Chris Goode

Tick Tock Goes the Clock

“You may delay, but time will not, and lost time is never found again." -- Benjamin Franklin

Time is a tricky thing, because it seems to slow down when we want it to pass quickly and does the opposite when we need it the most. The only time where time seems to pass normally however, is before something important happens. Let’s elaborate on that.

When you were a kid and you had school, chances are you would have projects that were due weeks ahead in the future. They most likely made you a little bit anxious, but not enough to make you freak out. They belonged entirely in the future, and not a single part of them existed in the present. And thus we created something -- procrastination.

Procrastination is a problem that plagues most people in their day to day lives. Eventually they procrastinate on so many things that it all hits them at once and they freak out about it. Then they get paralyzed by stress, which drags them down even further towards procrastination, which then stresses them even more… you get the idea.

There’s a lot of things that go into procrastination, which means that there’s a lot of things we can do in order to stop ourselves from procrastinating. I plan on elaborating on this a LOT in the future, because the more I think about it the more I realize that eliminating procrastination results in the elimination of most other problems I write about on this blog. Because this subject is so vast and intricate, I obviously can’t explain it all here. But what I can do is elaborate on our quote.

Time is something that’s going to pass whether we like it or not. Although scientists are incredibly smart and have figured out how to manipulate most things, time is not one of them. It might feel like time is passing slowly or quickly, but it marches on at it’s own pace consistently… quite literally at all times.

Because of this we need to understand that action must be taken. Logically we can’t do nothing because time is passing no matter what, so we may as well fill it in order to avoid stress. This doesn’t mean we have to do a lot (although that would obviously help), it simply means that we’re doing SOMETHING, even if that something is tiny. A lot of tiny things over the course of an entire day or week build up a lot, and that’s what makes progress.

Be sure to share this article with a friend, leave a like and a follow, and ask a question in the comment section! It brings our community closer together. Other than that, stay tuned for future blog posts and try to be the reason someone smiles today :)

by Chris Goode

True Belongings

“People can rob you of almost any possession, but hard work belongs to you and you alone.” -- Firas Zahabi

Unfortunately we live in a world of materialism, where everybody cares about what kind of phone you have, where you live, what kind of car you have, and how expensive your outfit is. Admittedly this can be stressful and depressing, and it might even seem like there’s no escape from it.

On top of this stress and anxiety we get from being pushed towards being rich, some of us have to worry about our riches being stolen from us; whether it be fame, money, property, etc. All this does is adds to the stress and leads to an eventual self destruct. It’s a pretty harsh cycle.

Since our physical possessions can be robbed, that leaves us with only one thing: our mind. Our mind can hold everything we’ve learned and put it out into the world for us to share with others. At the end of the day that’s what we end up doing with everybody else: sharing our ideas.

We also have our physical body. We can build it up so that we’re strong and healthy and live a long life. Of course there’s exceptions to this -- people end up disabled or hurt and lose the ability to move their bodies. But for the general population, exercise is a good way to unite your mind and body.

An even better way to unite your body and mind is through martial arts. This narrows down the barrier between the two, so you can move your body in specific ways without your mind holding you back or restricting you. This is also a good way to practice mental discipline because of the physical strain that’s put on your body.

Once you build up your body and discipline your mind, confidence blooms. You become secure and satisfied with your own body, and things start to fall back into place.

by Chris Goode

The Work-Play Balance

“Health without force is like hardness without elasticity.” -- Miyamoto Musashi

Oooohhh… this is a tricky one.

I had to really sit back for… well, a few days so that I could think about this quote. Usually with philosopher’s quotes you can find the context pretty easily and at least figure out the general idea. But this quote almost sounds like a riddle or a joke; “What do health and force have in common with hardness and elasticity?”

Well logically we try to compare the two things instantly. So let’s follow our logic. Hardness without elasticity sounds like something that’s durable but not flexible. Health without force sounds like something that’s always healthy without trying -- something that isn’t ideal because it’s unbalanced.

