Every Man's Battle

This book was great. Although I felt it was heavily catered toward married men, there was an abundance of valuable information about how to stay pure in a long-term relationship and how to beat sexual addiction.

Here.

Split Directions

I'm currently reading Happiness Is a Choice, Every Man's Battle, Walden and Scorecasting (when I shit). Way too much.

After I finish these books, I need to read, at most, TWO books at a time. Even if one is just a book I read when I shit.

Whew!

Maus: A Survivor's Tale

by Art Speigelman

I loved these graphic novels! Technically, it's one story but Speigelman divided it into two parts - I'm not sure why. I'm almost certain this was the first graphic novel I've ever read fully! I love Art's style and the imagery he incorporated into the story (Nazis as cats, Jews as mice, Poles as pigs, etc.). The war story of Art's father, Vladek and the time he spent in in Auschwitz was interesting; however, I found the narrative between Art and Vladek much more powerful. It was amazing to see how the aftermath of the war affected certain Jews (or affected some more than others) and how difficult Vladek had become to deal with and Art's struggle to honor his father, although he could not understand the way he lived his life. I thought the story was touching and it was interesting how Speigelman told "his story" through himself and his father, a variety of settings and time periods. He mentioned his depression and his struggle to care for his father and live with "survivors," while he himself was not a survivor of the Holocaust. Overall, it was a quick, painless yet emotional read. Maybe I'm brave enough to do Watchmen?

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

by J.K. Rowling

I don't really want to spend a lot of time "reviewing" this book. It was an interesting read (and probably would be even more intriguing had I read the series when they were relevant) and I finished the first novel in two days! Rowling has an excellent imagination and although some of her style and ideas are clearly borrowed from fantasy writers before her (Tolkien), The Sorcerer's Stone was a delight to read. After finishing the book, part of me wanted to read the rest of the series; however, the low reading level and predictability kept me from deciding to get caught up "Pottermania." There were many wonderful parts in The Sorcerer's Stone but I'll stick to hobbits, trolls and magical rings. After all, I'm just a Muggle.

Artist: MirrorCradle

Scorecasting: The Hidden Influences Behind How Sports Are Played and Games Are Won

by Tobias Moskowitz & Jon Wertheim


omission bias

risk aversion

Sacred Hoops

by Phil Jackson

Sacred Hoops was a great read! Jackson's detailed accounts of the personalities on the early 90's Chicago Bulls teams was fascinating. I already had a great deal of respect for Jackson (the numbers are unbelievable) but I have gained a much deeper respect, for Jackson as a human being and as a man, after reading Sacred Hoops.

Jackson stresses that "in basketball - as in life - true joy comes from being fully present in each and every moment, not just when things are going your way. Jackson's strict Pentecostal roots reminded me of my childhood and I could relate to much of the resentment and disenchantment he felt towards religion during his early adulthood.

He mentions many books he has read and found useful that may warrant investigation on my part, someday. One book, How to Meditate by Lawrence LeShan, Jackson said he began with and then moved on to Practicing the Presence and Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind.

While he was playing for the Knicks he read William James' The Variety of Religious Experiences and said that it changed his outlook on spirituality. He realized that religion didn't have to be a "big production." Rather, "it could be as uneventful as a moment of reflection... I no longer felt compelled to run from my past or cling to it out of fear. I could take what worked for me and let the rest go." That last sentence struck a nerve with me. I'm beginning to understand this and I believe that taking some of what I was taught as a child and letting the rest go is what I need to do.

Much of the zen principles and ideas that Jackson describes interest me greatly. "If you speak and act with a polluted mind, suffering will follow you... if you speak and act with a pure mind, happiness with follow you, as a shadow clings to a form."

This next part is very relevant to my struggles:

"What pollutes the mind i the Buddhist view is our desire to get life to conform to our peculiar notion of how things should be, as opposed to how they really are."

This is my main struggle. I become aggitated and depressed when my "self-view" does not match up with reality. I see the world and myself in should terms without honestly considering how I really am: what shortcomings I have, which situations I mishandle, etc. I need to be more honest with myself. More realistic and less of a perfectionist. These Buddhist ideas encourage me.

