Wow! Has it really been more that two years since my last blog post? Well, just for the heck of it, here are five good songs inspired by a recent text exchange with Scott G.
Tous Les Garcons - Francoise Hardy
Girl From Ipanema - Astrud Gilberto and Stan Getz
Little Child, Running Wild - Curtis Mayfield
Just As Long As We're Together - Prince
Be My Lover - Alex Puddu
Happy listening!
Saturday, May 23, 2020
Sunday, December 31, 2017
How I accidentally had a minimalist Christmas
The holiday season seems to be a favorite of minimalists, at least the minimalists that write blogs. All their favorite whipping boys are on full display. The evils of consumerism, the insanity of the crowds on Black Friday, the stress of finding the perfect gift, the credit card bills, and...of course...the children. Won't somebody please think of the children???
I usually enjoy a good old-fashioned consumer-centric holiday. The energy in a crowded mall the week before Christmas is an entertaining blend of ecstasy and desperation, although the parking (or lack thereof) severely tests my patience and, on one occasion, drove me to eject my own mother from the car. She was yelling from the back seat to reverse into a newly empty space, even as several other cars were homing in on the spot from behind and sated shopping carts were passing perilously close to the front of my car. I suggested that it might be a good idea to get out of the car and leave the parking to me so that she and my wife could get a head start on the shopping. I still think it was a good call. Some holiday family time is better spent apart. Once the car was parked, the materialistic shopping spree began in earnest. And it was fun.
So this year I was surprised to look around our living room a few days before Christmas and see no tree, no lights, and no gift-wrapped presents. My wife had just finished arranging a few favorite Christmas tchotchkes around the room. Beautifully, as usual. She is a curator, after all. Christmas carols were playing. I was feeling that familiar Christmas glow, even without the tree, the lights, and the gifts. Could this be what minimalists are talking about when they say that the stuff isn't what matters? It was worth looking in to.
Minimalists feel that time is more precious that possessions, and that time and things compete with each other. The logic is sound. Buying a thing consumes time, maintaining the thing consumes time, and eventually disposing of the thing consumes time. Earning the money to pay for the thing consumes time and, for people who don't have the skills to maintain the thing, hiring someone else to maintain the thing consumes more time and money, as well as the time needed to earn the money to pay for the person to fix the thing. Buying less should free up time for other pursuits.
This proved to be true during our (accidentally) minimalist holiday season. In past Christmases, large parts of our weekends were devoted to pulling the fake tree out of storage in the basement and then setting up, decorating, un-decorating, taking down, and putting the fake tree back into storage. Not this year. I also spent much less time in traffic hell trying to get to the mall parking lot, circling the parking lot looking for a parking place, and wandering the mall (or scouring Amazon) looking for gifts.
Although the gift count was low, the party count was high. It was a throw-and-go season: throw parties, go to parties. Repeat as necessary. An intimate Thanksgiving dinner with a couple of friends, an office party in Austin, a big blow out thrown by a realtor-friend for her clients (most of whom are also long-time friends), a sing-along Christmas carol party with members of the Honolulu Opera Theater (yes, I kept my karaoke-honed voice in the background), and Christmas dinner in our home with friends and visiting relatives.
We didn't throw-and-go to these parties because we didn't have a tree or many gifts. We would have gone to those parties anyway. But I enjoyed them more than usual, which seems to be a direct result of reducing the time consumed by obligatory gift giving. As a minimalist would say, there was more of me left to give.
Even our big purchase of the season, the fridge, became a completely different gift-giving experience. My wife and I spent hours and hours researching different styles and models of refrigerator. We reviewed our household budget to decide what we could afford. We visited (and revisited) appliance stores. We opened hundreds of refrigerator doors. We discussed the relative merits of different drawer configurations (and wine racks). We talked to several sales people. We read Consumer Reports. And eventually we settled on the perfect new fridge. Most importantly, we did it together. In past years, that time was spent alone. And that made all the difference.
What about next year? Minimalist or consumer? Personally, I'm leaning minimal on this one. There are too many great people to share the holidays and too little time. Spending that time in traffic and shopping to find them all gifts to express my gratitude for their love and friendship seems to be beside the point. Better to go straight to the heart of the holidays and skip the detours.
I usually enjoy a good old-fashioned consumer-centric holiday. The energy in a crowded mall the week before Christmas is an entertaining blend of ecstasy and desperation, although the parking (or lack thereof) severely tests my patience and, on one occasion, drove me to eject my own mother from the car. She was yelling from the back seat to reverse into a newly empty space, even as several other cars were homing in on the spot from behind and sated shopping carts were passing perilously close to the front of my car. I suggested that it might be a good idea to get out of the car and leave the parking to me so that she and my wife could get a head start on the shopping. I still think it was a good call. Some holiday family time is better spent apart. Once the car was parked, the materialistic shopping spree began in earnest. And it was fun.
So this year I was surprised to look around our living room a few days before Christmas and see no tree, no lights, and no gift-wrapped presents. My wife had just finished arranging a few favorite Christmas tchotchkes around the room. Beautifully, as usual. She is a curator, after all. Christmas carols were playing. I was feeling that familiar Christmas glow, even without the tree, the lights, and the gifts. Could this be what minimalists are talking about when they say that the stuff isn't what matters? It was worth looking in to.
Mele Kalikimaka
Someone recently asked me how people in Hawaii know that it is Christmas. A reasonable question. The weather doesn't change (much), although the warm sunny days are slightly shorter and we get a bit more rain. The most reliable indicators are the holiday lights twinkling on the new condominiums around downtown. They light up in mid-November. Around the same time we start to see cars ferrying imported pine trees from the container ships to their living rooms. Having grown up in Montana, where pine trees actually grow in the ground, these trees are sad beyond belief. Sometimes they bring uninvited mainland visitors, like the slug infestation of a few years ago.
We opted for a fake tree. If it is good enough for Martha Stewart to sell in Home Depot, it's good enough for me. Our tree even had fake red berries and built-in lights, which saves hours stringing them. It was perfect. Until the lights started to burn out. And the berries fell off. And the box for storing the tree rotted out. We kicked it to the curb (for bulk trash to pick up) last year.
The plan was to buy a new one this year. On our first attempt to find a new fake tree, the model we wanted was sold out at Home Depot. But the salespeople assured us that another shipment was coming in next week. They even took our name and number and offered to call us when it arrived. Yeah, right. Never happened. I called back a few times and the fake tree shipment never arrived.
No worries! We have Amazon Prime! And Amazon sells everything, including trees. The only problem is that they don't ship fake Christmas trees to Honolulu. I don't know why, but this is a fairly common problem in Hawaii. A bit of internet sleuthing turned up a vendor that would ship us a tree, as long as we bought a $2000 fake tree. Ummm...no.
We gave up. Neither of us had the time or inclination to put any more effort into finding a fake tree. It was actually a relief. I kind of miss putting up the tree, but I am quite content knowing I won't have to take one down in a couple weeks.
