Actually, I’m getting ahead of myself. To be completely honest, I didn’t plan on writing this story today, or at all. But when I was out running this morning, fragments of it started coming to me. By the time I got back, I knew I wanted to talk about power and freedom: understanding it, when you have it, and when you don’t. Because unfortunately, many people that I meet, including some close friends, aren’t fully embracing freedom in their lives.

Are you? What could your life look like if you were?

When I was about three years old, my family and I visited my grandparents in California. I loved spending time with them; and my grandmother, who grew up in France, was especially warm and loving. Just being around her was a comforting feeling. I’m sure you know the feeling. With her around, everything would always be OK. There was simply no doubt. And she was pretty easygoing, as well.

My grandfather was different. Having grown up in Brooklyn during the 1930s (and without a mother), his personality had adapted to survive in those unique circumstances. Thankfully, he hadn’t lost touch with his sense of empathy; but like a layer of old bark around a redwood, there was a layer of toughness around it. (Overall though, it was pretty remarkable how well he turned out given his unique childhood.) But even though his bark was worse than his bite, his bark was basically legendary in our family. He was loving, but he didn’t tolerate anyone’s BS, especially three-year-old-me’s version of it.

During the course of our visit, my grandparents watched me a couple times while my parents did other things. At that age, I obviously had a limited amount of freedom, but what I did have I used to its fullest potential. Often I would explore the area around the house for hours. (I know. Huge surprise, right?)

The Wrong Tendencies

Yet at my grandparents’ place, my freedom was even more limited. There were more rules here. There were things you dare not touch, and a fireplace ledge that I wasn’t allowed to sit on. “How dare they!” My 3-year-old self thought. “I’m not hurting anything by sitting on it.” But it didn’t matter. As I soon found out, breaking any of their rules had consequences.

The most famous incident (and the one that my grandfather continues to tell to this day, even in his advanced age), took place during the visit I mentioned above.

Young kids like throwing things. So did I. And though I have no memory of this, apparently I threw an ashtray (or something like it) across the room. For some reason, my grandfather didn’t understand how absolutely fun it was to throw things when surrounded by large glass windows and a sliding glass door. He told me if I did it again, he would have to punish me.

I should have realized the potential consequences, but I was in the mood to test my limits. So a few minutes later, I threw it again within range of a whole bunch of glass. And so, he hit me with a paddle (or maybe a belt), and I cried.

Lesson learned, right? Wrong!

The Wrong Replies

Being somewhat of a strategic child, I told my mother about this. And apparently, she told me he wasn’t supposed to punish me directly.

When my grandfather watched me a second time, I was armed with that information. And as we were walking up the steps to the house, I explained to him (quite proudly, I might add) that he wasn’t allowed to punish me because my mother had said that he couldn’t.

He nearly laughed and then explained how this was his house. If I was going to spend time in his house, I was to follow his rules, especially the rules about throwing hard objects near large panes of glass. Otherwise, there would be consequences.

Thankfully, I realized that throwing things in my grandparents’ house wasn’t the best use of my time, and after that conversation I never did it again. Instead, I played with what few toys they had and explored their backyard, as well.

When it came to learning about so-called “tough love”, my grandfather was one of my first teachers. And even though he could be rough around the edges, he was always very clear and congruent with his reasons behind anything that he did. From a young age, he helped me understand personal boundaries. Since then, I’ve come an extremely long way, as I’m sure any one would say they have since age three. But the fact that we’ve all grown isn’t the point.

The point is the direction in which you grow. Since then I’ve learned to wield my power more constructively and grow in a direction that increased my freedom. I’m pleased to say I haven’t thrown an ashtray since; and even though I’m still a smart-ass on some occasions, I balance it with compassion now.

Marching to the Wrong Drum?

What about you? Are you congruent with your own choices? Do you knowingly wield your Power to create Freedom? This ability is more valuable that gold-pressed latinum, but seeing in use is not nearly as common as it ought to be.

In some situations, your freedom is severely limited for very good reasons. The prime example of this is childhood. Obviously, when you’re a child you simply aren’t intelligent enough to fully realize the consequences (both positive and negative) of the actions you take, not to mention how those choices will affect others. And so, your free will is corralled and limited.

But as an adult, you have complete control to create your life as you see fit. Not all adults have consciously wielded this power to create what they want, but failure to wield your power doesn’t make you any less responsible for the quality and content of your everyday life. Or, put another way, you cannot be anything else but the captain of your ship, whether you realize it or not. As an adult, your power (and consequently your potential for freedom) has grown exponentially since you were a kid, but that only matters if you consciously wield it.

Too Long

If you’re reading this site, then travel has a place in your life, and it’s my job to encourage you to wield your power to make time to travel. It’s my job to remind you that your time on this planet is limited, and there are literally billions of experiences that await you.

What I write about here is a direct reflection of that mission. By writing about my explorations and sharing my sights, I do my best to inspire you toward what is possible when travelling. Yet in the past, navigating the wealth of articles within the Byteful Travel archives was rather clumsy.

No longer.

Although it’s been a long time coming, I’m really pleased to announce that the Byteful Travel Citypages are now fully operational. Some of the new features, such as the coding for the interactive map and its animation, took longer than anticipated (which is why I skipped a week in November), but I’m confident that focusing on these new enhancements was the best use of my time.

By completing these updates, it helps everyone navigate the wealth of information on Byteful Travel much more easily than before. You may even discover a lot of information that you didn’t even know was here. The new features include:

1. Interactive West Coast Quest Map
   • on the Archives page & the bottom of each West Coast article
   • includes a subtle animation to imply travel direction
2. Easier to use Citypages
   • wider map viewing area
   • reformatted attractions are now easier to click
   • an elegant graphical explanation of what pin colors mean
3. Quest Mini-Map in the sidebar (which leads to the Quest Map)

As I say in the site intro, your time is limited. If you’re not a kid anymore, your freedom is in your own hands. So what are you waiting for? In a way, the world is a huge playing field, waiting for you to explore the game space. Even if you feel like you’ve been on the wrong road for a while, picked up the wrong tendencies, or are marching to the wrong drum, you can change that. In fact, you’re the only one who can. The question is: Will you wield your power and begin your odyssey (in whatever form is meaningful to you), or will you wait until its too late?

You will only have Freedom when you create it for yourself.

Ready to Explore?

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Wherever you may be as you read this, I hope that it finds you sitting comfortably with something good to drink nearby, because everything we’ve ever known may be about to change… for the better.

What would you do if you thought the world was going to end in 7 days? Or, coming at it another way, what if you thought the planet was going to be reborn into a Golden Age very soon?

I realize this isn’t directly related to travel; but I feel some responsibility to alert you guys if it’s possible something very important is looming on the horizon… something that may come to light in just the next 7 days. Add to that how rapidly events have been occurring lately, the mounting feelings of uncertainty, and the grassroots financial protests that are currently happening globally, and you’d basically have to be a goon to think we don’t live in noteworthy times.

And, believe it or not, there are a fair number of people who think that something of great significance will happen in the midst of all this, next friday on October 28th. You’ve probably heard some of the hubbub around the Mayan calendar ending in 2012. Well, according to Carl Johan Calleman, who is one of the top Mayan researchers in the world, the December 2012 date was miscalculated. He and others have re-calculated that the real date is October 28, 2011.

