Mindfulness, Washing Dishes, and Making Tea

The Art of Appreciative Indifference

I am reading this wonderful book right now: Your Money or Your Life.  I ordinarily do not like books about managing money or making money or being the next millionaire.  Not that Suze Orman is too aggressive or anything, but Suze Orman is too aggressive.  Your Money or Your Life is just right in a Zen sort of way.  

I knew the book would be right for me when, in its first few pages, it referenced the seminal book on voluntary simplicity (titled, ahem, Voluntary Simplicity) by Duane Elgin. 

So, what nugget have I learned in this book on my “incessant learning” quest? 

• Separate your work from your wages! 

What does that mean? 

1. You are not your work. (Don’t confuse what you do with who you are.)  Thus, the cocktail answer to the cocktail question shouldn’t always be “I am this” or “I am that.”  How about “I am Chris. I love habanero peppers and spending time with my wife and son.  Oh, and I work for wages as a copy editor.”

2. Don’t let work get you stressed. You won’t let work get you stressed if you realize that your work is not the essence of who you are (this is, evidently, the way many people think.  You can see them buzzing from place to place, all hurried and harried, because their job is so stressful).  A good side effect to this realization is that you’ll actually get more done simply because you’re not letting your self-important ego get in the way to distract you.

3. Be ego-free.  Since your work is not the world’s focus, you can actually free yourself from self-importance and accomplish more with your time. Self-importance and excessive worry is downright tiring. In law school, there were many (some, to be fair) egos controlling their owners, directing them to speak like a self-important lawyer should speak, or argue for the sake of argument and put-downs, etc.  (You can find this anywhere – not just law school.) I tried to steer away from all that.  By separating your work from your wages, you will realize that being ego-free is truly the way to go. 

4. Reach for higher things.  Without worrying about what other people think about me or my work, I can do the best job with what I have.  In my current work for wages as a copy editor / project manager, I build the best Web sites I can utilizing my language and interviewing strengths.  This work bolsters my pursuit of other goals and interests, such as appellate advocacy and novel writing. Without worrying about whether or not certain things actually happen, I can pursue my interests knowing that I only fail when I refuse to try again. 

So when I separate my real self from my wages, I realize that I’m more than my job, and it feels pretty good. 

The Nothing is Impossible Theory

I am getting close to finishing Neuromancer, and I am adding it to my list of favorites under the sci-fi  category.  (Eww, science fiction.  Gross.)  No.  It’s not gross.  It’s very cool, this science fiction, and it’s one big reason your iPhone exists.  Let me take it a step further and say that writing (and thinking) is a catalyst for turning the impossible into the real.   

Here’s a passage from Wikipedia about author William Gibson: “In his afterword to the 2000 re-issue of Neuromancer, fellow author Jack Womack suggests that Gibson’s vision of cyberspace may have inspired the way in which the Internet (and the Web particularly) developed, following the publication of Neuromancer in 1984, asking “what if the act of writing it down, in fact, brought it about?” 

Let’s take a closer look at Jack’s last sentence:

What if the act of writing it down, in fact, brought it about?

This is absolutely one of my favorite theories: that whatever we’ve conceived in our minds and put down in books and movies can actually exist in reality, is DESTINED to exist in reality.  

I never got into Star Trek, but I loved Star Wars.  If you don’t understand the difference, then I’ve lost you.  If you’re still here, then you will agree with me when I say that both Star Trek and Star Wars had “warp speed”, or travel at the speed of light, allowing the spaceship to travel enormous distances in a relatively short period of time.  Travel to the stars.    

Impossible, today, I know.  So not based in reality.  So geeky.  So science fiction!  But however implausible light speed travel seems to all of us today, the fact that we have thought of it means that it’s destined to exist.  Perhaps it exists already; we just need to unlock the door. 

Just as we’ve done with fossil fuel powered autos.  As we’ve done with flying machines.  As we’ve done with handhelds that can give us any information we want with a signal and a click.

The nothing is impossible theory means that what we’ve thought can be real.

What A Good Lawyer Does

Back to a book from an earlier post, which you can refer to in a moment.

This post is more or less directed to my earlier self, my law school student self, and current law students, many of whom sometimes wonder what it is they’re doing there.  We’re working hard to become lawyers.  But we don’t really know what being a lawyer means.  I didn’t really know what a lawyer did. Even now, it’s difficult to figure out exactly. (Speak for yourself, you might say.) 

