Category Archives: culture

What Counts?

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Tainan, Taiwan

On January 15 this year I posted about a new habit I had committed to establishing:

1. Upon waking, get sunlight for at least several minutes before getting on any screen
2. Delay caffeine intake for at least 45 minutes after waking

I also committed to writing Morning Pages (3 pages, long hand, stream of consciousness journaling) in those first 15-30 minutes, which was actually the primary goal. The point of the practice is to unlock clarity and creativity in those first minutes of waking, when the door between conscious and subconscious awareness and insight is more open than at other times of day. Today was Day 310 total (I miss a few days a month, on average). But it was delayed, so did it count?

I do three high intensity workouts at Ethos every week. It gets harder to motivate to do things at home anymore, and yesterday I felt sheepishly happy to Iog 20 minutes of moderate effort on the elliptical. That counts as exercise, in my opinion. But what if I had only walked to the grocery store and back (which I also did)? What intensity and duration justifies that green dot on my habit tracker?

What counts as meditation, prayer, or ‘low carb’?

Why does it matter?

How many times a day do we encounter one recommendation or another for how many steps we should take, how much protein to eat, what school of meditation is best, what sleep routines to adopt, and how many people we need in our inner circle? If we wanted to follow all of the ‘experts” advice for health, just reading the recommendations and attempting to execute would be a full time job.

Of course I get to decide what counts as Morning Pages or exercise or not, because I am only accountable to myself for the habits and behaviors that uphold my own health. In the end it’s about goals, trade-offs, and results. Why do I do these things? What am I trying to accomplish? What am I willing and not willing to do for the desired outcomes?

What works for me, regardless of what ‘experts’ say and ‘studies show’?

Morning pages make my day better whether I have looked out the window or at my phone beforehand, though the insights may come a bit easier with the former, because I always spend more time on the phone than I intend. But it still usually takes at least a page and a half before novel ideas and epiphanies emerge. Regardless, I feel calmer and centered having journaled at all before the day starts in earnest.

Moving in any way for any amount of time benefits both mind and body, and I can both feel and see consequences of variations in frequency, duration, and intensity over days, weeks, and months. If I move above and beyond activities of daily living and work, then I count it, track it, and review over time to correlate with how I feel.

I see people getting fixated on ‘what counts’. Our culture of metrics, trackers, comparison, and competition foster this tendency toward obsessiveness. It’s too easy today to lose the forest for the trees, and much too easy to forget that the complex global ecosystem of a whole person’s health is synergistic in multiple simultaneous dimensions rather than simple or linear in any way. Whenever we hear anyone say, ‘just do (xxx), and it will fix (some global problem that nobody has yet to solve because there is simply no one right solution),’ we should approach with high skepticism and alert critical thinking.

If it aligns with my commitments and gives me a sense of progress toward my goals, then I say it counts. Tracking helps me see patterns, intersections, and correlates. It makes me more self-aware in real time, holds me accountable, and gives me a little dopamine hit with each green dot logged. Counting can be its own reward.

In the end, however, it’s the being and the doing that matter. So count it or not, I get to choose. The rewards of action and results outweigh those of counting. I think it’s good once in a while to consider more deeply the basic questions like, “What counts?” It keeps me honest.

Holding On

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Friends, it’s late. It’s Son’s last night at home for break, so we watched movies.
It was glorious.

How was this November for us all? Intense, thick, and full of emotion, I’d say.
Tonight I feel fulfilled and connected, for which I am truly grateful.
Thank you to all who have followed along these thirty days, this tenth year.
Not sure if I will do this again; I have eleven months to decide.
What did we Hold this NaBlo? Let’s review:

  1. Wholeness
  2. Regret
  3. Fear
  4. Fortitude
  5. Gentleness
  6. Space
  7. the Energies
  8. the Work
  9. Awareness
  10. What Helps
  11. Stories of Humanity
  12. Connection
  13. Patience
  14. Presence
  15. Resonance
  16. Polarity
  17. Allyship
  18. Perspective
  19. Understanding
  20. Love
  21. the Activist Heart
  22. the Questions
  23. Honesty
  24. Courage
  25. Strengths
  26. Accountability
  27. Rest
  28. Appreciation
  29. Belonging

I will reread these posts and the intention that initiated them in the coming days and weeks. It felt relevant to write about all of these practices–because looking back, most of them really are practices, not just ideas–with regard to the election and political discourse this month, this year. Yet each post applies to all relationships and all communication.
I intend to continue reflecting, sharing, learning, growing, and connecting.

This holiday season, let us slow down, de-escalate, and focus on the things that matter most. Let us find non-adversarial, respectful, and equanimitous approaches to disagreement, conflict, and collaboration across difference. Let us breathe deeply. Let us make more generous assumptions, speak more humbly, and withhold closure and judgment just a little longer. May open and honest curiosity lead us more than prejudice and bias.

I feel an urgent need to advance and elect people who model these skills exponentially better than those in office today. That is a big lift; I still vacillate between optimism and cynicism for this dream, and for human relationships in general sometimes. Still, we cannot know unless we try. The path remains long and tortuous, so we must help one another train for the journey. The work will outlive me, and likely anyone who reads these words. So Train, Recover, and Connect as my friends at Ethos say–we must stay fit to persist.

The only way out is through; the best way through is together. One breath at a time.

