Alexandersmap

    Category: Writing

    • Achieving Something Beyond

      “The meaning of life is just to be alive. It is so plain and so obvious and so simple. And yet, everybody rushes around in a great panic as if it were necessary to achieve something beyond them.” – Alan Watts

      Enjoying being alive is surely a worthy pursuit, but even Watts, in pointing this out, was achieving something beyond himself. For otherwise, what are we contributing beyond a few laughs over drinks? Unsaid, I believe, is contributing joyful pursuits that create those ripples that live on beyond your lifetime.

      I’ve visited the graves of many notable names in history, and generally it’s a chunk of silent stone in a lonely plot. The best graves betray the personality of the person who resides there. A clever line about how they lived, or what they believed. Or maybe it’s the stone itself that signals the character of the person. Ralph Waldo Emerson lies below a chunk of rose quartz, which stands out amongst the weathered gray stones of his family and peers on Author’s Ridge. Whether you ever knew much about Emerson, you’d surely note the personality emanating from his gravestone.

      Of course, Emerson left a big ripple well beyond a rock on a hill through his contribution to the world. Did he enjoy writing and speaking? Certainly. Emerson wasn’t running around in a panic trying to achieve something beyond himself. He just did the work. And so did Watts. And so must we.

      “Men live in their fancy, like drunkards whose hands are too soft and tremulous for successful labor. It is a tempest of fancies, and the only ballast I know is a respect to the present hour.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nature

      There’s a distinction between being alive and achieving something in your life, but they don’t have to be mutually exclusive. And usually the things that make us feel most alive offer more than just a momentary dopamine rush. They’re part of building something beyond ourselves. Family, meaningful work, friendships that transcend convenience, and community. These things aren’t achieved, they’re earned one moment at a time.

    • The What and How of Boldly Leaping

      “I have learned, as a rule of thumb, never to ask whether you can do something. Say, instead, that you are doing it. Then fasten your seat belt. The most remarkable things follow.” – Julia Cameron, The Artist’s Way

      The hard part about writing every day wasn’t starting, it was mentioning to people that I was writing every day. Writing has always been part of my identity, it was just expressed in other ways for a couple of decades while I busied myself with other things. People tend to assume those other things are who you are. But we know better don’t we? The quiet conspiracy of expressing your identity stays with you always. One day I just started writing again, and remarkable things have followed. And really, I’ve only just dipped a toe in the waters. There’s so much farther yet to go.

      “I have seldom conceived a delicious plan without being given the means to accomplish it. Understand that the what must come before the how. First choose what you would do. The how usually falls into place of itself.” – Julia Cameron, The Artist’s Way

      We all have bold plans. Some are fully realized, some fall aside in the grind of commitments and pandemics and other things. The world is fascinated with the characters who follow through on their boldness. Elon Musk, Richard Branson, Steve Jobs and Oprah Winfrey followed through on the schemes and dreams and truly audacious whimsies that most of us would gently set aside. First they chose what they would do, and the how fell into place.

      I’m watching the kids I watched grow up wade deeper into adulthood. Their own identities are emerging, different from what we might have assumed; thinking them a basketball or soccer player, or perhaps the noisy kids giggling in the basement over a Disney movie they’ve watched a hundred times. If I’ve learned anything on my own wading into the waters, it would be to offer encouragement and support the audacious without being an overprotective “adult”. Maybe offer some ideas about the “how“. Or who they might talk to about the “how“. And then get out of the way.

      So the question is, do we do that with ourselves? Do we fully support our own boldness or brush it aside as just so much nonsense? Do we focus on the “how” or the “why we shouldn’t“?

      Say, instead, that you are doing it. Then fasten your seat belt... The how usually falls into place of itself.

      Don’t just dip a toe or gently wade in the shallow waters. Figure out the hows: how deep is the water? How well can I swim in this? What do I need to know to stay afloat? (all of these questions limit your downside) And then quickly leap. And see how big a splash you can make.

