But then it happens. Of course, not suddenly. But it turns out that little bit by little bit something has happened.
I realized just this week that while I’m not quite raring to go out and do our 1 to 1.5 hour bike loop—I’m close to eager. There is almost no resistance (physical, mental, or emotional). That was a shock to me—that after 8 months of steady work during which it felt like I would never get beyond cranky, to find that the density of the resistance—which has really been a lack of freedom to do what I really wanted to do—has in large part dissolved. 8 months—I could never have imagined that it would take 8 months just to get to “emotional positivity” about something. But some things are persistant and we can sometimes be frail in the face of that persistance.
This is why we need to understand our role in changing those things we do not want, and why we need to understand consistency, congruency and alignment in our behaviors. It also reinforced for me that sometimes, with help, I can use the 4 “easy” steps to get passed a really big hurdle.
If you can’t do it all at least:
Do the right thing.
Then, when you can, say the right thing.
Then, when you can, think the right thing.
Then, when you can, feel the right thing.
Easy as pie!
Ever tried to be really good at pie?
It’s easy to see how difficult it is to create change in some areas of our lives. Just look for the “problems” you are always bumping up against. Some issues in our lives have a great deal of persistence and are not easily transformed.
In our culture, we sometimes get the sense that knowledge is the key to change, and sometimes it is. Knowledge can be instantly acquired and applied. This works in some arenas and not in others. There seem to be some kinds of behavior that are deeply persistance, that have support at all levels of the creative process, and to change these things is often a more profound and longer process than we can imagine at first blush.
For example.
Last fall we instigated, for critical reasons, a more rigorous exercise program and an even more stingent diet program.
Watching my progress over the months has been an education in the power of inertia to maintain the status quo and the density and power of the resistance we deal with every day. The existing patterns and potentials affect my ability to change at so many levels: of action (what I can do), of my speech (what I habitually say), my emotions (how I feel about things), and my beliefs. The density of the inertia is sobering as I realize how little progress is made each day or week or month, and how tenuous is the grasp on what progress has been made.
I made a decision early on to really try to do the right thing no matter what I thought or felt. This was made easier for me because I had a partner who is always stronger and more capable that I am. So I decided to pretty much agree to do whatever he suggested: ride this far, hike this hill, go out this often. So he would suggest a plan, and I would do my best to cheerfullly say yes and go. Already I knew that I couldn’t overcome my resistance to doing the work by myself. Without the outside nudge, I would not make it. In some ways, I surrendered my decision making to something outside of me as a way to instigate change. (This required two additional tactics: 1) I had to promise my partner that if things get bad, I WOULD stop. 2) I had to create a backup strategy in case I really couldn’t make it, e.g, carry a phone so I could call him if he gets ahead and I needed to stop; know how we would recover if I couldn’t finish. I needed a bail-out plan, otherwise, it would be hard to get past the resistance caused by the fear of failing.)
Inside I was afraid (of the stress or pain), but I would go without saying anything about what I was feeling. Never giving it any outside expression. And though the resistance, litttle by little, was softened, it was always there. I could always feel the urge to refuse, to sit, not to move.
The resistance, in this case, arose on all levels. My body was not really up to enjoying the task. My mind resisted the enforcement of discipline. My emotions never wanted to be subjected to the pain or pressure. On some level I had come to believe that this incapable lump was who I was. (Though I knew better.)
It took 8 full weeks of steady work before any noticeable or measureable differences were observable. 8 weeks—with no results. That’s a long time for me to keep my attention focused when everything inside of me is going the other way. I understand more than I ever have why it is so difficult to change some things. I never fully understood how deep and persistent so many qualities of our physical and emotional lives are. I guess that’s why the Buddhist teachings emphasize that it takes lifetimes for us to evolve. 8 weeks with no visible results; 9 months and there’s a little—a little progress, a little improvement.
But it doesn’t feel permanent at all. It feels tenuous, not a new me, but a hint of a new way of changing a little bit at a time. Whew! And I thought the bike rides were tough.
