Yes!! I can present!

Yes!! I can present!

Public speaking has never been my strong suit, and it has always tormented me a little as I’ve always wanted to be good at it. A week ago my manager asked if I could present in front of 30 people that had recently joined the company and had gone on the graduate scheme. Essentially I was tasked along with two other lovely colleagues to create a presentation that would help those new to the business understand what search engine optimisation is all about and exactly what we do.

Along with the two lovely aforementioned colleagues we created a beautiful presentation that talked all about search engine optimisation in a simplistic way that those we were speaking to could understand within the hour and a half that we had with them.

It went well. At first I initiated it all by asking everyone their name, position and whether they would like to share any interests. That went really well. Oh, aside from the fact that I didn’t state my name when I told them about myself. My colleagues corrected me on this, and I kind of made fun of the person that corrected me when she stated “we usually call him J J”, which is actually false! No one calls me J J and everyone usually calls me Jonny, except for my boss who seems to like calling me by my full name, Jonathan Jones. We then got into the deck and managed to go through the first 30 minutes of the deck where I talked about search engines, why we use Google, Google’s search algorithm, the AOL Click Curve, tools such as Screaming Frog, BrightEdge, Webmaster Tools etc.

I’ll be honest, I didn’t think I had it in me. I thought I would essentially suffer throughout the entire presentation — stuttering, forgetting everything, or doing something that might embarrass myself. But no, I did the complete opposite. I did well and according to early feedback the people there enjoyed the presentation and found it quite useful. We also did a bit of a Q&A and if they asked questions I was actually able to answer them with accurate information. I’m so pleased with myself, as I’m definitely not a confident person and I guess if whatever came of this presentation was negative then would have been devastated and I would probably be beating myself up about it all.

I actually do want to take part in presentations in the future. I guess that now I know that I can do them, what’s the problem? Haha.

I’m just so happy right now. But I am also so tired as well! It’s off to the shower and to bed!

Need inspiration to code? Code.org

Need inspiration to code? Code.org

I just came across this brilliant video about getting people to learn how to code. It’s amazing. It features a handful of creators in the past century who have created something with code and who have become successful.

The Code.org website is about teaching people to program and to encourage those who may have had a slight interest to have an even bigger interest. It has certainly got me excited. Perhaps, I won’t have to go to university after-all, and I can learn how to program completely free – this I think is the premise behind Code.org.

Life seems to have slowed down, so much.

Life seems to have slowed down, so much.

It seems life has slowed down and I’m now experiencing life at a pace which I’m not enjoying. I guess, my life is somewhat robotic in the sense that I do the same thing everyday. At least, when I was in the ‘building websites’ business, at least, I was doing something different. Instead I’m at a job which I’m not enjoying, and I can’t make heads or tails of whether or not I’m going crazy.

The first issue that I’ve encountered is a communication problem, I can figure what I have to do, but everyone obviously speaks Mandarin and my Mandarin is not exactly that good. I can understand some of it, but when it comes to absorbing it as anything useful; that’s where I fail. Essentially, I can understand the basics and that’s about it. I can understand what they want me to do, but when it comes to the question of “How?” they can’t answer me in good enough English.

I had no problems before they moved me to another department. I went from working for my job’s General Motors department to working for the BMW department. I thought, great, it’s a change from the same stuff I’ve been doing everyday for 2 months. Instead, it is the same in someways while also being totally different in other ways. It is unnecessarily complex. Why do I say that? Well, General Motors created a machine to make the task of coding other system’s machines to work with it. With BMW you need a separate computer to connect to the hardware, however the display is all on this other computer; which makes things ten times complex, it need not be this way. Plus, on top of learning how to run a new system, my bosses want me to type in Chinese words that I can’t even read. I can read some of it, but all I have is the English translation, but that isn’t good enough seeing as Google translate is just not accurate enough when it comes to translation. (It could be perfected, but I understand why it would be hard to translate 1,000’s of Chinese characters.

Whatever the case, I’ll be really starting in the BMW department tomorrow. I hope all goes well.

What do I post…

I would usually post how my Mandarin-Chinese studies are going, but I’ll be honest and say it isn’t going too well. Although I am improving overall, I’m not improving as fast as I would like. I guess you could kind of say I’m struggling a little to grasp this language, however today and yesterday I went to my local 24 hour McDonald’s and just got my head down and studied. No distractions, plenty of coffee and plenty of practise pronouncing, writing and lots of memorising. Although I got weird stares from others inside McDonald’s and people looking at what I was doing, it kind of motivated me in some weird way. It kind of told me “people are looking, I don’t want to look stupid” when in-fact to them I probably was just a crazy fool studying my basic knowledge of their own language. I studied from 12 at night to 3:00am in the morning.

 

Then I called it quits, went back home and had a shower. I did eat a large Big Mac meal just to get me through the night and I had 2 coffee’s; not really a healthy combination, but it helped me study and focus. However previously I played football from 7pm to around 8:10pm and that kind of wore me down, but I knew I had to get down to business considering I have an oral test coming up later today. (Right now for me it is 3:31am) I start class at 8am. But I think I’m going to throw up tomorrow, I drank way too much coffee. Which is why I am still awake now. In fact I am not going to go to sleep today even though I have a busy day ahead. I’m going to watch some Mandarin tutorials on YouTube just to purely understand the grammar structure and to learn a little more. – Rather than waste it on sleep. (Although I realise I should sleep, but I’m too worried; another unhealthy combination) 

 

In fact I’m so worried, I memorized a sentence to say to the teacher tomorrow. Essentially the sentence is: “No bad feelings, but I feel very nervous right now”. I’m worried I won’t be able to answer all the questions and that would really hurt my confidence, especially when I’m trying the best I can. 

