The Pillars That Hold The Clouds
As I approach the ending of the third project that I have consciously built under this scheme of releasing a project every full moon I realize how challenging it has been to establish a solid foundation of how to organize the work that I do every day so that I can be consistent with it. There have been many challenges involving the specific practices that want to build my life around. Perharps that’s a good starting point for what I’ll write today. The pillars that serve as the foundation of the person that I want to become, and which are the outlines of that (and how do I bring that into my life in a consistent basis so that I can be in charge of what I do and how I do it). What are the habits that foster the way I want to live? Why are those habits in there?
In the eternal loop of things that are appealing to the topics that I follow that the internet is, it is increasingly easy to lose myself into reading articles about ‘5 foods that I have to eat every day to be with good energy’, ’10 tips for being a successful developer’, etc, and as much as they give some small hints, they don’t offer too much guidance in a practical sense because there is a big gap between the person that I am now and the person that I want to be when I have those habits as part of my daily existence, without even having to think about them. The biggest example for me right now is fasting, because I know its benefits, I practice it more than regularly, but sometimes I feel that I’m not prepared for what it means to give up one of the biggest pleasures that this material reality has: eating. But the interesting here is that there is no eliminating of it, there is only delaying it. And the fact of using my willpower to delay when to eat, and to give up the temporal pleasure in search for something bigger, is one of the biggest things that I want to bring into my life. One of the biggest ones that I want to cultivate. Almost anything that is done in this way, thinking in the consequences of what that specific action will have in the long term, is something that I want to bring into my life. But what is the limit? I have thought that I’ve brought too much stress into my life in search of these habits, and that is when it starts being counterproductive. And that is when it is important to relax, and give me the space for a break. For example, on friday I wanted to eat a lot in the night, and I just did it, and it was perfect. Maybe there will be a day when I don’t fall into this temporal pleasure and I just keep my mind strong and be clear about what I want, but I think it is a process that doesn’t happen overnight, willpower needs to be built.
And how is it build? What comes to my mind now is that it is through the act of exposing myself to different circumstances that will make me grow, and then staying strong in them. The biggest /////
I was writing that and I started listening to someone cry, so I came to the terrace of the apartment and started listening to a small boy crying his heart out and saying: ‘I just want a little hug’. This makes me think about how much about being a parent I don’t know, and I’m close to that place very soon. Mila is going to be born on two months, and listening to this small boy cry I think to myself that I never want her to be in that place. I always want to be there for her, willing to give her a hug, willing to embrace with patience and love what is needed to overcome whatever circumstance we are going through in that particular moment. I know that me and my partner are prepared for that, and I think that there is a connection between what I was writing before and the inminence of being a father.
I was writing about the exposure to stress in search of a long term benefit, and how to have the mind prepared for overcoming those moments of stress -wanting to eat, listening to my baby cry, programming a hard problem when I don’t really know how to do it- and I think that Mila is going to teach me a lot about that. This is something like the ultimate challenge that life has brought to me, because there is no way out of it. I have to face it, with all what I have, and bring the best out of me so that I can be up to the mission that life gave me, of taking care of a new human being. I feel that all the preparation is for that moment, and that the yoga, the road of self-taught in programming, and all what I have faced in my life is what I need so that I can give her a big hug when she asks for it. That is what I want to be for her, whatever she needs me to be. I want to be like water, and being in different circumstances teach me how to do it, how to understand the situation that I’m in unconsciously, and answer back as good as I can.
Sometimes I think that what my brain is lost, that I’ve done a too intense work this last year trying to dig deep into my psyche and I don’t really know how to relate to this reality anymore, but I know that everything is preparing me for every day, and that I have always been a good experimenter of whatever comes. Right now the challenges that I have in front of me are the open source factory, being a good father, being a good partner, and learning how to communicate so that I can share what I believe is correct with the world. And the starting point is learning how to communicate with myself. What do I want from my life? What are the habits on which I will build my existence? What is it that I want to teach to Mila by being the example, not by imposing it to her? I have been in a really deep exploration of the answer to these questions, and my aim is that what happens in this space can be a consequence of that. I want each of these 14 projects to be a representation of what I believe is correct, of what I believe that is needed in this world. Maybe my programming skills are not as good as they could be, maybe the architecture of these systems lacks some professional structure, but I’m conscious about it, and I really want to get better at it. My goal is to be able to think about the work I do in every moment of my life, so that the answers are able to be generated in my brain without me thinking about them. That is the end goal, but for moving towards that I need a level of understanding of these systems that I don’t really have now. I’m far from mastery, I’m far from understanding the tools with which I work, and in this state of knowledge it is hard. Because there is an obvious separation between sitting down to work on programming the project of the month and the rest of my daily activities. But I aim towards being able to be walking in the streets with a notebook on my pocket and coming up with a way to organize the architecture of the system that I’m working in on paper. At the end of the day, coding itself is just a small part of what a programmer does. There is a lot of research that needs to be done, planning, organizing, structuring, thinking, problem solving, etc. All skills that will flow more easily if I understand better the tools with which I deal.