But Friday, out on a relatively short ride (just an hour) and nothing to prove, I found myself pushing myself over the hills, racing myself up and and down. Now that was something new, and a bit exciting to experience. (Though Saturday and Sunday did not go quite so well.)
(Okay, so this is fairly tongue in cheek, but this is really everything there is to do. Though it doesn’t rate the tasks by difficulty. That would be too heartbreaking.)
The overall gist of this set of tactics is as follows:
Change your relationship to everything from the outside in.
That is,
- Step One: Never DO the wrong thing; Do the right thing.
- Step Two: Never SAY the wrong thing; say the right thing.
- Step Three: Never THINK the wrong thing; think the right thing.
- Step Four: Never FEEL the wrong thing; feel the right thing.
No excuses.
That’s it. At first blush, our response is “Well, of course…I can do that. Just do the right thing.” But in practice we begin to realize how difficult it is to always do the right thing, how much potential and momentum we have that is often going the wrong way. How many decisions we make each day for which we merely follow habitual patterns and don’t even consider what the right thing is.
What gets in our way?
- Ignorance: Not knowing what the right thing is.
- Existing Potential: The momentum created by our life history and sometimes from doing the wrong thing habitually.
- Not Paying Attention: Not noticing when we are making decisions and acting on them.
The first element, ignorance, is the easiest to remedy. We can learn something new and use that to make better informed decisions. Maybe. I do find that information alone is often not enough for me to change my behavior. (I can immediately learn to say the right word in Spanish, but I cannot instantly learn to be non-judgemental.)
Of course, our actions, words, thoughts, and feeling are all tied up together—we often just DO an immediate reflection of what we feel. But we have to start somewhere. So we start with the most powerful and accessible creative action most of us have, external action, and we do the right thing.
This is where concentration, paying attention, and meditation can help—to slow down the transaction that takes us from an wrong-headed feeling directly into a wrongly-directed action. This requires knowledge—what is the right thing—and the ability to be congruent, approach the evolution of our capacities with our minds (with rules and guidance) AND our intuition (hoping to find the updraft and catch a ride.)
Is this easy? Well, no, not easy. But there are tactics that we can use to help us make better short term decisions and change our long term momentum.
Next time—applying a tactic to a constant challenge.
There is an interesting anomaly with updrafts. Working in an updraft doesn’t necessarily mean all the things we think of when we consider success. Or happiness. Or contentment. It can provide those things—but it might not. It doesn’t necessarily provide them. It provides what’s necessary to accomplish the goals of the updraft which might not include success or contentment.
You see, doing the right thing isn’t necessarily about making you happy or successful or content. It’s not necessarily about putting security in the bank. (The truth is that the universe may need something more important from you than for you to have money in the bank.) Not that there is anything wrong with money in the bank or happiness or contentment, but just because you’d like it, doesn’t mean it’s part of the current you are catching.
Each of us is living a different life, a different updraft, and so we will not live the same result. We are not meant to be the same, live the same, do the same, or have the same. We are each a different creative movement of the universe and will create and be something unique. And you will experience passion, interest, curiosity, and the joy of the creative force. There will be some momentum carrying you along.
So trying to keep up with the Joneses (or Myspace or Google) is really not where it’s at. It’s all about truly being yourself. There are so many ways in which we hamper the idea of who we really are by judging, comparing, and wishing it were different, wanting what she’s got. All wasted time, wasted effort. You are your potential coming into being in every moment—perfect as it is, able to make a new decision and create the next thing. It is precisely what you are.
Whatever comes to you will be the fulfillment of your updraft, your capacities, and the choices you make. The goofy part of this is this: it is what you actually are—simply creativity happening in a particular time and place as you. And it turns out that it is very fulfilling to be you. So enjoy it!
What makes some succeed?
Just as some of us are better singers, or some days we are more coordinated than other days, there is a great deal of variability in the effectiveness of any given thing which we might do. The final measure of success is the results of the potential generated—what eventually happens.
