My favorite part of the day is the morning. As I get older I find myself going to bed earlier and earlier so as to gain more conscious time enjoying that specific period of planetary revolution known as “dawn”. At about 5:30 of the clock, I’ll arise from my slumber, and go forth through the initial motions of the day as my brain and body return to conscious physicality.
Grab the coffee pot, fill it with water, pour it into the coffee maker.
Grab a bag of Dunkin’s and a paper filter.
Fill the filter with coffee, place it in the filter basket, press the power button and wait for hot dark roasted goodness.
In the spring, summer and fall, I’ll open la porte française to my back porch, sit at the patio table with my iPad and read the electronic version of the Boston Globe.
The sun, if it’s out, rises out of the east south east in the darkening Autumn, in early summer it rises out of the north east and whence comes the deadness of winter it rises out of the south east. The world wobbles, and so do we upon it.
I love the sound of mornings. The song of the black capped chickadee, the mourning dove, the tufted titmouse, and the shrill squawk of the Blue Jay.
I”m reminded of the early mornings on the Allagash River Waterway, with the rippling waters lapping it’s banks, a soft rising mist rising from the rivers surface and the echoing sounds of nature reverberating off both Shepherd Brook and Round Pond Mountains.
I associate the morning with mindfulness.
As the day burns on, so does the ever increasing list of responsibilities, stress, exertion and all the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.
Kierkegaard said “Don’t forget to love yourself”. That’s a common theme I’ve found in self-help books and speeches, and I get it…it makes sense. It’s the reason flight attendants insist that “in the event of cabin decompression, an oxygen mask will automatically appear in front of you. To start the flow of oxygen, pull the mask towards you, place it firmly over your nose and mouth, secure the elastic band behind your head and breathe normally. If you are traveling with a child or someone who requires assistance, secure your mask on first and then assist the other person”.
In other words: you can’t help others unless you first help yourself.
I get that, it makes sense both morally and logically…BUT, what if you can’t help yourself? What if you forget to love yourself…what if, in fact: you kinda loath yourself?
That’s a strong word “Loath”, an adjective meaning “unwilling; reluctant; disinclined; averse”.
I’m not talking about being “self deprecating”, a phrase meaning “to say and perform in a way that ridicules oneself for the entertainment of others”. And I’m not talking about humility here, where one is self assured, confident and admiring of oneself, but yet defers to others out of respect and caring.
I’m talking here about a genuine sense of dislike of oneself such that, on the outside one might sound self deprecating or humble, but in reality, known only to his or herself, that guy is self loathing.
I am, to be honest with you, not a fan of myself. Let’s put it this way: I would never want to be forced to go out to dinner with me, I would never want to spend any time with me. I would never want to be associated with me. Given the choice of standing in my own presence or watching paint dry: well...
It’s a fascinating process really: observing a fluid transform into as solid through a process of solvent evaporation where pigments and a binding polymer are left behind in a hardened layer of color.
I, on the other, just kinda sit there and suck.
It’s time to have an honest talk with you here, about this podcast. Many of you have come a long way with me through the years, and after over a decade of doing this, 12 years going on 13; so much has changed, with both Phedippidations and your host.
There have been some good shows, good days, good memories and bad, sad and angry moments captured in a compressed audio file that you have downloaded and given a listen to. In this time, as I’ve so often said: I have changed….and every time I start talking meta like this, someone gets the wrong impression that I’m bidding thee farewell.
I’m not. I’ll keep producing the podcast…or whatever you call this thing…and I’ll do it because….honestly, I don’t know why I’ll keep doing it. Maybe it’s my way of leaving something behind, although in all likelihood the entire body of my work here will one day be reduced to ashes and atoms…that’s the nihilist in me: not a bad word I’ll remind you…but a Nietzschean one just the same.
The universe is in entropy…moving from organized to chaos towards a day when every single atom comprising every single thing will be far beyond the reach of each other in a ever increasing expanse, but not infinite, space of nothing.
That’s just good science my friends, cheer up and live for the now.
