What is Faith?

             The answer to the question “what is faith?” is anything but easy to answer. It is a question that can be interpreted in many different ways, by people of different cultural backgrounds, beliefs and social context. This being said, my interpretation of faith comes from that of a Catholic male in his early twenties, coming from a middle class family and with a realistic understanding of what this world is all about.

            While at Mass this past Sunday, I looked around at the people in the Church and really tried to determine what my definition of faith is. As I looked on, I saw mothers holding their children closely, elderly couples holding hands and praying. I saw a teenager who seemed to be troubled and saw myself in his eyes, realizing that when things would go bad I could always find something to aid me in Church.

            This led to one word popping in to my head and sticking with me the next few days as I tried to determine what faith was. That word was “hope”. Faith is hope. Faith is the hope it gives to true believers to find some light in a world completely filled with darkness, bitterness, corruption, disease, disasters, famine and war. When all else goes to complete shit (sorry for the lack of a better word), faith is what grounds people of different religious groups and is what helps us get through an otherwise depressing world. If a person were to lack faith and hope in a world such as this, it would be far to easy to fall in to despair and suffering. Darkness can easily consume us, and as humans we need to cling to things that bring us joy. Religion, relationships, families, children, friends... these are all things that aid us in finding this joy. All of these bonds we create are linked to faith, because faith is believing and we believe in these bonds. Therefore, faith is not necessarily the belief in God or a religion. Because faith is hope and belief, it can be easily adapted to all of the connections I have mentioned above. I believe that we need more faith in this world, because without some sort of belief that we can achieve more then we are doomed as a society to continue down this self destructive whirlwind humanity has created for itself.

Laziness, Pop Culture and Other Rants: Part 1

Movies like "The Social Network" praise geniuses like Mark Zuckerberg for creating such revolutionary and ground breaking inventions that have essentially shaped the world we live in today. However, things like Facebook and Twitter, initially created with good intentions, have become grotesque monstrosities turning our youth and even our adult populations into lazy zombies with no other preoccupations other than how many friends or followers they have.

It feels as if modern technology, this digital age we live in, has made it extremely easy to develop lazy tendencies. It is this "get it quick" mentality which is reflected in our popular culture... music (Kesha, Katy Perry, Soulja Boy, Dougie bullshit dance, etc.), movies with no plot or purpose (Expendables, countless dance movies, etc.), even the food industry (McDonalds, Burger King, etc.). All of these things have made it impossible for someone to WANT to have faith, focus and a desire to finish any given project. The few people who do WANT, and those who don't, waste their potential because the modern fucking bullshit of our generation has made it too easy for us. There is no longer a NEED to succeed. Only a withering dream, a withering want of becoming something greater than what we are. We have become too lazy to succeed at anything more than logging online and chatting with our friends, and stalking attractive women on Facebook.

Although this seems like an incoherent rant (it basically is), there is a bottom line to my madness. There is no NECESSITY anymore. There is no sense of urgency. Aside from those poor and struggling in the world, people with basic commodities who are able to get by have no NEEDS only WANTS. We dream of having fancy cars, bitches, hoes, money and clothes. Who could blame us? When all we see everywhere is a small percentage of wealthy people on television, movies, radio, internet, etc. telling us how great it is to be rich and how we should all buy $600 jackets and $300 jeans because that will fulfill us.

-P

Hip Hop

Hello to the few readers I have!
I'm sorry for being away for so long. It was a combination of laziness and lack of things to say which made up for the delay. I have returned, however, after a difficult few weeks in which I have begun to reevaluate my life. I have decided to go back to my old rap days and upload a few songs to Youtube. Please take a look at some of my music when you get a chance, and I will hopefully be back soon!
Take care,
-P
______________________________________________
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/mpoliziani
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/PoliHipHop
Here is one of my songs entitled Hard to Find:

Project Poli : Day 1

It has been nearly a month since I've posted on the Playground. Between the new school term, work, video games and a girlfriend, I have found it difficult to find time to blog about my everyday life (which by the way is about as interesting as an uninteresting coffee table). Now that I have found a second to write, I would like to tell you about Project Poli.

For those who do not know me personally, I weighed about 270 pounds close to two years ago. Since that time I have lost a combined total of 44 pounds of fat thanks to Prestige Gym and Peak Performance founder and trainer Peter Berardi (I will put a link to his Facebook page below for those in need of training and advice).

The problem I have been facing in the past few months is my own laziness. I am still at an unhealthy 226 pounds, and it is something I have been procrastinating on fixing for a while. That is why I have made it a point to undertake what I am now calling Project Poli. I have no idea how much time it will take me to reach my goal of 190 pounds, but I plan to stick to my project until I do.

The plan is simple: intake less calories than I burn in a day, so that my body has no choice but to burn at my fat for energy. Sounds simple, right? Wrong. The main problem with people, myself included, is that we have a predisposed tendency to over-indulge in things that are sensually appealing to us. As said by my good friend and mentor Optimus Mastro (will link to his blog below as well), "why do we eat a bag of salty chips when we know that fresh broccoli is the healthy alternative?" The problem is being able to overpower our sensual need to eat tasty food with the intellectual knowledge we already have that the tasty food is unhealthy. This is the true challenge; not the calorie counting.

I have done it before, with my first loss of 44 pounds, and I will do it again. Maybe blogging about it will make it easier. Today I ate extremely healthy, combined with an intense morning boxing session and a cardio workout in the evening. The calorie count is good and I have successfully completed day one of Project Poli.


Take care and be good,

-P

Peter Berardi, trainer/founder of Peak Performance

Optimus Mastro, entrepreneur/neo-theologian/trainer/blogger

Welcome to the Playground

I would like to welcome each and every one of you people in the cyber world who have taken the time out of your busy schedules to visit my blog. I am here because if people can create popular and successful blogs by writing about sports and television with mediocre writing skills, then I can make a half-decent piece of work myself.

I'd like to discuss a few things with you before continuing on my welcoming post. The name: Poli's Playground. Who, why and where.

1- WHO
Poli is the nickname used by my closest and dearest friends. Since you, reader, will be reading about my deepest thoughts and considerations throughout the next few years (or however long it takes me to grow tired of blogging), I have allowed you all to refer to me as Poli as well. You will learn more about me as we further our relationship together.

2- WHY
Why the playground? In the wise words of Will Smith the Fresh Prince of Bel air: " [...] the playground was where I spent most of my days." Well, most of those days were spent being beat up and teased about my weight, which happened to be over the norm. Regardless of my repressed childhood memories, I chose playground mainly because it seemed to me an amusing word which went in alliteration with Poli. (I could have pushed the envelope and gone with Poli's Power Playground but did not want to abuse of the reader's good nature and sense of humor).

3- WHERE
I am situated in the beautiful metropolitan city of Montreal, Quebec, Canada. 

My goal in life is simple: to be successful and to have enough money so that my grandchild's grandchildren can live comfortably on the money I make in this lifetime. Since this is an unlikely outcome I satisfy myself with working part-time and going to school to further my education. I don't know what I wish to achieve in blogging... heck I don't even know if anyone will read this. What I do know is that I now have an outlet to speak whenever the mood strikes me and God help those who try to stop me.

Be safe and sleep tight,
-P