“The best thing for being sad,” replied Merlin, beginning to puff and blow, “is to learn something. That’s the only thing that never fails. You may grow old and trembling in your anatomies, you may lie awake at night listening to the disorder of your veins, you may miss your only love, you may see the world about you devastated by evil lunatics, or know your honour trampled in the sewers of baser minds. There is only one thing for it then — to learn. Learn why the world wags and what wags it. That is the only thing which the mind can never exhaust, never alienate, never be tortured by, never fear or distrust, and never dream of regretting. Learning is the only thing for you. Look what a lot of things there are to learn.”
— T.H. White, The Once and Future King
Does that quote resonate with you at all? It does me. I laughed out loud at White’s descriptions, and when life doesn’t go as I would like it to, I try to get curious rather than frustrated. I figure if I have to go through the experience, I might as well get/learn something from it. As I’ve said before, my motto is
Stay curious and open to life. No matter what happens keep learning and growing. Find what you love to do and find a way to share it with others.
I’ll spare you the details of my various phone calls to tech support this weekend. The ultimate answer was the update of the software doesn’t work the way it should, and there’s no going back. One rep said the software people are working on it, another one said I’ll just have to see if they ever update it again.
I could have dropped the matter early, but I was curious and I learned a lot, so I don’t begrudge the time. Not everyone’s cup of tea, I cheerfully admit!
My brain is my favorite toy.
January 12, 2015
I wouldn’t call my brain a “toy”. Toys are optional, a brain isn’t.
U
Ursula, I am very fortunate. I don’t have a brain to worry about what to call it.
U,
Have you really lost the childhood art of turning everyday items into toys? My condolences. 😉
R,
😀
Ah, your trysts with tech-supports continue. Something to entertain you on a regular basis I suppose. Have fun.
It’s more than just entertainment, of course. It’s great practice in patience, discernment (between which suggestions are helpful and which are nonsense), tuning into one’s sense of humor, and even mourning the loss of some feature I dearly loved but may very well be gone forever. Happiness as a spiritual practice — no lack of opportunities to practice.
“at night listening to the disorder of your veins”
i did laugh when reading that.
my newest bit of health nuttiness is . . .
i now hear my heart beat in my head. or ear. or both.
it drove me crazy at first. now i’ve made friends with it.
i’ve decided it’s a pleasant addition to the crickets in there. LOLOL.
are the updates the same pesky ones from wordpress that caused such chaos in mine?
my wordpress is STILL jumping like crazy whenever i write a post. oh well!
i truly don’t think about ‘learning’ per se. i just kind of absorb like a sponge . . .
reading. listening. watching. you know.
I wish I could remember the article I read about a woman who had your problem of hearing the heartbeat. Hers was an esoteric problem and she finally found a cure. On the other hand, I just googled the problem and there are all sorts of possible causes. I think your solution is the best one — make friends with it. Doctors don’t always make things better!
No, WordPress is working fine for me. Do you want me to look at your problem? You would have to send me your login password by email.
My problem is/was with my app for my Jawbone Up. I think they ignored iPad users when they did the upgrade, so I wouldn’t be surprised if they eventually forgot about us completely. Then it would be time to move on completely. 🙁
It’s not important on a cosmic scale, but there were some features that warmed my heart. Mourning our losses is a part of life.
Learning and thinking to exercise your brain is just as important as exercising your body. I feel better if I am physically active and mentally active.