As we hurtle through this combinatoric universe we call “life”, circumstances which add up to daunting personal challenges seem to be a given.

In these events, self-support is really important. I wrote about the SCUBA model before, and let’s just say—if you don’t have the right metaphorical gear, you may not make it through!

You will also become more resilient over time as you apply various tools and systems that are designed to support who you are, and who you can be.

But let’s stick with the big picture: In order to support yourself, it’s important to be able to believe in this “big picture” concept, and to have a set of ideals to believe in.

This may even feel more true, the more you yourself are, and have always been, a natural big-picture thinker—but it’s really true for everybody.

Discovering Your Big-picture Ideals

You may not feel like an idealist, but you probably have some big-picture ideals. Here are some aspects that can help you identify an ideal:

• Ideals may be described as: Hopes, beliefs, dreams, expectations.
• Ideals are sets of conditions you want to look forward to seeing in the future.
• An ideal outcome may not seem probable, but it will at least seem possible.
• You may not be able to describe all of your ideals, but you can feel them or identify with them when they are brought up.
• A rewarding feeling is attached to planning for, or expecting, the ideal outcomes.

One way I know my ideals are being supported is when I feel positive emotion. I may also feel more freedom to be creative, or to brainstorm new ideas.

Examples of Ideals

Here are some examples of ideals:

• I know we can work out our disagreements over time in a productive way, if we can be gentle and respectful.
• If we try to set a reasonably good example, this will often influence the people around us for the better.
• Exploring new phenomenon in life and in our universe can be a positive and energy-generating experience.
• We can work together as a group, team, or gathering and make big, positive changes.
• If we can reach win-win outcomes more often, we can be happier about the future of our civilization.
• We can search out, and find, people like ourselves who want to be creative, productive, and open-minded.
• If I keep learning, I’ll be able to give back to society in generous ways.
• Sometimes a pause in life can help us explore and rest, and find new creativity.

How to Put Your Ideals to Work for You

If you haven’t already, try to write down some of your own ideals. Keep them in a file, if you can.

Keep a list of media, such as music, paintings, movies, books, and video games, that instantly seem to teleport you into the world of those ideals.

For example, perhaps watching a Star Trek film really helps you feel optimistic about your life again, or a book like Scaramouche reignites your passion for life. Maybe the music of Daði Freyr helps you feel like your desire for creativity and life-exploration is part of a normal evolutionary path that humans often take.

Keeping a list like this can create a very powerful parachute-like resource for you, should you find yourself hurtling toward very hard ground—so to speak.

You may also wish to write down a list of friends, celebrities, or fictional people who bring the same types of ideals to mind.

Then, at the beginning of the next day, or even just the next time life gets tough, try this:

• Refer to your list of ideals, and the associated media.
• Directly experience at least some of the media—watch it, read it, play it, etc.
• If you have a list of people as well, review those people. See if you can metaphorically step into their shoes and experience the current events in your life as they would. What would they say, and do?
• Ask yourself how you can respect those thoughts, themes, and ideals, and live them, during this difficult time.

Additionally, you can try:

• Asking if it may help to re-phrase, or change the way you communicate or think about your ideals.
• Checking in later to reflect on what you’ve learned about living those ideals, including tips for respecting them in the future.
• If you have the energy: You may wish to try sharing what you’ve learned with others.

How The Results Should Look

As a result of this activity:

• Your own deeply-held interpretation of the beauty of life, or meaning of life, should feel like it is supporting you directly.
• You should feel more respect for yourself and your viewpoints.
• You should feel like you’ve learned more about your ideals.
• You should feel like you can put your own ideals into effect directly, rather than just waiting for them to show up someday!

You should also feel better about your beneficial role and position in life, and more secure in your ideals.

Congratulations, you are making the world a better place.

Notes On Going the Other Way

Sometimes we can get angry or upset when we feel like our ideals are being disrespected. To a big-picture thinker, it may seem like common sense to live based on a set of high ideals. But not everyone thinks the same way.

