Being A Wise Guy

It's frightening to suddenly find yourself the resident wise guy.

It's a position that I have not really held before, at least in any degree of regularity. I have always had the benefit of having others around me who were older and wiser, someone that I could turn to - or direct others to - as a reference.

Now more and more, I'm finding that it's myself.

I'm mostly frightened that I will give the wrong advice. Ideally I have enough bad decisions under my belt that I can confidently say "Don't do this; it doesn't work". However, I also have enough experience (in my less well experienced days, to be sure) of giving advice to others which did not work out nearly so well - for example, my track record at matchmaking is about zero.

It's a great incentive to read and study, of course - being a wise guy means you should have pithy statements and good quotes. It's also a good incentive to measure what I do in my own life - am I living the advice I give?

Still, it is a humbling set of shoes to walk in, shoes which I do not nearly fit so well as those who have gone before me in my own life.

Rage

There is nothing worse than realizing that people are ignoring you consciously.

It raises your blood pressure like nothing else. Your rage screams in your ears, demanding to be vented. You (cleverly) walk away, thinking that a short walk around the block or through the building hoping that the action and time will wear it away.

Your fingers strike the keyboard with a particular pressure and snap as you type out the angry e-mail, ranting about the situation and trying to find anyway possible to bring the othe person down with you, any crack in their armor where you can make them feel as ignored as you. Followed, of course, by hitting the "Delete" key all the way back to the beginning of the message.

Yes, it's being ignored that is angering - but also the sense that trying to do the best thing for others is not realized at best, or simply blown off as not important as worst.

Which leaves two choices: change the perception or change the situation.

Or barring that, change the location...

Thinking Linearly

A sense of peace about some decisions, not others.

Do we like New Home? Yes. There are a plethora of good things here: good (excellent) school for Na Clann, a reasonable place to live (a rental to be sure, but larger and paying less than we were in Old Home), good church, The Ravishing Mrs. TB is finding her stride, and we are finally able to begin to deal with the wreckage started almost 4 years ago by The Firm and my decisions around it. Other than the heat and humidity, not a lot of complaints.

Do I like my career field? Yes, on most days. It's not my ideal job to be sure, but it is well paying and enables to do lots of other things. Depending on whom I've worked for, it does allow me to have a greater or lesser degree of impact on the lives of others. Certainly it can keep my mind as active as it wants to be.

Do I like my job?

Hmm, much more difficult there. I like some of the people with whom I work. That said, the job itself (or really the company that encompasses the job) is much more problematic. I've alluded to it before: a loss of hope combined with a true sense of powerlessness. It is difficult to the point of wondering "Why?"

But (as I'm trying to do with this exercise) the company is not the career field, and the company is not New Home.

So do the math. If the career field is okay and the location is okay, what I really need to do is....

To For Through

"If you aim at becoming a great ruler, you will be able to become the lord of a province. If you aim at becoming the lord of a province, you'll become nothing." - Mori Shojumaru (later Mori Motonari), Mori Motonari

Aim is an important thing. Misplaced aim in driving will result in swerving to stay on the road. Misplaced aim in archery or hockey will result in missing the target. Misplaced aim in living will result in a wasted life.

However we teach people the wrong thing about aim.

For so much of our instruction, we teach people that they should aim at something: "Look at the road. Aim for the passing grade. Aim for the target." The error with this is that we are teaching people to aim to something, not through something.

In reality, we don't want people to just see the road in front of them, we want them to see the road ahead of them. We don't want our children just to get the passing grade, but to get the knowledge the grade entails - and the eventual place that the knowledge will lead them.

In hunting or hockey, it's not where the target is, it's where the target will be when you hit it that is important.

To aim at becoming something external without grasping that it is the internal that makes the external possible is to set one's self up for eventual failure in the midst of supposed success.

When you're setting your goals today - and every day - what are you aiming for? Are you aiming high enough? Or are you mistaking aiming to for through?

A Week of Work Reflections

A week of work reflections comes down to this: Do I love my job? Do I love my career field?

Do I love my job? - No. Do I dislike this job more than any other I've had, at least in my field? Not sure. In some ways yes, in some ways no. Some of the friends I have made through my coworkers are great - and are the only things making the days bearable. But on the whole? No. If I were rating this job as an outsider rating a marriage, I would wonder that it wasn't a shotgun marriage (which in some ways it was).

Do I love my career field? - Harder to say. Can I make a contribution? Yes, given the right circumstances. Am I good at what I do? Depends on what your asking. I'm skilled, yes - but I could become more so. Given the right circumstances I can be incredibly productive and incredibly useful. But does my pulse quicken at the thought of "getting" to go to this career field in the morning? Nope. Not at all - more to see the people than anything else.

So why do I keep looking here? (Insanity - continuing to do the same thing and expect a different result.) Force of habit - or force of fear? Or is it simply the laziness that says it's easier to lie down and die by the shrinking waterhole because that's what we know rather than risk seeking other waterholes elsewhere?

We will not change until the pain of change is less than the pain of continuing in our current situation.

Work: An Affair of the Heart

"Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking and don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking, and don't settle." - Steve Jobs

As we discussed yesterday, work is one of the most significant amounts of time we will spend on our lives, following hard on sleep and marriage. Steve Jobs above suggests that the only way to do great work is to do what you love - and love is as much as matter of the heart as it is a calculated decision.

Work is a great deal like a marriage - in theory, another affair of the heart. The question is much like finding a good partner, how do we find a work which will engage not only mind but our hearts as well?

On the one hand, we have college graduates coming out of school having followed their hearts to their interests only to find that their interests are not enough to create a job in the outside world (17th Century French Literature is not in and of itself a growing field). On the other hand, we have people who have done the "right" thing by taking the job that was offered to them only to find themselves in a relationship that is enduring but not endurable. It is again like marriage: those who marry the ones that excite them emotionally often find they are not good marriage partners, and those who marry sensibly find that sensibleness can become a long grey twilight.

But that may be where the analogy stops. To reinvent the marriage, you need to take action within the marriage. To reinvent the work is not necessarily to find yourself bound in the same way.

So there's the rub - how do essentially have an "affair" while at your current work, trying to find your true (work) love - (and without angering your current job)? How do you reinvigorate your work life - perhaps even your work search if it's been so long that you've given up hope?

Perhaps it's easier to ask another question: What excites you? What motivates you? What makes you feel like you are truly contributing, truly making a difference? Whatever those things are, that's where to start.

It could be that such things are light years away from what you are doing (They seem to be for me). That's not important. One has to start somewhere. When one is trapped in rainy weather, sometimes one only has the fantasy imagination of a sunlit day to start with. What's important is that 14% of your total life (on average) will be spent at a job. Will you settle only for passion, or will it be enduring the unendurable?

90,000 Hours

"Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking and don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking, and don't settle." - Steve Jobs

I have never heard a career described as a matter of the heart before. Yet what Jobs says makes a great deal of sense. If you're an average person, you'll work approximately 45 years (say 22 - 67) - approximately 90,000 hours at 8 hours a day (not including weekends and two weeks vacation). By contrast, other time you spend will rang from approximately 4896 hours in school (K - 4 year college) versus 221,920 hours sleeping (8 hours a night for 76 years- but who gets that). If you make 50 years in a marriage, you'll spend at least 145,600 hours together (not including work and sleep, of course).

Another way to put it: Most likely after sleeping and our relationship with our spouse and family, work is the next major line item we will spend most of our life doing.

Wow. That's a great deal of time to spend doing something you don't really care about - in fact, it's probably a great deal like being in a loveless marriage, enduring more for the sake of the relationship rather than for any sense of joy of being in the relationship.

I wish we taught this to our young people - that choosing a career is no idle thing, a thing which is much less important than things like having fun, a fully rounded growing up experience ("Do every activity so you can get into a good college") or dating. Good heavens - we spend more time instructing our children in how to select a good spouse than a good job, although by my rough calculations we spend 62% of the same amount of time in a career relationship as a marriage relationship.

I'll deal with work as a matter of the heart - a love, if you will - tomorrow. But for today, my closing thought is this: if we spend that much time at work and that much effort, shouldn't we as individuals spend more time preparing? Are we helping others - are we helping ourselves - to find the work that really matters for us? Or do we condemn ourselves to a loveless career marriage?

Loveless marriages generally don't turn out well. Neither do loveless careers.

Selling Myself

I need to work on changing myself.

I am realizing that if I want a new job - good heavens, a new career - I need to gain more skills. Simply put, I am not (apparently) marketable in my current condition.

That said, let's approach this like I am selling something else. How do I market something to sell it?

1) Need: What does the customer need? What are they buying (hiring) my line of work for?

2) Features: Why are they buying the product (me)? What do they expect from the product (me)? What features is missing that they are looking for?

3) Marketing: From an unbiased view, how do I appear as a marketed product? Is how I am presented representative of the product I am? Does how I am presented match their need? Am I the "New Coke" of my industry?

4) Failure Why haven't you succeeded in your efforts up to now? What has gone wrong in all your communications and presentation to this point?

