Core beliefs

Principles originate in beliefs so I shohave experiencedseit would be insufficientmyenuld do my best to outline those:

• The universe is infinite and my mind is finite. Therefore any attempt on my part to grasp reality/truth will be incomplete as I cannot fully comprehend the totality of existence. The same would apply to my belief in G-d
• My ability to perceive reality is limited. Even if I could understand all that I have experienced, it would be insufficient to grasp reality as it truly is, because I can only perceive through my limited five senses (and what I can test indirectly). While I might be able to create generalizations (theories) about how things work, they won’t reflect what is actually happening. Again, even if I could take in all that I encounter perfectly, I am constrained by both my ability to remember it, and more importantly, recall it later. I'd then have to merge it all simultaneously.
• Empiricism (science) has its limits -  we can only measure what we can manipulate. As we gain control of smaller and smaller particles we can get more and more granularity about the essence of matter and how particles interact, but eventually we will hit limits. The same goes at the opposite end of measurement, there are many things too large or too far away to experience/experiment with. I have no opinion on whether matter exists in continuous waves or particles, I just know that within my lifetime there is too much to grasp, and so much we won't figure out, that I know it is pointless to set such a lofty  as a goal.
• Time is limited, but I do have at least the present moment. I will die, but I am still living now. The main takeaway here is that I have a brief amount of time to experience things. I also I don’t have a way to not act/believe/participate. While I may frame my decisions as what I am not doing, I am still doing something.
• Others experience a similar reality as my own. While solipsism is the most logical course of action, my 6^th sense, my intuition tells me this is wrong. It simply doesn’t feel right. I have no logical basis for this. However, In the same way I cannot perfectly understand reality, I also do have faith that I perceive parts of it and I act with the faith that this is what works. I believe it with the same cautious reflective and skeptical understanding that I apply to reality. More generally, I feel that others also have hopes & dreams, experience sadness, want to be loved, get angry when they feel they have been wronged, display compassion to those in need, have a sense of awe and wonder when they see something beautiful and have anxiety about the future. All of these things can change in magnitude, but a large majority of people do share a basic humanity.   

These three facts lead me to several conclusions:

• Doubt is necessary. If I cannot understand, if I cannot perceive, and I cannot remember correctly, all I can do is hope.  
• Highly probable” is a best case scenario. Both because reality involves randomness and because I cannot grasp it fully. 
• I shouldn’t trouble myself too much with my own inability to understand things. I am human and this is the human condition.

These three views influence how I take information from others. I can happily listen, evaluate, process and take in whatever observations, feelings, and views they wish to share. However in the face of our limited powers of perception and competing claims of understanding, I exercise thoughtful consideration. I sift through this collection of human thought and belief and weigh the claims against my own reality. What has worked, what feels true, what makes me feel tied to the world. To the extent that I value and affirm the consciousness and experience of others I should also seek to make their lives as easy as possible. I should seek to end unnecessary suffering (both theirs and mine). 

To be continued...

Self Direction

“Success is getting what you want. Happiness is liking what you get.”

- H. Jackson Brown, Jr.

I have made two major mistakes in the past few years. I haven’t really been honest about the things I want, and how my dreams and goals are different from the prototypical suburban American. I have been successful by other people’s standards, but not my own.

The quote below summarizes this problem well:

“Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma -- which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of other's opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”
-Steve Jobs

I need to spend time defining two key areas of my life:

·    What do I truly enjoy doing – what things bring me joy and what are some common themes

·    What are my most basic core principles, and do I live according to them.

The first will be rather easy. I simply need to reflect on the past few years and codify my best experiences. Recognition was the hard part here. Continuing to pursue them in the face of a rather conservative state might be modestly difficult, but that has never really been too much of a problem.

The second part will be much more challenging. It will require work and thought and time. Perhaps that is why I have been avoiding doing it. Perhaps I have been afraid to. I know I have been lazy. The following two quotes from Kant highlight this trouble with unshakling the mind:

“Laziness and cowardice are the reasons why so great a portion of mankind, after nature has long since discharged them from external direction, nevertheless remains under lifelong immaturity, and why it is so easy for others to set themselves up as their guardians. It is so easy not to be of age. If I have a book which understands for me, a pastor who has a conscience for me, a physician who decides my diet, and so forth, I need not trouble myself. I need not think, if I can only pay - others will easily undertake the irksome work for me. That the step to competence is held to be very dangerous by the far greater portion of mankind...”

“Enlightenment is man's release from his self-incurred immaturity. Immaturity is man's inability to make use of his understanding without direction from another. This immaturity is self-imposed when its cause lies not in lack of reason but in lack of resolution and courage to use it without direction from another. Sapere aude! "Have courage to use your own reason!”

