Kittens and Crabs

Life is about more than just figuring out what your thing is. That's important. You need to learn what you like, what you are suited for, that also adds value to the world. You need your dreams, goals, Vision. But once you have that, there are two ways to pursue it. And even before you have that very clear, there are two ways to pursue whatever it is you've decided to pursue, even if you're not sure it's the be-all end-all (which I'm not sure it ever is. Life is constant change except for one thing.)

You can pursue your dreams like a retracted hermit crab inside a soft, pink, cozy, terry-cloth shell. You are slowly inching towards your dreams and goals, but you are constantly seeking comfort, seeking to protect your tender parts from pain, from loss, from the feeling of being bad at something, or making a mistake, or being publicly embarrassed. In this configuration, life is all about comfort and avoiding discomfort. Generally associated with a fixed mindset. It's not actually very comfortable most of the time because if we ever stop to honestly ask ourselves how we're doing, there is the distinctly uncomfortable feeling of living well below our potential. Of squandering life. But then we snuggle in deeper to our soft terrycloth shell and watch some netflix or surf facebook and distract/numb ourselves to the unease.

The other way is like a wet kitten in the wind. Our beautiful hair is plastered against us, and our scrawniness is visible for the whole world to seek. We're shivering a bit, perhaps from the cold, perhaps from the fatigue we feel as we take wobbly step after wobbly step, often falling, always eventually standing up and continuing on. This is not the comfort mode. It's not possible to maintain long-term unless you are working from a growth mindset. Without the strength provided by that perspective, your energy is quickly depleted by self-judgment, anxiety, and the like. But with a mind that is kind to itself the journey soon becomes less shaky, less cold. And the previous feelings of discomfort that came when the softshell hermit crab are gone, replaced by a deep, rich, anchoring contentment that you are living a good life.

I suppose someone might say, "who wants to be a wet kitten?!" But the kitten is not always wet. Usually it is playing, warm and dry. It's just that the litmus test is: what happens when you get wet? Do you become the kitten or the hermit crab? Likely what you do when wet (when obstacles and challenges come, or you're doing something your not (yet!) good at) is what you do even when you're dry, for the most part. The hermit crab is slow moving even when dry, always with an eyestalk out looking for the next bit of water coming its way. Perhaps hermit mode is better for the few things that actually require great caution in life. But overwhelmingly, we go into hermit mode for things that are not truly life-threatening. Things for which hermit mode is not a helpful response.

If we look hard enough, we can all find at least some areas in our lives where we are adventurous kittens, rather than timid hermit-crabs. Find those things that you love to do, that you feel comfortable and confident doing, that you can play at, and not worry about whether you're doing "good" or "bad." Use them as templates for the other areas of your life. Apply those kitten skills and ways of thinking to your inappropriately-hermity areas so that you become more and more kitten-ish day by day.

For me, the kitten areas that stand out are improv dance and writing/creating. I think about how free and playful and unconcerned with failure I am in those areas, and try to take some of that into the rest of my life.

I'm trying to apply this especially to teaching and dating, two areas I have noticed I am very hermit-ish about, and that seem to require kitten-mode to do well. I'm working on it. Wish me luck.

Not that short, actually. Beings of pure energy. The 94 year old grouch.

This is going to be a short one. I think. And perhaps a bit worse-spelled than usual, since I don’t currently have easy internet access, so I’m writing it on TextEdit. Oh how I love simplicity.

Anyhoo. The vacation has begun in earnest. One truly remarkable thing has happened, and the rest is par for the course. I’m currently writing this from the study of my sister's house in Maryland, which I’m visiting for the first time. Luckily, the kids were gone when I and my parents arrived, so I was able to nap unmolested my small inquisitive creatures composed of pure energy. And now I even have a few moments to try and write a blog post. I doubt I’ll have much free-time over the next two days, as I’ll be spending them with either adult or larval relatives, or in hypersleep after a full day of uncle-ing.

