So my father in law had his left lower leg amputated today.
It was not a total surprise. He has diabetes (Type II) and had already had his lower right leg amputated 10 years or more ago. Decreased circulation leads to increased risk of infection. He had non-healing wounds which would not respond to antibiotics and so....
He came out of surgery as well as can be expected (for which we are all grateful), but the doctors are giving him even odds for healing.
As I mentioned, this was not a surprise. He has not taken the best care of himself over the years, especially after he was confirmed diabetic. He will admit it. And the hardest thing in the world is having someone you love have a condition which you know ends badly and they will do nothing about it.
Is all diabetes controllable? No. Type I comes on with no help at all. But Type II can be very much be lifestyle driven.
But so are other things. Just yesterday, doing some background research for a job interview, I read (via Wikipedia, your mileage may vary) that there are 448 million new cases of sexually transmitted infections every year. That is new. Every year. Not existing. And, apparently, even one case of gonorrhea increases a man's chance of prostate cancer.
(I know - weird research, right?)
32% of cancer deaths are related to cancers due to (wait for it) tobacco use and poor physical condition (obesity, poor diet, lack of exercise, overuse of alcohol - again, Wikipedia).
So here is my point: we know what causes these things. We know what we can do to avoid them. And yet, we do nothing.
448 million new cases of sexually transmitted infections a year. That works out to one in every sixteen people. Dear Lord, we know how these things spread. We know what causes them. And we know very simple ways of preventing them. We have within our power the ability to, by behavior, greatly diminish them within the population.
And yet we do nothing.
I suppose for some cases there is not much many can do directly, especially in poorer parts of the globe. But we are the First World. We are supposed to know better.
Why do we do nothing? Because it is hard. Because is means self denial. Because it may mean living in a way radically different than what we expected or wanted to.
There are many facing health challenges they never intended. They ate right, lived right, exercised, and the bad news came anyway. My message is not directed at you.
But it is directed at the rest of us, those of us who know better and can do better and instead do very little. A lot, this is directed at myself who knows better.
I know we have fantastic medicine and I know we are making progress in fighting all kinds of conditions and diseases. I work in the industry; it is one of the reasons that I continue to do so. And there are really serious conditions - ALS, Alzheimer's Lupus, all kinds of CNS and genetic diseases, diseases of the Third World like Malaria and Hepetitus and Tuberculosis - and even Diabetes - that we need to give attention to.
Can w at least all make the commitment to do what we can to get the easy wins out of the way?
Tuesday, July 05, 2016
Monday, July 04, 2016
July4th 2016 - The Declaration of Independence
There are not a great deal of traditional posts here at The Forty-Five, but one that I always do is the Declaration of Independence on July 4th as a reminder of why we have a concept of "The consent of the governed" at all. The phrase "hat whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness" has some special meaning this year.
When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. --Such has been the patient sufferance of these colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systems of government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his assent to laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his governors to pass laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his assent should be obtained, and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of representation in the legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved representative houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the legislative powers, incapable of annihilation, have returned to the people at large for their exercise; the state remaining in the meantime exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavored to prevent the population of these states; for that purpose obstructing the laws for naturalization of foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither, and raising the conditions of new appropriations of lands.
He has obstructed the administration of justice, by refusing his assent to laws for establishing judiciary powers.
He has made judges dependent on his will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, standing armies without the consent of our legislature.
He has affected to render the military independent of and superior to civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his assent to their acts of pretended legislation:
For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by mock trial, from punishment for any murders which they should commit on the inhabitants of these states:
For cutting off our trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing taxes on us without our consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of trial by jury:
For transporting us beyond seas to be tried for pretended offenses:
For abolishing the free system of English laws in a neighboring province, establishing therein an arbitrary government, and enlarging its boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule in these colonies:
For taking away our charters, abolishing our most valuable laws, and altering fundamentally the forms of our governments:
For suspending our own legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated government here, by declaring us out of his protection and waging war against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burned our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to complete the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow citizens taken captive on the high seas to bear arms against their country, to become the executioners of their friends and brethren, or to fall themselves by their hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavored to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian savages, whose known rule of warfare, is undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these oppressions we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms: our repeated petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have we been wanting in attention to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace friends.
We, therefore, the representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress, assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name, and by the authority of the good people of these colonies, solemnly publish and declare, that these united colonies are, and of right ought to be free and independent states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as free and independent states, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent states may of right do. And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor.
New Hampshire: Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton
Massachusetts: John Hancock, Samuel Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island: Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery
Connecticut: Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott
New York: William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris
New Jersey: Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkinson, John Hart, Abraham Clark
Pennsylvania: Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross
Delaware: Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean
Maryland: Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia: George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton
North Carolina: William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn
South Carolina: Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur Middleton
Georgia: Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton
Source: The Pennsylvania Packet, July 8, 1776
When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. --Such has been the patient sufferance of these colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systems of government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his assent to laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his governors to pass laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his assent should be obtained, and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of representation in the legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved representative houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the legislative powers, incapable of annihilation, have returned to the people at large for their exercise; the state remaining in the meantime exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavored to prevent the population of these states; for that purpose obstructing the laws for naturalization of foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither, and raising the conditions of new appropriations of lands.
He has obstructed the administration of justice, by refusing his assent to laws for establishing judiciary powers.
He has made judges dependent on his will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, standing armies without the consent of our legislature.
He has affected to render the military independent of and superior to civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his assent to their acts of pretended legislation:
For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by mock trial, from punishment for any murders which they should commit on the inhabitants of these states:
For cutting off our trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing taxes on us without our consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of trial by jury:
For transporting us beyond seas to be tried for pretended offenses:
For abolishing the free system of English laws in a neighboring province, establishing therein an arbitrary government, and enlarging its boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule in these colonies:
For taking away our charters, abolishing our most valuable laws, and altering fundamentally the forms of our governments:
For suspending our own legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated government here, by declaring us out of his protection and waging war against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burned our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to complete the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow citizens taken captive on the high seas to bear arms against their country, to become the executioners of their friends and brethren, or to fall themselves by their hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavored to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian savages, whose known rule of warfare, is undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these oppressions we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms: our repeated petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have we been wanting in attention to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace friends.
We, therefore, the representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress, assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name, and by the authority of the good people of these colonies, solemnly publish and declare, that these united colonies are, and of right ought to be free and independent states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as free and independent states, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent states may of right do. And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor.
New Hampshire: Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton
Massachusetts: John Hancock, Samuel Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island: Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery
Connecticut: Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott
New York: William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris
New Jersey: Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkinson, John Hart, Abraham Clark
Pennsylvania: Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross
Delaware: Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean
Maryland: Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia: George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton
North Carolina: William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn
South Carolina: Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur Middleton
Georgia: Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton
Source: The Pennsylvania Packet, July 8, 1776
Friday, July 01, 2016
The Awkwardness Of Imposed Work Culture
As part of the current job environment, we are going through a "Culture Change". Apparently The Powers That Exist have decided the culture that was here when they arrived was not conducive to the way they wished to redirect the company. And so, we getting a culture makeover.
Not that I can successfully say no to their opinion. The previous culture, the one that existed the first 5 years that was here, was abysmal. Very top down, very argumentative, very looking for people to blame, very stuck on the privilege of executives to overrule. No tears to be shed over that.
But the make over is all wrong.
The only way I can explain it is imposed culture. Suddenly we have this team and that team. Suddenly we have fancy whiteboards and more "cozy" places to meet each other. Suddenly we are very concerned about the goings on in other locations right across the parking lot. Suddenly we hear a great deal about making sure people are being used to the best of their interests and abilities.
It is all reasonable, of course. It just does not seem real to me.
Culture is something that develops organically, not something that is imposed from another source. That can happen of course (as it is here) but then one ends up with two cultures: the official culture (the one posted on the website for recruiting purposes) and the actual culture, the one that lives on in cubes and work areas. They can be quite different with their own sets of rules.
The official culture lives on, of course, and every employee will nominally adhere to it lest they be singled out. But often such adherence seems to be lip service, the minimum we need to get by. Change key personnel or executive management and the official cultures lapses, sometimes towards the actual culture - the one where most people live and spend their working lives.
It is awkward not only for the foreignness of it but also for the ambassadors for it. There is usually a sense that this "must" be adopted. It can be said in the nicest of ways and with a great many incentives, but the bottom line is the same. Everyone else knows what is going on. Maybe the ambassadors do as well - but if so, they hide it well.
Am I advocating never changing corporate culture? Not at all. As I indicated above, some need to be changed and this is only done by individuals. But the changes, to be successful, need to spring from the actual culture (or at least be adapted from them) to truly take root and be adopted - otherwise, like a transplanted organ, they may be rejected at the first sign that they can be rejected.
Do you wish to make a different corporate culture? By all means, make it - but make it in such a way that people engage in it, not suffer through it.
The alternative? To have a corporate culture that will end up be a mile wide and an inch deep, ready to give way at the first sign of stress or opportunity.
Not that I can successfully say no to their opinion. The previous culture, the one that existed the first 5 years that was here, was abysmal. Very top down, very argumentative, very looking for people to blame, very stuck on the privilege of executives to overrule. No tears to be shed over that.
But the make over is all wrong.
The only way I can explain it is imposed culture. Suddenly we have this team and that team. Suddenly we have fancy whiteboards and more "cozy" places to meet each other. Suddenly we are very concerned about the goings on in other locations right across the parking lot. Suddenly we hear a great deal about making sure people are being used to the best of their interests and abilities.
It is all reasonable, of course. It just does not seem real to me.
Culture is something that develops organically, not something that is imposed from another source. That can happen of course (as it is here) but then one ends up with two cultures: the official culture (the one posted on the website for recruiting purposes) and the actual culture, the one that lives on in cubes and work areas. They can be quite different with their own sets of rules.
The official culture lives on, of course, and every employee will nominally adhere to it lest they be singled out. But often such adherence seems to be lip service, the minimum we need to get by. Change key personnel or executive management and the official cultures lapses, sometimes towards the actual culture - the one where most people live and spend their working lives.
It is awkward not only for the foreignness of it but also for the ambassadors for it. There is usually a sense that this "must" be adopted. It can be said in the nicest of ways and with a great many incentives, but the bottom line is the same. Everyone else knows what is going on. Maybe the ambassadors do as well - but if so, they hide it well.
Am I advocating never changing corporate culture? Not at all. As I indicated above, some need to be changed and this is only done by individuals. But the changes, to be successful, need to spring from the actual culture (or at least be adapted from them) to truly take root and be adopted - otherwise, like a transplanted organ, they may be rejected at the first sign that they can be rejected.
Do you wish to make a different corporate culture? By all means, make it - but make it in such a way that people engage in it, not suffer through it.
The alternative? To have a corporate culture that will end up be a mile wide and an inch deep, ready to give way at the first sign of stress or opportunity.
Thursday, June 30, 2016
Back In The Learning Again
So today I had one of those interviews that makes one scramble after the fact, thinking to see what one can do to move forward on it to get the job. Good things about it: It is a promotion, it is a greater area of responsibility, and it is local (which in my line of work do not come up too often).
One thing that moments like these do is make me realize that I have fallen behind in doing the study that I need to be doing.
If you are a long time reader of this blog, you know that I love to do a lot of very different activities. I love generalization. I love to know a great deal about a great many things. But this falls down when I comes to what I do for living: I scarcely have an interest in learning more except when it relates directly to what I do.
This contradicts one of my basic premises of course, that all knowledge is useful and can be related to almost any circumstance given enough thought about the matter. You should think that I would have more interest in the larger issues that surround my income (and trust me, there are many avenues that I could explore). But I do not.
Why? I do not wonder that it is somehow connected with the sense of distaste I have come to associate with my job, or rather with people associated with my job. I do not mind so much what I do, but I often mind who I do it with - or rather, who I do it for.
Which is a bit short-sighted if you truly consider the matter - after all, people will come and go but the career field will remain. I could have another 20-25 years easily doing what I am doing now. So why am I not working to maximize those opportunities.
And so I picked up the texts again tonight. There is no time like the present to begin working on the future.
One thing that moments like these do is make me realize that I have fallen behind in doing the study that I need to be doing.
If you are a long time reader of this blog, you know that I love to do a lot of very different activities. I love generalization. I love to know a great deal about a great many things. But this falls down when I comes to what I do for living: I scarcely have an interest in learning more except when it relates directly to what I do.
This contradicts one of my basic premises of course, that all knowledge is useful and can be related to almost any circumstance given enough thought about the matter. You should think that I would have more interest in the larger issues that surround my income (and trust me, there are many avenues that I could explore). But I do not.
Why? I do not wonder that it is somehow connected with the sense of distaste I have come to associate with my job, or rather with people associated with my job. I do not mind so much what I do, but I often mind who I do it with - or rather, who I do it for.
