Triathlons and Life

So Amy Winehouse is dead.

She was the soundtrack to the events that sent me into the triathlon world. With the interview coming up tomorrow, I couldn't help but take a blog entry to meditate on how the rest of my life intertwines with triathlons.


"It's only after we've lost everything, that we're free to do anything." 

Around the time that Amy Winehouse crooned in the background, I watched Fight Club over half a decade after everyone else did. Tyler Durden, my prophet, his words, sparks falling on dry tinder. I lost everything. I knew nothing.

"I don't know. You're just too Christian for me."

I lost my perspective on life. I had nothing on my resume except teaching at a church day camp.

"You have to answer this question! If you died right now, how would you feel about your life?"
"I don't know. I wouldn't feel anything good about my life." 

That was my answer too. I looked at my whole life. I didn't have anything I cared about in all of my life. I had a job I felt nothing towards. It fed me and kept a roof over my head. Was that sufficient for life? I had friends but what did we do except go out to restaurants and eat? I had a church I spent most of my free time at but what was that to me? Why was I even doing this? And take my church activities away from me and what was left of my life? Nothing much. And if those activities were taken away, would I really miss them so much?

People misunderstand what I mean by transformation. They think I mean the 120 lbs. I've lost. I mean the life I began. I turned off my auto-pilot switch. I stopped caring about what other people thought should matter to me. I became obsessed with my own death. Not in a macabre goth way. I feared death before - not because of heaven or hell - but because I lived a life that other people wrote out for me. How shameful would it be to arrive on the day of judgement with a life lived by committee?


"Mom told me to find a stable job. Dad told me to find a quiet woman. Church told me I needed to volunteer more. Work said they needed more hours. So there's my life!"

"First, you have to know, not fear, know, that some day you're going to die." 

I became obsessed about death because I knew what kind of death I wanted. I wanted to be surrounded by chubby, red-faced grandkids. I wanted my kids to gather around me grateful for the spirit that I had passed onto them. I have no intention of leaving grand material possessions behind. I'd like to give most of that away before I go. But everyone I meet at anytime, I want to give them a piece of me, the realest piece. I want to lay on my death bed and look back on a long life, grateful for the amazing ride I had. I want to do something incredible. I want to meet kindred spirits. I want to scream defiance against the impossible. I'd like to live a life I thought was amazing.

Is that too much to ask?

We overestimate what we can do in one year. Look at the New Years Resolutions people make when they're "determined" to change their lives. I want to learn a language, read a bunch of books, go skydiving/bungee jumping, etc. Most people end up accomplishing exactly none of those goals. Most forget them by February. I couldn't forget my goals because those goals were all I had.

We grossly underestimate what we can do in five years. Look at where you are now. Look at where you were five years ago. How much did you learn? How much have you changed? And for most people, this happens passively without application or dedication. What might happen if you put the full force of your life behind your drive to accomplish your goals? I was around 25 at the time. I came up with a "WILL DO BEFORE 30 LIST." Completing an Ironman race was up at the top of the list.

So I wrote out a 5-year plan. If I was to make the Ironman by age 30, I needed to see at least some of the steps in between. So I registered for the NYC Triathlon. Halloween 2008, while everyone dressed up and drank, I was at my computer frantically clicking away on the Firefox 'refresh' button. I'm glad I did. The race sold out in 20 minutes.

I chose an Olympic because a sprint just didn't look challenging. A quarter mile swim, 10 mile bike, and 5k? I could fall out of bed and roll 5k before I woke up at that point. I wanted to push myself to the very limit. The thrill of finishing NYC in 2009 was diminished by the fact that my body felt so good. I wasn't sore that day or the day after. Did I take it too easy? I always trained with the goal of over-preparation in mind, but I should have at least some sign that I was pushed.

Next year, I'll get that chance. Ironman. NYC. 2012. A great challenge in the world's greatest city, filled with the world's greatest fans. 2.4 Hudson river miles. 112 Palisade Parkway miles and 26.2 miles ending in Riverside Park. It's my dream come true. It's a chance for me to knock off one of my Before-I-Turn-30 Goals, a year early.

Triathlons are amazing. I'm built for powerlifting. It took me a month to bring my max bench press from 200 to 375 lbs. It took me two months to go from 300 to 450. But I don't regret leaving that behind for triathlons. The first triathlon, I ever did, NYC back in 2009, changed my mind. As I rocketed down the West Side Highway the clouds broke and the sun painted the course with brilliant light. I don't know what happened at that moment. I've seen sunrises and sunsets, magnificent declarations of God's goodness in his creation, but I began to cry. I rarely found God in church. I knew doctrines. I studied a whole hell of a lot. I found a bunch of friends but my soul still rang hollow. At that moment, alone on the West Side Highway, I met God and I felt an overwhelming confirmation that this race course was where I should be at that moment. I could've been in church leading the congregation in prayer that July Sunday but I believe that what happened to me that day did more to help me make much of Christ than ten thousand sanctuary-sequestered Sundays.

I stopped letting other people write my life for me. I'm the one that has to wake up in the morning and look myself in the mirror. When I die, I have to be the one to give an accounting of my life, all the wrong I've done, all the good I've done, before God. I am the one that will lay on my death bed one day, looking back on my own life. I don't know where or when, but I want to look back with satisfaction on my life.

I'm glad Kid Cudi dropped his weed habit. He's the soundtrack to my life right now. And right now, I love where my life is heading.

Sitting

I hate sitting.

The arc of my life's transformation takes me further and further away from sitting. In my younger years, I read a lot until I found video games. Then I planted myself before a computer and read a lot. The reading has blessed my life a great deal while the sitting has been an unmitigated curse.

Studying the psoas muscle, particularly my own issues with the psoas muscle, has led me to think along these terms.

The hips produce the force for running, fighting, dancing, leaping, loving, living. Plant yourself in a chair and your tell your hips this position is natural. Your pelvis tilts back, the spine comes forward and the head lowers, falling further from the sky. Sitting degrades your hips. Compromised hips, hips that can't run, fight, dance, leap or love properly, ruin the spine. Without a spine, it becomes nearly impossible to stand tall. Who can respect, much less love, a man who's forgotten how to stand tall? What woman is love-able when she doesn't believe she's worthy of love?

So stop sitting.

Repair your hips.

Cure your unnatural addiction to television reality game shows and comedy dramas with life. Breathe it in deeply, the purer, rarefied air of living worlds.

I was teaching a friend good running form this past Sunday, showing him how to finish his stride with his feet coming up towards the buttocks. "Doesn't that use more energy?" he asked. "It's running. It uses energy. Dragging your feet is the act of someone uncommitted to the reality that they're running. They don't want to use energy, don't want to open up to the possibility that running may be enjoyable. These people believe that running must be awful and are determined to be right about their belief no matter the cost. Lift your feet."

Move. In any direction. Open your hips. When you run, stride with commitment to each step. Yes, I am running, so let me run beautifully! God, free me from plodding and power-walking and all such half-hearted efforts! When you fight, let your hips explode with their full fury and force. Don't just throw arm punches, afraid to get hit or hit others. Throw a true punch, snap a true kick. When you dance, let your hips come to the party. Don't just awkwardly shimmy your shoulders on the side of the dance floor like you're afraid someone will see you trying to have a good time. In all that you do in life, do it with your most powerful driver, your hips. Don't go to the grave never having brought your body's engine to redline.

