Going Alone

The Good Life Meditation is my daily effort of recounting, considering, and developing my personal life objectives and principles. I perform this activity in the morning, usually on my way to work, as a start and readiness to the coming day, and as a reminder of the best life practices I have so far uncovered and made my own. With practice, the effort has become as familiar and refreshing as making and enjoying a hot cup of coffee, leaving me fortified and invigorated for whatever the day may hold.

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     Note: I periodically record this activity on video to upload to a special YouTube playlist titled “The Good Life.” I recommend watching one of these videos for more in-depth coverage of each point, as well as personal examples of how I apply these objectives and principles to my own daily challenges. The playlist URL is included in the appendix (appendix 9).

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Affirmation of human and civil rights

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I must recognize, respect, and abide the rights of individuals and the smaller groups within society such that these are not compromised in the pursuit of the common good. The lesser among us shall not be neglected or trodden upon in service of the many.

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Eight objectives

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1. BE ALWAYS READY TO DIE, or become infirm or old
   
   “That we must all die, we always knew; I wish I had sooner remembered it.”
   
   -Dr. Johnson
   
   At all times, have every important life affair in order: my decided purpose, my household, and finances, as well as my connections, obligations, responsibilities, and commitments. Have also my art in a state of readiness to carry on as my only real legacy and potential lasting memory after I am gone. My last photo taken. My last sketch complete. My final word penned and saved. No letters left to write. No goodbyes left to speak. No one left to hug. To be ready now, and at a moment’s notice, to loosen my grip when life is done all at once, and then fall into darkness without a single backward glance or backward thought, or longing backwards memory. Likewise, to be prepared if I am no longer able to care for myself due to infirmity or old age.
    

2. MAKE GOOD AND EFFECTIVE USE OF
   TIME AND RESOURCES
   To make good use of these few moments right now, and to dwell very little on past utilization, other than to use such memory to inform my judgment in the direction of improved forward progress. To also make good use of whatever resources are at my disposal, not just for increase, but to spend, share, give, or apply these resources well, and in ways which are in accord with my life objectives and principles. An especially good use of time are self-sustaining interests—namely, occupations of mind and time which are ends in themselves. Listening to the sound of rain is an example. As is reading a good poem. Walking the dog is another. So too, tucking myself into bed. Activities which are more difficult to remember tomorrow, yet which are very easy to live today.
   
   Below are examples of some of the things I would like to be caught doing when death comes at last to utterly snuff out my light:

   • Breathing slow and
     measured breathes

   • Controlling my emotions

   • Thinking and acting deliberately

   • Remembering and acting
     upon my responsibilities

   • Preparing a good meal

   • Eating well and very little

   • Helping others

   • Being attentive to my family

   • Providing good value
     to my employer

   • Learning something
     startlingly new

   • Reading an excellent book

   • Memorizing poetry
     which moves me

   • Studying history

   • Imagining the future

   • Enjoying good music

   • Listening to a good lecture,
     discussion, or debate

   • Challenging what I believe

   • Changing my mind
     for good reason

   • Admitting that I was wrong

   • Apologizing when necessary

   • Becoming uncomfortable

   • Withstanding discomfort

   • Suffering well and longer
     than I thought I could

   • Standing, walking, swimming
     or simply moving

   • Making a pet happy

   • Picking up litter

   • Recording and sharing
     my own thoughts

   • Accurately recounting
     the idea of another

   • Sleeping deeply

   • Discovering I am wrong

   • Remembering death
      

3. DEVELOP AND MAINTAIN GOOD
   AND SOUND LIFE PRINCIPLES
   
   “Do justice, and let the skies fall."
   
   -Roman proverb
   
   I will secure early in life, good rules to live by, objectives and principles which are accurate and true. I will then dedicate some time each day to using, testing, and refining these objectives and principles. Over time, I will make a small catalog of only the soundest truths I have found, which I will then number and recount each day for the purpose of further discover and self-guidance. Finally, I will share what I have found through the example of my words and actions, and my best effort of living a good and sound life.

4. CULTIVATE GOOD EMOTIONAL REACTIONS
   I will take control of my emotions such that these inform my living more than control it. Feelings and reactions will then become life councilors, rather than rulers and chiefs. Through this effort I will create and reflect a life of equanimity through inward control and a resulting outward peace. I will remember that life is lived as one upon a seashore, noting and living according to the tides; which fall now with feelings of low regard towards our purpose, and meaning, and well-being; followed later by rising spirits and outlook, with the fresh, clean flood flowing in—temporary, here for a very short season, before the ebb comes again to frustrate, confuse, and concern us in an always recurring cycle of lows and highs, and lows again once more.
    

