Geoff's Miscellany

Miscellaneous Musings

Autobiography

2020 Has Been a Big Year or I Finally Quit

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I finally quit school. I won’t say I left teaching.

Callings stick with us forever. Every dad is a teacher.

I taught for a long time, even became an administrator.

I taught Biblical studies, Latin, Greek, Geometry, Statistics, Algebra 2, Pre-Algebra, Logic, Public Speaking, Introduction to Computer Programming, and Strength and Conditioning. In college I taught introduction to systematic theology and the history of Christianity in the United States.

I had fun.

In my initial plan, I was going to take Lambda school courses at night and apply for a new job in the Spring and make next year my last. I mentioned this to a friend who’s the VP of a software company. He called me the next day and said I should just quit teaching now and to expect an offer. Anyway, I did. Because my attention and focus is less diffuse, I actually have more time to be a classicist and a lot of folks at the company are pretty entrepreneurial outside of work, but they also like what we do because it’s an unexpectedly important contribution. So over all, it’s been a great place to work. By a strange coincidence (providence? always) one of my colleagues worked on the same project as my dad in Singapore in the 80s, though they never met.

Anyway, one of these days I’ll post a list of things that need optimization in the classical Christian high school education domain. I’ve observed many dozens of these over the years and used to spend many hours every week puzzling over how to do it. I still do as the homeschooling of my children occupies my mind constantly.

I will say this one thing: my main preference in my current job over my previous on is this: I get to solve real problems as they come up. Here’s what I mean. I solve problems that really matter for peoples’ emotional well-being in jobs that use our software. This means that we even provide for their physical safety. The problems are real problems.

In education, you really want to solve real problems. Here’s the most-real problem of education: how to you pass down a tradition of habits that includes a body of skills and knowledge to a group of people with diverse family structures and backgrounds while still teaching individuals think logically and independently from the masses, particularly when mass media culture occupies so much of the time of the young? It’s a serious problem and it matters.

You often end up solving made-up problems instead: a new seminar invents a new method, a new paper-work, or a new “thing” and your whole workflow has to conform to it so you suss . In other words, the chief problem of education: “how can we create a curriculum that delivers the most important skills, knowledge, and experiences of the past in a way that meets the needs of individual students and their families” is often interrupted by, accreditation guidelines, dress-code minutiae, or a small-rudder on a big ship mindset where no agility is allowed.

2020 has been a big year for me. I got the strongest I’ve ever been, got the sickest I’ve ever been (lost 17 pounds in 14 days and all my gainz), switched careers, bought a house, probably had Covid-19 in January, and probably some other items I’ve left out.

Anyway, even though I work more hours now, I’ll probably have more time to contribute to my own blog. Or maybe not. But I hope to.

Hedonism, Love, and Goodness

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The things that shape who we are and how we think are pluriform and sometimes mysterious. This is especially so in the age of the internet stuff that may disappear forever after you read it. Every once in a while, the Internet sends it back to you.

Around 2008-2009, I was quite depressed. And while I was still known for being a social butterfly at work and school, and many people even called me for advice (I remember distinctly two women with doctorates in psychology contacting me for relationship advice), I was languishing. There are probably three main reasons for this:

  1. Many of my friends had moved away, gotten married, or achieved opportunities I had never managed.
  2. I worked between 3-5 part time jobs to pay for grad school at any moment and so I got very little exercise or sun light. My academic nature and lack of sleep made it easy to substitute books for exercise. I also couldn’t afford a gym membership anywhere except a giant mega-gym that operated like a night club and prohibited squats, chalk, and grunting.
  3. I was lovelorn. During this time period, I fell in love, really hard, with two women. And because of that I felt like I had lost every ounce of the charm that had helped me make friends and ask girls on dates effortlessly before that. It was like I developed a speech impediment or a sudden physical handicap when I communicated with either of these women.

Essentially, because of certain failures of courage, mindset management, and personal care, I found myself ignored by women right during the stage of my life in which I had subconsciously decided to get married.*

Now, during this time, I had gotten really into reading Hans Balthasar, and I read his book Love Alone is Credible.

