So I was working hard at improving my writing, spending my time reading the books from the internet and trying my hand at different types of writing. Everything was going well until the rest of my life began to take over (something which is all too common for the spare-time writer).

Work was hectic and I was also rehearsing for Calamity Jane – A musical set in the Wild West. The show was performed in the Bridewell Theatre in Blackfriars in the last week of November 08. I played Danny Gilmartin, a (slightly wet) lieutenant who found himself involved in a love triangle with Calamity Jane and Katie Brown. It was a fantastic show which was loads of fun but it was very time intensive and the writing came to a standstill.

After the show I promised myself I would start writing again but the festive period took over and I spent most of December catching up with neglected friends and going to Christmas parties. I found myself occasionally glancing towards the untouched books on my bookshelf, but I just couldn’t find the time to pick them up.

Now, I’m generally quite a motivated person, but sometimes I need a kick up the backside to get going again. That ‘kick’ came in the form of a new book idea, which popped into my head a few days after Christmas. It still amazes me how an idea can come from nowhere and change everything.

In my bolt of lightning I saw Clandestine’s protagonist – Jack Jones. He came to me as a completely formed character, in a scene which now appears around three quarters of the way through the novel.

I used Jack Jones as a starting point and asked myself how he had arrived at this place. I found some plain sheets of A4 paper and started brainstorming. Before I knew it, four hours had flown by and I was feeling mentally drained but exhilarated. The idea had potential.

The next day I took the almost forgotten books down from my bookshelf and started reading through the relevant chapters. I knew I was embarking on a huge project, but despite this, I was convinced that it was a good idea. I ignored the daunting feeling in my stomach and made the decision that this was the project that I would be spending the next year of my life on. The seeds for Clandestine had been sown.

Ok I am first of all the luckiest character of them all. I arrived in Nairobi approximately three weeks ago today and within this period of time I have managed to upset my parents beyond belief, seal a mega dollar deal between a Pakistani company and a Kenyan one and in the process get myself some gainful employment.

Now the parents are still not used to having me around and neither have i got used to being around them taking roll call every moment i even think of breathing outside the house. Talk of not wanting to let go, yaar! So most of the days they are either upset at me for being late to come home or not coming home at all or wanting to use the car without fuelling it or for not eating properly or not conserving power with the tariffs going so high or some other random reason like that. On the eating properly part it makes you kind of wonder how I survived healthy all this time and even managed to gain weight a little bit if according to them i am not eating. I am kinda slowly getting used to the bickering and the cynicism sometimes projected by the old lady but i believe all will be well.

Well my dream of giving Zia a distributor in Nairobi is looking quite good. I put him in touch with one of the technology companies here and within a span of a week and a half the guy was appointed the official distributor of the products here in Nairobi and Kenya in general. Not only that, but he also got Uganda and Rwanda as well. I am so proud of having the power of networks working for me. Some people say I am too social but i think my being social has now started paying back dividends That is the new excitement of the day.

In the process of brokering the above deal, I landed a job with this guys who have become the Kenya Uganda Rwanda distributors. The guy said I was a brilliant mind and since i brought the idea to him then i should be the one to mastermind the whole project. so as I write this I am actually taking a commercial break from writing up a business and marketing plan for the organisation all on the second day of work I must say the first day was nowhere near as exciting as today. I spent most of the day yesterday staring at walls and people who never understood why i was hanging around their office the whole day till I was formerly and officially introduced to them by the CEO. (Random day). All in all I am in gainful employment within three weeks of my getting home. The funny thing is that last eek my old man had flown out and he had said that he better find me in a job when he gets back, and true to the threat he did find me in a job, how ironic.

My good friend K called me just before I got the job and he advised me to give it time. He reckoned that I was not any more special than those who had been tarmacking for days on end without being successful given how bad the economic crisis is. Well it was sure good advice but in this case I guess i just got lucky. K love you man, and be rest assured I always do listen to what you say. Only voice of reason that keeps me alive in the midst of all the high expectations the folks put on my ass.

