Author Archives: Mark

Control

Grant me the serenity.

I started to more formerly explore step 1 of CODA – admit that we are powerless.

In one of the books I was reading it discussed doing some work to identify where you think you have control over people. Why you believe that? As in what is the basis for your beliefs.

It was one of the first time I stopped to not just examine my relationships, but actual look at my beliefs I had formed around them.

What did I think my responsibility was? How was it formed?

We are storytellers and story listeners/readers/consumers.

Things happen because they happen. But we try to make sense of it. And we see it from our perspective, putting ourselves as the main character.

If someone gets sick and passes, it becomes a negotiation of what you could have done differently. How you could have showed up more. Bargaining.

If you work lays people off, maybe you believe that if you make a mistake, you will be next. Or worse, if those around you make a mistake, everyone will be next. Burdening yourself with others’ responsibility.

Positive emotions too. It can start to rewire your brain.

A negative person in your life is positive when you did something. Now you could be spending your days people pleasing. Trying to get back to that high of control. Feeling that other person validate you.

The funny thing is that when you start to open your mind up to the narratives you tell yourself, you also start to hear the narratives others tell themselves.

I had a someone express that her entire team at work believes that they are responsible for the success of the business. If their projects fail, the business will too. One division out of many, bearing the responsibility of all. A feeling I too have harbored.

In my volunteering, someone told me all of the things they should be doing. Well, I really “need to do” this or that. Not able to simply be. Most certainly learned behaviors of the importance of productivity and how a “good person” is a do-er. Something I struggle with from my own background.

This realization is sad and hopeful. A bit melancholy.

To know that I need to discern and challenge my beliefs and the stories I tell myself, is overwhelming. It’s another big tally on the never ending list of not trusting myself. That list has exposed itself in my sobriety.

To start to see it’s not just me. There’s comfort there. Maybe I’m not crazy. I’m just human.

To finally get some resolution, well that is a win. To see above the trees so to speak and work past the pressures of life, it’s beautiful up here. The pressures that I put upon myself. Even if those moments of clarity are fleeting. They are real. And they are worth working for more.

Embracing Boredom – Mundanity in Modernity

I’m trying to stop using technology. When I say using, I mean it in an addiction sense. I still of course need to use technology and phones and computers and all that for my job and just my existence as a human being in 2024.

But I’m trying to stop using it.

Escaping with it. You know what I mean.

The scrolling. The bathroom breaks that take 15 minutes. The mornings hijacked by newsfeeds of photos and events that I actually didn’t need to know anything about. The well let me just one more video nights.

A little over a year sober from alcohol, I’ve learned some things during that time about myself and about addiction.

Anyone can use anything to escape. To dissociate themselves from reality. Food, work, drugs, sex, exercise, people, cheese. If you are only classifying addiction as something that is the same as a drug or alcohol then you are kind of fucked in your definition and are probably forfeiting your peace in ways you don’t even realize.

Addiction does not look like how it is portrayed in the movies. And that’s actually a negative. Addiction is portrayed as a complex thing. I feel as though it is simple. In my world, any time I feel myself forming a dependency within my brain on something – that is the building blocks of addiction.

In the same vain, people all too often wait for the bottom to be discovered to take control of their life. Addiction starts small and takes more and more. The reason why it gets bad is because we let it take up the space and territory in our world.

So I’m working on removing more and more addictions from my world. Without, you know, being addicted to even the act of that.

So technology, social media, my phone in general is something I’m working to define parameters and limits with.

I went on vacation two weeks ago. I read 300 pages of a book that I really enjoyed. Since returning I haven’t picked that book up.

Also since returning my screen time has doubled.

Part of what happens when you start to engage with yourself and the world around you is you get bored.

More often than not, I find myself scrolling to distract myself. But when you stop, and you can’t distract yourself, you find that the world for most of it doesn’t have too much going on in it.

I realize that I have been rebelling against the boredom in my life. That boredom has become a true four letter word for me. It is the ultimate negativity to be bored. But so much of sobriety is learning to feel comfortable bored.

And I don’t mean be bored so you can then go do something totally different. That in itself is a bit of addict mentality.

I’ll stop using this so that I can do that. If I do that then I can be this person I’ve always wanted to be.

That is escapism. Using. Dependencies on outside forces to live your life.

What I mean is truly not replacing the activity with anything else. So you can feel yourself get bored.

I had that moment the other day. I was hit with a wave of discomfort. I felt the pangs of boredom. And quickly tried to replace them with tasks. I should do this thing. I should do that. I should be a better employee. Husband. Creative. Human.

I pushed those out of my head. I sat with my boredom.

