Did I ever tell you about the time my Father swam in the Senior Olympics?
No?
He competed in a few different races. I’m pretty sure he competed in the freestyle, backstroke, and breaststroke but not the butterfly. He said he loved to swim the butterfly stroke but his breathing wasn’t right for competition.
The Old Man slimmed down and practiced. He trained hard. But more, this was something The Old Man did to prevent from feeling old.

In recent pages, I have discussed a popular explanation of depression, which is living or thinking irrationally in the past and anxiety is living or thinking the same way in the future. The question then becomes where is the peace. The answer is here and now. However, our reaches into the past or projections into the future have also created certain errors.
As for now, we are a mass of different circuits and patterns. We are records of our past. We are lessons from our experiences. We are also the product of our environment. We can say things like, “My parents used to do that to me,” and then we would swear that we would never do the same thing to our kids.

There is a common theme with this book. The theme is the same as it is with all of my books, which is that first, there needs to be a truth of self and self-discovery. Secondly, and especially when discussing personal or transformational change, improvement or calculating the thought machine, we bring our understanding back to us. We keep this person centered to adjust our thoughts appropriately to fit our needs and personal understanding.

It was autumn and the weather changed. The leaves switched from green to yellow and orange and the winds moved from warm to cool. The mornings showed frost on the grass and above all things, it was football season. 
The ground was hard and the toes were cold. I was small and played in what was called the pee wee league. My helmet was bigger than my shoulders and my pads were too big as well.
I was no stranger to sports because sports was an important topic in my home. My Father was a coach. He was an athlete when he was younger. My brother was well-known in town for his time on the football field.

I would like to take you on a little trip. So, for the moment, I am going to ask that you rule out the distractions around you. Take a deep breath and find your center.
Unplug from everything and follow along:

Imagine the morning. You are awake and ready for the day. There is nothing pressing and nothing pending. The slate is clean and you are about to leave your home and start the day.
Imagine yourself in your desired surroundings. See your home and decorate this exactly as you would want it to be. Think about the different rooms and the furniture. Think about the shelves and the entertainment center in your living room. Imagine the way the rooms would flow into one another. The sun is beaming in through the windows and the day is bright.

The idea is to improve on a daily basis. And that’s it. There’s really no secret here. Short, sweet and simple. We want to be better, think better and feel better. We want our life to work out. We want to honor our thoughts, our wants and our needs. Most of all, we want to improve the quality of our life. But first, we have to improve the quality of our thinking. Right?

Let’s go back to that mental picture of a busy day in the middle of Times Square, New York City. Can you see it?
Imagine the weather is neither too warm nor too cool, but perfect in either direction. Envision a blue sky. It’s a perfect day in New York City. People are walking around, up and down the streets. Imagine the different faces that pass us.

Keep it simple . . .

This is the most basic suggestion. Keep it simple. When it comes to change or when it comes to work, life or anything that we encounter; keep it simple.
But how?
Life is happening. They underpaid me this week and bills are due. There are feuds between family members. There’s a virus going around that has literally stopped the world, changed our life and the virus keeps mutating. We have life problems. We have emotional difficulties. We have physical concerns and everywhere we look, life is going on. 

If we think about it, everyone knows the basic rules to live a good life. We know how to eat and sleep. We know that our body has needs. The mind has needs too.
Everybody knows the dignity of a handshake. We know that a person’s word is a person’s word, which ties to the old question or saying, “If you don’t have your word, then what do you have?”
It’s a good question.
If you’re not being you, then who are you being?
And why?

How long can a machine run at full throttle without rest? I’ve seen a movie where they talk about being placed in a blender that never stops and the thought was argued because the machine can only run for so long. Come to think of it, in our last discussion about the thought machine I mentioned my time as a stationary engineer in a central plant. We ran large chilled water systems here. And we had more than one. Why? Because in case one shuts down. But also, it’s better to alternate machines to keep the run-times down. It’s also better to run two machines at 50% than one machine at 100%.
So, the question remains. How long can an engine move at its fastest speed? How long can the gas pedal be pushed to the pins until the engine blows? Or better yet, how long can a person last without backing off the throttle?