Trailerpilot posted this NY Times article to his blog this weekend and I’m so glad he did…it’s incredibly interesting to me. The article is about a fairly new dance craze that is spreading via the internet to teens all over the country-jerking. It’s not the dance style that interested me. Instead, what peaked my interest in this case can be summed up in this quote from the article:

They began dancing and posted videos on YouTube, and according the mysterious Web laws that can send a laughing baby video global, these unknowns quickly attracted thousands of viewers.

At this point in fact, the videos from the high school students from LA which this quote refers to have received millions of views….and consequently an article in the NY Times, sponsorship from clothing/footwear brands, and a documentary for MTV in the works.

I’m sure we’ve all had the experience of watching some link we got in a forward (or saw in a tweet or on someone’s tumblr) and we OMGLOL at it (because that’s it’s purpose) and then we scroll down and see it’s had millions of views and countless comments….and we think “WTF?  Why?”

It seems to me that while there are unimaginable numbers of people using the internet to post, share, and spread information, there are only a few users who really have the power to make something become viral.  What is interesting to me in regards to this (and these kids who are now responsible for this next big dance movement) is that these gods of the internet are now the ones curating our cultural lives*.  They are the ones deciding that jerking is the next big thing and three wolf moon shirts are the new standard of irony based ROFL-ing and cats doing much of anything are the funnest thing ever.

Truthfully, I can’t decide how I feel about this.  Part of me loves the way we all watch the same ridiculous pixelated crap…it bonds us.  The other part of me wishes maybe we were all watching the same creative, groundbreaking or thoughtful stuff that’s out there.

But since I’m not one of those internet gods, it actually doesn’t really matter what I want us to watch.  So instead, I watch this.

*Note that I am officially waiting to see how long it will take before work at the MCA starts reflecting this cultural phenomenon.

Sadly, I cannot claim credit.

Things have been pretty hectic since I got back from the States. I’ve had loads of work to catch up on and loads of debt to deal with. I’m not going to complain because I need the work and I like being busy (although the whole debt thing kinda sucks) but really all i’ve wanted to do since getting home was to draw for myself. It rained all weekend, so I stayed in, listened to a couple of records on repeat and between games of Rapid Roll (don’t ask) managed to draw this picture. It’s not even close to being finished yet but I thought I’d post it on here to give myself some false sense of achievement. I hope to get a bunch more drawing done and a bunch of new illustrations up here over the next few weeks.

Because everyone loves a distraction: Days Like Television.

When you hear the word “Vampire”, what flashes across your mind?

Probably an eternal being that wakes up at midnight, leaves the grave; one who has long pointed canine teeth which it likes to sink in to the neck to drink blood for it’s living…

“Yeah, I know very well how they might look and what they do for a living!” you might say.

But how many of you are aware of the other “Real” vampires that live among you draining your energy—mental, physical and emotional?

Unfortunately, most of us don’t know how dangerous these “real” vampires are, and how much of blood of your energy they could suck in no time leaving you paralyzed!!

Most of the people could relate themselves with at least one of the following situations:

– Jennifer started off the day well and all of a sudden finds herself being criticized by her boss, then colleagues makes fun of her followed by a stranger on the restaurant who vented his anger on her for no obvious reason she could figure out, leaving her an angry, depressed, agitated and utterly, emotionally disturbed person. The bitter truth is, there are energy-suckers or people who are waiting to “sink their teeth in to your neck ruthlessly”.

– Charles is driving on his way back home or office when he keenly notices a celebrity (Or any person with some prominent attributes to his/her credit such as beauty, affluence, tall, etc) on the road followed crazily by zealous fans. He says to himself one of these things,

“I wish I were wealthy/beautiful/lucky/beautiful/well-built/handsome/tall like him/her.”

