Letter 9: Balancing the Branches of Passionate Pursuits

Sometimes I feel like I’m coming to the beginning of multiple paths all going in their own directions. I’ve recently decided to explore each of these paths passionately as I travel further along than ever before. In the past month I’ve spent weekends with a Thai family, road tripped to a music festival with Thai friends, went camping with 120 Boy Scouts as well as 20 Thai teachers from my school, and explored the depths of Buddhism in both conversation and through reading. I’ve recently become engrossed in a well-rounded understanding of the Presidential Race. I probably spend up to two hours a day reading and/or discussing politics. I’ve spent a weekend traveling on my own and have finally joined an Ultimate Frisbee community in Thailand. In Chiang Mai I’ve found an ideal Chinese/Thai/Western doctor to help restore my health from my Yosemite fall four and a half years ago. I’ve also reread “Flowers for Algernon”, a book about intellectual growth in a mentally disabled boy and have begun studying for the law school entrance exam by playing games on an iPhone app. I’ve completed the first third of an online course on the Science of Happiness and have connected with new American friends in the past few weekends of travel. I’ve driven motorbikes to a mountain and hiked to its peak, whilst finding new ways to teach enthusiastically and directionally to capitalize on the limited teaching hours I’ve had recently. Amongst these passionate pursuits I’ve maintained my yoga routine, improved my basketball shot with weekly games of H.O.R.S.E with a ten year old, and had enriching conversations with some of my best friends in other parts of the world. My Face Time hangouts with my family have also been excellent and I’ve now watched my first a.m. Super Bowl. I’m loving my time here and capitalizing on the freedom to pursue all my present passions with an urgency and intensity. That said, I know there will be a decision to make at the crux of where and when these paths actually diverge. This conundrum has many inherent contradictions that are the source of a growing anxiety I’ve recently felt towards an inevitable decision I’ll be making when my time in Thailand is finished. I feel blessed to be in this position and my time here has overwhelmingly overshadowed this anxiety as its been filled with contentment, positivity, and gratitude for the present.

I have determined that the best way to initiate my investigations into this decision is to set down each of the paths of passionate pursuit. Right now there is no risk to the diverging passion I will be inevitably torn over because I’m not forced to commit to a certain path now. I have this sense of solace that I can always return back to the point where the paths converge. My anxiety, therefore, comes from putting myself in my shoes next October when my time in Thailand is coming to an end. At this time I know the intentional decisions I will be making will play a significant role in dictating my long-term future.

I can distill the decision at this point to the inevitable divergence of two larger paths. One path is of cultural immersion, living abroad, self-exploration, and experiential learning. I adapt to and grow from unforeseen opportunities and situations as I continue to first-handedly explore the depths of truth. The other is grounded in predictability and stability as I choose to commit to a lifestyle centered on my career. I’m confident this decision would be intellectually enriching, socially comforting, and the beginnings of a cementation in career, location, and family. At this point both paths are viable and I’m enjoying the ability to shift my focus between the two so far this year. I’m convinced that wholeheartedly pursing both of these paths now will guide me to a well-informed decision and help me to have convictions and justify my decisions with my personal framework. Right now I oftentimes feel very open-minded and find myself applying a velocity of intensity to my study of these paths because I believe this is the best way to expose my leanings. I see the variety of my interests becoming more refined as I am able to explore the beginnings of each with intense passion for the remainder of the year. However, there’s something unsettling about feeling contradicted over a choice to embark on multiple paths that one day will diverge from one another. The one commonality to the diverging paths is that I want to understand human truth. I hope to better learn what my role can be to use those truths to create a fulfilling life for myself and for the betterment of society.

Before I came to Thailand I prevented myself from having to make important decisions such as these because I wasn’t focused on pursuing the passions I should’ve been. These dilemmas of many passions are only now coming to the forefront because I avoided confronting them at Macalester. I chose to not commit to a serious pursuit of any particular passion because I was seeking a lifestyle rich in immediate social pleasure. My passion was the love I felt with my girlfriend and I was caught up with how to mold my pursuit of passions to include her in my future. I loved my role as captain of the Frisbee team, which was another centerpiece of my focus. In college I invested a lot of energy and focus towards an awareness of and progression in my health to rehabilitate from the significant trauma I experienced falling down the mountain at Yosemite the summer before my sophomore year. The decisions I made the second half of college were not anxiety inducing and I was able to derive pleasure from the same sources of my childhood. I was fueled by the intense and requited love that felt so resilient and enduring. After my most recent head injury a year ago and the time away from the responsibilities of life that followed, I fully understood that it was time to let go of my attachment to childhood and commit to adulthood. When I was a child I repeatedly heard that life would never be as good as my childhood. Last year I took a corporate sales job and within a week, my two and a half year relationship disintegrated. I was confronted with the reality that to successfully create a meaningful life after college, it was up to me to take control of the independence I’m afforded as an adult. This responsibility to myself began with identifying my passions and taking the first steps towards them. I assessed what my passions were and came to understand with conviction that teaching in Thailand was the best way to fully explore the dormant and insufficiently explored passions I had all along. I can confidently say that I am now successfully following these passions and gaining great insights to all the intricacies of my passionate pursuits. I’m independent and making wise decisions that will and are affecting the most core areas of my adult life. As I’m making these adult decisions, I’m consistently refining and acquiring tools to become even better at this task. I’m developing many opinions of my own and being challenged to remain connected to my core values while new ones arise. As I’m writing this, I’m sighing a breath of relief because it feels amazing to actually nail down that I have made it to this point of solidity.

