How long is a day? Forever. How long is a life? Milliseconds. How long is a moment in the Flow? Never Ending.

Where did we get the structure? Who made up the context of time? When did somehow we become expect our work to happen in daytimes, during the week, and our play time on nights and weekends? This isn’t going to be a whiny post about how we need to work 24-7 and if we’re not, then we’re doing it wrong… Exactly the opposite.

There is no separation between work and play, in the flow. There is no exhaustion, just excitement. There is rest time, there is work time, it all interplays throughout each day at all times of the day. Early morning, late morning, noon time, afternoon, evening, late night, early early morning. All these times are open for work, open for play, open for rest, Really.

I have struggled though, fitting this truth into a context of time, that maybe I learned in grade school? Starting quite young, our school weeks are boxed-up and packed, with blocks of play built-in: Recess, Lunch, Recess Again. All the good stuff seems to be the small parts, while the boring, or hard or tedious or stuck-in-your-chair work is the painful majority. Sad really. I did well in school.  I wanted to ‘do it right’ and get good grades, please people, yet I still wanted those play times most. Art classes, special project time, or  science experiments are what I enjoyed more than anything else. I didn’t want the boring work time… So sue me.

So later on, we grow up, we want to continue this structure and rhythm we’ve been institutionalized into believing, and we ‘need’ a job, and our stuff, and our little place in this big ole world. The best jobs, give the most free time, for the most money, right? Get a 9-5, enjoy weekends and vacations, be happy?!?!? Nope.

Been there, done that, it wears out. What’s funny about lately, is that I am working harder and better than ever. I have a place again. I am more found-er than lost-er on my little career journey. But quite upside-down from my old life. The work now is more intense, it’s harder, and requires more depth of focus. I make a mere fraction of the pay. I work all hours of the day, and night. I am happier. What?!?!

Yeah, it’s weird (ha!). Among the hard intense work, I enjoy mid day naps often. I sleep in late many days. I work late too. I make creative designs. I grill fat juicy steaks. I talk about business with my spouse a lot.  I had hiring conversations and meetings this week. I cleaned up poop, just yesterday. I dropped tough news that not everyone would like. I saw historic firsts, that delighted me deeply and simply with my wife.

I have enjoyed moments so far out of my own ideas of success, that I appreciated and was surprised by. This stuff is more highly concerted and divinely orchestrated than I could have ever created myself. And that’s the really funny part. I have been intentionally directing my life for several years now. Picking a far out big ole crazy goal, like becoming a professional Life Coach. Working with the world’s best, and choosing to dive into such uncharted waters, the struggle to stay afloat at all, was so exhausting. I chose all that. I chose how hard it was too. Probably didn’t have to be that hard. Anyway…

I see quite lately, that the Flow, shows itself in it’s ease and play and forthcomingness. The Flow is timeless, it’s suspended as an infinite and fleeting flash of gratitude and cooperation. I’ve experienced Flow in such simple little moments lately, no stress, no fear, nothing I could ever have decided and planned for and carved out with my intentionality.

To quote a teacher that has impacted me, it’s like holding a cork underwater and just letting it go. The feeling is release, it shoots upward, it’s easier than the struggle to grip something where it doesn’t want to be. This blog itself is like that. Even today, I struggle and fight to keep it where it is. It’s painful to push words through the clattering keys and make sense of something to share with myself, to fill this space, what is the point? I don’t actually know what the point is. I can tell from other recent experiences however, that this pattern of black letters and spaces, isn’t really in full flow. It’s too hard. It’s too much of a fight. It’s too pointless, to make sense of. Other activities lately are not that way at all. They jump onto the screen with vigor and pop. They ignite conversation and feedback and gifts and participation. This place don’t do that. It’s a fight to write, then crickets chirping, a like from my wife, maybe a couple more. Thank You all, for every last one of your clicks or comments that’s ever come. Maybe it was a struggle for you, to let the world know you read these crazy words.

This isn’t a beg. Please don’t read that. This is a contrast, it’s a distinction, it’s a laugh I’ve had at myself this last week. Things that are falling so fittingly into place, are a joy and delight in my world, they are so easy. They are not however, ‘normal.’ No, you can still guarantee that my life, doesn’t look like the thing you would want for your kid. It doesn’t have ‘security’ and ‘balance’ and a disciplined schedule that you can ‘count on.’ No, it’s wilder than that. It’s no round peg for a round hole. It doesn’t even Flow, most of the time.