His day passes with mixed feelings of longing, feeling of inadequacy, feeling bad about himself, worrying, loss of  self-confidence, depreciated self-image, lack of enthusiasm to name a few literally!

– Lawrence goes out finding fault with everyone he encounters, perfectly capturing their flaws. Whoever he happens to come across he says “You shouldn’t do that or you shouldn’t have done that…” or “You have to be like this or that…” passing judgment and being critical about others.

In the process he compares and contrasts himself with others, piling up a lot of resentment and other unsupportive emotions in him that annihilates his OWN attitude, charm and energy as well the others he come in to contact with.

– Angelina was sitting at her office desk working with great élan when she was suddenly struck by the old memories of her altercation with her neighbor 4 months back. She fights once again, but this time in her mind! Her enthusiasm vanished in to thin air like a deflated balloon. It has become another one of her “Bad days”.

These are only some of the instances of “Vampires” from a great lot that steal your “Poise” or “Peaceful mind”, suck your mental energies, physical energies, and your emotional energies from the time you open your eyelids to the time your head hits the pillow, and even thereafter!

Now, if you had the chance to study closely all the successful men and women since the dawn of time, you would soon realize that one quality cut through all of them and it is “Keeping their mind protected from the outside clutters” that steal their energies.

An aspiring person of success should closely guard him/her from all these clutters and flushes them out on his/her first sight of them for they have great power to drain his/her energies rendering him/her powerless!!

As a matter of fact, the more energy you could save or avoid being expended in the wrong channels, the more you would be “Available” for any situation, that too with great enthusiasm and power under your belt!

It’s a common knowledge that the mind should be free of all the discouraging thoughts and evil-behaviors, but it is not a common act executing and applying this knowledge, unfortunately.

When you are mentally energetic, chances are, you would be physically as well, mostly. In fact it is these mental leakages or vampires that cause the fatigue both in the mind and in the body.

If “Save your mental energy and don’t allow any vampires to disturb your inner poise” is your primary motto, you are already well on your way to be one of those rare individuals who has control over his/her day!

And one who wouldn’t be shaken by these energy-sapping vampires in the form of people or damaging thoughts that arises with them.

If people around you aren’t going anywhere, if their dreams are no bigger than hanging out on the corner, or if they’re dragging you down, get rid of them. Negative people can sap your energy so fast, and they can take your dreams from you, too.

–Earvin Johnson

PART-2

Wish you all the riches to come with God’s blessings

Peter Anand

I’ve never had habits. They don’t stick with me. It’s great in terms of negative habits, because I don’t get addicted. But a routine – i.e. a series of positive habits – would help get the work done, and establishing one is my current challenge. I can fall in step with mass routines, where a group of people do the same thing at the same time, but sticking to one on my own is difficult. Over whiskey I had a brilliant insight (humour me) – feeling frustrated I told my sister what my ideal day looks like, and she observed that I already have access to everything I need. I could in fact choose to live my ideal life immediately. It’s shocking what we don’t do even if we could. (Supposedly if you trap a fly in a jar and then leave the jar wide open, it still won’t escape.) The brilliant plan looked like this:

(The “@ DESK” is to ensure that I don’t kid myself that Starbucks entails working. The “WORKING 4 MONEY” refers to the fact that I’m always researching something which won’t pay off until 2012.)

That night I set my alarm for 6.30am. By 6.50, only 5 minutes later than planned, I was on the meditation cushion and stayed there for an hour. After that I was *knackered* and decided to sleep through breakfast. I’d been so tragically excited about the plan that I’d barely slept. I got work done eventually, and the gym, but subsequently felt so high on having done so many great things, and was so knocked out from a lack of sleep, that I was out of it for 2 days.

The next day I decided to run the scheduled hours, but only once I’d gotten enough sleep. The trouble is, I managed to put that off by reading until 3am every night. Every day brought a new book.

