I don't want this blog to be about me rambling on and going down the same mental pathways I've been down before that didn't produce anything miraculous. I want this to be about forging new mental pathways. Forging a way out of the predicaments of where I am. I think some of that last post was really good, but then look at that last little bit, I went down a trail that I've been down before and didn't produce any new commentary or insight on it. I just rehashed one of the common thoughts in my head. That's not thinking on my toes enough. I want this to be about being on my toes.
I reduced my hours at the walker because of inauthenticity. Or so I think, at least. Maybe there's some better explanation of psychologically why I did that. But what, am I just going to quit everything inauthentic? What work am I going to do then? How am I going to put food in my mouth? What's my principle here? So there's the question, as well formulated as my brain has formulated it thus far. So do I answer it by answering the question, or by disagreeing with one of its assumptions, or by just ignoring it and going on with my life? Will this come back to nag me again?
Well, okay, let's take this day-by-day. Today left me feeling like it wasn't my best day. I feel a little gross about how I spent my time today. What am I going to do tomorrow? How is tomorrow going to be better? Probably more watching. Meaning, watching myself as I approach crossroads. Not walking down any of the prongs of the fork but just standing there at the crossroads and watching myself. More meditation, probably, though that always has the fear that I'm going to forget about or ignore my health and material security. What is the resolution to this? Well, I'm going to try to have an excellent day tomorrow and see how that goes and what I learn from that. I'm going to try to have an excellent day tomorrow. I'm going to stay close to the state of not doing anything. So that I don't do anything impulsive. It's okay to do stuff, just be very very patient about doing it. Wait like, a long time and then see if you still want to do it. You'll end up not doing most of the things you would have done otherwise. and the things you do do, you'll do more efficiently. You'll cut the bullshit parts of it. The distractions and rabbit holes of uselessness you normally go down in the process of doing something, for me, something like play or practice piano, or research health. Today I spent time doing things that are totally uninteresting to me ultimately. So I'm going to default to doing nothing tomorrow and see if I have a good day.
Monday, September 30, 2019
This blog is about figuring out the best way forward.
What am I struggling to figure out today?
These two problems have been on my mind, one is my material security and the other is my health.
This blog is (partly) for the purpose of birthing forth the perspective that remains hidden under all the other thoughts and concerns that otherwise occupy my attention-time. It's about the absolute cream of the cream of the cream of my thoughts. I love this line from some Buddhist vow, it's something like "Just as a bolt of lightning on a stormy night for a moment illuminates everything, so a wise thought rarely and briefly appears." It's such a striking way to open a vow, and a striking metaphor anyway, because that experience is so amazing when it happens. Especially when you really get a bright lightning bolt, those rare occasions, and you're looking out over some outdoor place, and all you can see is the silhouette of the trees because it's so dark, then suddenly and for almost no time, everything is illuminated as if it were day, you see the green of the grass, the green of the trees, the browns and all the colors, as if it were a bright and sunny day. And then it goes away. It's surreal. It's impossible. It's like you're being shown something that doesn't exist, like it's been imported from a distant time, except that it's real and you see it with your own eyes. If you've had the experience, you know how exciting it is.
Anyway, the metaphor implies that our normal perspective as we go about life stands in stark contrast to some other, much better perspective that only shows itself rarely and briefly, and is impossible to intentionally invoke, you just have to wait and watch. So what is that much better perspective? It's like all the thoughts I normally have rest on a certain set of assumptions, so I'm busily going about using my attention to solve problems that depend on those assumptions, but all the while the assumptions are wrong or at least not necessary and there are things I could change that would open up whole other avenues and change the meaning of things and make new approaches possible.
What is this other perspective? What is the lightning bolt that cuts through everything I'm doing and puts all my concerns into perspective?
It's good to optimize your health. It's good to find out if you're at elevated risk of cardiovascular disease and then try not to get atherosclerosis. It's good to figure out a diet that leaves your unique physiological systems in the best shape. It's good to exercise, it feels good goddamnit, unless you're doing cardio is a place with lots of air pollution, but goddamnit it feels good to exercise and to have been exercising recently. Well, could I approach the issue any better? I don't know. Maybe. Probably. I bet. Well, I'm still waiting for my test results to come in. That will probably change things, because then I'll have something actionable.
