Log 6, Anxious people

 

Hello, this is Carolyn again. Here comes my last log. There is one thing that I need to confess I haven't finished this book till now; thus, the story's primary purpose still needs to be figured out. However, I have gradually found what the author wants to convey through this book. As I mentioned before, this book uses the robbery incident as the main story, but the core point of the book is nine persons. Those nine persons have faced different difficulties, and audiences could view different life and perspectives through those descriptive ways, which are constantly refreshing to me, so I focus on the meaning behind words and try my best to get my head around those brand-new perspectives.

As I mentioned above, there are nine persons appeared in this robbery. Yes, eight hostages and one robbery. "Where are those hostages from? "How can a failed robbery have so many hostages?" I know that your head must pop up with many question marks, but keep reading; you will finally learn about that. So, just let me do the quick clarification of the whole story for you guys so far. A failed bank robbery, turning an apartment of people viewing into a hostage situation. The core description of the book is how those nine "anxious peoples" in this apartment from different family backgrounds and different life experiences save each other.

To sum up, the plot of this novel is very cleverly set, and the author "slyly" designed every detail. The story laid out some seemingly obvious storylines on the robbery scene, and the backstories behind every hostage were excavated simultaneously and slowly. From the author's description, we can infer that the robber is a newly divorced person or tempted to get divorced with two children, but we do not assume the gender of the robbery at first. Also, we can be sure that this is not an impulsive crime, but what is the reason for the crime? Perhaps most people will guess that it is because of money. Based on my knowledge, a married adult with two children who has been crawling around in society for many years would not have made such absurd and unplanned actions. Therefore, when I read it, I thought for a while, "If I was this character, what would motivate me to do such impulsive behavior? "As my consideration, it may be sourced from the fear of the unknown future, a broken dream, or perhaps love for the children. "You probably have someone in your life whom you'd do something stupid for ."After reading this, I understand the significance of this robbery, and the word confirmed the reason for this "robbery ."In the strict sense, this is not a robbery about money, fame, and fortune, nor a long-planned crime, let alone making fun of it as a farce. This indictment is about life's powerlessness, which is both accurate and helpless.

The author wrote his sharp and real-life perspective into my heart, especially the sentence, "Because how happy can anyone really be, all the time? How could there be time for that? Mostly we're just trying to get through the day.". It touched my innermost secret. We all know that emotions are the norm in life over time, and with age, we seem to continually and unconsciously "avoid" ourselves from being unhappy. I wonder whether anyone has the same mood and situation as mine, but what I want to convey is that the word is ultimately a reflection of my current position, especially the word "trying to get through the day ."

Day after day, I seem to lose my enthusiasm for life under unchanged life. There seems to be only a "TO DO LIST" that must be completed in my mind every day; moreover, there are only tasks in black on a white background in this list, no colors, which made my life so dull and exhausted.

Furthermore, I woke up every morning saying to myself is only, "Just get over it," rather than any energetic words. Thus, I found that I seemed to understand the robber's helpless—overwhelmed behavior when I saw this sentence. Just imagine, how could you adapt when all your plans and lives for decades have been the same, suddenly, all those have been lost overnight? Although we all "get through" our lives, this kind of life has a rule. A simple change has disrupted all plans or even suddenly vanished at one moment; this result is also unacceptable and may do anything insane.

However, I want to discuss this time that life is not perfect if this is an authentic wonderful life. Although everyone wants to be an ideal person, a quintessential life will be the most helpless regret of life. As the author said, "how happy can anyone really be, all the time?" Only by accepting our imperfections can we have a more prosperous life.

Log 5, Anxious people

 

    Hello, this is Carolyn again. Here comes my fifth log. This time, I will introduce the " second" English novel in my life to you, called "Anxious people." This book is quite a quirky novel according to the writer's style, but I genuinely love it. The reason is that almost all the author's arguments hit my heart straight to the point. Unlike "Flipped," I haven't seen the plot on Netflix this time; I chose this book was only appealed by its name.