I Hold On for Us tonight and hereafter, my friends. Hold on to our friendships, our loyalties, our connections, our integrity, and our commitments to one another. Let go meanness, petty gibes, ad hominem, and ugliness in general. Hold on to decency, generosity, humility, compassion, and hope.

Onward, friends. One. breath. at a time.

Holding Belonging

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Everybody wants to both belong and stand out. The skillset for success here is attuning and differentiating at the same time.

In elections, and in 2024 especially, I perceive voting by many as rejection of the party that rejects us–that makes us feel like we don’t belong. Let us take a moment to let that idea sink in. At first it may seem irrelevant or even childish–and if we recognize it in ourselves, maybe we cannot imagine how ‘the other side’ could possibly feel the same, since they are the ones rejecting? But let’s get still and try to imagine how that could be? Within and among our layers of relationship–personal, professional, cultural–that feeling of rejection and being left out/behind is visceral and profoundly threatening, even when abstract. People feel it on both sides of this election, no question, and that feeling is also profoundly human. It’s vulnerable, raw, existential, and feels for many to be quite literally, not figuratively, life-threatening. If we can bridge even a little understanding around this fundamental and paradoxically shared experience, then we may actually get traction on healing our divides.

This idea of belonging as it relates to politics occurred to me early this month and faded; something calls me to post it tonight. Looking back, I actually already wrote a version, “Attune and Differentiate,” back in February 2020:

“…I listened again to Brené Brown’s Braving the Wilderness.  I highly recommend this book to help us all, conservatives and progressives alike, to engage (not avoid) one another this election year with a lot more compassion, civility, and mutual respect.  Throughout the book Sister Brené shares personal stories as well as evidence from her research that define true belonging, which I think of as another expression for self-actualization and self-transcendence.  In her words:

“True belonging requires us to believe in and belong to ourselves so fully that we can find sacredness in both being a part of something, and standing alone when necessary. But in a culture that’s rife with perfectionism and pleasing, and with the erosion of civility, it’s easy to stay quiet, hide in our ideological bunkers, or fit in rather than show up as our true selves and brave the wilderness of uncertainty and criticism.

“Attune and differentiate:  these two practices are not only not mutually exclusive, they are essential and integral for whole person and societal health and well-being.  Read the book to adopt her four practices to advance true belonging, for yourself and for all of us:

  1. People Are Hard to Hate Close Up. Move In.
  2. Speak Truth to Bullshit. Be Civil.
  3. Hold Hands. With Strangers.
  4. Strong Back. Soft Front.  Wild Heart.”

What makes us exclude others?

Once again I’m convinced it’s fear–likely many fears at the same time, all threatening our sense of safety and security. It relates to identity and values, which inform ideology, which manifests in tribes.

I wrote in November 2017:

“…I’m thinking tonight about tribal pride and tribalism—the benefits and risks of belonging.

“We all need our tribes.  Belonging is an essential human need. To fit in, feel understood and accepted, secure—these are necessary for whole person health.  And when our tribes have purpose beyond survival, provide meaning greater than simple self-preservation, our membership feels that much more valuable to us.  But what happens when tribes pit themselves against one another?  How are we all harmed when we veer from ‘We’re great!’ toward ‘They suck’?”

Clearly, many of us have spoken and written about this for years now. And though the movement to bridge divisions grows, we also quite clearly have not kept up. *sigh*
And it’s okay. Human relationships, tribal and otherwise, are an infinite game of fluid context, evolving technology and interaction, and chronic recurrent conflict. I have no illusions of ‘world peace’ in any abstract sense. I think all we can realistically work for now is a return to civility–but not the kind that ignores or erases difference and disagreement. Rather, I want a more thougthful, intentional, and respectfully engaging civility, one that emanates from mutual recognition of our shared core humanity–every. single. one of us.

We all belong to one another, like it, want it, know it or not.

In the first post of this month, Holding Wholeness, I wrote, “…any leader–man, woman, or otherwise–must own all parts of themselves to lead to their full potential. The strong and the soft, the masculine and the feminine, the committed and the flexible, the differentiated and the attuned–these polar and balancing aspects of our nature make us whole humans. People who live in their wholeness lead by example, by inspiration, by resonance with the wholeness of those they lead. They are leaders because we are moved to follow them; we feel their integrity and want it, aspire to it for ourselves.”

I had not planned to reference attunement and differentiation as bookends to this month of reflective posts–each day’s topic emerged in real time. And of course the same ideas recur, right? The ethos of this blog is consistent, if nothing else.

If we want to heal our divisions, I submit that we start with healing ourselves. We all/each have our own inner work to get to true wholeness, true and deep belonging to ourselves first, as Brené Brown writes. There is no interconnection without intraconnection standing right alongside, if not walking ahead. This requires humility, curiosity, and psychological safety, which fosters courage. I feel so impatient, so I can practice self-regulation. We all have our work.

I Hold Belonging for Us tonight. Whether or not we recognize, accept, or embrace it, we all share this need. How fascinating the metamorphosis of its expression and manifestation at the personal and local versus the government and policy levels, no? OH there is so much more to explore here. For now, though, I just Hold it. Belonging. What if we each take a few minutes, a few times, in the next several weeks and months, just contemplating the idea, encouraging ourselves to include as many people in our intersecting tribes as possible? It reminds me of loving kindness meditation–emanating belonging from our inner circles out to all of humanity. It costs energy and risks ego. The rewards of understanding and connection, in my strident opinion, far outweigh the costs and risks.