SIDCHAs

Two unbroken streaks: 8 months off-grid and 12 years daily blogging. Which is more challenging?

Habits / Nature / SIDCHAs

Two unbroken streaks: 8 months off-grid and 12 years daily blogging. Which is more challenging?

Yesterday began month 9 with my apartment disconnect from the electric grid. Today begins year 13 posting daily to my blog. Which seems more challenging? Which has taught me more about myself, humanity, and nature? Tough call. They seem even. I'm continuing both so I'll keep learning from both. The off-grid in Manhattan seems more rare, a bigger disconnect from my ambient culture. Earth also passed a month after the north's winter solstice and I can tell the added sunshine time, though January has been mostly overcast in New York. People ask the questions I would have, like how long a charge lasts, but I'm learning that view starts from what I want. When you rely on fossil fuels and uranium, you can dominate nature.…

January 23, 2023

Beginning month 8 off the grid and *coincidence* year 12 of daily burpees.

Habits / Leadership / Nature / SIDCHAs

Beginning month 8 off the grid and coincidence year 12 of daily burpees.

Today begins month 8 of my apartment disconnected from the electric grid. I'd wondered what I'd do as the weather got colder and days shortened. Now I passed the winter solstice so days will lengthen. The weather will still cool for another few weeks, but I may have passed the hardest part. It occurred to me I might just have to keep going for the year. We'll see. It can get cold up there. I'm still relying on my cheat of plugging my computer and phone at NYU, where I am now, but I'm also working on installing the panels permanently and finding other long-term solutions to avoid climbing thirty flights several times a week. America can lead if everyone else stops making excuses and…

December 22, 2022

Brief thoughts on the question/koan “who am I?”

Awareness / SIDCHAs

Brief thoughts on the question/koan “who am I?”

Regular readers know one of my sidchas is meditating, which I've done for over a decade and regularly for years. I've posted about it lately. I've used a few different techniques over the years. Sometimes I use koans. One is Who am I? sometimes What am I? I also often examine consciousness, which is oddly both all of what we experience and slippery to get a hold of. Asking who I am while exploring consciousness, independent of thoughts, emotions, memories, senses, and other contents of my mind leads to other questions I found curious enough to repeat here. I hope the subtle differences of meaning aren't lost to readers. They aren't supposed to sound trippy, but reflective. They're not meaningless or pointless questions. Each is…

November 18, 2022

200,000 burpees

Fitness / Habits / SIDCHAs

200,000 burpees

It's easy to track how many burpees I do as part of my twice-daily burpee-based calisthenics. I know how many I do per day and I don't miss days, so I just update the date in my spreadsheet and it tells me. More accurately, the spreadsheet tells me a minimum since now and then I do burpees for other reasons, but I haven't missed and, so I've done more than what it says, but not much more. I don't do many random burpees. Earlier this month I lost count of how many sets I'd done so defaulted to the lower number just in case. I'm pretty sure I ended up doing an extra set. I check the spreadsheet a few times a month, mainly to…

October 30, 2022

On when I should stop picking up litter in Washington Square Park

Addiction / Habits / SIDCHAs

On when I should stop picking up litter in Washington Square Park

The cops have cleaned Washington Square Park somewhat of its heavier drug use and dealing. I've talked to a few of the cops and they aren't all from the local precinct. Some came from elsewhere in the city. I talked to one from the Bronx. It sounds like word got around the city that it was worth it to act on the lawlessness, though I've heard there's plenty extra lawlessness in the Bronx too. I've wondered: when will I stop picking up litter from the northwest corner every day. I started in reaction to the drugs taking over that corner and the insane amounts of garbage fentanyl, meth, and crack users create around them. The picture below is of Washington Square Park, though not the…

October 21, 2022

Fifty-one

Awareness / Exercises / Fitness / SIDCHAs

Fifty-one

Different people define middle age differently, but having just turned 51 I think I'm in it by all definitions. Physical My first sense of my body physically declining came in my early thirties, when my potential to compete in ultimate began to decline. Before then, I always felt motivation to practice since I knew the next year my potential would be higher. After then, no matter how much I practiced, my potential would decrease the next year, which decreased my motivation to practice. Over the years, the physical decline continued. The biggest included the time to heal from injury and recover from hard workouts. In my second-to-last summer playing summer league I didn't play to be the best on my team, then in my early…