Unlearn sitting. Unlearn all the practices of life that destroy your core, your strength, your integrity. In that vacuum, rediscover possibility. It will start slow. For many years, I struggled to do a single pull-up. It took what felt like forever before I could run 5 miles without stopping to walk some part of it. Even in my 2nd year of running, I still took breaks in the shorter races to catch my breath. Keep fighting. Keep striving. The habits you've acquired over the course of decades will not dissolve in a few well-meant weeks. Before you can build a new life you must clear the rubble of your current one, and to do that, you most certainly must get up off your ass.

Giving Utterance

You can look at my thoughts from the past few years in a few ways. You can see them as meditations on ambition. My desire to do triathlons, marathons, kick boxing, novels and finding love can be seen as a desire to stand out and accomplish. In refusing to sit back and live a "King of Queens" or "Everybody Loves Raymond" kind of blue-collar life of beer league sports and reality tv, you may see me as a pretentious hipster. My jeans are certainly tight enough.

You can see my thoughts as preposterous navel-gazing. Just why is it that I think about my own biography so much? There is a limit to how self-absorbed one can be, no? Just how often do I need to think about my past relationships?

But really, in my own eyes, this blog has been about life.

Writings like this one encourage me and help me think that I haven't gone insane. The body and the soul have a deep, intimate connection. Traditional Chinese Medicine sees it this way. Their embrace of psychosomatic treatments have profoundly changed my worldview. Reductive anatomical medicine has conditioned me to think that a psychosomatic problem was somehow a lesser issue. The body is not physically wrong so there's nothing wrong. It's all in the person's head. My first steps into TCM (thanks to my wonderful girlfriend) have changed my views completely. A psychosomatic problem just means that there are two problems and reductive anatomical medicine has no means of treating one of them. If a house has problems with both the wiring and the plumbing, shouldn't both of them be addressed?

Western Christianity taught me that souls are real only when we're talking about death. Souls are only real when we're talking about Jesus and his atoning, substitutionary work on the cross. What I've been fighting for these past few years was my soul. I wanted to take it back from the butchers in the pulpits. Eternity is longer than your mortal life so spend your life to further the glory of God. What does that mean? Win souls. What does that mean? Tell people about Jesus and then get them to tell others about Jesus. Your suffering in doing this is glorious.

The practice of Western Christianity as I have seen it contains a deep line of hypocrisy. We teach the reality of the soul and the impermanence of the body. We live the reality of the body and the low value of the soul. Was your flesh martyred for the cause? Excellent. You have a reward in heaven. Did you give up soul-nourishing activities so you could give out tracts? Stop whining. Did a body go beneath the waters and emerge a Christian? Excellent harvest. Did your soul experience renewal and life when you heard an aria, read a passage, saw a photo, watch a ballet, spat a flow, played a riff, or breathed the rarefied air of purer worlds? Better talk about Jesus or we'll talk about how small your experience was.

I heard my soul echo in life's empty darkness. These blog posts of the past 3 years have been an attempt to give utterance to the institutional, doctrinal violence I suffered. My joys, my heart, my passion was crucified on a cross of evangelism and mission. If it doesn't manifestly lead to conversions, then what I do doesn't matter. If I don't apply my talents to racking up conversions, then I'm living in rebellion.

Their words affirmed that creation was made for joy, for our relationship with God but when I wanted to meditate on nature, on beauty, I found their hypocrisy. C'mon, hurry up! Get to the Jesus dying part! They have to know about that! What's with all this sappy crap about your own soul's experience? Joy? Joy without meditating on atonement? Blasphemous. That's not important. Quick before they leave, tell them about Jesus. Every time you talk to someone, you have to mention this!

The soul is real and it can die while a person lives. Rob a person of their means of joy and you do worse than kill them. Take from me my races, my words, my ability to spread my wings and you fetter me with chains of adamant. I feel alive, I feel nearness to God when I run, climb, swim, jump and free the body to do all it can do. I feel affirmation and confidence when I can write and create. Why don't I evangelize and be more plain with my Christian affiliation in my writing? Because that's exactly what stifled my spirit for so many years. I have little love left for movements of missionary zeal. I still support them selectively but they don't have the carte blanche on my heart they once did.
It may have taken me 3 years, but now I can give my heart utterance. It may have taken me two heartbreaks, and a number of hard journeys, but I know who I am. I know what I'm fighting for -- nothing less than my own soul.

Offering

Am I loved?

Am I pleasing to you?

Those two questions from last night's sermon circled above me my whole life, specks in the sky, vigilant, patient. I answered the needs beneath those questions for 20 years by hiding myself beneath obedience. I'll be the guy you want me to be. I'll study hard in school. I'll get a stable job, marry a girl who's not too pretty, not too fancy. I'll contribute at church and write up new bible studies. I'll show up for all the prayer meetings and head up committees. I'm good, right? I'm acceptable, right?

I prostituted my soul for over two decades but I don't blame the buyer. I blame the victim. No one took me by force. They couldn't deceive me had I not wanted to be deceived. I wanted to be accepted and I chose my path. Because I knew so little of who I was, I could not defend myself against who I was not.

There once was a peasant who grew his carrots and turnips on his farm. This plebeian loved his king with all his heart and from the overflow of his heart brought the king the largest, biggest carrot he ever grew. In response to this pauper's love, the king bequeathed land to the peasant, doubling his territory.

Seeing this, a well-to do lord wondered to himself. If the king was so generous to the peasant for a carrot, what would he give in response to a cow or a horse? So with expectant eyes the lord came before the king and gave the king a fine steed, a mighty steed, tall with lithe muscles and shimmering coat. The king thanked him absent-mindedly and waved the lord away.

Flummoxed, the lord dawdled confused. As the guards came to escort him away, the lord stammered about how excellent the horse was, surpassingly so, peerless. And indeed the horse was, said the king. So excellent this beast was, that you wanted to give it to yourself. You see, the peasant brought his carrot out of the love in his heart, expecting nothing in return. You however, seeing the peasant's reward brought the horse hoping to win something in return. Now, begone.

Others gave their souls to God from a genuine desire to minister. I gave my soul in service and in ministry hoping to find acceptance and approval. I do this, you do that. That's the deal, right? But God loved me far too much to accept those terms and conditions. No, he brought me through several hells. Lonely nights, hard fights, punching my knuckles bloody against boulders, throwing trash cans into lakes and destroying public property, screaming my anguish into the thunder. He gave me everything necessary, even if those necessities drew out tears and screams. My reward has been a mirror. I can see who I am now. Never in my life have I been so confident in my knowledge of self.

I haven't worked out the details yet but there's undoubtedly a connection between knowing yourself and dimming the need for approval, acceptance. Do I still battle it? Surely, but for the first time in my life, I've been finding victories. So, no, I don't blame the church for what it did but with my life I hope to light a way for other misfits, for those who refuse to settle for quiet lives of meek obeisance.

From where that pavement is...

"...'cause there's no parachute that they can make for this

'cause I put my pain, my heart, my soul, my faith in this..."

My spiritual infancy brimmed with missionary zeal. Every faithful Christian should eventually find their way to missions and ministry. Christians who simply gave financial support and prayed were just ducking the hard work.

Did anyone ever say as much? No, not once.
Was this the overwhelming impression that I was left with? Yes, I and very many others.

As adamant as these zealots might have been in saying that there was no two-tier Christendom, they never realized that their works and words created such a world. They scoffed and laughed at the charismatics who segregate the faithful into those who've spoken in tongues and those who haven't, but they then frowned on those who elected to pursue a dream apart from third-world countries or clerical collars.

Two tiers? No, never. It's just that some people love God more and some not so much. Not being in ministry meant you either didn't love God or you didn't love people.

