Brady Helps

In 2020 I wrote about sonder and I believe now is the right time to re-think that word. To remember that each person on this planet is living a life that's deeply rich, anxious, beautiful, creative, and complicated as the one you and I live. And that, for however many billion of people there are on this planet, each individual personal story is just as uniquely complex. With billions of layers of complexity, it's hard to distill the simple truths from it. What's true for one may be false for another?

Sonder gives us a framework for seeing through the complexity. Sonder gives us the idea that the complexity is the simple truth. And if you adopt the idea of sonder, then it's helpful to also adopt the tools of curiosity and skepticisms to help you learn the beautiful, anxious, and complex stories we all hold. You might find yourself taking less of a "this is what I believe" position about the world and more of a "here's what I've heard, it's interesting, I'd like to learn more" position.

And, anti-sonderites might think I'm not being much of the realist that I purport to be. I disagree. Sonder is ultra-realist. Sonder invites me to see the world as it is — beautiful, anxious, vivid, and complicated. And sonder requires me to engage in that world with curiosity and skepticism in order to understand it.

Without sonder, you might be gaslighting yourself into a view of the world that's not quite real, but "real enough" to be falsely-believable. And, I fear that doesn't serve you as much as it might serve the system that benefits from its people not seeing.

Conspiracy theorists can spin up blogs to speculate who might want us to be blind and not curious. That's not for me. I claim something more directly — that the cognitive costs of deploying sonder is so great and the returns to developing certainty about the world are so small, that it's more efficient to pick a side and feel more certain.

The tradeoff:

The expected value from spending more time and energy realizing how complex the world and its narratives are and the effect on my uncertainty is so low, that it it's better to allocate my resources behind theories that appear more certain.

For those that prefer that model, that's fine. What those people prefer is perfect, and it's my heartfelt and benevolent hope that it leads to maximum life fulfillment for them.

For me, it's not enough. I derive the greatest fulfillment realizing that nothing is as it seems and that the journey to understanding returns the greatest joy than the certainty that I have it all figured out.

Said another way: $$\text{Human Nature} = \frac{Logic}{\sqrt{-1}}$$

I'm offered a gig with friends. The gig requires me to bring a keyboard, show up and play high energy music for 3 hours, and be a good hang. For all of this, I'll make $75.

Most musicians will look at this and think: good hang with friends, sure, why not!

Most purchasers of music will think: they get to play, it's exposure, why not!

But I am not most musicians or most purchasers.

I cannot make decisions like a normal person. My parents gave me a high quality Jesuit institution, which means discernment is required. I'll do this process now, as I do it for every major life decision, and I'll demonstrate it as I go.

First Principle The purpose of human life is to move towards unconditional love with one's self and the world. Everything we have is to be used to push towards that unconditional love and celebrate it.

The Process

1. Clarify the decision: Should I spend 3 hours of my time playing high energy music in exchange for $75 and some fun with friends?
2. Meditate: The first principle is to move towards unconditional love. Unconditional love would be having the experience of being loved and being able to love wihtout needing anything to change.
3. Gather and weigh data:
   1. Weather: It's -27C out with windchill. There's snow and salt on the ground. My gloves ripped on the middle finger of my left hand — I'm left handed.
   2. Time: It's a 30-minute drive, probably 45-minute with traffic. Times two, that's 60-90 minutes time spent in a car. I'll probably listen to a podcast, maybe that's okay.
   3. Money: Well we have to think of the wear and tear on my vehicle, mileage, and we need to wonder how the effects of the cold on my immune system and potential future costs — I don't apply a discount rate on the future!
   4. Music: It's high energy swing music, that means I'll need to burn calories playing loudly and with gusto. In addition, I'll need to smile and look like I'm having a good time, which I probably will, so let's discount that. I'll be sight reading, so that's cognitive effort, more calories burned by the brain.
   5. The Hang: 90% of the gig is the hang — what it's like to be around and play with the people you're playing with. That's important.
   6. The money: I don't work for free! $75 is... low, but we are helping people have a good time, so maybe that outweighs the dollars? But there's the car and the gas and the wear and tear and the time away from home.
4. Attend to interior movements: as I'm thinking about this decision, I need to consider what's happening to my thoughts and desires and feelings — well... now that I'm thinking about thinking I don't know how I think about it, which means I probably need to think more and discern more...
5. Imaginative testing: I'm going to live the decision as if it's happened. I can already feel myself cussing at how cold it is and wondering why I do this to myself both as I get into the car when it hasn't heated up enough and as I exit the car when I feel again how cold it is and I've just started warming up.