I think it’s about energy management. Learning how your mind ebbs and flows, what it needs to sustain itself, in terms of physical sustenance, creativity, contact, solitude, rest, stimulation, comfort and exposure in equal measure. Squaring this with your absolute objectives, and endeavouring to provide those things in a rhythm that will work. It only took one hour of distraction, and my whole day would be off-kilter. Discipline (like marriage, apparently) is nothing but a long series of choosing to commit afresh, minute-by-minute.

When you trek in the jungle it takes days of hard slog just to clear a short path, and it frequently seems like you haven’t gotten anywhere. But once you’ve done it, every time you or anyone else walks it, it gets easier. Brain paths are the same. You can burn yourself out, phase into a fog or commit to providing a constant delicate balance.

Multimedia artist Laurie Anderson writes a funny true story here about the Dalai Lama, cappuccinos and harnessing the mind. Thanks to poet Kevin Griffin Moreno for sending me one of the best books of poetry ever, “What Book!?” (Parallax Press 1998).

Maybe I’d best get cracking? I have no motivation though. I used to be able to do an essay in a day, focus on it all day and that’d be it. Nowadays I get far too distracted far too easily, I don’t know what’s occuring. I think the more social I get as a person the more my attention span wanes and I go on facebook, check my phone and emails and go on MSN. I need to find the balance.

I watched a film the other night about Enid Blyton, imaginitvely called “Enid.” It was a good insight into the woman she actually was behind her books. I was a huuuuge fan of her books as a child, I read loads of them..and I still have loads of them. I never thought that she could be such a horrible woman though! She certainly wasn’t nice to her own children and was generally just quite self centred and horrid. It was a surprise.

Right, this essay needs doing. I’m gonna do it. No breaks or interruptions. Facebook is off, MSN is off, my phone is off. Go go go.

Howdy.

I have something to write about, but I won’t tonight. I’m pretty tired, and I want to give this very menial topic the full monty – by which I mean to do my absolute best with it, not strip naked for it.

See, I’m not even making any sense now. I think that I should go to bed soon.

But seriously, I promise that tomorrow’s post will be both long winded and of marginal worth.

Promise that you won’t get too excited.

One of the most value gifts you can give someone is your attention.  Think about the people you know that always seem the most popular.  They are the people who light up a room, who are well-liked and most personable.  Among other traits, most of them have one thing in common: they are good listeners.  What does that really mean?

Being a good listener means your attention is absolutely focused on the person in front of you, engaging fully.  Attention is like a mirror: you are presenting back to the speaker your absorption in what they are saying.  People love to talk about themselves and about their opinions.  When they have your complete attention, even for a short while, they come away feeling that you valued their comments and that even if you disagree, at least you let them present their story, viewpoint or observations. By extension, they come away feeling valued by you.

When your attention waivers, people notice.  They shut down because you are sending them a message that you don’t value their time.  In its essence, lack of attention boils down to this— as the Warden in the movie “Cool Hand Luke” said, “What we have here is a failure to communicate.”  Perhaps some examples might help at this point.

True Life Scenario No. 1: Revolving door office

You stop by an office-mate’s desk to share an idea.  You tell him it will only take two minutes.  He welcomes you in, but leaves the door open.  As you begin to speak, a person comes to the door and interrupts with a minor question.  Your office-mate stops to answer.  It only takes two minutes.  Then you begin again.

After two minutes, another person stops by with some papers to sign.  Your office-mate reads and signs the paper.  You begin again.  The phone rings.  Your office-mate answers.  It’s just a short call, about two minutes.

Then you begin again.  Then the office-mate’s email signals an incoming message.  He turns to his computer, reads the email.  It only takes a minute or two.  You begin again.  It’s now about ten minutes since you arrived for your two-minute chat.  You’ve restarted the conversation three or four times.  Mental note to email the office-mate instead of trying meet with him.  A week he later asks you why you haven’t stopped by to chat lately.

Has this happened to you?

