Alexandersmap

    Category: Philosophy

    • What Are We Carrying?

      “It is difficult to free fools from the chains they revere.” — Voltaire

      We may see the chains that others carry, but when they’ve wrapped them around their life like a comfortable blanket, removing them becomes all but impossible. It’s part of their identity. And identity is a very tricky thing to work with. They must see the chains themselves, they must choose to release the burden they represent. We can’t make someone reject the chains they revere, we can only help them see them for what they are.

      Naturally, we have our own chains we must learn to see, and every day is an opportunity to break free link-by-link (if we don’t simply throw them all off in one swift go). Aware of our own chains, we learn that we can’t be carrying someone else’s burden too. That frustration we feel when others won’t change is nothing but links of their chain that we choose to carry.

      The world is full of anger and hate, greed and envy. The world is also full of love and joy, generosity and acceptance. We each carry our share of each of these traits (for we are human, aren’t we?). The question we ought to ask ourselves is, what are we carrying into the future? Not just our future, but our collective future. The weight of all those chains eventually sinks the ship.

    • Shake the Grass

      And the days are not full enough
      And the nights are not full enough
      And life slips by like a field mouse
      Not shaking the grass.
      — Ezra Pound

      There is a compulsion to fill my days and nights with experience. Perhaps you share this too. There is an equally pressing sense that time is slipping past us at shocking speed. Tempus fugit. We humans are bound to notice it eventually.

      Forever chasing experience. Forever working to be here, now. It’s a blessing and a curse to be aware. Mostly a blessing, for awareness offers a glimpse of all that flies past. Awareness locks a few moments in amber, that we may cherish them for the rest of our vibrant days. Awareness makes us do things like getting out of a warm bed at 3 AM to attempt a glimpse at the northern lights, or to plunge into a cold mountain stream or the bay late in the season—simply because we may never pass this way again.

      Don’t waste a moment. We ought to spend the time as we know we should. We ought to avoid distraction and waste whenever possible. And be bold and daring when we least expect it of ourselves. Shake the grass and dance all night. For today will fly by like all the rest.

    • Shifting the Good

      “Noncooperation with evil is as much a moral obligation as the cooperation with good.” — Martin Luther King, Jr.

      A while back, I had a drink with a couple of old friends who celebrate the chaotic leadership of the current administration. There’s simply no consensus between us when it comes to politics, but there is common ground that we’ve walked on for years. What I believe to be evil and they believe to be good are unchangeable. They believe I’m quaintly naive, I believe they didn’t study for the test and are smugly cheating off the wrong answer sheet. And yet we view each other as inherently good.

      We are all imperfect beings, making our way through a complicated world with a limited amount of time with which to sort it all out. We ought to live a life of dignity and high moral character. We ought to treat others as we wish to be treated ourselves. We look around at the world and see that many who fail to exhibit these traits rise—not just to power, but abusive power. We look around and see some people we thought exhibited the traits we aspire to reveling in the abusiveness of powerful people.

      Every generation has its test. We are in the midst of ours. It doesn’t matter if our neighbor or our uncle passes the test, only that we do. Those who are blind may never see. Or maybe the light will dawn one day before they pass from this world. We only control our own path through the darkness. If we become a beacon of hope for those trying to find their own way, then maybe that is enough. Pendulums swing when the middle shifts ever so slightly. Fight evil, but the real work lies in shifting the good.

    • We Become the Sum

      “What strikes me is the fact that in our society, art has become something which is related only to objects and not to individuals, or to life. That art is something which is specialized or which is done by experts who are artists. But couldn’t everyone’s life become a work of art? Why should the lamp or the house be an art object, but not our life?” — Michel Foucault

      Walking the pup yesterday during a snowstorm, I considered turning back to slip on micro spikes. Fluffy snow over ice is never a good recipe for reliable footing. Instead I shortened my stride and the leash so the dog wouldn’t pull me down in her snowy exuberance. Some life lessons are learned from a sore backside.

      We know that we are works in progress, but sometimes get frustrated with the pace of that progress. It’s okay to paint over our mistakes now and then. It’s better to make them anyway, if only to learn which paths are not ours to take, if only to not have possibilities haunting us for not having tried them at all. As Nietzsche reminded us, that which doesn’t kill us makes us stronger. In this way, we may consider each day a lesson in how to live.

