Bitcoins

First off, there is a bitcoincraze going on, or at least, a blogger who seems to have fallen from grace has been trying to give bitcoins a second impulse. I wonder however if he realises that bitcoins have already come and gone. People built dedicated computers to mine bitcoins, but these days it’s so hard to mine coins that few attempt to do so. The electrical bill is simply higher than the potential revenue.

So yeah, I’ve read about bitcoins, explored the concept and had a few interesting talks about it on irc, but to me it’s already old news. And then this ex-blogger comes around claiming it’s new and hot. Sorry, but I don’t get it.

However, if you feel that bitcoins are fantastic, and would like to share with me, be my guest: 1Eg4DsqdYStdVYsVRfvSms64P8sYcBsmes

So far I have received 0.00201 bc :)

Google Fiber

Another one of those developments is Google Fiber. You might think that this is a good thing. (Google Fiber is extremely high speed Internet) But do you actually use every last bit of bandwith at the moment? When watching youtube movies, chatting on irc, Facebooking of what have you, there is hardly any traffic. Only when downloading movies is there a benefit to be had. And for most of us, this is simply where our computer-use ends. The computer is a glorified typewriter that allows you to shamelessly denounce every last bit of privacy and share your entire existence.

Take Google glass for instance, which was promoted a few months ago. Why would you want to have other people look in with everything you are doing? Isn’t it bad enough that people send tweets about “taking a shower now”, we need to be there to enjoy the visual experience of the shower as well? (Although I don’t know if the Google Glass actually is waterproof) Thank you, but I’ll pass.

Location Independence

It has been claimed dead. Yes, some delusional folks think it’s dead. I don’t believe them. When looking around, I don’t see LIP’s everywhere working via their laptop and enjoying life. I still see a lot of people going through the motions of the rat race. Hardly if ever do you actually meet an LIP in person. When looking online it seems they are everywhere. But given the population of the western world, not even 0.01 percent is location independent. And that might be an optimistic estimate.

People continue to create awesome information products, publish new ebooks and earn a nice income from it. Others are building affiliate sites, and it’s all still working. Just a few minutes ago I got a newsletter from Glenn talking about a membership site that grossed 100k in it’s first day! Yes, that is optimistic, but if such figures are still to be had out there then smaller businesses are quite viable. The minimalist business is certainly not dead. It’s continuously evolving, but for those who are still riding this wave there is more than enough work left.

Twitter

Four years ago, twitter was an upcoming technology and the 2008 Olympics were good for roughly ten million tweets over the entire event. During the 200 meter sprint last Thursday, some 80.000 tweets a minute were sent and over 150 million tweets were sent. How’s that for a dying technology.

Although I have not been using twitter for a long time and don’t feel the need to breathe new life into my account I do not feel that twitter is so 2008. My reasons for not using it is the same as with Facebook. It takes to much time and to me personally, it does not add value to my lie. The only three communication pathways I’m using on the web at the moment are e-mail (newsletter), Google+ and good old irc (Here’s to you #RU!).

Naturally, there are more ways to get in touch with people, but do you really need all that? Sometimes it’s better to be unavailable.

There is an app for that

The more apps there are out there, the less I feel the need to actually use them. It seems to me that people are glued to their phones these days. From my home to the university it’s a fifteen minute bike ride through a forest. Yes, a forest. Trees, birds, the occasional deer. You can see a lot there, hear a lot and even smell things. But most don’t notice, being completely plugged in and forgoing the sights and sounds of the real world.

It’s a damn shame. The world is a beautiful place, don’t waste your time on the web when it’s not needed.

I’m one to talk about this, having (well, almost, I’m waiting for my last grade) a bachelor’s in information science and using a computer every single day for hours on end. But my other hobbies include angling and rock climbing. No electronics involved whatsoever. You can’t get much closer to the real world than holding a perch in your hand and clinging to a rockface.