What to do:

Devote your attention to the person speaking, whether it’s face-to-face or on the phone or in a conference.  In all these moments, you are there because you need to be.  Someone needs to tell you something valuable and they want you to absorb it, process it and sometimes to act on the topic.  It may be because YOU need to tell THEM something that they need to absorb and act upon.  So be polite, but close the door or turn to the person interrupting and ask if they can wait just a bit for you to finish your business.  Say it with a smile.  It’s not rude; it’s efficient use of time.

True Life Scenario No. 2: Trapped with the Boss

You get a call from the Boss.  “Please come upstairs to review the coming month’s projects.  Bring your folders.”  You grab your folders and go up to his penthouse office.  You take seat in front of his chic Art Deco desk and begin to review the materials.  The phone rings.  It’s his assistant with an important call.

You rise to leave, but he waves you back into your seat.  It will only take a few minutes.  As the call spirals out into different subjects, you attempt to maintain a demeanor of nonchalance—you’re not really paying attention or eaves-dropping on his phone call.  The call goes on and on. It’s a sunny day. Oh look, a bird flew by.

You attempt to leave again, mouthing “I’ll come back later.” He waves you back to your seat.  Almost done.  You re-read the materials, page by page.  You trace the woodwork with your eyes. You notice that one corner of the wallpaper, way up high, is coming unstuck.

He hangs up the phone and you look at your watch.  It’s been 45 minutes and you have not even spoken an entire sentence.  He has to leave for a lunch with a board member.  The meeting will have to be rescheduled.

When the rescheduled meeting takes place, he chides you for not meeting with him sooner.  You write a short story imagining his murder.

What to do:

When the important call comes, go ahead and leave the room.  Speak to the assistant and ask that you be called when the boss is really free to meet with you.

True Life Scenario No. 3: Emergency Solitaire

The company is in crisis.  It has just lost a crucial and lucrative piece of business–lost its biggest client.  The company might go under.  The executive team calls an emergency “all hands on deck” Saturday seminar meeting to save the company.  It’s the most important work you’ve been asked to do.  You prepare a brief PowerPoint presentation with ideas for new directions to pursue for new business.

The seminar is packed.  The 30 top executives of the company are on hand, as well as the genius founder.  “How we got here,” “What can we do now?” and “Where we’re going” are the mandates of the day.  Everyone understands the stakes.  This is a make-it-or-break-it moment.  The air is electrified.

During the morning session, you notice a colleague across the table intently working on her Palm Pilot.  It seems that she’s capturing everything, taking complete notes.  After lunch you change your seat and move next to her, thinking that she must be generating fabulous ideas to help save the company.

The meeting resumes.  Your colleague whips out her Palm Pilot again and begins again…to intently play Solitaire.  That’s what she’s been doing all day.  The next week several people comment to you that they saw her playing Solitaire and how disappointed they were.  You keep the comments to yourself. The company goes under anyway. The Solitaire-playing colleague jumps to the departing client. You join some coworkers at another firm, life goes on.

What to do:

It’s simple—turn off or at least silence cell phones during meetings, any meetings.  If you do it in movie theaters and you can do it for PEOPLE.

Do not surf the Web or fiddle with your computer or cell phone during meetings. If your instant messenger, your Twitter feed or your email signals you that “you’ve got mail” — just ignore it.

Another way to give better attention is to turn away from distractions like a TV or computer screen.  If you have a swivel monitor, rotate it away from view.  Or move your computer screen to a less obtrusive place.

Who knows, you may find that YOU get more out of meetings too.

PS: In future posts we’ll talk more about active listening skills and Feng Shui for your office.

“The real judges of your character aren’t your neighbors, your relatives, or even the people you play bridge with. The folks who really know you are waiters, waitresses, and clerks.” ~Katherine Piper

A La Mie by Toulouse-Lautrec

Don’t play this game. Don’t even start. Sure, it seems innocent. Friendly. Simple. Stupid, even. But it will waste your precious time. But maybe your time isn’t as precious as I make it out to be. And who am I to deprive you anyway? Do I think I’m the ruler of your pursuits? I’m not. So, go ahead, try it if you want.

