After years of practice and contemplation, trials and tribulations, an eventful life with its fair share of contentment and trauma – I still can’t better these three simple words to sum it all up…
This is it.
Having ventured out towards a beautiful dawn, I arrive at work only to be shrouded in freezing fog!
A freezing frosty morning and a beautiful dawn to guide my way to work.
When it comes managing personal tasks and to-do’s the best piece of advice I ever heard came from Jason Fried of 37 Signals in the context of product development.
Instead of keeping an endless log of all the user feedback that came in he would ignore everything until he noticed the same issues being repeated again and again. This signalled importance and so became a task to be noted and addressed.
I have repurposed this behaviour in my own life. Instead making endless lists and notes of things I think need to be addressed, I let everything go and don’t make a note of anything until it keeps coming up repeatedly, which indicates its importance.
Apart from simplifying my life dramatically I also came to discover what was really important and what could simply be ignored, which turned out to be a hell of a lot!
If you can’t integrate/ assimilate traditional ancient wisdom into the ordinary reality of your own lived experience then you’re completely missing the point.
Knowing is new and spontaneous. Knowledge is remembered and rehearsed. One is accumulated, the other an empty space. As a window is a hole in the wall.
The difference
In the absence of adequate rites of passage, ad-men become the high priests of an initiation into the addictions of consumerism. Everywhere the ceremony of innocence is exploited. Without recognized rites, members of a society are not sure who they are within the structure.
Later on, life forces us to make one-sided differentiations. But that is why we get lost to ourselves and have to learn, again, to find ourselves. When you are whole, you have discovered yourself once again, and you know what you have been all the time.
— Carl Jung
It’s strange to consider the fact that liberal democracy has mostly been the exception rather than the norm across the globe for the last fifty years.
Where is home?
Here, always right here, right now. Which is, of course, everywhere we happen to be.
America is undergoing the most profound cultural transformation for a generation but not in the way many think. I’m not sure anyone can claim to know quite what is happening and where the country is going.
Started to watch Kneecap last night and got bored. Didn’t make it to the end. It’s got lots of great energy and music but ultimately I didn’t really care about any of the characters. Shame as it had lots of potential.
Hot in there.
…he won't get to the root of his problem, because the root of his problem is himself, and he doesn't know it.
— Anon
If I don’t know who I am, whatever I do to make the world better will only serve to make it worse. Herein the experience of remorse through which all must pass on the way to self-knowing.
Gnothi seauton
Still, clear air outside. A dog barks. Flames rage in the wood burner. In the distance the gentle hiss of the occasional car on the wet road. Cold feet on stone floor. Nothing done yet everything happening.
We just happen and our conscious awareness is a helpless passenger along for the ride.
A bright, crisp and clear morning. A good day for a run.
Everything uttered is too much…
There is only one way and that is your way; there is only one salvation and that is your salvation. Why are you looking around for help? Do you believe that help will come from outside?
— Carl Jung