Alexandersmap

    Tag: Carpe Diem

    • Gathering Towards

      “Your soul is the priestess of memory, selecting, sifting, and ultimately gathering your vanishing days toward presence.”
      — John O’Donohue, Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom

      If all that we’ve experienced has brought us to here and now, and we are the sum of each of these days, it follows that whatever days we have left ahead of us are destined to be gathered as well. So why not raise the bar with heightened experience, greater expectations of ourselves, and a healthier approach to living? Awareness is seeing all that is, but also all that could be.

      Thinking in possibilities is optimistic. It’s the dreamer within, imagining best possible outcomes. We all need to follow a dream, but we also need to root ourselves in reality. The better approach may be to also think in probabilities. Probabilities are calculated. They’re pragmatic. They’re based on facts. Now I know facts are funny things nowadays, but it turns out they still work in the real world of moving ourselves from here to there.

      To design a life, we ought to begin with the end in mind. Not the very end, but the desired outcome of this particular phase of our lives. We may think of our lives as a series of projects that we bring to conclusion. These projects define us and build our CV (Curriculum Vitae), qualifying us for even more ambitious projects. A career, a soul, our physical fitness, education and relationships with others and ourselves are built from all that we gather in each phase of our life. Drift too much in any one area and we see that area suffer.

      This is where awareness comes in handy. We learn to see the gaps forming in our lives, and to formulate plans to fill them. If one plan doesn’t work, try another, and another still. What is the probable outcome of establishing a better fitness and nutrition routine today and every day? What is the probable outcome of reading at least ten pages of a great book every day? What is the probable outcome of putting the damned phone down and being fully present with that person we’re talking to?

      We are each either climbing towards personal excellence (arete) or sliding away from it. Yes, we are the sum of our days, but that one step forward or those two steps back don’t define us, it’s simply where we are starting from as we begin our next day’s climb. Every act gathers us towards some outcome. What shall it be?

    • Still in the Game

      Isn’t it strange
      That princes and kings,
      And clowns that caper
      In sawdust rings,
      And common people
      Like you and me
      Are builders for eternity?

      Each is given a bag of tools,
      A shapeless mass,
      A book of rules;
      And each must make—
      Ere life is flown—
      A stumbling block
      Or a stepping stone.
      — R.L. Sharpe, A Bag of Tools

      This poem has been lingering in my life for decades. I don’t know when, really, for it sat quietly on the page of a book, corner folded over and book cover flap also marking the page, awaiting its time to be rediscovered. Welcome back.

      Life surely has flown. In fact it’s actively flying quite rapidly. And we are still in the game. We, with our bags of tools and our grand ideas taking shape, following the rules or breaking them. What matters in the end is how we use the time. Ben Franklin reminded us not to squander it, for it is the stuff of life. Has life been fully stuffed or are we feeling a little unfulfilled? What’s done is done, and what will be will be. Do something with what all that’s left.

      There are so many ways to stumble or to squander. Ah, but there remains so many ways to climb ahead to something greater for ourselves. We ought to rise to meet the moment, don’t you think? Surely, this time capsule of a poem, this gift from a forgotten day brought to the present and now shared with you, dear reader, offers some clue for what to do now. This is no time to clown around.

    • To Do at Last

      I bless the night that nourished my heart
      To set the ghosts of longing free
      Into the flow and figure of dream
      That went to harvest from the dark
      Bread for the hunger no one sees.

      All that is eternal in me
      Welcome the wonder of this day,
      The field of brightness it creates
      Offering time for each thing
      To arise and illuminate.

      I place on the altar of dawn:
      The quiet loyalty of breath,
      The tent of thought where I shelter,
      Wave of desire I am shore to
      And all beauty drawn to the eye.

      May my mind come alive today
      To the invisible geography
      That invites me to new frontiers,
      To break the dead shell of yesterdays,
      To risk being disturbed and changed.

      May I have the courage today
      To live the life that I would love,
      To postpone my dream no longer
      But do at last what I came here for
      And waste my heart on fear no more.
      — John O’Donohue, A Morning Offering

      For Saint Patrick’s Day, a morning offering from a revered Irish writer. And what a poem it is! Go on and read it once again, I don’t mind at all. I’ve read it a few times more myself, considered what to go with and in the end quoted the poem in its entirety.

      Patrick chased the snakes out of Ireland. George Washington and Henry Knox chased the British out of Boston Harbor. We note the history of this day but ought to remember to make a little history ourselves. Forget drowning in pint or dram—find your stride today instead. A wee bit of poetry, a soundtrack of favorite Irish music, a brisk walk, and some writing of our own. Perhaps a splash of green to mark the occasion. The 17th of March is a day for action, not simply commemoration.