Which is a bit short-sighted if you truly consider the matter - after all, people will come and go but the career field will remain. I could have another 20-25 years easily doing what I am doing now. So why am I not working to maximize those opportunities.
And so I picked up the texts again tonight. There is no time like the present to begin working on the future.
Wednesday, June 29, 2016
Summer 2016 Garden Planted
So I got the rest of my garden in this weekend.
I have drastically (at least this year) cut back the among of space I am growing in. This for two reasons. The first is practicality: With this space (the long strip in back behind the house) I can more easily manage it for weeds and care. The second is financial: I can easily water this strip (and with a little creative arrangement, catch my citrus trees as well) in one fell swoop instead of having to water multiple places.
What did I plant? Beans. Lots and lots of beans. Some peppers (three kinds). Okra. Corn (every year with the corn, even if I have not yet hit on the combination that will grow for me). Some lettuce some hot weather greens. And Black Eyed Peas (which have already sprouted).
It is certainly not the biggest garden I have grown. And (if pressed) I will confess I have limited anticipation of a truly successful harvest. But this is an experimental garden in a number of ways. The soil has been greatly overlain with the outcome of the rabbits cages (broken down wood pellets, hay, and rabbit poop) and I have more to add. The area means that I can daily control for weeds and growth. It is exposed to direct sun for most of the growing day. And the watering is as about as controlled as I can get it this point (barring an automatic sprinkler and drip sprinkler heads).
So I am hopeful, in nothing else perhaps that I am starting to work a little more towards a sustainable garden that I can manage. If I can get to the starting point here, I can more intensely manage.
I hope, anyway. If not, hope springs eternal. And fall is not too far away.
I have drastically (at least this year) cut back the among of space I am growing in. This for two reasons. The first is practicality: With this space (the long strip in back behind the house) I can more easily manage it for weeds and care. The second is financial: I can easily water this strip (and with a little creative arrangement, catch my citrus trees as well) in one fell swoop instead of having to water multiple places.
What did I plant? Beans. Lots and lots of beans. Some peppers (three kinds). Okra. Corn (every year with the corn, even if I have not yet hit on the combination that will grow for me). Some lettuce some hot weather greens. And Black Eyed Peas (which have already sprouted).
It is certainly not the biggest garden I have grown. And (if pressed) I will confess I have limited anticipation of a truly successful harvest. But this is an experimental garden in a number of ways. The soil has been greatly overlain with the outcome of the rabbits cages (broken down wood pellets, hay, and rabbit poop) and I have more to add. The area means that I can daily control for weeds and growth. It is exposed to direct sun for most of the growing day. And the watering is as about as controlled as I can get it this point (barring an automatic sprinkler and drip sprinkler heads).
So I am hopeful, in nothing else perhaps that I am starting to work a little more towards a sustainable garden that I can manage. If I can get to the starting point here, I can more intensely manage.
I hope, anyway. If not, hope springs eternal. And fall is not too far away.
Tuesday, June 28, 2016
On Recent Economic Turmoil
I long ago gave up any pretensions to predicting anything. I have been through my own set of "The Sky Is Falling" scenarios which have seldom manifested themselves in anything other than my mind. As a result of this hard won experience, I have been less inclined to give my thoughts on any such matters (or really, much of anything at all any more), content to watch and listen and quietly nod as other opine.
And neither am I an economist. I sat through Micro and Macro economics and to be honest, all I really learned is 1) what elastic and inelastic are; and 2) The the modern economy is a very fragile thing, a thousand connections built in such a way that potentially a failure in one are will ultimately break the entire mechanism.
As a result of all of this, I do not really understand the financial shenanigans that have erupted following the Brexit vote. I do grasp the fact that markets do not like uncertainty and there is plenty of that right now, but the loss of value - around the world - escapes me.
But I do get the fact that there are connections and implications. I do not necessarily understand what is causing this, but I do understand the results of it - and none of them work out well for us in the end.
More practically for myself, market turmoil means less products from my company are being sold. If less products are being sold, that means that that eventually our revenue stream falls. At best it means that we will have a minimal bonus or maybe no bonus at all; at worst it means that a number of us will be looking for jobs in an environment where a lot of people will be.
All of sudden everything takes on a new cast. At work, I begin to carefully watch the activities of those around me, looking for signs that decisions are being made or signs are being given off about cut backs (having been laid off once, I am especially sensitive to anything that looks like management is tightening its belt - and usually that includes lay offs); at home, I begin to question expenditures - including my own - in the context of "Do we really need it?, of looking more closely within to fill the time instead of to without.
It is not that I have a sense of immediate financial doom; I have long ago given up on that. What I am left with is that rather omnipresent sense of dread that follows one around everywhere, the sense that we are constantly living on a precipice.
And that one day we - or at least I - will go over.
And neither am I an economist. I sat through Micro and Macro economics and to be honest, all I really learned is 1) what elastic and inelastic are; and 2) The the modern economy is a very fragile thing, a thousand connections built in such a way that potentially a failure in one are will ultimately break the entire mechanism.
As a result of all of this, I do not really understand the financial shenanigans that have erupted following the Brexit vote. I do grasp the fact that markets do not like uncertainty and there is plenty of that right now, but the loss of value - around the world - escapes me.
But I do get the fact that there are connections and implications. I do not necessarily understand what is causing this, but I do understand the results of it - and none of them work out well for us in the end.
More practically for myself, market turmoil means less products from my company are being sold. If less products are being sold, that means that that eventually our revenue stream falls. At best it means that we will have a minimal bonus or maybe no bonus at all; at worst it means that a number of us will be looking for jobs in an environment where a lot of people will be.
All of sudden everything takes on a new cast. At work, I begin to carefully watch the activities of those around me, looking for signs that decisions are being made or signs are being given off about cut backs (having been laid off once, I am especially sensitive to anything that looks like management is tightening its belt - and usually that includes lay offs); at home, I begin to question expenditures - including my own - in the context of "Do we really need it?, of looking more closely within to fill the time instead of to without.
It is not that I have a sense of immediate financial doom; I have long ago given up on that. What I am left with is that rather omnipresent sense of dread that follows one around everywhere, the sense that we are constantly living on a precipice.
And that one day we - or at least I - will go over.
Monday, June 27, 2016
A Little Gomez Adams Monday
You know, we do not do humor a lot here at The FortyFive. A friend of mine sent this to me and I greatly enjoyed it. So instead of everything that is undoubtedly going on during a Monday, both the usual items as well as the continued activities from the Brexit, enjoy this instead. RIP, Raul Julia
Friday, June 24, 2016
Depth of Soul
There are veins that run within our souls,
veins that if we follow them lead to either
the very depths of thought
or the doors of despair.
It takes strength to go deep:
to look inside a soul and see the failures,
the weaknesses, to be reminded
of every single thing that has ever gone
wrong.
To ponder such things; to think on them.
To wrap our hands into them and weave them,
warp and woof,
into a useful tapestry of our lives.
This is the challenge of depth.
Any fool can look into the mirror of the soul,
sigh, and walk away.
But only a person of depth can look into such a mirror,
sigh - and then continue to stare until the blurry
becomes clear.
Thursday, June 23, 2016
On Depth
One thing that reflecting this week has brought to my attention is that I lack depth.
I lack of depth of knowledge - about my career, about my family, about my varying hobbies, even about God.
Oh, I have a great deal of knowledge, some of it rather detailed. I study a lot of things. I have a lot of experience. But what I find is that I missing the depth that it would feel like such study and experience should bring.
Depth is frightening to me, of course. Depth indicates that one is going to take a period of time - years, in most cases - to really come to understand a subject. In some cases, it means sacrificing new information in exchange for concentrating on the things that are currently in one's life.
Perhaps make my Rule of Five started this process. For the first time in perhaps a long while - maybe ever - I have a road map of the sorts of things that I want to spend the rest of my life working on. It is right there: the subject, and by extension the knowledge about the subject.
Take my career, for example. I have done it over 18 years now. But do I really know what I should know about it? Or do I too often skate around the fringes, trying not to burden myself too much with knowing about something that I perceive as not being that relevant to my life? (Except, of course, it pays for everything).
Depth is costly. Depth means that investment - perhaps of money, most certainly of time - needs to made. It is road of choices, of moving beyond the off ramps because the thing has not been pursued to its limit.
Rhetorical question: What would it look like if I took the items on my Rule of Five and subjected them to a depth test, a listing of what I really needed to know to exhaust the issue, to become an expert? Not for the sake of being recognized as such of course, but to truly come to a knowledge of these things?
I know the answer, of course. Investment of time. Investment of energy. A willingness and a commitment to persevere until the knowledge is obtained, the expertise achieved.
Rhetorical question two: And what would such a thing feel like, to truly know instead of knowing around the fringes?
Rhetorical question three; If insane is defined as doing the same thing again and again and expecting a different outcome, why do I choose to pursue insanity?
I lack of depth of knowledge - about my career, about my family, about my varying hobbies, even about God.
Oh, I have a great deal of knowledge, some of it rather detailed. I study a lot of things. I have a lot of experience. But what I find is that I missing the depth that it would feel like such study and experience should bring.
Depth is frightening to me, of course. Depth indicates that one is going to take a period of time - years, in most cases - to really come to understand a subject. In some cases, it means sacrificing new information in exchange for concentrating on the things that are currently in one's life.
Perhaps make my Rule of Five started this process. For the first time in perhaps a long while - maybe ever - I have a road map of the sorts of things that I want to spend the rest of my life working on. It is right there: the subject, and by extension the knowledge about the subject.
Take my career, for example. I have done it over 18 years now. But do I really know what I should know about it? Or do I too often skate around the fringes, trying not to burden myself too much with knowing about something that I perceive as not being that relevant to my life? (Except, of course, it pays for everything).
Depth is costly. Depth means that investment - perhaps of money, most certainly of time - needs to made. It is road of choices, of moving beyond the off ramps because the thing has not been pursued to its limit.
Rhetorical question: What would it look like if I took the items on my Rule of Five and subjected them to a depth test, a listing of what I really needed to know to exhaust the issue, to become an expert? Not for the sake of being recognized as such of course, but to truly come to a knowledge of these things?
I know the answer, of course. Investment of time. Investment of energy. A willingness and a commitment to persevere until the knowledge is obtained, the expertise achieved.
Rhetorical question two: And what would such a thing feel like, to truly know instead of knowing around the fringes?
Rhetorical question three; If insane is defined as doing the same thing again and again and expecting a different outcome, why do I choose to pursue insanity?
Wednesday, June 22, 2016
Open Hand
Last night at Iai we did open hand.
Open hand is the equivalent in our art of karate (which, literally, means "Empty Hand") and is the extension of our art into the realm of hand to hand combat. The belief of our Soke is that if one knows the sword, one will know all other weapons.
So last night was open hand.
Open hand is largely blocks and punches and falls and locks. Lots of locks: ankle locks,wrist locks, arm locks. Falls and recoveries. Up and down,
As you can imagine, I am a bit sore.
It is good. I love the ebb and flow of open hand. Frankly (and perhaps oddly), I love being taken down for the sheer sake of learning. I especially love being hip thrown - there is something above being flipped over onto a mat that is just mesmerizing to me, even after so many years.
It is a mental challenge for me of course. Prior to 2009 I had never really performed martial arts and so the concept of engaging someone in combat is always a little difficult for me. I worry about injuring others unknowingly or accidentally. But this is part of training as well, not just learning to trust others but to trust yourself and to learn control.
When this publishes, I will probably be creaking out of bed in the morning and muttering about sore muscles.
I foresee a great deal of stretching in my immediate future.
But life is very good. Martial arts has made a very positive impact on my life.
Open hand is the equivalent in our art of karate (which, literally, means "Empty Hand") and is the extension of our art into the realm of hand to hand combat. The belief of our Soke is that if one knows the sword, one will know all other weapons.
So last night was open hand.
Open hand is largely blocks and punches and falls and locks. Lots of locks: ankle locks,wrist locks, arm locks. Falls and recoveries. Up and down,
As you can imagine, I am a bit sore.
It is good. I love the ebb and flow of open hand. Frankly (and perhaps oddly), I love being taken down for the sheer sake of learning. I especially love being hip thrown - there is something above being flipped over onto a mat that is just mesmerizing to me, even after so many years.
It is a mental challenge for me of course. Prior to 2009 I had never really performed martial arts and so the concept of engaging someone in combat is always a little difficult for me. I worry about injuring others unknowingly or accidentally. But this is part of training as well, not just learning to trust others but to trust yourself and to learn control.
When this publishes, I will probably be creaking out of bed in the morning and muttering about sore muscles.
I foresee a great deal of stretching in my immediate future.
But life is very good. Martial arts has made a very positive impact on my life.
Tuesday, June 21, 2016
Being Glad To Be Small
There are days like today when I am glad I am small.