      The pup and I have a loop that covers the same ground twice to get us to the desired distance. Double the distance and we’re doubling the frequency of times covering the same ground. Which is noticeable when it’s snowing out and we’re leaving foot and paw prints behind us. In this way, each loop revealed the previous ground we’d covered, but our steps never exactly repeated themselves. Our strides changed with the conditions, we were pulled towards some curiosity just a nose below the snow, a car passed by that changed our path or some such thing. As the snow accumulated, the oldest footprints faded more and more into the layers building up on top of them. Each loop was the same, yet completely different. So too are our days.

      Our canvas transforms with every stroke of the brush. Each offers lessons on where to go next. Each fades further into the background with the addition of yet another. But here lies depth and progress. The richness of life is found not just in the changes we make to our days, but in the rituals that anchor them. It all builds upon itself to form the work of art that is our life. In this way, we become the sum.

    • Emerging Possibilities

      How long did all those possibilities sleep
      during the years
      before this emerging
      — Michael Ondaatje, The Then

      There are hints of our future together all around us. We may see some version of ourselves emerge from the habits that we develop, or those that hold on to us (try as we might to break from them). We are what we repeatedly do, and so it is that we become what we surround ourselves with. There will always be a gap between who we are and what we want to be. Is that gap closing or becoming a chasm?

      We see in the world possibilities emerging that we never imagined. We may share mutual disgust and dismay. But I’m here to tell you that there are other possibilities hiding right in plain sight, possibilities that we can control, should we become aware of them. Life is what we make of it—it has always been this way and always will be. Fight the good fight, but for the love of God start within.

      What we tend to see is that which demands our attention, be it a heart attack or an autocrat or the waiter asking us what we want to drink. Immediacy demands focus. Do we remember the Eisenhower Matrix? Right next to that “urgent and important” quadrant lies the “not urgent but important” quadrant where the real work of becoming resides. Our future lies in seeing what might be, not forever reacting to what is thrown on our shoulders to somehow carry.

      Everything begins with awareness. When we are self-absorbed we don’t see the soulmate standing right in front of us. When we are distracted by the despair machine, we don’t see the pendulum swinging towards decency. When we are wrapped in the comfort of easy, we don’t see the path to personal excellence available when we become inclined towards harder. Possibilities are all around us, simply waiting for opportunities to emerge. Feed them the attention they need.

    • Digging Our Ground

      The trouble, doll, is not moving mountains
      But digging the ground that you’re on
      If it’s true that good fortune gives no change
      We got just what it takes
      — Jakob Dylan, Something Good This Way Comes

      Nowadays, doesn’t it seem like everyone is angry or depressed or resentful of others? We know there are legitimate reasons for concern, but there’s also a collective amnesia about how good we really have it. It’s driven by an information diet that tells us how awful we should feel about the state of the world, about those “nasty” people on the other side, about the number staring back at us on the scale or the fact that few of us look like those fit, fashionable and well-traveled people we see on our screens. We know that comparison is the death of joy, but our feeds are relentlessly pushing for comparison anyway.

      There’s nothing wrong with aspiring for more in life, for that is how humanity grows and evolves. That’s how we grow and evolve. But we shouldn’t lose track of that which we are blessed with. How many people throughout history would have given everything for what we have right now? They’d be shocked by our lack of awareness of all that surrounds us.

      Gratitude grounds us. It changes our mindset from feeling like we live in scarcity to knowing we live in abundance. When we’re grateful for where we are, with what we have and who we’re spending our precious time with, it’s hard to feel like we aren’t living a great life. So maybe it’s time to start digging the ground that we’re on, and stop clawing for more of what’s over there. Because over there ain’t all that either.

    • The Slow and Difficult Trick of Living

      It isn’t very far as highways lie.
      I might be back by nightfall, having seen
      The rough pines, and the stones, and the clear water.
      Friends argue that I might be wiser for it.
      They do not hear that far-off Yankee whisper:
      How dull we grow from hurrying here and there!

