Life

Bowerbirds

Although the writing is not to my taste, the photos in National Geographic Magazine make it worth the subscription for me. A few months ago there was a picture of chimpanzees looking through a wire mesh fence in silent mourning as a the body of much a loved female chimp was carried away in a wheelbarrow. The emotion was obvious. The landscapes can be amazing too. It’s easy to think you’ve seen the world if you’ve travelled a bit. National Geographic reminds me I ain’t seen nothing.

Over the summer I read a beautifully illustrated article on Bowerbirds. Male Bowerbirds spend inordinate amounts of time building extraordinary ‘bowers’ which are at times fanciful and often huge confections to show off their prowess to lady Bowerbirds. A veritable nest builder’s ‘peacock’s tail’, often functionally useless, dangerous and wasteful to build they are the Victorian follies of the avian world.

Some are castles of kitsch, some monuments to consumerism and globalisation – constructed entirely of colourful bits of drinks cans and other rubbish. I saw one with two rows of tall twigs and a pathway of identically coloured purplish bits of slate in between which looked so minimalist it could have graced a home design magazine. It seemed impossible that a bird made it, but the male looking back coquettishly over his shoulder at the far end demonstrated it was his pride and joy.

I think we are all Bowerbirds to some degree. Some are lucky enough to be born with exceptional beauty – their own peacock’s tail, but I fear they are often haunted for the rest of their lives by the physical decline and loss that turns the beauty of youth into the inevitable walnut of old age.

We can all build a bower for ourselves though. And its beauty can live all your life – and sometimes beyond. A work of art, a book, creating a beautiful home, your children, different people have different bowers within them.

Taking 15 minutes to think, reflect and write every day may well be my route to quietly building a slate strewn, twig fronded pride and joy for just for me.

Work

Eureka

I read something today which put a bit of theory behind something I’ve been trying for a few months now. If you have a complex problem to work out try forgetting about it.

I originally read a letter in the New Scientist written by a man who said when he had a particularly tricky problem to work out he would set himself a timescale of between 10 days and two weeks and then forget about it. Routinely the solution would come to him unbidden at some stage in the time he allowed.

Since being aware of it I’ve become conscious of the same phenomenon. The answer to things I’ve been thinking about or working on a lot often floats into my mind as I pass a particularly forbidding high rise housing estate about 25 minutes into my morning cycle ride.

Turns out Poincaré wrote about this many years ago describing four distinct stages in developing new insights or having breakthrough ideas. First think about it and study it a lot. Then hopefully get distracted or less fun, but as effective, get frustrated and lose hope of working it out. Then from nowhere Eureka. Finally verification of the validity of the insight and the develping confidence you are really onto something. Conscious thought, unconscious thought (or incubation), illumination and verification are the key stages.

Discovering it written down is a great relief – routinely forgetting about major work and life problems feels a bit uncomfortable without a bit of intellectual cover. The polymath Poincaré is a pretty good brain to pray in aid.

So the answer I’m increasingly persuaded, whether you are Archimedes or not is study, stop, forget it and bingo – eureka.

Happiness

RGB

White light can be made from red, green and blue – just like in the Trinitron TV we had when I was a kid. Talking to a good friend this morning it came to us that finding a good balance in life needs you to get the RGB balance right.

We were comparing notes on our ‘re-entry’ into work after summer holidays and as Autumn is upon us wondering where the eudaemonia was going to come from in the short dark days of winter. Work is going to be tough. We live in an age of austerity. Home as family men is going to ask a lot of us too. I said if you think of it as spotlights (think of the Flickr logo) you have to get some balance between the work spot (red) and the home spot (green). I certainly had that balance wrong pre the summer and my life went red.

But to get to white, well-being and eudaemonia you need a blue spot too – and that’s the spot which is purely and uniquely for you. For most of my 20s I got nearly all I needed in my life from the red spot – work gave me money, laughs, sex and an international life. In my 30s I built a home: I found a partner and dog, mortgage and a family followed with the many joys and responsibilities they bring. In my 40s I have come to realise if I don’t do a few things for me I begin to get frayed and transactional. It is a truism that to really love others you have to start with yourself.