I have the sense that the world is moving quickly to a conclusion that does not work out well for anyone. There seem to be so many places where one small thing - one thing - need only go slightly wrong and I fear the world as we know it begins to ignite.
On days such as these it is a relief to be small and know the problems of the world are not mine to solve - or worry on.
Arguably it is a humble life - and probably will be for the rest of it, to be honest. In mapping out my Rule of Five for my life, I realized that I have mapped out everything I pretty much want to work on for the next 30 years that is realistic for me to do. Remarkably, most of them are doable right now, just where I live. We could stay here and I could still make most of them work.
Our needs, beyond living, are few. My wants are few as well - I have the "bigger ticket" item like I suppose most of us do, but mine are within the realm of reaching with a little economy and patience. Beyond those, there is not much to want - except more of the time to do them and less overhead to pay for.
In such days, to be big - to be noticeable - is to be responsible for things beyond one's control. It is to be higher up on the radar of others, to be one of the first to be focused on instead of one of the last.
Maybe tomorrow will ignite. I cannot fully know. But now I - for perhaps the first time, or at least certainly for the first time in a while - get that where I am right now makes my life both possible and attainable.
That is not a bad place to be.
I have the sense that the world is moving quickly to a conclusion that does not work out well for anyone. There seem to be so many places where one small thing - one thing - need only go slightly wrong and I fear the world as we know it begins to ignite.
On days such as these it is a relief to be small and know the problems of the world are not mine to solve - or worry on.
Arguably it is a humble life - and probably will be for the rest of it, to be honest. In mapping out my Rule of Five for my life, I realized that I have mapped out everything I pretty much want to work on for the next 30 years that is realistic for me to do. Remarkably, most of them are doable right now, just where I live. We could stay here and I could still make most of them work.
Our needs, beyond living, are few. My wants are few as well - I have the "bigger ticket" item like I suppose most of us do, but mine are within the realm of reaching with a little economy and patience. Beyond those, there is not much to want - except more of the time to do them and less overhead to pay for.
In such days, to be big - to be noticeable - is to be responsible for things beyond one's control. It is to be higher up on the radar of others, to be one of the first to be focused on instead of one of the last.
Maybe tomorrow will ignite. I cannot fully know. But now I - for perhaps the first time, or at least certainly for the first time in a while - get that where I am right now makes my life both possible and attainable.
That is not a bad place to be.
Sunday, June 19, 2016
Rule of Five
In my constant attempts to 1) Simplify my life and 2) Work on the process of goal setting, I have realized that I am setting my own bar far too high - not with what I am capable of, but what I can actually capable of doing within a year, my typical time frame.
What I realized is that I need less, not more. I have been working on constructs to help me with this, so I came up with The Rule of Five.
Five things. Five Areas. That is what I am capable of working on at one time. Convenient, because 5 is also the number of fingers on my hand. Look at my hand, remember the things (I am simple that way).
For example, the Five Areas of My Life where all my goals fall: Faith, Family, Financial, Fitness, Future (the letters matching are not required of course, but make a spiffy mnemonic device). Within each of these areas are sub-tasks of course - but I now have a framework to look at anything I am currently doing, look at my hand, and say "Does this fit into one of these? If not, why am I doing it?"
Or the Five Attitudes I need to practice: Godliness, Humility, Kindness, Self Discipline, Commitment.
And so on.
I am sure this idea is not new to me, as I am (generally) going behind others reinventing the wheel. But what this has done for me given me a framework to attach what I should be working on in a way that always sticks with me and does not require me to be grabbing for a planner or notebook to see what is next.
It is simple. And I am man always in search of a little more simplicity.
What I realized is that I need less, not more. I have been working on constructs to help me with this, so I came up with The Rule of Five.
Five things. Five Areas. That is what I am capable of working on at one time. Convenient, because 5 is also the number of fingers on my hand. Look at my hand, remember the things (I am simple that way).
For example, the Five Areas of My Life where all my goals fall: Faith, Family, Financial, Fitness, Future (the letters matching are not required of course, but make a spiffy mnemonic device). Within each of these areas are sub-tasks of course - but I now have a framework to look at anything I am currently doing, look at my hand, and say "Does this fit into one of these? If not, why am I doing it?"
Or the Five Attitudes I need to practice: Godliness, Humility, Kindness, Self Discipline, Commitment.
And so on.
I am sure this idea is not new to me, as I am (generally) going behind others reinventing the wheel. But what this has done for me given me a framework to attach what I should be working on in a way that always sticks with me and does not require me to be grabbing for a planner or notebook to see what is next.
It is simple. And I am man always in search of a little more simplicity.
Friday, June 17, 2016
Thursday, June 16, 2016
The Culling Of Facebook
So I am about done with Facebook. Finally.
This weekend finally pushed me over the edge - well really, this weekend and the political campaign in general to date.
There is a perfectly legitimate reason of course - Facebook (and Twitter) have completely destroyed the ability to discuss an issue in a meaningful sense. They have "dumbed down" the discourse of the day into - at its worst - 140 characters. Hardly the sort of thing that makes for the society of ideas that we claim ourselves to be. And rather amusing (in a dark sort of way) that easy connectivity has lead only to an inability to speak among ourselves.
But recent events have pushed it further - now, unless you specifically come out in favor of or against something, you are on the other side. There is no more "neutral" ground to be held. And frankly, the level of hate - yes, that is the word I used - has become unsustainable.
I suppose there are options, like significantly changing whom I see - but frankly that seems like a lot of work for not a lot of benefit. Just easier and more realistic to cut the cord all at once.
I will probably still keep it for a bit - oddly enough, for something that has only become a part of my life for the past 9 years I am surprised how difficult the concept is of quitting for me to warp my head around. But already I am checking it much less than I was; very soon I suspect I will not check it at all.
It strikes me as a little odd that I consider life without the thought of seeing the so many I do every day. But let us be honest - if 90% of the seeing is causing me more pain and anger than joy, is it really worth it just for that 10%.
But the fact of the peace that comes over me when I think about it tells me it is probably the right thing to do.
Wednesday, June 15, 2016
The Silence
Silence is a palpable thing for me.
I write to you in silence now - not just the silence of a lack of noise with everyone gone, but the silence of a house with limited activity. The two are completely different - the first indicates merely a lack of vocal activity, the second a peace that infuses the atmosphere.
There are no electronics on right now except for mine, no light except the one that I write on. I can hear the chirping of crickets outside and the hum of something electric inside, with the occasional sound of traffic flowing by. The only sound beyond that here is the click-clack of my keyboard and the swoosh that my feet make when I move them on the carpet.
Were I in other rooms, I could tell you the sounds I would hear if I were there: the quiet crunch crunch of the rabbits eating their hay or pellets, or the louder crack of the guinea pig eating his guinea pig chow (guinea pigs are louder than rabbit. I never thought about that before). In another room, the occasional rustle of the parakeet as she resettles on the perch or moves; from the garage, the occasional cry of the male quail, confused by the light from outside, thinking it morning at 11 PM. Beyond that, perhaps the hum of the refrigerator.
And nothing else.
This is a version of true silence, the silence I hear differently at The Ranch when I walk and only the wind blows throw the trees. I can hear things there I cannot hear anywhere else; perhaps the same is true on a lesser scale here in the midst of urbandom.
It is this silence, this peace, that I treasure more than anything else. This is rest and refuge to me; this is the thing I desire so much. In this peace I can do many things and still be at peace: practice cuts, pull weights, write, garden, read, pluck strings, think thoughts.
At this silence is my core - the inexpressible part of me that flows out through activities, that thrives (ironically enough) within the lack of activity and sound around it.
The burdensome question: how do I take this silence with me wherever I go so that I can do out there what I can do in here?
I write to you in silence now - not just the silence of a lack of noise with everyone gone, but the silence of a house with limited activity. The two are completely different - the first indicates merely a lack of vocal activity, the second a peace that infuses the atmosphere.
There are no electronics on right now except for mine, no light except the one that I write on. I can hear the chirping of crickets outside and the hum of something electric inside, with the occasional sound of traffic flowing by. The only sound beyond that here is the click-clack of my keyboard and the swoosh that my feet make when I move them on the carpet.
Were I in other rooms, I could tell you the sounds I would hear if I were there: the quiet crunch crunch of the rabbits eating their hay or pellets, or the louder crack of the guinea pig eating his guinea pig chow (guinea pigs are louder than rabbit. I never thought about that before). In another room, the occasional rustle of the parakeet as she resettles on the perch or moves; from the garage, the occasional cry of the male quail, confused by the light from outside, thinking it morning at 11 PM. Beyond that, perhaps the hum of the refrigerator.
And nothing else.
This is a version of true silence, the silence I hear differently at The Ranch when I walk and only the wind blows throw the trees. I can hear things there I cannot hear anywhere else; perhaps the same is true on a lesser scale here in the midst of urbandom.
It is this silence, this peace, that I treasure more than anything else. This is rest and refuge to me; this is the thing I desire so much. In this peace I can do many things and still be at peace: practice cuts, pull weights, write, garden, read, pluck strings, think thoughts.
At this silence is my core - the inexpressible part of me that flows out through activities, that thrives (ironically enough) within the lack of activity and sound around it.
The burdensome question: how do I take this silence with me wherever I go so that I can do out there what I can do in here?
Tuesday, June 14, 2016
A Giant Hole
This Saturday I tried an exercise I cannot remember ever trying: I completely stayed in.
No trips anywhere. No talking to anyone. Except for a quick check on Facebook to see where everyone was, no current events. No shopping. No spending money. Just me alone in the house.
The silence was very revealing.
Oh, I did things. Cleaned the house. Mowed the lawn. Changed the quail. Completed harvesting my garlic. Read. Watched some low budget movies. Practiced Iai.
And was taken by the huge silence in my soul.
Here it is, the perfect opportunity, the one so many people dream about. A day completely available to do whatever you want. Anything. No requirements on what to do or having responsibilities to complete. Just time available for the filling.
And yet, nothing seemed to satisfy.
This got me to think as I was into the evening. Activity after activity was engaged in and then stopped, trailing off into "I am bored". It was if I was trying to fill a hole that could not be filled by anything that I had available.
What hole? A good question, as I was not aware of its existence. But as I thought about it, it suddenly made sense. This sort of activity is not unknown for me and often represents my modus operandi: get involved in an activity, follow it for a while, and then stop. As if I had total lost interest - or as if I was trying to fill something up and, realizing that such an activity would not work, moving to the next one.
I do not know that I have a name for this hole. I have ideas, but no names.
But now I have something to think on. After all, it is not often that a heretofore unknown gap exists in one's life, one that is suddenly revealed to hold so many other things in its orbit.
No trips anywhere. No talking to anyone. Except for a quick check on Facebook to see where everyone was, no current events. No shopping. No spending money. Just me alone in the house.
The silence was very revealing.
Oh, I did things. Cleaned the house. Mowed the lawn. Changed the quail. Completed harvesting my garlic. Read. Watched some low budget movies. Practiced Iai.
And was taken by the huge silence in my soul.
Here it is, the perfect opportunity, the one so many people dream about. A day completely available to do whatever you want. Anything. No requirements on what to do or having responsibilities to complete. Just time available for the filling.
And yet, nothing seemed to satisfy.
This got me to think as I was into the evening. Activity after activity was engaged in and then stopped, trailing off into "I am bored". It was if I was trying to fill a hole that could not be filled by anything that I had available.
What hole? A good question, as I was not aware of its existence. But as I thought about it, it suddenly made sense. This sort of activity is not unknown for me and often represents my modus operandi: get involved in an activity, follow it for a while, and then stop. As if I had total lost interest - or as if I was trying to fill something up and, realizing that such an activity would not work, moving to the next one.
I do not know that I have a name for this hole. I have ideas, but no names.
But now I have something to think on. After all, it is not often that a heretofore unknown gap exists in one's life, one that is suddenly revealed to hold so many other things in its orbit.
Monday, June 13, 2016
A Heartfelt Plea for Salvation
This is not the post that I originally wrote for today. I wrote one, but felt compelled - I have no other word - to write another instead.
This weekend, at least fifty people died in Florida in two shootings, one in a nightclub (the majority) one a single shooting somewhere else - a young singer with a promising career gunned down. (No, I am not going to discuss the whys and wherefores - that is for other sites and other discussions.)
My topic this morning is eternity.
I am willing to bet that every one of those people woke up on the morning of their death with not a thought in their mind that this day was going to be their last. They more than likely got up and went about their day as they did every day, with perhaps (like so many) a thought of the coming week or coming summer on their mind.
For them, eternity came all too soon.
I am burdened as I write tonight by the real sense that world is becoming far more chaotic, far more destruction oriented, than it has ever been my in my lifetime. Certainly some will say I am overreacting, that people have always said such things. And (I must concede the point) they are true.
But for fifty people, chaos and destruction engulfed them in a horrible moment.
