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I am interested in how people connect via media, and how that might affect organizations in the future.

Sure, the amount of information that is being produced and shared is staggering, and yes, “keeping up” is like trying to drink from a fire hose. Some people want to think this surge in connecting via technology is a fad, and some just want to turn the whole thing off. It’s just too much NOISE!

As an instructional designer & educational technologist, my plan has been to participate and witness and ride the wave for a while to see how it all works — I can’t really expect to know how to work with this surplus of information and the myriad modes for tapping into it in any coherent “big picture” way (read: in a way that is clearly advantageous to my organization) until I’ve gotten familiar with some of the possibilities: thus I blog and text and podcast and get my RSS feeds of info. And this morning I set up a Twitter account (twitter.com/wjin). Cody and Jenna were there already.

There is corporate curiosity about these toys, no doubt. But I see the skeptical looks, too. Corporate workers are, for one thing, much too busy to play with toys. I’m not sure how to get past that reality. I do recognize that folks are inundated with tasks-at-hand (particularly middle managers). The information-influx already has them pulling out their hair. Most workers are at war with their email in-boxes and the cognitive dissonance of multi-tasking. Are they really going to take the time to learn about new technologies and to set up their own networking system?

Telling people that they’ll be better off for learning and incorporating technical solutions and online networks is like telling people they should eat their vegetables. Not well-received. Tell them it’s fun! doesn’t do the trick either. They’re too busy to have fun. I am tempted to go with the scare tactics: what’s gonna happen when EVERYONE else is connected and YOU’RE NOT?!? But that’s not going to work, either. And who am I to mess with the workings of evolution?

I play with technology because I get a kick out of it, and there are opportunities in my job to apply what I learn when I play on the weekends. Yes, on the weekends. My job does not include time for technical experimentation. I do, however, find that there is recognition (and rewards!) for the experimentation I conduct on my own time. Which rocks, because it’s something I want to do anyhow. So here I am on Sunday, accessing information about the future of technology and human capital management and generational differences in the workplace. I read what the best thinkers are writing, and communicate with people who are thinking about the same things. This begs the question, though: am I working on the weekend? If I am interested in the discussion, is it work or entertainment?

Clay Shirky recently shared some really interesting thoughts about cognitive surplus and the consumption of media. I link to both the text version of the talk, and a videocast.

Really cool stuff, and well worth reading/listening to. And it’s good for you. And it’s fun! And if you don’t, you’ll turn into a dinosaur.

I have to work on my proselytizing.

Ah, the weekend. What a crazy week at work. All jammed into four days, since I took Monday as part of my vacation.

But here it is, Friday evening. I have played my traditional Friday just-home-from-work game of online Scrabble, and suddenly found myself reminiscing about last night’s massage. On a whim, I booked an 8 PM appointment. I usually go for massages at noontime on the weekend. Wanted to see what it was like to have one in the evening. Was it as good as I might have wished? Indeed. And more.

That whole thing where they tell you to drink water after the massage, though? Well, two things. 1) It’s for real: there are toxins coming out of your muscles that need to get flushed through. I woke at 4:30 AM with a kind of groggy, dry-mouthed, toxic-feeling hangover. Because 2) there is not time after a late massage to drink much water. Not sure how to solve for that.

In other news: my company’s annual conference is coming up at the end of May. I will be a presenter on a “future forum” panel. Yes, you will have to hear me whine about not liking public speaking, etc. The current registration for the session is at 250. Yikes. Truth be told, I don’t feel as nervous as I would expect. This is pretty much the same session that I delivered to the board of directors last August, but with new, entertaining factoids added in. I will be sure to torment you with examples as we go along.

The way the psychological ante is being upped is by putting me on a panel. With REAL futurists. How do you get to be a futurist? Um, I think it’s a hang-out-a-shingle-and-make-sure-to-keep-up-with-your-future-related-reading kind of deal. Or I might be wrong. We’ll see when the rubber meets the road and we get to the question and answer portion of the program. Or the part where the moderator asks pointed questions. I know the moderator. I will arm him with lots of softballs for me.

