There is more wisdom inside you than in all the books ever written. Where are you looking for inspiration?
Raam Dev
Sustainable Lifestyle Choices
Notes: Reject Defining Yourself According to Exterior Standards
Chris Guillebeau reflects on how he once chased a "proper education", striving for things simply because the path from here to there was clear and easily marked out by milestones that many others had followed.
It took me a long time to get away from validating my life according to something that didn't relate to my true hopes and goals. At the time, I really did want to devote years of my life doing things that no one would notice, in hopes of obtaining letters behind my name that no one would care about. As ridiculous as I knew it was, I still wanted it! It was hard to let go of... until I finally did.
Part of it was the attachment to something of questionable value (a degree, useless letters), but I was also attracted to the linear nature of academia. I wanted to do something interesting and meaningful, and I saw a clear, if not entirely sensible path. Never mind that the end was muddled; at least I had a certain next step. Pay this amount of money, write a certain number and type of essays, complete such-and-such requirements, meet with these advisors, and so on. All fairly straightforward.
But when you venture out on your own, the next step is often unclear. You don't necessarily know what to do at any given time, which is why having a specific direction is a superpower. There is also no degree or graduation waiting for you at the end, and you have to determine your own milestones.
...
Years later, I write these notes while sitting in a hotel lobby in Tajikistan, a place I had never heard of back then. I fly around the world and work on projects I find meaningful. I have no qualifications to do much of anything, yet for the most part I do whatever I want.
I realize now it wasn't so much the acceptance or rejection of academia, an institution that may very well serve other people's needs more than mine. It was the rejection of defining myself according to exterior standards, a system that was rigged to reward conformity by design.
How often do we give up the things that make sense in return for things that are less ambiguous? Clarity might make our day-to-day, week-to-week, and month-to-month lives easier to plan and easier to predict, but are we really growing and learning and challenging ourselves if everything we do has been done a thousand times before?
Mindfulness Experiments: Discovering the Blanket
I've been exploring mindfulness for the past few weeks and with that I've been making a conscious effort to fully recognize when I'm not present. When I notice that I'm not 'here', I remove myself from whatever is pulling me away from that moment.
A few days ago I noticed that I had become not present after sitting in front of the computer for three hours. To break up what would've been an all-day session, I spontaneously went for a walk in the local state forest.
It's mid-winter here in the northeast Untied States and I was greeted by a thin coat of fresh snow blanketing the forest floor. With a bitter cold breeze blowing at my face and a bird chirping somewhere in the distance, I looked around and noticed something unexpected: I still wasn't present.
As conducive as the forest was to mindfulness, simply being in the forest didn't make me feel present and mindful.
Then I noticed something else: the cold wasn't the only thing wrapping around me; there was something resisting my desire to fully experience the present. I tried to consciously release it, but it maintained its grip.
After about an hour of walking and releasing thoughts as they arose, I began to feel something else strange. I felt myself 'gaining ground' on the present, somehow 'catching up' to it.
It was as though the stickiness of modern life was slowly melting away.
What had created this resistance? What had created this strange phenomena?
Was it possible the externalization necessary to interact with people and information in a non-physical space like the Internet had actually pulled me away from the present moment to such a degree that it created a false sense of awareness?
When I began walking in the forest, I thought it would take perhaps a few minutes to feel mindful and present again. It was cold and I hadn't planned on spending much time walking.
It took almost two hours before I began to feel mindful and present. (I spontaneously recorded a short video towards the end of my walk.)
I do not believe in the elimination of technology to solve problems that we ourselves create by misusing technology. (Just as a gun doesn't kill people, technology doesn't make people unmindful; we do that to ourselves.)
Taking a one-month digital sabbatical would only put a bandaid on the problem. I would rather learn how to create harmony in my life by experimenting with new ways of living and interacting with technology.
To begin, I sought out the greatest sources of distraction in my life by asking myself two questions throughout the day:
Where am I and what am I doing?
Is this activity pulling me away from the present moment or returning me to it?
What I learned surprised me: the greatest source of regular distraction from present-minded awareness in my life came from activities related to email.
I spend a lot of time working online and a large amount of my communication with others happens through email. That said, my email is quite manageable. I have a system in place that keeps things organized.
