M is for Money

Considering everything that is happening in my career
right now, it's pretty much inevitable that I'd be
thinking about money. Truth be told, if the next
couple of weeks go well, I will have raised my
career up to the precise level I've desired for over
a decade. And at that point, people start throwing
vast amounts of money at you. Literally hundreds
of thousands, and millions of dollars. This is no
joke at all.

The question becomes: what is selling out? What
is a legitimate use of your time and talent, and at
what point do you become a whore? I remember
years back, I met a writer who handed me his card.
It read: "Freelance Hack and Literary Mechanic."
The guy was dead of alcoholism within a year.

There is simply a limit to how much of yourself
you can sell. Personally, I've never sold out. I
TRIED to sell out once (ask me to tell you the
"Purple Heart" story some time) but fortunately,
if my heart isn't in it, I just can't do good work.
Wow, that was humiliating...just when you're
ready to sell out, there are no takers. Ugh.

But I get asked a LOT, and usually by starry-eyed
young Newbies: how do you keep your artistic
integrity. For me, the answer is fairly simple: I f
ind a way to fall in love with any project. You
see, my tastes in fiction range widely. There is
almost ALWAYS something to enjoy about a given
scenario. Or to put it another way, imagine a circle.
That circle contains everything I would want to
write if money were not an issue.

Then imagine another circle: this circle encompasses
everything that the market would like to pay me
for. You know something? So far, 90% of the time,
those two circles overlap. And where they overlap
is where I write. I don't have the luxury of writing
purely for love. Nor can I tap into my creativity
solely for money.

But for almost 30 years I've been able to find
something to learn, love, or contribute in every
commercial project. In one case, I wrote a script
out of revenge--the Producer of a certain show
tried to steal my work, and then made the
mistake of giving me another script. I embedded
something rather obscene in the dialogue, and
actually snuck it past the producers and censors,
so that no one noticed it until it aired...

Revenge is a dish best served alongside a BIG
check. Heh heh.

At any rate, I say this to encourage you to believe
that you don't have to betray your Muse to make
a living. That, in fact, if you will delve deeply
enough into your heart, you will actually find
your best and most successful work. Art and
Commerce are not enemies. They are neighbors.

And their children play together.

L is for Lifetime

The reason that "L is for Lifetime" is that your
writing should be a lifetime commitment. If
you think of it as a career, or something to do
for a little while, it will likely break your heart.
It took almost THREE YEARS for the paperwork
to wind its way through all of the producing and
creative folks involved in GOOD HOUSE. Can't
even begin to describe the stress. Not fun,
even a little bit.

But ultimately, I knew I was in this for the long
haul. So I concentrated on staying balanced,
loving my family, and finishing my other work.
And eventually, things happened.

What happens next? We go into the studio, get
notes on the script, start re-writing. Doubtless
we'll hit other walls. But the point is that this
is my life. This isn't something I'm doing while
I wait for something else, or better. THIS IS
THE LIFE I CRAVED, and warts and all, I'm in
the middle of it now. I could have had security
and calm. I wanted self-expression and the
chance to contribute to the cultural dialogue.

That comes at a price. So...ask yourself. Are
you willing to give this writing thing everything
you have? To immolate your ego on the bonfire
of your ambition? Can you write five novels, a
hundred stories, a dozen scripts, without
selling one, and keep your chin up? If you can,
you have what it takes.

Writing isn't a job. It's an adventure

Thoughts on pregnancy

A reader writes:

“Idea I had skimming this-

What are your thoughts (acknowledging you're not an expert) on how this could apply to building a body, rather than body-building? That is, to stabilizing the mother-ship during the tremendous nutrient drains and physical changes of pregnancy?”
###
There are a few things I’ve picked up about pregnancy, and the most important is to bring in the experts. That said, the human body is incredibly resilient, and women-folk have been having babies under adverse conditions for millennia.

I can tentatively try to apply some of the principles I’ve followed to preparing mind and body for delivering a child, though…

1) Nutrition. Good, wide-spectrum nutrition. This would mean both supplementation and a variety of fresh fruits and vegetables and lean proteins. That baby in your tummy is building tissue at an accelerated rate. Feed her!
2) Nicotine, alcohol and other drugs are such a no-no I hope I wouldn’t have to even mention it.
3) Stress reduction is vital. The hormones are raging. Meditation and journaling could well help keep you centered. Breathing is so central to health, in so many ways, that you should use it for more than just LaMaze classes.
4) Exercise. I would say walking and yoga. We had a lady in our Bikram class right up to the day before she delivered. Then she was back in class a week later. She had NO trouble getting her body back! But no jarring, no sprint work, no karate classes. Work on increasing healthy, oxygenated blood flow, stretching and strengthening.
5) Sex. I’m tellin’ ya guys, sex with a pregnant woman is GREAT. And it certainly seems (and I’ve been told) that HER sensitivity increases as well. Considering the flood of healthy hormones released during sex, it seems nothing but a good idea, assuming that you are careful to stay comfortable. The increased emotional connection with your partner can also be a comfort and source of strength.

In general, I’d be concentrating on health rather than fitness. Your body is undergoing a radical change. I wish you the very, very best of luck in your journey…and Happy Baby!
##
The sequel to "Great Sky Woman" is "Shadow Valley." I'm working on it now. The third "Lion's Blood" book is "The Bronze Nile" and details the war between the states. I'm hoping to get to it early next year.

Recovery Work

Man oh man, is this ever critical. Remember that your body doesn’t grow while you work out. It grows (or changes) during recovery. If you don’t give yourself proper time, nutrition, rest, support, etc., you’ll simply tear yourself to pieces.

In addition, building muscle mass requires your body to stress, tear down or damage existing tissue, and re-build, dumping vast amounts of toxins into your blood stream. It doesn’t matter if you’re working upper body one day, and lower body the next. As a bodybuilding wag once put it, “every day is kidney day.”

