Is it serious? Up Enjoyment to Bliss Filled Without Trying

While walking in a park one calm and cool autumn, from out of the enjoyment of a ten minute moment, with trees bathed in fall colours, with birds—black-eyed juncos, chickadees and sparrows—pecking among leaves and squirrels running around like maniacs, from out of the overcast white sky comes a question.

Is it serious?  

“It depends,” you say. “What is “it”? Is a mouse serious? A mouse thinks so. That’s why he runs. Owls think mice are serious. Survival is serious to survivors. Owl and mouse do owl and mouse things to survive just as humans do human things to survive (except with TVs, toilets and machines). The difference is, whereas a mouse and owl won’t understand what “serious” is, a human might.

Think of it as a game. (Cue music: Stakka Bo, “Here We Go Again” (1993)).

In the first chapter of Finite and Infinite Games (1986), James P. Carse lays out a theory in two sentences, “There are at least two kinds of games. One could be called finite, the other infinite. A finite game is played for the purpose of winning, an infinite game for the purpose of continuing the play.”

Mouse vs. owl is a finite game. A mouse named Jimmy can escape (win) or be eaten (lose). An owl named Janice can eat (win) or starve (lose). The dead are losers. Death is the triumph of past over future, but if life is the prize for winning, finite players aren’t living. 

What is won in finite games is a title (p. 19). In death, titles replace life. When you die, attempts to win titles stop. We take finite games serious, but in seriousness and certainty we lose awareness of wonder and the infinite game we’re playing.

Beyond the immediate owl and mouse competition (little picture), there is an infinite game (big picture) where owl and mouse play “live and let die” so others can continue.

In an infinite game players play (and die) to keep the game going. Finite games have boundaries, infinite games do not. You can’t actually tell how long an infinite game has been playing.

Is the universe serious? Is air travel, brain surgery and regular maintenance serious? Something is serious or it isn’t unless, of course, what is serious actually isn’t.

Are birds in trees serious? Are fish in seas and people in parks, serious? Is a goose standing on one foot stretching his wings among other geese, serious? Is a woman standing on one foot stretching among other women stretching, serious? Is a man selling drugs to another man, serious? Is a cat pouncing on a sparrow, serious?

Life and death feel serious. Ask any cancer survivor, terrorist or soldier. People who kill themselves are probably over-serious. It isn’t a question of whether it “’tis,” as Hamlet soliloquized, “‘nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,” because we know it “’tis!” Hard as it is to consider, suffering is part of the game so the trick is, let suffering be there without resisting. It ’tis what it ’tis! Do what you can and take what comes.

For millions of people, a lot of the time (most of the time?), life does not feel blissful, as in, perfectly happy, but then, as it is written by the Rolling Stones, “You Can’t Always Get What You Want”, but if you try sometimes, you’ll find, you get what’s agreed.

It’s like the joke Woody Allen told, the gist of which goes, “The food in this place is terrible!” “Yeah, I know; and such small portions.” To Woody, life is “full of loneliness, and misery, and suffering, and unhappiness, and it’s all over much too quickly.”

Something “serious” is important, grave, sombre, heavy, weighty, critical, sincere, in earnest and not trifling (Dictionary.com). Is that how “it” is? Is life grave sombre, heavy, and weighty?

The  Power Thesaurus lists 509 words that are the opposite of “serious,” including: funny, playful, light, unimportant, silly, trivial, lighthearted, ridiculous, happy, laughable, merry, easy,  trippy, unwise and priceless.

How would it feel if instead of thinking it is serious!, you thought the opposite?

What if you could see finite games for what they are? How would you feel, “to be on your own, with no direction home, a complete unknown, just like a rolling stone?” (“Like a Rolling Stone”).

Truth is, a lot of what people think of as “terribly important and serious,” actually isn’t. On and off. On and off. Now you see it. Now you don’t. Here and gone, as if, what was there never was. That is the infinite game we play so others can continue.

A test for what you see as true is to look at your day without effort to change it. Let your day rock and roll as it will. It will anyway, so why fight it? Recognize what you can and can’t do. Alter what you think is true and with a rock and roll mindset, you are free to swagger because nothing can hurt you.

Don’t get what you want? Forget it. So what? Someone slights you? Big deal. People don’t know what they’re doing, if they did, they wouldn’t do it and there wouldn’t be problems. Instead of swimming upstream, enjoy flowing (see also The Art of Enjoying).

