Monday, December 10, 2018

2019 Goals

Here we are, again: mid-December, the time my gaze shifts to the new year ahead. This year, I've grouped my goals thematically rather than chronologically:

Spiritual
-Finish Reading the Bible Again for the First Time by Marcus Borg
-Read The Jewish Bible
-Strengthen daily meditation practice, especially Lectio Divina, utilizing The Jewish Bible, The Liturgists meditations, and others
-Go on 3-4 personal retreats, to the nearby Nahimana Forest and the not-so-close Mepkin Abbey in South Carolina and the Hermitage of the Holy Cross in West Virginia

Relational
-Continue to build daily closeness with Mindy
-Continue to build community with friends by hosting dinners and going out on co-dates with other couples
-? Church men's group
-Participate in college friend's book club every 2 months

Physical
-Participate in 3-4 triathlons this summer
-Kayak on the New River 6 times and another river at least once
-Teach myself the bongos, practice 3-4 times per week (most of my off-days)
-Vegetable garden again
-Smoke meat at least 3-4 times
-Forage for mushrooms at least once
-Grow mushrooms in a climate-controlled manner

Vocational
-Engage in leadership program project
-Go through a lot of case studies on my own
-? Pitch Grand Rounds project to hospital leadership in preparation for Family Medicine Residency (set to start in July 2020)
-Identify and start other Family Medicine Residency projects


The big-picture themes for my year are reapproaching the Bible in a new way and generosity of spirit. My goal is to be more empathetic, warm, and understanding by the end of next year than I am now. Though I'll still be reading books and book summaries and posting my reflections, I'll be more focused on the emotional and relational side of life, which is where I stand to grow the most right now. And I hope that, as a result, joy and humor will flow like never before!

Wednesday, December 5, 2018

Dan's Top Ten Lists of 2018!

I would ask for forgiveness for such a clickbaity title, but I'm really not sorry.

Top 10 Memories

  1. Kayaking with Mindy on the Nantahala River
  2. Kevin Lloyd's wedding
  3. My yearly 3-day college guy's weekend (aka "PAW")
  4. Backpacking with Mindy in Uwharrie National Forest
  5. The Goble family beach trip to Oak Island
  6. My weekend visit with Sam Cox, Lee Robeson, and Sam's friend Nick in Raleigh
  7. Kayaking with Mindy on the New River
  8. Visiting my brother Thomas, Lindsey, and my nephew James in Roanoke Rapids
  9. Biking the Creeper Trail with Mindy, Norm, Cassidy, and their kids Calloway and Waverly
  10. Swimming in the Watauga Lake Triathlon


Top 10 Podcasts

  1. The Bible for Normal People
  2. The Deconstructionists
  3. The Liturgists
  4. The Robcast
  5. The New Yorker: Fiction
  6. On Being
  7. The Art of Charm
  8. Ask Science Mike
  9. History of Philosophy Without Any Gaps
  10. Dan Carlin's Hardcore History: Addendum


Top 10 Books

  1. Sinners in the Hands of a Loving God
  2. The Road to Unfreedom
  3. Reading the Bible Again for the First Time
  4. The Mountain of Silence
  5. Mastery
  6. Man's Search for Meaning
  7. Grit
  8. On Writing Well
  9. Evolution and the Fall
  10. Sapiens


Top 10 Apps

  1. Blinkist
  2. Spotify
  3. Pocket
  4. Evernote
  5. Strava
  6. Focus@will
  7. The Weather Channel
  8. Interval Timer
  9. Yoga Studio
  10. Goodreads


Top 10 Shows

  1. I literally only watched one TV show this year, and that was Black Mirror. But it was really good, so I'll keep it at the number one spot.
  2. ?
  3. ?
  4. ?
  5. ?
  6. ?
  7. ?
  8. ?
  9. ?
  10. ?


2018 Goals in Review

Things morphed in 2018 as they always do. Here are my SMART goals (with trips in parentheses) from last December, color coded in green if completed and red if not.


January (into February): Reach Level 2 in the Krav Maga self-defense course (See family in Roanoke Rapids and friends in Raleigh)

February (into March): Write a 1-day course on obstetrics, prenatal care, and neonatal resuscitation I will be teaching for Equip International's Missionary Medicine Intensive course 4 times per year starting in March (2-day marriage conference in Charlotte)

March: Focus on cultivating my marriage and applying concepts from the marriage conference (Camp in Uwharrie National Forest)

April-May: Design and build the library, build a barrel composter, help Mindy build the chicken coop (3-day weekend with college friends, kayak trip #1)

June: Work on my kayaking skills (Kayak trip #2, camp in Elkmont, TN)

July: Start growing oyster mushrooms, experiment with new dishes in the kitchen using home-grown produce (Goble family beach trip)

August: Morning meditation, practicing presence, positivity (Camping trip near Brevard, kayak trip #3)

September: Build a plyo box, lifting platform, and prowler (Trip with Mindy's family)

October: Do the ketogenic diet. It's time. (Backpacking trip with college friends)

November: We may be having puppy grandchildren around this time. If not, I'm sure something will have come up. (Travel to see Mindy's family in Oklahoma and maybe Colorado and Wichita)

December: Do Christmas here and plan for 2019. No trips (hopefully)!


In lieu of the things in red, we built a fence around our 6.5 acres for the dogs, had Lula spayed, bought two rabbits (only one of which survives to this day), biked the Creeper Trail, I did the swim portion of a triathlon, started a leadership seminar at the hospital, visited my friends Sam and Lee in Raleigh, went on a couple personal retreats, and started biking regularly. All in all, the number of projects and trips I ended up completing was the same as the number I hoped to complete at the beginning of the year. So on that measure, the year was a success!

I also feel pretty good about how I explored my dual themes of Creativity and Connection. Mindy and I have grown by leaps and bounds, and I've also cultivated a couple close friendships outside of work. I tried to write a short story but lacked the vision to finish it which was a bummer. But I was inspired to write a poem on Connection after a counseling session, which turned out very well. My many reflections on books and ideas reflect the kind of content I feel most interested in creating at the moment. So on the measure of exploring my key themes, 2018 was also a win!

But the most important metric of a year is personal and relational growth. The activities and themes above were all geared towards these ends, and I couldn't have asked for a richer year of growth. As we wrap up 2018 like a Christmas box and set our sights on 2019, I'd encourage you to outline some projects and themes to focus on, write them down, and review them as they come to mind to see how you're doing. At the end of next year, you'll be thankful for the course you've charted and the progress you've made.


