You might be wondering, why doesn’t he just focus on one: meditation or the sleep schedule? Well, the problem is that they rely on one another. The sleep schedule makes the meditation possible and vice-versa. On top of all of this, I have a volunteer project that I’m abominably overdue on. That’s an energy sap, but I refuse to cave on that one.

A thought comes to mind of one of the greatest real-life examples of the “re-route power” analogy: The Apollo 13 mission. If you haven’t seen the movie Apollo 13, you really should. It’s a masterpiece and pretty accurate, as well.

Having cut power to everything, they barely survived until it was time to start-up everything for the last part of their journey. But there was a problem: If they started up everything, then they wouldn’t have enough juice. No matter how they arranged it, no matter what permutations they used, it just wasn’t enough.

I found myself in the same situation. I needed enough willpower to get my meditation and sleep schedules started, but I’m starting from a point of exhaustion. Today, after artfully letting an emotional gut-punch at work roll off me, I decided that I was going to deliberately relax. My focus is getting back on balance. For the rest, I’m going to be gentle with myself. Yes, I’m going to continue to eat healthy. Yes, I’m still going to a job wherein people scream demands for the impossible. And yet, having made the determination to be good to myself, I find the situation already changed. I’m meditating tonight, and I’ve cooked up a couple of ways to make sure that I’m up when I need to be. The rest will take care of itself.

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On the other hand, noticing the raw currents of my thoughts and feelings has its ups and downs.

Sir Terry Pratchett writes of a fantasy blend of coffee that makes one “knurd”. This messes with your reality just as much as alcohol does, but in the opposite direction: Your clarity, memory, and understanding of the world sharpens to uncomfortable and then unbearable levels. In a strike of pure genius, one of his characters, a recovering alcoholic, is described as being naturally knurd to a small degree. He kept intuitively trying to find balance, and missing horribly. But I digress.

I’m feeling a little knurd today. It’s normal and I’ll adapt, but still a little uncomfortable.

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In other news, I seem to be rapidly returning to the tonal I remember. Making those existential “bookmarks” seems to have helped.

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Optimizing will only take you so far. Can you trust enough to go further?

I’ve been scavenging for bits and pieces of knowledge and skill for a long time. And it’s served me well. But the large-ish problem with that is that you can only stretch an existing setup so far before you have to start up something new.

Take stories for example: Sequels are notorious for being of inferior quality to the original, and long series tend to lose their focus and wind up with fans wishing for the early days.

Before the blog went on hiatus, I was starting to work with a meditation system that was simple enough to be useable, yet very far-reaching in its effects. The system has a core, or “foundation”, and you can study different branches of the knowledge from there.

Not long ago I was studying the topic of Surrender. Here I have to make explanations as I try to suppress my frustration with that word. Surrender in terms of meditation and inner development is vastly different from the normal meaning of the word.

Surrender in the day-to-day world means giving up, being defeated, throwing in the towel. This is not what I am talking about. This is an altogether different experience, and the only reason that “surrender” is used, is because it is the only word which comes close.

Surrender in the realm of personal, spiritual and psychic development is more akin to learning to move past the comfortable, yet restricting, thoughts and energies that we bind ourselves with. But surrendering them we become free.

Learning Surrender.

As I mentioned in my post regarding the Sedona Method, learning to let go can open doors you didn’t even know were there. My work on releasing was helpful to me, but Surrender goes beyond letting go of hurts and expectations. Surrender, in this context, is learning to trust. Learning to open yourself up to experiencing what the Universe wants to show you. All of the little things we hang onto are in fact holding us down, turning us into machines.

By learning to open yourself, you find that you don’t have as much need to fear (or any at all, really, but it’s difficult to maintain this state of being). You can be true to yourself, and act from the best place in you.

My Experience With Surrender Techniques.

Being primed with my Sedona experience and knowledge, I pretty much figured I had the “letting go” thing down. I have a coach I work with and he advised me to try working a little differently.

I started setting aside some time dedicated to the process of just letting go. I started making more progress, and I felt more flowing and adaptable, so I kept going. No big breakthroughs.

