A Bucket Full of Water
I was listening to the “Knuckleheads” podcast today. They were interviewing JJ Redick and he mentioned a mindset he employed while he was playing. I’d like to share it quickly… it doesn’t have anything to do with basketball. The analogy is very simple and goes essentially like this: “if your life’s goal is to have a bucket full of water, then put as many drops of water in as you possibly can.”
Pretty straightforward approach, sure, but it’s helpful to remember that all the little things that you don’t want to do in the moment are drops of water, helping you fill your bucket. They accumulate over time, so don’t skip steps or cut corners! Every workout, every hour of practice, every rest day, every bit of studying and learning - they’re all drops of water! Do everything you possibly can to fill your bucket.
-J.P.
Find the Fun
When we started getting more active on social media, it felt like a daunting task. The idea of posting every day and putting together a strategy and keeping up with it stressed me out and on top of that I don’t really want to be on social media because I don’t like the way it works and the content the algorithms appear to reward. Honestly, it just bummed me out to even think about it.
We’ve been posting a unique video 32 days in a row now and I gotta say, I’m having a pretty good time. I think it’s mostly because I was able to change my perspective a bit. Once I started thinking about it as just another way to express ourselves, just some more examples of who we are I was able to let go of the feeling that we had to go viral. I’m not counting on any of these videos to be the video that gets us a million followers. Most of the time I’m just trying to make myself and Understanding laugh. Anything more than that is gravy.
In conclusion, I was really dreading doing this thing until I was able to find the fun in the experience and now I’m having a great time, and it’s a lot easier to get it done. Give it a shot next time you have to do something you don’t want to.
-J.P.
It’s Deep
Beautiful Idiots Proverb #4: “It’s deep, but it’s not that deep”
Life is a very serious thing. As far as I know, this is the only one I get. When considering those stakes, it becomes imperative to do absolutely everything I can to achieve the goals I set for myself. There is no room for error. Every decision I make compounds, resulting in the current station of my life. My time on this planet is limited and therefore every moment I’m not optimizing is a moment wasted. Everyone I know is going to die and the oceans are rising and the forests are burning and animals are going extinct and people are starving and nations are at war. Everything sucks and it’s only getting worse and we should just give up. Right?
Maybe. Maybe it’s a lost cause. Maybe the consequence of our humanly greed is the irreparable damage we’ve done to our planet. Maybe we’re cosmically cursed, the price we pay for a bloodthirsty nature. Perhaps we’re doomed to repeat our pasts because we’re too stubborn to learn and perhaps we’ve wasted too much time to ever reach the heights to which we aspire. If that’s the way you want to look at it, then maybe it really is that bad.
Those are all really big problems that are definitely happening, but 99% of the time they exist outside of your personal influence. You shouldn’t let that dissuade you from doing what you feel compelled to - be it charity or activism or whatever - but I don’t think you should let those problems prevent you from seeing the other side of the coin. It’s imperative that we take time amid the struggle of everyday life to appreciate the beauty it has to offer as well.
Sure, you might step in a puddle, but at least you didn’t drown in the ocean. Maybe you broke a nail, but you still have your finger. A world leader has probably farted in the middle of an intense negotiation, and somebody probably laughed. The sun still sets and it rises again, the seasons change and we cry and laugh and think and learn and spend time with people we love. So you might lose a day here or there, but you still have your life, and you might change the world but you don’t have to change the world. When you look at it that way… it’s deep, but it’s not that deep.
-J.P.
A Time of Astounding Change
I have this app on my phone called “The Pattern”. It’s based on my astrology charts and it tells me about cycles I’m going through relative to the universal timing and offers advice about how to move though my days, things I should look out for. Now, I have the free version so I don’t get to “dig deeper” as they say and really read into any of it. I just get quick blurbs, so I take most of it with a grain of salt, but I do find it a useful tool when I want to reflect. I also think it’s interesting to consider my place in the grand scheme of the universe and how forces outside of myself might be affecting me.
Turns out a cycle that I’d been in for the last ten months is ending tomorrow. It’s been a time to “Expect the Unexpected”. Beginning early May 2022 and ending tomorrow (March 9, 2023) I was to be in an “astounding time of change in my life” where I would be driven to act on impulses to realize a version of myself that I might have only imagined. “Motivated by forces of innovation and individual expression” I might be able to “discover entirely new ways of thinking and being”.
