On measurements and perspectives

Postcards from Equanimity #013

“Wandering the immeasurable”, homage to our journey in discoveries in Physics so far, and those still to come. CERN, France.

Between life and death there is a library,’ she said. And within that library, the shelves go on forever. Every book provides a chance to try another life. you could have lived.  To see how things would be. if you had made other choices ... - The Midnight Library – Matt Haig

Here it is.  A baker’s dozen.  To all of you, the few and the brave readers of my missives, a thank you from the bottom of my heart for being a part of this journey so far.  When I started, I suggested that I may write to you each week.  Now I accept your thanks that I didn’t follow through on that threat. 😉

For me there is an ongoing evolution with every post.  And my sincere hope is that to some extent it is true for you as well.  Should I lose you in what may be a long post, allow me to say now, I have a favor to ask and an offer to make.

Favor: If you read this, and think someone else would like to read it, please share with them and/or share their email address with me so I may add them to the list.  Or visit at www.jeevun.com/blog

Offer:  I am exploring the human condition, living itself.  If there is anything that keeps you curious, that you would want to read more about or share, please drop me a line. I would love prompts to explore as we keep this caravan going.

Onward.  The opening quote above is from one of my reads from this year and easily one of my most favorites books of all times, The Midnight Library.  I won’t spoil it for you, but it is the story of a young woman at life’s crossroads and what choices may lie ahead.  This is a lovely treatment of the idea of dealing with who we are so we can become who we want to be.  If you haven’t read it, please consider doing so; this book has resonated with many in my social circles.  If you have read it, I’d love to hear from you on what it meant to you.

As many of you may know I certified as a life coach in mid-2021, my personal angle at sublimation of the calamity of COVID.  I also turned 50 this year.  Through my readings and contemplations, I have arrived on this understanding about age: you need sufficient lived experience in any given arena, and certainly life overall, before you can start figuring out what it’s all about.  I dare not wax philosophical on the math of it, but I guess that’s why there is a mid-life, which should be a point of assessment and hopefully not a crisis.  May our past inform our future but not dictate it.

The other related thing I sort of knew already but intend to start putting some deliberate weight behind for general consumption is that in the realm of causality we humans often tend to look for a singular answer.  Maybe it is our schooling or maybe the heuristics that come from the simpler cause and effect experiences of early life. But when you study philosophy and religion even at a topical level you may start to see common themes of duality, trinity, and more numerical combinations.  So my evolving state of thought is that nearly everything lives on a spectrum, not in singular states.  Most of us are capable of thinking about 11 things at a time, and at other times of blocking everything out to focus on something that we enjoy.  Similarly, in the realm of opinion, there is no one truth but the unique perspectives of each of us from where life finds us.  We have many thoughts seemingly at the same time and sometimes even in conflict to each other.  They are kept sorted by relying on context. (Content matters but context is king!). As thoughts lead to feelings, thus we are able to experience many feelings, even opposing ones, at the same time.

So, try an exercise.  Outside of hard sciences, and established matters like how to drive your car or bike, give some deliberate space to the idea of multiples.  I say deliberate because you do it already maybe without thinking about it. e.g., you go to work and deal with problems while also looking forward to going home and enjoying a show or time with family.  It is as if we grow from seeing causality and outcomes as dots to lines then maybe at times as two (train) tracks running parallel but not merging due to irreconcilable aspects. Eventually, we can arrive at a point where this thoughtscape is like a loom with threads going in multiple dimensions in a plane with some fluff (distractions) flying above and below.  That is the evolution of our intellectual lives; we are weavers at this loom, the masters of our dominion.

There are lessons in literature and social media about how to feel better or how to feel more in control. Some focus on unitasking, others on massive actions, yet others on various gamuts. To say that there is any one way that is the only way may be driven by marketing or agenda of a given author, but it doesn’t negate that you are capable of handling opposing emotions and conflicting views and need not discard parts of yourself to feel any which way by someone else’s measure. Yes, deep work requires focus on one thing and shallow work can be multitasked. You need not give up your authority as the loom weaver to satisfy someone else’s view of a linear or parallel outcome. Be you. Revel in your growth and trust your abilities.

I wrote a note some time ago where I mentioned I am in the bardo.  And I said I would explore what that means to me.  I can’t say I am ready to leave that construct but I can say that my state of mind about the experience has substantially shifted.  As I reflect on the fact that a year ago I shared thoughts on how we see ourselves and our experiences in comparison to other humans, I want to end this post with this one lesson from my corner of the bardo.

It is in our nature to set expectations, attempt to accomplish them, and then sometimes to measure the outcomes.  What has been a truth hidden in plain sight, perhaps laid bare by our pandemic driven focus on self-assessment and healing, is that more often than not we undervalue what we accomplish and overvalue what we think didn’t work out.  Humans are loss averse, even at the risk of giving up some gains: we see what we did not accomplish as a loss.  Which brings me to another wonderful book that landed in my lap this year, The Gap and The Gain.  The authors explore how we see progress, or lack thereof, in our life.  One of their conclusion is about why we set goals in the first place:

I don't think we set and achieve goals in an effort to become happy. We do it because we are happy and want to expand our happiness.

Dan Sullivan, The Gap and The Gain: The High Achievers' Guide to Happiness, Confidence, and Success

So if we set out to feel accomplished what is a more balanced approach to dealing with unmet ones?  The authors share another conclusion:

The way to measure your progress is backward against where you started, not against your ideal.” —Dan Sullivan

Benjamin Hardy, The Gap and The Gain: The High Achievers' Guide to Happiness, Confidence, and Success

The image below addresses the notion of ‘accomplishment’ in the context of circumstance and timeline.  We are much more likely to use the ‘common narrative’ where at the end of our effort we may find ourselves disappointed by a goal not met.  But we must ‘shift the narrative’ and start to see with a wider lens that more often than not we are farther along from where we started, even if we didn’t make the initially set goal.  This progress is the basis for future growth just as it can be the basis of equanimity.

