Wednesday, May 12, 2021

Failure and Recovery

I keep mentioning what a screw-up I am, which seems weird since this Slog makes me appear wisely on-target. Which, of course, is one of the reasons I do it. I sop up that artificially induced image of clarity and composure. I feed off of it like a retired actress peering at her old promotional glossies.
I've explained the trick many times (and even shot a video once). Consider the all-powerful Wizard of Oz - a masterful parable about art and artists - who was actually powered by a hiding fraught little nebbish. I like to note that Edison's "Genius is one percent inspiration, ninety nine percent perspiration" oughtn't conjure up wild-eyed fanatics banging hammers in garages in the middle of the night. It's about fraught little nebbishes blithely but indefatigably putting out. The Colorado River, etcher of the Grand Canyon, is just some shitty little river. The best among us are shitty little rivers. Do not judge me by my works! The work is the juice; me, I am just the raisin.
This posting's about me at my lowest. But also the subsequent redeeming recovery (redemption is the perennial desperate target of the error-prone).


Last year a friend sent this:
Well I have not had an easy time
4 months ago I wound be in a mental hospital then a rehab now I’m on heavy
Medicine everyday
Trying hard to keep interested in my life
I flipped my lid
I responded poorly. I cooked up 500 words of gurgling mind food, my eager attempt to help expand his perspective beyond the pinpoint I could feel him occupying. I did this via large blocks of intellectual text and terribly clever insights. I spent hours laboring over it, giving it everything I could, and the result was actually a near-masterpiece, I see upon rereading. But, of course, he couldn't possibly take in a word of it. Someone in that predicament can't parse windy clever explanations. The last thing they need is vast blocks of sweeping text!

Perspective needs to be reasonably expansive to begin with to tackle clever concepts. So it came off as confusing verbiage, blah-blah-blah, talking way over his head, to boot. He's not a conceptually pliant person, even on his best days. Jesus, what was I thinking?? These are the deranged failures that keep me up at night (this is also why I'd make a poor Messiah, even though I have some of the basic skills).

However, fwiw, I do have an explanation...which is, itself, smugly clever and conceptual, so fuck me. I usually put it in dialog form:
Question: What does a ballerina do when she needs to cross a raging river but there's no boat in sight?
Anwer: She dances.
I was dancing as hard as I could for my friend. But that's hardly an excuse, as I am, alas, actually versatile. Big blocks of clever text are not the only tool in my belt. I should have tinkered less with the execution and more with the overall approach. I got stuck in the former, like a blithering idiot.

He, quite understandably, didn't talk to me for a year. But then he sent this:
After a couple of nightmare years and
Now a divorce
I’m hoping a new start will turn things around
So I'm moving across the country.
Here's what I wrote back. Just this:
Every moment starts fresh.
This, too, was met with silence. But it was a very different silence. And then he started a dialog with me about some other stuff. And he sounds so much better. Like his old self. And, as always with reframings, he didn't seem to recognize what hit him. I'm pretty sure he doesn't even recall my email. Which is fine...even optimal. Pay no attention to the little man behind the curtain.

3 comments:

jeff davidson said...

I really can't tell whether you're kidding in some of these posts:

"Here's what I wrote back. Just this:

Every moment starts fresh.

This, too, was met with silence. But it was a very different silence. And then he started a dialog with me about some other stuff. And he sounds so much better. Like his old self. And, as always with reframings, he didn't seem to recognize what hit him. I'm pretty sure he doesn't even recall my email. Which is fine...even optimal. Pay no attention to the little man behind the curtain."

I mean, good on you for being a caring friend. You think your one line, hallmark card moment reframed your friend's life? or your relationship? or is this some kind of stab at parody of new age philosophy?

anyhow, you had asked about crabcakes in montrose in another thread, it closed before I was able to give it a try. for me, it was in the price danger zone: $15-$25 entrees in a newish strip mall. I'm much more likely to try a $10 rava masala dosa joint where the water pitchers stick to the table. otoh, my wife's guilty pleasure was its predecessor, The Yellow Jug, for good burgers, hand cut fries and reliably surly service.

The Red Apple Farm in croton has started serving tacos and claim to be making their own tortillas. I'm there a couple of times a week for fresh vegetables, fish and korean snacks, interested to try their tacos...

Jim Leff said...


1. Joke's on you for continuing to read. OTOH if you want to read for the slapstick ridiculousness, you are absolutely welcome. Maybe STFU about it, though?

2. "You think your one line, hallmark card moment reframed your friend's life? "
For that moment, yes. That's precisely how it works. Reframing is effortless and small and trivial seeming, but has huge (albeit temporary) effect. It's not about the words. There is no canned statement that works reliable magic. It's the timing, the moment, the feeling, and you have to bake fresh every single time. It's always a custom job.

This is also how deliciousness gets imparted into food, and beauty into art, and all that majestic but frustrating-to-pin-down stuff. A given brownie doesn't throw people into bliss because chef used a rare Himalayan pink sea salt. It's the timing, the feeling, the moment, the TOUCH. Simple things, seemingly banal, can be wielded with pure-heartedness to induce a shift in state of mind. And if that reads like nonsense to you, cool, but I don't want to ever taste your brownies. Do you ever do anything great? If so, tell me YOUR secret. If not, I'd repeat my amiable suggestion to STFU, because I've done quite well in seven different fields (and am the rare such person determined to offer up every secret so you and any other rando who wanders in can surpass my success).

3. I don't have a new-age bone in my body. I'm not into self-improvement or self-actualization. I am trying to crack the code of inspiration and creativity, and this is mostly ancient wisdom. If you're not into it, cool, join the multitudes. But, as-is, you're like the guy who walks into the one craft beer bar in the county and snarls at the bartender for his pretentiousness in not pouring Bud Lite. Go literally anywhere else for your Bud Lite and enjoy.

jeff davidson said...

Jim,

- on your first point, in general I find your writing to be enjoyable, lucid and to the point but I'm afraid I don't have a clue what you're talking about.

- On your second point, which by the way is beautifully written, I'm going to maintain that it's much more probable your friend was helped by a divorce, therapy, life experience, almost anything than by your single sentence. It's wonderful that you've done well in seven different fields, do you think it's just possible that's led to some confirmation bias?

As for MY secret around greatness, it's mostly that there is no secret and in fact you recently quoted it "Genius is 1 percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration". Maybe the secret is that when people look at success they see genius but not the perspiration. it's guys like you and I that know just how much effort it takes to execute everyday.

One of the great things I did was to co-found a startup which we eventually sold to a publicly traded company. It wasn't great because we sold the company for a large sum of money, it was great because we created a company and culture based on hyper-collaboratively. My success was your success was everyone's success down to our admins. So everyone helped each other, people loved working there and we grew and grew.

- on your third point, I really have no idea what this about. I suggested you were parodying new age wisdom, not adopting it.

In any case Jim, I think I'll take your advice and STFU. Farewell to you and your slog!



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