    This book seems to be written by the method of "flashback." When I first read it, I admit that I felt a little absurd and funny, especially the interrogations that answered beyond questions and the stories played in reverse order. I even felt puzzled and had the impulse to give up my understanding. Nevertheless, the author's clever technique supported me to continue reading, and the more I read it, the matter in my heart seemed to have been explained and gradually entered the story in the book. This book mainly focuses on "a bank gun robber and a failed hostage-taking farce." But honestly, the robbery is precisely not the critical incident in the story, which seems like a medium that leads the audience to figure out its significant purpose. 

     "This story is about many things, but mostly about idiots." This is a sentence that the author attracted my attention on the first page. When I saw this sentence, my first reaction was to laugh, and it aroused my desire to know why the author would say so after a few seconds. My attention is not on the robbery incident, and I pay more attention to the hidden meaning in the author's words and sentences. As follows, another sentence touched me again, "It's always very easy to declare that other people are idiots, but only if you forget how idiotically difficult being human is." After reading it, I fell into a series of questions about "being a person." In my opinion, being a human is not exactly a difficult thing for us; however, the main question is why being a human uses simplicity and difficulty to judge? People often complain, " life is so tough. how could we live such a life with lots of ordeals? " Actually, what makes people's lives feel tough and say these words does not come from themselves, but from the people and things that make them have these emotions. Anything can embarrass people, but what has been hindering people is the haunting "emotion" behind it.

    Next, I would like to share my personal insights based on the issues I have mentioned above. Emotion is a very polar manipulator. When we have positive emotions, the energy and atmosphere we exude can render all the things around us, and it can also make us show the best smile and speak beautifully to all things. However, when negative emotions take over us, they will cover everything we see with a thick dark cloud, and all the extreme and vulgar words and emotions will always appear in our minds. To sum up, we can find that most of our behaviors are guided by emotions. Perhaps after reading this, you may think that this has nothing to do with the "difficult of being a human" mentioned by the author. Everyone has different views and practices on everything, and we often only see things from our own perspective. Therefore, we often use the stories we have experienced and our own thinking logic to judge what a person does with emotions, which confirms the author's words, "It's always very easy to declare that other people are idiots" There's no doubt that we judge other people's behavior as an effortless thing. More, we often forget to explore why people have these behaviors and emotions behind them. When we consider things too subjective, we ignore, "What would we do if we were them?" Sometimes our subconscious behaviors are more absurd than theirs, and at this time, are we still qualified to laugh at others? In my life experience, I have usually used subjective judgment to judge what others have done, and I will always say something like, "I think you should...." However, looking back now, I always feel that the opinions I put forward were too self-righteous. When we put forward ideas, we can think from the other party's perspective, then any kind of ironic word may not appear.

    In fact, I spent a lot of time pondering the meaning of the text because the opinions put forward by the author in this book are very worth repeating and thinking about. Thus, it allowed me to gradually grasp the author's thinking logic in the following articles. Although I still have a clue about the robbery, I want to know the most about an episode memory in the text, which is about a man standing on a bridge ten years ago. The process of suicide was witnessed by a teenage boy, a young police officer after a decade. In the text, the author uses uncomplicated language to describe this memory, which makes me wonder if this memory is related to the robbery case. I consider it as the starting point of this book's " anxiety " factor. So far, I can't summarize the critical points of this farce because the dialogues in the book are somewhat nonsensical, and the psychology of perspective changes frequently, so I will try my best to continue to dig down. Indeed, I am eager to know what is going on. For example, "Caused this robbery," "why is this robbery so absurd?" and "why the answer from the hostage could be so nonsense?"

