Motivation.
I remember being a pretty bored kid in the suburbs looking out the window on rainy days wishing I had a brother or sister or something to push around and get into trouble with. I’d lay on the orange, rust and yellow shag carpet in our old turn of the 20th century house in the 80’s and imagine myself walking along the ceiling legs up, one eye closed to take aim and I’d lift an imaginary leg over the door frame and check out the upside down book case that was floor to ceiling and hop over the light fixtures that were still suspended even though the house was upside down. Then I’d close my eyes and imagine the house on the grass literally on it’s apex perfectly balanced and how I’d walk under the pitch of the roof below the turquoise wood slats and black shutters. I remember how excited and disappointed I was to find that there was already an upside down house in Wisconsin Dells. This is when I started getting the insight that there are really very few absolutely original ideas. If anything taking ideas and building upon them regardless of the source is the productive thing to do - or at least maintain the good ones as everything needs a good dusting off every now and then. Ego gets in the way sometimes of this - this collaborative building. But often enough, it doesn’t. Masses of wise hidden individuals somehow find each other and make cool stuff. It’s really amazing.Everything from art to streaming code to architecture to music to beer to ... even families. It’s pretty cool. So what makes all this happen? What compels us? Often things aren’t safe. And they aren’t done for money or even power necessarily. Those are usually the most interesting. Sometimes the money or power or security naturally come, sometimes they don’t - so there’s a risk right there. At some point someone says, Fuck it, I have to know. I have to pursue this. I have to climb this mountain. I have to build the Guggenheim and I am going to use this copy paper and make curves and stick it together and this is going to be the model I show my interns so they can get me the mathematical configurations in which we will base our support structure. That is nuts. Who does that? Frank Gehry does. I’m going to rock out some compositions, but I’m deaf. Fuck it - who cares, I’m doing it. I’m going to eat nothing but vegetables and kill a full on Ironman six times. I’m going to leave the presidency of the American Medical Association and divorce my jewish wife and leave my conservative life and start a surf school and raise ten kids in a van on the beaches of California. I’m going to ... set off on an adventure with my fellow dirtbags into Central and South America to go mountaineering and rock climbing and make all my own gear even though none of us have any dough in the bank and eventually grow one of the largest gear and clothing companies with an environmental and social mission. Who knew? I’m going to... Well, you get the idea. To carry on, I hear Yvon Chouinard still drinks plain water from the local rivers every month to keep his immune system up. Apparently, on that initial infamous endeavor he became very ill due to drinking the water. Not sure how smart it was, but he kept drinking it and built up a tolerance and an immunity to it. Something about how he noticed the locals all drank from the river and were okay. (Not to stray too far off subject - but on the matter of calculated risk combined with this particular safety issue, there is an article in the July 2015 Outside Magazine called Little Things That Kill You that covers microbes from waters and dirt and such... In case you are planning to way deep fly fishing or are taking an excursion to Mexico or something. In such cases, some may say Yvon just got lucky. Some might say it was a calculated risk and he has very good instincts. We all do know how vaccines work after all.) So what motivates us? We all have this little (or large) animal that exists within us. Maybe for some it’s just an alter ego. You might spend time widdling away at drawings and writings of what your imagination taunts you with playing with the different archetypes the “other” parts of yourself identify with. Superman? Spiderman? Cinderella? Wonder Woman? Ulysses? Carrie Bradshaw? All you know is you can’t help it - you must draw, you must write, you must read and learn things. Maybe for others, your id animal just keeps physically moving forward through space engaging those big muscle groups and fine motor skills. You must run or ride or lift weights or build something or have that people connectivity or play team sports or your inner animal eats you up from the inside. You’re always on the hunt for a little rush and you light up from the inside - you feel invigorated and know you are alive and why. Whatever that driver is, it is within us from the very beginning and sometimes somewhere along the way we may lose it. Letting your id stroll in the park or the field or in the mountains is pretty important, actually. You can contain it, but only for so long. This is the thing that made us cry for mom when we were hungry as a babe. This is the thing that made us test and learn about our environment or get really competitive on that math test in third grade. This is the thing that balances all the stuff that society tells us we need to curb or squeeze into our part of the tube like a sausage. It is the stuff you want, you just have to do, your inner animal or collective group super id animal really really needs to do because it is just going to be so much fun and so great or exquisite and perfectly elegant. You may fail. But you will learn from trying. You may get lost, but, as Thoreau discerns, this may be where we begin to know and be ourselves. “In our most trivial walks, we are constantly, though unconsciously, steering like pilots by certain well-known beacons and headlands, and if we go beyond our usual course we still carry in our minds the bearing of some neighboring cape; and not till we are completely lost, or turned round — for a man needs only to be turned round once with his eyes shut in this world to be lost — do we appreciate the vastness and strangeness of nature. Every man has to learn the points of compass again as often as he awakes, whether from sleep or any abstraction. Not till we are lost, in other words not till we have lost the world, do we begin to find ourselves, and realize where we are and the infinite extent of our relations.” Henry David Thoreau reprinted from https://etherealbeings.wordpress.com/2015/06/18/you-get-1000-words-today-since-i-blew-off-writing-yesterday-youre-welcome/
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Okay so I really need to do my nails.