Is a Golden Age coming?

To be clear, he doesn’t think the apocalypse is going to happen next week. That would be as foolish as the people who thought that the end of the world was going to happen back in May, spending their entire life savings by the 21st of that month. (Seriously, look it up if you don’t believe me.)

Far from it, he sees it as a slow transformation of the world with people beginning to experience what he calls a heightened ‘unity consciousness’. Basically, this would manifest as you and I coming to a deeper understanding of how we are connected as living beings on this planet. It would reveal the Oneness that underlies all members of the human species and reveal hidden connections.

Signs that We are becoming One People

Calleman sees the Universe as being created in a series of waves, with each wave 20 times shorter than the previous one. Each wave has driven the complexity of the universe to a higher level, starting with matter, then life, multicellular life, animal families, human tribes, nations, planetary awareness, and finally awareness of our place in the Milky Way galaxy itself.

Clearly, we’re not quite at planetary awareness yet, but one thing I agree with Calleman on is that we’re getting close. Just look at the way the web is breaking down the borders between nations. The veil is beginning to fall away to reveal that we have more similarities than differences.

As I said before, Calleman says all of this culminates in what he describes as ‘unity consciousness’. Quite different from a negative event, he sees the end of this huge cycle as the completion of the creation process of the whole universe.

Pretty heady, isn’t it?

Don’t Cling to Expectations, Just Be Open

At any rate, I’m not going to hold my breath that some breakthrough is necessarily going to happen next week, and I don’t recommend you go in with expectations either. What I do recommend is that you enter the next week with a heightened sense of awareness. There is a chance that something truly novel could happen on or around that date, so I’m going to be sure to listen to my intuition on all counts. (By the way, you can read more about Calleman’s interesting views on this subject at the wiki, and I recommend you check out his latest article about the end of the calendar and the changes that the Earth is experiencing.)

Is the end Metaphorical or Literal?

So I ask you once more. What if everything changed on Friday? How would you react?

Incidentally, next Saturday (the day after Calleman’s end date) I have the honor of hosting the Traveler’s Show & Tell blog carnival. It’s poised to be pretty great; and depending on what does or doesn’t happen on Friday, that Saturday blog carnival could be a bit more interesting than usual.

Of course, it’s quite possible that absolutely nothing of significance could happen on that date. Perhaps it’s purely symbolic in nature, intended to remind us of our connections. Perhaps it’s more. In either case, I hope you use the following week to reflect on your awareness of those around you, how much you value them, and how you impact them. After all, humans are tribal creatures, and our connections are our most valuable asset.

Whatever happens, I’m thankful to be living in such interesting times.
Aren’t you?

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In this article I’m going to share with you a concept that allows you to harness the natural cycles of your brain to the greatest effect in both work and when travelling.

You see, when I travel I seldom plan out exactly what I’m going to do on a certain day. Instead, I review my options before I set out and allow time and space for events to flow together organically and spontaneously. Granted, some of your travel commitments may have firm attachments to certain points in time and space, but acting merely on intuition is incredibly worth it whenever possible. In fact, I find that when I wait to plan a given day until the night before, I’m much more sensitive to how the day is going to go; and I’m more in tune with what my needs will be on the upcoming day.

Travelling is a creative act, and your ability to jump into a creative state ebbs and flows throughout the day. In my experience, there is much magic to be found when we are conscious of those changes; and when done consciously, this kind of flexibility allows moments to snap together like magnets.

So how exactly does this apply to work? I’ll ‘splain.

The Intuitive Planning Approach

Lately, I’ve realized that I’ve approached doing work this way for a while now. Instead of stating in big red letters that I’m going to write a rough draft of a given article on Monday or bust, I find that I work better when I have a general idea of what I need to accomplish by a certain day and then allow myself to be drawn to the tasks to complete that goal in its own perfect time.

For the purposes of this article I’m going to call this approach “intuitive planning”, because, while it’s still technically a form of planning, it allows your intuition to have a say in what you should be doing at a given moment. People who use David Allen’s “Getting Things Done” system (as I do) may recognize that the GTD “Next Actions” list can be used exactly this way because it’s a list of shorter tasks that can easily fit into the gaps between larger projects.

We can expand on that though. And as in both work and travel, defining the next physical action you need to take to achieve your goal is immensely helpful and can often give you clarity if you feel stuck. But if you already know what you’re going to do (and when it needs to be done) and you have some freedom over the order and speed at which the steps are completed, then you can experiment with the Intuitive Planning model.

For instance, I’m currently writing this sentence at 00.57, which is well past midnight. I didn’t even plan to write an article tonight; but inspiration struck me, and I had the time flexibility to act on it. By listening to my intuition and following it, this article was allowed space to manifest. Simply put, the Intuitive Planning approach has completely changed how I view my working time as well as my travel time. (Although you could say I’m “on the job” whenever I’m travelling, but you know what I mean.)

This model works best for me on a week by week basis. For instance, if I’m working on a big article about McWay Falls, I know that I have a few dozen photos to crop, color-correct, name, export, upload to the Byteful Gallery, and resize for the article. Then I need to outline the article, write it, proofread it, categorize it, and finally set the article to be posted in the wee hours of the morning. This whole process involves over 10 major steps with plenty of tiny steps in between; but because I understand the steps that it involves, I can set small milestones to let me know if I’m on track. (For instance, I like to have the photos done by Sunday night and a rough draft of the article done on Monday). Yet if I really get on a roll, I may have the article rough draft done by the end of Sunday. It all depends on my level of inspiration and energy level. The key here is really listening to myself and my mental state.

Inspiration & Expectation

Let me be clear here. I’m not saying you should wait for inspiration to get you started on your work. A wise man once said that inspiration must find you working; and in my experience, I think that’s putting it lightly.

There’s no Inspiration Faerie that’s going to come down and give you tons of energy. Your will and your will alone must start it. However, if you change your attitude to be open to inspiration sneaking up on you, it’s far more likely to.

Have you ever noticed that it’s those times when you don’t feel pressured and boxed in, that some of your most inspired ideas come through? In my experience, inspired ideas are more likely to come through because expectations cause a constriction in the mind. By “forcing” yourself to do a specific thing at a certain time, you will naturally feel limited and probably stressed out, too.

Don’t get me wrong. This certainly isn’t always a bad thing. Indeed, without that kind of discipline, we would not complete many things that legitimately need to be done. Yet, whenever possible, creating from a place of non-expectation is much more enjoyable experience for me, and I find more original ideas come when I’m not painstakingly looking for them. What about you?

How to Create the Flow for Yourself

The real trick here (which is a skill that can be developed) is the ability to consciously decide what you’re going to focus on and think about. I learned an important lesson about this in my teen years when I would push myself to the limit for school projects, and I continued to refine my approach when I was in college.

While it may come as an incredible shock to you, I really disliked being forced to do a project I didn’t enjoy, and I experienced a lot of stress in having to push myself to complete such a project on time. If I didn’t really care about the end goal of the project, it didn’t spur me to action. At all. In fact, I would have a lot of trouble “getting into the groove” of it. Therefore, I had to create that flow for myself. (I can’t not state the importance of this enough.)

