I’m in a hurry.
The process of learning and growing—a process that has worked for me pretty effectively and efficiently in my life so far—moves too slowly. There’s a stack of books I want to read. There’s a whole field of music production and sound design I want to learn. There’s a sea change in my style as a musician that I want to rush along. There’s a spiritual enlightenment that I want to reach.
But it’s taking too damned long. Books take time to read, no matter how quickly you can get through them. Music is learned through a process of trial and error, and stylistic development takes a lifetime to run its course. And enlightenment comes with effort on the meditation cushion and wise living during the rest of one’s day. That’s how it’s done, but it’s not satisfying to me today. Today I want some contraption to plug into the back of my head, à la The Matrix, from which I can emerge with a breathy nugget like, “I know kung fu!”
I resolved to do more this year to learn what I want to learn and do what I want to do, but I have managed so far to break nearly every law that I so painstakingly legislated for myself. And now I sit at work, writing this as I cast a sidelong glance at an inbox swelling with work, eyeing it like a nuisance, a gnat buzzing in my ears at a picnic, and I am keenly aware at this moment of how much I’d rather be doing something else right now. Letting that thought sink in, I realize that if I had the opportunity, the freedom to do that “something else,” I might not even be doing it. I might be sitting on my ass thinking about something else I’d rather be doing. I’d probably not even be on my meditation bench, which has only had to support me for ten minutes in the past month.
That is why achievement is a thing to marvel at. There is no shortcut, wishes be damned. I will have to work in order to achieve what I want to achieve. And to survive in the meantime, I just may have to work on some things I don’t want to work on.
To get those books read, I’ll have to read them. To get to the music I love, I’ll have to wade through hours of slow going and track after track of stuff I think is crap. To reach that spiritual bliss I like to talk about, I’ll have to sit on my ass. But this time I’ll have to do it seriously.
The process of learning and growing—a process that has worked for me pretty effectively and efficiently in my life so far—moves too slowly. There’s a stack of books I want to read. There’s a whole field of music production and sound design I want to learn. There’s a sea change in my style as a musician that I want to rush along. There’s a spiritual enlightenment that I want to reach.
But it’s taking too damned long. Books take time to read, no matter how quickly you can get through them. Music is learned through a process of trial and error, and stylistic development takes a lifetime to run its course. And enlightenment comes with effort on the meditation cushion and wise living during the rest of one’s day. That’s how it’s done, but it’s not satisfying to me today. Today I want some contraption to plug into the back of my head, à la The Matrix, from which I can emerge with a breathy nugget like, “I know kung fu!”
I resolved to do more this year to learn what I want to learn and do what I want to do, but I have managed so far to break nearly every law that I so painstakingly legislated for myself. And now I sit at work, writing this as I cast a sidelong glance at an inbox swelling with work, eyeing it like a nuisance, a gnat buzzing in my ears at a picnic, and I am keenly aware at this moment of how much I’d rather be doing something else right now. Letting that thought sink in, I realize that if I had the opportunity, the freedom to do that “something else,” I might not even be doing it. I might be sitting on my ass thinking about something else I’d rather be doing. I’d probably not even be on my meditation bench, which has only had to support me for ten minutes in the past month.
That is why achievement is a thing to marvel at. There is no shortcut, wishes be damned. I will have to work in order to achieve what I want to achieve. And to survive in the meantime, I just may have to work on some things I don’t want to work on.
To get those books read, I’ll have to read them. To get to the music I love, I’ll have to wade through hours of slow going and track after track of stuff I think is crap. To reach that spiritual bliss I like to talk about, I’ll have to sit on my ass. But this time I’ll have to do it seriously.
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