Potential for looking like an idiot? Pretty damn high, actually. For some reason, I don’t care. I think all of my reading about technology-mediated collaborative knowledge generation has got me OVER the notion of authority. Oh yes, I know lots of people like the idea of authoritative information and facts and all that crap. Whatever. I’m there to hang out and sit on a couch and say whatever comes into my head. It’s an astonishingly cool gig, so I’m just gonna go for it.

A video about learning. Or not.

Lax is talking about teachers today. Very interesting subject. Calls up all kinds of thoughts about authority and instruction and self-motivation, etc.

I like the fundamentalist approach of Annie Pace or Celeste Lau, but I also like the laid-back West Coast stylings of Anthony Carlisi and Volleyball Guy.

I guess I just like to know what the teacher’s parameters are. I can adjust to either/any style, which is zen style (Be open to the teacher in front of you).

When I taught The Cop, and when I counted the impromptu led at Saturday class a couple of weeks ago, I did my usual “Here I go; follow along to the best of your abilities” kind of teaching. Now that I think about it, that’s my management style, too. I like to model the behavior I expect, and I certainly am open to questions, but I prefer if people try a bit on their own and attempt to figure things out by themselves before they start peppering me with questions.

In fact, that’s a pet peeve of mine at work: it is a culture where you can barely get a sentence out before the questions start pouring in. If I’ve built a presentation on a concept, or written a business case, let me outline the big picture before you get all down and dirty with the details!

LOL! These may be artifacts of psychoanalysis and zen training: you learn that if you just are silent and pay attention for a while, things come clear in a way they won’t if you get too attached to using words to try to figure things out.

At led this weekend, there were three brand new people. One brand new to Ashtanga, and two pretty much brand new to yoga. The British Director set them up so they’d be to the left of established practitioners, and she also kept an eye on them. I had a gal to my left and to my right, and I figured my best bet was just to go about my business and let them do what they could. One of the gals across from us, though, a somewhat new Ashtangi, kept trying to explain things to the poor newbies. Which, of course, led to utter confusion for the most part. Her intention was good; her results, not so much.

I wondered if The British Director felt frustrated by this. She’s a pretty laid back person, so it probably bothered me more than it bothered her.

I still feel like people learn more by muddling unmolested through a whole class, rather than by trying to work into the details of individual poses. But that’s me. I’m pretty hands off — of both bodies and minds. I did wonder if the helpful gal thought this would make the practice seem more appealing to the new folks, that perhaps it would seem more inviting if they got lots of words and attention. Maybe she was on to something, too — I know there are people who like that sort of thing.

(I guess I like to exert my authority silently.)

I suspect most long-term Ashtanga practitioners are more introverted, leave-me-to-my-own-experience types. That’s been what I’ve seen, for the most part. Not many extraverts or social butterflies. But, again, my experience is certainly limited.

Indeed.

The dog seems to be having some health issues, so our trip to Utah is off. No worries, there are plenty of things to do around here.

Yesterday we went and bought a few desert plants for the backyard. Brittlebush, heavenly cloud sage, and my all time favorite desert plant, creosote bush. I will include some pictures of the project below.

It is going to take a LONG time for the backyard to grow in. The Cop did the work, and I sat on a rock and watched. At the end, I said, “Lots of people would think we are crazy.” He agreed.

When we moved in, the back yard had grass, a pool, a big white pool fence, hibiscus bushes, rose bushes, and fruit trees. We are slowly transforming it into a self-sustaining desert yard. At this point, it is a dirt lot with a couple of palms (which we’ll keep) and two fruit trees (we’re going to remove the one in the back yard and keep the one in the side yard). So yes, we are really starting from scratch.

When I am around desert plants, though, I am always happy. Reminded of camping trips and hikes in the desert. I think the meditative state that comes after (surviving) a day of climbing makes one particularly attuned to one’s surroundings. I would always sit in camp, looking out over the desert, and think about the fact that no matter how the day had gone — whether I had survived or not — the desert itself would have continued on: the life of the planet and all of its creatures, plant and animal forms, would carry on. Night would fall and everything would go about its business. And there is something really soothing and powerful in that.