I searched online for any commentary on the book and found a quote on a blog [utterly devoid of theological interest in the academic sense], lost to the sands of time, “Never compromise on love. It’s the only thing that isn’t bullshit.” I’ve since found the blog through a retweet of the quote with a link to the 2008 post. It’s a great quote (the other material from the post varies in quality), and while the author clearly means erotic love, the point still stands. But, as any depressed person would do, I read other another post from the blog. The other post I read was about the author’s personal philosophy. That was relevant, since I was a seminary student working at a corporate coffee shop and therefore talking to atheistic armchair philosophers all the time. The author advocated a godless hedonism:

Imagine you had incontrovertible proof that there was no afterlife. No supernatural entities. No heaven or hell. No otherworld. No reincarnation. No forevermore.

No second chances.

Imagine there was no moral accounting after death of your actions on earth. No supreme being to judge your soul’s worth on the scale of divine justice. No reward or punishment. No appeal to omniscient authority in matters of good and evil.

There was only the endless black void at the moment death. The infinite silence. A complete surrender of your consciousness as the last pinprick of light extinguishes. All your thoughts, your feelings, your sensation, your memories… you… wiped away clean to merge with the great nothing.

How would you live? Given this proof of the finality of death, and of the expectation of nothing once dead, what is your personal philosophy?  

-@heartiste

His answer to the thought experiment is this:

My answer to the philosophical question I posed above is hedonism. It is the only rational conclusion one can draw faced with the premises I presented. When there is no second life or higher power to appease; when our lives are machines — complex misunderstood machines cunningly designed to conceal the gears and pulleys behind a facade of self-delusional sublimation, but machines nonetheless — grinding and belching the choking gritty smoke of status-whoring displays in service to our microscopic puppetmasters… well, there can be only one reasonable response to it all. It makes no sense to behave any other way unless you never questioned the lies.

-heartiste

My own answer to the thought experiment is that if I try to imagine the world without meaning he described (advocated?), I come up blank. Why? If love isn’t bullshit, then there is meaning beyond the chemical soup and system of mechanical pulleys and levers he imagines us to be.

Indeed, if love bears the marks of a single aspect of life that isn’t bullshit, isn’t a lie, and is worth pursuing, then the matter of meaningless matter must be questioned. Is life actually meaningless or is this feeling of melancholy a salve for my own conscience? Perhaps the lie is that we’re just machines of no consequence in a heartless universe. If love isn’t bullshit, it’s implied that love is true and if truth is real, then perhaps beauty and goodness are real, too. This is an important implication, for if truth, goodness, and beauty are real, then it is perhaps the case that pleasures beyond the reach of mere physical pleasure exist. Pleasure is a good, but what happens when the intellect attains to beholding goods beyond the mere stimulation of dopamine and serotonin? And what of beauty? Love entails beauty. If there is transcendent beauty, enjoying it may require that we move beyond the mere act of feeling momentary pleasure.

Ultimately, if it’s true that love really isn’t bullshit, then the meaningless universe is opened to the possibility that there is meaning in the universe rather than artificially imposed upon it by our illusory consciousness (if you’re conscious of your consciousness being illusory, what is what of what?).

Love truly is not bullshit. And neither is the cosmos.

*Note: After I went through a fairly rigorous period of trying to improve myself, I did end up getting married and love, indeed, is not bullshit.

On Being a Person of Size

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Few realize the effort it takes to rebel against the oppressive spectre of obeso-normativity. To exist as a person of size is to be under constant threat of being appropriated into size-sameness.

But I will #resist. America is full of folks of cis-weight homogeneity. But I wish for America to be weight diverse. 

I’m for an America of people of multiple BMI ratings and where you can identify with whichever BMI you please. 

Today, I admit, I am a person of size. 

33 years and 33 thoughts

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Here are 33 thoughts for my 33rd birthday. These are some of the ideas that have been in my head over the past year. You could think of it as instructions to my younger self. But it’s not merely that, as a great deal of it is just what occupied my mind this past year. A great deal of it will come across as didactic, but my job is telling people how to find their best self and giving them steps to get to it, so I don’t care.