December is the heart of winter holidays in our part of the world.  The ending of the year, or the holidays, will bring a natural time to reflect on what the year has meant to us.  I hope you will be able to give yourself the grace of a fair timeline with respect to your self-assessment of achievement.

I will take my leave with a joke, which stresses the simplicity of solutions we sometimes don’t see until we change our perspective.

How do you stop a bull from charging?!?

Well… you cancel its credit card.

Happy holidays my friends.  ’Til next time.

P.S. Again, if you enjoyed these reads, please share far and wide, or direct your friends to reach out to me so I may share future postcards with them as well.  I would love to add more people to our tribe.  They can email me at akash@jeevun.com  Or you can direct them to this blog. 🙏🖖

Relearning the intentional living

“To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all.”

Oscar Wilde

Today is my 50th birthday. While I am still exploring the meaning of that duration of my existence on this planet, here is an adjacent short experience I can share, in intentionality.

As I approached this “big one” as many like to call it, I have been taking a stock of my physical body so that I may effect repairs. I was always lucky to have a low resting heart rate but my blood pressure has been rising. Now that my back pain has abated, I have been revisiting yoga and breathwork.

Yesterday, when I was feeling a bit out of sorts, I checked my blood pressure and it was high. As I have begun the process of medical visits, I also thought I might play with numbers a bit.

So I sat down in my office chair, reconfirmed my high blood pressure, and proceeded to do a deep breathing exercise. After 5 minutes or so of doing that, I rechecked my pressure and it had reduced.

While I explore long-term solutions, this short term bandaid of breathing reminded me the power of living intentionally. If 5 minutes of breathwork can start to show measurable improvement in my body, imagine what I can do with 30 minutes of breathwork and yoga three times a week.

As long as we live, our life will have both good and bad in it. We create a sustainable peace of mind, even happiness, by being deliberate about what to tackle and how. I hope this short birthday post will serve as a reminder for you to check your mindset, start moving your body more/regularly, and reach out to friends and mentors when needed to evaluate your ongoing choices.

Lots of questions, and a couple of answers

Postcards from Equanimity # 010

Scenes along a half marathon, Mt. Dora 2021

It's Christmas Eve 2021 as I put the final touches on this note. I wasn't planning for this note to go out today but why fight the outcome! As the year comes to a close, I am assessing my progress and also your interest.

Would you indulge me please and answer by way of replying to at least one or perhaps all the questions below? And I will answer some too.

a. What has been the best part of this newsletter for you? What's the worst?

b. Some of you have given explicit feedback. For those who have never written back, what topic would interest your engagement?

c. I have been putting the posts on my blog as well for posterity. Would you be more likely to read on a blog or in an email?

d. What are you looking forward to the most in the coming year?

And the final question...what did you learn last weekend? This one I will answer too.

Things I learned last Sunday:

1. I can walk a 10K pretty much any day once I am off the couch and stretch my lower back a bit.

2. Completing a half-marathon without appropriate training is just asking for trouble.

3. I don't particularly like running or training for running. But I should keep moving regularly as if my life depends on it. Because it does.

4. Florida is humid, no matter how pretty. Most of the race the weather was pretty hot, even for December

Before my Mom and Dad's recent health issues, I had signed up for a half-marathon months ago, thinking I had enough time to be ready, lose some weight, and generally speaking get more active and healthy. But unlike one of my friends who is the epitome of routine dedication to physical effort, I am less consistent. Of late I had the excuse of too much going on in family life. Still, I decided I would do my best to be ready, walk a lot, and show up to race day. That's most of the work right there anyway. Showing up.

The race was hard to be sure. There were many points where turning back seemed easier. But I had to walk my talk; I have been telling my kids that when having to make a choice between two things the right choice is usually the harder one. Especially where physical effort or a sacrifice from us is involved.

I was planning to mostly walk the race. There was a pacer for the 3 hour finish group. This is a half marathon; my best time ever was 2 hours 20 minutes. So 3 hours seemed doable. I tagged along with that group. Somehow the race organizers found all the dunes and up and down roads in Florida and plopped them on the race course. The pacer was doing 90/60 splits. Eventually I fell behind the 3 hour group and finished in just under three and half hours. Quitting came to mind at the beginning, around 4 miles, and 10 miles. But each time I persuaded myself into "2 more miles and we'll see".

At the end, I did finish. I got a towel and a T-shirt to remind me of the day. Then I went home with a few lessons:

• Finishing, no matter how unglamorous, feels amazingly better than quitting. When things get tough, we can coach ourselves into giving a bit more. When faced with adversity, the best question to ask yourself is: what are you making mean? If we see the situation as an obstacle, we are dejected. But if we can find our way to seeing it as an opportunity then the mind settles down and lets you attend to the task.

• Preparing for any big task be it a race, a new entrepreneurial venture, or a talk at an upcoming meeting can seem tough. But planned well it can break down into small, doable bits. All you need to bring is periodic focus and consistency. I wasn't as consistent this time, and I paid the price for it on race day.

• Experience matters. Nearly a decade ago I spent a year training for a marathon, which taught me a lot of lessons about heart rate, running stride, hydration, mindset, etc. Since then I have done a few long mountain hikes and a couple more half marathons. Every time, the prep is a good indication of the outcome. The same is true for really anything we do in personal and professional life. And when we are falling short, we can often lean on experience to get us through. It has a huge effect on mindset, above all, giving you belief that you can make it.

• Start where you are. The one thing that I was able to solidify between miles 9 and 11 is that while this race was a near disaster, it is not impossible to recover from a nadir. The key is to understand where we are, focus on a goal, and get going. The old cliche about a journey of a 1000 miles begins with a single step; well, the first step demands that a second follow. When I finished the race, my knees were not hurting. My feet and right calf were a different story but the knees and back held. So even as I finished and sat in the recovery area I knew that the only way to salvage myself is to not stop moving. Since that day I have been active every day in some capacity, be it walking, pilates, or body weight exercises. Now I just have to keep showing up daily. Next half marathon, sigh I know there will eventually be a next, will find me better prepared.