      Ready?

    • A Realm of Sunset and Moonlight and Silence

      “My house stands in low land, with limited outlook, and on the skirt of the village. But I go with my friend to the shore of our little river, and with one stroke of the paddle I leave the village politics and personalities, yes, and the world of villages and personalities behind, and pass into a delicate realm of sunset and moonlight, too bright almost for spotted man to enter without novitiate and probation. We penetrate bodily this incredible beauty; we dip our hands in this painted element; our eyes are bathed in these lights and forms.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nature

      I’m returning Emerson once again, partly to counter the din of political tweets and headlines that dominated over the last week, and partly because I’d like to read or re-read all of his work in 2021. Which brings me back to his essay Nature, for (I believe) a third reading. And I couldn’t help but linger on the sentence above, which resonates in this time, and for this place I myself reside, in a house in low land, with limited outlook, on the skirt of the village. Emerson had the Concord River to paddle to truth. I have the New Hampshire woods and the wildlife it sustains to show me the way.

      Days like these, a quiet bit of immersion in the forest seems in order. We live in strange times, distracting times, and I’ve seen the impact on my writing lately. Thankfully, I know where to find the remedy: in nature, in tapping into the Great Conversation, and in solitude.

      “Accept what comes from silence.
      Make the best you can of it.
      Of the little words that come
      out of the silence, like prayers
      prayed back to the one who prays,
      make a poem that does not disturb
      the silence from which it came”
      – Wendell Berry, How To Be a Poet (to remind myself)

      A special thanks to Maria Popova and Brain Pickings for pointing out this particular poem in a recent tweet. This poem immediately served as a catalyst on two fronts: to search for more Wendell Berry and seek the silent contemplation I’ve stolen from myself absorbing the madness of the world. Silence, as they say, is golden.

      So outside of paddling off on my own or building a small cabin in the woods, how to bring together the natural world and the silence necessary for contemplation? The answer, for me, lies in early mornings. The conspirator against a quiet mind is the whirl of madness in the world and a desire to keep up and understand it. In these times, finding a way to paddle or walk away from it all, if only for a little while, seems imperative.

      If only to find your own voice again.

    • Hit the Road, Jack

      “You boys going to get somewhere, or just going?” We didn’t understand his question, and it was a damned good question. – Jack Kerouac, On the Road

      I first visited Jack Kerouac’s grave in Lowell, Massachusetts when I was 20 years old. Once I knew where it was I’d stop in now and then to visit in my younger days. Usually there would be some scattered bottles of whiskey or some other tribute piled about. I’ve seen similar tributes with Thoreau and Twain’s graves, but Kerouac’s was first. It was there that I learned the sticky bond between a great writer and his readers.

      It was always mañana. For the next week that was all I heard—mañana,a lovely word and one that probably means heaven.

      Funny thing, I was wrapped up in the history of Kerouac, but I kept putting off reading his classic On the Road for years. Maybe I didn’t want to be disappointed if I didn’t like it. Maybe I had an image of what it was but wasn’t willing to see for myself what it was all about. But it was always mañana with this book. Until a friend posted a picture of his grave on social media that triggered me and I immediately downloaded it and started reading.

      “What is he aching to do? What are we all aching to do? What do we want?” She didn’t know. She yawned. She was sleepy. It was too much. Nobody could tell. Nobody would ever tell. It was all over. She was eighteen and most lovely, and lost.

      I think if I’d read On the Road at 20 I might have hopped in my Ford F-150 and crossed the country right then. Because at 20 you understand how Sal and Dean feel. The lost souls bouncing coast-to-coast searching for answers. When you live a bit you realize you’re searching in the wrong place most of the time. Most of the answers you need are right where you started. What are you aching to do? What do you want?

      “The days of wrath are yet to come. The balloon won’t sustain you much longer. And not only that, but it’s an abstract balloon. You’ll all go flying to the West Coast and come staggering back in search of your stone.”

