Man that ayyyyy lmao meme is exactly what I’ve needed. Understanding things conceptually is good and all, but the image of the whirlpool and the hydra make it easier for me to remember I hang out around that hydra too much and my life could use more whirlpool :)
OK now i think this meme goes even deeper and has more levels to it than i first realized. It almost works as like, a really simplified internal map of the relationship between attitude and experience.
The whirlpool and the hydra are both tools you can use!
The direction of the wirlpool is such that, when you're about halfway between it and the hydra, it acts like a stream carrying you along. The challenge here is, 'don't get too far ahead of yourself'. What you don't really want to do is taken for a ride _around_ the whirlpool, but even if you do, hey, it's fine, you ended up more or less where you started. The whirlpool represents the cyclical nature of the universe, which will both lift you up and tear you down over time.
I've found if i try too hard, for example, like really push myself for an afternoon, i go through a psychological pattern that feels like 'taking a trip around the whirlpool' - i get burned out, feel down, want to take a break and veg out, and then eventually i feel better. If I try to fight this process, it generally takes a bunch of energy and doesn't do a whole lot. If I just _accept_ that i'm burned out, it's fine, i pushed myself too hard, it's sort of like swinging in closer to the black hole at the center. The trip around becomes shorter and i'm back again in no time.
I think the hydra has a different purpose; it helps you experience death and therefore rebirth. The hydra tearing you apart allows you to die to the aspects of yourself that weren't really working, so you can then strengthen the parts that are.
I was about to write up a longer post on this but wanted to share the thought with you first; i don't want to 'scoop' you if you're still planning on writing this thing up, and also on a practical note i don't have the image without words on it. Any thoughts? Do you mind if i write this up into a full on post and link it here?
I can't tell you how reassuring it is to see a writer you admire and enjoy grappling with familiar problems. It's a celebration of the half-baked, and I can't wait to read these as they come into fruition
My list of essays and pieces that I want to write is SO LONG. It’s not so much that I’m putting them off, it’s that I’m focused on finishing the book of memoir now more than ever, and so all of these other things are sitting in the stew pot, stewing, cooking, bubbling away. I know some of them will get overcooked, some won’t be worth eating—and many will still be there for me when I come back to them. It’s frustrating, it’s tempting, it crowds my mind, but it’s also reassuring, exciting, and gratifying to feel so many ideas swirling around. I know that I don’t have any shortage of things that I want to write about.
Thanks for writing this. Just discovered your Stack and subscribed.
My memoir in progress and quite a few essays as well ⬇️
> know some of them will get overcooked, some won’t be worth eating—and many will still be there for me when I come back to them. It’s frustrating, it’s tempting, it crowds my mind, but it’s also reassuring, exciting, and gratifying to feel so many ideas swirling around
Love it! Just finished Tiago’s book last night, and this post feels right in line with some of the advice in there. Make *something* and share it as early as possible. Looking forward to seeing these essays materialize (in whatever form).
Just read this since you emailed your book buyers about writing essays again and woosh, gotta say I felt a rush reading your ideas here. There are plenty in that list that I know I would savour reading, so I hope you'll fight the resistance, poke around these reified spaghetti monsters, and publish them essays.
Also, I share a similar anguish about what to write (so many!) but I feel like I'm still a step or two behind your level of reasoning and breadth and depth of knowledge. Nevertheless, I'm publishing a mini-essay once a week and keeping at it so that I'll improve and deliver some of the good stuff eventually.
I love your essay ideas and would love to see them come into existence.
Another essay I think you’d do uniquely well on is something like: “How to negotiate with your self”
I find that you’re doing that really well here. No doubt part of it is from your experience journaling, word vomiting and youtube riffing!
Practically (on difficulty writing/publishing): I know you have Pressfield’s War of Art (I read parts of it from time to time when I struggle with my creative output), maybe read a few pages of it before every moment you want to write.
In any case, keep channeling the magical junkyard 🧙🏼♂️!
