-
Mom, Critic, Coach
Unconditional Generosity – See your work like a mother would see their child’s work. Generous. Gracious. It’s not about how great or magnificent the work is, the adoration is unconditional. Praising the effort. Praising the creativity. Praising the accomplishment. It doesn’t judge the quality of the work, it’s not about that. No criticism. No judgment. It’s love for love’s sake and sometimes love is blind.
Conditional Criticism – See your work with all its flaws, mistakes, shortcomings. Places you could’ve done better. Listen to and internalize everyone’s criticism. Struggle with yourself because it’s not “perfect”. Never being satisfied.
Critical Generosity – Appreciate the progress. Grateful for the accomplishment. Embrace the process. Don’t see the work as proof of validation or excellence. Don’t see it as proof of inadequacy or flaws. See it as a whole, see the flaws, mistakes, places you could’ve done better but seen as a whole, along with the progress, accomplishment and process. Everything is a rough draft.
-
Individualism for the sake of the whole
Is individualism bad or good? Some people see individualism as bad. It can look like or lead to selfishness, narcissism, greed, lack of compassion. And to some people individualism might be good. It can look like pursuit, growth, ambition, independence.
If you are someone that has a dream, vision, ambition but are in an environment with family, friends or circumstance that are defeatist, discouraging, unsupportive or even critical of your dreams. It maybe not because they don’t want to support you or don’t love you, but because they don’t know how. First the literal mechanics of how to help you get to where you want to go as well as knowing how to get over the psychological baggage of overcoming a defeatist mindset. Second, they don’t want to see you disappointed or fail. Or third, it might make them jealous, insecure or feel bad about themselves to see someone go after their dreams.
If you are in that kind of situation, there may be two ways to go. 1) Fall back in line and follow their mindset as to not make them feel bad or 2) become more of an individualist to find new voices to speak into your life, a new mindset to grow into and perceptions to change. It will be hard, difficult, feel impossible and lonely. In a way, you’ll be rejecting your friends or family’s mindset, and they may let it be known you’re making them feel that way. It may feel bitter. It may feel like they don’t understand. It may become isolating. It may feel like abandonment on both sides.
Individualism is the pursuit of betterment, independent of the group’s response or state. In this case, it might be to the group’s benefit to not create disruption, chaos or drama to not go for your dreams and keep everyone happy.
Individualism has the potential of becoming selfish, narcissistic and lack compassion. A common motto “Don’t forget where you came from.” You may have to be selfish, uncompromising, almost arrogant, driven to take those first few steps out of your comfort zone, circle of friends, family to go off on your own, to do something no one in your family or community has done but stay in that mind space too long and that can go from drive, self-centeredness, arrogance, resentment to lack of compassion.
But individualism needs compassion. Compassion and understanding for your circumstance. Compassion and understanding for your friends. Compassion and understanding for your family. Compassion and understanding for yourself. We become so hard on ourselves, driving, pursuing, pushing toward that end goal, we lose compassion for ourselves. You did something hard. You did something impossible. You did something more than you thought you ever could when you first started. But the act, the success, the dream isn’t the great accomplishment, it’s the value of compassion learned through this process, through the journey.
Compassion isn’t money, material, words or tokens of giving. Compassion is unspoken, humility, listening, presence, generosity, understanding. Compassion at our greatest moments, that is what can be shared, inspired, generous. That is individualism for the sake of the whole.
-
Red Alert
We need fear. Fear is a crucial evolutionary, survival instinct. The dissonance is when our fear does not distinguish between the non-life threatening and life-threatening. When fear becomes prevalent in a non-life threatening situation, mostly in situations of possible rejection, judgment, separation, it gives rise to the Ego. Ego is the defense mechanism.
The Ego can do either or all of these things, build a wall, get defensive, retreat or go on the attack.
The Ego creates a system of thought, decisions, words and actions all in an attempt to protect the fear. Hides the fear from being exposed, getting out, being vulnerable. Protects the fear by bunkering, getting defensive or attacking. Because “weakness” is allowing someone else to know what your fear is, because it can be taken advantage of, manipulated, create instability, hinder decision-making.
But then the Ego can become an entity of its own, because it begins to realize its existence comes from and kept by fear. So now the Ego’s defense mechanism goes into “red-alert”, almost arising its own consciousness to maintain its own survival.
But the even more insidious evolution of the Ego is when the it realizes it needs to hide from ourselves to continue its survival. It knows when we realize we’ve been being driven by fear and try to move into fearlessness – the Ego will die. So it attempts to gain more power, control and dominance to be able to become invisible even to ourselves.
It is able to do this because it is our mirror, it knows what we’re going to do before we do it. It knows our blindspots, it knows our strengths, it uses reason, logic, emotion, dependencies to create a system of thoughts, decisions and actions to not just survive but become even stronger, more dominant in our psyche. With the ultimate ambition of becoming inseparable from our Ego and identity.
The Ego is a part of us, it is us. It is us in all our fears. The part of us that uses fear as its source, fuel, drive, survival of energy and existence.
Ego is useful for a season. It can inform us. It can help us. It can protect us in our most vulnerable moments. But if the Ego stays too long it can become a pattern of allowing fear to take root. Fear as the life force. Arrogance to hide fears of being an “imposter”. Competition to hide fears of failure. Jealousy to hide fears of being without. Over-ambition to hide fears of inadequacy. Greed to hide fears of losing something. Validation to hide fears of rejection.