So…It seems to me you need a multi-phasic approach, involving body, mind, and emotions.
1) Proper nutrition. In the name of God, if you are asking your body to perform at a higher level, you MUST assume that your current habits won’t support it—otherwise you’d already be there! Fresh fruits and vegetables and lean proteins are an absolute must, and in plentiful array. Go for a wide range of colors in your vegetables. Take a good, wide-spectrum multi vitamin as well. Drink PLENTY of water (remember those kidneys!)
2) Proper rest. Get plenty of sleep. 8-9 hours a night, if you’re trying to upgrade your body. The recovery gnomes only work at night, dude.
3) Proper mental states. Meditate. Visualize growth. Clarify your emotional reasons for making this journey.

Then we get…PHYSICAL RECOVERY
1) Jacuzzi-Spa. Wonderful. Physical tension often masks its own effects. I love to soak in a spa on my hard workout days, until I feel my body relax more deeply. Good Lord, it feels good.
2) Massage. I’m terrible here. Not good at all at letting other people put their hands on my body. With certain…intimate exceptions, shall we say? But trading massages with a friend or seeking professional care in this regard can be a life-saver.
3) Yoga. Bikram style yoga is a phenomenal recovery system. Drink a ton of water, follow your breathing and sweat out a river of toxins.
4) Joint rotation work. We’re talking Intu-Flow or Warrior Wellness, available at Rmaxinternational.com. Scott Sonnon pushes his athletes like you won’t believe, and recovery work is built into the cycle. You not only need to squeeze toxins out of the muscles (that was physiologically inelegant, but you get the drift) but depressurize the traumatized tissue, realigning joints, tendons and ligaments, restore circulation by releasing tension. Let’s see, what else? How about restoring proper balance and posture? Checking in with your body to see if there is unexpected soreness or pain anywhere?

Frankly, there is too much happening for you to consciously take care of all of it. I would suggest that, if you are an athlete moving to a new level, or past thirty, that yoga be a steady and major part of your workout week, and that in addition you practice a dynamic recovery system like Scott’s. The combination will serve you well.
##
Scott Sonnon sent me the following note:
##
Steve,

This is in regards to your recent post on recovery: http://www.rmaxinternational.com/forum/showthread.php?t=15550

There are basically two aspects to development and a balanced, healthy neuro-immuno-endocrine system - which is what we're REALLY trying to improve though through the myofascial in exercise:

You're either using or or rebuilding. One or the other. We need to be rebuilding as much as we're using. If we're using more than we're rebuilding, it impacts more than just muscle. It goes to our neurological, endocrine and immune systems... and canibalizes us there.

##
The iPhone is working out very nicely. I’m not totally thrilled with the custom Bluetooth—it feels kinda small and easy to lose and doesn’t filter wind perfectly. But it is elegant and deceptively easy to use. I kept searching for something complicated and difficult to pair it with my phone. Turns out all you have to do is charge them next to each other, and they automatically synch up. Very cool.
##
I’m seriously thinking about starting a genealogy web. There is so much about my family I don’t know that it would be cool to have a web site where I can put in the names and info I know, and then invite other family members to contribute what THEY know…

Does anyone have suggestions about the best sites out there? Where information, photos and so forth can be uploaded and shared?
##
PLAYING FOR POSITION

That’s the thought of the day. I know the moment I fell in love with Tananarive. It was when I was listening to her talk about how she got Steven King to write her a cover blurb for “My Soul To Keep.” She used her connection to the Miami Herald to get to Dave Berry, who played in the “Rock Bottom Remainders” with King. Then she offered her keyboard skills to the band, and wore a VERY slinky stage outfit. Yum. Let’s say Stevie King was bound to notice. She got him a copy of the book, and the rest is history.

I listened to her story, and realized she’d done a three-wall bank shot on the biggest writer in the world, maneuvering into an ending position VERY different from her initial position.

I thought “Jeeze, she’s REALLY smart!” and, no kidding, that was the first time I let myself notice that she was also really beautiful. Bam. I was toast.

We’ll let the therapists figure THAT one out. The point is that the ability to see that you can’t always hit the target from your bedroom window. You have to get out in the world, meet people, do things…and those things are not always directly aligned with your goals. But if you’re smart, and choose your “peripheral” activities carefully, you can use THIS position to get to THAT position from which you can meet THIS person who will finally open the door to a place from which you can finally see your target.

Learning this lesson has taken half my life.

Monday

Great letter in Saturday's L.A. Times from an insightful fellow named Marvin Wolf, regarding Casanegra. He was dead-on about how calculated the entire venture was, but wrong if he thinks we were "exploited." And also probably wrong about how efforts like this place the future of literature at risk. It was a pure marketing move, and the gestation has been honestly described. If the BOOK isn't good, I'm man enough to face the criticism. But I have the delicious sense that there's a touch of "damn! Why didn't I think of that!" about some of the reactions...
##
Took a little longer to get out of bed this morning. I DELIBERATELY didn't do all of my recovery work (spa, range-of-motion work) so that I could feel the Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness (DOMS) from the density workout on Friday. Didn't feel like death, so today we'll try it again.
##
Had a long conversation with Mr. Al "Hot Dog" Harvey, an L.A. City Councilman, and 9th Degree blackbelt (honorary, signifying his status as one of Steve Muhammad's first students. By his own admission, that rank should really be about a 6th). What a fantastic martial artist, and a fine gentleman. Also opinionated as hell--he doesn't mince words. But this is a guy who, when he was 17, was tapped by the great Joe Lewis to help him prepare for fights with Bill Wallace. No joke. He's agreed to coach me a bit. Now THAT should be interesting.
##
I'm working on the sequel to "Great Sky Woman" today. Tananarive is out of town, visiting her sister in Texas. As soon as she gets back, we start on Tennyson II: "In the Night of the Heat."

