Posts in the “personal” category

“We have this idea of failure, but it’s not real; it’s an illusion. There is no such thing as failure. What you perceive as failure is really a new opportunity, a new hand of cards, or a new canvas to create upon. In life there are unlimited opportunities. The words, ‘success’ and ‘failure,’ themselves, are nothing more than labels. Every moment is an opportunity. You, as a human being, have no limits; therefore infinite possibilities exist in any circumstance.”

A quote from artists Herbie Hancock and Wayne Shorter, from this LionsRoar.com story.

Which of course reminds me of this Elizabethtown quote:

For about five hours today I felt really good. I felt normal, healthy. Unfortunately at 3pm that all came to a screeching halt, but until then, that was five hours of bliss. No pain, no weakness, no need to concentrate to stay conscious.

Sometimes when health issues creep up on you slowly, you don’t realize how crappy you feel, until you have a few hours like today when you’re reminded of what “healthy” feels like. In the days before the thyroid cancer I suspected something was wrong, because instead of gaining distance on my daily bike rides I was having to work harder, but couldn’t go as far. I also knew that I felt “foggy” in the head, but it wasn’t until I met a nutritionist who game me a supplement (I don’t remember what it was), and within 20 minutes I felt great, like the fog had been lifted.

Unfortunately today’s feeling of wellness didn’t last, but for that five hours I felt great.

According to my kidney specialist, all humans lose 1% of their kidney function per year after the age of 40. By her calculations, my kidneys are about 25 years ahead of that schedule.

(So where my kidney function should naturally be in the year 2041, that’s where it is in 2016.)

I always was ahead of my time. Or behind. Rarely on time. :)

I trimmed the “Thinking in Recursion” lesson of my Scala/FP book from 38 pages down to 33 today. As usual, I’m trying to follow the Steve Jobs “Get rid of the crap” axiom.

“When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.”

~ Viktor Frankl (a Nazi prisoner and Holocaust survivor)

Rafael Nadal is one of the rare athletes who talks honestly about what he’s thinking. This last year or two he’s really been struggling, both physically and now mentally. Here’s what he said after a 6-7(8), 6-0, 7-5 win a Indian Wells yesterday, where he had to save a match point to win:

“A great victory...I’m very happy about it,” Nadal said. “I am especially happy about the mentality on court, the spirit of fight during the whole match, believing that I can win a match during the whole time even in the tougher situations.”

“Did you go to your ten year high school reunion?”

“Yes, I did. It was just as though everyone had swelled.”

(From one of my favorite movies, Grosse Pointe Blank.)

This is a song called The Perfect Flaw, by Tim Story. It was used at the end of the first episode of the tv series, The Dead Zone.

“I’ve come to know the cold, I think of it as home.”

I thought of this line often when I lived in Alaska. It comes from a Guns n’ Roses song named “Breakdown.”

“In the archer there is a resemblance to the mature person. When he misses the bull’s-eye, he turns and seeks the reason for his failure in himself.”

~ Confucius

(as quoted in the book, The Whole World is a Single Flower, by Zen Master Seung Sahn)

I don’t know if this is a symptom of a tumor pushing on an adrenal gland or something else, but at the moment I feel like I could simultaneously take a 10-hour nap and go for a 20-mile run.

From this article on tinybuddha.com, 5 Ways to Cope with “Family Bullies”:

1. Plan your responses ahead of time
2. Stand up to the bully without hostility
3. Remove yourself from the situation
4. Set boundaries
5. When you leave, leave it all behind you

“You may never know what results come of your actions, but if you do nothing, there will be no results.” ~ Mahatma Gandhi

I wrote something like this on Facebook a few years ago, before I knew of this quote. I deactivated my Facebook account, but the way I wrote it was something like, “You can only do things with a good intent, but you may never know that the outcome will be good.” An obvious situation is that you save someone’s life, but that person ends up doing bad/evil things.

“Need You Now” by Lady Antebellum is today’s Song of the Day.

I always smile when I hear this song because it reminds me of Dawn and Julie, the apartment complex managers who were the Laurel & Hardy of my Wasilla, Alaska rental experience.

Pro tip: Life doesn’t always work on your schedule.

Doctor: It could be malignant.

Me: I’m trying to finish writing this book ...

One of my favorite things about living in Alaska — especially Talkeetna — is that most days ended with me saying, “Well, that’s something that I’ll remember for the rest of my life.”

In my travels over the last several years I’ve met several people who are “addicts.” One man I met in Canada was in horrible shape. He was constantly drunken and sad. He also had a gun. Another time I missed the gatherings/parties after the first Buddhist Geeks Conference I attended because I got a “Help me” text about 90 minutes before the end of the conference. (So I ditched the conference and missed the “good-byes” with many new acquaintances to go help a struggling friend.)

This is Joe Walsh’s song about his battle with addiction, titled “One Day At a Time.” I like his lyrics, including “It started with a couple of beers, and it went I don’t know how many years.”

I didn’t see this originally. This is a note from Joe Walsh on the YouTube page this video comes from. Click “Show More” on that page to see more information. From Mr. Walsh: “This song is about my path out of the darkness of drug addiction and alcoholism. The message is that there is a way out and a new life waiting in recovery that is good. The first step is to ask for help. The included links are a good place to start. I'm doing this because if it helps 1 person - it was worth it. It's by giving back that we receive and I am eternally grateful for my sobriety and my life today.”

“I imagine nothing, but I observe. I am a chronicler propelled by curiosity.”

~ Gay Talese, speaking at BUnarrative

It’s pretty neat to see this new generation of billionaires doing something good with their money. For a long time, including the 1980s, 1990s, and early 2000s, extraordinarily rich people like Bill Gates, Steve Ballmer, Steve Jobs, and Warren Buffett did nothing positive with the wealth they generated; the sat on it. Now it’s cool to see people like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos take huge risks with their money to try to create world-changing technologies, including Musk’s Solar City, Tesla, and SpaceX; and both of them trying to make “getting into space” a more practical, less-expensive, reusable technology.

(To his credit, Bill Gates made a small entry into philanthropy in 1994, then in 2000 created the “Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation,” which in 2013 was the world’s wealthiest charitable foundation.)

Back in 1983 I bought my first car for $325 — a 1972 Ford Maverick with 125,000 miles and rusted-out door panels — and among its many features was that it only had an AM radio. As a result of that, I learned about this song, “Pancho and Lefty,” by Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard. RIP, Mr. Haggard: