Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. We have spent quite a few of the recent posts talking about the importance of words. How they change and shape our lives. Sometimes these stories take amusing and unexpected turns.
I’m a sucker for a good dad joke. My favorite dad jokes have some form of double entendre. While the typical association of double entendre is something bawdy or an innuendo, it can also just be a double meaning with one being literal and one being ironic.
When is a door not a door? When it’s ajar.
Who doesn’t love a good dad joke? I found this article the other day that reminded me of this dad joke but turned out to be a whole lot more than I bargained for. When is a bee not a bee? When it’s a fish.
If you have the time, click on the article because it will make more sense. The headline I saw read “California court rules bees are now fish”. While a Floridian calling California crazy is a pot and kettle situation, this was still a little out there. However when I clicked on the headline it took me to the article linked above which provides the requisite details.
In order to use existing environmental protection laws to protect bees, a group of California judges ruled that bees are included under the California Endangered Species Act. The act does not protect the bees but rather protects “native species or subspecies of a bird, mammal, fish, amphibian, reptile, or plant.”
Cool new things at Crayola
The law further defines “fish” as “a wild fish, mollusk, crustacean, invertebrate, amphibian, or part, spawn, or ovum of any of those animals.” The judges noted that many of the protected classes under “fish” are not in fact fish, and that the terrestrial invertebrate bees would qualify under the protections extended to invertebrates.
It should be noted that a previous judge decided that “invertebrates” being under the subset of “fish” applied only to marine invertebrates and therefore bees were not protected.
There is a lot to unpack here. Bees being protected seems like a good thing to do. Maybe writing the correct language into the law is a better strategy than interpreting “fish” all willy nilly. California is still a little crazy (I know pot and kettle)
Science is fun
Just like our discussion on “sanitation” words are important. Definitions are important. The way that we intend our words to be taken can have a significant real world impact on our lives. (Or the lives of terrestrial invertebrates, as it were)
What is also important is a willingness to interpret those words and intentions based on a desired goal. Saving bees is certainly a noble and worthwhile pursuit. The classical question arises, do the ends justify the means?
Adding running back into the mix
If bees can be fish (albeit a little bit of an oversimplification) what other language and protections can be reinterpreted? If a new end is deemed to be a noble and worthwhile enough pursuit, the reinterpretation of something more close to home could easily be justified. Something that has more impact on our everyday lives than classification of terrestrial invertebrates.
Words mean what we intend them to mean, not what we decide later on that they mean in order to justify a new position. This is literally the foundation that our civilization is based on.
Without communication, without meaning, and without intention, there can be no civilization. And, there can certainly be no serenity.
A lot of miles and elevation while learning a new airplane
Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.
Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. As I’m finishing up training on my new aircraft and trying to squeeze in some research work I came across the concept of synchronic vs. diachronic language. It is an important distinction, and one that I wanted to share.
Last week we talked about philology. The study of language and words as they change through time. Philology has a focus on determination of intent. What did the chosen words mean at the particular time of use, and what did the author or orator intend to communicate?
Philologist are concerned more with validation and interpretation of documents and texts. Etymologists focus on the origin and development of words, which brings us to today’s focus.
Dinoland
Diachronic: of or concerned with phenomena, such as linguistic features, as they change through time.
Synchronic: of or concerned with phenomena, such as linguistic features, or of events of a particular time, without reference to their historical context.
Linguists have figured out (at least in an academic sense since I don’t actually know any linguists) that a word’s meaning and communication intent change over time. The same word does not have the same meaning as time flows and cultures shift.
Tractors and crayons
Studying how words change through time (diachronic) is interesting. It reveals a lot about the people using those words. How their communication needs shift with new technology, cultural norms, and ideas. How those words need to evolve or be created to meet those needs.
The study of words under a synchronic frame is a much harder task if you take the definition at face value. Like taking a Polaroid picture but ignoring how everything got into place. It is studying in a time bubble.
We would never examine a person this way. If someone makes a decision or initiates some sort of action. That action is not examined in a bubble, but rather in the context of the person’s history. How were they raised? What kind of transformative experiences have they had? What kind of learning, friends, hobbies, are they engaged in? What type of people do they associate with?
Bubbles!
