Lucas Weismann

Manifestos & Rants

On When to Quit

- Lucas

There comes a time an anyone’s life when it is time to stop doing what you are doing and do something else.  Sometimes it’s for obvious reasons like the idea that if you don’t stop it will kill you.  Mostly though, the reasons people quit have nothing to do with that kind of risk.  Most of us aren’t taking the sorts of chances that would lead to this being a likely outcome.

In most day-to-day situations, we quit because of the momentum loss of breaking a habit we’re trying to establish.  Often times when we make a mistake, we end up feeling a sense of guilt or hopelessness that attaches itself like a parasite on to the thing we were doing.  This is not the time to quit.

You are going to screw up.  Repeat this out loud.  (I don’t care if it’ll get you funny looks.  Do it).  I am GOING to screw up.  I am going to fail.  I am going to mess things up so badly that I need to bulk order duct tape and super glue in order to even THINK about fixing it.  Did you say it?  No.  Didn’t think so.  It’s true though.

You learned to walk?  That means you’ve fallen a lot.  I’m sure you probably got back up.  Well guess, what.  You need to be as tough as you were when you were like 13 months old.  Suck it up.  The alternative to tenacity in the face of messing up is misery and death, and sometimes death comes way before we plan it, so having resources as a Brooklyn wrongful death lawyer could help families in these situations.

How do you do this?  I’ve had a few teachers and summer camp counsellors use the “how fascinating” method.  Throwing your hands in the air, taking a big breath and shouting “how FASCinating!!!” instead of beating yourself up is silly, but it can be really effective.  More importantly, you need to lear to forgive the sin and repent.

What repent?  Luke, you adding religion to this?  No.  To sin means to error.  To repent means to turn away from that error (sin).  See?  No biggie.  That means, if you mess up and have dessert when it’s not your “cheat day”, you need to acknowledge it and move on.  No big deal.

This is not when to quit.  This is a minor setback.

***

There are a few times you SHOULD quit what you’re doing and they are as follows.

1) you realize your goals have changed.

2) you realize your actions are not leading to your goals

3) you realize your pursuit is harmful to yourself and/or those around you on a level you’re unhappy with.

You realize your goals have changed

Now is what you’d think would be the most obvious time to quit.

On Returning To Something You Once Loved

- Lucas

Sometimes coming back to something is like coming out of a hibernation.  Take anything, a sport you love, going back to school or even writing. If it’s been a long time, you’re probably feeling aches and pains.  You might feel like you’re moving through molasses or honey.  That’s no real surprise.  You haven’t used those muscles or those neurons in a long time and it takes a while to get back into the swing of things.

After awhile however, things warm up and you’re going to start feeling good.  Really good.  This is something you love after all!  It’s amazing to hit that ball, throw that opponent, or get those words on paper.   You now want to do the thing!  Great!  Don’t go nuts.

“What? But I haven’t been doing anything!  I haven’t gotten off my butt in so long!  How am I supposed to catch up?”

Short answer:  You’re not.  Lost time is lost.  Just accept it.  You had other things that were more important to you at the time.  Video Games, The Netflix Original Series Marco Polo, or some member of whatever sex/gender combination you are attracted to.  Congratulations.  You spent that time.  You’re not getting it back.

The worst thing you can do when re-introducing stuff back into your life is to overdo it right away.  Why?  There are a few reasons:

  1. You could pull something.  Yes, even metaphorically.  You need to warm up before you can be at your old strength.  Sorry, that’s just the penalty you pay.
  2. You might uncover old patterns that lead to your burnout (if that’s why you took a break).
  3. You’re likely to exhaust yourself without having built up a reserve.

Part of your goal now is to build up a habit and make it stick longer than it did before.  Your goal is consistency, not marathon power sessions.  So, here’s what you do:

  1. Limit your time.  Leave yourself wanting more.
  2. Tell people how excited you are to be doing the thing.  People knowing you’re doing something will make them ask you about it when they see you, so telling people you see often will not only make you more interesting than if you’re just gossiping about celebrity nonsense like the rest of the people at the watercooler, it will also make them have something to ask you specific to you.
  3. Set a goal.  Goals come later, but right know just know it needs to have a specific “win” state.  We’ll work more on setting goals in a future thing.

