Guilt Won’t Help – Daily Dad

This job is hard enough. You are flawed enough. You have screwed up and will screw up enough. We don’t have room or time or the luxury for guilt. We have to focus on right now.

We get so wrapped up in numbers in our society. The most important thing is that we are able to be one-to-one, you and I with each other at the moment. If we can be present to the moment with the person that we happen to be with, that’s what’s important. Fred Rogers

There’s no reason to rush. There’s no reason to rush through bedtime or dinner or the game. There’s no reason to rush through anything or to anywhere. Because what we’re rushing from is our children and the limited time we get with them—the amount of which is never guaranteed.

So slow down. Time flies. Time flies fast enough on its own. Appreciate any time you get with your kids. Don’t rush away from it.. Savor it.

Daily Dad

“I’m a believer in the ordinary and the mundane. These guys that talk about ‘quality time’ — I always find that a little sad when they say, ‘We have quality time.’ I don’t want quality time. I want the garbage time. That’s what I like. You just see them in their room reading a comic book and you get to kind of watch that for a minute, or having a bowl of Cheerios at 11 o’clock at night when they’re not even supposed to be up. The garbage, that’s what I love." Jerry Seinfeld

Cherish The Garbage Time – Daily Dad

The point is not to discourage you about being a parent with these descriptions, of course. You already bought your ticket and now you’re on the ride. It’s just a reminder: If you go around expecting this to be an unending series of Hallmark moments, you’re fooling yourself. If you’re comparing how you’re doing to what you see on television, you’re being unfair to yourself.

This thing is hard. Really hard. There are dark moments. There are moments when you think you’re the absolute worst. There are moments when you’ll be told you are in fact the worst. But you have to keep going. You can’t give up. You can’t despair.

They’re counting on you. And remember: it’s these moments that exist between the brighter, happier, more photogenic moments. Could you have one without the other? Maybe, but the former should make you appreciate the latter while you have them…and help you endure the former while you’re in them.

Source: Daily Dad

One of the things [Uncle Alex] found objectionable about human beings was that they so rarely noticed it when they were happy. He himself did his best to acknowledge it when times were sweet. We could be drinking lemonade in the shade of an apple tree in the summertime, and Uncle Alex would interrupt the conversation to say, “If this isn’t nice, what is?” So I hope that you will do the same for the rest of your lives. When things are going sweetly and peacefully, please pause a moment, and then say out loud, “If this isn’t nice, what is?”

I think about this a lot. Though not as much as I should.

How much do we do this? Think about, how, what we are experencing is, nice…

Not as much as we should.

Kurt Vonnegut // “Nobody will stop you from creating. Do it tonight. Do it tomorrow. That is the way to make your soul grow… The kick of creation is the act of creating, not anything that happens afterward. I would tell all of you watching this screen: Before you go to bed, write a four line poem. Make it as good as you can. Don’t show it to anybody. Put it where nobody will find it. And you will discover that you have your reward.”

from https://www.nitch.com

It will no doubt get me into trouble with the medical profession, but it is not too much of an exaggeration to say that you can eat as much as you like, drink as much alcohol as you want, slob about as much as you fancy, fail to do your exercises and live in as polluted an atmosphere as you can find, and you will barely notice the difference. But having no friends or not being involved in community activities will dramatically affect how long you live.

This Is How To Make Emotionally Intelligent Friendships: 6 Secrets

I’m currently reading Exhalation by Ted Chiang. One of the short stories involves the interactions between a missionary and a child he has met. They talk about writing.

“Moseby explained to Jijingi how each a person spoke could be indicated with a different mark on the paper. The marks were arranged in rows like plants in a field you looked at the marks as if you were walking down a row, made the sound each mark indicated, and you would find yourself speaking what the original person had said.”

Then words.

“… But you need to leave spaces when you write.” “I have.” Jijingi pointed at the gap between each row. “No, that is not what I mean. Do you see the spaces within each line?” He pointed at his own paper. Jijingi understood. “Your marks are clumped together, while mine are arranged evenly.” “These are not just clumbs of marks. … Where I come from, we call them ‘words’. When we write we leave spaces between the words.” “But what are words.” “How can I explain it?” He thought a moment. “If you speak slowly, you pause very briefly after each word. That’s why we leave a space in those places when we write. Like this: How. Many. Years. Old. Are. You?” He write on his paper has he spoke, leave a space every time he paused. “But you speak slowly because you’re a foreigner. I’m Tiv, so I don’t pause when I speak. Shouldn’t my writing be the same?” “It does not matter how fast you speak. Words are the same whether you speak quickly or slowly.”

It just struck me.

As a Year 1 (kindergarten) teacher, these are things we support students to learn every day. It was interesting to see a discussion that included someone who had never been exposed to the idea of writing or ‘words’.

“The idea of “boundaries” has become so porous when it comes to cultivating work/life balance that it’s lost all meaning. People don’t respect boundaries. You don’t respect them. Even when the pandemic is over, it’s going to be very, very difficult to try to rebuild them. What we actually need are guardrails, big and sturdy ones, to protect us from the runaway semi-truck of work.

