I promise I have not forgotten about you. This week and next week, I will be deep into RD/RA training and need to focus most of my time toward these endeavors. In order to maximize my sleep as well as have enough time to get my planning done, I have temporarily paused my 385 word project. Over the course of these weeks, I will still try to post a few pictures from time to time of all the fun things we are doing. I hope all is well and you are enjoying your summer!
Best wishes,
Mark

Hello world! For those of you who are new, welcome to the Luminstruct blog! I am currently working on a "365 Word Project" where everyday I will be posting a reflection on a word and today's word is "determination".

My parents recently moved out of a home that I had been living in for more than ten years. I have very mixed feelings about this move. I'm sad they are moving further away for my dad's job and I am going to miss the house, but I'm also glad to know my dad is working with good people and with the position I am in now, my parent's home has slowly become less and less my home as I've gotten older. I guess in many ways this move has severed a few more ties to that bond of the "high school me".  Of course home is where the heart is and my home will always be where my family are, but this new home will be a brand new adventure.

Looking back at one of my old houses, one of the fondest memories I had were our crazy squirrels. Being in a wooded backyard, we had so many different types of wildlife around us, and I loved it. We had a few bird feeders, but one in particular had "the best" birdseed. With so many squirrels wanting to get this food as well, we only put this birdseed into a special "squirrel proof" feeder which was even more elaborate than the picture above. It had a closing mechanism which would close if there was too much weight and this helped getting rid of the woodpeckers as well (since the frightened off the other birds). The squirrels did not care for this one bit, after many failed attempts of getting on the feeder and then falling off or not being able to get to the food, one eventually figured out there was a tiny opening between the lid and the glass and by standing upsidedown, hooking their foot in this gap and raising his front paws, they were able to hang and eat the food at the same time. It was kind of a mission impossible squirrel. The only downside to this strategy was that the squirrel was then vulnerable if we came out on the deck. The only way to get out of the feeder quickly was a one story drop to the ground which wouldn't be fatal, but would make them dizzy for a good time. Even with this being said, there were a good 4-5 times this squirrel would fall from the deck, but even after this death-defying free fall, we would see the same squirrel back at it the very next week.

There is not any other story I could think of that could represent the idea of determination as well. If there is a will, there will always be a way. During your more stressful times, I welcome you to think of my squirrel friend. I know personally while I am going through move in schedules, training, and placement, a simple story like this does make my work seem a little less daunting and a bit more manageable. Sure, there might be a few times you take a giant fall or have a hard time, but if you stay determined and stick with your goals, you can accomplish anything. 

Question time: What keeps you going when times get tough?

Take Away: I know I have shown multiple Devin Supertramp videos before, but he is easily one of the hardest workers I've seen on YouTube. He released this video a few days ago from France, and some of the shots are really remarkable and simply beautiful. If you have ten minutes to spare after this video, check out the behind the scenes video as well. You can appreciate the work a whole lot more once you see all the work that was put into it in the first place :) Enjoy! 

Hello world! For those of you who are new, welcome to the Luminstruct blog! I am currently working on a "365 Word Project" where everyday I will be posting a reflection on a word and today's word is "dazzle".

I am glad to say that I am still standing after the odd "ghost" experience yesterday. Today I had a great time with some of my RD staff. We cooked together and watched a movie. Inception was chosen and this is my favorite movie. With it being as long as it is, however, I am already past my bedtime and will have to cut out a little earlier than usual. Inception is simply a dazzling movie, every time I watch it, I take it from a different scenario, and I still haven't completely come across an idea that I can stand behind. Not many movies make me think as much as Inception does, and it amazes me to think that I still catch new parts even after watching it maybe 50 or so times. The only other movie that comes close to this is "The Prestige" starring Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale. If you have not seen either of these movies, please go out and see them immediately! Your movie going experience will be changed forever :)

Question time: What is your favorite movie? Do you enjoy movies which make you think?

