Integral Perspectives

As interesting as the pattern-machine model of mind is, it is a drop in the ocean of Integral Theory.  Integral Theory is a higher-level way to look at both interior and exterior states, types, stages, levels and lines of development and expression.  It also includes individual and collective quadrants for interior and exterior in a 4 quadrant system.  Integral Theory provides a great framework for organizing and understanding different aspects of individual and collective phenomena.

Pattern Machine

The mind is a reasonably fast, ultra-parallel, massively connected, super-hierarchical pattern machine.  As we get older these hierarchies of categories and categories of hierarchies get strengthened.  This produces hardening of the categories.  Unless we continue to grasp new ideas and concepts, this hardening will be more extreme.  It is good to confuse the existing patterns on a regular basis to help loosen the rigidity.

Fiscal Cliff

I officially do not care about the Fiscal Cliff anymore.  Bring on some short term pain that may give us long term gain.  It's way over-hyped by the media anyway.  Sure, we could do better if we had a functional Congress.  But from my understanding, many economists agree that the short term pain would be 6-12 months, with recovery after that.  Also, the economy is so complex with a myriad of global factors involved that it is impossible to predict what the actual outcome might be.

YouTube

Well, I guess I am behind the times, but I posted my first YouTube video yesterday.  It is a video of a concert I did a the Dallas School of Music on November 17, 2012.  The audio is pretty bad.  This experience satisfied a first step of a goal.   My goal is to continue studying jazz piano at DSM for at least 2 years, treating is as post-graduate study in jazz.  I will do concerts periodically in at least Spring, Fall, maybe Summer, or quarterly.  If I get better, maybe I could do it more on a monthly basis.

Whenever I am off work for a few days, I start to get ideas about improving my online presence with better connections between my blog, FaceBook, YouTube, recordings etc.  That idea seems to get lost in the maze of other responsibilities once the work routine starts up again.  I may spend some time on it as a New Years Resolution this year.

Jazz Is

Jazz is extended, altered chords based on a logical system of scales. The simplest way to view it is to start by  imagining a major scale.  If you have ever studied any music, you should know at least 1 major scale.  Starting with this major scale, any or all tones of this scale can be altered (except for the first note, which of course would make it a different scale).

First lower the seventh tone of the scale.  There you have a normal dominant scale.  Just like a major scale except the seventh tone is lowered by a half step.  A 4 note chord build from the first note of this scale is a typical dominant chord. This chord normally can resolve down a fifth, so a C dominant chord will resolve to an F major chord.

From here any number of other notes in the scale can be altered.  Lowering the third along with the seventh creates a kind of minor scale known commonly as a Dorian, typically played over a minor chord.

The most interesting chords/scales are altered dominant ones.  Continuing from lowering the seventh note of the major scale, altering other notes creates a plethora of possible dominant sounds including:

• lowered 9th
• lowered 9th and 13th
• lowered 5th
• raised 9th
• fully altered : lowered 9th, raised 9th, lowered 4th, lowered 5th, lowered 13th

Other combinations are possible.

One fundamental skill is to know all the scales and be able to create many patterns following the contour of the intended scale starting from any note in the scale.  Then, application of this skill includes the movement of chords that might change scales quickly.

Boating vs Kayaking

Boating is wind in your face, sparkling water, relaxed driving, coasting and swimming in coves.  You can drive up to a waterside restaurant in a boat.  You have to keep your eyes peeled for other boats and watercraft in a boat since traffic on a motorized boating lake moves faster than more relaxed watersports environments.

Kayaking is floating, pulling water, direct nature experience, no coasting and good exercise.  There is no coasting in kayaking.  You can get to more remote locations with a kayak.  You can get closer to turtles and other waterside animals with a kayak.  You can see other kayaks and have plenty of time to change course.

Why Blog?

It's a good way to practice introspection.  It serves as a record of your life that is interesting for future retrospectives.  It sharpens your verbal skills.  It helps force mindfulness about your activities and thoughts.

Blogging or should be part of a daily to weekly practice if you can do it.  I have failed to remain consistent over the last few years and have experimented with a few different styles, topics and degree of detail.

I hope to pick it up again with a focus on stream of consciousness.  I believe that in the past in some cases trying to be too long and formal has discouraged an approach that would produce more consistency.

Austin vs Dallas

Austin has a much more relaxed atmosphere than Dallas.  The lakes and hills create an enjoyable landscape. Easy access to water sports makes it feel more informal - not as informal as a beach town but more than a place like Dallas.

Austin feels softer - Dallas feels more rushed and concrete.  Austin feels like a college town embedded in a major city that includes politics and business.  Dallas feels like a business town.