  1. Learn the difference between what you can control and what you cannot and meticulously curate your inner life around recognizing that distinction. I have years and years of bad habits of thought based around, not taking responsibility for things beyond my control, but feeling responsible for them. There is a difference. One can choose to maintain or repair a car (taking responsibility), one cannot choose when accidents or natural disasters occur (for which one might feel responsible and therefore sad, anxious, whatever).
  2. Every moment is a gift. I’ve never suffered the way some have suffered. But my life has had it’s share of intense physical anguish as well as long term constant, dull, depressing, and demotivating pain, interrupted by bouts of intense discomfort. The idea that some events are truly evil and ought not be is difficult to reconcile with every moment being a gift, but both are true and until you learn to see things this way, it’s easy to be miserable with your lot, especially the moments beyond your control.
  3. Read broadly and carefully. Sometimes I go through phases of rushing through books and skim reading. It’s such times that I’m reading too much and should slow down.
  4. But don’t read all the time. Sometimes you need to engage in actual thought, not guided by another, and consider an issue. As a young man I discovered the cosmological argument this way sitting in a parking lot by myself staring at the night sky from the back of a truck before I ever heard of Aquinas or Aristotle.
  5. Unless your goal is to be an academic who writes often, don’t read about everything that interests you. There is only so much time and the world needs doers, not just thinkers.
  6. If you’re a Christian who can read, there is no excuse to not read the Bible daily, especially the Psalms, Proverbs, and the Gospels.
  7. If you’re a Christian who is especially interested in studying the Bible at a young age, do not let a youth minister convince you that this is a good time to consider Bible college.
  8. With that in mind, one should never major in something the purpose of which is to automatically be “in charge” of others or an institution upon leaving college. Either go right to work or major in something that forces you to acquire concrete skills for helping others.
  9. Along the same lines, if you’re sure that you were called into the ministry, major in something definitely helpful to others (maybe even trade school) and take some Greek/Hebrew courses to help you understand the Bible. Then go to church for a few years as an adult rather than figuring Bible college taught you everything (which is didn’t) and that you have the best ideas (you don’t) with which to remake a church in your image. The same is true among secular people who major in activist fields. Ayaan Hirsi Ali said it best, “Many students comes to me full of wonderful intentions hoping to change the world; they plan to spend their time helping the poor and disadvantaged. I tell them first to graduate and make a lot of money, and only then figure out how best to help those in need. Too often students can’t meaningfully help the disadvantaged now, even if it makes them feel good for trying to. I have seen so many former students in their late 30s and 40s struggling to make ends meet. They spent their time in college doing good rather than building their careers and futures. I warn students today to be careful how they spend their precious time and to think carefully about when it is the right time to help. It’s a well-worn cliché, but you have to help yourself before you help others. This is too often lost on idealistic students.”
  10. Take care of your body when you’re young. I lifted weights, ran, and did martial arts but frequently ate food that was affordable rather than healthy. I’m still paying for doing that trade incorrectly even now, despite having a low body fat percentage and remaining strong.
  11. Don’t make drinking “your thing.” I never did this, but I observed and known many who did. I’ve seen folks post on online that they drank themselves into a stupor over a political election (see point one again).
  12. Don’t make politics “your thing.” Human are inherently tribal. How you vote has effects on your tribe. So be educated, but your tribe is your thing. The last thing you need to do is alienate yourself from people near to you (you can control this) because you’re concerned about events you cannot control. It’s okay to be involved in politics, but politics on the grand scale is not your family or your tribe. Jesus said to seek first the kingdom of God and its righteousness. This means the wellbeing of the church around you (that’s what his kingdom is) and the highest standard of character you can imagine for yourself (based on God’s word, of course).
  13. Always have people in your life you can look to as teachers, examples, companions, and beneficiaries.
  14. On the other hand, be careful of having somebody become “your guy” that you go to for your thought. One can learn a lot from Jordan Peterson, but he’s wrong about a lot of things. One can learn a lot from Aristotle, but he’s wrong about a lot of things.
  15. If you want to avoid the deceitfulness of riches, spend a period of time seriously studying money, learning to save, manage accounts, and invest. By learning that money is a means that can be manipulated by choices, lost instantly, and has no intrinsic value can help you avoid making it a life goal, lifestyle, or a god.
  16. Build your career before you build your house. Pay for the lessons before the television, plant your crops before you paint the bedroom, and learn your craft before you buy your wine (Proverbs 24:27).
