12. Call to Action: From Knowing the Path to Walking the Path
"There is a difference between knowing the path and walking the path."
― Morpheus in "The Matrix"
"It doesn't matter how beautiful your theory is, it doesn't matter how smart you are. If it doesn't agree with experiment, it's wrong."
― Richard P. Feynman in one of his lectures
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It goes without saying that there is big difference between theory and practice. In fact, in our discussion on Mindful Bounded Rationality, we identified this as one of the biggest limitations of rationalism.
But now we must eat our own dogfood.
What we have done so far is to develop the MSE Framework and identified the "6CED" Tendencies of the universe and how they can be used to find meaning, purpose and hope in life.
What we really need to do now is to develop some practices based on these concepts.
Ideally, these practices should be simple for most people to do on a regular basis, so they can actually see the benefits themselves.
From Theory to Practice
Let us look at each of the 6CED Tendencies and come up with some initial ideas for turning them into actions.
This may look a little like a typical self-help TODO list, but it is only meant as an example to spark thinking along these lines. The list is by no means definitive or complete. It will evolve over time as we learn more about what works and what doesn't.
Coherence or Comprehensibility: This includes all our ongoing struggles to make sense of our lives, of our environment, of the economy, our relationships and so on are all a part of this. Of course, in order to align ourselves with our purpose, we need to actually take this seriously rather than simply doing whatever some social influencer or your friend circle or some book (including this one) tells us to do. First try to make sense of whatever you are being told, and if it does, only then turn it into practice.
Complexity: What this typically translates into is "being constructive" rather than destructive. For the physical world, it could mean building complex things. For the inner world, it could mean complexifying our minds by seeking out complexity and trying to understanding it better and communicating it to others.
Continuity of existence or identity: This could mean something as simple as taking care of your health and wellbeing, along with that of your family and friends, your community, all the way up to ensuring the sustainability of the entire biosphere. All of these are Meaning-Seeking Systems, and they all depend upon each other to achieve their aims of continuation of existence.
Curiosity: This one is easy: Always try to be curious and open minded, willing to experience new phenomena and learning from them. This is the natural behavior of our Bayesian brains, and it is only when we get stuck in routines or become dogmatic about some belief that we deviate from that.
Creativity: This one is also easy: Always try to be creative. And, in particular, creating things that embody at least some of the other 6CED Tendencies. One of the best ways to do that is to create or facilitate the creation of Living Entities of all types.
Consciousness: Simply being mindful is one of the best ways to enrich your conscious experience, and over time, enrich your consciousness itself. One can also add other rich experiences to their repertoire, like listening to music or appreciating good art or reading good books.
Evolution: Needless to say that our biological desire to participate in evolution is a part of this. But also participating in iterative improvement of everything we do or every organized group we belong to could also be seen as a part of this.
Diversity: This involves recognizing the value of and facilitating the enrichment of diversity in all aspects of the world. It also means detecting when diversity is being destroyed or monoculture is replacing it and slowing or preventing that from happening.
In addition to all of the above, one should always remain watchful that anything that one does eventually leads to the enrichment of life and consciousness.
With all that in mind, I have defined 4 practices that one can do on a regular basis to keep themselves on track towards a more meaningful life.
Here they are.
Motivation
Before I talk about the practices, I am gong to try to motivate you to actually undertake these practices. Let me start by asking some questions:
What's the first thing you do when you get up in the morning?
How about just before you hit the pillow at night?
How about whenever you have a free moment during the day?
My guess is, for most people, most days, the answer is: "Check my social media feed!"
Is it any wonder, then, that most people think that life has become crazy / sad / angry / sucky in general? When you feed your mind junk, it's no wonder it gets sick over time.
What would be a better alternative?
How about some healthy food for your mind, delivered in small chunks?
Fortunately for you, that's exactly what I have developed. 4 practices that can each be performed in a few minutes, and that can help make your life more meaningful, purposeful and hopeful over time. They help you to think about your day and your life methodically and creatively, and actually improve things rather than make them worse.
Here they are:
Mindful Moments: Whenever you have a free moment,
Purposeful Mornings: Before you start your day in the morning,
Hopeful Evenings: Last thing you can do at night, and
Meaningful Life: Whenever you are in the mood for taking a deeper perspective.
Each practice takes only a few minutes to complete, and is immediately useful.
Mindful Moments
Mindfulness is the ancient practice of focusing your full attention on the present moment. It involves simply observing and labeling things happening around you, as well as inside your body and your mind, clearly and calmly, without making any judgment about them. Practicing mindfulness in everyday activities has been proven to improve focus, productivity and peace of mind. Simply observing and labeling things occurring in the present moment allows you to see things more clearly, think more clearly about them, and act more effectively on them. Becoming really good at mindfulness is a lot harder than it sounds and takes a long time. But every little step can produce tangible benefits.
Mindfully focusing on your surroundings:
Start by settling down comfortably wherever you are, taking a deep breath and exhaling slowly.
