Choices in amber, (Suspended ambernation?) Are no choice at all. Today's Meditation(s): As I sit here, watching my folk's sleep after staying over last night, I found myself fretting about being late to work. Then I reminded myself of two things and felt better: 1. The work will still be there. 2. The graveyards are full of people the world could not do without.  ~(variously attributed) The world will turn. Life will go on. My delay costs me a little money, but no more. Caring for my parents comes first.

I detest the 'news'. Manipulation, dismay, False outrage and lies. Today's Meditation(s): What do my enemies say about me? I don't know. I don't know them. I've had people I considered good friends ghost me, but they never told me what triggered the split. (One disappeared from my life and never spoke to me again. The other, when we reconnected for a month or so, didn't say what prompted the split.) I'm sure people criticize me. I talk too much (or not enough). I think I'm smart. I didn't do my task (or did it wrong) and caused them trouble. I'm prideful. I'm annoying. I get angry. I say things I shouldn't. I eat too much. I'm a hypocrite. I only pretend to be nice. My manners are wrong or missing. I think I'm better than others. I'm racist, sexist, elitist, mean, and untrustworthy. My opinions are old and wrong. My effort is insufficient. My commitment is lacking. (Shee-it. I shoulda just thought about what I

Do with a glad heart What Fate brings to my table. The right thing. Always. Today's Meditation(s): Happiness is simple, not easy. I know what I need to do, but I don't do it.  Hell, even when I am actively trying  to be good, I let myself do stupid things as if I were an automaton and not in control my own actions . An easy example: I look at the snack in the cabinet or pantry.  I'll feel the passion arise to pick it up and eat it.  I reach of and take hold of it.  Then I tell myself, 'No. Don't eat that.  It's unnecessary.  It's be bad for your health.  It will make you fatter.  It won't taste as good as it I think it will.  Whatever taste is does have, I'll be distracted while eating and won't even notice it.  Half of it will be gone, unconsciously consumed before I even notice. Even if it magically did live up to the glory my imagination promises, taste is fleeting. It's here and gone, never to return.  There is no permanent s

Suddenly appear! As birds do, when you come by. Be the light you need. Today's Meditation(s): Can I control other people?  Can I make them do something?  Even if I can, can I make them do it well?  Is it the right thing to do?  Will it work? How many steps removed does it have to be before I give up nonsense and focus on what I can do?

Stop arguing of What qualities make a man. Be what you proclaim. Today's Meditation(s): Be good that others may be good also. Make goodness so integral that it will never leave me. Train my thoughts to precede my actions; be good from first to last. Teach the children by example that reinforces my words.

Put in a dumb bit. We'll outrage in a minute.  Quick! Show a dead child! * Today's Meditation(s): It's interesting (fascinating / heartbreaking) to see some differences between a person's soul as you know it and actions caused by degeneration of facilities.  Things incongruent with long history and habit. Changes to our physical brain change our mental states: of long-established principles, some hold, some fade in and out, some disappear entirely.  Rhyme and reason camouflaged, with little pattern discernable. But love remains, bedrock beneath the confusion, regression, opposition, and reconciliation. Unwillingly watching news shows this morning, there's (as expected) an incessant drumbeat for war. I find more and more evidence that my theory is correct: * today's 'news' is 100% utterly completely emotional manipulation . I am reminded how much better my life has been since I stopped watching this shit decades ago. So much better

I'd like to explain It so he would understand. He's too confused now. Reason (from Nature and Nature's Law) command fled. Even luck's grasp slipp'd. Today's Meditation(s): 'Treat others as yourself.' Up until know, when I've thought about this version of the Golden Rule, it's been about doing the things I like, and avoiding things I don't like, when dealing with others. But it's really so much more than that. It's not about just being fair to my neighbor. Or being less than hostile if true friendliness is not available. It's about replacing myself with my neighbor as the central focus of my concern. That's why it's so hard, why it seems only saviors and saints, buddhas and bodhisattvas, ever achieve it. But let me think only that it's something I can do, that it is possible, that I can always work to be closer to that goal and make progress. That, at least, is within the purview of my reason,

Amor the fati You ungrateful jackwagon.  My troubles are small. Today's Meditation(s): Today's feast, of thankfulness and union, is a melancholy time for many.  Those without a support system, no family or friends, spending this time alone among the thousands of ads showing large and happy gatherings. Those whose past continues to hurt them in the present and they don't know how to escape.  Those who use a dislikeable nature to push people away who might otherwise share time with them, lest they get hurt (again?), perpetuating their loneliness. It's been all of these in the past for me. I know something of these paths.   Instead of judging people who are in these straits, help them . That would be the kinder, more useful, more human, more loving response. Give money. Give time. Give kindness. Give understanding. Give love. 'He who has only my troubles is lucky indeed.' (I forgot the source.)