As I finish this note it is the morning of the 25th. My girls were up late watching TV. We just finished an hour plus gift opening session and everyone seems happy. Going for a walk now, our present to the dog. Will bring some cookies for the firefighters who are around the corner.

Last question: Can we pretend that I meant to send this post on Christmas Day all along?

I am working on three posts simultaneously so we will have to see which one finishes next. Wish you and yours all the merry and bright cheer and may darkness be gone from your lives in the coming days.

P.S. All my posts now live on www.jeevun.com/blog

In the meantime

Postcards from Equanimity # 009

"Leave the anxiety. Take the bread."

In the weeks that have passed since my last post, as I explore the next steps of the story that I am telling, I miss writing to you. Whether it is because the connection of even one response is so meaningful to me or that the writing itself is always therapeutic.

Since I shared my burden with you, allow me to share my relief. My mom was discharged from the hospital last weekend and is now in a long term care rehab facility. She is still weak and will take weeks to months to recover. But for now, she is getting better, and more responsive. And that is enough.

Life goes on for all of us. There is a balance in it, as we take things one day at a time. I will soon get back to what we started in exploring in the Maslow pyramid. But just to bridge the meantime, I wanted to share this.

I like cooking. The joy isn't just in eating but more in serving food to others. Growing up in a house where both my parents cooked well and often, it was natural to want to be like them. In my college years I worked at a convenience store with a deli so I learned to make sandwiches. And thanks to basic cable and food shows I learned to explore other cuisines. Indian food can be hard to make but I have learned the basics.

But the one thing that has been particularly elusive is learning to bake, especially making bread. This past week, I managed my best ever outcome so far in making crusty french bread. The friends who read this blog have some supremely talented people amongst them who make a vast array of foods. So you can understand my joy at mastering something simple, when done for the first time.

This holiday season, if you plan to cook for friends and family, I can vouch for this recipe. All I needed in terms of equipment were: a stand mixer, a dutch oven, a kitchen scale, and measuring spoons. All I needed to learn for my breakthrough was the idea that one should not manipulate, and certainly not punch down, the dough between the first and the second rise. That's it. That was all I needed to do differently.

There are umpteen billion recipes on the interwebs but the one that worked really well for me is on another blog: https://www.lifeasastrawberry.com/easy-crusty-french-bread/#anchor

If you bake and you get a chance to try this, I hope you find the simplicity of this recipe as enjoyable as I did. Thank you for reading my posts. As the year winds down, I hope you are in a good place, with all the peace and joy for you and yours.

More soon.

Detours and Pauses

Postcards from Equanimity # 008

"Dearly beloved, we’ve gathered here today to get through this thing called life." - Prince 

Built into this life thing, there are detours and there are pauses.  The detours may or may not be distractions, are just as often unintended as not.  But the pauses are quite often instructive, a lesson bundled into a packet of time, presented to us as an offering to teach a lesson.

I was planning to write about clothing in this post, the next block in our Maslow's hierarchy grid after the last post's discussion of food.  But my Mom was hospitalized last Thursday for acute decline complicating her late stage Parkinson’s disease.  I was actually scheduled to go to San Francisco to attend a family wedding.  Since I already had time off, I diverted my plans to Ohio and was able to spend time from Friday night thru Tuesday visiting with my Mom.  She was diagnosed with unexplained encephalopathy, was stable after initially presenting with severe hypothermia, was occasionally responsive but showed some progress from my first day to the last during my brief visit.  Heading home from that visit, I began writing this post.

For those three days in Ohio, a part of my brain was on pause.  No matter how much I tried, I couldn’t focus on anything well.  Given the situation, that was ok, and understandable.  As I was sitting in a corner in my Mom's room, between her paroxysmal waking spells, the steady beats of an ICU room pacing my thoughts, l was starting to think that this was a pause, not a detour.

Beyond trying to engage my Mom to see if she would respond, suctioning mouth and nose secretions and adjusting her pillow and the towel rolled under shoulder to better position her neck, there were long moments of holding her hand, talking with her, telling her how much I love her, and that she is, of course, the best mom in the world.  The pause was not stillness.  It was a deliberate collecting of myself, stepping off the fast paced road of daily to-dos, to walk back and forth from memories of my past to the hopes for my future.

My mind was looking to create sense and meaning of that moment, and my brain was the switchboard operator offering to connect so many wires of thoughts traversing the length of time.  My Mom was comfortable; she needed a thermal blanket to help regulate her body temperature for most of my visit although there were a few hours after the lumbar puncture when she managed without it.  I devoted time to reviewing all her imaging and lab tests; all were normal with regard to the acute situation, and I felt frustrated that I didn't have an answer.  I thought of all the past events and imagery at my disposal to replay in my mind, in short or in toto.  I tried to tell my mom a joke or two to see if she would chuckle as she usually does.

By the time I was leaving, my elder sister was in town (my middle sister lives in town).  We were exchanging information and making plans of care.  I was feeling guilty for leaving but had to go back to Florida to attend to my job, and all the other humans who depend on my showing up at certain places.  After working a few days, and getting news of stability, I returned this weekend to spend more time with my Mom, and be here with my sisters and my Dad.

To put salt on wounds, OhioHealth hospitals only lets one person go in at a time under Covid rules (two person policy at my hospital), and the front staff was being difficult about changing the designated people with or without proof of vaccination and screening.

My mom has managed to protect her airway, no intubation, temperature has normalized, is slightly more responsive, and is minimally recovered with the tube feeds.  I had a long chat with the hospitalist taking care of her this weekend, to layout a plan toward being able to bring her home.  He agreed with my suggestions.

My closest friend is a palliative care physician.  He listened to me and counseled me on my choices, which I am conveying to my non-physicians family members.  There are many misconceptions around the word 'hospice' and different people need different amount of time to come to terms with the illness of a loved one, especially when there is a sudden downturn.

