Category: Philosophy

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A Year Later & My Thoughts on Life’s Progress and Regression

Before I went to the gym, I decided to write for the first time in a long time once I got home. I haven’t written in a really long time, hardly read anything either – if this ends up so dry that it’s easier to eat than read, I hope you came hungry.

I have nothing specific to talk about, but that’s never stopped either of us, so I might as well start with this. I currently am hit with a wave of sadness about just being alive. Using my best analysis, it’s probably because I just got back from the gym – a haven that I’ve come to loathe. Not because of what it is, but what it once was and every rep and workout reminds me that all my friends are not here. There’s a last time for everything and that’s easy to understand but it’s hard feel after realizing the last time (or best times) has come and gone.

With this in mind, I should stop writing immediately to avoid the hazard of making everyone think I’m on the brink. But I’m afraid I won’t ever come back to this draft. Happy thoughts. It’s hard to do. This past year I’ve had to face the music about the stem cell treatment not working. It’s not all too hard when I have a beautiful girlfriend, travel, have my family around, support from friends, a good job that gives me financial freedom and a lot more vacation than most people my age. Well, what I should really say is that it’s not hard to face the music if I have other things – good things – in my life to distract me. But there are those moments, even while traveling, where I zone out and get deeply, momentarily, depressed and I honestly don’t think I’ll make it past 30 – I don’t want to – is this really me now? Then I snap out of it and the thought doesn’t come back for months. The good thing is that I know thyself & this is an emotional reaction, very much in the moment. Almost childish, like how a kid will scream and kick until a few seconds later forget it all and go run around with his friends like nothing happened. For me, this happens when I’m blatantly confronted with a terrible truth about life in a wheelchair. Unfortunately, this happens most when I am outside of the safe zone – i.e. when I’m traveling. There is no solution, maybe just mindfulness and acceptance but I’m no shrink.

So there, we went in a downward spiral. I guess the only place to turn is philosophy since I don’t really have good news to announce except that I’ll be slowly putting more effort into my “brand” WheelchairDNA – YouTube, writing and so on (no AI, pure human words here). I’ve been thinking lately about the regression to the mean. Usually spoken about in the context of the stock market. Essentially, there is no endless growth. (I don’t actually know this, and I won’t fact check myself, but this is how I understand it) You take the % gained / years invested and given a long enough time, the % gain will match the mean (average) of the market. In another way, given a long enough time, anything exceptional will become average. You can be great one year and even grow to be greater, but exponential growth can’t be sustained and over time that greatness just won’t be special.

I think about a time in middle school, I took an aptitude test that, among many things, asked me to memorize a sequence of numbers and repeat them back. I was told that my score was at the 16th grade level. That’s college. I also could be remembering wrong but that’s the difference between a memoir and a biography. After that test, I went back to class and nothing changed. Now I’m beyond university, and might even score worse if I took the same test. I remember when I was about 7 or 8 months after my injury. Working at Kimberly-Clark for my internship. I was in the gym, I had traveled to Europe (1 month after leaving rehab, 2 months after injury), I had a car, and I was way ahead of the game. A guy in a wheelchair asked me “How many years have you been in a wheelchair?” “None”. Only a couple months, and I was proud of that. I had excelled in rehab and went far beyond that. Exponential growth. But there’s a ceiling. For example, I mastered doing a wheelie, going down stairs, how to effectively lift weights, and maneuver international travel. Once I did all that, no matter how impressively early, it eventually becomes normal. I no longer can say I’ve been in a wheelchair for a short time and done so much. I’ve been in a wheelchair for some years now, all those things are nearly expected, kind of normal. Still impressive, but at this point you won’t be shocked. It’s the itch for new that’s been well scratched. Even think about weightlifting, there’s a video online when I was 14 or 15, before my injury of course, deadlifting 4 plates – 405lbs (~180kgs). That’s insane. But, overtime, I regressed to the mean. The interesting, or potentially interesting, thing I thought of is that perhaps the regression to the mean only applies if you continue investing. If you buy a stock and never buy anything else, perhaps it never regresses. If you do something great, then die, no one sees that greatness dissipate. All that’s left is what could have happened. This is why people like JFK, Caesar or Lincoln are so popular. Not that they were so perfect, but we only remember them at their greatest, they never had the time to regress to the mean. History had a chance to see Napoleon rise and fall, maybe it’s just that he overreached, but imagine if he were assassinated at his height of military power and French territorial control. Even if it didn’t last without him, we would all speculate on what more he could’ve done.