We see that some of our actions have more power than others to affect the future—they generate more potential:
- Some people have more power to affect their own futures and the future of others;
- In some areas we are more effective, that is, we each have areas of “talent”.
- Within different scopes we will have more or less effect—I may find that I can effect something in my home or business, but not in every home or business. (Though someone else with different knowledge, capability, or capacity may do just that.)
Where do the variations come from?
- Capacity: our talent, skill, knowledge
- Congruency: our ability to stay on track, to stay focused
- Alignment: our ability to find our updraft—the purpose and direction which is ours—and to align ourselves with it.
Alignment is an important facet of our success toolkit, that is, our ability to sense or intuit the possibilities that are already in the pipeline so to speak. If we can find a creative current that has a strong potential already we can leverage it’s momentum into our lives by our engagement with it. Ideas and intuitions we have are often precisely these potentials coming into our awareness. Part of this creative practice is to develop our ability to fully engage with the existing potentials, learning to leverage this current as our own creative power.
So we see that our success in affecting the future is mediated by many factors:
- Our ability to sense what is already arising in the potential of the future,
- Our ability to catch the current of that arising potential,
- Our ability to generate appropriately directed action,
- And then, what everyone and everything else is doing.
Our ability to dramatically change our world is limited to our ability to generate potential through powerful individual and group action, knowing all the while that everyone is making things happen, but many are only diffusely effective.
It is key to remember that an action does not generate a result. An action generates potential that arises with the rest of the potential into an actuality. This indirection is key to understanding the magic of the arising universe and understanding this will dramatically enhance our ability to succeed.
Darren Rowse, a leading blogger and blog consultant, had a post today titled “9 Attitudes of Highly Creative People.”
You can step over there and see his list. I, of course, wanted to see where he went with that and how it jived with Updrafting. How does our model of creativity get reflected in the general discussion? (And isn’t it interesting that the subject of creativity is of passionate interest to people trying to make money blogging—which is, of course, just a reflection (sometimes distorted) of trying to communicate and share—a basic creative impulse. For to be a successful blogger, as in any other creative endeavor, you must find some creative communications that are meaningful to others.)
It seems to me that his nine attitudes reflect two basic rules of the stance implied by Updrafting:
- Holding no fixed ideas about what should be now and how things should become in the future.
- Problems as interesting and acceptable
- Suspending judgement
- See hurdles as leading to improvements
- Constructive discontent
- Perseverance (not giving up just because what you thought would happen didn’t happen yet)
- Knowing that you are the creative impulse that gets to play with the medium of life to create something new.
- Curiosity
- Problems as interesting and acceptable
- Confronting challenge
- Constructive discontent
- Optimism
- Perseverance (knowing you are the force that can get it done)
- Flexible imagination
The first of these rules of Updrafting (holding no fixed ideas) keeps us from putting the brakes on the power of the creative force and imagination with our resistance. The second facet (knowing that you are the creative impulse) is the accelerator that pushes us to engage in the creative process.
Brakes are a protective device and we must know what we are trying to protect ourselves from. Creative people tend to be unafraid (at least in the area of their creative successes) and therefore don’t use their brakes. People who are cautious overuse the brakes and therefore don’t get anywhere.
And that is always the question: where do you really want to go today?
A Few Basics
These concepts are core to the practice of Updrafting.
Actions Create
We are all creating all the time with our every action and thought, though we do not often realize the effect we are having on the world. (When you have a grumpy day, it matters*.)
To cause the state of the world to change into something we desire, we must understand what is already happening, and we must act in accord with our desire. We must understand that all our action is generating potential which will, at some point, evolve into being as the world. What we do in any present moment is our investment in a change of state of things in our future, and it is this evolutionary process which we must learn to leverage through our actions. In this practice we considered everything an action: what you do, what you say, what you think, what you feel, and your ideas. Though they all don’t have the same power, they are all important to the end result.
It is an Visible Process or an Invisible Movement
The practice of updrafting manifests in different ways depending on the creative team (individual, groups) and their skill.
