Weather

A hot, humid morning in New Home - 40% chance of rain (which here means that it will rain 40% of the time).

Weather is one of those funny things that you try and plan for when you move, but I don't know that you are ever able to really do so. I knew what the weather was supposed to be like when I came here, and mentally prepared myself for it. In very many ways it lived up to exactly what I thought it would be.

But the thing I failed to prepare for was the overarching effect weather has on all activities. Even inside, weather becomes an issue, especially in summer - do we sweat or run the A/C at 82 F, which makes it tolerable but raises the electric bill. And outside - enjoying things even in the shade with humidity is definitely different than just dealing with the heat itself.

But it's good in an least one sense: it forces me to face another excuse that I can make to myself about not doing something i.e., the weather. The reality is, the weather is always there. To continue to put something off because the weather is "different" or "just humid" is to admit that on some level, I didn't really want to do it. It's the same with everything else I do or want to do: do I immediately look for excuses, or knuckle down and move forward? It's only in the going when you don't want to or can't seem to that character is built.

So I'm off to build character. I'll just need to shower off this sheen of humidity induced sweat first...

Goal Mountains

"We are built to conquer the environment, solve problems, achieve goals, and we find no real satisfaction or happiness in life without obstacles to conquer and goals to achieve. People who say that life is not worthwhile are really saying that they themselves have no worthwhile goals."
- Dr. Maxwell Maltz, The New Psycho-Cybernetics

This passage spoke to me this morning as I got out bed, mulling over the sort of sad mess that was yesterday and the pile of things that are on the plate today. This made total sense to me - but at the same time, I realized that I was missing these sorts of goals.

Dr. Maltz talked about a patient who had received a promotion and suddenly lost his confidence:

"However, once he got the promotion, he ceased to think in terms of what he wanted, but in terms of what others expected of him, or whether he was living up to to the people's goals and standards. He was like a mountain climber who, as long as he looked upward at the peak he wished to scale, felt and acted courageously and boldly. But when he got to the top, he began to look down and became afraid. He was now on the defensive, defending his present position, rather than acting like a goal striver and going on the offensive to attain his goal. He regained control when he set himself new goals and began to think in terms of, 'What do I want out of this job? What do I want to achieve? Where do I want to go?'"

Maltz's solution?:

"Get yourself a goal worth working for. Better still, get yourself a project. Decide what you want out of a situation. Always have something ahead of you to look forward to - to work for and hope for. Look forward, not backward. Develop a 'nostalgia for the future' instead of for the past."

Among many of the things listed above (they're good quotes - go re-read them) is the phrase "always have something ahead of you to look forward to." That resonates with me because right now, I really don't have that in a temporal sense (for salvation possibly - but even looking forward to Heaven holds some of the same difficulties for me). Every day to me seems like it will be like every other. There is nothing to look forward to to suggest that tomorrow will be any different.

But that's my fault, Maltz suggests. Nothing is going to magically appear to suddenly give me something to look forward to - that's job. Yes, it may be hard to see right now, but just because it is hard to see does not make it any the less important - if it is hard to see, then I need to do everything I can to make it real.

But that pre-supposes a first thing: one needs to have a goal or goals.

Knowing a Destination

If you don't have a goal, how do you know when you arrived?

I was speaking with Fear Mor yesterday morning about some of my job musings, about the industry I'm working in, and what I am thinking about careers. As the discussion arose, I got to talking about the fact that in other companies I've worked, we tended to work on products that were trying to meet a specific and real need. That was somewhat motivating, I realized: it was a sense of doing good and working for a greater cause.

Then it hit me (these things always seem to, right on the old noggin) that I don't know that I've ever consciously thought of doing this at a company, that I have had the presence of mind to say "Hey, that's something important to me." As I thought and pondered over the subject more, I realized that my work goals heretofore has been pretty much "Money". Trust me - it's important, but not enough to carry you through a career.

It was at that point that the image which I have used before hit me: an actor starting their career. Yes, they originally start out in "B" movies or in small playhouses, but the ones that want to succeed, they don't stay there. They use that experience, train to become better, and move on.

But the other side of that coin is that they know where they are headed. I'm not sure how they do this, but at some level in their brains they have a vision of what they want to do and where they want to be. Jim Carrey, it is said, wrote out a slip of paper as a $1,000,000 check to himself, and often looked at it to remind him of his goals.

So what do I have in my mind of where I want to be? If I want to stay in this industry (and there are perfectly good reasons for doing so), what is the type of place I want to work at? What is it I want to be doing?

If I can see those, then I can see where I am and what I need to do to get to the next level.

What is Happiness?

What is happiness?

Yes, I know what happiness is, but do I really? It is obviously more than the absence of sadness - I can be not sad but not happy. It can have multiple causes - something that may make me happy last week may not do anything for me this week, or something which probably shouldn't make me happy does. And it cannot necessarily be forced: I can "choose" to be happy but fail to be able to implement it?

So what is happiness?

Webster's says that happiness is "A state of well being and contentment" or " a pleasurable or satisfying experience." Interesting. When I'm happy, I don't think that I define it as a "state" of anything. I just define it as being happy.

Well being and contentment? Again, that sounds like something a lot more involved than what I am looking for on a daily basis. Those I often associate with the outcome of some greater decision or feeling in life. Possibly I could think about happiness as a pleasurable or satisfying experience, but that makes it experientially based, when what I think I need is something dependent not on an experience (how many times do I have non-satisfying experiences but still seem to be "happy"?).

But is happiness what I truly need?

I need something which does in fact create a state of well being and contentment, that is a pleasurable and satisfying experience, but does not necessitate an event to create the state or make the experience - in a sense, I need happiness which is not based on an event that creates it.

Is it happiness I'm seeking, or is it joy? And if so, what is the difference?

What Do You Want To Be When You Grow Up?

The Ravishing Mrs. TB asked me last night "Have you decided what you want to be when you grow up?"

I stared at her in the dark (the sort of thing that creates no effect because, well, it's dark) and asked "Have I what?"

"Have you decided what you want to be when you grow up" she said again. "You need to be happier. If your job is the issue, what is it that you want to do?"

I sighed. "I suppose what I'm doing now is it. The pay is good, and the career path is not too bad. The company - yeah, the company I don't care for so much but that's people, not really the career. Besides, I can't really change right now."

"No" she replied, "but you could start doing it in small steps."

I clonked off to sleep sometime soon after that but the thought was there for me to pick up when I got up this morning. If I was to do something else, what would it be?

Interestingly enough, I had been thinking around that thought earlier in the evening. I came up with five things (in no particular order):

1) Writer
2) Farmer
3) Swordsman
4) Musician
5) Theologian

The odd thing is, all of these are currently present in one form or another in my life, just as hobbies or part of hobbies. So it's not so much a question of not doing them, it's a question of doing them more.

How would one get from here to there? That I'm not sure of. The reality is, my current career field could (over time) fund a transfer over to any one of these careers (except swordsman, I suppose - not much calling for that these days) - and with a little effort on my part, I'm willing to bet that even earning with this field could be significantly improved.

So what do I want to be when I grow up? What am I willing to do to get there?

A Moment

Looking back in my life, I can see points where corners turned, where a decision - a single decision in a single moment- changed the course and outcome of my life.

The interesting thing to me is that if I look back, I can consciously see that at the time those decisions were made there was a sense of "I shouldn't be doing this" - but I went ahead and did it anyway.

I am rapidly approaching another one of those decision points in my life, not so much a major decision of direction but a choice of ethics, a choice that I am (theoretically) paid to do.

I have to be careful. I have this tendency to overdramatize these things, making every event the equivalent of The Charge of Light Brigade. None the less, this time I think it qualifies.

A single decision in a single moment.

As with any question of ethics, is it worth the outcome of the decision? Is it worth the inevitable nagging and haggling, the "You're too conservative" and "You don't really understand" and (my most favorite) "You must obey"?

What is my honor and my ethics worth? A paycheck? Or something more?

Two Different Places and Rambling

I heard from one of my old bosses this morning, who has finally (after over a year) secured a position in Seattle.

It's always nice to hear from old co-workers, especially when they've secured new employment. You of course ask a bit about the new company, are they moving and selling/renting their house, how things are going in general, etc. - and then follow up with a short update of your own. You make the generic comments about "Hope to see you again" - although in this case, I actually do go to Seattle from time to time and have a chance of running into him again.

Contrast this with a random thought yesterday: on a whim, I went to look up someone I knew while doing business at The Firm. Turns out she has done well for herself; so well, in fact, that she has moved to the next level of licensing and could potentially go out on her own if she so desires. She has done very well for herself since she entered the industry 8 years ago.

I bring these two up in juxtapose as I consider my own career path 20 years later. I've changed careers 4 times and moved around a great deal, but I continue to hold the title and responsibility I hold the same as I have for 8 years. Have I truly advanced in this field? Have I truly moved forward? Or do I just do the same thing at different places? Could that be part of my dissatisfaction?

The reality is that for what I do now, there is no real end game. The only path is up, with decreasing positions and similar responsibilities. Is that what I want? Is the fact that more of the same is not that attractive driving me to this contradiction of seeking that which I subconsciously don't want to seek?

One Thing At A Time

I made a mighty effort yesterday to focus at work.