So we concluded this morning that the pure white light of fulfilment, flourishing, eudaemonia and just keeping the show on the road requires a spot of blue – some things you do just for you. It’s easy to feel guilty about that – a moment for a cuppa, a walk around the block in the sunshine, indulging a hobby or interest you don’t share with anyone else. I think you shouldn’t and you mustn’t.

Happiness and well-being are emergent phenomena I’m increasingly convinced. You can’t approach them directly and doing one thing or set of things however well won’t deliver them. Like the white light from an RGB monitor you need the red of work, the green of home and crucially the spot of blue for you.

Work

Curling

I was talking today to a nice person who cares a lot about the organisation I work for about how we are doing. We face some big challenges in the next few months, but I’m pretty confident we know what we need to do and we’ll be stronger for it.

She was anxious that we might not seize the opportunity, and that people and personalities might get in the way. I said after a good break in the summer I realised there are somethings you can’t fix or tackle until the moment comes and rather than worrying sometimes it’s best to save your energy and trust yourself to perform ‘in the moment’ and do what is needed when it’s needed. She looked at me with some empathy, but I suspect was also wondering ‘is he ducking some stuff here’.

I then said to her that since my excellent summer holidays with the family I’ve found myself caring a little less about my work. I still care, and I still work hard, but it’s a bit less all-consuming. I don’t think about things so much, worry about them or try to arrange and fix things – especially around people. I’ve started saying what my gut tells me, not worrying so much about being right, asking for help and admitting to uncertainty and irrationality. It’s working a treat.

She said she sometimes realises she’s guilty of curling – the game with the stones on ice where you polish and polish and polish the ice furiously with what looks like a garden brush to get your stone to the target. I said to her I’d felt she’d been really effective in a meeting with us recently when she ‘bowled’ and said exactly what she thought and cleaned out all the skittles or smacked clear the blocking bowls depending on your type of bowling.

The conclusion was sometimes by caring a bit less at work you can be a lot more effective, more spontaneous, less anxious, more authoritative, and more able to seize the moment. I find I also have a lot more mental energy left for me and my loved ones at the end of the day.

Here’s my quick list tapped out on the iPhone of problems I’m not currently suffering by caring a little less about my work:

Gripping too tightly
Being anxious
Focusing on what I might lose not what I could gain
Driving not attracting
Running down my batteries
Sweating the detail
Overdoing
Interfering
Been seen to meddle
Taking the responsibility away from where it lies
Confusing people
Strobing (rapid jerky interventions with no linking narrative)
Appearing tricksy or political
Guessing not asking
Overpreparing
Not seizing the moment

Best of all though I simply feel better and that’s reason enough.

Death, Life

Death

I saw that larger than life parliamentarian Cyril Smith had died yesterday. He was a big big man. I think I heard he peaked at 29 stone. I was a little surprised to hear he made it to 82, just goes to show being a gourmand won’t necessarily kill you.

What struck me though was the report of his memorial service. How he had spent his last days planning exactly how it would be – including hand written notes to people he cared for to catch them by surprise and delight them after he had gone. A warm-hearted joker to the last [albiet subsequent reports in have strongly suggest otherwise].

I’ve often thought mistily about death and the final taking stock of my life I will do. Who will be there smiling at my rosy faced cheeks. But reading about the actual reality of death as I did in Anti-cancer made my heart race, my chest tighten and my anxiety levels rise.

David Servan-Schreiber sets out the most common fears, it will hurt, I will be alone, my story will be unfinished, important things will be left unsaid etc. These are very real fears for me. He also writes that some people close on the moment with grace and tranquillity.

Our dog is dying. He has a big and growing lump on his side which will surely kill him in weeks not months. He’s had a good long life and I’ve noticed he’s sleeping more, I can see he’s chasing bunnies – he is running in his sleep, catching and mouthing and happy. A friend told me his dog walked slowly out into the garden one day curled up under a tree and gently floated away.

Much of my attraction to eudaimonia or flourishing (and the ancient Greek version of ‘happiness’ as the product of a life lived) is tied up with this final account. But on my bike this morning it came to me that maybe it will hurt, maybe it will be sudden, maybe it will be banal, maybe I won’t get to write handwritten notes.

So the time to achieve the eudaemonia is here and now, and the right moment to assess my happiness is today and every day.

Achilles left no handwritten notes.