I have seen the Flow lately, in tiny glimpses. It’s so Real, and so visceral and so ordinary I chuckle at myself. I couldn’t have pushed for this. I couldn’t have made it happen. It was supposed to be this way, it was and is, always perfect. I was supposed to die, and be sad and be lost and fail. I was supposed to crack and crumble and be brokenhearted. I was supposed to be rich and unappreciative, then broke and content. I was supposed to have all the friends and all the people, then push it all away for one. The flips and flops and counter-intuitive lessons keep piling up, they will forever.

It’s quantum. As soon as I observe it, it changes, by the act of my observation. I love that. I hate that. It’s how it must be. The darkness and hollow silence of night, has broken. There is a glow of pink and shafts of orange fresh light spiking through cloudbanks. The Flow, is sunrise, out of my control, yet bringer of all life force. Without it, death. Luckily, I kept holding on, and struggling to grasp the cork, till finally I gave up, and let go.

What does all this mean. I dunno. It’s about darkness giving away to light. It’s about exhaustion wiped away by enthusiasm. It’s about menial tasks that show me God at work. It’s about divine detours rerouting our best plans, and taking somewhere far better than we ever set out to go. It’s about seeing for real, the unreal. It’s about release of our Mind, and letting God have our heart, and starting to listen to our Gut.

If it feels good, in our gut, and we know, like we know, like we know, that we feel that Flow, then it doesn’t fricking matter, if it looks right to the rest of the ‘world.’ The world’s got it wrong. God’s got it right.

I’ll see you around, maybe here next week. It may be a fight, or it may be the flow. We’ll see, as it unfolds. Again, it’s all perfection. The struggle and the song.

Sincerely,

Aaron Nichols

It was one little sentence spit out at the end of our weekly Hangout discussion that still haunts me. I fell to temptation, on video, and yet you’ll never see it…

(No, I didn’t finally give up on recording and posting the conversations that a few of you check out each week. This latest chat with the fantastic, Melissa Ford, was special and poignant and lost, in some unexplained glitch of the digital Universe. Maybe it was too powerful. Maybe it was too rich with insight, and inspiration and pure in clarity, that it just smoked the servers it was recording too… or something like that Prolly not…. ANYWAY, it’s gone forever, sorry )…on to the story…

Temptation has been a bitch lately. Among the feverish action and broad bounding steps forward we are taking in our own lives, temptations have sprinkled all the shiny new surfaces of my days.

Let me explain… “Since” my wife recently took a job as a teacher at the local high school. “Because of that,” I accepted new responsibility, and will be manning her post as manager and co-leader of our restaurant. Also, “I seem to be” coming out of my shell and regaining long lost confidence and even swagger, with more stuff to do, and problems to solve, as all men really love to do.

ANYWAY, I am beating around the bush here, and I want to make something clear. My life has ironically returned full circle, to a sort of ‘normality,’ that I haven’t felt in YEARS!! Lots of work on my plate. Lots of things going on. LOTS of moments that I am tempted to fall into an old trap. I even said something terrible, during the Hangout discussion with Melissa… I said this… “Because we run a Restaurant, we don’t get to bed, around our house, till Midnight or later…” YUCK! PUKE! I’ve returned to ZombieLand! SICK! I fell into the trap of NORMAL! (and not the good kind!) Melissa didn’t call me on it, but I felt it almost immediately…

Any time I follow the word ‘Because’ with anything other than ‘I choose to’ or ‘I’ve chosen it’ or ‘For now this is what I want’, I’m lying and victimized and being a big ole FAKE!! The TRUTH of the matter is that all things in my life, Are My Choice. How I react to all things, Is My Choice. All the Because’s and the Since’s don’t have anything to do with the circumstances or people or events I follow those words with. The words that follow Are My Choices. They are things and feelings and reactions and actions and releases and procrastinations and opportunities and missed opportunities That I’ve Chosen. They are not anything other than that… And I almost used my new life-shifts, to fall into an old trap. I’m too busy, to get to bed before Midnight… BullHockey!

I choose to go to bed at Midnight. Or I don’t. I may choose to watch 4 hours of Hoarders (for the first time ever, online) starting at 10:30pm and completely clean house instead of sleeping on a Tuesday night… YES, that would be, (and was, this week) my CHOICE!

I love sharing my shit here. I caught my own crap, during that one innocent sounding little sentence this week. Because, we run a restaurant, I don’t get to sleep early… blah…. blah… blah… BULL! It is this way, because this is how I Choose my life to be. Lucky me, that I got to see that BS story in action.

