Sunday, December 31, 2023

Apology Video

 


What was it? What was Alex going to say? What did he say, and then backed away from?

This was posted on my "Filler Episodes" post, which seemed from the idea of filler episodes from Alex's own "Filler Episodes" post. 

Looking back, Alex's post was all about how he didn't want his life to be full of filler episodes and how he wanted zero filler episodes in his life. My post was about how our lives are filled with filler episodes and how we need to embrace it. In other words, looking back, my post kind of seemed like an attack on his ideas.

I want to be clear: I loved Alex's idea. I wrote my post not to tear him or his ideas down, or to bash them, or to say "well, those ideas stink. My view is better." Because I don't want to tear his ideas down, I don't want to bash him, and his ideas are awesome. But maybe he perceived my post like that, and write a comment along the lines of "Andrew, what the heck? Why are you attacking my very passionate blog post? How could you tell me to 'get over it' if my days weren't productive? Not cool dude."

So I want to apologize if that's how my post came across.

I think both of our ideas co-exist. Alex was talking mainly about progression, and how he didn't want a single day of his life to be spent idle and having life pass him by. The entire idea of his post, I feel, could be summated in: Keep progressing, every day. Which I agree with. The gospel says we need to continually progress, and if we're not, we're actually regressing. So Alex was on point. My post was saying that we need to live our lives today, or else we'll find our yesterdays empty. Which is also what Alex say saying: if you don't work at living your lives today, you'll find your yesterdays empty, nothing more than filler episodes on what should have been a chance for you to grow.

TL;DR: I'm afraid that I offended by brother by one of my blog posts when it wasn't the intention and we actually have the same idea on the topic and I wanted to apologize.





Or maybe I'm looking WAY too deep into this.

Thursday, December 21, 2023

Filler Episodes

"Life is what happens to you when you're busy making other plans." --Alan Saunders

I love the movie from Disney/Pixar Soul, because it talks about life, and the purpose of life, and how beautiful just living is. One quote from it comes after Joe has finally achieved his dream of playing in the jazz quartet, but doesn't really feel any different. It's a story about two fish:

I heard this story about a fish. He swims up to an older fish and says, “I’m trying to find this thing they call ‘the ocean.'” “The ocean?" the older fish says. “That’s what you’re in right now.” "This?” says the young fish. “This is water. What I want is the ocean!”

The meaning behind it is that sometimes we are so busy searching for meaning or purpose in our lives that we fail to recognize that it is literally right in front of us. 

Another quote, from Alan Watts, which summarized is that life is not a journey. We are not here just for the destination. Life is a dance. Does a dance have a purpose, an end goal? It is meant to be enjoyed in the present.


When are we going to choose to be happy? After the next thing? After I get a job, then I'll be happy. Or, after I get married, or, after I get a promotion. The problem is you keep moving the goal posts, so by definition you will never reach it. Choose to be happy NOW. Choose to live your life NOW.

There are no filler episodes. Or every episode is a filler episode. Because every moment of life is just as precious as another moment. If you're only focused on the weekend, you'll miss most of life. If you only focused on the non-filler episodes, you'll miss most of life.

Because life IS the filler episodes.