From self loathing and podcasting nihilism we skip back to my thoughts on mindfulness with this short detour:
I recently read the abstract of a study published in the Journal of the Association for Psychological Science published this past October 10th titled “Mind the Hype: A Critical Evaluation and Prescriptive Agenda for Research on Mindfulness and Meditation” by
Van Dam, Van Vugt, Vago, Schmalzl, Saron, Olendzki, Meissner, Lazar, Ker, Gorchov, Fox, Field, Britton Brefczynski-Lewis, and Meyer from
The Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai; the University of Groningen; Vanderbilt University Medical Center; Southern California University of Health Sciences; University of California, Davis; Integrated Dharma Institute; University of Massachusetts Medical School; Harvard Medical School; Brown University; New York University; Stanford University; Princeton University; West Virginia University; and University of Michigan
I’m all about the creative commons with attribution thing.
A synopsis of the abstract is as follows:
During the past two decades, mindfulness meditation has gone from being a fringe topic of scientific investigation to being an occasional replacement for psychotherapy, tool of corporate well-being, widely implemented educational practice, and “key to building more resilient soldiers.”
Yet the mindfulness movement and empirical evidence supporting it have not gone without criticism.
Misinformation and poor methodology associated with past studies of mindfulness may lead public consumers to be harmed, misled, and disappointed.
Addressing such concerns, the present article discusses the difficulties of defining mindfulness, delineates the proper scope of research into mindfulness practices, and explicates crucial methodological issues for interpreting results from investigations of mindfulness.
Our goals are to inform interested scientists, the news media, and the public, to minimize harm, curb poor research practices, and staunch the flow of misinformation about the benefits, costs, and future prospects of mindfulness meditation.
So what do I think of this?
I’m calling “bull shit” on this one...and I know what you’re thinking
“Steve, have you not abandoned all belief in the non-scientific realm of the mystical?, how could you deny the findings of a reputable study that has been peer reviewed?”
Okay. It’s true that I do not give credence to magical thinking, but that doesn't mean that I scoff at all things I do not understand.
Do I believe in an afterlife? No, and I’ll live a good life regardless...but...how the hell should I know? The overwhelming majority of people I know, each of whom are significantly smarter than I’ll ever be, disagree with me on the subject of post mortem resurrection.
I continue to stand by my skepticism, but I will defend their intelligence and sincerity. The fact is, anything is possible...I no longer believe in magical fantasy and wishing thinking, but I admit that I’m not an expert on much.
But when it comes to the positive effects of mindfulness...I have to side on it’s efficacy. This is not a magical claim however: it is my honest opinion based on personal experience and the experience of others.
When I practice mindfulness...and by that, I do not mean to imply that is comes easy to me. For me, mindfulness requires a great deal of repetitive exercise to achieve the skill...but when I practice it: I find what Dr. George Sheehan called “The peace beyond understanding”.
It’s not a higher plain of existence, it’s not a magical force that overcomes me: it’s simply this; that when I stop, and breath, and focus on nothing but the present...the noise from outside and inside my head: is silenced. Abruptly.
Imagine it. While all around us the universe is in entropy, while we sit upon a spinning, orbiting globe that is contained in a solar system parked on the edge of a spiral arm of a barred spiral galaxy full of four hundred billion stars and a hundred billion other globes spreading out into nothing...imagine just being.
Just being. here. in this place.
Mindfulness is defined as “the psychological process of bringing one’s attention to experiences occurring in the present moment”. Don’t confuse this with meditation...although, it’s worth pointing out that meditation is a very good way, maybe even the best way, to develop the skill of mindfulness.
Now, to be fair...this “Mind the Hype” study does make some valid and interesting points, but the tone of the full article minimizes the benefit and usefulness of the practice of mindfulness: and in this skeptics opinion: that’s just not opened minded.
Yeah: I said open minded. Maybe you think that because I do not believe in ghosts or Big Foot or intelligent extraterrestrial visitors ever having landed on Earth…that it means that I won’t consider any evidence.
