Cyclone

I had my eye of calm quiet space,
amid confusion wildly hurled,
in which I used to watch and wait
as about me whirled the world.

And looking up, out of myself,
I saw your face amid the bustle,
With calm, bright eyes, and lucid health
Your thoughtful voice devoid of hustle.

And I leapt out, into the wall
Of shifting, moving, whipping things
It caught me, threw me, made me fall
Just like a bird with broken wings.

And now when I have no defense
When I can quietly stop and see:
All the things you said make sense:
The only thing that moves is me.

I am the wind about my heart
That shreds and flays my confidence
I keep me wild and set apart
I treat the world with violence

And so, right now, I have to slow
This frenzied, whirling, crazy spin,
To search and find what I can do
With this, my strange cyclone within.

What is a life worth?

The movie 'Margin Call' is a Wall-Street thriller, almost a re-enactment drama, almost a disaster movie. It depicts the events of a single night when a brilliant financial analyst, working alone, suddenly discovers the oncoming financial tsunami of the subprime mortgage crisis. It is simply brilliant, showing the startling, horrific influence of unfettered money-making on everything. It shows the impact and impotence of almost every positive, resilient human trait when faced with the sheer unmitigated power of wealth fighting for its own survival. 

Whilst watching the film, I was struck by how inexorable, how irresistible the force of this leviathan was. There's a scene when a senior analyst, previously fired by the firm and masterfully played by Stanley Tucci, looks over his life with a sense of regret and ponders his previous career as an engineer. He had built a bridge for commuters so that they spent less time in their cars and more time doing whatever they wanted to do. Tabulating in his head the millions of hours that 'his bridge' had saved over its lifetime, he could honestly claim to have made a tangible difference in the lives of the people who used his bridge. He could make no such calculation for his exorbitantly expensive career in finance. I was left feeling a little shocked and nauseated by the message of the scene, partially because it was so well delivered, partially because it was true. At some level, in the world today, the worth of a life is mainly measured in dollars, pounds and cents (or maybe even in yuan).

I'm a scientist, with healthy annual income, so why should I care? I think it matters what we value as a society since that's where we put our energy. We are immersed in the conversations of the wealthy and powerful. Donald Trump makes headlines by making the most absurd assertions and happily basks in undeserved notoriety and influence. I always have this almost uncontrollable urge to scream obscenities at the television whenever I see him on it. One day, I swear, I'll be unable to contain myself and get myself into all sorts of trouble. 

So let's ask the question: What is a life worth? How might we measure this? 

Christians (and some cartoonists) talk about the conversation you might have with St Peter at the Pearly Gates when he takes a long, lingering look over the balance sheet of your life to decide whether you may pass into the kingdom of Heaven (or not). I think of this often (although as an atheist, not with this particular imagery). When I die, looking back over my life, what would my balance sheet look like? What might I be proud of? What might I be ashamed of? Moreover, extrapolating from this sort of internal, private conversation, would it not be valuable to society as a whole to be able to evaluate this accurately and empower the people who make the biggest difference? We might stop paying such a lot of attention to ridiculous blowhards on TV.

A recent study by Kahneman and Beaton shows a distinction between emotional well being and life evaluation as measures of 'quality of life'. They show that there is a ceiling to the effect that money has on your emotional experience of life, beyond which, making more money has little effect. Broadly speaking, they did this by asking people about their day-to-day experience of positive emotions (laughing, happiness), 'blue' feelings (sadness, worry, anger) and stress. Having a family income of less than $75,000 per year seemed to exacerbate the impact of negative life events and simply makes it hard to cope. But having more money than that doesn't necessarily make your experience of life more positive or less stressful. This is in contrast to the way in which people evaluate their life in response to a question where respondents are asked to rate their 'current life' to their 'best possible life'. That question is directly correlated to how much money you have. There's always somewhere better to get to in the land of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Another statistic mentioned in this study is that, tellingly, of the 151 countries surveyed, Americans ranked 5th for their high levels of stress. 

