The Wrong Herd

There are times we must question whether we are right. Nobody is ever one hundred percent right of course but let’s say more right than wrong. Someone who goes through life always believing themselves to be right in everything may not end up with many friends but could likely have successes in other respects. If someone goes through life always believing themselves wrong, would it be the opposite outcome? Probably unlikely. It must be important to be aware that we may just be wrong though. Is that humility? Maybe self-awareness?

I was thinking of discussing something in the news. One of those fallback pieces in which I decide to deride some politicians for their ineptitude, or an evolution in something on a geopolitical level that arouses some dissatisfaction within me. Usually a complaint of some sort. We’re less likely to be drawn to stories that have a positive and happy narrative remember. Maybe there’s something in that we could learn from. We’re drawn to stories of misery while living lives of misery. Like creates like as they say. Perhaps I should do a new ten day challenge and only write about happy positive things. I’ll probably pass on that one.

Usually the political stories I’m drawn to involve ones bashing the current government in the UK or the US, and commonly the opposition to both governments too. As you can imagine I’m not full of much belief in the political legitimacies of these two countries. Other people though must be. I say must be because not only did enough people vote in the two buffoons holding power but it also appears enough people want to vote in the establishment representatives who will most likely replace them at the next opportunity. When we see a large group of other people doing things we’re inclined to believe they may just be right and we may just be wrong. Herd mentally amongst many other names. It is easy to dismiss these people voting for these two sides as adherents of such a mental state but it’s likely I’m just swayed by another herd that I want to be part of. It’s likely a much smaller herd and one that feeds certain things in my fearful sense of survival but it’s a herd none the less.

With all this then we must all admit we’re being played one way or another. This huge game of power is rattling away as different groups battle it out for moral superiority and likely financial gain one way or another. Money corrupts, power corrupts, everything seems to corrupt, especially morality. Perhaps we’re just a corrupt species and we need to accept it. Or maybe we just need to stop worrying about whatever wrongs are happening in the world and focus on life as it unfolds before us. One extreme to the other yet again. It’s just exhausting that these arseholes continually manage to win power. More so when they’re clearly morally bankrupt and doing a bad job. It’s even possible to imagine things like this could finally defeat me and I stop giving a shit about the world. Maybe just give a shit in a different way. A detached way perhaps, or one that doesn’t get caught up in the hyperbolic nature of power. Or even my own perceived role within all this power. There’s got to be an answer somewhere. I’m sure we’ll see it too when we can finally figure out what it is that has been in front of our eyes all this time.

Life’s Pot Of Gold

My eye hurts and I’ve felt a little sore the last two days. I think I need a holiday. Summer is drawing to a close, the numbers of visitors to this little village are ever so slightly decreasing and it feels like a period of time is drawing to a close. With Autumn comes the shedding of leaves as we move into a season of rest and recovery. The hibernation is upon us and with it like it’s time to step back out into the world. It is both daunting and exciting to make another change in life when you have been within one version of existence for so long. I was supposed to only be in this village for two months and that was last October. I won’t be giving my friends the satisfaction of having stayed for a full year but at eleven months it’s not exactly been a fly by visit. I understand more now and have gained an appreciation for a life in one place which I didn’t have before, as well as life already lived strangely enough. Despite being desperate for a holiday and being able to see something new I now know I am capable of returning to a state of existence previously beyond me. Will I miss it when I’m move one. Probably actually yes. But not this exact version.

When in a few years from now the stories of peoples time in lockdown are all out I look forward to reading about them. Of course there will be people who just drank beer, had BBQ’s and got bored but there will be as many who learnt new things and ways of being. When I speak to people here invariably they all say the same thing that they hated lockdown after a while and were just desperate to get back to work. Maybe I have been asking the wrong people but it is also one of the reason’s I know I can’t stay here. I love it very much but I need more, I need to be surrounded by people who want more. Maybe more is unfair because I’m probably just repeating previous mistakes in my understanding and valuing others, I just want different. Something else, something other than this version of existence. The constant search through the permanent existential crisis of life. But nothing is permanent, not even crisis and certainly not ones involving purpose and worth. Yet we continue struggling through them, determined to find an elusive answer we’ve promised ourselves exists. Was the pot of gold not buried below the very tree he was sitting under as he first devised how best to leave in search of prosperity. Despite everything; knowing, understanding and being still remain divided. Can they ever come together?

