What a strange feeling it is, to suddenly realize you’ve been asleep most of your life. Watching as a passive observer. What an even stranger feeling when you realize you’re in charge. Life is under your spell, not the other way around. It’s actually ME controlling MY life, not the other way around. It’s strange when the motivation, passion and inspiration hits … and you wonder where it might have been hiding.

I realize it’s been a long time since the last post, but I’ve not been compelled enough… today is different. I don’t know what it is; perhaps the new year, or just… or maybe the music is changing, my passage? My chance to realize my full potential and utilize all the tools life provide me.

Good morning life, it’s GOOD to SEE you… let’s make things happen shall we?

Maybe you’ve seen the movie ‘Click’ with Adam Sandler where he gets a universal remote for his life. He can choose at will to fast forward through ‘boring’ parts of but a consequences is that each time this particular ‘event’ occurs it will be automatically fast forwarded through again. Anyhow, I wasn’t planning on writing a review of it, but rather a feature of the remote, ‘Pause’.

Pausing is very powerful indeed. It will allow us to quickly run to the bathroom in the middle of a movie, make some more popcorn or perhaps just readjust the pillows for better comfort. But, I wasn’t actually thinking of the actual ‘Pause’ feature of most entertainment systems, but rather the pause button of life, yes there is one!

I spend far to little time pausing my life to just breath, relax and observe my surroundings. In the huzzle-buzzle of life, working a 9-5 job, getting consumed by doing is all to easy unfortunately. This is when it gets even more important to actually stop, put down the pen, remove oneself from the computer, make some tea, wrap oneself in a blanket and go sit outside and be quiet for a few minutes.

The sad thing is that each time I do this I get equally surprised at how calming, and nurturing it is, yet I only do it once in a while. It should be mandatory, just like having breakfast or breathing. Johanna and I have for the past two weekends spent at least an hour on our porch having breakfast and watching the sun climb the sky. It’s beautiful and utterly relaxing. I realize that we’re so very fortunate now with our new house in the countryside, but it hasn’t always been like this.

I can’t recall many days, before we got the house, where I just sat outside doing nothing. Having been on the move for the last 6-7 years, seeking a home, it has been nothing but unsettling and quite mentally draining. I could have benefited from pausing more often to appreciate the things I have and calm myself down.

That’s why I will attempt to spend more time doing nothing, pausing life to allow myself to be grounded and appreciate my current situation for what it is and what I have. I wouldn’t want to become the person that looks back at his life only to remember working and stressing about this and that.

Now I’m off for my morning walk.

I’m currently reading a book on software development practices. It’s not a regular book about the boring old, regular process. (Software requirements, use-cases and all that boring shit.) But, I will not bore you with the details, I just wanted to share something I realized while reading. While I’m sitting here reading about their approach to software development I can’t help but notice how extremely relevant this is for life in general. Read this (my notes):

• Create a clear vision
• Fuck the details, get the stuff working
• Don’t deal with problems that doesn’t yet exist
• Don’t try and please everyone
• Focus on the absolute minimum, features can come later
• Essentials only, cut the crap
• Better be a no-man, than a yes-man (Perhaps not applicable to all, but certainly to some!)
• Make only promises I can actually keep
• Iterative development is key

See what I mean? Pretty much all of these (except for, you know which one) are totally applicable to life. Take ‘Fuck the details, get the stuff working’. I could definitely use some of this in my life. How often do I find myself obsessing about details, when all I should focus on is to actually get something done. It’s almost laughable how often I do this. Details, details, details…

‘Essentials only, cut the crap’, another good one. Sometimes I’m overwhelmed with all the stuff I have in my house, and it’s distracting. These days, since having become aware of the problem, I make an effort into telling myself no, especially when it comes to ‘getting stuff’. Thinking in terms of ‘Essentials only, cut the crap’ isn’t exactly bad advice.

My favourite is probably ‘Iterative development is key’. This really is true for life. Don’t try and design and figure out life in one go, it will never, ever go the way it was ‘supposed’ to. It’s much better to start doing something, anything, then make small adjustments through an iterative process. Trying to get rid of a bad habit? Iterative development! Do it in stages. Don’t try and do it all at once… do it iteratively, one small piece at a time. Trying to learn how to paint? Don’t bother with getting amazing results the first time, it won’t happen (definitely not for me anyway). Iterate, one stroke at a time until you reach some results, they may not be the desired results, but they are results nonetheless.

If you’re interested in reading the book yourself, you can find it here.

There I was on my way to the train station from work after yet another day of labour. While walking back it struck me that perhaps I’m approaching this whole guiding life purpose from the wrong angle. My usual approach in understanding things is to break them down into more manageable components. This has worked fairly well… actually, maybe not but sometimes it works well. Perhaps I should first begin with a simple experiment that require very little effort and action, but could potentially bring some powerful results. I don’t know, but have decided to try.