Despite receiving more than a hundred emails a day and writing dozens of replies, I don't feel overwhelmed. Why then, was my email the greatest source of distraction from the present moment?
The answer, I determined, could be found in my relationship to email and in the way that I gave it my attention.
Normally, I would check for new email dozens of times a day and immediately reply to any messages that would take less than two minutes of my time.
I would also check email on my phone dozens of times a day, sometimes replying but usually just scanning their contents and allowing myself to reply later from the computer. (What a waste of time... always reading emails twice!)
What was so important that I needed to check for new email dozens of times a day and read the same email multiple times? What would happen to my daily mindfulness if I reduced that to checking email once a day and reading every email just one time?
Testing a Proactive and Conservative Approach to Email
Here's how I'm going to start experimenting with mindful email:
- I will read and reply to email only once a day, preferably towards the evening so that my vitality and creative energy are available to my other, more present activities like creating, learning, and reflecting. I will not enter the inbox until I'm ready to actually focus on the activity of reading and replying to emails.
- I will keep my email responses short and to the point; I will resist any urge to go into depth in a single email and instead choose depth over time by asking better questions and conversing across multiple replies. The goal isn't to be laconic, but rather pithy and succinct.
- I will use my phone to scan for emergency business-related emails, but I will never open the emails on my phone; I will only use the phone to scan email subjects.
The intention here is to be more deliberate with how I use email as a form of communication, to be proactive and instead of reactive to inbound requests for my attention.
In the few hours since I began this experiment, I've become aware of just how habitual checking email has really become. Any time my focus wandered while writing this Journal, I found myself with the urge to check my inbox or browse a social media site.
To reshape those habitual patterns, I've started turning my focus away from the computer or simply get up and walk away from my computer for a few minutes.
These mindfulness experiments are not about disconnecting more; I'm not trying to remove myself from technology or go on a 'digital sabbatical'. The goal here is to spend more time connected to the present while simultaneously using the tools provided by technology to grow and live better.
Mindfulness in the age of bits
Notes: Book Highlights from the Impossible Manifesto
My highlights from Joel Runyon's Impossible Manifesto:
Some time between our teenage years and adulthood, people strip away the possibilities from us. We're told what we can do and what we can't do. What's possible and what's not.
We're made to believe what we should do and what's simply irresponsible. Somewhere along the line, we forget that we control a lot of things.
It's your life. You get to decide what happens. There are a million different influences around you every day trying to get you to buy into what you "should" do, but ultimately you really can do whatever you want.
You get to write your story.
***
Are you telling a good story with your life? The emphasis is on the word "good", because whether you like it or not, you're telling a story. No matter what you do, with each decision you make, you're writing your story every day.
Whether your story is an adventure-filled page-turner or more boring than a 50-year-old-textbook is up to you. But, you get to decide.
***
When you want something, make sure you want something worthwhile.
Because eventually you are going to have to fight for it.
And it better be worth it.
***
Wanting to live vicariously through others takes relatively little effort. You can sit back and watch TV or scan the Internet, reading about people doing interesting things with the click of a button. But, because there's little effort involved, there's little conflict.
There's also little reward and little meaning.
The more worthwhile the cause, the more Impossible it tends to be. The more Impossible something tends to be, the more conflict the character invites in. But the more conflict the character invites in, the larger the story arc becomes and the more potential it has to suck you in because it's so compelling.
***
Living a good story is an amazing reward by itself.
Even if nobody knows what you're doing, you're enriching your life by immersing it in a story. Instead of having arbitrary goals and accomplishments, by living a great story, you create narrative for them. A context. A purpose.
Instead of just crossing stuff off a list, you're experiencing a story. You're living an adventure. One that's worth writing about.
One that's definitely worth living.
***
The really great stories are about pushing the limits and seeing what is possible. Not stopping ahead of time because the challenges seem too great, but rather pushing forward exactly BECAUSE they seem so daunting. You see a massive conflict ahead, but realize that victory is just going to be that that much sweeter.
***
When you start to challenge what's Impossible you begin to realize a whole new world of things that aren't actually Impossible. They only represent the limitations of other people's imaginations.
Once you've shot through the limits that are placed on you by other people, you begin to realize that there are still things beyond your limits that now seem within reach. So you keep going and going and keep discovering new so-called "Impossible things" that are now somehow doable.
