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Observations on Human Connection & Contribution

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#72: Eyes in your boat

I was at a silent meditation course recently where one commits to noble silence, i.e. silence of the body, speech, and mind. The goal is to cultivate inward attention so you don’t speak, write, read, touch another human or make eye contact for the duration of the course. The days start at 4am and end at 9:30pm alternating between individual sits, group sits, and breaks to eat and move in silence. A gong is sounded to indicate a break. It’s the purest form of silence possible while being in community.

For the individual sits, one can meditate in their room or the meditation hall. Since this was my second time, I knew individual sits in my room made me sleepy or lax. So I pledged to meditate in the hall even for my individual sits. It was the right call–my focus was better and my practice deepened. Not once did I feel the need to get up before the gong was struck. It wasn’t very hard this time; just hard. I did what I could everyday while paying no attention to others, as was the goal. Until the last day when I heard someone getting up and leaving the hall mid-way. Then another person and then another only to realize that I was the only one left. The hall is relatively empty during individual sits as most people prefer to meditate in their rooms. I had a general awareness but until this day, I didn’t pay much attention to when people came and left. Perhaps a part of me was pleased with how well I’d stuck to my intention so I started noting others. This awareness was top of mind in the next sit and in addition to the mental and physical fluctuations, there was a very clear outward focus on others and when they might leave. When they started filtering out, I noted. I also noted my desire to get up and walk out in the sunshine, to stretch my legs and breathe in the fresh air, just like them. Then the course came to an end and I left with the hope to wake up earlier in my everyday life. I thought if I could manage 4am during the course, I could certainly do 5am when back home. I came home to find a husband who had taxing work week so he needed to sleep in. He slept in and so did I, even though my week wasn’t taxing.

Yes, we are social creatures and this natural osmosis gives us the flexibility to thrive and grow with others. But this strength can become a deficit if we’re not careful; especially when we start anchoring our internal commitments to others’ external actions. We may have clarity around what we want to do in our short life, until we see someone else living differntly. A bit here and a bit there and before we know it, our life feels alien.

The phrase “eyes in your boat” helps redirect attention quickly. It’s a pithy directive I first heard while dragonboating and rowing. In both sports, efficient movement requires a team of people to move in complete unison. Any minor distraction and you feel an immediate impact in the next stroke. So you focus on your own stroke while mirroring the motion of the person right in front of you. When your mind wanders to a competing boat, a beautiful bird, or anything else, the coach will instantly nudge you back with this phrase. It has been helpful to me when I get distracted by worry, fear or judgment. It prevents me from sliding on the slippery slope of mindless imitation. Try it. 

“The bad news is you’re falling through the air, nothing to hang on to, no parachute. The good news is, there’s no ground.”— Chögyam Trungpa: Tibetan Buddhist meditation master

#71: Thresholds and applied learning

This post builds upon my last one on thresholds and pauses. By threshold I mean any undertaking that is different from what we’re currently doing or have ever done. Once we determine that we are indeed crossing a threshold, we may need to go searching for knowledge and tools to upskill. And we will likely encounter many intriguing and useful ideas during our exploration. Realizing that we know little, there may be an urge to unblock ourselves not just for the imminent threshold but preemptively for future ones too.

There is a bounty of affordable and high-quality knowledge out there; with as many functional frameworks as there are thinkers and organizations. While plentiful information is a blessing in general, it can be disabling if we approach it with a scarcity mindset and binge on whatever ideas we encounter. The key to progress isn’t to know everything and become an expert, it is to understand the context these frameworks are designed for and how they generally fit together. We don’t need to absorb every detail, just make note and categorize compelling ideas, frameworks and tools as resources to call upon when the right time comes.

We don’t prepare for all thresholds, we prepare only for the relevant ones. Because we won’t cross all thresholds in our limited timeline on earth. Every concept under the sun is more helpful and resonates deeper when it is actually applied vs. learned in theory.

“Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.”― Rainer Maria Rilke, Austrian poet and novelist.

#69: Setting our Pace

Ever try to run fast to slow and somber music or meditate to loud heavy metal? Certain tempos just don’t jive with the task at hand. The same holds true for our internal rhythms. We all operate at varying baselines but every person functions within a range of energy and activity. It’s valuable to understand our personal range and what determines our fluctuation so we can, to the degree possible, match our internal rhythm with the pace of our tasks. It also ensures we don’t blindly slump into rhythms of those we cohabitate with, and makes for more joyful and constructive days.

A side note: When people mention rhythm and pace in a modern context, it’s often a reminder to slow down. That’s not what this is.

The pace of our days is determined in some part by us, then by our responsibilities, and the rest by our environment and culture. However, as we progress through life, our vocation and environment tend to command how we anchor our days so we often lose sense of our innate wiring. Our pace also shifts when we or our context evolve. This is an invitation to explore inputs that feed our pace and adjust what we need to. One may need to slow down or stop in places and engage or speed up in others.

Innate tendency:

  • Is my natural tendency to lower the gears so much that inertia sets in or fire them so much that stress and burnout sets in? We’re all somewhere in the middle but it’s a big continuum; where do I fall on it?
  • How do I like to spend my downtime when not influenced by others? Asked another way: what does my ideal Sunday look like?

Stamina:

  • Which of these comes easily to me and which do I struggle with: sleep, movement, nutrition.
  • When and how do I naturally like to sleep/move/eat when not influenced by others or my environment?
  • What type of stamina comes easily to me and what might I want to cultivate: mental, physical or emotional?
  • How else do I like to build my energy, and am I lacking that input (mental stimulation, human connection, play etc.)?

Type of work:

  • What does my work need of me – expansive and creative thinking, more focused and critical evaluation, a combination, or something else?
  • Am I lacking any tools or skills that could help me work more effectively?
  • Do I use tools that in a different context become hindrances? 

Seasonality:

  • Do certain tasks go more smoothly at certain times of the day or week, in certain types of places, in silence or with sound, surrounded by people or without?
  • Do I naturally structure my days or weeks a certain way?
  • How do I function at different times of the day, different seasons?

Focus:

  • How much time do I need time to warm up and settle into focus? Does it vary by task?
  • When am I easily distractible?
  • What causes 80% of my distractions? Is it external or internal?
  • When it’s internal, is it physical, mental or emotional?
  • When it’s external, is it something I can control or is it outside my influence?

Stakeholders:

  • Which humans or creatures depend on me?
  • What do they need from me? I.e. what is my role within each context?
  • Who needs energy from me and who offers energy to me?
  • What is their pace and “seasonality”? Do they need me more at certain times than others? Do I need others more at certain times?

We can sometimes latch onto identities and internalize them. This obscures the truth so when observing oneself, it’s best to ignore internal judgments.

For instance, I’m not (or perhaps no longer) a “night-owl” or “have the stamina of a marine” as I’ve been told. I do best when I eat early, ideally by 7:00pm, and sleep by 10:00pm. This was initially unsettling to me and while it rarely happens given my schedule, it’s my reality. Many useful learnings have come about by observing my rhythms without judgment. You might be startled or delighted by what you uncover.

“If we can allow some space within our awareness and rest there, we can respect our troubling thoughts and emotions, allow them to come, and let them go. Our lives may be complicated on the outside, but we remain simple, easy, and open on the inside.”— Tsoknyi Rinpoche: Nepalese Tibetan Buddhist teacher and author 

#67: Thriving alongside cobwebs

Simply being alive creates mental impressions. There is no way around it. What so and so said or did that was loving or hurtful. What we did, didn’t do, or couldn’t do. And the longer we live, the more impressions we file away in our brains. The present passes through the prism of time and inevitably turns to sweet memories, painful ones, or regret. Then there is the future, where our goals, hopes and fears that are yet to materialize keep churning dreams and worries. All of these threads tangle up to become mental cobwebs.