You may have found that you reacted to such a disappointment automatically, with negative results. This could be even more true, the more you feel like your ideals are disregarded by society at large.

However, quite a lot of people haven’t been trained or raised to put their ideals first, in the way that big-picture thinkers do. Some have even been raised to equate big-picture thinking with naivete, or gullibility.

If you’re in such a situation, here it can ALSO help to refer to the steps above and put your ideals to work.

You can remain resilient and reinforce a healthy life by continuing to live your ideals, even if you do have to work to improve the way you communicate them.

If you do let your ideals fall through, and you “sink to their level,” please be very careful. This will not be a comfortable way to think for big-picture thinkers. So there may be a tendency to overdo it—to get really nasty or to take revenge for example. It may be important to buy yourself time or distance to think or plan.

Conclusion

I hope this gives you some food for thought regarding ideals. In my opinion they are one of the least-discussed, but most powerful tools we have in supporting ourselves as we build a healthy life.

Above: Foster The People – Sit Next to Me on Youtube

Filed in: Energy /120/ | Publications /44/ | Control /110/ | Therapeutic Practice /144/

This is pretty funny. I always loved the Shipping Forecast for relaxation purposes.

And somebody let me know that there’s a Retro Weather Channel on Twitch now.

But Unintentional ASMR is a just a terrific idea for a channel.

A few favorites follow.

And this pure gem…(a pleasant little Jungian projection there at 9:48)

Filed in: Rest /21/ | Sleep /10/ | Therapeutic Practice /144/

Connor writes,

Can you share some surprising moments in coaching? [Paraphrased]

Here are a few:

Coaching for the Inebriated

There are some people who only realize they need a coach when they are drunk. In waking life they would rather ignore the idea. It’s new, weird, or scary to them.

These cases are more obvious in part because after they get in touch during their drunken times, the very first thing the next day, they usually write an email saying they are no longer interested, or communicating a retraction of some sort…

This surprised me at first, because I never got drunk web development clients before. I guess people don’t think “I need a website” when drunk, so much as they think, “things in general need to improve.”

And the sad part is—coaching or no, these people still need some kind of help that’s apparently out of reach to their normal, waking mind. :-(

Tip: If you reached out for coaching while drunk, let it play out. Joke about it if you have to, but hang in there and see how it goes. You never know.

Coaching for the Lost

Some others get in touch because they need a therapist, and they want me to be their therapist.

Sometimes it’s difficult to set boundaries with these kind of people because they are unfortunately treating life as if all boundaries are blurred in the first place. If you clarify something, like “I’m a coach and not a therapist,” it can feel very hurtful to them.

After all, they usually realize this and are still more than willing to give it a shot, and they’d probably describe themselves as someone who bends over backwards for other people.

However—I just can’t do that. Not only am I not interested in being in the therapist role (some of my mentors were therapists, and we discussed the possibility), but I think there are some basics that everybody needs to pay attention to when they suffer from poor mental health, no matter their personality dynamics. Therapists are trained to cover those areas very well, for one.

Tip: Get and retain a good therapist AND a good coach if you need to. Try to avoid putting all that pressure on a coach who’s trying to focus on a different type of career entirely.

Coaching for the Socially-Broken, paid by the Socially-Able (or Mom)

There’s also a group of people who get in touch because mom’s paying. Or sister’s paying, or somebody more socially clueful.

“What do you want to accomplish,” asks my coaching intake form.

“My mom will tell you all about that.”

She will?!

Sure enough, there’s an email from mom. She wants her son to be…hmmm…just like her? Loving, confident, quick-witted, but above all, socially-appropriate and socially-skilled.

“God, to mix his brains with my relating skills, what an absolute hunk…err…model of a son he would be,” I think she thinks.

(Poor Dad is NEVERRRR spoken of in these situations, either. lol)

I can’t believe how patient some of these people are with their moms. But it’s a tricky situation, because moms hold the keys to a lot of things in life.

I was uncomfortable with this kind of coaching from the very start.