Between two worlds

I feel I’m on the boundary between two worlds. The completely digital, where people are plugged in 24/7 and the completely unplugged, where any form of technology is useless. No technology will replace meditation or climbing a mountain, yet without technology it would be impossible to connect with people all over the world and share knowledge.

Both worlds have their benefits and drawbacks. I just hope we can all learn to coexist in these worlds. It’s hard enough to coexist in the physical world and this second world is becoming bigger and more present with every second.

One day we will all be plugged in, and those who refuse will be shunned. The web will become the real world, and sometimes we escape to the former real world. And I’ll be complaining about those people who are missing all the sights and sounds of bits and bytes flowing by, and that amazingly colourful firewall they missed because they had to listen to a woodpecker.

It’s a damn shame.

Then one day he heard the older birds talk about oncoming winter. “What is winter?” he asked. Winter was a time of year that everything went silent, all was white and food was scarce. Also, it was cold, very very cold.

The other birds planned to head south before winter came. But this sounded like a dreadful amount of work. “We have to fly thousands of miles?! Are you crazy?!” the little bird said.

“Suit yourself, but we warned you, winter is coming.” And a few weeks later the older birds indeed went south. Our songbird was now all alone.

Every day grew a little bit colder and eventually our songbird did see the truth in what the older birds said. “You know what, I’ll just take off, and see how far I get”.

No sooner said than done or our little songbird was airborne. But because if was so cold, his wings began to ice up. And just a few miles in, he crash landed into a field.

Flying south was no longer an option and our little songbird felt very miserable indeed.

Sitting there in a snowdrift he could slowly feel himself freeze and he knew the end was near. “If only I had listened to the older birds”.

Then, out of nowhere, a big cow appeared. A huge animal in black and white, and our little songbird was terrified. He might be stepped upon. Although that would be a quicker end.

However, the cow did not step on our little songbird, but instead dumped a huge load of warm shit on him. And although it sounds quite disgusting, it saved our bird.

It smelled a bit strange, but it was nice and warm. And soon our little songbird was singing at the top of his little voice. O, ignorant little bird.

Little did he know, his singing attracted a cat, who was having a hard time finding food. “That bird does sound very tasty” the cat thought and soon he did find our little songbird.

With an elegant move, the cat plucked our little songbird out of the shitpile and ate him up.

Morale of the story

Now you might be wondering why I’m telling you this story. It was told to me a few days ago by my professor in Asian Religions and it’s apparently a Buddhist joke.

There are three lessons to be learned from our little songbird:

1. Someone who dumps a load of shit on you isn’t necessarily your enemy.
2. Someone who helps you out of a shitty situation isn’t always your friend.
3. When you’re in deep shit, it is sometimes best to keep quiet.

Last weekend I finally started out on my “passive income” dream as hinted at in my previous post. I built my very first niche site. In Dutch, and on a search term that gets just under 1k local monthly searches with a CPC above $1. A related search term gets 6k locals a month and a CPC of well over $4. I added some content, dove deep into SEO and started looking for ways to build links. Naturally I’ll be targeting both keywords.

Link building is quite hard though, especially in Dutch as -as far as I know right now- there are no article directories to submit to and very few blogs on the subject to comment on.

Nevertheless I’ve managed to already hit the top op page 3 with my chosen keyword having the 1k hits. Although this has not resulted in any google traffic yet, The other places I’ve dropped a link (A forum and two blogs) have resulted in just over 90 paviews and my first Adsense dollar. I haven’t found my site via the other keyword yet, but it shouldn’t take to long to get in the top ten pages at least. Well, you have to start somewhere.

More to come obviously, but I might just manage to get on page one by the end of this month as I keep adding content and doing the best I can on SEO.

Also, I deleted my facebook account as I hardly ever use it. I’m now trying out google+ and you can find me here: Christiaan Hillen

Well, that was a quick update. More changes are on the horizon and getting closer.

So what are you up to?

The last months I’ve been hard at work with my traditional education. A bachelor’s in information science in case you wondered. More important in it’s effect on this blog however, is the job I do to earn some money the traditional way: I’m a librarian and host at the university library. A nice steady income stream, and lots of spare time on my hands to do some reading, writing and thinking.

