Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Favorite quotations, etc.
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Ego
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Re: Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Post by Ego »

@guitarplayer, I have not yet finished the whole movie but so far I have found it both interesting and sad. A good example of how being adventurous can go awry if the adventurer uses it to escape life.

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Re: Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Post by theanimal »

I have only watched half so far but have found it to be mostly sad, especially since he does not want to be out there anymore. He reminded me of the van dweller in the documentary about The Villages, "Some Kind of Heaven."

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Re: Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Post by AxelHeyst »

Ego wrote:
Wed Apr 05, 2023 10:07 pm
It was dark and we were side by side, our headlamps shining down into the bottom of boxes full of dead people clutter as we dug for gems. Without looking up I said, "Roger, if you had all the money in the world, you would still be right here, right now, wouldn't you?" He didn't hesitate a second, "You bet your life I would."
Reminded me of my neighbor who I'm doing a PV build for. He was a raft guide in the Grand Canyon for something like 15 years. He's twice now related to me a conversation he had with a fellow guide doing the dishes by headlamp one night.

"Man, we make like $40 a day down here."
"Yep."
"I heard other guide companies pay like $60 a day."
"Yep."
"And we're working every minute we're awake, and we're responsible for people's lives, and it's dangerous, and we mostly forget what it's like to be indoors."
"Yep."
...
"I mean, I'd do this even if we didn't get paid at all..."
"Yep!"

(relatedly, I got the chance to raft the Grand Canyon years ago. 10/10, worth every penny of someone else's money.)

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Lemur
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Re: Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Post by Lemur »

I watched "The Sailor" and still left confused with whether this guy was happy or not with the life he lived. He went out like a depressed alcoholic and you only get to see the downside but what you don't see is the decades of personal freedom, living life on your own terms, creating thousands of stories, etc. Not sure if he kept in contact with his former lovers or children though. I feel I would be quite sad if I died lonely and without my family in contact with me. I do wonder if he felt it was his destiny to pass away on his boat. I recall he said his parents passed away on a sailboat so no coincidence there. This vaguely reminds me of when older folk say that there death can't be taken away from them. Kind of like Lt. Dan in Forest Gump who feels he is destined to die on the battlefield like his fathers before him.

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Ego
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Re: Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Post by Ego »

AxelHeyst wrote:
Tue May 02, 2023 6:10 pm
Reminded me of my neighbor who I'm doing a PV build for.
I am glad you pulled that over here because I think both Roger and your neighbor are good contrasts with "The Sailor".
Lemur wrote:
Fri May 05, 2023 1:46 pm
I watched "The Sailor" and still left confused with whether this guy was happy or not with the life he lived. He went out like a depressed alcoholic and you only get to see the downside but what you don't see is the decades of personal freedom, living life on your own terms, creating thousands of stories, etc.
The Sailor was fortunate to find the thing that made him feel alive when he was young but then he somehow lost the ability to find variations on the theme that would allow him to continue having adventures to the end. It seems somehow disrespectful to a well-lived life to end it stupefied and soaked in vodka.

Roger, on the other hand, is one of the most positive people I encounter each week. He is the same jolly guy he was in the Today Show interview from 2000. Somehow he has been able to adapt as he aged and while he looks very different, he literally exudes the same happiness he did the day he sold the painting for $1.4M.

I guess the point is that at least part of the project of living adventurously is looking ahead, plotting a course and finding ways to continue to be alive.

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Re: Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Post by jacob »

Lemur wrote:
Fri May 05, 2023 1:46 pm
I watched "The Sailor" and still left confused with whether this guy was happy or not with the life he lived.
Caveat: I haven't watched The Sailor.

Experiments have shown that people judge an experience based on "average intensity"+"final intensity". This means that the final experience is somewhat overweighed. It also means that "max intensity" is not that important. I wonder whether the same holds for judging life. I suspect it holds for judging other people's lives. However, based on how many like to talk about their "glory days" (whenever that was) I somehow suspect that people judge their own life based on "max intensity", that is "the best time of their life" and not "the average of time their life" or "the final time of their life".

FWIW, I only have a theoretical understanding for the common preference for accumulating stories to tell and/or wanting to have family close by. It doesn't hold for all. It doesn't hold for me. Mileage may wary.

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Re: Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Post by guitarplayer »

jacob wrote:
Sat May 06, 2023 8:30 am
Experiments have shown that people judge an experience based on "average intensity"+"final intensity". This means that the final experience is somewhat overweighed.
...with the more well known of these experiments being the colonoscopy studies :)
jacob wrote:
Sat May 06, 2023 8:30 am
It also means that "max intensity" is not that important. I wonder whether the same holds for judging life. I suspect it holds for judging other people's lives. However, based on how many like to talk about their "glory days" (whenever that was) I somehow suspect that people judge their own life based on "max intensity", that is "the best time of their life" and not "the average of time their life" or "the final time of their life".
I doubt we generally have such great insight into our past lives to be able to pick out 'max intensity' experiences, the scope for confabulation is enormous. Or another take would be that first experiences are normally rather stronger than the subsequent ones of the same sort. Since lots of folk don't try many new things as adults, 'glory days' usually fall sometime in the first part / quarter of life when naturally many things are tried for the first time.