Au contraire. I welcome your evidence. I appreciate your arguments. I will respect your opinion and consider what you have to say NOT from a position of authority, but in my case, from a position of science.
But one of the many things I love about science, is that it can be, and often is: wrong. Canals on the surface of Mars? Oh Percival Lowell, you were so close.
My attempts to enter a state of mindfulness, is an attempt: in some respects, to silence the voices of self loathing...and those voices are loud, annoying and degrading. The remind me about how fat I have become, how lethargic I’ve become, how...in many cases, somewhat catatonic I’ve become.
Those voices remind me of my past, and the horrible, rotten, stupid, selfish, and vain things that I have said and done. They scream at me about the many people I have hurt and regrets that I carry in my big frickin’ bag of suck.
But, when I stop and close my eyes, and breathe. When I allow myself to just be here. It doesn’t matter if I’m sitting, standing or laying down...when I excuse myself from existence and focus instead on the now.
It’s all okay.
Just imagine it. Mindfulness.
It’s neither good, or bad. I’ve said that it’s peaceful beyond understanding which means that it’s neither peaceful or violent. Entropy continues while I breath, and that’s okay...because for that moment, and I have no idea how long it lasts: part of practicing mindfulness is absolving yourself of the constraints of observing time....but for that moment, or moments, or eons: I’m not Steve Runner, Steve Walker or that guy you know,…I’m just me: whatever that means.
The researchers who wrote this paper were not looking to take away from the benefits and value practitioners of mindfulness report having. They were not looking to challenge the various clinicians who say that mindfulness works, they are looking to define what is meant by “it works”. In other words, how do you quantify the effects of mindfulness? What are the specific benefits of mindfulness and how can can they be specifically described.
The paper was both a clinical and neuro-scientific study of the physiological effects of mindfullness…and what they found, and what I can certainly appreciate and agree on, is that some of the claims are silly.
Mindfulness will not cure cancer, although it may reduce the negative effects of cancer or any life threatening disease or situation.
Mindfulness will not cure depression, although it may give you some clarity and peace to help to reduce the impact of some of the effects of MDD.
Mindfulness will not relive serious and intense pain but it may offer a brief and minimal psychological reduction of such suffering.
The researchers of this paper are simply saying that the practice and benefits of mindfulness requires more rigorous scientific study: which makes sense to me. They propose less media hype from charlatans and alternative medicine practitioners who make unsubstantiated claims, and they call for a more clear definition of what mindfulness actually is.
I’m good with all of that. What I don’t want to do, and what I hope this study will not encourage: is the abandonment of the practice of mindfulness: because despite the fact that it’s not, as the researchers point out “a universal panacea for various types of human deficiencies and ailments.” there is a great deal of good that it offers.
I don’t pretend to understand it all, but I do realize that it is not magic. What mindfulness is, and what it can offer probably depends on many variables, but I do feel that it’s benefits far outweigh any supposed risk.
Every once in a while: stop, breath, and just be present in the now. It’ll make you feel better.
The RSS feed which once hosted the podcast you may know as “Intervals” has been exterminated...or, if it is still out there I’ve stopped adding anything to it. I’ve made the executive producers decision to follow the sage advice of Henry David Thoreau and “simply, simply, simplify”. That doesn’t mean that the podcast “Intervals” has been decommissioned: it has not. You’ll still be able to hear my dulcet tones on the same place you’ve found Phedippidations, over at steverunner.com.
It’s not that I’m committed to podcasting, but you just heard me list the names of 26 friends of the show…ergo friends of mine, who continue to give me a dollar every month to, well, essentially, keep in touch.
So, it’s partly for them that I’m going to keep going with this quote “show”…which isn’t really a show….but that’s not the major reason why I’ll keep going.
I’m going to keep podcasting because it’s one of the things that I’ll leave behind. This and my extensive Lego collection: Now…let’s be clear: I plan on continuing to exist as a living breathing homo sapien sapien for many more solar orbits to come, and as long as I can…regardless of how few are listening, I’m going to keep producing Phedippidations…because someday, one of my grandchildren, might check it out.