This is significant if we think of our emotional experience of life, our impact on others and their impact on us. Even though this would probably be impossible to do, what if we could calculate the duration and intensity that the consequences of my actions had on another person's emotions? How many days of happiness, sadness, or stress did my actions convey to other people? There's a quotation that says "people may not remember exactly what you did, or what you said, but they'll always remember how you made them feel" which speaks directly to this. This even correlates somewhat to a financial argument. If a product makes more people happy, it will sell more units.  The financial argument doesn't necessarily run too deeply though. A financial evaluation of worth is predicted by market forces, so that the value of something is based on the presence of a market for it. If the worth of something cannot be easily perceived (or measured) then there will be a disconnection between its perceived worth and its actual worth. 

Consider the lives of two giants of the Information Technology world who died in 2011. Steve Jobs was eulogized and celebrated (justifiably so) but only a relatively small number of people lamented the passing of Dennis Richie. He was the inventor of the C programming language and the UNIX operating system. In the words of the historian Paul Ceruzzi: "… if you had a microscope and could look into a computer, you'd see his work everywhere inside." To compare these two great men is unfair, but at some level, the contribution of Richie is an order of magnitude greater than that of Jobs. But, because Richie's contribution occurred two or three steps removed from the glitzy iMacs, iPods and xBoxes that people would buy (including the machine you're now using to read this blog), his 'worth' may well have been recognized by some industry insiders and computer scientists, but would never have had any real financial reward. The challenge of understanding causality is an unsolved problem in most scientific fields. Understanding each of our parts in the grand web of interaction that makes up life with its messiness and complication is so difficult to be considered impossible. 

Another example of the tragedy implicit in our lack of knowledge of our contribution and impact to one another is the story of William Carothers. He was a brilliant chemist, well-recognized for his work during his lifetime and was the inventor of Nylon. The crowning irony was that he committed suicide at the age of 41 largely because (so the story goes) he couldn't "satisfy women" within his turbulent private life. In some way, he was the ultimate creator of every kind of lingerie elegantly and flamboyantly worn by women since the 1940s. At the end of the day, his balance sheet would have had a sizable checkmark in the 'made women happy' column. But that never translated back to him, even with recognition, even with fame, even with money. This resonates with me as a scientist, even more so since I am now the same age he was when he died and even more so since, as a bachelor, it's hard to know just how much I matter in the emotional lives of others. How do we really see or understand the contribution that we make? 

On the other hand, I sometimes think of Joesph Stalin as a man who's balance sheet was firmly skewed in the red, quite literally. He famously said "When a single person dies, it's a tragedy; when a million people die, it's a statistic". I think we have an obligation to give that measurement some teeth, some impact. A parent who raises their children well has an impact on their children's emotional life in its entirety. A musician who gives voice to a sentiment felt by people at their saddest (such a blues singer) might alleviate that sadness in millions. A medical scientist might contribute to make a great many people just a little bit happier, or even save the lives of a few. A nurse might alleviate the suffering of people in such pain so that they can die with dignity. A murderer might traumatize an entire family for life by killing a loved one. A politician might send troops to war, causing untold destruction in lives and subsequent conflict. A financier might sell mortgages to people that ultimately means that they lose their homes, bankrupting nations as they go. 

We are bound to impact others lives. At the very least, we must be aware of that impact and strive, to the best of our ability, to have that impact be a positive one. A 'man of consequence' is a weighty phrase. I would like to see us understand what that means, based on a person's actual consequences.  

And Let Me Be

And let me look with bright blue eyes,
on beauty's heart, on beauty's face,
and let me feel her breathing sighs,
with all of true love's style and grace

And let my heart not quicken so,
when shadows crawl across my eyes,
to darken and disgrace my sight,
with unknown fears and useless lies.

And let me be someone to trust,
who will not lie, who does not hurt:
someone who is not ruled by lust,
but loves to laugh and dance and flirt.

And let me show that I can be:
a man like no-one else or other;
a unique soul who lives for truth;
who loves the world and is its brother.

And now I know what I must do,
in life, in love, in work, in play,
and all my thanks must go to you,
for simply showing me the way.

---

I think that I'd like this poem to be written on my headstone when I die.

I wrote it in 1999 for someone who had a surprisingly strong attraction to. She really didn't reciprocate,  and even then, I found a powerful emotional driving feeling at my core in the small hopeful act of falling head-over-heels for someone. Although I was seeking a deeper emotional connection when there simply wasn't one there to have, the poem was a wonderful end-product of this process.

