Update 9/24/24:
I've struggled to actually create my first post, so I'm going to copy over some things that I've already written (even if they aren't super polished) in my Trilium notes.
# My intentions for this website
## Background
During my senior year of high school, I took a design & technology class which involved creating a personal portfolio; I kept this portfolio through college as a way to document projects.
After graduating, I've begun to write significantly more. So far, I've been keeping notes in this open-source, self-hosted app called Trilium, and it's been excellent for personal knowledge management. While sharing some of these thoughts with friends, I've been told that it should be published, so I deleted my previous site and signed up for Obsidian Publish - so that I can tie together concepts in a similar manner. Here's what my Trilium note map currently looks like:
![[note_map.png]]
I'll probably continue using Trilium for my direct ramblings & personal notes on a day-to-day basis, but will use Obsidian for publishing more final pieces.
## Potential Topics
I'm not sure what I'll end up publishing, but I have a lot of ramblings, and off the top of my head these topics include:
* mental health
* understanding the default mode network (DMN)
* social vs. medical models of disability: is it you or your environment?
* executive dysfunction vs. authenticity: accepting never being perfectly who you want to be
* justice sensitivity & conceptualizing expectations: when radical acceptance feels wrong
* self-control is authoritarianism internalized; self-guidance is better
* lessons from injuries
* what even is healing?
* internal ecosystems: a more holistic version of internal family systems
* alienation
* egocentricism vs. allocentricism
* the Seattle freeze
* the limits of an agent's ability to form community
* Epictetus' the Art of Living & connecting to Nature
* oppression
* intersectionality: massive grey areas of nuance
* internalization: how do you "choose" your values?
* solidarity for whom? therapy for whom? art for whom?
* memetics & culture
* intergenerational trauma through a memetic lens
* nature is to genetic life as war is to memetic life
* anthropology
* a review of The Dawn of Everything
* absurdism / existentialism
* hopelessness vs. defeatism
* an internal family systems approach to passive suicidality
* the relationship between defeat & rest
* everyone has survivorship bias
* criticisms of art & creativity
* the cruel indifference of art surrounded by injustice
* what is righteous art, and what is trauma porn?
* creation is overrated: a love letter to integration, preservation, & destruction
* art as egotistic, anthropocentric, individualist, reductionism; is nature art?
* moral issues & philosophy
* life & death
* effective altruism sucks, but it means well
* moral proximity
* neuroethics
* accepting the uncertainty of the responsibility gap
* against certainty
* valuing human life
* restorative vs. punitive justice & fighting ideas vs. fighting people
* the limits of compassion
* political theories & praxis
* the tension between epistemology & praxis
* doing vs. letting it happen
* art history
* design principles
* dog training
* video games
* book reviews
* random hyperfixations
* love
* saturation as an ideal
* Anbe Sivam: "Love is God" - a Tamil movie about communism as spirituality.
* intersections between all of the above
## Pyrrhonist Preface
I'd like to note that this website is not meant to be as self-ingratiating as it once was - or as I find many other personal websites to be. For the most part, these thoughts are partially-baked explorations into concepts which may not be novel, useful, or certain.
There are a few things I really hold with high conviction, but for the most part, I withhold judgement and am in a state of constant inquiry; more often than not, I can make as many points against beliefs that I hold than for. So if you're reading this, I hope you know that despite the grand or poetic tones I may be writing this content with, they're just parts of me thinking out loud - not necessarily statements that I wish to shout with certainty (except for a few in which my conviction will be clear).
Mainly, I enjoy the process of putting things together in a document and polishing it for someone else to see; it's a good creative outlet. But I really do hope that someone searching for some insight on a topic will come across a post of mine and maybe find it valuable - similar to how students searching for answers to coursework came across my former site. w