Alexandersmap

    Category: Learning

    • Where Am I?

      “Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes. Don’t resist them; that only creates sorrow. Let reality be reality. Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like.” ― Lao Tzu

      I was prompted to look at an old blog post I’d written back in 2019 because it showed up in my statistics. That one post has garnered hundreds of views, which isn’t exactly Seth Godin numbers, but it was one of the ones that got more traction than most. Historical, introspective and curious. I’d like to think I’m still those things, even if my focus has changed a bit.

      Back then I was traveling a lot more, we hadn’t had a pandemic yet, and life hadn’t thrown a few more gut punches our way. We all accumulate experiences over time—the good, bad and ugly. In general, I liked the way I wrote back then, I just hadn’t experienced the changes that would wash over me yet.

      The thing is, back in those days exploring place, I was asking the same questions I’m asking now: Where am I? What happened here and what can it teach me?

      Everything changes, and so must we. Each experience accumulated changes us in some way minutely or profoundly. It’s like that river analogy, where both the river and we are not the same each time we visit. And flow we must, always having been somewhere, always on to the next, and yet right here in this moment. What have we learned this time?

    • Floating Off the Edge

      “Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.” — Max Ehrmann, Desiderata

      May your hands always be busy
      May your feet always be swift
      May you have a strong foundation
      When the winds of changes shift
      May your heart always be joyful
      May your song always be sung
      May you stay forever young
      — Bob Dylan, Forever Young

      I rewatched The Last Waltz last night, secure in the knowledge that I could turn up the volume as loudly as I wanted to with my bride on the other side of the country (she may still have heard it playing). I was struck by how young each of the performers were. Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Van Morrison, Neil Young, Neil Diamond, Emmylou Harris, and even Director Martin Scorsese—they all looked like kids because really, they still were. And The Band, every last one of them gone now, all were at the height of their productive youth. How quickly it all flies by… Tempus fugit.

      That film was the amber of that moment for them, and they’re locked in time. So it was fitting for Dylan to sing Forever Young, and for Scorsese to provide the amber. The Band knew what they were walking away from—the grind of the road, true, but also their youth. There’s lingering sadness at what was left on stage revealed in conversations with each member, especially Rick Danko. No, we aren’t Peter Pan, forever young and living the life of adventure, we all must grow up one day. And so it is that each of the performers have aged and faded away one-by-one. Memento mori.

      Why did I rewatch this film? Maybe it was the music, or maybe to have my own look back on a different time. An industry friend passed away this week. He was twenty years my senior and cancer took him away with a mind as sharp as someone twenty years my junior. Age is just a number—health and vitality are our true currency in life. The body or the mind will surely fail us all one day, so be bold and dance today. And while we’re at it, turn up the volume as loud as we dare. Carpe diem.

      “We’re all in the same boat ready to float off the edge of the world” — The Band, Life is a Carnival

      Maybe I write to capture my own moments in amber, or maybe I’m just leaving breadcrumbs of where I’ve been. We all have our body of work and our faded photographs (or increasingly, lower resolution JPEG’s) that whisper of who we once were in the height of our own productive youth. The trick is to keep producing, to keep dancing, and to lock some particularly shiny moments away in amber while we can, until one day this boat floats off the edge to join all the stars in infinity.

    • Run to Simplicity

      “Go placidly amid the noise and the haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence.” — Max Ehrmann, Desiderata

      Do you wonder why the most beautiful people in this world seem so placid and steady? There’s an inner calm like a still pond; clear and deep and surrounded by hushed beauty. Isn’t that something to aspire to in our own lives? Not for the shallow goal of being beautiful, but of living beautifully? Our lives must be more than a puddle in a rut, waiting for a truck to thump into us and drag our essence down the road. Get off that damned road.

      “There is nothing that the busy man is less busy with than living; there is nothing harder to learn.” — Seneca

      The thing is, we’re all so very busy and distracted by life. It’s hard to go deep on anything when we barely have a moment to understand things at a surface level. But surfaces dry up quickly when the drought comes. We’re taught to stick to the surface—to hack our way through the hard stuff, seeking shortcuts and a way out of anything that holds us back from the next. That applies equally well in our education, our work, and our relationships with others. Is it any wonder why so many are unsettled and distracted? There’s no substance to them because they keep running away from it.

      To skate through life without ever lingering long enough to truly know the world and our place in it is the path of mediocrity accepted by the masses. Choose to be the exception—for there lies extraordinary. To truly master anything in life, especially the living of life itself, requires immersion and stillness. We must learn to turn off the spigot and develop a thirst for deeper waters.

