14 May - 20 May 2018
I published another article, Stop Reading, Start Doing and finally got chance to build a bit more of Ninjago City.
Reading progress
I’m currently reading Willpower doesn’t work and I also started Ready, Player One. I’m still undecided about Willpower. There are some interesting ideas but it feels like there’s a lot of fluff and hand-waving around those key ideas. I’m not struck on many of the examples that are trotted out in support of those ideas. It’s easy enough to read but compared to other books I’ve read lately, I’m taking far fewer notes. If I weren’t reading it as part of our book club then I may have given up by now.
I’ve only just started Ready Player One but I’m finding it quite enjoyable so far.
Scouting
We’re getting into the busier Scouting season now that the weather is getting better. Beyond our normal Monday night Beavers sessions we had a leaders meeting for our upcoming Group camp on Wednesday which unfortunately coincided with this months WMRUG and the Scout training surgery. All of which I ideally needed to attend.
That wasn’t the end of this weeks activities - on Saturday we spent the day herding Beavers around Ash End children’s farm before spending the night in the play barn. The weather was lovely and the kids had a great time. There was a bit of a lack of space for the leaders though. I managed to find a perch at the end of one of the slides but I wasn’t all that comfortable. Still, it’s a helpful reminder how fortunate I am.
As a result I had a quite relaxing Sunday, although I did spend 3 hours of it on my weekly review and planning and scheduling the team for the next few weeks.
A week in Stoicism
This week, another reminder to count your blessings. Appreciate what you already have and don’t covet what you don’t. Realise that the luxuries could come at quite a cost in every sense.
”Don’t set your mind on things you don’t possess as if they were yours, but count the blessings you actually possess and think how much you would desire them if they weren’t already yours. But watch yourself, that you don’t value these things to the point of being troubled if you should lose them” Marcus Aurelius
Further we’re reminded that the sage, a perfect Stoic, is an ideal to strive for not an end in itself. It requires much more than reading; it requires daily practice and training over a lifetime.
”That’s why the philosophers warn us not to be satisfied with mere learning, but to add practice and then training. For as time passes we forget what learned and end up doing the opposite, and hold opinions the opposite of what we should” Epictetus
”Show me someone sick and happy, in danger and happy, dying and happy, exiled and happy, disgraced and happy. Show me! By God, how much I’d like to see a Stoic. But since you can’t show me someone that perfectly formed, at least show me someone” actively forming themselves so, inclined in this way…Show me! Epictetus
weeknotes