Unacceptable hypocrisy.

God cannot be God of all creation and God of only those who are in ministry.

Creation, so great and so wide and God's name is writ large over it all. And yet, I believed, I followed those who would confine Christendom to church walls, literal and otherwise. The otherwise refers to the begrudging concession that Christ may be loved outside a church building. But a discomfort plagues them if the love is not covered in crosses, soft lighting and tearful conversion stories.

But now, day by day, the glowing upswell in me burns brighter. I know where I'm going. For so much of my life, I feared that my teachers were right and that God was a petty Asian bureaucrat who wanted to lock me inside a church. No, far more powerful, far more gentle than I could have imagined, he beckons me towards a life I was trained to believe could never be mine.

There has never been a moment of greater rebellion and greater obedience for me. Throwing my hat in the ring, I'm going to be a writer. An echo from years past rings in my heart "If you won't take a chance on this, what will you take a chance on?" I'm not going to write for Christian media. I don't have the stomach for trying to be awkward and impish, skirting family-unfriendly realities. Screw that stupid shit. It's not going to be for academia as if I cared about impressing them and acquiring for myself their distinctions and honors anymore. I won't have a big organization to hide me. My parents taught me that security lay in size. There is no security in size. There's only security in the hollow of God's hand. And I believe that's exactly where I am. Throw away so many of the beliefs I've been taught, so many of the doctrines that finger-wagging reverend faces have instilled in me. Throw away the fears, the false needs, the empty materialism. Throw away the useless practices that no longer serve me. Rebel, reject and return to the naked freedom of knowing that God wants you to be yourself.

Living Towards Death

It's been awhile since I've read Heidegger and I've loaned my copy out (I can't even remember to whom I loaned my volume of "Being and Time") so I don't know if the concept of "Being Towards Death" that I'll be writing about today accurately reflects his idea. That doesn't matter. I'm writing about "Living Towards Death" and if it's the same, it's the same. If it's different, it's different.

The idea owes its shape to an exercise by Stephen Covey. Imagine your funeral. Imagine the speakers. One from your family. One of your friends. Someone from a community you participated in, a church, a club, a league. What would they say about you? What will you wish they said about you? What kind of life will you wish you had lived?

But that's the shape of the idea. The root goes down deeper than I can trace. Ever since I was a child I was fascinated with the concept of life as narrative. I didn't want a boring story for a life.

But the dreams I was sold, the values I was given, the life I was told to live derailed my desire. Be safe! Study accounting or finance instead of unstable English! Save money. Buy a house. Get kids. 2 of them. 1 boy and 1 girl because that portends prosperity. Serve the Church! Advance the Kingdom! Here's what it looks like. Do the following activities because that's real Kingdom advancement and not this silly pretend stuff. Live for maximum impact on other people. If you don't want to do that, then you're resisting the Spirit of God.

Or so I thought.

If I close my eyes for a moment and imagine a life where most of my weekends and maybe 1 weekday a week was spent in the confines of a church, my heartbeat raises. I feel the artery in my neck pulsing. My diaphragm tightens. My hands clench and unclench and a wild, desperate anger swells in my gut. This is the frenzy of a cornered animal. I will kill whoever I have to kill to escape. You won't take my life this way. I refuse to go to the grave with this life. This isn't mine! Who took my life and gave me this sorry substitute?

I open my eyes again and my breath still doesn't calm down. The terror is too real. I know my values. I know my heart. They can't be found indoors. They're not found in group settings. I'm socially capable and I do recognize the need for regular social contact. But for me, I'd set my own upper tolerances at about once a week if the group is more than 3 or 4 people and meets regularly. It's not that I'm emotionally unavailable. I wear my heart on my sleeve and have no trouble opening up. The honest truth is that other people get in the way of what I want to do.

If I close my eyes and imagine my perfect death I know what I want to see. I'm old. The almond tree has blossomed but the heartwood remains vital. Back when I was much younger in the faith, I devoured Scripture with an appetite that surprises even me. When I came across Caleb's testimony I thought "Yes! That's what I want!"

"And now behold, I am this day eighty-five years old. I am still as strong today as I was in the day that Moses sent me; my strength now is as my strength was then, for war and for going and coming." -- Josh. 14:10-11

Some old people impress me to no end. The septa- and sexagenarians that rocketed pass me on the Half-Ironman for starters. And then to maintain a mind with its full faculties and the flowering of experience while possessing a vital body would complete the package. Do you notice how when someone turns a vital age, 16, 21, 25, 30, 33, 35, 40, that the joke is "It's all downhill from here!" I don't believe that for a second. Life is all uphill. That means it's going to demand more and more energy the further I want to go. It's going to make me want to puke my guts out. And life will need more man than I am if I want to be appropriate to the challenge. The challenge of dying with a life free from regret.

Realization

A realization after a session of yoga.

I can open my eyes and gaze full upon reality because reality is where God dwells.

Live long enough and you will lie to yourself. Animals do this without any of the functions of higher consciousness. At the New Orleans Zoo, I found a cute little chameleon in a small cage outside of their World of Reptiles or whatever it's called. Red mottled with green it clung to the cage. When I brought my head, colossal, misshapen, a terrifying monstrosity held at bay by the thin wires of the cage, the creature averted its eyes. Why? Would I disappear once it stopped looking at me, I, who have the power to crush it within my hand? Would its refusal to acknowledge reality change reality? Then why do we look away from reality? Why do we avoid asking the difficult questions? Why do we avoid searching for more difficult questions?

In my last post, I recounted my friend's question "Why do you (Stanley) study something so anti-Gospel?" I found my answer weeks and months later. I search because I believe. Supra-rational, non-rational, pre-rational, irrational, whatever you wish to say, I hold this belief in an ultimate being who acted, continues to act and will continue to act in history, who incarnated himself a little over 2,000 years ago, who dispenses treasures beyond imagining today. I believe.

And what could be a surer sign of faith than to test it? Princes and ideas should be shot at in order to prove their right to hold the throne. If God is real, if God was correct in his estimation of himself as the Scriptures recount, then let's ask the difficult questions.

The most difficult question continues to be the question of joy. It's the question I ask when I lift, when I dance, when I write, sing, love, run, jump, explore: "Are you God greater than your creation? If so, then how? Then why? Show me." I've heard testimonies all throughout my Christian life: I was a great businessman. I had it all. Then I was ruined. But in my ruin, I found Jesus and I much prefer Jesus. So they say. Or sometimes they had it all and gave it all up at the height and devoted their life to Jesus. Rarer but still out there. I need to find out. I need to ask. And I need to make the question as difficult as possible so that the answer might be worth as much as possible.

You see, I've lately been wondering what Christianity can offer to the mature person. The sermons decry petty materialism, the pursuit of European cars, clothes, metropolitan vacations, skyrise apartments with commanding views of the city, gastrophile cuisine. In short, consumption for consumption's sake. There seems to me very little Gospel and a lot of blue collar populism in those talks. What does Christianity have to offer the man who knows he will die and is not afraid, what dreams may come? What does Christianity offer  the man who cares little for material acquisition? Where is Christianity's joy? And does it match the joys of the created world?

I'll ask that question every inch of tomorrow's 26 miles.

Your Best

"I don't know about this, Stan..."
"Just do it. It'll be OK."
"I'm not sure..."
"You're going to do it or I'm going to leave. Which one do you want?"