5. PERFORM GOOD ACTIONS
   My deeds should be worthy of a life spent working to pass each day as an improvement, not only for myself and my family, but also for those with whom we share life now, as well as those in the future who will receive this common inheritance.
    

6. RECOGNIZE TRUE LIMITS
   AND TRUE OPPORTUNITY
   I will strive to live life in honest recognition of my true scope of control, which extends no further than my thoughts, actions and reactions, and the consequences these might entail. I will ask myself how I may craft favorable ends from any circumstance. What misfortune do I not have the power to fashion into some instrument of virtue? Is it death now at the door? Do not bar the way. For the hour of our meeting is truly at hand, and I will not attempt to detain in vain, any will, force or consequence which is truly beyond my control. And what role apathy in my discernment and feign engagement with a universe beyond the scope of my small control? And what reach must I attempt beyond the near, pale illumination of reason?
    

7. ONE THING SLOWLY
   Do only one thing at a time and do that thing slowly. I will try hard to never take on two activities or entertain two thoughts at the same time. In addition, I will pursue each activity or thought slowly. If I find this limit difficult to maintain, then clearly, I have accepted more responsibility than I can reasonably handle. Of course, there will be times I am unable to maintain this workload or ratio due to deadlines or other necessities. However, in hindsight I will try to identify where I went wrong, and how I managed to let my workload or responsibilities get so out of control that I had to multitask. I will do this in order to try and avoid making the same mistake in the future. I will then learn from my error and become more mature for the effort. The benefit of this objective may be self-evident in my improved ability to focus my attention on whatever is most important in the current moment. Moving and thinking slowly further improve these efforts by ensuring I make good and well-considered choices and actions which are less prone to mistake or costly redo. Over time, I will become able to do more with less and make better ends of whatever means I find and enjoy a more relaxed and considered living at both work and play.
    

8. BALANCE
   
   “To have the management of one’s own mind is a great art, that might be attained in a considerable degree by experience and habitual exercise.”
   
   -Dr. Johnson
   
   The difficult thing of keeping upright and straight, and walking forward without too much stagger or sway. It’s no easy thing when ambush comes our way, or when our limbic system kicks in with suggestions, drives and sudden emotions we did not expect. Like a tightrope walker stepping carefully on the narrow way, with open expanse below and sway and movement everywhere about. I will strive to not fall just now or tomorrow. And I will walk and think each day ready for whatever winds or blinding sunlight or rain or sudden storm or long expanse of burning sun or the tedium of no change may come my way.

Thirty-five principles

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1. PRINCIPLE OF WAR
   I rise each morning taking arms first against my own philosophy and beliefs and secondly against the philosophy and beliefs of others. I will suffer no unsound or unjust objective or principle to survive my honest, reasoned critique, no matter the consequence to my sense of peace, comfort, or abiding world view. I will equally yield to the warfare of another against my precious truths when these are shown to be unsound or dishonest in any way.
    

2. PRINCIPLE OF REASON
   Sub-principles: honesty, objectivity, doubt & humiliation
   
   “The life of reason is best and
   pleasantest, since reason more
   than anything else is man. So
   too this life is also the happiest.”
   
   -Aristotle
   
   Reason is my first instrument of reconciling hypothesis with truth. To be effective, I must be honest with myself and others regarding what I know and do not know; and make pains to view the world objectively, without coloring reality too much with imagination fortified of want, or need, or fear, or the normalizing pressure of authority, tradition and unfounded consensus. Doubt is my default stance and starting point for every new venture of inquiry. And humiliation at my own realized folly the surest sense that I am on the right track of correcting my own wrongs. Reason at its best is a tool of self-immolation, turned first inward as I seek to burn away the chaff and waste of unprincipled living, and then outward in resistance of our species’ less worthy answers to the mysteries of life.
    

3. THE HOMUNCULUS
   This is the small, mute, and hidden man within my head. The imaginary mortal who seemingly pulls my levers and strings, and hints at my opinions and judgments, and who must die utterly upon the failure and dissolution of my person. The homunculus is as imaginary as a soul, though a much better vehicle to remind myself that consciousness is nothing more than another organ of my body, serving a particular function, and as subject to corruption and death in the end as my spleen, liver, or any other bodily organ.
    