And so there is a new opportunity to do some blogging, and some good old mind work to find at “what’s next”. I’ve been down this road before but the flat fact is that I don’t actually do what I must to reach these goals.

So why is this time going to be different?

As said, my job allows me to sit at a computer for several hours on end with little disturbance. At home, sitting at my desktop, I don’t do much that actually produces something. I don’t have a deliverable at the end of the day. And last night, laying awake till around 4 am it struck me. If I don’t actually produce anything, then what the hell am I doing?

A blogpost is the least I can do, I could also work on my programming skills, HTML skills or other computer-related stuff. My job consists of a silent environment I have to sit in for three hours on end. Okay, there are a few chores I need to do but all in, those take up about 30 minutes. That leaves two and a half hours in silence that I can do whatever I want will still getting my hourly wage.

Yesterday I spent those 2,5 hours reading Chris Guillebeau’s book, which I actually bought almost a year ago. I never got round to reading it, and as with all those typically American Personal Development books it has a way of speaking to you. It kept me awake and I ended up walking several T’ai Chi sets in the middle of the night trying to slow my mind down enough to sleep. No such luck, but I do know that my bedroom is to small for T’ai Chi.

The difference this time round. An incredible nagging feeling that it indeed can be done and that everything starts out small. Looking round the bloggosphere I stumbled across Spencer Haws’ blog and this too, and it too kept me awake.

Keeping it simpler

I’ve been dumping and selling a lot of stuff that has been cluttering my life. At the moment I have around 30 items for sale on the Dutch version of craigslist. And if they don’t sell, they are binned. I also binned a huge box full of stuff lying around. Next week I’ll be doing a second sweep and toss more stuff. No difficult stuff with counting items, just plain and simple “I don’t need this” followed by getting rid of it immediately.

As for that online income, just two small niche sites by December 31st with the goal of 1$ per day per site. Humble beginnings, but if those prove to work, I’ll set bigger targets. First it’s getting over the anxiety of actually starting this. And i know, I’ve been blogging about internet incomes for over two years now, and still haven’t properly done anything about it.

Even after blogging about getting from saying to doing I’m still at the same spot. Either this is going to be the case the rest of my life, or something really needs to change.

How do you start change

Clearly, simply letting the world know what you are up to doesn’t work, I’m proof of that. The main reason for things to change is because the status quo changed. And changed in such a way that the current state of things is no longer comfortable enough for one to stay in.

You don’t go to a doctor unless you absolutely have to, and sticking with a lousy job is preferred to quitting it and facing the uncertainty that comes after that. Unless you thrive on uncertainty that is. As long as change means leaving relative comfort/acceptable conditions and heading off into uncertainty hardly anyone will try change.

So as I see it, you have two options for change.

1) You really are courageous enough to stand up against uncertainty while your current situation is acceptable or

2) You’ll have to convince yourself that the current situation is not acceptable.

I’ve tried option one, and failed numerous times because my current situation is acceptable and I don’t like uncertainty. That is, that annoying voice in my head that tells me “You can’t do this, you’re not good enough” and all those other inner monologues I’m sure you can relate to.

Option two is the only way to go. Convincing yourself that the status quo is not okay. It is not okay to sit at a computer all day and have nothing to show for it. It is not okay to keep blogging about what you should do, when I don’t do it myself. It is not okay to make all sorts of lists of things I’d like to do, and never actually do them. It is not okay to die (preferably when I’m old) with regrets. It’s not okay to look back at the past years with regrets as well. Regrets are not okay, and at the moment, I’m generating a lot of them.

Introducing the three M’s

Three years ago, almost to the day (Oktober 28th, 2008 to be exact, I write purchase dates in all my books.) I bought my copy of the Four Hour Work Week, which actually got me started on this whole idea of blogging and all other internet things. And for nostalgia’s sake I’m rereading it. It won’t give me a deliverable, but what it will do is remind me again, why I started out on this journey in the first place. And I’m reading the book with a whole new perspective.