Merry Christmas from the family
The gifts disappeared more gradually. Partly, it was the ravages of time. In the last fourteen months, my mother, my dog, and my stepmother all died of cancer. That's a big chunk of family to lose in a short time and also a big part of the annual gift exchange. It's a cliche, but I appreciate the value of people over things in a way I hadn't before. Maybe it was their last gift to me.
On a happier note, our refrigerator died, too. Not all of it, just the plumbing. Every time we got a glass of water, the wiring in the fridge got a soaking from a fractured plastic pipe. After shorting out the electrical, the water leaked into our basement bedroom. Not a good situation. Instead of separate gifts and stockings full of socks and shampoo, my wife and I decided to splurge on a snazzy new refrigerator for Christmas.
Pretty cool, isn't it? Definitely the right choice, but a refrigerator is a bit large to put under the fake tree we don't have. And it won't arrive until late January.
In past years, we could count on getting a few gifts from other relatives, but more and more of those have been replaced with gift cards. Nothing wrong with that. I love to receive gift cards, particularly if they are from Whole Foods, and sending Amazon gift cards is better that sending socks to our nieces and nephews. But they don't look terribly impressive piled up on Christmas morning. All tolled, we bought, wrapped, and mailed exactly zero gifts this year. And we received one gift wrapped box.
Throw and Go Holiday Season
Minimalists feel that time is more precious that possessions, and that time and things compete with each other. The logic is sound. Buying a thing consumes time, maintaining the thing consumes time, and eventually disposing of the thing consumes time. Earning the money to pay for the thing consumes time and, for people who don't have the skills to maintain the thing, hiring someone else to maintain the thing consumes more time and money, as well as the time needed to earn the money to pay for the person to fix the thing. Buying less should free up time for other pursuits.
This proved to be true during our (accidentally) minimalist holiday season. In past Christmases, large parts of our weekends were devoted to pulling the fake tree out of storage in the basement and then setting up, decorating, un-decorating, taking down, and putting the fake tree back into storage. Not this year. I also spent much less time in traffic hell trying to get to the mall parking lot, circling the parking lot looking for a parking place, and wandering the mall (or scouring Amazon) looking for gifts.
Although the gift count was low, the party count was high. It was a throw-and-go season: throw parties, go to parties. Repeat as necessary. An intimate Thanksgiving dinner with a couple of friends, an office party in Austin, a big blow out thrown by a realtor-friend for her clients (most of whom are also long-time friends), a sing-along Christmas carol party with members of the Honolulu Opera Theater (yes, I kept my karaoke-honed voice in the background), and Christmas dinner in our home with friends and visiting relatives.
We didn't throw-and-go to these parties because we didn't have a tree or many gifts. We would have gone to those parties anyway. But I enjoyed them more than usual, which seems to be a direct result of reducing the time consumed by obligatory gift giving. As a minimalist would say, there was more of me left to give.
Even our big purchase of the season, the fridge, became a completely different gift-giving experience. My wife and I spent hours and hours researching different styles and models of refrigerator. We reviewed our household budget to decide what we could afford. We visited (and revisited) appliance stores. We opened hundreds of refrigerator doors. We discussed the relative merits of different drawer configurations (and wine racks). We talked to several sales people. We read Consumer Reports. And eventually we settled on the perfect new fridge. Most importantly, we did it together. In past years, that time was spent alone. And that made all the difference.
What about next year? Minimalist or consumer? Personally, I'm leaning minimal on this one. There are too many great people to share the holidays and too little time. Spending that time in traffic and shopping to find them all gifts to express my gratitude for their love and friendship seems to be beside the point. Better to go straight to the heart of the holidays and skip the detours.
Monday, December 18, 2017
Trouble will find you, even while living a good enough life
No one is happy all the time. This shouldn't be too surprising. We begin life in a random place at a random time with absolutely no idea where to go next. If we are lucky, as most of us are, we find ourselves in the midst of a reasonably loving and conscientious family, who help to guide us and maybe give us a few rules to live by.
But the world is indifferent to your hopes and dreams, and it certainly isn't designed to insure that you will be happy. Plan a picnic and the weather turns stormy. Save for retirement and the stock market (or real estate market) crashes. The other party's candidate gets elected. Healthy people are diagnosed with cancer and die. Shit happens. So leading a good enough life includes learning how to cope when things don't go your way.
For example, I telecommute out of a spare bedroom in our house in a suburban Honolulu neighborhood. During the work week, I often don't see another person between the time my wife leaves in the morning and her return in the evening. Phone calls, email, IM, and the various other forms of electronic communication are helpful, but they don't replace good old face-to-face conversation. By the end of the day I am craving companionship and I eagerly anticipate our evening pre-dinner debrief (with martini and wine).
Trouble is, it doesn't always happen. A meeting may run long, there may be extra emails or essays to write, or a donor-cultivation dinner to attend. Whatever it is, I'll have an extra hour or two (or more) to fill. Maybe it sounds trivial (it probably is), but missing that evening conversation has been known to put me in a grey funk for days. Particularly if it happens on a Tuesday (don't ask why, I haven't figured that one out). Fortunately, I've learned a few tricks to navigate the unexpected misfortunes.
But the world is indifferent to your hopes and dreams, and it certainly isn't designed to insure that you will be happy. Plan a picnic and the weather turns stormy. Save for retirement and the stock market (or real estate market) crashes. The other party's candidate gets elected. Healthy people are diagnosed with cancer and die. Shit happens. So leading a good enough life includes learning how to cope when things don't go your way.
For example, I telecommute out of a spare bedroom in our house in a suburban Honolulu neighborhood. During the work week, I often don't see another person between the time my wife leaves in the morning and her return in the evening. Phone calls, email, IM, and the various other forms of electronic communication are helpful, but they don't replace good old face-to-face conversation. By the end of the day I am craving companionship and I eagerly anticipate our evening pre-dinner debrief (with martini and wine).
Trouble is, it doesn't always happen. A meeting may run long, there may be extra emails or essays to write, or a donor-cultivation dinner to attend. Whatever it is, I'll have an extra hour or two (or more) to fill. Maybe it sounds trivial (it probably is), but missing that evening conversation has been known to put me in a grey funk for days. Particularly if it happens on a Tuesday (don't ask why, I haven't figured that one out). Fortunately, I've learned a few tricks to navigate the unexpected misfortunes.
Before
Stoic philosophers advise us to contemplate the losses and misfortunes that could befall us. In his book on Stoicism, A Guide to the Good Life, William Irvine calls this practice "negative visualization." Modern cognitive therapists recommend a similar technique, which they call "decatastrophizing." Basically, you imagine the crappy things that could happen and then contemplate how you might react if they did happen.
Here's how it works. While hanging around on a Sunday afternoon, I might imagine that my wife will unexpectedly have to work late on Tuesday (aaarrghh...the worst possible night!) How might I react? I could curse the reason for her absence (damn those confounded hungry donors) and generally get mad at circumstance. From the perspective of Sunday, that seems like a ridiculous reaction.
