I look in his eyes,
Wishing to communicate,
What lies 'round final bend.
Not a finish-line,
No exit or river's end,
But instead a Mouth.
I once rounded that bend, and entered that Mouth..
Then the Mouth opened,
And it screamed out an ocean,
This path...
Once narrow, now wide.
I had searched for one,
one perfect path, one answer,
A silver bullet.
Instead there was choice,
more than I could imagine,
there was no answer.
Just destination,
And an ocean of options,
The rest up to me.
*Read "The River", my first post, before this.
Saturday, July 8, 2017
Thursday, July 6, 2017
The Day I Got It Right
It's just past midnight, and I'm still a little dazed.
Today was, if anything, full to the brim. Woke up, did dishes, went to work and got things done, had a nice lunch at a local diner and made some progress in the book "1984. Left work for a meeting on the medical device company, powered through some roadblocks and made some new contacts at the coffee shop, got home 2 hours later and seriously felt like kicking back. But didn't. Went to the gym, crushed the arms, gym closed early - no excuses, finished at home, picked up my girlfriend from Law School, got some Frozen Yogurt to-go so we could run to the pool before it closed, dropped her off, Pwned some noobs in League and cooked some seared salmon. Wrote a daily blog post.
You know what I didn't do? Sit on my ass. You know, when you literally waste hours on end - end up losing sleep while simultaneously having gotten nothing done (impressive, right?). Then you can't sleep because 1) you're stressed, 2) your day feels unfinished and 3) you've thoroughly screwed up your circadian rhythms with your phone screen.
So how the hell did today end up being one of the only days in years that I completely "got it right", and why am I confident this is a trend?
Today I made sure that I was always moving, doing something, pushing myself extra hard if I wanted to quit. I reminded myself that if I was exasperated to do what I could and give the problem time, if I was tired I'd just sleep that much better, if I looked too much like a newbie with a barbell to get stronger and ask questions. If had a full plate, I didn't try to eat it all at once - I tackled a section, let it digest and revisited it later. I stayed vigilant, keeping an eye out for when I was slipping instead of being frozen in fear, unable to catch myself when a misstep inevitably came.
I lived today like its outcome wasn't important. That instead of an endpoint it was just part of a longer process. The finality, judgement, and entanglement of self-worth with a random day's outcome, gone. I lived today like I wanted to be something, instead of like I was avoiding being something.
Predict, Pivot, Pursue. Invest in yourself in every action. Run toward the uncomfortable, open that door and face what's behind it. You have nothing to lose but regret.
*Tip of the day: Don't let yourself get overwhelmed. This is when you revert to old habits and become less conscious of the choices you make. If things are too crazy, take a deep breath, prioritize what you want to address and ask yourself honestly, "What can I do?", focusing on reality rather than a perfect world. Then move on. The moment you let yourself be overwhelmed, you cede power to your subconscious, habit-driven mind, which will justify you turning into a potato to reduce the swelling that you've let occur. Be aware, sense when you are close to this edge.
Today was, if anything, full to the brim. Woke up, did dishes, went to work and got things done, had a nice lunch at a local diner and made some progress in the book "1984. Left work for a meeting on the medical device company, powered through some roadblocks and made some new contacts at the coffee shop, got home 2 hours later and seriously felt like kicking back. But didn't. Went to the gym, crushed the arms, gym closed early - no excuses, finished at home, picked up my girlfriend from Law School, got some Frozen Yogurt to-go so we could run to the pool before it closed, dropped her off, Pwned some noobs in League and cooked some seared salmon. Wrote a daily blog post.
You know what I didn't do? Sit on my ass. You know, when you literally waste hours on end - end up losing sleep while simultaneously having gotten nothing done (impressive, right?). Then you can't sleep because 1) you're stressed, 2) your day feels unfinished and 3) you've thoroughly screwed up your circadian rhythms with your phone screen.
So how the hell did today end up being one of the only days in years that I completely "got it right", and why am I confident this is a trend?
Today I made sure that I was always moving, doing something, pushing myself extra hard if I wanted to quit. I reminded myself that if I was exasperated to do what I could and give the problem time, if I was tired I'd just sleep that much better, if I looked too much like a newbie with a barbell to get stronger and ask questions. If had a full plate, I didn't try to eat it all at once - I tackled a section, let it digest and revisited it later. I stayed vigilant, keeping an eye out for when I was slipping instead of being frozen in fear, unable to catch myself when a misstep inevitably came.
I lived today like its outcome wasn't important. That instead of an endpoint it was just part of a longer process. The finality, judgement, and entanglement of self-worth with a random day's outcome, gone. I lived today like I wanted to be something, instead of like I was avoiding being something.
Predict, Pivot, Pursue. Invest in yourself in every action. Run toward the uncomfortable, open that door and face what's behind it. You have nothing to lose but regret.
