I’ve written about the shiny object syndrome and trying to do too many things before, but today I’d like to add one more realization, which I call the magic of three goals.

Basically, it means that the ideal number of goals or tasks per timeframe is three. For example, when playing a padel match, I usually think about all the improvements I am going to apply to my game in this particular match. In the past, I never thought about setting any limits. I eventually realized that it was impossible to apply a dozen improvements all in one match. More likely, I would end up too overwhelmed and just defaulting back to my usual game. When I started to limit myself to three particular improvements it became much more achievable and manageable.

The same applies to team meetings. Before we start a meeting, we set three objectives at a maximum. That way at the end of the meeting we can review our meeting and hopefully see that we completed our big three goals. Of course, there usually are more than three things on the agenda, which is great, but it’s important to select a maximum of three big ones. That way we are setting ourselves up for success rather than failure.

Having too many goals for one session, be it sports, a meeting, or even a workday, sets you up for failure and frustration. Set three goals and focus on achieving them.

I’ve also written about finding three life priorities and the importance of finding three hobbies. Seems like the number three is an important guiding force.

 

I’ve been meditating in various forms since my teenage years, albeit with many on and off periods. Lately, I seem to have found a style that suits me very well, and I’ll be sharing some background on that today.

Essentially, I’ll be describing zazen meditation.

Zazen is primarily a seated type of meditation. There are several types of meditation, including ones that involve walking or even lying down. Zazen is considered the heart of Japanese Soto Zen Buddhist practice.

The aim of zazen is that of suspending all judgmental thinking and letting words, ideas, images and thoughts pass by without getting involved in them. Of course, all this is done while being immersed in sitting meditation.

In Zen temples and monasteries, practitioners traditionally sit zazen as a group in a meditation hall, usually referred to as the zendo. The practitioner sits on a cushion called a zafu, which itself is usually placed on top of a low, flat mat called a zabuton.

Before taking one’s seat, and after rising at the end of the period of zazen, a Zen practitioner performs a gassho bow to their seat, and a second bow to fellow practitioners.

The beginning of a period of zazen is traditionally announced by ringing a bell three times (shijosho), and the end of a round by ringing the bell either once (houzensho).

Long periods of zazen may alternate with periods of kinhin (walking meditation). In such cases the bell sequence will be a bit more elaborate than what I just described:

1. Three rings to start zazen
2. Two rings to end zazen and start kinhin
3. One ring to end kinhin
4. Three rings to start zazen again
5. One ring to end zazen

If you go to a zazen meditation center you will most likely take part in a longer session that will be punctuated by breaks of walking meditation, so you will hear the bell sequence I just described.

There is no need to use music while practising zazen meditation. It’s not common to have any background music at the zendo. At home, you are free to use whatever works for you.

This practice might seem difficult, but daily practice is very effective in increasing your sense of self-awareness and intuition. While the practice of zazen typically awakens a certain energy and sense of wakefulness in us, there is no need to set any objectives or aims to achieve anything. It simply consists of concentrating on the posture and the breathing as well as the mind and the thoughts it gives rise to.

You will need a zafu and zabuton, as we already mentioned. These can easily be found on Amazon. Here’s a picture of the Calming Breath set I got; I’m very happy with them. The zafu also doubles as a foot rest while working, which is great.

Let’s take a deeper look at each of these three pillars of zazen meditation:

Posture

Sit on the zafu (cushion) cross legged, with the zabuton beneath you for comfort.

There are several poses you can use:

• Full Lotus
• Half Lotus
• Burmese

If you can sit in Full Lotus without serious pain, then it is by far the most stable of all the cross-legged postures.

Place one foot on top of the opposite thigh then lift your other foot up onto its opposite thigh. The soles of your feet should be facing slightly upward and outward. If you experience pain, try going back to one of the easier postures while you continue to work on your mobility for this pose.

Many people who cannot manage Full Lotus can sit quite comfortably in Half Lotus.

Place one foot on top of the opposite thigh. Your other foot should be resting on the floor just under the opposite thigh/knee. Try it both ways. You may find that one side is considerably easier than the other. If that’s the case, then consider some yoga stretches to work on the imbalance so that eventually you can alternate sides and work on Full Lotus.

The Burmese Pose is ideal for those who aren’t flexible enough to comfortably stay in the Lotus poses. For this reason, it’s currently my preferred pose for meditation.

Put the sole of one foot against the inside of the opposite thigh. Put the sole of the other foot against the shin of the opposite leg. All of both your legs and feet should be in contact with the floor. It’s not an easy position but does offer a really stable platform for those that can manage it.

The weight of the body is placed on three points: the knees pushing against the ground and the perennial muscle which presses against the zafu. The spine is straight and vertical. The back is flexed, and the shoulders are relaxed. The chin is tucked in, the back of the neck is stretched. Push the top of your head up towards the sky. The mouth is closed and the tongue touches the upper palate and the inside of the two front teeth. This calms  “interior chatting”. The eyes are half-closed and look down towards the ground, about one meter in front, without focusing on anything in particular.