After spending nearly four months in Thailand and five months outside the United States, it is undeniable that I have grown from and love being immersed in a diversity of cultures particularly by living abroad. I love the challenge of connecting with and understanding the perspectives of new people from different backgrounds than I come from. I feel a tremendous sense of freedom to explore the depths of numerous opportunities and become a better-rounded person by integrating my new learning with what I already know and believe. When I’m traveling I go in and out of being connected and reliant on others. Sometimes I’m totally alone and other times I’m braving extreme weather, to language barriers, cultural misunderstandings with people who just hours ago were total strangers. I love the gaps between the intensity and variety of experiences. When I get a pause while traveling, with a long bus ride for example, I enter the most conducive headspaces for creativity and happiness. I love when my exhaustion fuels daydreams of future travels and imagined selves. I meet people along the way who get to know me, each planting little seeds of travel inspiration. In this kind of travel there are many new challenges and I feel that I’m afforded the opportunity to have a significant say over the design of these challenges. I’m lucky to consistently have a sustained focus on a long stream of present, pleasant thoughts every day. I can pause at some point each day and, when I do, my thinking isn’t flooded with anxieties because I’m confident I’ve set myself up for success and I trust myself to adapt to the many circumstances that are outside of my control.

In Thailand, I don’t have a long to do list or predesigned days or weeks. I’m afforded the ability to sleep well. There’s nothing keeping me from going to bed early if I need to or napping during the day or sleeping in on the weekends. I get quantity and quality sleep. It is easy to fall asleep quickly because I don’t have anything to dread the following morning. Even Mondays feel like a day to absorb the playful energy of kids and see my Thai coworkers who have become my friends. Working feels good here because its balanced with everything else I take on. It’s not the primary or dominant experience of most of my days as is typical where I come from. Work is simply one of my experiences in a day. I constantly feel supported and am driven by the welcoming, complimentary, and genuine generosity of those I work with and encounter in my travels. These are not daily gifts to overlook or begin to take for granted. These underlying pervasive subtleties color my days and equip me with the positive attitude and openness for inspiration. I am motivated to authentically and positively contribute to these communities in which I am in the beginnings of membership.

This past weekend three of us drove motorbikes for two and half hours and stayed for free in an empty resort that my shop-owner friend in Phrae connected us to. We saw the pastoral mountains and had a beautiful time spending the night in group solitude. It was a strangely lovely experience as we sat on top of five mattresses pushed together on the ground in our single bulb lit room wrapped in blankets and wearing nearly all the clothes we had packed. Our entertainment was just an iPhone speaker and our cleverly goofy banter. It reminded me of the camaraderie I once had in the three-story apartment in Essaouira, Morocco we once shared with nine Americans in November of 2012. Both of these situations had rare, simple beauty that forced us to band together and become extremely creative in the timeless and resource-scarce isolation of our setting. I think times like these strip people of their social guards and cultivate true self-expression. In turn, we collectively elevated the ever-increasingly interconnected group. Essaouira was three weeks of unwavering contentment as our communal dynamic fueled a well-nourished social dynamic. We exercised together, went shopping and shared in the task of cooking meals. We brewed tea every night, basked in the sun, played on the beach, and became increasingly connected with the Moroccan community outside. Journalism was as our vehicle to befriend shop owners as teaching is my gateway here to getting to know Thai people well. In Essaouira we laughed hard many times a day, ate hearty and healthy, and developed a level of elevated conversation that sparked many of the intellectual passions I have today. When it came time to leave we were convinced this arrangement was sustainable and only required each of us simply making the decision to stay. Of course we couldn’t stay, because of our expectations to finish our study abroad semesters and return to our respective colleges in America. Nonetheless, our seaside apartment helped me to develop many self-truths that are undoubtedly responsible for bringing me to Thailand. This past weekend reconfirmed my conviction I still have a conviction to believe in the gestaltic potentials of a closed-community comprised of intentional, authentic, curious, and well-developed individuals willing to expose their quirks and beliefs to the group. These kinds of arrangements are at the core of my passions for people, learning, mutual understandings, inspirational thinking, and vulnerability in front of others. Living in this exposed and communal way yields greater insights into my personal investigations and elevates my confidence in the potentials of society. This past Sunday morning in the mountains bordering Laos we hiked to the summit of Pu Chi Fa. At the top I thought of my passion for hiking and how braving the cold with others builds a unique combination of collective optimism through adversity and toughness to endurance. When the sun began to rise after enduring an hour and a half at the top of Pu Chi Fa in the 25-degree weather and 20 mph wind, the open beauty beneath us in all directions was a priceless reward for the incredible achievement we had created together.

I have embarked on and brainstormed many travels since I first left the country at the age of nineteen to scuba dive and backpack Central America for a month. Many of the ideas I have today I know would ignite a certain passion of mine to learn how cultures operate in the ways of healing. I consistently enjoy locating the ways in which I will choose to identify with these cultural practices after each immersive adventure. I still want to learn and participate in traditional Eastern healing practices in the mountains of China, live amongst an Amazonian tribe in Patagonia, become entrenched in a yoga community in India, trek the Himalayans in Nepal, and get my scuba diving instructorship certification as part of an excellent diving community. I simply want to set out on a trail and take the time to read many books whose knowledge I am convinced would add enormous benefit to my growth. I wish to visit friends living all over the world and soak in the learning of their experiences. Maybe after Thailand I choose to put together a proposal to procure a research grant for studies in mindful leadership, the affects of technology on democratization, or alternative forms of community and individual education? Maybe I build from the start of my English teaching career and find a job teaching on a different continent? Maybe the right decision will be to extend my time here?

