Friday, February 20, 2015

Self esteem

Since my last post, things have improved. I downloaded a calorie tracking app for a while (which was more difficult to use than I thought, since finding items to add was often a game of "close enough"), which was interesting in that I could see where most of my calories were going. I've since stopped using it because I'm lazy and entering all the food I eat into my phone takes too long and I can't remember to do it. Also because I found that I now have a better understanding of the caloric content of things and how I typically eat, and when I do not buy junk food all the damn time, I actually eat really well.
Anyway, the only two "rules" I have applied are
1) Only buy junk food on the weekends
2) Don't take the bus to class unless you are running late or it is hella freezing outside
And they work for me. They are beyond easy to incorporate into my life, I have saved a lot of money, and I get quite a few steps in a day.
Also, on a note that seems tangential but isn't, I've recently become slightly obsessed with The Mindy Project (which is hilarious and awesome and adorable, by the way, and you should all watch it), and one of the lines from the show really stuck with me. I feel ridiculous thinking it, but I like the line "You're a woman, and that's good. Look like a woman." It's a good line (delivered in a very cute way, might I add), and it was kind of like a slap in the face for me, in the way where I was like "jesus what am I so worried about, I am fine."

On another note, I realized today how much I have learned in university. This came from two incidents:
1) My sister reading me the ingredients on a nail polish bottle and me realizing that my knowledge of organic (and okay, general) chemistry meant I could roughly picture a lot of the things in my head. Ethyl acetate? Hey, we use that in the lab! You can write EtoAc as an abbreviation! It was kind of nice to know that I have that knowledge. I can identify molecules. It's not super useful, but I can still do it. That is a thing I have learned.
2) My sister reading the last half of my psych chapter out to me (I even got an interesting idea for a paper during this, which I did not write down because I am an idiot). She said that it was mostly gibberish to her, but it all made perfect sense to me. Describing studies, results, and ethical implications of psychological treatments, and the biological methods of treating psychological disorders, and a bit about preventative stuff. I mean, I know it's first year psych, and that's not that big of a deal, but I still felt smart.

There was recently a confession posted on my university's confession page on fb about how science students often neglect getting a real education from someone who felt like they weren't learning anything in a science degree and so switched into a humanities one and felt much more educated. I find that bizarre, because in my 1.5 and a bit years of a science degree, I feel like I've learned a shitton of stuff and it is great. I know so much crap about a bunch of things, and I get to learn even more, and I get to study whatever I want. I really feel very lucky that I get to go to university, and a good one at that.
I think the best part is when my classes overlap. This has happened mostly between my science courses (ochem II, a basic genetics course, and intro to biochem) and then between my arts courses (psych II, which I hate because it is beyond boring to me, and my prof doesn't help, and women's and gender studies, which, though philosophy based, is finally being taught in a way that I can understand). I love it when that happens, because it means that I'm thinking about all the things I've learned and putting them together to learn even more. It's great when we learn about the repair of deaminated bases and T-T dimers in genetics, because I know what those things look like thanks to biochem. We can talk about the forces holding DNA and proteins together in biochemistry, and I understand how they work because I've taken and am taking organic chemistry. Everything builds on everything else and it is wonderful. I might just be learning the basics of science, but they're still very interesting.

So yeah, I've been feeling pretty smart and pretty lately. It's a nice trend, and one that I hope will continue. I'm also thankful that I've been put in an environment that encourages the development of both of those traits.

yer pal,
swegan