I’m not so naive as to believe that they’ll all give it a listen.
I’m not so ridiculously self absorbed to believe that any one of them will listen to the entire body of my work here. At best, I suspect that at least one of them may listen to portions of a few episodes...and that, will be enough.
And so you might ask, “why is that so important”? Good question. Excellent question in fact...and the excellent answer is this: it’s not important. My presence here, my existence....the fact that Stephen John Walker ever existed: is essentially and perfectly meaningless. After I have returned to mud, I will be forgotten...just another creature who got the chance to watch Doctor Who.
BUT, just as I wonder how my ancestors lived and loved in Italy, Prince Edward Island and Invernesshire Scotland...so too might my grandchildren, or great grandchildren, or their offspring and issue wonder how this genetic code bearer of the 21st century lived, loved, and generally got along.
You and I are merely animals with a particular individual code describing our essence. Our differences in appearance, shape, color and particular unique attributes are, from a statistical perspective: essentially identical.
But that tangental conversation is for another time. This podcast is, for better or worse, a brief audible record of the life and times of me...and certainly some future descendent of mine, choking in the icy cold oxygen depleted atmosphere of Proxima b, the nearest extrasolar planet located only 4.25 light years from here in the Proxima Centauri system and likely the final resting place for the lone survivors of the long dead planet Earth...will wonder how I lived, and why Red Socks were so important.
You never know.
They might want to know if I took a stand against a certain Pumpkin Headed Tyrant Baby Child Drumph with tiny infant hands, or if I did my part to reduce the effects of Global Warming, or voiced my opinion about a cowardly American military industrial complex hell bent on killing and causing pain and suffering around the world... I don’t know...but there’s a fair chance that some of this podcast...or netcast...or compressed audio file of the format known as : Motion Picture Experts Group Audio Layer 3, might be heard by them.
And if that should come to pass, my descendants will be listening to this.
And so, if you’ll allow me the opportunity: I’d like to take this moment to address my future descendants.
Hello descendants.
I hope you all descended well.
I am your pretty great grand ancestor from the 21st century here to tell you that I’m sorry. For everything. Yeah...I specifically mean that. I could have done more. I tried my best, but maybe my best wasn’t good enough. Anyway: I’m sincerely sorry and wish you well.
My advice? For what it’s worth: is to find the beauty in the Universe and savor it.
That’s why you’re here after all. Almost 14 billion years ago stars exploded and entropy moved so that DNA would arise as it did, not by accident or design: but just because. Just because.
No magic, not flying spaghetti monster in the sky, no plan, no accident...it all just happened: I just happened and therefore you just happened to be.
That’s a good thing.
During your brief stay here, I advise that you do your part to make the universe a better place,
Even just a little...do what you can, because others will be conceived and experience life after you return to mud...and you’ll enjoy your life alot more knowing that you left this universe better than it was before you got here.
Nothing lasts forever, and that’s okay too. Change can suck, but so can lack of change. Try to remember that nothing is permanent and set your expectations such that you can enjoy the beauty of the universe even after all you love is gone...because all you love will one day be gone and my descendant, as you listen to this, assuming it’s after the year 2062, so too will I.
And that’s okay too...because time is not an illusion: it’s a direction, it’s a property...and science has figured out how it all ends: in a cold and motionless incredibly vast soup of teeny tiny particles. You don’t have to like that. Or cheese. But both are real.
So enjoy the warm days and pleasant nights while you can. You’re one of the lucky ones: you came to be.
I will leave you with that: my last bit of advice. BE.
Thank you for listening. And as for me, I could have done more, but as my friend Lenny once sang:
I did my best, it wasn't much
I couldn't feel, so I tried to touch
I've told the truth, I didn't come to fool you
And even though it all went wrong
I'll stand before the lord of song
With nothing on my tongue but hallelujah
I’m Steve Walker, reminding you that solvitur ambulando.