Week 27, 2024
Spencer Schubert
Sculptor, Entrepreneur, Owner of 4KWeeks.com, Motivator of anyone who will listen.
Week 27 of 2024 has arrived. We're going to do this all over again next year. The cycle will have run one full course, and we will all still be humans trying to make the most of what the universe has brought us.
I will say... thinking of time in the form of cycles (common with the ancients) as opposed to a unidirectional line (the modern way) has made the background anxiety around the crisis of this present moment in history easier to bear.
If it's one phase of the current cycle, then we are just at a point somewhere on the circle, and all will come around again. And if it will all come around again, then it's not an existential crisis... it's just not my favorite thing! And once I know that... then I know how to suck it up and be happy with what I have.
This Week's Quote
Argue for your limitations, and sure enough, they're yours. -Richard Bach
I have been thinking about different versions of this for the last few weeks.
It just seems like so much is possible.? Thoughts are energy, and energy changes the world.?
We know so little about what can happen, and even less about what will happen. It gets dicey when, like most humans, I try to prove?(definition 3:a) the rule with extreme cases... Of course, it is highly unlikely that by trying real hard and opening myself up to what is possible that I can make unicorns fly out of my eyeballs...(the best pop culture illustration of the chaos of what is possible.)
But...let's stick to the useful universe of possibility, and stop trying to find extreme edge cases so that we can eschew the personal responsibility of creating our dreams. I know we are all terrified of failing ourselves.? That's a fact. It is true in varying degrees of every human in the modern age.??
As a start, just stop arguing for what is NOT possible... because you don't really know.... and start saying "maybe" to all of the improbable dreams you have. You and I don't have enough of an understanding of the world to know what is possible for us, so let's be open to all the "what if's".
What I am Thinking About This Week
Why We Build The Wall.
I love the musical Hadestown.? I love that it was first an album written by Anais Mitchell, I love the concept, I love the translation to a musical, I love the setting... I knew nothing about it the first time I saw it, and was blown away.
It is based on the Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurydice, and how hard it is to have faith in a world that is trying to beat you down.
领英推荐
I was listening to the Original Cast Recording the other day while working. There is this song... "Why We Build The Wall" that is remarkable for a few reasons.? The first is that actor Patrick Page's (Hades) beautiful bass vocal is so low the notes seem dangerous...
But second, and what I have been thinking about all week is when Page's Hades asks "Why do we build the wall, my children, my children?" And the chorus answers: "We build the wall to keep us free."
It seems so comforting.? We're all scared. The world is dangerous and there are things and people to keep safe.? I will build a wall and be safe and free!
There is no useful wall that isn't also a prison.
You can build a wall that is thick enough and high enough to keep out everything that is dangerous and scares you. You can build a wall that keeps out contrary opinions, different types of people, uncomfortable situations, change, people who are stronger, people who are weaker, poor people, drug addicts, new ideas, love, hate, sadness, envy, etc. etc. etc.
You can build that wall. But then you have to live inside it.?
The risk of brushing up against the chaos of living will always be better than building yourself a prison to live in. In small ways, and in big ways, personally and culturally.
As the song continues, Page yells, "and our work is never done!"? If you commit to living behind a wall, you can never stop building it.... and that sounds exhausting.
Better to live free.
Until Later,
Spencer, Owner of 4KWeeks.com
Dad Joke O' The Week
I’ve been bored recently, so I decided to take up fencing.
The neighbors keep demanding that I put it back.
Brand Partnership for Equestrian and SMB Markets
8 个月Funny that in my mind’s eye, for as far back as I can remember, a year is shaped like a flattish ellipse, with January top and center, February and March to its left. The steep bending corner turns at April, the ellipse flattens on the bottom with May June July August and September. October November and December bend around the far corner of the eclipse. And now as I describe it, I recognize two more things: 1) the months are not equally distributed, so it’s not a symmetrical ellipse. And 2) wonder why the sequence progresses counter clockwise. Now I have to actually draw what I’m seeing. And add observation 3) why have I never said any of this to another before now about such an important thing as my inner representation of time over a year….