4. ANCHORHOLD
   The place where we suffer and die
   
   There is an inward architecture which we create through the fact and consequence of our decisions and actions, which becomes the scaffolding structure of the inner man or woman who others may dimly see when they look us square in the eyes; perceiving a light or darkness within which shines or empties in proportion to the effort we have made to not just live, but to live well, and in accord with our perceived nature and better inclination. We fail utterly when we build our inner world solely guided by the prescribed blueprint precedent of others, which guidance may suffice to create grand and stately outward living, but may leave us inwardly hollow and empty in the end, when we are alone within our outer world, and we look at what we have, and do possess, and have made; and we wonder what we may have seemingly missed—and if somehow there may be more? Why are we so outwardly filled yet so inwardly empty? Our home then, a stable and impressive castle of outward success and seemingly worthwhile achievement and acclaim, resting upon an inner foundation of shifting sand.
    

5. THE HOME OF GOOD AND EVIL
   
   “Activity in accordance with virtue is virtue.”
   
   -Aristotle
   
   A catalog of right and wrong maintained by that little mortal within my head, containing both opinion and judgment, and suggestive of a platform of subjective responsibility. The Homunculus owns this list and has the responsibility to develop and vet its contents; as well as reconcile these with the reasoned opinions of others. Good and evil then become perspective and opinion, dangerously subjective, yet also subject to the truth-finding powers of reason, honesty, and objectivity. Argument and discussion are the tools of reconciliation when such opinions differ, and consensus reached in this way has more authority and force than the proclamations and commandments of a thousand fictitious gods.
    

6. THE PRINCIPLE OF PURPOSE
   Sub-principles: Biology, duty, virtue & mission
   
   “Active in indolence, abroad who roam
   In quest of HAPPINESS which dwells at HOME, With vain pursuits fatigued, at length will find Its real dwelling is a virtuous mind.”
   
   -Dr. Zimmerman
   
   My first purpose is to live and reproduce, before then dying and getting the hell out of the way. I will also perform my duty: thirty years of life dedicated to improved societal ends, as well as twenty-five years of service to my kid, which work is largely complete when she is done with school. Beyond that, it is up to each of us to decide what our own personal purpose will be. For myself, I select the pursuit of virtue—where virtue is defined as a life lived in furtherance of the well-being of thinking things. And my mission is the series of goals I set for myself to achieve over the successive years of my life.
    

7. THE ATOMIC PRINCIPLE
   Sub-principles: dissolution and emergence
   
   “All things change to fire,
   and fire exhausted
   falls back into things.”
   
   -Heraclitus
   
   Everything in the universe is bits and pieces…flowing and changing…forever transforming and becoming. So too you and me—here for a bit, soon to pass, soon to dissolve, never again this thing once more. When remembering this principle, I will often pick up a handful of sand or dirt to let sift through my fingers in the blowing wind.
    

8. THE PRINCIPLE OF NATURE
   
   "A beast's track through the brush..."
   
   Everything and everyone has some qualities and character which define what they are, and what they are about. This nature, combined with perspective and will, is their paradigm and operational guide. The demands of Biology are a mandate deep and sound from the perspective of survival, and the continuance of our kind. I ask myself at every chance what is the nature of the things I will meet and interact with today? What are the natures of the people I know and with whom I share life? And what is my own nature? What am I made of and where am I going? Knowing these things will help me to engage better and more reasonably with everyone and everything.
    

9. THE PIRATE RIDE
   
   “And he’s awake who thinks himself asleep.”
   
   -John Keats
   
   There is no good reason to imagine we are anything but atoms and molecules, and compounds and organs, and muscles and limbs, and brain and mind—instantiated through energy borrowed of the sun and the internal heat of the earth in alignment with the inertia of the universe. That is it. In a sense—a very crude sense—we are complex chemical reactions: natural processes unwinding through brief years, months, and days towards some conclusion which a sufficiently powerful computer algorithm might one day plot and predict. We are decision engines, driven by the universe at large. In a sense, our destiny was always set, with our deliberations and decisions being just some distinct moments of seeming agency along our chemical unwinding from conception to death – a pathway we could hardly avoid or choose otherwise; a route decided not by us, but instead by the complex orchestrations of a universe which delivered us into life, and mindlessly conspires during every moment we live to nudge and jostle us into every decision and action we vainly think our own. Life a purposeless river-like meander. We live, we experience, we think, we decide, and we move—but never truly of our own volition, and always on the path of our law-bound chemical unwinding. Life, therefore, is like a Disney theme park pirate ride: an unintentional horror, joy, and amusement in which the robot pirates and the living riders are one. We live our lives then along seemingly invisible tracks we can never jump or escape, for we lack utterly the will to do anything but stay our course. And though we can make any decisions we like; we can never have made any decisions other than the ones we did.
    

