125 posts tagged with "personal"

10am. August 26th.

I think "Memento mori" puts everything into perspective.

We compare so much of ourselves and what we have, or haven't got, with others, with our past, with others past.

It's never an apples to apples comparison, and yet we agonise over whether we should do a thing or not, based on - again - other people.

And that perspective can change depending on your daily brain chemistry, you may be up one day and it's a great idea go ahead, and then down the next, and it's a waste of time, futile effort.

But one thing remains the same, we only have this life - the one that's in your hands - and this time today, to do what we will with it, because tomorrow is never promised, what do you have to lose but what you have in front of you - the now.

"Remember that you die"

maybe the machines make us unhappy.

the machine appeared in a time that had a void, a hole in the matrix.

the machine filled that need. it was consistently present (unless you'd b0rked it yourself), and would give as much as you could ask.

but we're not machines. as much as we'd like to be.

avoid the messy bits. cold hard logic.

easy.

lifeless.

the next best thing is we have the machines around.

we rely a lot on them, to give us what we're missing.

maybe the machines make us unhappy.

Just saw a video where someone was describing the act of writing a blog post, or an instagram caption, just writing something, publicly, every day was not the act necessarily of having something to say. but that the act allowed you to realise what it is you have to say.

I might have lost track of that. I tend to, once outside influences come into the picture, compliments, conversations, opinions from other, and even just my own instrusive thoughts from an outside perspective.

all irrelevant and honestly detrimental, to the process and the practice, of sitting myself down, coming into my own space (physically and mentally), and having that conversation with myself to figure out what I have to say.

I have so many thoughts that come to the fore every day, that I need to just come straight to the blog, and post the one that makes it to the front.

In the beginning there was the word.

Maybe before there was anything, you had to sit there and talk to yourself until those things you were talking came into existence.

You sit here talking into the void.

But you can't be intermittent with it, it's not like a cumulative thing, that adds up and eventually topples things over.

It's a pressure. It needs to build up.

Like a critical mass, until it is overwhelming.

So speak into the void, every day until from the void comes the world.

Sometimes it's just nice to not have a thought in your head.

23:16 as I write this, and the George Addair quote "everything you've ever wanted is sitting on the other side of fear."

Just thinking about that tonight, what would we all be, if fear and insecurity wasn't a thing. That we just did what made us happy, navigated what we needed to do, and just lived our lives.

Maybe some people just have this mode without any effort at all, and then some people need the daily ritual to get here.

Either way, this has to be the north star - getting to this state - because then you can begin, living your life the way that makes you happy, the way you want, right up until you need to remember this again.

Rinse, repeat.

I want to build something - several somethings to be exact...

Some things based just on a whim, whatevers caught my interest or "passion", usually something technical.

I want to record building a bunch of stuff on AWS and putting in on a YouTube channel.

Why?

Two things come to mind

1. commits me to picking a build and going through it, because there's no "content" otherwise
2. I've always liked documenting my technical adventures

I look at #2 as being the souvenir or documented proof of the experience.

It's also a point in time snapshot of approach, understanding and skill.

But we're limited in time (or so we're sometimes lead to beleive) and that time is the factor against which important decisions are made.

What do I do with my life?

Anything really. What's stopping you doing what you want and need to do?

What should I do with my life?

Probably avoid "shoulds", I don't see a life reaching its potential when its constrained by "should".

"Just do it" is the standard catch cry, at this very moment we become caught in - paralysed by choice, fear, insecurity.

But it's a moment that exists in everyone cycle, and we have different techniques and approaches to moving through it.

If we're lucky, we'll move quickly- or, maybe we're meant to stay in the uncomfortable a while longer, and receive inspiration, signals and directions from the void.

Either way, and eventually, we need action.

Action removes doubt.

If still in doubt, add more action until you can see something.

My thought today was our purpose in life, and being caught between the stationary pondering and action to under landmarks and expose perspectives.

I think we're best served by doing a healthy amount of both.

Mmmm "healthy", anothe relative term.

And thought for another day.

Sitting in the "uncomfortable"...

I saw a video with John Cleese talking about why he prefers people, other artists, who would sit in the awkward, uncomfortable longer, than those who either couldn't or wouldn't.

People who needed to "come to" or "make" a decision.

Why?

Because for those people coming to a decision, they were effectively bringing the uncertain, uncomfortable space to a close. Ending the awkward, uncomfortable uncertainty.

Why is that bad?

Because that space, where it's unknown, awkward and uncomfortable, is full of possibilities and wonders.

It's a space with only the limits you can imagine.

To hold that space, is to hold the door open to the gods, the universe, of creativity and magic.

But you have to be able to hold it open, and not allow your tolerance for the uncomfortable rob you of the space to let creativity birth something from the void, into your world.

Sit with it, be uncomfortable, see what the ether wants to show you.

It's funny how the exact same tasks, in the exact same environment and any and all extenuating factors can be experienced as trivial, easy, not even worth mentioning...

But also impossible, the most difficult, severely onerous and time consuming.

And the only difference is the way you looked at it.

"Just change your mindset" is Level 1 thinking.

I can change this with various external stimuli, inject, manipulate, go.

Is this sustainable? No.

Short-term band-aid at best.

Systems not Goals...

means the objective is not "change your mind", that's the result, the objective is "what helps create an environment for a healthy mindset?"...

And then never letting that slip lol.

The hamster wheel of doing the things because you're not naturally "the things", it is what is, what's the alternative?

Do the things, change the world.

"You only regret the things you don't do."

Is a saying I used to live my life by, probably more an excuse to get up to whatever chaos came to mind when I was younger.

I still think it applies today.

With everything around us, choice, options, doubt, opportunity-cost, fomo, I can only surmise that whatever prevents us from action, in our best interests, or in the interests of our truth, of what we want for ourselves in this life - is not worth the regret that will inevitably come at the end of it all.

A lot of the time it's about figuring out what it is we really want in our lives, what's our ideal life?

What does that look like?

Are we scared to dream? Do we think we deserve it? Or that we're capable of acquiring it?

Maybe we don't ask the question because we're not up to the possibility of that answer being what we don't want it to be. And once asked, you can't take that back.

Todays thought it the person who would advance, onwards towards their goal, taking in what external feedback was useful, no vanity metrics, real critical feedback, requested and processed as objectively as possible. Improving vision, understanding, thinking, on the course ahead.

Towards the life we've always wanted, but were afraid to dream.

Who is that person? That person is me.