July 20, 2022

My peaceful eating sidcha for this month

Awareness / Exercises / SIDCHAs

My peaceful eating sidcha for this month

I've been avoiding things I devalue lately. After writing about the day after Thanksgiving, also known as Buy Nothing Day, I decided to strive to buy nothing but food that month and succeeded, if you don't disallow that I bought two things that I later returned. I'll write more about it when I eventually do buy something, as I'm still going. Next, I decided to avoid social media and news sites for January. Strictly speaking, I'm avoiding pages that refresh daily or faster, though allowing short-term checks for deliberate intent sometimes. I'll probably write more about it after the month ends. But I've done things like those sidchas before. A new one emerged from training a new host for a new branch of This Sustainable…

January 9, 2022

Ten years (3,652 consecutive days)

Awareness / Choosing/Decision-Making / Fitness / Freedom / Habits / SIDCHAs

Ten years (3,652 consecutive days)

I just finished my second set today of twice-daily burpee-based calisthenics. Normally, I do my second set in the evening, but since I started the habit on December 22, 2011 and today is December 21, 2021, today completes my first decade. I already finished my first decade of publishing blog posts, nearing 5,000. Here are all of them. 20 percent of the time has been on a single load of garbage. A third of that time I haven't flown. More than that fraction I've gotten up, made my bed, crossed the room, and turned off my alarm in under 60 seconds. Various other sidchas, though the burpee-based calisthenics is the most physically active and vigorous. Past Reflections What can I reflect? On past milestones I've…

December 21, 2021

Scrubbing the floor regularly

Habits / Nonjudgment / SIDCHAs

Scrubbing the floor regularly

Someone suggested I learn about a writer named Pico Iyer. In an interview I listened to he talked about the musician Leonard Cohen, who apparently spent time living as a monk. Cohen's practice, according to Iyer, included scrubbing the floor. The practice doesn't sound glamorous. You can hire someone to do it. Why bother if you can afford not to? The movie Amazing Grace, about William Wilberforce, showed John Newton living monk-like and scrubbing floors. My podcast guest Cassiano Laureano, world record holder for most burpees in an hour, told me about scrubbing his gym's floors for hours at a time. Over the past five years or so, I've adopted a practice of scrubbing my floors each day I lift weights at home. This frequency…

November 2, 2021

How much litter should you pick up?

Choosing/Decision-Making / Nature / SIDCHAs

How much litter should you pick up?

There's litter everywhere. I pass maybe thousands of pieces daily. You may live in a place with a lower population density, but probably as much litter per person. I pick up a dozen or so pieces each day, leaving most of it. That means I pass most without picking it up. I'm not doing it for my health or to solve the problem. I do it because it feels right. Maybe it would feel right to you. I don't know. I feel good about picking up what litter I do and bad about what litter I pass without picking it up. Sometimes I mentally justify why I don't pick up some pieces. I generally think, "I don't have to pick up any." What's the right…

August 25, 2021

Inspired to my first run in almost a year: 9 miles. Still plogging.

Fitness / Habits / SIDCHAs / Stories

Inspired to my first run in almost a year: 9 miles. Still plogging.

I finished six marathons and my exercise habit began by joining the cross country team in high school in 1986. Ultimate had a lot of running in it. Practice led me to love running. I didn't at first, when I struggled. I've had my share of running injuries. Last year I started running barefoot, inspired by podcast guest Nir Eyal. Over the winter I tend to row inside on the rowing machine more since it's cold outside. This spring I didn't start running how I normally do. Why not? I got a plantar's wart---that is, a wart on the sole of my foot. For some reason, I felt ashamed to mention it, which was counterproductive because when I told another runner, he told me he's…

August 18, 2021

Food poisoning and burpees nearly as hard as after a marathon

Fitness / Habits / SIDCHAs

Food poisoning and burpees nearly as hard as after a marathon

Meeting myself as I did yesterday and today happens once every couple of years. It turns out the wild blueberries I thought I was picking were black nightshade. Black nightshade apparently comes in edible and toxic varieties and I seem to have eaten the toxic kind. First things first. If you see these adorable looking berries, I recommend thinking twice. It was hard for me to type the word adorable to describe them because of what they did to my gastrointestinal tract over the past twenty-four hours. That's even considering that this picture came from a page showing the edible kind, which I can't distinguish from the toxic kind. I'm sure we've all had the experience of our GI tract not working, not processing food…

August 5, 2021

175,000 burpees

Fitness / Freedom / Habits / SIDCHAs

175,000 burpees

My spreadsheet said I hit 175,000 burpees yesterday. I don't record each one. I programmed in how many I do each day. I update the date and it tells me how many I've done. So I've done more, since occasionally I do extra without telling the spreadsheet. A decade ago, I'd record what felt like big milestones like my first six months of doing them daily or the first ten thousand. Now milestones come less often. I hit 150,000 over a year ago, so my next round number, 200,000, will come around fall 2022. I'll finish ten years this December. Not much to say. It's just part of what I do. If you want to know what it brings my life, this collection of past…

July 19, 2021

I don’t pick up litter because I care about the environment. I care about the environment because I pick up litter.

