I’ve been thinking about head, heart, and sailboats.
Head and heart. Some days I like one more than the other. Some days it’s smarter to think. Some days I find it’s better to follow where my feelings lead me.
On days I am my head, I make my life about the work. I can perfectly clear my desk. I can venture forth with the most elegant strategic plan. Be ready to think quickly, if you take me on. I’m not as one-dimensional as some folks might have you think. After all, not everyone gets complimented quite this way by a friend.
I’ll analyze a problem to reach a brilliant, logical solution . . . in seconds flat. When I do, no person will be within the range of my 20/40 vision. I’ll see the people, sure, but they’ll be human data in the thinking chain.
No wonder I get headaches.
On days I am my heart, I can make my life about the people and beauty of the world. I see the wonder of a smile that fills a voice when a person discovers a new thought. I see the sun rise in glorious colors that make a sky no artist could possibly paint. The options and ideas assault me joyously like water falling as I stand laughing at the the marvel of being alive and drenched.
I imagine away bad weather and fill a hall-full glass half-again over the top. I can hear a symphony in my head and when I want I can make it go away. I can stop time, stress, and bad things me too. Generosity is without thinking. Life is magical.
Of course, the without thinking part is a bit of problem now and then.
On the days I am both, I lean from head to heart and back. I let my life tell me when to list which way.
Sailboats that list in concert with the wind have grace and flexibility, even in a rough storm. Sailboats that lean too far take on water. That’s wrong there. The water is supposed to stay beneath the boat . . . in the sea.
Head and heart together is balance, part holding on and part letting go. Lean too far toward one and the connection won’t work. It’s like sailing — the wind has some control. When I lose my trying and self-consciousness to make room for life, a day becomes adjusting my sails with the wind.
This weekend I’m going to be a sailboat.
Head and heart has to be lived to be learned.
Liz I love this post… Sometimes I find myself more heart than head and no driving or pushing or self-guilting can get me out of it. Rarely can I sail my way into an even keel.
Even in terms of time management – I’d love nothing more than to be able to set half my day working on client stuff and half on my own, but all too often those damn games websites find their way into my browser simply because I’m too worn out to force myself to do anything. LOL
Hi Lara!
Happy Friday! Thank you. I like this one too.
Hey now that we’re working together. We’ll get that boat to behave. 🙂
Liz, that’s quite a compliment you got there. I must say, I agree wholeheartedly. You challenge my assumptions, find every flaw in my thinking, and I don’t know what I would have done without you on my project. Don’t sail too far away.
Liz,
Great post! In the world of Theology (promise not to go all God on you, but one of my graduate efforts was in Theology), in addition to questioning everything, we read a great deal about, and then discussed, the value of tension.
All things have (are in a state of) tension. Our task is to recognize the tension, and then to discover the balance, and finally work to get ourselves in balance. Using your example, when we study the tension between heart and head, we then work to achieve balance between the two, and that is a path toward happiness. Therapy helps, too.
Hi Liz,
Having spent many hours sailing and racing sailboats, I heartily agree that doing either well requires a balance of head and heart. You need your head to know the rules and plan strategy and work your equipment, but you can’t be a consistent winner if you can’t become one with the wind and water to know and anticipate how they are acting and will act in different places and times. The best skippers, like zen masters, seem to feel the wind over the entire course all at once. Then they use their heads to implement a plan to take advantage of the heart’s insights.
Sailing and living can both be done enjoyable relying primarily on head or heart or alternating between the two, but that experience pales in comparison to integrating them together well.
Mike
Hi Brad!
Thank you. It was my pleasure to have the joy of seeing your concept come together. Thanks for letting me be a part of what’s going to be soemthing so you. 🙂
You’ll always be able to find me. 🙂
Hi Lewis!
Welcome. Nice to see you here and no worries we don’t make assumptions when folks talk about Theology. We discussed some Biblical quotes just yesterday.
Theology, Tension, and Therapy. I’m laughing at the 3-Ts. 🙂
Hi Mike!
The best skippers like Zen masters . . . Yeah, that’s it exactly giving your “self” over and yet “being there.”
Uh-huh. 🙂
zen and the art of sailing… i had the “zen and the art of riding today” with alle. It was uncharacteristically (and way refreshingly i might add) quiet since joani and lots of the folks at the barn are at a quarter horse show up north.