I imagine that he compares effortless health to solid hardness because both are unbalanced. Hardness without elasticity can’t change and adapt to its surroundings, which eventually leads to its downfall. Health without force becomes too dormant in its state and eventually falls out of health due to its lack of maintenance.

With this in mind, we can begin to understand what Musashi means. Health without force is like hardness without elasticity because both are unbalanced in their effort. It reminds me of the ratio people should have between work and play. We see people who party all the time and only work so that they can afford alcohol and fancy vacations, and they’re generally looked down upon by society because they don’t work a lot. We also see people who are buried in their work. They might be successful in terms of financial gain, but the truth is that they aren’t really living. There’s two ends of the spectrum: party animal and workaholic. The ideal way of stumbling through life is to find a balance -- it might not cure you of mental conditions or instantly make everything better, but at least it won’t all come crashing down on you.

Keeping this in mind, try to find ways where you can force health while also searching for ways you can be more flexible. Balance discipline and rest. Find your spot on the spectrum of work and play.

by Chris Goode

Avoiding the Trouble

“The ultimate aim of martial arts is not having to use them.” -- Miyamoto Musashi

Martial arts at their core are made to help people defend themselves. They trace back to the beginnings of recorded time when people figured out that humans are really good at wrestling, and after that happened we all got excited to watch people beat each other up.

On a slightly more serious note, martial arts are simply there to keep other people from hurting us. This applies to both the physical realm AND the mental realm; a good practitioner of any martial art applies the things they’ve learned to their thoughts and ideas as well.

That being said, the main goal of practicing martial arts physically and mentally is to prevent the need for them. We practice defending ourselves so that we know how to avoid the situations where we need them. We learn to avoid the sketchy guy in the alley way and to walk around the drunk guy in the street.

True martial artists learn to do the same in their thoughts and actions. We learn to avoid the people who could break our hearts or ruin our mental health. We learn to say no to people when necessary, and we learn to truly respect ourselves.

The thing about this is that you don’t need to practice martial arts to learn how to do this for yourself. You can study philosophy and read and learn about things in order to grow your mind and remind yourself that you’re worth respect because you spend your time trying to become better. A person who’s trying to better themselves should never be looked down upon, including yourself. You shouldn’t hate yourself if you’re trying to become better, and you shouldn’t look down on yourself if you need rest.

I know I strayed a little bit from our quote today, but I think that’s not a bad thing. Sometimes it’s okay to do that a little bit because it brings us to better things.

by Chris Goode

Finding a Work-Around

“You must understand that there is more than one path to the top of the mountain.” -- Miyamoto Musashi

Everybody has heard the metaphor that people use to describe how life is full of problems that you need to conquer; usually something along the lines of “Push to the top” or “Keep climbing.” Obviously these metaphors hold some value because people repeat them on their way to success, but just as many people forget that there’s more than one path to the top of any mountain.

Our problems in our day to day lives can appear bigger and stronger than us sometimes. Probably most of the time now that I think about it. Many end up faced against a problem that they’ll think they just can’t move over, around, or through. Honestly, it’s life draining. That problem becomes so huge that it’s all they can think about, and their life revolves around it to the point that it’s entirely consumed.

During these times it’s important to remember that there’s always more than one approach to solving problems. If one way doesn’t work, you pivot and try again. Keeping the current theme of martial arts going, we see opponents testing each other's reaction time and formulating a plan to break through their defense before moving. We really see the difference when we compare an amateur to a professional -- an amateur will throw out random moves they’ve learned in hopes that one might work, while a professional will make space while they think about which technique to use with precision.

Keeping this in mind, we can apply it to our every day life. If our current plan of action isn’t working, then trying to push through it with brute force won’t work. Instead, we need to take a step back and view the problem objectively and without emotion. Then and only then will we be able to come up with an appropriate plan that outmaneuvers our problems.

by Chris Goode

Uniting the Mind and Body

“It is difficult to understand the universe if you only study one planet.” -- Miyamoto Musashi

Martial Arts. Something that’s been in existence since as long as we can remember in one way or another.