Biosemiotics?

“Biosemiotics (bios=life & semion=sign) is an interdisciplinary science that studies communication and signification in living systems. Communication is the essential characteristic of life. An organism is a message to future generations that specifies how to survive and reproduce. Any autocatalytic system transfers information (i.e. initial conditions) to its progeny so that daughter systems will eventually reach the same state as their parent. Self-reproducing systems have a semantic closure (Pattee 1995) because they define themselves in their progeny. A sign (defined in a broadest sense) is an object that is a part of some self-reproducing system. A sign is always useful for the system and its value can be determined by its contribution to the reproductive value of the entire system. The major trend in the evolution of signs is the increase of their complexity via development of new hierarchical levels, i.e., metasystem transitions (Turchin 1977).”

Who is familiar with this term? A dear friend and mad scientist Jack Cohen sent me an essay I’ll be digesting for the next few days on this fascinating and hitherto unknown subject. Can’t wait.
##
Been interesting to read commentary on "Bourne Ultimatum." They praise it (deservedly) and contrast it with Bond, (especially "Casino Royale") which is legitimate in one sense, and unfair in another. I mean, the thing that makes Bourne so interesting is that he is a spy seeking his own identity. So...does anyone think "Ultimatum," the third Bourne film (and reportedly the last Matt Damon will star in) will have more impact on cinema than, say "Goldfinger" did? Really? Goldfinger was my first 007 movie, and I remember clearly that it created an absolute fever of excitement across the country, with dozens of imitation spy films and television shows and comic books and so forth. Does anyone think that Bourne could be sustained across even a dozen films at anything remotely close to the level we saw in the first three? I understand why Damon is doubtful about more: they've gone pretty close to the bottom of the barrel. One more movie, maybe, as he re-unites with his family and straightens out whatever problems THEY have. And after that? Uh...finding Julia Stiles and figuring out if they actually had a relationship? And after that? If I'm not mistaken, that dumps Bourne squarely in the middle of the typical spy movie scenario, and the whole thing cools off pretty quickly. Now, understand: Universal WILL make more Bourne movies, for the same reason you're going to work tomorrow: bills need to be paid. Will they be artistically corrupt? Probably, but not necessarily. A brilliant writer/director might come up with something radical. But the more radical it is, the more the executives at Universal will be scared: they want to provide the audience with an experience that will deliver a predictable level of satisfaction. Commerce and Art mate kinda like porcupines (very carefully), but it does occasionally happen.

L.A. Times

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/
la-et-underwood14aug14,1,4999517.story?coll=
la-headlines-entnews

##
Well, an article in the L.A. Times is something to shout about. Written by a gentleman named Greg Braxton, the piece isn't bad at all, 'tho I don't like my picture much: looks like they caught me blinking. Oh, well...
##
I have my Century Clubbell work underway. By using a mixture of Density training and GTG, I can do a set of five, wait a minute, do the next set, etc. until I reach the stress level that matches the day's load. Then I can finish out the reps for the day by doing a few more sets every couple of hours. The point is to get the load up to 100 reps a day, so that my joints and tendons have a chance to adjust. Yesterday's felt just fine.
##
Last week we had out meeting at Fox. I am cautiously quite optimistic. They had minimal notes on "The Good House" and Tananarive and I were just stunned. Now, this is after two years waiting to get the papers signed, and then weeks waiting for our meeting...we drive to the meeting, and T accidentally stains her beautiful white pants by sitting in SOMETHING that made it look as if she'd crapped herself. Didn't find out until we were AT the studio. Didn't panic...found a jacked she could tie around her waist, very California Casual. And we went to our meeting. The studio was in a tither...a recently announced movie had caused some shitload of controversy, and it was hard for folks to concentrate: we went in about 40 minutes late.
I refused to be nervous. As far as I was concerned, I HAVE their money, and if it falls apart, well, tough.

But then...all of the massive work we'd put into development, into writing that draft, into preparing for any and all complaints that they might have, into answering the questions on a "coverage" report our producer had paid for (even though I didn't respect or agree with everything the reader said, I responded as if those notes had come down from the President of Fox: careful explanations, a three-point exploration of the world's magic, suggested fixes for problems that weren't there...) and then...about ten minutes of notes and questions and "can you have the re-write before October? There's a strike coming..."

What? That's all? And the comment about the strike suggests that when we turn in a killer script, there is actually a larger chance that Fox Searchlight will want to go into production. The timing just couldn't be better.

It feels like the kind of "luck" that happens after years of prep. You know, the type that favors the prepared mind...

More to come.

iPhone

Oh, All right. I succumbed, and bought an iPhone on Saturday. The Apple Store was way busy, but most of the customers were there for the new Imac, so I was able to get serviced fast. Took it home. It came charged, which was smart, because I wanted to play with it IMMEDIATELY. This thing is beautiful. Feels solid, and the color screen is beautiful. Really, it seems less like a phone than a pocket-sized Mac with uber-connectivity. I'm still waiting for my cellular services to talk with each other and switch plans. But the updating seems pretty effortless, through my iTunes. We'll see how this goes--Mac is great within its little insular Mac world, sometimes irritating when you try to make it talk to the PC world.

But it sure is purty.

Flavor Flav?

Can anyone out there tell me exactly what Flavor Flav's talent is? Does he sing? Dance? Rap? Play an instrument? Produce music? I'm honestly unclear on the root source of his "celebrity"...
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http://www.flickr.com/photos/earthdog/998545422/

A picture of Nicki and her boyfriend Michael at ComicCon. They were being Hogwarts students, and apparently the crowd appreciated 'em. Prejudiced, of course, but I think she's adorable. And Mike's a good guy. As long as he makes her happy, I'll let him live.

