Monky Me

C.N. Parkinson's (1909-1993) first law reads "Work Expands so as to fill the Time Available for its completion". An example of this law, if a meeting is scheduled for 2 hours, we will take 2 hours to talk and finish the meeting. If for the same meeting 45 minutes is scheduled, we will "only" take 45 minutes.

What still puzzles me is the time I invest in my projects. For example, definition of happiness in ancient Egypt, Cabo Verde maps before 1900, the wind that blows me in a new track of books to explore. Generalized this law must read (c) JeanD99: The Demand Upon the Resource Time Tends to Increase to Match the Urgency. 

I never have time to read or start a new project but time and again I feel suddenly an urgency so strong that I will skip all the other activities for days (sometimes weeks) and invest all my time in this project. This project is always new, exciting and urgent. And gives me great satisfaction. Monastic (say "monky") me.

P.S. I wrote on this before in my blog 'Still there? It's about you too' (September 2011)

1 year blogging. My own favourite blogs. Which one is yours?

Happy anniversary! It's my 1st year of blogging. I wrote a little on this before. For me my blog is a mirror. My mirror. My public mirror. Next to that it's the archive of my dreams, puzzles and thoughts. For me. For my kids one day.

On the one hand it's an easy job: I write as I think with a lot of questions and wonder. On the other hand it's transpiration: I'm not allways in the mood to write another blog. Week in week out on Wednesday. Sometimes a blog takes me 10 minutes. Sometimes 1 day. Most of the time it takes 1 to 2 hours.Will I grow up and ever celebrate my 2nd birthday? I don't know. May be I will. May be not. 

In retrospect it was fun to blog. I wrote the kind of things - and in the same format - I usually write in private to a friend. These are my own favourite blogs: 

1. Most successful 'Any idea how influential images are?'
2. Deep drawing 'Stones 99 names of. Stones boring? 99 + 1 ways of looking at them' 
3. Most instructive 'History gliders (or sailplanes) in 3 pictures. Most distinctive evolution: launching method'
4. Largest survey 'Looking for a Prince (m/f) on a white horse? You are looking for Jesus!'
5. Most made with love 'Book review. Pamuk' Museum Innocence. Aren't we all surrounded by thousands of tiny little things of the ones we love(d)?'
6. Without blogging I would have not written this 'Kate Bush. Mystic on 'Aerial'. Invitation to be nondualistic' 

Question: What's is your favourite blog of 'Live Life! - wednesdayblog'?

P.s. To my readers. Please give back feedback once in a while. In a public comment or in a private e-mail. Don't forget that I need affirmation every now and then.

Me neither or The show stops right after the peak

Do you ever watch porn? Ever checked out home made video's on youporn? Me neither!

Fairytales and porn resemble each other! What? Let me explain. A fairytale is a story that ends with the remark "and they lived happily ever after". Read the fairytale  'The sleeping beauty'. After 100 years sleep she wakes up with a kiss by a prince and they lived happily ever after. We don't know what happened with the two of them: kids? house? friends? mutual interest? war? earthquakes? how was their marriage after 7 years? still in love?  who died first? how did they look back on their lives in retrospect?

Watch a random pornmovie. After a lot of physical excercise and sometimes the complete Kama Sutra the participants (sometimes only 2) get their orgasms. We don't know what happened with the participants: in love? married? kids? house? friends? mutual interest? war? earthquakes? were they paid for the video? just for "fun"? who died first? how did they look back on their lives in retrospect?

The resemble of both is that the show stops right after the peak. And in "normal" lives (read mine)? A peak too - I meant the bookreading ;) - once in a while but most of the days it's quiet, plain and boring.  Loving, working, raising up kids, reading, blogging and living: it's transpiration and hard work. Everyday!

Why is there never a book or movie about normal lifes? About quiet, plain and boring lives? About the lives of you and me?

Stick to Epicurus' concepts

Sometimes I feel as if I throw away my life. Once in a while I feel so without dedication, ambition and drive to be the best in whatever. There's no need, voice, or demon in me that tells me: climb the mount Everest, become next years gliderchampion, write a book or write an article about Old Egypt's concept on happiness.

I always stick to Epicurus' (341 - 270 BC) concepts "Live hidden and stay away from politics" and "The cry of the flesh bids us escape from hunger, thirst, and cold; for he who is free of these and expects to remain so might live in happiness even with Zeus." All the rest is vanity.

Am I too dutch to feel an expert in nothing? Am I really excelling in nothing? K. Anders Ericsson tells  us that excellation is above all more than 10.000 hours of transpiration. The key to excel in anything or to become an expert  is above all transpiration. Not 1 hour or 1 month but at least 6 years and 3 months.

What did I do with my life? In which subjects did I invest more than 10.000 hours?

• Books. I must have read thousands of books. To be honest all I learned from them is that I know "nothing". There's is so much more to read, to discover and to experiment. When I read a book I always discover thousands of things and details I never thought of before. Details that shift my opinions, judgements, prejudices and assumptions. It's like a floating river. Never solid ground.
  
• Lover, husband and father. Being loved and loving. It's what 'homo sapiens' all share. We all know by personal experience all about "love". To be more precise it's the foundation under our species' procreation. It's the reason why I was born and the reason that my four kids were born. And I hope it's the reason that my grandchildren (till eternity) will be born one day too.
• Let time pass by. Above all I am an expert on just doing "nothing". To read a little, to dream a little, to write a little, to tweet a little, to blog a little, to blip a little, to look out of the window a little,  to smell a little, to think of you ... a little. Nothing more and nothing less.

When I am dead all the above, all ones ability to live ones life, all the "knowledge" and "wisdom" will fade away. Blown away with the wind.

Question: where did you invest more than 10.000 hours in?