Day 65: Unwind

Posted on March 6, 2014 by joshdaddy

I guess I mean that word in a particular way–as in: Now that you’ve gotten yourself so wound up, do you think you might be able to unwind?

Much as I would like to imagine myself as serenely floating through my day, mindful in my actions and compassionate in my interactions, that’s just not the truth. There are times when I get very tense, and when I do, I tend to become very reactive and impatient. It’s not like I don’t know what my triggers are–running late is a big one. And it’s not like I don’t know when I’m more vulnerable to becoming reactive–when I’m overtired, for example. None of this foreknowledge, though, is enough to keep me from slipping over that line from time to time.

So tonight was one of those nights, I guess. Nothing huge or traumatic happened–just your run-of-the-mill mix of impatience, irritation, and exasperation with family and strangers alike.  And once I get to that place, the challenge is finding a way to step back across that line and back into a more comfortable and comforting way of being.

And that’s what I’ve been doing. Over and over. I catch myself over-reacting to something; I apologize; I find a way to be less reactive. Then I catch myself with that sharp tone of irritation in my voice; I apologize; etc. Rinse and Repeat.

While I chose to frame today’s challenge (read: struggle) as “unwind,” as the day comes to a close, I find myself thinking about a passage from Thich Hhat Hanh’s Your True Home on the “knots” that form in us, and how to untie them.

When someone says something unkind to us, for example, if we do not understand why he said it and we become irritated, a knot will be tied in us. The lack of understanding is the basis of every internal knot. If we practice mindfulness, we can learn the skill of recognizing a knot the moment it is tied in us and finding ways to untie it. Internal formations need our full attention as soon as they form, while they are still loosely tied, so that the work of untying them will be easy.

That passage is enough to make me unwind a bit–to recognize that the goal (I hesitate to use that word) is not to discover a means of living in the world free of these internal formations, but to find ways to loosen their grip on me before I get too tightly bound.

Now that I can work with.

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Day 64: Transplant

Posted on March 5, 2014 by joshdaddy

I’ve had an avocado tree in my office almost as long as I have been at my school–around seven years, I’d guess. It started out as an avocado seed suspended by four toothpicks in a peanut butter jar full of water–something I did with and for the boys when they were around pre-school age. It shot out roots and sprouted leaves, just like it was meant to do. After time, it got too big for its own toothpicks–and faced with the choice of throwing it in the yard as compost or putting it in a pot, I decided to keep it growing.

It stayed at home for a little while, maybe a few months, but as it got taller, I decided to bring it into the office, and that’s where it’s been ever since.

I have to say, that tree has had a hard life. On a fairly regular basis, it goes through a major stress that just about kills it–usually around the winter holidays, when the school cuts the heat in the building and no one is around to water it.

This year, it got hit hard. The tree stands around four feet tall, and after a major die-back, it has two, precarious sprouts and four shriveled leaves. It looks so bad right now that I’m going to save you from having to look at such a depressing picture.

So I figured it was time for a make-or-break move. I haven’t moved it to a new pot for some time, and it had definitely outgrown its container, so today I decided to re-pot the avocado. Either the tree would thrive in its new home, or it would go the way of all things….

As I was thinking about what I planned on posting for today, I had to ask myself: is transplanting an avocado tree really an experiment in living simply? Here’s why I answered yes to that question and why I made this simple act today’s point of focus.

It really comes down to this: other than me, that plant is the only other living, breathing regular occupant of my office. As odd as it may sound, I actually care about this plant, and I don’t want to see it die. So now it becomes a matter of doing whatever I need to do today to support its living, and to experience the hope that those actions embody.

And there’s a secondary point here as well, perhaps just as important: in order to care for this plant, occasionally I need to get my hands dirty. Granted, there are lots of people who get their hands dirty every day at work, but mine is not that kind of occupation. Don’t get me wrong–I love what I do; but there is something refreshing about feeling the dirt in my hands in a place where I am so unaccustomed to touching earth.

In transplanting the avocado tree, I also managed to transplant myself, if only for a moment, into a very different kind of experience of being in the day.

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Day 63: Walk

Posted on March 4, 2014 by joshdaddy

IMG_2078My oldest had to stay late after school today for an audition, which meant instead of him going home with his carpool ride, I had to pick him up on my way back from work. Not a big inconvenience, by any means, but the rehearsal ran until 5:30pm, which meant either staying late at the office, or finding something else to do while I waited.

So guess what I chose today.