I typically do not have the luxury of choosing my days or how to spend them: as the primary opinion leader for the bulk of many decisions by mid and lower level employees, I am regularly visited by them for opinions, signatures or reviews. I don't mind this function, both for the fact that it keeps me in contact with the daily flow of events and thoughts as well as having people ask before they execute (and we then have to discuss how to solve bigger problems). However, the consequence of this is the ability to focus singlemindedly on a task is often nil.

But yesterday I did it to a large extent. I chose one area of my job and tried to work to get everything involving that area under control.

I made great progress - although I still have as much as a second days' worth of work to do. But oddly enough, I did not feel accomplished when I left for the evening.

Not accomplished? How can that be? You said that you made an effort to accomplish things around one task and you did.

True enough. But what I realized as I focused in this one area were the 10 other areas that were not getting focused on and things not getting accomplished while I worked in this one area. It was if one part of the garden were properly hoed and prepared while every other section was weedy and continuing to sprout even as I said "Job well done" and went back into the house.

I'm honestly not entirely sure what this shows, other than 1) the power of focus and 2) the reality a system which may very well be out of control. I suppose it also goes to show that doing too much with not enough will in the end create a system in which much time is spent careening from problem to problem instead of managing towards a fully functioning system.

But the other thing this experience indicates to me is that the concept of accomplishing something is in itself not necessarily indicative of a thing or a system (or even a life) that is truly healthy. Not merely accomplishment, but accomplishment in balance is the key. Accomplishing anything is not in and of itself indicative of a success; it is only when the whole is viewed that the success of the accomplishment can be measured.

Torn

I am struggling with my heart torn in two.

On the one hand, my heart continues to be at The Ranch. Speaking with my parents this weekend, they related how the unusually wet winter has lead to the meadows being green with grass, the streams running high, geese wandering around the meadow, the bees are doing well, and the garden that my father has put in is moving along. I would love to be able to go there this weekend, look at the bees, see the meadows, and plan my inevitable "big plans" for what can be done up there.

On the other hand, what seems to best for my family at this time is for us to stay in New Home. Na Clann have a wonderful school, I have a good paying job and we are able to contemplate rebuilding our financial lives. For so many practical reasons, this seems like the place to be right now.

So how do I merge my heart and my necessity? How do I keep from constantly not being here? It seems that most things that I truly want to do are there, not here. Do I surrender those dreams and (at least in my own mind) settle for here, or do I continue to hope and dream perhaps ending in tilting at windmills?

Work and Work

Yesterday I realized that I have placed a barrier in my life which does not need to be in place.

For years I have separated "work" into three categories: the work that I do to get paid (my "job"), the work that I do for which I am not paid but which needs to happen (family, home, etc.), and then the work I do which is for me (hobbies, goals). I have carefully segregated this time, ensuring that one does not carry over into the other and that my own time (especially) is focused specifically on me.

What I realized yesterday is that this creates two levels of difficulty for getting anything done: 1) There is a constant sense of having to start up and stop any one of these three areas with the resulting loss in time; and 2) I have learned to associate great amounts of effort and diligence with my job that do not carry over into the other two areas, because I have come to believe that family/home/hobbies/goals should be enjoyable, and enjoyable means by default not working like at my job, which I often do not enjoy.

If you have children you probably already have a fine subconscious understanding of this: when your children, who were two minutes before excited playing outside or using their imaginations, are turned to the task of their homework, what do they do? Do they embrace it with the same enthusiasm, or do they suddenly become unenergetic, complaining, whiny, wondering why they "have" to do this?

(I'll carefully not point the same finger at myself, although I know it to be true.)

The reality is, we are always "working", both in the sense of moving forward in performing tasks on any number of fronts as well as training ourselves to become more diligent and learning to accomplish tasks.

In this sense, "work" simply rotates between these three areas, all of which should have the same level of importance in our lives: if we excel at our job but have no personal development or hobbies, we wither as individuals; if we excel at our job but fail to make efforts at home and with our family, we have family relationships not worth emulating by our children, overgrown lawns, and cars needing maintenance; If we excel at home/family and goals but are poor at performing our jobs, our paychecks will reflect this.

If work is viewed not as tasks but as an attitude to accomplish, suddenly this barrier breaks down. I'm accomplishing different things of varying importance, but the effort has not changed; what the effort is being expended on has. I should think that this would help to bring balance to my own life, as suddenly items in all three areas are moving forward, instead of one.

And relaxation? That still remains a part of life, although even in that the same level of effort should be made (the old phrase "Work Hard, Play Hard" comes to mind).

If I truly made this kind of effort (as I will this week), what would my life look like? What would I be accomplishing that I am not right now?

Stress

Stress walked into the room this morning and sat down on the couch.

I was already a bit grumpy due to the fact that I had to be up early this morning and had not gotten a great deal of sleep anyway. Fantastic, I thought: just one more fabulous way to start the morning.

"So how's it going?" Stress asked in the rising tone which indicates a person knows very well how its going as he stretched out, nearly knocking over my coffee in the process.


I grimaced as I rescued my coffee from nearly going over. "Fine, fine" I said. "To what do I owe the honor of this visit?"

Stress smiled broadly again. "Oh, nothing I suppose. You've just been spending a great deal of time with me lately in work, in not sleeping, in your personal life. I just thought that with all this time, we should probably just make a day of it."

I looked at the clock and sighed. I did not have time for this along with everything else I had to do today. "Look", I started, "today's a bit much for me and I'm really not going to have a lot of time to speak with you. Anything in particular, or just your usual 'Hey, the world is ending' routine?"

Stress smiled languidly. "I'll not be that easily deterred. You're under a lot of stress right now. You're eating up your personal life to make other parts of your life work. It's good for me, of course, because I thrive on this stuff. I actually just stopped by to tell you to keep it up."

I started to rebuke him, then stopped. He was right, of course: my entire personal life, my spiritual life, my family life, my romantic life - all of it was becoming sacrificed to the great tyranny of the urgent and stress.

"Leaving me with what?" I said out loud, forgetting anyone else was in the room with me.

Stress smiled again. "Oh, with nothing really - except me, of course."

He slowly stood back up. "Guess I'm done here" he remarked as he stretched back and forth. "Hopefully I'll see you again today. Maybe not."

And with that he was gone, leaving me to mull over my life through stress's prism as seen through a half warm cup of coffee.

Thought for the Day

"Grant me, Lord, to know all that I should know, to love what I should love, to esteem what most pleases You, and to reject all that is evil in your sight. Let me not judge superficially by what I see, nor be influenced by what I hear from ignorant men, but with true judgement to discern between things spiritual and material, and to seek Your will and good pleasure at all times and above all else." - Thomas A Kempis, The Imitation of Christ

Self Death

"There is hardly anything in which we have such a need to die to self as in seeing and suffering things that are contrary to our wishes, especially when we are ordered to do what appears inconvenient and useless." - Thomas A Kempis, The Imitation of Christ

I have been slowly reading my way through The Diary of David Brainerd, Missionary to the Indians (1718-1747). He was a contemporary of Jonathan Edwards. The diaries were edited by Edwards after Brainerd's death (likely from tuberculosis) at age 29. He dated his conversion to an event at the age of 21, so he had only 8 years of service (and life).

To read his diary is slow going, both for the denseness of the text as well as trying to actually absorb it. What emerges (at least what emerges so far) is a man who was passionately in love with God, hyper-aware of his own sinful nature, and often very depressed. Yet in spite of his sinfulness and depression and the conditions under which he labored (literally in the forest in 18th century colonial America), he stayed faithfully at his post until he literally could no longer serve.

I juxtapose this with the above quote from Thomas A Kempis because it seems to represent the other side of the same coin. I have often talked and thought about the concept of dying to self but don't know how to do it; here, A Kempis shows one of God's primary methods of doing it. By seeing and suffering things contrary to our wishes, by doing this which appear inconvenient and useless as commanded by others, A Kempis suggests that we are building up our ability to die to what we want in a practical fashion.

It's not that it sounds pleasant, nor is it from my experience. But that does give a different slant on things that occur in my day: maybe the purpose of at least some of them is not so much that I accomplish anything because of them but that I embed in my character how to die to self - so that in some greater circumstance (the extreme being Brainerd), such things will not seem so onerous or undoable but merely an extension of what I have already done.

Tuesday

Happy Birthday.

This is one of the oddest birthdays I can think of - for no other reason that more than any year previous, it simply feels neither festive nor like a birthday.

(Yes, I'm aware it's 0545 and things seldom seem festive then).

Maybe it's related to the fact that my life has been overwhelming both in terms of sheer volume of things to be done and my relative lack of enjoyment of most of it. Maybe it's due to fact that I'm grappling with the fact that everything I wanted to do seems out of touch and out of reach now and there's nothing to really fill the vacuum. Maybe it's because every day is becoming more and more a repeat of the one that went on before, so that one is not so much living life as marking time.

Maybe it's because Tuesday's are the least festive of all days of the week to have a birthday on.

I'm not sure, and possibly there is no good reason. What I do know is that of many of the birthdays I can remember, this one seems the least fraught with the expansiveness of possibilities of another year.

Decisions

I made a decision yesterday.

It was not a truly significant one: after months of having to borrow a mower, I decided to go out and buy one.