Interestingly, I think the failure aspect is the one most interesting to me at this point. Things have occurred in the last year, but nothing has come to fruition. Why? Is it the company's situation? (Yes, in some cases) Is it that I was not appropriately skilled? (Yes, in some cases) Is it that I had an opportunity and threw it away? (Unfortunately, yes in at least one case)

Would I like to do something else? Sure. Could my current line of work fund that something else? Absolutely.

If I am selling me (which I am), would I purchase me? Would you purchase you?

Inner and Outer Change

What am I working towards?

It occurred to me yesterday afternoon as we sat through Week Five of Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University as he discussed his financial story (in brief, millionaire by 26, lost it all [and I mean ALL], rebuilt it all) - not the money part, but the part about what he had to become through the entire process.

If I want more, am I working like I want more - more responsibility, more time, more money? Or am I mired in the belief that I can be exactly like I am and somehow this things will accrue to me? Do people look at me as I work from day to day and say "This is a man who is intent on succeeding" or do they say "This is a man who is intent on staying where he is"?

A long time ago, a very wise man (my manager at the time) told me "I'm not telling you not to be yourself - look at me (and he was his own independent person) - but I might suggest that management might have a hard time promoting someone who jumps up and down and waves at people in the manufacturing suite through the window." I took what I understood to be his advice at the time by attempting to bolt on a series of "adult" behaviors, but only now (12 years later) do I see it in all of it's fruition.

It's not about changing your essence, your inner person - although that can happen, I suppose. It's not about performing a series of rituals - dress better, be serious, never laugh - as an outer coating of responsibility. It's about becoming a person of more value in whatever field of work you are in by becoming more skilled, more competent, more responsible.

If you're low on the totem pole and poor, people think you are crazy and not responsible. If you're high on the totem pole with a history of success, people think you are eccentric - good at what you do, but eccentric.

I want to be eccentric.

A Word To The Young

So this is a message this morning for the young. You older people can eavesdrop if you want.

Be very careful what you do growing up.

Here's the thing: your past follows you around forever. Sometimes in ways and places you cannot possibly imagine.

We all do stupid things. We all go a little temporarily insane. It's okay, it's just part of growing up. The question you have to ask yourself - before you actually go anywhere to do these things - is "What is this going to mean 20 years from now?" Temporarily insane - like, let's say, dressing up and travelling to your local shopping metropolis looking like a rock group from the sixties may be okay. Drinking yourself under the table because it feels good and "Lord knows, you're incredibly funny when you drink" while a camera is in the vicinity is probably not.

Trust me on this - 40 year old you will not think as charitably on the stupid things as 20 year old you did. And, it undercuts a lot of what you might hope to do later in life. That image you carefully try to craft can be completely undone by something that happened one brief moment in time, 20 years ago.

Be smart. Plan. What do you really want to do with your life, not just how do you want to enjoy your life right now?

The Truck

The Truck will be going soon.

We got The Truck in 2005 from my great aunt, a gift from my father for something I could not afford but wanted. It was a 1987 Ford F-250 with only 55,000 miles on it and camper shell, originally a boat towing truck for them. The price was right, and so it came to live with us in Old Home.

I loved The Truck. It was big, it was high, it rattled as I drove it . I could haul all kinds of things in it. It had good air conditioning, a tape player for my older cassettes, and an actual CB. It was a thing of beauty. Smaller cars or more expensive vehicles sheered away in fear as I drove by.

But then life happened. The layoff came, followed by the move. I couldn't justify flying back a third time to drive another item out, nor the cost of the gas to get here. But I hung onto it, sort of the last toehold in Old Home of the life we had, not wanting to get rid of it.

And then I got the revised insurance bill. Suddenly, having the revised toehold became less important than not paying the insurance.

So The Truck will be up for sale soon. But more importantly, the last bit of Old Home will be going up for sale as well.

It is, I suppose, an admittance of something which has already been self evident to almost everyone else at this point: we are here for a longer haul than I had either anticipated or initially wished. That's not a bad thing I suppose, nor is it particularly unwelcome; it's just a case of reality smacking me across the face with "Deal with where you are, not the idealization of where you were."

Work and Relationships

I am starting to have a change in my life. We'll see if it sticks.

It happened on Monday, and interestingly it may have been Fear Mor who initiated it. As I was rushing out the door (obviously a bit frustrated by the start of events on Monday) he said "Why don't you just quit?" He probably meant it in jest, but my response was somewhat more "enthusiastic" than I had anticipated: "I don't have another option at this point. I need this job."

I didn't think much about it as I ran through my day, and then ran through yesterday as well - except that at the end of the day as I went home, I suddenly realized I had developed an edge. I was leaving at a time I chose (not a time I wanted, but we're working on that), having accomplished a fair amount at work, on my terms. In other words, I had actually been proactive.

Proactivity, as you may recall, is the first of the Seven Habits of Highly Effective People by Dr. Stephen Covey. As part of my retrenchment and reconsideration, I have begun rereading his book and listening to the CD I have of him.

One thing that I have realized that being proactive means (at least to me) is that I actually accomplish something, rather than mark time being somewhere. Yes, it's important to maintain good relationships (more important in my line of work than most); at the same time, I can have great relationships and get nothing accomplished.

The other thought this provoked was around the future direction of my life. I really enjoy those with whom I work, but the reality is that I will not work with these good folks forever. If I sacrifice my future to make my present livable I've not really gained anything either now or in the future.

Relationships are important - indeed, some of my greatest friends now (Bogha Frois, Songbird) came out of work relationships. But they were relationships founded through work and built on common interests, not founded to the exclusion of work in favor of catering to the individual.

Work and good relationships are not mutually exclusive - but both must be managed actively so that one does not overcome the other.

"Don't tell me how hard you work. Tell me how much you get done." - James Ling, American Businessman

Work and Boundaries II

So how did I do yesterday, you might ask? Did I start to set the boundaries between work and home?

Well, yes and no. Yes in the sense that I got to work, worked with purpose most of the day, and was able to focus.

No in the sense that I almost got sucked back in.

Sure enough, the project I spent the the morning working on had a meeting called in the afternoon. More appropriately, there was a meeting called about the project I worked on yesterday. I was not invited.

I lingered after my predetermined departure time. Would I be called in? How would it look if my boss came looking for me and I was gone?

And then I realized that the non-invitation was the choice of the meeting organizer, not myself. I was going to linger based on an impression that may or may not happen? I was going to assume the mantle of a project which had not been given to me?

And so, 45 minutes (but not the usual hour or hour and a half) after the fact, I headed home. Not great, but earlier than I had left in a long time.

The morale of the story: don't assume the mantle of responsibility for those things that you are not responsible for.

Work and Boundaries

I have got to draw boundaries at work.

Work is rapidly coming to consume my daily existence. Without trying, I spend 9-10 hours day there - plus commute (and the longer I work, the longer I the commute).

This is the first job I've had this issue with. Before, I set my boundaries clearly: 8 hours, 30 minutes for lunch then out the door. But at this job, I seem to have created my own issue. Initially I worked longer because I wanted to make a good impression and I was living here on my own. Then, we got issued the order that someone would stay until 6; rather than switch out, I just started staying 12 hours every 6 weeks. Then things started coming at the last minute which those in power above me demanded be done "now".

What happens? One loses their incentive to hold to the 8 hour day, since it really doesn't matter anyway.

But it does matter. I've realized that my productivity has gone down a great deal. Why? There's no incentive to accomplish in 8 what you're expected to do in 10. Suddenly time is not a currency, it's a commodity, something which seems beyond your power to control.

The results? More time at work, more time commuting, less happiness, less family time, greater sense of job frustration and most ironically of all, lesser ability to do my job. By time not being a currency, it becomes much more difficult to discern and complete the most important tasks.

So that has to change.

Starting today, it's time to change. Time to reclaim my life (and maybe my sanity?). Time to tell work "I do 8 hours of work a day - real work, not time serving on premises. I will work on the most critical tasks. I will meet my timelines. But my life is not yours."

It's time to start making time a currency once more.

The Unseen World

"An Australian business leader once told me when he shared his faith with a Japanese CEO the response was dismissive: 'Whenever I meet a Buddhist leader, I meet a holy man in touch with another world. Whenever I meet a Christian leader, I meet a manager at home only this world like I am.'" - Os Guinness, The Call: Finding and Fulfilling the Central Purpose of Your Life

Nighean Gheal has recently discovered the joys of Japanese Anime, especially that of Hayao Miyazaki, creator of Kiki's Delivery Service, My Neighbor Totoro, and Spirited Away. I have found them extremely enjoyable myself as well: they are well written, have fantastic artwork, and have storylines with good messages, especially for young girls (of which I am extremely interested.

One of the themes that Miyazaki deals with is the concept of natural spirits that dwell alongside the human world. This themes may not be surprising, as Miyazaki is Japanese and has been at the very least surrounded by the religion of Shinto, the native religion of Japan which concerns itself with man's relationship with the kami, essences or deities which may be human like or natural forces which inhabit the world with us.

