A short post. Closing. Bank failure. Bank success. A new house!

 I'm two weeks behind and I have ten minutes to write both posts, so expect something short.

The reason I'm one week behind is, two weeks ago was moving and "closing" week. Closing is real estate slang for "signing the fifty sheets of paper that mean you now own the house and accept the responsibilities and the mortgage."

That week was strangely full of obstacles towards that end (and other house related stuff.) My bank wouldn't let me send a wire transfer without coming in, which was a headache. People weren't getting back to us in a reasonable time with the documents we needed to give them, so we were scrambling (mostly Suzannah, since I was working all day) to get all the documents needed. This was made more difficult for Suzannah since she was having to get documents of mine.

In any case, the problems got solved and we sent a mind boggling (to me) amount of money over to someone, and now I own my very first house. It's very nice. I've never spent close to this amount of money on anything. My cars have been hand-me-downs, so the most I've spent is on schooling, which somehow didn't seem like as much, perhaps because it was split up year by year and semester by semester. I suppose it's not so much considering the house is re-sellable. It's more like setting aside a chunk of money that I can later get back, like investing in stocks. Though in the same way, how much I get back is not certain (and it's likely to grow, in the long run).

I'm leaving my Connecticut bank, they were monumentally unhelpful, like, they literally failed me on every front. Their customer support, while friendly and trying to be helpful, gave incorrect information that caused a bunch of fruitless work on our part, they didn't help me in any way, so I am leaving them as soon as I get time. Which may be a while. But Suzannah's bank, from Iowa, was much more helpful, and they got things done. Perhaps because she knew her bankers by name. 

In any case, we've got the house now and I'm very excited to get to work using the space to figure out what I really want in an office and shrine room. (and to some extent in a house, in general)

OK, that's already over my allotted time, you'll have to find out about why this week's post is also delayed, later.

Take care ^_^

-Isaac

Training Weights. Closer to Closing. Life keeps going.

 I have worked a lot this weekend. Through all that work I am finally... hmm. at par? Not sure the right word. I've caught up with the various weekly life-admin tasks, organizational tasks, etc. Not entirely, but to within a reasonable tolerance. I've also made progress on some longer term goals. Figuring out appliances and office set up for the new house I'll be moving into soon. I've also taken care of some weekly tasks that were do imminently. I think the main person feeling this aside from myself is my wife, who is probably rather upset to be getting significantly less time with me this weekend than normal. I'm going to try to minimize this by making this a shorter post.

There are limited hours in the day. There is also variable levels of energy. Energy can be modified via technique. For example, by spending a bit more time clarifying and staying in touch with my motivating, overarching goals, I give myself more energy. By reading/listening to inspiring material, I give myself more energy. By spending quality time with people I love, I give myself more energy.

However, time is not so flexible. I can only accomplish so much in the given time, and so in order to get the most important things done, I must identify and prioritize them, and be willing to give up on the less important things.

Example, I tend to collect notes, to-do's, etc., on various slips of scrap paper. Many of the todo's are unimportant, but they take up mental space, and also physical space, acting as a camouflage to the truly important things that need to get done, because I can't quickly differentiate them.

So, for example, this weekend, I sat down and wrote out a short list of the most important things that I wanted to get done, from the larger list of everything that I wanted to get done. It gave me focus and a sense of satisfaction when those items were actually completed. I'm trying to come to terms with the fact that, despite my yearning for a few months off to get caught up on all the little things, it may be an unknown length of time before I have that luxury. If I want my time and life to feel spacious, I have to figure out a way to do so, within my current constraints. To do that, I cannot manufacture more time, despite how much I may want a time-turner. The only other option is to prune. This is something true of design as well: if you have lots of things in a space, none of them are important. You don't notice any of them. They all become background. If you want to highlight a few of them, you have to remove the rest.

With life, if you want to excel at some things, if you want to put in the time necessary to do them well, you (I) may have to not spend time on other things.

Not all things are equally important, and if you don't consciously choose the things that matter, your environment will often dictate what you do, in a somewhat random manner, of what is calling at you loudest, or perhaps what is easiest.

It's nice having a pristine office, without distractions, but what is essential is a clean mind. A mind that can focus on what is important and ignore what is not. I'm learning this skill intentionally right now, because I don't have the luxury of setting up my physical space in an ideal way. Things are crowded... Though perhaps I can make my space less crowded as well. In any case, functioning under these less than ideal circumstances was kind of debilitating, until I took the time to refocus on my motivations, my goals. From that place of alignment and dynamism, the debilitations are becoming more like training weights. This is always an option, when you are presented with obstacles and challenges: take them as opportunities to learn, grow, improve, and they become assets to your ultimate development.

