How I see Others In my Month Without a Smartphone

As seen on Twitter.

Today I learned: Avoiding My Smartphone for One Months Seems Pretty Scary

I have decided, to set my smartphone aside for December.
This seemed pretty easy at first sight, but now it seems kinda frightening: I think, that some things will be more cumbersome.

I used to plan my day the night before on a smartphone. I wrote some articles for this blog on my smartphone. I used to make note on my smartphone. Almost all my appointments are made on my smartphone. Almost all of my ideas are captures on my smartphone. Much of my communication is run via WhatsApp, so almost exclusively on my smartphone. Much of distractions are also from smartphone: Reddit, messages, notifications. Sometime silly, but also fun games.

So, my smartphone is something I use everyday. More than I realized before.
And this step is now something frightening.

I will have to rely on my computer to plan my day (I need notifications for my tasks). I will have to take my notebook (not the computer, I mean the thing you write on) to make notes. I will have to rely on email (on my computer), and SMS for async communication. Feels a little bit like 2004.

Anyway, I'm glad not having to write anymore articles everyday. But somehow, I liked it. It forced me to reflect every day on what happened, what I have learned. It kinda rocked.

Today I Learned: Psalm 22 ist a prophecy fulfilled

In John 19 it is written, that the soldiers cut Jesus clothes into four parts and gambled for his tunic. This scene is explained with these words:

"They said therefore among themselves, "Let us not tear it, but cast lots for it, whose it shall be," that the Scripture might be fulfilled which says: "They divided My garments among them, And for My clothing they cast lots." Therefore the soldiers did these things."

A wonderful example of explaining the scripture with the scripture. But where does this stand, what is fulfilled? You guess right: Psalm 22.

In my opinion (and luckily, not only mine alone) this Psalm explains how the Cruscofication of Jesus felt. From Jesus' point of view.
Just read some verses:

Verse 8: "He trusted in the Lord, let Him rescue Him; Let Him deliver Him, since He delights in Him!"
-- That's what some people shout at him when he is at the cross.



Verse 15: "My strength is dried up like a potsherd, And My tongue clings to My jaws; You have brought Me to the dust of death."
-- That's how you feel, hanging on a tree


"For dogs have surrounded Me; The congregation of the wicked has enclosed Me. They pierced My hands and My feet;"
-- Guess what happened to Jesus' feet and hands


"They divide My garments among them, And for My clothing they cast lots."
-- Guess why this is quoted in John.



Jesus himself quotes Psalm 22, when dying:
"My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?"



And last, and maybe least, but nonetheless interesting fact: These verses were written by David, who was King of the Jews. Jesus has been hung because the Sanherin said, that Jesus was King of the Jews.
Thing like these explanations are one point why I love the bible.

Today I learned: It's more important how you do it than what you do.

Today, I was pissed off. I kinda saw no point in what I was doing. Every thing I moved, annoyed me. I groaned. I was in really bad temper.

Later that day my wife told me, that she was disappointed in me. It used to be fun doing that kind of work, but today my bad mood created bad mood in her. This sucks. I was an idiot, once again.

So, I experienced today first hand, that what you say or do does not matter as much as how you say or do it.

If I communicated my feelings and my expectations better, without all that annoyances, without groaning, but with seeking of understanding for the other person.

If I would handle that situation in this way, it would have been a way better to spend the afternoon.

So, instead of being annoyed, think about what it could mean. I bet in most cases you are angry, because your standards or your expectations are not met. If this is the case, either reflect whether your expectations are adequate and if not, correct them. If you think, they are adequate, communicate them as soon as possible, immediately at best.

I think, that could work wonders.

Today I learned: JavaScript's continue is only allowed in loops

Reading through the basics of JavaScript, I wondered whether you could simulate a while statement with a switch statement. You might ask yourself: Wait, what?

Let me explain: I thought some crazy thoughts. If you could combine labels, a dynamic case statement, and the continue statement, you could fake the while loop. Let's look at an example:

Let's compute some Fibonacci numbers, the classical way.

var a = [0, 1],
    num = 10,
    i = a.length,
    result;

while (i < num) {
   a.push(a[i - 1] + a[i - 2]);
   i += 1;
}

And so I thought to myself, maybe you could do something like that instead of the while loop.

loopMe:
switch (i) {
  case i < num:
    a.push(a[i - 1] + a[i - 2]);
    i += 1;
    continue loopMe;
  default:
    break;
}

I was an idiot, and JavaScript told me so:

 Uncaught SyntaxError: Undefined label 'loopMe'

When I removed the label after continue, I still was an idiot, and JavaScript told me so:

Uncaught SyntaxError: Illegal continue statement.

So there was no way to get this to work. continue statements are only allowed in loops, as I remembered.
The only funny thing was, that JavaScript bitched about unfound labels at first. And then about the misplaced continue statement.

Glad, I used two hours of my life on that one. But at least, I have learned something.
And that is what it's all about, isn't it?

Today I learned: Gratitude is the antidote to fear

This saying is something I heard today.

If I think about the things I fear, then there are many things that may come to my mind: Being expelled from the company I work for, losing my job, not finishing the the love projects I have, not being accepted. But there may be even more drastic things, like losing my health, losing my family, being ignored by the ones I love, etc. The longer I think about this, the more frightening it becomes. Finally, my mind would come up with some super weird, super sick fantasy about something, that will never happen.

So why is gratitude the antidote to this? Because it helps you to focus on the good parts.
If I focus on what I am thankful for, not much comes to mind. One trick for me, that works is to focus on what I might be thankful for. Then events, that were fascinating, where I participated, come to my mind. My wonderful sons, as well as my beautiful wife. But also the little things, like that coffee this morning or being able to come home in a relaxed way (train riding rocks). Being able to breathe and being able to pray.

Out of this focus, it's impossible to focus on the possible negative outcomes in life.
What if I would really lose my job? Don't know. I would be sad probably. But I would find another one. Maybe that new one would be even better.

What if I would lose my family? Don't know. I would horribly sad, for sure. But after a time, I would get over it and go on with life. And who knows, probably I would value life even more than I do today.

Don't get me wrong: I do not wish any of those bad things to happen to anybody. But bad things will happen, inevitably, to everybody. The question I want to ask myself then: "What good can I get out of this? What can I be thankful for because of this?". I know, that's no a single magic button, that you press and everything will be fine, but a shift in thinking.

The bible says, that "We know, that all things work together for good to those who love God". This is an incredibly powerful statement. If you can believe this, there is nothing not to be thankful for and hence nothing to fear.

Today, I learned: Progress make you happy

Today, after some days of being sick, slacking, being lazy (hey, but sometimes, I enjoyed being lazy), I got a little bit back on track.

One hack, which works pretty well for me: Plan your day the night before.
When I wake up and think about what I should do today, it feels arbitrary. It feels not like a must an hence, not compelling at all. But when I take some minutes the night before to schedule my activities (not focusing on results but on work itself), it feels mandatory. I have to work on these items for that specific amount of time. And when I get to finish some of the items on my to-do list, it feels great.

And this feeling of accomplishment is incredibly motivating. I believe, that you should improve not only in one area of your life, but in every area of your life. This is challenging, but necessary.

If you focus on your relationship with your spouse, and do nothing else, everything else with go to the dogs. If your work life sucks and you focus on improving it, and you do not improve in your relationships as well, after a not too long time, your rest of your life will suck, too.

To keep it short, as Tony Robbins stated:

If you aren’t growing, you are dying.