At the risk of falling into any certain pattern or regular format, “The Men Who Stare at Walls” is, indeed, another title inspired by…
Okay, I know what you’re thinking, didn’t I start the last post this way? Some silly title and/or theme similar to and/or conceptually criss-crossing a recently-viewed movie or TV series? How predictable, right? Right. So what? So what that I happened to have watched so many Netflix shows and movies lately that they’ve begun oozing out of my creative pores at a rate that I simply can’t control – and if I did, they’d start to eat me alive…or my baby – so that all my posts or articles or whatever you want to call them follow the same pattern every time (when I actually write them, which hasn’t been very often lately) because they’ve squeezed out all my other, original, good ideas the way my family’s fat little puggle displaces the seat cushions and part of my ass when he plops down next to me on the corner of the love seat and exhales.
Bandit being a fat puggle. Don’t feel sorry for him, he made his choices.
His name’s Bandit, by the way, which is perfectly appropriate because he steals half of my personal space and a little more of my formerly abundant adoration for puppies every time he wedges his fat paunch betwixt me and an armrest that’s left barely hanging on after all these years. I mean, seriously, don’t they sell diet Kibbles ‘n Kale Bits or something by now? Maybe Whole Foods? FYI, Amazon bought Whole Foods, so you can shop for it from the comfort of your crowded, puppy love seat. I realize pet pigs are a cute thing on TV sitcoms, but you don’t have to turn the dog into one (sorry, I don’t even know who I’m yelling at anymore).
Just save your judgements for political memes and nationally-televised singing competitions, cause I don’t need ’em! They no longer serve me! Namaste.
Sorry…I get defensive when I’m having an unoriginal blog intro day. I actually miss Bandit; haven’t seen the “little” guy since Christmas. Also my family. Let’s try this again.
“The Men Who Stare at Walls” is, indeed, another title inspired by a movie I saw recently. Though, to be fair, the last post – “Friends in Cars Going to Work” – was based on a web series now on Netflix, so we’re still keeping it somewhat diverse. Besides, the similarities end after the title.
Actually, the more I think about it, that’s not entirely true, but I’m going to try not to spend too many words on a movie you’ve never seen but vaguely remember the previews for now that I’ve just given myself a complex over being too predictable. I really ought to just embrace it. I mean, it’s a clever title, I just…man, I’m really fighting this today…it’s just that I’m starting to sound like a movie critic, and I don’t want to be a crappy movie critic because I’m certainly not a good one, and this blog isn’t like “Life Lessons from Weekly Movies,” so why am I…nevermind.
Sometimes these post intros are nothing more than me second-guessing myself in live stream-of-consciousness, completely lacking confidence in how I want them to begin and instead retreating to the far more comfortable land of self-deprecation (or unfair judging of pet owners…such hypocrites we humans are). After all, one thing I’ve never shied away from here on Bert Betterman is my neuroticism, and you’re about to see that in spades (if you haven’t already). It’s weird having Woody Allen narrate your inner dialogue, and I’d feel the guilt of a thousand Catholics if I didn’t let you in on that experience now and again.
The Men Who Stare at Goats is a terrible, weird (or maybe terribly weird?), pretty good, funny-if-you’re-in-the-right-mood cinematic production, but it’s also more than that. It’s a terrible, weird (or maybe terribly weird?), pretty good, funny-if-you’re-in-the-right-mood cinematic production starring George Clooney. And Ewan McGregor. And…wait for it…Kevin Spacey (if he still gets credit for that).
Actually, I thought it was pretty amazing. But also pretty bad (right?). You’ve seen it? You haven’t seen it. Trying to explain my thoughts on this movie is like going to a yoga class for the first time, standing on one leg, looking around the room, and trying to bend my hips the same way they are without falling over. I’m doing it right! (right?) Namaste.
Give me a break; I’m not Roger freaking Ebert. Or a yoga master.
The movie is essentially about a secret unit of army soldiers who are trained in a sort of zen, psychological combat instead of the traditional “blow his arse off!” kind, like hippies fighting in the army. And one guy in particular had so completely mastered his zen to the point where he could stop the heart of a goat by staring at it. Pretty intense. I won’t give away who, but it’s not the one who was publicly shamed for propositioning under-aged boys. Sorry…allegedly…not all the facts can be proven…like the date and time of the incident or the birthdate of the victim or the mathematical function of subtraction that would allow one to precisely know the age of such a person by “subtracting” one date from the other. I think it’s also referred to as “radioactive carbon dating” or something like that. Crazy progressives and their science…
What I’m about to discuss has two things in common with Mr. Clooney and his loony troops: zen and staring.
