Relationship Strata: Interest, Connection, Integration

Relationships are complicated person-magnets. Sometimes our charges fit and we attract; sometimes they oppose and we repel. But who exactly am I in a relationship with? Surly my mother, but the guy behind the counter? How does he rise to that level of commitment? If I only see him a handful of times in my life, why should I care?

Limited to your public-face, the null-state is where your interactions with people are casual and functional, generally fiduciary, neighborly, or logistically based. The moment we start to care, we leave the null-state and enter the strata. Initially, we find interest; maybe a friend, maybe a foe. We don't have to like someone to have a vested interest. When interest deepens, we form a connection. Our plans include each other. We coordinate meetings as friends; we meet on battlefields as enemies. Should we take this relationship to the ultimate level, we integrate, we bond without distinction. This is when war ends. This is when families form.

It is my theory that if there is life after death, some of us will choose seclusion and some balance. We will either disappear into our own world, or join the universe of others. If we choose to be with others, the scales of cause-and-effect must balance. This is a most simple, elegant, and symmetrical process. Our lives replay from the perspectives of all those we've affected. Our actions return to us in full. We have lifetimes of experiences to behold once we stop breathing. In a nutshell, when I die I will experience you reading this.

It's a fundamentally disturbing yet revealing notion. How will you treat others once you accept this possibility? It matters how you treat the guy behind the counter because eventually it will be you behind that counter. Whatever you say or do, you will feel exactly what he felt. You'll look through his eyes, hear through his ears. And if he's rude to you, you'll know why. When you no longer seek to protect your ego in every interaction but instead see each as an opportunity to spread the emotional state you prefer, you add to your treasure. A simple smile and considerate words go a long way in all of our lives. There are many moments we are completely unaware of that have had tectonic impacts on others. We have shown love to people and helped them in ways we will only know completely after we are no longer limited by the body.

Insuring our treasure is as simple as owning the relationship before us. Be present. We must also consider how our work and our habits affect the world as a whole, not just how they make us look to others. Polluters will account for their pollution; healers will enjoy their healing. When we consciously find everyone interesting, we are taking a step towards cultivating the benefits of future interactions. Connections are great, but have risks. Moving slowly and steadily is key. But integration is dangerous and beautiful. This is when soldiers disintegrate and companions become one.

If you want to integrate with someone, a single rule stands alone: never make it personal. We all disagree. We all have our point of view. How we negotiate the complications of life into a unified plan of action determines our success. When we stay on point, when we listen closely, express authenticity, and compromise for the greater-good, we overcome. Self-help strategies exist with varying degrees of effectiveness but can do nothing until clear boundaries and rules of engagement are set and kept. As long as a couple uses personal insults and character assassination to fortify a position, they will only succeed in one thing: destroying the connection and seriously limiting any future interest. When we personally attack our partner, what we are really saying is, “I'm done.” That's when it's time for space. If we can redefine our boundaries, we might just start over from the null-state and discover our interest again.

If you want to experience this idea as a narrative

read my short-story Aftermath.

For longer articles about all kinds of human-related things

read my primary blog jaxoncohen.blogspot.com

The Jarring Interruption That May Never End

Why do we observe Daylight Savings? What purpose does it serve? Will it ever end?

The answer: who knows.

Daylight Savings was conceived of independently by some guys who wanted to make the world a better place. One wanted people to spend more time in the sunshine. One wanted to save coal. But the guy credited with the idea (Hudson c. 1895) simply wanted more time after his shift to look at bugs. The assertion it was created so farmers could load the trains with their harvest on time is an urban legend. Fact is farmers hate it for the very same reason most of us hate it: it forces us to change our schedule. Fact is farmers schedule their time around the sun and trains still run according to the needs of those using them, including farmers. The reason we endure this sudden time-sift is purely the politics of big business.

England proposed this at the turn of the nineteen century because some rich guy felt his country was wasting time. Early to bed, early to rise? This all goes back to the forgotten reality of second sleep. Once we had lighting in our homes and factory jobs to attend, industry saw a way to further their bottom line: change the healthy way we'd slept throughout all of history and get us to work on time. They needed productive people making money, not sleeping people wasting daylight (their profits).

Before this, we'd go to bed with the sun, wake sometime during the night and bumble about. Then we'd go back to bed for a second sleep and rise with the sun. Electric lightning means we can stay up all night and thick curtains mean we can sleep all day. By the end of the nineteenth century, it was considered immoral, lazy, and of low character to sleep in. However long it takes to end Daylight Savings, let us be sure to end this illogical presumption about sleep now. The people we need to worry about are not the ones with a full night's sleep. In fact, sleep requires a certain state of mind. What we need to worry about is the cost of sleep-deprivation.