I would often experience false starts and slow progress in the beginning, so I’m not saying this is easy. Sometimes it can be very difficult. Sometimes you may feel as though you don’t even know where to start. Trust me, I’ve been there. But in those situations, I tried to take away as much complexity as I could and simply took the most logical first step. Keeping it simple is a very important tip to remember whenever you get stuck.

Discipline is what allows us to take those first few steps. But I’ve found that once I get going, less and less discipline is required because I’ve created the groove that I was looking for. And by creating it for myself, I make it easier to get back to that place of creativity whenever I want.

Choose your Focus & Make Alpha Waves

Remember, this all hinges on you being able to consciously decide what you’re going to focus on. You must choose where to place your focus. Will you focus on the part of your brain that is worried about failing or the part that simply relishes in the act of creation itself? Have you ever noticed that when you’re really in the flow of creating (whether it be writing, reading, painting, or designing) that you completely lose track of time?

This is because a different part of your brain is engaged. When you feel truly immersed in your work, your brain is actually at a different frequency than when you’re walking around during the day. The brain is in beta frequency during most of its waking hours, but when you’re really in the flow, you enter alpha brain frequency. These alpha waves allow distractions to fall away and allow a much greater depth of focus. For instance, I’m in an alpha state right now as I write this. How do I know? Because the words keep flowing out of me, effortlessly.

Things certainly weren’t always this way. To be completely honest, there was a time when I absolutely dreaded writing; but the more I practiced, the more I learned about what it felt like to be in this state. I gained a better understanding of how my own brain worked, and so can you.

In some ways, it’s like riding a bike. When you first rode a bike, you had no hope of balancing without training wheels, right? But in time, you refined your sense of balance, and soon you didn’t even need the training wheels.

Intuitive Planning: Create Abundantly!

As I said before, your ability to jump into a creative state ebbs and flows throughout the day, and “intuitive planning” is merely intelligently harnessing this quality of the human brain in the most intelligent way possible. To really put all of this in a nutshell, when you give yourself the freedom to create in the order in which your mind wants to create, your creative process can flow much more effortlessly and with much less stress. And if the time never seems right and begins to run short, you can always revert back to a more logical discipline-based approach.

Remember, you are not your brain. You are also not your thoughts. Realize that your mind is a wonderfully complex and dynamic tool; but it is still a tool, and when you use this tool with greater skill, you can create more abundantly and more meaningfully.

And fewer things are more enjoyable or more rewarding than that.

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If you haven’t already heard (though I suspect you’d have to be living under a rock to miss it), Steve Jobs died on Wednesday at the age of 56.

It’s safe to say that without Steve reviving Apple in the late 1990s, this website probably would not exist. And if you’ve been paying attention to my twitter feed, you got early access to what I’m about to share today.

In memory of Steve, I’ve created a special version of the popular “Think Different” commercial because I believe he is just as deserving of honor as the incredible people that were featured in the original version of this ad. My version is also special because it features part of an unreleased version where Steve Jobs himself narrates the ad. I spent many hours carefully color-correcting and editing this video together; and the footage of Steve is, quite fittingly, from his last public talk at WWDC 2011.

As a bonus at the end of the video, I have included an excerpt from his 2005 Stanford Commencement Speech. These are what I believe to be his most powerful words. They encapsulate why it is so important to cultivate self-knowledge, have faith, and realize that life is delicate and more precious than we often realize.

On Wednesday, the planet lost a visionary who has changed technology history forever. He will be missed, but his memory and legacy will live on. Steve had a positive impact on the planet, the effects of which will be felt for decades to come.

What about you? Are you doing work that will still be relevant years from now? If not, why not? As I am fond of saying these days, everyone gets 24 hours tomorrow, and changing the world requires a crazy level of courage. And if you aren’t crazy enough to think you can do it with the time you have left, how do you expect to do it at all?

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You may have heard it before, but have you ever posed this question to yourself? When was the last time you sat down to create something you really felt strongly about?

A couple weeks ago, I awoke to a quiet and sunny morning. I sat in the silence, and I wondered. I wondered what, of that which I’ve created, will live beyond me. I wondered what my lasting impact would be on the Earth.

As I sat there contemplating this, I realized that much of what anyone does will be forgotten in time. The meals they made, the possessions they owned, the places they lived in. None of these things would be relevant in even a hundred years time. I continued contemplating, and I asked myself, “What does the world need, right now? Where does it stand, and how can I help it?”

Have you ever asked yourself such questions?

In contemplating what the world needs, I thought about the different theories regarding climate change, impending prophecies, and the rapidly changing times that we are now all living through.

I realized that my actions already showed part of my answer to that question. I believe people need to continually push themselves into new experiences and stretch their boundaries, travel being one of the best examples of this.

I soon came to the conclusion that there was no way to be sure of what my final impact might be on a larger scale. No way at all, really. And I realized that this fact is one of the mysterious aspects to being a creator: you never know precisely what you’ll be remembered for. Do you think Benjamin Franklin would have chosen to be remembered primarily for his kite-flying lightning experiment? Maybe, maybe not. Certainly he had far more influential enterprises in his life. But of those other pursuits, none had the iconic imagery that the key on the kite provides us, so that is what he is most remembered for.

How are you serving your era?

If I had to say right now, I’d guess that perhaps three bits of my work will be remembered: a piece of travel poetry, a destination-focused article, and one or two of photographs in the Byteful Gallery. And if they are, it’ll most likely be because they’ll have documented a moment in the early twenty-first century that is interesting or important to future historians. Then again, I could also be dead wrong.

But how’s that for a thought? Every time you take a photo and put it on the web, it has the potential to be part of a historical archive, perhaps well into the twenty-second century. Since, year after year, storage space continues to increase in dramatic leaps and bounds, I wouldn’t be surprised if the entire web as it exists today (in 2011) will be someday preserved on a crystal that you could hold in the palm of your hand. (And hopefully by then we’ll have decent 3D interfaces so we can more efficiently sift through these vast archives of history.) In fact, it’s pretty likely that something you do today will be accessible for generations to come.

The Currency of Expertise

The point is, you never know what bits of your work are going to be relevant in the future until the future arrives. But even if something you’ve made is preserved… will it be remembered? Will it be notable? Will you have had a true impact? In order to do that, you have to create something of value in the first place.

Are you?

In my experience, the greatest value we ever create is when we work towards something we actually care about. You can tell when someone’s heart and soul has gone into their work, can’t you? I know I can. Think about the affect that kind of work can have on people. Don’t you want to have the same affect? Sure, the first time you try to do something, it will probably suck, but it’s the trying that makes you better. The number of mistakes made is all that separates a classical pianist from someone who stopped after learning a few chords. The price you pay for expertise is experience. Or, put another way, Experience is the currency of expertise.

The Highest Expression of Who You Are

When was the last time you sat down to create something you really felt strongly about? If it’s been more than 3 months, then what are you waiting for?

Too often, when I talk to people, they tell me how busy their lives are and that they see themselves not having the time to create anything. Perhaps they’re exhausted after a long day at their job, or perhaps they already have too many other commitments. But what if they’d made a more sacred commitment than a job contract? What if they committed to become the highest expression of who they could be, in every area of their life? How do you think their life might change when they whole-heartedly followed that commitment?

Apply it to yourself. What if you made a commitment to be the highest expression of your true self, and followed it wholeheartedly? How would your life change?

Now, I completely understand that when you’re starting out, things can be on a bumpy road for a while. But what if you’re in your 30s or 40s (or beyond) and you still haven’t made anything you’re proud of? How do you feel about that?

Let’s get to the Nutshell

Let’s get to the nut of the nut. At what point does going to a job, cranking the crank, coming home, watching TV, and hitting “repeat”, not enough?

If you need a reason to do more than the 4 things I listed above, consider this: Your fellow humans need you. Only you are able to create what only you are able to create. You have a unique light, and no one is going to shine it for you. You’ve probably heard this before, but did you really internalize it? Remember, everyone has unique gifts, abilities, and propensities that they were born with. And they exist of a reason.

Even if you’re not entirely sure what your unique gifts are yet, that doesn’t mean they’re not there. If you keep trying different things, you will discover one of your gifts. In my case, I had absolutely no idea what I wanted to do with my life when I was in college, but somewhere along the way, I realized my love for travel, writing, and design, among other things. Some take longer than others to discover their passions, but all can (and do) in time.

And when you use these gifts, you shine your light. And this is very powerful.

But this can only come out of making a conscious choice. That can be a daily choice of deciding to create just one thing or to do “your thing”, whatever it may be, on a regular basis. Whether it be through photography, dance, song, poetry, prose, drawing, or anything — express yourself. Perhaps 10 minutes a day, or even one hour a week. Whatever works best for you. Just remember, you won’t feel fully alive until you do.

So, what will You be remembered for?

When was the last time you asked yourself, “What will I be remembered for?”

If you skip the opportunity to create your life, you slip into the habit of simply watching life go by. And, what’s worse, you deprive us of your voice and, quite frankly, you do the entire world a huge disservice.

Yet if you have the courage to create from the deepest places in your heart (and have the courage to share) the world will respond to it like a birdsong on the wind. And in time, it will enchant us and make the world seem that much more alive, because you gave yourself fully to it. In that moment, you will learn more about yourself and feel more connected to the planet than you ever have before.

And there are few things more beautiful than that.

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And yet… I didn’t.

The last thing I remember was looking up in the sky and seeing three missiles coming through the clouds. They were like solid rocket boosters but much bigger. I knew they were ICBMs. Yes, Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles, the kind they use in Nuclear War. One headed high over me, one headed far to the south of me, and one came closer and closer.

The closest one was tumbling haphazardly in the sky and went behind some nearby trees. Then, a blinding flash. It’s hard to describe what I felt after that. It was like a warm rain or the feeling of a blow dryer against your skin. It was so quick, and then?

Nothing.

Well, not precisely. While I could perceive nothing around me, I could still feel me. I was still there, but my body had been wiped away.

I touched my left arm.

Wait a minute. How could I feel my arm if I’d been annihilated? I quickly realized it wasn’t a physical arm I was touching. This was my astral body’s arm. Some might call it my “energy body” or “light body”, but no matter what label you decide to place on it, I was grateful that I could feel that I still had some kind of substance, some energy. And in some instant later, I was in a place that felt perfectly peaceful and safe. In fact, it felt safer than “safe”, and I knew everything would be OK.

Before all this, I had been sitting at a picnic bench, staring at a strange tree. At the end of the branches were strange heads with large mouths like fish. One head started glowing, and instinctively I knew this was a bad thing. I tried to stop it with my mind, and that worked… but only at first. Then another one started glowing, and it would not relent.

And then I saw the missiles, and that’s about where we came in.

A Gift

If you haven’t gathered by now, the above experience happened to me in a dream recently; and, like most dreams, I thought it was perfectly real at the time. I experienced a brief pain, and thought that my time on this planet was over. After I died, appeared in the safe void that I described above. I had the impression that it was a temporary place like a waiting area and that soon others would come to meet me. I’m not sure why I didn’t see the typical white tunnel that is often described (perhaps because I wasn’t really dying), but while I was in this temporary waiting area, I started to do some serious reflection on my life.

Ever the optimist, I thought how it wasn’t so bad to be blown away by such a large missile. There was only a brief pain, and then it was very peaceful. I thought, “Certainly, there are worse ways to die, right?” And on this side of the mirror, I somehow knew that it was all working out for the highest good of all. I didn’t feel like I have to second guess myself like I did when I was alive.

All of this happened yesterday morning. After I woke up, I almost felt like I’d been given a second chance. I had received a taste of my own mortality, even if it was only an extremely mild taste.

I’ve thought about the dream on and off since then; and I realized that the dream has given me a newfound clarity on how I look at time itself. This dream was a beautiful gift, and one result was that I now have new insight on why being “productive” is so important to me.

The Idea of Being “Productive”

When I thought I had died, I did something that you would probably do, too. I thought about all of the things I would never have the chance to do, all of the places I’d never be able to see, and all of the incredible people who I would never be able to get to know. I thought about all of the things I still wanted to do, things like walking atop the massive glaciers in Iceland or photographing (and subsequently hugging) a massive Baobab tree in South Africa.

I thought about all of my opportunities lost.

Wouldn’t you?

The whole experience really drove home for me how scarce time is in our lives. And I realized that this is the single most profound reason why the idea of being productive is so important to me. Because it’s about wisdom. And the way the word “productivity” is used as a buzzword these days makes me concerned that its true meaning is going to get watered down. As a word, I’m starting to think it’s being overused, and that concerns me.

Why?

Because, at its most pure, “productivity” is just about being smart with your most finite resource: your time. That’s all. No bells and whistles. No palm trees are involved, and it certainly doesn’t take 4 hours to understand. Being a productive person just means making the stuff you want to make, completing the stuff you want to complete, and also having a life alongside that. (That third part is important.) Productivity is your ability to intelligently, and sanely, manage your time. It’s about balance. That’s all.

What would your life look like if you became twice as productive? Or, said in another way, what would the rest of your month look like if you actually got ahead of where you think you need to be? Would you have more time to travel? Is it possible that you would have more opportunities to experience the adventures that your heart longs for?

Honestly, you don’t have to be a ninja to become smart about this. And the smarter and more courageous you are about how you use your time, the better things can get. Remember, everyone gets 24 hours tomorrow, but not everyone has the same number of years left.

What would you do if you realized that you died yesterday, and this whole day you’ve been inside a dream?

Thankfully, that’s not the case… yet.
So, what are you going to do with the time you have left?

No posts relate.

Unless you’re in Australia, you’re probably dealing with ‘white sandwich’ weather, as I am.

“Huh? ‘White sandwich’ weather? What the heck is that!?”, I can hear you say.

Well, it’s a term I invented years ago for when the sky is completely cloudy and the ground is covered in snow. You see, from a certain perspective, when this happens you appear to be in the middle of a vast white sandwich… especially if you’re on a frozen lake. When the world configures itself this way, the only color you can hope to see is in the middle of the sandwich, which is usually the grey-brown color of leafless trees as they sleep through the winter.