Two arrows cycle business plan infographic design diagram EPS 10 vector illustration isolated on white background.

Fitness / SIDCHAs / Tips

I don’t pick up litter because I care about the environment. I care about the environment because I pick up litter.

Today, picking up litter, it occurred to me that the more I act, the more I care about what I do. The less I act, the more indifferent, apathetic, and complacent I become. It could apply to picking up litter, avoiding packaged food, or many things I learned to do after childhood. I care (second) because I act (first). If you want to get technical, caring and acting are parts of a system and drive each other. But I think the action is more likely to start the cycle. Like love, you have to spend time together and do things for each other before falling in love, at least in my experience. It's like thinking Arnold Schwarzenegger went to the gym because he was strong…

July 14, 2021

A New Reason I Pick Up Trash Every Day

Exercises / Habits / Leadership / Nature / SIDCHAs

A New Reason I Pick Up Trash Every Day

I've held back on sharing this because it felt too presumptuous. To remind you the context, I've found that to lead on sustainability, you need experience in three areas: LeadingScienceLiving the values you promote I know of almost no one with experience in all three. Not Gore, DiCaprio, Thunberg, or any of the big names people associate with sustainability. Previous guest Alexandra Paul fits the bill. For a while, I've contended that picking up litter gives me experience both leading and living the values I promote. Of course, it reduces the garbage immediately reaching the oceans too. Several other minor reasons. The Reason I'm Sharing for the First Time Another reason I hadn't consciously realized myself yet. I meant to post it on July 4,…

July 7, 2021

“Olympic Swimmer Caeleb Dressel Says the Key to Success Is Making Your Bed”

Fitness / Habits / SIDCHAs / Tips

“Olympic Swimmer Caeleb Dressel Says the Key to Success Is Making Your Bed”

Everyone who knows me knows every morning I make my bed, cross the room, and turn off the alarm before it turns off, meaning within sixty seconds. I have other sidchas, like picking up litter daily, which I've done without fail since 2017. People ask why, which seems obvious. Doing something with a measure of quality and a time limit gives a sense of purpose. For a cash cost of zero, I start every day with purpose, and a time gain of over thirty minutes compared to how long I took to get out of bed before starting this habit five years ago or so. If you don't do it, I recommend it. I couldn't imagine doing it before. I lacked discipline. It helped develop…

July 6, 2021

“How Exercise May Help Protect Against Severe Covid-19” Comments

Average American watches 5 hours of TV per day, report shows

Fitness / SIDCHAs

“How Exercise May Help Protect Against Severe Covid-19” Comments

The New York Times posted an article, How Exercise May Help Protect Against Severe Covid-19, by Gretchen Reynolds. I enjoy her pieces, partly because she wrote the story I learned about burpees from that prompted my sidcha. First I was going to comment only on my different way of looking at this characterization, "regular exercise—whether it's going for a swim, walk, run or bike ride—can substantially lower our chances of becoming seriously ill if we do become infected." That way characterizes not exercising as normal, a state that exercising improves. But it characterizes exercise as a change from normal. Everyone is free to define normal how they want. I prefer seeing exercising as normal and not exercising causing disease. I see the two views as…

April 14, 2021

After ten years, pushing 50, burpees are getting harder

A recent morning burpee

Fitness / Habits / SIDCHAs

After ten years, pushing 50, burpees are getting harder

I remember the first time I saw an old person doing burpees. Her body didn't have the flexibility or strength to do them how a younger person could. When I started mine, around 40 years old, I knew I couldn't do them like guy in his thirties or twenties. I didn't think about how they'd feel later. Over the years, as I've grown stronger and with experience, I've added to my burpee-based calisthenics routine. I'm still adding, though lately I tend to add stretches and balance activities more than strength. I started at ten a day. Now I do 54 most days, plus a bunch of other exercises. I do more than ever, but I think over the next ten years, increasing my challenge will…

April 12, 2021

An empty sidcha I’m considering

Exercises / SIDCHAs

An empty sidcha I’m considering

Once I was getting ready to leave my apartment and trying to remember what to bring. My friend said "phone-wallet-keys" like a single word and since then I've thought of them as the basic what to carry. I go for a walk every day, at least to pick up my daily pieces of litter, which also brings me to the park. I also sing with all my electronics turned off every day. I usually do it in the park, but sometimes walking down the street. Lately, beyond turning all the electronics off, I've been leaving the phone at home. Yet more lately, I've been leaving the wallet home too. I can leave my key with the doorman. The new empty sidcha I'm considering The new…

March 26, 2021

The Weather Is Warm. Guess Who’s Back in Washington Square Park, Sadly?