Facebook, freedom, and fascism

I don't want to write about Facebook. You already know the effect social media has on your attention span, and that posts which arouse prejudice and outrage get more likes and shares. If you're like everyone else, you realize from time to time that you should be doing better things with your life, so you deactivate or stop checking your account for awhile, only to crawl back to the feet of Zuckerberg a few weeks later. You know that Facebook doesn't give a damn about your privacy, but you just can't stay away. Perhaps you even recognize this for what it is: carefully-engineered addiction. Social Media Disorder. Maybe even you've seen a therapist for it, and made some progress in curbing your addiction. If so, you deserve to be commended.

But that's not what I'm interested in exploring, because the problem has shifted from an individual and psychological one to a societal and existential one. If you were on Facebook in 2015-2016 and voted for Donald Trump (or for Leave, if you're reading this from the UK), you were likely co-opted by Russian trolls and bots over the course of 18 months in 2015-2016. Hostile Russian intelligence services recruited millions of American citizens into fake online "communities" which spread misinformation and succeeded in driving the narrative of the 2016 election. But this may be old news to you too, and it's also not what I want to write about.

What I want to communicate today is twofold. The first is that healthy civil dialogue in free societies around the world (the US, the UK, most of Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, and South Korea) rests on the foundation of shared facts. And in the era of manipulable mass digital media, this is the soft underbelly of free societies that is being exploited. Donald Trump's never-ceasing torrent of verbal and written misinformation is Exhibit A. Though thoughtful folk like you and me would like to ignore his ravings, that's exactly the attitude that contributed to his election. Donald Trump and his lie machine can be hated, resisted, and (with persistence) corrected at every turn, but they cannot be ignored. He has muddied the very concept of truth by repeating the phrase "fake news" ad nauseum in reference to information very much grounded in reality, while promoting a constant flood of genuinely fake news. And to those of you who may be rusty on your history, allow me to remind you: this is always the first step towards fascism. Mussolini and Hitler are the first to come to mind, but it's also a tactic Vladimir Putin employed eight years ago as he transitioned Russian society into a full-fledged authoritarian oligarchy... around the same time he was funneling millions of dirty rubles into The Trump Organization, coincidently. But I digress.

The attacks on our information systems have no doubt already started to evolve into more sophisticated techniques as Twitter, Facebook, and the government crack down on first-generation misinformation techniques. As Renee DiResta puts it in her article linked below, 

Algorithmic distribution systems will always be co-opted by the best resourced or most technologically capable combatants. Soon, better AI will rewrite the playbook yet again — perhaps the digital equivalent of  Blitzkrieg in its potential for capturing new territory. AI-generated audio and video deepfakes will erode trust in what we see with our own eyes, leaving us vulnerable both to faked content and to the discrediting of the actual truth by insinuation. Authenticity debates will commandeer media cycles, pushing us into an infinite loop of perpetually investigating basic facts. Chronic skepticism and the cognitive DDoS [digital denial of service, a type of cyberattack] will increase polarization, leading to a consolidation of trust in distinct sets of right and left-wing authority figures – thought oligarchs speaking to entirely separate groups.

A sample of memes from far-right communities like Britain First, Sos racisme anti-blanc, Meninist Posts, 4chan, /r/The_Donald, and United Patriots Front.Which brings me to my second point: the theater of this "warm war" is the minds of (currently) free citizens like you and me. Being a war of misinformation and manipulation, it depends on us plugging in and reading, watching, or listening to content generated by fascists (state-supported, homegrown, or both). This is the soft underbelly of the fascist cyberwarriors. If enough citizens wake up, unplug from the torrent of misinformation, and plug into genuine news outlets with legitimate journalists and editorial boards, the fascist cyberwar machine will starve.

This requires each of us to become more circumspect and sophisticated in our consumption of media. Gone is the era when you could blithely scroll your news feed and repost pictures or articles that strike your fancy. We are all going to have to put forth some cognitive effort in evaluating what we consume. Of course, the government also has a giant role it must fulfill. As Renee DiResta puts it, 

We need an understanding of free speech that is hardened against the environment of a continuous warm war on a broken information ecosystem. We need to defend the fundamental value from itself becoming a prop in a malign narrative.
The solution to this problem requires collective responsibility among military, intelligence, law enforcement, researchers, educators, and platforms. Creating a new and functional defensive framework requires cooperation.
It’s time to prioritize frameworks for multi-stakeholder threat information sharing and oversight. The government has the ability to create meaningful deterrence, to make it an unquestionably bad idea to interfere in American democracy and manipulate American citizens. It can revamp national defense doctrine to properly contextualize the threat of modern information operations, and create a whole-of-government approach that’s robust regardless of any new adversary, platform, or technology that emerges. And it can communicate threat intelligence to tech companies.
Technology platforms, meanwhile, bear much of the short-term responsibility. They’re the first line of defense against evolving tactics, and have full visibility into what’s happening in their corner of the battlespace. And, perhaps most importantly, they have the power to moderate as they see fit, and to set the terms of service. For a long time, the platforms pointed to “user rights” as a smokescreen to justify doing nothing. That time is over. They must recognize that they are battlespaces, and as such, must build the policing capabilities that limit the actions of malicious combatants while  protecting the actual rights of their real civilian users.
If that sounds like a tall order for a government crippled by hyperpartisanship and giant technology companies defined by their short-sighted leadership and toxic cultures, I'm with you. But you can do one thing: #deletefacebook.

If you're not motivated enough to quit social media for your own privacy and well-being, perhaps the realization that Russian-backed fascists are using it in an attempt to destabilize our society will outrage you enough to do something. But deleting Facebook is only the start. The foundation of a free society is public discourse with shared facts, and that is under attack. So start spreading the word, and wake people up to the situation we face. Fact check your sources. Stop being lazy. Freedom itself depends on it.