Let’s face it, meditation, wonderful as it may be, isn’t for everyone (and, I would argue, as I do in this post, rather misunderstood). Even people who are into it aren’t always into it, not all the time. Some people find it weird. Some people find it boring. Some people worry they aren’t “doing it right.” Some people fall asleep, possibly from the “eyes closed” part. My solution? Open your eyes!
I was sitting in the guest room of my house – also known as the meditation room, reading room, exercise room, and Netflix room (I basically rent that room from myself to live in part-time, which helps cut down on my mortgage expenses as an owner…though I do have to pay taxes on the rent as income, unfortunately) – and I was trying to meditate. I had just gotten home from work. I was tired. I was a little irritable. I was ruminating over countless conversations and meetings from earlier in the day. Life isn’t all candy and nuts for an investment performance analyst. Or even half as exciting as the title makes it seem.
I figured meditation would help, but I just couldn’t get there on this particular afternoon. Frustrated, I opened my eyes and stared hopelessly at the popcorn ceiling. Suddenly, I had a major case of deja vu from childhood.
I was reminded of many a “boring” summer day, home without school, where at times I would just lie on my bed, silently griping to myself that “there’s nothing to do!” Hearing that phrase myself made me appreciate how nuts it must have driven my parents. But as the minutes passed, I would eventually let go of my boredom-induced frustration, shake hands with my current situation, and just…be. Just me and the walls of my room, counting wallpaper stripes or finding texture patterns in the ceiling that began to look like things, creatures, cartoon characters, mountains, rivers, almost anything I fabricate out of the randomness of the textures, not unlike the way our minds seem to find these same things looking up at clouds in the sky.
I was completely and utterly in the present, without a care in the world. And, completely oblivious at the time, I was meditating.
Purists may disagree with me; it may not be exactly meditation, but it gets to the same – or at least a similar – point. It’s simply about being present and fully aware. It’s about focusing on one thing and one thing only, but it’s not a laser-like focus, it’s more of a letting go, as if that one thing you’re looking at, listening to, touching, feeling, whatever, is the only thing that matters, the only thing that exists (outside of you, though really it’s all part of you, part of the one, universal consciousness in the world, right?).
Everything else just falls away. All the other “apps” in the iPhone of your brain start to close, one by one. The sky in your mind clears, your schedule opens up, time (seemingly) stops…and you’re free.
As I sat there in my room, this time at age thirty-something, it was almost as if I had found some lost piece of childhood memorabilia that I had forgotten ever existed, possibly a crappy painting of a tree by a fence or something, stuff that passes for “A” material in elementary art class. It had been so long since I had that feeling, so used to always being somewhere, doing something, thinking of something, being entertained or distracted (or one in the same?).
And from that point on, I sat in my room for an hour a day, perfectly content, building resiliency, improving my mood, and never again feeling any pain or discomfort.
Just kidding…but it helps. Sometimes.
Staring at walls – or meditating – is one of those things that is simple but not easy. It’s hard not to carry the load of your mind with you, and since it’s ultimately your mind, not the spackle or paint on the wall, that “creates” that face that kind of looks like Stewie from Family Guy, you have to get to the point where it drops everything else before you start to “see” what you need to see, focused but relaxed, kind of like those 3-D art pictures that you wait and wait and wait until all of a sudden they just pop out and smack you in the face.
And sometimes it takes a while. It’s like trying to put down a toddler (your ego) for a nap, but they keep finding one more thing to see, touch, or spit up on before finally they just settle in and go to sleep. From my experience (with staring at walls, not napping toddlers), some days take longer than others, but if I sit there long enough, the noise fades, my apps close, and I’m just there, present and content, and I’ve successfully put down little Woody Allen for his nap so I can go about the rest of my day, calm and aware, without the neurotic narrator.
Hypothetically, it might go something like this…
Okay, wall…just you and me buddy, here we go. Damn, it feels nice just sit down. Lie down. Get my legs up in the air. Anyway, time to focus. I mean, not focus, but just…look. Watch. Listen.
Crap, did I shut the garage door? Of course, I did, I just got home, it’s when I leave that I sometimes forget to do that. Well, technically I just worry that I did cause I’m on such autopilot when I leave that I get a block down the road and literally can’t remember, but it’s always closed when I get home, every single time.