So I am happy to think of an (eventual) desert landscape out back. Found some extreme-weather yard furniture that is made of recycled materials, which seems pretty cool. I want to sit out there in the evenings and smell the creosote and sage.

I kept crunching the creosote leaves and breathing onto them (adds some humidity, which makes them exude their fragrance) and sniffing them. I am happy that they will enjoy the rain and the wind and the sun. And the plants we are choosing have seeds and fruit and flowers that attract and feed creatures that live around here — the desert birds and lizards and butterflies.

We’ll just slowly keep planting away. Large shrubs first, then we’ll move on to flowers, and then trailing vines and groundcover. A long project, but a really satisfying one. Something we can just work through, slowly and methodically.

***

And in practice news, I am writing practice notes in my notebook. In pencil, in longhand. Right alongside my dreams. Somehow appropriate to the current practice, which is a change-up from what I’ve been doing and needs some longhanded attention and privacy.

***

Creosote and wheelbarrow:

The Cop plants brittlebush:

Waiting to be planted:

Where the pool was:

Maxine helps:

Creosote seed:

Okay, for any gym rats who happen to be working their backbends deeply, the translation is thus:

The soreness feels like second day onset in the rectus abdominis after a session with lots of weighted negative reps.

Which, by the way, would be almost impossible to do to your abs without dragging your hip flexors into the mix. So the experience of working into the backbends is leaving me with ab soreness and totally relaxed hip flexors, and it feels unnatural through the filter of my previous experience. I mean, think about it: to work the abs (in hanging leg raises in the gym — or in climbing, where you’d hang on to a hold with your hands and then pull your legs up) you generally pull up your legs. In urdhva dhanurasana or dropbacks or stand-ups, the legs are stabilized (hopefully!) and you don’t crunch them up into the abs.

Suffice it to say, this feeling would be hard to explain to a bodybuilder.

***

Yesterday at led-class-that-turned-into-Mysore, we practiced chanting the sutras from 2.29 – 2.36. Have I mentioned I am a huge chanting slacker? Yeah.

II.29 yama-niyamasana-pranayama-pratyahara-dharana-dhyana-samadhayo stav angani

The eight components of yoga are external discipline, internal discipline, posture, breath regulation, concentration, meditative absorption, and integration.

II.30 ahimsa-satyasteya-brahmacaryaparigraha yamah

The five external disciplines are not harming, truthfulness, not stealing, celibacy, and not being acquisitive.

II.31 ete jati-desa-kala-samayanavacchinnah sarva-bhauma mahavratam

These universals, transcending birth, place, era, or circumstance, constitute the great vow of yoga.

II.32 sauca-santosa-tapah-svadhyayesvara-pranidhanani niyamah

The five internal disciplines are bodily purification, contentment, intensity, self-study, and orientation toward the ideal of pure awareness.

II.33 vitarka-badhane pratipaksa-bhavanam

Unwholesome thoughts can be neutralized by cultivating wholesome ones.

II.34 vitarka himsadayah krta-karitanumodita lobha-krodha-moha-purvaka mrdu-madhyadhimatra duhkajnanananta-phala iti pratipaksa-bhavanam

We ourselves may act upon unwholesome thoughts, such as wanting to harm someone, or we may cause or condone them in others; unwholesome thoughts may arise from greed, anger, or delusion; they may be mild, moderate, or extreme; but they never cease to ripen into ignorance and suffering. This is why one must cultivate wholesome thoughts.

II.35 ahimsa-pratisthayam tat-sannidhau vaira-tyagah

Being firmly grounded in non-violence creates an atmosphere in which others can let go of their hostility.

II.36 satya-pratisthayam kriya-phalasrayatvam

For those grounded in truthfulness, every action and its consequences are imbued with truth.

Translation is Chip Hartranft’s.

I am astonished at how well people at the shala learn chants. I can hear them and stumble through them a bazillion times and still not have a clue. Except for a very few. The Asatoma rocks, and I am a huge fan of verses 2.29, 2.30, and 2.32. I even sing them in the car. But in the end, my proficiency is hugely lacking. Just reading back through the ones I’ve listed here gives me flashbacks to the millions of times Sanskrit Scholar has gone over them with all of us.