 

I also have some personal issues which is making me worry even further. I just wish I didn’t have to worry so much… but that’s me. I worry too much about everything. My friends, education, life, every detail… I worry about everything and I worry too much about every single individual ‘fucking’ thing. (It drives me crazy) I think in the end I’m going to go crazy. I think people are already seeing the crazy side come out. But it really isn’t funny. God damnit, I cannot control my ADHD sometimes and I go over the top. Then I get cynical of myself, thinking that others hate me while others adore me. I understand you cannot win everyone, but it seems the friends I have always been close to are distancing themselves. I have plenty of good friends, but I don’t want to lose anyone really. But my life is just all over the place at the moment. So if you are my friend and you are reading this, please understand my position. I’m a mess right now. Even though it may seem I am fine inside… there is an acronym I can use right now… it is FUBAR. (Fucked Up Beyond All Repair) – It is how I feel right now, although  I do believe I can repair myself in the end.

God does not exist

The best argument for an atheist when he makes the following statement:

 

"God doesn't exist."

… and a religious person replies:

 

"Can you prove he doesn't exist?"

 

You say:

The onus is not on me to prove whether he exists or not. It is you that has to provide the evidence for the existence for such entity since you claim it exists. I do not claim it exists, I purely dismiss having any knowledge of claimed higher being in the case of a human-made idea of such an entity. I merely state the fact that it doesn't exist on the same basis a wooden donkey isn't floating around in space right now talking to other aliens. 

 

If I say there is a military type-war taking place in Switzerland, I made the claim, so I have to prove that. If no news agencies are reporting that or if no one is talking about it, then no one is going to believe me, right? But because there are so many religious people around, people will believe religion, supported by the fact that there are so many others that also believe that religion. However the Muslim religion is the largest in the world, yet if you were brought up in a Christian country, you aren't likely to become Muslim though very likely to become Christian. That is how the religions we see today have grown to what they have now become.

 

Yet, if I said, "There isn't a war taking place in Switzerland", that is more believable. It is more logical and considering the news haven't reported of the war taking place or there aren't others talking about it, It is totally more believable. My point is that it can actually work both ways. So while the majority of the worlds population supposedly believe in a higher deity or "God", just because the majority claim it to be true, doesn't mean it is. But this all turns to one point, if you have evidence that there is a war taking place and that you have evidence of such a thing taking place (Citing sources that the evidence is totally credible), then it is more believable. However religion relies on one thing only and that is a huge amount of faith and belief in something which equates to the same as believing a 't-shirt' created everything. Arguments set out by those who debate atheists, sound totally outlandish to those who do not believe. 

 

However by the same token, because of how rapidly religion has grown through the past, through hate, love, the joining together of a group and the teaching of younger people who then spread that teaching to their children and so forth, religion has grown excessively with people believing mindlessly. – They haven't been taught anything else and to believe otherwise would be totally absurd in their minds. I can understand this considering I had the same upbringing. Though if you know me, I had a 6 month gap period where I stepped away from all that and looked at it more objectively. Otherwise I would probably be praising good old  'Jesus' right now. 

 

Although I wish for there to be an after life or heaven where I'll be able to see those who died and make new friends, it doesn't make it real. I really wish I could have more evidence, my life would be more endearing knowing that there is something out there waiting for me. But I cannot believe in something which cannot be proven. I stick to my principals on this issue as I know others can easily be influenced by fear of dying and going to hell by not believing. 

 

I can offer a story of when I was younger. — I went to a Christian school and at the moment of my last year at the school, I was the only person in my class who was atheist or I just didn't believe. I don't like to label myself as agnostic considering that I don't agree with the term. Although I cannot prove the existence of 'God', doesn't mean I have to. I just don't believe that such an entity exists. I was very open about this and I asked my R.E. teacher where I would go to after I'd die considering I didn't believe in God. He replied with "Hell". That is what I don't like about religion. Now if there were no such thing as hell, I wouldn't mind religion so much, but because it induces fear in the sense "You don't believe? Well guess what, you are going to Hell!"

 

That makes more people want to become part of some religion just so they "might" be right. For me, I stuck to my principles in this case, something like that wouldn't deter me. Unless of course 'God' indeed touch me like so many people say, I would probably have the same belief, however 'God' has never touched me throughout the years I was exposed to Christiniaty at a young age and up until I was a teenager. I am sure if 'God' as those who claim him to be almighty and all-powerful; if he did indeed touch me, I would be Christian right now. Therefore I cannot relate to those who say "'God' touched me". I wouldn't call them a liar, but at times 'misguided', 'confused' or any other amount of reasons that one could come up with fit perfectly. 

 

Atheist
Purely atheist to me means: I don't believe that God exists. Simple. Just in the same way, I don't believe that father Christmas exists or the tooth fairy.