That sounds like date rape. I didn't realize it until I typed it out but actually the conversation took place a week ago as I trained a friend at her request. Setting the weight, and I told her to pull down as hard as she could. She protested saying "I'm going to hurt myself." "I'm nervous. I don't want to attract attention to myself." and "I don't know if I can." To the last one I replied "I'm asking for effort. If you can't give me your best effort, then you've wasted hours of my life."

For this past week, I couldn't help but to review the training session in my mind over and over again. I was dissatisfied with what I perceived as the effort my friend gave. But I thought on it, I realized a stain of hypocrisy in my words. I criticized her effort but for months I've seethed at my own lackadaisacal attempts to work out. I don't know how many times I've finished a workout and smashed my fist into a wall in frustration. I've not been giving my best. The results will show on the day of testing. As days fly off the calendar, my desperation grows, but my body never seems to respond in kind.

Am I out of my mind?

Perhaps. But more critically, my perspective is flawed. I've been feeling a reservoir of hidden power in my workouts but for whatever reason I can't tap into it. It drives me insane to think that such potential is there so tantalizingly out of reach. I've called myself "lazy," "pathetic," "a spineless, gutless worm that deserves to be ground into shit." as a result. But if I stepped back and gazed upon the broad history of my personal transformation, a glaring inconsistency stares back at me.

People ask me "Stan, how did you lose all that weight? What did you do?" I tell them the plain and honest truth "Willpower and determination." When I died inside my chrysalis, I chanted a mantra like "Doesn't matter how much it hurts, just keep going." "It's better to die than to live fat." But all runs came to an end. The pain always got the best of me and I slowed to a walk. It never failed to defeat me, but the pain that made me quit yesterday is simple rust that I dust off in the morning today. I really have grown.

And how did that growth happen? By going to what I perceived as my limits each time. Back in the training session, she eventually acquiesced. Grabbing ahold of the bar she pulled down and the weight moved swiftly. Once, twice, three times, now five, now eight... finally twelve times. At half her bodyweight. She looked tired but she did it. I didn't specify a rep range for her. I only expected 3 or 4 reps. The weight could have been set much higher at around 75 or 80% of her bodyweight. But she had never done this before. I take for granted the fact that I've been working at a (relatively) high intensity in isolation for 2 years. My body knows what to do when exerting a maximal effort and feels little hesitation in doing so. Prior to this, I spent many years playing around in a weight room where insecure boys tried to one up each other by pushing more and more weight. It provided a stable foundation for strength training, if not maturity. That psycho-physiological foundation is key for future gains. The body and its soul desire security for going hard. You give ithem that security with constant training and exposure to hardship. I've pushed 200 pounds and it hurt, but it wasn't too bad. Now I can do 205. Little by little, the old self and more importantly, the old standards are sloughed off and a new self emerges. Everyone salivates at the goals but it's much more important to heed the process.

When I work out today, if I were to describe my effort, I could only give it an honest 30% There's so much more I can be doing that I'm not. So what does that make the effort of last year or the year before or 5 years before? It took me a long time to work up to what now seems like 30%. Before I thought I was at 100% effort because I only had my previous work as a comparison. Now that I know myself more, I know that my spirit is sorely lacking.

Practically, this means two things for me.  The first is that I need to prepare my spirit to go at 100%. It's not so simple as slapping yourself, beating your chest and yelling at yourself. It only works for so long. I need to do more work purifying my spirit of unnecessary things like sleeping late, candy, TV, facebook, idle banter. My body isn't in race shape yet but it will never be if my mind is not in race shape.

The seocond is that I need to give more grace when I train others. I, myself am not at 100%. But I am further ahead than where I was a year, 2 years ago. It's the daily increase that matters, the daily ritual of purification and renewal. No matter where anyone starts, they may grow.

"People often say that motivation doesn't last. Well neither does bathing -- that's why we reccomend it daily." -- Zig Ziglar

"To not give your best is to waste the gift." -- Steve Prefontaine

Color

When I wrote my previous post, I could not help but think about the faith that I've carried, that has carried me these past 11 years. I think specifically about the effect that theologians like John Piper and John Calvin have had on me. I first learned about the place that 'joy' has in the Christian life from them. But when I received their instruction, I had a seed of doubt in me. Through the years I held the doctrine of Christian joy firmly but the seed continued to grow until I couldn't ignore it any longer.

"Joy" was a dishonest word to use for the Christianity I knew.

Let's talk semiotics for a moment.

Christians love the color white. Spotless white lamb of God, full-bearded, English-accented Jesus wearing a pristine white robe towering over Jew and Arab looking peasants, white-faced church with its white steeple, white fluffy clouds where white-winged and white-robed angels fly...

What a God-damned bore. Piper and others that I've read talk so much about joy but the joy that they write about seems so fundamentally boring. Their language is so impoverished it makes me laugh. They play the same visual tropes to death a thousand times. The Grand Canyon! The sunset! And Piper tries to say sex, but I hear such scorn and contempt in his voice when he shouts it in his sermon that I might have thought it were an expletive. He has not once used the word in a way that gives me the impression it's something I want to have. If I don't have any new way to describe beauty and joy, I'll say the old ones MORE LOUDLY!

More than that, the expressions of joy were so limited. It's a thought you think. It's a feeling you feel. After absorbing such a mass of material I have the distinct impression that they really must not know joy.

The life that I lived, the life which grew out of that kind of Christian environment, was miserable. More than anything else, I had wanted to compete at a high level. In any sport. It didn't matter. I wanted an honest life, and nothing seemed quite as honest as someone who throws their body on the line because they can't stand the thought of losing. For whatever reason, when I saw the Ironman I wanted to do that. Maybe it seemed more accessible than something like MMA or maybe my inner glutton for training finally came out. For years I kept saying "next year, next year I'll start." But when next year came, I'd feel guilty that something might dull my evangelistic zeal, so I never did it. When I registered for the race, a part of me felt like I just burned a Bible and pissed on the ashes.

Oh certainly my theology proper knew that feeling was misguided and wrong. All things can be yours if you have Christ. This is the freedom of the Christian. But then how is it that mentors who hold to that same theology said to me:

"Do you really *have* to compete, Stan? You're so fit already. Do you have to be so vain? Think about how much time it'll take from your schedule. Can you really be committed to Kingdom ministry if you take up this hobby? Oh, I'm not trying to guilt trip you, just think about your priorities. What's really important, the souls of the lost or some silly thing you do for fun?"

It wasn't until my disastrous middle relationship that I finally woke up. I was forfeiting vibrant color for a sterile white. The joy I had in Christianity was so hollow, so false. But I didn't abandon Christianity. I never for a moment doubted God's veracity. I doubted the entire system I bought into. I needed to find my own way, to start over.

I searched for color and vibrancy because I didn't find it in the pastors, the theologians, the churchmen. Sure, they would always smile when they saw me, they would write about the joys of being a Christian but the practice was so shallow. Part of the answer was that they were all too pastoral, cloistered in an ivory-tower.

Listening to the Cirque du Soleil soundtrack, I find what the Christianity I know is missing -- frenetic energy, raucous joy, celebration sans alloy. The word "hallelujah" means a wild, uninhibited shout -- a holler. Where now is the church that can do justice to the word "hallelujah"? I "hallelujah" when I sack a QB in a football game. I jump up and down, I beat my chest and I let out a hot-blooded roar. Chest-bumps, forearm bashes, celebration dances because there's something worth celebrating. Doesn't the Christian have something to celebrate? Could I do that in my church service?  Oh no, never. That's not appropriate for church, young man. When a church cannot "hallelujah" it's probably time for that church to close its doors.