We are often reminded that life is lived in the present but that is also where the endless cycle of thoughts, emotions and actions live; one constantly feeding the other and being fed in return. Thoughts: the maker of every action and a gateway to sneaky emotions. Emotions: the often invisible contributor to action, the yanker of our most painful chains and fussy thought patterns. Actions: our primary tool of outward expression, the creator of mental impressions and the fertilizer for more thoughts and emotions.

Simply put, the act of living spins daily cobwebs that may cocoon our psyche and limit our potential to flourish.

Meeting each moment with curiosity and non-attachment is a big part of contemplative practices. We train to drop the weight of past and future so we can move through life lightly with more fluidity and awareness. Some other terms used to describe this idea— A fresh mind, beginner’s mind, child-like, the place of now etc.  The invitation is to show up completely present in the service of the now so we don’t color our actions with regret, worry or fear; so a fresh new trajectory can open up in the moment. A feeling of calm might be what drew us to contemplative practices initially, but we’d be remiss if we stopped there. A sense of calm fills only our vessel but a sense of openess and presence fills every vessel we encounter. Thriving happens when we channel the gift of the human mind, when new growth sprouts amidst the cobwebs.

“What does the Earth ask of us? To meet our responsibilities and to give our gifts. Naming responsibility is often understood as accepting a burden, but in the teachings of my ancestors, responsibilities and gifts are understood as two sides of the same coin. The possession of a gift is coupled with a duty to use it for the benefit of all.”― Robin Wall Kimmerer: scientist, professor, author of Braiding Sweetgrass.

#62: The delicate blue sky

One thing that all astronauts seem to have in common is the awe at witnessing our earth from afar. They speak of the deep emotion and tenderness they felt in the moment and the lasting perspective shift. They mention the thin blue line of our fragile atmosphere, the thing protecting our precious planet from the onslaught of space to make life possible. The same sky that appears to those of us on earth as infinite, everlasting and indestructible. While we enjoy the sky and its many stories―the dawn, the multihued sunsets, the star-studded night sky, and the enchanting moon―we don’t really think about the sky itself. It’s such a constant that it’s often invisible to us. We think it has always been there and it will always be there.

But the astronauts see it differently. They know what’s on the other side. Their veil of illusion has been lifted, making them aware of our small yet important part in maintaining or breaking this natural order. They know how fragile this nourishing blue sky actually is.

Certain life events have the power to show us our version of the delicate blue sky full of similar paradoxes. Each of us will experience these mind-bending and soul-altering events at some point in our lives. Childbirth and loss of a loved one are two examples that come to mind. They will make things more visible and impossible to take for granted. They will highlight the life-giving qualities of something alongside a sharp reminder of its fragility. They will pluck us away from our everyday to shove us in the presence of the divine. They will create a desire to tend to something deeper alongside a primordial reminder of our impermanence. They will create anxiety and discomfort.

If we sit long enough in this discomfort though, we’ll see a kernel of fearlessness amidst fear. We will see more clearly the things we have control over and those that we don’t. We will realize how truly miniscule we are compared to the limitless life. But we might also see that each of our lives has significance and a unique assignment the way each cell in the body does. And that this significance lies In shaping ourselves and contributing in ways only we can; in tending to our unique little footprint in time and space with integrity and love, not in the outsized actions and wins that popular culture might have us believe. Life asks us to tend to only our footprint, no more and no less, not because it wont fade but because before it fades it will impact another and through them another.

When you wake up to your own realization of the delicate blue sky, pause long enough to soak-in the questions that animate you. Note your version of the delicate blue sky. Note what you are called to tend to. Because when we each tend to our small footprint, we ensure every version of the delicate blue sky is tended to across time.

“Look again at that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every “superstar,” every “supreme leader,” every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there–on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.
…There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we’ve ever known.”― Carl Sagan, Astronomer and Astrophysicist. Pale Blue Dot, 1994