Austin is food trucks, coffee shops, yogurt shops, whole foods and scenery.   Dallas is highways, sunshine, downtown pockets of decay and attempted renewal.  Will Dallas ever be able to turn the Trinity River into a recreational area to rival Austin's Lady Bird Lake (aka Town Lake)?  Dallas does not have the equivalent of Barton Springs - the best city pool I have ever visited.

Downtown Dallas is on the upswing but has a long way to go.  Once all the parks are finished and if the inconsistent patchwork of sketchy areas in downtown can be turned into safe, robust and thriving businesses, Dallas may experience a revival and transformation.  Pushing it past the sins of the past and current downtown inconsistency will require a functional and aesthetic water recreation area to create a visual and spiritual facelift for the downtown core.

Denton Arts and Jazz Fest 2012

I went to the DAJF yesterday for the first time in at least a couple of years.  It seems that the main jazz stage has been moved to the northwest corner of the park.  The prior location of the jazz stage has been renamed to Courtyard Stage.  My understanding is that this was done to better conform to fire codes.  Apparently the old location, with all its trees, hills, twists and turns presents a challenge if there is an emergency requiring serious equipment or personnel.  The northwest corner stage is more open and flat.

While this might be a pragmatic move, it is unfortunate from an aesthetic perspective.  The old location is beautiful with lots of shade and streamside locations to lay out a spread of chairs and blankets.  The new location is pretty much tree-less in the main area, so shade is almost non-existent.  Yesterday I chose the old location, even though it did not offer the top shelf jazz entertainment, so that I could stay out of the hot sun and enjoy a shaded breeze.

Less is More

Good design is about simplification. Especially in software design. Focus on doing one thing very well. Know what product you are and which market niche you fill. Don't step outside that niche for that particular product. If a need arises and resources exist to fill a new niche, create a new product for that particular category.

Too much bad software tries to be everything to everyone. Feature creep without a crisp vision of market categories can produce products with tons of features and diffused focus. Ultimately we pay the price in technical debt, huge test matrices and long maintenance release cycles.

This notion of simplicity can be carried into all dimensions. We should stop trying to do so much and only do the things that matter. Easier said than done.

Tyranny of the Minority

Is that what we have today in the national political arena? Tea Party, Occupy Movements etc.? What happened to the political center? Seems that the political center is the majority but the fringe minority has enough influence to derail any sensible, rational compromise that could move the country forward.

Political leaders are more interested in theological positions than working the problems and actually making structural changes.

Living Vertically vs. Horizontally

I think another way to say what I wrote about in my prior post about what matters is the notion of living more vertically as we get older. Living horizontally we experience more things at a shallow level. Living vertically we experience fewer things at a deeper level. Allowing for differences in degree per personality types, I believe we tend toward more vertical living as we get older.

When we are younger we get stressed if we are not living horizontally enough. Trying more things. Feeling like we need to try more things. Needing more.

When we are older we get stressed if we are not living vertically enough. Digging into fewer things that are truly enjoyable. Enjoying the satisfaction that comes from doing a few things well. Needing less.

What Matters

One nice thing about getting older (one of the few things :-)) is that I have much less interest in things that don't matter that much. So, I don't spend a lot of time chasing things that burn time and money. But I do spend time and money on things that matter to me. More simplification and focus is calming.

What matters to me now? In no specfic order I'd say music, making a difference through my career, family/friend relationships, great ideas, health, financial independence, sex, mental clarity, spiritual search, seeing more of the world.

Maybe that's about it. Activities that enhance those things pretty much take up my time these days. Now that I wrote the list, it seems longer than I expected, cause it doesn't seem like I do as many different things as I did in the past. But, that's probably enough as I seem to stay busy most of the time with just doing the next thing.

Connecting the Dots

Sometimes we may wonder why we don't do a better job of seeing around corners. Why can some of us do it better than others. Most of us can detect obvious or not so obvious trends. But how many of us can connect the dots in new ways. There are probably an infinite number of ways to connect the dots for any given arena, context or media, not to mention the meta-world. I think we limit ourselves in two ways.

First, we notice the way things really are. I believe this is a pre-requisite to connecting future dots. We have too many distractions that give us lots of noise around what's really there.

Second, we rely too much on the "experts" to tell us what the future will be. Here again, too much distraction the same kind but different effect blinds us to the obvious.

Third, some particular aspect of the current opportunity is forcing us into a particular way of thinking of the approach to take. So, we are blind to an approach that might be simpler and yield more benefit.

Occupy Wall Street

I saw a sign hanging around the neck of one of the protesters. It said "A Job is a Right". Hmmm... Is that a right like the right to pursue happiness? If so, how is this enforced? Enforcing the right to pursue happiness means that the government will intervene if your rights are being compromised, meaning, your right to pursue happiness is being prevented or hindered. Or, you could go to court to sue someone for infringing on your rights in some way.