What has stayed with me the last years are three things I crave. Three things I really REALLY want. The Three M’s:

• Money
• Mobility
• Minimalism

Sounds a bit simple, but at least it makes a fine list. Let me explain them a bit further.

In order to do things, to have experiences, money is something you’ll just have to have access to, one way or the other. At the moment I’m getting it from my job at the library but it’s not enough yet. Seeing as I can’t work more hours a week, I have the option of finding a better paying job, (Which I won’t find, trust me on this one.)  or getting a second income. Here’s where that internet income rears its head again. It’s the only way I can supplement my current income of about €400.

Mobility, for me, comes in the form of a motorcycle, complete with panniers. I’ve been saving money for quite some time now but at the same time using some of those savings to complement my income in lesser months. My current income will actually allow me to save on a regular basis and I hope to buy a motorcycle come spring. Road trips across Europe will become possible.

This leaves the minimalism bit, getting rid of “stuff” feels great, and provides an additional small income to boot. Minimalism has always held my fascination, and if it’s an internet fad of not, it will keep being a part of me, and of this blog. Although I won’t be counting my possessions just yet I think I’ll do a weakly post on things that I’m actually going to keep and why. Which offers you a rare view into my private life as well. First up will be my computers (yes, plural) and computer-related stuff.

Getting there

Now to convince myself that the status quo is non-desirable, unacceptable, despicable even. Change must take place, or I’ll end up never really traveling, never really being free and independent. Time to make this dream, this ideal a reality.

First things first, as I’m sitting here behind my desk at my job: that $1 a day niche site. On to keyword research. I’m excited again!

You just need a few more…

Impossibilities of networks

It’s quite impossible for humans to have active social connections with more than one hundred (yes, 100) people. And less is often reality.

You might have one or two really close friends, a dozen friends and a few dozen co-workers or class mates.

Are you keeping tabs with all of them? It’s doable. But add a whole list of people you’ve never met face to face and all of a sudden it becomes much harder.

Yet you struggle to keep up with them and keep interacting…

That was me

Hundreds of people being followed in twitter, reading dozens of blogs, subscriptions to newsletters. The list was almost endless.

I started loosing contact with people and missed important events in their lives. One day they were beginning bloggers, and before I knew it, they were huge. I missed the wave they were on because I didn’t keep tabs.

A kick in the head should do the trick, wake up and start paying attention. But it’s not that simple.

Waking up is a very hard thing to do and letting reality sink in is even tougher.

In a world were subscriber counts, twitter follower numbers and other numerical are used as social proof it’s all to easy to loose yourself and grasp every opportunity to increase that integer.

But, those numbers are people.

If you’re following 100 people on twitter, that’s 100 lives just like yours. People going about their daily business, struggling with the same problems and being insecure, they’re stuck here too.

There are a few people who seem to be “better” than others. The social media powerplayers, the a-list bloggers, the rockstars.

What sets them aside from others is that they found a way to deal with the distractions that are everywhere and actually focus on what it is they want.

These people are just like you, the same biological blueprint, just about as tech-savvy and sometimes doubting themselves.  It’s what’s being human is all about.

Will getting a bigger network solve your problems? Most certainly not.

The way forward is quality, not quantity.

Your first step

Do you use Facebook, Twitter, and RSS feed and/or anything else you’re subscribed to and constantly following? Great! There is a wealth of information there. But it’s to much of a good thing.

Start over, blank-slate or whatever you want to call it. Throw everyone out of your twitter list, empty your Facebook friends list, unsubscribe to everything.

If you need to, get a new twitter account, a new mail account. Whatever it takes.

Once you’ve done that, take a few deep breaths and walk away from the computer for at least a day. Fight the temptation to have a quick look, there is nothing to look at after all.

Repopulating

Now, take out pen and paper and write down the names of everyone you really do want to follow, along with a quick reason why. If you can’t find a reason, don’t put them on the list.

Once you’re satisfied with the list, go back online and follow those people and nobody else.