And then I’m flying on Monday, so if I want to get it done by the weekend, now’s the time.

Enjoying the sweet anticipation of being reunited with some of my oldest and dearest friends, back in the ‘field.

So, the remarkable thing: vacation has started, and I have not yet gone into complete functional shut-down. normally at this point all I would want to do is hide away in my room on my computer until hunger or fire forced me away from my cave of solitude and mindless entertainment, completely drained of the willpower to so much as answer a work-related email unless it had the immediate urgency of putting out a fire that was consuming all the hair on my head.

But no, I’m ready to go. I’ve given myself permission to take the time I’m traveling off from work, but if I find myself with free-time, I actually look forward to using it to get some of the classwork done and out of my mind. I’m entering this break not totally exhausted.

Why? HOW? What can I do to repeat and continue this new development? I’m trying to reflect and mine all the possible variables that might be responsible for this change.

Perhaps how I’ve decided to stop working around 7 pm and give myself wind-down and social time, giving myself a hard-stop to when I have to be on and working. Perhaps how I’ve been keeping myself connected weekly with friends who recharge me socially, making that an iron-clad self-care habit. Perhaps it’s how I’ve been really working the growth mindset angle that I’d mentioned earlier, and that makes even things that I’m bad at, much less anxiety-producing and exhausting. Perhaps how I’ve started applying some mental contrasting/WOOP to activate my “necessity to act.” Perhaps it is the secret sauce that comes from focusing on keeping divinity/spirit/God in my awareness, with love, striving to listen and scrupulously follow the voice of my conscience, and committing to that endeavor 100%. That above all is my best guess at what lead me to experience the truly miraculous in my life, and seems to be the main ingredient in the secret sauce of Grace.

Perhaps I”ve said the word “perhaps” too many times in that sentence. But these are all just potential answers. I’ll have to experiment further to find the elements that are making the biggest difference.

In any case, it’s HUGE. I’m pretty pessimistic, and in fact I often self-describe myself as a cynical grouchy 94-year-old man. I’m more likely to understate than over-state. But this shift is really big. It is a phase shift. The difference between mostly being anxious and afraid and not doing the things that make my life meaningful, and being excited and relaxed and happy and doing those things with relative gracefulness.

The old man must add: we will see how long and how reproducible this thing is. It could all fall apart in twenty minutes. But I have seen and experienced a new possibility, and so I can at least set a course for being in this mode more regularly, even if it is fleeting.

My current hypothesis is it is mostly caused by really working and practicing the growth mindset, and the attitude of surrender and dedication (and therefore also transfer of responsibility) of my actions. And the general mix of the huge amount of high-quality self-improvement and spiritual literature I’ve been not just consuming, but digesting and integrating. Well, my rate of integration could still be higher, but it’s above zero, and that's the most important step.


In other news, I’ve all but decided that my next move is going to be back to FF. Though decided is a bit of a strong word. It was the answer that keeps coming up when I ask, in the silence of my own heart.

OK! Next time I write I’ll probably be back from my travels and super tired from traveling.


Take care, keep on flying, and don’t give up on your dreams. Just try some new strategies, if your current plan of attack isn’t working.

upcoming itinerary, grublets, voyeurism of the mundane

OK, the date's are set: This Thursday, after a half-day of classes, I will, perhaps directly from school, drive to my parent's house. Thence, Friday, I will drive with my parents to Maryland, outside of DC, to my sister's house, wherein her wee grublets dwell, hungry for avuncular holiday fun™ in the same way that zombies are hungry for brains or pirana are hungry for whole cows.

After two days of the poignant mixture of heartwarming moments, physical exhaustion, and the larger than normal pallet of smells that come with newish human beings, I will be flying out Monday from there unto the land of corn, soy, and CAFO's, yea, even unto the farthest reaches, to the island of art walks, yoga studios, and cool people, named Fairfield. Hopefully, there will be someone at the airport to pick me up. Almost certainly there will be someone. Hopefully, it's a friend and not a $100 driver service.

