Thread by @RonJeffries

Today I just heard the word "thrive" in regard to how we'd like things to go for people. I had been thinking about "happiness", but I think thriving is better. Anyway ...

People in my bubble have been very passionate lately, often angry, in talking about what we all need.

1/12

I had in mind some counterpoint. I agree entirely with the points my bubble-mates have been making, and yet I come at things a bit differently.

I, too, was a nerd when being a nerd wasn't cool, and I was oppressed the way nerds were, by the jocks and other cool kids.

2/12

I was lucky enough to run with a few other nerds, and since we were pulling the grades and got respect elsewhere, we knew we were just as cool, only differently. Also some of us shot a really good game of three-rail billiards, which, face it, is pretty darn cool.

3/12

So, rather than get all oppressed and smashed down and angry, I fell into the mode of knowing that I was OK, and pretty much ignoring the input from the cool side folks.

I started like a rock in the stream, letting the bad stuff flow around me.

4/12

Later, based on what I [probably mis-]understood about Aikido, I thought of the Master, who, when things come at him, takes a step, makes a graceful move, and the things fly away, usually upside down and about to land on their heads.

5/12

I have thought in recent years of Daniel Pink's "Purpose, Autonomy, Mastery" notion, and for me, autonomy was most important: the ability to do as I felt best. Mostly, what felt best was to move toward mastery in my craft, be it code, words, coaching, or whatever.

6/12

Moving toward mastery became my purpose. And that cycle, because it worked for me -- because in that cycle I seemed to /thrive/ -- I have long recommended it to others as a way to live and a way to provide a fertile soil for teams of people.

pragprog.com/book/rjnsd/the…

7/12

But inside that circle, close to the core of me, has been not to be angry, not to be fighting, but to have a calm, graceful style at my center. (Those who know me will have seen other aspects, not all good. Yes. Still, this was where I was trying to be.)

8/12

I was seeking, I think, a kind of stillness. Calm. A centered acceptance of myself and my place among all the noise that is reality. This, too, captures only part of it. Be that as it may ...

9/12

My desired response ... the responses in me that I like best ... have been the ones that come from a calm observation of what comes, an entering into it, an acceptance of everything in all its up-fuckedness, ...

10/12

and then, then, a touch, a grasp, a pull, ok maybe a bit of hip goes in there .... as graceful a touch as I can make to guide the up-fuckedness away, to upend it, to untangle it, first so that I can thrive, and second so that those around me can thrive.

11/12

There's so much anger among us and between us now. And when that anger leads to positive change -- which sometimes it can -- I guess it's OK.

But for me, a calm, still, steady touch ... that's where I thrive.

And that's how I try to write and how I'll continue.

12/12