The action can only be viewed effectively through these many lenses. There are so many events and factors that lead up to every decision. To ignore them and view decisions in a vacuum seems at best a disservice, and at worst an intentional misrepresentation.
But with words we have a unique ability to take a snapshot in time. Specifically with regard to communication intent. When words can have multiple meanings across multiple contexts, the communication intention is what matters in a synchronic sense.
Synchronic and diachronic language both have their place in understanding, and they are united by empathy.
“I’m not sure if that move is legal, but I also can’t count that high, so let’s call it a draw” (Speedy, probably*)
You might not agree with someone’s word choice. You may even find a particular word choice incorrect or offensive. However, without knowing the author/speaker’s diachronic and synchronic understanding of the word in question, their communication intention, you have an incomplete set of data to assess.
Empathy and exploration of their intention, finding out how they have chosen words in the past, and what they intended they’re words to convey in the vacuum of a particular communication exchange, while challenging and time consuming. Will ultimately lead to more understanding and serenity.
FTP booster workouts and test
Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.
Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. As part of my language and communication project I have been doing a lot of reading. Most of it overly academic, and written solely for the academic community. Every once in a while though, a gem will shine through that affects all of us in a profound way.
I didn’t know what philology was until I was introduced to the word while reading John Marco Allegro’s The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross. Marco was a scholar who helped translate the Dead Sea Scrolls, and compare them to original source languages, (think Sumerian, Aramaic and Hebrew).
This was very interesting stuff in my mind, but I understand it is a niche audience. But shooting down the federal mask mandate, that might have some mass appeal. Coincidentally, also a task based in language and philology.
Kathryn Kimball Mizelle is the Florida district court judge whose summary judgment declared that the Federal Mask Mandate exceeded the CDC’s statutory authority. To understand why this is pertinent to our discussion of language, a little background information on both the history and timeline of these regulations as well as the legal system are important. (my mother and my wife have often told me I should have been a lawyer, turns out I’m more interested in arguing linguistics, which is more annoying and less lucrative)
The CDC relied heavily on the Public Health Services Act (PHSA) of 1944 as the statutory basis for their authorization to issue mandates to help manage the Covid pandemic. In Mizelle’s decision, she relies in part on the plain language and context of the PHSA to determine if the CDC’s action where in line with the intention of the original act.
While you and I as everyday non legal types might not be familiar with this process, you have probably heard some political pundit or politician say something like “this is what the founding father’s intended”. Same idea here. What did the authors of the PHSA intend with the act? What powers were granted or restrictions placed? And, more importantly for our purposes, what language was used, in what context, and what was it’s meaning at the time of writing?
When examining the plain language and context of the PHSA, the court found that the relevant portions authorized regulations to prevent the spread of diseases for specific limited circumstances: (1) individuals traveling from foreign countries into the States; and (2) for the purposes of “inspection, fumigation, disinfection, sanitation, pest extermination, destruction. . . and other measures”.
The court referenced the Corpus Linguistics database to verify the meaning of ‘sanitation’ in 1944, and determined it’s primary use was ‘to make things clean’ rather than ‘maintain a level of cleanliness’. The court concluded that “wearing a mask neither sanitizes the people wearing the mask or the conveyance”. There are other procedural and legal issues that are at play, but again they are beyond the scope of this language focused discussion.
Philology is the study of literary texts and of written records, the establishment of their authenticity and their original form, and the determination of their meaning. So when Allegro is studying the Dead Sea Scrolls and validating the original Sumerian and its intention before it was translated into Hebrew or Aramaic, he is engaged in a philological task. Judge Mizelle, when referencing the Corpus Linguistic database for the context and meaning of sanitation in 1944, is engaged in a philological task. One that has a tremendous impact on my day to day life in airports.
As I have said often on this platform, and will continue to repeat, words are important. The intention with which they were spoken or written is important. The study and exploration to determine that meaning is a noble and worthwhile pursuit. A pursuit which has an effect on our everyday life via our legal system disproportionately more significant than I think most of us understand.
When analyzing laws and regulations like the PHSA, a single word can change the context, meaning, and intention of a whole section, having major implications. The same is often true for anyone who works in business contracts, or (as this work is sometimes focused) in aviation.
