Timing the Leaves as the Fall

Our eyes cast toward the sky. Trees blocked the deep blue sky and semi dark clouds lingering before the sun. Just as the breeze swept across our faces the leaves shook and fell from their homes. Raining a golden red symphony of colors. They dance down toward use shading us form the sun and revealing the intense momentum of time that has swpet across the year. Fall. The leaves, the winter comes after and another year has pressed forward withg out our conciouss reculection. A deep breath of autumn air crisps our lungs and we fall back into world that is on the brink of change. Will we be left here? or will we change with it ?

Whats been going on ?

Well nothing much. Or at leaset nothing that I think is interesting. I did jet around the world last year and go to Japan to hike the 88 Temples of Shikoku. You can read that over at https://daydreaminglantern.com/. You know when I think of vlogging or even writing about my own life I take a look and say, well I am not doing anything that interesting. So what would I share? In the sense if I keep thinking like that then nothing will ever be that interesting.

Those Things that Go Bump in the Night

We had all heard of the stories. One night someone you know is there chilling in their home and then the next you are searching for them in the forest with flashlights all through the night because you are worried that if the sun comes up they will be lost forever. The sun comes up the day of, you check into their house, their neighbors, the school and then their family. No where to be found. Everyone says one excuse and another.

“Oh he might be just skipping town for while, you know him”

“Maybe he got a new girl, always hanging around”

It always seems to take the ones that are most volatile. It knows that people will have a story built in their minds about what had happened. Where they went, who they went with and even why. But you, you know that they didn’t just get up and walk away with some pretty girl. That they didn’t hit the road to get out of town and skate their life away. You know what is really happening. And the truth is, so does everyone else. That deep down, they know what is going on , but the thought of admitting that it is real, admitting that it could happen, brings it one step closer to their door step. It makes them double check their locks at night and even cover their windows so no light escapes. Brighter bulbs to ward off the the shadows that creep slowly to their building panels. They know, they all know.

This is the first post of this kind for this blog. Each day I hope to post some sort of writing that could be anything. Such as Dialogue, Scenes or what have you.

Whenever I start these, I never know what I am really going to write. I start off with a sentence and just keep on going. This is sort of like IT, some kids chilling in some old times, having some disagreements. Some Dialogue and the hook for the story, which is James disappearing the next day after saying he wasn’t going to come back.

Things didn’t seem to gel well when they went down to the market. It was a cold November day and it had been raining for days on end. Each time the sun seemed to break through the clouds, a swirl of black and grey would close it off till more water fell from the sky. Three friends that would always hang together sat in front of the old school market in the middle of town. James, Tyler and Blake. Friends from the beginning of their time and inseparable from each other. They captained their bikes everywhere they went and flowed from fighting imaginary zombies to playing basketball at the school.

But today, there was a gloom of despair following them around. James was on Tyler case for what have you and Blake seemed to shy away from both them. Now they had ended up at the market to get something to drink to calm their fires.

James leaned back on the bench taking a sip of his Cola “Grey day, huh?”

Tyler, who was sitting on the ground, looked up “I guess, never changes anymore…you say that every day.” he said

“Yeah, well that’s what it is” James spat back

Tyler clicked his tongue and said “Doesn’t mean you have to comment about it, we have eyes”

The arguing had started again. Each day it got worse and worse. James stood up from the bench, voice raising higher. Tyler then rose to his feet to counter.

“Please” Blake yelled breaking them up “What is going on? Your guys are fighting all the time” Tyler and James back off clearly still riled up.

James grabbed his bike and heaved himself on “I’m going home” he said. Blake started to protest “I’m not coming back either” Tyler and Blake watched as James pedaled off up the road. His denim Jacket whipping behind him and black cargo pants pumping up and down. It was the last image that they both remembered, because the next day. James had gone missing.

This blog will have different things that I write including just short stories and writing practice. It is very possible that none of if will be good haha, so bare that in mind when reading these short practices of writing. It will be filled with emotion and some of the questions that I am pondering. It might be related to me , or it might be simply parts of the imagination.

I will call these sections - A Ravens Feather - for the book mark I used at one point when reading. Enjoy and let your mind be open and free.

I am in the middle of watching Castle Rock on Hulu, which is based off of Stephan Kings universe, so I am feeling a but horrific, if one can feel that way.

Focus on the Skills

I often look at life, particularly my life, and try to take stock of who I am and who I might want to become. This leads to a list of traits that I want and skills I want to gain. Skill is the ability to do something. An expertise. High skill means you can perform the skill well, lower not well. The perception of the skill can sometimes be judged by the enviroment. A place where low skill is only known, means that slighlty higher skill might mean much, but in the grander sense, the mastery of the skill is still low.