Thx Jibran! I basically wrote an entire book about "How to negotiate with yourself", that's basically what Introspect is about 😅 it's definitely a challenge to try and condense it into an essay, and I will be attempting it several times along the way, I'm sure
Ah, I haven’t gotten introspect yet! Did get FAN. (But I also see in your Gumroad email just now that Introspect is the better of the two! 😉)
Please do write the condensed version in essays, would love to read your attempts over the years (and see them get better/change with your perspective).
(accidentally didn't comment under this reply at first)
i’m here for the half-baked ideas! i’m glad you decided to share this despite it not being the perfect essay you had expected of yourself. what i enjoy second most (the most being the proposed essays themselves) is your ability to describe so well what and where you’re stuck. this expression of self-perception is really enlightening. thx for sharing.
I feel like I'm in the front row of the making of... all this, and it's exciting! relating with this process a lot, especially with the bit where it feels like a lot of these essay ideas need time, now that you've identified the whats and where you're stuck and also how it feels to write! ugh, I love to go wherever 'em words take me even though some landings are rough, uncomfortable, surprising. I love how you share your process so generously with us all. you've given me courage and made me newly excited to really peer into my own writing and see what my words - which come out as part-essay/poem/musing/short story - are making themselves into. thank you so much for sharing this! cheering you on as you continue this process!!💪🏿
ps. I finished reading FAN the other day. I found a lot of how you framed things relatable and helpful. there's always something from the book that pops into my days, the current ones being (i)what's my relationship with ___ I didn't know half the places I would end up exploring this, and (ii) the meaning of life is friendship ,and (iii) being deliberate about the conversations in relationships that need to be had.
still trying to wrap my head around ambition as that's the vaguest of the 3 things in my life. I feel like I need more reading(?) (or doing maybe) on ambition.
I'm really curious to hear your thoughts on "You can’t moralize away a load-bearing coping mechanism"; I've got some perhaps heretical thoughts on addiction too, and I'm curious how they match up.
Man that ayyyyy lmao meme is exactly what I’ve needed. Understanding things conceptually is good and all, but the image of the whirlpool and the hydra make it easier for me to remember I hang out around that hydra too much and my life could use more whirlpool :)
glad to hear it Mark!
OK now i think this meme goes even deeper and has more levels to it than i first realized. It almost works as like, a really simplified internal map of the relationship between attitude and experience.
The whirlpool and the hydra are both tools you can use!
The direction of the wirlpool is such that, when you're about halfway between it and the hydra, it acts like a stream carrying you along. The challenge here is, 'don't get too far ahead of yourself'. What you don't really want to do is taken for a ride _around_ the whirlpool, but even if you do, hey, it's fine, you ended up more or less where you started. The whirlpool represents the cyclical nature of the universe, which will both lift you up and tear you down over time.
I've found if i try too hard, for example, like really push myself for an afternoon, i go through a psychological pattern that feels like 'taking a trip around the whirlpool' - i get burned out, feel down, want to take a break and veg out, and then eventually i feel better. If I try to fight this process, it generally takes a bunch of energy and doesn't do a whole lot. If I just _accept_ that i'm burned out, it's fine, i pushed myself too hard, it's sort of like swinging in closer to the black hole at the center. The trip around becomes shorter and i'm back again in no time.
I think the hydra has a different purpose; it helps you experience death and therefore rebirth. The hydra tearing you apart allows you to die to the aspects of yourself that weren't really working, so you can then strengthen the parts that are.
I was about to write up a longer post on this but wanted to share the thought with you first; i don't want to 'scoop' you if you're still planning on writing this thing up, and also on a practical note i don't have the image without words on it. Any thoughts? Do you mind if i write this up into a full on post and link it here?
yes! and sure, go for it!