I am aware of the likely implications accompanying a decision to be guided by travel passions. As I move from one opportunity to the next as a kind of traveling student, I know I would become informed of further truth-seeking questions that would most likely demand experiences in other areas of the globe. To truly explore the depths of all of these interests would take years. I am certain I would want to become a true member of these communities instead of merely a tourist. I wouldn’t want to be passive about my time in places either. I like producing things to communicate with others that help to play a role in elevating my understanding and leaving an impact on a community. It would require creativity on my part to find an income that funds this kind of lifestyle, but I know from experience that if I set my mind to this exciting path I can make it happen. Any thought I have towards the permanency of this somewhat nomadic and meandering path, however, is countered by the conviction I also have to raise a family of my own in America near my family that has always been there for me. I know I need to see my family on a regular basis and continue to develop and maintain increasingly close relationships with my best friends. I’m only a plane ticket away from any of these destinations, including my homes in America. However, making only the small salary I do now, a plane ticket away always remains a plane ticket away.

The other, seemingly mutually exclusive, direction I see myself heading after Thailand is a return to America to pursue a law and/or journalism post-graduate degree. I could travel for a while after teaching in Thailand and return home to spend quality time with my family and stay with friends all over the country before enrolling in the fall of 2017. With this option, I know I would be consistently challenged intellectually and I feel a comfort knowing I’m building towards a sustainable future that puts me closer with my family while I’m on a career path and laying the foundation upon which to build a family of my own. This option is, in many ways however, the opposite of my present experience in Thailand. There would be not nearly as much free time, significant more pressure to perform, and I wouldn’t be unique with my cultural ethnicity as I am as a “farang” in Thailand. While this is true, I have a conviction that Thailand’s opposite would be an excellent option for satisfying many of the passions I’ve been dabbling in for quite awhile.

I see a dual-degree Law and Journalism program allowing me to hone my natural skills in these areas and utilize my leadership potential to begin to find my specific role in making the world a better place. Each of these disciplines would creatively inspire the other and would better inform and contribute to the well-developed worldview I will surely have after Thailand. Attending graduate school would place me around like-minded, motivated, intelligent peers. My classroom discussions would be rich in their exposures to new and creative ideas expressed by the many brilliant students and professors each informed by their own unique background. The kind of critical thinking demanded in these programs will help me to even better understand and organize my thoughts as I further develop the skills to creatively express myself. I will also be equipped with new lenses with which to frame my perspectives on the world. The pursuit of post-graduate degrees in these fields grants me new opportunities to explore the specific depths of each and discover innovative ways of applying my new knowledge. During this time I would most likely choose to study abroad. My separate paths would again converge in a new and exciting way yielding a combined richness that I can only begin to imagine at this point. When I graduated, I would have well-developed research to carve out my passionate niches and would be equipped with the qualifications to fully pursue my passions and apply them to make a difference for many years to come. As a journalist I’d be afforded the liberty to connect with people from many walks of life as I discover a story and creatively communicate its truths to others. I’d be able to further develop my skill of using reflection and the writing process to accurately communicate layers of truth that encourage others to learn how they can contribute to a better self and world. My astute understanding of the law would color my coverage of truth. At this point, I would eventually like to be in a leadership role where I have the power to create new laws or interpretations of laws that connect constitutions with a rapidly changing society in order to put us in the best positions to sustainably thrive. While I don’t have specific end goals to this graduate school path, I have full confidence that I will be able to utilize the skills I’ve developed here in Thailand to guide my decision-making and create opportunities that use my strengths, satisfy my passions, and allow me to grow in my unique way. Not only would I be on a long-term trajectory of successfully pursuing my passions, my financial security would also be taken care of. I would be able to soon establish a position where I could begin to transition to new stages of adulthood and establish roots, commit to loving a partner, and ultimately raise a family.

When I leave Thailand I’ll be 25. This fact is a double-edged sword. On one hand, I’ll never be this commitment free, able-bodied, and most likely as inspired and energized to experience the world outside America with such a deep and focused intensity. I’m learning so much about myself now and developing independent insights that will empower and guide me the rest of my life. There is seemingly no impact to delaying graduate school another year or two because I really feel like all paths of this exploration will result in me yearning for expertise, qualifications, and positions of great influence directed towards the longer-term goal of personal stability in the United States. On the other hand, I won’t be able to attend graduate school until August 2017, just before my 26^th birthday. The earliest I’d graduate would be May of 2020 and I’d be 28.5 years old. My entry-level position after graduation would likely require a full investment of my time and energy. Not to mention, this position would likely be temporal in nature because it is merely a stepping-stone. Additionally, I imagine myself remaining decommited in other important areas in order to fully commit to my career and until I feel like I’m established on my progression down a consistent path. I simultaneously recognize the futility in planning ten years in the future. There are so many circumstances I cannot predict, including the ways my feelings towards any of these passions may change. However, it doesn’t seem likely that I’d gain a suitable level of stability until my low to mid 30’s, even with a commitment to this specific path of permanence. Delaying this stability even longer would make me an old dad. I don’t want to be an old dad. Being home sooner with a plan that I know would be incredibly fulfilling and being able to spend quality time with my long-time friends and family sounds like a great option to me.