Verse 2.34? I mean, seriously.

Luckily everyone else is learning them quite handily. If all of her students were like me, she’d probably give up in despair.

***

I’ve made a matrix of our vacation trip for The Cop to review. Maps, drive times, hotels, destinations. Not a long trip, compared to what I had originally envisioned. We can see how this works before we try something more aggressive, in terms of miles covered. This trip will allow for a visit as we pass through My Gift’s neighborhood, a look at southern Utah, visits to Zion and Snow Canyon, and hotels that welcome the dog.

Started my morning with the right brain (Infinite Jest) and then did some work with the left (vacation matrix). Tomorrow I have to bring the left brain to work for a meeting that cannot be missed, and then it’s vacation until next Tuesday. Right brain, baby! Right brain for a full week!

Went to led this morning. Just six of us (including The British Director, who was heading up the proceedings), so we decided to just go Mysore. Nice.

Let me just say, The British Director has been doing some serious work on her adjustments, and it is totally paying off. She got my hands to the mat on Prasarita C, even though I now turn my palms out in the pose. Now, I knew it was possible to get my hands to the floor, because the first time I tried the pose with palms turned out was in Singapore, and Celeste Lau dragged me (screaming in my head, and maybe shedding a few tears) to the ground on that very day. Today, though, after months of practicing with my hands turned out, was much more pleasant.

It was kind of interesting, because after Celeste had me do it palms-out, I kept at it. Until I went to the Annie Pace workshop. I turned my hands back the “normal” way because I didn’t want to be doing anything sketchy, since she is traditional. She actually had me flip ‘em back the other way. And so I’ve been palms out ever since.

Okay, so then The British Director adjusted me in Janu A. Woohoo! VERY nice. Strong, confident, very effective. One of those adjustments where you are pressed flat, flat, flat and it feels just delightful. It was right about then that I noticed that I was getting adjusted way deeper into poses than last time I practiced at the shala regularly.

Duh, right? Okay, I hadn’t really thought about it, but when you go off to practice alone, you find out how much you can do on your own. And it’s less than when you have a teacher adjusting you. It’s a kind of culture shock, really, because here you are, going along thinking you’re all that, and then you find yourself at home, feeling kinda lame when you can’t magically self-adjust.

So it was great to have an adjustment in supta kurmasana (I can’t get my feet behind my head myself, and am not tripping on it, for some reason — figure I’ll just enjoy the occasional adjustments when there’s a willing adjuster around) and in baddha konasana. I saw how my home practice of baddha konasana is still less fully expressed than what I remember of “the shala version” (VBG could adjust me into it well enough to get my chin on the ground, though my chest would sometimes hover) — though today I found that with all the home practice, I can be adjusted much more easily and squashed flat flat flat to the point of my feet digging into my tummy rather dramatically. So that is a measure of progress. Not that I want to chase the progress (Does that sound like backpedalling? Because I can’t really argue…) — anyhow, it was nice to see that all the home practice hasn’t made me regress, and that in fact I have managed to get some benefit (progress) from the daily working-on-my-own.

And again, British Director, nice freaking work!

***

After practice I had a text from My Gift. She’s in town for a couple of days, hanging out with friends and going to Pride this weekend. She stayed at a friend’s house Thursday and Friday night, and I woke in the middle of the night, suddenly concerned that I hadn’t seen her for a while. I wondered if she was avoiding me, if perhaps she was ill and didn’t want me to know, etc., etc., etc. Crap. Night time thinking is very emotional and deep and hard to set aside. When I woke up, I felt re-balanced and less worked about my worries, but as the morning wore on, they started gnawing at me again.

We met up at Jamba Juice and had smoothies, then walked over to Starbucks to grab her an iced latte before she took off to meet with friends. As it turns out, she didn’t want to sleep at the house without Scotty. We both teared up when she said it. They were friends for so long. As I’ve mentioned, he came into her life when her dad and I were splitting up, her uncle was dying, and everything was just a huge emotional mess.

Scotty always slept on her bed at night, and it makes perfect sense that she feels shaky about sleeping in her room without him. Okay.

