Don’t vacillate

Enthusiasm develops with interest and interest develops through investigation.

Image by Will Simpson

The whole project of life drives one to become more and more steady and confident. Vacillating is counter to this. Not that we won’t be faced with changes in our environment, in our goals. But let’s be bayesian about it and not wishy-washy, vacillating from enthusiasm to caution, from commitment to a laissez-faire attitude. 

This ties in nicely with yesterday’s all-in post.

Hope you have an awesome day!

Credits — The 59 Lojong Slogans - Atisha's mind-training techniques. Commentary by Judy Lief Tricycle Magazine 2010

This journal is meant as a reminder to encourage my future self. Where I work on my mental fitness and ‘adulting’. A reminder to him to operate in the world with love and compassion and some tips put together in a moment of clarity to help him when he is less clear and caught up in stuff the he can’t control.  Continue the conversation anytime: will@kestrelcreek.com.

All in

'All in’ in a gambling notion usually. But here I’m using it as a way to signify a level of commitment or engagement. As with many things in life, there is a spectrum of commitment and engagement we can have with regards to various life modes. This spectrum runs from ignoring to this what I’m calling ‘all in’. 

Often we misinterpret our level of ‘all in-ness’. We think we are a compassionate person but we have little compassion for our those we don’t like, our enemies. We find the mindless distraction of you-tube more compelling then working on our wisdom and virtue. We nest in a cozy cocoon of distractions rather than simply stepping up and starting to doing the work of being a human. 

Look closely and be honest - am I 'all in' or just partially? Or do I have my head in the sand? What can I do to move from head in sand to partial engagement? What can I do to move from partial engagement to 'all in’?

Practice developing a mature commitment to involvement

Hope you have an awesome day!

Credits — The 59 Lojong Slogans - Atisha's mind-training techniques. Commentary by Judy Lief Tricycle Magazine 2010

This journal is meant as a reminder to encourage my future self. Where I work on my mental fitness and ‘adulting’. A reminder to him to operate in the world with love and compassion and some tips put together in a moment of clarity to help him when he is less clear and caught up in stuff the he can’t control.  Continue the conversation anytime: will@kestrelcreek.com.

Lojong Slogan 51

As part of my "Monk Mornings”,  a morning ritual of focus and reflection, I’ve been studying Tibetan Lojong Practice or Mind Training. This consists of 59 slogans and today I focused on number 51.

Image by Will Simpson

“Practice the main points”

These main points are:

1. Take on the attitude of benefiting others more than yourself. Start by noticing how many thoughts occur to you that are about your concerns and how many thoughts arise that are about others let alone about benefiting others.

2. Practice is more important than study. Book learning only takes you so far. It is like learning to ride a bicycle. Training wheels help you learn balance but eventually you have to take them off to become fluent. Without the learning you’d never get of the ground but, keeping with the same metaphor, it is the practice of flying that gives life.

3. Of all the practices you can do, Loving-Kindness is the most important. This is not an add-on but the richness of a life in relationship. To much focus on self-improvement can make you more self-centered. This is the antidote.

Hope you have an awesome day!

Credits — The 59 Lojong Slogans - Atisha's mind-training techniques. Commentary by Judy Lief Tricycle Magazine 2010

This journal is meant as a reminder to encourage my future self. Where I work on my mental fitness and ‘adulting’. A reminder to him to operate in the world with love and compassion and some tips put together in a moment of clarity to help him when he is less clear and caught up in stuff the he can’t control.  Continue the conversation anytime: will@kestrelcreek.com.

A small thing, repeated, is no small thing

Habits are easiest formed when they are explicit, trackable and tied to trigger and reward. To intentionally form a habit, just follow this formula. Be Bayesian about habits. Don’t be rigid. 

Hope you have an awesome day!

“If I read as many books as most men do, I would be as dull-witted as they are.”

—  Thomas Hobbes

This journal is meant as a reminder to encourage my future self. Where I work on my mental fitness and ‘adulting’. A reminder to him to operate in the world with love and compassion and some tips put together in a moment of clarity to help him when he is less clear and caught up in stuff the he can’t control.  Continue the conversation anytime: will@kestrelcreek.com.

A few thoughts on thinking

Thinking, materially only appears in the mind. No mind, no thinking. Change thinking, change mind.
Thinking is valid only to the degree that it reflects or correlates with what is outside mind.
Thinking that does not reflect this validity is called a delusion.

Image by Will Simpson

Feelings are but non verbal thinking. Feelings, together with thinking only appear in the mind.
Thinking and feeling play such an large outmoded role in our lives because they happen constantly.

Meditation helps breakup this constant flow of thinking and feeling, in a sense training us out of the multitasking mode of thinking and feeling while doing everything else. Meditation asks us to drop all delusions but the instructions of how to of this can be a bit nebulous and hard to follow. 

Don’t know. Be uncertain. Try. Try. Try.

Hope you have an awesome day!

Credits — Sam Harris

Credits — The 59 Lojong Slogans - Atisha's mind-training techniques. Commentary by Judy Lief Tricycle Magazine 2010

This journal is meant as a reminder to encourage my future self. Where I work on my mental fitness and ‘adulting’. A reminder to him to operate in the world with love and compassion and some tips put together in a moment of clarity to help him when he is less clear and caught up in stuff the he can’t control.  Continue the conversation anytime: will@kestrelcreek.com.

Communication

Communication isn’t only about finding the right words. It’s about finding the right reason to say them.
And that reason is LOVE and the desire to connect.

Image by Will Simpson

Life is sneaky. You are trying to become a better person by reading inspirational books and you are meditating regularly, You feel progress on the cushion then suddenly, you loose that special, no longer make stocking hat your sweetie bought for you and the world falls apart. 

Letting thoughts run the show so to speak. Arguing about this and that, there is crying, body tension, speaking loudly with foreign insistence, let frustration creep in, saying ill considered things for ill considered reasons. 

A recipe for terror. 

What is the antidote? Not sure. 

A seemingly tangential insight she pointed out was that communication in my family as I grew up was poorly modeled. Poor only begins to describe it. Non existent is more like it. The same goes for love. I remember not a single conversation or display of love with my family growing up. I can’t let this continue to influence the present. Stepping up communication skills will help, can’t hurt, and might be the antidote.

Hope you have an awesome day!

Credits — Sam Harris
Credits — The 59 Lojong Slogans - Atisha's mind-training techniques. Commentary by Judy Lief Tricycle Magazine 2010

This journal is meant as a reminder to encourage my future self. Where I work on my mental fitness and ‘adulting’. A reminder to him to operate in the world with love and compassion and some tips put together in a moment of clarity to help him when he is less clear and caught up in stuff the he can’t control.  Continue the conversation anytime: will@kestrelcreek.com.

This might not work

Your failures are simply data points that can help lead you to the right answer.

Image by Will Simpson

If I make an assertion, I might be wrong. 
If I take action, I might fail.

In being wrong or failing can I learn? There is no blame. How I react is up to me.

Hope you have an awesome day!

Credits — Seth Godin

This journal is meant as a reminder to encourage my future self. Where I work on my mental fitness and ‘adulting’. A reminder to him to operate in the world with love and compassion and some tips put together in a moment of clarity to help him when he is less clear and caught up in stuff the he can’t control.  Continue the conversation anytime: will@kestrelcreek.com.