I few weeks back, I wrote about trying to stop during the day to make time and space for some quiet reflection. But it was only about a week ago that I came to the realization that I could pause at any time during my day to do just that. So on the drive to my son’s school, I started to think about where I might find a quiet place to step out of my daily routine and enjoy the moment.

I remembered that there was a small park tucked away not too far from his school, with a little lake. I had seen it on a map, and had driven by it at least once (on a failed attempt to bypass traffic, no doubt), but I had never actually stepped foot in the park. Given how close it sat to my son’s school, it seemed like a perfect place to spend a half hour.

Instead of sitting, though, I decided to walk. I found a trail that led around the lake, so I headed out down the path. My first thought was entirely goal-oriented: let’s see if I can make it around the lake before I have to leave. Wrong approach. Instead, I decided simply to walk, look, and IMG_2074listen, keeping vaguely aware of time–and after fifteen minutes, turn around and walk back. Yes, I admit: I did interrupt my walking two or three times to take a picture, thinking ahead to this moment when I would be writing about this walk, but a hundred yards in, I put away my phone and just enjoyed the quiet.

There were others walking too–an older couple with their two dogs, a jogger, a woman walking on her own–so it was certainly not an experience of solitude. Nor was I entirely remote. Yes, I was “in nature,” but I was also very much in the middle of a city. But what I managed to carve out for myself in that half hour was a moment that I do not usually give myself, and certainly not at 5pm–a moment bound to no agenda and no plan.

I wouldn’t go as far as to say that it was a “walking meditation,” but it certainly provided me with more focus and reflection than an extra half hour at the office.

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Day 62: Detach

Posted on March 4, 2014 by joshdaddy

IMG_2070…with love, of course, as the saying goes.

So tonight is going to have to be another Monday evening quickie.

Not too long ago, I read about another blogger’s refrigerator magnet de-clutter project. Admittedly, it’s not a major, life-changing undertaking to clear off your fridge, but that’s about the portion size I need for today, so that’s the task that I took on.

We have stuff on our refrigerator that has been there for years. Case in point–the kids are well beyond three-letter “spelling machine” toys, but our fridge is still covered with plastic letter magnets. All of that stuff: detached from the fridge and sent down to the basement, awaiting the IMG_2072next charity pick-up. Then there are the random, assorted freebie magnets that showed up in our house through some form of junk mail or solicitation. One calendar magnet, advertising a local realtor, dated back to 2010. Pretty much all of those went in the trash (except the poison control magnet and the urgent care magnet). And then there are the random bits of paper that manage to get attached to the fridge as well.

The hardest part–the pictures. Some of the old photos really didn’t have much sentimental value to them in the first place. Those were the easy ones. But some of those cute pictures from when the kids were really young…well, those will just have to stay up.

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Day 61: Maneuver

Posted on March 2, 2014 by joshdaddy

Today was not really the day I expected it to be.

I have a big writing project due in less than two weeks. With everything else that has been going on at home and at work, I haven’t had a lot of time to dedicate to this project. So that was my big goal for the day–knock out as much writing as I could.

I didn’t get much further than an hour or so into it when the kids started to get rowdy. We were still at my in-laws, and my wife was tending to her father and mother–which meant my job was now to keep the kids occupied.

So I packed everyone up in the van, dragged them off to the store to run an errand, then went out to lunch. By the time we got back, it was getting close to 2pm, and I had lost the flow of writing. Instead, I decided to get to that other project that I had put off for so long–repairing the broken handles on the van.

Yes, the parts finally arrived, and I had loaded them into the van this weekend on the chance that I would have time to swap them out for the broken handles. All I needed to do now was to commit to doing the actual manual labor.

I have to admit: I’m really not terribly handy, and projects like this can get me bent out of shape. In fact, I almost bailed on the project entirely today on the excuse that if I messed up badly enough we would have to drive home to Atlanta with a disassembled door. Rather than balk, though, I decided I would give it a shot and hope for the best.

So it struck me that since I wasn’t going to get any more writing done, perhaps today was really all about my hands, not my head.

I managed to take off the door panel and remove the old handle without breaking anything else or dropping any screws down inside the door. It was a little struggle getting things reassembled, but with only one or two bouts of exasperation and minor cussing, I managed to get everything back together and functional.

The second handle went even better. A simpler job, true, but by this point I had started to overcome my doubts; I started to believe that I could actually get the job done.

I would be lying if I were to say that the entire process of fixing these handles was a study in mindful action. Maybe in moments, here and there, but the bigger gift for me today was simply being able to enjoy (for the most part) working with my hands instead of what I am usually working with–thoughts and words.