Tip: If someone else pays for coaching and you’re not 100% into it, at least make it authentic. Help your coach steer the conversation by bringing up things you are legitimately interested in, and see if they can help you make it enjoyable.

Coaching for the Mega-mind

Imagine you somehow dwell in a world of rabbits, and you’re the only non-rabbit, higher intellect you can find.

And then you realize that you NEED a rabbit as a coach. There don’t seem to exist any coaches with intellects greater than a humble rabbit, anyway. And an AI would really be ideal, but there’s a problem! The AI needs to approach your own ginormous intelligence…

…which, “we all know” this kind of AI isn’t ready for prime time yet.

“So in the meantime, you’ll have to do…”

“…by the way coach, if you need to schedule me, kindly use my convenient online scheduling system!”

(If I need to schedule YOU?)

Tip: If you are highly intelligent and proud of it, probably play it DOWN when getting coaching. At least at a start. Put some feelers out if you need to. But be careful being really direct about this. Otherwise any given session can quickly turn into some variant of a social-clues-and-hints session, despite the coach’s best intentions.

Conclusion

These are just a few that came to mind. Some others were even weirder…

Coaches often have to set really firm boundaries, but at least that makes for good exercise for the coach, too.

Filed in: Relationships /78/ | Coaching /27/

Erin in the Outback writes,

I am embarrassed to admit that I don’t know how to be in a long-term loving relationship. How should I love my partner?

This is a really huge topic. There are all kinds of approaches—love languages, interaction styles, and so on.

But let me share one concept. It’s one that I think a lot of INTJs will naturally miss, but I also think it will generally make them feel a lot better about themselves and their partner.

A huge part of love is attention given to the subjective history of the relationship.

Facing the future, part of your goal should be making good memories together.

But facing the current relationship, and facing the past, you should have some damn-solid good memories to look back on. They should make your partner feel good, and they should also make you feel good.

This does create some INTJ-style problems:

1. You have to remember stuff, somehow. (This is kind of a weird topic for INTJs, who will tend to over-commit to memory or under-commit, so please be gentle on yourself)
2. You have to pay attention to how you feel, in the moment. This is easier, but still hard when you’re worn out. Corollary: Be sure to do some activities together when you have plenty of energy.
3. You have to be willing to reflect on the relationship, like, “hey, today I was just reminiscing about” and have it not just be about sensations on your end, like hey, flying in a helicopter for the first time felt amazing. That’s not good because it’s more about what you felt, by yourself, and you don’t need a relationship for that.

So here’s what I suggest—

1. Keep a list of your top memories together. ALERT, ALERT: START NOW or ON DAY ONE. DO NOT WAIT. Favorite memories do not need to be N years old. Favorite memories can be N hours old.
2. If you can’t think of any off the top of your list, it’s OK to start with some intuitive-style hints to yourself, like “there must be something from when we were at the beach last month?” And later you can even ask your partner to help you remember, which in a lot of cases is less risky and even more fun for them than you may think.
3. Over time, sort the list and put your favorite memories at the top of the list.
4. Over time, break the list out into sub-lists. Favorite vacation moments. Favorite restaurant moments. Or “favorite moments of our twenties”
5. Do your best to include some actual quotes when you can. If you have to say, “sorry, I need a pen, I want to write down what you just said, that was great,” then boom, you have said something most partners can only dream about hearing from their partner.
6. In your list, do your best to include dates, approximate times, and locations if you can.
7. If you can add some context, like “we were both starving, and we went on this vacation knowing the food wouldn’t be that great, so it was funny but it tasted amazing anyway”, or “this was a difficult period in our life because…” then you are winning.
8. Bring these up when your partner looks like they are not hurting, not in trouble, not in danger, etc. In other words, bring them up when things are pretty normal, or when things are getting slightly better than a little bit ago. These moments often work best on the ramp upwards, so to speak.

Think of this activity as similar to sketching or painting. It can be impressionistic, but it should include at least some key details. And I guarantee you, it can become a really good hobby for an introvert.