  17. Get your sense of offense under control. Like the poem says, “IF you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you, If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, But make allowance for their doubting too; If you can wait and not be tired by waiting, Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies, Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
    And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise…” People will do bad things do you, but it’s no reason to lose emotional or moral control.
  18. Don’t waste your time with toxic people. For some, especially Christians, this can feel judgmental. But if you’re not somebody’s pastor, counselor, or parent there’s very little you could realistically do by letting them waste your time. It “feels like” ministry or service to let folks like this waste your time, but it’s really a desire to not be known for hurting people’s feelings. You wouldn’t wear ugly clothes if they were lying around, you wouldn’t drink nasty water if it was in your favorite cup, you probably wouldn’t eat garbage food if you found it in your fridge. Why would you spend time with somebody who is corrosive to your character and goals?
  19. Write every day, but don’t make it public. Writing helps your thoughts get to a place where you can examine them. Make task lists. Write ideas. It’s worthwhile. I keep a pocket notebook and when I turn a page I write “Ideas” on the left page and “tasks” on the right with the date in the middle. This way I can write down anything that comes to mind or needs to be finished before I relax in the evening.
  20. It’s stupid not to believe in God. From a risk-assessment angle, this is obvious. But it’s also true from a Platonic point of view. But just as stupid as it is not to believe in God it is also stupid not to show gratitude (see above). The problem for many people is that they attempt to have gratitude for being, consciousness, and bliss but they cannot because they do not think of God as the giver of all three.
  21. Your perceptions are part of the whole of reality, but they may not reflect reality outside of your head. Judge them accordingly.
  22. Jesus retired by 30, started a second career as an itinerant preacher, theologian, philosopher, and folk healer. But by 30 he was a master of his religious traditions and apparently had resources aplenty for his mother, brothers, and sisters to be cared for. He also had a reputation for his craft as a he traveled about. There’s a lesson in this.
  23. God is the source of all discrete entities. God is also the unity between them. God is distinct from all discrete entities. All discrete entities obtain their existence by relying on God. By creating, the God in whom all things have their being becomes a being among beings. Nature not only implies the existence of God. Nature herself implies the fact of God’s incarnation.
  24. While I mentioned caring for your family and tribe above, it’s important to have a big vision (I know, that involves some politics). Think about the whole of civilization. Having a child makes you care more about your tribe and family but also the larger future. Caring about where you leave your shopping cart and whether you throw garbage on the road is a prerequisite to inventing the space program and modern medical science.
  25. Having a child makes it easier for you to be unexpectedly harsh with people or animals that may be a threat.
  26. Having a child makes it easier for you to show compassion to very unappealing people because you see the chain of cause and effect from bad parenting, circumstances, and genetics.
  27. When you get older you’re fine with apparent inconsistencies like this.
  28. Family devotions make life all the sweeter. It’s sad when I find out that people have never had such an experience.
  29. Having a weekly or bi-weekly marriage meeting is a powerful experience because it depersonalizes some of the challenges of marriage and creates an “official time/space” for problem solving and planning without fighting. It also creates a time to revisit specific moments for which you appreciate each other.
  30. Masculinity and femininity are real, even if expressed differently in different people. Learn these polarities in yourself and in your partner. Don’t let people treat you as though you’re what you aren’t. Don’t treat your wife like one of the guys. Don’t expect your husband to be a perfect lady.
  31. Starting without a plan is way better than never starting anything. My whole life I’ve liked to plan everything I do with minute detail. But for larger projects with many moving parts these detailed plans remain unfinished and the project remains unfinished or worse, never started. It also increases the cost of obstacles. When one plans too thoroughly, roadblocks become irrecoverable.
  32. The Internet is filled with pointless rabbit holes. If you love knowledge, you can find a reason to distract yourself from any computerized project. It’s important to use a timer when you get online. On the one hand, I learned to manage my arthritis, improved my Greek and Hebrew, cured my heartburn, and learned options trading using the Internet. On the other hand, I know too much trivia about favorite movies, old video games, dead programming languages, unusual conspiracy theories (a favorite hobby of mine), and meaningless intra-blogger drama.
  33. Time is limited but every moment can be redeemed. This is Paul’s testimony. It is also the wisdom of the Psalms. Jesus died at 33, taking responsibility for the moral and spiritual evils of the entire human race. And I think that subjective and objective meaning can be found in life to the degree that a man takes responsibility for things. That’s how we redeem the time. We take ownership of its passing and the events that float upon its surface into our sphere.

