Learning Lessons Along the Journey Of Life | Tracks In The Dust

Archive for the category “Learning Lessons Along the Journey Of Life”

06 Jul 2014

Getting Your Answer Now

So we live in these times when we can say ” I want my answer now!”. Believing it may be something different.

Just the other day I found myself arguing with a friend over a beer about world affairs and the economy. Unlike days not that long ago, we didn’t have to go on too long expounding about our views and the actuality of what was happening in the world.

The fun of arguing and having a position on something has been severely changed in this Information age.

The answer was in our hands! Both of us grabbed our “smartphones” and Googgled and Binged our way to what we saw was the answer to the debate on the current events of the day. AH-HA said my opponent, listen to this… as he began rattle off some profound insights… I wrangled my way to a URL that had other things to say about the topic too.

So there we were, both spouting off answers about the shape of the world. Knowledge was at our finger tips, the answers were there and we could settle this once and for all and go on enjoying our beers with a bit more repose.

EXCEPT there was one problem: Access to the information didn’t mean we could claim to be knowledgeable at all. In fact who’s to say that what is posted on those Internet sites our search engines returned was factual in any significant way? I mean they can site sources with keen authority, but are those sources really correct? For some cases aren’t they just other Internet sites? Are they at risk of being colored with their own opinions?

So there we were- we had opined that we had gotten to our answers about the world’s economy and agreed to disagree.

BUT THEN we realized it,,,, that the Internet may have all sorts of biased and distorted information depending on its originator.

SO that is when we sparked up our next heated debate after all it is fun isn’t it?) : “Is everything you read on the Internet” the truth… just because it has an official name or URL that appears to have some authority or has a well-organized website – how can you know?..

My friends suggestion of how to solve that debate: “Let’s take a look on the Google and see “ …. okay – so I got my answer I guess…. 🙂

Posted in Learning Lessons Along the Journey Of Life and tagged answers, choices, Definitions, information, Knowledge, Looking for answers, Online Searching, Philosophy, Reality Check, The Internet, Truth

20 Jun 2014

Perils

No doubt about it – there are going to be “perils” . That’s the term insurance companies use when they are talking about those “risks” we want to be insured against.

Things like illness, loss of property, accidents and inclement weather and all of those things that have a chance of happening at some point – so insurance companies what us to be “safe”.

But what amazes me most is that we work so hard to attempt to recognize them. But it seems we are always in denial. What ever the perils are we want to know about them, but we don’t want someone to stop us from being in the way of them.

We are good with the idea that today’s industries are polluting the world, but we are not willing to give up their benefits of energy and goods that make our immediate life easier.

There are so many ways we could be safer, could avoid some of life’s perils. But it seems that protection could come with the sacrifice of our freedom to experience them. So experience we do- and then we are amazed when people step into the perils of life and living. It becomes the fodder for Internet news daily.

But doesn’t it seem that we are always in denial of that fact that we could be “next”? Some poor person, group, country has made a blunder beyond belief, but we are always thinking that “that’s not me” and we will be just fine. No perils in our way.

Do you notice that there are always other “do gooders”: that are out there trying to help us avoid these perils? Yet we reject their help in the sacrifice for independence, for freedom. Maybe that is from our childhood? When we were young (and even as we got older) our parents and teachers would warn us of perils – “be careful” – “don’t do that” – but we would not listen. We would want to go ahead anyway.

We would desire our independence and work on our own to just avoid them, but we don’t. We embrace our freedom. Freedom to be stupid on our own perhaps. Freedom to make mistakes, and perhaps- just maybe- freedom to be ignorant of the reality of what is really important.

Posted in Learning Lessons Along the Journey Of Life and tagged Acceptance, Being Safe, choices, Danger, Doubt, Fear, Happiness, Joy, life is precious, Perils, Postive Thinking, Recognizing Danger, Risk, Taking Chances, Uncertainty

13 Jun 2014

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My Father’s Drill

As a father of four children, I was never truly keen on the meaning of “Fathers Day”. It seemed like one of those days set aside to commemorate something that should be observed every day of the year. But then I recall as a child, I was not the best at reflecting on the genuine care my dad provided to me those days.

The old and the new.

As i got older I had very fond memories to recall. Many of them that I didn’t even realize I had absorbed at the time. But he was indeed the kind of father that I can say now I hope that I have been to my children.

He was in some ways distant like every working father would be from time to time. Busy making a “living” and trying to provide for his family. We had some great and very traditional family vacations, station-wagon packed to the windows and trips to cabins in the woods and relatives near and far. There were some personal times fishing together and spending time in the back yard at the grill.