As I went to bed last night thinking of how much I enjoyed My Neighbor Totoro, I was struck by the fact that these films - and indeed the Shinto religion - posits the fact that there is a supernatural world that exists around us and that we participate it. The thought then sprung to my mind of the quote from Os Guinness' book listed above, where a Japanese business reflects that most of the Christian leaders he had met were men that only reflected this world.

This, it occurs to me, is a challenge for Christians.

No, I'm not calling for some kind of sudden realization of seeing Angels in my yard and Demons in my car in the morning ("Out Out, ye Demons of The Dysfunctional Air Conditioner"). At the same time, we proclaim that there is a world beyond this one, that there are presences among us - indeed a God among us - that intervenes in our lives.

The comparison I can make is that of telling my daughters that we are driving through an area with deer. They will strain and seek under every clump of darkness looking for the deer - and then the excitement when they find one! Compare that with just driving through a forest going "Look kids, trees". There is no anticipation, no excitement - just acceptance that things are as they appear to be.

Guinness postulates that secularism of Western Culture has done this to us. I suppose so, but it occurs to me that Christians have done this to ourselves. We have so carefully stripped any way of God coming to us except intellectually and perhaps emotionally (occasionally, it depends on the circumstance) that when we read as in Psalm 19:1 "The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament shows His handiwork" or in Psalm 96: 11-12:

"Let the heavens rejoice, and let the earth be glad;
Let the sea roar, and all its fullness;
Let the field be joyful and all that is in it.
Then all the trees of the woods will rejoice before the Lord."

that we cannot see either God at work or God's handiwork rejoicing in Him by doing what He created them to do.

Again, I'm not calling for dryads in the oaks or wood spirits living in my bamboo. But do we as Christians reflect that there is another realm among us by how we live? Or are we convincing the world that we are just like they are, except we have a frosting layer of religion on top?

Apathy

Apathy: 1) Lack of feeling or emotion, impassiveness; 2) Lack of interest or concern, indifference.

I realized yesterday as I left work that I am suffering from a frightening, almost toxic level of apathy about my job. It's not to the point of making a serious error, but it is to the point of impacting my ability to do my job effectively on a daily basis.

Why is this?

I'd like to say that it is something that is being forced on my by circumstances beyond my control, by individuals and movements and events which I am a victim of. That in fact no matter how hard I can try, it's like walking uphill against an avalanche.

I'd like to say that. The reality is, while it all may very well be true, they're only excuses, not reasons. The reason that I don't care is that I choose to not care.

Ouch.

Why do I work? This was the question that confronted me as I walked through this exercise. Obviously it's not because I am deeply impacted by what I do - I should want to do a good job, but there is not sense that what I do impacts my life. I attempted to walk through this exercise by doing a Logic Tree - an exercise where one asks "Why?", then lists possible answers, then asks "Why?" again and lists more answers, and so on. This exercise, also known as "The Five Whys" will eventually lead to the root cause of an event or action.

Or should. My Logic Tree was not very persuasive. Moving from why I work is to get money, I then went to "Why do I need to get money?". My eventual answers - Because I'm the dad and it's my job, because it allows me to be a good Christian witness by supporting, tithing, and being and good employee, and that it allows me to pay for things for Na Clann - were not the sort of answers that made me excited when I looked at them.

The bottom line why I don't care: I choose not to. Why do I choose not to? Therein lies the rub. All the answers that come to my mind - it doesn't matter, it's not important, it's not relevant, you benefit others who would cast you aside in a moment if needed - all in the end condemn me. They may be true, but they are things that happen outside of me. The apathy is within me.

Why don't I care? Because overwhelmed with the sheer number of tasks to be accomplished and an atmosphere of indifference, I have made the conscious decision that I would rather do little than do a lot because me feeling like I am doing meaningful work is more important to me than me being one of the few that cares, even if it gets me nothing. I would rather wallow in indifference and failure than expend effort on something which benefits my life no more than allowing me to make a salary. I have chosen to accept that my emotional fulfillment is more important than doing the right thing, even if it means I will not do the things I think I should do.

And that constant note of me, mine and I does nothing to present either a good witness for Christ nor a good example to my family of how one works even if one doesn't care for what one is doing.

Two People, One Body

There are two personalities that seem to coexist somewhat uncomfortably in my skin.

The first is that of the Entertainer - a rather happy go lucky fellow that cracks jokes, gently mocks others, and tries to ensure that he gets along with everyone around him. He seems to go out of his way to make sure that things go as smoothly as possibly both for himself and everyone around him. In a lot of ways he's a "Hail, Well Met" fellow who seems to throw many of the typical aspects of relationships on their head.

The second is that of the Warrior - a somewhat grim, serious fellow that seeks to lead a life of purpose and honor. He wants to do great things, and sees that the path to do them is through dedication and action. He can become quite motivated and aggressive in pushing things forward; however he places relationships on a lesser plane than purpose.

How long have they been with me? If I sit and think about it, as long as I can remember. I have always craved attention, people liking, the sound of a laugh I produced just I have always craved a life of passion, honor, and purpose.

My problem is that the two of them often seem to work at counter purposes: the Entertainer wants to be liked, the Warrior wants to accomplish (and not care about being liked per se); the Entertainer wants to be happy, the Warrior wants to do; the Entertainer wants to create a laugh, the Warrior wants to move through life making an impact.

So here's the question: are these really two different people, or just two sides of the same coin? What are the common themes in them? How can I mesh them together so that there is no disconnect between the one and the other, no tacking back and forth, such that the energy wasted in being one or the other is transformed into the working of a fully integrated personality?

Blustery Wednesday

Who am I?
Not who I am, the persona I put before the world,
the image that walks with me as I get up in the morning
and goes to bed every night;
But the person that I am under all this,
the one who was here before years of schooling
and work and life itself was poured over it.

If being truly great is tied to truly being yourself,
Who am I?
Surely it is not the man that stumbles out the door every day,
immersed all day in a tsunami of paper and regulations
which will someday be packed into a box?
Surely it is not the man who so often has to "settle"
rather than do the right and correct?
Surely it is not the man to whom honor
is made to mean no more than taking the responsibility
others will not take?

Who am I?

A Slight Veer

As I thought through my objectives for the end of the year yesterday, I realized that there was one slight adjustment I needed to make to my plans: that of agreeing to put off any job search until the end of the year.

One of the key elements in my life which is creating stress for me at this time is my job - both from an "I don't really fit in this pigeonhole" category as well as the concept of "toxic work environment." The thought of abandoning any action on this front - to merely agree to continue to exist for a period of time without action - will in reality do nothing for my ongoing issues. In an attempt to bypass dealing with the problem, I will merely create an environment which will exacerbate the problem.

So I will continue to work on my goals (7 categories as suggested by Brian Tracy; one is already down) but I will equally attempt to move forward on my career search. To stop all action is to settle into mediocrity, and to become mediocre is to abandon all hope.

Becoming Myself

It's Labor Day, so I am celebrating (somewhat ironically, I suppose) by not laboring.

I spent part of the afternoon engaged in Radical Careering by Sally Hogshead (to add the fun, it was a free e-book!) which is a reasonably straightforward, in-your-face book about managing your career (versus managing your job) - the actual layout of the book is probably as much of a joy to read as is the book itself.

The best quote I got from the book from the first reading (out of a plethora of great quotes) is "You can be truly great only when you can truly be yourself".

If I had to point to a disconnect now, that would be it. I am not truly "myself" in the positions I've held, both from the point of view of what I do and the point of view of who I am at work. To be sure, I've bent the rules wherever I can, creating this sort "reasonable crazy person" image that follows me around - but at the core there is still a sense of having to kowtow to a greater corporate culture, a sort of bureaucracy that stifles any innovation or creativity except in prescribed channels. And that doesn't address the core matter of what I deal with from day to day: important to be sure, but incredibly boring minutiae that so often has to be fought over to garner attention.

So here's the question: Who am I? And how do I become myself at work?

The Book of Depression

Maybe I'll write a book called "The Anatomy of Depression". It could be a sort of user's guide, a daily recording of depression, what sparks them, and when they seem to blow over and when the return.

It's the one thing I could probably write better than anything else, having lived with it for so many years now. I'm minded of it as I go through the ebb and flow of it this week: depressed Monday and Tuesday, happy for half of Wednesday, then sliding back into it on Thursday to (probably) end Friday on it.

If you had to ask me for an impression I'd say a tunnel, a long tunnel with no outlets, no sense of an end. Life almost becomes a series of motions you go through, things you have to do rather than things you participate in and enjoy.

For example: it is 0600 and I have one more day of work until a three day weekend. I can honestly say that right now I have no sense of any excitement or anticipation of anything I will do at work, just things I have to do as I wander through my day. And afterwards? Again, no sense of anything but three days not being at work.

And so it goes: every day a duty, a thing to be moved through rather than a thing to be anticipated and enjoyed. What would it be to anticipate a day? I can barely imagine it - if there is a sense of future and optimism it is generally far from me.

It is so easy for me to hope in others, to see the best in them and their possibilities and their eventual successes yet almost impossible for me to see the same in myself. Why is that?

