Third

December 19th, 2021

Humans seem to have this unique ability to make choices. Whether it be a career path, a hobby, a habit or a mentality - we get to choose things. This skill doesn’t necessarily always make life easier, you could actually ague the opposite.

Granted, there are a lot of chemicals in our brain that make some choices a lot more appealing or easy than others. The neurons and the connections we build over time influence our behavior pretty significantly and we're learning more and more about how this works. One thing we're learning is that our brains and those networks can be changed - through neuronal plasticity. Then our choice is if we want to put in the work to rewire our brain. But our brain and how it relates to consciousness is still fairly mysterious. For now I'll settle with the idea that ultimately, we make the choices. Although at times overwhelming, it can be helpful in a very basic sense, it may be pretty empowering.

* Fun fact I recently learned: the number of neurons in our brain is about equal to the number of stars in our galaxy (one hundred billion).

Choices ties into choosing jobs and routines... basically our lives. Seems obvious, but the reason I started thinking about it the less obvious things seemed to be. And it struck me so hard, that I felt the need to write it down and share it. So here we are.

It started as I was listening to an interview between Rich Roll and Tommy Rivs. Rivs is an accomplished ultra marathoner and human (just all around), who got diagnosed with a rare form of lung cancer. He was going to die. However, not only did Rivs survive, but he ran the 2021 NYC marathon - and completed it. He did this a year after his initial diagnosis. Which followed a prolonged hospitalization, a lengthy medical coma, then a slow rehab while coming off of a large amount of heavy duty drugs he received (as he should of) throughout his months in the hospital. He completed the 2021 NYC Marathon even though it took him a little over 9 hours .. about 7 hours longer than in 2017 when he finished 16th overall.

Anyways, I listened to this story coming from this man who was in an ICU for 7 months, coming as close to death as someone (who is alive and can talk about it) could come. This was a long interview (heads up if you end up wanting to listen), but at one point he reflects on a particular moment he had while in the coma, an instance where he got tired of fighting to stay alive, he lost hope, so he stopped fighting - these are just snippets that stood out to me:

“It’s not just darkness, it doesn’t just end… and it’s right here, it’s all happening right here - but it’s different.

… it’s all connected, it all continues… and just the urgency of now. That what we continue to feel, beyond this, is directly linked to the way we interact with people and conduct ourselves now.

… I remember feeling as though… whatever it is beyond this… it’s not bad, its not scary, but it’s not here. It’s lovely, whatever it is when it happens…

But this is the after party, there’s no after party, this is as good as it gets, this is everything. Right now.

And gosh… I just want to stay in this as long as I can, and ring everything out of this experience.

… There is not this idealistic future somewhere down the line, where we are going to find happiness… where we are going to get there and everything is going to be right, and we are going to have this sense of just contentment and rest and ease. That doesn’t exist. It’s right now; it’s all happening at this very moment…

The entire range of human emotions, experiences, all of that is happening to us all the time. And whether or not we experience that joy, that happiness, is based on our ability to see it as it’s happening. Rather than in retrospect…”

Theres a lot in that interview, and I put the link on the bottom. But I honestly can’t stop thinking about the ‘urgency of now’ and the notion that “this is the after party”. Most importantly, that we have to choose to see that, and we don’t get to do it over, we have to choose to see that right now. Like today. While I'm writing this, while you're reading it.

Humans, it seems to me, are very good at finding things that are wrong - things with other humans, with society, with our day, with the internet (personally this has been problematic for me), with our jobs, with our relationships, with the holiday traffic etc.

For a moment, let’s suspend disbelief (if it's there) and say we had that same experience as Rivs. And we truly believed THIS is the after party... and that all of a sudden we really understood the ‘urgency of now’... that we should be celebrating all along! And how that would change the world... if we all saw this.

Would we make the same choices? Not just the physical choices, like what our plans are this weekend, what shirt to buy, caring about who said what to who, beeping at some driver who is an 'idiot' and 'ruining my day'. But also there's the mental choices. Choosing to be present, to practice gratitude, to love and be kind to this earth. Choosing to be nonjudgemental, choosing to listen and to care about others. Choosing to be excited and passionate while living out this one little life.

Even if what Rivs experienced seems crazy.. or if it's is not necessarily how you'd like to think of that 'whatever happens after we die' stuff... still, wouldn't that be a good way to live? Seems fun and honestly it's way better than what we see happening on the news.

But making choices rely's on people. I can be skeptical of people. But also, I admire a lot of them.

Our human potential is honestly pretty amazing. We’re capable of so much, just by being human and alive. Despite this potential we have this knack for downplaying our strengths. By finding fault in others and in ourselves. Even when human potential really shines through, we tend discount these moments as unexplained miracles or chalk them up to good luck "right place, right time" stuff. Not even giving credit where credit is due.

On one hand, we are pretty good at criticism and negativity. We’re great cynics. But on the other hand is the good part of humanity - and there's a lot to be said for that part. We're great when it comes to adaption, redemption and creation. We have the ability to organize as groups, to create goals and communities. We create these groups while at the same time pushing ourselves and others to achieve more and to be more. We constantly evolve, as a species and as individuals. And how we do so depends on our choices, how we look at the situations and the people and the resources around us.

