Toward new horizons

Yesterday was the main Carnival day with the big, silly parade... I made sure to stay far away from there but rather rode the other direction, heading to the woods. Skies were clear and blue, and although it's still rather barren it was so good to be back out there finally. I stopped for a while at this BBQ site and went on the swing. It was so peaceful there, so dreamlike in a way. One of those moments of consciously observing my consciousness, sensing that subtle shift in it... bike rides out in nature can be a sort of meditation I guess.

I was once again much occupied with the workings of my own mind.
I have also enrolled for two MOOC's on Coursera - not yet sure though if two at a time ain't turning out a bit overly ambitious! - one about chemistry and one about mathematical thinking, both of which started today. On the latter I also found a very interesting, related link, a blog by the instructor. I must admit that I enrolled for his course not so much for an interest in math but more for one in new, different ways of thinking.
I found it very interesting when in the blog he asked the question, "what is a context?"
Such a simple question apparently - and yet I'd feel hard pressed for an answer of if someone genuinely had no idea what the word means and I had to come up with a definition, let alone a concise one. I'd probably think up some examples to give, it would take me a long time and would be awkward. (I have a friend who sometimes assigns me with "exercises" of such sort since she's still learning English.) Or I could look up a dictionary definition. Which led me to think, if it's this difficult for me to give concise definitions of abstract words although I know perfectly well what they mean, then how did I first learn their meaning myself?
Most likely not in one go. And perhaps the awkward and long-winded explanation by example would be more helpful than a concise dictionary definition to a person who didn't know the meaning of the term.

Yes, the bike is mine.

Lately I learned that metacognition - the thinking about thinking - is very useful for lucid dreaming as well and that most frequent lucid dreamers practice it a lot. Of course this isn't the only reason I'm interested in it, I simply want to learn whatever I can about how my mind and consciousness works.

I was glad when the author stated in his blog, "[...] I will explain what persuaded me to try to prove that the pessimism I expressed in the above passage about someone becoming an X-er through a remote experience like a MOOC might be misplaced, at least in part."
Because in the passage above that he had talked about the social aspect of learning - "A large part of becoming an X-er is joining a community of other X-ers."
And if this aspect were really so crucial then I'd have to say, I've never been an athlete, a cyclist, or even a bodybuilder (although I look like one, don't I?), then I've never been a warrior, an artist, or even a Satanist!
Of course I consider myself all of the above, and perhaps more - but I've always done my thing alone, whatever it was. One more thing I can claim for sure to have always been: an autodidact. With no formal education whatsoever, I taught myself everything I know, either from books or online.

I was thinking along those lines also on my bike ride through the woods and charming rural landscapes. It was hard to get anywhere at all with no guidance, all alone with no map or manual to life. Somehow I always followed my instincts though which told me what was right - right for me, they certainly never were the sort of instincts in any way useful to the survival of the species I was born to, as instincts are usually thought to be in the biological context. ("Context," see, there is this word!)
Like women are said to have this "biological clock" telling them it's time to reproduce while they can - something so far beyond my imagination and comprehension! I'm nearly 30 years old and a virgin, and I'd rather die than have my body defiled. I'd rather die than give up my freedom! I'll never understand how people can actually be happy about starting a family - building their own jail for themselves.

My instincts have always been of a wholly different nature, and they rather told me that I was alien to the human race. They told me to distrust those who tried to make me part of what I would never want to be and never could be part of. I never had anyone else to trust but myself and that mysterious, invisible force guiding me whom I know as Satan.

How I know it's Satan, and not Jesus or Buddha or Odin? Because of my own nature, which is dark and rebellious, and because I know the nature of the forces I'm attracted to, even though I'm still in the process of bringing such knowledge up into consciousness.

And when I woke up this morning it suddenly hit me: in a way I'm still a kid! A kid in a 30-year-old body.
The difference between me and most adults is that I view my life much less as being rather than becoming.
It would be unthinkable to me to settle down and take up some "function" in society to henceforth fulfill and to think of that as "having arrived somewhere", not even if I were to be a general or a professor or a president, none of that could ever be of any meaning to me.
There is no goal that can be reached in this life but only through this life.
I'm here for myself, and the only meaning can be in transcendence.

Large raptors were circling near that radio tower.
Made me wonder if they roost up there?