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Waves

I took a surf lesson at the La Jolla Shore. It was awesome. I had a great instructor and the water was perfect for practicing. Low tide with calm but steady waves. I got up on 7 or 8 waves and plenty of fun fall-off’s. It was a blast, it kicked my ass, and I want to do it again.

After finishing Conspiracy by Ryan Holiday  (which was really good) I grabbed a book I had my eye on for awhile, Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life by William Finnegan. I knew little about this book other than that it was a memoir about surfing, it had won the Pulitzer Prize for Autobiography, and I’d seen it recommended a lot. The author grew up moving back and forth between California and Hawaii but surfing constantly at both. Early on I came across a passage talking about surf clubs:  “I had never been in a surf club. In California you heard about Windansea, which was based in La Jolla and had some big-name members.”

This is the exact beach we’re staying four blocks from, where we’ve gone every day it was sunny, and where I I’ve walked down to in the evening and watched surfers catch waves.

The book is wonderful so far. I love coming of age stories, and this one infused in the culture of surfing and Hawaii in the 60’s is interesting and new to me, and I’m learning a lot.

Surfing was a way of life for Hawaiians. It had religious importance. When the waves were good “all thought of work is at an end, only that of sport is left”.

“The islands were blessed with a large food surplus…Their winter harvest festival lasted three months- during which the surf frequently pumped and work was officially forbidden.”

Until the Europeans came. Calvinist missionaries specifically. “They changed the Hawaiian’s way of life, changed their religion, their agriculture and industry. They banned surfing. And spread disease…between 1778 and 1893, the Hawaiian population shrank from eight hundred thousand to forty thousand”.

The survivors were “forced into a cash economy and stripped them of free time.”

We sure know how to fuck up a good time.

Luckily surfing survived “thanks to the few Hawaiians, notably Duke Kahanamoku, who kept the ancient practice alive. Kahanamoku won a gold medal for swimming at the 1912 Olympics, became an international celebrity, and started giving surfing exhibitions around the world. Surfing caught on and postwar Southern California became the capital.”

It’s interesting to think of what manages to survive and everything else that fades, either from the collective memory, or the face of the Earth.

We used to spend our summers on the Cape at Nauset Light. That beach has faded from the erosion of waves.  A video shows the damage after a storm and how far the tide’s gone up. The Nauset facilities we knew have been demolished because the erosion posed a public safety risk. You can still go to other parts of Nauset, but it’s completely different from what it was even 10 years ago.

The waves were ferocious when we first got here and one day me and Sean swam out into them. Ducking under, swimming into, bobbing our heads up and under amongst some vicious waves. This is what we used to as kids with our Dad. You go under and feel it pass over you. Or you let it crash into you and you’re thrown around and lose up from down. Being in and under waves like that puts you into a special kind of flow and it puts you in your place.

Finnegan describes the allure of waves poetically: “I couldn’t get enough of their rhythmic violence. They pulled you toward them like hungry giants. They drained the water off the bar as they drew to their full, awful height, then pitched forward and exploded. From underwater, the concussion was deeply satisfying. Waves were better than anything in books, better than movies, better even than a ride at Disneyland, because with them the charge of danger was uncontrived. It was real.”

After ducking under and going over wave after wave, exhilaration becomes exhaustion. It was a real struggle to get to shore with the tide pulling you back in. For a split second you feel that real fear. And then you let the next wave push you forward, and you’re back on land.

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Status Report: CHANGE

I’m entering a period rife with change and uncertainty, mostly by my own choice. I just left my wonderful job (on great terms) with no real ‘career’ plan. We recently had to put our dog, Mojo, a beloved member of our family for the last 15 years, to sleep. I’m writing this on the opposite coast from where I’ve spent most of my 27 years, and I’ll be here for the next 2 months. My change is something I’m very excited for. A vacation in San Diego for three weeks with my family. Then a month of road tripping with my brother, zig zagging up the West Coast, a dream trip of mine. I’m sure this change will get harder once the adventure is over, but right now it’s exciting and care-free.

In the past, I’d be freaking out internally about all of this, worrying what my next step was going to be. I’ve always been prone to worry. But right now I’m not that worried. Occasionally panic flares up, and I just take a deep breath, recognize it, but I don’t engage it in thought. I just feel it. And then it passes. I believe I’m better able to do this now because of changes I’ve already faced and endured.