Tumble Waiter Game – MostFunGames.com

Now, as a nice palate cleanser from that emotional outpouring, I present for your consideration Japan’s answer to the fleshlight: the Dick Blender!

I still can’t decide if this is simply terrifying or unimaginably awesome.

I don’t know about you, but I’ve wasted countless hours back in the good ol days of highschool, playing One Slime…as well as candystand mini golf and the other simple games that weren’t blocked by the school.

Now don’t try to tell me that employees weren’t wasting their time playing stupid games too.

Distractions on the internet have existed as long as the internet.

Today, our distraction is social media.  In college, I couldn’t go through a single day without checking up on facebook.  Today, if I go a day without twitter, I start to get dizzy and forget where I am.

Not so bad though if you ask me.  Compared to spending hours trying to beat that damn “Big Blue Boss” and his evil minion, the “Psycho Slime”, spending time throughout the day connecting with friends and strangers, sharing valuable or entertaining content, and spreading ideas seems like a big step in the right direction.

Perhaps companies shouldn’t be looking to eliminate the distraction that is social media.  By distraction standards, social media is a blessing.  Perhaps they should start looking into how they can use it to help the company.

pwned.

Wanting to disappear a little. Do you ever feel disconnected? Misunderstood? Missed in the night? Want to curl up with your manuscript and pull a blanket over your head and not come out for hours and hours except for dinner, and if dinner could be delivered to you under the blanket even better? Because most people don’t say what you want them to? Because you haven’t told them what to say? Because they can’t read your mind? Because they have better things to do? Because it’s Thursday? Because who knows if this is any good? Because wow, you sure hope it’s good? Because you don’t want to disappoint anyone? Most especially yourself? Because maybe the words’ll come faster this way? Because who knows why? Just because?

Yes? Then you understand.

Writers, we’re sensitive creatures. It’s hellishly annoying most days.

Something lighter for your plate today. Chef Mark Bittman (aka “The Minimalist”)—we like that—has some fantastic suggestions for easy cuisine to help make your Thanksgiving high on taste and low on hassle.

Now, if there was only such a recipe to make difficult family members behave themselves…

from The New York Times, November 18, 2009

“The Minimalist”

101 Head Starts on the Day

By MARK BITTMAN

FOR cooks, most Thanksgiving problems are brought about by the sheer number of dishes competing for the stove: It’s not easy to roast a turkey and sweet potatoes for 20 at the same time. The best solution is to make food in advance, like one of the dishes that follow.

Unlike my earlier 101 compendiums, this one has some recipes that take an hour or more. Still, most are pretty quick. Almost all can be served at room temperature, although the soups should be reheated. Salting to taste is always a given. And if I don’t specify a temperature, “roast” or “bake” means a 375-degree oven. (…)

This one should bring back some memories of recipes from the old Andy Williams Variety Show:

60. Marshmallow topping for adults: Roast or boil chunks of sweet potato, put them in an oiled baking dish, top with dots of cream cheese, and sprinkle with a mixture of brown sugar, chopped pecans and chopped fresh sage. Broil until lightly browned.

And last, but not least from Bittman, an ultra-minimal recipe:

101. Buy some cheese. Unwrap it and put it on a plate with some walnuts and fruit; let come to room temperature. Serve with good bread.

See the full article at: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/18/dining/18mini.html?_r=1&ref=dining&pagewanted=print

The deafening silence of my non-blogging is due, at least for the last five days, to my having been ill. One of those head-curdling, mucus-accumulating diseases that leave your brain feeling fully spongiform.  So what does one do?