Okay, these are some basic guidelines I recommend as someone who has taken breaks from things I love and returned to them sometimes, years later.  What things in your life do you wish you hadn’t given up?  Which things would you rather do than watch movies?  Maybe try one of them for a bit and see what happens.

On What to Read

- Lucas

Go read everything you can

Reading makes you think.

Novels, Comics and directions

For your kitchen sink

 

Never shy away my son

From forbidden lore

Just know that every thing you learn

Will make you thirst for more

 

You’ll never know your path in life

Until it’s done and trod

Go read of villains, heroes and 

Some long forgotten god.

 

Pay attention to which books 

People try to burn

For powerful ideas live

‘Tween every page’s turn

 

Learn to think like Plato

Marcus and the rest,

But take it with a grain of salt

Choose what you think is best

 

Wisdom from the mouth of babes

Proceedeth it is said.

Perhaps it’s true, but only if

Those babes are quite well-read

 

Go read every thing you can

Reading makes you think

Headlong into wisdom’s font

Take a good long drink.

She Ran With Wolves

- Lucas

When I was a child, I remember my grandfather telling me the story of Sarah Greene.  She was a young girl who lived on the outskirts of town on the wrong side of the tracks.  “Man we had trouble with her.” Grandfather would say.  She grew up on the wrong side of the tracks and there was rumor that she had Native blood in her.  As far as I know it was just that.  A rumor, and not even a good one.  As if Native Americans were anymore or less “savage” than white people.  Grandpa used to say, “People are people and part of people being people is people making up rumors about people to make it easier for people to treat people like they aren’t just people who are people.”  Hence, the scurrilous rumor of her “savage blood.”  Grandpa had the good sense to be chagrined of how ignorant people can be, but to his credit, he didn’t try to make history sound more enlightened by hiding that fact.
Read more

What I’ve been up to – And a friend’s kickstarter

- Lucas

I’ve been fortunate enough to spend the last week with my friend Kezia Wineburg.  She’s a unique character. A buddhist poolshark, a former  Jeet Kune Do practitioner who used to be a bartender at First Avenue in Minneapolis.  An acupuncturist turned neuroscientist.  A unique individual to be sure.

We’ve been writing together at my family home north of Stillwater, Minnesota.  In that time, (and partly due to her good example) I put down over 10,000 words in my rough draft.  For that reason, and because I think it’s a good idea, I’m going to give her a shout out right here.

Not satisfied with the resume I listed above, Kezia is embarking on a new adventure. She’s becoming the publisher of an online magazine called Situate.  The idea is novel.  It’s an a quarterly rag where each issue will feature a given city (the first one is New Orleans!).
Read more

On certain regional pronunciations

- Lucas

     “I don’t give a good God Damn about what you think.”  The fat man was livid and actually slapped the table as he shouted, his walrus moustache bristled, “If you had enough volunteers you wouldn’t have kids calling the matches for wrestlers in their own age group.”

Read more

Benji the Wrestler

- Lucas

As a young child I had a lot of problems dealing with bullies and rumors and kids at school.  That’s not a revelation unique to myself, I realize.  Most people have.  But I was lucky in one major respect.  That is that my dad had a technique for helping me to cope with these situations, while at the same time instilling a love of wrestling for me.

Enter:  Benji the Wrestler.

Benji was a kid who wrestled.  He was a lot like me.  He was so much like me that it seemed a strange and amazing coincidence every time I heard a story about him.  (Okay, I’m gonna level with you- he was me.)

Every time I seemed to be going through something tough- a bully trying to beat me up, or turn my friends against me for whatever reasons motivate people to be awful to each other, there would be my dad.  He’d come to my room at bedtime and tell me a story.

The story had three main parts:

1) the problem (the bullies, the “mean” teacher, whatever it was that was making my life hard to deal with as a kid),

2) the “Problem-solving part” This almost always came in the form of my dad asking me something like “Sounds pretty tough Luke, what do you think Benji should do here?” afterward we’d workshop any solutions, no matter how sensible or senseless or emotive and he’d treat me with understanding.  He also never talked down to me as a kid and I really appreciated that.  Heck, I still appreciate it.

3) The action sequence.  This was super important!

A) it served to give me time to absorb what we’d talked about, all while preventing the stories from becoming lectures or preachy.