One of my favorite speeches I visit often is David Foster Wallace’s commencement speech – This is Water. Like a listening to a sad song when you’re sad, there’s a word yet to exist that describes the comfort in hearing someone else verbalize exactly how you feel – sometimes better than you ever could. I’ll learn German first then get back to you on what to call that feeling. In this speech he talks about how mind melting the day to day “adult trenches” truly are. For most people (this is my USA perspective), life changes frequently and routinely all through childhood. Every few years, we change schools. Preschool, first grade, then middle school (a new building, sometimes a whole new public school with 100% new people), then high school (again could be entirely new), then college (where the most change happens). Throughout all this there can be moving to new cities, states, doing new sports, and in university probably the most change inside and out. Then, all of the sudden, the change stops. Sure there are kids, new jobs, moving to new cities and states. But those changes really slow down and maybe stop completely. It’s possible to have 10 years in the same house, with the same car, going to the same job, shopping at the same stores, sleeping in the same bed. This is where the regression to the mean happens. When there aren’t really any new things happening. The day to day trenches of adulthood become month to month and year to year. I am entering these trenches. I am struggling to cope with the lack of newness.

But alas, not all is lost. For I am a thinking man. Life can be much better, the trenches can be enjoyable or maybe there aren’t any trenches at all. The truth is, I haven’t been very social lately. It was never about being in the university environment. It’s about having friends around, doing fun things, having hobbies. School was actually bad and I’m not a huge fan of the academic bureaucracy in universities – I always felt like I was being taken advantage of. I shouldn’t romanticize it. Adulthood is much better. Maybe I’m just lucky but I get to have a job where I can learn new things, do new things, and meet new people. Going to the office everyday is kind of fun, shopping at the same store is fine. I don’t have homework, so I can truly enjoy my time once I’m home after work – not to mention I get paid enough to go out after with friends after work (I don’t, but I could).

Still, the whole regression to the mean thing seems to be getting to me. I feel pressure to keep doing more and more. Always new, always impressive. I’ve done a lot, all very impressive in context, so can I relax now? Sadly, I don’t think so. It must be the go-go-go American in me. All my hobbies must make money, do drop shipping, be an entrepreneur. Blah blah blah. I’m not ready for a company, I don’t even know what I would do. I guess I have this WheelchairDNA thing. But maybe I’d rather go out with friends and just enjoy life. The real trick is doing something outside with other people, or just anything with friends.

In summary, I’m doing good and going through the same mental turmoil as anyone else who is just like me.

Caio, au revoir

Also, yes, there are some big boy milestones I’ve recently passed. I bought a house, I’m working towards another promotion at work, I got a food processor & made my own almond butter, I’m planning to do a bodybuilding competition, and I expect to leave the US & live in Europe or Asia within the next few years.

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Wish Upon A Better Feeling

It’s not a novel idea, but it’s not at the front of everyone’s mind: our struggles are largely the same. A lot of us will think that our trials and tribulations set us apart, that the way we feel is unique, who we are is unique, and that’s what we all have in common.

Myself, I’m not very bothered by being in a wheelchair. I don’t like it, but I never cried about it. Recently, talking with some friends, they rehashed the moment they were told about my injury. It was actually a bit emotional for me – hearing my friends recall this the same way anyone remembers many details about the moment they heard <insert important event>. I remember the whole thing, but not in that way. I don’t remember the exact moment I realized my legs don’t move or anything like that. Again, I never cried about it, and maybe in this case it’s worse to have someone close have this happen to them rather than be the one it happens to.

I do cry, I do get very sad, and run through the hills of emotion but if I were to write only about those things, you’d never hear about the wheelchair directly.

What inspired me to write this is a comment I saw on my youtube, and there are many of these, where someone just writes about their situation in a negative connotation. I’ve done this before – expressing my discontent with my situation. I really try not to, because it’s worthless. Other than some relief given from complaining, no one wants to hear anyone complain and it’s a very bad habit to get into.

Instead of talking about past days and resenting the present moment, I’d rather talk about my plans to ensure my current situation is temporary all the while being present and accepting the moment. This is the power of now, mindfulness, stoicism, or spiritualism type of stuff.