Live without worry and strain. Why not? The less you strain, the more free you are. There is only so much you can do. Beyond that, you’re helpless. Enjoy it. With this realization, comes the freedom to enjoy an infinite game. Look on the light side and give a whistle.

“Why so serious?” shouldn’t be just a catch phrase reserved for homicidal maniacs like the Joker.

As Joni Mitchell sang it starting in 1969, “Enjoy both sides now” because you can’t have one without the other.

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References:

Carse, J. P. (1986). Finite and Infinite Games: A Vision of Life as Play and Possibility. THE FREE PRESS, A Division of Macmillan, Inc., New York. See pdf: https://wtf.tw/ref/carse.pdf.

Enjoy A “You-day-mon-I-am!” Inspiration

This is the world. The world is as it is. It is not as it isn’t. The world is an interconnected balancing act. Some people say humans came from the hand of God. Some say they came from aliens or from rocks, water and sunshine, but any way you slice it, it’s really quite amazing.

Cue music: Ravel, “Bolero”.

Like alternating current (AC) and direct current (dc), the world is positive and negative. Clickety-clack. Clickety-clack. One thing leads to another on the train of days we call life. We hope something incredible will happen—if we’re lucky, if we’re blessed, if a genie grants our wish—but magic doesn’t come from outside.

It is an interaction.

As Sir Isaac Newton observed, “Every action has an equal and opposite reaction,” which means, “The bigger the push, the bigger the push back” (Propulsion). It’s like ping pong.

Everything is put into place and goes from there. There are good people. There are bad people. Sometimes good people are bad. Sometimes bad people are good. They’re inconsistent and situational even when they think they’re being spiritual (and/or reasonable).

The world is beautiful and horrible at intervals. We oscillate between positive and negative emotions every minute on our way to enjoying. Throughout history it hasn’t just been girls who wanna have fun. It’s everyone.

Everything humans do revolves around surviving and enjoying. They go together like bread and butter. It’s hard to enjoy if you’re not surviving and if you’re surviving without enjoying, what’s the point?

High-income countries have the highest prevalence of heavy episodic drinking (source).

That could explain why suicide is the tenth leading cause of death in the world. Globally, one million people commit suicide each year (source). 44,193 Americans commit suicide each year and of those, many are drug and alcohol related (source). 

Party on, Dude.

The trick is to enjoy, but not all enjoyment is equal. Behind the eyes of another is a consciousness that is as you are. The workings of another’s mind is reflected in words and actions. If you’re not enjoying, you could do some rewiring. Neurons that “fire together, wire together” (source). Everyone’s brain is capable of physical change.

Neurons firing at the same time develop a physical connection. Through self-awareness and mindful practice you can structure yourself sane, sensible, and not prone to weeping.

We all want to experience as many joy filled experiences as we can. Las Vegas and Disneyland were built on that desire. It’s why we love eating doughnuts (as opposed to just looking at them).

Let’s get started.

In this age of entertainment, where people are immersed in computer generated fantasy or escape through drugs and alcohol, it’s interesting to see that people are still singing, “I can’t get no satisfaction. ‘Cause I try and I try and I try,” like Mick Jagger (“Satisfaction”).

Why is there no satisfaction?

Everyone is searching for something but what that “something” is is sometimes uncertain. Watch reality TV and you’ll see how messed up people can be. It’s as if everyone should be assigned a psychologist at birth to guide them through life.

The ancient Greeks proposed two opposing philosophical traditions for how to find happiness. Aristotle (384-322 BC) called them: (1) eudaimonia (you-day-monia)—right action leading to “well-being” and the “good life,” and (2) hedonic enjoyment—the pursuit of pleasure from sensual self-indulgence.

Eudiamonia combines “eu” meaning “good” and “daimon” meaning “spirit” (“god” or “godlike”). Eudiamonia literally means “having a good guardian spirit”.

Socrates’ daimon.

In psychology daimonic refers to one’s drive towards individuation—the things that distinguish you from everybody else.

Eudiamonia asks you to live in accordance with your daimon or “true self” and hedonism asks you to enjoy an experience where you believe you’re getting what you want and feel the pleasant affects of that belief (source).