A few months ago, at my Baruch Alumni Men's Fellowship Group, a friend showed me of a video he took at a church in India. I think I saw some pews in the distance but they were empty. The music was turned up to 11. Where was the congregation? They were in the back of the sanctuary where the pews didn't obstruct and it was there they danced. In jubilant circles they danced. They sang and clapped. Hallelujah.

Now, that's only speaking of church services. My interest is far bigger than something as claustrophobic as church. I want to think about life at large. I've followed the lives of the theologians and for all the vastness of God that they were supposed to contain, they look so small and shriveled. They say they had more joy than anyone else. Were I to meet with them, would I come away with an understanding of what joy was?

No. The more that I met the more I was convinced that the practice was wrong. Everything we've been doing all looks so wrong. God should be praised. God should be renowned through all corners of the earth and what I'm convinced about more and more each day is that the way we've been doing it is all so seriously wrong.

Christians have understood white to mean purity. To do this, they've bleached, murdered and mutilated thinking that this would make them more pure. They've cut away joy, happiness and laughter from Christian living and somehow still preach that Christians are given joy, happiness and laughter as gifts from God. The white that I'm looking for is the white of completion, the white light which is the blend of all colors. I want the rich red of Chinese fortune, the festive green of Brazilian life, the deep blues of the sea, the whimsical blue of the clear sky, the beautiful, deep mahogany of Eastern Africa, the rich, warm ebony of Sub-Saharan Africa, the oranges of the desert, the violets of the sunset, the brown of cinnamon, the yellow of saffron and curry, the fall foliage, the Aurora Borealis, the Painted Desert, Hanauma Bay, Havana. I want a synaesthetic Christianity whose loud, passionate colors leave the soul hungering for more of God. Piper asked if we understood majesty in music. I ask if he understands festivity in music. The movement and celebration of an electric yellow and green samba, the seduction of black and red tango, the light-hearted laughter of pink and baby blue sugary pop. All rivers flow as one, all colors shine as one, this is the white I think Christianity should be looking for.

Achieving Life, further thoughts

Achieving Life. I feel like I've talked about it too much. I feel like I've barely touched the tip of the iceberg.

I'm well aware that achieving life is a weird phrase. By its construction, it seems like it's something you earn: a promotion, a victory, a prize. Only the prize fits. And it must be earned. But the prestige is always private. The glory always hidden. In its simplest form "achieving life" means... joy and the fullness thereof. But I use the phrase "achieving life" instead of "being happy" for two reasons: 1- Ayn Rand uses it, and I want to pay homage to her by using that phrase and 2- because I don't want you to be confused by what I mean.

What's joy? Is it just an expansion of happiness? Is it, like so many Christians blabber about, eternal and thus different from just plain 'ol happiness? When people speak of happiness they speak of chucking sick days to take off, paychecks, the Yankees winning the World Series, a new gadget, breakfast in bed, a night out drinking, parties where you get drunk and hook up randomly, vacations in the Caribbean. No, joy is much more than those things. They're nice but not enough. They can move endorphins but not the soul.

Joy is deep. Ecstatic. Effervescent. Overwhelming. Welling up from the depths exploding into reality. It fills up your being so that there's no room for thought. The Romantics pegged poetry correctly when they believed that it should be composed in quiet contemplation remembering passionate moments. It should not be composed in that moment.

Usually when I think about joy I think about competing in triathlons. The hot-blooded thrill of churning through the sea of arms and legs in the swim, zooming on the bike and tearing up pavement on the run. I think about the sun burning in the sky and my soul burning twice as hot in my gut. And I can't stop smiling. No matter how much the body hurts, no matter how out of nutrients, how torn the muscles, I never stop smiling when I race. And as I storm across the finish line I let out a giant roar and beat my chest. Joy.

The first time I wrote about achieving life, I wrote it after I did yoga with Kendra. A phenomenal teacher that I consider a huge blessing in my life, I'm glad to have begun my practice with her. I achieve life, I joy when I practice yoga with her. When we practice my mind and my body fall away and I simply live, I simply move. And afterwards, when we're done, I walk away feeling 10' tall and floating 6" off the ground. No fist-pumps, no shouts or hollars, only the realization "That was joy."

And when my girlfriend took me to see Cirque du Soleil's "Ovo" this past Wednesday she saw my jaw slacken and my eyes widen. I get that same child-like look when I witness joy in others. And the grace of the movement, the playfulness and artistry, the explosion of color, even as I call up the memories I feel my fingers slow and another smile stretch across my face. Joy remembered.

(Pictures not my own. Taken from a photoblog here which captured the Toronto show.)

To be honest, I'm dissatisfied with the stills because as beautiful as these pictures are they lack the energy and movement, the astonishing and haunting soundtrack (that I've been listening to ever since) that happens when you experience the show live. This is what I think about when I think about joy. Energy. Movement. Beauty.

A life you've achieved should be beautiful. Not a fake beauty like the air-brushed mannequins on men's magazines but surpassingly beautiful like a live Cirque, like an honest smile.

An honest smile for an honest life. It fits doesn't it? Playing beer pong does not seem like an honest life. Drinking, dissolving reality in alcohol, seems like a protest against life rather than life itself. How is that honest? Clicking your way through thousands of channels, watching a show because it makes you forget the fact that you're alive with powers and abilities beyond any animal, gifted with locomotion and initiative, does not seem honest. Thumbing through endless magazines, buying gadget after gadget, iPod, iPhone, iMac, iPad, I want to know if there's a reason beyond impressing others. No, that doesn't seem like an honest life.

Let me be clear here. I'm not advocating that people run off and join the circus, practice yoga (though that would be great), or register for a triathlon (that would be horrible as races are crowded enough as it is). These are merely metaphors. They worked for me. You cannot follow me in the same way I cannot follow anyone else. That's what honesty... integrity, is. You are what you are. You love what you love. Your life is what you live. So go and achieve your life.

5 Freshman Lessons (And some bonus rambling)

A quick post to crystallize some thoughts I had upon waking up this morning.

(This is a terrible tattoo. But I didn't find any other images that worked.)

1. You're a triathlete 24/7... sometimes.
   The idea comes from the Training Bible, the phrasing comes from Hajime No Ippo. The bigger the race, the more it will demand from you. People intuitively understand this much. I mean, everyone understands that running a marathon is significantly more taxing than jogging around your block. But most people will not realize until later, and some people never realize, that competing means you have to eat, sleep, read weather reports, plan vacations, plan families, plan work schedules a certain way. If I stay up to watch my favorite youtube videos until midnight, I'm not going to get to the gym in time for my early morning swim. If I do, I'll be depleted and unable to give my best effort. If I'm not giving my best effort, can we call this competition?
   
   However, it works the other way around. The smaller the race or the lighter the competition, the less you have to be a triathlete to finish. I think some people have enough raw physical talent to just get up and start a sprint triathlon and finish one day. Maybe, maybe, there are some who can do that for an Olympic. I cannot for the life of me imagine them doing that for a Half-Ironman. The 56 mile bike and the 13.1 mile run make that seem absurd. But then again, it might be the perspective of someone who finished an Olympic and hasn't finished a half-iron. Yet, as I look back on 2009 and the way I trained, I can say with complete honesty and integrity that I trained more than I ever did and more wisely than I ever did. And upon completing the NYC Triathlon last year, I wonder how little I could have done and still gotten away with it. Olympic-distance may sound impressive, but what if we used the equally true "second shortest" instead? Would I be as proud of myself? My poor effort, poor planning gave me predictably poor results. Near the bottom in swimming, 3rd from last in the bike but... above the middle of the pack in the run? An apropos time to go to my next point.
   