The End After completing such a rigorous process you decide to act. Which option (a) playing or (b) staying at home where it's home brings me closer to the experience of being able to love myself and others without needing anything to change?

Would I happily trade unconditional love of self for a great hang, an amount of money that could get me one avocado toast and a short Starbucks drink, some gas, and play music that was written in the 1920s and hasn't changed since in weather that may or may not be weather god's punishing the Milwaukee metropolitan area?

Yes. Obviously.

Any time someone at work says I'll ping you, I want to respond in a horrible Russian accent that only Sean Connery can do: "one ping, one ping only."

A ping is a sound wave sent from a submarine to its surroundings. The sound wave bounces off things and returns to the submarine. They do this to tell the distance of things. It's like echo-location.

That implies that if a manager pings me, they want their message to hit me and bounce back at them so that they can tell the distance of themselves from me.

I'm told I'm loud all the time. The LAST thing I want to know is how long it takes my voice to hit something and bounce back. I prefer my voice be absorbed and not bounce back! I don't need to hear me back to me to know I exist. And, anyone who hears me definitely should absorb every last meaningful word I say — which is really what a manager wants but doesn't know how to achieve, otherwise they wouldn't be pinging in the first place!

I am, of course, a hypocrite and I use that word at work at minimum 105 times a day, though I average 97 ± 31.

Each of my 97 ± 31 daily pings represents carefully chosen words that I feel disappear into a dark abyss — I need to know if anyone's still there!

I should do better. One ping, one ping only, as most people at work don't react well to more than that.

People say I'm funny. I never say I'm funny.

I always say I've been dropped an appropriate number of times as a baby, had parents as lawyers, and grew up in an Irish Catholic household, and chose the obviously comfortable life path of being a pianist and perhaps am, therefore, appropriately screwed up.

And that's funny to some people.

I call it, any day of my life.

I visited my cousin a few days ago in Santa Clarita. Here are my impressions of the area:

A Pattern

1. I see most people driving in neighborhoods and around local commercial areas; this seems like the kind of place that calls a walking spirit. The roads are twisty, the elevations change often, and they butt up against beautiful mountains and valleys — a walker could stop a hundred times and appreciate nature, a driver drives through.
2. I see Miami in most places — beautiful looking sidewalks, lawns, houses, people, food. Everything looks beautiful, but there's little depth underneath. Restaurants, shopping, homes, cars — all surface.
3. Lots of chain restaurants. A few Mexican-inspired places — places serving margaritas, and basic "Mexican" fare like burritos. Pubs served "cuban sandwiches" on wheat sandwich bread alongside "umami fries" which were french fries with seaweed sprinkles. Faux farm-to-table places served basic wraps with greens and all kinds of teas with soft wood interiors and servers with aprons with leather decorations at higher prices. I enjoy off the beaten path places that look public health questionable that serve a few amazing dishes and at reasonable prices, and Santa Clarita is not the place for that.
4. The architecture reminds me of Miami and Miami Lakes — Spanish villa look. But not as gaudy as Miami. Tamer than Miami. Even the gaudiness is restrained, lacking Miami's full-throated commitment to excess.
5. Temperature swings! Started off nice and warm, pleasant, and nights got a bit chilly. Not chilly enough to put on heat, but chilly enough that a light blanket offers comfort. So not too hot, not too cold... pleasant to be in, lacking intensity to be remarkable.

Three Exceptions

1. Nature offered no shortage of depth and demand for respect. I felt awe hiking in the valleys and up large hills.
2. Faith, a restaurant server, demonstrated refreshing depth on first contact. She immediately wanted to get past small talk and into deep topics with my cousin and me, to the extent a restaurant server could. Our meal ended with laughs and a group hug! Other interactions with non-family were transactional, as expected — which made Faith even more refreshing.
3. Huntington Gardens — an oasis of depth in a desert of shallow. Beautiful art and culture exhibits. I loved the gardens. I could spend all day walking there. We enjoyed Chinese food at a restaurant on the premises. 10/10 recommend.