And in times like that, I sometimes wish I could sleep though the winter, too.

Unexpected A-Cappella is GROOVY

Alas, you and I are not trees nor bears, so we face the winter conscious, which can be depressing sometimes. So what better way to cheer you up after living in ‘white sandwich’ weather than my video of the a-cappella group I stumbled upon while I was exploring Seattle? (And if you subscribe to the Byteful Video feed, you may have already noticed that this video was released.)

How did I discover a free a-cappella concert?

I’d just finished exploring the Chittenden Locks, and as I started heading back I came across this quintet singing near the botanical gardens. They performed Beach Boys covers and many other happy songs under the clear blue sky that day. And thankfully I had enough space after the Chittenden Locks photo shoot to record this short video of them singing “Blue Skies”. (I’ve even fine-tuned the video’s color with Final Cut Pro, so the video is as bright and vibrant as the day I shot it.)

In the midst of this snowy winter, I hope this video lifts your spirits, reminds you that the blue skies and green grass will return, and puts a smile on your face.

Coming up soon: The adventure at Seattle’s Chittenden Locks, including the amazing salmon ladder and lush botanical gardens.

— — —
To know about new videos when they’re released, Subscribe on iTunes or use the RSS feed. To see all videos, see the YouTube page.

Read related articles

1. Quick Chill Winter Video
2. The Radical Act of Kindness that Floored Me at a Seattle Farmer’s Market
3. Why Pike’s Market is a MUST SEE place in Seattle
4. How Color Transports You Across the Seasons (& A New Winter Wallpaper)
5. Up the Green Trail to see blue Rocky Mountains

I had to face this amazing reality one sunny day after I’d just stumbled into the Queen Anne farmer’s market. The entire experience reinforced in me how magical travel can truly be.

This all happened on day 55 of my West Coast Adventure — an adventure that would last over 150 days. I’d been in Seattle for a few days already, and I was enjoying soaking it in. It reminded me of Portland; but, despite being nicknamed the Emerald City, I was disappointed that there were less trees and greenery mixed in with the urban environment than there were in Portland.

Don’t get me wrong, though. Seattle had its high points, too. And as this series progresses, that will become more obvious. But let’s get to the farmer’s market and the amazing act of kindness that resulted.

Stumbling into Queen Anne

One sunny day in Seattle, while walking to the store, I stumbled right into the Queen Anne farmer’s market. I’d seen the street before; but now it was transformed as a variety of farmer’s booths and food were on display, and it looked delicious.

If you’re not that familiar with Seattle, Queen Anne is a neighborhood in Seattle on the northwest side of the city. The neighborhood is called Queen Anne because it was built on top of Queen Anne hill, which happens to be the highest named hill in the entire city. At a maximum height of 139 meters above sea level, it’s definitely a good neighborhood to walk to if you want to get some good exercise!

The PLUOTS are here! Oh, the Humanity!

Without a doubt, the most memorable products being sold at the market were some very unique hybrid fruits from a company called Tiny’s Organic, because they were selling pluots.

Have you ever tried a pluot?

Don’t worry. Despite what it may sound like, it’s not some rare creature from the Amazon jungle. It’s actually a cross between a plum and an apricot; and, speaking from experience, I can say it’s quite delicious. Next to the pluots, another hybrid called peach-cots were also for sale. And if you haven’t cracked the code yet, they were a cross between a peach and an apricot. Free samples of each of these hybrid fruits were on a plate in front of the displays, and both were uniquely delicious.

I recall one of the farmers explaining that these fruits were hybridized by grafting one type of tree branch onto a different type of tree. So in the case of pluots, a plum branch might be grafted onto an apricot tree. The resulting branch will mix the DNA of both the branch and the tree its connected to and produce a hybrid fruit (in this case pluots) from that branch. So it’s kind of like the Frankenstein monster, but with editable produce… and less growling and destruction. (And thankfully, it’s much safer than producing your own hybrid animal monster. And don’t worry: fruits have been being hybridized like this for a long time now.)

The Radical Act of Kindness that floored Me

Across from the strangely delicious hybrid fruits were plethora of flavored salts, ready to be sampled. The jars to a dozen flavors were open, and you could sample each flavor on a piece of bread. The woman behind the table told me that they were a small company that specialized in salt, specifically; and the sign next to the table said “Secret Stash Sea Salts” and boasted that all of the flavored salts’ ingredients were completely natural.

I tried a few of the flavored salts on some bread, and they were quite delicious and savory. Vanilla, Smoked Chipotle, Apple 5-Spice, and Lavender were just a few of the flavors available. I decided that the Lavender flavor was my favorite. But I decided not to buy any since I didn’t feel a pressing need to get salt, and I was feeling thrifty. After all, I still had over 2,000 miles to go before I reached home.

Then out of the blue, as I was walking away, a middle-aged woman I didn’t know handed me a small bottle of Lavender-flavored salt. Apparently, she’d bought it for me. My eyes probably bugged out a bit at that point. Nothing like this had ever happened to me before. And I can only assume that she overheard me say I liked the lavender one the most, which is why she chose that one.

As you can imagine, I was floored and thanked her profusely. I’d never been hit with such unexpected generosity and kindness quite like that before. Has anything like this ever happened to you? It was such an amazing experience being part of an unexpected act of kindness like that, and it really highlighted what can happen when you travel with a positive mindset. If being on the receiving end of this unexpected kindness felt so good, I wonder what she felt.

The Plastic Bag Monster Attacks!

The last interesting element I noticed at the farmers market was a scary (but not really) Plastic Bag Monster. Along with an older man, the Plastic Bag Monster was promoting green practices and spreading the word to use less plastic bags. The Monster was really fun to watch because it was a real hit with some of the kids there. As the monster and the man went from booth to booth, it was playfully growling and interacting with the kids. As the Monster would do this, the older man handed out pamphlets and spoke about the importance of reducing the amount of plastic the city throws away, particularly plastic bags. It was fun to watch this interaction, and it’s definitely a creative way to get people’s attention about the plastic bag problem.

A Mere Prelude…

Stumbling into the Queen Anne farmer’s market was one of the best “happy accidents” to happen to me on the entire trip, because on that day I learned that happy accidents can even give you an opportunity to experience a wave of unexpected kindness, if you’re open to it. Receiving a gift from a complete stranger was undoubtedly one of the most surprising things to happen to me in my entire 150+ day journey to the West Coast and back. And my story is just one example of how travel can open you up to a radical act of kindness.

Yet all of this was just a mere prelude to seeing one of my favorite Seattle landmarks: The Chittenden Locks & Botanical Gardens. There I saw salmon using salmon ladders to enter the Puget Sound, was introduced to extremely rare trees, and even stumbled upon an excellent a-cappella group singing Beach Boys songs.

All about those amazing experiences soon…

But can you find Marco?

While you anticipate the story to come, see if you can find Marco in all of the photos from that day. As always, Marco continued to follow me, and he didn’t hide in the shadows this time either, so you can narrow your search to the brighter spots in the photos. (Though I warn you, the last two photos are particularly challenging, and you may want to zoom your screen.)