Eternity is closer than we think. Seldom does one arise thinking "Today, tonight - perhaps at 7 PM - I will die". Seldom do we dwell on the awesome thought of what is after this life - or if we do, we think of it in generic terms we learned long ago or our ideas of what it should be like.
I am a Christian. I have (I hope) never made any claims otherwise or persuaded you who read and do not believe that I am either overly zealous or practice a false righteous. I am a flawed man - badly flawed - and have my own share of struggles and sins.
But I plead with you friends: be saved.
The best description of the Gospel I ever heard or read was from a book by Ben Patterson called Waiting: Finding Hope When God Remains Silent in which a friend of his, asked to explain the Gospel in 10 words or less said "We're all b_stards but God loves us anyway."
Harsh language (for me at least) but I do not, in this one instance, apologize for it. That is what a sinner is: a terrible, terrible bearer of evil who simply cannot, ultimately, do enough good for their salvation. We can try. We can pretend that we can earn our way into God's good graces (after all, is that not how the rest of life works?) or even pretend that He accepts our best efforts. But are sinners - dead, as it were, a corpse, unable to give ourselves (or anyone around us) life.
We cannot. But we do not have to.
The second part of the sentence states the miracle: but God loved us anyway. Loved us even though we as His creation rejected Him. Loved us so much that He paid the price - the sinless sacrifice - that we could not pay for ourselves.
"For God so loved the world that He sent is only Son into the world that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send His son into the world to condemn the world but that the world through Him might be saved. He who believes in Him is not condemned, but he who does not believe in him is condemned already because he has not believed in the name of the only Begotten Son of God." John 3: 16-17
"Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles "Men and brothers, what shall we do?" Then Peter said to them "Repent, every one of you, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit." - Acts 2:37-38.
It is simple and yet so profound: Repent - turn away from both the sins (and every one of us has them, not only the ones common to all but the ones we love best) and your hope that you can, by your good deeds, earn your salvation. And believe - believe that Christ paid the price of your sins and that He is the Son Of God, The Lord and Saviour of the world.
I have no special knowledge, friends, and am hardly anything to bear such news. I am a broken man, a coward that too often hides behind a passive silence, a man who constantly struggles against his own sin and so often fails.
But there is a Heaven and Hell, a fate that awaits all of us. And Hell is not the picture of the fantasies that we have allowed ourselves to make it, merely a hot place where "Well, I'll at least be with all my buddies". It is a place of unending - eternal - torment, a place that humanity was never originally designed to go. (I would be remiss in the regard if I did not refer you to Jonathan Edwards sermon Sinners In The Hand Of An Angry God.)
My friends, you may think me simple in posting this, or over-reactionary. You may think me a religious kook or a simpleton believing fairy tales.
Life goes quickly. Even if you are young and feel that death and old age is a long way off, I can assure you that it is not. Time flies faster than the fleetest bird, running quicker than the antelope with the cheetah pursuing.
And ultimately, as 50 people found out this weekend, death finds us all and finds most of us unexpectedly and most likely unprepared. As I mentioned above, most of us do not rise from bed in the morning thinking that today will be our last day.
But today or 70 years hence, death will find us. There is no safe space from it, nowhere we can go to outrun it or hide from it. Eternity is closer for most of us than we think.
I pray you, friends, give heed to the eternal destination of your souls. Tomorrow is vouchsafed for none.
This weekend, at least fifty people died in Florida in two shootings, one in a nightclub (the majority) one a single shooting somewhere else - a young singer with a promising career gunned down. (No, I am not going to discuss the whys and wherefores - that is for other sites and other discussions.)
My topic this morning is eternity.
I am willing to bet that every one of those people woke up on the morning of their death with not a thought in their mind that this day was going to be their last. They more than likely got up and went about their day as they did every day, with perhaps (like so many) a thought of the coming week or coming summer on their mind.
For them, eternity came all too soon.
I am burdened as I write tonight by the real sense that world is becoming far more chaotic, far more destruction oriented, than it has ever been my in my lifetime. Certainly some will say I am overreacting, that people have always said such things. And (I must concede the point) they are true.
But for fifty people, chaos and destruction engulfed them in a horrible moment.
Eternity is closer than we think. Seldom does one arise thinking "Today, tonight - perhaps at 7 PM - I will die". Seldom do we dwell on the awesome thought of what is after this life - or if we do, we think of it in generic terms we learned long ago or our ideas of what it should be like.
I am a Christian. I have (I hope) never made any claims otherwise or persuaded you who read and do not believe that I am either overly zealous or practice a false righteous. I am a flawed man - badly flawed - and have my own share of struggles and sins.
But I plead with you friends: be saved.
The best description of the Gospel I ever heard or read was from a book by Ben Patterson called Waiting: Finding Hope When God Remains Silent in which a friend of his, asked to explain the Gospel in 10 words or less said "We're all b_stards but God loves us anyway."
Harsh language (for me at least) but I do not, in this one instance, apologize for it. That is what a sinner is: a terrible, terrible bearer of evil who simply cannot, ultimately, do enough good for their salvation. We can try. We can pretend that we can earn our way into God's good graces (after all, is that not how the rest of life works?) or even pretend that He accepts our best efforts. But are sinners - dead, as it were, a corpse, unable to give ourselves (or anyone around us) life.
We cannot. But we do not have to.
The second part of the sentence states the miracle: but God loved us anyway. Loved us even though we as His creation rejected Him. Loved us so much that He paid the price - the sinless sacrifice - that we could not pay for ourselves.
"For God so loved the world that He sent is only Son into the world that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send His son into the world to condemn the world but that the world through Him might be saved. He who believes in Him is not condemned, but he who does not believe in him is condemned already because he has not believed in the name of the only Begotten Son of God." John 3: 16-17
"Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles "Men and brothers, what shall we do?" Then Peter said to them "Repent, every one of you, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit." - Acts 2:37-38.
It is simple and yet so profound: Repent - turn away from both the sins (and every one of us has them, not only the ones common to all but the ones we love best) and your hope that you can, by your good deeds, earn your salvation. And believe - believe that Christ paid the price of your sins and that He is the Son Of God, The Lord and Saviour of the world.
I have no special knowledge, friends, and am hardly anything to bear such news. I am a broken man, a coward that too often hides behind a passive silence, a man who constantly struggles against his own sin and so often fails.
But there is a Heaven and Hell, a fate that awaits all of us. And Hell is not the picture of the fantasies that we have allowed ourselves to make it, merely a hot place where "Well, I'll at least be with all my buddies". It is a place of unending - eternal - torment, a place that humanity was never originally designed to go. (I would be remiss in the regard if I did not refer you to Jonathan Edwards sermon Sinners In The Hand Of An Angry God.)
My friends, you may think me simple in posting this, or over-reactionary. You may think me a religious kook or a simpleton believing fairy tales.
Life goes quickly. Even if you are young and feel that death and old age is a long way off, I can assure you that it is not. Time flies faster than the fleetest bird, running quicker than the antelope with the cheetah pursuing.
And ultimately, as 50 people found out this weekend, death finds us all and finds most of us unexpectedly and most likely unprepared. As I mentioned above, most of us do not rise from bed in the morning thinking that today will be our last day.
But today or 70 years hence, death will find us. There is no safe space from it, nowhere we can go to outrun it or hide from it. Eternity is closer for most of us than we think.
I pray you, friends, give heed to the eternal destination of your souls. Tomorrow is vouchsafed for none.
Friday, June 10, 2016
Thursday, June 09, 2016
The Sound Of Rolling Dice
Change is in the air, darn it.
I cannot see it. But I can feel it.
The feeling is washing over me more and more. And there are real, practical outcomes of this.
For the first time in forever, I contradicted a superior in a meeting. Laughed out loud at a suggestion they made which was 10 times more difficult and less relevant than the one that we had come to weeks before. And when I mean out loud, I mean shockingly so. There is no forward there now, only the establishing of hard won positions.
I have openly begun discussing the possibility of not being there much longer at my current place of employment. I have begun - oh, how I have been down this road before - of beginning to look at the activities and things in my life, to begun to ask the question "Would I still do this? How will I do this?"
There is nothing of course, nothing but the sense that a corner has been turned. The dice are rolling, even if I cannot see where they end up from my view of the table.
But hearing the sound, I know they will eventually stop.
And I want to be ready to leap when they do.
I cannot see it. But I can feel it.
The feeling is washing over me more and more. And there are real, practical outcomes of this.
For the first time in forever, I contradicted a superior in a meeting. Laughed out loud at a suggestion they made which was 10 times more difficult and less relevant than the one that we had come to weeks before. And when I mean out loud, I mean shockingly so. There is no forward there now, only the establishing of hard won positions.
I have openly begun discussing the possibility of not being there much longer at my current place of employment. I have begun - oh, how I have been down this road before - of beginning to look at the activities and things in my life, to begun to ask the question "Would I still do this? How will I do this?"
There is nothing of course, nothing but the sense that a corner has been turned. The dice are rolling, even if I cannot see where they end up from my view of the table.
But hearing the sound, I know they will eventually stop.
And I want to be ready to leap when they do.
Wednesday, June 08, 2016
A Little Solitiude
So it turns out I have a little bit of a break.
The entire household has shipped out to The Happiest Place on Earth today, leaving me all alone for a week.
In a way this is always very odd to me. One gets used to the hustle and bustle of a house filled with people, going about their business. Now the house is strangely silent, the sounds of crickets and the neighbor's air conditioner all that fills the night.
People always ask "What are you going to do with yourself?" After all, being alone theoretically offers one a great deal of possibilities.
Not really for me, though. I am rather a homebody. The quiet suits me.
I have reading planned of course, and the normal chores that I have around the house (the rabbits and guinea pig appreciate the attention). Maybe a little gardening now that the weather has (hopefully) dried out. Plenty of time to think of course, and maybe to do a little forward planning. It feels, after all, as if we are on the cusp of change.
A little solitude is actually a welcome thing.
The entire household has shipped out to The Happiest Place on Earth today, leaving me all alone for a week.
In a way this is always very odd to me. One gets used to the hustle and bustle of a house filled with people, going about their business. Now the house is strangely silent, the sounds of crickets and the neighbor's air conditioner all that fills the night.
People always ask "What are you going to do with yourself?" After all, being alone theoretically offers one a great deal of possibilities.
Not really for me, though. I am rather a homebody. The quiet suits me.
I have reading planned of course, and the normal chores that I have around the house (the rabbits and guinea pig appreciate the attention). Maybe a little gardening now that the weather has (hopefully) dried out. Plenty of time to think of course, and maybe to do a little forward planning. It feels, after all, as if we are on the cusp of change.
A little solitude is actually a welcome thing.
Tuesday, June 07, 2016
Monday, June 06, 2016
Back To It
So today is the first day back in the office after almost two weeks.
The two week period has been a natural break of sorts for me. The change in the work environment has been so palpable, such a divide between before and after, that the break has created a closing chapter of sorts to seven years worth of work.
Our pastor this morning, in a sermon about work and living it out, made a point that we needed to make a point about work not owning us, owning our lives. In that sense this break - away auditing to see other companies, practicing my sword art - has been a good and needed reminder and break that my work is not my life. It cannot be, now: my hands have been pried off of all that responsibility and roles and reduced to a (yet unknown) position.
Perhaps a relief. I need no longer worry about (at least so long as I am here) the problems of office politics or greater strategies for getting ahead or even trying to make a better impression. That is all removed from my power now.
Two courses now. The first is to look for new opportunities. The second is to look to those parts of my life that are beyond the eight hours a day and work on those.
It was a good seven year run. I am looking forward to the next chapter.
The two week period has been a natural break of sorts for me. The change in the work environment has been so palpable, such a divide between before and after, that the break has created a closing chapter of sorts to seven years worth of work.
Our pastor this morning, in a sermon about work and living it out, made a point that we needed to make a point about work not owning us, owning our lives. In that sense this break - away auditing to see other companies, practicing my sword art - has been a good and needed reminder and break that my work is not my life. It cannot be, now: my hands have been pried off of all that responsibility and roles and reduced to a (yet unknown) position.
Perhaps a relief. I need no longer worry about (at least so long as I am here) the problems of office politics or greater strategies for getting ahead or even trying to make a better impression. That is all removed from my power now.
Two courses now. The first is to look for new opportunities. The second is to look to those parts of my life that are beyond the eight hours a day and work on those.
It was a good seven year run. I am looking forward to the next chapter.
Friday, June 03, 2016
On Seminar
Seminar is over.
This is my fourth time training with Soke. Every time I do it has seemed a little bit different.
The very first time I went it was within my first year of starting Iai. I was completely out of my element and was more concerned with not embarrassing myself than with anything else.
The second time I went it was two years later, and I went without my own sensei. This time the concern was very much around representing my dojo well - and not being an embarrassment.