Ending second sleep was just the beginning. For countries far enough from the equator to experience great swings in sunrise and sunset, Daylight Savings has become a tool to readjust daylight in order to increase productivity. There are various arguments in favor. It saves energy. It reduces crime. It keeps kids safe, walking to school or riding the bus. It allows for more activity outside during summer months. Only this last point is valid. It hasn't saved money. The accidents avoided in fall occur in spring. Crime only slightly reshuffles but doesn't change. And yes, people are allowed to spend an extra hour at the park before it gets dark. However in the Internet age, this option is being exercised less often. Daylight Savings will never end as long as it is linked to children and energy.

Standard Time is the winter part of the calender. Ending this pointless interruption means it will be light at a time most of us are not awake. That is the great cost of this; we would have a 5 AM summer sunrise. It would be weird, hard to get used to. But at most, it would be no more annoying than having a 5 PM winter sunset. The secondary cost would be fewer hours of summer sun in the evening but that seems to matter to less and less.

On the other hand, the benefits to ending it would be many. One stands out: better sleep. Sleep is the most important thing we do for our health and learning followed only by diet and exercise. Sleep erases stress, heals injury, solves sickness, entertains us with sometimes odd, sometimes awesome stories, changes our perspective, and allows us to take on the day. Having to readjust our sleep schedule twice a year costs real money and lives. It's the interruption to our Circadian Rhythm that is the problem. The reason for the increasing number of accidents in spring is more about the lack of sleep than the lack of light.

There are two types of chronology: synchronous and asynchronous. Time is synchronous. Life is asynchronous. Time is segments. Life is events. Synchronous means getting to work at 7 AM. Asynchronous means getting to work when you are ready. The world runs on synchronous time. But with computers and networking, it is possible to overcome these shackles and use tech to overlay an asynchronous life onto the synchronous bed of time. Instead of getting to work at 7 AM, one day we'll have an app to get us there when we are ready and needed. Ending Daylight Savings is the first step to a healthier, more efficient world.

New Zoo Same as the Old Zoo

My Trip to My Local Zoo

The last time I went to the zoo I was a teenager, rocking out to the recently-released, debut album of Guns-n-Roses. It's been a while. After writing a tough post on the very concept, I decided to accept my mother's invitation as part of my first vacation in decades. The zoo had recently been renovated and the reviews were positive. I don't want to be a hypocrite or ignorant or anything like that so I went. I didn't want to, but I did.

This is the very first picture I took when I entered the zoo. It is a beautiful statue of an idealized moment between an imagined family of plastic giraffes. The state bond issued by popular vote for the improvements certainly left money for aesthetics and commerce; Mom pointed out the new gift-shop's massive upgrade in size and scope. I took note of the food-court turned restaurant. It was early and I was hoping for some popcorn or a hot-dog. The old zoo had popcorn and hot-dogs right when you walked in. The new zoo had everything from a quesadilla to a vegan garden burger. But an hour after the gates opened, the restaurant remained closed. I went hungry.

As I said about my last visit, the staff does their best to keep the inmates clean and fed. Although I noticed more space was available to them, it is far from enough. We saw the savanna-themed pen, the lion's backyard, the rhino's corner, and the primate apartments. It wasn't easy moving through the park. I admit to spending the briefest of moments at each attraction. Looking into their eyes was hard.

My heart sank when I saw the polar bear, pacing in circles. It soothed itself through the cooping mechanism of repetitive motion while my fellow visitors and I witnessed this troubling reality. Polar bears walk miles everyday in a frozen landscape and never see the same thing for long. This year's Noble prize winners show how specific cells within the hippocampus fire when we are in a certain place while different ones fire when we are in a different place. They call it the brain's GPS. What does this poor bear's GPS look like? He was born here. He'll die here. For an animal with a brain specialized in vast, endless spaces, he is simply looking for something new, something he will never truly see. 

Why must they serve a life-sentence? What if it was illegal to keep a wild-animal who could otherwise return to the wild?

We finished with the reptile house, big-cat dens, and the giraffe barn. I come away from the experience unchanged in my views and a little more jaded by the whole thing (my hippocampus suffers the specifics). Through tech, we are becoming more aware of other cultures and ideas. From marriage equality to the facts of smoking, things are improving because we have more information, more experience of what works and why. How much longer will we hold to old ideas and institutions that not only do not work but cause harm? Tech has solved so many problems. When will it solve this one? Zoos are not sanctuaries nor rehabilitation centers and should never be. Instead, let the future promise to rid us of zoos and provide something better.

Let us flip the script. Instead of holding animals in real-life cages with virtual scenes painted on the walls, let us enter the virtual cage with walls painted in real-life. Imagine walking into an exhibit and being virtually transported to some far-off place where you can walk among the creatures in real life and real-time, only you're not really there. Sanctuaries, national parks, and rehabilitation centers are perfect for this. Don't think video cameras and microphones everywhere. Instead, thousands upon thousands of unobtrusive, high-tech sensors paired with an advanced computer system will eventually have the capacity to copy the four-dimensional scene all the way down to the individual movements of every blade of grass. Initial investment is high but so are profits for everyone, especially the animals and scientists.