Most importantly—this type of activity should be affecting YOU positively, as well as your partner.

Anyway, after the list is building up, it’s easy to calendar some recurring dates, if you need to, to review and then bring up these memories with your partner.

And if all of this is too much, there should be something here that is easy to start, or a bit more doable in part than as a whole.

BTW if you’re not in a relationship, this is also A) usable for general friendships and teamwork, and B) a great way to feel more secure in starting one.

Great question Erin, and I’m sure you’ll do great in your relationship, posing thoughtful items like this.

PS. Can you keep track of the bad stuff—yes but I think some INTJs will tend to overdo this, like as a contingency in case they end up in relationship jail or something. It’s not a good look but if you need to do it, at least try this other thing too.

Filed in: Relationships /78/ | Si /18/

Today I added four new INTJs to the list on the blog’s front page.

• George Lucas
• Rufus Sewell
• Julia Stiles
• Shailene Woodley

It’s been a lot of fun to reflect on their work and words.

Filed in: People /72/

Some people work really well with a system of rewards for things like productivity or progress on various goals. IF they do this, THEN they get that, says their personal system.

To me though, automatic, unearned rewards also need to be part of normal life. I find that I operate best with a good baseline level of life-sweetness which is always on.

I’ve also found that traditions are a really nice way of framing this kind of work.

New Traditions for a New, Upgraded Normal

Here are some of the things I look forward to that are more like weekly traditions now.

You could say that creating, modifying, and observing traditions is a big part of how I reward myself for just being me, and it helps a lot.

First, every Tuesday I check out a digital movie from my public library account. This means it will be returned on Friday. So it’s nice to watch it a little bit each day until the weekend. I really look forward to this because there are some pretty great films available. This new tradition has a noticeably positive effect on the middle of my week. (I’m currently watching The Man Who Killed Hitler and Then the Bigfoot)

Second, on Saturdays and Mondays I add new JustWatch titles to my various account lists. JustWatch is a nice service that lets you see what’s just been added to Netflix, Paramount Plus, Hoopla, and many other services. On Saturdays I review titles from Monday-Thursday, and on Mondays I review titles from Friday-Sunday. This makes my watch lists pretty long and also fresh, which I’ve found is really good for my energy levels overall. This new tradition has a nice, temporary fun energy effect, similar to opening a small gift.

Finally, I look forward to cleaning and organization tasks on the weekend. I have a lot to do still, in pushing this tradition forward, but I notice that it makes my weekdays feel a lot better. Sometimes it’s physical cleaning, for example cleaning off a work surface or organizing a bookcase. And sometimes it’s digital cleaning, like reorganizing some folders on my work computer. This tradition has a very noticeable energy accrual effect in the short- and mid-term.

These three examples are all in addition to family traditions, like holiday observances, or Taco Tuesdays, or making a donut run on Friday mornings.

But most importantly: I’m always updating these. I tweak my traditions over time and keep a file with notes relevant to each one. The value of this kind of ongoing refinement is very easy to understate.

Conclusion

Those are some examples how I use traditions to set a rewards-baseline for enjoying a better week.

Do you have any traditions that are just for you?

What works, and what needs tweaking?

Filed in: Feeling /64/ | Energy /120/ | Therapeutic Practice /144/ | Interests /111/

Catching up on some Q&A:

J. writes,

I tend to get lost in my daily to-do list. Then I get frustrated. Have you addressed this in your productivity work?

Yes—for starters, please check out the Debriefing Module within Task BATL.

I just updated and reorganized this module, but it was always meant to address this kind of situation.

Additionally, Task BATL is meant to help you gain energy momentum for diving back into your to-do list, so the Task BATL system in general ought to help with this.

Beca writes,

I have a quick enquiry about Task BATL. Have you thought about publishing it into a book?