10. THE PRINCIPLE OF MATURITY
    Sub-principles: wisdom, fortitude & integrity
    
    Maturity is a finely curated collection of experience gained of life trials both succeeding and failing and recalled with some accuracy and honest consideration toward improved future ends. Wisdom is the soil where such considerations are ploughed, while fortitude is the will and persistence to see the harvest through, and integrity maintains our sound constitution.
     

11. THE SOCIAL PRINCIPLE
    Sub-principles: diplomacy, justice & conspiracy
    
    “Society is the true sphere of human virtue.”
    
    -Dr. Johnson
    
    Human beings generally operate in pursuit of our own well-being and the well-being of one another. We can survive alone—though we rarely flourish in solitude, and we risk that whatever understanding and wisdom we gain in deep and persistent disconnect may not be easily communicated or translated to others; and may become irrelevant babble despite perhaps being true. Therefore, find one another, and make good effort to be together and share ideas. Go alone at times…but always return to be with others. I will become a diplomat and ambassador to not only the familiar, but also the strange and new. I will strive always with others towards sane and just ends. Become a man or woman of one another. We will conspire together towards what we perceive and decide is good. These are lofty goals; something I struggle daily to attain.
     

12. THE PRINCIPLE OF FAMILY
    Sub-principle: catalyst
    
    Our people make up the context of our lives in terms of purpose, obligation, mission, feedback, support and ultimately the best and almost intangible part of being alive. We begin with the people to whom we are born, the chance family which we gain by accident of birth. We grow then with the family we later decide, our friends and our partners and our spouse and the children we in turn together make. From these we gain our decided mission and our direction and our guidance forward; for better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health, ‘till death or very good cause do us part. Without this connection and circumstance we can still live a rich and meaningful life, though the way may be harder at times as we strive with less mandate, catalyst perhaps, to compel us through thick and thin, less necessity to push us out the door to our jobs on days when we’d rather not, and through many years and decades of hard work, sacrifice and giving—the very selfless endeavors which yield virtue from the dawning chaos of our life’s rising and falling and one day utterly failing. And if, once dead, we’ve left behind the fact and echo of our virtuous living within the “family” we formed and supported and maintained, then our life will hardly have been lived in vain, even if everything is eventually, one day in vain.
     

13. PUBLIC SPEAKING
    Sub-principles: best words, prudence, felicity, eloquence, literature, rumor & gossip
    
    “To him that ordereth his conversation aright will I shew the salvation of God.”
    
    -Psalm 50:23
    
    Speak and communicate always as though any person being spoken of is standing directly before us and attentive to our every word. In this way we shall not gossip or pass idle time at the expense of another. Use few words and just the right words to cautiously convey our meaning in alignment with our thoughts and emotion, avoiding verbal flourish unnecessary to our intent, or the adornment of our ideas with words irrelevant to our more Spartan meaning. Read great writing for the benefit of example and precedent. And never spread stories or trade in the misfortune or folly of others.
     

14. TEMPERANCE
    Sub-principles: suffering, simplicity, apathy
    
    “Keep your tongue and your belly under control.”
    
    -Anthony the Great
    
    Temperance is the controlled consumption of all things, such as food and drink, work, and play, and even our thoughts and emotions. I will strive to recognize these consumables and then measure out a reasonable portion for myself and then strive to consume very little of that. Such worthy living naturally entails some suffering when we deny ourselves our wants, though a simple life makes this easier when the denial becomes part-and-parcel of our habits and conditioned response. I will then apply apathy towards the intemperance of others, as well as any personal misadventure which is beyond my control. I will recognize my own excess and that of my peers and then use apathetic indifference as a buffer to prevent my consumption of the Feast of Offal (principle number 18).
     