Other than that, she is cheery and healthy and dear. Her hair color has changed from brown to red to blue to green just since Thanksgiving, and she’d told me the current color is platinum blond. I was thinking I wasn’t going to be a fan of the blond, but it is adorable. Cut short and with her dark eyebrows and bright blue eyes, it reminds me of Madonna during the Blond Ambition days, or Agyness Deyn, the model.

I’m happy I got to see her and can set aside the worrying.

I’m liking and not-liking the new split: this morning was the second half of primary and intermediate to supta vajrasana. The plusses = strength & focus. But I’m definitely less stretchy/bendy/relaxed/self-hypnotized when I hit bhujapidasana straight from standing.

So I’m liking having lots of energy for the intermediate poses. I recalled, last night, a point in my old gym rat days when I realized that I shouldn’t be lifting and then doing 90 minutes of cardio. I could lift and then do half an hour of cardio and get all of the benefits with less of the exhaustion. I guess it’s a vata thing: my energy grows attentuated rather quickly, as does my focus.

Anyhow, the new split is also scary — I actually had little fears of really injuring myself this morning. Why, when I’m not doing anything terribly different than I usually do? Well, I think it’s because I have developed a superstition about what order I need to do poses in before I’m “safe” to do others. Interesting. Ashtanga system-induced obsessive-compulsive disorder.

***

Talk about disorders. I think I may quickly develop a capsaicin habit. I know, it’s not the pepper’s fault. It’s mine. I have a tendency toward addiction. How they’ve changed over the years. Use your imagination about my “old days” (no, seriously — much worse than you are imagining! Remember, it was the 70s/80s!) and compare it to my current “issues”: unreasonable love of ibuprofen, the single cup of coffee per day (except on infrequent days when I throw caution to the wind and have a second cup), the occasional drink, the potato chip problem — oh, and sometimes I stay up late at night!

Okay, so give me a new toy like a roll-on tube of capsaicin and all hell breaks loose. I LOVE it. It starts off like nothing, and then it prickles a little bit, like a skin irritation, and after a while you notice you are on FIRE. Mmmmmm. I put some on my sore wrist last night, and before bed I rolled it onto my lower back. Woke up in the middle of the night to throw off the covers. Still warm when I woke. And then, during practice, when I started to sweat, it heated up all over again.

Nice.

There may be some repercussions if I got it on my mat, but we’ll have to just wait and see.

***

This morning, the Cop and I talk about where to go on vacation. I suggest just driving north.

My vision is that we just drive and if we have no destination, we will always be where we are, instead of trying to get to where we want to be. I suspect, right from the get-go, that this plan might trouble The Cop. When we drive to the sports bar for dinner on Tuesdays, he is driving to get there. When we are there, he is waiting to be served his pint of beer (which they brew on the premises and is, apparently, quite delicious). When the first beer is almost finished, he is prepared to order another. When we are done eating, it is time to pay the check. You see how it is.

We must have a goal.

And then it dawns on me. “I would love to go to Zion!”

“Like in the Matrix?” he asks, not even looking up from his book.

No, Zion the national park! I am totally psyched now. I have been to Zion to climb, but I LOOOOVE the idea of a visit that doesn’t involve wondering if I will survive the day. I’ve never been there without a big climb ahead. It’s such a gorgeous place. And it’s a PLACE. It’s a specific GOAL. It will work.

The heart opening continues, but isn’t always so pleasant, emotionally. I always miss Scotty when I get up in the morning. He was always first up in the house — and would greet me. Loudly, and persistently. But still. I miss it.

And I miss having him lounge about as I did my practice. I find myself looking over at the back of the couch, but he’s not there.

So practice was fine today. Split: second half of primary, followed by the intermediate poses to supta vajrasana. Then urdhva dhanurasana. A few where I decided to press my arms against the wall and walk my feet in. I know the “rule” is to walk the hands in, but my shoulders are the weak link right now (as in, being immobile), so it made sense to keep them still and walk the feet in, then press deeply into the anchored arms. I always felt like it was the thoracic that needed opening, and now that it’s busting open, it’s back to working into the lumbar a bit. I guess that’s normal, to always be working into one and then the other… without end…