The decision was made as I stood at our neighbor's door, knocking to borrow the mower (again). I suddenly made the decision that I wasn't going to borrow anyone's mower anymore. And back to the house I went to go out and buy one.

It felt good, making that decision. And then it hit me: my life is a series of not making decisions.

When asked, I defer. When pressed, I demur. In all cases, I tend to not make decisions rather than make them, even in such non-threatening things as lunch.

Where does this extreme reluctance to make decisions come from? Admittedly I've never been a great decision maker, but this has reached the point of insanity.

On one hand I'd say it was The Firm. That was a decision that I made - and the repercussions of it still continue to echo through my life. If anyone desired a case study of "Decision gone bad", that is it.

The other one is my fear of not doing what God wants me to do. This is an even longer running saga between what I perceived was my calling in my youth (Ministry) and where that led me, which was anywhere but. I have always feared that by choosing something, I would choose the thing that I was not supposed to do. What this tends to breed over time is not just a looking to God for direction (which is good) but a slavish reliance on signs - any kind of sign - whether a decision is the correct one or not. One starts looking for flights of birds or the slant of sunlight or even the voice in the night. Again, taking too far this leads to constantly waiting on others to indicate action.

So how does one overcome this - because it felt so yesterday to make a decision, so empowering and visceral and in-control? The secret, it seems, is simply to do it: no, not necessarily go off and make a life altering decision based on minor circumstances, but just start getting into the habit of making a decision when a decision is called for.

If one makes decision after decision, who knows where it will lead?

Where Have All The Dreams Gone?

The ever supportive Otis and I were having an e-mail conversation this week about the earlier posting (here) involving Himself. Otis' point was that he was in for the long haul, not only to be there but to help achieve the dreams I had.

The whole comment about dreams got me to thinking and pondering - mostly to the extent that I suddenly realized that I don't think I have any anymore.

"What?" you may say in shock. "You? The great dreamer, the great imaginer of many different things? No dreams? How can this be? Is it the result of your apparent mid-life crisis?"

I don't really know - I just know that at Otis' prompting I suddenly turned around and looked and the horde of dreams that used to follow me around were completely gone, leaving a desolate mental wasteland to my mind's eye.

Why have the gone? A couple reasons, I would submit. One, of course, was that many of the dreams I had were just that: dreams, imaginings that could (and would) never come true.

A second reason - not that 's any better - is that the choices that I have made have ruled some of them out. As we choose a career, a marriage, and children, we simply have less original choices available, and many of those dreams become unattainable as we work within the consequences of those choices.

The third reason - and the one that is most bothersome - is that I have simply seem to have given up. Those dreams that I have tried for generally failed. As a result of my choices, I have responsibilities which must be fulfilled. Dreams become subsumed by responsibilities and choices, until one's day, one's week and one's life becomes a long list of things that must be done and expectations that must be met. Any hope one had of changing that seems to grow more and more distant every day, leaving only the dull ache of duty in it's place.

How does one come about new dreams? I'm not sure I would even know where to start. As a child, one acquires them as a result of what one wants; now, it is all hedged with the starting knowledge what one actually has to do in life - which immediately comes up every time a dream is proposed: "Yes, but..." and "That would be nice, but here's what I have to do..."

Have to. Must. Responsibility. Duty. Dream killers all.

So here is my question: What is the catalyst to reawaken the dreamer and dreams? How does live change from an adventure to be lived instead of a duty to be endured?

Thought for the Day

"It is a small thing to endure hard words from time to time, if you are not yet able to bear hard blows. The reason why you take such trifles to heart is that you are still worldly, and pay greater regard to men's opinions than you ought. Because you fear their contempt, you do not like to be corrected for your faults, and you take refuge in excuses." - Thomas A' Kempis, The Imitation of Christ

Dreaming Again

Another wretched night: up at 3 AM, last known dream about work, last know dream about work being laid off from work.

This is becoming a trend.

Of the three, I don't know which is the most annoying: The fact that I cannot sleep past 3 AM on a workday (weekends: no problem) is annoying and somewhat physically degrading. The fact that I dream about work is annoying because I do it but it at least is not consciously controllable. The whole "I get laid off thing" - that, I have nothing for.

Something is going on - something inside my head, or something inside my life that I'm either ignoring or not conscious of. How do I figure out what this is? How do I act on whatever I is eating at me?

What am I trying to say to myself? Why can't I hear it?

Friendship and Fish

I've been thinking about Himself again.

I don't know really why. This year marks the fourth anniversary of last contact, and the fifth anniversary of the failure of The Firm. It's not as if I have moved on in time and space from that event, but there it is.

I go through this periodically. I'm not quite sure what to call it: Nostalgia? Regret? A nagging sense of guilt? A restless sense of failure? A need for closure that is not there?

This isn't about The Firm. That has been long closed out in my mind and in my soul - and given the current state of that industry, the fact that I am still not in it has more than likely greatly reduced my stress level.

No, it's more the personal aspect and side of an relationship that (if I live long enough) will arguably encompass 13% -20% of my lifespan. Not many relationships last that long (good heavens, many marriages don't last that long!). A relationship that for many years was the standard against which I judged the relationships of myself and others, a relationship that withstood the test of different locations, different states, different jobs, and different life experiences.

But either could not take the stress of business - or the stress of a friendship with business.

But then my mind asks itself, "If contact were to come, what would you say? 'How's your job going? What are the kids doing?' Be honest, the contact would be no more than reconnecting on Facebook with someone you went to school with 20 years ago." And in that my mind is probably right: there are some relationships that seem to pick up where they left off, even after a long period of time. However, there are others which lie there flopping on the pavement like fish out of water, gasping for air, counting the moments until they can be pulled out of this uncomfortable situation and plunged back into their regular environment.

I used to believe that friendship was a resilent thing, taking time and tide without fail. What I've found is that it is far more like an aquarium fish: pH, temperature, and water quality all affect the quality of it, even though they are not visible to the outside.

What prevents me from going back into that aquarium? I don't know which is more powerful, fear or shame: fear, that I will either be rejected or hear the feedback I don't want to; shame, because of this incessant need to find out why and how and the neediness it may be indicative of.

The Deceit of Sin

"If we say we have not sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive our sins and cleanse us from unrighteousness." - 1 John 1: 8-9

The thing about sin that I find so amazing (if in fact one should consider something about sin amazing) is the multiple layers of it within my own life, and how easily I am deceived by it.

I can start out with the best of intentions and discover sin lurking there. I peel that layer off, ask for forgiveness, and move on. Right underneath it is another layer, slightly better hidden but still there. Peel that one off and move on. And then, when I think I'm starting to reach the core of altruism, there's another layer, heavily spiced with good intentions and "thinking of others".

The reality is, sin is warp and woof of who we are: it's permeated into everything that we do. Without Christ, the attempt to act with sin is simply that: an attempt, one that will eventually lead nowhere.

Even with Christ it is difficult for the Christian to live on a day by day, moment by moment level without sin trying to run (and ruin) anything. Unless focused, the mind runs away with itself; unless constantly reminded of my true purpose here on earth, I can easily become enamoured of lesser things that lead not to Christ and His glory but me and my satisfaction - all the time vehemently protesting that I am not thinking of myself but Christ.

But for the Christian it starts with what John says above: that if we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and have no truth in us. Ponder that for a second: Christians, who say that they follow the truth, can have no truth in them. It's only when we acknowledge the fact that sin by confessing it (for to confess something, you have to know you have something to confess) that we receive the cleansing and forgiveness we so desperately need.


In a way it's a frightening thought: everything I think and everything I do has the potential to be a carrier of sin to myself or others. But at the same time, it's a liberating thought: I have the power through Christ to be forgiven and overcome that sin on a moment by moment, day by day basis.

I need only acknowledge The Truth.

Eternity

I spent the afternoon and evening last night reading Beyond The Khyber Pass: The Road to British Disaster in the First Afghan War by John H. Waller. It covers the history of the British in the Punjab and the initial British involvement in Afghanistan leading to the First Afghan War culminating in the virtual destruction of a British Army corps and their camp followers (16,500) in retreat.

The book is the kind of history book I best enjoy: well written, giving the historical back story, showing the many small points and people that went into a very poor decision. It’s also the kind of book that makes one think, both about current events (for obvious reasons) as well as the scope and focus of one’s life.

To read of these characters – British, Russian, Afghan, Indian, Sikh, and wandering adventurers – and to read of their plans and goals and dreams and machinations is look through the mirror of history 160 years. Of these matters of great import – the “Great Game” – where are the nations that played it now? Of those who sought to advance goals and plans for corporate, national, or personal enrichment, how did they turn out? Where are they now?

It gives a moment’s pause in reflection to look upon my own life now, my own aspirations and goals. Where will these be in 50 years? In 100 years? I can tell you that they will be in the same place that the Queen’s Own 44th Foot is today: scattered and buried in the brown earth, forgotten and having no impact.

This may initially sound morbid. It is not. It is a clarion call to the fact that anything we do here on earth that is not mingled with Christ’s purpose – anything – can have no lasting impact in the light of eternity. It is only when we turn our purposes and goals away from ourselves – to “deny ourselves, take up our cross daily, and follow Christ” – that we put our lives into something that lasts. It is the difference between spending and investing in something. In the first case, we receive a good now but that is all; in the second case, we work now to receive something better in the future.