15. LIFE WILL NOT GO WELL
    
    “The course of a stream...”
    
    I’ll be damned if I don’t nearly always stumble, trip, slip or otherwise get bounced around, turned backwards, and have the hardest time keeping a straight line towards the objects and ends I set myself to reach or achieve. It’s like life is this imperfectly evaluated landscape of changing textures, seasons, and weather; where winds suddenly gust from one side and slippery ice appears on the ground in a shady hollow or a lurking beast stalks and jumps from behind and a friend hails us demanding our time and attention and our bodies complain and yield to fatigue, disease and our ever-increasing weakness of capacity and uncertainty regarding want. That we ever get anywhere we’ve set out for is an amazing feat, demonstrative of strong object principles, seemingly indefatigable will and a wisdom arrived at by way of experience, reflection, and resolve. Life will not go well. But we certainly can if we try.
     

16. THE HORROR SHOW
    The recognized consequence of a universe unfolding beyond reach of our care or ministrations, and the awful evidence that there is no overarching management or oversight beyond the descriptive record we make and share with one another of how things operate, and the necessity which physics, chemistry and time does seemingly demand of us all. At last, we stand with our hands at our sides and our mouths agape and our minds at wits end as the unfolding tale of what is moves on without notice or care of what we want, or think is good, or right, or simply humane. It just moves forward, leaving everyone behind. We will all be left behind in the wake of horror…
     

17. THAT WHICH MUST BE BORNE
    Sub-principle: Hand on the tiller
    
    Life presents us with various burdens of many sorts: tasks, duties, responsibilities, as well as circumstances both apprehended and unexpected which we must shoulder, lift and carry despite our will, want, attitude, health, or even our desire. These are the things which we simply must do to fulfill our living mandate. Sure, some choose to not carry such burdens, though they do so not without consequence. Therefore, as long as this is what we must be and do and how we must live, then why not press forward with a smile and eyes lifted towards the sun and the stars and the light which is the better part of our lives. Let us press on despite the weight; move forward in spite of our fatigue; and live on, while mindful and feeling and suffering our weak bodies, frail minds, and inevitable consequent death.
    
    “Steady on course!” declares the master from the deck. “Hold the rudder tight against the wind, and the against current, and your fear, and your doubt, and upset and sense of drift and loss and ambush even by the forces of seeming Nature—and the draw of the seeming Fates towards the maelstrom at port side and the Siren rocks starboard.” “Quick!” declare the crew “Lash the master to the mast and unstop his ears before we ourselves shut up our own hearing with wax and throw all our weight to hold the ship straight on course.” Thus, we learn the secrets of the song of the demon sea hags while keeping our vision and direction intact against their sway. Will we soon enough go down and drown within the sea? Of course we will…but not before we first sail like men.
     

18. THE FEAST OF OFFAL
    The banquet of our suffering
    
    “A fool uttereth all his mind: but a wise man keepeth it in till afterwards.”
    
    -Proverbs 29:11
    
    This strange meal consists of the waste and by-product of unreasoned and unprincipled living, which we sometimes discard like filth where we live, think and act. Every time we become confused, frustrated, upset, or angry, and we take pains to let all the world know, we are then spilling out our personal offal onto the world, spreading the filth of our hot, raw emotions onto everyone within range of our upset. The curious thing is that so many then take up the filth we’ve flung at them, to then consume it with seeming relish, making themselves immediately sick in the process, and causing them to begin their own reciprocal Feast of Offal. And thus, it spreads, from one to another, throughout the waking day, and even at night while we dream our emotions into life; an awful banquet of filth, soiling deeply our peace and better living, poisoning our lives and the lives of everyone we know. I wish to cover my mouth and nose instead. To filter out the foul excess of undisciplined thought and living. To temper my emotions and my careless consumption of the emotions of others. I will neither offer, nor consume, the feast.
     

19. THE PRINCIPLE OF DISTRACTION
    
    “What is the course of the life
    of mortal men on the earth?—
    Most men eddy about
    Here and there—eat and drink,
    Chatter and love and hate,
    Gather and squander, are raised
    Aloft, are hurl’d in the dust,
    Striving blindly, achieving
    Nothing, and then they die—
    Perish; and no one asks
    Who or what they have been
    More than he asks what waves
    In the moonlit solitudes mild
    Of the midmost Ocean, have swell’d,
    Foam’d for a moment, and gone.”
    