      “One does not accumulate but eliminate. It is not daily increase but daily decrease. The height of cultivation always runs to simplicity.” — Bruce Lee

      I believe I keep this blog going to force myself deeper. The times when I want to simply shut it down and miss a day are when I’m running shallow—spread thin and beginning to dry up emotionally, intellectually, spiritually. I remind myself to run deeper, to eliminate distractions and to find stillness. Sure enough, the inclination fades away and I begin to write with clarity once again. Like a shallow stream building into a flowing river that steadily moves to the sea, building momentum in a deeper channel carved out of persistence.

    • Don’t Imagine They’ll All Come True

      You’ve got your passion, you’ve got your pride
      but don’t you know that only fools are satisfied?
      Dream on, but don’t imagine they’ll all come true
      When will you realize, Vienna waits for you?
      — Billy Joel, Vienna

      Blame it on the maddening state of the world, or for reaching an age where paths diverge in a person’s life, but I’ve been struggling with uncertainty lately. Make a decision, change my mind and cancel plans, then abruptly pivot back to the original plan again… or not. Really, it’s all a confused mess. And that’s no way to go through one’s days.

      To never be fully satisfied with the plan, and to thus always feeling compelled to modify it, is a blessing and a curse. Forever seeking Kaizen (constant and never-ending improvement) is a path to personal excellence, or to a restless life never fully realized because there’s always going to be something to work on. What works for Toyota ought to work for us, right? But we aren’t corporations, we’re humans. We can’t simply systematize ourselves and expect we’ll arrive at perfection. We must dig deeper and understand where the restlessness is rooted in.

      The answer typically lies in the question: what do we want out of life? That is our direction. Coming to understand it, we may set out in that direction today without trying to change course over and over again. Good habits and a healthy routine automate some important behaviors in our lives like exercise and flossing and writing, serving as gyroscopic stabilizers so we don’t get seasick from rocking back and forth too much with our behavior.

      Some people go to a Vienna coffeehouse simply to enjoy a torte or Buchteln. Some go to lasso a muse. Both can be right. To borrow a lyric from another Billy Joel song, do what’s good for you, or you’re no good for anybody. And to rock abruptly back to Vienna, don’t imagine all your dreams will come true, just focus on the one’s that do.

    • The Path

      Routine sets the tone of our days, which in turn sets the tone of our lives. Routine can be our savior or our executioner, our best friend or our worst enemy. We inevitably feel that we’re either wrapped or trapped in in our routine. Just what path are we on anyway? Our routine leads to a life of optimization or frustration. and so we must step in and design a routine that carries us to a place we want to go to.

      We must listen to the question that stirs within: what is the purpose of this path we’ve chosen for ourselves? When we have a why that is compelling, with a routine that is designed to optimize our purpose, we move through life with a higher level of energy and passion. People that tell you to follow your passion aren’t wrong, they’re just missing a step. Following your purpose leads you to passion. Passion is directionless and can lead us astray. When we get our direction from purpose, passion naturally builds within us.

      What drives us to a rewarding and meaningful life? It’s not the steering wheel, even if we can’t imagine getting anywhere without it. It’s not the engine, necessary as a good engine may be. These are our what and how, and surely necessary to move anywhere at all in this world—but to move where? We must develop a strong navigation system. When we know where we are going, the what and how to get us there are exponentially more useful and efficient.

      And suddenly everything begins to click. Like a fine-tuned vehicle, our routine carries us towards our purpose. And the wow (passion!) begins to stir within and exude outward. When we develop a high level of passion and purpose, we create positive momentum. Everything great in our lives builds from purpose backed by propulsion (action: our engine) and creative adaptability (steering and the set of our sails). This is the path to personal excellence.

    • Ditch the Drift

      “If information isn’t nurtured with action, it loses its power.”
      — Sahil Bloom

      I believe that I’ve read well north of a thousand books in my lifetime. Honestly, I’ve lost track. And I’ve listened to at least that many podcasts and other interviews with notable people in this world, all to glean a bit of wisdom that might move me closer to that evasive personal excellence (arete) I aspire to reach one day before I reach my expiration date. Each day we’re moving closer to or further away from this evasive arete, and the secret to the direction we’re going is hiding in plain sight: Take action immediately.

      We are what we repeatedly do, Aristotle pointed out as the path to excellence. How many times have we heard it said and not acted upon it? What are we repeatedly doing? Deferring progress for stasis? Breathlessly reading another book that promises the way won’t get us there unless we merge into the fast lane ourselves.