If you can’t recall a name, how important was that person to you? They didn’t resonate clearly enough with your ideas.

You won’t miss them.

I know it can be terrifying to delete everyone and yes, some people will be offended. But keep in mind that it’s better to have a few good connections, than hundreds of vague ones.

Good luck and let me know how things went!

My particular flavor of meditation is Zazen meditation. A form of meditation that in it’s essence is “just sitting”, with everything else omitted. Okay, and you need to breathe, obviously. But that’s it really.

The basics

In a nutshell, you sit on a pillow and for twenty-five (yes 25)  minutes you count your breaths. As soon as you reach ten, you start over. If for any reason you are not just sitting and counting but doing something else you start over.

That’s it really. Anyone can do it.

Why would you do it?

Obviously there is a reason to this madness. People in their right minds actually meditate like this, twice a day even. You can even join meditation groups that meditate like this for four consecutive sittings with a short walking meditation in between.

If people spend this much time doing it, there must be something to be had.

A quick list of benefits:

• You’ll need less sleep
• Your focus becomes better
• Your pain threshold increases
• Your endorphin levels rise
• You’ll automate happiness
• Your overall quality of life increases

In short: It will make you feel awesome.

Do you want to feel awesome? Meditation is an easy way to accomplish it. And all it will cost you is time. You don’t need any props, special clothing or materials.

Is it a talent? Are they just gifted? I don’t believe so.

I believe that all there is to it is something so simple, that it’s actually very hard to do: The right mindset.

When we engage someone or something, ninety-nine percent of the time we act out what we have powerfully created to survive – historical patterns

Questioning learning

When learning, the way you were thought was to learn by repetition. Do the same thing over and over and over again. Until somehow, things started to fall into place. Learning by repetition is boring, and takes a lot of time.  Probably the main reason why people don’t like to study.

But there are faster ways to learn. Ways to not only speed things up, but to do so without being bored. Oh yes, there are much more effective ways of learning.The first step is to question how you go about learning right now.

Questioning how you do things, questioning your habits is a very healthy way of life. That alone will speed things up, why are you endlessly repeating something? And what are you looking for while doing it?

What is this?

I never learned anything I didn’t already know – Peter Ralston

Read that quote again and let it sink in for a moment. Repetition isn’t learning. It’s mindless most of the time. If you truly want to learn something and become a master in that field you will have to find other ways. Or be prepared to spend a lot of time.

The best example I can think of is martial arts. The frequent way to learn is to imitate sensei, and if you get lucky you get a few personal pointers to look for. Other than that, you just copy and repeat.

But Martial Arts are a brilliant field to investigate yourself in and it’s my main reason for training daily, one way or the other. One moment I’m in the dojo training, the next I’m training while waiting for the bus, or lying in bed.

Yes, I can train anywhere, without other people noticing even! And it’s easy to learn as well.

Mind Learning

In an experiment three groups of people were asked to train for the task of shooting a hoop. The first group was allowed to physically train two hours a day, the second group was asked to imagine training two hours a day and the third group was asked to train one hour physically, and one hour mentally.

Can you guess which group was the best after two weeks?

The mental group came in last. They had no idea what it was like to actually hold the all. The complete physical group was rather good, but neither of them could stand in the shadow of the combined mental and physical training group.

Why? If you don’t know what something actually feels like, you can’t imagine it properly. If you train only physically, your mind is allowed to wander while your body mindlessly repeats motions.

But if you combine training, you will have a good sense on what it feels like when you are doing the mental training. And while you are physically training you will remember your mental training and look for the things that feel different than you imagined.

The concept is simple enough, but give it a try. You’ll find that you will grasp back to mindless repetition while training physically and getting distracted when training mentally. Like I said, the concept is easy enough. Doing it will be a bit harder. Especially staying “here” with your minds attention. But there are solutions there too.

Switch between mental and physical and they complement each other. You’ll be on your way to mastery in the fast lane.