For the general population, martial arts are thought of as something that’s used to hurt people. After all, their main purpose is to help people defend themselves; sometimes in order to stop yourself from getting hurt, it’s necessary to hurt your opponent. It’s a sad truth. But with that being said, martial arts are just that -- an art.

People often think of art as something that makes people ooh and ahh. Martial arts do that for many people, but maybe not quite as much as something such as dancing or music. The reason for this is because they’re often presented by people who have spent years of their lives disciplining themselves so that they don’t have to live in fear of what might happen. We’ll get into that more in future posts, so please ask questions about it so I don’t relay information that you already know.

Back to today’s quote. Although it can be taken literally, I believe it works best as a metaphor. And if this is a metaphor, the universe acts as the human mind and body while one planet resembles one aspect of one of those things.

There’s plenty of “planets” that we can choose to focus on: strength, flexibility, patience, endurance, memory, art, musical interest, and mathematical thinking to name a few. Most people make it through school and tackle a few planets. Some people exercise or do yoga and tackle a few more. Martial arts however unite them all. This is because they teach you how to use your body to create something beautiful, such as a kata.

Knowing this, it’s difficult to understand why people refuse to do martial arts. They keep you fit, they keep your mind whole, they stop you from hurting others BECAUSE you know exactly how to do it, and overall they just make you a more disciplined person. With this in mind, I encourage you to explore this world. Learn about the different kinds of martial arts and think about practicing one -- there’s plenty that don’t involve hurting others at all if that’s your concern.

by Chris Goode

Through the Battlefield.

I’m not too sure how to start this article out, so I suppose I should just cut to the chase and wing it.

Sometimes we have trouble moving through things. It simply is how things are. This is why people end up with PTSD. This is why people don’t change sometimes. First and foremost, it’s important to understand that this is nothing to be ashamed of. Being stuck or scared doesn’t mean you’re out of the ordinary. It simply means you’re having trouble with something -- and that’s okay.

The first step in moving through something is to understand that eventually the pain will subside. Sooner or later you’ll be able to look back and think “Hey. I did that. I made it through that.” It might take a while -- sometimes up to years and years. But eventually things get better.

The hard part isn’t recognizing this. The hard part is recognizing this when you’re about to go against your own demons. In other words, it’s easier to think things through in an ideal situation, but situations aren’t always ideal. That being said, sometimes we need to practice thinking things through beforehand. In fact, I recommend you do that anyways because otherwise you won’t have a protocol.

A good example of this is seen in martial arts. Someone might have lightning fast reflexes and be on the other side of their opponent in the blink of an eye. We see boxers slip under punches and through a hook to the other person's abdomen without comprehending what’s happened. The reason this is possible isn’t because they consciously think about their moves. Anybody who watches someone like Mike Tyson in the ring knows what I’m talking about -- their body moves before their mind does. This is done through hours and hours and hours of practice. They don’t practice until they get it right, they practice until they can’t get it wrong. The same applies to people with traumatic experiences. Often times they won’t be able to consciously think about what to do when they feel stressed, and that’s when they rely on the protocols that they’ve come up with beforehand. If they have anger issues, they know to separate. If they get anxious in a crowd, they understand that they need to breathe and separate. People rely on protocols in place of conscious thinking.

The same logic applies to everybody. Sure, you might not have PTSD or a mental disorder, but I can almost guarantee that there’s something that makes you uncomfortable. This idea of coming up with a protocol can act as a solution if you actively process it beforehand. So with that in mind, take the time today to meditate on your protocol and come up with a plan of action.

by Chris Goode

Take Action!

“Life must be understood backward. But it must be lived forward ” -- Soren Kierkegaard

One funny thing about life is that we often look back in wonder and see answers that only seem obvious now that we know the whole story. Maybe a friend passed away or you made a difficult decision for yourself, and now you realize just how influential that change was.