    -Matthew Arnold
    
    At every turn in life we desire not to see. We turn our heads to look, not away, but towards, something which might cause us not to see. The thing we do not want is to observe the emptiness which resides behind and before and between and within it all. We do not wish to sense the negative silence of the universe’s apparent vacuum of purpose. We do not want to know that death is forever beyond a nighttime soon to come which we can neither know nor avoid. And so, we busy ourselves with school and work and family and friends and hobbies and interests and gossip and joy and sorrow and peace and gratitude and anxiety and angst and ecstasy and the very fact of the observance that we are alive. Anything… Anything at all will do… Anything to avoid the awful aspect and great indifference of a soulless universe without god.
    
    Yet more and more, I am less inclined to fill the empty with my own fearful, distracted voice. Increasingly preferring substance to filler, though substance is harder to find and still harder to hold, leaving me often with nothing at all. But I am alright with that now. I’m at last better without the distraction of life and death which I know is not.
    
    Nevertheless, I continue to play in the sand, looking for sand, digging for sand, everywhere sand—like all of us, distracted by sand in our quest for sand; so much busy-ness, so much fuss and bluster, so much restless apparent life.
     

20. AGENCY AND THE GREAT INDIFFERENCE
    
    “I looked at the stars, and considered how awful it would be for a man to turn his face up to them as he froze to death, and see no help or pity in all the glittering multitude.”
    
    -Charles Dickens
    
    Every individual life is an agent, and the products of its living are its artifacts. Subtract these away and what’s left is the vast landscape of The Great Indifference—characterized by an incapacity to observe or maintain any thought or opinion towards well-being, an utter lack of regard towards joy or suffering, a god-less backdrop of unthinking, inanimate substance and time.
     

21. THE BEST SEAT IN THE HOUSE
    
    “I have learnt, in whatever state I am, therewith to be content.” 
     
    -St. Paul
    
    This place and time where I am now will suffice. I will have peace where, and who I am, at this time, and doing whatever engages my necessity and motive and the pursuit of virtue. Meanwhile, I will also strive towards better ends for myself and others, not as a replacement of my current circumstances and work, but rather as a natural improvement upon these.
     

22. THE RESTLESS MAN
    Sub-principle: Diminished Potency
    
    “Travelling is a fool’s paradise. We owe to our first journeys the discovery that place is nothing. At home I dream that at Naples, at Rome, I can be intoxicated with beauty and lose my sadness. I pack my trunk, embrace my friends, embark on the sea, and at last wake up in Naples, and there beside me is the stern Fact, the sad self, unrelenting, identical, that I fled from. I seek the Vatican, and the palaces. I affect to be intoxicated with sights and suggestions, but I am not intoxicated. My giant goes with me wherever I go.
    
    -Ralph Waldo Emerson
    
    There must be someplace better than here… Somewhere I can go to find satisfaction… If only I hadn’t made those earlier bad choices in life: hadn’t gone left when I should better have gone right, or straight, or heck even back—if I’d only decided to spend my life with that other person, or stayed in that other city, or taken a different job... Any direction at all besides the direction I went, which led me now to this settled, safe, dull, and unsatisfying place and life. Oh, how I want now that something else. Maybe I can convince those I’m bound to here, the people who expect and deserve my life with them here, the ones I’ve committed to, that there is someplace better than here for us all? Maybe I can drag them all along with me, the spouse, the kids, the dog and cat. We’ll throw away all this crap we’ve gained cluttering the garage, things we bought attempting to settle our restless ticking, things which quell nothing for more than a day or a week, gaining us only further loss in their successful gain. Oh, damn it all to hell! Why I am I stuck here in this place and doing this job and living in this home and behaving this way when none of it is really, truly me?? Why did I agree to this arrangement? Why can’t I get away?
    
    This is what we think. And this is what we do. When nature prompts us to new horizons. Nature has wired the young to press boundaries, to go beyond limits, and to cross over mountains to find new places where more and better might be found. This instinct and drive are one of the ways we survive. It’s how humans spread across the globe. It’s why, while we went extinct in one place, others of us lived on elsewhere. Not everyone is built this way, men more than women I suspect, but both sexes to be sure. And there will be no peace to those who are so driven. The only peace being the arrival of old age. Expect some relief in the mid-fifties or thereabouts, about the time—and in relative proportion to—your waning bodily potencies. Until then, suffer if you ignore the call to the Path. And even then, suffer on.
     