CST and stuff

A note on CST: there are three major “wings” which interact to create its wonderful effect.
1) Joint rotation drills to “clean the slate,” allowing decompression and release of microtrauma and accumulated stress.
2) Gross motor coordination drills which resemble a dynamic yoga to sophisticate the nervous system and teach basic breathing techniques.
3) Weight-bearing exercise which moves along circular pathways. The chosen tool here is Clubbells, but kettlebells and dumbbells are also useful. This allows us to test our breathing at higher levels, as well as protect the body from deviation during performance.

Note that the three wings could be satisfied by, say, yoga and gymnastics. The concepts developed by Scott can help explain both hard and soft-style martial arts and applications, but to keep it from becoming purely academic, it is vital to develop athleticism as well.

The beauty of his system is just how flexible it is, and in the final analysis, how he is encouraging you to develop your own programs, using your own tools, but “training” you to become an instinctive athlete.

Personally, I’m a “constructed kinesthetic”—someone with little innate athleticism, but a lifelong fascination with martial arts and yoga that have taught me to experience the world in other than the digital-visual manner that was most natural for me as a child. Actually, one NLP practitioner (and my Kenpo instructor) told me that I was “super-visual.” Experienced life as a succession of visual images. Probably not healthy, but it was interesting. Actually, that ability limited my martial arts training in an odd way. When I began studying BKF Kenpo (a somewhat different form), I could consciously move faster than others could move unconsciously. However, this was a dead-end. Ultimately, a real martial art is all about the hind-brain. So whenever I got to the point that I started moving unconsciously, it scared the piss out of me, and I backed away. I suspect that I was afraid of letting my anger out. Probably relates to some racial and father-issue stuff.

But you know what? You can spend thirty years on an analyst’s couch dissecting your past and still marry your daughter (Woody Allen, anyone?) so the “whys” don’t really matter.

To me, what matters is the ability to live the life you would have lived if you’d never sustained the damage in the first place. So…for me that would be being a good martial artist, having a writing career creating unique cultural images, and being a good father and husband.

The emotional garbage you see me throw up here is just that—the garbage I discard so that I can get on with the business of life.
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A major issue in my life now is the question of “what’s next”? Now, in one sense all that there is to do is chop wood, carry water. Just be. Just enjoy each moment of life. There is another part of me that loves goals, and I feed that beast as well—it has served me quite well over the years.

The relationship goal hasn’t changed. I think I’ve got the husband-daddy thing down pretty well. That means that I know the path to continue on there, not that I can stop and admire myself.

Martial arts? Still unfinished business. But about five weeks ago, I found a small BKF school in Leimert Park, and am seriously considering playing with them. We have things to teach each other, and the younger version of Steve, who still lives within me, would just flat love to have a black belt handed to me by Steve Mohammed, my first instructor. I never had that honor, earning instead a Dan ranking in AIKKA (Parker-style) Karate. A very nice school of motion, but without the same emotional resonance. I’m also thinking of adopting that little school as a pet charity: I have money I need to give away, and there, if I donate 200 bucks, next week I’ll see a new heavy bag…or new gloves…or three new students I’ve provided scholarships for. I could also teach there, and have an impact on the community. I have a need to give back.
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For the thousandth time, the rubber meets the road here: IF you meditate and control your breathing, you go to a calm, centered place. If you then remember to breathe during the day, eventually you will check your breathing during a stressful experience, shift it, and find out that the stress diminishes. If you sophisticate the breathing, deepen your ability to breathe calmly under stress, you will be able to handle higher and higher levels of stress without it becoming strain.

If you also create goals in all three arenas of life, admitting that you want love, financial success and bountiful health, and striving to achieve them, you will be exposed to considerable stress. If you continue on, while preventing the stress from becoming strain, the only way the organism can respond is by positive adaptation—you become stronger. You also make deeper contact with your true Self—the invisible space within the triangle created by your goals.

One of the signs of this is the ability to achieve high excellence in all three arenas without specific goals: you are simply “Zen-ing along.” I am honored to know a few people like this. Most of us aren’t in that category.

As CST is designed to make us healthy, instinctive athletes, Lifewriting and Threshold Training ("The Path") are designed to make us instinctive peak performers. You wake up in the morning, life your life, go to sleep at night eager to rest, eager for the new day. And then look back over a year and realize that you have deepened your practice of life itself. An extraordinary feeling.

And what is at the end of that road? A return to the ocean of living energy from which we all spring. Sorry, no egos allowed. Hopes of “individual survival” are dependant upon the illusion that we are individuals. We are so much more than that. Releasing the illusion of duality is one of the hallmarks of spiritual maturity.

That concept is useful because we can work backwards from there, find the pertinent attitudes and teachings in the religious disciplines we were raised in, unite with those of like mind from other traditions. We can go backwards from there to our philosophical concepts of life, our reality maps, and work to make them accurate and useful. And we balance our emotional lives, intellectual lives, physical lives, again searching to resolve the dualities at every turn.

And we ultimately ground it all in the physical reality of our existence, one breath at a time. And there it is: we start with a breath, work our way up to spiritual awakening, and then work back down through the chakras to align every aspect of ourselves with that primal state.

Life is so complex. And so simple. And so beautiful.

As are we all.

Answer to Steve Perry's Question

Steve: Here's Scott's answer to your question about the "Why" of a 100-rep Century attempt.
#####

That's an excellent question. The problem is the solution. Progression relates to HOW you feel, in the Circular Strength Training® System.

There is no such thing as maintaining. The body either expands or collapses, progresses or regresses.

So, in CST, we use incremental progressive resistance, as opposed to arbitrary qualitative increases. Baby steps are smaller (and are more intuitively latched in), but accumulate faster than larger (arbitrary) leaps.

As we all know, you cannot progress without stress (and if you don't progress, you regress.) So, surgically controlling precision stress is the hallmark feature of the Circular Strength Training® System (which sets us apart from say, a club swinging program.)