2. Your everyday efforts are also what define your weaknesses.
   Another Hajime No Ippo line that works well in thinking about this past year. Last year, I focused on swimming and running figuring that my impressive leg strength would simply carry me through the bike. And I already told you the results of that method.
   
   But in case you haven't heard from facebook or in person, it also led to some critical injuries. The IT-band issue was so severe that 3 hours of playing football left me unable to walk up a flight of stairs. I had to inch myself up and sit after every step. My everyday efforts didn't include stretching or isolation work for supporting muscles. I only wanted to use my time to develop the prime-movers: hips, knees, a decent amount of core. Everything else would just move through a matter of willpower. If I had to cross the finish line with all my limbs dangling in a grotesque pile, I would.
   
3. What you do today should be in direct relation to your goal.
   Goals, goals, goals, goals... goals I do ad-ore. Most people I've met don't have well-defined goals. Even if they have a well-defined 6-pack they probably don't have well-defined goals. This is about much more than just triathlons, but I'll talk about triathlons specifically.
   
   What did I want to do last year? Actually, this was pretty good. I wanted to finish an Olympic distance triathlon and I wanted to finish a marathon. Done and done. Now it gets worse.
   
   What do I want to do in my lifetime as a triathlete? Finish THE Ironman. Really? Is that REALLY my goal? Then what was that immature garbage about crossing the finish line with my limbs dangling? Upon reflection, I blush with shame at how many times and how many ways I chose to look cool and hard instead of working towards my ultimate goal.
   
   And more importantly, I never asked myself this question: How do you know if you are successful in your career? Last year, I would've answered "If I finish THE Ironman." Really? How might have I answered the corollary? "If that's all you did, would you really be content?" And in all honesty, no. Looking deeper, I want to compete my whole life. I never want to not be training, not be looking at my weaknesses and working to overcome them. I never want to be sedentary. I never want to lose the camaraderie and fellowship of my competitor peers. I would be immensely sorrowful without that part of my life. Weighing a lifetime of the sport versus one moment at the top, I would rather have this be a constant part of my life. The glory is nice, but the experience is better. So if that's my truest goal, then I have to work in a way that gets me closer. I can no longer do dumb things to look brave. Foolish pride has to be discarded.
   
4. Start small. Grow big.
   It's important to set goals that will push you beyond your limits, but it's no use if you don't get there. The best way of getting there is consistent daily effort. Without a doubt, it's consistency over a longer period of time that will be more effective. For triathletes, the rule is "When in doubt, leave it out." If you're a triathlete, you don't lack motivation. In fact, you've probably left a lot of friends behind, a lot of T.V. shows, a lot of drinking and all the smoking, as well as late-night comedies, to train hard. You don't lack motivation. What triathletes need is for someone to tell them to stop and go back to those things every now and then. My injuries, and many of those who've taught me  a lot have come from trying to take too big a step too soon.
   
5. No rest, no progress.
   Working out does not make you strong. It makes you weak. When I have a hard swim or run in the morning, the only thing I can think about the whole day is eating or sleeping. Images of delicious foods dance in my mind, dosas, dumplings, duck, durian... Send me to Singapore already! Strength doesn't come when you work out. Greater strength is the result of your body recovering. So let it recover.
   
   I could talk about the physiology of it, protein synthesis and all that but instead I want you to think for a moment of the trials you face in your life. Hardship breaks us down, disassembles our souls and leaves us feeling naked, vulnerable. We become stronger after we learn those lessons, not when we're being battered on every side by the stones and slings of life. So, rest.
   

And the final most important lesson, the one that encapsulates everything above is... less talking, more doing. Last year, I wanted to let everyone know that I had arrived. It was vain, certainly. I won't deny what can't be denied. But it had one redeeming reason: I wanted to leave myself no room for backing out. I've been a coward most of my life. If I didn't win, I'd have an excuse. I wasn't trying. I wasn't ready. I was just playing around.

I talked big so that I would be utterly devastated if I failed in my goals. 

That no longer serves me. No one's listening. That's good. Now, I can start to really push. I believe it was Moody who was quoted as saying "Character is who you are in the dark." That's true, isn't it? It was Ali who said "The fight is won or lost far away from the witnesses, behind the lines, in the gym, and out there on the road; long before I dance under those lights."

For me, this is a huge moment of growing up. A friend was sharing her training philosophy with me. She's a gunner. She never quits. She'll work out 'til she falls apart because DAMNIT, THAT'S JUST THE KIND OF PERSON SHE IS. As I listened, I asked myself "Was that really me?" "God, was I like that not too long ago?" Big talk. Big dreams. No plan. But I'm moving past that now. And the more I train, the more I realize that there's much more time in my day than I thought. The more disciplined I become, the richer my life gets. The more garbage I remove from my life, the more quality remains. If I don't spend time on facebook, I have a ton of time to write. If I don't watch Youtube, I have a lot of time to be with my church people, my girlfriend or make new friends. If I don't start a new manga series... How much joy do the small things of life give me compared to the big things? If I stack up three minor distractions, does it equal the happiness I derive from one major enterprise? 

More and more, I realize that my great struggle is against the element of the middle in my life. Refining my life. Achieving a higher level of integrity and purity. Living in full consciousness and awareness of my time. This is my aim. 

Refining is to remove the dross activities. Checking my e-mail and facebook, doesn't do anything for me. I do it because I have nothing else to do. Given the dreams and goals I have, can it ever be said that I lack for something to do? 

This is what I mean by integrity -- if I say it, it's because I mean it. And if I say it, then I will live it. Compare this to the girl who orders the double cheeseburger with fries, a diet coke and goes to Coldstone afterwards and yet complains about how fat she thinks she is. The words and the actions are in two different worlds. Where is the integrity in that specific part of her? I want to achieve integrity in every area of my life. I want to be that strange person who says something, believes in it fully and acts on it immediately. I'm not there, but I'm getting there.

And to do that, I need to live consciously. I need to be in the present moment. I've given up completely on multi-tasking. It's a distraction and a waste of time. It takes me longer and the quality suffers. Where is the benefit in it? One thing, and one thing only at a time. Give it my full attention and best effort. Be aware in whatever I'm doing. The moment I have in my hands, I'll never have again. So let's make it count.

The Cost of Opportunity, the Price of Achieving Your Life

"Choose your future. Choose life. I chose not to chose life. I chose something else."

Dan wrote today that choosing any particular choice simultaneously means choosing not to take an infinite number of other choices. Because I am typing now, I am not swimming, not running, not biking. And this is true. I wrote this and spoke this a number of times. We all have 24 hours in a day. No one has more. No one has less.

There are choices we make that, no matter how we juggle or how we strive, forbid other choices. In my life, I've chosen to explore widely. This precludes me in many ways from investing as deep as possible. I chose to study philosophy, feminism, post-modernism, other religions and mystery cults -- and more than that, I chose to take them more seriously, and in my opinion, honestly -- than a great number of Christians. When a radical French lesbian writes something, I pay attention and believe she has something worth listening to, worth considering as if it were true... something worth my sincere and deep effort. I do not, like nearly every Christian I have ever met, write her off as a faggot French who's just mad because she can't get a man with her hairy armpits and crazy hair. I myself feel a great deal of shame when I recognize that those who don't say that to her forebear out of cowardice and those that would say this to her, do it out of contempt. And I, together with them, are always assumed to be displays of Christian love. I am ashamed.