As the saying goes, if you want something done, it's the busiest people who are most likely to get it done. Busy meaning active, engaged in doing stuff full throttle, not full of busy-work. Getting stuff done breeds more getting stuff done, it's like a momentum you start to build up. I suspect it has to do with the inertia of getting started. That's the hardest part. But if you're already going, it's less work to just keep going.

School is continuing on, I'm slowly improving myself, my teaching and interacting. The house is moving towards closing. About two weeks until that's done (!). The cats are being cute. The wife is being wonderful and loving and keeping me from burning out and getting miserable as I tended to do when I was working hard by myself. Life is good, but quite challenging. I feel like the pandemic situation has been going on long enough that it's started to normalize.

That's dangerous. Don't let your guard down yet. Winter is coming. Stay safe and alert, especially when you notice complacency creeping in.

Love, wishing you all safety and health,

Isaac

the 9 to 5 grind. purpose, meaning, vision. flotsam or flowers?

Labor Day weekend! I must say I am quite looking forward to it. Something about that saddens me a little bit. To look forward to the weekend, rather than be excited about the week. It's something I thought about more when I was younger. I think it's epitomized in the Thoreau quote, (from memory, so perhaps slightly misquoted) "most people lead lives of quiet desperation"

What are you living for? As a kid and young adult in college, thinking about such things, and highly critical of the world, I looked at most people's lives: work to pay the bills, looking forward to vacation, play during your time off to try and recuperate from exhaustion, spend a few weeks every year enjoying intimate time with your friends and family. Eventually die, leaving not much of a mark one way or the other in the world, nor having grown much yourself.

The idea terrified me. I believe in an immortal soul that is eventually going to achieve union with Godhead, so death, at least day to day when it's far away, doesn't seem so terrifying. But stagnation does. To live and die with no meaning, nothing to show for your life beyond basic survival and comfort, is frightening to me. Perhaps especially so, since it seems so likely, since it happens to so many. I was terrified, but had no concrete plan for how to avoid it, just the desire to do so.

And I am now... 33, 34? Deeply into the middle of my life. I have goals, big things that I'd like to be accomplishing, but so do many people. How much action am I actually taking to achieve them? I see now, I understand how easy it is to fall into complacency. If you don't make hard choices and take hard actions, if you just let things drift as they may, then I can see how you can end up drifting into that standard, ultimately low-meaning lifestyle. Like flotsam from a river drifting into stagnant pools where they get stuck, slowly swirling around, never getting further downstream.

I often use my death as a perspective-giving tool: I look at my current life, imagining I'm spectating it from my deathbed, at the end of the inevitable results of my current actions. It's a good barometer for my actions. If doing that makes me feel uncomfortable, then I know I need to change things. If I feel satisfied from my deathbed, then I know I'm on the right track.

Because I'm regular about checking in on myself like that, it's hard to drift too far off course. Yet, it's still easy to slowly drift. Even when my goals are clear, I can find myself shying away from the harder work, the sacrifices of time and energy and self that will lead to a more fulfilling life, to a satisfied deathbed. Why? Right now, I feel like the biggest reason is lack of energy. It's hard to push out of the comfort zone, when your tired. And yet, energy is somewhat subjective. You can feel exhausted working on a boring task, and then as soon as it's time to play, become energized to keep playing till late into the night. Goals and visions are activated, or activate you, when they are given juice, made real for you, imminent. This can happen many ways. But the ways I can think of all involve getting your emotions into play. Your goal or vision must light you up, inspire you. Or you must visualize it in a way that activates your emotions.

I've learned how to do this but fallen out of practice. I think I need to climb back up into practice. At different points in my life I would take some time every day to connect with my goals and visions, and it was very helpful in directing and motivating my actions. But I've been busy and tired and the change of just about everything has disrupted my routines that were so helpful in keeping me linked to these practices. And my earlier work time coupled with waking up later means I have less time for these practices (at least if I want to do them in the morning, which is what my habit is).

It feels kind of pernicious, the workaday structure that leaves you without any time or energy to reflect and think about the bigger picture, to connect to your vision. But perhaps it's unfair to blame someone or something else. If you want something bad enough, you make time for it. You rarely really 'don't have enough time,' you just have chosen to do other things with your time.

Anyhoo, I'm going to go journal and pray or meditate or whatever seems useful to reconnect with my vision and goals now, and set up some index cards by my shrine so I can remind myself of them in the morning.

May all those that wish it, find and be connected to the goals and values that matter most to you, and take dynamic action towards them.

Warmth and encouragement towards living a life you feel good about,

Isaac