Post 903, Day 210 of 2013
- and 941 days since I started this blog -
Daily Comment
- and 941 days since I started this blog -
Here's why I plan stuff, why I wish I didn't have to, and, maybe, why it works (when it does).
If you live naturally, you live with all the people you need to see to live your life with a reasonable expectation of happiness and survival, both of yourself and your loved ones. No planning needed.
Civilization came about 10,000 years ago, largely due to the agricultural revolution, which saw humans transition from hunter-gatherer to domesticator and cultivator. This, in turn, led to alterations in the nomadic lifestyle, e.g., settlements, and with settlements, an expansion of the tribal concept. Families lived near each other. And families from other tribes lived near each other.
Planting and harvesting happened on a schedule. Cooperation was required by cultivation, and cooperation was required for harvesting.
Civilization, then, brings you into contact, forces you to connect, with people you don't need. People who may, in fact, enhance your life and/or entertain you, but whose absence from your life, from a survival and happiness point-of-view, are unnecessary.
The unnecessary is always where things get sticky.
The tribal family is the pre-civilization unit that worked to insure the survival and possibly the improvement of human beings for almost the entire existence of the species. It survives, in its way, post-civilization, but in an environment that distracts from the essential.
You don't have to plan things with people you live with. Encounters are inevitable and unavoidable. Only when you move outside of this core group does planning come into play. Immediately, a schedule other than your own must be taken into consideration.
That's the hallmark of civilization: The appointment.
Planning is how you aim your sense of time to keep an appointment.
Please leave a comment if you visit my blog. Thank you!
Food and Diet Section
Today's Weight: 210.4 lbs
Food and Diet Section
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| 2013 Daily Weight |
Yesterday's Weight: 210.2 lbs
Day Net Loss/Gain: + 0.2 lbs
Diet Comment
I thought I would lose weight after yesterday's minimal eating. What do I know?
Food Log
BreakfastCocoa-kale-hemp-chia protein shake: Almond milk, kale, a large egg, cocoa, hemp seeds, chia seeds, vanilla whey powder (24g protein), cinnamon, vanilla, psyllium and stevia-inulin blend.
Lunch
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| Dal Tadka and scrambled eggs. Not shown: Salad with Spring Mix, red cabbage and balsamic vinaigrette. |
Snack
Soft-serve ice cream. Later, a Protein bar
Dinner
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A Protein bar.
Liquid Intake
Coffee: 20 oz. Water: 112+ oz.
Please leave a comment if you visit my blog. Thank you!
I am not sure I see planning as different than cooperation. I haven't thought about it alot, though. Love you
ReplyDeleteWhat you are now calling planning is not what you seemed to be talking about when you referred to the kind of planning that is "fun" in your jul 25 blog commentary. You now seem to define planning as scheduling. One makes an appointment in the present with the "understanding" of the conditions required to keep the appointment. One keeps the appointment in the present when now is the appointed time. Where is the planning? I think that the "fun" way to plan that you refer to is more related to visualizing the fulfillment of one's desires and how one might will them into manifestation.
ReplyDeletei asked about the purpose and function of planning, because i see this, when i try to do it, as creating a division between what is and what i want to be. i only know duality. i am living in conflict. When i cease to pursue the imposition of my desires on the moment i find that life magsanages itself quite well, and i no longer have to contend.
- Light, Love, Compassion
that word in the last sentance is supposed to be "manages"
DeleteMaybe we're splitting semantic hairs.
DeleteI don't know whether this will clarify the point, but by planning, I mean putting in place a course of future action(s) that would, all things being equal (which they never are), bring about a desired result (in the future).
Whatever that desired result is, if it doesn't require any special action to achieve, no plan is necessary. If it does, then some planning can be helpful.
There's never anything certain, and good planners have contingencies. The kind of planning I enjoy and engage in is always, in some sense preparing for an appointment, but the appointment may not be with another person - it may be something that only involves myself, an idea I have for a way to do something I desire to do that I can't do in the "Now".
For instance, my retirement plan at this point really only takes me to the beginning of a path in the future. To get to that beginning, I have to do a number of things, such as unburden myself of many possessions, renew my passport, make travel arrangements. Many of these plans are actually appointments with ambiguous times - in the future - that actually have no specific start-date but do have a desired end-date; some of these things are going to require specific appointments to be made (a plan to make an appointment).
And, yes, you can go entirely down the rabbit hole, planning to plan. Keeping things loose and the desired end in mind, I like this kind of planning, which consists largely of visualization/dreaming.
So there is some fun in that, some enjoyment, because I'm anticipating a desired event, and doing things I think (hope) will move me in the direction (in the future - no guarantees) of realizing that dream.
On the other hand, Dentist's appointments, made 4 months in advance, aren't fun to plan - but some planning is necessary (I have to make arrangements for any absence during the workday that involves more than a half-hour (my lunch break). So that is an appointment that requires some minimal planning, but which gives me no joy.
I plan on ending my working life on January 29th, 2016, the day that qualifies me for full social security benefits. I will have to give notice, and, since I intend to start traveling within a day or so of that date, looking for a new residency, and I plan to spend a year or more in that pursuit. There are so many things that have to be done to make that work, that without some sort of plan, it is unlikely to happen.
Because this idea/dream/plan requires many things to happen, in a certain sequence, to be realizable, I plan. I enjoy it. If nothing works out, I will have enjoyed moving in the direction of the dream, and move on to another idea. I see this planning as something I do in the present that is part of a continuum that ends with the realization - or the lack of it - of the dream.
And some things I'm more than willing to do with no plan or planning at all.
I hope I've explained what I meant, and how I consider all my thoughts and ideas of planning as consistent - just depends on what I'm planning, how much I enjoy the process.
Riding round and round on the merry-go-round
ReplyDeleteGrasp the brass ring and go around. Get another and another.
They're always there for the taking
Reach and grab, until my arms can't reach again.
I hope I've got enough, I'm afraid that I don't
The necessary brass rings to satisfy my appetites.
OOOO, Shiny!