Then, one evening I was working with Surrender just before my normal evening meditation session. As patterns, events, and people came up, I released them. I wanted to see how far I could go. Eventually, I came to the image of a singular point, represented by a blue sphere, like a glowing rubber ball. This ball was resting on a concrete platform, and was (interestingly enough) wearing what looked like Renaissance metal armor, complete with a plumed helmet.

The blue point/sphere was obviously myself. What chilled me was that as I looked closer at the armor, I realized that it wasn’t what it appeared to be. What at first appeared to be protection, instead was slowly revealed to be tie-downs, chains of imprisonment.

Using the techniques I’d been taught, I started releasing the various pieces of armor, and all that went with them. It took time, but I was down to the concrete platform. I knew that it, too, had to go. Yet, I was still afraid. If I give up this solidity, how will I keep my bearings? How will my mind work without this solid structure in place?

It was at this moment, that a half-remembered quote from years out of the past floated across my mind. Here is the original:

One does not discover new lands without consenting to lose sight of the shore for a very long time.
-Andre Gide

Realizing that I would not progress unless I was able to stand on my own without this construct, I was finally able to step off the platform and let it go. The peace, excitement, and love that I experienced then can be hinted at with words, but must be experinced to really be understood.

Finding the Courage.

Of course it’s scary; As one of my favorite teachers is fond of saying, “If it were easy, everybody would do it”. But, it is worth it. If you feel like you are in a place where you can learn to let go and truly be yourself without the baggage and garbage, then I urge you to seize the opportunity. May you find the courage to take the leap.

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It’s not a cure-all, however: Focusing on learning to the point of forgetting to actually engage in life will also backfire. It is tempting to think that with just a little more knowledge suddenly the path will open for you and it’ll be smooth sailing. Unfortunately, this is almost never the case.

(On a side-note: You do get experiences like that, but they tend to happen when you’re putting forth the effort and engaging life. Suddenly, a new bit of knowledge makes your efforts much easier and/or more effective. Book learning and hands-on learning are compliments, not opposites.)

When I occasionally feel overwhelmed at life, one thing which I tend to do is to ask myself what I’m learning. This is actually a bit of a sucker play: The act of doing so starts a process of analyzing what’s going on in life for new lessons. That and a review of what I am/have been learning recently remind me that I am still moving forward in my journey, and that while I may feel like a becalmed ship, the currents are still taking me where I want to go.

If you would like to read more about how to make the most of the experiences life hands you, please subscribe to the RSS feed.

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The more I work to better myself, the more I notice a certain trend: When I fail to meditate as much as I should or times when my emotions get away from me, I find a rather disturbing fact: I gave my permission for this to happen. This is what I desired to have happen, and I created the scenario.

A difficult thing to look at. It’s not pretty. “Oh, gee, I got too wrapped up in (insert mundane task here) to meditate. Darn, that really is too bad.” Well, yes, it is too bad. But I also am honest enough with myself at this point to realize that I made it happen. I knew that time was running short, and that while the mundane task would hold, getting my meditation practice in wouldn’t.

I find much the same whenever I push the envelope, and encounter resistance. I can usually identify resistance these days. The thing is that now I have to do some growing up to look it and myself in the eye and work past it. Like all resistance, it works from a whisper and then puts me entirely off track if left alone:

• First, a distraction will take my immediate focus off the issue at hand. This can either be a road-bump or something outside the context entirely.
• Now that my attention is diverted, I sidestep making real progress by working through whatever it is that has been brought to my attention. The longer this persists, the harder it is to get back on track.
• Almost always I find that on some level I am aware of the whole process.
• Ironically, I tend to get back on focus when it is just too late. This builds remorse and threatens a scenario in which I start beating myself up. Such behavior (of course) only reinforces the same pattern the next time.

Obviously, the most effective time to handle such cases is as early as possible. Simple procrastination gimmicks can help, but unless you really know what’s going on, they’ll be weak at best. Recognizing the pattern, and striving to break it is starting to yield some results for me, but the thing to keep in mind is to keep sniffing for that first wisp of smoke, and not let it get any further.