I like the word maneuver as a focal point for today, since not only does it suggest the kind of repositioning I experienced in shifting from language work to body work, but etymologically it literally means “hand work.”

It also shares the same etymology as the word manure–and it’s good to be reminded every now and then that there’s a difference between cultivating handiwork and merely spreading around fertilizer.

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Day 60: Endure

Posted on March 1, 2014 by joshdaddy

I know the word “endure” usually has such negative connotations, but that’s not what I’m after here.

In looking at the Wordle graphic from yesterday, I was struck by the fact that the word I used most over the past two months on this blog was “today.” Probably not too surprising for a daily blog, but two of the other top words were also time-related: “day” and “time.”

So that got me thinking about time today (there’s that word again), and how we experience it. To borrow from a bit of French philosophy: the way we usually think about time, we treat it as though it were space. In other words: we treat time as though it stretched out in a line, one thing after another. We measure time as though we could lie minutes out against a ruler and count them off, one by one.

But we live time on a different order–as duration. When we are “in the moment,” time doesn’t stand still, but it feels different. Instead of measuring time pass, we experience it as an unfolding process. Time passes, but duration becomes and endures. I think that must be part of the reason why childhood summers seemed to operate under such a different logic of time, compared to the regimented days of the school year. But that’s enough philosophy–if you want a bit more, feel free to head off to Wikipedia and read up on Bergson….

So for today, my focus has been on becoming aware of the moment I am in, not the succession of minutes connecting my past to my future. I found this attention to duration particularly useful during those “moments” today when I caught myself becoming impatient. Rather than thinking about keeping to a schedule, or whether or not I was on time or running late, today I did my best to just let the moment I am in unfold. I could literally feel the moment shift, and in that shifting, I could feel myself becoming more aware of what was going on right in front of me.

We’re down at my in-laws again for a visit. My father-in-law is doing pretty well today, but we really don’t know how long that will last. It’s hard not to think about how many weeks, or months, or years we might have left with him. It’s good for today, though, to remind ourselves to appreciate the enduring moments we have together as they unfold.

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Day 59: Distill

Posted on February 28, 2014 by joshdaddy

wordleWell, here we are at the end of February. Last month, I took a couple of days to review everything I had written, and to try to extract some patterns in all of these daily experiments. I thought I would try something similar today, but more visual. I plugged the entire contents of the past 58 days of blogging into Wordle to create a word cloud, and this is what I got.

I’m going to pretty much let this image speak for itself as a blog post–and use it as a mandala of sorts for myself. Some of what I see here resonates with me pretty strongly–seeing “today” as the largest word, for example. And some of what I see probably just reflects the conversational tone of many of these posts (using “pretty” twice in this paragraph, for example).

So with more then 28,500 words behind me, I think I could use a short post at this point, and one that is so visual. So that’s it for now–and perhaps tomorrow I can bring what I see here into a little more focus.

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Day 58: Tackle

Posted on February 27, 2014 by joshdaddy

IMG_2054OK, so the other day I wrote about how all of this effort to bring order to the house was feeling a bit like fighting the tide. I discovered in the midst of that frustration that if I could simply focus on the action in front of me–instead of what should have been done in the past, or what needs to be done in the future–I didn’t have to feel that same discouragement. So in a similar spirit, today I decided to tackle that wellspring of all chaos in our house: the TV room.

I’ve made many attempts to get this particular room pulled together, and usually the results last for less than 24 hours. Honestly, it’s become a space that we’ve pretty much surrendered to the kids in all of their frantic mayhem. Unfortunately, though, it is also one of the most central rooms in the house, connecting directly to the kitchen and leading to the downstairs bedrooms and the stairs to the second floor.

So tonight, regardless of what this room might look like tomorrow, I cleared out everything that I could–I found toys and puzzles and stuffed animals tucked in corners and under cabinets that no one has played with (or noticed) in years. Those all went down to the basement in a donation bag. Clothes that normally get piled up on the couch ended up in dirty clothes hampers, or on hangers or in drawers. Towers of books made it to appropriate bookshelves (with every effort made to avoid double- and triple-stacking.)

And so on. The result: for tonight at least, we have a room that is comfortable and inviting–a room that I can sit in and not feel like I am surrounded by chaos.

