Lose or Gain

Transcript

The other day I was taking a journey returning from Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas to Guadalajara, Jalisco.

And I often have this nervous habit especially when I am traveling I wonder “have I remembered everything, do I have all of my possessions?”

And I find myself wanting to check the satchel for my passport even though I know clearly that I have seen it there, that I put it there just 3 minutes before.

I find myself with this anxious habit trying to confirm my object permanence. Trying to believe that things will be where I left them or understanding I had the presence of mind to put my things in the correct place. That I checked the hotel room 2-3 times to confirm all of my things must be with me and still I doubt.

That day as has been my habit more recently, I started praying to myself and the lord “Please let my objects be where I left them. Please let my objects be with me. Please protect my possessions.”

I was talking to my buddy Will Etches about this the other day and I started to wonder, so many things on this earth are impermanent and really we have such little control over whether we maintain something or whether we lose it. There are probably so many factors outside of our control and try as we might to control every factor, sometimes things are going to slip through the cracks and we won’t maintain things the way we hoped.

In fact perhaps sometimes the more we try to maintain things the more it will escape our grasp. It happens to a lot of people.

So I thought “Maybe I shouldn’t be praying for the lord to protect my possessions, to keep them within my possessions. Maybe I should say a different prayer.”

Maybe I should say “Help me lose the things I need to lose, help me maintain things that I need to maintain and gain the things I need to gain because ultimately it will not be up to me if I maintain these things or not. That is out of my control, the best I can hope for is to accept and embrace when I do lose things.

Many people like to practice these stoic techniques, for example, I think I heard this first from the public speaker and author and financial expert Doug Casey. He said that often many times, perhaps every night when he goes to bed he imagines all his possessions gone, he loses everything, he burns everything.

And then if he wakes up still maintaining his possessions that is a blessing. If he still has his wealth, so be it.

I found myself in a similar position when I was locked up in Iztapalapa Mexico City not knowing exactly what would be the state of my bank account or wealth when I left. Maybe my laptop with all my crypto keys in my apartment would no longer be accessible.

Or actually a friend of mine heard a rumor that I was going to be arrested for cyber crime and she went to burn my laptop. Getting a little carried away. Its not true, I am not a cyber criminal.

There was the possibility I could lose my possessions or my wealth and I said to myself “If I do get out of here, at least I will have my freedom and all I have to do is maintain my calm for a few more days. I don’t have to be happy, I just have to be peaceful and not attack guards. And then I will have my freedom.”

I was so delighted that soon I would be able to walk freely on the streets again. Free circulation as they say and I received it. Again we can be grateful for whatever form of freedom that we have. The freedom I had there was to breathe and when I smuggled a pen in, freedom to write. Again sometimes I just look at a pen and marvel at the freedom it allows me.

And then again we have the freedom in our minds not necessarily to imagine, not to walk on the street. Within our own minds we have some freedom, the freedom of space to enjoy that peace that is always within us. That can never be lost.