The Life Balance Sheet

It’s easy for me to get consumed by unimportant information because by nature I’m a data cruncher. For example, I could tell you within a few million dollars how almost every movie performed opening weekend at the box office this year. What’s this useful for? Knowing and potentially regurgitating, I guess.

It’s more useful to know your own life’s balance sheet. I think I’m getting a better handle of that. It’s one reason why nearing age 40 is a lot less stressful than nearing aging 30. “Know thyself.” While living downtown I’d jump over a broken cement wall with the words “Know thyself” spray painted on it. I imagined there was some significance to this.

I think I saw career with more doom and gloom when I turning 30. I’ve experienced enough now to see a career as something that can provide some value, but is relatively trifling when compared to relationships, or the value of understanding life and death. I’ve seen enough people retire over the years, for example, and seen the aftermath (the company shrugs and hires someone younger, for a cheaper salary). The Protestant work ethic wheel keeps turning.

Put more concisely, I’d like to continue focusing on the things that matter, and continue getting to know myself.

Thoughts Overdressed

It’s better to avoid overdressing both yourself and your thoughts. If you can communicate the message with a scowl, avoid the monologue.

What is the perfect length of a movie or book review? Generally, most video and blog reviews are too long. I rarely read or view a review that’s too short. It’s probably because we like to imprint as much of our own character in the reviews as we can. The review becomes a form of self-expression. That’s fine, I think, because the best critics show their quirks. You can show quirks while still be concise though.

You can easily draw out a joke at the dinner table until it dies, after all.

I’m looking forward to doing more this summer by virtue of doing less. Less exercise, but more effective use of the minutes spent exercising. Less stressing, and therefore more daydreaming. Less indecision, and therefore more creating. Less work hours, and therefore more sleep.

I’m running the Boston marathon next week. I’m looking forward to the event, which I think will be a celebration of being able to do something difficult. I’m also looking forward to not devoting so much energy and resources to such a long and painful burn. I’m glad to say that I’ve run marathons, and I’ll be honored to say I ran the Boston marathon, but at the end of the day, I can’t say running that many miles is “fun.”

I had a dream last night in which I was an NBA basketball player handling the ball at the end of a critical game. I sunk a 3 to the roar of the crowd and my team was up by 10.

Suddenly the coach decided to play the bench though, and a gang of diminutive nerds walked onto the court, singing the song “This is Halloween” from the movie Nightmare before Christmas. They paid no attention to the game at all. The other team made layup after layup and I watched our lead fade. Whatever great game I had lost all meaning.

That’s okay, I thought, because they’re my friends.

And maybe that’s the point. To be with people you genuinely like brings more success than any “win.”

The Ebb and Flow of Fortunes

I’ve noticed it is easier to buy nothing when I have nothing to spend. As is human nature, spending inevitably increases with fortune. It is probably less so for me than most people, as I believe I still live a pretty modest lifestyle.

Still, I believe that I possess too much. It is true that I have a pretty small closet, but the closet is rife with stuff. I may own less than most, but I still own much more than I have at times in the past. I’ve experienced what it’s like to own almost nothing (my years in China), and I’ve experienced what it’s like to own everything I had inkling to buy. Of the two, I prefer nothing. It’s more freeing.

Fortunes ebb and flow. Time has humbled me enough to know this. A possession can easily become a burden. Life is tough enough. Best to minimize the burdens if given the option.

I’ve seen how new possessions inevitably rust and fade, and lose their lore. In today’s subscription-based economy, replacements must be purchased at regular intervals. One can easily become a slave to possessions.

I don’t believe owning nothing is necessarily healthy either. Humans evolved by using materials. Shoes allowed us to migrate north, for example.

I do believe I need to reassess what is essential and what was bought on impulse. The mind convinces itself a lot more is “necessary” to buy when there’s money in one’s pockets than it does when the pockets are empty.

How much is enough? This is a difficult question to answer because the answer constantly changes. Generally speaking though, it’s less than a consumer thinks.

Judgments

I sometimes wake up in the odd hours of the night with a brutal anxiety that I can’t describe. Usually it’s severe enough that my system enters “fight or flight” mode and cannot fall back asleep.

I’m awakened by a dream, usually, in which I’m either replaying a stressful past event or a hypothetical future one. It isn’t so much the event itself that causes me stress as it is my perception of the event and how it might affect me. For example, I often dream of making some awful work-related error that destroys my reputation or gets me fired. Even when awake, it feels too real to erase from my mind. Or my mind amplifies the stress by creating another dozen similar hypothetical scenarios. I ensnare myself in these fictions and convince myself that I am powerless.