For further reading:
1. An up-to-date analysis of state-supported misinformation cyberwar cited extensively above: https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2018/11/28/the-digital-maginot-line/?utm_source=pocket&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=pockethits

2. A good overview of how widely distributed right-wing misinformation cyberwar has become throughout the world:  https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/ryanhatesthis/brazil-jair-bolsonaro-facebook-elections?utm_source=pocket&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=pockethits



5. An article discussing Facebook's lack of privacy protections after the Cambridge Analytica scandal broke: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/mar/20/facebook-is-it-time-we-all-deleted-our-accounts?utm_source=pocket&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=pockethits


7. A brief article that highlights many of the main problems with Facebook, with the great quote that "the promise of connection has turned out to be a reality of division."  https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2017/11/the-end-of-the-social-era-twitter-facebook-snapchat?utm_source=pocket&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=pockethits


9. A discussion of the societal effects of "technologically enabled persistent crowds" on Facebook and Twitter: https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2016/09/15/crowds-and-technology/

10. The difficulties our society is facing as a result of the erosion of trust in our institutions. https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/09/06/common-ground-good-america-society-219616?utm_source=pocket&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=pockethits

11. The book I just finished reading that exposes over a decade of deep ties between Russia and Trump, along with an exploration of the rise of fascism in Putin's Russia, its war in Ukraine, and its attempt to export fascism to the rest of Europe and the US.  https://www.amazon.com/Road-Unfreedom-Russia-Europe-America/dp/0525574468/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1544018305&sr=8-1&keywords=the+road+to+unfreedom

Thursday, November 29, 2018

Late Fall Reflection: Connection and Conflict

Image result for links connecting

As a tribal species, we are wired for both connection and conflict. Sometimes I wonder how a species would function if it were able to evolve beyond its tribalistic tendencies. Would every member of the species quickly develop into an enlightened yogi? Would they maintain the vitality that accompanies intense emotion? How would they respond to existential threats?

The answer to the last question (read: they wouldn't respond as well) is why I think a more enlightened species will never emerge. So, both as individuals and a species, we're forced to work with our wildly outdated hunter-gatherer software. If you think the Space Shuttle's 1970's software was ludicrous in the early 2000's, just multiply that by 2,000, and that's where we are as a species. Each agricultural, cultural, economic, and industrial revolution updated our external circumstances without touching our neurology or biology. Religions developed as a way of adapting ourselves to our complex environment. But sadly, religions have just as often played into our violent biological tendencies as they have helped us transcend them. As Michael Gungor sings in "Let Bad Religion Die,"

All belief demanding blood
If your god gives you a gun
Let bad religion die
Let bad religion die
If it spreads violence more than peace
God let religion cease.

Whether a faith promotes violence is the best litmus test for its validity. Evolutionary psychology has confirmed the psychological and sociological benefits of the more enlightened teachings of the great religious teachings of the world, such as meditation and charity, while highlighting the damaging effects of violent strands of faith. This new branch of science is a great tool to help us decipher which ideas to keep and which to discard. But I think we can go even further.

Jesus Christ's message of nonviolence and suffering love represents the pinnacle of enlightenment to which monks and yogis of all stripes attest. Though bad theology has misdirected much of Christianity, Islam, and other faiths into the violent rut of our species, there is still hope that the gospel can be reclaimed by a wider swath of our culture. I believe sociologists and anthropologists will ultimately learn that the best society we can aim for given our outdated software involves the inculcation of the gospel values of love and mercy at every stage of human development and every level of society. This is the hack that can sublimate our tribal in-group favoritism to universal love. Though we will need a lot of help from the contemplatives among us, it's this hope that will keep me from despair when I consider the sad state of our species.

Monday, November 5, 2018

Sinners in the Hands of a Loving God Part 3

It took me a year, but I've finally finished summarizing this book. I hope this summary is enough to convey the main ideas-- but you should still put it on your to-read list!

Chapter 7: Anthem of the Lamb

Zahd shifts gears for the last third of the book and deals with a topic near to his heart: Revelation. Having grown up in the shadow of popular dispensational readings of John's apocalyptic narrative, Zahnd understands that many of us require some serious de-education on the topic. Having heard a number of different interpretations over the years, I've simply required clarification on how to interpret the book rather than a complete restructuring, but it was still immensely helpful. Though hardcore dispensationalists out there may resist his interpretation, I found his perspective compelling.

The message of Revelation is more relevant for Americans now more than ever. Simply put, Revelation subverts empire, civil religion, and religious patriotism. Unfortunately, those who are so passionate about their mistaken reading of Revelation are also the most complicit in American empire-worship. The beast, the great whore, and Babylon are all veiled references to the Roman Empire, but can be equally applied to the 21st Century American Empire. As a humble Lamb, Jesus conquers the powerful beast, putting an end to the cycle of one beast conquering another. "The kingdom of God does not conquer the world by the violent means of the beast but by the self-sacrificing way of the Lamb." Clothed in garments stained with his own blood, the Lamb of God is the only one worthy of our worship-- not Caesar.



Chapter 8: War of the Lamb

Zahd continues his discourse on Revelation, turning to the topic of the war which some have interpreted as representing Jesus' violent return, when 200 million people will die in the Middle East and rivers of blood will flow. Fortunately, this is the worst possible misreading of the book. Jesus will never renounce the nonviolence of the Sermon on the Mount, hop on a red warhorse, and slay massive armies. Rather, he is depicted as riding the white horse of victory, with a sword coming from his mouth representing the good news of peace, forgiveness, and reconciliation with God. He vanquishes the unholy trinity of the accuser, empire, and propaganda, depicted as the dragon, the beast, and the false prophet. The whole point of the incarnation and the book of Revelation is that Jesus comes to subvert the violent way of empires and Caesars. Revelation simply symbolizes this process as a war. And "this is not a future war. Christ is waging this war right now."

Unfortunately, that is not how most modern evangelicals read it. And this misreading of Revelation has led many to disastrously condone violence and war, and even hope for a war in the Middle East that will somehow precipitate the New Jerusalem. Does that sound like good news? I didn't think so.



Chapter 9: City of the Lamb

Zahnd concludes his exploration of Revelation with a discussion of the New Jerusalem, symbolized also as the Bride of Christ, and clearly representing the Church. Though the church has been anything but pure over the last two millennia, we nevertheless have been entrusted with keeping and sharing the life-giving gospel of peace. And as the New Jerusalem is depicted as coming down from heaven to earth, so the church is the primary vehicle the divine is using to reconcile humanity to itself.



Chapter 10: Love Alone is Credible

In his wrap-up, Zahd draws on John's meditation that "God is love" in I John 4:8 and 16. Referring to these passages as "the summit of the holy mountain," he reiterates his point that "God is not a bloodthirsty deity requiring ritual killing. Though this may have been the only way we could understand God four millennia ago on the flanks of the holy mountain [where God's only self-revelation was "I am who I am], the truth remains that God is not bloodthirsty; God is love." We have the benefit of Jesus Christ. In contrast to Moses, who said that "no one can see the face of God and live," Paul says that we have seen the face of God in Christ! "John tells us, 'Indeed, God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.'"

So the next time you find yourself listening to someone talking about an angry God, please know: that's not the true God revealed in Christ. That God is dead. And may that religion die too.

