Jack's Diary

Thanks for the reminder, Trusylver. I guess I need to find a happy medium. I've been walking for exercise, so that will get some movement. Plus just getting around. Also, I've just recently started doing a kind of pedaling movement with my legs while laying on my back, just the past few days. I will also try out the tumeric - it couldn't hurt.

I still have a sneaking suspicion it's not arthritis, though. It feels like there's a thing deep in there that's off. It happened while I was playing tennis, like a snapping sensation. When I get full-time again (or at the latest when I'm on Medicare in a few years) I'll have it looked at again.
 
I've been listening to some of the gurus on YouTube - Ekhardt Tolle, and there are a couple of other guys from India, too. Sadhguru is one, Mooji is another. They have some really interesting stuff to say. From listening to them, think I might be too goal-oriented and not spiritual enough. Or maybe too caught up in this life's ups and downs - too "egoic" in my thinking.

Ekhardt Tolle is really opposed to the whole ego thing - it's basically just a conglomeration of beliefs you have about yourself. It's a bundle of thoughts that can be extremely limiting. They're all saying similar stuff, in different ways. It's all about losing the focus on "me" and opening up to the world around you. It's less about accomplishments, goals, habits, etc., and more about being.

For example, right now I'm focused on Japanese and my habits app, a little guitar here and there, keeping my weight down, and maybe a little too much r/celtics. And also, of course, there's the looming new job.

But a little more focus on my spiritual state - it's something I can get into. I like listening to those you tube videos.
 
jackbenimble said:
...Well, I finally signed on with my old company as of yesterday....
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I'm glad that the job is settled, and that it suits you so well, with the timing, but the company sound a bit sharp in their dealing, managing to "save" on your salary. :(
But Japan is coming up, and you're on target weightwise for it, so it's all system go! Great!
 
Hiya Jack! I don't really know what to think about the job thing...I'm sorry that it's not what you were encouraged to think was coming. My impression is that your agency interfered with the situation on both ends and messed up what was going to be a good thing for you. But you'll probably never know. I'm glad there are some upsides and interesting things about the job, including the travel aspect. And....just see how it goes. Hopefully you will like the work and it will lead to a positive next chapter.

Regarding the ego...it's pretty fascinating. So much of what we do and how we process the world is driven by ego. And not in the egomaniac sense, but just in terms of having a set of beliefs about ourselves and how the world is supposed to work. I would imagine this is the benefit/curse of being an intelligent species with self-awareness. I mean, a fish or a snail or an ant probably doesn't have existential angst, right?. :)

Anyway its good to know that you are settled for now and you have your Japan trip ahead to look forward to. Keep up the spiritual studies, I like it.
 
Hey Amy, Mols!

Amy - yeah, I was definitely disappointed they didn't share the wealth on that. If I had more courage, I would've walked away. But, I've been goofing off on the job prep stuff, and it's nice to have the cash rolling in while I decide if I want to stay on board.

Mols - the spiritual stuff is interesting. Good point about the animals not worrying about anything - in fact, one of those gurus was saying exactly the same thing. In the meantime, I've been doing 10 minutes of guided meditation a day, for now. Just videos from youtube, It's nice, but I wish I could stay that peaceful and calm for the whole day. Anyway, I'm going to stick with that habit - I have a steak of a couple of weeks or so going on with that.

Speaking of which, I finally got my habits app with the "streak" calendar deployed to the web. The way it works is you just enter some habits that you want to track. Then, every day, you go over them and click "done". Then it will pop up a calendar with the full year in it. Each day that you've done the habit will be highlighted in green.

It took forever to deploy it because there was a bug which was hard to track because the error message from the server is always a useless cross-browser-forgery message that makes it look like an authentication or authorization issue when it's nothing of the kind. But, at least I used it as motivation finally to review that portion of the code, and now I have a much better idea of how it's working.

I also found a good way to make the API call from a web client that doesn't mask the error. Once I got to that point, it wasn't long before it was straightened out. But that's software for you. It will easily eat up days of your time.