Aviation is heavily regulated and standardized, and most of our processes and procedures need to be approved by the governing body the Federal Aviation Administration or FAA. The FAA, being a federal government agency, is governed by, you guessed it, laws. The Code of Federal Regulations or CFR, is the codifcation of the general and permanent rules published in the Federal Register by the departments and agencies of the Federal Government. Because the FAA is tasked with governing the aviation industry, the rules it makes become federal law. This is why you hear that it is a federal crime to tamper with lavatory smoke detectors every time you get on an airplane. It also means that a company manual, specifying a company procedure, that has to be approved by a federal regulating (read law making) body, is going to require a specificity of language akin to a federal law or a business contract.
Full blown summer mode in the sunshine state
Words like “may”, “must”, and “shall”, can be easily slipped into the middle of a lengthy and convoluted sentence, in the middle of lengthy and convoluted manual, but they represent, not just a company procedure, but a Federal mandate for how to operate an airplane. So when the captain tells me to select the required flap setting for our takeoff and I reply “flap handle one” instead of “flap lever one”, I am not operating my airplane in accordance with our company, and thus federal, requirements.
While that may seem a bit anal and pedantic, (it definitely is) “flap lever___” is in quotations, and thus is a required call out. There are areas where (as Austin has said) “a certain laxness in procedure is permitted, otherwise no university business would ever get done!”, and where a strict adherence to procedure, no matter how anal or obnoxious, is required.
I am reminded of this important distinction as the instructor smacks my shoulder for the fourth time today for referring to the flap lever as a flap handle, or the thrust levers as the throttles. Learning a new airplane is fun, and I have spent an inordinate amount of time proclaiming the importance of words and meaning. Still even a linguistics nerd like me is more than a little frustrated by the minutiae that we can get hung up on. I can appreciate the origin and necessity, and despise the outcome and how it impacts my life for the next month in training all at the same time.
Language literally creates, shapes, and defines our world. Searching for the original intent and meaning of language then, seems like a natural step toward serenity. One I’m excited to be taking and happy to share with you.
Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.
Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. I mentioned last week that I was training on a new aircraft. This week I want to reflect on that process.
Training on a new aircraft is always an exciting and nerve wracking experience. It is very similar to starting to date someone new. There is an excitement attached to the newness. There is anxiety of the unknown. There is a hope of good things to come in the future together.
My happy little corner in the hotel room for the month
Just like a real relationship you show up with your past baggage. After all, you are getting out of a long term serious relationship with your last airplane. You learned what she liked and what she didn’t like. You learned her strengths and her weaknesses. The areas where you had to help her along, and the areas where she had your back, even when you had screwed something up.
You have to learn all of those things all over again. You have to get to know each other. You have to learn how she reacts to your inputs. What can you do to make her happy, and what you can avoid doing that will make her cranky?
Soccer and sweet summer treats
In some cases it is like learning to speak a different language. Talking to your new airplane the way you talked to your old airplane is like calling her the wrong name. Nobody ends up happy, and the reaction is going to be undesirable at best.
On this Mother’s Day Sunday, I count myself very blessed to have strong women in my life. Women who set an example for my boys and I to follow on how to interact with the fairer sex.
Some fast miles whilst back home
Despite my interest in communication, and my academic endeavors into language and theory, this is still an area where I need all the help I can get.
The mother’s in my life have always been there with a firm but kind reminder. My mother was always reminding me, “It’s not just what you say but how you say it.” My wife is a miracle worker with my boys and I, making sure we are communicating with each other in a clear and respectful manner.
A pirate’s life for me
At the end of the day, isn’t that what the cornerstone of a new relationship is? Learning how to communicate with each other effectively. Falling into the patterns of familiarity where you know the right questions to ask, and the right answers to give. Where you know what is expected of you and your partner (or airplane as it were) knows what is expected/asked of them.
Regardless of the airplane you are flying, monitoring the flight path and ensuring the safety of flight is largely an exercise in those two questions. What have I asked the airplane to do, and what is it doing?
Smiles in the city beautiful
Have I actually asked it to do what I think I asked it to do? Is it doing what I think it should be doing? If it isn’t doing what I want, why not? Did I not ask the right questions or provide the right inputs?