We desire, we crave impact – Christians and non-Christians alike. But we set our sights too meagerly on impact: we only look to this world, the here and now, while Christ wants us to look for eternity.

If I were to truly deny myself – if I were (as John MacArthur writes) to “invest totally in His kingdom, unconditional surrender all rights, retain no privileges, make no demands, safeguard no cherished sings, treasure no earthly possessions, and cling to no secret self indulgences” – and seek my impact and goals in Christ’s, what would my life look like? What would eternity look like?

Demanding Success of Others

"Therefore a skilled commander seeks victory from the situation and does not demand it of his subordinates." - Sun Tzu, The Art of War

How often do I demand that others create my success rather than myself?


I write this both as a manager and as one who is managed, who is responsible for and responsible to individuals. I hate the feeling myself, when I am expected to perform a task on behalf of a superior knowing that I am doing his or her work - but do I do the same thing to others? And is insuring they get credit enough?

But is that true of my personal life as well - do I want to involve others in my ideas (or, let's be fair, crazy schemes) not simply because I enjoy doing things with others (which is true) but because at worst I want to share the labor or at best I want someone else to do the work?

I would point to things that I do, to projects that I get involved in. Is it something that gets done by me, or is only when other people are "involved" that something happens?

Sun Tzu here seems to be pointing the fact that a great commander gains his victory from the situation, not placing the burden of the success on those reporting to him. This does not mean that the commander does not employ the individuals working for him or that there are expectations from them. What it does mean is that the commander understands the nature of the situation and his goal and uses those to create the victory. It's a subtle difference, I suppose much like the idea of lifting a rock by yourself versus using a lever to do it. You and the rock are the same participants in both situations; the lever changes the situation by moving your success to it rather than yourself.

It's a good thought and one to be cognizant of, especially if you manage others: are you making them responsible for your success, or the situation which you're in? One is tyranny, the other the mark of a great leader.

Writing With No Subject

There are mornings (like this one) that nothing springs to mind or to my fingers as I sit at the keyboard. This is the third time of typing; the previous two got were one or two sentences long, then quietly got deleted with the rapid tap tap tap of the "Delete" key.

How do ideas germinate for writing? I couldn't really tell you. Sometimes they appear in my head the night before; sometimes something I read in the morning speaks to and through me. Sometimes simply beginning the process initiates the winding trail of finding a subject for that morning.

But there are also times - like today - where none of that happens. Whatever part of the brain starts the writing process just sits there looking at me with a dazed expression, as if to say "I've got nothing. How about you?"

Is writing communication or an exercise? It's both, really. I'd like to think that it is the process of me communicating to my theoretical readers things that I find important or useful or even silly upon occasion.

But I have also come to appreciate that it is just as much an exercise, or a series of exercises. It's an exercise in collecting one's thoughts and laying them out. It's an exercise in creativity to some extent, finding something to write on every day. However, mostly importantly (for me, anyway) it's become an exercise in persistence, in 5 days a week sitting down at something and creating - even if it is not good, even if it is not what I had intended. One of the great struggles in my life has always been keeping with something overtime. In some small way, this blog helps me along that path.

So writing, then, is about persistence and keeping a commitment to myself.

Hey look, I found a subject after all.

Wednesday Morning

The Morning silence
again invades my senses:
dog quietly snoring,
refrigerator humming,
the slightly humid air slowly swirling.

A cool cup of coffee sits at hand,
waiting to be washed down and then refilled
with the overhot coffee in the pot.

It is a moment of background noise
yet intense quiet, the day waiting to begin:
a welter of thoughts and actions struggle
in my consciousness trying to get out and take action
before their time.

But I will sit here, at least for a few more minutes,
enjoying the peace that is not silence
and the state of relaxing
before the coming storm.

Gossip

So I have this problem with gossip.

Mostly, it's at work. I am a junkie for information, for data, for theories, for then taking all of that information and working out grand schemes about people and policies and directions and motives. I collect data like some collect baseball cards: carefully filed away by player and knowing the statistics on the top twenty cards.

And I use it. I use it the way nerds in high school use magic tricks to gain acceptance, demonstrating my industry experience, my knowledge and my ability to call a person or situation as a freshman would make a handkerchief disappear. It buys me currency in the realm of popularity and solidarity against those who often (it feels) treat me poorly or have my fate in their hands without any consideration of me.

But is it right?

The acid test is this, I suppose: Would I mention that information if they were in the room? Not the "Oh sure, in my mind I would do it (wind blowing in hair, courageous music playing in background) but "Would I do it and feel good about it if they were in the room but out of my sight (no wind, no music, just piles of paper and fluorescent lighting)?"

Done too long, this becomes an acidic canker in the soul, always eating away at every perceived intention and comment, carefully weighing words and motives to put them in the worst light or the light which is most helpful to my theories, not the reality - until one reaches the point that all motives and all theories are suspect except my own.

I was reminded this morning of 1 Peter 2:18: "Servants (employees, in this case), be submissive to your masters with all fear, not only to the kind and good but also to the harsh." Submissive, among other things, is not engendered ill will among others. Paul goes even further in Chapter 3 of Colossians by stating "But now you yourselves are to put off all these: anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy language out of your mouth" (verse 8). It's as if Christ was whacking me over the head, saying "Does this engender respect of your leaders of work? Does this build a more cohesive work environment, or one where you get to be the most popular at the cost of the respect of others?"

And that most damning question of all, "Is it Christlike?"

I'm going to try an experiment: for one day, I'll say nothing involving gossip or negative language about my work situation or those in it. One day. Perhaps not much, but maybe it's a start.

What is Personal Growth?

So what is personal growth?

I'm 631 posts and 5 years into this blog plus 20 years (this year) of journaling, spending a fair amount of time looking into my life and the actions around my life. Am I any better or different for having done so?

I don't know. I certainly don't feel like it - more that whatever changes have occurred have taken place as a result of circumstances I've been rather than some conscious choice to change or improve.

It hounds me a bit because my pits and flaws and failures only seem to become more self evident to me, while the changes and improvements made seem few and far between and hardly noticeable at all. Any effort to try more almost feels doomed to the same sense of failure.

Which is why I bother to ask the question at all: What is personal growth? What are the signposts, the roadmarks, that indicate that progress is truly being made? Am I truly as stagnant as I feel, or is there evidence that such growth has occurred, even if it is not visible to me?

Do I have too great a hope for personal growth or change? Perhaps I'm laboring under the illusion that it will be like high school or college, where change was swift and felt as such. Perhaps the very nature of change is more subtle as one grows older, not that it is not present.

I'm not sure - all I know is that for all my jottings, I should feel, I don't know, different.

Bang Your Head

I have been mulling over the night Otis's comment from yesterday post. I include the relevant comment here:

"I would challenge you as I have in the past that maybe the reason you are at your current job or industry isn't to necessarily accomplish things on paper as strange as that sounds. Maybe you are there for a different reason. How can you be an influence and as an example to those who you interact with on a daily basis? This can maybe help you adjust your thought process and attitude away from the tasks. Just a thought."

It's a fine thought, and probably a good one. The fact that it makes me bang my head is probably not relevant.

Questions, always questions. If influence is the question, why this situation? Why couldn't I influence people in a situation that I might enjoy more - you know, as a writer or maybe in this industry but not in a pressure cooker? If I'm an example, what am I an example of - how to slowly go mad, or perhaps how to question your career choice 12 years after you made it?

(Banging of head commences)

Somewhere inside of me, I know I should be grateful - as The Ravishing Mrs. TB pointed out, at least I'm not in a job where the ceiling literally collapses on you and buries you underground, and I certainly know the pain of not having a job to go to. At the same time, I grow weary of going to a job that I tolerate not because of some esoteric attachment or even because it's actually doing some good somewhere, but because that's what I do now and the possibility of changing to something else is remote at the time. I would, as I have only a few times in my life, like to get up to go to work with a sense of excitement and pleasure, instead of the dull sense of necessity that propels me out the door virtually ever morning.

If an influence or example, it would at least feel helpful to see some of that in my daily existence, instead of not seeing or feeling the impact - if ever. Probably the only thing worse than spending time in any activity which serves no purpose is the illusion that you spent your time there to fulfil a useful purpose, only to find that you were wrong after the fact.

The Wan Downslide of the Soul

So here it is, Thursday. One would think that I would be more excited - after all, we've entered the downhill side of the week, we made it through Wednesday, and there are only two workdays left (in a four day work week, no less) until the weekend.

One would think.

Part of this is simply due to the time at work - it's my cycle to work late, so I'm spending 10.5 hours a day work plus the commute time so it easily becomes 12 hours a day, so by the time I get home, have dinner with An Teaglach, put Na Clann to bed, my energy is low. Things I would like to finish or even do seem inevitably to fall off my list.

Another thing that I think is impacting me is the follow-on that always seems to come after I sit down for a goal setting/life improvement thinking session. I walk away from those with great energy and great thoughts, only to get slammed by the reality of my life (and in this case, an extra heaping of work). It seems that every time I do this, I crawl home that evening almost in tears, painfully aware of the huge gap between anything that I would like to accomplish and the reality of my life as it is. The mental discussion with myself then slides one of two ways: either I am foolish to perform those kind of activities based on the realities of life (24 hours in a day, work at least 8, need to sleep at least 7) or I am a failure because I can't do those things so therefore I must lack the will to do them. This will again somehow end in tears and frustration at my life.