I guess I have been going through stages of grief too.  In my mind there has been the prolonged experience of letting go of my Mom, watching her decline over the years.  But she surprised me by recovering so well from Covid last summer that once again, perhaps as I did when I was a child, I felt that my Mom will be around forever.

Now as I am exploring the nuances of home care vs hospice care, my mind jumps ahead to next fall, perhaps without my Mom around.  Human beings are strange in how we process information that isn't "live" in front of us.  I am jumping ahead to that future life without her but also jumping back to all the years gone by, looking at photos of my Mom and I, when I was a baby, a teenager, and through adulthood.

Sitting here late at night, I am holding on to this pause, where there will be a lesson.  If not now, then later.  At least it feels like a pause.  My Mom going through Covid last year felt more like a detour, where she came out slightly worse off but still with us but I didn't learn any particular lesson.  Now I am at risk of losing her in the near future. Once you lose a parent, you become a very different person.  I know I am not ready and also that I am.

"You, me, or nobody, is going to hit as hard as life. But it ain't about how hard you hit. It's about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward." - Rocky Balboa, 2006

I know I have what it takes to keep moving.  I appreciate being able to share this processing of my feelings, and hope to also someday share the lesson.  Some lessons from prior pauses when it comes to caring for my parents have been:

1. You must have a hobby, something you look forward to other than work. If you don't, and you stop working, you brain will die a slow, agonizing death.

2. You must have a conversation with loved ones about how you want to be cared for when extremely sick.

3. We must cherish all the moments with our loved ones, even the ones where we didn't see eye to eye. We must learn to love hard, be easy to forgive, and truly let bygones be.

Grief can take our strength away but mourning can restore it.  I am mourning the loss of vitality and awareness for my Mom.  She is still with me, and will still have moments of lucidity, for which I will forever be grateful.

As a physician who sees cancer patients, I have seen my share of death and explored people's thoughts on dying. We must do a better job of discussing our expectations around end of life care.  We must communicate well, and clarify how we want to die.  We must balance the needs of those who live and need to come to terms with letting go and the one who is ill and must be able to live their final days with dignity and quality of life intact. We must do so in order to attend to the more desirable task that comes before dying, living an intentional life.

This holiday season, above all, I will wish peace and clarity to all.

This Body of Food

Postcards from Equanimity # 007

What does a nosey pepper do?

Gets jalapeno business.

Speaking of getting up in your business, what did you eat for lunch say 3 days ago?  Was it healthy?  Does it matter?

Do you eat to live?  Or live to eat? Are you a foodie?

Enough questions?  

Here are my answers in brief.

Hummus and bread sandwich with pickles before leaving for a flight on Thursday afternoon.  I definitely live to eat (though I truly admire people who eat to live).  As much as I love food, yeah I am probably what you may call a foodie.  If taking pictures of your food counts, guilty! Sigh.

While you indulge this beta exercise in fleshing out my method and message, and while I am still learning how to make full on questionnaires that would allow us to quantify Maslow’s hierarchy, let’s enjoy some short term gains. 

Food is a cornerstone of Maslow's hierarchy.  While there are platters of opinions and smorgasbords of literature about food, we all come to some personal understanding of the matter that is evident in our habits and health.  The fact that what we eat often quite directly affects how we feel is evident in good and bad ways.  The fact that many of us eat emotionally is mostly maladjusted behavior, though common, and could use some attention.

But why is food a basic level component in the hierarchy?  Because regardless of the nuance of quality and composition, one thing that pretty much all experts agree on is that food provides energy as well as building blocks for our physical bodies.  What we eat literally becomes us.

I have been overweight most of my adult life.  Emotional eating, mindless grazing, and eating for entertainment have been a part of my existence at various times.  So recently, when I started some serious reading about food and sleep (courtesy of my excellent doctor) I was contemplating not just the eating but what it leads to… my body.

Despite my weight, I have done some active things.  Ran a marathon.  Done hiking and attempted mountain climbing.  This week I am starting a new experiment with caloric deficit by logging and proactively managing what I eat.  Though ultimately I hope to lose weight, my goals in doing so is not aesthetic but functional.

Our physical bodies allow us to interact with the world around us.  Depending on our chosen professions and recreational pursuits, we need not all look the Instagram models of fitness.  But what we really must ask ourself is a simple question: is my body serving my needs?

My body is currently not serving all my needs.  My day job is sedentary but through Pilates and rehab I have overcome back pain to a substantial extent and now want to be more active again.  Probably not going to run a marathon but will walk a half marathon before the year is up. Ultimately, I am aiming to lose 3 stones and change; let’s see how long it will take.

Logging what I eat, sitting with perceived need when the mind just focuses on food out of habit not hunger, and re-learning to enjoy the texture and taste through prolonged chewing.  Human joy can come from very simple changes.  But the multitasking world can sometimes make us go astray.

Most of the readers of these posts are actually quite healthy.  But some may still have the same concerns about food as mine.  I invite you to think about the questions I posted above.  And is your body serving your needs?  One of the natural consequences of this Maslow exercise will be that we spend more time than before in exploring and evaluating ourselves, and not just paying attention to all the external information that is directed at us.  I’d love to hear from y’all about how food figures into your life.

Have a nourishing week ahead!

A Tuesday night...in Fall

Postcards from Equanimity # 006

Okay, it's already been 336 hours ago since I wrote to you. Random and semi-regular, funny or otherwise.  This share is time sensitive.

Fall is my favorite time of the year.  To be honest even more than winter. You want to know why, right?  Because sometimes the anticipation is almost as good as, no, it's better than, the experience that we seek.  It's true, human psychology and all.  I bet you can think of at least one situation where the lead-up to something you had been looking forward to was full of tangible joy, that you hold and twist and turn in your imagination, almost to the point of being better than the experience. When you are in the middle of a very enjoyable experience a part of your mind is already dreading that it will end.  Plus once the experience begins a satiety factor also goes into effect.  Together these start to take away from the joy a bit.  This attrition of joy may actually be almost protective in keeping your mindset from suddenly falling apart when the end comes. But when you are in anticipation phase you don't have these concerns.  Basically, all your mental energy is focused on the joy of the experience.  Silly, isn't it!