Yes, I hope to at least publish an electronic edition. I really like the idea of keeping the system simple, so hopefully that means it won’t be too hard to get out the door…

Antonio writes,

You mentioned [elsewhere online —Marc] that you have gamified your productivity system, specifically playing it like a game of golf. Is this a Task BATL feature?

Yes, it’s a brand new Task BATL experiment and so far it’s been fun to play. I hope to add it to the formal Task BATL system soon, but I want to make it a bit more adaptable first. It works great for me, but I realized that some people may want to play it in the opposite way, basically, depending on what they need from a system of productivity.

Several People write,

Is Task BATL a Te-Fi-balanced system of productivity?

It started with some emphasis on what you might call Jungian Te and Fi functions. But since that time I’ve decided to incorporate additional, non-typology theory and systems.

For now: Please enjoy using Task BATL!

Filed in: Productivity /119/ | Te /36/ | Fi /34/

Over the years I’ve been contacted periodically by curious folks who wonder what I think about different types of meditation.

A lot of the meditations out there are sensory-focused, and outside of the sensory realm you’ve generally got hypnosis-oriented meditations. The hypnosis-oriented work is typically based on the concept of using someone else’s script.

So there’s this gap: What if your subjective-intuitive gifts could use some expression in support of your normal psychology? Is there a form of deliberate, conscious meditation that could be applied?

And one thing that’s always bugged me is: What’s a good, natural Ni-related form of meditation to practice? (Ni being one of the eight Jungian cognitive functions, and one with which this blog has quite a large conceptual intersection)

With this post I’m formally introducing this new concept.

Introducing Frontdooring

Frontdooring is an intuitive meditation activity that taps into your current context and interests, and offers an immediate transition to calming, interesting, imaginative, and introverted activity.

In Frontdooring, you write, draw, perform, or otherwise create your own script. The script can be referred to or reviewed later, for relaxation or meditation purposes.

The benefits of Frontdooring include increased familiarity with the capabilities of human imagination, a deeply underappreciated superpower.

The Process

The process of Frontdooring works like this:

• Go about your normal tasks, hobbies, or projects
• Pay attention to any surges of interest-energy
• Let the interest play out in your imagination a bit
• If it feels good, decide whether & how to Frontdoor the point of interest
  • Example: Visualize it in your mind, draw it, play it musically, or write it? Or a combination?
• Begin the Frontdooring process, releasing yourself from the current context
• End whenever you like, using the formal wrapping-up steps
  • If desired, review and analyze the Frontdooring outcome
  • Add this and any other simple notes to your ongoing Frontdooring Journal

As a result of the Frontdooring process, you should feel more calm, introspective, and connected with a deeper, more interesting outlook on life.

The Benefits

The Frontdooring process can have the following benefits:

• Release from life’s current demands
• Relief from sensory functions
• Relief from the day’s little tasks
• Increased ability to process big-picture life issues
• Increased receptivity to life’s meaning or messages
• Increased awareness of upcoming issues or changes in life
• A new, enhanced ability to analyze the current situation or context

In providing relief and release from the immediate situation or context, Frontdooring can also help you rebuild the energy to return to your daily needs or tasks later. This practical, restorative, productive usage is part of the day-to-day value of Frontdooring.

How to Start?

The Frontdooring process above will feel more natural for some personalities than others. Please review the basic example below. If it seems interesting, you may want to read the advanced example as well.

In the future, I hope to add more materials to describe and support the process for those who feel it is less familiar.

A Basic Example of Frontdooring

Annick is attending a family reunion. It’s the early afternoon, and she needs to get some rest before the evening’s activities begin. She has been very busy in catching up with family so far today, and could use some help getting to sleep.

She lays down and reviews topics that seem interesting recently.

Earlier in the morning, she was watching a detective film with her cousin, and it really caught her interest. Then, later, she felt intrigued by the idea of re-reading the book Dracula by Bram Stoker.

Annick concludes that she is in a detective-like mood. She imagines a location and environment where she’s going to be detecting, as a fictional detective. The first place that comes to mind is an old English manor.

