you were captain of your ping pong team when you were eleven.
That will make all the difference to the boys at Merrill Lynch.

not only captain of the team, but touted as one of hte greatest young players of my generation.

[ignotus]

Dont forget you were captain of your ping pong team when you were eleven.
That will make all the difference to the boys at Merrill Lynch.

not only captain of the team, but touted as one of hte greatest young players of my generation.

...till some Chinese guy showed up...

[MeDeFe]

I think the correct expression is "by and large" not "by in large".

[muy_thaiguy]

A more interesting story,

I'm a rolling thunder, pouring rain
I'm comin' on like a hurricane
My lightning's flashing across the sky
You're only young but you're gonna die
I won't take no prisoners, won't spare no lives
Nobody's putting up a fight
I got my bell, I'm gonna take you to hell
I'm gonna get ya, Satan get ya
CHORUS:
Hell's Bells
Yeah, Hell's Bells
You got me ringing Hell's Bells
My temperature's high, Hell's Bells
I'll give you black sensations up and down your spine
If you're into evil you're a friend of mine
See my white light flashing as I split the night
'cause if Good's on the left,
then I'm stickin' to the right
I won't take no prisoners, won't spare no lives
Nobody's puttin' up a fight
I got my bell, I'm gonna take you to hell
I'm gonna get ya, Satan get ya
Hell's Bells
Yeah, Hell's Bells
You got me ringing Hell's Bells
My temperature's high, Hell's Bells
CHORUS
yeow
Hell's Bells, Satan's comin' to you
Hell's Bells, he's ringing them now
Hell's Bells, the temperature's high
Hell's Bells, across the sky
Hell's Bells, they're takin' you down
Hell's Bells, they're draggin' you under
Hell's Bells, gonna split the night
Hell's Bells, there's no way to fight, yeah
Ow, ow, ow, ow
Hell's Bells

[greenoaks]

will CC get a mention ?

[Symmetry]

You've got a tough choice. A really great piece of writing will be either greatly original, or greatly thorough in terms of it's arguments. However, you can't ignore one over the other.

The best advice I can give is to look at the question or topic and frame it in whatever way most suits your strengths. You should know what people have been impressed by, and what has left people cold by now. Most teachers use essay topics as a starting point for discussion. They're not looking for a right answer. They genuinely hope to read as many different answers as possible. That's why they choose a vague question. A huge part of the test is how you read the question. That's what can set you apart.

In your opening, say what the question is. It's your question from then on in.

Finally, if your grade is in the balance, play it safe and write what the question writer wants to hear. Boring, mediocre, by the books, but a solid grade- no risks. If it's worth putting yourself out there, and you know that you can do it, then write what you want.

An essay that's the same as all the rest is like a sleeping pill for teachers. It has no mistakes, so it gets a good grade.

An essay that has originality for you, but shows no real originality in its field (i.e, you just write about ideas that others have had and discussed so many times before) will seem banal and will show that you're not interested enough in your field to read what others have written.

What you want is to have your original arguments, but to back them up with things that you've learned, and with stuff that you've learned outside of the course. I always recommend throwing in at least one quote from Lewis Carroll, or a song lyric, or something else really tangential. It shows that you can make the leap from academic to personal.

Hmm- sorry, this got to be a bit of an exorcism for my own writing demons. There are so many small tips and big ideas running around. Maybe PM me if you fancy a chat about it.

[Neoteny]

I think including clever descriptions of you such as, "freaking Ghandi," would liven your paper up considerably, and also be true. I will happily be a reference for you.

I actually quite enjoy writing about myself for school. It's a topic I know very well, and is very open-ended. Slight exaggerations are very unlikely to be noticed by the reviewer and makes my life seem much more interesting than it really is. When you look at it that way, it is not so much destroying the self, as recreating a new one.

Oh, wait, self deprecating...

I use too many commas when I write. And semicolons. And I break up my sentences in absurd patterns. Overall, my writing is an exorcise in absurdity, which makes it amazing. I love my writing style.

So much for self-deprecation...

[got tonkaed]

I think including clever descriptions of you such as, "freaking Ghandi," would liven your paper up considerably, and also be true. I will happily be a reference for you.

I actually quite enjoy writing about myself for school. It's a topic I know very well, and is very open-ended. Slight exaggerations are very unlikely to be noticed by the reviewer and makes my life seem much more interesting than it really is. When you look at it that way, it is not so much destroying the self, as recreating a new one.