What I’ve Learned from Jordan Peterson

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I’ve come to appreciate Jordan Peterson. It’s rare for me to find a recent scholar from whom I learn more than one or two important things. Peterson is an exception. 

Edit: Everything I’ve said below remains true, but as I read Peterson’s books and listened to some of his podcasts, I realized that there were things going on with his worldview and poltical aims that were unsavory to say the least. I’ll leave the post up in the interests of showing that you can learn from people with whom you radically disagree.

Here are some of the main lessons I’ve learned from him: 

Practically Speaking

  1. A key practice for good teaching is getting students to envision their future selves and the steps necessary to get there.
  2. Try to think of five good reasons to make any decision you make. I tried to do the opposite as well, try to find several good reasons reject an idea or not do something. As an aside, offering as many good arguments as possible is not good rhetoric.
  3. Remember that you’re a loaded gun, especially around children. This makes you circumspect about your words and actions. Somebody who knows that “I’m the sort of creature who might shake a baby unless I take steps to not do that” is less likely to shake a baby.
  4. In conflict with a partner (romantic, co-worker, etc), agree to say what you think the other person is saying to their satisfaction before you respond. This forces everybody to be clear and ensures everybody is on roughly the same page (this is actually from Carl Rogers, but Peterson reminded me of it).

Academically/Philosophically

  1. His paper on goal setting interventions helped me clarify the process I use to get my students to take ownership of their educations. I used to have them do a ‘diligence audit.’ I would ask them to look at their habits as though they were a third person advisor and describe where they will take them if they continue on the path they’re on. Then I would ask them to imagine who they would like to be by the end of a semester and to write the habits that would help them get there. Finally, I would have them write what they should do to gain those habits. Peterson’s paper showed me that this practice really has helped people and his self-authoring exercise helped me aim my questions more effectively. 
  2. Peterson, in some places, hits the Cain and Abel story exactly correctly, which is rare. Peterson regularly utilizes that story to remind people of the importance of cleaning their rooms and organizing their habits around the good instead of around their immediate desires, but even that way of saying things fits with the idea that Cain and Abel are archetypes at the bottom of the whole Biblical narrative. Jewish writers like Yoram Hazony have made this point for years, as did Philo of Alexandria two thousand years ago. 
  3. Peterson helped revive Jung for me, particularly the idea of the archetypes. This was significant because I needed to understand the relationships between the symbolic overlay that human beings use to interpret the world and the innate nature of the world itself. A combination of Jung, Husserl, and Aristotle helped me see that. But if it weren’t for a footnote where Dallas Willard mentioned Jung, I would have never listened to Peterson after I found that paper of his, because I was prejudiced against Jung. 
  4. In Eric Johnson’s Foundations for Soul Care: A Proposal for Christian Psychology, there’s a throwaway line about the value of evo-psych for Christian counselors because of the information they provide about mating patterns. I didn’t dispute that and even read a lot of evo-psych over the last decade, but Peterson helped me see how the Biblical material intersects with those claims. Whether his model of concordance is ultimately accurate is a question to consider, but it is definitely pragmatically accurate. 

Peterson is Wrong About:

  1. Peterson defines truth as “that which leads to survival.” Now, almost any atheist-evolutionist is kind of stuck here. But most will just be inconsistent and accept a correspondence theory of truth “truth is what you believe when your beliefs match the world outside of your mind.” Of course, there is also “provisional truth” or beliefs that are useful enough to aim you at truth, goodness, and beauty despite not being strictly or literally accurate. I’ve read some who call such truths “metaphorical truths.” But Peterson seems to collapse all truth claims into “metaphorical truth.”
  2. Peterson thinks that group-identity of any sort is wrong. But this is silly. We’re genetically predisposed to treat family like our in-group, we sort ourselves by geography, ideology, preferences, family, and so-on. Peterson himself thinks that biological sex determines one’s personal identity, and while male/female isn’t a group in the same way that family, nation, church, or club are, it is still a describable group into which one fits and among whom one can seek excellence. 
  3. Peterson is wrong to think that radical individualism is a viewpoint that can mediate between the insurmountable differences between the mass of Islamic migrants and the anemic atheistic post-Christianity of Europe. It won’t work, but he’s nevertheless worked on the UN report, “Resilient People, Resilient Planet: A Future Worth Choosing.” It counsels, among other things, achieving equality of outcome (a process Peterson usually claims to oppose) and moving people to plant-based diets (citing false datapoints about water usage in animal farming). Peterson, btw, now eats carnivorously, so perhaps he no longer agrees with other elements of the report.