23. THE PATH OF WILDNESS
    Sub-principles: Shadow Dividend & Ulysses’ Ride
    
    "The direction of our first inclination..."
    
    At every life crossroads I will assess the fact that a decision must be made, and then determine how much time I have to make it, and then collect my facts and consider the options, and then decide at the appointed time. If my facts are insufficient, and there really is no more time, then I will listen to my gut instinct, let it have its say, and then perhaps move in that direction, confident in having made the best evaluation I could, in a reasonable amount of time, and with the resources and facts at my disposal. I will be alright with whatever outcome—even if the next end is death. And I will beware the hard benefits which come of such change, the improvements which hurt, but which can be had in no other way; the Shadow Dividends of the pain of change and the loss of what is no longer needed. And I will suffer well through the decided pathway, like Ulysses riding the storm and temptation which he chose for his own.
     

24. THE GREAT LIFE ADVENTURE
    
    "Leaves blown in the wind..."
    
    “He who continues the same course of life in the same place, will have little to tell.”
    
    -Dr. Johnson
    
    Embark when you are young upon that beckoning dream and adventure. Let it be the centerpiece and point of reference for the man or woman who you will become. Let the experience inform and guide your active philosophy as well as the development of your own living objectives, principles, and standards.
     

25. THE RISK OF AVOIDING RISK
    Sub-principles: risk management, becoming the person you are, and to err on the side of family
    
    Life presents us with a variety of risks which we must attend to. Our parents and society commonly advise us to get an education, find a good job, and then settle down to a safe and sane life making and raising babies with a decided, worthy another. These are good, responsible things to do. But I offer there is a deeper risk which also needs attention; the risk of living a long and healthy life without allowing ourselves the chance to develop and engage our deeper self, or experiencing life without much challenging adventure, or living in such a way as to keep too much distance from the risks which yield the rich and satisfying reward of discovery, maturity, survival, and growth. So, attend to both types of risk: the practical aims of school, work, family, security, and money, as well as perhaps the less practical, though often quite worthwhile, risk of not becoming the person or living the life of our dreams. Avoid the trap of managing risk to the extent of walling ourselves completely into our own safe, secure, and familiar coffin, becoming who we have settled for; though when in doubt, always err on the side of family—even if such living might at times feel like a coffin—as such efforts are usually in alignment with our deeper and perhaps our only true life mandate and purpose; namely, getting our genes successfully into the next generation, passing, as Emerson might say, our ripened being into tomorrow.
     

26. SIN AND DAMNATION
    Sub-principles: falsity, credulity, faith, superstition, dogma, authority, rumor and gossip
    
    It is a sin to invest our expectations with hope, which may be corrupted or foiled by fortune. It is also a sin to believe things without good reason; to acquiesce for the sake of comfort, or security, or peace, or to simply avoid the discomfort of not knowing. The penalty for this sin is damnation, in the here-and-now, which is the only time we will ever really have. Damned for our unreasoned want. Damned for our unreasoned belief. Damned for our thoughtless, careless communications.
     

27. COMPLETE OBLIVION
    Sub-principles: no final reunion, no final reconciliation, and no final justice
    
    “So man lieth down, and riseth not: till the heavens be no more, they shall not awake, nor be raised out of their sleep.”
    
    -Job 14:12
    
    Soon the light within the mind will wink out. My life will come to an end. The storehouse of my memory will lose its electricity, which is the means of its maintenance and growth. The columns of my mental library and lyceum will quickly crumble and fall, the roof cave in, the foundations turn to sand. The philosopher is gone, evaporated to atoms. There will be then no last reunion with loved ones, no reconciliation of hard, careless or misspoke words, no satisfaction of wanting justice. The whole thing simply blows away with the new morning’s breeze.
     

28. THE SEASON OF PHILOSOPHY
    
    “Philosophy wields her own authority; she appoints her own time and does not allow it to be appointed for her.”
    
