Euan Semple's Blog, page 17

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@euan@mstdn.social

Little moments of joy

The Lock Screen on my iPhone continues to remind me of little moments of joy in my life.

Powerful stuff…

I just blubbed three times on my short walk with Hannah Waddingham. Do give it a listen if you get the chance.

My own little charnel ground

Buddhists of certain traditions are encouraged to sit in their local charnel ground as a way of deepening their understanding of the impermanence of form.

Alby is forever bringing us “presents”. Some of them we manage to save, some of them we don’t. This little soul passed away on the window ledge of my office and rather than clearing away his body I decided to leave it there as decomposure, hungry insects, and the weather took their toll.

It has been a daily reminder of how everything is constantly changing, nothing is permanent, and being here to see all of this happening is a miracle that we do well to appreciate.

Connection

In the end,stories are about one
person saying to another: This is
the way it feels to me. Can you
understand what I’m saying?
Does it feel this way to you?

– Kazuo Ishiguro

In the conversation yesterday about whether or not I should leave comments turned on on this blog, a couple of you mentioned a sense of community as being one of the benefits. I am never convinced about community. For me it has connotations of tribalism, group think and pressure to conform.

It dawned on me this morning that what I am more interested in is connection.

I have sat at this very desk for thirty years using a variety of keyboards to peck out words that agitate electrons, animate screens, and eventually pass through eyes into someone else’s head. Hopefully these words help in some way, share an idea, provide comfort, and who knows maybe occasionally inspire.

That’s why I do it! It is truly magical.

Discretion

In all the years I have blogged I have rarely written about my family. I didn’t even share photos of the girls when they were young. It somehow didn’t feel fair to write about them in a place where they didn’t spend much time and where their actions could be interpreted by others for good or ill depending on the quality of my writing.

When writing about work or family situations I developed the habit of abstracting the principles into “Isn’t it interesting that…” type of posts where I can hopefully help share insights and learning without compromising identity.

Even in terms of my own thoughts and actions though I have grown wary, and weary, of the opining that can be triggered on social media or even in comments on this blog. It is a fine line between valuable sharing in the interests of collective learning – and feeling exposed and scrutinised by people who don’t really know me.

I sometimes consider turning off the comments and likes on posts as they can be a constraint on my writing. But to do so runs counter to the shared understanding that was so much the attraction certainly of early blogging.

What do you reckon?

Getting off my arse.

It’s that time of year, when the paths become less overgrown, the temperature reduces, and less insects fly around.

It is time to get walking again, and even on my short local walk, it is such a joy to be out and about.

Second thoughts

I was in two minds whether to publish my last post and have subsequently decided to delete it.

Ha ha ha ha…

Start the day as you mean to go on

Every day when I tidy up and put things in the dishwasher there is this running commentary from my chattering monkey:

“Why is it always me who does this?”.
“This is clearly the way that things were meant to be put in this dishwasher”.
“How I put things into the dishwasher matters, getting it wrong means I haven’t tried hard enough”.

Noticing that this happens is the first step to not taking it seriously.

Work in progress…