Not Smoking Breaks

In my city, we have demonized an activity that was once commonplace and acceptable. I refer, of course, to smoking. Smoking used to be cool, in the days of black and white movies, but now pulling out a cigarette is shorthand for “I have money to burn and I can’t read warning labels.” I’m not writing to attack or defend the institution of smoking. Personally, I have smoked more cigarettes with my ear than with my mouth. That’s another story that I do not wish to recall at this moment.

The cynical might wonder if some people take up smoking just for the breaks. Every couple hours, or more frequently for the more hopelessly enslaved, smokers trudge outside for a breath of “fresh air”. Employers on a whole tend to tolerate these breaks, and I believe they are wise to do so. Freshness of air aside, a couple minutes on the hour to catch one’s breath—figuratively, at least—makes the rest of the hour productive. This is at least true of office work, which rarely brings forth a sweat, but often brings forth a headache.

I have taken to stepping outside myself, to take a few minutes and not smoke. Sometimes I even walk around the building. On my sanctioned lunch break, I’ll even walk around the block, which is dominated by the Winnipeg Technical College. There is a retention pond and an open field teeming with grasshoppers. The retention pond, with a busy highway behind it, may not have stunning beauty but it often has geese. In the suburbs one has to take what one can get.

In my specific case, these breaks may not improve productivity at work at all. Walking in the open air, watching the geese fly around and recalling the names of clouds, my thoughts are pushed to broader, loftier spheres. I contemplate all that I know of the world, or perhaps my own problems and concerns. Sometimes there is a wonderful revelation, but usually just a sense of being part of a large and fascinating world. Either way, when I return to whatever it is that sits on my desk, it seems mundane and insignificant by comparison. I return less motivated than before!

If these breaks are bad for productivity, they are at least good for actual quality of life. A change in scenery and a breath of outside air is a good reminder of the present moment, that I’m actually in a certain place, at a certain time. It is true that when I try to imagine myself from far away, I start with the now-familiar opening screen of Google Earth—but such are the times. Now if you’ll excuse me, I think there’s time to head outside to not smoke one more time before bed...

We ask too little of the world...

(from July 16, 2008)

It looks like looming thundershowers. Dark clouds, intermittent sunlight, and waiting trees. The fifth floor is the ideal balcony height. Close enough to reach out and touch the trees, high enough to catch sunlight and grow tomatoes and peppers. Well, actually just one pepper, so it looks like the little plant is putting all its effort into this one magnum opus, its only child. On evenings such as this I revert to my most common state, perplexity. The world is absolutely fascinating. It’s mesmerizing. My mind and this world are such an unlikely duo, and yet what a dynamic match! So many things warrant a lifetime dedicated to their study and appreciation. Among the most amazing are plant life, human cities, clouds, birds, cars and our minds. We value novelty too much and we ask too little of the world. Imagine if a thunderstorm only happened once every thousand years. Imagine the news coverage, the enraptured tears of those lucky enough to witness the miracle. Why does the world stop and take notice of a baby only when it is born with four arms and four legs? When did we stop being amazed at the ones with two arms and two legs?

Another source for endless speculation and fascination are the structures of the world, and I mean the structures between people. Between individuals or between nations, the struggle is always for power. The rich do everything they can to stay that way, and even the help that they provide serves them more than anyone else. It is hard to imagine things any other way. Poor countries have to develop their own industry and identity. Weak people need to find their own voice. In both cases, this is to the detriment of the powerful. The powerful can quash these efforts and they often do. They do it as if they had the right. They even make laws that supposedly give them the right. I have to think that in the end, power belongs to those with the most audacity.

Yet, we ask too little of the world. The powerful and audacious are selling themselves short. It’s a silly goal, in the end, to control things. There are better ways to live out your time, no? If the world fascinates you, you’ll always have things to learn. If helping people makes you happy, you’re in luck; you couldn’t have been born into a better world. But if you want to possess it all, contentment is much more precarious, more is the one thing that will always be wanting.

So, after reading about atrocity upon atrocity committed by people against people, systems to which I owe my comfort while others owe their distress, it hurts me but not yet to the core. We ask too little of the world, and so the imbalance between rich and poor seems greater. What do the rich have over the poor? More comfort, to be sure. Respite, but not freedom from death. More education but no more wisdom. Fewer worries but also more worries, a worry shift from healthy children to home security. If we asked more of the world, more than just money, my theory is that the money problems would ease up as well. Imagine if people started living as if they mattered, everyone else mattered, and the world was pretty good the way it is. Happier people are more generous, right? If money isn’t the focus of life it should be easier to part with.