Until a zoo like this is available, I think the next time I see animals such as these, it will be on safari, where the only cost my visit will pose to them will be the sound, smell, and pollution of our vehicle.

On a brighter note, my initial reaction to the SCOTUS non-ruling ruling or read the full post.

Me-cation

My First Vacation in Decades is a Vacation from Me

I have two dogs: a rotty named Jupiter Juice and his half-pit-bull, daughter India. I also have a cat, Sweetness (you can see them all in my latest blog at JaxonCohen.blogspot). When I'm finished with the day, I come home and sit down to relax. These two celebrate by howling as if it's Spring Break! I've learned to embrace the three or four minutes of ear-spiting sound. And for the first time in decades, I join them.

There are many complicated reason why I remained a Born-Again Vacation Virgin. I was in the Army. I took care of my father for a decade and a half. Since his death, I've been paying the bills. This year, my mother challenged me to make time for her. She invited me to the zoo. I accepted in light of my last post (my next post will cover our visit).

I am in the middle of an experiment with myself: practice what you preach. I theorize that the best way to change behavior is to make the process an ongoing game with rules, rewards, and a scoreboard. Science is backing this up. I have many things I want to change about myself. I've created a game to etch out the person I want to be. Spending a few days with her is the first opportunity here.

I will practice my future.

What do I mean by this? There is a popular saying, “fake it until you make it.” This vacation will be spent faking it. I will pretend to be the person I want to be. I will follow all the rules of the game I've not been able to because of the daily grind. I will score the most points. I will blow that board up! But more than this, I will create a playbook of winning strategies. By acting out my highest priorities even just a few times for a few days, I will change reality. I will create memories – new behaviors to build upon. These few days will be filled with “doing things differently.”

Instead of licensing myself to luxuriate in the depths the self-gratification, I thought it best to traverse this extraordinarily rare space by giving myself what I really want: a better life. The next time you take a vacation, consider this concept. Time off might not be as rare for you as it has been for me and not every vacation should be spent this way. But consider trying it out. Maybe next time you don't make the typical attempt to “release some steam.” Instead of being who you are everyday, but just somewhere special, stay where you are and pretend to be the person you wish you were everyday. Take a class. Organize your finances. Stare at some art. Clean out the basement. Explore a risky, family activity that requires investment. Climb the mountain that is your ego and crush it, if only for a few days.

Try a me-cation and when it's over, feel the joy of standing on new ground. Sometimes the greatest thing we can do to ease the stress of everyday life is to take time-off and focus on reconstructing our everyday life for the better.

For a Good Time, Visit Animal Prison

Only amusement and water parks were preferable to the zoo as a child. The pure amazement and wonder of lifeforms from far off places provided hours of joy and cemented many memories of family and fun. And then I grew up. As a teenager, I visited the zoo one, last time. It horrified me. All I saw was withering beings trapped in cages. I couldn't believe these places were legal. The facilities were not all dilapidated and it was clear the staff was doing their best but the idea of incarcerating the innocent for our amusement bothered me.

Both extremes lack subtly but are equally true. The human race, as a matter of priority, must consider the longevity of this institution. Confining these individuals is wrong. Imagine some alien race doing this to us. Imagine alien parents taking their alien offspring to the human zoo. There, the great lessons of our ugly past and present are placed on full display. The child watches in wonder as it beholds an array of humans from different ages, captured, held, and made to enact some bit of history like puppets in a play, only the humans don't know they are in a Matrix-style virtual-reality. The allegory is a perfect horror story with endless possibilities of torture and evil. What we are doing is not as extreme but certainly in the same vain. We go to zoos to virtually taste these creatures' complex, authentic reality. But the truth is that despite appearances, the wall behind them is concrete, not a lush forest, dense jungle, or vast desert.

Fact: humanity disintegrates natural habitats. Science deems this the Holocene or Human Era as we are the dominate force of nature. The choices we make shape the world. As long as we believe commerce is a higher priority than sustainability, zoos serve a purpose. Finding awe, making a connection, learning respect, and understanding the necessities of life means future generations may use their memories of the zoo to mend our course in time to save these critical species we find so wonderful.

Instead of seeing a visit as solely 'fun,' we have the opportunity to ramp-up change with a focus on education. Until we find long-term balance with nature, zoos have their place. And when we finally deem them illegal, it will be because we will have far better ways to appreciate life on Earth. How? Simple, instead of bringing the Savannah to us, we will bring the world to the Savannah. How? Who knows. However we accomplish this, it must be sustainable (maybe flying-cars; in fact, weren't we also promised smart-jackets, holographic-billboards, self-tying shoes, and hover-boards by now).