Later Jackson says, "The point of Zen practice is to make you aware of the thoughts that run your life and diminish their power over you." Sound great to me.

Jackson describes bare attention as "listening without judgement." Like living with the beginner's mind; a mind that is void of predispositions, judgement and that accepts things the way that they are. "In Zen it is said that the gap between accepting things the way they are and wishing them to be otherwise is 'the tenth of an inch of difference between heaven and hell.'"

Jackson also states, "I had to let go of my compulsive need for order and learn how to stay composed when everything seemed hopelessly out of control." Bingo. Remind you of someone?

"...most people were motivated by one of two forces: fear or greed. That may be true, but I also think people are motivated by love... They live for those moments when they can lose themselves completely in the action and experience the pure joy of competition."

"What makes basketball so exhilarating is the joy of losing yourself completely in the dance, even if it's just for one beautiful transcendent moment."

"If your mind isn't clouded by unnecessary things, this is the best season of your life." - Wu-Men. Jackson entitled a chapter, "Being aware is more important than being smart." Here are some excerpts from it:

The secret is not thinking. That doesn't mean being stupid; it means quieting the endless jabbering of thoughts so that your body can do instinctively what it's been trained to do without the mind getting in the way.

Jackson quotes Robert Pirsig, "Peace of mind produces right values, right values produces right thoughts. Right thoughts produce right actions and right actions produce work which will be a material reflection for others to see the serenity at the center of it all." This reminded me of the Buddhist's Guide to the Eightfold Path that I read part of last fall.

"Chop wood, carry water. The point is to perform every activity from playing basketball, to taking out the garbage, with precise attention, moment by moment."

"My biggest obstacle [as a player] was my hyperactive critical mind" - Sounds very familiar.

Suzuki Roshi calls "beginner's mind," an "empty" state free from limiting self-centered thoughts. "If your mind is empty," he write in Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind, "it is always ready for anything; it is open to everything. In the beginner's mind there are may possibilities; in the expert's mind there are few.

Jackson writes more about noting thoughts and sensations and then returning awareness to breathing - practicing meditation. It's remarkable how any experience, including boredom, becomes interesting when it's an object of moment-to-moment investigation.

As the stillness becomes more stable, you tend to identify less with fleeting thoughts and feelings, such as fear, anger, or pain, and experience a state of inner harmony, regardless of changing circumstances.

When I read the final part of Sacred Hoops, I found Jackon's opinions on anger extremely enlightening. "Anger was the restless demon that seized the group mind and kept the players from being fully awake." Regarding his athletes, "they'd been conditioned since early adolescence to think that every confrontation was a personal test of manhood."

"The strength of the triangle offense is that it's based on the Taoist principle of yielding to an opponent's force in order to render him powerless. Bottom line: there's no need to overpower when you can outsmart."

In Buddhist teachings the term skillful means is used to describe an approach to making decisions and dealing with problems in a way that is appropriate to the situation and causes no harm. Ultimately, leadership takes a lot of what St. Paul called faith: "the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen" (Hebrews 11:1). You have to trust your inner knowing. If you have a clear mind and an open heart, you won't have to search for direction. Direction will come to you.

The idea of impermanence is also discussed. Jackson describes a parable told by Achaan Chaa, a Laotian master, who tells of a beautiful goblet. He says that, to him, the goblet is already broken. "I enjoy it; I drink out of it...When I understand that this glass is already broken, every moment with it is precisou." This is a fantastic idea!

"There's no percentage in trying to push the river or speed up the harvest. The farmer who's so eager to help his crops grow that he slips out at night and tugs on the shoots inevitably ends up going hungry... When we cannot accept the truth of transiency, we suffer."

"What brings me real joy is the experience of being fully engaged in whatever I'm doing. I get unhappy when my mind begins to wander, during wins as well as losses Sometimes a well-played defeat will make me feel better than a victory in which the team doesn't feel especially connected."

"Eventually, everybody loses, ages, changes... Buddhism teaches us that by accepting death, you discover life."

"My mind is completely focused on the goal, but with a sense of openness and joy."