I don’t think I fully comprehended change, or life in general, until my Dad passed away suddenly at 54. It gutted me and my family. I learned for the first time, viscerally, that change is absolute. There’s no value system to it and it can come at any time. Change is guaranteed. That has informed how I live and a lot of the decisions I’ve made since.

It prompted me to change myself. Eventually, I scaled back my drinking to now nearly non-existent levels and I quit porn. These two habits were recurring activities in my life for years as an adolescent and into early adulthood. I replaced it with meditation, writing, journaling, exercise, marijuana, great food, books, TV, movies, deep conversations, diving into interests and learning about them, and adventure. These changes and the work that went into them have allowed me to feel kinder, gentler, more vulnerable, braver, and happier than, well, maybe ever before. That took a lot of hard work, practice, struggle, and repeated failure. It took a lot of active change to eventually see fuller aspects of the change cement itself.

Change has been on my mind and I want to share some of what I’ve learned about it, and how I’m trying to experience this change now and going forward.

The Paradox

The only constant is change, bro.

Change is the only constant in life, yet our reflex is to try our damndest to make sure things stay the same. On a basic level, change is uncomfortable. Change, even when begun in the pursuit of bettering ourselves, will bring up stressful feelings in the process like doubt, worry, anxiousness, fear and panic.

This pull to remain the same despite our constantly changing world is also an innate impulse inside of us, defined by natural laws such as homeostasis. Homeostasis is the tendency to maintain equilibrium, within ourselves and the world as a whole. It “characterizes all self-regulating systems, from a bacterium to a frog to a human individual to a family to an organization to an entire culture—and it applies to psychological states and behavior as well as to physical functioning”. Homeostasis is the reason why when we attempt to change a habit we so often backslide into our old behaviors. “Our body, brain, and behavior have a built-in tendency to stay the same within rather narrow limits, and to snap back when changed”. And for good reason: “if your body temperature moved up or down by 10 percent, you’d be in big trouble. The same thing applies to your blood-sugar level and to any number of other functions of your body.” Without homeostasis, we would die very quickly. But, homeostasis, “like natural selection and like life itself, is undirected and does not have a “value system” — it doesn’t keep what’s good and reject what’s bad.” This is a crucial distinction. Homeostasis resists all change.  “After twenty years without exercise, your body regards a sedentary style of life as “normal”; the beginning of a change for the better is interpreted as a threat.”

I encountered this while cutting out alcohol and porn. Alcohol was easier because of hangovers, or the lack thereof. Porn was a lot harder. Even though you know it’s bad for you, it feels good in the moment, and being the most biologically rewarding function, the pull is much stronger. I backslid and relapsed a ton. Eventually I carved out a new normal where I wasn’t craving it.

But then came the change of living without it. And that’s where I started to recognize the underlying root addiction or tendency more clearly for what it was, and how it so easily and imperceptibly affects so many of us today. The root lies in comfort itself; or put another way, the urge to avoid or numb any and all discomfort.

When I stopped drinking and porn, I replaced it with marijuana. Habit change is also indifferent to value systems and nearly any habit can replace another if it’s strong enough, good or bad. In this case it seemed like a perfect trade off, one that I’d still make. But eventually I realized I replaced one habit of comfort with another. In my opinion, a much less harmful one, but still a pull to comfort that takes a level of control and feeling out of my life. Instead of working on something I’m passionate about, or seeing friends, or experiencing new things, or just being bored by myself, lonely or sad or worried, I was blocking all of it out by getting high, and then usually eating and watching TV. That’s not the worst thing in the world, especially compared to darker vices, but I think that’s also what makes it harder to break out of, because it seems so harmless. Life is change and this habit keeps me comfortable but stagnant. Now I know working to change this pattern will bring its own challenges and uncomfortable feelings. But awareness of the problem and the road ahead is the first step. The awareness of comfort as the root of it all will hopefully help get me through it.

The Root

We cling to what feels good and we try to avoid what feels bad. It’s our nature and just seems like common sense. We try to avoid, at all costs, a void. With smart phones, social media, entertainment, drugs, and all of the world’s knowledge at our fingertips, we no longer need to feel something as mundane and previously common as boredom, let alone deeper and scarier feelings like existential dread or our own mortality and ultimate death.