Thinking a little more, I might realize that I could use the time to do a little extra work of my own, meditate for a little longer than usual, revise a draft blog post, plan a karaoke party, watch a little TV, or some combination of all of those things. Suddenly, a couple extra hours to myself start to look kind of appealing. Regardless of what happens next Tuesday (or any other evening), I'm prepared to deal with it.
Seneca says
Seneca says
He robs present ills of their power who has perceived their coming beforehand.Indeed it does. The example above isn't hypothetical. I used exactly that thought process once I recognized that the feeling of resentment and anger that bubbled up every time my wife got home a little late was pointlessly adding friction to our relationship. And it works. I don't like the extra loneliness, but I'm prepared for it.
During
Prepare all you want, but life will still catch you unawares. She can be a bee-otch that way. The curve ball could be something completely unforeseen. Or it could be something that you "negatively visualized" last week, which nevertheless still upsets you when it happens this week.
Suppose it is mid-afternoon on a week day and I get a call from my wife. She forgot about an opening of a show at one of the local galleries. Sorry, but she'll be an hour or two late. Normally, that's no problem. But sometimes, I don't want to do more work, meditate any more, or watch TV for two hours. I just want to mix up a martini, talk for awhile, and then make dinner. Forget the show, she should be home with me. What to do then?
How about nothing? Just sit back and watch the fireworks exploding in your brain. It can be an entertaining sight. After an unexpected interruption in my evening plans, the first thing I notice, when I'm being mature enough to practice what I'm preaching, is a bitter, resentful feeling. What right do these other people have to mess up my carefully laid plans? And a little self-pity often shows up - why didn't someone invite me out to dinner?
But it is not all whiny self-indulgence. Usually a feeling of empathy steals onto the scene. My wife is just as attached to our evening time as I am. She isn't happy about the change of plans, either. And for her it might be worse, she is working late at someone else's beck and call.
Compassion follows. First, for myself - I know the anger will pass if I let it. Then, for my wife. I can help her recover from the long (and possibly frustrating) day if I let go of the angry feelings and welcome her home with a smile and a hug. Or I could cling to my self-righteous resentment, with predictably bad results. My choice. Before I caught on to the mindfulness trick, I frequently went with the latter. Now I usually choose to let go and smile.
Suppose it is mid-afternoon on a week day and I get a call from my wife. She forgot about an opening of a show at one of the local galleries. Sorry, but she'll be an hour or two late. Normally, that's no problem. But sometimes, I don't want to do more work, meditate any more, or watch TV for two hours. I just want to mix up a martini, talk for awhile, and then make dinner. Forget the show, she should be home with me. What to do then?
How about nothing? Just sit back and watch the fireworks exploding in your brain. It can be an entertaining sight. After an unexpected interruption in my evening plans, the first thing I notice, when I'm being mature enough to practice what I'm preaching, is a bitter, resentful feeling. What right do these other people have to mess up my carefully laid plans? And a little self-pity often shows up - why didn't someone invite me out to dinner?
But it is not all whiny self-indulgence. Usually a feeling of empathy steals onto the scene. My wife is just as attached to our evening time as I am. She isn't happy about the change of plans, either. And for her it might be worse, she is working late at someone else's beck and call.
Compassion follows. First, for myself - I know the anger will pass if I let it. Then, for my wife. I can help her recover from the long (and possibly frustrating) day if I let go of the angry feelings and welcome her home with a smile and a hug. Or I could cling to my self-righteous resentment, with predictably bad results. My choice. Before I caught on to the mindfulness trick, I frequently went with the latter. Now I usually choose to let go and smile.
After
Now your day is going really badly. You anticipated a potential problem and it came to pass. You paid attention as it was happening but you still feel crappy about what went down. Now it seems like your world is going to hell in a hand basket. Nothing will ever go right again. At least not for you. Maybe it's time to remember your ABCs or, more exactly, your ABCDEs.
Martin Seligman outlines a great technique for dealing with setbacks after the fact in his book, Learned Optimism. There are five basic steps:
- Adversity - This is what happened. Rain, stock market correction, presidential election, or cancer.
- Belief - This is what you believe about the adversity. I should have looked at a weather report, invested in bonds, voted, or eaten more fruits and vegetables.
- Consequences - This is what you think will happen as a result of the adversity. Catch a cold, never retire, world war, or death.
- Disputation - This is where you challenge your beliefs and expected consequences. Colds are caused by viruses and not wetness, stock prices historically fall and then rise again, Congress has the sole power to declare war, chemotherapy and radiation are often effective treatments.
- Energization - Now you take a positive step in response to the adversity. Dry off and drink an orange juice, be patient and don't sell your stocks, write your representatives in Congress, call an oncologist.
There is a lot more to this technique and it is well worth the effort to explore in more detail. Rather than bore the uninterested, I'll just recommend the book. But you can skip the part where he administers electric shocks to dogs.
Epilogue
What? You're still here? You visualized (negatively), decatastrophized, paid attention, did your ABCDEs, and you are still grouchy? A regular Oscar-in-the-garbage-can aren't you? Then you leave me with no choice. We have to go way, way bold. It's time for Jonathan Richman. I dare you not to smile at the dance break. Enjoy!
Sunday, December 10, 2017
Four great books to help you lead a good enough life
How to lead a better life has been a topic of compelling interest for about as long as people have been able to write. So there are libraries full of books on the topic. Where to start? Anywhere is probably fine. But this is where I would begin, if I had to do it all over again.
Since we are in the thick of the holiday season, I'll offer one last word of warning before I present the list. Think twice before you buy any of these books as a gift for anyone. There is always the chance that unwrapping one of these would be like opening a birthday card that says, "would you please get your shit together already?" Buy these for yourself first. Use them well. And then recommend them wholeheartedly.
If you are looking for a gift, how about my favorite book: The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien? Or my favorite tearjerker? That is David Copperfield. Or maybe Tale of Two Cities. In either case, there is no doubt that there is something about Dickens. And if you are looking for something a bit more lighthearted, try the book that made me laugh the hardest. That is definitely (maybe) The Truth by Terry Pratchett. But I digress.
Now, in reverse order of how valuable they have been in my life, and therefore maybe in yours, here is the list.
If you have never heard of Jon Kabat-Zinn, you haven’t been paying attention, which is reason enough to read Wherever You Go, There You Are. Blame it on television, smart phones, social networking, or any of the other supposed ills of modern living, but it is hard to deny that awareness and mindfulness are in short supply.
The definition of mindfulness is deceptively simple. Kabat-Zinn calls it paying attention, on purpose, in the present moment, non-judgmentally. Easy to type, not so easy to practice. If you have never taken a self-guided tour through your own body and mind, you are likely in for a big surprise.