Then, it's as much friend time as I can pack into the next six days. There's even a high school reunion, not for a particular year, which I'm excited to attend. It is fascinating seeing what has happened to people I know from school. I think the one I've gotten the most of a kick from, is a fellow student who really was not a fan of school, and who I think many people might have dismissed, but who actually ended up being a pretty successful entrepreneur, in addition to taking over a successful family business. We all love the underdog story, and I'm no different. I think we like to believe that we can surpass the expectations the world has for us. When we see someone else doing that, we think, "maybe I can too." Or we get jealous and despise them. So I'm told. I'm pretty good at celebrating other people's successes; I don't generally go into the whole jealousy/envy thing. It's basically poisoning yourself to spite someone else, so if I can avoid it altogether, which I can, that seems like a strong play. We all have our weak areas, but that's not one of mine.

Oh, that's a fun question to ask at parties: what's your "favorite" sin (as in "the seven deadly sins")? Good conversation starter.

Anyhoo, I think it's about time I wrapped up this post. People keep congratulating each other and me on "finishing" but if you want a realistic time frame on when I'm going to finish, it will likely be no earlier than January 15th. I'm not going to have any time to do my various papers etc. this week, since I'm still in my internship and will just barely be scraping by keeping up with the assignments that absolutely need to be done now, to be done well. Then I'll be busy with family and friends until New Years (which is when I fly back.) Then I'll have one more week of internship (I got sick, so I need to make it up.) Then I will have a chance to focus on the papers etc. that need to get done. And that should take about a week of focused work. Perhaps a little longer.

I'm sure I will make a jubilant announcement when I am well and truly done.

Anyhoo, if you're a Fairfield friend, I look forward to seeing you. If not... I hope you've enjoyed this unostentatious, slice-of-life voyeuristic experience.

Happy holidays  ^_^

Living Somewhere Nice

On December 6th, I returned home to find out that I and my housemate's packages had been opened, hers had been stolen, and mine had been left. I'm insulted. What, mail theif, you don't like my comic books featuring Indian mythology? You have bad taste!

The next day, I went out onto the balcony to enjoy a little bit of nature and fresh air, and discovered that my foldable chair had been stolen. Clothing, money, booze, I can understand. But my chair? That's just a spiteful move. That's like the people that keep leaving their dog's poop on the (often not well lit) sidewalks. Self-centered, lazy, uncaring for anyone else's experience of the world. These are the people that are destroying the world people! The chair stealers and poop-leavers.

I didn't end up wanting to stay outside on the balcony/porch anyways though, because the people living downstairs were outside smoking again.

I am giving Brattleboro Vermont in general and Elliot Street in particular and 186 Elliot St. in especially particular a bad review on Yelp. Or I would if you could use Yelp for such things, and I had lots of spare time. My lease ends February 1st and I can renew it, and I had been considering staying for a bit, but you know what? I don't think I shall. I think I'm out of this living arrangement at the first convenient date.

I've been thinking about where I want to live for the next sizable chunk of time, and also in a more long-term way, about where I want to live forever, or until I die, or until society collapses and I have to run away to the forests and eat tiger-nuts and tree bark.

I'm making a little list of important things for wherever I live:

• Nice nature within a short walk that I can decompress in and stroll through
• A community of spiritually mature, spiritually active, kind people who I admire, to bring out the best in me and help keep my forward momentum in that trajectory
• Sufficient best friends that I've got at least one available to talk with when needed
• A job that fits me

I think that about covers it the absolute necessities for my happiness. I would prefer a small chill college town, or something akin to it. An ecovillage thing would be awesome. Really lush, pristine nature would be wonderful. 

But those points are a bit down on the list. I'm trying to make it a short list. Just the things that I know add the very most to my happiness, or detract the most when I don't have them. I need to prioritize, because it's unlikely I'll get everything I want.