The sort of surprising thing that happened yesterday was the thought "Let's just leave it all. Just pick up and go."

A surprising and not altogether happy thought - but it brings into vivid belief for myself the "Mid-Life crisis", that time culturally speaking for American males that they see to go off the deep end, seeking a lifestyle of youth or even something extremely risky or different. Why?

If they are in a version of the same situation as I (and I suspect many of them are), they simply feel trapped by the lives they are in. They've reached the beginning of what are typically the prime earning years, usually are well ensconced in their marital and child rearing relationships, and have many of the accouterments of having worked for years - but come to the screeching realization that the life they have is probably now the life they will ever have, and the thought of another 20 years of living in the same mold is suddenly revealed for the long tunnel it really is.

And so the urge to find something completely new and different, live differently, live without responsibilities at time when they seem oppressively bearing down on the soul of the youth inside of them who was a poet or a writer or an explorer, a desire to taste again (for some length of time) the excitement of discovery or living extemparenously or doing what one wants to do -instead of the rigid schedule, unchanging responsibilities, and drab realities of life.

In their heart of hearts, maybe they grasp that the promise is not there, that shucking large portions of a life they've built for 20 years is neither as simple or as rewarding as it appears and that the damage done by living for themselves is brutal to those around them and probably does not deliver what they are hoping for.

Maybe.

But sitting in the car, commuting in the dark for the umpteenth time to a career of shuffling papers without impact, feeling trapped by the life one is in without the hope that writing a series of "100 things to do before I die" will make difference doesn't really seem to be a viable option either.

Work Dream

Work dreams are the worst. There is nothing less fun than waking up from a dream about work only to realize that you have to get up to go to work. There is very little that is more demotivating.

And this one was one of the better ones. Simply put, I got fired.

Oh, it wasn't that straightforward, of course. The people involved were a combination of individuals I have worked with throughout my career: a coworker from my first job in the industry, an HR person from two companies ago, a Vice President from 3 companies ago, my current boss, and a current coworker.

The crux of the dream was the fact that I was fired.

Fired by my current boss (he was the one in the dream). The ironic part was that he didn't remember that he had fired me and could not remember the reason that he did. One of my coworkers (the current one) couldn't believe I had been fired; the other one (the one from long ago) continued on working on his tasks, even as he had no clue either why it had happened to me.

My last day there, my boss came up to me and asked me if I had scheduled my going away lunch. I looked at him somewhat strangely and said no, I hadn't. He wondered if I should.

I went to HR as my last stop, which was strangely my old college. I struggled to get HR's attention but finally got it; when I told them I was fired, they couldn't believe it and hadn't been informed. They called in the president (my old VP) who assured me that I wasn't fired - show up for work tomorrow. She then drifted off, leaving me to my own devices, to wander back to my home.

Finally, I called my boss. "Why aren't you here?" he asked. "I got fired" I replied. "Fired? No-one was fired" he replied. "When do you leave for your audit?"

At that point I woke up, rolled over to see the clock was at 4:53 AM, and then had that sinking feeling realizing "Hey, now I get to go to work and really live it!"

Work Tuesday

And here it is, Tuesday.

I am sitting here in the cool overcast New Home darkness, the wind rustling the trees as I mentally and spiritually prepare for the work week ahead. It's a form of willing suspension of disbelief, as I consciously ignore the problems and issues I know await me there.

Which begs the question: is this the way things are supposed to be?

I know, I know: all work, at some level, involves toil and struggle, and I certainly do not labor under the fact that it is otherwise. Still, I have to wonder if this level of essentially ignoring the way things are going to be is the way things have to be - or is this an aberration?

Certainly now, due to contractual obligations, I am not in a position to do anything about it - but I can begin to plan to do something about it.

The interesting thing is that, when I ponder it, every time I have made the determination that I am going to find a new position - truly find one, not just dabble - I have. So much for "I can't do it". The other reality is, I seldom have traded up in my positions. In responsibility, in job function, in the state of the companies I come to, all things tend to be the same. So is the the fault of where I go, or is it the fault of how I choose, what I am, and how I present myself.

The reality is that in any industry, the very best (in the sense of most competent and most skilled) always have employment. It's the second tier, the third tier, that is constantly struggling to find another position, find a higher position - who are trapped.

I hate feeling trapped in a job, that there are no options, that I must stay. It's then that the compromises of character and ethics begin to take place -"I have to do this, or else I'll lose my job."

Not for me - at least, not anymore. I will compromise neither character nor ethics for a person or a position.

The job is replaceable. The character and ethics are not.

Charting a New Course

I've had a delightful time with my parents being here this weekend - although it's been an interesting period of introspection for me.

I'm a man trapped in two places: New Home and Old Home. I find that both of them are holding attractions for me, in different ways: New Home in the fact of what opportunities it has afforded Na Clann, Old Home in the fact that my heart lies in the Ranch.

But in either event, I've come to realize that the possibilities that exist in either - or both - locations are not going to happen unless I make them happen. Doing what I've continued to do will not get me any closer to any of the things that I would like to accomplish. In other words, I've got to work on changing things.

And things within me. I've realized that I'm working for people that are more educated than I, but not smarter. The learning can be had.

My contractual obligations are coming up on their conclusions, and my ability to chart a new course in my career will become open.

The date cannot find me unready to act.

Maundy Thursday

Maundy Thursday.

What was Christ thinking as He prepared for this morning, His last morning before His Trial, Crucifixion, and Death?

Was He exhausted as He woke up?
Was His mind filled with things that He still had to do?
What did He think when He saw Judas that morning? Peter?

Was He already walking through the Last Supper in His mind?
Did He hear the snap of the whips, feels the spikes?
As He walked through Jerusalem and saw the Passover lambs, did He think of the task before Him?

Did He already see the glory set before Him?
Did He already hear the "Well done" of His Father?

What was Christ thinking as He arose to die?

Can or Can't Do

Yesterday I realized a basic difference that I seem to have with many people: I have a "Can't Do" attitude.

Oh no, not about simple things like making it through the day or completing simple tasks. No, it's more in regards to high vision or grand plans (usually set by others) in which stretch goals are being set, at which point my brain starts to shut down and instead of considering the concept of "Yes, it can!" I mull over "No, it can't!"

So I'm wondering, does this make me a pessimist or a realist?

I'm sure the view from those setting the goals is that I'm a pessimist, the roadblock in any unit or organization. When everyone else is trying to find the reasons we can, I'm finding the reasons we can't. When everyone else is moving forward, I'm dragging my feet and then having to hurry up.

But I'm also a realist. I've dealt with the problems of rushed planning more times than I care to think of. Sometimes "We can" is a thin mask for "We have to, even if it's not prudent" - and so often those that set these high expectations move on to the next thing, leaving those of us who are "responsible for it" trying to cobble together something that will continue to function.

So how do I mesh the two, more of a positive "It's possible" attitude while maintaining some level of "what's realistic"?

A "can do" attitude gets things done, but a "can't do" attitude makes sure that they are done in a way that they can continue to be done.

Shinken

I have started practicing with my shinken - true blade, to those (like me) who existed beyond the world of iaido a scant few months ago. This is an actual blade, 29" in length with an 11" handle.

It's different from the what we usually train with, a bokudo: a laminate wooden sword (mine is 26 inches in length with an 8" handle). Obviously, for availability of use as well as safety, bokudo are what we use on a day to day basis - but the end goal is to be able to use the techniques with a shinken.

The first time I pulled mine from the sheath (saya), I almost dropped the darn thing: it was heavy! The first week, I simply had to practice drawing it and then holding it in the first cut position, not letting the tip fall to the ground (a trick, if your not used to holding a 8-10 lb sword with one hand). As I've been working with it, I've moved up to holding it steady as well as being able to begin to wield it smoothly as I practice overhand cuts instead of the "chop-fall-recover" mode I was using when I first started.

In practicing with the shinken, I realize how light the bokudo now feels and how relatively easy it is to wield. It leapt to my mind, as I was practicing last night, that this is how life is as well.

We complain the first time something occurs. We can hardly do it, or lift it, or move on through it. Then, as we practice it and actually do it, we find that it become easier and easier and the old way of doing things suddenly (almost magically) becomes effortless.

Heartening in a way, as I practice keeping my tip up, that the same is true in life.

Weeding

Yesterday I spent part of the afternoon pulling weeds.

I'm struggling with the concept of living in a rental house again after owning our home for almost 10 years. There is a level of responsibility and effort one puts into their own home, as it belongs to you: it's not only where you live, it's an asset.

A rental is different. Yes, I want to take care of it (because it's not my property), but the level of care sometimes becomes difficult find the cutoff line. So for example the back yard: I spent about two hours pulling out thistles and dandelions. With every pull, I started to see another five that I had missed. As I go over to grab those, eyeing the limp pile of greens in the wheelbarrow and calculating space in the garbage (already filled with leaves), my thoughts start to wander to areas I could clean up, or maybe re-establishing a section of grass, or what would I do if...