Two extraneous observations of depth:

1. Flying in to Burbank and out of LAX (assuming a late morning flight) is ideal. Traffic is light, and travel times are not anxiety inducing.
2. The drive to and from Santa Clarita to Burbank or Los Angeles is beautiful. Would repeat.

Would I go back to Santa Clarita again? Yes, to visit my cousin.

Yes, if I was going to hike and understood I was trading away depth of food and other cultural interests.

No, if I was going to spend time in a city where I could enjoy its quirks, experience the richness of its community, and feel transported to somewhere else. Santa Clarita doesn't do that for me. It is a beautiful looking place seated in a deeply beautiful environment.

Most new restaurants open with a vision. A celebrity chef, a concept, an identity. Then the chef leaves, the hype fades, and the food regresses to average. The vision becomes a vague memory of what the place used to be.

Diners don't have this problem.

The diner doesn't regress. The diner might innovate a bit — I see breakfast burritos on menus or "no carb bacon and egg" options. But, on the whole, the food never changes. It's basic and easy.

The greasy spoon diner, not the modern retro takes that pop out, know what they are and live it. They are a no frills "joint" low-cost provider of calories. You don't go there for the fine dining or the "experience". You go there because it's consistent and easy on time and the pocketbook. But that's not enough.

At the diner you might find people holding court and solving the world's problems. Those people tend to be 65+ and tend to have it all figured out. You also see rebels hell bent on solving the worlds problems and they definitely have it all figured out — they are sub 18 years of age. And you see everything in between — families, loners, office worker types, construction worker types, truck driver types, paper readers, regulars, odd people, normal people. What you don't see are people showing up to get noticed. It's a place to notice, but not to be noticed.

There's a beautiful observation — such a simple and functional place attracts such an assorted variety of people for a multitude of reasons. I think it's the simplicity and functionality of the space — you don't go to a simple and functional place to take an Instragram photo of yourself or your $50 avocado toast. You go to a place like that because it's the kind of place where you or others aren't compelled to take an Instagram photo of yourself or your $5000 avocado toast. That person doesn't always show up at a simple neighborhood diner, and perhaps that's attractive to those who love them.

I love a diner. I would happily have my last meal at a diner. And, especially a diner where there's patina on the patina. Where the server, who's worked there their entire life and knows the life stories of all their regulars, is smoking a cigarette (the George Webb's of my childhood, can't smoke indoors anymore) while handing me pancakes. And where food is simple and consistent. A place that knows what it is, while being it, amidst an evolving world.

This, my love letter to Michael's Family Restaurant in West Allis. One such diner.

Yesterday I wrote about the Iliad and how warriors pause fighting when they recognize shared humanity (see post). I claimed that holding space for the enemy makes me feel most alive. Today, I still believe that—and I want to show you what that practice looks like when the gods are screaming at you to pick a side.

I start with a premise: you and I are made of the same things yet experience the world in unique ways. That's the foundation—shared humanity, different lives.

The next level is sympathetic vibrations. When someone feels harmed, the people accused of causing that harm often feel harmed too—by the accusation, by the conflict, by their own perceived injustices. The "right" and "wrong" parties create effects on each other that amplify and reinforce. It's a feedback loop.

The last layer is incentives and tradeoffs. I assume every party acts to maximize their interest. I think about what they're trading to improve their position, what second and third order effects follow, and what brutal compromises they're willing to make. I ask people for their thoughts. I try to hold space for all of it.

You might observe that I don't come to firm conclusions. In a world where gods amplify narratives and every issue becomes a loyalty test, I prefer to stay curious. I'll hypothesize, but I'm willing to change as I learn more. My refusal to give into certainty — that's the practice of living (for me).

Here's an example: trans rights.

First principle:

People for trans rights, against trans rights, and I are made of the same material and live unique lives. We're the same yet totally different.

Vibrational effects:

Pro trans rights people tend to feel their communities are marginalized, unjustly treated, targeted, vilified, unnatural.

Anti trans rights people tend to feel their words, history, traditions, and basic knowledge of existence are threatened. Their children threatened. They're victims of culture wars. This is unnatural.

I see harm on both sides and I see how the harms reinforce each other, like strings on a piano vibrating sympathetically. I cultivate empathy for both positions.

