I’ve scarce felt more thankful than I do now; with each breath my heart swells with a sense of deep gratitude. But for what, and for what reason? The world outside moves in strange ways right now, sometimes hopeful but more often violent and tragic. Within, my mind this year decides to act out with unrelenting frequency, in tantrums equally violent, such that for much of the year I have steered well clear of blogging and social media for fear that I might inadvertently renege on my commitment to positive posting.
On the subject of the webosphere, this is not to mean that everything has to be wine and roses all the time, but I have found myself adopting an attitude of judiciousness about blogs, tweets, and other such posts: to be aware of when I’m, say, recounting a difficult but truthful story about a challenging aspect of my life, as opposed to when I’m just airing my dirty laundry; to know the difference, and, to quote the old templar: to choose wisely. But, returning to the point, neither circumstances within nor those without are things I can point to to explain this immense sense of fullness and gratitude I feel throughout. This is what befuddles me as summer turns to fall.
On the subject of the webosphere, this is not to mean that everything has to be wine and roses all the time, but I have found myself adopting an attitude of judiciousness about blogs, tweets, and other such posts: to be aware of when I’m, say, recounting a difficult but truthful story about a challenging aspect of my life, as opposed to when I’m just airing my dirty laundry; to know the difference, and, to quote the old templar: to choose wisely. But, returning to the point, neither circumstances within nor those without are things I can point to to explain this immense sense of fullness and gratitude I feel throughout. This is what befuddles me as summer turns to fall.
In a seemingly unrelated occurrence, a thing I have identified as a “culture of doing” seems to have snuck its way into my pantheon of empowered habits, which, by the way, are those things I aspire to be every moment of every day, but am happy if I manage even ten seconds a week of being even but one of them. It’s not that I wasn’t getting stuff done before. But getting stuff done and doing things, I’m finding, are a little different. Past years I was often so busy getting stuff done, you know, stuff that “mattered” and was “important” etc., that I wasn’t doing the actual things the time for which the getting stuff done was supposed to free up. So the switch was nice—I’ll talk more on it later—and I highly recommend it to anyone. In fact, I can recommend a wonderful TED Talk on the subject, which I’ll link to here:
But seriously...
I used to run with yoga circles a bunch (more on that another time, although given the aforesaid commitment to positive posting, I might skip the subject altogether) and there was a lot of knocking the idea of doing. “No, bra (I’m taking liberties, but not really) life is about, y’know, be-ing-ness. All these ants just doing doing doing, just decadent capitalist western society, that’s not reality! You just gotta be!” (At this point I’ve conflated a few different personalities, but hopefully you get the general idea.) Now, in response, I believe it was Francis Albert “Frank” Sinatra who said it best, during his now famous recitation of Zen philosophy: do be do be do. That is, a subtle back and forth between two states, not so much balance or moderation as many of your hip-yo types would have you feel guilty for constantly failing to achieve, as a dynamic equilibrium. Moving between states of doing and states of being, sometimes intensely so. Incidentally, for the record, I do still practice asana and all them other limbs because yoga is awesome; I just gave up running with the circles, because, well... you know?
Back to doing. Actually this segues nicely into another thing I’ve been wanting to share for a while, which is: exactly what the hell have I been up to for the past nine months? Or so you ask, as well you may. As I said earlier, I am feeling, inexplicably perhaps, a sense of great fullness; I’m honestly super excited to talk news so I’ll do my best not to gush. The year so far has been defined by two initiatives, and those two initiatives have been: John Oliver, and the US Women’s National Soccer Team. I’m kidding; obviously I had little to nothing to do with the success of either this year, though they've both been handy, entertaining, and in one case, inspiring friends to have around this year.
Truthfully though there’s plenty to tell, with new developments and possibly a spoiler or two, though as the hour draws late I’m sensing this part at least has reached its natural cadence. I hope you’ll join me next time for Part 2, when I’ll look forward to diving in together. See you then!
In the meantime:
I used to run with yoga circles a bunch (more on that another time, although given the aforesaid commitment to positive posting, I might skip the subject altogether) and there was a lot of knocking the idea of doing. “No, bra (I’m taking liberties, but not really) life is about, y’know, be-ing-ness. All these ants just doing doing doing, just decadent capitalist western society, that’s not reality! You just gotta be!” (At this point I’ve conflated a few different personalities, but hopefully you get the general idea.) Now, in response, I believe it was Francis Albert “Frank” Sinatra who said it best, during his now famous recitation of Zen philosophy: do be do be do. That is, a subtle back and forth between two states, not so much balance or moderation as many of your hip-yo types would have you feel guilty for constantly failing to achieve, as a dynamic equilibrium. Moving between states of doing and states of being, sometimes intensely so. Incidentally, for the record, I do still practice asana and all them other limbs because yoga is awesome; I just gave up running with the circles, because, well... you know?
Back to doing. Actually this segues nicely into another thing I’ve been wanting to share for a while, which is: exactly what the hell have I been up to for the past nine months? Or so you ask, as well you may. As I said earlier, I am feeling, inexplicably perhaps, a sense of great fullness; I’m honestly super excited to talk news so I’ll do my best not to gush. The year so far has been defined by two initiatives, and those two initiatives have been: John Oliver, and the US Women’s National Soccer Team. I’m kidding; obviously I had little to nothing to do with the success of either this year, though they've both been handy, entertaining, and in one case, inspiring friends to have around this year.
Truthfully though there’s plenty to tell, with new developments and possibly a spoiler or two, though as the hour draws late I’m sensing this part at least has reached its natural cadence. I hope you’ll join me next time for Part 2, when I’ll look forward to diving in together. See you then!
In the meantime:
Tagged: #bluedorian #AFO #faerworld #daughtersoftime #uswnt #ibelievethatwewillwin #shebelieves #johnoliver #lastweektonight #greatgatsbycorgi #indianajones #lastcrusade #DoIt
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