Read, of course. I mean, hey, the text is dancing all over the page like a jittery addict learning the tarantella (and did you know that  the tarantula spider is not the source of the name of that dance? It’s from the city of Taranto in southern Italy, not the Lycosa tarantula, and it was the Mediterranean black widow, or Latrodectus tredecimguttatus, which was the spider responsible for biting farm workers and them needing to dance to sweat out the poison. I swear, I learn something new every single day… anyway…) and my brain can’t hold information because it’s too full of mucus, and if I keep my head in one place for too long my headache explodes when I do then move, BUT if I’m not up to doing anything else I absolutely refuse to just lie around and NOT read.

So I read. And because I couldn’t settle to one thing for too long, I read a couple of different things concurrently. And now my head is fully saturated with reading and they are something of a jumble. I think there were some good books in there, but I may have to wait until I’m absolutely over this cold before I can separate the neural strands to remember what each individual book was like.

Public speaking is not always the standing presentation in front of a room full of people.  Last week I conducted some presentations with 1 and 2 people in a room. For me, these presentations are often the most difficult. I prefer a larger room. More energy to connect to. More eyes.

In the smaller room there are a lot more distractions as well.  If my audience of one decides to do something else besides listen…well, my presentation just got a lot more difficult — and energy depleting.

One presentation stood out. I was cut off after 2 minutes. The listener had his own agenda: a list of things that, as I discovered later, were on his mind well before I got there. This is why public speaking is a ‘here and now’ exercise.  Difficult to prepare for being cut off after 2 minutes because of an agenda I was unaware of. Energy is everything.

The person I was speaking to (or trying to) had just come out of a high stress meeting an hour before I met him. He had a lot on his mind. Very distracted. One of the first points I raised was something similar to an issue he recently had. This set him off. Not in a bad way, just in a way that cut short what I was trying to put across. The presentation went way off track and didn’t return to its original point — the one that I had envisioned before I got there. The one that I prepared for.

A bad thing? Not really. In fact, it probably worked out better than I thought because I have another meeting scheduled with him and 2 of his colleagues. That is definitely something I didn’t prepare for! But, like the first meeting, the energy that shows up to our next session will be key to how the meeting unfolds. I can control the energy to a point — enthusiasm, inspiration, finding the eyes, sharing a story — but energy exchange is a 2-way street…there will be a lot of traffic coming my way.

If you’re cut off after 2 minutes think of it as a chance to evaluate the audience — even if that audience is just one person. Observe the mood, the energy and see where it can take the rest of the meeting. Lots of positive things can happen after 2 minutes.

Enjoy!

There’s something wonderful about silence. In our modern lives, we so seldom have any of it. When was the last time you did anything — other than see a movie in a theater–without some additional soundtrack–no traffic, no talk radio, no music, no cellphones.  Silence, or at least some muted-volume version of life, is for me way up there as a much valued commodity, which no one has enough of, but is often under-valued. The original TV show “Get Smart” had a silly device for secret conversations between Maxwell Smart and the Chief called the “Cone of Silence.” It always cracks me up, but it makes a point: there are times when you just need some silence.

Story time

Let me paint you a picture. As a freshman at University of Texas at Austin, I lived in the Jester dorm (a somewhat ironic title, but the actual name of the place, no joke)–ten floors, 3,000 of your best friends.  Consequently it was very noisy and I found it hard to sleep, having grown up in what by comparison was the ultra-quiet suburbs. The freshmen neighbors with whom I shared a wall were fond of cranking their music after midnight. I like music, and I like loud music–a lot–but I also realized that I would not be able to survive and thrive on less than 4 hours of sleep each night.  My neighbors also had a habit of bouncing a rubber ball, a Spaldeen to be exact, against the wall at random hours of the day or night. Try reading or sleeping with “pah, dah, pause, dah, pah, pause” –wall, floor, catch, floor, wall, catch–for an hour. (Side note:  neither of these “party hearty” guys made it to sophomore year, but I digress.)