But ideas change over time. Daemonic is now associated with a fiend motivated by a spiritual force that is evil, but daimonia is really about a feeling of unrest that forces you into an unknown that leads you to “self-destruction and/or self-discovery” (source).

In “Two Conceptions of Happiness…” psychologist Alan S. Waterman writes, “The daimon is an ideal in the sense of being an excellence, a perfection toward which one strives and, hence, it can give meaning and direction to one’s life” (p. 678).

Socrates and Plato thought human beings wanted eudaimonia more than anything and Aristotle—that eudimoniac!—rejected hedonism saying, “The many, the most vulgar, seemingly conceive the good and happiness as pleasure… they appear completely slavish, since the life they decide on is a life for grazing animals” (Aristotle, 1985, p. 7).

But Epicurus—the hedonist who was like Jesus (Christians and Epicureans shared social practices)—put the two opposites together. He didn’t advocate pursuing any and every pleasure. He identified eudaimonia (the flourishing life) with the life of pleasure and freedom from distress (Eudaimonia).

To shape a state of mind that is eudaimonic, here’s what to do:

First, cultivate virtue through: (1) apatheia (literally “being without passions” like a stoic) and (2) ataraxia (literally being “without trouble” or “tranquillity” like a hedonist). Second, stop thinking like a critic. Third, sing, “Chh chh-chh, uh, chh chh-chh, uh. In the summertime, when the weather is hot. You can stretch right up and touch the sky” (“In the Summertime”).

The world—Reality—is a hand in your face waving, “Hey Dude! Wake up Dude! (Reality sounds a lot like Keanu Reeves). “See that sky? That’s me! See those trees? That’s me too, Dude! If you see the world, you’re in the world. You’re the world seeing itself! WHOA! That’s heavy, Dude.”

Reality answers every question. It speaks every minute. Even when you’re sleeping, reality sleeps with you. The wheels are in motion—spinning, spinning.

Reality says, “Feel the grass under your feet. Incredible, right? The reality of your feet and grass feeling is reality happening. You don’t have to believe there are flowers. There are flowers! There are hummingbirds, rhinoceros, butterflies and robins fluffing feathers under sprinklers.” 

But like in dream where all the roads are congested as you choke on exhaust feeling “stuck in the middle” on this “eve of destruction”, is there anything you can do? Of course there is!

Do nothing.

It’s an effortless Chinese wu wei non-doing in harmony kind of thing. Practice not doing and enjoy yourself in not so doing. It doesn’t mean you’re a slug. It  means to sing, “Don’t worry about a thing because everything’s gonna be all right” (“Don’t Worry About A Thing”). Let muscular tension go. Relax and let time pass (see also: Enjoyment and Enlightenment and A New Way of Looking).

Just duck it. Duck it all anyway. Like a duck in a pond, float without purpose or boredom. Let your face go slack like an idiot and enjoy it. Float with euphoria and swim in living. The whole environment is the duck that’s in it.

“Quack. Quack.”

Feel aware of yourself feeling aware in the world you’re in and like Daniel Boone sing, “Hey, hey, hey, it’s a beautiful day” (“Beautiful Sunday”).

Enjoy! Enjoy! Enjoy.

References

Aristotle. (1985). Nicomachean ethics. (T. Irwin, Trans.). Indianapolis,
IN: Hackett.

Waterman, A. S. (1990). Personal expressiveness: Philosophical and
psychological foundations. Journal of Mind and Behavior, 11,47-74.

The Enjoyment Argument

Starting the day with an argument isn’t fun. Maybe some people enjoy a rip-roaring argument in the morning (sets the tone for a rip-roaring day!), but most people don’t.

Arguments can feel threatening. Threats can activate the fight or flight response, like the song: “The foot bone is connected to the leg bone. The leg bone is connected to the knee bone…” except it isn’t bones connecting; it’s brain chemicals and physical effects.

When we argue, we sing the “Fight or Flight Song” (set to the tune of the Delta Rhythm Boys’ “Dry Bones”): “The amygdala is connected to the hypothalamus. The hypothalamus is connected to the pituitary gland. The pituitary gland is connected to the adrenal medulla…”  and then it’s: “Release the hounds!”

Or rather, “Release the hormones!” First adrenaline then cortisol causing: “increased heart rate, bladder relaxation, tunnel vision, shaking, dilated pupils, flushed face, dry mouth, slow digestion and hearing loss” (source).