How Do I Work?

"Exhort bondservants to be obedient to their own masters, to be well pleasing in all things, not answering back, not pilfering, but showing all good fidelity, that they may adorn the doctrine of God our Savior in all things." - Titus 2: 9-10

How does my work measure up to this standard? This was the thought that tugged at my mind as I got up this morning to start getting ready for my job. How good of an employee am I?

Am I obedient to my own bosses? Am I well pleasing in everything I do at work? Do I not answer back? Do I not pilfer? Do I show all good fidelity (e.g. loyalty)? Do I adorn the doctrine of God in all things?

These are questions that make me squirm and squiggle away as I look at them - both because of my inability to respond to them as I should and the fact that I would consider myself a "good" worker, although not by the standards.

Note the focus (yet again for the slow in the audience like me): the point is not about my or my work (note that the words "self actualization" or "enjoy what you do" are not in there), it's about adorning the doctrine of God, to make it real for all those I work with.

As I consider these, I wonder where I changed. I've this sense that I used to be a much more diligent employee than I am now. I can't pin down in my mind where "the change" occurred, but as I think about it it may have been a combination of two factors: 1) The realization in my industry that any company will take all the effort you give it but will lay you off without a second thought ( and the secondary realization that all my effort is wasted and put into a cardboard box to be stored off site); and 2) The Firm, where we punctuated times of extreme labor with periods of less extreme labor.

The image I get from Paul's writing is that of someone who is active and busy the whole time they are at work, not sitting around and conversing (pilfering time counts) or complaining about the direction of the company or people in the company, loyally serving those in the structure above them instead of picking apart every flaw and overanalysing every action.

The part that then rears up inside of me is "Yes, but that's pretty much slavery (interestingly, that's who Paul was writing this to). If I do that, I put myself completely at the mercy of everyone around me. With no sense of what's occurring in the company I'll be the last one surprised by a drastic change that leave me over the side or gasping for air as I'm thrown under the bus. And advancement? Forget that. My career will become marooned in a small corner of the work universe as others go on to greater things because I 'worked' rather than playing the game."

That, of course, discounts the intervention of God. If I am adorning the doctrine of God in my work by how I work and leaving the results up to Him, it is a form of exercising faith by being obedient and leaving the rest to Him. The Bible is pretty clear that in these circumstances God will move - but He gets the glory, not me.

So how am I going to work today? Will I adorn the doctrine of God by my actions and attitudes of work (Dear Lord, can I go 24 hours without one negative comment?) or will I spend another day stripping the doctrine of God by my actions and attitudes?

Never Underestimate The Power of A Good Deed

Yesterday started out to be the same as the day before, a dreary walk through reality to be concluded by the darkness of sleep. I meandered through the day, occasionally seeing glimpses of sunlight but then watching them flicker and die like embers into a fire.

Until I wandered past Silverline's desk (probably with the intent of getting something signed). I caught her in the midst of eating half a sandwich. She turned from the computer, looked at me, and said "Do you want half a sandwich?"

"No" I replied. "I'm good.

"Really. Take it. It's good."

"I'm good. I already at lunch.

Then she fixed me in her gaze and said "You had spinach for lunch, didn't you?" When my failure to meet her eyes indicated assent, she said "Here. Take it."

So I did. And it was good - some yummy teriyaki chicken thing with fresh vegetables and fresh bread. But the thing that was really good about it was the way I felt about it - not that the sandwich had any magical "sandwich power" (although food always makes me happy), but the kindness of the offer.

My day almost instantly improved.

I think we underestimate the good that we can do in the lives of others. We (or at least I) often think we need to do some great and noble thing. In reality, it is the simple kindnesses - rendered when someone is truly in need - that go farther towards making a difference in the life of another than all the great deeds and public actions combined.

Never underestimate the power of a good deed, and never fail to do them when the opportunity presents itself. You never know how badly the other person may need it.

Depression is Like A Fog

Depression is like a fog,
a dense billowing log that creeps out of nowhere,
seeming to spring up from the ground itself.
The trees and bushes slowly merge into it
and then become swallowed up by it.

Depression is like a fog:
it becomes a barrier
cutting off all inputs of light and song.
Day, night, all become merged into a single monotone grey
with no hint of color or life.

Depression is like a fog:
it bounds my world until all I see and remember
is gray swirling mist.
When even hope and joy have become swallowed up
leaving only the dull ache of hopelessness
and the low moan of despair.

Service and Significance

Yesterday at church our pastor used a power video about service and significance. It picture a young man sitting on a set of bleachers, discussing his search for significance in his Christian walk - what God wanted Him to do. Suddenly this hand appears, holding something suggesting teaching. "Oh no" he replies. "My gift is not in teaching children. That's not me. But about me - and my place in the church" - and off he goes again on a discussion of what he is feeling called to. Another hand, holding a sponge. "What - me clean? Wow. I'm dirt freak. Really not my calling" - and off he starts to ramble again.

Our pastor then made the statement - If you want to be significant, if you want to find significance in the church and in God's kingdom (and in your life for that matter), serve. Ah, we may say, of course I'll serve - but I'll set the priorities. I know best what I'm skillful at and can do. Guess, of course, what God says to that.

This was not the most comfortable sermon Sunday.

But that's really the point, isn't it? If we're called to serve (and we are), we serve. Perhaps we've become too enamored of the concept (at least in 21st Century Western Culture) that serving means to serve in what I feel is my calling, the same way I should have a job which comports with what I believe my gifts are. Of course, most of us have jobs which are not in our areas of calling or interest yet we continue to do them because we like to get paid; how come we fail to hold the same standard when it comes to serving? Is it because we believe that serving God is something which is supposed to be intensely personal , not necessarily a matter of obedience? Is it because we believe that we believe we should directly feel good about serving, not that we may feel good as a result of serving? Is it because we believe that even is serving it should be all about us?

"God", said my pastor "made us to be servants. He didn't ask us to be servants." Perhaps much of my angst arises from confusing the two.

Motivation In The Water

So I'm fighting how to motivate others.

One of the great challenges I am fighting at my current position is a general sense of malaise. As I described it to Fear Beag and Fear Mor it's as if there is a preset level of enthusiasm which occasionally blips up but seems to be constantly held at a steady line and there seems to be nothing that can be done about it. One doesn't want to try negative motivation which works per se for a little while but is not sustainable long term and one does not have the opportunity to try positive motivation (i.e. money) as that is not in the power of middle management.

So here's the question? How do you motivate others? Or to ask it another way, how do you get people to care?

It is a deceptively easy question of course. The easy answer is to say that it simply needs to be something that either matters to people or impacts their lives significantly. But what if the problem should matter to people and does impact their lives significantly and they still don't seem to want to do anything about it?

The real danger is that it begins to pull down your own level of motivation and caring which is critical to your own success in your career and life.

Which then brings up the real question I suppose: How do you sustain your own motivation and caring in the face of vast indifference?

Time Out

I'm taking a bit of time out until the end of the year.

As I am trying to think through where we are and where we're going, I realized that (barring the unusual) nothing will significantly change between now and the end of the year. Nor should it I suppose: Na Clann are in school, any job change at this point may muck up any bonus or promotion I would get (and would not get me anywhere else), and we're not necessarily in a position to go anywhere at the moment.

I've also continued to roll around this concept of building brick by brick - it was Brian Tracy (I believe) that said "Most people overestimate what they can do in one year, but most people underestimate what they can do in five years". I need to be a little more conscious about the decisions I am making and where I am headed.

Some of this work (I think) will involve a conscious process of reviewing and setting my goals. Some of this will involve re-reading the books I have (or in some cases, buying more - Yay!). Some of this will involve writing. Some will simply involve trying to realign my life in terms of direction and time spent on activities.

But my intent in this pause is to enter 2011 and beyond with a clear sense of who I am and where I am going. If I've got those bricks, I need to have that plan to build with.

War

"Repay no-one evil for evil." - Romans 12:17

I am fighting having to go to war.

It is not a war I intended to have but it is one which I have seen brewing for some months now. In a way, I suppose it has been a process of self-concealation from myself, an acknowledged closing of my own eyes in hopes that peace and amiability could be maintained. This hope seems to be rapidly receding in the distance, and as Aragorn says to King Theoden in The Two Towers "War already marches upon your land."

What's a Christian to do?

This is where I always come into conflict with myself. On one hand I am commanded as above, "Repay no-one evil for evil" and "If it is possible, so much as it depends on you, live peaceably with all men" (Romans 12:18). On the other hand, there is the knowledge of being in the right and having to consistently take one "for the team" to preserve peace, let alone a constant guessing game of what support will come.

So really the question I'm asking is how, in modern social milieus, does a Christian fight? How does one stand up for what is the right, even if it calls for brutal infighting and still maintain one's witness? Is it as simple as conducting one's self in as Christlike as possible ("Be angry but sin not") while battling as hard as possible? Is it possible that in some cases winning is truly the more critical event (I don't think so, but it is worth considering)? Do I just fade from sight and let others live out the consequences of their actions? Or as Sun Tzu says "Anciently the skillful warriors first made themselves invincible and awaited the enemy's moment of vulnerability"?