How I Escape the Dungeon

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Everybody finds themselves in the dungeon from time to time. It’s that place where you feel like progress is impossible or meaningless, like you’ve gone too far in a wrong direction, or that there’s no such thing as the right direction. It’s so weird, because it feels like the same place no matter where you are. Sometimes, just being a person gets you down. The stresses of parenthood, the anxiety of being single, the Sisyphean task of making/spending money, the frustrations of work, feeling stuck at a job you hate, feeling like important tasks are undone, and dealing with other people. All of these together can make you feel like just getting out of bed is a chore. How do I escape? Here’s my get out of the dungeon plan, in the form of questions, when everything comes together to make me feel staying in bed all day:

  1. Have I been to the gym more than twice in the past seven days?
    For men, being strong helps you feel engaged in the world and gives you a sense of personal dominance over nature in a way that does not contradict nature. The weight room is a place where a man gains Marcus Aurelius’ mindset: “Our inward power, when it obeys nature, reacts to events by accommodating itself to what it faces…what is thrown atop the flame is absorbed, consumed by it – and makes it burn still higher. (M. Aurelius 4.1)” Being stronger is obviously useful for women, too. 
  2. Do I engage in daily exercise (push-ups, squats, calf-raises, stretches, etc) upon waking?
    There are a minimum of three exercises I try to do in the mornings, when I’m planning my life well, the list is longer and includes stretches and joint mobility exercises that vastly improve my arthritis pain. If I’m feeling down, I almost certainly stopped doing them days ago.
  3. What am I eating lately?
    If I base my diet around meat, eggs, cheeses, and vegetables I’ll feel better. If I’m eating sweets, breads, and even too much fruit, I start to feel worse. My family tree has some diabetes, so I suspect that my body just isn’t meant for sweets more than one or two days a week.
  4. How am I managing my sleep?
    If I’m sleeping 6-9 hours a night I’m feeling great. If I sleep 9 hours too many nights in a row, I start feeling more sleepy all day. But if I sleep less than 6, then I’m a wreck. Chances are, if I’m feeling down, I’m not managing my sleep well.
  5. Am I thinking about the past?
    Sometimes I think a lot about elements of my past that went poorly and I just replay them over and over. This strategy literally does nothing to improve my lot. But when focus on improving the quality of my work, of my relationships, of my knowledge, and of my skill-base now, then I start to feel better. It’s funny how whether it’s inside or out, complaining does nobody any good unless we voice it in prayer.
  6. Am I obsessing over something I cannot change?
    Many fantasize about a job they wish they had but don’t. If it’s changeable, change it. On the other hand, many have children for whom provision is necessary. Such parents cannot change their job, yet. So, they shouldn’t fantasize all day about where they aren’t (if they wish to feel good). In my case, because of the nature of my job, I’ll think myself into a funk by thinking about my job. As a teacher I want my students to choose well. It’s difficult to watch some of them choose poorly. But what I can change is the quality of my teaching, the content of my courses, and whether I teach in a manner that is pleasant for my students and myself. Others may do this to themselves with politics, economics, sports teams, and so-on.
  7. Am I taking my religious duties seriously?
    When I’m regularly participating in leisure time centered around Bible study, actively putting Jesus’ words into practice at work, in my family life, and in how I spend my money, and when I’m participating in the life of the church I feel better. There is less moral incongruity. I feel connected to the foundation of reality.
  8. Am I keeping track of my blessings?
    The old song says, “count your blessings…see what God has done.” People might think it’s cheesy or stupid, but they probably live their lives miserably. In the morning and before bed, when I think of specific blessings for which I am thankful, I feel better in between. Another step might be to declare the steadfast love of the Lord in the morning. Wake up and say, “Jesus loves me and gave himself up for me” or “God so loved the world that he have his only begotten son.” If you’re not a Christian or not religious, are you filling that psychological gap with something?
  9. What are my priorities?
    When I make my main goals in life virtue, the well-being of my family, and my health, then I tend to function more joyfully. If I make my goals financial, task based, or too far into the future, then I get down.