      The truth is, we get worn down by life and need to be provoked back on track. To break the dead shell of yesterdays and regain that courage to do at last what we came here for. There’s nothing to be done about all that’s happened before today, save to learn from it. Use this time to chase away our own snakes and move onward towards a brighter future. To welcome the wonder of this day by doing it justice.

    • The Wealth Beyond Money

      The rich have money.
      The wealthy have time.
      It is easier to become wealthy than rich.
      — Kevin Kelly, Excellent Advice for Living

      The only thing that matters in a lifespan is time and how we use it. To fritter and waste it in an offhand way is a surefire way to have regrets in the end, when time is gone and the song is over. Knowing this, do what must be done. Be jealous with time, that we may be wealthy beyond our money.

      To be aware and alive is the thing. To capture moments, a one line per day journal is helpful. A five-year journal allows us to see where we were a year or two ago on the same day. Some days are blessedly full of life and experience, while other days are sinfully devoid of anything memorable. Each offers a lesson in what to do with today. Do something, that we at least have something to look back on in future years, noting that this day was not frittered away.

      We get so caught up in looking ahead that we forget to spend our present time wisely. Not every moment is going to be jotted down or photographed or discussed over drinks with friends one day, but to be wealthy in time is to capture moments frequently and creatively than we otherwise would have. It’s all a grand experiment in living, and it’s ours alone to witness start-to-finish.

      We don’t have all the time in the world, but we have enough if we truly use it. Be generous with it, be wise with it, but be there with it. Unlike money, we can’t save it for later. True wealth is the active accumulation of time well spent.

    • Learning to See

      How you learn to see
      The hope eternally
      When you’re sure to leave
      Oh, leave at last
      — The Avett Brothers, Morning Song

      This blog post is being written exactly one hour later than normal, and yet at the same time as yesterday. Someone’s idea of daylight savings time flips the clock forward or backward in their respective seasons, and we all wonder why. Like most foolish rituals, it sticks because some people don’t like change. So here we are once again, changing the clocks and the morning ritual of writing before the madness of the day. What time is it really? It’s time to let go of what was.

      Lately the house has experienced changes. As the days grow longer, the communal vibe felt around the holidays fades further from memory. We often don’t stop our own scramble through the days long enough to feel the changes. Work and family commitments, a relentless winter and the rapidity of a finite life hold our attention. The day-to-day routine feels the same, but there are subtle changes.

      The dog, normally walking effervescent joy, has a look in her eyes that says something is off. Her appetite is off, her walks are more distracted. Something has changed in her mind. And then there’s the cat, normally a little ball of hate around the dog anyway, she’s gone out of her way to express it lately. Is the dog being bullied by the cat? Are they both feeling scarcity of attention and expressing it through their interaction with each other? When exactly did I become a pet psychiatrist? Pets react to change just as we humans do. They’re usually at least one paw ahead of us.

      There are forces larger than ourselves at work in the universe. Take that to mean whatever you want it to mean in your own march to infinity, but to me, some measure of hope begins with stepping away from the self and connecting with others. We are here on this brief dance through time together. Tell me, what do we really see? The changes are within us, seeking expression in the time we are given. Life goes on, and so to must we. One subtle step towards the infinite after the other.

    • 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.

    • It’s Our Time Now

      “The final mystery is oneself. When one has weighed the sun in the balance, and measured the steps of the moon, and mapped out the seven heavens star by star, there still remains oneself. Who can calculate the orbit of his own soul?” — Oscar Wilde, De Profundis

      The end of the Winter Olympics brought with it the usual mixed feelings. On the one hand, there’s a glow from witnessing the pursuit of excellence that inspires and stimulates one’s own pursuit of arete. When we see elite athletes performing at a high level, it’s natural to ask what in the world we’re doing with our own precious life.

      The answer, friend, is the best that we can given the circumstances. We are on our own path of discovery. We are on our own climb to better. We may celebrate the excellence of others, but don’t dare to compare, for we know that comparison is the death of joy.

      The end of the Olympics also releases us from watching them, that we may go forth and do our own thing once again. We are in the business of optimization of the self, first and foremost, because that’s who we’ve got to spend the rest of this lifetime with. So take stock of what’s working and keep moving in that direction, but surely, also make note of what’s not working and begin to reinvent, remove and restore accordingly. For it’s our time now.