Log 4, Flipped

 

Hello, this is Carolyn again. In my free time this week, I finally ushered in the end of this book, and the most important thing is that this is the first English original novel I have completed in this study process. After reading this novel, I was deeply indulged in Juli. From the beginning of the book, we know that Juli has been approaching and adoring Bryce since the first sight of him. However, Bryce has always avoided her as a "plague" and believes that Julie has deeply affected his life. However, after reading the entire novel, I discovered that Julie is a near-perfect existence, even perfect that I am very envious. Next, I will present a few points that I have observed for a brief exposition.

 At first, we were offended by Juli's crazy behavior towards Bryce; however, as I said in Log 3, the incident about the sycamore tree taught me to get to know Juli deeply. From my perspective, she is very self-confident and bright in learning, which shows in comprehending the notion beyond her ability.; Also, she is brave and dares to approach the people she likes. Moreover, she is kind and knows how to take the initiative to apply to her father to visit her uncle, who is mentally disabled. The most appealing thing is that Juli loves and is eager to be close to nature, and she knows how to appreciate the beauty of nature, who will talk to sycamore trees and chickens that she has cultivated. As mentioned above, those show that she has an intense curiosity and enthusiasm for everything, and also the drive that she had are qualities that most people lack these days. Obviously, she still retains this quality, which makes me believe she is completely attractive. Likewise, we can find in the novel that the sycamore tree incident also seems to be the turning point in Bryce's discovery of falling in love with Juli. From the incident, he may have discovered the advantages of Juli, such as freedom, bravery, kindness, firmness, and so on. To my knowledge, Julie was also full of magic for Bryce, and he began to be deeply attracted by Julie.

Nevertheless, he felt despondent when he found out that Juli didn't like him as much as before. Thus, this is the evidence that revealed Bryce fell in love with Juli. Although he initially only avoided and feared Julie, when Julie continued to show her charm and kept her enthusiasm for life and love for various things, he finally couldn't help but fall in love with her.

Therefore, what I want to share with you in this reflection is "the importance of having one's own charisma." In today's society, we will find that everyone is pursuing the so-called "standard beauty" regardless of gender. Still, they gradually lose their original self in blindly following "standard beauty." Imagine that is such beauty really attractive? When there is only one form of beauty in the world. Back to my experience, I used to try to change my image and behavior under other people's opinions, which led me to lose myself in the process. It is no exaggeration to say that I don't know who I am at that time. In my opinion, we can accept other people's suggestions to us. Still, we can't be attracted by a person's partial charm all the time, such as the handsome and beautiful face, fashionable dress, and so on. Thus, we should respect our individual nature traits because there's useless to change ourselves with one word. As mentioned in the novel, "the whole being greater than the sum of the parts." We need to cultivate our own charisma, maintain curiosity and enthusiasm for life, and even constantly invest in ourselves to make ourselves more valuable. Thus, instead of trying hard or making the other person like you, it is better to cultivate your abilities, build your own personality charm, and form a certain degree of irreplaceability when you have someone you are attracted to. Finally, the person who suits you will come to you and maybe meet someone better.

From my perspective, a good relationship should be two people who appreciate each other, make progress together, and continue to become better people for each other. Of course, the focus of cultivating your charisma is not only for a good relationship but also to make yourself more robust and more confident. To sum up, everyone is unique. Only when we find our personality traits and show them in time can we enjoy our belonged life.

Log 3, Flipped

 

Hello, this is Carolyn again. Here comes my third log. There's good news that I want to tell you is that I have read lots of chapters this time. The reason is that plots are so touched and meaningful to me. As I said in log 2, this book tells the story in two distinct voices: Bryce and Juli. Thus, my angle of vision could consistently be switching between the perspectives of two people when reading plots, which would naturally bring out the story's contradictions. What impresses me most is the incident of the sycamore tree. From Juli's perspective, the value of the sycamore tree isn't an ordinary plant, but it provides a place that gives her a sense of security and helps to broaden her horizons. By viewing the scene from staying on the tree, she not only came up with different levels of thoughts and feelings but even realized the notion of "the whole being greater than the sum of the parts." When I read this part, I was shocked by her change; her ideological maturity has even surpassed her peers. To Juli, the tree has become her friend to express her emotions and chat, and only this tree makes her think and change. The view on top of the tree breaks sixth-grade children's small patterns and vision which lets her feel the beauty of nature and feelings. In other words, the tree means a lot to her, so it is understandable why she can have such a strong opposition when the tree is about to be cut down.