Friday, November 2, 2018

Reflection on Creativity: Mastery Chapter Five: Awaken The Dimensional Mind: The Creative-Active

A couple months ago, Mindy needed one of her old college books, so I started digging through a few of the cardboard boxes sitting in my future library. As is often the case when digging through old books, I discovered a few forgotten treasures. The one I'd like to write about today was a book I bought in the middle of my residency, Mastery by Robert Greene. I'd read the first chapter or two, but ended up setting it down in a busy and distracted time of life and moving on to lighter fare. It's not a book that can be read distractedly. It's over 300 pages of deep analysis of the stages of attaining mastery-- truly six books in one. He traces the attainment of mastery from "Discover Your Calling: The Life's Task," to "Submit to Reality: The Ideal Apprenticeship," through "Absorb The Master's Power: The Mentor Dynamic." Chapter Four, "See People As They Are: Social Intelligence," was a particularly surprising component of his discussion of mastery, but one which dovetails well with my pursuit of connection this year. His final two chapters, "Awaken The Dimensional Mind: The Creative-Active" and "Fuse The Intuitive With The Rational: Mastery," comprehensively explore high-level aspects of achieving creative mastery. I had so many light-bulb moments reading them. In my vein of exploring creativity, I'd like to highlight a few lessons I learned from Chapter Five.

But first, I would like to note two things. First, the anecdotes in this book are anything but the "fluff" which characterizes the lion's share of nonfiction books out there. Rather, the dozens of biographical sketches sprinkled throughout the book are indispensable in the exploration of his topic. In fact, I can't think of another book that's as layered, complex, yet seamless in its construction. Mastery is a topic that requires real-life examples to understand. It also requires a highly organized approach, which is exactly what the author has attained. In short, Greene displays a masterful grasp of not just the topic of mastery, but also of the craft of bookwriting. I can only describe his treatment of this topic as magisterial.

Second, the following photo captures the most compelling idea bouncing around in my brain over the past few months: on balance, people are either creators or consumers. And if you want to have a shot at an extraordinary life, you'd better be moving toward being a creator and away from being a consumer. That's why I'm writing this blog, and why I pursue so many random hobbies. It's also why I don't watch much television and why I'm off social media, and why I'm bothered by those who lack this sensibility. People who spend most of their lives consuming media created by others atrophy their creative powers and end up dependent on the creativity of others for a sense of vitality.

Image result for mastery robert greene

With this motivation in mind, Greene breaks down the three essential steps to attaining creative mastery: choosing your creative task, using creative strategies to loosen and open the mind, and creating optimal conditions for breakthroughs and insights. He finishes by highlighting six emotional pitfalls to avoid and nine distinct approaches various masters have used to attain creative mastery. 

The essential thing in attaining creative mastery is to transcend the "conventional mind" that develops during one's apprenticeship and return to the creative childlike "original mind" with the added knowledge that comes from apprenticeship. But first, we must establish our goal, our life's creative task. This must be realistic yet challenging, open-ended and uncertain, and, crucially, something we are passionate about and which appeals to our sense of unconventionality and "calls up latent feelings of rebelliousness... The sense of having enemies or doubters can serve as a powerful motivating device and fill you with an added creative energy and focus." The creative journey is not for the weak-willed.

Once we find our life's creative task, we must follow the clues to mastery left by the masters who have gone before us. Greene details crucial developmental milestones attained by Mozart, Keats, Edison, Ford, Einstein, Darwin, Da Vinci, Faraday, and Champollion, the decoder of the Rosetta Stone. These include the ability to embrace mysteries and uncertainties and researching as widely as possible to create, as William James expressed it, "a seething cauldron of ideas, where everything is fizzling and bobbling about in a state of bewildering activity." If this can be achieved, "a kind of mental momentum is generated, in which the slightest chance occurrence will spark a fertile idea." An added tack is to engage in physical, artistic, or other kinds of activities outside your work to maintain an openness and looseness of spirit. The more varied the sensual stimulations we experience, the more unique connections are likely to spring forth. This can help us challenge ourselves to think more visually, metaphorically, and analogically, which takes advantage of the visual and associative powers of the mind. And of course, it's handy to always have a notebook or smartphone handy so we don't lose our insights when they occur. 

It's important to avoid the extremes of premature closure ("short-circuiting" the creative process) and permanent skepticism. Though we must always be open enough to explore new ideas and see things from different angles, we also need to challenge ourselves to "put our nickel down" and create an artifact of some kind based on our ideas. Setting deadlines and expectations can create the eustress and tension we sometimes need.

Balancing this need for deadlines is the necessity to avoid impatience, one of the six pitfalls to creativity Greene highlights. To counter this tendency, Da Vinci adopted the motto "ostinato rigore," or "obstinant rigor," for every project he involved himself in. Much like an athlete, we have to learn to love the grind, even the pain, as expressed by one of my high school track mottos, "pain is only weakness leaving the body"! "Although it involves much pain, the pleasure that comes from the overall process of creativity is of an intensity that makes us want to repeat it." And to return to a theme mentioned near the beginning of this post, "Engaged in the creative process we feel more alive than ever, because we are making something and not consuming, Masters of the small reality we create. In doing this work, we are in fact creating ourselves." I would add that the act of creation also puts us in touch with God, the creative energy energy inside each one of us, and is thus a deeply sanctifying act. As we become more in tune with this energy, we will become more sensitive to the pitfalls that lie in wait to pull us off our path.

These snares lie at hand each step of the creative way. One we must always scrupulously avoid is grandiosity, an inflation of the ego that can occur after some measure of success. Think Rocky 3, when Rocky rests on his laurels only to get dominated by a hungry Clubber Lang. Good relationships are the best avenue to avoiding this type of fate. The other pitfalls-- dependency, conservatism, complacency, and inflexibility,--are avoided by religiously keeping an open, fluid mind and a bold, independent, rebellious soul, as described above. A community of fellow creatives can also provide correctives in these areas.

Our greatest task as we emerge from our apprenticeships is achieving creative mastery. Most people falls into a series of pitfalls right out of the gate, never realizing their potential. The techniques shared above highlight these pitfalls and open up the path to creative mastery. Yet we are a distractible species in an age of distraction, and if one thing remains true, it is that low is the gate and narrow is the way to mastery, and few find it. May you and I be two of the few.