Good design:

• is innovative
• makes a product useful
• is aesthetic
• helps us to understand a product
• is unobtrusive
• is honest
• is durable
• is consequent to the last detail
• is concerned with the environment
• is as little design as possible

>> Back to purity, back to simplicity

This list has been around for a long time, and was put to paper by Dieter Rams. An industrial designer closely related to Braun. His designs were so good, that the first iPod was even inspired by it. Now Apple products, being somewhat of a fashion statement, need to have a good design obviously. And if Apple gets its inspiration from this guy, you know it must be good.

But these design points can be applied to all fields in life and to life itself. Let’s have a closer look:

Innovative

Life is a constant development, and staying with the old ways while there are better ways these days seems a bit strange. Yet a lot of people keep doing things like they always have because they “just work”. Emphasis on the “just” seems to apply here. As long as it’s still functioning, let’s not fiddle with it.

The same goes for blog design, business models, professions. As long as it’s not a complete failure we keep mucking about as if persistence alone will get us where we want to be.

I say, innovate! If what you are doing right now doesn’t work. Take a good hard look at the current playing field and get back in the game. Even if it means that you have to abandon all that you’ve done before and head of in an entirely new direction.

Useful

How often do you think “I wonder what I’m actually contributing”? I’ve asked myself this question quite often with my blog and didn’t feel like I was actually adding something. (Hence the infrequent postings) But every once in a while there is something that you can do that will be of use. For yourself or for another. To often we find ourselves in a situation we’d rather not be in, but don’t do anything to get out of it.

Do something useful for a change. Or, if you want to change, you’d have a good chance of succeeding if you did something useful. Think about it for a moment, what could you do right now that would actually be useful. That would help you design your life the way you wanted it to be?

Aesthetic

The best designs are often those that not only do what they are supposed to, but do so elegantly without to much useless frills. In a website design, you want to have a clear and singular message being broadcast. Everyone that visits your site will be influenced by the look and feel of your site.

But even more important, you will be influenced by the look and feel. If you are not happy with the design of your site, it will have a bad influence on you and you’d rather not visit it or work on it, just because it doesn’t feel good.

The same goes for life. You have an idea on how you want to be perceived and you likely also have an idea on who you want to be. Dress the part, behave the part, en do so elegantly.

Understand

This is so easy, it’s damn hard. Look at an old VCR, so many buttons on there people didn’t understand how to use one. The same actually still goes for modern computers and software. Have you ever looked at something like Photoshop? There are dozens if not hundreds of buttons you can click and without a descent study of the manual, you’d be hard pressed to even just resize and image.

I’m not saying Photoshop is bad design (or maybe I am) it’s just that builders tend to forget to look at what they are building from a customer perspective. Because they understand the workings, they assume everyone knows. This is one of the reasons so many IT projects fail.

Taking a look at a website, you might be overwhelmed by banners, buttons, icons and whatnot. This makes it very unclear to users what the deal is.

If you look at yourself, are you clear about what your deal is? What are you about? Are you singular in this or are you all over the map because you actually don’t know what you want? Here’s a quick assignment: In 100 words or less: What are you all about? I’d love to read all about you in the comment section. If you can’t tell others, how do you know for yourself?

Unobtrusive

Let me give you a hint: It’s the complete opposite of the average promotional flyer. Good design does what it’s supposed to without being to obvious and in your face. It leaves you the room to express yourself rather then being identified with the object.

For example: A huge firetruck-red coffee maker with speed fins and a chrome grill. Put one in your kitchen and it will take over, being the focal point of everything and drawing attention away from what matters most: you.

Don’t hide behind all kinds of clever gimmicks and facades. Be yourself, and express yourself through your actions. Don’t scream for attention, that’s not the kind of attention you want anyway. It may be there, but it’s short-lived and likely of the negative sort.

Honest

Honesty, something very dear to me in my daily investigations into Being. In design, it’s about making a thing such that it doesn’t appear more powerful than it is or giving it the impression of being very valuable when it’s actually not. It is exactly what you see, nothing more and nothing less.