Great for running from killer air-planes when you need bladder relaxation, but not when arguing about money, underpants, the existence of God or the Big Bang Theory.

We can try to stick to facts, but emotions get in. A rock and roll philosopher can be left feeling somewhere between the Rolling Stones’ “Paint It Black”: “No colour anymore!” (see also orchestral version) and Annie Lennox’s “Why”: “This boat is sinking.“

Academics, Mercier and Sperber, argue in the “Argumentative Theory” that arguments aren’t about getting at the truth. They’re about winning!

Dr. Jonathan Haidt said of the theory, “Reasoning was not designed to pursue the truth. Reasoning was designed by evolution to help us win arguments” (source).

Bias and lack of logic are social adaptations.

They enable one group to defeat another or, as George Carlin put it, “The problem with the world is that the intelligent people are full of doubt, while the stupid people are full of confidence.” Or, as Patricia Cohen from the New York Times put it, “Certitude works, however sharply it may depart from the truth” (source).

“I’m smart; you’re dumb. I’m big; you’re little. I’m right; you’re wrong!” (scene from Matilda)

Arguments can become loops of back-and-forth like Monty Python’s “Argument Clinic”. Reason is argumentative and people become skilled arguers, but skilled arguers are not after the truth: they want a better argument to support their views!

Reason is responsible for some fantastic achievements, but as Mercier and Sperber point out, we should be cautious with these accomplishments since “failures are often less visible” (source).

Some people blame emotion. 

Researchers at University College London say that rational individuals “can override their emotional responses” (source).

Paintings showing emotion: Picasso (on the left), Chagall (on the right).

The implication being that, rational individuals are unemotional and therefore better able to make rational decisions, but (and here’s the kicker) people left without emotion from a brain injury are unable to make decisions (source) because reasoning is full of emotion (source).

Thoughts are representations of reality.

Thoughts accepted as true become beliefs.

Once a belief is accepted, it is established as a fact that is rarely questioned.

What separates a reasonable person from an emotional person is not, feeling or not feeling. It’s the quality of those thoughts tied to those emotions (source).  The more we believe we know something, the more we ignore contrary information and look for information to confirm our beliefs (confirmation bias).

What we believe is like our personal operating system or window through which we evaluate everything we see.

Phenomena comes in two types. One type can be verified (ice is cold). The other type can’t be verified (do good and good things happen). Verified things are scientific. Unverified things are philosophical and religious.

Of things that can’t be verified, if it is accepted as self-evidently true, it is religion.

Beliefs carve grooves in our brains. Some beliefs start as theories developed from assumptions, observation and deduction. Some beliefs grow from emotional viewpoints that feel logical.

In the “Logical Song” Roger Hodgson sings of being taught to be logical: “When I was young, it seemed that life was so wonderful, a miracle, oh it was beautiful, magical. And all the birds in the trees, they’d be singing so happily, oh joyfully, oh playfully watching me. But then they sent me away to teach me how to be sensible, logical, oh, responsible, practical…clinical, intellectual, cynical” (Supertramp, 1979).

In the song Hodgson wonders who he is and therein is the key. What happens when you notice yourself and what you see?

source

Poetical philosopher Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) said that he not only knew himself as “the scene of thoughts and affections,” but he knew a “doubleness” to being where he could, “stand remote from myself as from another” (Walden and Other Writings, 1950, p. 122). It is from this “doubleness” that we too step back to see how beliefs pull strings.

Some beliefs shaped from childhood experiences can block one’s ability to be happy and free, but as Jiminy Cricket advised, “Always let your conscience be your guide!”

That’s especially true when it comes to enjoyment.

In adolescence we start believing in unhappy thinking and consider self-interest as the primary motivator of human behaviour but in so doing the carefree passion that was once natural and easy in childhood gets squashed by social expectations, subtle shame and criticism.

As comedian George Carlin (1937-2008) observed, “Scratch any cynic and you will find a disappointed idealist.” Mix one part disillusion with two parts pessimism and you get cynicism, but as Nana Grizol sang it, “Cynicism isn’t wisdom, it’s a lazy way to say that you’ve been burned” (“Cynicism”).

