Writing is my artistic expression. My keyboard is my brush. Words are my medium. My blog is my canvas. And committing to writing daily makes me feel like an artist.
In 3 generations, no one will even remember your name.
If that doesn’t give you liberation to just drop your problems and find some joy, I don’t know what will.
Life is inherently ridiculous and guaranteed to end sooner or later.
So you might as well enjoy the ride.
I had a simple reminder of this yesterday. My original Pair-a-Dimes for Your Thoughts blog was down for a while and I finally got around to going into the back end and figuring out what plugin was preventing it from working.
Then my phone got a notification:
“The site’s downtime lasted 4 months. We’re happy to report your site was back online as of 2:37pm on March 16, 2025.”
For 4 months a blog that used to be my baby, that I put thousands of hours into vanished, a white screen followed by an error page… and not even I noticed that it was down for a full 4 months. And anywhere from 1-5 years after I’m gone the DavidTruss.com domain hosting will expire and literally thousands of blog posts will be lost to all but the internet archive. When is the last to you visited that site to find a dead article? For me it had to be at least 5-6 years ago.
The frame to think about this is the one Chris shares above, “In 3 generations, no one will even remember your name. If that doesn’t give you liberation to just drop your problems and find some joy, I don’t know what will.”
Our journey here is short. The things we should worry about should not outshine the things we should be grateful for. The reasons to be frustrated or upset should not compete with or get in the way of things we appreciate and bring joy to us and others. We can all take at least a small dose of not taking ourselves so seriously.
I was listening to Michaela Slinger’s break-up song, Petty Things, this morning while on my exercise bike and began to wonder, what are the petty things I worry too much about?
Here is one example: The bad driver that does something stupid, making me swear out loud while in my car. Then this festers in my brain for too long, perhaps even to the point of mentioning it to someone later in the day.
But I’m not writing this as an excuse to share my petty grievances. No, that’s literally complaining about them while simultaneously re-grieving them. Instead I’m questioning what underlies the petty things that make them feel more than petty?
What are those points of anger, frustration, hurt, and aggression that trigger a petty response in a way that is an obvious overreaction? What’s beneath the surface, waiting for a petty excuse to be shared?
And can we do the same with joy? Can we (naturally) look for those wonderful occasions of happiness and delight to spring out at any given moment. Can we foster inquisitiveness around joyful happenstance as easily as we sometimes trigger petty thoughts?
I think the animal in us sometimes overrides our humanity. We look for the dangers, the warnings, the things that make life challenging as a sort of animal self defence. But when an animal escapes danger, it literally and physically shakes it off and goes about its life. Humans remember, hold on to, and relive the experience.
If we want to change that, we need to be intentional. We need to seek the positive things we want to live in our minds rent free… petty things already reside there, it’s up to us to vacate those thoughts by filling our brains with things we know will be more enjoyable, more delightful. When we do this our petty grievances start to feel a lot more petty… we start charging rent for negative thoughts, while joy starts to live rent free.
It started January 1st, 2019. I was almost 30 pounds overweight and I decided that I’d had enough of working out, getting busy and lazy and not working out, and yo-yo-ing between these two states… while progressively getting further out of shape.
In my 1 year video reflection, back in late December 2019, I was able to share that I’d basically lost the 30 pounds and was back on track for staying healthy. Now, years later, I’ve put back on about 12 pounds, but a completely healthy 12 pounds. I’ve added almost an inch to my biceps, I have great definition on my (still skinny) legs, and my shoulders/traps are probably where I see my biggest gains.
Here are my key stats this year:
Workouts – defined as a minimum of 20 minutes cardio and some weights (unless it’s a Coquitlam Crunch day when I don’t usually go weights).
Meditation – At least 10 minutes, usually 15 or 20 minutes guided meditation on the Balance App.
Daily-Ink – Daily writing on this blog.
Writing/Creating – Intended to be for writing beyond my blog regularly but mostly just tracking conversations with my uncle.
Workouts: 326 days or 89%
Meditation: 313 days or 85%
Daily-Ink: 366 days or 100%
Writing/Creating: 53 days or 14.5%
Reflections:
Workouts: I’m actually setting a goal to work out less in 2025. I’ve made some good gains and think they can be better if I gave myself more rest. This is especially true for my legs. I think working out cardio 10-12+ days in a row is limiting my leg recovery time needed to see them grow a bit more. Lack of rest might be why my legs are a lot stronger but still skinny. For upper body, many of my workouts are just a single muscle focus, and so I usually get enough rest between hard sets for specific muscle groups.
