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    • Break It Down

      “If you repeated what you did today 365 more times, will you be where you want to be next year?” — Kevin Kelly, Excellent Advice for Living

      This week I experienced something called Instrument-Assisted Soft Tissue Mobilization (IASTM), which is a fancy way of saying a highly-trained physical therapist used a chunk of metal to scrape my leg to what felt like a bloody pulp. It turned out there was no blood, just the breaking up of scar tissue accumulated over many stubborn years of telling myself that my ankle would just get better on its own. This procedure helps undo what’s been done through micro-trauma to the scarred areas. It turns out those micro-traumas create a bit of state change in the recipient. Ouch. But also, revelation.

      It’s no secret that small habits, done consistently, change us over time. If the scar tissue in my leg reminded me of anything, its that those bad habits accumulate and develop into things we aren’t even aware of until something jolts us into awareness. For me it was a gimpy ankle. For others it’s far more serious. Like the alien spores in Invasion of the Body Snatchers, bad habits sneak into our lives and change our identity. Don’t let the bastards drag you down! Break down that scar tissue.

      “Looking ahead, focus on direction rather than destinations. Maintain the right direction and you’ll arrive at where you want to go.” — Kevin Kelly, Excellent Advice for Living

      Dropping two quotes from Kevin Kelly today, but this little book is a gem. It reads like a series of bite-sized tweets, which makes it a natural read for people who stare at a screen more than they should. That’s another habit akin to an alien invasion, creating outrage and depression in people who we used to know. We’re collectively undergoing scarification, and we must find a way to scrape it away from our lives if we hope to hold on to the best of who we are and will become.

      Scar tissue hides within. Awareness of where we are is important, and so too is knowing where we’re going. What small habit, done daily, changes our course from a lesser version of us to a greater? The days will fly by either way, we might as well tune up the body, mind and soul in positive and productive ways. Decide what to be and go be it. Just accept the discomfort of change for what it is—the breaking down of the bad to make room for the good.

    • It’s Going to Melt, Right?

      You know what they say, “March comes in like a lion, and goes out like a lamb”. And this lion is eating me alive. Snow I can live with, but the frozen layers of sleet, snow and graupel that greeted me on the driveway made me question my choices in life. New Englanders everywhere are asking themselves the classic question of March, “should I just wait for it to melt?”

      The alternative to waiting for it to melt with such a mix is to get to work. Snowblowers don’t work on such stuff. One must test the ticker scraping this crap off the pavement with a sturdy shovel inch by inch. Slow and steady wins the race. Happily the ticker is still ticking.

      The thing is, we choose this lifestyle. What is it about me that believes that a clean driveway is all that important this time of year? It’s going to melt in a few days anyway. Right. Alas, I live by the philosophy of a tidy ship. And I wasn’t in the Navy.

      It comes down to mindful work. I cannot control what is happening in the world, I cannot control the rapid physical or mental decline of people in my life, I cannot control much of anything in the universe, but sometimes I can control how clean my driveway is. And generally it looks pretty darn good for a driveway this far north in a legit tough winter. And then Mother Nature reminded us once again who the boss really is.

      These are days when it helps to have perspective. We are gaining twenty minutes of daylight every week. Things are literally getting brighter. Focus on the beauty in the world, not the maddening setbacks to all that was right and good. For this too shall pass, and soon enough the daffodils will rise to greet us once again. Yes, it’s going to melt. Sooner or later… right?

    • But Not Today

      “When you feel like quitting,
      just do five more:
      5 more minutes, 5 more pages,
      5 more steps. Then repeat. Sometimes
      you can break through and keep going,
      but even if you can’t, you ended five ahead.
      Tell yourself that you will quit tomorrow,
      but not today.”
      — Kevin Kelly, Excellent Advice for Living

      This blog continues because I subscribe to the theory of quitting tomorrow, but not today. I’ll write just one more post, and one more again, and soon there’s a streak worthy of consideration when I really don’t feel like it anymore. Those moments are rare, but they happen. Simply kick to tomorrow what ought to be kicked. Today be alive with the task at hand.

      Kelly’s book is a collection of tweetable nuggets like the one above, if one were still to tweet. More to the point, it’s shared wisdom from one cat to the rest of us. We all ought to learn a thing or two and then share it with those who are rising to take our place on the line. We all ought to be aware of our place as a linchpin in the lives of so many who quietly go on with their lives, meaning to tell us one day what we mean to them, but not today. The trick is to not be the one who puts off the important stuff to tomorrow. No regrets—simply do it now.