      Wandering about in life sounds romantic, but Kerouac paints the grim reality of the quest. The abject poverty, the desperation and rootlessness. The descent into drugs and sex and casual regard for anything meaningful. The pursuit of what’s next. If Sal and Dean had iPhones they might never have left New York. They may have scrolled blankly through their Twitter feed. The search continues one generation to the next, the characters just use a different mode of transportation.

      He made one last signal. I waved back. Suddenly he bent to his life and walked quickly out of sight. I gaped into the bleakness of my own days. I had an awful long way to go too.

      It took a few decades but I finally finished On the Road. And really, I don’t have an urge to immediately drive across the country chasing dreams. Well, maybe a little bit. But mostly I understand. I see how it influenced the Baby Boomer generation when it was published in 1957. I hear it echo in Bob Dylon and Simon & Garfunkel songs (Listen to America and you’re On the Road with Jack Kerouac). I understand now how it influenced me even without reading it. What took me so long? I don’t know. But I’m happy I’ve finally crossed that bridge.

    • Mapping Your Future Like Disney Did

      George Mack tweeted out a “synergy map” that Walt Disney originally drew on a napkin in 1957 that blew me away in its simplicity. As a visual learner this drawing spoke more clearly to me than a dozen books on the topic might have. As they say: a picture is worth a thousand words. Who knew that better than Walt Disney?

      The key to this strategic map is in the center. The creative people drove everything with consistent output of intellectual property. This fueled exponential growth for Walt Disney Corporation for 97 years and counting. If you look at Disney since then, they’ve acquired more intellectual property with Pixar, LucasFilms and Marvel to revitalize the center. Altogether a stunningly effective vision that continues to evolve and grow. There’s an informative article on this strategy on reforge.com worth reading to learn more about the Disney strategy.

      But what of us? What can we take from this synergy map to apply in our own lives? Well, to start with it won’t be nearly as complicated as the Disney strategy map. But it starts with knowing what your core intellectual property is (what do you create?) and then build out a mutually sustaining infrastructure around it. That might be a job or starting a business or non-profit, it can be a blog or a publishing company (for distribution of that intellectual property), and it might be merchandise.

      Take someone who brews beer. Their intellectual property is in the beer recipes, but also in the company logo, artwork on the cans and overall vibe in the products and in the tasting room. They create synergies for that with a social media presence, maybe creative partnerships with concerts and food trucks every weekend, and sell merchandise. The more you expand these synergistic parts of your map, the more it fuels the creatives who can add more brewing equipment and distribution.

      Writing a blog every day is centering, but is it the center? There are plenty of examples of people who have made it so. Maybe its a synergistic side hustle of your overall entity. Do you write to make money or for other reasons? Do you do anything to make money or for other reasons? What do you want it to become? Drawing it all out on a strategy map might answer some of those questions.

      The trick is in knowing what your center is and what you want to build towards. What drives everything else? Sometimes you stumble upon it, but mostly you just keep trying things until you find your niche. Disney focused on monetization of his creative output. You might look at optimization of time or some other key metric. But you must know the center and where and why you want to go from there.

      The why is written on the arrows linking the different nodes sprouting from your center. Look back at Disney’s, you’ll see that there are arrows going both ways. Nothing is a one way street, and it shouldn’t be in your life either.

      And here lies the beauty of the Walt Disney synergy map. You see where the dead ends are. Where the synergies aren’t all that strong. And where you have a chance to build something special in your life. All you need is a pencil and something to draw on. Want a napkin?