Every time you challenge the Impossible, you gain a new understanding of what is actually possible.
You realize how small a world you had created for yourself with your own self-imposed limitations in the past. And how big of a future is possible. Pretty soon, even the most ridiculous things in the world don't seem out of reach if you really want to achieve them.
***
It's hard to imagine owning your own business when you're stuck working at UPS getting chased by dogs in the snow. It's hard to imagine running a marathon when you can barely jog a mile without heaving up a lung. It's hard to imagine traveling the world when you haven't even been out of the state.
You have to gain perspective.
***
It's hard to make huge jumps sometimes and imagine yourself in a completely different world living a completely different life than you are now. But that's because of your perspective. Your current perspective colors your subjective version of reality.
Push the boundaries of Impossible and you'll see that it expands. Keep pushing and you'll see that your subjective version or what's possible isn't as accurate as you think it is. The boundaries of the Impossible are constantly expanding. So keep pushing them.
***
Do something. I said this earlier but it bears repeating. The easiest way to confuse the feelings of accomplishment with the feelings of inspiration is to forget what accomplishment feels like. If you've accomplished something recently and remember what it feels like, the lure of watching someone else do something isn't nearly as attractive.
***
No one will live your life story for you. No one will make your life one worth reading about for you. No one will challenge what's possible with your life for you.
No one that is...except for you.
***
Chances are, you probably already know what you need to do. That thing you have in the back of your mind. That thing that gets you excited about life. That thing that keeps you up at night, but you're scared to try because everything might fall apart. That's the thing you need to do most.
***
The need for courage
The great myth of fear is that you overcome it. Fear isn't a barrier and it isn't something that you overcome. It's simply a constant.
You don't learn to get over fear. You learn to coexist with it and press on anyways, in the midst of it's presence.
That's why you need courage.
Courage allows you to look fear dead in the eye and tell fear to suck it.
People who do great things don't have an absence of fear. They have an abundance of courage, which allows them to do the Impossible, in spite of the fact that they're scared out of their mind.
***
It isn't all about you. Lots of people have lived great stories, but the ones that have the most impact are the ones where the authors look back to see how they can help other people tell great stories as well.
You can download the full manifesto for free over here: Impossible Manifesto.
Notes: A Case for Copyright
In discussion related to the anti-SOPA protest, commenter grellas writes on HN about Copyright:
Creative effort - or at at least any that is truly worthy of the name - takes tears, and sweat, and blood. We can marvel at the output of an artist, or a writer, or a composer, or a film maker and yet fail to focus on the years of toil that often preceded that work.
...
When a society makes a decision to defend the right of a creative person to control his work, and to profit from it or give it away as he likes, it has to make all sorts of policy decisions. Should such control last indefinitely? Of course not. Why? Because the benefits that we all get from being able to control our creative work only last so long. After a time, and certainly after we die, we have presumably exhausted whatever benefit we get from such control. Then too, others also create and, in time, all sorts of people borrow from one another and build upon the efforts of others regardless of the degree of creativity that they add to the process. Given enough time, we get what is known as a "common heritage" - something that far transcends the creative work of any one person. And so we have what is known as a public domain - a rich collection of creative output that is freely available to all. Those who value copyright and its social benefits in protecting creative output also value the public domain because it is a natural concomitant to the protected core of works that fall under copyright in any given generation. Indeed, a key aspect of copyright is precisely to encourage people to create - to invest the very blood and sweat that it often takes to do something great - in order that society generally will be enhanced and improved as creative works are done, are made available to the world as the creator may decide, and eventually pass into the public domain. So a fundamental tenet of copyright is that it cannot be absolute. It needs to be strictly bounded to achieve its legitimate goals without being extended to a point where it defeats those goals and gives special privileges to persons for no good reason.Today, copyright has been seriously abused in the U.S. and elsewhere and needs to be fixed. In particular, terms of copyright need to be brought back to sensible levels. The public domain as it exists needs to be preserved and a better system needs to be in place by which orphaned works can freely enter the public domain. Many other fixes are needed as well. What is most definitely not needed is a SOPA-style enforcement scheme that opens up legal channels to copyright holders that would permit all sorts of abusive actions against innocent parties in the name of copyright enforcement. This sort of thing merely perpetuates the abuse and does not fix anything. Those who have been paying attention strongly sense this, and it has been pretty amazing to watch people unite to oppose the back-room sleaziness that led to such legislative efforts in the first place.
