Or the most existential running koan of all:
What are you running from, what are you running to?
– C. Rivard
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6O8bGf0X9yU]
Author: Chris Rivard Page 30 of 36
What you are…what you actually are, is being. Being is not the mind thinking. Thinking is a movement, a motion. Being is the silence that precedes the motion. You cannot see it; you cannot grasp it because you
are it. The feeling that you are. The unadorned naked awareness that is always there, rarely heeded, is what you always have been, always will be. Cannot not be. You can’t look for it, because it is what is looking. It is
like space, you can’t see it but everything is in it. Everything is it. So I say to you, ‘be aware when you are unaware,’ let its presence warm you, fill you. Be present in the Presence.– Krishnamurti, speaking to actor Terence Stamp.
This is a short book report.
The book.
Warning: You will not be magically bestowed creative confidence by reading this book. I do not think I’m an anomaly.
If you’re a suit, or not a creative person… or something other than a designer (or if you want to unleash …something… in your cube farm). This is the book for you. BUY THIS BOOK.
If you are in the creative field: PASS. Your time would be better spent sketching.
The thing about the IDEO boys is that they have a lock on the message around design and business, but for the business audience. This is a business book about design. And honesly, there are better ones.
The one takeaway that I found valuable is to get moving – making, designing, exploring, etc. Rather than thinking. Which I find quite ironic a message in a business book about how to build creative confidence. They could have spared the anecdotes (heyo Akshay), trimmed 100 pages and had people out the door being … creative.
I actually think this is a better message, from Ira Glass:
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbC4gqZGPSY]
And so ultimately, confidence comes from experience – of doing the thing again and again, sometimes good, sometimes bad – but ultimately, the good increases and the bad decreases.
So … do MOAR!! (but go easy on yourself… stop to eat ice cream and get massages occasionally).
*The exercises in the back of the book were pretty good. Mind maps, etc. Although I think Dave Gray does better in Gamestorming. That’s a book every creative should read. It’s rad.
http://www.strava.com/activities/117826750
When I looked at my schedule this morning I resigned myself that today would be a day of meetings. I was booked straight through lunch with a break in the early afternoon and another meeting at 4pm.
I zipped my muddy (but dry) running kicks into their Manchester United shoe bag (purchased at the Heathrow Nike store) and was totally fine with leaving everything on my shelf in the locker room until Wednesday and just taking the day off. Taking one for the team.
My 2nd breakfast (everything I’ve brought for lunch) is typically dispatched by 11am and by noon I’m ready to run. Today I walked into a meeting at noon, then another at 1 that ran late until 2:30.
Back at my desk I checked my calendar, skimmed email and then looked over at my colleague and called it – I’m out, this is my window. I’ll be back in an hour.
I think that a lot of things in life are about timing and patience. Trust that you’ll know what to do when the time comes. It’s difficult to tune into those signals – but with practice you learn to recognize the opportunities. There is an acute sense of focused energy and purpose that becomes absolutely clear. When you have a shot, you take the shot. The window opens, you jump through it. You may land on your ass and fail miserably and want to cry in your beer at your misfortune… but the amazing thing is… if you’re the least bit self-aware – you just learned a valuable lesson 🙂 [Unfunnily… consider the alternative of never taking the shot. Anti-funny.]
I think that people who are happy, well adjusted and “successful” (whatever that means) have fallen on their ass more times than can be remembered. They just have the statistical advantage of more shots.
Anyway. The window opened and I jumped through it.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-k1UvozPeTw]
Amazing story.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M48tvsfpIew]
But read the book first.
http://www.amazon.com/Unbroken-World-Survival-Resilience-Redemption/dp/1400064163
http://www.strava.com/activities/117024698
This run is recorded, indexed, tagged and I’ve got a few materialized views for the more problematic sections. No wrong turns today. No surprises. It’s in my mind palace.
Notables:
Temperature varied about 15 degrees during the time I was out (about 3 hours). Started out in a light drizzle wearing a thin long sleeve zip and the OR centrifuge jacket. Stopped just before the Hawthorne bridge and took off the jacket. Stayed in the long sleeve top until the lookout at Hoyt Arboretum and made the executive call to switch shirts – peeled off the thin top (soaked) and put on just the (dry) centrifuge jacket. I had been pondering doing this for about 3 miles after I dropped down to the Burnside crossing from Pittock mansion and started seeing my breath. I was sweating quite a bit and starting to get cold, but had a few uphills so I knew I would warm up.
The highest elevation on this run is the top of Council Crest and it’s always colder. It’s so steep after crossing 26 that I shuffle/run/power walk (there are railroad tie steps) some sections and I thought I would be okay with a heavier layer and not overheat (and soak my jacket). It all worked and I didn’t overheat too much going up and I was cozy when the wind picked up on the East side and I started the long descent.
I’m finding that I’ve got a mental focus/motivation drop at about 11 miles. I think that’s my first real mental valley of a long run. On this loop at mile 11 I’ve already dropped back down into the arboretum and run some gently rolling singletrack before making a hairpin turn and running up to the lookout (just before the Zoo). It’s not a steep climb, but it’s sustained and boring and it saps my energy because I’m trying to prepare for the big up to Council Crest.
Nutrition:
- 3 gels
- 2 bottles of Cytomax
I’ve been drinking Cytomax for 15 years (heh) and I’ve found it’s the best for my stomach and I can actually find low end power when I’m starting to fade. Specifically, when I’m almost completely depleted, I can always find a little kick if I’m drinking it. There is a reason it’s been around for so long.
That’s it. Just putting time in to do the work.
Oh! And saw a few other runners, harley wave.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17PM-UMVud8&w=560&h=315]
I should have gone a little wider to get the correct radius on the sides – and the top was a little flat, should have crossed the road.
Snapped this excellent rainbow on my walk to work in Palo Alto this morning. My Airbnb was also excellent… I would describe it as the “Garden Court of Airbnb’s”. Hummus at Oren’s shop this afternoon… also excellent.
Meetings: productive and necessary.
Morning run: (first time running through Stanford in the rain), cut short because of the first meeting of the day. Didn’t make it up to the dish, but I did manage to shape the run like a map point icon. So that counts as fun.
Victorian box aka mock orange (Pittosporum undulatum)
That’s the tree responsible for the scent of Palm Drive on the Stanford campus.
“But the wild things cried, “Oh please don’t go – we’ll eat you up – we love you so!”
And Max said, “No!”
The wild things roared their terrible roars and gnashed their terrible teeth and rolled their terrible eyes and showed their terrible claws but Max stepped into his private boat and waved goodbye.”
Time for me to decamp to Portland.
Starting some lists.
People who self-identify as both “introvert” and “instigator”. In Portland we just call that passive aggressive. Very common among the designer set.
People who empty their coffee cups onto the street while sitting in their parked car. What other nasty habits do these people have? I’m certain they can be classified.
People who use the word “utilize”. Is there any word more useless in the English language? No. Pretentious or ignorant… probably a little of both.
0.0001% flappable
Completely losing the ability to communicate a coherent thought, where every word uttered or written undercuts the concept or idea attempting to be conveyed. Entropy as the measure of uncertainty in human communication. It’s a thing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Mathematical_Theory_of_Communication
“…well I could be condemned to hell for every sin but littering…”
Evolutionary
Dancing desks to follow standing desks.
[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/105547972″ params=”auto_play=false&hide_related=false&visual=true” width=”100%” height=”450″ iframe=”true” /]