About the video: Although this is one of their older videos, I couldn't resist. "How It Should Have Ended" is an amazing YouTube series which makes fun of movies and sometimes goes into detail about how they should have ended or how it could have been better. Although this one in general is more funny, The Harry Potter one and The Terminator one are easily two of my favorites! Enjoy :)  

Hello world! For those of you who are new, welcome to the Luminstruct blog! I am currently working on a "365 Word Project" where everyday I will be posting a reflection on a word and today's word is "muse".

Before I begin my post, I would like to share part of my night so far. It was right when I got home, made some dinner, and was watching some Youtube videos when a smoke detector went off in the hallway. I opened the door to my apartment to investigate and the detector turned off. This then happened a few more times until I finally got out into the hallway to figure out which detector was going off. At first it was one in a room near mine, the next time it was in the hallway near my bedroom, the next time it was at the VERY far end of the hallway (my building is a very long building with about 10 rooms on either side. This then continued again and again, until I eventually called the police for them to check it out as well. After walking around the building a little, like I had done before, they came to the conclusion that something was the matter with the control panel and they reset it. The chirping stopped and they drove off. About 15 minutes later, the alarm starting going off again. This time they called a facility worker to join them and after a long time walking around and discovering all of the smoke detectors going off were battery powered and fairly new batteries, they all became very confused. The best reason they could provide was that a student ghost had moved in early and was causing all sorts of a ruckus. We unplugged the batteries in the three/four detectors which had gone off the most, and after a few hours, the alarms have stopped sounding. I share this story for two reasons, firstly just the fact that it is creepy and this is probably the most exciting thing to happen in the building all summer, and also if the building were to catch fire and I happened to die in that fire, it was the ghost's doing. I'm sure it was probably the humidity, but this has also been pretty typical weather over the past month or so, and this is the first time I've run into this problem...too weird!

I was also interested in the idea of a muse. In Greek mythology, you see many heroic men choose a beautiful maiden to allow their wisdom, creativity, and skill just flow through them like a cascade of water. Today, you still see that in some cases, but often a muse is a feeling. Kind of a like a guardian angel to help you along your way toward brilliance. It is really hard to be brilliant all the time, if I were to ever find a person that could make me feel brilliant all the time, I feel like I would keep them around me all the time for inspiration and happiness. It just doesn't work that way though. Happiness, joy, and inspiration must come from you first before you rely on others. Of course someone might give you many ideas from what they say, or what they do, but the true muse is within. This is when you are able to find yourself and realize you can do anything you set your heart out to do. It is just important to figure out how you like to work. I get ideas from walking around and picturing something visually and feeling it as a kinetic learning before I can make it into a reality. When someone asks me to picture what I room would look like if rearrange things, I have to be in the room and imagine the world unfolding around me. It is kind of like the mind palace in Sherlock Holmes. I can see everything in my mind and can unlock pieces that I haven't used in ages, but I must first know where I stored the information and how I can obtain it again.     

Speaking of muses, I find it kind of funny that I write these journal entries when I am about to go to bed. I think best about a topic when I'm not yawning or thinking about bed, more than I am about the post. Over time these posts have become later at night, to get some really good content out there, I should start these conversations a little earlier in the day. Just a thought. :) 

Who.what is your muse?

About the video: I think it is funny that sometimes someone can trick to to believe in a muse. This video was released at the beginning of this month and I was immediately hooked. I wanted to share it with you and talk about how amazing of an act it was. It wasn't until today when I watched a "make of" video and realized it was all fake. Bits of me wish the fake video was actually the "making of" video, but once you see something, you can't unsee it. That is why asking for a magic trick will only lead to disaster if you aren't prepared for a simple explanation that takes away the magic. The last thing I would want to do is take away the magic power of the muse, but maybe the magical part of it is that all of us can be our own muses, we just need to be able to train ourselves learn new and exciting things and be open to new skills and ideas. Goodnight all!