The full comment is a bit longer, but it's well worth the read if you're at all interested in what Copyright means and why it might be necessary. I thought about this in the context of the 'bigger picture', and it seems like copyright makes a lot of sense.
I personally don't copyright my work, but that's exactly the point: Copyright gives you the option to retain rights to your work if you so choose to. If you want to give it away, you can do that too. All of my work here is Uncopyright, but I still think that if someone wants to copyright something, they should have that option.
Copyright extends from the scarcity mindset while Uncopyright embraces abundance. Should one be enforced over the other? I don't think so. If a creator can produce uncopyrighted work and still make a living (as I believe they can), let them.
I say instead of arguing between the two, let nature choose the winner.
Notes: The credit belongs to
It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat. - Teddy Roosevelt
Notes: Book Highlights from The Tower
From Chris Guillebeau's new manifesto, The Tower:
A long time ago I was considering various titles and subtitles for my first book. One of the many I looked at with my publishing team was "A Life That Matters," as in here's what you do to live a life that matters.
Something bothered me about this title, and it wasn't just that a lot of other writers had used similar phrasing. I finally realized what the problem was -— because life is precious for its own sake, every life matters, even if that life is somehow wasted or unfulfilled. We believe that a young child's life matters even though she isn't able to work or otherwise contribute anything productive to the world. Most of us also believe that the life of a hardened criminal still matters, despite the poor choices they may have made that caused harm to others.
It's clear, however, that there is often a gap in our lives between what could have been and what actually is. Because of choices or circumstance, some people are limited to a life less than they hoped for, or less than they were capable of. Every life matters, therefore, but not every life's potential is fulfilled. Therein lies the problem with a phrase like "a life that matters," and also the opportunity: because your life matters so much, how will you put it to good use?
In addition to the other answers about the meaning of life -— to acquire knowledge, to live free of suffering, to pursue happiness —- another answer is to think about influence and impact. After our basic needs are met, we have an innate desire to build and create. Constructing a life oriented around creative development is an opportunity to fulfill that desire, while also providing something of value for others to appreciate. A structure created in a video game might be a fun diversion for a while, but in life, the people you influence will benefit from the time and attention you spend on building something real.
We must work on our lives the way we would work on any other project. Instead of knowledge, pleasure, or happiness, the purpose of life is to create something meaningful that will endure after we're gone.
***
...you'll need to exercise influence with the people who are affected by your legacy project. Influence is not the same as control, and sometimes it's not even direction -— you may not be telling anyone what to say, think, or do. Instead, genuine influence is often more subtle. When you craft a legacy project over time, you'll find yourself surrounded by onlookers and participants. As you build relationships with them, your work will inspire people to pursue big adventures of their own.
If you don’t know what to do at any given stage, start by creating something and giving something. Every day, wake up and think about these two things:
What am I making today?
Whom am I helping today?Make something, help someone, and repeat. Your goal is to look back at the end of the day and identify something you've created and someone you've helped. Then, plan to do the same the next day, except try to take it further.
***
Part of my personal mission statement says that adventure and gratitude are my highest values, so I try to make decisions that are aligned with those values. My track record is far from perfect, but that's the point —- I need the values to guide my decisions when I'm uncertain. For example, I know that sometimes I can be stingy or selfish, even though I chose gratitude as a guiding force. On a recent shuttle bus ride to another hotel from yet another airport, I looked in my pocket in search of a dollar to tip the driver. I found only a $5 bill, and thus was presented with a dilemma: do I give $5, an abnormally high tip, or do I choose to give nothing?
I stiffed the driver and gave nothing.
A tip isn't always required, of course, but I felt bad all morning -- richer in cash, but poorer in spirit. If I had given the $5, I might have felt momentarily sad about the loss of a few dollars more than I had planned. But I'm pretty sure the monetary loss would have been compensated by the positive feeling of making someone's day with an unexpected reward.
Lead Yourself
Self-moderate
Announcing the Journal
I believe work should speak for itself, so this will be brief.