Incentives and tradeoffs:

Here are two quotes from people I love who are willing to make brutal tradeoffs to strengthen their positions—metaphorical amputation and actual physical confrontation:

• "A doctor would amputate what's not serving the system."
• "I'll absolutely get in a fight with someone."

The tradeoffs people are willing to make—cutting out parts of society, physical confrontation—show this isn't about finding an equilibrium of interests. It's about winning. Zero sum. And when both sides operate from that frame, cooperation becomes impossible.

I feel the weight of this issue. I know readers will want to place me in one camp or another. And I feel that pull too — the desire to resolve the anxiety by picking a side and letting the tribe do my thinking. But that resolution would be a kind of paralysis. The aliveness is in the resistance — in refusing to let amplified narratives be my conclusions, in embracing the nuance even when it's uncomfortable.

The very fact that I can doubt, question, and cultivate empathy with both sides of a controversial issue — that I can attempt to understand why people hold positions I might oppose—tells me I'm alive. I'm exercising agency. I'm thinking with my own mind versus letting the gods think for me.

You might say this method doesn't lead to action in the face of injustice. I argue the opposite. Acting from rage produces escalation. Acting from understanding produces resolution. Because if I rage, I see enemies to defeat; while my understanding sees humans in conflict whose interests might, with effort, be reconciled.

The "Iliad" shows us warriors can fight for their positions while still seeing their opponent as worthy of respect, even friendship. I see that as a kind of strategic empathy resulting from how I see the larger system.

I never intend to tell people what to think or believe. My intent is to show another way of thinking: that beneath the surface of every issue are people trying to live with dignity — even when their visions of dignity clash. People wanting to love and be loved in return.

Seeing that simple shared humanity doesn't paralyze me. I believe it equips me to act effectively — to respond to what's actually there: humans in conflict, a system that could move towards cooperation if we stopped treating it as a war for total victory.

This practice — holding space, staying curious, refusing to let the gods do my thinking— costs something. It means living with uncertainty when everyone around me has chosen their camp. It means feeling the anxiety of not knowing what to believe or who to believe or if to believe.

But, I rarely do life the easy way — who chooses a musician life style for the ease. And that discomfort, that lack of ease, is the price of consciousness. It's maintains my humanity. It's what makes me feel most alive.

I bet it's not hard for you to imagine something you're raging over right now. A slight at work, immigration, trans-rights, a boundary crossed, a promise broken, a thing of yours taken that you believe was yours. How much energy does that rage cost you? How long have you been spending that energy?

Homer's "Iliad" opens with two powerful men — Achilles and Agamemnon — who are pissed at each other over honor and a woman taken as a bounty of war. Their fight with each other is about standing, who gets to claim what, and public humiliation. Their nation, Greece, is at war with Troy; and Achilles is so furious by his issue with Agamemnon that he withdraws from the fight all together, willing to let his own people die than fight for a leader who disrespected him.

The Greeks and the Trojans have been at it for nine years. Why? A woman taken, an act that violated hospitality and marriage and conveniently gave both sides an opportunity to war. The gods don't help, they amplify everything, whisper in ears, tilt the scales, and turned an issue that could have been resolved through cooperation into something that must be avenged.

The "Iliad" tells the stories of warriors who die for perceived slights. For loyalty to family lineage. For national honor. For orders given by men who claim divine favor. The text is full of young men killing each other over things that appear ridiculous. And yet, given the amplification by the gods and the moment itself, it all feels righteous.

That kind of thing could never happen now.

Except, the "Iliad" isn't just about war. It's about when warring takes a beat and pauses. When fighting does stop, it's not because a victor emerges, it's because warriors choose to see each other differently.

Homer writes about a fight between Hector (Trojan) and Ajax (Greek). The heralds interrupt the fight. They agree to duke it out the next day. But before they part ways, they exchange gifts — parting as friends who see each other worthy of their respect.

Armies pause for funeral rites. Greeks and Trojans both recognize that mourning the dead are obvious reasons not to fight. It's understood that, universally, that death is pain and deserves its time.

Go to the first question: how much are you spending on your rage? And how long have you been raging?

What would you need to see in a person, or an idea, that would make you choose to pause? What would you need to see in yourself?

Gods, in the Iliad, are like media (social or any kind) — they amplify a narrative. They rouse a will to war, or rage, against a person or an idea. The gods are the voices in your head that tell you that you're right and just and the others are wrong and evil. Why give those voices power?