      “Do or do not. There is no try.” — Yoda

      The only way for us to retain the information we absorb is to act on it. Otherwise it drifts away into nothingness. Words without action are also known as drifting. String too many days together of going through the motions and we find that we’ve slipped noticeably. We get a little less sharp, a little softer. We slip a notch on the belt. Lethargy is no way to go through life, friend. We must act now or drift forever. Personal excellence is a life of action and purpose. Do or do not—the choice is ours. Ditch the drift.

    • Building Breadth and Depth

      “The length of your education is less important than its breadth, and the length of your life is less important than its depth.”
      — Marilyn vos Savant

      Many of us go through a stage in life where we’ve collected our diplomas and degrees and feel that we’re finally educated, and then realize when we walk out into the world that we don’t really know as much as we thought we did. A formal education is nothing but a starting point for a lifetime of learning. We can be both very smart and not very full of accumulated wisdom. Of course, we can also be devoid of both intelligence and wisdom and never realize it. Such people usually talk very loudly and confidently, and quickly put the spotlight on the imperfections of others to hide their own. We all know the type all too well now.

      When we reach the end of our lives, we may feel that we’ve left some experiences on the table that we wish we’d pursued more. The better thing to focus on is what we said yes to in our lives, at the expense of those no’s. We can dabble in many things but only master one or two at most. Are we here for mastery or to be a generalist? Just how broad a life do we wish to have? Just how deeply do we wish to go in any given area of our lives? Deathbed regrets are inevitable, for we can’t possibly do it all, but we can surely have a go at a few things.

      I’ve noticed that several of my neighbors have retired recently. I talk to them and every one of them are exuberant and engaged in something. One man has tapped his maple trees to try to make maple syrup. Another has invested heavily in woodworking equipment and turned his engineering skills into fine furniture. And a couple of close friends are currently bobbing at anchor in the Bahamas, dreaming of a bigger boat than the beautiful one they’re currently sailing on, that they may expand on already expansive experience.

      Many of us are not at an age or inclination to retire just yet, but we can chip away at accumulating wisdom and experience just the same. The trick for all of us is to live an ever-expansive life each day, regardless of the stage of life we’re currently in. Experience builds on itself, layer-by-layer, and we grow into a broader and deeper version of ourselves with each. Our minds and our lives are what we make of them. So by all means: get back to building.

    • Answers

      “Your mind will answer most questions if you learn to relax and wait for the answer.” — William S. Burroughs

      Yes, and how many years must a mountain exist
      Before it is washed to the sea?
      And how many years can some people exist
      Before they’re allowed to be free?
      Yes, and how many times can a man turn his head
      And pretend that he just doesn’t see?
      The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind
      — Bob Dylan, Blowin’ in the Wind

      The world is a confusing mess that we may either work to make sense of or practice active avoidance of. Most of us are somewhere in the middle. I used to pride myself on reading the news every day, and doubled down by watching the news every morning to be informed before I stepped out the door. It was my way of having a perspective on things when asked for my opinion, but also because I thought it was my duty as a citizen to know what the hell was happening.

      Lately, I’ve had an ongoing dialogue with a good friend about which media source is most unbiased. We all should know that they’re all biased, because they’re all hoping for enough traction to be profitable, but which is the best for fair and mostly unbiased information? Those who follow one source for all information are a slave to that source. We must seek information from multiple sources and sort it out ourselves.

      Or not. The historian in me knows the truth is never found in the headlines, but in the stories that come out long after the dust settles. We know certain truths, but we certainly don’t know everything. The lens of time offers true perspective. And even though we see the world burning, even though we may feel outraged far more than we ever believed we’d be outraged at this point in human history, we must separate emotion from the moment and see what happens (while fighting for what’s right in this world).

      We know that those who say they have it all figured out are generally full of crap and trying to sell us something (well, unfortunately, slightly less than half of us know that). Knowing everything is not in the cards. Our answers will come to us in time, if we’re lucky enough to have time, and so we must rely on what we believe to be true for us and set ourselves in a direction that feels right.

      All that said, the historian in me also knows that history is written by the victors, and vast swaths of truth have been swept aside and blown away in the winds of time. We’ll never know the full story about anything, only what we are able to capture and discern. The trick for us in this moment is to ensure that we come out on the other side to bring the truth to the future.

