the four stoic virtues.

Wisdom
 

Justice
 

Temperance
 

Fortitude

Some of these are somewhat archaic terms, handed down from the translator George Long, when he translated The Meditations into English many moons ago.

For instance, we might think of temperance, the 20th century American usage, meaning to abstain from drinking alcohol.

But no.

The stoic virtues listed by Marcus Aurelius.

A virtue is a trait which leads to goodness, not being your best but going towards your best.  Process and journey, and not destination; as is said of the journey and the destination, as it so with virtue-the process of getting there is so much more important than being there.

Wisdom is of course, not necessarily natural intelligence, but maybe also a learned kind of "applied knowledge".  Not necessarily Intelligence Quotient, or an abundance of memorized facts, but maybe some of both, along with some common sense, and life experience.

Justice can mean so much depending on one's politics or religion.  Justice for some is defined by the Creator, as in religion.  Or justice is social equity or economic equality, as per politics.

Temperance is the archaic word last used abundantly in reference to banning alcohol during the 1920's in America.

It's simply moderation or mildness.  Controlling the appetite, the emotions, and whatever else, such that one does not hinder oneself by his own impulses.

Fortitude.  This can refer to resiliency.  Not the ability to be naturally tough, or courageous, but the ability to continue through not being tough, despite that, or doing things that terrify one--as Joyce Meyer notes, one can be afraid to go forward, without shame, and go forward anyway, despite the fear.

It takes two, sometimes.

*The same world that created and shaped Marjorie to be who she is, also made Alexandria what she is, too.  (KJV: "...it rains on both the just and the unjust...").

One worked buns, in the assembling area.

One worked condiments, in the assembling area.

One by herself, forgettable, easily overlooked in the day to day course of sandwiches and smiles; however, together missing, would represent a stunning loss of productivity for the place.....

*There was Alexander and Diogenes.

Alexander was born a prince, Macedonian royalty tutored by Greek philosophers, and at a young age, spread his empire across much of the known world.

Diogenes was a destitute cynic who slept among dogs in the gutter, using a discarded wine barrel as his sleeping blanket.

Upon seeing Diogenes in the gutter, Alexander did not scoff or catcall.  Instead he said, "if I were not Alexander, I would want to be Diogenes."

*There was the Teals and the Lees.

The Teal family lived on Jefferson Road West and raised a lot of livestock on a modest acreage of forage land.

The Lee family lived on Jefferson Road East and grew crops on their acreage.

It took both to have a meal, both to have a well-rounded diet, in the American sense of the word.  They would both look to the sky, the weather, the God-brought precipitation from the heavens, to sustain their lifestyles.  To wit, (KJV)"see how God provides even for the flowers of the field, and for you, his Own beloved, how much more so?"

Conversely, the Teals bought corn from the Lees as feed for their livestock, and meanwhile, the Lees paid a pittance for a tonnage of livestock scat from the Teals in order to fertilize their crop fields.

The dousing wasn't the sport; self-improvement, itself, was the sport.

He found some water that was nearing freezing temperature, and it was to be a challenge, mentally and physically for him, to be part of his routine, to contest the thing within his own person, the very cold water....

He further found there would be a gradient of training challenges to that task, a version of cold-water dousing, an athletic training component that's older than the original Olympic games in ancient Greece.

The first time, he felt the water with his toe, less than a minute being dipped in and pulled out, and that was a session: he established his own baseline, his own benchmark, his own bar.

A first challenge, of the toe dipped for a few seconds.

And there would be more milestones in the training, later, a time scale, as he competed against his own best efforts, from one outing to the next, competing against his own prior results(that's what the real competitor does, competes against his own prior best effort, tries to top himself).

*He had the over-all goal of the actual activity itself, in the most simple terms.

*He had the challenge of developing a new challenge to coincide with every new step in his evolution in the process of performing the training:  Training goals.

"Developing a program" is the somewhat stuffy term for giving oneself an appropriate challenge for whatever point he is at in his training.

It was a sequence of challenges that he put to himself, in the name of his own self-improvement, and with that training, would come perspective and self-esteem:

failures would teach him humility,

and victories would teach him gratitude.

Time blocking turned to journaling in the calendar app.

 There is a lot of talk about "time-blocking" in calendar apps, among today's productivity pundits, as a way of planning out one's day.

How it works.

Scheduling yourself in your app, almost as if Calendar was the To-Do-List(Tasks).

Almost.

Usually color-coded chunks of time, with each portion being sometimes not very specific.

For instance, a block could be, not specific details about a task, but a very generic label, such as "project a", instead of being more particular in the description of the planned time.

What I've been doing is a little different, and a bit more haphazard.

I've been using the Google Calendar paid version to act as a kind of journal in shorthand code.  In other words, I don't transcribe a task into the app until AFTER its complete.

(The same thing can be done manually in the free version of Google Calendar by manually selecting the colors of particular entries when creating them.)

The idea is that its sort of a "time log", the calendar, and prior days can be looked back on for future reference, for sake of, perhaps, improving productivity going forward.  He who masters the past controls the future, it is said; or better still, he who has learned the lessons of the past is adequately prepared for the future.

The idea behind using the paid version in the Google vernacular, is the different calendars, as if there were more than person using the acct in the app.  

(The Many Calendars Of Mister Effective).

Sample Calendar Ideas:

A work calendar.  

Or a specific project calendar.

A family time calendar.

Or anything else.

And best of all, one click can make the particular calendar disappear or re-appear.

Again: ON THE FREE VERSION.

Beyond that, one "calendar" can be used on the one acct, as per the free version of the app.  

How to get around that is to manually change the colors of different items, as need.  Even if you don't have colors assigned to particular types of items, which would be very useful, you can at least vary the color almost at random to make the different time slots seem more obviously different.

Else, the blue of the regular calendar tends to make takes "bleed together" or blend into one mess if one simply glances at the calendar.

Much more visually effective to differentiate with various colors.

Frisson Naturale: mid-spring 2024, the "speedthaw"

Nature is honest, if sometimes unkind, and truth is honest, if sometimes unkind.

It's fascinating how even something as seemingly mundane as unusual weather can provoke reflection and stimulate change in our perceptions and routines. Nature has a way of affecting us deeply, whether through its beauty, its power, or its unpredictability.

In the case of South Carolina's unusual weather stimulating the growth of local flowers, it's like nature is presenting a tangible manifestation of its own dynamism and resilience. This can serve as a reminder of the ever-changing nature of life and the interconnectedness of all living things.

"The thankful receiver bears a plentiful harvest."

"Great things are done when men and mountains meet."

"Every bird that cuts the airy way is an immense world of delight, enclosing the fruitage of the universe."

-William Blake

"Nature always wears the colors of the spirit."

"Adopt the pace of nature: her secret is patience."

"The earth laughs in flowers."

-Ralph Waldo Emerson