So fall is my favorite time of the year.  It is the sound of the warbler and the nightingale, as they flock to fly south for the winter, the preparation for the actual event that is to come.  For us humans that event is the holiday season.  But more than that, depending on where you live fall also stands just fine on its own, offering a lovely closure to summer, a change in the weather, and hopefully a change in the foliage.  Winter was my favorite time of the year growing up; I looked forward to snow days off from school.  Then as a resident in New England I was lucky to experience some magical falls.  Those memories call on me every October.  Wherever I have lived since I have been able to appreciate the subtle shift in the collective mood of humanity around me.

So what about you?  Do you have any fall memories you cherish?  Fall traditions?  (I'll be honest Halloween is my least favorite holiday though I do my best to enthusiastically support others who love it.)  

How do you recall your memories? My memories have soundtracks.  The natural go-to for fall, especially on a crispish morning when one may be on a walk or driving to work, is the quintessential fall song- Autumn Leaves.  If you know the song then you know it has been recorded by many performers, the most popular versions are in English and in French, and there are instrumental versions as well.  Here are my two of my favorite versions, and a fall bonus:

Edith Piaf - Autumn Leaves (Les Feuilles Mortes)

Frank Sinatra - Autumn Leaves

Diana Krall - Autumn In New York

While these tracks flesh out my mind's memory palette, this fall has also gifted me a new experience, the making of a new fusion memory.  This past Tuesday, as my Floridian self was reminiscing fondly about those New England days, and enjoying the background play of the above links, my "smart" phone offered a follow up song it decided was related.  I was about to change the track but it was evening, and being in a relatively mellow mood, I let it play on.  That song was Walking in Memphis by Marc Cohen. It whisked me away to a whole new dimension.  As the melody of a song will attach itself to your amygdala, it's the lyrics that can help construct the 3D fabric of space where an event happens.  Verse by verse Beale Street materialized, on a dark evening, with cold rain, as the singer, and I, found our way to a cafe.  A sandwich plate, a whiskey to warm us up, and a piano in the corner with a capable musician.  I have not been to Graceland yet though if memory serves there are hardwood trees on Beale street that change colors in fall.  It was as if the undercurrent of fall found its way into this song's narrative.  From there my mind took an unexpected journey across my life and times.  Fall in Jacksonville giving way to fall in St. Louis.  Then Chicago.  And Seattle. Even Wilmington, Delaware, my hometown in my teens.

For a good 10 minutes I was able to summon the autumn of many cities, and relive the joy of them all.

In reading about the eastern traditions, the notion of meditation is one that is a bit hard to pin down for a beginner, sometimes even for a practitioner.  There are many way to meditate.  Though the "classic" approach is to emptying the mind vessel, it may be more practical to try to focus the mind on a single moment in time or a desirable event that happened to us.  This is nothing more than intentional manifestation of an idea.

There is great power in our memories.  Using sound, in this case music, to focus our mind on a particular moment, a place, or a phase of our life can effectively be a form of meditation.  As you experience fall wherever you live, I invite you to explore your memories of this season.  If you can, create a space, a favorite nook of your house, perhaps with comfort of a beverage, and take 10 minutes to drop all agendas and just sit with your memories of fall.  You may find this journey relaxing and refreshing.  You may find you come out of it with a new, easy energy. While it is likely that we all have a myriad of emotions and memories of each season, the goal here is to pick a positive moment and build on it to see what comes forth.

Give it a go and if you do I'd love to hear how it went for you.  Wishing you productivity as well as peace for this weekend and the week ahead.  

The iterative continuum

Postcards from Equanimity # 005

What did the earth say to the giant rock hurtling through space in its direction?

Comet me bro!

How is your fall going mon ami? For some reason I have never been crazy about the word friend in addressing an actual friend.  Crazy, I know.  It isn't really an issue only I am slow to come around on some things, as we may discuss eventually.  So 'mon ami' just sounds so much better, no?  A rose by any other name perhaps? But I digress. (Already?!)

I had an eventful middle of the year, partly from the unrelieved monotony of many summer days, though that may be hard to explain.  The highlight of the summer was a short trip to NYC with family and friends.  I will write about it at a later date.

I hope we are settling into the idea that these postcards are not as regular as the moon circling the earth rather more like a comet that takes longer to come around.  Yup, I'm that tiny white dot at the bottom left, coming back around again! 🙂

When last I wrote to you there was a monumental task ahead; I may have thought it would be a short hike up a hill known to me but it turned out to be a strenuous climb up a proper mountain that was a new beast.  In literal sense it was my goal to read the original paper by Abraham Maslow, 'A Theory of Human Motivation', originally written in 1943.  I won't lie that it was a dry start.  But once I got into it I found it to be quite insightful.  I aim to share my reflections in the coming months.

Okay, you know you want a preview.  A few simple, clean observations:

1. The idea that our basic drives don't entirely explain our behavior fully leaves room for the ethereal nature of what it is to be a human, and not another animal.  Maslow acknowledges this unique trait readily but doesn't explore it in much detail in this paper, leaving the introspection up to the reader.

2. Religion is one form of "world-philosophy" that allows humans to organize the universe into "some sort of satisfactorily coherent, meaningful whole..."  This is in part motivated by safety-seeking, a second level need.

The biggest takeaway from reading that article was that the hierarchy and its basis are far more nuanced than is made apparent in that pyramid schematic we have all seen.  And so there will be much to contemplate on repeat reads.  I look forward to carving it up some more and bring you choice pieces to bite into.

When I delay writing the underlying emotions of doubt and fear are borne partially from the relative lack of safety in leaving the comfort of my mind, and sharing words with others, knowing full well that they may be rejected or ignored.  Overcoming this doubt is the goal, and the path to growth.

While I have been moving like a glacier through a trough I am fortunate to have a great peer coach and also friends who are encouraging.  As I said earlier, sometimes we are slow to come around.  But adversity in various arenas may actually cause us to grow in a way that we didn't think was possible. In my case working my body through Pilates has helped me understand the saying shared by the Buddhist Zen and Stoic traditions:

"the obstacle is the path."