These are questions I am asking myself on a daily basis here in training, with regards to the new airplane. How much of a better communicator could I be if I took the same approach with my wife and kids? Double checking my inputs before executing. Wouldn’t life be easier if you could try out your words in a temporary flight plan page to see how they look first?
Zwift sweat sessions maintaining my sanity and serenity while training
Training on a new aircraft necessarily takes up a lot of mental bandwidth. Maybe after this new relationship is established, it will help bring some lessons learned and serenity to my existing ones.
Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.
Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. I made my way up to Atlanta to start training on a new aircraft yesterday. That will probably be a topic for next week. Over the past few weeks I’ve been trying to study for that new aircraft on top of my already extensive list of hobbies, projects, and those pesky adult responsibilities like working and being a husband and father. All work and no play makes jack a dull boy, as they say. Which is why I’m thinking about neoteny.
I was introduced to the concept by author Edward Slingeland, in his latest work Drunk how we sipped danced and stumbled our way to civilization.
Easter egg hunt with friends
The book provides a very well thought out and compelling argument supporting the careful use of alcohol in adults. Things like creativity, lateral thinking, team building and trust are some of the positive outcomes that are enhanced with responsible alcohol consumption. These are not just anecdotes, but we’ll documented peer reviewed scientific findings.
The book covers the dangers and pitfalls of alcohol as well, and makes the case for moderate use with appropriate set and setting.
One of the things I found fascinating, was how alcohol effects the adult mind mechanistically. Especially the analogies that Slingeland provided. Alcohol effectively down-regulates the prefrontal cortex (PFC). An area of the brain Slingeland refers to as the playground monitor.
Haircuts
The PFC is responsible for all of the pesky adult things like keeping you focused, task managing, self regulation, and daily routines. It is also the part of your brain that develops later in life (late adolescence).
This is the reason I can focus on putting on my shoes to take my kids to the playground, while El Duderino and Speedy want to play pirate, even though ten seconds ago the were asking me to take them. Their PFCs are not fully developed. Their task management, social cognition, and focus (or lack of all three) is the normal state of operation for their brain. The playground monitor doesn’t yet exist.
There are advantages however, to having no playground monitor. Children score significantly better than adults on lateral thinking tasks like a (remote associate test). You are given three seemingly unrelated words and asked to come up with a fourth that is related to the first three. Here is an example Fox, Man, Peep. (answer at the end of the post).
Family Easter egg hunt
Adults are able to close that gap in lateral thinking ability with their progeny by temporarily taking their PFCs offline. This has been done in scientific studies with cranial magnets, and with carefully administered doses of alcohol.
In other words, making your brain revert closer to it’s childhood state increase lateral thinking ability, reduces inhibitions, and provides an escape from the all that adult regulating going on in the PFC. Sounds like exactly what I was aiming to do at my college dive bar karaoke night.
This reversion to a more childlike state of mind can be very advantageous, especially when coupled with other similarly reverted individuals with similar goals. Slingeland references the types of synergy that is produced at industry conferences when creative individuals gather together with adequate social lubricant.
SerenityThroughSweat, with some friends tagging along
What I also found interesting, was that this reversion to a more child like state of mind, is not the only aspect of humans where retaining child like features has been evolutionarily selected for. Neoteny, (biologically speaking) is the retention of juvenile traits into adulthood.
I’m not sure knocking my play ground monitor of a pre frontal cortex out with a few craft beers is exactly what biologists had in mind with Neoteny, but Slingeland sure makes a good case for it.
Ironically (or maybe less ironic and more appropriate) the last line of my marriage vows read “I can’t promise to grow up, but I promise to grow old with you” retention of juvenile traits into adulthood runs deep in my gene pool.
Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.
Just walking in Memphis, on my last trip before changing airplanes
The answer to the remote associate test was “hole” (foxhole, manhole, peephole)
Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. This week I want to talk about quitting. That may seem like an odd message for what is typically a more upbeat and positively oriented platform, but hear me out.
Author of The Voltage Effect, John List was on the freakonomics podcast discussing his book and his overall economic philosophy. The book is an economist’s ideas on how to make entrepreneurial ideas work at scale.
The conversation covered a number of cases studies including Uber, Lyft, and K-mart. Specifically discussed was the K-mart blue light special.
