Letter

5:49am Dear Mike, if you are reading this in the future you want to know what I am thinking, feeling, experiencing on this particular day. 6:06am I stopped writing this post for a moment. I had to think. If I am writing something that only future me would see I would share things I keep hidden from other people. Things that would really remind me what I am going through on this day. But sharing those things beyond a letter to only future me could be potentially awkward. Everyday I do weird things. I have thoughts about intimacy and sex. I have interactions with people I don’t mention. I leave all that stuff out because I don’t want people like my wife, my daughter, my mom or the WIL to know about them. But that is what I am going through. That is who I truly am. How do I reconcile writing honestly for myself and others? I am quiet. I am reserved. I am in a position of leadership. I have been a spiritual counselor. How would people react if they knew I had a “dark” side? That I have desires? I feel secretive, deceptive, dishonest. Do all people have things they hide and would be embarrassed if people found out?

Audience

5:49am the way I post and what I share differs greatly depending on the audience I imagine as I write. Sometimes I write for my future self. Other times I write for strangers. Sometimes The WIL. Lately I have been picturing my wife and daughter finding this blog now or after I die. I believe the posts are most real and honest when I selfishly do it just for me to go back and read. I recently found a handwritten journal I kept from when I was did a clinical pastoral rotation at St. Mark’s hospital in 1996. While I tried to be honest in the journal I failed to capture the scene of what I experienced. As I read the journal I kept wanting more information. I wanted to know more about who I talked with. What they were like. The words they said. I wanted deeper analysis of what I was thinking. I wanted to know my hopes, fears and emotions. Because of the experience if finding the journal and realizing what is missing I am a better writer. when I am cognizant of my desire for more information I write more engaging material.

Sunday morning

8:37am I only did one post yesterday. I was getting tired of the subject matter. I feel like all I can think about or write about is work. A couple thoughts were bouncing around in my head but I didn’t want to take the time to share them. Last week I transitioned the director of business operations over to sales. I am not back filling his position right away. That means I have to do many of the business office functions. I will either learn responsibility quickly or fail spectacularly

Break past limitations

A good coach, boss, leader, trainer drill Sargent, etc is someone that pushes you to break past the limitations you believe exist. There is an alchemy that occurs when you are at the point of breaking but choose to go forward instead. You find a gear, a new expanse of existence. Like the example in a previous post, you start to see the circles.

And like the circles you don’t see them at first. Someone tells you to keep looking. You might not know they are there. Then they disappear. Then your mind starts to see them. Being objective focused is the circles. The squares are emotions, ego, politics, games, excuses, accepting and rationalizing not achieving the objective.