And then I snap back. This is a rental. Any effort I put it, while perhaps personally rewarding and giving Na Clann more lawn to romp through, is simply effort that will stay behind me when we go - which we will someday, one way or another.

And then I realize that my life is no different.

We are all just renting time in these bodies. They'll be returned to the Owner someday, and everything we did to them and through them and the things that we got to make their existence more pleasant will be left behind when we move on - which we will someday, one way or another. All the effort and time on the exterior, all the things we had to make them more livable, all the things we expended effort and time and resources on - all will be left behind, leaving us to meet with the Owner.

His question will not be "How did you beautify the rental? What did you fill it with?" but "How did you serve and glorify me?"

Let us endeavor to so work and live that our answer will not be "I made the yard more beautiful for myself."

Time Management of the Ages

One of the sempai (older students of my dojo) spoke a bit with our soke at the seminar we attended this weekend. He and his wife speak Japanese, so they were able to interface a little more than the rest of us through the translator. He asked the soke about his training and his life in martial arts. He was a busy man for much of his life: he became soke at an early age (mid-20's), had a family and a "regular" job, yet functioned as the head of a school. 

 How, my sempai friend asked, did the soke train and improve in this? 

  Soke confessed that he was very busy at all times but had decided to focus on martial arts, specifically our own art. The keys to using his limited time wisely was (his own words): 1) Concentrate 2) Practice the proper technique.

  I heard this, and thought about it all the way home. It's deceptively simple, even if you add the pre-step: Focus, Concentrate, Practice the proper technique. But as I thought about it, it became clearer that this in fact is a valid and useful tool in managing one's life and goals. 

 Given the society we live in, the reality is that none of us have as much time as we want or need, and we will never be able to do everything that we want or even need to do. For those things that we deem worthy (or required) to spend our time on, it becomes critical that we spend our time in the most valuable and useful way. If I concentrate fully on what I am doing in the limited time I am doing it, and I practice the proper technique in whatever I'm doing, it seems logical that I will improve in those things - in fact, I don't see where one could not. Even in the work environment, concentration on a single task and completing it according to whatever the template ("Proper Technique") is will almost certainly result in a greater degree of success.

 Time is not multiplying - all we can do is simplify how we manage it to maximize our use of it.

Too Many Tasks On My Hands

Leaving work yesterday, I realized that I am the in the position of having too much to do and not enough time to do it all.

It's a careful balance, of course. The first place I always have to start is my own use of time: am I using it effectively? I always need improvement in this area, especially at work, which has the interesting sideline of being my main point of socialization as well.

But beyond time use, there is simply a point at which one has to look at the resources and time one has in hand and say "You know, there simply may be too much work here to do and we're not resourced to do it all."

You can imagine how popular this opinion is amongst management.

So what does one do - not only for one's self, but for the employees under one's care? Any suggestion that we can do anything but what is commanded is inevitably met with the raised eyebrow, the tightened mouth, the invisible opinion of "slacker" and "not a team player". To suggest anything other than all things can be accomplished by a less than minimal amount of people is to suggest not that tasks are not possible, but that you are not capable.

Why is it that I've become incapable of making decisions - critical ones - and am willing to defend them? Why do I, who constantly am full of opinions about resources and tasks and time in my own life, cannot apply this same standard to my career? Is it that I don't see the need, that I cannot defend this to those above me, or that I lack the ability to successfully demonstrate my case?

I'm not sure - only that too many tasks with too few resources end up creating issues that cannot be solved, only glossed over.

A Different Spring

Torrents from the sky
rip the phosphorescent night:
Spring comes with thunder.

A Meditation on Death

One of those "Stop and Think" moments yesterday. A rather distant business associate of The Ravishing Mrs. TB passed away yesterday. She die from Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease, the brain wasting disease similar to that of BSE. She was diagnosed 36 days prior.

She was 43 years old.

It's one of those things that stops and grabs your attention at work, and then for the rest of the day. 43. That's darn near my age. And then you get to thinking about the totality of it.

43 is considered dead center in a lifespan in the US these days. This is the age where you're supposed to be in your prime earning years (per the actuary tables), planning for the remainder of your life, preparing your children for their own lives even as you are starting to find the balance (hopefully) of them taking less of your immediate time. Life's horizons for the next stage are starting to dawn; you may be able to see the fruit of the last 20 years of your life from college beginning to blossom.

Or not.

It gave me pause as I sat there, surrounded by paperwork of questionable value, demands from others about how I should fill my day, and crises which are only crises to a small percentage of people even at my own company. If I was notified today I had 36 days to live - and all of those good days, not the days typical of an degenerative disease which hardly present one with the faculties one has at full health - would I be ready? Would I look back on my life and say it was well spent and well invested, not in the material but in the relationships with family and friends and my service to God? Do I truly involve God in all my plans - not only the big ones, but the day to day ones - to insure that to the greatest extent possible I am living as I should? Am I spending my time energy on things that matter, or do I squander them on things of little import thinking that I will have time in the future to do the important things, time that is never vouchsafed me in fact?

And if any of this is true, what will I do about it?

Elegance

Elegant: Characterized by dignified richness and grace; luxurious or opulent in a restrained manner; characterized by a sense of propriety or refinement; impressively fastidious in manners and taste. At seminar this weekend, our soke, watching us perform a series of particular kata, stopped us with his gentle but firm arigatoo gozaimsasu. He moved to the center of the training dojo, and began to speak. "Iaido must be elegant" he said. "People are afraid of swords. To make iaido elegant is to make people lose their fear and make it accessible to them." He then performed the same kata; his moves were smooth and graceful, unhurried and well, elegant. 

 It gave me pause, as elegant was not a word that I had heard in some time - not for years in common speech, and some time even in the literature that I read. 

 What is elegance? You can see the definition of elegant above: dignified richness and grace, luxurious in a restrained fashion, a sense of propriety and refinement, fastidious (paying extreme attention to) manners and taste. It would seem to be a thing to be sought after: a sense of propriety and manners, dignity, restraint. 

 So why is it something at that we apparently no longer value - or even mention? 

 We have become a society obsessed by looks and attention and ourselves. Our self and our self image is important, often the most important thing going on in our own lives (and it should be so too in the lives of others). Our cultural heroes revel in the impact that they make through their appearances, sometimes even more so than the substance of their work. The ability to follow a sustained chain of thinking and logic has been replaced with the 3 minute song and the 30 second promo. Even in the business world, the well thought out and well executed plan is buried under the imperative of "Let's make money - now!" 

 Elegance is not flashy, but it can be beautiful. It is not loud, but it can be impactful. It is not a fast download of sensory images, but it can overload the senses. It is also not rushed. It cannot be made better by a bevy of lights and colors and cameras and screaming fans. Often it takes time and effort to develop this elegance, something that we as a society no longer have the time - or interest - to do. 

 I challenge you: take one aspect of your life, one solitary element, and seek to make it elegant. See what a thing of dignity, grace, propriety and restraint looks like and can do - not just for you, but for those around you as well.

Desperateness

"Lord Naoshige said: 'The way of the Samurai is in Desperateness. Ten men or more cannot kill such a man. Common sense will not accomplish great things. Simply become insane and desperate.'" - Yamamoto no Tsunetomo, Hagakure

At seminar this weekend, our soke (the head of our fencing school) observed us during our drills and stopped us. "This is not good" he said through the translator. "When you are doing the kata, you have to act as if it were real. Don't swing your blades - cut. You must incorporate desperation into your training. You must act as if you were desperate. This will give excitement and make your training real." He then had us go at it again, but this time as if for real.

To the greatest extent I could, I complied. I drew and parried with full force, not just touching the blades. My overhead cut (kirioroshi) was as quick and hard as I could make it. My retreat was low, watching my opponent.

As I reflected yesterday on my training and on the experience, what came to me is that this desperation of which he speaks is both incorporated and not incorporated into my life into the opposite positions of where it should be.

My job is a series of desperations day by day, also known in modern parlance as "Fire-fighting". We careen from situation to situation, from emergency to emergency, adrenaline always pumping and goals which are not of our own making always needing to be fulfilled. We have reached the point of the Greek saying "The bow that is always strung will break."

On the other hand, the rest of my life has no sense of desperation in it. I meander from idea to idea, task to task without ever feeling a sense of urgency to complete them. They then become only nice ideas to think about, rather than things that need to be done.

I need to reverse this trend: work needs to become less desperate, the rest of my life more so. Sensei is right that with desperation comes excitement - in battle the excitement of living or dying, in everyday life the excitement of succeeding or failing with the course of your existence (a form of battle, just more stretched out). I have allowed the two to become reversed in my mind and in my practice, which ought not to be.

At work, I need to chart a course and confidently move towards it, putting emergencies in their place as opposed to them putting me in their place. At home and in my personal life, I need to insert desperateness into those activities which should have them, giving the sense of life or death and the importance thereof.

Because in some cases, it's those things that are the true matters to be desperate about.

Soul

There are times when words become hollow vessels,
Shells of concepts which house appearance but no meaning.
There are times when emotions become landscapes,
Gardens which have been overrun by weeds.
There are times when our dreams become fantasies,
Movies that have no basis in reality but only in relieving our pain.

It is times like this that I wonder, Lord, why?
Why does it seem that I am made this way,
Always seeking something that does not exists,
or seemingly grappling with something alone
that I know others struggle with?
Why is the reality so often less than the potential,
the illusion more powerful in others
than the truth in myself?

How do I tell myself, that self that will not be turned,
that the reality is the reality; there is nothing else,
that even in the reality there is possibility for things greater
than I can possibly imagine?

How? I do not know.
I only know that I whisper words devoid of meaning,
feel emotions devoid of feeling,
live reality devoid of dreaming.

How to Succeed - By Really Trying

Seeing the results of the Oscars this week, I'm prompted to think of what causes actors and actresses to suceed. It's not as if they start out as being "Best Actor" material or garnering multiple Golden Globes - more often, it's the end of a journey that is marked by such starts as "backup band guy" or "lady in diner" credits. As I was mulling this over, I especially thought of Jim Carrey, whose start was as a backup band guy in "Peggy Sue Got Married".

It crossed my mind because whether I continue in what I am doing or switch into something new, I will hardly start out at the top - so what enabled these people to do the same thing (in a far more viscious industry, I might add)?

This is what I came up with:

1) They do the best they can at whatever role they land. Jim Carrey (above) is the example here, but I'm sure there are a thousand more like it. (For example the first time I remember seeing Patrick Stewart in a movie, it was in the first Dune, which was a total flop. He managed to do okay later, though).

2) They have an idea where they are going. I recall reading of Jim Carrey, who made a carried around a homemade check made out to himself in the amount of $1 million when he started his acting career.

3) They are always seeking to improve their skills. I'm guessing a bit on this part, but I would imagine that in order to expand their abilities to get new and more expansive roles, they have to have the skill sets to make those roles possible.

4) They hustle. It's a cutthroat "What-have-you-done-lately?" industry, and no-one - especially when one is starting out - will do it for them.

Wednesday Blues

By the time I hit the midpoint of the week - usually Wednesday, sometimes as late as Thursday and as early as Tuesday - I'm done. All of my planning, all of my sincere hopes and best intentions are gone. I struggle to get out of bed, my peace of mind destroyed in a welter of general grumpiness and lack of energy.

Why is this? I ask both because of the fact that I get tired of living this cycle week after week and because it insures that I will never get closer to advancing on anything.

So what is it? Sleep? Could be a factor - I usually come off of the weekends as well rested as I am all week. Accomplishments? Depends. Some weeks I am well on my way to checking off my To Do list, other times not so much.

But neither of these encompasses the feeling of blahs, even downright thunderclouds, that haze the edges of my mind even as I write this morning.

If I had to categorize it, I'd say a sense of hopelessness.

By the middle of the week, I've realized (or at least think I've realized) that there's no sense of moving forward in my life, that in some cases the list of things I've set for myself are not at all accomplishable, in other cases that doing those things is not really moving me towards my goals. I'm then overwhelmed by this sense of "What does it matter?", followed by a hopeless sense of duty.

I can't keep doing this. I can't keep living from week to week on this roller coaster of "Achieve and Go Forward" followed by "Stay stuck in the valley for another week."

It's not enough just to set goals - they have to include goals that actually advance you towards somewhere.

The End of the World and Things

I finished watching Rolland Emmerich's 2012 last night. Overall pretty predictable for the end of the world movies that he puts out (although watching California slide into the ocean was sort of interesting).

It got me to thinking in this time of financial uncertainty and global earthquake instability about how we live our lives.

As you watched the pictures of Haiti or Chile over the last weeks, you saw pictures of complete destruction, pictures of people alive but with everything they owned buried under rubble. It's sobering as I sit here is my warm home, cup of coffee nearby, listening to the rain bubble down (from inside), surrounded by accouterments of living that one acquires having a wife and children, to think that all of this could inexplicable be beyond my reach by the time I get home from work today.

All the plans we make for the future, all the things we save for and save up, all can simply be immediately - and inexorably - change in the blink of an eye.

In light of that, how much time and energy do I put into these things?

Aye, there's the rub: pouring my time and life into things that in the end don't last and I can't truly control. Why is it that I am so reluctant to see that, or even to say that? Why is my first reaction so often "More, more"? Why is it that the things that are intangible - my family, my friends, my God - something that I don't view with the same sense of investment, the same sense of care and concern, the same sense of realizing that they are gifts which, by the grace of God, could be removed from my life at any time.

In Me, Myself, and Larry Phil Vischer quotes Henry Blackaby in saying "He who has something plus God is no better off than he who has God alone" - that things are not the addition to our lives that we so often think that they are.

What are you investing in today?

March Rain

Early morning rain
pours down, as the aroma
of coffee wafts up.

If the opposite
were true, would I love the rain
as I love coffee?

New Home Dawn

In morning stillness
Oak leaves drop, a clicking snow:
Prophecy of Spring.

Confidence

"Nothing splendid has ever been achieved except by those that dared believe that something inside of them was superior to circumstance." - Bruce Barton

Where does confidence come from? On two levels, I suppose: the day to day level of confidence, and the ultimate underlying bedrock of the Christian's confidence.

I ask this in the context of being one who often does not have a great of deal of confidence, at least in myself. There are morning like this morning that I feel ready to take on the world, to bend life's mighty energies to my purposes; and then there are the evenings when I roll home and hang my head in the car after I turn it off, feeling completely defeated.

So where does it come from, this confidence that enables people to do what seems impossible to to me to even conceive? I'd love to have that kind of confidence, the kind of confidence that enables one to engage in a career day to day knowing that by working on the true dreams of the heart, there would be a success. One reads of it often: the individual who, toiling away by night and early morning, achieves success in a given field and everyone is surprised that someone like "that" could do this.

On one level I understand it: when I feel confident, it's like a high. I feel alive, full of energy, ready to face the world. It's like the feeling you get after a run (only better, in the sense that it doesn't involve sweat). It's probably one of the closest things to the fountain of youth as one gets older, because it's not dependent on physical prowess or looks.

I know that my ultimate bedrock of my confidence comes from Christ, from what He's done on the cross on my behalf and the behalf of all sinners. As He is a promise keeper, I can have confidence that He will keep His promises and that all He promises will come true. My question is how do I translate this into a day to day confidence that will allow me to rise beyond my circumstances, see those goals and talents that He has placed within me, and move towards them?

In writing the above sentance, I see that I used the word promise a lot. Promise. One of the motivational speakers I read talks often of keeping promises to yourself - that in setting a goal you are committing yourself to complete it, making a promise. So often, we are more willing keep our promises to others rather than the promises to ourselves.

So maybe that's a place to start: keep the promises you make to yourself. Believe that as you keep your promises to others, you will keep your promises to yourself.

And then, of course, keep them, as the Primary Promise Keeper has kept His.

Friday Blues

Another Friday where I arrive at the week feeling exhausted, rather than exhilarated.

Why is this? I could chalk it up to a lack of sleep - indeed, it's been years since I've had a "normal" sleep pattern - but that's not the totality of it. Work? Work's been no more or less difficult than in the past. And we're going into the weekend as well - that period of time where neither of these two are a factor. Yet here I sit, desperately trying to motivate for the day ahead.

What is it about things that draws me to this point from time to time? It's consistent in the sense that it happens periodically without any visible reason.

Hope possibly? A sense that today is one more day like any other and (barring something revolutionary) it will end on the same note as every other day. How do I fight this?

Dip Ahead

One of the dips in the roller coaster ride raised its head yesterday: the exciting kind, where suddenly you find yourself staring straight down at a long line of tracks with no indication of when the tracks go back up again.

My first reaction, of course, is my typical reaction: become depressed, retreat, grumble. But this is certainly not compatible with what I proclaim, that God is in control of all the circumstances, and that I am to glorify Him - because the reality is that these things don't occur in a vacuum: even as on a roller coaster your fellow riders are watching you (well, maybe - they're probably watching the track), so those around me are watching me to see how I react. I proclaim I believe in an omnipotent God - do I act like I believe it?

Making God real to those around us is not only the case when we are in a good place, it's probably even more relevant when we are in places not so good.

The Vineyard

My reading this morning included Mark 12: 1-12, the parable of the vineyard owner. In it, Christ tells the story of a land owner who clears and prepares land for a vineyard which he plants (including hedges for a fence, a tower, and a wine vat) and then leases it to tenants. At harvest time, the landlord sends his representatives to collect his portion of the harvest; the tenants beat some and kill some but send all away empty handed. Finally, the landowner sends his son, whom he believes they will respect. The tenants' solution is to kill the son (as the heir) and take the land for themselves. The landowner's final decree: he will cast out those who were currently leasing the vineyard and give it to others.

In the context of the gospels, this story is directed at the Pharisees and Sadducees, those two groups perennial groups that opposed Christ's ministry and bound the Jews to their laws instead of the law of God. Fair enough. But what struck me in reading it this morning was the activities of the landlord.

The landlord, Christ says, owned the land. He cleared it. He prepared it. He even planted the vines - and if he was coming back to collect the harvest, the implication is that the vines were not just newly planted but established (3 years minimum). He provided protection for it (in a planted hedge) and prepared facilities for use (a tower and a wine vat). Only after all this was done did he rent the land.