Being a Mom is hard, so is being a Dad
The blue light special (along with K-mart) went from being a sales mogul, to a forgotten cultural relic. Lost to the annals of history along with Kodak and Blockbuster.
The blue light special would alert shoppers to a great deal on individual products that were then first come first serve until they were gone. The resulting increase in sales not just for the blue light product but for all products was astonishing.
Taking advantage of excitement, scarcity, and a feeling of exclusivity, the blue light special was a smash hit. Until it was taken over by corporate. individual store managers could set the blue light special for their customers needs in a way that was inaccessible to corporate offices. Not to mention that the shoppers in Boise probably had different wants than those in Orlando.
El Duderino hanging out in my old haunt
Among other decisions and macro trends outside of their control, K-mart fell by the wayside. List discusses some of these trends but laments corporate inability to shift from a bad plan. When the desired outcome is not being served by a plan it is time to quit. This is what he calls optimal quitting.
Quitting has a decidedly negative connotation, and especially for the many endeavors that I pursue, grappling and triathlon among others. But within each of those activities are dozens of optimal quitting scenarios.
Abandoning a technique that has been cleverly countered. Switching to a different game plan or overall strategy for an opponent with different skill sets. Changing your race pace or gearing based on race day terrain or conditions. These are all examples of optimal quitting. Real time adjustments when the desired outcome is not being served.
Bounce house for Speedy’s birthday
Parenting presents plenty of opportunities for optimal quitting too. Wrestling with my boys is all fine and well until it escalates, or gets them too riled up before bed. There is undoubtedly and optimal time to quit. One that is often times slightly exceeded.
The tools used to tackle a tantruming toddler can vary in their approach. Using one too long may preclude using another. If you use the stick too early, it is hard to dangle the carrot. If they’ve already got the carrot the stick doesn’t hold the same power. There is a period of optimal quitting when changing your tactics with a toddler. One I have yet to figure out.
The point is, quitting is not the end all be all of negativity it is often painted to be. Practice quitting, especially optimally quitting, is worth your time and energy. As someone who has stumbled into doing it correctly on occasion, whether it be grappling, parenting, or grappling with my parenting dilemma, optimal quitting can yield its own form of serenity.
Tour de Zwift, running and some KOT programming
Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.
Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. While working on my linguistics project I have come across a lot of universal wisdom disguised as bland academia. Thoughts and quotes that produce a lasting effect well beyond the initial reading. I wanted to share one of them with you this week.
One of the best ways to truly understand a thing, is to study it’s history and development. Things rarely take a linear path to their current status. Those twists and turns are often filled with difficult decisions, decisions which alter trajectory.
The study of language and communication is no different. If anything I have found it to be even more interesting, because there’s is so much we don’t know. Hypotheses rise and fall on new data and discoveries in a never ending change of tides. The Oxford Handbook of the History of Linguistics, tells this story across the millennia and across the various areas of linguistic study.
Everybody needs a coozie
Our current understanding of language, is in large part due to understanding the process of change. What data we have an ancient languages, and mapping the changes through the years to where we are now.
One of the beautiful things about language is that it is dynamic and mobile. A word’s meaning, connotation, even it’s spelling is all subject to change.
“There can never be in language, just as there can never be in the continually blazing thoughts of men, a moment of true standstill.” (von Humboldt 1836b: 184)
Fun at Crayola
Linguists draw a comparison (which could also be expanded to fit humans) that languages only become static when they stop being used. These are then considering “dead” languages. People are very much the same.
Even the most obstinate toddler (not that I have any experience with those) is constantly being exposed to new information and experiences. They are a bundle of new patterns and changes.
When we stop our continually blazing thoughts, when we stop learning and growing, we reach a mental standstill. We become our own dead language. Something other people have little use for, except maybe a passing curiosity.
Spring emerging from the gloom along the trail in Augusta
The standstill is akin to death in this mental metaphor, which translates well to the physical realm. In grappling sports constant motion is required to set up an technique. Being at a standstill is a surefire way to get beat, or worse, injured.
In endurance sports a standstill is the classic sign of defeat. Haunched over, heaving, hands on knees, halted. The picture of an athlete who cannot progress any further that day.
A beautiful day for a tour d’ stade in Gainesville
Von Humboldt’s words are beautiful, and I think they are accurate. It seems with any judgement of people (and language for that matter too) it becomes necessary to add a caveat. An asterisk.