A few months ago I quietly launched my first paid-offering in the 10 year history of this site. The launch coincided with an essay I wrote on permission pricing and in that essay I announced the results of a pricing survey I conducted for this offering.
As much as I don't like focusing on marketing, I also know that unless I tell you the offer is there, you might not know about it.
So here it is: the Journal.
The journal is exactly that, my journal. It's where I share everything behind the thoughts and essays on this site. With a subscription to the journal, you'll receive new entires in your inbox and gain full access to the archives.
The current price is $7.00/month.
I offer a lifetime money-back guarantee.
You can read a sample journal entry and learn more about how I share bits of what inspires me through my Notes.
There's a full page with more about the journal, or you can subscribe here.
Notes: Deconstructing Celebrity and Accessing the Human Scale
Craig Mod writes about his experience working in Silicon Valley and riding his bike through Steve Jobs' neighborhood:
As I’ve written previously, Silicon Valley is where the gods very much eat yogurt with mortals. And Steve was no exception. His house has no visible security, no gate. It is modest. Nestled in a very tony neighborhood. But not so tony as to exclude three enterprising rag-tag entrepreneurs from also living here. The blinds are almost always open (as most tend to be in Old Palo Alto). TVs flicker at night. Lights go on and off. There is no mystery. Humans live there, certainly.
Time and time again, I found myself biking past Steve’s house — simply by the nature of it being on my path home. And time and time again I found myself drawing tremendous inspiration from the hyper-reality of his presence.
I’ve always felt — the quicker you can kill a dream by making it real, the quicker you see bigger, more important dreams once blocked by the first. The same goes for celebrity: the deconstruction of celebrity removes excuses. With mystery, and thereby celebrity gone, so also goes the pedestal. Their achievements can be more easily assessed at human scale.
A few months ago while living in California, I was working on my laptop outside a cafe when an older man walked by and remarked on my Apple laptop. We started chatting and come to find out, he helped invent some of the technology in the very laptop I was using. He also played a part in the invention and development of technologies like the mouse and the printer.
That short interaction reminded me just how human all these people are, from famous inventors to presidents to movie stars. All of them are just like me, perhaps on a different path in life, yes, but still human. Their achievements are not out of reach. They're not gods. They're human.
Notes: Inspiring Change
Lynn Fang invited me to participate in a collaborative ebook project called Inspiring Change. The free ebook contains inspiring stories from more than 25 bloggers. I'm including my contribution below:
A few weeks ago I met a friend for coffee. We knew each other online but we had never met in person. I knew she was all about sustainability, all about reusing things to avoid unnecessary waste.
Her writing and the things she shared online encouraged me to live more consciously and helped me feel more aware of the environment and the world around me.
When we arrived at the cafe, I ordered a cup of tea and received it in a paper cup. She ordered an ice coffee. But before the cashier had time to repeat her order, she handed him a glass mason jar and asked him to use that instead of a disposable cup. I smiled inside because I could feel the power of that moment. That seemingly insignificant interaction imprinted itself on me and has remained with me to this day. It has grown into a memory that acts as a tiny seed of her passion stirring within me, reminding me not to waste even a single paper cup.
The friend I met that day was Lynn Fang and I've started using mason jars.
Passion kindles passion. If you live your life passionately and fearlessly make conscious choices about how you live, others will be inspired to do the same. Passion is contagious. It spreads like an invisible wildfire through the hearts and minds of those around you, visible only through the subtle ways in which they desire to change themselves.
When you live consciously and allow your passion to shine through, others will be inspired to change with you.
In addition to having a greater respect for mason jars, I now always ask for my drinks at cafes in reusable "for here" mugs. If I'm going to be spending the day working from the cafe, why waste a paper cup every time?
With the amount of time I spend working from cafes, I calculate that I save hundreds of paper cups every year with this one habit.
Speaking of small habits, I wrote my first collaborative ebook back in 2010 on a topic similar to Inspiring Change: Small Ways to Make a Big Difference.
Notes: Own Your Idea
Julien Smith writes about the importance of figuring out your message, your core idea, the thing that your very existence stands for. I've been thinking about this a lot lately and Julien's question towards the end of this highlight is fantastic; when I think about his question I feel like I can almost put my finger on my core message.