Thursday, November 1, 2018

Mushroom burritos- stage 2

After three months with little visible activity in the mushroom department, I was beginning to despair that any mushrooms would ever materialize. Though that outcome wouldn't have made the experiment invalid, I was still feeling like a mycological failure. Plus, I had no tasty mushrooms to look forward to! But when I checked yesterday, voila! A bunch of baby mushrooms had made their way into the world!



The paper burritos are the clear winners, upending my hypothesis. In fact, I have observed no activity in the mulch, hay, or grass burritos, and little activity in the cardboard burritos, either:

 

My next step (after harvesting, sautéing, and consuming this first generation of mushrooms, of course) will consist of making sawdust burritos. I'll be using pressure treated sawdust initially, but ultimately non-pressure treated sawdust when I am able to obtain that. I hear sawdust is one of the best substrates, so I have high hopes.

Cheers!

Friday, October 26, 2018

Sinners in the Hands of a Loving God Part 2

Chapter 4: The Crucified God

This chapter unrelentingly and convincingly makes a case against most atonement theories, especially the penal substitution and satisfaction theories which posit that God is an offended deity who can only be propitiated with a blood sacrifice. "The sacrifice of Jesus is not a utilitarian payment to an offended deity bound to an economy of appeasement... The beauty of the cross is found in divine forgiveness." In contrast to the conceptualizations of the cross most of us have been handed, Zahnd describes the crucifixion first as a state-sponsored lynching of an innocent man, which is exactly what Plato in The Republic had predicted would happen to a perfectly just man.

One of Zahnd's many powerful points in this chapter is as follows:


The apostle Paul tells us that "in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself." This should not be misunderstood as God reconciling himself to the world. It wasn't God who was alienated toward the world; it was the world that was alienated toward God. Jesus didn't die on the cross to change God's mind about us; Jesus died on the cross to change our minds about God! It wasn't God who required the death of Jesus; it was humanity that cried, "Crucify him! Crucify him!" When the world says, "Crucify him," God says "Forgive them."


A particularly challenging point to my libertarian philosophy is this idea: "In Christianity the supreme value is not freedom but love. We can kill in the name of freedom, but in the name of love we suffer and forgive. Our savior is Jesus Christ crying "Forgive!"-- not William Wallace crying "Freedom!" This, in my mind, is the truly radical heart of Christianity-- which not coincidentally is what is too often missing from the institutionalized church.

He then makes the point that


The justice of God is not retributive; the justice of God is restorative. Justice that is purely retributive changes nothing. The cross is not where God finds a whipping boy to vent his rage upon; the cross is where God saves the world through self-sacrificing love. The only thing God will call justice is setting the world right, not punishing an innocent substitute for the petty sake of appeasement.


This restorative conceptualization of justice is another concept that is sadly missing from most of today's churches. Informed by their theology of a vengeful God, American Christians have set up a vast network of "correctional institutions" that are anything but correctional, and which have destroyed the lives of millions, most of whom are nonviolent offenders of arbitrary and senseless drug laws. Perhaps if we had a proper restorative view of justice, our justice system might actually work the way its supposed to, healing broken lives rather than shattering them.

To sum up the chapter,

  1. God reconciled the world to Himself on the cross, not Himself to the world. He is not the vengeful God requiring blood sacrifice conceived of by ancient tribal peoples, but a God of love and restoration as demonstrated by Jesus Christ, especially on the cross saying "Forgive them."
  2. The radical heart of Christianity is love, not freedom or any other value. Only love can break the cycle of violence the world has been locked in.


Chapter 5: Who Killed Jesus?

In this chapter, Zahnd picks up where he left off in his last chapter, and finishes off the common conception that he cross is the result of God's need for retributive justice. Here is one way he puts it:


In the parable of the prodigal son, the father doesn't rush to the servants' quarters to beat a whipping boy and vent his anger before he can forgive his son. Yet Calvin's theory of the cross would require this ugly insertion into Jesus' most beautiful parable. No, in the story of the prodigal son, the father bears the loss and forgives his son from his treasury of inexhaustible love. He just forgives. There is no payment. Justice as punishment is what the older brother called justice. The only wrath we find in the parable belongs to the Pharisee-like older brother, not the God-like father. Justice as the restoration of relationship is what the father called justice. 


Now, it's understandable that many reading the Bible would come to the conclusion that God desires sacrifice. After all, that's what was commanded in the Old Testament, right? Yet even the Old Testament is not consistent on this, and there seems to be a growing awareness (dare I call it an enlightenment?) that, as David puts it, "Sacrifice and offering you do not desire... burnt offering and sin offering you have not required," or in Hosea's words, God desires "steadfast love and not sacrifice." Hebrews echoes this exact sentiment, as does Jesus when he tells the sacrifice-obsessed Pharisees to "go and learn what this means, 'I desire mercy, not sacrifice.'"

Indeed, it was these Pharisees, and the other "principalities and powers," that, as Paul puts it, Jesus "put to an open shame by his victory over them on the cross." It turns out, viewing the cross as a ritual sacrifice "leaves unchallenged the massive structures of sin that so grotesquely distort humanity... Now the cross forever shames the rick and powerful who seek to preserve their privilege and position through the use of violence. Their pretentious claim that they are wise and just enough to use violent means to achieve good ends is put to everlasting shame. If we claim that it was God who required the crucifixion of Jesus, we seek to clothe with false dignity the very structures of sin that Jesus deliberately stripped bare and put to open shame in his death." True love must subvert the violence and injustice of empire, yet the power of this subversion is lost when we blame God for killing Jesus.

Zahnd presses further. He notes that if Jesus had to be tortured to death for our sins, each of use must deserve the very same thing. And that indeed is what I have heard time and again from the pulpit and read in Systematic Theology books. But of course it isn't true that everyone who has ever lived except for Jesus deserves to be tortured to death. That is "a vicious assault on divine goodness and human dignity" on the level of saying that God commands genocide. What we all need and deserve is love and healing, not torture and death, because we bear the very image of God.

The vision of Jesus dying for our sins should instead be this: "We violently sinned our sins into Jesus, and Jesus revealed the heart of God by forgiving our sins. By saying 'we' violently sinned our sins into Jesus, I mean hat all of us are more or less implicated by our explicit or tacit support of the systems of violent power that frame our world."

To sum up, "What Jesus did on the cross is far more mysterious and beautiful than simply offering himself as a primitive ritual sacrifice... God's action on Good Friday was to surrender his beloved Son to our system. And our system killed him. But on Easter Sunday God overthrew our satanic verdict by raising Jesus from the dead! ... Instead of being organized around blame and ritual killing, the world is to now be organized around forgiveness and cosuffering love.