How does one preserve a witness and prepare for these things at the same time?

Bricks and Plans

The imagery of bricks hung around with me all day after my posting.

As I went through my day: work, driving home, being with An Teaglach, going about my activities for the evening - I realized that there really was not a question of great strides of change (although those do happen - I know that better than anyone), but rather than using the our daily lives - our "bricks" - to build towards the events and goals of our lives.

But in building a plan is required. Bricks by themselves do not form themselves into anything (except a pile, of course). And perhaps that is where I have consistently fallen down - not potentially in the activity, but in the plan that activity is supposed to serve. These are, of course, otherwise known as goals.

Why do I have problems setting goals? Because in a sense goals bind you: they put you on one path and exclude others and I have always valued my options to act. Unfortunately you reach a point where by maintaining the options to act, you lose the ability to do anything because you haven't focused, which is where I seem to find myself in so many ways now.

The other problem is simply deciding which set of goals to set. There are plenty of guidances available for types of goals, categories of goals - but I am always dogged by the idea that there are goals I should set, rather than one's I want to set. So maybe that's the root cause I need to address.

How are your bricks? Do you have a plan, or are they merely sitting in a pile waiting to be used?

Walls and Towers

I am struggling mightily with purpose this morning.

Purpose? I continue to smash myself headlong against the walls of my existence. There is such an inner disconnect between what I think I want to be and what I really am, of where I'd like to be and where I really am, of the relationships I am in and what I wish they were, of what I have to care about and what I really wish I could care about. This absorb my time rather than the things I wish I could absorb my time with.

But as I write this, I wonder if I'm looking in the wrong direction.

The visual I used above pictured things on the horizontal plane, a smashing of walls and breaking out into the outside into a new area. But what happens if those walls are more firmly set than I imagine. Is it possible that I should be looking up rather than out?

Up on two levels, I should imagine. On one level, my relationship with God (more often not diligent than diligent) which inevitably gives me more purpose when I concentrate on Him; on the other level, building up upon the walls which surround me rather than trying to breaking through them, a tower rather than a castle.

The reality is, barring a layoff or end of the world as I know it, most change in my life is going to be incremental at this point, not the sweeping arc of destiny that I so often imagine (and desire on some level, I suppose). That being the case, perhaps I need to deal with the fact that I am building brick by brick - or even destroying brick by brick as necessary - rather than large scale destruction and construction. It's not that nothing is going on - it's just slower (more people and animals involved now) and needs to be seen in the web of relationships that my life is encompassed by.

Can I be patient and determined with the same intensity that I am currently trying to batter things down with?

Common Cup

I have started using the common cup at communion.

For many years - probably over 15? - I've been a "small cup" guy, possibly because that is what they offered at the churches I have attended: the small plastic cup in the holder with the wine (or juice) inside. However, the church that we attend in New Home has two options: the little cups or the common cup.

For almost 11 months I have been using the little cups - mostly out of habit. And then two Sundays ago, on a whim, I went ahead and drank out of the common cup.

I'm not going to pretend there was some kind of deep spiritual significance that occurred, or that somehow the heavens opened up. But what it did do was bring into a deeper sense of communion in the old sense of the word, community -in this case with God and the believers through the centuries that used only the common cup.

On some deep level it mirrors the development of so much of modern Western Christianity - we've stripped out the community from communion and replaced it with our own individual smaller buckets of God. God is no longer us and the community of believers but rather us and God, in a premeasured aliquoted amount with the empty container left behind. Yes I know that small cups have good sensible hygienic reasons but I think the symbolism is more profound than we care to admit.

I'm certainly not going to become hardline on the issue and may use the small cups from time to time (like illness for example - although the wine my church uses would, I suspect, kill any bacteria or viruses!) and yes, I know for many churches such an option is simply not practical. But it's given me a richer experience in communion and I'm the better for it. Besides, for myself what is more important: focusing on Christ's sacrifice or how it is dispensed?

No Brakes

Yet another vivid dream...

So I am at work with my most recent set of coworkers - yet strangely, I am in the building from my first job where I entered the industry, up to and including going into the room where I started with the glasswashers, oven, and autoclaves present. My current boss is there - he hands me a stack of papers with registrations that need to submitted today while he is apparently practicing softball out the door of his office. Other coworkers as busy whisking by me on tasks, carrying papers or going to lunch, all apparently not talking to me in the pursuit of their tasks. I pass a series of office mailboxes; it looks like they have not been used in a long time ("since the layoffs" my mind says) as there are only a few pieces of mail there, including an old calender with chocolate (which naturally I try to get to).

For some reason I decide I have to leave (it's not quitting time, apparently). As I go to exit I am suddenly not in either New Home or the original location of my job but in Seattle (always Seattle in these dreams) driving down frontage roads.. As I start to drive home, I suddenly realize that I can't seem to brake my car. I look down - there's the brake pedal, it presses down and up - but when I try to engage it driving home all that happens is that I press it to the floor. I either continue to hit green lights or blast through yellow ones as I roll home.

Apparently this is concerning enough that I turn around and go to back to work - although not so concerning that once I am there, I offer to give a coworker a ride home. Again with the hills, the brakes not working. She is obviously getting a little uncomfortable because I am continuing to drive around, not necessarily the direction of home over hills and through tunnels, trying to reduce my speed. I manage to coast the car to a stop on an uphill run into a residential neighborhood and explain to her the difficulties that I'm having, that it's not that I'm some sort of sexual predator (no idea why this comes up) but that my brakes are simply not working. I point down to the floor, show her the pedal and that it is not doing anything. She thanks me, says it wasn't really a concern and that this reminds her of a phrase they were going to put on their website which she then recites (but I can't understand the language), but that she would rather go ahead and call her husband and have him come and get her. I at least offer to give her a ride to a location where I saw a police officer for safety. She says no big deal, it's not far and she can walk. She gets out of the car and I start it up again, ready to drive away.

And then I wake up. All I can remember is the thought "I have no brakes! I have no brakes!"

Windows

"Opportunities are like windows. They open and close, sometimes quite quickly." - Brian Tracy, Victory

Once not so long ago, a somewhat younger (but quite ebullient ) me made the radical comment "You know, opportunities are everywhere you look. You just have to see them." A somewhat older, less ebullient me might still believe that now, but it seems that I have a harder time seeing them. So maybe in that sense opportunities are also like windows in the sense that they are transparent and can be seen through (and walked into) unless you are looking for them.

If that's the case, why does it feel like I am continually walking into walls with no windows?

A room without windows. What an apt description of how I feel so many days - not that the light doesn't shine in, but that it seems there are no windows to look out of. But the light is coming in, so there must be windows somewhere. Though as the quote says above, they open and close - somtimes with surprising speed, so that I may never recognize that they were ever there.

How do I see these windows of opportunity? Where are they in my life? What am I missing?

Making Most of Myself

"Each character is placed in a setting by a novelist; each expands or contracts his part through the choices he makes. Play your part gladly, but do not waste your time trying to make your role more important. The more a player in a drama elevates his part, the less he fulfills it. And the less is written of him in the Book, no matter how much has been written in the Shadowlands." - Marcus, Edge of Eternity (Randy Alcorn)

There are times when I tend to want to grasp responsibility and power, accrue them to myself because (gosh darn it) I deserve it: I'm talented, intelligent, simply wasted in my current position and life. I could be doing great things; instead I feel like I am doing little things that serve no purpose.

The above passage from Edge of Eternity was a good reminder as I re-read the book that I need to focus less on trying to make my role in life more important and simply live out my role in life. It's not that it doesn't mean that I can't do greater things or make a larger difference; what it does mean is it should be a natural progression, not a constant spotlight focused on me saying "Hey, look at what I'm doing! I deserve your attention!".

It's a version of the "You can only focus on one thing at a time." If I focus on drawing attention to me and what I'm doing, this typically detracts from performing my job whereas if I simply do my job (be that in career, family, personal or life), my role will typically increase if for no other reason than I am doing my task competently (let alone any eternal implications!).

So where will my time and attention be today: on making my role important or simply doing the role I have? Perhaps more importantly, what has the greater benefit?

A Blast From The Past

An Bohemianach seems to think I have some issues regarding my rant this morning. It reminded me of an oldie but goodie here.

A Rant

(Rant on)

I had my first rogue poster on Facebook today.

"Lose weight now with this amazing product! I can't believe how much it did for me! You should try it too!"

I sat there and looked at it as I scrolled through the postings - at first unbelieving, then with a growing sense of offense. This is my page, the page my friends (mostly) and business colleagues (possibly) look at - and this guy thinks it's okay to post junk mail?

It seems to me (after I calmed down and removed him from the list) that this in a microcosm is yet another ill of electronic society: the concept that I can do or say virtually anything I want because I am the most important thing on the planet.