If you’d like to read more about how to keep focused on your goals, please subscribe to the RSS feed.

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Lately, there’s been a lot of goings on in my life. Some would be considered “good” and some would be considered “bad”. One notable aspect has been that the amount of general stress in my life has gone up. While my meditative practice has helped with this, I was still losing ground, and didn’t know what to do.

For those of you who may remember, I’ve studied the Sedona Method. While this has been of great benefit to me, I made the (let’s call a spade a spade, shall we?) bonehead mistake of forgetting to apply it when it was needed. I was used to thinking of the technique as a “fix” for a “problem”, and not an ongoing process, much like I spoke about meditation the other day.

This has led to my stress levels getting higher and higher. This, in turn, has led to what I’m going to call “hardware glitches”: The beginning health problems I’ve been seeing recently. Today, throughout the course of the day, an event triggered me to use some of my techniques for handling tough emotions and situations. 90% of the stress, frustration, and all of that evaporated. Astonished at the result (and somewhat chagrined that I’d been doing things the hard way) I decided to have a look at the good and the bad.

The Good.

Being one to take the good news first, I focused on that first. What went right? Well, the technique I used worked the way it should (Sedona Method). The second thing that went right was that my mental trigger to use the technique fired when it was supposed to, and that saved me from mental/emotional overload. Much like Mr. Miyagi’s “Wax on, wax off”, I was primed to respond, and just needed the stimulus. Score one for the home team.

So, everything’s working. That’s good news. Yet, obviously there was a problem if I allowed myself to get pushed off balance as easily as that. So, let’s look at the bad news.

The Bad.

Ok, so everything is technically working. That is, it works when called upon. When it isn’t called upon, it doesn’t work. Makes me think of the first rules of electronics:

1. Make sure it’s plugged in.
2. Make sure it’s turned on.

So, obviously there’s something wrong in the “program” to not handle the situation. Upon closer inspection, I narrowed it down to the work environment (I was pretty sure, but had to check). Ultimately, it turned out to be that I was set to react to external events, whereas in my recently adjusted work environment, I needed to make sure to preemptively handle internal bumps and stresses. In other words, my internal monitoring was sub-par. This was partly due to the fact that with with more “hurry up and wait” going on, it was harder to steal a few seconds here and there to check my mental/emotional status.

The Game Plan.

Having figured this out, I decided to take immediate steps. First, I resolved to use the Sedona method or whatever appropriate technique at every open opportunity “whether I needed it or not”. This presented a huge relief, as I was much more able to handle what came my way. This weekend I’ll be going over what to look for to make sure I don’t get pushed this far off balance the same way again.

Practice is such an interesting word. It can mean an activity wherein you train yourself in a certain skill or ability. It can also mean a process of continual pursuit and improvement. My practice of these technologies to improve my life have given my perspective to see how to move forward, and some tools to help me do just that.

If you’d like to hear more about how to be at your best when things are at their worst, please subscribe to the RSS feed.

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I must admit, it’s been tough getting back in the groove here at Technology for Living. First, there was the future-posts. That instigated a micro-burnout in-and-of itself. The craziness and absence of the habit of writing put more distance between myself and this, which has been my passion for quite some time now.

When I realized that there was more going on than just being a little tired and rusty, I knew that I had to haul it out and have a look at it. What I found was interesting.

There was a part of me that liked having a little extra time to do absolutely nothing. There was a part of me that was remorseful that the quality of this blog has been sub-par. There was a part of me that still had a bad taste in its mouth from my frenzied writing spree. A large part of me is simply tired of the fight. Tired of trying to mediate all these disparate elements. Tired of the struggle to be the best I can possibly be.