Profound enjoyment combines two awarenesses: an awareness of yourself: “This is me! I’m incredulous! I AM ALIVE! CAN YOU BELIEVE IT?” and an awareness of your immediate surroundings wide-eyed in wonder accepting everything as mysterious and better than imagined.

This is when your face goes slack and you see from the sides. It’s when you feel an incomprehensibly beautiful feeling inside.

Click Here.

If this philosophy is to ring true for you, it will depend upon your preexisting beliefs and ability to lighten up.

The light simply won’t get in if you block the way.

Enjoyment is balancing in a tree. It is imagining yourself as the tree seeing itself feeling the existence of being and the sky above.

John Keats climbs a tree and comes up with the poem “Ode to a Nightingale” in the movie Bright Star (2009).

The Men Without Hats advised everybody to look at their hands (“Safety Dance”), so you do, and there, like the poet Walt Whitman (1819-1892)⁠—who also looked at his hands⁠—see a hair on the back that is “just as curious as any revelation!”

You have The Cure when on Friday you love everything (“Friday I’m in Love”) and, like The Kings, “mobilize some laughs with just one call” as “the beat go on” (“The Beat Goes On”).

Now Enjoy yourself.

What have you got to lose?

Enjoy What Is And Take What Comes

What does a sparrow see? Science can explain how a sparrow sees colour, movement and so on, but she can’t relay the actual experience of seeing. You’d need a sparrow gifted with the ability to describe what she sees in a language better than, “Chirp, chirp,” for a human to understand.

We can imagine and simulate birdlike seeing with drones, skydiving and literature, but the experience itself: of bird seeing, as bird in bird form within bird reality, is unavailable to us. The same holds true for other animals and people too.

It’s like the chorus to Nik Kershaw’s song that goes, “Wouldn’t it be good to be in your shoes, even if it was for just one day. And wouldn’t it be good, if we could wish ourselves away. Wouldn’t it be good to be on your side, the grass is always greener over there. And wouldn’t it be good, if we could live without a care” (Wouldn’t It Be Good). Of course Nik is singing about wanting to be in the shoes of a lover and sparrows don’t normally wear shoes; nevertheless, a feeling of dissatisfaction with one’s life is common.

Wanting to be as free as a sparrow is pretty universal. They look so happy. “What is that?” asks an old man. “A sparrow,” says his son lacking patience. Some might think, “Wouldn’t it be good to be a sparrow? Zipping from tree to tree! Eat a seed and you’re good for the day.” That may be so. To be free is beautiful, but then again, it’s all fun and games until you fly into a picture window.

Scientists can explain the mechanics of eyeballs: how they function and how to fix them, but in terms of perception – the link between world “out there” as taken in by eyeballs, and the mind’s interpretation of that world – science can’t say.

It’s a bit like the sparrow scenario. Nobody but you can see what you see. You are a kind of sparrow, but one without wings, without a beak, without feathers or bird feet.

Science can identify your species and proclivities but not your mystery. Nobody but you knows what it’s like to be you and even then, you hardly notice.

Think about what you see. As you walk, arms not swinging, looking at your feet, eyes glazed like donuts, imagine that you’re in a silent helicopter or a balloon looking down at landscapes far away and small.

It feels like there are third person things down there and all around and digging deeper into the experience of being, you observe a strange first person phenomena where you are the one looking.

We each think of ourselves as a subject in a world of objects. We think we have an inner stream of consciousness that babbles, sometimes turbulent, sometimes calm, but are you in the stream, the stream itself or the one looking at the stream?

Are you the inner story you tell yourself?

The trick to enjoyment isn’t in self-absorption. It’s the opposite. It’s in going outward. Don’t ask yourself how you should move. Step forward and let the world move through you. Don’t second guess what you say, speak from your heart.

Mick Jagger said a mouthful at the buffet when he said, “You can’t always get what you want”, but if you try sometime, you just might find, you get what you need.”

When you’re in the world without thought for gain or advantage, with humility and humour, you don’t feel self-conscious. When you’re in the moment, your inner story drops away and your consciousness and self-consciousness is gone (Hubert Dreyfus, 2013).

Science tells us we perceive only reflected colours. Red is not “in” an apple. An apple reflects wavelengths that we see as red with our light receptors. Our eyes and brain together “translate light into colour” (How Do We See Color). Reality is a merging of world and interpretation.