Okay, wall…ha, this is so like The Men Who Stare at Goats. I should write a blog about that sometime. I bet there’s a spot pattern up there that would look like a goat if I tried…wait…don’t force it. Just go with it. Maybe you find a goat, maybe you find…that kind of looks like…
*Bzzz* Shoulda put my phone on silent. *Bzzz* *Bzzz* Three in five seconds, must be the guys talking *Bzzz* about the *Bzzz* Duke/Kansas game. I think I had Duke in one of my brackets. Not that it matters. What a mess that thing is.
Let it go; it’ll be there later. Okay, I’m going to silence it. Annnnnd…airplane mode. I feel a little bad about that, by oh well, they’ll never know. It’s not like I keep some kind of online diary or something that they can reference later.
I really should be doing something now. Did I thaw out that pork chop already? I think I might have put it in the fridge yesterday. If I didn’t, though, and I sit here meditating…medi-staring maybe? If I sit here for another thirty minutes, and I’m already kinda hungry, and then I still have to thaw the dumb thing out later before I can even start…ah, just chill…you’ll be fine.
Back to the popcorn ceilings. Okay, that just made me hungry again. Even though I don’t really eat popcorn. I mean, maybe homemade stuff with real salt and butter, not that machine lubricant shit they use at movie theaters; so reminds me of those Castor Motor Oil commercials back in the day. Mostly I don’t eat popcorn because those damn shells get stuck in my gums and get infected. Anyway, that wasn’t the point…the ceiling…
Where was it I saw that T-Rex the other day. I wonder what the odds are of actually finding the same pattern of bumps a second time? This sure was easier the other day. And more relaxing. Today I just want to get up and do something, but that’s probably the point of this. Just keep sitting, keep letting the thoughts go, it’ll fade. It’ll fade.
Why do I find it so uncomfortable when my hair stylist asks if I want her to trim my eyebrows at the end? Probably cause I never even got asked that question till I was like twenty-five. Just wasn’t raised that way. Should I trim my own more? I can feel one of them dangling down and touching my eyelash. You never really notice eyebrows that much until you see someone without them. Such a small detail, but man…
It’s amazing how important context is. Like in the summer, I enjoy riding my bike. With my shirt off. Yeah, getting a good tan, a little Vitamin D. Warm sun feels good on my back. Just me and my bike, riding down the bike path. Totally innocuous (outside of a stuffy gated community, anyway). Then you change the bike path to a sidewalk…that goes past a park…outside of an elementary school…during recess…every day for weeks on end. Kind of changes things. Probably shouldn’t do that. The end of the innocence, as Don Henley used to say. Just heard that old gem of a song on the radio today.
I can’t remember the last time I just really listened to sounds, like the sound of my furnace and the cars going by and stuff. I pretty much always have a song stuck in my head. Literally damn near always. Even if I’m thinking thoughts I’m kind of simultaneously singing a song too, or just kind of having it passively play on repeat…it’s a little hard to explain, even to myself in my own head. Things sure are cluttered in here; I didn’t even know.
What if I just turned down that song…”In the year of the tiger…” alright, zip it Myles. Sorry, I mean just…you can play again later. Huh…I knew there were cars going by out there. I mean, I heard them, but I didn’t really hear them. Of course my neighbors’ dogs are barking, why wouldn’t they. Like Bandit every time the door moves…that fat freaking puggle. I can hear a tiny, little pulse in my ear when it’s pressed against my pillow. Crazy.
Whoa, it’s like a Pac-Man with a duck-bill. And kinda sharp teeth. Right next to some kind of evil, grinning badger or something. Probably the honey badger…cause you know he don’t…”In the year of the…” zip! Let the song go. “In the year…” no.
That one looks like Donkey Kong in Mario Kart. Oh my god, that game! Great in childhood, great in college…when was the last time I played that?
Dog with an elephant tusk. Morphs into an elephant. A pig licking a lollipop. A cobra with a flared hood.
…two minutes go by…
“In the year”…
…four minutes…
“In the”…
...seven minutes…
Dragon with huge nostrils.
…twenty minutes…
…
…
Well hey there 🙂 Welcome back to consciousness. Last I saw you were pulling out of the driveway, shutting the garage door on your way to work. What you been up to for the last ten hours?
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