I felt so calm and peaceful.. .from the very beginning to when I turned her out. Ms. show horse alle was the perfect partner.. two buds out for a ride. Methinks it’s because i was coming from my heart rather than the head and all the “chatter” that goes on.
We now return you to your regularly scheduled weekend already in progress
gp in montana who’s going to have a heartful run uh, i mean ride on throughbred mare tomorrow 🙂
Hi GP,
I do like the way you hear these posts when I write them. It’s like an echo.
I’m beginning to know who alle is from picken. I feel that’s quite a feat, having never met them. You must some good friend to pass on their spirit so well.
liz who just ride the thoughts hanging out inside your computer. 🙂
Hi Liz,
A beautiful post with such great analogies. It strikes me especially close since all my years of “sailing” were done underneath the surface of the ocean where heart and head had to be in as close to a perfect balance as you could possibly manage (even when you were out of sorts), working together as harmoniously as possible along with 90-100 other very individual personalities who had to maintain that same type of balance. And what a dance that was especially when the ultimate goal was to keep our small, unique environment (existence?) in balance with the sea around us. Funny how I can get so out of balance sometimes these days but always remember back to those days when we juggled head and heart so naturally even when the head and/or the heart were taken a beating.
Sorry if this strayed a bit far from the topic but I think it fits somehow. At least it does for me.
Not too sure I could do that again though. I mean it takes a lot of energy to do all that balancing and that’s one thing I don’t seem to have a whole lot of these days. 😀
Hi Kirk,
I could see and almost feel what you described here so well. I’ve sat here for the longest while just experiencing what you said, knowing how much it must take, and yet hearing that sometimes it was easier. . . . I can understand that too.
It’s so perfect that you chose words like harmoniously and dance to express the balance that was needed and yet you never actually said where you were or who you were with.
That is some beautiful writing.
Why thank your dear lady. Occasionally two or three extra brain cells kick in (which I totally ignore so they get disgusted and go away) and I let my heart do the writing. I’ve often considered writing about those experiences but I know once I started, I’d have to do it full time. I just know I couldn’t get it right if I had to write it as time permitted. Unfortunately, that is not an option at the moment.
That’s okay though…you always have to have your goals for the future no matter what your age (or past experiences). I even walk down to the pier where that ship they keep talking about is supposed to come in. If it isn’t on the horizon yet, then I just enjoy the scenery. 😀
Hi Kirk,
Great writing deserves notice. 🙂
Listening to you what you say here. I think we’re going to have plenty to talk about when we’re old and gray under the shade tree outside the elderly bloggers’ care facility — on the hill overlooking the water. 🙂
Hi Kirk,
Sometimes harmony is easier to achieve when everyone knows that there’s no place to run, and a nuclear sub is definitely one of those places!;-) (My brother served on a boomer for several years)
With respect to comment 41Charlie, just start writing, because you have a great voice and obviously lots of stories to share!
Mike
P.S. I love your masthead picture. I stared at it for five minutes, listening to the pounding surf!
P.P.S. 41Charlie is old space shuttle humor
Mike,
You’re a joy of understanding and relationship. What a combination!
Thanks, and likewise, my friend!
And thanks for having me as a guest. 😉
Aw heck, this is where we hang out. I don’t have to be here. Come in and get a snack and turn on the music whenever you want. 🙂
You know I will!
And I’ll make my special crab meat and cream cheese scrambled eggs mess and we can toast to high cholesterol. Cheers!
Hi Mike, glad you had time to listen to the surf. Northern Vermont may be beautiful but I do miss being near the ocean. Give your brother my best. Hope he didn’t get too bored trolling around at 4 knots (‘scuse the submarine humor there). 😀
PS:Okay, I’ll bite…what’s 41Charlie?
Hi liz,
Under a shade tree overlooking the ocean sounds just great.
The shade tree and folks in the beautiful building behind us will bring us out everything we need. 🙂
Kirk,
My brother lost many brain cells sitting at the bottom of [can’t betray his trust] for six months at a stretch.
41Charlie is the designation given to the shuttle mission that followed Shuttle Mission 12. The kids at NASA, having been chastened by the whole Apollo 13 thing, decided NOT to tempt fate and gave the next mission another monicker. Where ’41Charlie’ came from, I don’t know…
Since I live in the Valley of the Sun and spent most of my youth on the waters of the Great Lakes, I empathize brother!
Mike