Does the protester think that everyone should be given a job as soon as they want one? So, anyone, say, 16 years or older can decide they want a job, then show up somewhere that has jobs (at the job store?) and demand a job. If the potential employer refuses, the police could be called, or the potential employee might start a lawsuit against the business.

If someone has a job and they are not performing it very well, they cannot be fired. This would be infringing on their right to have a job. Nobody would ever be fired and nobody would be refused a job if they asked for it. Because it's their right!

Who pays for this? The government? Does it just print money constantly to support the rights of all citizens to have jobs? (I am assuming this right to have a job only extends to citizens).

I wonder what kind of world we'd have if having a job was a right.

Seth Godin

If you are a mourning Steve Jobs fan (as I am) and you have never read Seth Godin, you should start. He articulates the mindset of "think different". His recurring themes are: work as a platform for art, avoiding the resistance of our lizard brain, don't be a cog and generally just setting larger, smarter goals. His blog is great. His books read like a series of blog posts, are easy reads and full of insights. I am currently reading Linchpin, which tackles the topic of how to become indispensable in your career.

Steve Jobs

When I first saw an Apple II, many years ago, I was inspired to do something different than what I was doing. I took a few computer science courses and got a job programming an Apple II+. Later I designed software and game music for an Apple IIGS. I learned everything I could about building interesting applications on many generations of Macs. I worked at Claris (a former sibling company of Apple) for two years. I have lead software teams doing Mac development. I recorded many hours of music on several generations of Macs. Just last week I used iTunes to convert some recent home recordings to mp3 to upload to my web site. I also used it to burn those recordings to CD. I own an Apple TV.

These are a few ways that the direct and indirect contributions of Sir Jobs helped spur my imagination and energy over the last 30 years or so. He will be missed.

Saturday Night Live

I am surprised by the number of SNL fans I have run across lately. I lost interest during one of the "dry periods" ages ago where it just did not seem funny to me beyond occasional flashes of brilliance. Other than the original cast, my interest was piqued by Mike Myers, Dana Carvey, Phil Hartman etc., but many of the skits seemed forced and gratuitious.

I caught a few episodes this past weekend on Hulu since a friend came over and started talking about some of them. The clips we watched were hilarious for the most part, but not enough to make me want to start watching the show on any kind of regular basis.

I prefer the comedy style of Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert and Steve Carell. SNL has the tendency to repeat a joke over and over long past the truly funny moment.

Mega-shift

Suppose we are in a once every few hundred years massive societal change driven by information technology. We have been thinking this for at least the last 20 years or so. We have already seen a few waves of job transfers from manual to knowledge workers and of white collar repetitive jobs becoming automated.

Are the latest waves of financial crises exacerbated by the speed of information travel? What will that mean as the speed of information travel continues to go faster and include more dimensions? The stock market graphs of the last 10 years look remarkably different than all that came before with huge, spikey mountains and valleys. Seems that someone says something on one side of the world and a stock market on the other side of the world reacts within minutes... or seconds.

And have a somewhat permanent 10% of the US work force been cut. "Permanent" at least in the sense of until enough time passes for lots of re-training and re-education. Is the volatility of world financial markets another symptom of the kind of stress seen around major societal shifts?

If we are in fact accelerating our progression toward a time where everything that an be automated will be automated and our value is much more determined by how creative we are rather than how much quantity of work we can do, what does that mean for most of today's current work force?

Will we evolve into a more highly conscious, creative species overall? Will there be more separation between the haves and have nots, where the haves are represented by those who learn to be artists?

Fast forward 50, 100 years and how will we expect the societal landscape to change analagous to the changes we saw over 200 years ago from a monarchical, agricultural, rural society into a relatively democratic, industrial and urban society? What are the parallels and differences both in how we live physically, how we think and how we behave?

Deja Vu

I visited my undergrad college town a couple of weeks ago. I had only been there for one or two very brief passing-through visits in the last 32 years or so. Whenever I've been back, I am surprised at the intensity of feelings and memories that surface. This time was no different.

It's interesting that after living some place for a long time how we appear to absorb a collective consciousness for that place. Or, maybe we call it a "vibe". This vibe is multi-dimensional and perhaps beyond words. Music probably expresses it best.

This vibe certainly came rushing back. Part of it was the climate. Summer afternoons in Hattiesburg are warm and slightly humid. In the center of the summer, afternoon showers are regular, short and refreshing. That particular day was cooler and less humid, but I remembered, felt and practically saw many of the wonderful people I played, laughed, worked, learned and grew up with for the 4-5 years spent in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. I miss all of you.