In our current framework, boundaries are the individual’s responsibility, and when they’re broken, it’s because the individual failed to protect them. But guardrails? They’re there to protect everyone, and they’re maintained by the state, aka your company. There are a lot of ways to actually build guardrails around employee’s lives,”

https://annehelen.substack.com/p/imagine-your-flexible-office-work

I liked yesterdays Daily Dad

It’s not fair to subject your kids to all the things that have broken your heart in this world. It’s not fair to let your experiences deprive them of the hope and belief they need not just to survive but to be happy.

We have to stay positive. We have to keep trying. We have to remain strong—against the pull of bitterness and anger and hopelessness.

It makes me think of a couple of things that often come to mind. The first is them knowing my fears, or the things that I find difficult. The second is how I’m feeling and how they are aware of that - particularly the negative emotions.

The funny thing is all I ever wanted I already had
There’s glimpses of heaven in every day
In the friends that I have, the music I made
The love that I feel, I just had to start again

Hospital for souls - Bring me the horizon

Having someone to go with makes it harder to not go and more fun when I do.

Having someone working a different level has been good too, in that it forces me to consider what I’m doing more. As I creep towards 40, I’m making choices about working out so I can work out again this week and next month and for the foreseeable future. I’m happy with the programme I’m doing, I like this quote from their website.

It is for these reasons and more that Linchpin focuses on long-term health and fitness. We want you (and your back, knees, and shoulders) to be fit, happy, healthy, and extremely capable for decades to come.

“She’s a grown-up, isn’t she? Grown-ups and monsters aren’t scared of things?”

“Oh, monsters are scared,” said Lettie. “That’s why they’re monsters. And as for grown-ups…” She stopped talking, rubbed her freckled nose with a finger. Then, “I’m going to tell you something important. Grown-ups don’t look like grown-ups on the inside either. Outside they’re big and thoughtless and they always know what they’re doing. Inside, they look just like they always have. Like they did when they were your age. The truth is, there aren’t any grown-ups. Not on, in the whole wide word.”

…

I thought about adults. I wondered if that was true: if they were all really children wrapped in adult bodies, like children’s books hidden in the middle of dull, long adult book, the kind with no pictures or conversations.

Not sure why this passage struck me but it did and has me thinking about grown-ups and how we grow up and we’re the same but different.

stand up for what is right
prioritize your mental health
being flexible brings success
your voice makes a diffeerence
do not hide from your emotions
hard moments do not last forever
healing yourself makes life better
pursue your goals no matter what
embracing change eases your mind

young pueblo

via

“My relationship with the entire world in this moment depends entirely on the relationship I have with myself.“ – Paul Ferrini

swissmiss - My Relationship With The Entire World

In this email talking to a mindfulness teacher was a quote that struck me and now I can’t stop thinking about.

“How many other people need to be doing their jobs well for you to do your job well?”

the examined family

A strange truth about communicating is that we don’t get to choose whether we do it or not. In the presence of others, we are always sending messages, as helplessly as a star emits light.

The Force Field

via > Drawing Links

To my boy, all that energy, so wild
Love your hues and your blues in equal measure
Your comings and your goings-away
My mission is to keep the light in your eyes ablaze

To my girl, all your innocence and fire
When you reach out, I am here hell or high water
This nest is never going away
My mission is to keep the light in your eyes ablaze

To my boy, my precious, gentle warrior
To your sweetness and your strength in exploring
May this bond stay with you through all your days
My mission is to keep the light in your eyes ablaze

Alanis Morrisette - Ablaze.

I will not live in fear
of falling or catching fire.
I choose to inhabit my days,
to allow my living to open me,
to make me less afraid,
more accessible,
to loosen my heart
until it becomes a wing,
a torch, a promise.
I choose to risk my significance;
to live so that which came to me as seed
goes to the next as blossom
and that which came to me as blossom,
goes on as fruit.
— Dawna Markova

I’m aware how much I gloss over most of what I read online, taking the time when there’s some more scrolling to do. With that in mind, I’m copying some of the poems down into a notebook to help me take more time over them.

I’m sorry I have to say it but you look like you’re sad Your smile is gone; I’ve noticed it bad The cure is if you let in just a little more love I promise you this, a little’s enough Angels and Airwaves - A little’s enough

I know it’s cheesy but I’ve always loved this. 💬

It doesn’t make sense to me that you wouldn’t want to remember your life. This concept of partying, it’s like you’re sweeping up after yourself constantly. You’re just sweeping away your memories. I like to be present, and keep it with me. Some people think of straight edge as a tee-totaling sobriety movement, but in my mind it was just about self definition. I found it unimpeachably positive. But people always find ways to be derisive. You’re in England – you fucking know that, right? It’s an extremely snarky society.

http://www.huckmagazine.com/art-and-culture/ian-mackaye-survival-issue-interview/

I tell my girls this every day whether is teaching them to ride their scooters, working on their swimming or simply coloring. Paralysis prevents most people from ever realizing their dreams. And I want to instill in my kids fear is something you face head on, you never turn your back on it. As Hunter S. Thompson said, "never turn your back on fear. It should be always be in front of you, like something that might need to be killed."

http://johnwelbourn.powerathletehq.com/2015/01/02/lessons-learned/