One basic mindfulness exercise is to pay attention to your breath by counting each in-breath and each out-breath. The first time I tried it, I made it to a count of two before my brain decided it would be much more interesting to start playing the soundtrack to Grease. The music was followed by a few scenes from the movie (for some reason it’s always Rizzo singing There Are Worse Things I Could Do), then my awareness noticed the pain in my knee and the slouch in my back, at which point I thought “Wait! I’m supposed to be meditating, stop that.” Who was I talking to? Beats me. Somewhere around that moment, I started counting again. Maybe I made it to three the next try. Maybe not.
I’d like to say that I have gotten better at meditation over the last several years, but it wouldn’t be strictly true. My monkey mind still loves swinging from music to movies, to snippets of past conversations, to plans for the future, to drafts of blog posts, to various aches and pains in every limb and joint. Happiness, sadness, joy, grief, anger, anxiety, worry, doubt, hope, fear, pain, pleasure, and occasionally even stillness and equanimity make regular appearances. Wherever has been with me through the entire journey, reminding me that this is it. Enjoy the ride.
Learning how to spell Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi is a flow experience in miniature. At first, there is the challenge of assembling the letters of an unfamiliar name from a different culture. This requires learning a new skill (spelling the name), establishes a clear goal (correctly type the name from memory), and provides instant feedback (check the attempt against the correct spelling). For a short time, the task is completely engrossing and time seems to melt away. But, like all flow activities, eventually the skill is mastered and the task becomes boring. Time to find a new challenge. Like pronouncing Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi.
Flow (the book) would be a worthwhile read if all it did was describe flow (the state of mind), with a little explanation of the science and a few tips on how to achieve flow. But this book is much more. Part critique of the common conception of happiness, part guide for the aspiring autotelic personality, and part philosophical treatise, flow is always on (or near) the first page of my Kindle home screen.
The most challenging section of the book might be the last, the Making of Meaning. Csikszentmihalyi argues that stringing together flow experiences is pleasurable, but not necessarily meaningful. To give life meaning requires directing your choice of experiences to an overarching goal. Philosophers have called this “the project.” Psychologists refer to “propriate strivings” or “life themes.” By whatever name, a life theme imparts meaning to the efforts of daily life.
Life themes are everywhere. Lawyers may find meaning in working to reduce injustice. Doctors may find it by reducing the suffering of their patients or finding a cure for cancer. Teachers by freeing students from the bonds of ignorance. But they aren’t always easy to find. The examples in the book describe people who forged a life theme out of exceptional personal trials. What about the rest of us who lead more average lives? Wouldn’t it be nice is someone had provided a framework for looking at our lives and divining a sense of purpose from our experience? Luckily, someone has.
I stumbled upon Parachute while I was living in Champaign, IL and trying to figure out how to get out of academic research. The biggest problem was that I didn’t know what else to do. Richard Nelson Bolles didn’t know either, but he does know a lot about helping you figure it out for yourself. Ironically, the most crucial step is asking other people.
For those (probably few) who have never seen the inside of the book, the bulk of Parachute is dedicated to teaching you how to complete the Flower diagram, which has seven petals: geography, salary, working conditions, favorite kinds of people, transferable skills, favorite knowledge/field of interest, and your goal, purpose, or mission in life. Bolles gives you lots of tools for filling out the petals, but they don’t add up to much on their own.
Informational interviewing is what brings it all together. Basically, you head out into the world and ask anyone you can find to tell you about their work. What do they do every day? Why do they do it? How did they get here? What do they love? Hate? Learn everything you can about their job. And then “try it on for size” by comparing their work to the standard outlined in the petals of your flower. Then do it again. And again. And again. Many, many, many times.
The first time I used informational interviewing in a job hunt I did well over a hundred informational interviews over the course of three or four months of full time interviewing. Based on that experience, I can tell you with some confidence that it works. I began as an unemployed former astrophysicist and ended up as a freelance science communication consultant with several clients in a newly adopted city.
Considering moving to a new city? Do yourself a favor and read this book. Richard Florida knows a thing or two about what makes a city livable. More importantly, he acknowledges that not every city is a good fit for every person. Cities have personalities, too. And if you don’t click with a city, your relationship with the place is never going to take flight.
I wish I had read this book before I moved to Honolulu. I don’t know if it would have changed the ultimate decision to move, but at least I would have had the sense to visit once before committing to move here. Move to an island in the middle of the Pacific without visiting first? Yep. Did that.
And I probably wouldn’t have done it if I had read City first. Florida wisely notes that you have to be in a city to know if you connect with the place, which leads to the reason City only ranks as an honorable mention: the advice is very difficult to put into practice.
Even if I had come to Honolulu on a reconnaissance mission, I would not have understood all of what I was seeing. The tourist-eye view is not the same as the view of a jaded Honolulu resident. One could fill books exploring why this is so, but for the moment, trust me. The Honolulu you saw on your last vacation bears almost no resemblance to the Honolulu I live in. I am pretty sure the same is true everywhere, or at least in popular tourist destinations.
Plus, even if you know you should preview your potential new home, who has the time and money to preview several places to make an informed comparison? Finally, the freedom to choose a place to live from among many options has been a rarity in my life. Almost every move I have made was driven by employment.
There you have it. My list of books that might help you live a good enough life. How does this match your list? Any suggestions for books I should check out?
Since we are in the thick of the holiday season, I'll offer one last word of warning before I present the list. Think twice before you buy any of these books as a gift for anyone. There is always the chance that unwrapping one of these would be like opening a birthday card that says, "would you please get your shit together already?" Buy these for yourself first. Use them well. And then recommend them wholeheartedly.
If you are looking for a gift, how about my favorite book: The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien? Or my favorite tearjerker? That is David Copperfield. Or maybe Tale of Two Cities. In either case, there is no doubt that there is something about Dickens. And if you are looking for something a bit more lighthearted, try the book that made me laugh the hardest. That is definitely (maybe) The Truth by Terry Pratchett. But I digress.
Now, in reverse order of how valuable they have been in my life, and therefore maybe in yours, here is the list.
4. Your Money or Your Life
Vicky Robin and Joe Dominguez popularized (if they didn't invent) the concept of financial independence in this book. Financial independence is having enough capital to live on without recourse to paid work. A noble goal and one that is very difficult to achieve, despite all the encouragement that Vicky and Joe serve up.
But even if you never achieve FI, or like me are trying to get there but haven't made it yet, reading YMOYL is still well worth the investment of time just for their discussion of "enough." What is enough?
But even if you never achieve FI, or like me are trying to get there but haven't made it yet, reading YMOYL is still well worth the investment of time just for their discussion of "enough." What is enough?
Enough for survival. Enough comforts. And even enough little "luxuries." We have everything we need; there's nothing extra to weigh us down, distract, or distress us, nothing we've bought on time, have never used, and are struggling to pay off. Enough is a fearless place.
There is no universal prescription for enough. Everyone has to figure it out for themselves. Mr. Money Mustache set the enough bar at about $30,000 per year for his family of three.
I haven't found my personal threshold of enough, but it is definitely higher than MMM. I am notoriously inept with plumbing and, as a general rule, if the phone is broke, nothing gets fixed in our house. So I have to account for repair bills. On the other hand, I live most of my life in shorts and t-shirts, with a white-shirt-and-jeans uniform for public occasions, which keeps my clothing bills down. Eventually I'll get there. Maybe. Fingers crossed.