Before I choose a certain path, however, it is vital for me to seek a conviction to personal truths that will inevitably guide my exploration of my chosen path. In my short time passionately pursuing the beginnings of my future paths, I have learned that I want to become a master of a few passionate pursuits rather than remaining merely a dabbler of all. I am inspired by the presidential candidacy of Bernie Sanders who I see as model for living authentically and with conviction and focus. He passionately pursues a selfless interest in creating brighter futures for the greater good of society. People may have disagreements over his means, but Bernie is not going to make sacrifices to his character to satisfy his end goals. He is not beholden to the interest groups, the domination of corporate finance, or even party lines in his service to the country. Instead, his decisions are fueled by his conviction that all deserve access to the same general opportunities in order to for society to thrive. He is committed to an authenticity that empowers individuals. He is going to fight for those that have become pawns to powerful institutions that dictate the limits of the livelihood of everyday individuals. I admire how Bernie integrates the approaches of other successful political cultures to holistically better our country and world. He points out that the United States is the only major country where health care is not a right. He understands that the structure of the American educational system must change so that bright students of any class have the chance to fully develop their intellectual potentials. He understands the intricacies of the systemic violence of our criminal justice system and the ways that these injustices perpetuate antagonizing perceptions of race and class. I think he has a keen understanding to the implications of climate change, which he sees as the most overlaying issue facing our world today. His convictions are backed by the fact that our current economic and political structure has bred an inequality at its greatest in modern history. He recognizes that many people have become powerless in this fight as opportunities for success become further limited and everyday individuals are pitted against each other in a race with only a handful of prizes to win. Bernie’s call for revolution has ignited the passion of many millions of Americans as he’s exposed in the mainstream that those in the top one percent have already claimed the majority of the prizes and those born into privilege have a significant head start in this race to claim the little that remains. It seems clear to me that the “rigged” system Bernie describes is a recipe for growing disunity, malcontent, and rampant inequality. Nobody questions Bernie’s authenticity in these issues because his words and actions are grounded in a conviction to integrity and a moral responsibility that has been at the core of his politics for more than forty years.

Like Bernie, I am reaching some of my own convictions in regards to my understandings of effective leadership. I believe in serving the interests of people whom a leader represents. I don’t believe that we need to buy into the claims that powerful established interests use to persuade us that someone who believes the way Bernie does is a dangerous candidate to our self-interest. I believe that people should be given the chance to capitalize on their gifts being granted securities such as health care and education. If it’s up to us to buy these rights, the lives of those who cannot afford to pay become severely handicapped and their futures subsequently pre-determined. The system breeds success for those born into success while impoverishing those not fortunate enough to buy their way into these opportunities. I have conviction that people of all socio-economic statuses would benefit from removing the barriers that restrict them from carving out their own path. I am a living example of the ways that a relative freedom from restriction has allowed me to cultivate my passions, independence, and a greater understanding of the nuances and intersections of culture. I believe I have a much greater ability to empathetically take on the worldview of others because of my worldly education. I have the chance to experience universal truths in Thailand and assess my relationship to these truths first-hand. I am able to practice leadership toward my own life, and have personally developed by taking on leadership roles within a variety of diverse communities. Today, I am not only searching for a conviction to personal truths, I’m also looking for the best ways to carry out these truths with a focused lifelong pursuit. I’m asking myself, “What can I do to authentically serve and pursue these truths both for myself and others?”

Perhaps the answer to this question becomes the path I ultimately choose to pursue. I have learned that consistently becoming attuned to my personal philosophy grounds me with conviction that helps me to capitalize on the control I can exercise in the design of my future. I’m also able to better adapt to circumstances outside of my control that could potentially alter my progress for the negative. I feel privileged to have been helped along by those who were endowed with the capital to cultivate my skills, interests, and desires. I have clearly benefited from my ability to attend a top liberal arts college out of my home state, backpack Central America, study journalism in Morocco, and hike to Machu Picchu with a best friend amongst other travels. Now I am afforded the opportunity to move to Thailand for a year to teach English. I truly do have ample time and a conducive environment in which to reflect and chart my path forward. If I wasn’t privileged to intentional carve out my own path, I believe the enormous opportunity and hope I personally feel for my future would be greatly diminished. Since moving away for college I have become increasingly attuned to the control I have over these future decisions. I believe each of us are endowed to have a sense of power over our lots in life and I will do my best to help others achieve this right that we have been conditioned to believe is a privilege. I also believe, that as individuals, we can each play our own part in reclaiming this control by developing convictions of our own for self-betterment.

Another reason I believe so strongly in developing personal truths and conviction lies at the heart of a lack of control that nobody can escape. Our character, integrity, and convictions are challenged when we are confronted with situations that force us to closely examine and confront the parts of us that can be unsettling. This was particularly difficult for me just four months after finishing college when I went through a devastating breakup, the death of my grandma, was daunted by the sacrifices of convictions I had to make to be successful at my new corporate sales job, and moved into a new city with a roommate I met through Craigslist. During this difficult time I leaned on the conviction that I was strong enough to endure the lows life sometimes brings. I slowly developed an awareness of the greater conflicts I needed to confront if I were to reclaim control over my circumstances. My conviction to remain positive and exercise my degree of self-control eventually begat objective self-examination and, half a year later resulted in a decisive action to trust in the pursuit of my passions. Much was out of my control during this period and relinquishing a degree of control taught me enormous lessons in trusting my personal philosophy, convictions, and intuition. I am now in an excellent position in Thailand because of the trust I placed in myself and a faith in the fate that follows well-intentioned decisions. It is my intention in Thailand to continue the significant progress I have developed in creating a dynamic and resilient intuition rooted in self-understanding, insightfulness, and conviction. All of these positive impacts to my self-trust are creating a strong foundation to my adulthood that I can refer to when I’m confronted with new and different opportunities and/or limitations in the future. Times of profound powerlessness have equipped me with wisdom and a refined understanding of my intuition as I have been forced to adapt my new self-understandings to navigate future conflicts. Through reflection I realize that this self-understanding wouldn’t be as solid if I hadn’t developed a conviction to learning how to properly adapt myself to new ideas and situations I had to become vulnerable to myself in order to gain the wisdom required to navigate the mysteries of inevitable impactful decisions.