    • Confirmed in a Habit, Firmly Established

      I’ve been toying with the word inveterate in my mind for a couple of weeks. It would make a good New Year’s Day post, I figured. I mean, just look at the definition in the dictionary, practically screaming for a post:

      Inveterate
      in·vet·er·ate | \ in-ˈve-t(ə-)rət\
      Definition of inveterate
      1: confirmed in a habit : HABITUAL
           an inveterate liar
      2: firmly established by long persistence
           the inveterate tendency to overlook the obvious
      – Merriam-Webster

      I let New Year’s Day come and go but haven’t let go of the word. The opposite of inveterate would be intermittent or inconsistent behavior. Yet, Merriam-Webster casts a negative connotation on the definition. I like spinning it more positively. Call me a dreamer if you will.

      Last year I was an inveterate blogger, but not an inveterate rower or walker or eater of broccoli. This year, rather than setting goals or signing up for the gym I’m simply going to chase down more inveterate behavior. Lending positive intonations to the word, and swapping the word out in other sentences. From Inveterate eater of cheeseburgers to intermittent eater of cheeseburgers offers possibility. And so does transforming inconsistent effort in the mundane tasks that make you successful in your [fill in the blank] to something more, well, inveterate.

    • 11 of My Favorite Books Read in 2020

      Looking back on this maddening year, I found I read a lot of poetry that inspired and a lot of page-turner novels that distracted. It would be easy to make half this list collections of Mary Oliver poems, but I subtracted poetry from the list altogether to focus on the craft of the written novel or book. Still, I like to bend the rules, so in making my list of top ten favorite books for the year, I chose eleven. This was a nod to Charlie Mackesy, who spun a bit of magic in a year where it was essential. Illustrating the timeless nature of books (or perhaps how far behind I am in catching up), only four of the eleven were released in 2020. These eleven books are listed in no particular order, largely because there’s a bit of wonder in each of them. Each informed and delighted me.

      Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art by James Nestor
      “The more oxygen life can consume, the more electron excitability it gains, the more animated it becomes. When living matter is bristling and able to absorb and transfer electrons in a controlled way, it remains healthy. When cells lose the ability to offload and absorb electrons, they begin to break down.”

      I find myself thinking often about breathing after reading this book. Waking up with a dry mouth reminds me I need to be better at nasal breathing, when hiking I try to control my breath and focus on how I’m taking in oxygen, and when I chew almonds I crunch with satisfaction, knowing it helps release stem cells and increase bone density. This book is highly informative and strongly recommended for anyone, well, breathing.

      The 80/20 Principle: The Secret to Achieving More With Less by Richard Koch
      “Equality ends in dominance: that is one of the messages of chaos theory. The 80/20 Principle’s message is different yet complementary. It tells us that, at any one point, a majority of any phenomenon will be explained or caused by a minority of the actors participating in the phenomenon. Eighty percent of the results come from 20 percent of the causes. A few things are important; most are not.”

      This was the most highlighted book of the bunch. Honestly, there were chapters I skimmed over because they didn’t sing a tune I wanted to hear, but the theories here are sound. I wish I’d read this book at the beginning of my career, but it’s not too late to implement the core principles in many aspects of my life.

      The Splendid and the Vile: A Saga of Churchill, Family, and Defiance During the Blitz by Erik Larson
      Hitler wanted still more force applied against Britain. America seemed increasingly likely to enter the war but would do so only, he reasoned, if Britain continued to exist. On March 5 he issued another directive, No. 24, this signed by Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel, chief of the High Command of the Armed Forces (OKW), aimed mainly at how Germany and Japan might coordinate strategy under the Tripartite Pact, which both had signed with Italy the preceding fall. The goal, the directive said, “must be to induce Japan to take action in the Far East as soon as possible. This will tie down strong English forces and will divert the main effort of the United States of America to the Pacific.” Beyond this Germany had no particular interest in the Far East. “The common aim of strategy,” the directive stated, “must be represented as the swift conquest of England in order to keep America out of the war.”

      We all grew up sort of knowing about The Blitz. This book neatly sums up just how tenuous the situation was. I fancy myself well-informed about World War II, but I learned far more from the The Splendid and the Vile than I expected to. For all our complaints about the pandemic, most of us have no idea what real sacrifice is. Larson brings us closer to understanding with this book.

