A Competent And Self-confident Person Is Incapable Of Jealousy In Anything. Jealousy Is Invariably A

A competent and self-confident person is incapable of jealousy in anything. Jealousy is invariably a symptom of neurotic insecurity.

Robert A. Heinlein

The universe simply is, and must be accepted as such. That's what makes it so fun.

You Can't Plan It

A few days ago I posted a funny screencap that I made called “I’m Still Alive”.

Today it has almost 26,000 notes, which is bizarre for a number of reasons. The reality is that I wasn’t even going to post it. I thought it was funny, but since you can’t plan on what’s going to hit and what isn’t on the internet, then it seemed passive to me.

Similarly, every week when I arrange a song for you, I have no idea what the response will be. My Game of Thrones arrangement was perhaps one of my favorites, but it went nowhere. It took me 80 hours to complete, and it was a massive undertaking. It was also timed perfectly since I released it when Game of Thrones started its new season.

But then it failed. It got a few notes, few purchases, and although I was scared (scared as in “umm, how am going to eat this week?”), I was mostly dumbfounded.

On the contrast, some of my biggest arrangements are ones that I was doubtful about - either because I was unsure about how my arrangement turned out, or because I hadn’t heard of the band and assumed others hadn’t, too.

Over the years, I’ve witnessed companies strategize and come up with some crazy buzzword or graphic trending chart, but then they learn that nothing goes as planned. Take a look at My Little Pony - they marketed the show to young girls, but guess who their biggest audience is? 35 year old males.

It’s a bizarre concept - the idea that you can’t plan things. So every week I’m reminded more and more about the unpredictability of the internet. And while some would be frustrated about it, I’d have it no other way. It’s fascinating.

Impulse, Discernment, and Daoism

What is your first impulse when you find a bug in your home? Almost invariably, our first thought is to squish the thing. Whether out of fear, anger, or annoyance, we instinctively take action to kill the creature, even though very often it presents absolutely no threat to us. We are conditioned and raised in the modern world to despise all sorts of creepy crawly creatures, so this reaction is not surprising. However it does demonstrate how our impulses can lead us to do things that are frivolous, wanton, and off the Path. Simply because something feels right in the moment doesn’t mean you are acting in harmony by embracing it. Another example would be the sort of people that eat compulsively in reaction to stress or boredom. It is something that I have struggled with in the past, and even today I sometimes find myself drawn to the fridge for no other reason than procrastination. It is a habit that can range from being just unhealthy to absolutely life-threatening in some cases.

Instead of giving in to every one of these impulses, we should always take a moment to think before we act on them. How do I really feel about this action? Are my emotions clouding my judgement? Is this really the only or best course of action for this situation? The Dalai Lama calls this use of our faculties “discernment,” and that it is a vital step for us to truly live our lives more peacefully, more wholesomely, even simply more happily. Although it sounds silly to think about, it is surprising to see how often we are led by our impulses to act without thinking things all the way through. Once we recognize such situations in our everyday routines, we can then begin addressing them and righting ourselves from any number of bad habits and choices. Daoism is about seeing the truth in things, and that means that we must search for the truth of our own actions first of all. And while it may seem daunting to try and examine every action we take over the course of every single day, once you undertake the mindset of choosing your own path down the mountain, it becomes almost second nature to pause yourself before acting out of anger or fear and reevaluate the situation.

Like any new skill, it is difficult to begin, especially when we have been conditioned our entire lives in the opposite direction. In America, it is often a point of pride for people to act without thinking, to go in on nothing more than a “gut feeling.” On one hand, this can appear very Daoist indeed, to simply act in alignment with one’s nature and to not waste time overanalyzing the situation. But because so much of our culture has taken us off the Path already, it is imperative that we exercise our faculties of discernment to truly determine whether our instincts are on the Path or not. If our first reaction to a rude word is immediate violence, you can imagine all the sorts of trouble we could find ourselves in. Only after we have already developed a calm mind can we start to trust our gut feelings again, and even then our gut feelings and intuition are only informed by the breadth and depth of our past experiences. If we react strongly to something we have very little familiarity with, it once again brings up the need for us to introspect ourselves to see what it is we are truly having a reaction to.

Exercising discernment is a passive skill; once you begin to practice it, it is something you can constantly carry with you throughout your journey. It should always be on, always present to help you stop and breathe before committing to a rash decision. For further reading on discernment, I highly recommend the Dalai Lama’s Beyond Religion, a beautiful little book on pursuing a non-religious system of ethics.

Daoism and Change

I had a lovely conversation with a dear friend of mine tonight, mostly regarding our old theater group in college and how's it's changed. I honestly think that one of the most beautiful (and frustrating) things about life is that it's always changing, every day and every moment. It's one of those things in the universe that never changes, as the saying goes. But we shouldn't fear or resist this change, no more than you should try and fight the force of gravity or the rhythm of your band (remember those analogies?). Nostalgia is one of the biggest selling points of popular culture these days, and it's not that hard to understand why. People want to feel safe, they want to remember the past without all the grimy little details that made it complicated and real. People want to embrace this illusion, but that's really all that it is.

Rather than that, I try to encourage people to embrace life both as it is and as it was. If we are going to indulge in a trip down memory lane, I believe the past deserves the respect of accuracy, not the glossed-over SFW version. Real life is always messy and nuanced, and we should never ever forget that, lest we start to gloss over the present in the same way.

But even more importantly than remembering and reliving the past accurately, we should always remember to keep the focus on the current living moment. As I stated at the beginning, the world is constantly changing all around us, and there's not a thing we can really do about it. That's why the most important thing in a Daoist's toolbox is the ability to Adapt. One needs to be willing and able to flow with the changes that happen as they happen, looking at the options as they come and finding the one most in line with your best path. This means looking past all the illusions and nostalgia our experiences have been coated with, this means opening up and seeing things as they truly are (or at least as close as you can muster). By doing this, change won't be so frightening after all.

On the contrary, preserving biodiversity is one of the ways that keeps biological systems from crashing and burning. It is true that extinctions are commonplace, but to dismiss them offhand and be simply satisfied with energy transfers is shortsighted.

i don’t really care what animal species are alive or extinct. as long as the total amount of energy stays within a biological system, then i’m satisfied. i’m an environmentalist, not a conservationist.

nature is constantly in flux. the exact shape biological matter is currently taking on is only a snapshot of constantly changing variations of DNA. extinction is commonplace.

however, human pollution should be restricted and monitored.

A New Year

It is a new year, I suppose.

And yet the world turns on.