If you could choose how your days would be ... ?

[m1469]

And the choices were between the following :

Consistently good.  Each day is calm, you are happy and fed and peaceful -- no day is markedly better or worse than the next/last.

OR

Ups and Downs.  One day/week will be *amazing* and you feel like there is nothing in the world like just being alive.  But then there are strings of days that you feel like you have no reason for getting up.  Some days you don't even know why you would "go on" and this could last for months.



Which would it be ?

[thalbergmad]

Definately the 2nd.

The 1st would be boring.

Thal

[zheer]

Definately the 2nd.

The 1st would be boring.

Thal

  Women like men to be like the first one, sadly the vast majority of Uz men are like the 2nd one.

[thalbergmad]

That is true, but would not a lot of men like our women to be the 1st as well?

Thal

[zheer]

That is true, but would not a lot of men like our women to be the 1st as well?

Thal

  Good point never thought of it that way.

[pianistimo]

i'm not so worried about the days as the nights.  if there is no sleep deprivation or waking up too early - then the days are quite alright.  but, sometimes i wake up at 3 in the morning.  whether it gets hot - or what - i don't know.  but, then, it's like 'oh, no - it's close to 5 am ' must go back to bed and get one more hour of sleep.'  some weeks are good because the levels of sleep adjust themselves.  other days - it's like i want to just take a nap for an hour or so in the afternoon. 

maybe that's what you need, too, mayla?  more sleep?

or is this a rhetorical kind of question/choice? 

the reason i think about sleep is that i once heard that people sometimes don't realize they can also be sleep deprived if their bed is maladjusted or they can't breath through their noses right.  also, a noisy spouse. but, we've worked that out now - we both sleep so soundly (when we sleep) we don't hear the noise.  and even if we plugged it up - the other person would be completely oblivious.  what can break up the solidist marriage the first 15 years - turns out to be a sort of expected thing and you actually worry if you don't hear 'the sounds of sleep' from your spouse.  even our cat snores.  i only snort occasionally.

**about the fed part. m1469- gardens are the most peaceful and fun thing and relieve you from the occasional weeks where the bills are paid and nothing is left over.  happen to love tomatoe sandwichs - and always plant tomatoes/basil in the summer. you never know when you might need them.  gotta plant some stuff mayla.

[thalbergmad]

Thanks for that, very interesting.

Thal

[m1469]

Yeah, actually I do need more sleep  .  AND, I need to plant some stuff.  You are right about both, pianistimo .  I had actually planned to have a garden this year, but one thing led to another and I was under the gun for the this or that and things I didn't foresee, and whoooppsss... there goes the garden idea.  And now, I wonder if it's too late ?  Probably it's too late for seeds, but not for starts.  There's an awful lot of weeds out there, though.  

[pianistimo]

you're such a good listener, thal(sometimes).  anyways - what's the point of looking forward to a day just dragging around like a dead grasshopper.  may as well call everyone - and tell them you're sick - and sleep all day.

mayla, yes!  just plant some stuff whenever you want!  i plant stuff from the first thaw to the latest that i can.  it's just a curiosity now - 'will it grow?'  people rotate crops here. i tend to plant the same things in the same spot.  perhaps this is a gardening secret.

this year, bugs are starting to eat holes in my strawberry plant leaves.  the strawberries are fantastic this third year - but must squirt the leaves with grapefruit juice (my only other gardening secret - besides watering).

[prometheus]

I would pick the first. My brain is amply able to create all kinds of exciting things in my mind. And over those I have some control.

Existence is exciting enough.

[zheer]

I would pick the first. My brain is amply able to create all kinds of exciting things in my mind. And over those I have some control.

Existence is exciting enough.

  Your now a thinker.

[pianowolfi]

I would pick the first. My brain is amply able to create all kinds of exciting things in my mind. And over those I have some control.

Existence is exciting enough.

Good point, Prometheus. I am not able to choose Okay it's hypothetical. But existence is too existing to me .

[opus10no2]

An age old question, and still a very interesting one.

I've seen movies abotu a utopian future in which people are more level-headed and even mooded, there is no real pain, but then again, there is no real euphoria and high joy.

Without bad, good has no meaning.

Having said that, I see no reason for there not to be a majority of goodness and calm happiness in our lives, but still with great and joyous times too.

The main source for the ups and down, I feel, is human relations, and more specifically -  love.

Love is the source of the greatest joy and strength, and with that - also the biggest weakness and despair can come of it.

'Better to have loved and lost than never loved at all' is an interesting phrase, which I feel is related to this.

We love people, and we lose them. It's natural to fear loving, as an investment of emotion, time, and feeling that can all be lost.

Are memories a blessing or a curse? I think love and time are the most important gifts we possess, and we must use them wisely, and dont' always fear to regret, as the biggest regret many people have is that they feared regretting too much 

'Do You Realize - that everyone you know someday will die '

[counterpoint]

I understand the question that way, that you can't have great fun and excitement in life without deep troubles on the other hand. So if you never have troubles, you will never get fun and excitement. Is that correct?