In the immortal words of Arsenio Hall who while driving in his car one day pondered certain thoughts and referred to them as “things that make you go hmm…” inspiring the C + C Music Factory to sing the same, so too we explore things that make us go hmm, except instead of singing about infidelity, we sing of coincidence and connection, of links in chains between what we see and do and what is seen and done. We enjoy.

No special powers are required to experience beauty. Enjoy peace and looking without knowing. Forget who you think you are. Answers to the deepest questions like, “What’s it all for?” are in the lives we lead. Observe your unfolding.

There is a double vision between self and situation. Inside and outside are two sides of one coin. You see through a massive window, not as a thing inside. The world out there comes inside with each step you take forward.

Ideas in this unhurried mental receptacle are fuzzy; fuzzy like a pussy willow is fuzzy; fuzzy like a little yellow duckling that goes, “Peep. Peep. Peep.”

And, like a peeping fuzzy duckling, your life is nature’s music without notation.

The trick to enjoying the life you’re in is to sing with humble tickled amusement a melodious duck song.

 

A New Way of Looking

Here’s the thing: If someone says, “The secret to life is...,” that person is unknowingly (or knowingly) misleading. Why?

Because.

It isn’t a secret. If it was a secret, everyone’s secret would be different.

It’s like looking for keys and not finding them even though they’re right under your nose. You’re in a hurry but waste time running around looking for keys and not finding them because you’re in a hurry! You look repeatedly on the table where they should be (and are) but you don’t see them. Why? In desperation you start looking in weird places. So too do people look for enjoyment in weird place when they don’t have to. Enjoyment is right under your nose.

When you finally do find find your keys, you feel extra extra annoyed because they were there all along, and you wonder: “How could I not see them? Am I blind? (No.) Am I an idiot? (Only partly).”

The power is in the focus. It’s a matter of attention. It’s all a matter of awareness.

In the hurry to find what you’re looking for you see with eyeballs but not with brain. Hurry causes stress. Stress causes the release of cortisol in the brain. Cortisol can kill brain cells in the area responsible for memory (Your Amazing Brain). If you add multi-tasking to a frantic searching, you have zero attention (Brain Rules…).

Searching for keys in all the wrong places is like searching for enjoyment. We don’t see what’s in front of us. Enjoyment is simple. It’s so simple that we don’t get it until we do and then we doubt it because we might be expecting something that isn’t so subtle.

If you’re reading this—wherever you are in this world—you’re probably alive. If you’re alive, you’re halfway there, but the other half isn’t easy. Nature isn’t on your side. Nature isn’t on anyone’s side. Nature is cause and effect.

The trouble is that happiness gets tied to desire and expectations. We define happiness as, Wanting what we want and getting what we get and hoping the two coincide.

You see, it’s because of our brains. We either over-think and make it complicated, we under-think and act on insane urges or we multi-task and miss everything.

We think, “If I have this (or that), I’ll be happy,” but not only do we think that something outside ourselves will make us happy, we’re drawn to things that actually hurt us.

Our brains send messages. Sometimes these messages are destructive—ask anyone in therapy, rehab, prison or who is about to blow himself up. Not only do we deceive ourselves, other people trick us with their deceptions and w can become like pawns in the game of life, sacrificed for someone else’s idea of enjoyment.

So, what’s the answer?

Picture brain messages symbolically like they do in cartoons with a devil-you and an angel-you on each shoulder arguing their case for you to decide (see Internal Multitudes and Enjoyment Decisions). The devil-you often wins and when he does, he gets harder to stop.

Pleasure and habit are linked. Cells that fire together, wire together. In other words: Habits are hard to break (see: It’s not me. It’s my brain.)

It’s like a battle between, on one side, the Rolling Stones at 120 decibels singing “Sympathy For The Devil”, “Please allow me to introduce myself, I’m a man of wealth and taste,” and on the other side, a string quartet playing “Hallelujah” in your living room.! Who do you think will win?

On one side are symbols of light, innocence and wholesomeness (sappy?) and on the other, just the opposite (exciting?). In the battle between it comes down to focus. What do you choose to enjoy?

Enjoyment of life and of healthy beauty is decided by awareness of what “you” choose to pay attention to.