Meditation: These could have been qualitatively better this year. It’s not an issue of volume but definitely one fit quality. In 2024 I found that writing was taking me a bit longer in the morning, and so a lot of times I ended up doing a walking meditation on the treadmill to make up the time. That said I’m not convinced that those meditations were necessarily moving me towards my meditation goals as much as dedicated time would.
Daily-Ink: I’ll keep my blog going another year. And while I’ve basically maintained daily writing for 5 and a half years, I still want to track it.
Writing/Creativity: The largest area for growth is in being creative. I’m going to do a couple things to improve this. First, I won’t be counting conversations with my uncle, even when we are recording them. What I will count is video editing of the videos he and I record, as well as writing not related to by blog. A goal related to this is less social media time… Reducing distractions and focusing on creativity. My writing/creativity goal will be a minimum of two days per week, 104 days a year, or basically doubling last year’s total while not counting the vast majority of days I would have tracked last year. I won’t meet my uncle less often, I just won’t be counting these Zoom visits as part of my creativity goal.
Ultimately I want to see two outcomes this year that will result from my tracking above:
Gain 7-8 pounds of muscle. This is a big jump for me. In my 30’s and 40’s I had a hard time maintaining a weight of about 153 pounds. If I worked out consistently for several months I’d get my weight to 155 but struggled to put good weight on beyond that. When I stopped working out I’d drop a few pounds and sit closer to 150. By December 2018, at age 51, I’d (unintentionally and without awareness) let myself go and weighed just under 185 pounds, with all of that extra weight being unhealthy. After year one of my healthy living goals (reflection shared again here) I was back down to around 155. Now I fluctuate around 167-169 pounds and would like to bring that to 175 pounds. Basically, it took me about 5 years to gain 12 pounds of muscle and I want to add 8 more this year. Increased protein and more dedicated weight training will get me there if I maintain my positive habits and get a bit more rest between (harder/smarter) workouts.
More creativity. I think 2 days a week of doing something creative is realistic and attainable. Reducing social media distractions will be key. I’m going to automate my blog going into social media, and add time limits to all socials for Monday to Friday as a starting point. I’ll see how that works and re-evaluate my success after a month.
Finally, one more goal unrelated to my tracking will be a reading goal. Watching that December 2018 reflection video again I was shocked that I listened to 26 books that year. I think this year’s count was 6, with 3 partial reads to finish, although I did listen to a lot more podcasts. I want to improve my book count. I think this will also help with my creativity.
One final reflection: Overall I’m pretty damn proud of my 2024 stats above. Yes I have some ambitious goals ahead of me, and I’m always pushing to improve… but that doesn’t take away from the fact that I’ve been on a 6 year journey from an overweight and unhealthy 51 year old to a 57 year old who hasn’t been this healthy and strong since I was an athlete in my 20’s.
My ultimate goal is a great healthspan to go with my lifespan. I want to be able to do things in 20 years that most 77 year olds can’t imagine doing. I want to be hiking, traveling, and living a vibrant, healthy life well into my senior years. I think I’m on the right path.
Probably my favourite moment on any tv game show is John Carpenter on ‘Who Wants to be a Millionaire?’ He received the final, million dollar question and had his 3 support lifelines still available to be used. He hears the question and says he wants to use his ‘Phone a friend’ lifeline, and so a call goes through to his dad. Once his dad was on the line John tells him, ‘I don’t need your help, I just wanted you to know that I’m going to win the million dollars.’ He then gave his final answer… and won.
Not directly related but on a similar topic, a favourite movie scene of mine is from the movie, The Town. Ben Affleck’s character, Doug, walks into a room with Jeremy Renner’s character, James, and says, “I need your help. I can’t tell you what it is, you can never ask me about it later, and we’re gonna hurt some people.” After a quick pause Jeremy responds, “Whose car we gonna take?”
If you needed help, not just a skill testing question but real help for a challenging situation, who would you call?
As I reflect on the year that has passed, I have a great appreciation for the connection I’ve made to my good friend, Dave. In January of 2021, with Covid restrictions in full effect, we had just come off of our winter break where we were mostly isolated and home bound. We decided we would do a walk called the Coquitlam Crunch, because it was an outdoor thing that we could do and actually see each other, and still maintain a respectful distance from each other.
This morning, we witnessed a beautiful sunrise over Mount Baker as we did our 158th Coquitlam Crunch since that first one back in January ’21. These crunch walks represent 158 opportunities, basically 40 times a year for the past 4 years, where we’ve had a chance to connect face-to-face. These would not have been a chance to spend time together if it wasn’t for our planned walk. We went from not seeing each other regularly to our visits becoming a committed routine.
(A beautiful sunrise on our walk this morning.)