If you’re new to the “Where’s Marco” game, read this first.

So what are you waiting for?
Head over to the Queen Anne Farmer’s Market album and find Marco! —>

And Now

Continue the Journey —>

— — —
Photos from this event are in the Queen Anne Farmer’s Market album. All photos in the Byteful Gallery are under a Creative Commons license. With so much free content on Byteful Travel, why not tell a friend?

Jump to a Citypage to explore deeper:

Read related articles

1. Why Pike’s Market is a MUST SEE place in Seattle
2. Seattle Quintet Singing “Blue Skies” a-cappella is THE Antidote to Winter Video
3. Seattle’s Chittenden Lock Miracle: How the Salmon Were Saved from Oblivion
4. What is the Most Incredible Aspect of Seattle’s Space Needle? (A Photo Essay)
5. A Hitchhiking Failure, Craigslist Success, & Portland’s Welcoming Rainbow

And although it may seem obvious which one is more desirable, making a conscious decision about which one you want to experience isn’t always an easy feat. Or rather, it isn’t always easy realizing that you do indeed have the power to choose, in every situation. But rest assured that you do.

Experience has taught me this time and again, and today I’m going to begin to share with you a new way to look at fear and risk while travelling, how to spot when an inaccurate belief rears its ugly head, and how using this new perspective played out in my own experience. Because I want to cover a lot with this topic, I’ve broken it up into two separate articles. In this first article, I advise you to buckle your seat belts, because we’re going to look fear straight in the face, face the shadows of your mind, challenge how you perceive danger and safety, and nearly kill a cat.

Beliefs are always a choice

As you travel more and more, you will encounter more and more people who amaze you, annoy you, excite you, weird you out, and inspire you. And this is all by design, and extremely instrumental for your growth as a person. Occasionally however, you will come across a thought pattern that conflicts with your personal experience in a certain area. For instance, you may encounter a person who insists that a certain drink you don’t enjoy (for instance, cow’s milk) is important for your health. Now whether or not you’ve been very healthy for years without this hypothetical food item is usually not the person’s concern. They have their belief, and they may even feel that it’s their personal duty to “save” you.

Similarly, you may meet someone who believes that riding a particular bus or train service is fraught with terrible danger; and they may proclaim that you won’t make it out alive, despite the fact that you may have ridden this bus or train dozens of times and found that other kind people were aboard, as well.

While the first is merely the example of someone who is misinformed, the second is far more insidious. It is the projection of a belief system based around fear. And often this fear isn’t perceived as a choice by one who harbors the fear. Instead, it is merely thought of as a “fact of life” or worse, clung to like a security blanket. But these beliefs are always, and ever, a choice. And the real truth comes out when they are tested and verified. The process of realizing that a fact needs to be tested and carefully picked apart and weighed before it can be believed is the process of Discernment, and it is a life saver.

Shell of Your Understanding

Often when travelling, I come across individuals who harbor vast range of limiting beliefs like this. They may be terrified to use a certain service of which I know to be safe, or spooked at even the mention of visiting a certain place that I’ve found to be quite enjoyable. And to be completely frank, when this happens it makes me sad. It makes me sad because I see a powerful being, a human being, who can create whatever they want in their life, who can set their course for any rising star… and they choose to succumb to fear. They choose to give their power away to something outside themselves, and in doing so, keep themselves in a box of their own making.

Yet if they fail to explore even the nearest boundaries of their beliefs, how will they ever break the shell that encloses their understanding?

Perceptions aren’t always Truth

As the above examples illustrate: Other People’s Perceptions are not Truth. This is very important. A person can perceive the truth, yes, but the truth always goes deeper than any one person can understand. A perception alone is not truth any more than an eye is a beam of light. Or put another way, the chances of any one person’s fears coming true are always probabilistic, meaning they aren’t set in stone. If you go to XYZ place at XYZ time, there is no guarantee of anything, because that’s the nature our shared reality. Many minds are creating their lives here, and there are uncounted numbers of variables to consider. The process of making smart choices is about understanding risk as well as understanding the bias of the person warning. However, as we shall see, you can bend these probabilities to your whims, to your side.

Anyone may perceive danger. Anyone may perceive safety. Different people may see opposites. Even in the same place. Even at the same time. You may have noticed this in your own life, and when this occurs it means that the two people have profoundly different beliefs about what they’re perceiving. You see, perception is filtered through their belief system just like light filters through shaded sunglasses. But as my most recent longterm trip reinforced, it’s much more than that. Much, much more.

Observation is Creation

You may be familiar with the famous Schrödinger’s cat experiment in which teeny-tiny reactions happening at the quantum scale affect something on our not-so-tiny everyday scale. What Schrödinger had no idea of when he invented the thought experiment was that it was also the perfect way to explain why our perceptions effect our reality in such a profound way, even to the extent of actually creating reality around what we expect to see.

I’ll explain.

In the thought experiment, famous physicist Erwin Schrödinger envisions a sealed box containing:

1. A living cat
2. A container of poison
3. A Geiger counter
4. A radioactive triggering mechanism

If the Geiger counter detects radiation from the radioactive trigger, it shatters the container of poison thereby killing the cat. However, the radioactive trigger is decaying so slowly that there is only a 50/50 chance that it will trigger the Geiger counter an hour after the experiment is begun.

Because the trigger is a radioactive process, quantum physics comes into play. Therefore, after this one hour has elapsed, both realities have been superimposed upon the box.

Say what?

When you apply quantum mechanics to an everyday scale, strange things happen. This thought experiment implies both possible outcomes of the experiment exist simultaneously… until the box is open. But before we open the box, the cat would simultaneously be dead from the poison and alive and well because the poison never would have been released. Basically, before you open the box, the outcome of the experiment is like a “wave” and not a particle. It’s not a realized reality yet. However, when you look into the box you “collapse the wave”, and you see the cat either alive or dead. By observing the experiment, an outcome is decided. By measuring what has happened, you create the outcome.

Obviously a cat can’t be both alive and dead at the same time, right?

At least, it can’t in our shared reality. But this is precisely what happens on the atomic level with quantum physics… all the time. (Just ask your local quantum physicist.) Clearly the Universe is a lot more weird than we could have ever imagined.

The Focus-Reflection Model of Reality

Schrödinger, who was a personal friend of Albert Einstein, designed this thought experiment to show how the behavior of particles behaving as waves in the quantum scale just didn’t make sense in the our everyday world. In fact, he described that if this model of reality were true on the everyday scale, if the cat were actually in both states at once, it would be a “blurred model” for representing reality. And while Schrödinger clearly has trouble accepting this as how reality works in his original article, he does admit that, “In itself, it would not embody anything unclear or contradictory…” since “There is a difference between a shaky or out-of-focus photograph and a snapshot of clouds and fog banks.”

What if Schrödinger didn’t take his idea far enough? Or, taking another angle, what if he did take it farther but no one would publish any ideas “crazier” than that?