- It might be a momentary impulse, a seamless artistic expression (as in acting or dancing), or an organizational development lifecycle.
- It might be implicitly or explicitly practiced; that is, one might “flow” with the process without attention to the shifts in awareness, or one might have a structured step-by-step approach.
The Indirect Effect of Action and our Lack of Control
One thing we need to come to understand is simply this: while everything we think and do contributes to the possibilities and potentials of the future, it is also true that we are not in control the way we might have thought. The dance we do with life is a little more intriguing and indirect than a command-and-control scenario. It’s not necessarily less potent, but it is different; and when we live as if we have control, but don’t, we are not as effective as we could be. We also find ourselves frustrated because, in fact, we are then working in a world that we don’t understand and cannot predict. (And, of course, we cannot control it, because we never had control in the first place.)
So the world arises from the potential generated by all creative actions across time, and our part is to act to generate potential for the future. The potential, as part of the state of the universe, is the structure that holds the energetic information that will or can arise in the future becoming the actual world. This structure is as complex and deep as the universe itself. What happens in the future represents the potential from all of the creative acts that the universe has experienced.
The Ocean
The ocean is a beautiful example. Billions of actions happen within the solar system that cause waves to be generated: the earth quakes, the moon circles, wind blows, whales swim, clams open, sand shifts. All of these cause waves and ripples to flow into the moving structure we call the ocean. And each of these movements generates potential for a change in the state of the ocean having large or small effects. But the actuality emerging in any moment is the result of all of those movements as they arise together. Which wave hits the shore is a complex emergent behavior of the entire being of the ocean.
Our relationship to the future world is similar to sending a wave out into the ocean along with a few billion other waves.
* “It matters.” This turns out to be a very interesting phrase. It seems to mean: “It makes a difference to the results.” Another way to say it is that it results in the material world or it manifests as matter. In this practice we will assume that everything (including your thoughts and ideas) “matter”, that is, they affect the manifestation of your future.
Since this is called the “Illustrated Philosophy of the Everyday” I thought maybe some illustrations were in order. The practice is based in something we called modes. There are different modes for different parts of the process to be used at different times. They are not necessarily used in strict sequence though there is a general flow.
What is a mode?
A mode is a way of being in the moment while you relate to your project/process/creation. When we are embodying a mode we use a particular stance with chosen practices and tactics that help us to move the process forward.
A mode has a name. We use a “bubble” image (often used for “process”) to represent a mode. A mode ususal requires something: information, data, reports, vision, etc. A mode often produces something: a new perspective, an idea, more information or structure, or sometmes a product.
Here are a few definitions that contribute to our understanding of the term mode:
-
A way or manner in which something occurs or is experienced, expressed, or done
-
In physics: any of the distinct kinds or patterns of vibration of an oscillating system
-
Music a set of musical notes forming a scale and from which melodies and harmonies are constructed
One can experience modes in a very practical way (things to do, our practices and tactics) and one can (and hopefully will) experience them as differnt ways of paying attention, different levels of awareness. In that sense, they are different “patterns of vibration” in our awareness; similar to different “keys” in a musical modal structure.
Let’s look at one of the more “physical” modes: Embody.
For the Embody mode, we need to know something about what we are trying to do—our target. We will also know something about the the state of our creative environment (our team, our capabilities, our market, etc.). Then we “embody” what it takes to create our target. We may use several different “practices” or ‘tactics”. (Practices are process we engage like planning cycles or training programs; tactics are ways we respond to things that happen. We’ll go into these ideas more later on.)
Some things we may need to do as part of the Embody phase:
- Build the right skills
- Hire the right people
- Buy tools
- Train the team
- Acquire facilities
- Put processes in place
And it doesn’t matter if it is for an individual to prepare to paint a picture or a company to build a new product. The specific processes and tactics will different, but the intent is the same.
The Embody mode is one of the most famiiliar to us. We all know that we need to get our “things” together, though as usual, there are many things that we habitually do wrong in this mode. But that discussion is for another time.