I want to believe, that it's possible to have great "ups" without serious "downs".
And even if there are some days, where you don't want to get up, and just stay away from all the hectic of life - that's fully okay for me. Batteries have to be loaded from time to time. And thoughts about music do need silence, privacy and being free of disturbance from the outer world 

So don't take "downs" as more important as they are. They prevent us from completely running out of power. They just say to us: it's time for a break!

[elspeth]

I would have to choose the second... because that's pretty much how my life has been recently and it's not so bad!

For example, the last month has been really difficult. Work has been really heavy going , and my grandfather is being tested for cancer, and I have a bad back and haven't been getting nearly enough sleep. It's been rough. And I hate the hot weather we're suddenly having, I'm a cold-weather type.

But, I've achieved a lot too in the last month. The problems I had, I mostly overcame. Now I can go back to the Bach-related ones that have been neglected.... lol! And now I've got through so much stuff, the next couple of months should be fairly peaceful because barring crises nothing else should turn up for a while... so I can catch up on some sleep, have my back problems treated and concentrate on myself and my family.

Contrast is necessary, I think. Living the first lifestyle wouldn't be unpleasant, but I don't think you'd be a fully developed person.

[thalbergmad]

I'm a cold-weather type.

That will come in rather useful on your next holiday.

Thal

[m1469]

Living the first lifestyle wouldn't be unpleasant, but I don't think you'd be a fully developed person.

I have been thinking about this a bit and I think it's interesting.  I think that we do have experiences in our life that teach us lessons, and hopefully we learn from these experiences and carry the wisdom with us as we continue on through life.  I think this wisdom would naturally lead us into a different life, and probably on many accounts, a "better" or more 'authentic' life by our own judgements (at least mine seems to be getting more authentic overall).   In thinking about what you say, though, I have decided that probaby only a fully developed person can live the first life and appreciate it for what it is.

And, btw, just for the record, I do not consider myself nor mean to imply that I am in that "category" which I described above -- sometimes I struggle with even *wanting* to want that kind of life at all  .

A simple example to me is shown just in the relationships I have had.  I have had to grow quite a bit in what I appreciate and look for in other people.  And, I have had to learn from some not so pleasant experiences.  Over time I became a *little* wiser in knowing where certain interactions can lead and because I better appreciate certain characteristics in human interactions, I have learned to avoid some interactions that are of little interest to me currently.  As long as I would want a tumultuous relationship, that is what I would get because it's what I am looking for -- likewise with the opposite.

I just think that once we have really learned what we need to learn (though, that can seem to take years and even decades, and even an entire lifetime (or more  ) to learn some lessons), we no longer seek the circumstances that are meant to teach us, and we move onto other things.  In other words, I think that living an "even" life is somewhat of an acquired taste, so to speak.

[ted]

I think that the original question is too simple, presents too bald an alternative to what is an important issue. There are other functions beside sine waves and straight lines, after all. Forced to answer, I would probably opt for the second, exercised to a variable, controlled degree from within the comfort of the first. Complete stability might lead to nothing but contemplative idiocy, which would do nothing about solving important problems and would never lead to fresh ideas and the mental state needed for creation. Too much instablity is even worse because we might lose control of the system altogether, and that leads to madness. As with improvisation in music, I think the ideal state, the ideal "contentment function", corresponds to a mathematically chaotic feedback loop, a succession of events of absorbing interest, neither approaching a state of rest or periodicity, nor flying off the handle.

Crudely, very crudely speaking, a bit of both would be my answer. If the question implies a forced choice between extremes, just either/or, I would choose the first.

[opus10no2]

I think that we do have experiences in our life that teach us lessons, and hopefully we learn from these experiences and carry the wisdom with us as we continue on through life.  I think this wisdom would naturally lead us into a different life, and probably on many accounts, a "better" or more 'authentic' life by our own judgements (at least mine seems to be getting more authentic overall). 

It depends whether you find conforming to what other people want as a compromise, or a means to have a more satisfying life.

The reason we have to learn the things you speak of is because of other people, if we had purely everything we wanted at first, then things would be very very different.

Do we then adjust what we want, or simply adjust the way in which we get it...

One of the most interesting compromises in life is work and occupations.

Before modern society existed, we had to hunt our own found, defend ourselves more, and seek our own shelter.

Today we each develop individual skills to help eachother, as opposed to the 'all-rounder' of yesteryear.

[pianowolfi]

Well, I have thought a while about this. And the result for now is that I don't feel like I am choosing how my days are (or nights) I have done (very) long-term choices and these overall choices determine my days or nights. And I have (very) long term goals or aims or dreams and these also determine my days and nights. These long-term choices and plans seem to be stronger than everything else and they may cause days where I feel like I would rather die, but they cause also the other days, where I feel like "Wow it's great and it works, it works REALLY!"

[pianolearner]

And the choices were between the following :

Consistently good.  Each day is calm, you are happy and fed and peaceful -- no day is markedly better or worse than the next/last.

OR

Ups and Downs.  One day/week will be *amazing* and you feel like there is nothing in the world like just being alive.  But then there are strings of days that you feel like you have no reason for getting up.  Some days you don't even know why you would "go on" and this could last for months.



Which would it be ?

I'd like to try the first one for a change and see what it is like.