Circles

Sunday, October 11th, 2009.

Connections.

This blog has to do with how much I am living in my own head. Therefore, this is going to be a strange journey into the conscious that is understood as “The Williamstrasse.”

It is a Sunday. It is 8 AM. I have my New York Times under my arm. I am walking through the rain on a very wet morning. I find a coffee shop that is open. My cell phone is dead. I have Radiohead playing in my headphones. I have a coffee mixed with Bailey’s. Today is going to be a good day. Also, this is another favorite coffee shop as they serve animal crackers with you coffee. Um, awesome!

I constantly think of circles. I think of my mind as a circle. I think of life as a circle. I think of running as a circle. I have thoughts solely on circles. Everything is a circle and everything is everything. This is the fundamental understanding that provides the groundwork for my actions. This is not my foundation as I most certainly stole it from Emerson. See, everything flows like water through this existence having everything in the past connected with everything in the future. Crazy, I know.

It is an amazing feeling to not have a cell phone. It is like being set free. You do not have to worry about anything outside of yourself. You can just think about the moment and have no anxiety about what is happening to anyone around you. This is a feeling that is amazing and causes me much joy. See, I love my cell phone as it keeps me in contact with everything that is around me in terms of family and friends. All of these elements are crucial to a happy life; but sometimes these forces are the reason for the stress.

The circle is the most perfect form. When it comes to building, it is the triangle because it can be built upon and allows for equal weight distribution throughout. When it comes to life, it is the circle. A triangle in life has points and finite conclusions. A circle is never ending. There is no beginning nor end. There is no middle or break. It just keeps going on. Also, it is a great metaphor for the rat race that is the distractions that become our life while we try to fight through the constant progress that sometimes we love and other times we deflect.

I have become Norm from Cheers. I do not go to bars that much, any more, but I have learned to live inside of other establishments. I feel like a disjointed transient with no actual home. Rather, I go to coffee shops and make small talk with the people there. I make this small talk to try and create a connection. To try and have human interaction for my spirit and just have someone tell me it is going to be okay. Everything is going to be fine and keep coming back for more coffee so we can discuss philosophy and make sense of everything. I call these my coffee friends, no it is not very creative, but it is fitting.

These circles are not only within my thoughts, but it is in every element of my life. I have a social circle. I have a work circle. I have a creative circle. I have a drinking circle. I have you name it and there is a circle. The thing is some of these circles are bigger than others. Some of these circles become so small that they are suffocating. The only way to maintain a healthy level between these circles are to have them grow when they need to grow. To have them shrink when limitations need to be placed on them. Like anything in life, moderation is the key to happiness. I can not only live within my work circle as I will start to hate my work. I cannot only live in my drinking circle, as I will become an alcoholic and sap the joy and celebration out of drinking. I cannot only live in my creative circle, as I will end up in a padded room in an establishment off of Lamar and 51^st St.

I trot along to different places across Austin in search of something that is not there. I am out searching for a mirage when I know that it is unattainable. I am like the traveler looking for the fountain of youth. As I try and stay young forever, I am going to ruin my youth and once I accept that I will be too old to enjoy my life. I am out every night and every day to try and be complete. To find that perfect friend and discussion. To find the perfect place that sparks the perfect thought that creates the perfect story that gives me the perfect break that this world owes to me. I have news for myself, the moment I am looking for is unattainable and if I keep looking I am going to miss out on the music playing through karma right now.

The circles I speak of create the harmony that I live within my mind. They provide a sense of reason. They provide a set of rules that I can understand. As I have learned and studied the key to living is discipline. That is not the only key, but for the level of this post it will be. See, the most successful people are the most disciplined. It is not that they have the best thoughts or have a book that allows them to peak into the future. They do not go to fortune tellers now do they have a time machine. But, they are disciplined. This is something that I am working on. The most important element of life is this discipline and what it means to apply it to each circle within your life. I need to be more discipline and exercise the thoughts I have into the actions that I want with conviction in knowing that I will not fail as there is no winning or losing in life, there is just the attempt.

This mission has been understood. I now know what it is that I have to do. I understand the meaning of life and can finally relax. I just need to repeat every action that I am doing now. See, this is the trick with living. You figure out the perfect equation to succeed in a day, but you change so much when your head hits that pillow and you dream, that the same rules and potion is completely out of date the next morning when your alarm goes off. Life is not Groundhog Day where everyday is the exact same and you can waste a few of them to take chances to perfect the proper day. Life is a random abyss of chaos strung together on this circle only because these circumstances continue to happen to you.

The thing I enjoy most about living in these public spaces is becoming a part of the furniture. To put on my music, to blend into the wall or chair that I am sitting, and just watch other people live. I think this is the fascination with reality television now. This has always been an element of society. Humans have a desire to take a break of their noise in order to watch other peoples. This is why I gossip. This is why I read the news. This is why I watch movies. I need these windows to take my destructive brain away from over-analyzing my own actions, and process what it is that others are doing. The problem with having a college education is that you are trained to find reasoning for everything. You are conditioned to make a string of reasons for a random occurrence to happen. When you are released from your classroom, you are not given an instruction manual for how to use this tool you have spent decades fine-tuning. Thus, I am left with a mind that works very well when I understand everything in moderation and overloads to the point of insomnia when it turns itself to its maker and second-guesses every small action on a moment-to-moment basis.

What I know this morning that I will lose this afternoon and fight for this evening is that connections are needed. Connections allow us to escape the reality that we have created in our mind. If you do not escape the circle of thought that is your life, you will be doomed to suffocate under the pressure of living. I will better understand my circles of connections. I will better weigh all that is important to me and balance the perfect solution on a daily basis. Right now everything makes sense, I just need to take this moment and duplicate it for the rest of my life. What would the fun be in that though, the challenge of living is taking on all of these different challenges and surviving them.

Moral: Animal crackers in bailey’s and coffee is the perfect breakfast. Read the New York Times, it is one of the last standing quality publications. Understand the circles that are in your life and how they overlap with other connections and cause you to find harmony in the chaos. Never stop fighting, this life will beat you down, but you have all the tools you need to survive inside of your head.