Everyday I ask the universe what I should share at 4:20. I rarely have anything prepared ahead of time. It is always last minute like doing an assignment in high school. This is why you only get low grade writing that feels like a journal entry. There is no editing, there is no preparation. A novel isn’t possible for me without someone coaching me each day to stay on task.
I was that student in the 90s… I would just push out a report the night before. I don’t know any other way. Some people plan and do it slowly during the 2 weeks they have for a report. I am a procrastinator. But I never felt like I was procrastinating…I felt like I was prioritizing what I wanted to do first, which was always play.
This email is forced out of me because of social pressure I feel to finish a commitment. I also get positive reinforcement when I meet people who enjoy peeking into someones online journal and saying it made them feel something.
I am sure there are tons of books about how to be better at all the stuff required of us humans to be productive in society. I read some of them when I was 18. I read How to Win Friends and Influence People. I read Steven Covey’s book about 7 Highly Effective Habits. That is about the last time I finished a book about how to help myself until 2015 when I was introduced to Stoicism.
Have any of you read books about Stoicism? I got into Meditations by Marcus Aurelius….Book that came out 200 years after the New Testament. I really fell in love with the Philosophy and wanted to become a Stoic full-time. I kind of did for a hot minute, but Stoicism is hard to do, It’s a mindset philosophy that has to be actively practiced and there is no social pressure to stay on top of Stoicism like there is other moral philosophies like Christianity.
At this point in my life I don’t know what “I am”. I don’t identify as anything to be honest. My partners in business struggle to figure out what position I am in the company. What does Scott do? It’s not clear. He doesn’t do nothing, but what he does isn’t really defined in corporate organizational structures. I do identify as a misfit. If I don’t have a title, I don’t have a lot of responsibility. That is what I optimize for, less responsibility.
Actually, I wouldn’t want a single label placed on me because labels come with context that may not be true. I am an American by citizenship, but I wish I could even remove that label and be without citizenship. I am a man, but even then, I wish I could fluidly turn into a woman for a year and then back to a man. Maybe I become a woman and I like it a ton and don’t go back to man. Maybe I can’t actually ever become a woman because I am a man just as I am a human being and I can’t become a dolphin.
The point I am making is that none of us are easy to label. Even if you want to identify strongly as a Republican, you have to explain what type of Republican you are, and that takes time, and shows that you are very unique.
Maybe I need to settle down and just let the labels settle, and quit fighting it.
I am Scott Paul, White American Male, 43, pseudo-Libertarian, faux-Mormon with millions of units from Utah who adores tech and the movement of onewheeling. I am NOBODY.
Happy Tuesday, I am going in to show my wife Dune 2 on IMAX right now. Wish us luck. Eating a little Spice before we go in to make the Film 4D.
SP
Here are the images of Stoics in Utah, engaging in discussion around a stoa set against a beautiful desert backdrop. Each image captures the essence of Stoic philosophy blended with the natural beauty of Utah's landscapes.
You struggle with labels because labels are human made in order to associate with, categorize, compartmentalize and make sense of the world. In a sense, a lack of a label means lack of some control.
But we are energy, fluid and continuing to grow and expand or contract as we wish.
Those who need structure and control and a straight and narrow use labels. Nothing wrong with that and sometimes I envy them.
But for me, we are sparks of energy and the journey we are on is called uncertainty and it’s a beautiful discovery.
WHAT. how did you NOT prepare that? I was thinking paragraph 2 and 3 were really identifying with me personally..... perhaps why I started following youback in the forced MRNA era; the hypercurious, spiceseeking, wormriding, un-title-able, technoforward, backpacking, wigwearing, prioritizing, independatarian.... and then I finished reading the text and witnessed the Salvador-DALL3 Twelve Apostles in Utah's Monument Valley generated image. and. then. my. mind. melted.