We subjectively monitor three variables in CST Intuitive Training: discomfort, technique and effort. When the discomfort remains under a 4 on a scale of 1-10 (10 being the worst pain imaginable), technique remains above a 7 on a scale of 1-10 (10 being your best form possible), and effort consistently remains below a 6 for two sessions, then you can progress to the next level. Since Steve (Barnes) is doing a density cycle, this would be the next step up in rest compression. As a result, we inextricably bind quantitative progression with qualitative increments.

This is only one example in the system. There is also breath. No reason to go into the science behind it for now, but suffice it to say this: when one can consistently exhale on compression (say moving belly to thighs in a squat) rather than needing to exhale on driving the earth away, then one can progress. This transition from discipline level breath to flow level breath demonstrates an empirical signal that one can progress. Usually only the coach can observe this, unless you videotape your sessions (since flow level also involves a "soft-focus" of only being aware of the performance.)

A very accessible source material for this in stress physiology is "Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers" by Dr. Robert Sapolsky.
__________________
Best Regards,
Scott Sonnon
Distinguished Master of Sport

Body and emotion, the hard way

One of the things that I love about Scott is the way he keeps evolving. Over the last years,he’s started incorporating some serious yoga into his programs, and that’s all for the good. In my opinion, Yoga is just the best body-mind discipline available to the general public. Unless you are qualified to TEACH a yoga class, if you are serious about your health you should attend one at least once a month, and have a home practice at least 15 minutes twice a week MINIMUM. Yoga puts back what time takes away.

Anyway, the common element between many of these disciplines is the idea that the human body is interrelated systems which must be addressed globally for maximum impact. That means that you either practice an old, tried and true health system, or you research your butt off to be certain that you are covering everything.

The Lifewriting idea originally came out of the observation that the Hero’s Journey seemed to give people perspective on their lives that often disappeared under stress. It evolved to embrace the question of selection of resources—I’m now convinced that I’ll never find the “perfect” set, although things like I.F., Spiritual Autolysis, and the Flow State Performance Spiral are fantastic.

One thing that does hit me is that stress limits your ability to detect stress. It also limits your ability to find and use resources in your environment. In other words, as stress becomes strain, you become blind to the possible alternative options. Life turns into a “my way or the highway” situation. “There’s nothing I can do” is a common complaint. How many times have you heard this from a friend, when, as you look in from the outside, you see a dozen options?

Worse is the person who has a complaint that requires a long-term behavioral solution. Many times, I’ve suggested someone, for instance, meditate. They don’t have time. Years down the road, they hit an emotional or physical problem, where the perfect answer would have been meditation, but it will take about six weeks for that solution to begin to kick in. They don’t have time, and want an answer NOW. They’ll survive the crisis, and then once again won’t make the time to meditate, and the cycle continues. Month after month, year after year, decade after decade.

Scott has a saying about pain in the body: pain is the last to manifest, and the first to leave. In other words, chronic Yuck accumulates in the body for a LONG time before it actually begins to hurt. You try desperately to get an athlete to change their behavior, and they won’t. Or they’ll go to a clinic just long enough to salve the pain, and will then hit the field again, without addressing the underlying problem.

The same thing psychologically. People don’t want to address the real problems. They’ll deal with the symptom once it becomes intolerable, but as soon as the discomfort is gone, they’ll go right back to the old behaviors.

It’s heartbreaking, it really is.
##
. For at least the next 28 days, I'll be playing with a new exercise option. Actually, two of them.

Most importantly, I have a goal of performing 15 reps of FlowFit II in Fifteen minutes. Trust me, this is overall fitness at a VERY high level--flexibility, cardio, upper and lower body. Nice. But I'm also going for a 100-rep "Century" with the bruiser, using the Gama cast (a sort of over-shoulder figure 8) . Yep, I've tried before and failed. But the I.F. seems to give me a better recovery, so I'm trying again.

I'm using what's called a "Density Cycle." Here's the plan. You take an exercise that would be a complete and total physical breakthrough if you could do 100 reps. Say an exercise you can currently do 10 times. Do five reps per minute for 20 minutes. (approximately 1 minute per set. Expand this time-frame if necessary.) When you can complete all twenty sets comfortably, do 18 sets of 6 reps, at about one per minute. Or you could just rest one minute in between sets. Keep this up, upping reps and dropping sets so that the total work just clears 100 reps. This plan is strange, because as you march through the different rep schemes, you get a cascade of different physical effects: strength, power, size, endurance, fat loss, etc., each emphasized by a different rep range (strength/power is 5-7 reps. Size is 8-12 reps. Muscular endurance is around 15 reps, etc.) It's gonna be wicked, and I think going for both will be fascinating. I'll alternate with pure yoga days. This should be fun.

Please pay VERY CAREFUL ATTENTION: You MUST have serious recovery time built into a program like this. That is no #@$$%ing joke. You can tear your body to pieces if you try to make it adapt faster than it is prepared to do.

Yesterday, I did 20 sets of five Gama Casts, one set every half-hour through the day. This morning, I was sore, but that’s nothing in comparison with how sore I’ll be when I start compressing the rest periods. And if I don’t respect my body’s messages, and hurry too quickly through the stages, I’ll tear myself apart.

Now, this is the point. Do you see it? Your ability to progress physically is in direct proportion to your emotional control and discipline. In other words, the urge to “get there” to the final step will force you to degrade technique, to fail to get all the possible good from a given step. I think it relates to fears of age, or inadequacy, or desire to control the pace of change. We fear we can’t, and push too hard. We fear our competitors will get there first, and forget that we are never, ever competing with anyone but ourselves.

This opens the door a little wider, showing how body is created by mind and emotion. It is just a bit harder to demonstrate how intellect is created and controlled by the body and heart, or how our emotions are controlled by physical sensation and mental focus.

