Conflict and Connection

     "‘Gregor,’ said a voice – it was his mother’s – ‘it’s a quarter to seven. Hadn’t you a train to catch?’ That gentle voice!"      Franz Kafka in his book Metamorphosis paints a good picture of the struggle of whether to listen to the fear that looks beyond people's words, or the hope that encourages us to take them at face value. It’s hard to know whether to trust words or actions, because there are accidents and misunderstandings, there potentially is so much to win or lose by exploiting or being naïve to the difference. We are born wanting to hope the best of people, but passive-aggression and deception  seem to be the game of life, and even if we don’t want to play, it doesn’t mean we want to be played. Is there something innately different about us that makes us not want to play the game, or do we just notice the inconvenience to us when others play it and fail to notice the convenience of the game we are playing sub-consciously?   ...

     “I didn’t mean to do that.” “That wasn’t my intention.” “I know this looks bad, but it’s not what it looks like.”      What percentage of the things that surround us or percentage of the consequences of our actions were our intention?      Many stories and mythologies have items that are cursed if touched or carried would cause the worst fortune to happen. How is it that it seems likely to be the case sometimes that there is some curse on us that overshadows our intentions an abilities? We realize we don’t want to do some habit, smoking, drinking, gossiping, aggression or passive-aggression, and somehow we can’t do it? Isn’t it odd that we can both want to do something and not want to do it at the same time? And what is more odd, is that we can consciously not want to do something and then do it anyway? If we are not controlled by our own consciousness, then what are be controlled by?      I’m probably not the only o...

Why is it sometimes hard to be happy for the success of others      If you don’t trust yourself, what could you trust? In order to trust someone else you would have to trust your judgment of them… there’s no way around it, you can’t bypass yourself out of life, although sadly that doesn’t mean we can’t try.      Trust or confidence is an estimation of an obstacle overcome, which enables us to estimate obstacles ahead of us and know that we can overcome something at least as hard or maybe harder.      When weightlifting it is unwise to try and lift more than about 10 pounds more than the heaviest thing you have lifted. Our muscles might be able to do it because they can grow quickly, but our tendons which don’t have direct blood flow might not be able to handle it, not to mention limitations in our ability to balance a much higher weight than we are used to might get us into trouble and the weight might fall on us. There is no exact num...