There’s probably a million reasons for this, but perhaps the most important and obvious reason is because it would be cheating if we could do this in the moment. Part of the reason life is so… well, lively, is because it’s always unpredictable and open to change. Knowing the future would take away from that. Things would become mundane because we would already know the outcome.

Imagine knowing how you would die, for what reasons, when, and what events lead up to it. At first this seems scary, but I would imagine that containing this knowledge ahead of time would simply depress you. Everything would be meaningless in the face of death… or perhaps everything would have more meaning. I suppose we’ll never know. Which ironically brings us back to our quote.

Life can only be understood backwards… but on the other side of the coin, it can only be lived forwards. By this, Kierkegaard means that you can only know how things will turn out if you actually live through them. You can’t spend so long thinking about what might happen that you get analysis paralysis -- otherwise the worst is almost destined to happen. A foolproof plan to get through this is to remind yourself that sometimes you can’t do anything without disaster striking… meaning you might as well pick the scenario where the disaster strikes but you still get something good out of it. Being surrounded by enemies simply means that you can attack in any direction and actually hit something -- so you might as well pull the trigger before they’re right on top of you. So with that in mind, reflect on the past carefully and charge head on into the future.

by Chris Goode

Ignorance Might Not Be So Blissful After All...

“There is only one good, knowledge, and one evil, ignorance” – Socrates

As we’ve discussed before, knowledge is power. That’s something we’ve known for as long as we can remember and something we’ve been told since even before then. Knowledge is power because other people can’t take it from us.

So if knowledge is power, why then is ignorance such a rival for it? If ignorance is the opposite of knowledge, then shouldn’t it be weak? Logically, yes. And as we know logic is often correct. Ignorance is nothing but weakness… but it’s weakness that spreads.

Ignorance is the sole problem of… well, everything. Wars break out because people are ignorant of others' needs. People are killed because others are ignorant to their needs. Ignorance is weakness.

So, as always, we have to ask ourselves how this applies to our own mind. Why is knowledge power? How does ignorance defeat us?

Well, knowledge is power because it tells us what moves to make and when. With knowledge we’re able to predict our enemy’s moves and stop them in their tracks. By enemy, I mean anything that stands in the way of completing a goal we set for ourselves. Laziness is your enemy. Anger is your enemy. And of course, ignorance is your enemy.

Ignorance is our enemy because it keeps us completely in the dark. We lose track of what we’re supposed to be doing and how. We forget why things are important and we lose focus. In extreme situations, ignorance to us is like rust to iron -- it eats away at us.

So then the clear solution is to become more knowledgeable. This of course applies to academic knowledge; you should always be trying to learn something new. But what many fail to remember is that some knowledge can only be gained from experience. So… learn. Be ready to fail. Prepare yourself so that you get up and try again over and over until you learn something. Then you acquire the skill and the discipline. Discipline is knowledge too, and it can only be gained through experience.

by Chris Goode

Vision Through Time

“The unexamined life is not worth living” -- Socrates

A lot of people have the fear of the unknown. This includes myself; it’s not so bad now but it’s definitely not something I’ve missed out on. So what’s the solution to it, what’s the workaround?

Well, like so many other things in life, the only way out is through. The only way to make the unknown known is to do whatever it is you’re scared of. The best example I can think of is asking someone out. You could spend weeks on end wondering how they might react. “Will they feel the same way? Will they reject me? If they do, will they tell all their friends and ruin my reputation? Wait, but maybe they’ll feel the same way… I shouldn’t be getting off track and letting those things come at my mind…”

As you can see, it’s extremely easy to succumb to the process of overbearing thought. In this case the solution would be to tell the person how you feel. Then they give a reaction, and only then can you properly solve any problems that come up. Otherwise you waste time with guess work. Plus for all you know, things could go perfectly… you never know until you try.