Chapter 6: Hell... and How to Get There


This chapter is another must-read. Zahnd peels back the centuries of Western misconceptions about hell dating back to Dante and John Calvin, revealing in clear and dramatic fashion Jesus' actual teachings about hell. He repeatedly notes how we "read into" passages things that aren't there-- and gives several examples. Jesus' parables of the rich man and Lazarus and the sheep and the goats are two examples in which Jesus teaches that the wicked-- those who inflict evil on others-- are condemned. Never once is a sinner's prayer or somehow "accepting Jesus into your heart" mentioned. Neither is it mentioned in all of the evangelistic sermons detailed in Acts. Rather,


According to Jesus, the avoidance of afterlife condemnation is not based upon being able to give particular answers to abstract theological questions cribbed from John Calvin and labeled "faith" but on how one actually lives his or her life. Jesus certainly did not lay the foundation for an afterlife theology that claims all non-Christians go to hell. This has become a common way of thinking about heaven and hell-- "Christians go to heaven; non-Christians go to hell"-- but it is not based on anything Jesus ever said! ... Life is not an elaborate testing center for afterlife placement based on theological acumen... The New Testament teaches that it is Christ who judges how we have lived our lives: "For all of us must appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each may receive recompense for what has been done in the body, whether good or evil."


The second half of the chapter draws upon CS Lewis' conception of heaven and hell in The Great Divorce, where the damned "enjoy forever the horrible freedom they have demanded, and are therefore self-enslaved just as the blessed, forever submitting to obedience, become through all eternity more and more free." His key point is that hell is simply the state that results when a person cuts herself off from giving or receiving love. God's fiery love, which is warmth and light to those who receive it, is indeed torment to those who refuse it. Whether it is truly eternal is anyone's guess-- Zahnd speculates that "hell is as eternal as the human capacity to resist God, and thus hell is potentially eternal."

Lest he be misinterpreted, Zahnd reinforces his conclusion with a thought experiment comparing hypothetical women named Becky, from Kalamazoo, Michigan, and Belqees, from Kabul, Afghanistan. Becky is a Christian but a mean, self-righteous, and judgmental Pharisee. Belqees is a devout Muslim who is a kind and generous soul who regularly cares for the poor and sick. What happens when they die? Only a monstrous theology would condemn Belqees to hell while escorting Becky to her "finely appointed luxury mansion. And in response to the common objection that "only Jesus can save," Zahnd responds,


"Yes and amen." And who are you to tell Jesus whom he can and cannot save?! Are you going to tell Jesus he cannot save Belqees? Jesus can save whomever he wants. Jesus is Lord... This thought experiment, which I've given to many people, often leads to the objection that such a theology would lead to a lack of motivation for evangelism. But this is true only if you think the gospel is about the postmortem issues of heaven and hell, a subject never raised in the apostolic sermons in Acts. The truth is that the gospel is a joyful proclamation that the kingdom of God has arrived with the incarnation and resurrection of Jesus Christ... If you don't know how to preach the gospel without making appeals to afterlife issues, you don't know how to preach the gospel!


The odious dogma that only Christians go to heaven has needlessly and tragically driven countless away from the faith. We Westerners would do well to follow the humble lead of our Eastern Orthodox brethren in this matter, who believe God is great enough to save anyone he wants. May we all avoid the belief that only those who think like us wind up in heaven, for that belief is itself a highway to hell. Just look at fundamentalists like Westboro Baptist. They're on the first bus there.



Third Quarter Report

I'm a few weeks late getting this out, but here are the latest developments:

-Mindy and I are doing very well, and both of us are learning how to build an ever stronger connection. We also had a wonderful 3rd anniversary in the West Jefferson area. As I've reflected on connection as one of my two focuses of the year, I've realized in a deeper way that it must be a primary focus of each stage of my life, not just this year. More on that in an upcoming post.

-I've started a year-long leadership seminar at the hospital. We've only had one meeting, but I'm in a great group and excited to tackle a project with them next year.

-I'm working my way back through Sinners in the Hands of a Loving God, which has become my top religious book of the year. Brian Zahnd's take on central Christian issues such as salvation, the gospel, the afterlife, and prophesy has been a major wind in my spiritual sails as I continue to reconstruct what I believe as a post-Reformed, post-evangelical, newly progressive Christian.

-In that vein, Mindy and I have found a service we both feel at home in at Boone United Methodist Church, and am looking forward to deepening connections there over the coming months.

-We bought kayaks! Mindy and I took our new boats out for their maiden voyages just the other day, and it was every bit as magical as I had hoped. Looking forward to many a paddle on the New River and beyond. Photos here:




-I'm still biking, swimming, and starting to run more in anticipation of some triathlons next year. I'm also getting more into Natural Movement.

-Pepper had to get surgery for a paw injury last month, but he is finally healed. Lula is as crazy as ever. Molive the cat is great. Thistle the rabbit did have a prolonged bowel obstruction that has now healed with the addition of fresh greens to her diet. We are growing to love our animals more each day.

-Mindy and I went biking on the Creeper Trail with Norm and Cassidy Hogan and their kiddos a couple weeks ago. It was chilly but fun!



That's all I can think of for now! Deeper reflections coming soon.

Thursday, October 11, 2018

Fall Reflection: Connection



We are brimming with bonds.
Physiologic connections constitute our being. 
Telescopes, microscopes stared into darkness
And found no match to our complexity
Mind-boggling mesh of synapses, receptors
The id, ego, super-ego
Explanations unsettling in their inadequacy
Mapped in colorful complexity
Still so far beyond our ken. 

Know thyself.
The most ancient phrase.
The most wise.
Know thyself.
What ties you together?

Wives, husbands, mommies, daddies,
First-order bonds, identities
Messy words like love
Conceal as much as reveal.
We pretend to understand each other--
Till confronted by how we have not. 
How distorted our pictures of others
Our gaze fixed on ourselves.
What can refocus, what can refine?
Let thyself be humbled!
Tear that too-strong tie.

Charlatans predate primate relations
Tangle ties meant for tribes
Salesmen's spiderwebs stick 
Stripping the seams of society.
So we must build walls,
We must skepticize,
We must ever say, 
Put me on your no-call list.
Blessed it must not be, 
The tie that binds.

Triggers make connections, but destroy.
Knots can be tangled or clean.
Glue defaces as well as binds
Tape turns on itself.
How fraught, our connections, how fragile
What delicate touch we need with the other
What science, skill, experience, what sensibilities
What an art is love.