Giving back to life What is only loaned to me  Is a hard lesson. Today's Meditation(s): My son was only lent to me for short time. My father for longer, though that time may be coming to an end. When it does, will I be able to say 'Of course'? Will I be able to mean it? I think about my impending loss and try to prepare. I try to imagine the time after it happens and how I will respond. Will I remember to put my mom first? Her pain will be so much more than any son's could. She'll lose the man she's loved and shared her life with for more than 60 years. Helping her is so important to me. And it will be so hard to see the hurt she feels. Will I remember to help my siblings? To support them and love them, to give them my care and attention as well as I can? Will I remember to hold my family close and to help them through the loss of their grandfather? To explain to them and love them and give them my support? Will I be able to process my own grief and

Resting on laurels Of prior accomplishments. Not for true virtue. Today's Meditation(s): Be good everyday.  Not once. Not a string of seven lucky days in a row.  Not a  great  day and the rest 'who cares.' Every. Day.

Learning social queues To expand intro children's  Stable of options. Today's Meditation(s): What do I control? My reason.  What will make me better at dealing with life? Being calm and collected.  How do I become, and remain, poised and controlled? By using my reason. How do I use my reason to be quiet and steady?  By focusing on what is up to me. By remembering my faults. By starting from a place of kindness. By assuming ignorance rather than malice. By taking a long-term view. By counting to 10. By loving fate. By not adding judgments to impressions. By remembering others have handled the situation well. By keeping a mentor in mind (WWMD?). By any of a hundred ways my studies have taught me. *Only  I  can stop myself from trying to improve. (FIFY)

Day one of year four,  Day one, again, of study's Uncertain footsteps. Today's Meditation(s): I have a long journey yet. I add to my sorrows minute by minute because of my desires. My sins. Gluttony. Sloth. Pride. Lust. Greed. Wrath. Envy. Steps forward; steps back. In what ratio today? 1 to 4 so far? It's been a bad day? Ok. How can I fix it? What positive step can I take? Stop complaining. Think and do. Get busy in my own rescue. Sometimes I hide bad things. Sometimes I hide good things. Sometimes I hide everything. Sometimes I hide nothi... nope. Can't finish that one.

Another small step Inaugurating wisdom. So much more to do. Today's Meditation(s): Marcus's reminder of some of Stoicism's primary points (Meditations, 8.7, Holiday's rephrasing) helps focus my attention on the basics. Withhold assent until I know. Be kind and Other-focused. Want what I can give myself. Amor fati . Sounds like a darn good list to me. Do only this and I'm on the right path. Now to cement this in my psyche and aim higher. That's the goal: that all my actions be good ones. I've a ways to go.

Perceptions of worth, Wrong in principle and fact. Time to be better. Today's Meditation(s): Put these three together and what do I have? A secret of life. My desire for things to be other than they are — whether a person's behavior or a situation or the laws of physics — does two things to me: 1. It makes me unhappy because the world does not work that way; I have no control over externalities so I end up frustrated. 2. It prevents me from treating people as I should. I preempt my ability to practice virtue because I close off possibilities before they can become real.

Everybody Rushing to decide, "He's bad!' Wait! Let me explain....  Today's Meditation(s): I see someone do something I disprefer and believe myself superior to such an obvious cretin. And, naturally, the opposite: they dislike something I like and therefore must be inferior. So much trouble because I prejudge people and events — believing I know the answer without waiting to see how fate unfurls — trying to shortcut the real person in front of me with a predefined category or some simple formula. Treat others as real, full, people. Treat them as worthy of care and love and understanding. Treat them as myself.

Too much to think about. Must to bed go. Goodnight. Today's Meditation(s): To resent change is to wrongly assume that you have a choice in the matter. ~ Ryan Holiday I wish more people understood this. I said something similar a few days ago. My behavior is not dependent on others. I can choose to be a kind person regardless of what someone else does.

As the cartoon says, 'It's all coming together.'  Slowly, but yes. (Kronk!) Today's Meditation(s): Too often, knowledge is pursued for its own sake. If you want to do that, more power to you. I don't have enough time in my life.  I desperately need to do more to eliminate unproductive pursuits in my life.    I have to actually change to become better. Mere thought is not enough.