I haven't found my personal threshold of enough, but it is definitely higher than MMM. I am notoriously inept with plumbing and, as a general rule, if the phone is broke, nothing gets fixed in our house. So I have to account for repair bills. On the other hand, I live most of my life in shorts and t-shirts, with a white-shirt-and-jeans uniform for public occasions, which keeps my clothing bills down. Eventually I'll get there. Maybe. Fingers crossed.
3. Wherever You Go, There You Are
If you have never heard of Jon Kabat-Zinn, you haven’t been paying attention, which is reason enough to read Wherever You Go, There You Are. Blame it on television, smart phones, social networking, or any of the other supposed ills of modern living, but it is hard to deny that awareness and mindfulness are in short supply.
The definition of mindfulness is deceptively simple. Kabat-Zinn calls it paying attention, on purpose, in the present moment, non-judgmentally. Easy to type, not so easy to practice. If you have never taken a self-guided tour through your own body and mind, you are likely in for a big surprise.
One basic mindfulness exercise is to pay attention to your breath by counting each in-breath and each out-breath. The first time I tried it, I made it to a count of two before my brain decided it would be much more interesting to start playing the soundtrack to Grease. The music was followed by a few scenes from the movie (for some reason it’s always Rizzo singing There Are Worse Things I Could Do), then my awareness noticed the pain in my knee and the slouch in my back, at which point I thought “Wait! I’m supposed to be meditating, stop that.” Who was I talking to? Beats me. Somewhere around that moment, I started counting again. Maybe I made it to three the next try. Maybe not.
I’d like to say that I have gotten better at meditation over the last several years, but it wouldn’t be strictly true. My monkey mind still loves swinging from music to movies, to snippets of past conversations, to plans for the future, to drafts of blog posts, to various aches and pains in every limb and joint. Happiness, sadness, joy, grief, anger, anxiety, worry, doubt, hope, fear, pain, pleasure, and occasionally even stillness and equanimity make regular appearances. Wherever has been with me through the entire journey, reminding me that this is it. Enjoy the ride.
2. Flow
Learning how to spell Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi is a flow experience in miniature. At first, there is the challenge of assembling the letters of an unfamiliar name from a different culture. This requires learning a new skill (spelling the name), establishes a clear goal (correctly type the name from memory), and provides instant feedback (check the attempt against the correct spelling). For a short time, the task is completely engrossing and time seems to melt away. But, like all flow activities, eventually the skill is mastered and the task becomes boring. Time to find a new challenge. Like pronouncing Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi.
Flow (the book) would be a worthwhile read if all it did was describe flow (the state of mind), with a little explanation of the science and a few tips on how to achieve flow. But this book is much more. Part critique of the common conception of happiness, part guide for the aspiring autotelic personality, and part philosophical treatise, flow is always on (or near) the first page of my Kindle home screen.
The most challenging section of the book might be the last, the Making of Meaning. Csikszentmihalyi argues that stringing together flow experiences is pleasurable, but not necessarily meaningful. To give life meaning requires directing your choice of experiences to an overarching goal. Philosophers have called this “the project.” Psychologists refer to “propriate strivings” or “life themes.” By whatever name, a life theme imparts meaning to the efforts of daily life.
Life themes are everywhere. Lawyers may find meaning in working to reduce injustice. Doctors may find it by reducing the suffering of their patients or finding a cure for cancer. Teachers by freeing students from the bonds of ignorance. But they aren’t always easy to find. The examples in the book describe people who forged a life theme out of exceptional personal trials. What about the rest of us who lead more average lives? Wouldn’t it be nice is someone had provided a framework for looking at our lives and divining a sense of purpose from our experience? Luckily, someone has.
1. What Color is Your Parachute
I stumbled upon Parachute while I was living in Champaign, IL and trying to figure out how to get out of academic research. The biggest problem was that I didn’t know what else to do. Richard Nelson Bolles didn’t know either, but he does know a lot about helping you figure it out for yourself. Ironically, the most crucial step is asking other people.
For those (probably few) who have never seen the inside of the book, the bulk of Parachute is dedicated to teaching you how to complete the Flower diagram, which has seven petals: geography, salary, working conditions, favorite kinds of people, transferable skills, favorite knowledge/field of interest, and your goal, purpose, or mission in life. Bolles gives you lots of tools for filling out the petals, but they don’t add up to much on their own.
Informational interviewing is what brings it all together. Basically, you head out into the world and ask anyone you can find to tell you about their work. What do they do every day? Why do they do it? How did they get here? What do they love? Hate? Learn everything you can about their job. And then “try it on for size” by comparing their work to the standard outlined in the petals of your flower. Then do it again. And again. And again. Many, many, many times.
The first time I used informational interviewing in a job hunt I did well over a hundred informational interviews over the course of three or four months of full time interviewing. Based on that experience, I can tell you with some confidence that it works. I began as an unemployed former astrophysicist and ended up as a freelance science communication consultant with several clients in a newly adopted city.
Honorable mention: Who's Your City
Considering moving to a new city? Do yourself a favor and read this book. Richard Florida knows a thing or two about what makes a city livable. More importantly, he acknowledges that not every city is a good fit for every person. Cities have personalities, too. And if you don’t click with a city, your relationship with the place is never going to take flight.
I wish I had read this book before I moved to Honolulu. I don’t know if it would have changed the ultimate decision to move, but at least I would have had the sense to visit once before committing to move here. Move to an island in the middle of the Pacific without visiting first? Yep. Did that.
And I probably wouldn’t have done it if I had read City first. Florida wisely notes that you have to be in a city to know if you connect with the place, which leads to the reason City only ranks as an honorable mention: the advice is very difficult to put into practice.
Even if I had come to Honolulu on a reconnaissance mission, I would not have understood all of what I was seeing. The tourist-eye view is not the same as the view of a jaded Honolulu resident. One could fill books exploring why this is so, but for the moment, trust me. The Honolulu you saw on your last vacation bears almost no resemblance to the Honolulu I live in. I am pretty sure the same is true everywhere, or at least in popular tourist destinations.
Plus, even if you know you should preview your potential new home, who has the time and money to preview several places to make an informed comparison? Finally, the freedom to choose a place to live from among many options has been a rarity in my life. Almost every move I have made was driven by employment.
There you have it. My list of books that might help you live a good enough life. How does this match your list? Any suggestions for books I should check out?
Sunday, December 3, 2017
Want to get happy, be creative, and make new friends? Try karaoke!
Karaoke always frightened me. Walking past the open door of a bar and
hearing the words to Copacabana floating out into the night air, sung by someone
who is clearly not Barry Manilow, gave me sweaty palms and a sinking feeling in
the pit of my stomach. Much like the
feeling I get when I watch a bungie jumper leap off of a bridge. I could not imagine why anyone would ever
willingly subject themselves to karaoke, much less enjoy it.
