Letter #17: Security is mostly a superstition

Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all?

I’m going to continue the series of getting to the root of my procrastination and finding a sustainable, satisfying and custom solution. To recap, these are the understandings I have come to so far: 

1. My behaviors do not always align with my intentions (e.g. I procrastinate)

2. My behaviors stem from my mind state

3. The mind state in its natural form is erratic (if you say it is not so, then try to think of nothing at all. How long can you do that for?)

4. To change behavior, is to change the mind state*

5. Focus is the essential ingredient for influencing and taming the erratic mind

6. Meditation is simply the practice of honing focus

* You could do it the other way too, change behavior to influence the mind state, but it hasn't worked out too well for me

So, it seems I have it all figured out, don’t I? About 2 weeks ago, I committed to meditating for 2 hours a day total. I even created a tracking chart and put it on my wall and I mark it each day with a check mark or an "X". I fall short most days, but I do meditate for at least 30 minutes each day. It has averaged out to an hour I believe.

So, all this meditating should be leading to me procrastinating less, correct? If I think I'm so smart and I can really figure myself out, then how is this manifesting in my reality? 

Unfortunately, I don't have a way of comparing my procrastination from 2 weeks ago to now. So, I can only speak in generalities and vague terms. I feel I am accomplishing tasks at a faster rate than I was before, with less suffering in the process. I realize the hard thing about most tasks is the thinking part, not the actual doing part. It sounds obvious, but let me paint a picture. I realize if I have a goal and a specific task to get closer to it, and I just sit down in stillness (best as I can), and I just really think hard through how I would do the task, accept the risks, the failure, the success, the embarrassment, etc., then at the end of this process, there's nothing else standing between me and the task. 

Last week, the first time I had to send an email to a contact about using their venue for an event collaboration, I felt extremely anxious. My fight or flight was at an all time high, but I sat there and watched those feelings rise, and then go away. Then every subsequent time I thought about the same task, the bodily reaction and emotions became weaker and weaker, until they were barely a flicker. Then of course the reality of carrying out the action and observing the consequences, which were not dire at all (even in the case of failure), I reflected back on those initial emotional processes and considered them silly. 

Now, when faced with the same type of task in the future, I recall those feelings, the actions, and the reality, and the same anxiety attack doesn't come. I believe a method like this is the only true way of creating a sustainable and healthy mindset and behavior change, and increasing productivity.

The brute-force, “bias for action” method gives quicker results sure, and I guess can work for the less emotional, but I believe it's over-preached in the productivity culture of today. At the core, what action-taking is achieving is essentially the same thing I described above. It's dismantling some illusions you might be carrying about how insurmountable a task is. Meditation has made me realize if I just acknowledge all of these feelings of fear and anxiety and give them the attention they desperately need for whatever reason, then they simply dissipate. All without the time wasted and suffering of carrying out meaningless work. 

"There's never time to do it right, but there's always time to do it over." — Murphy's Law

I rarely jump straight into tasks anymore, which I haven't clearly defined and I haven't thought through. If not meditating, I'll go for walks. If not walks, then a blank piece of paper. Anytime I feel a resistance to carrying something out now, I close my laptop and think through this next iteration that is causing me stress and discomfort. Hammering away at something when you're unsure of the destination and while you're stressing about it the whole time is such an inefficient method. 

I realize now why Steve Jobs preferred walking as a method of thinking. Imagine if Steve Jobs had used the pomodoro technique to force himself to set at his desk in 30 minute intervals and come up with innovative ideas. Imagine if he thought that if he just released enough crap products, then he would sure land on a golden egg and become more wealthy and influential. 

In addition to the productivity aspect, the meditating is also allowing me to enjoy myself and learn to live in the so elusive present. I am generally joyous and a more positive presence to my friends and family (at least I would say so!). 

---

There is a new challenge I've been encountering this week when it comes to this procrastination topic. That new challenge is how to deal with risk and worst-case scenario thinking, and fear. Or rather the illusion of fear. I’m attempting to do things now that require “risk-taking”, and it’s interesting to experience in first-person these quotes I had heard long ago:

Earl Nightingale: “You can measure opportunity with the same yardstick that measures the risk involved. They go together.” 