      We each have work to do. I know I ought to work on being more fluent in French before I go to France. Perhaps today I’ll resume those lessons. I ought to do all of the exercises in my physical therapy program if I hope to see improvement on my gimpy ankle. We know what has to be done. We just put off the wrong thing. Instead of doom-scrolling or binge-watching, do something that we may repeat again tomorrow. Then do it again. It’s simple really. So why hasn’t it caught on more?

    • Something Much Larger

      “Your passions should fit you exactly,
      but your purpose in life should exceed you.
      Work for something
      much larger than yourself.”
      — Kevin Kelly, Excellent Advice for Living

      Some days things larger than ourself grab hold of us and dominate our attention. There have been a lot of such moments this year in my life, and I bet in yours too. We must recognize the moment and meet it. Sometimes it’s just our time to get to work on something far exceeding the self.

      What is purpose but striving toward some worthy goal far beyond the selfish goblin endlessly crying “Me! Me! Me!” between our ears? When we stop paying attention to our ego and start looking for ways to contribute to the far-beyond-us, we learn and grow and become more useful for the universe. And in the process, we become something greater than who we were before.

      The answer is simply to work, not whine. See the need and get to work addressing it. But our call to service is only heard when we shut up and listen to those calls for help. It’s amazing what we can see and hear when we stop singing our own tune long enough to understand what’s being said all around us.

    • Sparks of Interesting

      Someday, we will dream about today
      Look back, wonder how it slipped away
      — The Sways, Someday We Will Dream About Today

      Did you see the blood moon? Watching it rise up to meet the night sky was impressive. I imagine that the eclipse that happened the morning this is published was something else as well. It turned out it was not for me. Living low in the valley, it had set before I had an opportunity to see it, and a drive to the top of a local hill netted me no moon sightings. Just the company of fellow experience hunters looking for the same thing.

      That’s the point, isn’t it? To put a stamp on this day with something beyond the ordinary. If these are days we’ll remember one day, what makes it memorable? What is that spark of interesting that kindles that fire within? We ought to stoke those fires whenever possible. For the future will be full of dreams fulfilled or stories of how they faded away. Choose wisely.

      There’s no doubt that a large part of living well is hitting the birth lottery on place and time. There are parts of the world today that wouldn’t net the experiences and freedom of expression that we enjoy here. There are times in human history that wouldn’t offer the possibilities of length and breadth of life that we enjoy today. Do you hear the whispers of those who weren’t so fortunate as we find ourselves? Don’t waste this opportunity on mundane existence. Seek interesting, and give it a big embrace when you find it.

    • Trying Stuff

      “Prototype your life. Try stuff instead of making plans.” — Kevin Kelly

      I’ve been known to make grand plans and bold proclamations before. The theory was to go big or go home. Thoreau once said it was okay to build castles in the air if we then build the foundations underneath them. And of course that’s backwards, but he was talking about turning dreams into reality.

      Kevin Kelly is talking about being a scientist with our lives. Experiment and dabble in different. Begin with small habits, systems and routines, see what is effective, and then establish identity by building momentum on the good stuff.

      The thing about grand plans and bold proclamations is that they are easily disrupted by the realities of living day-to-day. Start with the basic stuff and establish something tangible today—either yay or nay, and do the same tomorrow. Hold on to the good stuff, ditch the bad stuff and soon we’re on to something far more grand and bold than we would have accomplished with some resolution or proclamation.

      So just do it. Or don’t. Both are prototypes for a different version of who we are, leading to who we will be. And isn’t that grand?

    • What Will That Be?

      “I write to find out what I didn’t know I knew.”— Robert Frost

      Lately I’ve been playing with writing style just to see where it takes me. I’m not sure I want to dive too deeply into writing poetry, but I aspire to write as elegantly concise as a great poet does. As you can see from my first two sentences compared to the quote from Robert Frost, I still have work to do. And perhaps that should be the blog post today: Aspires for great, sentenced to better. No?