I realized that was the closest I’ve ever gotten in my adult life to understanding what the phrase you are enough means.

Strip away all of the distractions, bullshit, labels, everything. And just learn to be alive.

You are enough. You are allowed to live. Be.

House of Cards

Spend so much of my life plotting my moves. Making sure that I’m doing the “right thing.” Can’t be wrong.

When you spend your life second guessing yourself, questioning your motives, not trusting your decisions – you spend your life fighting your humanity.

To err is to be human.

Lesson I must have skipped in Kindergarten. Maybe I was sick that day.

First impressions count for everything.

Well what about the second, the third, the 50th? When can I release the tension of expectations and perfectionism?

How do you reconcile who you are with who you are expected to be?

The rub of is finding out the expectations come from you. Of course, you’ve been coached and molded along the way. Family, teachers, friends, TV, whatever. The imprint of society has been left on you. Sometimes battered onto you.

But they aren’t living your life. So who I am is determined from myself?.

That is a lot of responsibility.

Especially if you don’t trust yourself.

What if you show your cracks? What if your whole existence is cracked?

Can’t go to the doctor, what if something is wrong. Can’t stop, what if the engine won’t turn again.

I feel it some days. When I rest. The rust builds. The anxiety creeps.

So I keep trucking. Keep smiling. Keep doing.

The foundation is unstable. I’m a child of engineers; I know it’s time to reinforce it. Some steel would do. But who can afford that in this economy?

Build the plane while you fly. That’s the trick.

Unless of course, you are actually a boat. A magnificent, majestic boat. Destined to sail and circumnavigate the oceans. And you’re stuck in the skies. Trying to keep the plane alive.

Well then you are fated to crash. Into the oceans where you belong, except you won’t know how to swim or stay afloat. You spent so much time investing in others, never invested in yourself.

Frequencies – Poem

Lust

My thirst is insatiable

It feels as though a beast has been awakened in me

I know this demon

I don’t trust him

I need structure, I tell myself

I need boundaries

I need control

Need, need, need

Freedom

Liberation on the back of my mind daily now

From what though? Where am I trapped?

I take a vacation and do the same things there that I do here

Walks, coffee, beach

Yet there, I’m free

And for that, I’m alive

Death

Never have I been so aware of time

What do I have, 40 – 45 years? Well my grandparents lived longer, but they complained for most of it.

What’s the quality of life past 75? I’m already 31.

One life to live, I’m already marching towards death

Morning

In the morning, I awake while my wife sleeps

I start work

Everything I do is work, I don’t know the word hobby

My wife sleeps, softly – it is what peace looks like

I labor away

I’m envious of her

While I do the things I choose to do

Control

Just let go

I’m not holding it

I can’t just drop it

It’s tethered to me in ways I don’t even know

I can only control me

But it’s made itself part of me, sewed itself inside of me

Exorcism

Let the demon out of me please lord

Spend most of my days panicked over good or bad

Ancient biblical shit that still plagues my 2024 brain

I’m an atheist who believes he could go to hell

People pleasing, codependence just to be good

Do the right thing!

Me

Passive

When in recovery is there such thing as passive recovery. Active using and active recovering are certainly different. But can you be passively recovering? Isn’t that just passively using. Which just is active using.

Active does not indicate awareness. Conscious is not active. Active just means it is taking a presence in your life in a commanding way. That the addiction is in control.

The problem is that you can’t passively live your life. That is the Catch 22 in it all. To take control of you, the only thing that you truly control, and take control of recovery you now have two major active responsibilities in your life. And yes, they are very much related, but they are unique and different in their own ways.

To fight off the cravings and to understand and untangle the psychological triggers of an addiction versus to truly learn to take agency for your actions and how you react to what occurs in your life. And so the problem is that as one focuses on more and more the chance for burnout climbs.

Burnout is about the width of things you are focused on, not the depth. If you had to over see a lot in one particular area of your life, then it would be far more easier than overseeing a little in multiple areas. That’s why I think CEO’s don’t burnout. They design their life to be about work. Everything else – maids, cooks, nannies, drivers, is handled by others.

But with recovery and with trying to truly be free, the active focus means that you already have two of your spots filled in, guaranteed. So you have to pick wisely on your next handful of priorities. Is it health? Relationships? Family commitments? Work? Hobbies? Friends? Money?

And then what about the layers in those sub-categories. Work – well how much are you taking on at work exactly? 1 project or 5? Friends – how many different friend groups are you juggling?

The crux is that I think as an addict, I want it all. Somewhere in my brain I think I can do it all. Because I’m a perfectionist. One of the classic signs, ironically enough, of an addict.

So I spread myself too thin easily. And burnout increases easily.