The third time was an additional two year later/ 5 years into my journey. Here I actually did manage to embarrass myself (unintentionally of course, but still) and spent the greater part of Seminar desperately trying to not call any more attention to myself.
And now the fourth time is complete.
This time there was much less concern about embarrassing myself (other than the general sense of not sticking out as being so bad) and much more concern about learning to do things the right way, about paying attention to what Soke was doing and then trying to replicate that.
We talked a great deal (more than I remember in past Seminar, but maybe I am just paying attention differently) about the importance of our spirit when we practice, of the expressions we carry on our faces when we cut, of the spirit of Iai and its place in the larger place of things.
It was good.
I have a great deal to work on until the next time I see Soke again: technique (always technique), expression, and spirit. But I am coming to anticipate these visits rather than fear them - after all, it is becoming less about how I appear and more about how much I am learning.
This, I think, represents the progress that Iai truly means to teach.
This is my fourth time training with Soke. Every time I do it has seemed a little bit different.
The very first time I went it was within my first year of starting Iai. I was completely out of my element and was more concerned with not embarrassing myself than with anything else.
The second time I went it was two years later, and I went without my own sensei. This time the concern was very much around representing my dojo well - and not being an embarrassment.
The third time was an additional two year later/ 5 years into my journey. Here I actually did manage to embarrass myself (unintentionally of course, but still) and spent the greater part of Seminar desperately trying to not call any more attention to myself.
And now the fourth time is complete.
This time there was much less concern about embarrassing myself (other than the general sense of not sticking out as being so bad) and much more concern about learning to do things the right way, about paying attention to what Soke was doing and then trying to replicate that.
We talked a great deal (more than I remember in past Seminar, but maybe I am just paying attention differently) about the importance of our spirit when we practice, of the expressions we carry on our faces when we cut, of the spirit of Iai and its place in the larger place of things.
It was good.
I have a great deal to work on until the next time I see Soke again: technique (always technique), expression, and spirit. But I am coming to anticipate these visits rather than fear them - after all, it is becoming less about how I appear and more about how much I am learning.
This, I think, represents the progress that Iai truly means to teach.
Thursday, June 02, 2016
Wednesday, June 01, 2016
Could Be, Who Knows
As I sit here and write at 2300 hours on Tuesday night, I am exhausted. We finished Embu tonight, a public demonstration of Iai. This is the end of the third day of the Seminar, the end of 14 hours of training. My calves are sore and my right knee is starting to say unkind things to me. By all rights, I should be asleep already.
And yet, my mind is racing and sleep seems to be the farthest thing from my mind.
I feel a great current moving underneath my life, as if things are shifting around me in ways I cannot see or understand. It is that sense that an ending of something is approaching and the beginning of something else is at hand.
I cannot define this thing completely. I cannot say what the nature of the changes are. I can sense hints, like something moving in murky water which only the currents of the water speak to something being there.
I know that changes are occurring at work and maybe that is part of the feeling. I know that being away for almost two weeks removes someone from the fray. I know that when I eventually have to return to real life all that I previously faced will be there.
But circumstances are changing. Or at least I feel they are changing. Or maybe it is just that I am changing.
But, to quote West Side Story, "Could it be? Yes it could. Something's coming, something good. If I can wait."
Here is to the change I can sense even if I cannot now see it.
And yet, my mind is racing and sleep seems to be the farthest thing from my mind.
I feel a great current moving underneath my life, as if things are shifting around me in ways I cannot see or understand. It is that sense that an ending of something is approaching and the beginning of something else is at hand.
I cannot define this thing completely. I cannot say what the nature of the changes are. I can sense hints, like something moving in murky water which only the currents of the water speak to something being there.
I know that changes are occurring at work and maybe that is part of the feeling. I know that being away for almost two weeks removes someone from the fray. I know that when I eventually have to return to real life all that I previously faced will be there.
But circumstances are changing. Or at least I feel they are changing. Or maybe it is just that I am changing.
But, to quote West Side Story, "Could it be? Yes it could. Something's coming, something good. If I can wait."
Here is to the change I can sense even if I cannot now see it.
Tuesday, May 31, 2016
Choosing Action
So one thing that training provides one is focus - and lessons.
In training on Sunday Soke made the following statement:
"Once you begin an action, you must think five or six steps ahead to its completion. And once you choose an action you must continue to move through it to completion. But you must move - once you attack you must continue until you defeat the enemy."
It got me to think a great deal about drive and action.
I am not, by nature, a driven person. I tend to drift along with flow, happy to engage with whatever is going on at the moment. In some ways, this is a reasonable philosophy to hold. If I am in a regular environment, I tend not to worry about things. I can easy change plans or priorities as the circumstances dictate. And generally that is a good thing.
I am not, however, as good at accomplishing things longer term. In fact, I am generally pretty bad at it. Which is a bit of an issue if you actually want to move certain things forward in your life.
I am not very good at strategy. I am not terribly good at creating a plan. And I am certainly not good at following up on said plans.
But Soke's statement made me think. Because Iai is, after all, really about life.
I understand the concept he was trying to communicate. Once an action is begun you cannot end at that action. You have to have the next attack or next block thought. But one has to remain fluid; once a series of actions has begun, it can become like a cascade - one has to continue down the line of attack or defense one has chosen. And always, one must keeping attacking, keep moving, until the opponent is defeated.
I am not really good at any of the points, but I am especially bad at the last one. I start and stop things in spurts. Which is never really the way to get anything done of course.
It comes back to that thing I hate to do of course, commit. To commit is choose something - and not choose something else.
But it becoming relatively clear, if for no other reason than the theme that keeps reappearing in my life, that this is a step that I need to start taking.
Choose one action, then choose a dozen more. Always keep moving.
But choose.
In training on Sunday Soke made the following statement:
"Once you begin an action, you must think five or six steps ahead to its completion. And once you choose an action you must continue to move through it to completion. But you must move - once you attack you must continue until you defeat the enemy."
It got me to think a great deal about drive and action.
I am not, by nature, a driven person. I tend to drift along with flow, happy to engage with whatever is going on at the moment. In some ways, this is a reasonable philosophy to hold. If I am in a regular environment, I tend not to worry about things. I can easy change plans or priorities as the circumstances dictate. And generally that is a good thing.
I am not, however, as good at accomplishing things longer term. In fact, I am generally pretty bad at it. Which is a bit of an issue if you actually want to move certain things forward in your life.
I am not very good at strategy. I am not terribly good at creating a plan. And I am certainly not good at following up on said plans.
But Soke's statement made me think. Because Iai is, after all, really about life.
I understand the concept he was trying to communicate. Once an action is begun you cannot end at that action. You have to have the next attack or next block thought. But one has to remain fluid; once a series of actions has begun, it can become like a cascade - one has to continue down the line of attack or defense one has chosen. And always, one must keeping attacking, keep moving, until the opponent is defeated.
I am not really good at any of the points, but I am especially bad at the last one. I start and stop things in spurts. Which is never really the way to get anything done of course.
It comes back to that thing I hate to do of course, commit. To commit is choose something - and not choose something else.
But it becoming relatively clear, if for no other reason than the theme that keeps reappearing in my life, that this is a step that I need to start taking.
Choose one action, then choose a dozen more. Always keep moving.
But choose.
Monday, May 30, 2016
Iai Training
Today started the week of Iai training.
Oddly enough, this is not something I could have imagined doing before I started Iai. A whole week of vacation spent, dedicated solely to the purpose of a hobby which brings me personal pleasure but seemingly does little else to advance my life.
What a luxury.
My legs are spent tonight of course; 5 hours of training plus an 8K run in the morning will do that to a person. And the next 5 days promise to be much of the same.
Yet I welcome it. For a week, all of the issues of my life, all of the problems and small time emergencies that consume so much of the waking part of my life, get to be pushed aside while I immerse myself in 430 years ago when the sword was king.
Oddly enough, this is not something I could have imagined doing before I started Iai. A whole week of vacation spent, dedicated solely to the purpose of a hobby which brings me personal pleasure but seemingly does little else to advance my life.
What a luxury.
My legs are spent tonight of course; 5 hours of training plus an 8K run in the morning will do that to a person. And the next 5 days promise to be much of the same.
Yet I welcome it. For a week, all of the issues of my life, all of the problems and small time emergencies that consume so much of the waking part of my life, get to be pushed aside while I immerse myself in 430 years ago when the sword was king.
Friday, May 27, 2016
The Rise Of The Delegator
I have come to understand that the last failure mode of any
human association or organization is the rise of the Delegator.
Any association, any endeavor is in the beginning started by
Doers. These are the people that make things
happen, that start things, that are not only cognizant of the fact that
decisions must be made to accomplish things but have the decisiveness and
fortitude to make them. When faced with a choice, they make it.
And things move forward.
And the endeavor grows. And
perhaps experiences success. But ultimately the Delegator arrives.
The Delegator is chiefly known for two things. The first is their inability to make a
decision. They will dither and worry and
avoid making a decision as long as possible, either in the hopes
that someone else will make the decision for them or that the need for the
decision will pass. Action may be called
for – but the Delegator will stand to the side until they are forced
into a corner.
The second item of identification is their very name. They delegate.
They delegate the grunt work of the actual day to day
operations. They delegate the work of
setting things in motion. They may
delegate the day to day management of things. They hold actual power and
recognition to themselves but push the work to get that power and recognition
to others.
What does this do? It
saps the drive and initiation from any organization. Work for a Delegator, work with them, and one
rapidly loses any sense that one’s work or effort leads to anything. Decisions that must be made are never made –
and if one takes the initiative and makes the decision more often than not one
is either criticized or told that in fact that belongs to the realm of
others. Of the Delegator.
Instead, one finds one’s self quietly pushed
into the silences of silos, reliant on the Delegator to provide direction which
often never seems to come.
Where does this leave one?
Ultimately with a stark choice.
Choose the path of least resistance and ride the organization or
association down with those that will make no decision.
Or be different. And
do not delegate one’s future to one who delegates.
Thursday, May 26, 2016
Wednesday, May 25, 2016
A Return Of Sorts
So today I returned back to a part of Old Home, to the places that The Ravishing Mrs. TB and I lived when we first got married. It is a fortuitous occurrence in this week of our wedding anniversary.
It is an odd thing, traveling the highways and roads that I traveled 23 years ago when we first got married. As I write this, I sit in the same town where we first lived when we got married. I had dinner 5 doors down from the print shop that I worked at then. The print shop is gone, replaced by some other business, but the streets still remain the same.
A flood of memories invoked themselves unasked, in some ways memories from a time long passed. Before children. Before my career field that I am in now. Before so many things of the things that figure into our lives even existed. In some ways a very very different me.
But not a me I would necessarily change.
So many different paths over the years, so many chances to chose another course that led somewhere else or to something else. Occasionally I wonder what those paths might have been.
I find myself content.
It is an odd thing, traveling the highways and roads that I traveled 23 years ago when we first got married. As I write this, I sit in the same town where we first lived when we got married. I had dinner 5 doors down from the print shop that I worked at then. The print shop is gone, replaced by some other business, but the streets still remain the same.
A flood of memories invoked themselves unasked, in some ways memories from a time long passed. Before children. Before my career field that I am in now. Before so many things of the things that figure into our lives even existed. In some ways a very very different me.
But not a me I would necessarily change.
So many different paths over the years, so many chances to chose another course that led somewhere else or to something else. Occasionally I wonder what those paths might have been.
I find myself content.
Tuesday, May 24, 2016
23rd And Me
So this weekend was our 23rd Wedding Anniversary.
That surprises me, just a little bit. Not so much the fact that it is 23 years - good heavens, I had no real conception of how long we would make it in the first place - but on people's reaction.
I posted a short comment and picture on Facebook, mostly about the dinner and only (I thought) coincidentally about our anniversary. I received a great deal of support and like and comments and "reactions" (whatever those are supposed to be).
My first thought was "Is 23 years really that rare?"
It does not feel like some kind of worked for accomplishment, not like trying to lift a caber and turn it or the constant worry about if a garden will take. In a way, it was just sort of showing up - and continuing to show up.
It is not like I think people imagine it would be. There are bumps in the road. Long periods - sometimes years, it feels like - of lingering issues that seem to hang around. And perhaps it is a common complaint, but marriages of this length are scarcely like those of the movies.
I still midlife crisis every now and then, of course. As I alluded to earlier, sometimes it feels like everything is the same - and will continue to be same, time without end. The exotic allures, the course of "freedom" beckons.
And then goes away, of course. There are commitments to keep and bills to pay and children to be responsible for and pets that need attention. That is the nature of this life, and certainly I have been around enough to grasp that most of what I see is only the side I want to see, not the side as it actually is.
And there are compensations, of course. I wish I was conscious of all of them. But one, I think, I now know: most people think that you sticking with it is something special.
And perhaps that is not all a bad thing.
That surprises me, just a little bit. Not so much the fact that it is 23 years - good heavens, I had no real conception of how long we would make it in the first place - but on people's reaction.