To put me in the best position to navigate this decision I believe I need to passionately pursue all the diverging paths that I am potentially interested in setting down before I meditate for 21 days. Now is a relatively stress free time and environment free of the typical distractions that interrupt the depths of conviction to personal truths I believe I am capable of attaining this year in Thailand. I don’t know exactly what to expect in 21 days in meditation for insightfulness, but I hope to attain greater clarity towards the future of these paths.. I believe meditation will nurture my intuition to guide the decision-making process. For the next couple months I’m committed to passionately pursuing all of these paths so they are in my recent memory before this 21-day pause in two months. I’m not trying to control the destination of these pursuits. Instead, I’m going to be conscious of my insights and changing feelings. I will attend the meditation retreat after having completed my first semester of teaching and reuniting with my Dad and brother for ten days in Thailand. I will probably work on a farm for a week in northern Thailand to reconnect with my core self hopefully in similar ways as I was able to do on the Cambodian farm. I also plan on playing in my first Frisbee tournament abroad and celebrating Thailand’s biggest holiday Songkran, which will include five days of celebration and water wars in the streets. When it comes time in the second half of April to pause for 21-days, I will have all the relevant material on which to reflectively explore the depths of my passions as I become attuned to the ways in which they overlap. I will use this time to assess how they fit within my worldview and personal value system as well as how they consistently put me in a better position to develop conviction, authenticity, and fulfillment. After 21 days meditating for insightfulness I don’t want to be left wondering, “well what if I had tried this idea out that I felt very connected with in 9^th grade” or “this suggestion offered up by a friend that knows me well.” I also don’t want to feel regret over a sacrifice I made that interrupted my investigation down a path of passionate pursuit. At this time I will assess my most current relationship with each of these paths and be solaced by the honestly I have with myself that I have done my best to refine my passions over what will be six months of living in Thailand. I can trace the life of each of these paths back to my childhood and, for three-weeks, ruminate on where and how I decide each of them to develop in the future.

In my day-to-day life all these inevitably diverging paths are connected now. I am learning valuable life skills and already gaining some insights that are beginning to be further developed as I design my future. I have developed a greater sense of balance and become better rounded as I focus on each individual pursuit. I have learned how to better maintain mindfulness towards to the transitions between my pursuits while applying a macroscopic reflection that enlightens me to my overall growth. I have gained conviction in the belief being consistently focused on the present is a prerequisite for a well-designed future. I have become connected with a new doctor in Chiang Mai that has helped me to understand this concept as he aides in my post-Yosemite rehabilitation. Sawat does chiropractics, massage therapy, acupuncture, and applies Eastern medicinal remedies to comprehensively heal his base of western patients. His most popular treatment is a Chinese therapy called guasa. In two, three, and sometimes four hour sessions of guasa, Sawat repeatedly runs an oiled buffalo horn over many parts of my body. Certain parts are painful and begin to bruise. He focuses in on these parts applying increasing pressure as he follows the lines of the bruising towards the extremities. He explains that the bruising comes from the stale blood and toxins that rise to the surface when the scar tissue of an injured or sick area is broken. The healing takes place because inflammation that has been blocking the flow of energy and preventing healing is finally released and can become flushed out of the body. I like to compare his work to the strokes of a painter or someone sweeping the house. The doctor collects the mess and directs it towards the exit points leaving visible streaks on his canvas. Sawat’s intuition for locating the origins of my debilitations is remarkable. Some of the theories he asserts particularly resonate with me making me even more curious. After my second appointment he let me stay at his house because the tickets to return to Phrae Sunday evening were sold out. During our Monday morning commute together to the Chiang Mai bus station I asked him questions about the ways he benefits from sacrificing so much of his time and energy to helping people through this monotonous physical treatment procedure. He explained that it helps him to stay present and calm in his day-to-day life. I asked him if he meditates and he told me his practice has taught him to maintain a constant state of meditation. He countered with questions for me about my career goals and, in general, my future after Thailand. I attempted to explain about some combination of journalism, law, and a continued exploration of health practices through immersion amongst a diversity of cultures. It was clear to both of us I was struggling to understand how I was to achieve all of my ambitions. He consoled the agitation I was having for my answer telling me its good to have admirable goals like I do, but that the best way to find these answers comes from focusing on what I’m doing today. These decisions, he explained, will become easy when the time comes to make my next decision because it will naturally become the next thing I am to presently focus on. I have since found a comfort in the thought that futures greater than I can imagine are best realized by following what I love in each day.

