A Useful Metaphor for Impermanence: The Tide Ebbs and Flows
The tide goes in. The tide goes out. It comes and goes. The pattern of rising then falling tide repeats although each change is never quite the same across a range of highs and lows. There is also never only high tide. A lower...
Awareness Is a Starting Point for Action and Change
Peter shared a story with me about returning home exhausted after a long bike ride that he did in preparation for his upcoming IRONMAN race. All he wanted to do after riding was to sit down and relax, but his wife Kathy asked him to look at their outdoor grill first....
How to Design a Better Experiment for Test and Learn
I had previously blogged about the concept of test and learn as a practice for continuous improvement. Continuous improvement can be for an activity that one is doing (e.g. running a business or playing golf) or for oneself (e.g. learning how to quiet the mind). What...
Could Be Better or Could Be Worse
We've all experienced bad days where things don't go as planned or something unexpected or even tragic happens. Maybe your dog eats your homework (which has actually happened to me recently), a car hits your car from behind when you're stopped at a light, or you...
Ten Things to Look Forward to When Leaving a Place
When I spoke to Peter recently, he was in the last week of a month-long trip to Florida with his wife. Peter shared how much he appreciated the warm weather as he was able to swim, bike, and run outside plus eat outside in restaurants. He was not looking forward to...
What Is the Real Problem of Humanity?
When asked in an interview if we (humanity) will be able to solve the crises of the next hundred years, sociobiologist E. O. Wilson answered: “The real problem of humanity is the following: we have paleolithic emotions; medieval institutions; and god-like technology”...
Using Test and Learn for Self-Development Practices
As I shared in a previous post, test and learn is an approach for evaluating options when you're not sure which option better. The basic idea is that you test out a new option against an existing default option to learn to see if the new option performs better. If the...
Starting the Day with a Intentional Power Hour
In looking back over the past three years, if I had to pick one new practice that has been most helpful to me, it would be starting my day with an intentional power hour. I first learned about the idea of establishing power hour in an online workshop through Jamie...
Test and Learn as a Tool for Continuous Improvement
When Peter and I were summarizing our key takeaways from 2020, he shared one of his was the idea of test and learn, which I had shared with him earlier in the year. After our conversation, we both realized how test and learn was another way of saying continuous...
Bring a Question to Ask the Teacher
One of my martial arts teachers used to tell us students to always bring a question to ask whenever we had senior instructors visit to teach seminars. Bringing a question is a practice I've since adopted for any type of seminar or class I take. I've discovered several...
Why Do I Do What I Do? Why Do You Do What You Do?
I've been thinking about this question a lot: Why do I do what I do? What I've realized is that sometimes the reasons I have for doing things changes with time. Sometimes I stumble into doing something for one reason and then discover other reasons later on. For...
No Understanding Without Direct Experience
During my Eastern Theories class today, the teacher shared that there can be no understanding without direct experience. I can read, watch videos, or listen to lectures to learn about spiritual traditions like Advaita Vedanta or Buddhism, but I can never hope to...
What If You Have Only Five Minutes?
When I was living in Southern California a few years ago during fire season on especially windy days, I considered this question: What if I have only five minutes to evacuate? From my previous experiences fires in the area, I knew that evacuation orders often came...
How to Make the Most out of the Time We Have Left
In writing about the question of How Much Time Is Left? as a segway into finding more meaning and purpose in life, my first thought was to come up with ideas on how to make the most out of the time we have left in whatever we are doing. In other words, how can we...
Using Questions as a Filter for Better Choices
When I consider how to make better choices, I resonate with what T.S. Eliot wrote in The Use of Poetry and the Use of Criticism: “To do the useful thing, to say the courageous thing, to contemplate the beautiful thing: that is enough for one man's life.” The question...
Find an Expert Versus Learn from a Sensei
When I have an injury, I want to find an expert at fixing the injury I am experiencing. For example, if I break a bone in my hand, I see a doctor who is a hand specialist rather than a psychiatrist. If I need help with my income taxes, I talk to an accountant who...
Doing the Opposite of What Everyone Else Is Doing
Doing the opposite of what everyone else is doing...takes courage and introspection. It's easier to go along with the crowd and what everyone else is doing. This plays out with sports teams. For example, if you live near Clemson, SC, it's easy to be a Clemson Tigers...
Discover and Learn by Doing
One of the themes that I'm trying to cultivate more of in my own life is Rilke's suggestion to "live the questions." In other words, how can I come from a place of curiosity in order to discover and learn? The alternative would be to not be curious, which means...