Alexandersmap

    Tag: Philosophy

    • Stay the Course

      “Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one.” ― Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

      I’d been saving this quote for the day I finished writing the blog. It seemed as good as any way to close it out. Perhaps this will be the last—since I’m using it and all that. Perhaps.

      It seems I share a birthday with my old friend Marcus Aurelius. Not too far away now, really. He has a few years on me, of course, but reading Meditations was a catalyst for making some changes to my routine of the time, including writing this blog every day. Blogging sometimes feels like shaving for me: I don’t always want to do it, but I feel better after having done it so I keep on doing it. Then the next morning there I am staring at myself in the mirror once again.

      The answer, Marcus suggests, is to stop worrying about process and routine and obligations and just be what you aspire to be. Just do the things that make us good people. The things that make the world less good will be there either way, so we are the counterbalance to all that we wish were different. Our answer all along has been to stay the course, friend. And so it shall be.

    • To Give Light

      “What are we here for if not to enjoy life eternal, solve what problems we can, give light, peace and joy to our fellow-man, and leave this dear fucked-up planet a little healthier than when we were born.
      Who knows what other planets we will be visiting and what new wonders there will unfold? We certainly live more than once. Do we ever die—that is the question. In any case, thank God we are alive and of the stars—into all eternity. Amen!” — Henry Miller

      The thing about stars that may interest only me is that they give light to the eternal darkness of the universe for however long they exist. They aren’t relying on other stars for their energy—perhaps a little gravitation pull now and then, perhaps a bit of orbital spin, but their energy is all their own. Stars shine light into the vacuum of space with no expectation that anyone will receive it someday. That’s of no concern to the star—all their energy is put into giving light while they dance in their orbit to infinity and beyond.

      And here we are, stardust ourselves, receiving that light and mixing it with our own. We too are here to shine; we mustn’t ever worry where our own light goes, just that we give it freely to the universe in our time. The question is never whether to give light, but what our light should be. Perhaps, as Miller suggests, the answer is simply to enjoy this life eternal in our time and solve more problems than we create. Maybe it’s enough for us to put positive energy into the universe that illuminates others in their darkness, that they too might shine.

      Sometimes I wonder if I’m spinning in the right orbit or perhaps even burning out. There are days when I don’t want to do much of anything but find when I stop focusing on the void and begin the process something worthwhile eventually arrives to greet me. Something like the little note to himself Miller wrote in 1918 find their way to me and now to you, to serve as a reminder: Who are we to keep the light to ourselves?

    • The Gift of One More

      “The idea that the future is unpredictable is undermined every day by the ease with which the past is explained.” ― Daniel Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow

      “The illusion that we understand the past fosters overconfidence in our ability to predict the future.” ― Daniel Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow

      (Rest in Peace, Daniel Kahneman)

      Life is complicated and our best intentions don’t always lead to successful outcomes, but in general when we pick a direction for our lives and stick with the incremental steps necessary to stay on that path, we are more likely to become that which we aspire to be than we might have otherwise. We may accept the ambiguity of the future for what it is, even as we work to shape it into what we most want it to look like. For all my carrying on about habits and routines, I know I’m one bad day from having a series of streaks end. There are some days I want to just end a few streaks just to get it over with, until I remember why I established those habits at all.

      There’s a place for randomness in our lives. In fact, our very existence and progression to the present moment consist of one lucky break after another that led us here. It’s a miracle, or a series of miracles, that we rarely celebrate in our rush to get to what’s next. We ought to have enough awareness to celebrate our moment in the sun, even as we have the audacity to plot something greater for ourselves than we’ve already been given. We skate a fine line between proper acknowledgement of the gift at hand and the underlying expectation that there are more presents under the tree with our name on them simply because there’s always been that one more.