I've spent a lot of time around authors over the past little while and I've started to figure out that almost all of them have one primary thing to say, a single idea that they are really about. Seth Godin could be "be remarkable," applied to multiple different formats. Tim Ferriss: "most effort is wasted– do what matters." Pema Chodron: "Drop the storyline." I could do this all day.
Here's the thing: authors have to write down their ideas and express them differently. It's their job and they have to work at it, so they get many ideas in their head and stick with those that matter to them (or sometimes those that sell– sigh). Point being, even non-authors need to figure this one thing out. But most never think about it. They plod along without much direction or grand goal at all– and if it is, it's often rather selfish.
Again, I include myself in this.
Here is my suggestion: If you had a TED talk, or some other grand idea, how would you present it? Think about it. This is your one chance. How would you use it?
Thom Chambers wrote something along these same lines. I keep this close and re-read every few days:
It’s tempting to want to break new ground each time you publish a piece of writing. To dazzle. Far more valuable in the long run, though, is when you take an idea and run with it. Show us around it. Show us how it works in action, how it affects us. Own your idea and you’ll be remembered for it.
Create habits of regular practice
Notes: Owning Yourself and Stripping Away False Identity
In an article featured in Your Money, Your Life, Adam King writes about how after failing several times to make a living online, he discovered his real problem: he wasn't owning anything of himself.
The concept he shares towards the end, that of uncovering layers of false identity through testing our assumptions, ideas, and beliefs, is incredibly powerful and it's something I intend to actively practice.
I met a successful entrepreneur for brunch in Chicago and she proceeded to fillet the problem wide open for me. "You're not owning anything of yourself," she said. "Own your words, own your vision, own your life."
It didn't take long after that talk for me to uncover the root of all the exhaustion, overwork, stress, and physical breakdown over the past ten years. Simply put, I was pursuing pre-conceived visions of an ideal lifestyle.
Each of my offline businesses was aimed at producing particular experiences tied to a lifestyle vision that I had adopted from other people or from the expectation of the crowd associated with that type of business. The same thing happened when I moved things online. I was pursuing what I was told was the ideal internet lifestyle but, again, it was someone else's ideal rather than my own.
Chasing lifestyles is exhausting because it drains your knowledge, abilities, emotions, and time into bottomless pits. There's no way to achieve the ideal lifestyle of someone else without massive sacrifice of your own truth and happiness.
It's taken time to remove the layers of what I thought I was supposed to pursue so that I can tap into the raw and powerful realizations of what I've actually wanted all along.
One of those layers is identity. In the past, everything I pursued in business and in life was all tied to what is assumed I should obtain due to that identity. If I eliminate the idea of being a writer, artist, designer, or whatever I might call myself, and just focus on mastering that craft, then I grant myself the freedom to achieve the lifestyle I desire outside of the realms of identity and in spite of the social expectations that come from that particular genre or crowd.
It's difficult, being honest with myself about my desired lifestyle. Guilt was a huge factor in holding myself hostage to the work and life I thought I was supposed to have. But the reality was, adhering to that guilt was keeping me from bigger and better things.
In reconstructing my own vision for my ideal lifestyle, I've been learning about the path of people like Derek Sivers, Richard Branson, and even Abraham Lincoln. Doing this has revealed their paths have piles and piles of failed businesses, elections, pursuits, ideas, and dreams behind them.
But in the end, it's those failures that were necessary for success. Each one was another layer of false identity being stripped away to reveal their core truth.
And that's really the key to stopping the pursuit of other people's lifestyles. Be willing to test each idea and inspiration as far as it needs to go in order to learn what you need to learn. Then repeat, often and always. This will quickly peel away the superficial that's hiding the truth about where you want to go and what you want to do.
The Wandering Mind and the Wild Horse
What's important? I've been asking myself that a lot lately. What is important to me and what am I doing with it? If being fully invested in present is important to me, where am I right now?
These questions weigh heavily on my mind after an unusually varied week, full of everything from writing, to answering an a high volume of emails, to strolling and running through a state forest, to completing freelance web development projects, to playing with my nephew and helping my brother-in-law fix home wiring issues (and getting electrocuted in the process; there's no room for pride in science).