Never is a powerful word. An absolute. One that begs no argument. Humans, and language, can only find themselves at a true standstill of their own accord. When they fail to forge forward along the path, is when they die literally or metaphorically.
No standing still on the zwift pedals, freewheeling doesn’t work.
Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.
Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. This week I’m reflecting on my 35th birthday. How I feel. How I’ve grown. What type of man I have become and what type of man I want to be.
Listening to Zach Bitter and Aaron Alexander on the Human Performance Outliers podcast, Aaron said something that made me reflect on my last decade.
First time flying a kite
Zach is very literally a human performance outlier as an ultra marathoner, and Aaron is a movement coach and author of the Align Method. Their conversation covered wellness topic such as mobility, training, breathing, and mindset.
Whenever you wade into the world of endurance sports, the somewhat unanswered, elephant in the room question, is that of longevity and vitality. What are the long term costs of pushing performance? What is the cost of being an outlier? Specifically on your long-term health and wellness.
Pirate playground
Looking back, I have pushed myself pretty hard in the last decade. And not just physically. The volume of miles from triathlon training alone is staggering. Jiu jitsu, despite being the gentle art, takes it’s toll on the body. I’ve finished a graduate degree. Changed jobs twice. Found a partner and started a family. Just in the past few years I’ve cultivated new hobbies and habits.
I feel better now than I did at 25. I walk around at a lower weight than I did at the starting line of IronMan FL in 2013. (Which I hope is the lifetime peak of my training volume). I prioritize sleep and nutrition in a way that I was uneducated about a decade ago. I have more balls in the air now and struggle with balance, but find myself better equipped for that struggle.
El Duderino’s new do
Despite all of that, the question remains, am I burning the candle at both ends? Will this impact my longevity and vitality? My healthspan?
Aaron said something that I found incredibly reassuring. “your body adapts to what it is exposed to, even if that is nothing”
Birthday treats
If you are exposed to nothing, your body will adapt to that as it’s default. The smallest offset can then be momentous. On the other end of the spectrum, if you vary and amplify your exposure, your body adapts. Your level of resilience is directly correlated to your level of exposure.
There are some obvious caveats. My days of thinking “I’ll sleep when I’m dead” are long gone. Lower intensity work, mobility, and less “demanding” practices like meditation and breath work are a critical part of my routine now. Not every session can be a grip it and rip it sweat fest.
El Duderino and Speedy playing in the water
Beyond what I expose my body to in search of positive adaptation, my boys become exposed to fair portion of it is well. They are always watching and listening. Being exposed to someone pushing themself. To someone who struggles, falters, and ultimately grows. I can only surmise what lens they see me through but I hope that the exposure is beneficial.
I’m grateful for all of the beauty, challenge, pain, and struggle that I have been exposed to. I’m grateful for all the ways my body has adapted over the last decade. I hope for continued exposure to push my adaptation. I hope that I find the appropriate level of exposure for my boys as well. In some dynamic interplay of exposure and adaptation, I hope to find serenity.
Zwift, peleton, treadmill, and some mobility work from a birthday week spent mostly on the road
Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.
Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. This week I was listening to Joe Rogan conversation with General H.R. McMaster and he made a comment that reminded me of something an old boss used to tell me
While describing the recent US military withdrawal frome Afghanistan, McMaster posited the question, “did we fight a twenty year war, or did we fight a one year war, twenty times?”
My old boss, a man who is largely responsible for my professional and career development, used to ask, “Do you have one thousand hours, or one hour, a thousand times?”
The things you learn in those thousand hours
The thought being, there are components of experience, familiarization, and competence that are gained with the accumulation of hours. But that accumulation only takes place if you learn the lessons rather than repeat the same processes of your first time. In other words, have you grown and progressed?
This seems like it should be a given. If you have flown an airplane for a thousand hours there is bound to be some growth and learning. If you have fought a war for twenty years you should have picked up a thing or two.
Learning is hard. Growth is not automatic. The human condition often defaults to the path of least resistance. This is how you end up with “one hour, a thousand times” without some of the requisite lessons learned.