It’s never the event that causes stress, as events are just moments in time. It’s our judgment regarding the event, and our ability (or inability) to let go.

Judgment plays a key role in how we shape and present ourselves. If it wasn’t for judgment I’d probably live like Rob Greenfield, owning just a dozen possessions and dumpster diving when I need something else. It’s a shame, really, that I still can’t seem to let go of my own need to uphold a reputation.

I still have time to learn though. Here’s to hoping I figure it out before my 40th birthday.

Old Strength, and Returning

I started a weekly strength training class called “Old Man Strength” (I guess I’ve finally attained the honors to join this class thanks to Father Time). It was great, I learned some new exercises and had the instructor correct a few bad habits I had on exercises I knew. I will definitely be sore tomorrow. I like that most exercises involved full range of motion, single leg balance, and power. That’s what I was looking for. In fact more important than strength, to me, is power. It’s actually power that typically diminishes at a faster rate than strength when you get past 40. Power is also a more useful tool, in my opinion. You break a brick with your fist primarily with power.

The class started at 7 am and lasted an hour. I had a rare meeting at 8 am and I said screw it, and I made bacon and eggs and ate them slowly instead. I want to enjoy a ritual, not shove food down my throat for the sake of moving forward. People who request meetings at 8 am should be tarred and feathered. A peaceful morning is sacred.

Nothing interesting playing at the cinemas. Squid Game season 2 started slow but I’m invested now that I’m on episode 4. I think the South Koreans are producing a lot of high quality cinema/television.

I hate that my smartphone always follows me around and seems to demand attention. They’re doing their best to become appendages. Nostalgic for the days of arriving home from school and roaming the local neighborhoods and parks at dusk. Maybe once free of the 9-5 I’ll find a way to minimize phone use. You can’t really think in a state of distraction.

Denzel said something along the lines of, “Youth is for learning, the middle is for earning, and the older years are for returning.” Maybe I’m old, or I’m returning a little early. I’m good with either of those.

2024: A Hopeful Step Back

Sometimes you have to take a step backward to move forward. I have a pervading sense that backtracking will be a theme for me in 2024. I’ve realized, through trial and error, that I want to revert certain aspects of my life.

The first change surrounds my cycling. I tested the waters of fitness cycling for a few years and have decided to go back to my bike commuter roots. Broken bones are not the primary reason for this. I find the most joy in keeping cycling simple: just hopping on a commuter bike and riding around a park, or on a short trip to the grocery store. I envision my future and cannot see myself embracing cycling as a sport: it just seems like an added stressor, and cycling is supposed to be my stress relief. So, I’m selling my endurance bike and a lot of my cycling apparel.

I often find the most joy in life when I keep everything simplified. Cycling for me is a prime example of this. I want cycling to be an adventure, not a chore. I want it to be organic and raw, not an exercise monitored by GPS watches and power meters. I want to breathe fresh air and have the world slow down, not obsess myself over the desire to speed up. I generally hate “intervals,” so why am I pigeoning myself into more of them during a hobby?

I want to rid myself of the Protestant work ethic while on a bike.

I’m also ditching the Kindle in favor of more physical books. I read far too much via blue screen. There was a time in my life when I only read text on paper. Electronic reading is a strain on the eyes. Sometimes I wonder if our screens will render all of us prematurely blind.

I’m aiming to write more reviews. Years ago I enjoyed providing reviews of various elements of pop culture and I’d like to return to the habit. Some of my favorite authors, including Edgar Allen Poe and George Orwell, were also prolific reviewers.

Finally, I’m prioritizing my own dreams. Over the years I’ve let them slip too much for the sake of money and as I look up the capitalist heirarchical ladder, I don’t see more money solving any problems. In fact, I see more money creating new problems.

When I die, I don’t foresee anyone reading a eulogy about how much money I made or how productive I was as an employee. That would be terrible as part of anyone’s eulogy, and the thought of that having anything to do with my character is nauseating.

What would I want to be said at my funeral? I think everyone must ask himself or herself this question at some point and come to terms with the finiteness of life. I think for me, the answers are starting to be more apparent, and they have nothing to do with materialism.

So here’s to 2024, a step back for the sake of forward movement.

A Change in Seasons

Fall is not a good season for minimalists.

There’s a jacket for every slight temperature variation and a layer for every social occasion.

There are shoes for the rain, shoes for hiking, shoes for lounging, and shoes for conducting business.

There are lounge pants for the coffee shop, fatigue pants for the bar, technical pants for a walk, and chino pants for the cubicle.

I’m always a great minimalist in summer. It’s too hot for all of these things.

Then fall hits and I find myself in a vanity fair.