In 4 years we have only skipped out on one walk after driving there on a cold, wet, miserable, sleet-blowing-sideways day. Just once despite many other miserable and even snowy days. These walks have been medicine for the soul. They have been ‘phone a friend’ kind of support, except with the joy of being in person.
So, to end the year, I’d just like to thank Dave for the opportunity to connect so often. It has been an enriching experience to have so much time together with a friend. It reminds me of how valuable friendship is, to have scheduled companionship, and to have someone that I need not have any filters or pretence to talk to.
These walks have been ‘phone a friend’ moments that have enriched my life… and I get to have them almost once a week.
If I could give anyone advice for the new year, if anyone is looking for a resolution, my advice would be to routinize connecting with friends. Do you want to build a relationship where you can phone a friend up and ask for anything at all? Well that kind of bond is created by spending time together. In this day and and age, if you don’t schedule time with people, you just won’t see them enough.
PS. Hey Dave, need my help? Just one question, “Whose car we gonna take?”😜
My oldest kid turns 25 today. How did I get to be old enough to have a daughter that old? I only ask that question partially in jest, because there is a part of me that is really baffled about how fast time flies by. I remember holding her in my arms for the first time, her first words, and her first steps. Did all that really start a quarter century ago?
With age, time goes by faster. I think it has to do with reference to the length of our lives. To a 10 year old, 5 years is half of a lifetime; to a 15 year old, 5 years is a full 1/3 of a lifetime. To a 60 year old, 5 years is 1/12 of a lifetime. So that same 5 years is relatively shorter as we get older, and represents less significance to our overall lifespan.
I think about how much my life changed from ages 26-31… I moved to BC, met my wife, started my career in education, got married and bought a house. Then we started a family and the next 5 years are a blur of joy, stress, and core memories of our kids having first experiences.
In comparison, the last 5 years have felt a lot more like status quo, and have seemed to fly by a whole lot faster. I can remember the excitement of starting a new school year, and now it’s already just a week away from the Christmas holidays… where did the last 3 and a half months go?
I remember my mother-in-law saying to me that she didn’t know where the time went, and how she felt that she was a young person in an old body. I think of that now because about 26 years later I realize that I’m almost the age she was when she told me that. Is this just a cycle of life that the older we get, the more we recognize that time speeds up for us?
Today my oldest daughter turns 25. This is a reminder to me that I’ve got to value the time I have, and to spend it wisely… no matter how fast it seems to fly by.
This is something I’ve thought a bit about over the years. As time passes, and I’m looking ahead at retirement, I think about the time I have left with family and friends. I wonder how do I create experiences rather than just reminiscing? When we meet up, are we doing something together or are we reflecting and sharing stories of the past?
This isn’t to say reminiscing isn’t enjoyable, but simply identifying that this shouldn’t be what we do every time we get together. Are we doing something active? Are we doing something novel? Are we creating opportunities to experience something new? Are we designing our time together or just letting time pass.?
It’s easy to live a life of ‘rinse and repeat’, going through the day-to-day routine and taking both people and time for granted… ‘they will always be there’… ‘there will always be more time’. There is comfort in those beliefs, but also caution. Are we just going through the motions of life with little emotion? Or are we creating experiences that will give us future reasons to reminisce the next time we meet?
When I walk on a treadmill I usually go at 4 to 4.2 MPH, (I don’t bother clicking to km, miles is the default on my treadmill). For the past couple months I’ve been walking at 3.8 with a 34lb weight vest, and increasing the incline. But every time I increase to 7.5 or higher, I end up holding the handrails for most of the time I’m on those increased inclines.
Today I forgot to increase my speed from my 2 minute warmup at 3.6 and was able to do most of my walk at a 7.5° incline. I also did 4 minutes at 12.5°, but did hold the handrails then (actually the front rail so I’m not pushing down as much as levelling myself). Still the increase in my ability to maintain the 7.5 incline, for most of the 30 minute workout, and mostly without assistance, was impressive after feeling stuck trying to do this for so long.
I’ll do this a few more times then try at 3.7, then shortly after back to 3.8 MPH. But that’s still to come. For right now I am just surprised that this little adjustment made such a difference. It’s so important to mix things up a bit when you want to see gains in workouts.
There are some things I write here on Daily-Ink, and when I read my own writing a month or two later I barely remember or even recognize my own writing. I wrote that?
But there are other things I write and I remember. There is one post in particular that I think about regularly. Tonight on (another) walk with my wife we reached an intersection where we were crossing the road. Perpendicular to us, on the cross street’s sidewalk, were two men who reached the intersection exactly the same time as us. We all slowed down to let each other pass. They were the only other people walking anywhere near us and sure enough we intersected at the one place our paths crossed.