I've gained a lot from this stance. Because I've chosen to adopt this stance I've made some deep friendships and read some deep works. Second-wave feminism has subtly changed my views on the dignity and worth of women. I haven't been exposed to much third-wave feminism but I think there's a lot I can learn there too.

And at what price does this come? I think I've alienated a few friends along the way. Let's widen the scope beyond feminism and speak of any worldviews for a moment. I have a friend and one-time mentor who refuses to read the Koran because he believes that exposure to this ink and paper is a gateway to spiritual attack. Because of this he's never picked up Derrida, Lacan and the other writers that bore me greatly. Because of this he has no dialogue with others. Only monologues. Because of this, his evangelism is limited to lecturing others.

Another cost is companionship on this journey. I wanted to explore. And I did. And what exploration means is that you've left the safe world of the known, the agreed-upon and ventured into the world of the unknown and debated. A ship cannot be in both the open sea and the sheltered bay. Is there anyone else who does what I do, thinks what I think? I don't know of any. It's part of why I have this blog. In many ways, it's a distress call. Someone please let me know I'm not the only one here out in the unknown.

But you know what? The costs are small. The returns are great. We all must choose, but the wisest choice is to choose yourself. Or to be more theologically precise, choose to be who God made you to be. I used to read my Bible much, much more. There was a time, I read it 2.5 times in the same year while leading multiple bible studies and participating in 2 distinct fellowships and extracurriculars. This year I might only finish 1/8th of it and halve my "fellowship" time. But I truly believe I function better this way.

Scripture reading is often draws dietary metaphors. And as well it should because man doesn't live on bread alone but on every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. But just as a person would harm themself by eating nothing at all, a person would do cause themself injury by overeating. Look at America's waistline and try to contradict me. We all have 24 hours a day. How much of it would you devote to Scripture? If you slept 8, and spent another hour eating, would 15 hours of reading lead to a more spiritual life? A more vibrant life? A more God-honoring life?

What if it were 8 hours? 4 hours? 2 hours? 15 minutes? Less than daily?

May I humbly submit that we have to find that answer ourselves? I know how many of you read. I know that my blog doesn't have a lot of readers because most people who start at the top never make it this far down the page. I know that I don't keep you in suspense like Lost, have the drama of the Bachelor (who some of you didn't swim with me to watch) [oh hell, like they would read this] nor the competition of American Idol. So when you spend 15 minutes "with the Lord" every morning, what does that amount to? When you listen to the Bible in your car, do you really gain anything out of it or does it quickly become background noise to a life of Jesus fish bumper stickers, Christian t-shirts and praise nights?

The same goes with every other choice we make. It takes experimentation to understand the proportions which honor God the most, honor the lives he has given us the most.

I find the Christian community, and Christian culture as I've lived through it to be so disgustingly cowardly and afraid of experimentation. Why are pastors so afraid of liberating their congregations from the READ EVERY DAY mantra? What does an absent-minded 15 minutes get them? Triathletes don't train every day and they bring more zeal, determination and enthusiasm to their regimen than most Christians do and yet many of them live with more joy, passion and excitement. We're under spiritual attack, yes, but how do we know that we've not already succumbed to it? How can we be so sure that this slavish attachment to tradition isn't itself the attack?

Does that itself stimulate growth? I've seen a committed student learn more in a week than a church-goer who has mailed it in for decades. Worse, the church-goer never made the little he knew, his own. He only had the stale regurgitations of his teachers. Yet, they've read as close to every day as one could hope for! There has to be a better way.

I thought so. So I experimented. Went through some dark times, went through some good times. I found out certain things about myself, about God, how we relate and how I move through the world around me. I used to like the Puritans. They taught me a lot but I like them a lot less now. They're far too melodramatic and the emotions strike me as overwrought. I used to value ancient Christianity but I realized I did that because of its novelty value. It just made me cool (in a select crowd). It's not really for me. People in suits garner a lot less respect once I learned how to wear one right. They're just people to me now. And more than anything else, I learned never to compromise truth for harmony. Never ever betray the integrity of your life. If not being competitive makes you feel like you're suffocating in a soft world, then fight for your life. I learned this when I sold my soul for what I once thought was unattainable, and since then have discovered it be so easy to attain as to feel embarassed at the past. I tried to be soft. I tried to be a normal guy. I tried to blend in and adopt another face to be accepted. And paid for it by being wounded like I never thought I could be. So above all, never trade your integrity for anything. And to keep your integrity, you must choose in a way that propels you towards your telos.

When you make choices, choose in a way that gets you closer towards your goal. Don't choose in a way that gets people to stop bothering you about something. A half-hearted choice brings you closer to nothing but the end of your life.

The Most Important Thing

"The most important thing you have in this world is your time." -- Jor-El

Indulge me in this thought experiment if you will. You are invincible, beyond the reach of injury or disease. You can travel faster than the speed of light, appearing anywhere on Earth in at most, a few seconds. You can see past anything not shielded by lead. What would you do with your life?

Think about that deeply for a moment. Not just strong, but impossibly strong. You could push the planet out of its orbit if you so desired. Not just fast, but capable of going to any point in time. How would you use this power?

I'm sure there are a bunch of snarky answers. I'm not even sure if anyone reading this will actually take this thought experiment seriously. As humans we have a power greater than any amount of super-strength -- the power of our mind. And yet, even with this power, we will someday die. Our lives will end and it will be no more.

My expected lifespan is somewhere around 85. Let's be generous and adjust it to 95 because I only know of 3 or 4 people in my life with what I'd consider healthier lifestyles than me, and because my family has a tradition of longevity. That's 34,675 days of life I can expect. Not a million. Not a hundred thousand. Barely half-way to fifty thousand. That doesn't seem very much at all does it? And more than that, I've already spent more than a quarter of it.

I don't have much time left.

So what will you do with your life?

Don't worry, this isn't a Jehovah's Witness method of evangelism. I won't tell you that the way to stop worrying is to have eternal life by doing whatever it is they do. That is quite possibly the last thing I want to say. Have you ever noticed that if you're given a project with an indefinite deadline, it'll likely never get done? What do you think will happen if you were then given infinite time and space at your disposal? Won't you do so much less than you are now?

Last year, I and one of my closest friends sent each other a list of ten goals that we wished to accomplish in 2009. I wrote in that e-mail "Most people grossly overestimate what they can do in one year and severely underestimate what they can do in five." Consider New Year's Resolutions. How many times have you made them? How many times did you keep them? But consider 5-year spans. 5 years ago, I was graduating college. I was applying to grad schools. I was taking on a dead-end job that I had no real desire to go to and only attended because it was the first thing available. The things I did, the things I believed, the intentions I had... was that really where I was after 21 years of life? Yet, I look at myself now and it doesn't feel like a 5-years difference. It doesn't even feel like the same life.

And you know what else? Year by year, I'm picking up steam. I feel the gears in my mind inexorably turning and grinding. Determined. Focused. I plow forward through time, each moment richer than the last. And it's largely because I realize how fleeting all of life is. What is it that I want to do? I want to realize the full potential of humanity. It's a goal with infinity as the end-point. But as one of the quotes that continues to inspire me goes, "Goals aren't necessarily meant to be achieved. Sometimes they serve as targets to aim at."