The question of importance is inevitable when the demand on our attention (whether from others or from ourselves) exceeds what is available to us. But there really are no excuses to misdirected focus. As I wrote in my latest essay, our system of keeping time doesn't determine when we act; we determine when we act.
The concept of time is a subject I could talk about for hours. I could run circles around what it is and what it isn't, why it matters and why it doesn't. But one fact remains: I will die.
This physical body will eventually break down and stop functioning; it will eventually cease to act as a vehicle for life. My true self may be timeless and limitless, but this physical body definitely has limitations; its lifespan is restricted by the framework we call time.
How we spend our time and energy within those limitations is influenced by what is, or what isn't, important to us. We can take a reactionary approach to life and simply spend our time doing whatever calls our attention, or we can take a proactive approach and decide where that energy will be focused.
In reflecting on this for the past two weeks, I've found myself spending less time paying attention to my phone; less time checking and answering emails; less time on social media; less time worrying about how to respond to this person or that person; less time wondering what's next or where I should focus my energy tomorrow; less time reading; less time writing.
I find myself spending less time and conserving more.
Things that are not present don't receive as much attention because that attention is being redirected here, where I can be present. Instead of volunteering my time and attention to long elaborate email responses, never-ending to-do lists, phone calls, people, projects, and goals, I find myself reserving that precious commodity for here, right now.
I find myself holding depth in conversation as something worthy of great respect, an outpouring of energy that cannot simply be dumped into every email, comment, and conversation, but rather something that is reserved for special occasions where some passionate voice inside becomes inflamed and pushes that pent up reservoir over the edge.
A few days ago I began my morning playing with my nephew. When I'm visiting my parents I usually play for a minute or two before rushing off to start working on my laptop, catching up with emails, figuring out what project I need to complete for that day, and otherwise "spending my time and energy" doing whatever I think needs to be done.
About two minutes into playing with my nephew, I felt the pull of "this other stuff"; it was stronger than usual. I had stuff to do, things to finish. The morning was already getting late and there was so much to get done.
Instead of giving into this pull, I allowed myself to feel overwhelmed, to "fill up" with this sudden self-imposed surge of demand on my attention; I resisted the urge to get up and go (with lots of help from my 2-year-old nephew).
Instead of getting up and going, I got down on my hands and knees; my nephew climbed on my back.
Then the reservoir tipped.
Wrapping his arms around my neck, he tried to stay on my back as I marched around the room like a wild horse. Laugher spilled from the both of us as he repeatedly slipped off and then jumped back on.
This went on for more than 15 minutes until both of us were exhausted from laugher.
***
There will always be other stuff to do, people to meet, conversations to be had, stuff to learn, places to experience, work to be done.
But there will only be one now.
We need to be fully invested in that, in the present. Instead of letting it wander aimlessly, we need to bring our mind home.
What's here in this moment is gone in the next and unless we decide to experience life from that perspective, the perspective of the present, we cannot live a whole life.
We can invest in the future and even in the past, but we need to invest that energy carefully and with intent. Unless most of our energy is being invested in the present, where are we really?
I'm going to practice expending less energy in areas where energy easily dissipates. I'm going to practice more proactive conservation and focus, less reactionary and aimless expenditure. More here, less there; more now, less then.
The past and the future do not really exist; what exists is now.
Notes: Numb to the tragedies of this world
Children often have an incredibly pure perspective of the world. In this short letter from Jarkko Laine's Curious & Creative, I was reminded just how easily we can become numb to reality.
As I sat down to have have breakfast with my sons, Oiva, the older of the two, asked me for a song in place of saying grace. I agreed, and without thinking about it that much, started to improvise: "We are thankful that we have food. Not everyone has food, but we do."
As I was singing, I noticed Oiva's face change: he was trying to hide his tears. I stopped singing and quickly asked him what was wrong. With tears in his eyes, forcing a smile on his face (but failing to do so), he said: "Dad, that song is a little strange."
Oiva is four. He still cares.
For him, hearing that someone doesn't have food is not something to be thankful for.
At that moment I was very happy for the small monthly donation we make to charity as I could use it to explain to my son that there are ways we can help those people who don't have the goods we do.
But once again, his natural compassion had revealed to me something ugly about myself: I have become used to the tragedies in this world.