I probably really need to do a lot of things. Gravity isn’t working in my favor as I continue to be drawn in certain directions and what gets done, gets done. What doesn't, doesn't. Not that I’m not a fan of existentialism - I am actually. These are the things I am carving out: writing, working, limited time at a desk, ample time with the ones I love and the things I love, yoga, etc. I probably will force myself to clean the house soon. I’ve had to start putting my shoes up because Sammy the dog has a little shoe fetish I noticed as I was putting on my brand new Tommy Bahama sandals. (Insert ucky face here) Anywho - my house is, shall we say, very organic right now. Like the mold that was growing in my water bottle from the Hammer sport drink I had left over in it. Did you know mold can actually grow to about four inches, makes beautiful colors and learns multiple languages if you let it sit for long enough? It’s true. It’s all true. I guess I've been a little busy (and loving every minute of it) - everything happens all in good time one way or another - so no worries, right? It will all get done. So today, or yesterday, I confirmed that Strava is not counting my hill runs for the climbing challenge. None of them - not the stairs, not the hill repeats. Only the cycling. I suspected that at first until a very very wise ninja critter told me it could be run OR ride. Silly me believed it. Turns out ninja critter cant read so good. Regardless, my feelings for the ninja critter remain uncompromised. He is still amazing in my book. Mostly because I secretly am glad I did the stairs and the hill training. I do have a tri coming up after all so it is all good. It is a lot of effort no doubt. A Lot. (I encourage you to try it if you don't believe me.) At the point of realization that the 20 hill repeats and ten sets of stairs - seven flights each - would not count, I thought, okay, well, even if I am unable to complete 29,029 feet in cycle climbing by the end of June I have done way more than I would have had I not signed on to the challenge. I’m stronger for it. I’m stronger from the struggle. The Strava reward after all is just a pat on the back anyway if even. So no loss there. Besides, I give props to Strava for trying to bring awareness to the situation in Nepal - and that is what is really important. I also have pushed myself to ride in Wisconsin (which is hilly and gorgeous) and in the wee mornings through town. I know, I know. You’re thinking I am just some kind of strange optimist. I don’t know. Maybe I am. But why not. It isn’t as if I don’t work hard. And it isn’t as if some things, as you know, in life are super difficult. So why not enjoy the good stuff? Also, did you know that if you get a splinter in a callous in your foot it is nearly impossible to get out? I don’t know where these splinters are coming from. That's two in a week. Maybe I’ll look it up in my metaphysical handbook and see what it means spiritually. (I am now feeling my friend Blane cringe as I write that which kinda makes me giggle....) Off to the next thing! Ganbatte yo! Super tired. Ready for bed. Thinking about..... cell phones.