Love--
Creaturely, embodied, yet divine
For creatures, others, and the divine.
Our utmost challenge:
Untangle, retie that knot
So blessed can be the tie that binds.


Thursday, August 30, 2018

Swimming and biking update

A couple weeks ago, I swam in the Watauga Lake Triathlon as part of a relay team, which was a blast. We were totally average, coming in as the 6th out of 9 relay teams, but we're legends in our own minds. "2 docs-n-crisis" will never be forgotten. Here's my team, and my super-serious-looking dive-- check out those triceps!




I'd been able to swim 2-3 times per week the last few months, and it was nice being able to focus on swimming leading up to the race. Though my times plateaued over the month leading up to the race, I did have a great week of open-water training in New Hampshire the week before the swim, which improved my technique tremendously.

Without a major upgrade in my upper body strength, I'm probably not going to be able to significantly improve my times in the water. I do hope to get stronger in the home gym over the next year, but I doubt I'll ever reach the ideal BMI for a swimmer, which is 24. But I do plan to maintain the past year's gains in the pool with weekly swims.

With the Watauga Lake swim behind me, I've shifted my focus onto biking. In addition to a couple other workouts, I'll be in the saddle a minimum of twice per week for the next several months. I've started with 8-10 mile rides near my house, which have some really great hills, very little traffic, and beautiful scenery. I'll gradually inch up the mileage every week, much like I did with swimming last year. My goal is to do three triathlons next year. I'm hooked!

Friday, July 20, 2018

The Mountain of Silence by Kyriacos C. Markides





I've never read a book like this one. As the front cover describes, The Mountain of Silence is "a fascinating narrative that is... dialogue and meditation, history and politics, theology and travelogue." Viewing his native Orthodox spirituality through a skeptical, academic lens, Kyriacos Markides wrestles with and ultimately weaves together his modern scientific knowledge with the rich and ancient tradition of Eastern Orthodox monasticism. Over the course of the 1990's, Markides' many travels to Greece and Cyprus allowed him to assemble quite a collection of conversations with, stories about, and meditations by Orthodox monastics, particularly an influential and charismatic figure named Father Maximos. It is his wide-ranging conversations with Father Maximos that form the core of the book, and also which make a complete summary of the book impossible. You just have to read it!

The big idea behind the book is that "the spiritual practices and psycho-technologies we seek in India and Tibet are also present at the very heart of the Christian tradition, preserved in the cliff-hanging monasteries and hermitages on Mount Athos since the early centuries of the common era. Yet churches of all denominations as well as biblical scholars of the West are oblivious to the mystical wisdom that still flourishes in some of these monastic communities (6)." This book will change that ignorance. And the truths it wrestles with have the potential to not just slake the thirst of the spiritual seeker, but heat up the hearts of the "frozen chosen," lend an appreciation of ambiguity to the black-and-white Baptist, provide depth to the shallow emotionalism of the charismatic, and enliven the dead faith of the casual Christian. True Orthodox spirituality is indeed deep, rich, powerful-- radical, in the original "rooty" sense of the term.

That being said, I would like to highlight in a couple stories that have stuck with me, and a few key takeaways from the book. Quoted from page 146:

       In this story that came to mind, Tolstoy wrote of the encounter between a Russian Orthodox bishop and three hermits, The bishop was traveling by boat with other pilgrims from Archangel to the Solovetsk monastery. On the way her heard rumors that on an obscure little island along the way there were three old hermits that had spent their entire lives trying to save their souls. The bishop became intrigued and implored the captain to stop the ship so that he could visit them. The captain reluctantly agreed and dropped anchor near the island. The bishop was then placed on a boat and with a group of oarsmen sent ashore, The three hermits were dressed raggedly with long white beards to their knees. In total humility they welcomed the bishop, making deep bows. After he blessed them he asked them what they were doing to save their souls and serve God. They replied that they had no idea how to serve God. They just served and supported each other. The bishop realized that the poor hermits didn't even know how to pray, since all they did was lift their arms up towards heaven and repeat "Three are ye, three are were, have mercy upon us." The bishop considered it his ecclesiastical duty to teach the illiterate hermits the Lord's Prayer. They, however, were poor learners and required a whole day of instruction. At dusk and before returning to the ship, the bishop even offered them a short and simple lesson on Christian theology.
        But lo and behold! During sunset as the boat left the island all the passengers saw a sight in the distance that filled them with fright. The three hermits were running on water as if it were dry land. When they came by the side of the ship they implored the bishop to remind them of the Lord's Prayer because, poor fellows, they had already completely forgotten it. The bishop crossed himself in awe and told the hermits to continue their own prayers, for they had no need for instruction. Then he bowed deeply before the old men and asked them to pray for him as they turned and ran back across the sea to their island. "And a light shone until daybreak on the spot where they were lost to sight."

       Another story involves Father Maximos himself as he is visiting elder Paisios, a legendary Athonite monk who had been his spiritual father. From page 82-83:

        ...While I was getting ready to recite "Mary Mother of God," suddenly and inexplicably everything was transformed around us... a very subtle wind rushed into the chapel even though the door as well as the window were both firmly shut. The lamp in front of the icon of the Holy Virgin began swinging back and forth by itself. There was a lamp in front of each of the five icons. Only the one hanging in front of the Holy Virgin went on moving back and forth, back and forth...
       After about half an hour... everything went back to normal. Elder Paisios stood up and signaled me to follow him outside for some fresh air. 'What was that all about?' I asked him. 'What?" he replied, pretending not to have a clue of what I was talking about. 'That phenomenon in the chapel. What happened, really?' I asked. 'What did you see?' he asked me again. I told him that I saw the lamp in front of the icon of the Holy Virgin swing back and forth and described everything else that took place. He asked me whether I saw anything else. I said not. 'Oh... it was nothing, it was nothing,' he said and waved his hand. 'Don't you know that on the Holy Mountain the Panagia [The Most Holy One] goes from monastery to monastery, from cell to cell to find out what we monks are up to? She just passed by here also. She saw two idiots praying and moved the lamp to let us know that she was paying us a visit.' As he finished his sentence he burst out laughing."
      "What impressed me about elder Paisios during the brief period that I met with him, "I commented, "was his good humor."
      "That's who he was. Even such intense experiences could be a cause of laughter for him. Saints, like all other human beings, have their own unique personality characteristics. Some are gregarious and lighthearted like Paisios. Others are somber and introverted. I've known both types. The attainment of sainthood, you see, does not make everybody share identical personalities."