If you don’t have a plan to change what you don’t like, then please don’t complain. I don’t want to see comments, I don’t want to hear it. Because if it isn’t going to change, then you’ll be making the same complaints on repeat looking for someone to join you in your discontent. Get a therapist to listen to that (they get paid to listen), but even then what (I hope) they’ll tell you is that you need to have a plan to fix this “problem,” otherwise stop seeing it as a problem.

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A Story on Growing Confidence and Pooping With the Door Open

How courage and confidence have become my priority for putting myself first.

The university I attended had a lot of inaccessibility. So much so that there was a group that started just to address it, I’m talking about basic ADA compliance. There’s a bathroom with only a single stall that when I go in, the wheelchair doesn’t even get all the way in and so the stall door won’t shut.

Once I had to go to the bathroom (a different one than mentioned above), and the larger stall was occupied. As an aside, I try not to get upset at people who use these stalls and don’t need to, because honestly, who would want to do business in the small tight stalls? Anyway, I really had to pee and ended up peeing my pants because of the stall being occupied. I even took the elevator to another floor and found the larger stall in use there as well. I took the next week to do my schooling from home to avoid this happening again.

When I came back to the university campus, my friend introduced me to a new way of thinking. It’s called “dude, who cares, do what you need to do.” In action, this translates to: when I have to pee, as long as I’m in the bathroom, I’m going to pee. I don’t need to go into a stall, I can just go next to a urinal, and if not that, then just face a wall or a corner. If I need to poop, I don’t need a big stall, I just need to get close enough to a toilet so I can transfer onto it.

Here’s the story, and not the only instance of this. I was at whole foods eating some food and waiting for a tow truck to pick up my brother’s car and we got hungry. As a human wont, I had to pee. On my way to the bathroom, the very kind security guard came running down the hall after me to give me a lot of help (more than I need, but I truly love people of this kind heart). He held open the door and was seemingly ready to do anything. He actually waited for me to finish so he could open the door for me on my way out and asked many times if I needed help with anything.

Here’s the thing, there were two stalls, one larger and one smaller, both occupied. Without hesitation, I go to the urinals to pee, wash my hands, and go back to finish eating. As soon as I get back to the table, I realize I need to poop. I usually can tell just like anyone else, but it’s hard to predict when I’ll have waited too long, and then I’ve reached the point of no return. This was a moment of no return, I had waited too long. I bolt back to the bathroom, hoping to avoid the security guard’s notice, and knowing that at this point, the best I can do is minimize the trouser attrition.

Naturally, the larger stall is taken, but I entirely do not care. I go into the smaller stall, the door doesn’t shut but I can get in. Facing the toilet, I 180 transferred while taking off my pants and released the Kraken. All the ruckus doubtless grabs the attention of the guy in the larger stall, who certainly feels poorly about himself (and I’m not without a shit tonne of resentment). I’m still on the toilet, (with my pants up at this point) when the guy gets out to wash his hands and I stare deep into his soul when he catches my glance in the mirror.

I finished up, washed my hands, went back to our table, finished my food, the tow truck came, we left to go to the broken down car, and I went home to shower.

The point is, I’m absolutely done letting anything get in my way when I need to do something, especially when the implications are trouser attrition. This requires a lot of confidence and courage, it’s harder to do at work where I’ll see these people day in and day out, but they won’t want to admit it happened any more than I’ll want it to happen. Ultimately, it’s a mindset and value change, it’s not easy to do, but necessary if you respect yourself.

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In What Way to Accept Being Disabled

A fair amount of people struggle to accept being in a wheelchair. It’s possible to not like it yet accept it simultaneously. Naturally, I hate it entirely but that doesn’t keep me from being happy, living a great life and doing what I want. I’m here, now.

I was at the zoo with a some friends, they had a kid that was old enough to walk around but young enough that they brought a stroller for her. She ended up not using the stroller at all. Throughout the time we were at the zoo, and struggling to get the stroller around, the mother was poking some passive aggressive things towards the father about how she knew they didn’t need it and so on. The father argued back a little bit, that they might’ve needed it and so on. A typical argument you may have when the wrong decision was made and one person was right. What I couldn’t understand during all this was that they were both intelligent, well read in philosophy, and a virtuous couple. All the while, the stroller was still there and ultimately no good came from their bickering.

Remember this: the stroller is here, now. You are here, now. That won’t change, now.