Status Report: 0545;111025;LUKE;N;DEASY
The seasons they’re a’changing.
Getting uncomfortably public about addiction and mental health (and other random stuff) through unfiltered stream-of-consciousness writing [is that redundant?].
Introductory Remarks
Dear Zesters,
In last Friday’s post, Getting Graphic #60: Hype Trends, we looked at a pseudo-chart that deconstructed the lifecycle of a trend. I think it’s fascinating to consider who the participants are at different stages of the trend—and whether or not those who jump on a trend super late are aware of their tardiness. Or maybe there are just certain types of people who are trend-starters, early-adopters, trend-identifiers, and trend-followers or something—and so there’s a natural adoption curve for this stuff. I know this is pretty well-trodden territory within the realm of like technological adoption—but I guess I wonder if there’s something more generalizable there. I think maybe it all relates to risk tolerance, to some extent. Maybe all of life is about risk tolerance.
Status
Health
I’m in a moderately-transition-ish period right now as it relates to my health a little bit just because I just started eating three meals a day again about a month ago and so that’s been new. Honestly this is a pretty boring section I’m not sure that I really have much to say here. I just am very conscious of my health—and I think I’m like trying to find the balance between preserving, maintaining, and optimizing physical, mental, psychological health. I’m not really sure what I’m trying to say here, really. But maybe I’ll turn it into a broader commentary on like over-optimizing for stuff. Because sometimes I feel like maybe I’m way too focused on trying to strictly adhere to a schedule and do things “correctly” when really I can sort of vibe and trust myself and trust myself and things might just be okay. Within the context of health and physical wellbeing specifically I think I am starting to think more and more about like what our natural state is—and more specifically thinking that we are supposed to be healthy and in shape and fit and stuff—and we have sort of been softened by society—but I think there’s probably some set of lifestyle habits and stuff that are conducive to relatively abundant health. I guess it’s hard to really say for sure. I don’t even know what the fuck I’m talking about right now. Let’s just move on.
Bryan Johnson’s Shroom Trip
As of the time of composition for this post, Bryan Johnson is gearing up to take 5g of shrooms (yesterday, relative to when you’re reading this) and I’m so excited to see what happens. I don’t know too too much about his personal history with psychedelics, but I do think that he could go into this thing with an improper amount of respect for the power of psychedelics and then get like rocked. I also question him doing it so publicly and like so scientifically and feel like that kind of goes against everything shrooms really stand for. So honestly this feels kind of like it’s my Super Bowl and I’m super excited to see what comes of it—and I really do wish him all the best. But I also think it’d be so funny if he tripped super hard and realized that like trying to beat death like isn’t an honorable goal or some shit like that—and then like totally gives up on his life-optimization journey and stuff like that.
A Bohemian Woman
I’ve recently decided that really I’d like to marry a bohemian woman. I don’t know specifically what I mean by that—but that’s the overall vibe I’m going for. Like I’d like an artsy-adjacent woman who is carefree and effervescent and luminous. Is that too much to ask? I think this also is some amount of projection because I think really I wish that I were more bohemian and artsy and like avant garde, when really I think I’m probably pretty boring and mainstream and uninspired—like in the grand scheme of things. And that is quite upsetting to me. But I guess life is meant to be lived and identity is meant to be constructed so we’ll see if I can’t start pushing myself in the direction of art and music and romance and blah blah blah. Really I think what’s happening is that I’ve been pushing myself in a literary-consumption direction of like mid-20th century social and romance-adjacent novels with The Adventures of Kavalier & Clay and then I’m reading Bonfire of the Vanities right now and then next I’m going to read Goldfinch and then maybe some more Tom Wolfe after that—and so I’m just in this kind of place of pretty fundamental and comprehensive creative destruction, and so I think I must first practice and apply a more bohemian attitude to art and expression within the context of myself and my identity.
It’s also kind of ridiculous because I literally like think of myself as a musician and the work I do as music—even though it’s literally some of the most technical and white collar stuff imaginable. But that’s honest-to-god how I think of it—like each engagement is an album and I really do feel like I’m making music with my customers—and my computer is a guitar and stuff. I don’t think this is actually that crazy because my dad’s a musician and so that’s sort of how I implicitly understood work growing up in that type of household—and so I think I’m just living out that same like operating guide within my own life—even thought the actual work I’m doing and the literal stuff I’m thinking about and like my personal core competencies couldn’t be further from lyrico-sonic composition. But that’s okay! Because it’s actually how I identify. And I think also to some extent that’s why I’ve never really treated my work as a purely economic pursuit and/or activity—I really do view everything I do and everything I pursue as an artistic expression of self. And so that’s also why I think I don’t really do well working under other people and then more generally why I never wanted to work, really, within a large corporate organization. Because the artist creates the music that the artist wants when the artist wants. Of course there are certain economic constraints associated with my work, whereby I actually have to deliver for clients and have deadlines and stuff like that. But I’m mostly pretty good about delivering on time because I really don’t mind spending a lot of time in the studio because for the most part I’m writing my own songs and working on a craft that I love—and so that’s super rewarding.