I can't tell you how reassuring it is to see a writer you admire and enjoy grappling with familiar problems. It's a celebration of the half-baked, and I can't wait to read these as they come into fruition
I'm so glad! cheers Amanda 🥰🙏🏾
My list of essays and pieces that I want to write is SO LONG. It’s not so much that I’m putting them off, it’s that I’m focused on finishing the book of memoir now more than ever, and so all of these other things are sitting in the stew pot, stewing, cooking, bubbling away. I know some of them will get overcooked, some won’t be worth eating—and many will still be there for me when I come back to them. It’s frustrating, it’s tempting, it crowds my mind, but it’s also reassuring, exciting, and gratifying to feel so many ideas swirling around. I know that I don’t have any shortage of things that I want to write about.
Thanks for writing this. Just discovered your Stack and subscribed.
My memoir in progress and quite a few essays as well ⬇️
https://bowendwelle.substack.com/
> know some of them will get overcooked, some won’t be worth eating—and many will still be there for me when I come back to them. It’s frustrating, it’s tempting, it crowds my mind, but it’s also reassuring, exciting, and gratifying to feel so many ideas swirling around
very relatable!! ❤️
Love it! Just finished Tiago’s book last night, and this post feels right in line with some of the advice in there. Make *something* and share it as early as possible. Looking forward to seeing these essays materialize (in whatever form).
Just read this since you emailed your book buyers about writing essays again and woosh, gotta say I felt a rush reading your ideas here. There are plenty in that list that I know I would savour reading, so I hope you'll fight the resistance, poke around these reified spaghetti monsters, and publish them essays.
Also, I share a similar anguish about what to write (so many!) but I feel like I'm still a step or two behind your level of reasoning and breadth and depth of knowledge. Nevertheless, I'm publishing a mini-essay once a week and keeping at it so that I'll improve and deliver some of the good stuff eventually.
I love your essay ideas and would love to see them come into existence.
Another essay I think you’d do uniquely well on is something like: “How to negotiate with your self”
I find that you’re doing that really well here. No doubt part of it is from your experience journaling, word vomiting and youtube riffing!
Practically (on difficulty writing/publishing): I know you have Pressfield’s War of Art (I read parts of it from time to time when I struggle with my creative output), maybe read a few pages of it before every moment you want to write.
In any case, keep channeling the magical junkyard 🧙🏼♂️!
Thx Jibran! I basically wrote an entire book about "How to negotiate with yourself", that's basically what Introspect is about 😅 it's definitely a challenge to try and condense it into an essay, and I will be attempting it several times along the way, I'm sure
Ah, I haven’t gotten introspect yet! Did get FAN. (But I also see in your Gumroad email just now that Introspect is the better of the two! 😉)
Please do write the condensed version in essays, would love to read your attempts over the years (and see them get better/change with your perspective).
(accidentally didn't comment under this reply at first)
i’m here for the half-baked ideas! i’m glad you decided to share this despite it not being the perfect essay you had expected of yourself. what i enjoy second most (the most being the proposed essays themselves) is your ability to describe so well what and where you’re stuck. this expression of self-perception is really enlightening. thx for sharing.
🥰🙏🏾
I feel like I'm in the front row of the making of... all this, and it's exciting! relating with this process a lot, especially with the bit where it feels like a lot of these essay ideas need time, now that you've identified the whats and where you're stuck and also how it feels to write! ugh, I love to go wherever 'em words take me even though some landings are rough, uncomfortable, surprising. I love how you share your process so generously with us all. you've given me courage and made me newly excited to really peer into my own writing and see what my words - which come out as part-essay/poem/musing/short story - are making themselves into. thank you so much for sharing this! cheering you on as you continue this process!!💪🏿
ps. I finished reading FAN the other day. I found a lot of how you framed things relatable and helpful. there's always something from the book that pops into my days, the current ones being (i)what's my relationship with ___ I didn't know half the places I would end up exploring this, and (ii) the meaning of life is friendship ,and (iii) being deliberate about the conversations in relationships that need to be had.
still trying to wrap my head around ambition as that's the vaguest of the 3 things in my life. I feel like I need more reading(?) (or doing maybe) on ambition.
looking forward to reading Introspect!
I'm really curious to hear your thoughts on "You can’t moralize away a load-bearing coping mechanism"; I've got some perhaps heretical thoughts on addiction too, and I'm curious how they match up.