Now, does that help you at all, that I saw my own crap, when I started to ‘explain’ some circumstance to a friend during a conversation? I sure hope so! I’ve spent years and years and years of my life, doing that exact thing! I’ve talked with people and family and co-workers and bosses and all kinds of people about tons and tons of ‘Becauses’. We have a little barometer in our gut, that starts to go haywire, whenever we say or hear someone use a bunch of “BS Becauses.” It’s kinda funny that our higher self understands the truth veiled by this swiss-cheese white lie, that we pass off for ‘being realistic’.

I’m not being smart or mature or astute, when I give you some calculated example of my limitations and my weaknesses, after speaking slowly… and deliberately… the word ‘Because’… I’m just full of shit. I instead could say:

• I am choosing this right now.
• I want this thing.
• I don’t want that.
• I am choosing no.
• I am not willing to, right now, solve this.
• I am choosing to feel my fear.
• I like where I am at, really.
• I am a powerful person, and I have all that I really really really want, and that is good enough for me.

Ya know… stuff like that….

Instead, I can fall into what the cultural backdrop seems to accept as perfectly valid and even responsible behaviors of cowardice and complacency and just trying to be comfortable for the time until I die… Yeah, really.

I do that sometimes still anyway. I even choose to play this game, in certain conversation, purposely, to get along and even limit my exposure to the Victim-One-Upmanship-Game, that occurs out in the world. I wouldn’t however be okay with myself, if I didn’t ‘out’ my own crap in this little space. This little place where we can be released from the BS of Because, and finally free-fully OWN our own crap!

I won’t always do this right. I won’t always be a 100% OWNER, I could fail, and you could see that in me, or read it here too. I do know, right now, in this moment, that those times are chosen times. I do have the power in the reaction. This physical world around us, isn’t really an outside-in type of place. It looks backwards to us. Like we perceive the image in the mirror to be the real thing. It isn’t. It’s an illusion.

Our experiences (meaning our individual perceptions of life) aren’t a little hunk of play-doh that is beaten, formed and shaped by the objects, people and events around us. It’s the opposite. We are the shapers. We are conduits for creation. The world we see is completely malleable, and we LIE to ourselves when we speak otherwise. This mis-alignment with truth actually shows up in our gut as stress. We actually already know this. We are divine instruments that spiritually know when clarity and truth is spoken, and when it’s not. And anytime, we follow the word ‘Because’, with a ‘reason’ instead of our CHOICE,  it hurts a little.

Melissa Ford, said something so awesome on our Hangout together. We shared that everyone has a shitstorm of emotion and junk and thoughts and fears and excitements and flushes of arousal (okay, I threw that one in ) among their ‘normal’ lives. Actually all that ‘weirdness’ is what normal really is. She even went so far as to say this blog should be called www.normalforgood.com, because having all these crazy thoughts and junk is just what we all experience, yet rarely share.

I am that kinda normal, my friends. A specimen of such brutal, and numerous yellow-diarrhea-stained mind-monkeys, that I may be the most Normal person you know…

And I LOVE, (right now) that I’ve CHOSEN THIS. Oh yeah! It’s not because of anything other than that. P-E-R-I-O-D. I’ve chosen this. I’ve chosen this. I’ve chosen this.

End of story. It all is the way it is, because I’ve chosen it. It all will be the way it will be, because, I will continue to choose it. I always have. I always will. There is nothing else that exists after the word Because.

So, if you are around, and catch me falling, failing, not seeming to be winning at this ownership thing, know that I’m choosing that too. And you can choose what to do about it then. You can speak up. You can keep quiet. You can Choose to see another human being, trying and failing, or trying and learning, or just being human…

That is Your Choice.

Enjoy it.

Sincerely,

Aaron Nichols

Alright, ONLY click this video if you have a sense of humor, and ‘get’ the message I’m sending today… (Psst… it’s not, Because I Got High!)

What needs written today? What hasn’t been said? What are you here for? And for that matter, what am I here for? Specifically, sitting in just some jammie shorts with a cup of coffee at my too-cluttered office desk, on this rain-drenched Friday morning…

I’ll make this quick… There’s sooo much, tooo much, amazing, tragic, scary, blissful, and just plain wrong, to tell you about today. In fact, just not today, that is like every day. In fact, most all the time, the ‘stuff’ in my mind, the ‘activities’ in my life and the events taking place are just so unbelievable to me, that I usually say nothing, to almost everyone…

In my old life, I talked a LOT about what I was going to do, or thinking of doing, or seeing other people do. Now I don’t. In fact, I feel that this place, this online little spot, is the only place I really share much at all. Of course, my wife and I talk about life. Deeply and truly we do share with each other. However, in my interactions out in the world, I am seeing myself withhold, and go through the motions. For now, that’s what I’m choosing…

Inside it’s different. Inside the world is fabulous chaos most of the time. I am doing, seeing and experiencing first hand so many new things. I constantly see the unfolding of magic and gifts from God. Here’s a few: I recognize how blessed I am that ‘problems’ of career and of money, from months passed have flipped-turned 180° in our house. Lindsay has a new gig in the fall, that she’s dreamed of for a loooong time. I get to help run this restaurant, a dream too, for me. Monies for the little things, the regular stuff of life, is here now. Stacks of hundred dollar bills can be easily found when needed. Stuff has sold, we’ve saved, we’ve stayed frugal on the little stuff, money builds up over time.