I believe the more skils that you have, the more interesting and successful you can become. Now you might be thinking, jack of all trades, master at none. You need to specialize! Master the one thing and make your mark with it. I do not disagree with this, but in my research or at least readings I have noticed that a new level of mastery and when you reach the top of mastery the climb to the top is not up, but sideways and up.

There are many stories of people of master getting to the top to only hit a ceiling. A skill ceiling? No, becaue there is more to be learned, gained and mastered. It just isn’t in the same road anymore. You are forced to innovate, combine skills to move on. Instead of just working with a hammer, you start to use a chisel as well. You master the hammer, but gain the skill of using a chisel, then combine them both. Hammering the chisel. Instead of just punching, you kick as well. Your body moves in a different way, puts you in different postions, opens up possibilites for new moves and motions. Exposes flaws in technique and demands you improve both skills to move forward.

It also helps that people are attracted to a person of many talents. You play an instruement? Do card tricks? Excellent at math or can explain sceience wine? Color me impressed if you drop this on me at a party. All humans are interesting whether we want to admit it or not. With more skills, you can become more intersting.

The How

How do you gain a new skill? This is a question that led me down a road of trying answer the question of how do we learn. How do you learn to learn better? Intersting question, we are never taught how to learn. It is just something we do. School, at least mine, did not teach me such things. So my quest began.

How

How

• used to ask about the condition or quality of something.
• in what way or manner; by what means.

Lately I have been trying to improve my self-talk. As I move through my day I notice more negative thoughts or questions enter my mind. Particularly dealing with my current actions and the future.

Questions such as
1. Why am I not doing what I want to do?
2. Why do I want to do this/that?
3. Why am I still at my current job, doing the same thing?
4. Why can’t I get it together?

Looking at these questions it is no wonder why I seem to feel stuck. These questions, if answered, only give me a meaning, the cause of situation. What it does not give me, which I desperately need, is action. What to do next.

While watching a video of Dan Lok,a successful entrepreneur and deal maker, he talks about deep questions. To get yourself to the next level of your life and to keep improving, you must ask yourself deep questions. The thing I noticed is that the questions he framed were always with “How”. Such as -

How do I make $50,000 more with the same products and customers?

And you could add more conditions onto this question to further deepen it. When looking at “How” I started to realize that it is very hard to make a “How” question negative and that “How” usually led to an action.

Let us tackle the negative statement first.

To make “How” negative we must do something like -

How can I not perform?
How do I fail at this all the time?

When saying these two questions, they feel forced. They seem to long even when writing them. You automatically want to ask the why. Why can’t I perform, why do I fail all the time. Using “How” it just seems out of place. Let’s reverse these into true “How” questions.

How can I perform?
How can I succeed all the time?

Not only are these positive versions of the questions above, they give you a gate to head towards. You have the end goal already set with the question, now it is time to figure out the road.

Action Phase

This is where the action comes in. When you answer these questions, you get the action.

To perform, you must practice.
To Succeed all the time, you must prepare. (if even possible haha)

From there you can ask the questions what? Where? and then Why? At the end of the day, if the “Why” is not there, then the action will not matter. Which I still believe in asking the “Why”, but I think that asking the “Why” is the second question, not the first in situations that you know you want to do. A lot of times we already know the “Why” and still don’t do what we want. This is because the actions are not clear to us, or there are too many actions. Using “How” we can narrow these down.

Question Chain

Let’s look at the chain of questions that might occur. Let our question be - How can I speak Japanese?

Simple answer? Practice every day. But practice what?

What do you want to talk about? - Food and Travel

How do I talk about food and travel in Japanese?

Learn the vocabulary for these subjects and basic Japanese sentence structure.

This process could go on until you are at the very basic word/structure that you want to learn or the skill that you would like to learn.

By using questions, we can narrow down the steps that we need to take and get to the next action to take in our Journey to master the skill or get to the next level of our lives.

Using “How” at the beginning can help start the chain and pinpoint what we need to do next. Also, it forces us to use our imagination and thinking power to find the possibilities to get us to the end goal.

Your turn!

Next time you find yourself talking to yourself and asking “Why” something is happening or you are not doing something, change it into a “How” and see what happens.

The Start of Something

Welcome,

If you have stumbled upon this, or have been invited, I welcome you. This place is one for writing and thoughts. It may convey some meaning to you, or it might just be something that you like to read once and awhile to gather new ideas.

I implore you to not think of every post as being something, but rather take it with open eyes and heart. Most might be bad or just random expressions from myself. I intend to post as much as I can. To fill this space with myself and ideas. Take them and spread them to the world if you wish. If I can inspire or make ideas come alive for you, then that is all I can do.

Welcome to this haunted place, where the ghosts of my memories and imagination swirl through the walls.

Welcome to the Ghostly Hotel.