What does that mean to you?  Have you explore zen philosophy or the stoic tradition? I am still racking my brain on creating a way where we can discuss these things as individuals and as a community. I am not sure what level need that is on Maslow's hierarchy. Well, I have an inkling but I really want to hear from others too.

Here's my invitation to you : think about how your summer transpired.  Was there any sticky point?  How did you overcome it? And if not how are you working through it?

Y'all are most welcome to write back.  I'd love to hear about your experiences.

ON DOUBT AND ABSENCE

Postcards from Equanimity #004 - written 6/24/2021, published 7/1/2021

Dear Friend,

I have been away far longer than planned or desired. Though my reasons for absentia are varied and boring, two things are true.

First, in my delay and subsequent inertia to getting back to the writing desk I am often thinking about the reader. What will he think? Will she even care? Should I give up? Does not writing on time mean I failed already? So forth. It may seem a silly thing, I know, but one I share both as just that but also as a reminder that doubt and imposter syndrome plague us all. So while I bring myself back to a grounded state by believing that you are generous and will be there when I write, I also hope you are able to believe in your moments of doubt that whatever it is that you are struggling with, the struggle is real but overcoming it is just as real, and achievable.

Second, I started writing about Maslow's hierarchy and the things that took me away were both pleasant and ugh.

On the pleasant side, I had to focus on the requirements for my life coaching certification (as most of you know I have been studying to be a life coach) and they are all completed. I expect to get my certificate next week. Also, I had a major work related project requiring completion and submission of the application for a new fellowship in Nuclear Radiology at Mayo Clinic Florida, for which I will be the program director. That was a slog! Now fingers crossed and waiting for approval.

On the 'ugh' side, when I sit down to write about Maslow I am immediately plagued with doubt. And then I start questioning the whole enterprise. But this will be overcome gradually. I am assuring the midwestern in me with tried and true phrases like 'go big or go home' and 'ain't nothing to it but to do it'. Little mantras that bring me back to the desk. I am also concerned about the level of detail that is needed and the length of the finished product. Ultimately, I have opted to just follow my heart and write until it feels right. Hey, maybe that can be my mantra: write until it feels right.

In not sending this out sooner, another thought that presented itself the most was that I am not in integrity. I said I would write, and I asked for your indulgence in reading. Both were well intended but intention alone does not get the job done. Whether good or bad, B- or A+ I must write something and send it in order to follow through. So while I am working on that post I woke up last week feeling rested, blessed for the lack of a better word, and wanted to share a look behind the veil, at the goobers and gremlins that live in my brain while I curate the presentable me. I do so in order to show that we all have this happen sometimes. And it's ok. Whatever your goobers may do, forge ahead with your tasks. If you feel yourself derailed, know that you own the train and the tracks, that you have it in you to show up for your plans when you are ready.

Wishing you a lovely Thursday, and I hope to be back in your mailbox again next week.

WHERE DOES A JOURNEY START?

Postcards from Equanimity #003 * - Sunday June 13, 2021

Dear Friend,

Writing is hard, writing well is harder, and writing well regularly is simply the hardest.

I returned from my mountain adventure last Sunday.  Being away is a break from our daily grind.  If you are lucky it opens up enough space in time to allow you to ponder things you don't get to otherwise.  I pondered, and in that exploration lay the answers to some of the many things that may come to call on us at unexpected times during a day. I will explore them in time.

So I spent the week trying to figure out the next step. It would be a bit trite to say that it was just the next step in front of me. If you write then you know all too well the apparent discrepancy between the joy of writing and the frustration of feeling that you didn't do a good job getting your point across. I finally circumvented the mess by giving myself a deadline of Sunday (today) to ship my B minus, minimum viable product. Because you agreed to read my work and I am obligated to secure words to paper for that transaction to take place. I am grateful for the feedback I received on the first two posts. I will re-read and cherish every word someone takes the time to write in response to my writing. Perhaps a small gesture but one with a multiplying effect!🙂🙏

Some things that are worth reiterating and others worth addressing for the first time.

Podcasts and video-based social media are becoming the mainstay of how the new messengers bring their thoughts to an audience. But for me, the written word is still the preferred way to share my views because there is a joy in finding the right word, creating the just-so story, and creating an invitation for a response. So I say I am grateful for your reading this not just because it is true but also because in every utterance of gratitude lies a little gift of recognition that this is a voluntary engagement which is being enjoyed with friends.

It was pointed out that the first post was too long. I submit that is true. It was partly the necessity of the context, explaining well what it is that I intend to pursue in coaching, and partly that I think and write long-winded. A possible solution would be to arbitrarily break up the final post into smaller parts and then send them out over several days. But is that much different than you choosing to read only bits and pieces at a time? I don't know. Though I will also point out that of the 20 people whom I sent the posts to 4 responded, and only 1 of them commented on length. So it is hard for me to know if any length will guarantee high readership, which is why this remains in play. But please keep that feedback coming. I became proficient at Twitter, I'll shorten these posts if I must.

Some friends commented that I should have explained Erikson's stages and Maslow's hierarchy in detail since I referenced them. I submit that is a fair point. While the former may be lesser known the latter is often referred to in popular culture that I assumed familiarity for the purpose of the post. Would you believe I partly did that in order to keep the post short?! Ha. Anyway, I will likely write individual posts about each framework with regard to what it means to me, and how one could make use of either. Again, please know that any and all feedback is truly appreciated. Yes, even the copyediting kind, which is actually really good because I want to increase the likelihood that my words are understood as meant.

I didn't make it to the top of Mt. Rainier. Didn't even get close. Once again the weather was predicted to be rough so I decided I'd get to Camp Muir. On the first day of full climb, a day after snow school, we set out with our full packs. The snow started from the parking lot level up, which is to say there was no rocky, hikeable terrain like two years ago. As we neared the first stop on the mountain, I was starting to feel that I wasn't getting enough air. Even with the pressured exhales I wasn't getting enough air. I felt dizzy and thought it may have been because I had skipped breakfast. As I sat down at the first stop, I was actively debating between continuing up to the second stop or just cutting my losses and going back. In that moment it seemed unlikely that I would make it to the camp.