*Tip of the day: Don't let yourself get overwhelmed. This is when you revert to old habits and become less conscious of the choices you make. If things are too crazy, take a deep breath, prioritize what you want to address and ask yourself honestly, "What can I do?", focusing on reality rather than a perfect world. Then move on. The moment you let yourself be overwhelmed, you cede power to your subconscious, habit-driven mind, which will justify you turning into a potato to reduce the swelling that you've let occur. Be aware, sense when you are close to this edge.
Wednesday, July 5, 2017
"Never go to bed angry"...with yourself.
If you've ever been married or known people who have, you've probably heard the phrase "Never go to bed angry" thrown around. It's a way to force two people in a relationship to face what's causing conflict and resolve/reduce it before going to bed. Why? Because problems don't go away, no matter how much a couple will continue to avoid the subject. You wake up the next morning, feeling almost hungover from being angry, unable to start the new day clean and unsure if you'll lose ground by letting go of your grudge.
What "Never go to bed angry" does is force communication when both sides would otherwise be too defensive. So if I follow this advice in my relationship with my girlfriend, why don't I follow it in the relationship with myself?
So much time is wasted because we feel defensive, unwilling to give up ground, wanting to blame someone else, finding some bland or destructive way to avoid getting anything done for hours on end. There are a million reasons we get defensive, for me it's fear of failure and perfectionism.
So how do you win this game? How do you get yourself to honestly address what's bothering you? You realize it's just that, a game. The perceived importance of every minute failure is just that, perceived. If you wake up tomorrow aiming to never mess up, guess how that's going to go? You make it through, maybe, 30% of your day smoothly and then BAM! - a problem that you always seem to encounter sucker-punches you. Between your lack of readiness to fail and self-torment from messing up you spend the next 60% of the day being unproductive, projecting and not addressing the issue. Then the last 10% is spent lamenting on the day you've wasted and you end up staying up too late, sabotaging the next day because you can't accept the last. You put all your importance on not failing, so your brain labels the day a failure - one you will always take personally.
But what if....failure wasn't the focus. What if you change the rules of the game? Make the game about awareness. How fast can you catch yourself derailing? If you take a breath before responding or reacting can you even prevent it? In this game, you view failure as something happening externally rather than something you have done. You take responsibility without getting wrapped up in fault. If you can make this a habit it will not only improve your habits, it will remove the emotional baggage that you've attached to so much of day to day life. And maybe, just maybe, not having to carry all that heavy baggage around will leave you with a little more energy to enjoy the things you love and pursue your dreams.
There's no silver bullet. We live moment by moment, in an ever-changing life. The only constant you can control is yourself and how you react to the world around you. Predict, Pivot, Pursue.
P.S. If you haven't heard Mel Robbins' "5 Second Rule" TED Talk, then go watch it right now. It is an incredible tool for prompting immediate action and good habits that fits perfectly with the method in this post.
What "Never go to bed angry" does is force communication when both sides would otherwise be too defensive. So if I follow this advice in my relationship with my girlfriend, why don't I follow it in the relationship with myself?
So much time is wasted because we feel defensive, unwilling to give up ground, wanting to blame someone else, finding some bland or destructive way to avoid getting anything done for hours on end. There are a million reasons we get defensive, for me it's fear of failure and perfectionism.
So how do you win this game? How do you get yourself to honestly address what's bothering you? You realize it's just that, a game. The perceived importance of every minute failure is just that, perceived. If you wake up tomorrow aiming to never mess up, guess how that's going to go? You make it through, maybe, 30% of your day smoothly and then BAM! - a problem that you always seem to encounter sucker-punches you. Between your lack of readiness to fail and self-torment from messing up you spend the next 60% of the day being unproductive, projecting and not addressing the issue. Then the last 10% is spent lamenting on the day you've wasted and you end up staying up too late, sabotaging the next day because you can't accept the last. You put all your importance on not failing, so your brain labels the day a failure - one you will always take personally.
But what if....failure wasn't the focus. What if you change the rules of the game? Make the game about awareness. How fast can you catch yourself derailing? If you take a breath before responding or reacting can you even prevent it? In this game, you view failure as something happening externally rather than something you have done. You take responsibility without getting wrapped up in fault. If you can make this a habit it will not only improve your habits, it will remove the emotional baggage that you've attached to so much of day to day life. And maybe, just maybe, not having to carry all that heavy baggage around will leave you with a little more energy to enjoy the things you love and pursue your dreams.
There's no silver bullet. We live moment by moment, in an ever-changing life. The only constant you can control is yourself and how you react to the world around you. Predict, Pivot, Pursue.
P.S. If you haven't heard Mel Robbins' "5 Second Rule" TED Talk, then go watch it right now. It is an incredible tool for prompting immediate action and good habits that fits perfectly with the method in this post.
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