Now, my dad has always teased me for being a contrarian and it’s true. I’m generally turned off by things that lots of people like and I often feel a deep responsibility to go against the current in the name of art and expression, if only to prove that there is space for more than what’s easily accepted. So it’s not surprising to read that I’d be compelled to do something different. That’s just one thing, though. When I was reading through this cycle it was hard not to make other connections.
These last ten months have been a time of dramatic change in my life. On the personal side I’ve found myself in a new relationship which has brought a great sense of joy and has also provided opportunity for important growth. In my career, I finished what was essentially four years of learning under RZA and working on the Wu-Tang show, and Understanding and I set out to build our own enterprise.
We officially established Beautiful Idiots LLC on July 11, 2022. Since then I’ve experienced just about every single thing this cycle told me I would. I felt a need to be different, to do my own thing rather than be part of someone else’s system. It’s been an “exhilarating” and “unnerving” foray into “uncharted territory” where I’ve been forced to learn to “let go of needing to decide the outcome and stay open to whatever comes [my] way.” I’m hoping that these beginning months of embracing the Beautiful Idiot that I imagined will be the “important initiation” that this cycle forecasted for me, and that by completing it I will have the capacity to propel us to higher heights.
Whether or not this venture was the unexpected change I was supposed to experience, I’m grateful to have had the chance to realize this dream. At the end of the day, this was all I ever wanted.
-J.P.
Toilet Dialogue Pt.1
“There is no world in which the ground where treachery lays is dry. Be it tears, blood, or both - you’ll find dampened soil.” - L. Understanding Diggs, Toilet Thoughts, 2023
Someone needs to start or end a movie with this cause this is some heat.
-L.U.D.
MARCH 7
I admit, I’m doing this much later than usual, and yes it’s because I forgot, but technically it is still March 7 where I am, so even if this post says “Mar 8” on the date it was actually March 7 and we have not missed a day yet.
Which reminds me, how silly is the calendar. Who’s to say March 8? Who’s to say it’s 2023? Why are we keeping time relative to Jesus’ death? What happened to separation of church and state? Huh? HUH?! This is a pretty great example of me embodying the “Idiot” portion of our name, seeing as I’m making this up, without having done any research into the topic on which I’m speaking, and it’s not really an interesting or coherent argument at all. More like a late night ramble. We’re all human. Except Jesus. I’m just kidding, relax.
Whatever, the point was this was written and published on March 7, 2023. 10:50 PM PST. Suck it squarespace. Goodnight.
-J.P.
Adjustments
I mentioned this a few days ago here, but I’m going to be making some adjustments this week. We’re moving into the third month of the year and we have to start reorganizing our time to get everything done in terms of the music, but we’re also beginning to compile a more informational sample of our social clips. In an attempt to drive more engagement we’re going to work in a couple different kinds of content to develop a more comprehensive understanding (not the person) of what it is to be a Beautiful Idiot. It would be foolish not to use the insight to learn and adapt, right? This is not to say we’re going to stop doing the things we’ve been doing up to this point; we’re just going to add in some new elements in the hope that it will get more people on board.
Unfortunately one of those changes may be posting less links to these thoughts on our socials because the apps seem to suppress content that takes users off their platform. Super lame. Catch me on the right day and I could talk at length about how much I dislike these apps. Or maybe it’d be the wrong day… guess it depends who you are. Anyway, we’ll still post here daily because there’s a bigger goal at play with these thoughts, but I may not always link them on our socials. If that’s where you’ve been finding them, I hope you find yourself here on your own accord so we can keep up.
Let’s see if this works!
-J.P.
Nothing To Say
Sometimes there are days where you find yourself with nothing to say. Nothing important, nothing profound, nothing to complain about, not even a funny joke to share.
That’s totally fine. Just sit there in your silence and reflect. Consider all the things you’ve already said and the impact those things have had, likely without your knowing it. Then think for a second about all the things you’re going to say in the future. All the help and comfort you’ll offer to people you love. All the arguments you’ll have in the moments you feel compelled to stand up for yourselves. All the laughs you’ll share with friends and all the pain you’ll have to open up about. That’s going to be a lot!
So take this moment where you have nothing to say and sit with it. Enjoy that stillness. It’s sacred.
-J.P.
