Do, Please, Overthink Things.
I shall share an insight with you that took me four continents three wives two wars and one lifetime to learn:
One must embrace the suck. The coincidence of opposites is too interesting not to have deeper meaning and I find it as I dig. But that is for a different night.
No, tonight I must remind myself that the current drags the myriad creatures along quite well without my turbulence. Tonight I must remind myself that this might all be a fever dream in one of the many times I should have died but for some reason did not; this could all be a Last Temptation / Jacob’s Ladder fever dream because I have lived a million lifetimes already, what more is this one?
I was always told not to overthink things, but the people that told me this, they crack under pressure and do not do what they said. I hypothesized that this was because they under-thought things. Some are heros, and can’t help but jump towards danger, but anyone can learn to lend a hand. I have found if we do not consider all the things in advance, and decide to be humans, we are more likely to be assholes. I know this, of course, from experience and observation of my own and others behavior. I knew what best made sure orders would be followed both when given to the troops or myself. Discipline is the same no matter which direction is goes. It is like physics, it does not really care about time, and is fractal in nature when you look for deeper meaning. One can almost always find deeper meaning in leadership thought experiments. The more one ponders in advance, the more likely one is to behave wisely. It is just lazy engineering for those who may not think quickly on their feet but still want to act rightly.
I’ve “overthought” things all my life, and now that I’m old (I like saying this because it’s true), I still examine every possible outcome or consequence of my actions, but with a twist. It’s no longer a matter of going in circles overthinking, but more of what on might call “thoughtful analysis.” Because of all I’ve experienced and learned through the sheer fact of surviving for seven decades, it’s much, much easier to make decisions and be decisive. You don’t have as much to lose, and you care a lot less what anyone thinks of you and your decisions. That’s liberating and allows me to consider infinitely more possibilities.
@oswego Indeed!
You then, have hit what we call ‘overtime’. 😉 It is for reflection, and we applaud you.
Reflection should happen between every quarter, we think, to stay on the path one chose early in life, or to ensure that the change is a considered change and we are not being swept by circumstances. I did it in retrospect, not by thought, but when we look back from 54 years, we see that about every 18 we made considered changes or rededicated our efforts. Certainly 18 is arbitrary, but the process interests me.
Long term heuristics for a measured and considered life so that at the end we have no more to process and we just peacefully merge into the ongoing Stream.
The River.
@cygnusx-1 That sounds like a good way to describe the right kind of old age. I like the metaphor, but then again, I’ve always had a deep metaphysical interest in rivers, streams and creeks, and I think I more fully understand why after reading the last paragraph of your note.
@oswego You might like my favorite lyricist / drummers, recently shuffled, name of Pert but they called him Professor. Both, I think because of his technical brilliance, but also the sheer wealth of literature he brought to the lyric game; not unlike Led Zeppelin songs but they were almost all middle earth. Pert has some specifically libertarian views I loved when I first heard them; I’d recently read Atlas Shrugged and was fresh back from war, and they sent me to recruiting school which taught me how to manipulate the perceptions and create the desired actions in teenagers. Kind of gave me pause on my whole mission, but it took a long while to take full hold of me.
I don’t know why we’re here, but one reason we MIGHT be here, it isn’t ridiculous and as good a story as any other, but some people think we are here to learn how to be gods, how to handle that kind of power with more grace and aplomb than is apparent in any of the books I’ve read on the history of such things. But, we MIGHT be here for that, which is as good a prompt as any to do right and make the man in the mirror a good person.
I have failed miserably so many times. But we persist.
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