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One thing leads to another, in this case a visit to Denver led to reading Josh Waitzkin’s The Art of Learning, which in turn led to reading Loehr and Schwartz The Power of Full Engagement.

Loehr and Schwartz describe how to maintain high energy (physical, spiritual, mental, etc) for purposes of personal and professional performance. The authors argue that time management is not our modern challenge, but energy management. To continuously recharge throughout the day, they recommend taking a short nap or other mental relaxation spell after every 90-120 minutes of hard mental work. I opted for the nap, naturally. In my case, a 10 minute nap. Other relaxation spells might include quiet meditation or a brisk walk.

So I set a 10-minute timer, lay down, and focus on my breathing to quickly clear my thoughts, relax, and get to sleep. Now I have never timed my to-sleep like this before, but it seems that after about 3-5 minutes, dreamlike images begin to float by, and I sort of consciously note that, hey, that was a weird dreamlike image (I must be getting close to sleep). By 7-8 minutes, I seem to be sleeping. At 10 minutes I can barely hear the timer go off.

I wonder what those dreamlike images are and where they come from? I swear they seem totally random and in no way connected to what I had been thinking, my deep knowledge (not) of my own subconscious notwithstanding.

Update 1: Yes, the 10 minute nap does seem to dispel the fog that sets in after a period of work. Your mileage may vary, but I expect to see good results from this over time. In some cases, after the nap, the day doesn’t seem to be the same one I lay down to. It seems like a different period of time, not contiguous in anything but the logical sense with the pre-nap period. Not sure what this effect is, but there seems to be something to it.

Update 2: If you are at work and cannot take the nap, close the door to your office and do 15 minutes of yoga to clear the mind and reset the body. The point is to develop a ritual resetting of your energy level. Work, recover, work, recover.

[tags]sleep,personal performance[/tags]

It took four attempts spanning three months, but it was worth it: finally, I sighted Yosemite’s mighty Half Dome from the summit of Contra Costa County’s Mt. Diablo.

Friend David Beckemeyer and I made the trip up last week, on February 5. This was two days after a good Bay Area rain, which cleared the atmosphere of dust. Half Dome is 130 some odd miles from Mt. Diablo, so the air has to be clean, clear, and cloud free.  Winter mornings are the best time to attempt the view, when seasonal humidity is low and before mid afternoon clouds start rolling in over the Yosemite Valley.

There are a few simple ways to get the bearing to Half Dome from Mt. Diablo. You can go up into the beacon lighthouse and use the compass rose there to find due east. Half Dome is 93 degrees off true north, almost due east of Mt. Diablo. If you’re using a magnetic compass, subtract about 15 degrees from its reading to account for magnetic declination in California. Either way you sight, a couple of degrees don’t make that much difference, as you will be scanning in the field of view anyway.  Look for Half Dome sitting on top of the ridge, where the ridge meets the sky. Good, bright binoculars (8×42 or 8×50) are required for a good view no matter how you sight. You can see Half Dome without optics, but you must know exactly where to look and the air must be very clear.  And even then it appears as the tiniest speck – so small that the eye can barely light on it for more than a second or two.

Yet a third way to sight Half Dome: Clifton Court forebay reservoir lies along the line from Mt. Diablo to Half Dome. The reservoir is the large rectangular body of water about 50 miles east. On an east-west line bisecting the reservoir, follow all the way up to the horizon. Half Dome is lurking near where the line meets the sky. David ginned up a map showing that line.

We stayed up top for about an hour, taking in the tremendous panoramic view, and showing Half Dome to the few passersby who wanted to know what we were up to. Mt. Diablo boasts one of the best so-called viewsheds in the world. The view of the snowcapped  Sierra Nevada, downtown San Francisco, the Farallon Islands (60 miles distant) to the west, is sight to behold.

It’s hard to describe how large Half Dome will appear in the binocolar or telescope view.  With my 8×50 binoculars, it took up maybe 1/20th of the field of view.  It’s not huge in that view, but it is easily discernible if you know what you’re looking for.  Its profile is unmistakable.

Here is the Half Dome webcam, situated in the Ahwahnee Meadow, which refeshes every half minute or so. During the winter, you have a front row seat to observe the hourly change in weather conditions that are common in the park. What a sight.

It is, of course, heresy in some quarters to discuss global warming as caused by anything other than carbon emissions, but what the heck, let’s reference such a discussion. A group of Canadian (as if national origin matters) scientists is considering an alternate view: fluctuations in solar activity. It’s worth a read to remind ourselves that other thinking people have different views of climate change and variation. One thing is sure: these guys cannot be popular with the carbonists.

I’m not a climate scientist, but just a consumer of information like everyone else. Maybe carbon is the culprit for recent temperature changes, maybe not. But no matter to which view you subscribe, it’s important to at least try to listen to the other side in good faith. But with the massive momentum carbon has in this discussion, these guys are going to have a tough time being heard, let alone listenened to.

One thing I do find appealing in their work is that it lets me off the hook as a human being. If they’re right, I can take one problem off the long list of ecological, political, and cosmological problems that are my fault as a respirating homosapien. What a relief. I could use a break.

[tags]global warming,solar fluctuations[/tags]

Update: 3/14/2008 We run across another group of researchers who believes recent global warming is caused not as much by “anthropogenic” greenhouse gases as by decades-long fluctuations in solar output. This group does not attempt to refute that greenhouse gases contribute to global warming, but they do argue that the effect of solar fluctuations could account for as much as 69% of the recent temperature rise on Earth. 69% is a big number, and the value depends on the model used. But if the model has validity, it would certainly affect how (possibly read: whether) nations deal with carbon emissions.

I consider myself someone who reads a fair amount, not necessarily from books, but on the Internet, too. Too much of what I read is technical in nature, or keeping up with current events. A lot of this material is informative, but not nourishing. It makes us smarter, but doesn’t make us better. I won’t stop reading this stuff, because being smart has its advantages; it’s necessary if not sufficient.

However, reading a (nourishing) book on performance psychology recently surfaced this quote by Lance Armstrong that I found compelling. In discussing his experience with cancer, he wrote:

I remembered not much more than we are much better than we know, the rest being easy to fill in. Our goal now should be to determine in what ways are we better than we think we are, to discover where are those opportunities for growth.

We are much better than we know.

Normally I don’t post political material to this blog, but this year I make an exception. There is too much at stake to remain silent.

Larry Lessig has posted his position on why he is supporting Barack Obama for President. We would expect nothing less than a well-reasoned statement from Larry, and we get one.

That a man like Barack Obama can rise to become President of the United States makes me fiercely proud to be an American. The same America that gave rise to Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Lincoln. Tall company. But there are times when such great Americans must be called to mind. This is one of them. Our need is that great, our yearning for change that urgent.

That this change, this hope, is within reach is deeply redeeming. Without Obama in this contest, there would be no such hope, and no obvious path toward national redemption and cleansing that so many seem to need and want on so many different fronts.

[tags]democracy,hope[/tags]