For me personally, I want to see this in my life. I want to see how strong, how enduring I can get, how much I can learn, how much I can share and how deeply I can feel. I want to see where the outer limits of human existence are. Why do I fight for justice? I fight because I don't think I should be alone in my journey. I fight because I think that as long as people suffer as victims of slavery, of poverty of disease, that I won't reach my potential, because I was meant to live in community and they are my community. If I ignore them, I would be someone strong and smart, but I think I would have given up a critical part of my humanity. And also it's because I believe that these abilities exist for a reason. What good would strength be if I never had to carry anything? What good would my spirit or mind be if I had no one with whom to share it? And more than that, how could I reach my full potential as a human if I don't understand life from the perspective of those who suffer? They are neither charity cases nor damsels in distress awaiting my knightly self. They are human beings with their own lives. And because of that, the most valuable thing they can give me is themselves. I would be honored to receive it.

So little by little, I want to live in time rich and full. Not the vacancy of empty movements of hands along a circle, a guillotine falling in slow motion, the life of a person aimless and purposeless, but the kind of time and life that is proper to a human being, conmeasurate with the powers and abilities that they have been gifted with.

Let's go. Clock's ticking.

Always and Never

Women never shut up.

Men never listen.

Blacks can never be trusted.

Jews are always stingy.

Asians are always frail.

Whites are always boring.

Republicans never care about the poor.

Democrats never care about America.

It suddenly strikes me that the words "always" and "never" might be great indicators of the lizard brain at work. The lizard brain works at the instinctual level responding to fears and drives. It can only act on impulse. People are not lizard brains. They have lizard brains. It is simply a question of whether they serve their impulses or their impulses serve them. I'll go into that another time and if anyone knows any more about it, I'd love to learn.

But at any rate, why am I thinking about this? Facebook. Youtube. If I wanted to argue for the destruction of all our technology and a return to the age of naked savages with clubs and torches, I would use the internet as my strongest argument. In graduate school, one of my classmates was fascinated with technology and the concept of the singularity -- particularly the eventual union of all humanity into a single consciousness. Having seen Facebook threads, having seen Youtube comments, I can only shudder at the thought. Discussions on the internet have this unnerving tendency to degenerate into what amounts to be geysers of sewage spraying in every direction.

The words "always" and "never" have the ability to comfort a person in ways that empiricism simply cannot. Absolutes order the world, give it structure, tell you what your place is in it, require you only to nod your head and go along.

Arabs are always terrorists.

Americans always fight for freedom.

Arabs are always oppressed by the Zionists.

Americans are always after oil.

Atheists are always scientific.

Christians never think.

Atheists are always arrogant douchebags.

Christians are always persecuted for their faith.

Everything fits into categories. Nothing is left unaccounted for. The things that are left unaccounted for need no explanation. They only need to be explained away. That black swan isn't a swan at all because all swans are white! Logic now moves in reverse, a retrograde rationality.

If you wish to live life, the lizard brain must be subdued and made your servant. The impulses must be mastered. The fear must be mastered. Embrace uncertainty, venture forth into the darkness of not-knowing, of possibly-never-knowing, and set up your tents there. When you hear the questions howl in the night, don't run back to the warm, moist confines of mother's womb -- once you've left it, you can never go back -- instead go forward, always forward, and seek out the unknown.

Approach each moment, each instance, each atom with the knowledge that its distinct from every other. Your sample size is always one. Don't approach everything the same way. There may in fact be two of the same thing. I may be wrong. You won't know until you get there. I'll be working from the premise that if I want to get there, I'll have to get moving. If it makes sense to you, then get off your ass and go. If it doesn't make sense to you, if sitting still and waiting for the answer seems more reasonable, then sit and wait. But you must think. You must overcome the mind that knows only fear, thinks of only survival, can not give you anything more than survival. Is survival all you're after?


Pretty girls are always bitches. Or have boyfriends.

Good guys are always taken. Or gay.

Frat boys are always homophobic jerks.

Sorority girls are always sluts.

Premise #1: Life is infinitely rich and diverse. 
Premise #2: Homogeneity is wearisome. 
Conclusion: The diversity of experiences and facts in life is a gift from God.

"A ship is safe in the harbor -- but that is not what ships are built for."

-- John A. Shedd 

To enjoy this gift, we have to leave the harbor. A willingness to throw away what we know in order to gain what we don't yet know -- isn't this a premise to all learning? I believe it's a fair one. The classical physics that govern airplanes and billiards required minds to throw away the Greek theory of the elements. Quantum physics, Schrodinger's cat, requires us to discard the airplanes and eight-balls. What new mysteries yet unknown will require us to throw away quantum physics anew? Are you scared or excited? Do you want to shrink back or push forward?

"... don't be mad because it's all about progression/ loiterers should be arrested"

-- Jay-Z, On To The Next One

For me, I learned this experience when I took a gender politics course in grad school. Up until this point, I only received an unilateral education in gender politics -- conservative and Christian. I'm still not exactly sure what my motives were for taking the class. Was it because feminist criticism was the only major school of theory that I had no training in? I think I said that to some people. Was it because other people believed that those people, those gays, those lesbians, those people who love gays and lesbians, were so far away from God that they could never be brought back and consequently needed an intrepid adventurer like myself to go and win them for Jesus? Yes, I believe I thought that to myself a number of times too. Or maybe because it's the only class that could fit my schedule that semester. I don't remember.

But I do remember carrying a combative attitude to class every week in the early part of the semester. I can only express relief that I did most of the readings and as is my usual habit, waited around to get a sense of things before I spoke. Something changed in me. I began to see where they were coming from and the legitimacy of their arguments. These were serious thoughts and issues that needed to be considered. I burned with shame and anger that I laughed at Voddie's jokes. No, lesbians are not lesbians because they "can't get some." No gays are not failed attempts at "being men." I've seen too much to make that repulsive a joke. I have had a lot of great things happen to me in life, all of which I feel a deep indebtedness to God for, and right near the top is whatever work of the Holy Spirit caused me to walk a mile in feminist and LGBT shoes. I don't agree with them, particularly on political issues -- I remain adamant against abortion although not opposed to gay marriage (which isn't the same as supporting it), but I understand the issues far more fully now. And more importantly, I respect the origin of those issues. And I sneer at the ostriches in the pulpit, the ones who have never sailed real-life experience's stormy seas, the ones who say that we're the ones being persecuted when we comprise 90% of the population.

I wonder what kind of world we would have if we could all subdue our lizard brains and venture into the unknown. Last year I had an argument with someone over religion. I don't do much of this sparring anymore but he had been so aggressively douchey about it that I felt compelled to stand up. He eventually made this assertion that I could believe whatever I wanted because it gave me comfort.

Comfort.

Motherf*cking comfort. My religion, my belief in God has been the source of nearly all my greatest anxieties and angers in life. Love God? Sometimes I hate him. I love the Courage Wolf quote "Climb the highest mountain. Punch the face of God." because that's exactly what I want to do sometimes. Even the pains I experienced in relationships are attributable to my theological leanings. I certainly did not choose Christianity for Goddamned comfort.

But this assertion flew. As if he knew me! As if he understood me! As if he knew about my mental breakdown where I ran off into the stormy New England night, sprinting into the howling wind and pouring rain, lost in a park, with my cell phone battery dying, screaming obscenities into the sky until my throat was hoarse and punching boulders until my knuckles bled. Comfort. God damned, motherf*cking comfort.

But can I blame him? Christians, in debates, often assert that people don't want to be Christian because they want to continue to live in immorality. Hell, I made that argument many times in my early years. I made that argument to people I didn't know, barely knew and knew all my life. I followed a script. The whole world followed a script. But that was then. Here we are now. I grew. I moved forward. And now that I know, I'm resolved only to ever move forward.

Would you join me in this journey?