Schrödinger’s “blurred model” of reality could better be described as the “Focus-Reflection Model” of reality. Meaning, what a person focuses on is what coalesces, manifests, and reflects back to them in their reality. I’ve seen firsthand how my own (and others) beliefs dramatically shape the reality around them. In the past, I’ve written about how this can happen in outright weird ways. In fact, if you’re not familiar with the intention-manifestation model of reality (also known as the “Law of Attraction”), I highly recommend you read “How I Solved my Travel Dilemma in 60 Seconds using the Law of Attraction” as it will give you greater clarity on what I’m describing here.

But if I had to sum it up, I’d say that, based on what we’re learning about the true nature of reality, you shape your life more than you could ever realize. Events that you think are out of your control… are reflections of you. Your specific set of beliefs, attitudes, and expectations affect what the wave collapses into.

You are the one who decides if the cat lives.

Continue on to Part 2 —>

Read related articles

1. How to Spot Inaccurate Beliefs While Travelling: Magic of Choice (& Couchsurfing)
2. How I Solved my Travel Dilemma in 60 Seconds using the Law of Attraction
3. How to Balance Blogging and Travelling
4. How I used Intention-Manifestation to stop an Identity Theft (& had fun doing it)
5. Interview with Seasoned Hitchhiker Irv Thomas: Part 3 “Living & Travelling Subjectively”

Today I’m going to share with you an otherworldly place that allows you to easily overcome the boundaries of both space and time. Today we’re going to leave the modern world behind and enter the world of the Ming Dynasty over 500 years ago.

I had only been in Portland for a few days when I first laid my eyes on the entrance to the Lan Su Chinese Garden in Portland, the prime Chinese cultural heritage site in the region. The Lan Su Garden encloses a full city block and was created in the style of Portland’s sister city, Suzhou; and its presence created a beautiful contrast to the western architecture around it. Surely, its high walls must have been protecting a hidden world inside: a world that I would soon see. The name “Lan Su” is from “Lan Su Yuan” which means Garden of Awakening Orchids. And even from the outside, the sense of sacred ground gave the air a texture of charged mystery.

I entered to find a small anteroom where smiling people offered me a visitor’s guide. I took one, and when I looked beyond I saw a strange flower-shaped entrance that opened up into the Garden itself. (And, as I discovered later, apparently I was followed.)

I walked through.

At the time, I didn’t know that these types of gardens are often referred to as living landscape paintings in which the Tao itself is said to overwhelm the people inside; but now having been inside, I can see why. Uncounted serpentine walkways lead through strangely-shaped passages. A zagging bridge juts across the meticulously-designed Lake Zither. And special Lake Tai stones sit quietly all around, carefully placed to appear as tall mountain peaks throughout the Garden’s landscape. In fact, over 500 tons of stone were shipped from China to create the Garden, and the effect was unmistakeable.

Every Plant is a Symbol

I looked down at Lake Zither and saw pink lotuses. They seemed perfectly placed, and later on I learned that lotuses were placed in Lake Zither because they symbolize the essence of purity. As they sprout up from the bottom of the muddy lakebed, they are cleansed as they grow though the water and eventually emerge above the lake in their full beauty. To the Chinese people, the lotus symbolizes rebirth through the life cycle of bud, blossom, and seed pod.

In a Chinese garden each species of plant is carefully chosen for its symbolic value. Pine, flowering plum, and bamboo are all included in the Garden and are collectively known as the Three Friends of Winter because each plant adapts the winter well. To the Chinese people, they are living examples of the virtues of strength, flexibility, and integrity. In fact, the Garden contained over 500 species of plants, and over 90 percent of the Garden’s plants are native to China. With that in mind, it didn’t surprise me that over 70 Suzhou craftsmen lived in Portland for nine months to carefully build Lan Su Yuan. The attention to detail was immaculately authentic.

Finding Harmony between Architecture and Nature

I continued wandering around the enlightened landscape. Everything was meticulously designed and thought out in advance. There was poetry in every element. Inside one of the small buildings, I admired an expertly-trimmed bonsai tree set between two small Chinese dragon figurines, and I was amazed at how standing in that room truly did make me feel as though I was in the East.

Here, water complemented stone. Shadow offset light. Interiors and exteriors were balanced, all to manifest the Tao, or Way of Nature. In the distance, I heard the sound of a waterfall cascading over rocks, and the noise of the city was no more. Around me were jasmine, wintersweet, and osmanthus flowers that awakened the senses through all seasons.

It may surprise you to learn that there are a number of small buildings within the Lan Su Garden, but this is normal for a garden created in a Ming dynasty style because these gardens were traditionally part of the extended living space for a wealthy family. Placement of these small buildings is considered the most important element in the layout of the garden in order to harmoniously integrate architecture within the natural world.

To say that the builders of the Garden were clever is an understatement. They deliberately used many different traditional building forms to make the Garden appear larger inside than ever could be imagined from the outside. But for all its mysterious spaciousness, my favorite elements in the Garden were the small details.

No Garden is Complete without…

A key detail of Lan Su Yuan, a detail that some completely fail to notice, is its poetry.

In Chinese tradition, a garden can boast majestic lake stones, hundreds of plants, and amazing integration between architecture and nature… and it all would still be incomplete without poetry.

Thankfully, Lan Su Yuan is indeed complete, enchanted with an abundance of poetic inscriptions. All around the Garden, you can easily discover poetry engraved onto huge stones, doorways, buildings, and pavilions. Granted, unless you can read Chinese you probably won’t have any idea what the poetry is about, but the mere presence of these poems lends a unique energy to the Garden. And if you ask politely, someone nearby may even be able to tell you what one of the engravings means.

Traditionally, the owners of gardens like these were scholarly officials in the Ming imperial court who had grown up within a culture that valued the craft of poetry writing and recitation highly, so poetry was naturally included in these gardens to add another level of intellectual pleasure to the visitor’s experience. Poetry allowed conversation across time and space between poets, as well as between gardens.

Which is the greater poetry?

Khalil Gibran once wrote: “Beauty is Life when Life unveils her holy face”; and I believe that this veil is pulled away, if only partially, within this Garden’s walls.

Once you allow yourself to calm your mind, the Lan Su Chinese Garden can and will transport you across time and space, to a place of great wisdom and quiet reflection. That is why I highly recommend that anyone who values beauty or wisdom visit the Lan Su Yuan. A visit to Portland would certainly not be complete without it.

Before I left the Garden, I took some time to appreciate a small violet flower just before it bloomed. I captured that moment, and the photo above is the last picture I took before I left. I’m grateful that it turned out so well, because it captures a piece of the poetry of the Garden that my words cannot. Perhaps even greater than the Chinese poetry engraved on the Tai stones, is the poetry in the tiny details that are more often overlooked.

For is there not even more poetry in a flower about to bloom?

Most cherished in this mundane world is a place without traffic;
Truly in the midst of the city there can be mountain and forest.

~ Wen Zhengming – Ming poet-artist (1470-1559)
Inscribed on a panel in “Flowers Bathing in Spring Rain Pavilion”

The Journey Continued

And not long after, I headed onward up to Seattle. I would return to Portland, but not before I explored the Wonders of Seattle; and the first wonder I saw was Pike’s Market where I met a street performer who played the strangest instrument I’ve ever seen in my life…

Continue the journey —>

— — —
Photos from this trip are in the Lan Su Chinese Garden album. All photos in the Byteful Gallery are released under a Creative Commons license.