I don't have an opinion. I can only look at the situation and hold it in my attention. Maybe an answer will become obvious. Maybe what the problem is will become obvious. I don't have anything to gain from thinking about it, because I don't know what thought to think about it. I can only look at it. Just keep looking at it. Absorbing it. Taking it in. Maybe then I'll be able to approach it better. I mean, there is good information out there, and it's really worth doing. I mean, what's more wholesome than that? I'm trying to care about my long-term health. I think that's something that some deep, deep, truly deep part of me will actually be happy about. And thank myself for. If I do it right.
By the way, after that last post, I reduced my hours at the walker by over a third. It felt good, but also that's a hole in my income. So...it opens up a whole box about income, how dependent I am on income, and how I have to wrestle with the idea that there may be no way immediately for me to be 100% authentic and pay rent. Or like, just the fact that work is extrinsic. Like, is it wrong to do something just because you're getting paid to do it? What if I attempted to be totally real with my piano students? Well, think about this, would I be teaching piano if money were no object? Well, the answer is, sure, a little bit, like I sometimes teach my brother things about music and piano just in a social setting and I'm not getting paid for it, and sure, I love music and piano and I want to share the ability to play music, I love talking about it and enabling people and revealing the secrets of music et cetera, but what I really want to say to my students is "Why do you think that you playing piano is going to be such a good thing for you and for the world that it's the most important thing for both of us to be doing with all this time? Do you know how difficult and rare it is to have a musical practice that's in the same ballpark of being as spiritually nourishing and important as some of the other things we could both be doing, like meditating? Do you think you're up to the task of making this as personal of a venture as it needs to be for it to be worth our time? You know you're going to have to meditate too, since I don't know how else to make this work? Because if so, then I will actually devote an hour a week to you and anyone else who's up for it to working on making music make the world deeply healed with you here in this space, I'd be willing to devote that much time to this. But you've got to be as all-in as I am." See, I'd be willing to have a high time-commitment relationship with a student or many students if money were no object, if it were sufficiently open. Okay so what I'm saying is, it would be harder to find students I'd be willing to teach. if I were totally authentic. And I need hours. That's the problem. I wouldn't have enough hours. But maybe that's just narrow thinking, I mean who knows who would be interested in this if I inserted myself in the market in the right way? Like on the web or something? I don't know, who knows. But I can't like, start being authentic tomorrow because I'd be risking losing my students (if they find out they/re not interested in what I really want to teach) and I really couldn't even stand in the walker art center at all. Maybe I could have more faith that the market is there for what I really want to teach and it's just more of a long-term goal. I need to figure out how to reach the people interested in me though. Maybe that's online. Or maybe I need to get more involved playing and attending shows in the actual music scene, though again that only moves me toward anywhere fun if I'm totally authentic about it, and maybe the fact that I'm not playing and attending more shows already indicates that it's not authentic for me to do so. Hm. Well, I'll think about that.
What am I struggling to figure out today?
These two problems have been on my mind, one is my material security and the other is my health.
This blog is (partly) for the purpose of birthing forth the perspective that remains hidden under all the other thoughts and concerns that otherwise occupy my attention-time. It's about the absolute cream of the cream of the cream of my thoughts. I love this line from some Buddhist vow, it's something like "Just as a bolt of lightning on a stormy night for a moment illuminates everything, so a wise thought rarely and briefly appears." It's such a striking way to open a vow, and a striking metaphor anyway, because that experience is so amazing when it happens. Especially when you really get a bright lightning bolt, those rare occasions, and you're looking out over some outdoor place, and all you can see is the silhouette of the trees because it's so dark, then suddenly and for almost no time, everything is illuminated as if it were day, you see the green of the grass, the green of the trees, the browns and all the colors, as if it were a bright and sunny day. And then it goes away. It's surreal. It's impossible. It's like you're being shown something that doesn't exist, like it's been imported from a distant time, except that it's real and you see it with your own eyes. If you've had the experience, you know how exciting it is.
Anyway, the metaphor implies that our normal perspective as we go about life stands in stark contrast to some other, much better perspective that only shows itself rarely and briefly, and is impossible to intentionally invoke, you just have to wait and watch. So what is that much better perspective? It's like all the thoughts I normally have rest on a certain set of assumptions, so I'm busily going about using my attention to solve problems that depend on those assumptions, but all the while the assumptions are wrong or at least not necessary and there are things I could change that would open up whole other avenues and change the meaning of things and make new approaches possible.