Nonjudgment / SIDCHAs

The Weather Is Warm. Guess Who’s Back in Washington Square Park, Sadly?

You might remember my writing about the needles I'd find in Washington Square Park last fall. I presumed they came from heroin users, though I don't know what drugs people inject. You may have noticed I haven't written about them for a while. Well, I've continued my sidcha of picking up at least three pieces of litter from the northwest corner of the park and the cannabis dealers have been there every day, but the heroin users disappeared from the park over the winter. Now they're back. I'm writing about it because I've noticed the difference between them and the weed dealers and I've been challenging myself to describe the difference. The weed dealers seem like businessmen. I've talked to a few. They're lucid. They…

March 24, 2021

Hear me on the Cybertraps podcast

Audio / Education / Habits / SIDCHAs

Hear me on the Cybertraps podcast

This episode started talking about sidchas and the episode one of the hosts did on my podcast, involving biking in minus 40 degree weather, but the meat of it was what traps us online and to devices, which also traps us polluting: people design everything to make us want more. First they promote craving, then ways to mollify the craving but that recreate the craving. They try to addict us. We also talk about how to exit the addiction, whether to devices or polluting behavior, and how to avoid getting addicted in the first place. And how to recognize when they're trying to start it. About Cybertraps: The Cybertraps Podcast is a twice-weekly podcast discussing all the trouble we can get into with technology. Hosted…

February 11, 2021

10 Years of Daily Posts

Habits / SIDCHAs

10 Years of Daily Posts

After writing a dozen or so blog posts starting from 2008, on January 23, 2011 I wrote a post, Why I avoid proprietary software. I hadn't posted the day before, but the next day I wrote Crowding out beats letting go. And I kept posting without missing a day until today, ten years later. As my friend who set up my Wordpress blog said, "If you miss one day you can miss two. If you miss two, it's all over." So began my first sidcha, followed by burpees, which evolved into a burpee-based calisthenics routine, cold showers, picking up litter, lately singing, and more. Here's my workshop on starting your sidcha: Life-Changing Habits Even (Especially) Under Lock-Down. Wordpress says I've posted 4,152 posts. In the…

January 23, 2021

Year 10, day 1 of daily burpees (about 163,000 and counting)

A recent morning burpee

Fitness / Habits / SIDCHAs / Tips

Year 10, day 1 of daily burpees (about 163,000 and counting)

Today begins my tenth year of daily burpees, not one day missed. My spreadsheet says I've done over 163,000 of them. I have yet to spend one penny doing them. Since I consider them something I do instead of TV, I've saved time doing them too. A recent morning burpee The activity continues to evolve in its meaning and value to me, always increasing, but mostly I think of them, along with the rest of the calisthenics and stretching that make up my twice-daily routines, like brushing my teeth. They're harder to start and leave me more winded, but just as habitual. Discipline I value them most for developing discipline. Without them, or some regular vigorous exercise, what discipline they've developed in me would atrophy…

December 22, 2020

Full lotus: 21 minutes meditating on a Sunday morning

Fitness / Habits / SIDCHAs

Full lotus: 21 minutes meditating on a Sunday morning

I'm pleased enough with the side effect of regularly meditating that I can sit in a full lotus position for an extended time that I don't mind posting possibly the most boring video on the internet. After first meditating at a Vipassana retreat in 2007, starting with a ten-day no reading, writing, phone, etc experiment, I practiced irregularly but deeply, doing more 10-day, 5-day, 3-day, and 1-day retreats slightly less than once per year. Inspired by my podcast conversation with Julian Guderley in May, I included meditating in my five-day exercise cycle, so I meditate two days out of five for about twenty minutes each time. Gratitude to Julian for inspiring me. When I started in May, I don't think I could sit long in…

November 2, 2020

Day 1,300 picking up at least one piece of litter daily

Habits / Nature / SIDCHAs

Day 1,300 picking up at least one piece of litter daily

I happened to check: today is my 1,300th consecutive day picking up at least one piece of litter per day. It's my dirty sidcha. I do it to develop leadership experience and skills to hasten the day when we view single-use packaging how we now view asbestos and leaded gasoline. Yes, you too will cringe at takeout and to go, now matter how much you relish it today. One day operators of factories producing cups, bags, bottles, and such will shut their machines down because no one will buy their poisonous waste. Your buying packaged stuff finances them even if you believe you dispose of it benignly. Luckily, the more you buy fresh produce from, say, farmers markets, the more you can finance them to…

November 1, 2020

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