Gently allow your mind to pay attention to what is happening around you, right here, right now.
Take a look around yourself and make a note of something that catches your attention. It could be anything you see or hear or smell or touch (e.g. "pen", "chair", "carpet" etc.).
Pay careful attention to that object. Notice some of its properties, such as its color or shape or texture or the way it is changing etc.
If your mind wanders, that's ok. Gently and playfully bring your focus back to the object. Allow it to fill your attention as much as you can, at least for a few seconds.
Now it is time to focus on your body:
Gently close your eyes and turn your focus inwards, towards your own body.
You will start to noice various physical sensations occurring in your body, such as your breath coming in and going, maybe an itch somewhere on your skin, or tenseness in your muscles etc.
Once again, choose whatever catches your attention and pay as careful attention to it as you can, at least for a few seconds.
And again, if your mind wanders, just gently and playfully bring it back to the sensation. Allow it to fill your attention as much as you can, without trying to judge it as good or bad.
Going deeper, focusing on your mind:
The next step is to pay attention to what is going on inside your mind.
Notice any thought or emotion passing through your mind. Simply observe and label the thought or emotion as it is.
Try to stay with it for a short time. Try to look at your own mind playfully, as if it is a child. It is important to remember not to make any judgements about it.
This is probably the hardest part of the practice, but even a minute amount of regular progress towards it will compound over time.
Purposeful Mornings
The "Purposeful Morning" practice is basically identical to the Stoic practice of Morning Reflection, with the addition of the 6CED principles outlined in my book,"An Engineer's Search for Meaning".
It involves sitting quietly for just a few moments every morning and going over your goals or objectives for the day, idenifying challenges you may encounter while pursuing them, and visualizing the actions you might take to handle them.
In addition, the practice requires that one should ensure that these goals and actions are "virtuous". In our case, we define virtuous as being in alignment with the 6CED Tendencies of the universe, in a life- and consciousness-enriching manner.
Doing this practice everyday has been proven to improve productivity, focus and peace of mind, as well as contributing to a sense of meaning, purpose and hope in our lives.
Becoming really good at this practice is a lot harder than it sounds and takes a long time. But every little step can produce tangible benefits.
So here is a quick exercise just to introduce the basic idea to you. It should take only a couple of minutes.
Indentifying Goals for the Day:
Start by asking yourself what you need to accomplish today. Identify up to 3 goals or actions for the day.
These may be personal goals, work or school goals, or family or community goals.
Make sure the goals are SMART:
Specific: Clearly defined.
Measurable: It should be easy to measure your success or progress towards the goal.
Achievable: Ensure the goal is realistically attainable.
Relevant: The goal should be aligned with the 6CED Tendencies of the universe.
Time-bound: Set a specific timeframe for goal achievement.
In addition, try to visualize what challenges you might face while trying to accomplish these goals, and how you might overcome them.
Visualize yourself actually taking those actions and overcoming the challenges that may come up. Doing so may lead to insights that require modifying the goals and actions.
Alignment with the 6CED Tendencies:
This Stoic practice requires us to ensure that our goals and actions are virtuous. In the context of this app, we will consider a goal or action to be virtuous if it is aligned with at least one of the 6CED Tendencies of the universe, in a life- and consciousness-enriching manner.
Here is the list of the 6CED Tendencies for your reference:
Coherence or Comprehensibility
Complexity
Continuity of Existence or Identity
Curiosity
Creativity
Consciousness
Evolution
Diversity
So the practice involves identifying your goals and actions for the day, and ensuring that they are aligned with the 6CED Tendencies of the universe in a life- and consciousness-enriching manner.
Note that, sometimes, some of your goals and actions may not lead to life or consciousness enrichment even though they may be in alignment with the 6CED Tendencies. So it is important to keep that in mind and modify your goals and actions if necessary.
In the beginning, it may be hard to achieve this for at least some of your goals, but over time, as you see the benefits, they should become better aligned.
In the next 3 steps, we will enter up to 3 goals or actions you have identified, along with checking off the 6CED Tendencies they may be aligned with.
Hopeful Evenings
Meaningful Life
And of course, in order to be respectful of nebulosity and unknowns in reality, we need to exercise mindful moderation and willingness to learn and improve the above list of actions accordingly.
Not only that, but even a cursory look at the list will reveal that, at times, some of these tendencies or actions might be in conflict with each other. This is where mindfulness comes in again, in deciding how to prioritize and schedule actions accordingly.
Moreover, this time, because you know the reasoning behind how these tendencies and actions were arrived at, you can make far more informed decisions about the prioritization and scheduling as compared to pretty much any other method of meaning making or realization.
As I mentioned earlier, this list is only a set of sample suggestions, just to clarify the definition of purpose. Feel free to build your own as it applies to your own life, experiment with it and see what works.
Congratulations, that was the last chapter in this book! With that, we have completed everything we wanted to accomplish in this book.
Next, for good measure, we will quickly summarize everything we have discussed so far and then take some questions.
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