      So here we are: we have this one gift of today, with some measure of physical and mental fitness to do something with it. That’s an old theme on this blog, and forgive the repetition, for it’s a reminder to myself as much as anyone else. To build something consequential in this lifetime requires a measure of discipline and focus often missing in our days. If it were easy everyone would be doing it, right? Indeed. So it’s fair to ask ourselves if this is our contribution, or are we just spending the time forever preparing to leap?

      We may never produce that which we aspire to in our lifetime. We may produce it and have it ignored by the universe. That doesn’t make the journey less meaningful. Each day is one more gift delivered to us by who we grew to be yesterday. Knowing this, we ought to at least try to put a bow on the gift of tomorrow, that we might progress forever into the future until all the gifts have all been opened.

    • Do Not Say, Do

      “It is a hard thing to leave any deeply routined life, even if you hate it.” — John Steinbeck

      “You are what you do, not what you say you’ll do.” — Carl Jung

      Both of these quotes appeared in my media feed recently. I’m not particularly happy with that media feed lately, but such is the state of the world and the Internet we once hoped would democratize it. That the quotes appeared to me through all the noise that is social media now is another example of that other expression about the student being ready. Spring is in the air, travel is more than just a distant whisper now, and what exactly have we been doing to prepare for all that suggests itself to us?

      The thing about writing a blog every day is that it’s very easy to say what we’re going to do, much harder to execute on that vision. It’s routines that make us or break us. Intentions are a fool’s game. Who wants to hear about the promises we make to ourselves that we break? Who wants to write about that?

      In sales there’s a term for reaching out to someone regularly just to check in and see if they’re ready to work with you. It’s called a drip campaign. When the student is ready the salesperson seemingly appears at just the right time. That can be viewed as either opportunistic or pragmatic, but the prospect will eventually leave a routine they’ve grown accustomed to whether they really want to or not. A diligent salesperson will be the one they nod to in that moment.

      Life is sales. We’re either selling ourselves on the idea of change or we’re being sold to by the rest of the universe. What the salesperson has to learn is that it’s dissatisfaction with the routine that drives change. At that moment, we flip from all talk to meaningful action. At that moment we begin to do. And doing is where the magic is.

    • Who I Am

      When I was young, it seemed that life was so wonderful
      A miracle, oh, it was beautiful, magical
      And all the birds in the trees, well they’d be singing so happily
      Oh, joyfully, oh, playfully watching me
      But then they sent me away to teach me how to be sensible
      Logical, oh, responsible, practical
      Then they showed me a world where I could be so dependable
      Oh, clinical, oh, intellectual, cynical
      There are times when all the world’s asleep
      The questions run too deep
      For such a simple man
      Won’t you please, please tell me what we’ve learned?
      I know it sounds absurd
      Please tell me who I am
      — Supertramp, The Logical Song

      The beautiful thing about moving through a few decades is rediscovering the soundtrack of your youth well after you rejected it for the waves of more current music that followed. Supertramp was one of those late 1970’s bands that I loved for a time, forgot all about, and delight in all over again when I hear one of their best songs now. How is it a band with as many hits as they had isn’t in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame yet? Because they were surfing the wave instead of creating the next one? Spare me. Music stirs feelings deep within us, and Supertramp created some timeless masterpieces that still ring true. But I digress…

      The other beautiful thing about moving through a few decades is that sense of momentum that comes from focused living. We learn what works for us and what we’re good at. We lean into mastering a few skills that make us uniquely positioned to do well in some niche of life. And if we’re lucky, we collect a few people around us who like us for who we are.

      Who we are…. That’s the real trick, isn’t it? We spend a lifetime figuring it out, finding our way, embracing change for change’s sake, just to keep marching onward and upward. Until one day we hear an old song that makes us remember that part of us that we left behind that still whispers to us in the quiet moments.

      The thing is, most people don’t want to wrestle with such things as who they are, let alone who I am. Generation X kept all this stuff to ourselves, leaving it to these generations that followed us to put it all out there for the world to deal with. I admire that about them even as I roll my eyes at the drama in it all. Be who you are, I’ll do the same, and we’ll both agree to respect each other’s differences. It’s the provocation that irritates. It asks that we not be who we are but to reach across that invisible threshold and become something more. And sure, sometimes we need to do that too. Just meet us halfway.

