Month: January 2021

Whatever you think is causing the situation, is not.

There is a deeper cause at work. It’s simple when you see it. But it’s hard to see, mostly because it’s prosaic and obvious and therefore invisible.

Once seen, it cannot be unseen.

Example: a mix of Kevin Kelly and Nassim Taleb. Technology gets marginally better all the time. That’s the Kevin Kelly input. It’s an exponential function. That’s the Nassim Taleb input. Looking backwards is misleading because it does not reveal the exponential future.

The implications of this are at odds with business as usual.

Gravity always wins.

I have specific beliefs about where this leads in the society, economy, etc.

That’s all well and good. Things will happen the way they will happen. How am I going to position myself and my family to live well?

By seeing the obvious. By seeing the stuff in plain sight. By not being distracted by the chaff, by not being attracted by the chum.

I did what I do best: patiently take confusion and create a simple, clear path to the objective. For this project it took two days to figure out. Now I have shared my plan with the others. Let’s see whether it survives.

I’m home, feeling ok.

Now it’s time for the second shift. That first shift at work was all about them and their lives. Now it’s about building mine.

Let’s do this.

It’s where I am right now, at work. it doesn’t help that I’m not sleeping particularly well. That makes the hard slog sloggier.

And yet. Let’s imagine what Marcus Aurelius would say.

First, remember the part where he tells you to get out of bed. I can’t remember how many times recently I have awakened, wishing for more rest, and then that passage has come to mind.

At dawn, when you have trouble getting out of bed, tell yourself: “I have to go to work—as a human being. What do I have to complain of, if I’m going to do what I was born for—the things I was brought into the world to do? Or is this what I was created for? To huddle under the blankets and stay warm?”

Meditations, 5:1.

That gets me up and headed to the kitchen to make coffee.

Then, it’s time to not take myself or my circumstances too seriously.

that if you were suddenly lifted up and could see life and its variety from a vast height, and at the same time all the things around you, in the sky and beyond it, you’d see how pointless it is. And no matter how often you saw it, it would be the same: the same life forms, the same life span.

Arrogance … about this?

Meditations, 12:24

It’s harsh but accurate. Is it pity party? Is it arrogance? No, it’s the same old stuff for you and everyone else.

You can do what you can do. Let’s go do it.

Finish your coffee, have a shower, get dressed. There are things to do.

If I must live with the paradox, bring it on.

There is a nice courtyard at work. I will sit outside with a cup of coffee. Invite the longing. I will sit with the feeling rather than attempt to solve it like an equation.

Once you recognize the feeling of longing, you begin the journey of allowing yourself to reveal the truth to yourself.

Sitting here quietly before anyone is awake, an answer comes back: friendship, companionship, not feeling alone, loving and being loved.

It still astonishes me that my family wants to be with me. I still, today, do not believe this is totally true. Wife of 25+ years. Grown children. They’ve had plenty of time to judge me and they still say and behave as if they love me.

Why do I not accept this? Why do I still feel empty and alone? Why do I doubt what I see and experience?

This is something that doesn’t yield to Industrious Personal Development, I fear. And buckling down to a deliberate course of self-improvement is the only tool I have in my toolbox.

Study and hard work has been my lifelong solution to everything. It won’t work here.

Ah well. If this is the paradox I must live with, so be it.

In the meantime I’m going to pull out the only tool I carry, and try to live the words of the St. Francis Prayer. Seek to understand rather than be understood. Seek to comfort rather than be comforted. Etc.

I don’t know what else to do. Except maybe just sit with the yearning.

What do I yearn for?

I don’t know exactly, except that the feeling of longing pops up again and again.

When we meet, I don’t want to ask you what you do for a living. I want to know what you ache for when that door of longing swings open and if you have the courage to feel your own desire.

The Invitation, page 16 (if I can believe Kindle)

The times it has been strongest lately has been on the recent Colorado trips, out in the middle of nowhere. I can’t say what I long for in those moments, except to stay, quietly, doing nothing. Just small me in a big, empty land. Sitting.

I wish I had slept well last night. Trudge onward.

Walking Down Madison, by Kirsty MacColl. It popped in my head this morning.

That’s a reminder to be careful about what you put in your head.

Yeah, true. But hear me out.

The song came to mind as I was thinking of Nassim Taleb’s idea about time as the filter that determines quality. Not time itself, of course, but the passage of time that exposes an idea (typically) to repeated stresses. Survival is an indicator of truth.

An idea that breaks under stresses is a bad idea, and an idea that survives repeated stresses is likely to be a good idea. We can’t know with certainty, because it might break under a future stress.

So the song came to mind. Hah. Because there is no connection between the two thoughts.

From the sharks in the penthouse to the rats in the basement

It’s not that far

Walking Down Madison

A momentary snapshot in time. We see it. We feel it.

But facing the individual exemplar, and what I do about it? That’s the trick.

See you give ’em your nickels, your pennies and dimes

But you can’t give ’em hope in these mercenary times, oh no

And you feel real guilty about the coat on your back

And the sandwich you had, oh no

Maybe it’s time to remember B’s admonition. If you see a bum, the important thing is that you noticed (just like Kirsty MacColl). What you do next matters to you, not to the bum. Give nothing or a quarter or $20. It doesn’t matter except that you did something recognizing what you noticed. “

It doesn’t matter” is an overstatement of course. Your money makes a difference to the person you see.

But the vital thing is that your consciousness saw something. What are you going to do about what your consciousness observed? Is your life important to you?

B would say it’s not your job to give away all your money. It’s not your job to solve the problem of homelessness singlehandedly. Giving some money would, though, be a signal to your mind, acknowledging and interacting with a reality. And that is your job. God put this in front of you for a reason. You saw it. Now what are you going to do?

“If you see a toothpick on the floor, pick it up.”

The sound of kids playing in the neighborhood. Birds. City traffic. Airplanes, both jets and small propeller planes.

The pale winter sun setting behind the big tree in the back yard. The air is cool but comfortable in short sleeves.

Ok.

I have enough.

There is this certain commodity that I have been panic buying. I don’t need a lot, and I have plenty (several months supply) right now. It’s a hobby thing I’m talking about. I’m being vague on purpose.

Yet there is a shortage on the shelf, so anytime I find some, I buy it.

There is a large pile that I ordered online, waiting for me to pick up. I mean a LOT. I got lucky and placed orders that got fulfilled. As a result I would probably come close to doubling my stash.

I have toyed with the thought over the last couple of days . . . pick it up or get a refund?

Hard core hobbyists would say get it. They are speaking from experience.

I’m going to let half of it go and keep half — for a specific and immediate purpose.

Half of the order is a special type of product that I got just because it is available. That’s the easy decision.

The other half I will pick up so I can take some classes and get skillful in this hobby. It is probably 7 – 8 classes worth of supplies plus practicing on my own.

But additional stacking stuff in the closet just to make me feel secure from future uncertainty? No.

I don’t want to feed the fear of What If. There is enough. False Evidence Appearing Real. Take action in the opposite direction of the “real” my brain conjures up.