The difference between physical communication and electronic communication is that physical communication (i.e. communication in the presence of another) gives context and body language. Few people would think of blurting out something completely off topic in the middle of conversation - they would be looked at, ignored, and the conversation would continue on. However, electronic communication does not have the same feedback loop: I can post something or send you a junk e-mail and even though you delete it immediately, it still takes time and effort on your part - and the poster feels pretty good, like they've done something.

Where does this come from? This inane notion that what I have to say or do is so important that I will overstretch the bounds of good taste and manners because it's all about me (and my product, service, opinion, etc.). Of course you delete it - it's more important that I get attention to myself. What, expect restraint or good manners of me? Ridiculous. My berry-cobbler-juice- mix will help you lose weight (and, by the way, help me to make money) - It's amazing!

And so friends, as I leave you, be sure to try out Toirdhealbheach Beucail's Amazing Blend of Wisanity (it's wisdom - and insanity!). It's good for you, it's environmentally friendly, it will help you lose weight, improves your dating life, clears your skin, and best of all - it's absolutely free!

(And, all the words are properly spelled. Rant off.)

Support Your Local Personality Stand

Another rejection e-mail last night.

I've almost become accustomed to the sense that where I am now is where I am going to be for a while - if for no other reason, to have a career in this economy is a good thing at all. I've managed to take the edge off the concept that a rejection is not a rejection of me or my skills per se, but rather the fact that there are simply a good many number of people out there seeking employment.

Within that framework, I'm attempting to address the fact of "What am I supposed to be doing now?" I'm trying to work with the model of "bloom where you are planted" and "work with what you have" - a sort of personal life "Small/local is beautiful" theory or "Support your local farmer". So based on that, what do I have?

If I go through and make the list, I find that I have much of what I had back in Old Home - in some ways different (less family immediately near, for example) but not significantly the changed. I have some new things as well: a new location, a new set of coworkers and job field, a new church. I also have a new set of time, which is conveniently been given to me by the move, not directly owning a house, and having that extended family far enough away that regular visits are not an option.

So if God has shaken my hand loose on one side, what has He put in the other? And what am I to do with it?

Off The Treadmill

I've had yesterday's post hanging over my mind since I wrote it, wondering if it was too bold or definitive or an overstatement of what I'm feeling right now. I decided not, as the more that I thought about the more I kept coming back to "Yes, that just about sums it up."

The feeling that I got yesterday after writing the post was the sense of being on a treadmill which is moving, but really going nowhere. So the question, I suppose, is how do I get off the treadmill and get on to a path which is actually going somewhere.

That presumes of course that 1) One is looking for the path and 2) Once one finds the path, one will take it.

But am I looking for that path? Or am I intent on following paths of my own choosing, paths that really just lead me back to the treadmill rather than actually having me walk further down it? If God has determined the way for me to go, what does the fact that I constantly seem to shy away from that path say about me?

I have tried (O Lord have I tried) to constantly negotiate with Him my path within His will, figuring out what would be the best way for me to serve Him instead of listening to what He had for me. I don't know that I did any permanent damage trying this approach but I certainly failed: failed to get to seminary (two times), failed to move into leadership, failed to become the teacher I hoped I would. Every vision I had of how I would serve Him and what I would do for Him failed - and even after those paths ended, there was the other visions of great things I would do as a layman. Those too seemed to fade away, falling faster and faster out of my hands until Old Home became New Home and those dreams seemed to be pulled away as well.

But every path is not blocked. There is at least one open - the one off of the treadmill. I would ask if I could find it, but the reality is it is probably already wide open before my eyes. Is it a question of I can't see it - or that I won't? "Can't" means that it is beyond my ability; "Won't" means that I am voluntarily choosing not to. And if it is "Won't" is it because it is a thing of true fear, or simply because it does not match what my own estimation of what I should be and should be doing?

Am I tired enough of hopelessness, of activity without motion, that I am willing to submit myself to the path laid before me? Or will my pride keep me rigidly in place, hoping that if I just run all the faster the treadmill will suddenly break off and I'll be moving?

Hopelessness

Another moment of epiphany this morning.

I was mulling over yesterday, as I walked through the hot and humid day of New Home enjoying our semi-local Animal Theme Park, about the fact that even though it was a weekend and I was spending the day with An Teaglach, I was not really all that happy. Not really unhappy mind you; just not all that happy. Heat, humidity, large crowds of people: certainly I'm not fan of any of them. But below the surface of all that was general silence of the soul: not angry, not upset, just sort of placid and soot colored.

If I thought about it, that tends to reflect my mood most days: not angry or upset, just placid and soot colored. When I get up, when I go to work, when I come home from work, when I interact with my family, when I go to bed: virtually the same.

So why is this? What explains this sort of bland melange of unenthused action and feeling?

A loss of hope.

I've lost hope - temporal hope, anyway. I've essentially lost hope that my life is going to be able to change for the better in any meaningful way.

Meaningful way? It can relate to any number of things: finances, relationships, job, goals, impact. There is just a subconscious crushing sense of the fact that no matter what I do it will make precisely no difference. It's the sense of all your efforts being poured down a hole, washed away forever.

Again, it's not depression (How well I know that feeling!). It's not despondency - although it may share some attributes of despondency in the sense of "the uselessness of further action". It's the sense that no matter what is done, it will simply make no difference.

How does one combat such a thing when it permeates the very air that one breathes? When every time you go for a day, or even a week of not thinking about it you suddenly come crashing back down to earth with the sense of "Nothing is changing, no matter what I do".

How do you soldier on in the face of a desolate landscape when your getting no closer to the edge of the desert?

What's Love Got To Do With It?

It is remarkable to me that life is as sometimes as mysterious and repetitive as it is.

Witness: Another friend, having recently gone through a divorce and with a number of children, has just rekindled a relationship with his girlfriend of almost 30 years ago. This is a thing which, if I thought about it, is too much to be believed. Ah, the power of Facebook.

Love is an odd thing. I've now in my mid-forties, and I've yet to really understand it. Some of the mysteries which I think may be esoteric:

1) What happens to the true romantic over time? At what point does that get crushed out in the word in which we live and the circumstances we confront?
2) How is it we can instantly be back in love with people we've not seen for years, while we too often sputter with the people we have been with for years?
3) What is love really? If it's a verb instead of a noun, how do prevent it from becoming a duty? And if it's a noun instead of a verb, how do you practice it?
4) How is it that people that are together have such different interpretations of what love is and how it is practiced?
5) Given hopelessly romantic me of 30 years ago or experienced, tired and exasperated (but responsible) me of today, which would I truly rather be?

All pretty questions of course and probably worth the thought I will give them on my way to work. But maybe, just for today, I'll revel in the fact that somewhere love is still working in it's mysterious way: beyond time, beyond reason, beyond geography.

Because in the end, it's sort of difficult to logically explain it anyway.

Assigned and Consigned

"You are only as free as your options. You are only as free as your well-developed alternatives to whatever you are doing today. If you have only one choice, or one course of action you can take, you will start to feel trapped. You will feel locked in and out of control of your life or your situation. You will begin to experience what Dr. Martin Seligman of the University of Pennsylvania calls 'learned helplessness'. You will feel unable to change or improve your condition. This feeling causes inordinate stress and anxiety." - Brian Tracy, Victory

The quote above resonated with me this morning as I thought over yesterday; surely as night follows day, the minute I say I am almost enjoying my life, I get whacked upside the head.

I can't say I didn't try. I went to work buoyed up with the thought that "Life is really okay". I went through most of the day thinking the same thing, or at least trying to think it. And then, around 4:00, I got double blindsided: on the one hand, I found out that yet another project has suddenly become my responsibility; on the other, I found out that someone unexpected was leaving.

And how does this equate into the quote above, you ask? Simple: in one case, the individual has options which they are going to exercise because they can; on the other hand, I received another (thankless) task because the fact of the matter is I have no other options based on my personal situation than to accept the work with a smile (real or feigned, it matters not).

It's a terrible thing, this concept of "learned helplessness". It drains energy and optimism and leaves in its wake cynicism and the dull roar of depression. It's one thing to say it is better to try and fail than to never try; it is another to live with the fact of having tried and failed and feeling as if you have just been assigned somewhere, but consigned somewhere.

"Always have options" the saying runs. However, actually having and maintaining those options is something which can be a full time job on top of the full time life one already has. But is that truly any less energy that fighting the daily battle of feeling that life cannot change and will not change?

If freedom is measured in options, how free are you? What are your options? How can you get more?

The Past as Present

There are moments when I almost find I am enjoying my life.

"Good Lord", I scream to myself silently. "Where is this coming from? This is not supposed to be my life as it was going to happen."

It's odd - in approximately 10 years, we have come fully circle in some many areas of our life - financial, employment, relationships. The multiplicity of children is something that had not been intended or anticipated, I suppose (nor for that matter, the increase in the rabbit population here) - but other than that, we seem to be right back where we were in 2000.

I'd argue that's not a good thing for a number of the implications that it carries - and in some ways it is probably not - but in other ways it's not so surprisingly bad.