I have recently learned a lot about equanimity and mindfulness from my imagined Thai weekend over New Years. I am seeking equanimity the best I can in order to stay grounded and move myself forward at my own rhythm. My understanding of equanimity is that it is the undisturbed stability and composure that results from an even-minded balance of all experiences, emotions, and external phenomena. I believe equanimity is achieved with a conscious effort to apply the Middle Way that Ta refers to. I’ve consistently reminded myself of the need to apply skepticism to the things I’m taught and adapt what I’ve learned to fit within my personal truths. My primary teacher of these concepts in Thailand, Ta, recently loaned me a book titled “Why Buddhism?” that I finished two weekends ago. It was actually his first philosophical inquiry into Buddhism. Combining some of the passages with my experiences helped confirm and refine my need to practice self-control of my mind and seek balance in order to make wise decisions. I believe it’s important for me to approach these pursuits in this way in order to best understand the benefits to each pursuit and to be properly equipped to make the most well-informed decisions I have a personal responsibility to make. The book speaks about how mindfulness is superior to knowledge because, without mindfulness, it is impossible for a man to make the best of his learning. I am certainly seeking knowledge when I’m reading detailed analyses breaking down the Presidential Primaries. However, I’m also simultaneously being sure to take mental notes to my reactions, the energy I’m devoting to understanding the particular topic, and how my investigation of a singular pursuit of knowledge fits within my overall daily quest to be well-roundedly balanced and healthy emotionally, socially, spiritually, physically, and intellectually.

I think that the best way to equanimously and mindfully develop a self-perpetuating well roundedness is through exposure to an eclecticism of influences. It’s best for me to learn from people of all ages, backgrounds, gender affiliations, and racial identifications as well as across the ideological spectrum. In this way I’m confronted to question and justify the ways I think as I put myself in the shoes of others. I’m challenged to find points of connection as I learn to appreciate the passions of others and their individual worldviews. A few weekends ago I transitioned from crawling on the ground with preschoolers, to playing and dancing with sixth grade boy scouts, to a banterous slow afternoon outside with my fellow Thai teachers. This series of experiences was soon followed by a seven-hour road trip to a music festival where I danced until 4am with fellow twenty somethings. My weekend concluded with a low-energy Sunday in the back of a van listening to podcasts on happiness, meaningful work, open sourced innovation, and growing up as an individually constructive process as we returned to Phrae. This particular weekend was my creative way of experimenting with the challenge of maintaining equanimity through an eclecticism of experiences. I learned that I think equanimity is impossible to achieve as a constant state of being. It is difficult enough to maintain a balanced consciousness towards the present, but when combined with social responsibilities to contribute to the unique dynamics of various groups, a constant balance is impossible to achieve. Experiences tend to have a particular focus and come with their own set of intensities that call for slowing down or quickening the pace as well as exerting more or less energy as I adapt to the different rhythms inherent in eclecticism. I nurtured intellectual, emotional, physical, spiritual, and social sources of happiness and creativity because of eclecticism. This particular creative experiment left me with a different goal than expected to help me to better understand equanimity. I began to wonder if it is more reasonable to average equanimity. If I go 70 mph and then 30mph for the same length of time, do I average 50 mph? One of my new goals is to learn how to best create goals that allow me in these trying times to at least maintain a consciousness for seeking an average that balances out my equanimity. I believe that eclecticism spurs an ongoing creativity that is the force driving a motivational cycle of setting and accomplishing increasingly challenging goals. An eclectic approach to my experiment in equanimity, for example, bred creative goals of balancing the opposites of the mind. As I have begun to confront the new challenges accompanying my paths of passionate pursuit, it has become my goal to balance curiosity with truth, productivity with receptivity, strength with grace, and will with acceptance. I maintain a commitment toward finding contentment.

Understanding the creativity that comes from mindfulness, equanimity, and eclecticism has recently reminded me of a thought activity from freshman year of high school. In my gifted class ten years ago we did an activity where we had to rank the most important values for humanity. We came up with things like peace, family, love, freedom, and happiness. I remember deciding that happiness was the overall most important value because I thought it was the universally fulfilling end goal of each of the other values.. I remember being surprised with the answer my teacher gave because her value didn’t even make it onto any of the lists we students had created. Our teacher said creativity was the most important idea to value because it empowers us to achieve the other values and makes us into the unique people we are. My increasing understanding of the complex topic of creativity is reminding me of this important point my teacher made. I see much more clearly now, because I have been experiencing first-hand how a life can be constructed through an attention to a constant creative process. The more I become attuned to my inherent creativity, the better I become at setting precise goals that motivate a better me. As I accomplish ever-challenging self-created goals, I achieve happiness, positivity, and optimism that propel the cycle. I have also learned the power letting go of negativity from the past has in liberating one’s navigation of the future. I still see happiness as the most important end-goal, but I now believe that creativity is perhaps the most important tool we each have and can learn to master in our pursuits of happiness. As I pursue passions inspired by the kinds of happiness derived from creativity I’m gaining valuable insights on personal goals to be setting and creating ways of accomplishing them. I believe that when a person relinquishes their fear of failure, and intentionally step forward into the unknown there is nothing stopping an individual’s creative cycle. When this cycle is in full affect it is perpetually designing the future self. If I can keep track of my creative cycle and learn its potential impacts, I begin to assume a position where I have the power to contribute to whom I become because of my conscious and creative decision-making. My English classroom in Thailand recently has been a microcosm of this very idea. As the leader in my classroom I’m beginning to think with more clarity on where we are going and constantly make creative, and oftentimes spontaneous, decisions to get us there. I’m learning to bridge communication gaps, for example, by incorporating dance moves I’ve learned from attending a Thai music festival. I impress my students when I pull up Thai songs I’ve learned outside of school and connect through precise references to popular English/Western culture that the kids appreciate. Students’ scores are rising, the overall focus is much higher, and my interpersonal relationships have blossomed with many new students. I attribute a lot of this progress to the ways I’ve become attuned to applying a creativity to certain situations that stems from an eclecticism of cultural experiences outside the classroom. My lessons and exercises are developing more complexity and I’m consistently finding better ways to communicate and motivate English learning. Recently I have captured the attention of some of the more naughty boys when I take on the character of WWE wrestler John Cena. The students love when I hold them up one at a time by my flexing bicep as I boisterously announce, “I’m John Cenaaaaa!” Creative decisions such as this, no matter its silliness, has allowed me to better engage more students and bring them along in helping me accomplish and set increasingly complex unit goals.