So when a friend mentioned that her company was using karaoke as a bonding exercise for new employees, I started counting the days until she was working for a new company. And when the same friend invited my wife and I to join some other friends and visiting relatives at the Karaoke Hut a few weeks later, I immediately said…yes???
So when a friend mentioned that her company was using karaoke as a bonding exercise for new employees, I started counting the days until she was working for a new company. And when the same friend invited my wife and I to join some other friends and visiting relatives at the Karaoke Hut a few weeks later, I immediately said…yes???
You don't have to call me Merle Haggard...anymore
WTF? Did I really agree to suffer the humiliation of trying sing in public? Apparently so. From out of nowhere, my inner Steve Goodman decided he wasn't going to be left out of an evening with friends spent eating, drinking, and belting out off-tune versions of pop hits.
That is how I found myself sitting in a windowless room filled with battered leather couches, a table covered in wine bottles and cookies, lyrics scrolling across a television screen, ... and microphones. Two ominous microphones. Into which I was going to have to sing. I doubled down on Steve Goodman and selected You Never Even Call Me By My Name.
I was wise to choose a funny song for my first attempt. A recent study suggests that listening to happy music increases creativity.
Creativity was higher for participants who listened to ‘happy music’ (i.e., classical music high on arousal and positive mood) while performing the divergent creativity task, than for participants who performed the task in silence.According to Wikipedia, divergent creativity (or divergent thinking) typically occurs in a spontaneous, free-flowing, 'non-linear' manner, such that many ideas are generated in an emergent cognitive fashion. So divergent creativity is for brainstorming. Coming up with crazy new ideas.
My crazy new idea was to add Subterranean Homesick Blues to the queue.
Look out kid
How do hip-hop MCs keep up that rapid fire flow for verse after verse? Part of the answer has to be adrenaline. Bob Dylan is no Eminem, but SHB is plenty speedy enough for a novice karaoke singer. No time to think, the screen was counting down. 4...3...2...1... Johnny's in the basement! I was off and running.
Two minutes later I was panting and totally pumped! I hit (almost) every word at (almost) the right rhythm and something resembling the melody. The crowd cheered and clapped and laughed (in a good way). Serious adrenaline rush.
Probably a substantial dose of endorphins, too. Another study found that performing music increased pain tolerance, which indicates that the performer's system is flooded with endorphins. Interestingly, listening to music did not have the same effect. The researchers concluded that the active performance of music generates the endorphin high.
Does the performance kick bring people closer together? The researchers in this study thought it likely. My wife and I took a shot at answering the question by singing one of our favorite duets.
Does the performance kick bring people closer together? The researchers in this study thought it likely. My wife and I took a shot at answering the question by singing one of our favorite duets.
Dirty deeds...done dirt cheap
Maybe AC/DC isn't the first group that springs to mind when you think of love. Lust, probably. But love? Not so much. So take my word for it, there is something terribly romantic about snuggling up to your sweetie and snarling along with Bon Scott. At least my wife and I think so.
Our passionate rendition of Dirty Deeds resonated with the rest of the room. When the call-and-response chorus kicked in, they were right there with us. We called out the dirty deeds...they responded with the cost. Done dirt cheap never sounded as good as it did coming back at us in that cramped little karaoke room. Now I understand why singers on stage point their mic at the audience. Audiences that know the words rule.
It will come as no surprise that researchers have exhaustively demonstrated that sharing music bonds people together. The mechanism is probably the release of oxytocin, a neuropeptide that plays a role in bonding between prairie vols, dogs, and humans.
But all the science seems to be beside the point. Or maybe it just belabors the point. Does anyone really need to read a scientific paper to know that that they will feel happier, more creative, and more connected with their friends if they sing a song together?
Not after a night of karaoke, they won't. In fact, the most surprising thing I learned from reading scientific studies of music and positive psychology is that there are people who get paid to play snippets of Mozart to other people and then ask them to come up with different uses for a brick. True story. It's called the Alternative Uses Task.
Whether you learn it in the lab or in the karaoke room, there is no doubt that music rocks. Or rolls. Or swings. Or hips and hops. Whatever. Leave it to Friedrich Nietzsche to cut to the core of the issue. "Without music, life would be a mistake."
Drop the mic.
Not after a night of karaoke, they won't. In fact, the most surprising thing I learned from reading scientific studies of music and positive psychology is that there are people who get paid to play snippets of Mozart to other people and then ask them to come up with different uses for a brick. True story. It's called the Alternative Uses Task.
Whether you learn it in the lab or in the karaoke room, there is no doubt that music rocks. Or rolls. Or swings. Or hips and hops. Whatever. Leave it to Friedrich Nietzsche to cut to the core of the issue. "Without music, life would be a mistake."
Drop the mic.
Sunday, November 26, 2017
How much time should a happy person spend at work?
Do you spend too much time at work? Is overtime a way of life or, even worse, do you take work home for the weekends? If so, you are not alone. Approximately 60% of employees are estimated to work on the weekends. All the while a little voice in the back of our heads is whispering, just think what you could be doing if all your time wasn't consumed with work.
This is not a new sentiment. Nor is it confined to the average citizen. Even Gaius Octavius, aka Augustus, emperor of Rome, was worn down by the work-a-day grind. In the book On the Shortness of Life, Seneca says:
Work can become all-consuming for non-emperors, too. Meeting the seemingly never-ending demands of bosses, customers, clients, and co-workers leaves many of us with precious little time to care for ourselves and satisfy our own needs, hopes, and desires.
Seneca's explanation is that we simply don't place enough value on our time.
Part of the reason is the nature of my work. The patent office will only give an inventor a patent on a new idea. If there is any evidence that the idea was already known at the time the patent application is filed, no patent for the inventor. That includes the inventor talking about, writing about, or offering to sell their invention. So deadlines are baked into the process.
This creates serious time pressure. For example, one of my clients is a member of many standards bodies that define how my client's products (and all of their competitors and fellow members' products) must operate. Holding a patent on a standardized technology is therefore very valuable because everyone has to use it.
The members meet several times a year to present ideas and haggle over what to include in the final standards. Most of the time between meetings is spent working on new ideas and so the inventors don't finalize the inventions until a few days before the meeting. In order to protect the inventions that might get included in a standard, a patent application has to be filed before the invention is discussed at the meeting, which leaves me with precious little time to do my part.
The work is intense and sometimes nerve-wracking. I have to learn the technology, interview the inventors, prepare and revise the application (with a 20-plus page specification, claims, and drawings), and file the application. There are some early mornings, long days, and late nights, particularly if the inventors are located in Europe, India, China, or Japan, as they often are. Yikes! Just explaining the process gets my heart pumping and my palms sweaty.
Most of the anxiety that comes with a short-fuse application is anticipatory. I always worry that this will be the application that doesn't make it to the patent office by the deadline. That all vanishes once the work starts. Almost a soon as I begin reading the disclosure that describes the invention, I lock into the flow state, where I (mostly) stay until I click SUBMIT on the United States Patent & Trademark Office application filing page. And in the end, the applications always get filed on time. It's kind of a specialty of mine and I take great pride in being able to deliver a high quality application on short notice.