All three are interrelated, and there is nothing sadder than a mindless jock, an open-heart who won’t learn from mistakes, an intellectual brain-in-a-box. Sigh. Our true excellence lies so close at hand. It takes so little time to connect with all three—but growth demands consistency. Just a little work every day will get you there.

But most people wait until it hurts, and then try running the emergency room.

That’s nuts.

Weekend torture and "Bourne Ultimatum"

At this moment in my life, everything is going perfectly, or about as close to it as I can get. I mean this in the sense that everything is moving in the right direction, all plans seem to be ripening. There are certainly challenges, and tomorrow I might fall flat on my ass. But today is great.
##
Spent last weekend in Bellingham, Washington, at Scott Sonnon’s latest CST certification seminar. I had to get my cert updated, so I flew up last Thursday, back on Monday. There was a bit of stress involved: one of my good friends, Al Siebert, has had some health challenges, and I wanted to be certain to see him. I was also supposed to see Charles Johnson, but I missed my flight and my connection, and didn’t get up to the NW until late. Didn’t get to my hotel room until midnight, on a day when I woke up at 5am. Bleh.
##
Will go over the seminar later, as well as some other things that involve the body-mind connection. We’ll say the content of Coach Sonnon’s work has clarified considerably. His assistants were wonderful, and I re-connected with some old friends. On Sunday (unbeknownst to me!) was something called the “Trial By Fire,” 130 reps each of three different Clubbell exercises. My, my, THAT was interesting. More on that, as well.
##
Friday, saw “The Bourne Ultimatum.” Just wonderful, one of the best action movies ever. Probably more action than any movie I’ve ever seen that still made sense. One of the top 10 fight scenes I’ve ever seen. Matt Damon knocks it out of the park. An A+ for action fans. An “A” for moviegoers in general. This tale of a deadly, heartbroken spy searching for his own identity is simply a corker. DAMN I love what’s being done with the super-spy genre these days.

Taking off for Scott Sonnon's CST seminar in Bellingham. Can't begin to thank this brilliant man for what he's done in helping me integrate my physical and mental practices. He's the best.
##
A thought: the only reason we are ever afraid is that we aren't paying attention to the NOW. Since responses in the Now are the only things that can ever resolve a problem, fear should be seen as a signal to re-center your breathing and stay Now. The greater the fear, the louder the signal. Fear is our friend.

"School For Scoundrels"

Saw “School for Scoundrels” last night. Someone asked me to check it out and comment about Michael Clark Duncan’s role. The movie is about a school run by Billy Bob Thornton (who actually does some VERY nice, subtle acting in the role) to help wimps (especially the protagonist, "Napoleon Dynamite's" Jon Heder) become lions. Duncan plays his aide-de-camp, an enormous, threatening, hyper-male figure. It is implied that he has actually raped some of the students.

Now…considering that male rape is treated like a joke across the board, I can’t take that too personally. Every man (and all but one woman) in the entire film is a cartoon, so you have to roll with it. In other words, a funny movie, Duncan (or the other black characters) comes off no worse than anyone else, really. Overall, I’d give the movie a “B-“. By the way: the last line is a killer.

Now if you want to get me going about Duncan, look at “The Green Mile,” a perfect example of the hideous choices made when people aren’t aware of their unconscious racism. A “Magical Negro” movie at its most loathsome. But that’s another story.

K is for K

(Yep, I know, I skipped "J")

###
That is, "One Thousand." My impression at this
point is that a daily goal of 1000 words a day is
enough to keep the gateway between conscious
and unconscious minds open and healthy.
To a certain degree, this is just dredging out a
channel, understanding that the constant pressure
of the workaday world, and all of the trivial and
non-trivial demands on our time and minds, will
cloud this connection.
It is close to the dream state, you see. The
creative part of your mind is so primal, so
young, so outside of social conventions that
it is, or can be, extremely difficult to access
it and simultaneously keep our lives in balance.
But if you aim at writing 1000 words (or 5 pages,
or some other quantity that is a "stretch" but
not too painful), while simultaneously meditating,
clarifying your values and goals, and increasing
the quality of your reading...
Good things are going to happen. Our minds
(from one, admittedly mechanistic viewpoint)
are machines designed to succeed. Continue
telling it what you want (in this case: increased
quality of writing that reflects our deep values
and most honest perception of the world)
and it will start trying to give it to you.
Continue this process for a couple of years,
and you'll be in completely new territory.
You see, so much of success in anything is
a numbers game. You simply have to do "X"
an unknown number of times before you
jump up to the next level of performance.
And you have no idea what "X" represents.
So for the sake of simplification, let's say
that the number in writing is One Million
Words. Get beyond a million words, and
you are at a different place with your writing,
your ability to represent the reality you
experience, and so forth. It is the doorway
to spontaneous, instinctive, reflexive writing.
Now...if you are constantly challenging
yourself with fine reading and/or viewing
of quality books, stories, plays, and films...
Then you will find that your work slowly,
surely, simply gets better and better.
Another thing: most people aren't ready for
the truth of how much WORK is necessary
to become excellent at anything. They think
that if they try it, and don't succeed, that
there is no point in trying again.
That means that if you have more gumption,
more tolerance for failure and emotional pain
than the next person...you can actually
out-perform a more "talented" person just
because you had the ability to "step up to
the plate" again and again and again...until
your hands were raw and your heart ached,
but you just wouldn't quit.
I'm telling you that people with that quality
simply can't be stopped. And that you can
train yourself to head in that direction...
By committing to write a thousand words a
day.



Write With Passion!
Steve

"I" is for ideas

"I" is for Ideas

"Where do your ideas come from?" Ah, the classic query,
and every writer gets it. And the answer seems so
glaringly obvious to most that it seems simplistic
and infantile. Some create smart-assed answers to
brush people off (Harlan Ellison's infamous: "there's
a guy in New Jersey, and every month he sends
me a six-pack of fresh new ideas..."