Faking it until you make it isn’t something you want to be doing. Learn to simultaneously get what you want and be happy with what you have. Be honest with yourself about this though. There is a lot people tell you you need, which clearly isn’t what you actually want.

Also, be honest to others about who you are. About your intentions and motivations. Who are you?

Durable

I’m writing this blogpost on an almost four year old laptop (thinkpad X61s). But because of it’s design you wouldn’t know that. Okay the 4:3 screen size might give it away but other than that, it’s almost timeless. Good design is often the opposite of the latest trends. Granted, minimalism has a lot to do with it. What’s not there can’t age.

If you want to learn a new skill think for a moment why you want to learn this. Is it because you’ve seen someone else do it and you thought it was cool so now you want to do it too? In ten years from now, will you still want to do it? Is traveling the world and writing for a blog you see yourself doing for years to come? Or is it just a fad you’ll stop with in a few months.

Every day you get older, every day you go to bed, you’ve spent another day of your life. What are you doing right now that will get you where you really want to be? Be durable, don’t follow the trends. Ask yourself “Will this matter next year?”

Consequent

Leave nothing to chance. Every detail does matter and spending time to get it right will help you in the long run. Sure, it will take more time but you’ll have something that is right, right down to the last little detail.

This follows naturally from honesty. If you know exactly where you’re going, you’ll be single-minded about it. But to get this one right, obviously you’ll need to know where you’re going.

Being consequent is being about respecting yourself.

Environment

This – to me – is one of the big benefits of being a minimalist. Take care of your personal surroundings and provide as little visual and environmental pollution as possible. If you’re a blogger, keep track of what you put out there. There is more than enough bad content out there already.

I don’t want to sound harsh, but if you’re not writing excellent content that people want to read, please don’t bother.  Don’t clutter the Internet more than it already is.

In your life, stop contributing to all the (mental) crap you’re hauling around everywhere. And most certainly don’t project it onto others. Drop it all, get rid of it and start enjoying a cleaner environment.

Design

As little design as possible. Concentrate on the essentials and don’t burden yourself with the non-essentials. What is essential to you? How do you want to design your life? Again, be honest.

Design your life the way you want it to be, but be sure that it’s proper design. You’ll be better off in the long run and challenged to get it right, right now.  It’s not the easiest way of doing things, but it will last you a lifetime.

I’ll finish this blogpost with words I’ve already written at the top, but they are important so read them again:

Back to purity, back to simplicity

Lately I’ve been thinking (and reading) a lot about martial arts and the interactions and relations that are a part of that. Today during Aikido training it struck me as I was trying a technique. It went wrong – obviously – or at least, the situation didn’t unfold as I had intended it.

Discrepancies

Here’s the situation. There is a guy right in front of you, “offering” his face so you can hit it. In the split-second before your body starts to move, it got the intention from your brain, based on the information it had at that moment.

The first monkey wrench. Your mind had a concept of the situation and planned ahead accordingly. If you’ve read my blogposts lately you know what’s going on with concepts.

So, your first starts flying, in your mind it’s all going perfectly according to concept. Any millisecond now you will register a feeling of pressure in your hand as it hits that face. It can’t go wrong..

..and then he moves, the face isn’t exactly where your concept said it was anymore. He messed up your perfect punch! How could he!

Practice

In Aikido, we learn to help the attacker. We stay in place, move along and facilitate the technique in any way we can. At least at the lower kyu’s, which is where I’m at. It’s helpful when the one attacking you actually plays along so you can learn the concepts of the technique.

But at the same time, even though they are facilitating you, they are still moving, still messing you up.

In free play (Cheng Hsin) it’s even clearer. You and your partner are each attempting to do techniques while at the same time listening to what the other is doing and yielding to anything they try in such a was as to mess it up for them.

It’s actually part of the job in that game to mess things up for the other player. Time and time again it shows you that your concept was wrong. What you thought was going on wasn’t going on. The key skill here is listening. As soon as you stop listening, you mess up.

