johnmaconline

When I was a kid, sticks and stones may have broken my bones, but names would never have hurt me.

When I was a kid, we were color-blind. 

When I was a kid, if I got in trouble at school, my ass was toast when I got home.

When I was a kid, if I misbehaved in public, some annoyed adult would scold me, and my parents would thank them.

When I was a kid, we could and did get hurt on the playground.

When I was a kid, we figured out how to get a game going, the teams, and the rules all without a single adult supervising.

There. I got that off my chest…Now get off my f*!king lawn!

A tree lives alone in a field near my house.

In the summer, it tells a story. As autumn peaks, the story changes as the color and shape shift. Now its structure is exposed — the bones, the connections, the underbelly — and the cold has come.

It tells a different story, yet you know it’s the same tree.

The sun warms the air, the days elongate, and the tree’s color and shape shift again. Its story follows. But that story is not the same as the previous summer. It will never be the same because the tree has lived through that similar yet unique season of exposure. Some branches died. New ones were born. The trunk has added girth and length. This year’s leaves could never be the same ones of last year.

Yet again, you know it’s the same tree.

And the pattern continues for 10, 50, 100 years. Each year, the tree is the same, but its story changes.

Don’t feel guilty if…

You grew up in a loving family.
Your mom and dad are still together.
Your family was middle class.
You had a stable home in the suburbs.

These are things over which you had no control. It was luck (or Providence).

Now turn that around. Don’t feel guilty if…

You grew up in a broken home.
You never knew your dad (or mom).
Your family struggled with money.
You lived in several places.

These are things over which you had no control. It was (bad) luck.

Exactly.

Are you on your phone? Yes, you’re being manipulated.
Are you shopping on the internet? Yes, you’re being manipulated.
Are you watching YouTube? Yes, you’re being manipulated.
Are you browsing social media on your computer? Yes, you’re being manipulated.
Are you watching/listening/reading the news? Yes, you’re being manipulated.
Are you playing video games? Yes, you’re being manipulated.

The question isn’t if you’re being manipulated. The question is, what are you allowing?

Read this today from the interesting thinker and wonderful writer, Luke Burgis:

Yet we have to go through the thin to get to the thick. We have to watch bad movies to know a good one when we see it; we have to drink mediocre wines; most of us have to date people we will not one day marry; we must go through adolescence to reach adulthood. The key is learning to get better at identifying one desire from the other—to develop a hermeneutic or interpretive key by which to judge these experiences in the first place.

Luke Burgis

I love it because it speaks to the ordinary yet true nuances of the toggle-switch, Failing Forward rhetoric from the Personal Development Crowd (PDC). The thin, the bad movies, the mediocre wines, the wrong relationships — these are every bit the failures without which we can never move forward. These are the kind of failures that give us context. And context is critical in every aspect of our life.

Yes, I’m a believer in using the capital ‘F’ failures to move us forward, as the PDC preaches. But never underestimate the power of the ordinary.

Because when we come to the fork in the road carrying a bag full of ordinary life failures, and the Cheshire Cat’s eyes are staring inquisitively at us, all of a sudden, the direction we choose does matter. 

I was watching the Bills-Bengals game live when it happened.

First, thank God for the reaction, action, and expertise of the medical staffs, officials, players, coaches, crews, and everyone on that field or in the stadium.

Second, kudos to ESPN, including Joe, Troy, Booger, Suzy, Adam, and the behind-the-scenes crew, for respectful and emotionally accurate coverage and for not jumping to conclusions, purposefully obfuscating or grandstanding. In my opinion, that was great reporting.

Third, before us lies an opportunity. What will we do with it?

Some have already decided the opportunity is to stick a fork in the other side — to continue to push the agenda. 

“How many more have to fall? #DiedSuddenly”

“Anyone claiming this is a vaccine injury is despicable and repulsive.”

But the real opportunity lies in the conversation we should now be able to have. Sober, if emotional, conversation about data, studies, and the real world devoid of tribal influence. Conversation about those whose names we don’t know. Conversation outside of narratives. 

And most importantly, conversation about how we can see the world from different angles yet still come together. 

Resilience often requires a distributed model. Independent farming is resilient. The blockchain is resilient. Suburban sprawl is resilient.

Efficiency often requires a centralized model. Corporate farming is efficient. A central bank is efficient. High-rise, high-density housing is efficient.

Resilience and efficiency aren’t antonyms, but neither are they synonyms. They are orthogonal. Elegant solutions strike a balance in systems with orthogonal requirements. Sometimes we push one way, sometimes the other. Sometimes we need flexibility in both thinking and doing.

What we don’t need, however, is religious fervor about either.

“This is the year that I…”

Starts with “This is the day that I…”

Which starts with “This is the moment I…”

Here’s wishing you awareness, courage, and sentience for all those moments in 2023.