Annick rests her head comfortably on her pillow and imagines herself at a writing desk in the old manor. In her mind’s eye, she can see herself opening her journal, and writing,

It’s a new week, and I must make progress on the case. My travels will likely take me far into the mountains of eastern Europe. I will pack the following…

Annick continues this fictional journaling in her mind’s eye, and gradually falls into restful sleep.

A More Advanced Example of Frontdooring

Below I’ve shared a personal example, in which I journaled my way through a basic Frontdooring activity, with my laptop open. If you haven’t already selected some journaling or writing software to use, please do so.

Just prior to writing this journal entry, I was struck by some interesting imagery while watching a retro-computing video on Youtube. This kind of activity, engaging in personal hobbies or interests, will often make it easier for a Frontdooring exercise to begin.

I felt my mind’s eye taking me back to a favorite type of environment from my youth: A computer software store. I decided to use this Youtube video and the resulting mind’s eye imagination as the “front door” and dive into this fictional, imagined world in a conscious, intentional way.

As it seemed appropriate, I wrote out the visualization as if I was playing an interactive fiction adventure game. The lines beginning with “>” indicate what I was imagining myself typing, but in reality I have imagined the entire thing, both my typed commands and the responses.

(The example starts below)

Welcome to the software store. It is 6:30 p.m. on Sunday. The store is closed.

> Look around

You’re inside a store, after hours. It’s about 1996, maybe?

The lighting is low, and some corners of the store are a little bit dark, though streetlight spilling through large windows on two walls does naturally bring up those levels a bit.

You see rows of double-sided shelves, some desks with demonstration computers and software, a computer repair desk that’s remarkably well organized, and a checkout stand.

In one corner of the store there’s a little glass fridge stocked with drinks and a few snacks, and nearby there are a few tables with chairs. This corner of the store has a tile floor. On each table there’s a standee on top of a little pile of interesting books about computers. Weird! But creative, different. Kind of a reflection of the industry itself.

You see a flight simulator game high on one of the longer shelves running along the walls. Screenshots on the box show some neat-looking aircraft gauges, with the ground being green, and the sky a dark blue.

> Imagine playing that game

You see yourself bringing the game home. It’s rainy, and getting dark. You pull into your driveway and enter your house. It’s quiet; you live alone. The house is clean, organized inside. It has a lovely aesthetic.

You sit down at your computer desk and peel the plastic off of the game box. You smell the manufacturing process, and it’s a happy smell. Your brain seems more than familiar with the burst of fascination that hits after that smell.

You remember your new desktop publishing software from last month, and recall that using it is also a lot of fun. In fact there are a lot of titles like that sitting right across the desk.

Your computer, a Pentax Optimus V, is fictional. It is a 586 which you have equipped with a 3D graphics card supporting the “bonus 3D texturing features” also shown on the game box.

You insert the install disc and type “PINS” which is a handy Pentax alternative-universe shortcut which can be typed into an MS-DOS-equivalent text input GUI. The command searches available drives and prompts you to run whatever installer it finds.

Within a few short moments, the game is installed. You turn up the speaker volume. BOM BOM BOMMMMMM, the music starts.

BOM BOM BOM BOMMMMMMM, it continues.

RATATATATAT, it goes. Then there’s a 3D animation of a really slick alternate-universe German bomber aircraft flying over Vietnam.

Within the next 30 seconds your eyes and ears are bombarded with various hypotheticals. They light up the furthest reaches of your brain.

And 30 seconds after that, you are flying a training mission. The control scheme is ingenious and adapts well to dum-dums like you. Or at least, that’s how you imagine the internal documentation reads.

With the mission completed, even the landing goes well. You manage to park the aircraft roughly where it’s supposed to go, and now your 3D character is standing on the tarmac.

> Get him a drink for god’s sake

You buy him a drink at the bar, and you notice there’s someone sitting near the back of the room, at a small table.

> Talk to that guy

“Hejjj,” he starts.

Oh my god, this part of the game was never translated. Funny! You look in the manual and see that the development team is based in Stockholm.

