how do i love thee? let me count the ways...

Raplh Waldo Emerson. I love this guy.

I love him so much, in fact, that I want to name my first unborn son after him. (Well ok the Emerson part of his name. I'm not really feeling Raplh. Or Waldo for that matter.)




Verses penned by Emerson have literally changed me. My nature, thought process, and even self-image, have all been pulled out, examined, and redefined. Nothing is as it once was.

Reader, what have YOU read this summer that has similarly made you grow and think? If the answer is nothing, then I highly suggest you change that. Experiment with the power of transcendental thought, and immerse yourself in the pages of "Self-Relience" or "An American Scholar." I say, without the slightest hesitation, that if you allow yourself the time to read and ponder, thoughts will play upon your mind that will unfold to you your potential as a human being, and a creation of our God.

"American Scholar" poses the thought that you're not a banker, or a farmer, or a teacher, or a manger. Instead you are a HUMAN BEING who happens to bank, or farm, or teach, or manage. Our humanity is not defined by what we DO, but what we think and become. As children of the ALL KNOWING, we likewise have the potential, duty, and privilege of making our own pilgrimage to enlightenment-to becoming our own version of all knowing. We must climb the erudite ladder, with the focus of exploration our ENTIRE lives. Education is the power by which we gain awareness, and become-if we allow it to-closer to our God. In essence, we become like him, which is the destiny of all of humanity. By largely ignoring our minds and encumbering our intellectual reach, we are denying our innate objective-to be like God. Why then do we ever stop the search for higher intellectual awareness? Why do we ever stop learning?

"Self Reliance" is beautiful because you begin to feel utterly convinced that you hold, within your tiny hand the power of all creation. You hold the power within yourself to become who you want to become. You need nothing more than your own intellect and will power. "A man should learn to detect and watch that gleam of light which flashes across HIS MIND FROM WITHIN, more than the lustre of the firmament of bards and sages." Depend on the power of your OWN genius, and search out your OWN purpose, and look naught at others for emulation. "Envy is IGNORANCE; Imitation is SUICIDE." Stop conforming to what everyone else THINKS you should be, and truly be yourself. Envy and imitation only weaken the strength of your own soul-while turning your destiny into disarray.

Reader, I hope this incredibly TINY bit of Ralph Waldo Emerson has made you too catch his vision of humanity-and therefore of yourself. I hope you can see the magnitude of your own power. I hope this has inspired you to pick up his work, and begin your own journey of self exploration.

"To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men,-that is genius." What does it mean to be "genius"? Does it mean living for YOU? Is there really one truth for all, or is truth merely subjective? Perhaps the only truth that really matters is the truth you discover, for yourself, from within.