58/61 degrees. Brisk walk and bike ride this morning!
Set up my "Chromecast" yesterday. Impressive, if more limited that the Apple tv device.
Had some time yesterday to study the book "The Willpower Instinct". Reviewed the first chapter. Not to bore anyone, but I learn when I try to explain (Maybe I need to set up a new blog for this). Basically he went into Willpower Challenges of "I will" (something you want to do more of or stop putting off) "I won't" ((What like to give up, a "sticky" habit) and I want (what I wants are distracting you from long term, more valuable "I wants". Willpower is the ability to use the three (I will, I want, I won't) powers to get what you really want.
To paraphrase we have two "selves", the self that acts on impulse for immediate gratification and the self that controls our impulses and delays gratification for long term goals. They are both us, but switch back and forth. Neither is bad in and of itself, in fact without desires we become depressed and without fear, we'd fall to protect ourselves.
First Rule of Willpower: KNOW YOURSELF!-Develop self-awareness as the first step to willpower. BE AWARE YOU ARE MAKING A DECISION! Making a decision while distracted and not being aware of the decision may lead to an impulsive decision and thus not the best decision.
--Action to take: Try to be aware of decisions and when I am giving into impulses. Don't try to control, just be aware. Awareness of the impulse and the awareness I can control my behavior if I wished is the first step.
Techniques for willpower:
-Breath focus/Meditation: Sit still, feed on ground. As far as fidgeting, other thoughts, "See if you can feel the urge but not follow it-learning to automatically not follow such impulses your body and brain produces!
-Become aware of breathing, say "inhale and exhale" , if notice mind wandering, bring it back to the breathe.
-Notice how it feels to breathe and notice how the mind wanders. Drop the labels "inhale and exhale" and focus on the feeling of breathing .
-Start with a few minutes a day.
Enough for today of that!
Relatively relaxing weekend so far. Caught up on some work, some reading etc.
Last poem from "The World Without End is Ending" is "Dreams of Youth". Again, I don't recall the purpose of this poem, probably descriptive again.
I am pleased to not that, approximately 20 years after writing this poem, I do not experience many, if any of the feelings other that "Old Age is like a never present tomorrow". I define "old age" as a lot older than I did then!
DREAMS OF YOUTH
Living in the present
Life,
A never ending song
Of highs and lows
Old age
A foreign place
Never to be visited
Like a never present tomorrow
Hearing the sweet songs of Spring
Dissolve into
The sour dirge of Winter
Visual fading
As the years
Stain the colors of
Dreams unfulfilled
Like a sunset, swallowed by the dark
Touching
The rough dry form
Of the wrinkled replica of life
The roughness of the years
Like hardened bark on a tree
Tasting the myth
Of sour
Shattered success
And bitter
Tattered dreams
Hearing the cheers of youth
Turn to the jeers of
Retrospective thoughts
The redundant musty odor
Of wasted time and opportunities
Like the muddy river, never
To be the ocean
Like firewood
Consumed by the flames
Of today
The years dissolve
Into fragile memories
Of the ashes of life
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