My job is not ideal - but I have great coworkers. The church we currently attend is not like the one we used to attend - but our family all gets to go together. We don't own our house- but it's bigger and there's a room for everyone and a yard for the dog and in the event we have to move in the future, we don't have to worry about selling it. Certainly my industry knowledge far surpasses where it was 10 years ago. I'm writing regularly now in a semi-public forum - something that was definitely not happening 10 years ago. And I have a wonderful expanded family - something that was dimly forseen (if at all) 10 years ago.

So what have I got to grumble about?

If I've got problems in my life, it's up to me to make them better: if it's work that is not working, I need to fix it (and maybe the company if it comes to that); if it's finances, then it's up to me to make the money; if I'm not doing what I want to be doing, it's up to me to find a way to make it happen.

It's the past as present - except in surprising ways, much better.

To Cherish and Rationalize

"...the Psalmist said, 'If I regard wickedness in my heart, the Lord will not hear.' (Psalm 66:18). To regard wickedness is to cherish some sin, to love it to the extent that I am not willing to part with it. I know it is there, yet I justify it in some way like the child who says, 'Well, he hit me first.'" - Jerry Bridges, The Pursuit of Holiness

The heart is a tricky thing, especially with sin. It can hold on to things and provide every justification about why they are in fact not sin; it can rationalize and protest and reason every day for the rest of one's life about why certain sins must be maintained at all costs - even at the cost of a relationship with God.

My personal favorite is the "If I don't do it this way, it won't happen" school of thought. "If I don't imagine about X, there will be none of it in my life - and after all, everyone needs X in their life." How many times have I veered into places I never should have gone, simply because of this argument?

The reality is this, like many other arguments for sin, is a false choice. In one sense it is true - if I don't do something some ways, they won't happen. The question really should be "If I don't do this, will I really miss it?" This moves the question a step beyond, from debating how to do something to the more fundamental question of whether it should be done in the first place.

And certainly there are plenty of things that need not be done at all by their nature - especially when measuring the cost overall. It's like the addict who cannot give up the thing they are addicted to, even to the extent of destroying everything around them. We cluck our tongues and say "That's a shame when someone is so addicted to something so bad for them" - yet given the same circumstances with our own sins and areas of weakness, we somehow fail to make the connection in our own lives. If the addict cannot give up an addiction for this life, how pathetic are we who cannot give up an addiction (often not a physical craving) for eternity?

When I say "we", I mean "me". I am the foremost offender in this, holding onto things I should have jettisoned long ago, justifying my own failings in the guise of something being better than nothing. Is that always true? Or are there some nothings that are better than somethings?

Perhaps it is time - finally time - to hew down the altars and high places in my own life, to determine that I will no longer sacrifice at altars which are not God's.

Scary? Sure - I say this now but that "If I don't do it this way it will never happen" roars to the forefront, and given my penchant for wanting to do something noble and great and seeing my life in comparison, the temptation will be strong. But - and here's the question - if I don't do things that way, do I then open up another option for God to move those things in and through my life?

Of course if I don't do it, I'll never know.

Reverence

As part of my attempt to memorize more Scripture, I have been working on the book of Titus (it's three chapters or about 50 verses, something I think even I can handle). In the course of working my way through Chapter 2 (in which Paul is dealing with personal behaviors of various age groups) I came across a series of repeated commands to be reverent.

Titus 2:2 : "that the older men be sober, reverent..."
Titus 2:3 : "the older women likewise, that they be reverent in behavior...
Titus 2:7 : "in all things showing yourself to be a pattern of good works; in doctrine showing integrity, reverence, incorruptibility;..."

In Scripture (as in life), things that are repeated are meant to be emphasized. So what is Paul driving at?

To our old friend Merriam-Webster:

Reverent: "Expressing or characterized by reverence; worshipful."

Okay, let's try reverence.

Reverence: "Honor or respect felt or shown; deference; profound adoring awe or respect."

Ah, there it is then: honor, respect, deference, profound adoring awe or respect.

So why would Paul have felt it necessary to insure that three of the four groups he addressed be instructed to demonstrate this? It would seem obvious: they were a group that did not understand what reverence meant.

But we are generally no different. We are not typically a reverent culture as Western Civilization, or (for the most part) a reverent religious people as Christians. There are very few things that are shown the deep honor and respect that reverence entails in our culture; in most cases such things have become flash points between two groups.

But the more alarming part (at least for me as a Christian) is that we don't show reverence to God. We have moved from the concept of God as other than that of what we are to the idea of God as something which is similar to what we are, only better; from Luther's picture of the absurdity of a small thing addressing the Creator of the Universe (and sometimes, yelling at Him) to God as the fulfiller of our plans and, if you will, our "buddy".

Give yourself a test: when was the last time you heard God or the things of God spoken of with reverence? Even more damning, when was the last time you spoke of God or the things of God with reverence? We should expect the world to do so but do we as Christians also not do so?

If I had to take a stab at the core of the matter, it's because we have lost the impact of our salvation and our own lostness. Perhaps we treat salvation as more of a good thing that God has done for us rather than the eternity altering act that it was; perhaps because we make God in our own image rather than letting Him be who He is and conforming our understanding to that. In either case, we try to make God accessible to our finite minds and thus lose His majesty and greatness.

If we proclaim God as being great and awesome but treat Him practically like just another friend or a hobby, how can we expect others to take us (or Him) seriously?

In a world of irreverence, reverence will be noticed. Let us be known for reverence with which we treat God, not for our ability to bring God to our level.

Online and Time

As part of the periodic nostalgia to which I seem prone from time to time, I decided to try my hand at one of the Online Role Playing Games. I've always been fascinated by the concept since it came out but never wanted to do so; now, with some opportunities for free play available, I thought it would be interesting to try.

It was extremely cool, the very thing that my imagination was longing for all those years. To visually see a world other than this, to visually immerse myself in an adventure, to see the characters and things that had wandered my imagination for years, was a treat indeed.

But as I continued to play, I realized that there was one significant problem: time.

Playing online, like everything else, takes time. And in role playing games, sometimes you lose. The nice thing is that you are never really "gone"; you just come back and have to start over.

But one thing doesn't come back: the time. The time spent playing these games is lost, passing in the breeze. And if you're not careful, you'll find 3 hours have slipped away and you have done nothing but have to go back to the beginning and redo the whole thing.

It's a game. I understand that completely. At the same time, this is a game that I played (in old fashioned paper and imagination!) many years ago, a concept of game that many people continue to play now - so even if the medium is different, the lesson is the same.

The lesson is simply that if for no other reasons, these things teach terrible lessons about time and the way life works.

They teach that that there is a dichotomy that exists between reality and fantasy, that one's actions can be undone and you can go back to the beginning - no harm, no foul. They also teach that time is essentially a thing which doesn't matter so much, at least as long as you're enjoying yourself.

The harsh reality - the reality of mid-forties me looking back - is that time is the thing which matters most. Yes, there's nothing wrong with enjoying one's self, but I cannot pretend that spending time on something means that there is no impact on other things in my life. Other things - critical things, meaningful things - will get pushed aside, goals will not be achieved, relationships will with and die. And unlike online games, one does not get to go back to the beginning - you have to continue forward where you are.

Will I play again? I'm not sure. Ironically, I seem unable to swallow the loss of time (for myself, dare I call it a waste?) based on all the other things I need to do and the time frames I have to do them; this world we call reality has far more to do in it than I can ever get done. It will, however, encourage me to continue to try to teach my children about the importance of time and how, once gone, it never returns. Even the memories of how we enjoyed ourselves doing these things never returns a second of the time we used to do them.

Three More Dreams

Three more dreams - Whatever my conscious is trying to tell me, it's getting more frantic.

Dream 1) I am with someone in an area with high mountains are rolling valleys. We have a need to get down to the bottom of the valley to a road. In order to do this, we are essentially flying down the mountainside, leaping from what appear to be hovering platforms to hovering platforms. There seems to be a time element involved, because every time I am having to evaluate "Is this the right platform? Will we crash? Where do I jump next?" always with a sense of urgency.

Dream 2) I am living in a college dorm (although apparently I'm no longer in college). I have just completed attending a meeting which apparently I was responsible for setting up. As people leave, I suddenly realize that I have someone's personal items. I'm tortured by what to do, because there are no identifying features. Do I put an ad up somewhere, risking that someone will see it? Do I just leave in the lobby, hoping they will find it? Do I hold on to it, although I'll be able to do nothing with it?

Dream 3) I am living somewhere in a house which I am renting. As I am walking out with Cedric (our cat who died last year) I suddenly realize there's a rattlesnake ahead of us. It's not interested in striking but is going along the ground somewhere. As it's close to a house, I decide something has to be done, so I head back to the house. As I get ready to go in, I realize there's a second, smaller rattlesnake on the porch next to Fergus, another one of our cats that died last year. It too is not interested in striking. I grab a basket, plop it over the snake and whip it to the side as I grab the cats and head indoors.

The Power of Gratitude

Yesterday another audit was wrapped up at work. The closing meeting occurred after 12 hours of document review, facility tours, walkthroughs and conversations and over 24 hours of pre-audit preparation. The auditors completed their comments and walked out the door. Documents were recovered and moved back to a holding area for further processing and return to their home.

