Reflections on April 2020

Hey patrons,

Here they are:

(1) The pacing of March vs. April

When I wrote this post in March, we were in the midst of an unprecedented month where lockdowns were being enforced and daily routines were being upended.  It argued for the observation that time appears to slow down as the intensity of shock increases, and when that happens at such a large scale, interesting things happen.

In March, the general consensus amongst friends, family, and those I don’t know personally (whether through social media or news reports) was that the month felt like it dragged on over the span of a whole decade.  Time slowed to a crawl as people had to understand how to build new routines, navigate odd schedules, and shift everything they’ve grown accustomed to doing.

But toward the end of March, I remember wondering how April was going to feel like in regard to the passage of time.  Would April be just as drawn out, or would it move faster?

Well, the end of this month is here, and based on a sample size that consists of myself and a few others, the month appears to have moved at a faster pace.  Statements like “it’s already late April” have been thrown out, and while I’m aware that my sample size is small and my conclusions are being made subjectively, it seems that the pacing of the two months have been different for a good number of people.

This observation makes me think of two things:

• We are quick to acclimate to change.  It’s one thing to know that humans are adaptable, and another to experience how adaptable we are at a global scale.  It’s astonishing to me how everything about daily life could change, and within the span of a month, we can grow accustomed to this type of restructuring.  We’re way more adaptable than we’d like to think, and this applies to everything.
• We are fortunate if April has felt faster than March.  I’m sure that April may have felt even slower than March for many people, especially if financial woes have overtaken, or worse, if they or their loved ones have actually been struck by the virus.  The intensity of shock may have strengthened over the month, and in those cases, April will likely have felt like two decades instead of just one.  So if April has moved by fairly quickly for you, then that’s something to be immensely grateful for.

(2) Interpreting boredom

In one of my recent reflections on the reciprocity of interest, I briefly commented on the nature of boredom:

In a way, boredom is arrogance. It’s the acceptance of the belief that nothing is worth your interest because you already know what you need to about yourself, others, and the world. A curious mind is a humble one, as a prerequisite for curiosity is the acceptance that there is more to life than what you think you already know.

I want to further expand on this a bit here.

In a sense, boredom is something that many of us no longer experience, simply because there’s no reason to be bored anymore.  Literally all the world’s knowledge and entertainment is waiting to be accessed at a moment’s notice, and we would require a plethora of lifetimes to go through it all.

So in an age where our attention is always subsumed, it is actually important to embrace boredom as well.  To give our minds some rest while it’s awake, to know what it’s like to just be.  This ability to be still with one’s own mind is, in my opinion, a superpower in today’s world.

But in the above section, I said that “boredom is arrogance,” so under this logic, shouldn’t we avoid it altogether?

I think there’s a distinction in the types of boredom here.  The boredom one experiences when he looks at others is the result of a lack of curiosity, whereas the boredom one experiences when he’s alone is the result of a lack of introspection.  The nature of the two are different; the former is a boredom that is birthed by inaction, whereas the latter is driven with intention.  It’s ironic that we must be deliberate in our decision to be still, but that’s what is required in today’s age of information abundance.

Boredom in itself is multi-faceted, so it’s important to know what dimension of it you’re facing at any given moment.

(3) The power of daily journaling

For a while now, I’ve had a consistent journaling practice.  Everyday I fill out a whole page, and oftentimes, I have no idea what I’m going to write about when I sit down to journal.

But reliably, when the pen hits paper, the thoughts start churning, and the pen does its best to translate some of them down into the written word.  Next thing I know, a whole page has been filled – sometimes it feels like gibberish, and other times it feels like I wrote something more substantive.

But each day, it starts with a blank page.  And everyday, it gets filled.

Sure, journaling is a good way to catalogue your thoughts and segment the events of the day, but perhaps its greatest power is helping you realize that you have something to say, even if you thought you didn’t.  If you think about it, that makes sense.  Everyday we’re processing things: conversations, work projects, news stories, TV shows, books, etc., and it’d be ignorant to think that all of that stuff simply goes in one ear and out the other.  We are information soaking machines, and it’s only logical that some of it is processed in some unique way underneath the hood of daily life.

Journaling is a way to lift that hood at the end of each day (or whenever you want to do it), and see what might be in there.  A lot of the time, you’ll just say what you did yesterday, and the day before that.  That’s fine.  We are creatures of repetition, habit, and pattern, so it only makes sense that our thought processes may be the same.  But putting those thoughts down on paper helps you identify those patterns, see if they’ve been helpful or not, and allows you to make adjustments if necessary.

Every now and then, it’s also fun to go back and see what you wrote a few years ago, and get a birds-eye view of how much progress has been made since then.  If you read your prior entries and get a sense that you were so dumb back then, that’s tangible progress that you can actually date, which is pretty cool.

Journaling is like keeping a changelog for your mind – it’s powerful to see how far you’ve come, and to know how much further you are capable of going.

_____

That’s it for my reflections on the month!  Hope your April has been good, and that you are entering May with a clear mind.  Thank you so much for taking the time to join me here, and for your support as well.

-Lawrence