      Many have gone, and think me half a fool.
      To miss a day away in the cool country.
      Maybe. But in a book I read and cherish,
      Going to Walden is not so easy a thing
      As a green visit. It is the slow and difficult
      Trick of living, and finding it where you are.
      — Mary Oliver, Going to Walden

      It isn’t very far at all for me to visit Walden. I could be there in about an hour, accounting for rush hour traffic in that general direction. I’ve gone there before, just to be there on some random Tuesday or Wednesday or whatnot. While others worked I would play hooky for an hour or two, just to see the water, just to feel like Thoreau in the interlude between responsibilities. Inevitably I’d return better for having been there. Some might argue that my nose to the grindstone for those couple of hours would have been a better use of the time. Let them think what they want. We’re all different people, aren’t we?

      I can feel that it’s almost time to re-read Walden again, just as I felt today it was time to revisit Mary Oliver. There are other voices beyond the hustle culture that ought to be listened to. There are other ways to spend our precious time. The trick to living is awareness and presence in the invaluable now. To learn and grow and become at a pace that we can maintain for the long haul, even as we know that the time slips away so very quickly.

      You won’t find me at Walden today. I assure you it will be just fine without me. For a Monday I ought to be in more of a rush somewhere, but what is on the other side of that hustle? Just what do we arrive at when we go from here to there anyway? Maybe that’s why I keep writing—to remind myself to be aware of the time going by, or to simply remind myself to cherish the view along the way. To be here, now feels like more than enough. Why would we ever rush away from it?

    • Nothing Can Come From Nothing

      “Ex nihilo nihil fit: nothing can come from nothing”

      Those Romans knew a good maxim when they encountered one. I suppose the bad maxims are simply lost to history, but the great ones are timeless. Surely, nothing can come from nothing. We get what we put into things. This applies equally well to our fitness level, our relationships, our personal finance and our education. Consider the universe and where it came from. Will we know all the answers in our lifetime? Of course not. But we can keep on seeking answers in our time.

      Have a look around at the hot mess that is global leadership. It didn’t just pop up overnight, it evolved out of anger and lack of diligence and a perfect storm of technology and wealth accumulation. The generation that fought fascism is passing away, the generations that followed simply forgot that history rhymes.

      We get what we deserve.

      We’d all grown rather complacent.

      And here we are.

      But here’s the thing; there is substance and resolve at our core. We have something to say about the matter, even as we are driven off the cliff by the abrasive minority. We’ll either do something, or we’ll do nothing. Just remember that maxim if it’s the latter.

    • To Build Better Days

      Winter days are growing longer. Have you seen the lingering light? Sure, there will be many more cold days ahead, and many more frigid nights. But the earth is tilting back towards the north, offering a gift of brighter each day.

      Nature offers lessons, should we see them. Our hardest days will pass, should we be resilient. Our darkest days will turn brighter when we become aware of the light. And we ourselves—unkempt, distracted and full of accumulated empty calories, may reset and focus on steady improvement in the key areas of our life. Our path isn’t always ours to determine, but how we react to it is uniquely ours.

      Today is ripe with opportunity or it will surely dash our dreams, ’tis largely up to us to decide. When we feel the world is in a rut, when everything has brought us down into despair or depression, why linger there? The only viable choice is to begin climbing. Now is as good a time as any to reset and begin again. To build better days one choice at a time.

    • A Free Mind in a Chaotic World

      “Freedom is the only worthy goal in life. It is won by disregarding things that lie beyond our control.” — Epictetus

      Let’s face it, the world is a hot mess right now. Anger, disgust and outrage are delivered daily to our news feed, just waiting for us to consume it. There are countless reasons to focus on the state of the world, but one big reason not to: it removes our focus from the things we can control, leaving us in a constant state of distraction. We become enslaved to the people who demand our attention. To hell with them! Focus on that which we may control instead.

      I’m not saying we should turn our back when the barbarians are at the gate, merely to lock the gate and defend the fort. What is within that must be protected? Our attention, our precious time, our health and well-being, and that of our family. When measured against the infinite unknown to come, our time alive ought to be focused on far more than things we have no agency over.

      So respectfully, I will grow quiet and distant when prompted for outrage. I will fight for all that is right in this world against those who would destroy it for profit, but I won’t dabble in their daily dose of distraction. There is so much to be done with this time already. Free the mind from the chaos and attend to that which we may control instead.