In all of this, nobody thanked anyone.

This thing is a pestilential curse upon every relationship up and down the chain of human existence, this assumption that those that are less than us are here to serve us. The reverse does not appear to be true: when a superior of any kind performs an action or kindness, there almost always seems to be an immediate recognition and thanks. However, more often than not we fail to offer those who serve us the same thing.

The reality is that nothing in modern society gets accomplished without a great deal of moving parts from a lot of different sources. For my own example: the person who cleans the room where the audit is going to be, the person who prepares the room (coffee and water don't provide themselves!), the personnel who greet the auditors, the guides, the subject matter experts, the document retrievers and those who review the documents before they enter the room, the note takers, the re-filers of the documents once they've been used, the responders to the audit, the person who (re)cleans the room after the fact. Each and every part of this process takes people to make it happen, people who are too often presumed that this is "their job."

In one sense of course it is "their job". In another sense it is not fully their job, because very seldom is there a calling to servanthood on any job description, which these sorts of things require.

Gratitude is really recognition. It can be as simple as a "Thanks for all your hard work"; it can be as extensive as a reward of some nature. The reality is that means that someone recognizes the effort that was put into the end result - the effort that, if done correctly, makes the whole process appear seamless to those who do not know better.

Gratitude is a powerful thing, in some ways one of the most powerful social forces. It can cost nothing, so there is never an excuse about the price. It can be as simple as a sincere "Thanks for your hard work", so there is never an excuse about being too difficult. It can be short as a 10 second conversation, so there is never an excuse about the time.

Then why aren't people more grateful?

There are, I think, two reasons. The first is simply that people tend to be focused on themselves, on their needs. It is like our entire lives are in a restaurant where the purpose of everyone in the restaurant is to serve us. Personally. Most people don't acknowledge the Chip Guy, the Table Cleaner, even often the Server beyond the order giving and the perfunctory "Are you enjoying the dinner?" So often we view everyone around us as being here to serve us personally.

The second is a Freudian slip I made in typing this. Instead of typing "Gratitude is a powerful thing" I typed "Gratitude is a power thing". A slip, but I realized it's true. So often showing gratitude is used as a means of power in relationships. If I want something from you or I want you to notice me in the future or I want to indebt you to me, I will express gratitude. It is treated as the gratuity on the bill of life; I will tip you if I feel you have served me (again, that self focus) well, not necessarily if you have served well.

But then we wonder why communication breaks down, why people are less willing to help us, why the expectations in personal relationships becomes that of a third world dictatorship where a form of gratitude becomes the "grease" to get things done than an expression of sincere thanks.

Be different. Be radical. Today, thank people for what they've done, not as a tip for services rendered but out of a sincere gratefulness for other's do to make your life function. Never be stingy in that which costs nothing, takes little time, and is a simple (yet profound) part of every relationship.

Ungratefulness

"In 1538 on May the 26th there was a big rain. (Martin) Luther said 'Praise God. He is giving us one hundred thousand gulden worth. It is raining corn, wheat, barley, wine, cabbage, onions, grass, and milk. All our goods we get for nothing. And God sends His only begotten Son, and we crucify Him." - Martin Luther, Table Talk as quoted in Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther by Roland H. Bainton

Courage

How does one gain the verve and spirit to become courageous?

I realize - in multiple parts of my life - that I have essentially developed the art of waiting for permission (or at least acceptance) prior to beginning virtually any activity that involves anyone else. It's as if I wait to get permission to act, rather than act. And from what I can see, it's both disappointing and frustrating to others - as was related to me, "Are you going to do anything, or are you going to just sit there and twitch?"

"Courage is always expressed in the willingness to go forward, to face danger, to take risks with no guarantee of success...Courage is essential to success in all activities that call for risk and daring." - Brian Tracy, Victory

This is something I need to come up with - not only for myself, but for all of those around in the situations I find myself (work and home). People are looking to me to act, to be courageous enough to take a step, to push things through.

But inside I cringe because I'm looking for approval prior to executing the action, not after it succeeds. I don't quite know where the originates from, only that if I look deep within my heart I find it to be true in situation after situation. To think myself brave - to psyche myself into acting like I should act prior to doing so - almost seems the height of fantasy or an illusion that I am knowingly trying to perform, waiting for the balloon to collapse at the first sign of opposition. It's the sensation of putting on a mask and acting unlike yourself and knowing it.

But if it feels uncomfortable (and it often does) is that valid? Or is it the fact that I am so used to acting another way that it is not that it is wrong, but that it simply is different? The two are not the same.

To wait forever for permission is to eventually lose. To go forward without the guarantee of approval is uncomfortable and sometimes risky but may entail winning once in a while.

So what is it today? Twitching - or winning?

"No great battles are ever won on the defensive." - Napoleon

Trivia and Impact

I realized yesterday how much of our lives is spent on trivia which has no impact on either eternity or the greater good of anyone.

I realized it yesterday as I reorganized over 50 sets of records, preparing them for an audit which will perhaps look at 1/10th of them for a product that probably won't matter 10 years from now; I realized it as I spoke to Uisdean Ruadh about his new job and his specialization in hardware parts that you wouldn't even remember were in a home; I realized it as I overlooked Am Bhan Bhothemeanach as she made minor adjustments to marketing materials that will probably get glanced and and recycled more than they are read.

As we have continued to reach new heights in our 21st Century technological civilization, it has imposed on us a requirement: that as there are more moving parts to do more things, we need to have more people skillful in the subcategories of each of those moving parts to support them. As a result, we become more specialized and skillful at one part or subpart of an industry or profession, which can equal a greater ability to succeed in that profession - but if that profession goes away, more often than not nowhere else.

But this specialization also creates a second issue, perhaps the more damning one for me personally: we become more and more focused upon less and less, until we are experts in that which truly has no significance except what we infuse into it via the amount of time we spend on it.

Think on it: in your work circles, how much conversation, meetings and discussions have you had on a project that eventually died? Do you remember, as the notice comes out about that project, all the paper and effort that was poured into it, the late nights and hurried meals and time away from family and friends to make it important? Have you ever experienced the realization that something was indicated as terribly important was, by the standards of all that truly matters, worthless?

Interestingly for most of us, it is only in those "non-work" activities - be they hobbies, family time or friend time - that we begin to break away from the high degree of specialization and begin to touch on the matters that have more significance, that may have impact beyond ourselves both here on earth and in eternity. Perhaps it is because they are more broad in nature, perhaps it is because they by what they are enable us to get beyond the circle of "me" - but in gardening or changing a rabbit box or doing something with my children, I touch on things that are part of a larger picture, have greater impact, and (perhaps) can change the lives of others.

My question: Why have we allowed ourselves to be sold this concept, this inverse proposal that the trivial is important and the broad and impactful is something to be wedged into our free time? And if this is true, what do we - what do I -do about it?

Buttercup Is Writing Again!

Go here.

YAY!

Five Dreams

Five vivid and odd dreams last night:

1) I chartered a plane (which I was flying) from Old Home to see Otis in The NW. I had two friends and Nighean Dhonn with me. We arrived there, drove around a bit (for some reason there were lots of hills), and then immediately returned to the airport to leave without seeing Otis. I enjoy the flying and am trying to get a cost of how much a plane is, but can't seem to get anyone to answer me.

2) We're still in The NW, and it's the same group that I flew up with. We are trying to find a restaurant to deliver a prize to. We get there and everyone is all but ignoring us, even though we are here to deliver an award. We finally convince someone of what we're here to do. They thank us, take the award, and disappear. Eventually, the owner finally comes out (as if they figure out we won't leave until we see her) to accept it. It's a quick thing, as apparently they are closing shop to go out and don't want to appear that they're leaving quickly but that they are; that sort of lingering around near the door in hopes that someone will get a clue that it's time to go and leave sensation.

3) The Ravishing Mrs. TB and I were in a taxi going to visit Otis and Buttercup in The NW. It's a van and we are sharing it with a number of other occupants, who slowly exit as we continue. Unfortunately, the driver failed to ask where we were going and I failed to provide the information. He made his last drop and asked us where we were going. When we informed him, he shrugged. "Back at the beginning?" I asked, at which he nods "yes". However, there are still more passengers so rather than return, he keeps on driving as two ladies in front of us begin to discuss the new apartments that we're driving past.

4) At my high school, a school bus is getting loaded up. Nighean Dhonn is there along with me, walking up the street towards my grandparent's house as a father and son walk by. Suddenly, the father starts pointing and talking excitedly. Here comes Nighean Dhonn down the street, driving on a riding mower. The father was agitated, shouting "pull it over, pull it over" - which she does. As later the two of us walk up the street we see the father and son looking at the mower pulled over to the side of the street.

5) We are still near the high school but it is myself and two friends (one of them is Uisdean Ruadh). It's night, but we walk up to the door to knock. We see that the lights are just turned out as if my grandfather (gone 18 years now) is apparently going to bed. We turn to go, but then the light goes on and he opens up the door. We essentially say hello, say goodbye and then he shuts the door and turns off the light.

Finis