Comfort blocks these scary things out. But according to ancient wisdom and cutting edge science, the most important thing to do is to FEEL IT. The Buddha to Seneca, Marcus Aurelius to Garry Shandling, Viktor Frankl, Tara Brach, Pema Chodron and many more, all agree: Trying to avoid our feelings created by the change and reality around us only digs ourselves deeper into a hole and increases our reliance on the thing that makes us not feel discomfort, even if it ultimately makes us feel worse in the long-term.

It’s uncomfortable to realize how little power we have in the world. It’s uncomfortable to recognize how much power we have over ourselves. It’s uncomfortable to feel embarrassed or awkward, sad or lonely, stupid or angry or jealous or ashamed. But by simply paying attention to the feelings rather than reacting to them, they actually lose their control over us. As Tara Brach says, “When you see and feel the sensations your are experiencing as sensations, pure and simple, you may see that these thoughts about the sensations are useless to you at that moment and that they can actually make things worse than they need to be.”

I’m not quitting all of the things that bring me joy in life, like movies and books, great food or some marijuana. But I would like to change my relationship with them, towards a more balanced, healthier approach. I want more time to experience new things, meet new people, nourish relationships I already have, and feel what I’m feeling, whatever it is, in the moment.

But right now, in this time of change, I’m just going to plant myself in the here and now, and enjoy myself and time with my family. There are much harder places to do that than San Diego. Pema Chödron says to “relax into the groundlessness of our situation”. Any time I feel worried about the present or future, I try to remember this quote and take a breath. By embracing the fact that we are insecure and vulnerable, that we don’t know what tomorrow will bring, we are freed to truly feel and live, in this moment now.

I don’t know what my next job will be and I’m not sure where I’ll live 6 or 12 months from now. I’m not sure what my next attempted habit change will be but I have some ideas. I do know I feel best when I’m living in the present, embracing the change, learning new things, struggling, and trying to become better. I am 27. In 27 years I will be 54. I hope to make it there and live on well past it, but the evenness of it both weighs on me and propels me, to live these next 27 years to the absolute fullest.

Post-Script

Going forward, beyond personal self-improvement and this west coast adventure, I’m going to focus on writing. I’m finishing a screenplay I’ve been working on for a while and submitting it to competitions in May. I aim to be more active on this blog too. It still isn’t quite what I thought it would be. I think I had the wrong preconception. I imagined I’d post something each week with original, breathtaking thoughts. But more and more I’m thinking of this blog as an archive, and my role on it as more of a curator, for what I’m into, what I’m learning, and what I’d like to share with you. Nothing is original, and the internet and the world it’s created is so gigantic, I might as well just share what I find interesting, helpful, or joyful.  More practically, it can be a personal archive untethered from the social media conglomerates that rule today and could be gone tomorrow. As Austin Kleon advocates, I’m owning my own turf with this blog. And it can be whatever the hell I want it to be.

I saw a retweet from Kleon by Paul Boag that inspires my fresh outlook on this site: “I know it sounds kind of arrogant but I am bloody proud of my blog. Everything I have learned over 13 years all nicely organised and documented. I find myself referring to it everyday. It is an invaluable tool. More people should blog.”

I think that’s a lovely idea.

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Sex Criminals by Matt Fraction & Chip Zdarsky

Hear me out.

This comic book is fucking amazing. It’s a hilarious and earnest look at sex, from puberty to adulthood, all running under an insane premise. A man and a woman are able to stop time momentarily after they have sex. And then decide to rob a bank.

It’s the funniest comic I’ve ever read.  Each page is gorgeous, like Chip, the man who creates them. The visuals are stunning and the editing and storytelling remind me of a movie. I can’t wait to read the next volume.

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Black Panther & Marvel Rankings

God damn what a gorgeous, powerful movie. Boseman and Nyong’o are elegant and badass. Shuri steals the show. Killmonger’s the best villain Marvel has had yet. Michael B. Jordan absolutely killed it. It’s a real ass movie about deep, painful conflict that’s festered for generations. The scenes in the ancestral plane are touching and tragic. It also has a sense of humor and Andy Serkis is maniacally entertaining. Loved it.

Here’s my stab at ranking all of the 18(!) Marvel movies up to this point.