Read a related article about the stewardship of dogs at JaxonCohen.blogspot.com

Negotiate Like a Bored Russian

Russians have their own, unique style. It isn't pleasant. And when it's over, they'll seem as relieved as you. Maybe you'll even become friends because that's what happens to innocent soldiers when the war is over. The fact is, it's all part of the plot and Russians know well how to tell the story of suffering and victory. When negotiating with a Russian, prepare to endure the intense, complex, and labored narrative of a thick novel.

When the peninsula was invaded, the idea of an imminent WWIII raised its multimedia profile. Putin's extreme move ran contrary to signed documents. But remember, initially he denied any involvement. What anonymous soldiers with Russian license-plates? A staged election added a veneer of legitimacy but remains factually insignificant; Russia occupies Crimea. At the time, there was no violence, no war. Their stagecraft failed to incite revolt. So they raised the stakes, massing troops at the boarder and sending operatives into nearby population centers. When entering negotiations with a Russian, brace yourself for an emotional roller-coaster that starts with the extreme.

Negotiating with a Russian means dealing with someone who isn't in charge. It means no matter what you agree upon, they'll have to take it to someone else to make the call, even if you're talking to Putin himself, in this case a bystander who claims to have no troops or agenda in a place he now refers to as “New Russia.” When negotiating with a Russian, expect he'll always have to get back to you.

Putin admits to some influence, strictly used for humanitarian purposes. Contrary to this facade, his real agenda is focused and his influence, widespread. For example, the thing to do if you're a Russian soldier with some time-off is to vacation in New Russia and play real-war. Recently, a group of captured Russian paratroopers were exchanged for Ukrainian fighters which brings us to our next point.

When your Russian counterpart doesn't like the facts on the ground, they will use a magic-wand to make it all disappear: incompetence. What happened was not as it seems; there's no invasion. Instead, it was a small error in a complex calculation. It won't happen again – until it does. And sanctions? This time the West made the mistake. Sanctions only help the Russian economy in the long-run by providing opportunity to indigenous merchants. If you think you've got a Russian cornered, be assured they will turn it around and frame you in that same corner. Moreover, if you do them a favor, it is seen as weakness. And when you make a mistake, they'll never let you forget it.

A crisis in Ukraine? In Russia, it's more like an opportunity they have all the time in the world to monopolize. They're in no hurry, possibly even bored. The fact is Putin is popular. His people support him and see him as the wise-warrior who only wishes to protect his Ukrainian-Russian family from the reach of the radical Ukrainian Government. What he really wants is no secret: a land-bridge to the peninsula. The Crimean naval-base is non-negotiable. Remember South Ossetia? That was the blueprint. New Russia is the master-plan. And when Putin wins, he'll frame it as if he did us all a favor. 

Our Human Leash

I drove home from Ft. Benning in a 1976 CJ-5 Jeep. Even at the time, it was an old, beat -up ride. While crossing the country, I experienced an unparalleled sense of freedom. After I returned home to care for my father, I soon questioned the usefulness of the strap around my wrist. In the Army, punctuality was required. That watch served me well. But in my new roll, I was the one with the plan. I had a new relationship with time. So, I removed the leash.

Wealth is the definition of living without a leash. Money fundamentally renders control over space, silence, and time. When you're the one with the funds, people wait for you. Large estates primarily provide extensive personal space and the ability to maintain a level of silent serenity. Why else get rich if not to come and go as you please, surround yourself with only the people and things you choose, and be able to find the peace and quite you deserve. For the rest of us, we have to go where we are told, do what we must, endure those we don't like, and complete all this by a certain time, under questionable conditions. Just like a dog, the masses must respond to a leash.

The current incarnation is new and shinny. It's smart. And it digs deep into your psyche. It capitalizes every aspect, every corner of your life. You don't only feel naked without it, you long for it when separated for even a moment. It's so cool and it's your phone. How much of your time, your space, and your solitude is exchanged for you complete attention on that small screen? What are we becoming?

How many of us do any number of things with this thing in our hand we would never do without it? Walking down the street while talking on the phone, minus the phone, and you look like a crazy person. Driving while texting, minus the device, and you're simply a slumped-forward tragedy waiting to happen. Exchanging texts about things instead of talking, sending photos instead of sharing physical space, watching others embarrass themselves on YouTube for a cheap thrill, filming reality instead of participating in it … the list is long. We act in ways we would not if not for this noose around our soft-stuff.

When will we confront reality and decide to dissolve the leash? Using a tool is so much different than being one. If the world around us can no longer compete with the world inside our phones, how are we fundamentally different from the pods of humans in the Matrix? Do our devices serve us or do we serve them?

The primary question is: how tight is the leash? The most simple answer is in the form of this question: when and for how long did you last leave it off?