The moment things go wrong

I’m sure you’ve experienced a moment when you knew things were going to go wrong any second now. The general advise is to take a good look at what went wrong. That’s to late!

Things go wrong way before that. Subtle things that you normally won’t notice (until it’s to late and things obviously go wrong). And because they are so subtle, you keep making those mistakes. It takes training to notice those subtle mistakes.

Outside the dojo

Practice makes perfect, but for proper practice you must see where things go wrong. We learn from our mistakes after all.

All to often you “practice” which is more like playing around, rehearsing the things you already know or at least think you do correctly. Playing the same songs on the guitar over and over, doing the same technique over and over, but without looking for the flaws.

Things go wrong, because we make mistakes and others make mistakes. If others make the right mistakes they just might adhere to your concept of reality and whatever you try will work out exactly as planned. This is rare however.

Usually though, you will make a mistake, fail to see it and spend time looking in all the wrong places for what went wrong. Look at the last moment things really went right, and start looking there. Chances are you missed a spot.b

With luck, things fall into place. With true practice, things fall into place more often.

You’ve probably heard things like “Don’t think”, “Clear your mind” and “Shutting up your inner dialogue”.

The problem is that those are just concepts. Did you ever try having no thoughts? Not only does it have the same effect on you as reading the following: Don’t think of a purple cow. It’s also very frustrating.

“I’m not thinking, I’m not thinking, look at all this space in my mind, this is so cool, I haven’t had a thought in minutes, I’m so good at this. Wait, who’s thinking that, shut up! No you! Who? Where? What the… ”

That which generates

The mind is a wonderfully efficient thing. But it has a hard time dealing with true insight. Insight is in the realm of that which generates, while the mind does it’s best work conceptualizing what we experience and put in the realm of that which has been generated for future reference.

The moment of generation does make a nice whooshing sound when it passes you by. But is there a way to keep a hold of it and jump on it’s back for a ride? How awesome would that be, constantly being at the forefront of generation, and looking back to see all those concepts form.You used to be back there and you had no idea what’s going on up here. All you had were concepts, not the real thing.

It’s fuzzy, and it’s actually a concept what I’m trying to write down here, but it’s as close as you’ll ever get to meditation without actually doing it yourself.

To put it more briefly, when you meditate you step away from the real of that which was generated and you enter the realm of that which generates.

There is no moment of “will be generated” or “was generated”, no, it’s this very moment that is indescribable, unconveyable.

Listening to your surroundings

And there is only one way to get there: practice over and over and over again. As you’re meditating, or doing anything else for that matter, you’ll have these brief moments that you are actually just experiencing, just listening to the world around you. Listening in the broadest sense of the word that is. You’re completely in touch and sync with the moment.

But those moments are brief, you’ll loose them within a split second.

In martial arts this is very apparent. You listen to your opponent and dodge a blow because you saw it coming. But now your mind steps in to pat you on the back “Cool, I dodged his blow, I’m so awesome. I’m…. *smack*” and another blow lands. We were no longer listening.

Loosing time, self and mind

The mind is a concept-creating wonder. This is what it does. Pattern recognition, attempting to predict future events based on the past, gathering “knowledge”, interpreting signs. You get the idea.

But the mind isn’t perfect. All it’s concepts are created with other concepts in mind, and the more you experience, the more your concepts become entwined. Soon there will be no more possibilities because you think that you know what is coming. Pattern recognition is particularly good at this.

If I manage to land a blow every single time I kick first. In time you will adapt and expect a blow after each kick. Also, I will punch after every kick, being sure that I will hit you. This is just a simple example obviously, but the idea goes for everything. How we interact with each other is all the result of previous encounters. We apply filters to what we hear others do and interpret them according to our own concepts.

What would your world be like if you had no more concepts? And I remind you, “you” and “self” are also concepts. What if you left the realm of that which was generated and get right up there, up front in the realm of that which generates?

No more concepts, no more filters, no more previous experiences to judge current events by.

Just listen.

ps. Happy Towel Day everyone