There are also dangers of living without clear principles, the biggest is aimlessness and hypocrisy:

“Sometimes we forge our own principles and sometimes we accept others’ principles, or holistic packages of principles, such as religion and legal systems. While it isn’t necessarily a bad thing to use others’ principles—it’s difficult to come up with your own, and often much wisdom has gone into those already created—adopting pre-packaged principles without much thought exposes you to the risk of inconsistency with your true values. Holding incompatible principles can lead to conflict between values and actions—like the hypocrite who has claims to be of a religion yet behaves counter to its teachings. Your principles need to reflect values you really believe in”

-Ray Dalio, Principles

My lack of time spent on core principles is also probably the main culprit for my sense of restlessness. I will plan a weekend away to focus on this and just to write and reflect. I must return to the wilderness.     

_____________________

Reflections on my own life experiences related to the points above:

I feel like I have done things backwards. I have focused on the end goal (wife, family, financial stability) without outlining what type of person I want to be.

I remember the feeling of "what next?" after I left Bridgewater in 2009. I had a great start to my career, had just gone on a 12,000 mile cross country road trip, bought had house, finished my college education with a reasonably respectable degree, own my car, had money in the bank, and was dating a girl I expected to marry at the time. I felt as though I had checked off most of what I wanted to do and was left at a loss. Call it my quarter-life crisis. From there I got a bit creative and slowly checked off a few more things from my bucket list – float down the river for a few days, bike to Charleston, run a marathon, go skydiving. Though none of these were particularly difficult or emotionally/spiritually challenging.  

There was a while where I lived the life I wanted & had a very clear sense of purpose. I worked intently on my home, the community garden, my neighborhood, pushed for local political change, worked diligently towards my personal development, my physical health and had richer relationships with my friends and family because I had the time to spend with them and reflect on where I was weak. I found new hobbies and devoted my time to interesting projects. I felt more free than I ever have. However, others seemed to criticize me or at least look at me disapprovingly for not being on the straight and narrow. Few were able to share in the joy of my uncommon situation. I let this shape my choices and my current situation is the result.

Since grad school, I have, for the most part, spent the past two years doing all the things I needed to do to advance my career and have forgotten to save time for the things that I enjoy. I left my hobbies: I quit watching film, I quit traveling. Generally, I quit being weird. Lately, I have noticed that even my circle of friends has begun to dwindle. While a lot of this is because of life circumstances (marriage, new jobs, kids, graduation, ect) I think part of it is my fault – I haven’t been living a very interesting and rich life and bringing in new minds and faces into my inner circle.

About two weeks ago I made a few concrete steps toward remedying this situation. I found a running group, a weekly cycling ride and a pickup game for ultimate Frisbee. I called a bunch of old friends to schedule dinner and reconnect. These social outlets are important and make me feel alive. This things are fun, but I would also probably benefit from more focused cultivation of my activities – plan regular adventures, continue to reach out to friends (don’t wait for them to reach out), be more courageous about attending events I am interested in even if I can’t find people who want to go. Be more honest with myself about the things I enjoy even if others may find them odd (couchsurfing, visiting new spiritual communities, estate sales, ect).

Slow Learner

“Unrest of spirit is a mark of life.”

           -- Karl Menninger

Recently one of my coworkers commented that I had been carrying around a book on Zen for too long not to have finished it by now. It made me realize how dense the content is. How I can read a page or two, and then spend weeks digesting the content. Almost like a cow chewing cud, I may have to process the same material several times before it becomes integrated into my life. It’s taken me over a year to make it through the first chapter on the importance of clean, open space -- on the importance of getting rid of unnecessary possessions and clutter. Sometimes friends will unknowingly tell me the same lesson and set me back on a course towards the forgotten goal. It’s a slow process. It’s like trying to run through mud.

Another area I have been focused on is how certain sensations can derail my mood for a day. I do not mean easily identifiable mental feelings like anger or jealously. I mean something nebulous and more physical. Drinking too much coffee is a way to generate something similar to what I am talking about – it creates a churning in the stomach, jitteriness and anxiety, and an overall sense of uneasiness. Often I will not know the origin of these sensations but they certainly effect my mood. In a desire to not ignore my feelings, I tend to think of what could have caused these things, using the sensation as signals that something may be awry and emotionally unaddressed.

Knowing that others have probably thought about this issue, I reached out to one of my Buddhist mentors who offered the simple advice that things just are, and that there isn’t a way that they should be. We had a short phone call that lasted less than 10 minutes. This would be another slowly digested nugget.  

 I often buy into the idea that if I am mindful, kind and meet all my basic biological needs (sleep, food, shelter, mental rest) that I will be content. This obviously isn’t the case. Sometimes I will have weird feelings and sensations. It’s no different than experiencing physical pain. It just is. Things will go wrong.

Accepting the reality of my situation, while obvious, wasn’t something I’d considered. My goal was to change it to something else. I WANTED to feel good. As with most lessons in Buddhism, problems tend to arise when attachments form – when I say that things “should” be a certain way. This was no exception.

The past week has been interesting as I notice these feelings and then my immediate desire to label them as bad. From there I see how I start plotting how I can change them. It will take a while to just accept them for what they are -- passing sensations.