When You Can Take the Pebble from My Hand

I'm pretty sure that the key to having a long life is not caring much.  I mean by that not putting a lot of pressure on yourself to achieve or to be happy.  It's just not getting up in the morning and hating yourself for not doing what you might think needs to be done.

Low stress.  Not giving a shit.  Whatever.

So I wake up in the morning thinking of all the things that need to be done and all the things that I haven't done and I begin to stress and hate and worry.  It doesn't help, of course.  I don't get any more done than I would have.  I just hate myself more.

And then that stress turns into anger and frustration and I begin to unconsciously put the blame elsewhere.

"I didn't do this because. . . they. . . ."

You want a list of all the things I didn't do?  I mean just the important ones?

I think about halfwits like Mick Jagger and Paul McCartney and suffer.  I don't mean them in particular.  David Bowie, maybe.  But you have your own list.  You know what I mean.

I feel like Terry Malloy (don't worry--I had to look it up, too).

So. . . it's not the Paleo diet or the moderate exercise or not drinking or smoking.  Those things are probably good, but look at where the Blue Zones are.  Rural.  Not high stress.  Low expectations.

Etc.

So, if you are not making good pictures, it's time to buy a better camera, right?  Nope.  It's time to quit trying to make better pictures.  And if you are not writing what you want. . . .

That's today's Sesame Street lesson.

Oh, God, I could have been. . . ha!

"When you can take the pebble from my hand. . . ."