So hey to get a little bit back on track, let’s ask another question. How an this apply to everyday life? Well, first we must consider what we spend most of our time doing, and that's thinking. Thinking about what could happen, how we could solve a problem, how something might turn out… many things that happen throughout the day. But the things that make the biggest impact on our mindset and personality are the things we think about first thing in the morning and right before we fall asleep -- typically anything but the present. We already discussed that anxiety of what’s to come can be overcome by moving over, around, or most importantly THROUGH a brick wall, but we didn’t talk about the past.

The past is a tricky idea. It has the ability to drag us underneath dark shadows and pull us to our absolute lowest point because it has the weapon of regret. There’s a million different ways to combat this, but the way that I’ve found works best for me is to remind myself that those events happened to/with a past version of myself. If we think in 4 dimensions, we recognize that that version of ourselves is part of us, but doesn’t represent who we are now.

by Chris Goode

Knowledge is Power

“The only source of knowledge is experience.” -- Albert Einstein

If knowledge is power, then words are weapons… but also sources of happiness, satisfaction, confusion, anger, joy, pain, and Being.

Knowledge is something that people are made to strive for as soon as they’re born. There’s tv shows made for children, toys to help them understand how things work and develop their brain so that it can understand concepts that adults never even think about, and methods of speech to teach them how to communicate with others. Most interestingly, however, there’s school. Kids are put into school as early as they can walk and taught a multitude of different things. Why? Well, as stated before, knowledge is power. We begin education as soon as possible in order to empower people as soon as possible.

That being said, knowledge is still power. But do children really need to be given that kind of responsibility so soon in their lives? Well… yes and no. Obviously school is a good thing -- it teaches things such as social skills, cooperation with others, and if the school is good, conflict resolution. The best schools are those such as waldorf schools, where creative thinking and imagination is prioritized in the earlier grades instead of how to read and count to 100. Obviously these things are important -- I don’t intend to discredit that. I simply intend to point out that most schools don’t teach students how to think outside the box.

So how does this fall back to Einstein’s quote? Well, experience is the best teacher because it leaves the best memories. Reading a book can be an excellent teacher for some people, especially if they have a good imagination. But for most, experience is truly the best solution due to the fact that every little variable is up to them instead of an outside source.

This information is neat and all, but how is it related to the rest of this blog? A little bit of time spent thinking about this question might give rise to a somewhat obvious answer: it’s relevant because everything else for you to read is a bunch of knowledge. I tell you about this quote and I analyze it and reveal my thinking to encourage you to do the same, and in turn seek out experiences to put the rest of these lessons (if you will) to the test.

At the end of the day, humans are constantly seeking knowledge. It could be knowledge about how to improve their bodies or how to do a specific thing, but regardless we seek knowledge. Try to learn something new every day, or at least study what you think you already know. It’s crucial to understanding not only the subject, but yourself and your limitations.

by Chris Goode

Forgive and Forget... or Try to Anyways...

“Often we forget that forgiveness is for us and not the offender. Forgiveness in no way condones cruelty or unkind treatment. Forgiveness gives us back peace of mind.” -- Fred Luskin

We’ve all heard the phrase “forgive and forget.” Probably too many times if we’re honest with ourselves. Perhaps we’ve thought about it before. Maybe we’ve come to the conclusion that forgiveness is to let the other person move on so that we can do the same. Maybe we haven’t thought about it at all. Regardless, it’s a phrase that holds some value to it.

Like Luskin says, forgiveness isn’t for the offender. It’s for the person forgiving. The truth is, forgiveness is simply saying “you no longer occupy my mind rent free.” Forgiveness also isn’t saying that the other person was right or that you agree with them. It doesn’t morally justify their actions. It doesn’t mean that they’re a better person than you. It simply means that you’re no longer holding onto them.

It’s important to hold onto the idea that forgiveness is to help us, not justify the other person. Without it, we fall into depression and… well, dark times. This kind of grudge is the kind that kills. I know that today’s post is short, but it’s because it holds an important message that shouldn’t be lost in an excess of words.

by Chris Goode

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