      The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse by Charlie Mackesy
      “What do you want to be when you grow up?” asked the mole.
      “Kind,” said the boy.

      A beautiful, simple book. I picked this up for my daughter as a gift and read it quickly before wrapping it up. If 2020 kicked you in the ass, read this. Then read it again. The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse is art, meditation and a warm hug disguised as a book.

      Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved The Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time by David Sobel
      The zero-degree parallel of latitude is fixed by the laws of nature, while the zero-degree meridian of longitude shifts like the sands of time. This difference makes finding latitude child’s play, and turns the determination of longitude, especially at sea, into an adult dilemma—one that stumped the wisest minds of the world for the better part of human history.

      I’ve danced around this book for years, never getting around to reading it. And then I went to Greenwich and saw the chronometers ticking away in their plexiglass cases and resolved to get right to it when I returned home. This is a story of perseverance solving what was believed to be the impossible. A delightful book.

      Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community, and War by Nathaniel Philbrick
      No longer mindful of the debt they owed the Pokanokets, without whom their parents would never have endured their first year in America, some of the Pilgrims’ children were less willing to treat Native leaders with the tolerance and respect their parents had once afforded Massasoit.

      Living in New England, you can’t really get away from the story of the Pilgrims. But the part we seem to forget with the Pilgrims is how much they relied on luck and the strategic kindness of Massasoit to survive at all. It seems I’m a descendent of a Pilgrim (or two), so I’m told, and that lineage makes me all the more indebted to the Pokanokets who assured that those first few years here weren’t the last for the passengers on the Mayflower. As the quote above suggests, that indebtedness seemed to skip the next generation, paving the way for the tragedy of King Phillip’s War.

      Draft No. 4: On the Writing Process by John McPhee
      “That four-to-one ratio in writing time—first draft versus the other drafts combined—has for me been consistent in projects of any length, even if the first draft takes only a few days or weeks. There are psychological differences from phase to phase, and the first is the phase of the pit and the pendulum. After that, it seems as if a different person is taking over. Dread largely disappears. Problems become less threatening, more interesting. Experience is more helpful, as if an amateur is being replaced by a professional. Days go by quickly and not a few could be called pleasant, I’ll admit.“

      Reading McPhee, like reading Hemingway, it’s easy to get just a bit intimidated. The beauty of this book is that he pulls back the curtains to show you the way. Great research, editors and fact checkers smooth out the rough edges and polish the story, but the work you put into it makes the finished product shine.

      Cape Cod by Henry David Thoreau
      “The ocean there is commonly but a tantalizing prospect in hot weather, for with all that water before you, there is, as we were afterward told, no bathing on the Atlantic side, on account of the undertow and the rumor of sharks. At the lighthouse both in Eastham and Truro, the only houses quite on the shore, they declared, the next year, that they would not bathe there “for any sum,” for they sometimes saw the sharks tossed up and quiver for a moment on the sand. Others laughed at these stories, but perhaps they could afford to because they never bathed anywhere. One old wrecker told us that he killed a regular man-eating shark fourteen feet long, and hauled him out with his oxen, where we had bathed; and another, that his father caught a smaller one of the same kind that was stranded there, by standing him up on his snout so that the waves could not take him. They will tell you tough stories of sharks all over the Cape, which I do not presume to doubt utterly,—how they will sometimes upset a boat, or tear it in pieces, to get at the man in it. I can easily believe in the undertow, but I have no doubt that one shark in a dozen years is enough to keep up the reputation of a beach a hundred miles long.“

      This book, like Philbrick’s Mayflower, informs the native New Englander about the places that once were the places that now are. I have a stack of quotes from this book that I’m saving for other blog posts, but the one above reminds us that the question of sharks has been around a lot longer than we might believe. Like Thoreau I’m much more concerned about undertow when swimming in the surf, but hey, you never know…

      Siddhartha: A Novel by Hermann Hesse
      “Were not all sufferings then time, and were not all self-torments and personal fears time? Weren’t all the difficult and hostile things in the world gone and overcome as soon as one had overcome time, and as soon as time could be thrust out of the mind?“

      I’ve heard enough people recommend this book that eventually I had to read it, and I finished it in 2020. Amazingly, it feels like I read this a decade ago, for all that’s happened this year. Like The Alchemist, it’s a story that teaches you a bit about yourself as you wade through it.

