1. Do you become self–conscious of your ideas?
I suppose ideas can often seem more personal than our selves, at times. I, personally, am usually very self-conscious of my ideas, and am constantly seeking approval and justification for whatever ideas I may have. I suppose it is less about needing approval and more about needing a definite path to walk; a guarantee that what I’m doing is the right thing. For instance, I’ve recently been wrestling with my degree plan, wondering if I should swap my major and minor for one another. While it seems entirely the same, I’m honestly very concerned about doing the right thing. In all honesty, job security and pay are incredibly large factors in this dilemma, but I also feel uneasy about my talent as an artist and just how happy I’ll be as a graphic design major compared to a computer science major.
Not to sound full of myself, but I am proficient in quite a few areas — specifically writing, art, math, technological applications and so on — so I find it hard to settle on a specific career path or degree that’ll let me use all of those skills to the best of my abilities. Is it best to be a programmer with art experience, or a artist with programming experience? It’s difficult and important, but I have no understanding of what is actually right. Who’s to say that Andy Warhol should have been a tap dancer? I suppose no one else is capable of saying so, except for Warhol himself. I suppose that the real goal is to be self-conscious about your ideas, but not to the point where you loose sight of your intentions and goals. Maybe that’s the missing link for me?
2. What do you think of the nothing–to–lose attitude? What are it’s pros and cons?
I think to say you have nothing to lose is ultimately unrealistic, yet effective. It is impossible to have no consequences for the choices we make in life, but sometimes throwing caution to the wind is the best way to motivate yourself to take important risks or make life-changing decisions. However, that mentality, I believe, can snowball into a much larger tone of ignorance for one’s position. If you have no sense of consequence whatsoever, you can become and entirely irresponsible and dangerous person, and that’s a very slippery slope to walk on. I’m the kind of person who likes to play things safe, so maybe that’s a bad thing. But, on the contrary, I’ve never been in serious trouble before. Risks are okay, but even the most whimsical of risks can still benefit from being more calculated than others.