I posted a short comment and picture on Facebook, mostly about the dinner and only (I thought) coincidentally about our anniversary. I received a great deal of support and like and comments and "reactions" (whatever those are supposed to be).
My first thought was "Is 23 years really that rare?"
It does not feel like some kind of worked for accomplishment, not like trying to lift a caber and turn it or the constant worry about if a garden will take. In a way, it was just sort of showing up - and continuing to show up.
It is not like I think people imagine it would be. There are bumps in the road. Long periods - sometimes years, it feels like - of lingering issues that seem to hang around. And perhaps it is a common complaint, but marriages of this length are scarcely like those of the movies.
I still midlife crisis every now and then, of course. As I alluded to earlier, sometimes it feels like everything is the same - and will continue to be same, time without end. The exotic allures, the course of "freedom" beckons.
And then goes away, of course. There are commitments to keep and bills to pay and children to be responsible for and pets that need attention. That is the nature of this life, and certainly I have been around enough to grasp that most of what I see is only the side I want to see, not the side as it actually is.
And there are compensations, of course. I wish I was conscious of all of them. But one, I think, I now know: most people think that you sticking with it is something special.
And perhaps that is not all a bad thing.
Monday, May 23, 2016
Lightning Storm
Last night and early Sunday morning, driving through New Mexico, we came across a lightning storm in the distance.
It originally started as a small set of distant flashes that was noticeable; as we got farther from the last town the sky really began to light up to the northeast. Sheet lightning in a night so dark you could not make out the clouds until the lightning cast the outlines and the shadows the clouds. Strikes in a night that you could see the entire bolt hit the ground in a blazing outline, sometimes so bright and accurate that the lightning seemed pour out its fury on the ground, at other times to to curl around itself as it went down.
On and on it went, sometimes continuing on faster pace, with strikes and sheet lightning alternating lighting up the sky almost to the point of brightness, other times the strikes few and far between, illuminating the darkness like a piercing flickering candle. As we continued to drive we steered around the edge of the storm, pacing it for a good two hours through the changing landscape and descending elevation until we finally passed beyond its edge and into the general clouds beyond.
At one point, looking over the New Mexico terrain that sloped down and then up into the distance, I saw a single light sitting in the middle of the pool of darkness that was the ground. That was the place to be, I thought. Living out beyond anyone else, just sitting on the porch at night and watching the lightning light the sky and the ground in turn.
I am not ultimately sure what that says about me and my desire for aloneness and beauty. What I do know is that in that time I found a piece of my soul dancing in between heaven and earth, descending and rising on the bright flashes on a dark night.
It originally started as a small set of distant flashes that was noticeable; as we got farther from the last town the sky really began to light up to the northeast. Sheet lightning in a night so dark you could not make out the clouds until the lightning cast the outlines and the shadows the clouds. Strikes in a night that you could see the entire bolt hit the ground in a blazing outline, sometimes so bright and accurate that the lightning seemed pour out its fury on the ground, at other times to to curl around itself as it went down.
On and on it went, sometimes continuing on faster pace, with strikes and sheet lightning alternating lighting up the sky almost to the point of brightness, other times the strikes few and far between, illuminating the darkness like a piercing flickering candle. As we continued to drive we steered around the edge of the storm, pacing it for a good two hours through the changing landscape and descending elevation until we finally passed beyond its edge and into the general clouds beyond.
At one point, looking over the New Mexico terrain that sloped down and then up into the distance, I saw a single light sitting in the middle of the pool of darkness that was the ground. That was the place to be, I thought. Living out beyond anyone else, just sitting on the porch at night and watching the lightning light the sky and the ground in turn.
I am not ultimately sure what that says about me and my desire for aloneness and beauty. What I do know is that in that time I found a piece of my soul dancing in between heaven and earth, descending and rising on the bright flashes on a dark night.
Friday, May 20, 2016
Reorganization 2.0
So today we went through another corporate reorganization.
I was not caught in the major reorganization, which was significant. But I was caught in a minor one, which was significant enough for me.
I have changed reporting structures again. The dual form of reporting up was not working, so there is a new single line of communication - essentially what we had for almost 7 years until about a month ago. That system worked, apparently - just not with me.
There has been a "leveling". I have been stripped of 3 of my 4 team members, who are now reporting on equivalent level up - a team I have spent 7 years building. My job responsibilities, while not quite redefined, are shrinking in scope to well under half of what they used to be. And instead of reporting directly to The Head, we are all reporting to a Subhead who reports to The Head.
I have, in other words, been practically demoted.
I am not happy. I have indicated this, both to The Head and to The Subhead. I am essentially capped: I am precisely one level below The Subhead so the chances of moving up are rather limited. Even more so arguably, as with reduced areas of responsibility come reduced abilities to make the sorts of impressions and do the sorts of work that get the sorts of attention that makes such things possible.
Everyone is sympathetic, of course: of course we understand, it is for the betterment of the company, there will more opportunities for growth and expansion, do not feel like you have been put aside, it is really for the better. You are doing a fantastic job, keep up the good work, and we are 100% behind you.
I am really, really trying not to be bitter about this. Really. It would be lying to say it is not hard - except I have no-one to direct the bitterness at.
There is little enough to do about the situation, of course: what is done is done and to be anything less than 100% supportive will brand you in ways not good to consider. On the positive side, I am still employed.
But all that echoes in my mind is the ringing sound of echoes getting closer as the potentialities of my current position - and perhaps my career - shrink in like an old volcano sinking in on itself, leaving only a crumbling cones and broken lava tubes to mark its passing.
I was not caught in the major reorganization, which was significant. But I was caught in a minor one, which was significant enough for me.
I have changed reporting structures again. The dual form of reporting up was not working, so there is a new single line of communication - essentially what we had for almost 7 years until about a month ago. That system worked, apparently - just not with me.
There has been a "leveling". I have been stripped of 3 of my 4 team members, who are now reporting on equivalent level up - a team I have spent 7 years building. My job responsibilities, while not quite redefined, are shrinking in scope to well under half of what they used to be. And instead of reporting directly to The Head, we are all reporting to a Subhead who reports to The Head.
I have, in other words, been practically demoted.
I am not happy. I have indicated this, both to The Head and to The Subhead. I am essentially capped: I am precisely one level below The Subhead so the chances of moving up are rather limited. Even more so arguably, as with reduced areas of responsibility come reduced abilities to make the sorts of impressions and do the sorts of work that get the sorts of attention that makes such things possible.
Everyone is sympathetic, of course: of course we understand, it is for the betterment of the company, there will more opportunities for growth and expansion, do not feel like you have been put aside, it is really for the better. You are doing a fantastic job, keep up the good work, and we are 100% behind you.
I am really, really trying not to be bitter about this. Really. It would be lying to say it is not hard - except I have no-one to direct the bitterness at.
There is little enough to do about the situation, of course: what is done is done and to be anything less than 100% supportive will brand you in ways not good to consider. On the positive side, I am still employed.
But all that echoes in my mind is the ringing sound of echoes getting closer as the potentialities of my current position - and perhaps my career - shrink in like an old volcano sinking in on itself, leaving only a crumbling cones and broken lava tubes to mark its passing.
Thursday, May 19, 2016
Memories and Images
Sometimes I wonder what has happened to others.
It used to be quite a mystery, of course: people would leave our own circle of living, leave our own geographic area, and then would disappear off the face of our known earth. Perhaps we would hear of them from a friend of a friend or a relative, but they had effectively moved beyond our own orbit. We might picture where they were or what they were doing, how their lives had gone.
Now, of course, we have the Internet. And Facebook and Linked In and 40 other ways to keep in touch with other people. And yet, I still find myself wondering what has happened to others.
Oh, I can find them of course. They will pop up as soon as you search for them. But all it is now is a carefully crafted image, what one wants everyone else to see.
To be fair, I do this as well. My "On-line presence" (sounds so official) is in some ways very different from the way I would present myself in my more personal space. Part of it is essentially image management - after all, everybody (including your company) can find you now.
But the mystery is gone, in a way. No longer does one wonder where those others are or what they have done. It can easily be found out - or rather, the image can be found out. But them, who they were or who they are, has become submerged beneath that image.
Which makes it sadder, in a way. Before one had to imagine. Now one has the outer image without the core.
It strikes me as strange that in this world of interconnected technology, we find ourselves more isolate dfrom such memories than we perhaps ever thought possible.
It used to be quite a mystery, of course: people would leave our own circle of living, leave our own geographic area, and then would disappear off the face of our known earth. Perhaps we would hear of them from a friend of a friend or a relative, but they had effectively moved beyond our own orbit. We might picture where they were or what they were doing, how their lives had gone.
Now, of course, we have the Internet. And Facebook and Linked In and 40 other ways to keep in touch with other people. And yet, I still find myself wondering what has happened to others.
Oh, I can find them of course. They will pop up as soon as you search for them. But all it is now is a carefully crafted image, what one wants everyone else to see.
To be fair, I do this as well. My "On-line presence" (sounds so official) is in some ways very different from the way I would present myself in my more personal space. Part of it is essentially image management - after all, everybody (including your company) can find you now.
But the mystery is gone, in a way. No longer does one wonder where those others are or what they have done. It can easily be found out - or rather, the image can be found out. But them, who they were or who they are, has become submerged beneath that image.
Which makes it sadder, in a way. Before one had to imagine. Now one has the outer image without the core.
It strikes me as strange that in this world of interconnected technology, we find ourselves more isolate dfrom such memories than we perhaps ever thought possible.
Wednesday, May 18, 2016
Drained II
An epiphany of sorts today.
I realized, as I sat at my desk balancing visitor after visitor with requests for information or questions and e-mails clamoring for attention amidst coming and going to meetings, that I simply do not have the energy to maintain this sort of working life. I have no time to recharge.
I am, by every test I have ever taken, an introvert - so much heavily so that I almost always top out the chart. This surprises some people when they see me interacting in social settings - I can be witty, personable, engaging - the life of the party. This works, as I have come to understand, because that is not a taking of energy by others but exchanging of energy with others.
But what I am doing in my workday now is completely different.
Everyone has a need. Everyone has a question. Everyone wants something from me - if not in person, then via e-mail. This has become my day, a steady stream of individuals coming with questions or requests. They are most good natured about it of course, and I suspect scarcely any of them wish me ill will, but still they come. And ask.
There is no exchange of energy in these interactions, no building of excitement - just a steady drain of energy as one after another, people come with their needs.
And leave me mentally and psychically exhausted. Literally. I have nothing left to give by the time I leave for home. Add to that a commute approaching an hour or more and then another group of people at home who have a different set of requests and needs for interaction and you can see where this ends up.
I have often wondered over the years why I can stand commuting to the extent that I do. I truly do not mind the concept of long drives - and now I know why. It is a small chance to recharge from the daily drainage of energy. It also explains why I set such aggressive goals at the beginning of year yet always seem to lose steam, or how I can come out of a weekend ready to go and find myself with nothing by Wednesday. I have given myself time to recharge via vacation or weekend - but the batteries do not have enough regular down time to maintain that level of energy.
What to do about the situation, that is the question. It is not as if I can wall myself away from everyone (oh, how I wish!) and recharge time seems no more likely to appear now than ever.
But it is the germ of a concept and realization, the fact that I require a more balanced approach to my interactions to pace myself and (really) make myself the most functional me that I can. People are not going to like it.
On the other hand, I surely do not like the way I feel now and how my life is working out. Ultimately, that should trump all.
I realized, as I sat at my desk balancing visitor after visitor with requests for information or questions and e-mails clamoring for attention amidst coming and going to meetings, that I simply do not have the energy to maintain this sort of working life. I have no time to recharge.
I am, by every test I have ever taken, an introvert - so much heavily so that I almost always top out the chart. This surprises some people when they see me interacting in social settings - I can be witty, personable, engaging - the life of the party. This works, as I have come to understand, because that is not a taking of energy by others but exchanging of energy with others.
But what I am doing in my workday now is completely different.
Everyone has a need. Everyone has a question. Everyone wants something from me - if not in person, then via e-mail. This has become my day, a steady stream of individuals coming with questions or requests. They are most good natured about it of course, and I suspect scarcely any of them wish me ill will, but still they come. And ask.
There is no exchange of energy in these interactions, no building of excitement - just a steady drain of energy as one after another, people come with their needs.
And leave me mentally and psychically exhausted. Literally. I have nothing left to give by the time I leave for home. Add to that a commute approaching an hour or more and then another group of people at home who have a different set of requests and needs for interaction and you can see where this ends up.
I have often wondered over the years why I can stand commuting to the extent that I do. I truly do not mind the concept of long drives - and now I know why. It is a small chance to recharge from the daily drainage of energy. It also explains why I set such aggressive goals at the beginning of year yet always seem to lose steam, or how I can come out of a weekend ready to go and find myself with nothing by Wednesday. I have given myself time to recharge via vacation or weekend - but the batteries do not have enough regular down time to maintain that level of energy.