Yet it is more positive than it sounds. If anything has become obvious from recent events it’s that in life you just keep going. We find joy and happiness in the unexpected but we must be open to seeing and embracing these unexpected. To understand that everyone has a pot of gold out there somewhere but that they themselves already have both the map and the spade is key. First though we must stop trying to use others maps and others tools. With this all becomes exciting once more. It actually is possible. It’s always been possible. It’s just down to us to make it probable.

Absolved From Pain

I’m a tall man. Not an abnormally tall man but tall enough to be completely at ease describing myself as such. I was about to suggest abnormal was such a strong and negative word but as it turns out, abnormally for myself, I checked online for something and didn’t just try to wing it. It turns out the prefix ab- simply means ‘away/from’ and as such looking at examples like abrasive, abdicate, ablution, absolve, they don’t seem to have a contrary and therefore aren’t able to be viewed in the binary positive and negative. To abdicate is to step away from power, to be abrasive is to take away the smooth, to absolve is to distance from guilt or punishment and ablution is to wash away the dirt. A cloth would absorb the water but the word sorb refers to “the fruit of the true service tree” which is Biblical and which means the two words aren’t related and cannot be compared to the negative prefix un- in nature.

I digress.

Being tall I hit my head a lot, I am also prone to hurting my back. I managed to hurt it badly about five or six years ago when I was trimming grapes in France. You spend eight hours Monday to Friday bent low trimming leaves off vines which are about one to two feet from the ground. That is a lot of moving while being bent over, and after four weeks strained my lower lumbar, slightly stretching the space between and pinching a nerve in the process. I tried over the time yoga and Pilates, went to a chiropractor, but never managed to quite shake the awareness of something not being quite right. In times of inactivity it would start hurting and I discovered over time the busier I was the less I felt it. Eventually I remembered a treatment I was given by a friend in Australia called Bowen Therapy, which is a very subtle process, don’t worry I’m not about to meander through the meaning of sub, which involves rolling the muscles and in a way activating them, allowing them to recover themselves. I could barely move before that first time in Australia and the next day I had returned to about 75% which felt at the time like a miracle. I don’t necessarily automatically believe in certain treatments, different people react differently and stronger to different things, I never got much from acupuncture for example while others swear by it. I would comfortably swear by Bowen, nearly on par with my exclamation over my height.

I discovered a woman in Scotland near me who practices it and had my first treatment with her prior to a lengthy period of active life on a sail boat. I felt my back had recovered. It felt good and strong for the first time in a few years. About six months ago though as my friend attempted to convince me to appreciate not just Crossfit but Crossfit done to create a rugby player style body, I over did myself on a sit up bench. My back ever so slightly clicked, not painfully at all but I knew I had done something. Right enough I had shifted and unbalanced my lumbar and hip. With my hips now negative and unaligned the old pain subtly returned until a few days ago when I twinged something moving a particularly heavy bread basket. Yesterday I strained it further and was in crippling pain. This is a very long winded back story for something that is supposed to only be around the five hundred word mark so I have little more space to talk about Bowen other than I went today again and while I can still feel it, usually the day after is when you really notice the change. I will return next week and have a second session soon after the first which I have never done before. I just want to be really sure. In the meantime yoga must return to habit status. Ultimately I simply attempted to create context and a backstory to a therapy which few know about but I fully believe many could benefit from. Why it’s not more commonly practised is beyond me.