I took a 'transformational life-training' course at a company called Landmark Education in 2001, which had a really profound and beneficial effect on me. This course was all about personal discovery, self-realization, breakthroughs and re-charting the course of my life. It consisted of about 200 people and was lead by a remarkable Australian woman call Cathy Elliot, who must have lead this course to literally hundreds of thousands of people over the course of her career and I was determined to make sure that she remembered us, the people from our course, out of all the hundreds of courses she's participated in.

So, I wrote out this poem in a frame, and read it to her in front of the entire room full of people on the last night of the course. I then asked every single person to sign their name around the border of the frame to represent how the sentiment in the poem was true for everyone else as well. It was just a wonderful night and I filed it away as just one of those fantastic moments for posterity.

About 3 or 4 months later, Cathy sent me a small note of acknowledgment for this: the postcard shown below. This was really a small gesture, but is certainly a token that brings me a remarkable amount of pleasure and satisfaction to see.

And now, as I sit, reflecting on my current experience, amid my failings, the seemingly impossible challenges I face, and the unquenchable thirst for suffering exhibited by my shadows and my fears, I think of this poem. I think of how, at its heart, these few scribbles on a page is a true expression of who I really am and of what I really stand for in myself. Perhaps, we all need such a declaration to seize on in troubled times. This is mine.  

My Feelings for Truth

Truth is power. It provides answers to the questions 'how?' and 'why?'. When we realize it, it touches us, moves us and shocks us. When it can't be found, we become confused and rudderless. When it is abused, it conveys power to deceivers at greater cost to the deceived. When it is shared, it is the basis of trust. The truth requires courage, humility and clarity. It needs no argument. It needs no defense. It needs no impassioned plea to convince or cajole. It simply is. 

It disheartens me to observe that argument seems to stand as the sole arbiter of truth. Win arguments and your truth will carry the day. Argument is fraught with charismatic charlatans who score points, argue, insult, humor, joke and say almost anything to convince you of their point of view. I'm harsh in my judgment of these people. Their souls are stained. I hold the truth sacred and like any true believer, I can be an asshole about it sometimes. 

A couple of years ago, I found myself strolling along third-street promenade in Santa Monica on a Friday night. I saw some people had set up a microphone and were arguing with passer-bys about Intelligent Design. Now, this idea stems from an incident in 1802, when William Daley found a watch in the street. He suddenly realized that there must be a watchmaker. Such a thing could not possibly have appeared there randomly through natural processes. By extension, the same argument should hold for the human eye, or other wonders of nature. Hence, it follows naturally that an ‘intelligent designer’ created us and that the whole notion of Darwinian evolution is unfounded. Nowadays, over two hundred years later, this logic has no scientific credibility, but advocates of this idea argue the point anyway. They have a religious agenda, not a scientific one. They present pseudoscience and proselytize.

I squared my shoulders and cricked my neck in preparation for a fight. I wanted to take these guys on. I needed to. A teenage kid was at the mike trying his best and I stood just behind him and started muttering encouragements: "Good point!"; "You're doing great!". I had a thought. "Ask them about snowflakes! Go on, ask them about snowflakes." After all, each individual snowflake is completely unique, beautiful and complex. We know that their fractal patterning arises from the geometry of water molecules, not from a 'designer'. Our opponent didn't understand the point I was trying to make. He just looked there and looked at me with a mixture of confusion and incredulity on his face. 

After a while, I realized it really didn’t matter what we said, they weren't really interested the argument, they were only interested in winning the argument, no matter what. Tellingly, I noticed a camera they’d set up to record the conversation and I suddenly realized that they'd study the footage and just work to find counterarguments to the things being said. By getting in their face like this, I was actually helping them.

They didn't care about the truth at all. They were bullshitters; worse even than liars, since liars care enough about the truth to try to subvert it. The determining thing was their underlying intent. In this case, this was fairly innocuous: spend a Friday night spreading the good word amongst the heathen, then go off to Denny's for pancakes. 