What to do about the situation, that is the question. It is not as if I can wall myself away from everyone (oh, how I wish!) and recharge time seems no more likely to appear now than ever.
But it is the germ of a concept and realization, the fact that I require a more balanced approach to my interactions to pace myself and (really) make myself the most functional me that I can. People are not going to like it.
On the other hand, I surely do not like the way I feel now and how my life is working out. Ultimately, that should trump all.
Tuesday, May 17, 2016
Iai On A May Evening
Last night I went out to practice iai.
Yesterday was a Monday, the sort of Monday that has you swearing that you will submit your resignation letter in the first 10 minutes after arrival and never really improves after that. The sort of Monday filled with meetings that never really seem to resolve anything and a commute that leaves one drained just in time to try to generate something of a personality.
And so I went out to practice iai, increasingly my refuge (along with writing) to maintain my sanity in a life seeming gone not so bad as bland and tasteless, a sort of endless poi dish that one takes day after day knowing it is nutritious but having no other redeeming qualities.
At first I began almost going through the motions, doing the most basic of kata to warm up; then, I began to notice the world around me.
The sky was that blue-green that almost defies description, the color that only appears right at evening and right before morning, transient as the moment just before sunrise and just after sunset. The weather held its coolness from the morning rains with a light breeze, mocking the fact we already halfway through May.
Our yard is exceptionally green this year, an outcome of the rather large amount of rain. Our new resident hare, Joey (so named by Nighean Dhonn) was out about an evening silfay, cautiously eating the grass while watching me practice. Fireflies began to pepper the yard, far more than I have ever seen any year since we moved here, their yellow-green luminescence moving in and out as if they were teleporting across space instead of moving through it.
The crickets (or frogs, I am never sure) sang their background chirps as the high pitched squeaks announced the evening bats out for the hor de' oeuvres of the night. A random toad, as pale as the concrete he hopped across, appeared out of nowhere on his way to a rendezvous with a nameless appointment he did not seem inclined to share.
All of a sudden I found myself practicing iai not alone but in the midst of world going on about its business - or rather, kindly welcoming me into its business. I was no more a stranger to this dance of movement and sound and light than any of the other creatures there.
In a sense, I think it was iai in its most pure form, of being one with nature as one practice the forms, sliding in and out of the fireflies, not alarming the hare, seen as nothing more than a thing of shadows not to be feared by a toad. The sky in its strange and seldom appearing color reflected the purity of form to which the apprentice always strives: memorable yet not standing out, unique yet blending into the balance of whole.
I cannot say that this moment made up for the day before. I can say that it gave a sense of peace and serenity where none previously existed.
Yesterday was a Monday, the sort of Monday that has you swearing that you will submit your resignation letter in the first 10 minutes after arrival and never really improves after that. The sort of Monday filled with meetings that never really seem to resolve anything and a commute that leaves one drained just in time to try to generate something of a personality.
And so I went out to practice iai, increasingly my refuge (along with writing) to maintain my sanity in a life seeming gone not so bad as bland and tasteless, a sort of endless poi dish that one takes day after day knowing it is nutritious but having no other redeeming qualities.
At first I began almost going through the motions, doing the most basic of kata to warm up; then, I began to notice the world around me.
The sky was that blue-green that almost defies description, the color that only appears right at evening and right before morning, transient as the moment just before sunrise and just after sunset. The weather held its coolness from the morning rains with a light breeze, mocking the fact we already halfway through May.
Our yard is exceptionally green this year, an outcome of the rather large amount of rain. Our new resident hare, Joey (so named by Nighean Dhonn) was out about an evening silfay, cautiously eating the grass while watching me practice. Fireflies began to pepper the yard, far more than I have ever seen any year since we moved here, their yellow-green luminescence moving in and out as if they were teleporting across space instead of moving through it.
The crickets (or frogs, I am never sure) sang their background chirps as the high pitched squeaks announced the evening bats out for the hor de' oeuvres of the night. A random toad, as pale as the concrete he hopped across, appeared out of nowhere on his way to a rendezvous with a nameless appointment he did not seem inclined to share.
All of a sudden I found myself practicing iai not alone but in the midst of world going on about its business - or rather, kindly welcoming me into its business. I was no more a stranger to this dance of movement and sound and light than any of the other creatures there.
In a sense, I think it was iai in its most pure form, of being one with nature as one practice the forms, sliding in and out of the fireflies, not alarming the hare, seen as nothing more than a thing of shadows not to be feared by a toad. The sky in its strange and seldom appearing color reflected the purity of form to which the apprentice always strives: memorable yet not standing out, unique yet blending into the balance of whole.
I cannot say that this moment made up for the day before. I can say that it gave a sense of peace and serenity where none previously existed.
Monday, May 16, 2016
Saturday, May 14, 2016
May 2016 Garden Update
So how is the garden doing in May?
You will remember my citrus from last year that were overwintered (with not great results)? Well they are growing:
Even the ones I thought I killed
are showing new life (This is a Mexican Lime. Apparently they will reproduce from the root stock, one of the few citrus trees that will):
Overwintered (by accident) peppers (Bell and Jalapeno) are growing - if you look down, you can see the peppers:
The garlic is starting to fall over and the leeks are coming up.
Volunteer pumpkins have returned:
And the grain and onions are doing well:
Overall very happy!
Even the ones I thought I killed
are showing new life (This is a Mexican Lime. Apparently they will reproduce from the root stock, one of the few citrus trees that will):
Overwintered (by accident) peppers (Bell and Jalapeno) are growing - if you look down, you can see the peppers:
The garlic is starting to fall over and the leeks are coming up.
Volunteer pumpkins have returned:
And the grain and onions are doing well:
Overall very happy!
Friday, May 13, 2016
Blogger or Wordpress
Greetings to The Fortyfive Nation (all eight of you, anyway)! I have a global question that I would like to throw out there and see what the feedback is.
Do I stay with Blogger? Or do I go to Wordpress?
I have been with Blogger since I started blogging in 2005. Overall the interface is okay and I have had very little to complaint about - except the fact that Blogger is owned by Google, which I sort of do have problems with.
If you have ever had or held a blog, you know the rather daunting task when you are considering creating a new one - let alone updating and migrating the one that you have maintained for any number of years. It is a pain, I imagine - just updating the links to other people's sites alone is going to be a pain.
But still, I am at the point where I wonder if it is the right thing to do. Certainly my friend Otis has said his wife's new blog (Saturated In Seattle) has gotten a great deal more traffic since she moved over there.
Thoughts? Opinions? Experiences?
Do I stay with Blogger? Or do I go to Wordpress?
I have been with Blogger since I started blogging in 2005. Overall the interface is okay and I have had very little to complaint about - except the fact that Blogger is owned by Google, which I sort of do have problems with.
If you have ever had or held a blog, you know the rather daunting task when you are considering creating a new one - let alone updating and migrating the one that you have maintained for any number of years. It is a pain, I imagine - just updating the links to other people's sites alone is going to be a pain.
But still, I am at the point where I wonder if it is the right thing to do. Certainly my friend Otis has said his wife's new blog (Saturated In Seattle) has gotten a great deal more traffic since she moved over there.
Thoughts? Opinions? Experiences?
Thursday, May 12, 2016
Saturated in Seattle
So ordinarily I do not link other stories in place of my own for a posting. It is a poor blog author that constantly relies on others for their material.
Today is an exception.
My friend Vintage Chick, who has been working on a different sort of blog journey, posted something today that is definitively worth sharing.
You know I do not do politics here and religion as a rule, and this post edges over into that. But it deserves to be read and considered.
Read the words of someone that can actually write.
Saturatedinseattle
Today is an exception.
My friend Vintage Chick, who has been working on a different sort of blog journey, posted something today that is definitively worth sharing.
You know I do not do politics here and religion as a rule, and this post edges over into that. But it deserves to be read and considered.
Read the words of someone that can actually write.
Saturatedinseattle
Wednesday, May 11, 2016
"Available At Your Local Bookstore"
Last week as I was driving around, I heard an advertisement for a book on the radio (small bit of irony right there). The narrative, driven by dark sounding dramatic music and telling us that the novel was ripped "right from today's headlines" ended with the statement "Available at your local bookstore, Amazon.com or iTunes."
Which made me think "Local Bookstores?"
I remember the bookstores of my youth. There were two, beyond the library where we got to check things out. One was a local, single store in a strip mall (I still have some of those books). The other was "Citadel of Books". It was this store that formed my impressions of what a bookstore should be: Towering shelves of books in pine shelves of varying heights with long rows, wandering up and down the aisles lost in literary wonder.
How times have changed.
I lived through the growth and essentially the death of a medium. I remember the first time I went to a Walden's books. "Wow", I thought, "so many books". Then I went to a Barnes and Noble. "Wow, it is so big" I said to myself. "They must have everything." And then I went to Borders and had a similar experience. "Wow, so much more like Citadel of Books" I said.
But Borders is now gone. The small independent bookstore of my youth is gone. All that remains is Barnes and Noble as a new book seller.
I do not really enjoy going in Barnes and Noble at all. The selection is limited. The prices are high (stupidly high). And the atmosphere - green themes with dark brown bookshelves - is hardly the sort of adventure I experienced once upon a time.
I shop the used book stores now. There is far more of a sense of adventure in finding something that you are looking for or even finding the unexpected - and the prices are a sheer luxury. Sure, I very seldom get the latest books, but those are (generally) not the books I am looking for.
Or Amazon.com. Cannot beat the selection and the prices -if you shop carefully - are just as reasonable as a used book store.
(No Kindle or iBooks for me. I simply cannot enjoy reading on a screen. I think this may partially stem from having to look at a computer screen all day. And the fact that the book is an object, a familiar thing I can manipulate and highlight and easily go back to).
A final thought hit me as I rolled the radio station over to something else. I have seen the bookstores go, first the independents, then the local chains, then the national chains. Will I live to see the day that, like a beached whale, the last great bookstore chain goes under leaving only ghostly remainders in the form of empty big boxes and the remains of a once thriving industry to be found only in the kiosks of airports?
Which made me think "Local Bookstores?"
I remember the bookstores of my youth. There were two, beyond the library where we got to check things out. One was a local, single store in a strip mall (I still have some of those books). The other was "Citadel of Books". It was this store that formed my impressions of what a bookstore should be: Towering shelves of books in pine shelves of varying heights with long rows, wandering up and down the aisles lost in literary wonder.
How times have changed.
I lived through the growth and essentially the death of a medium. I remember the first time I went to a Walden's books. "Wow", I thought, "so many books". Then I went to a Barnes and Noble. "Wow, it is so big" I said to myself. "They must have everything." And then I went to Borders and had a similar experience. "Wow, so much more like Citadel of Books" I said.
But Borders is now gone. The small independent bookstore of my youth is gone. All that remains is Barnes and Noble as a new book seller.
I do not really enjoy going in Barnes and Noble at all. The selection is limited. The prices are high (stupidly high). And the atmosphere - green themes with dark brown bookshelves - is hardly the sort of adventure I experienced once upon a time.
I shop the used book stores now. There is far more of a sense of adventure in finding something that you are looking for or even finding the unexpected - and the prices are a sheer luxury. Sure, I very seldom get the latest books, but those are (generally) not the books I am looking for.
Or Amazon.com. Cannot beat the selection and the prices -if you shop carefully - are just as reasonable as a used book store.
(No Kindle or iBooks for me. I simply cannot enjoy reading on a screen. I think this may partially stem from having to look at a computer screen all day. And the fact that the book is an object, a familiar thing I can manipulate and highlight and easily go back to).
A final thought hit me as I rolled the radio station over to something else. I have seen the bookstores go, first the independents, then the local chains, then the national chains. Will I live to see the day that, like a beached whale, the last great bookstore chain goes under leaving only ghostly remainders in the form of empty big boxes and the remains of a once thriving industry to be found only in the kiosks of airports?
Tuesday, May 10, 2016
Accept And Unrealistic Expectations
So now that I have these unrealistic expectations, what the heck do I do with them?
This is the other side of acceptance - not just that one accepts the way that certain things are but that one actively works on the expectations that one was clinging to, that one finds something to do with them. Because they sure do not seem to want to be dealt with of their own accord.
They constantly speak in your ear, suggesting that you are "surrendering" or "caving in". They try to push you towards success related literature, pointing out that you are giving up perhaps at the point that success is about to become yours. Anything, they suggest, except abandoning them to the cold.
I have my own secret weapon, of course. I call it "Failure".
I have remind these sweet siren singers of the times that I did follow their unrealistic promises down the rabbit hole of dreams, of what happened when the bottom dropped out of the hole and down I fell into the rocks. Of the countless times as a youth I "fell in love" only to embarrass myself horribly. Or the time I took a position based on other people telling me that I would be a great leader, only to be a terrible one and leave after half a year. Or the time I was going to be wealthy as Midas and only ended up losing a great deal of money and eventually having to lose the house we never should have bought.