> Teleport to the development team HQ

You are now facing N, standing in a parking lot. In front of you is the entrance to a well-lit modern glass & steel building. It is 3 a.m.

The environmental temperature feels close to freezing.

> Go inside

The door is locked.

> Use the back door that’s unlocked

You’re right about that. You enter through the back door and a curious Swede looks up at you from his coffee.

“Hej,” he starts.

> Shake your head and break the news to him

You hold up your hand and shake your head. “It’s not translated fully yet,” you tell him.

“Sorry?”

“The game, look, it’s unfinished.”

Your raised hand projects a beam of light at, and into, his forehead. His eyes begin to move rapidly, as if looking at something just past your current surroundings.

“Oh my god,” he says.

“This man in the game, I need to know what he is telling me.”

“He is telling you to come to Stockholm, for some kind of a meeting, I think.”

“So? I’m here.”

“You need to crash somewhere until Thursday. He says he’ll send further word then. Do you want to sleep on our couch?”

“Sure.”

(End of Frontdooring example—you can read the benefits of this exercise below)

More About the Advanced Example

The first big benefit of this example is satisfying the needs of the intuition. As you can see, there was quite a bit of imaginative, intuitive energy available for the exploration of this internal world. So, it felt really satisfying to write this out, like uncorking some built-up pressure somewhere.

The second benefit is the “duh” message inside this little story I wrote, if you sort of zoom out, or summarize: “You can make progress, and some interesting things are in store, but you need to wait.” In this case, it really did turn out that I needed to wait until Thursday. And I was able to consciously breathe again, no pressure, take a break until then!

So, this wasn’t just a fancy little exercise, but it had immediate practical, reassuring, therapeutic effect. I was able to make better decisions with that information in mind.

The third benefit is the expansion of the limits of the personal imagination. This is a very advanced topic, but it’s my belief that this is an extremely important benefit to all of mankind. Most of us have extremely limited contact with these internal worlds and symbols.

And, the more comfortable we become with the rare & ever-more-useful subjective-imaginative skill, the better the world we will be able to conceive and construct together.

This may all sound fancy or even ignorant! But have you ever made a plan, worked to a plan, and accomplished something? That plan was fueled in part by your imagination at work.

That’s what I’m talking about, and much more. The practical value of this kind of work is not something we can fully grasp at this stage of our evolution as humans. But it doesn’t help that we have trained ourselves in many ways to think of the imagination as unrealistic or unproductive.

Stop dreaming and get back to work!

(What if those dreams really were relevant to the work, and could help to save time, save effort, fix strained relations, and generally make life easier for everyone?)

For this reason, I consider Frontdooring a past-present-future-focused meditation, in that it brings symbols from the past forward, to describe the current state, and contribute to practical, beneficial future outcomes. It helps to open a door to our future evolution as individuals and as a species.

In its advanced mode, Frontdooring can be even more helpful as you build up a personal symbol vocabulary. This vocabulary helps you to 1) identify your current interests, 2) identify and experience the possible meanings of those interests in your life right now, and 3) consciously transfer the psychological energy from these interests to your current set of problems. Further, you can 4) advance the integration of those interests at longer timelines, so that you are able to solve even more complex problems that would have blocked your path before.

This is similar in benefit to what Carl Jung termed “making the unconscious, conscious.”

Questions? Comments?

This new practice is in active development. In the future I hope to write more about how it can be done, and what makes it unique.

In the meantime, if you have questions or comments, you can find my email in the sidebar.

Music: Hansee – Elevated | feat. Mordi

Filed in: Intuition /61/ | Ni /42/ | Publications /44/ | Openness /49/ | Energy /120/ | Therapeutic Practice /144/ | Control /110/

Happy New-Bond-Film Weekend, everybody!