When the perspective changes to Bryce's side, we will find that Bryce's focus is always on the past. Suppose he does the same thing with Julie or is with Julie, there will be the same rumors as in the past, which has become his prejudice against Julie to some extent, resulting in his refusal and exclusion to understand everything related to Julie. In the novel, Bryce describes the tree as "the tree was an ugly mutant tank of gnarly branches." This simple text description showed that Bryce's understanding and perception of the tree are not profound and far. In his eyes, the tree brings him Juli's noisy time report and ridiculous behavior.

As a matter of fact, there are no so-called "right and wrong" from these two perspectives. Julie climbed to the top of the tree and got a different view from others, which let her have widely different feelings for it. Bryce didn't have such a deep understanding of the so-called scenery. Further comprehension is the most attractive point of this book. When a thing is told from two perspectives, the ignored parts will let us understand that there are no precisely standard rules in this world, not only right and wrong but just different views, resulting in different interpretations.

After reading a paragraph, I was gradually attracted by Juli's personality traits. What attracted me most was her ability to appreciate beauty, which was the direction I was learning. For her, the beauty of nature was shocking and unparalleled. Recalling my primary school days, I was even sad that I couldn't go to the amusement park. From this point, it's not difficult to find that Juli's family education may not be the top, but from the spiritual level, her maturity is definitely much higher than her peers. To my knowledge, the ability to appreciate beauty may seem vainer or useless than other abilities, but now I find this is the ability to make people happy. In today's society, the pressure and burden are always getting heavier, but when we learn to discover the little beauty around us, isn't it full of a sense of happiness? This little beauty could be just the cloud ratio in the sky was more beautiful than yesterday or had delicious food, etc. Knowing how to appreciate beauty is the primary condition for creating a better life.

Finally, I want to share a paragraph on Juli once said in the sycamore tree: "the higher I got, the more amazed I was by the view. "This passage seems to be an experience of climbing a tree, but when we read it from another perspective, we will find that it is a simple and understandable truth of life. The harder we work, the more beautiful and more prominent the fruits of success we can harvest.

Log 2, Flipped

Hello, this is Carolyn. Here comes my second log for you all. This week, the book I will share with you is "Flipped," which mainly describes the intriguing story between two children.

Before sharing my reflection and experiences, there are two reasons that I want to tell why I choose it. As I said in my first log, I have less interest in reading books or novels; thus, I have tried so hard to select the most suitable book for me to read, which not only need to suit my taste but also require the ability to inspire me to complete the whole book. Thus, I came up with an effective way to find the appropriate book for me -- Choose the novel-based film that I've seen, and then I could pick up the book to read, which will let me reduce the burden on understanding the brand new plot. On that note, I have started to go through what I have watched on Netflix. This time, "Flipped" has completely caught my attention!

Due to time constraints, I read this book in the form of an e-book. Many people will regard this as just a depiction of two young and ignorant children's emotional stories after watching this movie adapted from a novel. Like many people, I watched the film as a pastime before. However, with the age and the knowledge broadened, the first few chapters have already given me a different level of insight when I read the plots this time. This book mainly describes events from the two protagonists' perspectives, expressing their respective psychological activities and thoughts, explicitly showing the characters and storylines and making the book more attractive. From my point of view, this story could be discussed in different aspects, including family, friendship, love, and even self-growth. As follows, I'll share my reflections and connections to my life from the chapters I've read so far.