What motivates me is that I know what lies ahead. I know that perseverance is the key, and I know that by doing this monthly projects I’m learning a lot about myself, about the tools at hand, and about the potential of what I can build. It is just amazing, because there is no limit on what can be built. The world is wide open, and right now I’m doing the organic work of developing the threads, the web, that will sustain whatever I decide to build after this project is over. It is highly motivating to have this in mind, and it is what has given me the energy to continue pushing it forward. Continue showing up, every day, to do the work. (A big lesson from this week is that it will not be every day! I decided to give myself freedom on saturdays, so that I can enjoy my family, enjoy life, without the pressure that I give myself that I have to code every day. It is a huge pressure that I’ve built into my shoulders, and this saturday I gave me the permission to give up that stress and allow me to rest. It was important, and I plan to continue with that in the future. The plan that makes more sense to me right now is to code 4 hours from monday to friday, then saturday rest and then on sunday come back with two hours, so that I can complete 22 weekly hours. As I move into parenthood, and I’m able to understand better how to organize my time so that I can do things in a more organized manner, it makes complete sense to have this schedule, at least until Mila is 40 days old. That is an important landmark, and I’ll see where I am at on that moment. But for now, that 4 4 4 4 4 0 2 schedule works just fine. A good amount of stress that gives me the push that I need to evolve my skills, to build the systems that I want to build)
It has been challenging to reach a daily work routine that makes sense and feels good. And also a feeding one. I’ve been playing around with these things and it has been quite interesting, because I’m always changing and there is nothing fixed in it. I know that I have to code for 4 hours, I know that when I wake up I have to do what I do, and then I know that I have to do my yoga practice. The rest of the day is about doing other things, and it has been really interesting for me not to be able to establish a routine that enables me to make a better use of the spare time after this ‘mandatory ‘ activities. I’ve been playing around with scheduling the sessions the day before, and it seems to work. At least because afterwards I know what I did in the spare time that day, and that gives me feeling good sensation because I managed to do what I have to do. When I’m not able to do it, my whole energy changes, and I guess that is a sign that it is a habit that I’ve brought into my life. My body resents when I don’t do it, my whole being resents it, and when I do it, I’m happy, proud-ish, and with energy to give to my surroundings. That’s why it is good to do the first session before my partner wakes up, because when I do that I feel that I’m winning it do the day. If it is the opposite, I always feel behind, and I always feel that I’m running. I really don’t like that feeling of stress that I build on my own brain, so it is helpful to do the work early in the morning to bring those feelings down.
One of the key elements of my routine every day has been the cold shower. This is one of the most stressful elements of it all, but at the same moment it is one of the most beneficial because it is the one that shows me clearer what it means to be under stress. I’m able to recognize what the stress is, and after that I’m better able to deal with it, focusing on what is making me feel stressed, on what I feel in my body, and then trying to do the work of relaxing the whole body. It has been really beneficial to go through that, and right now I’m thinking of what is the best moment of the day to do it. I was doing it first thing in the morning and it was going great, and right now I’m doing it after the first session of programming and my hiit training of the day and it is an interesting exploration. I don’t really know the answer yet, I will have to do some research.
Speaking about research, that brings me into some important aspect of what I’ve done until now that is a big space for getting better. I have brought all these habits into my life because on the depth of my heart I know that they are the most beneficial to me: fasting, cold showers, hitt, yoga (meditation), programming, eating healthy, but I have gotten to this point without even reading too much about the research that is being done that support all these habits. Just today I was watching a lecture about fasting from a doctor and he was speaking about the immense amount of benefits that fasting has in health, and it was really motivating to hear him because it is huge. And I know it is the way that I want to live, I know that I want to take out the craving for food from my life, but it is tough to be pushing it away without a complete understanding of why I’m doing it. So one of the missions that I have is to be better informed, to understand better the decisions that I’m making so that I can know better my body and make a good use of it. There is so much good information on the internet this days, that I see it is as my duty, because there is people that can benefit from me knowing more about what I do. I’m thinking about a friend of the family that has really bad cancer right now, and how he could feel better if he started fasting. But the really interesting part is how far the common participant of society is from that. There is so much information going around but so few knowledge about which are the practices that derive in a particular condition of being. I wonder, are we moving towards a world where people take actions towards what is good for them, and the pleasure of short term rewards behind? (Or at least in a secundary spot for most of the week… Its a process. For me it has been a really tough journey, full of noise from my head, full of distractions, full of giving back and then coming with strength. This weeks has been like that, because I came to visit family and friends in Santiago and I have not been able to escape the food that they have shared with me, and I have had to make peace with the fact that I’m not eating how I would like to and that is perfect also, because at the end of the day what matters is the habits that I have brough into my life, and I know that my tendency to fast 20–4 ish will not be broken because of that friday munchees, because I do it for something bigger than the short term reward, and if I fall I will get up and continue walking with more strenght and willpower -hopefully-).