I am still to watch this with DW but I am waiting until she finishes something to do with CISCO and she's procrastinating.

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Re: Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Post by jacob »

guitarplayer wrote:
Sat May 06, 2023 9:17 am
I doubt we generally have such great insight into our past lives to be able to pick out 'max intensity' experiences,...
But that doesn't matter. What matters in the eventual analysis is how we remember them. E.g. apparently military people (since I'm not, please correct if I'm wrong) look back fondly on their time in basic training even if it sucked at the time. Kinda how we fondly remember playing games on the C64 ... but if we try it again on an emulator, it's painful how much it sucks 8-)

I definitely agree that there's a diminishing returns quality to repeating the same kinds of experiences. The first time I calculated a new result doing actual science and not performing some textbook exercise (IIRC it was the half life of some isotope relevant to supernova remnants) I was high on feelings of excitement and being the first human ever to know that "the value is 4578 years!" After the 10th or so such "discovery", it was just another day at the office. At the 20th discovery, I was thoroughly "meh'ed" out. OTOH, many people seem to have the capacity to keep enjoying the same kinds of activities over and over and over.

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Re: Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Post by Frita »

jacob wrote:
Sat May 06, 2023 9:32 am


[quote=guitarplayer post_id=273041 time=<a href="tel:1683382666">1683382666</a> user_id=7073]
I definitely agree that there's a diminishing returns quality to repeating the same kinds of experiences.
+1 I find that repeating the same thing, expecting the same neurochemical hit, to be a losing game. My options are to unsuccessfully chase, whether through more or different, or let it go. And the latter acceptance is more of a process than an event. (I prefer novelty so this is hard. Even talking about stuff after doing it brings minimal enjoyment.)

[quote=guitarplayer post_id=273041 time=<a href="tel:1683382666">1683382666</a> user_id=7073] OTOH, many people seem to have the capacity to keep enjoying the same kinds of activities over and over and over. [/quote]
This prompts me to reflect under what conditions do I enjoy repetition. Some thoughts:
1) Repetition allows for my meditation practice which brings me peace and moments of clarity.
2) I can find joy in discovering something new (to while walking/hiking skiing. Examples include observing the progress of something being built over time, spotting my first Eastern Bluebird of the season.
3) Some contentment with repetition comes from appreciation. Examples include the sun shining, my son and spouse alternating post-dinner dishwashing duties, my perennials popping up yearly.

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Re: Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Post by zbigi »

jacob wrote:
Sat May 06, 2023 9:32 am
I definitely agree that there's a diminishing returns quality to repeating the same kinds of experiences. The first time I calculated a new result doing actual science and not performing some textbook exercise (IIRC it was the half life of some isotope relevant to supernova remnants) I was high on feelings of excitement and being the first human ever to know that "the value is 4578 years!" After the 10th or so such "discovery", it was just another day at the office. At the 20th discovery, I was thoroughly "meh'ed" out. OTOH, many people seem to have the capacity to keep enjoying the same kinds of activities over and over and over.
Do you feel the same about woodworking? If not, why? Is it the lower intensity (less hours per year) of work?

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Ego
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Re: Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Post by Ego »

If they are done solely for the sake of the memory or the future story, then they are no different than the contrived photo.
The taste for the spontaneous, natural, lifelike snapshot kills spontaneity, drives away the present. Photographed reality immediately takes on a nostalgic character, of joy fled on the wings of time, a commemorative quality, even if the picture was taken the day before yesterday. And the life that you live in order to photograph it is already, at the outset, a commemoration of itself.
I tend to look at myself as a never ending (until dead) work in progress and my experiences are the building blocks.

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Lemur
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Re: Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Post by Lemur »

@Jacob.

I suppose one thing I should mention is that when one is judging the Sailor’s life, it is too easy to project one’s own values which is why when I watched it, I was thinking about his life from the lens of how his family was impacted.

+1 on the military reference. I do not want to repeat my military experience and if I woke up 18 years young today, I’d pick something else…but there is a bond that is formed amongst a collective group that “embraces the suck” as we liked to call it together. It’s also easy here to look back with rose-colored glasses. Sometimes it is easy for me to forget that I spent nearly everyday in the military counting down until my contract was over.

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Re: Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Post by jacob »

zbigi wrote:
Sat May 06, 2023 11:38 am
Do you feel the same about woodworking? If not, why? Is it the lower intensity (less hours per year) of work?
I think so yes.