What is this other perspective? What is the lightning bolt that cuts through everything I'm doing and puts all my concerns into perspective?
It's good to optimize your health. It's good to find out if you're at elevated risk of cardiovascular disease and then try not to get atherosclerosis. It's good to figure out a diet that leaves your unique physiological systems in the best shape. It's good to exercise, it feels good goddamnit, unless you're doing cardio is a place with lots of air pollution, but goddamnit it feels good to exercise and to have been exercising recently. Well, could I approach the issue any better? I don't know. Maybe. Probably. I bet. Well, I'm still waiting for my test results to come in. That will probably change things, because then I'll have something actionable.
I don't have an opinion. I can only look at the situation and hold it in my attention. Maybe an answer will become obvious. Maybe what the problem is will become obvious. I don't have anything to gain from thinking about it, because I don't know what thought to think about it. I can only look at it. Just keep looking at it. Absorbing it. Taking it in. Maybe then I'll be able to approach it better. I mean, there is good information out there, and it's really worth doing. I mean, what's more wholesome than that? I'm trying to care about my long-term health. I think that's something that some deep, deep, truly deep part of me will actually be happy about. And thank myself for. If I do it right.
By the way, after that last post, I reduced my hours at the walker by over a third. It felt good, but also that's a hole in my income. So...it opens up a whole box about income, how dependent I am on income, and how I have to wrestle with the idea that there may be no way immediately for me to be 100% authentic and pay rent. Or like, just the fact that work is extrinsic. Like, is it wrong to do something just because you're getting paid to do it? What if I attempted to be totally real with my piano students? Well, think about this, would I be teaching piano if money were no object? Well, the answer is, sure, a little bit, like I sometimes teach my brother things about music and piano just in a social setting and I'm not getting paid for it, and sure, I love music and piano and I want to share the ability to play music, I love talking about it and enabling people and revealing the secrets of music et cetera, but what I really want to say to my students is "Why do you think that you playing piano is going to be such a good thing for you and for the world that it's the most important thing for both of us to be doing with all this time? Do you know how difficult and rare it is to have a musical practice that's in the same ballpark of being as spiritually nourishing and important as some of the other things we could both be doing, like meditating? Do you think you're up to the task of making this as personal of a venture as it needs to be for it to be worth our time? You know you're going to have to meditate too, since I don't know how else to make this work? Because if so, then I will actually devote an hour a week to you and anyone else who's up for it to working on making music make the world deeply healed with you here in this space, I'd be willing to devote that much time to this. But you've got to be as all-in as I am." See, I'd be willing to have a high time-commitment relationship with a student or many students if money were no object, if it were sufficiently open. Okay so what I'm saying is, it would be harder to find students I'd be willing to teach. if I were totally authentic. And I need hours. That's the problem. I wouldn't have enough hours. But maybe that's just narrow thinking, I mean who knows who would be interested in this if I inserted myself in the market in the right way? Like on the web or something? I don't know, who knows. But I can't like, start being authentic tomorrow because I'd be risking losing my students (if they find out they/re not interested in what I really want to teach) and I really couldn't even stand in the walker art center at all. Maybe I could have more faith that the market is there for what I really want to teach and it's just more of a long-term goal. I need to figure out how to reach the people interested in me though. Maybe that's online. Or maybe I need to get more involved playing and attending shows in the actual music scene, though again that only moves me toward anywhere fun if I'm totally authentic about it, and maybe the fact that I'm not playing and attending more shows already indicates that it's not authentic for me to do so. Hm. Well, I'll think about that.
Thursday, September 26, 2019
How was my day, you ask?
I suppose this blog is about non-rhetorical questions. I'm actually asking you, the reader, stuff. This blog is for what I don't know the answer to and want to know the answer to. I want you to send me what you think the answers are.