      And that brings me back to the Burroughs quote that kicked us off today. We must learn to quiet our minds and find the answers within ourselves in the context of the times we live in. To be aware of the world is essential for navigating within it, but we cannot forget to turn inward and listen to what our own truth is. And if we find those answers, we may set our compass in a direction that carries us through the confusion and madness in the world to a place we know deep down is right for us.

    • The Finest of Impulses

      “Every day we slaughter our finest impulses. That is why we get a heartache when we read those lines written by the hand of a master and recognize them as our own, as the tender shoots which we stifled because we lacked the faith to believe in our own powers, our own criterion of truth and beauty. Every man, when he gets quiet, when he becomes desperately honest with himself, is capable of uttering profound truths. We all derive from the same source. there is no mystery about the origin of things. We are all part of creation, all kings, all poets, all musicians; we have only to open up, only to discover what is already there.” — Henry Miller

      Tempus fugit: time flies. And every night I slip into bed feeling like I’d just done it an instant ago. We become what we repeatedly do, as Aristotle reminded us. I remind myself of that every morning and wonder every night, “have I done enough today?” The answer lies in another question: “what is enough for what I want out of life?”

      We might act on our finest impulses today, or not. We might get swept up in the madness in the world. It’s what those creating the madness would like for us, isn’t it? To get swept up makes it easier for us to be swept away. Time is doing that quickly enough, thank you. To navigate life soundly one must have a level head, grit and resolve. So don’t let the bastards grind you down. And to make something out of our time here we must add awareness, focus and an inclination to act on the things we’re focused on. So get to it already.

      If we are derived similarly, it stands to reason that the thing that differentiate one life from another is what we do with the time. To make something glorious, or to tear down everything savagely is just the same in one way only: they both acted on their impulses. What makes one fine and another less so but the judgement of humanity for ever more? If we value those around us and those who would come after us, we ought to be thinking beyond ourselves with the things we produce. To contribute, not to take away. But hey, that’s me talking.

      Anyway, have a nice day. It may be all we’ve got, or a step on our path to personal excellence a series of days from now, but it remains our miracle of the moment. What is one to do with a miracle but make the most of it? And perhaps that’s our call to action with this one. The only thing certain is that it will go quickly. So act on the finest of impulses today.

    • Calibrating for Greatness

      “If you make the choice of reading classic literature every day for a year, rather than reading the news, by the end of that time period you’ll have a more honed sensitivity for recognizing greatness from the books than from the media.
      This applies to every choice we make. Not just with art, but with the friends we choose, the conversations we have, even the thoughts we reflect on. All of these aspects affect our ability to distinguish good from very good, very good from great. They help us determine what’s worthy of our time and attention…
      The objective is not to learn to mimic greatness, but to calibrate our internal meter for greatness. So we can better make the thousands of choices that might ultimately lead to our own great work.” — Rick Rubin, The Creative Act: A Way of Being

      We have the opportunity to do something with our lives. We may reach closer to personal excellence (arete) and achieve that which we’d only imagined. Arete looks different for each of us, but we know when we see a glimmer of it in those who rise to meet it. And it stands to reason that if we wish to get closer to personal excellence ourselves, we must also rise to meet greatness where it resides. We must climb beyond where we’ve been and work towards it.

      I have some exceptional people in my life who are currently outraged by the things happening in the United States. I grow quiet when they talk about it, not because I’m not also outraged, but because focusing on the worst in others takes our focus away from our own climb to greater things. It recalibrates us for outrage.

      The point isn’t to ignore it all and just let it fester, it’s to grow into one’s own potential. We are what we focus on the most. We mustn’t be dragged down by putrefaction and the strategic dismantling of our higher collective vision. We are builders of greatness—don’t ever lose sight of that. We must take to the heights, now more than ever.

      The heights by great men reached and kept
      Were not attained by sudden flight,
      But they, while their companions slept,
      Were toiling upward in the night.
      — Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, The Ladder of St. Augustine

      This is a time in our lives when we may achieve greatly, whatever that means for us. The world is more frustrating than ever, but it’s always been so. In our darkest days of human history, those who would reach for personal excellence found a way to climb. And so too must we in our time.

      Climbing requires energy and a level of focus that comes from inspiration. We are what we repeatedly do, and surely we are also what we repeatedly consume. To actualize excellence, to bring it into existence within ourselves and our work, we must develop a taste for it. Nurture a deep hunger to do more with our brief time before it all goes away. We may find excellence throughout human history, including today. There it all is, hiding in plain sight: we must simply lift our gaze to find it. Having seen it in others and in their contribution, we may then climb to meet it ourselves.