Do you know that people actually come up to
Harlan after talks and ask for the idea guy's
address?

Sigh. All this means is that people are not in
touch with their own creative process.
Everyone has one. Not everyone knows how
to mine it.

Simply put, creativity is drawing connections
between apparently unconnected facts. Seeing
a leaf, and imagining freeway offramps. Seeing
intertwining snakes in a dream, and imagining
a double helix. The truth is that all of us have
an absolute explosion of creativity every night
--our dreams. To get in touch with our
dreams is the beginning of connecting to our
creative source.

Keeping a dream diary can be an essential part
of the process of increasing our creativity.
Another is simply the principle "Garbage In--
Garbage Out." In other words, output will
never exceed input. In fact, GIGO is entirely
too generous. The truth is that if we eat
steak, we know what comes out the other end.
So...what happens if we START with crap? I
don't even want to go there.

So keeping a strong creative flow depends
on a few things:
1) Quality of input. It must be high-quality,
and daily. It must include intense experience
of life itself, observed and recorded in a journal
or in daily writing.
2) Quantity of output. You must write daily,
to keep the flow going and to learn how to
turn off the inappropriate "editor's voice."
3) Learn to discern. You must develop an
aesthetic sense. Of the ideas that come to
you, you must learn to determine which are
appropriate and usable.
4) Direct contact with the subconscious.
Meditate. Keep a dream diary. You have to
deliberately "thin" the walls between conscious
and unconscious mind. This is where the
gold will be found...but it takes work, and
the willingness to trust your own process.

Washington Post "Review"

We've gotten nothing but great reviews on Casanegra, but here's one that puzzles me. It was in the "Washington is also reading" section (is that a section?) and reads:

Washington Is Also Reading

Sunday, July 29, 2007; Page BW14

CASANEGRA: A TENNYSON HARDWICK NOVEL

By Blair Underwood with Tananarive Due & Steven Barnes


(Atria, $25)

That's right. Three authors. Does that make for a better yarn? Well, that's for you to decide, but with the caliber of talent on hand -- an award-winning actor and two novelists, each boasting an impressive résumé -- the odds are auspicious. Their protagonist, semi-profitable actor and recovering gigolo "Ten" Hardwick, unveils a new talent hidden beneath his hunky exterior -- detective. And not a moment too soon, as he finds himself the prime suspect in the death of rap star Afrodite, who went from former client to potential sweetheart after their recent rendezvous. Hardwick's hunt for the killer takes us on a roller-coaster ride through Hollywood (with tidbits about the evolution of black films), the rap world and the sex-for-pay industry. Hold on, there's bound to be some turbulence. (F)
####
Now, I'm puzzled about the parenthetical "F." I'm guessing that it relates to a reviewer's name. If it's a grade, that opinion certainly isn't reflected in the review itself. Anyone out there familiar enough with the Washington Post to help me figure out what the "F" means? If it IS a grade, I can live with that, but seems weird...

The Simpsons (2007)

Du’h! You know, I’ve never been a huge Simpson’s fan, but always found them amusing. This wasn’t like “South Park,” where I looked forward for months to the movie, and was knocked on my butt. This full-length theatrical version of the longest-running situation comedy in television history isn’t going to make new fans, but it is quite funny, sometimes touching, and sometimes drags a bit. Overall, it works and occasionally is drop-dead hilarious. The basic plot deals with Homer screwing up the town of Springfield so badly that the EPA is forced to take drastic measures. Animated hilarity ensues. Fox labored mightily to keep the plot secret, so I won’t give away details here. Most if not all of the beloved Simpsons characters appear, and Bart skate-boards while quite naked. What more do you want? Give it an "A-" for Simpsons fans, and a "B" for fans of animation and/or snarky humor.
##
The I.F. is still working just fine, although I find myself getting a little lazy with it—eating sloppily on Feast days just because it doesn’t show up on the scales. Can’t do that. My body craves the best food available on Feast days, and if I don’t give it, I’m gonna pay down the road.
##
Was in Las Vegas last weekend, for a seminar with my first Kenpo instructor, Steve (Sanders) Mohammed. He’s 68 now, and a bit wizened, but his reverse punch is…perfect. Not good, not excellent, not fast, not powerful. Perfect. As in no detectable flaws.

Back in the 60’s he was a Vietnam vet who studied Ed Parker’s Kenpo and found its circular motion inadequate for tournament play. He extracted bits and pieces of various techniques, simplified and streamlined, and became one of the most successful tournament competitors in American history. He also had vast street experience, and produced an absurd number of high-level fighters. In fact, at one point seven out of ten of the top tournament competitors in the California-Nevada-Arizona tri-state area were all Sanders students.

He can now explain intellectually the value of the drills he had us perform, endlessly, up and down across the dojo floor. Jesus, he was smart. He saw things so clearly, and is just now being acknowledged for his brilliance.


His wife Connie was there, too. I still remember when they hooked up, about 22 years ago. What a horn dog he was then! Wow! The guy was just a sex machine, and if there had been rules about consorting with students, he would have been in jail. Now, I never saw ANYTHING that looked even vaguely like sexual harassment. He treated the male and female students exactly alike. But I found out over time that he’d gone through a LOT of the lovely ladies who came through his front doors. My guess is that they came on to him more often than he came onto them…but Connie sure ended that.

I suspect that he is quite happy and content in his life. He is a gentleman and a scholar, and one of the three most important men in my life.
##
Tananarive is out of town visiting her Mom, and Nicki is down at Comicon with her boyfriend. It’s just me and Jason here for the weekend, and he seems to be sleeping late this morning. Come to think of it, he went to sleep pretty fast last night. Hmmm. You know, he had shots at the doctor a couple of days ago, and that in combination with T being gone might be making him just a bit low-energy.
##
Arrgh! Just realized I haven’t meditated in a couple of days. Darn. Just slipping into the Mommy role with Jason probably threw me for a bit of a loop. Have to get back on the horse.