I’m thinking that willpower is like an ascendant curve, one that goes up as I’m able to stay strong with what I believe, and that goes a little bit down when I’m not. But what is important is the tendency of the curve, because that is where I’m heading as a human being. I’m heading towards mastery of myself, knowing of myself, and knowing about the bias that I have in my existence that make me behave in a particular way. As I move towards that understanding, as I progress through that slope, of course I’ll encounter some ghosts, some noise, and some major challenges. But what is what sustains me there? Why am I still on that road, walking it, no matter what? I believe in it. I have done it, without any support, without anyone walking on my side, without anyone telling me what to do. I have carved my own path deeply, and it is important for me to acknowledge that. To celebrate it. The work that I have done the last year, the work that has made me able to publish Mamíferas this saturday has been incredible. I need to stand up, face the mirror, and celebrate myself. I don’t do it as often as I should, but it is really important that I do it. For example, today is monday, and I could not work anymore on the project until saturday, and publish it, and be ok with that. But the work that I’ve done until now, the one that has had me showing up, day after day, giving my best, has been the one that has sustained my willingness to keep showing up, to keep doing the work. Nothing can take away from me, nothing can erase the trail that I’ve left behind, the trail that I’m building step by step, word by word. Building for myself this world of expression, this sun from which all the open source factory projects gravitate around, has been huge. It is really hard for me to give me love, but that is what I need to do the most, because if not I’ll never be able to give love to my family, to my daughter, to my surroundings, to the world.
Look at this space. This is the fourth week in a row that I come here and write whatever comes to my mind. It is not correct, it is not incorrect. It just is. And it is already a established part of what I have to do, and I do it with grace, with love, with passion. I cannot go to bed on monday without doing it. Actually last monday I was not able to do it, and it felt horrible. First thing I did on tuesday was to write the blog post of that week, because I needed to do it. It is a present that I’ve given to myself, to my inner child, to express himself. To come up with something creative, to start building it, and the share it with the world. Until now, not too much people have benefited from what I’ve done, but there will come a day when I build something interesting, and that is when all this work is going to pay off.
That’s not true really. It is already paying off. The sensations that come from being able to be where I am at right now with the practices that I’ve been cultivating is the space where it pays off. Going to my yoga class and feeling the commitment that I feel every day that I’m in it is when it pays off. Coming into the computer and programming and solving the problems that I have that day and build from there and then feel what comes after that struggle is when it pays of. Thinking about a problem and being able to build something to fix it is when it pays of. The amount of tools that I’m gathering right now are beyond my comprehension yet, and that is why I need to celebrate it.
Hello JP from the future, I wrote this for you. As you have read for the last 10ish minutes, I have a lot to say, but I don’t really know how to structure it. I’ve put the work in, and I don’t really know where it is, but I know that your life and your family’s life is better right now because of this effort. I know that you are able to do what you do because of what I’m doing now, and it has been only by following my heart. I’ve not been able to open my heart to love fully -working on that- but I’ve been able to follow what I believe is correct and stay true to that. Yesterday we had the first part of the elections for choosing the next president of Chile, and I had a big noise in my mind related to going or not to vote. I feel like living out of time, and I have not done even a small effort to be informed about what is going on politicaly in my country. My commitment is in another realm. My commitment is with myself, with the capacity that I have for creating, for changing the world with what I create. I don’t care who is the next president of Chile, I don’t really care about who is the president of any country. The world that I’m helping to build is one of power that comes from ideas, from the willingness to do the work, from the capacity of self study, and the capacity of saying: I’ve been wrong. Please teach me how to do it better. I don’t care about those people that spend a big part of their energy throwing shit to the ones of the other side. That is not my game. I’m the one that gathers all the shit that they have thrown around and builds something useful with it. Fuck them all, the world of the future is not there.
The pillars that hold the structure need to be build step by step, handful of sand over handful of sand. And the capacities that I’m building in myself this year are the bonding of each of this handfuls. Each time that I wake up and meditate, each time I show up when I said I will, each time that I give up food, each time that I write a poem, each time that I exersize, each time that I give love to my partner, each time that I don’t try to be right and assume that each perspective is valid, each time that I’m true to myself, I continue moving forward with this slope that goes up and up. There is no finish line, there will never be a limit, but it is really amazing to be able to just walk the path. The opportunity that life has given me for having the material wealth, the love with which I was brought up, the people that I’ve met, is what sustains all what I am. I won’t be selfish, I’ll continue to give my best every day. It is important. It is what needs to be done. The important work is the one that is done every day, because that is the path that constitutes who I am now. As I look back and reflect, as I see myself in the mirror, stare in my eyes, and think about where I’ve been, I realize that no one can take it away. It is mine, it is in my consciousness, and it is my duty to embrace it, to feel happy about it, to feel proud. No one will do it for me. Smile, take a deep breath, and continue walking the path. Tomorrow will be a new day, a new opportunity, and it is up to me to give my best to it.