In my studies of equanimity I have gained a conviction that the most effective leader should be directing his/her goals consistently towards an astute and well-rounded understanding of all the liberal arts. I think a leader successful in this kind of understanding is best positioned to bridge divides and equanimously integrate the diversity of understandings that coalesce individuals behind basic shared commonalities. A leader attuned to the liberal arts is mindful of the various storytelling perspectives and intersectionalities of a variety of disciplines of study. To be the most capable leader I need to truly become a liberal arts student. Each discipline tells its own story of the world. I want to be a leader in bringing others to an appreciation of their individual capabilities created by their unique histories and guided by positive visions for the future. If I don’t understand the way that the economy explains human behavior or how computer programming is rapidly altering the our affiliations with the future of our realities, I’m missing out on key connection points with many millions of people. Someone who studies gender and sexuality studies, for example, examines their identifications inwardly and outwardly much differently than someone whose perspective is informed by their study of astronomy or biology. In college I studied the effects of newer forms of media on culture and examined how these pervasive structures communicate messages to control cultural thought. And I learned the ways cultural sub-communities attempt to subvert or resist the institutional prowess of the media. Perhaps the diversity of disciplines does have inherent differences that may be difficult to coalesce. However, I believe understanding an amalgamation of these various viewpoints is vital to uniting people over mutual understandings and shared goals. Each discipline tells its own story of how the world works and it’s in the overlaps of the liberal arts webbing that a leader should examine and strengthen. There is always new webbing being spun and applying a student-like approach to understanding the ever-changing dynamics of the webbing is a prerequisite to holistically grasping the present and plotting out the most pragmatically ideal solutions. I recognize many of my shortfalls in liberal arts studies at this point, but I also am becoming increasingly aware of the ways that my twenty-four years of being a student of the world has influenced the nuanced depths of my understandings and explanations of reality up to this point. As I go down each path of study I will balance first hand knowledge with the consultations of experts in a particular field while consuming an array of media all while examining opposing perspectives. In such a way I will best be able to synthesize the knowledge I consume and cross-apply the disciplines and ultimately yielding a personal conviction for truth that can translate into effective, mindful leadership.

I like to listen to TED talks while traveling to gain these types of insight into topics of interest to me most now. I think these talks are an excellent liberal arts way to investigate my positions on their topics as the episodes look at a theme from seemingly all perspectives. I listened to a particularly appropriate TED talk on a bus ride back to Phrae after having spent the weekend in Chiang Mai with an Ultimate Frisbee group mostly comprised of ex-pat Americans. In Chiang Mai I had purposely chosen to trust the culture of Ultimate that has taken care of me so well in the past. I didn’t come to Chiang Mai with a place to stay the night or have anything on my schedule other than a Frisbee scrimmage and my doctor’s appointment with Sawat the next day. My vulnerability paid off. The scrimmage was really fun and immediately afterwards I was driven to a dinner with some of the guys and offered a bed at one of the player’s apartment. In the morning, I enjoyed a solo breakfast and journeyed outside the city proper to visit Sawat for guasa at his shop. After a three hour treatment he offered me to stay at this house and, in the morning, gave me a ride to the bus station. I was impressed and gratified with the generosity that each person supplied in helping me complete my journey. After the Monday morning ride in which Sawat and I talked about meaningful work and finding the future, I was settled on a bus home. I scanned the list of podcasts on my phone to pass the four-hour ride and was intrigued by the title of a particular TED Talk – The Hero’s Journey. This podcast argued that nearly all the stories of heroism we watch or read follow the same sequence of actions and sub-actions. The hosts of the segment profiled an analysis of Star Wars to exhibit the ways the hero leaves home on a journey, goes through a series of test and trials, and eventually returns home victorious. There are sub-actions such as a call to adventure that alters the hero’s destiny followed by a refusal or a denial to answer this call. Eventually supernatural aid propels the hero to cross the threshold and leave home. This particular story was supplemented with interviews from a former inmate who had become a community organizer as well as a woman who had sailed around the world twice to enliven the discussion regarding the truths to these tropes.

While I in no way deserve the title of hero, I could not help but to identify with the talk. I noticed many similarities to what I’ve experienced thus far on my journey and in what I desire to continue going through. I was first called to come to Thailand by my college education, study abroad, and travel influences. However, I chose to stay in Minneapolis because of a certain denial of the immediacy of this need for personal flight. Six months later I found myself frozen by stress and dissatisfied with my corporate sales job. It was my concussion last February that reoriented and propelled me, through various unforeseen means, towards my passions. Ultimately I made decisions that led to an English teaching placement in Thailand and, beforehand, the most fulfilling summer job as a camp counselor in Minneapolis.. Now I am here in Thailand, fully strapped in for this journey, and I’ve had to overcome numerous, one-of-a-kind tests. These are not frivolous tests either. Instead, they are the kind that dynamically strengthen my character and sharpen my mind to recognize, create, and achieve goals that consistently motivate action towards becoming my best self. In four months time, I’m already beginning to identify ways that I can begin to become a hero for others as I shape my individual future. Like the trope of the hero’s journey, I do eventually wish to return home victorious in my self-actualization. When I return I will be armed with a plan that brings opportunities to others and encourages others to embark on their personal journeys as they discover their innate potentials for heroism.