Early valentine cookies
Sure that might be something of an exaggeration, but the concept is there. That’s one of the primary reasons why we have assessments. Every child in a classroom receives the same number of hours of content, but they are assessed to measure their growth and proficiency.
Pilots have intermediate assessments (stage checks) and check rides. There are defined minimum hour criteria to be eligible for a check ride. The check ride itself is a way of verifying that you have accumulated the skill and mastery of those combined hours. Rather than merely repeating the same hour over and over.
This was something I struggled with in the beginning of my professional aviation career. I was a great student in the classroom, and in the airplane. When told what was important, I could immerse myself and learn. The professional world is not always so cut and dry. There is a reason academics tend to stay in academia.
Kids love candy and puppies right?
If you are fortunate, someone in the professional world will take you under their wing (aviation pun intended). They can help you sort through what is critical. What to focus on. Push you to grow.
Without that kind of mentorship. That professional nurturing. You are left to your own devices to accumulate knowledge and experience. The risk of repeating your solitary hour grows.
Daddy made it home and he brought treats
I see that lesson more clearly now as a father. My boys need to “build their hours”. But, I can be there to guide them. Making sure their hours accumulate rather than simply repeat.
Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.
This week’s SerenityThroughSweat, zwift double headers and a few days at OBJJ
Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. I wrote a few weeks back about Pappyland, a book following the van winkle family and their generational story through the booming bourbon market. The writing even after just a small snippet struck such a chord with me that I bought the book and could hardly put it down. After finishing it, I wanted to share my thoughts especially as they fit in with the overarching themes of the blog.
Whright Thompson spends a few years researching the book getting to know Julian Van Winkle, the bourbon industry as well as the family’s complicated history. The story follows four generations from “pappy”, Julian’s grandfather, all the way to Julian’s son Preston, who is learning at his father’s side.
Maple syrup lollipops from Vermont (what does a father, especially one who travels, owe a son?)
Thompson weaves his own relationship with his father as well as his journey towards becoming a new father into the novel which becomes more about family than it does about bourbon.
“Meeting with Julian and making him talk about his family made me ask myself the same question I’d been asking him: What did I owe my late father? What did I owe a grandfather I never met? What is demanded of a son or a daughter? What was demanded of me?”
Both Julian and Wright’s fathers died of illness before their time. Both sons felt the weight not only of the loss, but of the pressure to live up to family expectations. To succeed and press on in ways that the previous generation was unable to, for one reason or another.
He also owes snuggles
The idea of raising a child, makes you reflect on those questions. If you are fortunate enough, and live in enough comfort to be introspective, having all of your needs met, you inevitably owe a debt to your parents. One that I’m not sure can ever be repaid.
Even if that debt is never tabulated, called in, or otherwise made tangible, it exists. It is an unspoken calling across generations to fulfill potential. To create, and affect, and change, hopefully in a positive and lasting way some part of this world.
Time to be a hero
In the acknowledgements Thompson writes to his young daughter telling her “let me save you some soul searching: you don’t owe me anything”. He goes on to say that he loves her unconditionally and that the book is for her.
I love his work, and I am inspired by it. Especially as I tackle my own literary project. Still, I think he misses the mark. After his deep and moving coverage of the VanWinkle family, it seems to.me there is always some form of generational debt.
The unconditional love and the debt are not mutually exclusive. If your parents did right by you, whatever their faults and failings may be, a debt is owed. It may not even be payable to them. It may be payable to yourself. But, a debt is owed.
Some non tour cardio
My own feeble attempt then, to answer those questions.
Mom and Dad, I cannot thank you enough for the foundation you laid for me, and especially now for my family. There are lessons that are poignant in my mind, that I feel obliged to pass on. Traditions and relationships that I vow to maintain. An idea, of a fulfilled life that I will strive towards. These are the things I feel are demanded of me as a son.
Tour de Zwift
Speedy and El Duderino, you are loved unconditionally. Your mother and I will support you to the best of our abilities in your endeavors. But you owe a debt, mostly to yourselves, but in a small part to us. To try, to engage, to grow, to explore and experience. In short, to live a life with purpose.
These are broad strokes intentionally. There are innumerable paths you both may choose. Following any of those paths in earnest, with intention, grace, and maybe even a touch of serenity, will clear any debt that may be owed.
Teach and appreciating craft
Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.