    • Get Out and Happen

      “It had long since come to my attention that people of accomplishment rarely sat back and let things happen to them. They went out and happened to things.” — Leonardo da Vinci

      I had a conversation with someone this week who observed that Americans believe they can be anything they want to be if they work hard enough towards a goal. The inference was that this isn’t the case in some other countries. Perhaps that’s true, perhaps not. As an American it’s not for me to say what someone from another country believes. I would point towards the Winter Olympics happening right now in Milan as one counter to that argument, and read the worlds of the prominent Italian quoted above as another. I think the real point is that Americans always wear their aspirations on their sleeve. We lead with who we aspire to be.

      This blog surely doesn’t refute that statement. Decide what to be and go be it is one of the most commonly quoted lines you’ll find here (with a nod to The Avett Brothers). At this point in the blog, AI and you, dear reader, have figured out a lot about this writer. The trick in this evolving world is to never show all your cards. That ought to go for aspirations too. Don’t tell us what you’re going to do, show us with the results of your actions. This is the only truth—the rest is just talk.

      The thing is, we know that time is flying by so very quickly. The deck is stacked against any of us really doing anything significant to put a dent in the universe in the time we have available to us. The only answer to this riddle is to be audacious. If fortune favors the bold, stop being timid about what needs to happen today. Get out and happen.

    • To Be, Well

      “Ambition means tying your well-being to what other people say or do.
      Self-indulgence means tying it to the things that happen to you.
      Sanity means tying it to your own actions.”
      —Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

      With respect to the folks who are spun up about the latest offensive thing happening in the world, the thing that matters most to our well-being is what we can control ourselves. And what we can control is our actions. So it follows that we must be bold in facing the day!

      Our choices may not seem like the thing that moves the world, but our choices move our world. We have the agency to choose how we react, and we have the agency to act. Reaction and action are change agents. We change and grow based on how well we leverage these agents in our lives.

      Our well-being is largely a lagging indicator of the choices we’ve made to this point. Make better choices and life improves. Make no decisions and we may expect that things will remain as they always have been, but this is folly. Everything changes and we must be decisive in steering our lives where we want it to go. Ignore the call to action and opportunity slips away. Fortune, after all, favors the bold.

      Our climb to personal excellence is full of choices. Each day we may choose to worry about what others think or feel about us. Every day we may think of nothing but ourselves, and one day wonder where everybody went. Or we can look around, see the changes that need to happen to build a life of excellence. We may choose each day to do what must be done to be, well. In the end, isn’t that the only logical choice?

    • Every Passing Moment

      As wave is driven by wave
      And each, pursued, pursues the wave ahead,
      So time flies on and follows, flies, and follows,
      Always, for ever and new. What was before
      Is left behind; what never was is now;
      And every passing moment is renewed.
      — Ovid, Metamorphoses      , Book XV

      We are forever transformed by what was. If we take this to be true, then it follows that what will be will be realized because of what we do now. Our lives are thus reinvented one day to the next, right to the end of our days. We may choose to do something with each precious moment to ensure tomorrow renews with promise, or concede our agency to fate and the whim of others.

      Each week passes by more quickly than the last. Seven days feel like three, four weeks feel like two. So what do the years feel like? Shockingly brief time capsules marking each stage of life before the next wave is upon us. Tempus fugit. Our awareness of this rapid flip through days naturally leaves us feeling like we’re forever behind, trying to grasp the moments as they fly past. To seize what flees, as Seneca put it.

      The answer isn’t to try to cram more into our moments, but to savor what we’re doing as it’s happening. Thich Nhat Hanh suggested approaching everything, even something as mundane as washing dishes, with mindfulness, that we may process our time more fully. This is it, such that it is. So what does it feel like? What are we making of it? Where will it take us from here?

      It’s easy to meditate in the garden or even while washing the dishes. It’s harder to sit in traffic and accept the minutes turning to hours. Each situation presents an opportunity to be fully aware, fully awake, fully alive. We are all works in progress, wave after wave, surfing through time. What is this moment teaching us about our place in it? What does it offer for the moments to come?

      Whenever I tell myself to stop writing this blog and use the time for other things, I’m struck by two thoughts. First, I’m a streak-based creature of habit, and I’m not inclined to break this streak just yet. But more to the point, writing is my particular way of processing each wave, for ever and new. I gently place this post in my timeline and face the next wave as it rises before me. The days and weeks and years fly by, marked thusly, for anyone inclined to follow along (I really wanted to use the word thusly in today’s blog, and there it is).

      This post will be longer than the norm. Maybe I just don’t want to say farewell to our moment together. But the next wave is rising, and we each must bring our attention to each passing moment as it renews before us. And here it is! So thank you for this time. We both know just how precious it is.