I’m not on this planet to take little swings
This might be the second to last thing that I’ll discuss briefly, but I’m increasingly certain that my purpose on this planet is to swing for the fences with whatever I do—and I think that feels really liberating to kind of realize that I have these pretty grand and undefined ambitions and I can construct a life and exhibit and live out the habits associated with pursuing those grand ambitions—and really my imagination and my self-belief and my work ethic are the only limiting factors. With fear of sounding condescending, I’ve realized that there are many highly successful people who are less capable than me—and so I’m sort of thinking about the arc of my personal and professional development and the songs I want to sing, and I feel highly compelled to push and push and push and to move quickly and leap boldly and strike aggressively and just see what happens. I’m not here to be small or to be bashful or to fit into someone else’s box. I am here to be the best version of me and I can be and to have the most impact possible and to create a life that has a positive impact on humanity and those around me (even if small)—but, to be totally honest, I have less of a “make the world a better place” attitude and more of a: “have a positive impact on myself and those around me” sort of mentality—and I think that’s okay. But all I really want to say here is that as I start to really pursue my own entrepreneurial endeavors for the first real time in my life I just feel this really intense fire burning inside me, and I don’t want to extinguish or be frightened by the flames—I want to stoke the fire within. To tie this all to Avatar the Last Airbender, I feel like I’ve spent the past 5-10 years really grappling with the source of my heat, and trying to find the ‘original benders’ (i.e., the dragons), and then doing the dance with the dragons (s/o Zuko), and so I really feel like I’m sort of on the most firma terra I’ve ever been on—and of course I have to keep improving and growing there—but I’m really like ready to push and strive and pursue and attack. And I guess I also don’t think that means like action for action’s sake, but really like sort of cultivating a quietness of the soul and the spirit and the body and mind, while training in the dojo, waiting for the moment to strike and preparing for the right opportunity to take the leap. And then to assess, and modify, and retrain, and adjust, and then wait for the chance to strike again. I just don’t want to be afraid of trying, and striving, and I want to intentionally lean into the irrational exuberance and grand ambitions that I have for myself and those around me and that I want to work to express during my time on this planet. As you get older, people stop telling you to reach for the stars—and I was lucky enough to have a mother that really reinforced from a young age that I could do anything I set my mind to—and even though I strayed from that path for awhile, it’s always been there, just waiting for me to return. And now I feel like I’ve found it again, and I’m so thankful to be on it that there’s no point in meandering or strolling down it. I want to run!
Not pushing
Okay but then at the same time, and this maybe makes very little sense, but I also don’t feel the need to kill myself like day-to-day to accomplish these goals. I really am in it for the long-haul, and there’s not point in running myself ragged in the near-term, when I want to still be firing on all cylinders like 10 years from now—when the demands of my life will, in all likelihood, be much greater (assuming children and wife and civic responsibilities and stuff—maybe big assumptions)—and so I think I want to be mindful about like preparing and pushing and striving and taking advantage of opportunities when they present themselves—but also not necessarily swimming upstream or paddling against the tides of opportunity, and just trying to create the environmental and circumstantial pre-conditions for opportunity and making sure that I’m ready to strike when those chances present themselves. It’s hard to explain exactly what I mean by this, but there’s like a certain universal like contentment I think that comes from working and pushing and trying to make the most of everyday, without straining and struggling unnecessarily to feel like you’re progressing. In one of the online yogas I do, the teacher says “stretch without strain, struggle without pain” or something like that—and so that’s a pretty good paradigm for how I’m thinking about things in the “business” world—which really is just my world. Like I’m definitely in the camp that says there’s no such thing as work/life balance because it’s all just my life—and I’m fortunate to be doing something I mostly love for work—and if I stop loving it then I can modify.
Naivety & Pursuit
I think in the past I was pretty cynical, broadly, and then very self-cynical. And so I think as I use grandiloquent prose to describe my aspirations and ambitions and as I unabashedly pump myself up—there’s that old voice inside of me that feeds doubt and is trying to prepare me for inevitable disappointment, and is whispering that I’m going to look back on these words in 10 years, having completely failed to live up to my perceived potential, and that it’s going to be the same old story. The same old failures. The same old foibles. The same old Luke. But I no longer want to submit to that voice of doubt and that fable of fear. I’m the author of my narrative and I want to write a story of pursuit and growth and attempts—and I don’t want to be cynical anymore—about myself or the world or others. And that’s just a choice I’m making.
Concluding Remarks
That’s all from me. I ended up writing more than expected—after a very choppy start where I was talking about health or some shit like that. Boy did that suck! Well, have a beautiful wonderful amazing week! Also this my 600th POST!!! Woohoo!!! I really am going to do some like statistical analysis on all of this soon, because I think that’d be very fun—and now with the AI coding tools I feel like it’d be relatively straightforward to do. Adios!
With infinite zest for life,
Luke