Your enemy, is a person who also fears humiliation, carries wounds, and believes they're defending something just as important as what you believe yourself to be defending. That doesn't make your enemy right and you wrong, and it doesn't make you right and your enemy wrong. It does mean that you and your enemy have something in common — a shared and fragile humanity.

Your enemy might be an idea. And I argue that an idea is not a person, it's a story we want to tell ourselves and that we want to be alive or dead. And ideas left unattended and unchecked can be intoxicating and dangerous. Ideological humility is a virtue. Hold your story lightly enough to recognize it's a story — one that can inspire you but isn't finished, isn't complete, and doesn't capture all of reality.

The choice to see the shared humanity is not a one-time choice. It's a persistent practice. It requires effort and constant reinforcement. It may not seem worth it because the ideological or physical stakes may look too high. I maintain the practice is worth it and is felt in the long-run.

I am a realist and I advocate for peace. Not because it's easy or because conflicts aren't real, but because the alternative — years of life and energy raging over harms appears absurd from any distance. And because when I choose to hold space for the enemy in my head and my heart, I feel most alive.

Economists like to use the prompt — solve for the equilibrium. Oversimplified, the phrase challenges the responder to find the point where everyone’s interests are met.

A memorial service is a kind of market. Dad had an explicit wish for one thing. Others would like to see something else. No one participant in this market is right, and no one is wrong — there are just different interests to consider. The goal of the market maker, the siblings, is to find a way to meet everyone’s interests with the least amount of waste (hurt feelings, anger, resentment, lifelong grudges, and wrecked families).

I get paid to do that kind of work every day. Sellers have different demands and needs than buyers and I try to find a way for both parties to meet at the equilibrium point. When that happens, business happens. However, a memorial service is not a business transaction, though it feels like one.

When a person wants to buy a thing, they are investing money into a thing they believe will solve a problem they think they have. The classic marketing school example is that of a hammer — a person buys a hammer to make a hole in the wall. I argue a person buys a hammer because they have pride — presumably they want to hang something on the wall they’re proud of. A salesperson isn’t selling a hammer, they’re selling pride. A memorial service is similar.

Some people who want to attend a service have decades of history with my Dad. For them, a 45-minute service represents decades of a life with someone. It’s a chance for that person to get closure on that life. For some people, the 45-minute service represents the almost 79-years of my Dad’s life. A hammer is not just for a hole, and a service is not just for readings and music.

The challenge for the market maker here is that everyone’s perception of what constitutes value from a service is different. For some its readings and music rendered by offspring. For some, it’s immediate family. For some still, it’s a few words. Religious and societal cultural traditions are also production input factors.

Personally, I see playing or reading at my Dad’s funeral as a net negative. I can’t imagine anything more horrifying for me than doing that. A priest can do readings and we can always play recordings, or hire someone. But contrastingly, someone might see my participation as value.

Like every economic decision there are tradeoffs. My siblings and I will make decisions that will appear some aspects of the market, and disappoint others. Equilibrium doesn’t mean that all needs are met, it just means the market has reached a balance between the quantity of a thing supplied at the current price and the quantity of the thing demanded at the current price.

Within 72 hours cousins, aunts, uncles, friends, mothers, fathers, wives, husbands, kids, passerby, and maybe ne'er-do-well pepper me with questions like — when is the funeral? who is invited? when will the burial be? can they attend?

These people all mean well, and I love them. They want and need closure. They want to participate. They want to help. They want to show support. I love it! Truly. I just don’t understand it.

Who has these details figured out immediately? For my siblings, they’re still figuring out their day and what they’ll do next. They’re stressed. The LAST thing they want to think about are these details. Me, meh, I prefer to work on these things on a work day as this feels like work to me.

I realize these are natural questions. And I am sure some families have these things ironed out well in advance. But we did not intentionally. We didn’t know when Dad would pass. And, we didn’t know what we didn’t know — those are terrible conditions for making effective decisions. Instead, we chose to see how things looked post-death and mindfully and methodically work the problem — as a group (my siblings and I).

I laugh as I write this post to you. So many people tell me “everybody grieves in a unique way”, yet, it also appears that everyone expects everyone to have their shit together the same way too.