Short Entry

OK this is going to be a short one, I promise-- and you want to know why? Because I didn't do much work all last week and have nothing really to show for it except the realization that my soul is androgynous and reaching level 9 in tetris.

All right, I did do SOME work... I'm basically done with my BPS poster (just need references) so that should be ready to print once I get the HOC's approval. I also remodeled my lit review idea (see, I told you I would). It is not simply on the relationship between imagery and perception now, but the relationship between imagery, perception, and hallucinations. You may not think that makes a big difference, but it completely restructures the point of the paper. As for writing? I'm over 2100 words now, with half a handwritten page to add to that, so about 2200/6000 words. Not much considering I was at 1700 before. Need to write this weekend.

My "random experiment" is partially programmed in e-prime, and I need to apply for ethics approval (will also do that tomorrow). I've scrapped earlier ideas for my fake PhD studentship proposal and am now going with something I might be able to get help from Dr Barrett on, a.k.a., something that has to do with visual attention. Also, I got 5/30 research participation credits since last week. So this week was semi-productive.

My goals for this weekend are as follows:
Make a REAL structured outline for fake PhD studentship
Write at least 1000 words on normal imagery/hallucinations, and brain areas involved in both.
Submit ethics for random experiment.

Those are realistic goals, right?

Anyway, enough about work. On to fun!

My dad sent me a book called Journey of Souls which was written by a clinical psychologist/hypnotherapist specializing in LBL (life beyond lives) regression. LBL is basically that period between death and reincarnation -- for those of you who believe in both a) the soul and b) reincarnation, it is a collection of 29 case studies where all the patients talk about going to a heaven-esque location and being with their spiritual friends.

It is actually a very interesting concept: The body dies, and depending on the soul's maturity level, it could linger for a while to see what happens, or whiz right away through the astral plane. Young souls are apprehensive to follow the magnetic force that seems to pull them toward the spirit world, and need their guides/spiritual family to comfort them immediately. Old souls are the relaxed veterans, needing nobody to tell them what's what and simply speeding along the magnetic line to their destination.

Souls live in groups, made up of others who are spiritually resonant, or on the same maturity level as the rest of the group. Younger souls study all their past lives and talk about the lessons they have learned and hope to learn in the next life. Older souls act as teachers to the young ones-- even older than them are the guides for the recently body-shed, and the oldest act as something like judges and overseers and rarely reincarnate anymore.

Anyway, the book paints a really interesting picture, and I would like to read a fantasy novel based on these cases, where one soul is the main character and goes through all this soul stuff in a couple of volumes-- it would be cool to see all the incarnations it chooses, and it's relationship to its friends, etc.

Oo, it's 8 o'clock! I'm gonna grab me a bowl of cereal before I've deemed it too late to eat.

Then tetris! WOOHOO