I'm researching heart disease. I don't want to die of heart disease, that's why. My dad died of an LAD heart attack when he was 49. He was slim, active, didn't eat excess sugar or processed food, non-smoker, and not high enough LDL-C to be put on medication, at least by up to 2003's standards. My mom said he had borderline high blood pressure but wasn't on medication for it. So why did he die when he was forty-freaking-nine? His dad and his brother also died of heart attacks. Am I screwed? The only thing that signaled he might have a problem was slightly elevated blood pressure. Everything else said "A-okay." I am slim, active, don't eat excess sugar or processed food, don't smoke, and don't have high enough LDL-C to demand medication. And yet none of that consoles me because that's what my dad was and, like I said, forty-nine. I'm doing well blood-pressure-wise, 112/64 at last test. Though that usually rises with age. Tom Dayspring sort of implied once that high blood pressure means you're probably insulin resistant. Ivor Cummins had a slide in a presentation that said there were people who had visceral fat (a component of metabolic syndrome, which is related to insulin resistance) without "subcutaneous fat" (fat on the outside of your abdominal wall, the fat we're used to seeing) so you could have metabolic syndrome and appear skinny. Maybe that was my dad. Maybe he had "normal" (by 1990s medical standards) fasting glucose but elevated post-prandial glucose and insulin which was damaging his arterial endothelium and causing atherogenic dyslipidemia (low HDL-C, high triglyceride, small LDL particle size) so his LDL-P was high but his LDL-C was still low because his particle size was small, and he had visceral fat and slightly high blood pressure and BOOM that's how you have metabolic syndrome and cardiovascular disease and still look skinny. Total speculation. I have no data on any of this. Maybe he had high Lp(a) which worries me because then I probably inherited it, but they do have those antisense drugs in the pipeline which might be expensive but might be worth it to save my life, Peter Attia thought that in five years they'd be done. I won't be able to afford them for at least five years anyway. But does high Lp(a) or high LDL-P matter if you're insulin sensitive and your endothelium is in good shape? Great question! That's why I research heart disease! I listen to podcasts and lectures and take notes. And I'm going to compare them all. So stay tuned for my Heart Disease Internet Content Literature Review. Because people don't all agree about everything. There are people out there who read tons of scientific literature and there are recordings online of some of them talking about it, and I'm going to keep listening to those recordings and trying to distill what they say, identify points of consensus, identify conflicts and specify the nature of the conflicts, then look more deeply into the conflicts and see which arguments I'm more convinced by and see what I think is genuinely unknown. I'm lucky there are people actually reading all this scientific literature and distilling it and citing it so I can just listen to them and compare what they say.
This blog is not for me to think aloud to myself. This is to communicate. I want feedback. Um...but there's no question for you in that paragraph. I just told you that I'm listening to a bunch of people who have done a lot of research about heart disease talk about it and I'm going to compile and compare all their notes.
You know, in a sense this blog may be an attempt to try to start communicating about authenticity. And the thing about it is that it is seemingly futile to try to talk in the abstract about it. So some sort of journal would help me show you on the day-to-day level the kinds of decisions I'm trying to make and, you know, I think I think about authenticity in-context a lot, so presenting my thoughts in context might help make sense of what I'm trying to say. I developed the theory in context.
Inauthenticity at the walker today:
I suppose this blog is about non-rhetorical questions. I'm actually asking you, the reader, stuff. This blog is for what I don't know the answer to and want to know the answer to. I want you to send me what you think the answers are.