      Then again, this isn’t meant to be a diary or journal. It’s a ship’s log without the ship. Here is where the journey has taken me. Have a look around and note the state of things. What one line will mark this day uniquely on this passage? How does the first day of a new month feel compared to the last day of last month? Are we one day closer to knowing? Knowing what? Every day is learning and discovery and marking the changes.

      I stray onto social media less frequently now. We all feel it’s changed. We were collectively violated by bots and billionaires enough to be deeply suspicious of each platform. These blog posts are shared on three platforms that felt less icky when I linked to them. Is less icky enough of a reason to share content with people I don’t know? Is it all AI scanning now? I don’t do the like-for-a-like thing very well at all (sorry). Does that make me anti-social or simply selective with my precious time? Are we slowly shrinking from open to closed while we debate such things?

      We’re on the road to find out. My road happens to involve an hour or sometimes two of quiet contemplation and moving words around to make things flow better. I’m under no illusions that this blog will change the world—only its writer’s world. For that hour or two compounded over thousands of days adds up to something better than we started with. The world may be more icky, more divided, more collectively stupid than it could have been with better choices, but all we control is what we contribute to the conversation. And just what will that be?

    • Something

      “I have finally concluded, maybe that’s what life is about: there’s a lot of despair, but also the odd moment of beauty, where time is no longer the same. It’s as if those strains of music created a sort of interlude in time, something suspended, an elsewhere that had come to us, an always within never. Yes, that’s it, an always within never.” ― Muriel Barbery, The Elegance of the Hedgehog

      How so we seize what flees?
      Beyond an awareness
      of time passing by
      ritual captures
      something
      of each day.

      To do the same few things
      offers an impression
      on our dizzying days.
      To manage
      something,
      as each flies.

      No, these days are not ours,
      only each ritual—
      odd moments of beauty.
      We seize
      something,
      always within never.

    • The First of That Which Comes

      “In rivers, the water that you touch is the last of what has passed, and the first of that which comes. So with time present.”

      “Observe the light. Blink your eye and look at it again. That which you see was not there at first, and that which was there is no more.”
      — Leonardo da Vinci, Codex Arundel

      Let’s talk of matters for a moment. What we did with our time that has passed matters, for it brought us here. And what happens here matters just as much for what happens next. So the heart of the matter is an instant of action moving us from what was to what is to what will be (or will be no more). Everything changes—whether we’re aware of it or not is beside the point.

      So it follows that awareness and action are two of the most essential assets in our toolbox. We move through moments either way, but what do we really see? What do we really influence? Putting aside all that is out of our control, it’s largely ours to see and be.

      Memory is our companion on our path to what’s next. We each remember moments from our journey to now as if they had just happened. If we’re blessed with a series of good decisions, many of those memories are pleasing to recall. But we also carry our mistakes with us, nagging us in quiet moments. Memory loves to play our greatest hits, but also our biggest mistakes. It’s all a part of us that brought us here.

      Dreams are lovely things indeed. We each imagine a future full of wonderful. There are no aches and pains and lingering sadness, only blissful discovery surrounded by loved ones. Watch a commercial for a luxury cruise line or Disney World and you’ll see some version of the dream. Marketing people know how to pull dollars out of imagination.

      We ought to remember that we have agency too. To realize an imagined future requires the use of those tools in our toolbox. To be aware of where we are and what we’re trending towards, and to take action to influence a more compelling future. To be aware of time passing by and the opportunity at hand before it slips away forever, joining those regrets in our memory bank. To have awareness without action is to concede our lives to fate. Decide what to be and go be it.

      Tempus fugit, friend. Can you believe another month is over? Don’t blink! Time moves at the blink of an eye, and the future is coming for us faster than we ever could believe. Our task is to become a brighter, healthier and more engaged-with-life time traveler. So grab that tiger by the tail and make it a heck of a ride. The first of that which comes is right here.

    • Shake It Loose

      “It isn’t the mountain ahead that wears you out; it is the grain of sand in your shoe.” — Anonymous

      It’s easy to be annoyed. There’s just so much material to work with in the current state of things. Being positive feels out of touch with reality. Not having an opinion on something marks you as naive or guarded. In either case people take note. There’s just no winning when we’re all so on edge all the time.

      Simply remove that grain of sand and keep moving towards the mountaintop. It’s not that the grain of sand isn’t important, it’s just that it’s keeping us from getting to where we’re trying to go. So shake it loose and move on. There’s a mountain to climb.