Helen Keller: "Security is mostly a superstition. Life is either a daring adventure or nothing." 

William James: "It is only by risking our persons from one hour to another that we live at all." 

Rumi: 
"Forget safety. 
Live where you fear to live. 
Destroy your reputation. 
Be notorious. 

Inside you, there's an artist you don't know about …say yes quickly, if you know, if you've known it from before the beginning of the universe."

It just occurred to me that there seems to be a process to this whole creating a "successful" business (keeping in mind that success means different things to different people), or living to your potential or squeezing everything out of life. Most of the information I've consumed about the topic has been in an unorganized fashion kind of scattered all over (and that's why the majority hasn't worked). Now that I'm relying on my own experiences and coming to understandings of things myself, I notice the wisdom fit as pieces into the life puzzle. It's satisfying!

So, to the topic of risk-taking and fear. To do something "different", to change the "status quo", or bring into fruition whatever grand ambition you have, is to do something out of the ordinary (which seems obvious). But what is the ordinary exactly? There must be some really attractive and compelling things about it, otherwise it wouldn't be so popular. 

First and foremost, the ordinary is the place of comfort and security. Both in the internal and external sense. So where does risk fit into all this ordinariness? I'm tempted to hypothesize that risk is the degree to which you are comfortable with disrupting your comfort and security. I'm comfortable being uncomfortable (playing sports helped me with this physically growing up and meditation is helping me mentally currently), but I'm still at a loss with how to accept risking my physical security. I believe the worst that can happen is imprisonment, or death. Which you might say sounds like a large leap to make. But I believe these two are the most motivating factors for accepting the ordinary in our current society. 

If I were to go to prison, like Sam Bankman-Fried, could I accept that? If I were to die, like John Lennon, could I accept that? Could I risk my security for a living a full and large life? (don't think too hard on my examples).

How much of what Helen Keller said is true? How do you assess risk? How much of it is too much and how much is too little? Why can't there be an instruction set for it damn it! 

Then there is the other side of risk, which is not harm to yourself but others. It occurs to me that almost anyone who does something significant and impactful, even when their intentions are good, are likely producing equal if not greater harm. Perhaps this is why business is most suited for people with psychopathic tendencies. Who else would be capable of thinking through how their creation could negatively impact the world and go on with it? Perhaps this is also why business is also suited for the more short-sighted and brute natured sometimes. 

Jan, the non-participation of the monks and gurus in the world is seeming more attractive by the day.

I’ve been reading a lot of Lao Tzu and Alan Watts this week. I still feel at the intersection of spirituality and business. Which sometimes makes me cringe, because I think about the people that exploit the spiritual for material gain. I’m specifically thinking of that episode of Black Mirror with the CEO of a tech company whose creating great harm in the society but is in a silent meditation retreat himself. 

Anyhow, here's a passage from my Alan Watts quoting Lao Tzu: 

"So the first principle in (we could call it) the art of pleasure is: you must swing. And that means - or at least looks like, superficially-- that you mustn't take anything seriously. You must realize that life is a form of dancing. And dancing is, of course, not serious… What is the virtue in being stiff and rigid? As Lao Tzu said: "Man at his birth is supple and tender. But in death, he is rigid and hard. Plants when young are juicy and soft. But when old, they are brittle and dry. And thus, suppleness and softness are the signs of life, but rigidity and hardness are the signs of death.""

And also another quote that I believe is relevant to the first half of this letter:

"That’s where the trouble begins: when we use technology to get there fast. And the faster we get there, the less worth is the place of arrival because you’ve eliminated the distance between. And that’s what makes the difference between here and there: the distance. If you take it away, then there is the same as here. So there was no point going there. There’s no point going from here to Honolulu. None, whatever; it’s the same place to all intents and purposes. Certainly no point in going from Los Angeles to Tokyo. I mean, there are a few nice little bars in Tokyo where you can get sushi, but you can get them in Los Angeles now because Tokyo’s come to Los Angeles. So it’s practically the same place.  And both have the same smog. The police in Tokyo wear gas masks when they’re directing traffic. You know, crazy."

(Text sourced from https://www.organism.earth/library/document/pursuit-of-pleasure)

Signing off for the week,

 Your pal, 

Sam (Vancouver, Canada)