When I watched this film in the past, I felt crazy and absurd about Julie Baker's expression of love to the hero. Moreover, I couldn't understand the authenticity of the so-called "love at first sight" and whether its influence was so powerful, letting Juli do many ridiculous behaviors, such as chasing behind Bryce all the time no matter what Bryce's response gave her. Therefore, I regard Juli's behavior as an exaggeration used by the author in the story. As I grow older, I realize that seemingly ridiculous behaviors in the past are often the spice of life we need. In these chapters, Julie Baker presents the little girl's love for the little boy, but, love aside, those bold behaviors allow us to exist in our lives to some extent.

Why would I say that? Back in my life experience, Juli's behavior reminds me of the truth, "Bravery never goes out of fashion. "As I said above, although the theme of this novel is a love story, I comprehend from Juli's behavior is why I always lost my chance because of cowardice. Juli's courage and perseverance in pursuing Bryce are just like those trying to pursue their dreams. Although Juli doesn't know where the endpoint is, she seems to be immersed in this process.

On the contrary, I am always afraid, hesitant, and helpless about things that do not know the end. Also, I often doubt and shrink from useless questions such as "Can it be completed?" and "Can it be done?" For now, I have encountered such a problem with my career planning. In retrospect, I began to explore a lot of knowledge about psychology from the junior high school period, and I also like to study some books about psychology. When I came to college, I even took relevant courses and gradually immersed myself in psychology. However, I'm still hesitant about my future and can't recognize the development direction I truly want. The most struggling thing is that I'm always thinking about studying psychology again or settling for the status quo. Even though I am still in a state of indecision, I clearly know that this state will only make me spin helplessly in circles and unable to progress. This mental contradiction does drive me CRAZY all the time!

Nevertheless, Julie's brave spirit and persistence woke me up and made me seriously face what I needed and wanted again. In my perspective, everyone should try to pursue their dreams, no matter how hard the road will be or what kind of outcome they will gain. Sometimes innocent rampage may be the spirit that people need, and also, there's no doubt that having the courage to face difficulties like Juli's in our lives is the key to reaching our goals.

Log 1, Introduction

 

Hi, this is Carolyn. Like other parents in Taiwan, my parents believed that learning a foreign language proficiency could be essential in this era. Still, while studying the same foreign language for an extended period, my enthusiasm for English is gradually consumed. Therefore, I once went through a complicated process when learning English. This problematic experience doesn't infer that I can't understand this language, but I have less interested in English, which indirectly affected my motivation to learn and refused to learn. From the above description, interest and enthusiasm are the main factors of my learning motivation. After realizing the problem of my learning process, I tried different ways to figure out how to overcome this situation, such as reading novels, watching American series, writing a diary in English, chatting with my American friends or teachers, listening to American songs, and so on.

After trying many ways to help me through this difficulty, I found that the most effective way is to watch American TV series. Watching American TV shows is a stress-relieving and effective way to learn English because my hobby is Watching dramas or movies. My love for TV shows can be said to have reached a fever pitch. For me, I could have binge-watched all 30 episodes of the drama in one day. Thus, when I use my interest to learn, I can gradually retrieve my enthusiasm for learning English, which virtually improves learning efficiency.

Moreover, while watching American TV shows, I jot down some quotes and lines. The significance of memorizing these sentences allows me to have a more profound impression of the plot and think about the true meaning of these words, which can significantly help me in future writing. After watching the American drama, I will go online to look up some movie reviews, which can help me think about some of the inspirations and touches movies or series have brought me. Finally, I will sum up and write down a brief reflection after watching through these different aspects of movie reviews.

However, my interest in reading is weak, so it is difficult for me to read English novels, but I hope to change my rejection of reading through this class. To help myself, I will set aside an hour every day to read books no matter what kind of books, and through this way to develop the habit of reading. I hope that I will not resist reading through this way. Like I said before, I consider myself a writer since I have less interest in reading fields, whether Chinese or English. Therefore, I except professor could help me figure out solutions on how to enhance my ability on reading or at least less annoying on reading. Last but not least, I will try my best to write essays and read books as well as I can.