17th July - Focus, focus? where is it?

(Thoughts of confusion)

I am really confused. I am stuck at the part where I have to go collect stories. I am certain I need material to introspect on, if I intend to write a narrative. But also, “belief ” is such a topic, which has a lot of solving and clearing out of my own prejudices before talking to anyone else. I am struggling to do that. More like, how do I go about clearing out my own prejudices?

Also interviewing some people might actually help me clear my prejudices (in a way) but it needs to be a very focused interview (I need to interview pple in such a way or ask those Qs. Where I can get to the experiences I am looking for) and I need to identify who all is it I am talking to? Since I am looking at Placebo and how a placebo makes use of Belief as a powerful medication, I will be interviewing counselors (psychotherapy) and Homeopaths. But this is only in the area of medicinal practice. There are more aspects through which belief can be looked at like “belief in a supreme power”, “belief in yourself-internal belief”, “belief in someone else – external belief” – This sort of opens up the premise of Belief especially that area where what is it that people have belief in, more than questioning what belief is?

I am feeling really stuck and I think I am wasting time just thinking. What should be my next step?

I met Vasanthi day before yesterday, and another way to go about the abstract idea of belief would be to somehow symbolize it and use it as a metaphor to say many things. I actually got homework: to look up the term “Metonymy” and how it is different from a Metaphor and see possibilities of how I can convert this idea abstract idea of Belief into something more tangible.