Now despite my current state of being overweight I have a lot of hiking experience, most recently 30+ miles in the Tennessee mountains, including a single day 14 mile trek. As I was eating my sandwich and drinking water, I was assessing my body for integrity. My legs were reporting no issues. The back was holding against the 40 lb. pack. But the lungs were unsure. I have never experienced altitude sickness before. My friend Vikram, my hiking buddy, had experienced a bit more of it the day before so I was starting to understand the situation. I chose to go back down the mountain because my brain rationalized the voluntary nature of the exercise and threw in a coupling of everything off the mountain that mattered more, and had a bind over me, compared to the joy of getting to the camp. As I walked back down, I knew in my heart that I'll want to come back. I don't know when. Then I spent the last few days building a rational path toward that return; it happens to go through hiking on the Appalachian Trail, climbing some other non-snowy mountains, and getting my body into better conditioning. So, all in all, a lesson well learned.

The title of this post speaks to my state of mind over the last few days combined with processing the information that my posts may have been less than clear. Just as I am clearer on my path to wellness, in writing I continue to refine the value proposition toward the idea that sharing these thoughts may serve to celebrate and strengthen my bonds with friends and community.

When faced with multiple issues and complex decision trees, where to begin the journey? Although the age old adage 'a journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step' is true in this case the more useful phrase may be "start here." More often than not, we take our existence and surroundings for granted and sometimes we are unable to begin a transformation because we don't give enough time to process where we already are, the beginning. When thinking of pursuing a new direction, remember that any new task will almost certainly squeeze your existing landscape of daily living and resources. Only when we create a defined space and time to ponder the issue can we see the logical beginning step. It doesn't have to be by flying across the country and trying to climb a mountain. Even an hour each day on the weekend, an important appointment on the calendar with yourself will do the trick. I had a birthday this past week, and that is exactly what I did. I read the feedbacks, thought about why I write, remembered my positive intention and created a timed goal. It got me to get rid of some of the cobwebs of writer's hesitancy and block, and got me through to this point of completion, B- work and all.

Unless the feedback demands otherwise, in the next post I will share my thoughts on Maslow's hierarchy and what it has meant to me, a prequel if you will before we continue the saga of a quantifiable, data driven life. I am thinking of calling these messages 'postcards from equanimity' because that is what I envision our collective journeys' destination to be while we are here and sentient.

I hope that you have a wonderful week and that reading this far serves as a catalyst to help you contemplate and introspect on issues that you may be pondering. I am working on defining a platform to allow comments and interaction for anyone who wishes to do so, in the aim to build on the foundation of A rising tide lifts all boats after all. I leave you with a view from my high point on the mountain.

Happy Sunday!

P.S. As I said I am opting to call these emails 'Postcards from Equanimity'. This is postcard number 3.

I managed to create a page on my blog that will have just the coaching posts. This is the third post and it has a maximum of 30 posts allowed per block. I figure by then I will know how to get the website better organized. You can access all the coaching posts at

Unless the feedback demands otherwise, in the next post I will share my thoughts on Maslow's hierarchy and what it has meant to me, a prequel if you will before we continue the saga of a quantifiable, data driven life. I am thinking of calling these messages 'postcards from equanimity' because that is what I envision our collective journeys' destination to be while we are here and sentient.

I hope that you have a wonderful week and that reading this far serves as a catalyst to help you contemplate and introspect on issues that you may be pondering. I am working on defining a platform to allow comments and interaction for anyone who wishes to do so, in the aim to build on the foundation of A rising tide lifts all boats after all. I leave you with a view from my high point on the mountain.

Happy Sunday!

P.S. As I said I am opting to call these emails 'Postcards from Equanimity'. This is postcard number 3.

I managed to create a page on my blog that will have just the coaching posts. This is the third post and it has a maximum of 30 posts allowed per block. I figure by then I will know how to get the website better organized. You can access all the coaching posts at

https://www.jeevun.com/coaching

All the coaching posts will be housed there.

METRICS AKA “IF YOU CAN’T MEASURE IT, YOU CAN’T MANAGE IT

Coaching Post # 002 - June 4, 2021

I am learning a lot and for the rest of this year I want to rediscover my love for the written word. I will aim to write regularly, and share with friends who may wish to give feedback or discuss the ideas I bring to the table. Here is the first post that I have written since my post about life coaching itself. That post is housed on my blog and can be found by clicking here

I am away from home this week, trying to climb Mt. Rainier. For the second time. But that is a story for another day. While I am here, I am able to create some mental space for continuing my explorations around life coaching and personal development, and in doing so aim to offer some value to those who choose to read these emails.

When I decided to pursue formal training in life coaching, one of my old ideas came back to the forefront, to create a quantifiable model for what is otherwise a qualitative realm of personal development. There is a large body of work in this area, from which a few writings substantially resonated with me. One such concept is Maslow’s hierarchy of needs and another is Erikson’s stages of psychosocial development. As with anything in psychology these are not laws but constructs, frameworks for viewing an aspect of life. This notion of frameworks will recur in future explorations. And within frameworks lives a subset concept, which is metrics.

There is a fundamental maxim in the business world — if you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it. Like any maxim this one requires context. In this case, we can say that measurements have to be meaningful, and relatively simple, in order to be useful to whatever is being managed.

Maslow’s pyramid, as known to us, is a qualitative framework of personal growth resulting from one’s needs being met. If we can create a quantifiable model of the same then maybe we could use it to check in with ourselves at any point during this journey of life. It would be a reasonable guess that most of us dream of achieving a point in our life where we have no unmet needs and our life is “near perfect”.