Things are not so harmless in the wider world. In his book 'Bad Science', Ben Goldacre takes on a whole host of bullshit artists: T.V. dietitians with mail-order doctorates, newspaper columnists stoking false health-scares, miracle cures for incurable diseases; all with an intent based on credibility and cash. These people have the resources to litigate their cause endlessly. They have public relations savvy to drive their perspective relentlessly. They are masters of propaganda, of argument, of finding the public pulse and pressing it just hard enough to sell their wares. Put simply, in the world of argument, they will always win.

During the horrors of the Japanese 2011 earthquake and subsequent nuclear meltdown, the right-wing pundit, Ann Coulter, was on TV espousing possible benefits of radiation for the people of Japan with a few wisecracks about sunbathing. It was in monumental poor taste, minimizing the ordeal of a whole nation for her own publicity. But she did it with enough stage presence to make it sound plausible to the right-wing faithful. She presented anecdotal evidence; she looked good on camera; she made her statements with certainty. It was patently designed to increase her notoriety as an incendiary firebrand and ultimately just to sell more books. 

A friend of mine posted on Facebook "Call me old fashioned, but I think this is wrong". I posted back "You're not old fashioned; you just have a soul". For want of a better word, isn't it just that? Intentions, actions and commitment constitute the raw material and quality of a soul. Bullshitters who to mix cruelty with their lies have the most putrid spirits of all. 

Everyone inhabits the world with a personal understanding of its laws. Our individual 'truths' are subjective and somehow equally valid. A scientific, objective view of the world answers the question 'how?' and gives us atoms and electrons, galaxies, cars, and mechanisms. 

These are, however, utterly devoid of meaning, which arises from our subjective, personal 'truths' as an answer to the question 'why?'. When I declare 'I love you', just you try to convince me otherwise. 

There are many contradicting, equally valid, subjective truths. The way these subjective truths map to the known mechanisms of the scientific universe determine how we predict the future and shape it to our will. The degree that our subjective truths resonate in the souls of our fellows is how we touch, move and inspire each other. 

I've had mystical experiences that defy explanation. A few years ago, I was in love with a Catholic woman and was taking some initiation classes to look at joining the church, despite being an atheist. These once-a-week evening classes allowed me to pepper our priestly teachers with questions. I found that it became more about deeper attitudes and relationships rather than finding a logical definition for God. I was taking time to pray, which just consisted of me sitting quietly by myself, asking questions and contemplating answers. 

One night, I was working out, warming up on an elliptical trainer in an empty L.A. gym at about 9pm. I suddenly had an uncanny feeling of Jesus (yes, that Jesus) running in the air besides me. It was a strange, miraculous feeling of being watched over and cared for specifically by him and it was wonderful. It was very moving. 

Was it objectively real? No. I'm sure that the air never shimmered with light to reveal Jesus Christ in a pair of running shorts keeping me company in a way that was measurable to an outsider. But who cares? That's not the point. The point is the underlying subjective relationship. A Christian who talks to God every day really does talk to God in their mind. Even though my scientific self happily declares this to be objectively impossible. This leads to contradiction, and an imperfect logic that I relish. There is a God. There is no God. 

The 'how' and the 'why' are different things and there's no need to mix them up. The meaning in life is lodged in the 'why', in our intentions, our actions and our commitments. A life lived in bullshit carries little meaning in its brief passing and even less in its legacy. A life lived in truth carries love and real power forward into the future for its heirs.

'Tink'

'Tink'. The soft sound of metal on metal. Two blades meeting for the first time in a quiet engagement. The prelude to a bout. As a nickname, it fitted her perfectly. A slim blond actress with martial grace. Think of Naomi Watts with a sword in her hand.

I was taking a stage combat class for fun. Of course, within the grand sweeping continuum of unfulfilled-hopes-and-dreams-that-is-Hollywood, this was serious stagecraft for some people. After 19 years of training in competitive fencing, this was nothing like that for me. Surprisingly though, it revealed some unexplored worlds that I had no idea about: sexiness, charisma, style.

I walked into class one day and there she was. Distinctively beautiful, poised and altogether as non-demure and fully in-your-face as any fencer could be. That night, we worked on a scene where she was the hero and we were the bad guys. She got to kick our asses. She looked damn good doing it and she made no secret of how much she reveled in her own power. Almost immediately, irrevocably, I fell in love with her.