      Thinking in Bets: Making Smarter Decisions When You Don’t Have All The Facts by Annie Duke
      What makes a decision great is not that it has a great outcome. A great decision is the result of a good process, and that process must include an attempt to accurately represent our own state of knowledge. That state of knowledge, in turn, is some variation of “I’m not sure.”

      How do you make decisions? How can you make better, more informed decisions when you don’t have all the facts? And what is a game of strategy versus a game of chance? This book uncovers some of these answers. As with anything, there’s book smart and there’s street smart, and reading about it and understanding it in real life are different things. Duke sprinkles in some street smarts hard won on the poker tables.

      Sailing True North: Ten Admirals and the Voyage of Character by James G. Stavridis
      “The contemporary malaise is the unwillingness to take chances. Everyone is playing it safe. We’ve lost our guts. It’s much more fun to stick your neck out and take chances. The whole attitude is to protect yourself against everything, don’t take chances. But we’ve built this country on taking chances” (Quoting Rear Admiral Grace Hopper)

      A quick, enjoyable read that offers lessons learned from some of the great “Admirals” in history. This is examination of character in ten short biographies, but also an unflinching look at racism and sexism in the Navy and how that battle continues to be fought to this day. And there’s no mistaking the Admiral’s feelings about character in certain political leaders we currently suffer through. A timely message for all of us.

    • Somewhere Among Strangers

      Some days I’ll write a blog post and it will immediately take off, receiving a ton of views and a fair share of likes. Nice! But then there are the other blog posts that fall flat, barely registering a couple of views and no likes. Hmm…

      Of course I love them both, as any parent might love their children, just the same. For ultimately I’m just working things out on my own, sorting out what I learn, see and do on my own terms. But that’s blogging for you: Sorting it all out, hits and misses, one post at a time. Like days stacked one atop the other.

      “Still, I ponder
      where that other is –
      where I landed,
      what I thought, what
      I did

      what small or even maybe
      meaningful deeds
      I might have accom-
      plished
      somewhere
      among strangers

      coming to them
      as only a river can”
      – Mary Oliver, A River Far Away and Long Ago

      Sometimes I’ll look back on a blog post from a year or two ago when someone likes it, drawing my attention back to the person who wrote it. I’ll ponder the words, remember who I was then and what I was doing and thinking. People who were everything who are strangers now. Strangers who have become everything. How I sorted things out then, and how I do now.

      I note the changes.

      And wonder where this life might meander next.

      And who I might become.

    • Maintaining Streaks

      “Build streaks. Do the work every single day. Blog daily. Write daily. Ship daily. Show up daily. Find your streak and maintain it.” – Seth Godin, The Practice

      I made a relatively big deal (by my standards) of blog number 900. Well, this is 914 and I just keep quietly going. I have some exciting plans for blog posts in 2021, which rely on good health and the freedom of mobility that comes with a world getting back on its feet again – dare I say – after the pandemic. But I’ll write either way. I like this particular streak I’m on too much to stop just because I’m not out there seeing the world. And so the streak continues for as long as I’m blessed with another day and the acuity to do something with it.