When that part of me has had its say, another part of me quietly comes to its feet. It speaks of the exhilaration and joy that this blog has brought me, from the beginning up through today. It reminds me that I’m not simply doing this blog for personal gratification. I am an active agent of the Force (or Divine Will, God, The Is, you name it). To give over to whining and fussing about a few bumps in the road would not only cheapen what I do, it would be tantamount to betrayal both of myself and of my purpose. Why do I keep fighting? I do so because while the path may become difficult, to leave it would be unthinkable.

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One interesting phenomenon that I haven’t really discussed is the interesting fact that the best books on marriage that I’ve read are really all about being a better person. Sounds obvious when I say it like that, doesn’t it? However, when you are looking for romantic reading material to share with that special someone, you aren’t really looking for self-development tools. I wasn’t, at least. (Quick note, here: I’m very happily very married. I picked up the book because I’m all about taking what’s good and making it better, and I figured that this was something to share with my beloved.)

Although this book’s intended purpose is to keep the spark and magic alive in a marriage, it approaches this topic from a radically different perspective from most such books in that it doesn’t start off assuming that either you or your partner are abnormal. It instead treats the marriage itself as (amongst other things) a way of becoming a better person. The author sometimes refers to it as a “people growing machine”.

The author has four ideas to keep in mind, four keys to making the most of your marriage. These traits and skills are:

1. A clear sense of self.
2. The ability to soothe yourself, not requiring someone else to do it for you.
3. The ability to be “non-reactive”, not to be thrown off balance when your partner is.
4. The willingness to experience discomfort in the name of progress and growth.

These are powerful, and as I was reveiwing them in my mind I realized that I’d come back to the exact same place where I usually find myself, but by an entirely unexpected road. While these are good for enhancing a committed relationship, they are also tenets for self-development in general. The clearer an idea you have of who you are, the better you are at handling your own emotions, the more you can keep your balance, and the more you have the courage of your convictions the more you can forge ahead in your life.

Interestingly enough, the author also mentions a common yet commonly overlooked way to practice and hone these skills: Being married . Through the inevitable frictions and disagreements, you and your partner help each other develop these skills. Here is an environment where you may not want that kind of “help” but ask anyone who’s married and you’ll find that you’ll get it just the same .

Interestingly enough, this is not the only such book with insights on personal growth based on relationships, but probably the only one I’ll mention here. The impressive work in this book (or short audio course) are so impressive that I couldn’t resist. If you would like to know more, check out the book:

• Passionate Marriage: Keeping Love and Intimacy Alive in Committed Relationships

Or check out the audio (2 CDs. Also available as instantly available mp3s.)

• Secrets of a Passionate Marriage

If you would like to read more about how to grow and improve every day, please subscribe to the RSS feed.

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As I mentioned yesterday, I recently had a minor catastrophe. Me, Mr. Monitor Eyes, had my computer finally give up. This was actually a good time for it to happen. Why? Simply because I’d been pushing the envelope and had the week’s worth of posts (but not the podcast) ready to go.

I try to avoid meta-blogging, but a few details may be needed here: Most blogging platforms will let you queue up posts to be published when you decide. For most of the life of this blog, I had been writing and publishing “just in time”. Recently I got feedback that more regularity and coherence was desired, so I put forth the effort and blogged two weeks into the future. I knew that this big jump was necessary because I would be unable to blog the first week, so I figured I should “flex the muscles” so to speak.

Needless to say, I did it, but I had pushed farther than was good for me. That started a chain reaction which ended up with me utterly exhausted and now trying to fight off the early stages of the local flu.

The Red Line.

Remember the red line on a tachometer? Your engine is designed to peak there, not stay there. I’d been running at the red line so long that I’d forgotten the cost that comes with it. You tend to wear things out. Now I’m paying the price.

Would I go back and change it? Absolutely not. Firstly, I managed to keep the blog (more or less) running like clockwork for you while chaos reigned. No small accomplishment if I do say so myself. More than that, I have gained a priceless lesson. Calibrating the “sweet spot” for the biggest payoff for effort takes all kinds of data, and most of it will be either lackluster results or feeling kinda like your brain has been deep-fried. The real challenge comes in picking up and moving on. Like I said yesterday, it’s really good to be back.

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