I could continue on with these worldview-blowing anecdotes, but you get the idea. In addition to many anecdotes, the book contains extensive discussions on spiritual topics such as prayer, other spiritual disciplines, strategies, and ascetic practices, icons and idols, miracles, demons, justice, and humility. Towards the end of the book, Markides does a fine job of tying many of these ideas together in a chapter entitled "The Threefold Way," which is his distillation of Orthodox monastic theology. From page 213:

       The soul's journey towards God... must go through three identifiable and distinct stages. At first there is the stage of Catharsis, or the purification of the soul from egotistical passions. It is then followed by the stage of Fotisis, or the enlightenment of the soul, a gift of the Holy Spirit once the soul has undergone its purification. Finally comes the stage of Theosis, union with God, as the final destination and ultimate home of the human soul.

This vision, and the tools from the monastic tradition which must accompany it, forms a powerful framework for understanding spiritual development. For a more detailed look at these ideas, read this book! It's my top pick of the year.










Mushroom burritos- stage 1

      At long last, the blue oyster mushroom spawn that has been patiently hibernating in my refrigerator can spring to life! In the spirit of a 5th grade science project, I submit to you the first stage of my experiment with "Mushroom Burritos."

Primary question: Which is the best substrate for blue oyster mushrooms: hay, grass clippings, cardboard, paper, or wood mulch? 

Hypothesis: The materials with the most mass and surface area will produce the most mushrooms. Grass > Mulch > Hay > Cardboard > Paper.

Secondary question: Which substrate is the easiest to incorporate into plastic-wrapped "burritos?"

Materials: Blue oyster mushroom spawn, hay, grass clippings, cardboard, paper, wood mulch, boiling water, plastic wrap, a wheelbarrow, 4 plastic recycling bins, and a 10-level metal shelving unit.

Methods: I lined the porous bottoms of the recycling bins with plastic wrap, then prepared each material as displayed in the below photograph:


The cardboard strips took the most time to prepare by far, while the grass clippings and mulch required minimal preparation. The paper took a little time to tear into strips, while the hay was somewhat difficult to compress into a small enough bunch to wrap. That answers my secondary question!

As I was preparing each material, I boiled large pots of water and poured it in each container to sanitize each medium, which will hopefully allow the mushroom spawn to successfully colonize each medium. After allowing a few hours to cool, I then separated each material into small burrito-shaped mounds on strips of plastic wrap. Here is how the grass, hay, and cardboard looked just before inoculation:



I then sprinkled each burrito with about a spoonful of blue oyster mushroom spawn, obtained from the Mushroom Mountain booth at the Mother Earth News Fair:


Here is how the paper looked once it was inoculated:

And the mulch:


After employing my best Chipotle-style burrito-wrapping skills, I randomly placed each sachet onto a metal shelving unit in my outbuilding, where it will be humid and in the low 50's to high-80's for the next couple of months-- ideal mushroom-growing conditions!


I'm interested to see if there will be a correlation between position (upper vs lower, inner vs outer position on the shelves) and production, in addition to substrate and production. We shall see in a few months. Stay tuned for the results... and let me know if you've heard about any science fairs I can enter!



Sunday, July 8, 2018

Second Quarter Report

Another three moons have come and gone... which means it's time for another life update. Here are my top 10 highlights of the quarter:

1,2 &3: Mindy and I have gone on three major trips: a backpacking trip in Uwharrie National Forest near Ashboro, a camping trip to Elkmont campground in the Smokies, and a beach trip to Oak Island with my family. All were great in their own ways: It was nice to do some real hiking and camping in Uwharrie, then celebrate the nuptials of my friends Kevin and Catie right afterward. We spent two out of our three days in the Smokies learning how to kayak and the other day camping and checking out Gatlinburg, all of which was fun and educational. And it was nice and relaxing to spend almost a week at the beach reconnecting with family and soaking in all that the beach has to offer.

4: I am still swimming at least twice per week, and my times for my workouts continue to drop. My mile time came in at just under 37 minutes back in May. I'm actually going to be participating in the swim portion of the Watauga Lake Triathlon as part of a relay team next month, which was not something I anticipated doing this year, but which made a lot of sense when I looked at how much time I was dedicating to swimming. This has replaced self defense / Krav Maga as my main physical pursuit for the year.

5: I bought a new road bike last month in anticipation of getting back into doing full triathlons later this year or next year. It worked great on the couple rides I went on at the beach (wish I could say the same for Mindy's tires...)

6: We have started warm composting. We also had worms for vermicomposting for a brief time, but they all got burned up when the compost heated up after I added rabbit manure. Sigh.

7: On a sadder note, we bought 2 angora rabbits at the Mother Earth News Fair in Asheville, but Pepper killed Roger, so only Thistle remains alive at this time. As a result, we have started our family pet graveyard. But we are still harvesting her fur to ultimately spin into yarn, as well as her manure for compost and fertilizer.

RIP Roger (top)


8: We completed a fence around our entire 6.5 acres, but Pepper has learned how to jump a part of the fence, so now we are in the process of attaching an electrical fence to the existing fence. I heave a heavy sigh as I write this. Hopefully the end of the Escaping Pepper Saga is in sight.

9: We decided to not have puppies, so Lula has been spayed as of last month. We also are holding off on chickens and goats for now, but have a long-term plan to make than happen sometime in the next decade.

10: Back in June, I sojourned to the Nahimana Forest in Ashe County for a 2-day personal retreat. If you're looking for a place to retreat from the stressors of the world, I can't think of a more peaceful spot than this one. It was my best personal retreat by far, and I'm looking forward to going back in a few months for another round. A month later, I'm still benefiting from the sharper focus and higher perspective I gained during those two days.



Despite the setback of having to build all these fences for Pepper, I'm staying on track with most of my goals. Here are a few of my thoughts as I look ahead to the third quarter:

The garden is doing even better this year than last, and the harvest has begun! We will probably need to learn how to can or preserve or pickle some of the stuff we get if it produces like I think it will.

I have oyster mushroom spawn sitting in the fridge ready to grow and am hoping to start growing them in the next few weeks.

I have several house projects outstanding for the rest of the summer that I hope to get done.

I plan to buy a kayak very soon and start getting out on the river as much as I can, hopefully at least once per month.

Mindy and I are flying up to New Hampshire for her mother's 60th birthday next month. After that, we only have one camping trip planned for the rest of the year.

I've finished several books and hope to get reports written on these sometime soon!

I'm really digging a couple new (to me) podcasts: The Bible for Normal People and The History of Philosophy without any Gaps. Download a few episodes now and check them out the next time you're in the car!

Much love.