When we are fulfilled we may be better able to assess what “self actualization” actually means to us. But let’s start this journey from the first step. The first thing we can measure is our physical body. This is close to the first level of the pyramid, the physiological needs. There are so many ways that we can measure the working and well-being of our body. And every minute of the day someone is willing to see you a widget to measure heart rate, steps taken, EPOC etc.

So here is the first tip in measuring, courtesy of one of my teachers — my running coach. If you are (or are planning to be) physical active and considering using the many parameters of performance, here’s one way to simplify that goal.

Check your heart rate first thing in the morning, even before you roll out of bed or sit up. Do this for a week and you will have your average resting heart rate. (By the way you can simply check your heart rate with fingers on neck pulse, or use one of your widgets!)

When you exercise on any given day, if the next morning’s resting heart rate measurement is greater than your average resting heart then your body has not fully recovered and you shouldn’t engage in more strenuous activities (until it returns to baseline).

There are many athletes who don’t necessarily follow this rule and their bodies are both working and recovering. But especially for those who workout infrequently, or newly active, following this tip will help reduce injury and also help build cardiovascular ability. As you remain active, your resting heart continues to improve so you have to keep that track as well.

This is not a concept that is commonly followed but I found at least one informally written post about the concept.

https://theathleteblog.com/athlete-resting-heart-rate/

Next time I will highlight another aspect of our basic needs as we are working from food, clothing, shelter and up. Today’s post is loosely under the physiological aspect, adjacent to food.

Thanks for reading.

P.S. I would appreciate your feedback on the content and readability, etc. Also, if at any point you don’t wish to receive this regular communication just let me know and ‘poof’ all future emails will disappear from your unread box. :-)

AN OLD IDEA RETURNS…

Coaching Post #001 - May 23, 2021

As I continue in a life coaching certification program, I have to record some practice sessions of coaching. When I asked my friends for help, it also occurred to me to combine this project with my always standing desire of writing regularly (um, this poorly attended to blog counts!). This is the first post I wrote to some friends who were willing to help me with my coaching sessions. I am posting it here for posterity.

Dear Friend,

A few weeks ago, you were one of the people who kindly agreed to help me by being coached as part of my training. Firstly, thank you for your patience as I am getting my act together. As most people who responded are physicians, you can appreciate that our main gig has unpredictable parts and gets in the way of the side gig! 😊

In the coming weeks, I would like to engage you for a session, with audio recorded for my certification. I hope that you still have time but just reply either way and let me know.

This specific school of coaching relies on a specific construct, and I need to demonstrate competence for that in about 20-30 minutes. But each session is actually 45 minutes and I want to both practice AND offer you some value. I will tell you more about the logistics if you are still interested.

In the meantime I want to share the who/what/why/how of it all, something I have been working on as a foundation of this process, and while it is lengthy is should give you some insight. If you have questions arising from this reading, or commentary, please send it my way.

Who: I am your coach. As most of you already know, I am a practicing radiologist, working at a major multispecialty clinic/hospital. I have been in my day job for 16 years and going. I feel grateful every day to be doing something that is personally, professionally, and financially fulfilling. Since finishing my training, I have worked in both private practice and academic settings. Being at the mid-point in my career, in addition to my clinical work I have already had the privilege of guiding many trainees and colleagues in their career and life choices. Along the way I also completed an MBA to round out my general knowledge of the business world and operations, something that we don’t learn directly in medical school.

Why: We are all sharing this common experience of the recent pandemic although its impact has been quite disparate depending on our physical location in our country. The most relevant part that I can put forth is that Covid19 created an involuntary slowing down of life, and gave me a chance to contemplate life in a more concentrated way than before. As I was exploring these ideas around existence, accomplishment, responsibility, and purpose I stumbled on to life coaching. I first encountered professional coaching in the form of executive coaching when I was an MBA student at Wash U. In the business world coaching is very common, both at individual and group level. Having had that experience, and being fascinated with personal growth as well as organizational behavior, I was drawn to the notion of a broader platform of life coaching, which also touches personal and financial issues, but can be offered outside of the professional realm to any individual or groups. In our case the sessions are 1:1 (for now).

What: “All coaching is life coaching.” I came across this definitive assertion in a book on coaching. When you think of a coach, who comes to mind? Here are some that you may think of: Phil Jackson, Peter Drucker, Bob Bowman, Bobbie Knight, Bill Belichick, Jon Wooden, Pat Summit, Joe Paterno. You may know some or all of them.

But how about our parents and other adults in our lives as we were growing up? Our teachers, siblings, friends, and those who cared for us in various arenas. How about us ourselves?!

To show you that we have all been coaches at some point in our life, allow me to offer you the nature of life coaching. The best way to think of a life coach is a navigator who is accompanying you on a journey through the landscape of your thoughts. A coach creates and holds space that allows you to express, analyze, and absorb discoveries around your beliefs, especially the limiting beliefs, as most obstacles in personal growth come from a place limiting beliefs that must be overcome. The common things being common, there is a trend for coaches to focus on weight, health, addictive behaviors around eating and drinking (alcohol), but also around anxiety, relationships, life events. But the framework that supports coaching in my training can be applied to many other aspects of life as well, in both broad and a very targeted way. And beyond this construct there are still more frameworks to consider.

As part of my training, the goal is the practice the application of this model. Now going back to us, each of can think of a time when we helped someone see through their issues, solved a tough problem, or just thought out loud on what could be. To truly understand what coaching is, we should be clear on what a coach is not.

A coach is NOT a friend, a mentor, or a therapist. This is crucial. Even though I am a radiologist/doctor, as a coach I am merely trying to help you see your own thoughts, be a reflector, and help with prompts and reflections toward a clearer understanding of the present. I will not offer therapy or any medical advice. If the present is found to be suboptimal or not meeting stated goals then I can help you formulate and clarify your intention and goals. Of course, you are in charge the whole time. You are the driver, and I am just your navigator on this rally across adventurous, sometimes muddy road of life.

If this offer of exploring our thoughts and feelings resonates with you, let me know and we will get our first session on schedule. I look forward to hearing from you.

Happy Sunday night!