I just updated a key aspect of the Task BATL Trigram: The Diamond, also noted as V, for Values-driven. Here’s the updated description:

• DIAMOND Items: Values-driven items—related to personal goals, personal development, and the development of personal interests over time. Usually results are satisfying in the mid- to long-term. In the short term, organized or planned conscious effort may be needed. Examples: Purchase tickets and watch a new film by a favorite director; Finish first aid certification process; Schedule campground for this weekend; Practice the piano.

Why Change It?

For months I watched as my personal list of Diamond items seemed to want for attention. I’d have lots of Circle items on my list, lots of Square items, but the Diamond slots would remain empty, longer.

Diamond items were still important to me, but I recognized that the description and categorization rule might be off a bit.

Diamonds represent values, yet I noticed that I was pushing my values forward in many different ways than I had originally anticipated. These experiences often involved placing Diamond items in the Circle items list. The difference between the Diamond list and the Circle list seemed more like a difference between “work” and “fun,” which I didn’t like.

I realized I was also looking at my personal goals in ways that were less “me”, and in fact it was starting to get a bit painful to work on goals. Almost like I couldn’t recognize a good personal goal to save my life!

An A-ha Moment

In fact the answer was right under my nose: Values-related goals should often be directly linked with the kind of attention that is freely and happily given to personal interests on a daily basis. There should be no lack of energy in the Values system, as a result.

A lack of energy could hint at a lack of stable “connective tissue” between Circle and Diamond items, specifically in the contexts of time scope and interest-development.

This made a lot of sense given the way I’ve accomplished various outcomes personally in my own life, but it also made sense as I reviewed my experiences as a professional coach.

More About What’s Changed

So the new difference between Diamonds and Circles is in placing a bit less emphasis on the two Diamond areas of goals and personal development (developing “who I am” into “who I want to be”), and bringing Diamond items closer to our conscious energy center by directly involving personal interests (“what gives me energy”).

Both Circles and Diamond items can involve interests, but Circle items involve more temporary attention to those interests, treating the interests like a temporary sandbox to play in, for example. Diamond items involve a bit more conscious attention to “the state of a given interest,” and to the structured development of specific interests.

For this reason, I’ve added “the development of personal interests over time” to the list of Diamond-qualifiers.

Some Examples

Examples of this kind of activity could include:

• Updating my list of favorite foods
• Making a logbook of my Old Time Radio hobby, including tracking episodes I enjoy
• Developing a way to keep track of my ongoing online formal education, to include Wikiversity courses
• Organizing my most-used stationery items so they’re more easily accessible (stationery hobby)
• Adding new entries to my list of interests (meta-interest)
• Checking off a to-do list item in my Fantasy Baseball III hobby (logs for hobbies or interests also have to-do lists)
• Adding more resource link URLs to my role playing game hobby’s character creation section. (logs also have external Resources)

All of this effort may be enjoyable, but its outcomes are also usually more appreciated over the mid- to long-term. It aims at supporting development of specific interests in the long term.

In that way it’s different from, say, listening to an Old Time Radio episode, or using a favorite stationery item, which are both activities that are more “about” the current context, usually.

Conclusion

As usual, there’s much more room for improvement and refinement. Eventually I’d like to reorganize Task BATL itself even more, and I have new modules to add.

But for now—I hope you enjoy the framework and it’s been a lot of fun working on it so far.

Filed in: Goals /52/ | Productivity /119/ | Interests /111/

I came across the Spartacus Educational website while doing some research on the whole JFK assassination thing, which is a sad but interesting topic (I had written “fun” topic here before, but it’s a pain to explain patiently how a sad thing can also be so deep that eventually it becomes fun to learn more about)

The site is quite extensive and interesting, and the author bio really made me think, “ah, this seems like an INTJ project.”

Regardless, I think it’s just fascinating that there is this well-considered set of dead witnesses.

Well, I’ll go one step further: SPECIFICALLY I think it’s interesting that one of them died from a “karate chop” to the throat.

I will be thinking about that one for a while. So weird! Thus far I find that after a few hours it spins one’s head away from all the seriousness and quite a distance into “Wes Anderson film” territory.

Filed in: Interests /111/ | People /72/