What we call development might be more than getting power and money to the poor by prying it from the rich by a conscientious--or guilty--few within their own ranks. It might be development as a human race, development as if people mattered. If there is hope for us, it lies within ourselves. Better technology, but better distribution of the technology we do have. Better education, but education to celebrate curiosity and wisdom. Better health, but healthier lifestyles. There are people who really need development to stave off early and widespread death, and they are living in certain places, and there are people who need development to grow as people, and they are found everywhere.

Moments, Time and Scale

All moments are not equal, and great swaths of time may pass by unnoticed until a sudden, radiant instant adds new meaning. I cannot speak for others, but I have an instinctive notion that the spiritual value of things does not square up with any measurement known to our world. That is to say, things that are physically larger are need not be spiritually so; things that are physically closer need not spiritually so; feelings that are emotionally more intense need not be spiritually so; actions that demand much of our time need not offer much to our spirit, while actions that demand little of our time may offer much indeed.

I was sitting at my desk at work—as I often do, out of habit and necessity—when there came a starling revelation. I enjoy almost every part of my day more than that time spent working at work. For example, sleeping is much better, far more restful. Sadly, I retain few memories from my time spent sleeping, and those memories that I do retain involve too many flying monkeys for me to trust them completely. Yet, between sleeping and working the greatest part of my day is divided. After the mundane and routine necessities of eating and preparing food, washing body, clothes and bathroom, there remains only a thin crust for higher pursuits.

The trip to and from work, cycling along the streets of Winnipeg, is more invigorating than the long hours between the trips. In the morning I leave downtown, and pass through the older neighbourhoods and into the suburbs. The trees shrink in size and finally disappear, cars drive ever faster, green gives way to grey, and it always seems to me a decent into hell. This feeling affects my perception of the hours that await me in the office. The return to the city centre after work is one of the certain joys of my day. Though the roads are flat, it seems like an ascent—not into paradise, but at least to an earth full of purpose.

Then, there are times of communion with other people. It is with family around the table, with great minds through books, or with friends in an apartment, restaurant, or a bar. Beyond this, the greatest times I have known were spent creating or helping others. On rare occasions, greater still, are moments where I am doing nothing at all, except walking, thinking, looking, or listening, and long stretches of time seem to come together and resonate. This is when I am reminded again, I am a bell, and had almost forgotten for it had been so long since I was last lifted and struck.

Occasionally I read articles about the newest ideas in physics, which are unintelligible but fascinating. Some scientists, if it can still be called a science, believe that there are many universes beyond our own. Personally, I find the idea repulsive. The universe is already far too big, and my mind refuses the idea that all of that is one among many. After looking at the sky mapped out on Google Earth, I got an impression of just how many worlds we can see between each of the commonly visible stars. Perhaps we are highly irrational, but we give our planet more importance in our minds and hearts than its size and position would seem to dictate. Perhaps it is we humans who have defined spiritual value for ourselves, in which case our self-centered approach is understandable and pragmatic.

As with great spaces, so with long stretches of time. I would hesitate to predict how long it would take to tell the story of the entire planet to an alien race. If pressed, I would say between ten to fifteen minutes. Mercifully, we do not need to be concerned with this any more than we are concerned about our irrelevance upon the Andromeda galaxy. We are in the business of living our lives; we are here and it is now. Therefore, it makes sense to take the pragmatic approach: to accept that we are the ones who have decided, and still decide, where meaning and purpose lie.

This is not to say that spiritual richness is whatever we want it to be. We could ascribe great value to money and power, and people certainly do. However, the definitions that have stood the test of time are more ambitious, calling us to seek out that which is good but also within our reach here and now. This is why we still need God, because he is bigger than the universe in a different way than the physicist’s world of many worlds is bigger. We need him to be greater, but also within our reach. Most of the world’s religions give us something to that effect, not always God, but something both transcendent and immanent.

Only the rejection of that wisdom has led us off the track in the last few years. We have learned fascinating new truths about the scale of our world over space and time. With better scientific understanding of our insignificant place in celestial geography and history, we have carried these insights too far beyond the proper reach of science. Now we are saying that those times and distances really matter! Even though we know in our hearts that 1969 was more important than any one year plucked from the Precambrian period. Even though we know in our hearts that 70 kg of human being has a greater purpose than 70 kg of limestone. Do we not see that accepting a reality beyond the time and distance we can observe is both wise and pragmatic? While religious beliefs may often be irrational, some form of religion is surely our only means of holding on to any reason at all.