Working all afternoon at Church yesterday, to get an internet cable run, is something that seems simple, but not being tied to a schedule that allows that kind of freedom, is really fun still for me. I can always choose to make myself available if I really want to now. Other things aren’t so Pollyanna. I do ride the waves of emotion that we’ve discussed together here. I don’t always stay waaay up on a high wave, they fall too. I have hard times. This sobriety is a freakin’ work in progress. Excruciating at times. Too hard some days. Why I hold the line? Why I didn’t give in to temptations lately? I can’t say. I don’t know. But the feeling of having something I want; complete freedom from alcohol, sucks sometimes.

So, the garden is in, new life is coming, a summer of tending my plants, I like that. I like the design and creativity and artistry it can be. It’s a distraction too. It’s something I use to spend energy upon that feels productive and pure, just because I decided that too. The house is a wreck, and I don’t want to clean it. That too is here in this moment. I cause the messes, then I don’t feel like cleaning them up. Someone once told me, “How we do some things, is how we do all things.”

And maybe, that is where this blog is headed today…

I am moving through life lately, causing things, creating things, inventing myself as I go along. I rarely do maintenance anymore. I really don’t put effort into the nurturing and the care-taking like I used to. Especially in relationships, in people moments. I actually experience this as a free-fall. It must be by choice, everything is. This detachment and looseness and being in the present moment, is pure love sometimes, pure terror others.

And, I don’t share that either, anywhere but here.

I share this stuff today, to connect with someone else, who may have felt the same way, and weren’t sure if they were the only one who has. All the connected-ness and rhythm and repetition of my old ways are gone now. Almost every step is brand new, sometimes good, sometimes bad. I don’t know what the future holds, but I do know that little by little, I am creating it now. I get to shape it, I have the opportunity and the responsibility, it’s not the worn-in groove created by years and years of the same cycles spinning over and over and over again…

Sometimes, like out at the lake last weekend, I desperately miss those old cycles…

Sometimes, like this very morning, I’m headed off to help shape a business. I have a clear mind and determination and a fumbling forward mindset. I know I’ll fall and fail and make mistakes, and I’m good with that too. I don’t do this thing right. I can’t if I want to stretch myself into new places. Growth and new experience can only happen outside my comfort zone, outside feels both exhilarating and terrifying, simultaneously.

That’s what’s up this week. That’s what I won’t share when someone asks, ‘How’re you doing?’ And I’m gambling here, to guess that I’m not the only one, with more to say, than we actually do, most of the time.

I feel you out there. I feel that something is boiling within. I feel that you are here for that part of you, to connect with that part of me. If it weren’t true, you’d have clicked away long ago, and never made it this far, down the rabbit hole, with me.

Thanks for being the REAL YOU, somewhere, somehow. It’s important.

Sincerely,

- Aaron Nichols

Some days reroute lives forever. Some events occur as game-changers, severing any continuity with the past, and leaving us to wonder how a new future will ever be possible.

I was reminded this week of a few of those moments. For people in my life, but not just us.

This week of May shines summerish sunlight we’ve missed through the long winter. It’s been mild here; windows open at night. Things are dry but not too dry. Most people have a garden in. The best outdoor time of the year so far, in Kansas.

So we spent time outdoors this week. Like standing with Mother and Sister, at my Father’s headstone. Gathering all together, maybe only for the second time I really remember, we talked about normal stuff, like the big week they had ahead. Their trip to Mexico. A wedding. Without too much angst, we just had a conversation. Eventually someone looked down, we could see the names of not only my Dad, but Uncle Steve, and Grandparents William (Bill) and Dorothy too… The ending date on my Daddy’s stone shows May 21 1983. It’s been thirty years since that big day.

Why was 5 years ago, the first time we three stood there? I don’t know. Lots of little days go by in between I guess. Times past, we couldn’t have. In that day’s moment, it felt good, it felt right. It wasn’t too hard, but I revered that little space we created together. It was time to go, nearby, another too-young person was laid to rest. We stood together and hugged. Funny, I felt real tall. It was like the heads of my sister and mom, only came halfway up my chest. It was a good hug. I probably won’t ever forget it. It was a big day, in honor of a Big Man we all lost too young.