To cope with this noise level, I bought a pair of good headphones, not ear buds, full enclosed earphones. With them on, I could hear practically nothing of the outside noise. Even better, with the Classical FM station on low volume, wearing these in bed at night was something akin to an isolation chamber, but without the mind- and body-altering effects as seen in the 1980 sci-fi/cult/schlock film “Altered States,” in which William Hurt is magically transformed into a caveman by peyote.  With the headphones on, I slept well, passed my classes, graduated and went on the graduate school.

Story No.2

Later in life, I began to work more seriously as a professional writer and editor. I edited a few big books (100,000+ words) for an art museum, reviewing and revising the work of university professors and museum curators. At the same time, I set up a home office and began to work on projects there.  At the time, my kids were little and everyone who has kids knows that containing their volume at home is not really possible without Draconian measures. I remembered my college  strategy for coping with noise, but writing with music on proved too distracting. So I got a pair of ear protectors, like the ones used on a shooting range or flight line. When I put them on I would tell my wife, “I’m going into the ‘Cone of Silence’ for about an hour, so if you need to talk to me about anything important, please come see me face-to-face.” That worked, mostly. It required some give-and-take from all concerned. (In the interest of full disclosure, I am sorry to confess that this spillage of my work obligations into my personal life did not help my parenting or my marriage.)

But the main point is this: sometime you may need to establish your own Cone of Silence to deal with distractions. In the office, I’ve seen people use headphones in cube-land. For those that have an office door, just close it when you need to focus, and to be polite, put a sign outside that says simply “Please knock.” People will realize that you are working on something for which you need to focus and they will generally save non-essential interruptions for a time when your door is open.

For many writers, artists, graphic/web designers and even some computer programmers, they require a quiet place to work, apart from coworkers or family. That’s why people who have the means have private offices within their homes or a shack in the country. In some big cities, there are businesses where you rent a desk. Ginny Wiehardt, a Fiction Writing Guide at About.com, has posted a list of such places around the nation and the world at http://fictionwriting.about.com/od/startingtowrite/tp/urbanspaces.htm (thanks Ginny!) The key point here is that carving out a place and time to focus is a universal desire that you share with many other people.

You just have to make a step forward to try. Try headphones, ear protectors, a private room, a rental desk. The main things is to afford yourself a Cone of Silence that works for you. Send more ideas and examples!!

The bed. The upcoming movie opening for Twilight: New Moon. Grey’s Anatomy episodes. The radio. People talking outside the room. The TV. Facebook. The bed. The TV. The boyfriend. The peeling nail polish on my toes. The split ends. The magazines. The bed. The TV. Facebook. More Facebook stalking.

I don’t know about you, but as the big F, Finals that is, approaches with each passing day, breathing heavily down my neck, more oppressing and ominous than a serial killer on a B-grade summer horror blockbuster, the more I’m distracted. Everything seems to be distracting. It’s like a virus. First it passes you before your eyes. Then it settles quietly on your fingertips. And then, before you know it, it creeps up into your mind and poisons you….its toxic cells multiplying insidiously throughout your grey matter until it fills every corner with everything un-academic imaginable. What do you call this? I’m not even a senior yet, and I am officially suffering from the seasonal college affliction of senioritis.

Made plans for the winter holidays? Check. Made a shopping list for winter and next spring’s wardrobe? Check. Pedicure? Check. Replied to all incoming emails? Check. Downloaded the latest episode of Grey’s Anatomy? Check.

Piles and piles of untouched reading assignments? Yet to be checked.

Number of days to the Big F. Five. (Oh, how convenient, Five with a capital F.)

And then I am reminded of my responsibilities as a college student, this is my calling, my destiny, my duty. I am here because I am meant to study. Because I can. And I am not about to throw it all away because of my struggle to focus. And as though this is not enough, I remind myself of that annoying pimply-faced kid in my Natural Hazards class (or, don’t you wanna know I’m talking about you?) who (almost) said pointedly in my face that I don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t know what I’m doing? Well, I will show you.

Ahh, that was easy, wasn’t it? Now watch me roar. And strut down the examination hall looking cute and in style at that.