I suppose I should do something like that for romantic partners. I've made long lists of all sorts, but it might be more helpful to understand what are the few things that are truly essential to a sustainable and generally great relationship. The stuff that's not likely to just get better with time and work.

For example:

being a literal gorilla. Relationship counseling's not gonna help that one.

OK, that's all you get for this week. No more soup for you! I've got a million... well, at least thirty, at a rough estimate, things I should do by yesterday or earlier. Not that I'm going to get much of them done at 6:30 pm Sunday night, but I may get one of them done now, and there is probably at least one thing that's really important to get done now.

Oh, I know, plane tickets! I'm planning to fly down to Fairfield around Christmas to New Years, and I assume plane prices are just going to go up.

So yeah, if you live in Fairfield, and you want to pick me up at the airport, you will get my company and conversation, gas money, at least one meal, plus any reasonable amount of money you want, if you desire additional compensation. If you know me, you've got my email, let me know if you're interested. I should have specific dates and times soon.

Death, self-compassion. Schools out! (soon)

I have a little checkpoint in my list-manager (where I try to keep all the things I need/want to do organized) that says, "check 'regular review' folder." It's a red folder, with scraps of paper, that have really good advice and reminders on them. It's been quite a while since I've gone through it, and I was prepared to throw out a lot of it. But I threw out almost nothing. There was a lot of good advice and inspiration in that folder.

I think I have a lot of good advice for myself, hard-won, and I tend to forget it. Or it gets mixed up with the less useful advice I have for myself. I give myself lots of advice. I like to think of it as being in continual beta. (not my analogy, but I like it.)

Beta testing is what game and software developers do when a program is mostly ready, to work out the bugs. They play with the program, test for bugs, and then report the bugs and glitches and inefficiencies, to the programmers, to be fixed. My life is in constant beta. I'm continually reflecting on how I'm doing and how I can improve.

Some people might think that's an unpleasant way to live, but that's only true if I get judgmental or impatient. The real truth is, I feel happiest when I give myself the time to reflect on what is working well and what is working poorly, and come up with possible solutions for the buggy areas.

I don't believe in final death, just bodies being discarded like old clothes so new ones can be put on, so death, though scary in a biological, visceral sense if faced with a hungry tiger, offers me no existential dread. Given a functionally immortal existence, the only true fear, as Marcus Aurelius put it, is, 'not death, but never having lived'. Though I might add "also, things being really awful for a long time."

Am I growing? Am I making my life more and more worthwhile? If so, then that is success, whatever the outcomes. If not, then I've just wasted my time, my life, this moment.

Here, I'll share a few of the tasty tidbits from the red folder:

In bold sharpie, on a bright pink sticky-note: Remain HUMBLE

A print-out of Bronnie's article on "The Top Five Regrets of the Dying"

Some notes on shame vs. guilt (too long to write it all out. Shame is focus on self, toxic, Guilt is focus on behavior, helpful, because you can do something about it.
Shame fertilizer: secrecy, silence, judgment.
Shame pesticide: Empathy ("me too") self-compassion, common humanity, mindfulness.

Notes on a one-on-one I had with God about how to do discipline with my kids.

Notes on an important lesson in a dream I had with God in it where I was going to the bathroom rather than talking to God.

Many more. But now time to go.


Also, I'm still sick, apparently. Though my head is much clearer. But I still am getting random stomach things. Though I tried sitting up straight instead of curling up into a ball and it went away. Possibly related?


Two more weeks of classes! Woo!
Then another two weeks of internship. Oh.
Also a week or so of finishing all the assignments. Um...

But! Winter break! No more assignments! Time to sleep and play and be warm and cuddled with friends and family!





Anyhoo! The next phase is soon approaching! I must figure out what it is! And buy plane tickets if I'm going anywhere.

Much love, dear friends and family,
-I