What are the responsibilities of the tenants? If you know anything of vineyards, hard work but not a great deal of challenge: prune in winter; manure in spring and fall, trim in spring; water in spring and summer, drive off the birds in sumemr and fall, harvest and prepare wine in fall. The hard work, the clearing and ripping soil and planting and preparing a water source and buildings are already done.

And what does the landlord ask for? His share, the share he earned for putting in the preparation and expense of the vineyard, not to mention the ownership of the land.

But the tenants are selfish and ungrateful. They don't seem to appreciate or realize everything that was done prior to their arrival, only that they "did" all the work but the landlord (who was in a far country and not visible) did nothing to assist them. Casting aside all gratefulness and memory, they attempt to hoard it all for themselves, forgetting that in the end, they have no ability to either hold the land or a right to it.

What a wonderful metaphor (wonderful in the sense of a stinging rebuke) for much of my own life in relationship to God. I neither own the world nor my own life: I didn't prepare it, I didn't make it, I just happen to be occupying it. God only asks of me that I care for the vineyard I'm in and give Him His portion of the fruits at the end of harvest - in both cases acknowledging the fact that He is the owner of the vineyard, and I am only a tenant.

My response? Too often it's like the tenants' of Christ's story: I fight against all God sends to me (not stoning or killing anyone, like that makes it better), denying Him the rights to which He is entitled. My "work" is "mine".

How often I get stuck on my "rights" and not on God's grace in ownership - or His patience in dealing with me, time and time again. Perhaps it's time to look down the nodding rows of vines in spring and remind myself Who made this all possible and what He is really asking of me.

A Prayer for Lent III

"Lord, make possible for me by grace what is impossible for me by nature. You know how little I can bear and how quickly I become discouraged by a little adversity. I pray You, make every trial lovely and desirable to me for Your Name's sake, since suffering and affliction for Your sake is so profitable to the health of my soul." - Thomas A' Kempis, The Imitation of Christ

Purpose

An epiphany of sorts last night - in the sense of purpose of life.

I don't know why I hadn't seen it before. I've certainly danced around the issue before with other writings and postings, but it never hit me head on. What is my purpose in life?

1) To Glorify God.
2) To Advance The Kingdom of God

That's it. That's the purpose - or purposes, I suppose (they're sort of two sides of the same coin): to glorify God by my life, indeed by my existence, and to advance God's Kingdom.

How do I do this? Ah, there we fall back on some of the previous issues that have plagued me in the past, knowing what to do.

But maybe not now. After all, if glorifying God and advancing His Kingdom are my purposes, then what I do is a little less critical so long as I am doing those things. I have to believe that as I do that, other things that I am to do will become more apparent.

But some of them probably are. What are the opportunities that are in front of me now? What situations has He put in? What talents and gifts has He given me, what do I like to do? What audiences are granted me (that would be you, gentle reader)?

All of these are signs, hints, indeed tasks to be accomplished. What I am to be doing right now?

The things that are in front of me - right now.

Quick Thought for a Monday

My apologies - the van is still out of commission and I have to borrow a ride from Fear Mor this morning.

"I guess more players defeat themselves than are ever beaten by an opposing team." - Connie Mack

Frustration

So The Ravishing Mrs. TB calls me yesterday at work. "The Van is making a noise and gurgling" she said. "I think we'll have to take it in."

My first reaction - Frustration.

"Why me?" I roared to myself in my mind. "Every time it feels like we get ahead just a little bit, something else happens."

I run through the gamut of bad things in my mind, ranting and raving against anything: bad timing, problems, not enough money, undoubtedly some giant plot against me designed by the universe. Somehow frustration at The Ravishing Mrs. TB enters the picture, as if somehow this is caused intentionally.

All my plans, cast aside into the ash heap of the day.

But in the end, who am I frustrated at? Events? The World? God? Or just at my own sense of how the world should run to convenience me?

It's not the event that matters - it's how I react to it.

Jesus and Time

How did Jesus find the time to do what He did?

I ask this in the context of my own life, where on any given day I only ever accomplish half of the things I intend to do. I collapse into a heap each night (seldom now do I have the problem of falling asleep); each morning I seem to stagger out of bed half conscious. My day is filled with running hither and thither on this and that, an endless series of motion seemingly resulting in nothing.

And I, I have not nearly the life that Christ had or the purpose He came for.

How did He do it? Surrounded by people at virtually all times, many of whom sought miracles, having no true home in His three year ministry (I forget that everywhere He went, except by boat, He walked), so often probably feeling as if He could not even get His message across to His closest friends.

And yet, He accomplished all He came do.

So the question is this: am I seeking to do too much, not enough of the right thing, or the wrong thing?

Christ prayed - often, and for long periods of time, and still accomplished much. Do I pray? At anywhere near that amount?

Could it be that my seeiming sense of failure and His success is a combination of the two?

Pursued

Another one of those nights where you wake up feeling not at all rested, chased into wakefulness by dreams that haunt you after you crawl out of bed.

Specifics - There were two or three separate dreams, one in which I was at at college attending, always have to move/be chased for reasons that were not clear to me; finding a booth that could be rented and writing on the sign up sheet essentially a manifesto about why I needed to rent it yet realizing that the writing made now sense; a recurring dream (second time) in which I am having to run from some kind of hideous evil in the shape of a initial lightening strike followed by a tendril of semi-protoplasmic ooze that one cannot let touch them but follows you around relentlessly like a small rivulet of rain, veering right then left, splitting way from itself as you double back, close doors, climb objects to get out of the way as the liquid tendril, a slight red heart at its center, balefully watches what you're doing, seeking only to touch you for a second to electrocute you.

The worst part, of course, is that you wake up in the morning feel pursued, not rested, your mind not on what lies ahead in the day but what happened during the night and "What the heck is chasing me?"

Which is, of course, the real question: What is chasing me to the point that it is pursuing me in my dreams?

Just Like Them

In reading the gospels this time around (which I always do at this time of year in John MacArthur's "Read Through the Bible in a Year") I am struck by the patience of Jesus. Not just the patience with the crowds, although that alone is amazing: we read how He was surrounded by people almost continually, moving from place to place, constantly being importuned by individuals about their needs, from healing to spiritual warfare to who will feed them. The part that has really spoken to me is His patience with His disciples.

The more times I read, the more I am struck by the fact that the disciples were human, totally so. They missed the point - almost constantly, sometimes. They argued. They tried to determine how Christ should act ("Lord, should we command that fire come down from Heaven?"). Sometimes they tried to manage who came to Christ (as in the children), sometimes they put the whole crowd on Christ ("Who can feed this multitude?"). And most of all, in the most critical part of Christ's earthly ministry, His death and Resurrection and the redemption of mankind, the disciples never seemed to get it. Day after day, with the Son of God preaching repentance and the Kingdom of God, they seemed never - up to the very last moment and a little beyond - to get it.

Which, in an insane way, give me hope, because more often than not, I'm just like the disciples.

I argue. I try to determine how God should. I try to manage how people come to God, or turn the whole responsibility (including my legitimate role) over to Him. And so often, even though I am on the other side of Easter Sunday, I still fail to get it. My repentance is shallow, my service light, my faith more often bolt on that an integral part of my life.

But the part I must cling to in these times is that Christ loves me and is patient with me no less so than the disciples - or for that matter, the men and women that have gone before me for 2000 years. Christ never (thankfully!) forgets that we are human - not that that becomes an excuse for remaining where we are, but a confidence that even where we are, He still loves us - and puts up with us.

Because, I suppose, if there was hope for Peter, there is hope for me.

Second Violin

I have run down - or at least am willing to admit to - the reason that I don't try harder.

Senior year of high school, Spring Musical. If you were involved in any kind of annual performance, you understand the way things work: it's a seniority thing. Year by year you participate, slowly climbing the rung of "extra" to "says a few lines" to senior year, where seniors typically get the lead roles as it is their last year.

My senior year we did "The Sound of Music": Maria, Edelweiss, the whole works. Threemajor male leads, three major female leads. Three seniors, including myself, audition. Two of the three seniors move on to the lead roles.

I am not one of them.

I participated of course: played the butler (I always played the butler) and the local political chief, but the reality, at least the one that stuck in my head, is that if you follow the system and do all that's called for, you'll still only be second violin.

You wouldn't think this would be so crippling: after all, I was almost 18 when it happened (seemingly far beyond the years where such things make an impression) and it was only one item. But a significant one: it reinforced every concept that I had that I was only a support personnel, never a leader, and that no matter how hard one works it is always subject to whims beyond your control.

But to some extent, it probably explains why to this day I have always tended to move away from leadership roles and putting in all my effort: why, when it will at best mean nothing and at worst will be time and energy wasted.

It would seem foolish to base the outcome of one's life on a failure to be a lead almost 25 years ago, and even more foolish to use that as a lens to map out the future. Unfortunately for me, I am more wont to be foolish than I am to learn from the past.

Or was.

I cannot go back and get the lead (nor would I want to). I cannot go back and change the past based on a lens that was overcorrecting for a problem that was not there. I can, however, accept the fact that one failure to achieve through playing by the rules and effort is not indicative of how things work all the time. For that example, there are others in my life that effort and rules have resulted in great success. I need to turn to them, instead of the sad murmuring of a ghost that cannot be restored.

Today is a New Day.