Despite thinking about the following post regularly, I hadn’t actually re-read it in a couple years. I didn’t consciously remember that it also started with a walk with my wife, but what I do remember, what I reflect on when it regularly happens, is that we are somehow drawn to these intersections.
Last night I went for a walk with my wife. Minutes from home we were walking on a quiet, empty street that doesn’t have sidewalks. Then a car approached from in front of us. We started to move to the side of the road, and noticed car lights coming from behind us as well. The cars crossed paths right where we were on the edge of the road, having had to slow down to cautiously make space for us and the other car. Then we continued our walk with no cars approaching us from either way until we arrived home.
I find it fascinating how we seem to be drawn, pulled to intersecting points with other people. For the amount of times someone walks by our house, or the front of my school when I arrive before any students, I’m amazed how often I have to wait for a pedestrian to walk cross the driveway before I can make the turn… amazed that as I wait, I can see no other pedestrians for an entire block.
In a car you are turning left and must wait for the one car coming the other way to pass.
At a shopping plaza you go to open a door to a store and the one other person in sight is coming through the door the other way.
On a path in a park, you are walking faster than the people in front of you, and as you go to pass them, other people are approaching from the other way crowding the path at your takeover point.
I think we find ourselves at these intersections at a rate that is greater than probability would suggest… The likelihood of such intersections happen far more than just by chance. Like magnets passing one another, there is a pull towards others, an unseen force that draws us into each other’s path. It isn’t a case of bad timing, it’s not that we are unlucky and forced to slow down, wait, or squeeze by someone else. It’s actually just the opposite. We naturally seek each other out on some unconscious level. We are drawn to human intersections.
Today I was going to write about the benefits of increasing protein in my diet, especially as I age. I came up with the title, ‘The Power of Protein’, but that sounded familiar so I searched my blog and found a post by that name, on this topic, written this past January. Then I thought about writing about ‘rinsing and repeating’ old ideas, but that seemed familiar. A quick search of my blog led me to ‘Rinse and repeat’, but I wrote that over 4 and a half years ago, in February 2020.
I ended that post saying,
“I’m sure this will happen again. I will have moments when my creative juices are flowing and I’ll share fresh ideas… or at least fresh ideas to me. And I’ll have moments when I end up recycling or repeating older ideas. The process of writing every day will lead to some repetition, hopefully though, the ideas I choose to repeat are worth reading and thinking about again. I probably won’t re-share this idea of sharing my repeats again even if I catch myself, but if you catch me doing this, please feel free to let me know.”
But I think enough time has gone by to be able to bring this topic up again. The reason is a bit of a realization (in two parts). First, I think some ideas are worth emphasizing. Saying or thinking something once doesn’t always sink in. Sometimes I need reinforcements, and the writing process reinforces my thinking. For example, while I eat more protein than I did a year ago, I still don’t eat as much as recommended by people like Dr. Rhonda Patrick or Dr. Peter Attia. So writing about this again makes me think about increasing my intake.
Secondly, I’m not some guru that knows a lot about everything. I have passions and interests and that’s what I enjoy writing about. So when I’m writing about some topic yet again, I’m ok with that… Because I’d rather write about something I’m passionate and interested in, rather than forcing myself to write about a topic I’m less interested in, just to add more variety to my writing.
It’s more of a ‘rinse and re-emphasize’ rather than repeat. So, despite previous saying, “I probably won’t re-share this idea of sharing my repeats again even if I catch myself.” I just did it anyway. And I’m doing it to emphasize a different point: I will repeat myself! But when I do, I’ll do my best to emphasize some aspect a little differently. I’ll attempt to enlighten rather than digress… to rinse out new ideas, rather than just repeat them.
I’m watching a Jason Statham movie. Now this is a guy who has been typecasted as a specific kind of hero: The lead actor who will beat people up, shoot them, and either bend the law to his favour or be on the wrong side of the law and yet still be the guy you are rooting for.
Not everyone gets typecast quite as strictly as Jason, but watching this movie got me thinking… How do people typecast me? What do they expect from me? And do I deliver as expected?
I think so. I don’t think I surprise too many people. I’m pretty consistent, and don’t feel I need to be performative. Actors get typecast into roles and have to play those roles. Regular people just are the roles they become. Sure there are bumps along the way, and I certainly did a few uncharacteristic things in my teens and early 20’s, but since then I’ve been pretty much what people expect of me.
That’s not a bad thing. Well for some people it might be. As a simple example, some people are known to always be late, lateness becomes expected. There are more serious things that people might not want to be known for, but there are many, many things that you can be typecast as which are positive.
You can be loyal, kind, fair, reliable, loving, thoughtful, even playful. The question is, if you were an actor, how would you be typecasted? If you don’t like your own response to that question, maybe it’s time to play a new role.