I had nothing of her sense of danger, nothing of her need to test boundaries. We went out on only one occasion that could have been misconstrued as romantic. If there was ever a possibility of a mutual tryst, it flared briefly that night and fizzled.

I remember her saying "I could invite you up but I have to get an early night" and as gentlemen like myself have always done, I respected her wishes without the faintest idea of what might really be going on. I professed my interest, asked her out, heard that she was seeing someone else and realized that it was hopeless. I either refused or found myself incapable of giving up, continuing to reach for the unimaginable goal of being with her. The romanticism, suffering, and fantasy fed on deep hidden things. I hated it. I loved it. It caught me up in its clutches and it sure as hell wasn't letting me go.

It was a little disconcerting how she easily accepted my feelings. Who knows? Perhaps she enjoyed the attention. Perhaps she was oblivious. This was untamed and driven psychology. It fed a dark shard of thought that resonated darkly within me, slyly muttering "Why would she want you? Why would anyone want you?"

One time as friends, we were going to a comedy show and I, the man, drove. I picked her up looking forward to spending a nice evening with her. I remember vividly the moment when my car simply conked out at a traffic light near the venue. I felt a flash of panic. I sat, hands frozen on the wheel, breathless and frankly aghast. She calmly reached across me, hit the hazard lights on the dashboard and started to look around for a place to stash the car. She was unbelievably gracious all evening and I was mortified. As I said goodnight, I put her into a taxi and tried to preserve some vestige of bravado. The cause of the breakdown was that I had forgotten to fill up the car and had run out of gas.

Amid all this humiliation, unfulfilled desire and self-loathing, there was a moment, utterly vivid and astonishing clarity. I remember one day I was fighting through tears and feeling quite utterly miserable over her. A quiet soft voice welled up in me and said, quite clearly, "Its OK for you to feel this way. You love her and she doesn't love you back".

It was simply the act of giving permission to be, pronounced internally with a gentleness that makes me soften even now. I remember how the tears retreated, how the clenching knot in my belly untied and how my whole body unwound. 

It was a moment that I will remember forever.

We're still friends, Tink and I. She's still with the same guy, still a free spirit, still beautiful. I now know, that like Cyrano with Roxane, some element of my own self-loathing had needed an external beauty to help in the search for redemption. The moment I let all that go was an inflection point of the highest magnitude. It was the moment when my compassion for myself finally outweighed my sense of everything I lacked. In some sense it was the moment the blades came apart, separated and were put back in their scabbards.

All R.A.F.

In pictures snapped at my cousin's wedding, my Grandad stands between me and my uncle; clear and steady, clipped and clean. All RAF.

Grandad flew Hurricanes over the shores of Devon during the Battle of Britain. He fought at the allied disaster at Dieppe. I remember with affection my mother's account of him accidentally flipping his plane upside down and entangling it in a tree. He really never spoke of this time, during his twenties, when he'd dash out to fight Nazis in the sky under the shared terrifying threat of national extinction.

He had a softly spoken presence that always filled in spaces, made things happen. I once stomped into the sitting room, flopping down in front of the TV, frustrated that my ball had disappeared somewhere into the overwrought flora of his garden.

"I can't find it" was all I said, arms crossed, a picture of sullenness. Ten minutes later he tossed it to me having gently snuck away, expertly managing the imminent upset with a grandfather's silent grace.

The old devil was a sly hand with the ladies too. At my sister's 18th Birthday, at the ripe old age of 75, he caused an admirable stir by taking time to have a slow dance with my father's girlfriend. She almost certainly enjoyed it too, since he would never have descended to an inappropriate hand or caress. The old bones had rhythm, and he certainly was a dashing fellow.

I moved stateside at the age of 27 and only saw the family occasionally. I called once at Christmas and asked to speak to him. And so, on the phone, I said, as we Californians often do, that I loved and admired him. There was some silence on the line and all he could say was a ruffled 'jolly good' in shocked embarrassment. The next voice on the call was mum's: 'What did you just say to Father?'

