Want to witness a magic trick?

Yay! I love magic!

Ok, calm down zippy. This is a special trick that you can actually experience in your own life and self, given of course that you are not one who refuses the existence of an essentialized stable self based on some kind of Cartesian ontolotogical…

Umm…can we start the trick please…

(murmurs something evil) Ok. So this is what you do. For three straight weeks, get up around 6:30 in the morning, complete your entire morning routine and be at the office by 9:30…

I’m a burgeoning scholar; I have no need to play by bourgeois ‘work time’ schedule.

No, listen. You do this of your own volition so that you can 1) take care of all those bureaucratic loose ends 2) have a rigorous discipline that allows you to maximum space for productivity.

All right, you may continue.

So; you establish this schedule that allows for approximately 12 solid hours of work and another 4 hours for your meditations, martial arts practice and hygienic duties. You continue this for 3 really strong productive weeks.

That sounds good…

Doesn’t it. You will begin to build momentum, perform your tasks with greater peace and concentration, be more efficient..

Oh wow, is that the magic?

No no, that’s just the start. You begin to accelerate, grow more determined, and more convinced that this semester is going to be the strongest ever..

That must be the magic!

Nope. The magic happens when the universe shoves a barrel full of thick mucus in every breathing passage you have prevents you from thinking sleeping or functioning clearly makes you feel like you’re going to choke if you lay down announces drastic changes in plans so that you have rethink projects syllabi and plans gives you tremendously exciting prospects that will require the very discipline you began to instill before the crippling snot suspended all hope which surprisingly stays alive despite the overmedicated dull hazy consciousness you are slowly normalizing as your own mode.

Uh-huh. How is that magical exactly?

Quiet you. You’re just an imaginary voice used to create a situation where I can vent my frustrations in a clever mode and avoid the always annoying voice of self-pity.

Ah, am I the imaginary or are you?

I’m Keyser Soze biatch…