I'm researching heart disease. I don't want to die of heart disease, that's why. My dad died of an LAD heart attack when he was 49. He was slim, active, didn't eat excess sugar or processed food, non-smoker, and not high enough LDL-C to be put on medication, at least by up to 2003's standards. My mom said he had borderline high blood pressure but wasn't on medication for it. So why did he die when he was forty-freaking-nine? His dad and his brother also died of heart attacks. Am I screwed? The only thing that signaled he might have a problem was slightly elevated blood pressure. Everything else said "A-okay." I am slim, active, don't eat excess sugar or processed food, don't smoke, and don't have high enough LDL-C to demand medication. And yet none of that consoles me because that's what my dad was and, like I said, forty-nine. I'm doing well blood-pressure-wise, 112/64 at last test. Though that usually rises with age. Tom Dayspring sort of implied once that high blood pressure means you're probably insulin resistant. Ivor Cummins had a slide in a presentation that said there were people who had visceral fat (a component of metabolic syndrome, which is related to insulin resistance) without "subcutaneous fat" (fat on the outside of your abdominal wall, the fat we're used to seeing) so you could have metabolic syndrome and appear skinny. Maybe that was my dad. Maybe he had "normal" (by 1990s medical standards) fasting glucose but elevated post-prandial glucose and insulin which was damaging his arterial endothelium and causing atherogenic dyslipidemia (low HDL-C, high triglyceride, small LDL particle size) so his LDL-P was high but his LDL-C was still low because his particle size was small, and he had visceral fat and slightly high blood pressure and BOOM that's how you have metabolic syndrome and cardiovascular disease and still look skinny. Total speculation. I have no data on any of this. Maybe he had high Lp(a) which worries me because then I probably inherited it, but they do have those antisense drugs in the pipeline which might be expensive but might be worth it to save my life, Peter Attia thought that in five years they'd be done. I won't be able to afford them for at least five years anyway. But does high Lp(a) or high LDL-P matter if you're insulin sensitive and your endothelium is in good shape? Great question! That's why I research heart disease! I listen to podcasts and lectures and take notes. And I'm going to compare them all. So stay tuned for my Heart Disease Internet Content Literature Review. Because people don't all agree about everything. There are people out there who read tons of scientific literature and there are recordings online of some of them talking about it, and I'm going to keep listening to those recordings and trying to distill what they say, identify points of consensus, identify conflicts and specify the nature of the conflicts, then look more deeply into the conflicts and see which arguments I'm more convinced by and see what I think is genuinely unknown. I'm lucky there are people actually reading all this scientific literature and distilling it and citing it so I can just listen to them and compare what they say.
This blog is not for me to think aloud to myself. This is to communicate. I want feedback. Um...but there's no question for you in that paragraph. I just told you that I'm listening to a bunch of people who have done a lot of research about heart disease talk about it and I'm going to compile and compare all their notes.
You know, in a sense this blog may be an attempt to try to start communicating about authenticity. And the thing about it is that it is seemingly futile to try to talk in the abstract about it. So some sort of journal would help me show you on the day-to-day level the kinds of decisions I'm trying to make and, you know, I think I think about authenticity in-context a lot, so presenting my thoughts in context might help make sense of what I'm trying to say. I developed the theory in context.
Inauthenticity at the walker today:
- I don't really care if people touch a lot of the art. If it's a bare-canvas painting or some surface that fingerprints don't come off of, then fuck you for touching it and fuck you for being so presumptuous as a person to walk into somewhere you don't own and don't know the rules and just have no caution or hesitation about starting to touch stuff. Okay--but do I really care that much about that or am I just frustrated at them because they're forcing me into a situation where I either have to confront them about it or let something slide that would absolutely be unacceptable if one of my bosses saw me letting it slide? You know, like today there was a guy leaning on a bookshelf in a gallery that's supposed to be a recreation of an office building. Do I care? No. The bookshelf was fine. I don't...care about this job. I'm not there because I want to be there. I'm there just because I need money. I don't care if people bring backpacks into the walker art center---I mean, the galleries. Or if they have a water bottle in the galleries. You know, do I want to stay there all day and just enforce these stupid rules that I don't believe in? No. Here's me at my job if I'm actually real:
- I'm in gallery 1 and someone comes in with a backpack. "Hi. Look, I'm so sick of saying this that I'm flabbergasted as to why we don't just put a fucking sign up that's big and obvious enough that people actually see it and know that they're going to get talked to if they don't do the right thing with their backpack and water bottle and admission tab et cetera, but if I let you go into gallery 2 with that backpack on both of your shoulders then I know my coworkers are going to see it and know that it's their job to take care of it but also that the gallery assistant in gallery 1 didn't take care of it so, whatever, I don't know what goes through their heads but I know for me definitely when I'm in gallery 2 and I see a backpack come through I feel annoyed with the gallery assistant in gallery 1 that they didn't take care of it before the guest got into the flow of looking at the artwork, because it's kind of like, why am I being talked to about this in gallery 2, I