B) it indoctrinated me into loving the sport and associating a difficult pastime with positive memories

C) It showed that even a kid with problems at school could (with hard word and determination), be the hero.  It would be a challenge, sure, but since Benji never gave up, no one could really beat him.  (Even if he lost a match, he wasn’t truly defeated so long as he maintained a good attitude).

I miss those stories.  In retrospect, I miss how these insurmountable problems could be faced and I could take the time with someone who cares about me to work through options together rather than having to face them alone. I miss the reminders of how you can work around any problem if you find the right solution rather than just reaction to it.  Not surprisingly, I also miss wrestling.

 

Dad

- Lucas
One thing to know about me, would be my father. He’s always been sort of heroic in my mind.
This is the same father who raised me to believe that only he knew about the two misprints in the 10 Commandments. The one of them should have read “Thou Shalt Not Covet Thy Neighbors Wife- In Vain”
The other was originally written “Honor thy father and mother- If they deserve it”
The first one was a silly setup, but the second one very clearly illustrates something important I was raised to believe. Respect should not be freely given based on number of years on the planet, but are earned. Even from your children.
One of the things we used to do every night during the summer was to play catch (like with a baseball and glove). My dad knew that the easiest way to gain acceptance from your peers as a weird kid is to be good at things, particularly to be good at sports; and so we would play catch until it got dark most evenings.
We’d go do special wrestling practices at other teams on the nights we didn’t have them, so that I could learn as much as possible from any coach with a reputation for knowing how to build good wrestlers.
It was from him that I learned the dedication and drive that has allowed me to excel in the areas I have and how to find the opportunities to and capitalize upon them when I find them.
It’s often his voice I hear when I’m discouraged about my ability to learn or get better at something, asking whether I’m considering quitting because I’m tired or quitting because I’m in actual real danger.
Though as I get older, his voice is more often replaced with my own. The voice I use to pass the lessons he taught me to my students.
I sometimes wonder if eventually it will only be my own voice in there keeping me company and I wonder if I will feel alone.

Meditations – A reminder

- Lucas

When I am traveling and cannot get to the wilds and the quiet places, I must remember to cultivate the quiet place within myself.  To find the space and center in myself so that I can find peace and clarity, even when surrounded by the din and clamor of the city.

To find grounding in the bustle so that I’m able to think, and write and be.

Rare moment with an honest politician.

- Lucas

Restrained by his guards, I looked upon the man who I’d once counted a friend.  He wound toward me like a serpent, or a villain in a pantomime.  Jesus, I can’t believe there are people who really do this, I thought.  Hasn’t he read the evil overlord list?

“It occurs to me that the reason that you individualists will never win is your inability to organize other people.  You assume that people will act in their interest or even know what is in their best interest.  In reality, people aren’t that sure. They’re so focused on whatever they’re told to pay attention to that they are thankful to have a strong hand to guide them.  They follow their shepherd right into the abattoir.

How else could we get people to give us their time, money, allegiance?  How else could we get elected again and again, even admitting our corruption and willingness to exchange “principles” for favors.  Long-term good for short-term gain.  Because they don’t care and even if they did, the average person is too stupid to do anything about it and too powerless to stop us.

So, what are you going to do, hero?  I know your kind.  You are opposed to violence and profess the value of reason?  Well guess what?  I am neither opposed to violence, nor am I amenable to reason.  I profit far too much from the current system to wish to return to your fabled more principled time.

And don’t think that this is something that I say because of the party I belong to.  The left uses radicalism, the right uses religion.  Hell, we even us the same sentences with only the basic terms switched.  We have a pope using science to gain followers for his mystical beliefs and scientists watering their discoveries with the language of religion.

You think that just because you follow the law you have nothing to fear?  That we will leave you alone?  Of course not.  Not while the fires of reason burn in your mind.  Not while you have a spine to stand erect.  Do you know who the last hominid species was who elevated the individual?  Homo Neanderthalis.  You know what happened to them, I trust?

We killed and fucked them out of existence.  Except of course a few throwbacks like yourself every few generations.  It’s too bad, if you were just a bit less principled, you could’ve been a shepherd.  Instead, we will destroy you, claiming all the while you were a wolf in sheep’s clothing.

And please, for the sake of any past feelings of conviviality we may have shared, please don’t ask me why I sting you.  If you can excuse the mixing of imagery.  I sting you because, it is in my nature.”

Scroll To Top
Skip to toolbar