MCU Power Rankings

  1. Captain America: Winter Soldier
  2. Guardians of the Galaxy
  3. Captain America: Civil War
  4. Black Panther
  5. Spider-Man: Homecoming
  6. Avengers: Age of Ultron
  7. Iron Man
  8. Captain America: The First Avenger
  9. Thor: Ragnarok
  10. The Avengers
  11. Doctor Strange
  12. Iron Man 3
  13. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2
  14. Ant-Man
  15. The Incredible Hulk
  16. Thor
  17. Iron Man 2
  18. Thor: The Dark World

God damn. The fact that there’s 18 movies on it alone is incredible, and that 75% of them are at the very least, good, is just astounding. I’ve enjoyed all of the Marvel movies to some extent, except maybe the last 3 or 4. Winter Soldier and Guardians are two of my favorite movies period. And I’m fully expecting Infinity War to blow them all out of the water. As a Marvel nerd, this is really special.

 

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Loving Kindness

Struggling to come up with something to write about this week, I found some inspiration, as usual, from Sean. I recommend reading his most recent post first. It’s real and raw.

How do we deal with living in such a tough world? Our lives can feel hard and tragic, but then we look out the window, or on the internet, and realize how lucky we are. And that can make us feel even worse, for feeling bad about our “minor” problems. How can we stop that cycle of shame? And what can we do to impact the world we live in in a positive way?

I’ve been reading Radical Acceptance by Tara Brach. I keep returning to books about mindfulness, meditation, compassion and how our internal mental processes work. It’s so easy to fall out of gratitude and presence, and reading a bit on these topics each day helps keep it present in my mind.

I want to share something I’ve practiced before that Brach goes over in her book, and something I’m sure we’ve written about before: the lovingkindness meditation. It seems simple, even cheesy, but can have a noticeable effect with consistent practice.

Here’s the process.

Sit comfortably. Relax. Feel the breath going in and out.

Remember your basic goodness. Whether it was helping someone out last week, or the joy and compassion you had as a child. Remember it and feel it.

Choose four or five phrases that are meaningful to you. For example:

May I be filled with love and kindness. May I accept myself just as I am. May I be happy. May I know the natural joy of being alive. 

You start with yourself, just like in an airplane when the oxygen masks drop. Repeat the words in your mind or in a whisper.

Then envision your loved ones, family, your partner, close friends. Think about them in your mind and then repeat the following:

May you be filled with love and kindness. May you accept yourself just as you are. May you be happy. May you know the natural joy of being alive. 

Repeat it for a few different loved individuals.

Then bring to mind someone neutral, that you interact with but have no strong feelings for. Repeat the words again towards this person or group of people.

Then think about someone you have a difficult relationship with. Maybe you don’t like them or they don’t like you. Maybe it’s for a good reason. Even so, repeat those words again, in their direction.

Finally, try to open it up to everyone in the world. Each person is real and filled with emotions and struggle and goodness and pain. Repeat the following:

May all beings be filled with love and kindness. May all beings accept themselves just as they are. May all beings be happy. May all beings know the natural joy of being alive. 

Then rest in openness and silence. Breathe in and out and recognize how you feel.

Tara Brach has guided meditations on her website, and a guided lovingkindess meditation can be found here.

This may seem too passive. You’re not directly helping anyone, you’re just thinking thoughts. But think of it as priming yourself to act in a kind and loving way. It doesn’t mean you’ll be perfectly serene and understanding. It’s just meant to open you up and create some more awareness to take with you. You’re loading up for the day ahead.

The root of the practice is in recognizing that other people are real. It’s easy to walk by a homeless person on the street or wait behind an obnoxious asshole in line and dehumanize them as other. But that person is real. All people, no matter if they’re saints or monsters, want to be happy and loved, and they want to avoid pain. This practice can at its heart open you up to recognizing the basic goodness in another person, even if they’re not showing it. Whether they’re numbing themselves with drugs, or striking out at another, they’re actions are rooted in trying to avoid pain by whatever means necessary. This doesn’t excuse a behavior. But it can open up your mind to at the very least, see them as a fellow human being, a real person, who’s suffering and doesn’t know how to deal with it.

You’re not going to change the world with this 5-10 minute practice. But you might change yourself.