The summer before he died, I took a trip and spent a day with him at the old family home in Devon, the whole place teeming with memories of summer vacations, marriages and Christmases. We talked for the first time as men. He brought out some of his old Royal-Air-Force Logbooks to show me. This treasure described the chapter and verse of each sortie, of each kill, of each loss. Brilliant 1940s cursive penmanship gleamed brightly from the page. The clipped tone of the airman's unflappable commentary chimed echoing in the background. His voice was always soft, charming, and full of a working Englishman's propriety.

I think of him flying, risking everything; his young wife waiting at home pregnant with his first child: my mother.

So now he stands sixty years later. After a career as a Fireman and the father of a family of four kids, eight grandkids and some great-grandkids on the way. I do hope he feels proud in this moment: piercing blue eyes, airman's moustache, impeccable suit. All RAF.

Stand back, I'm going to use Yoga

Although, on the whole, yoga simply makes me feel really relaxed and happy towards everyone in class, sometimes I’ll actually get angry when I’m practicing. I’ll be attempting to master my breathing and focus when someone does something in class that, quite frankly, pisses me off. For example, one of my fellow practitioners will move their mat to the other side of the room and I’ll assume that they’re avoiding me (‘snooty bitch’, my inner dialog will say). Or maybe someone next to me is breathing too loudly (‘what a show-off’, my thoughts will chime). Or a teacher will spend a little too much time working with a pretty girl (‘creep’, I’ll shamefully think to myself). I’m shocked by my own meanness sometimes and its certainly a little embarrassing and humbling to admit it here for everyone to see.

It may seem strange, but this is the central core of what yoga is for. By focusing on the breath and the movements in the asanas, we’re able to hear the uncharitable chitter-chatter in our minds and attempt in some calm way, to let the thoughts rest, to let them be and maybe even let them go.

This isn’t the scary part: I think I’m a nice person, I’m probably at my most calm, relaxed and honestly considerate when I’m practicing yoga. And then, even there, my thoughts are often capricious, unkind, cruel and even violent. And that’s in a quiet room doing something I love to do. Put me on the freeway, in rush hour traffic, with deadlines nipping at my ankles and the whole world in a rush. Out there, my mind is tumult of chitter-chatter and I mostly don’t even notice.

A couple of weeks ago in class, I was next to an attractive woman and the assistant teacher kept on adjusting her, working with her on poses, and flirting with her, or so it seemed. I thought that this was completely inappropriate and this completely incensed me, I was furious.

Rather than let this particular thought process work its way out calmly, I let it take over my practice. It felt good to be aggressive and to work it out through physicality. I was just angry and it probably showed. My face had a hard, gritted edge to it. I moved through the actions accurately, carefully, with precision and purpose. In its limited way, this felt like a solid ‘fuck you’ to the guy I was fuming at. My inner voice was crowing: ‘Yeah, check this out, see what I can do’.

And, sure as night follows day, I got injured. It was minor, a little pain in the external edge of my wrist. More than enough to slow things down and sober me up. ‘Nothing teaches good alignment like a little inflammation’ as one of my teachers used to say and violent actions lead naturally to trauma, pain and suffering. The thoughts themselves do nothing, the actions are the things that carry consequence.

Aggression, showing off, pursuing sensation for its own sake, or even just assuming that you ‘should’ be able to do certain things in yoga are all great ways of getting injured. The injuries can be valuable too, they serve as a break, a wake-up call for foolishness carried too far. The guy I was so angry at is a great teacher; he has a gentle manner, a kind heart and, get this, he’s married. My immediate, triggered reaction to him was, quite simply, flat wrong.

‘Using yoga’ is simply this: decoupling your actions from your reactions. I used to practice Krav Maga, the Israeli martial art that utterly embodies the antithesis of this idea. I was hanging out with some Krav buddies and we were just cycling around the Marina in LA. Two of us were about to cross a street when a car started barreling towards us. My friend leapt into action, he pedaled forward, muscles straining, speeding out in front of the car and skidded to a stop on the other side with some degree of elegance, grace and power. I joined them after waiting for the car to pass. He grinned at me as I met up with them on the other side.

“Did you see what I did?”, he said triumphantly, “That was Krav Maga!”

“Sure. Did you see what I did?”, I responded, “That was yoga.”