      I’m not much of a musician, for I was afraid to pursue it for where it might have brought me once. But I know it’s in me still, as untapped energy put into other places. Writing was once like that for me too, but now I regularly dabble in words. The beautiful thing about moving through a few decades is we have the time to let go of the things that were holding us back from ourselves. From who we really are. Less sensible, perhaps, but possibly more wonderful. Beautiful. Magical.

    • The Given

      “I inherit from the past of my family, my city, my tribe, my nation, a variety of debts, inheritance, rightful expectations, and obligations. These constitute the given of my life, my moral starting point.” — Athenian oath

      If the way we live our lives is based on the routines and beliefs we establish for ourselves over time, the foundation for those routines and beliefs is that which we’ve been given by the circle of people who have surrounded us from our beginning. The desire to break free from that circle begins in our teenage years, but there’s no getting around the momentum of the given. Our very identity is formed by those we’ve been surrounded by. Is it any wonder that some people move away, that they may be someone else?

      When we think about the people who have influenced us most, we begin to understand ourselves more. Our positive and negative voice that quietly whisper to us as a running dialogue, waiting to rise to the surface to make an appearance in our best and worst moments? Given. Our fallback position on everything from religion to politics to underlying feelings about people who are “different from us”? Given. Our lives begin with momentum. But that which is given is merely our foundation. We are the architect for who we become beyond our base.

      “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” ― Jim Rohn

      That circle changes over our lifetime. The gravitational pull of our belief system from when we were a child changes as the circle influencing us changes. When we go off to college or move to a faraway place, we are breaking free of that which once influenced us and placing ourselves in a new, developing circle. Most of us have the personal freedom to choose who we want to be. It begins with who we surround ourselves with, and how we spend our days. Habits and routines are as essential to our becoming as who we started out as in the beginning.

      Lately I’ve been in many conversations about what we’ve been given. Our emotional, intellectual, physical and financial foundation established momentum for each of us. It’s up to us to keep that momentum going from there, but there’s no doubting the impact of the forces that brought us here. It’s easier to become what’s next with a running start than it is from a static position. Reflecting on our own momentum might enhance our empathy for those who start without any. When we think about it, we are all part of the same tribe, aren’t we?

      “We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.” — Winston Churchill

      We are all part of someone else’s circle. Isn’t it just as fair to ask ourselves what are we giving, perhaps even more than what are we getting? That Athenian oath doesn’t just speak of rightful expectations, but of obligations too. Living a meaningful life demands that we use that positive momentum to pull others up as well, that our circle grows larger. Great societies and cultures are built on such things as this. This is true excellence, for it lives beyond us.

    • Venture

      “Dare to be strong and courageous. That is the road. Venture anything. Be brave enough to dare to be loved. Be something more than man or woman. Be Tandy.” — Sherwood Anderson

      So what, one might fairly ask, does Anderson mean by Tandy? It’s not an English word and you won’t find it in the dictionary unless there’s reference to Jessica. Well, he spares us all of that, as Tandy is defined in the very quote and the short story of the same name that it comes from. Venture anything. Be brave enough to dare to be loved. There we go. Some people venture into dark places. Some shine brightly in a lifetime of growth and transformation. Choose wisely.

      Anderson was an influential author who apparently really embraced the roaring 20’s and the personal freedom that brought to those who let it all hang out at that time. Henry Miller mentioned him as one of his favorites. William Faulkner spent a good deal of time with him. A hundred years later most people don’t know his work, but it lives on through the work of authors who became giants themselves. His epitaph reads, “Life, Not Death, Is the Great Adventure”, which is a statement we may get behind ourselves. He seemed to be quite a character, and his work is on my radar. This is how we expand into broader reading, isn’t it? This blog is full of such characters who come to life through their words and Wikipedia bio.