It can be way easier to be negative, maybe because of those neuronal pathways we've built over time. Negative thoughts constantly building on them selves making those pathways pretty easy to us 99% of the time. However, with every one negative complaint I can come up with about my day, I know I can also choose to think of so many more positives - the sun, the trees, breathing, the ability to walk or run, the ability to make coffee in the morning - these are pretty amazing things. But I have to choose to see them. Rivs sees them now, now that he's choosing to be here, at this life party.

So, we get to choose if we look at the good side of human potential or the bad. If we choose to look at the good side and really acknowledge our power here, we’re then going to have to choose if we're going to use this potential or not.

Hilaree Nelson is way up there on the list of people who I look to for inspiration and for advice in some weird way. I was watching a North Face video one night where Hilaree said something that really has stuck with me.

For context, this video documented Hilaree and her partner Jim Morrison becoming the first people (known) to ever climb up Lhotse (the fourth highest mountain in the world, sitting directly next to Everest) and then proceed to ski down the face of it. The 20 minute North Face video is linked… I wouldn’t do any justice by attempting to explain how impressive that accomplishment is (physically and mentally)... but in one of the final scenes Hilaree says:

“I think there’s so much aversion to risk taking. I don’t think thats the right direction we should be going, you have to take risks if you want to learn anything about yourself. If you want to expand the self imposed walls we put around ourselves.

I think that’s what interesting to me about us as a species… that’s how we move forward, how we create things, how we have ideas; by taking risks and being a little different, or being passionate about something. You don’t have to climb Lhotse to do that.”

In physics they talk about entropy (randomness, disorder). Basically, the increase in entropy is related to movement, change and transformation - and the more disorder that exists, the more entropy. It's a whole cycle. Alan Lightman talks about this idea in his book Probable Improbabilities. We often don’t like the idea of randomness or disorder, it is comfortable to stay orderly and so we do. We stick to the thoughts and behaviors that our own little neuronal pathways have created, and that's quite comfortable.

Whether we like it or not, there is a lot of chaos and disorder in the world right now, and there probably will continue to be; we can not avoid disorder. We complain about things not being fair, when things don’t go as expected, when bad things happen to good people - but it's how life works.

Lightman points out “Nature not only requires disorder, but thrives on it” - life needs disorder, we need it. I won’t go into quantum physics or biology or the creation of the universe… but the idea is that entropy, disorder and change make us better. Disorder allows us to grow and learn. Which we can only do if we choose to use our human potential.

Hilaree Nelson talks about 'expanding the self imposed walls we put on ourselves', as individuals and as a species... but that requires making the choice to do so. By taking risks. Physically and mentally. Mentally speaking, I think we need to make the choice to be grateful for being alive and be grateful for everything that makes up life... the whole spectrum of human emotion... the trees and the rocks.. all of it.

The ‘urgency of now’... personally this translates to the urgency in fully understanding and appreciating our own human potential - the urgency to choose love over hate consistently, with ourselves and with others around us. At a time where it is easy to be cynical (and I will be the first one to say that I find this very easy) - we also have this ability to choose our whole experience! Maybe this is obvious... I guess I'm just thinking that I want my experience to be through the lens of awe and wonder not cynicism or hate. But we do have the choice.

That said, things will happen that we can’t control, ones that are uncomfortable and challenging, the randomness has ups and downs. I think we have to focus on what we can control. Our moral ethics, our work ethic, the relationships we form with the people around us, how we use our human potential to pursue what we are passionate about, how we share this life with others, how we impact this world. What we put our time and energy into and what we don't. We can’t control a lot of things, but we can control ourselves.

So... this is how I’m thinking about it now. If this IS the after-party, I’m going to try to enjoy it and make the absolute most out of it. Easier said than done, and I’m sure there will be times in the future where this is harder than I could imagine right now. This also requires effort; like Rivs running the NYC marathon, there are going to be times where it is very hard. But I don’t want to look back and regret not doing the hard things. And let’s not forget, humans are awesome and (as Glennon Doyle says) ‘we can do hard things’.

I don’t necessarily know all the choices I'm going to make - I’m definitely still trying to work out the details... and probably will always will be. But I do know I want to appreciate being at this party, with these people, on this earth, while it’s happening, at this moment and not in hindsight.

With that in mind - while fully acknowledging I’m not perfect (so I’ll definitely mess up) - these are things that I’d like to focus on as we head into 2022:

• Practicing gratitude, as much as possible. Out-loud if I can. Really fully appreciating the disorder and randomness in life, the expected and unexpected, the hard parts and the fun parts, the people in it and the planet that makes it possible. Right now, in the moment, not in hindsight.

• Choosing the hard things, to push down my own self imposed walls, choosing to take risks & be passionate. Never believing things are impossible and really encouraging others who choose to do the same.

• Making the choice of compassion, love, kindness, redemption and empathy over judgement, hate or resentment - even when that seems hard (we can do hard things).

This all looks different for each of us I might add, every human has their own unique potential. Even Hilaree in her video ends with saying “you don’t have to climb Lhotse to do that” (thank god). At the end of the day, I think the point is in maximizing our time here - and that comes from appreciating the urgency of now. After all, this is the after party!

Shout out to Tommy Rivs

https://eu.electriccalifornia.com/blogs/electric-life/tommy-rivs-words-of-wisdom

Links

The North Face presents: Lhotse ft. Hilaree Nelson and Jim Morrison (2019). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPXSFVruIHI

The Rich Roll Podcast. Episode #648 with Tommy Rivs. https://www.richroll.com/podcast/tommy-rivs-648/

Probable Improbabilities: Musings on Beginnings and Endings by Alan Lightman (2021).