Do you take the gentle path of life as represented in Wordsworth’s poem, “I wandered lonely as a cloud; That floats on high o’er vales and hills; When all at once I saw a crowd; A host, of golden daffodils“? Or is that boring? “Daffodils? You’re kidding!”

Do you prefer your entertainment on the excitingly evil side? How about delightful depravity and edgy cruelty that’s funny too? What’s your pleasure? Do you choose a quiet read, a walk in the park, a pint with a friend, or ‘gorified’ death in a Zombie Apocalypse?

It’s a tough decision for most people.

Subtlety is missed by mobs fed on chatter, drugs, violence, convenience and bread and circuses. A butterfly caught in a web is easily killed by the spider. It takes heart and courage and a focus on what is wholesome to overcome dark greed.

Wholesome isn’t a word used much these days. It alludes to marketing all-natural breakfast cereals and family values but back in the year 1200 wholesome meant “of benefit to the soul.” It comes from the word “whole” meaning “healthy” (undamaged, entire, safe) and “-some” meaning “tending to” (Etymology Dictionary).

Wholesome relates to “Hallow!” as in Hello! Health! Holy! It’s a greeting and a call to health and Hallelujah! (Word Origins).

Imagine: You go to a concert in a high school auditorium but your brain is messed up with problems. You miss the first part before your spirit gets caught up in the music and then… and then…

A switch to whole.

You see where you are. Your face relaxes. Totally still you breathe and your eyes… your eyes! they widen and go slack. You see as if you were life itself.

What was a disheveled auditorium with flickering light bulbs about to die and chattering nuisance people becomes… beautiful. You enter the stream. You are empty absolutely. You know that life runs along like a runaway train as you float in your body behind a face.

A scene.

You look out of yourself self-aware. This moment is captured in the very being of yourself – not as an ego, but as… a spirit.

The purest illuminations come unsought.

You are transfigured but no one knows. How could they? You are alone in yourself but through the eyes of another you see the importance of all this. It’s in relationships and immersion. You’ve put your will to the side and thrown yourself out.

Such is enjoyment seeing.

Cease demanding that life conform to desire. See daffodils and ignore zombies (they aren’t real).

What’s your philosophy?

If you’ve reached adulthood, it’s probably clear to you by now that everyone has to face good times and bad. There are ups and downs and how you deal with them depends on your philosophy.

Whether knowingly or not, everyone has a philosophy. The trick is to keep it simple. Find a philosophy that’s right for you.

With the Philosophy of Enjoyment, from The First Step to the Will to Enjoy, the goal of life is to enjoy.

This isn’t to say that you enjoy yourself at the expense of others. Enjoying yourself at the expense of others will lead to trouble. If you think you are more important than other creatures (think Presidents, movie stars and or billionaires) you are not. True enjoyment requires kindness, humility and sensitivity.

Helping others to enjoy themselves is enjoyable and if you hurt others, they will enjoy hurting you. It’s a ping-pong thing.All creatures are alone, together. Whether duck or human, it’s appropriate to enjoy.

If enjoyment is selfish, then every living creature is selfish. Even helping another could be construed as selfish. It’s all in how you look at it.

The keys to enjoyment are found in sensual awareness and contemplation. You don’t need a particular lifestyle with lots of possessions or acquaintances or admiration from the crowd. You don’t need luxury. Those things might be enjoyable, but they’re not necessary.

Professional philosophers debate the nature of enjoyment and happiness, but you know what it’s about. You know when you are enjoying yourself and when you are not. You know that when others are not enjoying themselves, its better when they are.

If you have a philosophy of enjoyment, morality is simple. What is good is kind and what is evil is cruel. It’s what children know. It’s natural. Trouble rises when people get unnatural.

Imagine that you are a cloud hovering above a city. What do you see?

You see a few people enjoying themselves in a park (a few sky watching), but the majority are busy acting like ants in an ant hill or wasps in a wasp nest.

Why is that?

People act like ants and or wasps because they’ve lost touch with enjoyment. They’re busy for the sake of business. In the battle of life, they think it’s a survival-of-the-fittest game. They don’t realize that survival for the sake of survival isn’t what it’s about.

People conclude that life is suffering so they go about doing just that. They get technological, industrial, mechanical and electronic. They lose touch with nature. They choose virtual over a real. They favour artificial intelligence over biological.