    -Seneca the Younger
    
    Think and record your thoughts while you can. See how the sun is fading now, dropping near the horizon? You will not survive the coming night. If you fail to record your words today—right now—they will never come again. Or maybe, if the words arrive again in some new form some distant day hence, will you have the body, will or constitution to record what you hear? Will your mind still function well enough to put the words together in the correct order? Will you have enough energy then for the effort? Will your hands perhaps tremble too much, or your medicine dull your nerves, or your broken self simply refuse to cooperate? Will you remain tuned to the muse? These are very real risks. So instead, keep a pad and pencil handy now, or a recorder, or camera, and pull yourself aside when the muse speaks, attend to her words, and prepare your thoughts and philosophy as best you can, while you can.
     

29. SCRIPTWRITING
    Life presents us always until death with an almost clean and clear canvas of whatever available time we’ve left. We may use this canvas to either live whatever life happens to us, or to take more active control of our days, hours, and minutes in order to seemingly manage and guide our path according to our seeming will, and in alignment with our hard won and decided values, goals, and best practice. This “scriptwriting” requires effort and imagination, as well as optimism if we are to aim our living in the perceived and decided direction of virtue, and to make the most of whatever brief days we have yet the chance to live, experience and hopefully enjoy.
     

30. BULLSEYE AIM
    Our best ambition is to achieve our goals and objectives to the extent that we can feel our effort is complete. That is often a pretty high mark, even with a pessimist’s aim. The fact is we frequently fall short, well short, or at least short enough to cause us to bluster or regret that we even tried. For myself, I will be satisfied if I have made a good and honest effort. There is really otherwise no time to lose.
     

31. THE UPHILL CLIMB
    Sub-principle: The Open Ocean Swim
    
    I will rise each morning and turn my attention to the uphill grade. To the slope which leads up. To the path which resists my climb yet yields ever widening horizons with each step forward. I will move forward and up. I will rarely stop, and I will never willingly go back or even cast a longing backwards glance at the places I’ve been and have left behind.
    
    Another way to look at this is from the perspective of my life by the sea, where sometimes, I slip alone into the ocean to swim far out to deep water and then along the shore. The water is deep out there. And the waves incessant; pushing me now up and then back and over and across as I make my best line along the distant shore. No matter how the sea might rock or jostle my body, I carry on. I keep swimming. And when a larger wave foils my attempt to take in a breath of air, filling my mouth instead with salt seawater, I only sputter and spit and yet carry on. I swim through the sea with a steady resolve, apathetic to the sea, while nonetheless engaged upon and within it. This is the uphill and steady climb forward. This is the Open Ocean Swim.
     

32. ARENA AND UTILITY
    Every place and situation are an opportunity to practice and refine our objectives and principles. Ask yourself at every point through the day what utility and good end might be found for the employment of your reason and philosophy, which must be forever alert, skeptical, and active. Life is the arena. Our objectives and principles are our utilities.
     

33. nothing IS enough
    Not relying on things for our well-being
    
    “Frugality is not only the basis of
    quiet, but of beneficence.”
    
    -Dr. Johnson
    
    We start out life in pursuit of whatever might satisfy our aching desire to become sated at the banquet of life. Education, career, friendship, family, and belief are each in turn stuffed into the yawning crevasse opening onto an indifferent universe hard at work exchanging order for night, a cosmos incapable of sympathy to our plight, without pity for our pain, with no awareness or interest regarding our dreams. We try and we try, doing everything we think we should, to no avail and no relief, nothing ever enough, nothing ever being quite enough; until one day…we realize that we are saved when we discover that—nothing IS enough.
    .

34. THE PRINCIPLE OF FUN
    Sub-principles: hope & retrospect
    
    “Then I commended mirth, because a man
    hath no better thing under the sun...”
    
    -Ecclesiastes 8:15
    
    Along the way we might become overly focused on the pursuit of living well such that we neglect to enjoy the fact that we are alive. Be gay, be jolly, have fun! Find friendship, and community, and family and things to do which might make us smile and laugh and sleep well and hard and with a smile on your face. Live such a life that the mortician must ask your heirs if they wish him to wipe the death mask grin from your face before the funeral service begins. Bring to your death a good and happy life as a warm, fading spark of light and life glowing down into the seemingly infinite sea of darkness and gloom.
     

35. BEING READY
    Be prepared at all times for anything and nothing. Regarding anything, be especially ready for big things with enduring consequences like education, marriage, children and old age. Go as far as you can with your education; that you study is more important than what you study. Pick someone who shares your core values; looks, hobbies, and all the rest are secondary. Each of your children gets at least twenty-three years of your life; be ready for that. Regarding nothing, be ready for peace; it’s harder than it seems.