IMG_2056I’ve talked about the importance of building allies in the family–grown ups and children alike. As I was putting the room in order and clearing out the clutter, my middle child started to ask me questions about this blog. And then my youngest piped in as well. Now, it’s not as though they suddenly displayed an overwhelming urge to clear out their rooms of unneeded clutter–or even that they were very enthusiastic in lending a hand when I asked for help. But I did get the feeling that they understood that what I was trying to do was more than just “clean up” or “organize” a room. It was about making space for a way of living that is less likely to produce an accumulation of castaway attachments.

We’ll have to see how this room looks in 24 hours. I guess instead of just posting “before” and “after” pictures I should also post an “after the after” picture to see what sticks….

For now, though, I will enjoy the space I have created for us all. And tomorrow morning, when I come downstairs, I will be faced with a less chaotic space in which to start my day.

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Day 57: Yield

Posted on February 26, 2014 by joshdaddy

IMG_2048Meet our new coffee maker.

No, I wouldn’t call it minimalist. Nor is it very simple. But it is ours now, and I’m sure it will do just fine.

Our old coffee maker somehow sprang a leak. It took us some time to realize that the little bit of water we were seeing under the coffee maker wasn’t the result of careless filling of the reservoir. No, something had cracked inside, and now with every pot we brewed, water would seep out of the bottom and make a little puddle. This went on for a few weeks. As the leak grew worse, we had to resort to putting a plate under the coffee maker, just to keep the water from running down the counter and onto the floor. This morning, 10 cups of water poured into the machine only gave me 8 cups of coffee. No question about it: we needed to get rid of that machine.

But before I could volunteer to pop out to the store to purchase another $29.99 replacement, my wife said she would be more than happy to pick up the new coffee maker.

A little back story: about two months ago, before we realized that the old coffee maker was broken, my wife had come home one day with what I would consider to be a rather high end coffee machine. Now this was in the midst of December, with all of its Christmas purchases (and rapidly rising credit card bills), so I pointed out to her that the last thing we needed to be spending money on was a fancy, new coffee maker, when our old machine was working just fine. I asked her to return it, and she did.

So when she volunteered the other day to pick up our replacement, I had a pretty good idea which coffee maker my wife had in mind….

Now, I’ve known plenty of friends who have had major spousal arguments over appliance purchases that carry a much higher price tag than a coffee maker, that’s for sure. So in this instance, rather than getting into a self-righteous rant on minimalism and simplicity (I can hear me now: “You think Thoreau would make his coffee in this thing?”) it struck me that the best path here was to simply let go of a potential point of conflict and yield to my wife’s decision. I mean, it is only a coffee maker.

And I’m sure it will make a mighty fine cup of coffee tomorrow morning.

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Day 56: Intend

Posted on February 25, 2014 by joshdaddy

I have been a little down on myself over the past couple of days. I’ve started to see some things slip. The past two mornings, my alarm has been set for 6:15am instead of 6am, which means I haven’t had time to start my day with quiet sitting. In fact, I’ve caught myself picking up my phone before I’ve even made it downstairs to get the coffee going. And some of the clutter is starting to creep back in around the edges–an unassuming little pile or two on the dining table. A board game that the kids took out over the weekend, still left sitting in the living room. A couple of crumpled receipts pulled out of my wallet and tossed on the dresser….

That sort of thing.

I’ve already written on the need to sustain all of these efforts to live more simply as a form of daily discipline or practice. I get that. But this morning I was starting to feel a bit like I was struggling against Newton’s Second Law….

So I made the bed.

And I felt better.

As with so much of what I have written about over the past two months, what I’m learning is that the most important act is the one I am undertaking right now.

Later in the day, I received a comment on a blog post from almost two months ago. The focus for that day had been: “Stop.” Getting that comment today brought me back to that day during the first week of this experiment, and what it had been like on that particular day to intentionally and deliberately stop what I was doing in the middle of my day to make time and space for quiet.

What a great tool that was, just to stop for a moment during the day, I thought to myself as I was walking across campus. Then I realized: Hey! I could do that–right here, and right now.

And so I did. I found a place to sit, brought my day to a stop, and sat quietly, if only for five minutes, to listen and observe.

I often think of Thoreau’s call to live deliberately, and what that means on a daily basis. At its simplest, I suppose, it’s about acting intentionally–being aware of what you are doing, and doing it with intent. I shut off lights all the time, but today, as I turned off a light, I thought about my energy fast, and what it would mean to be more deliberate in how I use electricity.

And so on.

I’ve managed to put together 55 days of little experiments in living more simply and directly. As a result, I now have a growing collection of tools with me on any given day that I can turn to help me along the way. And goodness knows I will probably need all the help I can get as I head down this path!

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