Anyway, now that that's out of the way, I have some more cleaning up to do. Right now, it's not set up for multiple users, which is basically like creating a car without wheels. I really have to get it to that point, in case I evero demo the code like in a job interview situation or something.

But, I want to do the same app in something called React. It seems to be more popular and have more widgets available. Also, it's what my company uses.
 
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I'm at 164 lbs. What a massive difference between that and my usual 167. Amazing.

YouTube floated me a crazy video by Alan Watts. He explains some stuff that Ekhardt Tolle talk about - how we are really the same as the world around us. That's what Tolle calls the "true" self, as opposed to the ego. It's confusing stuff, but it makes sense, too. YouTube is great for making these things that were available in just books, or maybe purchased tapes, previously. The accessibility of this knowledge is incredible.

 
AN was very into Alan Watts...I have to agree with a lot of his philosophy - it's the same as a lot of others but sometimes its just the way that he says it that really provokes lightbulbs to go off. Thanks for sharing.

Hope you had a great 4th and are enjoying your weekend Jack!
 
Mols24 said:
AN was very into Alan Watts...I have to agree with a lot of his philosophy - it's the same as a lot of others but sometimes its just the way that he says it that really provokes lightbulbs to go off. /QUOTE]

Hi Mols -
Happy Fourth to you as well!


I watched a few more of Watt's videos, but it got to the point where I was like, well this is just so out there that I really can't apply it. Like there's no cause and effect. Ok, I see the argument, but that doesn't mean I still don't have to deal with the consequences of my decisions.
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Went to my brother's for a couple of days of relaxation down the Cape. It was nice, the water was just right. There were some niiiccce looking youngsters around, I was trying not to be too obvious - it's probably to late, but I don't want to seem like the dirty old man, lol.

We leave for Japan on Tuesday. I'm just relaxing right now. I'm trying to get unhooked from NBA news - but I'm going to watch the Celtics in Summer League today and Monday.

My app disappointingly doesn't show the "streak" colors on mobile. Super-annoying, but I have invested too much time into Angular now - I want to re-do in React. I hate to do it because I can't demo it on my phone. But, I prefer React because that's what they do at work.

I'm having a tough time getting started on practicing interview questions. It seems like such a waste of time when I could be doing something productive, like re-doing my habit app in React, Japanese, play guitar, whatever. But if I'm not going to retire at the end of the year and I want to be in a stronger negotiating position than I left myself in this time around, I need to do it. It's more important than adding another technology. But I really want to do the React thing.
 
Back from Japan! It was a great trip. We visited a couple of places, and of course, I love a lot about the country. The best thing about it was, after six months of more or less sustained study, I was able to actively communicate in Japanese with people without it being like pulling teeth.

It's not like I don't have a looooonng way to go. But the feeling of *finally* being able to be more-or-less functional in the spoken language is a good one.

Literacy is also coming along. All those unreadable signs everywhere are finally starting to melt into comprehensibility. Of course, there again I have a long way to go.

So, I really don't want to lose this, and I plan to keep maintenance level at least.

But now that I'm back I have a chock full of other things I have to pay attention to - including getting back to 165 (I'm up to 169).
 
So, I'm starting to crash, and it's not even 5 pm. In Tokyo, it's either 4 am or 6 am, one of the two. I did get some good sleep on the plane, so that helps.

Got some stuff out of the way, working backward:
- showered
- mowed the lawn
- got mousetraps
- laid out on the beach wall
- checked the mileage credits (long way to go there)
- Got the new health plan
- Switched to the new credit card on the phone plan
- shower
- Gas
- worked out at the gym
- did pushups, leg rolls
- got up
 
I'm glad your trip went well & it looks like all your hard work has paid off. Well done, Jack!
 
Cate said:
I'm glad your trip went well & it looks like all your hard work has paid off. Well done, Jack!
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Thanks, Cate!

Well, I decided I'm going to try to work off a schedule somewhat - something I've never been able to pull off before. I read an article and the guy said to start with tracking your time. I got off to a good start today, but I'm definitely running out of steam. I did get 1/2 hour of Japanese and 1/2 of guitar in, but nothing related to software. It's so much easier to do work in the morning...
 