Or things active activities turn to passive.

And if you aren’t actively recovering then you aren’t recovering.

I am starting to understand the complexities of it all more and more. It’s a big Jenga game.

But it’s also beautiful in a way. It feels like I’m at a new level of life. That I can see things I hadn’t seen before. I never wish to go back to how it was. I am just starting to comprehend the level of commitment that will take for the rest of my life.

Powerless

Back on the schoolyard we used to be blunt

Taunting and name calling to toughen up the runt

Fun and games until it’s your turn to be the hunt

Start looking for the next victim, pass the blame and punt

Adult days we have to stand and listen to the whining

Everybody online spends all day crying

So much disdain you’d think they are dying

Take energy to the real world, stop fucking trying

Wish that we could call people out like back in the day

Take them aside and tell them hey, Take it down a notch, okay

Don’t you know it’s all a game, anyway

Irony is that trauma brought us here

Trauma a big reason I picked up those beers

Trauma comes from days of youth

Trauma dates back to your first loose tooth

Told to act right, now you questioning your truth

Confidence never built so it can’t shatter

Never realized that you don’t even matter

Don’t take control, waiting to be served a platter

Can never climb if you don’t touch the ladder

Negativity breeds negativity, that much I know

Seems like I encounter it most places I go

I’m working on myself, trying to grow

Everyone around me says it’s not my role

Don’t look from within, demand better

It’s not your fault, no one likes a go getter

Schoolyard taunts turned to group think

Peers don’t want us to feel we have the missing link

Its our responsibility to fix ourselves

Instead of challenging others, we gotta get to work like the elves

Start cleaning up our houses, fixing the shelves

Lose the word powerless if folks worked on themselves

Stretching

I woke up feeling envious of Stretch Armstrong. He was an old action figure I had as a kid except his arms and legs were made out rubber so you could stretch them seemingly infinitely.

There is something so enticing about having the range of motion to stretch far and wide. My legs and back are sore from a long weekend of moving and something tells me they are due for a nice long stretch.

Some nights I wish I was like Mr. Potato Head and could remove my limbs. My arms get in the way while I sleep. Can’t quite feel comfortable as a human.

I wonder when humans became aware of their limitations, their bodies’ deep connection to gravity, and the general design flaws. It must have been part of the greater awareness.

The physical informs the mental. My mental has been on the uptick. I am trying to redefine my stiff muscles as a representation of my strength. Hopefully it sticks.

A good cracked back and then I would be free. I just cracked my leg. Glorious.

Sometimes, I think of myself as a Sim – with hundreds of little bars I need to maintain rather than 8. Maybe that’s giving me too much credit. Maybe the point is to simplify.

Digging too deep into the specifics can burn you. That becomes a game of control. You have to remember you can’t predict that much, so just generally trying to be comfortable is better than specifically fixing that little creak in your neck. Until that creak becomes worse.

So my legs and back are sore. But my arms and shoulders feel nice. It could be worse. Spend all day thinking about what’s wrong, acutely aware of our limitations, and then everything is dark. No hope in sight.

Put things in a general bucket and all of a sudden there’s a general optimism. A general hope.

Going to work on that. Until I can stretch my legs in any direction, 40+ feet out.

Morning Fog

My free time is when I just wake up.

When my body is awake before my brain.

I feel my body. My muscles are sore; knee creaks. My back is stiff. That run I took yesterday is coming back to bite me.

This bed soothes them.

My head hangs heavy. A weight seems to sit all around me.

This bed shoulders some of the burden.

I feel like doing nothing. My body tells me how tired and worn I am.

I wake up wondering why? Why when there is more rest to be had?

This morning purgatory is when I am free. From heaven to hell I am traveling.

Soon my brain turns on and compulsion is born.

The need to be and do overwhelms the body.

I can’t be when there is so much to do. Can’t rest when time is so precious.

Thoughts of muscles turn into inventory of tasks. The pain becomes prioritization. My head now swirling with strategy.

Nurture has defeated nature.

On Sleep and The Myth of Superpowers

A few weeks ago I started waking up at 5am.

My schedule was as follows:

5am – Wake Up

5:15-6 – Journal

6-7 – Make Music

7-8 – Workout

8-9 – Morning walk with my wife

9 – 5 – Work

5 – 6 – Wrap up work/Make dinner

6 – 7 – Eat dinner

7 – 8 – Relax with wife

In bed by 8

Asleep by 9

It was an aggressive schedule, but for the 2 weeks I was doing it consistently it felt great.

It felt great to have completed all these tasks before work started, great to have the evenings to just decompress with my wife, great to make music every day, great to know exactly when I was going to work out. I felt like I was on top of the world.