I’ve been trying to figure out my purpose without actually thinking about the context in which I want to apply the purpose. I’m lacking the reference frame. Today I thought that I should attempt to imagine my ideal life. How would I like to wake up? How would I like to approach my day? What would be my ideal routines and habits?

Pixie dream (mehmeturgut/devitantART)

As a wildly crazy and imaginative guy this is not all that strange to me, I’ve often drifted off into the far-away-land of dreams. What I’ve never consciously done before however is to dream about a life that I actually want to live. I don’t mean the kind of life where you walk around in a robe surrounded with bunnies, but a more authentic and real life. A life not rooted, or derived, from already existing societal ideals such as a shallow career driven by something that really doesn’t matter. (Sure, maybe some actually strive for that life, good for them, but I don’t.) I mean a life where I feel my desires are fulfilled and where genuine and authentic happiness is part of my daily routine.

Even from a scientific perspective this makes sense, even though I couldn’t even begin to explain the chemicals involved or their composition, but still. The content of our mind is a result of our own conscious construction. We choose what goes in and stays there. We give our thoughts meaning. We decide how to approach any given situation. I have mentioned in a previous post about the power of association which I find applies particularly well in this scenario. Associations in my mind are mine to create, no one else can do that. (Even though they can obviously influence me!)

Actually, I’m not even sure why I brought up the science here, it makes no sense, disregard. I’ll try and figure that out later, assuming this helps me, how science plays a part here I mean. Why would it help me to imagine an ideal life? How could that be explained through science? Maybe it can’t?

This is how I imagine my ideal life

I’m in love with learning and understanding how things function. When I began writing this blog I kind of already knew that reading and learning was a big part of me. But it was only when I started writing things down that it occurred to me how incredibly sexy learning is. Intellectual stimuli is pretty darn high up on the list of awesome things. Hence, my ideal life would be filled with books and opportunities to learn about anything and everything. Sure, I have that now too, but on a much more limited scale. I mean to be literally paid to learn and share.

My hours would not be determined by anyone but me. I would be the sole determinator (awesome word!) in how my day would be spent. From the moment I wake up, to the moment I fall asleep should only be determined by choices I make alone, period.

I would want to share everything that I learn and hopefully inspire others to do the same. One of my most ambitious and long term goal would be to ‘advance’ the human race to a higher level of thinking. A time where communal knowledge generation is valued much more than individual knowledge hoarding. Sharing would be key in my society. Wisdom would be paramount.

The people around me would themselves be driven, engaging and full of ideas. A constant influx of new, fresh thinking should permeate my entire life. Together with my closet friends (I currently have none I would consider my close friend) we would create, innovate and drive society forward in a meaningful manner that benefits not just us, but everyone.

(Hey, this is my ideal life, so… I can do this!)

Then I would want to be able to leave, travel at any time when the mood strikes. To create, to express my emotions through music (I play the Piano, perhaps I should compose some music and upload?). To finally unwrap the drawing kit I got for x-mas a few years ago. To be able to do all those things I long for. A life without boundaries, only those I myself impose. To live like the earth. Constantly moving, constantly changing, evolving… living.

I do not wish to be trapped in this invisible cage. I want to break free from these chains. I need to.

At work the other day I was faced with what seemed like an insurmountable amount of tasks. Having read about brainstorming many times before, I had never quite been able to use it. I thought that this would be an excellent opportunity to just brainstorm down all the tasks, and their related subtasks. So, I tried. I began and allowed myself to roam freely with the pen on the paper. I managed to produce three A4 pages full with tasks and related activities. It felt kind of good. What had been previously kept in a normal text file on my computer in no particular order, was actually now in some sort of order with actionable items surrounding them.

Yeah, planning and organisation have never quite been part of my skill set, but it’s something that I’m trying to improve. This little exercise, forced upon me, got me thinking. So far I’ve not come any closer to my finding or creating my guiding purpose. But, what if I tried and brainstorm my life? It would be a simple exercise really. Put myself in the middle, and start by branching out some of, what I would consider, skills. I’ve not yet done this but I can imagine where it would lead.

Reading and learning, music and creativity, writing and sharing, programming and thinking, early mornings and exercise, yoga and meditation, kissing and hugging (my Johanna, oh and Pixie our dog, but perhaps only hugs there!), loving and caring. On it goes. I will do this tomorrow, I’m excited. This will be my task. To brainstorm my life, ideal or current, it doesn’t really matter. The purpose would be to just get it out there and letting it flow freely. It would seem rather logical that from that brainstorm session I could garner quite a lot of useful information about myself. Perhaps it could even be used for finding, or creating, a guiding purpose?

Today becomes yesterday and yesterday was once tomorrow. But I don’t care, I welcome each day as if it was any other day filled with opportunities to learn and experience.