Welcome home Jack! Really cool to read that you are developing an everyday fluency in Japanese. How nice to experience the results of your many hours of study. I hope that you had a great trip, and lots of memorable moments. :)
 
What was your favorite place you visited in Japan? I have always wanted to go and my daughter will take Japanese in high school, so we are planning on going in the next few years. I wanted to see the temples in Nara and the deer park especially.

I noticed you like Eckhart Tolle, too. I have to sit down and catch up on your posts soon, but just wanted to chime in that if you haven't, go see him in person. He is so calm and loving and peaceful you can physically feel it, and that is his best teaching (for me) is knowing that feeling that comes from his deep relaxation and peace with the world.
 
Hi Mols - thanks - it was a great feeling to be able to speak to my in-laws and various people without it being like pulling teeth. I felt especially good when I got out on my own and was having conversations with merchants and so forth because those are pretty simple and easy. I felt like a pro on those occasions. Then there were other times where I had no clue, a lot, especially when trying to follow conversations between Japanese speakers. So, I have a long way to go, still. But I've made a significant dent in this language, which has been way too long in coming.
I'm also speaking Japanese as much as I can to my wife. I can put together sentences now, and some times she'll respond in kind. So that's a huge resource right there.

Marisa - there are a lot more places to go than I thought, but my favorites have been Kyoto (the Ryoanji rock garden was so cool), and also Kamakura, which has a beautiful statue of the Buddha. I like Shinjuku and Ginza in Tokyo as well.

As far as Eckhart Tolle, I really enjoy listening to him. Unlike traditional religion, he doesn't ask you to buy into hardly believable myths. He's very humorous, and while that's a draw it's not the reason I listen. It's just that his way of explaining things really resonates, and like Zen addresses what I think are my biggest drawbacks - e.g. regrets about the past and worry about the future, also "monkey-mind".

I would like to listen to him in person, that would be very cool. It must be an amazing experience.
 
The first two days of work were predictably wild, but I've survived and fortunately it's the weekend.

As far as weight, I'm back down below 165, so that's good. I've started trying to do 200 pushups a day plus 200 leg-rotations a day. I've kept it up for a couple of days now.

The football season start Thursday night, I'll be watching the Pats first exhibition game. That was a fast off-season.

My stupid to-do program is again not showing the "streaks", this time on a regular browser. I am determined to switch the platform to React. I've had trouble getting it working on my MacBook Pro, but I think I'll switch to the PC that I got earlier in the year, just to avoid conflicts.
 
jackbenimble said:
Marisa - there are a lot more places to go than I thought, but my favorites have been Kyoto (the Ryoanji rock garden was so cool), and also Kamakura, which has a beautiful statue of the Buddha. I like Shinjuku and Ginza in Tokyo as well.

As far as Eckhart Tolle, I really enjoy listening to him. Unlike traditional religion, he doesn't ask you to buy into hardly believable myths. He's very humorous, and while that's a draw it's not the reason I listen. It's just that his way of explaining things really resonates, and like Zen addresses what I think are my biggest drawbacks - e.g. regrets about the past and worry about the future, also "monkey-mind".

I would like to listen to him in person, that would be very cool. It must be an amazing experience.
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That's great you can practice Japanese with your wife. We have just been starting to learn the hiragana and a few phrases, and it's fun, but so hard! I looked up the places you recommended, and they all look so beautiful and interesting! Looks like you had an amazing trip!!

My teacher was from a Zen Buddhist tradition and I love how straight forward and how he always says to see for yourself what is true. I agree about humor - it's so refreshing listening to people who can go deep but don't take themselves so seriously.

I've been trying to get out of looking back at my past lately and just be a lot more present. I think regret is a form of self punishment, and I love when I just remember to learn from my past mistakes instead of beating myself up about them - that's another thing I have been really working on! It was definitely an unforgettable experience seeing Eckhart Tolle, and it's like I can remember back to it and still feel his warmth and wonderful presence years and years later.

It's great to see you are doing so well with your weight and exercise!! Happy weekend!
 
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