So what happened?

Well, work got busy and I got thrown into a new project. My equilibrium shifted and my schedule paid the toll.

I couldn’t make music everyday, which stressed me out and made me feel like a failure. The morning wins I was stacking for disrupted and I got emotional about it.

My routine, which was a way for me to maximize my happiness turned into a new way for me to be perfect.

The shame spiral started.

Disruption led to guilt, which led to using food to cope, which led to sleeping in, and then the schedule got abandoned. The guilt of not following it stayed though.

My wife made the point, while I was lamenting about how frustrating it was that my body wanted to sleep until 6:30 lately, that perhaps this schedule was fool’s gold from the start. If it was so precarious that one thing could throw it out of whack, then how could it actually serve me.

Said another way, how often is my life predictable versus unpredictable.

I think CEO’s get to wake up at 5 and have a very tight schedule because CEO’s are in control of their life fully. Their life and jobs are demanding, but they have designed it.

Most of us, do not have control or flexibility over things like work. Our schedules, and through it sense of peace, can easily be disrupted when new projects land, responsibilities shift, and work just generally increases.

We have an idea that if these extremely successful people can craft a meticulous schedule we should be able to do the same. But these people have minimized the variables in their life.

They don’t live in apartments where the fire alarm could go off at 12am at any point. They have chefs making dinners and meals, balanced precisely to their needs. They can take extravagant vacations to make up for the short windows of time they dedicate to their families.

In short, they have designed their entire being to be productivity superheroes and have put all of their resources into it. The same way LeBron James spends millions on his body yearly, these people spend their waken hours obsessed with maximizing their usefulness.

Life is unpredictable. We are human. Complex creatures constantly reacting and absorbing and digesting new information around us. The likelihood that we will be able to have a perfectly consistent day is low. Something or multiple things are going to get in the way. Sacrifices will be made. Recalculations and prioritizations will be needed.

I was upset about the inconsistencies. The things that were throwing me off the stable, productive path I outlined. In doing so, I was upset about being human.

On Icarus, Limits, Growth, and Boundaries

I woke up this morning thinking about the story of Icarus. You know the Ancient Greek myth about the boy with wax wings who flies to high in the sky despite being warned by his father. The higher he goes, the closer to the sub he gets until the wax melts, and Icarus plunges to his death. Charming.

Unrelated, the fact that we still have these stories from pre-printing press days is pretty fantastic.

But this morning, I was thinking about Icarus. I was feeling like Icarus. I had a big meal for Friday night and had some acid reflux this morning. Powered by guilt and shame, I felt like Icarus, flying too high to the sun on my cheat day and now feeling my demise.

The story of Icarus details a fine line to walk. Something which I fundamentally struggle with. On one hand, there is a concept of stay in your lane I agree with. Don’t concern yourself with other people’s business, focus on your own things, and worry about what you need to worry about.

That’s not quite what this story is preaching. This is talking literally about the physical boundaries of man. Something which my bubbling stomach is reminding me of right now. But there’s also a conversation of ambition.

If you push it too far and don’t know your limits, you will get burnt.

I’ve been running more frequently because running is without a doubt the best way to burn calories. An hour on the treadmill burns at least 750 calories for me, which would take about 3.5 hours of walking for me to match.

When I get on the treadmill, it can quickly turn from a this is going to be a good source of exercise regardless of how fast I run to a contest against myself. Every run becomes a Mario Kart time travel and I’m racing my own personal best. Get a little further, go a little faster. Burn a little bit more.

Of course, leaving the treadmill having left it all on the floor and all of a sudden my day’s changed. Energy is depleted, muscles are tight, heart is still recovering; what went from just a simple run turned into a whole thing. Only because I don’t know how to pace myself and my hubris.

So the goal of losing calories becomes negligible as all of these other things come into play.

So in that way I do understand the concept of Icarus. Pacing yourself. Marathon not a print mentality.

On the other hand you still have to jump. Icarus would have made it if he didn’t go too high.

To grow, change, succeed, there is a certain amount of pressure that you need to apply. Pressure creates diamonds. All that stuff.

And I believe that too. I’ve seen it. Felt it. Putting the right amount of pressure in the right situation leads to growth. I was reading a psychologist who said that the only way for humans to learn is through stress.

And learning is good, right?

So where is the line? It feels good running faster. Running further. That pressure allows me to improve. But I don’t want to hurt myself.

Self-awareness is key. But it’s a lot of pressure to operate with those expectations.

Do I always need to improve? Do I always need to succeed? Can just doing be enough?

That’s the constant question.

What’s the point if I don’t get better? But why is everything about tangible progress? Why not just about the joy/love of doing it?