passed other employees and they didn't say anything, why are you saying something now? I was enjoying the art and now I feel like I'm being reprimanded by security (because a high percentage of people are insecure and easily sent into negative emotions and thoughts by even little things like this) and nobody told me the rules up front, and as the gallery assistant I feel like it's more likely to be a negative social interaction if I take care of it in gallery 2 versus gallery 1 or better yet, Bazinet lobby, and, well, if the gallery 2 guard doens't take care of it then it's going to go up to gallery 3 and I have it in my head that someone is going to get frustrated about this stupid backpack, because I sure do in those situations, since if I'm in gallery 4 let's say the chief guard walks by and there's a backpack that I'm obviously ignoring, I feel like now I did something wrong because I annoyed them and disobeyed their orders (I'd be much less incentivized to ignore a backpack if I knew the chief guard was watching, which is how I know it's wrong) and created a problem for them, not to mention the fact that I don't want to get in trouble for my own selfish reasons, so I'd guess that the other gallery assistants feel the same way, at least some of them do, and I don't want to put them into that situation, and I don't want to create a problem for the chief guard (who, depending on the gallery, might be able to see me on camera from the control center, as may Todd) so, I know this is silly, but technically if you just shift that backpack over to one shoulder instead of both, then none of this will be a problem." Notice how NONE of that had anything to do with believing that a backpack on one shoulder is less likely to damage the art. Which I don't believe. But that's why the rule is there. That's why I have to have all these social interactions with people about their backpacks. I've stood in those galleries 30 hours a week for a year and I can tell you people being fucking idiot assholes is a way bigger hazard to the art than a backpack. Even on a Free First Saturday it's not crowded enough that people are going to have such a small radius within which to turn that there's going to be a likely chance of their backpack bumping into anything it shouldn't. These galleries are spacious. A full backpack sticks off your back about eight inches. It's a stupid rule. So, when I have these repeat social interactions with people, one after the other about their backpack, I have to be fake. What I said above is real. I can't say that. Takes too long. And plus, installing a sign is the real solution. Well, I mostly can't say that because it makes the museum look stupid. (Which it is. I mean, this aspect of the security department and its coordination with visitor services is.) It makes the whole situation look stupid (which it is). Now, I don't know how to navigate a social situation if I'm being fake. Because what I've said so far is, what is authentic to say (what I said above) I can't say. Wow. Think about that. But I have to say something. See? I just don't want to be at this job anymore. (Well, whether or not there are any better options currently is another question.) Sometimes I can relax and be authentic, and I like it. But fairly often, I can't. I'm not able to just let loose and do what I want. And if money were no object, is this what I'd be doing? No. I just don't care about this. I care about displaying art, but not so much about this art that I'd be interested in guarding it all day. And the museum would have to figure shit out better before I'd want to participate with it, because right now it's kind of a their-way-or-the-highway situation and I think their way is poor.
- So, in order to get my money and not create problems for my coworkers and bosses, I have to say things that don't come from the heart. Then the patrons have to receive what I say, and since I don't know how to navigate situations with fakeness, (since the way to navigate any situation is to be real, since that way the best possible thing will happen, in fact I think that while being fake seems to work sometimes it is still always a charade that if pushed in the wrong direction will reveal worse consequences than if you'd just been honest, since the truth you don't have to create, you can push it as far as you want in any direction and there's still more truth there, but falsehood has to be created, and thus the efficacy of the charade has a small perimeter, it's like a box you've created in mid-air, and if the situation gets pushed outside that box you have to invent some more box that will accommodate the new stimulus which requires greater and greater complexity the further you push it and thus becomes less and less possible to create, so I think there is no "right way" to navigate something with fakeness because the right way to navigate anything is with truth) I inevitably create many unpleasant and regrettable encounters with these people that my heart feels are for no real purpose, yet my "Gallery Assistant" character is creating this negative social interaction that cascades through this person's mind and then through their social connections and for the rest of their life and out into the world (in undetectable and minute but, I believe, real ways) and I'm responsible for creating this?? It's a wonder how I even tolerate this job at all. I must be asleep and numb. I must not be fully conscious. There's just no way my real, awake self could stoop this low and be this wretched. I don't believe in this! Every negative interaction I have is for a cause I don't believe in! I do it because this museum provides me with food and shelter. That's a lot to ask someone to give up. Off hand, I can't think of any jobs where I could just show up and be 100% real and get my needs met. (I can imagine long-term dream jobs but it would be quite risky to bet that I could actualize any of those before my savings ran out.) I suppose I could keep thinking about that. I mean, the other route is just sleep on the street and refuse to be fake. Man. I'll have to think more about this. Good night.
Okay, I'm tired. I'm going to bed.
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