Remember back in the day when we had land lines? It cost like ten bucks a month? Ah well. Life marches on. Long gone are the days when you could ride your dirt bike down the dusty trail to the quarry. Long gone are the days when you could tip toe through the woods to the viaduct and hang under the bridge. Long gone are the days of the rope swing that hung high off the tree. We'd have to climb up the quarry house to get to it - then a big leap aaaannnnnd splash! In the quarry the little fish would nip at my toes and there were turtles and tad poles. Now its bricked in and they capitalized the quarry by putting paddle boats in and fenced it all off - probably got a TIFF passed to do it all. The old fashioned fire escapes are all long gone now too. Those were always a blast to climb up. Since I'm editing last night's journal (good thing too because there were a lot of spelling errors - teat instead of treat? I had to laugh and say, okay, time to edit!), I will tell you that in the near future I will talk about the joy of climbing up the fire escapes of Old Main, a giant beautiful limestone building in the center of town. In my opinion, kids should be allowed to do those things - like - it should be a given. Like a ritual of growing up. It was for me - but it was for some people I knew even more so. It is the things writers can base movies and novels of off. It is a coming of age story. Now, everything around here is so stringent. I would even say it is built upon the idea of a police state - police officers everywhere doing their thing. Seems like if more cops wanted to show they cared,they’d treat it more than just a job. They’d treat it like a lifestyle. I will say, I did get a very sympathetic gesture from a police officer the other day when I asked him for his name. I could tell he felt bad actually the whole time. He cared and it meant a lot. But what really got me was I wasn't sure how to address him: Sargent, Officer so-in-so, etc. So I asked him. He replied that I probably just want to call him asshole. I almost cried I thought it was so sweet. ] (Somehow, right about here, I fell asleep. I would feel bad - but I have come to discover that all this training has given me narcolepsy. I believe it is contagious actually and that I actually contracted it from my training partner as I watched him request a cup of coffee as he sat on my couch and fell asleep. He may not even know but I drank the first one I made for him since he was drooling on himself. When he awoke, I made another. He actually took it in his hand. Not three minutes after leaving the room I hear a yelp! Yep. Hot coffee all over the couch. He fell asleep. I will have you know, dear reader, there were absolutely zero alcoholic beverages involved in this evening. Heck, after all the 3:45am and 5am wake ups for training, I haven't really even had a chance to touch the Deschutes in my fridge actually!) (Anyway, this is how the story ends... ) I’ll have you know I just fell asleep and woke up. OK so half - ish will have to do. over and out. gn. I suppose sooner or later the topic of love will arise. So elusive. So full of paradox and hidden meaning. So complex, yet so simple.... Like sleeping in on Sunday mornings or afternoon naps. Like pairing of fine wine and haute cuisine. Like... Like... grinding up a hill that has got to be a 14 - 23% grade hill.
And, as I double check the grade of the hill repeats, I noticed Strava has me running in the lake. Okay - don’t believe anything Strava says. I did not run in the lake although since I was completely over heating, I wanted to. Now that I look at the map, what a mess! I need to clean up my run art, my goodness, it’s like someone just scribbled all over Four Lakes. Anyway, Strava didn’t record the ten stair repeats - Seven flights, ten times. Stealth like a ninja warrior now. Take that Strava - don’t record the indoor super secret training. I didn’t want you to have it anyway! Yea? Um... I guess love subject will have to wait for another day. I don’t really have anything to say about love right now that isn’t complete cliche anyway. Except - okay - except this one thing. There is this one little thing I notice when I start to get to know people better. Or even if I have known them for a while (friends included, like girl friends even) - Only when you really look at them though. I mean, it’s easy to look at people. We see people every day. You look around. You look and see everything. But not really. You look, but maybe you don’t see. Maybe you see, but you’re not really looking. What I noticed, well, was reminded of, is innocence. When you see a person’s soul, and you see an innocent soul, a true soul, it is beautiful. Really. See - even that sounds cliche. I’m tempted to add in a “fucking truly beautiful” there... And, if that helps you, add it. It’s a funny thing - seeing beauty, or love, or truth. It is full of meaning and nothing at the same time. It just is what it is. And it’s fleeting. So even if you see it one day, or one moment do not be surprised if it vanishes. That must be the thing about ‘looking’ and ‘seeing’ - we take it for granted. We just see so much. Some of us more than others (probably stories for another day - and not all of them for the faint of heart). And we look at everything (bombarded with visual simulation). It’s easy to unwittingly take it for granted. Words like trust and faith can come into play here too. Maybe a simple deprivation experiment like just walking around blind folded for a day and taking the hands of others - relying on others. (Deprivation exercises will definitely have to be a topic for another day as well. If you’ve never done any, I’m going to have to recommend it. You will learn more than you think!) So, back to hill repeats. They’re horrible. Like love? Because it is a lot of work, but so worth it at the end? (Bad simile?) The razzing may never end (insert smilie face here). If you do have to do such horrendous activities - be sure to do them with people that make you smile. By the way, I have discovered that I totally will go for a strawberry frosted cupcake with sprinkles. You can even call me cupcake if you want. I will take the cupcake if it means I don’t have to go 15 hill repeats and settle for ten. Okay so I better jam some words out before I forget and the day slips away. Does that ever happen to you? Do days just fly by and you find you’ve forgotten something - some little thing - that you promised you would do for your soul? Yet another unnoticed geeky little personal goal again left behind in the corner like the “weird” kid that never stood up for himself and made a ruckus. Yes, that *could be* my little #500wordsaday challenge. But not today.