Ego is who we are with our fears. But there is a version of us with our dreams, ambitions, visions, direction, decision without the fear.
That is who we can be. That is who we are.
-
Nothing more. Nothing less.
Desires uncovered, fear discovered.
Needs. Wants. Desires.
Beckon us to step into our fears.
Desire to. To be. To become. To have.
Fear of not having, being unfulfilled.Desire the wind for our sails. Fear the crashing waves.
Dreams our treasure. Fear the thief.
Fear finds our desires. Desires find our fears.
Fear and desire intertwined.Who are we, if without fears, desires, decisions.
Fear becomes us. We become fear.
The desire and the fear inseparable.Or is it.
The miracle, dreams in fearlessness.
Being without fear.
What’s been written in our hearts.Doing what we’re meant to do.
Being what we’re meant to be.Simply.
Nothing more.
Nothing less.Fearlessness.
-
Managing Flowstate
Productivity is the art of managing flowstate. For most of us flow or the zone feels like an elusive, unmanageable, unreliable, flakey muse that comes and goes whenever it pleases. Or maybe sometimes we’re able to build processes around trying to get into flowstate, building habits, routines, schedules, setting up a space, avoiding distractions. So that’s why maybe productivity is usually principled around time management and to-do tasks. And then maybe it feels like there might be some control in getting into flowstate. But does flowstate have to be that rigid and blocked out.
I think there’s a more essential fundamental to flowstate that goes beyond schedules, time management and productivity apps that will actually allow you to maximize the use of productivity apps with more ease and fluidity.
To easily get into flowstate avoiding self-judgment which sometimes looks like expectations, demands, control, fear of failure, results-oriented mindset, overthinking, distractions, procrastination, indecisiveness. Which sometimes feels like fear, anxiety, stress, frustration, urgency, defensiveness, offensiveness. This is the primary first step in getting into flowstate, which also maximizes your energy level for the activity, which you’ll save by not being spent on managing stress and anxiety. But you’ll also find you’ll feel less distracted and be able to freely transition in and out of completely different activities and work tasks.
The second part of managing flowstate is managing your energy. If you avoid the above self-judgment you will find you have so much more energy available for the task your concentrating on and performing. But with that, understand, that is, be mindful of the energy you are expending for each given activity. Don’t grind yourself to the nub, where now you need more time to recover. Managing energy is finding and knowing a good place to stop.
Leaving 10-20% left in the tank will give you a quicker recovery period but also give you a place to pick up when you resume. This method would also mean avoid cramming deadlines. You’ll find by leaving that 10-20% left in the tank you will have a quick bookmark to comeback to when you resume where you left off, instead of having to restart the momentum of finding and generating a new thread.
By leaving 10-20% in the tank, you will not have that burnt out feeling, which will then allow you to move onto another task that you could theoretically utilize a different part of your thought process, intellect and creativity – a different part of your brain. From a workout analogy, before you burn out working out your legs, move onto your arms. Bodybuilders probably wouldn’t recommend this but from an energy output standpoint you’d get more energy output at a higher efficiency.
The point of diminishing returns is a real thing, we don’t have limitless energy at a constant rate. At some point the quality of our output will not be worth the effort and energy we are putting in. Although, I will say, at first, the point of diminishing returns is shorter but with this practice and approach the point of diminishing returns will extend further out as more of the ability and skills becomes more automaticity and new ability gets learned and acquired.
By leaving 10-20% in the tank and coming back to the task or activity, instead of trying to finish it all in one marathon sitting. You will be allowing your subconscious to process, problem-solve, make connections, produce more creativity and insight in the background, so that you’re actually smarter, more thoughtful, creative and open-minded when you come back to it then next time.
-
Deconstructing Writing
A note on my personality/curiosity, since a child, I’d take apart toys, electronics, mechanical things to see how and why they work. Later on, I’d do the same thing with website codes and some programming. So for me, trying to figure out things is a huge part of the “fun”. I internalize, understand and own it a lot better. It’s a lot more taxing, slow and frustrating process but it’s also feels more rewarding to me. And I guess that’s the “fun” motivation for me.
Deconstructing writing has been a lot of my work and focus of reverse engineering. Writing is definitely a more subjective less quantifiable product but I think that’s the part that makes it even more interesting. It’s not quantifiable but it definitely is qualitative. And I believe there are essential writing principles that do make up good and sound writing. But as I’ve embarked on this curiosity of backward engineering, I’ve embraced the subjectivity and discovered the importance of these questions as a writer, what is writing to me, how is it personal, what kind of writing is trying to come out of me, how does who I am contextualize what I write?
-
Clean Fuel
To be happy and content in engaging in the material, self exploration and discovery. I’ve found personally, but I think is also generally true, there’s a corrupting element to wanting something else and using the “it” (creative endeavor) to get that thing that you want.
It might work as motivation and probably ultimately get you what you want and accomplish the endeavor but the fuel might not burn clean. Maybe you want success, validation, money, control, power, influence. Or maybe you want to alleviate insecurity, self-doubt, or prove something. Or even if it’s something like provide for your family, give back, realize your full potential.
There are degrees to which the fuel doesn’t burn clean. Meaning this kind of fuel might produce waste products like frustration, discontent, resentment, guilt, lack of fulfillment, narcissism, jealousy, competition, etc…
The cleanest fuel might be to create for the sake of creation without any expectations or external dependencies or motivations. Create for the sake of giving and generosity.