Breathing

The rhythm of the breath is very important in zazen meditation.

Breathe calmly through the nose, remaining totally conscious of it, meaning being attentive to each breath, like a tiger on the watch. Breathe naturally and breathe out calm, long, deep breaths all the way under the navel. Don’t judge your breathing – if it’s slow or rapid – it is just the way it is.

Little by little, with practice, breathing out becomes soft, slow, peaceful, long and deep; pushing the abdominal mass downwards and creating a concentration of energy in the zone which is called the kikai tanden (ocean of energy) located under the navel. At the end of the breath, breathing in is done naturally.

State of Mind

Once you have the right posture and the breathing rhythm in place, you can start noticing your state of mind. In the first practices of zazen you will most likely get distracted easily, and you will have many thoughts going on. Once you settle into the practice, however, you will notice that you start to take control over your mind and you start to adopt a stronger, more centered state of mind.

At the end of the day, Zen is very simple, but at the same time very hard to comprehend. It’s a question of struggling and practicing repeatedly, much like life itself. In this seated position of zazen, without doing anything special and expecting nothing in return, if our posture, our breathing, and our mental attitude are in harmony, we will begin to understand the authentic Zen.

If you don’t feel comfortable with zazen, I would recommend that you adopt the pose itself and use a more mainstream kind of meditation. You can use apps like Calm or Headspace for example, which are excellent introductions to the practice of meditation.

Whenever I want to do a quick meditation I still revert to Calm. For example, at times when I don’t have time to do a full zazen meditation session, I’ll just pop in my noise canceling earphones and use Calm to do a 15-minute meditation. You don’t even need a mat for that, you can do it sitting down anywhere.

Further reading and viewing:

A five-minute instruction introducing the correct positioning and breathing for the Zazen style of meditation:

A ten-minute zazen session:

A longer explanation of Zazen and posture:

An introduction to meditation in general, including why it’s beneficial and how to make it a daily habit:

• Dojo Zen Barcelona Kannon
• Association Buddhiste Zen d’Europe

The purpose of this post is to share some of my favourite music for when I want to immerse myself in work and shut the rest of the world out. Music is a very important thing in my life; I listen to a wide range of music styles but here I am going to suggest some music styles that are particularly good for getting work done.

For general background music, I like to discover new music from the following styles:

• Instrumental Jazz
• Instrumental Bossa Nova

I don’t have any favourite jazz or bossa nova bands so I rely on Spotify to find new albums whenever I get tired of what I’m currently listening to.

Ambient music works really well for tasks such as programming and tech related work. Here are my recommendations:

• Brian Eno
• Tycho
• Jens Buchert
• Emancipator
• Kraftwerk
• Jean-Michel Jarre

While remaining in the electronic realm, trance and electro sometimes work well for me, especially when I need music that packs more punch and infuses a sense of urgency to what I’m doing. This can turn out to be ideal also in the afternoon when I generally tend to feel a bit sleepy. I don’t have too many favourites here, although I do love to listen to the album Berlin Calling from Paul Kalkbrenner every now and then. The Tron soundtrack is also awesome, as is that of The Social Network.

When I need to be really pumped up and I don’t mind lyrics I turn to my favourite music in the form of euro dance and rock. I have an extensive euro dance collection from the late 90s and early 00s and that’s what I put on in these occasions. My favourite rock band is Queen and they are usually the ones on my playlist when I need some comforting music to help me through some menial work that I would be dreading doing.

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One of my favorite podcasts is The Tim Ferriss Show, hosted of course by 4 hour workweek mastermind Tim Ferriss. If you haven’t checked out his latest book, head over to Amazon right now, you need to get a copy of it: Tools of Titans.

One of the guests on Tim’s show was Derek Sivers, and I’m also a big fan of his blog, especially his book summaries.

So in this interview Tim asks Derek what advice he’d give to his thirty year old self.

Derek replies: “Don’t be a donkey”.

I found the reply and it’s explanation very fascinating and it really hit home.

So what does Derek mean by that?

Many 30 year olds are trying to pursue many different directions at once, but not making progress in any.

Or they get frustrated because the world wants them to pick one thing, and they want to do them all. Why do I have to choose?! I cannot choose!

The problem is that they’re acting short term, as if you don’t do them all this week, they won’t ever happen. But the solution is to think long term; to realize that you can do one of the things for a few years, then do another one for a few years, and so on. 

The analogy with the donkey comes from a fable in which a donkey that is equally hungry and thirsty is placed precisely midway between a stack of hay and a pail of water. Since the paradox assumes the ass will always go to whichever is closer, it will die of both hunger and thirst since it cannot make any rational decision to choose one over the other.

A donkey can’t think of the future, if he did clearly he would realize that he could first drink the water and then go eat the hay, or vice versa.

I’m in my early thirties and I can relate to this issue 100%, in fact I’ve already written about the shiny object syndrome in the past. I’m also currently stacking up books about decision making and going through them, precisely in order to help me make sense of the many opportunities that present themselves and avoid that dreaded FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) and decision paralysis.

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