Katamari as a life philosophy

I'm a writer, my sister's an artist, and my brother's a musician. Our parents, meanwhile, are doctors. My siblings and I don't have medical school - a hugely formative experience in our parents' lives - as a frame of reference, so their stories of triumph wouldn't have quite the same resonance if they weren't tweaked a bit. Our dad is good at this, but some stuff still gets lost in day-to-day translation, namely what we plan to do with our lives and how we intend to get there.

I had the opportunity to talk with my sister the other day about communicating with people. My sister, who's studying animation and graphic design, pointed out that it can be difficult for people grounded in certain disciplines to use broad terms that aren't necessarily field-specific, which is why it's so important for people to learn as much as they can about a lot of different things. She hit upon a brilliant approach to acquiring knowledge.

"If you eat, breathe, sleep one thing and nothing else," my wise sister said, "you're not really expanding yourself into a fuller person. It takes a lot of things to make a good person, and that's why it's important to read scientific articles, keep up with news, read the history, learn the mythology and learn something new every day. I believe that people should be like Katamari."

She refers to Katamari Damacy, a popular video game series. For those not familiar with the game, a katamari is a magical, sticky ball one rolls around through various levels to create an even bigger ball made out of everything from thumb tacks to shrubberies to cows. (Watch this to see how this plays out.) The goal is to make a planet of some sort, and ultimately to avoid beatings by the King of All Cosmos, who's kind of... eccentric, shall we say.

I love the idea of my mind as a katamari, collecting as much knowledge as possible to become a "well-rounded" person and able to share what I've learned with the people around me. I discovered that Katamari Damacy even (roughly) translates from Japanese to "clump soul." (Thanks, Wikipedia!) How awesome is that?