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Overview

  • 9 references 6 Confirmed & Positive
  • Fluent in English; learning French, Indonesian
  • 45, Male
  • Member since 2007
  • graduate studies in a little farm town one hour outside o...
  • degrees in neuroscience/philosophy from the massachussett...
  • From isle of palms, south carolina
  • Profile 90% complete

About Me

CURRENT MISSION

discover beauty / create reality / destroy preconceptions / enjoi

ABOUT ME

i like to be near water.

i enjoy finding beauty in simplicty.

i believe we forget to choose to choose.

i want to pay attention more.

i want to explore.

i seek to dance as much as possible.

PHILOSOPHY

i've actually studied philosophy formally.

much of it is inapplicable to practical everyday life experience.

some of it is.

perhaps the most potent morsel i have come across in my time stems from the discipline known as phenomenology. one of the great phenomenologists of this century had this to say: "We must not wonder whether we perceive a world, we must instead say: the world is what we perceive.” (Merleau-Ponty)

reality is what you perceive it as. further: reality is what you *choose* to perceive it as. even further: you *create* the reality you perceive to exist. and ultimately: those around you respond to and strengthen that reality you have chosen.

i believe strongly in a philosophy of generosity and gratitude. not only as a means to benefit the world around me, but as a means to evolve myself. this one little realization, i believe, is the key which marries our destinies together: in order to be happy -- to expel greed, animosity, jealousy and aversion -- all it takes is a true commitment to generosity (compassion) and gratitude. diametrically opposed attitudes cannot coexist at one moment.

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

currently: i bow to a tide of recommendations telling me to sign up with this thing. hi!

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

i have a friend in montreal. she's one of my favorite people in the world. we had plenty of adventures in her high school exchange year in my home state of south carolina.
years later, i visited her up in quebec one fine (read: COLD) january weekend. i'd never driven stick shift before. she thought it'd be a good idea to teach me in the snowy streets of montreal. (crazy canadian) hilarity ensued.
luckily her car came out ok. (dunno about that clutch though)

another friend of a friend in munich put me up around new years several years ago for a couple of days. on nye he took me out for the night of my life. i don't like to gloat about what i consume (lest i be consumed by my own consumption) but damn. i enjoyed -- for the first ever -- franziskaner, jagermeister, gluhwein (hot german spiced wine) and absinthe from the czech republic (yeah the real deal) all in one night. and somewhere in the middle of that blur i remember getting splashed with champagne and dodging bottle rockets in the middle of marienplatz.

Interests

dancing, adventure, sharing time, trading knowledge and wisdom, meditation, sonic and visual arts, patterns, immersing in nature, algorithms, unravelling the mysteries of consciousness and intelligence (i.e. neuroscience!), evolution, emergence, dimensions, networks, snowboarding, surfing, backpacking, canyoneering, sail sports, fine beer, backgammon, go, tea, free verse, philosophy, photography, symmetry, asymmetry, simplicity, now

  • arts
  • literature
  • photography
  • beauty
  • dancing
  • wine
  • beer
  • meditation
  • partying
  • traveling
  • music
  • backpacking
  • surfing
  • sailing
  • snowboarding
  • buddhist
  • sports
  • mathematics
  • neuroscience
  • visual arts

Music, Movies, and Books

this book Terrene is my current obsession. just finished it. mind blown. incredibly smart, compelling, relevant and actually important page turner. i'm urging all my friends to pick it up...

previously: aldous huxley "island". damn. ill say that again. damn. mr. huxley certainly evolved in his life. trivia: did you know his last words were (reportedly), "LSD, 100 kilograms I.M." to his wife. she obliged and he was injected twice before his death.

"The Wind Up Bird Chronicles" by Murakami was completely on the *other* side of literature stylistically. little content but amazing narrative. really amazing. every time i opened this book i felt like i was back in a recurring dream.

i don't watch as many movies as i'd like to have time to watch. though i watch exactly as much tv as i would like to, which is to say none at all.

music is one of the finest pleasures in life. if i had nothing else to live for i would still live to listen, create and dance to music. here's some of the music i enjoy most in the world: brian eno, dead can dance, debussy, autechre, four tet, balinese gamelan, mum, plaid, telefon tel aviv, deltron, FSOL, seefeel, cocteau twins, coco rosie, pj harvey, (early) jump little children, rachels, philip glass, the ocean

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

ok, here are three.

have you ever seen coral patterns clearly in the bottom of the ocean through the floor of a glass wave reaching above your head ready to swallow you? (sumatra, indonesia)

have you ever walked on the dried liquid insides of the earth -- a landscape of smooth black alien material paving your way to a hypnotic fiery flow of molten lava? (hawaii, hawaii)

have you ever been to an all night party in a hangar at NASA? we threw one two years in a row! (bay area, california)

Teach, Learn, Share

i would love to talk to you about buddhism, neuroscience, music, water/snow sports, patterns, math, space, philosophy, love, beauty, travel, literature... there is so much to say and so much to learn. i like to synergize with people.

Countries I’ve Visited

Canada, Germany, Ghana, Indonesia, Switzerland

Countries I’ve Lived In

United Kingdom, United States

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