The real appeal of Zen to me is the idea of "not thinking." I am so often consumed by anxiety, fears, anger and the desire for truth that I rattle my brain with more thoughts than it can handle. I over-analyze, dwell and dance from one situation to the next, neither of which I truly can control. The idea that someone can stop thinking; stop worrying, analyzing and processing every moment to make the best possible decision, is liberating.

I am glad I was born with a brain that tries to piece everything together. A brain that looks for patterns, order and reason. Sometimes or really, most of the time, I feel like I'm swimming through my thoughts. Like I'm trying to figure everything out at once and that each detail must be carefully considered or I may not optimize my happiness (my life, etc.). I want to "stop thinking" now and then. Maybe more often than I know now. I want my brain to stop processing, reflecting and fearing and just be. In the moment, aware.

Hopefully I'll accomplish this to some degree, in the near future.




Artist: Kaitan

The Catcher in the Rye

by J.D. Salinger

This is another book I feel like I should have been reading years ago. Apparently there has always been a lot of criticism, when The Catcher in the Rye in taught in high school - too much sex or something, pessimism probably. Old Holden Caufield, the bastard. He reminds me of myself. But a wit's end type, version of myself, that is.

I'm interested to find out if Holden overcomes his great disdain with the world and all of its phonies or if he stays the same. Also, why does he hate the movies so much? There are specific excerpts that are eerily familiar. Instances when Holden fantasizes about "chopping some guys head off with an ax" or "socking" crooks in the face - but he can't. His sexual frustrations and the battle between his kind heart and cynical nature remind me a lot of myself too.

I just finished and I really enjoyed the novel. The story ends and Holden never really matures, which confuses me a bit. Assuming J.D. Salinger was trying to describe the awkward phase between adolescence and adulthood, why wouldn't he detail any maturation in the central character? Huh. I read that "the catcher" could be interpreted as an analogy for Holden, who admires childlike attributes, such as innocence, kindness, spontaneity and generosity, that he fails to find in adults. Falling off the cliff would be the progression into the adult world that surrounds him and that he strongly criticizes. At the end of the story, Phoebe (his little sister) and Holden switch places as the "catcher" and the "fallen," he gives her his hunting hat (the symbol of the catcher) and becomes the fallen and Phoebe becomes the catcher, stopping him from hitchhiking out West.

I don't know. I get it - cool an analogy - but what is Phoebe really catching him from? Moving out West? I suppose, growing up; however, just because he doesn't leave doesn't mean he's going to avoid growing up. At the end of the book, he goes back to school, so it makes sense. I don't know. I just don't get "growing up" myself.

I guess some critics have argued that Holden does mature, in the end, when he stops Phoebe from coming out West with him. I can understand that; however, it's frustrating to never see any "real" change in his attitude or lifestyle. It's depressing.

He reminds me of Charlie from The Perks of Being a Wallflower and Oskar in Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. He's much more of cynic and older than the other two, maybe it's just the writing style that reminds me of the other novels?

Holden's uncertainty, angst and disapproval with the state of the "adult" world resonates with me. He says things repeatedly like, "Even if you did go around saving guys' lives and all, how would you really know if you did it because you really wanted to save guys' lives, or because you did it because what you really wanted to do was be a terrific lawyer, with everybody slapping you on the back and congratulating you in court when the goddam trial was over, the reporters and everybody, the way it is in the dirty movies? How you know you weren't being a phony? The trouble is, you wouldn't."

My existential pandering, exactly.

I really liked the part where Holden visits Mr. Antolini (even though he ends up being an alcoholic flit, probably). He quotes Wilhelm Stekel, "The mark of the immature man is that he wants to die nobly for a cause, while the mark of a mature man is that he wants to live humbly for one." Mr. Antolini also tells Holden, "You're in love with knowledge... once you get past all the Mr. Vinsons, you're going to start getting closer and closer - that is, if you want to, and if you look for it and wait for it - to the kind of information that will be very, very dear to your heart. Among other things, you'll find that you're not the first person who was ever confused and frightened an even sickened by human behavior... After a while, you'll have an idea what kind of thoughts your particular size mind should be wearing. For one thing it may save you an extraordinary amount of time trying on ideas that don't suit you, aren't becoming to you. You'll begin to know your true measurements and dress your mind accordingly."

I really loved it though, it just killed me.

Artist: Alexaaaaa