February 2013 – Achilles & Aristotle

Small Pleasures

Today the email system at work catastrophically collapsed. Ironic that, as we were at an Away-day discussing our digital strategy. Ho hum.

I bumped into one of my team on returning to the office. He commented on the crash in connectivity and then laughed:

“You’re trying to find something positive to say aren’t you.”

“Yes; and I can’t.” I admitted.

And so with a rueful chuckle I donned my jacket and pedalled home nice and early. And what a delight…

Tea time with the kids, leftover spuds hoovered, dishwasher packed, lamb and aubergine in the oven, a happy boy abed and read to with gusto, red wine in a glass, sparkling teeth and three kisses from a delighted daughter and now time to sit down – and all before the News!

Small pleasures indeed – but a break in the breakneck speed of ‘always on’ connectivity and an extra 45 minutes at home, brings myriad small benefits. I left this morning feeling blue, now I’m in the pink. Perhaps I should cut the connection more often…

But literally just as I finish these words, the server’s back. ‘You have unread mails’ – the joy and curse of 21st century life.

Achilles, Children, Death, Life, Odysseus, Psychology

Dead Mum or Dinosaurs

I was debating with a friend yesterday whether he should feel any more concerned by the beliefs and values of his dead mum as the behaviours of dinosaurs. Both belong to the past; we live in the present. And soon we’ll be down with the dinosaurs – extinct.

We were on the topic of ‘self limiting beliefs’ – ideas we carry around which help us ignore reality or choose not to tackle the big questions in life. And the big question we were discussing was: how much to save for old age and how much to spend in the middle years.

I’m persuading him (especially if he’s reading this) that save, save, save and worry, worry worry are to be finally and fully vanquished. (Paradoxical that, as I bow to no man in my capacity to worry about the future). But he’s just about ‘home free’ financially and just ain’t rational to keep on saving when your days are numbered.

Just because your folks were thrifty until their last breath, doesn’t mean it’s right for you. Life is for living. We’ll all be dead before we want and it behoves us to get on and enjoy ourselves if we can afford to.

I’ve often worried much more about the years to come than the ones I’m living. So I’m with the dinosaurs, get munching those leaves and worry less about the meteor.

Achilles, Art, Life, Philosophy

Life as Art

I always used to be big on objectivity – getting to what’s factually and actually right. But I’m much less obsessed with the ‘objective’ these days.

The (at times painful) discovery of my working and family life is that, with the exception of basic chemistry and arithmetic, pretty much everything in life is a matter of interpretation.

It all depends on where you’re looking from, what you’re looking with and how you’re understanding what you’re seeing. Different lives and different experiences equal very different interpretations of the same data. There are few facts and many interpretations.

So, with the passage of years and against my better judgement, I’m strangely drawn to Sartre’s view nicely encapsulated here:

Since I could always have chosen some other path in life, the one I follow is my own. Since nothing has been imposed on me from outside, there are no excuses for what I am.

Since the choices I make are ones I deem best, they constitute my proposal for what any human being ought to be.

The inescapable condition of human life is the requirement of choosing something and accepting the responsibility for the consequences.

Which makes me totally responsible for the life I choose.

Freed from the shackles of objectivity – that there is a right answer or a right way to live – I realise that in fact we often have more choice than we think.

What happens to us is more our responsibility than we are sometimes ready to accept. Every life is a unique, personal and ongoing act of creation. We live creating the ultimate work of art – ourselves.

Norman Mailer puts it pithily:

Every moment of one’s existence one is growing into more or retreating into less. One is always living a little more or dying a little bit.

Life is a work of art. But these days I’m happy to settle for the bustle of a Dutch feast, instead of seeking the perfection of an Italian ceiling.

Life

Blue Footed Boobys

One of the jokes I share with ‘er indoors, is that I think of us as Blue Footed Boobys.

Said bird seeks his mate by placing shiny pebbles on the foot of she he would woo – only to have her flick them away with disdain. Until, he wins her heart with his persistence.

Apt then that my beloved should stumble across this splendid photo on Valentines Day, which she sent with the comedy line: “That’s you, that is.”

And indeed it is. A perfect likeness. And, it appears, with her ladyship sat on her behind, behind.

Psychology, Science

Brain Cocktail

Shaken but not stirred, I spotted this fascinating diagram yesterday. It describes moods, mental states and conditions in test tube form.

So which comes first – the chemical state or the state of mind? Are we in love or just hydrogen bonded. Are we low or just low on the right hormones.

It’s complex chemistry – but it is chemistry. The brain is a wet sugary computer – but that I think is why it’s so different from silicon chips and solid state physics. Hormones diffuse and dissipate they don’t switch on and off.

Computers are yes/no. Brains are a constantly changing cocktail of ‘maybe’.