Build Your Own "Bible"

Okay, FIRST, don't get all twisted about the word "Bible." Heck, I'll lower-case it. We're using the concept "bible" to mean "a collection of important things we should revisit." (That's pretty much the entire post, by the way. You can stop reading.)

Today, in my paper journal, I was playing with a concept because I was struggling with some work on a writing project. I just couldn't seem to feel engaged. I wrote down, "Maybe I could make this a place to play. What could I do to make it a fun play environment?" (The writing itself. Like, could I make it fun to "play" with the words.)

That was fine, but then I wrote down, "It's like my co-create idea mixed with the Little Drummer Boy concept."

And THAT was my a-ha about bibles.

What Do I Mean About Bibles

Let's talk about "the" Bible, but insert Koran (Quran), Torah, whatever. Your holy book of choice. Why does such a thing exist? Why do we have books of ANY kind?

We use books like software. We read the material. It loads a "program" into our brain. We follow the program for better results. A bible is basically just a word to denote that this book has a set of instructions. It wouldn't be wrong to say it's a recipe book. Only, we assign different values to those words, don't we?

That's why the Gutenberg press is considered one of the world-changing technologies, because before that, we required scribes and hand-copying to get any data to travel or stay stored. A lot of the world was still word of mouth. Printing bibles was the first time people could get information shipped out faster and to more places.

So suddenly, people had these instruction books just hanging out in their towns, then their homes. They could read and re-read, and re-read, and get little meetings together (church or whatever your services are).

What Do Bibles Do?

In my journal, when I wrote about "oh hey, maybe this 'play' idea is a blend of my 'co-create' and 'Little Drummer Boy' ideas," it was an a-ha moment. Both for the matter at hand, but then also for the realization of this:

I should be reminding myself of those things that matter to me far more often and on a regular pattern and frequency. I should 'read my bible.'

OMG, I thought. That's exactly what I should do. And "should" means "won't," but in this case, I realized that I want to set to work building a bible of my thoughts I want to remind myself about all the time.

A bible's purpose is to reinforce and refresh and renew our values and visions and views. We congregate in so many ways to feel connected to something. If you love baseball, you watch games, go to the parks, watch people talk about the sport, read about it, and on and on and on. If you're a Star Wars fan, you argue about tiny little details because you absorb the material over and over. You reinforce your existence as portrayed through that particular lens.

So What Do We DO With This Idea?

I realized that I want to build myself an actual bible of that which matters most to me. This means I can use a paper journal as a platform for this. I think paper will be better in this use case so that I can "flip around" and read the parts that matter most. But if you're a religious person and you've ever experienced your religious text digitally, you know that's an incredible process.

To demonstrate that, I went to google and said, "What does the Bible say about practice?" Here's the answer. I asked about the Quran's views on patience. Here. So, a digital bible has some value that you can't accomplish in paper.

For me, I'll use paper.

What goes in there? I'll put down thoughts (my own and from other people) that I want to remind myself about a lot. That's the key differentiator. I want to remember these ideas a lot. Over the last several days, I've been thinking so much about a quote from Rumi that points to why meditation is cool (I talked about it yesterday on here). I'll put THAT in my bible.

I think I'll also include some positive self-talk. Maybe even for a variety of situations. Wouldn't it be cool to have a book full of pep talks for myself?

"Why not use the REAL Bible/Quran/Tao Te Ching/*.book, Chris?"

Because those books were all written with someone else's agenda, edited over centuries with other people's touches. They're not made for you. They're made as a tool to interpret the world, and they work GREAT for some people in that regard.

This bible, the lower-case-b one, is for you to create for yourself.

I'm doing it. Not sure about you. What do you think?

(And again, I have no interest in talking about your religion. Just the concept. I'm glad you're into what you're into. I'm Buddhist. ;) ).

Chris...