Fortunately, someone much smarter than I or at least more experienced (Lawrence Lessig) already has, in his Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace. Well, I guess it was his uncle or some other relative, but nevermind:

“It is what a lawyer does, what a good lawyer does, that makes this system work. It is not the bluffing, or the outrage, or the strategies and tactics. It is something much simpler than that. What a good lawyer does is tell a story that persuades. Not by hiding the truth or exciting the emotion, but using reason, through a story, to persuade.”

Man, that’s good perspective.

The Not-To-Do List

I do a quick Google search to find an online to-do list, something that will help me get things done, because I feel kind of overwhelmed right now and I need to prioritize. 

I find Tim Ferriss’ blog, author of The 4 Hour Workweek, which I haven’t read, but after having read his post on The Not-To-Do List, I probably will.

Tim’s idea is great: instead of creating a list of things to get done, you create a list of things that you won’t do, which in turn frees you to do the things that matter.

One of the things on my not-to-do list: respond to e-mail everytime it comes in.

That Classic Little Handbook

The Elements of Style, by Strunk and White, that classic little handbook I’ve been picking away at over  the last seven months or so.  It sits on my desk, next to my computer, and I read it from time to time, reading about writing.  Today’s quote goes like this:

The beginner should approach style warily, realizing that it is an expression of self, and should turn resolutely away from all devices that are popularly believed to indicate style-all mannerisms, tricks, adornments. The approach to style is by way of plainness, simplicity, orderliness, sincerity.

That quote echoes one of my favorite writer-heroes, William Zinsser (more about his classic handbooks later) who writes about writing, and trumpets simplicity and sincerity.

Simplicity and sincerity are hallmarks of good writing-probably any good writing-whether an appellate brief or a short story. 

At any rate, it’s great to have a copy of The Elements of Style by your side. You’ll refer to it long after you’ve read it through-even if you’re more of a Spunk & Bite, rather than Strunk and White, type of writer.

The New Promulgation

Earlier on Twitter I wrote that Lawrence Lessig was the coolest lawyer / code man. I am currently reading his Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace. Published in 1999, the book is somewhat dated (especially since we’re talking about the Web here), but I still think Code is hip.

Legislatures promulgate rules. These rules become the code that regulates our conduct and behavior. But another group of folks promulgate rules: software developers. These folks promulgate in the form of HTML and a variety of other languages.

In his chapter on regulating code, Lawrence writes:

“Congress passes an endless array of statutes that say in words how to behave. Some statutes direct people; others direct companies; some direct bureaucrats. The technique is as old as government itself: using commands to control.”

Software developers create their own commands. These commands, in turn, control “killer apps” like micro-blogging tool Twitter, allowing journalists (or anyone else) to send realtime tweets on the political debate from inside town hall. That’s just one example of what someone can do with Twitter. And Twitter, like other like-minded programs, is a product of the new promulgation.

Grainy McCain

My friends!

Ever notice how television insists on portraying Senator McCain as some kind of ghost in the screen? As if suddenly everything went from digital to analog again; the image just isn’t quite as clear. The effect makes you think that the footage is from some bygone era, irrelevant and old. This is, however, conjecture. Who knows?

I will, of course, draw an analogy to words. Behold, Michael Crichton of thriller-book fame in State of Fear:

“…there was no scientific basis for eugenics. In fact, nobody at that time knew what a gene really was. The movement was able to proceed because it employed vague terms never rigorously defined. ‘Feeble-mindedness’ could mean anything from poverty and illiteracy to epilepsy. Similarly, there was no clear definition of ‘degenerate’ or ‘unfit’. Vague terminology helped conceal what was really going on.”

What was really going on was genocide in the name of progress. According to Wikipedia, eugenics is a social philosophy. A smarter, healthier, less-suffering human race is its fundamental goal. But if what Mr. Crichton says is true, then it’s quite important to wake up when you come across impotent words like “feeble-mindedness” and “unfit” – or a television network’s subtle use of poor imagery.

Wax Moon Garden

This first snippet is a relevant one for a blog that is, ostensibly, on words. From the pen of Ray Bradbury in his 1953 book Fahrenheit 451:

“So now do you see why books are hated and feared? They show the pores in the face of life. The comfortable people want only wax moon faces, poreless, hairless, expressionless. We are living in a time when flowers are trying to live on flowers, instead of growing on good rain and black loam.”

Until a few days ago our vegetable garden was struggling to survive the onslaught of bunny rabbits. My wife and I put up an imposing wire fence and electrified it. (I’m kidding about the electrified part.) Our wax moon garden is much more comfortable now.