      The concept of streaks is nothing new, but I’ll credit James Clear with writing the right book at the right time (for me) a couple of years ago shining a spotlight on habits and building streaks with them. It hit me in a way that Charles Duhigg’s book on the same topic didn’t. Both informative, but Clear’s book was catalytic. Since reading it I’ve tried to string together consecutive streaks for many things, but the writing is the one that’s lasted the longest. If you search for James Clear in this blog you’ll find plenty of quotes on this topic, but here are three I don’t believe I’ve used before:

      “The point is to master the habit of showing up.”

      “The identity itself becomes the reinforcer. You do it because it’s who you are and it feels good to be you.”

      “Never miss twice.” – James Clear, Atomic Habits

      So every morning begins with maintaining the streaks: Writing and reading. Fitness is saved for the middle of the day, and the evening is Duolingo to close out the day. Which may explain why I’ve had to use the streak saver several times with Duolingo (though I’ve never missed twice in a row) and the exercise streak gets broken more than it should. That exercise streak is just as critical for overall health as the writing, reading and language learning are for mental fitness. But it tends to get lost in that middle of the day time slot, so I’m debating moving it to the beginning of the day without breaking what’s working.

      As a morning person, the payoff is more obvious in the morning streaks. I publish every day, usually before I eat breakfast unless there’s an early start for a flight or a hike or whatnot. And I chip away at the reading immediately afterwards. I finished John McPhee’s Draft no. 4 (for five books in a week). That reading streak is paying off as much as the writing streak. They go hand-in-hand, of course, but it’s nice to finish things and “check the box”. For the blog checking the box means clicking Publish. For reading checking the box means reviewing the book after I’ve finished it on Goodreads. This also serves as my de facto tracker for how many books I finish in a year.

      “Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seeds that you plant.” – Robert Louis Stevenson

      Reading that McPhee book reminded me of what I don’t know. I spent a fair amount of time looking up the definitions of words he’d drop, or places he’d been to that I wasn’t familiar with. You could look at that in two ways: either you’re hopelessly behind on the learning curve, or you’ve reached another hurdle to clear on your sprint around the track of life. Embrace the humbling process of learning what you didn’t previously know, and look with anticipation towards the next hurdle in line.

      So that’s where you’ll find me each morning: maintaining streaks while sprinting around the track of life. We’re moving around it either way, we might as well keep a few streaks alive as we go. Now, about that fitness goal…

    • The Magic of Single Line Journaling

      “find beauty in each day
      a small beauty works fine

      bask in it
      then let it go

      other beauty awaits you”
      – Kat Lehmann, Stones from the River

      Last night I finished my fourth book in four days. That sounds like I’m reading a book a day, which is inaccurate. No, I’m merely whittling down the stack of books read throughout this year at around the same time. But I’m pleased to close them each out. When I read on the Kindle app I then go back and review the highlights once again, just to understand the salient points to make sense of the whole. No great surprise to anyone: some of those highlighted passages end up in this blog.

      If you take the micro poem by Lehmann and insert the word “book” where “day” is, well, you get an entirely different micro poem, and yet very much the same. Or insert “journey” or “conversation” or “decision” where “day” currently resides and… you get the point. There’s magic in words, and our choice of words.

      But to stay with the original word just a bit longer, I established this habit of writing down a summary of each day in one line in a journal. Sometimes this isn’t easy when all you did in a day was write a blog post, work and eat a pizza for dinner. But other entries offer more emphatic moments of consequence. I start/stopped this habit early in the year, and then it became an every day thing in June. I’d say six months officially makes it a habit.

      This micro poem sums up the exercise quite well. Find something notable or beautifully commonplace that occurred in a day and write it down in one line. And like a micro poem there’s joy in its simplicity. You only have one line. Write small if you will, but get right to the point. What happened? What did you do? What was the beauty you found in this day? One line.

      As with re-reading the highlights in a Kindle book I look back on months of single line entries and I see moments come alive again. Celebrations, mountains climbed, loved ones lost, friendships rekindled, and yes, an occasional pizza. I’m grateful for having written it all down. One line, for one day, at a time. For there’s magic in those words.