So, what’s on topic today? Beer? Climbing the hillz by bike? Leg pain? Culinary delights? NROTC scholarships? Awesome kids? Being an outlaw? Moving to a third world country (possibly Batavia - okay, that’s kinda a joke... I really meant Lisle..) and starting a commune? So many possibilities. I think I will choose, just for a moment, to talk about how amazing people are. Specifically, some of my yoga students. They always bring a smile to my face. They inspire me daily. Today, one of my students wanted to do inversions. I roughed ‘em up a bit in my power class - lots of planks and core activities and got them super sweaty (they like that - sometimes I actually get scolded if I lighten up!). Then during our stretch, I got the request from Heather. SHe said they always make her feel happy. And isn’t that what it’s all about anyway? So that would be next. It’s not a secret that my power classes aren’t for the light hearted. But what really inspires me is watching the transformation. I’ve been asking my students to give me leg lifts from headstand. Constant motion. It’s a great core workout, but it’s not easy. Inversions can drum up fear in someone who is not accustomed. Now on top of it, I’m asking them not to use their elbows and knees. I personally struggle with this from handstand. My friend and student, Angie, has been working on it from pike although she kills it from straddle. And Ingrid has gone from none to some - which means she has stuck with it and hasn’t given up. That right there is the key. Making the unfamiliar (that which is difficult) into the familiar (that which is easy). I’ll also have to give gratitude to one of my yoga students for the reference points therein as well, by the way. In the attempt to look up some witty quotes, I came upon this thought by another blogger, “In Beckett’s terms, we need Boredom to escape the terror of the unfamiliar, and must endure Suffering if we are to create for ourselves more than a base life.” It is the long and more eloquent way of reiterating the old adage: if it doesn’t challenge you, it doesn’t change you. On occasion, I have been known to drop the idea that, for some, taking the break - or, in other words, to *not* take the challenge - IS the challenge. The idea of being at peace with yourself is a profound one and one that, unfortunately, I find is a common problem we have with our ego, id and psyches. For me, being alone and quiet is a necessity. Like food or water. I’m sure it’s more common that people would imagine. Introverts, after all, are not going to go about blathering about their alone time. But rather, as if in denial, secretly squirrel away and find their own space privately. In sum, no matter what your challenge is - whether it be to chill or to take risks - that is for you to decide and that is for you to do and either choice is great and necessary. Do that. You are your only judge - so be kind. #500wordsaday can be found here for this entry>> https://etherealbeings.wordpress.com/2015/06/12/busted/
500 words a day, huh? well... let’s begin. Lets see if I remember one of the passwords to one of the blogs I started a million years ago. Lets see if I can hold my heavy eye lids open for long enough to tap out a few bits of fiction... or maybe nonfiction. That, dear reader, will be for you to guess. So with no particular direction, off I go. As I kiss the cheek of the living dead at what is otherwise known as the crack of dawn, I write. Give a pencil and real live paper and I may doodle a bit as well to add to the future collection of nonsense and scribbles of which you will find this stolen-but-I-asked-permission-first-idea right here.
Some while back I abandoned the act of scribbling until I saw a friend of mine posting 500 words daily. It kind of drove me crazy. I wanted it. I was busy. I’d see it again. Id want it again. I’d get busy. Day after day of watching and wanting and working out and finding myself exhausted by days end, or in the beginning or anywhere in between with little left but haze in between my ears, a few bad jokes that would spill from my mouth to anyone who would listen and a weight on my eyelids if I dare turn to a computer screen rather than a pool or a road or studio in which case I would have zero problems forking over a few handstands. Last week I was lucky enough to wake up at 3:45am Tuesday through Friday. I say lucky because I was on deck to sub for a fellow yogi who was out of town... so, if I didn’t wake up we would both be unlucky. I cant do that to a friend. So up I went. Turns out 5am bootcamp is very invigorating. What follows after the endorphins / seratonin rush dissipates, however, generally looks like the walking dead over here. Especially after having gotten up at 3:45am. Saturday and Sunday provided no relief either - although they were equally invigorating having done two days of hills by bicycle. Both days were in the woods. The air just feels better there, tastes better. It was as if the oxygen was just cool coming into me right through my skin under this canopy of green lushness. I love this. Saturday, up at 5am, was by mountain bike (I have a hybrid) and we tracked about 800 feet in elevation. Sunday, slept in to 6am, by road in Wisconsin where we tracked about 3500 feet in elevation. I don’t think I shook the zombie off me until Wednesday. I think I may have slept in until at least 7 or 7:30. That’s certainly not to say that zombie is a feeling that should be avoided entirely. One can take particular delight in grunting out answers when others try to engage in verbal communication with a zombie. Drool happens occasionally also. Sometime even while discovering you’re just hangin at the office and you’ve fallen asleep sitting up. You just wipe that drool from your chin and keep on truckin little soldier. Just keep on truckin. And that’s my 500(+) words for today. Let’s see if I can remember to get a mental burn on tomorrow as well... with a little help (and inspiration) from my friends. |
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