So the movie of the younger days and “good” times plays back in my head, along with some black and white photos and a few 8 MM films. After I got married and we moved away, we were still close enough to get “visits” from him and my mom. We would visit them too.

They worked hard to have an active retired life, but they were also there when I needed them. It has been over 20 years since he passed from this earth. I still remember all of our times together fondly.

When my wife and I got our first home, he gave me some of his tools ( a new homemaker must have tools!). One of them was a power-drill. Nothing special really, but to this day I have had it in my tool box.

It has his drivers-licence etched into the side, the label (Black and Decker I think) has fallen off. Last time I used it was recently with my son – when we were working on some kitchen cabinets. The drill worked, but it sparks were coming from the body of it. It was still a functional tool, but it had seen generations of better times. Time takes toll on everything and everyone.

So with regret I will likely now retire the drill, most likely bought at the local hardware store in my small home town in Wisconsin. Most likely with dozens upon dozens of projects for the home behind it. It will be replaced by a drill bought from Amazon (not made in the USA I am afraid) and shipped to my door. A concept my dad would have marveled at.

Or maybe I should hand the drill off to my son? Tell him to be careful with the “sparks” inside, but mind the fact that it has worked well for decades of projects meant to build on the future.

Posted in Learning Lessons Along the Journey Of Life and tagged Acceptance, Change, choices, Father's Day, Memories, moments, My Dad, Reality Check, Remembering the past, Self-Awareness

12 Jun 2014

Take The Weight Off

No, it is not a diet edict. This weight is the weight we all carry, regardless of our physical appearance. It is the weight that becomes a burden that we come to be dependent upon. It is that heaviness that we don’t want, but no change in diet or physical exercise is going to remove it.

It is the weight of information. and we are all subject to that these days. One time stored in encyclopedias, reported in newspapers and magazines and complied in text books – the information for those of us who have access to the Internet seems nearly infinite. Mistaking that for knowledge is another thing. The nearly infinite source does not have a definitive declaration of the truth, but only the versions of the truth we come to find there.

I love the Tom Waits picture below. It is pretty profound. It is the weight of the things in our lives. Here in America we collect things to make us more important. From what I can tell is that way in many other places around the world too. The more we have (information, possessions, money,friends, etc) the more we think we will be happy. Abundance can sometimes seem to translate to safer life, or a better life. But hopefully that is understood. It is not going to ever be enough. And as the adage says “you can’t take it with you”.

Kids, my advice is to understand where you are, and know how you should see it? There is more.

DO you have the weight of the world carting around on your soul? Of have you found that there is much more than that?

Love this quality video from The Band. The Weight.

Posted in Learning Lessons Along the Journey Of Life, Life's Sound Track (Music) and tagged Acceptance, Burdens of Life, Change, choices, Faith, Hope, information, Information Age, mental-health, Reality Check, Self-Awareness, The Band, Tom Waits, Too Much Information, What is imporant

09 Jun 2014

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Our 35 Years of Sharing

There is no way to put it into perspective completely. Today my wife and I celebrate 35 years of being married.

It has been a marriage filled with joy and sorrow, adventure and patience, love and anger, some victories and some regrets. The memories are precious, even as some of them are filled with cloudy remembrances, they are part of our love growing together.

We were married as our parents opined “very young” ( my wife was 19 and I was 23). We didn’t go in blindly to the marriage, but I think we were naive about what the journey ahead would be. But headfirst we jumped into life with the promise of a bright future.

Thirty-five years later we have relocated multiple times across the US ( mainly because of job related reasons), we have 4 great children that have supplied ( and continue to supply) a house full of love and family dramas. But over all we have been blessed. Not by wealth, not by possessions, not by health or constant good fortune, but by each other. It has not been perfect.

I want to quote a wise spiritual leader, pastor, author I have had the honor to know, Steve Lucas, who also recently posted some sentiments about his marriage on his site (Yesterday Lucas): These really captured my heart as things that I feel are so true. “Marriage is not about perfection. It’s about two people, stumbling through life together, growing in their relationship with each other and with God. Forgiveness, patience, a bad memory, and extra love are all ingredients that are required to make it in marriage.”

And I agree with that 100%. As he explains also that there are a handful of days that could be good to have called a “do over”. I can think of several in recent memory ( some further back are a bit cloudy, but the remnants are still there ). But as he says, do-over’s would likely be at the expense of the wisdom gained through mistakes. Again I couldn’t agree more. “ Thankfully, in every failure there has been forgiveness; in every trial, we shared them together.”

“I don’t deserve my wife. But then again, neither do I deserve the Grace of God. But I’ll happily accept both.”

I am blessed with the happiness of what is truly the good fortune in my life, to know true love.