That was Tuesday.

Last week, there was a birthday. I celebrated in my own way, late at night by shuffling through bunches of old pictures and posting some to facebook. My cousin Megan would have been 35 that day. Her too, lost too young. A big day, none of us will ever understand.

Then Monday, we saw the news. Moore, Oklahoma. A Big twister, a day so many of them will never forget. A day that erased the past. The day before, someone mowed. The day before, someone shopped for groceries. The day before, someone fought over something trivial. The day before, wasn’t that Big Day. On the big ones, nothing else matters, but love. Finding someone alive. All the stuff in their world gone. Didn’t matter at all. The people. The love. Life itself was enough. Everything else could be taken. Have it. We’ll start over.

We had other big days this week too… On Tuesday, at the Restaurant, we installed a new computerized ordering system. A big step forward for us. We changed the game. We can now do lots of new things, to measure our business. We can serve our customers better, when things are clearly defined. We want to be in process of making improvements always. This is just another one. Big nonetheless.

My wife and I hung out with our favorite band this week too. The boys of the Band of Heathens including their sixth member, the freight train whistle and it’s lumbering screeches, put on another awesome show at Knuckleheads. We rocked out. We had a date night. We had real fun. Watching my wife bring us two crisp clear bottles of water, while the rest of the party guzzled booze, was big, for me. Sure, I still feel the tug of cracking a cold one during a concert. But this new way is even more refreshing. Even more rock’n roll rebel style. Against the grain. That’s me.

I could go on and on, about the big days we’ve experienced lately. Tons of moments, not the least of which was seeing my youngest sister say Yes, to a life-long commitment.  I was lucky enough to join her for the small ceremony that legally united them, before they stood in the sand and did it oceanside. Her dream wedding is taking place today. I was really lucky to get to witness and be there for her, in part of her journey, if not all of it.

So what about balance? What about the little days? What about times and weeks that pass without much exciting taking place, or life-changing going on? Should we be thankful for them? Should we be glad that not every day is totally radically tragic, or fantastically inspiringly romantic and blissful?

In this moment, for me, I’m saying screw balance. In the waves of emotion that have moved me both up and down in the last few weeks, I’ve felt a rush. I’ve been pushed and I’ve sailed, and the rigging is up and catching wind. I have a rhythm of activity and of dance that brings pleasure then pain then back again. It feels natural. It feels like real life. I’m so thankful for all of it.

Balance is suffocating. It feels so teeeee-dious and irritating to try and achieve balance. Barely adding a bit to this side, while barely taking away from that side. Ever so slightly adjusting this and that, to find this perfect moment where all things have the right weight and energy and ritual and discipline in my life. Yuck. Lately, it’s been Big Days. We’re pushing waay forward and making cool stuff happen. I’ve shared these super deep moments, in love. I haven’t however kept my house cleaned up, and in perfect order. I haven’t done all the projects on my plate. I haven’t done everything right. I’ve made messes along the way too. It’s cool though. With me.

I see that there will be Big Days for those things too. Days to make a decision and cut projects loose. A day to block out, and just clean and clean. A day to finally put a garden in. A day to say thank you, to people in my life, for the cool things they’ve given me. A day to appreciate the forgiveness and flexibility I’ve been given, as I wander and reroute and play with my life, sometimes changing too much. The old familiar ways are now the uncomfortable ones… Crazy idn’t it.

Really, every day is a big day. Every day contributes to the weight of these big events. None of the big things happen without thousands of tiny little things coming together. Watching this band, with my wife, sober, and appreciating the gift of God, didn’t happen out of the blue. Thousands of moments lead to this. Including the death of my Dad, when I was age four, and he, only 26… Wow.

Balance doesn’t inspire me. Keeping things perfectly all in order, while nothing gets the chance to be great, or die, leaves no risk and no reward. Life doesn’t have meaning without death. There is no halfway between the two, that we can maintain for any amount of time. Jesus told us to be hot or cold, not lukewarm. Balance is lukewarm, and I’m not interested. So today, I’ll again barely show up on time. I’ll drop the ball. I’ll sit here among a mess. I’ll also take a step, working to make a business great. I’ll pound out the very last word of this message, to completion. I’ll, be who I am called to be today. In the only way I know how. I’ll guess at it. I’ll just shoot in the dark. I’ll do something, instead of waiting and wondering.

I’ll do things wrong, and screw up the balance. I’ll feel the rush of the swings and swells and the winds of change. It won’t be teee-dious though It will be another Big Day.

Sincerely,

Aaron Nichols