My woodworking transitioned from handmade dovetails to pocket-hole style joinery over a few years (few hundred of hours of practice), that is, from technically demanding to "expedient". As far as I'm concerned, it's not about work or intensity of working. It's about whether there's something new to explore or rather a new kind of exploration. For example, not just calculating another beta decay or making another box but doing something I have not done before. The renaissance ideal helps with this because it makes it possible to combine different fields. For example, I'm in the slow process of making a set of flight controllers. This requires engineering the mechanical parts (woods and metal), hooking it up to the electronics, and programming the controllers. I have done all such things separately and each of them separately ARE kinda boring but I have never combined them and that is what is exciting. To give an example, cutting gears for a clock is meticulous work and not very exciting. The first time I put such gears together into something that went tick-tock was on par with the first physics discovery above.

Maybe more succinctly: I live mainly in idea-space. My daring adventure is to explore new ideas.

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Re: Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

My ideal lifestyle is the Adventure Cottage Library, so my tendencies towards Adventure (Ne)are often tamed down by my tendencies towards Library (Ti) and Cottage (Fe,Si) to the extent that they wouldn't seem like adventures to the average person. Looking through the new seed bank drawers at the public library!! Making out in car parked behind abandoned pickle factory with 65 year old man with excellent credit rating!! Riding my bike with big basket on the front through a fairly dangerous neighborhood at 10 AM on my way to the $1 Goodwill Store!! Wading out in the mud to take a better picture of very interesting frog!!

I think there are some broad categories of experiences that are almost likely to seem like an adventure, but only if approached with the proper attitude/perspective and not indulged too frequently and/or against "natural" cycle. For instance, no matter how many times I did it, I never got over the thrill of the hunt when competing against other dealers at big book sales. Dumpster diving, foraging, birding, anything that can be seen as a "treasure hunt" will provide similar thrills.

Immersion in entirely new environment or culture is also likely to seem like an adventure. You don't necessarily have to travel far to accomplish this. For instance, exploring the storm drains under your subdivision or socially interacting with recent immigrants to your community. Reading novels written from different places and times.

Exposing yourself to the forces of nature is another broad category likely to result in adventure. Rough camping, sailing, sexuality from the feminine perspective (because interacting with somebody who is stronger and bolder than you is kind of like white-water rafting. See Pam Houston "Cowboys are My Weakness" ) etc. Just walking rather than driving a car can accomplish this.

Engaging in unconventional practice or hanging out with unconventional people. For instance, having friends who are artists is always kind of an adventure because they expose you to their own novel works and perspectives. Same hold for exposing yourself to new ideas through reading widely and well.

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Re: Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Post by Western Red Cedar »

A Danish man, Thor Pedersen, recently finished a trip of ten years traveling to every country without flying. The quote on his website brings it back full circle to the OP:
Helen Keller(1880-1968) once wrote: “Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing”.
I could have stayed at home, gone to the library, watched documentaries, spoken to people and explored the World from the comfort of a chair in familiar surroundings. However loosely translated from the Danish scientist, Piet Hein, I have read: “one must travel in order to understand that the World is round”.

https://www.onceuponasaga.dk/journey

https://www.onceuponasaga.dk/why-not

I listened to a two hour interview with him last weekend, and it was clear that this wasn't all smiles and rainbows. He mentioned that after two years he realized he had basically designed his own prison.

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Re: Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Post by jacob »

Western Red Cedar wrote:
Tue Jul 11, 2023 11:29 am
A Danish man, Thor Pedersen, recently finished a trip of ten years traveling to every country without flying.
For those who understand Danish ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VSLqOJo9gw

In other news: Another Danish Pedersen recently won a stage of the Tour de France.

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Re: Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Post by henrik »

Western Red Cedar wrote:
Tue Jul 11, 2023 11:29 am
Piet Hein, I have read:
The road to wisdom?—Well, it’s
plain and simple to express:
Err
and err
and err again,
but less
and less
and less.

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Lemur
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Re: Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Post by Lemur »

Be careful on your adventures.
But inspirational to know that the human will to survive is strong indeed...
https://youtu.be/A2WXawMmwCo?t=1

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Ego
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Re: Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Post by Ego »

All of the Mexican radio stations are talking about this right now.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/tim-shaddo ... -2-months/
some videos: https://www.9news.com.au/national/sydne ... 06262ef232
An Australian sailor who says he survived more than two months lost at sea with his dog is "stable and very well," his doctor told an Australian news channel on Sunday. Tim Shaddock, 51, and his dog Bella were sailing from Mexico to French Polynesia when rough seas damaged their boat and its electronics system, leaving them adrift and cut off from the world.

The pair drifted for more than two months in the Pacific Ocean and survived by drinking rain water and eating raw fish that Shaddock was able to catch, according to his own account, provided in a couple videos obtained by Australia's 9 News network. By chance, a helicopter that was accompanying a tuna trawler eventually spotted Shaddock's drifting vessel and rescued the pair.

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Re: Life is a Daring Adventure | The Inspiration Thread

Post by grundomatic »

So he gave up his dog, after all they'd been through together!?! Also, he said he was checking in with his sister daily but didn't call for help...that's pretty rugged if true.

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