One reason for ant hill behaviour relates to the type of person each unique individual is. There are basically two types of people: There are saints and there are earth-creatures. People get lost between two extremes. Let’s break it down.

A saint’s mind is fixed on pity. Sadness is the prevailing emotion. Other people are the priority and suffering love is the ideal. For a saint personal enjoyment is pretty much irrelevant. Saints thrive on abstractions, not sensations.

A saint is sad about the tragedy of life because there is poverty, starvation and disease. Saints feel sorry for people but not themselves. Saints feel superior. Saints aren’t funny. They don’t laugh at the absurdities of life. They take it all very serious.

Earth-creatures on the other hand, are just the opposite.

Happiness is the prevailing emotion in earth-creatures. Self is the priority.

Earth-creatures are happiness seekers. They understand what drives other selves to do what they do because they have a self and they do it too.

Earth-creatures live sensuously on food and drink. They cope with tragedy and focus on beauty. Unlike a saint who may see life as tragic, earth-creatures like to laugh because life is comic. Humour helps them enjoy life. They know ecstasy comes and goes.Earth-creatures (including some humans) enjoy the lightness of being. They value humility over superiority and power. They live for sunshine and rain and if they are like that woman in a Rolling Stones’ song, they might even be a rainbow (see: “She’s A Rainbow“).

Despite death, disease and starvation, earth-creatures can experience moments of elation from simple things like a drop of rain, a kiss, a kind word, the sight of a happy dog’s wagging tail, a country road, a piece of bread and jam, a hot beverage, a friend.

So, what’s it going to be? Which would you rather be: a saint or an earth-creature?

What’s your philosophy?

Cloud Hovering

Imagine that you are a lonely cloud hovering. Can you do that?

Imagine your thoughts are projected onto a cloud that is detached and free-floating above you. As a cloud, you can look down and see everything.

If your imagination is rusty, go back to a time in your childhood when the things you imagined felt real. You’re a lonely cloud hovering. Note: This goes well with the earlier post entitled “Sky Watching.”

Imagine you’re a lonely cloud during a business meeting, stuck in traffic or some other unpleasant experience. As you hover above yourself – without worry, without care – imagine that you are immune to insults. You are immune to attacks. You are immune to anger.In lonely cloud form nothing anybody can say or do will irritate you. You are impervious to annoyance! In your lonely cloud essence, you can make some interesting observations about the nature of enjoyment.

First, you notice that it’s just you up there hovering. No one can join you. It’s your cloud. That’s why it’s lonely, but, it’s the good kind of lonely. It’s lonely because it’s just you, but you like it. If someone tried to get onto your cloud, you’d say, ‘Hey! You! “Get Off of My Cloud“!’

As a cloud hovering, you can see a connection between your feelings of enjoyment and your feelings of being alone inside. Your thoughts can be untethered. You can use your imagination to feel enjoyment.

If you contemplate yourself as a cloud hovering, you can be like Joni Mitchell seeing from “Both Sides” now.

Being alone is what you know. Unless you have a split personality disorder, being alone is the only way you can be. You are alone and have always been ever since your eyes adjusted to the light and you came to know yourself outside your mother.You are alone, but this isn’t sad. Far from it. You have yourself. You are not unhappily alone or lonely. There is really no other way to be.

You can share a connection with other clouds, but only you can know your cloud from the inside. You’re like a hummingbird, humming the song that is your life.

As a lonely cloud hovering, you realize that enjoyment is a personal experience. When other clouds crowd together, there’s static. It can be energizing, but clouds can rub each other the wrong way and when that happens, there are explosions until someone cries and then everyone cries and you’ve got a storm on your hands.

Second, as you hover like a lonely cloud, you notice the absence of extreme pain. You realize that extreme pain counteracts enjoyment. It could even be said that a day without extreme pain is enjoyable. If you remember feeling extreme pain, you probably don’t remember there being anything funny about it. One is less likely to laugh when feeling extreme pain.

In your imagination, as you hover like a cloud or a hummingbird (if you are tired of being a cloud), you know that in whatever bad situation you might be in, it could be worse.It has been said that there is no beauty equal to life. It would certainly be more difficult to know beauty if there wasn’t a you to perceive it. As a person who has found the secret thrilling life of intense happiness, you do not need a lot of stuff or acquaintances because you can contemplate any time you want.

Find out what you know then hum the tune before you are “Out of Time.