Jump to a Citypage to explore deeper:

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3. Top 5 Portland Sights from a Remarkable Walking Tour & An Amazing View
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Too often we hold expectations of ourselves to do something that we don’t actually want to do in the first place. Often this arises from obligations we’ve made in the past, inaccurate perceptions of what we should do in the present, or a combination of both.

The secret is, even when travelling (in fact, probably especially when you’re travelling), that you need to listen carefully to your intuition, to your heart. Some people would call this their gut or their intuition, but since emotion arises out of the heart, I’m going to refer to this as your heart for the purposes of this article. What does your heart tell you about where you should go? Only when you can learn to listen to your heart, as well as your head, will you be a truly balanced person.

A Hilariously Distinguished Lecture

What can happen when you start listening to your heart/intuition more?

I’ll share an example.

Last month, I took a spur of the moment trip to Madison. I wouldn’t have normally gone to Madison on short notice, but a good friend told me that Merlin Mann, hilarious productivity speaker extraordinaire, would be speaking at UW Madison as part of their Distinguished Lecturer Series.

And a distinguished lecture it certainly was..
No, that’s wrong. It was an absolutely hilarious distinguished lecture.

All the tickets were free, and there were only a few hundred people in the theater which had a capacity of 1,200 people. (However, it’s worth noting that failure to reach even half of the capacity was probably due to the fact that an apparently popular band called Death Mouse was performing in Madison that night.) But those who decided to go to the Death Mouse concert instead of Merlin’s talk really missed out. I’d seen videos of Merlin’s talks before, but this was the first time I’d seen him in person. And maybe I’m biased (maybe), but the talk was more hilarious and enlightening than any Death Mouse concert could ever be. Not only did we learn a lot more, but we laughed a heck of a lot more, too.

Positive Reinforcement or Negative Reinforcement?

Going down to Madison again reinforced an idea that I’ve been playing around with for a while now, which is that Excitement is the best motivation. Now, in “modern” western society, motivation seems to stem primarily from fear. Some popular fears include: fear that you’re not going to make enough money, fear that you’re going to be hopelessly lonely if you travel solo, or even the fear that your email is so incredibly overflowing that you’ll never be able to handle it so you just won’t think about it.

Basically, when these types of fears are used to spur action, that’s negative-reinforcement. And while dealing with these fears certainly spurs growth, there are far more effective (not to mention healthier) methods of motivation.

In my experience, the varying types of positive reinforcement are much more effective and lead you to take more action. Paying attention to what you’re actually excited about, paying attention to what you really profoundly care about, and choosing to grow these aspects of your life and acting on them can be incredible motivators. Consciously deciding to do these things is one of the most profound decisions you can make in your life, and it will have untold positive ripple-effects.

Merlin’s talk addressed the role of fear, too; as well as the role of self-management and the difference between intelligent behavior and unintelligent behavior when dealing with communication channels like twitter, email, and even phone. In a nutshell, his talk focused on how to use your time and attention truly intelligently; and with the plethora of inboxes we have in our lives today, his message has come at just the right time.

How I met Merlin Mann and a Surprise

Coming down to Madison on the spur of the moment wasn’t all rainbows and sunshine, either. It took a fair amount of arranging and planning, but I knew intuitively that this was something I had to come and see. And even before I arrived, I had a strange feeling that I’d end up having a good conversation with Merlin. I had no evidence for this, but sure enough a small group of us were able to talk to Merlin for about 2 hours after his talk. And having followed his work for a few years now, as well as being a huge fan a podcast he helps create called You Look Nice Today, it was a fantastic experience to be able to have a long candid conversation with him; and I was really thankful. (i.e. I basically as excited as a Japanese schoolgirl at a Cosplay convention. It was pretty ridiculous.)

Imagine that you got to sit down and have a 2 hour conversation with your favorite author… or movie star… or whatever. It was like that, (except that Merlin is much more genuine than most movie stars) and I’m very thankful that he took the time to talk to our small group of remaining people after his talk. He gave a few people enlightening advice on their careers, gave us some interesting insights on the podcast, and was basically open to talking about anything.

It was a delight to say the least, and if one is happening near you, I highly recommend you see one of Merlin’s talks. They’re quite hilarious, especially if Merlin thinks he’s having a stroke (you’ll know what I mean when you see him); but more importantly they’ll give you a totally new way of thinking about your work.

Below, I’ve attached Merlin’s Time & Attention talk from earlier this year. (The talk he gave at Madison isn’t online yet.) The talk below is over an hour, so you probably not finish it in one sitting. But I warn you, once you start watching it, you may have trouble stopping.

No posts relate.

That’s what I did yesterday. I went out to stretch my legs and get some fresh air, and luckily my camera was slung around my neck.

It’s true, I could have processed the next batch of photos from last year’s epic journey to the West Coast and back; but instead of discussing the past, I’d like to share with you something beautiful (and often taken for granted) that’s happening all over the North American Midwest right now.

The Quietest, Slowest Rain

You see, it’s raining very, very slowly right now, even as you read this.

But there’s something strange about this rain. This rain won’t get you wet, and it lasts for days and days every year. The rain that falls now isn’t a rain of water, it is a rain of leaves.

As I was walking back, I noticed a leaf fall beside me, and the still voice within me told me to halt. And so I completely stopped.

And listened.

I looked under a maple and waited. After a minute or so, I saw a leaf fall. Then another. After spending some time to stop and really take in my surroundings, I realized that roughly once or twice per minute, one or two maple leaves would make an infinitely small crackling noise, and then fall slowly to the ground.

The trees themselves were raining. I began to listen, and in my listening I started to realize what old monks mean when they say that contemplating nature itself is a meditation.

The Magical Bed of Radiant Mapledrops

It’s been over 3 years since I’ve photographed the autumn colors here in Wisconsin. I was lucky this year because I found a place (as you can see above) that had a very even bed of bright orange leaves. To say this yard was completely untouched may be an understatement, but I’ll give the house’s owner the benefit of the doubt since they were probably on vacation. And the way that the sunlight streamed through those golden leaves from above was something of the Essence of Autumn here in Wisconsin.

I find that the best autumn colors occur in Humid Continental climates like that of Wisconsin (and no, that doesn’t mean it’s always humid); and if you have never experienced an autumn in a Continental climate, I highly recommend it. No other autumn comes close. And only by consciously choosing to stop, take a breath, and be really aware of what was happening around me, was I able to appreciate it.

But there’s also a lesson behind the lesson of today.

Just because creating something is beautiful and sacred, doesn’t mean it has to be difficult. In fact, when you act on inspiration, it feels easy.

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Photos from this walk work absurdly well as a desktop wallpaper (or for just sharing with friends). They’re in the An Orange Wisconsin Autumn album. All photos in the Byteful Gallery can be used as desktop wallpapers and are released under a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND license.

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Read related articles

1. How I Found Beauty in Late Autumn
2. A Rainbow and Purple Rain over Mt. Galbraith Trail