The Pickaxe Of Liberty

Go on admit it you’re all desperate for a holiday. But then maybe you feel like you’re having one already. As I am still working I’m very envious of everybody sitting around, reading, studying and exercising. There is every chance I’m simply envious of the idea that this is what people are doing because while everyone may be taking photos of themselves doing these things, or videos of themselves being creative and inspiring, there’s also a good chance they’re currently lying on the sofa watching something on Netflix about tigers. Sorry that was two weeks ago, I’m so behind the times I wonder what the current obsession is. Are people getting bored though. Are those still sober dreaming of going back to their jobs because they’ve realised they’re not carpenters, painters or musicians and that actually they don’t really enjoy reading books as much as they thought and told everyone they would. I’ve admitted already I’m envious but I am also aware that I have spent large chunks of my life travelling and doing all these fun things but in random places. I’m well practised at not getting bored. Having spent time in the countryside I’m also well practised at not seeing people for a couple of weeks. So I’m envious but also aware that I’ve experienced a few lockdowns already in my life.

It is though arguably a social experiment that will define this period of history. I’m not trying to trivialise this very serious situation but that doesn’t make it anything other than a future treasure trove of theories for researchers. I’m not a researcher, but I enjoy observing, and I’m already really looking forward to seeing what conclusions the researchers come to. I’m not an optimist in the traditional sense, I’m no Pangloss and this is certainly not the best of all possible worlds. I don’t believe in the idea of being constantly positive and happy because it is balance we need in life. However, there is always a possibility to find something positive in any situation no matter how bad, and while it doesn’t have to outweigh the bad, there is no reason for us not to enjoy and embrace it’s existence. Who knows maybe we will even use it as a pickaxe to help us climb out of our hole. For this reason we will find something to celebrate in all of everything that is going on. Researchers will discover some terrible results, the media will fill us with dread and fear, while politicians will continue to chip away at the last scraps of our self-determination. They will also discover incredibly positive results, there will be happy stories told and, actually maybe I’m pushing it a little far by including the latter group.

In a way though none of this will mean anything, not really. We may enjoy discovering these moments of positivity but unless they exist in our immediate realm they’re more than likely to just pass on through. What will leave us with any lasting sense of light though will be what we can see in our own lives, in our immediate situations. What little events are happening right now that could snowball into something resembling that pickaxe. What are we experiencing that if we manage to step back from for a second we can recognise as bringing some kind of benefit to our lives. As I said it doesn’t have to outweigh the other stuff going on, but even if it is just one percent of everything going on in your life it is infinitely more important than the other ninety-nine. It’s there. It’s always there if you manage to look.

Free Time Anyone?

What is interesting with this coronavirus situation; is what people are going to discover about themselves in this period. I mean this in a completely positive way. Yes this could be a piece on the worst elements of peoples characters coming out but i’ve already talked about scumbags stealing the last pasta out of the hands of old ladies. What I mean is that if you ignore the possibility of illness and the stress of financial ruin and homelessness, I know I’m asking a lot here, this does create the most wonderful opportunity for people to find a lot of time on their hands. It is only a matter of time before we’re in lockdown, a pasta trip may be in order, but when lockdown does come we’re going to be forced to interact with ourselves a lot. That will result in a lot of ‘self-interacting’ I’m sure but when people get bored of that and have watched all the series on Netflix they can endure they may just be forced into something else.

What they will end up doing is anyones guess. I imagine if they have access to an instrument then they may learn an instrument. If they have enough books or ebooks then people are going to become rather well read. I imagine people will find the time to exercise as well as needing it when stuck around at home all day and night. Maybe people will find the time for creativity, all you need is a pencil and a blank page, and the possibilities are endless. I recommend people search online for courses because there are an endless number to complete. I mentioned the other day I had developed a new hobby, well I’m currently doing a course on edx.org and there are an infinite amount to complete. We may just connect with old friends and family, all it takes is a quick message to see how people are.

Really what I am attempting to do is put a positive spin on all this because even when something is ninety-nine percent negative there is still that one percent we can choose to focus on. Choose may be the wrong word because events are not always our choice, but it is there, it does exist. Like I said I am far too often filling these pages with some bullshit about how fucked the world is and all that goes along with that but sometimes it is important for the sake of our sanity and those around us, to not necessarily be positive, but perhaps to see the positives. There’s a difference, I’ll leave it up to you to decide what that means for yourself.