I bring these failures to the unrealistic expectations and point to them, saying "Look at this. This is where following you gets me. Off with you now. Join forces with those things that I can impact. Or abandon me to whatever you think my fate will be. But what you promise will never come to pass."
They always seem to abandon the cause and slink away, of course. Because if one thing is true of unrealistic expectations, it is that they is that they are very proud and demanding. They would rather expire than join the energy with those things that can be accomplished.
This is the other side of acceptance - not just that one accepts the way that certain things are but that one actively works on the expectations that one was clinging to, that one finds something to do with them. Because they sure do not seem to want to be dealt with of their own accord.
They constantly speak in your ear, suggesting that you are "surrendering" or "caving in". They try to push you towards success related literature, pointing out that you are giving up perhaps at the point that success is about to become yours. Anything, they suggest, except abandoning them to the cold.
I have my own secret weapon, of course. I call it "Failure".
I have remind these sweet siren singers of the times that I did follow their unrealistic promises down the rabbit hole of dreams, of what happened when the bottom dropped out of the hole and down I fell into the rocks. Of the countless times as a youth I "fell in love" only to embarrass myself horribly. Or the time I took a position based on other people telling me that I would be a great leader, only to be a terrible one and leave after half a year. Or the time I was going to be wealthy as Midas and only ended up losing a great deal of money and eventually having to lose the house we never should have bought.
I bring these failures to the unrealistic expectations and point to them, saying "Look at this. This is where following you gets me. Off with you now. Join forces with those things that I can impact. Or abandon me to whatever you think my fate will be. But what you promise will never come to pass."
They always seem to abandon the cause and slink away, of course. Because if one thing is true of unrealistic expectations, it is that they is that they are very proud and demanding. They would rather expire than join the energy with those things that can be accomplished.
Monday, May 09, 2016
Accept
Sometimes you come to the realization that there are simply things which you have to accept.
This tears at the fabric of our societal understanding, of course. We have been taught that we are able to make our own fate, to chart our own course, to turn any situation or circumstance into the one that we desire. In fact, I would go so far as to say that it is almost considered a failure to not be able to do such a thing.
But sometimes, the reality is that some things simply cannot change.
Some of these things depend on circumstances beyond our control, things which we can neither directly nor indirectly impact. Some of these depend on people who will not change, not have we the power within us to make it so.
Either way, the initial realization can be a crushing blow - after all, we interpret the failure to be something caused of our own inabilities, of our weaknesses, of our lack of trying. We may try to fight this blow by redoubling our efforts. And perhaps then we try to go to the other side of ignoring the situation, or even acting out against it. Perhaps we may sink into a depression over it.
And then, one day, we learn to accept it.
Acceptance does not change it, of course. The situation is still the same. The relationship is still not what we wanted it to be. But in acceptance comes the ability to move on.
Maybe the thing will not change. But let it not be an anchor to weigh us down in the rest of our life.
This tears at the fabric of our societal understanding, of course. We have been taught that we are able to make our own fate, to chart our own course, to turn any situation or circumstance into the one that we desire. In fact, I would go so far as to say that it is almost considered a failure to not be able to do such a thing.
But sometimes, the reality is that some things simply cannot change.
Some of these things depend on circumstances beyond our control, things which we can neither directly nor indirectly impact. Some of these depend on people who will not change, not have we the power within us to make it so.
Either way, the initial realization can be a crushing blow - after all, we interpret the failure to be something caused of our own inabilities, of our weaknesses, of our lack of trying. We may try to fight this blow by redoubling our efforts. And perhaps then we try to go to the other side of ignoring the situation, or even acting out against it. Perhaps we may sink into a depression over it.
And then, one day, we learn to accept it.
Acceptance does not change it, of course. The situation is still the same. The relationship is still not what we wanted it to be. But in acceptance comes the ability to move on.
Maybe the thing will not change. But let it not be an anchor to weigh us down in the rest of our life.
Friday, May 06, 2016
Commit
I have a long term problem in the practice of my iaijutsu, specifically when I am asked to attack. I always aim to the side, never directly at the target.
This is something that I have done for years. Why, you might ask? It is a legitimate question. I carry with me a very old reluctance to risk hurting someone, an aversion acquired many years ago but still as fresh in my mind as it was the day it happened.
And so I aim beside the target, not at the target.
This creates issues for my sensei on two levels. On the first level, of course, it is very difficult to demonstrate a technique when your attacker is never cooperating in the attack. The second - the one that just entered my awareness tonight - was a frustration with me, or rather a frustration with the fact that I have studied for almost 7 years and still am reluctant to strike.
"Commit" he said tonight as I once again moved my attack to the right. All of a sudden, that word became one of the profoundest things I had heard in years.
Commit. Drive out all doubt. Drive out all extraneous things. Drive out the hesitation and reluctance. Commit. Strike. Cut with authority.
Understand the profoundness of this moment. Not just in iai. In life. Choose - we cannot all do everything. And then when you have chosen, act with authority. Remove doubt from your mind. Strike every time as if you mean to win.
I am not sure that I know what enlightenment feels like. But tonight I received a very dim taste of it.
This is something that I have done for years. Why, you might ask? It is a legitimate question. I carry with me a very old reluctance to risk hurting someone, an aversion acquired many years ago but still as fresh in my mind as it was the day it happened.
And so I aim beside the target, not at the target.
This creates issues for my sensei on two levels. On the first level, of course, it is very difficult to demonstrate a technique when your attacker is never cooperating in the attack. The second - the one that just entered my awareness tonight - was a frustration with me, or rather a frustration with the fact that I have studied for almost 7 years and still am reluctant to strike.
"Commit" he said tonight as I once again moved my attack to the right. All of a sudden, that word became one of the profoundest things I had heard in years.
Commit. Drive out all doubt. Drive out all extraneous things. Drive out the hesitation and reluctance. Commit. Strike. Cut with authority.
Understand the profoundness of this moment. Not just in iai. In life. Choose - we cannot all do everything. And then when you have chosen, act with authority. Remove doubt from your mind. Strike every time as if you mean to win.
I am not sure that I know what enlightenment feels like. But tonight I received a very dim taste of it.
Thursday, May 05, 2016
Wednesday, May 04, 2016
Silence
The bridge hangs,
suspended over the gorge,
cables twanging in the rushing air.
You walk forward,
eyes trained on the other side,
carefully ignoring the yawning gap beneath you.
In the center you stop and look up:
the azure blue sky speaks a tale of peace,
the clean warmth of clouds above the spires.
And then it happens:
The high pitched snap of cables
coming undone.
And at that moment,
suspended above heaven and earth,
you realize all the support under you has vanished,
leaving only the silence of the clouds
to catch your fall.
suspended over the gorge,
cables twanging in the rushing air.
You walk forward,
eyes trained on the other side,
carefully ignoring the yawning gap beneath you.
In the center you stop and look up:
the azure blue sky speaks a tale of peace,
the clean warmth of clouds above the spires.
And then it happens:
The high pitched snap of cables
coming undone.
And at that moment,
suspended above heaven and earth,
you realize all the support under you has vanished,
leaving only the silence of the clouds
to catch your fall.
Tuesday, May 03, 2016
A Place of Service
Sometimes I forget my place in my life.
I am a supporter, a believer in others, a servant. My job, my task, is to lift others up - to help them see in themselves what they cannot see. Often it is buried in the muck of a life where circumstances or others have buried them or not treated them well. My goal is to clean up those dreams and skills and aspirations, recall them to what is possible, and help them to believe and then move forward.
It is a task. It is something that I enjoy doing. But sometimes I forget my place in life.
When this happens, I get myself too involved in the life of others (Trust me, I have done this). I have made their happiness and their success as much about me as it is about them. Rather than just being a supporter and second violin in the orchestra, I try to make myself a lead character and first violin.
This never goes well, of course. The point of believing in people and lifting them up is that they will take wing and fly to new heights - not that their stories somehow entwine with mine.
The end is actually always the same, of course - they find their way up and onward (that is what I am trying to help with, of course) and I find myself feeling left behind and isolated. No reason to feel that way of course - what I thought and what was actually going on were two very different things indeed. Yet I always somehow am surprised at the end even though it is the same every time.
It is not that I regret what I do. It a necessary thing, not only for those who need encouraging but for me - I need to do it. The problem is the unrealistic baggage I bring along with it.
To serve - to truly serve - is to remember that the very best of service is the one that exists as a memory in the back of the served's mind, the sense that they really did do it without the recollection of any expectations or demands that were placed on them by the ones serving.
I am a supporter, a believer in others, a servant. My job, my task, is to lift others up - to help them see in themselves what they cannot see. Often it is buried in the muck of a life where circumstances or others have buried them or not treated them well. My goal is to clean up those dreams and skills and aspirations, recall them to what is possible, and help them to believe and then move forward.
It is a task. It is something that I enjoy doing. But sometimes I forget my place in life.
When this happens, I get myself too involved in the life of others (Trust me, I have done this). I have made their happiness and their success as much about me as it is about them. Rather than just being a supporter and second violin in the orchestra, I try to make myself a lead character and first violin.
This never goes well, of course. The point of believing in people and lifting them up is that they will take wing and fly to new heights - not that their stories somehow entwine with mine.
The end is actually always the same, of course - they find their way up and onward (that is what I am trying to help with, of course) and I find myself feeling left behind and isolated. No reason to feel that way of course - what I thought and what was actually going on were two very different things indeed. Yet I always somehow am surprised at the end even though it is the same every time.
It is not that I regret what I do. It a necessary thing, not only for those who need encouraging but for me - I need to do it. The problem is the unrealistic baggage I bring along with it.
To serve - to truly serve - is to remember that the very best of service is the one that exists as a memory in the back of the served's mind, the sense that they really did do it without the recollection of any expectations or demands that were placed on them by the ones serving.
Monday, May 02, 2016
The Second Act of Second Marriages
I am now apparently in that phase of living (and apparently have been for several years) where many of my friends are in the "Second Marriage" stage of life.
Most of them were divorced the first time for various reasons. I do not always know the reasons and do not always ask, of course - people share what they feel they need to share when they need to share it. Some seem to have ended relatively pleasantly, others with a level of animosity. Most, on the whole, have moved on to at least acceptance and moving on with their lives.
But here they are.
It is interesting because lots of them are in that "first stage" of second marriage where everything is newly wed bliss and extreme happiness. It is odd to myself, who have been married over two decades, to see and experience this. After all, up to this point most of my acquaintances were either unmarried or had been married for a considerable time. Odd to think that suddenly I am greatly exceeding the span of peoples' relationships. I am used to dealing with younger people in the throes of a new relationship. Not so much the older ones. It is as if I have been planted into a new scene with familiar players but a plot from a previous act.
It does make one think a great deal about one's own marriage. After all, it feels like (no statistical data) here that I am in the minority. And those who are in the second round seem to be at a relational place I am not and have not been for years. The simple fact of the living through a marriage with its accompanying children, finances, and events has a way of drawing everything into the "life is so ordinary for me" scenario.
Which is why I have to constantly - and forcefully - remind myself that it is not about the simple act of relationship. It is a picture, a picture of Christ and His church. I do not know that it is always helpful to me in the most positive of ways. But it does keep me on the track of remembering that to fail here is not just a failure for me, it is a failure for my outward facing witness to Christ.
I can fail myself. I cannot fail Him.
Most of them were divorced the first time for various reasons. I do not always know the reasons and do not always ask, of course - people share what they feel they need to share when they need to share it. Some seem to have ended relatively pleasantly, others with a level of animosity. Most, on the whole, have moved on to at least acceptance and moving on with their lives.
But here they are.
It is interesting because lots of them are in that "first stage" of second marriage where everything is newly wed bliss and extreme happiness. It is odd to myself, who have been married over two decades, to see and experience this. After all, up to this point most of my acquaintances were either unmarried or had been married for a considerable time. Odd to think that suddenly I am greatly exceeding the span of peoples' relationships. I am used to dealing with younger people in the throes of a new relationship. Not so much the older ones. It is as if I have been planted into a new scene with familiar players but a plot from a previous act.
It does make one think a great deal about one's own marriage. After all, it feels like (no statistical data) here that I am in the minority. And those who are in the second round seem to be at a relational place I am not and have not been for years. The simple fact of the living through a marriage with its accompanying children, finances, and events has a way of drawing everything into the "life is so ordinary for me" scenario.
Which is why I have to constantly - and forcefully - remind myself that it is not about the simple act of relationship. It is a picture, a picture of Christ and His church. I do not know that it is always helpful to me in the most positive of ways. But it does keep me on the track of remembering that to fail here is not just a failure for me, it is a failure for my outward facing witness to Christ.
I can fail myself. I cannot fail Him.
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