I remember in the late nineties / early oughts, thinking to myself “Man, Time Life’s best of the 70s and 80s, who would want to listen to that?” Because of course, there was so much good music coming out right then (in my opinion). I just couldn’t imagine a world where you’d want to listen to anything but new-ish, great songs.
Over the past couple of days, I’ve been listening to several playlists that are made up of 90s bands. Counting Crows. Gin Blossoms. Goo Goo Dolls. The Bare Naked Ladies. You know, the stuff I was listening to when I couldn’t understand the people wanting to listen to 80s music.
You know what’s changed?
The date. It’s now 2013. That means A Long December was on the charts 17 years ago. I’m the guy. I’m the guy buying the best of the 90s (not really buying it, but listening to it, at least). I almost don’t know what to do with myself.
And I’m fairly certain that the kids in our Youth Group are probably looking at me, wondering “Why would anyone want to listen to that old music?”
Nothing new under the sun.
Finding Joy in the Mundane
I keep coming back to the idea that I need to figure out how to find joy in the stuff that I am doing well AS WELL AS pursuing the things that will bring me joy. Is a good trash collector joyful because he’s doing the thing that brings him joy or because he finds joy in the thing he is doing? I think it’s got to be the latter. Maybe that’s revealing a personal bias. Actually, it almost definitely does.
So, if the thing is finding joy in what you’re doing, how do you do that? Here’s what I’m working on:
– Specify goals. Even in the little things, having some targets that you’re aiming to accomplish is a big deal. It helps you to see the forest for the trees.
– Celebrate complete. Moving something from undone to done is a big deal, no matter what it is.
– Remember that “Work is not a curse. Frustrating work is a curse.” (From an “Ask Pastor John” about laziness.)
– Remember that your arc isn’t the big deal. Christ’s arc is the big deal. Creation, Fall, Redemption, Restoration. And for the believer, good work is part of the restoration.
That’s what I’ve got for now.
Routine Noise
Ceiling fans whirring. Clock tick-tocking. My wife’s mouse clicking as she digs her way through Minecraft. (Yeah, some guys dream of what it’d be like to marry someone who games with them. Me, I just went ahead and married that girl. Protip: it rocks.) These are routine sounds that surround me.
I have a drive to control the noise. Whether I blare music or listen to an audio book, I like to drown out the mundane noise.
But there’s a beauty in it, especially if you can get past the human-created noise. Behind it, there are crickets chirping. Loudly. There’s wind through the trees in my neighbourhood. If I wasn’t writing this late at night, there’d be bird calls and cats meowing and dogs chasing the cats. That might be my favorite part.
It’s a good thing to find joy in the routine things around us.
Weaning…
I’m working to wean myself off of compulsive behaviors as far as loading certain websites go. I wouldn’t say I’m an internet addict, but I do have concerns about my attention span. So, how am I doing it this time around? I’m using a combination of SiteBlock and Stayfocusd for Chrome.
Siteblock is set to get rid of the websites that I’ve decided to push out of my life. Sites like Reddit and imgur and the like that are pure time-sucks, heavily lacking in valuable content. It’s set to allow access for 0 hours of the day, every day.
Stayfocusd, on the other hand, is set to prevent me from wasting time while I work. I have a much broader family of sites entered on my Stayfocusd list. Everything from news sites to lifehacker.com to other sites I find valuable, at appropriate times. StayFocusd helps me by not allowing me to access them at inappropriate times. I’ve set it to be active from 9 am to 7 pm. I can also turn on the same list for a discretionary period at night if I’m working on writing or other creative tasks.
This has helped me tremendously. It’s cut back on compulsive behavior that I don’t think is healthy. But it’s been hard. Internet addict? No… I can quit any time I want.
On No
Kevin Ashton wrote a brilliant post (over here) about saying no. It has some of the most quotable polite rejections that I’ve ever read.
Here’s a doozy (in response to being invited to participate in a study on creativity)
“One of the secrets of productivity (in which I believe whereas I do not believe in creativity) is to have a VERY BIG waste paper basket to take care of ALL invitations such as yours — productivity in my experience consists of NOT doing anything that helps the work of other people but to spend all one’s time on the work the Good Lord has fitted one to do, and to do well.” – Peter Drucker
Much more than that, though, at the source. Ashton’s main thrust is that we have to say no in order to be able to accomplish the things we want to accomplish. My friend Samuel made the same point about saying no to our kids here.
Sounds like I need to learn to say no.