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Apparently the ancient egyptians had a man-headed-bird - they called it the Ba, and it represented the soul/personality. I thought I remembered seeing a man-headed-bird somewhere, but I thought it was a Babylonian reference at first. I know I've read the "dispute between a man and his ba" before. So either it was stuck in my subconscious or I stumbled across a truth the ancient egyptians knew long ago, that birds and a jabbering mind are both obnoxious.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dispute_between_a_man_and_his_Ba
I'm going to start meditating every evening. I fixed up a spot by the window with a small rug and a meditation cushion. The window has a lovely view of the setting sun through the trees. Yesterday I picked some random youtube guided meditation, about 30 minutes long. The first 20 minutes was nothing but the Ba zooming around shouting distracting nonsense, getting nowhere, but eventually, I was able to visualize sitting in a garden by a large circular pool with a gentle splashing fountain in the center that expanded and shrank with my breath. There's a pool in the gardens around the national gallery of art that is like that - it has a beautiful fountain display at different intervals. It's easy to picture because I have been there. Anyway, after a while the Ba settled down beside me on the bench and we were both quiet for long breaths. The Ba smiled at me smugly and I realized, he wants to be quiet, that dick. And it was good.
So basically I've been bullied into a meditation practice because I don't want to get heckled by the mean man-headed-bird again. Make of that what you will but it's all true.
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Phase two of the grey project has been ongoing and still doing very well. I had a goal in mind when I started this, and I have surpassed it, which is a very pleasant surprise for a first effort. It is amazing what a relatively small investment of resources and time will yield. Of course, this makes me suspicious that we are currently in the golden "wild west" stage, when the frontier is fertile and open, and soon this may not be true as government and big business figure out what's up. If I know about it, and lots of other people know and are excited, it's just a matter of time. They're going to want to install regulation hoops in the name of "safety" and make it difficult so they can extract their pound of flesh. There's a way to easily preserve part of the grey project such that I can store it and possibly restart it years, even a decade in the future if I choose. Maybe it won't be necessary, maybe I won't need the grey project after this, but I would like the option, in the face of what seems like inevitable future capitalist assholery. This is the golden age right now, when good info is freely available and items are easy and inexpensive to source. It won't last. I'm going to write up my notes and stash away what I need, because we all know how this story goes.
I have no guilt about keeping this from spouse. It's not like I'm sneaking "book of boba fett" episodes without him, now that would be a shocking betrayal. He's a bit too grounded for the grey project to hold much interest. The kindest, most rational option is just to carefully keep it to myself until spouse escapes uncle sam's clutches, and then extend the offer to share the experience if he likes. Fireworks for the retirement party, perhaps.
I'm going to wrap up phase two by feb 4, clean everything up, and that will be that.