      What do we aspire to? Are we willing to pay the price to reach that place? Perhaps. Anderson himself turned his life upside down a few times over to become who he wanted to be. Novels and some measure of fame aside, his life doesn’t read as a hero’s journey, and ended abruptly when he swallowed a toothpick that created internal bleeding and likely sepsis. There are so many strange ways to end a life. But the question remains—how do we live?

    • The Different Angles of Experience

      “Our state of mind is never precisely the same. Every thought we have of a given fact is, strictly speaking, unique, and only bears a resemblance of kind with our other thoughts of the same fact. When the identical fact recurs, we must think of it in a fresh manner, see it under a somewhat different angle, apprehend it in different relations from those in which it last appeared…
      Experience is remoulding us every moment, and our mental reaction on every given thing is really a resultant of our experience of the whole world up to that date.” — William James

      The experience of being on a full domestic flight down the coast is different every time I take it. This is obvious as the people, service and weather conditions make every flight different. What we sometimes forget is that we too have changed, and with these changes our reaction to the next flight changes in kind.

      Some flights, like some days, are better than others. Some planes and seats and expectations of service are better than others. We too are either more prepared to roll with the changes or worse. Developing a keen sense of awareness is helpful, but not nearly as essential as having a fully developed sense of self awareness.

      I used to travel for business far more frequently. Flights all over the continent honed my travel acumen. Each flight offered both opportunity and a cost, but in all cases a new entry in the chronicles of life experience. The hope is to learn and adapt to each, that we may be better for the next day.

      Travel is just living in a different way than we live when we aren’t traveling. Life will throw its curveballs at you in either case. Experience teaches us to anticipate some of those curveballs, but more often than not something new will upset the apple cart. Such is life. Change happens and will happen again. Appreciate the journey is the most important thing we can ever realize.

    • Truth and Stories

      “Truth is the only safe ground to stand on.” ― Elizabeth Cady Stanton

      Truth is not found in the media or popular opinion or in the best of intentions. It’s seen in the boxes checked (or unchecked) day-after-day, cold indicators of what we have done or not done with the promises we make to ourselves. Truth is the scale and the waistline and the recycling bin. We know the truth when we encounter it staring right back at us. Maybe that’s why so many prefer to focus on other people’s stories instead of their own truth.

      Stories are what we tell ourselves about the world and our place in it. Stories scare us into submission or make us feel better about unchecked boxes. Stories are watercolors of hopefulness or fear, the promise of better somedays, and reasons for why we didn’t act then. Stories are lovely things or scary things, and sometimes confused with truth, until truth knocks a story down to size. Some people live their whole lives in a story, never finding the truth. What a sad story indeed.

      Change may be built on the truth or a compelling story. We ought to know what is driving us, that we may arrive at a place better than the one we departed from. What are we tracking in our lives? Properly tracked, metrics tell the story of who we might become, while telling the truth about what we’ve done thus far. We are what we repeatedly do—that’s truth, but we may decide what to be and go be it—that’s a story. Both are necessary for us to reach another place in our lives.

      It’s fair to ask ourselves where we stand, and what we stand for. What do we find acceptable in our lives? What do we settle for? Just where are our stories taking us? When we encounter the truth in these questions, we may change the chapters to come in our lives. For tomorrow is a story to be written, the only truth is today. Which begs another question: what will we do with it?

    • To Fish or Cut Bait

      “An ounce of action is worth a ton of theory.” —Ralph Waldo Emerson

      We can plan indefinitely but not go anywhere, and we can leap into the unknown with nothing but a flash of inspiration to guide us. But at some point in our lives we must fish or continue to cut bait.

      Some days we look up with amazement at how much we have done. Some days feel completely wasted. The only thing to do is learn its lesson, put it behind us and lean into our next day. We win some, we lose some—the only tragedy ls to never try again.

      Just don’t return to cutting bait. What kind of life is that? Go fish.