Nonetheless, once the rush application is done and filed, I start hoping for a break and thinking that life would be so much better if I didn't have to spend my time grinding out patent applications.
The impulse to avoid work, even though it provides some of the most stimulating challenges in our lives, is pervasive. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi found that subjects in his studies of flow consistently report that they have some of their most positive experiences while working. Nevertheless, these same people report that they would prefer not to be working and their motivation on the job is low.
The belief that leisure is the best way to spend time is also nearly universal, even though people tend to be less happy at leisure. Csikszentmihalyi's subjects reported surprisingly low moods during their leisure time while also claiming that they would prefer more leisure time. Csikszentmihalyi calls this the paradox of work.
The result? For the most part, challenging work is enjoyable, as predicted. I find I am generally willing to make the trade-off between work and leisure to tackle a tough project. However, there is a limit. Skipping walks or meditation is tolerable if I'm deeply immersed in drafting an application, but if work squeezes them out for too long, I get resentful and unhappy. Reading and writing about new inventions is fine, but not to the exclusion of reading and writing about life. Or simply living life.
So does working hard feel like happiness on the good days? Not really. When I am happy, I feel a sense of lightness, freedom, and joy. Crunching through a patent application, particularly if I am on a tight deadline, is more like a weighty challenge. Satisfying but not joyous.
Flow may be an important clue to the mystery of happiness, but it is not the same as happiness. Csikszentmihalyi may be correct that we are not heeding the evidence of our senses when we are working, but it also seems plausible that measures of flow are missing some ingredients of happiness. One possibility suggested by Csikszentmihalyi is that happy flow results from an internal motivation, whereas the less happy state of flow reported at work is produced by external motivators, like bosses, customers, clients, and co-workers.
This agrees with my experience. Flow at work is not as sure to produce enjoyment as flow on my own time. And too much work, even in flow, produces diminishing returns of happiness. Perhaps flow and work are overlapping states. Work without flow is less likely to be happy work. And work with flow is more likely to be happy work, But not all flow at work is guaranteed to produce happy work.
All work and no play...
This is not a new sentiment. Nor is it confined to the average citizen. Even Gaius Octavius, aka Augustus, emperor of Rome, was worn down by the work-a-day grind. In the book On the Shortness of Life, Seneca says:
The divine Augustus, to whom the gods gave more than to any man, never ceased to pray for rest for himself and to seek release from the affairs of state.Augustus never arrived at his eagerly anticipated retirement and as far as I can tell, he never even took a vacation. Laying the foundations for an enduring Pax Romana is a full time job, it might even require a little overtime now and then.
Work can become all-consuming for non-emperors, too. Meeting the seemingly never-ending demands of bosses, customers, clients, and co-workers leaves many of us with precious little time to care for ourselves and satisfy our own needs, hopes, and desires.
Seneca's explanation is that we simply don't place enough value on our time.
People trifle with the most precious commodity of all; and it escapes their notice because it's an immaterial thing that doesn't appear to the eyes, and for that reason it's valued very cheaply - or rather, it has practically no value at all.Most likely, neither Augustus nor Seneca ever heard the phrase "work-life balance," but I'm sure they would understand the concept. Assign the proper priorities to "work" and "life," then allocate your time accordingly. Right. Like that ever happens. My "work" is never balanced with my "life."
Part of the reason is the nature of my work. The patent office will only give an inventor a patent on a new idea. If there is any evidence that the idea was already known at the time the patent application is filed, no patent for the inventor. That includes the inventor talking about, writing about, or offering to sell their invention. So deadlines are baked into the process.
This creates serious time pressure. For example, one of my clients is a member of many standards bodies that define how my client's products (and all of their competitors and fellow members' products) must operate. Holding a patent on a standardized technology is therefore very valuable because everyone has to use it.
The members meet several times a year to present ideas and haggle over what to include in the final standards. Most of the time between meetings is spent working on new ideas and so the inventors don't finalize the inventions until a few days before the meeting. In order to protect the inventions that might get included in a standard, a patent application has to be filed before the invention is discussed at the meeting, which leaves me with precious little time to do my part.
The work is intense and sometimes nerve-wracking. I have to learn the technology, interview the inventors, prepare and revise the application (with a 20-plus page specification, claims, and drawings), and file the application. There are some early mornings, long days, and late nights, particularly if the inventors are located in Europe, India, China, or Japan, as they often are. Yikes! Just explaining the process gets my heart pumping and my palms sweaty.
Most of the anxiety that comes with a short-fuse application is anticipatory. I always worry that this will be the application that doesn't make it to the patent office by the deadline. That all vanishes once the work starts. Almost a soon as I begin reading the disclosure that describes the invention, I lock into the flow state, where I (mostly) stay until I click SUBMIT on the United States Patent & Trademark Office application filing page. And in the end, the applications always get filed on time. It's kind of a specialty of mine and I take great pride in being able to deliver a high quality application on short notice.
... makes Jack a dull boy?
The impulse to avoid work, even though it provides some of the most stimulating challenges in our lives, is pervasive. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi found that subjects in his studies of flow consistently report that they have some of their most positive experiences while working. Nevertheless, these same people report that they would prefer not to be working and their motivation on the job is low.
The belief that leisure is the best way to spend time is also nearly universal, even though people tend to be less happy at leisure. Csikszentmihalyi's subjects reported surprisingly low moods during their leisure time while also claiming that they would prefer more leisure time. Csikszentmihalyi calls this the paradox of work.
What does this contradictory pattern mean? There are several possible explanations, but one conclusion seems inevitable: when it comes to work, people do not heed the evidence of their senses.Or maybe we just aren't paying attention. The thought that work could be as enjoyable, if not more so, than leisure never occurred to me until I read Flow, and even then I spent many years viewing work as a necessary evil (or at least an unwelcome imposition). Only recently did I put the idea to the test by committing to more challenges at work and consciously noticing whether I enjoyed it or not.
The result? For the most part, challenging work is enjoyable, as predicted. I find I am generally willing to make the trade-off between work and leisure to tackle a tough project. However, there is a limit. Skipping walks or meditation is tolerable if I'm deeply immersed in drafting an application, but if work squeezes them out for too long, I get resentful and unhappy. Reading and writing about new inventions is fine, but not to the exclusion of reading and writing about life. Or simply living life.
So does working hard feel like happiness on the good days? Not really. When I am happy, I feel a sense of lightness, freedom, and joy. Crunching through a patent application, particularly if I am on a tight deadline, is more like a weighty challenge. Satisfying but not joyous.
Flow may be an important clue to the mystery of happiness, but it is not the same as happiness. Csikszentmihalyi may be correct that we are not heeding the evidence of our senses when we are working, but it also seems plausible that measures of flow are missing some ingredients of happiness. One possibility suggested by Csikszentmihalyi is that happy flow results from an internal motivation, whereas the less happy state of flow reported at work is produced by external motivators, like bosses, customers, clients, and co-workers.