To recap what seems to be working on that level:

1) Meditate daily. Slow, still, and deepen the breathing.
2) Exercise at least 3 times a week, and connect your meditative breathing to the exercise breathing. Increase exercise stress while maintaining a smooth inhalation-exhalation cycle.
3) During the day, 5X, stop and breathe for 60 seconds. If possible, stress your breathing with an exercise (for instance, FlowFit)

The above will slowly begin to change the way you breathe under stress. During meditation, visualize the end point of your current goals. Begin to develop a sense of whether you are internally aligned to do your best, day after day, to accomplish them. This is tricky, but disciplines like Tad James’ “TimeLine” are good at this.

Over time, you’ll start knowing when you are fighting yourself, dragging your feet, misaligned or unclear. If you can’t see yourself accomplishing your goal, don’t you think that it will be difficult to harness your skill, strength and creativity?

Now, here’s the weird part. I preface this by saying the following only SEEMS to be true. I don’t believe it. But I have experienced things that are close enough to “true” here that I’m gonna say it just for fun:

If you can find the right alignment of inner and outer resources, you attract luck. Visualize your goal, align inner resources, clarify the inner light that represents your emotional/spiritual state, work hard and consistently to move forward and clarify your reality map…and stuff just starts falling into your lap.

It’s so strange that it feels like magic when it starts happening. It can actually be a bit disturbing. That disturbance is what has induced me to stop the practice in the past—life was just getting so good that it freaked me a bit. I suspect I won’t let that happen this time.

However, I notice that my subconscious is always waiting to stop me from moving too fast. T out of town? Perfectly reasonable time to stop meditating! After all, Jason needs me…

NO! He needs his father to be at the absolute highest level of effectiveness and energy and emotional flexibility. Balance. Centeredness. It takes me twenty minutes a day to do this, but EVERYTHING in the world will conspire to keep me from it.

Almost as if there are demons and angels, I’ll tell you. Easy to see why so many believe in them.

"I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry"

I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry


Well, there it is. I actually took a break in the middle of the day, and went to see an Adam Sandler comedy with my wife. Lord God, forgive me.
##
Well, you know the premise: a widowed fireman (Kevin James) is afraid that if he dies, his kids won’t get the benefits. He has the bright idea of having his best friend (Adam Sandler) pretend to be his Domestic Partner, to get around the rules. Low-Jinx and much socially responsible soul-searching follows.

The first 2/3 of this movie was pretty hysterical. Sandler’s arc as he reacts to someone calling him “faggot”—a word he himself had used not twenty minutes earlier—is actually a terrific scene, in a lowbrow comedy kinda way. And overall, the movie has its heart in the right place. As one character puts it: “In America, we have the right to put anything up our ass we want.” Trust me, this one is still for the frat boys—it isn’t exactly Brokeback Mountain. But there is a touch of something more there. Straight reviewers have been harsher than the one openly gay critic I read, who thought it was a hoot. It’s been interesting to watch straights get all offended for their poor gay brethren. I’ll give it a “B” for Adam Sandler fans, a “C+” if you’re not, and, unfortunately a great big…

SAMBO ALERT**SPOILERS

You know? I sometimes think that tolerance, or non-prejudicial attitudes seem to be a zero-sum game. In other words, when Sandler (and his producers) stretched themselves to be kind to gays, they let some of their other attitudes show. Rob Schneider shows up as a Chinese minister, and it’s pretty much worse than Mickey Rooney in “Breakfast At Tiffany’s.” Sorry, but considering how few Asian actors get cast anywhere, if you were going to have a stereotype, at least cast a real Asian—an actor could send his daughter to Yale for what Schneider earned here. If you’re gonna be humiliated, at least get something for the pain.

On another note of grim inevitability, when Ving Rhames shows up as a beefy, threatening, uber-tough Fireman…and the only black fireman…why was it so #$%@@ predictable that he would be gay? And wiggle his ass naked in the shower? And get the only screen kiss I can remember this ultra-masculine actor ever getting…with another man.

Please remember this in the context of white audiences still apparently unwilling to accept the onscreen hetersexual coupling of Black or Asian men. IT'S NOT HOLLYWOOD--don't think you can pigeon-hole it, lay this problem off on a few executives. Hollywood just tallies the box office, boys and girls. They have no agenda higher than making their Hummer payments. This is America.

It is so terribly predictable, and the rough genetic equivalent to having the only black male character in an action/horror movie die. Sorry, but I can’t help but believe that this wasn’t some statistical fluke, it is deliberate (or subconsciously “loaded”) to create an effeminate, non-threatening clown out of this impressive man. Can any of you think of a single movie…I mean one single film where there was only a single white male, who was gay, in a film filled otherwise with heterosexuals? I have to think that this kind of stuff—a howl to the typical white fratboy Adam Sandler audience—is a universal human tendency. Because if I took it personally…I probably would have climbed up on a building with a rifle by now.

Oh, and that predictability factor…just watched “The Peaceful Warrior.” Very nice adaptation of Dan Millman’s book about the spiritual awakening of a college gymnast. There is only one black gymnast on the team. Guess who gets badly injured, so that the white guys can feel all bad, and then compete for his position.

People, when you see me reluctant to tar an entire group of people without absolute certainty (our recent discussions) it is because I hold with a death-grip to the idea that people are just people, that the negative tendencies I see are a part of our nature that becomes more severe under pressure…and that “there but for the grace of God go I.” The instant I start attributing differential basic value and morality to groups based on religion, nationality or ethnicity…

Well, it isn’t pretty.