Oh, wait, self deprecating...

I use too many commas when I write. And semicolons. And I break up my sentences in absurd patterns. Overall, my writing is an exorcise in absurdity, which makes it amazing. I love my writing style.

So much for self-deprecation...

i too am normally a fan of my writing. However, i took one look at the 10 pages or so of text i eventually got around to, and quickly erased it and declared that it was rubbish.

[Neoteny]

I think including clever descriptions of you such as, "freaking Ghandi," would liven your paper up considerably, and also be true. I will happily be a reference for you.

I actually quite enjoy writing about myself for school. It's a topic I know very well, and is very open-ended. Slight exaggerations are very unlikely to be noticed by the reviewer and makes my life seem much more interesting than it really is. When you look at it that way, it is not so much destroying the self, as recreating a new one.

Oh, wait, self deprecating...

I use too many commas when I write. And semicolons. And I break up my sentences in absurd patterns. Overall, my writing is an exorcise in absurdity, which makes it amazing. I love my writing style.

So much for self-deprecation...

i too am normally a fan of my writing. However, i took one look at the 10 pages or so of text i eventually got around to, and quickly erased it and declared that it was rubbish.

Wow. That's always a sad day. I've done the same thing, though I wasn't writing about me. I actually did it on the GRE, and I was fucking TIMED! I wrote a page, and looked back at it... it was, by far, the worst thing I've written since the second grade. Logic was suspended, sensible content order was out the window... I deleted the whole thing and wrote a paragraph of apology before time ran out. Needless to say, I need to take the GRE one more time...

[got tonkaed]

lol yeah that will hurt the cause in only taking the GRE one time.

[Gregrios]

so attempting to be industrious i decided to take advantage of my inability to sleep by trying to write this milestone thingamajig for my sociology capstone (essentially the final course). Now the incredible part of this, as the part about me not sleeping isnt, is that the assignment certainly is not due until thursday and by all accounts it wont be class time on thursday for about 36 hours.

You may be asking yourself...why start now, to which i will point you to the first line of this post.

So here we are, trying to write a milestone about the situated educational process that has been my life. Almost immediatly i run into a dilema...in writing about myself instead of writing about some theorectical concept or abstract mumbo jumbo, im supposed to write about me.

Now as many of you know, i love to talk about me, cant get enough of it, in fact im posting just to avoid actually doing it formally (interesting idea there). However the process of taking the self and transferring into something that will be graded in terms of achievement is somewhat disconcerting.

What if, despite all evidence to the contrary, my milestone sucks? Therefore, do i suck as well, am i a boring person? Someone actually has to read this garbage. So i try to tell jokes, make interesting analysis of my life and say something profound. But everyone tries that right? in as far as we exist in relation to others, how is my self going to be more interesting to learn about than someone elses sense of self? What would it mean to me if my story was seen as less interesting as some of my peers? (probably more than id like to admit)

So thats why ive successfully written one page thus far. Its probably the greatest page ever written. Sadly i know by in large what i want to say, but for the first time in a long time, i keep looking at what i write and go, that is absolute rubbish. Well not rubbish, but when you can use the word rubbish you should.

Anyway, feel free to post other psuedo intellectual philsophical rantings here...or spam, since thats more likely.

But at least be self depreciating.

You've got to get over it dude. If your life seems more dull then most, big deal. You've got to realize that all people are different. If everybody lived exciting lives, then life for everybody would be boring because we would all be doing the same thing. This world NEEDS diversity. Without diversity we would all go crazy.

[got tonkaed]

will CC get a mention ?

cc will probably not get a mention...

and gregorios that just sounds like a justification for living a dull life.

Frankly its all more of an intellectual exercise than anything, and if one can have a bit of fluff to help navigate the journey that is life (in this case in the form of perhaps less than essentially questioning of the self) then it certainly would be less stimulating.

[browng-08]

I find that whenever I write something, it becomes an exercise in stuffing as much BS as I can in five paragraphs. Toss in some flowery language and I end up hating myself and get a solid 95%. In talking about myself, I lie. Never about anything important, just past experiences that never really happened. I also have far too many commas and colons when I write, and just can't go without them. Oh well, I gave up on being an author when I realized I wasn't very creative... Now I'm a crappy artist.