This agrees with my experience. Flow at work is not as sure to produce enjoyment as flow on my own time. And too much work, even in flow, produces diminishing returns of happiness. Perhaps flow and work are overlapping states. Work without flow is less likely to be happy work. And work with flow is more likely to be happy work, But not all flow at work is guaranteed to produce happy work.
Sunday, November 19, 2017
Don't ask me about protein and I won't ask you about cholesterol
No discussion of plant-based diets is complete until a doubtful meat eater has asked about protein. Where does it come from, if not animal products? Won't your muscles disappear if you stop eating meat? Vegetarians and vegans have grown tired of the question and some are getting a little defensive. Instead of turning the discussion to legumes, they are trying to turn the tables on the carnivores by pointing to the cholesterol raising effects of eating meat.
Why bother? Is it really worth all the trouble to eat (mostly) vegetarian or vegan in a meat based society? Yes. And if I could re-roll that dinner party conversation, here are the three reasons that I would give for abstaining (mostly) from eating animal products.
Great. Just what we need. Another arena where discussion and debate are shut down and replaced by snarky sloganeering. I get it. Sometimes you just want to eat. No questions asked. But sometimes you want to ask a few questions about what is on your plate.
Let's get one thing on the table. I'm not a vegetarian or a vegan. At least not according to the strict definitions. I eat very few animal products, but I still love sushi and I won't toss out a pizza that is topped with cheese, even though most of the pizzas I make are vegan (and deliciously so).
That said, I usually describe myself as a vegetarian. Why? Because saying you are a vegetarian is the easiest way to make sure that the food you are served is mostly plant based, which is virtually always what I want to eat.
I claim to be vegan less often, but with a purpose. Mostly, I do it in restaurants to taste test their off-the-menu vegan options, which are usually as good or better than the items on the menu. Then again, sometimes the vegan option is the best reason to compromise and eat some animal products.
Other times, I'll play vegan just to start a conversation with the wait staff. One day I was on my own for lunch in Greenwich Village and I wandered into Nix. Holy cow! What a great restaurant! Really! If you get a chance, you gotta go, meat eater or not. Anyway, I started asking about the vegan options and by the time lunch was over I had been schooled in the food, philosophy, and friendly restaurant rivalries that make Nix tick.
Things don't always work out so well. I was the poster child for vegetarianism at a recent dinner, which would have been fine except that most of the guests spoke only French (with a smattering of English), while I speak English (with a smattering of French that I last used 20 years ago). So I wasn't participating in much of the conversation.
When my chance to articulate my views on vegetarianism and veganism finally arrived, I choked. A kindly older woman suggested to me that the chicken soup would be alright for a vegetarian to eat. My response? "Chicken isn't really a vegetable." I swear I tried to keep the sarcasm out of my voice, but it was not one of my finer moments.
A vegan of convenience
Let's get one thing on the table. I'm not a vegetarian or a vegan. At least not according to the strict definitions. I eat very few animal products, but I still love sushi and I won't toss out a pizza that is topped with cheese, even though most of the pizzas I make are vegan (and deliciously so).
That said, I usually describe myself as a vegetarian. Why? Because saying you are a vegetarian is the easiest way to make sure that the food you are served is mostly plant based, which is virtually always what I want to eat.
I claim to be vegan less often, but with a purpose. Mostly, I do it in restaurants to taste test their off-the-menu vegan options, which are usually as good or better than the items on the menu. Then again, sometimes the vegan option is the best reason to compromise and eat some animal products.
Other times, I'll play vegan just to start a conversation with the wait staff. One day I was on my own for lunch in Greenwich Village and I wandered into Nix. Holy cow! What a great restaurant! Really! If you get a chance, you gotta go, meat eater or not. Anyway, I started asking about the vegan options and by the time lunch was over I had been schooled in the food, philosophy, and friendly restaurant rivalries that make Nix tick.
Things don't always work out so well. I was the poster child for vegetarianism at a recent dinner, which would have been fine except that most of the guests spoke only French (with a smattering of English), while I speak English (with a smattering of French that I last used 20 years ago). So I wasn't participating in much of the conversation.
When my chance to articulate my views on vegetarianism and veganism finally arrived, I choked. A kindly older woman suggested to me that the chicken soup would be alright for a vegetarian to eat. My response? "Chicken isn't really a vegetable." I swear I tried to keep the sarcasm out of my voice, but it was not one of my finer moments.
L'esprit de l'escalier
Why bother? Is it really worth all the trouble to eat (mostly) vegetarian or vegan in a meat based society? Yes. And if I could re-roll that dinner party conversation, here are the three reasons that I would give for abstaining (mostly) from eating animal products.
Cholesterol. My now-retired doctor was fond of giving his middle-aged patients the animal products speech, which goes a little like this. There are three knobs that control your cholesterol levels: genetics, exercise, and diet. The genes knob is stuck; you can't turn it. To turn the exercise knob, forty minutes (or more) of activity that raises your heart rate. Turn the diet knob by minimizing (or eliminating) the animal products in your diet. Each person has a different sensitivity to each knob. My ex-doctor had patients that are strict vegans but still take cholesterol-reducing medication because they are genetically predisposed to high cholesterol. Diet and exercise work pretty well for me. My bad cholesterol numbers went down, and my good cholesterol numbers went up, after I started walking regularly and cut out most animal products.
Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs). Jeremy Bentham first advocated for (but did not adopt) a vegetarian diet around 1780. His rationale for extending rights to animals was straightforward, "The question is not, can they reason? Nor can they talk? But, can they suffer?" And suffer they do. By the millions and in the most inhumane conditions imaginable. Need convincing? For the bravest souls, check out one or two PETA videos. For the wimps like me, watch Okja on Netflix. It's greatest movie Disney never made because Disney is so ... well ... Disney.
Climate Change. The Union of Concerned Scientists estimates that 14% of the emissions that contribute to global warming comes from the food and beverages we consume. A big chunk of those emissions are methane "exhaled" by ruminants like cows, sheep, and goats. That's right. The unusually warm air you're feeling this year is partly caused by cow burps ... and the manure lagoons at CAFOs (see above). The UCS concludes that eating less meat, particularly beef, is a useful strategy for reducing your carbon footprint.
Oh, look...they all start with a C! That might make it easier to remember in the heat of a dinner party.
Climate Change. The Union of Concerned Scientists estimates that 14% of the emissions that contribute to global warming comes from the food and beverages we consume. A big chunk of those emissions are methane "exhaled" by ruminants like cows, sheep, and goats. That's right. The unusually warm air you're feeling this year is partly caused by cow burps ... and the manure lagoons at CAFOs (see above). The UCS concludes that eating less meat, particularly beef, is a useful strategy for reducing your carbon footprint.
Oh, look...they all start with a C! That might make it easier to remember in the heat of a dinner party.
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