A contemplative evening. I have been having some good discussions with people lately, on any number of topics. Mostly quite personally-related - what people are trying to do in/with their lives, things with which they're having problems, and general, genuine, personal conversation. It's been good.

I've been coming to realize that one major thing that has been missing from my life lately is the personal interaction that I've only recently started having again. Not simply surface conversations - "what's up?" - but real 'quality time'. I fear that it has been some time since I have paid enough attention to quality.

I blame TV. Let me rephrase that: I blame my inattention to my friends, manifested by an unhealthy level of TV-watching. It's not that I really am "addicted" or whatever - I really only watch about 3 shows, and they're truly only so important to me.

The actuality of the matter is that it's just easier. I go home after a day of work, and my mind is shutting down. All I want to do is eat something and zone out. Or is this really the case? Perhaps I should take the hint from the book I'm reading (originally for work, now for myself) and postulate that I require a context shift.

Perhaps my brain is not shutting down at all, but merely rebooting - clearing out the junk from the day's work and starting fresh for 'me-time'. I moved back to Victoria so that I could be with the friends that I was constantly coming back to visit, yet here I sit, night after night, spending time with only a few people, and more with a certain mindless, cable-fed cyclops.

It's been boiling up inside me for some time, but I think the big self re-evaluation is finally coming to the surface. What are my values? What are my goals? Who (or what) is important to me? Funnily enough, I think I already have nascent answers to these questions.

For a long time now, I have been walking a knife edge between faux-negativity and true negativity. When one pretends a thing too long, one runs the danger of becoming that which he pretends to be.

As much as I hate to admit it, the "Seven Habits of Highly Effective People" (even the title makes me want to vomit) has been making me think and reflect quite a bit. Imposed upon my team by our temporary lead at work, I looked at this unpaid homework assignment as a chore as dismal as those self-help books my "crazy uncle" tried to encourage upon me in past years. The difference was, I could just ignore my uncle! ;)

However, if you look at anything the right way, you can take valuable lessons from it. In this case, it's easier because the author says pretty much the same thing in the beginning of the book! And I'm allowing the book a chance - since I'm already involved in that self-evaluation.

I find a number of things in the book reinforce new tactics I have been trying in my personal life already. The author provides less than empirical evidence for his hypotheses, but many of the ideas resonate with my current explorations, and so I will try his suggestions to reinforce my own initial stabs.

I wrote the start of a blog entry on Friday, but failed to complete it. Even now, it sits in my inbox awaiting my attention (though it will only be deleted now, since my tack has slightly changed). In it, I mentioned that I actually got angry during a chat with Timmy on Thursday evening. It surprised me because I am usually not one to take things personally. I am of the belief that when one gets angry, it is generally because one is taking things personally. And if one is taking things personally, there must be something about which one feels personally inadequate.

So, in noting my anger, I must also see that there must be some truth to what Timmy was saying - that in some way I am not living up to my own expectations. Try it out next time you get angry, and see what comes up. It can be a very interesting experience if you are open to it. Remember, before you can affect a worthwhile change, you must first see the underlying problem for what it truly is.

I am nowhere near being angry now; instead, I have a wry smile. It may be small, but at least it's a start to that upside down frown...