If I were to distill my current test, it would be how to overcome my conflictions over the inevitable choices I will be making in the near future. If I decide to go to graduate school as early as possible, I will be sending off completed applications in nine months time. Before that, however, I will need to take the LSAT in Bangkok (which I’m set on because the scores last five years) and spend significant time for months in preparation for this all-powerful ticket to admission. If I apply and get in, I can most likely choose to defer my admission. This decision would come in March or April of 2017 meaning I have a little more than a year from now to decide on whether or not to commit to this path soon. Regardless of these heavy decisions, I still will need to figure out how to make money to fund my travels, spend significant time with my family, see my friends across America, and transition into wherever my next home is. Throughout all these decisions I will be sure to mindfully and equanimously seek wisdom and knowledge to navigate future arising challenges.

I want to embrace adulthood. I want a fulfilling job. I want a family and to be a dad. And I want to set myself up to accomplish these goals with intentionality, derived from personal enlightenment first. I also want to affect positive change from the role of a leader guided by purposeful passions. I’m committed throughout this process to remaining open and vulnerable to the lack of control I do have. I know that the questions I’m confronting now are just the beginning of many more important decisions to come. When I’m in the next stage of adulthood I want to be able to affirm that I am where I’m meant to be because I took the time to study myself and created my own path with wise decisions that have shaped the cornerstones of my future. Perhaps my split is evident in the two books I picked up over my solo weekend in Chiang Mai. I’ve decided to read “The King of Tort” by John Grisham to become engrossed in the thrills of the legal life. I also decided it would be beneficial to read “The Motorcycle Diaries” by Che Guevara in order to understand, from a first-hand perspective, the enlightenment that comes from designing a life based on the pursuit of passions derived from travel. I’m excited to read both as I am similarly excited to continue exploring both paths in my daily life in Thailand.

Following the paths of my passions thus far has only left me with a greater desire to pursue each path and an increased conviction that now is not the time to begin to limit myself. After beginning a deeper exploration of these inevitably diverging paths, peering ahead in fantastical predictions, and digesting the fruits of my pursuits, I have learned that the solution to my current problem is to reconceptualize it. I wanted to write, but I wasn’t writing because I felt I first needed to resolve my relationship to each of the paths. I told myself I would write once I became enlightened to how to resolve my conundrum. My enlightenment came, finally, when I decided to momentarily pause my pursuits. My brain had been working so fast and I was struggling to take on a perspective that would allow me to adequately reflect on the compulsion I feel to resolve my anxiety for these impending decisions. After school I set out on my bike to find a place to perch, pause, and appreciate all the shades of a sunset. I thought about meditation and the importance in the practice of focusing on a single object in order to center control of the mind. I began focusing on this big, round, beautiful tree enveloped in the sunset. It had a thick trunk and long branches and sub-branches sprouting outwards in all directions. The tree had symmetry to its structure balanced by its lines of various thicknesses and lengths. As the sunset silhouetted the tree, I began to visualize it as more of a cohesive set of connected lines rather than a tree. I started tracing the ends of the tiniest lines of sub-branches back to the base and the base outwards to the tiniest sub-branches. Seeing the tree like this suddenly caused me to profoundly identify with its artistic constitution. I began to see it as a metaphor to begin to resolve the conflictions I had been feeling for my eventual arrival at the choices ahead.

Like my pursuits of passion, the tree also branched in many different directions out of the trunk. Each of these branches was of different lengths and thicknesses similar to the extent and intensity with which I have grown my branches from my foundation as a 24-year old. Each of these branches was endowed with their own branches of unique lengths, thicknesses, and directions much like my experiences in the pursuit of self-discovery. Although I was too far away to see, I knew that each of these sub-branches had their own tiny twigs representing the unique experiences I’ve encountered since coming to Thailand as I’ve grown each branch and sub-branch of my passion. Unlike the flat, singularly dimensional paths I was imagining, the concept of the tree has certain dimensionality that better represented an underlying connectivity and dynamism that makes me human. I knew that the twigs represented the end of my tree now, but many are still growing and many new ones to arise from my expanding branches. The branches upon which these twigs were given birth each was expanding at the same time and were supported with balance and rootedness in accordance with the overall dimensionality of the tree. I also knew that at the beginnings of each of these ever-expanding endings was the web of an unseen root system that nourishes the stability of this tree and informs its intuition to grow and thrive in its own unique way. The tree reframes how I can view my conundrum for now and into the near future because it provides insights that are both holistic and microscopic. Everything is connected in my pursuits in Thailand just like the tree. The variety of the branches of passionate pursuits is what gives my tree its balance, beauty, and dimensionality. If I think of the whole of my experience as a tree, I come to understand that I am an engineer and architect making decisions for how to grow my tree in its entirety. My focus on the specifics of the individual branches will come once the base of the tree and the beginnings of each branch have become fully established. I am the tree and the ends of my branches, sub-branches and twigs will continue to grow. It is up to me to nurture stable growth, weather storms, and passionately pursue wisdom and self-truth to determine the size, length and direction my branches take.

 

 

An Inspiring video on Bernie Sanders’ pledge to unite our differences –

Bernie Sanders’ campaign just released a video that will give you goosebumps

http://www.npr.org/programs/ted-radio-hour/458496650/the-heros-journey